D&D General Alternate thought - rule of cool is bad for gaming

[FrogReaver]

But that is all just pointing out that a DM can be bad. A better one would handle it differently. The check against unlimited DM douchebaggery is the players warning them they’re a jerk, and then abandoning the game when they don’t. Or five kids playing in a group and with no option to escape, duh, Keith doesn’t get to dm any more, we’ll figure something else out.

I didn’t read the past 67 pages, but man do I love rules and having certainty about stuff, but come on man, when all the stuff plays out, and there’s one guy in the room with the ability to say, wouldn’t it be cooler if this happened instead, and everyone goes yeah, and he goes then that’s what happened, and everyone’s like yeah, and what’s the point hating on that?

The rule of cool is on the guy with the power being cool, of course. If they’re not cool, game’s gonna be bad for so many other reasons.

For what it's worth I think @pemerton is not saying that. It's more that from his perspective all play he describes as 'GM decides' play is bad for himself (which is a rather broad category that includes far more than jerk DM's as he recently expounded on).

 

[Oofta]

Obviously I cannot speak for @EzekielRaiden. But to me, it seems that once we accept that who has narrative control and how the decisions points are made will change with the system used then the notion that all RPGing is basically the same has been blown out of the water! Given that RPGing really is nothing but the process of making decisions about the content of a shared fiction, if we agree that that process can vary, we are agreeing that RPGing can be very different in how it is done.

Doesn't matter to what? I can tell you that it matters profoundly to me. I have zero interest, as a GM or as a player, in RPGing in which the content of the fiction is all directed by the GM. And there are other RPGers who have zero interest in anything but that!

Given we're talking about a game of making decisions about the content of a shared fiction, how could it not matter what the process is for doing that. I mean, no one thinks that the differences between soccer and AFL football don't matter, even though both a team ball sports that involve kicking a ball through a goal to try and score points.

Did I say all TTRPGs are basically the same? If that was your takeaway then either I'm not being clear or you aren't understanding. All TTRPGs have different approaches, goals, have different aspects of controlling the narrative. Which one works best for any individual is a personal thing and none of them are inherently better or worse. We still make decisions, the main issue between D20 games and PbtA is what scope of change those decisions can affect.

My personal preference is that I only worry about my character, it makes the game more immersive for me. But I'm not going to run around trashing other styles simply because they don't work for me, and the hyperbole with ezekiel is pretty over the top IMO.

 

[FrogReaver]

A) Apparently my attempt at humor fell flat.
B) People have been ignoring the official rules text of D&D and doing their own thing since the inception of the game. It's why we have D&D and not a tactical wargame.
C) I simply disagree that it will make a difference for many people. I'm not even convinced there are that many truly bad DMs. There are inexperienced DMs, DMs with styles I don't care for, DMs who could improve. Actually that last one includes just about everyone, including me. But truly bad DMs usually find that they can't maintain a group so it's a self-correcting problem. Rules and procedures will never improve someone's ability to represent scenarios evocatively, will never alter personality type, will not suddenly make someone better at engaging. People that acknowledge their weaknesses and look to improve already have far more aid at their fingertips than we've ever had before.

Hopefully the 2024 DMG will do a better job of guidance for new DMs (it could hardly do much worse), I just don't think it makes much of a difference. But I don't see a reason to argue about it any more, this is just on spin cycle.

Consider a moment - a horror movie might show all the gory details of some calamity that befalls a person. Or it might simply cut away and leave it up to the imagination. The plot of the movie doesn't change, but the tone and feels of it often do.

Likewise, different game systems can yield the same plots but due to the game itself the tone and feel of the experience can be quite different. *Maybe not to the characters, but to the actual people at the table.

 

[Oofta]

GM's being "bad" is a red herring.

I'm not talking about someone's character or personality; I'm talking about the procedures of play.

The reason I don't like "GM decides" as a resolution method is not because I hate GMs - most of my RPGing involves me being a GM. It's because I want the fiction to be a surprise to me as much as to everyone else.

All I can say is that the fiction takes surprising turns all the time when I DM. Because I don't plan out plots, I plan out actors the PCs will engage with and what those actor's motivations and goals are. There have been plenty of times when the players subvert what I thought might happen and it's awesome.

Why should the ability to suggest that cool things happen be limited to the GM?

Again, why can't players in D&D also suggest cool things? Happens all the time in games I play. Sometimes it doesn't work (just like you can't suddenly invent a jetpack in DW), but players come up with fun ideas all the time.

 

[Oofta]

Consider a moment - a horror movie might show all the gory details of some calamity that befalls a person. Or it might simply cut away and leave it up to the imagination. The plot of the movie doesn't change, but the tone and feels of it often do.

Likewise, different game systems can yield the same plots but due to the game itself the tone and feel of the experience can be quite different. *Maybe not to the characters, but to the actual people at the table.

This whole conversation has meandered ... well a lot. As Obvious man would say, different games will play differently. On the other hand this all started with the assertion that one type of game had a way to resolve everything and that D&D does not. Then we got into the whole back-and-forth of DMs/GMs/narrative control and so on.

I read about how some people played D&D back in the day and it feels like they were playing a different game. Because in many ways they were. People have always made the game their own, different DMs have always had different styles.

So while I agree that the game will feel different if I'm playing CoC instead of D&D, there's not going to be some magical transformation of GMing capabilities because of the rules of the game. Some rule sets may be a better fit for a specific person, but that doesn't say much about overall impact.

 

[FrogReaver]

Huh?

Anyway, I can tell you what I mean by "GM decides" - I mean that the GM decides what happens next in the fiction, with relatively little constraint arising from material and ideas introduced by the players. An example: if the players decide that their PCs try and befriend a NPC, and the GM is at liberty to decide, based on their own private thinking about the fiction, that this NPC can't be befriended.

I need a small clarification - Is 'GM decides' when the GM actually decides or is it just that he has the liberty to decide? While closely related those 2 concepts are quite different in my mind.

Another example: if the players decide that their PCs try and befriend a PC, and succeed on whatever check is set to resolve this, and the GM is at liberty to decide, based on their own private thinking about the fiction, that the NPC will betray the PCs anyway even though the NPC feels friendly towards them.

Right, that's GM decides regardless of any other details, but depending on the other details around it could easily be an example of a railroad or could simply be an example of the DM having already codified in 'secret notes' what the NPC's motivation is for betraying the PC's (maybe the BBEG has his kids and is threatening them if he doesn't betray the PC's). In this situation the PCs could detect that something is 'off' with this guy, possibly gain the info about his kids being kidnapped and rescue them which subverts the betrayal.

Though, you've written that module play isn't GM decides and since secret notes can be viewed as a stand in for module, so maybe the later scenario above wouldn't be an example of 'GM decides' to you.

When the GM makes these sorts of decisions - ie they establish the content of the fiction with relatively little constraint arising from material and ideas introduced by the players - then I describe their vision as that which determines the shared fiction.

Which depending on some of the nuances above, sounds more like a description of a railroad than normal play.

And ultimately there's another piece to this puzzle - what if the GM decides a few things (via some other method than whim) and other times decides dice need to be rolled to decide. Is the game still 'gm decides' if the gm is asking dice to be rolled for most situations?

 

[Remathilis]

I find those essays interesting, and I re-read them from time to time. I started a thread about them around a decade ago now: DMing philosophy, from Lewis Pulsipher

I share Pulsipher's dislike for the "GM novel" approach to D&D, but don't share his preference for "wargame" D&D. As I mentioned upthread here, and also in the decade-old thread, since the late 1970s new methods have been developed which create the possibility of non-GM-driven-yet-story-esque RPGing.

I took a dive into that link (apologies that I didn't read that whole thread) but with the upmost respect to those who like that play style, I would probably quit DMing and the game in general if that was how I had to run things.

I came from video game RPGs to the TT circuit on a very simple promise: I can create my own protagonist, my own world, my own stories. Epic heroic adventures like Final Fantasy and The Elder Scrolls. Great villains, massive stakes, drama and tension, etc. We played kinda traditional "wargame" style Basic D&D at first, but once we moved to 2e, we embraced storyteller style. After all, 2e practically encouraged it in it's modules and metaplots, how could we not?

But the notion of the impartial referee DM just feels off to me. I never met one in real life, the idea was kinda a joke in our circles until the OSR movement began pushing such ideas online back to the forefront. Attempts to try it were met with extreme dislike. I do not assume my experiences to be universal, but I do realize that the style I preferred was picked both by TSR's gentle nudging and my own love of highly narrative play, something that has remained popular as D&D has advanced editions.

 

[O-Castitatis-Lilium]

If you're the DM, why did you allow it to happen? There's really nothing wrong with "Rule of Cool" it's all in how it's applied. If you didn't want the person with the 5 ft. pole to be able to get up the 30 ft. pillar with it, why did you say he could? You could have easily said" No, the pole you have isn't going to get you up the 30 ft., you need to find another way up."

"Rule of Cool" can be an issue if the DM allows it all the time. It can be irritating or aggravating for players if it's allowed all the time, but if the DM never says no, that's not the "rules" fault that's the DM's fault at that point. If you only allow it when it makes sense then it does make some situations memorable and epic for the players and DM alike. Nothing wrong with it, what's wrong is how often the DM doesn't tell the players "no" when it comes to the "Rule of Cool".

 

[Micah Sweet]

I took a dive into that link (apologies that I didn't read that whole thread) but with the upmost respect to those who like that play style, I would probably quit DMing and the game in general if that was how I had to run things.

I came from video game RPGs to the TT circuit on a very simple promise: I can create my own protagonist, my own world, my own stories. Epic heroic adventures like Final Fantasy and The Elder Scrolls. Great villains, massive stakes, drama and tension, etc. We played kinda traditional "wargame" style Basic D&D at first, but once we moved to 2e, we embraced storyteller style. After all, 2e practically encouraged it in it's modules and metaplots, how could we not?

But the notion of the impartial referee DM just feels off to me. I never met one in real life, the idea was kinda a joke in our circles until the OSR movement began pushing such ideas online back to the forefront. Attempts to try it were met with extreme dislike. I do not assume my experiences to be universal, but I do realize that the style I preferred was picked both by TSR's gentle nudging and my own love of highly narrative play, something that has remained popular as D&D has advanced editions.

And there's nothing wrong with either way of playing (nor all the other ways). It does seem, however, that folks who are fans of whatever style is currently most popular tend to think that makes their opinion somehow more valid. I love classic play, but if it were the presiding view in the community I still wouldn't see it as more valid than a more narrative playstyle.

Popularity only matters if you're looking for players or trying to turn a profit. I see no point in even bringing it up unless you are talking about one of those things.

 

[Remathilis]

And there's nothing wrong with either way of playing (nor all the other ways). It does seem, however, that folks who are fans of whatever style is currently most popular tend to think that makes their opinion somehow more valid. I love classic play, but if it were the presiding view in the community I still wouldn't see it as more valid than a more narrative playstyle.

Popularity only matters if you're looking for players or trying to turn a profit. I see no point in even bringing it up unless you are talking about one of those things.

I merely point out that I am happy the rules currently support my play style with minimal changes. I feel bad your given style isn't en vogue, but there are literally dozens of OSR and retro-games that do.