When Adventure Designers Cheat

[Cedric]

I voted for:

It's a good thing. Designers should create new rules to challenge the players.

But I really wanted another option between that and neutral. I think it's fine if used in moderation and not taken to ridiculous lengths.

 

[Celebrim]

Count me as a grognard, perhaps, but as far as I'm concerned "Wish" should be able to trump anything short of the explicit will and actions of a god...assuming, of course, it's worded properly...

Well, since I've been playing since 1980, if I'm not a grognard I'm only a few gray hairs short. However, in practice this has never been true. First edition in particular was sprinkled with references to the limitations of wishes. It's the first edition modules in particular where you are going to find the notes like, "Not even wish will destroy the widget/rescue the character/destroy the box"

You know, you may have just stumbled on to the biggest single flavour difference between 1e and 3e: in 3e, everything has to have a number attached.

This is a subset of what is actually the biggest single change between 1st and 3rd. First edition was a DM centered game. Third edition is a player centered game. Neither is really 'better' than the other, because both versions can be run poorly and played in a manner that not everyone at the table will enjoy. But third edition attempts to make the DM's judgement and experience somewhat superfluous. All those numbers are thier so that the DM won't, in theory at least, have to decide what happens. The designers of 3rd edition seemed to want to render the DM into a 'game engine' rather than a 'game master'.

In 1e, things *could* be designed as absolute - "the Door of Wonders will not and can not open unless the word GROGNARD is spoken loudly enough that the speaker can hear their own echo from the door"

Except that EGG has a really good passage in the 1st edition DMG (one of the better ones) where he explains that special circumstances should always trump the rules whenever it makes sense within the game. I'm thinking of the passage in which he describes the PC's in a temple and the party is attacked by giant apes (IIRC) and one of the players has his character fall onto the feet of the goddesses statue and begin blubbering like a baby and begging for mercy. In truly extraordinary cases, I think EGG would have broke his own absolutes.

Besides, the whole point of my talking about the numbers was to point out that effectively a target DC above what could be reasonably obtained WAS an absolute design. You just as easily could have written, "The door cannot be opened by any means but..." They are the same thing. If anything, the only purpose of the number which is so high as to be unreasonable is to give you some idea of what you'd consider a special case. Maybe the Barbarian rages, and throws himself before that gargantuan door with a 60 STR, and he throws a 20 for his STR check and you throw 1 for the doors and amazingly the super twinked Barb beats the doors 38 STR result. You don't really need those numbers to tell you maybe that the player of a super strong character with a super extraordinary result has a reasonable expectation of the normally impossible result, but there they are just in case you do. Why not let him slow the door for a round even if the rules say that absolutely he can't? It makes for a great scene, and more than anything else, great and memorable scenes is what makes RPing fun.

As for WG4 Lost Temple of Tharizdun, I've run it twice now and both times it's been more than memorable...

Absolutely. It's an extremely influential module, fun and interesting module which had a huge influence on the gaming industry ever since then. A new DM can still learn all sorts of interesting things about design by reading that module.

 

[lukelightning]

Speaking of "not even wish...." things; the designers seem to assume that wishes are pretty common and that every party has a spare ring of 3 wishes.

I figure, if I ever gave a ring of wishes out and the players actually conserved it just in case of some drastic thing like whatever the module said "can't be reversed even by a wish" I'd go ahead and let the wish work. After all, it's a wish.

 

[The_Gneech]

I've always found divinations to be useless. Normally the DM just gives a cryptic answer that is no help at all, or information that is just plot exposition.

Or the ever-popular "tell you what you know already, rephrased"...

-The Gneech

 

[Imagicka]

I've had many experiences where a DM tells me, "I didn't think you guys would try that. Would it be cool if you didn't do that, and instead did it the hard way? because otherwise we have no adventure for the rest of the night."

This is probably was irks me the most. I hate it when someone plays the Deus Ex Machina card, and then expect me to enjoy the ride.

Now, if your designing something for public consumption, then yeah... I think you should be working as close to the RAW as possible. If your going to go out of the books and create new monsters, new spells, and new situations. Then just as anyone would expect you to define what these new monsters and new spells are... then you should explain to me why you have these new situations. Even if your going to write something for just the GM to read so it makes sense to him... then, that's fine.

Whenever I spend money on my gaming products, instead of spending an afternoon in a drug-induced haze watching clouds float by, or drug-induced haze surfing the internet to steal ideals from other... I want those gaming products to be tight. To be well thought out, and worth the money I spent on it. No holes of logic anywhere. I don't want players coming back to me asking: "So, you have a chimera in this sealed room, for what? A few hundred years? How did the thing breath? Where did it get it's food and water? Why is it even here?" But I'm a big proponent of making everything logical. Why are there even frictionless-corridors in this underground complex anyway? Even if you explain it away with 'the world's dungeons were built by insane drunken dwarves who thought it would be fun to build confusing random rooms and tunnels, fill it with traps and monsters... just so they could store their gold in because they don't trust banks!' -- It may be silly, but it's still an answer.

I have an especially big problem with unbreakable/unhackable doors. I hate being forced to check every corner of a dungeon for a key when a dwarf with a hefty battleaxe should be able to make short work of a door. or all those miraculous impenetrable stone doors. I actually have many characters carry stoneworking tools exactly for this reason. Thank 3.5 for adamantine picks.

Exactly... if you have some door that the players need a key for, then don't say 'it's magical' or it's unbreakable (especially if it isn't magical) ... or pull out the Deus Ex Machina card and deal with it that way. It just shows me that you don't know the game well enough to come up with a suitable explaination as to why things are the way you want them... and that were just too lazy to do a little research.

By all means... if you want to say that the door is unbreakable because it's been magically reenforced... great... that it's been made out of a super-strong material... super. But you know that players are always going to find a way around your DM-designed problems. That's the point of the game...

Whenever I've designed puzzles/traps/problems I've always measured it against *What would I do?* I work on the system, if I can think of a couple of ways to tackle the problem...it's an easy problem If I design it so that I can only think of a way to solve it... then I consider it hard... and... If I design it so even I can't think of a way to solve it... I consider it near-impossible. But not impossible. -- Because the players will always think of some way to derail your plot. To come up with a solution to your problem that you never thought of. The secret is to expect it, and roll with it. Personally, I cherish these moments.

But I hate it when it's obvious that the DM is denying solutions just because they didn't think about it. Like someone said before... if I wanted to play a game where I had to guess the only right solution to a problem, without being creative. I'll play one of those early Sierra computer games.

Does coming up off-the-table ideas add to the game? Sure it does. It makes the game that much more interesting and imaginative. But I don't think we should ever be restrictive about the solutions that the players should be allowed to apply. The problem with leaving plot/design holes all over the place is that players pick up on them real quick, and start picking at them thinking they are there for a reason.

What does plot have to do with this? Aren't we talking essentially about what constitutes legitimate puzzle/challenge design? It might be helpful to break this down into a couple of basic questions...

"By what methods can (or maybe 'should') an adventure designer control the possible solutions to the challenges they create?"

Ahh... think about what he's designing? Don't just think about what looks good on paper, but think about how players are going to tackle these situations, and for heaven's sake... Playtest it! (and get it proof read)

"Is there anything to be gained by taking certain solutions 'off the table'?

Only if there is a key plot point to be gained by it. Can't teleport around the dungeon, explain it! As soon as you say 'you can't do this...' you better explain to me why.

"Should all in-game challenges be resolvable through the mechanics presented in the RAW?"

Never! If you want to think of a few RAW-solutions... great... but players are going to think of ingenious ways to solve their problem, and it makes the game that much better if you let them succeed.

"If so, what are the drawbacks, if any?"

Yeah, you design too much that is Deux Ex Machina, relying too much on 'off the table' solutions that exclude in-game mechanics... then I'm just going to lose respect for you as a designer, a writer, a gamer and will probably never even waste my time considering reading anything else you designed, let alone pay money for it.

"Does that place too much emphasis on resource management, at the expense of other forms of problem-solving?"

Hey, if your game is good where you don't concern yourself if the players have enough rope, torches, oil and spikes... hey... that's your game. But I don't think it's too much to ask the players to come up with a list of resources, and say the simple phrase 'I'm going to replenish my resources whenever possible.' The same goes for magical resources. If you throw monster-X against the players, and forgot that the rogue has a dagger-of-monster-X-slaying, who fault is it when you were expecting the characters to run?

 

[MerricB]

Hmm - this thread has interested me enough to pull out my copy of The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun...

The text:

This place is COLD. Exposed flesh immediately takes 2-12 points of damage, 3-18 if it also touches metal (such as a sword or the like). Torches must likewise be clasped by the means of the robe sleeve covering the hand, although the heat of their burning cones helps to keep the adventurers suffering more than chiblains...

Interestingly, no mention of "no spells protect against the cold". Nothing at all.

There is talk of only the special torches lighting the darkness, but as you're in the presence of the god of ultimate EVIL, I see no problem there.

Cheers!

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

I've always found divinations to be useless. Normally the DM just gives a cryptic answer that is no help at all, or information that is just plot exposition.

That's another type of thinking I'm trying to wean my current group away from. We've gamed together for about 4 years (mostly Unknown Armies), but started playing D20 in the last year or so. They are really stuck in the mode of thinking that their old DM left them in... anything that has a "save or" is useless, since the DM will fudge the rolls (hell, he told them flat out Phantasmal Killer would never work on anyone important) and any divination will be more or less worthless. In their early adventures they were somewhat confused, since many of the clue's I'd left in assumed they would use some of the magical abilities at their disposal. With an akashic, a bard, a greenbond with the ability to speak with plants and spirits etc in the party, I assume they'll be doing more than just making the equivalent of a library use roll and calling it a day lol.

 

[lukelightning]

I see no reason to have a special "cold damage that cold resistance can't protect you" thing. A regular damaging effect accomplishes almost exactly the same thing, while rewarding the player who just happened to prepare protection from cold or whatever.

If you don't want it to be regular cold, make it negative energy and allow death ward to protect you from it. Or "divine fire" and say that channeling positive or negative energy can protect you for a short time.

Description is also important. Don't just say "it's cold" make sure the players know it's something special (or make 'em do a knowledge check...reward the PCs with knowledge skills!).

Darkness so dark that no light works? Well, just force the caster to do a caster check vs. whatever DC. If the check succeeds, hooray, they have some light! If not, say "forces of evil block your spell".

 

[Flexor the Mighty!]

Hmm - this thread has interested me enough to pull out my copy of The Forgotten Temple of Tharizdun...

The text:



Interestingly, no mention of "no spells protect against the cold". Nothing at all.

There is talk of only the special torches lighting the darkness, but as you're in the presence of the god of ultimate EVIL, I see no problem there.

Cheers!

Well the God of Ultimate Evil shouldn't cheat! Wait a second....

 

[Lanefan]

Speaking of "not even wish...." things; the designers seem to assume that wishes are pretty common and that every party has a spare ring of 3 wishes.

I figure, if I ever gave a ring of wishes out and the players actually conserved it just in case of some drastic thing like whatever the module said "can't be reversed even by a wish" I'd go ahead and let the wish work. After all, it's a wish.

My favourites are "luck" items (e.g. 1e's Luckblade) that have some relatively mundane function (a Luckblade is a simple +1 longsword) but also contain a wish...so next time the possessor says "I wish...", it happens. Identify and similar spells will never pull the wish function. I lob these into my game on a just-barely-frequent-enough basis that my players are (usually) careful what they wish for.

Best one of these so far is while camped deep in a dungeon, an uncomfortable PC said "I wish we had a feather bed." and *foop!* a feather bed appears. On realizing what had happened, the rest of the party nearly killed her as there were so many things the wish could better have been used for - such as bringing back some or all of their several dead companions...

Best part was the feather bed wouldn't fit out the door of the room they were in, so they had to leave it behind.

Sort-of back on topic, wishes cast long ago are another perfectly valid reason why things don't always work as they should. The frictionless floor in White Plume is a possible example, and Keraptos could certainly throw wishes...

Lanefan