D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[kayakingpoodle]

This seems flawed to me. The GM acts as the PCs' senses and needs to accurately convey information they would have. In the modern era, particularly urban and sub-urban environments, grass is typically short and green, and it's understandable to me that a player would assume such without clarification. Long grass is enough of a deviation from the norm for most players that I think it warrants clarifying on that basis alone, regardless of potential ambush.

It really depends on the group, as I said I'm constant in my methodology. If a DM was not I can see how it would be a flaw. Take trees, they could be redwood size or fruit trees, rock piles could be the size of riding mower or a building.

In the example I initially replied to it was grass in a dungeon if that doesn't raise questions from the players that is not a problem with how tall it is or how I describe the grass. I the example given was it only in a single room, or had who ever grew it there done so elsewhere in the dungeon? As a DM if there is going to be an ambush hidden in grass tall enough for that purpose grass like that is going to be in places before The party gets to the grass with the ambush in it. Otherwise it is pretty much useless to place an ambush in the grass, why would the ambushing group choose such a conspicuous hiding place? I subscribe to the idea that the monsters are not dumb, and actually know what they are doing, even the minions.

The party is a group of adventurer's not a family headed to the local bazar for a day of shopping and dining, if they aren't curious about their surroundings they're gonna miss some things. The groups I DM have fun, and ask lots of questions about the environment. They still get complacent and miss obvious stuff from time to time as their focus is on different things.

Have you never been out with a group and only one person notices something blatantly obvious that the rest of the group would have missed had that person not pointed it out? It happens all the time sometimes no one in the group notices it.

You know what I’ve never had to do when I see a patch of grass? I’ve never had to ask anyone else how tall it was. I could just see it for myself.

IRL sure but playing a fantasy trpg using theater of the mind, if you don't need to ask questions like how tall is the grass, what kind of trees are they, or how big are those rock piles there are then IMO some great opportunities missed for both the players and the DM. Now when the maps and terrain are used things are different depending on the level of detail the equipment will allow. Using theater of the mind, if the DM only mentions the environment when it is important to an ambush then the ambush is not being used to its full potential, and if every part of the environment is described in great detail the game will not be fun. My solution is to give general basic information and let the players flesh out what they deem significant. This is used consistently through out the game, and not only when it affects the party for a mechanic such as surprise.

It is my style of DMing, and the groups I DM for do not have an issue with it, others in my play groups have their own DMing styles and they are equally fun for the groups.

 

[Lanefan]

Sure, I agree with that assessment broadly. I wasn't meaning to make any explicit comparison to other games, just to talk about Circles in BW. I agree that the end result and/or the fiction could be very similar in many different games, but, to me at least, the process is the interesting part.

For me, the process is the interesting part only when it's likely by design to produce different end-result outcomes (and-or for widely different reasons) when looked at in hindsight; because only then can one say "this process makes intuitive sense and produces intuitive results while this other one doesn't".

And I think that's the root basis of a lot of the argument here: processes and results that make intuitive sense to you and-or others might be highly counterintuitive to me, and vice-versa.

 

[Maxperson]

I would not justify it after the fact based on a failed sleight of hand check to open the lock.

Don't forget the skill of the lock picker, which is the worst part of all of this. Let's say both are level one and the DC for the lock is 15. A PC with an 8 dex untrained has a 75% chance of failure and running into the cook. A PC who is trained and has an 18 dex has 40% chance of failing and running into the cook. The one with an 8 dex has a 35% greater chance to encounter the cook behind that door than the one with an 18 dex.

 

[Lanefan]

That may be because I’m not following your logic at all… but I’ll try and clarify.

Let’s say the NPCs are in location A. You’re saying they are there whether the random encounter roll is a yes or a no… that either way, that’s where they are.

You’ve also said that the roll doesn’t determine the PCs’ location either. So they are also at location A.

How can both the PCs and NPCs be at location A both when an encounter happens and when an encounter doesn’t happen?

The PCs' location is set by the players. The NPCs' location is set by the GM's notes. If they happen to intersect somewhere then there's an encounter no matter what the dice say. If there's no free-roving NPCs or monsters then the GM wouldn't be using random encounter tables for that area.

 

[Maxperson]

Honestly… I think maybe the core bit of disagreement is that I don’t think the world should be independent.

And this is perfectly fine. We are all entitled to our preferences for what we like when we play RPGs.

 

[pemerton]

Sure, but if the ambient noise is loud enough to mask the sound of a group of orcs, surely it's significant enough to warrant narration before the surprise attack, otherwise it can feel like a retcon or a rug-pull.

So if the GM doesn't narrate shadows, or ambient noise, or whatever, does that mean that no roll can be made for the Orcs to be stealthy?

Does the GM also have to decide on the visibility of the stuff floating in the gelatinous cube before rolling to see if it surprises the PCs?

 

[pemerton]

The framing scenes thing is actually my personal yes/no toggle for "narrative game", and that's actually from years of reading your posts. I associate narrative games with games @pemerton likes, which I associate with "games where Pemerton talks about scene-framing.

Yet I talk about Classic Traveller quite a bit, which (as I play it, and I think on the strength of the rules text) plays more like Apocalypse World than like a scene-framing-type game.

But all RPGs require the GM to present scenes/situations to the players, like "You're standing at the entrance to the dungeon". The most primordial rule for managing scene-framing in a RPG is the opening of a dungeon door: that's why classic D&D has so many rules about doors. (It's a weird legacy thing that many RPGs continue to be obsessed with doors even though they no longer use doors as the in-fiction device for managing scene-framing. One noteworthy thing about Classic Traveller is that it has no rules for doors - its author knew that they were not a very salient part of its subject matter.)

 

[definiteFreakyFishGuy]

This is a very interesting conversation, and let me see if I understood correctly by applying the monster encounter in the wild conversation to the cook behind the locked door situation.

(I didn't read every single post, so I apologize if this is something that already came up.)

I'm trying to describing the process in which a PC would run into a cook after picking the lock.

Trad Approach

• player succeeds a lock picking check.
• GM rolls for a random encounter, which says there should be an NPC behind the door. The GM decides a cook would make sense.

Narrative Approach

• player gets a mixed success for breaking into a building (which maybe a lock-picking move)
• player and GM discuss what the complication should be. They decide that a cook would make sense.

Does this seem correct?

 

[AnotherGuy]

What are your thoughts on paying out a meta currency on a fail? I'm thinking of Daggerheart where failing gives GM a resource* that they can subsequently spend on trouble.

*Half the time, but assume it's always for the sake of this question.

I like it as

• Moves against the PCs can be quantified.
• It provides permission for GM decides.
• Dice rolling provides an increased risk to the party (risk of increasing GM resource).

 

[pemerton]

The cook is both there and not there based on the skill of the person opening the lock combined with the result of the roll.

No. The GM decides if the cook is there, or not, based on whether the rules tell us that the burglar's attempt to break in went well or badly.