D&D General On simulating things: what, why, and how?

[Micah Sweet]

I hear you. There needs to be a lot of communication to make sure that everyone is on the same page. If you want to run game type X and the players are expecting Y it'll lead to issues until resolved (if they can be).


BTW, I wasn't joking about Riddle of Steel. The title is a Conan quote, and combat has been endorsed as a good real world simulation. I personally have been wanting to play it for years (it came out in 2002) but never got a group to go for it.

I've played Riddle of Steel. It's great.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I don't understand this entire line of discussion. Lets look at the definition of the word 'simulation':

noun
1: the act or process of simulating
2: a sham object : counterfeit
3 a: the imitative representation of the functioning of one system or process by means of the functioning of another, ex: a computer simulation of an industrial process
b: examination of a problem often not subject to direct experimentation by means of a simulating device
I think 1 is of little use to us, as it seems to be effectively the same as 3. 2 likewise isn't terribly relevant here. Both of the senses of 3 seem pretty much what we're talking about here. So, when we simulate something we must thus have some conditions that hold:

a) The thing we are simulating must exist! OK, I'm willing to be less rigid on this point, we just have to be able to agree on its properties, so we can know what to represent when we simulate it.

b) There must be some meaningful process (functioning) of the thing being simulated. Clearly we would have to agree on what that functioning is and its salient characteristics.

Neither requisite a, nor b exist for a D&D dragon, ogre, or spell. They hardly even exist for a D&D fighter, though at least we can perhaps get SOME level of agreement on what a fighter is a simulation of. The point is, we cannot possible simulate, or have a simulation of, a dragon, ogre, or spell. No such thing is possible, and no RPG can ipso facto possibly be doing such simulating. It simply fails at the level of logical impossibility.

So, can we characterize this thing that an RPG, at least a fantasy one, is doing? I mean, we could more deeply consider the question WRT ALL POSSIBLE RPGs, as certainly a game which intended to portray jungle fighting in Guadalcanal in WWII has at least the bare logical prerequisites to potentially be a simulation. FRPGs and TBH basically about 99.9% of all RPGs ever written, nope!

So, are you saying that there's no such thing as simulation in a fantasy RPG? Can't think of a better way to end a conversation.

 

[overgeeked]

BTW, I wasn't joking about Riddle of Steel. The title is a Conan quote, and combat has been endorsed as a good real world simulation. I personally have been wanting to play it for years (it came out in 2002) but never got a group to go for it.

I’m sure it’s great. The character sheet is more involved than most games I prefer to play. “Opposed 2d6, high roll wins. Make stuff up.” That’s about where I’m at re: complexity these days. Anything more than that goes to waste.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I don't agree that it is insipid.

Your lead post says:

* "NOTE: I am using the term in its most natural definition, not necessarily in its jargon definition. I am talking about, loosely stated, "presenting rules ina way that sort of look like how things actually work, if you squint."

* @chaochou had a great post on page 1.

* You made a post immediately thereafter lamenting a bunch of 5e tropes (both fictional tropes and tropes born of game engine design) that you felt were "simulation-jarring" to you.

So I'm just doing the same there (lamenting tropes/design). There is an entire legion of them that are simulation-jarring to me (much like your post lamenting 5e tropes and pacing as "simulation-jarring"), but I'm not going to enumerate all of them (beyond the dragons and dragon : epic hero relationship I mentioned HP and recovery of HP and Armor Class abstraction...those are only a small number).

The reality is that D&D simulation works toward being comprehensible sufficient to play a game. Can a player functionally navigate their decision-space to affect the gamestate (and the shared imagined space) in a way that is predictable and rewarding? Yes? If so, good enough job to play the game.

The problem is that this isn't what a significant cross-section of the D&D user base (or at least a significant vocal portionof it) mean when we talk about it over the years. They mean all the other stuff. And they've used that other stuff to gatekeep the hell out of D&D in the last decade and a half (keep your epic martial tropes out of my D&D...keep your HP as not-meat out of my D&D...keep your damage-on-a-miss out of my D&D...maintain spellcaster supremacy...maintain GM control over Adventuring Day pacing, over the overall gamestate and the trajectory of play because they are exclusively the arbiters of "what is simulation-worthy" and therefore "gamestate-legitimate-moves" because of the GM-facing aspect of action resolution and the ever-present GM veto).

So I don't agree that it is insipid and it doesn't look to me that your lead post and your post on page 1 supports "its insipid." You've got your lamentations. I've got my lamentations. And the bold above (what is actually relevant to D&D sim) and the italicized above (what is relevant to a certain person looking for a certain brand of immersion....and then weaponizing that to gatekeep D&D culture and design) aren't the same thing...but they're often conflated rather than separated and discussed as two very separate things.

I think the only thing we can agree on is that you and I want D&D to be different, in more or less opposite directions.

 

[Manbearcat]

I think the only thing we can agree on is that you and I want D&D to be different, in more or less opposite directions.

I’m not sure? Maybe?

I like D&D a few different ways.

Maybe tell me what you want and what you think I want and we can see how much daylight is between us? And maybe how you feel the lead post bears on that daylight?

 

[niklinna]

Anyway -- because I started with a version of the game that at least sometimes nodded in the direction of this kind of simulation, my tendency is to continue to do so, even after it has not only fallen out of fashion but also out of the rules almost entirely. Part of me wants the game rules to reflect the reality within the game (and to some degree, the reality outside my window) even when doing so might not be the most efficient or "fun" way of doing things. That's a tall order, of course, and I am not interested in truly rigorous simulation. But even so, I would love to see rules for shields that reflect their absolute dominance in ancient combat, along with rules that take into account how demanding and horrible bending space and time to create magical effects could be. Some of these desires are similar to earlier editions, while others are not. Some other game systems that appeared early in the hobby were direct attempts to simulate history or fiction ina way D&D did not, of course, so we can talk about those games too.

What might you do for shields, give them more active uses? Like, say, you can use your reaction to reduce/negate damage from certain attacks or critical hits. Maybe your bonus action to shove before striking for a bonus to hit, or as a bash for extra damage. Then again, a shield should be a useful weapon all on its own, you should be able to just hit with it. Maybe not both hit and use it for defense, though (although I'd guess a skilled user could manage both, and if each seaparate thing uses up your action/reaction/bonus action, that fits the action economy).

Magic could be more demanding and horrible if high-level spells caused fatigue—maybe on someone other than the caster! Or casting any spell causes HP loss equal to the spell level to the caster or spread evenly around anybody near the caster. Or if the caster takes damage, a random ally is affected by an ongoing spell even if the caster makes their concentration check. (I never played Dark Sun but I understand it covered the horrible thing in more horrible ways.) Wild sorcerers kind of have the random side-effect as their own schtick, of course.

Just some spitball ideas there.

 

[niklinna]

You can do what you like. But I said my benchmark for simulation is 'testable against real world outcomes'. Since that isn't possible with made-up units (whatever that means) I don't agree it's a simulation, and calling it 'high concept' is just verbiage.

Verbiage seems to be a recurring problem, and I think that particular bit of verbiage ("high concept simulation") just might be a specific contributor here. There's a difference between simulation and emulation, and verisimilitude is yet another thing, with consistency contributing heavily to all three.

 

[Reynard]

What might you do for shields, give them more active uses? Like, say, you can use your reaction to reduce/negate damage from certain attacks or critical hits. Maybe your bonus action to shove before striking for a bonus to hit, or as a bash for extra damage. Then again, a shield should be a useful weapon all on its own, you should be able to just hit with it. Maybe not both hit and use it for defense, though (although I'd guess a skilled user could manage both, and if each seaparate thing uses up your action/reaction/bonus action, that fits the action economy).

Magic could be more demanding and horrible if high-level spells caused fatigue—maybe on someone other than the caster! Or casting any spell causes HP loss equal to the spell level to the caster or spread evenly around anybody near the caster. Or if the caster takes damage, a random ally is affected by an ongoing spell even if the caster makes their concentration check. (I never played Dark Sun but I understand it covered the horrible thing in more horrible ways.) Wild sorcerers kind of have the random side-effect as their own schtick, of course.

Just some spitball ideas there.

For shields I am not sure exactly what I would do but their importance in historical ancient warfare can't really be overstated. Granted, the kind of small team tactical fighting we do in D&D wasn't really a thing in a historical context, so it's probably not worth upending the whole combat system unless we are going to start fighting with shield walls.

As to magic, I think my favorite form in all fantasy RPGing that would be worth importing is Earthdawn's system.

 

[kenada]

Pathfinder 2e has a nice take on shields (requires an action to Raise a Shield, and there are feats for customization). Not sure how adaptable it is to 5e.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'm a designer by profession, hobby, and heart. I don't mind separating my design hobby (simulation based) and gaming hobby (fun / social based). It has worked well for 30 years. They only way I would want to mix them at this point if I the sim based design could be as fast and fun as a more abstract game design. Right now, I just don't find it fun to try to run a simulation based game.

A few questions:

• What do you mean by process sim?
• If you are a rules lawyer, doesn't that work against your simulation tendencies. I mean the rules are there to facilitate a game (generally) not simulate reality. Surely you've encounter the conflict between the two. I mean I can't roll a dice without seeing it!

I mean rules designed to simulate actual things in the real world as much as is practical, and do the same with fantasy stuff based on a consistent depiction of what that fantasy stuff is. So if I create a town, I want that town to have everything it would make sense for it to have, based on my best understanding of what that would be. If a character is not supposed to be magical, I want them to be no more fantastic than action movie physics allow. And I want to model those people and places as close to reality (or whatever rules have been determined for fantasy elements) as possible.

5e does not really do that, but Level Up does most of what I want, and I can and do houserule whatever else I need, subject to player buy in.

That being said, verisimilitude in worldbuilding matters more to me than PC verisimilitude. That's why my favorite fantasy RPG is actually ACKS. That game care a lot about accurate worldbuilding.

To answer your second question, I do run into conflict sometimes. I prefer the game to be fair to both sides, even to my detriment as a PC, and prefer to err that way when necessary.