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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ratskinner" data-source="post: 6521570" data-attributes="member: 6688937">Yeah, that's why I was apologetic for bringing it up.Also, I'd like to second the notion that when you cut and paste different posts together to respond like this, that it makes it awkward to respond to them. Although I appreciate the effort such a long post must take. I know my eyes are glazing over as I finish this.....so fair warning if something looks weird, I may just be too tired to notice.Wait, so Divinely inspired PCs only have capacity to act (make skill checks etc.) from Divine inspiration/intercession ? Without the Raven Queen, her clerics and paladins have no skill at persuasion or arms? This statement doesn't seem to follow for me, and is at least orthogonal to anything I was saying. I admit bafflement as to how "You can't (or shouldn't) narrate what the Raven Queen did or didn't do." is equivalent to "You can't use the challenge mechanics."I don't feel its controversial that gods in D&D are generally NPCs at best. Ascribing motivations and actions to NPCs is generally the purview of the DM. If the DM wants to do such things as you described and the table is keen on it, go for it. I'm fair sure that allowing a player to determine the actions of a deity as casually as you describe is a bit unusual for D&D play, and may require the kind of long-term group consensus you say your group has. I think any PC making that statement at any table I've played at would be taken as making a proclamation of faith, not statement fact. (You do later seem to imply that this was not a particularly consequential declaration, beyond the coolness of the retort...so we just may be weighing things differently.)IME with 4e, admittedly limited, the Power Source keywords were the least useful/used, as in I don't recall them ever being relevant at all. I seem to vaguely recall how (at least initially) they were trying to make sure that they didn't have much impact, mechanically. I don't recall him specifying the correspondence, i.e. everybody's HP and saves are some mishmash of providence, skill, etc. I also agree that he was intending the DM to be the narrator of such things (or at least exert strong editorial discretion upon his players.)Hang on....are you under the impression that I think that's an absolute? Why would this:Make you think that? Is there some key qualifying or softening phrase that I neglected to put in?Diversion from whatever the game would have done otherwise. I'm presuming the DM had something in mind (even 4e isn't so easy as to run without prep, I wouldn't think) and after the player's comment, there is a new storyline. IIRC, you consider 4e to be a "no myth" game, and I think its probably the closest of D&D games, but I don't think 5e generally is. I can tell you that very few groups I know play any edition of D&D that way. (Although "Session Zero" is becoming more popular, I'm not sure that counts.)It doesn't, it relates to the types of fiction cited in relation to the mechanics. To guarantee the plot results of romantic fantasy, the D&D DM needs to have the ability to override unfavorable results of D&D's combat mechanics in the kill-loot cycle. The degree and predictability of such necessity varies by edition (and optional rules within editions, at times). While 4e is solidly on the "rarely, if ever" end of that spectrum, it still isn't a guarantee of any particular result to the fiction by rule. At the very least, even the 4e GM is required to plot and set up a suitable array of enemies and NPCs to reflect what you have referred to as "signalling" by the players for the plots they want to see. There are other games for which this is either explicit or implicit in the operation of the mechanics.I haven't gotten to play enough 5e to know how it shakes down in this regard from personal experience. I'd love to hear from those who have, especially if they've made heavy use of the mechanics & options that purport to support such play. My suspicion is that it hews more closely to the older editions, but ::shrug::.I can't be sure of how to respond to this without being in your head and knowing precisely what you want out of D&D. Which is something that, despite lengthly conversations here, I do not claim. Although I also won't claim total ignorance we are getting into pretty finely nuanced discussion here. 4e is, in many ways that are likely the reasons you are its fan, an abberation for D&D. (In many other ways, like AEDU, I don't think it is at all...so go figure.) I believe that you yourself have stated several times about how 4e gave you precisely the kind of game you were missing in previous editions. In spite of that, I still suspect that your way of playing 4e was unusual (even if the rules supported it better than previous editions). I also suspect that 4e's success in this regard is more a matter of permission or flexibility rather than direct commission.Now, I'm not sure what exactly the "ethos of D&D" would be, but its default mode, supported by each and every edition I'm familiar with is: "We go on adventures (often in dungeons) kill things (sometimes dragons) and take their stuff. For this we get experience points which make us better at ...well, doing that again." That's not exactly the Hero's Journey or one of the Romantic Fantasy plots. Can other stuff happen around that?...you bet. Can the participants invent complicated rationales for all this stuff?...you bet. Can groups play with some of the rules differently...sure. Does that make it a great narratively-intense storytelling game?...not in my experience. Not that that makes D&D a poor game, or unfun, or negative in any way. It just is what it is.My comments were specifically in reference to D&D-style games. I didn't intend for them to extend to all games. Other games, like MHRP, are designed with heavier player authorship (or more distributed authorship in general) in mind, sometimes even to extreme degree. Which is fine. Heck, one of the playbooks my group used in Dungeon World had a "move" that flatly stated there was always something in every scene that he could use for his daring maneuvers be it a rope, chandelier, runaway wagon, whatever. (BTW, that sounds great, but it gets old very quickly, IME) I even think there's some room for player authorship in D&D beyond what the mechanics might strictly prescribe. However, I think that has to tempered to account for both the competitive nature of some groups/playstyles and what the rules are designed to handle, especially vis-a-vis the role of DM. So while the MHRP Thing's player may declare that action with the car, he doesn't add any dice for it unless he spent an action to create it as an...asset(? IIRC). This is not so true, or free, for a D&D player who might narrate picking up a weapon on the battlefield because it has mechanical impact (the damage die, proficiency, etc.) that are inherent to the rules system. This is also an issue for free-form abilities like Polymorph or 3e Summoning spells in D&D, as compared to games like MHRP or Fate, which live in freeform mechanics. When you summon or polymorph somebody into a form, then you need stats for that form. In MHRP and Fate, you may have just created an advantage that has easily described mechanical capacity to impact the narrative.  ....and if you're willing to "retcon" the event, then I suggest that the character's declaration wasn't very meaningful beyond an expression of faith, anyway.I think you're conflating two points. The presence of a deity actively interfering in the characters lives requires (in all D&D play I've experienced) the DM to take an active role in portraying the deity, and to a proportional degree of heavy-handedness vis-a-vis the divine actions. (heh...literally a Deus Ex Machina) This may or may not be disruptive to an individual player's immersion.</blockquote>

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