You're doing what? Surprising the DM

[pemerton]

"True King" is not vaguely defined. To be the true king, you must be by the laws of nature and man the one who is king.

If that is your view, you can't GM the BW game under discussion. This would come out in the preplay, when you made it clear to the player in question that you weren't prepared to run a game in which certain theories of monarchy were not taken as given.

For an account of the conceptual space in which views about "true kingship" can become more open, and hence the game becomes playable, see my lengthy response to [MENTION=6681948]N'raac[/MENTION].

As to whether BW is No Myth, it is not fully No Myth - the game has backstory - but it is No Myth to a high degree, as the game mechanics like Wises and Circles only work if backstory starts very loose and open ready to be filled in play; and resolution of failures per "Intent and Task" also requirs a very loose backstory at the start that is filled in via play.

That filling in of backstory is also part of what drives the game towards culmination - as the backstory is filled in, the room to move (both for participants at the table, and hence for PCs in the fictin) becomes less, the stakes therefore become higher (there is less and less room in front of you in which to "fail forward") and we can see the endgame approaching.

4e builds up the same story pressure in quite a different way - by adapting the traditional D&D idea of levelling into a combination of pacing mechanic and story scaling mechanic: as you level, the story is no longer about dealing with kobolds, but dealing with Tiamat - and when you deal with Tiamat again there is not much room in the fiction to "fail forward"! Of course you could reskin 4e so that epic level critters were still mere mortal, worldly entities - 4e Dark Sun does that to some degree. My own view is that this waters down the game, though - not fatally, but noticeably. Intead of having a story meaning, level at that point is simply an index of greater PC complexity. Given the effects of the level scaling on success probabilities (ie they basically don't change), it becomes more-or-less a functional variant of E6.

 

[pemerton]

To a certain extent I wonder why. There is a certain confusion in this. Let's say we are playing in setting inspired by Greek Myth, and a characer rides a horse to death in order to reach some destination for some reason. Later, the character is shipwrecked and offers a sacrifice to a priest seeking an Oracle, and the priest Communes and comes back and says, "You have illly treated a horse, and in doing so you have offended Poseidon who is wroth with you for taking so lightly the gifts he has provided of you. You must atone for your crime against the Sea God, or you will always have misfortune on the seas." In what sense does this confirm that the character was absolutely in the wrong and committed evil by riding the horse to death? Is Poseidon in a position of absolute priviledge with regards to morality?

No, there's no confusion. There are different religous frameworks. Your example presupposes a framework in which the gods are just further frail actors, with no particular moral insight. As per the Euthyphro, it is not the god's desires that make things good.

But there are conceptions of religion, and divine guidance, and the relationship between divinity and morality, that differ from the conception around Poseidon. And D&D, in it's treatment of divine characters as modelled on paladins, knights teplar, samurai etc draws on those other conceptions. They are what I had in mind in discussing my game.

For my own discussion of a case close to your Poseidon one, I refer you to my reply to [MENTION=6681948]N'raac[/MENTION], where I talk about a game involving monks defying the heavens. In that game the gods are just more frail beings. But the Buddhas are not - and can't be, if the game is to work. To bring them into play as NPCs, for instance, would be to completely pull the rug out from under those players, and thereby kill the campaign stone dead.

 

[Celebrim]

If that is your view, you can't GM the BW game under discussion.

??? Well, I guess that's that then. pemerton has spoken.

This would come out in the preplay, when you made it clear to the player in question that you weren't prepared to run a game in which certain theories of monarchy were not taken as given.

Err.... oh never mind. I've no more desire to argue the meaning of words like 'can't', 'believe', and 'monarchy' with you, and I think I've proved my points well enough just through all the contortions you are going through here. But one last one...

But there are conceptions of religion, and divine guidance, and the relationship between divinity and morality, that differ from the conception around Poseidon. And D&D, in it's treatment of divine characters as modelled on paladins, knights teplar, samurai etc draws on those other conceptions. They are what I had in mind in discussing my game.

Even if that was true, and I'd advise you to look to things like 'The Magicians' by Lev Grossman and 'His Dark Materials' by Phillip Pullman for counter examples that I think show that regardless of the cosmological framework those questions of whether the judgment of the gods is unquestionable can still be put into play, I don't think I've ever encountered a game of D&D in 30 years that was monotheistic or even dualistic in cosmological fact. All were unvaryingly loosely based on (usually European) polytheism and all presented deities which - to the extent that there are stories about those gods and they matter within the campaign - are in their mythic conceptions and activities the equivalent to the Olympians in moral fallability. For example, in probably the best known published D&D setting, the story of the Gods that is most well known to the players is that the were judged morally deficient by the auditors of the divine, and it is revealed that many are former mortals and fallable therefore in every sense. This is the confusion that I spoke of. What you have in mind seems to be less a natural consequence of D&D play, than at best assumptions about D&D play based on a small number of incidents or some other such thing. My point being that, even if you want to quibble with this post, even once I've got you to concede that "Well, yes, for the purposes of Poseidon, these things don't stop a campaign dead even by my standards.", we've pretty much proven the point that all of your claims about moral investigation being impossible by any other framework than what you've been espousing are out of play. And it's not like Poseiden himself wasn't right there in the orginal Dieties and Demigods rulebook. Having a natural definition of 'true king' as it is normally defined in law and heroic fantasy doesn't prevent us exploring a story about a true king (or someone that for some reason thinks he is a 'true king') that doesn't have his rightful throne. Beyond that, I'm tired of arguing.

 

[Hussar]

But the GM needs to present the desired scenes. If he doesn't know what scenes you desire and don't, he can't do so effectively. And it seems like your "not desired" scenes are pretty unpredictable from where I sit - 80+ pages of several of us trying to understand why you differentiate between desert and siege seems to bear that out. Even now we're getting a "oh, it's not the desert travel I object to but the Ride Skill minutia" clarification, so we're obviously still not clear on which scenes you dislike so much you can't abide to even consider playing them out.

All this means is that if I were to sit at your table, I would play core casters only. That way I know that I could retain the ability to control pacing within the framework of the game and you would have no problems with it. I know that if I were to play a non-core caster, I would simply be frustrated and likely leave the game as I am forced, yet again, to somehow justify my preferences to you, and you are apparently incapable of understanding them.

I would say that the DM would know the desired scene by actually LISTENING to the players. When the players say, hey we don't like scene X, don't do scene X. When they play through scenes A through W, then it's probably not a problem. If the players have a goal, then maybe focusing on that goal is a good idea.

But, just to flog the equine one last time.

The Difference Between the Desert Scenario and the Siege Scenario

In the desert scenario, we can completely skip the scenario with an application of in-game resources and you would be perfectly fine with it. We could land at one side of the desert, teleport and arrive at our goal and that is perfectly fine. Once we arrive at our goal, any and all encounters within the desert scenario are rendered completely irrelevant unless the DM adds in additional information to send us back out into the desert. The desert becomes scenery through the simple application of character resources. The nomads, the giant scorpions, whatever, cannot be interacted with from inside the desert. And, without additional information, the players have no reason for even trying to interact with elements in the desert since they don't know those elements even exist.

Now, the siege is again bypassed by a teleport spell. That's true. But, that last bit about the desert is where the difference really enters into it. The players can certainly interact with the siege without any further prompting from the DM. They know the siege is there, they can see it. If they choose to interact with the siege, they can certainly do so. It's entirely in the hands of the players. The players are now empowered to make informed choices, or at least fairly educated guesses.

Could the DM have a besieged city where the siege has absolutely no effect on the inside of the city? Sure. But, then, why would you bother having a siege in the first place? Other than as a fairly clumsy roadblock for a group that lacks teleport, I suppose. A DM has to pretty actively work to make the siege completely irrelevant to events in the city. Most sieges do have pretty strong effects on the besieged and most players are probably going to expect that there would be effects.

The difference between the desert and the siege, for me, boils down to empowering player choices. The desert is 100% reactive. The players have no choices to make. They cannot search out for nomads that they don't know exist, they can only react to the nomads that the DM throws in their path. They cannot search out for a hostage they don't know exist, they can only react when the DM throws that in their path. But they can certainly choose to interact with a siege in some fashion. They can see it right there. They know it exists and they can assume a number of things - hardship in the city, leadership of both the siege camp and the besieged city who have needs and wants that the party could choose to interact with. Danger and quite likely a time pressure as well can certainly be implied or outright stated.

I mean, you arrive at Helms Deep with a sea of orcs pounding on the gates. Are you really going to tell me that the orcs are irrelevant to the party if there is something in Helms Deep that they need?

 

[Nagol]

I get most of what you're saying Hussar with a couple of exceptions.

The PCs can bypass the siege because it is colour too. If the PCs puzzle out something that leads them to make educated guess that interaction would be fruitful, that's OK -- good even. But if the PCs puzzle out something that leads them to make educated guess that interaction with the desert would be fruitful, that's bad and contrived and just the DM being spiteful.

I really don't see the difference once the PCs get to a location where information can be gained about which colour will be beneficial to engage with and why one colour is better than the other. At that point, you're past both -- or easily could be.

And the orcs at Helm's Deep are completely irrelevant if the PCs want them to be, are properly prepared to bypass them, achieves their goal, and leaves. I've done similar in campaign play a few times. The orcs only become relevant if the PCs care about the inhabitants, the orcs, or the structure itself.

 

[Drowbane]

"Would this work?" "How would this work if I did...?"

 

[Jackinthegreen]

"Would this work?" "How would this work if I did...?"

"What resources or tools would I need to make this work?"

 

[Manbearcat]

I think a portion of this winding, multi-premised conversation is about Setting and Situation establishment; both in who has the power to do so, how it should be done and when it should be done.

You've got High Resolution Setting. The when; almost exclusively established completely beforehand. The how; typically grounded in earth-system extrapolation and inference with some genre influence and driven by granular process simulation or high concept simulation replete with intricate cosmology, chronology, regional (inter-regional) politics, technology, infrastructure, macro and micro topography, economy and climate, etc. Setting transcends Situation as establishment of the illusion of a "living, breathing world" carrying on external to the PCs is paramount. The who is almost universally and totally the GM.

You've got Low Resolution Setting. The when; a hybrid of zoomed out, low resolution generated before play with the zoomed in, high resolution details established during play. The how; genre-physics and logic (at least in my situation) are the primary driver here in that the Setting details that are fleshed out beforehand are typically reduced to what is necessary to color Situation and provoke characters within those Situations. The details that emerge in play during Situation resolution in-fill the cracks, serving to increase the Setting resolution. The who of the Low Resolution portion is typically split with GM as majority author while the High Resolution portion is typically split with players as majority authors.

Then you've got No Myth Setting which is a more extreme version of Low Resolution whereby most of the intuitive continuity of Setting is established during play via Situation resolution and hindcasting.


There is definitely a lot of tug-of-war over Setting approach here. In the same vein we have the tug-of-war over who has the authority to establish/frame Situation, how it should be resolved (techniques and system) and when should Situation be Action versus Transition.

If we have a:

- High Resolution Desert
- that through GM Situation establishment, it possesses no immediate, clearly delineated association to meta-goal (whatever is of consequence in the city) beyond geo-location/proximity relative to players:city; eg positioned between them,
- when is it reasonable for a player to veto the GM's establishment of Situation and request desert as Action Scene be shunted to Transition Scene?

And how does a Low Resolution Setting and No Myth Setting change that answer.

 

[Hussar]

I get most of what you're saying Hussar with a couple of exceptions.

The PCs can bypass the siege because it is colour too. If the PCs puzzle out something that leads them to make educated guess that interaction would be fruitful, that's OK -- good even. But if the PCs puzzle out something that leads them to make educated guess that interaction with the desert would be fruitful, that's bad and contrived and just the DM being spiteful.

I really don't see the difference once the PCs get to a location where information can be gained about which colour will be beneficial to engage with and why one colour is better than the other. At that point, you're past both -- or easily could be.

And the orcs at Helm's Deep are completely irrelevant if the PCs want them to be, are properly prepared to bypass them, achieves their goal, and leaves. I've done similar in campaign play a few times. The orcs only become relevant if the PCs care about the inhabitants, the orcs, or the structure itself.

Oh, sure, the PC's could ignore the siege, to some extent, presuming that the orcs don't come busting through the walls while the PC's are in the city. But, the point is, the players get the choice. It's up to the players to determine just how important the siege is. If they want to just skip over the siege, they certainly can.

But the desert is different in that there is nothing for the players to puzzle out. You're in a desert. You want to go to the city over there. What puzzling out is there? There's no reason for the players to start interacting with the desert unless the DM starts bombing reasons in there. IOW, the PC's without any additions from the DM, will only ignore the desert. Even if the DM doesn't do anything with the siege, the players can certainly choose to interact with it.

Put it another way. As a player, can I tell the DM, "I want to explore the desert to find nomads that live here" without knowing that there are nomads in this desert in the first place? Can I assume nomads? Can I assume giant scorpions? Besides sand and rock, what can I assume?

With the siege, I can assume all sorts of things - leaders, hardships, soldiers, lots of things to interact with. I don't really need to ask if they exist - they're going to be there because it would be pretty difficult to have a siege without them. If I want to go find the leaders of the siege, I simply tell the DM that I'm looking for the leaders and we can run with that. It's entirely player driven.

Without knowing what's in the desert first, what can the players drive?

 

[JamesonCourage]

The Difference Between the Desert Scenario and the Siege Scenario

Here we go again!

In the desert scenario, we can completely skip the scenario with an application of in-game resources and you would be perfectly fine with it. We could land at one side of the desert, teleport and arrive at our goal and that is perfectly fine. Once we arrive at our goal, any and all encounters within the desert scenario are rendered completely irrelevant unless the DM adds in additional information to send us back out into the desert. The desert becomes scenery through the simple application of character resources. The nomads, the giant scorpions, whatever, cannot be interacted with from inside the desert. And, without additional information, the players have no reason for even trying to interact with elements in the desert since they don't know those elements even exist.

With you so far.

Now, the siege is again bypassed by a teleport spell. That's true. But, that last bit about the desert is where the difference really enters into it. The players can certainly interact with the siege without any further prompting from the DM. They know the siege is there, they can see it. If they choose to interact with the siege, they can certainly do so. It's entirely in the hands of the players. The players are now empowered to make informed choices, or at least fairly educated guesses.

Well, the players can interact with the desert. Including seeking out information about it, exploring it, divining about it, etc.

Could the DM have a besieged city where the siege has absolutely no effect on the inside of the city? Sure. But, then, why would you bother having a siege in the first place? Other than as a fairly clumsy roadblock for a group that lacks teleport, I suppose. A DM has to pretty actively work to make the siege completely irrelevant to events in the city. Most sieges do have pretty strong effects on the besieged and most players are probably going to expect that there would be effects.

But that's pretty beside the point. The point is that either one can be relevant or irrelevant.

The difference between the desert and the siege, for me, boils down to empowering player choices. The desert is 100% reactive. The players have no choices to make. They cannot search out for nomads that they don't know exist, they can only react to the nomads that the DM throws in their path. They cannot search out for a hostage they don't know exist, they can only react when the DM throws that in their path.

The cannot search for a siege they don't know exists, they can only react to one if the GM throws one in their path. Right?

But they can certainly choose to interact with a siege in some fashion. They can see it right there. They know it exists and they can assume a number of things - hardship in the city, leadership of both the siege camp and the besieged city who have needs and wants that the party could choose to interact with. Danger and quite likely a time pressure as well can certainly be implied or outright stated.

All of these can be applied to the desert. It can be especially hot, cold, barren, hostile, filled with sandstorms or monsters, or whatever. They know the desert is there, and can know these things about it, and the implications that these things would bring to a city situated in it. The players can certainly interact with the desert willingly.

And, no, they can't interact with the nomads or sandstorm until the GM brings it up or puts it in their path. In what way is the siege different? Like you pointed out, they cannot interact with it until the GM puts it in their path.

I mean, you arrive at Helms Deep with a sea of orcs pounding on the gates. Are you really going to tell me that the orcs are irrelevant to the party if there is something in Helms Deep that they need?

Or if there's a giant sandstorm, and the gates are closed and everyone is locked down? But that's different, I guess. But I still can't see why. As always, play what you like