Save My Game - Goes off like a bomb!

[FireLance]

I think the article addresses a couple of issues that I happened to touch on in the "Examination of Differences between Editions" thread. One is the issue of player interface, and the other is the issue of what was referred to in the thread as "low-detail propositions" (e.g. "I make a Search check") and "high-detail propositions" (e.g. "I search behind the painting"). I'll just quote the relevant parts.

Sometimes, I think one of the major determinants of how smoothly a game is run is how well the players interface with the game. In more open-ended systems, like previous editions of D&D, the DM has more responsibility to be that interface and to adjudicate the players' interactions with the game world. If the DM is flexible, creative, and able to adapt the challenges on the fly to create hints or add new complications, as necessary, the players will be challenged, but will not feel frustrated. However, if the DM has only one solution in mind, or is otherwise rigid and inflexible, the players might feel that they are playing one of those text-based RPGs where you have to type in exactly the right commands, e.g. "Move painting" instead of "Search painting", "Use knife" instead of "Cut rope", etc.

More codified systems like 3e solve this problem by defining more clearly what the PCs are capable of doing. Effectively, they allow the players to interface with the game in a command-driven or menu-driven manner. By narrowing the universe of choices down to a limited number of ways in which the players can interact with the game, and implying that the solutions to problems should be defined in terms of these limited interactions, at least one source of frustration (the game interface/DM not recognizing the player's input as valid) should be eliminated.

The irony is that one of the main advantages that a table-top pen-and-paper RPG has over a computer RPG is the flexibility of the DM to accept all kinds of input. However, if I'm playing with a DM that insists on acting like a computer, I'd rather have a command-driven interface than have to guess exactly what input he will recognize as valid.

(On trying to encourage players to step out of their menu-driven or command-driven mindsets.) I think the solution to this is for the DM to accept both what you refer to as low-detail and high-detail propositions, and for successful low-detail propositions to point towards high-detail propositions.

For example, you could set your games up so that a Search check is simply a visual inspection. However, a successful Search check will uncover additional clues or hint at a course of action that the PCs could take to discover more.

Using the painting example, on a DC 20 Search check (a low-detail proposition), you could tell the PCs that there seems to be something behind it, or that it is slightly tilted, or that there are scuff marks on the wall that indicate that it had been moved repeatedly. The PCs are thus at liberty to manipulate it further (possibly setting off a trap or hazard), check it for traps (another Search check), or leave it alone. However, if a PC specifically stated that he was moving the painting (a high-detail proposition), he would find the hidden object (or set off the trap) automatically.

Similarly, for the example of the cluttered room, or the trapdoor hidden behind straw, a PC with a high Search check should realize that there might be some things that are still hidden because the straw or the clutter is in the way.

 

[molonel]

Plenty, but I'd be willing to bet it's still a small percentage. Be that as it may, you have more options in a table top environment.

I think what we're saying here, though, is that this particular advantage is a lot smaller than it used to be, and is vastly overstated by some tabletop advocates, and is getting smaller all the time.

But it is not unlimited choice, which was my point. Actually, I think I've figured out where our misunderstanding is coming from. I'm not advocating that video games are linear things where you must go from A to B to C. There are plenty of "sandbox games" out there that offer you a huge array of choices. They aren't unlimited, but you've got a whole boat-load of things you can do. But in a table top game, you can do (or rather, attempt) anything you can think of (barring a railroading GM). That was my point. Sorry if I was unclear on that.

And, as KM just rightly pointed out, this "unlimited" option in tabletop is often more myth than fact.

 

[molonel]

Yeah, but you can't bribe a CPU with beer and pizza.

Yeah, but then again, I've never had a computer get mad at me because I killed its pet NPC, and decided to TPK us out of spite, either.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Yeah, but then again, I've never had a computer get mad at me because I killed its pet NPC, and decided to TPK us out of spite, either.

You never played Everquest back in the bad old days, then.

 

[BryonD]

Specifically, there's probably not very many tabletop games where you can just rampage against the locals of a town like you can in GTA. There's no tabletop game I know of that allows you to demolish the world like Katamari Damacy.

Tabletop is plenty limited.

What game can you NOT do these in?
Maybe the DM isn't interested in running that particular game. But the game itself (D&D and many, many others) can handle these options readily.

But if you find the difference between tabletop and computer limitations to be this insignificant and you believe that tabletop is limited so-as to proscribe these activites then I feel sorry for the terribly constrained experiences you must have been limited to.

 

[molonel]

But if you find the difference between tabletop and computer limitations to be this insignificant and you believe that tabletop is limited so-as to proscribe these activites then I feel sorry for the terribly constrained experiences you must have been limited to.

Well, if YOU have been limited by the limitations of a limited delimiter, and believe this limitation to be insignificant so as to proscribe the hitherto activities of a wherewithal hereby, then I feel bad for your completely circumscribed situational .... something or other .... than you've been limited .... to.

That started out a lot funnier than it ended up.

 

[Thurbane]

IMHE, 20 years of being a fan of video games and tabletop roleplay, tabletop has always had more options and a more open "interface" (in terms of a DM) than video games.

It's certainly true that (some) modern day video games offer a wider array of options than ever before, but I still think we are a long way technologically from when a game can offer as many options in any given circumstance than a flesh and blood DM can.

That is NOT to say that pen and paper RPGs are inherently superior to video games - each have their own appeal, and I am a huge fan of both...

 

[phindar]

It seems like the discussion of which is more limited, a D&D game or a computer game seems to actually be a discussion of the limitations of say, a specific computer game versus a specific GM. Not that its a bad discussion, just that there's no such thing as a generic video game or a generic D&D game. You can't play a video game someone hasn't written the programming for (with its implied limitations), nor can you play a D&D game that someone isn't running (with their own set of limitations). I'd rather play a good video game than a bad D&D game, and vice versa, but I still see them as fundamentally different acts. Apples and oranges, let's say. (I like both, but I get different nutritional elements from them.)

That said, "Guess what the DM is thinking" or "Mother-May-I Mechanics" is not a particularly fun way to spend a Thursday evening. At least when I get stuck on a video game level where I can't divine what the game designer wants me to do, I can always find a walk-through online.

(I remember one time I got stuck on an AvP level; cleared out the whole thing, had no idea how to advance. Walked the whole level-- with randomly spawning xenos-- kicking wall panels and space barring everything in sight. Eventually I got frustrated and checked a walk-through and it turned out I was supposed to go to this one particular spot and shoot a light bulb in the ceiling which would cause the ceiling to fall in and I could walk up a ramp to the next level. Like the light bulb is holding the next level up. Its a load-bearing light bulb, apparently. If a GM had tried something like that, I'm pretty sure the group would have force-fed him his GM screen.)

 

[I'm A Banana]

What game can you NOT do these in?
Maybe the DM isn't interested in running that particular game. But the game itself (D&D and many, many others) can handle these options readily.

Right, and that's exactly what I was saying: the DM limits the game, because they are only human and have particular limitations for their games. Any game in which the players are "heroic" (which I don't think would be much of a stretch to say "most D&D games") wouldn't really work like GTA or Katamari Damacy. D&D isn't well set up for it: there's no system for measuring how much force a law agency sends after you, or for gaining a certain number of levels in a certain time limit. You could impose those, but then you'd be designing the game -- the game isn't designed to handle that from the ground up.

But basically my point was that a DM is going to limit his game (and reasonably so), so the "I can do anything!" potential of tabletop is mitigated in everything but theory. You can't do anything. You can only do what the DM lets you do. Which isn't a whole lot different from only being able to do what the CPU lets you do.

But if you find the difference between tabletop and computer limitations to be this insignificant and you believe that tabletop is limited so-as to proscribe these activites then I feel sorry for the terribly constrained experiences you must have been limited to.

Did you read my post? Do you think that disallowing 1st level beholders and 25th levels in 4th level parties and warforged ninjas in 7th sea-style games is "terribly constrained?"

Because I really don't. It's constrained, but, well, that's part of the point. It wouldn't be much fun if it wasn't constrained.

It *is* constrained, though. Which is why "Tabletop allows you to do anything!" is a nice theory, but it doesn't work out that way at the table.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Yeah, and in practice, that limitless imagination shows up in extremely few tabletop games. Just reading what people say about their games at ENWorld drives that point home rather firmly.

Probably because neither tabletop D&D nor CRPG/MMORPG's require the LIMITS of imagination. The point is that the computer can only do what it's programmed to do ahead of time. In particular, the interactivity with non-player characters may as well be done with stone knives and bear skins.

A real DM, on the other hand, can make things up on the fly. He can alter the entire world at a stroke on a whim. Players can do and SAY anything they have a mind to and have it reacted to realistically and dynamically, not just choosing canned options from the popup menu or following the programmed random quests and quest trees. This is not to say that all D&D games are NOT like that - many are, and there's nothing inherently BAD about that. The point is that they have the vast potential to at least accomodate imagination and creativity in real time that computer games do not.

Oh, and if I dare risk it, I'll draw the direct comparison to how I see people play a particular MMORPG - WOW. My experience with WOW players is that once they get to the max level they just do the same quests over, and over, and over, and over. While relatively minor details may change during play as random results will do, requiring a certain... skill (though perhaps 'preparedness' is a more accurate word) it is utterly unimaginative play at that point. It is rote and repitition, not imagination and creativity. It is playing out the result of crunched numbers and well-rehearsed tactics in the same encounters over, and over.

I could be wrong, but that such is my experience.