Character ability v. player volition: INT, WIS, CHA

[Celebrim]

I'm huge in favor of combat balance between PCs.

Not for balancing out of combat against combat power though.

That's almost an entirely different topic. Suffice to say that no game system, however it tries to achieve balance (point buy, skills, classes), allows a character to be maximally good in all aspects of the game. There are always tradeoffs. We can argue over whether for a given system the available tradeoffs are good ones, but that would do nothing to prove that RPG's rules design isn't motivated by resolving the central conflict of role-playing.

No game system ignores balance completely. You don't start GURPS with infinite points to spend. You can't start d20 with a character with the best progression in BAB, all three good saves, the best spell progress, the most and best skill selection, 20's in all attributes, and so forth. In 4e, if you are striker, you can't tread too far into a controller or leaders sphere and do what they do better than they can. And if you can do these things, generally we don't like it, because at some level we recognize that the conflict we were turning to the rules to resolve has now no longer been resolved.

 

[Ariosto]

Except it wasn't 'solved' in game.

Perhaps what you mean is that it wasn't 'solved' in your story? Or have you really dissociated the game from player input?

All I'm advocating is that the player do the sort of things to bring his PC to life in interesting and entertaining ways, that the players expect the DM to do to bring to life interesting and entertaining NPC's. I see no reason why this should make people squirm the way they have. What is hard to understand about, "Roleplay your character."?

Then why are you getting so steamed and rules-lawyered-up about it? What's not hard to understand doesn't take hard-ass bullying to enforce. You seem to have a much pushier agenda than just encouraging a bit of the amateur thespian now and then.

I see why 3e made "skills system" a dirty word in some quarters. People are losing sight of the actual game.

 

[Celebrim]

Perhaps what you mean is that it wasn't 'solved' in your story? Or have you really dissociated the game from player input?

???

Let's break down what was said:

1) There exists a puzzle in the game.
2) The player knows the answer to the puzzle.
3) The character isn't supposed to be smart, so the player proposes to solve the puzzle by smashing it.
4) Instead of resulting in a smashed puzzle and the consequences of that, this is supposed to result in a solved puzzle.

I disagreed with #4, noting that because of the player input, the game state of the puzzle wasn't 'solved' but smashed. How is that dissociating the game from player input?

I am perfectly happy that sometimes a locked door is solved with the simple expedient of knocking it down. I'm simply suggesting that 'smash' is not a universally applicable player proposition if the goal is 'solve puzzle'.

Then why are you getting so steamed and rules-lawyered-up about it?

Rules-lawyered? When have I been quoting rules? I'm discussing things at way above the level of 'rules' here. I'm talking about basic expectations of play in a RPG. I've been trying to show that how the player can reasonably expect the game referee to behave can be turned around as a reasonable expectation of player behavior on the part of the referee and other players. Call it 'social contract', call it whatever, but it is certainly not 'rules lawyering'.

And as for 'steamed up', I've got a record here I can stand on. The moderators know that this isn't me 'steamed up', because they've seen me steamed up.

What's not hard to understand doesn't take hard-ass bullying to enforce. You seem to have a much pushier agenda than just encouraging a bit of the amateur thespian now and then.

I reject your characterization. And I couldn't equally make insinuations about your agenda for all the good that would do. Why do you find it so hard to accept that a player is expected to role play the flaws he's taken during character creation? What is exactly is your goal in rejecting that? What do you think that the actual game is, if you think I've 'lost sight of it'?

 

[billd91]

To a player, that's more or less the exact same action. You have stupid person A run into a puzzle, you figure it out ooc , then your character does IC.

Heck, if you really want puzzles, make a puzzle, if the player figures it out, have Krunk the barbarian smash the puzzle with his axe to solve it. The puzzle was SOLVED ooc, just resolve it IC and call it good.

Ugh. No. Smashing the puzzle isn't solving it. Resorting to that kind of role play once the player has done something else smacks me as dissociative gaming.
I'd much rather have the player figure it out and then come up with a way for Krunk to figure it out in Krunk's simpleton ways.

Now, if you're untangling the Gordian knot and cleverly figure out (like Alexander) that the real secret is to cut it, have Krunk do it in frustration. *chop* "THERE!! There's what I think of your knot! Not as strong as my axe, is it!"

 

[pawsplay]

In my games, wit and cunning are not represented by any trait on the character sheet, with the exception of certain meta-traits. For instance, a "GM gives the player a hint" trait would be an obvious exception, but even then it still hinges on the player to figure things out eventually. In my D&D games, Int is book-learning and the ability to thwart confusion and the like, Wis is saving throws and various checks, and Cha is social skills, leadership, and so forth. None of them are "smartness" because smartness cannot be captured by any trait, or any three of them, is subjective in many dimensions, and for reasons detailed above, creates metagaming problems. "Smartness" as a trait isn't needed and is rarely wanted.

If the player of the Int 5 characters comes up with some strategy that is absolutely brilliant, the elegant thing to do is for the player to give the strategy to the player of the high Int character. But there is no problem in game in letting the Int 5 have the strategy.

- It's not a balance problem, because the stats do not provide ideas, the player does. Int 18 does not entitle a player to be smarter, so Int 3 does not obligate them to be dumber.
- It's not a game reality problem, because if the character provides the strategy, that's how smart they are.

While the Int 5 is a nice guide, the actual intelligence the character displays depends on player decisions as well as the outcomes of various checks.

 

[Ariosto]

3) The character isn't supposed to be smart, so the player proposes to solve the puzzle by smashing it.

That's not what I recall (not finding the post just now). The player proposes to do your "story" thing by saying the character smashes it. The player in fact solves the puzzle.

I think it unnecessarily uncharitable to assume that the poster knew that his conception of the situation was so radically different from yours that "smashing" could not be an implementation of the solution's logic. It would not have leapt to my mind, but a lot of stuff people think obviously "cool" in D&D today baffles me.

I don't like it, but I dislike it less than the 4e approach in which the dice decide all and players are just commentators -- or, in practice, often just an audience to the DM's narrative.

 

[Ariosto]

Why do you find it so hard to accept that a player is expected to role play the flaws he's taken during character creation?

I don't! For a start, the whole fundamental premise is nonsense in my OD&D game. When the scores are randomly generated, there is no abstract-game business of "dump stats". So that pure-game element (magnified by the addition of the 3e/4e skills systems, etc.) is not a factor.

The pure-game element that is a factor is that Conan the Librarian does not bring chips and dip or tell funny stories. He is incapable of playing D&D because he does not exist. The game is not for his sake, or for the sake of academic study of algorithms; it is for the sake of the players. These are game players and my friends, not actors getting paid to perform.

 

[Ariosto]

- It's not a balance problem, because the stats do not provide ideas, the player does. Int 18 does not entitle a player to be smarter, so Int 3 does not obligate them to be dumber.
- It's not a game reality problem, because if the character provides the strategy, that's how smart they are.

Exactly.

It's a problem if you arbitrarily choose to make it a problem. Maybe the designers have done so in 4e (I don't know), but even in 3e I don't think that's the case. If there's a rule somewhere that messes with this, then maybe it's not such a good rule.

With old D&D, it's definitely just a matter of conservatism; take the rules for what they are, rather than make them what they're not.

 

[bert1000]

I think the tension here is the desire to both reward player skill and character skill in most significant encounters, whether combat or non-combat.

In combat situations, the dividing line seems to be less contentious. Players are allowed to use their full skill in the form of "tactics" -- when and how to move, which power to use, who to attack, etc. Character skill comes into play through to-hit #s, AC, etc.

"Tactics" are often considered to be unrelated to mental stats and other character ability, and most people are ok with this since they want some kind of player decisions/skill to matter in the combat portion of their rpg game. Since every character is an adventurer (or hero, whatever) it is assumed that every character can be really good at combat tactics. Players can get some satisfaction from becoming better at this player controlled part of the game.

Now the tough part is how do you recreate these meaningful player and character roles for non-combat situations? What is the equivalent of "Tactics" for the player to feel like she can play up to her ability and make a meaningful difference in the non-combat encounter while at the same time incorporating character ability to resolve most of the action.

 

[The Ghost]

Telling Bob he can't solve a puzzle because his PC is too dumb to figure it out doesn't neccessarily help Tom to solve it, if Tom can't figure it out. I'm not a fan of Harrison Bergeron d20...

To prevent us from talking past each other allow me to say that in general I give my players a lot of latitude in how they develop their character. All I ask is that they respect each other. That, unfortunately, is not always the case. In my experience, players often turn to the DM to sort out or solve player versus player problems. That is all I was saying (or trying to say) in my response to your question.