D&D (2024) What could One D&D do to push the game more toward story?

[doctorbadwolf]

This will never happen, but maybe as a houserule: make rolls matter more. For example, when you succeed on a roll it often changes the gamestate but when you fail on a roll it often does not. For example: you are trying to persuade the guard at the masquerade ball to let you in, you fail your roll, he refuses to let you in. If this same thing happened in Blades in the Dark, there would be some sort of consequence (and there are guidelines for how to make up a consequence).

This can work for successful rolls also. I suspect that a lot of players interpret the die roll to indicate quality of success and failure in a narrative way, but there is no rule that makes this so. For example, when people roll very low, they might narrate what they do as humorous incompetence ("2 for perception. My druid is too busy looking at the flowers! ::laughter:. Similarly, when people roll high the dm might view that as a quality of success ("ok those of you who got a 15 or higher notice the goblins, but Cleric, with your 23, you notice that some of them appear to be riding wolves").

This sort of thing means that something always happens and keeps the narrative progression of the game moving forward.

This is the only “story” mechanics I’d enjoy in a 5e style game, and I’d like them best as a success ladder with mixed results in the middle.

 

[Neonchameleon]

...are we not already having final battles on dragon back over waterfalls wherein the PCs can realize the redemption they sought all along was never needed because the burden of their past was never something they should have carried and now they can truly be heroes, not just debtors paying their due?

The DM, because that is fairly baked into the role.

And this is another reason why, as both player and DM, I find D&D's lack of good rules for story development and complete lack of rules for character development far more intrusive than something like Apocalypse World or Blades in the Dark in which such things arise much more organically rather than requiring scripted climactic battles.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

In a lot of D&D play, including (as best I can tell) a lot of 5e D&D play, it is the GM who makes key decisions about what the protagonists want, and what the significance of any situation, or any action declaration, is.

I have never seen a GM make any key decisions about what the protagonist wants, in any version D&D .

Is this perhaps misstated, or are our experiences really so divergent that you’ve had DMs telling players what thier PC wants?

 

[Incenjucar]

And this is another reason why, as both player and DM, I find D&D's lack of good rules for story development and complete lack of rules for character development far more intrusive than something like Apocalypse World or Blades in the Dark in which such things arise much more organically rather than requiring scripted climactic battles.

I'm rather confused, as this sounds like you want a completely different game.

Do you want a game story system where there's no DM designing the opposition or choosing when they oppose the players?

I run my games with stuff happening on its own and let players choose whether or not they engage with it, but I still design that stuff and determine when it's been shut down by the players when they choose to engage with it.

 

[Pauln6]

Thousand Suns used the concept of 'Narrative Authority". Each character had a few traits, which were sort of quotations, picked entirely freeform, which encapsulated the character. I think the player could swap them out between adventures for a new one linked to things that happened in the last adventure. Then, once per adventure, the player could invoke narrative authority to dictate the outcome of some event related to their trait. So Captain Kirk might have: "You're too much woman, too beautiful to ignore," and might invoke that when trying to woo a female npc to decide how she reacts and what he gets out of the encounter rather than rolling the dice and the DM deciding. It might require horse trading but a lot of players are happy to compromise with the DM if the result is fun. In D&D I suppose you could include it as one of the options when spending inspiration.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

I am not sure what what D&D One can do to truly monetize story based mechanics. Maybe they could? But people that are going to cough up the most coin for skins and items and etc. I suspect still want a game of numbers and competition.

I suspect One and its VTT will focus more on this than pushing storytelling per se.

I don’t have a dog in the fight necessarily—-my group is unlikely to go virtual except when someone is sick (last night we had cameras and iPads with video for that purpose).

I am very invested in terrain—-I have perhaps 150 trees, 24 square feet of foam dungeon with doors and furniture and…stuff.

There are a few of us dinosaurs that are still way into distances and tactics for whom 4e did not stick.

My belief is that D&D is and will remain a cousin of wargames. I suppose when the giant skeletons swarmed us last night we could have used a storytelling element to find a way to excuse ourselves from what the board showed, but why have the table set up at all?

My bias is showing.

I suppose really dialing down on discussion of bonuses and ranges and damage would be a start. Story telling seems to obviate a lot of extant mechanics.

We are into emergent play coming from dice rolls and choices bound by mechanics of war and exploration I just cannot see what would be left of the current game if they really dove into story telling games.

I don’t wish away other people’s fun. Do what you like—-but is D&D the game for that? And why would WOTC want to go in that direction?

I think where money is involved we will see the opposite and at most maybe a section about other styles of play talking about a few ways to think less about mechanics and less about crunch.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I'm rather confused, as this sounds like you want a completely different game.

Do you want a game story system where there's no DM designing the opposition or choosing when they oppose the players?

I run my games with stuff happening on its own and let players choose whether or not they engage with it, but I still design that stuff and determine when it's been shut down by the players when they choose to engage with it.

No. I want a design that gives me the tools to lean into the characters' arcs in ways I decide. And where a confrontation can lead off in any number of directions rather than will almost invariably end with a few hp lost and a few spell slots expended.

But it's the mechanical respresentations of character growth (as opposed to power growth) I'm arguing here is the missing part. One D&D will be better than 5e because the feats are much better done but this is baby steps.

 

[Incenjucar]

No. I want a design that gives me the tools to lean into the characters' arcs in ways I decide. And where a confrontation can lead off in any number of directions rather than will almost invariably end with a few hp lost and a few spell slots expended.

But it's the mechanical respresentations of character growth (as opposed to power growth) I'm arguing here is the missing part. One D&D will be better than 5e because the feats are much better done but this is baby steps.

In what way can you not do that already?

Edit: Do you want emotional growth feats...?

 

[Neonchameleon]

In what way can you not do that already?

Edit: Do you want emotional growth feats...?

Aaarrggghhhhh!!!!!!! I have been writing again and again parts of this on this thread, sometimes in direct reply to you.

From here

The best class in 5e for character development is the Warlock because you get to choose how you level up, by picking invocations. Two warlocks are not the same as each other (and it would be better if you replaced roughly half the invocations with good ones). Second best is either the sorcerer (your spells are determined with each level) or the artificer (what did you spend your time learning how to create)? Most of the classes with spells have either the same spell list or at worse can switch books.​

I want other classes to be able to do this; once you have selected a subclass to not spend the rest of your time just levelling up as a cookie cutter member of that subclass unless you abandon your class entirely to multiclass. And OneD&D feats are better - partly because the feats aren't so in competition with ASIs and partly because they are much better balanced meaning there are more good choices.

From here

The fact that levelling is passive only makes it push the story more because the players and characters have less control over it and it forces them more down a predetermined path. And you have to write your settings such that levelling with the inherent vast disparity in power is a part of them.​

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Now, I'll give you a mechanic that to me is one that encourages story from Apocalypse World (from memory)​

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When life becomes untenable choose 1 [exclusive so each can only be picked once]:

• Die, permanently
• Come back with -1 Hard
• Come back with +1 Weird
• Come back with a different playbook [class]

(The Apocalypse World stats are Hard, Hot, Sharp, Cool, and Weird and a +1 modifier is significant).​

Do I think that this sort of mechanic would work in D&D where coming back after death was fairly cheap but had limited uses and a player chosen long term consequence (for example replacing your subclass with one from the god or patron that brought you back?) I certainly think I'd like to see something inspired by this mechanic rather than no consequences at all other than diamond and spell slot cost.

From here

5e has a tool for storytelling that I don't think is pushed enough although I've used to good effect (having stolen the idea from Apocalypse World) - the subclass change. The Paladin of Valour who loses the faith can become a Paladin of Redemption, of Glory, of Conquest, or even an Oathbreaker - or a Warlock can change patrons. This is a very powerful tool and should be used sparingly (I've even turned a battlemaster into an echo night for reasons) ​

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This also ties into my pet hate about 5e's storytelling - character growth is on rails. Once you have your subclass at level 3 you've very few important choices left to make; you're almost certainly taking an ASI in your primary stat at 4 or 8 and most of the +1 feats just aren't that good. Who most characters are mechanically at level 11 is almost entirely predetermined from who they were at level 3 unless they multiclass. (This is a key reason I like the OneD&D feat changes).​

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The other biiiig thing is a lack of consequences for combat. No Rust Monsters. No wounds. No scars. Either you die or you're fine. ​

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I'd also give a lot of monsters a "short rest action" in their statblocks - so if the PCs stop they can recover their wound and are now fighting slightly empowered versions of their foes. And more weight on what you can do with loot.​

Again I think I've been pretty clear in what I want and how it can tie into 5e's existing mechanics. And you'll note that most of what I want isn't additional character power like feats. It's allowing characters to change to better reflect who they are and what has happened to them. "Emotional growth feats" are the most ham-fisted way I can imagine to do this.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

The DM, because that is fairly baked into the role.

Only for one narrow definition of how to GM... MANY possibilities exist. Some games can accommodate more than one approach (I'm thinking of 4e D&D, which admits of either a classic neotrad GM or a story game scene-framing GM).