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

[pemerton]

The key distinction isn’t that I sometimes choose an outcome that’s interesting. It’s that I only choose from outcomes that are consistent with what’s already been established in the setting, character motivations, and current world state.

This bring me back to the point that everyone does that. I mean, Vincent Baker has a direct instruction to do this in Apocalypse World.

I’m not inventing scenes to escalate drama or to test a character's belief, I’m extrapolating forward from what the NPC would reasonably do.

And the second clause here doesn't preclude the first. They're not mutually exclusive.

 

[pemerton]

The 100% realism straw man returns! Back by popular demand!

No one is talking about "!00% realism*. I'm talking about the knowability of outcomes generated via a process.

 

[pemerton]

I've been running my games basically the same way since the late 20th century once I outgrew the dungeon of the week. It's nothing new.

See how you talk about "outgrowing"? You're not the only poster who feels that way about the development of their RPGing experiences and techniques.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Sure, why does anyone's opinion matter, Micah?

I think it matters because I think "be a neutral arbiter" has remained common advice in the hobby, but is more relevant to specific games rather than the hobby in general.

Do you have any thoughts on that topic other than that you wish I didn't post it?

My thoughts were, "why do you think this matters?", because I clearly do not think that, and you answered. I think that advice is still valuable for the community, even if some games don't want it, and don't agreed with your implied call to action that folks should stop giving it because some games you favor don't want it or see it as against the spirit of that particular game. Not every piece of advice is going to be helpful for all games. We'll muddle through somehow I'm sure.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I haven't read the full 7000+ posts, so sorry if this is repeating something already discussed to death. But on the topic of "Realism", "In game logic" and "Plausability" I think I have a valuable perspective that I haven't seen here: These are all about player expectations.

In order to competently play the RPG, players need to have some basis to judge likely outcomes of their actions. If their actions consistently has completely different outcomes than the players envisioned, there are no sense of agency.

In this perspective the relevant terms are just about the source of their expectations. "Realism" is about expectations that come from their understanding of the real world. "Internal logic" is expectations that things already established in the fiction is not contradicted. "Plausability" is about how the players understand causality patterns.

With an understanding that the key value in these lies in expectation management and why that is important, there also lies the key in recognising when these can be down prioritised. In a game that is leaning heavily into strategy and players trying to make good moves to "win", pulling the rug under their expectations can quickly feel like "cheating", and preventing them from playing competently. However in other groups that is more into experiencing cool situations, subverting expectations might rather be a welcome touch to spice things up.

I agree player expectations are huge. I also think this is why plausibility matters in these campaigns (the players are aren't going to accept something that seems implausible, so the GM has to consider how it will be received by the players, and as a group they have to be on the same page)

 

[pemerton]

It's a weird one because if you ask me how I make character decisions then I'll say something like 'it just feels like what that character would do.' and it does feel like that in that moment. Which doesn't yield much up in the way of analysis.

I mean, when RPGing - whether as player or GM - one is constantly having to make decisions about what one or more imaginary people do. And we don't have that much trouble making things up!

There's a vast range of input: the genre of the fiction; the stories one has read; all the people one has known and seen and listened to and loved and hated.

To me, the contentious claim is that some particular decision manifests a plausibility that any of a billion other decisions wouldn't have. Like your example of the tyrant whose daughter was inadvertently killed - you went for despair, others might go for fury, either seems plausible (and they hardly cover the field, and each can be rendered more precise in so many ways), but depending which is chosen the direction of the fiction goes radically one way or another.

 

[AlViking]

See how you talk about "outgrowing"? You're not the only poster who feels that way about the development of their RPGing experiences and techniques.

I have as much drama and emotion as I want in my game without implementing rules to force it. Glad it works for you, I don't find it necessary.

 

[robertsconley]

I agree with what you are doing, but I disagree that what you are doing is any different than "the referee's logic." In fact, I think it is impossible to be anything but. Perhaps you could say it is: "the internal world logic as the referee* imagines it."

There is no such thing as "referee's logic." Just bear with me. What we each have is our own way of reasoning about how we roleplay or adjudicate. As a result, we each have our own process that we go through.

I described mine.

You have yours.

In the course of the discussion on this thread, I figured out how to describe mine in detail. Now, other folks can try my methodology for themselves.

So if you have a similar explanation for your process, explained in a way that other folks can try it for themselves, I encourage you to share. I suspect it will be your own take on how to adjudicate and roleplay. To which I say: the more the merrier!

 

[pemerton]

Which seems to suggest you'd like to give the players the ability to see into the fiction's future such that, in simple terms, they know "if we do X, Y will happen while if we don't do X, Z will happen".

That doesn't sound like playing to find out.

Correct. Dungeon-crawling, and a hexcrawl equivalent, are not playing to find out. They're skill-based approaches to RPGing.

See also @Enrahim's post not far upthread, which is making basically the same point as I have been making.

 

[Bedrockgames]

I have as much drama and emotion as I want in my game without implementing rules to force it. Glad it works for you, I don't find it necessary.

The way I see it is some people want drama, when it happens, to emerge very naturally and organically, not part of the recipe of play, just a potential thing that can occur, while others want drama that is more driven by the structure of the game or pre-loaded elements. Both are fine, but there is a lot to be said for organic play in terms of its long term play. It is an approach that works very well if you want long campaigns