D&D General Playstyle vs Mechanics

[hawkeyefan]

Clearly some people prefer games and settings where the PCs really do start off as unremarkable nobodies who attain the status of "hero" by deed, and not by abilities or powers that they acquire automatically through choice of class, species or background features.

I think that their preference is games where this style of play is more easily, or outright supported, such as older editions of D&D (pre 3e?) or other games entirely.

Their argument is that 21st century D&D doesn't meet that preference. And that's okay.

To argue that this mode of game play is TRVE KVLT or "the one true way" is another subject to debate.

Oh, I get the idea of having the PCs be nobodies from Bumbleturd, and having them be fragile and in danger. It’s not really what 5e delivers or is designed to deliver, but I can understand the preference, even if I’d suggest other games to get that effect.

But regardless of the game, the PCs are special in that they are the focus of the game. They are who we are following. They are therefore different from NPCs.

I don't know where you guys are getting the idea that magic always works. It doesn't always work, or sometimes works, but not as expected.

Plenty of spells work automatically. There may be outside factors that can prevent that from time to time, but many spells are designed to be cast and then work at full effect.

 

[Maxperson]

Where has anyone said the opposite?

All the arguments against overriding the ability due to in fiction circumstances say it or at a minimum extremely heavily imply it.

Either there are in-fiction exceptions to these mechanics or there aren't. If there are(and there are), then the arguments against using this in-fiction exceptions would go away if people on your side of the discussion agreed that they existed.

Arguing that you can/should find some sort of circumstance to always say yes(and I've seen that in this thread) is an argument that such exceptions don't exist.

 

[soviet]

All the arguments against overriding the ability due to in fiction circumstances say it or at a minimum extremely heavily imply it.

Either there are in-fiction exceptions to these mechanics or there aren't. If there are(and there are), then the arguments against using this in-fiction exceptions would go away if people on your side of the discussion agreed that they existed.

Arguing that you can/should find some sort of circumstance to always say yes(and I've seen that in this thread) is an argument that such exceptions don't exist.

'Unless vetoing player action declarations is literally impossible then it's always OK', this is your position?

 

[Maxperson]

'Unless vetoing player action declarations is literally impossible then it's always OK', this is your position?

Not by anything I've posted in this thread. I'm struggling to understand how you jumped this far into left field.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Bring back the Commoner class!!!

There was real value to those NPC classes IMO.

 

[Oofta]

No. That's not the case. But we do play with people who aren't perfect and sometimes declare an action without thinking fully about the fictional circumstances, or aren't 100% certain that it would fail and so make the request just in case it might. Perhaps don't think the worst about the players of those of us on the other side of this discussion.

I could make a comment about the "lack of imagination" involved in only seeing it as people who don't care about the game, but I won't. I'll leave that sort of thing to your side of this discussion.

Interesting to me the attitudes. I freely admit my own reactions and preferences. They don't match up with some people and that's okay. I like that flexibility to make the game our own.

But I will never claim that someone that disagrees with my preference lacks imagination, are only doing it because they're stuck in the past, are going out of the way to make the game less fun for their players.

I've expressed my opinions about what I want in games I DM or play. I don't tell people how their running their game wrong.

 

[Micah Sweet]

But the rules say they can.

That mechanic IMO needs to be bent when setting logic contradicts it.

 

[soviet]

That mechanic IMO needs to be bent when setting logic contradicts it.

I agree, but this is my point. People have said that introducing additional variables into the background traits - such as yes you get an audience but they are unwelcoming, or yes they'll give you shelter but they want a favour in return - is somehow not allowed. You must either let them work completely and always, or almost never. I don't think that's right.

 

[prabe]

I had a player who always felt he needed to keep his strategies and build choices (or at least their implications) secret from me. It always baffled me and harkened back to the more adversarial aspect of gaming from the earliest days of our group. I would tell him over and over that there's no need to keep that stuff from me, but he never seemed to believe me.

Fortunately, the player I had who was most inclined to do these things was also newest to the system and A) needed the mechanics checked and/or explained to him and B) was happier knowing (how) things were going to work before he tried things. The way I ran things with/for him seemed to get the message to the other players that I wasn't going to use out-of-game foreknowledge of their ideas against them.

 

[prabe]

Exactly! Now that you, and @soviet, @prabe, and @hawkeyefan(since they liked your post) have acknowledged that there are circumstances in the fiction which will override mechanical abilities that "always" work, we are all on the same page!

What I said that was most relevant here, I think, was this:

I'm open to the idea there is some reason this particular context overrides the rulebook, but I think it's the GM's responsibility to convey that context to the player/s such that there is adequate buy-in to move on. "Nope" won't do it, most of the time.

and also possibly this:

It's not "Nope." It's "Here's the situation, does what you want seem plausible to you, as though it fits the narrative, here?" It works out so much better when the player says no, even if they're kinda guided to it. It also works out better if it's not the default.

Do you really think I'm entirely agreeing with you?