Siloing: Good or Bad?

[keterys]

Here's a recent quote by Mike Mearls over on rpg.net that I think relates (though a little tangentally) to what I am trying to say about what I feel are some of the disadvantages of siloing... now whether you agree that it is a good or bad thing depends on what you want out of playing D&D.

Yep, good quote. And that's exactly the point - siloing protects players from themselves, effectively.

Even in 4e, someone can choose to play ineffectively. Boy have I seen it. But at least you don't show up to the table and they're completely useless by design.

 

[Markn]

And my main concern in this respect is that everyone has to be on the same page as far as what is fun and interesting for them in the game for siloing to work the way it is suppose to.

This part I disagree with. A good DM tries to convey his campaign style to his players but quite often, things go awry, the DM changes style, the player didn't understand the DM's message, etc. Siloing helps make up for the lack of understood communication because its impossible to make a strong character in the wrong silo because all silos are given equal consideration. So for me, this helps the game a lot.

This is sort of my concern, but let me try and clarify further. I believe that if I tell my PC's that I want to run an investigative fantasy game, they have the option to be Sherlock Holmes (old school or new school), but if they want to experience it in a fashion more similar to Watson, Mike Lawry (Will Smith in Bad Boys) or even Scooby Doo that is an option for them. To me that is the essence of roleplaying games, the chance to experience situations from different perspectives, points of view and yes, even competency. Siloing, IMO, narrows this range because it forces a certain competency and thus a certain type of character.

I don't know if I agree here. If these are all balanced silos so that no character is more powerful in one silo than any other silo you would have to have a minimum competency that is imposed so that you really are competent in everything, and really good at some things but not incompetent or disadvantaged in anything deemed important by the designers. Yeah you could be worse as an archer than a fencer, but in the end you are a skilled combatant no matter what.

I think I understand where you are coming from now. You point is that everyone has equal competency. No player can truly specialize in silo because everyone "gets the same amounts of points to spend" if you will. Sure, overall the characters are weak and strong in certain areas but you want to take it a step further and have the character stronger by "having more points to spend" if the player so chooses.

I can see your point here. Siloing does indeed prevent anyone player from truly being spectacular or weak but I think the upside of siloing is far greater than the downside. Hence, I strongly support siloing and wish 4e had gone much further.

 

[Derren]

In the end, Siloing is only needed when the players are not responsible/experienced enough to make balanced characters by themselves.

 

[Markn]

In the end, Siloing is only needed when the players are not responsible/experienced enough to make balanced characters by themselves.

I can think of 2 other cases:

- inexperienced DM

- a true munchkin in my group in 4e has made a truly impressive damage dealing character. Over time, this has altered the rest of the groups feat selections to more combat oriented (read as math boosting) feats so that they feel they can stay somewhere near him.

 

[Mallus]

In the end, Siloing is only needed when the players are not responsible/experienced enough to make balanced characters by themselves.

"The only reason a game needs good design is bad players".

Ahem...

... there's another good reason for siloing. It (mostly) sidesteps the need for difficult costing schemes which try to assign a relative value to everything under the sun a player character might want to do. How many build points does fencing mastery cost? What about a silver tongue? Sports car driving? Expertise in the Japanese Tea Ceremony, facility with puns, and a mustache that %75 of women find irresistible?

A good design employing siloing breaks a character's abilities down into broad categories, and then has them pick, like from like (more-or-less). No need to compare aptitude with kung-fu to sudoku. This works particularly well for games that have common, central activities.

For instance, killing sh*t with swords and magic.

 

[keterys]

In the end, Siloing is only needed when the players are not responsible/experienced enough to make balanced characters by themselves.

Needed? Yes.

It's still helpful, even when not needed.

The example earlier about a system where you have full points and the designers assume one split between combat and social, but then your game uses a different split definitely leads to folks favoring certain abilities over others because the points just don't add up.

For example, let's say that someone can spend 5 points in a point-buy system to get either +1 to Fast Talk or +1 to Hit and Damage. In a campaign where Fast Talk is helpful in 80% of encounters and hit/damage in 30%, then fast talk is better. In a campaign where fast talk is useful in 10% of encounters (which is probably slightly above your average dnd campaign, when you factor in all other encounter types vs social, then the number of social encounters where fast talk is the answer over some other method or some other character talking...) - well, you'll find that most characters favor the hit and damage.

Even in a campaign where they're equal, people will favor hit and damage because the penalty for a failed fast talk is some other new and exciting situation (sometimes it's an advantage to fail such rolls, in terms of fun at the game table) and the penalty for a failed combat is often death.

 

[Markn]

Even in a campaign where they're equal, people will favor hit and damage because the penalty for a failed fast talk is some other new and exciting situation (sometimes it's an advantage to fail such rolls, in terms of fun at the game table) and the penalty for a failed combat is often death.

QFT.

I've heard many players at many table say that when it comes to character survival, the choices that help them live are more important than those that don't - even if they see less use.

It only benefits the game to not have players have to choose between these options.

 

[billd91]

But above all, RPGs should involve every player in every encounter - you should always be making a meaningful contribution to the game, otherwise we're back to the bad old days of Shadowrun 3.

I don't actually agree with this. RPGs do not have to actually involve every player in every encounter. But they should allow the possibility of doing so, even if some PCs are less competent than others at specific aspects of it. And that's the problem with games like Cyberpunk and Shadowrun. The solo, rockerboy, or nomad simply can't tag along with the netrunner.

But that's more of a genre problem than anything related to siloing class abilities.

 

[Hussar]

I will disagree with you here. The purpose of good siloing, IMO, is to make sure the characters are roughly equal to each other by avoiding the large disparities that a freeform or point buy system would allow... yet feats are just a poorly disguised point system that crosses the boundaries that the siloing creates.
/snip.

Bold mine

I think, Imaro, this is where you differ from many here. THe purpose of good siloing isn't to make characters roughly equal to each other.

The purpose of good siloing is to make sure that characters are roughly equal to each other within the parameters of a given game element.

In other words, all characters contribute to combat in roughly the same level, all characters contribute to out of combat to roughly the same level. Sure, fighters aren't as good skill wise as rogues, for example, but, that doesn't mean they are completely incompetent.

Complete incompetence was a 3e thing. In 4e, at the very least, you get half your level plus ability in any skill. Sure, the specialized guy will succeed far more often, that's true. But, that doesn't mean you will never succeed. Within the silo of skills, everyone can contribute, just as within the silo of combat, everyone can contribute. It's just that that contribution will be different.

At no point should you be completely inneffective in a well silo'd system.

If you are adding "Domain Governance" as a silo, EVERYONE gets it. It costs nothing for basic competence. To be a good Domain Governer, you spend feats to improve that, perhaps buy magic items, spend resources, whatever.

But, the guy that spends nothing still starts off with basic competence for free.

Now, if you choose not to use that, that's fine and no system will help you. If I choose not to participate in skill challenges, no amount of skill competence is going to change that. But, that's up to the player.

What you don't have is five people sitting at the table playing five different games, which is a problem that occurs with non-silo'd systems.

 

[Derren]

Even in a campaign where they're equal, people will favor hit and damage because the penalty for a failed fast talk is some other new and exciting situation (sometimes it's an advantage to fail such rolls, in terms of fun at the game table) and the penalty for a failed combat is often death.

I wouldn't count those people among "good role players" as they create their character according to metagame benefits and not by how they envision the character to be.