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12 months ago ::
Jun 18, 2012 - 10:48AM
#11
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Date Joined:
Jun 15, 2004
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The character is right there in the combat. He knows the difficulty of fighting the monster and is determining tactics against it. That translates to the player via knowing the AC and calculating Power Attack.
Agreed:
- Since the PC has access to a lot more information than can be conveyed to the player, I'm ok hand-waving some of the reverse as compensation.
- Plus, tactics is part of the game (although long tactics discussions during combats can still be annoying for different reasons).
- Also, D&D 4e is expected to have a decent amount of Transparency.
- That said, there are still roleplaying consideration, but most players tend to be good about that (example: "I personally know this NPC is evil, but my character wouldn't, so I'll just play along").
fwiw: here are some things I do to avoid meta-gaming:
1) When recording damage on monsters, I sometimes round up/down (making it hard to precisely calculate their HP).
2) I sometimes ignore expectations (examples: a lawful good creature that is normally evil, or an under/overpowered creature), so players can't really rely on tropes and standards.
3) When a monster becomes hidden, I remove its miniature from the board (players that make their perception can still attack it fine; I just handle it verbally).
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12 months ago ::
Jun 18, 2012 - 11:29AM
#12
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Date Joined:
Sep 20, 2010
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The only effort I'd make to discourage metagaming is in situations where one character has learned something independently and hasn't had a chance to share, or has chosen not to share it, with the others. If a players suggests something about the conditions on the ground based on session knowledge that they shouldn't have, I'll say "does your character know that?" I find this to be just a reasonable nudge to help promote the "perspective" of the character's choices. Honestly, they can usually dream up an explanaition for why the character would do such-thing without having the proper knowledge, and I give it to them, but at least they are aware of what they're doing.
So if one player scouts ahead and learns something about the condition of the enemy's camp, and something happens at the ally's camp that forces them to move, and someone at the ally's camp mentions something that the scout learned but that they wouldn't know yet, I'd ask them if they really would know that, and they'd usually just explain their way around it and we'd move on. But at least we're aware of it, and pointing something out will often encourage them to think twice and come up with an even better idea based on their more appropriate character perspective.
I also use DM note cards like jorgeo, especially in situations where languages are being used that some PCs know and some don't. Then I make sure it's clear whether the PC has shared their knowledge or not. I find that my players, at least, appreciate being held accountable for that kind of session knowledge.
I like to draw a distinction between session knowledge and common metagaming. I'm fine with metagaming in terms of character optimization, coordinated backstories, and puzzles (I love puzzles, in fact), but session knowledge is something learned right now in this session that could reasonably impact the challenge of the current encounter. That I try to discourage, if only because my players would rather have the challenge of being held accountable for what they should or shouldn't know.
Sleeping with interns on Colonial 1
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12 months ago ::
Jun 20, 2012 - 1:18PM
#13
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Date Joined:
Mar 27, 2008
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I rarely call foul for metagaming. If I can assume that something might be common knowledge for a person in the world of the game I let it go. If it seems to be "special knowledge" I may ask for a skill check. As a player I really dis-like the "gotcha" DM who peanizies the party for not specifing EVERY action or item in preparation of the adventure (i.e. we are riding horses and "no one said you bought feed so your horses die")
The biggest reason I woul call foul is if someone read the module and used that information to guide their actions (has not happened in years).
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12 months ago ::
Jun 20, 2012 - 2:12PM
#14
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Date Joined:
Jun 16, 2012
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Metagaming is rarely in issue in my group, mostly because we are all fairly immersive players who all think that abusing too much metagame knowledge can ruin our own fun. This is an important agreement, as we players have pretty much all read every 3.5 book we can get our hands on cover to cover and all have an enormous amount of metagame knowledge to not use. There are big bits of knowledge that are easy to "forget" about, but some of the finer points often slip through the cracks of play. Thankfully, this thread has actually helped me to exorcize some of my own worries that we don't do enough to persecute and destroy those guilty of incidental metagaming. navar100's comments and mvincent's response in particular have given me some great insight into our own style of play. I never really thought about it, but that is how I look at metagaming.
I'm afraid I have nothing to contribute but thanks. So, thanks.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 20, 2012 - 5:56PM
#15
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Really, the meta I disapprove of is when a player pre-reads a scripted module (LFR, RPGA, Printed WotC modules etc) and then designs a toon specifically to counteract that module.
[spewbile]
An example:
I was playing at a table, running "Sun and Moon" at LFR, and in the first encounter, you are defending a ring of festival civilians from encroaching aberant tenticles coming out of big-ole portals. There are about 8 to 10 different tenticle spawns, and PCs must kill the tenticles so they don't haul away npcs. The tenticles are 1 hp minions, and as such die in a single hit. This encounter is difficult normally (or can be with bad party composition), and very enjoyable. This time around, however, one of the players had pre-read the module, and decided that he wanted to be the hero in the first encounter.
He built a druid (I mockingly refer to it as the "Architect" druid), who put up four encounter-long walls that did damage. The encounter was effectively over after he went, as the only thing remaining to do was to polish off some soldiers, and to do an in-combat skill event. He was insanely proud of himself, and everyone else at the table and even the DM were really displeased. He has done similar things before and since, and it really aggrivates people to no end.
[/spewbile]
Other than cases like these two ^, meta is really subjective. I've always thought that PCs, by virtue of being PCs had an "adventurer's sense," or "I'm a PC" thing going for them which made them have above-average (in universe) knowledge of monsters, fighting monsters, and general monster-weakness knowledge. Every person who spends time in a tavern, as adventureers invariably do, will have heard at least one story about how the only way to kill a troll is with fire (or acid in 4e.) Its why you can make monster knowledge checks untrained.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 21, 2012 - 9:34AM
#16
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Date Joined:
Oct 24, 2001
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and then designs a toon specifically to counteract that module.
Toon?
Here are the PHB essentia, in my opinion: - Three Basic Rules (p 11)
- Power Types and Usage (p 54)
- Skills (p178-179)
- Feats (p 192)
- Rest and Recovery (p 263)
- All of Chapter 9 [Combat] (p 264-295)
A player needs to read the sections for building his or her character -- race, class, powers, feats, equipment, etc. But those are PC-specific. The above list is for everyone, regardless of the race or class or build or concept they are playing.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 21, 2012 - 11:14AM
#17
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Toon?
It's another name for Character. Its interchangable, but sometmes people have a negative connotation associated with it, suggesting that the character is really 1 dimensional and never shows any advancement.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 21, 2012 - 1:16PM
#18
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Date Joined:
Oct 24, 2001
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Thank you.
Here are the PHB essentia, in my opinion: - Three Basic Rules (p 11)
- Power Types and Usage (p 54)
- Skills (p178-179)
- Feats (p 192)
- Rest and Recovery (p 263)
- All of Chapter 9 [Combat] (p 264-295)
A player needs to read the sections for building his or her character -- race, class, powers, feats, equipment, etc. But those are PC-specific. The above list is for everyone, regardless of the race or class or build or concept they are playing.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 21, 2012 - 7:30PM
#19
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Toon?
It's another name for Character. Its interchangable, but sometmes people have a negative connotation associated with it, suggesting that the character is really 1 dimensional and never shows any advancement.
Meh. the only time you should call your character a toon is if you're actually playing Steven Jackson Games Toon RPG.
Another day, another three or four entries to my Ignore List.
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12 months ago ::
Jun 23, 2012 - 9:20AM
#20
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For me it's habitual, and I thought it was a City of Heroes thing (Yeah yeah, MMOs are lame, yadda yadda,) but I have seince learned that it's actually just a Role Playing term in general. Often times it's also applied to characters people have very little actual investment in.
That being said, lets stop derailing :P
Normally a certain ammount of meta is pretty acceptable anyways. I (as both a DM and a player) trend towards letting the DM decide how much of a given field my character knows based upon the setting (So, for example, if your version of the material plane has no recorded history of Sigil, no matter how high your arcana check to figure it out, you will still not know of sigil in name, even if you can conceive of it conceptually,) and modified by that character's particular background.
I also play with a number of people who read the extended materials (Demonomicon, Vile Darkness, etc.) simply for the lore of it, so we do periodically get people going "ooooh..." which can harm "immersion" as it were, but that's not really our primary goal. We wouldn't play 4e if we wanted a simulationist game. (or really, any D&D after 2e)
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