Your character can't do anything right now, this is a cutscene

It literally doesn't deserve to be called part of a game. It's completely one-sided. The DM is reading out his story and you have the privilege of sitting there and shutting the fuck up.

Oh sure, it could never happen. That must be why people are defending it.

You've cracked the case, Sherlock.

With cutscenes, you can:

Give more characterisation to your villains, as they perform their speech.

You can show players what is happening elsewhere, while characters have no way of knowing that. (Kinda like they show you in movies that main villain after his presumed death took another breath.)

It works for some kinds of games, but certainly not for everyone. I agree DM shouldn't force actions of PCs, but IMHO it is entirely in his jurisdiction to shift the camera focus.

> I shoot the king XDDDDDD
Fuck off and die, OP

You're actually defending paralyzing the PCs during the bad guy's monologue?

Both examples are awful. Really awful. If you want to tell a story 100% the way you want, write a book.

Even if it WAS the case, he should be allowed to try that, and suffer consequences (mostly likely a TPK). It isn't (shouldn't be) PF or 3.5 with permanent NPC with GM protection.

>You're actually defending paralyzing the PCs during the bad guy's monologue?
>I agree DM shouldn't force actions of PCs, but IMHO it is entirely in his jurisdiction to shift the camera focus.

>You can show players what is happening elsewhere, while characters have no way of knowing that.

Did you mean to reply to that post? Because your reply doesn't address it.

>Even if it WAS the case, he should be allowed to try that
A GM is perfectly well within his rights to insist players only take actions that make some sense in context, even if it could be responded to realistically (at the risk of derailing the game for everyone else who presumably wants to play).

>paralyzing the PCs
What? No.
But... can't you just ask your players to let you finish the villain's monologue? It became trope for reason.

Sure, it doesn't fit every kind of game. I probably wouldn't do it in anything described as gritty or realistic, but in flashy, anime games? Why not.

>players choose to skip it
>suddenly you're in a different location with no knowledge how you got there or what you're suppose to be doing

I kindof really want to do this now.

I usually just use alternatives to the traditional villain monologue. A dialogue often conveys the same interaction, if the party is willing to talk even just long enough to ask basic questions. If not, monologues can be delivered remotely - by holo (if scifi), by video (if modern), or in any setting by writing or by proxy. If your party aren't total murderhobos they're not likely to kill a servant, slave, or unpaid intern.

>Even if it WAS the case, he should be allowed to try that, and suffer consequences
The consequences is being kicked out, because he's a fucking faggot, and now he's crying on Veeky Forums because his DM hate fun. Again, kill yourself OP.

OP's boat got stolen by the Cult of Shipthieves again.

No snitching.

It's not my fault my players have no sense for the dramatic. They all expect to get their special moments and not be interrupted. So do I.

Inexperienced GMs often fall into that trap

Honestly, if there's no reason that people shouldn't be able to react to what is happening, let them. If it's "happening too fast", allow them a initiative or similar test to see if they can get 1 round worth of actions.

And if you really want to have shit happen without anyone being able to react:
>do it after combat has started, but the players have already taken their actions

>do it after combat has started, but the players have already taken their actions
Genious.

this has to be bait

now i understand why people find so difficult to DM dungeon world

they play like it's a fucking videogame
a bad one with a lot of cutscene

>tfw you'll never have a cute asian Watson telling you to go to sleep or holding your hand when you're sad
Life is suffering.

>playing 4e
>DM denies all money and gear for the party during character creation, except for a single common weapon
>party approaches some farm a bunch of bandits have taken over
>split in two, sneaking closer
>DM doesn't hide he expected us to go in fighting
>one half of the part gets stopped
>DM doesn't allow any diplomacy, any attempts to talk to the bandits are ignored
>all bandits inside and outside of the farm charge right at all the part, even the ones who were on the other side of the farm hiding in bushes, behind the building

How do you get anime in your tabletop? Flipbooks?

>now i understand why people find so difficult to DM dungeon world
It... um, isn't?

And funnily enough, you exactly guessed my exact opinion on Dungeon World.

Could you explain what do i do badly and how to fix that?

By anime i mean over-the-top action and mighty heroic feats. (Like some people suggest that way to boost martials in DnD is by letting them do feats on par with mythical heroes, slashing through mountains, jumping over the wide river, surviving spear in head, stuff like that.)

Oh, so action themed, not necessarily anime or even Japanese.

I prefer the term 'cinematic'.

The cinematic style of running games is unequivocally the best style. Focusing on hardcore realism is pretentious and always doomed to fail.

Nowadays videogames have learned how to do interactive cutscenes, you mong.

The easiest - EASIEST way to do a simple cutscene is the way Half Life 2 did it with Gordon Freeman's approach to Dr Breen.

Breen appears on giant screens, monologuing to the player character as he advances, mocking him, taunting him.

"Tell me, Dr. Freeman, if you can: you have destroyed so much — what is it exactly that you have created? Can you name even one thing?... I thought not. "

Just have your villain monologue through illusion spells, if you want them to do a big speech. Or do what he wants to do out of range of the PCs. How hard is that?

Instead of denying player action, which is essentially you masturbating while playing with yourself.

Yes, cinematic is actually a good term for that sort of thing. It doesn't limit the subject matter to one genre or culture.

I want to pat Kizuna Ai on the head.

>Could you explain what do i do badly and how to fix that?

basically you need to sandbox and not railroad

>talking to dmpc woman who has been with us from first session alone in her room at the inn
>we were temporarily separated and we ran into a vampire and had joked about her being bitten ig
>my pc is trying to find out if it's true
>sort of an ooc joke but also an excuse to talk to npc and have a little scene together
>I ask her to take off cloak so I can inspect her neck
>she takes it off, opens window, says some shit, puts it on and goes to leave all in one paragraph
>'wait I uhh grab her arm to keep her from leaving???'
>door is open and other party npc is there
>they start to argue
>I try to come between them and figure out why they're upset and mediate
>dmpc tells me to stay out of it, go downstairs and let her handle this
>refuse, slam door in npc's face and demand she tell me what's up
>door flies open as npc goes super saiyan or some shit
>they continue their argument
>I sit on the bed, annoyed in character at these bitches
>I peanut gallery their stupid cutscene, calling out the npc for their dumb shit constantly
>they don't react or reply
>other players decide to interrupt as well
>bard hits the rampaging mad npc with an anti magic spell to knock out her hurricane of anime drama
>I go downstairs to discuss this insane npc with bard
>paladin tries to help by soothing upset npc, gently asks what's wrong
>'can you just give us a few minutes alone?'
????

They were vampires btw

>try to have an enemy do something cool
>try to have him actually speak with the party
>I ATTACK HIM BY SURPRISE
Fuck you

Fuck you with three furry dicks

>try to have an enemy do something that's stupid and out of character
>try to suddenly have him drop everything and try talking to the band of misfits that's been fighting his minions to the death on more than one occasion
>they attack him

THIS IS BULLSHIT I NEVER COULD HAVE SEEN THIS COMING WHY WON'T THEY LISTEN TO MY SUPERB WRITING REEEEE

That's when I'd have them do what Darth Vader did to Han Solo's blaster. The villain blocks and disarmed you, since he caught you by surprise in that his guard wasn't down at all and if they'd tried to read his stance they'd have known that. They can start a sec early but it'll be at a disadvantage since they can't indulge my single fucking line of dialogue before they start swinging.

>Party's in the middle of a fight with some hooligans
>We've got them on the ropes
>Figure we can spare them and end the fight right then and there
>The hooligans get to live another day, and we won't have anyone taken out in the last round by a single annoying critical
>Use my turn to demand their surrender
>Entire table looks at me like I've just dropped my pants and taken a shit in front of them, then fights to the death anyway

Wat.

I find the people who complain about cut scenes, are generally the ones that just do shit for the express sake of doing shit. Then said people complain after game, saying some shit like - "The npc's are really 2-D and I don't really get why bad guy X was doing what he did".

If you shut the fuck up for a second and allow any npc to actually talk or take an action, you would be having a much more immersive experience.

Not to mention how hard it is on the DM to literally improv everything out of their asses everytime a player decides to trample on anything and everything on complete whim's with no cause.

This is a real bad example of a cut scene and I am sorry you had to go through that.

I should make it clear that a good cut scene should only be a couple lines of dialogue or an action. A DM should never hinder the party to be fully useless, especially while 2 or more npc's are going at it. Also a good cut scene should drive the narrative forward, making the story better. Players equally should allow this. If you want to just hack and slash and literally do what ever you want. Go play an actual video game. Because last time I checked Table Top games were about the fucking ROLE PLAYING and you can't get much done if your players just fucking talk over everything you do.

Singed an angry DM that's sick and tired of rude players.

Interact, yes. But there is a difference being being able to interacts and being able to interrupt an action that is happening in front of them as the GM is describing it.

Obviously this isn't a black and white issue, but if an assassin suddenly pulls out a poisoned dagger and stabs the king in the back with it, the player doesn't get to spit out their wine and teleport across the throne room to interfere all because they screeched "I want to stop that!" as soon as they heard the word dagger.

Combat is broken up into turns during which you can and cannot act. All because you are not in combat does not mean you can act all the time.

>Narrating scene
>Get interrupted as player extrapolates a ridiculous assumption
>Tell him to calm down and that I was about to continue the exposition that would've cleared his doubts

Fortunately this almost never happens,
but peeves me a bit

>Singed an angry DM that's sick and tired of rude players.
>Singed
user, I can understand you being frustrated, but attacking your GM with fire is uncalled for

>Combat is broken up into turns during which you can and cannot act. All because you are not in combat does not mean you can act all the time.

in general doing something without letting the players react is bad DMing

>you see a guy pull out a dagger that seem to have poison on it, he is going to stab the king! what do you do?

good DMing

>you see a guy pull out a poisoned dagger, he stabs the king!

>wait wait i cast this spell!

>no u can't he's ded

bad DMing

Ya I agree, my example is crazy but I've also been on the dm side of it, trying to describe a room and having the players just zip through ignoring what's happening. 'Ya ya ya we keep walking' like ok you don't want to know who the guy you've been investigating is? Cuz that's what you just fast forwarded through.

It only works if the circumstances allow it.
>bad guy on a screen or behind reinforced glass
>players are bound
If the players enter his room and he starts talking, the players should be able to react

Just have him use a magic item to talk to the party where he's not actually present.
Like have him puppet an innocent man through a magic item or something, or give them a phone call.

This isn't actually hard.

The quantum death

>your spell avoided the attack!
>the assassin is dead
>the King cheers for the heroes, sipping his wine
>the wine was poisoned! The attacker was a ruse!

Even worse DM?

God that reminds me of another cutscene in the game with the vampires etc.

We got locked in a room with a window on the door and outside were people talking, basically a cutscene. Except our paladin threw a fucking chair at the door and they didn't react and the dm ignored it until asked, then he said it cracked slightly but it's super glass or something.

How's
>You see the king try to stand in surprise; suddenly, he slumps face forwards into his food.
>An assassin becomes visible as the invisibility magics fade off, and he pulls a poisoned dagger from the king's heart.

>by the way, you all failed your perception checks except for the rogue who didn't do anything

Yuck.

It's slightly better. At least you can buff up and then go to town making the door a deathtrap.

It's still even better if they actually reacted to the players, or if players could do something.

Yeah I feel that.

I managed to put a lid on it with my long term group by getting each of them to run at least 1 session for the group, or I would flat out stop DMing.

I may have been a dick here, but for each of their sessions, I wrote up a new character and was as destructive as possible. And the rest of the party followed suit - until after they had run their session that is.

It was a dick move, but it worked. They respect what I do a lot more now.

But the frustration is still there with my other groups.

I've since come to realise; Player/DM problems mostly stem from players not knowing what its like to run games (in rare cases vice versa), because they really are a different ballpark to each other. At least, this is what i've experienced.

I know, vampires right? Disgusting

>villains starts villainous monologue
>player interrupts with "I shut him up with an arrow to the neck"

Well, user? Do you accept this or not?

No good villain just stands there talking. They always have a hostage or have the PCs restrained by something like decorum at a party or you know a laser cutting table rack thing.

>The arrow goes through the villain, he's not actually there
>he doesn't even notice the arrow, in fact, it's a pre-recorded message
>oh, but the dozen elite guards who have just been buffing are totally ready to see you now while the monologue continues!

So long as the rogue's player actually did choose to not do anything? Fine.

See, this is a situation where you've presented a chance for both success and failure based on the abilities of the player characters. And whether they succeed or fail, both results lead to adventure

>So long as the rogue's player actually did choose to not do anything? Fine.
Nah, rogue player was trying to pickpocket the duke, she asked if there was anyone to be wary of, I started explaining about the invisible person, she interrupted and asked if the invisible person noticed her pickpocketing the duke, I said no, she asked how much loot did she get.

No smart PC would just fly into a room and shoot the first thing that looks like a baddie, sometimes for the very same reasons you pointed out in that the BBEG might have a hostage they don’t see.

Go look at pretty much any classic fantasy film and tell me how many times the protagonists just rush in and attack the baddie without assessing the situation or preparing themselves for an ambush first. The only time I can recall a “enough talk, I stab him” situation is one of the Conan movies, and that was more for comedic effect.

Though it's true most of the time they don't just rush in and attack anybody on sight, I'd say it's more of a cinematic thing than an actual smart character doing smart things like checking for an ambush. Heroes get ambushed right in front of the main villain all the time on media. They don't attack because it's some kind of script law that the villain has the right to give his big speech before the final showdown, even though there's nothing preventing the protagonists to confront him right there and then.

Yeah that's fine. Both an in-character and out-of-character mistake.

That's on the Rogue for being fucking stupid.

As a DM I can do whatever the hell I want in my setting, players be damned. That being said I'd rather have friends than not so I tailor my games to the players I have.

>Tfw mostly lolrandom players so everything is played for laughs and combat is cinematic as fuck. No srs games allowed with these kids. Still fun though

Just a dick DM

This guy's correct. Players: if your DM has been doing a decent job so far, any cutscene or villain speech is likely to be fairly important to the plot of the story. Yes, you are all telling a story together, but there are some times when you need to let your DM do the talking, and sit back, and enjoy the unfolding story. For fuck's sake, just shut the fuck up for one fucking minute while the villain explains his motivations, or foreshadows future events.

Let NPCs have their say before murdering them. Let the Villain say his dying bit before killing him. And if you do this shit as a player, DO NOT ever complain about how the villains "had no motivations" or "the NPCs were one-dimensional"

Yes they're one-dimensional because you fucking murder them before they can say "hello, welcome to my store!" Fuck's sake.

I only had to do this with one group, and only because if I didn't I literally wouldn't get through fucking anything because they did that stupid "If I interrupt the DM and YELL AT THE TOP OF MY LUNGS, that makes my interruption canon" thing.

It got worse when they did it to one-up or stop each other, and a casual conversation with a bartender would turn into a screaming match for 10 minutes.

>Someone asks if the bartender has heard any good rumors lately
>"Oi, just the other day there were some strange lights over b-
"I ROLL THIEVERY TO ROB HIM WHILE HE'S TALKING."
>"I ROLL TO STOP HIM."
"NO YOU DON'T, I ROLL TO STOP YOU STOPPING ME."
>"I STAB THE BARTENDER."
"OH THEN I TAKE ALL HIS MONEY."
>"WAIT, HE'S DEAD, I'M TAKING AS TORCH AND BURNING THIS PLACE TO THE GROUND HAHA."

And this is before I get a chance to respond to anything until they finally wear themselves out. Didn't even make it a full campaign before I grabbed the one decent player from the group and told everyone else to fuck off, and got another group going.

It's better to have an IC reason for the players not to act and for the enemy to monologue.

Like there being a wall of bullet proof anti-magic glass between them, or just being very far away or a spectral projection.

God that was the worst... We ran into the vampire chick but she left us alone and went and found the girls and bit them I guess? But since we're Special they became semi vampires who could handle sunlight a little etc. So then they act like they had it sooo hard but we got arrested and locked up without food for 5 days! Fuck those bitches.. Oh and they didn't even thank me when I let them have my blood. Then the dm basically forgot they were vampires and then we cured them.

It's been a very long time since I played in a game where smashing down doors, killing everything on the other side and taking their shit was normal

I miss good old fashioned dungeon crawls.

Yup. Even in my bad dming cutscene examples I always tried to help the dm out and just roll with things, another player was the opposite and would be so disruptive it just made it worse.

>sandbox
No drive for the PCs to do anything
>railroad
No agency for the players

This is how you do games, pic related

>No smart PC would just fly into a room and shoot the first thing that looks like a baddie, sometimes for the very same reasons you pointed out in that the BBEG might have a hostage they don’t see.

>Go look at pretty much any classic fantasy film and tell me how many times the protagonists just rush in and attack the baddie without assessing the situation or preparing themselves for an ambush first. The only time I can recall a “enough talk, I stab him” situation is one of the Conan movies, and that was more for comedic effect.

Too many times I've seen heroes stand back and wait while a bad guy yells out a magic spell, while the hero is holding a ranged weapon.

"You're too late!" shouts the bad guy. "THE SUMMONING IS COMPLETE!" or whatever. Then they actually have to fight the evil demon from hell or whatever and the hero's best friend sacrifices his life or something.

Because of their stupidity, their best friend gets killed, and that's something that could have been easily stopped by just shooting the guy.

First thing that shows up on google for "why didn't they just shoot" Negan, from the walking dead, apparently. Why DIDN'T they just shoot the bad guy instead of having 12 episodes of all out war with this dude's army.

Play a video game then

My only cutscene type thing was the Maze spell from 3.5 but I had it like the house of the undying from asoiaf. This was before the show so nobody knew what it was in the group. Anyway, they had to pass through the rooms without being tempted to stay or go the wrong way etc. Except the players know this so they just waltz through unaffected by, for example, a vision of how their sister died, an npc being tortured for information on them, the mysterious npc they want to know more about as a child, their wife mourning them after they die, etc. I had a bunch of things with a lot of useful info for them but they just ignored it.

In my current group everyone bursts into a room like a fucking swat team and mows down everything on round 0-1. I begin to wonder why I bothered putting ranks into diplomacy, but it's funny as hell.

Someone's never played a late-era Vampire the Masquerade module. The one where the Giovanni take over from VDA in particular is like one big campaign-long cutscene.

The DM is all that's standing between you and the pitchforks. You should be thanking him.

I like this guy, he gets it.

That had some great advice, thanks.

Without knowing any context, that's a fair thing for them to do because:
1 they don't know whether or not the information provided by the place is even truthful or not just lies and misinformation to decieve them
2 it could just be more tricks to trap them, as the premise was they had to move through "without being tempted to stay or go the wrong way"

That you had planned actual information provided by these things, is a bit of meta knowledge

I just realized my GM has been doing this all the time without us noticing, and it was a great game.

True, and my favourite advice ever obtained here on Veeky Forums (possibly from when this happened years ago) is to not be frustrated by the players not getting a thing but rather to wonder how you could have communicated better.

But they sort of yaddayaddayadda'd me and breezed through the rooms without listening, that was the problem. I mean I described the fuck out of this kid. "You see a young boy about 7 years old sweeping the floor, he has dark chestnut curls and blue eyes. He's doing his best to ignore the other people in the brothel" they say uh huh ok we proceed. Then my husband reminds me that the kid is a half elf by loudly whispering 'one pointy ear!' So I say, "oh! And he's a half elf!" And they say ya ya...

It's really good, but I also find the opposite can be great.

Give the players a goal at the start - KILL EMPIRE

And let em go with it. See what they come up with.

Almost-sandboxes are pretty good too.

GURPS recently added a system for Impulse Points and Villain Points that let you buy metagame effects. One option for refreshing them is playing true to the genre.

Examples:

Not using guns against melee fighter enemies.

Not interrupting villain monologues

Responding correctly to persuasive villains (ie being tempted by the seductress, cutting deals with the negotiator, being scared by the intimidating bad guy, etc).

Giving enemies a "fair fight" if in a dueling campaign.

Following rules of courtesy if present in the setting.

There's no punishment if you don't, but if you do, you're rewarded with points you can use later for lucky breaks and serendipitous events.

It overlaps and blurs into rewards for good roleplaying, itself valuable.

>not be frustrated by the players not getting a thing but rather to wonder how you could have communicated better
Though I understand how this is good advice, there's certain players which are simply unwilling/unable to follow clear, precise directions.

I have found myself literally asking a player to not do the thing -for the game's sake- just for them to do it anyways because they thought I was trying to force them out of "winning" on purpose.

Great gaming advice.
I will note that the Apocalypse World/Dungeon World GM guides are also great, even if you are running D&D/other systems.

I like that idea. In cortex there are plot points which I always thought were a great 'light touch' to push players towards better Roleplaying and better behavior. I'll look into this

If ooc the dm says trust me, that's entirely different.

Often cutscenes are used by bad dms to paper over holes in the plot by bulling right over players getting any choices at all. With a good DM, this doesn't apply.

>I have found myself literally asking a player to not do the thing -for the game's sake- just for them to do it anyways because they thought I was trying to force them out of "winning" on purpose.
For those, there's always the rocks fall option.

Oh ya, there's a point where you just give up because players are fucking monsters. But if you're dwelling on a situation and wondering why they didn't solve the puzzle 'because they're dumb' wrong help much. You need to reevaluate the situation and figure out what clue would have been enough to let them solve it. That way next time you can plan better. If you have to hit them over the head with it, then go ahead.

>players are doing something unrelated
>ordered by a messenger to return to the castle at once
>the king is dead

RPGs aren't movies dummy.

True, but that doesn’t mean we can’t let players act like it’s one.

Yes. After all, I don't have the monsters attack them when they come up with detailed tactical plans in the middle of an ambush.

Well, I did do that once in a game long ago, but the players didn't stop whining about it for weeks.