D&D 5E "But Wizards Can Fly, Teleport and Turn People Into Frogs!"

[Ahnehnois]

The argument against that is it doesnt become a narrative until after the fact a bit like history. You can compose a narrative of history once it has occured by taking events and giving them structure,but while it is happening it isnt a narrative (and that isnt the purpose of the events themselves). I think people on both sides make too big an issue out of the word story. If you take it to mean, the stuff that is happening in the game, i have no issue with it and think it can be a useful term. If you take it to mean something more (story structure, themes, thesis, etc) then I would disagree and say that isnt what my games involve.

I don't mean anything more. I have no academic background in literature (well, one class, but I don't know enough to talk about theory). Regardless of whether I'm playing D&D or writing a story by myself, by and large I try to avoid having classical structures and I try to maintain a naturalistic, stream-of-consciousness style.

So yes, all I mean is that stuff is happening; that the people playing the game are creating a meaningful narrative, not that they're necessarily making a conscious effort towards high art.

 

[Libramarian]

I've been thinking about the dissociated mechanics issue today, as well as the comments by some 4e fans that they find 4e combat more immersive, and now I'm thinking of it like this:

There's a third piece to the player thinking/character reality relationship -- story image. Story image is the idealized theme/genre resonant image of their character the player has in their head while playing. Different players play with a stronger or weaker story image.

Character reality can feel dissociated or not (varies by degree, not an either/or thing) with the player's thinking OR with the player's story image.

Old school "Fantasy F----- Vietnam" and 3e "Fighter as wizard lackey" are more associated in terms of character reality-player thinking, but more dissociated in terms of character reality-story image.

4e play is more associated in terms of character reality-story image (and moreso if the DM is good at scene-framing) but more dissociated in terms of character reality-player thinking.

Does that make sense?

I'm realizing now that this is very similar to saying some games are gritty-immersive and some games are cinematic-immersive, but hopefully more clear.

 

[FireLance]

In a way, we've come back to the original premise of the thread. Magic is not disassociative because it can do anything. The player's decision to have his spellcasting character cast a spell can closely mirror the character's decision to cast a spell, and the spell can have whatever (reasonably balanced) effect on the game world because "it's magic".

It only really becomes an issue when it's a martial character instead of a spellcasting character because there is a disconnect between what a martial character can regularly accomplish in reality, and what some players would like a martial character to be able to regularly and reliably accomplish in a fantasy world. In particular, some players want martial characters in a fantasy world to be able to regularly and reliably accomplish tasks and create effects on par with (although not necessarily identical to) that of a spellcaster.

 

[timASW]

I have a similar perspective in that I used to be much stricter about taking dice as rolled and 'living with the consequences' as it were. I too have found that I enjoy the game more if I force certain outcomes to be what I want them to be and skip through things that don't matter.

That being said, there's also a certain thrill that comes with unpredictability. I'll fudge, reroll, and ignore rules to varying degrees based on the style of game I'm running. To me, it's sort of like the rolled stats vs point buy debate; they're different and both valid for different reasons.

Oh its definately about styles. If I'm running a horror theme or something thats supposed to be really gritty then you take the dice as they fall. But in that type of game part of the story IS the unpredictability of death and the sense that at some points failure is more likely then success (even if its not true they should feel that way at points).

 

[Hussar]

But other editions of D&D work that way too. If the opponent has a charm power, how many editions impose that effect on PCs without a save or (in 4e) successful attack? The availability of the power or building of the creature with it doesn't have to be the same at all, but the assumption that the power isn't an auto-success generally is the same.

So you allow 3e diplomacy to work on PC's?

 

[Bluenose]

But other editions of D&D work that way too. If the opponent has a charm power, how many editions impose that effect on PCs without a save or (in 4e) successful attack? The availability of the power or building of the creature with it doesn't have to be the same at all, but the assumption that the power isn't an auto-success generally is the same.

Just about all of them impose some things on PCs, though not necessarily 'Charm'. Spells with no saves, spells with an effect even if you save, aura and area effects that you can either be outside or affected by - it's not a small list. It certainly doesn't consist of Come and Get It alone.

If you're not "telling a story" what are you doing when you're playing D&D? AFAIK D&D is a form of cooperative improvisational storytelling (among other things).

I'm playing a game. There's no story until afterwards, when you know what happens. The difference between story creation and story telling is significant.

So you allow 3e diplomacy to work on PC's?

If dissociated mechanics are ones where the player is making a decision the character can't, then I assume a player deciding not to be influenced by an effect that would affect the character is dissociated. There are some games where that carries a penalty to your actions when you do that, and I like that as a mechanic.

 

[Hussar]

Yeah. I was thinking that there have always been elements like this in dnd. After all, pc's don't make morale checks either.

In what version of DnD has a PC and an NPC ever used all the same rules?

 

[Neonchameleon]

I think it's more fair to say, Neonchamelon, that 1e / OSRIC was un-fun, and un-immersive for other reasons (realism, abstraction).

I do have to disagree that dissociation is mapping between player and designer. I can have a completely clear, coherent idea of how a game is designed, and its mechanical effects. And simply not like them for reasons that have nothing to do with association (realism, abstraction, unnecessary time for bookkeeping, lack of elegance).

The Alexandrian's definition is actually fairly narrow--association / dissociation relates to decision mapping between player and character, and nothing else. He's also quick to point out that there dissociated mechanics in every RPG.

And the reason that I found OSRIC to be disassociated was precisely that. There was a great yawning chasm where the decision mapping should have been. For literally 55 seconds out of every minute my character was running on autopilot in a high tension high stakes situation where decision making should be critical. I found the decision making process to be utterly FUBAR because of this - hence disassociation.

3.X (ignoring the Bo9S) has a decision mapping process that's far better than that. In fact it has a decision making process that is common to most process sim/toolbox RPGs. In it the decision mapping is weak - but I'm no longer running on autopilot 90% of the time. On the downside I never have low level unusual opportunities thrown at me by the situation - I get the opportunity to do every trick I own all the time. A critical element of combat is entirely missing (which beats being on autopilot 90% of the time). Is AEDU perfect for handling this? No. But it at least gives me an unfolding situation in which the opportunities I have that don't involve people being out of position by 5ft or more are different round to round. It's a slightly rickety bridge over what was a small chasm.

Anyway..... thanks for the considered response.

And thank you

I've been thinking about the dissociated mechanics issue today, as well as the comments by some 4e fans that they find 4e combat more immersive, and now I'm thinking of it like this:

There's a third piece to the player thinking/character reality relationship -- story image. Story image is the idealized theme/genre resonant image of their character the player has in their head while playing. Different players play with a stronger or weaker story image.

Character reality can feel dissociated or not (varies by degree, not an either/or thing) with the player's thinking OR with the player's story image.

Old school "Fantasy F----- Vietnam" and 3e "Fighter as wizard lackey" are more associated in terms of character reality-player thinking, but more dissociated in terms of character reality-story image.

4e play is more associated in terms of character reality-story image (and moreso if the DM is good at scene-framing) but more dissociated in terms of character reality-player thinking.

Does that make sense?

I'm realizing now that this is very similar to saying some games are gritty-immersive and some games are cinematic-immersive, but hopefully more clear.

It makes some sense. But no edition of D&D ever has given me a Fantasy F----- Vietnam vibe from the rules. To get a fantasy F---- Vietnam vibe your big powers (magic) should be risky and have blow back - even if you're bringing along much larger than life guns you shouldn't want to fire them. You can drop a high level fighter from orbit and he's not just going to survive, he's going to stand up and walk away. If I do that to a GURPS or Rolemaster character they'll be lucky to not end up as strawberry jam - and certainly won't be walking away. Which is another point - if I've taken 90% of a fighter's hit points away by riddling him with two crossbow bolts and a critical hit from an orc with an axe (something that would be an insta-kill in Vietnam and so should be if the game was genuinely about Fantasy F----- Vietnam) he's fighting every bit as strongly as he was when on full hit points. If I do that in GURPS or even in the World of Darkness (or, for that matter even in FATE) our badly beaten fighter is struggling to hold in his guts and is taking massive penalties to do anything.

And that is the problem here. The hit point mechanics in D&D tell me I've a larger than life action hero (as they were intended to do). The magic system in D&D tells me I've a larger than life action hero. And D&D level 4 heroes were called Heroes and level 8 were called Superheroes in the earliest editions. I therefore find the notion that D&D should be gritty-immersive in any edition to be counter-intuitive.

When literally all the rules I can think of to D&D and every single book I have read from Appendix N point to a cinematic story-image game I find the notion that my character image should be Fantasy F---- Vietnam (rather than that of Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser as I expect my martial characters to default to) to be a massive break from my expectations. This doesn't mean that there aren't gritty-immersive games out there (GURPS, Rolemaster, WFRP 1/2e). Simply that on almost all counts I don't find D&D to be one of them.

This might be where the disconnect comes in. I played GURPS, WFRP 1e, and MERP before I played D&D. So the notion that we were meant to take D&D as gritty never crossed my mind. In fact of the systems I played in the 90s with the exceptions of RIFTS and possibly Cyberpunk 2020, I think it was the least gritty and most obviously set up for heroic play. Which is pretty much what 2e tells you to do.

 

[pemerton]

I prefer to be more of a narrator, sometimes as simply the "voice of god" putting ideas into their head

<snip>

I really feel like 4e gives that to me more than any other edition. Very little GM force is needed to turn it's wheels.

Yes, I can relate to this.

I suppose I fight so hard in favor of the concept because it represents a very real thing that I have experienced, and being told, "No, it isn't" just kind of gets under my skin.

<snip>

I guess I'm just asking for at least a little recognition that experiencing "dissociation" happens to many players

At least for my part, there is no doubt that some players experience "dissociation". My concern, though, is whether this is a mechanical phenomenon or a psychological/experiential phenomenon. And it seems to me that it is the latter - ie a certain sort of experience that some players have when using martial metagame mechanics with karmic rather than fortune resolution.

But exactly the same mechanics don't cause "dissociation" in other players - ie don't stop them inhabiting their PC and playing the game from their PC's perspective.

For instance, on the idea of CaGI (or some other martial power) signalling an opening that the PC exploits - when the power is used, the player need not be thinking of the situation in a god's-eye, narrative fashion ("I hereby declare that an opening is available for my PC to exploit"). It can be thought of purely in an in-character first-person fashion ("Now I do my clever move that beats my opponent") - in other words it's not just about exploiting openings but about creating them - making your own luck through your ability to project your will (via skill, bravado, etc - all the typical elements of a high fantasy warrior) onto the situation.

I agree the player will be thinking things the PC isn't - like "Should I use my encounter power now?" But the player is always thinking things the PC isn't, and having regard to them in making decisions.

The auto-success of CaGI doesn't give the target an even break.

<snip>

Try using it much on your players and see how well they enjoy being sucked into close contact automatically. I suspect you'll get complaints.

that, not anything to do with the supposed disassociation on behalf of the PC is why they erratad it.

I'm with Neonchameleon here. Whether or not one approves of karmic resolution for CaGI - and pesonally I do, and at my table we use the pre-errata version - it has nothing to do with "dissociation".

As for whether the players would like it - of course there are interesting sensitivities there! But I'm sure the players generally wouldn't like it if you did your quickie-estimate resolution in lieu of mechanical resolution against them either, even if the numbers stacked up in much the same way as they do when you narrate rather than resolve PC victory against NPCs. But CaGI typically isn't used against PCs. And at least to me, there's no parity between player agency - which is exercised primarily via the PC in an advocacy role - and GM force, which is exercised primarily via framing and adjudication, not via adopting the advocacy role in respect of any particular NPC. (In fact, it is fairly common for advice for new GMs to advise against confusing the GM's role in respect of NPCs with the players' relationships with their PCs.)
[MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION]'s interesting comparison to the NPC-only status, in many RPGs, of certain forms of social action resolution is also interesting here. I think a comparison of CaGI to classic D&D's morale rules, which apply to NPCs/monsters but not PCs, is quite an illuminating one.

If you're not "telling a story" what are you doing when you're playing D&D? AFAIK D&D is a form of cooperative improvisational storytelling (among other things).

As [MENTION=49017]Bluenose[/MENTION] said, I'm playing a game, the result of which is a story. And part of the point of which is to generate a story. But not by cooperatively telling a story. (Indeed, as I understand it, the whole point of indie-style narrativist mechanics is to yield an engaging fiction without anyone have the job of telling an engaging story.)

An additional complexity here is the move from "the DM's story" - which is the phrase you used that [MENTION=27160]Balesir[/MENTION] and I picked up on - to "cooperative improvisational storytelling". If the GM is allowed to suspend the action resolution mechanics to narrate something that suits the story, do the players enjoy the same privilege? One feature of what one might genuinely call "story games" is that they do allocate this power among the participants, rather than confine it just to one participant. Conversely, a game like Call of Cthulhu in which one participant enjoys a type of narrative power that others lack (eg the GM can set the terms of the sanity that PCs suffer, and hence exercise a high degree of control over what the PCs do - there is only limited player agency in CoC) is in my view properly characterised not as cooperative storytelling, but rather as an RPG with a high degree of GM force.

 

[Ahnehnois]

I'm playing a game. There's no story until afterwards, when you know what happens. The difference between story creation and story telling is significant.

I actually don't think it's all that significant. Telling a story means you've created it and communicated it (and D&D is a creative medium that inherently involves both aspects).

Again, I'm not necessarily suggesting a great deal of intentionality or purposefulness; D&D is storytelling in the same sense that humming to yourself is singing or running to catch a bus is exercise; you're doing it whether you want to or not.