Which is fine but after a while it becomes pretty pointless. I can post until my fingers are tired about why I do what I do, why it works for me when other styles would not. I don't think it really changes anything.
D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.
- Thread starter Reynard
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Which is fine but after a while it becomes pretty pointless. I can post until my fingers are tired about why I do what I do, why it works for me when other styles would not. I don't think it really changes anything.
Self-restraint means adopting some sort of principle or process or heuristic. It's not an alternative to it.
EDIT: Also, what @Manbearcat said:
Once we're are talking about restraint, we can then talk about how it is communicated, applied, etc.
We can also look at how it relates to scenarios like the one I described just upthread, where I as GM have to decide how many enemy wizards attack the PCs, and the in-fiction situation permits a range of possibilities from modestly to overwhelmingly, such that my decision as GM at this point basically dictates the resolution of this whole aspect of the ingame situation. Telling me to restrain myself is not, on its own, a useful heuristic.
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But I look at my XP budget for every combat based on the guidance given in the DMG in my game as well. Nothing forces me to pay attention to that other than the social contract I have with my players of course. But if that social construct isn't enough - if I regularly kill off all my player's characters - then I won't have players for long.
As GM I can always ignore the rules or guidelines and the rules police aren't going to come arrest me.
hawkeyefan
Legend
It doesn’t say that. But so what? I wasn’t only talking about modern D&D.
My point was how practices established in the early days of D&D don’t make as much sense in modern versions of the game, yet have remained out of some mixture of nostalgia and conservatism.
Or we can take the approach that Classic Traveller does.
Here are the rules for Bribery and for Streetwise (from the 1977 version, Book 1, pp 14-15; "DM" means the modifier to a roll of 2d6):
Bribery - The individual has experience in bribing petty and not-so-petty officials in order to circumvent regulations, or ignore cumbersome laws. (Bribery expertise does not guarantee success, but does minimize bad effects if the offer is rebuffed.)
Petty officials can generally be bribed to ignore regulations or poor documentation, requiring a basic throw of 8+ (plus a cash offer) to do as asked. If the first offer is refused, a second roll may be made with the cash offer doubled. The character offering the bribe should first roll on the reaction table (book 3), and should not offer to a negatively reacting official.
DMs are allowed: if character has no expertise: −5. Per level of expertise: +1. If official reacts as a strong friend on the reaction table (a roll of 12), +2.
Referee: must insure cash offered and act solicited are both reasonable; if not, implement negative DMs. Roll for acceptance, and if rejected, a throw of 3- indicates the offer is reported. Other DMs may be made as appropriate.
Streetwise - The individual is acquainted with the ways of local subcultures (which tend to be the same every-where in human society), and thus is capable of dealing with strangers without alienating them. (This is not to be considered the same as alien contact, although the referee may so allow).
Close-knit sub-cultures (such as some portions of the lower classes, and trade groups such as workers, the underworld, etc) generally reject contact with strangers or unknown elements. Streetwise expertise allows contact for the purposes of obtaining information, hiring persons, purchasing contraband or stolen goods, etc.
The referee should set the throw required to obtain any item specified by the players (for example, the name of an official willing to issue licenses without hassle = 5+, the location of high quality guns at a low price = 9+). DMs based on streetwise should be allowed at +1 per level. No expertise DM = −5.
Petty officials can generally be bribed to ignore regulations or poor documentation, requiring a basic throw of 8+ (plus a cash offer) to do as asked. If the first offer is refused, a second roll may be made with the cash offer doubled. The character offering the bribe should first roll on the reaction table (book 3), and should not offer to a negatively reacting official.
DMs are allowed: if character has no expertise: −5. Per level of expertise: +1. If official reacts as a strong friend on the reaction table (a roll of 12), +2.
Referee: must insure cash offered and act solicited are both reasonable; if not, implement negative DMs. Roll for acceptance, and if rejected, a throw of 3- indicates the offer is reported. Other DMs may be made as appropriate.
Streetwise - The individual is acquainted with the ways of local subcultures (which tend to be the same every-where in human society), and thus is capable of dealing with strangers without alienating them. (This is not to be considered the same as alien contact, although the referee may so allow).
Close-knit sub-cultures (such as some portions of the lower classes, and trade groups such as workers, the underworld, etc) generally reject contact with strangers or unknown elements. Streetwise expertise allows contact for the purposes of obtaining information, hiring persons, purchasing contraband or stolen goods, etc.
The referee should set the throw required to obtain any item specified by the players (for example, the name of an official willing to issue licenses without hassle = 5+, the location of high quality guns at a low price = 9+). DMs based on streetwise should be allowed at +1 per level. No expertise DM = −5.
Now, Book 3 (p 8) states that "the referee should always feel free to impose worlds which have been deliberately (rather than randomly) generated. Often such planets will be devised specifically to reward or torment players." On these non-standard worlds, maybe the customs around bribery and close-knit subcultures depart from the norms for human society described in Book 1. That's when various techniques for flagging such things (which, in Classic Traveller, begin with the Ship's Library program) become useful.
Trust is a red herring, as I've already explained. But what makes you think the GM will have trouble following rules? I mean, I do a lot of GMing. I read the rulebook and I follow the rules. Sometimes the rules aren't as clear as they could be, so I have to re-read them once or twice. Occasionally I discover a gap in the rules, and the I decide how to close it, or discuss with my friends how to handle it (the degree of unilateral vs collective decision-making will depend very much on context).
This doesn't seem hard or puzzling to me.
Everyone posting in this thread wants that, as best I can tell.
Who is talking about moral culpability? All we're pointing out is that here you are describing GM-driven play.
An alternative approach is to use procedures that change how decisions are made and outcomes arrived at. These don't change the degree of realism/believability. They just change who (if anyone) is in control. Wargamers invented these sorts of procedures well before RPGers started extending their use beyond the original context of army-vs-army battles.
It means the GM's view of common sense.
This is why most RPG worlds make no sense politically or sociologically, because - notoriously, I would say - most people's political and sociological common sense is not that strong. To me, that seems to come through in the actual discussion of the bribery scenario: why would the worlds of D&D have officials who follow the norms of contemporary European and North American bureaucracies, as opposed to the norms that are far more common even in most contemporary bureaucracies, let alone among historical officials?
But it can be an issue when it comes to other domains of "common sense" also. I've seen discussions of athletic endeavour that make no sense - eg I am in my 6th decade of life, and in the past two years I have been able to run a half-marathon, not in any great time but with no ill effects other than pulling up a little sore the next morning, after doing 4 training runs (of 11 to 16 km) in the few weeks preceding the event. So that sort of performance sets an absolute minimum baseline for what ordinary people who live physical as opposed to sedentary scholarly lives can do.
Once, in a convention sci-fi scenario, the PCs (one of whom I was playing) were stuck in an installation where the oxygen supply had been cut off. So we had only the oxygen present in the base at the time the supply was cut off. One of the players was a chemical engineer, and so was able to quickly calculate that we had enough oxygen to last some hours, and we planned our actions around that. But then the GM imposed his "realistic" conception of how long we would have - it was expressed in minutes or maybe tens of minutes, and so our plans were hosed. Naturally enough, that left a pretty sour taste in our mouths as players.
Yes. That's why we roll dice. Wargamers worked this out 100+ years ago.
It's not as if the only alternative to GM storytelling is player's narrating the story of their PCs' glorious victories.
To me, taken literally, this is a doorway to utterly pointless and frustrating play.
I mean, I can't think of a much worse RPGing experience than to spend (say) hours or even sessions of play having my PC trying to achieve something, only for it to ultimately turn out to be impossible because of a secret decision that the GM made about one or more setting elements.
What a way to waste my time!
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