Player skill vs character skill?

[Bill Zebub]

I have seen the same with new players and story. Fun to watch. But still, if that player took a Hulk Smash character, no amount of fiction engagement should allow Hulk to delicately sneak across a fragile bridge. That is where the GM needs to explain the choices have consequences concept. Perhaps with a "As soon as Hulk gets on the bridge, it collapses...."

I guess I would want to know what you mean by "Hulk Smash" character. If it's a superhero game where you can literally throw garbage trucks around and you weigh a metric f**kton, then....I guess so? I haven't actually played any of those RPGs so I don't know how they work.

But if you mean, in a D&D (or derivative) game, a character with 18 Strength, then I don't think that's a good ruling. 18 Strength means you get a 20% bonus to Strength-based rolls, compared to the average. Not 2000%, or 200%....20%. So why can't that character delicately sneak across a fragile bridge?

As I said upthread, if the player wants to roleplay this, "Ja, zare iz no vay I am crossing leetle girly-man bridge. My massive awesomeness vould crush ze poor bridge," then that's fine. But the player should not be overly mechanically penalized if they decide to cross anyway.

 

[Celebrim]

Why should we prevent a player who is not a good Tactician not to play a characterr who is not a good Tactician or to play a character more intelligent than themselves if they invest in the proper mechanics if that is their fantasy and role they want to play?
We don't tell people not to play an acrobatic character or high dex, because the player does not have it in real life. We don't tell them not to play high strength characters if the player is not strong.
We don't them not to play a Monk because the player doesn't know martial arts, not to play a martial character if they have training weapons, or a Rogue if they can't pick locks.

Because if you try to simulate the mental skills of the character then very quickly these will need to overrule or supplant the choices of the player, reducing the player to an observer of the character which would actually be controlled by the dice or game rules or the referee.

 

[MGibster]

Some uncommon ones I think would be interesting to talk about are combat and resource management.

In the various Modiphius 2d20 games, like Star Trek, Fallout, Conan, etc., etc., there's a shared resource, it's called something different in each game, but we'll call in Momentum for now, that's generated by rolling more successes than is necessary to complete a task. i.e. If a player needs one success to complete a task and they roll two, they add 1 to the Momentum pot. Any player can spend this Momentum to roll additional dice for a task, perform additional actions, gain some information from the GM, etc., etc. In my last Fallout campaign, the players kept forgetting to use their available Momentum. They'd have 6 Momentum, the maximum, and they'd simply refuse to use it for anything, making a lot of combat far more difficult than it had to be. They just didn't realize Momentum was part of the game, the assumption being the players would spend it, gain more, spend it, etc., etc.

 

[Bill Zebub]

In the various Modiphius 2d20 games, like Star Trek, Fallout, Conan, etc., etc., there's a shared resource, it's called something different in each game, but we'll call in Momentum for now, that's generated by rolling more successes than is necessary to complete a task. i.e. If a player needs one success to complete a task and they roll two, they add 1 to the Momentum pot. Any player can spend this Momentum to roll additional dice for a task, perform additional actions, gain some information from the GM, etc., etc. In my last Fallout campaign, the players kept forgetting to use their available Momentum. They'd have 6 Momentum, the maximum, and they'd simply refuse to use it for anything, making a lot of combat far more difficult than it had to be. They just didn't realize Momentum was part of the game, the assumption being the players would spend it, gain more, spend it, etc., etc.

Totally off-topic, but this is why I prefer finite resources that modify dice rolls to be spent after the roll, either as a modifier or a re-roll. It's very common to see people saving them for a really important roll for so long that they forget they have them. But if they can be spent after the roll they suddenly start using them all the time.

 

[Blue]

Most things in D&D and other RPGs are a combination of both player and character. Think about combat, where the player contributes the actions, tactics, and party coordination, while the character provides that possible actions, numbers, and other mechanical aspects.

Now, one important thing is that the character is the floor of what happens. I don't need to cast spells in real life to cast fireball, and by the same token I don't need to have know how to track nor have a silver tongue -- the character does. A player trying to be entertaining and describing the wrong key to play a medieval musical instrument does not mean that the character who is proficient with it suddenly isn't.

This is important enough that if you find a DM who is inconsistent in this -- a player who can't read dwarvish runes isn't penalized when their character, who is invested in doing so can, but a different player who can't speak eloquently off the cuff when their character, who is also invested in gets penalized, that's a walk-away-from-the-table Red Flag. It's a GM who won't follow the rules, and who applies the rules inconsistantly. They play favorites, often allowing magic and other fantastic character investments to stand but handwaves away mundane character investments. Remember: if the character is proficient, the character is proficient. That's a rules issue, and cannot be taken away by any fair GM for the player not being proficient in a particular skill. That isn't negotiable.

But, as mentioned, the character is the floor of what you can do. A fighter played "attack the closest foe until it goes down" will not contribute as much over time as one who goes after smart targets, positions themselves to block foes from getting to squishy ranged party members, focuses fire, and the like. Same with everything else. If the GM isn't willing to include cleverness, roleplay and ingenuity in all of the aspects, not just combat, then why bother playing a roleplaying game? Play a board game, it'll be quicker.

 

[Blue]

To me there's no question player skill makes for more fun and immersive gameplay, so should be favored where possible.

The undercurrent in the player skill vs. character skill conversation is: "what if I'm not witty/a good tactician, shouldn't I be allowed to imagine myself that way in-game?"

I think we have to be willing to say...no. That's what CRPGs on Story Mode are for.

Just to understand:

If I build a character who spends resources to speak Elven, but I've myself never studied Professor Tolkien's Quenya nor Telerin, my character can still read and speak those languages even though the player cannot. So we baseline establish a character can speak in ways the player can't.

But if I build a character who spends resources to be witty and have a silver tongue, like Matthew Broderick's character Mouse in the movie Ladyhawke (a character I admit I mimicked back in the early 90s) or the Dread Pirate Roberts in The Princess Bride, you will bar me from using those character resources if I myself am not witty and clever?

If two players want to play silver tongued characters and one can do it in real life, do you show them favoritism by letting the rules work for them? I'm sorry, that's incorrect, rules working should be the default. Would you discriminate against one of the players and not let the rules work for them because they don't possess spoken wit? Even in a game that explicitly allows characters to do things the players can't so?

 

[overgeeked]

The other side of that coin is the eloquent player who used CHA as their PC’s dump stat. Do you let them charm and beguile NPCs or do you limit their character to their character’s stats?

Then there’s the question of the smart player with the dumb character. “Your character wouldn’t think of that” is an obvious problem.

If a PC gets to benefit from the player’s stats, then they should also be limited by the player’s stats.

Likewise, if a PC does not get to benefit from the player’s stats, then they should not also be limited by the player’s stats.

It seems obvious to me you should pick one or the other. Either the character’s stats are the floor and the ceiling or they shouldn’t matter. It’s weird to say stats only matter when you benefit from them but don’t matter when they’d limit you.

 

[overgeeked]

In the various Modiphius 2d20 games, like Star Trek, Fallout, Conan, etc., etc., there's a shared resource, it's called something different in each game, but we'll call in Momentum for now, that's generated by rolling more successes than is necessary to complete a task. i.e. If a player needs one success to complete a task and they roll two, they add 1 to the Momentum pot. Any player can spend this Momentum to roll additional dice for a task, perform additional actions, gain some information from the GM, etc., etc. In my last Fallout campaign, the players kept forgetting to use their available Momentum. They'd have 6 Momentum, the maximum, and they'd simply refuse to use it for anything, making a lot of combat far more difficult than it had to be. They just didn't realize Momentum was part of the game, the assumption being the players would spend it, gain more, spend it, etc., etc.

Sorry, I’m not seeing the connection to the topic.

 

[MGibster]

Sorry, I’m not seeing the connection to the topic.

Player skill as in using the rules to their maximum advantage. That's an aspect of the game, right?

 

[overgeeked]

Player skill as in using the rules to their maximum advantage. That's an aspect of the game, right?

Ish. System mastery could be considered a player skill, sure. But that’s not the “player skill” the thread’s about.

Where do you think the lines should be re: a smart player with a dumb PC or an awkward player with an eloquent PC? That’s the player skill vs character skill the thread is about.