What is "railroading" to you (as a player)?

[hawkeyefan]

Modifiers IMO aren't enough if the stats present themselves as part of the character's definition. Look at those name. Those are definitions, not simply modifiers, and without evidence I can't accept them as just that.

Okay, so let’s take an example. It’s silly, but I hope it’ll be something that everyone gets.

Rodney Dangerfield’s character in Caddyshack… is he a low Charisma character who somehow makes all his checks? Or is he a high Charisma character whose player has decided to play him as crude and obnoxious but somehow everyone likes him?

Is there only one answer? And if either is possible, then the question is “what do the stats really say about the character?”

 

[Reynard]

Okay, so let’s take an example. It’s silly, but I hope it’ll be something that everyone gets.

Rodney Dangerfield’s character in Caddyshack… is he a low Charisma character who somehow makes all his checks? Or is he a high Charisma character whose player has decided to play him as crude and obnoxious but somehow everyone likes him?

Is there only one answer? And if either is possible, then the question is “what do the stats really say about the character?”

Then you have the issue of how the other uses of the stats can muddle things. I want to play a super creepy Warlock who stinks of brimstone and gives the evil eye to children -- but I also have a 20 charisma! What?

 

[Micah Sweet]

No. they acknowledge that Int modifies certain die rolls, so those aspects must be relfected. But that isn't the only thing these examples do.

None of the D&D stats are simple or one dimensional. They are by their natures very broad and abstract. That means we have lots of room to interpret what any of them mean.

You can't demand people incorporate their stats into their personality and then also limit how they might do that.

I'm not. But I am questioning why someone wouldn't do so.

 

[Fenris-77]

Stats don't and have never mapped even close to perfectly over 'real people'. You're always going to have issues when you try to describe every character in terms of the same 6 stats or whatever. It's fuzzy, and fuzzy here does the job it needs to (more or less). Other games have other fuzzy ways of doing the same thing but suffer the same issues.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Okay, so let’s take an example. It’s silly, but I hope it’ll be something that everyone gets.

Rodney Dangerfield’s character in Caddyshack… is he a low Charisma character who somehow makes all his checks? Or is he a high Charisma character whose player has decided to play him as crude and obnoxious but somehow everyone likes him?

Is there only one answer? And if either is possible, then the question is “what do the stats really say about the character?”

Never saw it. Can't answer without seeing the character in action.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Then you have the issue of how the other uses of the stats can muddle things. I want to play a super creepy Warlock who stinks of brimstone and gives the evil eye to children -- but I also have a 20 charisma! What?

That's an issue of Charisma being too broadly defined to make logical sense, or a mistake in having it be mechanically important to warlocks, or both. In other words, a rules problem.

 

[Hriston]

It isn't a great one, but in some degerate cases it may be the lesser of two evils.

I have a hard time imagining the sort of play that would make it desirable for any participant to violate table expectations to control the choices of another player's character. What do you have in mind?

 

[Reynard]

That's an issue of Charisma being too broadly defined to make logical sense, or a mistake in having it be mechanically important to warlocks, or both. In other words, a rules problem.

I don't disagree, but here we are.

 

[Fenris-77]

That's an issue of Charisma being too broadly defined to make logical sense, or a mistake in having it be mechanically important to warlocks, or both. In other words, a rules problem.

Just use the original (i.e ancient greek) meaning, beloved of the gods or divine favour, and it works just fine. It's mostly the descriptions of the stats that are the issue. When you broaden things out, especially for the WIS/INT/CHA three it gets a little easier to make the pieces fit.

 

[Hriston]

Lack of 1 particular choice, especially for a particular aesthetic reason, isn’t railroading.

I don't know what the GM's reason is for violating table expectations to control my character's choices. Why do you assume it's aesthetic, and why would it matter? And yes, it's the very definition of railroading.