Hope?

[LostSoul]

In view of that, I don't see why it should be counted as "bad role playing" to think in a metagame way. Why not have Gunnar the Skandic figure out how the steam riddle works? Why not have him be able to be clever no matter his intelligence, or draw on real-world principles of engineering (as monitored by the DM, of course)? It's a game, and I'm the one playing, not Gunnar the Skandic.

Yeah. If the point is to have fun playing, and metagaming makes it more fun for you, then metagaming is good roleplaying.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

There doesn't have to be rules for it, there has to be a design philosophy that promotes it. Such things appearing early and often in published scenarios, for example, establish a playstyle and tone.

Also: "social skills" don't belong in the game, AFAIAC. You can have mechanics for leadership and morale and such, but if a player can't squeak out a decent argument, he shouldn't be playing a diplomatic PC.

I do not think that it is required of a diplomatic PC to speak eloquently.
What is important to me is that he figoures out what he wants the NPC to do, and what the PCs want him to do (or do for themselves), and then find a goal on how to combine these things. But I don't want to require him to make a good speech. That's where social encounter rules can get in.

In combat, I don't tell the PCs who is the enemy, or (a lot less constructed ) whether it would be smarter to dispel the enemies flight spell or fire a lightning bolt at him. That's a what the player is there for - he make the decision what to attempt. The rules will determine whether he succeeds at it.

The player sets the goal (based on his understanding of the situation), and the rules tell us whether he succeeds (or to what extend he succeeds).

 

[Reynard]

In combat, I don't tell the PCs who is the enemy, or (a lot less constructed ) whether it would be smarter to dispel the enemies flight spell or fire a lightning bolt at him. That's a what the player is there for - he make the decision what to attempt. The rules will determine whether he succeeds at it.

The player sets the goal (based on his understanding of the situation), and the rules tell us whether he succeeds (or to what extend he succeeds).

As a RB-OS DM, *I* decide. Now, most of the time -- in combat for example -- I decide to let the dice and rules decide. When figuring out riddles/puzzles, when hathcing hair brained schemes, and when convincing NPCs of things, I decide to not let the rules and/or dice decide

 

[ptolemy18]

So? The goal of bowling is to get a strike on each and every throw. This is not a realistically attainable goal for most players.

The inability to be 100% perfect is not a reasonable barrier to having fun trying.

I agree with Umbran. Of course I don't think I am actually going to mystically inhabit a character's head or something, but I'm more concerned with the roleplaying aspect of RPGs than the problem-solving or game-beating aspect. Of course, there's a long and venerable tradition of trying to come up with in-character justifications for things you want to do out-of-character, but there's got to be some "in-character" involved in there somewhere.

Basically, though, it's really up to the PC and their gaming style. How many players would WILLINGLY FAIL TO SOLVE the "steam engine puzzle" because Gunnar the Skandic is supposed to have low intelligence? Good question. Probably not that many people. Howver, I've willingly done self-destructive or counterproductive things in RPGs for alignment and "role-playing" reasons, many times.

 

[RFisher]

Usually because the puzzle or riddle is so bad, or because it is in fact challenging me-the-player instead of me-the-character; riddles that spin on modern concepts (such as the solution to the word puzzle being 'Woolworths') don't work all that well because I-the-character am not looking for a solution in that vein.

But the player can't have perfectly internalized 100% of the cultural context of a completely alien fantasy world, so the player could not solve a proper-for-the-fantasy-world riddle. Think of the player solving a riddle that uses modern context as a simulation of the character solving a riddle that depends upon the fantasy world's context.

Or, just admit that the fantasy world isn't a world at all. It has the depth of a theater set. It's nothing more than our own context with some painted slats & props pretending to be a world. Then admit that the characters aren't really characters. They are essentially avatars of the players. Pawns on the board.

Either direction you want to approach it, challenges for the player are perfectly appropriate.

 

[Reynard]

Either direction you want to approach it, challenges for the player are perfectly appropriate.

And fun. Rolling dice is generally not fun. Combat is a prime example: there's nothing more soul-drinking in an rpg than a rote combat, where every turn the player does the same thing they did last round (hack the goblin, cast web, whatever). Combat is fun when it is a tactical challenge that requires the players to think on their feet and make use of all those nifty numbers on the character shet. What I am hoping for, I guess, is that the player-challenges stop being just combat and character building, that the guys behind 4E realize that it is a game, metagaming is part of gaming and different peoplelike different things.

note, though, that my hope is eroded with every new 4E blog entry. the death knight thing is just the most recent example: here's the death knight, here's how we are going to toss out everything cool about it from previous editions, and here is how we are going to make sure it fits neatly into its combat encounter niche.

 

[Celebrim]

note, though, that my hope is eroded with every new 4E blog entry. the death knight thing is just the most recent example: here's the death knight, here's how we are going to toss out everything cool about it from previous editions, and here is how we are going to make sure it fits neatly into its combat encounter niche.

Increasingly, it's like listening to some super-toked up type A personality describing in lavish detail how his homebrew and house rules which involve 20th century icons as major dieties kicks butt and is soooo much better than the normal game.

 

[Reynard]

Increasingly, it's like listening to some super-toked up type A personality describing in lavish detail how his homebrew and house rules which involve 20th century icons as major dieties kicks butt and is soooo much better than the normal game.

Are you talking about me or them?

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Wait. If by "challenges the player" you mean "has puzzles that have to be resolved with the player's mental acuity instead of their character's statistics," then how would it even be possible to work that into the rules of the game? You could work it into the design of a module, but how would you work it into the actual edition?

I know it's not exactly what you were getting at, but one way to integrate both player ability and character ability is to allow the player an amount of time dependent on the character's Intelligence.

An average 10-Int PC might have 2 minutes to solve the riddle. If the PC has only 6 Int, perhaps the player only gets 30 seconds. A very bright player of a very dumb PC might still solve the riddle in that time, in which case it could be seen in-game as the lummox just happening upon the solution. Conversely, a non-genius player of a genius-level PC might have more time, perhaps even a hint, to reflect his character's intelligence -- but it's still a combination of player and PC ability.

 

[The Little Raven]

super-toked up type A personality describing in lavish detail how his homebrew and house rules

Sounds like pretty much every campaign setting ever made, starting with Greyhawk.