D&D 5E D&D compared to Bespoke Genre TTRPGs

[Hussar]

You don't even need fail forward principles to avoid the problem of the jig being up with one failure. I think it's more of an example of clashing expectations and styles - the DM's being way to focused on the consequences of one failure or adversarial DMing rather than sticking to good storytelling or genre conventions. I won't deny that BitD has much better and more explicit guidance for GMs playing along with the players toward their goals - but the whole idea that you can't do that with D&D (or shouldn't try or whatever unhelpful advice comes along) is ridiculous.

And, again, we're back to I'm just a bad DM and I play with bad DM 's. If we were just better DM's, then everything would be fine.

Show me in the rules where it says that a failed stealth check should result in the players being able to leverage player side mechanics to stop the guard from raising the alarm. There isn't. Instead, it's 100% DM fiat. Raising the alarm is no different than the DM deciding not to raise the alarm - it's 100% in the DM's lap to decide.

And that's apparently great rules support.

 

[tetrasodium]

@hawkeyefan Im sorry. I have also had a terrible day, spending most of it in significant pain and unable to not work because 3 people are out on COVID leave.

That doesn’t excuse being rude, however.

I value your input, here and in other threads. I hope the rest of your day is relaxing and satisfying.

@Hussar I am very frustrated about our interaction in this thread, and because of that I have been completely unsympathetic to your response to my arguments here. Disagreeing with you about the nature of an argument isn’t an excuse to mock your response to it or to dismiss you as a result. Intentional or not, I caused you to feel belittled. I’m sorry for that.

I have never sought to imply that you or anyone else here is a bad DM. My argument has been and is that;

• The claim that heists cannot be done well in D&D 5e is false, and probably so. The proof is simply that not everyone has a hard time running them.
• My theory as to why the difference is that you and I (insofar as we represent to two sides of the debate) have such differing priorities and expectations of both the game in general and of heists (or horror, or naval combat, etc) specifically, that what works for one of us won’t work for the other.
• Following from that, I suggest that it is bad form to tell someone that they cannot do The Thing in D&D, without any reasoning or explanation. Not “justification of your experience”, but reasoning.
• I will note that most people are more likely to take advice seriously if it comes with some idea of the givers experience with what they’re giving advice on.
  
  

I've done them successfully, explained it& the conditions responsible for those successes in fairly good detail earlier while making it clear that the success was in spite of d&d not thanks to it.

 

[Hussar]

D&D can do anything so long as that anything is done in a D&D way.

As glib as this is, I think it's 100% true. D&D is FANTASTIC for doing D&D. It's not so great as soon as you start futzing about with basic assumptions.

 

[Hussar]

Some people do... others don't. The same way you have issues hacking D&D (and assume it must be universal) but others have done it (and so it must be possible)...

And... again, I'm told I'm just not a good enough DM. And, now apparently, anyone who questions the 5e stealth rules (which have been resoundly criticised since day 1) are also inferior DM's.

 

[jayoungr]

Thing is, no one here is saying that.

What IS being said, is sometimes D&D doesn't do something very well.

Doesn't do it, doesn't do it well--my answer is the same. As long as my group has fun, then D&D does it well enough.

 

[pemerton]

The fact the DM can choose from several options how to adjudicate a thing, does not mean the game has no rules for the thing. It pretty much means the opposite of that.

It is perfectly valid to have consequences and “teeth” be decided outside the game’s mechanical structure.

I don't really know what valid means here. I also don't know how you see rules being related to mechanical structure, nor how you see either/both of these being related to teeth.

My view is that if the GM is free from moment to moment of adjudication to decide what happens in the fiction, and if the rules of the game place no significant constraint on that, then there are no teeth. Declaring an action may prompt a check, or may not. Failing at any such check may bring down disaster, or may not. Succeeding at it may avert disaster, or may not.

I'm not really seeing much in the way of rules either. Being trained in a skill, or with a tool, puts a "tag" on my PC sheet which says I'm a bit better at this than I otherwise would be. But there is no rule that states when that tag actually matters to resolution. The GM is welcome to have regard to it, or not.

This is a wildly different way to approach RPGing from BitD. And (to restate what I think is @Ovinomancer's point) it provides support only in the sense that it establishes those tags on PC sheets and gives the GM the permissions I've described above.

I think the contrast with how D&D approaches combat - where there are teeth, and there is much more to resolution than just a few tags and some GM permissions - is pretty striking. Likewise the contrast with how classic D&D (AD&D, B/X) approaches dungeon exploration - where again there are teeth, in the form of concrete rules about how much time passes while doing various things that in turn interface with spell durations, wandering monsters tables (that interact with dungeon level, which in turn interacts with treasure available) and the like.

If someone said that Prince Valiant provides support for D&D-esque dungeoneering because it has machinery for framing and resolving perception checks and dodging scything blades, I think the reply would be pretty obvious: while those things are true, it has no machinery for giving the whole process of exploration teeth. The GM can dial up or dial down the pressure at will, and the passage of time means nothing besides colour.

Somewhat the same thing is true of the "heist" I described upthread from my Traveller game. My narration of an approaching Imperial Navy cutter was a "soft move" (in PbtA) terms, in that it introduced an approaching threat/problem; and it allowed me to colour some subsequent narration of the passage of time and the resolution of actions on board the alien vessel, much as a PbtA GM might. But it had no teeth in that, until I narrated its arrival, it was just a source of narrative colour. I think a system that has a way to make that sort of thing more than just colour - like a clock framework - is clearly providing more support for heist/caper RPGing.

 

[Hussar]

@hawkeyefan Im sorry. I have also had a terrible day, spending most of it in significant pain and unable to not work because 3 people are out on COVID leave.

That doesn’t excuse being rude, however.

I value your input, here and in other threads. I hope the rest of your day is relaxing and satisfying.

@Hussar I am very frustrated about our interaction in this thread, and because of that I have been completely unsympathetic to your response to my arguments here. Disagreeing with you about the nature of an argument isn’t an excuse to mock your response to it or to dismiss you as a result. Intentional or not, I caused you to feel belittled. I’m sorry for that.

I have never sought to imply that you or anyone else here is a bad DM. My argument has been and is that;

• The claim that heists cannot be done well in D&D 5e is false, and probably so. The proof is simply that not everyone has a hard time running them.
• My theory as to why the difference is that you and I (insofar as we represent to two sides of the debate) have such differing priorities and expectations of both the game in general and of heists (or horror, or naval combat, etc) specifically, that what works for one of us won’t work for the other.
• Following from that, I suggest that it is bad form to tell someone that they cannot do The Thing in D&D, without any reasoning or explanation. Not “justification of your experience”, but reasoning.
• I will note that most people are more likely to take advice seriously if it comes with some idea of the givers experience with what they’re giving advice on.
  
  

Fair enough. And, honestly, I've been more than a dick here, so, yeah, I'll make a concentrated effort to tone it down.

However, I do disagree where our main point of disagreement is. I think that this:

"The claim that heists cannot be done well in D&D 5e is false"

Because, while myself and others have given extensive examples of why heists/infiltration scenarios don't work very well in 5e, the counter claim has never given any evidence other than "As long as my group has fun, that's all that matters". @billd91 claims that it's the DM's fault because the DM is too focused on the mechanics. Other claims have basically swirled around in a cloud of Oberoni Fallacy. And, frankly, in a system that lacks any real concrete mechanics for dealing with something, it's always going to come down to the DM to make it work.

Which, as @Ovinomancer so rightly points out, is EXACTLY what it says on the tin for 5e D&D. That's the point of "Rulings not Rules". But, that's also it's biggest weakness - relying on the DM to make up stuff will always be problematic. That's always been true. So, just saying, "Well, it works in 5e because this or that DM made it work" isn't a win for 5e. It's a win for that DM.

You can't claim that a game supports something when the support basically amounts to, "make something up" and dumps everything into the DM's lap.

 

[jmartkdr2]

There have been extensive threads on these boards which have argued that players absolutely cannot initiate any skill check. The rules of 5e D&D do not permit players to do so. They can ask the DM if they can do something, and then the DM tells them what check to make, if the DM decides if that check is necessary or not.

At no point under the rules of 5e, do the players have the opportunity to tell the DM anything. At best, the player can ask if they can attempt something.

That still doesn't mean there aren't rules for skill checks.

What you do as a player is tell the dm what you want your character to do. You have the authority to do that. The dm decides what move, if any, is triggered.

 

[Hussar]

Just to add to @pemerton's point about "tags" because I do think it's a very salient point.

Say my character is trained in Jeweler's tools. Jeweler's Tools consist of "a small saw and hammer, files, pliers, and tweezers."

Can I use that training to open a lock? What can I do with Jeweler's Tools proficiency? Even with Xanathar's, the answer is, "Look at gems". So, I'm trained in cutting and polishing gems, presumably making jewelry, but, can I apply that knowledge beyond gems?

Well, in 5e, the answer is universally, "Ask your DM". So, maybe.

In 4e, the answer would be yes, so long as you can plausibly justify it. In other games, the answer would be, "Yes, and..."

So, I would say that other systems support using Jeweler's Tools to a degree that 5e doesn't. In fact, that Tool Training proficiency rules are extremely bare bones and really barely provide any support. Obviously this is true since Xanathars devotes a fair page count to remedying this. With some degree of success.

But, other systems, right out of the gate, add "teeth" to the fact that my character has this training.

So, if someone is looking to change/improve tools in 5e, for whatever reason, suggesting a different system might not be all that bad an idea.

 

[jmartkdr2]

Just to add to @pemerton's point about "tags" because I do think it's a very salient point.

Say my character is trained in Jeweler's tools. Jeweler's Tools consist of "a small saw and hammer, files, pliers, and tweezers."

Can I use that training to open a lock? What can I do with Jeweler's Tools proficiency? Even with Xanathar's, the answer is, "Look at gems". So, I'm trained in cutting and polishing gems, presumably making jewelry, but, can I apply that knowledge beyond gems?

Well, in 5e, the answer is universally, "Ask your DM". So, maybe.

In 4e, the answer would be yes, so long as you can plausibly justify it. In other games, the answer would be, "Yes, and..."

So, I would say that other systems support using Jeweler's Tools to a degree that 5e doesn't. In fact, that Tool Training proficiency rules are extremely bare bones and really barely provide any support. Obviously this is true since Xanathars devotes a fair page count to remedying this. With some degree of success.

But, other systems, right out of the gate, add "teeth" to the fact that my character has this training.

So, if someone is looking to change/improve tools in 5e, for whatever reason, suggesting a different system might not be all that bad an idea.

I believe the hair being split by OP is: there's a difference between "you should look at [other game] for inspiration on how to do that" and "you should play [other game] instead of dnd."

Because you will get the later advice if you ask online about modifying your dnd game, no matter how you phrase the question.