Negativity bias, trauma-based game design and learned helplessness in metagames

[Xervous]

IME, people don't usually randomly murderhobo doctors just because they don't recognize the drugs they are injecting someone with.

Redacted political commentary

Operating word here is usually.

[Satinavian]

Heck, just look at Gandalf for… how many examples of that?

Maybe one. And that one was dicey.

Ah, but you're missing context: someone pointed a device you don't recognize at your friend / at a stranger, and they look happy about this fact.

If mind control devices were circulating, that would be taken as some kind of assault, yes. A plausible reaction would be to subdue the person and then have the device analyzed.

[Telok]

Hmmm. Jedi mind trick anyone? Of course there's the Potterverse mind control too.

Makes a difference if you can charm someone with a subtle gesture & suggestion or if you have to wave a wand and say magic words.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Hmmm. Jedi mind trick anyone? Of course there's the Potterverse mind control too.

Makes a difference if you can charm someone with a subtle gesture & suggestion or if you have to wave a wand and say magic words.

Basically "how obvious is it that you're messing with them." And the default in D&D is "very", unless you have some way of removing components.

Casting a D&D spell is like openly brandishing a gun-shaped object. Can't always tell who it's pointed at or what it might do, but certainly a cause for concern and alarm.

[KorvinStarmast]

Casting a D&D spell is like openly brandishing a gun-shaped object. Can't always tell who it's pointed at or what it might do, but certainly a cause for concern and alarm.

My problem with charm spells being all abra cadabra with waving hands is that in fiction, that power is often embedded in the caster with examples including Saruman's words convincing people of things or the infamous "you are getting sleepy" scene in Love at First Bite or "these are not the droids you are looking for" in Star Wars. A wide variety of movies and stories have a change in attitude (Jafar "desperate time call for desperate measures" in the first Aladdin movie with Robin Williams) happening because this magic using caster is saying something, rather than the 'verbal somatic material' component clunkiness D&D has arrived at.

Any of those could be charm person or suggestion; not at all obvious but still a spell cast.

Put another way, I think that charm and suggestion should not have somatic components.

[Satinavian]

My problem with charm spells being all abra cadabra with waving hands is that in fiction, that power is often embedded in the caster with examples including Saruman's words convincing people of things or the infamous "you are getting sleepy" scene in Love at First Bite or "these are not the droids you are looking for" in Star Wars. A wide variety of movies and stories have a change in attitude (Jafar "desperate time call for desperate measures" in the first Aladdin movie with Robin Williams) happening because this magic using caster is saying something, rather than the 'verbal somatic material' component clunkiness D&D has arrived at.

Most of the more crunchy systems have rules for how subtle those spells actually are. Some even explicitely describe gesture and words. One even demanded that any caster player would say the rhyming spell formula at the table and the spell would not work if a mistake had been made. I have never been in a situation where the degree of subtlety couldn't be extracted directly from the rules though occasionally some looking was required.

[icefractal]

In 3.x, there are ways to remove those components in general (Paizo Psychic magic, Psionics, SoP), but it does mean that a Wizard (Enchanter) isn't the best at enchanting people. On the other hand, a Wizard (Necromancer) isn't the best at having a skeleton army either, so that's not necessarily a problem.

It does seem like maybe Bard should have a way to subtly enchant though. On the other hand, Bard is going to have the Bluff to explain it away if they do need to.

In terms of fitting the fiction, I'd note that while the smooth enchanter who ensnares people without anyone noticing is an archetype, so is the creepy psychic whose mind control is obvious and even painful until it fully takes effect.

[Quertus]

Redacted political commentary

Operating word here is usually.

I'm quite proud of my weasel words

Whereas I'm opposing, "anything else would be incoherent".

If mind control devices were circulating, that would be taken as some kind of assault, yes. A plausible reaction would be to subdue the person and then have the device analyzed.

Congratulations, G. Lockhart was getting his picture taken for the Daily Prophet. But because you didn't recognize the spell, you subdued the photographer.

Again, all you have to go on is, something clearly magical that you don't understand happened, now someone seems really happy about it.

Basically "how obvious is it that you're messing with them." And the default in D&D is "very", unless you have some way of removing components.

3e Sense Motive actually makes your reply to my scenario even more nonsensical: "nobody in our torch-wielding mob felt anything was wrong, but we're out for blood anyway" is the mindset you're projecting.

Now, granted, 3e Sense Motive *does* mean that such a response may be warranted to the *original* scenario. But that's an edge case, not a general rule of "all worlds in all systems must act this way, else they are incoherent".

Casting a D&D spell is like openly brandishing a gun-shaped object. Can't always tell who it's pointed at or what it might do, but certainly a cause for concern and alarm.

Ah, but that's because you know something about the nature of D&D spells. This is why I quoted you talking about just going from what you can see.

Look, I know role-playing is a dieing art, especially among GMs. But you have to ignore what *you* know about D&D spells when evaluating how ignorant citizens will respond.

"He did something magical, that i don't recognize, and Bob seems happy about it."

Can you roleplay a coherent response to that scenario?

[Max_Killjoy]

Problems:

Assuming a world in which magic is common and often used for mundane tasks, yet also a world in which most people - including PCs - have no clue what's going on with magic and no ability to discern hostile or suspicious magic. The classic "magic is very common and also super mysterious" conundrum.

Assuming that the context of magic cast out of the blue on an unwitting person will draw the same reaction as an agreed-upon casting that everyone has openly talked about.

The worldbuilding issue of having magic that can warp minds and swap souls, and that supposedly most people can't identify when cast... and yet people are perfectly willing to have spells cast at/on them for mundane tasks like "taking a photo" or "making a call". I'm sure someone will bring up electricity or something as a "counter", but consider how much effort goes into making electricity safe and not exposing people directly to it... and some of the fear about it in the early years.

Demeaning comments about other people's roleplaying.

[Kardwill]

IME, people don't usually randomly murderhobo doctors just because they don't recognize the drugs they are injecting someone with.

A doctor who injected a willing patient that came to them, or a recognised guy from the local hospital helping an unconscious victim? Yes usually, people won't turn hostile.

But if a random guy I just met in the street just went and injected one of my friends out of the blue, without consent and without explaining what they were about to do? Yup, I'm going to turn hostile, even (or maybe even especially) if my friends behavior suddenly becomes wierd. Maybe not "roll for initiative" hostile, but putting myself between them, angrily asking for an explanation, and calling the police, certainly. And if the guy continues to try and interact with my now-dosed friend, without giving me a satisfactory explanation, then we'll roll init' and use the graple rules.

And I'm mostly a peaceful guy, bordering on cowardly. But there is a big difference between a medic doing their job, and a random dude doing weird **** to someone I care for without asking for their consent.

[OldTrees1]

Ah, but that's because you know something about the nature of D&D spells. This is why I quoted you talking about just going from what you can see.

Look, I know role-playing is a dieing art, especially among GMs. But you have to ignore what *you* know about D&D spells when evaluating how ignorant citizens will respond.

"He did something magical, that i don't recognize, and Bob seems happy about it."

Can you roleplay a coherent response to that scenario?

One coherent response to an unknown magical effect imparting a mental alteration (Bob is now suddenly happy and emotions are part of the mind) without a clear and verifiable benign method (We don't know the spell was benign. We don't know what it did or how it did it.) is to enact anti-mind-control procedures. The exact procedures will vary based on the power dynamics, resources available, etc. However presumption of harm is a rational response.

Without further context about the situation, I will claim my anti-mind-control procedure would be to:
- Prevent repetition of the event.
- Act normal. Don't give away the procedure is active.
- Investigate the event.
- Prevent loss of information (the "caster" leaving for example).
Depending on the context escape and acting normal might be prioritized over preventing it from spreading.

The severity of the anti-mind-control procedures will probably scale up/down with the subject's belief of the most severe possible mind control threat. An NPC in D&D might know of worse threats than we face IRL or they might be blissfully unaware of any nearly as bad as ones we face IRL. So we would need to calibrate that during the roleplay.

[Satinavian]

Congratulations, G. Lockhart was getting his picture taken for the Daily Prophet. But because you didn't recognize the spell, you subdued the photographer.

Again, all you have to go on is, something clearly magical that you don't understand happened, now someone seems really happy about it.

a) Harry Potter is not a good source of exploring the implicatin of magic in your setting
b) Yes, I expect a society with mind control magic to quite paranoid and to act accordingly.

Ah, but that's because you know something about the nature of D&D spells. This is why I quoted you talking about just going from what you can see.

Look, I know role-playing is a dieing art, especially among GMs. But you have to ignore what *you* know about D&D spells when evaluating how ignorant citizens will respond.

"He did something magical, that i don't recognize, and Bob seems happy about it."

Can you roleplay a coherent response to that scenario?

That is a clear no. The reaction is character knowledge based. I assume for a standard D&D setting that average Joe knows that mind control magic exist as much as he knows that healing magic exists. If anything, mind-control magic should be the most feared magic for the common citizen. Most other harmful magic would only be deployed in escalated conflict scenarios that the common guy mostly avoids. But mind control is useful whenever someone wants to take advantage of you. That could happen everytime, especcially when interacting with strangers. I really can't see how necromancy has a bad reputation but enchantment has not. Should really be the other way around.


I know there is a school that plays "all NPCs are idiots/don't know a thing about the world they live in so the PCs can seem smart", but i don't see that as an example of good roleplay.

[icefractal]

In terms of how the populace at large reacts to magic, that largely depends on the setting. So for example, let's say that 1st-4th level characters are the most numerous group (probably true in most settings), and therefore 1st-2nd level spells are the most widely known.

What kind of things does that cover? From a quick look through the PHB Sor/Wiz 1-2, let's consider spells cast while talking to someone -
Safe (and makes sense): comprehend languages, silent image, minor image, whispering wind, eagle's splendor, fox's cunning, owl's wisdom
Safe (but still odd to cast without a clear reason): endure elements, protection from [alignment], shield, mage armor, detect undead, floating disc, magic aura, ventriloquism, enlarge person, expeditious retreat, feather fall, jump, reduce person, obscure object, protection from arrows, resist energy, see invisibility, continual flame, blur, magic mouth, misdirection, phantom trap, false life, bear's endurance, bull's strength, cat's grace, darkvision, levitate, spider climb
Suspicious: grease, mount, obscuring mist, unseen servant, detect secret doors, true strike, disguise self, animate rope, erase, magic weapon, arcane lock, fog cloud, locate object, darkness, gust of wind, invisibility, mirror image, spectral hand, alter self, knock, pyrotechnics, rope trick
Dangerous: summon monster 1, charm person, hypnotism, sleep, burning hands, magic missile, shocking grasp, color spray, cause fear, chill touch, ray of enfeeblement, acid arrow, glitterdust, summon monster 2, summon swarm, web, detect thoughts, daze monster, hideous laughter, touch of idiocy, flaming sphere, scorching ray, shatter, hypnotic pattern, blindness / deafness, command undead, ghoul touch, scare

So it's not "all spells are hostile", but the odds aren't great - about 1/3rd that they're casting something directly harmful, more like 1/2 that they're up to no good, and very few that there's a good reason to cast unannounced in the situation. Given how dangerous the "Dangerous" results can be, it's not odd people wouldn't like those chances.

That's for casting with no explanation. If you say something like: "That price sounds reasonable, I'll mentally contact my associate and see if he agrees ..." and then cast a spell, probably most people are fine with that.

[OldTrees1]

In terms of how the populace at large reacts to magic, that largely depends on the setting. So for example, let's say that 1st-4th level characters are the most numerous group (probably true in most settings), and therefore 1st-2nd level spells are the most widely known.

What kind of things does that cover? From a quick look through the PHB Sor/Wiz 1-2, let's consider spells cast while talking to someone -
Safe (and makes sense): comprehend languages
Dangerous: detect thoughts

Two Dwarves are talking in Dwarvish. A nearby Human seems lost. The Dwarves ignore them and continue talking. The Human mumbles something and they replies, in common, to what the Dwarves are talking about.

Obviously the Dwarves might consider the Human to be a bit nosy, but how nosy? Which level of eavesdropping will they assume? Or will they react somewhere between those assumptions?

[icefractal]

Eavesdropping could be considered rude, but magically knowing the language isn't really any worse than happening to have learned it (the human might speak Dwarven anyway). That said, Comprehend Languages would still be somewhat strange to cast unannounced.

As for Detect Thoughts, while it could be used just for communication, consider this conversation at a party -
"Hey, always hard to make small talk, isn't it? I've got an app that fixes that! Just install it and give it full permissions - it'll read all your emails, your web history, everything, then use that to suggest topics of conversation we're both interested in. Don't worry, it's totally safe!"

Would you install that app? I would not. And if someone tried to grab my phone and install it anyway, I'd consider that very much a hostile act and reply in kind.


Incidentally, I did have a character in the past who used extensive divinations on people, without asking, as a routine part of meeting them. That was an intentionally-creepy trait though, and part of the reason he was neutral rather than good-aligned.

[OldTrees1]

Eavesdropping could be considered rude, but magically knowing the language isn't really any worse than happening to have learned it (the human might speak Dwarven anyway). That said, Comprehend Languages would still be somewhat strange to cast unannounced.

As for Detect Thoughts, while it could be used just for communication, consider this conversation at a party -
"Hey, always hard to make small talk, isn't it? I've got an app that fixes that! Just install it and give it full permissions - it'll read all your emails, your web history, everything, then use that to suggest topics of conversation we're both interested in. Don't worry, it's totally safe!"

Would you install that app? I would not. And if someone tried to grab my phone and install it anyway, I'd consider that very much a hostile act and reply in kind.


Incidentally, I did have a character in the past who used extensive divinations on people, without asking, as a routine part of meeting them. That was an intentionally-creepy trait though, and part of the reason he was neutral rather than good-aligned.

I was assuming the Dwarves did not identify what spell the Human cast. Just that the Human suddenly knew what they had been talking about. Was the Human reading their minds? Or did the Human just learn Dwarvish? Obviously the Human is being nosy, but the Dwarves don't know how nosy. Different Dwarves might react differently but I was curious what reaction you would pick as an example response.


I would not install that app. The explanation of what it does is already rather severe and would require greater compensation. Furthermore, with the permissions it requires, I would be leery about maybe it does even more than it claims. I might want to check the source code or further security checks to verify that is the limit of what the app does.

If someone grabbed my phone in that context, I would consider that a malware attack with the presumption that the malware does even more than they claimed it did. I would respond accordingly.


Extensive divinations as a way to RP a creepy character? That is a neat idea.

[Quertus]

"long ago" (darn senility), Cluedrew was… less than thrilled at my insistence that 4e was not an RPG, and was… curious regarding my definition of an RPG. And I explained, "it's complicated". Since then, I've been thinking about that topic.

To my mind, to be an RPG, well, it requires role-playing. And it's not surprising that, as with all things, my stance is that the primary and/or most damaging failures come from the GM's side of the GM screen.

But there was one phrase in this thread that really brought it all home for me:

People should react based on what they know or could assume.

That simple sentence catches a critical part of the central essence of role-playing.

People should react based on what they know or could assume.

So, what do we know?

Let's call the caster "Alice" and the charm target "Bob".

We know Alice did something magical, and Bob is happy about it / Bob is happy with Alice.

Well, technically, we don't even know that: we know Alice said words we don't recognize, maybe spoke animatedly in this unrecognized language, and now Bob is happy about it.

Well, maybe not even that - in some editions, at some tables, Alice could have whispered the verbal components.

But perhaps we should pretend, for the moment, that the casting had been noticed and recognized as something magical? Or will that violate the original complaint, that GMs penalize these spells unfairly?

People should react based on what they know or could assume.

What don't we know?

Even assuming we actually know a spell was cast…

We don't know that Bob was the target of a spell - charm doesn't leave a trail of glittering dust, or otherwise indicated that Bob was targeted.

We don't know what the spell was. Maybe we don't even know that a spell was cast, but let's ignore that for now.

Afaik, outside of (or at least before) 3e, we don't know whether Bob's mind has been affected by this spell.

We don't know what came before - we don't know whether Bob was expecting / asked for this spell to be cast or not.

People should react based on what they know or could assume.

Which brings us to the setting. What do the ignorant peasants know (or believe) about magic?

Why do I say "ignorant peasants"? Because that is, quite literally, what we're talking about here: average Joe Farmer in a likely pseudo-medieval society, who is too ignorant to recognize the spell.

Maybe the ignorant peasants know that only the nobility have noble, magical blood, so when Alice begins casting, they know that she's a noble.

Or maybe they believe that only the gods and their agents can use Magic. Maybe they should drop prone like extras from Stargate, and possibly aggro Bob for not showing proper respect.

Maybe magic is something of a lost art (many worlds before 3e), and they therefore have no concept of what it can do… or they don't even believe in it.

Maybe they know that magic is the tool of those who saved the world.

Maybe magic is commonplace enough that they know several people they can ask to analyze any trace magic / still active spells.

Maybe magic is so commonplace, the commoners can "sing along with" most common spells (even if they don't know which are which).

Maybe magic is a commonplace tool - everybody sees it everyday, and thinks nothing of it.

Maybe mind control magic is a common, known thing.

(Combine those last two, and you've got Harry Potter)

People should react based on what they know or could assume.

To simplify, to roleplay a character, you need to know what the character perceives, and what background they have to filter and process that information with.

To roleplay a character to the extent humanly possible, you shouldn't react based on information or perspectives that the character couldn't reasonably know, deduce, or believe.

People should react based on what they know or could assume.

What else could be going on here, that matches the description of Charm?

Alice could be telling Bob something in a foreign language.

Bob (G. Lockhart) could be getting something he wants (his picture taken).

Alice could be casting a spell with permission.

Alice could be casting a "necessary" spell, like Healing or Remove Curse.

Alice could have cast a useful spell, like Make Whole, on an item she (or Bob) just broke.

Alice could be defending against the invisible poltergeist / the Demon that their Anticipate Teleport delayed / the doppelganger of Cindy.

Or many other possibilities.

People should react based on what they know or could assume.

Since it's really hard to roleplay ignorance, I tried asking my evil overlord mandated 5-year-old advisor substitutes what *they* would do. Here's what i got:

"Shoot them - Bob doesn't deserve happiness"

"She just improved their day"

"Yeah, so follow her, and see if she's just making people days better, or if she's using it to get a discount."

"If they're just making everyone's day better, ask them to use it me."

"If they're getting a discount… is that illegal?" "Ask them to be friends."

"Create a horrific distraction (to break concentration?)"

"1) kill all the cops; 2) assault Alice"

Maybe not their best showing, but seems evidence of multiple responses not being incoherent… even with the same setting (ie, IRL) for their background.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Basic assumption -- spellcasting is recognizable as spell casting[0] by default. Second basic assumption -- it is not obvious what spell is being cast[1]. Third basic assumption -- there are lots of harmful spells.

Those three are enough to set a default to be fear, concern, wariness, or otherwise not happy.
1) I know you're casting a spell.
2) I know that I don't know what spell it is.
3) I know that lots of spells do all sorts of nasty things, including take over people's minds and make them feel/believe things they otherwise wouldn't.
4) I know you didn't ask permission, which normal/ethical people do before doing anything that directly affects another person in any substantial way.

Thus, the balance of probabilities is that you were doing something you wouldn't have gotten permission to do if you'd asked (otherwise you'd have asked first). And/or that you're not an ethical person.

Ergo, it's likely that the spell is intended to have a negative effect. Which means the default reaction should be negative.

You don't need anything else.

Edit: and anyway, spellcasting is powerful enough already. We should stop taking away the restrictions that exist in the books and in the fiction.

[0] this is an explicit thing in 5e; not sure about 3e. You have to perform the components in an obvious manner--no hiding them under a cloak, no mumbling the words. They're arcane language spoken in a clear voice at a set cadence that identifies itself as casting a spell. Sorcerers can get away with some of it via subtle spell, but that doesn't take away material components, so you're still manipulating a focus or waving components around.
[1] 5e sets it as a DC 15+spell level Intelligence (Arcana) check. So a 75% chance of failure for a normal person identifying a cantrip. And technically that's an optional rule--the default is that you can't identify spells at all. 3e has a Spellcraft check of the same DC, which can't be done untrained. So a 100% chance that a normal person can't tell what spell you're casting.

[Quertus]

Basic assumption -- spellcasting is recognizable as spell casting[0] by default. Second basic assumption -- it is not obvious what spell is being cast[1]. Third basic assumption -- there are lots of harmful spells.

Those three are enough to set a default to be fear, concern, wariness, or otherwise not happy.
1) I know you're casting a spell.
2) I know that I don't know what spell it is.
3) I know that lots of spells do all sorts of nasty things, including take over people's minds and make them feel/believe things they otherwise wouldn't.
4) I know you didn't ask permission, which normal/ethical people do before doing anything that directly affects another person in any substantial way.

Thus, the balance of probabilities is that you were doing something you wouldn't have gotten permission to do if you'd asked (otherwise you'd have asked first). And/or that you're not an ethical person.

Ergo, it's likely that the spell is intended to have a negative effect. Which means the default reaction should be negative.

You don't need anything else.

Edit: and anyway, spellcasting is powerful enough already. We should stop taking away the restrictions that exist in the books and in the fiction.

[0] this is an explicit thing in 5e; not sure about 3e. You have to perform the components in an obvious manner--no hiding them under a cloak, no mumbling the words. They're arcane language spoken in a clear voice at a set cadence that identifies itself as casting a spell. Sorcerers can get away with some of it via subtle spell, but that doesn't take away material components, so you're still manipulating a focus or waving components around.
[1] 5e sets it as a DC 15+spell level Intelligence (Arcana) check. So a 75% chance of failure for a normal person identifying a cantrip. And technically that's an optional rule--the default is that you can't identify spells at all. 3e has a Spellcraft check of the same DC, which can't be done untrained. So a 100% chance that a normal person can't tell what spell you're casting.

I agree completely that the untrained cannot recognize spells in most vanilla editions of D&D.

And my settings, at least, favor "casting is obvious" (your [0]).

However, loudly proclaiming "ast tassarith simiralan krynawi!" while sprinkling / tossing sand gets you little more than a few strange looks IRL (homebrew LARP? Or overly enthusiastic players?), and quite possibly not much more in elf games - ie, I reject your first premise. It's obvious that you're doing *something*, but not what that something is in a polylingual world.

This fact - or its flip side - is very important to my characters who pretend to cast spells. I've had several characters pull off such tricks in numerous settings, so it is certainly nowhere near universal that untrained peasants can 100% accurately determine whether or not someone is casting a spell. And I don't think that makes such settings incoherent.

I also reject the universal (or required for coherency) nature of your #3 condition. What the untrained, ignorant peasants know about magic is not at all guaranteed to have any basis in fact, and likely to be highly distorted from reality. Heck, just look at politics redacted, and you can see that humans often lack the ability to recognize fact from truly idiotic ideas

And #4 is explicitly not stated in the original post. I'll agree that it's *likely* true, but… just assuming it is proving their point, that GMs like to treat such spells unfairly.

So, of your 4 listed requirements, I'll only grant you #2 - that you don't know what the spell is.

You don't know what conversations Bob and Alice had before you walked in, to know the nature of consent, only that Bob looks happy with Alice.

You may not know that Alice cast a spell - probably only that she said something in an unfamiliar language (like "gesundheit").

And you don't know what spells can actually do. What misinformation - if any - you possess will depend on the setting.

Given that, do you still hold that any setting that doesn't murderhobo G. Lockhart's photographer is incoherent, or can you see some reasonable ideas you missed on your first evaluation?

EDIT: note that your 4 points do *not* follow from your 3 basic assumptions. Although I grant the second and third assumption, I reject ¾ of your points. Even if I granted all 3 assumptions, I'd still reject 2 of your 4 points as unfounded. Just because there *are* dangerous spells doesn't mean that the ignorant peasants are cognizant of the scope of their capabilities. And there is nothing in the original statement or your stated assumptions to indicate that the observer knows whether or not Bob had given consent; in fact, based on his reaction, assuming consent had been given seems the more reasonable conclusion.

[OldTrees1]

I agree completely that the untrained cannot recognize spells in most vanilla editions of D&D.

And my settings, at least, favor "casting is obvious" (your [0]).

However, loudly proclaiming "ast tassarith simiralan krynawi!" while sprinkling / tossing sand gets you little more than a few strange looks IRL (homebrew LARP? Or overly enthusiastic players?), and quite possibly not much more in elf games - ie, I reject your first premise. It's obvious that you're doing *something*, but not what that something is in a polylingual world.

This fact - or its flip side - is very important to my characters who pretend to cast spells. I've had several characters pull off such tricks in numerous settings, so it is certainly nowhere near universal that untrained peasants can 100% accurately determine whether or not someone is casting a spell. And I don't think that makes such settings incoherent.

I also reject the universal (or required for coherency) nature of your #3 condition. What the untrained, ignorant peasants know about magic is not at all guaranteed to have any basis in fact, and likely to be highly distorted from reality. Heck, just look at politics redacted, and you can see that humans often lack the ability to recognize fact from truly idiotic ideas

And #4 is explicitly not stated in the original post. I'll agree that it's *likely* true, but… just assuming it is proving their point, that GMs like to treat such spells unfairly.

So, of your 4 listed requirements, I'll only grant you #2 - that you don't know what the spell is.

You don't know what conversations Bob and Alice had before you walked in, to know the nature of consent, only that Bob looks happy with Alice.

You may not know that Alice cast a spell - probably only that she said something in an unfamiliar language (like "gesundheit").

And you don't know what spells can actually do. What misinformation - if any - you possess will depend on the setting.

Given that, do you still hold that any setting that doesn't murderhobo G. Lockhart's photographer is incoherent, or can you see some reasonable ideas you missed on your first evaluation?

EDIT: note that your 4 points do *not* follow from your 3 basic assumptions. Although I grant the second and third assumption, I reject ¾ of your points. Even if I granted all 3 assumptions, I'd still reject 2 of your 4 points as unfounded. Just because there *are* dangerous spells doesn't mean that the ignorant peasants are cognizant of the scope of their capabilities. And there is nothing in the original statement or your stated assumptions to indicate that the observer knows whether or not Bob had given consent; in fact, based on his reaction, assuming consent had been given seems the more reasonable conclusion.

Quertus, double checking, are you arguing about the murderhobo part or the rational paranoia and skepticism in the face of "Alice did something unrecognizable and immediately Bob had a sudden inexplicable change of mental state"?

I am going to pretend Charlie saw Alice and Bob.
1) Charlie doesn't need to know Alice was spellcasting. Alice did something unrecognizable with unknown limits and effects.
2) It looks like you both agree that Charlie does not know what spell it was.
3) Charlie probably believes that mind control can exist. They might not know anything more about it.
4) Charlie did not witness any consent, but is currently considering the dangers of escalated user privileges (although not in those words). Unless Charlie believes Bob would grant Alice root access, then Charlie is still concerned.
5) Charline perceived Bob's change in mental state as sudden, inexplicable, and correlated with Alice's action.

From those premises alone Charlie can suspect the possibility that Alice used mind control on Bob as one of several scenarios they are evaluating for potential risk (including it some unknown Dave that did this).

If Charlie sees Alice start to do the "something" again, what are the outcomes if Charlie's theory is right/wrong and they do/don't act on it? I added ordinal payouts. 1 is best outcome for Charlie. 4 is worst outcome for Charlie (my judgement). From my estimates acting is the strictly dominant strategy (provided acting in a way that preserves my ordering of 1 and 2).

	Right	Right	Wrong	Wrong
Act	Interrupt attempted mind control	3	Interrupt something benign. Miscommunication identified.	1
Don't Act	Become mind controlled	4	Status quo	2

Now Charlie could act in many ways. Some of those ways preserve "Acting and clearing up the confusion" being better than "Status Quo". For example preventing Alice from doing the something while asking and investigating what that something was. Other reactions (kill first ask questions later) reverse that payout and make the rational response depend on the severity of the payouts and the probability that Alice did use mind control.

[icefractal]

However, loudly proclaiming "ast tassarith simiralan krynawi!" while sprinkling / tossing sand gets you little more than a few strange looks IRL (homebrew LARP? Or overly enthusiastic players?), and quite possibly not much more in elf games - ie, I reject your first premise. It's obvious that you're doing *something*, but not what that something is in a polylingual world.

It doesn't get much of a reaction because most people don't believe that magic exists or that saying words to empty air does anything.

You know what can do something? Saying the right words into a phone. And as a result, people may very well be wary about it.

Consider the likely reaction if you walked up within earshot of someone while describing them in a 'police sounding' way into your phone. Like for example:
"... sighted. White male, about 6 feet, gray sweater, jeans. No visible weapon. Ok, will stand by."

Heck, you don't even have to say anything. Follow someone to their car in the parking lot, making sure to take several pictures of them and their license plate.

Actually don't do either of these, because you could get beat up, and could make someone nervous for no good reason. Technically, you weren't doing anything harmful - but they don't know that.


Now if you had a setting where magic was so rare most people had never even heard about how it works or what it could do, then yes, reactions would be a lot more varied.

However, in such a setting, there would be no shops selling even potions, no temple priests available to cure problems, nobody else you could trade spells with or buy magic supplies from. On the plus side (for casters), 1st-2nd level spells would probably be enough to become the shadow ruler of most towns - or just steal anything you want if leadership isn't your bag.

So, not the typical D&D setting. I'd be down to play it, but it's hardly anti-enchantment to not consider that the default.

[icefractal]

If Charlie sees Alice start to do the "something" again, what are the outcomes if Charlie's theory is right/wrong and they do/don't act on it? I added ordinal payouts. 1 is best outcome for Charlie. 4 is worst outcome for Charlie (my judgement). From my estimates acting is the strictly dominant strategy (provided acting in a way that preserves my ordering of 1 and 2).

	Right	Right	Wrong	Wrong
Act	Interrupt attempted mind control	3	Interrupt something benign. Miscommunication identified.	1
Don't Act	Become mind controlled	4	Status quo	2

I don't understand the ordering here. "Interrupt attempted mind control" is a better outcome than "Interrupt something benign", but you have it listed vice-versa. And I don't think that "Interrupt something benign" is actually better than the status quo. Sure, you cleared up a misunderstanding, but many people would rather avoid the awkwardness, especially depending on their relative social position.

That said, even with the ordering of:
A) Interrupt attempted mind control
B) Status quo
C) Interrupt something benign
F) Get mind controlled

Interrupting still comes out ahead.

[Satinavian]

To my mind, to be an RPG, well, it requires role-playing. And it's not surprising that, as with all things, my stance is that the primary and/or most damaging failures come from the GM's side of the GM screen.

How about stopping to pretend that your way is the roleplaying way.

We don't know what came before - we don't know whether Bob was expecting / asked for this spell to be cast or not.

Nope, the premise was that the spell was cast by a stranger while Bobs associates react. And if they are surprised, they would assume, that none of this is the case. Don't move the goalposts.

Which brings us to the setting. What do the ignorant peasants know (or believe) about magic?

Sure true. That is why there have been qulifiers sprinkled during the thread about assumptions made. If you change those assumptions, anything goes.

But let's have a look at common popular D&D settings like Forgotten Realms, Eberron, Planespace, where do you think those fall into ? How about the new edition ones like Ravnica, Theros or Stryxhaven ? Or popular/main settings of other fantasy RPGs like Aventuria, Warhammer's Old World or Lorakis ?

I would say at the overwhelming majority of tables the hostile reaction would make the most sense when NPCs were roleplayed properly.

What else could be going on here, that matches the description of Charm?

In some of these cases Alice can just ask. In the others, she should not resist the attempt to constrain her and explain afterwards. Hopefully she can prove it.

This fact - or its flip side - is very important to my characters who pretend to cast spells. I've had several characters pull off such tricks in numerous settings, so it is certainly nowhere near universal that untrained peasants can 100% accurately determine whether or not someone is casting a spell. And I don't think that makes such settings incoherent.

Yes, pretending to cast spells is a thing and often works. Might still need a bluff check or whatever the system uses and you are kinda limited to spells that don't have obvious results if you don't have a way to fake those.

[OldTrees1]

I don't understand the ordering here. "Interrupt attempted mind control" is a better outcome than "Interrupt something benign", but you have it listed vice-versa. And I don't think that "Interrupt something benign" is actually better than the status quo. Sure, you cleared up a misunderstanding, but many people would rather avoid the awkwardness, especially depending on their relative social position.

That said, even with the ordering of:
A) Interrupt attempted mind control
B) Status quo
C) Interrupt something benign
F) Get mind controlled

Interrupting still comes out ahead.

1) I ranked Interrupting something benign over Interrupting attempted mind control because Charlie values their safety. Despite not being able to control the columns, Charlie prefers knowing they are in the safe column.

2) I ranked Interrupting something benign over Status Quo because Status Quo includes Charline not knowing of Alice is an existential threat or not. I ranked Charlie's preference for knowing they are in the safe column as more than Charlie's aversion to awkwardness. Some may disagree, see #3.

3) If you flip the payouts for Status Quo and Interrupting something benign, then interrupting is no longer a strictly dominating strategy. So we would need more information (switch from ordinal payouts to quantified payouts and provide some information on the probability of each column). However you will likely reach the same conclusion unless another extreme is introduced.

1. We know being mind control would be a really bad outcome. What if the consequence for interrupting something benign were also really bad (example: death sentence)?
2. What if the likelihood of mind control was extremely low. IRL the chance of true mind control is so low (maybe 0%) that we don't consider it.

However in Charlie's case, absent additional information, I think we can dismiss 3.2. Additionally 3.1 depends on what action Charlie takes. Interrupting with minimum force rather than maximum violence is likely to avoid 3.1. Considering Interrupting attempted mind control and continuing the Status Quo are rather neutral outcomes, Interrupting something benign is a mildly negative outcome, and becoming mind controlled is a severe negative outcome we can make an example payout. I do not expect anyone (including myself) to agree 100% with the example. I just needed numbers to show the math.

	Danger (P)	Benign (1-P)
Act	-1	-2
Don't Act	-10	-1

Act = -1 x (P + 2 - 2P) = -1 x (2 - P).
Don't Act = -1 x (10P + 1 - P) = -1 x (9P +1).
2 - P = 9P +1
1 = 10P
P = 1/10
Using this example quantified payout, an 10% chance that Alice used mind control would be enough to overcome the awkwardness of being mistaken the remaining 90% of the time. Of course that assumes being mind controlled is merely 5x as bad as the awkwardness. If mind control was 50x as bad as the awkwardness, then there would only need to be a 1% chance. Etc.

[Quertus]

Now if you had a setting where magic was so rare most people had never even heard about how it works or what it could do, then yes, reactions would be a lot more varied.

However, in such a setting, there would be no shops selling even potions, no temple priests available to cure problems, nobody else you could trade spells with or buy magic supplies from. On the plus side (for casters), 1st-2nd level spells would probably be enough to become the shadow ruler of most towns - or just steal anything you want if leadership isn't your bag.

So, not the typical D&D setting. I'd be down to play it, but it's hardly anti-enchantment to not consider that the default.

That's pretty much my point, yeah, that there can exist settings that might produce different responses without those settings being inherently incoherent.

Also, *most* of the D&D settings I've played in were of the "no shops" variety you describe. So, to me, that *is* the default.

Nope, the premise was that the spell was cast by a stranger while Bobs associates react. And if they are surprised, they would assume, that none of this is the case. Don't move the goalposts.
Sure true. That is why there have been qulifiers sprinkled during the thread about assumptions made. If you change those assumptions, anything goes.

But let's have a look at common popular D&D settings like Forgotten Realms, Eberron, Planespace, where do you think those fall into ? How about the new edition ones like Ravnica, Theros or Stryxhaven ? Or popular/main settings of other fantasy RPGs like Aventuria, Warhammer's Old World or Lorakis ?

I would say at the overwhelming majority of tables the hostile reaction would make the most sense when NPCs were roleplayed properly.

Senility willing, I'll go back and quote the starting posts (again).

Speaking of moving goalposts, I'm only opposing the notion that any setting where the ignorant peasants don't immediately murderhobo (or otherwise interfere with) the caster is incoherent. So appealing to "but in this setting it would make sense" is completely irrelevant - I have never contended that it is impossible for a setting to exist where someone might reasonably (or unreasonably, because human(oid)s aren't always perfectly rational) take such an action.

Quertus, double checking, are you arguing about the murderhobo part or the rational paranoia and skepticism in the face of "Alice did something unrecognizable and immediately Bob had a sudden inexplicable change of mental state"?

Fair question. Senility willing, I'll circle back to this at the end.

I am going to pretend Charlie saw Alice and Bob.
1) Charlie doesn't need to know Alice was spellcasting. Alice did something unrecognizable with unknown limits and effects.
2) It looks like you both agree that Charlie does not know what spell it was.
3) Charlie probably believes that mind control can exist. They might not know anything more about it.
4) Charlie did not witness any consent, but is currently considering the dangers of escalated user privileges (although not in those words). Unless Charlie believes Bob would grant Alice root access, then Charlie is still concerned.
5) Charline perceived Bob's change in mental state as sudden, inexplicable, and correlated with Alice's action.

I… Hmmm… "provisionally"(?) don't object to your 5 points, provided they are general enough that Alice saying "Gesundheit" qualifies (especially for #1 & #5).

From those premises alone Charlie can suspect the possibility that Alice used mind control on Bob as one of several scenarios they are evaluating for potential risk (including it some unknown Dave that did this).

Good call - I should definitely add Dave to my examples.

If Charlie sees Alice start to do the "something" again,

Now, that's an added wrinkle. Senility willing, I'll return to the original quote (and perhaps the responses as well), but I suspect that this is goalpost moving - that there was no mention Alice attempting additional magic as a prerequisite for the murderhobo-fest to commence.

"Ready an action to interfere should Alice attempt something 'like that' again" (in 3e parlance) is… more sane than many responses, but still not "the only possible valid response, else the setting is incoherent", IMO.

what are the outcomes if Charlie's theory is right/wrong and they do/don't act on it? I added ordinal payouts. 1 is best outcome for Charlie. 4 is worst outcome for Charlie (my judgement). From my estimates acting is the strictly dominant strategy (provided acting in a way that preserves my ordering of 1 and 2).

	Right	Right	Wrong	Wrong
Act	Interrupt attempted mind control	3	Interrupt something benign. Miscommunication identified.	1
Don't Act	Become mind controlled	4	Status quo	2

Now Charlie could act in many ways. Some of those ways preserve "Acting and clearing up the confusion" being better than "Status Quo". For example preventing Alice from doing the something while asking and investigating what that something was. Other reactions (kill first ask questions later) reverse that payout and make the rational response depend on the severity of the payouts and the probability that Alice did use mind control.

OK, we're at the end. Now what?

I imagine that someone screaming, "you fools!" after characters have taken actions in ignorance, and before things go ploin-shaped, is common enough that I don't need to explain the basic concept. So now, a silly example:

Bob thought that the woman before him was, in fact, his long-lost niece, carried off by wolves the night her parents were murdered, and their family home burned down. The family resemblance was strong, her mannerisms wild, and the wolf pelts worn proudly and clearly better cared for than the rest of her makeshift rags all pointed in that direction, but she was quite evasive about her past.

But then she revealed her true colors, casting a spell in the unmistakable family style. Happy days, his lost niece had returned home!

-----

Alice had read the bones, she knew that her past would only bring her pain. And her foes doubtless knew it, too, which was why this should be the last place they looked for her.

Yet this shopkeep just wouldn't let up with the questions. What part of "in a hurry" did he not understand?

Too late! They'd found her. She had missed the "scry" portion of their "scry and die" (probably due to the shopkeep's constant distractions), but her spells had caught and delayed the Teleportation effect that preceded the "die" half. She needed to erect magical defenses quickly, else these innocent bystanders would suffer the same fate as so many others.

Only… why were the innocent bystanders grappling her?

Alice managed to bite out, "You fools! You've doomed us all!" before the hit squad appeared, Delayed Blast Fireball gems in hand. The immediate surroundings turned to flame, and her Contingency went off.

Or, to continue your example, Dave has Bob kill Alice while Charlie is grappling the poor naive heroine.

Point is, there's catastrophic failure cases for Charlie intervening. It's not a no-cost action.

And it's not just act / no act - there are numerous possible actions one could take. If you're an ignorant peasant, living in a world where magic common, I personally would think "getting someone who has a clue" would be a good answer, but apparently that makes IRL incoherent that I could think of that.

Or, closer to home, imagine if you sneezed, and then you saw someone football tackle someone for saying "Gesundheit".

Or, more relevant to my position, imagine a setting where only the PCs - who are famous and beloved, champions of good, and known to have saved the world blah blah blah, but who not everyone has actually laid eyes on before - can cast spells. And Alice just cast a spell.

To answer your initial question explicitly (having, I hope, answered it implicitly and in detail with this post), I am opposed to both halves, to both the murderhobo-fest, and to the belief that any setting where interference isn't the only possible answer is incoherent. But mostly to the second half.

EDIT: don't forget that you're role-playing an ignorant peasant. "Charlie knows mind control exists, but, because Bob's eyes didn't change color, Charlie knows that Alice didn't mind control Bob" is, IMO, a perfectly valid potential thought process, whereas I'm opposing the claim that Charlie believing such & acting accordingly would make the world incoherent.

[Telok]

Perhaps part of the issue is that the lowest common denominator of D&D isn't exactly consistent between its rules, its fluff, its adventures, and its novels.

Its current rules say that all casting is automatically recognized as such and anyone can check to identify spells. The fluff does stuff like bards "weaving spells into songs" while performing, or wizards using spells in social settings like its normal and ok. The adventures have things like npcs emulating sorcerer subtle spell with stealth and of course the novels & such are all over the place. And you know there should be a "find lost car keys" type spell thats vastly more common and popular than Magic Missile, but the PH only really has combat & adventure spells.

I think its understandable how some people can want or assume certain things about magic that violate actual rules in LCD D&D. So what do? Write out rules for stuff? Put in some world building or adventure advice? Make a checklist of rulings DMs are going to have to make? Just let there be play traps for people to hit? Learn for other games that don't have similar problems?

[OldTrees1]

That's pretty much my point, yeah, that there can exist settings that might produce different responses without those settings being inherently incoherent.

I'm only opposing the notion that any setting where the ignorant peasants don't immediately murderhobo (or otherwise interfere with) the caster is incoherent.

Senility willing, I'll go back and quote the starting posts (again).

Wait. Thanks for prompting me to check and giving me enough information to find the root of the argument.

You both agree there can be multiple different responses to the generalized scenario. However PhoenixPhyre is arguing that over time the reactions that defend against extreme hostile magic will dominate over the reactions that leave themselves vulnerable to extreme hostile magic. I don't even think they claim any would strictly dominate. Merely that the general consensus would be that nonconsensual magic should be presumed to be assault.

As expected I fall somewhere between you two. I can see good arguments for the rational response being to act. There are qualifiers on when/how but it appears like defenses against extreme hostile magic are a rational response. People are not entirely rational but selection pressure (societies vulnerable to mental enslavement are mentally enslaved more often) would promote the rational response.

I… Hmmm… "provisionally"(?) don't object to your 5 points, provided they are general enough that Alice saying "Gesundheit" qualifies (especially for #1 & #5).

Yes. If Alice says "Gesundheit" at the same time as Bob has a sudden inexplicable change of mental state, and Charlie is in a world where mind control is a threat, then Charlie should consider the possibilities that Alice or Dave used mind control on Bob.

Good call - I should definitely add Dave to my examples.

Dave might be better left implicit rather than explicit. I don't want to bring Emily into this. Basically I am just using Dave to signify that Charlie should not limit their threat assessment at merely the visible actors.

Now, that's an added wrinkle. Senility willing, I'll return to the original quote (and perhaps the responses as well), but I suspect that this is goalpost moving - that there was no mention Alice attempting additional magic as a prerequisite for the murderhobo-fest to commence.

"Ready an action to interfere should Alice attempt something 'like that' again" (in 3e parlance) is… more sane than many responses, but still not "the only possible valid response, else the setting is incoherent", IMO.

This additional wrinkle was just to simplify the possible anti-mind-control reactions Charlie could choose between and to force Charlie to choose.

Forgive me, but "the only possible valid response, else the setting is incoherent" is an exaggerated version of PhoenixPhyre's original post and I am making a milder initial claim.

OK, we're at the end. Now what?

To answer your initial question explicitly (having, I hope, answered it implicitly and in detail with this post), I am opposed to both halves, to both the murderhobo-fest, and to the belief that any setting where interference isn't the only possible answer is incoherent. But mostly to the second half.

I have avoided implying "murderhobo-fest" because that is not the only type of anti-mind-control protocol.
PhoenixPhyre was arguing that nonconsensual use of magic, in a world with extreme hostile magic <additional qualifiers>, would generally be considered assault. I fail to see where they claim there is only 1 response to perceiving assault.

You asked "Now what?". I believe my logic shows enacting some ant-mind-control procedure is the rational response provided your choice of procedure does not alter the ordinal payouts. My follow up logic says that even in cases where the ordinal payouts in the right column flip, the extreme negative of mind control requires another extreme (extremely low probability or high downside to a false positive) in order to destabilized the rational response.

As a result, the general case would
A) Have Charlie's rational consideration consider the possibility Alice did assault Bob (and similarly the possibility some Dave assaulted Bob)
and B) Have Charlie's rational response be to enact some form of anti-mind-control procedure.

This is still milder than PhoenixPhyre's claim that coherent settings would treat Alice's nonconsentual magic as assult.
Which in turn is much milder than your claim that PhoenixPhyre's is claiming something about murderhoboing being the only coherent response.



Now a couple of your follow up examples include adding an additional actor. I have referenced Charlie would need to also consider a possible unseen Dave assaulting Bob. For simplicity and to be brief, I have not detailed the responses Charlie might have to the possibility of that Dave. Instead I merely referenced it would be rational for Charlie to do so. If Bob starts to act, Charlie might respond.

In your scry-and-die world Charlie would also already have considered and enacted whatever protocol they have to the ongoing omnipresent threat of scry-and-die Emily. Adding a scry-and-die Emily does not change the payouts.

A couple of your examples target the anti-murderhobo perspective and/or invoke intuitions about our world rather than a world with much more probable mind control. Your IRL sneeze example is a false analogy due to the difference in mind control probability. The only reasonable IRL examples I know involve censored topics. Let's stay away from IRL.

EDIT: don't forget that you're role-playing an ignorant peasant. "Charlie knows mind control exists, but, because Bob's eyes didn't change color, Charlie knows that Alice didn't mind control Bob" is, IMO, a perfectly valid potential thought process, whereas I'm opposing the claim that Charlie believing such & acting accordingly would make the world incoherent.

Yes but it is also rational, given the severity of mind control, for Charlie to also consider the case where the "eye color" is not a valid test. Also in a world where mind control is a real threat, some information would be taught. Parents teach children about the dangers they might face.



So Quertus, in a world where mind control threats are worth considering, nonconsensual magic that coincides with a sudden otherwise inexplicable change in mental state, would be a big warning sign that might trigger anti-mind-control procedures. The actual nature of those procedures might vary based on context, but it is a rational response to consider of the nonconsensual magic might be hostile mind control.

[icefractal]

I guess also I wasn't primarily considering using these spells on random peasants - sure, sometimes that'll come up, but often when people are going to the extent of using enchantments, it's on someone in a position of some authority or power.

Does that mean they know anything more about magic? It depends on the world. In a world where casters are common enough for dishonest mages to be a threat (which doesn't need to be that common), then authorities who could easily be subverted by 1st-level spell raise the question: "Why haven't they already been subverted and/or replaced?"

And I'm not opposed to the PCs being significant outliers, in fact I prefer for high-level characters (and defenses against such) to be very rare in the world, and by mid-levels the PCs can easily be A Big Deal™. But "even 1st level PCs are an out-of-context problem that 99% of the world stands no chance against" is a bit too far for my tastes.

[Satinavian]

Speaking of moving goalposts, I'm only opposing the notion that any setting where the ignorant peasants don't immediately murderhobo (or otherwise interfere with) the caster is incoherent. So appealing to "but in this setting it would make sense" is completely irrelevant - I have never contended that it is impossible for a setting to exist where someone might reasonably (or unreasonably, because human(oid)s aren't always perfectly rational) take such an action.

Sure, there can always be setting that work differently. No one ever questioned the setting dependence.

But when i would run any of the official D&D settings i am somewahat familiar with or any of the custom D&D settings i have ever run or any of the other fantasy settings i have played/run (and that have mind control), they all would have a hostile reaction to such potential mind control. That is why i see this as default.

[Xervous]

If anything the biggest flaw I’m seeing here is that 1 in 4 Joe Farmers will know what spellcasting, or a given cantrip is by VSM components alone. Garbage in...