How adversarial is your group?

[Gorgon Zee]

Some recent threads I have been in have discussed player-GM interaction and the degree to which GMs need to handle player knowledge and the degree to which players and GMs like to challenge each other. This is not a poll to discover who is playing "the right way", but more to establish a baseline on styles of play -- all of which can be valid and fun!

Please choose options that you feel are generally true for you and the group(s) you play regularly with. If you have any other thoughts and suggestions -- especially if there are variations or have thoughts on factors that might influence these issues, please add in the comments, but remember that the goal is to discover trends, not to brand anything as badwrongfun!

 

[TiQuinn]

Our current group is not adversarial, though I've played with groups where that feeling did exist between the GM and the players (not fun). I would say right now, nobody is actively seeking to create advantages off the rules, but when it does happen, I think we let it ride for one session, but if and when our DM says "that's not sustainable", everyone is of the mind that "yeah, that made the fight too easy, and it makes sense not to do it again" even sometimes if there isn't a formal ruling. We can cheese an encounter, but I think my group is good about not leaning into that over and over. Similarly, our GM is trying to scale encounters to make them challenging, but not to try to punish the group.

We've got a pretty open dialogue at the table about what works and what doesn't work, and yeah, we even hold back on actions when it just makes more sense for our characters to fail at something - just because it feels right. It happened for me last night during our weekly game. We were playing Mothership, and we were acting out what we were seeing in a room where we found a dead body that had been gruesomely killed. I'm playing a kind of itchy trigger finger Marine, and decided based on what was being described that he'd have to make a fear check because of something the Android player said in response to seeing the body. GM didn't call for it - it just felt "right" at the moment.

 

[Lanefan]

Some recent threads I have been in have discussed player-GM interaction and the degree to which GMs need to handle player knowledge and the degree to which players and GMs like to challenge each other. This is not a poll to discover who is playing "the right way", but more to establish a baseline on styles of play -- all of which can be valid and fun!

Please choose options that you feel are generally true for you and the group(s) you play regularly with. If you have any other thoughts and suggestions -- especially if there are variations or have thoughts on factors that might influence these issues, please add in the comments, but remember that the goal is to discover trends, not to brand anything as badwrongfun!

I could, quite honestly, vote for every one of those options when considering the group as a whole, even the last two that are in direct contradiction with each other. Thus, my vote would be meaningless for the stated purposes of the poll.

To vote for only some of the options, I'd have to break it down to the individual player level and vote differently for each one (and then again, as myself).

Fortunately the days when these things turned into spitfire arguments are (I hope!) long behind us; it's all in good fun.

 

[Umbran]

My players use their real-world knowledge to empower their characters, but only when the character clearly would have that knowledge anyway.

Like, if you are playing a mad scientist, and in your day job you are an engineer, that's more about having a bit of depth and color than exploiting anything.

 

[Gorgon Zee]

Like, if you are playing a mad scientist, and in your day job you are an engineer, that's more about having a bit of depth and color than exploiting anything.

I studied pure math for 4 years and went on to get a doctorate in applied math. At a Gen Con long ago and in a city far to the north I was playing in Cthulhu Masters and in the first round I was assigned a character who very rapidly went mad due to having his brain super-augmented to do extreme math for (I think) Mi-Go. The GMs helpfully suggested some ideas on how to portray this. I said “I think I’ve got this”

Absolutely agree. There’s a big difference between doing things for fun and doing them to exploit. However I do feel I had an unfair advantage in the masters competition, at least in that round

 

[RenleyRenfield]

None. 0. Nada.

We play boardgames to compete. We play videogame to compete.

Roleplaying is where we create, and we create together.

...

Side note, adversarial gaming is a byproduct of design and often intentional. Games like D&D are built around the idea of the GM against the Players, it's a wargame meant to be won or lost. People have done a great job at playing outside that design, but that does not change what adversarial games are. More often than not, there is a better system that is a better match for folks who want to roleplay. And noticing that a game like D&D is adversarial is like noticing a steak tastes like beef.... cause that is what it is.

D&D is not the only one or only way. PBTA's Urban Shadows goes out of its way to pit players against each other by forcing them to take side with different factions and then roleplay out the adversity between their characters and the factions.

 

[jdrakeh]

We only really have one adversarial player and he often plays against tone (silly in a serious campaign, violent in a political campaign, etc).

 

[overgeeked]

My answers are based on when I used to run 5E D&D games.

For other games, I couldn't ask for better players.

 

[billd91]

I don't think my group is too adversarial. The group has a player who likes to dope out highly effective tactics and combinations, but he's also pretty good at roleplaying how that all works out. It does mean I sometimes have to work to specifically raise challenges in some encounters and situations, but I have to do some of that anyway just to accommodate 6 players. Plus, the group is usually pretty accepting of limitations, DMing errors, and other issues that work against them too. Overall, I think we take a fairly mature and friendly approach to it.

 

[payn]

I've had some tangentially related thoughts recently on player types in games. Been playing a lot of Battletech and I find there are a few archetypes I commonly run into. The first is the "list builder" in terms of RPGs this might be the chargen min/maxer. For this player, the enjoyment leans heavily into the mechanics. They want to test the limits of the system in a constant back and fourth of rock, paper, scissors playstyle. The other type I run into is the "spirit of a fair match" player, which would probably be viewed as the casual RPG player. These players are in it for the fun of getting together and enjoying the game at what would be its intended middle.

I definitely lean towards the latter, and try to avoid the former. Though, unlike in my past where I would exclude the list builders, I try and find opportunities for them to match up with folks who are their level while maintaining an inclusive community. Sometimes feathers are still ruffled from time to time, but folks are starting to form the boundaries and enjoy being all part of the same family.

I assume adversarial players are like the list builders and either its fully embraced by the entire group, or measures have been taken to limit the adversity provided by such players.