Is 4E coherent, incoherent or abashed? (RPG theory stuff inside)

[marune]

Thanks, Roger. That clarifies the issue a whole lot (although now that I understand skeptic's terminology, I know that I don't have enough of a grounding in 4e to really discuss this issue).

Can you recap what you have understand ?

 

[marune]

Not trying to "derail the thread" but this issue has always existed in D&D.

Of course, and it was a lot worse in AD&D 2E (Paladin, I'm looking at you).

From a "game theory"* point of view, the guy who does "what my character would do" and the party be damned is called a "tool" or a "dill-hole" and "isnt invited back to play," whereas the guy who "grudgingly accepts his combat role even though it causes some tension with his character and later roleplays through that tension" is called a "normal person" or a "grown up" and is a "welcome part of any game group."

Yes, except that some RPG are built around the "doing what my character would do" and that's "fine".

 

[Roger]

Hmm, I was simply saying that the XP for two encounters (combat + trap) is more than for one (skill challenge).

In other words, maze = 1000 xp, combat + trap = 2000 xp.

So it's better to fail the maze than succeed it and that's the strange thing.

Sure it's strange -- but don't blame D&D for that strangeness.

You're the one that created that skill challenge. If you don't like the success and failure results, change them.

If all, or even most, of the example skill challenges in the game books were set up like this, then I could potentially agree that there might be an issue. But that's not the case.

As I mentioned earlier, almost none of the skill challenges presented in the game texts or official products are set up like yours.

Any given DM can create all sorts of skill challenge wackiness. He could create a skill challenge that gives the PCs a billion gold pieces and immortality if they fail, and kills them all if they succeed. That's hardly a problem with the system.



Cheers,
Roger

 

[marune]

Sure it's strange -- but don't blame D&D for that strangeness.

You're the one that created that skill challenge. If you don't like the success and failure results, change them.

It has nothing to do with skill challenge, let me give another example :

Encounter 1 = Combat with patrolling orcs.

If suceed, PCs get to the dungeon.

IF failed ("TPK"), PCs are brought into a prisonner camp.

Here, they face Encounters 2 and 3 (two combats) to get their freedom and proceed to the dungeon.

 

[LostSoul]

Encounter 1 = Combat with patrolling orcs.

If suceed, PCs get to the dungeon.

IF failed ("TPK"), PCs are brought into a prisonner camp.

Here, they face Encounters 2 and 3 (two combats) to get their freedom and proceed to the dungeon.

This is why the orcs take away your weapons.

 

[marune]

This is why the orcs take away your weapons.

Hmm… a loss of equipment/treasure maybe a good idea, because it makes the following encounters harder, however it must be cancelled by more treasure later, to stay within the level expectations.

 

[Kid Charlemagne]

It has nothing to do with skill challenge, let me give another example :

Encounter 1 = Combat with patrolling orcs.

If suceed, PCs get to the dungeon.

IF failed ("TPK"), PCs are brought into a prisonner camp.

Here, they face Encounters 2 and 3 (two combats) to get their freedom and proceed to the dungeon.

What, and are there never going to be anymore encounters otherwise?

 

[pemerton]

Anyway, the way I think of "coherence" is: Does the game design actually do what it is setting out to do? The reason I'd personally describe 3e as "incoherent" is because you can run any number of different types of games with it, which can be good, but that if you have a bunch of players who sit down to "play D&D", it's like the blind man and the elephant... you have to do a lot of talking to figure out if all these folks who want to get together to "play D&D" are actually talking about the same thing.

For that reason I don't think incoherence is ever a good thing if you're trying to run a game as written. People make lemonade out of it because they're used to houseruling and snipping bits they don't like, sure. But we'd probably all be better off if those different games had different names and you knew what you were getting.

I think that this is right.

In comparison, I think 4e is pretty damn coherent. Both in terms of the design, and in the DMing advice given. (I'm ignoring the intro "This is how you play" stuff... it's extremely superficial and the in-depth DMing advice later in the book doesn't match it, so I figure we can safely ignore it.) That's just my opinion from reading the books.

For example, there's bits in the DMG about the PCs looking to gather info in the local wizard's guild library, the DM hasn't yet established that one exists, but since it's plausible and the players have an idea he wants to run with, voila, yes, there is a wizard's guild. Or the quest section where players are encouraged to come up with quests and the DM assigns suitable difficulty and reward. That's pretty neat stuff and it goes far beyond the kinda-railroady introduction text.

Interesting. I've just got my books this morning (it's already midday of June 6 in Australia) and haven't had a chance to read them yet.

 

[buzz]

skeptic, I mentioned in one of your other threads that I was a GNS/Big Model fan, so please keep that in mind when I say...

I think one really needs to look at actual 4e play before one says anything about 4e w/r/t GNS and Incoherence. Examining the text is fine, but any GNS analysis needs to be grounded in examples of people involved in the process of play. Give that few, if any, people not under an NDA have played 4e with the full text in hand, I think it's really too early to be asking these questions and expecting definitive answers. Honestly, I'd give it a year or so, and then see what kinds of anecdotal evidence there is.

A second, more general point I want to make is lifted directly from some discussions I've been reading on Vincent Baker's blog that are from c. 2005.

G, N, and S are not totally exclusive across instances of play. Vincent's analogy from '05 is to think of them as targets on a dart board. When you look at a group's play over time, you're going to see pock marks from tossed darts all over that board. The important bit is that you're going to see those pock-marks cluster in the zones of one of the agendas. I.e., agendas are what groups do consistently, not exclusively.

Thirdly, a quick point about immersion. Immersion is a technique. It can happen as part of any of the agendas (though maybe less so with G). It's isn't specifically incompatible with G, N, or S.

 

[buzz]

Heh, looks like Roger and Paka beat me to my point.