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

[EzekielRaiden]

If you take away the assumption of a "wealthy person's country estate" how would it change anything? The real point of the scenario is that someone is trying to pick a lock and how the state of the world because of success or failure. So what if the lock was on a rundown estate that had been taken over by some local bandits?

...the context is massively, ENORMOUSLY important for what possible consequences might result from failing to pick a lock.

I thought that was something everyone here agreed upon. Was I mistaken?

If you're trying to infiltrate a thieves' hideout, the kinds of consequences which might arise from taking way too long to pick a lock would differ in a great many ways.

Or the family has fallen on hard time and doesn't have any servants any more?

Then there simply would not be any servant. That simply would not happen, because established fiction explicitly says that that isn't a possibility.

There are many, many times when a character is going to be picking a lock and there aren't going to be any servants at all. What happens on a failure then?

Something else. Something context-appropriate.

Why is this even a question? I am genuinely at a loss as to why you would even need to ask this question. "Begin and end with the fiction" is a GM-binding rule for a reason!

 

[AlViking]

Isn’t that the same for the folks who live in the home being broken into?



Something else? Something that makes sense based on the context?

Such as? I'll keep talking about how the example is bad, but picking a lock to break into a building is hardly uncommon.

 

[AlViking]

Something different that is consistent with what's been established, follows from the lockpicking fiction and the GM thinks would be compelling. There is no single answer that applies in all circumstances. Different fictional circumstances require different approaches, different judgements. The last would likely not require at all because there is no duress involved. We can talk about each in turn if you like.

At the table I'm not trying to resolve all attempts to pick a lock - just this one in this moment.

There's probably always going to be a risk breaking in to a place. If the GM doesn't allow retries on lock picking or it's not guaranteed that the character is skilled enough to pick the lock.

But "something that makes sense" is not exactly a meaningful answer.

 

[AlViking]

...the context is massively, ENORMOUSLY important for what possible consequences might result from failing to pick a lock.

I thought that was something everyone here agreed upon. Was I mistaken?

If you're trying to infiltrate a thieves' hideout, the kinds of consequences which might arise from taking way too long to pick a lock would differ in a great many ways.


Then there simply would not be any servant. That simply would not happen, because established fiction explicitly says that that isn't a possibility.


Something else. Something context-appropriate.

Why is this even a question? I am genuinely at a loss as to why you would even need to ask this question. "Begin and end with the fiction" is a GM-binding rule for a reason!

Then provide examples. I've been told the one I provided is terrible so come up with something a better example.

 

[Campbell]

There's probably always going to be a risk breaking in to a place. If the GM doesn't allow retries on lock picking or it's not guaranteed that the character is skilled enough to pick the lock.

But "something that makes sense" is not exactly a meaningful answer.

I don't know what to tell you. I'm making a creative choice in the moment, constrained by the established fiction, but not only the established fiction. I cannot make that choice irrespective of the circumstances of the game, which includes the player characters, why they are breaking in, who has not been in the spotlight lately, what I have telegraphed, etc. If I'm using fail-forward I'm not running a simulation or an explorable setting players can neutrally explore. I'm running a game where I at least sometimes frame conflicts. So, without a detailed breakdown of what's been established in the fiction and what's going on at the table I cannot make that decision abstractly.

 

[Faolyn]

So, essentially, we can't have these things in the game because we cannot trust players to actually play in character.

Hrm... how does that dovetail with the notion that immersive gamers want to inhabit their characters and act like it's a real world?

Seems that the notion of immersive gaming only goes as far as doing stuff that won't actually result in negative consequences for the character.

I play multiple RPGs where players, in the play of their PCs, are bound in the sorts of ways that @Hussar describes. In Classic Traveller, players have to make morale checks for their PCs, and are bound by the outcome. In Burning Wheel, PCs can be bound by the result of a Duel of Wits; similarly, in Torchbearer 2e, PCs can be bound by the outcomes of Convince and similar social conflicts. In Marvel Heroic RP/Cortex+ Heroic, PCs can suffer mental stress, emotional stress, and social complications, which impede their rolls and can even result in them being taken out of a conflict. Etc.

The way these are enforced is the way any other rule in a game played for fun among the participants is enforced.

The problem is that rules like morale or Persuasion checks is that they make people play not in character. They have to run away because the dice say they do, not because it's in character for them to run away. They have to believe an NPC or accept someone's arguments because the dice say they do, not because the NPC is actually believable or made a good point.

In other words, you stop playing your character and let the dice play them instead.

In D&D, and many other games, most of the time (there are a few exceptions) when a character is forced to run away or believe an NPC, it's because there's magic involved. Or if not actually magic, then something that is pretty darn close: a dragon's roar may (or may not) be magical in nature, but it's a creature nearly as big as a football field that is angry at you in particular. Some games even specify that fear effects should be limited to supernatural events--both GURPS and SWADE make a note of that, for instance.

 

[Faolyn]

If you take away the assumption of a "wealthy person's country estate" how would it change anything? The real point of the scenario is that someone is trying to pick a lock and how the state of the world because of success or failure. So what if the lock was on a rundown estate that had been taken over by some local bandits? Or the family has fallen on hard time and doesn't have any servants any more?

There are many, many times when a character is going to be picking a lock and there aren't going to be any servants at all. What happens on a failure then?

Then you pick a different possibility. Many, many of them have been brought up in this thread alone.

 

[Emerikol]

Isn’t that the same for the folks who live in the home being broken into?

If the DM's campaign world has a cook in that home then yes, otherwise no.

 

[Thomas Shey]

The problem is that rules like morale or Persuasion checks is that they make people play not in character. They have to run away because the dice say they do, not because it's in character for them to run away. They have to believe an NPC or accept someone's arguments because the dice say they do, not because the NPC is actually believable or made a good point.

The problem is that's not that clearcut. What its more accurate to say is that the player doesn't believe its in character (or at least is convincing themselves and/or others it isn't). How well people will stand up to terrifying experiences is one of the things people assume will occur more consistently than it does. It may be that someone's view of the characters in adventure fiction is that they're more resistant to that, but that still doesn't make it a given.

A naturalistic view of characters shouldn't make people's reactions to a lot of high-stress things as determinist as many, maybe most players will do so; even if they don't end up fleeing or going berserk, it often should have some impact.

(Note: I'm not saying you or anyone has to want that, but I think its entirely defensible that morale and being convinced by people you don't think should convince you is as or more likely to be an accurate depiction of what would go on as the player purely deciding it from their perspective. Its just tricky to get it so the situational results are right and many people are super resistant to even trying).

 

[hawkeyefan]

Such as? I'll keep talking about how the example is bad, but picking a lock to break into a building is hardly uncommon.

Such as what? It depends on so many factors. There’s not one answer. You use your creativity combined with whatever has been established to come up with something.

Without context, there’s no way to give you an answer.

If the DM's campaign world has a cook in that home then yes, otherwise no.

But if the cook shows up in play, it’s because the GM introduced the cook… so how could the campaign world not have a cook?