D&D General Why the Great Thief Debate Will Always Be With Us

[Snarf Zagyg]

I think your earlier thread on Context Switching Paralysis or Why we Will Always Have the Thief Debate constitutes a full post on your idea of "The Great Thief Debate."

One of the problems of posting so much is that you forget what you've post already.

After I wrote the entire post, I was looking at the comments. And, of course, I looked down at the similar threads. And there I saw ... that thread. That I wrote. A little over two years ago!

Arguably, it's a more interesting take because it goes into the idea of "context switching paralysis" which I think is worth exploring in terms of the issue when you have systems that have both rules-space and non-rules space, but ...

Yeah. I may have a problem. When you've written so many essays on a forum that you no longer remember what you've written, it may be time to re-examine what you're doing with your life....

 

[Voadam]

One of the problems of posting so much is that you forget what you've post already.

After I wrote the entire post, I was looking at the comments. And, of course, I looked down at the similar threads. And there I saw ... that thread. That I wrote. A little over two years ago!

Hey I have a completely original idea in 2020, let's list what Fantasy Africa stuff is out there!

Also me.

Hey 2011, lets list fantasy Africa stuff that is out there.

 

[CreamCloud0]

If you haven't understood it from the many words already used in the OP, I don't think that further explanation will help.

If, on the other hand, you do understand what I am saying, but wish only to argue, you are welcome to do so; but it is preferable that you don't demand I keep explaining the same thing to your satisfaction (which is not going to happen, based on the prior evidence of every prior thread that you've brought up this same issue) simply because you don't agree with what I have already stated.

it's possible you're looking at this from the two different perspectives of 'a rule exists which isn't applied to everyone, and so only the characters deemed worthy to access that rule can perform the action' and 'a rule exists which applies to everyone, and this standardises the action across everyone who performs it',

the difference between 'the rogue has rules for sneaking, so only they can sneak' and 'there are rules for sneaking, which everyone can use'

 

[Staffan]

This is something I've commented on before-

One of the main advantages that often goes unremarked about other games (from PbTA/FiTD games to FKR/Rules Lite games) is that they benefit from the limited scope of the genre and system.

That's not a backhanded compliment. Instead, it's a statement that the limiting of genre and rules beforehand allows for consistent understanding and buy-in.

D&D, on the other hand, has the gift and the curse of not having that specificity.

If you want to drive in a screw, a you want to use a screwdriver. If you want to cut things, you want to use a knife of the appropriate size, or a pair of scissors. If you want to open a bottle of wine, you want a corkscrew. You need to pull out a small splinter or stubborn strand of hair, that's what a pair of tweezers are for.

A Swiss army knife can handle each of those things in a pinch, but it's not ideal for any of them.

(That said, it's not like D&D is any kind of universal game engine – D&D does D&D pretty well, but doesn't work all that well for other things. But D&D is significantly broader than e.g. Blades in the Dark.)

 

[EzekielRaiden]

it's possible you're looking at this from the two different perspectives of 'a rule exists which isn't applied to everyone, and so only the characters deemed worthy to access that rule can perform the action' and 'a rule exists which applies to everyone, and this standardises the action across everyone who performs it',

the difference between 'the rogue has rules for sneaking, so only they can sneak' and 'there are rules for sneaking, which everyone can use'

A rule can still "not apply to everyone" and yet not be an exclusionary, "if you don't have this you cannot do this" rule.

Consider: "We are offering a discount on green cars." This does not mean the dealership cannot offer a discount on cars that are not green, nor that the only way to get a discount is to buy a green car. All it means is that you don't have to negotiate for a green car.

Or, since legal stuff is already injected into the thread, consider the idea of an "absolute defense" against a particular alleged act. An absolute defense is something that, if demonstrated in the court, constitutes a guaranteed success for the defendant against a particular charge. There are several examples. Self-defense is one of the most commonly discussed absolute defenses; so long as certain criteria are met (usually regarding the need for force and the proportionality, e.g. striking someone with your car when they're armed with only a knife is probably not proportionate!) Another common one is demonstrating the truth of an allegedly defamatory statement. You cannot defame someone by saying true things about them, so if it is true and can be shown to be true, that's pretty much a slam dunk victory for the defense. Others exist in other areas of law, I'm sure.

Point being: does the existence of the self-defense doctrine thus mean that if you weren't acting in self-defense, you automatically lose? Hell no! It's just one guaranteed successful defense, IF you qualify for it.

That's how class rules should be understood in D&D. They are not, in general, rules of the type "the President has the right to veto laws" (a special dispensation which cannot and will not be allowed to anyone else). Instead, they are generally "if what you said was true, then it cannot be defamatory" type: you can still win against a claim of defamation despite not showing the truth of the statements, it just requires more effort and other factors in play. It is a guaranteed path to success, but not the only path to success.

That's why I keep harping on this. Snarf basically just said, "hey, this principle happens a lot, so that's exactly what's going on here"....but never actually defended why that principle should be applied, rather than the alternative where negotiation is always possible but sometimes unnecessary.

 

[Retros_x]

I agree in principle, although all the attempts I've seen at equating social mechanics with combat mechanics (admittedly not that many: mainly Exalted 2e and Infinity) have fallen pretty flat.

I think another reason is because playing out social scenes is more fun than a complete abstraction with combat like mechanics. Rolling a nat 20 and describing your brutal kill is cool and works in combat, but rolling a nat 20 with your social attack and than saying "Uhm, my vicious argumentation lets my opponent drop 3 sweat drops" is just not very satisfying.

The current system of first playing out the scene and THAN roll depending on your argumentation and approach makes much more sense IMO. Using the rules for social encounters from the 2014 DMG is actually fun, especially if you actually implement ideals, bonds and flaws for your NPCs.

 

[Minigiant]

I think another reason is because playing out social scenes is more fun than a complete abstraction with combat like mechanics. Rolling a nat 20 and describing your brutal kill is cool and works in combat, but rolling a nat 20 with your social attack and than saying "Uhm, my vicious argumentation lets my opponent drop 3 sweat drops" is just not very satisfying

I think the "issue" with social mechanics is many try to make it like the combat ones.

I have a Language variant rule that I use for social combat mechanics that feel awkward but has a few of simple logical Yes/No aspects that expand and limit how effective roleplaying is. "You are a native Elven speaker so you know the elven word for "transfer". But maybe not the Orcish one. Roll INT to see"

Which goes back to replicating what you want.

I don't like the idea that every PC is a Trilingual orator. That would the realm of rangers and rogues. The bard and sorcerer would speak better but know fewer languages

 

[M_Natas]

A rule can still "not apply to everyone" and yet not be an exclusionary, "if you don't have this you cannot do this" rule.

Consider: "We are offering a discount on green cars." This does not mean the dealership cannot offer a discount on cars that are not green, nor that the only way to get a discount is to buy a green car. All it means is that you don't have to negotiate for a green car.

Or, since legal stuff is already injected into the thread, consider the idea of an "absolute defense" against a particular alleged act. An absolute defense is something that, if demonstrated in the court, constitutes a guaranteed success for the defendant against a particular charge. There are several examples. Self-defense is one of the most commonly discussed absolute defenses; so long as certain criteria are met (usually regarding the need for force and the proportionality, e.g. striking someone with your car when they're armed with only a knife is probably not proportionate!) Another common one is demonstrating the truth of an allegedly defamatory statement. You cannot defame someone by saying true things about them, so if it is true and can be shown to be true, that's pretty much a slam dunk victory for the defense. Others exist in other areas of law, I'm sure.

Point being: does the existence of the self-defense doctrine thus mean that if you weren't acting in self-defense, you automatically lose? Hell no! It's just one guaranteed successful defense, IF you qualify for it.

That's how class rules should be understood in D&D. They are not, in general, rules of the type "the President has the right to veto laws" (a special dispensation which cannot and will not be allowed to anyone else). Instead, they are generally "if what you said was true, then it cannot be defamatory" type: you can still win against a claim of defamation despite not showing the truth of the statements, it just requires more effort and other factors in play. It is a guaranteed path to success, but not the only path to success.

That's why I keep harping on this. Snarf basically just said, "hey, this principle happens a lot, so that's exactly what's going on here"....but never actually defended why that principle should be applied, rather than the alternative where negotiation is always possible but sometimes unnecessary.

The thing is, it depends entirely on the implementation of the rule.
The example that was brought up was the Actor Feat, that allows you to Mimic other persons voices.
It is worded in a way, that makes it clear that without that feat, you can't mimic the speech of another person.
"- You can mimic through speech of another person ..."
Thr actor feat in that regards only makes sense, if you can't mimic the speech of another person. It even wants a check.

So anybody who took the actor feat would be rightly pissed, if another player could just make a "mimic speech" check now, because that is the main selling point of this feat.

Now, nobody takes the actors feat and it is counterintuitive... because in the case of 5e it bad implementation.

A better implementation would be "You now have advantage on charisma (deception) checks to mimic another person you have heard speak for at least a minute ..." - a solution that was also proposed here in the thread.
Now this rule doesn't make the use of Mimic Speech exclusively by this rule, everybody can still try it. It leaves it open in the Arnesonian Space while the original rule puts it firmly in the Gygaxian Space, closing if off from the Arnesonian Space.

5E does both with rules. You have closed rules - like a halfings nimble ability "you can move through the space of any creature that is a size larger than you". Just by reading that, you know "oh, not being a Halfling means, I can't do that". There is also the general rule in the combat section, saying that you can "only move through a hostiles creatures Space, if it is 2 sizes larger".

Now, those two rules together put the whole thing firmly in the Gygaxian Space - there is no wiggle room, no possibility to move through a hostiles creatures space that is only one size bigger then you unless you have the nimble feature.

A less obvious rule is everything about magic. There is no "negative" general rule that says "You can't do magic" - at least I didn't find one spelled out in the magic section of the 2014 basic rules. But just by having the current spellcasting rules it is clear that a character can't do magic, unless a feature grants him access to spellcasting.
Just by having the spellcasting rules in that form exist, made casting magic got impossible in the Arnesonian Space.

Not every rule makes it impossible to do something in the Arnesonian Space, it is how it is implemented and intended.

For example "You can steal stuff. To do that you need proficiency in sleight of hand - then you make a dexterity (sleight of hand) check would put stealing stuff directly in the Gygaxian Space and shutting it off, exempting every character who is not proficient to do that.

In contrast, a "In order to do magic, a Character needs to make an Intelligence (Arcana)-Check and describe what his magic is supposed to do, the DM decided Based on the desired Effect, the DC" - now Magic can be tried by everybody, a rules written that way leaves the Arnesonian Space open.

Or lets go back to 5e 2014: praying. Unless you are a cleric of a certain Level, you can't pray (and expect anything to happen). Because the only way to pray implemented into the book is the divine intervention feature. So in general, PCs wo try to pray don't get anything from DMs so far I have seen.

And answering prayers for Non-Clerics would rightly upset Cleric Players, because they only get the feature at level 10 and only a 10% chance at that level.

So again, all the God-Player interaction is deep in Gygaxian Space and closed of the Arnesonian Space and limited to High-Level clerics.

 

[MuhVerisimilitude]

The thing is, it depends entirely on the implementation of the rule.
The example that was brought up was the Actor Feat, that allows you to Mimic other persons voices.
It is worded in a way, that makes it clear that without that feat, you can't mimic the speech of another person.
"- You can mimic through speech of another person ..."
Thr actor feat in that regards only makes sense, if you can't mimic the speech of another person. It even wants a check.

So anybody who took the actor feat would be rightly pissed, if another player could just make a "mimic speech" check now, because that is the main selling point of this feat.

Now, nobody takes the actors feat and it is counterintuitive... because in the case of 5e it bad implementation.

A better implementation would be "You now have advantage on charisma (deception) checks to mimic another person you have heard speak for at least a minute ..." - a solution that was also proposed here in the thread.
Now this rule doesn't make the use of Mimic Speech exclusively by this rule, everybody can still try it. It leaves it open in the Arnesonian Space while the original rule puts it firmly in the Gygaxian Space, closing if off from the Arnesonian Space.

Let's take the mimic example you just gave. It's a good example. I like your reasoning, but I think there's a problem with this line of thinking.

You argue essentially that if feature X is allowed to be designed such that feature X is REQUIRED for activity Y to be possible, then you lock activity Y out from the set of possible actions that can be taken without this specific feature.

The problem here is that if we follow this reasoning we will come to the conclusion that any activity that is allowed by any feature must not be an exclusive feature, otherwise we lock other people out of features... And here I think it's obvious to everyone that magic does not follow this at all. Because magic is not exclusive. For example, no one argues that because the knock spell exists, rogues cannot lock pick doors.

The conclusion is that we cannot design a non-magic feature that allows someone to do Y, because doing this prevents people without the feature from even attempting Y, but we are allowed to create a spell that does Y because the spell does not restrict people who do not have the spell.

So clearly spells are superior, because they are allowed to do anything without concern for any restrictions imposed on people not using magic.

 

[Clint_L]

The thing is, it depends entirely on the implementation of the rule.
The example that was brought up was the Actor Feat, that allows you to Mimic other persons voices.
It is worded in a way, that makes it clear that without that feat, you can't mimic the speech of another person.
"- You can mimic through speech of another person ..."
Thr actor feat in that regards only makes sense, if you can't mimic the speech of another person. It even wants a check.

See, I don't read it that way at all. I would definitely still let a character without that feat attempt to mimic someone else; I just wouldn't let them add their proficiency bonus, and might make it a harder DC depending on circumstances. But there's nothing in that wording that excludes someone without the feat still trying to mimic a voice or sound. That's something all people can try.

Mimicry. You can mimic the sounds of other creatures, including speech. A creature that hears the mimicry must succeed on a Wisdom (Insight) check to determine the effect is faked (DC 8 plus your Charisma modifier and Proficiency Bonus).

The main of the actor feat is advantage on deception and performance checks, on top of the +1 charisma. In heavily social campaigns, it can be really good.

I generally don't read rules as exclusionary if they are describing special facility with something that, intuitively, anyone can attempt. But then, I don't take the rules that seriously, anyway. I'm certainly never going to prioritize a rule over what makes sense in the story.