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

[pemerton]

Are the rest of us not playing a game? What you're saying here makes no sense to me.

You keep posting as if the only reason the GM would be subject to rules any stricter than introduce whatever fiction you think is worth introducing and that the other participants will accept would be because the GM is terrible and can't be trusted.

Whereas the actual reason seems obvious to me: I want to play a game different from the one described in the previous paragraph - which gives the GM essentially unlimited authorial power - and hence I adopt different rules.

 

[hawkeyefan]

So, using that logic, and feeling that the game is better with fewer constraints on players, you now understand why placing fewer constraints on the GM benefits the game?

I never said “the game is better with fewer constraints on players”. Depends on which game and the purpose of play.

All I did was ask why there are constraints on players.

So rather than answer my question (which several others have done), you'd rather test me?

Help me help you, Micah!

 

[Maxperson]

As GM, you have editorial control, and you are in charge of implementation. Once you pick it up and use it, it is yours.

Plus, unless you are going to claim that pretty much everyone who uses those settings would, if given the same situation in the setting, come to the same setting-logic conclusion for the next events, then it isn't the setting's logic - it is the GM's.

So, do you want to make that claim?

I don't buy that premise, which means that I also don't buy the claim you say I need to make in order for it not to be mine. Once I pick it up and use it, it's a combination of what came before and mine. It doesn't become mine alone.

 

[Faolyn]

Is this ridiculous notion of "the terrible GM' ever going to go away? Or is it like some chewing stuck to the bottom of various rhetorical shoes?

The reason for wanting games with rules and principles has nothing to do with anyone being terrible. It's about wanting to play a game.

That wasn’t about rules. That was about the idea that @EzekielRaiden has that there are all these GMs who demand total trust without earning it.

 

[Lanefan]

So, in what way, when you describe the world first - events that are going on, history, conflicts - is that not telling a story?

What's the difference between telling a story and setting a scene? Scene-setting is what all that setting expositon and backstory is doing.

This is what I just can't wrap my head around. How can you claim that this isn't a story? You have every single element of a story except the conclusion. Which, frankly, is what we're playing for. We play the game to write the conclusion of the story.

And - far more importantly - you're playing to write the path it takes to arrive at a conclusion...or maybe a series of conclusions when as one chapter ends another begins or is already underway.

 

[pemerton]

I’m not talking about creative control of the setting either. More creative input into the direction of play. Into the game.I’ll caveat that with the idea of “independent of the GM’s ideas”.

I think your view that it’s player driven comes from the illusion of geography more than the source of what constitutes play.

Right. The illusion of geography is similar to - not necessarily identical to, depending on details of how the illusion is established and maintained - the idea of a "GM-offered menu".

I don't see how that benefits the GM, which is what I asked.

If the GM wants to experience a fiction rather than author a fiction, then the game needs to be set up around a different basis than largely unconstrained GM authorial power.

 

[AlViking]

I never said “the game is better with fewer constraints on players”. Depends on which game and the purpose of play.

All I did was ask why there are constraints on players.



Help me help you, Micah!

What you seem to see as constraints I see as freeing me when I'm a player to focus on my character. It's not a constraint to have a different role. It's a differentiation of responsibility that makes the game more enjoyable.

I might as well ask you why you feel like interacting with the world through my character is a constraint? Are we as mere humans constrained?

 

[AlViking]

You keep posting as if the only reason the GM would be subject to rules any stricter than introduce whatever fiction you think is worth introducing and that the other participants will accept would be because the GM is terrible and can't be trusted.

Whereas the actual reason seems obvious to me: I want to play a game different from the one described in the previous paragraph - which gives the GM essentially unlimited authorial power - and hence I adopt different rules.

There's nothing wrong with wanting a different approach from what others want. We likely don't want the same thing. I'm pretty sure that while Micah and I agree on some things we disagree on others, I don't need the Level Up modifications to the game, he prefers them.

I don't think we need rules that change the role of the GM. I also think that even a D&D DM realistically has restrictions, they just aren't restrictions written down in the rules. They're restrictions based on what other people at the table will enjoy and keep coming back for.

People should play the game that works for them.

 

[pemerton]

What's the difference between telling a story and setting a scene? Scene-setting is what all that setting expositon and backstory is doing.

They're closely related. That's why I generally prefer RPGing where the players exercise a degree of control over what scenes are framed.

How that control relates to authorial power depends on further details of how play works. For instance, in Burning Wheel the GM is the pre-eminent author of scenes, but frames scenes having regard to player-determined matters.

 

[Lanefan]

Like I said I have zero interest in the incredibles. And I haven't even heard the original quote before. I've probably picked up this phrasing because I heard it applied to other things (or the incredibles are quoting something). I am not going to debate the incredibles with you because I haven't seen it and I have desire to. But I think what I said is true, if the definition of story is so expansive that anything the GM makes is a story, then the term becomes very meaningless

"When everything is special, nothing is" is a (very true) saying that's been around for ages. All The Incredibles did was make it famous.

Check The Incredibles out, though. It's quite good.