The D&D Experience (or, All Roads lead to Rome)

[pemerton]

pemerton is the one of the very few FoREplayers I'm genuinely interested in listening to, largely because of his application of theory to actual play.

Thanks very much, this post really helped me to understand not just what we're discussing here, but also some (pretty cool) nuances of 4e.

Thanks both for these generous responses.

Because I'm an academic philosopher and lawyer by trade, I think it's somewhat natural that I'm heavily invested in theory, and also heavily invested in the real-world impact of rules systems and the texts used to express them. It's reassuring that the posts this produces are at least sometimes interesting to some others!

Reverting back to the edition-wars issue, I don't care that someone doesn't enjoy 4e as much as I do (or at all). But I like at least to try and get clear what exactly 4e is trying to achieve as a game.

It came to me after reading this that we're looking at a "Platonic Form" in a slightly different way.

<snip>

In other words, D&D is both my own personal definition and the sum total definitions of everyone who has ever thought of it.

<snip>

Now it may be that we simply have two different types of thinkers with regards to this issue, those that choose a "big umbrella" approach and those that are more specific and want something more concrete. Speaking for myself, I have a hard time saying that any form of D&D is "not D&D to me" because I just don't think that way. I tend to take a big umbrella approach and feel that "D&D to me" has less to do with the specific edition or version and more the experience that I get, which could theoretically come from just about any rules set. I mean, you could play Savage Worlds with beholders, drow, and fighter/magic-users and it could quite easily feel like D&D.

Merkurius, another generous post. Thanks. I'll plead guilty to not always being a "big umbrella" person. But your comment about Savage Worlds gives me a better handle, I think, on what you mean. With this in mind, I think my old RM games count as "my D&D" under your conception.

That's not entirely easy for me to embrace, because back in the day we Rolemaster players took a degree of pride in not playing D&D (mostly it was an issue with hit point attrition combat). Strangely enough, given that The Forge is mostly seen as an anti-D&D website, since I've become a FoRE (Shaman's term - "Friend of Ron Edwards) I've got a better handle on what various iterations of D&D can do. Posts from Raven Crowking and Philotomy Jurament, in particular, have given me a new appreciation for 1st ed AD&D and earlier editions, while also making it clearer to me why the way I approached those games wasn't getting out of them what they were capable of giving. This hasn't made me go back and play those games again, but it has made me stop criticising them, and instead look around for rulesets that better support what I'm looking for in an FRPG.

Anyway, thanks for starting a thread which (for me at least) has turned out to be really affirming of the ENworld community even if it hasn't turned out exactly how you hoped!

 

[pemerton]

The entire 4e DMG revolves around the presumption of adopting a role. Every bit of advice flows from that basic assumption. Page 42 examples come from the idea that the player is making role play decisions, not based on what is the most tactically advantageous, but on what would make a good story.

My experience with 4e is that most, if not all, decisions are based on whats tactically advantageous.

I think this response to Hussar may have missed Hussar's point.

I think that what Hussar was saying is that page 42 is a way of making decisions that would, in the real world, be tactically suboptimal, nevertheless be mechanically effective and even advantageous. The idea seems to be that players who do wacky things get roughly the benefits of using an encounter power.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

My main problems with the "big umbrella" approach:

1) it does not address the issue certain persons have with other's perceptions that 4Ed doesn't have the right feel: the personal attacks and dismissive language continue. If Defenders of the Fourth can't accept that others experiences with the game may vary from their own, the approach taken here simply fails.

2) if it can encompass games/campaigns that have the "right" feel and yet are in no way to be mistaken for D&D (in the factual sense- see examples of RM or HERO, supra), then it is overbroad. At a certain level, it seems ludicrous to suggest that the "D&D experience" can be had by playing systems totally alien to D&D. Even though I get the right feel from my HERO D&D clones, I daresay most would want to exclude that from inclusion under the "umbrella," if for no other reason than it seemingly stretches the definition of D&D to all-inclusive uselessness. Such as when non-hobbyists use the term.

 

[Hussar]

My main problems with the "big umbrella" approach:

1) it does not address the issue certain persons have with other's perceptions that 4Ed doesn't have the right feel: the personal attacks and dismissive language continue. If Defenders of the Fourth can't accept that others experiences with the game may vary from their own, the approach taken here simply fails.

Not sure if I count as a "Defender of the Fourth" or not, but, I'm not sure why you would be surprised that personal attacks and dismissive language wouldn't breed the same in return.

"It's not D&D" has been the rallying cry of edition warriors for over a decade now. Telling someone that they're not really doing what they say they are doing is going to get a pretty negative reaction.

So, just because you tag on "for me" at the end of "4e isn't really D&D", doesn't really matter. People are still going to have pretty strong reactions to that. And when pressed on the issue, the only response that seems to be forthcoming is "Well, it just doesn't feel like D&D".

Are you really surprised that this might be very frustrating to anyone who might want to honestly engage in dialogue, never mind people who are immediately negative?

2) if it can encompass games/campaigns that have the "right" feel and yet are in no way to be mistaken for D&D (in the factual sense- see examples of RM or HERO, supra), then it is overbroad. At a certain level, it seems ludicrous to suggest that the "D&D experience" can be had by playing systems totally alien to D&D. Even though I get the right feel from my HERO D&D clones, I daresay most would want to exclude that from inclusion under the "umbrella," if for no other reason than it seemingly stretches the definition of D&D to all-inclusive uselessness. Such as when non-hobbyists use the term.

I think though, that your examples are somewhat self-selecting out of the umbrella anyway. Someone who chooses to play, say, Rolemaster over D&D isn't going to claim that they're playing D&D. By and large, as Pemerton says, they're going to vehemently deny that they are playing D&D. Just as you deny that your HERO game is D&D. So, since those people don't self-identify as having the D&D experience, they aren't germane to the discussion.

I would also point out that are games that deliberately emulate D&D (such as building a HERO game to "do" D&D) really "alien" to D&D? The entire point of these games is to capture the "D&D experience" just with different mechanics.

For a system to be really alien, I'd say you'd have to go to something like FATE and then run a fantasy campaign. That would not be D&D. Too different. The focus of play is very different and the mechanical rewards are based on very different presumptions.

 

[Raven Crowking]

"It's not D&D" has been the rallying cry of edition warriors for over a decade now. Telling someone that they're not really doing what they say they are doing is going to get a pretty negative reaction.

So, just because you tag on "for me" at the end of "4e isn't really D&D", doesn't really matter. People are still going to have pretty strong reactions to that. And when pressed on the issue, the only response that seems to be forthcoming is "Well, it just doesn't feel like D&D".

(1) This is, IMHO, pretty strong evidence that the "D&D Experience" doesn't exist in any objective sense. One person's "D&D Experience" may have very little in common with another's.

(2) I don't believe that there has has been a "rallying cry of edition warriors" for the most part -- just people who want to open a dialogue. Sometimes, though, that dialogue is about disappointment, and how a product doesn't meet their expectations. Specifically, it doesn't meet their expectations as to what the "D&D Experience" is.

(3) Believing that the other party is simply "edition warriors" and that their words are simply a "rallying cry" -- rather than meant to impart actual meaning -- is probably closer to the root cause of "edition wars" (and, quite probably, other similar events) than anything else.

(4) "Well, it just doesn't feel like D&D" is very much "It doesn't have what I believe is the D&D Experience".

(5) Getting frustrated over "Well, it just doesn't feel like D&D" therefore seems very much like either (a) denying the other person's "D&D Experience" is valid, and/or (b) demanding that the other person modify his/her definition of the "D&D Experience" to match one's own.

(6) So, this still seems very much like simply being unable to accept that others have differing (and equally valid) points of view.

(7) So long as one is respectful of other viewpoints, and doesn't invest one's ego in what other people's "D&D Experience" must be like, neither "X is D&D to me" or "X is not D&D to me" should carry any emotional weight, positive or negative.


RC


EDIT: I note, also, that there is a lot of similarity between worrying about "Well, it just doesn't feel like D&D" being the only answer forthcoming, and "I just don't like it" being the answer when a GM doesn't wish to include an element in a campaign.

Neither are caused by reason, although one might come up with reasons why one feels as one does.

It is better, IMHO, to simply accept that people feel differently and get on with it (whatever it might be).

 

[Raven Crowking]

Telling someone that they're not really doing what they say they are doing is going to get a pretty negative reaction.

Just wanted to touch on this for a second.

IMHO, when someone says "X isn't Y, to me" that doesn't IMO mean that they are saying you cannot believe X is Y, or that when you say you are doing Y that you are lying or mistaken.

It means, rather, that you define Y (and/or possibly X) in a different way than the other person does.

Either (a) you can choose to work together toward a common definition, or (b) you can choose to respect the other person's differing definition. Or, I suppose, you can demand that they adopt your own. Me, I think that last option is the worst possible option. YMMV.


RC

 

[Sorrowdusk]

WAIT...id D&D is Rome...WHO are Caligula and Nero?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

"It's not D&D" has been the rallying cry of edition warriors for over a decade now. Telling someone that they're not really doing what they say they are doing is going to get a pretty negative reaction.

So, just because you tag on "for me" at the end of "4e isn't really D&D", doesn't really matter. People are still going to have pretty strong reactions to that. And when pressed on the issue, the only response that seems to be forthcoming is "Well, it just doesn't feel like D&D".

Are you really surprised that this might be very frustrating to anyone who might want to honestly engage in dialogue, never mind people who are immediately negative?

Actually, this is mostly news to me. I don't recall any meaningful Edition Wars prior to the launch of 4Ed. One- and only one- guy refused to adopt 3Ed for a few years based on what they did with PC stats (he's a math whiz "They've changed the math of he game!!!"). He does now play 3.5...and 4Ed out of fair play towards other members of the group.

Still, the coda "to me" indicates rather clearly that the statement precedent is entirely from one's own view, not an attack. To me.


(FWIW, I don't consider you an Edition Warrior, Hussar.)

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I think though, that your examples are somewhat self-selecting out of the umbrella anyway. Someone who chooses to play, say, Rolemaster over D&D isn't going to claim that they're playing D&D. By and large, as Pemerton says, they're going to vehemently deny that they are playing D&D. Just as you deny that your HERO game is D&D. So, since those people don't self-identify as having the D&D experience, they aren't germane to the discussion.

Not really. I chose the HERO D&D cloning to make a point: the "big umbrella," as Mercurius has refined over the course of this thread, is defined by "feel," and that's a problem.

That 4Ed doesn't give me that feel and that it does for others is OK by Mercurius', yours AND my way of thinking.

However, since the very definition of the "big umbrella," the "D&D experience" is all about feel, despite the fact that inclusion strikes the two of us (and possibly her) as somehow wrong, there is no reason to exclude those games and campaigns that evoke the same feeling we expect from D&D- the aforementioned RM, HERO, and GURPS games. By the very parameters Mercurius sets, since they evoke the same response, they MUST be placed under the "big umbrella."*





* "Under the Big Umbrella" was, FWIW, the name of a boargame I played as a tot...the one part i can remember is the rule "Bunnies like it under the Big Umbrella. Ducklings like it in the rain.". Good times.

 

[BryonD]

Telling someone that they're not really doing what they say they are doing is going to get a pretty negative reaction.

If they are playing 4E and saying they are playing 1E, they are objectively wrong.

If they are playing 4E and saying it "feels" like 1E to them, then who exactly is saying they are not?

But, what if someone else is playing 4E and they say "I am feeling like I'm doing something that is different than 1E." Is it ok for you to say they are not doing what they say they are doing?