Abuse of the need to have fun

[hyphz]

We've been playing D&D (hey, I don't pick 'em) on and off a bit now with several different DMs, but we've just switched back to the DM who was originally the regular DM for the group.

That DM ran a game for a long while which eventually broke down, with some objection from the players.  The main source of the objection from the players was that, well, the enemies were being far too sensible.  Another player was calling high frustration at "They always run away, and then go somewhere where there's loads of their mates and they're all set up and stuff".

I've felt the same thing numerous times.  In one player I was playing a Thief, who disarmed traps and snuck around and did the general stuff that a D&D Thief does - but also got humiliated by a much lower-level thief who managed to lead the entire party a merry dance through a "haunted" mansion in which everything was set up in advance for them to use.  This included using the Disguise skill to appear as several different people, taking in the party completely, while my PC's own Disguise skill had lain unused for sessions on end because you can't exactly get hold of the stuff you need to disguise yourself when you're constantly on the move adventuring.

And I thought about what was causing this, and it comes down to - yes - abuse of the need for players to have fun.  Players have to have fun, and therefore some courses of action for their PCs are ruled out, because they wouldn't be fun.

Want to guard the vehicle you came here in?  Sure, you can, but you won't be doing any playing that session while your PC just stands by the cart.  Most non-confrontational players are going to choose to not have their PC guard the cart, but to head off with the group.  Which is why it's incredibly frustrating when our cart gets raided, but if we try to do the same to the enemy, they have major characters guarding the cart because NPCs don't have players who need to have fun.

It happens in combat too, where the PCs have to walk into ambush after ambush after ambush.  Monsters can run from combat to more favourable situations, but PCs can't; the monsters just won't follow, so while the PCs are technically safe, the players still need to have fun - which involves playing the dungeon, which involves going in and fighting the monsters no matter how tilted the situation is against the PCs.

"Hi, I'm stock NPC guy!  I traded between town A and town B to make a fortune and buy this huge gilded palace and huge amounts of stuff.  There's still a great market out there, but you can't use it, because it wouldn't be fun to play!"

When I ran D&D, I didn't have the monsters acting as "smart" as this because I considered that doing so was an abuse of this type, but the same DM then wound up criticising me and obliquely criticising the players for liking that type of thing ("well, since it seems you just want adventures where the monsters just stand there and wait to be killed...") so I don't know which way to go now.

[greyorm]

This is a serious Social Contract issue, but not in the way you might think.

It is perfectly possible for the players not to get nailed in the way you describe -- but the reason players are making choices about which courses of action are "off limits" is because they don't believe the GM will make that course of action fun and interesting for them.

Guarding the cart can be a blast...if the GM's in on it, too. Otherwise you are correct: guarding the cart is a boring, un-fun job.

[hyphz]

This is a serious Social Contract issue, but not in the way you might think.

It is perfectly possible for the players not to get nailed in the way you describe -- but the reason players are making choices about which courses of action are "off limits" is because they don't believe the GM will make that course of action fun and interesting for them.

Guarding the cart can be a blast...if the GM's in on it, too. Otherwise you are correct: guarding the cart is a boring, un-fun job.

Sure, but it doesn't mean that the players in particular want to play out guarding the cart.

What the complaint is is when the players and DM have all gotten together and decided that we're going to go explore this dungeon, and everyone is keen to do so, and then they explore it and come out to find their cart raided - which they couldn't have prevented, because guarding it would have contradicted what we had already decided to do.

Or the PCs are stoked to look at the next level, and a bunch of monsters run down there with clear intent to set up a trap, but the PCs are forced to wander into it, because the decision's already made that the session's "fun" will come from exploring the next level.

[Clinton R. Nixon]

Man, Raven nailed that so hard. I was going to respond in the same fashion. Obviously, the GM's interested in a game where people scheme, come up with plots against each other, and execute them wisely. If your group is interested in that, do it back.

If he doesn't make it fun, then, you've got a problem. (And it's not hard. I can think of two or three good cart-guarding adventures at my desk right now.)

[hyphz]

Man, Raven nailed that so hard. I was going to respond in the same fashion. Obviously, the GM's interested in a game where people scheme, come up with plots against each other, and execute them wisely. If your group is interested in that, do it back.

Well... um, no, he isn't.  Or at least, if he is, he has a funny way of showing it.  Given that we're inevitably "exploring" areas in the game, and thus can't come up with plots in advance, because we don't know the territory until we've been there.

But I think I've failed to convey the issue here.  The problem isn't that the players want to guard carts, or to have adventures guarding carts.

The problem is that the players and the GM are all keen to go off on an exploration adventure, and we do it, and we have fun, and it's all good.. and then we get back to find our cart raided, because "what do you think happens if you leave a cart unguarded in the middle of the wilderness?"

It's not an issue of wanting to do something that isn't being made fun.  It's an issue of the GM penalising PCs in-game because the players don't want to play out certain things.  And I consider doing that with a simulationist justification ("what do you think happens if...") to be unfair, because the RL players finding or not finding certain things entertaining isn't a part of the IC world under simulation.

Edit, clarify:  In other words, if we have decided not to guard the cart because we (the RL players) would not enjoy playing it out, then the PCs IC should not be subjected to the 'normal' consquences of leaving the cart unguarded in the gameworld - because the very fact that our PCs behaviour is being determined by what the RL players find entertaining has meant that the gameworld has already left the realm of 'normal' reasoning.

[Marco]

I don't think the social-contract discussion is limited to having interesting stuff happen when the cart is being guarded. Even if the GM says (IMO, possibly legitimately) "Guarding the cart is, you know, gonna be kinda dull" there are still some possible solutions or, at least, some cause-and-effect issues to work out.

1. Henchmen: hire someone to guard the cart.  If you can't afford them or can't afford enough of them to be useful, then ...

2. Become cart thieves. If people are doing dungeon delving with expensive, valuable carts to carry their stuff with, then take their carts until you have enough to afford guards. If that doesn work then ...

3. If every dungeoning team is must be 2x the size and skill of your group (1x to go down in the dungeon, 1x to guard the cart from guys like you) then, simply put, the GM has created an economy where your group is too small to be a dungeoneering team.

Maybe you need financiers.

Maybe you need a mercenary company--do dungeons pay that much? If they don't then why are there brigands waiting around to rob the carts of guys going in them (once the word gets out that its a losing deal that source of plunder will dry up).

Essentially a working economy will more or less sort a bunch of this out.

This works for monsters too. Monsters won't follow you? Then you can always disengage. Find a source of fun other than fighting monsters (or, again, perhaps you need a larger group--if the average scavenging party is enough to face your party and is always part of a much larger force then, again, your group lacks the fire power to be out in the wilderness).

Where I think the problem is coming in is that the GM is relying on the PC's getting fooled or screwed to drive the adventure and if that's so then that's a problem if the GM is working double time to ensure that there's no good way out (and you aren't enjoying it).

I'm not sure that's the case (if you'd seen through the thief's disguise would the GM have played it fair? I'd hope so--but even so he's teaching you to pull an Austin Powers ("That's a MAN, baby!") assault on every NPC you meet or simply trust no one and, ultimately, become nastier, more devious predators than his world is usually stocked with--an eventuality he may find unpalatible if he's looking to run cool dungeon adventurers).

-Marco

[greyorm]

I still say that's right where the problem is, Hypz. That and you and your friends are looking at the game from a completely different standpoint than your GM.

You just want empty hack-and-slash and looting, he wants some realism in action and consequence. Or perhaps he's being Gamist, and using every mistake you're making against you, whittling away your resources, when you aren't looking to Step-On-Up at all.

Ultimately, you all need to work out a Social Contract between yourselves that works, where the details of play are clearly stated. "We want to do this, and we want you to participate in it, by making sure we can, and that we have fun doing it."

Marco, how to solve the cart problem, specifically, is a red herring (not that those aren't excellent suggestions, because they definitely are, if the problem were, "How do we stop getting our assess kicked?") -- because that doesn't apply to dungeon traps being set, enemies fleeing towards loads of friends, or other "smart" behavior on the part of the GM's NPCs regarding the character's behaviors.

The only way the actual problem can be overcome is for everyone in the group, including the GM, to get onto the same page, and for the GM to play for the fun of the players, as I noted above. It's in his hands to make the situations fun for the players, and the players to sit down and work it out with him and among themselves as to how to communicate what they consider fun.

[hyphz]

You just want empty hack-and-slash and looting, he wants some realism in action and consequence. Or perhaps he's being Gamist, and using every mistake you're making against you, whittling away your resources, when you aren't looking to Step-On-Up at all.

I don't particularly want empty hack-and-slash and looting, but if we assume that the others do, then the GM obviously does too.  The GM is the one who's initiated the decision that we're going to head off to explore the dungeon.  He's usually done so by showing us the cover of the Dungeon magazine with the adventure module in it.

because that doesn't apply to dungeon traps being set, enemies fleeing towards loads of friends, or other "smart" behavior on the part of the GM's NPCs regarding the character's behaviors.

Again, the objection is that this "smart" behaviour is cheating because if the PCs were "smart" too they wouldn't be in the dungeon at all.  They'd have collapsed the entrance to stop the threat getting out.  Need to find the riches in the vault somewhere in the mansion that's full of horrible ghosts?  Mansion's made of wood, is the vault magically protected?  Probably?  Ok, we burn down the mansion and the magical protection ensures the vault's the only thing left.  Who cares about a bunch of ghosts, after all?

Now, of course, to actually do this sort of thing would be a social contract violation, and would be seriously messing up the game, so we don't do it.  But aren't I then entitled to say that our PCs shouldn't be penalised IC for not doing it?  If we go into that mansion, why do we have to be disadvantaged by walking into traps because it's "realistic" (aka versimilitudinal)  when if we were playing "realistically" we'd have burned the place down?

[Marco]

Marco, how to solve the cart problem, specifically, is a red herring (not that those aren't excellent suggestions, because they definitely are, if the problem were, "How do we stop getting our assess kicked?") -- because that doesn't apply to dungeon traps being set, enemies fleeing towards loads of friends, or other "smart" behavior on the part of the GM's NPCs regarding the character's behaviors.

The only way the actual problem can be overcome is for everyone in the group, including the GM, to get onto the same page, and for the GM to play for the fun of the players, as I noted above. It's in his hands to make the situations fun for the players, and the players to sit down and work it out with him and among themselves as to how to communicate what they consider fun.

Well, I realize we see things differently--and that's okay--but I'm am aware of the distinction you make and I'd approach the problem from a different perspective. It's not that I disagree that "we have to have fun doing it." I agree with that.

But re-read what I said--including my use of language in the first paragraph I wrote.

As a GM I wouldn't want to be saddled with an agreement that I'll "make sure everyone has fun." Sounds like a set-up to me. I'd rather be tasked with providing situations I hope they'll find interesting and letting them respond as they see fit.

If the way they see fit to respond doesn't lead me in an interesting direction, I would like to share in the responsibility for that with the player. That is: if I don't have something interesting happen then the player may decide to try something else (this is not a new point of discussion between us).


In each of the cases that hypz noted were enemies using a tactical advantage due to cited cause and effect. It's not necessary to break that paradigm to solve the problem.

Monsters can still flee towards their friends. Con-men can still stack the deck in their favor. Unattended goods can still be pillaged. If the characters leave an as-yet-unmentioned "back door" opened, it can still be taken advantage of.

That's all still very viable--even with this group, IMO.

What I'd change is the GM's perception of the character groups capability relative to the power-economy (their relative effectivness, the kinds of challenges they ought to be facing, etc.) Not the "rules of engagement."

This still involves a discussion. It's just an alternate SC-Solution from the one you suggested.

-Marco

[greyorm]

Re: The hack-and-slash looting: twas an example reinforcing the point I was trying to make, not a judgement of your playing style (which I simply don't have enough information about to make that kind of judgement). It is not the meat of the post, however. That is my fault, though, I should have been more clear with that.

Again, the objection is that this "smart" behaviour is cheating because if the PCs were "smart" too they wouldn't be in the dungeon at all.

Hypz, I get it. I understand the source of the objection. Now go back and read what I said, it still applies.

In fact, what you say below is exactly what I'm getting at:

But aren't I then entitled to say that our PCs shouldn't be penalised IC for not doing it?  If we go into that mansion, why do we have to be disadvantaged by walking into traps because it's "realistic" (aka versimilitudinal)  when if we were playing "realistically" we'd have burned the place down?

And this is the stuff you need to hash out in your social contract with the GM. You need to say, "Look, you want to do this versimilitudinal, cause-and-effect thing with us, but we're getting the short end of the stick because of it."

Marco has some good suggestions too, and again, they rely on sitting down with the GM and saying, "Dude, look..." and, as a group, altering choices in play to mesh between GM and players. If he won't listen, you have two choices: get a new GM, or hose him right back, and when you're all sitting around disatisfied afterwards (including him) you can say, "And THAT'S exactly why we aren't having any fun."

From what I'm seeing, you guys are sacrificing/ignoring certain options so that you can have the experience of the dungeon-crawl. The GM is then using the fact that you are making this metagame choice, in the name of achieving a particular kind of gaming experience, to hose you. You are completely correct that this is not fair.

As I said above, this is all about the GM doing his part as part of the group, as players, have fun. (Marco notes some problems with using that terminology, the pitfalls it could entail, and I agree with him about that, but I trust that it gets the point across nonetheless?)

[clehrich]

I think Raven's totally right here, Hyphz, but it's not coming across because you're sort of thinking in a different mode.  Let me try this.

Okay, so the DM says, "Hey, let's play this cool module, it's a mansion and creepy gothic stuff, okay?"

Now the problem is that you hear this, quite reasonably, as, "I want you guys to play by the genre-type conventions of this module, which means you have to go into it and all that stuff.  When you do, I will hose you, because that's realism, man."  And you find that this sucks.

What Raven is suggesting is this.

You say, "Hey Phil, tell you what.  This isn't working quite right, you know?  Every time we walk into one of those places, you hose us by having all the monsters and stuff think outside the box, and they're prepared for us and we don't know what the hell to do.  We don't find that fun."

"That's realism and verisimilitude, you should be smarter."

"Phil, what happens if we say we burn down the mansion and spray holy water on the ground, then pick up any valuables left over?"

"Ummm, well, the mansion is magically protected against fire."

"Why?  Do people regularly go around burning down huge mansions?  Is that normal behavior around here?  Is that written into the module?  Is this realism or constraint?"

"Well, no, but that's not how it's supposed to go at all, it just ditches the whole dungeon."

"See, that's the point.  You're saying we can't do X and Y because they're not how it's supposed to go.  But we're saying that if we agree to behave like idiots in walking into this hellhole, your monsters have to behave like equal idiots in letting us do it."

"No way, that's not realistic."

"Okay, tell you what, Phil.  Let's be realistic.  We're 7th level characters, okay?  So we walk into a first-level dungeon.  We roast everything, no matter how clever you make them, unless of course you do something unrealistic like putting powerful monsters in there.  If we're going to be realistic, why would we go into this creepy gothic mansion?  That's crazy talk."

"But---"

"Phil, do you get this at all?  You basically say, 'Go through this module the way it's written.'  But we've all got these ideas about the kind of play it's supposed to be.  It's supposed to be, you know, high fantasy and stuff.  We don't want to be vicious predators destroying piddly kobolds or something, because that's not high fantasy.  You don't want that either, or you'd be pushing easy modules on us.  But you've got to run hard modules so that the kind of play we like to do is a kind of play that can succeed.  It doesn't have to be easy, we don't want that either, but you can't just make all the monsters plan together to hose us.  We want to play the module without having to spend all our time thinking about 'what if the monsters were all plotting against us?'  That way we can all have a rollicking good time."

Something like that, anyway.  The point is that you've got to get him to see that you're playing by a set of genre constraints, and that he's violating them.  If he's adamant that the way he plays is "realistic," then you have two choices: Marco's, which is to say become vicious predators and wipe out first-level dungeons and steal carts and the hell with his modules; or walk away.  If the DM sees that those are the options, that Marco's version is "realistic" if "realistic" means what the DM is currently saying, then chances are he's going to want to shift things.

Does that make sense?  It's a matter of getting him to see that there is an incongruity about what's supposed to be fun and coming to a mutually-acceptable compromise so everyone has fun.

[John Kim]

In my experience, it is possible to still keep the action moving while allowing the PCs to act sensible.  For example, in my Vinland campaign, the PCs were all of the viking traditions -- so they were landowners who married, had farms, and so forth.  However, they would go off on raids or other activity in the summer.  In practice, the long dull winters would be handled by relatively brief narration, along with things like trading sheep, building palisades, and so forth.  

So while this isn't the only solution, I'm going to suggest ways that more realistic behavior might be workable for you while still keeping the action moving.  

In D&D, you can do pretty well by establishing a "Standard Operating Procedure".  The point is that rather than eating up time for the GM to ask each step of what you are doing, you instead establish an SOP -- possibly written out on a sheet of paper.  Hopefully, the GM then can skim through the dull parts assuming that you act according to SOP, and move on to the more exciting action.  For example, when tackling a dungeon, you want to establish a highly defensible position where you can go to recharge.  You will have listed out steps which you take to secure and defend that position, along with things like who's on watch.  

This does change the genre a bit.  i.e. The PCs become professional who sit and talk over dinner about the monsters they've killed that day, rather than fly-by-seat-of-the-pants adventurers.  Maybe for you this sort of  procedure would kill the fun for you, but I've seen groups which it's worked for.  As Chris says, it depends on what you want.

[Marco]

Re: The hack-and-slash looting: twas an example reinforcing the point I was trying to make, not a judgement of your playing style (which I simply don't have enough information about to make that kind of judgement). It is not the meat of the post, however. That is my fault, though, I should have been more clear with that.

[snip good stuff ]

Just to say: I agree whole-heartedly with everything Raven wrote.

-Marco

[Callan S.]

For the record I missread what Greyorm meant at first as well, only understanding with his latter correcting post.

hyphz,

I think part of the problem here is an issue of GM PC, covered over by the fact he doesn't use the same NPC each time and he also covers it by saying 'It's realistic'. 'It's realistic' can and often is the GM version of how some players use the phrase 'my guy'.

Perhaps you need to highlight how it isn't 'realistic' to use the players urges against them. The players urge is to have fun, thus their PC's are going to go on adventures which those PC's would otherwise avoid like the plague. The reason you as GM can raid the cart or have the monsters keep falling back is because of the players urge to have fun, but this is NOT part of the game world. It's the players urge...so it's hardly realistic that the bad guys can raid the cart because of something that has nothing to do with the game world. If the monsters raid the cart, IT IS NOT REALISTIC, because that opportunity to do so would never have happened if there were no players wanting to have fun. The PC's would never have gone on the adventure to begin with. The monsters taking advantage of PLAYER urges is not realistic. It's not even anything to do with the game world.

Really, the above paragraph is too bulky to use as is, but that's the general idea. Perhaps this shortened version is better:
1. These tactics rely on the players urge to have fun (go to a dungeon, fight monsters)
2. Monster tactics that entirely hinge on the players urge to have fun are not valid tactics. Because without the player wanting to have fun, the adventure would not happen.
3. These tactics reward behaviour that doesn't lead to adventuring, because if you don't adventure, no one suffers the damage of these tactics (because their PC stays at home and drinks cocoa, thus no cart to raid).
4. If the reward for not playing (or not playing in this GM's game) rivals or beats the reward for actual playing, shit will fly.

Indeed, monster tactics (raid the cart) that hinge on the players living up to genre expectations (storm that dungeon!) aren't either. Genre expectations are just another type of fun.

Personally, I think you can do this 'non play is rewarded thing' if its strength is lower than the 'play is rewarded' strength. Eg, say the cart has zero treasure in it, but does have their food supplies. They keep the treasure and now have to step on up the journey back, scrounging for food. Technically, even taking damage is a reward to not play, but is generally outweighed by many things (generally even just some healing being available will outweigh that).

Really, he needs to play the monsters as smart as possible, without the results of that making the reward for not playing outweigh the reward for continuing to play.

but the same DM then wound up criticising me and obliquely criticising the players for liking that type of thing ("well, since it seems you just want adventures where the monsters just stand there and wait to be killed...") so I don't know which way to go now.

That just sucks! I would, not because its mature or anything, obliquely criticise him back for encouraging the PC's to be sensible stay at home types. With extra's like 'Ooh, I can't wait to get another rank in my doiley making skill!'.

He's showing a clear lack of respect for your step on up, which will have an effect on how everyone feels (respect is a big part of step on up). Really, he needs to face the same lack of respect what he's doing to step on up to begin with. GRR!! Okay, that IMO and all that!

[jdagna]

Hyphz,

Just a quick question that occured to me...

Does the GM feel like he needs to hose you to make it fun in the first place?

The thought came up when Clehrich mentioned 7th level characters raiding a 1st level dungeon.  Obviously, the characters would be too strong and would waste the place.  My GM instincts kick in and the first thing that occurs to me is "If the enemies aren't strong enough to win, they need to be smart enough to be a nuisance at least."  Tactical withdrawals/ambushes and cart-raiding would be their first two strategies.  A tactical position boosts their effective strength, and raiding a cart drains your own strength.  I've ran games for groups who just became far more powerful than I anticipated, so that I really did have trouble challenging them.  As much as the players groaned when they finally started getting hosed, we all recognized that it made the game more enjoyable (and not just from a Gamist perspective).

To a point, this can be a good style - it keeps even underpowered challenges challenging, and also requires some player thinking beyond checking your to-hit averages.  Taken too far, it can be... well, what it has been for you.

The ultimate disconnect is definitely a social contract issue.

By the way, have you tried explaining the problem to your GM?  You mention the players' objections and the GM's defense (of realism), but have you discussed it on a player level?  It sounds like most of the discussion has been at an in-game level (like Marco's discussion of cart-guarding and game economics) not at a player-level (like the conversation Clehrich modeled out).  It's my experience that game-level discussion of social contract problems never results in a functional solution.