You Can, But You Really Can't

[KorvinStarmast]

Also the dragon has claws and the rope is made of rope, I means seriously how hard is it for the dragon to just cut it. This idea is folly from the start ok I'll stop

Players sometimes forget that monsters have agency also.

[Mastikator]

Players sometimes forget that monsters have agency also.

You know what's really killing me about this thread? How is the dragon moving 200 feet into the air. In 5e young blue dragons don't have legendary actions, with dash it's maximum distance would be 160. In 3.5e it would be 150 (since dash action doesn't even exist as far as I can recall). Where does this 200 feet movement come from??? Is this some 4e insanity that I can't understand? Is it some thac0 infused nonsense that I would prefer not to understand?
How is the dragon moving exactly 200 feet? Pure DM fiat? Why isn't the DM reading the monster stat block? Is that why they're not cutting the rope?

--

Yeah this is stupid. The OP should be happy the DM didn't kill them for their stupid gambit IMO. But they are right to ask for better communication.

[Metastachydium]

In 3.5e it would be 150 (since dash action doesn't even exist as far as I can recall).

(If our Blue Dragon is doing nothing else in the round, it can use the Run action to move upwards at a 45° angle, at quadruple speed for up to 300' covered in a single round; if it has the Run feat for some Reason, that's up to 375'; if it has the Run and Air Heritage feats, it can move as much as 450' that way. As for why 200' exactly… It may very well just choose to do that.)

[GloatingSwine]

The way to handle the Pumpkin incident, as a player, is via role play, not complaining about it. Like this example in that thread

Yeah, but the way to handle it as a DM is not to generate Pumpkin Incidents by not standing by things you already said yes to.

The dragon has a grappling hook sunk into it, the Fighter is hanging on to the rope. The DM said yes to it, the DM's job now is to make it work. Maybe the dragon cuts the rope and the fighter really hopes he makes his death saves or the party catches up in time, maybe the fighter climbs along the rope and threatens to slash the dragon's wings to ribbons unless it lands, maybe he has to do that and now gravity is everybody's problem.

[Catullus64]

The OP should be happy the DM didn't kill them for their stupid gambit IMO.

No? Even if I were to agree that it was stupid and should never work, I would have preferred death. I committed to my course of action, knowing that death was not an implausible outcome. If my character had died, it would have meant that my actions mattered, and it probably would have been spectacular to boot. As I said in my first post, I know that I am not owed success, but I do feel that I am owed not having my actions essentially negated.

Maybe there's the lesson: letting a PC die when you think their actions warrant it is often the kinder approach. Otherwise, you will damage their belief in the reality of the story, perhaps in a way that cannot be repaired.

Regarding movement speed, I don't know what number the DM said exactly, just that it was too far away for us to do anything. I don't remember any of the numbers involved in this incident precisely, except my Nat 20.

[Talakeal]

No? Even if I were to agree that it was stupid and should never work, I would have preferred death. I committed to my course of action, knowing that death was not an implausible outcome. If my character had died, it would have meant that my actions mattered, and it probably would have been spectacular to boot. As I said in my first post, I know that I am not owed success, but I do feel that I am owed not having my actions essentially negated.

Maybe there's the lesson: letting a PC die when you think their actions warrant it is often the kinder approach. Otherwise, you will damage their belief in the reality of the story, perhaps in a way that cannot be repaired.

Regarding movement speed, I don't know what number the DM said exactly, just that it was too far away for us to do anything. I don't remember any of the numbers involved in this incident precisely, except my Nat 20.

You and I are a rare breed.

[Jason]

No? Even if I were to agree that it was stupid and should never work, I would have preferred death. I committed to my course of action, knowing that death was not an implausible outcome. If my character had died, it would have meant that my actions mattered, and it probably would have been spectacular to boot. As I said in my first post, I know that I am not owed success, but I do feel that I am owed not having my actions essentially negated.

Maybe there's the lesson: letting a PC die when you think their actions warrant it is often the kinder approach. Otherwise, you will damage their belief in the reality of the story, perhaps in a way that cannot be repaired.

The players in an RPG need to feel like their decisions are meaningful or they will quickly loose interest in playing.

Whether their choices have good or bad consequences is less important than that there be consequences.

[kyoryu]

Maybe there's the lesson: letting a PC die when you think their actions warrant it is often the kinder approach. Otherwise, you will damage their belief in the reality of the story, perhaps in a way that cannot be repaired.

Sure. But, I'd say that in general, the best way to handle that is to make very very sure, when appropriate (and try to make it appropriate), that players know when death is a likely result of actions they're about to make.

The players in an RPG need to feel like their decisions are meaningful or they will quickly loose interest in playing.

Whether their choices have good or bad consequences is less important than that there be consequences.

Certainly for some people. For other people, they're just along for the ride and more there to go through the GM's story.

But, yeah. I again think the best approach is to make sure people are forewarned of consequences in rough proportion to the severity of them when appropriate. But then follow through.

[Mordar]

There is no leverage though, strength literally doesn’t factor into it. It’s the equivalent of flying by picking yourself up.

Edit: Assuming the rope isn’t anchored against something. I could easily see the Rock doing this with an anchored rope, or with his bare hands like Captain America did in Civil War.

Well, Rock did use a chain, it was a helicopter, and he held on to a truck with the other hand...

Depends on how hard and fast you can yank it. You can't weigh it down unless you're an elephant, but if you are Captain America you might be able to yank it really hard and cause it to swerve mid air. (or if you're Captain America and you do have leverage, you could hold it in place).

That said, the OP said they had a +4 to their strength, so they're not captain america. They're the rock. And the rock- cool and strong though he may be, does not pull down helicopters nor dragons with a rope.

Derail: Captain America *should* be the Rock. Super Solider made him peak human, not super-human. Stupid movies. Even the good ones.

So I'm torn a bit on the "let the PC die" only because of this - a player character death can often derail a game, and it is a decision that impacts not just the player of that PC but also the X other people sitting around the table for Y amount of time. Now, I don't think I would have played things like the GM in question, but unless this baby blue was a major element in the scenario I wouldn't have been too keen on "unnecessary" PC death. I know, terrible, right?

- M

[Talakeal]

Well, Rock did use a chain, it was a helicopter, and he held on to a truck with the other hand...

That makes a bit more sense, assuming the truck was beyond the helicopter's lifting capacity.

Derail: Captain America *should* be the Rock. Super Solider made him peak human, not super-human. Stupid movies. Even the good ones.

I would say Dwayne Johnson is far from the strongest man who ever lived.

Of course, this is further obscured by "action movie physics" which don't always line up with reality.

[Jason]

Certainly for some people. For other people, they're just along for the ride and more there to go through the GM's story.

But, yeah. I again think the best approach is to make sure people are forewarned of consequences in rough proportion to the severity of them when appropriate. But then follow through.

Which raises the meta-question, "is someone actually playing a role-playing game if all that is happening is that the GM is telling them a story?"

[kyoryu]

Which raises the meta-question, "is someone actually playing a role-playing game if all that is happening is that the GM is telling them a story?"

I'd say decades of people playing linear adventure paths has strongly answered that in the affirmative.

To be clear, it's not my preferred style of play, but (for instance) the original DragonLance series is a classic for a reason. People enjoy them.

[KorvinStarmast]

Y
The dragon has a grappling hook sunk into it, the Fighter is hanging on to the rope. The DM said yes to it, the DM's job now is to make it work. Maybe the dragon cuts the rope and the fighter really hopes he makes his death saves or the party catches up in time, maybe the fighter climbs along the rope and threatens to slash the dragon's wings to ribbons unless it lands, maybe he has to do that and now gravity is everybody's problem.

Also a good approach.

[Jason]

I'd say decades of people playing linear adventure paths has strongly answered that in the affirmative.

To be clear, it's not my preferred style of play, but (for instance) the original DragonLance series is a classic for a reason. People enjoy them.

"It's a popular style," or "people enjoy it," doesn't really answer the question.

[Mordar]

Which raises the meta-question, "is someone actually playing a role-playing game if all that is happening is that the GM is telling them a story?"

I'd say decades of people playing linear adventure paths has strongly answered that in the affirmative.

To be clear, it's not my preferred style of play, but (for instance) the original DragonLance series is a classic for a reason. People enjoy them.

"It's a popular style," or "people enjoy it," doesn't really answer the question.

I'll answer for me - Yes. Absolutely.

It is my general experience that those "along for the ride" are really accepting a smaller range of impact on the story than those that are looking to shape the story as a primary goal. They don't want to be told what they do, what they say, etc...but they are happy following the general line of the work the GM has done to lay out an adventure.

The decisions a "rider" makes changes the outcome. The dice a "rider" throws changes the outcome.

- M

[kyoryu]

"It's a popular style," or "people enjoy it," doesn't really answer the question.

It really kinda does. If a significant percentage of people in the hobby are doing this, and describe it as roleplaying, it kinda feels to me like it really is.

This kind of linear gaming is a significant amount of the hobby, if not even a majority.

[glass]

I'll answer for me - Yes. Absolutely.

It is my general experience that those "along for the ride" are really accepting a smaller range of impact on the story than those that are looking to shape the story as a primary goal. They don't want to be told what they do, what they say, etc...but they are happy following the general line of the work the GM has done to lay out an adventure.

This highlights an important point that I feel often gets lost in discussion of such things - linearity is a continuum not a binary.

Just because people don't mind or even prefer having less impact on the game's progression than they would in a wide-open sandbox, that doesn't mean they want to have no impact.

[Vahnavoi]

Which raises the meta-question, "is someone actually playing a role-playing game if all that is happening is that the GM is telling them a story?"

"It's a popular style," or "people enjoy it," doesn't really answer the question.

If you want an answer beyond that, it's "yes, because games themselves define how they are played".

If a game says you participate in it by kicking a ball, kicking a ball is playing the game. If a game says you participate by listening to a game master's story, listening to the game master's story is playing the game. Simple. The loaded part of your question is "if all that is happening", since most of the time, it isn't all that is happening.

For the sake of the argument, if it is all that is happening, then it's still playing a game, but it is not roleplaying. Reason being, a game itself can define how it is played, but roleplaying has a definition outside of that, which involves a person changing their behaviour to match a role - specifically, in context, the role of another person. Simply being a passive listener is not sufficient.

---

@glass: if you want to talk about continuums of game structures, then the measures you'd want to use are game tree branching, divergence and convergence. A strict linear game is one where the game tree does not diverge - in practice, even most linear adventures are not this strict, each segment (such as a combat encounter) has its own subgame with its own game tree, but all branches of the subgame converge on one of two outcomes (namely, total failure which ends the game, and the planned continuation segment).

But you are certainly right that there are a lot more game structures than just linear and sandbox.

[Easy e]

It really kinda does. If a significant percentage of people in the hobby are doing this, and describe it as roleplaying, it kinda feels to me like it really is.

This kind of linear gaming is a significant amount of the hobby, if not even a majority.

To tie back to the categories you showed earlier, wouldn't this be a Trad/Neo-Trad game style?

The DM has authority and the sets the plotline seems to fit into this linear style. If that is accurate, than this linear story-telling approach is one of the "oldest" styles of role-playing?

[kyoryu]

To tie back to the categories you showed earlier, wouldn't this be a Trad/Neo-Trad game style?

The DM has authority and the sets the plotline seems to fit into this linear style. If that is accurate, than this linear story-telling approach is one of the "oldest" styles of role-playing?

I'd say that's a very accurate statement.

I'd also say it's the first really contentious point. While I think the Classic style in the article was a mix of about three different actual styles, the "trad" style and its linear approach and focus on the GM's story really shifted a lot of emphasis in how the game was played. People that were more into the more player-agency-focused styles of Classic (they all had that in common) often really didn't like the highly linear play of the trad style, leading to a lot of pushback.

I mean, that describes me! And I even wrongly pushed back on "narrative" games assuming they were the same until someone (on this forum!) corrected me by telling me about a Fate game that they had played where, yeah, they won in the end, but at the cost of the party basically getting obliterated.

So I get the "it's not really roleplaying" argument, as it's kind of an anti-style for me. I'm just not going to tell a significant percentage (again, possibly a majority) of the hobby that they're having. BadWrongFun.

This highlights an important point that I feel often gets lost in discussion of such things - linearity is a continuum not a binary.

Just because people don't mind or even prefer having less impact on the game's progression than they would in a wide-open sandbox, that doesn't mean they want to have no impact.

I think there's actually one fairly binary thing, though it can vary a bit over the course of the campaign. And that's basically can the players meaningfully do something (in terms of scenes/encounters) that the GM hasn't prepared.

In a lot of games, that's no. There may be branches that the GM has prepared. There may be the ability to go to different locations to do different GM-prepared things. You might be able to futz about doing unprepared stuff, but you'll be subtly (or not-so, most often) guided back to the prepared content.

It's understandable - that's how published modules kind of have to work by definition.

It's not how I run games. I don't know what the players are going to do, and how they're going to handle the situation. I don't know where they're gonna go, and what they're gonna do.

Because of this, I can take two groups through a given starting situation and have them have completely different experiences.

Without that ability, you can still have an impact on the game/plot - but it's going to be more like what you'd see in a BioWare CRPG. The details will differ, and how certain things were handled may differ, but everyone is going to have the same basic experience. If two people play Mass Effect 2, for instance, they might have different experiences on the suicide mission, but they will both play through the suicide mission.

[Jason]

Yes, the crux of the question is "if all that is happening is that the GM is telling a story,"; and yes, most of the time that isn't all that is happening - even in the most "railroady" games the players are still making occasional decisions. It's just that the results are largely trivial.

My point is that players who want a game will generally want to have their decisions effect the outcome.

My preference (and yes, it's a value judgement, so it's subjective) both when running and when playing, is that player decisions should matter. I don't enjoy games that depend either too much or too little on randomness.

If the GM is just telling me a story and there's not much that I can do to change it, I'll go read a good book rather than continue to pretend that I'm influencing the story.

If the game is too random, with the dice or card order or whatever random element having much more of a role in determining victory or defeat than my choices, then I'll choose to go play a game that I can effect more directly.

The whole point of a role-playing game, for me, is the ability to interact meaningfully with the story being told.

I won't tell "spectators" that they're doing it wrong, I'll just tell them it's not my way.

[kyoryu]

My point is that players who want a game will generally want to have their decisions effect the outcome.

I think it depends on what decisions the players care about.

In more railroady games, I find a lot of players care more about combat and building their characters than making story-level (where do we go now?) type decisions. That might be because they think that's what RPGs about, it might be they find the openness of a higher agency game intimidating, or it might be just that those are the things they enjoy.

But "how do we tackle the problem, where do we go, what do we do?" aren't the only questions/decisions in an RPG.

My preference (and yes, it's a value judgement, so it's subjective) both when running and when playing, is that player decisions should matter. I don't enjoy games that depend either too much or too little on randomness.

If the GM is just telling me a story and there's not much that I can do to change it, I'll go read a good book rather than continue to pretend that I'm influencing the story.

Yup, me too. I'm just not gonna BadWrongFun people that have different preferences.

The whole point of a role-playing game, for me, is the ability to interact meaningfully with the story being told.

Same here! That's why I don't play or run linear games (okay, sometimes I'll play a linear game with friends, but then the emphasis is on the friends, and I kinda hold my nose). But, again, I'm not going to go so far as to say people playing RPGs in a non-preferred way aren't playing RPGs.

[Talakeal]

Yes, the crux of the question is "if all that is happening is that the GM is telling a story,"; and yes, most of the time that isn't all that is happening - even in the most "railroady" games the players are still making occasional decisions. It's just that the results are largely trivial.

My point is that players who want a game will generally want to have their decisions effect the outcome.

My preference (and yes, it's a value judgement, so it's subjective) both when running and when playing, is that player decisions should matter. I don't enjoy games that depend either too much or too little on randomness.

If the GM is just telling me a story and there's not much that I can do to change it, I'll go read a good book rather than continue to pretend that I'm influencing the story.

If the game is too random, with the dice or card order or whatever random element having much more of a role in determining victory or defeat than my choices, then I'll choose to go play a game that I can effect more directly.

The whole point of a role-playing game, for me, is the ability to interact meaningfully with the story being told.

I won't tell "spectators" that they're doing it wrong, I'll just tell them it's not my way.

In my experience, a lot of the conflict in RPGs comes from players who have a very particular thing they find fun in RPGs, and if the game they are in doesn't focus on that particular facet, they say they would prefer to go read a book / watch a movie / play a video game / play a board game, etc.

For example, my infamous buddy Bob really only finds RPGs fun as an advancement / power fantasy, and any aspect of the game that doesn't revolve around either powering up his character OR showing off said power loses his attention, and if the game offer rapid character progression he always threatens to go read a book about rapid power progression in games instead.

[Vahnavoi]

My point is that players who want a game will generally want to have their decisions effect the outcome.

You can just simplify that to "some people want their decisions to affect outcomes". The word, "game", is not pulling any weight there, since the word is broad enough to cover activities where the only meaningful decision a player makes is whether to participate or not.

[kyoryu]

You can just simplify that to "some people want their decisions to affect outcomes". The word, "game", is not pulling any weight there, since the word is broad enough to cover activities where the only meaningful decision a player makes is whether to participate or not.

Also there was a whole thread on how you can have levels of impact in different aspects of a game - builds, "what do we do now" decisions, etc.

Some people are happy to have impact on the "where do I move in combat" level, or "how do I build my character", or the kind of side-effect stuff we see in BioWare RPGs, etc.

Some people want to know that they can solve a larger problem their way, and that there isn't a set of scenes for them to go through.

Some people don't even want a problem to solve, they just want a world that they can pursue their own goals in.

[Mastikator]

No? Even if I were to agree that it was stupid and should never work, I would have preferred death. I committed to my course of action, knowing that death was not an implausible outcome. If my character had died, it would have meant that my actions mattered, and it probably would have been spectacular to boot. As I said in my first post, I know that I am not owed success, but I do feel that I am owed not having my actions essentially negated.

Maybe there's the lesson: letting a PC die when you think their actions warrant it is often the kinder approach. Otherwise, you will damage their belief in the reality of the story, perhaps in a way that cannot be repaired.

Regarding movement speed, I don't know what number the DM said exactly, just that it was too far away for us to do anything. I don't remember any of the numbers involved in this incident precisely, except my Nat 20.

You are correct. I concede the point. The DM should've respected the player's choice and their agency, and killed their character. But they should also have just said "hooking a grappling hook to the dragon's wing is not going to stop it from flying" If the player wanted to go for a jolly ride on a hostile flying dragon they have no-one to blame but themselves. But I feel they should've been told at least once.

[kyoryu]

You are correct. I concede the point. The DM should've respected the player's choice and their agency, and killed their character. But they should also have just said "hooking a grappling hook to the dragon's wing is not going to stop it from flying" If the player wanted to go for a jolly ride on a hostile flying dragon they have no-one to blame but themselves. But I feel they should've been told at least once.

Exactly. Tell them the obvious consequences of their action, then follow through on that.

[Jay R]

No? Even if I were to agree that it was stupid and should never work, I would have preferred death. I committed to my course of action, knowing that death was not an implausible outcome. If my character had died, it would have meant that my actions mattered, and it probably would have been spectacular to boot. As I said in my first post, I know that I am not owed success, but I do feel that I am owed not having my actions essentially negated.

Maybe there's the lesson: letting a PC die when you think their actions warrant it is often the kinder approach. Otherwise, you will damage their belief in the reality of the story, perhaps in a way that cannot be repaired.

Ah – got it. I was more accurate than I knew when I wrote, "The DM saved your life -- poorly. And you're focused on the 'poorly' part, rather than the 'saved your life' part."

I addressed this in my personal "Rules for DMs" document (along with the pumpkins):

50. For the players to be free to be clever, they must also be free to be stupid. For them to be free to make the right decision, they must also be free to make the wrong decision. Either way, it’s the freedom to make the choice for their PCs.

a. If you carefully prevent them from making any mistakes, then you’re the one who’s playing the characters.
b. This can require careful judgment calls. Find a way to prevent them from making TPK-causing errors based on no information. Don’t bother to keep them from losing their pumpkins.

[gbaji]

I've been guilty of the "Are you sure?" as a DM.
It's much better to be clear-don't ask "Are you sure?" tell them "If you do [ACTION], [CONSQUENCES] will happen (potentially on a failure, potentially no matter what you roll)," and then ask them if they're sure.

Lay out the stakes. Make it clear.

Yup. I think the biggest issue is that the DM, instead of laying out the action and consequence relationship, just kinda went with vagarities instead. The DM clearly knew that this would not work the way the player was envisioning things (or had clearly decided it would not work, which is not exactly the same process, but the same outcome). The DM therefore really needed to tell the player this.

I don't put a lot of stock in slippery slope arguments when it comes to GMing. "If we let players think creatively once, soon they might want to think creatively all the time!" should be a message of encouragement, not a dire warning.

Embrace the chaos, I say. If I wanted to play a perfectly tactical and rules-as-written game with no edge cases or Rule Of Cool, I'd pick up Gloomhaven or take out a second mortgage and finally get into Warhammer 40K. I play D&D and other TTRPGs like it precisely because having a human at the helm allows for creativity.

Eh... I do agree mostly with this. However, I will present a counter:

I have on some occasions encountered players who just absolutely insist on ignoring everything on their character sheet, and every standard rule in the game, to try to go "outside the box" to do everything. I mean, on the one hand, I applaud out of the box thinking. But in some cases, it can become quite obvious to the GM that the player is just trying to do a form of min/maxing. In some cases, it's that they dumped their combat abilities during build to focus on other things, and want to be effective in combat by inventing new rules on the fly. "Well. I didn't put any ranks in weapons, nor take any feats that add damage or to-hit or whatever, but I'll come up with a clever way to use the environment to kill the monsters anyway, and then complain that the GM isn't respecting my agency if it's not allowed to succeed".

I think someone pointed out earlier that some games include rules for stunts/whatever, and if that's what you want to play, then play those games (and pay the costs for those abilities). Some games don't really have much in that regard. So yeah. If the expected course is to use your spells/abilities/weapons to damage the enemy, and that's how you win or lose, then maybe that's what you should be focusing on as a player? That's not to say that the occasional really clever thing should not work. But if the player is trying to always use some kind of clever trick to succeed instead of stats/skills/spells/items/abilities on their character sheet, then the pendulum may have swung too far in the other direction. The stuff printed on your sheet really should matter. If it doesn't then why is it there? And it's absolutely not fair to the players who did spend the points/whatever putting stuff on their sheets, if the GM is just going to hand the same level of effectiveness in return for a what is essentially just words spoken at the table by the player.

There's obviously a balance to this. Finding the right one can be tricky sometimes though. And yeah, it's heavily game system dependent.

This is not a DM problem. This is not a player problem. This is a miscommunication between the two of you problem. The player is trying to do something that cannot work, and the DM told him so in DMspeak, rather than plain English.

I don't think it's so much that it cannot work at all (though, as a couple people have pointed out, grappling hooks are not really designed to sink into dragon scale covered wings), but that the result of the proposed action is not likely to be what the player wants.

You are absolutely correct that this is entirely about miscommunication. And it's the GMs job to ask the player what they intend, and to clarify what the GMs perception of that action and its likely outcomes are before the player commits to the action itself.

Oh, and this is ignoring any pain that the hook would cause. Which is probably reasonable given how tough dragons are, but still another factor where the "ball and chain run" is easier if anything.

Again though, the problem is one of game mechanics. We're talking about a game where the same dragon is continuing to function normally while being hacked repeatedly by weapons actually designed for doing maximum damage in a combat situation to targets which are wearing heavy armor. So the idea that the hooks from a grapple are somehow going to hurt *more* than the other sources of damage it's taking is kinda strange. And yes, also a game system that doesn't have rules for "you managed to entangle its legs/arms/wings with something and here's the effect". And also a game system (heck genre) where dragons kinda have to be assumed to use some kind of supernatural <something> to fly in the first place. So trying to apply "real physics" in the situation is questionable already. If we were really judging the ability of a dragon to take off based on the lift characteristics of them flapping their wings, then they can't actually fly anyway, whether they've got a grapple with some extra weight hanging off of it or not. So how exactly do you decide that "by putting this much weight/resistance on the wing, it'll prevent the dragon from flying"?

There are game systems that do have hit locations (including wings), and rules for incapacitating or immobilizing those locations. You want to do this, play those games. If you're playing D&D? The DM wasn't entirely wrong with the suggestion of "just attack the freaking dragon" (poorly communicated IMO, but fundamentally correct).

I'll also take a big swing here and suggest that there was some subtext to the actual situation at hand. Since the OP said that he was already annoyed from previous stuff in the session, my guess is that this actually had less to do with the mechanical resolution or GM/Player interaction, and more with a player becoming frustated at what appeared to be obvious railroads in the adventure the GM was playing. The only reason for even thinking of "grapple the dragon to prevent it from flying away" is if the player is annoyed at multiple GM run monsters flying/running away. So the player decided that "this encounter is going to be the GM having the blue dragon harass us for a few rounds, and then fly off to become a recurring annoyance to us, so I'm going to see if I can prevent that".

I could be wrong here, but if I'm not then this speaks to larger problems. The first one being that the GM is running a game that the players (or at least one player) doesn't actually want to play. Some GMs think that "I'll have the NPCs be super smart and use hit and run tactics and it'll be great!". Protip: It pretty much never is. Yes. A string of suicidal lemming NPCs is not great fun either, but if I have to choose between the two as a player? I'll pick the lemmings. At least I'm accomplishing something, even if it's not terribly thought provoking or engaging.

No? Even if I were to agree that it was stupid and should never work, I would have preferred death. I committed to my course of action, knowing that death was not an implausible outcome. If my character had died, it would have meant that my actions mattered, and it probably would have been spectacular to boot. As I said in my first post, I know that I am not owed success, but I do feel that I am owed not having my actions essentially negated.

Maybe there's the lesson: letting a PC die when you think their actions warrant it is often the kinder approach. Otherwise, you will damage their belief in the reality of the story, perhaps in a way that cannot be repaired.

As long as the player knows the degree of plausibility of death to a reasonable accuracy, I agree. But... this kinda does require that the GM ask some questions and make sure to tell the player what's going on and what the likely outcomes will be before accepting the action.

I've found in my time GMing that the number of times a player proposed something that I knew would likely result in the death of their character but the player didn't realize this and would change their decision if/when they do, vastly outnumbers the times they they did know this and were just plain ok with the death happening.

So yeah. I'm always going to err on the side of making absolutely certain the player knows the score before proceeding in these kinds of situations. If they do, and they choose "nearly certain death", then that's their choice and a reflection of their agency. But if they don't, and their character dies with them wondering why it happened (and likely being very upset about it), then that's not their choice, and it's me bypassing their agency.

[Catullus64]

I have on some occasions encountered players who just absolutely insist on ignoring everything on their character sheet, and every standard rule in the game, to try to go "outside the box" to do everything. I mean, on the one hand, I applaud out of the box thinking. But in some cases, it can become quite obvious to the GM that the player is just trying to do a form of min/maxing. In some cases, it's that they dumped their combat abilities during build to focus on other things, and want to be effective in combat by inventing new rules on the fly. "Well. I didn't put any ranks in weapons, nor take any feats that add damage or to-hit or whatever, but I'll come up with a clever way to use the environment to kill the monsters anyway, and then complain that the GM isn't respecting my agency if it's not allowed to succeed".

I think someone pointed out earlier that some games include rules for stunts/whatever, and if that's what you want to play, then play those games (and pay the costs for those abilities). Some games don't really have much in that regard. So yeah. If the expected course is to use your spells/abilities/weapons to damage the enemy, and that's how you win or lose, then maybe that's what you should be focusing on as a player? That's not to say that the occasional really clever thing should not work. But if the player is trying to always use some kind of clever trick to succeed instead of stats/skills/spells/items/abilities on their character sheet, then the pendulum may have swung too far in the other direction. The stuff printed on your sheet really should matter. If it doesn't then why is it there? And it's absolutely not fair to the players who did spend the points/whatever putting stuff on their sheets, if the GM is just going to hand the same level of effectiveness in return for a what is essentially just words spoken at the table by the player.

I'm not saying I'm that guy.. but I'm not not that guy. I make no secret of the fact that I find winning via the character sheet alone to be unsatisfying. If an encounter is low-stakes or easy, I stick with my abilities, and I try to make an honest assessment of if an improvised action is actually more effective than just pressing my buttons, but I will definitely persist in trying to do stunts even in the face of clear GM opposition. It's a confrontational streak, I admit it, and in the long run the only solution is to communicate with GMs that I really value that sort of gameplay, and that if all I wanted from RPGs was social interaction + tactical use of pre-programmed abilities, I'd be playing World of Warcraft.

I don't think it's so much that it cannot work at all (though, as a couple people have pointed out, grappling hooks are not really designed to sink into dragon scale covered wings), but that the result of the proposed action is not likely to be what the player wants.

You are absolutely correct that this is entirely about miscommunication. And it's the GMs job to ask the player what they intend, and to clarify what the GMs perception of that action and its likely outcomes are before the player commits to the action itself.

This is exactly why I always try to phrase actions like this in terms of intention. It's to signal to a GM that if they don't think what I'm attempting to do is feasible, or works the way I think, now's the time to nip it in the bud.

Again though, the problem is one of game mechanics. We're talking about a game where the same dragon is continuing to function normally while being hacked repeatedly by weapons actually designed for doing maximum damage in a combat situation to targets which are wearing heavy armor. So the idea that the hooks from a grapple are somehow going to hurt *more* than the other sources of damage it's taking is kinda strange. And yes, also a game system that doesn't have rules for "you managed to entangle its legs/arms/wings with something and here's the effect". And also a game system (heck genre) where dragons kinda have to be assumed to use some kind of supernatural <something> to fly in the first place. So trying to apply "real physics" in the situation is questionable already. If we were really judging the ability of a dragon to take off based on the lift characteristics of them flapping their wings, then they can't actually fly anyway, whether they've got a grapple with some extra weight hanging off of it or not. So how exactly do you decide that "by putting this much weight/resistance on the wing, it'll prevent the dragon from flying"?

There are game systems that do have hit locations (including wings), and rules for incapacitating or immobilizing those locations. You want to do this, play those games. If you're playing D&D? The DM wasn't entirely wrong with the suggestion of "just attack the freaking dragon" (poorly communicated IMO, but fundamentally correct).

Wanting to run a game where players mostly stick to strictly rules-defined actions is legitimate, but I think it's also fair to say that, for a Roleplaying Game, it's off-center in terms of what people expect. It's the sort of thing that I think is the exception rather than the rule, and something the GM should explicitly lay out before play.

As for how you decide things when bets are off regarding physics, I think a good GM should ask "Will the overall verisimilitude of this game be damaged if this action succeeds?" Which is a very different question from "Would this action actually succeed?" Lots of unrealistic things, no magic involved, fly in RPGs and narrative fiction in general, because they're close enough to how things actually work that they won't strain suspension of disbelief unless dwelt upon.

I'll also take a big swing here and suggest that there was some subtext to the actual situation at hand. Since the OP said that he was already annoyed from previous stuff in the session, my guess is that this actually had less to do with the mechanical resolution or GM/Player interaction, and more with a player becoming frustated at what appeared to be obvious railroads in the adventure the GM was playing. The only reason for even thinking of "grapple the dragon to prevent it from flying away" is if the player is annoyed at multiple GM run monsters flying/running away. So the player decided that "this encounter is going to be the GM having the blue dragon harass us for a few rounds, and then fly off to become a recurring annoyance to us, so I'm going to see if I can prevent that".

I could be wrong here, but if I'm not then this speaks to larger problems. The first one being that the GM is running a game that the players (or at least one player) doesn't actually want to play. Some GMs think that "I'll have the NPCs be super smart and use hit and run tactics and it'll be great!". Protip: It pretty much never is. Yes. A string of suicidal lemming NPCs is not great fun either, but if I have to choose between the two as a player? I'll pick the lemmings. At least I'm accomplishing something, even if it's not terribly thought provoking or engaging.

Yes and no on the subtext you're reading. Yes, I was definitely feeling railroaded by that point, and frustrated by a GM who seemed incapable of handling things going even a tiny bit off-script. I won't pretend there was no spite in my actions. No, enemies fleeing or using hit-and-run wasn't a specific problem. It simply occurred to me that mobility was one of the dragon's most significant advantages, and I wanted to hamper that.

I agree that lots of GM attempts at 'smart tactics' are simply irritating. Typically, they only seem 'smart' because they depend upon the monsters acting with the GM's omniscient knowledge and ability to view a fight from a zoomed-out view, and have very little to do with how a thinking creature might actually be able to make choices in the heat of battle. As such, they tend to come off more like cheap tricks than clever fighting, and to feel more 'game-y', not less.