D&D General The adventure game vs the role-playing game

[pumasleeve]

Do you expect them to talk in first person?

Not unless they want to. In fact, In my game I tend to describe instead of act, as I think it actually leads to the type of immersion I am going for.

Example: If I say "You hit the orc with your arrow, he screams in pain and clutches at his chest, and falls down" you imagine this happening in a way that is believable to to you. If i try to ACT like an orc that just got hit by an arrow, my performance will be campy at best. Of course, for some people campy acting with your buddies is part of the fun of the game (particularly among role-players).

 

[payn]

I think there are balances based on the thematic feel of a particular game. For instance, im going to expect less combat and more investigation and character exploration in a Call of Cthulhu game. In a Dungeon Crawl Classics OSR romp, im going to expect more gonzo dungeon delving and fast action combat. In a 3E/PF style of RPG chargen is going to be a focus along with any role playing.

Any game can combine both the stated styles, but some make it easier than others. Also, some gamers lean heavily in one direction or another, and dont have any interest in a hybrid approach. In the past, I would often put a lot of effort into making mixed matched styles work together. Now, I try and off load that work ahead of time so I can get to the point of the game. Sometimes thats gonzo combat chargen, sometimes thats character to character role play exploration, and other times its both.

 

[HJFudge]

Yeah I find myself wanting both. If I have too much roleplaying with nary a break, I get bored. If all that happens is dungeon crawling and combat, I get bored.

Variety is the spice of life, and novelty is the key part of running a successful game. I do find that some enjoy more of one or the other, but I have never met someone who wants NONE of one or the other. Also, roleplaying and dungeon crawling do not HAVE to be separate experiences. I know most people treat combat as a separate thing but I try to weave roleplaying and dungeon crawling in my combat too. Roleplaying is especially easy to weave into combat, as simply allowing everyone to talk ICly as the battle goes on and interact with the enemies too helps the RP-only crowd from getting too antsy.

Keeping players from getting bored involves changing things up, switching tasks and focus, as well as having whatever you are doing be interactive.

It is not either or for me.

 

[MichaelSomething]

Doing a little bit of everything? You people sound like a bunch of Bards!

 

[el-remmen]

If I had to choose I'd pick "adventure" but I do love some role-play and like to use it to frame scenes/locations and like when players use it to deepen their character's interest and engagement with what is happening in the adventure or emerging from the camaraderie of a party of heroes, not just acting out every tavern encounter.

 

[Maxperson]

I don't think there's really any trade-off here. One really can have a good "adventure game" with plenty of acting and portrayal of the adventurers' personal characteristics. There's no need to choose one or the other.

Yeah, this. I and my players enjoy both at the same time.

 

[Lanefan]

... or squeezing every +1 out of the rules until they scream in pain ...

Best line of the day! Thank you.

To be fair though- the ROLL player vs ROLE player war has been going on for more than 20 years, now.

20 years? Try closer to 50...

And any bias on my part vs the RP'er type has mostly to do with the sour taste left in my mouth by all the flamewars, and the condescending nature of much of the flamage. The talky talky stuff DOES get tedious, when it gets overdone. (Seriously, dude- just let me buy a coil of rope, some spikes, and a 10' pole without having to spend an hour of gametime rping it out in detail...)

Interacting with minor NPCs can be taken to irritating extremes, no doubt there.

My beef is with DMs and-or players who want to cut short the playing-out of interactions between player characters.

 

[DEFCON 1]

The groups I run are much more on the Roleplaying side rather than the Adventure side because I find character comes out of personality, needs, wants, desires, rather than numbers. That's part of the reason why 3E and Pathfinder's "options" are to me the biggest misnomer there is. "Options" I can select to make my numbers bigger are not helping me to "define" my character or "play" my character.

My Pathfinder character I'm currently playing has selected as his last four feats Dodge, Toughness, Iron Will, and Arcane Strike. Thus... my ability to "create the character I wanted" raised my AC by 1, my HP by a half-dozen, my Fortitude save by 2, and my weapon damage by 1. That's it. A bunch of numbers got bumped up. But now that I've written these numbers down on my sheet... I completely forget while I'm playing that my character is supposedly tougher and can dodge, and his weapon is slightly magical. Why? Because all of those bigger numbers could have come from dozens of different sources, so there's literally no difference between me taking the Dodge feat or me just using a larger shield. No matter which way I went, my "character" is in no ways different as a person, just the number is higher.

And since so much of the Adventure part of the game is just adding and subtracting numbers, that "board game" aspect of D&D certainly has a place, but I just don't hang my hat on it. Because I find there to be dozens of better "board games" out there that I could play instead if the Adventure was all I cared about... and it's only the Roleplaying layered on top of the board game that makes D&D what it is.

 

[nevin]

It seems we are at about the same point. I confess I lean to the adventure game side myself. Old school gamers like me (playing since 1st edition) tend to lean this way. Its really just in the last few years that I have seen a mass influx of the roleplayers who groan when

Been playing sinc the 70's most players I know think of the combat part of the game as the crchy topping. Take away the roleplaying and you might as wellplay any other board game

 

[J-H]

As a player I'm about a 70/30 if you split it between these two categories.
Even when running Castle Dracula (Castlevania), which has several areas that are mostly mindless undead, we had good RP and back-and-forth between the party members keeping it from being boring.