D&D 5E With Respect to the Door and Expectations....The REAL Reason 5e Can't Unite the Base

[Emerikol]

Simulation: The discipline of imitating a macro-system (typically real-world) over time. This is done by way of developing a model of the system which will represent the key physical interactions and behaviors (* parameters) of the system you are imitating. In order for the model to bear out fidelity to the system you are attempting to imitate, you must first constrain each of the parameters. The more unconstrained the parameter (eg higher margin-of-error, high upper and lower bounds, more abstracted), the more latent entropy you load into the model when you run the simulation. The more latent entropy you load into the model, the greater the chance of realized entropy to to manifest in any one run. The more realized entropy manifesting in a model run, the greater the chance that the model run will not properly imitate the system, over time, that you are simulating.

Process-Simulation: The discipline of imitating a micro-system (typically real-world) right now. These micro-phenomena are your * parameters in the Simulation of a macro-system. The more unconstrained (by way of being abstracted or being unphysical) these parameters are, the worse the Simulation will perform in its effort to model the macro-system over time.

I hope that helps.

Well this clears up why you are talking past so many of us. A lot of us are using simulationist in the GNS sense and not the sense you defined above. I can see why you keep going back to realism arguments. I could care less if a game as either of the above to be honest. And they are completely unrelated to dissociative mechanics. My own limits on "realism" I suppose exist but for the most part D&D prior to 4e didn't have a problem and I'd say 95% of the powers in 4e didn't have a problem.

Dissociative Mechanics (and thats just a term and if you don't like it then make up another. I'm tired of rearranging the chairs. It is called dissociative because it dissociates those who agree with the subject at hand. Of course it doesn't for those who disagree.) are about the player and character being driven apart.
[MENTION=87792]Neonchameleon[/MENTION]
All I know is that from red box through first edition I didn't have a dissociative problem. I played all those games in a simulationist (GNS) style and had no dissociative mechanics.

I've yet to see a rebuttal. All I see is people addressing things completely unrelated to the subject. Who go down the realism path or the abstraction path, neither of which applies to this issue. I might have opinions in those areas but they aren't related. Those are three issues separate. All I see is people so completely out in left field as far as understanding what I'm talking about that I feel like it's hopeless. For those of us who "get it", it is a crystal clear issue. We all agree on what is and isn't an issue. That the rest of you can't see it is like I said probably why it doesn't bother you. For me though I have no problem telling that a daily martial attack is dissociative and hit points are not.

Your in combat example is pretty silly. When I'm fighting with a sword, I never know when I'm going to get an opening. Obviously if I'm very skilled and my opponent is not then the opportunities are greater. This is reflected in my attack bonus and the targets AC (which has realism issues I agree but not dissociative issues). If you take a normal high damage daily, I'm trying to execute that attack every single round. Thats whats in my mind. I'm not spamming my at-will because I'm out of dailies which is what's in my players mind. And that is the issue.

 

[Underman]

@Nagol @Underman @Emerikol ;An exercise to make sure that there is some level of coherency and consistency within the application of the concept of "dissociation" and to confirm its limits.

For each of the following please provide 1 or more of the following labels and the reasoning for the labels;

Sorry, I've learned my lesson from the waste of time adopting the 'process sim' label that turned out not to be process-sim; I'll leave those label discussions to those who enjoy that kind of thing.

- Arthropods (creatures with Exoskeletons) having unbound sizes (eg greater than the size of a chicken

But I will ask you why you're even thinking about that kind of thing in D&D, or this kind of thing:

- Dragons and other excessively large creatures (with incoherent trim characteristics) within the "implied setting" defying "flight physics" (eg gravity, atmospheric friction/drag, propulsive thrust, aerodynamic lift requirements, mandatory trim characteristics, etc)

when pemerton gets to get away with this kind of thing:

When the bardic power Vicious Mockery has been discussed, I've suggested that, when used against (say) an ooze, or a zombie, what the bard is mocking is not the mindless thing in front of it, but (say) Juiblex, or Orcus.

Sure, I get that pemerton doesn't need to apply stringent scrutiny in a non-sim game. But just because I aim for sim-oriented play, I hope I'm not being beholden to some ludicrous level of fidelity to realism. Because that would be a failure to understand the sim agenda in D&D.

To put it into plain words, when you invest so much time and effort into comprehensive real-life biophysics references, it implies to me a concern that I may have some sort of hole in my understanding that needs filling. The alternative is to have written something simple like "Huge insects are impossible in real-life, but possible in fantasy -- what terminology would you use to label that?" and just trust us to know about the science.

We reskinned her Eldritch Blast as a "ray of truth" that deals psychic damage. She's driven NPCs insane by forcing them to deal with the emotional impact of the multitude of their own lies over a lifetime, all at once. I think the fact that she could not use her Eldritch Blast against the centipede scuttler who was coming for her gave that reskinning meaning.

That makes sense to me. In my ideal "let's pretend" playstyle, the desired fiction or worldbuilding calls the shots and the mechanics are the rules of engagement. Not being able to use the ray of truth would be a feel good moment for me, even if it's self-crippling in a gamist way, because it validates and reinforces the intent of the playstyle. The 4E RAW treatment would bother me very much by overruling that.

 

[D'karr]

My own limits on "realism" I suppose exist but for the most part D&D prior to 4e didn't have a problem and I'd say 95% of the powers in 4e didn't have a problem.

In all editions of DnD that rate has probably been sustained for me. About 95% of the "rules" I don't have a problem with. Then there is that "bothersome" 5%.

The "problem", those of us that want to understand where you are coming from have, is that you mention that in prior editions you had no problem, but with 4e 5% of the powers give you a problem.

What did you do in prior editions with "rules" that gave you problems. For me the other 5% I either ignored, modified, or adjusted my expectations for. It's just a game after all, nobody is going to die if I do it "wrong."

Dissociative Mechanics are about the player and character being driven apart.

Okay, for the purpose of what you are saying I'll use that definition. Then you go on to make this assertion.

For me though I have no problem telling that a daily martial attack is dissociative and hit points are not.

If Disassociative Mechanics, according to your definition, are when a character and a player are driven apart, I'd appreciate it if you could explain what function of HP is NOT disassociative, by that definition. The character has no "connection" except mechanically to HP. HP is completely a metagame construct. It's not a resource that he (the character) can use or replenish, like filling up a waterskin. It's not something that he (the character) can decide to expend in any way. What is the "connection" in this case that exists, on the character side? I can understand how a player interacts with HP, but what is the interaction from the character side?

By the same token the character doesn't know anything about the metagame construct called a daily or encounter power. The player understands it and interacts with it at the metagame level. In the "game fiction" the character doesn't know anything about daily, or encounter powers, levels, initiative, XP, HP, AC, speed, or any of the hundreds of metagame constructs that the game provides.

It would be quite jarring if the characters talked to each other in the "game fiction" and said things like, "Dude, I just blew my Initiative roll." "Man you really kicked ass when you spent Come and Get It." "That was some awesome Fireball, how many points of damage did you do with that?" Or discussed things as characters such as, "I only have 2 hit points left, come heal me!!" It is assumed that all that "talk" is happening Out of Character. It's happening at the metagame level.

So when someone makes a statement such as "I have no problem telling that a daily martial attack is dissociative and hit points are not", it seems quite strange. If one is disassociative because it drives the player and character apart, I don't see how the other one wouldn't.

 

[Hussar]

Apropos of nothing relating to the thread at large, but this strikes me as odd, given that the 4e Bard powers are all explicitly spells, and would -- I tend to think -- have the same exclusion from the requirement for a believable rationale as is normally afforded to wizard, sorcerer, warlock, swordmage, and artificer powers. The bard is "just casting a spell" that has the described effect (including, possibly, a weapon attack component to the spell).

Just a random thought, though.

Oh, hey, I totally admit this is my proud nail. It's not a knock on the mechanics at all. I just can't wrap my head around how the bard is presented. Maybe if it was more like the 3e Truenamer, I'd have less of an issue.

But, yeah, it's my "thing" entirely.

 

[Hussar]

I had to go look up Rain of Blows; I don't know 4e well. Rain of Blows is associated -- the character has an ability to "turn up the heat" as it were. He knows it, it conforms to the genre, and he can take advantage of the ability. The only disassociated point is the recovery.

Imagine a scenario where the character uses RoB in round one killing his opponent and is stuck on a overlook watching the rest of the combat and resting. Two minutes later, a demon teleports up to him and the character is still too tired from his single action to repeat it, but finds he can still do <insert other heavy strenuous activity like encounter powers, daily powers, or stunts>. The character can't say "I'm too tired" because he can do more intense stuff still. How does the character rationalise his inability to perform that one move?

My preference would have recovery mechanisms that tie into the nature of the power and world fiction rather than simple flat periods, but the game designers wanted consistent game elements more than associated elements. I can wink at encounter powers if I need to, but I find they're pretty gamist.

But, that's because you are insisting that there is one and only one explanation for why you can't use an encounter power twice. It could simply be that the opening for Rain of Blows doesn't occur in this second combat. The "It's too strenuous" reason is only one of many. In a process sim game, sure, that would be the one and only reason and it would apply all the time. Presuming, of course, that the process-sim is inflexible enough that you can only have one explanation ever. That certainly doesn't have to be the case.

I have to say though, that this particular example is something I can see coming up more often than, say, knocking the jelly prone (is that the cousin of jumping the shark? ). Stringing encounters together like this does happen fairly often.

But, is that really damaging to immersion? The character has many powers, Rain of Blows being only one of them. But, not having RoB for this part of the encounter can make that encounter more exciting - after all, it increases the danger. Maybe after this second encounter, a third one gets strung in without a short rest.

Now, we're in desperate straits. Second wind is likely gone, most, if not all encounters and dailies are spent and we're down to mostly basic attacks and at-wills. But, again, this does work from a process sim standpoint. The longer the fight goes, the less go-juice the character has. He's gone from fighting trim to 9th round Rocky swaying on his feet and barely holding it together.

Isn't this a good thing?

Compare to 3e or earlier. Ignore the hit point loss for a second - maybe the character is getting fairly frequent hp recovery from various sources. String three encounters together. What's the difference between Round 1 Fighter and Round 15 Fighter? Other than hit points, there is nothing to distinguish those two points of time. The fighter shifts 5 feet and full attacks, round after round after round.

Isn't this actually somewhat counter to process sim play? Shouldn't there be some sort of fatigue kicking in? But, pre-4e had no fatigue rules (other than straight up HP, but, you die when those run out). 4e doesn't have specific fatigue rules, but, with Daily and Encounter powers, you can certainly get the same effect. There is a significant difference between the every character in the party (not just the casters) between round 1 and round 15.

Again, isn't this a good thing?

 

[Shadeydm]

I think this depends heavily on what you mean by "roleplaying". I don't think the 4e mechanics encourage rich descriptions of what a PC is doing (unless page 42 is in play). But nor do earier editions of D&D.

In my experience (since about 1982) this was unique to 4E play.

On the other hand, I see much roleplaying in 4e combat in the form of actor stance decisions that are expressed both through actions taken and incharacter statements made: to other PCs; to NPCs and monsters; etc. And I think there are distinct features of 4e - especially the obvious effort to embed many facets of PC build, and most of the monsters, within a conflict-rich csomology - that conduce to this.

As described by the poster I originally quoted, in combat there was the announcement of the power. Roleplaying speaking in character etc waits until the battle is over not by choice or design thats just how the game seems to play. This was never my experience in earlier editions. It not a bad thing but its not the sort of game I prefer to run so I am only a 4E player and stopped DMing once we switched editions.

 

[D'karr]

dup

 

[D'karr]

In my experience (since about 1982) this was unique to 4E play.

I haven't seen this much when I, as the DM, used vivid description.

As described by the poster I originally quoted, in combat there was the announcement of the power. Roleplaying speaking in character etc waits until the battle is over not by choice or design thats just how the game seems to play. This was never my experience in earlier editions. It not a bad thing but its not the sort of game I prefer to run so I am only a 4E player and stopped DMing once we switched editions.

I believe this is entirely table dependent. My descriptions of combat, as a DM, can run the gamut from detailed description, to XX to AC and YY Damage.

I've had players describe in detail how they slide across a table and shoot across the room at the goblins, I've had players simply say, I attack AC 23, 20 points of damage, and I've had players simply say I attack with Tide of Iron.

Just as players in previous editions would describe or not describe to taste, and the player playing the Magic-User could describe casting in detail, simply say I cast Magic Missile, or I attack the darkness.

Nothing much has changed with my group of players in that respect.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Oh, hey, I totally admit this is my proud nail. It's not a knock on the mechanics at all. I just can't wrap my head around how the bard is presented. Maybe if it was more like the 3e Truenamer, I'd have less of an issue.

But, yeah, it's my "thing" entirely.

Weapon and armor weights, comparable uses, rate of fire--those kinds of things are my proud nail. I can grin and bear it with D&D because I know why they did it that way. And I can even appreciate it as a game design element. But I have to keep the details somewhat at a distance during play, or it just starts to annoy the heck out of me. This is pretty much true in any edition of D&D.

 

[Manbearcat]

Well this clears up why you are talking past so many of us. A lot of us are using simulationist in the GNS sense and not the sense you defined above. I can see why you keep going back to realism arguments. I could care less if a game as either of the above to be honest.

Sorry, I've learned my lesson from the waste of time adopting the 'process sim' label that turned out not to be process-sim; I'll leave those label discussions to those who enjoy that kind of thing.

To address both of these simultaneously because I'm clueless how these two paragraphs have come into being.

I'll ask Underman first: When did the "process sim" label turn out to not be "process-sim"? The moment that Underman erroneously said the above paragraph? Is that the moment? Because he is most certainly incorrect. My "Unabridged" definition of Simulation and Process Simulation are the orthodox definitions used in modeling and is the "Unabridged" definition of Ron Edwards GNS theory. I even went on later (in my post depicting how I "changed my expectations and playstyle:" - which Underman prompted after asking why I lowered my expectations and I obliged him a complete answer in good faith) to describe the very specific genre Simulation of "High Fantasy World Married to Real World Physics By Way of Strict, Rigid, Linear Process-Sim."


Here you are (straight from Wikepedia):

Simulationism

Simulationism refers to a style of play where the main agenda is the recreation of, or inspiration by, the observed characteristics of a particular genre or set of source material. Physical reality might count as source material for these purposes, but so might superhero anthologies, or any other literary, cinematic or historical milieu. Its most frequent concerns are internal consistency, analysis or modeling of cause and effect, and informed speculation or even extrapolation to the point of satire. Often characterised by concern for the minutiae of physical interaction and details of setting.

That is, quite literally, the exact, abridged version of what I wrote but narrowed solely to the Simulation within RPGing specifically while my definition was the broad definition of Simulation (which encompasses the sub-genre of Simulation in RPG) and modelling generally.

Process-Sim (again) is the modeling of phenomena at the micro-level (singular task resolution and the physics that underpin interactions within the implied setting in DnD) in order to parameterize the greater Simulation.

This is what Simulation is and this is what Process-Sim is. I have no idea what Emerikol is talking about because he refusing to answer rejoinders to his position and he refuses to get specific despite coming to this board and asserting his want to engage (and I just provided him a framework to do so and again, he appears to be declining)...and refusing to do so over and over again...and then ringing his hands and playing the misunderstood Alpha amidst a group of Deltas. Its getting tiresome. I answered his specific request, definitively and with precision, and where is the response?

But I will ask you why you're even thinking about that kind of thing in D&D, or this kind of thing:

when pemerton gets to get away with this kind of thing: Sure, I get that pemerton doesn't need to apply stringent scrutiny in a non-sim game. But just because I aim for sim-oriented play, I hope I'm not being beholden to some ludicrous level of fidelity to realism. Because that would be a failure to understand the sim agenda in D&D.

pemerton "gets away with it" because pemerton is advocating Outcome-Based Sim. Definitionally I would not hold it to the requirements of Process-Sim where, in order for the Greater Simulation to have fidelity to the world being modeled, the implied setting and each task resolution must have a coherent, internally consistent, granular coupling of cause and effect. Outcome-Based-Sim is not bound by this imperative...at all. It is trying to accomplish something entirely different - Emulate genre...not model/simulate it.

To put it into plain words, when you invest so much time and effort into real-life biophysics references, it implies to me that I have some sort of hole in my understanding. The alternative is to have written something simple like "Huge insects are impossible in real-life, but possible in fantasy -- what terminology would you use to label that?" and just trust us to know about the science.

That makes sense to me. In my ideal "let's pretend" playstyle, the desired fiction or worldbuilding calls the shots and the mechanics are the rules of engagement. Not being able to use the ray of truth would be a feel good moment for me, even if it's self-crippling in a gamist way, because it validates and reinforces the intent of the playstyle. The 4E RAW treatment would bother me very much by overruling that.

You invoke "world-building". That is extremely important here and why I cringe at this "physics-based" incoherencies in the implied setting when I want good Simulation and its corresponding Process-Sim. These two things cannot exist in the same INTERNALLY CONSISTENT PHYSICS WITHIN THE IMPLIED SETTING (which is required for a proper Simulationist experience when you are Simulating "High Fantasy World Married to Real World Physics By Way of Strict, Rigid, Linear Process-Sim.":

1) Dragons and Large creatures and Arthropods and the Ability Score Model utterly violating/ignoring Real-World Gravity, Real-World Friction, Real-World Drag, Real-World Kinesiology.

2) Mundane, Martial Characters must abide by, and be limited to, Real-World Gravity, Real-World Friction, Real-World Drag, Real-World Kinesiology.

When the Physics of the world do not have Internal Consistency, the Simulation fails its most fundamental litmus test. Beyond that, I see people wanting to hand-wave/ignore the existence of 1 while DEMANDING the adherence to 2 and then maintaining the position that they are somehow Simulating a "High Fantasy World Married to Real World Physics By Way of Strict, Rigid, Linear Process-Sim." They flat out aren't. Which is why pemerton gets a pass. And why my expectations aren't lowered. We are not producing Simulationist Games. Our task resolution is not resolved by way of linear, strict coupling of Process (cause) > Outcome (effect). It is Outcome (effect) period...and post-hoc rationale for Process (cause) if relevant to our fiction. Because of this we are not 100 % constrained by internal consistency of the physics of a real-world model married to High Fantasy. We are not having our cake (1) while eating it too (2). We don't care about those things. We are Emulating Heroic Action Adventure Scenes and Fiction...which doesn't concern itself with the granularity and internal consistency demands of real-world physics and the causes (Processes) that trigger effects (Outcomes).

If you need further clarification, see my last post to you regarding Simulation versus Emulation and Process-Sim versus Outcome-Based-Sim if you need further clarification.

We seem to be getting nowhere and you've questioned my "good faith" a few times now while I think I've put a lot of effort into being polite to you and trying to clarify our differences...and I seem to be getting mostly snark in return. I even apologized (when I certainly didn't need to) when you unfairly called me out for your perception of my "bad faith" and that I'm being an "armchair academic". I think it would probably be best if we just discontinue this exchange.