[d&d4e] Puzzles in RPGs
Callan S.:
Hi Misha,
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I think it's because the gamist strength of roleplaying games is that they present more complicated situations than board games/puzzle books can.
Well, let's test whether they do present more complicated situations.
To get the solution I did, I had to sit down for some time and think about it (and I did look at the goose and fox puzzle, which is similar, so it would perhaps have been harder without that).
Now looking at the RPG.net thread, you have people...knocking the gnolls out. Or tying them to a tree. Did they have to scratch their heads for these solutions? Was it hard to think of? Even a more complicated one, like using cone of cold to make an ice bridge, does that require much thinking? And as you say yourself, that'd be innefficient anyway, using a daily when you could tie them to a tree or knock them out.
With the bitterest gamer, it's noted that naturally flowing fiction rarely delivers challenge. What hasn't really been looked at is how the idea of fiction, even if a challenge is presented, erodes the challenge level way, way down. I think you'll find RPG's actually present LESS complicated situations than board games/puzzle books - perhaps giving the illusion of more complexity, but when push comes to shove, the thinking involved is lower.
But keep in mind the model I said before : Try an in the box solution first for the most points. If you can't manage it, admit it and then go for the fiction/outside the box method, for not as much points, but points all the same. Less points, because it's simply not as hard - thinking of tying them to a tree does not involve a mental work out at all. Most of us would just be repeating past games in doing that, even, which involves no thought.
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There's just something painful about having an effective and easy option hanging within reach,
Well, I'm talking in terms of designing and about not making that option be within reach at all (for the initial in the box attempt). It's a bit hard to talk about design when you've already decided it will be within reach and have closed the case on considering the alternative.
Currently, in terms of self improvement, it looks like someone who's on the bench press and has the option of 10kg weights or 1kg weights and is saying "But it's painful to not take the effective and easy option" and I would say yes, no pain no gain! So I'm saying sever your damn option to have 1kg weights from the design! :) Well actually I'm being pretty soft still - you are forced to try 10kg, and if you can't, you admit it and then you go onto the 1kg weight. You might argue it's more than 1kg, but honestly, if you can't do the 10kg weight, it's definately less than 10kg, that's for sure!
Can we talk about severing that option that you say is within reach? I can't make you obviously, but at the same time you don't have a line of arguement in saying it's always within reach - that's just your design choice to keep it in reach and not how it has to be (as if it were as fixed as the laws of physics or something).
Hi Fred,
Really chrono thought he'd stuffed up and had no fixed solution - really I'm humbly suggesting that works as a solution. If he decides to adopt it as the fixed answer, then I'm right. If not, then I'm not right. That will determine who, if anyone, is bending the rules, rather than you or I deciding it/arguing it. And really I haven't won in the proper sense, let me disclaim - the solution aught to have been set prior to me trying to figure it out. Making up a solution then getting the designer/GM to okay it - where's the challenge there, eh? Your right, it's just alot of making stuff up and bending words. If your workplace is politics, better to stay at work then. :)
otspiii:
Relating to the gnoll problem, you have some interesting points, but I still don't think it's well suited for inclusion in an RPG session. Difficulty isn't the issue; it's more that it a) has to be forced, somewhat unnaturally, into the fiction and b) it requires an extremely different approach than the expected line of play.
In response to a), it's not that the puzzle isn't fun or challenging, but by putting it into the RPG you suddenly mutate either the rules of the RP world or the puzzle itself. Either you have the option of the easy way out hanging over you or you just completely change the rules of the game temporarily while the puzzle's in effect. Either way it just doesn't flow well with the game. If the players enjoy that kind of puzzle in general they'll probably enjoy it, but the artificial changes you have to hack into the system to make it work leave that compromise of system just hanging over them as they do so. They might enjoy the puzzle, but will they enjoy it more than if they were just doing it outside of the context of the game? I don't really buy the idea of the gamist as a Platonic ideal, with no attachment to the setting or the story. By virtue of the fact that they're playing a RPG rather than a board game or filling out a puzzle book they obviously find the fiction to be important on some level, even if not a large one.
It's true that situations generally aren't as 'hard' as puzzles; there's no one 'right answer' to them, although there very much are 'wrong answers'. They're about gathering information and trying to figure out what path of action grants the maximum reward for the minimum risk.. When I said that they're more complex I meant that there are countless variables that have to be considered when deciding how to respond to them. Even so, a well-made computer program could solve the gnoll problem, while even very basic situations would be incomprehensible to it. The thing is, the human brain is all about dealing with this type of complexity, so it seems easier to us. Situations are all about dealing with and minimizing uncertainty and once you've done everything you can to minimize the risk taking the leap into the unknown. It's not hard in the way that that a logic puzzle or lifting weights is, but it's still exhilarating in its own way.
Which brings me to b). That process of minimizing uncertainty and then surrendering to chance is the basic form of RPGs. It's what people are expecting, so you can be pretty sure that everyone present will enjoy it. Changing the type of challenge isn't bad by itself, but it's not something you should do without knowing your audience and being certain they'll be for it. It's similar to if you decided that the number of push-ups you can do in a minute will determine how much damage an attack does; if one of the players hates doing push-ups it's going to be a game-breaker for them. Even if the player enjoys push-ups there's a chance they'll dislike it due to being in a roleplaying mindset rather than an exercise one. Offering the 'less XP if you just knock them out' option lessens this to an extent, but it just makes issue a) worse, and I still feel like a well-run RPG should offer XP and other rewards for the players engaging in activities that they enjoy. Otherwise you just end up with the dilemma of "Well, I can either not have fun or I can be ineffective," which really isn't fun for anyone.
But hey, if you know the players and know they love computational puzzles, then you should absolutely toss stuff like the gnoll puzzle in. Issue b) is really more of a social contract thing than anything else, I think. I've just heard a lot of people frustrated because "I came here to roleplay, not solve riddles all night."
The gnoll example is a little weird for this discussion, because it completely ignored cheap-ways-out when it was designed, so of course the basic out-of-box solutions are going to be simple and unsatisfying. The blood example from earlier on in the thread is a better example, where the party had to weigh the risk of each being weakened by splitting the blood between each of them with the risk of a blood substitute not being accepted with the moral risk of sacrificing a hireling with the risk of hunting down a monster to use the blood of with the risk of sacrificing one of their own to let the party advance (okay, I'm not sure if every one of these options were present during this specific example since I don't have details, but the point remains valid). There's always the risk that a situation like this will have a no-brain easy solution that the GM just didn't consider, but skilled design can considerable lower this risk.
Callan S.:
Misha, this is, as I'd expect, going into fiction first territory.
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suddenly mutate either the rules of the RP world or the puzzle itself.
Rules of the RP world, you say? And who determines these rules? A council of elders somewhere? May I meet them, person to person? Of course, there isn't any such council and yet your very certain, I'm sure, that such rules exist, like just about every other gamer I've ever spoken with.
You modify your own physical behaviour to match these rules, and yet...can you even name the origin of these rules of the RP world you speak of? Who invented them? Where did they come from? And yet your changing your own lifes course to follow rules that you don't even know the origin of? Whatever it is that twitches and turns those rules, eventually determines atleast part of your own lifes direction - yet you don't know what it is that twitches and turns those rules (and in doing so, twitches and turns you as a human being)? And you'd advise me to adhere to rules you couldn't name the origin of, as well? That I must craft with these rules firmly in mind?
That's religion.
I know I'm not getting onto your other points, but they are smaller circles inside the largest circle that are these 'rules of the RP world' you talk about. We couldn't find any common ground on the smaller circles because of the big difference of your largest circle. Or maybe I'm wrong and you can describe the origin down to an individual - but even then, that will have been your choice to be loyal to that guys plan (or if it's your own plan, loyal to your own), which isn't an arguement by itself for me to follow his/your 'rules of the RP world'. I simply don't operate with some 'rules of the RP world' hovering over my shoulder.
Sorry to get all Richard Dawkins in your thread, AzaLiN. :( I'm trying to cut off as early as possible.
otspiii:
You're making some weird assumptions about where I'm coming from. The rules aren't religion, they're an agreement the players make with the GM about how conflict is resolved/etc. The Council of Wizards won't pepper your house with lightening bolts if you break 'the rules', but the game does start creeping into Calvinball-type territory. It's not the end of the world, but it does seem distasteful to me, like using a lens-flare in photoshop. Don't do it unless it's really appropriate for the setting/audience.
Callan S.:
Can you or your GM write down all the rules of the RP world you mentioned, Misha? If not, then your following rules/altering your real life behaviour to follow the directions of an unknown origin. Also in terms of any rules that are printed, you only use them if the fiction seems to call upon their use, right? Your talking fiction comes first. I'm talking rules come first - start with rules and fiction only happens if the rules prompt fiction to be made and fiction only decides things if those same rules grant it a capacity to decide something. Fiction first vs rules first is probably an even bigger divide than that found between nar vs sim creative agendas, and such like. Regardless of my feelings on whether somethings a religion, I have a very different approach but you started this arguement as if I have your approach, but I'm doing it wrong/not meeting the requirements of your approach. I think I've pointed out some things but I'm taking up space, so I'll leave it at saying there is a large divide between our mutual approaches.
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