DMG & MM: Players Stay Out?

[Dausuul]

Ah. In general...nah....read all ya want. Just no reference during play.

You let your players reference the MM during play? I certainly don't, except when they need it for summons and the like. But if a fight broke out with a vrock, say, and a player immediately reached for the Monster Manual to look up vrocks... uh-uh. There'll be none of that. I may not be able to achieve a sense of wonder, but whatever scraps of mystery remain thanks to faulty player memory, I'm bloody well going to hang onto.

Not that it's ever been an issue, because the people I play with are not that lame.

 

[Reynard]

You let your players reference the MM during play? I certainly don't, except when they need it for summons and the like. But if a fight broke out with a vrock, say, and a player immediately reached for the Monster Manual to look up vrocks... uh-uh. There'll be none of that. I may not be able to achieve a sense of wonder, but whatever scraps of mystery remain thanks to faulty player memory, I'm bloody well going to hang onto.

Not that it's ever been an issue, because the people I play with are not that lame.

Reading the MM in particular sort of strikes me as using a Brady Games manual when playing aCRPG.

 

[Fenes]

If a character would know what Vrocks can do, then by all means the player should read up if he is not familiar with Vrocks - anything else I'd consider metagaming.

 

[Wisdom Penalty]

Not even when the Pit Fiend pulls out the asploding devils trick for the first time?

The trick here is to not name the Pit Fiend a Pit Fiend. Change his description just a bit, too. And - wallah! - you have a "new" critter your players haven't met before. Heck, give him a glaive and keep the attack stats of his normal attacks. There's all sorts of little changes can you do that a) don't change the statistical underpinnings whatsoever, and b) flummox your players.

 

[Dausuul]

If a character would know what Vrocks can do, then by all means the player should read up if he is not familiar with Vrocks - anything else I'd consider metagaming.

It's one thing to know generally what vrocks are capable of. It's quite another to know their exact stats, to the point where you can say, "Okay, he's got 2 hit points left." I will certainly allow a Knowledge (Planar) roll to get an idea of vrock abilities, and if it succeeds I'll describe the high points of what vrocks can do, but IMO you'd need a pretty insane Knowledge roll to have exact knowledge of all their abilities.

 

[Fenes]

It's one thing to know generally what vrocks are capable of. It's quite another to know their exact stats, to the point where you can say, "Okay, he's got 2 hit points left." I will certainly allow a Knowledge (Planar) roll to get an idea of vrock abilities, and if it succeeds I'll describe the high points of what vrocks can do, but IMO you'd need a pretty insane Knowledge roll to have exact knowledge of all their abilities.

That assumes that you use the exact hp number from the book, and not something simply in that ballpark.

But the whole idea of keeping players ignorant won't work long term anywaya - every monster they fight they know about afterwards, so sooner or later, you are either switching to home-brew monsters, change the monster stats, or deal with players knowing what a hydra can do.

And you can already change stats/create your own monsters if this is so important for you (and may have to anyway, unless none of the players is a DM either, or plays computer games).

 

[Toryx]

I'm of several opinions on this.

First, I think that all the material a player needs should be available in the PHB. 3.x having all the magic items and prestige classes in the DMG was a big mistake, I think.

Second, the monster manual may be available for everyone to refer to, especially when it comes to summoning, but I think player's should restrict themselves in how carefully they read the monster descriptions and stats. If they want to ruin the fun for themselves, that's fine, but then they've got to add extra caution to make sure they don't mix player knowledge with character knowledge. If you're starting out at 1st level in a campaign, it's highly unlikely that your character will know much of anything that exists in the MM.

Of course, there's no way in hell that WotC is ever going to put it into the rules that any book is restricted for the DM or someone else. They want the players to buy all three books. Long gone are the days when they recommend that any one book is for the DM only. It's all about the profit margin now.

 

[Charwoman Gene]

Now every setting book is tailored to both players and DMs.

4e FR has a player's guide and a Campaign guide.

 

[UngeheuerLich]

I think the 4e approach seems good so far. DC´s included which informations are gained from the moster entry.

Also we know for certain that there is a campaign book for FR and a Player´s guide. This seems to me as if there is a seperation betwen player and DM knowledge.

Also, in 2nd edition, you didn´t constantly have to look into the DMG or MM, because you didn´d need all those magical items (besides some +x armor) of whatever kind to protect you, and if you ever had to know monster information because of summon spells, you just needed 2 lines of numbers or so. (HP, AC, THAC0, number of attacks, damage)

In 3rd edition, DMG and MM was often so important to Players, that disallowing to look inside was just annoying. In 4e the need to look in the MM or DMG seems to be reduced once again.

So I won´t allow my Players to look constantly into the DMG or the MM. A little bit of browsing should be ok...

 

[mmu1]

I find that if you try to keep players from reading some of the rulebooks, you mainly ensure that they remain ignorant of all the minor details which allow them to understand how the game world really works, and to make informed decisions.

Sure, in theory a DM could take the time to explain all those rules the players need, and hand out all the common info the PCs would know by virtue of 20 years of everyday experience - but how much time would that take? Even if you spread it out over a number of sessions, there's simply so much information in most RPG rulesets and settings that it's just not feasible.

Then, as a result of not having all the information, players will either end up acting on incorrect assumptions - and get frustrated when they do something which sounds like it'd make sense, but just doesn't work given the rules and/or setting, resulting in characters getting hurt, wasting money, or just looking foolish - or fail to act entirely and overlook certain possibilities, because they have no reason to think they'd exist, and not enough information to ask the right questions.