D&D General The Quantum Ogre Dilemma

[AlViking]

I (almost*) never use quantum ogres, if the players make a choice I will always try to make it a meaningful choice. There are, of course many times when things go as I had envisioned they would but its up to the players. If they go in an unexpected direction I'll improvise. I typically outline out an extra encounter or three with appropriate enemies but that's just a list of creatures with numbers to gave a medium or difficult encounter. Its one of the reasons I dislike online play, it's much more work to set up an encounter setting online.

They may still end up encountering the same enemies using the same stat blocks but presentation, attitude and options make a difference. For example a while back the characters had stopped in a city and the plan was to move on first thing. However, one of the players made some choices that long story short got them involved with the local thieves guild and suddenly the entire session revolved around events in the city. So the encounter with the gnolls the group I was planning on went out the window - so I used the stats for the gnolls for the local thugs and came up with a reason for them to behave like gnolls.

But I run a very open game, I don't have plots in mind I have NPCs and organizations and give them goals and desires that put them into a position to help or hinder the characters. Then we just see what happens. So yes the military commander will taunt the characters in the hope that they will attack so there is an excuse to have them arrested, but whether they attack is up to them. Their decision changes all sorts of downstream things. Meanwhile I fully expected them to enter the ancient temple to stop yet another ritual granting power to an ancient power. If they hadn't I would have figured out how much of a difference it made. But if they had chosen not to enter the ancient temple or had a way of stopping the ritual without a fight it simply wouldn't have happened.

*Because there's an exception to every rule.

 

[Reynard]

I think there’s also a meaningful difference between repurposing an encounter you prepared but didn’t end up happening where you originally planned for it to so that work doesn’t go to waste, vs. shuffling things around behind the curtain to force an encounter to happen no matter where the players go or what they do.

This is an important distinction and I agree with your point here. Re-using work you did is not the same thing as forcing an encounter in the moment regardless of what the PCs do.

In my opinion, the most important aspect of RPGs, the thing that separates them from every other form of game, is player agency. And that agency is Always On. If the PCs come to a fork in the road, they choose right or left. If there is "no discerning information" for that choice, the players are no using their agency to discover the distinctions. The game really does belong mostly to the players, not the GM, and it is up to the GM to be able to communicate the world to the players when they investigate it enough to make meaningful choices. But to be clear, flipping a coin at the fork in the road IS an expression of player agency, too.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I don’t view the stereotypical quantum ogre as railroading. I think it’s more coherent and precise to note that quantum ogres aren’t a simulationist technique, which is a different thing that also bothers many people.

IMO. The DMs #1 job is to frame scenes. One cannot frame a scene without introducing new information and new situations to the players. Players have little to no agency in what is framed. They can put some limited constraints, ogres probably shouldn’t be introduced in the castle walls without a lot more explanation. So players can avoid ogres by intentionally going to the castle.

IMO. The real ‘magic’ of rpging happens in how the dm responds to the players interactions to that which they framed.

Absent some serious context, going left or right, north or south just isn’t the kind of decision that’s going to limit the location of a generic ogre or even a named ogre.

Well, this really goes to the more fundamental question of what is the GM here to do. For you, they are here to "frame scenes" (a term I see bandied about on many a gaming thread but rarely if ever in a game book). For me, they are here to present a consistent, verisimilitudinous world with fantastic (based on setting) elements. It would be against my philosophy to use a quantum ogre, or more generally to intentionally put any encounter in front of the PC's path during active play regardless of their actions. For me it's either prepped ahead of time, or rolled for randomly when an encounter is called for. In either case, that ogre is there or not there irrespective of my desire for the players to face it specifically. It's because its presence or lack of same makes sense in the setting.

 

[Desdichado]

I think the "dilemma of the quantum ogre" makes more sense if a few points are considered.

• In spite of what sandbox cultists say, the Platonic ideal of a sandbox isn't a very good model for an RPG, and very few players really want to play that kind of game.
• Anything that isn't a Platonic ideal of a sandbox isn't a railroad. That's a particularly ridiculous false binary.
• Yes, railroads are bad. Running into an encounter isn't a railroad, unless the PCs knew about the specific encounter and were actively trying to avoid it, and the GM said that they couldn't by fiat. And even then; if the monsters knew the PCs were in the area and were actively seeking them out, that's not necessarily a railroad moment either.

Once those points are kept in mind, then much of the drama about the question of the quantum ogre dies down. It's an interesting idea to discuss, but it's fraught with value judgements that make it very difficult to do so.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I think there’s also a meaningful difference between repurposing an encounter you prepared but didn’t end up happening where you originally planned for it to so that work doesn’t go to waste, vs. shuffling things around behind the curtain to force an encounter to happen no matter where the players go or what they do.

Sure, but that doesn't mean you are putting that work in the player's path regardless of there actions. For me, it's still there (or potentially there in the case of a random encounter) regardless of the presence. If they go somewhere else, they don't meet the ogre.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I am at this point pretty explicit with the players at the tables I run that, as far as I'm concerned, PCs are all, always, weirdness magnets.

Being explicit seems to make that not even low-level illusionism, but it's not something I'm inclined to argue over.

If I knew I lived in such a world, I think it would bother me and I would try to find out why.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I (almost*) never use quantum ogres, if the players make a choice I will always try to make it a meaningful choice. There are, of course many times when things go as I had envisioned they would but its up to the players. If they go in an unexpected direction I'll improvise. I typically outline out an extra encounter or three with appropriate enemies but that's just a list of creatures with numbers to gave a medium or difficult encounter. Its one of the reasons I dislike online play, it's much more work to set up an encounter setting online.

They may still end up encountering the same enemies using the same stat blocks but presentation, attitude and options make a difference. For example a while back the characters had stopped in a city and the plan was to move on first thing. However, one of the players made some choices that long story short got them involved with the local thieves guild and suddenly the entire session revolved around events in the city. So the encounter with the gnolls the group I was planning on went out the window - so I used the stats for the gnolls for the local thugs and came up with a reason for them to behave like gnolls.

But I run a very open game, I don't have plots in mind I have NPCs and organizations and give them goals and desires that put them into a position to help or hinder the characters. Then we just see what happens. So yes the military commander will taunt the characters in the hope that they will attack so there is an excuse to have them arrested, but whether they attack is up to them. Their decision changes all sorts of downstream things. Meanwhile I fully expected them to enter the ancient temple to stop yet another ritual granting power to an ancient power. If they hadn't I would have figured out how much of a difference it made. But if they had chosen not to enter the ancient temple or had a way of stopping the ritual without a fight it simply wouldn't have happened.

*Because there's an exception to every rule.

Would the ritual have happened if the PCs don't stop it, and decide to do something else instead? I doubt every GM would have the same answer.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Well, this really goes to the more fundamental question of what is the GM here to do. For you, they are here to "frame scenes" (a term I see bandied about on many a gaming thread but rarely if ever in a game book). For me, they are here to present a consistent, verisimilitudinous world with fantastic (based on setting) elements. It would be against my philosophy to use a quantum ogre, or more generally to intentionally put any encounter in front of the PC's path during active play regardless of their actions. For me it's either prepped ahead of time, or rolled for randomly when an encounter is called for. In either case, that ogre is there or not there irrespective of my desire for the players to face it specifically. It's because its presence or lack of same makes sense in the setting.

I have hard time believing that a game where everything is prepped or even randomised will be functional. Like a lot of things can be, but I can't imagine that everything could, nor I think it is practical. Like do you have a random chart for "interesting thing that could happen when people go to the market" or do you predetermine that wandering minstrel will be performing on the market a song that includes a plot hook on Thursday 2 P.M. and if the PCs go there at any other time they miss it? Or perhaps the minstrel just happens to be there singing the song whenever the players go there?

 

[Sorcerers Apprentice]

Player: You’re giving me a quantum ogre!

GM: A what?

Player: A quantum ogre. It’s an encounter you had planned ahead of time, and intend to carry out no matter which way I went, thus robbing my character of agency.

I'm open to feedback and discussion about my DMing style, but regardless of whether this ogre is quantum or not, any player who wants to argue about metagame topics in the middle of an encounter is very likely to get upgraded to an encounter with a Quantum Beholder.

 

[prabe]

If I knew I lived in such a world, I think it would bother me and I would try to find out why.

But we don't (that I know of, anyway). We're just playing a game that makes stories set in such a world. It doesn't break my suspension of disbelief in a novel when (genre appropriate) weird stuff happens to the protagonist, that's just kinda how (some) stories work.