D&D 3E/3.5 In Favor of 3.5, With One Reservation.

[Celebrim]

Yes, they designed this into the 3E rules, whether they really understood that they were promoting this effect or not. But, you can design it right back out without breaking things.

Honestly, I think that you can design it right back out with out changing things. From your example, I believe you are assuming that the rules work in ways that they don't actually work.

You can change what skills like search, spot, and listen can actually be used for and how.

Player 1, "I search the room. I rolled... 29!"
DM, [without rolling dice] "You find nothing obvious."

Once again, there are claims being made here about the system and how to change it that are dependent upon already having broken the rules as written. Under RAW, the proposition, "I search the room.", is strictly speaking against the rules. The search skill does not allow 'rooms' to be searched. It is often used that way, I agree, and we could argue over the legitimacy of wanting to use it that way, but strictly from an evaluation of the rules, "I search the room" is not a rules proposition and is probably too vague both as an in game proposition and as a rules proposition. Indeed, it is more vague as a rules proposition than it is as a game proposition. The correct response in most cases by the DM is not, "You find nothing.", but rather, "I need more concrete information about what you are doing than that. I need to know who searches where, and in what order, and how you intend to get from the square you are standing in to other parts of the room. Otherwise, it will be impossible for me to ajudicate what happens under the rules because I won't know exactly what you are doing."

Player 2, "I search the walls looking for secret door triggers, see if I can move the strange rock, look under the heavy carpets. I rolled only 18 though."

It's important to note that this proposition, while for the most part an informative one and closer to being consistant with the rules, still is potentially too vague. Not to put too fine a point on it, but by the rules search allows you to examine by sight and touch a 5'x5' area. I 'search the walls' can be in this case extremely vague:

a) If there is a trap along one of the walls, we may need to know the order in which the walls will be searched. This is particularly important with multiple searchers. Similarly, if there is something to be discovered on one wall, say a warning, that might alter the way in which the player searches the rest of the room, we really need to know whether he searches the west or east wall first and whether when he searches that particular bit of wall how close of attention he pays. More on that later.
b) If there is a time element involved (the PC doesn't know it, but goblin reinforements will enter the room in 20 rounds) and there is a secret door in the walls, we certainly need to know the order in which the walls are searched.
c) If more than one thing is to be discovered, a single die roll probably will not suffice for the whole room. If the player rolls a 20, you may not want the result to be 'you find everything in the room', and conversely if he throws a 1, you may not want the illogical result of 'you find nothing' when some of the things are rather obvious. Did the 18 apply to the walls, or to the rock?
d) If the walls are 20' high and something beyond reach is hidden, it is not clear how 'I search the walls' necessarily finds the thing. Did the player climb the walls? Did he crawl on someones shoulder? Did he observe the upper wall only at a distance? Or did he fail to consider the possibility at all?
e) The player has just specified a very extended period of action. For a 30' x 30' room, the player has probably just specified 70+ rounds of action, including searches and moving carpets around. The big problem with this is that sometimes you won't be able to answer this proposition because of spending or inserted propositions by other players. It would be highly appropriate at this point to ask the other players exactly what they will be doing for the next 7 minutes or so. Worse yet, if the player had implied he was taking 20 on the search by leaving off the die roll, he may not have realized that he's just specified two hours of going over the room meticulously. You'll probably want to clarify that as well.

Then don't just LET them roll dice alone. Insist that their roll be accompanied by some description of what they might be doing.

I thuroughly agree, but in the case of search, so does the rules. Search has some extreme complexities that I've discussed in other threads, and neither the old school nor the new school methodology is fully acceptable in all situations, but I believe you've created a very bad example of demostrating that. A much better example is created when the player actually abides by the rules but is vague about what the search of the 5'x5' area entails in the situations where you know that the details are important, but the player cannot know that. Handling that without passing metagame information is extremely difficult, because suddenly we want granularity that we previously didn't need. And again, even your understanding of the rules suggests you are used to using very low granularity. Another equally bad problem is that the RAW aren't actually as explicit as I've just been here in that they are rather vague about whether searching means 'touching'. That is, can you search a doorknob without touching it? Equally bad is that they are vague on the level of interaction involved. You'll need to create concrete expectations for your players about what, "I search X" will be interpretted as. For example, in your case, the player very helpfully provided actions to go along with his inspection, but you'll need an understanding of whether, "I search the rock" implies, "I lift/move the rock", or simply, "I stand close to the rock and look at it." And frankly, that would be true if "I search the rock" is used as a proposition in 1e as well.

Old School gaming is not what version of the game you play - it is how you choose to play it.

This statement is a special case of Celebrim's Second Law, and hense I completely agree with it.

 

[Water Bob]

Thinking more about this, it sounds to me like you are better served for what you want by actually adhering closer to the RAW.

Yes, I don't really like straying too far from RAW. I used to do that all the time (in fact, I think 1E AD&D encourages a DM to do so), but I think in a game as tightly packed as 3.0/3.5, the DM who strays opens himself up too much to the Rule of Unintended Consequences.

I rarely use house rules anymore (though I speculate a lot on changing the rules).

As I previously indicated, although almost everyone does it, the RAW don't actually allow you to use Diplomacy to make 'persuade' checks.

I don't think I agree with you here. The Diplomacy rules clearly allow a character to change an NPC's attitude towards them. That's persuasion. Under the "Check" section of the skill, it says, "You can change the attitudes of others (NPC's) with a successful Diplomacy check...".

On top of this, the skills in the game are typically viewed as being quite broad in scope. Putting skill points into the Appraise skill, for example, makes you an expert in a wide variety of appraisal situations. The same throw would be used to appraise an antique sword, a diamond, a painting, or the quality of a mansion/house. The Ride skill covers riding all things that can be ridden, even though riding a horse is a bit different than riding a camel is different from riding a griffon, dragon, or giant bat.

Therefore, it's seems to me to be well within the scope of the Diplomacy skill to use it on all persuasion based checks. If you can persuade an NPC to like you better with the skill, then certainly the skill can be used to convince the gate guard to admit you to the town after sundown.

One thing that I find very handy is having a legal pad beside me that briefly summarizes all the rolls I might want to make for the players in secret.

Yes, I've kept this practice as a GM, no matter what RPG I'm playing.

Yes, they designed this into the 3E rules, whether they really understood that they were promoting this effect or not.

As much work and playtest that they put into 3.0/3.5, I'd like to think that they did know what they were doing. But, you're correct is that there is a chance that they never realized the effect of some of their game design choices had on the game.

Player 1, "I search the room. I rolled... 29!"
DM, [without rolling dice] "You find nothing obvious."
Player 2, "I search the walls looking for secret door triggers, see if I can move the strange rock, look under the heavy carpets. I rolled only 18 though."
DM, [satisfied that player 2 is putting forth roleplaying effort, unlike player 1] "There are no secret door triggers but under the rock is a small depression holding a sack of 5 gems and under the carpet is a trap door."

True, but I think I'll eliminate the roll all together. After participating in this thread, I think I'm convinced that allowing roleplaying to trump die rolling is the way to go to get the flavor of game I think best.

Yet, the stats will still be important, because half of the time, even though the default is to RP, I'll roll enough encounters that putting skill points into skills won't be moot. And, even when RPing, I think considering a character's skill level (not rolling) should skew roleplaying.

This way, you don't ever really have a suave CHR 5 Half-Orc. If the player RP's him that way, I'll prbably say something like, "That's the way you came across in your head. And, if the recipient of your dialogue were another half-orc, you were probably quite suave. But, you were talking to an elven gate guard, and all he really sees is a sniveling, animalistic monstrosity--a freak of nature--no matter what you say."

Old School gaming is not what version of the game you play - it is how you choose to play it.

This comment struck me wrong, at first, Then, I read it again, and I don't think I really understand your intent. Care to elaborate further?

 

[Eldritch_Lord]

Two points.

1) Trying to turn things into a rolling vs. roleplaying dichotomy is really losing out on a lot of benefits of the 3e system. If you roleplay everything out, that can be good for immersion, but players whose characters are supposed to be suave and charming might feel like their stats are put to waste. If you roll for everything, then you do a good job ensuring that charismatic, diplomatic characters are portrayed as such and uncharismatic, undiplomatic characters are portrayed as such, but players who prefer to talk things out feel pulled out of the game. If you roleplay everything up until a deciding roll, players might feel that their roleplaying doesn't mean as much if the dice decide everything.

So here's my tip: don't make rolling an either/or proposition. Don't choose between chatting up a commoner and having the player roll Gather Information; roll Gather Information for the PC and use the result to shape how warily the commoner responds and what he's willing to share. Don't choose between asking the merchant about the sword's quality and having the player roll Appraise; roll Appraise for the PC and use the result to give the player information between the merchant's patter.

The problem you run into where a low Bluff undercuts good RPing or a character feels his +11 Diplomacy went unrecognized is solved if you roll Bluff first and play to that. If you know you rolled a 30 for your Bluff, you're going to RP a lot differently than if you know you rolled a 10, and the conversation is going to flow a lot better than if you RP worthy of a 30 but roll a 10 or vice versa. Likewise, instead of having either long, drawn-out conversations or quick summaries, you can tailor the length of the RP to the roll; if you know the NPC will be uncommunicative, you can keep the conversation short, whereas if you know the NPC is a bit gruff but ultimately helpful you can draw it out a bit more.

As several have said already, you shouldn't be deciding between RPing and letting the dice decide, you should be using the dice to guide your RPing, which will (I think) result in a more cohesive and satisfying experience overall.

2) You mentioned that checks should only be used when characters have knowledge players don't. This is true, but that's the case for all stats, really. If your player doesn't know that an infinity symbol means an artifact sword you roll Appraise, but what if the same player doesn't know about Damascus steel or proper blade care or the like? Why do you avoid rolling Appraise if the player knows about blades but not, say, avoid rolling Tumble if your player knows gymnastics? Yes, you've said you take Int and modifiers and such into account, but the skill itself is exactly how you should know what the character does or doesn't know--if he rolls low on Appraise, it looks like he didn't know about Damascus steel after all, and you don't have to sit there and ponder if it's something he'd know based on ranks and Int, the dice just tell you.

As some mentioned already, a shy-in-real-life player playing a confident character uses Bluff and Diplomacy rolls to mediate his interactions, and NPCs might find a shy-but-Charismatic character likable and an outgoing-but-unCharismatic character unlikeable; you make the rolls and take their actions into account, even if the actions aren't what you'd expect of a charming bard. So why force a character who can't think of how a trap might work or be hidden to find them without the benefit of Search checks? As Celebrim pointed out, you can't really just say "I search the room; 35 Search!", you need more information than that, so allowing someone to say "I search the door, looking for traps. Search 22," instead of "I search the door, looking for hidden spikes in the lock, contact poison on the doorknob, pressure plates in the door jamb...." can only be beneficial.

 

[Water Bob]

1) Trying to turn things into a rolling vs. roleplaying dichotomy is really losing out on a lot of benefits of the 3e system.

I haven't been saying "either/or" at all. Several times I've said that a good DM will keep the pulse on his game and know when to use roleplaying and when not to.

I don't want to make throws and then roleplay off of that. I've tried that, and I don't like how it breaks the smooth flow of the game.

As I've said earlier, I think roleplaying should trump dice throws. I want to take the game back to the player, not the dice. I want my players thinking and solving problems, not rolling dice.

So, whenever a situation pops up, the default is to roleplay it out. But, a good GM is a good story teller, and there certainly is a place for dice rolling. Therefore, default first to RPing the situation, but if that feels wrong, or the GM thinks this will bog down the game, then cover it with a dice throw and move on.




Let's look at an example:

The PCs approach the town at sundown. "Who goes there," asks the guard atop the battlements. We go straight into RPing the enounter. That's the default. No dice are thrown. The players are masters of their own fates.

The next night, and the night after that, the PCs find themselves in similar situations at each village. Well, it's just not fun to repeat a similar encounter so soon after the first. The players wouldn't enjoy that at all. Getting into the town at night becomes drudgery. The GM should know this and have the story-telling chops to just let the second and third nights be dealt with using Diplomacy checks. A quick dice throw, and the GM says, "It's a similar situation that you had at the last town, but you sweet talked the guard and got inside."

The GM guides the game between RP moments and dice rolling moments just as he does guiding the game between scenes and combat scenarios measured in six second rounds.





Yet...even when roleplaying, stats and skills will be important. They should skew the GM's RP even if no die throw is made. This way, you don't ever really have a CHR 5 half-orc coming across as suave to a lofty, stuck-up, civilized noble NPC, unless the player comes up with something extremely convincing in his roleplay.

GM: "That's the way you came across in your head. And, if the recipient of your dialogue were somebody other than this stuck up noble, you might have half a chance at coming off as suave in spite of being perceived as an uncivilized savage. But, you were talking to this dandy, all he really sees is an uncouth, uncivilized freak of nature not worthy of his attention."

This way, I think both rolls of RPing and skill checks are served.

 

[Greenfield]

In my opinion, the RP of a situation should give circumstance modifiers to the dice roll, not replace it.

I really want to encourage my players to get involved in the story, in their characters, but I have to acknowledge that not everyone is comfortable or even good at persuasion.

We had a player join our group briefly, and his Rogue was trying to steal a horse. It started to make a fuss, and the player said, "I stuff some jerky in his mouth.", meaning to give it a treat.

Horses don't eat meat, a fact that the player either didn't know or never considered. I didn't declare his effort a flat failure, I just asked for the Handle Animals check. I presumed that his character, who had spent points in skills, might well know more than the player in this situation. (Note that I would have called for that check no matter what he tried to feed the horse.)

Well, it turns out our would be horse thief had no points in Handle Animal, and none in Ride either. So the entire scene was an exercise in bad professional decisions, and his dice were as bad as his skill points.

Had he had a good idea I would have given him a +2 on his roll. As it was I didn't have to bother with the -2.

The point is, I don't require that a player have a Red Cross certification in First Aid to make a Heal check. I don't require that they be good actors or persuasive speakers to use a Diplomacy skill. They don't need to know a thing about horses to use Handle Animal or Ride.

But it helps.

 

[Water Bob]

I really want to encourage my players to get involved in the story, in their characters, but I have to acknowledge that not everyone is comfortable or even good at persuasion.

I prefer to roleplay "in character", and I try to do that as much as I can. Sometimes I'll use just the right accent and nail the character. Sometimes, I just sound silly.

For better or worse, my group has gravitated to roleplaying using a narrative voice rather than in first person. Stuff like, "Well, I tell him that if I don't get inside the town tonight, he's going to have a bloody mess outside the gates when the hoard of trolls get here." Stuff like that. Not as good as "in character first person", but it's roleplaying.

The one benefit of roleplaying this way is that you hardly ever run into anybody who is not comfortable or good at it. Although I encourage it, we don't always (or force a player) to roleplay in first person, and therefore, it happens and it doesn't, as the situations come and go.

But, it's easy to roleplay that way.

We had a player join our group briefly, and his Rogue was trying to steal a horse. It started to make a fuss, and the player said, "I stuff some jerky in his mouth.", meaning to give it a treat.

Horses don't eat meat, a fact that the player either didn't know or never considered. I didn't declare his effort a flat failure, I just asked for the Handle Animals check. I presumed that his character, who had spent points in skills, might well know more than the player in this situation. (Note that I would have called for that check no matter what he tried to feed the horse.)

I think you handled this brilliantly, and I'd probably do the same in that position. In the past, instead of a roll, I just said, "Well, horses don't eat meat. Do you have any carrots on you?" And, then, go on with the game as if the character had never said jerky. But, I like the roll in this situation.

Then again, it's quite fun for a player to make a roleplay flub. GM: "The horse spits out the jerky, almost untouched, onto the ground."

This keys the player in to that he's got to try something else. Sometimes, the situation is quite funny. I've been known to play this way as well.

The point is, I don't require that a player have a Red Cross certification in First Aid to make a Heal check.

I don't either. I'll even suggest things.

Player: I want to make a Heal check.

GM: Fine. What are you doing?

Player: I don't know...the normal routine.

GM (sensing that the player isn't lazy about the roleplay--he really just doesn't know): OK, you rip some cloth from your shirt and wrap the wound, not before using water from your waterskin to clean it out as best you can.

The next time the player starts using the heal skill, I'll usually hear, "I'm going to wash the wound with some water, then cut my right sleeve off and use it as a bandage."

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

As much work and playtest that they put into 3.0/3.5, I'd like to think that they did know what they were doing. But, you're correct is that there is a chance that they never realized the effect of some of their game design choices had on the game.

I think it is arguable that 3rd Edition was the first time that actual game design theory was given any influence upon D&D rules. Every edition prior to that was only technically written by a professional game designer in that they received pay for the effort. But did they REALLY know what they were doing? Even though 3E designers may have had some actual schooling or greater clinical understanding of game rules doesn't mean that RPG design wasn't a field that was only barely crawling out of infancy. It seems to me that game designers are still learning their craft and still making great leaps of understanding regarding their field of endeavor. To oversimplify to make a point - these people often still don't know or understand just what it is they're doing.

This comment struck me wrong, at first, Then, I read it again, and I don't think I really understand your intent. Care to elaborate further?

A good DM and cooperative and involved players can overcome tremendous faults and omissions in a set of rules. It does not matter if that set of rules was written yesterday or 35 years ago. Obnoxious players were a problem three decades ago and things have not changed simply by creating newer rulesets with go-faster stripes. A bad DM can still render a fine set of rules an intolerable gaming experience. Though I have no experience with 4E rules I have no reason to doubt that one can run a fine "Old School" game with them. I have decades of familiarity with AD&D rules and know that you can run a game with them which has a complete lack of commonality with "Old School" ideas about playing D&D.

Old School is not about understanding how the rules you use want you to play the game - it is about how you wish to play the game using the rules that you are given.

 

[Water Bob]

To oversimplify to make a point - these people often still don't know or understand just what it is they're doing.

I understand what you're saying, and agree with most of it. Except that, in many ways, I think game design has deteriorated in some respects over the years, not gotten better.

How many games today, especially game supplements, are written by fans? I've know plenty of people who were no more qualified than any long term GM who've written for gaming companies. It's rampant. Vincent Darlage was a Conan fan and then fell into writing much of he first edition of the Conan RPG. There are a ton of Traveller writers who are just fans who ended up writing for the game because of contacts they made on the net. Traveller d20 wasn't written by profession game designers. It was written by fans. The same goes for the newer 2360 (or whatever it's called---the newer version of Traveller 2300).

I think, back in the old days, stuff put out by a company, at least, benefitted by better quality control. I think a lot of the early game designers tried to really make the best decision--not just fill up pages.

In many respects, game supplements for a lot of games are no better or worse than someone's free house rules that the GM happened to post on the net.

Old School is not about understanding how the rules you use want you to play the game - it is about how you wish to play the game using the rules that you are given.

You specifically stated that I wasn't running an old school game. We either have different definitions of what an old school game is, or one of us doesn't know what he's talking about (and I'm sure both of us think we know what we're talking about).

 

[Jackinthegreen]

You specifically stated that I wasn't running an old school game. We either have different definitions of what an old school game is, or one of us doesn't know what he's talking about (and I'm sure both of us think we know what we're talking about).

I believe he's referencing the fact that you've said (paraphrasing) "The rules encourage X behavior" and are bemoaning that observation when you could just change the way you look at the rules and play with them to suit your wants.

 

[Water Bob]

I believe he's referencing the fact that you've said (paraphrasing) "The rules encourage X behavior" and are bemoaning that observation when you could just change the way you look at the rules and play with them to suit your wants.

What I'm doing is on the borderline of changing the rules and just interpreting them differently, because I'm allowing roleplaying to trump dice rolls in some situations.

For example, a character could find a trap and never roll on his Search skill simply by roleplaying it out.

Player: "I take my spear and use the blunt end to tap on the floor."

GM: "On your third tap, a stone in the floor depresses and darts fly from both sides of the walls. One of them even pierces the shaft of your spear!"

That's old school and not quite 3.0/3.5 because I didn't allow the player to roll a check for his character.

So, when the man tells me, absolutely, that I'm not running an old school style game, I wonder at what he thinks an old style game happens to be.