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

[EzekielRaiden]

Who vetoes player actions made within the confines of their PCs in an active game?

Have you not seen the examples in this thread?

Any and every action the GM doesn't like, regardless of reason, can and will get a "no". Doesn't matter what the action is. That was core to the discussion we had about my (constructed) example of the faux-Egypt paladin character being completely incapable of even TRYING to convince the Priesthood of Set to help with preventing an invasion of faux-Egypt. The GM can, in fact, reject a player's action for any reason or no reason at all. The player just has to trust that it will make sense. Potentially for months before any answers whatsoever will be forthcoming.

 

[Enrahim]

Sorry, but going to separate this one out.

Where it's useful is in actually creating a taxonomy for discussing a game. If a DM says, "I'm running a heavily sim based game where the logic of the setting is key and mechanics are as diegetic as possible" and then pulls out D&D, then the DM is lying. He's lying to himself and he's lying to his players. Because the mechanics of D&D are very much not diegetic and the system provides nothing for simulation.

It's no different from me pulling out FATE and claiming that I'm going to run a really heavy sim game. I would think that most people would be giving me a lot of side eye for that.

I bolded the problem. Here the GM made a claim about the mechanics. I agree that claim is dubious at best. (It might go in a tangent about the ambiguity in the meaning of the word "lying", as the GM might really believe the claim themselves. But I think this is irrelevant for your point, which I grant)

As to FATE - I really think it might be good for simulating what is happening in in certain kinds of drama. The compels in particular seem exelent for supporting a simulation of how the main cast seem to always get in trouble related to the key aspects of their role. The fate point requirement for invoking aspects is obviously a serious hindrance if you want to simulate a set of characters living in a world neutral to their existence and actions. But it can provide a (weak) support for simulating how dramas don't let one of the characters solve all the problems, even in an environement they should have a clear advantage.

And I think the above points to what I think is a key problem in this conversation. Too little effort is made in order to align on what we actually want to simulate.

Much of the conversation seem to assume real world as the baseline. As such while deviations from real world is recognised and accepted in actual play, the idea is that an analysis disregarding these will still be valid. I think it is in this context diegetics has been identified as a favorable trait for mechanics in terms of supporting simulation. And I think this is a good first approximation in general.

However as we start deviating from real world i terms of what we want to simulate, I think the diegetics requirement is similarly lessened. For instance I think me introducing "silly points" as a meta currency would not be considered particularly hindering for a simulation of loony tunes, and indeed might be helpful for the simulation as a way to inspire and motivate approperiate simulative actions and judgement calls.

As for D&D the much bashed upon HP is clearly not good for simulating anything corresponding to real life. But it appear at least somewhat simulative of some idea regarding how 70s fantasy heroes don't just randomly die from a stray arrow, while the red shirts definitely do.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Remember I'm arguing against "must accept tieflings"; I'm not in the absolute power debate.

Must I accept tieflings in Ryu & Ronin?

"Must" you accept anything? "Must" the player accept everything?

As for Ryu & Ronin, oni. That's...pretty much literally what oni are. Human-shaped, dangerous spirits with varying red or blue tones of skin. We are, after all, prioritizing integration with traditional Japanese cultural expression--and in that expression, oni (and many, many, MANY other devilish/demonic/spiritual/etc. beings besides them!) lived, worked, played, and even married among regular ordinary humans. Sun Wukong literally recruited Pigsy after serving him divorce papers from the father of his wife. She was a human. He was a rake-wielding pig-demon-man. (Versions disagree as to why this situation occurred, but the one I'm familiar with, Pigsy used shapeshifting magic and a not-entirely-accurate portrayal of how much benefit it would be to have him as a son-in-law, hence the woman's father feels he got sold a bill of goods and wants to break things off.)

 

[CreamCloud0]

HOLD THE HORSES! STOP THE TRAIN!

For 1,000+ pages people had issues with the unfortunate luck of running into a cook when one failed one's lock-pick roll, yet now bad luck is ok for climbing.

So it is obvious the issue was the above example reflected a tool proficiency.
This thread would have been long over if the original example had been the PC fail a climb check and the Fail Forward result being he got to the top of the mountain only to encounter the cook.

bad luck is fine for climbing, bad luck is fine for lockpicking too, however, the existence of a cook is not a consequence of bad luck in the act of lockpicking, it is just a generalized 'bad thing' that you don't want to happen.

bad luck in lockpicking would be having your picks break, or the lock jamming, or opening with a loud noise, but the cook is not any sort of direct consequence of the act of picking the lock, it is just a secondary bad thing that happens to occur somehow in coincidental timing of failing to pick the lock

 

[AnotherGuy]

bad luck is fine for climbing, bad luck is fine for lockpicking too, however, the existence of a cook is not a consequence of bad luck in the act of lockpicking, it is just a generalized 'bad thing' that you don't want to happen.

bad luck in lockpicking would be having your picks break, or the lock jamming, or opening with a loud noise, but the cook is not any sort of direct consequence of the act of picking the lock, it is just a secondary bad thing that happens to occur somehow in coincidental timing of failing to pick the lock

I hear you but please see my reply post #18477 to Max where I directly tie the consequence of the action to the poor die roll.

 

[Enrahim]

Have you not seen the examples in this thread?

Any and every action the GM doesn't like, regardless of reason, can and will get a "no". Doesn't matter what the action is. That was core to the discussion we had about my (constructed) example of the faux-Egypt paladin character being completely incapable of even TRYING to convince the Priesthood of Set to help with preventing an invasion of faux-Egypt. The GM can, in fact, reject a player's action for any reason or no reason at all. The player just has to trust that it will make sense. Potentially for months before any answers whatsoever will be forthcoming.

This is not an example of "player actions made within the confines of their PCs in an active game" being vetoed. From my understanding if what you have written previously, your PC actually got to try to convince the priesthood of Seth to the extent possible within the confines of the PC. The attempt failed due to not being able to get direct access to the priesthood of Set, due to circumstances outside the confines of the PC.

 

[Hussar]

But do the jenga tower support the simulation? Is it irrelevant to the simulation? Or might it complicate/hinder the simulation when it toples in a moment the prescribed effect of that is tricky to justify as a natural consequence of the fictional state? What do you want to simulate anyway? Is it the genre of horror movies? Or arthurian court romance? That is the sort of questionsI think is useful to ask about the ruleset and situation to determine if it is good for a simulation.

Not really. That's not the point of the Jenga tower. The point of the Jenga tower is to ramp up the horror factor by ramping up the tension of the players. As they pull each piece out of the tower, each next piece gets that much harder. It's not simulating anything in the game world at all. It's not meant to. It's meant to make you feel like a horror movie. So, in a sense, I suppose, you could say that it's simulating the feeling of a horror movie.

But, that's certainly not the sense that people are using simulation in this thread. There is no connection between pulling the piece and the narrative in the story. But, apparently, so long as I narrate the results in just the right way, suddenly Dread becomes a sim game.

 

[Hussar]

Perhaps I misunderstood the point. But I don't see how what he wrote supports your position.

What I took from the post is that simulationist games aspires to meet a certain level of granularity and realism at a mechanical level, which I found useful. I don't think aspirations are the same as a definition.

Well, considering he responded already and said that he agreed with me, perhaps you didn't understand his point

 

[pemerton]

HOLD THE HORSES! STOP THE TRAIN!

For 1,000+ pages people had issues with the unfortunate luck of running into a cook when one failed one's lock-pick roll, yet now bad luck is ok for climbing.

Right. This point was made, way upthread, by @hawkeyefan and me (back then it was crumbling rocks, rather than sharp rocks).

If you were more skilled, you would have picked that lock a lot sooner, before the cook made his way to the kitchen.
If you were more skilled on the attempt, you've have not made so much noise while lock-picking thereby attracting the attention of the perceptive cook.

Yep, I think these things were said by some of us upthread too!

 

[Enrahim]

Then I think those people would be best served by doing the thing that does, in fact, give them absolute power over a fiction: Write a book. Or, I suppose, a film, TV show, play, etc. Video games are probably not a good idea, as players tend to chafe at being reminded about how little power they have over its fiction.


Then I think those people would be best served by engaging in an activity that does, in fact, give someone else absolute power over a fiction they're experiencing: reading a book (or, as noted, watching a movie/TV show/play or other, similar activities).


What does it mean to want to belong? Because from where I'm sitting, wanting to "belong" means, in part, that you accept and integrate the judgment of others, specifically desiring that they find you worthy of recognition and inclusion. It's a desire to integrate with a group external to yourself.

Desiring power over some given domain is entirely the opposite intent. You do not want to integrate with anything. You want to tell others what they must accept being integrated into.

Now I think we are starting to tickle the real subtlety of "absolute power".

A school kid come to school with their new cool toy. They let their friends play a bit with it. This sharing is a nice bonding exercise. All the while though, the kid owning the toy provide clear instructions about what they find ok to do with the toy, and rapidly shoots down any idea the friends might have that they are worried might damage their toy. The friends, being good friends do not question or push, but immediately defers to the owner of this toy whenever they voice any opinion regarding this toy's use.

In what sense can this kid been said to have power over their toy? Can any of their friends be said to have power over the toy? Is the feature that noone are in a position to question the kid's ownership and related rights regarding the toy sufficient to call the power of ownership absolute? Or is the fact that the kid temporarily handed over some limited control to their friends a demonstration that their power of controll isn't absolute? Are even the two questions contradictory? Might it be that the kid holds absolute power over the toy in one sense, but not in another?

And in all cases is it hard to see how the act of sharing their toy, even if it might be in a very limited sense, might be a very strong expression of a wish for feeling like they belong?