Badwrongfun & unintentional elitism...

[Kid Charlemagne]

As the RPG market has developed up to the present, my experience is that D&D out of all the available RPGs offers the most structured, rules-bound, carefully circumscribed RPG experience currently on the market.

While I think this is true, I think it's also true that 3rd Edition takes such a toolbox approach to design that its is possible to modify that experience significantly with a little bit of work.

 

[Desdichado]

Back when the RPG market was a lot smaller and people had spent a lot less time thinking about and categorizing RPG styles, I think this was probably truer.

Well, that's when I started playing.

I agree that the very structure of 3e+ suggests that that is not the default paradigm anymore, but at least at my table it's still true.

But today if people want to have a more freeform joint creative outlet, they have a lot of systems to choose from that deliver this better than D&D does. As the RPG market has developed up to the present, my experience is that D&D out of all the available RPGs offers the most structured, rules-bound, carefully circumscribed RPG experience currently on the market.

I agree that D&D is not the optimal solution for my preferred playstyle. Despite that, there are a variety of reasons why I play it anyway, most important being that that's what my group prefers to play most of the time. I suspect (and have heard anecdotally) that that is true for a lot of people.

Therefore, attempting to "bend" the system to better work with our paradigm is a desireable outcome. In fact, from a marketing perspective, making D&D (or at least d20) more flexible and useful across a broader continuum of styles is a desireable feature. In fact, back in the early days of d20, such claims were made by the likes of Ryan Dancey and others IIRC. That d20 could be the last system you ever need. However, for that to be true, it can't be too rigid.

The presence of rules doesn't imply that all must be used. Or used exactly as written. The whole premise of rule 0 predisposes this. And on a technicality, the presence of rule 0 means that all these varying interpretations are all equally "correct" and valid.

I currently play in a campaign that has taken this a little too far. It is really nothing more than a negotiation with the GM; no die rolls we make have any meaning because if the GM doesn't want us to succeed, we don't and if he wants us to succeed we do. What we roll on the dice has absolutely no bearing on events that take place.

Well, that's not wrong because it's wrong, it's wrong because you don't like it.

Honestly, I wouldn't either, but I know gamers who wouldn't mind playing that way at all, and would in fact welcome such a loose interpretation of the rules.

I'm getting old here because I know I said something very like this in an ENW post about four years ago but I think everyone can agree that sitting down with a bunch of D&D books, cannisters of nitrous oxide, pinking shears, polyhedral and finger paint, people could have a rollicking good time cutting up the core books and smearing them with finger paint based on ad hoc interpretations of various die rolls while taking copious hits of nitrous. It would be fun but there is no way it could be defined as playing D&D right.

I can't agree, but mostly that's just because it's you.

However, I think pushing examples out to their most absurd extremes to show that the concepts aren't sound doesn't always work. There's a big difference between cutting up your books and taking hits of laughing gas and calling that D&D and using an ad hoc fumble mechanic.

 

[Clavis]

I definitely believe there are better and worse ways to play RPGs.

I define "better" as leading to a game that is more satisfying, on more levels, for a longer period of time. For example: playing PCs with motivations, DMs adjudicating PC actions without favoritism, running campaign worlds that react to the PC's, not railroading PCs, players cooperating with each other, DMs being sensitive to the desires of their group and adjusting their adventures accordingly, etc.

The "worse" way to play might be fun for some people, but will only remain fun for a short period of time. For example: PC on PC combat, powergaming, DMs playing PCs, PCs having more magic items than they have levels, etc.

It's not elitist to believe that there are better and worse ways to play, because anybody is capable of playing better.

New players are almost always going to play worse than more experienced ones. That's OK, because its how players learn to be better. They HAVE to make the same mistakes that every gamer has made. They will almost certainly still have fun playing the game while making the classic mistakes. The most an experienced player or DM can (or should) do is set an example of good play, and thereby demonstrate that there is even more fun to be had in playing better than in playing worse.

 

[Desdichado]

It's not elitist to believe that there are better and worse ways to play, because anybody is capable of playing better.

Ah, but you assume that what you define as better is universal.

That's patently untrue, and the idea itself is elitist.

I agree that there are certain ways of playing the game that please very few, and certain other ways that please most players, but even so those aren't intrinsically good because of that. For groups that fall on the long tails of the distribution and prefer something different, as long as they play the way that they like, that's "better" for them than your one-size fits all solution.

 

[barsoomcore]

Sitting down with a bunch of D&D books, cannisters of nitrous oxide, pinking shears, polyhedral and finger paint, people could have a rollicking good time cutting up the core books and smearing them with finger paint based on ad hoc interpretations of various die rolls while taking copious hits of nitrous.

Okay, now I'm REALLY looking forward to your next game session.

 

[Prince of Happiness]

I'm getting old here because I know I said something very like this in an ENW post about four years ago but I think everyone can agree that sitting down with a bunch of D&D books, cannisters of nitrous oxide, pinking shears, polyhedral and finger paint, people could have a rollicking good time cutting up the core books and smearing them with finger paint based on ad hoc interpretations of various die rolls while taking copious hits of nitrous. It would be fun but there is no way it could be defined as playing D&D right.

Someone say "nitrous?" I mean, D&D?

 

[Desdichado]

I should point out before anyone gets carried away that arguing about pointless things on ENW is a bit of an in-joke between fusangite and I.

We're all good here.

 

[Prince of Happiness]

I should point out before anyone gets carried away that arguing about pointless things on ENW is a bit of an in-joke between fusangite and I.

We're all good here.

Nitrous?

 

[YourSwordIsMine]

It's not just Bad...
It's not just Wrong...

It's Badong!

I vote we call it badongfun for now on.

 

[fusangite]

Therefore, attempting to "bend" the system to better work with our paradigm is a desireable outcome.

As I said, playing the game wrong often is more fun than playing it right. So I have no dispute re: desirable outcomes.

The presence of rules doesn't imply that all must be used. Or used exactly as written. The whole premise of rule 0 predisposes this. And on a technicality, the presence of rule 0 means that all these varying interpretations are all equally "correct" and valid.

I would like to suggest that Rule 0 does not make all human action that is called D&D into D&D.

Rather, I would like to suggest that we should look at the corpus of D&D rules in the same way that we look at other systems that are based on an agreed-upon canon. Religions that have canonical Scriptures, countries that have canonical Constitutions sometimes contain rule zero-like statements. But these statements do not, in effect, nullify the canon itself. Rather, they are evaluated in a matrix of competing claims.

In Mormonism, as you know, pronouncements of the Prophet, Seer and Revelator cannot be viewed as automatically nullifying canon and tradition -- one thinks of Brigham Young's Adam-God statements or John Taylor's statements regarding polygyny. In Canada, our Charter of Rights and Freedoms begins with the "demonstrably justifiable" clause which states that the rights contained therein can be limited by legislation any time such limitation can be seen as "demonstrably justifiable in a free and democratic society." But this declaration does not, in fact, give the Canadian state sweeping powers to run roughshod over codified rights.

Ultimately, as in politics or religion, no single declaration about an individual's or a body's sweeping authority can nullify the rest of the canon, even if (or perhaps precisely because) that statement is embedded in the canon itself.

However, I think pushing examples out to their most absurd extremes to show that the concepts aren't sound doesn't always work. There's a big difference between cutting up your books and taking hits of laughing gas and calling that D&D and using an ad hoc fumble mechanic.

There is a big difference -- a massive one. What I am saying is that these extremes exist within a wide continuum and are not of a fundamentally different type.

I definitely believe there are better and worse ways to play RPGs.

I define "better" as leading to a game that is more satisfying,

To whom? To you or to the players?

on more levels,

What if the players are more satisfied by a game taking place on fewer levels?

for a longer period of time.

What if the players are more satisfied by one-shots than campaigns?

It's not elitist to believe that there are better and worse ways to play,

As long as you define better as "better for me" I have no problem with your definition. But once you define better as some kind of objective standard, then we have a problem.

Note that in my post I was talking about "wrong" not "worse" -- I think that playing a game wrong can be better than playing it right.