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Respect Mah Authoritah: Thoughts on DM and Player Authority in 5e
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<blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8433347" data-attributes="member: 42582"><p>I think there are two ways of looking at this.</p><p></p><p>If I'm comparing AD&D, or Rolemaster, to Burning Wheel, than the contrast you describe is evident. All give you characters; those characters have various numbers on sheets associated with them (for fighting, for talking - that's CHA in AD&D, etc). But the first two are pretty rickety in their action resolution structure.</p><p></p><p>But not hopeless. For social interaction, as an example, AD&D has a reaction table, modified by CHA, and that can be used to resolve approaches by PCs to NPCs. (I do just this in Classic Traveller.) Rolemaster has the Influence/Interaction table (this is from RM2/RMC Character Law):</p><p></p><p style="margin-left: 20px">-26 down: Your blatant attempt at coercion alienates your audience. They are infuenced to do the opposite of what you were attempting to get them to do. Until a change in circumstances occurs, any attempts by to to infuence them will fail.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">-25 to 04: You audience rejects you, causing you to lose confidence and your air of authority. Any influence attempts during the next hour will result in failures (see 05-75 below).</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">05 to 75: You have failed. Your audience will not be receptive to any of your attempts at infuence for at least 1 day.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">76 to 90: Your audeience is still listening. You can continue to try to influence them.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">91 to 110: Keep talking, your audeince is becoming more friendly. Modify your next roll by +20.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">111-175: You have influenced your audience.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">176 up: Not only did you influence your audience, but you receive a +50 bonus on influencing them until you do something to cause them to lose confidence in you.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px"></p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Modifications: Difficulty [from +30 Routine to -70 Absurd]</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">+50 - Audience is personally loyal or devoted to the character</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">+20 - Audience is under hire to the character</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">+ Skill bonus for Influence and Interaction.</p> <p style="margin-left: 20px">Note: Difficulty and other modifications are based upon the basic attitude of the audience towards the character and upon what the character is trying to get them to do.</p><p></p><p>Ultimately, what gives teeth to resolution in BW is <em>intent and task </em>together with <em>let it ride</em>. AD&D is not inherently unable to incorporate these.</p><p></p><p>Oddly enough, 5e might be less amenable to "vanilla narrativism" than AD&D: it doesn't have a set reaction table like AD&D (or Traveller) and so needs the GM to set a DC for interactions, which is perhaps less certain/stable and doesn't produce the "intermediate" results that a typical reaction table does. But couldn't that be worked around?</p><p></p><p>Another issue with 5e is the one I mentioned upthread to [USER=6785785]@hawkeyefan[/USER]: there are abilities like the Folk Hero one, or Rangers' favoured terrain, which are (in my view) a bit unclear as to what their actual function is and hence put a lot of decision-making pressure on the GM; AD&D and RM don't have this sort of thing.</p><p></p><p>There are knowledge and perception-type skills in all these systems. But that's not fatal. Prince Valiant does too, and yet can work with pretty light-touch prep. And in the context of D&D, there is so much published material available it's often not going to be that hard to pull out a map or room or similar, with perception used to spot hidden things and/or people. Investigation probably becomes a pretty unhelpful skill in low-prep 5e D&D, but that's a modest casualty.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="pemerton, post: 8433347, member: 42582"] I think there are two ways of looking at this. If I'm comparing AD&D, or Rolemaster, to Burning Wheel, than the contrast you describe is evident. All give you characters; those characters have various numbers on sheets associated with them (for fighting, for talking - that's CHA in AD&D, etc). But the first two are pretty rickety in their action resolution structure. But not hopeless. For social interaction, as an example, AD&D has a reaction table, modified by CHA, and that can be used to resolve approaches by PCs to NPCs. (I do just this in Classic Traveller.) Rolemaster has the Influence/Interaction table (this is from RM2/RMC Character Law): [INDENT]-26 down: Your blatant attempt at coercion alienates your audience. They are infuenced to do the opposite of what you were attempting to get them to do. Until a change in circumstances occurs, any attempts by to to infuence them will fail.[/INDENT] [INDENT][/INDENT] [INDENT]-25 to 04: You audience rejects you, causing you to lose confidence and your air of authority. Any influence attempts during the next hour will result in failures (see 05-75 below).[/INDENT] [INDENT][/INDENT] [INDENT]05 to 75: You have failed. Your audience will not be receptive to any of your attempts at infuence for at least 1 day.[/INDENT] [INDENT][/INDENT] [INDENT]76 to 90: Your audeience is still listening. You can continue to try to influence them.[/INDENT] [INDENT][/INDENT] [INDENT]91 to 110: Keep talking, your audeince is becoming more friendly. Modify your next roll by +20.[/INDENT] [INDENT][/INDENT] [INDENT]111-175: You have influenced your audience.[/INDENT] [INDENT][/INDENT] [INDENT]176 up: Not only did you influence your audience, but you receive a +50 bonus on influencing them until you do something to cause them to lose confidence in you.[/INDENT] [INDENT][/INDENT] [INDENT]Modifications: Difficulty [from +30 Routine to -70 Absurd][/INDENT] [INDENT]+50 - Audience is personally loyal or devoted to the character[/INDENT] [INDENT]+20 - Audience is under hire to the character[/INDENT] [INDENT]+ Skill bonus for Influence and Interaction.[/INDENT] [INDENT]Note: Difficulty and other modifications are based upon the basic attitude of the audience towards the character and upon what the character is trying to get them to do.[/INDENT] Ultimately, what gives teeth to resolution in BW is [I]intent and task [/I]together with [I]let it ride[/I]. AD&D is not inherently unable to incorporate these. Oddly enough, 5e might be less amenable to "vanilla narrativism" than AD&D: it doesn't have a set reaction table like AD&D (or Traveller) and so needs the GM to set a DC for interactions, which is perhaps less certain/stable and doesn't produce the "intermediate" results that a typical reaction table does. But couldn't that be worked around? Another issue with 5e is the one I mentioned upthread to [USER=6785785]@hawkeyefan[/USER]: there are abilities like the Folk Hero one, or Rangers' favoured terrain, which are (in my view) a bit unclear as to what their actual function is and hence put a lot of decision-making pressure on the GM; AD&D and RM don't have this sort of thing. There are knowledge and perception-type skills in all these systems. But that's not fatal. Prince Valiant does too, and yet can work with pretty light-touch prep. And in the context of D&D, there is so much published material available it's often not going to be that hard to pull out a map or room or similar, with perception used to spot hidden things and/or people. Investigation probably becomes a pretty unhelpful skill in low-prep 5e D&D, but that's a modest casualty. [/QUOTE]
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