D&D 5E How cognizant are you of the rules of the game?

[iserith]

I think about the archetype I want to play and the things I expect him or her to do the most, then use the mechanics to build the most effective character at doing those things I can.

Then I strive to minimize how often those mechanics might get called into play by the DM by aiming for outright success rather than leave it to those fickle dice.

 

[steeldragons]

Sooo, I see. It's nothing personal to any players. It's just using meta-game knowledge, defined as "in game/world knowledge that a professional adventurer would have", to justify your character being a condescending douche to other characters for being "incompetent" and "liabilities" (but not the players, obviously).

Ok. Think we're done here.

I presume everyone at your table is on this same page as you, Saelorn, so that you all can enjoy each other's characters and "competent" company. Happy gaming to you all.

I, for one, will not envy any of you.

 

[The Lich]

If we die because of your incompetence, then it is your fault and you are liable.

Let's take a close look at what you wrote, shall we?

My character might have a problem with another character, if the actions of the latter are liable to get the former killed. This is an in-game matter. No reason to drag the players into it.

That's right, you wrote "liable to," not "liable for." Notice that the subject is the "actions of the latter," which you say "are liable to get, etc." Actions are not "legally responsible" for anything; it's the persons who perform those actions that are legally responsible for whatever those actions brought about. So the very grammar of your statement shows that it had nothing to do with the "legal responsibility" sense of "liable" and everything to do with the "likely result" sense of "liable." So, care to retract this blatant fallacy of equivocation?

 

[aramis erak]

So I was reading another thread, and thinking about how my playstyle has changed over the years, and was wondering how other people played. But first, a disclaimer-

And, as usual for polls, of course we are all unique and special snowflakes and a simple poll does not carry within it the variety of your gaming experience; that said, please try and fit your square peg into the round choices provided, and explain further in the comments.

EDIT-

If the poll choices are unclear, think of them as a continuum from the top to the bottom.
"Completely" means that the rules (and numbers) dictate your choices. You make all your choices based upon the mechanics.
"D&D has rules?" is like the kids I talked about- you don't know or don't care at all about the underlying mechanics, and just choose based upon how cool something is.
The other two choices are variants in between.
"Mostly" means that while you don't make all of your choices based on the mechanical benefits, the mechanical aspects largely drive your choices.
"A little" means that while you usually ignore the mechanical benefits of your choices, you still are cognizant of them, and usually adhere to them a little (and are aware when you are "playing against type.").

I've seen some hard core optimizers - and their performance, mathematically, hasn't been significantly better. In fact, the fighter with the -5 to hit for +10 damage has averaged LESS damage than the one who took a stat increase. Stat boy Gear has outpaced and outperformed Feat Boy Vlad in every combat but one. Wherein Vlad was stacked with a bless, a bardic inspiration AND inspiration... Without the triple buff, he's just not getting the hits against big-bads, and doesn't need it versus lesser threats. And thus Gear, who, until a few weeks ago was a level behind Vlad, is the party anchor.

System mastery is FAR more important for spellcasters. Not so much that it matters for damage done, but for decision time taken.

I'm not seeing the effects of system mastery make as much of a difference as does mastery of one's own character. Knowing what you can do and and when to do it matters FAR more.

 

[CanadienneBacon]

System mastery implies that those who choose not to optimize do not fully comprehend the rules or how they can create powerfully built characters designed to maximize defense or offense. It's a little bit of a loaded term (though perhaps no more so than others of the terms bantied about this thread). I won't speak for the others who voted "little," or who indicated they prefer a character with a flaw, but--to clarify--I grok the system but actively choose a different path when I sit down to draft a character. My choices are often collaborative and story-driven.

It's a purposeful approach, one my table is likely to be comfortable with. I very much respect that other tables operate differently. The beauty of RPGs is that the many play styles are valid if they produce a happiness and fun (whatever one's definition of happiness and fun may be) at the table. Again, system is irrelevant. Player composition is everything. It's not what you play, it's who you play with.

 

[MoonSong]

Just making sure we're all clear on your rationale for calling everyone not doing it your way [edit to correct misquote: you did not actually call anyone "stupid"] "fools", "liabilities"[/edit], "jerks" and "suicidally incompetent."

There's always a first for everything. I agree a lot with you tonight.

My character might have a problem with another character, if the actions of the latter are liable to get the former killed. This is an in-game matter. No reason to drag the players into it.

It's only a problem if the player thinks he has the meta-game right to tag along with the rest of the party, just because he's being controlled by someone other than the DM. If a new player is joining the group, then it behooves the new player to build a character who will fit in with the existing party, rather than trying to fit in something that obviously doesn't belong (be that a necromancer into a group of paladins, or a suicidally incompetent character into a group of professionals).

But why should we be bound by discrimination in-game? RPGs are still escapism, in the real world people quickly label you incompetent at the slightest flaw or sign of weakness. Personally, I feel better when my PC is a flawed person I can identify with than a killing machine with no real ties to the world. I have more fun when idealism can get you far, and if my PC is not that good at killing, that doesn't make my character suicidal or incompetent or even a load. Teamwork cuts both ways, maybe my noncombat sorceress won't hurt a fly, but can still be useful and helpful even valuable to the party if they just cut her some slack.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

That's right, you wrote "liable to," not "liable for." Notice that the subject is the "actions of the latter," which you say "are liable to get, etc." Actions are not "legally responsible" for anything; it's the persons who perform those actions that are legally responsible for whatever those actions brought about. So the very grammar of your statement shows that it had nothing to do with the "legal responsibility" sense of "liable" and everything to do with the "likely result" sense of "liable." So, care to retract this blatant fallacy of equivocation?

I stand by statement. If a character is liable for the consequences of an action, then that actions is liable to have consequences. This is within the basic flexibility of the language being used.

Even if you want to argue with semantics of the grammar - which I won't argue any further, because this is entirely the wrong forum for discussion - the underlying point remains. When a stupid Fighter uses the objectively inferior weapon and anything bad happens as a result of that choice, then the Fighter is at fault. It doesn't matter how small the risk is, because any unnecessary risk is unacceptable.

A much more relevant point, especially at low levels, is that the difference between a d6 weapon and a d8 weapon is noticeable against the sorts of foes that the party might decide to engage. When an enemy has a maximum of 8 Hit Points, and your bonus is +3, you have a 33% chance of dropping the enemy in one hit with the club, but a 50% of succeeding with a warhammer. It's not some corner-case scenario that's unlikely to ever happen during actual play! It's a very real probability that it actually will make the difference, at least once, before the characters get to a high enough level that the impact diminishes.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

But why should we be bound by discrimination in-game? RPGs are still escapism, in the real world people quickly label you incompetent at the slightest flaw or sign of weakness.

For a lot of people, the escapism in an RPG comes in the form of a power fantasy - we want to be powerful, so we play characters who are powerful. It's more true of D&D, in general, than it is of something like Call of Cthulhu.

I'm not saying that everyone has to play a competent character, but if you expect the other (presumably competent) characters to put up with your incompetence, then you need to give them a good reason. If you're just new to the system, and you don't know how to make a competent character, then the other players should help you with that until you get the hang of things.

If the game is complicated and full of traps and it requires an inordinate amount of work in order to understand the system well enough to build a competent character, then that's not generally a system I would recommend.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I'm not saying it was wrong, because you were just a kid, but what you are describing is not role-playing. You were making decisions based on your own, out-of-character opinion of what is cool. Role-playing is defined as making decisions from the character's perspective.

The in-character perspective would be to look at what the character knows, and determine what the character would do based on that information. The character can observe that a long sword causes more grievous wounds than a short sword does, increasing the chance of felling an opponent, without a meaningful depreciation of applicability. The character can see that muscle mass improves the ability to wield a long sword, in ways that nimbleness does not, and thus chooses to exercise in the appropriate fashion such as to gain Strength +2 upon hitting level 4.

The characters are aware of the in-game reality which the rules reflect, and given that I won't make a character who is suicidally incompetent, there is no conflict between Optimization and Role-Playing. A character who chooses a sub-optimal weapon, merely because it is "cool", is a fool and a liability that shall not be suffered by the other individuals in the group.

Seriously, building an incompetent character is a jerk move to everyone else at the table. Don't do that. If you fail to kill the dragon because your sword only does a d6 instead of a d8, and then the dragon breathes fire and kills the whole party, then that TPK is entirely your fault and you should feel bad. There are millions of ways to build and play a character that isn't incompetent; it is not a meaningful limit on your freedom of expression.

I disagree with all of this, role-playing means not always making the perfect choice... in the real world I even know some choices I made were bad ones... I should eat healthy, and I know that if I combined that with exercise I would live longer... BUT I like five guys double bacon burgers, and play games instead of work out... by your logic I am not making the right choices...

 

[The Lich]

I stand by statement.

You shouldn't, because you're simply wrong, and falsifying what was said. Let's take it step by step:

First, you said:

My character might have a problem with another character, if the actions of the latter are liable to get the former killed. This is an in-game matter. No reason to drag the players into it [emphasis mine].

You then said:

The likelihood that it will actually matter whether it's a d6 mace or a d8 warhammer is pretty small for any given encounter (probably less than 1%) [emphasis mine].

I pointed out that this amounts to a flat out contradiction. If an action is liable to have a certain result, then by definition that means it is likely to produce that result. But an action that has less than a 1% chance of having a certain result is not, by any stretch of the imagination, likely to produce that result, and is therefore not liable to do so.

You then threw in to the discussion an utter red herring: the fact that "liable" can also mean "legally responsible," which has absolutely no relevance to the point I made, due to the fact that the meaning involved in your initial use of the term is not that one, but rather the "likely result" meaning (as your own statement makes abundantly clear: "The likelihood that it will actually matter ...").

So rather than simply admit that you contradicted yourself, and that you're making an issue out of a player's choice that would have, according to your own reckoning, a less than 1% chance of having any noticeable impact on the party's chances of success, you decide to double down on your misguided assertions. So be it. I have no patience for this sort of dishonest attempt to avoid admitting you were just wrong.