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RndmNumGen
2011-05-11, 09:25 PM
Recently I had a dispute in my game where one of my players questioned the ability of another player, who takes very good notes but was playing an illiterate barbarian, to recall the information in his notes. Previously I didn't have an issue with using notes in-game, but I felt this brought up a very good point; would a savage barbarian really be able to remember all of the details and minutae of a diplomatic negotiation that took place 4 days prior?

Now, from my point of view the barbarian has not previously shown a great interest in diplomacy, and seemed to be more inclined to chop people in half. However, the player thought that his character did care about it(in this case, it was in regards to payment for a service). I trust the barbarian's player in the matter, and ultimately I allowed him to use his noted with a promise that he wouldn't abuse OOC knowledge, but I was wondering if others have encountered similar experiences and how they handled them?

Sillycomic
2011-05-11, 09:38 PM
It only came up once in a game.

My players found a room with a large mirrored wall. They came up to touch the mirror and it broke. Their mirrored images didn't disappear though... and now they were in a room of evil versions of themselves.

I told them that they could role play these evil versions however they wanted, so long as they killed their original "good" selves first.

The fight took an hour, and after a few rounds one of my players realized that... with two of everyone it was hard to keep track of what was going on.

Since the good barbarian and the bad barbarian were fighting each other (and I had them roll their own attacks and whatnot, because its their twin, so they're character sheet) the Sorcerer didn't know which one was the good barbarian and which was the evil one.

So someone decided they needed to write down where everyone was to keep track. But I said no. There was no way to keep track of them in the game, since they were all in the middle of a fight, so there should be no way to keep track of them outside the game.

They thought it was a fair call.

The good news is, only one good guy fell from that fight.

The bad news... no one in the party knew which "good" guy fell except for me and the player.

Although... it was the final fight of the campaign (school was ending and summer vacation had people going everywhere) so unfortunately I never got to do anything particularly evil with that.

Ahh well.

Bobby Archer
2011-05-11, 09:43 PM
Mostly I've run into the opposite problem: players not taking notes or bothering to remember important details and asking the DM to remind them of every little thing citing high intelligence scores and/or abilities that grant their characters photographic memory.

In this case, it comes down to a gut call as to whether the PC would have been able to remember this information. Some players just don't want to play their low scores, especially for non-physical abilities. It can be tempting for players to use their mental and social abilities instead of simulating their characters'. Low-Charisma characters shouldn't be suave, charming, or impressive. Low-Wisdom characters shouldn't be cunning, alert, or subtle. Low-Intelligence characters shouldn't have large stores of knowledge at their fingertips.

In this case, 4 days isn't a terribly long amount of time to remember information. Depending on how minute the details this player was able to pull out and how relevant this information was over the course of the last few days, it wouldn't be unreasonable for him to remember it.

Provided his INT isn't 4 or something.

Kaun
2011-05-11, 10:07 PM
IMHO never punish a player for takeing notes.

Telling them that their character wasn't actualy there so they can't know that is one thing.

Telling them that their character wouldn't be able to remember all that info when they have supplied it from their own notes is another.

Anxe
2011-05-11, 10:11 PM
I always allow my players to take notes. Often more time passes in out-of-game time than in-game time. The players forget what their characters learned, so it's appropriate for them to write some stuff down to remind themselves.

There is some stuff they don't write down (cause they don't want to write down everything). If they later want to remember that but can't, I allow the character an intelligence check to (with whatever DC I feel like) see if the character remembers. Works pretty well for me.

There are exceptions that could occur such as what RdmNumGen and SillyComic posted, but they haven't come up in my games, so I haven't worried about it.

The_JJ
2011-05-11, 10:18 PM
If it's that big a deal take the notes, pass them to the Wizard/Rogue, give them a few moments, then pass them back to the Barbarian.

Then give the Barbarian shiny lootz for being a cool player.

El Dorado
2011-05-11, 11:55 PM
Our DM encourages note-taking. It helps the players stay invested in events and piece together his plots.

John Campbell
2011-05-12, 12:18 AM
Being able to write things down reduces the necessity of actually remembering them, and our brains are lazy like that, so an illiterate barbarian from a savage (read: "oral tradition") culture may well have better recall of conversations than a literate player from a literate modern civilization who can just jot down important things, and is used to doing so.

(Similarly, 20 years ago, I could reel off a dozen or more phone numbers of friends and relatives off the top of my head. Today, I have a cell phone with a contact list and automatic dialing. I couldn't tell you a single one of my friends' numbers. (Except my lady's, but that's just because hers has a funny and mildly obscene mnemonic.) Hell, I don't remember my phone number. My phone remembers them, so I don't need to. So I don't.)

The player also doesn't have the advantage of having directly experienced the conversation. He's also got a separate life with completely different, and much more important, issues to worry about between sessions, that should rightfully be monopolizing the majority of his attention.

A player writing things down may just be compensating for those disadvantages, recording things that might be important and memorable to a barbarian for whom it's their life, but not so important to a player who's only the barbarian in a game for a few hours once a week.

On the other hand, I'm currently playing an illiterate barbarian, and, contrary to my usual habit, I'm not taking notes because my character is illiterate.

On the gripping hand, I have a really good memory for that kind of thing, and am still the one who's usually most up on what's going on with the plot. I'm making up for my disadvantages not by writing things down, but by being just generally a lot smarter than my character.

dsmiles
2011-05-12, 05:40 AM
Recently I had a dispute in my game where one of my players questioned the ability of another player, who takes very good notes but was playing an illiterate barbarian, to recall the information in his notes. Previously I didn't have an issue with using notes in-game, but I felt this brought up a very good point; would a savage barbarian really be able to remember all of the details and minutae of a diplomatic negotiation that took place 4 days prior? Probably, if his INT/WIS are above, say, 10. It's not that hard. Just because somebody is a barbarian doesn't mean they can't have a good memory for details. Out there in the wild, details matter, like "is that black bear poop or grizzly bear poop?"

Now, from my point of view the barbarian has not previously shown a great interest in diplomacy, and seemed to be more inclined to chop people in half. However, the player thought that his character did care about it(in this case, it was in regards to payment for a service). I trust the barbarian's player in the matter, and ultimately I allowed him to use his noted with a promise that he wouldn't abuse OOC knowledge, but I was wondering if others have encountered similar experiences and how they handled them?I'll re-iterate what's already been said: Don't punish players for taking notes. Many players take notes based on what they (and their characters) key in on in descriptions. I once had a player take notes about every door and trap they came across. (I still don't know why, though. :smallconfused:) I've had others take notes about every spell that was cast (so he could research it later). It happens. It's a good idea to take notes.

Shhalahr Windrider
2011-05-12, 06:05 AM
As others have said, being illiterate does not mean having a poor memory for details. A Barbarian’s survival often hinges on those details.

Similarly, being uninterested in diplomacy doesn’t mean one never pays attention. Just that one will try to cut through all the niceties and get to the point. This is especially true if the object of negotiation is very important to the otherwise-uninterested party—such as a payment negotiation would be.

Also, as has been pointed out: OOC notes are often necessary if your characters are meant to have even a decent short term memory. Without the notes, a player can forget things even the densest character should remember simply because it’s only been four days for him in-character, but it’s been five weeks for him here in the real world. And what’s life-and-death for his character is simply a bit of entertainment for him. Add to that those things that are life-and-death for him taking up his attention between sessions, and it becomes rather silly to expect the player to remember any but the coarsest details on his own.

Tyndmyr
2011-05-12, 07:42 AM
IMHO never punish a player for takeing notes.

Telling them that their character wasn't actualy there so they can't know that is one thing.

Telling them that their character wouldn't be able to remember all that info when they have supplied it from their own notes is another.

Would agree. People play their characters for a few hours a week, generally, and have all sorts of other things to remember.

You might not remember the name of the person you talked to an hour ago in game time(but last session in real life). This is a task that your character could generally handle. Notes usually help play a character MORE realistically.

If illiterate is really that much of a problem, a skill point investment or a dip in something else will solve it.

Serpentine
2011-05-12, 07:52 AM
I sorta have an opposite thing. The players keep forgetting stuff, so I require "memory retention checks" for their characters to remember it, even if it only happened a few minutes ago in-game. Resulted in "muskrat" shenanigans that's become a running joke, once.

Note before criticism: it's pretty much just played for laughs, not an actual punishment for not paying attention or anything.

Seb Wiers
2011-05-12, 08:18 AM
Recently I had a dispute in my game where one of my players questioned the ability of another player, who takes very good notes but was playing an illiterate barbarian, to recall the information in his notes.

Non-literate cultures often have extensive oral traditions, which include traditions on how to accurately memorize large bodies of information (a necessity for those without recourse to written records). If your barbarian had ANY kind of trained, non-physical skill, he might well have developed a better memorization ability than the characters who are used to using written records.

valadil
2011-05-12, 08:26 AM
I had one player who really wanted to keep journals but didn't think it would be in character. Instead he drew comics of the sessions from the character's perspective. The art was horrible and nobody but that player could figure out what the comics meant, which in my eyes made them even more awesome. Could a compromise like that work for you?

CalamaroJoe
2011-05-12, 09:45 AM
Mostly I've run into the opposite problem: players not taking notes or bothering to remember important details

I too... and it annoys me a lot.
Could I have 1 dollar for each time I heard "Who are we after, again?".


I always allow my players to take notes. Often more time passes in out-of-game time than in-game time. The players forget what their characters learned, so it's appropriate for them to write some stuff down to remind themselves.

This. After all, as others yet stated, for the characters is life, for players is just a game.
RndmNumGen, I have a feeling that your second player is just nitpicking.


Edit:
In a lot on campaigns we played, it was usually one player that took notes for all the group.
For a lot of time I was that player, and I played a barbarian. This gave place to a lot of jokes on my "barbarian-cartographer", but actually we assumed that I, the player, was just writing down things that various characters remembered by themselves.

Jay R
2011-05-12, 09:52 AM
Most people remember more about a real-world encounter than any player writes down in his notes. I approve of players taking notes.

Oh, and people from illiterate societies often have excellent memories - because they have to. The Iliad and the Oddyssey - all 24 books of each - were "written" within an oral tradition and learned by heart by many bards for centuries before being written down.

I often have the opposite problem - players not remembering something that I'm sure their characters would remember, but if I remind them, then they know it's an important clue. In a game I'm playing, we bumped into an evil priest with an amulet with a spider emblem on it. Several episodes later, we bumped into another, but nobody remembered that the first one's amulet had a spider too. The DM had to remind us.

Sir Swindle89
2011-05-12, 10:04 AM
If the player was there it's not player knolege as long as his character was there.

I'd suggest if he takes extensive notes that he makes what he actually knows and what he wasn't there for.

lady_arrogance
2011-05-17, 06:32 AM
I'll re-iterate what's already been said: Don't punish players for taking notes. Many players take notes based on what they (and their characters) key in on in descriptions.



I have found as a player, that notes are good thing. Even if our group played once/week, there was still so much information, that I couldn't recall without taking notes. And for notes I have been taking, there's two kind of them: those, what my character knows/remembers, and those which are based on things I think important for the plot, and I have/should remember later as a player. (Our group was somewhat mature, so there were never problems about abusing the OOC-knowledge.)

Grogmir
2011-05-17, 07:23 AM
I always allow my players to take notes. Often more time passes in out-of-game time than in-game time. The players forget what their characters learned, so it's appropriate for them to write some stuff down to remind themselves....


This for me too.

Sounds like the OPs got some underlying group issues though - a player having a go at another for keeping notes? GGM, at least you don't have too!

Tanngrisnir
2011-05-17, 08:27 AM
Given that memory is not governed by intelligence and that illiterate doesn't mean someone can't remember things, there should be no issue with a barbarian remembering anything. The player writing notes so as to not forget what his character knows shouldn't be an issue.

Warlawk
2011-05-17, 11:34 AM
Being able to write things down reduces the necessity of actually remembering them, and our brains are lazy like that, so an illiterate barbarian from a savage (read: "oral tradition") culture may well have better recall of conversations than a literate player from a literate modern civilization who can just jot down important things, and is used to doing so.

This is such an excellent point that I just wanted to be sure it got due attention. Someone who cannot take notes and relies strictly on memory is probably more likely to remember those details, doubly so because many barbarian cultures did have an 'oral tradition' of storytelling to keep the lore of the tribe alive.

Seerow
2011-05-17, 11:39 AM
I want to point out that while you play your game once every week or two, or however often, the Barbarian in question is living the campaign. The player may not remember the exact details of something that occured a month ago in real time, but in game time that event may have happened yesterday, and he almost certainly remembers it.

Honestly, I see no point in punishing players for note taking. Forcing an Int check or the like to remember something the player didn't remember is one thing (though as I mentioned above, it depends on circumstance. If it was something that literally just happened in game, but IRL it was a session or more back, exceptions should be made), but saying "No you don't remember that" is just asinine.

navar100
2011-05-17, 12:10 PM
Being illiterate just means you can't read. It has no relation to the ability to remember or plan.

ShneekeyTheLost
2011-05-18, 03:03 PM
Going back to the discussion of metagaming and using OOC knowledge IC that your character would have no previous knowledge about, I had a player who did that a few times.

He owned more splatbooks than I did (quite an impressive feat, really), and had an encyclopedic recollection of them. Specifically, the problem came in when his city-born wizard character was spouting off the minutae and weaknesses of every last damn thing we ran up against. Without any investment in Knowledge skills.

First, I told him that he'd need to make a Knowledge (appropriate for the encounter) check to use that information IC. So he stopped spouting it off, but still took advantage of it IC personally.

So I decided to get nasty. I started making my OWN monsters. And clearly stated 'these monsters do not appear in any WotC book. They are a creation of my fevered imagination. Any relation between these and any other monster are purely coincidental, and likely setups for a big huge trap.'

He still tried to argue with me every time something didn't work out like he thought it would.

Shhalahr Windrider
2011-05-18, 06:27 PM
I sorta have an opposite thing. The players keep forgetting stuff, so I require "memory retention checks" for their characters to remember it, even if it only happened a few minutes ago in-game. Resulted in "muskrat" shenanigans that's become a running joke, once.

Note before criticism: it's pretty much just played for laughs, not an actual punishment for not paying attention or anything.
Yeah, I’ve had that thing pop up a few times in games I’ve played. Most notably with a player of an Int 6 Paladin when that same player probably had the equivalent of Int 13 or 14 in real life. Said player usually did the checks of his own volition.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t always comic effect… :smallwink:

Comet
2011-05-18, 06:29 PM
In situations like this it's important to keep OOC and IC separate. Metagaming is, again, the solution.

So, the player has taken notes but his character isn't clever enough to remember all that stuff. So have the player recite those notes he has and then give control to another player, who uses his considerably more brainy character to recite those same facts in-game.
The first player gets his sense of accomplishment for taking notes and the in-game fiction remains intact since the brainy guy is doing the brainy stuff. That's the way that seems to make the most sense to me, at least.

Pigkappa
2011-05-18, 06:57 PM
would a savage barbarian really be able to remember all of the details and minutae of a diplomatic negotiation that took place 4 days prior?

He wouldn't, but the Wizard with 18 Int would certainly do it, and he would also come up with very good ideas, and it's likely that the wizard's player isn't doing that (because he doesn't have 18 Int OOC and because he doesn't care too much about the game).

For this reason, I would just let the barbarian do this.