I'm going to need a concrete example here, so bear with me. Let's take rot grubs as a for-instance.
The very first time I encountered rot grubs, I had no idea how to beat them. We tried stuff that didn't work, including one thing that seemed like it should have but didn't. In character there was screaming and yelling and dying and out of character there was a lot of frustration at the table.
That first encounter wasn't fun! There's no reason it should have been, losing characters to what's kind of an eff-u monster.
But, we eventually figured out how to beat them. And from then on, that's what we did. The first encounter with rot grubs where we didn't lose a PC felt like a real earned victory in a way that a level-appropriate combat encounter doesn't.
Now here's my assertion, which maybe not everyone will agree with: play-acting out the screaming and yelling and dying phase of the learning curve isn't the point of rot grubs. The point of rot grubs is the part where you, as the player not the character, have the opportunity to figure out the puzzle, and if you do so, get to actually beat them from then on.
The catch in asking players who do know how to beat rot grubs not to meta-game is that they're actually playing stupider than a party that doesn't know in the first place. Because the party that doesn't know may still stumble on or surmise the one winning play, while the play-acting party is still looking for the nod or the intelligence check that will let them proceed.
So if you have a GM whose players all know about rot grubs, and his solution is to keep running rot grubs but ask them not to act on out-of-character knowledge, that GM has profoundly missed the point. The only way to be true to rot grubs at this point is to stop running rot grubs and come up with your own damn Saturday night specials.
...
"What about the guy who reads the book and ruins it for everybody else?" Okay, if you're stuck with that guy at all, I can actually see a role for telling him to keep it in his pants and let the newbies figure it out. But I'll still assert that holding the whole table to the standard you set for that guy risks holding them back into playing stupid territory.
So I do draw a line between reading all published material ahead of time and acting on what you've discovered or heard as a player at the table. They're both OOC knowledge, but to me they're as far apart from each other as IC is from OOC. We need a quadrant grid, not a straight line continuum, to talk about meta-gaming or OOC knowledge.
...
"What about this thread, which I am obviously responding to?" Well, partly we may be thinking of different play styles or scenarios, which is why I didn't post there.
But I will note that a player in my L5R game, who GMs and plays other games, has commented that he likes playing a game where he genuinely doesn't know what the back of the book says about things. So it's a broader point than just rot grubs in D&D. He was talking about a sense of mystery specifically - but on this topic it also means he's allowed to act on his own wild guesses, even when they're right! Firewalling OOC knowledge may be a necessary evil for other players' sakes when you've been reading the book, but it's a very poor substitute for just playing games and worlds where you as a player don't have the books memorized, but are allowed to play as smart as you can.
The very first time I encountered rot grubs, I had no idea how to beat them. We tried stuff that didn't work, including one thing that seemed like it should have but didn't. In character there was screaming and yelling and dying and out of character there was a lot of frustration at the table.
That first encounter wasn't fun! There's no reason it should have been, losing characters to what's kind of an eff-u monster.
But, we eventually figured out how to beat them. And from then on, that's what we did. The first encounter with rot grubs where we didn't lose a PC felt like a real earned victory in a way that a level-appropriate combat encounter doesn't.
Now here's my assertion, which maybe not everyone will agree with: play-acting out the screaming and yelling and dying phase of the learning curve isn't the point of rot grubs. The point of rot grubs is the part where you, as the player not the character, have the opportunity to figure out the puzzle, and if you do so, get to actually beat them from then on.
The catch in asking players who do know how to beat rot grubs not to meta-game is that they're actually playing stupider than a party that doesn't know in the first place. Because the party that doesn't know may still stumble on or surmise the one winning play, while the play-acting party is still looking for the nod or the intelligence check that will let them proceed.
So if you have a GM whose players all know about rot grubs, and his solution is to keep running rot grubs but ask them not to act on out-of-character knowledge, that GM has profoundly missed the point. The only way to be true to rot grubs at this point is to stop running rot grubs and come up with your own damn Saturday night specials.
...
"What about the guy who reads the book and ruins it for everybody else?" Okay, if you're stuck with that guy at all, I can actually see a role for telling him to keep it in his pants and let the newbies figure it out. But I'll still assert that holding the whole table to the standard you set for that guy risks holding them back into playing stupid territory.
So I do draw a line between reading all published material ahead of time and acting on what you've discovered or heard as a player at the table. They're both OOC knowledge, but to me they're as far apart from each other as IC is from OOC. We need a quadrant grid, not a straight line continuum, to talk about meta-gaming or OOC knowledge.
...
"What about this thread, which I am obviously responding to?" Well, partly we may be thinking of different play styles or scenarios, which is why I didn't post there.
But I will note that a player in my L5R game, who GMs and plays other games, has commented that he likes playing a game where he genuinely doesn't know what the back of the book says about things. So it's a broader point than just rot grubs in D&D. He was talking about a sense of mystery specifically - but on this topic it also means he's allowed to act on his own wild guesses, even when they're right! Firewalling OOC knowledge may be a necessary evil for other players' sakes when you've been reading the book, but it's a very poor substitute for just playing games and worlds where you as a player don't have the books memorized, but are allowed to play as smart as you can.
In defense of meta-gaming
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