# Pros and Cons of going mainstream



## Luce (Nov 20, 2012)

The usual declaimers:
This is NOT an edition war! 
The only wrong way to play is to not have fun.

Greeting all.
I found the attached article and while personally not agreeing with authors conclusions it does seems to raise interesting topics for discussion.
In particular how has the focus of the game changed thorough the years and editions?

The author of the article argues that by reaching a more mainstream  status the game have become more focus on the casual play making easy to  pick up, but loosing some of its sense of wander.

Personally I feel that the earlier editions (OD&D, 1st and 2nd) were more focused on individual creativity where each DM makes an unique world of his own creation. In other words specialized, but more close fitting to the game group. There was a problem when switching groups or DMs for that matter. The growth of the PC was also more pronounced. 1st level adventurer is only slightly better then Joe NPC, while high level (10+ as defined by the High level handbook) is much more likely to succeed in a level appropriate challenge (hit more often, save more often etc). The world were more status quo - PC can face a variety of challenges in the same adventure (6 gargoyles vs 25 level lich) ans still feel threatened. It was up to them whether they will run or fight.
3rd and 4th streamlined the rules and tried to place an unification factor as well as fully disclosed math. That increased the ease of play but also introduced predictability and for some a drive for optimization. Rules layering is nothing new, but I feel it rouse to new levels as well as get more organized in last two editions. I do not fight the expected wealth by level to be wrong, just not everyone's cup of tea. The feeling of magic items also felt to me less rewarding both due to its commonality as well as its way of meshing with the system. In other words, before magic items were thing that allowed one to go belong what was possible, now magic gets more everyday necessity vibe. (I guess IRL it parallels what computer have become- a luxury and wander to everyday nececity)
Just my two coppers.


Please discuss.


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## dkyle (Nov 20, 2012)

You know, I don't think I've ever seen an experienced, adult RPG player describe a recent gameplay experience as possessing a "sense of wonder", in any system, including old editions of D&D.

I don't think "sense of wonder" has anything to do with game mechanics or design. It's rose-tinted nostalgia for childhood where mechanics quite literally didn't matter, because kids are perfectly happy with pure make-believe.  "Sense of wonder" happens when the world is a mystery because the processes used by the DM to run it are a mystery.

But I think, as RPG players get older and more experienced, _that_ mystery simply doesn't work any more.  We see past that.  Succeeding or failing at things simply because the DM said so loses any meaning.  Lack of coherent rules makes trying to plan frustrating and meaningless.

To be clear, I'm not making any statement on the relative merits of editions of D&D, but rather on the lack of usefulness of "sense of wonder" for evaluating game systems.  It's tangential to mechanics, and inextricably tied up in our own very personal experiences and expectations.


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## howandwhy99 (Nov 20, 2012)

dkyle said:


> You know, I don't think I've ever seen an experienced, adult RPG player describe a recent gameplay experience as possessing a "sense of wonder", in any system, including old editions of D&D.
> 
> I don't think "sense of wonder" has anything to do with game mechanics or design. It's rose-tinted nostalgia for childhood where mechanics quite literally didn't matter, because kids are perfectly happy with pure make-believe.  "Sense of wonder" happens when the world is a mystery because the processes used by the DM to run it are a mystery.
> 
> ...



I take you don't play video game puzzles either? Or believe anticipation based on prior experience can improve the enjoyment of a game? By the market alone your personal preferences are off for literally billions of people. Pretty much everything you said is demonstrably wrong.


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## dkyle (Nov 20, 2012)

howandwhy99 said:


> I take you don't play video game puzzles either? Or believe anticipation based on prior experience can improve the enjoyment of a game? By the market alone you're personal preferences are off for literally billions of people. Pretty much everything you said is demonstrably wrong.




Video game puzzles are the exact opposite of succeeding or failing because a DM said so.  They behave according to precise mechanics, with clearly established "win" conditions.

I'm not sure what "anticipation based on prior experience" means, or what it has to do with my post.


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## howandwhy99 (Nov 20, 2012)

dkyle said:


> Video game puzzles are the exact opposite of succeeding or failing because a DM said so.  They behave according to precise mechanics, with clearly established "win" conditions.



Unless you understand all videogames as being played with full knowledge of the programming code by every player, videogames have unknown rules learned through play. None need to tell you a "win" condition and that's hardly a necessary part of any game or puzzle. When the game functions it's largely because the programmers programmed it that way, just like a DM behind a screen it is the programmer saying so.



> I'm not sure what "anticipation based on prior experience" means, or what it has to do with my post.



Just take it on the understanding it has to do with one's sense of wonder, something your use of quotes makes clear you hold in contention.


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## dkyle (Nov 20, 2012)

howandwhy99 said:


> Unless you understand all videogames as being played with full knowledge of the programming code by every player, videogames have unknown rules learned through play. None need to tell you a "win" condition and that's hardly a necessary part of any game or puzzle. When the game functions it's largely because the programmers programmed it that way, just like a DM behind a screen it is the programmer saying so.




You don't need to know every programming detail to understand the rules of the game.

And even if not told up front, it's enough that the game _has_ rules to be discovered, adapted to, and exploited. 

And _puzzle_ games usually _are_ played with the rules and objective known up front.  Or at least, very readily apparent within minutes of play.

When you win a video game, you win because you were skilled enough to accomplish the challenges setup by the programmer, according to the predefined rules setup by the programmer.

In contrast, the DM need not behave according to any rules at all.  They can make decisions on any completely arbitrary basis. And if they do so, in that environment, a "success" in any roleplaying situation is not due to any sort of skill or wise decision-making.  Increased chance of success comes from meta-gaming, and guessing how the DM will behave, not by engaging with the game world.

But a DM running the game with a game system can run a meaningful game by using game mechanics to resolve situations instead of fiat.



> Just take it on the understanding it has to do with one's sense of wonder, something your use of quotes makes clear you hold in contention.




My use of quotes was to indicate that I was quoting you.


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## howandwhy99 (Nov 20, 2012)

dkyle said:


> In contrast, the DM need not behave according to any rules at all.  They can make decisions on any completely arbitrary basis. And if they do so, in that environment, a "success" in any roleplaying situation is not due to any sort of skill or wise decision-making.  Increased chance of success comes from meta-gaming, and guessing how the DM will behave, not by engaging with the game world.
> 
> But a DM running the game with a game system can run a meaningful game by using game mechanics to resolve situations instead of fiat.



I've snipped a good bit out, but that's because I largely agree with it. It's just that in D&D the objectives are largely determined by the whims of each player every moment of play.

I disagree the DM does not behave according to rules. In fact, that's pretty much all a refereeing DM is allowed to do. They don't make decisions, they seek to avoid bias. It's all about the rules behind the screen, which don't have to be designed by the DM at all. And especially if they aren't, guessing how the person running the rules would have designed them, what you call meta-gaming above, is to the players' distinct disadvantage.

And while I agree with your last line above, I disagree that game mechanics are antithetical or even tangential to wonder, cannot be designed to impart wonderment, or even need to be known by the players to be rules at all.



> My use of quotes was to indicate that I was quoting you.



I was referring to your use of them for Raven Crowking's now long overplayed Sense of Wonder.


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## Jester David (Nov 20, 2012)

Ironically, D&D was most popular during the 1e era when it was a cartoon and action figure line.


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## dkyle (Nov 20, 2012)

howandwhy99 said:


> I've snipped a good bit out, but that's because I largely agree with it. It's just that in D&D the objectives are largely determined by the whims of each player every moment of play.




It is.  But if the player decides on an objective, it is much more satisfying to be able to realize that objective through application of well-defined rules, and say "I do this", than to ask the DM "do you permit me to succeed?", which is what a player must fall back on to in the absence of rules.



> I disagree the DM does not behave according to rules. In fact, that's pretty much all a refereeing DM is allowed to do. They don't make decisions, they seek to avoid bias. It's all about the rules behind the screen, which don't have to be designed by the DM at all. And especially if they aren't, guessing how the person running the rules would have designed them, what you call meta-gaming above, is to the players' distinct disadvantage.




I'm not saying that DMs inherently don't use rules.  I'm saying that they don't _necessarily_ use rules.  Whereas video games, by definition, are strictly driven by rules at all times.  It's essentially inevitable that a DM will need to use fiat (that is, decisions made not on the basis of game rules) from time to time, if not frequently).



> And while I agree with your last line above, I disagree that game mechanics are antithetical or even tangential to wonder, cannot be designed to impart wonderment, or even need to be known by the players to be rules at all.




I find it hard to imagine rules that are both simple enough that a DM can consistently apply them himself, and complex enough that players can't figure them out rather quickly.  And I don't think obfuscating the rules is a good thing, anyway, as the rules are a players only real means to impact the world they're playing in, without appealing to fiat. I don't see a good reason to make them guess about what their options are.


I think specifics might be useful: can you recall a specific gameplay experience within recent memory which imparted a "sense of wonder" to you? What gameplay mechanic helped enable that feeling?




> I was referring to your use of them for Raven Crowking's now long overplayed Sense of Wonder.




I don't know who Raven Crowking is, or what he has to say about Sense of Wonder. I was just quoting the OP's terms.


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## Luce (Nov 20, 2012)

dkyle said:


> When you win a video game, you win because you were skilled enough to accomplish the challenges setup by the programmer, according to the predefined rules setup by the programmer.




You win a video game by fulfilling a condition the programmer set, not necessary the way he expected. "Make sure the NPC is not killed by enemies while going to floor X" ->
"Sure, I will kill him myself." While not what the programmer expected, the NPC cannot be killed, is in your party when you get to X. Quest done.

"Bring me that kender alive." Go find kender, kill kender, carry body back, resurrect. Done.  Bit expensive but much better then enduring a long journey with kender in tow.

Video Games can have bugs and exploits. Hex editing saves anyone?

In contrast a DM  being there in person is more likely to be able to adjudicate spontaneous solutions.
"Bring me the head of so and so general." -> Sure, along with the rest of his living body and an army for just deserts. 

"Make sure he stops breathing" -> Do I have a necklace of adaption and if not where can I get one fast?

 I would agree that a well written game can make a DM role as a referee easier, I just consider too much rules can be detrimental to the DM's ability (due to set expectations) to customize the game to his group in attempt to provide better experience (fun). Now what that limit is can vary from group to group.
What I am trying to say is that RAW is not the only way to have fun. In fact while i find the rules as a great place to start eventually I like to make the game my own by introducing my own (personal and group) idiosyncrasies in the rules.

I do however feel that we are getting sidetracked from the points I was trying to have a discussion on:
How has the game changed in the process of becoming a staple?
The article contents that there are changes and that EGG in '79 states:
"Americans have somehow come to equate change with improvement. Somehow the school of continuing evolution has conceived that D&D can go on in a state of flux, each new version ‘new and improved!’ From a standpoint of sales, I beam broadly at the very thought of an unending string of new, improved, super, energized, versions of D&D being hyped to the loyal followers of the gaming hobby in general and role playing fantasy games in particular. As a game designer I do not agree, particularly as a gamer who began with chess….I envision only minor expansions and some rules amending on a gradual, edition to edition, basis"

Personally I do think the game has strives to improve from one edition to the next. However, at the same time I also feel that the direction of the game has changed. There are multiple factors driving the change:
the Internet, society becoming less fundamentalist, change in fantasy tropes and emergence of new ones, different classics. For example, I find 2ed closest to my ideal not because it is the perfect game but because it fit closest out of the box with the feelings I get from the novels that had most influence (imprinting even) during my early teens.


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## howandwhy99 (Nov 20, 2012)

dkyle said:


> It is.  But if the player decides on an objective, it is much more satisfying to be able to realize that objective through application of well-defined rules, and say "I do this", than to ask the DM "do you permit me to succeed?", which is what a player must fall back on to in the absence of rules.



But there is no absence of rules, if the DM is following them. I strongly disagree it is less satisfying, and again the evidence in the videogame arena alone is hugely against your point.



> It's essentially inevitable that a DM will need to use fiat (that is, decisions made not on the basis of game rules) from time to time, if not frequently).



That's an absolutism and one I disagree with. It's a kind of soft bigotry that prevents any growth in RPG design beyond its current state.



> And I don't think obfuscating the rules is a good thing, anyway, as the rules are a players only real means to impact the world they're playing in, without appealing to fiat.



They aren't the rules known to the players, they are the rules of the puzzle design, the game system. It's why nearly 100% of them are called guidelines. You didn't have to use them as the known rules weren't the proverbial cartridge so to speak, but the console.



> I don't see a good reason to make them guess about what their options are.



It depends upon your game design goals. When designing a puzzle game guessing can be the point.



> I think specifics might be useful: can you recall a specific gameplay experience within recent memory which imparted a "sense of wonder" to you? What gameplay mechanic helped enable that feeling?



I'll do a google search for a post of mine in the last couple months about the everfull beer stein we found. The rules of how it functioned are still unknown to us, but it provided hours of fun just by itself.
EDIT: It's in the spoiler


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## Quickleaf (Nov 20, 2012)

Jester Canuck said:


> Ironically, D&D was most popular during the 1e era when it was a cartoon and action figure line.




So maybe it would be for the best if Disney bought D&D?


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## Luce (Nov 20, 2012)

I think it was more that during 1e the majority of the follower were hardcore, while as it gained popularity the ratio of casual games increased. I do not use the term in any way derogatory. I just feel that some people come to play at the table and do not spend large amount of time thinking about the game in their daily life. They do not read articles, of hang on forums trying to analyze the game or get the latest build. They are there to have fun. Nothing wrong with this. 
Contrast with the early days of the game where the game was much more niche targeting people of college age or older. 1e PHB & DMG can be a spring of inspiration (it breathes character) however I do not see many 8-12 year olds being able to grasp it, while I regularly see people that age to play in and even run Encounters of 4e in the FLGS. Am I saying that 1e is any way not a god game? NO! Just think that it has a different set of goals in mind and is targeted for older people.

Quickleaf: about your XP comment http://wizards.com/dnd/images/rollplaying.jpg


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## Dannyalcatraz (Nov 21, 2012)

dkyle said:


> You know, I don't think I've ever seen an experienced, adult RPG player describe a recent gameplay experience as possessing a "sense of wonder", in any system, including old editions of D&D.
> 
> I don't think "sense of wonder" has anything to do with game mechanics or design. It's rose-tinted nostalgia for childhood where mechanics quite literally didn't matter, because kids are perfectly happy with pure make-believe.  "Sense of wonder" happens when the world is a mystery because the processes used by the DM to run it are a mystery.
> 
> ...



While what you say has merit, when a campaign hits the sweet spot where players and the DM have all "bought in" to the campaign, you can still get that sense of wonder.

Not recent, but definitely well into my adult years and a decade+ into the hobby, I ran the best campaign of my life.  it was a supers game set in the 1900 as imagined by Jules Verne, H.G. Wells, and others.  I was in the zone, creatively, but so were the players.  EVERY PC was fully grounded in the time & place, right down to the strongest man in the world being a bald, handlebar-mustachioed, club-swinging, leopard-skin wearing Brit and an amnesiac Atlantean teen.

Nobody wanted to miss or postpone a session.  Nobody was looking at the "meta" aspects of the game.  There were "reveals" in the game that made some players' eyes go wide.  There were player actions that actually got cheers & high-5s.

I admit I caught lightning in a bottle...and I couldn't have done so without the players.  (I know this is at least partially true, because I haven't run a game anywhere near that fun since.)


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## pemerton (Nov 21, 2012)

Luce said:


> This is NOT an edition war!
> 
> <snip>
> 
> Please discuss.



I think it's an interesting essay, although a bit overblown or exaggerated in places. I'm a great admirer of Weber, and I think there is something to be said for applying a Weberian analysis to the aesthetics of D&D.

But I think the author falls into an edition-warring trap. For example, the author clearly doesn't understand how skill challenges are meant to be adjudicated. On page 20, s/he says:

Through a mechanic called “skill challenges,” the game converts a role-playing event such as negotiating with a local duke into a quantitatively governed dice-rolling session, described as “Level: Equal to the level of the party; Complexity 3 (requires 8 successes before 4 failures)” (Wyatt 76). Gone is the uneasy treaty between rationalization and enchantment; here, the system is all-encompassing.​
And on the same page, s/he says of 4e monsters that

the qualitative aspects are like a skin overlaid on this framework.​
In both cases, s/he shows a lack of understanding of how these mechanical systems relate to the "qualitative aspect" of play ie the fiction. In neither case is the system all-encompassing; rather, the system is intended to regulate the process of narration between player and GM, and it is their narration, within the constraints of that regulation, that produces the fiction.

The essay would have been strengthened, I think, by recognising the huge influence of indie- and Forge-style design on 4e: as in my description just above, for example, the conception of the function of the rules that Vincent Baker has pioneered, namely, as primarily intended not to describe the fiction, but to regulate the shared production of the fiction. (And no one in the RPG world has more strongly attacked the idea that _if only your rules are mathematically tighter in their simulation, you'll get the enchantment you're after_ than Ron Edwards. So 4e is influenced by a school of design that agrees with many of the points made in the essay.)

This would then have provided a basis for identifying 4e (and Forge game design more generally) as a modernist attempt to reconcile rationalised production and creativity, rather than a mere McDonald's-isation. Which may or may not be vulnerable to some sort of deconstructive or other critique (depending on the author's inclinations in that regard).


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## S'mon (Nov 21, 2012)

dkyle said:


> You know, I don't think I've ever seen an experienced, adult RPG player describe a recent gameplay experience as possessing a "sense of wonder", in any system, including old editions of D&D.




I think sense of wonder is something evoked by the GM. I can recall having it playing d20 Midnight, playing a 4e Ravenloft game oneshot (our PCs were children, fighting the Erlking), and to a degree playing a sandbox Labyrinth Lord game. The latter two were within the past year. Perhaps notable that the former two were with female GMs, for some reason I find female GMs are particularly talented at evoking SOW.


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## S'mon (Nov 21, 2012)

pemerton said:


> In neither case is the system all-encompassing; rather, the system is intended to regulate the process of narration between player and GM, and it is their narration, within the constraints of that regulation, that produces the fiction.
> 
> The essay would have been strengthened, I think, by recognising the huge influence of indie- and Forge-style design on 4e: as in my description just above, for example, the conception of the function of the rules that Vincent Baker has pioneered, namely, as primarily intended not to describe the fiction, but to regulate the shared production of the fiction.




But it doesn't say that in the 4e DMG - it doesn't even imply that, AFAICT, except maybe in the example of a roleplay skill challenge? It maybe sort of implies it in the 4e DMG2.


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## pemerton (Nov 21, 2012)

S'mon said:


> But it doesn't say that in the 4e DMG - it doesn't even imply that, AFAICT, except maybe in the example of a roleplay skill challenge? It maybe sort of implies it in the 4e DMG2.



The DMG2 has whole sections of Robin Laws's HeroQuest revised rulebook cut-and-pasted, so definitely.

But I think it's implicit throughout the whole of the DMG too - from the emphasis on scene framing ("cut to the fun") through to the description of skill challenge mechanics (see the discussion in Imaro's current 4e encounter design thread) to the metagame approach to combat encounter design.

I don't know that one would _identify_ it if one didn't already know that school of design, but that is often the case with influences that aren't overtly acknowledged.


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## dkyle (Nov 21, 2012)

howandwhy99 said:


> But there is no absence of rules, if the DM is following them. I strongly disagree it is less satisfying, and again the evidence in the videogame arena alone is hugely against your point.




When I say "do _you_ [the DM] permit me" there, I mean to imply that the DM himself is deciding, not based on any rules, but on whatever ethereal, intangible ideas he has about what "should" happen.  This is in contrast to the player considering what the _rules_ permit him to do.



> That's an absolutism and one I disagree with. It's a kind of soft bigotry that prevents any growth in RPG design beyond its current state.




You really think you can play a full-fledged RPG where absolutely every thing that happens is determined by pre-defined rules?

Also, "bigotry"? Really?



> I'll do a google search for a post of mine in the last couple months about the everfull beer stein we found. The rules of how it functioned are still unknown to us, but it provided hours of fun just by itself.
> EDIT: It's in the spoiler




That example bears out my original point: that "sense of wonder" is independent of system.  There aren't any game mechanics at play, other than very basic ones your DM invented for that item, that couldn't just as easily be used in any system.

You DM was instrumental in capturing your imagination.  Not the specific edition of D&D he used.


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## howandwhy99 (Nov 21, 2012)

dkyle said:


> When I say "do _you_ [the DM] permit me" there, I mean to imply that the DM himself is deciding, not based on any rules, but on whatever ethereal, intangible ideas he has about what "should" happen.  This is in contrast to the player considering what the _rules_ permit him to do.



I gathered that. What I'm saying is that element isn't essential or unavoidable in games with a DM as referee. The player is determining through trial and error what the rules are just like in a videogame or any puzzle game. 



> You really think you can play a full-fledged RPG where absolutely every thing that happens is determined by pre-defined rules?
> 
> Also, "bigotry"? Really?



What I mean is absolutist thinking denies certain possibilities as fundamentally impossible and it's easy to be prejudiced against anything that doesn't fit inside our predetermined conceptions of the world. I'm asking that you open yourself to up other possibilities.

And yes, I have both played and run games where everything is covered by either pre-defined mechanics (like a dictionary pre-defines the words we are using) or the incorporation of new elements that fall within the operation of pre-defined play.



> That example bears out my original point: that "sense of wonder" is independent of system.  There aren't any game mechanics at play, other than very basic ones your DM invented for that item, that couldn't just as easily be used in any system.



While elegant in design I would hardly call it basic. Plus, you're still assuming a game system is not the puzzle. The system is run by the DM not necessarily created by him or her. As I mentioned before, like a cartridge and a console the game rules define the operation of play and the puzzle the operation of the DM.



> You DM was instrumental in capturing your imagination.  Not the specific edition of D&D he used.



Or maybe the game rules he used behind the screen, but I'm not advocating for any specific edition here.. I'm saying game rules and game design itself can successfully be focused on building in wonderment via suspense, anticipation, and rewarding the use of imagination.

You can certainly continue to deny or try to limit all of that, but between the two of us all we end up with is you unwilling to conceive of or play games you don't believe are possible.

Look, I'm not seeking to change your mind here. If you want to continue to believe with such certainty in whatever set of beliefs you hold, I don't desire to change that. What I'm disagreeing with is that others might not only be holding differing views from your own, but flourishing with them.


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## Stormonu (Nov 21, 2012)

I'm afraid I didn't have the patience to read the whole paper, so I'll just make a quick comment.

I feel one big difference I've seen with D&D is it has shifted from a game where the  DM is required to make huge swathes of the game experience to one where everything is prebuilt.  Part of this has been due to demands by time-pressed DMs who do not have the time, patience or desire to design things themselves (I fall into the time-starved block; I've got too many spinning plates in my life to spend hours on adventure design these days).


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## pemerton (Nov 21, 2012)

This thread seems as good a place as any to mention something I noticed last week when reading Chris Perkins's column: one thing that Perkins talks about is a deal done by one of the PCs with Dispater, which ended up being one element of the campaign's dramatic resolution. And in the comments, we get this:

EvilDM1395: Chris I am disappointed in you for the first time. Dispater is the most paranoid of the Archdevils of the Nine Hells and I doubt would even project himself to make such a deal. Now it would have been much more interesting to have Mephistopheles, Archdevil and ruler of Cania, to make such a deal as he can't be trusted as the betrayer that he is.

Chris Perkins: The player character chose to summon an aspect of Dispater, so it wasn't my decision. . .

EvilDM1395: Didn't realize the Multi-verse was dumbed down that much in 4th Ed . . . Not matter, Dispater is still cloistered Devil who has almost no interaction with others due to his self preservation and paranoia. The rest of the game sounded great.​
I don't know about others' responses, but I just don't get where EvilDM1395 is coming from! "The rest of the game sounded great", but (by obvious implication) it would have been _even better_ if Perkins had copies some other author's conception of Dispater, rather than following the lead of his player and letting Dispater's personality emerge and unfold as it did in _his_ game.

What's up with that? I mean, it wouldn't have made anyone at the table have any more fun. It wouldn't have made the climax of the campaign more dramatic. How has aping someone else's fiction become, for some players at least, a self-standing measure of the quality of an RPG experience?

_That's_ the true sacrifice of creativity that (in my view) has tended to infect the contemporary RPG scene.

Here is Ron Edwards on Jonathan Tweet's RPG Over the Edge, beginning with a quote from the rulebook:


The first time I played OTE, I had a few pages of notes on the background and nothing on the specifics. I made it all up on the spot. Not having anything written as a guide (or crutch), I let my imagination loose. You have the mixed blessing of having many pages of background prepared for you. If you use the information in this book as a springboard for your own wild dreams, then it is a blessing. If you limit yourself to what I've dreamed up, it's a curse.​ 
All I see, I'm afraid, is the curse. The isolated phrases "mixed blessing" and "(or crutch)" don't hold a lot of water compared to the preceding 152 extraordinarily detailed pages of canonical setting. I'm not saying that improvisation is better or more Narrativist than non-improvisational play. I am saying, however, that if playing this particular game worked so wonderfully to free the participants into wildly successful brainstorming during play ... and since the players were a core source during this event, as evident in the game's Dedication and in various examples of play ... then why present the _results _of the play-experience as the _material _for another person's experience?​
The issue is the same: what is the source of the pressure to treat the _output_ of others' gaming as the _input _for one's own.

That's not to say that setting is bad. But setting should be something the participants in the game can build on and use in play; not something to which they are expected to _conform _in play. This is why I, personally, far prefer 4e's cosmology to Planescape and its 3E variant.


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## Luce (Nov 28, 2012)

pemerton:
I think this to me is are examples of misaligned expectations. Chris Perkins is not your friendly local GM running his home brew, he’s the senior producer for D&D. What he does can reflect on the company therefore its unsurprising that some people expect him  to  be consistent to what they consider canon.  Me not so much, unless he is running an official game at Gencon or some such.

It also depends on the level of information of each side of the screen. In my experience people do not mind expansion of material as long as it can be reasonably consistent with what they already know. That is what makes works such as RttToH so good. The original premise is there with several added layers. Players do have pre establish expectations and breaking them can be detrimental to the sense of immersion. If your run the temple of elemental evil featuring Vacuum, Ash, Dust and Salt factions that could be cool, however those quasi planes are a divergence from the original. 

I wanted to be more generalized discussion of editions from high level view.
However, we can also talk about how the settings are affected. I like FR, read the novels mine through the source books for ideas. That being said I never run campaigns in it. Too many players (as a group) know a lot of details about it. Conversely I run a Grayhawk meets Plancescape because at least among the group I am playing with not many are so intimately familiar with the fine details as to either setting lawyer or have their sense of immersion compromised.  I do realize that varies from group to group and maybe for some changing the layout of the second layer of Pandemonium inn may be bad for the game.


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## pemerton (Nov 29, 2012)

Luce said:


> I think this to me is are examples of misaligned expectations.



I think it's more than that. I think "canon" has, for some (many?) become an end in itself.

When Arneson ran Temple of the Frog, and Gygax was running games in Maure Castle, they weren't aping anyone else's game. They weren't recycling anyone else's play experience and passing it off as their own? So why has this now become the measure, for a large group of RPGers, of the quality of an RPG experience?

As I said, I think this is where there has ben a move away from creativity to formulaic, pre-packaged experiences.

Looking at it from an edition point of view, I think that 4e was self-consciously built to provide a setting that was transparent to the players in its rationale and basis for adventure, and that lent itself to GMs doing their own thing with it. There is no metaplot.

Some 4e supplements head in a more 2nd ed-ish direction (aspects of Manual of the Planes, the Plane Below and (to a lesser extent) the Plane Above) but overall I think it has been fairly consistent in its approach to setting and its abjuration of metaplot.



Luce said:


> Chris Perkins is not your friendly local GM running his home brew, he’s the senior producer for D&D. What he does can reflect on the company therefore its unsurprising that some people expect him to be consistent to what they consider canon.



Why? How would this make his game better for his players? How would it make it a more interesting or useful example of GMing?

If anything, his column is better for demonstrating that "canon" should be the _output_ of play, not its input.


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## JamesonCourage (Nov 29, 2012)

howandwhy99 said:


> dkyle said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I'm kinda curious what you mean by this. Because, if everything was decided by a rule of some kind, I'm really interested in that, as someone who prefers to run sandbox games.

For example, say the PCs are talking to a noble about something. I understand that it is common for there to be rules covering social situations; however, how does one determine that the PCs are talking to a noble initially, or even where they are? Traditionally, this is covered by GM fiat, not rules. Was there some way with rules to determine that they were talking to a noble in his mansion, or did the GM determine this?

And, of course, this extends to all situations from here on out. When the PCs decide to go somewhere, there can be rules covering that journey; I get that. However, if they wait (if they're healing, crafting, working, training, or just generally time skipping), what rules did you determine what happened everywhere else during that time? If, later, they meet someone, how do you know who or what that someone is? Was literally everything a type of random encounter chart, but on a bell curve so as to provide more reasonable results?

I'm just curious, because such a system is begging for me to steal things from it. As always, play what you like 



pemerton said:


> luce said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...



I can only really answer this for my players and my group, but to my players, exploring the setting is very important, and reliable descriptions help them immerse (one of our main goals). If they know Dispater is a very paranoid devil lord, but I play him as reckless, it'll hurt their immersion. It's just not what they're expecting; if they asked for a deal that he'd likely say no to, then I'll have him say no, and they'll say "that makes sense."

Just as, if I'm running a new homebrew setting with my own game system, and I say "dragon and their riders terrorize and dominate the countryside, and dragons have been known to devastate small armies," but then they're successfully able to kill several at low level with minimal trouble in a small group, they're going to get pulled out of immersion, since they were expecting something else (that dragons are able to dominate them, not that they're easily killed by low level PCs).

Basically, this type of consistency helps my group because it gives them reliable outlines of an in-game world to explore. This, basically, can give my players that "Sense of Wonder" that has been mentioned. I'm not saying it's universal, as it's certainly not, but this is why "canon should be the _output_ of play, not its input" doesn't completely work for me. "Canon" in my game is set by the initial setting, and how the PCs (and NPCs) affect things in the course of play. I won't change the setting in a drastic, meaningful way because the players wish it was different. That does both of us a disservice. It doesn't work that way for your group, I don't think, and that's cool. But that's how, and why, it works for mine. As always, play what you like


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## pemerton (Nov 29, 2012)

JamesonCourage said:


> to my players, exploring the setting is very important, and reliable descriptions help them immerse
> 
> <snip>
> 
> this type of consistency helps my group because it gives them reliable outlines of an in-game world to explore.



I think what you talk about here is separate from my point.

Consistency of setting is fairly important to any game in which backstory and revelations matter. But that's not what I was talking about. A completley consistent world can emerge through play, without predefinition (if you're playing no-myth style) and without adherence to "canon" (whether or not you're playing no myth style).

What I was talking about was someone _who was not a participant in the game_ criticising the game's failure to adhere to canon. There was no suggestion that, for the participants in the game, the gameworld was not consistent - indeed, as per Chris Perkin's reply to the poster (which I did not quote in full above), the deal with Dispater wa worked out through extensive roleplay and active resolution. The player does not seem to have been in any doubt or confusion about Dispater's nature.

My puzzlement concerns why anyone would think it important that the setting adhere to some externally-defined canon. Why is it deemed so important to adhere, in play, to someone else's fiction?


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## JamesonCourage (Nov 29, 2012)

pemerton said:


> I think what you talk about here is separate from my point.
> 
> Consistency of setting is fairly important to any game in which backstory and revelations matter. But that's not what I was talking about. A completley consistent world can emerge through play, without predefinition (if you're playing no-myth style) and without adherence to "canon" (whether or not you're playing no myth style).



That's true. I think the poster you were replying to, though, was saying that people that use the "canon" setting expect things to function in certain ways, as defined by the people who write the fictional setting. So, when someone who can write the fiction (like Chris Perkins) plays Dispater against how he's been portrayed fictionally, it might make people object to it, as it's breaking that consistency.

I think it's similar to the 4e Eladrin backlash; people didn't like when they were rewritten as high elves, rather than celestials. Is it wrong to change it? Not in any objective sense, no, but some people didn't like the change. I think Luce was just saying that as someone who has control of D&D's fictional setting, running something established publicly (or writing about it publicly), without qualifiers, might ruffle some feathers, or put people on edge. Which makes sense to me, even if it doesn't bug me, personally.


pemerton said:


> What I was talking about was someone _who was not a participant in the game_ criticising the game's failure to adhere to canon. There was no suggestion that, for the participants in the game, the gameworld was not consistent - indeed, as per Chris Perkin's reply to the poster (which I did not quote in full above), the deal with Dispater wa worked out through extensive roleplay and active resolution. The player does not seem to have been in any doubt or confusion about Dispater's nature.
> 
> My puzzlement concerns why anyone would think it important that the setting adhere to some externally-defined canon. Why is it deemed so important to adhere, in play, to someone else's fiction?



This is what I tried to comment on; to groups that like to explore the setting, it's important that they remain grounded in the pre-established "canon". I don't think Luce cares that they're deviating from "canon", but commenting that some people might not like a WotC representative publicly playing something against the fiction they're supposedly adhering to.

As far as EvilDM1395, it seems like part of his social contract is similar to my group's: the setting, once decided, should play out as assumed once the game begins. So, if you're running a game with Dispater in it, and part of that involves him being very paranoid, then it breaks that social contract if he's played as reckless. Unless, of course, it's made clear up front that you're just using the "canon" as a springboard, and that things are different; indeed, that's exactly how I ran my long term 3.5e game. So, when things different from the stat blocks, or adhered to rough flavor but not strictly to details, my players knew that going in.

I can't say for sure, but I imagine most people would be fine with this if it was made clear. From the sounds of it, though, EvilDM1395 was expecting Dispater, if used, to act as Dispater is described, and that his actions not matching up with his assumptions broke his sense of "immersion" in the story. Again, like I said, it's an obvious play style thing, but that's my take on it.

Then again, I feel like I'm totally missing your point. When you say, "Why is it deemed so important to adhere, in play, to someone else's fiction?", all I can do is go over why it's important for my group, again (immersion, exploration of setting, etc.). Sorry if I'm missing the point. As always, play what you like


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## Hussar (Nov 29, 2012)

Pemerton said:
			
		

> My puzzlement concerns why anyone would think it important that the setting adhere to some externally-defined canon. Why is it deemed so important to adhere, in play, to someone else's fiction?




Dude, after the years of caterwauling about the canon changes that 4e made to D&D, are you really surprised that people would hold canon uber alles?  I mean, many of the changes 4e made weren't judged based on whether or not the changes resulted in an interesting game, but were instead solely judge on whether or not they adhered to material that had been out of print for a DECADE.  

I can almost see it when you talk about established settings.  Almost.  But, when talking about core elements of the game?  Blows my mind.


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## pemerton (Nov 29, 2012)

JamesonCourage said:


> I feel like I'm totally missing your point. When you say, "Why is it deemed so important to adhere, in play, to someone else's fiction?", all I can do is go over why it's important for my group, again (immersion, exploration of setting, etc.).



Unless I've misunderstood, you're talking about creating your own fiction, not adhering to someone else's.


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## pemerton (Nov 29, 2012)

Hussar said:


> Dude, after the years of caterwauling about the canon changes that 4e made to D&D, are you really surprised that people would hold canon uber alles?
> 
> <snip>
> 
> Blows my mind.



I guess I'm not shocked, in the sense that I can comprehend that it's out there. But I don't understand the motivation.

I mean, how does anyone get hurt by Chris Perkins presenting Dispater in a different way? In what sense is Perkins making a mistake, or doing something wrong?



JamesonCourage said:


> I think the poster you were replying to, though, was saying that people that use the "canon" setting expect things to function in certain ways, as defined by the people who write the fictional setting. So, when someone who can write the fiction (like Chris Perkins) plays Dispater against how he's been portrayed fictionally, it might make people object to it, as it's breaking that consistency.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> I think Luce was just saying that as someone who has control of D&D's fictional setting, running something established publicly (or writing about it publicly), without qualifiers, might ruffle some feathers, or put people on edge. Which makes sense to me



It doesn't really make sense to me. Why should someone be put on edge by someone else running the game with different fiction?

A novelist isn't obliged to write with the same characters, or the same themes, every time. A musician can change tune or rhythm. How could it be that Chris Perkins is obliged to be straitjacketed by his (or his employer's) previous fiction?

And relating this back to the essay in [MENTION=29760]Luce[/MENTION]'s OP, why has the nature of play changed, so that the emphasis is not on individual groups creating their own fiction, but rather on individual groups doing their best to reproduce the fiction written by TSR/WotC?


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## Neonchameleon (Nov 29, 2012)

Luce said:


> The usual declaimers:
> This is NOT an edition war!




Really?  Because I just read a long rant about how 4e sucks (by someone who doesn't get 4e - @pmerton has gone into some of this) and how much better things were in The Olden Days.



> Personally I feel that the earlier editions (OD&D, 1st and 2nd) were more focused on individual creativity where each DM makes an unique world of his own creation.




This would be the 2e that is not well remembered for the quality of its rules, but for the quality of its monster manuals and settings like Planescape, Spelljammer, Dark Sun, and Birthright?  And the 2e for which TSR were putting out an average of five books per month?

It would also be the 4e which _intentionally_ has only a dimly detailed default setting (the Nentir Vale) and in which there were, for the most part, precisely two worldbooks per setting encouraging you to make things up?

Finally it would be the 1e for which the best known and best selling adventure was the railroad-adventure-path known as the Dragonlance Saga, in which all Paladins would fall, in which all Assassins were Evil, and in which alignments had their own languages and were otherwise hardcoded into the rules.

Right.



> That increased the ease of play but also introduced predictability and for some a drive for optimization.




On my bookshelf there are three books within the space of about half a dozen.  Unearthed Arcana, Skills and Powers, and the Complete Book of Elves.  Do you want to talk about optimisation and editions?  And at least you don't have stat requirements for classes these days.



> Rules layering is nothing new, but I feel it rouse to new levels as well as get more organized in last two editions.




And yet 4e has _fewer_ systems and subsystems than 2e - and 1e had the rules layering of things like the Wilderness Survival Guide and Unearthed Arcana.  Do you want to  talk about how the 2e Thief Skill system was entirely distinct from the Non Weapon Proficiencies (and there was a mess), the combat rules including AC modifier by weapon type (did anyone ever use that thing?)  Now that's rules layering.



> I do not fight the expected wealth by level to be wrong, just not everyone's cup of tea.




Paradoxically most ignorable in 4e when 4e has the clearest guidelines.  In early editions the wealth by level was "You must be this tall to play" - without the right sort of weapon you couldn't hurt your target at all.  4e first codified the WBL, then _because it was codified_ managed to remove most of it and replace it with inherent bonusses.



> Just my two coppers.
> 
> 
> Please discuss.




I think that you're looking at a range of factors that were undoubtedly present in 3.X (although I'd argue 3.X wasn't any worse than 2e at most of these examples) and then assuming that 4e must be like 3.X when one of the things 4e is is a reaction against the very things you are criticising.


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## JamesonCourage (Nov 29, 2012)

pemerton said:


> Unless I've misunderstood, you're talking about creating your own fiction, not adhering to someone else's.



It can go either way. In my 3.5e game, I ran based on the core 3.5 books, including the Greyhawk deities, planes listed in the 3.5 DMG, etc. So, I was using the basis of the setting there, but I made it understood that it was a springboard, as I wasn't familiar with D&D canon _at all_ when I started to GM. The setting was basically made up by me (nations, technology, etc.), but I did use deities, planes, devil lords, some celestial rulers, monsters, etc.

However, if I hadn't made it clear I was using it as a springboard, I can see someone getting a little upset if they found out that something they assumed -based on my description of the setting (Greyhawk setting)- was different from how it normally was. Like, say, Vecna and Pelor are actually Neutral, or that orcs  get a penalty to Strength. I'm changing the "canon" of the accepted setting.

This gets more compounded when it comes to official D&D setting stuff (thus the complaints about the Eladrin, etc.). People (not my group) have played in official settings, using strict details, and even transitioned characters through the editions in those settings. When someone who has great influence on D&D canon publicly alters that canon, even for private use, I understand the wariness that is voiced. Again, it doesn't affect me, but I get it.


pemerton said:


> I mean, how does anyone get hurt by Chris Perkins presenting Dispater in a different way? In what sense is Perkins making a mistake, or doing something wrong?



I know this was to Hussar, but I'll give my input, if that's okay. I don't think Chris Perkins did anything wrong. It's his world, and he can run it any way he likes.

Again, I get that people might feel he's misrepresenting canon. I mean, if Dispater is amazingly paranoid, but isn't acting that way, then he is indeed breaking from canon. So, valid complaint for the guy that values canon. In Mr. Perkin's world, though, he can alter stuff however he likes, and I respect that.


pemerton said:


> It doesn't really make sense to me. Why should someone be put on edge by someone else running the game with different fiction?



Again, I think it's because of his influence on D&D canon. Some people get very invested D&D settings, and dislike the changes made. I think there was something with 4e and Forgotten Realms, but I'm not sure, since I don't read the books / know the setting. Or, like I said, the Eladrin change.

These are canon changes that make people dislike where the game is going, because the game, to these people, includes heavy investment in the canon, rather than just mechanics. Up to this point, these people have loved the settings; it's why they're invested in them. They don't like the idea of seeing the canon "messed up" by the people with control over it.

It's kind of like George Lucas tampering with the original Star Wars trilogy. A lot of people like the movies the way they were, and don't want Greedo shooting first, as it changes events in a meaningful way to them (by showing Han to be more defensive and reactive, rather than cunning and ruthless). They don't like Darth Vader yelling "nooooooooo" before killing the Emperor, because his silence with the music and sound of lighting was gripping already.

People don't want things they like getting tampered with. So, theoretically, they wouldn't want the director of the new Star Wars movie talking about "and then I had Luke murder a guy in cold blood", even if it was just in his own fanfiction. Why? Because they don't want the fiction that they love "messed up" from how they like it, and they're afraid that the guy with authority might do it, as "he doesn't get it." Because they value "canon" and have invested in it.

It's just how it is. I'm not invested in the settings; Chris Perkins can do what he likes, even if I were invested. But do I think it's weird, or do I have problems understanding why someone might get put on edge by it? No, not at all. As always, play what you like


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## Luce (Nov 29, 2012)

*JamesonCourage:* Thank you for undertsanding what I meant to say in much more coherent words.
*

pemerton: *In my view Wizards had been pushing for unified experience, with 3th and 4th. Things like by that level you have to be that level of resources, have so powerful treasure. I believe for some people that have extended to the cannon. On one hand such approach does makes easy to more easily change groups as possibly every participant will have a shared body of lore that is consistent. On another as you pointed some DMs feel contained creatively by the canon.  Personally canon for me is in a similar category as DM fudging - use it or not depending what will make the game better. The difference is , to repeat myself, what the players already know. Changing things they did not know (such as if their guess about the plot is cooler then mine), does not invoke sense of derealization.

Neonchameleon: I want  to discuss the changes in a multiple prospective. When I say the changes in the Game, I do not limit the definition to the rules but also include the culture as well as the environment factors.
Take lawyering for example. There always have been rule loopholes and people willing to use them. There was not always a drive for campaign consistency between different groups. What may be overpower in one group can the norm in another in the 90s at least amongst the group I observed. I also saw more DM fiat at those times. 
We also did not have the level of Net presence in the past. The ability to easily share ideas also means sharing exploits. In the past if say I notice a combo, such that using a dust of maximization (from Dragon) goes well with rod of empowerment from book X together with a feat that allows changing the elemental property of the spell on the fly allowing me to very effective against anything with an energy weakness form another source. Well I might have shared it with few friends but it would not have been out there for the world to see. Other undoubtedly would have noticed the same combo, but probably not as many as the number of people who read char op boards.
Again that is just my experience, but I think the culture of the game in regards to what is permissible on the table have changed as well. Despite what the 3e DMG and multiple subsequent handbooks state that PrC and the rule contained therein are optional and subject to the individual DM approval many more people I met in the later 2000s think if published it is core. Once again that is my experience, if others have seen otherwise please share.


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## howandwhy99 (Nov 30, 2012)

JamesonCourage said:


> For example, say the PCs are talking to a noble about something. I understand that it is common for there to be rules covering social situations; however, how does one determine that the PCs are talking to a noble initially, or even where they are?



It all depends upon the rules you use for your games. There are all kinds of rules you could design to cover this. I'd suggest the first step is determining what nobility will be in the game. For example, while it could be faked, it is only actual when backed by social authority in a monster group or faction. How many nobility there are for a given faction depends on the design generated, which takes into account all kinds of other elements besides monster/racial type. Area layout matters, especially when determining wandering encounters and when and why nobles wander (or don't wander).  For me, a lot of this falls under the movement rules, marching order, NPC behavioral rules, Intelligence, and how wandering monster tables are determined for any given area.



> Traditionally, this is covered by GM fiat, not rules. Was there some way with rules to determine that they were talking to a noble in his mansion, or did the GM determine this?



Players are generally in control of how and where their PCs move, but of course sometimes they are forcibly moved, like an earthquake ...or the city guard. The key is the NPCs are already there before the players characters arrive. And why and when those NPCs are in their where is predetermined by rules.



> And, of course, this extends to all situations from here on out. When the PCs decide to go somewhere, there can be rules covering that journey; I get that. However, if they wait (if they're healing, crafting, working, training, or just generally time skipping), what rules did you determine what happened everywhere else during that time?



That's the easy answer. Before each session you generate a scenario. You run the simulation outward far enough - along both time and space - to cover just enough of what the players may get into the next session. And that scenario is the timeline and place map of what is where and what is going on throughout until influenced during session by the PCs. During session determining PC action results should be as easy as possible, but it takes practice for any DM. Later, all of the actions during the session are incorporated for generating the next session's scenario. 

Now tracking actions in a session may sound difficult, even impossible, but it's just like keeping track of game time. KISS, keep it simple. The vast majority of what will happen during any given session is already covered by the rules. That means it's on the scenario maps in front of you when you DM. You will want to heavily familiarize yourself with these just before running a session. Then tracking actions is quite often literally dragging a pencil line across one or more of these maps as the PCs progress down one or more areas of exploration (spatial or otherwise).



> If, later, they meet someone, how do you know who or what that someone is? Was literally everything a type of random encounter chart, but on a bell curve so as to provide more reasonable results?



First, bell curves are more for population distributions, like with Ability Scores. Wandering Monster tables can be generated by frequency (common, uncommon, rare, very rare), but that isn't necessarily curvilinear. If you remember the tables in the AD&D DMG, those results were by activity cycle, climate, terrain, as well as frequency (based on population amounts, growth rates, procreation and gestation rates, and so on). Frequency was expressed by the number of percentile slots each had on the table. These results weren't curvilinear, but varied and then listed alphabetically, which makes might oddly make them more confusing. Not to mention that while their theory was sound, the implementation was often lacking in my experience. 

To answer your question, NPCs and everything about NPCs are generated just like treasures and dungeons and outdoor terrain and everything else. The first time this stuff is constructed this way (or converted from player created content) it receives a place in the game world. Where the PCs go, who they choose to stop, if they talk to them, what is talked about, what is learned/passed on, what creatures actively stop and/or seek out the PCs, and so on, is either a result of the players actions or an expression of monster behavioral rules (e.g., these monster, sometimes with these classes, know these tactics which fall under this INT rating and then implemented in these manners which fall under WIS, and so on). In the end it isn't a chart or a roll, but a mental construct of high detail backed up by notes and maps. This method provides for both a level of detail and a degree of coherency for which there is no substitute. Nothing quite compares to actually having an imagining in one's mind.


----------



## Neonchameleon (Nov 30, 2012)

Luce said:


> Neonchameleon: I want to discuss the changes in a multiple prospective. When I say the changes in the Game, I do not limit the definition to the rules but also include the culture as well as the environment factors.




And you seem to be trying to discuss "the Game" by assuming that 3.X and 4e are the same.  They _aren't_ and any discussion that assumes they are will fail to get out of the starting blocks.



> Take lawyering for example. There always have been rule loopholes and people willing to use them.




Really?  "There have always been rule loopholes"?  Name three of them in 4e.  I'll wait (or at least find something else to do).

The 4e design team has been _superb_ at putting out errata so that whenever some bright spark finds a rules loophole _it gets closed_.  Also the core rules for 4e are clear, consistent, simpler than anything since the White Box, and after a round of errata (4e on release wasn't properly playtested) work well.  Rules lawyers in 4e find it a pretty barren wasteland when looking for loopholes - and this bears out in play to the point that across multiple groups and playing weekly for three years I've seen half a dozen attempts to rules lawyer, none of which lasted longer than the time it took the DM to decide - and I literally can not remember looking a rule up in a book in the last year.  You don't even need to look up spells to play a mage or cleric as they are printed right there on the character sheet for you - this is a sea change from the days of 2e and 3e and "character sheets" that required you have several rulebooks to hand to play a wizard.

I speak as someone with the temprament and ability of a rules lawyer - and one of the reasons 4e is far and away my favourite version of D&D is that it doesn't encourage me to rules lawyer by including huge power differentials, unclear rules, and multiple levels of contradictory rules.



> Again that is just my experience, but I think the culture of the game in regards to what is permissible on the table have changed as well. Despite what the 3e DMG and multiple subsequent handbooks state that PrC and the rule contained therein are optional and subject to the individual DM approval many more people I met in the later 2000s think if published it is core. Once again that is my experience, if others have seen otherwise please share.




This matches my experience - but what this means differs a lot.  A lot of the rules, monsters, and just about everything else in 3e were half-baked.  Shivering touch, anyone?  Venomfire?  The Sarrukh?  The diplomacy rules?  Sculpt Spell + Antimagic Field?  4e source books (other than the Dungeon Explorer's Handbook) were almost all brought out with the idea that _all_ the books should be as high design quality as the PHB (higher in almost all cases), that simply adding options shouldn't add power creep, and if they get something wrong _they fix it with errata_.  Adding e.g. the Spell Compendium to 3e makes all prepared casters more powerful by its very existence - more spells means more versatility and more power.  Adding e.g. Martial Power 2 adds such things as the Brawler Fighter who uses sword and fist almost as effectively as most fighters use sword and shield, and makes a whole range of other archetypes viable and effective but doesn't actually contain any top flight builds I can think of other than arguably the final pieces of the Lazy Warlord.

So the approach may be simmilar in certain ways - but the consequences are very, _very _different and because as far as I can tell you only know 3.X you are trying to treat them as if they were the same.


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## Loonook (Nov 30, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> Really?  "There have always been rule loopholes"?  Name three of them in 4e.  I'll wait (or at least find something else to do).





Just going to leave this here:

http://community.wizards.com/charop/wiki/Broken/Broken

Where there's a(n at) will....

Slainte,

-Loonook.


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## Neonchameleon (Nov 30, 2012)

Loonook said:


> Just going to leave this here:
> 
> http://community.wizards.com/charop/wiki/Broken/Broken
> 
> ...




That thing's way out of date - they put in a 1 free action attack restriction that deals with a lot of it.  And I'm sure you'll forgive me for not worrying about:
Use a Falchion (2d4) as your base weapon, and you've got a good chance of rolling a silly-high damage roll. Use a _Ring of Radiant Storm_ and _Free Soul_ epic destiny to make it more reliable. Don't crit.

Level 29 only.​Epic in general I'll accept and Epic Destiny level 30 powers.  In fact my biggest problem with 4e epic is it isn't gonzo-broken _enough_.  To do epic well you need to go gonzo.

So outside epic destinies, epic powers and doing something that fails the giggle test (attacking yourself to miss) about all that's left is obvious abuse of the War Wizard's Staff and Storm Pillar, and a pair of Evermeet Warlocks.


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## Imaro (Nov 30, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> Really? "There have always been rule loopholes"? Name three of them in 4e. I'll wait (or at least find something else to do).





Well I don't know if this is a "loophole" but my hybrid swordmage/wizard has an Arcana of +17 at 4th level and with the cantrips Chameleon Mask, Spook, and Suggestion... I am now better than the Rogue at hiding and sneaking... and better than our Bard at Intimidating and Diplomacy...


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## Neonchameleon (Nov 30, 2012)

Imaro said:


> Well I don't know if this is a "loophole" but my hybrid swordmage/wizard has an Arcana of +17 at 4th level and with the cantrips Chameleon Mask, Spook, and Suggestion... I am now better than the Rogue at hiding and sneaking... and better than our Bard at Intimidating and Diplomacy...




Yeah, that's obnoxious and shouldn't have happened.  And you've gone all out on Arcana I see (20 Int, Trained, Skill Focus, Racial?)  Remember they each only work 1/encounter (which can cause trouble with stealth if you use it to get in and then can't get out - you can hide yourself but you can't really do stealthy operations in the way the rogue can as "Get in undetected, do something, get out undetected" is two stealth rolls) and the Bard should be at about the same Diplomacy as you with Words of Friendship and can keep going after shooting his bolt (although this isn't as important as for stealth).

The only place you clearly win therefore is intimidate  

But definitely a good point and a reason I prefer the PHB cantrips to the Essentials ones.


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## Imaro (Nov 30, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> Yeah, that's obnoxious and shouldn't have happened. And you've gone all out on Arcana I see (20 Int, Trained, Skill Focus, Racial?) Remember they each only work 1/encounter (which can cause trouble with stealth if you use it to get in and then can't get out - you can hide yourself but you can't really do stealthy operations in the way the rogue can as "Get in undetected, do something, get out undetected" is two stealth rolls) and the Bard should be at about the same Diplomacy as you with Words of Friendship and can keep going after shooting his bolt (although this isn't as important as for stealth).
> 
> The only place you clearly win therefore is intimidate
> 
> But definitely a good point and a reason I prefer the PHB cantrips to the Essentials ones.




The funny thing is that I don't have skill focus and didn't start with a 20 in Int... but if I had started with 20 (I'd have 22 as a Genasi) and I do take skill focus( which I probably will go for later) that's another +3, and well yeah it gets even worse for the Rogue and Bard at that point. 


As to the 1/encounter... well outside of combat that's once every five minutes, which really isn't that long a time except when you go into combat mode. Honestly I wouldn't place the blame 100% on the cantrips... it got much easier to do this type of stuff concerning skills in 4e with the addition of Themes and Backgrounds (I have the Magic Scholar background and Moteborn theme.) along with feats (I also have a Book Imp Familiar)

EDIT: And Intimidate is pretty powerful when you finally get that main solo or elite bloodied...


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## TerraDave (Nov 30, 2012)

The bit on the start of the hobby was ok...and it had this, which was pretty funny:

"the Dungeon Master’s Guide represents the pinnacle of the rationalization"

Though he backs away from it a bit later. 

But otherwise: edition war as sociology. 

I do agree their is a problem with 4Es tone, and it does lack a certain style...but I have felt that way about most D&D books since, well, that pinnacle of rationalization was released.


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## Steelwill (Nov 30, 2012)

pemerton said:


> I think it's more than that. I think "canon" has, for some (many?) become an end in itself.
> 
> When Arneson ran Temple of the Frog, and Gygax was running games in Maure Castle, they weren't aping anyone else's game. They weren't recycling anyone else's play experience and passing it off as their own? So why has this now become the measure, for a large group of RPGers, of the quality of an RPG experience?
> 
> ...




What is the point of using settings and creatures like Dispater and Mephistopheles that have canon already if not to stick with it?  I mean if you don't want any expectations associated with canon, run a home brew with home brew monsters and everything.  It seems really backwards to act shocked that player's would respond to the canon being wrong when it is in fact being used and incorrectly.  This is why I didn't run Forgotten Realms for so long, it had a megaton of canon lore that went with it, and I didn't want to learn it all and bother being faithful to it, thus ultimately negating the point of running in that setting in the first place.  I ran homebrew instead, and built my own canon for the world, and then was faithful to it because that builds consistency in the world.  

There is value in creating your own or using a pre-existing one, but if you are going to use a pre-existing one that your player's are familiar with, using the canon correctly is one of the challenges faced.


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## Neonchameleon (Nov 30, 2012)

Steelwill said:


> What is the point of using settings and creatures like Dispater and Mephistopheles that have canon already if not to stick with it? I mean if you don't want any expectations associated with canon, run a home brew with home brew monsters and everything. It seems really backwards to act shocked that player's would respond to the canon being wrong when it is in fact being used and incorrectly. This is why I didn't run Forgotten Realms for so long, it had a megaton of canon lore that went with it, and I didn't want to learn it all and bother being faithful to it, thus ultimately negating the point of running in that setting in the first place. I ran homebrew instead, and built my own canon for the world, and then was faithful to it because that builds consistency in the world.
> 
> There is value in creating your own or using a pre-existing one, but if you are going to use a pre-existing one that your player's are familiar with, using the canon correctly is one of the challenges faced.




That depends on the level of detail you are expecting.  I'd make the assumption in any game that Demogorgon was a well known two headed leader of demons about whom a  lot of legends had grown up - but I'd assume that that was all at the legendary rather than true level in the average fantasy setting.  It gives a nice shared baseline but I certainly wouldn't expect that lore about Thuruzdun I'd read in the MM was correct _in this specific setting_.  Using the names and attributes provides baseline common knowledge the DM doesn't have to set up rather than binds the DM; not all stories are true and not all are false.


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## Luce (Nov 30, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> That depends on the level of detail you are expecting.



 My point exactly when I talked about the two sides of the screen expectations. IMO with the encroaching sentiment that everything is core and everyone plays, if not the 1-to-1 exactly same then very compatible game ignore the fact that in fact DM do make campaigns their own prissily by making the changes that make sense to them with the intent to make the gaming experience better. In other words to some people changing the contents of MM is the same as making longsword do 1d12 damage vs large creatures in all editions. I would not have problem with either, as long as the DM tells me that there are deviations from RAW, preferably also giving me a list  of those changes without spoilers.

As for why I group 3e and 4e, in the context of this discussion I see both as shift in the direction of making the rules not only consistent in terms of crunch  but also in fluff. Thus the concept of overcampaigns, fluff that applies to all those who choose to run a game in published one (or even the one implied in the core books). While there are several advantages to this approach it can also lead to the mentality that if you change detail X in setting/edition Y you are not in fact playing Y but a homebrew. (And should go be ashamed in the corner.)
In the same vain, since not everyone uses the same rules it is not inconceivable that not everyone applies errata. My game is not "broken" it is differently structured  then the RAW and by your statements Neonchameleon so is yours.


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## Libramarian (Nov 30, 2012)

pemerton said:


> This thread seems as good a place as any to mention something I noticed last week when reading Chris Perkins's column: one thing that Perkins talks about is a deal done by one of the PCs with Dispater, which ended up being one element of the campaign's dramatic resolution. And in the comments, we get this:EvilDM1395: Chris I am disappointed in you for the first time. Dispater is the most paranoid of the Archdevils of the Nine Hells and I doubt would even project himself to make such a deal. Now it would have been much more interesting to have Mephistopheles, Archdevil and ruler of Cania, to make such a deal as he can't be trusted as the betrayer that he is.
> 
> Chris Perkins: The player character chose to summon an aspect of Dispater, so it wasn't my decision. . .
> 
> EvilDM1395: Didn't realize the Multi-verse was dumbed down that much in 4th Ed . . . Not matter, Dispater is still cloistered Devil who has almost no interaction with others due to his self preservation and paranoia. The rest of the game sounded great.​



Ouch...yeah, that's kind of a WoW Red Shirt Guy type moment.


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## Loonook (Nov 30, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> That thing's way out of date - they put in a 1 free action attack restriction that deals with a lot of it.  And I'm sure you'll forgive me for not worrying about:
> Use a Falchion (2d4) as your base weapon, and you've got a good chance of rolling a silly-high damage roll. Use a _Ring of Radiant Storm_ and _Free Soul_ epic destiny to make it more reliable. Don't crit.
> 
> 
> So outside epic destinies, epic powers and doing something that fails the giggle test (attacking yourself to miss) about all that's left is obvious abuse of the War Wizard's Staff and Storm Pillar, and a pair of Evermeet Warlocks.​





A.) Doesn't deal with all of it.

B.) You mean a game where actual errata is applied can be balanced?

The problem is that, for want of balance 4e became kind of boring.  I think of 4e as the Ikea edition.  Modular in its specific use, functional but not exactly flashy, and built with simplicity in mind.  There are few ways to hurt yourself playing 4e, and there aren't a lot of competitors deciding to produce additional models.

3.x (and to a lesser extent OD&D, AD&D, etc.) is dealing with a giant machining and carpentry shop with limited safety gear.  Yeah you could in theory chop your arm off, but you can only make that mistake twice.  You can create your own safety measures... And you have a much finer influence on the final product.

Slainte,

-Loonook.​


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## Neonchameleon (Nov 30, 2012)

Loonook said:


> A.) Doesn't deal with all of it.
> 
> B.) You mean a game where actual errata is applied can be balanced?




Perfect balance is like a frictionless environment.  No one actually wants one because the consequences are ... weird.  But engineers spend a long time trying to get as close as they can for a damn good reason.



> The problem is that, for want of balance 4e became kind of boring.  I think of 4e as the Ikea edition.  Modular in its specific use, functional but not exactly flashy, and built with simplicity in mind.  There are few ways to hurt yourself playing 4e, and there aren't a lot of competitors deciding to produce additional models.




Off the top of my head MHRP (i.e. the third biggest game this year) explicitely calls out 4e in terms of design decisions and WHFRP 3e is very obviously inspired by a mix of 4e, WHFRP 1/2e, and Descent.  Then there's Pelgrane Press's 13th Age (although citing a game by Heinsoo is probably cheating) and a couple of Heartbreakers.

I'd say that's some decently sized names - especially given that a cramped 4e simply wouldn't work half as well - you need the powers to give the characters the distinctiveness they were lacking in earlier editions.  No, it's not the OGL glut - but guess what?  No OGL.  And a massively higher barrier to entry both in terms of quality and versitility to produce a competitor.



> 3.x (and to a lesser extent OD&D, AD&D, etc.) is dealing with a giant machining and carpentry shop with limited safety gear.  Yeah you could in theory chop your arm off, but you can only make that mistake twice.  You can create your own safety measures... And you have a much finer influence on the final product.



4e on the other hand is a junkyard full of cars which gives you welding tools and has some cars that may be on the scrap heap but are certainly drivable.  If you want to create something other than a car made out of metal you're going to struggle badly or go elsewhere - but if you want a car it's much easier than making one out of wood.  And with the junk yard being what it is you can customise your cars far more effectively and efficiently.  And cars are 90% of what the carpentry shop is trying to produce.


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## Loonook (Nov 30, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> Off the top of my head MHRP (i.e. the third biggest game this year) explicitely calls out 4e in terms of design decisions and WHFRP 3e is very obviously inspired by a mix of 4e, WHFRP 1/2e, and Descent.  Then there's Pelgrane Press's 13th Age (although citing a game by Heinsoo is probably cheating) and a couple of Heartbreakers.




Being the third biggest game is a hell of a drop off.  Also WHFRP's movements towards a more boardy experience isn't necessarily a shout out to 4e (moreso a nod to Warhammer Fantasy). 



> I'd say that's some decently sized names - especially given that a cramped 4e simply wouldn't work half as well - you need the powers to give the characters the distinctiveness they were lacking in earlier editions.  No, it's not the OGL glut - but guess what?  No OGL.  And a massively higher barrier to entry both in terms of quality and vers[a]tility to produce a competitor.




One of the great parts of pre-3e was the prevalence of those house rules.  When Usenet came about you started going from handwritten/typed printed little batches to the Netbooks of the late 2e period.  Those netbooks could cover a range of ideas that were just too niche to fit.  The OGL allowed those writers to hang up a shingle and make a little dosh for their hard work.

For the most part that homebrew craftsmanship just no longer exists in my personal sphere of 4e players beyond the occasional power, destiny, or small bit.  Just look at this old netbook list.  I love that level of obsessive energy being pointed towards some of those silly topics... And the old Pantheon lists that included dozens if not hundreds of gods to just yank from mythology, homebrews, literature?  It was fun.



> 4e on the other hand is a junkyard full of cars which gives you welding tools and has some cars that may be on the scrap heap but are certainly drivable.  If you want to create something other than a car made out of metal you're going to struggle badly or go elsewhere - but if you want a car it's much easier than making one out of wood.  And with the junk yard being what it is you can customise your cars far more effectively and efficiently.  And cars are 90% of what the carpentry shop is trying to produce.




And the car metaphor is kind of apt.  For the most part 4e encourages the building of Yugos, with the occasional Fiat.  Nothing really flashy, or challenging to drive.  3e provides for a collection of parts that could create a Nash Rambler or a Ferrari... 

But with a DM who selects a rough template you have a bit of definition. Maybe you put a restrictor plate here, a governor here, and that balance is enforced.

The real issue is that the earlier editions required that the DM have system knowledge and the ability to corral overpower at their own table.  4e makes for an extremely portable, small mod community.

But some of us like fighting that beast, and maybe losing a fingertip from time to time.

Slainte,

-Loonook.


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## Neonchameleon (Nov 30, 2012)

Loonook said:


> Being the third biggest game is a hell of a drop off.  Also WHFRP's movements towards a more boardy experience isn't necessarily a shout out to 4e (moreso a nod to Warhammer Fantasy).




The game has _Power Cards_ ffs.  I'm not sure what you're looking for.

And yes, being the third biggest game is a hell of a drop off - but it always has been as far as I know.  Your point?



> One of the great parts of pre-3e was the prevalence of those house rules.




Best - and worst.  They were interesting certainly.



> For the most part that homebrew craftsmanship just no longer exists in my personal sphere of 4e players beyond the occasional power, destiny, or small bit.




That might just be because the 4e character design is more flexible and more reflective of actual mythological character concepts than either 3e or 2e _despite the glut both games had_.  



> Just look at this old netbook list.




All links 404'd.  Which might be just as well as the quality of netbook design made me want to poke my eyes out in most cases.



> And the car metaphor is kind of apt.  For the most part 4e encourages the building of Yugos, with the occasional Fiat.  Nothing really flashy, or challenging to drive.  3e provides for a collection of parts that could create a Nash Rambler or a Ferrari...




Yeah, sure if by "Ferrari" you mean a wooden cutout saying the word "Ferrari".

Given that despite Appendix N The Grey Mouser was almost impossible to create as a PC before 4e, the casters were so larded with flavour that they resembled almost nothing in any fiction anyone wanted to write, and the non-casters were boring and crippled you might theoretically be able to create the parts for a Ferrari - but you had about the same chance of that as you had of creating a working fusion reactor. 



> But some of us like fighting that beast, and maybe losing a fingertip from time to time.




And some of us are, from the players side, capable of hogtying that beast with one hand behind our backs, and consider it still not worth the effort as the beast is bug ugly, doesn't resemble _any_ fiction, and is neither a particular challenge nor shows us anything about the world the way GURPS books sometimes can.


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## Loonook (Nov 30, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> The game has _Power Cards_ ffs.  I'm not sure what you're looking for.




Cards that contain information on specific abilities?  Well then, 2e was retroactively designed using the 4e design philosophy:














> Best - and worst.  They were interesting certainly.




And the idea was great.  Being able to tune to your specific desires?  Fantastic.





> That might just be because the 4e character design is more flexible and more reflective of actual mythological character concepts than either 3e or 2e _despite the glut both games had_.




Using the idea that splitting your character's levels into artificial steps does not make you Campbell.  Even so, such artificial cliffs did exist in earlier editions through the edition of various follower groups, the Druid's special type of advancement, etc.

If the rules need to make the story for you that could be an issue, as that is now making a system of resolution affect the narrative directly.




> All links 404'd.  Which might be just as well as the quality of netbook design made me want to poke my eyes out in most cases.




And that was the point.  There were plenty that were fantastic, and some that were horrendous.  Those b&w Kinkos prints handed out among groups for campaigns and rules... A lost art.




> Yeah, sure if by "Ferrari" you mean a wooden cutout saying the word "Ferrari".
> 
> Given that despite Appendix N The Grey Mouser was almost impossible to create as a PC before 4e, the casters were so larded with flavour that they resembled almost nothing in any fiction anyone wanted to write, and the non-casters were boring and crippled you might theoretically be able to create the parts for a Ferrari - but you had about the same chance of that as you had of creating a working fusion reactor.




I see what your problem is now... The difficulty in separating mechanics from flavor.  Now your choices of games to highlight also make sense.  Also you're kind of an obsessive optimizer per your other discussions in threads.

That's definitely an interesting place to approach gaming from.  While there will always be a certain amount of gamism, narrative and simulation can be achieved through the system.  The problem is that you suffer from a need to optimize so much in 3e that you find the enforced limits of 4e to be comfortable.  Which was kind of the point behind the Ikea vs. Carpentry argument.



> And some of us are, from the players side, capable of hogtying that beast with one hand behind our backs, and consider it still not worth the effort as the beast is bug ugly, doesn't resemble _any_ fiction, and is neither a particular challenge nor shows us anything about the world the way GURPS books sometimes can.




Here's a hint: 



Spoiler



So can we


.

An implied level of system mastery above those who play 3e and enjoy it is just worrisome.  We understand the breaks in the system, we deal with them.  Like a homeowner we patch the walls, lay on some paint, maybe replace the ductwork here and there... But we also can make a nice little comfortable sweet spot cottage, or an extravagant mansion with lakes filled with dire psuedonatural koi swimming in their Lovecraftian beauty.

And the argument against the game not playing like fiction... Well, we're creating something of our own.  That's the fun of our group.  If we want a shaved orangutan who grapples using holy tattoos as a fiendhunter?  We can put it together.  Wanna play a fat merchant who uses wind magic through his ornate fan? We can do it.  There's all sorts of ways to tweak the levels of power, base this on that, go from there.

And it's still 



Spoiler



fun


.

Slainte,

-Loonook.


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## Neonchameleon (Dec 1, 2012)

Loonook said:


> Cards that contain information on specific abilities?




No.  Setting the whole thing up so you don't have to look a thing up in the rulebook because it's all printed in front of you including what everything does.



> Using the idea that splitting your character's levels into artificial steps does not make you Campbell.  Even so, such artificial cliffs did exist in earlier editions through the edition of various follower groups, the Druid's special type of advancement, etc.
> 
> If the rules need to make the story for you that could be an issue, as that is now making a system of resolution affect the narrative directly.
> 
> ...


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## Loonook (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> No.  Setting the whole thing up so you don't have to look a thing up in the rulebook because it's all printed in front of you including what everything does.




You mean like Spell Cards.  Which have existed since at least 2e as an option and been made by people who enjoy recipe/note cards probably since the dawn of the hobby.




> You mean that 3e bakes an entirely narrow flavour into the rules.  4e doesn't do this.  It also has a much wider array of non-casting charaters and because the D&D casting flavour is so overwhelming it has a much wider variety of casting options.




And again, you don't seem to understand this topic.  3e lays out 'Here is what we think a Barbarian is."  Now, I can take that and make it into several different things... And go from there.  Being provided with that framework gives me a great starting point to build on... But it isn't the end-all, be-all expression of that idea.



> Finally 3e had the narrowest monster design of any edition of D&D because of the stupid idea that you had to make NPCs by the same rules as PCs.




Not really.  Again, there was the supplied framework and how it is played. Sure, some DMs did completely encode the entire House of Plot merchant's guild into a rogue's gallery of NPCs.  Others... Didn't.

4e codified a specific framework (Solos, Elites, Minions, effects, etc.) that most of us had been playing with for years.  Believing that Elder Demon Bob has a CR of 21 because he appeared in the Codex of Fiends 3: Concerning All Demonic forces named Robert... Doesn't mean that's how it played out at the table.  

Again, you're showing the Ikea vs. Carpenter right here.



> As for being an obsessive optimiser, not quite.  I'm obsessive _at understanding what I am doing._  There's a difference - but understanding what you are doing is a prerequisite to most of the benign forms of optimisation.




And part of DMing is knowing when to play with those optimal options.




> I don't suffer from a need to optimise.  I suffer from a need to understand what I am doing - take your ad hominem away please.  I also suffer from a need to roleplay within the world set up by the rules.
> 
> The less I understood 3.X the more I enjoyed it.  I find that unforgivable in design terms.  The more I understand 4e the more I enjoy it - and I was sold on it the first time I flung a monster into its own pit trap without thinking about it.




That can be done... In any version of the game.




> Except that it's not Ikea vs carpentry.  It's a massive bucket of lego for 4e with everything working with everything else vs a junk box.
> 
> In 4e you can make what you want as long as it's fantasy heroic fiction.  In 3e you need to make yourself stupid, ignorant, or a conspiracy theorist in character to not take certain spells over others.




You realize that, your attack on the system asides, you just made the exact same point I made through my Ikea vs. carpentry argument? 4e is a series of snap into place pieces with a heavily defined mode... Just like Ikea furniture.

Also, as I have stated... People who allowed every spell in 3e in every backwood spirit caller's shack were just silly.  Those of us who remember the old Spell Compendiums saw the issues... And in our group and most of the groups I have played my almost a decade of 3.x in?  We gain our spells through research, learning from others, capturing spellbooks, and traveling to learn new magic.  It's _fun for us_ to have that separation, that thematic mean, rather than just "Oh, well, everyone takes X,Y, and Z".  



> Most of the people whose system mastery I respect turned their backs on 3e because they understand how it works - see, for instance Logic Ninja.  (The others, like Trollman, are 3.X obsessives).  [MENTION=22424]delericho[/MENTION] is a 3e fan and he, himself compares the 3e mechanical structure to having a broken arm and people pointing it out to people poking at the broken arm.




And that is a recognition of the places where 3.x doesn't work, or needs to be corraled.  Strangely enough, that does require a certain amount of system knowledge and the ability to delve into it.  And almost never comes into play at a table unless someone has been spending fevered nights at a CharOp board.



> A homeowner in a ramshackle house.




Or someone who has put that all together on their own.



> Guess what?  So can we with 4e.  Except that the whole thing isn't held together by string and duct tape.




Really?  Truly I am surprised.  It is almost as if you can take disparate parts of a system and put them together as a whole.




> The biggest problem I have with 3e is that the magic system is  overwhelming enough that you need to make up excuses for it not to  become a stock 3e world.  Which means it actively _impedes_  creating something of our own.  4e on the other hand fits a vast range  of settings because the builds have a lot of character and the mechanics  are purposely fairly generic.




Again... Not really.  But if you believe that Vancian casting is an issue you can check out spell points, skill based magic, etc.  You know, the things produced under that OGL to help people who don't like Vancian casting.



> I thought you said you were making your own fiction not using prefabricated stuff like fiend hunter?  And the 4e grapplers (brawler fighters) who get to drag people around are much more interesting than the 3e grapplers.  You've just illustrated a concept 4e does better than 3e.




We used a lot of different mechanisms, from bull rushes, grapples, variant rules from OGL, to produce the concept.

Investing that time was part of the fun of it.




> Simple reskin.  Your point?




Yes.  Reskinning... The thing we've been discussing that is available to anyone in any game.




> The levels of power shouldn't _need_ tweaking.  That's what the character level should represent.




And again, saying that doesn't make it so.  Character level is a quantifiable justification for the experiences of an individual in measure to others.  

Having a bunch of broken elements, which can be ignored, doesn't immediately justify ditching an entire system.

I fear you did not strain your bath water.  There seems to be an angry baby out your window.

Slainte,

-Loonook.


----------



## MoonSong (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> No.  Setting the whole thing up so you don't have to look a thing up in the rulebook because it's all printed in front of you including what everything does.
> 
> 
> If the rules need to make the story for you that could be an issue, as that is now making a system of resolution affect the narrative directly.
> ...



No, 4e isn't a bucket of lego, it is a bucket of oversized building blocks with stickers to pretend they are anything else, and some people use paint where stickers don't suffice, you can build a lot of things with it, but there is only so much you can make fit on it's square shapes, may be enough for some and it's extremely safe, but pretty limited to build anything that doesn't fit on it's fundamental estructural asumptions. 3.x is more like the legos, you can build lots and lots of things with it, and if any pieces you have aren't enough, you can always go and buy the specialized pieces to fo the job, or even recurre to soem third party pieces if what you want is esoteric enough, but what you can do with it has no real limits, you arne't limited to build something that looks like a car, depending on how deep you went the thing will also move like a car, sound like a car and drive like a car. (the thing might even be able to move on it's own). and what you can build with a basic set of it goes way beyond what you can build witht he bigger blocks. Of course given their smaller granularity, they are choking hazards, and not everybody will feel comfortable with their more unstable nature, as nothing waranties they'll be structurally sound, but you can't have everything.

And there is only so much you can do by reskin, many 4e lovers have sold reskinning as the panacea for everything 4e doesn't covers. But tell me how do you create the equivalent of an exalted healer on 4e? (someone who contributes to party survivability in the wild, exudes healing, putting characters who also dabble on offensive magic to shame whern it comes to actually mending wounds and in a pinch can turn use her own blood to heal others, who can make creatures regrow limbs, cure illnesses and affections eventually brings back people from being actually dead in mere seconds, that no matter what other members on the party do, if she causes damage she contributes to that creature being subdued instead of being dead, and that eventually gets a unicorn companion who does actually fight, and most importantly she has to do all of that while playing differently than a cleric would, a skimisher more than a front-liner). Tell me how can you build something like that on 4e just by reskinning? (3.5 is just a base class pluss four feats)


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## pemerton (Dec 1, 2012)

Steelwill said:


> What is the point of using settings and creatures like Dispater and Mephistopheles that have canon already if not to stick with it?



Because they're evocative? Because someone already put the stats and backstory together? Because you want to see how they change and evolve in your game?

Dispater is a paranoid devil lord who lives in an Iron City. It doesn't follow from that that he won't bargain with an epic PC!




Steelwill said:


> I mean if you don't want any expectations associated with canon, run a home brew with home brew monsters and everything.  It seems really backwards to act shocked that player's would respond to the canon being wrong when it is in fact being used and incorrectly.





Luce said:


> My point exactly when I talked about the two sides of the screen expectations.



There seems to be some confusion here. The example I posted wasn't a player complaining about his/her GM's "misuse" of canon. It was about a third party observer complaining about a GM's "misuse" of canon despite overwhelming evidence that the players of the game in question were very happy with the game, and were in fact driving the way that Dispater was used by the GM.

What surpised me is that an outsider would think it is more important for Chris Perkins' game to conform to canon than to be fun for and responsive to his players.


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## pemerton (Dec 1, 2012)

Luce said:


> As for why I group 3e and 4e, in the context of this discussion I see both as shift in the direction of making the rules not only consistent in terms of crunch  but also in fluff. Thus the concept of overcampaigns, fluff that applies to all those who choose to run a game in published one (or even the one implied in the core books). While there are several advantages to this approach it can also lead to the mentality that if you change detail X in setting/edition Y you are not in fact playing Y but a homebrew.



Huh? 2nd ed AD&D introduced settings with canon, didn't it (though Dragonlance was the prefiguring of this trend).

I think the relevant contrast is between backstory and metaplot. 4e actively eschews metaplot. 2nd ed AD&D embraced it. 3E, I don't have a firm handle on in this respect.


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## JamesonCourage (Dec 1, 2012)

howandwhy99 said:


> It all depends upon the rules you use for your games. There are all kinds of rules you could design to cover this. I'd suggest the first step is determining what nobility will be in the game.



Oh, my RPG does have rules for determining what nobility is. Some of what you talked about was setting issues, but nobility is definitely defined mechanically in my game (how desirable you are as nobility, minor or major, what your noble family specializes in, etc.). I was just curious how you'd use rules to determine where the PCs start play, etc., or if that was decided by GM fiat (which is normal, from my understanding of most RPGs).


howandwhy99 said:


> Players are generally in control of how and where their PCs move, but of course sometimes they are forcibly moved, like an earthquake ...or the city guard. The key is the NPCs are already there before the players characters arrive. And why and when those NPCs are in their where is predetermined by rules.



Yes, this is what I was curious about! It sounds very interesting. Can you give me an example of how rules decide why/when/where NPCs are? Or, point me to a system that covers this? Because I want to steal from that system.


howandwhy99 said:


> That's the easy answer. Before each session you generate a scenario. You run the simulation outward far enough - along both time and space - to cover just enough of what the players may get into the next session.



I'm interested where there's rules governing this, too. For example, I get that I can use social skill rules to determine if people behind the scenes can convince each other of certain actions; however, how do I use rules to determine which person they want to talk to, or convince?


howandwhy99 said:


> To answer your question, NPCs and everything about NPCs are generated just like treasures and dungeons and outdoor terrain and everything else. The first time this stuff is constructed this way (or converted from player created content) it receives a place in the game world. Where the PCs go, who they choose to stop, if they talk to them, what is talked about, what is learned/passed on, what creatures actively stop and/or seek out the PCs, and so on, is either a result of the players actions or an expression of monster behavioral rules (e.g., these monster, sometimes with these classes, know these tactics which fall under this INT rating and then implemented in these manners which fall under WIS, and so on). In the end it isn't a chart or a roll, but a mental construct of high detail backed up by notes and maps. This method provides for both a level of detail and a degree of coherency for which there is no substitute. Nothing quite compares to actually having an imagining in one's mind.



Okay, I get this, and it's more or less what I'm used to. Is there any system that has rules for placing NPCs, monsters, cities, etc. _before_ the game starts? I'm curious, because I'd probably use that system on the fly for a lot of stuff. Thanks for the reply! As always, play what you like


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## Neonchameleon (Dec 1, 2012)

Loonook said:


> You mean like Spell Cards.  Which have existed since at least 2e as an option and been made by people who enjoy recipe/note cards probably since the dawn of the hobby.




No.  I mean power cards.  Including martial attack powers.  Have you ever played WHFRP 3e?



> And again, you don't seem to understand this topic.  3e lays out
> 'Here is what we think a Barbarian is."




Indeed.  3e lays out "here is what we think a Barbarian is", 4e lays out "Here are five very distinct conceptions of what we think a Barbarian might be and you can mix and match building blocks from all of them".  I've seen 4e barbarians so metal that when they roared to the heavens, the heavens answered their thunder with lightning.  The 3e Barbarian is positively colourless alongside the 4e one - but you can cover the entire range of the 3e Barbarian with the 4e one - and have a vast array left over.



> Again, you're showing the Ikea vs. Carpenter right here.




You want Ikea?  Putting together prefabricated constructions with obscure names like "fiendhunter"?  I'd call that the very essence of Ikea.



> You realize that, your attack on the system asides, you just made the exact same point I made through my Ikea vs. carpentry argument? 4e is a series of snap into place pieces with a heavily defined mode... Just like Ikea furniture.




If that's what you mean by Ikea _so is 3e_.  Each level in 3e is a snap into place part.



> Again... Not really.  But if you believe that Vancian casting is an issue you can check out spell points, skill based magic, etc.  You know, the things produced under that OGL to help people who don't like Vancian casting.




Oberoni fallacy.  Yes, you can houserule 3.X to take away all the 3.X rules and leave something less obnoxious and with less overwhelming fluff.  Why not just take away 3.X - after all a full third of the PHB is spells.



> We used a lot of different mechanisms, from bull rushes, grapples, variant rules from OGL, to produce the concept.




And it's dead easy in 4e.



> Yes.  Reskinning... The thing we've been discussing that is available to anyone in any game.




Except that reskinning doesn't work when you have overwhelming fluff mixed in with the mechanics - as for Vancian Casting.



> And again, saying that doesn't make it so.  Character level is a quantifiable justification for the experiences of an individual in measure to others.




Which means that the entire philosophical basis of the ECL and the CR system is impossible.



> Having a bunch of broken elements, which can be ignored, doesn't immediately justify ditching an entire system.




No - but you need a damn good reason not to.  Especially if they _can't_ be ignored.



KaiiLurker said:


> No, 4e isn't a bucket of lego, it is a bucket of oversized building blocks with stickers to pretend they are anything else, and some people use paint where stickers don't suffice, you can build a lot of things with it, but there is only so much you can make fit on it's square shapes, may be enough for some and it's extremely safe, but pretty limited to build anything that doesn't fit on it's fundamental estructural asumptions.




And yet it is more varied and versatile for building characters like those in fantasy fiction than 3e.  4e kicks the arse of 3e without breaking a sweat for non-caster versatility.



> but what you can do with it has no real limits, you arne't limited to build something that looks like a car, depending on how deep you went the thing will also move like a car, sound like a car and drive like a car.




You've heard about the car with the wooden engine and the wooden wheels of course?



> and what you can build with a basic set of it goes way beyond what you can build witht he bigger blocks.




Fine.  Build me a Warlord with the basic set.  Or build me a Barbarian who can cry to heaven and have the heavens call back.  Or build me The Grey Mouser.

You're making unsubstantiated claims - back them up.



> And there is only so much you can do by reskin, many 4e lovers have sold reskinning as the panacea for everything 4e doesn't covers. But tell me how do you create the equivalent of an exalted healer on 4e? (someone who contributes to party survivability in the wild, exudes healing, putting characters who also dabble on offensive magic to shame whern it comes to actually mending wounds and in a pinch can turn use her own blood to heal others, who can make creatures regrow limbs, cure illnesses and affections eventually brings back people from being actually dead in mere seconds, that no matter what other members on the party do, if she causes damage she contributes to that creature being subdued instead of being dead, and that eventually gets a unicorn companion who does actually fight, and most importantly she has to do all of that while playing differently than a cleric would, a skimisher more than a front-liner). Tell me how can you build something like that on 4e just by reskinning? (3.5 is just a base class pluss four feats)




That's just a normal 4e wisdom based PHB cleric other than the unicorn.  Skirmisher?  Check.  Stuns rather than kills?  If you like.  Doesn't do much hit point damage but heals massively?  Sure if you take the right powers. Sacrifices own health for others?  If you take the right powers.  Seriously, that's your idea of a big challenge?

If you like you can also take the Pacifist Healer feat.  At that point you're outhealing anything by a very comfortable margin including other PC clerics at the cost of taking backlash if you do _any_ damage to bloodied foes.  But it really isn't necessary.

Now try The Grey Mouser.  Or the Thunderborn Barbarian I mentioned above.  The one who's so metal he cries to heaven and the heavens answer.


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## Loonook (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> ]
> Oberoni fallacy.  Yes, you can houserule 3.X to take away all the 3.X rules and leave something less obnoxious and with less overwhelming fluff.  Why not just take away 3.X - after all a full third of the PHB is spells.




So if we decide to change one portion of the rules... We are now worried about whether the boat is still the boat?  Yes.  Elements of Magic made a complete 1:1 swap for spells, with built in guidelines for any spellcasting class and full modular spellcasting for any spell with dozens of examples in a spell point system. 

There was also the skill based method as presented in Eom: Mythic Earth, which did it in the style of Jedi powers for each possible type.



> And it's dead easy in 4e.




It takes about the same time with 3e and a hint of system mastery.




> Except that reskinning doesn't work when you have overwhelming fluff mixed in with the mechanics - as for Vancian Casting.




Not really. But it's alright.



> Which means that the entire philosophical basis of the ECL and the CR system is impossible.




Or it shows that, for each group, there is going to be different ECL and CR bases.  But again, it's alright.




> No - but you need a damn good reason not to.  Especially if they _can't_ be ignored.




Except they can.  It's weird that for approaching over a decade I've been able to do something that is impossible.




> And yet it is more varied and versatile for building characters like those in fantasy fiction than 3e.  4e kicks the arse of 3e without breaking a sweat for non-caster versatility.




Uhhuh.




> Fine.  Build me a Warlord with the basic set.  Or build me a Barbarian who can cry to heaven and have the heavens call back.  Or build me The Grey Mouser.
> 
> You're making unsubstantiated claims - back them up.




Grey Mouser exists in one of the Lankhmar books statted out.  Barbarians 'crying to the heavens' for lightning?  Wow, a simple magic item or even a PrC could do the same... Not even difficult.

"So Metal" Barbarian, fwiw, sounds like a pretty shoddy concept for a character.  But if you need we could always just check the outline for making a character class, match up the appropriate guidelines, and give a wide range of lightning and thunder based abilities over levels... Then supplement that with some basic magic items.

You seem extremely focused on being flustered regarding the fact that more people play 3.x/d20 than 4e.  I understood that years ago... I had some of the same feelings.  But for what we do in my group and the groups I have played with?

Never been an issue.

Slainte,

-Loonook.


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## MoonSong (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> That's just a normal 4e wisdom based PHB cleric other than the unicorn.  Skirmisher?  Check.  Stuns rather than kills?  If you like.  Doesn't do much hit point damage but heals massively?  Sure if you take the right powers. Sacrifices own health for others?  If you take the right powers.  Seriously, that's your idea of a big challenge?
> 
> If you like you can also take the Pacifist Healer feat.  At that point you're outhealing anything by a very comfortable margin including other PC clerics at the cost of taking backlash if you do _any_ damage to bloodied foes.  But it really isn't necessary.
> 
> Now try The Grey Mouser.  Or the Thunderborn Barbarian I mentioned above.  The one who's so metal he cries to heaven and the heavens answer.




1) where is the unicorn?, the unicorn is an important part of the character.
2) it isn't "doesn't kill the thing if I'm the last to hit it", or "Apply the stunned condition" (in fact healers have zero debuffs on their spell list) is "If I ever hit it it won't die no matter how hard or mercilles my allies hit it, short of massive damage or a coup de Grace"
3) What are those powers? anything that can leave you practically dead? ( laser powers are a big no, no; the only way this character ever inflicts damage is by the way of an unaugmented melee attack with no other effect than the above one.)


Well I'm not familiar with the grey mouser at all, and the barbarian if you give me time to search for an appropriate psionic power I might be able to do it. Or short of that I'm sure we'll find something if we look for third party books hard enough.


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## timASW (Dec 1, 2012)

The flaw in this whole thread is equating 4e with mainstream.

It wasnt. It failed because Mearls and Co dont know what mainstream gaming is anymore. 

They thought 3e stopped sellling because people wanted something different. They were wrong. Some did, just like some wanted warhammer, or white wolf. But the problem with 3e sales at the end wasnt a bad system. It was that everything had BEEN DONE. 

Monster books, setting books, alternate books, 3e had been done. There was nothing left to do. And so they had to publish more and more niche books, because WoTC is a  business and they need to sell books.  

And they made something so far from 3e that it was absurd. They tried to be games workshop or white wolf while still being D&D. And that was impossible.


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## Neonchameleon (Dec 1, 2012)

Loonook said:


> So if we decide to change one portion of the rules... We are now worried about whether the boat is still the boat?  Yes.  Elements of Magic made a complete 1:1 swap for spells, with built in guidelines for any spellcasting class and full modular spellcasting for any spell with dozens of examples in a spell point system.




So if we decide to change a literal third of the rules to third party products, yes.  And I mean a third of the rules.



> It takes about the same time with 3e and a hint of system mastery.




And (a) doesn't work as well (you do not get the kinaesthetic combat of 4e or even the marking) and (b) is more complex.



> Not really. But it's alright.
> 
> Or it shows that, for each group, there is going to be different ECL and CR bases.  But again, it's alright.




In short it doesn't work at all and you've learned to live with it.



> Grey Mouser exists in one of the Lankhmar books statted out.




15thf/11ftr/3mu - the statted books are 2e.  And that's an epic fail right there.   (The recent Lankhmar books are Runequest).



> Barbarians 'crying to the heavens' for lightning?  Wow, a simple magic item or even a PrC could do the same... Not even difficult.




*sigh* So keeping within the official rules it's magic items and making things up as you go along.

Fail again.



> "So Metal" Barbarian, fwiw, sounds like a pretty shoddy concept for a character.




Wait a second.  Wasn't it you who came up with the tattooed ogre fiendhunter?  And you're talking about shoddy character concepts.  Riiiiight.



> But if you need we could always just check the outline for making a character class, match up the appropriate guidelines, and give a wide range of lightning and thunder based abilities over levels... Then supplement that with some basic magic items.




Make up a class.  That's the "cut down a tree" school of carpentry.  And then you need magic items to make things work?

Believe it or not you can make  up in 4e as well.  It's actually easier.



> You seem extremely focused on being flustered regarding the fact that more people play 3.x/d20 than 4e.




No I'm not.  It's a simulationist game which means it's easier for many to get into.  Also the 2008 rulebooks were a year under in terms of playtesting, and no part of WotC's outreach strategy was a good one.

What annoys me is that people dump on 4e based on making  up and on double standards.



KaiiLurker said:


> 1) where is the unicorn?, the unicorn is an important part of the character.




*snicker*  In short 3e drowns the basic character concept by forcing things.  You can do it with paragon path, theme, or prestige class.



> 2) it isn't "doesn't kill the thing if I'm the last to hit it", or "Apply the stunned condition" (in fact healers have zero debuffs on their spell list) is "If I ever hit it it won't die no matter how hard or mercilles my allies hit it, short of massive damage or a coup de Grace"




Is trivial in 4e - you don't have to kill things when you knock them out.  You don't even have to houserule this - just to get others to agree to your character concept.

And the stunned condition in 4e is applied to the caster - they are actually serious about pacifist clerics.



> 3) What are those powers? anything that can leave you practically dead?




Glory be!  A bit of actual fluff in 3.X that matches fluff somewhere else.  And a drawback for spellcasting.  And that depends how many surges you have left.

I'm impressed - you've actually found some decent flavour.



> ( laser powers are a big no, no; the only way this character ever inflicts damage is by the way of an unaugmented melee attack with no other effect than the above one.)




Not all "laser" powers do damage.



> Well I'm not familiar with the grey mouser at all,




Appendix N.  4e he's just a rogue with the ritual caster feat.



> and the barbarian if you give me time to search for an appropriate psionic power I might be able to do it. Or short of that I'm sure we'll find something if we look for third party books hard enough.




Now I'm just amused. There were over 50 books published for 3.5 that were generic and dealing with player side information, and however many Realms and Ebberon books there were.  Between all those 50 you fail?  And you are claiming that "a unicorn is a core part of the character concept" and want to slap my straight down the line barbarian with psionics?

I suppose once you take 50 rulebooks, a dozen Forgotten Realms books with PC material, eight Eberron books centered round PCs, the official Dragonlance book, and then go outside that for third party material (we're over 70 books and I'm not counting monster books) you ought to be able to get somewhere.  And then you have to go outside that to third party books?

And you're struggling to match what 4e can do easily, while your idea of an interesting concept was the prefabricated stuff in the Book of Exalted Deeds and saying that "the unicorn is an important part of the character".

Hell, we'll try an easy one.  Fighter.  The 4e fighter gets up into the face of his foes and mechanically makes attacking someone else a bad idea.  Also he's fast enough to get a free attack when someone tries to 5 foot step away and if they try to walk past his opportunity attack stops them cold.  He owns the space around him and anyone who he focusses on in that space.  Make me a 3.5 character who owns the space around him the way a basic 4e fighter does even before we start getting into build details.  No magic.


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## delericho (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> Most of the people whose system mastery I respect turned their backs on 3e because they understand how it works - see, for instance Logic Ninja.  (The others, like Trollman, are 3.X obsessives).  [MENTION=22424]delericho[/MENTION] is a 3e fan and he, himself compares the 3e mechanical structure to having a broken arm and people pointing it out to people poking at the broken arm.




I kinda wish you hadn't mentioned me - I think I would have been happier not reading into this thread.

Unfortunately, what you say is right - the mechanics of 3e have deep and systematic flaws, especially in an "anything goes" campaign, but in some cases even right there in the core. In particular, the multiclassing system, item creation, and high level play in general all pretend to a much higher degree of mathematical rigour than they actually possess. A player who is determined to game the system absolutely can break it, and it takes a lot of mental effort from a determined DM just to rein in his worst excesses.

And, despite that, it's still the "least worst" edition for me.

(Actually, that's what I count as the worst tragedy of all of 4e. It was in amongst the course of the 4e design process that I really became aware of just how deep the flaws in 3e are, and 4e itself has some _very_ nice fixes. And yet 4e, in totality, is _really_ not for me, for various reasons. The upshot being that 4e was good enough to make me really disatisfied with 3e, without being good enough to replace it.)

But I digress. I'll let you all get back to your Edition Warring now.


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## Luce (Dec 1, 2012)

Gentle people (and DMs ), while I appreciate your input it seems to me that we had become mired in yet another 3e vs e4e debate. My original intention was for the discussion to be more encompassing of all published editions. So if you are familiar with say Homes edition and wants to chime in, by all means do so.




pemerton said:


> Huh? 2nd ed AD&D introduced settings with canon, didn't it (though Dragonlance was the prefiguring of this trend).
> 
> I think the relevant contrast is between backstory and metaplot. 4e actively eschews metaplot. 2nd ed AD&D embraced it. 3E, I don't have a firm handle on in this respect.




IME 2e philosophy was :"Here are the official rules. We use those for sake of consistency if we have to play tournaments and living campaigns. Feel free to do otherwise." As I said before in this tread I want to beyond what the rule are and focus on how the game was played. The experience will undoubtedly vary based on the individual experiences. But (hopefully) that will still be a insightful discussion.

Personally when I was playing 2e the DMs did not feel that they have to follow all the official canon. So when a player would show them a contradiction in their game based on rulebook X it was acceptable for the DM to state that he or she was not achieving to X in their campaign. In 3e in such situation it was expected for the DM to retro change his narrative in order to preserve consistency. May be this was because TSR was printing so  much material in short amount of time most groups could not keep up, may be DM fiat was more accepted as way the game was run, may be players could not just go to their local library and find the setting books there. 
In other words, in the 2e plot kingdom the DM was king and canon was an adviser while in 3e the canon was king and the DM was his herald. 



			
				[URL="http://www.enworld.org/forum/members/neonchameleon.html" said:
			
		

> Neonchameleon[/URL]]  I also suffer from a need to roleplay within the world set up by the rules.






			
				[URL="http://www.enworld.org/forum/members/neonchameleon.html" said:
			
		

> Neonchameleon[/URL]] I'd make the  assumption in any game that Demogorgon was a well known two headed  leader of demons about whom a  lot of legends had grown up - but I'd  assume that that was all at the legendary rather than true level in the  average fantasy setting.  It gives a nice shared baseline but I  certainly wouldn't expect that lore about Thuruzdun I'd read in the MM  was correct _in this specific setting_.  Using the names and  attributes provides baseline common knowledge the DM doesn't have to set  up rather than binds the DM; not all stories are true and not all are  false.




Could you please elaborate as to dispel the contradiction the above two quotes create? The way I read it one one hand you are OK if the campaign have deviates from the rules while also stating that you value the consistency undiluted canon provided. Or may be you are stating that as a player you value creative changes, but you play your character as if the canon was real until proven otherwise in game?


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## MoonSong (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> *snicker*  In short 3e drowns the basic character concept by forcing things.  You can do it with paragon path, theme, or prestige class.




Ok, granted, might be forced flavor, now where is my unicorn? 



> Is trivial in 4e - you don't have to kill things when you knock them out.  You don't even have to houserule this - just to get others to agree to your character concept.
> 
> And the stunned condition in 4e is applied to the caster - they are actually serious about pacifist clerics.




You mean that because the lack of rules I have to tell other people at  the table how to play their characters in order for my character to work as it should? 



> Glory be!  A bit of actual fluff in 3.X that matches fluff somewhere else.  And a drawback for spellcasting.  And that depends how many surges you have left.




Tell me how being stunned for a round compares to the sacrifice that taking CON damage implies? it isn't just taking hit point damage, it also affects further spellcasting and being more susceptible to many nasty effects and it isn't something that just goes away in five minutes, it is a panic button that risks actually killing your character, being stunned for a round is like cutting yourself with papper in comparison. If there is something like that please tell me which power does it. (really I'm been struggling to map this kind of character to 4e all edition long)



> I'm impressed - you've actually found some decent flavour.



I'm not sure if this was sarcasm or not.



> Not all "laser" powers do damage.



Again tell me which powers.



> Appendix N.  4e he's just a rogue with the ritual caster feat.



well it sounds like a 3.5 rogue/wizard/fighter/arcane trickster, but if you care so much about being very powerfull on all fronts I have no idea, on 2e I would do him with a multi/dual classed fighter/thief with the runecaster kit. But I cannot be sure I'm too young for 1st edition and I haven't read the source material, I ignore if it could do the source book justice.



> Now I'm just amused. There were over 50 books published for 3.5 that were generic and dealing with player side information, and however many Realms and Ebberon books there were.  Between all those 50 you fail?  And you are claiming that "a unicorn is a core part of the character concept" and want to slap my straight down the line barbarian with psionics?




Psionics was about the first thing that popped in my head when you requested this, and like I said on the initial challenge, reskin if you must, just give me my unicorn. Still finding the right power/spell is an important step towards homebrewing a prestige class. (DMG II has some good guidelines on how to create them).



> I suppose once you take 50 rulebooks, a dozen Forgotten Realms books with PC material, eight Eberron books centered round PCs, the official Dragonlance book, and then go outside that for third party material (we're over 70 books and I'm not counting monster books) you ought to be able to get somewhere.  And then you have to go outside that to third party books?



Well I haven't read (or even owned) all of those, forgive me for not knowing them from memmory, but soemthing that I liked from third edition was "if you look hard enough you'll find something", at least 3rd edition has an endless amount of third party support to speak of.  



> And you're struggling to match what 4e can do easily, while your idea of an interesting concept was the prefabricated stuff in the Book of Exalted Deeds and saying that "the unicorn is an important part of the character".




First of all, it isn't a prefabricated concept, and all it takes from BoED are three feats, it is a base class from miniatures handbook, and it is the dream come true of any dedicated healbot player, on 2e it was the pacifist priest of love, on 3.5 it is a healer with exalted feats, why a healer and not a cleric? well, the cleric has been progressively gainning more and more aggressive and martial bent as editions have advanced, having a class with a code of conduct that includes "no denying good people healing", is refreshing, and the semi druidic flavor overtones really help, a healer really screams "field medic". 



> Hell, we'll try an easy one.  Fighter.  The 4e fighter gets up into the face of his foes and mechanically makes attacking someone else a bad idea.  Also he's fast enough to get a free attack when someone tries to 5 foot step away and if they try to walk past his opportunity attack stops them cold.  He owns the space around him and anyone who he focusses on in that space.  Make me a 3.5 character who owns the space around him the way a basic 4e fighter does even before we start getting into build details.  No magic.



Combat Reflexes + Improved trip, pluss *cof, cof* Thicket of blades... And shield counter works very similar to marking.


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## Dannyalcatraz (Dec 1, 2012)

I was thinking Combat Reflexes + Stand Still + Hold the Line + Deft Opportunist.  For added giggles, add a polearm and Short Haft, or use a "Dhalsim" unarmed striker with extra-long limbs.  Add in something like Enlarge Person or Expansion, and you can control a pretty big area.

(And , of course, there is more...)


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## Stormonu (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> 15thf/11ftr/3mu - the statted books are 2e.  And that's an epic fail right there.   (The recent Lankhmar books are Runequest).




Grey Mouser is also in the 1E Legends and Lore/Deities & Demigods.  And were you expecting, for comparison Elmister to be statted up as a 1st level wizard?  Of course the printed stats are going to be for the character at the prime/top level of game.  Balking about how high level he is doesn't change the fact he's been statted out for close to 30 years in D&D - _which you said he wasn't_.


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## Loonook (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> So if we decide to change a literal third of the rules to third party products, yes.  And I mean a third of the rules.




You don't seem to understand that spells are a part of the system that can be excised and not looked at at all.  But again, I'm not expecting much out of meeting anywhere near each other.



> And (a) doesn't work as well (you do not get the kinaesthetic combat of 4e or even the marking) and (b) is more complex.




Your need for kinesthesia aside, this doesn't make your need for vehement agression apparent.




> In short it doesn't work at all and you've learned to live with it.




In short I don't think I've ever used it, and believe that any quantifiable number in an RPG is situational.  That whole 'playing two decades' thing showed me that, unless you're playing Rock Paper Scissors?  Don't necessarily trust the odds.




> 15thf/11ftr/3mu - the statted books are 2e.  And that's an epic fail right there.   (The recent Lankhmar books are Runequest).




Rules for ritual casting and incantations exist as options in D&D (see: UA).  Again, I understand you must let the hate flow, but don't be willfully obtuse about the edition to 'make your point'.




> *sigh* So keeping within the official rules it's magic items and making things up as you go along.
> 
> fail again.




And that is how it should be.  Slapping a bit of extra Lightning damage and the occasional Daily swap instead of a bit of fire damage and the occasional Daily swap isn't exactly rocket science.  Your Lightning barbarian is just a new shade of Koopa Troopa.






> Wait a second.  Wasn't it you who came up with the tattooed ogre fiendhunter?  And you're talking about shoddy character concepts.  Riiiiight.




Orangutan.  




> Make up a class.  That's the "cut down a tree" school of carpentry.  And then you need magic items to make things work?




No, it's the essence of the carpentry concept.  I have the tools to create a balanced elemental barbarian class which, if I wanted, I could then just make an overall elemental barbarian.  From there, I can then add additional effects through magic items without having to burn time making a Fireborn, Iceborn, etc.  Just apply traditional elemental factors to each type.  It takes less than an hour, and could technically just be done through Alternate Class abilities.



> Believe it or not you can make  up in 4e as well.  It's actually easier.




Uhhuh.  



> No I'm not.  It's a simulationist game which means it's easier for many to get into.  Also the 2008 rulebooks were a year under in terms of playtesting, and no part of WotC's outreach strategy was a good one.




Yet somehow more people and more new players still play 3.x and PF.  Odd that.  If we want to discuss purely easier to play we could go with BECMI, or any of the retroclones.



> What annoys me is that people dump on 4e based on making  up and on double standards.




And what is bothersome is that 4e players cannot understand that their game isn't all that it is cracked up to be.  Thus why we're coming up with a new edition that's mostly 3.x with some vague notions from 4e, 2e, etc.



> *snicker*  In short 3e drowns the basic character concept by forcing things.  You can do it with paragon path, theme, or prestige class.




Yes.  From what I understand from lore of other tables, Monte Cook will come out of his eternal slumber and punch you in the throat if e'r you attempt to change The One True Edition.  



Is trivial in 4e - you don't have to kill things when you knock them out.  You don't even have to houserule this - just to get others to agree to your character concept.

And the stunned condition in 4e is applied to the caster - they are actually serious about pacifist clerics.




> Glory be!  A bit of actual fluff in 3.X that matches fluff somewhere else.  And a drawback for spellcasting.  And that depends how many surges you have left.
> 
> I'm impressed - you've actually found some decent flavour.




Between the wreck of the Realms, the complete shift of the planar paradigm, and the obsession with Points of Light... What fluff did 4e take with it from earlier editions?



> Now I'm just amused. There were over 50 books published for 3.5 that were generic and dealing with player side information, and however many Realms and Ebberon books there were.  Between all those 50 you fail?  And you are claiming that "a unicorn is a core part of the character concept" and want to slap my straight down the line barbarian with psionics?




Your barbarian isn't exactly 'straight down' in any form save for 4e.  But again, I don't think you understand how 3.x works due to your blatant disregard for how 3.x works.




> Hell, we'll try an easy one.  Fighter.  The 4e fighter gets up into the face of his foes and mechanically makes attacking someone else a bad idea.  Also he's fast enough to get a free attack when someone tries to 5 foot step away and if they try to walk past his opportunity attack stops them cold.  He owns the space around him and anyone who he focusses on in that space.  Make me a 3.5 character who owns the space around him the way a basic 4e fighter does even before we start getting into build details.  No magic.




Again, just because your fighter does things that are labeled differently in editions does not make it somehow the paragon of fighterly virtue.


I've gotten tired of the conversation as you seem to just be mad at all of this fun we're having.  I get it... Maybe 3.x was too difficult for you to grasp, or your tendencies to destroy a system too difficult to ignore.  The fact is that 4e has become sort of a lead balloon regarding play, and couldn't sell the 100 or so books 3.x did reliably.

IYou have about 14 months.  Then welcome to being a neogrog.

Slainte,

-Loonook.


----------



## Neonchameleon (Dec 1, 2012)

Luce said:


> Gentle people (and DMs ), while I appreciate your input it seems to me that we had become mired in yet another 3e vs e4e debate. My original intention was for the discussion to be more encompassing of all published editions. So if you are familiar with say Homes edition and wants to chime in, by all means do so.
> 
> 
> IME 2e philosophy was :"Here are the official rules. We use those for sake of consistency if we have to play tournaments and living campaigns. Feel free to do otherwise." As I said before in this tread I want to beyond what the rule are and focus on how the game was played. The experience will undoubtedly vary based on the individual experiences. But (hopefully) that will still be a insightful discussion.
> ...


----------



## Manbearcat (Dec 1, 2012)

KaiiLurker said:


> 1) where is the unicorn?, the unicorn is an important part of the character.




Fey Beast Tamer Theme - Unicorn Destrier as companion/familiar/mount (whatever it is that you're looking for).

I'm sure I can sort out the other concerns.  I'm thinking this character might be better served as a Priest/Malediction Invoker (with all non-damaging rebuke/control effects that hurt the Invoker).


----------



## Neonchameleon (Dec 1, 2012)

Loonook said:


> You don't seem to understand that spells are a part of the system that can be excised and not looked at at all.  But again, I'm not expecting much out of meeting anywhere near each other.




Do you genuinely think there are any rules involved in 3.X?  Or is it really a case of "Make things up as you go along and by the way we've sold you a set of rulebooks for no particular reason".  Because that's what you appear to be arguing.

You are yourself admitting that the rules of 3.5 as presented are not fit for purposeevery time you suggest house rules.



> Your need for kinesthesia aside, this doesn't make your need for vehement agression apparent.




I get aggressive when people _lie_ about 4e or assign to it things it doesn't have.  Stop trying to define what it is when it is blatantly obvious you don't understand it



> Rules for ritual casting and incantations exist as options in D&D (see: UA).  Again, I understand you must let the hate flow, but don't be willfully obtuse about the edition to 'make your point'.




From the person who defined 4e as Ikea - and then proceeded to snap together an Ikea-style silly combination for a PC this has a lot of irony.



> And that is how it should be.  Slapping a bit of extra Lightning damage and the occasional Daily swap instead of a bit of fire damage and the occasional Daily swap isn't exactly rocket science.  Your Lightning barbarian is just a new shade of Koopa Troopa.




And the thunder?  His roars which get answered by lightning?



> Orangutan.




Worse and worse.



> No, it's the essence of the carpentry concept.  I have the tools to create a balanced elemental barbarian class




Balanced against _what?_  A 3.X druid?  A 3.X Monk?

As the two are spectacularly badly balanced against each other, I'm going to say no you don't.

And the carpentry concept is apparently another way of saying "This game sucks and the parts I was sold are not fit for purpose".



> Yet somehow more people and more new players still play 3.x and PF.




Citation needed for new players.



> Odd that.




There's little 4e did right at the launch.  The books were badly playtested, Keep on the Shadowfell might just be the worst introductory adventure ever, and the errata was needed because 4e was thrown together in a year after they threw out Orcus for being terrible.



> And what is bothersome is that 4e players cannot understand that their game isn't all that it is cracked up to be.




Oh, 4e players understand what 4e does well and what it does badly.  It's superb where it rocks - but if you want fast combat or non-adventurers or a gritty game, find something else.



> Thus why we're coming up with a new edition that's mostly 3.x with some vague notions from 4e, 2e, etc.




Mostly 3.X?  I'm seeing more of a 2e influence.



> Between the wreck of the Realms, the complete shift of the planar paradigm, and the obsession with Points of Light... What fluff did 4e take with it from earlier editions?




Ebberon.  Dark Sun.  Most of the Gods.  Most of the archetypes.



> Your barbarian isn't exactly 'straight down' in any form save for 4e.  But again, I don't think you understand how 3.x works due to your blatant disregard for how 3.x works.




If I listen to you, 3.X "works" by homebrewing to make up for its deficiencies.



> Again, just because your fighter does things that are labeled differently in editions does not make it somehow the paragon of fighterly virtue.




Admission of failure I see.  You know you can't match it - and it's a clear way of doing something.



> I've gotten tired of the conversation as you seem to just be mad at all of this fun we're having.  I get it...




No you don't.  I get mad when people persistantly spread distortions.  It started with Luce lumping 3e and 4e into one box when they are at very different ends of the spectrum.    I also consider bad game design to have to fix the designer's oversights - the amount of time you have spent running down 3.X and saying "well you could homebrew" in this thread is quite spectacular.

And I get why you are mad.  4e came out and yours was no longer the main game in town.



> Maybe 3.x was too difficult for you to grasp,




Maybe it wasn't.  It's trying to recreate GURPS Fantasy's design assumptions in a D&D framework.  And the better you get it the worse it looks.  And the less you know other games the better it looks.



> or your tendencies to destroy a system too difficult to ignore.




Now there's irony.  I ignore 3.X until people start comparing it to 4e.  Or worse yet trying to lump the two together.



> The fact is that 4e has become sort of a lead balloon regarding play, and couldn't sell the 100 or so books 3.x did reliably.




It didn't try as far as I know.  And if you release a product a year early right into the teeth of a recession with improper playtesting, bad advertising, bad explanations, rules which don't work (the DMG skill challenge rules), a Monster Manual you literally have to replace because it's in many ways terrible, an online initiative that's crippled by a murder/suicide, and the introductory module being the Keep on the Shadowfell (probably worse than The Forest Oracle), and follow that up by pissing off your magazine publisher and almost all the third party publishers it's not surprising it does comparatively badly.  To add insult to injury, having your rules and most of your content for the edition you are trying to pull available legally for free in a way that can be reused is just asking for trouble.



> You have about 14 months.  Then welcome to being a neogrog.




Or just not bothering with ENWorld or D&D forums, as is far more likely.


----------



## Neonchameleon (Dec 1, 2012)

Manbearcat said:


> Fey Beast Tamer Theme - Unicorn Destrier as companion/familiar/mount (whatever it is that you're looking for).
> 
> I'm sure I can sort out the other concerns.  I'm thinking this character might be better served as a Priest/Malediction Invoker (with all non-damaging rebuke/control effects that hurt the Invoker).




I don't think Malediction Invokers have much in the way of non-damaging control effects.


----------



## Manbearcat (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> I don't think Malediction Invokers have much in the way of non-damaging control effects.




I just checked and you're correct. There are a few, but not enough to spread around in all the encounter power levels (which, of course, you don' need for hybrid). 

Preservation might be a better route. However, I'm not sure it matters to be honest. I was just trying to find all the "Feedback" powers that hurt you in the Invoker line. They're a bit all over the place and don't require Malediction. The biggest problem is no At-Will power that is just either (i) a catch-22 with no direct damage or (ii) no damage and just a negative status effect or slide, etc. 

As far as Encounters go, these are levels 1, 3 and 7 that are either (i) a catch-22 with no direct damage or (ii) no damage and just a negative status effect or slide, etc:

Whispers of Defeat
Symbol of the Broken Sword
Offering of Justice
Written in Fire
Death's Dread Whisper

As far as Dailies go, there are plenty about that are just negative status affects or summonings (therefore no direct damage). 

Might just be best to multi-class Invoker and power swap a few invocations that harm you when you invoke their power.  Between power swapping Cleric and Invoker, you should be able to find enough non-damaging powers and one or two that hurts you upon invoking it.


----------



## Loonook (Dec 1, 2012)

Neonchameleon said:


> Do you genuinely think there are any rules involved in 3.X?  Or is it really a case of "Make things up as you go along and by the way we've sold you a set of rulebooks for no particular reason".  Because that's what you appear to be arguing.
> 
> You are yourself admitting that the rules of 3.5 as presented are not fit for purposeevery time you suggest house rules.




No... I'm admitting that, in the case you don't want Vancian magic?  You have options.  Let us try to find a version of 4e where Vancian casting exists.  How about skill-based combat and casting?  What about spell points?

Again.  The flexibility of the OGL's material allows for the game to go in the path it wants.




> I get aggressive when people _lie_ about 4e or assign to it things it doesn't have.  Stop trying to define what it is when it is blatantly obvious you don't understand it




I've played 4e.  I've even run a few 4e games, including a 20 session campaign.  The game, short of deciding to paint those shells, is not really able to go outside of its very specific, very focused nature.  




> From the person who defined 4e as Ikea - and then proceeded to snap together an Ikea-style silly combination for a PC this has a lot of irony.




Yes.  As we all know Ikea allows you to take the handles off of this bureau, the shelving off of this bookcase, the structure of this TV stand...

I feel you're missing the point of a metaphor that everyone else is getting.



> And the thunder?  His roars which get answered by lightning?




When they activate that magic item or ability they howl.  Not exactly rocket science.



> Worse and worse.




And that's like your opinion man.



> Balanced against _what?_  A 3.X druid?  A 3.X Monk?
> 
> As the two are spectacularly badly balanced against each other, I'm going to say no you don't.




Oh noes! Classes can do more or less than each other?  Now, I understand that playing a character who doesn't automatically hurl fire or fart thunder as a fighter may be upsetting.

Some of us don't need that, and build functioning characters.




> Citation needed for new players.




I've been in five different states in the time since 4e came out.  I usually check out FLGS as I go through, and when I settle down I check out all available shops within driving range to see which will be my home shop.

I have seen 2 4e games posted on bulletin boards.  Now, that may just be anecdotal so let us go to something that is observable; a simple check of PBP forums.  

Now, I went to Myth-Weavers because it has the easiest board to search, and keeps track of activity and involvement.  Green-Yellow-Red system, pretty easy to figure out.  I cut out Red because it just becomes more of a landslide, but here are the numbers:



			
				From Myth Weavers said:
			
		

> *Pathfinder*
> [*]12 green games
> [*]42 yellow games​
> *3.5*
> ...






> There's little 4e did right at the launch.  The books were badly playtested, Keep on the Shadowfell might just be the worst introductory adventure ever, and the errata was needed because 4e was thrown together in a year after they threw out Orcus for being terrible.




Yep.  Then they got a professional errata team to fix the glitches... Something not offered to 3.x.  Which was then dealt with through... House rules? Like every other edition?




> Oh, 4e players understand what 4e does well and what it does badly.  It's superb where it rocks - but if you want fast combat or non-adventurers or a gritty game, find something else.




All of these things can be done with 3.x and perhaps an OGL sourcebook/simple house rules.

And it doesn't break the system.





> Ebberon.  Dark Sun.  Most of the Gods.  Most of the archetypes.




So they got the stuff done right in previous editions.  Got it.




> If I listen to you, 3.X "works" by homebrewing to make up for its deficiencies.




If I need to change something, I can change it without worrying about starting a roll of dominoes.  Yes.



> Admission of failure I see.  You know you can't match it - and it's a clear way of doing something.




Uhhuh.




> No you don't.  I get mad when people persistantly spread distortions.  It started with Luce lumping 3e and 4e into one box when they are at very different ends of the spectrum.    I also consider bad game design to have to fix the designer's oversights - the amount of time you have spent running down 3.X and saying "well you could homebrew" in this thread is quite spectacular.




When we disagree with a specific ruling, we can choose to alter it.  The obsession with RAW is just silly.




> And I get why you are mad.  4e came out and yours was no longer the main game in town.




Which is odd considering I'm one of three guys who I know who has run/runs 4e IRL, and about a dozen who run anything OTHER than 4e.

And, you know, the numbers.



> Maybe it wasn't.  It's trying to recreate GURPS Fantasy's design assumptions in a D&D framework.  And the better you get it the worse it looks.  And the less you know other games the better it looks.




Uhhuh.  




> Now there's irony.  I ignore 3.X until people start comparing it to 4e.  Or worse yet trying to lump the two together.




And it gets in your craw.  As I have explained, 4e does what it does... But it isn't anywhere near the coverage of 3x and the resultant d20 system.




> It didn't try as far as I know.  And if you release a product a year early right into the teeth of a recession with improper playtesting, bad advertising, bad explanations, rules which don't work (the DMG skill challenge rules), a Monster Manual you literally have to replace because it's in many ways terrible, an online initiative that's crippled by a murder/suicide, and the introductory module being the Keep on the Shadowfell (probably worse than The Forest Oracle), and follow that up by pissing off your magazine publisher and almost all the third party publishers it's not surprising it does comparatively badly.  To add insult to injury, having your rules and most of your content for the edition you are trying to pull available legally for free in a way that can be reused is just asking for trouble.




So you're blaming 4e's failures on the economy?  It's odd that OD&D took off with that whole recession thing going on.




> Or just not bothering with ENWorld or D&D forums, as is far more likely.




Ahh, the 'take your ball and go home' style.  Excellent!  Like people who claim they will leave their country if X happens, it almost never happens. 

And when it does no one mourns. 

I see the beginnings of the neogrog forming.  The obsession with beating on other 'impure' editions, the anger, the fear.  Let it all flow.

But 4e has the most reverse grognards I have ever seen during my time in gaming... And I've seen quite a few major changes to other RPGs.  You have your fun, but we don't find it intriguing... So you need to fight against it.

Again I used to be like you.  Let it go.

Slainte,

-Loonook.


----------



## pemerton (Dec 2, 2012)

JamesonCourage said:


> Is there any system that has rules for placing NPCs, monsters, cities, etc. _before_ the game starts? I'm curious, because I'd probably use that system on the fly for a lot of stuff.



It's a bit tangential, and works at a more abstract level than you're looking for, I think, but are you familiar with the world and economy generation rules from Classic Traveller (found in Book 3, Book 6 and Book 7)?

Also, [MENTION=26473]The Shaman[/MENTION] (I think) no longer posts on this board, but used to talk about world and situation-generating mechancis for his Flashing Blades game. I don't know if those mechanics are found in Flashing Blades, though, or if The Shaman made them up himself.


----------



## pemerton (Dec 2, 2012)

Stormonu said:


> Grey Mouser is also in the 1E Legends and Lore/Deities & Demigods.



But not in a form which is a legal PC build, as per the AD&D rules.



Neonchameleon said:


> That was the 2e version of him - and the reason he was an epic fail is because he's certainly not that high level.



And also not legal.

At least as I understand it, you're not denying that earlier editions than 4e have the action resolution mechanics to handle the Grey Mouser, or a barbarian who roars to the heavens and is answered with thunder. You're noting that the PC build rules of those editions can't produce a Mouser, or a barbarian of the sort you describe.

Which is true of AD&D (unless your Mouser is an elven or half-elven F/M-U/T). And seems plausibly true of 3E.


----------



## pemerton (Dec 2, 2012)

Luce said:


> IME 2e philosophy was :"Here are the official rules. We use those for sake of consistency if we have to play tournaments and living campaigns. Feel free to do otherwise."
> 
> <snip>
> 
> ...



I find this a little hard to follow - are you talking about mechanics (PC build and action resolution being the main ones), story elements (what Dispater or Demogorgon may or may not be willing to agree to, for example), both, or something else that I'm missing?

I think it's fairly obvious that at a certain point many fantasy RPGers wanted to use fantasy RPGs to achieve a Dragonlance-ish heroic fantasy experience rather than a classic D&D dungeon crawling experience (whether in Tomb of Horrors and Hidden Shrine Advanced Squad Leader mode, or White Plume Mountain and Ghost Tower of Inverness freeform wackiness mode). In response to this, 2nd ed offered settings but no mechanics to support them. I think it is apparent that 2nd ed AD&D needs more jury-rigging of its PC build and action resolution mechanics if it is to work than (say) 4e does. The 2nd ed rulebooks come right out and tell the GM to suspend the mechanics for the sake of the story (in my own view the worst GMing advice of all time, but many people seem to like it).

From my (slightly distant) point of view 3E seems to have offered PC build rules and a veneer of action resolution to support heroic fantasy play - creating a superficial impression that "anything is possible" - but in the realisation suffers from numerous problems, most notoriously the dominance of AD&D-style "creative spellcasting" over other avenues of action resolution.

4e, on the other hand, is the first version of D&D designed _to deliver a heroic fantasy story simply in virtue of following its mechanics_. That is part of the indie-ness of 4e, and its relationship to "story now" gaming.

There is a question as to whether it succeeds at this or not. Some people find it fails because the combat is grindy rather than heroic. Others aren't interested in its particular flavour of heroic fantasy (typically because they find it too gonzo). But whether or not it succeeds or fails, it is clear about what is attemting. And it is something different from any other version of D&D.

Of course, for those who don't _want_ the action resolution rules, in and of themselves, to deliver story via their application, the whole 4e project will be unwanted. These would be the same sorts of players who think that The Riddle of Steel would be great if not for its Spiritual Attributes mechanics, who can't see what The Burning Wheel offers that Runequest doesn't (after all, both a class-and-level-less, low(ish)-magic, skill-based games where combat is gritty and PC advancement is based on either doing or training), and who think that it's silly that a PC might perform with mechanical advantage in a particular situation just because the player of that PC is more invested in that situation.

But for those who like 4e and what it attempts, even if they disagree on how successful it has ultimately been, it makes no sense to regard it as a virtue that the GM has to house rule and fiat basic features of the system. If the whole point of the system is to deliver story by play, how is it anything but a failure for the GM to have to fiat it - GMs have been delivering stories by fiat ever since the first group suffered through someone's crappy railroad.

Story elements, on the other hand, are a completely different matter from mechanics. It's of the essence of a system like D&D that the content of the story - and hence the ultmate status of story elements like Demogorgon and Dispater - is not settled until actually produced via play. So a 4e GM who fiats the resolution engine in order to proudce outcomes that keep the fiction in conformity with canon and metaplot has (in my view) fundamentally misunderstood what the game is for.

Hence my puzzlement at, and objection to, the response to Chris Perkins's game that I posted upthread. In a 4e game, _no one knows_ how paranoid Dispater really is, and how that will affect his behaviour, until the skill challenge has been played out. It turns out that, in Perkins's game, Dispater wasn't as unwilling to make deals as someone who had only read the backstory might think. That's "story now" for you!


----------



## JamesonCourage (Dec 2, 2012)

pemerton said:


> It's a bit tangential, and works at a more abstract level than you're looking for, I think, but are you familiar with the world and economy generation rules from Classic Traveller (found in Book 3, Book 6 and Book 7)?



I am not familiar with it. I'm 27 years old, and got into official RPGs at around age 17, so just before 3.5 released. I haven't even seen those books in person. I love the sounds of rolling up a character, though! I'll comment on the "abstract" portion in a second.


pemerton said:


> Also, [MENTION=26473]The Shaman[/MENTION] (I think) no longer posts on this board, but used to talk about world and situation-generating mechancis for his Flashing Blades game. I don't know if those mechanics are found in Flashing Blades, though, or if The Shaman made them up himself.



I think he stopped posting, too. However, he used the Mythic - Game Master Emulator books a lot for random rolls. I made a system that's similar to that, which is very abstract in nature. It works well, too, so I'm glad you mentioned The Shaman. I was just curious if there was something more rules-intensive, or if things were basically GM fiat. I'm okay with GM fiat and abstract rolls for me to interpret, personally, but I'm still really interested in something more hard-coded. Thanks for the reply, pemerton. As always, play what you like


----------



## Manbearcat (Dec 2, 2012)

KaiiLurker said:


> But tell me how do you create the equivalent of an exalted healer on 4e? (someone who contributes to party survivability in the wild, exudes healing, putting characters who also dabble on offensive magic to shame whern it comes to actually mending wounds and in a pinch can turn use her own blood to heal others, who can make creatures regrow limbs, cure illnesses and affections eventually brings back people from being actually dead in mere seconds, that no matter what other members on the party do, if she causes damage she contributes to that creature being subdued instead of being dead, and that eventually gets a unicorn companion who does actually fight, and most importantly she has to do all of that while playing differently than a cleric would, a skimisher more than a front-liner). Tell me how can you build something like that on 4e just by reskinning? (3.5 is just a base class pluss four feats)




Alright, I wanted to take a shot at this just for fun.  I didn't include a race (or any of the features that would come with it) as you didn't outline it.  I made the character level 16 to run it through its Paragon Features (you can make it considerably earlier...I just arbitrarily chose 16).  

This build does the following:

- Gets a unicorn companion that actually does fight and aids the character and its companions with a <Healing Keyword> Encounter Power.
- Is a skirmisher rather than a front-liner.  Has standard + 2 defense bonus against Opportunity Attacks and can augment that up 1/Encounter to probably + 6 or so (Rogue Multi-Class).  If you go with Agile Escape (lvl 2 Rogue Utility), you'd have more battlefield mobility.  Can remove movement impairing effects on self or others (Holy Celerity).
- Has the Background, Skills and Rituals to navigate the wilderness and do well more than contribute to a party's survival (complete stand in for a Ranger or Druid).
- Exudes Healing.  Has both amazing Healing skill from mundane application in the field in combat (Combat Medic), mundane Ritual item creation (antivenoms, potions, poultices), and amazing mundane care abilities for the sick and afflicted (Herbalist + Rituals).  Has amazing Divine Healing that is far, far beyond the standard for a Priest.  What's more, through Love and Sacrifice (Domains), can suffer and sacrifice in the stead of others; further augmenting healing effects and allowing saves or removing afflictions - while taking damage and suffering afflictions.
- Can bring back people from the dead (Raise Dead) and in mere seconds (Combat Medic, Loving Sacrifice, Unexpected Return)
- Can do all of this while doing no physical damage to enemies that would contribute to them being dead.

*Class*:  Cleric (Templar), Multiclass Rogue 
*
Level*:  16
*
Features*: Channel Divinity <Healer's Mercy>, Healer's Lore, Healing Word, Ritual Casting
*
Background*:  Wilderness Guide - Nature
*
Theme*:  Fey Beast Tamer - Gain Unicorn Destrier Companion
*
Paragon Path*:  Compassionate Healer Paragon Path - All manner of powers and abilities that lets you augment your healing to others by your own vitality; spending surges in their stead, taking damage in their stead, taking damage to provide further HPs and defense bonuses, forcing weakened on your enemies when they damage your allies and taking the damage and conditions that your allies would take.

*Feats*:  Loving Sacrifice <Channel Divinity>, Power of Love <Recovery Strike>, Pacifist Healer, Saving Grace, Restful Healing, Combat Medic, Sly Dodge (Rogue Multiclass), Defensive Mobility, Herbalist

*Skills*:  Arcana, Bluff, Diplomacy, Heal, Nature, Religion

*Rituals*:  

Nature - Antivenom, Pass Without Trace, Hunter's Blessing, Travel Sense
Create Campsite, Traveler's Camouflage, Tracker's Eye, Survivor's Preparation, Herbal Poultice, Snare, Speak with Nature, Call Wilderness Guide, Trailblaze

Heal - Woundpatch, Delay Affliction, Remove Affliction, Cure Disease, Raise Dead

Arcana/Religion - Purify Water, Brew Potion, Protection from Energy, Fantastic Recuperation

*Powers*

At-Will Attack:  Astral Seal, Recovery Strike (Power of Love Augmented)

Encounter Attack:  Hymn of Resurgence, Price of Violence, Remorse

Daily Attack:  Consecrated Ground, Dismissal, Aura of Astral Radiance

Utility:  Life Transference or Agile Footwork (Rogue), Holy Celerity, Word of Vigor, Unexpected Return


----------



## Stormonu (Dec 2, 2012)

pemerton said:


> But not in a form which is a legal PC build, as per the AD&D rules.
> 
> And also not legal.
> 
> ...




What's not legal about the 1E build?  Does he not meet the ability requirements for dual classing?


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (Dec 2, 2012)

I was wondering the same myself, but not so much that I have actually wandered across the all-but impossible distance to my upstairs den where my RPG books are located...

Waiting to see evidence that I need to, that this isn't a claim born of a slight misunderstanding or lack of familiarity with the AD&D or 2Ed rules.


----------



## Neonchameleon (Dec 2, 2012)

Loonook said:


> No... I'm admitting that, in the case you don't want Vancian magic?  You have options.  Let us try to find a version of 4e where Vancian casting exists.  How about skill-based combat and casting?  What about spell points?




You just don't get it, do you.

4e does not hard code the justifications for the limits into the system anywhere.  Which means if you want to play a wizard who thematically casts as a Vancian mage you can - and the mechanics does not get in the way of this.  If you want to play a wizard who is skillful and magic is a reflection of his skill it's not hardcoded and 4e doesn't get in the way of this.

By mandating the method as opposed to the outcome, the methods used are restricted.  If you only deal with the outcome then there are few methods that are incompatable with given character concepts.

So Vancian Casting exists in RAW 4e.  So does skill based casting (and if you want to make skill rolls, there's the entire ritual system to do it in).  It's only process-sim games where this is a problem.



> Again.  The flexibility of the OGL's material allows for the game to go in the path it wants.




You mean "Because we have the OGL we can house rule".  Good to know you need permission for that.



> I've played 4e.  I've even run a few 4e games, including a 20 session campaign.  The game, short of deciding to paint those shells, is not really able to go outside of its very specific, very focused nature.




Political intrigue?  A team running a con on someone?  Because I've run both those in 4e and there are explicit reasons why both worked better than they would in 3.X (skill challenge systems, more versatile PCs, less overwhelming magic) or better than they would in e.g. GURPS - although not as well as they would in Spirit of the Century or Leverage.  The 4e niche it does well is "Team of action focussed adventurers".



> Yes.  As we all know Ikea allows you to take the handles off of this bureau, the shelving off of this bookcase, the structure of this TV stand...




Which is the 3.X approach you seem to advocate.

The 4e approach is lego - all the parts fit together and you are intended to create something interesting witht hem rather than just what you bought.



> I feel you're missing the point of a metaphor that everyone else is getting.




No.  I'm pointing out that the metaphor shows you just don't get the versatility of 4e.



> When they activate that magic item or ability they howl.  Not exactly rocket science.




And the howl causes enemies to recoil, to take damage, and to run away?  Start with "Heavy metal Barbarian" as your character concept.



> And that's like your opinion man.




You started the "That's a bad character concept".



> Oh noes! Classes can do more or less than each other?  Now, I understand that playing a character who doesn't automatically hurl fire or fart thunder as a fighter may be upsetting.




And now you're explicitely strawmanning.  My point stands - if characters aren't balanced against each other then balancing them becomes meaningless.



> Some of us don't need that, and build functioning characters.




Oh, you can build functioning characters in 3.X.  But you made a claim about balanced ones - with the difference between a druid and a monk, talking about balanced ones is almost meaningless.



> Yep.  Then they got a professional errata team to fix the glitches... Something not offered to 3.x.




*snicker*

They pulled 3.0 off the shelves after two and a half years, replacing it with an edition that had a significant (although not sufficent) number of bugfixes.  One of the reasons for the errata team was so they didn't have to do that again.  Claiming that 3.X wasn't offered a bugfix when it was offered _an entire new edition with many of the most blatant problems fixed_ (and new ones added) is ... revisionist.



> Which was then dealt with through... House rules? Like every other edition?




And unlike most RPGs that I consider well designed.  



> All of these things can be done with 3.x and perhaps an OGL sourcebook/simple house rules.
> 
> And it doesn't break the system.




All can be done _badly_ by 3.X and house rules.  That much I'll grant.



> So they got the stuff done right in previous editions.  Got it.




Let's run through this again to show just how the goalposts are shifting.

You: What fluff did 4e take with it from earlier editions? 			 		
Me: [Stuff]
You: So they got the stuff done right in previous editions.  Got it.

And yes they did.  Your own words.

They then threw out the bits that caused arguments at the table and made little sense outside Planescape with its Philosophers-with-Clubs like the Great Wheel, and made a mistake by throwing out the Realms fluff for whatever reason; although I detest the Realms and prefer the new stuff, there are groups of people who like the Realms and it serves that need.  I'd prefer Ebberon and the Vale - but the Realms shouldn't have been torn up.



> If I need to change something, I can change it without worrying about starting a roll of dominoes.  Yes.




You are talking about 4e here?  Rather than the edition with Polymorph and Shapechange taking the stats of monsters so you can't even unleash a poor monster like the Sarrukh on the world without the PCs stealing its stats - hence Pun-Pun.

On the other hand I could add a monster like the Sarrukh to 4e with literally no problem at all - the bits of the game that would be changed are shifted.

You are therefore objectively wrong about this claim (as usual).  You don't normally break stuff by changing the rules in 4e - and for reasons like the pervasive magic system you often can in 3.X.  But the misunderstanding is a common one and there's a good reason behind it.  The 4e rules are elegant - and against them half-baked houserules simply look half baked.  With a system that let the 3.5 Diplomacy rules go to print and in which Toughness was considered a feat worth printing you aren't going to have a set of house rules look bad.



> When we disagree with a specific ruling, we can choose to alter it.  The obsession with RAW is just silly.




You appear to be the incarnation of the Oberoni Fallacy.  RAW is what I paid money for.



> Which is odd considering I'm one of three guys who I know who has run/runs 4e IRL, and about a dozen who run anything OTHER than 4e.
> 
> And, you know, the numbers.




Given the amount of  spread about 4e, the community separated.  That you've given 4e a try and not understood it is better than many, I agree.



> And it gets in your craw.  As I have explained, 4e does what it does... But it isn't anywhere near the coverage of 3x and the resultant d20 system.




And I've challenged you on this in a number of ways.  You just keep repeating assertions.  Or do you mean that there isn't the OGL boom?



> So you're blaming 4e's failures on the economy?  It's odd that OD&D took off with that whole recession thing going on.




I gave at least half a dozen different reasons 4e has problems including the playtesting and the marketing.  The economy is just one part of it.  For you to pick out a single point and say "You're blaming one thing" and to then make an unlike with unlike comparison is deceptive.  (TSR were thought to be insane for producing a few hundred brown box sets - 4e is orders of magnitude bigger than that although neither it nor 3.X reached the 80s high as far as I know).



> Ahh, the 'take your ball and go home' style.  Excellent!  Like people who claim they will leave their country if X happens, it almost never happens.




Believe it or not I wasn't a member of ENWorld until about six months after I started playing 4e regularly.  I was, however, a member of RPG.net for many years before that.  Because it was about games I was interested in.



> I see the beginnings of the neogrog forming.  The obsession with beating on other 'impure' editions, the anger, the fear.  Let it all flow.
> 
> But 4e has the most reverse grognards I have ever seen during my time in gaming... And I've seen quite a few major changes to other RPGs.  You have your fun, but we don't find it intriguing... So you need to fight against it.
> 
> Again I used to be like you.  Let it go.




Hint: You are spending thousands of words to run down a game you don't like and seem absolutely obsessed with it.  I suggest you take your own advice - becuase it's the first good advice you've given in this thread.


----------



## Hussar (Dec 8, 2012)

Luce said:


> Gentle people (and DMs ), while I appreciate your input it seems to me that we had become mired in yet another 3e vs e4e debate. My original intention was for the discussion to be more encompassing of all published editions. So if you are familiar with say Homes edition and wants to chime in, by all means do so.
> 
> 
> 
> ...




This is ballocks.  The DM's of 3e were no more or less beholden to canon than any other edition.  I challenge you to show me a single, solitary piece of advice in any WOTC publication that states anything remotely close to, "it was expected for the DM to retro change his narrative in order to preserve consistency".  This is simply not true.

Hey, I'm not the biggest fan of 3e, but, let's not start making stuff up to complain about.  I had players in 2e challenge me on canon elements.  For example, I had a player complain that I used a monster in a particular area, when the monster manual clearly states that said monster lives in another area.  So, IME, it's hardly a new thing at all.

I would also advise you to peruse 2e modules if you think that canon is not king in 2e.  Never mind the entire Planescape and Spelljammer lines which were massive canon metaplots that overarched every TSR setting.  

DM fiat was accepted to some degree in 2e because 2e mechanics didn't cover a large number of pretty basic game interactions.  Want to bluff the guard?  DM fiat and free form roleplay because 2e had virtually no mechanics to help you here.  It has nothing to do with players being any different then than today.


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## Luce (Dec 8, 2012)

Talking about 3e.
I did write IME (in my experience). I did not see  in 2e people getting out source books to show the DM his is wrong. On  the other hand despite what 3e DMG states about "This may be an official  setting, but it is my game" I distinctively remember players referring  to setting wikis and the (then) DM accepting the correction.       But  in a way that is my point, some people do play by changing the rules to  make their game better. It is just that for a long time, me personally  and others who I gamed with were led to believieve by the clean up rules  that there is one and only one way to play the game. RAW. It is clearly  fallowing on my part that I did not notice this sooner, but the way the  books are written there is a clear set expectations. By that level you  have to be this tall to adventure, have so much magic items, access to  such and such spells and resources and so on. That is fine, but not  everyone abides to those expectations. Even if you play by RAW,  depending on the permitted source books, balances and experiences  between groups can vary. Furthermore,  one of the distinct feature of 3e  is the 3pp. Many of the 3e groups I had experience with, did indeed  adopt rules and materials from one or more 3 party sources in their games.
In  the end that created games that are balanced within themselves, but not  universally so across the gamespace. And that is fine as long as there  is fun to be had.


----------



## Hussar (Dec 10, 2012)

Luce said:


> Talking about 3e.
> I did write IME (in my experience). I did not see  in 2e people getting out source books to show the DM his is wrong. On  the other hand despite what 3e DMG states about "This may be an official  setting, but it is my game" I distinctively remember players referring  to setting wikis and the (then) DM accepting the correction.       But  in a way that is my point, some people do play by changing the rules to  make their game better. It is just that for a long time, me personally  and others who I gamed with were led to believieve by the clean up rules  that there is one and only one way to play the game. RAW. It is clearly  fallowing on my part that I did not notice this sooner, but the way the  books are written there is a clear set expectations. By that level you  have to be this tall to adventure, have so much magic items, access to  such and such spells and resources and so on. That is fine, but not  everyone abides to those expectations. Even if you play by RAW,  depending on the permitted source books, balances and experiences  between groups can vary. Furthermore,  one of the distinct feature of 3e  is the 3pp. Many of the 3e groups I had experience with, did indeed  adopt rules and materials from one or more 3 party sources in their games.
> In  the end that created games that are balanced within themselves, but not  universally so across the gamespace. And that is fine as long as there  is fun to be had.




Again, you're ignoring what's actually there.  Look at EVERY module ever produced for D&D.  They all have a level range.  You can go all the way back to the very first modules, and you'll see that you have to be "this tall to adventure, have so much magic items" and so on.  There's a reason that the 1e (and 2e IIRC) paladin were restricted to TEN magic items.  Everyone was expected to have more than that in fairly short order.  A quick look at the treasure tables in AD&D shows that you've got about a 10% chance (give or take) for 3 magic items with every lair.  Sure, it might be higher or lower, but, that's a decent estimate.  How many lairs will you clear per level?  Easily 5, and probably 10 - note, lair could be as small as a single ogre, although it could be much larger when we deal with humanoids.  It's not unreasonable that the party is gaining 3-5 magic items per level.

Now, as far as 3pp goes, I'm somewhat ambivalent.  For one, a lot of the 3pp material was very, very bad.  The gems shine by comparison.  But, even though I personally bough in pretty heavily into 3pp, I was generally the only one.  And I could very rarely entice anyone to join in.  It was WOTC or nothing.  And, let's not forget, that the basic advice whenever anyone was having problems with 3e was, "Core only".  No one ever said, "Hey, you're having problems with 3e, you should start using lots of 3pp, that'll help".  

I think that the 3pp material was far less prevalent at tables than might be assumed on a messageboard.  

But, in any case, I think that you are really not looking at the history of the game objectively.  Sure, you can chuck in an IME on your idea, but, then, okay, my question becomes, "So what?"  If it's only your experience, then you cannot make any broader statement, nor can you use your experience to make statements about how the game was played.  In other words, if you think that 3e DM's were more beholden to canon than other edition DM's, show me some proof beyond your group.  Otherwise, your idea has some pretty large holes in it.


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## I'm A Banana (Dec 13, 2012)

Loonook said:
			
		

> And what is bothersome is that 4e players cannot understand that their game isn't all that it is cracked up to be.






			
				Neonchameleon said:
			
		

> You just don't get it, do you.






			
				Hussar said:
			
		

> This is ballocks.




*BOYS AND GIRLS*, if you cannot stop fighting, I WILL pull this thread over and you will be WALKING home. I don't care if it's raining blood!


----------



## pemerton (Dec 14, 2012)

Stormonu said:


> What's not legal about the 1E build?  Does he not meet the ability requirements for dual classing?



For a start, he has more than two classes, which is not permitted under the AD&D (1st ed) rules for _the character with two classes_.

I can't remember the Mouser's stats in DDG, but even if the illegal number of classes is disregarded, there would need to be a 15 in one of STR, DEX or INT (depending on 1st class) and a 17 in the other two.



Dannyalcatraz said:


> Waiting to see evidence that I need to, that this isn't a claim born of a slight misunderstanding or lack of familiarity with the AD&D or 2Ed rules.



I'll leave 2nd end AD&D to others, but I've got a pretty good working knowledge of the AD&D rules, based on both playing and GMing.


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (Dec 14, 2012)

> For a start, he has more than two classes, which is not permitted under the AD&D (1st ed) rules for the character with two classes.




You're taking that "character with two classes" language more literally than they intended.

The requirements are simply these:



> 1Ed PHB p33
> In order to switch from one class to another, the character must have an ability score of 15 or more in the principle attribute(s) ability of the original class and a 17 or 18 in the principle attribute(s) of the class changed to.  Note that nearly any combination of classes is thus possible...Alignment will preclude some combinations.




And the reason that I know you're misinterpreting the language in question is the rules to become a Bard in 1Ed:



> 1Ed PHB p117
> Bards begin play as Fighters, and they must remain exclusively fighters until they have achieved at least the5th level of experience.  Anytime thereafter, and in any event prior to attaining the 8th level, they must change their class to that of thieves.  Again, sometime between 5th and 9th level of ability, bards must leave off thieving and begin clerical studies as Druids; but at this time, they are actually bards and under druidical tutelage.




As for his stats, he has Str16, Int18, and Dex19 (D&Dg p97)- assuming he started as a fighter, there's nothing illegal in the build.  Given the way he lives, it is unlikely he'll progress beyond MU 3rd, though.

Fafhrd, OTOH, is more interesting, because he is a Bard.  Why is that interesting?

Because:

1) He's a ranger, not a fighter, making it clear that they interpreted language in the PHB referring to "fighter" in the bard section meant any subclass of fighter.*

2) He has too many levels of Ranger, and his stats definitely are not up to snuff




* The Arthurian section makes this same interpretation with Bards with Paladin levels...but without _any_ thieving levels!  Babylonians and Celts likewise have Bards sans thief levels, and I imagine others do as well.


----------



## pemerton (Dec 14, 2012)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> the reason that I know you're misinterpreting the language in question is the rules to become a Bard in 1Ed



Bards are an exception, in multiple respects: (i) Half Elves can be bards (but can't be "characters with two classes"); (ii) bards don't have to meet the stat requirements for dual-classing; (iii) bards can "dual-class" into a third class!


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## Dannyalcatraz (Dec 14, 2012)

I'd point out that there are lots of other humans in the D&Dg that have more than 3 classes besides those in Nehwon, but as I myself have already pointed out, many break the DC rules in some way...without being bards, FWIW.

Hiawatha is a LG Paladin, Ranger,Druid, for instance, violating the alignment restrictions.


----------



## pemerton (Dec 14, 2012)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> I'd point out that there are lots of other humans in the D&Dg that have more than 3 classes besides those in Nehwon



Yes. In my view they're not rules legal, for multiple reasons (including the stat issues that you mentioned).

I also assume that at least some of the DDG entities can cast their MU spells while armoured - the gods, at least, if not also the heroes.

Another respect in which the humans in the DMG break the rules is that, as heroes, they all have excellent saves - 3+ on a d20, from memory.


----------



## Dannyalcatraz (Dec 14, 2012)

> I also assume that at least some of the DDG entities can cast their MU spells while armoured - the gods, at least, if not also the heroes.




oddly, the D&Dg seems silent on that.  while i would assume the Gods can do so, it is undler as to the Heroes.  (Some don't have the issue, since they are not wearing armor...)

OTOH, there are still old sources: Count Hazendel of Sunndi is listed as being C5/F8/MU8 in the Greyhawk Boxed Set.  No race is given, but Sunndi is supposedly 79% human- presumably, Hazendel is one.

That same set has personalities who have not _quite_ risen to true divinity who clearly have multiple classes without being bards and who do not conform to any known demihuman multiclassing rules- Murlynd, for instance, is a Paladin/MU/Ill, and Kelanen is a Ftr/MU/Ill/Th-Ac.

And that's Gary Gygax's work.

I wouldn't be surprised to find more such in early modules.


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## pemerton (Dec 14, 2012)

I've always assumed that the king of Sunndi is an elf or half-elf - those look like multi-class stats, to me, and those Greyhawk books use a double-slash (//) for dual-classing, as with the fighter//illusionist rulers of the Thilronian barbarian kingdoms.

As for the quasi-deities and heroes, I've always assumed that they're not rules legal too - I assume that, to the extent that they got that way in play, it was via Wishes or similar rules-breaking stuff.


----------



## Luce (May 1, 2013)

Hussar:
From http://www.escapistmagazine.com/articles/view/features/9294-The-State-of-Dungeons-Dragons-Future
"
"I have a theory about  RPGs," Mearls said. "When 2nd edition really got focused on story [in  1989], we had what I call the first era of RPG decadence and it was  based on story. The idea that the DM is going to tell you a story, and  you go from point A to point B to point C. The narrative is linear and  [the DM is a] storyteller going to tell you a static story, and you  would just get to roll dice occasionally. 3rd edition came out and said  'To Hell with that,' it's all about players, we're going to give you  some really cool options, it's all flexibility in the DM and for the  players, there's this meaningful choice.
 "I think we've hit the second era of RPG decadence, and it's gone the  opposite way," he continued. "It's all about player power now - the DM  is just the rules guy - and the DM can't contradict what the players  say. [The game] is taking away from the DM, and that's where I worry  because other types of games can do that better. I might as well play a  board game, 'cause I'm just here enforcing the rules. Without the DM as  the creative guy, what's the point?"
 Mearls admits 4th edition might have gone too far in creating a  perfectly balanced game. "We've lost faith of what makes an RPG an RPG,"  he said, admitting that in trying to please gamers with a limited  imagination, 4th edition might have punished those with an active one.  "There's this fear of the bad gaming group, where the game is so good  that even playing with a bad gaming group, you'll still have fun."
 The result of this philosophy is that, perhaps more than ever before, gamers are playing different games than the official _D&D_ coming out of the Wizards of the Coast. "What _D&D_  faces now with different editions and old school versus new school, and  3.5 versus 4th edition, it's like the comic book conundrum," Mearls  said
"

Not exactly WOTC publication, but words attributed to a lead designer.

I am not saying that is the universal truth (I have seen plenty of 2e games which were not railroads, or 3e GMs which did not abide being relegated to a position of only a referee), but there must have been enough of a discontent to warrant him making those statements.


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## pemerton (May 1, 2013)

The idea of a "second era of RPG decadence" may be true for the games Mearls plays - I wouldn't know. Or he may be engaged in producing propaganada for the game he is currently authoring - seems plausible.

But if you look at games like Burning Wheel, Marvel Heroic RP, HeroQuest revised, other indie games or games that are inspired by the indie movement, and (at least as I experience it) 4e, they have a pretty clear concetpion of the GM's role. It is not just "the rules guy".

Here's how the 4e PHB puts it (p 8):


*Adventure Builder:* The DM creates adventures (or selects premade adventures) for you and the other players to play through.


*Narrator:* The DM sets the pace of the story and presents the various challenges and encounters the
players must overcome.


*Monster Controller:* The Dungeon Master controls the monsters and villains the player characters battle against,  choosing their actions and rolling dice for their attacks.


*Referee:* When it’s not clear what ought to happen next, the DM decides how to apply the rules and adjudicate the story.

This isn't completley unambiguous, and is perhaps not fully coherent - for instance, the first point implies that the GM "creates the adventure", whereas the fourth suggests that the GM only adjudicates the story "when it's not clear what ought to happen next", implying less GM authority over the plot.

But it is clear the the GM is not just "the rules guy".


----------



## Manbearcat (May 2, 2013)

pemerton said:


> But it is clear the the GM is not just "the rules guy".




When I read commentary such as this from someone who should (must?) be intimately familiar with the source material, I am left stunned...stunned.  What can you do but wonder such things as:

- Was this person mostly detached from the actual nuts and bolts design process, working mostly as a superficial quality control element (this is extraordinarily common on many projects I've been involved with; "lead designers" being represented as artisans for work they were only tangentially related to)?

- Did this person actually play the game to the fully nuanced experience that the mechanics support?

- Is this person's primary exposure to the gaming system (and the play experience ushered forth) witnessing the full-throttle, tactical war-gaming inherent to their Encounters program (rather than a home table where an actual campaign unfolds with understanding, committed players and GM)?

Without one or more of the above as root cause for the above position, I am left baffled.  I would love for him to sit for a few sessions of any of our home games.  I'm certain that if he sat at my own table for a few weeks, it would be blatantly obvious that player empowerment and GM creative enterprise are not mutually exclusive...in fact, they are synergistic.  Player empowerment =/= GM relegated solely to "rules guy."  Facepalm or SMH is the appropriate internet response?


----------



## Luce (May 2, 2013)

I think that is one of the points I been trying to engage in conversation about.
This is what I think:
Shifting demographics: 
D&D started as an indie. As the IP grew so did the demand and supply. With the increase in quality and quantity of products there came a need to sell more products to justify the cost of investment. WOTC would rather sell 5 books to 5 people (Players side) then 20 books to 1 (the DM side). This has been discussed before, so I will leave it at that. A by product of this is that we see more casual gamers, e.i. people who does not put more then hour or two between sessions on their characters (thinking, planing, reading rules, etc) then show up and play. Nothing wrong with that as they are having fun, or they would have stopped showing up. 
"Casual GMs":
 Unfortunately, one of the results of having a more clear, intuitive rules is that with a little effort (almost) anyone can pick up DM-ing. On one hand, I think there are not enough DMs so bringing more into the fold is great, and players tend to become more tolerant and having realistic expectations after seeing what DMs involves. On another hand... some previous editions (such as 1st and 2nd) by creating an artificial high bar of complexity (weapon speed, sometimes needing to roll high other times low to succeed) insured that greater level of dedication was required in order to run a game. Nowadays I occasionally see DMs who does not seem to spend any time outside of game improving their craft. The science (rules) part is very accessible, however the art side of DM ing is not something one can learn from a book, (how to read the mood of the table, improvising, dealing with problem player who is also a friend) those things one can only learn by living through them. I do not want to make it sound like an insurmountable hurdle, but it requires some dedication. Especially in:
"Mixed groups":
Yet another side of resent changes is that more groups (compared to previous decades) are fluid. When I started gaming in the 90s I like Manbearcat had a dedicated group composed of my friends and peers. We had known each other half our lives and hang out on a daily bases. Gaming was just one more thing we did. Nowadays, more groups starts as strangers who happen to share a common interest and meet in a public venue (as opposed to a private home). More games are episodic. This way there is less pressure to show every week (for players) or run a deep, detail rich campaign (for the DM). While I would like to be a part of a long campaign, this arrangement scratches my gaming itch and avoids the frustration of having more then 1 in 3 gaming nights being canceled due to RL issues.
One of the results of this is having a mixed age groups. Parents bring their children to game. In many cases it works out and it is endearing to see the love for gaming being passed on. However, sometimes people do not take into account the age difference while interacting. Especially when providing criticism (constructive or otherwise). For that reason, among others, when facing a group of (near) strangers DMs and players alike tend to rely on game mastery as a basis of interaction. While games have become more portable (easy to switch groups or play with strangers) it also curtails the DM customization (house rules, deep personal plots etc) in favor of consistency.
Put another way nowadays there arises a need for explicit social contract in contrast with the implicit one of the past. When you are gaming with long term group you know what the other boundaries and interest are and have established sense of camaraderie. With a pick up group it is harder to tell what hooks will work or that a give person is afraid of spiders for example.


----------



## pemerton (May 2, 2013)

Luce said:


> some previous editions (such as 1st and 2nd) by creating an artificial high bar of complexity (weapon speed, sometimes needing to roll high other times low to succeed) insured that greater level of dedication was required in order to run a game. Nowadays I occasionally see DMs who does not seem to spend any time outside of game improving their craft.



I don't really undestand how this sort of rather baroque aspect of AD&D helped make the GM something other than a "rules guy".


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## pemerton (May 2, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> When I read commentary such as this from someone who should (must?) be intimately familiar with the source material, I am left stunned...stunned.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> Player empowerment =/= GM relegated solely to "rules guy."  Facepalm or SMH is the appropriate internet response?



My first thought is that, as part of a marketing campaign, this is Mearls as an echo-chamber for a certain sort of potential customer who is not especially happy with the current direction of WotC's games.

You may be right, though, that he doesn't have a good feel for what people are doing with the game - but then why hasn't he asked Chris Perkins, who presumably is in an office/cubicle down the hall somewhere!

I guess it's possible that most home games are crap and you, I, [MENTION=463]S'mon[/MENTION], [MENTION=20323]Quickleaf[/MENTION], [MENTION=59411]Pour[/MENTION] and others are some breakout exceptions. But suppose that were true - which I personally doubt - is there any particular reason to think that things were once upon a time different in some past golden decade? I played quite a bit of, and saw plenty of others playing a lot of, crap D&D back in the 80s and 90s.


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## billd91 (May 2, 2013)

Apparently you guys weren't very active on the internet over the last 10 or so years in which we witnessed lots of players complaining about GMs not following the RAW, disputes over what the RAW meant, dismissals of people who adhere to Rules as Interpreted as "house rules", as well as players complaining bitterly about GMs violating encounter creation guidelines, not upholding wealth by level limits, destroying their stuff with rust monsters setting them back on their WBL permanently, creating campaigns that disallow certain character concepts, enforcing paladin code violations, and otherwise saying no to them when they want to do something "cool".

Of course Mearls's theory isn't going to apply to every single game being played. He's not trying to say that games in which the players and GMs have a functional rather than dysfunctional relationship don't exist. He's trying to describe the zeitgeist of D&D with respect to rules vs rulings, rules vs GM authority. The pendulum has swung when you compare the 1e days to the 2e days to the 3e days to now (in fact, it's probably fair to say there are multiple pendulums all swinging around at once). And in some ways, that's deliberate. Part of 3e's philosophy, thanks to Skip Williams, was to put more of the rules in the players' hands so know what to expect out of the actions they choose to take. And while that may be reasonable, one of the blessings of turning things over to the general public is that you get people and groups who push reasonable to the point of unreasonableness. And that gets reflected here on the discussion boards where discussions serve to amplify differences more often than promote commonality.


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## Manbearcat (May 2, 2013)

pemerton said:


> My first thought is that, as part of a marketing campaign, this is Mearls as an echo-chamber for a certain sort of potential customer who is not especially happy with the current direction of WotC's games.




Those are the only two options; ignorance or willful marketing campaign.  Its sort of the same questions that we asked about the authorial voice of 4e (get to the fun, skip the guards, etc).  It beggars belief that he would be ignorant to how the game is actualized at home (outside of a Step On Up Encounters framework).  So I guess we're left with your hunch; marketing campaign and strident authorial voice advocating a playstyle. 



pemerton said:


> I guess it's possible that most home games are crap and you, I, @_*S'mon*_ , @_*Quickleaf*_ , @_*Pour*_ and others are some breakout exceptions. But suppose that were true - which I personally doubt - is there any particular reason to think that things were once upon a time different in some past golden decade? I played quite a bit of, and saw plenty of others playing a lot of, crap D&D back in the 80s and 90s.




Like you, I'm certain that we aren't exceptions.  There are probably 15-20 or so 4e GMs that I can think of on these boards alone where if you traded each of us out, the game would be only superficially different (primarily at the genre preferences level with only minor technique fluctuation).  So this isn't some rare experience that is inaccessible to the masses (or mearls specifically...especially, as you note, he has a system-experienced GM at his beck and call).

Its exceedingly frustrating to see what should be (and as such is pressupposed as) authoritative commentary, informed by insight and experience, bear no resemblance to my play experience and then be passed down the grapevine (to be used as a weapon by detractors).


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## billd91 (May 2, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> Like you, I'm certain that we aren't exceptions.  There are probably 15-20 or so 4e GMs that I can think of on these boards alone where if you traded each of us out, the game would be only superficially different (primarily at the genre preferences level with only minor technique fluctuation).  So this isn't some rare experience that is inaccessible to the masses (or mearls specifically...especially, as you note, he has a system-experienced GM at his beck and call).
> 
> Its exceedingly frustrating to see what should be (and as such is pressupposed as) authoritative commentary, informed by insight and experience, bear no resemblance to my play experience and then be passed down the grapevine (to be used as a weapon by detractors).




Maybe it is authoritative commentary but you refuse to see it because it doesn't match your own confirmation bias? After all, you're *certain* that you and pemerton aren't exceptions, but you seem to be basing that on little data that isn't unbiased itself. Could it be that he's not ignorant or that he's not just doing some market-speak but that he has noticed a real trend based on the data he values or trusts? I think that's certainly a third option along with the "only two" you lay out.


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## S'mon (May 2, 2013)

pemerton said:


> My first thought is that, as part of a marketing campaign, this is Mearls as an echo-chamber for a certain sort of potential customer who is not especially happy with the current direction of WotC's games.
> 
> You may be right, though, that he doesn't have a good feel for what people are doing with the game - but then why hasn't he asked Chris Perkins, who presumably is in an office/cubicle down the hall somewhere!
> 
> I guess it's possible that most home games are crap and you, I, [MENTION=463]S'mon[/MENTION], [MENTION=20323]Quickleaf[/MENTION], [MENTION=59411]Pour[/MENTION] and others are some breakout exceptions. But suppose that were true - which I personally doubt - is there any particular reason to think that things were once upon a time different in some past golden decade? I played quite a bit of, and saw plenty of others playing a lot of, crap D&D back in the 80s and 90s.




I kinda recognise what Mearls means by RPG decadence, both in the '90s railroad era and in the 3e player-entitlement era. But I actually thought 4e did a lot to roll back on the problems 3e brought in. I've seen a few aggressive, obnoxious, sense-of-entitlement players at my D&D Meetup. But not in 4e games. I see some people on rpgnet advocating "4e GM as rules monkey", but I've never experienced it as a real issue at-table, whereas it was a real problem for me with 3e. For a start 4e firmly rejects 'rules as physics', which makes the rules-monkey approach very hard to sustain.

Edit: Oh, I guess there is the issue with 4e adventures - while the 4e game itself does not try to turn the GM into a dancing monkey, the horrible 'Delve Format' with its prepositioned monsters and computer-script style combat instructions does often feel a bit "Dance Monkey, Dance!"


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## S'mon (May 2, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Apparently you guys weren't very active on the internet over the last 10 or so years in which we witnessed lots of players complaining about GMs not following the RAW, disputes over what the RAW meant, dismissals of people who adhere to Rules as Interpreted as "house rules", as well as players complaining bitterly about GMs violating encounter creation guidelines, not upholding wealth by level limits, destroying their stuff with rust monsters setting them back on their WBL permanently, creating campaigns that disallow certain character concepts, enforcing paladin code violations, and otherwise saying no to them when they want to do something "cool".
> 
> Of course Mearls's theory isn't going to apply to every single game being played. He's not trying to say that games in which the players and GMs have a functional rather than dysfunctional relationship don't exist. He's trying to describe the zeitgeist of D&D with respect to rules vs rulings, rules vs GM authority. The pendulum has swung when you compare the 1e days to the 2e days to the 3e days to now (in fact, it's probably fair to say there are multiple pendulums all swinging around at once). And in some ways, that's deliberate. Part of 3e's philosophy, thanks to Skip Williams, was to put more of the rules in the players' hands so know what to expect out of the actions they choose to take. And while that may be reasonable, one of the blessings of turning things over to the general public is that you get people and groups who push reasonable to the point of unreasonableness. And that gets reflected here on the discussion boards where discussions serve to amplify differences more often than promote commonality.




I agree, but I feel this was a 3e thing that really died down a lot with 4e. 4e design doesn't seem to lend itself to the same kind of player-GM clashes 3e produced. It didn't do that by disempowering players, either - more that it expects well of them, and they tend to rise to expectations. Eg I just don't see any "Pretending to be CG, actually CE" type behaviour in 4e games. The absence of mechanical Paladins' Code restrictions, or even mechanical alignment, did not lead to a rash of LG-really-CE either, quite the reverse.
4e certainly has its problems, but disempowered GMs is not one of them IME.


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## Imaro (May 3, 2013)

S'mon said:


> I agree, but I feel this was a 3e thing that really died down a lot with 4e. 4e design doesn't seem to lend itself to the same kind of player-GM clashes 3e produced. It didn't do that by disempowering players, either - more that it expects well of them, and they tend to rise to expectations. Eg I just don't see any "Pretending to be CG, actually CE" type behaviour in 4e games. The absence of mechanical Paladins' Code restrictions, or even mechanical alignment, did not lead to a rash of LG-really-CE either, quite the reverse.
> 4e certainly has its problems, but disempowered GMs is not one of them IME.




Yeah, I kind of see it differently, here are just a few things in 4e I saw complaints about...

1. Wish lists of magic items...
2. A boatload of player powers with their own individual rules that most DM's couldn't memorize and thus must rely on the player's rules knowledge/integrity/etc. to understand and adjudicate correctly...
3. Players create their own quests and assign xp for them...
4. Expectations set of balanced (most often this meant winnable to players) encounters...
5. Expectation set that everything is core and not subject to DM or consensual approval...
6. Paragon paths and epic destinies were all allowed regardless if they fit or didn't in the campaign world...

I think there were plenty of complaints early in the lifespan of 4e from GM's who didn't enjoy or want the dis-empowering things in 4e... but like the problems they had with numerous other things they were told either the problem didn't really exist or to just change it...


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## Luce (May 3, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I don't really undestand how this sort of rather baroque aspect of AD&D helped make the GM something other than a "rules guy".



Fair question! I did not convey my view that before the DM starts changing the rules he should learn them. That initial burden seems to discourage casual entry into DM-ing. Not saying that this is either good or bad. Another feature of that era IMO was that rules did not cover as much as subsequent editions. And even if there was a rule in some supplement, more DMs were just as happy to make a ruling instead of keeping current of all the rules. In fact rules were seen as more of official opinions () and DM made calls were common. For example, RAW if somebody slipped on slick surface (like ice) do the DM call for a Dexterity check (roll under) or save vs petrification (roll over) in order to catch oneself before falling off? I have seen examples of both in modules. Another part was that there was not assumed to be as much consistency (and balance) between individual groups ways of playing. That make switching groups harder (one campaign may feature numerology magic while another use spells based on gems) while often resulting into more customized to the players rules.


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## pemerton (May 3, 2013)

S'mon said:


> I guess there is the issue with 4e adventures - while the 4e game itself does not try to turn the GM into a dancing monkey, the horrible 'Delve Format' with its prepositioned monsters and computer-script style combat instructions does often feel a bit "Dance Monkey, Dance!"



I don't think I've seen anyone try to defend the 4e adventures. Some of the ideas are interesting (but some are not), and some individual story elements or encounter set-ups are interesting (but some are not), but their overall design is (I think) clearly a failure.



Imaro said:


> 1. Wish lists of magic items...
> 2. A boatload of player powers with their own individual rules that most DM's couldn't memorize and thus must rely on the player's rules knowledge/integrity/etc. to understand and adjudicate correctly...
> 3. Players create their own quests and assign xp for them...
> 4. Expectations set of balanced (most often this meant winnable to players) encounters...
> ...





billd91 said:


> lots of players complaining about GMs not following the RAW, disputes over what the RAW meant, dismissals of people who adhere to Rules as Interpreted as "house rules", as well as players complaining bitterly about GMs violating encounter creation guidelines, not upholding wealth by level limits, destroying their stuff with rust monsters setting them back on their WBL permanently, creating campaigns that disallow certain character concepts, enforcing paladin code violations, and otherwise saying no to them when they want to do something "cool".



I guess that I don't see these things as per se objectionable.

Wanting the GM to follow the rules; wanting the GM to recognise encounter-building guidelines around which the game has been designed; expecting access to PC-build resources (eg WBL, magic items) around which the game has been designed; wanting to exercise some authority over the fictional content of the game (via choice of PC build elements and setting quests) - I don't see any of these things as bad. To me, this is players wanting to play the game according to its rules. And I personally don't see much attractive in an RPG ideal of the players just sitting at the table and doing nothing but making in-character calls in response to situations that the GM throws at them entirely according to his/her conception of what the game is going to be about.



S'mon said:


> I feel this was a 3e thing that really died down a lot with 4e. 4e design doesn't seem to lend itself to the same kind of player-GM clashes 3e produced.



This is interesting. I don't have the play experience with 3E to make the comparison, but it doesn't entirely surprise me - as best I understand the system, 3E seems designed almost deliberately to create conficts of interest, or at least tension, at the table, because the GM is called upon both to push opposition against the PCs, _and_ to make "rules as physics"-style calls that can easily end up hosing the players.

I think it's an important innovation in RPG design (which 4e didn't make, it copied from earlier models) to come up with "level appropriate" or "scaling" DCs (of which 4e's approach is just one version) that mean that the players can be confident that the GM's calls _will_ contribute both to colour and to the details of resolution, but _won't_ make the difference between easy and hosed. (An alternative to scaled DCs is a Burning Wheel style approach of "objective" DCs but liberal Fate Points in combination with "fail forward" which means that the players are happy to take risks and not always succeed.)

AD&D has many similar features to 3E in this respect, but (at least in its classic playstyle) maybe has enough gonzo on the player as well as the GM side (especially various spells and items) that the conflicts don't manifest quite as egregiously. I'd be interested in your (S'mon's) views on this given your recent GMing experience with AD&D.



Luce said:


> before the DM starts changing the rules he should learn them. That initial burden seems to discourage casual entry into DM-ing.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> RAW if somebody slipped on slick surface (like ice) do the DM call for a Dexterity check (roll under) or save vs petrification (roll over) in order to catch oneself before falling off? I have seen examples of both in modules.



I still don't see how this sets up the GM in some role that contrasts with "the rules guy". What contribution does it make to the game that we have multiple rather baroque options for determining whether or not someone slips on ice?

In 4e, for instance, this is an Acrobatics check. The GM's role isn't to decide what sort of check it is - the rules tell us that (and so a player who has build a high-Acro bonus PC will be better at traversing slippery ice). The GM's role is to choose how difficult the check is, which will then determine what sort of impact the presence of the ice makes during play.


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## Imaro (May 3, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I guess that I don't see these things as per se objectionable.




I am in no way surprised. The problem isn't a problem... thus the problem doesn't exist. Of course this in no way addresses whether these things are or aren't dis-empowering to DM's (which is what we are discussing), only that you don't find it objectionable... Ok.



pemerton said:


> Wanting the GM to follow the rules; wanting the GM to recognise encounter-building guidelines around which the game has been designed; expecting access to PC-build resources (eg WBL, magic items) around which the game has been designed; wanting to exercise some authority over the fictional content of the game (via choice of PC build elements and setting quests) - I don't see any of these things as bad. To me, this is players wanting to play the game according to its rules. And I personally don't see much attractive in an RPG ideal of the players just sitting at the table and doing nothing but making in-character calls in response to situations that the GM throws at them entirely according to his/her conception of what the game is going to be about.




First, great way to misrepresent the way DM empowered games are played in and run in that last sentence... but I guess broad generalizations and disparagement is par for the course.  

That said, and getting back to the point... do you agree or disagree that these are dis-empowering things for the DM, regardless of whether your favored play style embraces them or not?


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## Luce (May 3, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I still don't see how this sets up the GM in some role that contrasts with "the rules guy". What contribution does it make to the game that we have multiple rather baroque options for determining whether or not someone slips on ice?




The DM is always the "rules guy", whether it is the RAW or the ones of his own creation. I wished  to engage into discussion if there has been an official point shift as well as at the table application regarding uniform consistency of the rules.

From the intro to 2e DM:
"Choice is what the AD&D game is all about. We tried to offer you what we think are 
the best choices for your AD&D campaign, but each of us has different likes and 
dislikes. the game that I enjoy may be quite different from your own
campaign. But is not up to me to say what is wrong or right for your game
...
Don't just let the game sit there, and don't become a rules lawyer worrying about
each piddly little detail. If you cannot figure out the answer, MAKE IT UP!
And whatever you do, don't fall into the trap of believing these rules are complete.
They are not. you cannot sit back and let the rule book do everything for you. Take
the time and effort to become not just a good DM, but a brilliant one.
...
I'm often asked for the instant answer to a fine point of game rules. More often then not,
I come back  with a question -what do you feel is right? And the people asking
the questions discover that not only can they create an answer, but their answer is as good
as anyone else's. The rules are just guidelines."

I do not remember seeing anything contradictory in the following editions rules, in the same time I neither remember this view being so explicitly reiterated since.

Edit: From 3e DMG p11:
"Every rule in the PHB is written for a reason. That doesn't mean you cannot change them for your game
...
Given the creativity of gamers, almost every campaign will in time, develop its own house rules.
...
changing the way the game does something shouldn't be taken lightly.
...
(pp 15) Mastery of the rules is one reason why the DM is sometimes called the referee.
"
My apologies, I do not have my core 4e books at hands. May be somebody will be willing to provide a better examples. All I can find was from the Rules Compendium :
"(pp9) Referee:The Dm decides how to aplly the game rules and guides the story.
If the rules don't cover a situation, the DM determines what to do. At times the DM might alter or even ignore the result of a die roll if doing so benefits the story."

To me the progression in the rules modification advice (from those excerpts) seems to be "Change the rules as you will, experiment.",
"Change the rules with extreme caution", "Do not change the rules, fudge to get the desired result". None is wrong or right, but I do feel there is a definite change. 


When I read people obsessing about the latest errata or telling others that by not following the RAW they are committing a sin I start to wander: Have I become a minority, which only cares about having fun with some friends?


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## pemerton (May 3, 2013)

Imaro said:


> The problem isn't a problem
> 
> <snip>
> 
> do you agree or disagree that these are dis-empowering things for the DM, regardless of whether your favored play style embraces them or not?



Hey, I'm not the one who called other peoples' playstyles "decadent" - that was Mearls. Nor am I the one who reposted and endorsed that - that was the OP.

Judging from your list 1 to 6, you prefer a game in which:


There are no PC build elements (eg magic items, boons, etc) which are also non-PC generated story elements, because you prefer the introduction of non-PC generated story elements to be under the sole authority of the GM;


There are no PC build element which have mechanics whose administration and oversight is under the primary jurisdiction of the player rather than the GM;


Players do not have authority to establish story goals for their PCs that will generate metagame rewards (like XP, presumably also Fate Points, etc);


There are not guidelines for assessing the mechanical relationship between challenge threat and player resources (or, if there are such guidelines, they are disregarde by the GM; you may also (it's not clear) prefer a game in which many challenges cannot be overcome by the PCs - presumably, then the PCs' survival of such encounters would depend upon something other than the players' capacity to deploy their mechanical and story resources;

The GM has authority over whether or not new PC build elements can be included in the game, both from the mechanical point of view and the story point of view.

I've got no objection to anyone playing that sort of game, although I don't think it's especially representative of the D&D tradition. I do object to departures from it being described as decadent.



Imaro said:


> great way to misrepresent the way DM empowered games are played in and run in that last sentence



Where's the misinterpretation? In a game that fits the parameters I just outlined (which I am inferring from your list of things you don't like), what _do_ players do besides make  in-character calls in response to situations that the GM throws at them according to his/her conception of what the game is going to be about? The players don't introduce story elements themselves, for instance, unless they are PC-generated within the fiction. And the players don't get to establish goals that will generate metagame rewards, and which the GM is obliged to respect in encounter and scenario design.


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## pemerton (May 3, 2013)

Luce said:


> From the intro to 2e DM:
> "Choice is what the AD&D game is all about.
> 
> <snip>
> ...



To the extent that this is good advice, why does it not also apply to the players?

To give an example from my own game: one of the players in my 4e game plays an invoker/wizard who has take the Expert Ritualist feat which gives a +2 bonus to skill checks involved in peforming rituals. Now, what counts as a ritual? My guess is that when that feat was authored, the writer had in mind only rituals as defined mechanically with the 4e PC build and action resolution system. However, my player interprets "ritual" to mean any deployment of his skills to generate a magical effect, such as closing a portal or sealing a breach. Given that the feat is hardly overpowered, and the player spending more time having his PC do that sort of thing seems to make for a fun game, I (as GM) haven't raised any queries about the player's interpretation of that feat.

Is this bad GMing? Or decadent RPGing?

The whole idea that getting the players more involved in the game - in story, in mechanics - is a sign of degradation I find odd, myself. If someone can indicate a particular conflict of interest, that's another matter - but GM's can have conflicts of interest too, and how RPG rules balance such things is an interesting and tricky matter. There's certainly no general principle that all authority over story and resolution should be given to the GM.


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## pemerton (May 3, 2013)

Luce said:


> from the Rules Compendium :
> "(pp9) Referee:The Dm decides how to aplly the game rules and guides the story.
> If the rules don't cover a situation, the DM determines what to do. At times the DM might alter or even ignore the result of a die roll if doing so benefits the story."



The bit about altering dice rolls was not in the 4e PHB. There is some discussion in the 4e DMG, but the RC goes further, as in the passage you quoted.

In my view this is a bad piece of GM advice which lingers on from AD&D and the 3E DMG. The 4e rules would be better - both better suited to the way the 4e mechanics play, and in my own view also better all things considered - if they did not contain that advice.


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## S'mon (May 3, 2013)

Imaro said:


> Yeah, I kind of see it differently, here are just a few things in 4e I saw complaints about...
> 
> 1. Wish lists of magic items...
> 2. A boatload of player powers with their own individual rules that most DM's couldn't memorize and thus must rely on the player's rules knowledge/integrity/etc. to understand and adjudicate correctly...
> ...




Do you want to give my perspective on these? Re #6, I asked about EDs on rpgnet a couple days ago and several people there said things like "I would never disallow a player side mechanic!" and "They can choose what they want and reskin it however they want" - an attitude which I do dislike, since it's the 'fluff' I find interesting for thematic depth IMC. But none of my own players have said anything like that, they seem to accept that the GM can determine whether a PC can have a particular ED. 

IME restrictions in 4e don't matter as much as option restrictions in 3e because in 4e there is much less variation in power level among Powers, Paragon Paths, EDs etc. Likewise my attempts to tinker with 3e like I did 1e were pretty disastrous, but 4e feels much more robust and accepting of changes. Again, I've seen a few people on rpgnet object to the idea of GMs not using encounter building or treasure tables, but it's never been a problem at my tables (eg I pretty well never build encounters to an XP budget, though I adjust monster level so it's within about 4 of the PCs by converting along the Solo/Elite/Standard/Minion scale while retaining XPV).


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## S'mon (May 3, 2013)

pemerton said:


> To give an example from my own game: one of the players in my 4e game plays an invoker/wizard who has take the Expert Ritualist feat which gives a +2 bonus to skill checks involved in peforming rituals. Now, what counts as a ritual? My guess is that when that feat was authored, the writer had in mind only rituals as defined mechanically with the 4e PC build and action resolution system. However, my player interprets "ritual" to mean any deployment of his skills to generate a magical effect, such as closing a portal or sealing a breach. Given that the feat is hardly overpowered, and the player spending more time having his PC do that sort of thing seems to make for a fun game, I (as GM) haven't raised any queries about the player's interpretation of that feat.
> 
> Is this bad GMing? Or decadent RPGing?




It's fine GMing to allow it. But I'd be annoyed if a player just started adding +2 to his arcana checks without asking me first. This is the kind of house rule I implement all the time, but it's not the player's right to create house rules without consulting the GM.


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## S'mon (May 3, 2013)

pemerton said:


> This is interesting. I don't have the play experience with 3E to make the comparison, but it doesn't entirely surprise me - as best I understand the system, 3E seems designed almost deliberately to create conficts of interest, or at least tension, at the table, because the GM is called upon both to push opposition against the PCs, _and_ to make "rules as physics"-style calls that can easily end up hosing the players.
> 
> I think it's an important innovation in RPG design (which 4e didn't make, it copied from earlier models) to come up with "level appropriate" or "scaling" DCs (of which 4e's approach is just one version) that mean that the players can be confident that the GM's calls _will_ contribute both to colour and to the details of resolution, but _won't_ make the difference between easy and hosed. (An alternative to scaled DCs is a Burning Wheel style approach of "objective" DCs but liberal Fate Points in combination with "fail forward" which means that the players are happy to take risks and not always succeed.)
> 
> AD&D has many similar features to 3E in this respect, but (at least in its classic playstyle) maybe has enough gonzo on the player as well as the GM side (especially various spells and items) that the conflicts don't manifest quite as egregiously. I'd be interested in your (S'mon's) views on this given your recent GMing experience with AD&D.




AD&D - if I'm doing task resolution, typically it's using a system that does not scale by level and the chance of success can be inferred by the player from his PC's attributes - STR for feats of strength (open doors, bend bars), Charisma for interaction (loyalty %, reaction % modifier). I avoided using d20-roll-under attribute checks in my 2012 AD&D campaign because they're not in 1e and I wanted to stick as close to the RAW as possible, but again they give the player a good idea of success chance.

With 4e because both competency and task difficulty scale by default at the same rate, again a player can look at his sheet and have a good idea of where he can succeed. I've only seen problems where players don't look at their sheets and/or don't pay attention to the fiction, eg the 4e STR 10 PC who drowned trying to swim 3 miles down the (known to be) exceptionally deadly river, where a STR 20 PC would almost certainly have been ok, because that was a +5 difference to the swim checks. If he had even tried to swim ashore once he started getting into trouble he'd probably have been ok, though.

Basically, IME both pre-3e and 4e have decent task resolution systems that tend to give decent results, and this is probably linked to neither attempting anything like a world-sim. Both need judgement calls, eg 4e swimming rules don't say anything about weight carried, 1e has no swimming rules in the core. In practice it comes out the same. 3e has detailed rules which discourage GM judgement calls and can cause big problems where the rules are broken, eg Diplomacy as written. 4e has a few bad bits but it's written so much vaguer/woolier that they cause less problems. Also, in 3e you could be a skill monkey at the price of combat effectiveness. If you invest resources in being the skill monkey you reasonably expect the GM to not mess with the rules you depend on. 4e siloing eliminated that issue. Incidentally in my limited experience of Pathfinder I think its tweaks also did a lot to lessen the problems with 3e skills.


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## pemerton (May 3, 2013)

S'mon said:


> Also, in 3e you could be a skill monkey at the price of combat effectiveness. If you invest resources in being the skill monkey you reasonably expect the GM to not mess with the rules you depend on. 4e siloing eliminated that issue. Incidentally in my limited experience of Pathfinder I think its tweaks also did a lot to lessen the problems with 3e skills.



Interesting observation!


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## Imaro (May 3, 2013)

pemerton said:


> Hey, I'm not the one who called other peoples' playstyles "decadent" - that was Mearls. Nor am I the one who reposted and endorsed that - that was the OP.




Funny I'm not Mearls or the OP so what does it matter what they said if you are commenting on my post?



pemerton said:


> Judging from your list 1 to 6, you prefer a game in which:




Here's your/another mistake... go back and read my post again, these aren't "my preferences". They are examples I was giving S'mon about complaints I have seen towards DM dis-empowering features in 4e... Again my post wasn't about like/dislike, a particular play style or even my own preferences (though you seem intent on trying to force the discussion in that direction) it was about discussing features of 4e that are or could be dis-empowering to a 4e DM... and as seen in S'mon's reply he too has at least seen some of these things as well.  



pemerton said:


> There are no PC build elements (eg magic items, boons, etc) which are also non-PC generated story elements, because you prefer the introduction of non-PC generated story elements to be under the sole authority of the GM;
> There are no PC build element which have mechanics whose administration and oversight is under the primary jurisdiction of the player rather than the GM;
> Players do not have authority to establish story goals for their PCs that will generate metagame rewards (like XP, presumably also Fate Points, etc);
> Theree are not guidelines for assessing the mechanical relationship between challenge threat and player resources (or, if there are such guidelines, they are disregarde by the GM; you may also (it's not clear) prefer a game in which many challenges cannot be overcome by the PCs - presumably, then the PCs' survival of such encounters would depend upon something other than the players' capacity to deploy their mechanical and story resources;
> The GM has authority over whether or not new PC build elements can be included in the game, both from the mechanical point of view and the story point of view.




This list is silly because it's based on extremes as opposed to the excluded middle... well that and I never said this list was representative of a particular play style or my preferences...




pemerton said:


> I've got no objection to anyone playing that sort of game, although I don't think it's especially representative of the D&D tradition. I do object to departures from it being described as decadent.




Well the discussion isn't about what is or isn't the "D&D tradition".  With the number of people who feel 4e is the furthest thing from the D&D tradition to be published so far... not sure what your purpose is in even trying to open the "It's not real D&D" can of worms... but I'm not interested in a round of that pointless discussion.



pemerton said:


> Where's the misinterpretation? In a game that fits the parameters I just outlined (which I am inferring from your list of things you don't like), what _do_ players do besides make  in-character calls in response to situations that the GM throws at them according to his/her conception of what the game is going to be about? The players don't introduce story elements themselves, for instance, unless they are PC-generated within the fiction. And the players don't get to establish goals that will generate metagame rewards, and which the GM is obliged to respect in encounter and scenario design.




The misinterpretation is in assuming that your parameters describe all or event he majority of ways in which a DM empowered game is played or run... especially when using a list of extremes that you "infered" from a post that wasn't talking about any particular play style.  But hey, don't let that stop you, keep posting about this imaginary umbrella you've created in defining how Iand/or empowered DM's run games.


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## Manbearcat (May 3, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Maybe it is authoritative commentary but you refuse to see it because it doesn't match your own confirmation bias? After all, you're *certain* that you and pemerton aren't exceptions, but you seem to be basing that on little data that isn't unbiased itself. Could it be that he's not ignorant or that he's not just doing some market-speak but that he has noticed a real trend based on the data he values or trusts? I think that's certainly a third option along with the "only two" you lay out.




If you're looking for a a completely disfunctional conversation where we impute each others cognitive sensibilities, self-awareness, and pretension to objectivity you can have it with someone else.  You don't know me from Adam nor I you; not each other's moral bank accounts, not each other's intellectual quotient, nor each other's line or body of work.  So that isn't going anywhere.

However, I do know each of those things about myself and I know that Mearls design thoughts (as a WotC rep) are public record so I can comment on those things and try to divine how we are where we are.  I know that I have no conflict of interest; no dog in this fight.  I'm not trying to sell a new product nor am I trying to groom an evolving resume as a platform from which I can use to sell new products.  I have not had thoughts on RPGs that are all over the proverbial map just a few years apart.  I've not been a part of a product line that endorsed scene-based play and used inflammatory rhetoric  toward many classic approaches ("get to the fun" and "skip the guards") that produced wild backlash against the product from the word "go."  I've not candidly endorsed the product and then written some solid, official articles on Skill Challenges that appear to reveal my understanding of the intent and means of proper actualizaton of the resolution mechanics.  I've not then gone onto writing an adventure that is disfunctional with respect to leveraging the ruleset's strengths.  I've not then hired a known indie savant to head up the penning of the DMG2 which unabashadly advocates for the narrative and metagame strengths of 4e.  I've not then helped produce, and advocated for, a line of rewrites with softer edges with respect to those exact strengths (or something?) that attempts a gateway product for either entry level gamers or more metagame averse gamers (or something?...still don't know).  I've not then been front and center lead on a new design iteration that overtly courts all of the gaming sensibilities that 4e's launch and mechanics were either unfriendly toward, ambivalent on, or indifferent to.   I've not then spoke about courting everyone in a big tent approach while then (oddly) going the 4e launch route again and either accidentally or willfully invoking badwrongfun rhetoric that, if you're in the business, you know is inflammatory and would be out and out edition warring on this message board (and would fail to court the people you're alleging to want to court).  

My line on 4th edition has been extremely consistent; it works amazingly well as a ruleset that produces a scene-based gamist/narrativist table experience with tools that can drift it toward light sim and serial, procedural play (if you wish...but you don't have to).  I am not only not metagame adverse, I appreciate a robust metagame as it facilitates the play I'm looking for.  4e shines here.  It facilitates this play masterfully; so coherently that it would be nigh impossible for it to be by accident.  However, its ruleset components are compartmentalized enough that if you want to do nothing but a * closed series of Action Scenes as tactical combat encounters, you can do it.  If you want to do nothing but a ** closed series of Action Scenes as narrative-driven, non-combat conflicts that you resolve via the resolution mechanics, you can do it.  If you want to do nothing but *** Transition Scenes, you can do so with the recovery mechanics and the Ritual mechanics (that include crafting magic items as well as spending resources on Divinations, etc).  If you want **** more overlap such that your game is more open/serial rather than strictly closed scene-based, you can certainly do so via aggressive leveraging of the objective task resolution system, the Ritual mechanics, and the Condition/Disease Track mechanics.  

However, if you are rabidly metagame-averse want a totally metagame-neutral experience, then you are going to have trouble as the Encounter Power system and the Healing Surge system is baked into core.  But, every single edition of D&D has had metagame mechanics baked into core os this is just a threshold issue.  If you're of the opinion of OLD METAGAME MECHANICS GOOD/OK...new metagame mechanics...BAD...then 4e isn't going to scratch your itch...and will likely cause it to fester.  

Besides all of this, I've watched 3 Encounters sessions at a local hobby shop just to collect a few data points.  My limited exposure to these yielded datapoints of play experience that were exclusively pick-up games where approximately 9 - 16 year olds primarily play out * above (a series of tactical skirmishes) and try their hand a bit at ** (which I've seen produce some really good stuff a few times but most often either humorously bad or grossly robotic as they awkwardly claw their way through the scene).  A very light evening of fun for groups of sugary soda-infused 5 - 7 boys (I didn't see a single girl) where they rode their bikes or walked after school or their parents dropped them off and picked them up a few hours later.  I didn't see any of these player entitlement issues manifest there.  

I didn't see any of this insidiuous protesting over DCs, encounter levels, or wealth by level.  Again, these were sugar-infused, immature, adolescent boys...a veritable time-bomb of discord.  I'm sure it happens, I just haven't seen it.  Maybe those such scenarios comprise that mountain of formal data?  I have no idea as I haven't vetted it.  If it is the case though, that isn't particularly compelling as a line of evidence for something being internal locus control of or endemic to a ruleset.  Because I have, however, seen plenty of protestations by my nephew and his friends while they play Minecraft or Stratego or Star Wars Monopoly or Nerf Gun Wars (who hit whom and all of that).  

Personally in my home games (where I would hope there would be real, formal data), throughout the run of 3e and 4e (where apparently this "player entitlement" is so rampant), I have witnessed it 0 times in the almost 5 years of play of 4e and only twice in the 9 years of play of 3.x.  My groups in 3.x were much large and more transient so there was a considerably larger cross-section of the gamer populace available for me to personally behold.  One issue was a "my Wand of Polymorph eats up more of my wealth/level than his Wand of Cure Light Wounds but his is affects the game far more" while the second was just a "My Fighter sucks compared to his Generalist Wizard so I need a lot more treasure than the wealth/level warrants o make up the difference...gimme".  In truth, both players were fundamentally correct in their reasoning, they handled it well outside of the game...we talked about it as a group and fixed the issues with unwieldy band-aids.  Neither of which were in the same universe of insidious as LFQW or a cavalcade of strategic I win and fiat buttons cordoned into one spectrum of the Class populace and the subsequent racking of my brain to try to prepare content to challenge wildly dispirate power levels twixt my players (which was the source of most of my players' rancor).


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## Luce (May 3, 2013)

pemerton said:


> To the extent that this is good advice, why does it not also apply to the players?
> 
> To give an example from my own game: one of the players in my 4e game plays an invoker/wizard who has take the Expert Ritualist feat which gives a +2 bonus to skill checks involved in peforming rituals. Now, what counts as a ritual? My guess is that when that feat was authored, the writer had in mind only rituals as defined mechanically with the 4e PC build and action resolution system. However, my player interprets "ritual" to mean any deployment of his skills to generate a magical effect, such as closing a portal or sealing a breach. Given that the feat is hardly overpowered, and the player spending more time having his PC do that sort of thing seems to make for a fun game, I (as GM) haven't raised any queries about the player's interpretation of that feat.
> 
> ...




I think the conflict of interest was assumed. The players were encouraged to get involved in the game, but not in  defining the mechanics. Suggest, offer, plead their case- Yes. Tell the DM, this is the Rule -No. There was an example [in the DMG] of player wanting to be from noble background. Fine. Then the said player using that as justification to demand being in charge of the rest of the party and having vast amount (for a 1st leveler) of wealth. Not Fine. 

In your example, you are effectively changing RAW You and your players are redefining what the keyword "Ritual" means in the game. Which is fine and as you said does not break your game- and more power to you. Your game has been house ruled. 

One complain I have heard about 4e was that RAW denies player agency thus the game becoming "it isn't about where the players _want _to go, it's where the appropriate encounters are that dictate where they _can _go." (ref:http://hackslashmaster.blogspot.com/2011/09/on-list-of-ways-youre-ruining-your-game.html)

I think while the D&D through the editions have preserved theme and mood, certain other base assumptions have changed. That difference in expectations may be one of the reasons we keep having editions wars.
For example, for me 2e is intended to give the feel of European myths (specifically Greek). The heroes may grow strong enough to even stand toe to toe to the the gods, but still have a fill of vulnerability- that is, a well placed blow can bring them down if they are not careful. I like to call this the oscillating challenge.  To give and example, in Dungeon module ( from # 77) a party of 10 level characters have a final encounter with 25 level suel lich. While that is the most dangerous encounter, the party will also meet and be challenged by six gargoyles. Since older games often had 1) multiple encounters between chance to rest 2) More limited renewable resources (potions, wands, scrolls) 3) Lower HP for both PC and monsters - there was a different feel. Magic item creation was supposed to be (for this more powerful then potions and scrolls) an excuse for and adventure. Just having the money and spare was not enough, one had to go personally and collect the ingredients. Time consuming and sidequestty Yes, but at the same time I found it provided investment in game and sense of accomplishment to players.  Not necessary everyone's preferred way of gaming, but it is one of the ways that works for me.


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## D'karr (May 3, 2013)

Luce said:


> One complain I have heard about 4e was that RAW denies player agency thus the game becoming "it isn't about where the players _want _to go, it's where the appropriate encounters are that dictate where they _can _go." (ref:http://hackslashmaster.blogspot.com/2011/09/on-list-of-ways-youre-ruining-your-game.html)




After reading that I had a moment of facepalm.  IMO that article is the biggest load of horse manure I have read in a very long time.  Obviously I have a huge disagreement on how 4e would remove player agency.  IMO 4e is one of the strongest editions in providing ways for players to exercise player agency.  A DM can remove player agency, but they can do that easily with any edition.


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## Imaro (May 3, 2013)

S'mon said:


> Do you want to give my perspective on these?




Sure, but I am more interested in whether you consider them to be or not to be dis-empowering for the DM. I can understand if you personally prefer them, or your table has no issues with them but that doesn't speak to wether they are or are not dis-empowering.



S'mon said:


> Re #6, I asked about EDs on rpgnet a couple days ago and several people there said things like "I would never disallow a player side mechanic!" and "They can choose what they want and reskin it however they want" - an attitude which I do dislike, since it's the 'fluff' I find interesting for thematic depth IMC. But none of my own players have said anything like that, they seem to accept that the GM can determine whether a PC can have a particular ED.




This is exactly the sort of things I've seen as well.  But unlike you I've experienced, on other sites, it being alot more common and ingrained in the 4e community than you seem to think it is. 



S'mon said:


> IME restrictions in 4e don't matter as much as option restrictions in 3e because in 4e there is much less variation in power level among Powers, Paragon Paths, EDs etc. Likewise my attempts to tinker with 3e like I did 1e were pretty disastrous, but 4e feels much more robust and accepting of changes. Again, I've seen a few people on rpgnet object to the idea of GMs not using encounter building or treasure tables, but it's never been a problem at my tables (eg I pretty well never build encounters to an XP budget, though I adjust monster level so it's within about 4 of the PCs by converting along the Solo/Elite/Standard/Minion scale while retaining XPV).




I'm not sure I agree with the premise here... I think the restrictions 4e has don't matter to a particular group of people who enjoy 4e (In the same way someone who has Pathfinder as their preferred game may find 4e's restrictions distatsteful but 3.x/PF's restrictions something they can enjoy or work with.). It's not just about power level (though 4e has issues in this area as well "wizard with an uber Arcana skill and certain cantrips I'm looking at you", there's also story elements (Say as a DM my campaign world doesn't have psionics... but in 4e a psionicist is core and allowable if the player wants to play one, so...) this is, IMO, DM dis-empowerment regardless of whether psionics is overpowered or not.

I've also seen players, when things turn against them, start to grumble and make snide remarks or question DM's about whether an encounter is "appropriate". In fact I will say I've seen this more often in 4e games than in 3.x games... of course I admit that's purely anecdotal evidence. A better question I think is why is this even coming up if a DM has the right to set the encounters at any level he wants?


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## Luce (May 3, 2013)

D'karr said:


> After reading that I had a moment of facepalm.  IMO that article is the biggest load of horse manure I have read in a very long time.  Obviously I have a huge disagreement on how 4e would remove player agency.  IMO 4e is one of the strongest editions in providing ways for players to exercise player agency.  A DM can remove player agency, but they can do that easily with any edition.



Cannot say I agree with his assessment either, but similar views have been posted occasionally. It also seems to echo Mearls' statement that people choose to deviate from the official game because they feel that 4e punishes active imagination. (ref http://www.enworld.org/forum/showth...g-mainstream&p=6126294&viewfull=1#post6126294)


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## Luce (May 3, 2013)

Imaro said:


> I'm not sure I agree with the premise here... I think the restrictions 4e has don't matter to a particular group of people who enjoy 4e (In the same way someone who has Pathfinder as their preferred game may find 4e's restrictions distatsteful but 3.x/PF's restrictions something they can enjoy or work with.). It's not just about power level (though 4e has issues in this area as well "wizard with an uber Arcana skill and certain cantrips I'm looking at you", there's also story elements (Say as a DM my campaign world doesn't have psionics... but in 4e a psionicist is core and allowable if the player wants to play one, so...) this is, IMO, DM dis-empowerment regardless of whether psionics is overpowered or not.
> 
> I've also seen players, when things turn against them, start to grumble and make snide remarks or question DM's about whether an encounter is "appropriate". In fact I will say I've seen this more often in 4e games than in 3.x games... of course I admit that's purely anecdotal evidence. A better question I think is why is this even coming up if a DM has the right to set the encounters at any level he wants?




James Watt in DMG 2 pp5: "Start by knowing when to say no. If I player bring new options to your table that does not fit in your game, it is ok to tell the player to hold onto the idea until the campaign wraps up and you (or somebody else in your group) starts something new... know the limits of what you what in you game and do not be afraid to enforce them." In other words, a more polite form of "Not in my campaign you didn't" (NIMCYD)

I will reiterate my opinion that while there have been change in rules there also had been a change in demographics and both of those have impact on gaming. Gaming with (near-) strangers is different from gaming with life long friends. In the former often the only known shared ground are the rules and thus RAW start taking a greater spotlight. 
As far as the encounter, there seems to be absence of the concept of "status quo"  as 3e DMG put it. Encounters have to be winnable. Which is paradoxically not diferent from previus editions, just with the clear cut math there is different definition what is called so. Sending a 18 level elite ( such as a lich) vs party of six composed of level 9 PC is not in 4th or 3rd, but acceptable in 2nd (DUN # 75 "Forgotten Man"). Is that the way to go? Matter of personal opinion.


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## D'karr (May 3, 2013)

Luce said:


> NIMCYD




I liked that one...  LOL


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## Imaro (May 3, 2013)

Luce said:


> James Watt in DMG 2 pp5: "Start by knowing when to say no. If I player bring new options to your table that does not fit in your game, it is ok to tell the player to hold onto the idea until the campaign wraps up and you (or somebody else in your group) starts something new... know the limits of what you what in you game and do not be afraid to enforce them." In other words, a more polite form of "Not in my campaign you didn't" (NIMCYD)




I find it telling that this is in DMG 2 and not DMG 1... since the official WotC 4e release line was that everything was core and the DMG 1's party line was "say yes"... perhaps this advice was a reaction to exactly the types of complaints I was speaking too earlier... but then again maybe it was their own internal realization that they had went a step to far in dis-empowering the DM, who knows? Of course as far as I understand, this type of DM empowerment and owning of the campaign flies in the face of what many fans of 4e such as [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] want unless I am mistaken.



Luce said:


> I will reiterate my opinion that while there have been change in rules there also had been a change in demographics and both of those have impact on gaming. Gaming with (near-) strangers is different from gaming with life long friends. In the former often the only known shared ground are the rules and thus RAW start taking a greater spotlight.
> As far as the encounter, there seems to be absence of the concept of "status quo" as 3e DMG put it. Encounters have to be winnable. Which is paradoxically not diferent from previus editions, just with the clear cut math there is different definition what is called so. Sending a 18 level elite ( such as a lich) vs party of six composed of level 9 PC is not in 4th or 3rd, but acceptable in 2nd (DUN # 75 "Forgotten Man"). Is that the way to go? Matter of personal opinion.




I also think WotC's push for "official" play (rpga, encounters, etc.) has definitely had an effect on the development of and presentation of their versions of D&D towards a stronger RAW basis. Touching on your comment as to what is or isn't winnable, I don't think that's necessarily the difference so much as the re-definning of what is or isn't fair and the most obvious way of accomplishing (and thus measuring) "fairness" has changed (ie  mainly head-to-head combat). 

I agree that it should be a matter of opinion and that the game itself shouldn't come down to heavily on either style being "right"but instead giving strong and solid advice for how to accomplish and manage either approach depending upon one's preferences.


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## Manbearcat (May 3, 2013)

@*D'karr* you have a ton of experience running Encounters for strangers or "walk-ups", right?  From what I recall you posting, I would trust your body of anecdotal evidence (data) on this issue.  Have you encountered little/some/many instances of players quibbling over things like wealth/level (or treasure in general), encounter design/difficulty (eg L + 2 as standard vs L or DCs in Skill Challenges), what PC build elements are "available"?

I've seen 3 encounter sessions (as I mentioned upthread) and haven't seen any of that but my experience is pretty minimal.  I play with adults and who are friends and I'm pretty "alpha" and welcome confrontation but I also have little problem admitting when I'm flat out wrong on something; so I haven't dealt with these insidious player empowerment issues that are apparently problematic for whatever cross-section of the gamer populace they are a cross-section for.  

I've said many times before; Due to the tight mechanics of the system and the PC build resources, I feel more empowered with 4e than I have in running any D&D system to date and I'm more reliably able to produce the table experience I am looking for than I ever before..


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## D'karr (May 3, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> @*D'karr* you have a ton of experience running Encounters for strangers or "walk-ups", right?  From what I recall you posting, I would trust your body of anecdotal evidence (data) on this issue.  Have you encountered little/some/many instances of players quibbling over things like wealth/level (or treasure in general), encounter design/difficulty (eg L + 2 as standard vs L or DCs in Skill Challenges), what PC build elements are "available"?
> 
> I've seen 3 encounter sessions (as I mentioned upthread) and haven't seen any of that but my experience is pretty minimal.  I play with adults and who are friends and I'm pretty "alpha" and welcome confrontation but I also have little problem admitting when I'm flat out wrong on something; so I haven't dealt with these insidious player empowerment issues that are apparently problematic for whatever cross-section of the gamer populace they are a cross-section for.
> 
> I've said many times before; Due to the tight mechanics of the system and the PC build resources, I feel more empowered with 4e than I have in running any D&D system to date and I'm more reliably able to produce the table experience I am looking for than I ever before..




Yes, I have run D&D Encounters tables as well as organized them at two different game store locations since the program started.  We are talking about hundreds of players over several years, with many repeat players too.  I also organize and run the Living Forgotten Realms (LFR) gamedays locally at multiple locations on a *bi-monthly* basis.  With that program we are talking about quite a larger community, and a lot more repeat players.  The frequency makes it such that we are running a mini-convention sized event every month.  I've also organized one of the local conventions with a huge amount of LFR play.  Not to mention that I volunteer at GenCon, DDXP (now Winter Fantasy), and Origins.  All in all I've observed/played in/DM'd games with thousands of D&D4e players that were complete strangers to me before they sat at my table, and I also run a regular D&D4e game for my group of friends (7-9 players).  Before 4e I ran Living Greyhawk (3.x) locally and at conventions, as well as 3.x for my regular group.  So 3.x for 9+ years, and 4e since after DDXP 2008. 

In that whole time, with thousands of players, the only time I have seen "quibbling" about the specific areas you mentioned was when we were doing playtesting of LFR adventures.  That is part of the work involved in playtesting for gauging the relative difficulty of encounters for the advertised tier of play (average party level APL).

As a DM for my own group, and as a regular player in another group I can say that the robustness of the 4e framework is one of the greatest assets of the game.  You can bend it quite far, my players and I do on a regular basis, but the robustness always helps me to gauge if I'm going to achieve the desired outcome.  And the framework is so simple, that tacking on other stuff is relatively easy.  The rules don't take away player agency, usually a DM that doesn't trust his players does that.  The "rule" of yes, is there so that DMs have guidance to not automatically use NO as the default answer.  It does not mean that the DM should not use "yes, but" as well as "yes, and" as the answer.  It also does not mean that there are no situations when "no" is the appropriate answer.


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## Manbearcat (May 3, 2013)

Thanks for the insight.  That is pretty much what I figured.  @*D'karr  *


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## Imaro (May 3, 2013)

[MENTION=336]D'karr[/MENTION] ... I think I would be more interested to hear how often (if at all) you have seen a DM modify, change or go off the rails in official play, and how this was received by players? I mean it's all well and good to say in a program that (for the vast majority of the time) abides by the actual guidelines presented in the books, which is what is expected by the players, there is no disagreement or squabbling. But we are talking about the DM having the authority to go outside of those boundaries and it being acceptable to players.


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## pemerton (May 4, 2013)

Imaro said:


> This list is silly because it's based on extremes as opposed to the excluded middle
> 
> <snip>
> 
> The misinterpretation is in assuming that your parameters describe all or event he majority of ways in which a DM empowered game is played or run



Well, if you are not going to post what a "DM-empowered" game looks like, I am stuck with trying to draw inferences.



Imaro said:


> It's not just about power level (though 4e has issues in this area as well "wizard with an uber Arcana skill and certain cantrips I'm looking at you", there's also story elements (Say as a DM my campaign world doesn't have psionics... but in 4e a psionicist is core and allowable if the player wants to play one, so...) this is, IMO, DM dis-empowerment regardless of whether psionics is overpowered or not.





Imaro said:


> this type of DM empowerment and owning of the campaign flies in the face of what many fans of 4e such as pemerton want unless I am mistaken.



As best I can tell, you are describing in these remarks one feature of a "DM-empowered" game, namely, GM control over introduction of story elements, and of mechanical elements of PC build.  That was my first and fifth dot points.

"DM owning of the campaign" might also imply GM control over campaign storyline, which goes to my third dot point.



Imaro said:


> I've also seen players, when things turn against them, start to grumble and make snide remarks or question DM's about whether an encounter is "appropriate". In fact I will say I've seen this more often in 4e games than in 3.x games... of course I admit that's purely anecdotal evidence. A better question I think is why is this even coming up if a DM has the right to set the encounters at any level he wants?



This also seems to me to be a description, by you, of another feature of a "DM-empowered" game. It seems to correspond to my fouth dot point - namely, that if there are encounter-building guidelines, the GM is free to ignore them.

So it's not clear to me, at this stage, in what way my dot points involved misinterpretation. It would be clearer if you actually said a bit more about what constitutes a "DM-empowered" game, and what the role of the players is in such a game. For instance, what role do the players in such a game have in introducing story elements? In contributing mechanical elements, and/or adjudicating the mechanics? In setting goals for their PCs which, if they accomplish them, can earn metagame rewards like XP?

That last thing, in my view, has a long tradition in D&D. For instance, Gygax makes it completely clear in his PHB that players are expected to set treasure-recovery goals for their PCs, and his DMG makes it clear that they are entitled to metagame rewards - XP - for recovering treasure. Does this mean that Gygaxian D&D is "dis-empowering" of the GM?



Imaro said:


> [MENTION=336]we are talking about the DM having the authority to go outside of those boundaries and it being acceptable to players.



When has that _ever_ been acceptable in tournament play?

Back in my university days I ran a tournament scenario - it involved 20+ players with pregen PCs in a series of interlocking scenarion "zones". Each zone had its own GM; one of the GMs imposed his own judgement on the particular zone he was GMing, adding abilities to one of the NPCs (a lich) which were not in the encounter description I had prepared. As a result, those players who ended up in that zone had no chance of winning the tournament, as they could not escape from this GM's free-formed challenge. That's not "empowered DMing", that's just breaking the rules of the competition.


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## pemerton (May 4, 2013)

Luce said:


> I think the conflict of interest was assumed. The players were encouraged to get involved in the game, but not in  defining the mechanics. Suggest, offer, plead their case- Yes. Tell the DM, this is the Rule -No. There was an example [in the DMG] of player wanting to be from noble background. Fine. Then the said player using that as justification to demand being in charge of the rest of the party and having vast amount (for a 1st leveler) of wealth. Not Fine.



I don't entirely see what this example has to do with the player adjudicating the mechanics. For instance, in D&D there is no mechanic of "being in charge of the rest of the party". And to the extent that a player is trying to break the game by introducing excessive starting wealth, why does the GM have some special role in relation to that? What are the other players doing here? (Burning Wheel, in particular, emphasises the role of the other players in ensuring that starting PCs are well-suited to the game that everyone has agree to participate in.)



Luce said:


> Magic item creation was supposed to be (for this more powerful then potions and scrolls) an excuse for and adventure. Just having the money and spare was not enough, one had to go personally and collect the ingredients. Time consuming and sidequestty Yes, but at the same time I found it provided investment in game and sense of accomplishment to players.  Not necessary everyone's preferred way of gaming, but it is one of the ways that works for me.



More strength to your arm!

But I don't really see what this has to do with "DM empowerment" or decadent RPGing. For instance, I hate the whole notion of "sidequests" because it implies that anything player initiated is not central - the central, non-sidequest is created by the GM. Is this a mark of decadence in play? Of player-empowerment? And how does this related to the alleged thwarting of player agency by 4e?


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## D'karr (May 4, 2013)

Kimberly614 said:
			
		

> Kimberly614
> Kimberly614 is online now
> Registered User
> 
> ...




Reported


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## S'mon (May 4, 2013)

Imaro said:


> Sure, but I am more interested in whether you consider them to be or not to be dis-empowering for the DM.




Stuff is disempowering for the GM when it tells the players "Your GM must do this". GM-facing advice is not disempowering IME. I find the Wish List idea really stupid and don't use it. If the 4e PHB said "Your GM will hand out X items per level" then that would be disempowering. As it is (stupid) suggestion in the DMG, it is not disempowering IMO. Likewise the books don't say "Your GM will allow anything" so it's not the books' fault if some player expects that.

One thing I find disempowering about 4e that is not in your list relates to magic items and the electronic character builder. The builder leads players to expect that any item I hand out is in the builder. Some players get really discombobulated at the idea of GM-created magic items that cannot be selected in the builder. Having the magic items be in player-side books like PHB likely contributes to that.

Conversely I find the 4e monster creation system is very empowering for the GM, it gives me all the flexibility I need, and support at least equal to pre-3e, better in some ways. It is a very welcome change from the nightmare of 3e monster build-as-PC-build.

Overall, I don't find irrational expectations of some players on bulletin boards to be objectively disempowering, only player-facing materials in the actual rules have the potential to be disempowering. 4e has a bit of that, but not a lot.


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## S'mon (May 4, 2013)

Imaro said:


> ...there's also story elements (Say as a DM my campaign world doesn't have psionics... but in 4e a psionicist is core and allowable if the player wants to play one, so...) this is, IMO, DM dis-empowerment regardless of whether psionics is overpowered or not.
> 
> I've also seen players, when things turn against them, start to grumble and make snide remarks or question DM's about whether an encounter is "appropriate". In fact I will say I've seen this more often in 4e games than in 3.x games... of course I admit that's purely anecdotal evidence. A better question I think is why is this even coming up if a DM has the right to set the encounters at any level he wants?




Most of my 4e campaigns don't use PHB3, I've never had any problem with players demanding to play psionic PCs. Nowhere in the 4e books does it say "Your GM must allow this stuff". Sure WoTC want me to allow it, just as Gygax wanted me to buy and use 1e Unearthed Arcana (I did, more fool me), but they don't try to force me to allow it AFAICT. I don't totally dismiss your experience BTW - I did see a player in another GM's 4e game complain that the GM was 'doing it wrong' by restricting sources, eg not allowing Eberron stuff in a non-Eberron campaign. But I don't think that is a 4e thing in particular, or the fault of 4e presentation. I've met dozens and dozens of players over the past five years, of course a few will be jerks.

Grumbling about inappropriate encounters -bad linear *adventure design* can cause this as a somewhat legitimate grievance: in a linear adventure the players may feel forced into the encounter that lies along the railroad line. If it then feels impossible to win, I understand why they may feel aggrieved. The best solution is to not run linear adventures. The second-best is to scale everything to the PCs. IME this is far, far more a problem in 3e and PF adventure paths because offense outstrips defence, encounter design is built on a knife edge, and what was designed as tough-but-winnable can easily become an unwinnable TPK waiting to happen.

If the GM is running a sandbox/open campaign and players still grumble about the potential existence of unbeatable fights, that would be a problem. It takes an aggressive misreading of either 3e or 4e encounter building guidelines to get to that point, though. Both allow for unwinnable encounters - 3e even says to include unwinnable encounters - so a player who has read the guidelines should be aware of their potential to exist.


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## S'mon (May 4, 2013)

Luce said:


> I will reiterate my opinion that while there have been change in rules there also had been a change in demographics and both of those have impact on gaming.




I think there has probably been a cultural shift over the past 20 years or so such that more people are growing up with a sense of entitlement. And maybe modern D&D caters to that 
more - "This game is about you being awesome" rather than "This game is about you probably dying horribly and repeatedly". OTOH the intro to the 1983 Mentzer Basic D&D Red Box told players the game was about heroic solo dragon slaying, then gave them 1d8 hp and death at 0. At least 4e's mechanics match the promise of the fluff a lot more closely.

Personally, as a player I like* the Old School D&D challenge of being awesome in a game that is trying to kill me. But I also like it that 4e allows the average player to step up and 'be awesome' fairly reliably - it's possible for a sufficiently incompetent player to fail at that, but they really have to work at it.

*Exception -recently played Labyrinth Lord. I played it correctly - cautiously - and was repeatedly slagged off by a 'new school' player who thought my 4 hp Elf should have been charging into battle like a 4e PC, not lurking behind his wall of NPC spear-carriers. That player was not fun, though the game was.


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## S'mon (May 4, 2013)

Luce said:


> As far as the encounter, there seems to be absence of the concept of "status quo"  as 3e DMG put it. Encounters have to be winnable.




4e does lack the concept of the status quo encounter, and for me this is certainly a problem and something I have wrestled with. It does not mean that encounters must be winnable. It does mean that the assumption is that non-winnable encounters have a story/dramatic purpose, not an environment-simulation purpose. 4e's GM-side design is a gamist/dramatist mix that is really hostile to simulationist play, and I've eventually learned that if I want to run a simulationist game I should use a different system.


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## S'mon (May 4, 2013)

Luce said:


> Sending a 18 level elite ( such as a lich) vs party of six composed of level 9 PC is not in 4th or 3rd, but acceptable in 2nd (DUN # 75 "Forgotten Man"). Is that the way to go? Matter of personal opinion.




In 4e, take 10 minutes to turn the level 18 elite into a level 13 solo, and it's a good 'very hard' encounter for your level 9 PCs. In 3e you have to nerf the Lich by de-levelling or by nerfed spell selection, so yes it's not really doable in 3e. 1e-2e it works fine, of course.


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## pemerton (May 5, 2013)

S'mon said:


> I think there has probably been a cultural shift over the past 20 years or so such that more people are growing up with a sense of entitlement. And maybe modern D&D caters to that more - "This game is about you being awesome" rather than "This game is about you probably dying horribly and repeatedly". OTOH the intro to the 1983 Mentzer Basic D&D Red Box told players the game was about heroic solo dragon slaying, then gave them 1d8 hp and death at 0. At least 4e's mechanics match the promise of the fluff a lot more closely.



I don't know the Mentzer box but Moldvay Basic has the same dragon-slaying heroic stuff that the game can't really deliver.

Whatever the overall cultural shifts may have been, I'm a little sceptical of the idea that they explain some dramatic shift in RPG expectations. Fishing, or learning to play a musical instrument, may be hobbies that require discipline relative to reward. But I personally find imposing that model onto classsic dungeon crawling doesn't really work - unlike musicianship, the "discipline" of playing your first level PCs until one makes it to 3rd level and survivability isn't actually cultivating any talent or teaching you anything of independent value. (Of course, if you find this sort of play _intrinsically_ enjoyable then go for it! But I don't accept that enjoying lethal dungeon crawling is a sign of some greater moral character.)



S'mon said:


> 4e does lack the concept of the status quo encounter, and for me this is certainly a problem and something I have wrestled with.



I agree it lacks that concept. As you know, for me that's not such a big deal - and the scaling rules make it easy to adjust one's planned stuff pretty easily if necessary.



S'mon said:


> It does not mean that encounters must be winnable. It does mean that the assumption is that non-winnable encounters have a story/dramatic purpose, not an environment-simulation purpose.



I agree with this too.

I'm also interested in the notion of "winnable". In classic (Gygaxian) D&D, "winnable" means "able to extract the loot". In 3E presumably it means "able to kill the monsters". In Burning Wheel, "winnable" means something like "contains room for failing forward" - ie non-fatal to the PC.

Because D&D traditionally has no end-point for combat other than _death_, it puts especial pressure on the notion of "winnable" encounters. This is also complicated by the absence in 3E and 2nd ed AD&D (as best I know) of evasion rules - whereas these are fairly prominent in classic D&D, and can be handled in 4e as a skill challenge (although you have to wait for DMG 2, I think, to see this expressly flagged).



Luce said:


> Encounters have to be winnable. Which is paradoxically not diferent from previus editions, just with the clear cut math there is different definition what is called so. Sending a 18 level elite ( such as a lich) vs party of six composed of level 9 PC is not in 4th or 3rd, but acceptable in 2nd (DUN # 75 "Forgotten Man").





S'mon said:


> In 4e, take 10 minutes to turn the level 18 elite into a level 13 solo, and it's a good 'very hard' encounter for your level 9 PCs.



I ran an encounter with a 15th(? - memory a bit hazy) level solo wizard against 12th or so level PCs in my 4e game. I narrated his high hit points as skill with his staff (having the LotR movies in mind), deflection magic, etc. And as a Vecna-cultist I gave him a way to steal the secrets of the PC's encounter powers to gain action points, which he could then use to cancel debuffs. Plus he could blind at-will, or close to it - the PCs ended up using their wish ring to wish that no one in the keep in which the were fighting could be blinded for the next hour, which depowered the wizard quite a bit and let them win the fight.

(The wish ring was a non-DDI item that they didn't object to writing down and tracking manually.)

Had the wizard won, he would have taken them prisoner (4e makes this easy with it's flexible rules for what 0 hp means), triggering a Conan-style "escape from the wizard's dungeon" scenario.


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## Manbearcat (May 5, 2013)

On expectations of DM-empowerment and the implications on player-entitlement.  This is all pretty intuitive to me but apparently its not a logical inference and requires written text to underscore it so some greater cultural movement of over-expectant players doesn't co-opt the table dynamic:



> Page 5 (Putting it All to Use) of probably the best piece of 4e work to come out of the edition; the DMG 2 by Wyatt, Slaviscek, and Laws:
> 
> Start by knowing when to say no.  If a player brings a new option to your table that doesn't fit in your game, it's okay to tell the player to hold on to that idea until this campaign wraps up and you (or someone else in your group) starts something new.  Balance this, of course, with the advice to say yes as much as possible (see page 28 of the Dungeon Master's Guide), but know the limits you want in your game and don't be afraid to enforce them.




Do we really need rules advice that says "man up and put your foot down when necessary?"  That would seem implicit.  If an edition with lots of cool stuff player-side didn't have such text actually penned out would that then qualify it as "the edition that ushered in the Player Entitlement Plague"?  I cannot imagine buying into that as if I did then I would have to force myself to then extend such reasoning to a whole host of other issues that I find equally implicit; don't do something foolishly perilous or negligent and then assume a 3rd party with little to no locus of control with respect to my action must then assume liability for the ill that befalls me.

But I suppose its moot because its blatantly spelled out in the 2009 DMG2.


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## pemerton (May 5, 2013)

On the "saying no" issue - this is not a rules issue. It's a social contract issue.

For instance - a player in a group buy PHB3 and wants to play a Shardmind Psion. Whether or not this is acceptable isn't something that the rules can answer; who has authority over saying yes or no isn't something that the rules can dictate.


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## Hussar (May 5, 2013)

billd91 said:


> Apparently you guys weren't very active on the internet over the last 10 or so years in which we witnessed lots of players complaining about GMs not following the RAW, disputes over what the RAW meant, dismissals of people who adhere to Rules as Interpreted as "house rules", as well as players complaining bitterly about GMs violating encounter creation guidelines, not upholding wealth by level limits, destroying their stuff with rust monsters setting them back on their WBL permanently, creating campaigns that disallow certain character concepts, enforcing paladin code violations, and otherwise saying no to them when they want to do something "cool".
> 
> Of course Mearls's theory isn't going to apply to every single game being played. He's not trying to say that games in which the players and GMs have a functional rather than dysfunctional relationship don't exist. He's trying to describe the zeitgeist of D&D with respect to rules vs rulings, rules vs GM authority. The pendulum has swung when you compare the 1e days to the 2e days to the 3e days to now (in fact, it's probably fair to say there are multiple pendulums all swinging around at once). And in some ways, that's deliberate. Part of 3e's philosophy, thanks to Skip Williams, was to put more of the rules in the players' hands so know what to expect out of the actions they choose to take. And while that may be reasonable, one of the blessings of turning things over to the general public is that you get people and groups who push reasonable to the point of unreasonableness. And that gets reflected here on the discussion boards where discussions serve to amplify differences more often than promote commonality.




You mean, the exact, almost word for word, identical discussions that we had throughout the 80's and 90's?  I guess you haven't been around for Dragon Magazine articles through that time.


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## Manbearcat (May 5, 2013)

Precisely.  Which puts the story to bed on this one.  Its pretty self-evident.  

Which leaves me wondering how, and why, a conversation is being built around the premise that its more (or at least equal) system issue rather than social contract issue.  There is a locus of control issue dangling at the epicenter of this; one of which an investigation of would likely be breaking board rules.


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## Hussar (May 5, 2013)

Imaro said:


> /snip
> 
> This is exactly the sort of things I've seen as well.  But unlike you I've experienced, on other sites, it being alot more common and ingrained in the 4e community than you seem to think it is.
> /snip




Whereas I think it's far, far more ingrained in the community of 4e critics than in actual 4e players.  Because it only ever seems to be those who dislike the system who keep trotting these things out.  I've not really seen anyone say, "Gee, I really like 4e, but, man, I wish I had more authority as the DM because those 4e rules are just so restrictive of what I want to do."

But, I certainly have seen lots of 4e critics trot that out.


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## Hussar (May 5, 2013)

Luce said:


> /snip
> As far as the encounter, there seems to be absence of the concept of "status quo"  as 3e DMG put it. Encounters have to be winnable. Which is paradoxically not diferent from previus editions, just with the clear cut math there is different definition what is called so. Sending a 18 level elite ( such as a lich) vs party of six composed of level 9 PC is not in 4th or 3rd, but acceptable in 2nd (DUN # 75 "Forgotten Man"). Is that the way to go? Matter of personal opinion.




Sigh, why do people insist on comparing apples to oranges?

A party of six 9th level PC's in 2e would obliterate an 18th level lich in about one round.  About the only way the lich would survive is if the PC's didn't have +1 or better weapons (extremely unlikely for 9th level PC's).  The three fighter types are doing about 30 points of damage each/round and the lich has probably about 50 hit points.  Dead lich.

Different systems do not compare.  Ever.  A lich in 3e would mop the floor with these PC's.  In 2e, it's a speed bump.


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## Hussar (May 5, 2013)

Manbearcat said:


> On expectations of DM-empowerment and the implications on player-entitlement.  This is all pretty intuitive to me but apparently its not a logical inference and requires written text to underscore it so some greater cultural movement of over-expectant players doesn't co-opt the table dynamic:
> 
> 
> 
> ...




Apparently, judging by many, many of the criticisms of 4e?  Yes.  It's absolutely mind boggling to me, but, apparently, the second we pick up a 4e DMG, we lose all critical facility and become mindless drones, subject to the whims of our royal queen players.  

Funny thing is, whenever you discuss issues in any other edition, the standard answer is always, "Well, yes, but, change that rule and the problem goes away" and that's perfectly acceptable.  I mean, the current problems with paladins thread states exactly that.  

Funny thing is, it's reversed though.  There, proponents want the restrictions hard wired in, and then tell the rest of us to just take things out that we don't like.  Apparently, adding things in is impossible for a certain segment of gamers.  Baffling but true.


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## S'mon (May 5, 2013)

pemerton said:


> I don't know the Mentzer box but Moldvay Basic has the same dragon-slaying heroic stuff that the game can't really deliver...
> 
> ...Because D&D traditionally has no end-point for combat other than _death_, it puts especial pressure on the notion of "winnable" encounters. This is also complicated by the absence in 3E and 2nd ed AD&D (as best I know) of evasion rules - whereas these are fairly prominent in classic D&D, and can be handled in 4e as a skill challenge (although you have to wait for DMG 2, I think, to see this expressly flagged).




Moldvay not Mentzer, sorry! 

Evasion - I don't know why other groups struggle with this concept. If X is no longer on the battlemat with Y, X and Y are no longer in combat. If Y wants to then pursue X, that is adjudicared by the noncombat rules, such as BX Evasion %, 3e skill checks (DCs set by relative speeds, cover, etc), 4e skill challenges, etc. IMCs NPCs run away all the time, and PCs run away whenever they're losing, which happens at least a few times per campaign.


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## S'mon (May 5, 2013)

Hussar said:


> Whereas I think it's far, far more ingrained in the community of 4e critics than in actual 4e players.  Because it only ever seems to be those who dislike the system who keep trotting these things out.  I've not really seen anyone say, "Gee, I really like 4e, but, man, I wish I had more authority as the DM because those 4e rules are just so restrictive of what I want to do."
> 
> But, I certainly have seen lots of 4e critics trot that out.




Something I haven't seen discussed is that when compared to 0e-3e, 4e encourages a less adversarial mindset between players and GMs. The player and GM advice and the mechanics seem designed to foster trust between the two - trust that both are working together in trying to create a fun game, which in 4e seems primarily about creating an engaging story. It's widely recognised that 4e is less Simulationist than pre-4e, but it's also less Gamist, except within the narrow combat-as-sport confines of the combat encounter system.
The result of this trust is that IME in actual play 4e players don't complain about GMs going 'outside the rules' - because they trust that doing so will create an engaging story, and is not being done in adversarial fashion.
In this sense, 4e feels empowering for both GMs (who can do what they like) and for players, who are trusted to contribute in creating the emerging story. But it also means that 4e is a different and (I think) narrower game than pre-4e D&D; it is not designed for the Gamism-built-on-Simulation style which I think was common to at least 1e through 3e, if not 0e (0e seems more pure Gamism to me, but obviously had the potential to be tweaked in a Simulationist direction).  I think it's a legitimate complaint about 4e that it is not good at 'doing D&D', if D&D means the Gamism-on-Simulation style of 1e or 3e. It's also not very tweakable to other styles, eg the way 2e used 1e rules for a more dramatist/story style. I'm wondering if this is a source of the complaints about disempowerment: it's not disempowering if it's run the way it's designed, but it's not designed to run like traditional D&D.


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## Hussar (May 5, 2013)

S'mon said:
			
		

> I think it's a legitimate complaint about 4e that it is not good at 'doing D&D', if D&D means the Gamism-on-Simulation style of 1e or 3e. It's also not very tweakable to other styles, eg the way 2e used 1e rules for a more dramatist/story style. I'm wondering if this is a source of the complaints about disempowerment: it's not disempowering if it's run the way it's designed, but it's not designed to run like traditional D&D.




I agree with most of what you said.

Only thing is, I don't think that 2e was very successful using the 1e rules for a more story style.  The reason that 2e was, for the longest time, the red-headed stepchild of D&D is because it tried to be a bunch of things for a bunch of different styles but generally failed at all of them.  Die-hard 1e fans hated it because it was too poncy and into Thespianism and the story gamers hated it and fled for Vampire and other games of that ilk.

4e, IMO, fails because it is so transparent.  It doesn't hold anyone's hands.  People suddenly see under the hood and they don't like it.  Take the whole, "Encounters must be winnable" line.  That's not what 4e says.  4e says that, by and large, most encounters that the PC's face are winnable.  Now, you never saw anything like that in the 1e DMG because Gygax didn't have the luxury of 30 years of gaming to look back on and make pronouncements like that.  But, the 4e devs did.  They looked at the modules and whatnot produced over the decades and made a pretty easy generalization - most encounters that the PC's face are, in fact, winnable. 

3e went some way down this road.  When you read the CR/EL guidelines, they pretty much say the same thing.  It might be fuzzier - but when most encounters, according to the guidelines, are EL=Party level par, then most encounters are winnable fairly easily.

Thing is, 3e monsters vs parties were so tight that it's a very fine line between a cakewalk and dead PC's.  The monsters didn't scale very well.  AD&D isn't really a problem since monsters in combat, outside of save or die, were individually so weak.  3e, OTOH, was a much different animal.  4e is different again in that it makes the monster math 100% visible to the DM.  A level X monster can do Y to Z damage.  Raise the level of the monster and the damage scales.  

I honestly think what people are really reacting to is the transparency of 4e.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 5, 2013)

> Something I haven't seen discussed is that when compared to 0e-3e, 4e encourages a less adversarial mindset between players and GMs.




Hmmm, I can't say I agree with this...nor can I disagree.

IME, the adversarial relationship between GMs and players varies more because of the individual on the other side of the screen, or sometimes the nature of the campaign, and less with the system.  I base this on 30+ years of gaming experience in over 100 systems in 3 states and 5 cities...on both sides of the shield.

But I have only gamed with one guy who runs 4Ed- and he has _only_ run 4Ed in our group- so my sampling size on that side of the analysis is insignificant.  I cannot make a valid comparison.

I have to say, though, that in my primary game group, our playstyle didn't change as the campaign was updated from 1Ed to 2Ed, then later to 3Ed & 3.5Ed.

For us, it wasn't transparency that turned @50% of our group irrevocably against 4Ed.


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## S'mon (May 5, 2013)

Hussar said:


> I agree with most of what you said.
> 
> Only thing is, I don't think that 2e was very successful using the 1e rules for a more story style.  The reason that 2e was, for the longest time, the red-headed stepchild of D&D is because it tried to be a bunch of things for a bunch of different styles but generally failed at all of them.  Die-hard 1e fans hated it because it was too poncy and into Thespianism and the story gamers hated it and fled for Vampire and other games of that ilk.




I don't disagree, I never actually owned a 2e DMG anyway so my experience is limited - we basically used 2e PHB & MM as supplements for our 1e campaign, which was never a Story type campaign, it was pretty hardcore Gamist as [MENTION=326]Upper_Krust[/MENTION] could attest.


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## S'mon (May 5, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> IME, the adversarial relationship between GMs and players varies more because of the individual on the other side of the screen, or sometimes the nature of the campaign, and less with the system.




In pre-4e editions of D&D, a very common starting experience for new players is that in the first session their new 1st level PC suddenly gets killed, seemingly out of nowhere. IME players immediately react to this by going into adversarial stance. The only way to routinely avoid this is to run very low-threat 'newbie quests' or else fudge to keep PCs alive - neither very satisfying IMO.

Random death is much rarer in 4e, and there is not the 1st level 'fantasy effin Vietnam' experience. While I have had a 1st session TPK in 4e (and several later session near-TPKs), the system pretty much ensures that PC defeat comes at the end of a long, drawn out combat where the PCs go down heroically swinging. These tend to be quite satisfying even for the losers, and PCs rarely die randomly or alone. This in itself I think reduces the adversarial perception on the player side.


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## Hussar (May 5, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> Hmmm, I can't say I agree with this...nor can I disagree.
> 
> IME, the adversarial relationship between GMs and players varies more because of the individual on the other side of the screen, or sometimes the nature of the campaign, and less with the system.  I base this on 30+ years of gaming experience in over 100 systems in 3 states and 5 cities...on both sides of the shield.
> 
> ...




But, hang on here.  The 1e DMG is pretty clear on the adversarial role the DM should be playing.  There's numerous places where it flat out states that the DM should be against the players.  Look at the section on finding secret doors.  Or listening at doors for that matter.  The rules and the modules are pretty clear that the DM is in an adversarial role.  It's take thirty years of RPG development to beat that idea out of the heads of many groups.

So, if it wasn't transparency, then what turned you off of 4e?  And, why couldn't you do the same thing with 4e that you did with every other edition - ie.  drift the rules so that it fit with your playstyle?


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## Manbearcat (May 5, 2013)

S'mon said:


> In pre-4e editions of D&D, a very common starting experience for new players is that in the first session their new 1st level PC suddenly gets killed, seemingly out of nowhere. IME players immediately react to this by going into adversarial stance. The only way to routinely avoid this is to run very low-threat 'newbie quests' or else fudge to keep PCs alive - neither very satisfying IMO.
> 
> Random death is much rarer in 4e, and there is not the 1st level 'fantasy effin Vietnam' experience. While I have had a 1st session TPK in 4e (and several later session near-TPKs), the system pretty much ensures that PC defeat comes at the end of a long, drawn out combat where the PCs go down heroically swinging. These tend to be quite satisfying even for the losers, and PCs rarely die randomly or alone. This in itself I think reduces the adversarial perception on the player side.




Great post S'mon.  Keen bit of insight here.



Hussar said:


> But, hang on here.  The 1e DMG is pretty clear on the adversarial role the DM should be playing.  There's numerous places where it flat out states that the DM should be against the players.  Look at the section on finding secret doors.  Or listening at doors for that matter.  The rules and the modules are pretty clear that the DM is in an adversarial role.  It's take thirty years of RPG development to beat that idea out of the heads of many groups.




And this is good here too, Hussar, but cannot xp.  To bulwark your point, lets take a look at a few of the:



> *Top Ten Traps to Avoid advice in DMG2, p 65.
> *
> 7.  *Traps that Counter PC Preparations*:  The frost giant's palace of ice shouldn't have fire traps.  Maybe you can justify it, but instead of explaining why you're making the players unhappy, why not make them feel smart and reward their preparations for cold by giving them exciting ice traps to overcome?
> 
> ...




You won't find that in the 1e DMG.  Its also amusing when contrasted with the general advice that you find (on these boards and others) for dealing with overpowered Generalist Batman Wizards (who are prepared for everything due to the breadth and scope of their PC build choices) and the 15 MWD.


----------



## Luce (May 5, 2013)

Hussar said:


> Sigh, why do people insist on comparing apples to oranges?
> 
> A party of six 9th level PC's in 2e would obliterate an 18th level lich in about one round.  About the only way the lich would survive is if the PC's didn't have +1 or better weapons (extremely unlikely for 9th level PC's).  The three fighter types are doing about 30 points of damage each/round and the lich has probably about 50 hit points.  Dead lich.
> 
> Different systems do not compare.  Ever.  A lich in 3e would mop the floor with these PC's.  In 2e, it's a speed bump.




I bring that example up because I feel that feel that some people forget that difference exist. A lot of crunch carried over between those two subsequent editions, but the numerical statistics does not mean the same things.
Even starting with Char-gen, 3d6 and 4d6 drop lowest may both result in 3-18 range but the latter results in higher average. So the old 14 is the new 16. Or spells, for instance Fireball may no longer explode to fill available space, but does the same damage progression. However, doing 35 points at 10th level is one thing when the enemy has 80 HP (2e average Old blue dragon  (18HD)) and different impact vs 182 hp enemy (3e young adult blue dragon CR 10).
In 2e the spell casters power is limited by lower number of spells available combined with the ease of disruption- any hit (or even the act of dodging according to one Dragon article) means that the spell is lost. [drg 173:
  “[...] foes can  disrupt spellcasting by throwing almost anything at the caster: small  sacks or pouches with flour in them, light (nondamaging) pebbles, even  mud pies. The act of dodging a blow, which occurs if a spell-caster  wants to apply his armor class bonus from dexterity to prevent his being  struck, negates his spell-casting.”]. 
In other words, while the two editions share a lot in terms of the theme, mood and fluff the way the game handles at the table (even just using the core 3) is not exact one-to-one map. 
Finally, I disagree that the given situation is a speed bump especially since the lich is more likely to have the jump on the party then the other way around and that he had 30 mummies and two score of skeletons plus a high level anti-paladin to act as his protective wall. Winnable?- defiantly. Easy? not so much.


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## Luce (May 5, 2013)

Hussar said:


> Apparently, judging by many, many of the criticisms of 4e?  Yes.  It's absolutely mind boggling to me, but, apparently, the second we pick up a 4e DMG, we lose all critical facility and become mindless drones, subject to the whims of our royal queen players.
> 
> Funny thing is, whenever you discuss issues in any other edition, the standard answer is always, "Well, yes, but, change that rule and the problem goes away" and that's perfectly acceptable.  I mean, the current problems with paladins thread states exactly that.
> 
> Funny thing is, it's reversed though.  There, proponents want the restrictions hard wired in, and then tell the rest of us to just take things out that we don't like.  Apparently, adding things in is impossible for a certain segment of gamers.  Baffling but true.




That is one of the things I been trying to talk about- the difference in expectations stemming from both a shifting "official" position how the game is supposed to be played and the gradual change in demographics (I cannot think of better term in expressing the opinion that more people play with high turnover groups often composed of strangers)
Another thing, each DMG is targeted for new player (and DMs) as well as veterans. In other words people who do not have previous experience or established style of play. One can definably run say 3e the same way as he used to run 2e - using fiat when he cannot remember or dislike the RAW. "DM:How did grapple work again? You know what, just give me a STR check and we go from there." Likely you will have a fun game if you are playing with friends, but expect rule aheavers to scream bloody murder that you are mangling the rules.
Again the difference was that level of fiat was not only acceptable but encouraged by the designers  in 2e. 3e seems to have established different expectations.  Neither is everyone's preferred way I understand, but neither is a wrong way to have fun.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 5, 2013)

Hussar said:


> But, hang on here.  The 1e DMG is pretty clear on the adversarial role the DM should be playing.  There's numerous places where it flat out states that the DM should be against the players.  Look at the section on finding secret doors.  Or listening at doors for that matter.  The rules and the modules are pretty clear that the DM is in an adversarial role.




By some modern standards, I probably do have a somewhat adversarial style.  But its not on 100% of the time.  Why?

Because, like every other GM, I use or toss rules as I saw fit, based on what I felt the campaign needed.  AD&D weapon speed rules? BLECH!  Even Gygax talked about D&D rules he didn't use and/or bent into pretzels- they're guidelines, not immutable rules of the universe.

(Though once a rule is used a certain way, that is the way it was used thereafter.  One must be consistent.)




> So, if it wasn't transparency, then what turned you off of 4e?  And, why couldn't you do the same thing with 4e that you did with every other edition - ie.  drift the rules so that it fit with your playstyle?




Second question first:

1) because the rules I changed in other editions were much easier to excise...were less crucial...than the aspects of 4Ed I dislike.  Like the aforementioned weapon speed rules.  That's an easy toss.  But the way HPs & HSs work?  That's a lot of work to redo.

2) because there were fewer rules I disliked in prior editions compared to 4Ed.

So, what turned us off?

4Ed turned me (and several guys in our group) off out of the starting gate, and only after a while of playing it did I find my personal sweet spot of enjoyment in it...but it remains my least favorite incarnation of the game.

The first problem was the difference in the race/class design tossed out the option of campaign continuity.  Our group easily upgraded our game from 1st to 2nd, and the 3Ed conversion guide made that changeover pretty easy.  With 4Ed, that wasn't an option- developers even said as much during Pre-release comments- the multiclass rules alone invalidated a good 70% of my PCs.

The second problem was in the combat system.  All those modifiers that can pop up, changing from round to round, turn to turn; marking, etc., were pegged early on as being fiddly bits that would slow things down.  And they have proven to be so.

Worse, in prior editions, the majority of such modifiers came from one source- spellcasters.  That meant, in a typical combat, between 3-5 sources, from friendlies and enemies.  In 4Ed, every PC and NPC in the game can buff, debuff & rebuff one or multiple targets every time they act.  This slows things down and often results in modifiers getting missed or forgotten.

(Some of the guys in our group are rabid computer gamers, and we even include professional computer game designers among our number.   _To a man_, this was something they said they would rather have computers tracking.)

Hit Points & Healing Surges: at the very least, there are too many.  And their potency is occasionally jarring, seemingly arbitrarily assigned when they run contra to the usual D&D style.  Between his HP & HS, my Warlock has more HP than any other PC except the Fighter: this pure caster is tougher than some of the front line fighters.  Worse, the Rogue- a striker who actually DOES see melee combat regularly- has maybe 70% of the one who can usually sit back an lob spells.  That's ass-backwards.

The alignment system: I personally liked the 9 point system, and that alignment had an actual impact on the game.  What 4Ed has is neither complete nor relevant- it may have well been excised completely instead of wasting the space it took up in the books.  Even a simple Good/Unaligned/Evil system would have been better, if the alignment had an impact.

I could go on, but I won't.

Like I said, I do enjoy playing 4Ed...but I'll never run it as a DM.


----------



## Hussar (May 5, 2013)

Luce said:


> /snipFinally, I disagree that the given situation is a speed bump especially since the lich is more likely to have the jump on the party then the other way around and that he had 30 mummies and two score of skeletons plus a high level anti-paladin to act as his protective wa[/SIZE][/SIZE][/SIZE][/SIZE][/SIZE][/SIZE][/SIZE][/SIZE]ll[/SIZE]. Winnable?- defiantly. Easy? not so much.[/SIZE]
> [/SIZE][/FONT]




LOL.  What level of an encounter would that be in 3e?  Like you said, it's winnable in 2e with a 9th level party.  That's an epic level encounter in 3e.  There's just no comparison.  Which rolls me back to the idea of why people find 4e so different from 3e.  It baffles me to be honest.  In 2e, as you say, this encounter is winnable.  In 3e and in 4e, this is a TPK in the making.  30 mummies plus an anti-paladin, plus a lich?  If you aren't scraping the party off the walls after this, you're not trying very hard.

Mechanically, 3e shares very, very little with 2e.  Yet, people seem to want to lump 3e with AD&D and call 4e the outlier.  I just don't understand how.



Luce said:


> That is one of the things I been trying to talk about- the difference in expectations stemming from both a shifting "official" position how the game is supposed to be played and the gradual change in demographics (I cannot think of better term in expressing the opinion that more people play with high turnover groups often composed of strangers)
> Another thing, each DMG is targeted for new player (and DMs) as well as veterans. In other words people who do not have previous experience or established style of play. One can definably run say 3e the same way as he used to run 2e - using fiat when he cannot remember or dislike the RAW. "DM:How did grapple work again? You know what, just give me a STR check and we go from there." Likely you will have a fun game if you are playing with friends, but expect rule aheavers to scream bloody murder that you are mangling the rules.
> Again the difference was that level of fiat was not only acceptable but encouraged by the designers  in 2e. 3e seems to have established different expectations.  Neither is everyone's preferred way I understand, but neither is a wrong way to have fun.




Like, I said, I've had very, very different experiences.  I once had a player in a 2e game tell me that I couldn't use a manticore in the location I was using it in, because the climate/terrain was wrong.  And he argued with me about it.

I'd also suggest you go back and reread those Dragon magazines that you are referencing.  Gygax made no bones that if you were adding in all sorts of house rules, you weren't playing D&D anymore.  Sage Advice columns go back a lot further than 3e.  Sage Advice starts in Issue 31 in 1979.  THAT'S how long rules arguments have been going on in public forums.  Well, at least that long.  

The idea that fiat was somehow more acceptable then and not now is a complete fabrication.  Good grief, ten bajillion 3rd party product books for d20 D&D and somehow house ruling is less common?  Who do you think wrote those books?  

The difference with 3e is that 3e was based on actual play.  Again, 20 years of gaming experience went into the design, instead of simply piggybacking on the original works, they sat down and looked at what groups were doing during play.  Instead of having no rules for common actions like jumping over a pit, we got the Jump skill with a standard DC.  

This is the exact same argument that's been trotted out since 3e was released.  3e did not take the authority of the DM and give it to the players.  It took some of the authority that the DM had, and made it transparent and wrapped it up into the mechanics.


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## Hussar (May 5, 2013)

DannyA said:
			
		

> Like I said, I do enjoy playing 4Ed...but I'll never run it as a DM.



  Whereas I'm the complete opposite for 3e now.  I'll play it, but, I'll never DM it again.  Different strokes.

But, the hit point thing does kinda surprise me.  That's such an easy thing to fix.  Too many healing surges?  Ok, remove some to taste.  It's not going to change the game that much, simply change pacing.  Recovery too fast?  Ok, instead of a complete rest regaining all surges, it regains however many you want.  Again, the game would work perfectly fine with that.  The Dark Sun game they talk about on the WOTC boards ((the ones the devs play)) works so that you get 1 healing surge back with each extended rest.  And the game works fine.

That's the point with very transparent rules.  You can make these changes very easily.


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## Luce (May 5, 2013)

Hussar said:


> Like, I said, I've had very, very different experiences.  I once had a player in a 2e game tell me that I couldn't use a manticore in the location I was using it in, because the climate/terrain was wrong.  And he argued with me about it.
> 
> I'd also suggest you go back and reread those Dragon magazines that you are referencing.  Gygax made no bones that if you were adding in all sorts of house rules, you weren't playing D&D anymore.  Sage Advice columns go back a lot further than 3e.  Sage Advice starts in Issue 31 in 1979.  THAT'S how long rules arguments have been going on in public forums.  Well, at least that long.
> 
> ...




You have your experiences, I have mine. The disparity does not mean imply exclusivity.
EGG did say (in DMG 1e) both The players want to play this game and not the one of your devising and that This is your campaign, change it so it is fun for you.
"Master of the game" (1989) pp15 "the Game Master is required to design and develop rules sub-cases, bridging rules, rule expansions, new rules, and possibly sub-systems and systems  within the overall RPG system.

A common advice for a long time was: "Make it up". There may be a need for consolidated ("official") rulings so people can play together in tournaments, but in you home game go with what you feel is right.

All editions are based on actual play and been tested before release. For example, feel free to re-read the intro of 1e DMG.  2e DMG states pp9 "No role-playing game we know of has been play tested
more heavily then this one. But that doesn't mean it's perfect. What we consider to right may be unbalanced or anachronistic in your campaign.  ...In short follow the rules as they are written if doing so improves,your game. But on the same token, break the rules only if doing so improves you game."
3.5 one:"In the three years since the d20 Game System energized the roleplaying game industry, we’ve gathered tons of data on how the game is being played. We consider D&D to be a living game that constantly evolves as it is
played. Using the gathered feedback, we’ve retooled the game from the ground up and incorporated everyone’s suggestions to improve the game and this product."

You can argue that the scale on which the testing occurred was different, but I will have to disagree that the editions were not tested before release.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 5, 2013)

Hussar said:


> But, the hit point thing does kinda surprise me.  That's such an easy thing to fix.  Too many healing surges?  Ok, remove some to taste.  It's not going to change the game that much, simply change pacing.  Recovery too fast?  Ok, instead of a complete rest regaining all surges, it regains however many you want.  Again, the game would work perfectly fine with that.  The Dark Sun game they talk about on the WOTC boards ((the ones the devs play)) works so that you get 1 healing surge back with each extended rest.  And the game works fine.




I'm sorry, but that is not an "easy fix" IMHO- not if you want to do it right.

It's not just rest & recovery, it's not just the amount of HP: many magic effects- spells/powers/items- are also tied into having or using Healing Surges.

And it does not alter the fact that some classes number and/or value of surges is out of whack with their roles, such as Warlock vs Rogue.

That is a number of separate issues of varying importance tied to the same core mechanic, and because of this, a change in one aspect may have unintended and undesirable consequences in another aspect.  Sorry, I'm not interested in that amount of work.



> That's the point with very transparent rules.  You can make these changes very easily.




Hey, my favorite system- HERO- is as transparent as it gets.


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## S'mon (May 5, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> I'm sorry, but that is not an "easy fix" IMHO- not if you want to do it right.
> 
> It's not just rest & recovery, it's not just the amount of HP: many magic effects- spells/powers/items- are also tied into having or using Healing Surges.
> 
> ...




I'm planning to go to 2 surges per overnight rest in my next 4e campaign (converted 3e AP), with a full Extended Rest taking four or more days.  I don't foresee significant knock-on effects; the idea is to enable lower-powered combats spread over several days and have them still be challenging. So rather than 4e's typical 4 on-level encounters in one adventuring day, I might have four such encounters over two or three days. Do you foresee reasons why this won't work?


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 6, 2013)

> Do you foresee reasons why this won't work?




The Rule of Unintended Consequences?! 

My main concern would be the aforementioned powers & items thing.  2 surges would greatly neuter healing magic powers & items.  It seems as if a third to a half of the powers classes like the WarPriest, Warlord, Cleric, Ardent, etc. have include some kind of effect that interacts with Healing Surges (and some items flat out require them to be useful).

Minimizing the number of surges like that, then, amounts to a nerfing that could drive players away from those powers and/or even worse, those classes.

Secondarily, there are certain powers that monsters have that assume you have the standard amount of surges available, and some classes are built with this in mind.  I know that some low-level encounters in 4Ed were very tough for our party because the NPCs had synergistic abilities that made them hard to defeat quickly.  A few bad rolls, and our Fighter (a Defender class) was dipping into his surges.  Then again.  Then again.  Most of the rest of the party is still shiny and new; he looks like he went through a car crusher.  But as a Defender, that's his job.

If he didn't have the HSes to burn, with or without the aid of other PC's abilities, he'd have been toast.  And my Warlock would be on the front lines..._again_...and sooner than normal.


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## pemerton (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> Something I haven't seen discussed is that when compared to 0e-3e, 4e encourages a less adversarial mindset between players and GMs.
> 
> <snip>
> 
> ...



Well, you and I have discussed this! - for instance, using p 42 to set ad hoc damage as consequences for a failed improvisational check.

For me, this is one of the telling signs of indie design influence on 4e. Of course, many of the features that support it - heaing surges, scaling DCs, damage-by-level, etc, are quite unpopular.



S'mon said:


> it also means that 4e is a different and (I think) narrower game than pre-4e D&D; it is not designed for the Gamism-built-on-Simulation style which I think was common to at least 1e through 3e
> 
> <snip>
> 
> It's also not very tweakable to other styles, eg the way 2e used 1e rules for a more dramatist/story style.





Hussar said:


> I don't think that 2e was very successful using the 1e rules for a more story style.



I'm with Hussar on this one - I don't think 2nd ed AD&D was very flexible at all - the "dramatist" style of 2nd ed seems to consist mostly in the GM fudging/railroading around the mechanics to make things come out the "right" way.



S'mon said:


> it's not disempowering if it's run the way it's designed, but it's not designed to run like traditional D&D.



"Traditional D&D" covers a very wide range of styles, I think. For instance, I think 4e does a better job of the sort of game the 1986 Oriental Adventures seemed to be aimed at than does that system itself.

I think one thing where [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] is right about "transparency" is that applying the sort of fiat/fudging/railroading to 4e as 2nd ed seems to rely upon will be very obvious - far more obvious than in 2nd ed, where the systems are quite opaque even without fiat/fudging. Which might make it _seem_ less flexible.



Luce said:


> A common advice for a long time was: "Make it up".





Luce said:


> One can definably run say 3e the same way as he used to run 2e - using fiat when he cannot remember or dislike the RAW. "DM:How did grapple work again? You know what, just give me a STR check and we go from there."



And there is one edition of D&D that I know of that builds the whole system around these easily-improvised resolution methods, and that has a section headed "Actions the Rules Don't Cover" - 4e, and page 42.

So I don't know where the idea comes from that 4e can't be played this way. (Actually, one of the more frequent criticisms of 4e is that it resolves grapple as a STR check.)


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## Hussar (May 6, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> The Rule of Unintended Consequences?!
> 
> My main concern would be the aforementioned powers & items thing.  2 surges would greatly neuter healing magic powers & items.  It seems as if a third to a half of the powers classes like the WarPriest, Warlord, Cleric, Ardent, etc. have include some kind of effect that interacts with Healing Surges (and some items flat out require them to be useful).
> 
> ...




How is the fighter example any different than any other edition.  The same thing happened before.  The fighter stepped up, maybe with the cleric, they lost the most hit points, while the rogue and the wizard came out of the encounter with nary a scratch.

Asymmetrical HP loss is the result of bad tactics and/or bad luck, not a system thing.

As far as items go, in the PHB, the only item that keys off of surges that I can think of off the top of my head is healing potions.  And, note, he's not reducing the number of surges a character has, just how fast they recharge.  Class powers, with a couple of exceptions, only key off of surges when they heal.  Again, there are exceptions, but, they are just that.  Exceptions, not the rule.  

And, what's wrong with driving players away from classes that use mechanics that you don't like in the game anyway?  If you hate non-magical healing, for example, why not drive players away from the warlord?


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## pemerton (May 6, 2013)

I built a CON-based Elementalist Sorcerer so a friend who was visiting could have any easy PC to play when he dropped in for a single session. It exhibited the same oddity as [MENTION=19675]Dannyalcatraz[/MENTION] has noticed with respect to his Warlock - many more surges than a pure caster seems to need!

The build challenge is then to find a way to make such a PC at least a semi-viable front-line fighter via close attacks, reasonable defences and a bit of condition mitigation.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 6, 2013)

> How is the fighter example any different than any other edition.




1) Again, a melee striker should not have fewer HP than a ranged striker.  A melee striker without HP gets in trouble quickly and can't get out of it once he takes a couple of solid shots.  On a ranged striker, having a massive HP total is kind of like a billionaire winning the state lottery.

2) In a party with a Fighter, a WarPriest, a Ranger* and a Rogue, among others, it is illogical that the Warlock- basically a non-melee class by design- should have the second most HP in the party.  And not by a little bit, either.  In prior editions, all of those would be either much higher or at least equal to the Warlock (or similar caster, like a post-1Ed Bard).  If someone got past the foursome mentioned above, the casters couldn't take too many hits.

But in 4Ed, there is my Warlock, stepping up to keep the (untouched) Ranger from being bitch-slapped by ogres.  _THAT_ simply doesn't happen in prior editions.  Its a complete overturning of D&D's historical playstyle.



> Asymmetrical HP loss is the result of bad tactics and/or bad luck, not a system thing.




Its not the asymmentrical HP loss in and of itself that differs, it is the post loss consequences.

In prior editions, the Fighter catches some bad luck, then the Cleric and Ranger (just using the classes mentioned, for convenience) step up because they have the better armor, melee weapons & HP than the Rogue & arcane casters.

In my example, the Warlock has double-digit more HP than anyone else except the Fighter. The WarPriest is also on the front line, alongside the Fighter, so that isn't changed _too_ much.

But instead of the Ranger stepping up next, it is the Warlock who must fill in the breach.  The Ranger can't go toe to toe with things like ogres, etc., because he can't take hits.  So even though the Ranger has better melee weapons at his disposal, it is the ill-equipped (in terms of weapons) Warlock who has to interpose himself between friend & foe.  And his powers & abilities do not lend themselves to that role.  Suddenly, he goes from a ranged combatant to recon with, to a guy swinging a hammer with his MBA...just so the squishy Ranger can do his thing.

Simply put: an unwounded *warrior* shouldn't be hiding behind spellcasters.



* there are actually two Rangers, but we almost never have both players show the same session.


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## pemerton (May 6, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> The Ranger can't go toe to toe with things like ogres, etc., because he can't take hits.  So even though the Ranger has better melee weapons at his disposal, it is the ill-equipped (in terms of weapons) Warlock who has to interpose himself between friend & foe.  And his powers & abilities do not lend themselves to that role.  Suddenly, he goes from a ranged combatant to recon with, to a guy swinging a hammer with his MBA...just so the squishy Ranger can do his thing.



Your warlock needs more close attacks! Or items to shift those surges onto the ranger.

I agree that it produces some counterintuitive dynamics into the game. I'm not at all sure what they were thinking of when they went for CON warlocks and sorcerers.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 6, 2013)

I can understand Con casters in the sense of "the channeling of arcane energies" in such-and-such a way is physically demanding, but coupled with the HP the class gets anyway, plus racial benefits, etc...

As for close attacks, I'm struggling with that a bit. I'm probably going to train his Eldritch Blast into Eldritch Strike, but he's a bit feat starved* for me to make him _exactly_ how I envisioned him in the beginning.  I'd like him to be able to do more with his Psion multiclass side- a big source of his feat starvation**- and Dwarven weapon training and Bludgeon expertise would be very nice...










* FWIW, I'm in favor of PCs being feat starved.

** but not a fan of the way multiclassing eats feats


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## billd91 (May 6, 2013)

pemerton said:


> "Traditional D&D" covers a very wide range of styles, I think. For instance, I think 4e does a better job of the sort of game the 1986 Oriental Adventures seemed to be aimed at than does that system itself.




On that, I would disagree. I think 4e would handle the Chinese chop socky action movies like Invincible Shaolin. But I don't think it does the swift brutality of the samurai story nearly as well as 1e does.


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## MichaelSomething (May 6, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> The Rule of Unintended Consequences?!
> 
> My main concern would be the aforementioned powers & items thing.  2 surges would greatly neuter healing magic powers & items.  It seems as if a third to a half of the powers classes like the WarPriest, Warlord, Cleric, Ardent, etc. have include some kind of effect that interacts with Healing Surges (and some items flat out require them to be useful).
> 
> ...




So you don't like the fact that PCs get so many HPs through Healing surges yet you understand the fact they're expected to have them because they'll be expected to need them all?  I feel like it's complaining that a car having a 50 gallon gas tank is too much yet still wanting to drive 2,000 miles without stopping for gas.

You could simply remove all Healing Surges, and state that any power requiring Healing Surges simply doesn't anymore.  They still recover HP according to the Healing Surge Value.  You'll then need to change healing encounter powers to 1 per day with an additional use gained every six levels.  Will that be closer to your liking?


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## S'mon (May 6, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> The Rule of Unintended Consequences?!
> 
> My main concern would be the aforementioned powers & items thing.  2 surges would greatly neuter healing magic powers & items.  It seems as if a third to a half of the powers classes like the WarPriest, Warlord, Cleric, Ardent, etc. have include some kind of effect that interacts with Healing Surges (and some items flat out require them to be useful).
> 
> ...




Thanks - I can see that. But if the system assumes ca 4 fights between extended rests, wouldn't a smaller number of fights between rests keep effective surge availability exactly the same? 
IME what actually happens IMCs is that there is usually 1 fight between rests, sometimes 2, rarely 3, and surge availability in practice is not the resource issue the game apparently intended. So eg surge drain attacks are not seen as a real threat, because PCs are not slogging through four battles a day. (Also, PCs at Paragon Tier IME fight only 4-5 battles each level, not the 8-9 assumed by the game, but each fight takes 2-3 hours!)

Edit: It's definitely also my experience that the Defender, if doing his job, is burning through lots of Surges. And there's also the risk that other players are lazy and don't support the Defender, so they don't use their own surges. What should be happening IMO is that the Defender takes a large chunk of the aggro, but other PCs like CON Warlocks certainly should be attracting a decent amount away from him. Letting the Defender bear the entire brunt is quite dysfunctional play IMO, except in a very small group.


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## S'mon (May 6, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> But instead of the Ranger stepping up next, it is the Warlock who must fill in the breach.  The Ranger can't go toe to toe with things like ogres, etc., because he can't take hits.  So even though the Ranger has better melee weapons at his disposal, it is the ill-equipped (in terms of weapons) Warlock who has to interpose himself between friend & foe.  And his powers & abilities do not lend themselves to that role.  Suddenly, he goes from a ranged combatant to recon with, to a guy swinging a hammer with his MBA...just so the squishy Ranger can do his thing..




Don't you have any Blast attacks? 
I don't have any issue with Infernal warlocks being tough; it's thematically appropriate and they tend not to have the greatest AC so it evens out. But I do think that melee Strikers often seem a bit too squishy, and don't get much to balance against the advantages of being a Ranged striker,. Indeed Ranged strikers often have better AC & Ref due to better DEX. We had a melee Ranger in one campaign with CON 10 and AC 13 (Hide) at 1st level, who was constantly getting knocked out.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 6, 2013)

MichaelSomething said:


> So you don't like the fact that PCs get so many HPs through Healing surges yet you understand the fact they're expected to have them because they'll be expected to need them all?  I feel like it's complaining that a car having a 50 gallon gas tank is too much yet still wanting to drive 2,000 miles without stopping for gas.
> 
> You could simply remove all Healing Surges, and state that any power requiring Healing Surges simply doesn't anymore.  They still recover HP according to the Healing Surge Value.  You'll then need to change healing encounter powers to 1 per day with an additional use gained every six levels.  Will that be closer to your liking?



Its a chicken and egg problem, to a certain extent.

I wasn't in the room with the designers when the idea of HS first originated, or the idea of the NPC abilities that, even at low levels, could cause PCs to need huge amounts of HPs, so I don't know which popped up first.  But now they are inextricably linked.  

To use your analogy, its like designing a car with a 50g tank, then _intentionally _placing cities 2000 miles apart.

And you have missed that part of my complaint about HSes and HP is that they have radically changed the way certain classes play.  For 30+ years, the Ranger was a damn tough dude.  The Warlock's initial incarnation was physically tougher than most arcanists, but not a beefcake.  But in 4Ed, as I have pointed out, there are Con-based casters who are flat out tougher than Rangers, and that _really_ feels wrong. Its a distortion that shouldn't be.

Lastly, no, your proposed change would not be more to my liking.  For one thing, it still means magical healing works better on certain PCs than on others, just by virtue of the PCs class (and possibly race).


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## S'mon (May 6, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> And you have missed that part of my complaint about HSes and HP is that they have radically changed the way certain classes play.  For 30+ years, the Ranger was a damn tough dude.




The 1e Ranger was damn tough at 1st level, but the 4e Ranger seems closely based on the 3.5 Wilderninja Ranger (d8 hd). Both influenced by Peter Jackson's Legolas rather than tough-guy Aragorn.

Edit: OTOH I would never dispute claims that 4e 'feels' different/wrong. I've come to enjoy the feel of 4e a lot but it feels very different from what I think of as D&D. And I'm not surprised that 4e seems to have a narrower appeal than does traditional D&D.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> Thanks - I can see that. But if the system assumes ca 4 fights between extended rests, wouldn't a smaller number of fights between rests keep effective surge availability exactly the same?




Can't really say- because I don't like the system all that much and have no intent to DM it, I haven explored how changing things would interact with the game's math.  I'm content to play the game as the DM runs it.



> It's definitely also my experience that the Defender, if doing his job, is burning through lots of Surges. And there's also the risk that other players are lazy and don't support the Defender, so they don't use their own surges. What should be happening IMO is that the Defender takes a large chunk of the aggro, but other PCs like CON Warlocks certainly should be attracting a decent amount away from him. Letting the Defender bear the entire brunt is quite dysfunctional play IMO, except in a very small group.




Sure, but a Con Warlock isn't designed to enter melee, at least, not as the Defender's wingman.  Even if he has Eldritch Strike, his defenses are pretty flimsy and he needs to stay mobile.  In that, he would be like a Rogue.  But most of the Warlock's powers are low-damage compared to most melee strikers.  (They can be pretty accurate, though, depending on build.)

Its not like we're hanging the Fighter out to dry, though.  The WarPriest IS right there in melee beside him.  But the Ranger is hanging out with the Wizard, with my Warlock filling the gap betwixt & between.  (The composition of the rest of the party depends on who can show up in a given session.)


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> Don't you have any Blast attacks?
> I don't have any issue with Infernal warlocks being tough; it's thematically appropriate and they tend not to have the greatest AC so it evens out. But I do think that melee Strikers often seem a bit too squishy, and don't get much to balance against the advantages of being a Ranged striker,. Indeed Ranged strikers often have better AC & Ref due to better DEX. We had a melee Ranger in one campaign with CON 10 and AC 13 (Hide) at 1st level, who was constantly getting knocked out.





Actually, I'm playing a balanced-stat Starlock- yes, he could have _even more HP_ than he does now (possibly more than the Fighter)- who is multiclassed into Psion.

While I do have some AoE attacks, I have to be careful about targeting, lest I hit the Fighter.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> The 1e Ranger was damn tough at 1st level, but the 4e Ranger seems closely based on the 3.5 Wilderninja Ranger (d8 hd). Both influenced by Peter Jackson's Legolas rather than tough-guy Aragorn.




Even in 3.5Ed, a Ranger will have more HP than most arcane casters- Warlocks are only d6, as I recall.  A 3.5Ed Warlock with a double-digit HP lead on a Ranger of like level is, AFAIK, unheard of.



> OTOH I would never dispute claims that 4e 'feels' different/wrong. I've come to enjoy the feel of 4e a lot but it feels very different from what I think of as D&D. And I'm not surprised that 4e seems to have a narrower appeal than does traditional D&D.




That's kind of where I am as well.  I have posted more than once- occasionally in a poorly worded fashion- that I think 4Ed _as a game _would have been better if it were not released as an edition of D&D.  Maybe not as _lucrative_, but a *better* game, since it would have been free from all the baggage of having to feed ANY of the sacred cows of its legacy.

The designers would have had a tabula rasa: Non-Vancian wizards without books...maybe even wearing armor.  No expectations of any particular races being included or excluded.  No discussions about alignment.  Holy Warriors of a different design.  Whatever.

Don't get me wrong- I like many of those sacred cows, and I want them in my D&D.  It just seems to me that parts of 4Ed get kinda creaky when made to accommodate them.


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## pemerton (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> IME what actually happens IMCs is that there is usually 1 fight between rests, sometimes 2, rarely 3, and surge availability in practice is not the resource issue the game apparently intended.



Interesting.

In my game the frequency of rests is much less - it depends a bit on how small a skill challenge can be and still count as an encounter, but something more like 5 to 10+ would be the norm in my game. This is in part because I use various techniques to limit extended rests - skill challenges in the wilderness to find a safe spot, or in the Underdark no extended rests except in a safe place, like the duergarhold they stayed in for a week or so or a Hallowed Temple if they can find the space for it and have enough components.

I think the tension between player and GM control over extended rests is probably one of the more vulnerable aspects of 4e's design - a GM who won't permit rests is in danger of being too adversarial, but a GM who lets the players take complete control of their rests is perhaps coming close to a 1st ed GM who lets the players choose their own treasure. I don't think I've found any magic solution in my own game - getting it right is a mixture of the players being good sports and me doing my best to use my judgement in encounter design and pacing.


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## Balesir (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> Thanks - I can see that. But if the system assumes ca 4 fights between extended rests, wouldn't a smaller number of fights between rests keep effective surge availability exactly the same?
> IME what actually happens IMCs is that there is usually 1 fight between rests, sometimes 2, rarely 3, and surge availability in practice is not the resource issue the game apparently intended. So eg surge drain attacks are not seen as a real threat, because PCs are not slogging through four battles a day. (Also, PCs at Paragon Tier IME fight only 4-5 battles each level, not the 8-9 assumed by the game, but each fight takes 2-3 hours!)



My concern with "2 surges per rest" would be power balance in a different way - if surges come back without daily powers, or daily powers come back completely but surges only partially, then the balance of encounters changes.

The method I am using to limit rest benefits is intended to cover this: I treat daily powers (of all sorts - item powers etc. included) a bit like "recharge" powers for monsters. In theory, surges are treated similarly. I have "imperfect" rests graded 2-6. That many(1) out of every 6 surges used are regenerated, and daily powers that roll that number or higher on a d6 are regenerated. It's simple and allows characters that expend lots of surges (but also have lots of surges) to keep relatively in line with the rest.

Edit: (1) Sorry - obviously wrong: should be 7 minus that many. So, a "Rest 4" means half (3 in every 6) of the surges expended and expended daily powers for which you roll 4, 5 or 6 are regenerated. Odd surges can be rolled for just as daily powers are.



S'mon said:


> Edit: It's definitely also my experience that the Defender, if doing his job, is burning through lots of Surges. And there's also the risk that other players are lazy and don't support the Defender, so they don't use their own surges. What should be happening IMO is that the Defender takes a large chunk of the aggro, but other PCs like CON Warlocks certainly should be attracting a decent amount away from him. Letting the Defender bear the entire brunt is quite dysfunctional play IMO, except in a very small group.



I find the first to run out of surges (which determines when a rest is taken, usually) is often the strikers. The fighters and paladin use a lot, but they also have a lot!


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## Upper_Krust (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:
			
		

> I don't disagree, I never actually owned a 2e DMG anyway so my experience is limited - we basically used 2e PHB & MM as supplements for our 1e campaign, which was never a Story type campaign, it was pretty hardcore Gamist as [MENTION=326]Upper_Krust[/MENTION] could attest.




1st Edition had an edge to it, where 2nd Edition did not. I want to fight devils, demons and gods - not baatezu, tanar'ri and avatars.

...plus it didn't have Gygax.


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## S'mon (May 6, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> Even in 3.5Ed, a Ranger will have more HP than most arcane casters- Warlocks are only d6, as I recall.  A 3.5Ed Warlock with a double-digit HP lead on a Ranger of like level is, AFAIK, unheard of.




Heh, in my 3.5 Barakus campaign the _Wizard _had a double digit hp lead on the Ranger!
 Mix of random dice rolling and Wizard prioritising making himself stat-boosting items, inc a CON-boost.


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## Weather Report (May 6, 2013)

Upper_Krust said:


> 1st Edition had an edge to it, where 2nd Edition did not. I want to fight devils, demons and gods - not baatezu, tanar'ri and avatars.
> 
> ...plus it didn't have Gygax.





1st Ed does have gnarly vibe, best yet.


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## Upper_Krust (May 6, 2013)

Weather Report said:
			
		

> 1st Ed does have gnarly vibe, best yet.




Plus the art also reflected this, 1st Ed. art had far more personality, interior art wasn't trying to be photorealistic...it was trying to educate about the game. Plus there were far more vignette pieces with PCs and either monsters or traps interacting.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 6, 2013)

S'mon said:


> Heh, in my 3.5 Barakus campaign the _Wizard _had a double digit hp lead on the Ranger!
> Mix of random dice rolling and Wizard prioritising making himself stat-boosting items, inc a CON-boost.




Jeez!  

OK, lets say its highly improbable, then.

But 4Ed doesn't have those random HP swings due to rolling for them, so its much more likely.  In fact, as long as the builds don't change, the oddball HP result will be 100% reproduceable.


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## Hussar (May 7, 2013)

DannyA - how does your striker have that many more HP than the ranger though?  They both start with exactly the same baseline and advance at exactly the same rate.  The only difference between your characters is Con.  At best, you're looking at four or five more healing surges and maybe 8 or 10 more base HP and that's assuming the warlock has an 18+ Con and the Ranger has a 10.  

I suppose that could happen.  But, then again, if you did that in 3e, then the warlock would almost always have double the hit points of the ranger anyway.  The warlock would be averaging 7.5 hp/level and the ranger 4.5.  I'm not seeing the huge difference here.  Granted, it would be unusual, but, then again, what you're talking about in 4e is unusual too.  A two weapon fighter ranger almost certainly would have at least a 14 Con, so the difference between a melee ranger and a Con Warlock wouldn't be terribly pronounced.

Now, granted, most PHB Warlock powers are ranged, so, it's a bit strange to have a character who's almost never in melee have so many hit points.  Totally grant that.  But, beyond the PHB, that's no longer really an issue.  There are quite a few melee style options for a melee warlock in the DDI.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 7, 2013)

Double digit just means more than 9...  Unfortunately, I don't have access to the Ranger's sheet, so I can't speak to his actual stats.  I just know he's at least 10HP fewer than Magnus- I only know because his player remarked on it.  That started the HP comparison, whereby we found the Fighter had the most HP, Magnus came in second, the WarPriest third, and everyone else (of the regulars) lagging behind.

Still, Magnus Skyhammer is level 6 with 54HP- his starting Con was 16, his first stat boost got him to 17.  He has one magic item- the Collar of Recovery- that boosts his HS by +1, so its at 14.



> There are quite a few melee style options for a melee warlock in the DDI.




I am not now, nor have I ever been, nor do I intend to be a DDI subscriber.  (Got lots of books, though.)

Besides, he's a Warlock/Psion who is going towards the Dreamwalker Paragon path.  Almost without exception, his powers are going to be ranged.  I plan on making the concession of retraining his Eldritch Blast to Eldritch Strike to address the campaign reality that the Elven Ranger needs a Dwarven kilt to hide behind.  But Feats like Dwarven Weapon Training and Bludgeon Expertise are on a wish list crowded with psionic multiclassing power swaps and so forth.

(And of course, since part of his schtick is mobility that makes him harder to hit AND improves his accuracy- thank you, Shadow Walk & Hidden Sniper- he's STILL going to suck in melee, even with his beefed up martial ability.  At least he'll have a use for all those HP & HS...)


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## Hussar (May 7, 2013)

> Still, Magnus Skyhammer is level 6 with 54HP- his starting Con was 16, his first stat boost got him to 17. He has one magic item- the Collar of Recovery- that boosts his HS by +1, so its at 14.




That's 10 Healing Surges, not 14.  6+3+1.  Where did the four extra surges come from?

Also, Hit points are 12+16+5*5=53.

/edit - sorry, me no do math.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 7, 2013)

1) that was value of Healing surges, not number.  And he has 9 of them.

2) we haven't played in a while, so my stuff is stashed away except his sheet on my iPad.  I'll see if I can track down my books.  The numbers jibed with what came out of the OCB, though- the DM is a DDI subscriber.


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## Hussar (May 7, 2013)

Ok, compare that with a ranger with a 12 Con.  Pretty low for a ranger.

6th level ranger would have 12+12+5*5=49 HP and a surge value of 12.  Pretty much exactly the same.  We're not talking huge differences here.  Certainly not a ten point spread.  Even with a 10 Con, the ranger is only losing 2 HP, for 47 and a surge value of 12.  

I think there's something off about the math.

My point is, in 3e, this would net pretty much exactly the same result.  6th level ranger with 12 Con averages 8+6+5*4.5=37 HP, and 16 Con warlock averages 6+18+3.5*5=42 hit points.  

Almost an identical spread in 3e as 4e.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 7, 2013)

If there is, its in the OCB.  

The DM has all of the PCs in his account.  I did mine by hand, but my numbers checked out.  The Ranger's PC is entirely in the OCB- he often forgets his sheet, and accesses the DM's account via my computer, which is on my desk, adjacent to the game table.  Sometimes, he even prints it from there.


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## Hussar (May 7, 2013)

DannyA, I don't know what to say.  The HP for a 6th level ranger is 47 presuming a 10 Con.  For that ranger to be 10 HP or more behind you, he'd need a 7 Con.  Possible, I suppose, but extremely unlikely.  And, now we're discussing some pretty big outliers - a ranger player with less than minimum scores compared to a Con based warlock.  Not that the warlock is all that out of line.  It's pretty much bog standard.  But, I doubt that he's 10 or more HP behind you.


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## Manbearcat (May 7, 2013)

I think much of the Ranger:Warlock issue is PC build decision.  I've playtested various Ranger builds quite a bit and there is an enormous amount of PC build tools available to build a stout, tough-guy Ranger and still be a heavy Striker.  It just seems that a certain cross-section of the 4e populace builds Rangers as glass cannons, optimizing to umpteenth degree so they can eek out every last possible point of single-target damage.  Built that way, they are the highest damage strikers in the game but, of course, glass cannons.  Quick look below at the inherent features and available options to Rangers through Heroic tier - up to 11th level...at Paragon tier there are lots of Paths to elevate Ranger survivability - to build a stout, mobile, survivable, melee combatant that can survive duels and offtank effectively:

*- Defense bonus for the primary NAD attacked; Reflex.*
*
- Defense bonus for the secondary NAD attacked; Fortitude.*

*- A build with Dex as primary for all melee attacks, yielding an extremely high primary NAD attacked; Reflex.*

*- Class feature that grants either 10 HP (Toughness; which should all but make up the HP differential with respect to the Con-lock) or + 1 AC and Reflex (2 Weapon Defense).

- At-Will Attacks that give you a + 2 power bonus to AC or let you shift 2 squares to set up denial of follow-ups against you.*
*
-1st, 3rd, 7th level Encounter Attack Powers that grant:*

* Multiple slow and shift options leading to action denial.
* Multiple large shift options after attacks leading to potential action denial. 
* Huge attack penalty interrupt which is tantamount to action denial.
* Minor action option that imposes a -2 or -4 to hit you which can be coupled with other Standards or Immediate actions to improve survivability.
* CB1 push and prone for action denial on multiple enemies.

*- 2nd, 6th, 10th level Utility Powers that grant:*

* Multiple Encounter Powers with Free or Immediate Actions that let you shift/move your speed and/or gain + 2 to + 4 bonus to AC and Reflex, or all defenses (and not all are power so they stack with power bonuses).  As Immediate Actions (enemy moves adjacent to you), these can set up action denial.
* Low level Daily that gives (Wisdom) resistance to all damage for the encounter.
* Non-stance Daily with + 2 speed bonus and + 1 shift distance anytime you shift (which can set up action denial).
* Daily with + 4 Speed bonus with running (Stance which stacks with the above speed daily) with no CA against you which can lead to all manner of enemy action denial.
* Encounter power with Shift plus Second Wind as Move Action.
* Daily Stance with + 1 or 2 power bonus to AC.
* Daily Move as Teleport and + 5 power bonus to all defenses.
* 2 Dailies that let you heal your Surge (or more) as Minor or Free Actions.

*- 1st, 5th, 9th level Daily Attack Powers that grant:
*
* Stance with conditional + 2 power bonus to AC and Reflex (and extra 1d8 damage per attack).
* Attack with large power bonus to AC UEOYNT.
* Attack with weakened UEOYNT.
* Stance with MBA + large shift as Immediate Reaction when hit by close or melee attack, so enemies with multiple attacks lose 50 %, or more, of their action economy against you. 
* Attack with blinded and cannot shift (save ends).
* Multiple attacks with dazed (save ends), immobilized, slowed or prone (sometimes with shifts) leading to action denial.
* Attack with effect "whenever you hit the target with a melee attack, you gain temporary hit points equal to 5 + your Wisdom modifier."
*
- Ranger Feats that grant:*

* Twin Strike imposes - 2 penalty to attack rolls.
* Enemies adjacent don't gain + 2 bonus to attack rolls for CA.
* Whenever you use an encounter or daily that lets you shift, shift 2 extra squares - coupled with other features its action denial setup.
* Use Second Wind as Free Action after downing quarry.
* Conditional (movement prereq) + 1 feat bonus to AC and Reflex (stacks with power, etc).
*  Whenever you hit an enemy with a melee attack during your turn, you don’t provoke opportunity attacks from that enemy for moving away from it until the end of your turn - action denial setup.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 7, 2013)

Hmm...I cannot access the OCB.  He may have let it lapse.  I can log into the DM's account, but buttons don't seem to do anything.

All I can say at this point, then is Magnus has 54 HP according to the math I did (months ago), backed by the OCB character sheet.

But I cannot access the Ranger, and he didn't leave his sheet behind (for once).  Perhaps he took an 8 Con to max something else.  He IS the highest damage-dealer on a per-blow basis: that would seem to echo Manbearcat's suggestion.  Perhaps he built a glass cannon.

FWIW, the Rogue's sheet IS here, though, and he clocks in at 49HP...which, IMHO, still looks flimsy for a melee striker in light of the ranged striker with 54 and comparable or superior defenses.


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## MichaelSomething (May 7, 2013)

As always, we need consider more then the RAW numbers.  4th Edition characters do have powers and those tend to greatly influence what a character does.  Can you tell us anything about their powers?  maybe you can save us all some time and just load complete pictures of the character sheets so we can properly analyze them?  Seriously, whenever people want to discuss specific characters, we should just agree to post character sheets.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 7, 2013)

Well, since i don't own the Ranger and can't currently access the OCB*, I'm kinda SOL on that.

Like I said, he IS the party's heavy hitter.  With that, I have no issue.  My problem is that Rangers hiding behind casters is very un-D&D like to me.









* I emailed the DM to see if his subscription is still active.  If it is, there's something wonky on my end.


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## Hussar (May 7, 2013)

This is what I'm talking about when I mentioned transparency though.



> My problem is that Rangers hiding behind casters is very un-D&D like to me.




In 3e, the difference, before ability adjustments, between a ranger and a warlock is 1 hp/level +2.  That's it.  That's the sum total of difference in hit points.  And variability in ability scores and actual hit point rolls can easily put the warlock ahead of the ranger.  

But, what I think probably happens at a lot of tables is that people only look at the end results, not how they got there.  Sure, a die rolled ranger with a 35 point buy value character is going to be a lot more durable than the die rolled warlock with a 25 point buy character.  That's not because of class though, that's because the two players aren't playing on the same level field.  

The thing that started all this was the idea that in 4e, you'll always get the same result, but in 3e, the ranger would be ahead more often than not.  But, if the same stats are applied in 3e as we have for comparison in 4e, you get identical results.  The warlock comes out ahead.  And, as levels advance, the warlock comes out even further ahead.  There's no difference here.

Unless, of course, the ranger gets lucky a few levels in a row and the warlock gets unlucky.  But, again, that's not the classes or the system, that's just luck of the dice.  4e doesn't do that.  You always play average characters in 4e because there are no variable hit points.  A ranger and a warlock with the same Con score will always have the same hit points (barring feats of course).  All strikers will have the same hit points.  The only variation is in Con.

So, why would Rangers hiding behind casters feel un-D&D?  It was that way in 3e.  A high Con warlock and a low Con ranger would be pretty much equal from the gate and the warlock just pulls ahead every level.  

But, what people only seem to look at is the end result at their own table.  "Well, at my table, the ranger had so many more hit points than the warlock, so the warlock always stayed behind".  But there is never any real examination as to why that happened.  When you look at the math, the two classes should be darn near equal.  But of course, that will get ignored and any counter argument gets buried to death by anecdote.


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## Hussar (May 7, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> /snip
> FWIW, the Rogue's sheet IS here, though, and he clocks in at 49HP...which, IMHO, still looks flimsy for a melee striker in light of the ranged striker with 54 and comparable or superior defenses.




So, your Rogue would have a 12 Con no?  

Again, comparing in 3e, you'd have exactly the same spread.  A 16 Con warlock vs a 12 Con Rogue would result in the warlock having more hit points.  Should be about 12 more actually (Level 6X2 hp extra per level).  Mr Rogue in 3e would have (6+6+3.5*5)=30 HP on average and the warlock (6+18+3.5*5)=41 HP on average.  Hey, there's your double digit spread.  

Again, I'm really failing to see the difference between 3e and 4e here.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 7, 2013)

> A 16 Con warlock vs a 12 Con Rogue would result in the warlock having more hit points.




In 3.5Ed, they'd have the same HD as well, making for a tautology.  The 3.5Ed Ranger has a bigger HD than either one of those classes.



> So, why would Rangers hiding behind casters feel un-D&D?



The difference between 4Ed and 3.5Ed is that, for the most part, they didn't design classes primarily designed as ranged attackers based on CON, and- prior to 4Ed- a warrior using CON as a dump stat in 3.5Ed would be as rare as hen's teeth.

But for the operation of random dice- most warriors could/would not be built in such a way as to not be able to take a hit.  Even a 3.5Ed archer ranger could take a hit.  This guy can't.

Thus: un-D&D feel.


Anywho, just found out that the DM DID let his DDI subscription lapse, which likely means that the 4Ed campaign is over, and that no mo 4Ed will be played by this group _ever._  I _may_ have been the only one who bought books.  _*sigh*_


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## Manbearcat (May 7, 2013)

Someone pick a level.  I'm going to build a stout, Human Ranger for that level (wealth/level as inherent bonuses) and compare him against common MM3/MV enemies for that level.  I won't use any Theme (which might provide an extra-class buff that would skew results).  Then I'm then going to set up a Forest environment with some blocking and difficult terrain and run him through 3 successive encounters for a 4 man group with an encounter budget/4.  I'll post the results when I'm finished.


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## Hussar (May 8, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> In 3.5Ed, they'd have the same HD as well, making for a tautology.  The 3.5Ed Ranger has a bigger HD than either one of those classes.
> 
> 
> The difference between 4Ed and 3.5Ed is that, for the most part, they didn't design classes primarily designed as ranged attackers based on CON, and- prior to 4Ed- a warrior using CON as a dump stat in 3.5Ed would be as rare as hen's teeth.
> ...




Why do you say that about the archer ranger?  The only way that archer ranger would have signficantly more hit points is to jack up his Con.  Well, Archer rangers are going to main stat Dex, probably with Str next, need about a 13 Wis to still qualify for all his spells and a number of his skill key off of Wis, and Cha isn't all that out of line for a ranger for the Animal handling stuff.  Not unreasonable for Mr Archer Ranger to have a 12 Con.

Unless, of course, we're talking die rolled PC's with 38 point buy values.  Then things change a bit.

But, the warlock, OTOH, is going to mainline Cha, probably with Dex next for ranged attacks and Con in third place.  Dump stat Str and Int and a 16 Con warlock isn't unreasonable.

All this really is besides the point though.  You made the argument that 4e was different from 3e because in 3e you would get different results.  No, you actually wouldn't.  You'd get identical results with the same inputs.  The difference in "feel" that you're talking about comes a lot more from different players than different systems.  I imagine the biggest difference is due to the point buy values of the characters being played.


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 8, 2013)

Yes, you would get different results:

1) almost nobody uses Con as a dump stat for 3.5Ed Rangers (I have never seen that in person)

2) 3.5Ed warlocks are not built with Con as their primary stat

If I were to tell you that there were 2 ranged "strikers" in a pre-4E D&D game, one Ranger & one arcane caster/Warlock, which would you guess would be the one with the most HP?  I'm talking statistically speaking, not outliers.

Taking the same question in 4Ed, there are at least 2 Warlock types- and possibly other arcane casters as well- that will beat the Ranger on HP every time because they are built to be Con first.  There simply are not ranged classes in 3.5Ed designed to prioritize Con.


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## Hussar (May 8, 2013)

Dannyalcatraz said:


> Yes, you would get different results:
> 
> 1) almost nobody uses Con as a dump stat for 3.5Ed Rangers (I have never seen that in person)
> 
> ...




But, you can't have it both ways.  If ranged classes in 3.5E don't prioritize Con, then it stands to reason that a Warlock might very well beat out a ranger.  After all, Con for an archer ranger doesn't help him very much.  Warlocks, OTOH, specifically are told in the class writeup that stats go Cha-Dex-Con.  

Now, if you want to compare, say, sorcerer to ranger, sure. The ranger should have more HP.  Then again, in 4e, they do.  Or, at least it should be pretty close.  But, there's no reason not to have a pretty high Con warlock.  Str isn't doing the warlock any good, so, where do you put your third highest score?  The 3e ranger has to have Dex and Str (after all, a strength bow is par for the course - no Str means your damage will be pitiful) and and above average Wis.  Con is probably 4th.

Just because you didn't see it doesn't mean anything.  In this thread people talked about seeing warlocks with higher HP than rangers in their 3e games.  Are their experiences somehow less valid than yours?


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## Manbearcat (May 8, 2013)

Just made a level 10 Human Ranger (no Theme) with inherent bonuses (+ 2 weapon, neck, armor by level 9 instead of magic items) with standard array as follows:



> HP = 70
> HS = 7 @ 20 per
> AC = 25
> Fort = 24
> ...




We just ran through 2 quick fights in succession at 1250 XP and 1500 XP (50 % and 60 % the XP for an of-level encounter for a 5 man group respectively) with MM3/MV math enemies.  Level 10 enemies with + 15 vs AC and + 13 vs NADs.  Fight one with 1 Standard Ogre Brute, 1 Manticore Skirmisher, and 2 Minion Soldiers.  Fight two with 1 Elite Ettin Soldier and 1 Manticore Skirmisher.  Only needed Skirmisher's Stance on 1st Fight.  SWS Stance, Oak Skin, Blood of the Fallen, Ranger's Recovery (* 2 DS), Action Point on Ettin Fight.  All Encounter Power's used on both with DS * 2 on ettin fight due to RR.  Bonuses to AC and Reflex galore with - 2 or more to hit on enemies all over the place.  Neither fight was an issue.  Had enough healing surges to manage them in succession; spent 2 in each fight with IS (Second Wind) and Reactive Surge, 1 after first fight to get to full.  Second fight was even easier than the first with DR from Oak Skin, 2 * DS, and BotF Heal.  

All told, the mitigation/damage avoided by the Ranger in the second fight from its suite of powers (including At-Will - 2 to hit) was 176.  2 Surges + 25 HP BotF Heal = 65 HP.  Total of 311 effective HP pool for the fight and only 2 surges spent during the fight and 1 spent afterward.  Not sure on the first but it was probably around 240.

Conclusion:  A Ranger can easily be built as a front-line, "tanky" melee combatant with lots of survivability and still bring the control effect "dead".


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## Dannyalcatraz (May 8, 2013)

Hussar said:


> But, you can't have it both ways.  If ranged classes in 3.5E don't prioritize Con, then it stands to reason that a Warlock might very well beat out a ranger.  After all, Con for an archer ranger doesn't help him very much.  Warlocks, OTOH, specifically are told in the class writeup that stats go Cha-Dex-Con.
> 
> Now, if you want to compare, say, sorcerer to ranger, sure. The ranger should have more HP.  Then again, in 4e, they do.  Or, at least it should be pretty close.  But, there's no reason not to have a pretty high Con warlock.  Str isn't doing the warlock any good, so, where do you put your third highest score?  The 3e ranger has to have Dex and Str (after all, a strength bow is par for the course - no Str means your damage will be pitiful) and and above average Wis.  Con is probably 4th.
> 
> Just because you didn't see it doesn't mean anything.  In this thread people talked about seeing warlocks with higher HP than rangers in their 3e games.  Are their experiences somehow less valid than yours?



Last question first: no, there is no difference in validity of experiences.

*However*, my recollection was that person said it was a Wizard, not a Warlock _and_ specifically said the HP disparity was due to random dice rolling and stat boosting items created by the Wizard himself.  It was not that the caster prioritized Con, or that the class priortized Con, it was that he used his ability to create items to make his actual choice of stat prioritization irrelevant.

While the 3.5Ed Warlock may indeed be told to build Cha-Dex-Con, that is entirely different from the 4Ed warlock being built Con *first*.  Add in Int or Cha for his rider effects or certain key powers and the rest of the stats mostly doesn't matter.  Nearly everything else can be ignored.  The HP differential is hard-coded into the class.  _That_ is alien to pre-4Ed D&D arcanists.

Con is no less useful for an archer ranger than any other ranged attacker.  HP always matter.  An archer ranger in 3.5Ed can be quite effective as a Dex-Con-Wis build: use ranged weapons as per usual and fitnessable weapons for melee.  Then there's the issue of things like Endurance.  Using Con as your dump stat on a 3.5Ed ranger, regardless of build, pretty much negates the value of this free Feat.  Strength bows are very nice, but not essential.  (Personally, I favor accuracy and durability over accuracy and damage dealing.)


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