Player vs Plot - DM responsibilities

[Nagol]

Except that "no" is just as absolute as "never". Logically, if we should avoid one, we should also eschew the other.



Could you please quote for us where anyone said that play (superior or otherwise) would have, "no chance of affecting actual outcomes", in that absolute sense? Where was such a statement made in anything other than a very limited scope?

I don't think you'll find those words, or even words to that effect. So, this is a strawman, I'm afraid.

From the OP:

Unfortunately, the DM is invested in secret backstory and plot that means the player's major goals are impossible and doomed to failure, though there is no way the player or character can know that for ages. The DM believes the secrets are integral to the plot.

Pretty much equates to "no chance of affecting actual outcomes" to me.

 

[ExploderWizard]

Unfortunately, the DM is invested in secret backstory and plot that means the player's major goals are impossible and doomed to failure, though there is no way the player or character can know that for ages. The DM believes the secrets are integral to the plot.

Could you please quote for us where anyone said that play (superior or otherwise) would have, "no chance of affecting actual outcomes", in that absolute sense? Where was such a statement made in anything other than a very limited scope?

I don't think you'll find those words, or even words to that effect. So, this is a strawman, I'm afraid.

Perhaps the OP didn't really mean impossible? To me, impossible means not going to happen no matter what.

If that is the case, and the chances of achieving the desired goals are really just extremely difficult or unlikely then play does have a chance of affecting outcomes.

 

[Umbran]

Pretty much equates to "no chance of affecting actual outcomes" to me.

Now, consider the difference between:
1) One player's goals planned before play could not be achieved.
2) Superior play has no chance of affecting actual outcomes.

The first is talking about very specific things that cannot be done, due to specific conflict. The second, as written, is a general statement.

This is typical of a strawman - the issue is inflated beyond it's original scope or intent. A kind of infatio ad absurdum, if you will. Sure, players have *no* chance to affect *any* outcomes is bad. But having one outcome that the players won't be able to shift isn't exactly time for torches and pitchforks.

 

[Nagol]

Now, consider the difference between:
1) One player's goals planned before play could not be achieved.
2) Superior play has no chance of affecting actual outcomes.

The first is talking about very specific things that cannot be done, due to specific conflict. The second, as written, is a general statement.

This is typical of a strawman - the issue is inflated beyond it's original scope or intent. A kind of infatio ad absurdum, if you will. Sure, players have *no* chance to affect *any* outcomes is bad. But having one outcome that the players won't be able to shift isn't exactly time for torches and pitchforks.

Superior play won't affect this outcome. So the unknown factor in play is how important is this outcome to the player in question? We're told the player likes to succeed and has invested the time to come up with goals and strategies that at first blush appear to be reasonable to achieve given the limited understanding of the player in question and to the OP should the future plans of the DM not have been known.

Would the player in question respond by thinking it's not worth playing [this character with these goals] under these circumstances? I posit that would be a reasonable though not foregone position. A sounding out from the person with inside knowledge much as you suggested originally would be helpful to determine if (a) that is how the player does feel, (b) if anything reasonable to all concerned can be accomplished, and (c) whether one or both of the participants should effect change to their plans and conceptions.

 

[Celebrim]

Perhaps the OP didn't really mean impossible? To me, impossible means not going to happen no matter what.

If that is the case, and the chances of achieving the desired goals are really just extremely difficult or unlikely then play does have a chance of affecting outcomes.

I agree with Umbran's response, but wish to add that I think this argument only really exists in the vague hypothetical space of generalities.

Without knowing the goal and without knowing the setting, we basically have no basis for judging the validity of either the DM or the player's position except or own biases. We aren't mustering facts or making judgments here. All we are doing because its all we are capable of doing is displaying our own prejudices. And the only way to attack the other person's position is through argument ad absurdum because the only available attack is to provide an exception that demonstrates the falseness of the absolute rule.

Really, because the original proposition is a nebulous generality, I think our only available response that isn't a gross exaggeration are hedged generalities with no concrete guidance. All we can reasonably answer is "Maybe, these are the sorts of things you have to weight and consider.", and I think probably almost everyone actually is saying, "Maybe, here is something you should weigh into your calculations", but to the extent anyone's maybe sounds a little like "Yes" or "No", out come the arguments ad absurdum.

An example of an actual impossibility in my world would be a player with the goal of preventing something of consequence that happened in the past from occurring. This is because time travel does not exist in any setting I run where it's not actually a trope of the setting. I simply refuse to deal with problems of non-causality because it's too much of a headache, and find it absolutely reasonable of me to set that limit. A player with this goal would find it absolutely impossible. Not even the gods of my Homebrew world could accomplish it. The best you could probably accomplish would be create a world as if the thing had not occurred, where most people could not remember or did not know the thing had occur. You could expunge the event and its consequences from history, but you could not actually cause the event to not happen. Even this goal is realistically beyond the scale of any campaign I'm likely to run however, as it would in general involve much higher level play over a much longer period than any prior campaign I've done.

Now, this 'time travel' example isn't really a good match for the specific case imagined by the OP. because I'd assume 'time travel isn't possible' is common knowledge among the learned of my setting and not feel constrained from telling the player my reasoning. The OP postulates a case where I really don't want to reveal the problem to the player because in doing so I'd ruin a campaign level secret. I'm having trouble coming up with a strong example of this from my own game, as there are far more things that the learned would say are impossible where they would be wrong than there are things that are believed to be possible but are actually impossible. I believe that is actually rather logical, because things are believed to be possible usually because they have been and example exists, whereas things are generally believed impossible because they've been tried and failed. But of course, any number of examples of failure doesn't prove something is impossible, while a single example of success does. The only case I've come up with that I'd be firm about is that incarnated embodiments of ideas of chastity cannot be rendered unchaste by any means. In that sense they are unconquerable by definition of who they are. Immortal ideas don't change, evolve and grow. They just are. In general, these sorts of impossibilities that are actually impossible would relate to things 'the Gods themselves' could not do. A player contesting things that the Gods cannot contest would generally find actual impossibilities. There are a far larger set of things that are practical impossibilities, particularly within the constrains of a campaign. For example, it would be practically impossible to conquer Sartha within a single mortal lifetime, and as such, could never happen within a campaign's lifetime because they rarely deal with more than a year or two of game time.

 

[Nagol]

I don't think you have to so far out as to try to affect embodiments of ideal to reach the impossible stage.

If, for example, the base campaign write-up mentions the beautiful princess of the realm and the player sets his sights on marrying said princess. If the DM knows the princess had been consumed body and soul by a <fill in the blank> and is now running the kingdom from behind the scenes then marrying the beautiful princess is now of a probability that characterising it as impossible and doomed to failure would be appropriate.

The character could still marry the <fill in the blank>, but that is hardly the same thing or as satisfying and marrying the beautiful princess and possibly even belongs to a different genre of game.

 

[Dungeoneer]

Let's say a player is highly enthusiastic about a new campaign and has come up with a character with an ambitious bunch of goals that seem perfectly viable, and might be in another campaign. The player is analytical and goal oriented and likes being successful in the game.

Unfortunately, the DM is invested in secret backstory and plot that means the player's major goals are impossible and doomed to failure, though there is no way the player or character can know that for ages. The DM believes the secrets are integral to the plot.

Well this scenario is extremely vague, so it's hard to generalize about. Does this mean that some huge disaster is going to happen part way through the campaign that will Change Everything? For example, the player wants to become a dragon but all the world's dragons are going to be destroyed?

Or is this more specific? Maybe the player envisions his character rising through the ranks of the thieves guild, but the DM plans to have the thieves guild subverted by devils.

Or is this the bait-and-switch that others were talking about, where you start out, say, with a city intrigue plot and then all of a sudden the party is sucked down into the underdark and it becomes a survive-and-explore plot?

Those are three very different scenarios and I'm sure others could think of more.

What do people think a responsible DM should do, given that doing nothing will lead to the affected player most likely having a sucky game of constant failure capped by finding out his goals were impossible all along(as he's the most likely player to discover the secret) ?

Does your opinion change if the problem invalidating the character's goals isn't crucial to the overall plot and can be changed without affecting it majorly?

You mention 'constant failure'. This applies that the player's goals won't just be frustrated down the road, but from almost the beginning. That certainly spells big trouble within your play group.

I think some kind of allowance needs to be made for the player, almost certainly.

 

[DEFCON 1]

As a long-time improv performer and director (and roleplaying *is* improv)... one of the lessons I've learned and which I pass on to everyone at my table is that the moment you try and steer a scene in a direction of your choosing while forgetting you have a scene partner with their own ideas... your percentage of success drops precipitously.

You really can't pre-plan or improv three or four moves ahead, because invariably your scene partner is going to offer up ideas that will swing the story off in directions you never expected. So I always tell my players that while establishing your past is great, and knowing who you are and what you are when the game begins is going to do you wonders... don't get tied up in permanent ideas of your future. You have no idea where the story is going to go, and you'll invariably end up disappointed when you don't get to where you want to go, or the method for getting there doesn't end up fitting the idea you had in your head from the very beginning.

And this goes the same way for the DM... you may have a "plot" in your head of where you want the campaign and story to go... but be prepared to change or adapt if the players lead their characters in a direction that runs counter to that story. You obviously can throw down breadcrumbs to see if they pick up on them and head back in the way you've got outlined... but if not, you can't force them into your plot. Everything needs to be fluid on both sides of the screen if the improv is going to be more successful than not.

 

[ThirdWizard]

This quote, especially, I find quite interesting.

In principle and in abstract, I agree wholeheartedly that players should be consulted as to the storyline of the campaign.

In practice, at least in my case, I can't ask players to make up a character and backstory, and then wait three to six months while I work out the campaign.

For my own games, player integration in the game is of the utmost importance. And, I don't just mean fitting them into the campaign setting's metaplot. I mean, the PCs' places in the game are of central importance to actual gameplay, so it is of central importance to any session preparation, which includes world building. I also don't spend anywhere near three to six months on homebrew world backstory! I'm of the (most) bottom up approach, though.

I basically don't have a plot until I see the PCs. How will I know what to write about without that? My current game, for example, involves a wealthy gnomish aristocrat. That means lots of urban interactions, political intrigue, and family connections that alter how the PCs deal with challenges. Each PC brings something different to the table that I have to account for in ever facet of gameplay, and if I weren't to account for it, then what's the point of the players building me all of these great plot hooks? I want to encourage that as much as humanly possible.

For example, we played a Thay Slave campaign, so we knew that we would have NO gear at the start of the game, but would have to scavenge up things. One player insisted on playing a wizard (because "Sorcerers suck," and had no spellbook and no components. His character was all but helpless, and he tagged along with us hoping we could get a spellbook somewhere. It was not fun for him or anyone else, but the DM told him in advance that is what would almost certainly happen.

It was in Thay... it seems like it would have been trivially simple for the DM to put a spellbook in front of the PC in less than an hour of play. I cannot see the point of not doing so, and I find it somewhat surprising that a DM would just let that happen to, presumably, a person he would like to enjoy the game. Although, to be fair, the DM might not have fully comprehended the consequences of his decision as a product of a full gaming session. DMs especially sometimes put too much emphasis on the "integrity" of the game, subconsciously placing that above the "fun" of the game. I've had bad experiences as a player due to new DMs who made decisions that turned out to hinder the fun of the game, and they always had reasons for those decisions.

With a little creativity, the DM probably could have woven something together that would have been awesome. A stolen spellbook, for instance, with some kind of strange text that isn't normal spell patterns. Everything past page 10 is trapped, and he barely escaped setting it off. What's on those pages? There's a plot hook right there. The wizard he got it from stole it himself, and now two NPCs are after it. Who originally owned it? There's another plot hook. The book itself glows of magic under detect magic, but there's no obvious sign of what the book does. Yet another plot hook.

Now you've got the PC being hounded by those who want it back, who is searching for a way to bypass certain traps, and who is researching the origins of the book discreetly. DM wins. Player wins. Everybody's happy, and the game is off to a deadly and intrigue-laden start!

 

[Aenghus]

Like I said there were various examples inspiring my original post. I'll through out a few.

One was the potentially irreconcilable differences visible in the current paladin thread, haunted by all the terrible situations involving paladin play that have happened over the years.

Another was a game I wasn't in, which was ostensibly a fairly standard fantasy universe where the players were a mix of experienced and new players. A major plot point was the socially and politically powerful monotheism of the players country that a number of the players were associated with, though the new players avoided. There was a major twist when the players found out they were on a generation starship and the religion's god was the AI operating the starship. As it happened the experienced players dealt better with the reveal than the atheistic new players. The game ended shortly after the reveal, by design.

I know I would have hated the above reveal a lot.

My hypothetical example is of another ostensibly conventional fantasy game, with magic and religions. One player is inspired by a tiny footnote about an imprisoned good deity and the remains of the cult associated with him and wants to play a PC who revives the cult, regain their magic and ultimately attempt to free the god.

Unfortunately, the referee doesn't particularly like religion and has decided the gods are all dead and gone, and the remaining clergy are mostly charlatans, some of the higher ups being in a secret conspiracy to conceal the secret and retain power, using corrupt magic to do so.

The referee knows this player is like a dog with a bone, and with this PC would try to interact with this setting element long before he or his party can survive the consequences. Also the player is inspired by this fantasy religion and isn't willing to drop it with this character. And it's not something the referee wants the game to revolve around, especially with the eventual reveal, which he doesn;t think the player will take well.

(I know I am deliberately creating irreconcilable differences in this example, but these issues sometimes arise).