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

[pemerton]

I'm not clear as to what distinction you're drawing here, so I can't say. Man, that's two "can't says" in a row!

The distinction between (1) playing ToH style, or the sort of thing @Numidius has described from Lost Caverns where the players have to deal with various factions so as to achieve their goals - that's not the sort of tournament adventure my group ever played or did well in, and (2) playing "story"-oriented RQ or RM or Pendragon or Elric scenarios, where the way to do well as a team is to get into your characters, not contest the GM's lead-up or framing, and then buy into the blood operatic climax and give it all you've got!

In case it's not clear, (2) is what my group did OK at. There is a system aspect to it - normally buying into the climax will require declaring actions that make sense given, and perhaps even leverage, system element. There may even be a puzzle aspect where there's some particular element of the PC sheet that you are expected to pick up on and deploy at the crucial moment. But more than system, there's just being ready to give it a go and take the situation and characters on their own terms and buy into the resulting situation. I think that's a skill, but I don't think it's "skilled play" in the Gygaxian or any other sense.

 

[Numidius]

Don't attribute checks risk becoming de facto skill checks?

If the PCs turn up in their white robes, do they also have to make a CHA check to pull it off? To me that would seem a bit unfair.

Yes, that is a possibility. But I would never let a silent check substitute a declaration in plain language.

No, I personally would not ask for a CHA check in that situation.

 

[pemerton]

I personally would not ask for a CHA check in that situation.

Whereas I'm guessing you'd agree that in AW calling for Acting Under Fire or in BW calling for an Inconspicuous check would be not only fair but expected?

EDIT: For me, this is closely related to a reply I made to @Manbearcat in the "fair trap" thread.

One reason I personally don't enjoy "skilled play" RPGing is because if the players player well, then none of what is promised in the set-up (eg in this case, despite all the best efforts in the world, one of the PCs having the robes fall open revealing the holy symbol of St Cuthbert underneath it) actually comes to pass. So we have the promise of epic fantasy in the set up, but the reality of play only realises that promise if the players make a mistake.

Whereas the AW or BW approach means that some of this interesting stuff happens at least some of the time! The flip side is that failures need to not be too severe in terms of hosing the PCs and/or blocking future action declarations, because if they are then the guaranteed regularity of failure will mean play grinds to a halt.

 

[Numidius]

But more than system, there's just being ready to give it a go and take the situation and characters on their own terms and buy into the resulting situation. I think that's a skill, but I don't think it's "skilled play" in the Gygaxian or any other sense.

If I am understanding the above correctly, that's the way I'd like my table to play.

I want drama at my table so I take the written adventure as a basis to which add my own ideas, players input and expectations, and memorable (hope so) npcs for me to portray, while trying to mantain the general tone of the module.

As an aside, the dungeon part of Tsojcant was an actual tournament scenario, to which Gygax added the wilderness part for publishing.

 

[pemerton]

If I am understanding the above correctly, that's the way I'd like my table to play.

But I thought you're using an OSR, puzzle-solving approach?

See my post just upthread of yours, contrasting OSR-ish approaches with more dramatic approaches. In the tournaments I was mentioning, the drama was achieved by tight scripting of the lead up in a two-session scenario. Using terminology I wasn't familiar with at the time, I'd say that what they really consist in is some events and narration that establish colour and reveal the stakes (which are dictated by scenario design and prebuilt PCs, not player choice) and then a crunch point with a bit of denouement.

What I've discovered in the intervening couple of decades since those tournament experiences is how to get that sort of drama without relying so much on that tight pre-scripting.

 

[clearstream]

I've bolded two of the games you mentioned, because Ron Edwards has made the following remark about them:

From Maelstrom (Hubris Games, 1994, author is Christian Aldridge):​

​

Literal vs. Conceptual​

A good way to run the Hubris Engine is to use "scene ideas" to convey the scene, instead of literalisms. ... focus on the intent behind the scene and not on how big or how far things might be. If the difficulty of the task at hand (such as jumping across a chasm in a cave) is explained in terms of difficulty, it doesn't matter how far across the actual chasm spans. In a movie, for instance, the camera zooms or pans to emphasize the danger or emotional reaction to the scene, and in so doing it manipulates the real distance of a chasm to suit the mood or "feel" of the moment. It is then no longer about how far across the character has to jump, but how hard the feat is for the character. ... If the players enjoy the challenge of figuring out how high and far someone can jump, they should be allowed the pleasure of doing so - as long as it doesn't interfere with the narrative flow and enjoyment of the game.​

​

The scene should be presented therefore in terms relative to the character's abilities ... Players who want to climb onto your coffee table and jump across your living room to prove that their character could jump over the chasm have probably missed the whole point of the story.​

​

. . .​

I can think of no better text to explain the vast difference between playing the games RuneQuest and HeroQuest.​

There is a lot going on both in the passage quoted from Maelstrom Storytelling and in the short remark that Edwards himself makes. But one consequence of the differences is that, in RQ, it makes sense - once the difficulty of the jump across the chasm is established by the GM - to try and identify advantages that will give a bonus on the relevant check and hence decrease the chance of failing. Conversely, in HeroQuest (and especially HeroQuest Revised) the player is not expected to try and manipulate the difficulties of tasks, which are set by the GM essentially by reference to pacing considerations. That's not to say one doesn't leverage the fiction, but to other ends - like establishing what is at stake and what the consequences - not in win/lose terms, but in purely fictional terms - will be. (Maelstrom itself uses various mechanical devices within its scene resolution system to handle this.)

Those differences in how the game plays have fundamental implications, in my view, for how one thinks about them from the perspective of "skilled play". For instance, I can just about conceive running Tomb of Horrors using RQ rather than AD&D as the basic mechanical framework (and I have in fact toyed with this using Rolemaster). But the idea of running ToH using HeroQuest seems to me like it makes no sense at all.

I wonder if you agree?

I will try to keep this short in the first instance as I may not be clear on what you are asking.

It seems to me the question you are asking is whether it would be possible to run Tomb of Horrors in HeroQuest dramatic-mode? (Not just, could I make the mechanics of HQ work for ToH in Gygaxian-mode, to which I believe the answer is yes.) On surface, there may well be some sort of House of Horrors story that could be told using the Tomb map+key. Perhaps by assuming Acererak had already attained his latterly developed role of plane-hopping usher of adventurers to their doom. Playing up the cheesiness.

What I believe will happen there, however, is that I will turn out to be not running ToH as ToH. From the above I already have a sense of the Tomb bending out of shape. Once I speculate that running Gygaxian-mode Tomb to the standards of Gygaxian-mode Tomb, cannot be done whilst playing in dramatic-mode, then the underlying question perhaps turns out to be - can we even assess dramatic-mode from the perspective of Gygaxian-mode? As you know, I believe that attempts to do so are likely to run into problems.


EDIT Just in case it isn't clear - I agree with your intuition here, and am attempting to suggest what it might be grounded in.

 

[clearstream]

I don't understand why you see it as important to rate RPG players in terms of skill. When I see "skilled play" discussed in the RPGing context its in terms of orientations and expectations of play, and the actual processes of decision-making during play. Not normally in terms of "my skill was better than your skill", except in tournament contexts.

Ugh. The first half of this thread I was berated for discussing "skilled play" only as the in-quotes label. The second half I am berated for talking about skilled only as skill. No matter. I am fairly sure I never said it was important to rate RPG players. Rather I took our aims sincerely: can we create concrete skill-constructs for RPG-modes?

As it turns out, our aims were not to create concrete skill-constructs, but to speculate as to factors of skill in RPG-modes. I'm fine with that. Some posters did seem to be ruling out what others counted as skill, so I was additionally pointed out that no one has the high-ground here. To me their error is to spatchcock factors for skill from one mode into another mode, where those same factors may not matter, and then worse still ignore other factors that might well matter in those other modes. Your case of ToH in HQ dramatic-mode illustrates that quite well IMO.

 

[Thomas Shey]

More generally, it may be that very little 3E or 5e play involves engaging the fiction as opposed to playing a miniature skirmish game. But once we get to those episodes of 3E and 5e play that do involve playing the fiction, what role does character build play? And - more importantly given your claim - how does that affect the skill of play in the moment? My experience in playing AD&D is that many (not all, but many) players who are better at building mechanically effective characters (which in AD&D mostly concerns spell load-out) are also better at engaging the fiction when that is necessary, including by "creative" spellcasting. This experience of mine doesn't support the claim that the display of skill in one arena of play makes it unnecessary to, or is at odds with, displaying skill in another arena of play.

To the degree character traits matter to that part of the game, it still mattered quite a bit in 3e, because while a great degree of optimization was aimed at combat capability, there was still plenty of ways to, say, optimize toward social skill usage or other elements. Often the gaps there could be even larger, though there weren't as many synergies.

 

[Numidius]

But I thought you're using an OSR, puzzle-solving approach?

See my post just upthread of yours, contrasting OSR-ish approaches with more dramatic approaches. In the tournaments I was mentioning, the drama was achieved by tight scripting of the lead up in a two-session scenario. Using terminology I wasn't familiar with at the time, I'd say that what they really consist in is some events and narration that establish colour and reveal the stakes (which are dictated by scenario design and prebuilt PCs, not player choice) and then a crunch point with a bit of denouement.

What I've discovered in the intervening couple of decades since those tournament experiences is how to get that sort of drama without relying so much on that tight pre-scripting.

Kind of an hybrid, I'm using. The initial mission, the survival mode are there, but we are also exploring needs/personality of characters, as they arise, and I put forward my view on the backstory and the magical means of the dead archmage.

From your past threads and posts: I use scene framing, when I feel like it, resolution of action declarations that I push beyond Pc tasks, and I make them roll to cast spells, no memorizing, so 20s and 1s on the D20 are pretty big deals and convey a sense of unexpected twist every time.
I use the encounters to show the setting and roleplay npc and moster to the limit, trying to force the players into crucial choices.

The hardest part is make them "solve puzzles", truth be told.
(Yeah, I quoted it)

Edit: The way encounters are structured in Tsojcant, kind of demands scene framing...

 

[clearstream]

To the degree character traits matter to that part of the game, it still mattered quite a bit in 3e, because while a great degree of optimization was aimed at combat capability, there was still plenty of ways to, say, optimize toward social skill usage or other elements. Often the gaps there could be even larger, though there weren't as many synergies.

I found this very true. The term diplomancy was coined from 3rd ed. The way the skill system worked, it was possible to get crazy bonuses that allowed you to simply force the outcome of social encounters that you wanted (were the rules played sincerely).

I DM'd 3rd edition for many years. One of my favourite villains - Solon Summer - abused diplomancy to give my players a horrible time. One of them (my players) is in my current 5e campaign and he still remembers the Solon as one of my better villains. She came up just a few days ago when we were discussing social interaction in 5th.