Payn's Ponderings; System mastery and the concept of fair fight.

[Velderan]

TL: DR Folks are drawn into RPGs by system mastery and/or the concept of a fair match. Some lean heavily on one or the other. How about you?

The 2 game systems I currently run are pretty much on opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of fair play (PF2e and CoC). For PF2e the math of the system and how encounters are constructed typically means you can expect a fair fight each time you roll initiative. Some character options can be better situationally, but for the most part character options are balanced which means the fights are typically decided by decisions made by the players and a fair fight can be expected. CoC on the other hand is not about fair play at all. The players know combat is lethal and not all encounters are meant to be solvable through force, so it's up to them to decide which encounters to avoid.

As far as system mastery my preference is games to not require a high level of system mastery to be played. For players in the games I'm in I like seeing people developing their characters based on events that occur ingame and not based on what gives them the best options to win. In my first 5e campaign with my current group, the group at 2nd level was ambushed by a white dragon terrorizing the region they were in. One of the players decided their character was scarred by the experience and took the Alert feat so they wouldn't be surprised again. They also roleplayed their character as nervous and constantly on the lookout for danger. In the first session of PF2e, another player's character tried to climb down a cliff and fell which almost killed them. When they leveled and could take a skill feat, they chose Cat Fall after saying their character had been practicing tumbling since they had their big fall. That character became a little more daring when it was time to climb things because they had been practicing. To me that's what makes roleplaying games fun.

 

[payn]

The 2 game systems I currently run are pretty much on opposite ends of the spectrum in terms of fair play (PF2e and CoC). For PF2e the math of the system and how encounters are constructed typically means you can expect a fair fight each time you roll initiative. Some character options can be better situationally, but for the most part character options are balanced which means the fights are typically decided by decisions made by the players and a fair fight can be expected. CoC on the other hand is not about fair play at all. The players know combat is lethal and not all encounters are meant to be solvable through force, so it's up to them to decide which encounters to avoid.

As far as system mastery my preference is games to not require a high level of system mastery to be played. For players in the games I'm in I like seeing people developing their characters based on events that occur ingame and not based on what gives them the best options to win. In my first 5e campaign with my current group, the group at 2nd level was ambushed by a white dragon terrorizing the region they were in. One of the players decided their character was scarred by the experience and took the Alert feat so they wouldn't be surprised again. They also roleplayed their character as nervous and constantly on the lookout for danger. In the first session of PF2e, another player's character tried to climb down a cliff and fell which almost killed them. When they leveled and could take a skill feat, they chose Cat Fall after saying their character had been practicing tumbling since they had their big fall. That character became a little more daring when it was time to climb things because they had been practicing. To me that's what makes roleplaying games fun.

Seems like a combination of system mastery and fair fight with the narrative piece Bill posted too. I didnt post them as opposite "camps" but more like spectrum where the answer for some folks might be none on any one of them.

I really like how you laid out the difference in expectation of type of genre being emulated. Firearms for example, can range from get shot and die to get shot all day dont die. This also touches on the infamous combat as war vs combat as sport. As you highlight, combat is expected in PF2 and has rules to provide a fair fight for its frequency. CoC is not a fair fight and if engaging, should be sure to have every advantage as possible. Interestingly enough, there are versions like pulp Cthulhu which does expect the PCs to get into lots of fights. So, the expectations can vary, and be catered to. Though, it makes for some incendiary discussions for folks who have a strong preference in one set and expect all games to function as so.

 

[payn]

When the fight is fair, you didn't prepare.
Johnny Cochrane, cementing his grognard status.


Ahem. Anyway, I used to be really into system mastery when I started out. Now? I just want to have fun. I am not particularly interested in either fair fights (since that means that I didn't do enough to get the odds in my favor) nor in optimization, but in playing and interesting moments. But I can appreciate those who do love that, since I used to appreciate it more.

Gaming is a journey and folks dont always find their anchor point, nor do they sometimes even have one.

 

[Umbran]

TL: DR Folks are drawn into RPGs by system mastery and/or the concept of a fair match. Some lean heavily on one or the other. How about you?

Of those who are specifically into the game for the small-unit tactical wargame, sure, I suppose.

 

[Krachek]

Base on my DnD experience, I never look at system mastery. Just play decent build, which I don’t call mastery play.

For fair fight, I guess to odds are 99:1 for the PCs. Not really a fair fight. Sometime a kind of thrill, but most of the time fights are not fair at all.

Fair fight is a myth. Even in tactical games ( Unless playing a mirror match) , cards game, war game, most games don’t offer fair fight. Right from the start the odds favor one players.
In RPG the odds favor the PCs all along.

 

[Emerikol]

As a DM, my players came to expect me to shoot down ideas that were rules loop holes and also ideas that were genre busting. So almost always, they'd come to me out of the game and ask if they had any doubts. I'm sure many times they just knew but when they didn't they'd come and get a pre-ruling ahead of time. If your PC can use two lances on a horse, I'm guessing he or she knows that.

I think excessive system mastery is something I dislike but I do like the idea of player builds being something enjoyable. It's a delicate balance. I tend to prefer a class be a mechanical decision more than a flavor decision so I am not in favor of dozens of classes. I'm probably back in the four is enough. Warrior, Magic User, Hybrid, and Expert. Then flavor those classes however you like.

I'd go to a skills based system probably but I think the basic framework of levels, x.p., and ascending power options is good.

 

[TiQuinn]

There was a guy we used to game with who was very much the system mastery guy. Alex would constantly be building characters that were designed to pull off special combos of spells that combined control and damage to some pretty devastating effect. He would half joke about bringing a Coffeelock character to the table, but that would be silly because it’s so cheesy, and then Quick Look at the DM to see if he might actually let him play a Coffeelock. Alex would often let his characters die intentionally every few levels because he had another build that he wanted to try.

All fine, all well and good, it’s Alex’s PC. Except when Alex would lean over to me and say, “hey, you know your character would be REALLY cool if you dipped fighter for a couple of levels to get the action surge and then think of what you could be pumping out damage wise.” And I’d always look at him and say yeah that’s cool but I like my guy the way he is. But Alex never caught the hint. To him, not doing the optimal build was just incomprehensible. He couldn’t understand that I just wanted to play my character within the normal rules for the class and subclass I picked and had absolutely zero interest in build optimization. Been there, done that, put it away in 3rd edition where I saw what you ended up with game-wise.

I think I could probably only deal with one Alex at a table at a time personally. If there were more than one player like that, or heaven forbid, the whole group played that way, it’d definitely start bugging me to the point I’d have to bow out.

 

[payn]

There was a guy we used to game with who was very much the system mastery guy. Alex would constantly be building characters that were designed to pull off special combos of spells that combined control and damage to some pretty devastating effect. He would half joke about bringing a Coffeelock character to the table, but that would be silly because it’s so cheesy, and then Quick Look at the DM to see if he might actually let him play a Coffeelock. Alex would often let his characters die intentionally every few levels because he had another build that he wanted to try.

All fine, all well and good, it’s Alex’s PC. Except when Alex would lean over to me and say, “hey, you know your character would be REALLY cool if you dipped fighter for a couple of levels to get the action surge and then think of what you could be pumping out damage wise.” And I’d always look at him and say yeah that’s cool but I like my guy the way he is. But Alex never caught the hint. To him, not doing the optimal build was just incomprehensible. He couldn’t understand that I just wanted to play my character within the normal rules for the class and subclass I picked and had absolutely zero interest in build optimization. Been there, done that, put it away in 3rd edition where I saw what you ended up with game-wise.

I think I could probably only deal with one Alex at a table at a time personally. If there were more than one player like that, or heaven forbid, the whole group played that way, it’d definitely start bugging me to the point I’d have to bow out.

Yeap, I hear that. I was in a PF2 game a year or two ago and there was a fella that leaned heavily into the "you are only good at one thing" the system kind of encourages. I made a druid that I wanted to do a few things. This guy would constantly, but politely, offer his advice. "May I offer a suggestion?" Eventually. I just said no, and finally said no more suggestions ever.

3E is a total animal. There are a lot of cool looking things, that produce some very uncool results. I remember one player made a halfling ninja with a sandtube for a weapon. This PC was probably the most useless character ever possibly built. Though, we all just sat back and let it sink in for the player. Sometimes a person just needs to do and find out themselves. Not saying sandtube ninja should be an obvious dont do moment, thats on 3E/PF1.

I will say I do get a chuckle everytime I see somebody crying out about 5E multiclass being broken.

 

[TiQuinn]

3E is a total animal. There are a lot of cool looking things, that produce some very uncool results. I remember one player made a halfling ninja with a sandtube for a weapon. This PC was probably the most useless character ever possibly built. Though, we all just sat back and let it sink in for the player. Sometimes a person just needs to do and find out themselves. Not saying sandtube ninja should be an obvious dont do moment, thats on 3E/PF1.

3e reminded me of being a kid in a candy store with their parent’s credit card. Yes, you can do all these seemingly cool things with your character on paper. I spent more time building characters for that edition that I actually ended up playing. When I did play, I realized not only were some of those builds wildly unbalanced (in either direction), sometimes they really caused the game to slow to an absolute crawl. I remember one character that was a polearm build who was combining trip attacks with immediate follow thru attacks on prone characters, and the damage was eye popping but it took forever to finish a turn. And then everyone was doing it at the table. Then the DM start creating crazy builds for monsters with classes, and it all just became. Too. Much.

 

[payn]

3e reminded me of being a kid in a candy store with their parent’s credit card. Yes, you can do all these seemingly cool things with your character on paper. I spent more time building characters for that edition that I actually ended up playing. When I did play, I realized not only were some of those builds wildly unbalanced (in either direction), sometimes they really caused the game to slow to an absolute crawl. I remember one character that was a polearm build who was combining trip attacks with immediate follow thru attacks on prone characters, and the damage was eye popping but it took forever to finish a turn. And then everyone was doing it at the table. Then the DM start creating crazy builds for monsters with classes, and it all just became. Too. Much.

Yeap, in my experience that went one of two ways. Either the GM said, no we are not doing this and added some houserules and guidelines to lower the ceiling, or they just joined the arms race and made ever increasingly more difficult builds of their own. I was very much in option 1 as an often E6 GM.