D&D 5E How to deal with Metagaming as a player?

[Guest 6801328]

"Meta-gaming" is not really a hard concept to understand for most of us. "Meta" comes from the Greek meaning "beyond" or "after." It has the sense of being outside of a concept, or above the concept. So meta-gaming is what happens when you play the game above or outside the knowledge and traits that your character would have. It's when you play based on the knowledge you have as a player at the table have instead of playing based on the knowledge your character has. It's essentially one of the ways a person is no longer "role-playing."

So when a character is not present to overhear a conversation that another character is having, but then later walks into the scene and starts speaking as though he knows everything about what had been going on (because the player at the table obviously heard the exchange), then yes, that is meta-gaming. There is no way for that character to have known it was an old man, nor any reason why he would form an opinion on whether he should be killed or not.

If you still (and stubbornly so) don't understand what meta-gaming is, then you're on your own. And a person who refused to understand the concept wouldn't be allowed in my game, honestly. That might sound mean and I don't intend to be mean, but if you don't understand what role-playing is and what meta-gaming is, then you should find another game. You should find a game where all the other players don't mind setting the role-playing concept ablaze and stepping all over each other. Sounds like a real crap-show to me. Have fun!

And the meta-gaming concept applies to all sorts of role-playing systems, not just 5e. This whole argument that if meta-gaming is not precisely defined in the newest edition, then the game designers meant to throw out the concept of meta-gaming that has long been understood by most role-players when they designed 5th edition, seems really silly to me.

Does that mean that every time you do some quick math in your head to decide whether to spend Inspiration, or use some other bonus, or whether or not to cast a spell, you're doing some evil metagaming? Because assuredly your character does not know that a d20 is rolled for an attack.

Or can you honestly say that you never think about any of the arithmetic behind the game as you make decisions?

 

[Aldarc]

Has this discussion on metagaming scared away the OP?

 

[Guest 6801328]

This I agree with. Making a puzzle challenge where everyone knows the answer to the puzzle, but has to pretend they don't, isn't a game challenge; it's an improv sketch.

I think this is what secondhander means by "role-playing". It's not about exploring a role and feeling yourself in it, it's about "pretending" to be that person. It's about outward appearances, not inner experience.

There are a number of posters here who seem to think this isn't just a form of roleplaying but the only valid form of roleplaying.

 

[Guest 6801328]

People with different expectations is a breach of the social contract. This doesn't apply blame, but given the social assumptions of all parties are not in alignment where they were previously thought to be so, the social contract has been breached. The evidence is that the solution to such a breach is to amend the social contract -- someone has to change playstyles, or an accommodation in playstyles must be reached, or someone leaves the game.

Social contracts are often unstated and assumed. This is why the advice of a session zero, where you explicitly cover portions of the social contract and achieve buy in, is so widespread and helpful. It avoids these kinds of breaches.

Ok, like I suspected, you're just being pointlessly esoteric. Breach of Social Contract == People Need to Talk. Got it.

"But they're a jerk, too," is rarely a winning or useful argument. Aside from the fact that your statistic is made up, this seems like an attempt to excuse being a jerk so long as someone else can be claimed to be a jerk.

That was a slick turning of the tables.

I was suggesting that the word 'jerk' is subjective and therefore probably not a very useful argument. (I happen to totally agree that the behavior described by the OP falls into the 'jerk' category, but I'm trying to approach this without imposing personal judgments on the playstyle.)

 

[TwoSix]

"Meta-gaming" is not really a hard concept to understand for most of us. "Meta" comes from the Greek meaning "beyond" or "after." It has the sense of being outside of a concept, or above the concept. So meta-gaming is what happens when you play the game above or outside the knowledge and traits that your character would have. It's when you play based on the knowledge you have as a player at the table have instead of playing based on the knowledge your character has. It's essentially one of the ways a person is no longer "role-playing."

To be fair, while using player-only knowledge to make character decisions is certainly metagaming, there's a broad swath of actions that can also be considered metagaming beyond that. Using game narrative information gained outside the auspices of the game play (like overhearing the DM tell another player about a trap the character isn't present for) I would certainly consider poor play, and should certainly be frowned upon.

Taking out of character considerations, and using them to make in-character decisions, is also metagaming, but can be a positive or negative depending on the game system and play style. You have to use metagame considerations to play FATE, for example. And many retro D&D games, for example, also encourage out-of-game considerations; for example, using a poorly rolled character to gather treasure to hand off to their (hopefully better rolled) replacement.

 

[TwoSix]

I think this is what secondhander means by "role-playing". It's not about exploring a role and feeling yourself in it, it's about "pretending" to be that person. It's about outward appearances, not inner experience.

There are a number of posters here who seem to think this isn't just a form of roleplaying but the only valid form of roleplaying.

I'm reasonably sure 99% of roleplayers have no idea of things like player stance and how they inform play, it's fairly esoteric. (And a shame, since knowledge of it has made my roleplaying much better across a spectrum of systems.) I mean, we have posters on this forum who insist that any game with metagame mechanics isn't actually a roleplaying game at all!

 

[iserith]

Another good way to curb metagaming is to set up a system of rewards for players who inform on fellow players when there is metagaming going on. For example, if Comrade Steve notices that Comrade Megan is taking out a flask of alchemist's fire to deal with the troll, having never fought a troll with this character before, or having never otherwise used that alchemist's fire before, you give Comrade Steve some bonus XP when he calls it out. If you're going to police the thoughts of your players, it's important to encourage everyone to spy on others and report possible subversion. With this method, you too can turn your table into a nerdier version of East Germany rather than take 3 seconds to alter the monsters' weaknesses!

 

[machineelf]

This got me thinking. I'm going to provide a scenario and ask you a question, and I like to give you the benefit of the doubt that you will give an honest answer.

As @Arial Black suggested above, about a druid in his party, let's pretend you are the DM. Every day the druid in the group casts water breathing on the whole party. For little or no apparent reason. Other than because he can and has the spell slot to waste.

Now, again remember, you're the DM who has seen this day-in-day-out. Did you ever even think to put a water trap in your adventure in the first place? Or did you metagame and come up with something else?

It can go both ways. I've run into similar things where my group will use leomunds tiny hut all the time. I still would have wild animals try to attack them in the middle of the night even though it's useless, until the animals get bored and go away. Hope that answers that question.

 

[Uller]

It can go both ways. I've run into similar things where my group will use leomands tiny hut all the time. I still would have wild animals try to attack them in the middle of the night even though it's useless, until the animals get bored and go away. Hope that answers that question.

We're playing Ravenloft right now. After two of four PCs went down and the remaining two had to unleash all their spells to avoid a TPK they used leomund's th to take long rest.

I could have been mean and just had Strahd show up and finish them off. He'd have whiped the floor with them in that state.

But since they had not yet enountered him yet I just rolled for random encounters every 15 minutes. Three Strahd Zombies and 15 crawling claws piled up on the hut by the time the spell ended.

 

[machineelf]

I think this is what secondhander means by "role-playing". It's not about exploring a role and feeling yourself in it, it's about "pretending" to be that person. It's about outward appearances, not inner experience.

There are a number of posters here who seem to think this isn't just a form of roleplaying but the only valid form of roleplaying.

No not quite. If we really wanted to go deeper into this topic, I would tell you that there are some gray areas. There are places where you can't get away from meta-gaming. You are rolling dice, after all. There are game mechanics you are thinking about. And yes, I do like to give puzzles to traps or secret doors sometimes, and when that happens it's the players themselves trying to use their minds to figure out the answer, not their characters.

These are things I've thought about and explored before, and I am very comfortable knowing that there aren't always clear lines with these things. I don't mind that.

But, there are some clear lines to me. And if you don't agree, then so be it. Play the game your way. But for me, if I as a DM tell have an NPC tell one character the magic word to open a secret door, and that NPC never tells anyone else, then it crosses a roleplaying line for another character to just somehow know it and use it to open the door. There is some line between player and character when we roleplay, in my opinion. To say there is no line, that we are not playing a role or playing a character when we role-play, is wrong for me.

So no, I do believe that "roleplaying" is "exploring a role and feeling yourself in it." But when you use meta-knowledge to know things your character shouldn't know, or get an edge somehow, then it is inconsiderate to the other role-players, generally speaking.