D&D General Old school Wish

[toucanbuzz]

What's often forgotten is the Wish is being interpreted and granted by the DM another creature.

Trying to turn your Wish into a legal document with iron-clad terms is meaningless to the DM that creature, and some laws of the universe may be so unchangeable that the Wish has to be perverted in a way to best screw the player over altered in order to give it some meaning.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

What's often forgotten is the Wish is being interpreted and granted by the DM another creature.

Trying to turn your Wish into a legal document with iron-clad terms is meaningless to the DM that creature, and some laws of the universe may be so unchangeable that the Wish has to be perverted in a way to best screw the player over altered in order to give it some meaning.

If this is a serious concern, then you simply have to add in an escape clause to every wish. Something with the legal force of, "I will be allowed to preview the consequences of each provisional wish, and if I find any are not to my liking, I have <X amount of time> as I personally measure it to revoke the provisional wish while retaining the right to make alternative proposals in its place; should there ever be any reason why this clause cannot be upheld, I shall be notified before any effects of the provisional wish are applied, and no effects which could prevent the fulfillment of this clause shall be applied, with ample time (up to and including the effects of a time stop spell, if necessary) to make such a determination."

If the wish-granting entity is gonna be a s#!tter, make every granted wish provisional and revocable.

 

[RuinousPowers]

It always bothered me that wishes always seem to default to twisted Monkey's Paw curses instead of them being treasure in the flavor of Aladdin.

 

[James Gasik]

It always bothered me that wishes always seem to default to twisted Monkey's Paw curses instead of them being treasure in the flavor of Aladdin.

"Never let the PC's get away with nothin'." -E.G.G, probably.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

It always bothered me that wishes always seem to default to twisted Monkey's Paw curses instead of them being treasure in the flavor of Aladdin.

From what I can tell, it mostly arises from the extremely old-school notion of making every powerful choice suck at least a little bit, and to suck more in proportion to the amount of power. That is, most folks agree that gaining power should come at some kind of price, whatever it may be, but they differ on when that price should be paid, and how big it should be.

In the old school way of doing things, you allow outright things that could break the game--but the cost is prohibitively steep in almost all cases. This means the only times it will be taken are by the unlearned (those who haven't yet learned better), the stupid (those who should have learned but didn't), the desperate (those who have learned, but see no other option), or the crazy (those who have learned and don't care.) The punitive angle is kind of the point; without a stick, there is no lesson.

By comparison, the "new school" way of doing things is to not have any specific rules for this stuff, and make it purely a negotiation between player and DM if they wish to go off the rails. Essentially, it's saying, "There's no need to be punitive. Just don't bother having rules for it in the first place. If the whole point is to bend or break the rules, then just go outside the rules and come to a decision some other way."

The former, more or less, assumes that players will always be striving to do the most stupidly broken, powerful thing they can do. That every player will push everything to infinity and beyond, without care, unless forced to care. It's a very Hobbesian worldview, where every player is a sort of chaos gremlin that has to be forced, on pain of (character) death, to behave. The latter assumes that players pursue stuff like this in good faith, and thus an inherently punitive bias is counterproductive or even destructive. Instead, it goes for a more neutral discussion-table approach, where the two sides make their cases and determine an appropriate outcome together.

Under that old-school, Hobbesian worldview, a wish without a Jerkass Genie is effectively carte blanche for the players to destroy the game--and they are guaranteed to take it. Hence, there must be steep penalties; to lack steep penalties would be to invite outright disaster.

 

[James Gasik]

From what I can tell, it mostly arises from the extremely old-school notion of making every powerful choice suck at least a little bit, and to suck more in proportion to the amount of power. That is, most folks agree that gaining power should come at some kind of price, whatever it may be, but they differ on when that price should be paid, and how big it should be.

In the old school way of doing things, you allow outright things that could break the game--but the cost is prohibitively steep in almost all cases. This means the only times it will be taken are by the unlearned (those who haven't yet learned better), the stupid (those who should have learned but didn't), the desperate (those who have learned, but see no other option), or the crazy (those who have learned and don't care.) The punitive angle is kind of the point; without a stick, there is no lesson.

By comparison, the "new school" way of doing things is to not have any specific rules for this stuff, and make it purely a negotiation between player and DM if they wish to go off the rails. Essentially, it's saying, "There's no need to be punitive. Just don't bother having rules for it in the first place. If the whole point is to bend or break the rules, then just go outside the rules and come to a decision some other way."

The former, more or less, assumes that players will always be striving to do the most stupidly broken, powerful thing they can do. That every player will push everything to infinity and beyond, without care, unless forced to care. It's a very Hobbesian worldview, where every player is a sort of chaos gremlin that has to be forced, on pain of (character) death, to behave. The latter assumes that players pursue stuff like this in good faith, and thus an inherently punitive bias is counterproductive or even destructive. Instead, it goes for a more neutral discussion-table approach, where the two sides make their cases and determine an appropriate outcome together.

Under that old-school, Hobbesian worldview, a wish without a Jerkass Genie is effectively carte blanche for the players to destroy the game--and they are guaranteed to take it. Hence, there must be steep penalties; to lack steep penalties would be to invite outright disaster.

It's funny how the Wish itself is never considered the cost in these situations.

EDIT: by which I mean, the spell slot, item, or whatever else is giving you the ability to cast the wish.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

It's funny how the Wish itself is never considered the cost in these situations.

EDIT: by which I mean, the spell slot, item, or whatever else is giving you the ability to cast the wish.

Well that's sort of what I meant by the bit about "when the cost is paid." The new-school method usually presumes that the party or player paid the cost in advance, merely to be able to make the wish, it being the final reward of a long and (hopefully) satisfying journey. The old-school method structures it more as surviving all that stuff was the reward in its own right, and the benefits of getting wish are separate. The analogy that comes to mind is, the former is the child who learned discipline and patience and goal-setting by saving up their allowance for six months in order to buy something expensive, and thus the buying is the reward for that plan and effort. By comparison, the old-school method is like someone cashing in their paycheck (which is the direct reward for their job), and then spending that money on something potentially dangerous or foolish--they'd better save money for all the stuff life is gonna throw at them etc.

Neither is strictly better or worse. One is rather more preoccupied with minutiae and grit, while the other is more preoccupied with meaning and narrative. There's lessons to be learned from each. I tend to favor the latter (the new-school way) because I have more than enough concerns to deal with IRL, I don't need to be reminded of budgeting and taxes and such when I'm trying to have fun.

 

[James Gasik]

Well that's sort of what I meant by the bit about "when the cost is paid." The new-school method usually presumes that the party or player paid the cost in advance, merely to be able to make the wish, it being the final reward of a long and (hopefully) satisfying journey. The old-school method structures it more as surviving all that stuff was the reward in its own right, and the benefits of getting wish are separate. The analogy that comes to mind is, the former is the child who learned discipline and patience and goal-setting by saving up their allowance for six months in order to buy something expensive, and thus the buying is the reward for that plan and effort. By comparison, the old-school method is like someone cashing in their paycheck (which is the direct reward for their job), and then spending that money on something potentially dangerous or foolish--they'd better save money for all the stuff life is gonna throw at them etc.

Neither is strictly better or worse. One is rather more preoccupied with minutiae and grit, while the other is more preoccupied with meaning and narrative. There's lessons to be learned from each. I tend to favor the latter (the new-school way) because I have more than enough concerns to deal with IRL, I don't need to be reminded of budgeting and taxes and such when I'm trying to have fun.

And yet, I can name more than one instance where just surviving the DM deciding to add the Deck of Many Things to the campaign didn't save you from the battle of wits to actually make a wish feel like a reward, lol.

 

[Vaalingrade]

"I wish for a turkey sandwich. AND--and--I don't want any zombie turkeys; I don't want to turn into a turkey myself, or any other weird crap."

"Hmm... good bread. Plenty of mayo. The turkey's a little dry--THE TURKEY'S A LITTLE DRY! OH CURSED THING! WHAT FOUL DEMON FROM THE DEPTHS OF HELL CREATED THEE?!"

 

[EzekielRaiden]

And yet, I can name more than one instance where just surviving the DM deciding to add the Deck of Many Things to the campaign didn't save you from the battle of wits to actually make a wish feel like a reward, lol.

I got nothin'. There's only so far I can take doubt benefits before the implicit and occasionally explicit "be a dick DM" stuff in classic D&D can't really be excused anymore.