Do you "save" the PCs?

[Fifth Element]

I honestly think it's just a case of sloppy writing.

I'll give you that one.

 

[Ariosto]

I honestly think it's just a case of sloppy writing.

It looks to me like a case of very careful writing, insofar as the meaning of "tell a story" is made perfectly clear in the elaboration that follows.

The claim of its being definitive of "any roleplaying game" may have been sloppy thinking, but I see no indication that it was not sincerely meant.

 

[Jeff Wilder]

It looks to me like a case of very careful writing, insofar as the meaning of "tell a story" is made perfectly clear in the elaboration that follows.

If you say so.

I think that what they describe isn't the use of a tool for telling a story, but rather the use of a framework for the unfolding of a story in play.

I'm perfectly fine with what they describe (example of fudging aside), but I agree with people that calling an RPG a means of "telling a story" can be problematic.

Thus, IMO, "sloppy writing."

 

[pawsplay]

I agree here. I don't play D&D the way that passage describes the Star Wars RPG. I also dispute its description of the purpose of "any RPG."

Also, that passage straddles the line between saying, basically, it's okay to fudge, and essentially suggesting you resolve certain actions via fiat, even if you pick up the dice. In a certain sense it's saying "save PCs for the good of the story," but in another sense, it's saying don't use dice to make decisions you have already made for yourself.

It's an interesting passage, but it's certainly not the way I played Star Wars, or other games.

 

[ExploderWizard]

In the cases you cite, I think it merely appropriate that players should get such clues.

It is in my experience almost unheard of for a D&D game (or almost any RPG) to conceal players' Hit Point scores from them. There seems to be a very intuitive grasp of the importance of observing that resource in assessing risks.

To hide attack, save and damage rolls likewise makes the game harder. To discover, for instance, an opponent's chance of hitting requires a big enough sample. To find out not just how often but how hard requires a big enough sample of actual hits. Remove hit point information on top of that, and the only hard data you get is:

How long did it take to get this character killed?

Repeat enough times to reach statistical significance.

Alternatively, players can memorize the Monster Manual. Is that "ugly", too?

"Metagaming" my Aunt Fanny! It's just gaming.

If you need some kind of "method acting" rationale, try this on for size: If I were a veteran fighting man actually informed by all five senses and by memories of both watching and fighting many fights -- then might I not have more information than a GM's verbal description is likely to provide?

There are ways to communicate threat levels that permit rational player choice without laying the stats out on the table and asking " ok you wanna fight this?" We can also rattle off whatever treasure it happens to be guarding so no time is wasted going after chump change.

I don't know where the notion that I don't let players know thier own hp totals came from? They are expected to track that themselves.

Method acting? Hardly. A player can score a hit for maximum damage and I let him know that the monster barely seemed to take notice of it. This is informative without having to say: " You hit it for 17 points of damage. It is now down to 212 hp."

Players will figure out what they need to score a hit fairly quickly. The part that remains concealed is how difficult it was for the monster to hit them. If I describe a claw attack against a player as " slamming into you almost effortlessly" then the creature most likely hits on a low number.

 

[Umbran]

There is no requirement for discussion. A single word is enough. "He rolled a 20. Fudge. 16. He misses."

There is no call to bring up that which you don't want the players to at least consider - if you say it, you want them to absorb it and internalize it, and take it into consideration. Thus, the statement is intended to intrude on what they're doing at the moment.

Of course, if they are aware that you are fudging, that too removes some uncertainty, doesn't it? "Will the BBEG stike for another critical, killing the paladin?" "Why, no, we can safely expect any such roll to be fudged!"

First, that's a big "if". I know you contend that players can always tell. I just don't buy that assertion. My experience is that if you do it well, they don't notice. I don't know why people you've worked with always seem to notice, but it is not anywhere near my experience.

Second, the, "we can safely expect any such roll to be fudged," presupposes a whole lot about my pattern of fudging. Far more than I have said here, and thus far more than you could posit would be an issue in my games.

Is it possible to have a successful game using techniques that are not generally recommended?

Who is this General that's recommending or not recommending things? Did I miss that you worked in the Pentagon, RC? I don't think some folks on internet messageboards here really qualify as "general". And I really don't feel you trump the advice in several editions of D&D, and several other RPGs with which I'm acquainted.

And, even after noting that exception, do we conclude that Piratecat is running his best possible game by not prepping, or do we consider that, should Piratecat have the time and inclination to prep more, it is possible that he could improve his game?

You see, I feel no reason to conclude much of anything. I only brought him up as an example of a process that didn't really fit the "completed creation" model.

I've been lucky enough to play a few sessions with him as GM, and I think he's damned good. If I *must* assume something, I assume he knows what works best for him. It isn't like prepping more isn't bleedingly obvious or somehow a new idea that someone with his experience would not have tried in the past.

 

[Ariosto]

I don't know where the notion that I don't let players know thier own hp totals came from?

Not from me, certainly.

I mentioned hit points betting that you probably took for granted player tracking of that datum, and even more probably would agree that -- and understand why -- it is so widely taken for granted throughout the hobby.

Hit points seem to me the very model of a pure game abstraction. As I stated, keeping them secret from players is one way to make the game harder. I tried to point out how hiding other data -- in particular rolls to hit and rolls for damage -- could theoretically make the game harder as well.

As I went on to point out, that theory would (at least in old D&D) largely fall apart once players read not merely sample rolls but actual stats for the monsters.

Players may have no such opportunity so to inform themselves in a game in which monster stats actually vary widely. I suppose that might be an advantage to someone desirous of the consequently greater challenge.

This is informative without having to say: " You hit it for 17 points of damage. It is now down to 212 hp."

"I don't know where the notion that Jeff Wilder lets players know the monsters' hp totals came from?"


You think it's fine for players to see their own rolls to hit, and damage dice, but not the monsters'. Wilder and I roll in the open, without considering it to "give away too much information". Neither do I, for one, see anything where you choose to draw your line that indicates to me some change of state to "meta-gaming".

It seems to me that these are matters of taste.

If this were rolled openly the player would know that extreme luck is the reason for the good fortune and withdraw while the character would run from a fight he/she was winning for no apparent reason.

Not only do I disagree with your characterization, I do not place on it in the first place the value that you do.

 

[Reynard]

There are ways to communicate threat levels that permit rational player choice without laying the stats out on the table and asking " ok you wanna fight this?" We can also rattle off whatever treasure it happens to be guarding so no time is wasted going after chump change.

I don't know where the notion that I don't let players know thier own hp totals came from? They are expected to track that themselves.

Method acting? Hardly. A player can score a hit for maximum damage and I let him know that the monster barely seemed to take notice of it. This is informative without having to say: " You hit it for 17 points of damage. It is now down to 212 hp."

Players will figure out what they need to score a hit fairly quickly. The part that remains concealed is how difficult it was for the monster to hit them. If I describe a claw attack against a player as " slamming into you almost effortlessly" then the creature most likely hits on a low number.

It's interesting. I used to track PC hit points and give the p[layers hints about how hurt they were. I am not sure why, other than assuming it would somehow increase immersion. It didn't really work that way and I don't do such things any more.

I remember discovering recently that the combat example from (I think) the original Basic set has the DM rolling damage for the PCs' hits behind the screen, without telling the PCs how much was scored but merely describing the blow and the remaining health of the enemy (hobgoblins, if I recall) to the players. I have never done this, though I do keep the hit points of the enemies secret behind the screen and use descriptive language to indicate how hurt the enemy may be.

I find it interesting what individual DMs do keep secret. Some keep DCs secret even upon success or failure, while others write the enemy hit points on a card or white board for all to see. How does secret versus "public" information interact with the idea of fudging and immersion and game play?

 

[Imaginary Number]

Moreover, when we explicitly make production of art "the purpose of" a process, it stands to reason (at least to me) that the artist's intuition and "feeling" is going to play a decisive role.

"Avoiding anticlimax", or any other "dramatic necessity" is a sensible concern for authoring a dramatic story. Ditto assumptions that these or those figures are "the heroes". Script immunity is premised upon there being after some fashion a "script" in the first place.

This is a good observation, but I also think you're using "authoring" here in a sense that doesn't fit the context. I don't think anyone in this thread has suggested that the DM is an "author" in the same sense that the writer of a script is an "author." Although I design the campaign background and adventure settings and so have a role in the process, the authorial "plotting" decisions involving where the PCs want to go and what sorts of things they want to do are made by the players, not by me. Random chance also plays a role, of course. The players and the dice therefore have at least as much authorial responsibility for any stories resulting from their in-game shenanigans as I do.

The key distinction on the "fudging" issue, it seems to me, is not between "storytelling" and "non-storytelling." It's between a view that the game rules and the adventure scenario as written are The Immutable Law from which the DM cannot deviate from the moment play starts and a view that the DM can deviate from those things judiciously in order to make the gameplay experience more "fun" (however one defines that). I can see virtues in both approaches; in my experience, however, the latter works better for my group.

 

[Ariosto]

Imaginary Number, I was commenting upon a lengthy text extracted (by Doug McCrae) from West End Games' 1987 Star Wars game.

http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/274845-do-you-save-pcs-32.html#post5162066

a view that the DM can deviate from those things judiciously in order to make the gameplay experience more "fun" (however one defines that)

No. There are a whole lot of things from which a DM can deviate judiciously without "fudging". The question is what kind of "fun" one is looking for in the first place.

You want "fudge". I do not, because "fudge" is not my idea of fun. End of socially mediated narrative construction.