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

[EzekielRaiden]

That's funny, but I still think you're taking the least generous reading possible and starting from there.

Remember: Generosity is only required for D&D-alike fans. Generosity given to someone who's a fan of BW? Not on your life. Charity must be earned if you're on that side of the debate, and only the people on the other side get to decide if it's been earned or not. Just like how people on that side get to demand endless clarification and reject any and every term they have even the smallest problem with, but their terms and their definitions are inviolate and challenging them is a totally unacceptable "rhetorical trick".

 

[EzekielRaiden]

And a broken exploit in the rules, for thems as wants to use it as such.

Because D&D has never, ever had such a thing, ever.

The double standards are so thick you could sell them as double cheeseburgers.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I don’t disagree with this at all. It’s one of the things I’ve been pointing out.



Sure, but how is plausibility of different events compared? Certainly there’d be some obvious answers when two possibilities are compared. But there are also going to be some that are equally plausible, or close to it.

How is a choice made from that point?



I think you’d be surprised how many people might disagree with the idea of a GM determining things based on what’s interesting or fun. I wouldn’t be one of them… I mean, who wants a GM to pick something that’s obviously boring?

And yet there are people who insist they do not think of this at all. That fun or interesting gameplay or character focus or anything other than depicting a living world should not be considered by the GM at all.



I think that’s a really odd conclusion to draw after your three points.

You're definitely more generous than I am with this whole plausibility thing. Honestly, I think it is a very weak plank to build on. First of all we're discussing Fantasy games (or similarly fantastical SF etc.). So, there is no defined way to say what is or is not possible, or even how likely it is. Gygaxian Naturalism can be seen as an attempt at an approach to this issue. The world is as it is, so presumably it is most plausible for it to continue to be that way, and some lampshades are applied to that, like describing the 'ecology' of various monsters.

Secondly, we have very little detailed information about the game world. I follow a lot of science, especially related to computational approaches to things. What I have learned is that the details matter, A LOT. So, yes, sometimes you can order things in terms of some average sense of verisimilitude that will be produced by describing things that way vs some other way, but there are always tons of roughly equally good options.

Next, the real world is filled with unusual circumstances. In fact ALMOST everything which happens is highly unlikely at some level of detail. Yet these things happen all the time, because the real world is deep and rich, it is filled with countless happenings. FOR ME at least, simply depicting 'likely stuff' isn't very convincing.

Finally, when it comes to people and social organization and what is or is not 'likely to happen' or 'plausible' in that sense, which is probably the most significant category, all bets are off. While we can characterize human beings, the truth is they are extremely complex, their interactions are highly dependent on chance events or small details that are below the level of resolution of any game world. While you might state that it is likely that the Beggar's Guild sends an assassin after you, I argue it is equally just as likely that they don't, or that they offer you a payment to go away, or whatever. And I am utterly, deeply, skeptical that a GM has any way of making an objective judgment between these options. Yet practitioners of deep world building absolutely refuse flat out, to a person, to acknowledge this!

 

[Micah Sweet]

Huh? What is fidelity to what has gone before - which of course is something that the GM authored - but adhering to a vision?

A vision can be anything. Fidelity to what come before is a specific vision, grounded in logic.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I would say one feature of my play is there isn't an arc. A situation like that could certainly arise, but it wouldnt' end with it just serving that purpose. There would likely be things that arise from down the road.

Setting has magistrates, sheriffs and constables, even wanted posters (which I have rules for). But there are lawless areas too. Honestly the law is less of a concern in a wuxia setting (most martial heroes can evade law enforcement pretty easily), but there usually are consequences for things like beating someone up or killing them. Sometimes not though. Not every group of ruffians are going to come back later. But this is definitely something that could end up on a grudge table depending on things

Right, and that makes perfectly good sense in terms of what you are doing. It is just a bit different from the Narrativist process where beating up some ruffians might also be leveraged by the GM later on to 'bring on the heat', and (say in DW) it may even be the case that the ruffians are part of a front (or one is created with them as part of it in response to this) and they become one of its dangers, or their reappearance is an omen of trouble to come, etc.

 

[Old Fezziwig]

You're definitely more generous than I am with this whole plausibility thing. Honestly, I think it is a very weak plank to build on. First of all we're discussing Fantasy games (or similarly fantastical SF etc.). So, there is no defined way to say what is or is not possible, or even how likely it is. Gygaxian Naturalism can be seen as an attempt at an approach to this issue. The world is as it is, so presumably it is most plausible for it to continue to be that way, and some lampshades are applied to that, like describing the 'ecology' of various monsters.

Secondly, we have very little detailed information about the game world. I follow a lot of science, especially related to computational approaches to things. What I have learned is that the details matter, A LOT. So, yes, sometimes you can order things in terms of some average sense of verisimilitude that will be produced by describing things that way vs some other way, but there are always tons of roughly equally good options.

Next, the real world is filled with unusual circumstances. In fact ALMOST everything which happens is highly unlikely at some level of detail. Yet these things happen all the time, because the real world is deep and rich, it is filled with countless happenings. FOR ME at least, simply depicting 'likely stuff' isn't very convincing.

Finally, when it comes to people and social organization and what is or is not 'likely to happen' or 'plausible' in that sense, which is probably the most significant category, all bets are off. While we can characterize human beings, the truth is they are extremely complex, their interactions are highly dependent on chance events or small details that are below the level of resolution of any game world. While you might state that it is likely that the Beggar's Guild sends an assassin after you, I argue it is equally just as likely that they don't, or that they offer you a payment to go away, or whatever. And I am utterly, deeply, skeptical that a GM has any way of making an objective judgment between these options. Yet practitioners of deep world building absolutely refuse flat out, to a person, to acknowledge this!

I tend to take the following view -- things only need to happen once. It's my Lee Harvey Oswald rule, as it were. However hard the shot that killed Kennedy might've been based on equipment, training, skill, circumstances, etc., it only needed to happen once. He didn't need to show up the next day and shoot Johnson, too.

 

[hawkeyefan]

You can always use both, if they're not blatantly contradictory. The warring nations could begin to war again and the prophecized portal to the Abyss opens.

Or, roll a die.

What are the factors that go into this decision? When do we go to dice? When do we just pick? Or pick multiple outcomes?

For example, @robertsconley has said that verisimilitude is his highest priority. @Bedrockgames has said his is character agency. These different priorities may play a part in how things go.

None of these reasons is bad… it’s all a matter of preference. But, without a set procedure, it’s all just the GM deciding what happens.

Then their game worlds would be quite different. No biggie.

If you say so. But the how of things seems to matter a lot to people, so I don’t know that many would agree with your “no biggie”.

How so?

Well, your first point was about the sheer volume of possibilities. Your second was about the varying levels of plausibility among those possibilities. Those would seem to lead to the conclusion that more than one outcome is both possible and plausible.

Combined with the third point, I suppose those possibilities are narrowed down some, but as I said… many folks would not include those factors. And even if they do, I still think that more often than not, there’s be multiple options from which to choose.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I flatly disagree. When someone asserts X is better than Y because X never does P while Y does do P, and then someone points out that X in fact does do P, there are only three valid responses:

Are you talking about stuff like dissociated mechanics (because I didn’t see the post you were responding to). What I am saying is just that in those kinds of conversations sometimes people find a root cause of a problem for them but over apply the explanation. For instance I think dissociated mechanics was one aspect of why some features of 4E didn’t feel right for some people. I think though they started going on a. Witch hunt and rejecting all dissociated mechanics where they found them. And the issue is dissociate mechanics are just one piece of the explanation and dissociated mechanics are only an issue when you really notice them. You can point back to earlier editions but they were in places of the game where they were do grandfsthered in no one noticed or in that particular context they just didn’t pop out. Also where I agree with you is fundamentally the root cause is just a possible explanation (call it dissociate theory). The real issue is they didn’t like the mechanics in question as they appeared in 4E (and it may have also been heightened by other things the game was doing).

 

[Old Fezziwig]

Remember: Generosity is only required for D&D-alike fans. Generosity given to someone who's a fan of BW? Not on your life. Charity must be earned if you're on that side of the debate, and only the people on the other side get to decide if it's been earned or not. Just like how people on that side get to demand endless clarification and reject any and every term they have even the smallest problem with, but their terms and their definitions are inviolate and challenging them is a totally unacceptable "rhetorical trick".

I don't know, man. I don't want to take this trip with you. It doesn't seem helpful.

 

[robertsconley]

For example, @robertsconley has said that verisimilitude is his highest priority. @Bedrockgames has said his is character agency. These different priorities may play a part in how things go.

None of these reasons is bad… it’s all a matter of preference. But, without a set procedure, it’s all just the GM deciding what happens.

I invite you to illustrate precisely what you are talking about with my actual play breakdown.

R

D&D General Post in thread '[rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.'

Yesterday at 10:13 PM

I understand that, I think one of the differences is that you predominantly maintain that sense of order at the table and in the fiction.

As promised, here’s a breakdown of the video in question, covering three situations that occurred at the start of the session, along with my commentary.

Video

Spoiler

Rob: Why don't you take the lead here and we can get started at your convenience.

Okay, so you folks made casters. I believe Adam, you made a third-level knight named Sir Broderick, correct?

Adam: Correct.

Rob: Brendon, you made a fourth-level...

• robertsconley