D&D 5E Resting and the frikkin' Elephant in the Room

[Ilbranteloth]

OK so I'm not as term savvy as some of you - instead of saying "sandbox" was I supposed to say "open sandbox" (as opposed to a "closed pre-defined sandbox") to refer to the players being able to go out of the prescripted/preset/developed area??

Trust me, the terminology that people use is extremely confusing, and I don't get most of it either. But what you're describing in your prior post is not a sandbox at all. It has nothing to do with a sandbox (and most players that prefer sandboxes would agree that they don't like the technique you're describing).

Adventure Design: Sandbox vs. Linear
You have two extremes - a railroad and a sandbox. The far extremes would be a totally randomly generated on the spot sandbox vs. an adventure that's entirely predetermined (like playing through The Fellowship of the Ring). Everything else is someplace in the middle.

I refer to my campaign as a "living sandbox," where you can go anywhere you want, anytime you want, but I also have dozens of plots going on behind the scenes, essentially every NPC has some sort of plot. That doesn't mean that I know what everybody is doing all the time. But there are plots that have a trajectory, and that trajectory changes if the PCs intervene, otherwise it continues as is. They can have good or bad consequences in the world.

In addition, I listen to the players, and many plots and ideas are developed based on things they say, and also the characters and what they say, do, etc. So I have "linear plots" but as soon as the PCs engage in one, they are no longer linear.

So I don't know where you stand on the linear plot vs. sandbox continuum, but your post was objecting to something that has nothing to do with a sandbox or linear design.

False Choices
You were objecting to a false choice, where the DM presents a choice, but the result of that choice is predetermined, regardless of which of the two "choices" the players decide. In fact, it's a technique more likely to be hated by players who prefer a sandbox, and usually more commonly used (and useful) in a more linear plot.

The classic example of a false choice is something like this:

The DM creates and encounter with an ogre, and wants to use it.

You come to a fork in the road, and make a choice to go left. You meet the ogre.
If you had chosen right. You would have met the ogre.

A false choice. And evil, right?

The problem is, it places the expectation that the DM will have pre-planned everything ahead of time. Not only do I not consider that reasonable after 35+ years of DMing, I also consider it virtually impossible, because no matter how many scenarios I consider, the players always think of something else.

So you learn to improvise. One of the tools that I use to improvise is that I do have lots of little hooks, scenes, short encounters, and such that I can drop in at any time. I can also attach them to a random encounter table, which have categories like: predator, unusual terrain, ruin, etc. Ruin has a subtable that has things like tomb, which can be a a body recently killed by orcs, or a long lost crypt that's suddenly discovered when a sinkhole opens under your feet.

So when a choice is presented, there are many times when I don't have any idea of what's down the left or right road. Sometimes I have something that's appropriate either way (the ogre), and sometimes a real choice.

So the question is, from a player/character perspective, what's the qualitative difference between:

1. A choice with no solutions known to the DM, and the result is randomly determined after you select a choice. The second choice remains undetermined, unless you choose to go back and select it. In which case it's randomly determined, or improvised.

2. A choice with no solutions known to the DM, and the result is improvised after you select a choice. The second choice remains undetermined, unless you choose to go back and select it. In which case it's randomly determined, or improvised.

3. A choice with one solution known to the DM, which is the result for the first path you take. The second choice remains undetermined, unless you choose to go back and select it. In which case it's randomly determined or improvised.

4. A choice with both solutions known to the DM, and he knows which path they are on before you make a decision. The other choice (prepared ahead of time) is unused unless you go back and take the second path.

Of course, there are variations of this, such as both solutions being known by the DM, but still selecting one of them as the solution for the first choice no matter which direction you take, and the second prepared solution is always option 2.

From the characters' (and really the players' perspective) the choice is always "real." The result in option 3 is predetermined, but you still have two choices. If you go the other direction, there still has to be something different. So really, the only thing that's predetermined is the result of the first choice.

Furthermore, if I were to run four different scenarios, each using one of these techniques, I would bet that you would be unable to determine which was which. They would play identically. In addition, players seem to be inherently OK with option 1 or 2, but not option 3, since the DM is deciding the result ahead of time. Of course, the DM is predetermining the result for option 4 as well.

While there's some part of me that wants to say there's a problem with one of these or another (people think #3 is somehow dishonest for example), the real problem in my mind is the skill of the DM. If the DM relies heavily on option 3 (which I don't recommend), and they aren't good at improvising the other option if they go there too, then you'll have a qualitative difference in the game itself (prewritten material works better for that DM). If you're that type of DM, then make sure you have plenty of prepared bits to drop in at any time.

A false choice can have real choices nested in it. This is frequently used in adventure design. SKT is a good example of this.

In SKT, you have lots of freedom to explore, but from Chapter 2 you're eventually going to go to at least one of three places. It doesn't matter which you select, everyone leads to chapter 3. From Chapter 4, you can choose Chapter 5, 6, 7, 8, or 9, but ultimately, no matter which one you choose, you will move on to Chapter 10.

The adventure has a very sandboxy feel. And there isn't anything that prevents you from going to more than one of those chapters (it's been a while since I've read it, so there may be a time element). But in the end, you really have only one result - Chapter 10.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Creating/editing content on the fly is the defining line between the two styles illuminated by the author.

Well, I was commenting in regard to [MENTION=29398]Lanefan[/MENTION]'s comments, and not those from that article from almost 40 years ago. I disagree with the author in that regard....I don't think there needs to be a correlation between GM Improvisation and either a sandbox or linear game style.

I'm not surprised by your poistion on this - I suspect that in order to be content playing with an omnipotent DM changing and creating content on the fly, one would need to believe that doing so doesn't taint player agency.

No, I acknowledge that it could limit player agency. I don't think that it must. I think there's a difference between creating content on the fly and changing content to suit a desired outcome.....but you seem to lump those two things together.

Dismiss it??? I have very, very consistently maintained that there is both a loss of player agency (control over where to go) and a gain in player agency (less DM taint) in playing a tactical style.

Dismiss its impact, I mean. You seem to consider the reduction in agency on the part of a DM improvising to be greater than the reduction of agency by having a linear story. I don't agree.

To me, a very linear story allows for minimal player choices, and often those choices are pretty minor. And I say this knowing that I have linear elements plenty of times in my game. There's nothing wrong with it, but I think you're biased to assume the worst of sandbox play and/or DM improvisation, and so your comparison is skewed.

You may want to reread the passage in question. Its not about linear vs sandbox - its about DM impartiality and taint. The author believes as I do that a DM creating/inserting/changing content on the fly taints player agency.

I was not commenting directly on the article, but rather in comments made about the article. The Tactical Play versus Escapist Roleplaying angle, rather than any kind of DM Improv. But I think it's just a matter of you conflating a couple things, or in me reading such a conflation into your comments.

As I said earlier, DM Improvisation can indeed impact player agency. But I don't think it's a case that it must do so. A DM can improv things that don't dismiss player agency.

For example, it's possible for a DM to improv the exact same scenario that another DM prepares ahead of time. The two instances could play out exactly the same at the table.

I suppose I am just comfortable enough in my ability to construct things on the fly (when needed) that my improved scenarios are not noticeably different from those I've prepped ahead of time. Now, I admittedly have a much looser prep style than you, based on your description, so that's certainly a factor....but not every encounter needs pages of details.

Honestly, my need to improv is a direct result of my players having agency to choose things that I may not have anticipated....so it seems weird to think of the result of their agency somehow limiting their agency.

If I made a math error (like calcing it for 4500 xp in stead of 3400 xp) then I discuss it with players and see if we can fix it. But if the particular monsters were correct in xp and just exploited the party's weaknesses then - well - sucks to be them, sorry. We aren't playing to sit around and sing songs and give hugs, we are playing to win lol - its a tactical challenge to the death. So I will play the bad guys with bloody resolve, wipe the party, and probably make fun of their weakness as well

No, I mean specifically if you make an error. Not just a hard encounter....but one that you did not intend to be so hard. Are you saying you would stop the game and discuss it, or would you let things play out and then discuss it?

the latter

the latter

Okay, thanks. I suppose my confusion on this point is your view that something written beforehand is somehow inherently more "pure" than something decided at the table. This is likely because I don't prepare encounters the same way....I don't bother with XP budgets and all that.

It seems you are trying to push me into some extremist position here to be honest. Of course I make mistakes. Of course I have to make some rulings. etc. But do I limit those as much as possible? Yes. Taint is not like a killer virus that kills you with 1 drop. More DM taint is worse than less DM taint.

No, I'm not trying to push you into anything, just trying to get a better understanding of your view.

Rulings are not unique to D and D. Get a group of gamers together for any game and there's likely gonna have to be some rulings. You just try to be impartial. Again - no need to try to pigeon hole my style into extremism. The goal in this style is to limit DM taint, not eliminate it. Re-read the passage - the author explains it very well. If you still don't get it I don't think there's any thing I can say that will help you understand it better.

No, I understand the article. I just don't lend it a lot of credence. It's a pretty dated article which also is openly favorable to a particular play style. I won't link to an article about the merits of sandbox style play and then cite it to you as some kind of proof.

I suppose that it's the use of the term "DM Taint" that seems to be my main area of contention. I don't see why the stuff you write ahead of time is free of such "taint" but the stuff I decide at the table must always be "tainted" in such a way.

 

[Ilbranteloth]

lol love that quote @MichaelSomething. It really articulates the difference between myself and so many of the DMs in these forums. While I don't view D and D as a wargame, I do see it as a tactical game - and can remember (fondly a time when the escapist roleplayers weren't so dominant as they are now (and so quick to jump all over anyone with a differing view of what D and D is).

That quote is horrible. And describes so little and does it so poorly. It's just plain wrong in so many ways.

To start, from my perspective, there's at least a third option, which I think was the more common option (now potentially overtaken by min-maxers), perhaps "immersionists".

That is, we approach it as if the characters are people in a real world. We're not "playing a game" which is an approach where it's more about the rules than the content, and we're not escapists, looking for a story to be told by the referee. Overall the goal is to immerse yourself in the character and the world, and the job of the DM is to populate that world, and present it in a consistent, believable, and "realistic" way, whatever that means in terms of the physics, cultures, and so on in that world. Directly engaging the rules generally ruins the immersion. Within that world, the approach of the characters can be very tactical. But the key is that as a player you approach everything as a character in a world, not as a player in a game.

This approach is not well supported by the rules anymore, and hasn't been for some while. Those who like a linear approach with a referee have been well served by published adventures. Min-maxers were extremely well served by 4e, but also simply because of an influx of gamers from other hobbies, like video games, board games, and MtG type games. It's natural to approach D&D by reading the rules, and trying to play the game "according to the rules." For those that are used to deck-building and such, treating character creation the same way comes naturally.

On the other hand, RPGs are unique in that they support an almost opposite approach, which is you play the game, and then if you're not sure how to resolve something, look up the rule. This was what I saw as the promoted approach with AD&D, in that most of the rules (including combat) weren't in the PHB. I still prefer to start new players by helping to build a character (which can be modified as we play), and then they just jump in and play. When they want to do something, we let them know how the rules address that if needed.

You say you'd "rather be railroaded into a good story and adventure that's predesigned" and then say that the quote that says people who "prefer to be told a story by the referee" are escapists and what you hate. In a linear, pre-published adventure, you're specifically being told a story by the referee, with your input.

You're mixing adventure design, DM techniques, and playstyle.

You prefer everything to be predetermined, and the DM acts as a referee as you explore their predetermined adventure. I think that's great. I think it's a valid approach, and a lot of people like it. I'd argue that it's probably the predominant play style, promoted by WotC by both the rulebooks and their publication of APs, that set the baseline for playing D&D is, "Buy the PHB (or download the basic rules), buy an AP, and a DM runs you through what we designed." And that's nothing new. As soon as they started publishing adventures, the default approach is a blend of linear plot, DM as referee, and players as a mix of player and character.

Player agency is sacrificed because you can only go and do what the adventure designers provided. You seem to prefer getting to the portcullis of the town and being told, sorry, you can't leave, I didn't design that, to the DM winging it and letting you leave the town. Fair enough.

But here's the thing. I can design a world, with everything in place and predetermined, but with no plot. You can go anywhere and do anything you want, and I will only use material that I predesigned. That's a pure sandbox. No story, impartial referee, and absolute player agency. There are zero restrictions on your agency, and you can approach it as tactically as you'd like.

I'm not complaining about your preferences, my point is that your mixing things up and attempting to define what others are doing, and it's just wrong. Lew's assessment is wrong. I can't stand the overpowered, silly, superhero approach of play either. But I also can't stand things like the conclusion that it's better to heal somebody after they are reduced to 0 hp, instead of before. Because that's ridiculous and silly too. Even if it works because of the rules. Two are both things that break the immersion in a believable world. My goal is, in part, to avoid feeling like I'm playing a game.

My solution, I fix the rules. But really that's to better support the playstyle we prefer and are already doing.

There are a lot of different things - game design, rules, DM approach, DM techniques, that all intersect to make a play style. And you can be along any point of each of those continuums at that point of intersection.

So when you say you prefer a tactical game, and that's why you dislike DMs that run a sandbox. You're fundamentally wrong because the presence or absence of a tactical game has nothing to do with whether the game is a sandbox or not, and that's going to generate a response. There are DMs that run a sandbox game specifically to ensure their game is a tactical game full of player agency and as free from DM interference as possible.

So it's very difficult to understand your position because you're mixing these things together in a way that doesn't make sense.

My experience is that 90% of all players that I've actually played with prefer my approach to playing. But of course that's the case, because if they didn't, they wouldn't be playing with me.

I find that despite what people say they like, the majority of players don't consider the theory behind role playing. They'll agree to just about anything because the reality is that most people just don't care. They just want to play the game. The probably don't fully understand what they are objecting to, and any sort of question and explanation tends to be not only leading, but outside the context of an actual in-game experience.

I would put most "escapists" closer to your camp - they prefer a linear adventure, doesn't have to be silly and unbelievable, but it's probably not something that really has to make them think either - and they just want to play their players while the DM tells the story. They are escapists because they literally just want to play an enjoyable game to "escape" like going to a movie. Some of them like superhero stories, some horror, some gritty tests of survival. Just like any play style, there is no single group. Don't know if they approach it from what you consider a tactical approach, though. Most casual players probably fall into this category, and probably care little how the DM does what they do.

Aside from that, Lew is also just plain wrong. TSR was slow to publish adventures and campaign materials, specifically because Gary felt that DMs wouldn't want anything like that, since they should be making it up themselves. Gary considered improvisation and reaction to the moment. He rewarded creative play, altering the adventure, the encounter, or the creatures in response (the ways to kill Acererak in Tomb of Horrors, for example, were because those were the creative things that his players came up with when they first played it). He also designed creatures to foil their usual approaches, and force them to come up with different solutions. He felt that anything more than a sentence or two in a room was excessive in adventure design, and that a portion of the rooms should be left empty to be filled as needed and appropriate. His approach was a very actively involved DM, but not an antagonistic one (as many accuse him of being). When the DM filled in a room wasn't a concern. Providing a great adventure and challenging both the players and the characters was.

I also don't understand what you mean by playing it as a tactical game. Are you talking about combats using the rules to move around the battlefield and make tactical decisions with miniatures? Or are you talking min-maxing, finding the "perfect build" and avoiding "trap" choices? Or something else?

I am genuinely interested in what you do like. I agree it's often as important to understand what you don't like as well. But be careful about assigning what you don't like to approaches incorrectly. It's a lot of what I see people disagreeing about with you.

 

[shoak1]

Very thorough post - lets see if we can come to some greater understanding of each other:

I refer to my campaign as a "living sandbox," where you can go anywhere you want, anytime you want, but I also have dozens of plots going on behind the scenes, essentially every NPC has some sort of plot. That doesn't mean that I know what everybody is doing all the time. But there are plots that have a trajectory, and that trajectory changes if the PCs intervene, otherwise it continues as is. They can have good or bad consequences in the world.

Doesn't your approach necessitate creating content as they go, if they have freedom of movement? Or is your sandbox tightly bounded and everything therein detailed? If your style does necessitate creation of content, random generated content, or plug-and-play content, then it is in the "other" category from mine.

You were objecting to a false choice, where the DM presents a choice, but the result of that choice is predetermined, regardless of which of the two "choices" the players decide. In fact, it's a technique more likely to be hated by players who prefer a sandbox, and usually more commonly used (and useful) in a more linear plot.....The classic example of a false choice is something like this: The DM creates and encounter with an ogre, and wants to use it. You come to a fork in the road, and make a choice to go left. You meet the ogre. If you had chosen right. You would have met the ogre. A false choice. And evil, right?

I was not referring to that type of false choice actually. I mean this: The PCs have two villages to go to, and neither is predetermined by the DM. They choose village A. The DM decides there is a thieving juggler there. Who would have been in Village B if they had gone there? Maybe the thieving juggler, maybe someone else - who knows? Many players feel like their choice of village therefore had little meaning. as opposed to choosing between two villages that already exist when they get there.

The problem is, it places the expectation that the DM will have pre-planned everything ahead of time. Not only do I not consider that reasonable after 35+ years of DMing, I also consider it virtually impossible, because no matter how many scenarios I consider, the players always think of something else.

Very well articulated again - now here is where we can really make some headway in understanding. Your school of thought is very compelling but it is predicated on the idea that there is no degree of taint, only taint or no taint.

In other words, lets say the players decide to smoke out the occupants of a castle, literally. Now I have to figure out what bad guys do what, and its a contingency not directly addressed in my write-up. So I have to make some arbitrary decisions on the spot. But because I have thoroughly detailed the castle, its occupants, their motivations, etc, I can do this with a minimum of taint. It's definitely not "clean," but its a far cry from not having the castle detailed in the first place.

So you learn to improvise. One of the tools that I use to improvise is that I do have lots of little hooks, scenes, short encounters, and such that I can drop in at any time. I can also attach them to a random encounter table, which have categories like: predator, unusual terrain, ruin, etc. Ruin has a subtable that has things like tomb, which can be a a body recently killed by orcs, or a long lost crypt that's suddenly discovered when a sinkhole opens under your feet. So when a choice is presented, there are many times when I don't have any idea of what's down the left or right road. Sometimes I have something that's appropriate either way (the ogre), and sometimes a real choice.

Again, I can see how many people could view that as a fine way to play. But to me and those of my school of thought, inserting plug and play and/or random content between a cause (a player decision) and an effect serves as a fundamental break between that cause and effect.

So the question is, from a player/character perspective, what's the qualitative difference between:

1. A choice with no solutions known to the DM, and the result is randomly determined after you select a choice. The second choice remains undetermined, unless you choose to go back and select it. In which case it's randomly determined, or improvised.

2. A choice with no solutions known to the DM, and the result is improvised after you select a choice. The second choice remains undetermined, unless you choose to go back and select it. In which case it's randomly determined, or improvised.

3. A choice with one solution known to the DM, which is the result for the first path you take. The second choice remains undetermined, unless you choose to go back and select it. In which case it's randomly determined or improvised.

4. A choice with both solutions known to the DM, and he knows which path they are on before you make a decision. The other choice (prepared ahead of time) is unused unless you go back and take the second path.

Of course, there are variations of this, such as both solutions being known by the DM, but still selecting one of them as the solution for the first choice no matter which direction you take, and the second prepared solution is always option 2.

From the characters' (and really the players' perspective) the choice is always "real." The result in option 3 is predetermined, but you still have two choices. If you go the other direction, there still has to be something different. So really, the only thing that's predetermined is the result of the first choice.

Furthermore, if I were to run four different scenarios, each using one of these techniques, I would bet that you would be unable to determine which was which. They would play identically. In addition, players seem to be inherently OK with option 1 or 2, but not option 3, since the DM is deciding the result ahead of time.

Here lies the fundamental difference - your players seem OK with options 1 or 2, but mine don't. Those options involve an event between cause and effect, and that inevitably alters the effect. To my school of thought, that's a mathematical actuality. Your school of thought sees it (correct me if i am wrong) as a defining part of the game.

 

[shoak1]

No, I acknowledge that it could limit player agency. I don't think that it must. I think there's a difference between creating content on the fly and changing content to suit a desired outcome.....but you seem to lump those two things together.

No, no, no, I am not saying you are changing things to produce a desired outcome..... I assume that you and everyone else is being a good DM in that respect. I am saying that placing DM agency between player cause and effect is a fundamental break in that cause and effect, and that it is possible, and desirable to many of us, to minimize that insertion/breakage to a much greater extent than you seek to.

Dismiss its impact, I mean. You seem to consider the reduction in agency on the part of a DM improvising to be greater than the reduction of agency by having a linear story. I don't agree. To me, a very linear story allows for minimal player choices, and often those choices are pretty minor. And I say this knowing that I have linear elements plenty of times in my game. There's nothing wrong with it, but I think you're biased to assume the worst of sandbox play and/or DM improvisation, and so your comparison is skewed.

Again, no, no, no. I am assuming you demonstrate the best, not the worst qualities of sandbox play and improvisation. It is simply the fundamental break of cause and effect that I don't agree with.

For example, it's possible for a DM to improv the exact same scenario that another DM prepares ahead of time. The two instances could play out exactly the same at the table.

To be fair though, can you see how to someone of my school thought, randomly rolling an eleven is not the same as the result already being 11?

Honestly, my need to improv is a direct result of my players having agency to choose things that I may not have anticipated....so it seems weird to think of the result of their agency somehow limiting their agency.

To those of your school of thought who see it as the DM's job to improvise, I can see how it can seem fundamentally ridiculous to see how that can be seen to negatively impact player agency. I think its why it has always been so difficult for me to get many of you to appreciate a different way of thinking.

I suppose that it's the use of the term "DM Taint" that seems to be my main area of contention. I don't see why the stuff you write ahead of time is free of such "taint" but the stuff I decide at the table must always be "tainted" in such a way.

Having the material exist ahead of time means player cause leads directly to player effect rather than going through a DM in between.

 

[Lanefan]

hahahahahaahhahaha
More realistic. I am mad at you Lanefan. You have had nice players which will not play Jasper's pc badly when jasper is on a date.

Well, in part it's because they know what goes around comes around, and if they hose my character when I'm not there they'll get no mercy next time they're absent and I have their character...

I quit allowing my pcs to be ran when I was not there, and quit allowing other people's pc to be ran by committee back in 1981. Or about 1 year after I started gaming.
People vanish? Use the fog from Ravenloft (my groups were doing similar things but the Ravenloft fog became the default).
People wander off? People disappear? Like that comic book amazon guest star in the "simpsons" episode. "a wizard did it."
Or be realistic.

Being realistic - within the game world - is what we're trying to do.

D&D is a game. Jasper is not here. So Jasper's pc is not here because this is a game.

Which blatantly fails the realism test, so - doesn't happen.

Lanefan

 

[shoak1]

This approach is not well supported by the rules anymore, and hasn't been for some while. Those who like a linear approach with a referee have been well served by published adventures. Min-maxers were extremely well served by 4e, but also simply because of an influx of gamers from other hobbies, like video games, board games, and MtG type games. It's natural to approach D&D by reading the rules, and trying to play the game "according to the rules." For those that are used to deck-building and such, treating character creation the same way comes naturally.

On the other hand, RPGs are unique in that they support an almost opposite approach, which is you play the game, and then if you're not sure how to resolve something, look up the rule. This was what I saw as the promoted approach with AD&D, in that most of the rules (including combat) weren't in the PHB. I still prefer to start new players by helping to build a character (which can be modified as we play), and then they just jump in and play. When they want to do something, we let them know how the rules address that if needed.

Well articulated, I like how rather than declaring D and D to be a pure RPG and therefore blah blah blah, you see it (correct me if I am wrong) as a game that can be many things to many people, and has changed back and forth in its emphasis through different editions. One of the most frustrating things I encounter in these forums is a lack of appreciation of that, which can lead to a lack of appreciation of other playstyles and the view that one or the other is "right."

You say you'd "rather be railroaded into a good story and adventure that's predesigned" and then say that the quote that says people who "prefer to be told a story by the referee" are escapists and what you hate.

Not at all - I see the other style to be as valid as my own and as a those who play that way as an important part of the D and D family.

You prefer everything to be predetermined, and the DM acts as a referee as you explore their predetermined adventure. I think that's great. I think it's a valid approach, and a lot of people like it. I'd argue that it's probably the predominant play style, promoted by WotC by both the rulebooks and their publication of APs, that set the baseline for playing D&D is, "Buy the PHB (or download the basic rules), buy an AP, and a DM runs you through what we designed." And that's nothing new. As soon as they started publishing adventures, the default approach is a blend of linear plot, DM as referee, and players as a mix of player and character.

But here's the thing. I can design a world, with everything in place and predetermined, but with no plot. You can go anywhere and do anything you want, and I will only use material that I predesigned. That's a pure sandbox. No story, impartial referee, and absolute player agency. There are zero restrictions on your agency, and you can approach it as tactically as you'd like.

That's a sandbox I want to play in

I'm not complaining about your preferences, my point is that your mixing things up and attempting to define what others are doing, and it's just wrong. So when you say you prefer a tactical game, and that's why you dislike DMs that run a sandbox. You're fundamentally wrong because the presence or absence of a tactical game has nothing to do with whether the game is a sandbox or not, and that's going to generate a response. There are DMs that run a sandbox game specifically to ensure their game is a tactical game full of player agency and as free from DM interference as possible.

I think you just don't fully appreciate how difficult it is to articulate a point without using terms and labels. From everything I have heard and seen, most sandbox DMs do not detail the entire play area. So while you might, I don't think that makes my use of the term improper. And while I can use many terms to describe a gamer based philosophy/style, "tactical challenge" seems to be the best fit. In the end, we can argue about labels all day, but my intent is to try to illuminate my point without so many exceptions and asterisks as to make my point intelligible.

I find that despite what people say they like, the majority of players don't consider the theory behind role playing. They'll agree to just about anything because the reality is that most people just don't care. They just want to play the game. The probably don't fully understand what they are objecting to, and any sort of question and explanation tends to be not only leading, but outside the context of an actual in-game experience.

True dat

I also don't understand what you mean by playing it as a tactical game. Are you talking about combats using the rules to move around the battlefield and make tactical decisions with miniatures? Or are you talking min-maxing, finding the "perfect build" and avoiding "trap" choices? Or something else?

I mean minis/rules based, law and order, no DM insertion between cause and effect, skill challenges rather than speaking in funny voices, etc.

I am genuinely interested in what you do like. I agree it's often as important to understand what you don't like as well. But be careful about assigning what you don't like to approaches incorrectly. It's a lot of what I see people disagreeing about with you.

From my point of view, I believe my approach is so alien to many of you that it leads to false assumptions on your part about what I am saying that are unsupported and contrary to what I articulate - which then leads to rancor from you that actually does serve to get us into an adversarial position I never intended.

 

[Tony Vargas]

Edit: I feel like this post is just going to look confrontational and ranty, so I'm going to re-state my conclusion, at the start here, in the vain hope of heading that off:

Theories about RPGs, their systems and 'styles,' seem to inevitably fall into the trap of taking elements that make up the roleplaying experience, separating them out, isolating them & declaring certain pairs of them to be mutually exclusive, when in fact, they're all not only compatible, not only synergistic, but vital.

So, yeah, this is just another 'why can't we all just get along' rant.

Further Edit: And, my apologies to Ilbranteloth for unleashing this in a quote of his post, really, any post in this thread could have touched it off, including some of my own.

To start, from my perspective, there's at least a third option, which I think was the more common option (now potentially overtaken by min-maxers), perhaps "immersionists".

There's certainly been a lot of plaintive whingeing over 'immersion' starting promptly in 2008, and continuing until the h4ters were done dancing and spitting on 4e's grave (so still going on, really).

It's just 'realism' and 'simulationisn' wearing a different pair of jackboots, with which to stomp on anyone who wants to actually play a game or tell or story, or exercise their own creativity or find their own fun in any way that deviates from the immersionist's vision.
Because your precious immersion can be shattered by any build decisions (race, class, feats, backgrounds, etc), and any in-play decisions, and any mechanic, it gives you a pretext to dictate what & how other players play, and what rules the DM uses.

As such, it's a dangerous concept to lend any credence to, at all. Unfortunate for anyone for whom it is a real creative agenda, who is actually able to pursue it individually yet still co-exist with others' creativity, that it gets abused that way and can't help but be rife for such abuse by it's very nature.
But there it is.

For me, "Immersion" as a concept, is fatally tainted. If the same positives (and there /are/ positives, I've experienced them, myself, in the past), can be articulated and worked towards /without/ putting undue restrictions on anyone/everyone else, maybe some related concept could be rehabilitated and put to good use.
Maybe.

This approach is not well supported by the rules anymore,.

Beg to differ. 5e's DM-Empowerment approach to the rules lets the DM wishing to run an immersive game take resolution, and thus direct engagement with the rules, behind the screen. It's ideally suited for a hypothetical non-pathological take on the concept.

and hasn't been for some while

Min-maxers were extremely well served by 4e[/quote] You wouldn't know it by the vitriol of the 3.5/PF faction of the edition war. Of course, in a sense, 4e did accommodate min/maxers (optimizers or powergamers) very well, in that they could pursue their preferred style without wrecking the game for anyone else at the table no so deeply inclined to system mastery, because it was such a robustly balanced game (by D&D standards, really, objectively, it was barely-adequate). OTOH, in another sense, it was very frustrating to them, because it offered mostly meager rewards for deep system mastery, relative to obvious build choices, and, where more rewarding loopholes were found, they were often quickly closed by a subsequent update.

Those who like a linear approach with a referee have been well served by published adventures.

There have also been some quality sand-boxxy adventures. But, really, those of us who like less directive, more improvisational play use published adventures, if we use them at all, just for inspiration - it doesn't matter if they're linear or not.

On the other hand, RPGs are unique in that they support an almost opposite approach, which is you play the game, and then if you're not sure how to resolve something, look up the rule.

I wouldn't say they support that, so much as they suffer from it, as it grinds the game to a halt and can be dreadfully frustrating unless the rules are very neatly laid out, impeccably indexed, and paragons of brevity & clarity.

3.x's solution was to incentivize knowning the rules inside-out with rewards to system mastery, 4e's to have clear/consistent rules & print the out the relevant ones right on the character sheet, and 5e's to have the DM ruling on everything, all the time.

This was what I saw as the promoted approach with AD&D, in that most of the rules (including combat) weren't in the PHB.

DM-facing rules were treated as a sort of inner mystery, yes. The effect was not unlike that which 5e goes for.

There are a lot of different things - game design, rules, DM approach, DM techniques, that all intersect to make a play style. And you can be along any point of each of those continuums at that point of intersection.

I'm not so sure all those things /make/ a playstyle. The design - and even presentation - of a ruleset, for instance, can permit, encourage, punish or even reward some of the elements that make up a particular playstyle. 3.5 lavishly rewarded system mastery, which is a component of some styles and potentially irritating to others (at least, when it's lavishly rewarded). Classic D&D seemed to fall into a few recognizeable 'styles,' though they weren't called that back then, based mainly on the DM's attitude: "Monty Haul" and "Killer" probably being the most recognizable.

So when you say you prefer a tactical game, and that's why you dislike DMs that run a sandbox. You're fundamentally wrong because the presence or absence of a tactical game has nothing to do with whether the game is a sandbox or not, and that's going to generate a response.

That's how I'd feel about it, too. But, if we take liking a tactical game a little differently, as disliking the strategic side of the game, then it makes a little more sense. In a sandbox, there is more potential for a strategic element, where do we go next and to what end and how do we try to accomplish that end, ultimately, while in a linear game, it's easier to focus just on the next challenge, and even only during the next challenge.
That's not how it's being couched, but I could see that maybe having something to do with it.
[MENTION=54380]shoak1[/MENTION]? Am I completely off base?

I find that despite what people say they like, the majority of players don't consider the theory behind role playing. They'll agree to just about anything because the reality is that most people just don't care. They just want to play the game.

And the theories, after having seen too many of them, and having seen them twisted to various agendas, aren't worth much, and almost always seem to fall into the trap of taking elements that make up the roleplaying experience, separating them & declaring them mutually exclusive, when in fact, they're all not only compatible, not only synergistic, but vital.

 

[Harzel]

[MENTION=6785785]hawkeyefan[/MENTION], [MENTION=6778044]Ilbranteloth[/MENTION] - Thank you for your last couple of remarkably cogent, articulate posts; you saved me a lot of typing.

 

[Ilbranteloth]

More DM taint is worse than less DM taint.

I'm just confused on this whole "DM taint" thing. To start with, I think it's a useless term that implies something negative but doesn't really tell us anything. DM taint would be anything the DM touches. If he wrote it, it's tainted.

For example, it makes me thing that if the DM wrote the adventure, then then entire things is dripping with filthy, stinky, rotten DM taint.

How could you bear to play such a thing?

Obviously I don't think that's what you think. So where is the line where it becomes DM taint? Why is everything on one side of that line OK, and everything on the other side not?

It seems to me what you don't want, is the DM changing or adding anything once the game starts. The ideal approach to D&D for you seems to be like the old tournament modules. Where they were designed as a sort of competition, to see which group was the best that year.