D&D 5E (2014) Legends & Lore 4/1/2013

[Campbell]

One element of the critique of a more narrative approach I believe is often missed is the notion that authority and responsibility are intrinsically linked. The more power a given actor has over the outcome of a situation the more responsibility they have for that outcome. I find that GMing in the manner I chose to is far less stressful. Running 4e lays less at my feet, makes me more of an even participant, and allows me to focus on the parts of GMing I actually like in comparison to other versions. My players have not stolen anything. I give it away freely and without reservation.

 

[Manbearcat]

One element of the critique of a more narrative approach I believe is often missed is the notion that authority and responsibility are intrinsically linked. The more power a given actor has over the outcome of a situation the more responsibility they have for that outcome. I find that GMing in the manner I chose to is far less stressful. Running 4e lays less at my feet, makes me more of an even participant, and allows me to focus on the parts of GMing I actually like in comparison to other versions. My players have not stolen anything. I give it away freely and without reservation.

Absolutely. Offloading some narrative authority to players has three effects:

- It reduces my total mental overhead such that I can focus more intensely on the techniques I can bring to bear to improve play for all of us.
- It empowers my players to feel that they are just as responsible for the depth and excitement of the emergent story, in turn conditioning them to be more pro-active by default.
- It flat out creates a more dynamic story and play experience. I'm quite creative...but in no way do I perceive myself as more creatively potent than myself + my 3 creative players. They will see angles and opportunities that I do not. I'd like them to be empowered to bring them into play.

Case in point. The below end to this Skill Challenge was one I did not perceive in the moment it was happening. The player cued the result completely and brought new content into play entirely:

GM: Your horse moves sluggishly and its natural sense of the way appears askew due to its state. You see none of the scant trail-signs that you marked in your mind on the way in. Everything looks the same. Over the next rise your worst fears are realized in the shape of a deep gorge. Your horses in their best state could leap across the chasm...but they are tired. Doubling back may be the only way out. But your pursuit closes in on you. <We are now down to next success or failure dictates the outcome of the Skill Challenge>

D: This place looks familiar from stories I was told in my youth. Many thousands of years ago, wildmen once roamed here and used hot springs for winter baths. A story told of a barbarian king who won this territory when the ground opened up and swallowed his enemies. As our enemies close in for the kill and my friends dismount their horses to prepare to fight, I consult the earth spirits and the annals of my mind for a means of earth-borne egress. < History - Failure>

GM: Were the stories right? Perhaps yes. Perhaps no. Regardless, "earth-borne egress is what you get." As the gathered force of the snake-men surrounds you, the earth yaws wildly beneath your feat. Screams from man and beast alike fill the air. The smell of dank, dusty death fills your nostrils for a moment and the splash of freezing water sends you to unconsciousness.

<Skill Challenge to escape with the idol lost. Complication ensues. Sinkhole manifests. Good guys lose 2 HSes apiece. "Mole-man" pilfers idol and butchers horse while PCs are momentarily unconscious and brings the horse-meat and idol back to their lair. "The Descent" style Skill challenge to track the mole-man, recover the lost idol, and escape the Underdark ensues.>

That content was entirely the product of emergent play and offloading of narrative authority to my players. If the Druid was successful, and they won the Skill Challenge, she would have been granted the authority to author whatever resolution to her History check that she wished (something related to the story that she made up on the spot for the context of the History check or something else)...and it would have been just as good, or better, than anything I would have come up with.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Some people rejoice in the structure of 4th, while others long for the creative freedom of earlier systems, its a preference thing. But the systems are slants of those idea, neither embraces either sides fully- and both systems, in the hands of a good GM, can make up for the lack of whatever you want, in either system.

I think the point I would argue is that there's no added creative freedom to be had. One game places the creativity in how you cleverly utilize very specifically described spells, the other invests it in how you relate fairly non-specific powers to the narrative. The only real beef I have with previous editions is they do leave little scope for many of the non-casting classes. General rules for doing arbitrary things might help there, but until 3e they were poorly developed at best and somewhat inhibited by the way subsystems were so heterogeneous. 3.x does make it halfway to where 4e is, by having well-defined general rules, but IMHO tends to choke off use of it with too many specific rules, and still lacks the fairly non-specific powers aspect (though fairly you could implement that on top of 3.5, its just not clear what you'd do with the existing traditional classes).