D&D 5E Do you DM?

[Inchoroi]

I have been a player for a grand total of 7 sessions in the last five years. In fact, the game where the majority of that took place just ended because that DM's job got strict on leaving early, so he can't DM anymore, and I have to get a campaign ready as quickly as I can, as I'm the only other DM.

 

[Maxperson]

It's a lot harder in practice isn't it? It's easy for people to say "just roleplay" but when the scenario risers where the decision could have a lasting impact on the campaign and you know the right answer, that's not role-playing.

I disagree. While it's harder to come to the decision due to the pre-knowledge, you can still arrive there and do what your character would do. That's roleplaying.

 

[Stoutstien]

I disagree. While it's harder to come to the decision due to the pre-knowledge, you can still arrive there and do what your character would do. That's roleplaying.

I can't remember the exact article, I have to dig through all my books but they did a study on decision-making during role-playing exercises and found that there where two common thought processes. The first is the person made the decision based on if they were in their characters place and the second was they made the decision based if the character was in theirs.
They also found it was easier for the people in the study to make a distinction between what they would do and what their character would do if the scenario followed logic channels and the more improbable the situation the harder it was for people to make a distinction. Also the more diversity between the person and the character the harder it was for them to "get it right." Internal cohesion of the character was harder to maintain. Not impossible but harder. Unless the characters they are portraying are so far removed from themselves any decision was as logical as the next. if I remember correctly the example was people pretending to be aliens making first contact.
The inherent nature of the duality of the root question in all RPGs "what do you do?" Is beyond fascinating to me.

The fact that the rules serve to limit player options and the open ended freedom of role-playing are in direct conflict all the time and from this conflict emerged the most popular style of TTRPGs.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

Assuming good faith at your table - and given that one cannot consistently separate player and character knowledge in any realistic way that doesn't lead to awkward game play, IMHO - the best solution I've seen is just to not worry about metagaming at all. Players use metagame info at their PCs' risk. Better to have their PCs engage with the game world in a manner suitable of bold adventurers than make faulty assumptions based on what they as players remember about an adventure or what they think that the DM would or would not do in a given situation.

Now, if a player is secretly reading the adventure ahead of the session in order for their PC to "win" - whether that means getting the loot first, avoiding the trap, surprising the enemy, just looking to one up the other PCs, whatever - that's simply not good faith play. It would likely become obvious after a few sessions and would need to be addressed. I'm not sure a table exists that would enjoy such a player.

 

[Maxperson]

I can't remember the exact article, I have to dig through all my books but they did a study on decision-making during role-playing exercises and found that there where two common thought processes. The first is the person made the decision based on if they were in their characters place and the second was they made the decision based if the character was in theirs.
They also found it was easier for the people in the study to make a distinction between what they would do and what their character would do if the scenario followed logic channels and the more improbable the situation the harder it was for people to make a distinction. Also the more diversity between the person and the character the harder it was for them to "get it right." Internal cohesion of the character was harder to maintain. Not impossible but harder. Unless the characters they are portraying are so far removed from themselves any decision was as logical as the next. if I remember correctly the example was people pretending to be aliens making first contact.
The inherent nature of the duality of the root question in all RPGs "what do you do?" Is beyond fascinating to me.

The fact that the rules serve to limit player options and the open ended freedom of role-playing are in direct conflict all the time and from this conflict emerged the most popular style of TTRPGs.

That's really interesting. It truly is. However, it I was still roleplaying no matter how you slice it. I was putting myself into my character's shoes and making the decision as if I were him.

 

[The Green Hermit]

.
Simply play stupid. With hold your DM knowledge. If you can't, then don't play. What is bad when you have DMs with photographic memories. I had one I thought he was cheating until his monk ran face first into lava.

I actually have close to photographic memory. I don't have the whole shebang, but I can remember where on the page the information I want to retrieve can be found -- and I can frequently see the whole layout of the page if it isn't just block text.

First, you require a certain DM playstyle - one where a DM changes up published modules. New DMs especially may not feel comfortable with that. AL DMs may not have the freedom for that. Low-prep-time DMs may find that completely against why they bought a module in the first place. Your proposal on how to fix it can work, but is not a universal solution. Your statement that "all cases of metagaming can be dealt with" is shown to be incorrect.

Second, you are fixing a symptom not the root cause, and putting the onus to do that on someone other than the one who is causing the problem.

I am one of those new DMs that really, really need a published campaign. Having said that, I have also bought several modules in order to help me add depth to certain geographic areas. I am also somebody that can completely see the story from the published campaign -- even with the blanks it leaves for character discretion. A published campaign is supposed to be a framework, not a Bible.

 

[Guest 6801328]

Title of the thread should be "Do you even DM?"

 

[DemonSlayer]

DM once in a while, play mostly. Our group has 3 DMs and we rotate out.

 

[J-H]

Yes, because nobody else was available to run a game that met only once every 2-3 weeks instead of every single week.