Basic DMing - The Advice of the Times

[Mark CMG]

Great thread! One might find some useful advice on the old threads linked here -

http://www.enworld.org/forum/showth...Advice-(Links-fixed-July-20-2008!)#post831884

 

[Iosue]

@Iosue, thanks for the very interesting reply.

When I tried to run early D&D I was not very good at it! Whereas I think I'm not too bad at (what I think of as) a more "modern" style.

How have you found running D&D in the old style (which I gather you have been doing)?

I can't really say how good I may or may not be. My players seem to have fun. There is some 4e influence; we use minis, 4e dungeon tiles, and Monster Vault tokens, the majority of my players are regular 4e players, and I myself only felt comfortable running B/X with minis after experience with 4e. Which is not to say we use 4e minis rules. Merely that I don't know if we are approaching the game quite as someone would in the 70s.

Also, earlier I mentioned drift. When I played B/X back in the day, we drifted it to high fantasy heroic adventure. This current group, though, has 4e well-designed to handle that particular area. So I'm trying to keep largely to the "default" experience, focusing on somewhat suspenseful exploration in the dark. Also, I'm rusty as all hell as a DM. To this end, Pulsipher's idea of planning out the whole dungeon has served me well. OTOH, since B/X's method of dungeon stocking relies on random tables, there's this element of surprise, out of my control, as well. OK, now the game tells me there are bandits in this area of the dungeon. Oh, and there are traders over here! Maybe the bandits chased the traders? And how will the PCs interact with either party? I didn't really have to plan ahead there. The bandits were suspicious; the traders were frightened. But otherwise it depended very much on the reaction roll.

I think, as long as a group is interested in exploration, this works very effectively, and DMing feels quite easy. A pre-stocked, non-linear dungeon, random encounters, and random reaction and morale rules. I sit back and let the players play, as it were. The random aspects stimulate my imagination while reducing mental overhead. The randomness also goes a long way to resolving the conflict of interest. In my experience, it creates the independence Pulsipher talks about, while at the same time providing for surprises and new opportunities. I get a 1 on a Wandering Monster check. I roll to see what it is. I roll to check distance and direction. When the party and monster meet, I roll for surprise. If they talk I roll reaction. If they fight, I roll morale. In essence, I strive to treat the monsters/NPCs as Carr recommends for the players: allow them to make the decision. It's just that their decision making is decided by the dice, rather than primarily what I think is the personality of the NPC.

The hardest thing is to sit back and let it all happen, though. You want to make suggestions. You want to fix their map. You want to mitigate the player's mistakes. You want to nudge players towards a particular room you're sure they'll enjoy. I'm still working my way through that. Reading Mike Carr's B1 helps me get into the mindset.

 

[pemerton]

I strive to treat the monsters/NPCs as Carr recommends for the players: allow them to make the decision. It's just that their decision making is decided by the dice, rather than primarily what I think is the personality of the NPC.

This is very interesting. Do you read the reaction dice back into the NPC's personality - ie suppose the dice come up 6+6 = very friendly, do you infer from that something about the personality of the NPC (even if it's, say, an orc or a troll)? If so, that would be an interesting example of fortune in the middle, and quite different from more standard presentations today of free-formed social interaction.

I know [MENTION=386]LostSoul[/MENTION] uses B/X-style reaction dice, so I'm going to see if he'll drop into the thread.

The hardest thing is to sit back and let it all happen, though. You want to make suggestions. You want to fix their map. You want to mitigate the player's mistakes. You want to nudge players towards a particular room you're sure they'll enjoy. I'm still working my way through that.

I would be hopeless at that! I'm always chatting to my players, nudging them one way or another, reminding of what's at stake, sometimes playing one off against the other. It's a long time since I've just sat and watched in a neutral fashion.

 

[LostSoul]

In essence, I strive to treat the monsters/NPCs as Carr recommends for the players: allow them to make the decision. It's just that their decision making is decided by the dice, rather than primarily what I think is the personality of the NPC.

That's pretty much how I play these days.

This is very interesting. Do you read the reaction dice back into the NPC's personality - ie suppose the dice come up 6+6 = very friendly, do you infer from that something about the personality of the NPC (even if it's, say, an orc or a troll)? If so, that would be an interesting example of fortune in the middle, and quite different from more standard presentations today of free-formed social interaction.

I would. It might even be that the troll with a very positive reaction is a polymorphed elf who has been looking for someone to remove the curse. Or anything like that.

On randomness in the game: [sblock]In my last game the PC ranger went hunting. He got a "stunning success". (I have been working on my wilderness/hexploration rules lately so I let the player pick some other kind of foraging result - as if she had taken two actions. She picked the "gemstone" result; I rolled on the treasure parcel table and got something worth 25 GP.)

Anyway, I said that he found a rabbit warren and had time to grab a bunch of rabbits or pick up the gem. Then I realized that was stupid - where's the gem going to go? - so I said that a rabbit was wearing a piece of jewellery. So he could catch that one or a bunch of the other ones.

She (the player) thought there must have been something special about that rabbit, so her PC tried talking to it. I made another random roll and it indicated that yes, he could talk. (Just a d6; I use a 1 is bad and 6 is good ad-hoc system. I rolled a 6.) He turned out to be the prince of rabbits in the area defined by the overland map.

Then I made a reaction roll ("uncertain, cautious and wary" was the result) and we social skill challenged it out; the ranger vowed to become a vegetarian, to be a protector of rabbits, and to drive out the local gnoll presence that was killing their warren. In exchange the ranger would be marked as a friend to all rabbits, and the prince would give him the ability to speak with rabbits. Which he did.[/sblock]

 

[Iosue]

This is very interesting. Do you read the reaction dice back into the NPC's personality - ie suppose the dice come up 6+6 = very friendly, do you infer from that something about the personality of the NPC (even if it's, say, an orc or a troll)? If so, that would be an interesting example of fortune in the middle, and quite different from more standard presentations today of free-formed social interaction.

It's something of an emergent process, not something I have clearly worked out, but yes. To use something of a cliche just as an example, if the PCs took a very aggressive posture, and the reaction roll came up positive, I might have the orc lower his sword, laugh, and say, "You guys got spunk! I like that!" Or alternatively, the positive result might be that the orc says, "Whoa! You guys mean business. I give!" I might have a vague idea what each of the reaction results will be, or I may just go with whatever occurs to me in the moment. The result may indicate merely a localized behavior in context, or it may suggest a fuller personality trait. In a sense, it's not unlike random chargen, where I "meet" the character through ability score rolls. Each reaction roll tells me more about the NPC, and they get more and more fleshed out with each interaction, to lesser and greater degrees.

I know @LostSoul uses B/X-style reaction dice, so I'm going to see if he'll drop into the thread.

Given his contribution, I'd say, "Good call."

I would be hopeless at that! I'm always chatting to my players, nudging them one way or another, reminding of what's at stake, sometimes playing one off against the other. It's a long time since I've just sat and watched in a neutral fashion.

It can certainly be a challenge. Which is why I think Mike Carr's B1 is extremely underrated, and I think it's a shame that it was quickly replaced with B2. B2 is great, and it has some good advice in there, too. But Carr's clear statement, "First, it is crucial to keep in mind that this is a game based on player interaction and player choice" is something that I think should have been in every subsequent book. Because given the metagame powers virtually exclusive to the DM, the temptations to railroad, or to be an antagonistic DM, can be so strong. The DM's advice needed to say, "Look, you're very important to the game, you'll have a lot to do, and the game will be fun. But it's not about you."

On randomness in the game: [sblock]In my last game the PC ranger went hunting. He got a "stunning success". (I have been working on my wilderness/hexploration rules lately so I let the player pick some other kind of foraging result - as if she had taken two actions. She picked the "gemstone" result; I rolled on the treasure parcel table and got something worth 25 GP.)

Anyway, I said that he found a rabbit warren and had time to grab a bunch of rabbits or pick up the gem. Then I realized that was stupid - where's the gem going to go? - so I said that a rabbit was wearing a piece of jewellery. So he could catch that one or a bunch of the other ones.

She (the player) thought there must have been something special about that rabbit, so her PC tried talking to it. I made another random roll and it indicated that yes, he could talk. (Just a d6; I use a 1 is bad and 6 is good ad-hoc system. I rolled a 6.) He turned out to be the prince of rabbits in the area defined by the overland map.

Then I made a reaction roll ("uncertain, cautious and wary" was the result) and we social skill challenged it out; the ranger vowed to become a vegetarian, to be a protector of rabbits, and to drive out the local gnoll presence that was killing their warren. In exchange the ranger would be marked as a friend to all rabbits, and the prince would give him the ability to speak with rabbits. Which he did.[/sblock]

This is very awesome, and is what I'm striving for, but haven't quite reached.

 

[pemerton]

given the metagame powers virtually exclusive to the DM, the temptations to railroad, or to be an antagonistic DM, can be so strong.

This is what I like the metagame action resolution frameworks of "modern" games for. They let me play my antagonists, and kibbitz with the players, without falling into railroading or (unhealthy) antagonism. They provide a brake, if you like, which means I don't have to fight against myself (the conflict-of-interest problem).

Carr's clear statement, "First, it is crucial to keep in mind that this is a game based on player interaction and player choice" is something that I think should have been in every subsequent book.

<snip>

The DM's advice needed to say, "Look, you're very important to the game, you'll have a lot to do, and the game will be fun. But it's not about you."

I think this is good advice not ony for an early-D&D sort of game, but a "modern" game too.

The discussion of randomness is giving me a picture of two (broadly described) "architectures":

• Classic D&D: the GM deals with the conflict of interest via a mixture of pre-prep and randomness for creating story content, thus creating a space in which player decisions and responses matter even though the players don't have much metagame control;
  
  
• "Modern" RPGing: the GM deals with the conflict of interest by pushing hard against the players in creating and adjudicating story content - ie pretty much the opposite of pre-prep and randomness - but finely tuned metagame mechanics ensure that player decisions and responses matter even though the GM is pushing hard against them in introducing the story content.

Does that make any sense? Am I being fair to both approaches? Are there different implications for the importance of fictional positioning in resolution (I think it's generally regarded as a potential casualty of the "modern" approach)?

This is very awesome, and is what I'm striving for, but haven't quite reached.

Agreed. Nice example, [MENTION=386]LostSoul[/MENTION].

 

[LostSoul]

This is very awesome, and is what I'm striving for, but haven't quite reached.

I think what I do is to try to stay aware of my own thoughts while DMing and use specific randomness mechanics when certain thoughts pop up in my head. Usually the trigger is "I have no idea" in response to something the player asks or the PC does.

The rabbit example was one of those "I have no idea" times; can it talk, and more to the point, why is it wearing a piece of jewellery? I didn't know, so I reached for my "game world randomizer" - the d6, with 1 being bad for the PCs and 6 being good. I was thinking the range of possible outcomes were that it was a horrible monster, the pet of someone good or bad, just a strange coincidence, or yeah, it can actually talk.

"Did they remember to bolt the trap door?" "Is there a stone on the ground in reach?" "Is there a hot poker in the fire?" When detailed questions about the game world come up and I think to myself, "I don't know," I reach for the d6. (If I do know, then I don't.)

Reaction rolls and social skill checks trigger off of that "I don't know" a lot. When I roll a wandering monster, I don't know how they are going to react. That's the most obvious example. When the PCs start talking, and they say something, and I don't know how the NPC is going to react to what's just been said, then I call for a social skill check.

I might do the same for physical actions - "I don't know if this will succeed" - but I don't really think about it.

 

[Iosue]

This is what I like the metagame action resolution frameworks of "modern" games for. They let me play my antagonists, and kibbitz with the players, without falling into railroading or (unhealthy) antagonism. They provide a brake, if you like, which means I don't have to fight against myself (the conflict-of-interest problem).

Yup. I think the Classic D&D style* can perhaps put more responsibility on a DM than they are comfortable with, and/or provide less mechanical control than some players would like. Thus, the "modern" system works for them, as the responsibility and the control is evenly spread. OTOH, the Classic D&D style allows players to engage the game less through the mechanics, and more from an "in-character" stance.

I think this is good advice not ony for an early-D&D sort of game, but a "modern" game too.

The discussion of randomness is giving me a picture of two (broadly described) "architectures":

• Classic D&D: the GM deals with the conflict of interest via a mixture of pre-prep and randomness for creating story content, thus creating a space in which player decisions and responses matter even though the players don't have much metagame control;
• "Modern" RPGing: the GM deals with the conflict of interest by pushing hard against the players in creating and adjudicating story content - ie pretty much the opposite of pre-prep and randomness - but finely tuned metagame mechanics ensure that player decisions and responses matter even though the GM is pushing hard against them in introducing the story content.

Does that make any sense? Am I being fair to both approaches? Are there different implications for the importance of fictional positioning in resolution (I think it's generally regarded as a potential casualty of the "modern" approach)?

I think those are eminently fair and sensible takes. As far as fictional positioning, I think it becomes the players' primary entry to resolution in virtually everything in Classic D&D, aside from combat, and even then it can play a major role. One might say that loading most meta-game onto the DM is to allow players smooth access to fictional positioning. I think we can expand on this as we get further in the other materials, but one can see this in frequent admonitions to not get involved in rules discussions; the players are encouraged to engage the game through the fiction, and leave virtually all mechanics to the DM. Even such things as spells, turning undead, and thieves skills, while ostensibly mechanical ins for engaging the game, resolution of such resources are almost entirely DM-side.

*Classic D&D in this case (and pretty much all throughout this thread) refers to the game as described and suggested by the materials we're looking at. It should go without saying that not everyone played this way, even way back in the 70s.