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Message: <blockquote data-quote="DEFCON 1" data-source="post: 5498837" data-attributes="member: 7006">The irony about all the talk of 'Yes, And' and its roots in improvisation and its usefulness (or lack thereof) in roleplaying... is that despite it being the Golden Rule of improv instruction and the first rule that is taught to aspiring improv performers, at about Hour 7,500 of your 10,000 hours you finally learn--"Hey, you know that 'Yes, And' rule we went on and on about?  It's baloney.  It's not true.  You can actually say 'No' all you want in an improv scene and still have it come out fine, assuming your scene partner also knows what they are doing."Because here's the thing... all saying 'Yes' does is help a less experienced improviser do something that in the long run will help them improvise better, and that is... get over their fear.The main stumbling block to inexperienced improvisers (and inexperienced dungeon masters for that matter) is fear.  Fear of the unknown.  Fear of not knowing where things are going.  Fear of doing the 'wrong thing'.  Fear of upsetting their scene partners or players.  Making a choice has the potential of screwing things up horribly, and it is that fear which usually stops someone from making a choice.  Any choice.  If you don't make a choice, then you can't make a bad one.  If you say 'No'... then you don't have to make a choice, and have that choice possibly be bad.  As a result... most beginning improvisers and DMs say 'No' reflexively, because it's a way to protect themselves from screwing up and making a bad choice.But the thing we learn in improvisation later on (and I think is the point KarinsDad and others are making about DMing, if I understand them correctly) is that sometimes saying 'No' *IS* a choice.  It is a very powerful one.  And it is just as valid a move in improv and roleplaying as saying 'Yes', because the 'no' comes from a position of strength, not a position of fear.  Saying 'No' does not automatically mean the death of the scene, assuming that the person saying it does so to give a Negative Choice, rather than avoid making a choice.  And they are definitely two different things.  No choice means a scene is stalling and not moving... a Negative choice means that a scene is is still moving, just not moving in a specific direction.  But the thing about this though... is that at the beginning it is very hard for new players and improvisers to recognize the difference.  Because if you say 'No'... both players have to be confident in taking this result and running with it.  One has to be in a position of strength within himself to say 'No' as a choice, not as reflexive fear... and the other has to be in a position of strength to immediately (and without getting upset or confused) move around the roadblock... or sometimes even more fun, move directly into the roadblock and see how things play out.  If the players on both sides are on their game, they can 'No' their way through a scene quickly, easily, and without any stalling, problems, or hiccups along the way.  But you have do be really comfortable to do it.  And most new improvisers and roleplayers aren't there to start with.So what many introductory improv teachers and the DMG are trying to do by telling you to say 'Yes, And' is to try and break that reflexive first habit of saying 'No' because of fear and not because of choice.  It's the process of starting off slow... trying to break habits and instincts that have been in place for centuries.  But what's truly important here is that the BEST improv teachers can get their students over their fears and can get them making choices without actually ever teaching them the 'Yes, And' rule, because it's teaching a rule that really doesn't even exist.  And they'd rather just skip over it altogether than give a rule only to eventually take it away.  And for DMs like KarinsDad and the others... it sounds like they follow this same philosophy.So when they say things along the lines of "I wish WotC had written those sections better"... what it sounds like they mean is that they wish WotC could articulate how to get the results that are wanted without needing to actually throw in the artificial rule of 'Yes, And'.  The best improv teachers can do it, and a better-written section of the DMG could possibly have done it too.Although to be perfectly honest... I've seen so few improv instructors who can actually accomplish this that it's exceedingly rare for beginning improv instruction to not include 'Yes, And'.  And I also do not think that a written instruction in a DMG with no possible give and take between the writer and the reader to help explain things could actually get the desired results either.  It's just too hard.  Now like everything else... if there was an experienced DM right there next to the reader to help explain everything as the person was reading the book... then yeah, skipping over the whole 'Yes, And' thing could be done in the DMG.  But the long and the short of it is that the rule is an easier and more understandable shortcut that will usually generate positive results more frequently when all the reader has to go on is just that section of the book.  So I definitely see why WotC included it.</blockquote>

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