D&D 5E How do you define “mother may I” in relation to D&D 5E?

[Maxperson]

I have to say this varies considerably. I've met GMs who hate surprises (because they like things to be planned or they feel more comfortable running things that they've had time to think through, but met just as many GMs who love surprises. Personally I much prefer my players to surprise me.

Same here. It's not rare for my players to completely veer into unforeseen directions. Usually I can just roll with it and we continue on. I've become pretty good at improvising until I can get on more solid footing. Occasionally they veer so hard that I have to tell them that I can't do what they want justice without taking time to think about it and prepare, so we stop the session and pull out board games for the rest of the night.

 

[tetrasodium]

Well said. I agree. I would add that there's something that seems fundamentally flawed about arguing against Mother May I by constantly citing the passages in the book that one believes point to the GM as the absolute authority as @Maxperson is doing.



Can't these examples ever be kept to like a reasonable and likely sort? Do we really need to add in world-hopping just in an attempt to win some kind of technical win?

like this actual play one?
I was running an eberron game in 5e long before rising from the last war. Iirc it was even before xge levels of before. I took the time to explain the brosd strokes of khorvaire and told everyone that I needed some character ideas of what raxe/class/background they ware thinking so I can explain relevant bits in more detail without overloading everyone.

• bob: I want to play a drow noble who serves lloth (I forget what it's not important)
• gm: ok drow get into xendriik the giants and a whole lot of stuff that would take a lot to cover. Lloth isn't a thing & the drow are super different. I'd be willing to allow elf but would be an elf from valenar. Most people know that the valenar elves were basically mercanaries who seized territory from their employer the minute things got chaotic and won't trust you. Also elven nobles would be pretty different because of the foreign culture of ancestor worship and all so most people won't care that you are a "noble" and might even scoff at it as if you declared yourself an officer in a military known for misdeeds. In short the player was very much told that he would be treated like a stereotypical orc from the or. Warband that conquered a nearby county and hadn't bothered to shower since.
• needless to say it was expected in detail with lots of specifics & attempts to suggest the there choices plus a few questions.
• Once play started the player ignored everything and often found himself treated worse than the commoner party members getting upset with me when he pushes even after a servant dismisses situationally unreasonable claim of privilege
• an example is the group wanting to visit someone important at one of the dragonmark enclave houses while low level. At the gate they weren't getting too much credit from the urchin sorcerer's initial efforts only to have the elf noble make things worse by showing his noble signet ring or something. Eventually a dragonmarked pc apologizes for his useful servants and is able to get the party inside where they are taken to a waiting room.
• players are told they are made to wait a few hours and can hear things going on in the distance but eventually in the afternoon a servant brings a simple meal of breads and mest/cheeses type of thing explaining someone would be with them as soon as there is a break in matters.
• mind you that most of the group is expressing some form of "OK cool" but Bob is playing Mr elf noble and proceeds to push his noble status again. "oh we have a room in the next building special for you". Smelling a trap he makes sure to bring his weapons but the servant scoffs a"'typical" or something and shows him to a small building with an inside decorated in valenar style but no food no drink. Soon after someone unlocks the door & tosses in a sack of hard (stale) bread before quickly locking it again.
• someone important came to meet the rest of the party and the npc suggested not bringing back"your elf"* to which the party enthusiastically agreed without a moment of thought. .

The example is getting pretty long but the player never quit trying to play the noble card in ways he knew and was warned were not going to be helpful for the next year or so of that campaign.

*remember at the gate the dragonmarked pc claimed that the elf pc was one of his servants.

 

[Maxperson]

The GM is perfectly capable of crafting a believable version of failure and a believable version of success.

That's the key right there. It's NOT believable for the noble on Toril to fall for something he KNOWS to be so against the odds as to be statistically impossible. Imagine if a man who looked completely human knocked on your door tomorrow claiming to be from Ceti Alpha VI. There isn't a reasonable way you could come to believe him.

That's what is happening in the example of a noble from Mystara going to Toril and knocking on the door of the local lord and asking to stay there.

Overriding that seems very questionable.

Quite the opposite.

What is irrational about a noble recognizing kindred and honoring custom?

It's irrational to think that something that is statistically impossible is happening, rather than thinking that it is a scam of some sort which under those circumstances is statistically incredibly probable.

 

[Maxperson]

Well said. I agree. I would add that there's something that seems fundamentally flawed about arguing against Mother May I by constantly citing the passages in the book that one believes point to the GM as the absolute authority as @Maxperson is doing.

No. This lack of understanding comes up quite frequently in my discussions of RAW. In discussion of RAW, I will argue what the rules say, which is not always 1) how I personally run things in my game, and 2) can often violate the social contract as is the case with the vast majority of Mother May I instances.

The DM CAN tell you that your PC does not swing the sword at the merchant when you declare it. He has the authority to do so. He is also violating the social contract and therefore won't unless he's a jerk that you really don't want to be playing with anyway.

 

[Manbearcat]

I suspect this is a case where "limitations" has some semantic loading that isn't helping the discussion, though I concur its not fundamentally inaccurate.

It’s not only “not fundamentally inaccurate,” it’s fundamentally accurate. It’s literally the field-usage within the discipline and (so far as I’m aware) the typical general usage among folks outside of the discipline.

It’s not clear to me why we would tie ourselves into pretzels using another term which carries less useful information. When I suffer from a particularly bad bout of Insomnia, cognitive limitation is what it suffer from. I mean, I could say “cognitive impairment” for myself when my affliction manifests in its worst form because it isn’t a persistent condition, but I’ve got enough hardships, concerns, and pressing matters that I can’t spare anymore mental bandwidth to worry about dying on that hill (I can’t believe I’ve spent 3 posts on this now!).

 

[Thomas Shey]

It’s not only “not fundamentally inaccurate,” it’s fundamentally accurate. It’s literally the field-usage within the discipline and (so far as I’m aware) the typical general usage among folks outside of the discipline.

It implies incapability where in some of those cases most people would perceive it as lack of desire.

It’s not clear to me why we would tie ourselves into pretzels using another term which carries less useful information.

That's always an argument with words that are accurate but have negative semantic loading. The answer is "How much is it worth it to you to use your preferred term when its going to get pushback because of connotation?" I think there's a tendency to die on the hill of word usage in a lot of online discussion that is counterproductive, but you do you.

 

[Cruentus]

It would be better if they provided a benefit most of the time. However, sometimes it's hard to tell exactly what a Background ability can do for you, and what I've noticed is, the Background abilities sit on your sheet and are often forgotten about, because they don't often immediately apply to common adventuring tasks like skulking around in dungeons or killing monsters.

And I presume many DM's don't take them into account either.

I find this to be a huge problem for me nowadays. Background benefits, the "ribbon" type stuff, which impacts narrative and story more than the crunch gets lost (for me) on the character sheet, buried beneath skills, feats, class abilities, subclass abilities, spells (so many spells), spell like abilities, etc. "Oh, that's right, I have the Noble background, that would have been helpful last week talking with the Duke's knights."

I find that, while its not codified, backgrounds and similar are more impactful when I play and run Old School Essentials. It doesn't get buried, and often gets leaned into in appropriate situations, so its self-reinforcing.

I like, as a DM, using those background ribbons for players as much as possible - Noble background, while allowing access to lodging and hospitality, also gives some knowledge of heraldry, who the nobles and such are in the area (assuming you're not from another plane, and are from nearby that area), knowing appropriate address and manners, etc. And I'll try to remind the player about those things.

 

[Cruentus]

That's the key right there. It's NOT believable for the noble on Toril to fall for something he KNOWS to be so against the odds as to be statistically impossible. Imagine if a man who looked completely human knocked on your door tomorrow claiming to be from Ceti Alpha VI. There isn't a reasonable way you could come to believe him.

That's what is happening in the example of a noble from Mystara going to Toril and knocking on the door of the local lord and asking to stay there.

Quite the opposite.

Yup.

Player: "Good day sir, I am Sir PC, and I wish to lodge here tonight, as I am a Noble."
NPC guard: "You're who? Hold on." Closes door.
NPC Castellan: "Good day. You are who?"
Player: "I'm Sir PC, and I'd like to ask lodging here with your Lord."
NPC Castellan: "What is your family name?" "Where are you from?"
Player: "Sir PC Afterthought. I'm not from around here, I'm from Toril, another planet. But I assure you, I am a Noble."
NPC Castellan: "Ah. I see. I am not familiar with that family. My guard will give you a few silvers, you can see yourself to the Inn in town. He will give you directions."

That's about how it would go. If you're a Noble, your mannerisms, dress, carriage, etc. will mark you out as "noble", but if people don't know you, what does it matter.

I have three Nobles in one game I'm running, all children of local Lords and Knights. One is landless, from a disgraced family who lost their lands in the war (also not the eldest), one the eldest of the local Duke. The other the eldest of one of the Duke's Knights, whose family has responsibility over the village where the players began. So, they're all Noble, they know each other, they know the other Noble families and vice versa. But if they went to the neighboring kingdom, without a letter of introduction, their titles might not mean a whole lot depending on the political situation, and whether their Houses have any kind of rep beyond their own kingdoms borders.

They've asked their parents/Houses for horses, and other equipment/accessories, with no issues. The players have organized feasts, inviting other nobles, military officers they encountered, etc. to their house, etc.. and these are low low level characters. Its been completely collaborative.

Its been super helpful that the players are adding to their Houses, and their interrelationships. It would work less well as a "wandering, itinerant Noble" type character.

 

[hawkeyefan]

That's the key right there. It's NOT believable for the noble on Toril to fall for something he KNOWS to be so against the odds as to be statistically impossible. Imagine if a man who looked completely human knocked on your door tomorrow claiming to be from Ceti Alpha VI. There isn't a reasonable way you could come to believe him. That's what is happening in the example of a noble from Mystara going to Toril and knocking on the door of the local lord and asking to stay there.

But this is why I said we should evaluate a likely example and not an edge case. You've introduced an absurdity to the example and are now dismissing it as absurd.

Forget planar travel for a bit, please.

What's irrational about a noble recognizing kindred and honoring custom? Is this a possible thing? That's really the only question.

 

[Cadence]

What's irrational about a noble recognizing kindred and honoring custom? Is this a possible thing? That's really the only question.

Would a bard who wanted to pass as an unknown minor noble from somewhere else (that is, they are not trying to impersonate someone or be from some place the noble at the castle had heard of before) be able to do it with a knowledge and performance roll, and the right clothing? If so, then it feels like the actual noble certainly should without the roll. If the bard couldn't, then I'd wonder why not.