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Respect Mah Authoritah: Thoughts on DM and Player Authority in 5e
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<blockquote data-quote="niklinna" data-source="post: 8427230" data-attributes="member: 71235"><p>I see a couple different things that fall under "authority".</p><ul> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Control of character (and object) <em><strong>behavior</strong></em> in the game world</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Determination of character <em><strong>knowledge</strong></em> about the game world</li> <li data-xf-list-type="ul">Determination of <em><strong>facts</strong></em> about one's character or the game world</li> </ul><p>All fall under a division of labor that varies from game to game, but is <em>usually</em> "players each control one character's behavior, GM controls everything else in the world". It's rare to see games where players control more than one character (pets/minions notwithstanding—and this stretching of the line is one reason pets are so contentious). Also see recent discussion on <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/game-design-masterclass-ars-magica.682857/" target="_blank">Ars Magica</a> for a notable exception.</p><p></p><p>This division of labor exists for particular reasons, which do vary from game to game. The basic goal in roleplaying/storytelling (and most games) is to have fun, obviously, but there's tons of ways to have fun playing roles and developing stories, and many of them come down to <em>who knows what, when</em>. This includes global info about the game world, the past and present of particular characters and objects in the world, and what happens when one character swings a sword at another.</p><p></p><p>One way of having fun is for one person to be principal author, and the other players to discover the cool things that principal author has come up with through exploration, inquiry, and of course fighting. If that's fun for everybody, then great! Narrow player authority, broad GM authority, let's roll.</p><p></p><p>Another way is for everybody to build a world together, taking turns proposing things, negotiating what is accepted as fact, and so on. Think of <a href="https://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/classic/rev_7310.phtml" target="_blank">Universalis</a>, for example. And there are many points between and even to the side of the line spanning these two extremes.</p><p></p><p>In Spirit of the Century, it's explicitly in the rules that a player character can make an Academics, History, or Science skill check not only to learn facts about the world as established by the GM, but to declare facts (aspects) about the world <em>as a player</em>, with advice to the GM on setting difficulty for the check, up to and including veto. Looks like one hand giving and the other taking away, but still, SotC is up-front about encouraging players to contribute to the shape of the world (or at least the situation).</p><p></p><p><em>Apocalypse World</em> and its many, many offspring take another tack entirely, with a sketched-out world, rules for action resolution that bind both players and GM in quite particular ways, and encouragement to play to find out what happens. Players still generally control one character (and notably do not have complete control over their minions), but are pressed by the resolution mechanics nearly as often as the GM to assert facts about the world, including NPCs.</p><p></p><p>As noted above, knowledge/control isn't just a matter of <em><strong>what</strong></em>, but also <em><strong>when</strong></em>. Character creation notably gives players a lot of authority to determine what their characters can do and what they know, as well as in some cases what is true of the world outside their characters—again, with agreement from the GM and/or everybody else at the table. But once the story begins, some games preserve that authority and some restrict it, to whatever degree. And then there's mechanisms like flashbacks in <em>Blades in the Dark</em> and such. </p><p></p><p>Regardless of all that, the main ruleunderlying asserting facts about the world—apart from "don't be a wangrod"—is generally, "don't contradict what's already been asserted", which of course has all sorts of edge cases and soap-opera-style confounds (like when Dustin Hoffman spun that wild tale before tearing off his wig in <em>Tootsie</em>), but that stuff has to be agreed upon, whether explicitly or implicitly, and when it isn't, somebody at the table ends up disgruntled. I have been that person, and sometimes I have felt comfortable bringing it up (in the moment or later), sometimes I have not. I'm confident most roleplayers and GMs have faced that as well.</p><p></p><p>I think all of these approaches are generally fine, so long as everybody at the table agrees on them. Making the terms of agreement explicit is the tricky part, and it's been interesting to me to see the discussions about that happening recently here on enworld. (I almost—almost—want to go back to The Forge and revisit how these topics were discussed back then. But not really. Although I did look up fortune/karma/drama for a sub-point I decided not to get into.)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="niklinna, post: 8427230, member: 71235"] I see a couple different things that fall under "authority". [LIST] [*]Control of character (and object) [I][B]behavior[/B][/I] in the game world [*]Determination of character [I][B]knowledge[/B][/I] about the game world [*]Determination of [I][B]facts[/B][/I] about one's character or the game world [/LIST] All fall under a division of labor that varies from game to game, but is [I]usually[/I] "players each control one character's behavior, GM controls everything else in the world". It's rare to see games where players control more than one character (pets/minions notwithstanding—and this stretching of the line is one reason pets are so contentious). Also see recent discussion on [URL='https://www.enworld.org/threads/game-design-masterclass-ars-magica.682857/']Ars Magica[/URL] for a notable exception. This division of labor exists for particular reasons, which do vary from game to game. The basic goal in roleplaying/storytelling (and most games) is to have fun, obviously, but there's tons of ways to have fun playing roles and developing stories, and many of them come down to [I]who knows what, when[/I]. This includes global info about the game world, the past and present of particular characters and objects in the world, and what happens when one character swings a sword at another. One way of having fun is for one person to be principal author, and the other players to discover the cool things that principal author has come up with through exploration, inquiry, and of course fighting. If that's fun for everybody, then great! Narrow player authority, broad GM authority, let's roll. Another way is for everybody to build a world together, taking turns proposing things, negotiating what is accepted as fact, and so on. Think of [URL='https://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/classic/rev_7310.phtml']Universalis[/URL], for example. And there are many points between and even to the side of the line spanning these two extremes. In Spirit of the Century, it's explicitly in the rules that a player character can make an Academics, History, or Science skill check not only to learn facts about the world as established by the GM, but to declare facts (aspects) about the world [I]as a player[/I], with advice to the GM on setting difficulty for the check, up to and including veto. Looks like one hand giving and the other taking away, but still, SotC is up-front about encouraging players to contribute to the shape of the world (or at least the situation). [I]Apocalypse World[/I] and its many, many offspring take another tack entirely, with a sketched-out world, rules for action resolution that bind both players and GM in quite particular ways, and encouragement to play to find out what happens. Players still generally control one character (and notably do not have complete control over their minions), but are pressed by the resolution mechanics nearly as often as the GM to assert facts about the world, including NPCs. As noted above, knowledge/control isn't just a matter of [I][B]what[/B][/I], but also [I][B]when[/B][/I]. Character creation notably gives players a lot of authority to determine what their characters can do and what they know, as well as in some cases what is true of the world outside their characters—again, with agreement from the GM and/or everybody else at the table. But once the story begins, some games preserve that authority and some restrict it, to whatever degree. And then there's mechanisms like flashbacks in [I]Blades in the Dark[/I] and such. Regardless of all that, the main ruleunderlying asserting facts about the world—apart from "don't be a wangrod"—is generally, "don't contradict what's already been asserted", which of course has all sorts of edge cases and soap-opera-style confounds (like when Dustin Hoffman spun that wild tale before tearing off his wig in [I]Tootsie[/I]), but that stuff has to be agreed upon, whether explicitly or implicitly, and when it isn't, somebody at the table ends up disgruntled. I have been that person, and sometimes I have felt comfortable bringing it up (in the moment or later), sometimes I have not. I'm confident most roleplayers and GMs have faced that as well. I think all of these approaches are generally fine, so long as everybody at the table agrees on them. Making the terms of agreement explicit is the tricky part, and it's been interesting to me to see the discussions about that happening recently here on enworld. (I almost—almost—want to go back to The Forge and revisit how these topics were discussed back then. But not really. Although I did look up fortune/karma/drama for a sub-point I decided not to get into.) [/QUOTE]
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