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Trekkin
2013-05-11, 09:30 PM
I'm a bit sheepish about posting this, because several of the people who have DMed games in which this has come up read these forums. Let me just preface this by saying that this isn't a complaint; this is something I keep doing that's rather disruptive in good games, and something I'd like advice on how to stop doing.

I can't efficiently ask questions of the GM when my character's looking through archives or libraries for information. This includes questioning sages and so forth, since in the end it all boils down to asking the GM questions for plot; I always feel like I'm wasting the GM's time by asking things that aren't relevant. The first question might be "what did we just fight" or "what just happened", and then we'll meander through the questions raised by those answers and I'll almost always run out the clock, as it were, with questions left unanswered, because I'll identify the wrong questions to ask based on the answers we get. On the GMing side, I'll usually overload my players with information without making sure they get all of the information they need, just because the things they pick to research more aren't what I thought they would be and it feels forced to lead them around to the truth.

So how, from both sides, do you all approach this scenario? As a player, how do you efficiently mine a wealth of information for plot-relevant data? As a GM, how do you make sure the players learn what you intend for them to learn as a result of their questioning? I'm sorry to make it so general, but it pops up in all sorts of scenarios; there's apparently some fundamental flaw in how I approach this that makes everything take a really long time.

Water_Bear
2013-05-11, 10:05 PM
If the PCs are in the Library, that's either the conclusion of a quest to find said library or part of the intro to a quest using information from said library. Either way, the process needs to be memorable and quick; exposition slows the game down enough without adding tons of time just to get to it.

As an example;

In one of my campaigns the party was looking for a shadowy cult leader running some sort of vague doomsday plot (it was better than that description makes it sound, but also mostly irrelevant here) and they decided to hit up the biggest library in the region to scope out clues.

Said library happened to be the tower of an old friend of theirs, who they had rescued from another planet as a kid and was now secretly the BBEG. The library was part of his plot to gather a ton of willingly given blood; to get information from the magic library you cut your palm and bled into a bowl and the blood magically formed into any and all relevant texts, scrolling across the walls of the room you were in like an evil wizard version of google.

So when they went there, they had a) a guide to RP with and b) a cool special effect which gave them the information they needed (and some useful lies) with a minimum of faffing about.

JusticeZero
2013-05-11, 10:09 PM
Every question eats a bunch of time, and you find more contradictory or disputed stuff about the previous questions with each pass. Advanced research is basically "you disappear into a library for two years asking one question, and walk out having written a book about your findings plus what you saw on your one adventure". And you mostly stopped looking because you got hungry.

However, the first pass will probably find a book that has a pretty good entry with a variety of info. Tell them a long and detailed blurb with far more than they asked on the first pass, and let them know that more questions will take much longer and be much more confusing.

Slipperychicken
2013-05-11, 11:46 PM
As a player, I'd ask the DM "I use the library to research [insert subject here], asking the librarian about it beforehand. What do I need to roll?" After that, the DM gives me whatever information he wanted me to find at the library, and how long it took me to find it. No Q&A session, just roll the dice and give me the goods.


I'm not a DM myself, but I imagine two options: either the library itself has a Knowledge skill appropriate to its size and quality, which you roll to determine what you learn there, or it adds a fitting amount like +2/+5/+10 to your own Knowledge skill roll. Or if it's important to the plot that the PCs learn something from the library, you somehow railroad plan the library encounter in advance and already know what they're going to get (maybe a high roll gives them a little something extra, like an important enemy's weakness?).

GoddessSune
2013-05-11, 11:57 PM
As a GM, how do you make sure the players learn what you intend for them to learn as a result of their questioning? I'm sorry to make it so general, but it pops up in all sorts of scenarios; there's apparently some fundamental flaw in how I approach this that makes everything take a really long time.

Most often I will let players ''waste time'' and ask whatever. I don't ''intend'' for them to learn anything. I really, really, really don't like the dull and boring ''GM tell me what to do'' thing that many players do. And should a player really do it too much like ''I sit around at the library and read books until the GM tells me what to do'', I won't be gaming with that player for very long.

Otherwise, I'll just give the players the information. Though often it will be vague, contradictory or even somewhat wrong. The idea is simple enough, to get the players doing something, anything except 'reading a book'. For example, they might have three leads to go out and follow, not knowing the 'right one'.

And I'll avoid ''libraries'' if I can...and make it more like an oracle.

Hanuman
2013-05-12, 12:04 AM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MduM0SCXlqM

bbgenderless100
2013-05-12, 12:34 AM
How do you interrogate a library? well you do it in the most non time consuming way possible meanwhile benefitting everyone.

Telok
2013-05-12, 12:45 AM
As a player I spend money to hire someone to do research for me.

As a DM... It's an issue.
In my current generic fantasy setting game I have four easily accessable libraries; a magic school, a research facility, a national documents archive, and a general public library. In addition there are two high mages and a ten thousand year old friendly dragon around to answer questions. Yet my players make no effort to look for anything or question anyone. They haven't even asked what sorts of books or subjects are in the collections.

I'm just thankful I didn't put anything required by the plot in the libraries.

Slipperychicken
2013-05-12, 01:01 AM
How do you interrogate a library? well you do it in the most non time consuming way possible meanwhile benefitting everyone.

Agreed. I see it like buying items. It's something which has to be done, but it's not what I want to do all night. I've seen people waste hours haggling a merchant down over pocket change, and it's no fun at all for anyone (except that psychotic player who fights for every single copper piece like it's her only child, but she doesn't count).

There are times when I desperately desire nothing more than to just roll a die and have these torturous exchanges be over with. Even if the result isn't what I wanted, at least I get to play for the rest of the night, and not argue with the DM about imaginary people bickering over a pittance of imaginary gold.

NM020110
2013-05-12, 01:04 AM
These solutions likely aren't going to be too helpful, but...

1.) Type out a list of your questions, hand it to the DM. Get a list of responses, make more questions. This is best done between sessions.

2.) Get a general area of questioning that you would be pursuing. Until the end of the session, your character is generally assumed to have researched anything that comes up in that area. When the session ends, proceed to 1.

It doesn't make the questioning any more efficient, but this method should prevent said questioning from taking up too much time in the session.

Slipperychicken
2013-05-12, 01:13 AM
Why do people go this "question-answer" route?

Libraries aren't Google; You can't just ask them for a specific piece of information and get only the relevant bits. You have to search for any book tangentially related to the topic you're researching, then either labor through each one of the books that come up (of which there may be dozens), or cast Scholar's Touch on them if you're lucky enough to have bought a scroll of it (or you actually know it for some bizarre RP-related reason). Hopefully the librarian is competent and helpful, and even that usually does little more than narrow the pile of books you're going through.

Gnoman
2013-05-12, 01:37 AM
In my games, when the players search for information in a library, they roll Search to find any books that might be relevant. (The DC is dependant on how esoteric the knowledge is, and how well they describe what they're looking for, and how high they roll determines how well they filter out irrelevancies. For example, searching for a book on "big demons" will have a low DC, but even a decent roll will result in a lot of books that will turn out to be completely irrelevant, while looking for more information on "a hundred-foot demon with three legs, four arms, who shoots black arrows of death in combat" will have a very high DC, but there will be pretty much no false leads. This takes one day in game-time, and assistance from library staff grants a bonus on the check.

From there, each book must be examined with the appropriate Knowledge check, depending on subject. Depending on the esotericness of the subject, and how relevant I decide the book actually is, this has a DC from 5-60, and takes anywhere from 10 minutes to a month. From that point, I usually either summarize what they found out, or present them with a few pages of text if I determine that there wasn't clear information available. On a few occasions, the book that they discover will be in an extremely poor condition, be written in a lost language (Comprehend Language only works on "living" languages in my games), or have some other complication that they have to resolve before they can make use of it, making that an adventure in and of itself.

Generally, they would roll the Search checks at the end of a session, and I would prepare and provide the rest individually between sessions.

TuggyNE
2013-05-12, 01:46 AM
Libraries aren't Google

Sure they are! (http://drmcninja.com/archives/comic/21p41/)

OK I just wanted to link that image. :smalltongue:

Craft (Cheese)
2013-05-12, 02:39 AM
As a GM, how do you make sure the players learn what you intend for them to learn as a result of their questioning?

Simple: I don't. When this comes up, I give them a time pressure which limits the number of questions they can ask. If the players fail to ask the right questions to get the information they need, tough luck, they'll need to find some other way to progress. If they're truly stuck and directionless without the information, it means I've screwed up somewhere. In case of an absolute emergency like that, my preferred method is to have a (hopefully established) NPC do something that changes the circumstances so the PCs can respond to them and get the game moving again.

Trekkin
2013-05-12, 02:54 AM
That makes sense, then. Thanks, everyone; I think I know how to structure my questions, now, by just asking for an infodump on a topic rather than trying to answer a particular question about it.

SiuiS
2013-05-12, 02:55 AM
As a player, I'd ask the DM "I use the library to research [insert subject here], asking the librarian about it beforehand. What do I need to roll?" After that, the DM gives me whatever information he wanted me to find at the library, and how long it took me to find it. No Q&A session, just roll the dice and give me the goods.


I'm not a DM myself, but I imagine two options: either the library itself has a Knowledge skill appropriate to its size and quality, which you roll to determine what you learn there, or it adds a fitting amount like +2/+5/+10 to your own Knowledge skill roll. Or if it's important to the plot that the PCs learn something from the library, you somehow railroad plan the library encounter in advance and already know what they're going to get (maybe a high roll gives them a little something extra, like an important enemy's weakness?).

Aye. This is the best way to handle it. Alternately make it an extended roll with time pressure; tell them in X time they can make Y rolls (with bonuses for indexing or specific searches or whatnot) and for each success they get one piece of information. Bonus points for making it so the prices don't make any sense unless you've got most of them/all of them to put together.

Also, Craft (Cheese) has the right of it. This shouldn't e life or death for the layers. If they fail to stop the next step of Baron Von Mean's plan, well, they just deal with the aftermath.

BWR
2013-05-12, 06:41 AM
There's a reason Library Use is a much valued skill in CoC.

Libraries come in two basic varieties: organized and disorganized.
Disorganized ones are typical mediaeval collections of books. Small enough that a single caretaker can, over the course of a few months or years, have become familiar with all the books and know which one contains what knowledge. The role of a librarian in these sorts of libraries in invaluable. These are the hardest for outsiders to use because you have to read (or at least skim over) everything to find what you're looking for, and this is time consuming. To make matters worse, most ancient books don't have titles on their spine or their covers, at least not the ones I have seen) so you must open every one.
Mechanically, I would use Search/Perception (to find the right book) and a Linguistics (if you play PF) to speed-read them to find interesting stuff.

Oraganized libraries have some sort of system to them. This usually occurs when enough books are present that you need some sort of organization to keep them apart. Not every organized library would use the Dewey system, but a simplified "all religions here, all history there, all fiction in the trash" can cut down on time spent looking through useless books.
Mechanically, apart from the skills mentioned above, I would allow Knowledge skills to help, because you know enough about the subject to tell whether or not a particular text is helpful, and know what sort of fields the subject overlaps with. Especially in the D&D worlds where religion and history are often both correct and the same thing. E.g. Dragonlance: the Cataclysm is both historical and divine in nature, so which section would a dissertation on it be kept?

valadil
2013-05-12, 08:37 AM
Honesty I try to avoid libraries in games. They seem like a good idea but simulating research just isn't a good RP experience. If the pcs need information to proceed, I give it to them. If the info is optional I roll for it. I might do something puzzley if I'm feeling up to it, but more often than not if rather get back to the adventure.

BWR
2013-05-12, 11:37 AM
I like libraries, and see no problem having them in games. If every adventure requires you to spend several hours real time looking things up, there is something wrong.
Saying "you can't find any info about the 4000 year old vampire-king of Nod by talking to people. Perhaps some ancient gathering of arcane tomes might help" and having the PCs find a library and make a few rolls to find the stuff is fine.
There is a reason libraries developed in the real world, and those reasons hold true for the D&D game world as well, at least from a fluff POV.

Scow2
2013-05-12, 12:08 PM
"Welcome to the library: What do you want to know about?"
PC asks question
"[Give answer in extremely extended form, not yes/no/short answer, giving all relevant information the library has about the subject of interest. Pre-empt questions.]"

It's a pile of books and stories. Not a corpse (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/speakWithDead.htm),deity (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/commune.htm), or Extraplanar entity (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/contactOtherPlane.htm).

LibraryOgre
2013-05-12, 12:32 PM
As BWR says, a lot of this is going to depend on the library you get, and how organized it is. In a general mechanical sense, I think adding a bit to the knowledge check, especially a cumulative amount based on time spent (up to a limit), is the most reasonable way.

So, depending on the library, you might say that, as a DM, it has a maximum +10 bonus... but you only get a +1 per day. +3 per day if you have a librarian help you (since they know the collection and can direct you to sources). The library will only give you so much, but time invested will improve the bonus up to there.

And you might decide on other modifiers. Maybe being able to speak more languages will make it more useful (because you can read the books in Tamil, you can do better on your Knowledge: Religion checks). Or you might make a certain skill useful.

Slipperychicken
2013-05-12, 12:58 PM
So, depending on the library, you might say that, as a DM, it has a maximum +10 bonus... but you only get a +1 per day. +3 per day if you have a librarian help you (since they know the collection and can direct you to sources). The library will only give you so much, but time invested will improve the bonus up to there.


Also, it should be typed as a Circumstance bonus to avoid weird stacking issues, like if you previously let a PCs' small guidebook act as a masterwork tool.

valadil
2013-05-12, 09:45 PM
I like libraries, and see no problem having them in games. If every adventure requires you to spend several hours real time looking things up, there is something wrong.
There is a reason libraries developed in the real world, and those reasons hold true for the D&D game world as well, at least from a fluff POV.

I agree that they belong in fantasy. I just don't think they add to the roleplaying. I include them when appropriate, but I'd rather hand wave the research so it's done quickly.

LibraryOgre
2013-05-12, 10:09 PM
Also, it should be typed as a Circumstance bonus to avoid weird stacking issues, like if you previously let a PCs' small guidebook act as a masterwork tool.

I tried to make things a bit generic, since we're not necessarily talking about d20 and its variants, but I would be more inclined to call it an equipment bonus, like that of a masterwork item.

Slipperychicken
2013-05-12, 11:27 PM
I tried to make things a bit generic, since we're not necessarily talking about d20 and its variants, but I would be more inclined to call it an equipment bonus, like that of a masterwork item.

In 3.5, Masterwork Items grant Circumstance bonuses (weird, I know). Good call on your part, I keep assuming people are talking about D&D.

LibraryOgre
2013-05-13, 01:07 AM
In 3.5, Masterwork Items grant Circumstance bonuses (weird, I know). Good call on your part, I keep assuming people are talking about D&D.

3.x provides a useful common vocabulary, but since I'm not a fan, I try to keep it generic.

And, yeah, calling it a circumstance bonus is silly.

holywhippet
2013-05-14, 10:14 PM
In my games, when the players search for information in a library, they roll Search to find any books that might be relevant.

I'd have gone with a gather information check personally, assuming the library has staff.

Gnoman
2013-05-15, 03:54 PM
I'd have gone with a gather information check personally, assuming the library has staff.

That's reasonable, and I'd probably allow it if a player asked. I tend to think of fantasy libraries as semi-organized masses of books, some of which are shelved, rather than the neat, well-organized sort you would encounter in the Classical or Modern eras, which is why I picked Search.