Mearls' Chicken or the Egg: Should Fluff Control Crunch, or the Other Way Around?

[Crazy Jerome]

I am not at all certain that you can separate our the design question from the results of the design. But, I agree, you can do it without claiming that one way is objectively better than the other.

Mechanics-first, as I noted, can be enormously freeing in terms of narration, but you cannot expect that the game will consistently tell you what fluff should affect actual play. Of course, the mechanics then become the constraining force.

OTOH, game-world-meaning first can be consistent in telling you what is important (in terms of when simulation and mechanics should be considered primary), but by necessity are also more constraining in terms of the game world's meaning, even as the mechanics allow more leeway.

You really just have to decide whether you want the mechanics or the game world to offer your constraints. Perfect role-playing games don't exist.

As an extreme, yes, but note that one always has the option with a "mechanics first" design to lock in fluff over time. This is, in fact, how our group often played our long Fantasy Hero campaigns (though FH does not require it). If you reskin a power, but having reskinned it, you leave it as a standard, you've created your own fluff--which now is no longer a second class thing.

Fluff that is provided by the designer, for which everyone follows, is the same thing, only locked by a different person. I'm not saying that the time of locking doesn't have huge effects. It does. But the nature of play in a single group is not necessarily one of those huge effects. A much bigger effect, IMO, is that those who follow this designer provided fluff are therefore in sync with each other. That can be a benefit and a disadvantage, the same way having things be somewhat mutable until you locked them, can be.

 

[Raven Crowking]

As an extreme, yes, but note that one always has the option with a "mechanics first" design to lock in fluff over time. This is, in fact, how our group often played our long Fantasy Hero campaigns (though FH does not require it). If you reskin a power, but having reskinned it, you leave it as a standard, you've created your own fluff--which now is no longer a second class thing.

Fluff that is provided by the designer, for which everyone follows, is the same thing, only locked by a different person. I'm not saying that the time of locking doesn't have huge effects. It does. But the nature of play in a single group is not necessarily one of those huge effects. A much bigger effect, IMO, is that those who follow this designer provided fluff are therefore in sync with each other. That can be a benefit and a disadvantage, the same way having things be somewhat mutable until you locked them, can be.

Disagree.

One can change the fluff in such a design, although that may also require changing the mechanics.

Note that one always has the option with a "fluff first" design to lock in mechanics over time. This is, in fact, how many groups often played long TSR-D&D campaigns. If you make a house rule, and leave it as a standard, you've created your own mechanic--which now is no longer a second class thing.

Mechanics that are provided by the designer, which everyone follows, is the same thing, only locked by a different person. I'm not saying that the time of locking doesn't have huge effects. It does. But the nature of play in a single group is not necessarily one of those huge effects. A much bigger effect, IMO, is that those who follow these designer provided mechanics are therefore in sync with each other, as Gygax discusses in the 1e DMG. That can be a benefit and a disadvantage, the same way having things be somewhat mutable until you locked them, can be.


RC

 

[prosfilaes]

As an extreme, yes, but note that one always has the option with a "mechanics first" design to lock in fluff over time.

But the problem is is that it's easy for mechanics first design to create fluff that doesn't make sense. Hit points are one example that's generated endless debates, since there's no agreement on quite what they mean. It's wonderful to give a fighter a distance attack, but if you give a fighter only armed with a sword a non-magical attack over 30 feet, without loosing his weapon, there's no obvious fluff that matches that.

I would note that GURPS is in many ways not a mechanics first design; the base fluff of GURPS is mildly heroic realism. It is simulating something, and tends to work less well when you get away from that underlying fluff.

 

[sciborg3]

But the problem is is that it's easy for mechanics first design to create fluff that doesn't make sense. Hit points are one example that's generated endless debates, since there's no agreement on quite what they mean. It's wonderful to give a fighter a distance attack, but if you give a fighter only armed with a sword a non-magical attack over 30 feet, without loosing his weapon, there's no obvious fluff that matches that.

I would note that GURPS is in many ways not a mechanics first design; the base fluff of GURPS is mildly heroic realism. It is simulating something, and tends to work less well when you get away from that underlying fluff.

Yeah, I don't think of fluff on the level of world history and gods has to be locked down, but things like caster power and how many heroic things you can accomplish should be determined by the world you're trying to emulate.

Perhaps casters require long rituals to do anything of note, or have to work through lots of deals with spirits. No sudden, flashy spell anymore. This can help balance the classes, but drains the fun in a game based around adventuring (a political game might be a different matter.)

Improving one's strength can either make you humanly strong or strong enough to wrestle a dragon or somewhere beyond or in between. Should the game allow you to kill gods? Yes? Now it needs to be balanced past level 20 or the gods themselves are defeatable by a level 20 party. If so, why hasn't anyone done it before? Why doesn't a level 20 party conquer a nation if it can kill a god?

Some games can have fluff placed after mechanics have been decided, but I don't think most RPGs can do so - there is just too much variety in what the play experience is supposed to be for that.

 

[pemerton]

does "Shifty" allow them to skulk in thedarkness or set traps and ambushes?

They can split their move on either side of a standard action. This can sometimes help.

Does "Shifty" allow them to swarm over weaker opponents and hide from stronger ones?

Yes, because it significantly facilitates both flanking and retreating.

Does it help them to sneak up and attack foes?

To an extent, because of the movement flexibility it grants. But not as much as the above.

Does it allow them to attack in a sudden rush?

Yes, because it allows withdraw + charge.

What exactly in that description of their tactics does "Shifty" even represent?

Well, I've given a couple of examples there.

My question is - has anyone running kobolds ever had trouble interpreting or using the Shifty power? Has anyone running hobgoblins ever had trouble interpreting or applying the Phalanx Soldier trait? If they have, I'm baffled, but obviously 4e is not the game for them.

If you want to run this argument, though, that the words used to describe NPC powers aren't adequate to the task of running them and conceiving of them in the fiction, I think you'd be on stronger ground if you looked at something like the pact hag. Understanding what is going on with some of those powers is, in my view, a bit more intricate - although when I used a pact hag it didn't take a lot of thought to decide how I would run them - for example, after a failed check in a negotiation skill challenge I told the player in question that the hag suggested to his PC that he should move from where he was standing to place XYZ, and that he did so. (Not long after, the trap door was opened!)

The problem here, as I see it, is that 4e is chock full of keywords that don't, apparently, mean what they mean in the dictionary. I can be "bloodied" by words, influence geniuses and programmed things to Come and Get It, push dragons or giants around, have square fireballs that avoid friendly figures, knock a snake prone, etc., etc.

Every time how a PC power is questioned as it related to common sense, the chorus is that the words don't necessarily mean what they mean in common usage.

<snip>

But, please don't tell me that the description is both important, and has no effect on when the power applies.

Haven't you answered your own question? Come and Get It is a PC power. The burden of description falls primarily on the player. The PHB (somewhere around p 60) states that the player may characterise the power as s/he sees fit, provided that it coheres with what is going on in the fiction.

Keywords are a different matter again. "Fire" as a keyword means fire. Heat. Burning. This is what tells us that fire spells can set things on fire whereas weapon attacks cannot. There is a discussion to this effect somewhere in the DMG, I think around p 40 (where it talks about attacking objects).

Shifty is an NPC (kobold) power. Why would a GM who is wondering "What is a kobold, and what is going on when it shifts as a minor action?" ignore the word used, and the implied description? Of course it's the GM's prerogative to reskin, but why would a GM who is wondering what the original skin is ignore what is stated?

:If those terms have meaning within a general context, fine. If not, fine. If you expect to shift from one to another, as needs suit, that's shifty.

I'm confused as to what you think the debate is about. Why would a GM wanting to know what a kobold is like ignore the fact that one of its powers characterises it as shifty? And that the mechanical consequences of that power flesh out what this shiftiness consists in, namely, that it can swarm foes, withdraw from melee easily, etc.

This has nothing to do with whether or not play should grind to a halt when the player of a fighter uses Come and Get It, or knocks a snake prone. Whatever puzzles those situations evoke (which, in my view, are grossly exaggerated - it might be undesirable for some to run a metagame heavy RPG, but the idea of such a thing is hardly puzzling), they don't resemlbe the puzzle of "What is the monster like, and what does it do?"

 

[delericho]

It tells me less about goblin history and hierarchies than does the 4e one.

Given that the 4e "goblin" entry also includes hobgoblins and bugbears, there are three 3e MM entries to draw from. Also, the very two sentences in "Goblin Society" (3.5e MM p133) reads "Goblins are tribal. Their leaders are generally the biggest, strongest, or sometimes the smartest of the group." So that would be heirarchies right there.

I don't recall it telling me more about orcs, ogres or giants (less history for the lattermost). It's entries on drow and spiders don't tell me anything about Lolth having once been a god of fate.

I'm not going to repeat the exercise, but each monster in the 3e MM has a similar block of information. It may not give exactly the same information, but it does give plenty.

(The specific case of Drow, it is true that the 3e MM has a particularly small amount - because the Drow are listed under "Elf", and so given less room.)

I must also note: the examples you have given are for monsters that the 4e MM particularly focuses on. There is much less information available for the majority of creatures - see "Hag", "Githyanki", "Halfling", or the like. By contrast, the "Goblin" entry in the 3e MM is not unusual in the amount of information provided.

In fact, the 3E MM has no mythic history that I recall - it engages the cosmology only by telling me the alignments of creatures and what planes they live on.

True. The 3e MM is written under the assumption that you won't be using their default setting. As such, mythic history would be rather useless - when doing a homebrew the DM would necessarily be throwing most of it out. Heck, even the Pathfinder Bestiary is written assuming you won't be using the Pathfinder setting!

It may tell me a little more about what some creatures eat, or what terrain they prefer - I haven't done this sort of comparison - but at least for me that is not very important information.

Lore is lore. Otherwise, I can simply declare that anything about "mythic history" or "Lolth being the goddess of fate" as being irrelevant - after all, I run Eberron, where none of it applies.

 

[Bluenose]

How is this even slightly hard to understand? It's no different to a word like level in older editions.

Hit is a better example of a word defined differently by D&D than it is in real life. A hit that does no damage because the target is armoured is a common result to have described in combat. In D&D, a hit does damage, and hitting doesn't mean you've actually hit, but that you've actually done some damage.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Haven't you answered your own question?

No. And, honestly, neither have you. You just side-stepped around it.

In a game where terms do not need to mean what they mean in normal parlance, why would the GM assume that normal parlance need apply? If PC powers work regardless of whether or not the description makes sense in context, so long as the end effect can be made sense of, why would this be any different for monsters? Is there a quote to that effect, anywhere?


RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

Hit is a better example of a word defined differently by D&D than it is in real life. A hit that does no damage because the target is armoured is a common result to have described in combat. In D&D, a hit does damage, and hitting doesn't mean you've actually hit, but that you've actually done some damage.

In 4e, yes. Originally, hit meant that you hit, even if all the damage done wasn't physical. I just went to the trouble to put the usual quote pulls back into their full context in another thread you were participating in. I can easily cut & paste it here if you forget.


RC

 

[Imaro]

Alright, taking the bait.Yes. Having the ability to move both before and after a standard action attack opens their options to take advantage of a number of traps that a less mobile creature could not, including, but not limited to timed or lever operated gate/spike traps. Raise the gate/spikes, rush in, strike, rush out, lower the gate/spikes. It allows them to skulk in the darkness and set up ambushes by allowing them to move 2 squares in a turn(via 2 1-square shifts) without provoking the -5 penalty to Stealth any other creature would incur. Swarm weaker opponents? Yes. Move action to approach, minor to shift into any holes in their line up or even just around the sides, allowing the kobolds to more effectively and quickly surround foes. Hide from stronger ones? See stealth, above. Flee from stronger ones? Oh, my, yes. Have you ever tried to catch a fleeing kobold in 4e? I have. The little buggers can use the minor action shift to disengage and then use a double move to get further away. They can then keep using that extra square of movement to slowly gain ground. Again, stealth, above. Though it can also be used to pop out from behind cover, attack, and then return to cover, possibly using stealth again to become hidden.Swarming foes? Yes. Getting flanking in the first round of combat? Often, yes.Oh yeah, it allows them to use a wide variety of tactics not available to other creatures, because the ability to make two separate moves in a round, while attacking(even if one of the moves is limited to one square) is huge.

I'm not even talking about tactics I had to invent myself, here. Most of this is directly in the MM, and the kobolds in the sample adventure in the DMG have a gate trap.

They can split their move on either side of a standard action. This can sometimes help.

Yes, because it significantly facilitates both flanking and retreating.

To an extent, because of the movement flexibility it grants. But not as much as the above.

Yes, because it allows withdraw + charge.

Well, I've given a couple of examples there.

You guys are really stretching this. So just to be clear... if you use the "Shifty" ability to facilitate tactics you attribute to trickery and deception(even though everything you've come up with could also be attributed to the kobolds just being fast and jittery.) then it gives the kobold the flavor and fluff of being tricky and deceptive... Uhm, ok but nothing in and of the power itself (without you purposefully setting up tricky or deceptive situations to use "Shiifty" in) gives one this flavor or fluff and that is what is being argued. The power "Shifty", in and of itself, does not give the DM fluff about kobolds. It gives him an abstract mechanic he can interpret or skin in numerous ways but it tells us nothing about kobolds in the game world... unless we start adding stuff to support our interpretation of what said power is suppose to represent.