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

[Umbran]

And I also don't really follow what it would mean to assess dramatic mode from the perspective of Gygaxian mode, or vice versa? As far as I understand, the modes are approaches to playing RPGs - so I'm not really sure what it means to treat them as frameworks of assessment.

I am in a similar boat. I don't know what is meant by "assess" here.

So, let's look at Tomb of Horrors, played with D&D as the ruleset, but by two groups - one in Gygaxian mode, and one in dramatic mode. We must accept that D&D doesn't have a lot of tools for the players to work dramatic play, but the players are trying it anyway.

Step 1 - Why are we even going into this death-trap?
Gygaxian mode: Well, there's treasure and traps, and something powerful at the end to kill. Let's go!
Dramatic mode: No, really, why are we going in there? (Note: The original module actually doesn't give an reason to enter the tomb.) GM, you going to give us something? Is a rival also trying to enter the tomb to get a powerful item with which they'll threaten someone we care about? Has Acererak become some sort of threat? What is the narrative frame for going here?

Step 2 - Engaging with the elements of the Tomb
Gygaxian mode: lots of puzzle solving ensues.
Dramatic mode... in the first 15 areas of the original Tomb, there is one, and only one, creature that might talk - A gargoyle. It has low intelligence, doesn't speak common, and by gargoyle stats is 90% likely to just attack the party. The gargoyle has no stated desires or motivations. There's no new information about Acererak, or any other motivator revealed. So, other than basic physical danger, there's no source of dramatic tension or plot in there. The Players are working with whatever they brought in with them....

Folks here have seen the Brendan Frasier/Rachel Weis The Mummy, from 1999? Maybe that's what Tomb of Horrors looks like - the characters work through inter-personal relationships with the stresses of danger as a sort of driving inspiration. Gygaxian players may wonder why there's, oh, a budding romance developing while figuring out if someone's getting disintegrated by a Sphere of Annihilation, but hey....

 

[clearstream]

I am in a similar boat. I don't know what is meant by "assess" here.

So, let's look at Tomb of Horrors, played with D&D as the ruleset, but by two groups - one in Gygaxian mode, and one in dramatic mode. We must accept that D&D doesn't have a lot of tools for the players to work dramatic play, but the players are trying it anyway.

Step 1 - Why are we even going into this death-trap?
Gygaxian mode: Well, there's treasure and traps, and something powerful at the end to kill. Let's go!
Dramatic mode: No, really, why are we going in there? (Note: The original module actually doesn't give an reason to enter the tomb.) GM, you going to give us something? Is a rival also trying to enter the tomb to get a powerful item with which they'll threaten someone we care about? Has Acererak become some sort of threat? What is the narrative frame for going here?

Step 2 - Engaging with the elements of the Tomb
Gygaxian mode: lots of puzzle solving ensues.
Dramatic mode... in the first 15 areas of the original Tomb, there is one, and only one, creature that might talk - A gargoyle. It has low intelligence, doesn't speak common, and by gargoyle stats is 90% likely to just attack the party. The gargoyle has no stated desires or motivations. There's no new information about Acererak, or any other motivator revealed. So, other than basic physical danger, there's no source of dramatic tension or plot in there. The Players are working with whatever they brought in with them....

Folks here have seen the Brendan Frasier/Rachel Weis The Mummy, from 1999? Maybe that's what Tomb of Horrors looks like - the characters work through inter-personal relationships with the stresses of danger as a sort of driving inspiration. Gygaxian players may wonder why there's, oh, a budding romance developing while figuring out if someone's getting disintegrated by a Sphere of Annihilation, but hey....

That was my intuition, and let's not get hung up on one ill-chosen word. I retract it, and need to think of a different word to capture my meaning. Recollect that one poster suggested that in dramatic-mode it would make no sense for PCs to be moving forward with 10' poles as they might in Gygaxian-mode. It feels like "bonkers" to do Gygaxian things in dramatic-mode. That is all I meant: that the concepts clash. The one doesn't make sense in the other.

My intuitions are otherwise the same as yours. Maybe I can run a circus House of Horrors type affair in dramatic-mode, with Acererak as the usher. That might make malformed props like the gargoyle workable. Maybe your Mummy idea could work. People are inventive, so I imagine someone can think of a way to use the ToH map+key with HeroQuest. What wouldn't work is to use HeroQuest in dramatic-mode to try to emulate a Gygaxian ToH. That makes no sense.

 

[Umbran]

Recollect that one poster suggested that in dramatic-mode it would make no sense for PCs to be moving forward with 10' poles as they might in Gygaxian-mode. It feels like "bonkers" to do Gygaxian things in dramatic-mode. That is all I meant: that the concepts clash. The one doesn't make sense in the other.

I would say that many Gygaxian player behaviors do not serve the goals of dramatic play, except insofar as they keep characters alive in Gygaxian-designed adventures, and as the pirates tell us, dead men tell no tales. Poking around with 10' poles is mostly narrative dead weight.

When you have enough activity that doesn't serve the stated goals, that activity gets in the way of achieving the goals. That goes either way, of course - a lot of dramatic play in the middle of a Gygaxian adventure is probably going to end with dead PCs, or PCs not actually advancing toward the BBEG at the end.

What wouldn't work is to use HeroQuest in dramatic-mode to try to emulate a Gygaxian ToH. That makes no sense.

There is a strong element of "choose the right tool for the job" to this, yes.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Well, the concepts of Story Now and Story Before definitely do originate from the Forge.

The terminology surely does, the distinction and meaning behind it are simply inherent within the core definitions of RPGs. We don't need 'forge speak' to tell us that some GMs make up all the story stuff ahead of time (as much as they can at least) and others don't. Nor that these are system-significant factors which become part of the process and process design of RPGs.

 

[Charlaquin]

The terminology surely does, the distinction and meaning behind it are simply inherent within the core definitions of RPGs. We don't need 'forge speak' to tell us that some GMs make up all the story stuff ahead of time (as much as they can at least) and others don't. Nor that these are system-significant factors which become part of the process and process design of RPGs.

We certainly don’t, and doing so incorrectly presents those approaches as dichotomous.

 

[Campbell]

We certainly don’t, and doing so incorrectly presents those approaches as dichotomous.

They are certainly are in any given moment of play. You cannot both be playing to find out what happens and what the GM's story is.

 

[Charlaquin]

They are certainly are in any given moment of play. You cannot both be playing to find out what happens and what the GM's story is.

In any given moment of play, sure. But an adventure can still contain both.

 

[Fenris-77]

They are certainly are in any given moment of play. You cannot both be playing to find out what happens and what the GM's story is.

Hmm, I think it's more of a spectrum than a binary.

 

[Campbell]

Hmm, I think it's more of a spectrum than a binary.

My personal thoughts on this are that if the GM has the capacity to override results or push play in a given direction for story reasons them making the active choice not is itself a choice that pushes play in a direction of their choosing. If I only have the ability to impact the fiction when the GM decides not to override play in that way then there is no real ability to do so. It's smoke and mirrors.

 

[Fenris-77]

My personal thoughts on this are that if the GM has the capacity to override results or push play in a given direction for story reasons them making the active choice not is itself a choice that pushes play in a direction of their choosing. If I only have the ability to impact the fiction when the GM decides not to override play in that way then there is no real ability to do so. It's smoke and mirrors.

The reason I went with spectrum there is that even in PbtA play my level of 'prep' which may or may not equal 'story' at some point, kind of varies by group, genre and format. So even when I'm playing to find out, there's a real range of what I deem necessary, as GM, to have at least available prior to play. I don't preference that prep at all, but sometimes, and in some genres, I need a lot more on-hand prep to run the game well. Obviously that's in terms of PbtA, not, say, high-prep D&D.