Tomb of Horrors - example of many, or one of a kind?

[pemerton]

One of the most important differences being that the protagonists aren't under the control of the author. In the literature that inspires D&D, the author favors the protagonist and insures that whatever happens and no matter how unlikely this outcome is the protagonist wins. Obviously, this doesn't make for a very good game, and Gygax disparages game authors who take that stance.

This seems to identify the GM as analogous to the author (if I've read it correctly).

I tend to prefer an approach to RPGing that views the players as authors also.

In the first Conan story, when we first meet Conan, he is engaged in updating a map!

But not a map of the dungeon. And not in the field. He's sitting in his study talking to his counsellor. Also, it is obviously an authorial device to introduce the world. The equivalent in an RPG might be a brief introductory vignette for the players.

The actors of the story are generally competent and when being proactive, assumed to have "reasonable gear" such that the only time the gear needs to be mentioned in when it is lacking for the task on hand.

An RPG could incorporate this, of course. And some do.

My strongest literary sources are Tolkien, Lovecraft, and the brothers Grimm.

<snip>

Since my inspiration comes from Tolkien and Lovecraft, the goal of the investigation is usually to save the world or at least your peice of it, and very often what you are saving it from is someone who has learned or desires secrets that mortals were not meant to know.

My last campaign resembled this. It makes for a good fantasy RPG (in my view, and presumably yours!).

 

[Ariosto]

Why are the obstacles in the classic modules chosen so that the stories that result after play typically bear so little resemblance to the stories that were supposedly the inspiration for the game in the first place?

My proposed answer is that the game authors were more familiar with the fiddly bits of battle simulation rules, and less facile with the rules of fictional dramaic structure, content, tension and pacing.

1) I simply do not agree with your assessment. "So little resemblance" is definitely not what comes to my mind. If there is a game that would better put me in the shoes of an adventurer in a fantastic universe -- not in one particular fictional setting, mind you -- then I have yet to find it. (I do very much like Chaosium's games, but see no such great difference as you seem to imply.)

2) Dramatic structure is for a dramatic production. I know of no evidence that the RPG pioneers wanted to make such a thing, but I have encountered testimony from them suggesting that they did not. Many went on to work in the field of computer games, in which dramatic structure was one way of making a silk purse from the sow's ear of limited capabilities. Ken St Andre not only did that (contributing to Wasteland) but continued to make his living as a librarian. Gary Gygax and others wrote novels.

When people at TSR, GDW, Chaosium and Games Workshop wanted to "tell a story" in a scenario, they were quite capable of addressing the matter explicitly. Tracy Hickman's efforts are of course very well known in D&D circles.

The claim that they lacked acquaintance with story-telling devices rings false.

3) It is perhaps not just coincidence that "talk and slash" scenarios with heavy plot lines coming to the fore seems for many to mark the end of the period of "classic modules". The old quality of game-play, the great appeal of D&D to its early market, seems to decline when the "storytellers" start to crank out product.

In sum, I think you are really reaching when there is a straightforward answer readily to hand: The designers were making fun games for the fun of games, not trying to make emulations of books.

 

[Celebrim]

This seems to identify the GM as analogous to the author (if I've read it correctly).

I tend to prefer an approach to RPGing that views the players as authors also.

I won't quibble with that. It's not very important to the topic and theory is less important than preparation and play. However, to the extent that authorship is distributed around several contributers, it's another reason to think that story games will be a different than other sorts of stories.

 

[Ariosto]

How come Displacer Beasts are running around in a pseudo-medieval world instead of space ships? It's the same reason that all sorts of other things are thrown together.

It's a common spirit found on Heinlein's Glory Road and in Farmer's World of Tiers that inspired D&D, not slavish adherence to the particulars of any story.

The notion that a special selection of the works of, say, Robert E. Howard and J.R.R. Tolkien should somehow define the limits of D&D just has nothing to do with the historical attitudes of the game's creators.

The only answer necessary is, "It's more fun for us this way!"

 

[Stormonu]

There has certainly been a shift in modulecraft over the years. Remembering back through old modules, the early years of D&D certainly concentrated on "here's a location - how do YOU best it". The adventure was about the location, and any story that arose was incidental. Characters were simply avatars for the players to interact through to deal with the location. This was the age of "your character knows what YOU know".

By the time of Ravenloft (though it still had a strong "Location is King" element) and the Dragonlance series, that had clearly changed. Story was becoming more and more important and it was becoming more and more popular to tell a story that involved these fictional characters. Beating a location became less and less important as the fictional characters themselves became more important (think of the likes of Raistlin and & Co., the perennial villian Strahd, as well as the rise of Drizzt). As 1E grew to 2E, the game was slowly drawing a line between what the character and the player knew, and the game was shifting more towards the fictional story being more important than the location where the adventure was occuring - a shift away from "Dungeon Crawls".

I think that the likes of White Wolf games stole a lot of former D&D players (as well as many who would never touch D&D) because they hit on what D&D did poorly at the time - characterization. WW was based more on storytelling aspects and D&D was lagging behind. It was only when we started seeing the likes of Planescape (with Dark Sun being perhaps a preview of the drift away from "Location is King") that D&D itself started diving into immersion, and even then it was hampered by the rules/mechanics it was based off. It was still a game of "kill things and take their stuff" even as the designers tried to deny it.

3E drew a firm line between character knowledge and player knowledge, while at the same time shifting back toward "Location is King". However, it allowed for nearly equal play either way - you could do games where Story was more important, and the play of the game could be resolved like a story or novel, or you could go old sckool with the 10' pole and checking for traps every 10 feet and brave the likes of the Tomb.

My brief brush with 4E gives me the blush that while it too can handle play in either direction, it cares less about Story than the action/location at hand. There is a heavy stress on the fictional character, but it less on exploring who the character is and more on what he/she can do. IMO, characters are very much a tool to interact with the environment, and not so much a fictional individual to explore what it means to be in the fictional world.

In the end, RPGs have moved far, far away from the outlook way back in the days the Tomb came out. Tomb was asking a question - "Are you, the PLAYER, smart enough to get through this alive?".

Most modules these day ask an entirely different question - "Do you want to hear a story?"

 

[Ariosto]

3E drew a firm line between character knowledge and player knowledge, while at the same time shifting back toward "Location is King". However, it allowed for nearly equal play either way - you could do games where Story was more important, and the play of the game could be resolved like a story or novel, or you could go old sckool with the 10' pole and checking for traps every 10 feet and brave the likes of the Tomb.

Just how does 3e especially make it that "the play of the game could be resolved like a story or novel", as opposed to 1st ed. AD&D or Vampire: the Masquerade?

How is the subject matter of a raid on the Tomb -- for that is not only what Umbran pointed to but what you are identifying here -- opposed to "a story"? Obviously, most stories are about other things, but the same holds for almost every subject apart from romance and religion!

I certainly don't see the relation of an hour or two of "push the target a number of squares equal to 1 + your intelligence modifier" as more like literature than the sweeping action of old-D&D pacing. I can dig that many people love that aspect of 3e and 4e, but it does not look to me like a "dramatic structure" improvement of the sort that Umbran hails.

It might better resemble Tom Clancy's prose style, or some pornography, but that hardly speaks to popular fiction as a whole.

 

[Ulrick]

*snip*

In the end, RPGs have moved far, far away from the outlook way back in the days the Tomb came out. Tomb was asking a question - "Are you, the PLAYER, smart enough to get through this alive?".

Most modules these day ask an entirely different question - "Do you want to hear a story?"

Followed by:
"How can my character interact best with the story?"
"What is my character's inner motivation, besides treasure, to enter the Tomb of Horrors?"
"Is my character a descendant of Acererak? If so, are all those messages in the Tomb really for ME?"
"Maybe I can reach out to Acererak and redeem him from his evil ways..."
"How does Acererak make me feel?"




Or worse: "Obviously the DM wouldn't throw challenges several levels above our average party level, but why is half the group dead after only 3 rooms?"

 

[Celebrim]

3E drew a firm line between character knowledge and player knowledge, while at the same time shifting back toward "Location is King". However, it allowed for nearly equal play either way - you could do games where Story was more important, and the play of the game could be resolved like a story or novel, or you could go old sckool with the 10' pole and checking for traps every 10 feet and brave the likes of the Tomb.

Or, in my case, you could (and can!) do sessions either way, alternating back and forth between dungeoncraft and story, and between exploring an environment and exploring characters.

What gets me is that this is the way I've been playing since roughly 9th grade. I haven't really changed my game at all in 22 years. My stories may have gotten a little less linear and more accomodating and my rules have changed a ton (hopefully for the better), but ultimately I'm still playing the same D&D I was playing my last year in high school.

In the old days, circa 1990, back when we were disparaging that new even numbered edition for dumbing the game down, I was already going from dungeon crawling for a session to not picking up the dice for a whole session because I was involved in complex NPC interaction. I was in groups that alternated between planning out their campaign against some stronghold of the enemy in lavish detail, to spending much of the session discussing politics in character with each other.

Most modules these day ask an entirely different question - "Do you want to hear a story?"

Yes, I do.

And, sometimes I also want to challenge myself against a trapped filled tomb. Is there something wrong with like cake and ice cream?

 

[Stormonu]

Or, in my case, you could (and can!) do sessions either way, alternating back and forth between dungeoncraft and story, and between exploring an environment and exploring characters.

I certainly see no problem in that, and I'm sure most people do swing like that quite often. The designers, though, seemed to try and shape the game in certain directions - sometimes against the flow of its fans (such as in 2E).

What gets me is that this is the way I've been playing since roughly 9th grade. I haven't really changed my game at all in 22 years. My stories may have gotten a little less linear and more accomodating and my rules have changed a ton (hopefully for the better), but ultimately I'm still playing the same D&D I was playing my last year in high school.

My style, on the other hand, has definitely changed. I started out as a 10-year old hack'n'slasher in the early 80's and got bored with it over the years (somewhere in 2E). I'm much more of a story-teller these days, though I still love a good brawl every so often. And I feel I've gotten a lot better with the rules too. I shudder at the memory of some of the "adventures" I put together back in my teenage days. I have a lot of respect for the "classic" D&D modules as they helped to lead me on the path towards better and thoughtful design.

In the old days, circa 1990, back when we were disparaging that new even numbered edition for dumbing the game down, I was already going from dungeon crawling for a session to not picking up the dice for a whole session because I was involved in complex NPC interaction. I was in groups that alternated between planning out their campaign against some stronghold of the enemy in lavish detail, to spending much of the session discussing politics in character with each other.

(As an aside, I loved 2E for cleaning things up - I was never fond of 1E, and only moved to it from Basic/Expert just before UE came out.)

There was a sort of epiphany I had back in 2E when we started to have regular sessions where no dice were being thrown; it was, in a way, a lot more fun. That realization - "I don't need the dice to resolve this" - became very prominent in the VtM game I ran a little later down the line.

However, what I was reading from the rulebooks and Dragon mag back in the day (or at least, my memory of what I read back in that time) gave me the firm impression that the designers had a particular disdain for dungeon crawls in favor of grand metaplot campaigns, which I completely disagreed with.

Yes, I do.

And, sometimes I also want to challenge myself against a trapped filled tomb. Is there something wrong with like cake and ice cream?

As do I; I love I6 - Ravenloft, but the day I feel guilty about sending a party through Tomb will be the day I put my dice bag up for good.

 

[Doug McCrae]

3E drew a firm line between character knowledge and player knowledge, while at the same time shifting back toward "Location is King". However, it allowed for nearly equal play either way - you could do games where Story was more important, and the play of the game could be resolved like a story or novel, or you could go old sckool with the 10' pole and checking for traps every 10 feet and brave the likes of the Tomb.

The creation of 3e was a real 'stress point' in the history of roleplaying and the game could have been very different. As I understand it, there were a number of voices within WotC that wanted 3e to be in the same vein as Dragonlance SAGA System, which was "designed to reproduce the sweeping romance and fantastic epics of the DRAGONLANCE tradition". Such a 3e would have been rules lite and explicitly pro-story.

As it was the 'Skip Williams tendency' won out and the published version of 3e was rules heavy and simulationist, the edition of D&D closest in style to GURPS, HERO and RuneQuest.

I suspect a SAGA System version of 3e would have been a commercial disaster tbh, generally rpg fans prefer rules heavy.