Fighters vs. Spellcasters (a case for fighters.)

[N'raac]

That looks like a valid interpretation to me. The interesting question is why you decided to use that specific backstory.

It illustrates my concern that, if the die rolls do not indicate a failure on the part of the PC when unsuccessful, then logically they also do not indicate any success on the part of the PC when successful. That is, the "die roll creates circumstances" logic indicates that the PC neither succeeds nor fails based on his own skills - the die roll indicates something else.

Makes sense - I confess, it's hard to keep track of everything going on in this thread. Maybe it would have been better to stay on point; but that wouldn't have been as fun!

I'm not sure which point you would stay on - the thread goes in a lot of directions.

I think the idea was that the war troll was going to be interrogated before the court, and the acid was there to use on him if he got away. Yeah:

The fire and acid read a lot more like he was being tortured, and they expect that to continue.

That's probably my fault, because I "escalated" to violence when I attacked the chamberlain (using my war troll proxy). This is how the players end up driving play.

I think [MENTION=27570]sheadunne[/MENTION] shifted the challenge from social to physical, as he says. My point is simply that there seems no way to have an actual social challenge under this model. The shifting backstory meant they could pretty much do as they pleased and, through a combination of "fail forward" and "successful roll means intent realized", whatever they chose would lead to success eventually. Unless, apparently, the half orc wants to use his belching skill - I find it odd that this is so clearly wrong, but converting a negotiation into an execution is just standard, even good, play.

That's a good question. I think that it could work that way. The players are going to judge that contribution to the game's fiction - not in terms of action resolution, but whether or not they like it. If someone keeps taking actions that you don't like, maybe the two of you shouldn't play together - your aesthetics don't mesh. Which is fine and good, I think.

So, if another player had objected to the attempt on the Chamberlain's life, would that mean Quinn's enchantment would fail? Which successful rolls can players override, and which can they not? It seems to me this started because of objections to a GM either overriding a die roll or ruling it could not succeed at the outset - "say yes or roll the dice"; "the rules as written must be followed". Why is it OK for players to "say no despite the dice"; "override the rules"?

Because I was invested in seeing the dryad, her godess, and Lucann being reunited, and I thought the chamberlain deserved to die. My own personal beliefs about these "problematic aspects of human interactions" - self-important bureaucrats getting a kick out of their power to say "no" even if someone gets hurt, and the relationship between someone in power (Sehanine) and their responsibility to their wards (the dryad).

My question was more directed at the player theory than the character motivations. However, given our investment, would it have been OK for sheadunne (or someone else) to have redirected that challenge to violence/combat, or is this scene somehow different?

Two things. First you're probably right in that I've been a stickler for interpretation but mostly that's due to what I see as some very questionable interpretations. Rope trick has potentially lethal limitations. The summoned demon has already used its wish. That sort of thing.

I think a lot of us have seen your interpretations as very questionable as well, including those two spells, but anyone interested in those discussions can locate them in the history, I expect. To summarize, however, I don't think

the demon has used its wish, which it can only grant monthly

is any less reasonable than interpreting

The demon can use this ability to offer a mortal whatever he or she desires—but unless the wish is used to create pain and suffering in the world, the glabrezu demands either terrible evil acts or great sacrifice as compensation.

to mean that Glabrezu cheerfully grant any wish which is selfish, or harms someone (but somehow, not to someone else within the past month).

Similarly, “lethal” seems at least somewhat more reasonable than “dismissed as never having any effect” when interpreting

It is hazardous to create an extradimensional space within an existing extradimensional space or to take an extradimensional space into an existing one.

 

[Hussar]

N'raac I think it's pretty safe to say we are not going to agree on rules interpretations.

 

[N'raac]

No doubt you could adjudicate things this way if you wanted to - disregarding the players' intents in the narration of their successes. What does that prove about other playstyles, though?

How specific a playstyle? I am setting the backstory based on success or failure of your rolls.

No, you also disregarded the players' intentions in determining the consequences of their successful checks.

My recollection was that their intention was to persuade the Chamberlain to grant them an immediate audience with the King, which he did. Their purpose in having that audience granted was to persuade the King to ally with their plans which, for all of their rolls were successful, he did. What intentions were violated?

LostSoul has an example above where he had an intent for his Disguise skill which he did not state and, as such, he was not unhappy that unspoken intention did not come to pass.

Which takes us back to the contrast between "indie" and "storyteller" play: in indie play there is no predetermined conception of how things might unfold and be resolved.

If there is no predetermined conception of what activities might successfully resolve the matter, why was my Orc Belch resolution method so roundly and consistently dismissed?

Yet Quinn did not dominate the scene, nor solve it singlehandedly with his magic. That is the point of skill challenge-style mechanics.

Again, I come back to a certain sameness. Had matters begun with Quinn ensorcling the Chamberlain successfully, dominating him utterly, their objective of getting the Chamberlain to grant them access to the King would still require several more successes, and if my Orc chose to Belch his way in, this could not simply have had them summarily dismissed, as we had not yet failed enough checks. We even know up front how many more successes we need, and how many more failures we can absorb.

And this is very different from the claim that Charm Person, in and of itself, should have gotten the PC’s past the Chamberlain.

The focus returns to the king in post 88,

I think the crowd chanting “let them see the King” is a return in focus to the King (or the endeavour to access the King, more precisely). And that was entirely GM initiated.

That's the whole point: replacing GM force with mechanical structures that the players can leverage by deploying their resources (in this case, skill checks).

From all I see, they can simply pick any skill desired (with the possible exception of Perform: Belch) and, if their roll is successful, it will advance them to success. That seems a lot more like “roll dice and tell a story” than about careful deployment of resources.

 

[N'raac]

N'raac you bring up the point that you think they can't fail. Why do you think this?

My reference to "cannot fail" was to the character failing to persuade the target of his diplomacy skill. When he rolls a '2', and the check is a failure, this cannot be attributed to the character misjudging the situation, making a less than inspired speech, inopportunely belching (or failing to, depending on cultural norms and expectations), or any other failing on his own diplomatic skills. Instead, he must fail because some hidden backstory element prevented his success - the Chamberlain is secretly a magical construct under control of their enemies.

If failure cannot result from their own failings, then how can success attribute to their own skills and ability?

 

[LostSoul]

It illustrates my concern that, if the die rolls do not indicate a failure on the part of the PC when unsuccessful, then logically they also do not indicate any success on the part of the PC when successful. That is, the "die roll creates circumstances" logic indicates that the PC neither succeeds nor fails based on his own skills - the die roll indicates something else.

I think it's more about the player than the character. That is, the PC is a vessel for the player's own beliefs, and the die roll simply indicates the direction of change in the situation. The PC need not fail nor succeed in order to achieve your goals for play (dealing with those "problematic aspects of human interaction").

I think sheadunne shifted the challenge from social to physical, as he says. My point is simply that there seems no way to have an actual social challenge under this model. The shifting backstory meant they could pretty much do as they pleased and, through a combination of "fail forward" and "successful roll means intent realized", whatever they chose would lead to success eventually. Unless, apparently, the half orc wants to use his belching skill - I find it odd that this is so clearly wrong, but converting a negotiation into an execution is just standard, even good, play.

Two things here: I think we could have continued with a social challenge if we had wanted to, but clearly we didn't. As I said, I could have tried to calm down the war troll and used that socially - to shame the chamberlain for his inactivity.

It would have been nice if we had a real failure in that play. I came close to it in my "transition scene". I could imagine seeing Quinn tied up when the rest of the PCs went to talk to the chamberlain if I had failed. That would be a result of failing my intent (to overcome the bodyguard) and also fail-forward (because it increases the tension of the following scene).

So, if another player had objected to the attempt on the Chamberlain's life, would that mean Quinn's enchantment would fail? Which successful rolls can players override, and which can they not? It seems to me this started because of objections to a GM either overriding a die roll or ruling it could not succeed at the outset - "say yes or roll the dice"; "the rules as written must be followed". Why is it OK for players to "say no despite the dice"; "override the rules"?

What I mean was that if a player consistently introduces elements into the fiction that you don't like, you shouldn't play with them. I wasn't talking about action resolution. For example, I remember playing with a guy who always seemed to choose to have extremely large-busted women as his PCs. I found it crude and wasn't interested in playing with him. I didn't overrule his action to use his PC's "hotness" to seduce NPCs, though; I did not have that kind of authority.

My question was more directed at the player theory than the character motivations. However, given our investment, would it have been OK for sheadunne (or someone else) to have redirected that challenge to violence/combat, or is this scene somehow different?

Two things (again!): Those were player motivations, translated into PC motivations. I had the PC do what he did because of my own personal feelings about the in-game situation.

And yeah, it would have been fine with me for someone else to have redirected the scope of the scene. I would have been good with Lucann attacking Quinn, for example.

 

[Ahnehnois]

Honestly Hussar... because I feel there is a bit of a double standard going on here. When we talk about 3.x or earlier editions it seems to always be about what the rules say exactly... but when we talk about 4e it's nebulous... "choosing interpretations", adding supplemental advice (from later supplements and totally different games), and so on instead of looking at the original rules text... of course that's just in my opinion...

Which becomes particularly salient when you start talking about all the stuff that exists under the 3e label. There are a multitude of official variants from WotC alone that completely transform the balance between classes, let alone what's happened with all the non-WotC OGL stuff.

 

[Manbearcat]

The analysis efforts are so broad and ranging that its impossible to focus on any specific issue and attain clarity. So I'm going to try to focus on a few angels and clarify.

First things first.

1) My role as GM in this specific scene (and generally) is to:

- Identify and challenge the PCs' thematic material and force them into a proactive position by provoking them along those lines.

- Present and evolve the scene’s evocative colour, and the concrete, functional elements that may serve as assets for the PCs or that may complicate their efforts, while incorporating the players’ contributions.

- Establish my role as the primary author of adversity via the conflict resolution mechanics and frame them directly into the conflict.

- Intimately understand the mechanical engine of the conflict resolution mechanics.

- Make transparent the conflict's stakes and the players' strategic objective with respect to them.

- Respect genre conceits and make sure players do the same.

- Pay heed to player intent.

- Continually drive play with thematic adversity that interposes itself betewen the PCs and the attainment of their strategic objective.

- Interpret each step of the conflict's results by the rules of the conflict resolution system and by stridently observing all of the above.

- Interpret the overall results of the resolved conflict with respect to the evolved fictional positioning and the stakes/strategic ovjective established at the outset.

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2) Now, I want to resolve the bit about "invoking the king after things escalated." The stakes for the current scene were established as "Will the PCs attain audience with the king?" The strategic objective was to "attain audience with the king in order to appeal to him to bulwark (hopefully lead) the defense of the city against the siege." See my responsibilities above. It is my role to push play within the scene towards answering the question set out in the stakes. It is also the players' role to inhabit their PCs with respect to those stakes and their strategic objective. However, if the stakes change and a new strategic objective manifests, it is then my responsibility to confirm this, close the scene, and push play toward whatever conflict the PCs are now seeking.

If you'll notice, after things escalated and Quinn used Suggestion on the (now) ranking member of the War Council, @LostSoul the player (rightly) telegraphed that his strategic objective changed. He wasn't concerned with attaining audience with the King as much as he was concerned with locating and dealing with the Court Mage. As such, I asked for the players to confirm this with:

Let me know how you guys wish to proceed here. If the stakes ultimately change, we're going to need to close the scene and transition to <whatever your aims are>

As it turned out, Thurgon and Theren wanted to continue with their strategic objective and answer the stake's question established at the outset of the conflict. Quinn and Lucann wanted to pursue the Court Mage. Works for me! Quinn's passive Arcana to follow the magical flow (from the possessed chamberlain golem to the possessor) augmented by Lucann's prior Ritual would suffice to locate the Court Mage. As such, we continued the initial conflict with Thurgon and Theren and simultaneously framed Quinn and Lucann into their conflict with the "Court Mage" (Lucann's lost Dryad lover) in the Royal Garden.

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3) I have no idea if the War Troll was being tortured in the bowells of the Fortress. I introduced its fictional positioning (the heavy wooden wagon it was drawn to by chain, the burning brazier and the vat of acid) as (i) means to control and cow the mighty beast during its capture and (ii) as scene elements that would lead to interesting complications or assets for the PCs (should they be invoked). It was to be interrogated in the Grand Entrance Hall that you were in, hence the refugees were being herded away from the immediate area while the War Council was on its way for the interrogation. Beyond that (if torture took place before or was to take place in the future), it was fully open.

I asked @sheadunne to introduce a pivotal scene element into the fiction here that I would then have to incorporate. This is an indie technique that is not present in all systems but is certainly present in some. One of the primary reasons for doing this is that players will often have better ideas than you have. Or, perhaps better put, they'll have a better idea of what they see as "fun." My idea was to introduce a serious, serious complication; part of the horde had found the entrance to the tunnels below the Citadel and were about to burst forth into the grand citadel after slaughtering the soldiers below. Sheadunne's idea was much more interesting than the (rather generic) complication I had in mind. I'm certainly glad I asked him to introduce a scene element in this case.

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4) If you take notice of the scene elements established at the outset of the conflict, there was "Guards with Dogs." Why were they there?

a) I wanted a potential complication that was thematically relevant to Theron and Lucann. Theron's nickname is "The Hound." Theron is a hardened warrior, born and bred in the Broken Lands (Background) in a spartan, warrior culture (Iron Wolf Warrior Theme) with a very high Nature check. Living out that existence gave him a very high Nature check and would have put him in direct physical confrontation with various feral canines for territory. He is a man of action. Lucann is a classic Elf with a ridiculously high Nature check (his highest ability). Obviously, dealing with beasts would be in his sweet spot. Whats more, he is a powerfully emotional person (seething with it) and has spent the last decades of his life seeking to master an ascetic approach in the stead of emotional volatility and violence. The potential for an explosive situation and the anxiety of the aggressive dogs would test that.

b) The city was under siege and perhaps they would be the first line of defense for the citadel should the walls be breached.

c) Perhaps the chamberlain wanted them there in case the situation with the PCs (whom he may not trust) escalated.

The dogs were invoked as a complication of the situation by me with provocation (as he mentioned) by @sheadunne . Theron responded by wanting to interpose himself between the servant girl with the animal fat-soaked smock and the hungry hounds. The way I see it, he can do this by:

- Taking the blow (Endurance)
- Giving the blow (either Athletics or the deployment of an attack power)
- Outright cowing the beasts with menace (Intimidation)
- Cowing the beasts by way of his insight into their nature and his experience with them (Nature)

He wanted to use CaGI to augment (works for me). So he did. This is basically an "indimidate augment" to his check. However, everything the he wrote (multiple howls, invoking his considerable history with the menacing beasts, thumping the ground with his spear, lowering his center of gravity in the posture indicative of a beast challenging for territorial supremacy) led me to an intent of drawing upon Nature with the augment from CaGI. Its my responsibility to interpret that correctly, verify, and proceed. At a table, this would happen via a short exchange. In a PBP, for expeditious purposes, I go with my deduction.

As to the "well you can do anything you want with little to no respect for the fictional positioning" postulate (which is Gamist) that I've tried to disarm in many threads, over and over, consider the above scenario with:

- The loose, trained attack dogs.
- The servant girl with the animal fat-covered smock as object of their aggression.
- Theron the interceptor.

I presented above 4 feasible responses that are thematically relevant to Theron and observe genre conceits (GM and player principle). If sheadunne would have approached the table with

- "I'm going to dance a jig to distract/entertain the trained attack dogs (in primal feed mode)."
- "I want to spout some moving poetry to appeal to their sensitive side."
- "I'm going to preemptively say last rites for the girl."
- "I'm going to make note of the historical irony of this moment and wax about how just such an event took place some 2000 years to the day."

Would any of those illicit anything less than an eye-roll (and perhaps a throat punch) and contempt from the rest of the group? Its absurd and makes a mockery of the play effort. Further, if it is not a willful act, then it is so grossly aloof as to warrant the boot because I don't want that person in my house for fear that they may catch themselves on fire while lighting a candle due to their propensity for unaware negligence.

Now can you find a way to invoke the thematic use of a skill that fits the fictional positioning that others my not consider? Of course! That is part of the fun. Perhaps in desperation you reach for your holy symbol and say a prayer to your God that if the girl is a devout believer, may she be protected in her moment of need (Religion). Is she a devout believer and/or will your God intervene? Perhaps. Let us deploy the resource, roll the dice and find out. Perhaps your successful and the result is some of the cracked entablature stone comes loose and falls right onto the dogs, inches away before their jaws snap around the girls throat. Everyone breaths a mutual sigh of relief and you say a quick prayer of thanks.

That is all I have for now. This conflict and the resultant fiction could have produced dozens of configurations, many varying outputs of story (now). That is the point. In the end, our PBP output is what it produced this time.

 

[N'raac]

As to the "well you can do anything you want with little to no respect for the fictional positioning" postulate (which is Gamist) that I've tried to disarm in many threads, over and over, consider the above scenario with:

- The loose, trained attack dogs.
- The servant girl with the animal fat-covered smock as object of their aggression.
- Theron the interceptor.

I presented above 4 feasible responses that are thematically relevant to Theron and observe genre conceits (GM and player principle). If sheadunne would have approached the table with

- "I'm going to dance a jig to distract/entertain the trained attack dogs (in primal feed mode)."
- "I want to spout some moving poetry to appeal to their sensitive side."
- "I'm going to preemptively say last rites for the girl."
- "I'm going to make note of the historical irony of this moment and wax about how just such an event took place some 2000 years to the day."

Would any of those illicit anything less than an eye-roll (and perhaps a throat punch) and contempt from the rest of the group? Its absurd and makes a mockery of the play effort. Further, if it is not a willful act, then it is so grossly aloof as to warrant the boot because I don't want that person in my house for fear that they may catch themselves on fire while lighting a candle due to their propensity for unaware negligence.

Now can you find a way to invoke the thematic use of a skill that fits the fictional positioning that others my not consider? Of course! That is part of the fun. Perhaps in desperation you reach for your holy symbol and say a prayer to your God that if the girl is a devout believer, may she be protected in her moment of need (Religion). Is she a devout believer and/or will your God intervene? Perhaps. Let us deploy the resource, roll the dice and find out. Perhaps your successful and the result is some of the cracked entablature stone comes loose and falls right onto the dogs, inches away before their jaws snap around the girls throat. Everyone breaths a mutual sigh of relief and you say a quick prayer of thanks.

Given our discussion is supposedly framed around answering the question of balance between spellcasters and nonspellcasters, but in a broader sense balance between characters, your comments above lead to a fairly obvious (in my view) question - do some skills (which I expect are linked to certain types of characters) lend themselves to broader application, thereby granting characters who would normally focus on those skills a greater, broader and/or easier means of influencing the narrative? The two skills which leap to mind are Arcana and Religion, which would be the two skills associated with the major spellcasting classes. Meanwhile, your examples seem to relegate my knowledgeable Bard to the sidelines in that three of your four "Don't be stupid!" examples relate to knowledge and Performance skills. The fourth would be Religion, where you have indicated a different use might easily be successful.

You also noted you specifically wrote in elements which would provide Sheadunne the opportunity to use his major skill, Nature. This doesn't seem like a technique unique to Indie gaming, but simply a tool designed to allow each character their time in the spotlight, highlighting their special skills. Presumably, a similar approach wold be adopted to provide opportunities for the knowledge-based Bard. By writing in challenges suited to being addressed by the warrior's skills or abilities in a 3e game, do we not effect balance in a similar manner? I don't think designing scenarios, scenes and challenges with the specific abilities of the various PC's in mind is a unique innovation of Indie games - it's a standard GMing technique which has existed for as long as RPG's have existed.

 

[Hussar]

Which becomes particularly salient when you start talking about all the stuff that exists under the 3e label. There are a multitude of official variants from WotC alone that completely transform the balance between classes, let alone what's happened with all the non-WotC OGL stuff.

Again, fair enough. But, can I criticise the AOO rules in 3e using only the 1st printing 3e PHB? How about the magic creation rules? After all, there are very, very large differences simply between first and second printings of the 3e PHB, let along 3e to 3.5.

I've typically tried to stick fairly close to core to core. But, I also consider errata to be part of core. There's no point in beating a dead horse here. We all agree, by and large, that the original presentation of skill challenges was less than it should have been. It wasn't very good. You can argue how bad it was, but, no one is stepping up and saying it was great.

Or, instead, we can look at Skill Challenges as they are presented towards the end of 4e, after thousands of play hours of improvements and revisions and say, "Yup, they got it pretty all right at the end there". Pretty much affording the same advantages to 4e as you want to allow for 3e. I mean, good grief, you've got massive revisions to a great deal of 3e, and that's what we're using as a baseline. 3e as of 2007, not 3e as of 1999.

Why insist on ignoring all the stuff that comes later for 4e?

I actually agree with you and have done so repeatedly in this thread on the idea of variants changing class balance. As I said, WAYYY back, if I ran 3e again, the core casters would be ejected in favour of Favored Soul and Sorcerer. Play to about 10th or 12th level and we're good to go. I would generally have no balance issues, at least as far as casters are concerned, in that campaign.

But, please, in these discussions, bear in mind that [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] et al are arguing SC's as of 2012, not 2008. You can keep belabouring the point about the original presentation, but, it doesn't really matter. No one, other than you folks, are actually talking about that.

 

[Ahnehnois]

Why insist on ignoring all the stuff that comes later for 4e?
...
But, please, in these discussions, bear in mind that [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] et al are arguing SC's as of 2012, not 2008. You can keep belabouring the point about the original presentation, but, it doesn't really matter. No one, other than you folks, are actually talking about that.

I can only speak for myself, but I never talk about skill challenges to that level of detail. It may be that they were improved over time, but my position has always been that using multiple rolls to model extended actions is a good idea, and that the level of structure associated with skill challenges is a bad idea. To me, the original UA complex skill check concept is the best approach.

I actually agree with you and have done so repeatedly in this thread on the idea of variants changing class balance. As I said, WAYYY back, if I ran 3e again, the core casters would be ejected in favour of Favored Soul and Sorcerer. Play to about 10th or 12th level and we're good to go. I would generally have no balance issues, at least as far as casters are concerned, in that campaign.

Well, okay. Having played above those levels with the original 3.0 core, I never saw any real class imbalances there, but I do think those steps (i.e. avoiding high levels and focusing on spontaneous casting) are likely to create a better experience, if mostly due to reduced bookkeeping rather than any real balance issues.