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Yikes, that is some extreme bad faith argument considering anyone who has read the thread knows it didn't go down like that. Psinesis and this guy have been playing RPGs together for nearly 20 years. The fact that this old friend of his who is a mechanic and everyone agreed could play a TechPriest wanted to build cool sttuff obviously did not come as a surprise to Psinesis, not even in the context of the setting -- which Psinesis said he described to the players as like FO3 ... a game in which you can eventually access plasma weapons and power armour (and a giant killer robot by the way). And let's keep in mind it was still a 40k campaign. The character seems to have been aware of wider Imperial technology. He's a TechPriest. Why would he not want to build that stuff? I mean, his own body is probably a higher tech level than the rest of the setting.

It's absolutely nothing like a situation in which one person wants to play a game of nihilistic horror set in a historical period and another person wants to play a cartoonish humour-driven mutant romp game. What you're talking about is, in board game terms, one person wanting to play Monopoly while another wants to play Chess. A game has not even started yet. In Psinesis's example, the players are already playing the same game.

But let's say it in some hypothetical situation, it does go down like you say, where everyone agrees to play a certain style of game and then during play one of the players wants to radically diverge. Well, how would this look in the board game example? We're all playing Monopoly and suddenly one of the players starts moving the little houses around like chess pieces. What has happened there? The game has stopped. Monopoly is not possible to play when one person is trying to play it as Chess. This is why the expectations thing is so important and why when there is expectation mismatch it often kills the campaign and maybe even the group.

 Manchu wrote:
Yikes, that is some extreme bad faith argument considering anyone who has read the thread knows it didn't go down like that. Psinesis and this guy have been playing RPGs together for nearly 20 years. The fact that this old friend of his who is a mechanic and everyone agreed could play a TechPriest wanted to build cool sttuff obviously did not come as a surprise to Psinesis, not even in the context of the setting -- which Psinesis said he described to the players as like FO3 ... a game in which you can eventually access plasma weapons and power armour. And let's keep in mind it was still a 40k campaign. The character seems to have been aware of wider Imperial technology. He's a TechPriest. Why would he not want to build that stuff? I mean, his own body is probably a higher tech level than the rest of the setting.

It's absolutely nothing like a situation in which one person wants to play a game of nihilistic horror set in a historical period and another person wants to play a cartoonish humour-driven mutant romp game. What you're talking about is, in board game terms, one person wanting to play Monopoly while another wants to play Chess. A game has not even started yet. In Psinesis's example, the players are already playing the same game.

I've only re-framed and re-expressed the exact same argument I've been making all thread. To say that I'm now making it bad faith, and know that how it isn't went down when the previous post on the matter was this:

 Psienesis wrote:
Chongara seems to be grokking what I'm saying because it is still me, the GM, telling the player of the character "you can't do that", whether it's Fallout: Dark Heresy or Teenage Mutant Ninja Cultists.

and I'm making the same argument I've been making the entire thread that lead up to that comment.

There are perhaps some matters of magnitude to be put aside I'll concede, but in in terms of kind the two problems are identical. GM signs up players up for deverivation on an established game a that demands certain changes, players agree then ham-fistedly tries to force things through to make it more like the standard version of the game subverting the entire purpose of putting together the derivative in the first place.

What I got from the story about knowing him for 20 years is that he's a cool guy that's mostly fun to game with, but likes to use OOC knowledge to spring "gotchas" on the GM for the purpose of scoring higher numbers. Maybe not all the time and certainly not with intentional malice, but enough so that it's frustrating even if he could kind of see it coming. Like my buddy that always tries to work raunchy sex antics into his characters and sometimes we let him and other times we're like:



No Anthony, you characters can't find "A whole bunch of hookers with giant muscles".

But let's say it in some hypothetical situation, it does go down like you say, where everyone agrees to play a certain style of game and then during play one of the players wants to radically diverge. Well, how would this look in the board game example? We're all playing Monopoly and suddenly one of the players starts moving the little houses around like chess pieces. What has happened there? The game has stopped. Monopoly is not possible to play when one person is trying to play it as Chess. This is why the expectations thing is so important and why when there is expectation mismatch it often kills the campaign and maybe even the group.

It's closer to saying "Let's all play monopoly, and use the house rule where "Free Parking" gets all the penalty money and also all the light blue properties count as part of dark blue" and he starts going "Oh come on, let me build the house I've got boardwalk and park place. We never said explictly you'd need all 5 properties, what if I just get one of the light blue ones. That's a total of 3, you usually need 3 to build houses".

At any rate I'll try not to nitpick too much here at least, since we agree on one point: Setting expectations is key. Regardless of how you view breaches of them or what are or aren't fair guidelines to use.

What I got is a mechanic was told he could play a TechPriest in a game that was like FO3 and when he tried to play a TechPriest doing stuff that can be done in FO3, the GM bizarrely interpreted that as off-brand.

Also, I think a big difference between our perspectives is your experience seems to be that the DM offers a game with X conditions and players either accept your terms and play or not. My experience is much less formal, basically a D&D game sort of works with people's schedules and we go with it and as a DM I am open to everyone's input as to how the game ends up going.

 Manchu wrote:
What I got is a mechanic was told he could play a TechPriest in a game that was like FO3 and when he tried to play a TechPriest doing stuff that can be done in FO3, the GM bizarrely interpreted that as off-brand.

Also, I think a big difference between our perspectives is your experience seems to be that the DM offers a game with X conditions and players either accept your terms and play or not. My experience is much less formal, basically a D&D game sort of works with people's schedules and we go with it and as a DM I am open to everyone's input as to how the game ends up going.

Typically if I feel like running a game. I'll think of 3-5 "Pitches" for games I'd like to play like I outlined my previous posts and run whatever people want next. Like for my next game I pitched a variety of things including that D&D 5 game I described, an X-COM inspired savage worlds game, losing war against monsters at the end of humanity, and super heroes in 1980s NYC among other things. Everyone was super gung-ho about the super heroes thing so that's what my next game is going to be.

Certainly I'm not going to go "I'm going to run a game" then just patchwork something together with everyone tastes. Every time I've tried something like that we get this odd design-by-committee feeling experience that satisfies no one, least of all me. It always feels disjointed because you're trying to align 5 different sets of desires into a single new thing, rather than just align 5 people on to this concrete thing that already exists.

EDIT: Just to be clear I don't know enough about Fallout to judge what would or wouldn't be in character for fallout specifically. However I am taking him at his word that what the player purposed was out of line with whatever they discussed initially, even if something (like fallout) where it might be slightly more appropriate is/was being used as shorthand to describe the game.

For me, it is almost to the point where I don't want to run license-based games. The last time I ran a Star Wars game, the players ended up being really violent. I could have paused the game and lectured them about Star Wars and how their ultra-violence doesn't at all fit but there was no point. These players were totally familiar with Star Wars. They understood that how the game worked out was not Star Warsy. To me, it seemed utterly clear that these cats did not want to play Star Wars even if they had agreed to it previously.

I mean, social interactions are complex. Sometimes your friends want to play something because they know you are excited about it. But they aren't.

When I play D&D, I feel like there is a lot more room for different tones. IME the players eventually start to play off of each other and a tone emerges. Up to that point, as a DM, I am just encouraging them to play off of each other: I am not putting much effort into setting the tone. Once I am reasonably confident they have gotten into their groove, I reinforce that with vivid descriptions and on-point story development.

With CoC, it's a bit different. I feel like the theme of the game is already so strong that players kind of bring the right tone to the game.

Let's back up a second and point out (to the casual readers of the thread) that neither "side" in this is wrong, these are just examples of different play-styles and play-groups. What works in one group with one group of people might not work in another.

Chongara wrote:There are perhaps some matters of magnitude to be put aside I'll concede, but in in terms of kind the two problems are identical. GM signs up players up for deverivation on an established game a that demands certain changes, players agree then ham-fistedly tries to force things through to make it more like the standard version of the game subverting the entire purpose of putting together the derivative in the first place.

What I got from the story about knowing him for 20 years is that he's a cool guy that's mostly fun to game with, but likes to use OOC knowledge to spring "gotchas" on the GM for the purpose of scoring higher numbers. Maybe not all the time and certainly not with intentional malice, but enough so that it's frustrating even if he could kind of see it coming. Like my buddy that always tries to work raunchy sex antics into his characters and sometimes we let him and other times we're like:

And that is exactly the situation. This player is known to do things like this, not because he maliciously wants to "ruin the game" or be all-powerful compared to the other PCs, but it's simply how his mind works. And the rest of the group (myself included) have plenty of "Oh, you..." moments. Most of his ideas start off with "Wouldn't it be cool if..." and then rapidly spiral out of control from there.

Case in point (names changed to protect the innocent... and the guilty):

Me (to group): "Following your successful prosecution of the slaving and smuggling ring in the city of Sprucetuck, you have a couple months to rest and recuperate and pursue some of your own studies. The only admonition the Guard gives you is 'don't get yourself killed!' So... now is the time to train up some skills you have 3 or less ranks in, learn something new, or pursue a personal goal. Plans?"

Him: "Gryx is going to start summoning and imprisoning small fire elementals. Like, small ones."

Me (suspicious): "Ok.... uh. How?"

Him: "I'll get to that. See, what I'm going to do is bind them into orichalcum orbs, right? Then throw them into a big tank of water. The elemental, inside the orb, won't be extinguished, but will heat the water, making steam, add more elementals, heat water faster, make more steam faster..."

Me: "But...again, how?"

Him: "Here, see?" (produces twenty-seven page design specs for steam-driven flying galleon). I figure that I can bargain steam-tech with some rats and get them to summon and bind the elementals for me. We can fly over the Scent Barrier and take the war to the Weasels!"

Me: "Dude, this is a game of Mouseguard... you're three inches tall and live in a hollowed-out gourd. Rats are strange, large and frightening. Not to mention that your people make boats out of twigs and leaves."

Iv always liked the Manchu method of explain what you are doing instead of just declaring of things.

it has lead to a whole lot of hilarity and high jinx of our groups rogue.

In general though i think its reasonable to play loose fast and fun if you think your group can handle it.



for a Beginning group though i think improving situations where everyone gets to do something is a good idea. and make sure they do it right so they learn how to do it in the future.

One thing a GM can do is keep in mind that he controls the actions of all NPCs, which means that societal pressures don't need to be abstract. If a PC violates the beliefs or propriety of the game world, than there likely will be in game conflicts and consequences.

Meaning, if the use of such elementals and/or steam teach was unknown in that world, than wouldn't there be a group that was willing to work against its creation? Would they be armed?

There are no elementals in MG, period.

 Psienesis wrote:
Let's back up a second and point out (to the casual readers of the thread) that neither "side" in this is wrong, these are just examples of different play-styles and play-groups. What works in one group with one group of people might not work in another.

Chongara wrote:There are perhaps some matters of magnitude to be put aside I'll concede, but in in terms of kind the two problems are identical. GM signs up players up for deverivation on an established game a that demands certain changes, players agree then ham-fistedly tries to force things through to make it more like the standard version of the game subverting the entire purpose of putting together the derivative in the first place.

What I got from the story about knowing him for 20 years is that he's a cool guy that's mostly fun to game with, but likes to use OOC knowledge to spring "gotchas" on the GM for the purpose of scoring higher numbers. Maybe not all the time and certainly not with intentional malice, but enough so that it's frustrating even if he could kind of see it coming. Like my buddy that always tries to work raunchy sex antics into his characters and sometimes we let him and other times we're like:

And that is exactly the situation. This player is known to do things like this, not because he maliciously wants to "ruin the game" or be all-powerful compared to the other PCs, but it's simply how his mind works. And the rest of the group (myself included) have plenty of "Oh, you..." moments. Most of his ideas start off with "Wouldn't it be cool if..." and then rapidly spiral out of control from there.

Case in point (names changed to protect the innocent... and the guilty):

Me (to group): "Following your successful prosecution of the slaving and smuggling ring in the city of Sprucetuck, you have a couple months to rest and recuperate and pursue some of your own studies. The only admonition the Guard gives you is 'don't get yourself killed!' So... now is the time to train up some skills you have 3 or less ranks in, learn something new, or pursue a personal goal. Plans?"

Him: "Gryx is going to start summoning and imprisoning small fire elementals. Like, small ones."

Me (suspicious): "Ok.... uh. How?"

Him: "I'll get to that. See, what I'm going to do is bind them into orichalcum orbs, right? Then throw them into a big tank of water. The elemental, inside the orb, won't be extinguished, but will heat the water, making steam, add more elementals, heat water faster, make more steam faster..."

Me: "But...again, how?"

Him: "Here, see?" (produces twenty-seven page design specs for steam-driven flying galleon). I figure that I can bargain steam-tech with some rats and get them to summon and bind the elementals for me. We can fly over the Scent Barrier and take the war to the Weasels!"

Me: "Dude, this is a game of Mouseguard... you're three inches tall and live in a hollowed-out gourd. Rats are strange, large and frightening. Not to mention that your people make boats out of twigs and leaves."

When will the Tyranny end! When will you stop robbing the players of all their agency and forcing them to take part in your bad fan fiction! Why must you ruin everyone's fun just so you can have the satisfaction of being in control of everything. Can't you just see that was an opportunity for character growth. You're a terrible, terrible GM that's ruining RPGs. You won't let them do anything!! They may as well be watching cutscenes from FINAL FANTASY oh the horror!!

More seriously though, sounds like this dude would be more at home in episodic, high-concept game centered over-the-top antics with lighter continuity. His type wants to constantly push boundaries, break from the status quo and do things in any way but the most intuitive. This can be a lot of fun in the right kind of game but they're bound to feel stifled in anything focused on staying within restrictions or playing a part in the story instead of being the story. I wonder if there is a good system for running a game that mimics the style of "Rick and Morty", that'd be exactly the kind of thing players like this would be looking for.

Chongara, that's a really childish response and yet another example of bad faith argument. Can you really not tell that Psinesis's latest example is completely unlike his first one? In the first example, the TechPriest character wanted to do things that are generally possible in the setting in question as well as the game in question -- plus what he wanted to do was completely in line with what TechPriests usually want to do in that setting and game. In the Mouse Guard setting, by contrast, there is nothing like summoning magic or elementals. These things simply don't exits at all as a matter of the setting and game. I guess you must be unfamiliar with 40k, Fall Out, and Mouse Guard.

 Manchu wrote:
Chongara, that's a really childish response and yet another example of bad faith argument. Can you really not tell that Psinesis's latest example is completely unlike his first one? In the first example, the TechPriest character wanted to do things that are generally possible in the setting in question as well as the game in question. In the Mouse Guard setting, by contrast, there is nothing like summoning magic or elementals in Mouse Guard. I guess you must be unfamiliar with 40k, Fall Out, and Mouse Guard.

Dude. It's called joke. It's in italics, with a winky-ork face and the next sentence begins with "More seriously though".

Was I not supposed to take that as a parody of my point?

 Manchu wrote:
Was I not supposed to take that as a parody of my point?

Certainly. That doesn't make it yet another "Bad Faith Argument" or any kind of argument. It's a joke, a bit of ribbing. You know taking the piss, busting your chops, some levity. Because you know you were talking consistently about how I didn't understand the situation, and that I didn't get the story. To which I clarified and got a response of:

And that is exactly the situation. This player is known to do things like this, not because he maliciously wants to "ruin the game" or be all-powerful compared to the other PCs, but it's simply how his mind works. And the rest of the group (myself included) have plenty of "Oh, you..." moments.

Clearly I do get the situation. We're just dealing with a player who likes to pull a little gak now and again. Sometimes it's amusing, sometimes it's not, sometimes you can reasonably see their line of reasoning (sword guns and laser tanks in 40k) other times it's outright insane (fire elementals in mouse guard). In the end though it's all kind of the same for the GM, the player in question and the rest of the group: He's going out of the ballpark of what the game is trying to do, maybe a little, maybe a lot but in the end out of the park is out of the park. In the end it's not the worlds biggest deal but he does need reigning in if you're looking to keep the game grounded.

BTW here's how the conversation could go:

Player: My character wants to summon elementals.

GM: How does your character know about such things?

This question is just a set up to remind the player or let the player know, if the player is unfamiliar with the setting, that there is pretty much no such thing as magic in Mouse Guard. If the player insists:

Player: Well, I start waving my paws around and chanting strange squeaks.

GM: Townsmice stop and stare, exchanging puzzled looks.

Point being, players can attempt whatever they are willing to describe -- the GM narrates the consequences. This is actually why I stress the "tell me what you're doing and I'll tell you want to roll" principle because when players invoke mechanics rather than narrating what their characters are doing, it gives them the false impression that they narrate consequences.

Magic does (or might) exist in MG, it's just in possession of the Rats. Possibly. Maybe. Or maybe they're just weirdos.

There is nothing remotely close to summoning elementals when it comes to MG. In that case, you didn't explain or the player did not understand the game being played. Returning to our boardgame analogy, he was basically suggesting that he move queen to knight 4 in a game of Monopoly. It's as if a player in a Forgotten Realms game said, my character escapes in her X-Wing starfighter.

 Manchu wrote:
Yikes, that is some extreme bad faith argument considering anyone who has read the thread knows it didn't go down like that.

You say that, however it becomes your dogmatic 'but it shouldnt happen' when a formulated character origin or a development storyline is proposed.
Restrictions are not of themselves limitations on gameplay but enablers of deeper gameplay. If a campaign calls for everyone to be a commoner from the same village with a communal backstory, or if you have a no tech-priests allowed 40K backwater campaign, the restrictions enables the setting which is turn enables the story.

 Chongara wrote:


At any rate I'll try not to nitpick too much here at least, since we agree on one point: Setting expectations is key. Regardless of how you view breaches of them or what are or aren't fair guidelines to use.

This is so true, in fact a little discipline on setting has additional benefits. One thing our group does is round robin GMing, where the GM chair cycles between story arcs, which requires a mutual agreement on what is available, what and where. This would not be possible without a structure.

For our Dark Heresy campaign we exclusively used round robin GMing from the start. 40K based systems are excellent for this, we tried round robin for D&D also and it works though to a lesser degree as the game universe is compact. In 40K players only have a very limited interaction with the universe as its too big to be affected in a meaningful way. So we can round robin easily as the consequences of one GMs play doesn't really effect the next. With more deep involved system like CoC and Runequest we have one GM and a standard party.

 Doctadeth wrote:
Hey guys,

After a few friends and mates expressed interest, I've decided to DM a DND session at my place. Most of those involved are beginners, and this is my first time DMing. I am looking to do maybe a single encounter first, to establish the party, and then hopefully spur it into a more campaign-like series.

The first thing you must consider is what your players want...dungeon crawl or character driven champaign, or combination

Dungeon Crawl: is an adventure based entirely on fighting, gaining XP, and Treasure. The need for high character interaction is not really needed (great for NOOB's)

Character Driven Champaign: Think Final Fantasy here, there is a purpose for the characters to do some epic quest, character interactions (good and bad) are in high demand. This is where player put more effort into 'acting out' there character and should be equally rewarded just as much as killing monsters.

combiniation: most RPG pen and paper, is a combination of the above 2, most have a overall goal, but do dungeons crawls from time to time. After all players want to defeat monsters, gain XP and treasure so indulge them.



Next thing to consider

YOU MUST BE OK WITH LOSING ALL THE TIME....Your job is to entertain and set challenges not to win against the players.
while encounters with antagonist NPC's and monsters should be a challenge to the players you should not outright seek to kill the party or a individual character (no matter how annoying). That said, well it happens from time to time.

it is helpful to randomize who is attacked in a fight or ambush to attempt to spread out damage, with that said some antagonist NPC may have an agenda against one of the party.


Encourage the party to diversify...
Tank, cleric, mage, thief. A wide varitey of skills is need for good adventures.



Number of Players AKA Player Management

I found 5-6 is the magic number anything over that becomes herding cats. Stray conversations and commentary become a problem in large groups, especially when one character goes off by themselves to do something.


FEATS for other sources

Careful when combining sysytems, Pathfinder has an array of excellent feats that cross-over to DND. becarefull when allowing this. PC characters can quickly become too powerful fast.


Thats all I can think of for now,
Goodluck

For a new GM, and doubly so for newer players, I would simply not allow the party to split. there's simply no good way to handle it, and the best ways are still hell on a GM and the players.

I don't meant that the party can't do different things in the same dungeon or town, but you cannot have parts of the party out of touch with each other.

 Rune Stonegrinder wrote:

YOU MUST BE OK WITH LOSING ALL THE TIME....Your job is to entertain and set challenges not to win against the players.
while encounters with antagonist NPC's and monsters should be a challenge to the players you should not outright seek to kill the party or a individual character (no matter how annoying). That said, well it happens from time to time.

I'd caution the underlined text isn't exactly right. You should learn to not frame things in terms of winning or losing. When I throw up a combat encounter I have no investment in that encounter "winnning" and when it is defeated I haven't "Lost" what I care about if it's properly engaging. If it is than I have succeeded, if it hasn't I've failed. What properly engaging looks like changes with the situation, the playerbase and the specific game. Sometimes this is the encounter beating the players, most often it's the players beating the encounter in an interesting way.

This holds true with social scenes and other things. I don't "Win" when the merchant is able to get the highest price for his goods, or buy from the PCs at the lowest price. I "Succeed" when the process of buying and selling enhances the game experience in some capacity for both me and the players. I'm not a force opposed to the players, I'm sitting down as invested in playing the game and seeing the characters move through the world just as much as they are. I just go about it through different mechanics and with a different perspective.

 Polonius wrote:
you cannot have parts of the party out of touch with each other

Can you give an example?

 Manchu wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
you cannot have parts of the party out of touch with each other

Can you give an example?

Well I know I can.

In my long running campaign we've had a few party splits:

One member of the party took a train halfway across the continent to join a meeting with a government official, while the rest of the party continued on the regular mission. His character was totally out of touch with the group for a good 2 months of in-game time (~2-3 sessions iirc).

One member of the party had her swords stolen by a giant bird and went on adventure to go get them back, but could only convince 2 of the remaining 3 party members to go with her.

A couple of times party members have gone to different cities to visit parents or love interests while the rest of the group was concentrated on personal projects in their home base.

After one incident half the party refused to even enter a city where they had a mission to do, so the other 3 had to go in while their characters waited outside.

 Manchu wrote:

 Polonius wrote:
you cannot have parts of the party out of touch with each other

Can you give an example?

Yeah, I was asking more about what seemed like the distinction Polonius was drawing between going to separate areas of a locality on the one hand and going to different regions of the world on the other.

 Manchu wrote:
Yeah, I was asking more about what seemed like the distinction Polonius was drawing between going to separate areas of a locality on the one hand and going to different regions of the world on the other.

Yeah, I mean, I guess I used the words "in touch" to mean that there was a concrete plan to split up and reunite in the same gaming session. Haivng half the party explore a dungeon while the other half rests in town in bad. Having half the party use tunnels to sneak into a keep while the other half talks/charms its way in is good.

My old GM called it the "smoke break rule." He was fine splitting a party, as long as the party that split off could finish its business, in real time, within a smoke break for the people that weren't involved.

I like the dramatic possibilities created by split parties (especially in 1920s CoC games) but it does take some effort to be "cinematic" about how you manage the "scenes" so to speak.

 Manchu wrote:
I like the dramatic possibilities created by split parties (especially in 1920s CoC games) but it does take some effort to be "cinematic" about how you manages the "scenes" so to speak.

It can be done very well, but as you point out, it takes a skilled hand. I'd advise a new GM to avoid it. Of course, you want to foster creative problem solving and narrative, so you need to strike a balance.

And "splitting" a party that's in town (meaning, not actively in adventuring mode) is different, as many campaigns have montages where months pass. But as a rule, no session should end with a split party.

In CoC, investigators inevitably decide to fan out across town: one groups goes to the public records hall, another to the local historical society, a third to the university library, etc., and I love it, especially considering telephone is so much more cumbersome in that setting, and I am pretty strict about metagaming, so the players get to see how they're being cornered just as their characters start to get the relevant information that, if they could only make it back to one another safely, would piece together how danger could be avoided, or at least forestalled. Oh yes, it can be marvelous!

 Rune Stonegrinder wrote:

Next thing to consider

YOU MUST BE OK WITH LOSING ALL THE TIME....Your job is to entertain and set challenges not to win against the players.

Excellent point well crafted, while obvious to us techniques are often hard to describe to others.
The above is short and crystal clear, it sums up the role of a GM. Mental notes have been taken.