D&D 5E Do You Prefer Sandbox or Party Level Areas In Your Game World?

So these are two approaches that campaigns can (and do) use. They have various names, but I'm using these names. I've used both approaches in the past.

Obviously there is more nuance than the definitions below, but these are two possible extreme ends of the poll when voting feel free to choose whichever end you tend towards, or embellish in the comments.

Sandbox -- each area on the world map has a set difficulty, and if you're a low level party and wander into a dangerous area, you're in trouble. The Shire is low level, Moria is high level. Those are 'absolute' values and aren't dependent on who's traveling through.

Party -- adventurers encounter challenges appropriate to their level wherever they are on the map. A low level party in Moria just meets a few goblins. A high level party meets a balrog!

Which do you prefer?

 

[Maxperson]

yikes. Is that really the DM advice from 1e?

No wonder there is a generational difference in DMing style. From the perspective of what everyone I know sees D&D as being about, that is the worst advice possible.

You've seen me post for a long time now, so you know I'm pretty DM forward, and even I'm appalled by that particular bit of advice. I like a lot of what Gary had to say, but that piece is too far.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

You've seen me post for a long time now, so you know I'm pretty DM forward, and even I'm appalled by that particular bit of advice. I like a lot of what Gary had to say, but that piece is too far.

Yeah, it’s pretty wild.

Also yes, a very long time. Since...before 4e? I think I argued with you about alignment on the wotc forums in a thread entitled Alignment Thread 2: Electric Bugaloo, or soemthing very close to that, either before 4e came out or the same time it was coming out.

 

[pemerton]

IT IS THE THE LETTER OF THE RULES, NOT THE SPIRIT OF THE GAME, WHICH IS IMPORTANT. ALWAYS HOLD TO THE LETTER WRITTEN, AND ALLOW THE PLAYERS' ADVOCATE TO HOLD YOU TO THE RULE BOOK, EVEN IF IT GOES AGAINST THE OBVIOUS INTENT OF THE GAME. BE CERTAIN THE GAME IS MASTERED BY YOUR PLAYERS AND NOT BY YOU. WITHIN THE NARROW PARAMETERS GIVEN IN THE DUNGEONS & DRAGONS VOLUMES, YOU ARE NEITHER CREATOR NOR FINAL ARBITER.
BY ORDERING THINGS AS THEY SHOULD BE, YOUR PARTICIPANTS FIRST, YOUR CAMPAIGN NEXT, AND THE GAME AS A WHOLE THEREAFTER, YOU WILL BE PLAYING DUNGEONS & DRAGONS AS IT WAS MEANT TO BE. MAY YOU FIND AS LITTLE PLEASURE IN SO DOING AS THE REST OF US DO!

First, IT IS THE THE LETTER OF THE RULES, NOT THE SPIRIT OF THE GAME, WHICH IS IMPORTANT. ALWAYS HOLD TO THE LETTER WRITTEN, AND ALLOW THE PLAYERS' ADVOCATE TO HOLD YOU TO THE RULE BOOK, EVEN IF IT GOES AGAINST THE OBVIOUS INTENT OF THE GAME:

I think that would be bad advice. It's bad - or at best woefully incomplete - advice in statutory interpretation, which deals with very carefully and expertly drafted texts. How much moreso in rules that are drafted with the casualness of the typical D&D volume.

But second, BE CERTAIN THE GAME IS MASTERED BY YOUR PLAYERS AND NOT BY YOU. WITHIN THE NARROW PARAMETERS GIVEN IN THE DUNGEONS & DRAGONS VOLUMES, YOU ARE NEITHER CREATOR NOR FINAL ARBITER. BY ORDERING THINGS AS THEY SHOULD BE, YOUR PARTICIPANTS FIRST, YOUR CAMPAIGN NEXT, AND THE GAME AS A WHOLE THEREAFTER, YOU WILL BE PLAYING DUNGEONS & DRAGONS AS IT WAS MEANT TO BE.

The wording is a bit obtuse, but the spirit of this seems pretty reasonable to me. It's always baffled me that Gygax's afterword suggests that the game is more important than the campaign or the participants - maybe that's so from the publisher's perspective, but why from that of individual players? - and I think a game in which the participants are in charge is generally a good one. This even extends to ascertaining the spirit of the game which then feeds into rules interpretations. I don't see the argument for GM domination in that process very compelling.

As far as the narrow parameters are concerned, I think there's a lot to be said for treating a RPG like any other game - eg when I turn up to play (say) 4e D&D I am expecting a 4e D&D game, not a variant of 2nd ed-era GM storytelling. This applies to all participants, players doing their jobs (eg declaring actions for their PCs within the simultaneously permissive yet structured 4e context) as well as GMs doing theirs. When I GM Cthulhu Dark I don't apply the same techniques as when I GM 4e D&D or Burning Wheel or Rolemaster.

I look forward to your rebuttal!

 

[iserith]

As far as the narrow parameters are concerned, I think there's a lot to be said for treating a RPG like any other game - eg when I turn up to play (say) 4e D&D I am expecting a 4e D&D game, not a variant of 2nd ed-era GM storytelling. This applies to all participants, players doing their jobs (eg declaring actions for their PCs within the simultaneously permissive yet structured 4e context) as well as GMs doing theirs. When I GM Cthulhu Dark I don't apply the same techniques as when I GM 4e D&D or Burning Wheel or Rolemaster.

Fully agreed!

 

[Maxperson]

The wording is a bit obtuse, but the spirit of this seems pretty reasonable to me. It's always baffled me that Gygax's afterword suggests that the game is more important than the campaign or the participants - maybe that's so from the publisher's perspective, but why from that of individual players? - and I think a game in which the participants are in charge is generally a good one. This even extends to ascertaining the spirit of the game which then feeds into rules interpretations. I don't see the argument for GM domination in that process very compelling.

That's not what I get from reading the Afterword. I get that the game as a whole(shared fiction) comes first, then the campaign(DM's fiction), then the participants(PC fiction). The shared game as a whole is more important than either of the separate parts, which makes perfect sense.

 

[Bawylie]

If nothing else, the warning against endless arguments over syntax and semantics is timeless.

 

[Manbearcat]

First, IT IS THE THE LETTER OF THE RULES, NOT THE SPIRIT OF THE GAME, WHICH IS IMPORTANT. ALWAYS HOLD TO THE LETTER WRITTEN, AND ALLOW THE PLAYERS' ADVOCATE TO HOLD YOU TO THE RULE BOOK, EVEN IF IT GOES AGAINST THE OBVIOUS INTENT OF THE GAME:

I think that would be bad advice. It's bad - or at best woefully incomplete - advice in statutory interpretation, which deals with very carefully and expertly drafted texts. How much moreso in rules that are drafted with the casualness of the typical D&D volume.

But second, BE CERTAIN THE GAME IS MASTERED BY YOUR PLAYERS AND NOT BY YOU. WITHIN THE NARROW PARAMETERS GIVEN IN THE DUNGEONS & DRAGONS VOLUMES, YOU ARE NEITHER CREATOR NOR FINAL ARBITER. BY ORDERING THINGS AS THEY SHOULD BE, YOUR PARTICIPANTS FIRST, YOUR CAMPAIGN NEXT, AND THE GAME AS A WHOLE THEREAFTER, YOU WILL BE PLAYING DUNGEONS & DRAGONS AS IT WAS MEANT TO BE.

The wording is a bit obtuse, but the spirit of this seems pretty reasonable to me. It's always baffled me that Gygax's afterword suggests that the game is more important than the campaign or the participants - maybe that's so from the publisher's perspective, but why from that of individual players? - and I think a game in which the participants are in charge is generally a good one. This even extends to ascertaining the spirit of the game which then feeds into rules interpretations. I don't see the argument for GM domination in that process very compelling.

As far as the narrow parameters are concerned, I think there's a lot to be said for treating a RPG like any other game - eg when I turn up to play (say) 4e D&D I am expecting a 4e D&D game, not a variant of 2nd ed-era GM storytelling. This applies to all participants, players doing their jobs (eg declaring actions for their PCs within the simultaneously permissive yet structured 4e context) as well as GMs doing theirs. When I GM Cthulhu Dark I don't apply the same techniques as when I GM 4e D&D or Burning Wheel or Rolemaster.

I look forward to your rebuttal!

Follow the rules.

Share the energy that propels play.

Everyone should be prepared to “bring it.”

Play the actual game, be curious, and find out what happens.

++++++++++

Seems good to me!

 

[pemerton]

I've started a new thread provoked by some of what I've read in this thread: What is the point of GM's notes?

 

[tetrasodium]

with all the talk of an afterword from 1e I decided to pull something meaningful from the 2e dmg since I'm more familiar with it & there are a lot of people on here who never played 2e

Spoiler: introduction

Spoiler: Giving the players what they want

5e can shout from the rooftops all day about how the overly simplified & "streamlined" rules light natural language is there to empower GMs & make it easy to do the kinds of things spelled out just there on page 9 & 10 of the 2e dmg. But critically the left out the rules that provide safety nets & guard rails in an effort to streamline one more thing one more step. 5e then took that one step further by not including much if any detail on design intent or the pros & cons of making changes to the rules. That omission is not especially surprising because in many cases an individual subsystem no longer includes any dials that once allowed smaller tweaks & corrections leaving little option beyond removing that subsystem or writing an entirely new one. Having to build an entirely new subsystem is made harder because d&d is a complex interconnected set of subsystems that depend on each other so even a simple rewrite of something becomes needlessly complex as an ever snowballing collection of one off changes to interconnected things build up to dwarf the original change.

3.5 may have dialed back some of the guidance & insight or moved parts of it into various splatbooks, but it still had a bunch of smaller more subjective leaning dials that could be adjusted to achieve goals or compensate for slightly missing the mark just as it still had safety nets baked in.

 

[S'mon]

First, IT IS THE THE LETTER OF THE RULES, NOT THE SPIRIT OF THE GAME, WHICH IS IMPORTANT. ALWAYS HOLD TO THE LETTER WRITTEN, AND ALLOW THE PLAYERS' ADVOCATE TO HOLD YOU TO THE RULE BOOK, EVEN IF IT GOES AGAINST THE OBVIOUS INTENT OF THE GAME:

I think that would be bad advice. It's bad - or at best woefully incomplete - advice in statutory interpretation, which deals with very carefully and expertly drafted texts. How much moreso in rules that are drafted with the casualness of the typical D&D volume.

But second, BE CERTAIN THE GAME IS MASTERED BY YOUR PLAYERS AND NOT BY YOU. WITHIN THE NARROW PARAMETERS GIVEN IN THE DUNGEONS & DRAGONS VOLUMES, YOU ARE NEITHER CREATOR NOR FINAL ARBITER. BY ORDERING THINGS AS THEY SHOULD BE, YOUR PARTICIPANTS FIRST, YOUR CAMPAIGN NEXT, AND THE GAME AS A WHOLE THEREAFTER, YOU WILL BE PLAYING DUNGEONS & DRAGONS AS IT WAS MEANT TO BE.

The wording is a bit obtuse, but the spirit of this seems pretty reasonable to me. It's always baffled me that Gygax's afterword suggests that the game is more important than the campaign or the participants - maybe that's so from the publisher's perspective, but why from that of individual players? - and I think a game in which the participants are in charge is generally a good one. This even extends to ascertaining the spirit of the game which then feeds into rules interpretations. I don't see the argument for GM domination in that process very compelling.

As far as the narrow parameters are concerned, I think there's a lot to be said for treating a RPG like any other game - eg when I turn up to play (say) 4e D&D I am expecting a 4e D&D game, not a variant of 2nd ed-era GM storytelling. This applies to all participants, players doing their jobs (eg declaring actions for their PCs within the simultaneously permissive yet structured 4e context) as well as GMs doing theirs. When I GM Cthulhu Dark I don't apply the same techniques as when I GM 4e D&D or Burning Wheel or Rolemaster.

I look forward to your rebuttal!

Hi Pemerton! Can't say I disagree. The ordering of priority Game>Campaign>Players does not feel right to me, although I think there is a valid point in there about not bending to player wishes if you think it will harm the game. But that's ultimately about what is best for the GM and the other players, not the Game as an abstraction.

I do think 1e AD&D is more suited to ignoring & changing swathes of rules than is 5e. I was annoyed by the GM (who had mostly ran 1e) who declared after play had started that Rogues could not Sneak Attack when shooting into melee, since that is a huge nerf to the class which he said was for reasons of realism. Whereas running 1e there are a whole lot of different valid approaches to Backstab.