The Typical Party & the Typical DM

The first image shown is from p. 10 of 4th Edition's DMG, How to be a DM.  The second image, below, is from p. 15 of 4th Edition's Players Handbook.

Rating: mostly true

I might have divided this section up into two or more posts, but I believe that would have been frightfully dull and overthinking the issue.  The second image indicates what you'll find if you search page 15 of the player's handbook.  A complete description of the four types covers all of page 16; I felt that was a bit much.  In short hand, controllers are wizards; defenders are fighters & paladins; leaders are clerics & warlords; and strikers are rangers, rogues & warlocks.  Most readers, I'm sure, can work out the relationship between label and class easily.

We can see here an attempt by the publishers to formalize what we commonly see as the chief combat structure that D&D players employ.  I think the content is self-explanatory and doesn't need repeating.  Accepting this structure is, I've found, fairly universal in the experience of most participants, though I can't say that I've seen it in action since I played in a club at the University of Calgary in the late 1980s.

I played 4th edition for about three months in 2015/6; that association led to a disturbing confrontation with the 4th and 5th edition game culture at the gaming store where we played.  Returning to that post is my only way of positively identifying when I played.  I have no other associations with that brief period, and gained no acquaintences from it.

As I remember, while lip-service was paid to the theory described here, what I remember were blocks of player characters fighting blocks of monsters, jammed together without much sense, pouring damage back and forth until one block evaporated.  I don't doubt that some people do strategize as indicated, but many players have no concept of strategy—and therefore, we may argue they need a passage like the one shown.

I see two general discussions worth having from the material.  The first is the idea that the strategy employed here is correct and effective; the second relates to the need to have these four character roles in a party.

I cannot, alas, speak properly to 4th edition with regards to these things.  Frankly, I don't think the character role labels worked.  I read a lot of D&D description and argument, and I can't recall people making use of these terms.  Unquestionably, the roles played by a wizard or a fighter in a fight match up to "controller" and "defender"—it's only that when I see people talk about it, they say "wizard" and "fighter."  Not the terms here.  Like "fetch," these terms didn't happen.

As such, I'm not going to use these terms; nor am I going to discuss 4th edition classes.  4th edition fairly tanked as a system, though for many it was their first system and of course there are many who still play it.  But after 12 years of talking about AD&D, original D&D or my Frankenstein's version of D&D, I doubt anyone here will be heartbroken if I don't talk about the fantastic striking abilities of rogues.  This notion that fighters stand in front, wizards stand in the back, thieves go around and clerics heal has been around for a long, long time; I can't recall settling in to write about it, so this is a good excuse.

Part 1: Strategy

Taking from the 4e text, we're told that without a fighter, a party is vulnerable; that the lack of a cleric seriously compromises the party's ability to heal; that without a thief to backstab or a ranger to fire multiple arrows into a target, it's hard to do enough damage to kill monsters; and that without a wizard, the monsters can't be wiped out in groups.  Well, true enough.

This being a post for going back in time, I remember I got into some big trouble when I ran at game cons in the mid-80s.  Those were my first experiences running players who I didn't know, and didn't know me.  I saw them use the tactics I've just described: fighters in front, wizard in back, etc.  And, having played years of Avalon Hill wargames as a kid, as well as plenty of practical experience with capture the flag (which used to be a fanatical pursuit among cub and scout trips in the mountains, training us for the day when we'd join the army, as para-military propagandistic organizations did in the 1970s), it was awfully simple to break the player's strategy.  In a word, as a strategy goes, it sucks.

Think about it.  "Fighters in front, wizards in the back" works if you're fighting in a hallway that definitely has a safe rear.  Why would a monster building a lair ever design it with a rear that was safe for an invader?  But more to the point, I'm Russian.  The way you kill an invader is not to rush forward and fight them on the ground they choose.   No, no, no!  You back away, let the invader grab worthless territory, and then, when they're good and deep into your territory, you encircle them and let them die in their own juices.  That's pretty obvious.

If you're outside, fighting in the wilderness, it's worse.  Where's the "front"?  What side of the wizard do you stand on?  If I do attack you in the wilderness, I'm sure to have missile weapons, even if its just rocks.  Why would I waste my missiles on a fighter?  Of course, it is always assumed that goblins and orcs are amazingly stupid, and haven't learned the difference between a fighter and a wizard.  In my opinion, since they have language, I'm sure they'd invent a little rhyme* to help out the new soldiers:

Lots of robes and no plating,

That's the one you should be hating.

Shiny armour and metal sword,

Kill them when the wizard's snored.

* yes, I just invented this

So, I cheerfully made pincushions out of wizards from goblins behind trees, or had monsters with an intelligence of more than five bulldoze straight for the wizard, specifically when the party stopped to camp or got into an argument about something.  Seems to me, DMs usually perceive that the instant an intelligent monster spots a party, they have an uncontrollable urge to break cover and run straight at the fighter, waving their club around irrepressibly, in mad rage.  Take my word for it: when you don't play monsters this way; and you don't have the intelligent monsters make dungeons that have avenues taking outsiders straight to the treasure vault, players get mighty sore.  As I learned, using a monster to take advantage of the party's poor understanding of strategy is definitely playing outside the rules.  Though, of course, I can give you the page and passage where Gygax says that's exactly what you should do.

These days, I rarely go all out strategically.  It just isn't fair.  As a kid, I ran with players who could spend hours discussing the tactical choices made at Borodino; nowadays, I rarely find people who have heard of Borodino (yes, yes, I know, you all have, but ask around; the readers here are rare, don't you know that?).  Today, I reserve all out tactics for really smart monsters, high intelligence and up.  But I still target wizards.

I have sat with my mouth hanging open when a DM says, "Sure you can run around and attack the monster from behind."  Says right in the original books that you can't do that.  I have had online players in the last year ask if they can move around an enemy and attack them from behind.  I try to explain, over and over, that even if it is turn-based combat, everything in game-reality is still happening simultaneously, which means, if you run around the enemy, the enemy would have time to turn and face you.  But I still get asked—because, well, players are always doing their best to improve their odds of winning a fight.  I can't blame them for that, but surely we can understand the game is not intended to enable characters to break believable reality.  A defender in the center of the circle you're making to get around to his or her rear has to move far, far less than you do in order to maintain their facing.  It therefore takes less time to turn right, then run around to your left.  We can think this through, right?  It is pretty obvious.

Yet, there's the thief, running around and doing it "in shadows," like I can't see you moving or hear you tramping your feet at a full run.  Says right in the original books, you can't surprise me if I know you're there.  Also says, you can't hide in shadows or move silently when you're under observation.  But people don't read the books, they don't like the books, and hey, "fun."  Uh huh.

Strictly speaking, the standard tactics as described are garbage.  In general, the tactics employed by many players in my online D&D game are a mystery to me.  Usually, off-line, my players will keep tight, guard each other's flanks, stand back to back and try to keep the mage more or less in the center.  When the fight is full on, the mage fights, like everyone else.  It is impossible to maintain concentration when the fighter can get stunned and be forced to stumble backward.  Human beings are not walls.  When they're hit, they falter.

Online (thinking over games I've played all the way back to 2009), especially in outdoor fights, players choose to run in three different directions, splitting themselves up.  Instead of a mage running away from the combat, taking advantage of their spell range, they stand in easy reach and begin casting—even though they know I have a rule that it will take them one full round to cast their spell.  Anything will throw them off balance: a boot, a rock, a dagger, a flying tackle ... but still, they insist on doing it, with faith that the enemy will rush to attack the fighter and certainly not the mage.  I don't get it.  I have to assume they've learned certain tactics in the presence of other DMs, who have allowed them to get away with stuff that is a disaster when running in my game world.  It is much like those games I played with strangers in the 80s.

What's weirdest is that the players don't seem to learn from one fight to the next.  A new fight and once again, they take up the same old tactics.

Part 2: Covering

I need to be clear.  Given the way most campaigns are built; and the habits developed by most players in those campaigns; the expectation that there needs to be a fighter, a cleric, a mage and a thief of some kind is pretty near a necessity.  Most modules are designed with the presupposition that the players will have one of each of these character classes (or modern equivalents), and therefore the party will not be able to solve many of the problems or compete effectively in the combats without a full covering.  This is why many genre-savvy players will, upon entering my world, ask immediately, "which kind of character does the party need?"

I dislike this question.  As I say, it comes from the above structure that most players are used to playing, or designing adventures for.  It demonstrates a fundamentally flawed thinking in the game's design, however—one that is largely ignored.  Or which, perhaps, people simply can't see for the trees.

Let me give an example.  My present online party consists of two fighters, an assassin and an illusionist.  The players were in a good-sized town.  They proceeded on their own volition to a tiny village, and from thence into the wilderness, to explore.  Every reader here will have already noted that there's no cleric in the party.  Many will wonder, "What sort of healing did you give them, Alexis?"  Well, there was healing available in the large town, but it is very expensive and two members of the party did not think to purchase it.  One of the players has a bottle that will dispense a salve that heals 1-4 hit points per day.

"But surely, Alexis, you gave them a healing potion, or more than one.  Surely there was one in the first treasure they found."  Actually, no.  I don't run my game as though it is a series of set-pieces waiting for the party to turn up and get what they need.  The party is told the risks, then they decide what to do.

In my opinion, the party is crazy for deciding to be in the wilderness, with these limitations.  The assassin has been strengthened into a kind of dark fighter, but still, that makes three fighters in the party.  However, the reason why they chose to explore the wilderness is obvious:

This is the game as it is usually explained to the players.

The wilderness features an absence of laws.  Everything they find is theirs.  There's no one telling them what to do or where to go.  There's always treasure in the wilderness; there's always another dungeon.  And the DM's there to protect them, right?

This is how every party learns to play the game from day one.  Virtually every manifestation of the game argues that this is HOW the game is played.  Run a party with four illusionists?  That would be insane.  How would the party survive in a dungeon?

Give me three other players and a twin of myself as a DM, and I'd happily run a game with all of us playing illusionists.  We would not head off into the wilderness.  We would not explore a dungeon.  We'd find a nice large city and carve ourselves out a little safe place in it, and then use our wits and magic to spin the residents like tops—gaining experience through cleaning out shops and houses, or making bargains with local authorities to root out criminals or rebels, thus getting our experience through rewards and thankful gifts.  Or both.  We'd strengthen our lair, hire dupes to fight, associate ourselves with smart followers who would loyally help us protect our stake and steadily build up a tremendous underground network, like Sherlock Holmes, or an empire, like Moriarty.  It would definitely be fun.

What would I do with three grunts and a spellcaster?  That is definitely a town party as well.  We need to be near a large city so we can count on someone to heal us.  We need to make friends with a church mamber, so we need to make a donation and join the congregation.  We need intel, so we either need to lean on an official or a snitch.  The assassin can get us in with the criminal element, though not all at once; the fighters are muscle, so let's use them to either help protect some backstreet where we can set ourselves up, or settle ourselves in with the middle class.  We've got a little money; the illusionist has 1100 g.p. credit, for heaven's sake.  Let's use it.

The DM can set up a few in-town dungeons, build a faction that competes with the party, throw in some frivolous plots and provide one or two "do a side job and I'll pay you" arrangements with NPCs.  A couple more levels and the players will get henchmen, square out their party and THEN try the wilderness.

There are several reasons why a party balks at this.  The first is that a typical DM thinks that "intrigue" needs twists and turns like a Bond-movie; every follower is a turncoat, every NPC is a liar and the money is never, ever paid out as promised.  Second, a typical DM can't envision a city the way they can a dungeon; they don't know how the politics in a city work, they can't frame the motivations of half a dozen factions and a dozen more individuals, except in the cheesy 2D frame of a television show like Breaking Bad.  It just isn't possible for typical DMs to imagine that, in fact, criminals are often deeply loyal, which is why real life cartels and terrorist groups survive for decades.  Leaders do not kill their own followers to make a point and once you're on the inside, you're rewarded if you do good work.  This is not how a typical DM thinks.  A typical DM does not understand that the competitors are the enemy, not your own faction.  TV and films describe a world where that isn't so, and these are accepted at face value.

Third, typical players can't comprehend who the enemy is, or how to make friends.  Running a game in a town, where there are plenty of resources, beds, blankets, a continuous supply of food, equipment that doesn't have to be carefully preserved, and lots of healing, still seems confusing.  How is that player going to make friends with a priest?  Or a guard?  What do I say?  Am I supposed to just walk up and say, "Hey, I want to be your friend?"

[I've had players in games do exactly that—SMH]

Social skills are often a bridge too far; players have been trained to walk up, explain to the DM what they want the NPC to do, and then roll dice to see if the NPC does it.  That doesn't translate well to "Let's be friends."  Rolling dice to see if a coldly approached NPC suddenly becomes the party's friend is ridiculous; and the players feel that it's ridiculous, wrecking any possibility of the game being meaningful.  Players simply do not understand how one person talks to another in the game world without it being a matter of "what I want/what you'll do."

I sincerely HOPE players do not approach real people in the real world with this constant mindset.  But I have had players who only considered NPCs and buttons to be pressed, with the dice determining whether or not something would pop out of the little chute.

There's unquestionably a post to be written about how to communicate believably with the game world, but that's not the goal here.  I only want to highlight that the covering of classes in a party reflects the very narrow sliver of what's considered game-play, according to the way people normally perceive a role-playing game.  So long as what we want to do adheres to the resources a particular group has, there's no such thing as insufficient coverage.  But so long as there's only one adventure scenario structure we're allowed to play, then yes: better have one of each.  It's the best plan.

This series continues with The Character is Only a Game Piece