D&D 5E Regarding DMG, Starter Set and Essentials kit: Are they good for the starting DMs?

[Oofta]

No, I didn't say that.

I have explained again and again how it can be handled differently. I've share my opinion about how to improve the information in the DMG. Some of those opinions you've even shared.

I think the starter set and/or essentials kit is a perfectly good place for new players and DMs to begin. However, I think the DMG should be the second step, and as such, can be organized and presented better with that goal in mind.

I also think it's likely better to focus on helping new folks rather than catering to those who don't actually need what it offers.

You stated that a different game handles it differently by having advice for different levels of DM. I've pointed out that every chapter in the DMG starts with advice for the new DM. What would you do differently? I don't see how it would help or what it would look like to break it up further. Repeatedly stating that there are different sections is kind of meaningless unless you can show how that would apply.

D&D game concepts are not that hard to grasp. Whether the DMG is the second, third or fifth step if you want to DM is going to vary by individual. Most people play first, or if that's not an option maybe they watch an actual play stream or read some blogs. Perhaps they pick up the free encounter and watch the associated video. Maybe they get a starter set. If you want to understand how to play the game you should probably grab the PHB (you can get the important bits from the free PDF) as well.

But ultimately? You just have to jump in and DM. No amount of text will make someone a proficient DM. If you don't have any option to actually playing with another DM, odds are your group is brand new and you'll figure it out together. Just like people always have.

Honestly though, if you're just going to continue to repeat the same thing there's no value to continued conversation.

 

[Manbearcat]

Just going to post some thoughts that are pertinent to this thread I think.

So I ran John Harper's 1 page RPG Lasers & Feelings last week for @Campbell , @hawkeyefan , and Ovinomancer (who can no longer post commentary unfortunately). Its has the following characteristics:

* Its uses a version of only Apocalypse World's absolutely outer/most basic layer of its concentric design (1 of VB's linked page).

* Its like pulp Star Trek/Firefly.

* PC generation is simple. You have two tags (Style like "Dangerous" and Role like "Scientist"), a number 2 to 5 to represent your Lasers (science, reason, etc) and Feelings (rapport, passion) and you have to roll under for Lasers and over for Feelings to determine total successes (which is handled like Blades; crit success, success, success with complications, failure) and Lasers and Feelings = on the number (where you get to ask a question, get an answer, and maybe reframe and reroll your action). A small dice pool is generated based on exerpt/tag application, if you're prepared, +1d6 default.

* You then create your Ship with two tags; a Strenght and a Problem.

* Obviously (being a 1 page RPG) its extremely light. The GM/table generates a situation based on 4 rolls (each d6) that fills in the blanks of the a statement; "A Threat..." "wants to..." "the..." "which will..." Outside of that, it leverages the most basic and stripped-down version of AW's agenda/principles/always say. Its sufficient to manage a one-shot, but it requires a whole lot of "blank-filling" because it is so rules lite.


As a result of this, I find myself dealing with questions that the simple text doesn't answer like "when is a PC knocked out of a scene" or "what constitutes prepared and how does that interact with the Laser Feelings action resolution part of the game (if you roll your number you effectively get a free Read a Sitch from AW question and you can act on the answers) so that you get +1d" or "how does your gear impact play (both in action resolution and in consequence handling)" or "how do I diagnose what 'the action' (so that I can cut to it) is if two players feel the action is about the possessed captain, the default set-up, and two others think its about the generated situation...how do we resolve" and a few others.

The game is totally feasible as a one shot and we had a decent time. But make no mistake, I had to rely upon my knowledge of AW and the like in order to manage certain aspects of play. Further, I think it makes the case fairly strongly that while it is a complete, playable game (supporting VB's statement that the outer core of AW is a complete, playable game), it is only such for a 3-4 scene one shot...which is fine, because that is typically the case for 1 page RPGs.

I think this diagnosis about a game which is hyper-simple, yet elegant and easy-to-suss out and operationalize broadly bears on the questions of "starter set" and "essentials kit" for D&D (which tends toward wanting to streamline and distill the fundamental D&D experience). You have to be careful what you take out and how intensely you streamline. Otherwise, you become reliant upon a GM's reservoir of knowledge outside of the streamlined text (and even with a significant reservoir to rely upon, there still might be pending issues due to various system and play collisions).

 

[pointofyou]

Every single chapter in the book has advice and guidance. It doesn't prescribe specific behavior because that's the direction of 5E, that you should make the game your own.

It's become obvious to me we're no longer having a good faith discussion, it's come down to you stating some variation of "nah uh". If you want to ever come back with something specific, something other than a troll, feel free.

I agree we are past any point of reasonable discussion. As to who's just repeating "nah uh" and who's being a troll ...

 

[Micah Sweet]

Your argument comes down to - or comes across as coming down to - two forks:

(1) An argument from popularity. Not a good look, and certainly not a sound support.
(2) An argument from "kids can read the dictionary" - this is... well, let me put it as below.

There are hundreds and thousands of books you can get that introduce you to new skills - learning how to play piano, learning how to code HTML, learning how to bake, and so on. None that I've ever seen is structured the way the DMG is structured. There is something very telling about that. What's more, none of them assume that just because you can read a word in the dictionary means you sufficiently grasp the concepts involved. Suffice to say that between your say-so and the work of professional pedagogues on how to write and structure an instructional manual - I find the latter group to be far more compelling.

Now, if the DMG's purpose as a book is not intended to help new DMs learn how to run a game, and is instead intended to be an all-purpose reference manual for running games - similar to way, say, the rulebook for Axis Empires: Totaler Krieg is not intended, as such, to help new players learn how to play the game - that's all well and good, as far as it goes. But if that's the case, it should be made explicitly clear in the DMG so prospective new DMs know that they should use a starter set or other resource to learn DMing skills, and use the DMG as a reference.

I thought that was clear in the DMG. That's certainly what I've used it for over the decades. And if it were less of a reference and more of a teaching tool, it would be less useful to me, and so I can't advocate for that.

Use the starter sets. Or the innumerable third party learn-to-play options.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

1. Bring up games others aren't likely to own.
2. Demand they can't have an accurate opinion about the game unless they buy the game.
3. If they own the game or have read it (being a free game) then demand they can't have an accurate opinion if they don't play the game.
4. If they have played the game demand they can't have an accurate opinion of the game unless they have played it for a long time.

IMO, bringing such games into the discussion is about bringing in an air of authority so that whatever is said about those games cannot be disputed. If it was otherwise then IMO, examples showing where they were actually present would be readily provided.

Alright. You want an example? I'll quote an example. This is something I'm pretty reluctant to do, because while rules text is unambiguously something you can clearly share, developer commentary is...a lot more questionable. But you've been so strident in your requests, and made rather a lot of silence or refusal to provide such things. So here you go.

First example is rules text, so I can post that without much difficulty. These come from 13th Age, a game which I think has an excellent core book. It's for the Linguist feat. Though the whole feat is good, the relevant part is underlined (which is not in the original; all other emphasis is.)

LINGUIST
Adventurer Tier: If your campaign cares about languages, this is the feat you take to speak enough arcana, dwarven, elven, gnomish, gnoll, goblin, orcish, and other standard humanoid languages to comprehend enough of what most other humanoids are saying or screaming during battle. You are probably not fluent in all these languages, no one will mistake you for a native speaker, and your vocabulary is probably adventurer-centric, heavy on words connected to danger rather than philosophy or emotions. But if it's important to your character and it matches your backgrounds and story, sure, go ahead and be fluent in a few.

You can also read enough to get by in all these languages.​

Champion Tier: You can speak, read, and write all the humanoid languages fluently. Stranger languages are no problem for you either: giant speech, flame tongues, Abyssal, 4th age reptiloid, lich-cant, etc. If someone is speaking it, you can probably figure it out given a bit of time to ponder and cross-reference.

There shouldn't be any need for an epic-tier linguist feat. If you really want one, you know what you want it for better than we do.[/indent​

Second example: the developer commentary about the One Unique Thing feature. TL;DR: Every character gets some thing which makes them unique in all the world. It can't have combat applications, but it can be whatever the DM and player agree on.

GAMEMASTER
If players don't want to come up with a one unique thing right away, or if they want to give the game a chance to develop, it's fine to let some players feel their way into what is unique about their characters after the first or second session.

This delay may come in especially handy if a player wants to figure out what the tone of the campaign is before settling on their big secret or special feature.​

[Rob Heinsoo's icon] More than Jonathan, I sometimes push players to come up with ways that their characters are truly unique--the only person in all the world who has this particular story. Obviously I enjoy games that push into new territory right away . . . but I also run a lot of demo games, where we only have a couple hours to get to the core of what's cool about a character and the game. When I have an entire campaign, I'm happier starting calm and building into something greater, if that's what's appropriate for the character's story.
[Jonathan Tweet's icon] I don't need the characters' uniques to be wild and crazy. The story works out fine when the one unique thing is something as prosaic as "I'm incredibly good looking and I get treated a lot better than I should just because I'm so good-looking." Of course I'm fine with far-out unique things like the human child of a zombie mother we'll talk about in a few paragraphs. But in my games, the important thing is that the player invents something that interests them about their character that's different from any of the other characters.

Finally, a bit simply from Rob Heinsoo, discussing why they went with average damage for monster attacks.

Except for the first half of his Elysombra campaign, Jonathan has always run d20 games using average results for monster damage instead of rolling damage dice. I stuck to rolling monster damage dice, claiming that Jonathan's version might make monsters predictable. Gradually I realized that wasn't true.
Designing 13th Age, I noticed that I had no interest in abilities that let monsters reroll damage; and if a reroll isn't interesting, the original roll isn't either. So we've moved to Jonathan's system. It's less swingy, simpler for the GM, and offers an illusory iota of player control over hit point outcomes that are easily complicated by monster abilities that trigger as surprises. The new system makes the attack roll more meaningful and preserves damage rolling for a few dramatic exceptions.
If you find that you can't abide the new flat-damage method, you could opt to roll damage dice that have an average close to the listed result. But we don't recommend it. The monsters are retooled to be interesting using fixed damage.

Each of these demonstrates an actual delving into the how and why, a discussion of the interaction between players and DM, ideas on the act and process of running. It's conversational, which might not necessarily be the right tone for every part of the DMG, but it helps make it feel like amiable instruction from a person. I find it extremely helpful for thinking about how I could run the game, and in helping me make my own decisions about how I will run my game.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

The back of the book mentions nothing about teaching you the fundamentals of the game. I have no idea why people would think it is when we explicitly have starter sets.

It tells you exactly what is inside the book on the back cover if anyone is confused. Nowhere does it mention tutorial.
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Uh...it actually does in the thing you've mentiond: "tools to help you be a great Dungeon Master."

But, more importantly, there's a huge flag for it splashed right across the front cover.

What on Earth is a "Guide" supposed to do other than provide guidance?

 

[pointofyou]

Uh...it actually does in the thing you've mentiond: "tools to help you be a great Dungeon Master."

But, more importantly, there's a huge flag for it splashed right across the front cover.


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What on Earth is a "Guide" supposed to do other than provide guidance?

I've tried that argument. Apparently in this context "guide" means "reference manual." That wouldn't have been my choice.

 

[Oofta]

Uh...it actually does in the thing you've mentiond: "tools to help you be a great Dungeon Master."

But, more importantly, there's a huge flag for it splashed right across the front cover.


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What on Earth is a "Guide" supposed to do other than provide guidance?

Again with this fabrication that the DMG provides no guidance? Where is this even coming from? It may not provide all the guidance you want, which is why they clarify on the back. It's incredibly specific on what it provides and available for anyone to see even if the book is shrink-wrapped.

There are explanations for new DMs, examples, there are options, there are discussions of why and when you would choose one option over another. You can't, well okay you can because you just did, just decide that 80% of the book that is guidance and suggestions is not guidance because it doesn't meet your expectations.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

You can't, well okay you can because you just did, just decide that 80% of the book that is guidance and suggestions is not guidance because it doesn't meet your expectations.

Sure I can. The "guidance" it provides is crap. Woefully inadequate for actually supporting the kinds of decisions and evaluations DMs need to make. The quotes I gave from the 13A core book (which is PHB, DMG, and MM all in one) give clear, concise, effective descriptions of how things could be done, of places where the DM needs to make decisions for themselves. They explain decisions, and show how two different people (the game's two lead designers) can implement a single rule in very different ways, sometimes based on context, sometimes based on preference, etc.

Just throwing a pile of rules options at people does not actually help them figure out how to use them. Telling them why a rule is what it is, telling them how different people can view the exact same rule differently, explaining why alternatives weren't used, etc. THAT is guidance.

 

[pointofyou]

Sure I can. The "guidance" it provides is crap. Woefully inadequate for actually supporting the kinds of decisions and evaluations DMs need to make. The quotes I gave from the 13A core book (which is PHB, DMG, and MM all in one) give clear, concise, effective descriptions of how things could be done, of places where the DM needs to make decisions for themselves. They explain decisions, and show how two different people (the game's two lead designers) can implement a single rule in very different ways, sometimes based on context, sometimes based on preference, etc.

Just throwing a pile of rules options at people does not actually help them figure out how to use them. Telling them why a rule is what it is, telling them how different people can view the exact same rule differently, explaining why alternatives weren't used, etc. THAT is guidance.

This is what I'd want the DMG to contain and it's what I find most lacking in the current version of it.