D&D General Supposing D&D is gamist, what does that mean?

[AbdulAlhazred]

I'm against railroading as well. My preference would be some threats presented to the players that if not dealt with would have consequences to the setting, but I wouldn't want all of them that way. If we're talking fantasy, I'd want a mix of "save the village/kingdom/world" with "let's explore that abandoned Dwarven mine to see if there's treasure".

Well, Dungeon World fronts are always organized in an 'active' way. So, a dungeon might exist as an Adventure Front, something that is likely to engage the PCs for a time, but not be an overall theme for a whole campaign. Typically it will have 2-3 dangers (major threats/encounters) and it may also have some lesser things like traps, terrain hazards, etc. that are basically passive. A Danger will also have 1-3 grim portents, which are foreshadowing moves the GM can use to indicate the coming of a danger. If the PCs IGNORE the grim portent, then the danger becomes a 'Doom' at some point, which actually has an impact on the game world.

So, the classic Dungeon World dungeon would have say 2 dangers, one could be the 'Rat Horde', and that could have a couple of portents, like the disappearance of all cats, and the spoiling of food. If nobody deals with the rats in the dungeon, then eventually they boil up and plague the local village! Now maybe that plague isn't the end of the world, certain NPCs perish, the people of the village become unwell, etc.

The thing with narrative focus games is that STUFF HAPPENS, so you won't really have a purely passive dungeon. Its possible you could have a dungeon where if the PCs never mess with it, things don't ever happen, perhaps. The PCs are heroes though, they're going to have to fix stuff, and drama is going to ensue somehow. So its not like the old B2 Caves of Chaos where the monsters just camp forever. The DW Caves of Chaos monsters are gunning for the Keep, if you don't clean out the caves, they'll eventually clean YOU out!

There's too much in 4e that I don't like, so that one is a definite no go. I'm curious what games are "like D&D 4e" however, as perhaps they would more to my tastes.

I don't know what things you dislike, though I might observe that playing 4e as a story game and losing the whole idea that this is how D&D is today, oh no! is probably a good idea. Anyway, 13th Age certainly has quite a few 4e-isms in it. Strike! is another game that is similar to 4e. SWSE, the WotC Star Wars from back a few years is widely considered to have been a strong precursor of 4e design as well. There are probably other games, though honestly I haven't found anything that REALLY matches 4e in terms of a combination of all its key traits.

OK, how is it determined the sword wouldn't work on the dragon? Is that predetermined by the GM, or just a judgment on the spot?

Yeah, these things are derived from the fiction, and since the GM has the job of deciding which 'move' the actions described by a player for his character constitute, the GM will have to decide this stuff. DW just states that the table should deal with any disagreements. So I guess if the players really have a different view of it, they can obviously argue that the GM is wrong. In the end someone will have to decide to accept someone else's interpretation.

I wouldn't want a consequence for every action/decision the players make. That's good sometimes, but a trip to granny's house shouldn't always lead to a wolf having eaten/replaced her. I know some argue "if it doesn't lead to drama/action, then what's the point", but I like a mix.

A mix of what? I mean, I'm going out of my way to play an RPG. I want stuff to happen. OK, maybe the trip to Granny's house doesn't end with the wolf, maybe it only ends with some hard choices made by the PCs and the knowledge that there's a wolf SOMEWHERE ABOUT. The game is afoot now!

I've not played any supers RPG either, so maybe that's another option. Thanks.

Yeah, @Ovinomancer also mentioned Ironsworn. Its available for free and is an interesting game with a solo play mode. It is somewhat similar to DW, but definitely reworked the whole idea of threats and whatnot.

 

[RhaezDaevan]

Oh, yes, I got that part, I called it out. I also pointed out that you leapt to a bad assumption, made an erroneous conclusion, and then labeled the whole thing as unserious and only fit for zany cartoon games. Oh, and that this is contrary to your earlier claim, you didn't ask questions. It's this exact reason I declined your invitation to explain anything more -- you seem more keen on finding assumptions to dismiss than actually learning about the concepts of play.

I have been asking questions, though they've mostly been to AbdulAlhazred. So far I've appreciated their efforts to explains things to me.

If you don't care, and just want to dismiss the play, then do that and stop wasting people's time. If you actually are interested, show more curiosity and less jump to conclusion.

I'm not dismissing anyone's play. Just because I don't like some of what I'm hearing doesn't mean the whole group of games is written off, just perhaps certain games within that group.

Ironsworn is not a large or complex ruleset. You could have made it through the overview and first pass (the presentation is in layers) in just the time you've spent posting today. It's not much at all.

Feels like you're trying to shame me for being a slow reader. 270 pages as a novel would go by quickly, but rule sets take more time to "sink in".
Reading and responding here is much easier and quicker than the hours it would take for me to fully comprehend a 270 page RPG rule book.
I'll note that it took a while to get through the D&D rule books I've read too.

 

[Arilyn]

Beyond the Wall might be worth checking out. Its' rule set is based off Basic D&D but it has playbooks and has some attitudes found in Story Now. It's definitely low prep. Might be a good bridge. Especially good system if you are a fan of Earthsea or Lloyd Alexander's books.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

You like it that way, enjoy. Retcons would irk me even if it smoothed play.

But it isn't really a 'retcon', nothing was established and decided on and acted on and then retracted and redecided and 'edited'. Instead the whole point of this sort of mechanic is SIMULATION. How do you simulate the sort of planning where the heist guys anticipate every little thing they need because they are masters of their craft? I'm not a heist guy, I don't know what is needed to rob the magic shop or whatever. My character does though! She's Anita, specialist magic shop burglar! This is a great way to simulate that.

 

[Thomas Shey]

But it isn't really a 'retcon', nothing was established and decided on and acted on and then retracted and redecided and 'edited'. Instead the whole point of this sort of mechanic is SIMULATION. How do you simulate the sort of planning where the heist guys anticipate every little thing they need because they are masters of their craft? I'm not a heist guy, I don't know what is needed to rob the magic shop or whatever. My character does though! She's Anita, specialist magic shop burglar! This is a great way to simulate that.

Its another case where I've mentioned that in the end, a lot of people aren't really happier with intellectual mechanics than they are with social ones.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

Oh, my mistake. When someone mentioned there was no combat system I made the wrong assumption that things like hitpoints would also not be there. Thanks for the clarification.

Yeah, I mean, COMBAT is a big thing in Dungeon World, it just (in all PbtA games I would assume) isn't a SPECIAL RULE. The whole game simply progresses by the GM describing a scene, including something that the PCs need to deal with. The players describe what the PCs do, the GM determines which moves those constitute, dice are rolled, the GM describes any consequences, the players generally describe what they achieved. In some cases some additional mechanics may be engaged, like damage may happen or something like that.

So, a fight is likely to simply consist of the GM describing some bad guys attacking the party, a player says they X, there's some adjudication and dice are rolled, the situation evolves, another player does something, etc. Its more informal than D&D combat where this special set of rules takes over.

 

[Ovinomancer]

I have been asking questions, though they've mostly been to AbdulAlhazred. So far I've appreciated their efforts to explains things to me.

I'm not dismissing anyone's play. Just because I don't like some of what I'm hearing doesn't mean the whole group of games is written off, just perhaps certain games within that group.

Feels like you're trying to shame me for being a slow reader. 270 pages as a novel would go by quickly, but rule sets take more time to "sink in".
Reading and responding here is much easier and quicker than the hours it would take for me to fully comprehend a 270 page RPG rule book.
I'll note that it took a while to get through the D&D rule books I've read too.

Oh, that's a great point! You can't understand a game without reading the whole thing -- just a chapter isn't enough. I suppose, now that you have had this revelation, you'll stop asking people to explain play to you piecemeal and accept you don't get it at all until you've had time for serious reading?

Or was that just a specious argument thrown out because you have no intention of looking at it and just want someone to say some magical set of words that you can put together to dismiss the whole thing. Like how you have a very bad take on the BitD loadout system but yet feel confident in dismissing it as an unserious game only suited for zany cartoon antics? Which, by the way, is extremely dismissive of anyone that feels BitD actually delivers on it's promise of grim and gritty life of a criminal. So, yeah, protip, if you don't want to look like you're dismissing people's play, don't use terms to describe it like not "serious" or "cartoon" or "zany" or "unpleasant." No amount of appealing to the Dude makes this less dismissive.

 

[RhaezDaevan]

Well, Dungeon World fronts are always organized in an 'active' way. So, a dungeon might exist as an Adventure Front, something that is likely to engage the PCs for a time, but not be an overall theme for a whole campaign. Typically it will have 2-3 dangers (major threats/encounters) and it may also have some lesser things like traps, terrain hazards, etc. that are basically passive. A Danger will also have 1-3 grim portents, which are foreshadowing moves the GM can use to indicate the coming of a danger. If the PCs IGNORE the grim portent, then the danger becomes a 'Doom' at some point, which actually has an impact on the game world.

So, the classic Dungeon World dungeon would have say 2 dangers, one could be the 'Rat Horde', and that could have a couple of portents, like the disappearance of all cats, and the spoiling of food. If nobody deals with the rats in the dungeon, then eventually they boil up and plague the local village! Now maybe that plague isn't the end of the world, certain NPCs perish, the people of the village become unwell, etc.

Ah, OK. Definitely a different way to do things.
You say 2 to 3 dangers and 1 to 3 grim portents. Does the GM decide the number themselves or is it a roll?

The thing with narrative focus games is that STUFF HAPPENS, so you won't really have a purely passive dungeon. Its possible you could have a dungeon where if the PCs never mess with it, things don't ever happen, perhaps. The PCs are heroes though, they're going to have to fix stuff, and drama is going to ensue somehow. So its not like the old B2 Caves of Chaos where the monsters just camp forever. The DW Caves of Chaos monsters are gunning for the Keep, if you don't clean out the caves, they'll eventually clean YOU out!

So each dungeon is less a place to visit and more a house on fire? Do something, or else?

I've personally never experienced modules for any version of D&D, so I don't get the reference to Caves of Chaos. I'll take your word for it that they're very different.

I don't know what things you dislike, though I might observe that playing 4e as a story game and losing the whole idea that this is how D&D is today, oh no! is probably a good idea. Anyway, 13th Age certainly has quite a few 4e-isms in it. Strike! is another game that is similar to 4e. SWSE, the WotC Star Wars from back a few years is widely considered to have been a strong precursor of 4e design as well. There are probably other games, though honestly I haven't found anything that REALLY matches 4e in terms of a combination of all its key traits.

Oh boy. Since you've asked nicely:

• I don't like skill challenges, or at least I've never experienced a good one. Felt like a mini-games and took me out of the fiction.
• I don't like the powers. Every class getting the same amount didn't sit well with me and having to switch them out every few levels was even worse. They should have been a smaller pool of powers that scaled with level and different classes should have gotten different amounts of them. For example Fighters being focused on at wills, while wizards would get a bunch of dailies and maybe they'd bother get some encounter powers (an idea off the top of my head).
• I don't like the idea of players meta-shopping and giving the DM a wish list for treasure that will show up in later dungeons.
• I don't like that Epic tier is a core part of the game. It should have been opt-in as a separate book or line of books.
• Though I don't like how frail characters start as in other versions, the amount of HP everyone starts with was a tad too much. Should have had an option to start a bit weaker to begin with.
• I don't like how the inclusion of long lists of powers and the epic levels meant there wasn't enough room for all the expected core classes and races to be in the first rule books, requiring more investment in later volumes just to have what most earlier versions had. Basically the Player's handbook 1 and 2 races and classes in one volume would have been better.

For those who love all the above, I'm not trying to yuck your yum. There was too much to house rule so I had to leave it all behind. For reference I had issues with every version of D&D I've played or ran but the others are much easier to house rule.

I've not looked at 13th age all that deeply, but maybe it would be more for me than 4e. I don't like the idea of those preset characters, Elf Queen, Dwarf King or whatever they're called, but that's easier to house rule away and replace with home-made ones.

I have played SWSE and thought it was OK. From what I've heard better star wars RPGs have come out since that better capture the feel of the franchise.

Yeah, these things are derived from the fiction, and since the GM has the job of deciding which 'move' the actions described by a player for his character constitute, the GM will have to decide this stuff. DW just states that the table should deal with any disagreements. So I guess if the players really have a different view of it, they can obviously argue that the GM is wrong. In the end someone will have to decide to accept someone else's interpretation.

OK, so it's expected that each threat is able to be dealt with in some way? Or is there some of the classic "you meet the dragon and have to run away until you're stronger, but you'll be back..."?

A mix of what? I mean, I'm going out of my way to play an RPG. I want stuff to happen. OK, maybe the trip to Granny's house doesn't end with the wolf, maybe it only ends with some hard choices made by the PCs and the knowledge that there's a wolf SOMEWHERE ABOUT. The game is afoot now!

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I'd be OK with what you're describing part of the time, and then mix in some quests/missions that don't affect the world. Sometimes you go places just to get loot, only your own lives are at stake.

I think in another part of the thread there was talk of high stakes Story Now versus low stakes Story Now? Maybe some hybrid between those two would be more my style. Anybody know which are which? BitD definitely sounds like the high stakes kind, DW sounding close to it as well. Not sure what's an example of the low stakes Story Now.

Yeah, @Ovinomancer also mentioned Ironsworn. Its available for free and is an interesting game with a solo play mode. It is somewhat similar to DW, but definitely reworked the whole idea of threats and whatnot.

I do plan to read it when I have time. Looks a bit like gritty low-magic fantasy, is that the intended genre?

 

[RhaezDaevan]

Yeah, I mean, COMBAT is a big thing in Dungeon World, it just (in all PbtA games I would assume) isn't a SPECIAL RULE. The whole game simply progresses by the GM describing a scene, including something that the PCs need to deal with. The players describe what the PCs do, the GM determines which moves those constitute, dice are rolled, the GM describes any consequences, the players generally describe what they achieved. In some cases some additional mechanics may be engaged, like damage may happen or something like that.

So, a fight is likely to simply consist of the GM describing some bad guys attacking the party, a player says they X, there's some adjudication and dice are rolled, the situation evolves, another player does something, etc. Its more informal than D&D combat where this special set of rules takes over.

Ah, so it's all the same gameplay. No separation of combat from the rest. That would take some getting used to, but I guess that works.

 

[RhaezDaevan]

Beyond the Wall might be worth checking out. Its' rule set is based off Basic D&D but it has playbooks and has some attitudes found in Story Now. It's definitely low prep. Might be a good bridge. Especially good system if you are a fan of Earthsea or Lloyd Alexander's books.

Thank you for the recommendation. I might give it a look. I love Earthsea.