On the Creative Crocodile Conundrum

Are modern gamers objectively less creative than old-school gamers?

Here over at Monsters and Manuals, Noisms discusses some of the agency-sucking, mind-reading, poorly presented, 'Gotcha!' ideals that make up some of the 4thcore adventures.

Noisms postulated a problem that could be solved creatively in a variety of different ways. A treasure hoard is on the other side of the room, with a channel in the middle filled with crocodiles.

One of the posters responds:
"Conversely, any realistic solution to the crocodile problem is going to involve someone being fast enough or strong enough to do something at some point - it's also a skill check scenario (even if it boils down to the good old OSR dodge of the GM rolling a percentage chance - that's still a skill check, just a very arbitrary one)."

I do not think this point of view is uncommon—that the only solutions for problems are skill solutions. A short word about old-school play.

A dice roll in an old-school game is only made when the outcome of an action absolutely cannot be decided by agreement or fiat.

You don't roll to climb up to a ledge or a wall, get out of a pit, ride the horse up the mountain, tie up the prisoner, or jump off the horse; YOU DON'T NEED TO ROLL TO FEED THE CROCODILES POISONED MEAT or have your unseen servant bring the treasure over, you don't need to roll to climb over the channel, or to throw the bag across the channel or any one of a hundred different solutions.

Some actual dice rolls may be required for some of the solutions—but they will most definitely not require only strength or speed. Sure, if you cast web or sleep, the crocodiles will get a save. Sure, if you have the ranger attempt to calm the beasts, they may get a reaction roll.

A roll for discovery is different than a roll for allowing the player not to play.

I know the cliché of the young player looking at his sheet and going "There's nothing on here that lets me solve this problem" is a cliché because it occurs often, but the comment above got me thinking. It occurs a lot—personally—to me—in many of the games I ran. Players who only want to follow the main hook, players who wonder how they can tie someone up without the use rope skill, and even players who can only have relationships with NPC's if there are rules for romance. (No, not my current groups)

So are new school players just objectively less creative? Is it part of the generational issue of millennials having a fear of doing anything that's not explicitly permitted by authority sources? Why is the above sort of response so common? And really, as DM's, what can we do about their lack of creativity in problem-solving without holding their hands and giving them a half dozen ideas for solutions? Is this the same lack of creativity bemoaned by Gygax and Kuntz after the publication of classic D&D, or something different?

But thieves need to make a skill check to climb walls!

No, they don't. Anyone can climb walls. Just like anyone can hide or move around quietly. Thieves can climb unclimbable walls or normal walls unreasonably quickly. They can hide in the very shadows themselves and move so quietly that you never hear them until the knife enters your back.

Just because there is a resolution method for an action doesn't mean you need to use it—you don't make your players roll to kill unconscious opponents.

But if you don't make them roll, how will they ever fail?

The problem here is that you want the game to be a railroad. You don't want your players to decide what to do or how to solve a problem; you want to call for a skill check.

If you take off the safety rails and give them some freedom, you will be astounded at the bodies and rooms they forget to search and the actions they neglect to do. How many monsters or NPC's they leave on the ground unconscious to get up and get revenge another day.

I've got a post up about treasure generation. I put the opportunity for about 50,000 experience, 45,000 of which is treasure, to give the party the 10k total they need to reach the second level. Why is that? because they miss a full third or more of the treasure in the dungeon.

The fact is, if you don't lead them by the nose, player skill is a real thing they will need to have, and if they don't have player skill then they will fail.

The whole skill system is a crutch because it allows them to fail without feeling personally responsible, among other reasons.

Then you're just playing a guessing game! The whole session becomes about "Guess what the DM is thinking"!

If you tell the players what they need to know to solve the problem, they don't have to guess. They still have to solve the problem.

How come it's ok to use 'skill checks' for combat and not for something like talking to opponents?

Because at the table, I can't use my personal skill to swing an axe, but I can use my personal skill to convince a crocodile to let me pass.

Well, then how about I make my players lift something heavy when they want to bend bars, huh? Isn't that player skill?

Nice strawman, but as above—if we cannot agree or decide by fiat that you can't lift the gate, then a roll is required isn't it? This is a situation like "do I hit the monster" that is best decided by a die roll. Of course it's a continuum. I may know that the gate is latched closed, and no matter the level of your strength you will not be able to lift it, but you might be able to bend the bars.

If you use your skill to talk to the crocodile and there is no skill roll, then the DM just makes a decision—But you don't have any control over the DM's decisions! Without the dice to protect you, you'll just be railroaded into guessing what he's thinking all the time.

This is of course, another strawman—a misrepresentation of the actual process of play. The process of the DM making a decision comes down to discussion and agreement.

What does the party know about crocodiles in a skill light system?
The DM starts by asking if anyone is a druid or a ranger, but that's just where it begins.

Here is the important part - if anyone can come up with a reason that they would know something about crocodiles that is reasonable, then they do.

Reasonable how? By table consensus, but as always, the DM has the last word.

If your problem is that the DM can be unreasonable—let me assure you that more rules is not a solution to that problem.

How many solutions can you create to the Crocodile Conundrum problem?

Originally published 10/7/11

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On the Monster Conversation

This post was originally published on 6/2016. It is linked on the Links to Wisdom wiki

I read an excellent post on Dungeon Fantastic by Peter V. Dell'Orto about players negotiating with monsters. 

  

GURPS uses an objective mechanical interface for social encounters. This isn't too common in the old school world. It was really refreshing to hear from someone else using objective social mechanics in play. What's interesting is the wildly different experiences he has.

It, ostensibly, is about errors players make during negotiations with monsters. This is a whole knot of complexity, but I don't think anything players choose to do in play is an error because I don't have an outcome in mind.

Errors players make during negotiations:

• Not negotiating
• Negotiating from imagined strength
• Negotiating from weakness
• Demanding one-way trust

These points are expanded on in his post. Not negotiating is always fighting to the death. Negotiating from imagined strength is acting as if the monsters can't challenge the party. The original article is worth reading.

This doesn't match my experience of play at all. And it's not just with the groups that know me. My players are constantly aware of dangers. They know they can't do the above things. Well, they can, but it probably ends up with someone in the party dying.

Critical hits did this also this week with their piece "Realism vs. Genre Conventions" by guest poster Jon Lemich. He says:

"There’s an illusion of threat, but how often does the party really lose a fight? Even if the GM doesn’t fudge any die rolls, they’re still building encounters that are designed for your party to win. That’s illusionism, too; and so is fudging die rolls: The decision not to flee from combat against the wandering monster has no consequences if the GM fudges the dice to prevent a TPK from a pointless random encounter, but rolling behind the screen, the players don’t know you’re fudging the dice, so you preserve the tension if you do it we."

I feel like an alien on an alien planet.

Let's start at the top. How often does the party really lose a fight? I've been part of two total party kills since spring. Once as the Dungeon Master and once as a player. So, like, frequently?

Who is still building encounters designed for the party to win? I mean, pathfinder players, sure. Anyone who wants to run a combat gauntlet. But what part of "the party should win this encounter" is part of the design? The introductory adventure for 5th edition contains multiple deadly encounters. No one was expected to win the Venomfang fight.

Have we not exhaustively covered the territory of why random encounters aren't pointless? Haven't we exhaustively covered the topic of how players can tell that you're fudging dice, because you're not a trained actor/liar?

Negotiation

My experiences with the players and monster negotiations have been different. First, players talk with anything that isn't immediately attacking them, because talking is safer and more productive than fighting. They don't have to be encouraged to negotiate. It's usually the first thing they try to do. (In more than one instance, players have said, "It's attacking us? Are you sure we can't talk to it?". Once they even used their turn in combat, just to make sure that it wouldn't converse.)

Even when vastly outnumbering the opponents they choose to parley because of the risk that reinforcements could be called. They know they have a reputation and that even if an enemy is weak, there's always more enemies than party members.

Players are nervous around monsters because they never know what they can do. When you randomize abilities and have creatures like undead and dragons that can have unknown abilities players become very cautious.

Second, they never feel like they are so much stronger than the monsters that they can 'not negotiate'. I give them the target number of whatever they are trying to negotiate for; they don't choose to negotiate from imagined strength. And because of the way relationships work, I've seen them build trust with factions and individuals.

I'm not putting the blame on Peter here. Clearly the baseline expectation of most gamers is different and somewhat shocking when exposed to this different playstyle. Someone out there is creating encounters that the players are designed to win.

Even in my set encounters, there's a high variability in encounter numbers. It's possible they might run into only a few creatures, or maybe a lot of them. This isn't even counting wandering encounters from creatures nearby that might be attracted to the sounds of a fight or people talking, nor random encounters from creatures indigenous to the area.

I don't know about other people, but specifically what and how many are encountered is unknown to me. I decide the creatures, yes. But generally the range of the encounter goes from completely trivial to unwinnable fight.

What I am saying is that these aren't mistakes. They are natural outgrowths of behavior in the players due to their environment. I'm assuming Peter talks about these being mistakes because they aren't successful tactics for the players. But as a Dungeon Master, that's not my problem. My problem is running a responsive and living game world, which very quickly visits negative consequences on people who do such stupid things when talking to monsters.

I'm not talking about punishing anyone or playing "mother may I" or any of the other quick accusations. The incorrect assumption under the basis of the entire argument is that the dungeon master is the opponent they are negotiating with, rather than an impartial arbiter, and that bad things that happen to the characters are a reflection of the esteem and worth of the player. Neither of these are true. We are playing to find out what happens. 

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