new preview DMG2

[Umbran]

I never said that storytelling was bad/wrong, merely that it and roleplaying are different animals and D&D is marketed as a roleplaying game.

It would be a valid critique if they were inconsistent in their own use of the term, but failing to match your particularly strict definition isn't exactly noteworthy. Rather, it seems to me that the makers of RPGs haven't been using your definition for a couple of decades now. To me, your definition is sorely out of date. These things are not, and have not ever really been, strictly separate animals.

And really, even if I accepted your definition, it should not be a barrier to including other elements in the rulebooks. Purity of concept is not generally of value in a recreational hobby.

 

[Barastrondo]

I think that is helpful to divide storytelling and roleplaying advice. While they can both be utilized in a tabletop game they are sort of at odds with one another. One cannot simultaneously stoytell and roleplay and vice versa.

I imagine that depends on whether or not you believe that storytelling is by definition always recital, or whether telling an improvised story (or even one that you tweak as you go along) counts. I don't believe the former, myself; I've told stories to kids that I made up as I went along, and I've played games like "Once Upon a Time" where there was no fixed ending, yet the entire process was storytelling. I've worked with a few professional storytellers, and even they improvise and tweak.

I admit that a game run by someone who believes that all storytelling must by necessity be recital is not going to be very great. Thankfully, most tend to accept improvisation as a valid form of storytelling. The story just doesn't have to be finished for you to be telling it as you go along.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

I think that is helpful to divide storytelling and roleplaying advice. While they can both be utilized in a tabletop game they are sort of at odds with one another. One cannot simultaneously stoytell and roleplay and vice versa.

One can do both in the same game and with the same game system. Maybe you cannot do it at the exact same time. But I think that's okay.
I don't roleplay or storytell when I am calculating my total attack bonus. Or check my character sheet if I do have a rope.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Why do games need mechanics?

What is the purpose of rolling dice if the DM and players can just collaborate on a sequence of events for thier story?



Why do I feel like such an old fart?

 

[Halivar]

I've never heard of anyone running a game by rote recitation. I certainly don't think anyone using the term "collaborative storytelling" means it that way. I also don't think we should have to call it "extemporaneous collaborative storytelling," because it's a mouthful.

That said, I liked this chapter, and have employed some of its concepts (flashbacks, 3rd party asides) regularly.

EDIT: With respect, EW, it's frustrating trying to follow you here, because I think you're saying that suggestions are being raised that aren't, and that those suggestions are wrong. Nobody is predetermining anything. The article suggests (in places, not with a brack-bat or anything) that open-endedness and player autonomy are essential elements of the game to be preserved in these episodes. It appears (and correct me if I'm wrong) that you're taking exception to ideas pulled from your personal (and unique) operating definition for "storytelling."

 

[Barastrondo]

Why do games need mechanics?

What is the purpose of rolling dice if the DM and players can just collaborate on a sequence of events for thier story?

Why does it have to be an all-or-nothing dichotomy? What about the phrase delivers ultimatums like "there will be no dice-rolling whatsoever," "the end is predetermined," and "improvisation is taboo"? What you describe doesn't have much resemblance to the collaborative storytelling RPG sessions I've been part of.

It may be that you don't have a lot of experience with games that have narrative systems, but it just isn't true that a game that's about storytelling must by necessity not have mechanics. Again I cite Once Upon a Time. It's a pure storytelling game, no roleplaying at all — and it has mechanics, even a random element (in the form of cards). That's what makes it a game.

Why do I feel like such an old fart?

To be honest, it seems to me as though you're adhering to a single conception as to what "storytelling" means in roleplaying games instead of experience with multiple approaches to how it's actually used. You describe "storytelling" as though it were strictly a process of recital and of pre-determined endpoints to a story, even though there's nothing intrinsic about the concept of storytelling in RPGs that imples those things need to be present. All the best games that do invoke narrative conceits avoid pure recital and pre-determined endpoints like the plague.

To maybe show you what it would look like from your end, imagine someone insisting that old-school D&D consisted entirely of pre-packaged modules and playing through the random dungeon generator in the back of the 1e DMG. Assume his definition of "old-school" did not allow for designing your own dungeons, or wilderness or city adventures. You would probably challenge it as inaccurate. That's kind of what's happening here — you're promoting a definition of RPG "collaborative storytelling" that just doesn't include what a lot of other people have been doing for years. Including, in all likelihood, the folks who wrote that chapter of the DMG2.

I mean, they may prove me wrong. It might be that they want to throw out dice and surprises and mechanics and all sorts of things that are already present in pretty much every other RPG out there that considers itself a subsect of storytelling. I don't see why they'd want to, though. There aren't a lot of us who enjoy storytelling who would find such a thing fun.

 

[ExploderWizard]

EDIT: With respect, EW, it's frustrating trying to follow you here, because I think you're saying that suggestions are being raised that aren't, and that those suggestions are wrong. Nobody is predetermining anything. The article suggests (in places, not with a brack-bat or anything) that open-endedness and player autonomy are essential elements of the game to be preserved in these episodes. It appears (and correct me if I'm wrong) that you're taking exception to ideas pulled from your personal (and unique) operating definition for "storytelling."

We may indeed be talking past each other here. Let me get home and perhaps we can clarify some terms.

 

[Halivar]

BTW, I would like to say to all that if you haven't tried it, extemporaneous collaborative storytelling is a terrific past-time. Orson Scott Card suggests in his book How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy (an excellent book for developing game-world writing skills) that this is a great writing exercise that he does in class with his writing students.

I tried it with a friend of mine, asking him simply "what would happen if you woke up, and our apartment building and everyone in it was transported to strange grassy field in the middle of nowhere?" For the next several days, we had a running storytelling exercise that started as a survival tale and wound up as an epic fantasy story. Throughout the day, people we met, either for dinner, or hanging out, or whatnot, would jump into our conversation (like Forrest Gump, I suppose), offering their own spin to the unfolding narrative. I found the experience as fulfilling as a really good D&D session, and probably for the same reasons.

EDIT: The most fun I remember was the poignancy of the moment that we all decided that the people sent out into the jungle to go scout should be the two guys with the lowest survivability and least contribution to the group: the guys with contact lenses and no glasses, me and my friend.

 

[Agamon]

Yeah, I think a) telling a story as you play and b) playing the game, which contributes to the story that can be told after the game, are two seperate things. In some games, like Dread, you do the former, in other games, like D&D, you do the latter.

 

[Umbran]

Why do games need mechanics?

What is the purpose of rolling dice if the DM and players can just collaborate on a sequence of events for thier story?

Um, why do you ask? Reading the preview, the cooperative storytelling elements they are suggesting aren't a replacement for mechanics. They look to be more about adventure design and structure, plot hook development, and other things for which there is no mechanic!

Your jump there seems... nonsensical.

Why do I feel like such an old fart?

Well, here's the question - is your opinion based upon the evidence presented in the preview, or upon fear that they're changing the game?

The latter - reacting from habit, pre-formed opinoin, or fear of change is kind of old fart territory. I mean, nobody calls the 70-year old who goes skydiving an old fart, right? Only the folks who get stuck in their ways, unwilling to try new stuff are called that.