D&D General [Poll] Metagame justifications for in-character behavior

[Emirikol]

We have a group rule:
You're NEVER allowed to be a dick at my table -- even if it's what your character would 'supposedly' do.
Every gamer kid goes through that decision of whether or not to steal from other characters..or they get bored or annoyed and attack another player character. THEN YOU TURN ELEVEN YEARS OLD AND STOP BEING A DICK. Right?

 

[Oofta]

Ask your non-gaming friends how you kill a vampire. I bet a LOT of them know some tricks.

And that’s in a world in which vampires don’t exist.

Don't exist as far as you know.

 

[SakanaSensei]

I am fine with metagaming in one circumstance: it enhances the fun for my fellow players (or GMs) at the table.

For example: Sure, my infernal lawyer character in Barovia wants to head over to the priest in the village and try to get him into a contract to sell his soul. If I get the opportunity to do that, great! But if it's obvious to me that the other players are wanting to bounce and take care of something else, I think it's 100% the right call to let what I want go so we, as a group, can continue to go have fun elsewhere. It's a metagame decision, but an important one to make.

Basically, whenever a "that's what my character would do" situation comes up, I ask myself if anyone else will enjoy what my character would do. If no, meta wins.

 

[overgeeked]

Rarely. If your character would walk away from the group, it’s okay to meta-game the decision to stay. Short of that, all decisions should be based on the character’s, not the player’s, preferences.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

The thoughts of a character are a fiction the player authors. Characters exist within the fiction as their players ‘write’ them and as their actions are ratified & reified by the DM and other players.

I do (believe it or not) some what agree. You made your character, you decided they were the type of person to do this action. If you want to keep playing at this table you might want to alter this character OR make a new one that wont do this...

 

[Lanefan]

Rarely. If your character would walk away from the group, it’s okay to meta-game the decision to stay.

If the character would walk away from the group then away it walks. I can always roll up another one.

Meanwhile, the first one is still out there for later re-use should the group change or a different group form within the same campaign/setting.

Short of that, all decisions should be based on the character’s, not the player’s, preferences.

 

[p_johnston]

So I'm at sometimes because I tend to judge things on a individual basis.
I'm fine with most of what people consider metagaming. Feel free to remember whatever you want about troll regeneration, devil resistances, etc. Just like I'll feel free to change them up whenever I think it's necessary. Similarly if you the player have a suspicion about the way the story is going feel free to have your character act on it. Call it a gut instinct if you want. Hell even if you've played the adventure/module before I won't be to bent out of shape (thought I would ask people to let me know beforehand so I could change things up If I feel the need).

The only time it really becomes a problem is if it looks like someone deliberately looked things up to gain an advantage. Things like reading the adventure were playing to see whats coming, peeking at my DM notes/custom monster cards, or even looking up a monster while we play. I tend to give people a fair bit of leeway and a huge benefit of the doubt but if a player decides to look up information that their character would have no access to then that's just straight up cheating.

 

[hawkeyefan]

When it comes to metagaming being problematic in some way, I generally think that if that's the case, it's largely the GM's fault. This isn't always the case, and I think there are several factors that play a part, but generally speaking, if you as a GM don't want your players to use metagame knowledge, then don't present them with situations that involve doing so.

I just see it as kind of oxymoronic. Like, if you're worried about players having an unfair advantage due to metagame info, then it seems you care about RPGs as a game... which means you are likely interested in testing player skill. Asking players to not use knowledge they have is counter to player skill... it seems less about the game than it is about the integrity of the fictional world. And if that's your chosen focus... that the fictional world be consistent and have verisimilitude... then it would seem that allowing player knowledge to influence the fiction would facilitate that. That there would be some in world reason to explain why the characters know what the players know.

The motivations against metagame info influencing play just seem confused.

Plus, very often when these things come up in play, the metagame information is still influencing things even when it's not being "used" by the players. So if there's a monster weakness that the players know, but the characters don't, then not allowing the players to deploy attacks that target the weakness (fire vs. trolls is always the example, but it can be anything) is still a case of the metagame info interfering with play. What if a character may have guessed the weakness, or used an appropriate spell or attack that would have revealed the weakness? Not allowing them to do so is just as much metagaming as allowing it. If there is not some system in place to account for this and make it part of the game (and often even if there is) then it's arbitrary. It's the GM making players jump through hoops.

So yeah, although I think there can be exceptions... there may be times when it makes sense to somehow not allow out of game information to be used... I think those are more the exception than the rule. The reasons to do so are just confused and inconsistent and let's be honest, pretending to not know what you know just for the purpose of preserving or prolonging an encounter is boring play. Give me some other way to engage with the scenario that will be interesting instead of relying on the metagame element to make it so.

 

[CreamCloud0]

I feel like alot of the issues with metagaming monsters is if all their resistances and immunities and weakness’s and such were all floating fill in the blanks but generally consistent within a session or at least an area of the world, like for example any given zombie is weak to two energy types, resists a third and is immune to three types of status condition, A troll has regen unless hit with one of two energy types...yadda yadda, It preserves the challenge of your adventurers having to discover their various strengths and weaknesses in game through checks, interaction with the world or just plain experimentation rather than knowing it because they read the monster manual.

 

[James Gasik]

A problem comes in with balancing creatures with weak points. The same monster is stronger or weaker depending on whether it's weakness is known, and whether the party can exploit it.

If one ran a Troll encounter, but described it not as a Troll, but a "really ugly ogre", that fight is harder than one where you say "It's a Troll. You know about Trolls, right?", despite having the same Challenge Rating and experience point value.

As for randomly varying weaknesses, remember, anyone can produce a torch. Most might be able to produce a flask of oil. Some can produce a flask of acid or holy water. But cold damage on demand requires very specific spells and cantrips.