D&D 5E Is D&D 90% Combat?

In response to Cubicle 7’s announcement that their next Doctor Who role playing game would be powered by D&D 5E, there was a vehement (and in some places toxic) backlash on social media. While that backlash has several dimensions, one element of it is a claim that D&D is mainly about combat.

Head of D&D Ray Winninger disagreed (with snark!), tweeting "Woke up this morning to Twitter assuring me that [D&D] is "ninety percent combat." I must be playing (and designing) it wrong." WotC's Dan Dillon also said "So guess we're gonna recall all those Wild Beyond the Witchlight books and rework them into combat slogs, yeah? Since we did it wrong."

So, is D&D 90% combat?



And in other news, attacking C7 designers for making games is not OK.

D&D 5E - Doctors & Daleks - Cubicle 7 Brings Doctor Who to D&D 5E

Cubicle 7 -- makers of the official Doctor Who roleplaying game -- has announced that the Doctor will officially be coming to 5E soon under the name Doctors and Daleks. There are no dates or details yet, over than that the Doctors and Daleks Player's Guide will launch 'soon'. A NEW COMPANION...

www.enworld.org

 

[HammerMan]

Whoever you're replying to in this post has me blocked or I have them blocked, but I can say that I've done a lot of gaming that wasn't planned ahead at all.

we are talking about a game that that poster said has 0 prep... so I don't understand how the DM starts the game... I assume you would be like "You are in a place" but then not have any details on the place until some mechanic sets it.

and again you (like the poster who blocked you) are free to go look at my post I think I am most resent in 'how did your last session go' were I talk about winging it A LOT last night. However I can wing research in my magic library because I already have a hundred or so pages of prep, so when they go on tangents I have some idea even if i need to make up details.


Many years ago we tried an experiment (end of 2e.begning of 3e) where we tried to run round robin games. The idea was 5 DMs would sit down and take a note book. You roll to see who goes first d20 highest goes first reroll ties. Then you start and go clockwise around the table each person rights 1 sentence (and normally says it outloud) then passes the book. Until you have a loose 1-3 paragraph concept for a story/plot/world. Then you take a graph paper, put a dot in the middle and pick (as a group) the name of a town, and then you all make characters (back then 1st level roll stats) and one of you volunteers to go first.
Each person runs 1 night, writes new info in the note book during the week then at the end of each session hands the book and DM duty to a new person. No one can go twice until everyone runs a night. You can ADD retcons but you can't invalidate anyone else stuff.

we tried at least 3 times (the one I remember the best is when game 3 we became a port town we kept coming back to cause so far we had only gone west and back, and now the new DM filled half the map with ocean and got us on a boat to help on an island... and (I think same game next session) we had a dungeon end mid dungeon and went from fighting undead to fighting abberations... but we never made it past a dozen games and 4th or 5th level. it just couldn't hold

 

[HammerMan]

So, let me ask, then, when you play Horse, is it okay if you shoot from the 3-point line and then the other player just goes in for an easy layup? When you play poker, is it okay if someone blatantly cheats by going through the deck for aces and dealing them, obviously, to themselves?

I mean In the first case we did that all the time... it would be some super hard shot that the next person knew they could never make... so the joke was to fake shoot/self pass then lay up and say "that counts right" and all of us laugh. and if someone just openly took the aces we would most likely laugh at that too although I don't have a personal experience story for that. I caan imagine "Anyone want to guess what Becky is holding"

There's always integrity to competition. Keeping score is not integrity.

but fun sometimes means that the rules and score don't matter. Poker night or playing at a park are 99% of times for me just doing something while talking to friends... so it is like worrying about the integrity of sitting at doncun donuts?

It is. Getting out and exploring the space when RPGs happen can be quite enlightening and help you do better at running favorite systems, even if you discover you don't like the other options.

I have to look up blades tonight

 

[Cadence]

... so it is like worrying about the integrity of sitting at doncun donuts?

Is integrity just there in the background sometimes? You presumably don't think about integrity eating donuts... but might start if a "friend" grabs part of one of your donuts. I don't think about whether folks are cheating with die rolling in RPGs until something rises to the level of notice (like the 3rd critical in a row and then I start thinking back).

 

[tetrasodium]

we are talking about a game that that poster said has 0 prep... so I don't understand how the DM starts the game... I assume you would be like "You are in a place" but then not have any details on the place until some mechanic sets it.

and again you (like the poster who blocked you) are free to go look at my post I think I am most resent in 'how did your last session go' were I talk about winging it A LOT last night. However I can wing research in my magic library because I already have a hundred or so pages of prep, so when they go on tangents I have some idea even if i need to make up details.


Many years ago we tried an experiment (end of 2e.begning of 3e) where we tried to run round robin games. The idea was 5 DMs would sit down and take a note book. You roll to see who goes first d20 highest goes first reroll ties. Then you start and go clockwise around the table each person rights 1 sentence (and normally says it outloud) then passes the book. Until you have a loose 1-3 paragraph concept for a story/plot/world. Then you take a graph paper, put a dot in the middle and pick (as a group) the name of a town, and then you all make characters (back then 1st level roll stats) and one of you volunteers to go first.
Each person runs 1 night, writes new info in the note book during the week then at the end of each session hands the book and DM duty to a new person. No one can go twice until everyone runs a night. You can ADD retcons but you can't invalidate anyone else stuff.

we tried at least 3 times (the one I remember the best is when game 3 we became a port town we kept coming back to cause so far we had only gone west and back, and now the new DM filled half the map with ocean and got us on a boat to help on an island... and (I think same game next session) we had a dungeon end mid dungeon and went from fighting undead to fighting abberations... but we never made it past a dozen games and 4th or 5th level. it just couldn't hold

It might be easier to grok how a game system can fight prep by using fate than BITD & such. Take this example:

• The players are infiltrating a modern day megacorp-like company's high security factory after hours for reasons that will be made clear later, they want the macguffin is all that's required at this point.
• Bob has a "stunt" that allows him to extract information during a fight & midway into the infiltration says "this is supposed to be a [high security] factory, shouldn't there be guards?" while waving a fate chip
• The players & gm all agree so Bob expends a fate point to literally insert guards
• Soon after the party gets in a fight with the guards that Bob created. During the fight a fire starts for reasons that aren't important (maybe someone has an ability that can start fires, maybe someone lit something on fire, whatever the case was it doesn't matter)
• The players still don't have the macguffin but the building is on fire & they don't want to be on the hook for the resulting arson investigation either so they need to get the fire put out but are having trouble.
• Alice waves a fate chip declaring that maybe a janitor heard the fight & ran off leaving his mop bucket nearby so she can use it to put out the fire. Everyone agrees that it seems reasonable & cool so she uses the mop bucket for that.
• After obtaining the Macguffin the players are faced with a mexican standoff hostage situation where the bbeg or one of his henchmen is holding the janitor that alice created after bob created a situation that scared said janitor into the arms of the bbeg/
• At the start of the session the players decided that the best way to get the bbeg to backoff from an ally of theirs would be to get some dirt on him & that because he's a VIP at shadymegacorp he probably has some involvement in questionable business practices that might even be illegal to some degree.
• The players decided to go after the bbeg because when they went to their ally hoping to solve a different problem the GM threw in a fate chip to tag an existing city/world aspect about the bbeg

 

[Cadence]

It might be easier to grok how a game system can fight prep by using fate than BITD & such. Take this example:

• The players are infiltrating a modern day megacorp-like company's high security factory after hours for reasons that will be made clear later, they want the macguffin is all that's required at this point.
• Bob has a "stunt" that allows him to extract information during a fight & midway into the infiltration says "this is supposed to be a [high security] factory, shouldn't there be guards?" while waving a fate chip
• The players & gm all agree so Bob expends a fate point to literally insert guards
• Soon after the party gets in a fight with the guards that Bob created. During the fight a fire starts for reasons that aren't important (maybe someone has an ability that can start fires, maybe someone lit something on fire, whatever the case was it doesn't matter)
• The players still don't have the macguffin but the building is on fire & they don't want to be on the hook for the resulting arson investigation either so they need to get the fire put out but are having trouble.
• Alice waves a fate chip declaring that maybe a janitor heard the fight & ran off leaving his mop bucket nearby so she can use it to put out the fire. Everyone agrees that it seems reasonable & cool so she uses the mop bucket for that.
• After obtaining the Macguffin the players are faced with a mexican standoff hostage situation where the bbeg or one of his henchmen is holding the janitor that alice created after bob created a situation that scared said janitor into the arms of the bbeg/
• At the start of the session the players decided that the best way to get the bbeg to backoff from an ally of theirs would be to get some dirt on him & that because he's a VIP at shadymegacorp he probably has some involvement in questionable business practices that might even be illegal to some degree.
• The players decided to go after the bbeg because when they went to their ally hoping to solve a different problem the GM threw in a fate chip to tag an existing city/world aspect about the bbeg

What was known about the megacorp, it's building, the macguffin, and the BBEG before the play started?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

we are talking about a game that that poster said has 0 prep... so I don't understand how the DM starts the game... I assume you would be like "You are in a place" but then not have any details on the place until some mechanic sets it.

IF it's Blades In The Dark, then there is prep in the sense that the game has a setting you can refer to, but not in the sense that the GM determines what the PCs are doing or where in that setting they are or who their enemies are or what the factions are doing or what the game will be about beyond the basic premise of "do crime", ahead of time. All of that is determined in play, collaboratively.

Which is similar to a lot of dnd games I've run.

 

[tetrasodium]

What was known about the megacorp, it's building, the macguffin, and the BBEG before the play started?

It depends on how you define "before the play started". I'll Cover both:

• during the city & character/world & character creation the gm & players all work together to build a world where their characters are involved in problems & such as competent proactive & dynamic individuals. During this super session zero point five it's decided that the city is going to be kind of a [dark & gritty dystopia run by megacorps] as a trouble aspect. The ally the players went to in the example could be a coyote established during this creation, lets call her lilly & make her "the face" of the underground railroad for smuggling out escaped clones, officially Lilly is [Restaurateur by day, clone smuggler by night]
• If "before play" ids the session in the example potentially as little as the noted [aspects] in the last bulletpoint. The gm or even a player could theoretically have used an action or a fate point to crate the problem Lilly had keeping her from helping & the specific megacorp/bbeg could have been created at the same time as part of creating the problem keeping her from helping.

The whole process is very smooth but requires serious buyin from everyone at the table

Spoiler: Here is a great example of fate being played

 

[Ovinomancer]

I mean In the first case we did that all the time... it would be some super hard shot that the next person knew they could never make... so the joke was to fake shoot/self pass then lay up and say "that counts right" and all of us laugh. and if someone just openly took the aces we would most likely laugh at that too although I don't have a personal experience story for that. I caan imagine "Anyone want to guess what Becky is holding"

but fun sometimes means that the rules and score don't matter. Poker night or playing at a park are 99% of times for me just doing something while talking to friends... so it is like worrying about the integrity of sitting at doncun donuts?

I have to look up blades tonight

Okay, let's unpack your horse example. Player A makes a tricky shot that player B knows they cannot do and doesn't wish to attempt. They then perform the socially agreed (probably unspoken) concession move, conceding that Player A had won this round. No score is kept, but this example is 100% showing integrity of competition.

For the poker, sure, a joke is a joke, but if the player always did this, rendering the game completely meaningless, then I'm fairly certain some action would be taken to maintain the integrity of the play -- either they'd just be mutually excluded from play by ignoring their antics and the other players only engaging with their play, or someone would speak up about the jerk behavior and please stop. I suppose you could just continue on with the activity, and that's fine.

To put this into D&D terms, would you find it perfectly acceptable for a player to show up with all 18's in every stat, a character who is level 20 in all classes and possesses all beneficial magic items, and who then blatantly cheats at all die rolls? Would this just be funny and perfectly acceptable in play? Or is there some minimum integrity expected -- to mostly follow the rules, say -- so that play has some meaningful integrity when challenges are presented?

 

[HammerMan]

Okay, let's unpack your horse example. Player A makes a tricky shot that player B knows they cannot do and doesn't wish to attempt. They then perform the socially agreed (probably unspoken) concession move, conceding that Player A had won this round. No score is kept, but this example is 100% showing integrity of competition.

For the poker, sure, a joke is a joke, but if the player always did this, rendering the game completely meaningless, then I'm fairly certain some action would be taken to maintain the integrity of the play -- either they'd just be mutually excluded from play by ignoring their antics and the other players only engaging with their play, or someone would speak up about the jerk behavior and please stop. I suppose you could just continue on with the activity, and that's fine.

I mean I guess but you literally used those examples... I answered them. You can't cheat if you are just all having fun.

To put this into D&D terms, would you find it perfectly acceptable for a player to show up with all 18's in every stat, a character who is level 20 in all classes and possesses all beneficial magic items, and who then blatantly cheats at all die rolls? Would this just be funny and perfectly acceptable in play? Or is there some minimum integrity expected -- to mostly follow the rules, say -- so that play has some meaningful integrity when challenges are presented?

this is funny... I do have not quite a straight 18's but similar...

When I went to try pathfinder for the first time all the players were old friends. I had for years played pt buy or array for stats, but this DM said "Roll 4d6 drop the lowest 6 times place where you want" I sat down to roll and said to myself "I know many of those guys will just scrap rolls and re roll until they get what they want" so I just picked 6 stats, no rolls. When I got to game, I showed my sheet and the DM asked "Did you roll these?" and I said "No, I figure I will still be lower then half the group but I just didn't" he was shocked but held off until his brothers and one of our other friends showed up... all 3 of those players had 1 or more 18, and in general better stats then I. So he just accepted my character.

I don't know if you count what I know they did as cheating. I don't know if you count what I did is cheating (I am sure some here would) but to me it is just a game... and if we have more fun picking or rerolling just do it. We used to joke about 'criting jon' and 'floating jimmy bless' cause we knew that they were flubbing rolls in order to be 'better' then luck. 25 years ago I called them on it. 20 years ago I let most slide until a point. 15 years ago I stopped. It's not really cheating... it just what they do.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I mean I guess but you literally used those examples... I answered them. You can't cheat if you are just all having fun.

this is funny... I do have not quite a straight 18's but similar...

When I went to try pathfinder for the first time all the players were old friends. I had for years played pt buy or array for stats, but this DM said "Roll 4d6 drop the lowest 6 times place where you want" I sat down to roll and said to myself "I know many of those guys will just scrap rolls and re roll until they get what they want" so I just picked 6 stats, no rolls. When I got to game, I showed my sheet and the DM asked "Did you roll these?" and I said "No, I figure I will still be lower then half the group but I just didn't" he was shocked but held off until his brothers and one of our other friends showed up... all 3 of those players had 1 or more 18, and in general better stats then I. So he just accepted my character.

I don't know if you count what I know they did as cheating. I don't know if you count what I did is cheating (I am sure some here would) but to me it is just a game... and if we have more fun picking or rerolling just do it. We used to joke about 'criting jon' and 'floating jimmy bless' cause we knew that they were flubbing rolls in order to be 'better' then luck. 25 years ago I called them on it. 20 years ago I let most slide until a point. 15 years ago I stopped. It's not really cheating... it just what they do.

Okay. I have to admit I'm a tad surprised that there's no appreciation or consideration of any kind of integrity of process that you care about in the games you play. I'm wondering why you advocated prep, then, though? What is prep providing to your play?

Also, I would not recommend Blades in the Dark to you. It requires a very high degree of principled play and sticking tightly to the rules system to function. You might better enjoy Fiasco, though, as there are barely any mechanics to deal with and it is pretty low prep as well.