D&D General How has D&D changed over the decades?

[Hussar]

Though I find Hussar's way interesting, I must admit that this must be done with a specific kind of players with a very specific mindset that is far from common. I would not do this approach with total noobs in RPGs...

Edit: Damn the autocorrector. These were made by the devil I am sure. If I ever get my hands on the imp responsible for these...

Honestly? I find this works best with new players who haven't been taught that having any player side authority is a bad thing. They are far more creative and willing to engage. If you start out this way, it works fantastic.

Now, I'm going to go back into MY OPINION here, and this is not an attack, despite how people are reacting to what I'm saying.

I find that in trad play, players are treated as untrustable. You said it yourself that this style of play would lead to abuse, thus, we need to keep authority in the DM to avoid abuse. Well, if you start from that position, I find that it becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy. You don't trust the players to have authority so, they will do anything they can with what little authority they actually do have, if for no other reasons than to test the limits of that authority.

OTOH, if you start from the point where the players are being specifically entrusted, and any good or bad results are entirely their responsibility, most players will step up and engage because then it's not about fighting authority, but rather working cooperatively.

 

[tetrasodium]

Finally, it's pretty clear that you have no experience with these games, as you say as much in this paragraph. Why, then, with no experience in these games, do you feel you're sufficiently aware of how they work to be able to make these kinds of claims? Heck, there's risk even making that kind of assumption about someone else's D&D game when you've played D&D for decades, and here we're talking about some pretty large changes in how the games even function at a foundational level. Your claims aren't new, either, they're pretty much the normal ones that try to shut down or shut out discussion of other types of games and experiences that can help even if you don't adopt them (because your thinking is broader as is your experience). I recognize this is new to you, and it's a tad unfair to unload, but it's not at all new to me (or the topic) and it's become quite frustrating to hear the same kinds of dismissive assumptions based on ignorance.

[/spoiler]Unless fate is not "one of these games" I don't see anything too untoward in the post from @Helldritch you quoted

Spoiler: fate core Players & Game Masters

In any game of Fate, you’re either a player or a gamemaster. If you’re a player, your primary job is to take responsibility for portraying one of the protagonists of the game, which we call a player character (or “PC” for short). You make decisions for your character and describe to everyone else what your character says and does. You’ll also take care of the mechanical side of your character—rolling dice when it’s appropriate choosing what abilities to use in a certain situation, and keeping track of fate points.

If you’re a gamemaster, your primary job is to take responsibility for the world the PCs inhabit. You make decisions and roll dice for every character in the game world who isn’t portrayed by a player—we call those nonplayer characters (or “NPCs”). You describe the environments and places the PCs go to during the game, and you create the scenarios and situations they interact with. You also act as a final arbiter of the rules, determining the outcome of the PCs’ decisions and how that impacts the story as it unfolds

Both players and gamemasters also have a secondary job: make everyone around you look awesome. Fate is best as a collaborative endeavor, with everyone sharing ideas and looking for opportunities to make the events as entertaining as possible.

To do this, you’ll spend a fate point. You should try to justify your story details by relating them to your aspects. GMs, you have the right to veto any suggestions that seem out of scope or ask the player to revise them, especially if the rest of the group isn’t buying into it.

Anyone at the table is free to suggest when a compel might be appropriate for any character (including their own). GMs, you have the final word on whether or not a compel is valid.

Who can use a situation aspect depends a lot on narrative context—
sometimes it’ll be very clear, and sometimes you’ll need to justify how you’re
using the aspect to make sense based on what’s happening in the scene.
GMs, you’re the final arbiter on what claims on an aspect are valid.

, post: 8607387, member: 6855114"]
Side note: I called my friend to know what the game was that we played. It was Fate in 2004. The first edition of it. It surely has evolved and better itself.
[/QUOTE]

It probably was not Fate. Fate core is 2013, dfrpg was a half step or so back in 2010. sprit of the century is the oldest version of fate I can think of & even that was very much proto fate with a 2006 date. Fate can be pretty tough to get into because the fate core rules are kind of a rules shell that needs to be built off from. Something like dfrpg with it's city & character creation section is probably the best start if much of ther group is familiar with dresden files[/spoiler]

 

[pemerton]

I will say this if your game is primarily oriented around overcoming challenges / adventures / dungeons you do need to be somewhat careful about the parts of the setting players may have a say over.

Agreed. This has come up very early in my Torchbearer game: one of the PCs had an Elven Ranger friend as a component/outcome of PC-building. During the Town Phase, the player tried to Circles up the PC's friend, and failed - and so the PC received a dream in which she saw her Ranger friend taken prisoner by her enemy Megloss (the enemy was also a component/outcome of PC-building).

I now have to make a decision about how much benefit (if any) the player gets from the PC's friendship with the Ranger (in play terms, I am anticipating an encounter with the Ranger's horse as the PCs travel through the wilderness from the town they are in, to the place where Megloss has taken the Ranger prisoner). The player is entitled to some benefit, as the friend is a component of PC build. But the whole play of the game depends upon keeping the PCs (and thus their players) under pressure.

My current thinking is that a Rider check will be needed to calm and take control of the horse, and that the horse will have some supplies, and maybe one interesting/distinctive item, in its saddlebags.

I don't think chamberlains, maids, clerks are good examples though because in most cases those moments feel like a set of hoops to jump through to get to the real adventure. I am somewhat alright with such challenges being obviated on either side of the screen.

Also agreed. This was what I was getting at with my example, upthread, of letting the PC whose player wanted to shame a NPC in debate just find the NPC in town. I don't see the virtue in making a big deal - in play time, or resource consumption - of what are essentially transitional moments for setting up the real action.

 

[Campbell]

So I would not call the sort of play my group tends to engage in story oriented. I really hate "story focused" or "the story" as a descriptor for any sort of roleplaying game analysis. I would say we are character focused. We generally play a mix of traditional (D&D, Exalted, Deadlands, Vampire, L5R) and Powered by the Apocalypse / Forged in the Dark games.

Our central conceit is that we agree on a premise and then create characters together. Then we build a world around them. The point for us to basically find out who these characters are. When we are done with the characters we're basically done with the setting. We have revisited characters and setting, but only when the new game is directly related to a previous game in someway.

 

[Ovinomancer]

[/spoiler]Unless fate is not "one of these games" I don't see anything too untoward in the post from @Helldritch you quoted

, post: 8607387, member: 6855114"]
Side note: I called my friend to know what the game was that we played. It was Fate in 2004. The first edition of it. It surely has evolved and better itself.

It probably was not Fate. Fate core is 2013, dfrpg was a half step or so back in 2010. sprit of the century is the oldest version of fate I can think of & even that was very much proto fate with a 2006 date. Fate can be pretty tough to get into because the fate core rules are kind of a rules shell that needs to be built off from. Something like dfrpg with it's city & character creation section is probably the best start if much of ther group is familiar with dresden files[/spoiler]

Your quote tags are broken -- I added a quote open above to clear it.

FATE is a game I do not like. The reason I do not like FATE is twofold. One, it's has a weird engagement with fiction first such that if a scene is described as being shadowy, it's not sufficient to use that in an action unless a specific tag is present to leverage -- the description in insufficient, it has to be a mechanical tag. You can add the tag through a move, sure, but you have to do this first. To use some piece of fiction in FATE, it has to operationalized in the system.

Second, and larger, is that FATE fails utterly to adequately tell you how to use it, and defaults into a weird middle place where you have a system that tries to do one thing but muddled directions on play that lets you think you can use it for play just like D&D. And, even worse, you can make this happen without a huge headache -- you can play this trad with heavy GM control and the game can work, but the GM is deploying "no" as a tool. Thing is, the system actually works better if you don't do this, and instead follow the play, only setting scenes rather than plot.

So, yeah, I don't like FATE because it's muddled and not a good example of anything. Others like it for this reason. I don't reach for FATE as an example. I will say, though, that if FATE is liked because it gives the GM the same controls as D&D over setting and fiction but ALSO adds the ability for the GM to compel actions, then I'm really checked out.

 

[pemerton]

The proposed play type in which the DMs fully give up his control over the game in not suited for a long term campaign world.

I don't know what "proposed play type" you are referring to, given that no one has described a GM "fully giving up control" over the game world.

But I have GMed campaigns that appear to involve a greater sharing of authority than you allow for that run for many years, and many dozens of sessions.

 

[Campbell]

For what it is worth I consider games like FATE, GUMSHOE (Trail of Cthulhu, Night's Black Agents), and Seventh Sea Second Edition the antithesis of the sort of play I tend to be all about (most of the time) because they play to desired narrative outcomes/arcs.

 

[Hussar]

The proposed play type in which the DMs fully give up his control over the game in not suited for a long term campaign world. A one shot lasting a year or two and then put to the trash bin to start an other one would be more on par with that kind of game. That is what I call a one shot campaign which might last a year or two but rarely goes beyond that if ever. In these, this is where we try new ideas and concepts not necessarily in the core rules but imported from other games. The style Hussar proposes (and you too to a certain point) would be perfect to try in such a campaign. The potential fun is certainly there but I have the distinct feeling that not all players and DMs are and will be able to play this style as it is supposed to be played and will avoid the "I win" buttons for good... But I do admit that concept is interesting as I did use it in my Vampire the Masquerade games (but not tonthenextent proposed here.)

Heh, thanks @pemerton, I missed this on my read through. But, it should be addressed.

I think part of the reason that some people are feeling attacked, when absolutely no attack is meant, is because they are looking at any shared authority as one where "the DMs fully give up his control over the game". AFAIK, absolutely no one is advocating for this. There is a HUGE excluded middle here where the DM's give up a small amount of authority over the game and give it to the players. Being able to add in an NPC is a far cry from fully giving up control.

HOwever, that being said, you do very accurately describe my approach to campaigns. Campaigns are about 2 years (give or take) and once they are done, they are put away and never looked at again, except maybe as the odd Easter Egg in a later campaign. I have zero interest in a campaign that is longer than that. So, from that perspective - this sort of "authority creep" I guess you might call it, simply isn't an issue for me.
But, all that aside, let's be absolutely clear here. I am not advocating that the DM gives up all authority of the game and everyone becomes co-equal DM's at the table. That is very much not how D&D works. I AM however, advocating that the DM cede some authority over the game to the players in order to better engage the players in the campaign.

 

[pemerton]

I will say, though, that if FATE is liked because it gives the GM the same controls as D&D over setting and fiction but ALSO adds the ability for the GM to compel actions, then I'm really checked out.

Agreed on this!

it's has a weird engagement with fiction first such that if a scene is described as being shadowy, it's not sufficient to use that in an action unless a specific tag is present to leverage -- the description in insufficient, it has to be a mechanical tag. You can add the tag through a move, sure, but you have to do this first. To use some piece of fiction in FATE, it has to operationalized in the system.

Marvel Heroic RP/Cortex+ Heroic has this too. (I don't know about other versions of Cortex+/Cortex Prime.) By default, the GM gets up to three Scene Distinctions for free.

In my experience, what it produces is situations that are very "stylised" - that may not be quite the right word, but I can't think of a better one at the moment. The elements that are flagged as Scene Distinctions leap out very prominently.

I found that in my LotR/MERP game using this system, that worked very effectively. JRRT often uses clearly drawn scenes with some key features - White Towers, Swan Boats, Pennants Streaming in the Breeze, etc - and the Scene Distinction approach captures this well.

It can also be used to make features of a scene that are more "dynamic" or "emotional" (again, I'm not sure these are the best words) loom large in play. For instance, I've used Scene Distinctions like Pursued by Giants (in a non-LotR game), In Pursuit of the Orcs, and Uncertain Of What to do Next. These create a clear focus for action - the players declare actions to run down the Scene Distinction, and in the fiction this corresponds to getting away from the Giants, closing on the Orcs, or (like Aragorn at Parth Galen) reaching a decision as to what to do next. The way the system generates consequences - growth of the Doom Pool, and possible adverse consequences on a failed check (mechanically, the "defending" player can spend a resource to turn a successful "defence" into an affirmative effect) - mean that these checks are more than just whittling away by attrition.

It produces quite a different feel in play from something like Burning Wheel or Prince Valiant. Certainly it's less "gritty"!

 

[tetrasodium]

Your quote tags are broken -- I added a quote open above to clear it.

FATE is a game I do not like. The reason I do not like FATE is twofold. One, it's has a weird engagement with fiction first such that if a scene is described as being shadowy, it's not sufficient to use that in an action unless a specific tag is present to leverage -- the description in insufficient, it has to be a mechanical tag. You can add the tag through a move, sure, but you have to do this first. To use some piece of fiction in FATE, it has to operationalized in the system.

Second, and larger, is that FATE fails utterly to adequately tell you how to use it, and defaults into a weird middle place where you have a system that tries to do one thing but muddled directions on play that lets you think you can use it for play just like D&D. And, even worse, you can make this happen without a huge headache -- you can play this trad with heavy GM control and the game can work, but the GM is deploying "no" as a tool. Thing is, the system actually works better if you don't do this, and instead follow the play, only setting scenes rather than plot.

So, yeah, I don't like FATE because it's muddled and not a good example of anything. Others like it for this reason. I don't reach for FATE as an example. I will say, though, that if FATE is liked because it gives the GM the same controls as D&D over setting and fiction but ALSO adds the ability for the GM to compel actions, then I'm really checked out.

I'm not sure what happened to the quote tags either since some of the post seems to have gotten eaten iby the mixup or while trying to fix it in with edit earlier.

That explains why you don't like fate but not what actually supports the playstyle that you seem to be defending in your 2733 response to helldritch or how it functions. There's been a lot of posts about how certain styles of campaign/gm'ing are dictatorial regimes giving players zero agency & so on along with questions about parts of those play/gm styles that frequently seem to lead into why it's a bad or inferior style but precious little about what the distinctly different alternative actually looks like in play & what rule structures support it. How is it distinct & what rules structures enable it to keep functioning?