How Would Your Favorite Game System Handle This?

[Lanefan]

In a perfect world, players would respect in and out of character knowledge and not play on it. My suggestions are ways to use existing rules to help be a gentle reminder to players that they are acting on out of character knowledge. This has a very positive effect of not requiring 'putting a hammer down', as it just alerts them to the bad habit and resolves it via roleplay/rules. So the roleplay is smoother in handling it.

Other than the players are left unsure as to what they can act on and what they cannot. Why introduce that uncertainty when you don't have to?

Each scenario is "bad" by means of the players using out of character knowledge. The first scenario is double bad as it also highlighted sometime tedium in scenarios created by the GM.

Ah, got it. OK.

So, one thing here I like to do is "Assume Character Competency".

If the humans at my table are collaborating in how a given character might want to act or look out for = I am 100% fine with this. We are assuming the character, living, breathing, growing up in that fantasy world - would have a greater understanding and depth of knowledge, than the player who controls them. That character may in fact, have thought of those other things to do that other players are suggesting or helping with... the character is assumed to be competent.

In fact, I go so far as; when Character A is alone in a high-stakes discussion with NPC X, I let any player at the table offer questions or manipulation ideas to the active player of Character A (should that player want such advice, otherwise I shush the others). In a highly collaborative group that enjoys this, it becomes everyone investing in and respecting other players and their characters.

In my experience both as DM and player the bolded is NEVER the case, leading to an immediate and nasty argument when such advice is given by those who just can't keep quiet.

As long as the game feels like it has: stakes, there is sense of danger and consequence, and the plot is interesting and the NPCs are engaging = I don't care how the players share or act on out of character info. I got what I wanted = a really fun game

Part of the fun for all of us is maintaining a vague sense of in-character realism. Obviously it's never perfect but that's no reason not to try.

It could be seen as a "Yellow Flag of a GM" who is likely too controlling or too insecure about their plot. There are possibly other issues of a GM who would panic over players engaging with the game collaboratively.

I will also re-state - players who wantonly take out of character knowledge to 'win' or choose their actions; are likely acting in response to a GM who is too adversarial.... but that's just my opinion on the matter...

I expect a certain degree of adversariality (is that even a word?); the players are trying to win and the GM, in role of referee, tries to keep things fair as per the rules of the game.

Let's never forget that the GM always acts on out of character knowledge...

While true, I think it's still on the GM to run the setting's NPCs true to what those NPCs would know, as best as possible. It's one of the real differences between being GM and player: a player can inhabit the mind of the character and stop there while the GM always has to look at the bigger picture.

note; none of this is a dig at you, I am just talking to the OP concepts overall.

Didn't take it as a dig, we're all good.

 

[aramis erak]

Did they never get around to making the add-on setting rules sets available? I was a backer so I got them, but after running a campaign I decided outside of a few selective campaign types it wasn't my jam after all, so I haven't paid attention beyond that (I know there was some controversy about what was and wasn't delivered and how Cam Banks handed it off to the current owner, but again, by that point I didn't much care).

The ones I've seen (aside from Hammerheads) are Tales of Xadia and one other, both of which are sold as preadapted cores.
They finally let me access the core book again (I bought after the KS but before the handoff), but never let me know.

 

[Thomas Shey]

The ones I've seen (aside from Hammerheads) are Tales of Xadia and one other, both of which are sold as preadapted cores.
They finally let me access the core book again (I bought after the KS but before the handoff), but never let me know.

The ones I was referring to where all adaptations too; I phrased it badly. I don't consider that entirely trivial though, having constructed a Prime campaign and concluding I'd tried to cut a few too many corners.

 

[Golden Bee]

For an example from yesterday's game, the target (The Duke of Windsor) was out sightseeing and shooting with a party of British expatriates in 1940 Gambia. His party had looked at one of a large cluster of stone circles, and was strolling towards another where there was a large crowd of natives, for reasons that weren't obvious.

A group of Europeans come running towards him, not holding weapons, who seem quite concerned about something. The two who arrive first, quite puffed out, are two of the crew of the aircraft that's taking him to the Bahamas, in a long series of flights. They've been quite helpful, and they explain, with a successful Diplomacy roll, that the natives are holding a funeral for someone important. They quote the Ancient Roman adage about not interfering with subject people's religion unless it's really necessary, and suggest watching respectfully from a distance.

This seemed like a reasonable idea, and the Duke was able to use his military training to point out a small hill that offered a good view. The new arrivals (the PCs) then broke out gin, whisky and good cigarettes to keep the Duke's party entertained.

Nothing special happens if one character is in combat and others aren't. If an alarm is raised, the infiltrator may well try to exploit people moving around to get further in, or escape, without being noticed. The heavy may well try to ambush the villain; the over-watcher presumably has ranged attacks, and so on.

I love the saga of this darn Duke!

 

[Gorgon Zee]

And to the degree people are okay with that, it does indeed solve the problem--largely by washing out most of the details where the issue comes up. How satisfactory doing that is, is however not a standard with people, especially when the process has impacts on other elements that will be played out in detail.

Sorry, I’m not really clear on what you are getting at here. Is it that you think that the act of using actions to accomplish a task, by itself, makes the actions themselves less flavorful, or maybe using fewer mechanical options than if they were done outside such a framework? Perhaps an example showing how the framework makes the details less fun would help.

To me, it seems that if you have a scene that you run for say, 30 minutes, if it’s a set of actions in a skill challenge, or to overcome a set of FATE obstacles will feel pretty much the same as the same 30 minute scene outside of such a framework. Certainly the framework makes it possible to run faster if you want to elide details, but surely that’s a good thing — allowing the GM more control of pacing?

 

[Gorgon Zee]

To the bolded: how do you prevent players (ab)using kowledge their characters don't and can't have, when making their next moves?

And as a player, I don't ever want to have to do this. I want to be able to use the knowledge I have as a player to its fullest extent, on the basis that I know what my character knows and if there's something I don't know but should, I can ask for more description or detail. I also want to be able to use my player knowledge unfettered by having to compensate for that player knowledge exceeding what my character can know; because any such compensation might be too little, too much, or just right and I'll never know which.

Two answers to this.

The first is simple — I trust my players and they don’t abuse it. I wouldn’t play with people who do. I mean, we’re playing a game of let’s pretend where people are continually trying to behave in a way that is not their (player) nature, and if a player cannot handle this, honestly, they are just not a good player. Let me be clear — I completely understand they may not want to (as you do not want to), but I’m pretty sure you could.

And this is especially true for the heist drama which is quite formulaic. If player A fails their “scan for guards” check, how hard is it for player B to say “well, dang, this is probably not going to work, but my character would definitely trust A’s skill and walk into the next room”? In my experience, the overwhelming majority can. And this includes home games, games at conventions, narrative games, heavy games — pretty much all the time.

But more than that, if your goal is “I want to be able to use my player knowledge unfettered by having to compensate for that player knowledge exceeding what my character can know” then you are doomed from the start! You have so much more experience and so different knowledge than your character does that you are going to be highly fettered from the get-go. Playing a medieval game must be a terrible chore for you — you know all kinds of physics, economics, science, geography that your character has no idea about. And if the game is set in a historical period or in a known IP, that knowledge is fantastically relevant.

Unless you are playing a version of yourself in a game set in your area, in the present day, the amount of player knowledge you are having to suppress or ignore is enormous, compared to the knowledge you get from observing another player’s interactions. Maybe it feels different to you, or you have so much experience with ignoring player knowledge that you don’t even notice it any more, but every time you play a game in a medieval setting and don’t invent gunpowder you absolutely are NOT able to use you player knowledge unfettered by having to compensate for that player knowledge exceeding what your character can know.

TLDR: you are already suppressing a ton of player knowledge. Adding a little bit to that doesn’t increase the amount you need to suppress significantly, and experienced players should be able to do it easily.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Sorry, I’m not really clear on what you are getting at here. Is it that you think that the act of using actions to accomplish a task, by itself, makes the actions themselves less flavorful, or maybe using fewer mechanical options than if they were done outside such a framework? Perhaps an example showing how the framework makes the details less fun would he

A little bit of the latter, and a little bit of lumping of a bunch of interconnected actions reduces ability to make meaningful decisions.

Regarding the latter, if you have one resolution event in a process, the (unless you have very complex task declaration, and ideally one that does so in steps) then you have less choices than when you have four. This is why very few combat systems do "Resolve this process in this one mechanical step to see if you win or lose"; it reduces the ability to change tact in mid course (of course when you have multiple steps you usually need to set up the process so that one failed roll or other resolution doesn't mean the whole process fails, too)

To me, it seems that if you have a scene that you run for say, 30 minutes, if it’s a set of actions in a skill challenge, or to overcome a set of FATE obstacles will feel pretty much the same as the same 30 minute scene outside of such a framework. Certainly the framework makes it possible to run faster if you want to elide details, but surely that’s a good thing — allowing the GM more control of pacing?

That's the common perception, but its also, in my opinion, what ends up making many games feel so combat-centric because GMs get in the habit of doing that eliding. It also doesn't intrinsically help with the fact not all the separate processes logically take the same length of time; some may well be simpler or more complex than others.

 

[RenleyRenfield]

I expect a certain degree of adversariality (is that even a word?); the players are trying to win and the GM, in role of referee, tries to keep things fair as per the rules of the game.

This is totally fair, and a good distinction I would highlight.

In session 0 of games it can be a great time to bring up typical expectations since what you have there is a valid game style, and absolute no GM adversity is a thing in other groups too.

It may be that some folks don't have that quick chat, and that can be what leads to mismatch in what players and GM each thing they can/supposed/allowed to do.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

My weapon of chioce is Dungeon Carwl Classics, and it would handle this situation fine.

The character on watch would make the occasional Luck check (rolling their Luck score or lower on a d20) to notice anyone coming by. Alternately, I might call for an Intelligence check (with probably a DC 10 or so) if the character was taking specific actions that might warrant using that ability instead. These checks are contingent upon 1) there actually being something happening while the character is on watch, and 2) that happening not being revealed by other mechanics (such as an enemy blowing a roll trying to sneak up on the party).

The Face character could make a Personality check (again, probably at a DC of 10 or so) to keep the villain occupied/distracted, though I'd be open to a different kind of ability check or even a different apprach (such as a spell) depending on what exactly the character was doing. I don't like using dice to determine social interaction if I can avoid it, but generally if there's a chance of failure at any task I'll ask for a check of some kind unless success (or for that matter failure) is just too entertaining based on what the character was actually attempting.

The Heavy would be fine. No need for a check there.

The character searching for the Thing would make an Intelligence check or a Luck check, depending on which gave them better odds, unless the character was a Thief or Halfling, in which case they have pother abilities that might come into play. For that matter, a spoellcaster doing the searching could use their magic if they had something applicable.

In a low-level scenario I'd use side initiative, but if its a level 2 or higher situation I'd have a separate initiative roll for each character. Unless there was something causing a potential problem, the Heavy wouldn't need to do much of anything until the fight started, at which point they'd probably take center stage. I have characters get separated from each other on occasion, and it's never been an issue beyond making my job as a Judge more challenging.

DCC RAW doesn't do opposed checks, so a Thief (for example) makes a roll against a static DC to successfully sneak, climb a wall, pick a lock, whatever.

DCC is such a smooth system. The Crawl zine Bard class has specific abilities that would be useful for a face character in that scenario, but otherwise, yes, a simple Personality check would make the most sense.

 

[hawkeyefan]

This is totally fair, and a good distinction I would highlight.

In session 0 of games it can be a great time to bring up typical expectations since what you have there is a valid game style, and absolute no GM adversity is a thing in other groups too.

It may be that some folks don't have that quick chat, and that can be what leads to mismatch in what players and GM each thing they can/supposed/allowed to do.

Definitely the kind of thing that should be discussed before play begins.

But as someone who just doesn’t worry about this stuff, I can confirm it’s never had a negative impact on my game.