There's no one 'modern' way of doing things, but I definitely think that a lack of randomness in character creation is a major marker of modern design sensibilities.

Old games: You get what you roll up.  Eg: OD&D, Traveller, BRP.

Modern Games: You create what you want. Eg: 4e D&D, Savage Worlds.

Quote from: Daddy Warpig;540121Poor DM's can be as big a problem at the gaming table as poor players.

Yes. Sometimes the person behind the screen is just an asshole without hope. In these cases replacing the DM is the only solution.

As far as novice DMs looking for guidance, heavier more structured rules do not give them the help that they actually need. Only one thing makes a good DM and that is running games, making mistakes, talking about them honestly with the players, and learning from them.

Extra rules are just a crutch that delay the inevitable. Sooner or later actual judgement calls will be needed and the quicker a new DM becomes used to dealing with them the better.

Problems with this include players who expect perfect performance out of the gate and are unwilling to assist novice DMs in building these skills, DMs who won't listen to the players and learn, or a combination of both. In short, the game is all about the people and people are the problem.

One thing that seems more prevalent in modern games is taking the fucking game too seriously. Nothing bad can happen to my carefully built special little snowflake, or else the DM responsible for it is an asshole. Seriously? Relax and play already and if your precious little character gets mangled roll up a new one and fucking game on.

Quote from: Daddy Warpig;540126You're correct, in part. It depends on what kind of bad GM you're dealing with. There are many varieties, and several of them such rules wouldn't help.

Dicks are dicks, no matter the game. If they're out to screw you over, the only solution that I can think of is to just move on.

Some GM's aren't adept at devising rules on-the-fly, or adjudicating poorly-written or conflicting rules at the game table, so clearly-written and internally consistent rules can actually help them.

(In fact, I'd go so far as to argue that poorly written, conflicting, or vague rules are an obstacle to all GM's. Some are more adept at dealing with them than others, thus how much of an obstacle they are varies from trivial to "I can't run this".)

I prefer clearly written rules that allow me maximal flexibility, because that's how I roll. (I like to learn how a game is intended to be run, then modify it to more closely match my own tastes.) That's not optimal for everyone.

I am not advocating poorly written or unclear rules. I am just not a fan of having minute sub systems or official answers for everything. For me it is much easier to have sets of broad principles I can apply as I run the game. For my tastes, 3e had a bit too much minutiae and (in my experience) handed too much ammo to rules lawyers. It wasn't a terrible system or anything but the two areas I had the most trouble was that and how optimization friendly it was.

The reason I found the skip williams quote striking, is he did sage advice and clearly brought that sensibility to the table. To me, the sage advice colum was iconic rules lawyering since (for thise who viewed it as an official decree---which most of us didn't) it created the need to look up and master official solutions to edge cases. I also prefer games that are not designed around the fear of the GM from hell (judging by the quotes provided there was a lot of that going on)----not a big fan of games designed to stop players from hell either.

(1) Notice that when asked about Rules lawyers, it is Skip who brings up arbitrary DMing as a counterpoint, and then pushes by pointing out how old designers were wrong. I guess you can add one and one yourselves: this is related for Skip, because there is some personal history behind this, and that goes back to the Greyhawk days.

(2) Only a rules lawyer would think you can fix bad DMing with rules. Rules don't fix people; people fix themselves. At the game table, this means communicating and trusting in each others' ability and willingness to get a great game going together and keep it that way. Without this, the game can only go down. No amount of rules will *ever* fix it for you.

And... I offer you proof of what I am talking about, posted by Old Geezer, aka Mike Mornard, who was a player of Castle Greyhawk at the time:

Quote from: Old Geezer;311458Okay, so Skip Williams finally admits he was one of the 13 year old kids who kept getting his character killed by Gary and Rob because he had his head up his ass.

Note the comment about "aribitrary and capricious GMs."  Good GMs aren't, and neither Gary nor Rob ever were.

About 1974 there was a sudden influx of younger high school age kids into Gary's mostly-adult game.  We are still seeing the aftereffects.

Also, I was Skip Williams' patrol leader in Boy Scouts too.

In the thread discussing this very same interview.

LOL Love this post of Melan too: Inane Bullshit from Sage Advice.

So my initial feel was right he did basically believe there was an adversarial relationship between player and DM and believed in neutering DM's any way possible.

Doesn't he know that more rules just equal more rules, not better?

Thanks for the links, Ben.

I went back and read the OP on that thread, and I think Skip (regardless of his real or perceived failings as a player) actually makes a decent case for tight rulesets and against GM fiat.

In my gaming table, the solution to the problem he poses -- bridging the gap between player expectation and GM rulings -- has always been founded on honesty and common sense.

Player: How deep is the chasm?

GM: You can't see its bottom.

Player: I want to jump the chasm. What are my chances?

GM: Here's how we'll do it. Roll 1d6+your Str bonus, and if you get a 5 or 6 you succeed. If you fail, roll a save vs. death ray and if you pass, you get a hold of a ledge or something. Fail both and you'll take falling damage.

Player: And how much is that?

GM: 1d6 for each 10'.

Player: But I can't see the bottom, right? I can't say whether this will kill me or not. Could be 2d6 or 10d6 or whatever.

GM: Right, you can't estimate its depth.

Player #2: Throw a pebble or something! Bob's an elf, he's got keen hearing.

And so on.

Adventuring does not always afford a character the chance to calculate his risks in great detail, but I expound to the players what I think their chances are, whenever I think that's reasonable for their characters to understand it.

I think it's just common sense, but YMMV.

Quote from: Marleycat;540200So my initial feel was right he did basically believe there was an adversarial relationship between player and DM and believed in neutering DM's any way possible.

Doesn't he know that more rules just equal more rules, not better?

The fact that Skip Williams held his position as "the Sage" for the Sage Advice column for FIFTEEN YEARS, providing official rulings on the most trivial matters, which really should have been answered (as Melan pointed out in the original thread) with a clean "grow some balls and make a ruling yourself already" in the first place, ought to answer your question.

Yeah. But Butcher is right most of this is handled by common sense. Though clear rules DO help. I know that I had to develop my common sense given I run Mage games and well rules aren't White Wolf's strength though they got alot better about it with the NWoD.

Quote from: The Butcher;540201Thanks for the links, Ben.

I went back and read the OP on that thread, and I think Skip (regardless of his real or perceived failings as a player) actually makes a decent case for tight rulesets and against GM fiat.

In my gaming table, the solution to the problem he poses -- bridging the gap between player expectation and GM rulings -- has always been founded on honesty and common sense.

Player: How deep is the chasm?

GM: You can't see its bottom.

Player: I want to jump the chasm. What are my chances?

GM: Here's how we'll do it. Roll 1d6+your Str bonus, and if you get a 5 or 6 you succeed. If you fail, roll a save vs. death ray and if you pass, you get a hold of a ledge or something. Fail both and you'll take falling damage.

Player: And how much is that?

GM: 1d6 for each 10'.

Player: But I can't see the bottom, right? I can't say whether this will kill me or not. Could be 2d6 or 10d6 or whatever.

GM: Right, you can't estimate its depth.

Player #2: Throw a pebble or something! Bob's an elf, he's got keen hearing.

And so on.

Adventuring does not always afford a character the chance to calculate his risks in great detail, but I expound to the players what I think their chances are, whenever I think that's reasonable for their characters to understand it.

I think it's just common sense, but YMMV.

But....but....this doesn't provide the player with a chance to influence the narrative by coming up with a reason the gap is narrower where he wants to jump. How on earth is any player supposed to feel like a proper protagonist if he/she is perpetually stuck in actor stance.

Intolerable. :rolleyes:

Sure, the accessibility of the rules set will help in some general sense. Though I found that, personally, writing an RPG core book as a manual to use a toaster oven is not automatically the best way to go about it. The counter-example coming to my mind is in fact the 1e DMG, which is written with Gary Gygax's voice, as though he was talking from one DM to another, providing advice and insight on a variety of topics, with the clear understanding that in the end, you will be the one making the decisions at the game table.

Quote from: Dungeon Masters Guide's AfterwordIT IS THE SPIRIT OF THE GAME, NOT THE LETTER OF THE RULES, WHICH IS IMPORTANT. NEVER HOLD TO THE LETTER WRITTEN, NOR ALLOW SOME BARRACKS ROOM LAWYER TO FORCE QUOTATIONS FROM THE RULE BOOK UPON YOU, IF IT GOES AGAINST THE OBVIOUS INTENT OF THE GAME. AS YOU HEW THE LINE WITH RESPECT TO CONFORMITY TO MAJOR SYSTEMS AND UNIFORMITY OF PLAY IN GENERAL, ALSO BE CERTAIN THE GAME IS MASTERED BY YOU AND NOT BY YOUR PLAYERS. WITHIN THE BROAD PARAMETERS GIVEN IN THE ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS VOLUMES, YOU ARE CREATOR AND FINAL ARBITER. BY ORDERING THINGS AS THEY SHOULD BE, THE GAME AS A WHOLE FIRST, YOUR CAMPAIGN NEXT, AND YOUR PARTICIPANTS THEREAFTER, YOU WILL BE PLAYING ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS AS IT WAS MEANT TO BE. MAY YOU FIND AS MUCH PLEASURE IN SO DOING AS THE REST OF US DO!

All caps in the original text.

Quote from: The Butcher;540201Thanks for the links, Ben.

I went back and read the OP on that thread, and I think Skip (regardless of his real or perceived failings as a player) actually makes a decent case for tight rulesets and against GM fiat.

In my gaming table, the solution to the problem he poses -- bridging the gap between player expectation and GM rulings -- has always been founded on honesty and common sense.

Player: How deep is the chasm?

GM: You can't see its bottom.

Player: I want to jump the chasm. What are my chances?

GM: Here's how we'll do it. Roll 1d6+your Str bonus, and if you get a 5 or 6 you succeed. If you fail, roll a save vs. death ray and if you pass, you get a hold of a ledge or something. Fail both and you'll take falling damage.

Player: And how much is that?

GM: 1d6 for each 10'.

Player: But I can't see the bottom, right? I can't say whether this will kill me or not. Could be 2d6 or 10d6 or whatever.

GM: Right, you can't estimate its depth.

Player #2: Throw a pebble or something! Bob's an elf, he's got keen hearing.

And so on.

Adventuring does not always afford a character the chance to calculate his risks in great detail, but I expound to the players what I think their chances are, whenever I think that's reasonable for their characters to understand it.

I think it's just common sense, but YMMV.

But this (if I understand it) is different from what Skip seemed to be suggesting. You are merely providing tranparent communication between GMs and Players so everyone is on the same page (i.e. I am going to roll this die and on a 17 you will be hit and take damage). Even if you are making on the fly judgment call, this can be done by informating the players about your judgment process. I think this is certainly a valid approach and I do similar things at critical moments where I don't want any misunderstandings. But Skip appears to be more in the strict rules lawyer camp of codifying everything so the players can use that against the GM making his own judgment calls. The problem here is two fold: you can't codify everything (attempting to do so creates a massive system requiring system mastery) and shifting the rules like that into the player's camp takes away the GMs ability to adjudicate (and that is critical to actual play). Few rules will cover every situation perfectly and one of the key jobs of the GM is to make sure the rules and the situations line up in a way that is satisfactory.

Quote from: Benoist;540207Sure, the accessibility of the rules set will help in some general sense. Though I found that, personally, writing an RPG core book as a manual to use a toaster oven is not automatically the best way to go about it. The counter-example coming to my mind is in fact the 1e DMG, which is written with Gary Gygax's voice, as though he was talking from one DM to another, providing advice and insight on a variety of topics, with the clear understanding that in the end, you will be the one making the decisions at the game table.

"BY ORDERING THINGS AS THEY SHOULD BE, THE GAME AS A WHOLE FIRST, YOUR CAMPAIGN NEXT, AND YOUR PARTICIPANTS THEREAFTER, YOU WILL BE PLAYING ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS AS IT WAS MEANT TO BE. "

The part I have referenced above is where I differ with Gary. As the sole arbiter of my game what the heck do I care about "THE GAME AS A WHOLE". This seems an awful lot like rules-first 4E thinking IMHO. I put ensuring that all participants (myself included) are enjoying the campaign as first and foremost. What the game as a whole is doing is at best a tertiary concern.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;540214"BY ORDERING THINGS AS THEY SHOULD BE, THE GAME AS A WHOLE FIRST, YOUR CAMPAIGN NEXT, AND YOUR PARTICIPANTS THEREAFTER, YOU WILL BE PLAYING ADVANCED DUNGEONS & DRAGONS AS IT WAS MEANT TO BE. "

The part I have referenced above is where I differ with Gary. As the sole arbiter of my game what the heck do I care about "THE GAME AS A WHOLE". This seems an awful lot like rules-first 4E thinking IMHO. I put ensuring that all participants (myself included) are enjoying the campaign as first and foremost. What the game as a whole is doing is at best a tertiary concern.

He did have quite the distinctive style didn't he.

I do prefer conversational over technical for rulebooks though.