RPG Combat: Sport or War?

There are two different extremes in arranging fights. One is like war and the other is like a sporting event. Sporting events are supposed to be fair contests between roughly equal forces. On the other hand, war is the epitome of unfair competition.


Jeffro Johnson introduced me to this topic, which was discussed in an ENWorld forum. If your game doesn't involve much combat this discussion may not mean a lot to you.

Strategem: a plan or scheme, especially one used to outwit an opponent or achieve an end

Any GAME implies fairness, equality of opportunity. Knightly jousting tournaments were combat as sport. We don't have semi-pro soccer teams playing in the Premier League, we don't have college basketball teams playing the NBA, because it would be boringly one-sided. People want to see a contest where it appears that both sides can win. And occasionally the weaker side, the underdog if there is one, wins even when they're not supposed to.

An obvious problem with combat as sport, with a fair fight, is that a significant part of the time your players will lose the fight. Unless they're really adept at recognizing when they're losing, and at fleeing the scene, this means somebody will get dead. Frequent death is going to be a tough hurdle in most campaigns.

The objective in war is to get such an overwhelming advantage that the other side surrenders rather than fight, and if they choose not to surrender then a "boring" one-sided massacre is OK. Stratagems are favored in war, not frowned upon. Trickery (e.g. with the inflation of the football) is frowned upon in sports in general, it's not fair, it's cheating.

Yet "All's fair in love and war." Read Glen Cook's fantasy Black Company series or think about mercenaries in general, they don't want a fair fight. They don't want to risk their lives. They want a surrender or massacre. The Black Company was great at using stratagems. I think of D&D adventurers as much like the Black Company, finding ways to win without giving the other side much chance.

When my wife used to GM first edition D&D, she'd get frustrated if we came up with good stratagems and strategies and wiped out the opposition without too much trouble. She felt she wasn't "holding up the side." She didn't understand that it's not supposed to be fair to the bad guys.

Think also that RPG adventures are much like adventure novels: we have to arrange that the players succeed despite the odds, much as the protagonists in a typical novel. In the novel the good guys are often fabulously lucky; in RPGs we can arrange that the players encounter opposition that should not be a big threat if the players treat combat as war rather than as a sport.

I'm not saying you need to stack the game in favor of the players, I'm saying that if the players do well at whatever they're supposed to do - presumably, in combat, out-thinking the other side -then they should succeed, and perhaps succeed easily. Just like Cook's Black Company.

contributed by Lewis Pulsipher
Photo © Marie-Lan Nguyen / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.5
 

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Lewis Pulsipher

Lewis Pulsipher

Dragon, White Dwarf, Fiend Folio
the 3-4e unwritten ethos of you can't try it unless a rule says you can
I know nothing about 3E in this respect. But from the 4e DMG (p 42):

Actions the Rules Don’t Cover
Your presence as the Dungeon Master is what makes D&D such a great game. You make it possible for the players to try anything they can imagine. That means it’s your job to resolve unusual actions when the players try them.​

This "unwritten ethos" seems to be written only in your imagination.
 

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RPGs play differently from story-telling games. Games like FATE, which you presumably consider a story-telling game, are definitely in the RPG category. Mechanics in story-telling games revolve more around ways players can add to the story, not character abilities.
Your first two sentences are contradictory. It seems that you understand the difference between RPGs and story-telling games, but then you contradict that by claiming that story-telling games are RPGs.

I've read FATE Core. It's a very well-constructed book, and the layout isn't terrible. The rules are mostly consistent. I get how story-telling games are supposed to work, and what the appeal is supposed to be. I don't get what benefit there is to calling it an RPG, other than to trick role-players into trying it so that they can be horribly offended.

I guess if you really wanted to, you could create an ultra-broad category of games that involve fictional characters and fictional events that take place (without regard to how players identify with those characters, or how those events are resolved), but that doesn't seem terribly useful. Those similarities are superficial, like the difference between Poker and Magic. And then we'd have to come up with further terminology to distinguish the actual role-playing games from the story-telling games and board games with story elements. It's easier to just avoid the broad category description, and restrict the name to games where you actually role-play.
 

Classic Traveller and AD&D are not recent games.
I think those would fall under the grandfather clause. To the extent that they asked you to meta-game in the process of playing - however much that may be, I cannot say - they can be forgiven for not knowing what they were doing. Most people don't even think about those things unless someone points them out. It took time for people to really understand the concept of role-playing, and everything it involved.
Where's the lack of honesty or integrity?
You should have figured out "the real backstory to the mission" before the session started, so you would know to generate all other elements in such a way that they would be consistent with it, rather than making that determination only after it was forced by the actions of the PC. (I'm not sure of the degree to which that was actually the case, based on your post.) It certainly looks like your behavior exhibits the same lack of integrity as (for example) letting a PC choose between two boxes, and only determining the contents of that box after they select it, such that their choice was meaningless.

Even if you are honest with your players about how you make these decisions, the process itself is what lacks integrity.
 


To the extent that they asked you to meta-game in the process of playing - however much that may be, I cannot say - they can be forgiven for not knowing what they were doing. Most people don't even think about those things unless someone points them out. It took time for people to really understand the concept of role-playing, and everything it involved.
I'm not sure who you have in mind as "most people", but I think that Gygax and Marc Miller thought about these things; and modern designers like Robin Laws, Luke Cane, Vincent Baker and others absolutely think about them.

Having thought about them, they noted that (i) a virtue of a RPG is that the play of the game is engaging relative to the interests of the players, and that (ii) one way to achieve (i) is by having the GM manage content introduction as the game unfolds.

You should have figured out "the real backstory to the mission" before the session started, so you would know to generate all other elements in such a way that they would be consistent with it, rather than making that determination only after it was forced by the actions of the PC.

<snip>

Even if you are honest with your players about how you make these decisions, the process itself is what lacks integrity.
All "lacks integrity" means here is not how you would do it. There's no actual corruption or debasement to point to.

It certainly looks like your behavior exhibits the same lack of integrity as (for example) letting a PC choose between two boxes, and only determining the contents of that box after they select it, such that their choice was meaningless.
What meaningless choice did the players make?
 

Er...right in the first bit of the 1e PH - e.g. "...you become Falstaffe the Fighter..." - he's pushing for immersion into one's character.

Your first two sentences are contradictory. It seems that you understand the difference between RPGs and story-telling games, but then you contradict that by claiming that story-telling games are RPGs.

I've read FATE Core. It's a very well-constructed book, and the layout isn't terrible. The rules are mostly consistent. I get how story-telling games are supposed to work, and what the appeal is supposed to be. I don't get what benefit there is to calling it an RPG, other than to trick role-players into trying it so that they can be horribly offended.

I guess if you really wanted to, you could create an ultra-broad category of games that involve fictional characters and fictional events that take place (without regard to how players identify with those characters, or how those events are resolved), but that doesn't seem terribly useful. Those similarities are superficial, like the difference between Poker and Magic. And then we'd have to come up with further terminology to distinguish the actual role-playing games from the story-telling games and board games with story elements. It's easier to just avoid the broad category description, and restrict the name to games where you actually role-play.

I don't see a contradiction. I said that you feel that FATE is a story-telling game. I whole heartedly place it under the RPG category, despite the fact that it borrows some story-telling elements. I never said that story-telling games are RPGs, although they are related.

Your dislike and worry over meta-gaming is so extreme that it is not allowing you to accept that the wealth of exciting developments in the field can still all fall under the RPG category. Role playing games encompass a wide variety of methods and styles, and can certainly contain your preferred style as well as mine. It encompasses the whole gamut from Basic DnD to Dogs In the Vineyard.

You feel games like FATE or Dungeon World are claiming to be something that they are not, but this is simply not true. They have differeing philosophies behind role playing, but still share the same basic tenets which constitutes the hobby.

I'm curious as to what games on the market you consider RPGs?
 

So, is it just me or is this thread now "Everybody vs. Saelorn telling people they are playing the game wrong"? Because that's what the last few pages have read like to me.
 

After reading this I have to ask:

What on earth are some of your players and DM’s doing?

You as a DM have a job to provide excitement, believability within a fantasy world, and consistency. “Honesty” isn’t required. You are not an umpire, you are a playwright directing a script you wrote. I won’t let a player die in a trap I meant as a delay, what’s heroic about that? Who wants that ending? I want the players riding the barrels in the river living or dying, the ones that do die in the barrels might have a chance to wash up on the shallow shore. I am not going to one shot a player in the first round of combat.

I suggest every DM go get A4, your players start naked in a dungeon underneath a volcano that is about to erupt. You COULD kill them any time, easy, just by being fair and impartial. Why have a session that’s over before the pizza even gets there?

As far as players, you job is to have fun, not be a dick, and realize you are part of an ensemble cast in a story. You PC isn’t you, you are the PC. Everyone who plays D&D knows a vampire is vulnerable to silver, but your PC hasn’t seen all the movies you have. I have read or played almost every module over the last 35 years, you won’t surprise ME with most anything but my PC is a 16 year old Dragonborn Stone Sorcerer/ Bard seeing the world for the first time as a Far Traveler from the Dragon Kings wouldn’t know that without a history, arcana, or perception check (or some combo of all 3.). I won’t spoil the story for everyone, especially new players.

If a PC who pulls out an app or a monsters manual at the table to read the stat block will just be told right then and there “WTF!”

Your not there to beat the DM, he isn’t against you.



As far as combat as sport or war, as a DM let your players try ANYTHING to make combat more exciting. The rules are just a framework, the house is all yours. Almost nothing should be illegal, but many things might be almost impossible but the right skill check or role play might get it.

Did anyone read or play City of Skulls? Right in the adventure was described a playtest were the PC were caught during an infiltration mission by an Orog but a PC charmed the Orog, took the Orog out to a bar and got him drunk, cast forget to make sure no memories existed, and then sent him back to his barracks, were in his stupor he assured everyone there that everything is ok. That’s role play and DM greatness right there, and not a single rule would really cover that situation.


Sent from my iPhone using EN World
 

There are two different extremes in arranging fights. One is like war and the other is like a sporting event. Sporting events are supposed to be fair contests between roughly equal forces.

An obvious problem with combat as sport, with a fair fight, is that a significant part of the time your players will lose the fight. Unless they're really adept at recognizing when they're losing, and at fleeing the scene, this means somebody will get dead. Frequent death is going to be a tough hurdle in most campaigns.

One is like war. One is like a sport. And another is like storytelling. (Thanks to everyone who said this before me.) :)

Game of Thrones had several fair fights, and they made for some really dramatic TV. So, I wouldn't call it a problem. Also, if PC death is a problem in your game, just take it out.

I know nothing about 3E in this respect. But from the 4e DMG (p 42):

Actions the Rules Don’t Cover
Your presence as the Dungeon Master is what makes D&D such a great game. You make it possible for the players to try anything they can imagine. That means it’s your job to resolve unusual actions when the players try them.​

This "unwritten ethos" seems to be written only in your imagination.

It's written in my imagination too. The source of the problem was a continuous outpouring of accessory books that reinforced using existing rules or new rules to do new things. Instead of, well, just providing the fluff and letting the GM worry about the rest.

Also, I find it telling that 4e's answer to Everything is on page 42...
 

Er...right in the first bit of the 1e PH - e.g. "...you become Falstaffe the Fighter..." - he's pushing for immersion into one's character.

So, is it just me or is this thread now "Everybody vs. Saelorn telling people they are playing the game wrong"? Because that's what the last few pages have read like to me.

Yes, this thread has drifted. Conversations do that. You are right, it has gone on for a while, but you know, human nature and pet peeves. Actually, for my part, I enjoy discussions on the nature of role playing and find the variety of styles interesting. My pet peeve is creeping in because I'm trying to convince Saelorn on the large scope of RPGs and playing styles, and Saelorn' s pet peeve is creeping in because Saelorn has a very firm definition of role playing. And then, pemerton has opinions too, which align more closely to mine, cause we're right, of course! Bright side, we are not flinging abuse at each other. Yet....
 

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