The Underlying Philosophy of Worldbuilding

Sometimes I write a post where I find myself wanting to say more than one post will cover, spawning a series, and sometimes I think of the series ahead of time, based on some list I have where I think, "I could write a post about each one of those things."  I think, on the whole, the first kind is better than the second ... this is the second kind.  But I'm not going to talk of what the list is, or where it came from.  At least, not for awhile.

I've argued that your game world's structure depends a great deal on how you approach ethical play.  What you believe about your world is essential to how that world is going to interact with the players, as it defines what you'll do, what they can expect, how legitimate your form of play is and the probable sustainability of your campaign.  Yes.  It's going to be one of my heavier posts.

Your legitimacy as a dungeon master begins with the amount of voice you grant your players during the game.  They need the freedom to push back against your dictates — which is why the argument, "the DM is always right" fails the test of justifying our right to make a ruling on anything.  No one is always right ... and to argue that we are is more than a hint that we're dealing with an asshole and a coward, who hasn't the ability to defend his or her privilege on any other scale than, "because I said so."  That's not legitimate and it will subvert any chance of ever running a long-term campaign.

Many will claim that, however; they'll say they're always right, but they don't run that way.  When they actually run, the smug entitlement gets put down in favour of the greater good.  So why argue that the DM is always right, if even the speaker doesn't believe it?  Damned if I know.  The fact remains, players must believe they have a voice in what the DM says and does.

Secondly, legitimacy demands that we act in accordance with things we've said and decisions we've made, day to day.  If the NPC can throw a sword, then the players deserve to have that power also; and if the player is given that choice today, it can't be taken away tomorrow.  This is why game rules exist: to establish, as an agreed-upon context, what's permitted and what isn't, always.  If a rule is retracted, then this demands a discussion, because the players deserve a voice in that discussion.  We've always done this, this way.  It can't be changed ad hoc.

This obliterates the DM's fiat, and that gets some folks in a knot.  DM's like the power to arbitrarily decide that something that players are entitled to do is suddenly not permitted.  A DM with the wrong attitude can make a call like this without awareness that it's been done; and players often let it go by, because that judgment isn't enough to make them quit a game that's giving them their only opportunity to play ... but the tension cause by this arbitrariness grows, session-by-session, until the players get sick of the bullshit.  This helps explain why a player "loses it" over some small ruling — because it's the last straw on the camel's back, and fuck you.  This ruling may be small, but that's why the idiom uses "straw" and not "anvil."  There's only so much we'll take.

Finally, authority has to be fair.  If Jimmy gets more attention and choices then I get, then to hell with this game.  A DM must remain constantly aware of everyone playing, not just his or her favourites.  This gets increasingly difficult with more players, as it calls for more and more of a DM's time to provide attention to so many.  It's a juggling act.  Moreover, in the best parties, not only does Sam feel overlooked, Barry will notice that Sam's being overlooked.  And Jane will notice that Barry's pissed off about something, and steadily the cracks grow.

Sorry to go off on a definition of legitimacy, but it matters.  A sustainable world must address these matters.  At the same time, that world has to be active, it must have an overarching game structure that permits play.  Here, we're not talking about the physical world, but the way the DM approaches what the game IS and how it RESOLVES.  The game of checkers is a game of movement and strategy, that resolves by eliminating all the enemy pieces.

D&D cannot work like a game of checkers, or most board games.  It's not only about strategy; it's also about personal growth and proving one's bravery against unseen odds.  Moving a checker is a risk; and it requires at least a little courage to push the piece forward ... but a concession is made prior to the game that someone has to move or else we're done.  D&D has no such concession.  If the players have come to the understanding that sieging this castle is going to be far too difficult, or dangerous, because they are simply lacking in the bravery to take on this attack, then unlike checkers, they don't have to move.  They can do something else.  That is, unless the DM says, "We're taking on the castle today and I have no other adventures to offer."  In which case, you get the pleasure of the other fellow reaching across and moving your checker for you.  Though only the first few moves.  After that, you're on your own.

The way that "moves" work in D&D are radically different from any other game, including all video games — largely because they're not limited by any predetermined construction.  A designer does not need to conceive of what I do in a bar at a given time with my character, for me to have the option of doing that thing.  All "if-then" game function occurs after the character is made and the game is set in motion ... and the "then" part is conceived after a random person round the table, including the DM, spontaneously invents the "if" part.  This far-reaching fundamental nature of the game offers unfathomable possibilities — which most DM's seek to limit harshly, because that many possibilities seem impossible to manage.  Most DMs, and company-designed products, strive to brutally restrain player choices, essentially destroying the game's potential in order to make it manageable for the inexperienced and uncreative.

Putting that aside.  Our choice in "moves" includes talking to an NPC, buying an object, choosing a direction to walk, choosing the speed of movement, choosing to fight or not to fight, choosing which weapon to fight with, switching weapons continuously in combat, giving up a fight, deciding to die if that's what it takes, choosing whether or not to raise a dead character, reincarnating a character instead, rolling a new character, choosing to be an elf, choosing to travel by horse rather than on foot, buying a stable and food for horses, building a house next to the stable, building a yard around the house, plowing a farm, building a mill to make flour, selling the flour in town, joining a farmer's cooperative, buying more farms, heading out to adventure again, saving an innocent, getting decorated for bravery, being given a title, turning the farm into a fief, settling strangers on your land and collecting rents, raising an army, going to war, usurping a commander or a king, putting yourself on the throne, studying dark magic, calling forth demons from hell, using them to open a gate, speaking through the gate with gods, etcetera, etcetera.  And all of these are legitimate, fundamentally purposeful aspects of the game and are in no way remotely 0.01% all the possible moves a player, or group of players, can make.

Therefore.  Given the immensity of possibility, even when that possibility is drastically constrained, as a DM it serves to have a specific philosophy in mind where it comes to running the game.  With each player move, it serves to have SOME idea how that move should be worked into the game's overall structure, what responses ought to be given, what measure of recompense ought to be given for what player "moves" and — to put it succinctly — what is all this moving supposed to accomplish?  Remember ... in checkers, the goal is to win.  The goal in D&D is very definitely not to "win," though various salespersons will twist and torment the moves and rewards of the game in a hundred varied ways to argue that you're achieving "a win" if you do this or that or some other thing.  That determiner is doing a lot of work here.  None of the "wins" suggested equate remotely to checkers.  There is no end to the game that a win achieves.  So let's stop using that word as a wished-for shorthand and get down to brass tacks.

D&D offers something other than wins and losses.  It's up to us to determine what that is — because, like all the choices we make as players and DM, there is no definite answer to this offering.  This is, at last, what the post is about.

I'd like to suggest three philosophies to consider.  They're not the only possible approach we can offer, and each can be easily blended with another.  So think of these as markers on a linear scale rather than three camps of belief.

The first is the proposal that the players are owed something for playing.  They've shown up for our game, we're running them, we have a responsibility that the players won't walk away from the session without something in exchange for their time.  Our role as DM is to provide that.  We can variously define the thing they're being given: a exciting adventure, a sufficient amount of treasure and experience for their willing involvement, the time we commit prior to the game in preparation, perhaps the recognition that they deserve to go up a level, or get a treasured object, once they've committed a certain amount of their time.

Arguments supporting this philosophy propose that characters have the right to expect going up a level every two, three or four sessions, regardless of what's transpired.  Or that character should be in possession of certain objects once they've reached a pre-determined level.  "You're 7th?  Then by now you should absolutely have a +3 shield.  Here it is.  It arrives in a velvet bag, sent by the local king."

There's a great deal of comfort in taking this approach.  As a DM, you more or less have assigned what you're supposed to give ... and since, in effect, the players are paid for showing up and participating, they feel compensated for the time they've given.  Quite a lot of the tropes with which we're familiar fit into this ideal.  All adventures are built around a few minor monsters and puzzles in the beginning, and when the end comes there must be a big bad and a pile of treasure, because this is what players expect ... and our role as a DM is to ensure the players get what they expect.  Because if they can't get that, then why should they play at all?  If they're not ultimately receiving steady compensation for their participation, then why should they participate?  Therefore, when you play as DM, you think clearly to yourself, "This is what the players want.  This is how I'm going to give them what they want."  Deciding they can't get it, with this approach, is off the table.

Before discounting this approach, mind you dear reader, you are on the hook to explain why this shouldn't be the way the game's played.  You can't just decide not to give the players what they want.  You can't decide that they don't deserve to be compensated.  It's not enough for you to recoil, or illegitimately refuse the players what they've come here expecting to receive.  You need a damn good argument for incorporating a different philosophy into your game's play.  Have you got one?

Okay, the second proposal argues that you can't always get what you want ... but if you try sometime, you'll find you get what you need.  This proposal has legs.  It says that the game isn't about getting rich and powerful, it's about trying ... and enjoying the successes when they happen, while overcoming the setbacks.  As a player, you learn to be resilient.  You learn to take it on the chin.  But when all is said and done, the compensation you receive for your troubles is the knowledge that everything you've done and achieved in the game, was fucking earned.  None of it came free.

For those resistant to this policy, who prefer the "I'm owed" perspective, it can be hard to explain how much sweeter something is when it's suffered for.  As people get older, starting from around age 9, they start to select themselves into two categories: the first argues that the world's wronged them, that they got sold a bill of goods and the world didn't pay the bill, and that everything's gone to hell in a handbasket.  "Damn it, I was promised," they say, and though the so-called promise is never fulfilled, they keep harping on it anyway.  They never let that promise go.  They never cut their losses and move on.  Never, as they say about Batman, get over anything.  Never get over anything.  Carry that shit to your grave; coddle it in your breast and build it a nest under your heart, but never, ever, let that shit go.

The other group shrugs, understands the promise was false, understands there are no promises, understands that life is different from that, and gets on with getting what they need.  And when things go right, and gives them more, usually because they worked for it, they again self-select into two groups.  There are those who share those fruits of their labours, and there are those who don't.  The first group usually acknowledges that while the bounty came from work, a lot of it came from luck also.  They have the ability to look around and see that not everyone's lucky, so they share some of that luck.  This type makes a damned fine group of players, let me tell you.  The other kind of soul looks at their bounty differently.  They look at it and think, "I worked hard for this, and I deserve ALL of it."  "Fuck you," they say.  "I got mine."

So, what does a DM do when they choose this path, the one where at least you get what you need?  Well, to begin with, what do players need ... keeping in mind the principles of legitimacy, above?  They need a fair way to equip themselves, so that they can think their way through strategising against disappointments when they occur.  They need a very clear understanding of their abilities, because talking their way through problems won't work — the DM is under no obligation there to ensure their success just because they can talk a lot.  We need a clear idea of what "problem solving" is, so we can define when the players have solved something, as opposed to going through the motions of solving it so we can give them the solution before we all get bored.

We need clear-cut rules the players can exploit, because their ability to exploit those rules is not the guide path between success and failure.  They're not guaranteed success, so if they get it, that will happen because they did the right things in the right way to achieve right results.  "Right" in this case being a rational, logical, believable way to solve a problem, rather than that the problem exists as a cardboard cut out of the problem that the players are guaranteed to knock down.

It's easy to see this asks a lot more of the DM than giving the players what they want.  Whereas with "success is the only option," the end-goal is clear, now the DM is forced to divide every move the players make on a scale that either says, "Not a believable solution at all," or, "That sounds reasonable."  Die rolls really mean something; they can't be fudged to ensure the players get a victory; now they have to be viewed as something that might seriously fuck up the chances of a player EVER succeeding.  And the players, in turn, have to know this plainly when they roll the die.  They must have it in their heads that if this die roll does not go well, that's the ball game.  We were able to play, but we failed.

What they say about a baseball season is that everyone's going to win 61 games and everyone's going to lose 61 games ... it's what you do with the other 40 that counts.  There's a tacit acceptance that sooner or later, the dice won't go our way, we will lose player characters, my own player character may ultimately die in a way that he or she can't be raised ... and that's okay.  Many players, and DMs, can't live with that.  Especially in a game that's supposed to be "fantasy."

D&D is not my fantasy.  My fantasy involves waking up each day to another producer's phone call to offer me half a million dollars for the rights to my book.  My fantasy is to meet Madonna, and when I tell her that I've loved her music, she tells me that she thinks my book is fucking awesome, and can I sign a copy.  My fantasy is to stand in the Hagia Sophia for about a week, then to get on a flight and stand in the Taj Mahal, for about a week.  I have much, much bigger fantasies than having my 6th level character become 7th level just because I want that.  Any fantasy that involves changing a written "6" to a "7" is a pretty cheap fantasy.

How "fantasy" changed from a game based on fantasy-era fiction to a game based on allowing people to live their fantasy, I don't know.  Sounds like a marketing strategy.  In any case, that's not what's promised by giving the players what they need.  They don't need fantasy.  They need breakfast.

Still, "need" seems like a bottom-level benchmark where play is concerned.  We are talking about a game, where decisions get made that enable the player to either succeed or fail.  Surely, that's a reasonable ask.  Surely, that's "fair" ... and that if we don't want to give the players their heart's desire, it's correct that the game ought to be fair.  At the start of checkers, everyone has a "fair" chance of winning.

That said, if you're an 8-y.o. playing against my uncle Tom in 1972, fair has not one thing to do with it, because my uncle's going to win that game, every time.  Oh, you'll play him again when you're 14, and again when you're 22, but you're never going to win that game, because he's going to die — and that's what he did — before you ever win a game against him.  Because that's how it happens sometimes.

Our third proposal is that life sucks.  Which it does.  But why play that way?  Why pursue a position that counts on disappointing the players, since the point of the game is usually seen as succeeding, having fun and being challenged?

Take a moment and examine the precepts of the game as we know them.  So far, either the game guarantees them a win, or guarantees them a fair contest.  But is this D&D, really?  Because both of these premises presume a game world that specifically exists to serve the players.  Which in fact limits D&D on what it can be.

Consider: you've invented a time machine that you can use to travel back to the year 1635, and let's say for argument's sake that you've chosen the northern slopes of the Carpathian mountains, near the German-controlled Transylvanian town of Kronstadt.  Let's add, retaining the principles of The Terminator, you have to go back naked, without money or anything.  And finally, let's add that by virtue of the time machine, it will turn on again the moment you've gone back in time, but from your perspective, you have to wait five years before the machine pulls you back.  This means you've got to survive, by your wits, for five years ... without help, without the guarantee of survival, without a DM to ensure that the experience is "fair."

Would you do it?

Speaking for myself, I would.  I don't see that adventure as a game, because by the principles that I've laid out, it wouldn't be.  I'd have to actually survive in an very unfamiliar environment, by my wits, using the 21st century knowledge I've accumulated to out-wit the locals and anyone else I might confront.  I'd have to avoid getting into fights, I'd have to find a way to make a living that would sustain me, I'd have my health to manage in a world without medicine ... and in return I'd obtain a perspective that is, in fact, impossible to obtain.  To see the way people lived, to obtain their trust, to witness their strategies for living and to adopt them, to be one of them, to share and explore what part I could play in their lives.  Why ... it would be incredible.

But there'd be no safety net.  No assuredness that the game was fixed or fair.  Faced with that, a person must be of a certain character.  Arguably, the person might be called a dare-devil, but I think that's a simplification.  I think, rather, that someone would need to be very confident; self-reliant; bold.  And a little stupid.  I feel I have those qualifications.

The thing about a game world that would reflect — NOT "simulate"! — that opportunity is the sort of player it gathers.  No player around the table whines about not getting what they want, because they don't expect that.  No player whines that the game was "rigged."  They expect it to be rigged.  They want to play the game because it's rigged.  Not in the sense that a game of chance is rigged, but in the way that life is.  Life isn't fair.  It isn't kind.  It won't assure you survival.  It will spontaneously wreck your gawddamned year.

A game that does that has to be built very, very carefully.  We're not speaking of a game world that's out to get you, or one that's full of clever traps designed to assure your death ... I'm not discussing the Tomb of Horrors.  I'm proposing a game world that's indifferent to what you want or what you're doing.  Yes, it will contain completely friendly people.  I would expect to find those people in 1635 Transylvania, after all.  Nothing about 1635 would be lying in wait to kill me.  There's no design in place along those lines.  The difficulty isn't that I'm facing a world that's destined to kill me ... it's that I'm not facing a game at all.  I'm facing a setting that has evolved for a purpose that is not about me.

That is largely impossible for most people to contemplate head on.  The universe, whatever it is, does not care about me, or you, or anything that presently exists in our experience.  It doesn't "care."  It merely is.

But a game world that's built that way can't be, until the DM reasons that the main goal in designing such a setting is to take the DM out of the loop.