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Swordguy
2008-06-19, 05:26 AM
Under what circumstances is it OK for a GM to change the rules of the game between sessions, and retroactively apply penalties from that rules change to a single player (when all players at the table fall under the penalty clause), when there is a standing table agreement between the players and the GM about how that rule is to be handled?

Am I right to be annoyed at this?

Full Story (warning - L5R-related, lots of Japanese terminology):
Let me preface this by saying that I believe in the "GM is always right" school of thought. As such, my character has taken the Honor penalty for the actions described below, and I'll not be asking for it to be given back. What I am looking for here is to set a precedent in our games - is this interpretation of Honor correct for a GM to make?

To my GM - if you happen to read this, please let other people comment without jumping on folks. I just want a popular opinion. Like I said, I'm not asking you to take it back. (I'm also giving you the option to remain anonymous - but that only works if you don't post...)

Out of Game situation: Of our group of players, 6 players, 2 have extensive L5R experience and 1 has just a touch. The rest are newbies to the system. as such, the group agrees that the GM will give notice aforethought if an action taken by a PC will result in an Honor Loss. I.e., "Are you sure you want to do that, Dave? You'll lose 3 Honor if you do it." Further, because the GM in question is new to GMing in general (though he's got a LOT of L5R experience as a player, and has a full year of GMing experience by now), many, many, many Honor Gains as per the rules have been ignored, with the mutual understanding that we may get away with a little more because we aren't gaining Honor at all (but not as likely to lose any either). The game has been continuing using this table agreement for nearly a year now.

Further, we run the game in the following manner. While the Tsuruchi is the Lord (Emerald Magistrate) on paper, we as players talk about what we're going to do, agree, and then the Tsuruchi has the final OK, rather than having one player able to impose his absolute will on all the rest of the players. We feel that dictatorial style of gaming is counterproductive to the point of roleplaying.


In-game Situation: We're all Yoriki (assistants) to an Emerald Magistrate (Tsuruchi, one of the players) in Zachiotoshi, a city on the border of the Shinomen Forest. I'm playing a mostly-standard-issue Matsu. Late one night, we get woken up by the sounds of combat from downstairs. Grabbing weapons, we rush downstairs to see a bunch of ronin (Spider) trying to break in, with our household guards barely holding them off. We massacre the ronin, and take a look outside. The city is burning. It's a warzone out there, with hundreds and hundreds of Spider assaulting all the major Clan embassies, and the governor's mansion. The governor's mansion is under assault by half-a-hundred ronin, and are being held off by the governor's troops and the Rank 8 uber-Kuni Witch Hunter who's up on the roof throwing spells like there's no tomorrow. Which, if he stops, there probably won't be. The general response from the table is "Oh, crap."

So, we pull back into the house and quickly formulate a plan. We need to secure the governor and take him somewhere safe. We'll move to the Lion embassy (my Matsu is the highest-Status/Glory Lion in the city) and clean it out of Spider to gain reinforcements. From there, we use the Lion as assault troops to clear out the Crab embassy (a veritable fortress) and use THAT as our safe house for the governor. Once we have somewhere safe to put him, we'll go get the governor - it looks as though the Kuni can last a while, and the governor's guards are holding the door's Thermopylae-style, so we estimate we have the time to do this. Seeing as how we're going into a war zone (the consensus is that this battle's gonna last a LONG time), we take the time to go put on our armor. Just as we're finishing this up, the Tsuruchi (the EM) suddenly yells, "My family", and runs out the door (his family was staying at the governor's estate) without giving us any further orders. We look around and kind of shrug, because we were really depending on the Tsuruchi to provide overwatch while we moved from embassy to embassy, but we've come up with a plan and we go execute it. No input from the GM one way or another thus far. The plan doesn't work out quite how we were expecting, but it doesn't go horribly, and we end the session for the night.

2 weeks later is our next session. I walk in, plop myself down at the table, and hear, "your character is taking an Honor loss." Yes, my Matsu takes the Honor hit for being "Disloyal to your Lord/Superior/etc.". Why? Because we didn't follow the Tsuruchi, wrapped only in our nightclothes, out into the middle of a war, after we at the table had made a plan of action to deal with the problem and were in the process of carrying it out. The quote from the GM was "As a good little samurai, you should follow his lead." What's the point in having other players if everyone is forced at all times to do exactly what another player is doing? The same player, I might add, who agreed to the plan of action, thought it was a good idea, and then broke the plan for (legitimate) In-Character reasons. Hell, had I known this would have resulted in an Honor Loss, I would have a) followed the EM, or b) asked for an Test of Honor to NOT take the action that'd make me lose Honor. But because it's a retroactive Honor Loss, I don't get to do any of the mechanical things that wold stop it from happening.

Finally, no-one else in the party took the Honor hit. It was mentioned that "since you know the game universe better, I'm holding you to a higher standard." Yeah, nobody else in the party followed the Tsuruchi either, yet I'm the one getting hit with the Honor loss - the only character in the group who really needs a high Honor score.


...

So, setting aside for a moment the understanding that "the GM is always right", is this a reasonable interpretation of Disloyalty to one's Lord? Moreover, is this a reasonable thing for the GM to do ex post facto considering the table agreement up to that point?

(Posting publicly only to solicit unbiased opinions)
Yes, I know how "hard" it is to GM. I've got 20+ years of experience doing so, including a few in this very system, and haven't had a player complain or willingly even think about quitting my games in over a decade. I just wanted to be sure I hadn't missed a memo somewhere. :smallmad:

kamikasei
2008-06-19, 05:39 AM
Under what circumstances is it OK for a GM to change the rules of the game between sessions, and retroactively apply penalties from that rules change to a single player (when all players at the table fall under the penalty clause), when there is a standing table agreement between the players and the GM about how that rule is to be handled?

Before I read the spoiler: very few circumstances. If you've got an agreement around the table about how something should be handled, it's not a good idea for the GM to unilaterally change that. If for some reason a rule change seems really necessary to a GM (something agreed in theory before the game turns out to work differently in practice, say) and he feels compelled to make it, and to apply it backwards (a bad idea in itself usually but may be desirable from the point of view of consistency), then he should definitely talk to affected players and be flexible about compensating them or letting them adjust their character with the new rule in mind.

edit: And now having read the spoiler, the situation was a little different than I'd envisioned (I was thinking in terms of changing how some mechanical aspect of the game worked, which might mess with a build or choicce, whereas this was more of a table convention), but the GM was still being unreasonable in my opinion. If you were going to take an Honor loss, why wouldn't he tell you as was the rule? If he changed his mind after making the call and decided that you should take an Honor loss after he let you off, shouldn't everyone? What does your being more experienced as a player have to do with whether your character's actions were dishonorable or not?

I can't judge whether it was reasonable to deem your actions honorable or not because I don't know enough about the standards in L5R, but the GM's actions around it are very questionable.

Kizara
2008-06-19, 05:47 AM
I would like to give you feedback, but I would ask you to summerise the nature of the change in question so I might understand your situation without knowing the system-specific rules and terminology of L5R?

Dan_Hemmens
2008-06-19, 05:54 AM
For what it's worth I *don't* believe that "The GM is Always Right" - I think it's one of the most insidious and destructive ideas in roleplaying.

And in this case, I think your GM was wrong, wrong wrong wrong wrong.

It's the social-mechanics equivalent of saying "yeah, you know that fight your characters had last session, well it turns out that I got the rules wrong, so that last attack the guy made against your character would actually have hit, so I'm afraid you're dead."

SilverSheriff
2008-06-19, 05:55 AM
if anything your "Master" should have taken the Honor point deduction, planning something out of game means that (in game) He (the leader) is spelling it out slowly for you (his minions), if he decides to change his mind exactly after planning to save his family than he is basicly abandoning his followers to complete the plan by themselves.

Swordguy
2008-06-19, 06:07 AM
I would like to give you feedback, but I would ask you to summerise the nature of the change in question so I might understand your situation without knowing the system-specific rules and terminology of L5R?

Honor in L5R is a tracked stat. You have 5 ranks of 10 points each. For my particular character, most of her really good abilities depend on having a high honor score. Honor can be gained, but it's hard. Honor is far more easily lost. There is an explicit list of actions that gain or lose Honor. The one in question here is "Disloyalty to your Lord/Superior/etc.".

Before: The table agreement was that if someone was taking an action that would cause them to lose Honor, the GM would say something at the time, I.e., "Are you sure you want to do that, Dave? You'll lose 3 Honor if you do it." This give the player the warning that they're going to lose the Honor and to change their actions if they don't want to lose it.

In addition, we have a "let bygones be bygones" system. Because the GM is really bad about keeping track of what gets or loses people Honor, he doens't generally track it in the first place unless we mention it or do something REALLY serious (pee on the Emperor-level serious). Thus, while we don't gain a lot of honor, we don't lose a lot either (not that we've taken Honor-losing actions thus far in the campaign, though). By our conservative estimates, we've lost out on 20-30 points of Honor thus far in the campaign because he doesn't track it, but we felt it was worth it not to cause him problems.


...

What happened was the GM, for whatever reason, didn't make that warning call at the time, and arbitrarily decided to set the table agreement aside in the intervening weeks between games in order to hit my (and only my) PC with an Honor loss. (Note: this PC is very explicitly fluffed and played as someone who WILL NEVER take an Honor-losing action, which has made my life very difficult on several occasions.) The circumstances of the Honor loss are as follows:

The PCs are sworn to follow their Lord. Their Lord is another PC, a member of the Tsuruchi family and an Emerald Magistrate (kinda like a local Sheriff). As such, we follow his orders. After the group discussed a plan and started to put it into practice, the Tsuruchi ran off without leaving us any new orders. We continued with the plan, and I subsequently lost Honor for not following the Tsuruchi (nobody else followed either), because "as a samurai, you should always follow your Lord" - a complete 180-degree turn from the way the rest of the campaign has been played.

Kizara
2008-06-19, 06:24 AM
Honor in L5R is a tracked stat. You have 5 ranks of 10 points each. For my particular character, most of her really good abilities depend on having a high honor score. Honor can be gained, but it's hard. Honor is far more easily lost. There is an explicit list of actions that gain or lose Honor. The one in question here is "Disloyalty to your Lord/Superior/etc.".

Before: The table agreement was that if someone was taking an action that would cause them to lose Honor, the GM would say something at the time, I.e., "Are you sure you want to do that, Dave? You'll lose 3 Honor if you do it." This give the player the warning that they're going to lose the Honor and to change their actions if they don't want to lose it.

In addition, we have a "let bygones be bygones" system. Because the GM is really bad about keeping track of what gets or loses people Honor, he doens't generally track it in the first place unless we mention it or do something REALLY serious (pee on the Emperor-level serious). Thus, while we don't gain a lot of honor, we don't lose a lot either (not that we've taken Honor-losing actions thus far in the campaign, though). By our conservative estimates, we've lost out on 20-30 points of Honor thus far in the campaign because he doesn't track it, but we felt it was worth it not to cause him problems.


...

What happened was the GM, for whatever reason, didn't make that warning call at the time, and arbitrarily decided to set the table agreement aside in the intervening weeks between games in order to hit my (and only my) PC with an Honor loss. (Note: this PC is very explicitly fluffed and played as someone who WILL NEVER take an Honor-losing action, which has made my life very difficult on several occasions.) The circumstances of the Honor loss are as follows:

The PCs are sworn to follow their Lord. Their Lord is another PC, a member of the Tsuruchi family and an Emerald Magistrate (kinda like a local Sheriff). As such, we follow his orders. After the group discussed a plan and started to put it into practice, the Tsuruchi ran off without leaving us any new orders. We continued with the plan, and I subsequently lost Honor for not following the Tsuruchi (nobody else followed either), because "as a samurai, you should always follow your Lord" - a complete 180-degree turn from the way the rest of the campaign has been played.

I'll say that I am in the middle-ground of the "DM is always right" line, believing in authority at the table but also that following the rules consitantly and working cooperatively with your players is very important.

I will also say that I am a fan of defined honor, codes and that sort of thing. The PHB paladin class is, fluff-wise, one of my favorites.
..............

Ok, so in a broad sense, your DM has been running a game in a half-assed fashion and now decides to disregard your conventions and screw you over personally because, I can only guess (from your comment), your character is more honor-obsessed? Sounds like garbage to me, might be time to take your golden chair back. :)

Not to mention he is more-or-less intentionally pissing on your character's development/roleplaying by re-defining what is honorable and then ret-coning that she now isn't. Which really couldn't be more horse****.

As for the actual example (which doesn't actually matter, since his action and how he handled them are pretty unacceptable regardless of the details), how did you act dishonorably? I mean, I don't think "follow your Lord" was meant that literally, I'm sure it meant "obey his will", not literally running after him.

I mean, lets look at in the context of the world.

1) Samuari are busy pursuing something, with the lord's explicit consent (you discussed it with him), to further his goals.

2) Lord decides to run off without saying anything or in any obvious distress (under attack, hear's scream of panic, etc).

3) Samuari shrug and wonder at the cause of their Lord's alarm, but realize that it is not their place to intrude in his affairs or question his actions. Thus, they continue doing his bidding (as they were last instructed).

4) Samuari lose honor for not running after their lord, disobeying their oders, breaking from their mission and generally acting in an irresponisble and foolish manner. WTF?

Sounds like your DM doesn't know sheit about honor ethier. Honestly, I could probably run your campaign better without knowing much about Japan (beyond the Last Samuari movie and a wee bit of personal research) or that system (beyond what you just now have explained to me) then your DM, from what you've said here. That's seriously sad, as I am hardly a miraculously good DM.

Kizara
2008-06-19, 06:27 AM
if anything your "Master" should have taken the Honor point deduction, planning something out of game means that (in game) He (the leader) is spelling it out slowly for you (his minions), if he decides to change his mind exactly after planning to save his family than he is basicly abandoning his followers to complete the plan by themselves.

I agree with this as well, its poor leadership.

Tsotha-lanti
2008-06-19, 06:58 AM
Under what circumstances is it OK for a GM to change the rules of the game between sessions, and retroactively apply penalties from that rules change to a single player (when all players at the table fall under the penalty clause), when there is a standing table agreement between the players and the GM about how that rule is to be handled?

Under no circumstances.

Consistency is important, but backwards-consistency is rarely desirable. If a GM discovers they got the rules wrong, they have to fess up and get them right the next time.

Changing rules and retroactively applying them to players in a punitive way is not okay.

Applying rules inconsistently between players is not okay either.

Xuincherguixe
2008-06-19, 07:28 AM
Changing the rules between sessions? There can be good reasons for that.

Retroactively applying penalties? Seems pretty distasteful, but I'd cautiously say there might be some situations where it might be appropriate. But it'd probably still be pretty seriously lame.

Doing that to only one person? Seems spiteful, petty, and immature.


You might want to quit the game and kill yourself in a particularly defiant way. At the very least, get blood on the Emperor or something (I'm not familiar with the setting). Go out awesome.

llamamushroom
2008-06-19, 07:49 AM
Knowing what I do about Japan (read: high-school obsession, little serious study), I'd say that running after your EM would have been more dishonourable than complying with his orders - there was a very strong culture of unquestioning obedience at around the time L5R seems to be 'based'. In addition, running after him could've been construed as you questioning your EM's judjement, almost like you think he'd screw up without you, which would probably be dishonourable.

Also, I agree about the 'dont ret-conn' thing - changing a house/table rule is OK, as long as everybody is informed before time, and you don't take penalties for past actions.

Finally: What's L5R like? It's been intruiging me ever since I saw it (though in TCG form).

DigoDragon
2008-06-19, 08:02 AM
The PCs are sworn to follow their Lord. Their Lord is another PC, a member of the Tsuruchi family and an Emerald Magistrate (kinda like a local Sheriff). As such, we follow his orders. After the group discussed a plan and started to put it into practice, the Tsuruchi ran off without leaving us any new orders. We continued with the plan, and I subsequently lost Honor for not following the Tsuruchi (nobody else followed either), because "as a samurai, you should always follow your Lord" - a complete 180-degree turn from the way the rest of the campaign has been played.

I think that there is a good basis for your argument on why you shouldn't loose honor points. If I'm reading your story correct, you're losing honor points for following your Tsuruchi's orders and not following the Tsuruchi himself out the door when he went off for his family.

My advice is talk to the Tsuruchi PC and to the GM together with the statement above as your opening argument. Ask the Tsuruchi PC if he feels you did the right thing. If he felt you should have kept to the original orders as you did, then I don't see why you should loose honor points.

valadil
2008-06-19, 08:53 AM
The only time I'd retroactively change an outcome when adjusting rules is if it had a positive effect on the player. The GM should be allowed to change things between sessions, but what happened happened, even if it didn't follow the rules.

JBento
2008-06-19, 09:11 AM
Never. There are no such conditions, on the count that even if there ARE repercussions... er, prepercursions? they should be applied to ALL players under the penalty clause. Singling your character out because you, as the player, are more used to the system, seems unfair and makes no sense however I look at it.

More specific to the case:
Why are you even getting a penalty? You followed your orders like the good little mindless pup... er, samurai that you are. You should get an honour penalty if you DID go after the boss, not for not going. Really, we're talking about a "death before (or in some cases because of) dishonour" culture here.
Also, making one player, well, the Boss Of You, seems like a bad idea from the outside, though I'm not privy to your group dynamics and could very well be wrong on this count (more than generally, that is:smallredface:).

Still, retroactively penalties that give the player no chance to avoid them (though story-derived penalties are generally harder to retcon for than mechanical changes) are very, very bad.
Changing an agreed upon rule without telling anyone... well, Im sorry for your "the DM is always right" philosophy, but that's crappy stuff to do on my book (note: my disagreement is not that he CHANGED the rule - if the DM beleives the new ruling will increase the overall enjoyment, I think he should change it - but that he changed without warning and then applied its consequences)


Ooooh, text block :smalleek:

Tsotha-lanti
2008-06-19, 09:31 AM
What's L5R like? It's been intruiging me ever since I saw it (though in TCG form).

It's freaking awesome. (The real one, not the d20 version, although that one may be fine too.) The breadth and depth of published background material alone is pretty stunning, and the setting is wonderfully broad and flexible - you can do typical adventuring, politics and intrigue, warfare, horror, mystery...

Vortling
2008-06-19, 11:36 AM
Even under "DM is always right" DMs, you shouldn't ever single out one player for retroactive rules reform. He could easily drop that penalty on everyone and have all his players mad at him. At the very least he needs to let you replay your actions at that point or let you use the "honor test" mechanics to avoid the loss of honor. Have you been having out of game personal issues with him at all?

Raum
2008-06-19, 12:12 PM
The only time a GM should change a ruling regarding a specific character is when all of the players agree with the change. Otherwise targeting a single character smells of favoritism or simple injustice. It's a group game, not an opportunity for someone to play tin dictator.

That said, I agree with Dan Hemmens - GMs are human. They will make mistakes. The good ones will admit mistakes, take responsibility, and do what they can to correct any mistakes which harm a character or game play. It's leadership 101.

The commonly touted phrase "The GM is always right" is nonsensical sillyness. The GM needs to make decisions during the game to keep it moving. That doesn't mean he can't make mistakes and shouldn't need to correct them when he does. I'm human, I have a right to my mistakes. :)

Hopefully your GM will recognize the mistake and move to correct it.

erikun
2008-06-19, 05:59 PM
This is the equivalent of deciding that the orcs you killed last week were Chaotic Neutral, not Chaotic Evil, and thus everyone should lose their good status - except it only affects the Paladin, who should know better.

As to whether or not the action was dishonorable - are your characters sworn to defend the Tsuruchi or the Emperor? If I recall, most samurai swear allegiance to defend the Emperor first, and if they had a plan to do so, then following the Tsuruchi would have involved putting his life before your sworn duty.

If you were sword to defend the Tsuruchi instead, it's a bit more questionable as to where the honorable path would lead. However, the DM is still the one who flubbed up - he had agreed to tell you which actions would lead to dishonor and which ones would not. If you can't work something out, it may be time to look for another group.

Tengu
2008-06-19, 06:09 PM
I agree with the general consensus - since you were given an order to defend, and not an order to follow your lord, following him is what would lead you to a loss of honor, and your GM has no idea how to handle such situations.

rockdeworld
2008-06-20, 06:54 AM
I have yet to see a post saying "your GM did the right thing."

To add to that, the rulebooks and DMing guides I have read give the (good) advice of: Set down any house rules before the campaign starts, and don't change them during the campaign.

To narrow that down: Set down any house rules before the campaign starts, and don't change them between sessions.

To narrow that down: Set down any house rules before the campaign starts, and don't change them between sessions and then apply the new rules to a previous session.

The only case where this kind of thing would be acceptable would be to repair a massively-game-distorting mistake or action, which is absolutely necessary to patch up the game (i.e. a character taking the Leadership feat, or multiclassing to IotSV). The GM should then present his reasons for doing so to the player in question in order to help that player understand why his previously-fair action cannot be done, and come to a reasonable understanding. Your GM's choice, and reasons behind it, were none of the above, and therefore unwise.

That said, if you confront him about it kindly he will - if he is an honest GM - probably reconsider his actions, and either undo them or compensate you in some way. Suicide + Blaze of Glory tend to not be suitable answers for this type of situation (unless you honestly don't want to play anymore).

Occasional Sage
2008-06-20, 02:57 PM
Under what circumstances is it OK for a GM to change the rules of the game between sessions, and retroactively apply penalties from that rules change to a single player (when all players at the table fall under the penalty clause), when there is a standing table agreement between the players and the GM about how that rule is to be handled?

Absolutely none. Rules changes between sessions are necessary sometimes, but should be applied going forward only. In one of the bizarre situations where a new ruling is made to be retroactive (and I don't think I could ever be 100% convinced that that's right to do, regardless of which side of the screen I'm on or who benefits from the decision) the rule should be universal, not targeted.


Am I right to be annoyed at this?
Yes, and I think "the GM is always right" doesn't apply to this. There's a time and place for arguing with the GM; at the table I feel it's fine to object, but if he sticks with his ruling let it drop until after the session. That's what you seem to be doing. Now is the time to ask that he be fair and reasonable.



What I am looking for here is to set a precedent in our games - is this interpretation of Honor correct for a GM to make?
I can see where he's coming from with his reading of chugo. As a samurai, your duty is to your lord; it's not just a requirement but a privilege to lay down your life to protect him. By allowing him to rush out of the house into a war zone, you are allowing him to place himself in enormous danger without protection.

This interpretation on my part is based on the fact that he seems to be doing exactly what you had all agreed to do, only outside of the plan. Had you decided on this plan, and he were headed someplace else within the city entirely, I think that obeying the directions he gave to head to the governor's would take precedence and no Honor would be lost.



We're all Yoriki (assistants) to an Emerald Magistrate (Tsuruchi, one of the players) in Zachiotoshi
Out of curiosity, does this mean that another PC can give and take Glory from the rest of you?



Finally, no-one else in the party took the Honor hit. It was mentioned that "since you know the game universe better, I'm holding you to a higher standard." Yeah, nobody else in the party followed the Tsuruchi either, yet I'm the one getting hit with the Honor loss - the only character in the group who really needs a high Honor score.

One justification I can see for singling out a character like this (although again, *NOT* retroactively) would be based on the GM's Survival Guide suggestion of slanting honor gains and losses based on the Clan of the samurai in question. The Crab, Lion, and Scorpion put a high premium on chugo, while the other clans, especially the Phoenix, hold it on the low end of the scale. Not knowing the composition of the group, however, I can't really know how much this applies and anyway, this wasn't the GM's justification. It might make you feel a bit better, though.



So, setting aside for a moment the understanding that "the GM is always right", is this a reasonable interpretation of Disloyalty to one's Lord? Moreover, is this a reasonable thing for the GM to do ex post facto considering the table agreement up to that point?
SYNOPSIS: When applied to a Lion character, yes I find this to be a valid reading of the chugo tenet of Bushido. I think that this was a very bad decision on the part of the GM, however, and one which should not set a precedent.

If he does indeed plan to hold you to a higher standard, he needs to inform you in advance and then perhaps the two of you need to make sure that you share an understanding of the Lion view of Bushido. Anything else creates a confrontational and hostile relationship at the table where players and GM try to stick it to one another, rather than cooperating in creating a story. I doubt this is what he was trying to do, but these decisions can go that route very quickly.

EDIT TO REPLY:

It's freaking awesome. (The real one, not the d20 version, although that one may be fine too.) The breadth and depth of published background material alone is pretty stunning, and the setting is wonderfully broad and flexible - you can do typical adventuring, politics and intrigue, warfare, horror, mystery...
Sadly, the d20 conversion robs it of much of what makes it so fabulous.