This is the only (!) regret I have about having become a DM: it forced me to look under the hood. Before that the game was a wonderful mystery - I'd tell the DM what my character was trying to do, some dice would fly behind the screen for no reason I knew of, and I'd be told what happened.
And I loved it that way!
As a player I hate knowing what goes on behind the DM screen; but as I can't un-learn my DM experience every Saturday night when I play, I'm kinda stuck with it. Making it all player-facing would be ten times worse!
I admit that I'm a bit stumped on how to address someone so proudly taking the blue pill.
I mean, ultimately, I would say to try a new game. But for some reason I expect that idea would get shot down right quick.
If the DM is honest enough not to fudge the rolls it doesn't matter.
It does matter. The players are more secure in the fact that the rolls are not being altered. And more importantly, as I mentioned in my last post, take this basic idea of transparency and then apply it to other areas of the game.
Beyond that, the DM is allowed to have ideas as to what happens next just as much as the players are - she's not a robot or a CPU - and as she knows more about the unexplored setting it's juuuust possible her ideas might be worth a bit more?
I don't see how anything I said would remove the GM's ability to have ideas about what happens next. Their ideas need to be constrained by what's been established, though, that's something I think must be the case.
As for a GM's ideas being worth more...I'd say no, not at all. I'd place them of equal value to any other participant's. It's a group activity and everyone's enjoyment and contributions matter equally.
I don't care what the PCs do about the Kraken or the boat occupants. My job is to throw the scene at them and stop there. Their job is to decide what to do with that scene, whereupon my job is to react accordingly to what they do and run (or adjudicate) whatever happens next.
So they can fight the kraken or they can leave, sure. That's true of either approach, right?
What you're advocating for, from my perspective, is not really either. It's some middle ground where the players have to waste time on learning enough in order to make the interesting decision. So just skip all that nonsense and get to the fun stuff, or else move on. Give them the information that they need to decide how to proceed, and then proceed.
If the combat's already in progress and the father is holding his own then yes, it's clear he's either hella lucky or he knows what he's doing. But until the combat starts and-or the PCs can see any of this, they know nothing.
They came upon the scene described. I expect there was a bit more description than was in the post that was made, but either way....the action was already under way.
Let me ask you this; would you have any problem if the GM said the below?
"You can tell this guy knows what he's doing. He's protecting the girl very well, and managing to fend off the tentacles. He's clearly a competent swordsman. But it's only a matter of time until he's done."
My guess is you would not. So then I don't see the problem with sharing some mechanical bits that clearly define that description into the language of the game.
How, though, if I'm expected to give out the mechanical info at scene-set?
I deliberately left off the punch line in my rowboat-and-demons example: the harmless-looking guy in the rowboat was a divine minion (equivalent of an angel) summoned by someone's prayer to - just like the PCs - size up the demons and assess their threat; and at the time would have been the single most powerful being any of those PCs had ever met. His presence was also the reason the demons were only on the far shore of the lake and hadn't advanced further.
But from the players' (and PCs') point of view he was just some random local, and an encounter that they (unintentionally) avoided.
Cool, thanks for sharing a deliberately incomplete example. Now that I have the missing information, I still don't think this sheds any light on the matter.
I don't think that one must always share such information. However, I think the reasons to not do so have to be far more compelling than your old man in the boat.
Agreed.
Which brings us to the next obvious question: is use of force cheating?
And I'll stop there; I saw the can-DMs-cheat debate once already this year and can do without a repeat.
If you agree, then I don't see why you're okay with subtle Force but not unsubtle Force.
Game I played in, years ago. Party was in a dungeon looking for the second of a series of items needed for [reasons]; this the second adventure in a 5-adventure arc embedded within a bigger campaign. At one point our lightning-happy MU put a bolt into a creature guarding a treasure room; the bolt extended into the room and shattered the item - a crystal - we were there for!
After that adventure we were fairly-obviously railroaded to the site of the next one (I suspect in part because our drunken bunch of fools had taken so damn long to find the last one!); and doing anything else was not really an option. Further, there "just happened" to be someone there who could magically repair the shattered crystal, without which we couldn't complete the overall quest.
Result: some wonderful fun adventuring followed, none of which happens without that ride on the railroad.
But you might have had something as fun or even better if the GM had honored the events of the game and the destruction of the maguffin led to something entirely different and unexpected instead of "well there's three more stops after this one.....so everybody back on the train!!!!"
It's impossible to say, of course.
I'll just close with this; it's perfectly fine to say "I don't mind being railroaded by the GM as long as we're having fun".