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

[Enrahim]

Absolute power does not discuss. It declares.

Absolute power that requires discussion before anything can be done simply, flatly, is not absolute.

Absolute power MEANS no discussion. That's what it means!

A dictator is LITERALLY "one who speaks". That's what the word literally means.

Not to everyone. You are making implied assumptions on how people understands and uses certain words. Mind you, this is formulated so that any dictionary definition you might be be coming up with is irrelevant for the validity of this statement. If you want a demonstrating example of my statement, I hereby provide myself.

I might agree to a certain understanding of line 2 and 4. My understanding of what you seem to try to say in 1 and 3 do not match my understanding of those words.

 

[pemerton]

Is that any weirder than not knowing why the runes were created?

I don't follow.

When attention is paid in the play of the game to the runes, the reasons for their creation emerge. As the anecdote illustrated, that took place in a way different from the GM making an authorial decision or the GM reporting an earlier authorial decision. Attending to the fiction yields answers about it, via the relevant process of play.

Whereas I'm saying that, if I am playing a Star Trek game, and my character sits down with your character to explain the special relativity thought experiments, we don't know or work out what my character says to yours.

The general point I was making is that departures from the reality of physical law, in a fiction, will inevitably produce tensions, and ultimately contradictions, if we focus our attention on those features of the fiction that constitute the law-breaking. How does a dragon fly? How does light behave in Star Trek? How do Batman's joints and muscles survive the forces that operate on them when he catches himself on his swing lines, cape, etc? How does a "sword" the size of a pin behave just like a rapier? And so on.

This is a particular point of vulnerability in a RPG because in RPGs, unlike in fiction which permits more author control and editing, it is harder to stop situations that engender these sorts of tensions emerging. The author of a fantasy novel can simply refrain from having any characters perform physical and biomechanical experiments on dragons. But what happens if the players in a RPG have their PCs do such things.

As I said earlier, I believe that Star Trek has never had its characters discuss special relativity as their ship accelerates to warp speed. But what stops players having their PCs do this?

Likewise with the mouse-y rapiers - can a player have his mouse PC try to investigate the tensile etc properties of their rapier?

I posted examples upthread from my own sci-fir (Traveller) RPGing where we, as a group, reached consensus and compromise on some of these sorts of issues. I also posted, and continue to think, that achieving that sort of consensus/compromise can be harder if the players are trying to beat the scenario or solve the mystery - because that puts more weight on them making their own inferences about the fictional facts, but if the fictional facts ultimately entail contradictions then there is risk of those inferences breaking down.

 

[AlViking]

That's not true. Absolute power just means you have the ability to do anything you want, not that you will do anything you want, or that you won't listen to others without that power.

The only thing that makes it absolute is that nothing can stop it if it is exercised. Nothing about absolute means that it doesn't discuss.

The odds that the DM will listen to the discussion and very probably change things. His power may be absolute, but he is also human and presumably wants everyone in the game to be enjoying themselves.

You have a really odd view of what absolute power means. "My way, or the highway" isn't even close to the only way it goes.

I would also repeat yet again that the "DM has absolute power" is a (all powerful?) strawman. If I don't provide a style of game my players want I won't have players for long. A couple of times over the years players have left my game because I wasn't the right DM for them, for them it was their choice to take the highway. I took no offense, they didn't leave in a huff. Meanwhile except for moving or other life changes my players stick with me in part because I adjust the game for what they enjoy within limits of what I'll also enjoy. On the other hand if you want to play an evil vampire that drinks the blood of your compatriots because you thought Astarion of BG3 fame was cool my game isn't going to be the one for you.

As DM I'm a player as well. I also have to take into consideration what the rest of the people sitting at the table want. If that leaves an individual out a couple of times over decades of DMing? Then it is our way or the highway.

 

[AlViking]

Name 2.

I've named numerous sim systems that meet the criteria. So, let's see you name the ones that don't. you're the one insisting on a level of detail that I have repeatedly not talked about. So, let's see the proof shall we? Simulationist systems that are black boxes that provide no information about how the results are achieved. RPG's that players would generally look at and say, "yup, that's a good simulationist leaning game."

Your definition of simulation is that "If the numbers fall here it means X, if they fall hear it means Y" is completely arbitrary. If that works for you, great. For me? It's just an arbitrary and meaningless cutoff point. I don't care if some other games use similar criteria or a random chart, it can't give you the real reason for failure in the fiction because the real reason for failure is that the player didn't hit the correct range of numbers. Any other detail is just adding a meaningless layer of arbitrary made up fiction. I can't provide any examples because it's obvious you'll just say I'm wrong.

Have a good one.

 

[Don Durito]

I would also repeat yet again that the "DM has absolute power" is a (all powerful?) strawman.

Well it's definitely an odd statement, as is the whole argument about what kind of king or dictator a GM is.

 

[The Firebird]

I don't follow.

In both cases, key aspects of the world are not defined until the players interact with them. The runes imply a history--an author, a purpose, a culture--which does not exist until the players interact with them. This produces tensions, and ultimately contradictions, with other material in the setting because it is not tied to anything fixed.

The physical laws of reality are fixed, so infidelity to these (via Star Trek) can create contradictions. But parts of the campaign world are also fixed. For example, anything that appeared on screen. And infidelity to these also causes contradictions.

As you describe in your post, the players can investigate the points of tension, like the biomechanics of dragons. They can also investigate the origin of the runes--who created them? Why did a person want a map there? Was that something valued in the culture? When they start interacting with these, the fact that the world doesn't gel, wasn't put together as a real world is, starts to create problems.

 

[AlViking]

Because we don't know how would the disproof has been rendered?

To put it another way, what - in the universe of Star Trek - is the false premise, or error of method, in the special relativity thought experiments? Eg is the speed of light in a vacuum not constant? But then what does it mean to accelerate to a speed that is faster than light? And if the starship is travelling faster than light, how is illumination within the vessel even occurring?

Star Trek uses an explanation that maybe, just possibly, might work. They don't accelerate in the same sense that we accelerate in our car when we press the accelerator, they warp the space-time continuum by expanding the area behind it and contracting the area in front. As far as light in the ship if you think that's a problem you really don't understand the theory of relativity.

There have been truly stupid sci-fi that ignore all sorts of the known laws of physics, and others just say our understanding of the laws of physics are incomplete. Star Trek uses technology that may be impossible but it does follow the laws of physics as we understand them.

 

[pemerton]

It seems to me that there are (at least) 3 ways of thinking about an episode of RPGing, or an approach to RPGing, as simulationist:

(1) The participants rely (and are able to rely) upon the mechanical system, without needing to inject their own concerns or judgemental opinions, to learn what happens in the fiction. Rolemaster, RuneQuest and GURPS are like this, or at least aspire to be.

(2) The fiction, during play, is generated via a process that doesn't have regard for what anyone hopes it might be. This might require the application of heuristics to support extrapolation from what is already known or mechanically established, but they should be "neutral" ones. This approach won't use techniques like "fail forward" or the approach to deciphering strange runes that I described upthread in the context of MHRP play.

(3) The players, during play, aim to receive the fiction from "outside" of themselves, rather than "inputting" into it (except by having the in-fiction causal consequences of their PCs' actions worked out). This approach does not similarly constrain the GM, who might - for instance - make decisions non-neutrally, eg, "for the good of the story". Many "event-based" modules will only work if this approach is adopted.​

I think that each approach is a special case of the approach(es) with a higher number than its own. That is, (2) is a special case of (3) - because it maintains the approach of (3) as far as players are concerned, but puts additional constrains on the GM. And then (1) is a special case of (2), as it aspires to drop all the non-mechanical heuristics and keep only the mechanics.

 

[Umbran]

But when I asked for discussion for HOW one does this, for how one should go about trying to fix a smaller breakdown of the table's function, you know what I was told, repeatedly, by several different people?

Some variation of "you just HAVE to trust me[/the GM]." Which, as I said at the time, is precisely the opposite of helping someone get over their concerns.

So... some people on the internet were wrong.

You present this as somehow remarkable, instead of being about as common as water being wet.

 

[pemerton]

As you describe in your post, the players can investigate the points of tension, like the biomechanics of dragons. They can also investigate the origin of the runes--who created them? Why did a person want a map there? Was that something valued in the culture? When they start interacting with these, the fact that the world doesn't gel, wasn't put together as a real world is, starts to create problems.

There were no problems in my MHRP/Cortex+ Fantasy game. The players interacted with the runes, and the process of play led us to answers.

But what answers are going to be offered in the case of Star Trek and special relativity?

This is why I don't see any resemblance. There is no contradiction or even tension in a dungeon having strange runes that, when properly deciphered, indicate or explain a way out. No law of nature or physical principle is violated.