Recently I consulted the DnD 5e FB page to get a read on the two options of a moral dilemma for an adventure I was writing. I presented it as an A or B choice: The players could choose to honor the confidence of a pair of lovers and mostly likely start a war that would kill scores, or they could betray the lovers and avert the war.
I didn’t really learn anything about the choices I was presenting, but I did learn some things about players:
- Players don’t like moral dilemmas.
- Players don’t like being small fish.
- Players are spoiled brats.
This is part of the ongoing opinion series “Chief Yells at Clouds”. LP’s Curmudgeon in Residence, Shawn Stanford (call him ‘Chief’), takes issue with everything that isn’t exactly the way it was when he started playing D&D on papyrus and clay tablets.
Players Don’t Like Moral Dilemmas
A moral dilemma is different from a moral choice. A moral choice is the decision between a morally good and morally bad option. A moral dilemma is a choice made among options that are all morally good or all morally bad. In this situation, the moral choice was between “enabling the happiness and freedom of two people” and “preventing the death and suffering of scores of people”.
This was a clear moral dilemma, and the obvious answer is to choose to do the greater amount of good by averting the war. So, to make the choice more personal, I planned for the players to get to know the lovers. They could betray the lovers they know and like, or condemn scores they don’t know. This must have worked, because it caused one commenter to lament, “I feel like there should always be the possibility that the players can save everyone.”
He and I are not in agreement on that. I don’t feel any obligation to always provide a happy ending. And that’s not the way this adventure was intended to work. The difficult, morally ambiguous decision is the climax (and kind of the point) of this adventure. There is no option where everyone will win, and it’s up to the players to decide who will lose.
Situations don’t always – in fact seldom do they – allow everyone to win. Some games are zero sum, and this adventure is one of them. The idea that ‘everyone can win’, or even that the Good Guys will always win, is a fantasy. And I get it: DnD is fantasy. But that doesn’t make it mandatory that every adventure, every choice, should have nothing but winners.
DnD was designed to be a series of challenges: Challenging monsters, challenging dungeons, challenging traps, challenging NPCs, challenging environments, etc. In this case, the challenge is to the players’ compassion and sense of morality.
Players Don’t Like Being Small Fish
I got the impression during these conversations that a lot of DnD players don’t like to feel they can be pushed around by the world they’re in. It makes sense that people who feel trapped, overwhelmed, and small in the real world, would gravitate toward FRPs, where they can inhabit (or create) a world in which they have options, matter, and can make a difference. Sure, it’s a stereotype, but there does seem to be something there.
More than one commenter said that presenting an either/or choice was a ‘false dichotomy’ that removed player agency and railroaded the players (who must surely hate me). But it seemed like the real problem was that either choice inevitably set events in motion that the commenters didn’t want to happen, and were unable to affect. In other words: They didn’t want to be pushed around or made to feel unimportant in the game.
But when asked what their reaction would be to the choice of betraying the lovers or not betraying the lovers, they presented ideas that simply weren’t viable. One commenter suggested that during an interview with a ruler, the players might choose to charm a couple of guards, who would then depose the ruler and prevent the war. I’m at a loss to describe how ridiculously unfeasible that is, even in the context of DnD. Leaving yourself vulnerable to any group of random vagabonds that shows up to talk to you is not how being a ruler works.
Some commenters were sure that if they could just negotiate with the families involved or have a crack at rousing the people against the king, then they could stave off the war and the lovers could be together. On its face that may seem reasonable; but in the context of this situation it isn’t. It’s conceit on a massive scale, which brings me to my third point.
Players Are Spoiled Brats
The situation was established such that the forces at work were far beyond the ability of the players to affect. These are the rulers of large kingdoms with sizable armies, decades of history, and generations of culture. Why would some group of a half-dozen people feel like they could waltz in and fundamentally change these nations? It’s not just ridiculous, it’s stupid.
Of course, that’s fine if the GM builds a way for that to happen; a lever that the players can pull. But as I explained during the discussion, that lever did not exist here. But the commenters still expected that lever, and scolded me for ‘removing player agency’ when I didn’t allow them to create one. Players always want ‘options’, even when there are no viable options, or insist on trying ideas that are flat-out ridiculous even in the context of a fantasy role-playing game.
But it’s not really the players’ fault; it’s the fault of the GMs that are allowing, enabling, and even encouraging this expectation. I’ve seen players suggest doing the most ridiculous things in-game; things that shouldn’t be possible, even considering the context. Not only do GMs allow it, when they should just say “No, you can’t do that”, but they insulate players from their silliness, rather than inflicting any well-earned injury or death.
I suspect part of it is that the GM is trying to keep things entertaining by allowing some light-hearted silliness into the game. But, I’m sure that a lot of it – no, I know a lot of it – is that GMs are afraid of their players. They don’t want to risk alienating, angering, or being bullied by their players after telling those players they can’t do anything they like. Heaven forbid the players complain the GM ‘removed their agency’.
I mean, I get it: It’s a fantasy role playing game. But when any fantasy becomes possible, it’s no longer a game, it’s just masturbation.
It’s not that kind of a movie.
That’s not how I write adventures, that’s not how I GM, and that’s not how I play my toons.
Just because you describe in excruciating detail your brilliant idea for manipulating the situation doesn’t mean it’s going to work; and no amount of effort, angst, hope, desperation, and argument is going to change that. The world doesn’t owe you something just because you want it so much.
The world may be your playground, but it isn’t your plaything, and this ain’t kindergarten. Players will seldom be able to effect Big Changes, and then only if an opportunity exists and they work their asses off. The world is vast and there are powerful forces and enormous momentum at work. Unless you get very lucky (or very unlucky), the world is mostly indifferent and immune to you and your shenanigans.
