D&D General What are Players?

[Lyxen]

Never mind that doing it this way gives the scout PC's player the chance to give a first-person report on returning to the party, which report may or may not be accurate and allows for said inaccuracy to be or not be intentional.

That's why I try to be flexible in the approach, and why people in our game use message a lot, or have a familiar riding on the rogue's shoulder, etc. That gives me some flexibility, because ultimately it's a compromise between fun and verisimilitude. To each his own...

 

[Lanefan]

While on the one hand I agree that this is somehow awesome, creating a new character rather than modifying an existing one is actually more disruptive to the party and possibly the table than just modifying a trait of the character. It's still, in essence, rather selfish rather than adaptative to the table's need, although it is certainly being much less a wangrod.

This falls right into the "it's what the character would do" mantra - a mantra I follow closely - and in the past I've roleplayed myself right out of games this way: my current PC left the party for [in-character reasons] and there was no believable way to bring in a replacement.

 

[clearstream]

Okay I have a theory about gameing styles... most (not all) of your style comes down to what you think the players are, but there are multi questions to this.

1) Is the DM a player?
2) Are the players writers creating a narative?
3) Are the PCs able to have any narrative control of the world (before/after/or during game play)?
4) Are the players the audience watching 'the show' of the game?
5) Are players trying to 'win' by beating everything as best they can, or are they trying to make the most intresting story, or are they (oh god I hate this one) doing just what there characters would do?


in my eyes the DM is a player, all of the players (including the DM) are only partially creating a narrative, and PCs ALWAYS can help narrative control of the work before/after game play and sometimes during. I believe the Players are the audience, and as such I have 100% banned out of game secrets. I also think we are at 50/50 between players trying to win and trying to make intresting stories (so I expect that they will not always take the best choice).

what about you? Don't feel constrained by JUST my questions, this is open ended... What are Players?

That's a great topic to introduce. One thought is that players are those who enter-into a game from outside, and in grasping and upholding its mechanisms meet the lusory expectations of other players. Thus your question could become - what are the lusory expectations of other players given their grasping and upholding of the mechanisms of an RPG?

This could seem to exclude 4) save that players always have a duality: they remain members of their real world, while subjecting themselves into the game world. So players are both performing the show, and watching it. Miguel Sicart uses that to construct a theory about game ethics (not one I fully agree with, though.)

In 5) you capture some player motivations. I suspect that we need to divide game into game and metagame in order to more fully understand their behaviour. Actually, we should consider the real world they exist in, and the game and metagames they subject themselves to.

 

[Yaarel]

I probably agree that a player should not keep secrets from the DM. (Of course, players can keep secrets from each other.)

If the DM is unaware of something, it simply doesnt exist in gameworld.

And whatever the secret might be, the DM and player would both have to agree on it anyway.

 

[Maxperson]

For those saying that the DM is not a player, this is from the PHB page 5.

"One player, however, takes on the role of the Dungeon Master (DM), the game's lead storyteller and referee. The DM creates adventures for the characters, who navigate its hazards and decide which paths to explore."

In D&D, the DM is objectively a player, but he is not a Player(player of PCs).

 

[Mercurius]

Yet another example where "One True Wayism" creeps in, and there's a tendency for people to argue that there's one proper way to do it and everything else is wrong or, at least, inferior.

It really depends upon the table, and the agreements between DM and players. That is pretty much it, with lots of variations from that.

Or rather, the "right way" is what is right for a specific table and the enjoyment of everyone involved.

Some people like a game where players co-create the world and narrative, in a collaborative approach that may even involve rotating DMs, who are more arbiters and less so the singular storyteller. Others take the approach that the DM is the omniscient and omnipotent storyteller, and the players act with agency within the story but have no control over the world itself or what occurs outside of their character's actions.

There isn't a wrong way. Or rather, the only "wrong way" is either if it isn't working with a particular group and/or one thinks that everyone should follow their way, because their way is the "Best Way" (i.e. One True Wayism).

 

[Bolares]

What is love?

 

[Maxperson]

What is love?

What's love got to do with it? ~ Tina Turner

 

[Mercurius]

What is love?

How do you say dee-licious?

 

[Vaalingrade]

What is love?

It's not Love, that's for dang sure.