D&D 5E HELP action automatic? Clarification and thoughts...

[Satyrn]

No, it's a philosophy meant to scare the players out of trying to break the game to their advantage.

I don't really see a difference between this and what I said. You're just spinning it more positively than I did.

Finding a trick that is always convenient should be evaluated against the narrative and suspension of disbelief, and based on that the group should either:

- agree that nobody uses the trick (it doesn't pass the narrative test and breaks suspension of disbelief, presumably a rules artifact/loophole)
- agree that everybody uses the trick (it makes narrative sense, so why should only the PC in the whole world have figured it out?)

This suggestion assumes a philosophy that not everyone shares. That was the point I was making in the post you quoted: not everyone ascribes to the what's good for the goose is good for the gander.

 

[Satyrn]

I would differentiate between "creative trick" and "simple exploit." If the players figure out a way to maximize their effectiveness within the rules system, they deserve to have that work both ways. But if it's a unique, one-off creative idea that is about maximizing the fiction, that deserves to be trademarked.

So might I.

I was mostly just venting about a regular occurence: A poster will bring up a possible exploit, and ask about whether it's legal, or looking for discussion on how powerful it would be, or the like. There's a common reply that has landed on my pet peeve list (paraphrasing and exaggerating):

"just ask your players how would they like that exploit turned on them!" *evil laughter*

 

[5ekyu]

Bottom line, I feel that you can find in-story reasons to both allow and prevent the PCs to be the inventors of something, and in the end the choice of one or the other is matter of playstyle, group preferences, settings.

gotcha and all i wonder is what is it in an RPG play experience of guideline that you do not feel is "matter of playstyle, group preferences,
settings"?

"I don't see any issue with players coming up with "signature moves" or their characters."

i would have a serious problem with a "signature move" for PCs that was defined as "only your characters do it" unless there were also such things for other NPCs that the players would not be allowed to do as well under similar circumstances. it would break the "sense of belief" in a rather substantial way the first time i told them "yeah, even though you have the same stuff, its the NPC signature move so, off-limits to you.".

of course Gm could rule some GOD decreed others were not allowed to do it... or other such thing... and that no others gods did that... and that he didn't ever do it for anyone else... etc etc etc

lots of ways to make it "fit" depending on your definition of "fit".

Just doesn't "fit" the type of game, playstyle and settings i run... where players don't expect to be shut out of tactics or have others shut out of their tactics and see good tactics as their own reward, whether "signature" or not.

 

[briggart]

gotcha and all i wonder is what is it in an RPG play experience of guideline that you do not feel is "matter of playstyle, group preferences,
settings"?

"I don't see any issue with players coming up with "signature moves" or their characters."

i would have a serious problem with a "signature move" for PCs that was defined as "only your characters do it" unless there were also such things for other NPCs that the players would not be allowed to do as well under similar circumstances. it would break the "sense of belief" in a rather substantial way the first time i told them "yeah, even though you have the same stuff, its the NPC signature move so, off-limits to you.".

of course Gm could rule some GOD decreed others were not allowed to do it... or other such thing... and that no others gods did that... and that he didn't ever do it for anyone else... etc etc etc

lots of ways to make it "fit" depending on your definition of "fit".

Just doesn't "fit" the type of game, playstyle and settings i run... where players don't expect to be shut out of tactics or have others shut out of their tactics and see good tactics as their own reward, whether "signature" or not.

I don't think I was able to explain myself clearly. I replied to a poster saying that they could see only 2 outcomes to a player recognizing a previously unnoticed feature of the rules: 1) nobody uses it 2) everyone uses it, because for sure somebody else beside the PCs will have figured it out. I asked why not having a narrative in which the
PCs are the inventors of that particular tactic/style/etc.

I never said that NPCs should not allowed to use PCs "moves" or viceversa, I actually said the opposite. I framed it in terms of NPCs learning the style from the PCs, which would give the players an amount of control on how quickly the NPCs will adjust to their tricks, rather than simply assuming that whatever the PCs discover it's automatically available to NPCs, which seemed to me the position you and other poster were advocating.

 

[acorn_stasis]

This is a classic debate around the "metagame issue". There are PCs in a world. There are players and a DM around a table. What the DM knows, all the world knows. Mostly, what one player knows, all the characters know but you can pretend they don't. The way RPGs slip in and out of the collaborative imagined world where game mechanics exist and people sitting around a table will always be a place of uncertainty and freedom I think.

In the specific example here, an invisible flying familiar providing advantage to party members is nice consequence of the rules mechanics. My PC, say, loves doing it and does it often and it is an important contribution to the party. But the world of the game has NPCs whom may also have an invisible flying familiar. So during an encounter I as a person sitting around a table point at the DM and say, "hey no fair you stole that from me". That's way up in the metagame sphere. DM says, "no you are wrong, Hykos the evil warlock has been using his familiar for such advantage for years!" That's very much in game in character.

It is possible that this fuzzy area is a part of what makes RPGs the best of all games (note: "a part").

Great debate by the way, enjoying it!