D&D General Story Now, Skilled Play, and Elephants

[Umbran]

In my post just upthread I mentioned dungeon crawling as a candidate for a mode of play which is rich in scenes, and in action resolution, but may often be quite low conflict. I think a game in which a player sets out to play The Reluctant Hero and it is understood that the processes and outcomes of play will uphold that character conception may well also end up being fairly low conflict ...

The point wasn't about the Reluctant Hero specifically. Replace that with the Trickster, the Parental Figure, the Natural Leader, the Grizzled Veteran, or what have you.

Thinking in an immersionist sense - when inhabiting the mind of the Reluctant Hero, yes you make gameplay decisions that avoid conflict.

However, from a story oriented sense, that is keeping the character in their comfort zone. Characters do tend shine when in their comfort zone or area of expertise. Like, the Grizzled Veteran will kick butt and take names in a violent conflict. However, for that Veteran, one fight is much like another - it is not a place for change or growth, in a dramatic sense.

A good story has both places where the character's competence shines, but also places where they are not comfortable, and experience growth thereby. I submit that story-oriented Skilled Play will include using the game mechanics to adjust the pacing and dramatic tension to create satisfying story arcs.

In Fate, for example, the Reluctant Hero may use an Aspect to enhance an influential speech about how we really don't want to fight (shining in their comfort zone), but at another time, choose to accept, or even suggest, a Compel on that same aspect that throws the character into the middle of a fight that's tactically questionable and not what the mind of the character actually wants.

Cortex has similar choices - like taking a low die for a Distinction in a given moment will give you that moment of discomfort for growth/display character depth, but give you the plot point to use to shine later.

I submit story oriented skilled play may also include using mechanics to help manage spotlight and pacing for the group as a whole. The Fate version of this might go thusly - you're playing the Grizzled Veteran, and you're in the second fight of the night, and you've had lots of time slicing up bad guys. But, the Naive Librarian in the party has been cooling their heels. Instead of Attacking like you always do, a skilled play then may be to Create an Advantage for the Librarian to use, helping to give them spotlight time and a good scene for themselves, too.

 

[Thomas Shey]

It seems there's maybe a difference between "social gamesmanship" and "getting on the same page." Sorting through some arbitrarily large number of options and choosing one because you believe it'll appeal to the GM seems like the former; getting into a mindspace where the first thing you think of to do makes sense to you for your character to do it, and it appeals to the GM, seems more like the latter.

I dunno if that makes sense outside of my head, but your post got me thinking about it.

I understand the distinction you're making, but I have to say I think the first is immensely more common than the second (not the least because the first still can work when the second fails).

 

[Bedrockgames]

As I noted earlier, however, "skilled play" that operates outside of the system can frequently come across as more about social gamesmanship (i.e. presenting things in a way the GM will find credible and allow to succeed) than it is about being in the character's shoes, too. The assumption the GM will be a genuinely neutral arbiter doesn't seem to stand up to extended experience in the wild.

You don’t have to agree that it is viable but when people say skilled play, they are usually referring to this. If you question the plausibility of GMs fairly arbitrating, this may not be the style for you...but it is a style of play

as to whether it stands up, I find it does. But what it means to be a fair arbiter is a whole other topic of discussion and debate. My view is it is like anything else where fairness is the goal; it is an ideal one strives for. Referees are human do no one is perfectly fair: but there are more fair GMs and less fair ones. Becoming more fair is a skill you cultivate. At the same time it does require ceding authority to the GM on the part of the player and allowing for the GM to have final day for it to work. Sone people have difficulty with that or just find it doesn’t fit them. but again plenty of people play in this style and enjoy it.

 

[prabe]

I understand the distinction you're making, but I have to say I think the first is immensely more common than the second (not the least because the first still can work when the second fails).

I wouldn't say "immensely" more common, in my experience, but I'll acknowledge you have much broader experience than I do. No argument.

It occurred to me after I posted the GM is probably doing some work, either pulling the players in or finding where the players are and joining them there. That's not really relevant to my distinction, of course, and it seems more like GM skill than player skill.

I was also kinda thinking it might not be easy (or possible) to tell from the outside which a player was doing.

 

[clearstream]

So I don't think there is any rift. I think that Ovinomancer and Manbearcat (and most other posters in this thread) are well aware that RPGing requires people to make suggestions about the fiction, and requires a process to make these "true" (ie part of the shared fiction) - I don't think anyone dissented from Vincent Baker's remarks to this effect upthread. The point they are making is that not all GM-side processes of this sort are consistent with the exercise of skill on the player side.

The rift is between my view and others. A GM could certainly use force unskillfully which would very likely mean it was dissatisfying to players and limited their opportunities to play skillfully. On the other hand, a GM could use force skillfully to elevate the challenges and open up opportunities for players to play skillfully. I have witnessed both. Remember that I regard any time a DM decides as much on par.

I am not saying that decisions are undifferentiated, or equal in quality, I am saying that any DM decision is open to being skillful or unskillful, elevating or deflating to player skill. As a thought experiment, I imagine a vast number of DMs faced with the same putatively constrained and obliged decision, and I believe they will make a diversity of decisions... possibly as many as one per DM.

That doesn't mean that I disagree that

Certain approaches to how GM's frame scenes, establish fiction and orchestrate conflict are not really compatible with skil;ed play, because they make it hard for players to constrain and oblige, and they tend to make the fall out from conflict independent of the choices the players make when responding to it. Roughly speaking, these are the approaches that @Ovinomancer has called "Force" not too far upthread; and these are the approaches that @Manbearcat has called "participationism" or (perhaps a bit less neutrally) "rudderless system setting tourism".

Except that I wouldn't put it as not compatible because it is compatible, albeit the nature of the compatibility is to limit skill. Remember that when I think of skill, I don't think of it as simply present or absent. Skill-constructs must include playing unskillfully (or less skillfully, is a better way to put it). So what is happening with the approaches you are thinking of (or when any approach is wielded badly) is that there is absolutely still skill, it is just a worse or more limited skill. As soon as we say that there is some skill, no matter how little, we have let skill in the door. That is different to my mind from excluding the possibility of skill.*

It might be that other posters do not mean to exclude the possibility of skill, and all they mean is that skill is diminished or limited by some approaches (or by any approach wielded badly, right?). The thing about skill however, is that it is relative not absolute. Say in the whole world the most skillful Chess player was what is currently Elo 800. Well then, we should not think 700 so very bad. (Of course the scale would recalibrate, but let's imagine we have some planets of alien cohorts that do better, so that we know that in truth humans are terrible at Chess. Or maybe some kind of Chess-playing machines...)

There are a few caveats to that. Some kinds of activity really do have a skill cap. Players reach it. We have no idea if they could show greater skill on the dimensions those activities stress. Other activities step outside human capability. No player can show skill... they are just inhumanely difficult. However, I do not believe that is where we are with RPG.


*EDIT an exception is where no choice by players or outcome of mechanics is allowed to stick: the DM overwrites them all. I would exclude that from being RPG, seeing as it amounts to a monologue.

 

[Thomas Shey]

You don’t have to agree that it is viable but when people say skilled play, they are usually referring to this. If you question the plausibility of GMs fairly arbitrating, this may not be the style for you...but it is a style of play

Let's be real: its what OSR proponents mean when they use the term. I've seen it used by people playing D&D 4e and PF 2e and that's absolutely not what they mean when they say it.

as to whether it stands up, I find it does. But what it means to be a fair arbiter is a whole other topic of discussion and debate. My view is it is like anything else where fairness is the goal; it is an ideal one strives for. Referees are human do no one is perfectly fair: but there are more fair GMs and less fair ones. Becoming more fair is a skill you cultivate. At the same time it does require ceding authority to the GM on the part of the player and allowing for the GM to have final day for it to work. Sone people have difficulty with that or just find it doesn’t fit them. but again plenty of people play in this style and enjoy it.

A "fair arbiter" is not the same thing as being "fair"; the latter is about trying to not bring bias to a group of players and what they do. A "fair arbiter" tries not to bring his own expectations to addressing something, because he knows he's just as likely to be, well, wrong on several levels, and its not his players job to read his mind. I quite agree most people are the former; I absolutely disagree they're the latter.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I wouldn't say "immensely" more common, in my experience, but I'll acknowledge you have much broader experience than I do. No argument.

And its not impossible I'm wrong, but it at least requires that over many, many years of playing and listening to people talk about the game (more of the former when I was younger and wasn't quite as insular in who I played with), I'd at least have had to had a peculiarly selective set of experiences.

It occurred to me after I posted the GM is probably doing some work, either pulling the players in or finding where the players are and joining them there. That's not really relevant to my distinction, of course, and it seems more like GM skill than player skill.

Well, if he's not doing at least some of it, he's made it a massive guessing game for the players (which, I admittedly did see some of in my younger days, but that was also back in the days when certain kinds of adversarial play were considered a more generally desirable thing).

I was also kinda thinking it might not be easy (or possible) to tell from the outside which a player was doing.

Over time you can make a pretty good educated guess, but it requires knowing both the player and the GM pretty well.

 

[Bedrockgames]

Let's be real: its what OSR proponents mean when they use the term. I've seen it used by people playing D&D 4e and PF 2e and that's absolutely not what they mean when they say it.

I am not terribly familiar with the 4E and PF2 community. The only place I have encountered skilled play as a concept is among old school gamers talking about it in the way I was suggesting. But I played 3E and we always called it system mastery or optimization if you are playing to optimize outcomes through mechanics. Regardless though, this isn't so much about who owns the term as the concepts behind the two ideas I expressed are distinct. There is a difference between skill being focused on the mechanics of the game and skill being focused on the scenarios the characters are in.

 

[Bedrockgames]

A "fair arbiter" is not the same thing as being "fair"; the latter is about trying to not bring bias to a group of players and what they do. A "fair arbiter" tries not to bring his own expectations to addressing something, because he knows he's just as likely to be, well, wrong on several levels, and its not his players job to read his mind. I quite agree most people are the former; I absolutely disagree they're the latter.

I am not 100% clear on the distinction you are making here. I think the GM is supposed to be fair and impartial, and be a fair arbiter of what is going on. Every system is different of course so what that means will vary. But in skilled play where I've encountered it, it means applying the rules fairly, making rulings fairly, making decisions about what happens in the setting fairly, giving players adequate information to understand the situation etc. But I do think we disagree on how feasible it is to be fair. I think it fairness is like anything else, it is something you have to cultivate and strive towards. On both sides of the table, it definitely seems real to me. I have played with GMs who are clearly more fair than other GMs, and over the course of my being a GM I have become more fair. If this is something you take issue with, that is fair. You don't have to play in skilled games focused on this kind of GMing style. But there are lots of people who experience it, and enjoy it. And there are plenty of GMs who are fair and meet the approval of the players in the game in their fairness. These are human beings making judgments of course, so no one is saying they are computers simulating reality. But I certainly can game with GMs and find the choices they make for say how their NPCs behave or what mechanical resolutions to call for when a player attempts an action to be pretty consistently well reasoned and sound. Certainly enough for a game.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I am not terribly familiar with the 4E and PF2 community. The only place I have encountered skilled play as a concept is among old school gamers talking about it in the way I was suggesting. But I played 3E and we always called it system mastery or optimization if you are playing to optimize outcomes through mechanics. Regardless though, this isn't so much about who owns the term as the concepts behind the two ideas I expressed are distinct. There is a difference between skill being focused on the mechanics of the game and skill being focused on the scenarios the characters are in.

I disagree. Being focused on the mechanics can entirely be using the proper tool for the job to get to the situation a character within the mechanics. The difference, as another poster ascribed, is that with knowledge of the mechanics you know the proper tool, instead of having to be on the same page as the GM when guessing whether what you're attempting to do will work well given the traits of your character.

They're still about trying to play the character in a way to get them to their goals, whether short or long term. Its that, frankly, a lot of OSR proponents want to write off actually using the mechanics as a lower form of skill so they don't want to acknowledge proper use of mechanics is skilled play, and reserve that for what they consider the "proper" way to play.

To consider the two methods truly distinct only makes sense if you insist on considering use of the mechanics entirely separable from what the characters decisions would be, and its not. Its not automatically any more than the OSR usage is (which, after all, is so disconnected from character traits in many cases the character might as well be a token; there's nothing intrinsically wrong with token play, but if, when deciding what your character is going to do you can ignore the nature of the character, claiming one method is more focused on the situation is kind of rich.)