2020 - The Year of Blackmoor - 50th Anniversary - Day Forty-One

Celebrating 2020 - The Year of Blackmoor - 50th Anniversary!

From back in 2011 over at the Beyond the Black Gate blog(NSFW images) there was an article about Ref Impartiality You might want to read this article first and then go to this post Dave Arneson and Impartiality in the Temple of the Frog. The second link is what I am talking about here, although the first link lays out a background and context.

You will want to read the whole post of course, but here are a few highlights, the added bold print is provided by me for emphasis:

When it comes to the perfect role model for the impartial ref, I need look no further than my experiences with Dave Arneson. As some of the comments of the linked article would indicate, impartiality can be associated with a "ref vs. players" mentality. I probably made similar associations myself in the past, but gaming with Dave dispelled the notion.

Absolute impartiality is definitely not "ref vs. player" although if you are used to a ref that "helps" players and "fudges" rolls then at first glance you might jump to that conclusion. 

Being, for the first time, in a game run by Dave was a bit disorienting. When your character interacted with Dave's world, he became very animated, as if pouring every bit of his personality into making the game come alive.

I would hope that we all aspire as referees to do this, making the game come alive for our players, to help them see what you see and immerse themselves into the game. But he goes on to say if the players were discussing how to proceed among themselves, Dave did not react at all, instead:

He would sit, stonefaced, not reacting to anything anyone was saying. If a question was put to him as DM rather than as an NPC, he would simply shrug and look bored.

This is hard to do and I am definitely not as good as Dave, but when I play with experienced players this is what I strive for. When I ref inexperienced players I gradually move toward this more each game. I start out helping them with the lay of the land and to get a picture of how free they are to take action, but gradually they have to do it themselves, pick up the ball and run with it. I tell them up front that this is going to happen, that I will stop giving them hints and there will be no do overs if they screw up.

If you've ever watched a court trial on TV (a real trial, not a show), you've seen this same behavior - from the judge.

"Judge" would actually be a better description of how Dave ran his games than "Referee". The difference being one of rules vs. rulings. Dave was firmly in the rulings camp. 

This is what I strive for to be more of an impartial "Judge."

Dave had exactly two ways of resolving dilemmas or challenges. 1) Make an absolutely impartial ruling, or 2) if an absolutely impartial ruling was impossible, roll the dice.

I really think this is the way to go and I think that players really respect this. Consistency builds trust and if you do not favor the monsters or the characters, players learn to use the freedom they have to play smart and make good decisions. Players also learn to decide quickly and play quickly as that is to their advantage. 

To say that Dave was completely impartial with regards to the game was not to say that Dave was completely impartial with regards to players, often with hilarious results.

If you did not read the whole thing, then you will want to go back and  read the rest of that paragraph. IMO it is the perfect example of how to deal with someone who whines and complains about "fairness." In the cited example the complaining player had nothing to complain about, but the squeaky wheel learned there were consequences for being irritating and disruptive.

This next quoted section I really love as it nails it all down tight.

It didn't take long in one of Dave's games for the players to realize that we were on our own, completely. There would be no hints, subtle or otherwise, no clues dropped in our paths when we happened to go off-track. No mercy when we stumbled into overwhelming odds. No poison types fudged when we failed our saving throws. It was up to us to search, scout, research, prepare, plot, and react with some sort of competence.

I find myself unable to do this with complete newbies who have no concept of what an old school game is like and have no conception of what freedom of action they both have and are expected to exhibit. But experienced players, I would hope, want to play in a game like this. It means that they have to ask questions and explain what they are doing. Now once they have established that they know how to describe a thorough search (for example) I allow players to say, "We are going to take the time here to do a our standard thorough search, with emphasis on..." instead of taking the time to detail it all out each time. Now if a new player joins the game I ask them to detail it out so the newcomer knows what is up.

If players ask the right questions, then the referee/judge should answers the questions with the thoroughness they deserve. But if they fail to ask the questions, that is on them.

How about you? Are you impartial?