# So what's gold gonna be for?



## SpiderMonkey (Oct 13, 2007)

One of the things we keep hearing about 4E is that the "christmas tree" effect is gone (and good riddance, I say).  One of the things that's weird about it is the question of what to do with the gold pieces.  

In 1E and 2E, after the first few levels gps were basically for xp and (if you wanted to bother) saving up for a keep.  In 3.X, we actually got to put those gold pieces towards character advancement in a well-thought out system that incorporated this accumulation of wealth into developing appropriate challenges.

This, of course, had the unfortunate effect of making the PCs dependent on their wardrobe (according to the RAW, we can quibble about how "good" DMs can tweak it somewhere else).  If this is going away though, what do we do with treasure?  I *like* getting treasure. It makes your pockets jingle, all jingly like.  But if it's just so much debris...

I hear there are still ways to make magic items, but to be honest, I miss the "wow" factor of going out and actually finding one.

I dunno.  What do you guys think?


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## Mercule (Oct 13, 2007)

Um... maybe PCs will actually be able to afford to build and maintain a stronghold again?

That's one thing I missed from 1E.


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## Mark (Oct 13, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> If this is going away though, what do we do with treasure?  I *like* getting treasure. It makes your pockets jingle, all jingly like.





Indeed and still will, I suppose.  I like jingly.


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## Mouseferatu (Oct 13, 2007)

Mercule said:
			
		

> Um... maybe PCs will actually be able to afford to build and maintain a stronghold again?
> 
> That's one thing I missed from 1E.




Ditto. If the plan is indeed to have a new DMG every year, then there should be _plenty_ of room to include stronghold and territory rules for high-level characters.


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## Shroomy (Oct 13, 2007)

If the preserve some of the elements from the Weapon of Legacy system, then you will need gold to unlock the powers of your magic items.  I hope they do implement some of the WoL into the magic item system of 4e (maybe redo some of the balancing the items so wielding one doesn't seem so onerous).  Based on their many appearances in late 3.5e products, I do expect to see this in 4e.


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## SpiderMonkey (Oct 13, 2007)

Shroomy said:
			
		

> If the preserve some of the elements from the Weapon of Legacy system, then you will need gold to unlock the powers of your magic items.  I hope they do implement some of the WoL into the magic item system of 4e (maybe redo some of the balancing the items so wielding one doesn't seem so onerous).  Based on their many appearances in late 3.5e products, I do expect to see this in 4e.




I could get behind that.  I really liked the idea of the legacy weapons, but it wasn't implemented quite the way I'd have liked it (too much book keeping, too much of a double-edged sword *ahem*).  If the kernel of the idea was put into 4E and streamlined, it might be love at first sight, particularly if it's how you describe it.


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## Morrus (Oct 13, 2007)

It's for food.  You eat it, and it "charges up" your powers.


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## Lanefan (Oct 13, 2007)

Shroomy said:
			
		

> If the preserve some of the elements from the Weapon of Legacy system, then you will need gold to unlock the powers of your magic items.



I'm not familiar with Weapons of Legacy, but what's written here tells me that not only do you have to pay for your items (as part of your treasury share, usually), but you have to pay to use them as well?  Is that how it works?  If so, that'll add to the bookkeeping...

Another place to spend gold is in training, which really should (but probably won't) become a core rule.

Lanefan


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## blargney the second (Oct 13, 2007)

Bling!


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## Mouseferatu (Oct 13, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> Another place to spend gold is in training, which really should (but probably won't) become a core rule.




Oh God, no. Keep training as far away from my core rules as possible, thanks. Maybe--_maybe_--as a purely optional rule, fully labeled as such, buried somewhere in the DMG.

But as an assumed part of the default core? There aren't enough syllables in the word "No" to fully express the no-ness of it.


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## Shroomy (Oct 13, 2007)

WoL is a leveled system, so it would seem to fit into the 4e design paradigm.  Its appearance late in 3.5e and the rumors that 4e PCs will require less magical items overall leads me to believe that this will be making an appearance in 4e.


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## Rechan (Oct 13, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> I'm not familiar with Weapons of Legacy, but what's written here tells me that not only do you have to pay for your items (as part of your treasury share, usually), but you have to pay to use them as well?  Is that how it works?  If so, that'll add to the bookkeeping...



Basically, Weapons of Legacy are magical weapons that "level" with you. They gain enhancements and special powers as you go up in level.

However, you have to spend GP to unlock those powers, as well as spend feats and sacrifice BAB/Skill points. All this in addition to RP requirements (dunk your sword in the blood of a red dragon during the full moon).


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## Shroomy (Oct 13, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> I'm not familiar with Weapons of Legacy, but what's written here tells me that not only do you have to pay for your items (as part of your treasury share, usually), but you have to pay to use them as well?  Is that how it works?  If so, that'll add to the bookkeeping...




The powers of a Legacy Item are spread-out by a level distribution.  At certain levels, you need to discover some of the history behind the item and then perform a one-time ritual to unlock the power (performing the ceremony gives you one of the Legacy Item feats).  The ritual requires a fixed gp cost in 3.5 edition.


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## Lanefan (Oct 13, 2007)

Mouseferatu said:
			
		

> Oh God, no. Keep training as far away from my core rules as possible, thanks. Maybe--_maybe_--as a purely optional rule, fully labeled as such, buried somewhere in the DMG.
> 
> But as an assumed part of the default core? There aren't enough syllables in the word "No" to fully express the no-ness of it.



Why not? 

As long as there's mechanisms to still allow characters to advance (more slowly) if they can't or won't train, what's wrong with it?

Bringing in training rules would have many benefits, here are two: 1) invoke some realism into things (you learn the theory then put it into practice, rather than the reverse), and 2) forces the party to take breaks now and then...see if the world can survive without 'em for a few weeks. 

Simply having skills, abilities, etc. appear out of thin air has never made sense to me in any game (excluding rare exceptions like wish, divine intervention, etc.).

Lanefan


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## Shroomy (Oct 13, 2007)

I agree with Ari, training should be an optional rule and not hard-wired into the core game.


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## Atlatl Jones (Oct 13, 2007)

To blow on ale and whores!


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## Rechan (Oct 13, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> Why not?
> 
> As long as there's mechanisms to still allow characters to advance (more slowly) if they can't or won't train, what's wrong with it?



Ever been in a campaign where you don't have time to make magical items? Or barely have time to rest? 

Downtime is a requirement for training. When the adventure/campaign has a time crunch, and you don't get downtime, you don't get your level benefits. 

And, continuing the adventure when you should get your abilities but can't because you didn't take a week off to swing your sword at a practice dummy, it really sucks.


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## The Little Raven (Oct 13, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Ever been in a campaign where you don't have time to make magical items? Or barely have time to rest?
> 
> Downtime is a requirement for training. When the adventure/campaign has a time crunch, and you don't get downtime, you don't get your level benefits.
> 
> And continuing the adventure when you should get your abilities but can't because you didn't take a week off to swing your sword at a practice dummy sucks.




I ran a war campaign that stretched from level 1 to level 14, and the character's longest time to themselves to recover and relax was 36 hours. Training rules would have killed them.


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## gothmaugCC (Oct 13, 2007)

Atlatl Jones said:
			
		

> To blow on ale and whores!




Heh, Thats why I play Mongoose's Conan RPG (a variant d20 system). You start every adventure penniless and broke, and end every adventure rich. Then you go boozing and wake up broke again. 

Essentially most weeks when you sit down at your table, you find out that your character spent all his money on booze, gambling and whores, leaving you with nothing but a loincloth and a dagger to your name (Dm's discrerssion). 

Suffice to say in that system, feats and skills are everything. Equipemnt is a secondary thought. Its fun as hell.   

Once you get above 6th level in DnD I never find myself worrying about money. There's always plenty to pay for dinner, rent a room and bribe a guardsman. At that point your never destitute.


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## useridunavailable (Oct 13, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> Why not?
> 
> As long as there's mechanisms to still allow characters to advance (more slowly) if they can't or won't train, what's wrong with it?



I don't want my characters hanging around Undercity and selling off Primal Might and Spellcloth in the AH to get the money for their epic flying mounts.  I have a WoW subscription for that.


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## SpiderMonkey (Oct 13, 2007)

useridunavailable said:
			
		

> I don't want my characters hanging around Undercity and selling off Primal Might and Spellcloth in the AH to get the money for their epic flying mounts.  I have a WoW subscription for that.




Huh?  This has what to do with training...?


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## Greg K (Oct 13, 2007)

Mouseferatu said:
			
		

> Oh God, no. Keep training as far away from my core rules as possible, thanks. Maybe--_maybe_--as a purely optional rule, fully labeled as such, buried somewhere in the DMG.
> 
> But as an assumed part of the default core? There aren't enough syllables in the word "No" to fully express the no-ness of it.




I would much rather have training as core than WoL mechanics. Hell, I would rather have training rules as core than of  most of the other things WOTC has come up with over the past year or two that will find itself in 4e (e.g.,Bo9S maneuvers, per encounter, MM V triggered abilities)  and  other things revealed about 4e (e.g., tiefling and warlock as core, bloodied condition, the new monster stat block per the spine devil).


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## Nifft (Oct 13, 2007)

Atlatl Jones said:
			
		

> To blow on ale and whores!



 QFT.

Cheers, -- N


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## Treebore (Oct 13, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> I'm not familiar with Weapons of Legacy, but what's written here tells me that not only do you have to pay for your items (as part of your treasury share, usually), but you have to pay to use them as well?  Is that how it works?  If so, that'll add to the bookkeeping...
> 
> Another place to spend gold is in training, which really should (but probably won't) become a core rule.
> 
> Lanefan





Not to mention totally destroy my verisimilitude.


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## SpiderMonkey (Oct 13, 2007)

As an aside, I remember looking on a character sheet of one of my high-level characters in 2E, and realizing that I had almost 100,000 gp just sitting in a bag of holding.  To this day I still think of Scrooge McDuck swimming in his money vault whenever I think of gold and bags of holding.  Is that weird?


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## SpiderMonkey (Oct 13, 2007)

Treebore said:
			
		

> Not to mention totally destroy my verisimilitude.




Lanefan killed Treebore's verisimilitude and took its stuff.  *sigh* I'm sorry.  I had to.  You may all hate me now.


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## Treebore (Oct 13, 2007)

Mourn said:
			
		

> I ran a war campaign that stretched from level 1 to level 14, and the character's longest time to themselves to recover and relax was 36 hours. Training rules would have killed them.





Obviously thats when the DM institutes "training under fire" rules, and has them level up as they get the appropriate XP's.

Training rules assume "down time". So obviously if you don't give the PC's the downtime the training rules need to go out the window.

So you have normal training rules, then you have "training under fire" rules.


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## JoeGKushner (Oct 13, 2007)

Perhaps we'll see a silver standard with gold and platinum being rare?


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## Nifft (Oct 13, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> As an aside, I remember looking on a character sheet of one of my high-level characters in 2E, and realizing that I had almost 100,000 gp just sitting in a bag of holding.  To this day I still think of Scrooge McDuck swimming in his money vault whenever I think of gold and bags of holding.  Is that weird?



 Yes, it's terribly weird.

And it's going to happen in at least one of my games. 

Thanks, -- N


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## Treebore (Oct 13, 2007)

gothmaugCC said:
			
		

> Heh, Thats why I play Mongoose's Conan RPG (a variant d20 system). You start every adventure penniless and broke, and end every adventure rich. Then you go boozing and wake up broke again.
> 
> Essentially most weeks when you sit down at your table, you find out that your character spent all his money on booze, gambling and whores, leaving you with nothing but a loincloth and a dagger to your name (Dm's discrerssion).
> 
> ...





See, I am a cruel DM. Thieves rob PC's too! Led to some awesome adventures too. Nothing like a rabid PC wanting their gold back!


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## Treebore (Oct 13, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> As an aside, I remember looking on a character sheet of one of my high-level characters in 2E, and realizing that I had almost 100,000 gp just sitting in a bag of holding.  To this day I still think of Scrooge McDuck swimming in his money vault whenever I think of gold and bags of holding.  Is that weird?




Wierd?

Nope. Thats the whole reason my PC's have a Portable Hole full of gold. Now if only they can figure out the "gold diving" feat.


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## Treebore (Oct 13, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> Lanefan killed Treebore's verisimilitude and took its stuff.  *sigh* I'm sorry.  I had to.  You may all hate me now.





OK.


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## Gloombunny (Oct 13, 2007)

JoeGKushner said:
			
		

> Perhaps we'll see a silver standard with gold and platinum being rare?



Oh man, that would be sweet.

Anyway, yeah.  Ale and whores.


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## Treebore (Oct 13, 2007)

My concern about removing the "christmas tree" is that its been blended/added into the character class builds.

Looking at Book of 9 Swords/Tome of Battle I think I may definitely be concerned about something real.


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## Gloombunny (Oct 13, 2007)

Treebore said:
			
		

> My concern about removing the "christmas tree" is that its been blended/added into the character class builds.



Huh?  What do you mean by that?


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## Rechan (Oct 13, 2007)

Treebore said:
			
		

> Obviously thats when the DM institutes "training under fire" rules, and has them level up as they get the appropriate XP's.
> 
> Training rules assume "down time". So obviously if you don't give the PC's the downtime the training rules need to go out the window.
> 
> So you have normal training rules, then you have "training under fire" rules.



Or obviously, you make training optional for those who want it.


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## RPG_Tweaker (Oct 13, 2007)

JoeGKushner said:
			
		

> Perhaps we'll see a silver standard with gold and platinum being rare?




Oh, I hope so... hell, I wouldn't mind it going down to a copper standard for food and lodging, silver for arms and armor, gold for city intrigues and land purchase, and platnum for dealing with nobles and purchasing castles.


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## frankthedm (Oct 13, 2007)

Mercule said:
			
		

> Um... maybe PCs will actually be able to afford to build and maintain a stronghold again?
> 
> That's one thing I missed from 1E.



Yep, that would rule. especially if 4e gets rid a lot of those annoying spell comboes that make strongholds pretty much undefendable.

Collect gold
Build stronghold
Attract followers
Cultivate your very own point of light.
Plot hooks come to you.

A really good way to make gold useful is to have it be slight more magic resistant than lead. Thus the more gold you pour into your stronghold's walls, the more resistant to scry and teleport.


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## SpiderMonkey (Oct 13, 2007)

frankthedm said:
			
		

> Yep, that would rule. especially if 4e gets rid a lot of those annoying spell comboes that make strongholds pretty much undefendable.
> 
> Collect gold
> Build stronghold
> ...




Awesome.


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## Greg K (Oct 13, 2007)

JoeGKushner said:
			
		

> Perhaps we'll see a silver standard with gold and platinum being rare?



One could only hope. That is exactly the type of thing that I hope to see by continuing to look at the 4e teasers and other bits tossed to us- little things  worth stealing despite my overall negative impression of 4e and the current WOTC inhouse design team (from a design and not a personal perspective as I am sure they are all good people).


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## ehren37 (Oct 13, 2007)

Atlatl Jones said:
			
		

> To blow on ale and whores!




Thats some pretty retarded expensive ale and whores at upper levels.

I think its a bad design decision if you cant spend gold on magic items. Not everyone wants to fart around with army building (or we'd be playing Warhammer or some other wargame). You need to be able to spend gold to improve your character, otherwise treasure loses a lot of appeal for many people. Only a certain type of player really gets excited about describing the types of gold inlay buckles they have on their 8th set of fancy boots.


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## ehren37 (Oct 13, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> As an aside, I remember looking on a character sheet of one of my high-level characters in 2E, and realizing that I had almost 100,000 gp just sitting in a bag of holding.  To this day I still think of Scrooge McDuck swimming in his money vault whenever I think of gold and bags of holding.  Is that weird?




No. Gold was worthless in 2nd edition. In 1st at least you were expected to equip and cart around a ton of mooks to set off traps. As D&D got away from a wargame model, that fell by the wayside. With nothing practical to spend it on, gold sat unused for the most part.


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## WhatGravitas (Oct 13, 2007)

Ask Iron Heroes players.

And use it for maintenance (food, inns, potions), fun (bling up your armour... and get a big gem for your wizard's staff, get better clothes), built your own empire (stronghold, hirelings, whatever).

Cheers, LT.


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## Gloombunny (Oct 13, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Thats some pretty retarded expensive ale and whores at upper levels.






			
				Lord Tirian said:
			
		

> And use it for maintenance (food, inns, potions), fun (bling up your armour... and get a big gem for your wizard's staff, get better clothes), built your own empire (stronghold, hirelings, whatever).



So high-level adventurers are like medieval celebrities, strung out on expensive drugs, wearing absurd amounts of bling, followed by sycophantic entourages...

I like it!


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## WhatGravitas (Oct 13, 2007)

Gloombunny said:
			
		

> So high-level adventurers are like medieval celebrities, strung out on expensive drugs, wearing absurd amounts of bling, followed by sycophantic entourages...
> 
> I like it!



Yes. 

Ah, don't forget, that bling *is* social power. Medieval kings and the church knew to utilize the power of bling.

Ah, and I forgot an important thing: Bribes.

EDIT: To expand on that: Gold (i.e money) is a very real measurement of power. It's social and economic influence solidified. You can use money to influence the social, economic, and political environment. Ask the Medici about that! This means high-level adventures can *really* play in the league of nobles, lords, and kings - because they have the financial back-up for such a scale, not only personal prowess.

Cheers, LT.


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## reanjr (Oct 13, 2007)

For starters, we can start having a world where an adventurer's socio-economic status doesn't determine their power.  You can have a poor 15th level mercenary who can slay a dragon, or a wealthy 1st level nobleman "slumming" with a local group of ne'er-do-wells.

On top of that, wealth accumulation can be used for more entertaining things like influence and objet d'art.  And you can finally get away from the loot-every-body style of adventuring if it's inappropriate for your character.

I remember the good old pre-3e days when people used to role-play their wealth.  I hope to get back to that.


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## Nifft (Oct 13, 2007)

In my ideal game, a windfall benefits all PCs -- albeit temporarily.

New swords? Great! You can now afford a masterwork sword, dagger, and armor! They'll be great until they wear out and/or are broken in combat. Because that's what happens to equipment.

New spell components? Great! You can now afford to cast slightly more often, or more effectively. Until they run out.

Rogue got bling? Great! You can now afford bigger bribes (bonuses on social skills), or a few magic items, which will eventually wear out (because they're equipment). You wouldn't say no to a masterwork blade, either.

Cheers, -- N


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## SpiderMonkey (Oct 13, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> In my ideal game, a windfall benefits all PCs -- albeit temporarily.
> 
> New swords? Great! You can now afford a masterwork sword, dagger, and armor! They'll be great until they wear out and/or are broken in combat. Because that's what happens to equipment.
> 
> ...




Hmm...I like a lot of what you've got here.  I wonder if it would be a matter of DM fiat to determine whether equipment wears out, or if the rules would cover that (if it's not some flat mainenance cost, no thanks).  I'd also like to make a (very simple) way of incorporating wealth into social situations.  Not just bribe, but bling as well.  I dunno.  I think that, and then I remember how lazy I am.


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## Rechan (Oct 13, 2007)

I am a person who hates book keeping. I'd hate to have to go _buy_ things with it. Or have to constantly do upkeep. Or budget a fortress. Ugh. When I DM, I don't make my characters follow how many rations they have or if they have one or five arrows in their quiver, unless that's part of the plot.

In my head, my character is all ready awesome _looking_. I don't need bling. I don't need to write 'Staff with ruby on end' on my character sheet. And just buying one to put on there is... worthless to me. 

I'd much rather your gold have a mechanical benefit, like in 3e. 

I feel the "Christmas Tree" effect comes from having Too Many magical items, especially because you NEED those stat boosters/save boosters/AC boosters. I'd much rather have several small magical items that let me do a few cute things (think: James Bond's equipment), or one or two multi-purpose items that all have magical abilities that are unrelated to my to-hit or AC.

Sacrificing gold so my magical weapon gains new powers, or whatever, is just fine with me.


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## Bloosquig (Oct 13, 2007)

Just because you don't HAVE to have a ton of magical items doesn't mean you can't spend all your extra cash on random magical items that you enjoy for the hell of it.  

Or any of the other great ideas here.  (strongholds, beer, girls/boys, whatever.     )


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## Rechan (Oct 13, 2007)

I also anticipate that many want "A functioning D&D economy".

Which makes me wary. 

Among other things, it makes me think of Knights of the Dinner Table. They charged into a dragon's lair, to find the dragon sitting there in an empty lair. "WHERE'S YOUR HOARD?" "Hm? Oh. It's tied up in investments, bonds, and stocks in the neighboring kingdoms." "... What?"


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## A'koss (Oct 14, 2007)

What I used to do, pre-3e, when the PCs started becoming high level was to encourage them to _*create*_ something for the campaign - _something that would outlast the character who built it_.

In the past I've seen PCs create their own knighthood in their name, a multiplanar spy network, a city of their own design (which took 3 generations of PCs to finish), an underground fortress, a merchant/war fleet... I even a had one player (a very HL Paladin) who's sole mission in life was to create the most lavish Inn/Gambling House in Greyhawk - the Golden Lyric. In every adventure he'd be out looting the _furnishings_ from our enemies. He even refused to allow the wizard to cast any fireballs in rooms he saw stuff he liked. By the time he finished building the Golden Lyric, he poured something like 1.2 _million_ in gold into it.

Even today the Inn is still a prominant feature in my GH games, even though no one can remember the name of the Paladin who built it...


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## Treebore (Oct 14, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> No. Gold was worthless in 2nd edition. In 1st at least you were expected to equip and cart around a ton of mooks to set off traps. As D&D got away from a wargame model, that fell by the wayside. With nothing practical to spend it on, gold sat unused for the most part.





Really? My players in 2E, and 1E, spent it on building temples, castles, MAnors, towns, even a city or two.

One group even built a certain High Clericists tower from DL in Faerun. On the ocean front area to the east of the Giant's Run mountains. Then a town, which turned into a city, with a nice harbor, developed around it. Much to the dismay of a certain city to the north of them.

The tower is also dedicated to "The Triumverate", Tyr, Helm, and Torm. Cormyr likes them too, since they are friends with several important personages in the Cormyrean nobility, and are a strong and staunch allie against the chaos, corruption, and evil around them.

I wasn't able to make that happen in 3E. They spent their money on making items, or having them made. No one wanted a castle or temple unless it was Daern's Instant Fortress.

So I am glad to have a ruels base that takes me back to that. Which is C&C, but 2E, 1E, and OD&D certainly support it as well. OD&D probably best of all. I certainly use a lot of its guidelines for my C&C game.


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

A'koss said:
			
		

> What I used to do, pre-3e, when the PCs started becoming high level was to encourage them to _*create*_ something for the campaign - _something that would outlast the character who built it_.



Honestly, I think you're able to do this as early as possible. 

Set a goal, and work towards it, and all that. Accomplishing things that don't involve the DM's plots that are handed to you, but instead say 'I want to redeem this race of damned people so that they will no longer be tainted', or 'I want to overthrow that tyrant and make that country just and for the people.'

I know it's a different setting and different expectations, but in the Exalted game I played in, we made our own empire. We walked into a place with lots of warlords in little fiefdoms, and started toppling the despots, making deals with neighbors, improving the standard of living, and doing favors for Entity X to get Aid for Goal Y. We were doing this to Combat certain entities in the setting, and also offering a safe haven for others of our kind. But we started out small and, many small actions built up.

One example of something that I personally did was, while looking through a book of important cities, I came across the entry for a city state. It had apparently been attacked, or fended off an attack recently, and so the city state had practically no standing army. This city-state also had a HUGE population of spirits (magical entities like elementals and outsiders in D&D); its rulers were three powerful spirits. 

One of the small fiefdoms our empire dealt with was an independent town of about 50 Aasimar (equivalent) warriors who bred heavily with Spirits, hoping to create offspring with unique abilities. One power that characters can have (including the Aasimar) is the ability to _quickly_ and efficiently train mortals to become elite fighters. 

What did I Do? I approached my GM and said, "Hey. City-state has no army, but lots of spirits. Our neighbor can train an elite army real fast, and likes to breed with spirits. I'd like to broker a deal between City-state and our neighbors, so that our neighbors can train City-state's army in exchange for spirits to breed with. I'd like to get something from both of these guys in exchange for brokering the deal."


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## WyzardWhately (Oct 14, 2007)

Okay, so, there's a choice between having gold be spendable to improve your character in substantial ways (buy magic items) and not.

If you can't, then gold becomes uninteresting to players who only want to optimize their characters.  I'm going to submit this isn't a problem, because that just means they don't care about the piles of money.  They can sure as hell still care about any magic items on the pile, or XP, or, y'know, accomplishing whatever it is they're trying to accomplish.  So, this doesn't actually create any problems for them.

However, if gold CAN be used to buy magic items, it DOES create a problem for those PCs who would like to be building temples, raising armies, and establishing kingdoms.  Because they have to make their characters weaker as a price for doing all those cool roleplaying things that add something to the campaign.

So, given a choice between these two consequences, I'd easily say that magic items shouldn't be purchaseable.  Maybe the kinda weak, disposable things like healing potions and stuff, because nobody high level can use many of those anyway.


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## Gundark (Oct 14, 2007)

Lord Tirian said:
			
		

> Ask Iron Heroes players.
> 
> And use it for maintenance (food, inns, potions), fun (bling up your armour... and get a big gem for your wizard's staff, get better clothes), built your own empire (stronghold, hirelings, whatever).




Yeah a variantion on these rules would be cool


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

> So, given a choice between these two consequences, I'd easily say that magic items shouldn't be purchaseable.




To be quite honest, I never looked at magical items as "purchasable". I'd never have a character walk into a shop and say "Give me that holy avenger there on the wall, shop keep!" 

I just viewed the pricing for magical weapons as a way to balance 'what level are magical items appropriate' by their Pricing and how affordable they are when you look at PC wealth levels. A 6th level PC is expected a wealth of 13,000 - this seems a reasonable time to get a +2 weapon, as that's about 8,000, which gives them 5,000gp for any other equipment. 

The pricing also helps when you y'know, get a magical item in the dragon's hoard no one int he party wants, and thus need to sell it.


----------



## Wormwood (Oct 14, 2007)

Another vote for the *awesome* Conan rules.


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Among other things, it makes me think of Knights of the Dinner Table. They charged into a dragon's lair, to find the dragon sitting there in an empty lair. "WHERE'S YOUR HOARD?" "Hm? Oh. It's tied up in investments, bonds, and stocks in the neighboring kingdoms." "... What?"



 IMC, Dragons are bankers. You give them your gold, and they sit on it. In return, they give you little bits of paper with their _arcane mark_ on them. Each dragon ensures that his currency is accepted by all merchants within three day's flight -- beyond that, you're on your own. (Deposited money does earn interest.)

Cheers, -- N


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## shadewest (Oct 14, 2007)

Let's get back to the _ale and whores_ for a moment.  I can see a rule that gives a +1 morale bonus for each consecutive evening of carousing, decreasing  by one every day since the last night of carousing.  Of course, that sets a certain tone for the campaign...


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## The_Fan (Oct 14, 2007)

I heard, but don't know where, that the coinage rate will be cahnging in 4e. So 100 copper = 1 silver, 100 silver = 1 gold, 100 gold = 1 platinum. That might alleviate the Money Bin effect a bit.


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## WyzardWhately (Oct 14, 2007)

The_Fan said:
			
		

> I heard, but don't know where, that the coinage rate will be cahnging in 4e. So 100 copper = 1 silver, 100 silver = 1 gold, 100 gold = 1 platinum. That might alleviate the Money Bin effect a bit.




Jesus.  That'd make a handful of gold quite a bit bigger deal, and no mistake.


----------



## The_Fan (Oct 14, 2007)

Yeah. Wish I could confirm it, but as of right now I'd file that as "baseless rumor."


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> IMC, Dragons are bankers. You give them your gold, and they sit on it. In return, they give you little bits of paper with their _arcane mark_ on them. Each dragon ensures that his currency is accepted by all merchants within three day's flight -- beyond that, you're on your own. (Deposited money does earn interest.)
> 
> Cheers, -- N



Thus, Dragonslayer = Bank robber. But you slay the dragon, and you got everyone within three miles flight gunning for your head. 

"You damned adventurer, that gold is my daughter's arcane college fund!"


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## A'koss (Oct 14, 2007)

The_Fan said:
			
		

> I heard, but don't know where, that the coinage rate will be cahnging in 4e. So 100 copper = 1 silver, 100 silver = 1 gold, 100 gold = 1 platinum. That might alleviate the Money Bin effect a bit.



Actually that came from one of the podcasts - they only toyed with the idea but aren't going to use it. IIRC, I think the big sticking point was that copper became even more worthless as the standard is still gold.


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## AnonymousOne (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> IMC, Dragons are bankers. You give them your gold, and they sit on it. In return, they give you little bits of paper with their _arcane mark_ on them. Each dragon ensures that his currency is accepted by all merchants within three day's flight -- beyond that, you're on your own. (Deposited money does earn interest.)
> 
> Cheers, -- N




This idea is ridiculously badass.  Consider it YOINKED!


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## Nyeshet (Oct 14, 2007)

If gp is not useful beyond early levels, then perhaps they will get rid of gp entirely, replacing it with the wealth check system in use in d20 modern and some other similar systems? I tend to dislike such systems, but if they are seeking to streamline the game and reduce the math, this is certainly one way to do so - especially if gp would be of little use to the system.


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## Imp (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> IMC, Dragons are bankers. You give them your gold, and they sit on it. In return, they give you little bits of paper with their _arcane mark_ on them. Each dragon ensures that his currency is accepted by all merchants within three day's flight -- beyond that, you're on your own. (Deposited money does earn interest.)



Those overdraft fees must be murder.


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## Nyeshet (Oct 14, 2007)

The_Fan said:
			
		

> I heard, but don't know where, that the coinage rate will be cahnging in 4e. So 100 copper = 1 silver, 100 silver = 1 gold, 100 gold = 1 platinum. That might alleviate the Money Bin effect a bit.



Only if money traders are common enough - which I doubt will be the case. So you may have instances of a person coming to buy an item only to realize that the trader does not have enough change. Or consider this: dragons are likely to have large piles of the coins they are most likely to find. In this system, that will be coppers and silvers, rather than golds or platinums. So it may be that you slay the dragon - only to find a couple hundred thousand copper and silver coins within (barely enough to blanket the floor where the dragon lays, but still . . . .) So it could simply shift the situation from having bags holding a few hundred gp to bags holding a few hundred sp &/or cp.


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## A'koss (Oct 14, 2007)

Iron Heroes had some ways of using your money called "Wealth Feats". Conceptually it was interesting, but the execution was so-so. You start by putting money into a Wealth Pool - 100gp grants you 1 Wealth Point. Each Wealth Feat required a certain amount of Wealth Points to buy in (they don't count towards your normal feats) and with them you could gain Cohorts, Followers, Property, Buy your way out of legal problems, Political Connections and Social Influence. There are even alt-rules for _gaining XP _for spending money on wine, women and song!


----------



## Imp (Oct 14, 2007)

Also, re: gold, what is it good for, I've long had the temptation to draft a "he who dies with the most toys, wins" retirement system that determines how well the adventurer's going to be living once his sword-slinging days are over.  I am also okay with purchasing an assortment of limited-use magic items, beneficial sacrifices, and special training regimens (the latter two of which I have also failed to rigorously implement, so far).

I do not like abstract wealth in a game focused on scoring loot; it's fine in modern and futuristic systems, though.


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## WyzardWhately (Oct 14, 2007)

A'koss said:
			
		

> Iron Heroes had some ways of using your money called "Wealth Feats". Conceptually it was interesting, but the execution was so-so. You start by putting money into a Wealth Pool - 100gp grants you 1 Wealth Point. Each Wealth Feat required a certain amount of Wealth Points to buy in (they don't count towards your normal feats) and with them you could gain Cohorts, Followers, Property, Buy your way out of legal problems, Political Connections and Social Influence. There are even alt-rules for _gaining XP _for spending money on wine, women and song!




I really, really like this idea, but I would be shocked as hell to see it in 4E.


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## Hairfoot (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> I also anticipate that many want "A functioning D&D economy".
> 
> Which makes me wary.



I'd like it to be addressed, but there's no need for the designers to go overboard.

I like the idea of a copper/silver standard, and I'd particularly like to see tax mentioned.  DMs who've tried to make PCs pay their dues know it's like herding cats, so I'd like to see some acknowledgment of it in the rulebooks, even if it's only as an optional rule.


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## frankthedm (Oct 14, 2007)

shadewest said:
			
		

> Let's get back to the _ale and whores_ for a moment.  I can see a rule that gives a +1 morale bonus for each consecutive evening of carousing, decreasing  by one every day since the last night of carousing.  Of course, that sets a certain tone for the campaign...



A most excellent idea!


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 14, 2007)

Gold isn't for anything. It doesn't exist in Lord of the Rings type games. In Conan type games it serves as a motivator. The PCs start off the adventure poor. DM dangles a great treasure in front of their noises so they go down a dungeon or whatever to get it. After the adventure is over they spend it all on ale and whores. There must be a game contract that no one will spend their money on anything remotely useful.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 14, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Thats some pretty retarded expensive ale and whores at upper levels.



I regard it as shorthand for frittering it away. Luxury clothes, super-expensive drugs from far off lands, massive parties for the whole city, gambling. Whatever, so long as it's an utter waste of money.


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## TwinBahamut (Oct 14, 2007)

I like the idea of spending money on stuff _other_ than magic items. I never liked the way wealth was directly linked to character power. It means that you really have no options on how to spend your money. You have to spend money on stuff that raises your AC, attack bonus, etc.

I think it would be best if the benefits you can get from spending money hit a plateau in the early levels of the game, so that by higher levels (the Paragon/Epic levels), you already have all the equipment you will need (other than plot-related and otherwise unique and special things, but I think even those should be had by 10th level).


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## A'koss (Oct 14, 2007)

TwinBahamut said:
			
		

> I like the idea of spending money on stuff _other_ than magic items. I never liked the way wealth was directly linked to character power. It means that you really have no options on how to spend your money. You have to spend money on stuff that raises your AC, attack bonus, etc.
> 
> I think it would be best if the benefits you can get from spending money hit a plateau in the early levels of the game, so that by higher levels (the Paragon/Epic levels), you already have all the equipment you will need (other than plot-related and otherwise unique and special things, but I think even those should be had by 10th level).



A compromise route might be having low level magic items possibly available to purchase (for example, potions and up to +2 items), but mid to high level magic is simply too rare. And like earlier editions there are those who might be willing to buy items off of you (eg. powerful wizard guilds), but don't sell them in turn.


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## pawsplay (Oct 14, 2007)

A'koss said:
			
		

> A compromise route might be having low level magic items possibly available to purchase (for example, potions and up to +2 items), but mid to high level magic is simply too rare. And like earlier editions there are those who might be willing to buy items off of you (eg. powerful wizard guilds), but don't sell them in turn.




I'd rather do it the other way... any kingdom worth its salt has a magic throne that does something awesome, and a gathering of wizards can create pillars to the clouds, but you could live your whole life without seeing a magic sword in your village.

In AD&D, a death knight had a 75% chance of having a magic sword. Like that.


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## ruleslawyer (Oct 14, 2007)

WyzardWhately said:
			
		

> _Originally Posted by A'koss_
> Iron Heroes had some ways of using your money called "Wealth Feats". Conceptually it was interesting, but the execution was so-so. You start by putting money into a Wealth Pool - 100gp grants you 1 Wealth Point. Each Wealth Feat required a certain amount of Wealth Points to buy in (they don't count towards your normal feats) and with them you could gain Cohorts, Followers, Property, Buy your way out of legal problems, Political Connections and Social Influence. There are even alt-rules for gaining XP for spending money on wine, women and song!
> 
> _I really, really like this idea, but I would be shocked as hell to see it in 4E._



Well, given that Mearls is part of the design team... 

Having run an IH game for a while, I actually am much, much happier when wealth doesn't need to be spent on personal augmentation, for several reasons:

1) You can create more realistic economies. Warrior humanoids don't have to have treasure beyond their weapons, armor, and equipment; animals and unintelligent monsters don't need any possessions whatsoever, and PCs and NPCs alike need only as much money as required to transact in goods and services in the quasi-historic manner of a fantasy realm.

2) You can play any genre of fantasy you like without warping balance. Want a Conan-style game where the PCs amass huge fortunes and start the next session broke? An LotR campaign where money is simply irrelevant in th context of larger conflicts? A post-apocalyptic savage world setting in which there's basically no minted coin whatsoever and the most prized possessions are clean water and solid food? All possible and easy.

3) PCs can actually USE their money to drive the campaign! Wealth feats are a partial implementation of this in IH, but investment in a merchant coster, purchase of a ship, or setting up a realm or stronghold can be BIG campaign drivers. One of the PCs in my current campaign is a merchant-tinkerer of Gond (FR) who is adventuring in part to amass a fortune to return to his native island of Lantan for a life of ease, but also to fund his own workshop wherein he plans to create a variety of constructs and other techno-magical devices. Another PC (a noble of Waterdeep) might gain fortunes and glory for his family. And so on.


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## JoeGKushner (Oct 14, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> Gold isn't for anything. It doesn't exist in Lord of the Rings type games. In Conan type games it serves as a motivator. The PCs start off the adventure poor. DM dangles a great treasure in front of their noises so they go down a dungeon or whatever to get it. After the adventure is over they spend it all on ale and whores. There must be a game contract that no one will spend their money on anything remotely useful.





I'd go so far as to say it doesn't appear in most fiction of the day.

Elric, Hawkmoon, or other Eternal Champion bits? Nope.

Motivator for Farfd an d Grey Mouser but not actually used once possessed/lost?

Even in most books that are modern like Wheel of Time or Shanara, actual gold use is rare.

That's because it's pretty boring in and of itself. It has no purpose.


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## howandwhy99 (Oct 14, 2007)

Gold = gourmet food, lavish services, custom-built equipment, manses, yachts, servants, the best of the best the land has to offer.

It also means power, influence, bribery, titles, land, organizations, armies, navies, sages, universities, cathedrals, kingships, and all that money can do for you as in our world.


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## A'koss (Oct 14, 2007)

ruleslawyer said:
			
		

> Well, given that Mearls is part of the design team...
> 
> Having run an IH game for a while, I actually am much, much happier when wealth doesn't need to be spent on personal augmentation, for several reasons:
> 
> ...



This pretty much sums up my feelings on it as well. I am really curious now to see just how much in the way of magic items WotC _does_ plan on keeping around. With class-based AC bonuses, seemingly high Save Defenses, Bo9S style manuevers, at will and per encounter abilities, traits and so on it sounds like you could get away with running a "no magic" game a la IH or with just a small tweak here and a nudge there. 

On the other hand though we've already heard that there's +x wands in the game and with all of their talk about keeping all the math in check from from low level to epic I wonder what assumptions they have about the gear you'll have at various levels...


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

A'koss said:
			
		

> I wonder what assumptions they have about the gear you'll have at various levels...



 I hope none.

The value of "level" as short-hand for character prowess is severely undermined in 3e by this assumption.

Cheers, -- N


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## M.L. Martin (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> I hope none.
> 
> The value of "level" as short-hand for character prowess is severely undermined in 3e by this assumption.
> 
> Cheers, -- N




  On the other hand, guidelines as to maximums (and to some extent, minimums) could be most helpful to keep levels useful for that very purpose by not throwing off the umbers.

  Given the few hints we've seen so far, my guess is that the equipment bonuses to 'key stats' (attacks, defenses, etc.) should be around the Level/5 range, and magic will be more useful for horizontal expansion--adding new capabilities--than addition.


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Matthew L. Martin said:
			
		

> On the other hand, guidelines as to maximums (and to some extent, minimums) could be most helpful to keep levels useful for that very purpose by not throwing off the umbers.



 Sorry, I don't understand what you're saying here.



			
				Matthew L. Martin said:
			
		

> Given the few hints we've seen so far, my guess is that the equipment bonuses to 'key stats' (attacks, defenses, etc.) should be around the Level/5 range, and magic will be more useful for horizontal expansion--adding new capabilities--than addition.



 Really? That'd be nice, but remember... *+6 Wand*.

Cheers, -- N


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## M.L. Martin (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Sorry, I don't understand what you're saying here.



  Sorry about that; I'm not sure i'm quite awake yet.   

  Basically, some guidelines on what magic items a PC should have at a given level should be included just to keep from giving them too much too soon and thus exceeding the expected range of numbers with magic, throwing off the whole level system.  This applies to minimums as well, but to a lesser degree.



> Really? That'd be nice, but remember... *+6 Wand*.
> 
> Cheers, -- N




  That's part of what I'm basing my hope on--that +6 wand fits in nicely *if* it's the kind of thing you're using at the high-end of the epic range, say levels 27-30.  Wishful thinking on my part, to some degree, but remember the design notes for the _Magic Item Compendium_, where they point out how ubiquitous and comparatively boring the 'Big Six' were?


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

howandwhy99 said:
			
		

> It also means power, influence, bribery, titles, land, organizations, armies, navies, sages, universities, cathedrals, kingships, and all that money can do for you as in our world.



So in other words, frills that don't help you when you're an adventurer.


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> So in other words, frills that don't help you when you're an adventurer.



 I dunno. At minimum, "bribes" seem pretty solidly in the "help" column. They're just plot bonuses instead of attack + damage bonuses.

Together with a Swashbuckling Card type of mechanic, wealth / fame / whatever could become a cool mechanic.

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Matthew L. Martin said:
			
		

> Basically, some guidelines on what magic items a PC should have at a given level should be included just to keep from giving them too much too soon and thus exceeding the expected range of numbers with magic, throwing off the whole level system.  This applies to minimums as well, but to a lesser degree.



 Here's the thing, though: if you really have expected minimum stat bonus items at various levels, why not just build those in to the levels directly?

What do you gain by being able to choose between *cool yet sucky* items and *boring yet effective* items? Why force players to choose?

I'd much rather see a system like Conan (or to a lesser degree SW Saga) where PCs gain more stat boosts over time, and don't ever get items which directly affect stats.

MIC items sound cool -- I don't have that book myself, but what I've seen of it is nifty. 

Cheers, -- N


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> I dunno. At minimum, "bribes" seem pretty solidly in the "help" column. They're just plot bonuses instead of attack + damage bonuses.
> 
> Together with a Swashbuckling Card type of mechanic, wealth / fame / whatever could become a cool mechanic.



Sure, it's nice if you're in a type of campaign where that sort've thing is useful. Not so much when you're traveling the planes or going after that Evil Lich or Nefarious Blackguard. 

Right now, Gold only facilitates "Buy magical items to facilitate combat". That only suits one style of campaign - thus, it's unsatisfactory to other styles. But if it flipped back to the 2e "You really just spend it on non-adventure related stuff" or "Hey now you can buy a Castle", to parties who have no intentions of buying castles, there goes the whole point of treasure. My ascetic monk or down-to-earth druid is going to scoff at fancy clothes and pretty boats. And a lawful good character isn't going to be doing a lot of bribing.

In other words, if gold is only there to facilitate one type of campaign style, I will not be happy.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Sure, it's nice if you're in a type of campaign where that sort've thing is useful. Not so much when you're traveling the planes or going after that Evil Lich or Nefarious Blackguard.



 I would disagree -- when my PCs travel the planes, they find border guards, tariffs, taxes and tolls all over the place -- particularly the more Lawful of the Evil planes.

They've bribed Yugoloth mercs to abandon their current masters _en route_ to killing those masters.

Evil minions are exactly the kind who love bribes most! IMHO, of course. 

Cheers, -- N


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> I would disagree -- when my PCs travel the planes, they find border guards, tariffs, taxes and tolls all over the place -- particularly the more Lawful of the Evil planes.



That's nice, but again, only applies to those planes.


----------



## WyzardWhately (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> My ascetic monk or down-to-earth druid is going to scoff at fancy clothes and pretty boats. And a lawful good character isn't going to be doing a lot of bribing.




So...they don't care about the gold and gems.  Devise other motivations, it shouldn't be that hard.  I've played plenty of characters like that.  What's the problem?


----------



## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

WyzardWhately said:
			
		

> So...they don't care about the gold and gems.  Devise other motivations, it shouldn't be that hard.  I've played plenty of characters like that.  What's the problem?



If Gold is built into the game as a Reward and a resource, and the characters *have no use* for that reward and resource, then they are impaired. 

What happens to my warforged artificer (who doesn't want food or fancy clothes), whose sole reason for adventuring is so he has the cash to creating new and better magical items and research? I say that many "Classic Archemage style" wizards don't generally have lots of bling or fancy parties.

So building the wealth rules _just for one campaign style_, like it is now, imo is bad. Wealth = prestige is just gold = roleplaying enhancement. It's _just as bad_ as 3e: wealth = combat enhancement.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> That's nice, but again, only applies to those planes.



 Wait, again? Your point was it doesn't apply to planes. Or hunting bad guys. I'm countering exactly (and only) those two points. So yes, my previous point only applies to a limited subset of situations. Because those were the ones you thought were impossible.

Is that really your final answer?

- - -

Our conversation from my point of view:

*Me*: I think it could be used for A, B and C.
*Rechan*: It's nice, but doesn't apply to situation X or Y.
*Me*: In my experience, B did indeed apply to situations X and Y, and here's how...
*Rechan*: That's nice, but only applies to X and Y.

Cheers, -- N


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Wait, again? Your point was it doesn't apply to planes. Or hunting bad guys. I'm countering exactly (and only) those two points. So yes, my previous point only applies to a limited subset of situations. Because those were the ones you thought were impossible.



Except that your example only applies to a SUBSET of planes. Is that really your final answer?

So allow me to change the conversation from My point of view:

*You* I think it could be useful for A, B, and C.
*Me* That's nice, but it doesn't apply to situations X or Y.
*You* No, it applies to those situations! Like when it's really sunny in X, or on Sundays at 3pm for Y.
*Me* That's great. Until it's partially cloudy, rainy, or night time with X, or for Y any other day but Sunday at 3pm.

I'm sorry that I didn't declare you the winner because you pointed out a very limited situation where wealth could apply to my complaint, Nifft.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Except that your example only applies to a SUBSET of planes. Is that really your final answer?



 Not at all. Tolls apply on all Lawful planes; bribes work well on all Chaotic planes. Good planes like donations; Evil planes like tribute. Everyone wants money. (For proof of this, see every _planar ally_ spell.)



			
				Rechan said:
			
		

> I'm sorry that I didn't declare you the winner because you pointed out a very limited situation where wealth could apply to my complaint, Nifft.



 Well, now you can rectify that. Or maybe come up with some situations that aren't "3pm on a Tuesday".

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Not at all. Tolls apply on all Lawful planes; bribes work well on all Chaotic planes. Good planes like donations; Evil planes like tribute. Everyone wants money. (For proof of this, see every _planar ally_ spell.)



I just don't see it working out that way on a fourth of the planes, let alone _all_. Especially when, at levels where you can access the planes, you're teleporting everywhere, you don't _need_ roads. 

And unless there's a specific sidebar under "Shadowfell Toll road" or "Feywild Taxes", or "Elemental Chaos Tarrif", I don't see it playing out that way, Niffft.

You're also forgetting the fact that Lawful good PCs might not want to give _any_ money to evil. That's _letting evil benefit from you_ by giving them Your money that they can further their evil with. I'd definitely kick a Paladin's alignment in the sack if he just said "Here Mr Evil Fiend, take this money and go away." 

My impression from the _planar ally_ spell is that the GP represents an offering appropriate to the being summoned. I do not believe that all planar entities have use for a shiny metal from the material plane. The same reason why scribing scrolls cost GP to make - you're not just throwing gold at the paper and it evaporates, you have to buy special, magically treated inks and appropriate paper etc etc. It's _material_.


----------



## ehren37 (Oct 14, 2007)

Treebore said:
			
		

> Really? My players in 2E, and 1E, spent it on building temples, castles, MAnors, towns, even a city or two.




I've already said wargame stuff was part of 1st edition. If you guys carried it over to 2nd edition, great for you. MANY D&D players do not want to manage an army. If they did, I'd suspect they'd be playing a wargame, where the primary point is army unit management rather than a game where the primary purpose is rp'ing a single individual.

I have one player who is really into that sort of political/empire building stuff. The other 4 are bored to tears when he goes shopping for drapes and spends hours poring over militia statistics, and just want to get back to kicking ass, solving mysteries and well... adventuring. I try and accommodate him somewhat, but adventuring is why I play and run D&D... not to simulate a turn based strategy game (which video games do better anyways). I suspect they are hardly alone. Taking away practical benefits of wealth crams this style down everyone's throats.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> I just don't see it working out that way on a fourth of the planes, let alone _all_. Especially when, at levels where you can access the planes, you're teleporting everywhere, you don't _need_ roads.



 You need roads if the master of the divinely morphic media thinks you do. You need portals to get to other layers. You need roads and signs (and perhaps even a tout) if you're looking for a place you haven't seen yet.



			
				Rechan said:
			
		

> And you're forgetting the fact that Lawful good PCs might not want to give _any_ money to evil. That's _letting evil benefit from you_ by giving them Your money that they can further their evil with. I'd definitely kick a Paladin's alignment in the sack if he just said "Here Mr Evil Fiend, take this money and go away."



 Nope, I'm just not counting on him being Lawful Stupid to the point that he forgets his options. You certainly can fight your way through all the Hells -- but it may not be the best use of your time.



			
				Rechan said:
			
		

> And my impression from the _planar ally_ spell is that the GP represents an offering appropriate to the being summoned. I do not believe that all planar entities have use for a shiny metal from the material plane. The same reason why scribing scrolls cost GP to make - you're not just throwing gold at the paper and it evaporates, you have to buy special, magically treated inks and appropriate paper etc etc. It's _material_.



 I'm sure you have a point here. Could you clarify it? "Expensive offering appropriate to the being" is not outside the definition of "bribe", let alone "donation" or "tribute".

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> You need roads if the master of the divinely morphic media thinks you do. You need portals to get to other layers. You need roads and signs (and perhaps even a tout) if you're looking for a place you haven't seen yet.



In your campaign, sure. But we're not talking about how Niffft runs the planes. 



> Nope, I'm just not counting on him being Lawful Stupid to the point that he forgets his options. You certainly can fight your way through all the Hells -- but it may not be the best use of your time.



Thanks for calling me lawful stupid, Nifft. 



> I'm sure you have a point here. Could you clarify it? "Expensive offering appropriate to the being" is not outside the definition of "bribe", let alone "donation" or "tribute".



Because you said all outsiders care about gold? Just dragging sacks of shiny earth metal through the planes Doesn't Cut It.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> And unless there's a specific sidebar under "Shadowfell Toll road" or "Feywild Taxes", or "Elemental Chaos Tarrif", I don't see it playing out that way, Niffft.



 Ah, there's no rule books yet, but there's already someone telling me how the planes must work by citing them.

Do I need to explain how tolls & tariffs might work in a Points of Light setting? I'll do so upon request.

Cheers, -- N


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Ah, there's no rule books yet, but there's already someone telling me how the planes must work by citing them.



Let me know where I said "THIS IS HOW IT WILL BE" and you have to run it that way. But you seem to be implying that the planes Must be ran your way.



> Do I need to explain how tolls & tariffs might work in a Points of Light setting? I'll do so upon request.



It appears you're willing to do condescension without request.


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## WyzardWhately (Oct 14, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> I have one player who is really into that sort of political/empire building stuff. The other 4 are bored to tears when he goes shopping for drapes and spends hours poring over militia statistics, and just want to get back to kicking ass, solving mysteries and well... adventuring. I try and accommodate him somewhat, but adventuring is why I play and run D&D... not to simulate a turn based strategy game (which video games do better anyways). I suspect they are hardly alone. Taking away practical benefits of wealth crams this style down everyone's throats.




You should maybe have a chat with your player, and tell him to just send you an email between games rather than eat up session time with it.  I think that you're overstating the case if you say it 'crams a certain playstile down everyone's throats.'  It is much, much easier for an individual DM to create different motivations (saving the world, anyone?) for PCs than for an individual DM to extricate the "GP==Magic Items==Character's ability to stand up to encounters of a given CR" problem of 3E.  Making gold less important doesn't cram anything down anyone's throat - it opens up options other than buying the next "+."


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> In your campaign, sure. But we're not talking about how Niffft runs the planes.



 We're talking about how a DM can make wealth useful without allowing PCs to buy the magic items that have been the default purchases in 3.0e and 3.5e. I'm just using my campaign as an example.



			
				Rechan said:
			
		

> Thanks for calling me lawful stupid, Nifft.



 The irony: this is the one sentence where you've spelled my handle correctly.

But yes. If you're in Hell voluntarily, and you have a goal which requires your attention, and you disregard that goal to endanger yourself and others because you don't want to pay a toll *only because the toll-keeper is evil*, then I'd say your action is lawful stupid. Unless you object to all tolls (and always resort to combat in place of paying), in which case your action would be chaotic stupid.



			
				Rechan said:
			
		

> Because you said all outsiders care about gold? Just dragging sacks of shiny earth metal through the planes Doesn't Cut It.



 *sigh* Gold = wealth. Did I really need to spell that out for you? If so, please go back and mentally substitute "wealth, as instantiated in an appropriate form, including (but not limited to) liquid assets" for "gold".

Cheers, -- N


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> We're talking about how a DM can make wealth useful without allowing PCs to buy the magic items that have been the default purchases in 3.0e and 3.5e. I'm just using my campaign as an example.



I don't see it that way. That's basically making Wealth a book keeping nightmare of "Move x miles, reduce y gold from your character sheet." If you want to ride the Raid the Demonwebs, pay the lady at the ticket counter. That's not what I call "Useful" to adventuring, I call that Accounting.



> But yes. If you're in Hell voluntarily, and you have a goal which requires your attention, and you disregard that goal to endanger yourself and others because you don't want to pay a toll *only because the toll-keeper is evil*, then I'd say your action is lawful stupid. Unless you object to all tolls (and always resort to combat in place of paying), in which case your action would be chaotic stupid.



But yeah, I appreciate the continual insulting of my interpretation of the gameworld. 



> *sigh* Gold = wealth. Did I really need to spell that out for you? If so, please go back and mentally substitute "wealth, as instantiated in an appropriate form, including (but not limited to) liquid assets" for "gold".



Do you really need to be rude about it?


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## WyzardWhately (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> If Gold is built into the game as a Reward and a resource, and the characters *have no use* for that reward and resource, then they are impaired.
> 
> What happens to my warforged artificer (who doesn't want food or fancy clothes), whose sole reason for adventuring is so he has the cash to creating new and better magical items and research? I say that many "Classic Archemage style" wizards don't generally have lots of bling or fancy parties.
> 
> So building the wealth rules _just for one campaign style_, like it is now, imo is bad. Wealth = prestige is just gold = roleplaying enhancement. It's _just as bad_ as 3e: wealth = combat enhancement.




In order of paragraphs.

1.  A player being uninterested in some potential aspect of the game or campaign does not amount to impairment.  This is a loaded word you are using inaccurately.

2.  Then he's sure got something else to spend money on, so it's cool that he accounts that above 'bling.'  You have replied that Nifft's comments are somehow issue-dodging because they're too narrow, but here you reply with, as near as I can tell, "But what about class X which needs gold for their class features?"  My reply is that that class isn't even suspected to be core, and we won't see it for a good long time.  I would also say that I still don't see the problem here.  Now, there COULD BE a problem, if the GM was taking joy in his new cash =/= character power liberty to run a money-poor game, and some guy was playing a class designed on the assumption that wealth would be available...But this only again suggests to me that cash shouldn't be used as a balancing factor above the very lowest level.  And, in that case, if the GM says "I'm running a low-treasure game,"  _don't play an artificer and then complain._ 

3.  It is not Just As Bad.  People who are interested only in combat can ignore the roleplay elements, I've yet to meet D&D players who could ignore combat.  In fact, I would submit they are playing the wrong game.


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

WyzardWhately1. said:
			
		

> A player being uninterested in some potential aspect of the game or campaign does not amount to impairment.  This is a loaded word you are using inaccurately.



No, the issue is that you are suggesting a system in that the character is hurt by not being interested in an intrinsic aspect of the system itself. Just as a character in 3e would be severely impacted if they forgoed using magical items at all. 



> Then he's sure got something else to spend money on, so it's cool that he accounts that above 'bling.'  You have replied that Nifft's comments are somehow issue-dodging because they're too narrow, but here you reply with, as near as I can tell, "But what about class X which needs gold for their class features?"  My reply is that that class isn't even suspected to be core, and we won't see it for a good long time.  I would also say that I still don't see the problem here.  Now, there COULD BE a problem, if the GM was taking joy in his new cash =/= character power liberty to run a money-poor game, and some guy was playing a class designed on the assumption that wealth would be available...But this only again suggests to me that cash shouldn't be used as a balancing factor above the very lowest level.  And, in that case, if the GM says "I'm running a low-treasure game,"  _don't play an artificer and then complain._



Except that by this mechanism, _all_ games are low-treasure if that treasure is useless to anything but being an elven Paris Hilton. I find it offensive and unhelpful to build a rules set that only facilitates one type of campaign or a few types of characters. 

It's bad game design if the only use for gold is to build an awesome crib or grease some pockets. 



> 3.  It is not Just As Bad.  People who are interested only in combat can ignore the roleplay elements, I've yet to meet D&D players who could ignore combat.  In fact, I would submit they are playing the wrong game.



And I think sequestering wealth to purely a roleplaying device is a horrible idea, because it's completely useless to any campaign that isn't geared towards it.

Why are you against making wealth have _multiple options_, rather than only facilitate your campaign style?


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## WyzardWhately (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> No, the issue is that you are suggesting a system in that the character is hurt by not being interested in an intrinsic aspect of the system itself. Just as a character in 3e would be severely impacted if they forgoed using magical items at all.





You have not yet explained how having a character uninterested in wealth is hurting that character.  I'm starting to wonder if you can.


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

WyzardWhately said:
			
		

> You have not yet explained how having a character uninterested in wealth is hurting that character.  I'm starting to wonder if you can.



Because it hurts the story, takes away from the mechanics, and hurts fun for some people at the table?


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## WyzardWhately (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Because it hurts the story, takes away from the mechanics, and hurts fun for some people at the table?




The first makes no sense, the last I have never, ever seen.  If hoarding up all your money to spend on the next best magic item in order to stay competitive was a good story, I'd have read fantasy novels that featured it.  The second, I simply disregard as neutral.  I don't see what it 'takes away,' other than a system I find pernicious.


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Why are you against making wealth have _multiple options_, rather than only facilitate your campaign style?



 Actually, that's my line. I'm presenting things you can do with wealth outside of combat, and you've been replying that combat enhancement is the only useful expenditure.

Note that in my game, the party (currently*) has lots of magical loot. It's not their only expense -- but it is their most boring expense.

Cheers, -- N

* (They've also lost lots of magical loot -- they get captured, their stuff goes away. They go on adventures, they get more stuff.)


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> I don't see it that way. That's basically making Wealth a book keeping nightmare of "Move x miles, reduce y gold from your character sheet." If you want to ride the Raid the Demonwebs, pay the lady at the ticket counter. That's not what I call "Useful" to adventuring, I call that Accounting.



 If you define everything outside of combat as "not useful", then you've voluntarily restricted yourself to a particular subset of the game.

If you think choosing 260,000 gp worth of magic items is anything other than your dreaded Accounting, I wonder if you've ever seen high-level play.

The book-keeping is terribly tedious, and it only gets worse, because PCs are expected to get all that *and more* next level. 

Cheers, -- N


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Actually, that's my line. I'm presenting things you can do with wealth outside of combat, and you've been replying that combat enhancement is the only useful expenditure./QUOTE]
> No. I'm not saying that it's the _only_ option. I don't think it should be. I don't think it should be tied directly to the effectiveness of the PCs.
> 
> It should be optional. That's all I'm saying.


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## A'koss (Oct 14, 2007)

The bottom line is that if you can buy whatever magic you like, then that is all money (in large sums) is ever good for from an adventurer's POV. I don't think it's a bad idea that low level magic could be availble to buy from large wizard guilds in major cities and the like, just keep the mid to high level stuff off the market (just too rare). Then as the PCs get into higher levels they'll start looking into doing other things with that money.


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## A'koss (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> I don't think it should be tied directly to the effectiveness of the PCs.
> 
> It should be optional. That's all I'm saying.



From what we've heard so far it looks like it will play a _smaller_ role in the overall effectiveness of a PC, but it will still be enough that you still have to factor it in. If there are +6 Wands in the game then obviously there is a notable difference between having it and not. What I'm hoping for is that somewhere in the DMG there will be rules on how to make simple adjustments to your game to run it without magic items and maintain the overall standard of power.


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> No. I'm not saying that it's the _only_ option. I don't think it should be. I don't think it should be tied directly to the effectiveness of the PCs.
> 
> It should be optional. That's all I'm saying.



 Okay, but here's the problem with that -- and it's the problem with wealth *in general* in 3.5e: it's too important.

PCs who have the optimal items for their level are much better at combat. It's really hard to balance encounters for a mixed group of PCs, some of whom do and some of whom don't spend their money optimally -- just as it would be hard to balance encounters for mixed levels too far apart.

So the general consensus has been that we should work to reduce magic items. Eliminate the Big Six, tone down the expendables, remove the necessity of flying by making sure everyone can climb & swim, etc.

This does mean technically removing options, but since the removed options were too good, what it really does is open up everything else. When there's no such thing as "optimal equipment", you're free to choose all the other items that weren't in the Big Six.

You're also free to spend your money on what I've been calling Plot Hacks (tm). I've got some system-independent ideas for those, since it's not a new idea -- maybe I'll write them up.

Cheers, -- N


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## Kraydak (Oct 14, 2007)

Past editions of DnD have been based on "kill them and take their stuff" with the "take their stuff" being between a large and the dominant portions of the PC's motivation.  The success of this adventure-for-powerups design is obvious in the extent to which it dominates the market (RPGs/CRPGs).  This means there needs to be powerups to adventure for.  This means there needs to be widely available magic items, be they in treasure hoards or a market to be purchased with looted gold.  Of course, if there are widely available magic items, there *will* be a market for them, although the currency may not be in gold (there will be a way to convert between the magic item economy and the mundane economy though).

Remember, if you can't spend gold on magic items, why can you spend gold at all?  This isn't an idle question.  For people to want gold, they need to be able to spend it on things they need.  At high levels, this means magic items.  Private armies?  The low level people who are interested in gold are irrelevant before the power of high level characters.  Castles?  Without exotic (read magical) defenses, castles are useless at high level.  If you can't spend gold on magic, you can't spend gold on relevant castles.  Bribes?  The only people you need to bribe are near or above your power level: if you can't spend money on magic items, then neither can they.  They will have no use for gold, and therefore won't be bribable with it.

Even in 1ed with DMs who broke all hope of economic realism by vetoing magic item markets, you had the "christmas tree" syndrome.  It is inherent to any lootable powerup system.  The only way to cut back on the "christmas tree" syndrome without dropping the historically most successful design philosophy is by reducing the number of magic item slots (preventing people from dropping irrelevant amounts of cash on minor upgrades just to fill out their slots).  Making gold irrelevant... is irrelevant to mitigating the problem.


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## TwinBahamut (Oct 14, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> Past editions of DnD have been based on "kill them and take their stuff" with the "take their stuff" being between a large and the dominant portions of the PC's motivation.  The success of this adventure-for-powerups design is obvious in the extent to which it dominates the market (RPGs/CRPGs).



Actually, I disagree with this premise. I would claim that "take their stuff" is, at most, the motivation of a fraction of PC's, and that many consider wealth and the like to be a fun perk, rather than primary motivation. Also, for the characters who are motivated by wealth, it seems odd to me that people would constantly risk life and limb to get money, and yet never spend that money on anything enjoyable (like having a roof to sleep under), because they are too busy saving every last coin to get the next magic item. It seems illogical to me.

Also, the "adventure-for-powerups" concept is already handled well enough by experience gain. I also fail to see how it domintes the tabletop RPG and the videogame RPG markets...


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## WyzardWhately (Oct 14, 2007)

Incidentally, magic items are also a part of treasure hordes.  So, if you can't purchase them, it's not like you'll never see them.  You'll just have to go out and get them the old-fashioned way.


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## Kraydak (Oct 14, 2007)

TwinBahamut said:
			
		

> Actually, I disagree with this premise. I would claim that "take their stuff" is, at most, the motivation of a fraction of PC's, and that many consider wealth and the like to be a fun perk, rather than primary motivation. Also, for the characters who are motivated by wealth, it seems odd to me that people would constantly risk life and limb to get money, and yet never spend that money on anything enjoyable (like having a roof to sleep under), because they are too busy saving every last coin to get the next magic item. It seems illogical to me.




Money spent on adventuring gear is an investment.  The more powerful you are, the more loot you can get.  Unwary adventurers accumulate enemies, so adventuring gear is also insurance.  Adventurers handle adequate amounts of treasure that at high levels, a comfortable lifestyle (if you aren't Mordekainen's Mansioning it) is merely a rounding error in the accounting.



> Also, the "adventure-for-powerups" concept is already handled well enough by experience gain. I also fail to see how it domintes the tabletop RPG and the videogame RPG markets...




DnD (all editions), WoW, Everquest, Diablo, EQ2 etc... all fall into the category of powerups-through-loot.  They all dominated their market and were only replaced by another game who also followed the same design.  The situation is less clear in non open-ended games (later FFs, for example), but those games provided an incentive for playing: win the game.  In an open-ended game you need something else.  The dominant design has been loot.  Other designs work, but they end up as comparatively niche products.


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## Li Shenron (Oct 14, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> I dunno.  What do you guys think?




I think that the fact that we are now forced to think how to make money useful, is a good thing


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## ehren37 (Oct 14, 2007)

WyzardWhately said:
			
		

> You should maybe have a chat with your player, and tell him to just send you an email between games rather than eat up session time with it.




We try to, but that also feels like gaming homework. We've been trying to strike a balance. I brought it up to mainly point out how that style of play is vanishing aside from a few old timers.



> I think that you're overstating the case if you say it 'crams a certain playstile down everyone's throats.'  It is much, much easier for an individual DM to create different motivations (saving the world, anyone?) for PCs than for an individual DM to extricate the "GP==Magic Items==Character's ability to stand up to encounters of a given CR" problem of 3E.  Making gold less important doesn't cram anything down anyone's throat - it opens up options other than buying the next "+."




Those options are largely fluff. Fancy clothes, a mansion, etc. The only appeal to a certain type of player, and those options existed under the 3.5 economy, where if you wanted to blow your gold on fancy pants, you could. Removing the practical aspect of buying magic items DOES enforce a certain play style.

Its like removing any decent feats from the game because the guys who like the crappy +2/+2 type feats dont want to be underpowered for their choices.


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## ehren37 (Oct 14, 2007)

WyzardWhately said:
			
		

> Incidentally, magic items are also a part of treasure hordes.  So, if you can't purchase them, it's not like you'll never see them.  You'll just have to go out and get them the old-fashioned way.




Actually you'll go on an adventure. One guy gets a shiny new toy. The rest get useless coins. 

And you thought dividing loot was tough now? Imagine when the best you can hope for is an owlbear omelet while the other guy is sporting his helmet of laser beam eyes.


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Its like removing any decent feats from the game because the guys who like the crappy +2/+2 type feats dont want to be underpowered for their choices.



 I agree in principle, but not in characterization. 

IMHO there is a difference between feats and magic items: there are lots of good feats and only a few that are too good. You can pick several "good" feats and still have some "feat budget" left over. (There are builds which require all of your feats, but they're not required to be competitive.)

With magic items, the ones that are too good eat up almost all of your budget. If you have gold left over, you should save it, to later upgrade one of your major items.

So with feats, IMHO the answer is to get rid of the stinky ones, reduce the power of the too-strong few, and call it a day. 

Cheers, -- N


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## Kraydak (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> I agree in principle, but not in characterization.
> 
> IMHO there is a difference between feats and magic items: there are lots of good feats and only a few that are too good. You can pick several "good" feats and still have some "feat budget" left over. (There are builds which require all of your feats, but they're not required to be competitive.)
> 
> ...




Actually, having good magic items is actually ideal.  The 3e christmas tree only really comes into play when, at lvl 10 or so, it becomes worth it to blow 2k gp on an item, ANY item to go into your empty slots.  Reducing the number of slots and increasing the non-slotted penalty would result in PCs with fewer, but more cherished and signature, items.

Removing the wealth<->magic exchange rates results in all sort of wonkiness.  A system where gold and the magic currency (stones of jordan?) were completely seperate would be somewhat interesting though.  Mundane treasure would become largely useless, which in turn would mean that taxes (mundane!) become insignificant.  This would results in high level people setting up "governments" designed provide the important people (high level people) with creature comforts.  24/7, neutral ground galas, whose cost doesn't matter because gold and power are disconnected.  War as a replacement of gladiator combat.  Imagine a gilded age on steroids.  A gilded age without the possibility of revolt.  A gilded age where the little people are completely meaningless.  Hmmm......


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## Cbas_10 (Oct 14, 2007)

> Originally Posted by howandwhy99
> It also means power, influence, bribery, titles, land, organizations, armies, navies, sages, universities, cathedrals, kingships, and all that money can do for you as in our world.
> 
> 
> So in other words, frills that don't help you when you're an adventurer.




Speaking of not wanting to have a game that forces you to play in a certain manner....I'd have to toss my cookies out of extreme boredom if I was forced to play or run a game where the only motivation of any of my characters was, ".....umm....Adventure!!"  Then again, the same would have to be said for a game where we were only doing this in order to build castles and raise armies.

This is a _role-playing_ game, not simply an _adventure_ game.  We should be able to have characters with any number of motivating influences - not only a simple lust for adventuring (what the heck IS that, anyway?).  One person may want to become famous for being the dragonslayer; one may want to find and sell lost treasures to save up for a castle; one may want to embark on missions that open lines of promoting his religion.....and on and on.

In any case, money is a simple fact of life, and has more purpose than any one individual use.  Even in a rpg's setting, money has multiple uses.  For players who need some sort of mechanical benefit to spending money instead of as a means of adding to the character in a non-mechanical, storyline sense....there should be some sort of mechanic.  There were a lot of examples in 3E aside from magic items: equipment bonuses, circumstance bonuses, transportation, back-up plans, hiring spellcasters, and so much more.  For players who want more than numbers and stats and a game beyond the maps & character sheets, there should be support there, too.

There will be cases of one player wanting the castle and others wanting to get back to the dungeon....but that is in now way the fault of the game or its rules.  Those are playing styles and issues that need to be resolved as fellow players & friends.


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## Haffrung Helleyes (Oct 14, 2007)

*wealth and magic*

In 3E, its virtually pointlist from a wargaming perspective to spend your money on anything but magic items.  And so we end up with the 'christmas tree effect' -- the adventurer loaded up with thousands of GP in  gear who doesn't own a home.

But if you get rid of the ability to buy magic items, you lose a lot of versimillitude -- something so generally useful, in a realistic world, will generally be part of the economy.

What about this:  instead of changing magic items, change the rules so that mundane things (temples, homes, castles) have an in-combat effect.

For example, what if being the high priest/founder of a temple confers extra spells to a cleric?

What if having a wizard's sanctum or laboratory helps a wizard in a similar way?  Like in Ars Magica, for example.

I would make social skills like Diplomacy heavily influenceable by gold spent to benefit the local area.  I suppose that, to make this work, you need a reputation mechanic.

Just a thought.

Ken


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Okay, but here's the problem with that -- and it's the problem with wealth *in general* in 3.5e: it's too important.
> 
> PCs who have the optimal items for their level are much better at combat. It's really hard to balance encounters for a mixed group of PCs, some of whom do and some of whom don't spend their money optimally -- just as it would be hard to balance encounters for mixed levels too far apart.
> 
> So the general consensus has been that we should work to reduce magic items. Eliminate the Big Six, tone down the expendables, remove the necessity of flying by making sure everyone can climb & swim, etc.



And _I agree_. 

I generally despise the notion that you can walk into a shop and buy a holy avenger. I've always used the Wealth rules as guidelines as to what magical items PCs of that level "can have" by what they "can afford".  Or that your fighter _has_ to have those gauntlets or that belt of giant strength just to compete, in higher levels. _The Big Six_ is something I dislike, too. 

And I hate that the _only_ option in 3X is combat optimization. If you're playing an intrigue game, or a more thief-style campaign, that +3 flaming burst sword isn't important to you and in 3X your money is now not useful. A hat of disguise, cloak of the arachnid and a few Bond-like trinkets are all you need, and then you have this surplus of cash. The system of "Bribes and Bling for loot" works for a more RP centric game.

But, I also don't think that 4e the only difference between a rich character and a poor one is that one has bling and bribes and the other doesn't. 

My thinking here is that the paladin should be able to take his share of the loot and go to the high priest of his church and say "Here, Oh Hirophant, lay my sword in the tomb of the saints so that it will be endowed with the Good enhancement, and in exchange here is my donation to the church" or the equivalent. Or whatever Weapons of Legacy mechanism that means GP sacrifice = Enchantment.


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> If you define everything outside of combat as "not useful", then you've voluntarily restricted yourself to a particular subset of the game.



No, I see what you're doing there is basically taxing characters for going where they have to go in the adventure. "You want to follow this adventure? Fine, you're going to lose money for it." 

I intentionally do not make my PCs count their rations or their arrows unless the intention of the plot is to starve them or make them have "Survival Horror Ammo Syndrom". Resource accounting is too tedious for me to worry about taxes and tariffs. To me it's like saying "You either let me know your PC is periodically going to the bathroom, or I will start making con checks to see when you soil your armor and get diseases."


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## Treebore (Oct 14, 2007)

Cbas_10 said:
			
		

> Speaking of not wanting to have a game that forces you to play in a certain manner....I'd have to toss my cookies out of extreme boredom if I was forced to play or run a game where the only motivation of any of my characters was, ".....umm....Adventure!!"  Then again, the same would have to be said for a game where we were only doing this in order to build castles and raise armies.
> 
> This is a _role-playing_ game, not simply an _adventure_ game.  We should be able to have characters with any number of motivating influences - not only a simple lust for adventuring (what the heck IS that, anyway?).  One person may want to become famous for being the dragonslayer; one may want to find and sell lost treasures to save up for a castle; one may want to embark on missions that open lines of promoting his religion.....and on and on.
> 
> ...




I agree that it comes down to play preferences, or "styles", but 3E definitely did not support my preferred style, where the players play "characters" who have a long history and a worked out personality. I am not saying full immersion role play by any stretch of the imagination, but to have characters that own lands, that have a keep or even a castle or temple, who hold titles of nobility, and where owning and have these titles have an impact on what the character does and does not do.

Like my son plays a Paladin, has a 100 square miles of prime land. He even has several mines (lucky friggin percentile rolls), and has built a Castle and fortified town over a 5 year period. He has gone aon "recruiting" campaigns where he entices people to move to his lands, because he needs more bodies to work the land to its fullest potential.

There is a party member who plays a Druid (my Daughters). The druid and the paladin works together to make sure the land doesn't become overworked and ruined.

The Ranger (my other son), before he died, was helping develop the animal husbandry aspects, to make sure lands weren't over hunted, and even the herd animals were cultivated at the most balanced rate possible.

Whats their motivations? Money. Creating the best living conditions possible for their people and even their live stock. Not to mention the prestige they now have among the nobility. Plus enemies.

So they have many things to spend money on. Roads, Dovecoats, mills, fortifications, soldiers, churches and temples, recruiting new citizens, helping them set up homes, farms, and businesses.

So they not only go into "adventures" and slay demon princes (just finished DCC 18 last night) but they also take on the challenges of cultivating their lands, protecting their citizens, and dealing with jealous nobles who hate them for their successes, and so vividly illustrating their failures to properly manage their lands to the Empress.

Thats the kind of game I like to run. I couldn't do it in 3E. Not only because of the gold issues, but they would level so fast that they were powerful enough to just take the kingdom for themselves and eliminate all opposition easily.

So this is another reason why 3E isn't my "cup of tea", and is something I hope is taken into consideration with 4E.

Not that I am worried. I'm very happy with Castles and Crusades, so if 4E still doesn't do it right for me, I'll just steal what I like from 4E and keep on gaming the way I like.


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> With magic items, the ones that are too good eat up almost all of your budget. If you have gold left over, you should save it, to later upgrade one of your major items.



Or rather, that there are some magical items that are _necessary_.

Prime example being spellcasters and ability boosters. By high levels, they _must_ have those ability boosting items. Enemy saving bonuses inflate higher than DCs, and unless they spend all of their feats on pumping up DCs, the ability booster items are a way to handle it.

It becomes an arms race between PCs' magical items and enemies To Hit/AC/Saves. 

Let me illustrate this.

1) A 20th level fighter with a masterwork sword and masterwork plate.

2) A 20th level fighter with a Cloak of the Monteback, Boots of Striding and Springing, a necklace of fireballs and a glove of storing.

3) A 20th levle fighter with a +5 vorpal sword, +5 Platemail, a belt of giant strength and an amulet of natural armor +5.  

Fighter 2 has more _options and variety_ than fighter 1, allowing for varied tactics. But Fighter 2 is no less _better_ at hitting than fighter 1.

But fighter 3 is _vastly_ more effective in combat than 1 or 2. Fighter 3 is what the system expects him to be - it's built anticipating Fighter 3, rather than 1 or 2. 

This should not be.


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## Nifft (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Or rather, that there are some magical items that are _necessary_. (...)
> This should not be.



 Very much agree. I call this *freedom to suck*, but it boils down to the same thing. 

My preference would be to ditch the flat bonus gear, keep the cool items, and also allow expenditures for non-magical solutions to challenges (e.g. bribes).

Cheers, -- N


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

Cbas_10 said:
			
		

> Speaking of not wanting to have a game that forces you to play in a certain manner....I'd have to toss my cookies out of extreme boredom if I was forced to play or run a game where the only motivation of any of my characters was, ".....umm....Adventure!!"  Then again, the same would have to be said for a game where we were only doing this in order to build castles and raise armies.



The question that I think comes down to here is: what do we want D&D to be? 

As a poster earlier pointed out, D&D is a wargame. If you try to take the combat out of D&D, and run say, a social game, it falls apart. So how flexible should the system be to facilitate other types of campaigns? 

I think the threat of a game system trying to accommodate too many options is possible. There is, in my opinion, nothing wrong with saying "This system is built for this, and if you want a different kind of game, there are systems structured to handle it much better." For instance, if you want a real gritty, "combat is DEADLY" type game, then GURPs is more appropriate - if you want a game built on Pulp and Cinematics, where your character leap out of the shower and dispatch a room full of storm trooper mooks and not get scratched, Spirit of the Century is your best bet. 

Am I saying that D&D should stay a wargame? No. I game online, and the emphasis on five foot steps and placement is a real headache. And the lack of dynamic social situations, the lack of a system to handle Favors and Contacts, and so on, is really disappointing. If the system were more flexible, it would be Real Nice. I don't think that D&D should try to work for every desire, but a more flexible system would be ideal, imho.


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## Lanefan (Oct 14, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> The question that I think comes down to here is: what do we want D&D to be?



Flexible enough to handle different styles of play...styles in this case defined by how characters/parties spend their wealth.







> As a poster earlier pointed out, D&D is a wargame. If you try to take the combat out of D&D, and run say, a social game, it falls apart. So how flexible should the system be to facilitate other types of campaigns?
> 
> I think the threat of a game system trying to accommodate too many options is possible. There is, in my opinion, nothing wrong with saying "This system is built for this, and if you want a different kind of game, there are systems structured to handle it much better." For instance, if you want a real gritty, "combat is DEADLY" type game, then GURPs is more appropriate - if you want a game built on Pulp and Cinematics, where your character leap out of the shower and dispatch a room full of storm trooper mooks and not get scratched, Spirit of the Century is your best bet.



Older D+D can do all these.  3.x can as well provided the DM throws out the CR/EL tables and wealth-by-level guide and wings it.







> Am I saying that D&D should stay a wargame? No. I game online, and the emphasis on five foot steps and placement is a real headache. And the lack of dynamic social situations, the lack of a system to handle Favors and Contacts, and so on, is really disappointing. If the system were more flexible, it would be Real Nice. I don't think that D&D should try to work for every desire, but a more flexible system would be ideal, imho.



Agreed.

What might help solve this, in any edition, is that DMs allow the game to give out a bit more wealth than the PCs really need, while at the same time severely limiting what magic is available outside of adventures (and in 3e, limiting PC magic-item creation ability as well).  Over time, the PCs will slowly build up some spare cash, and they'll either hoard it or find something interesting to spend it on, be it bribes or a castle or whatever.  This does require a somewhat radical departure from 3e core design thinking, mind you, and won't be for everyone...

Lanefan


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 14, 2007)

Mouseferatu said:
			
		

> Oh God, no. Keep training as far away from my core rules as possible, thanks. Maybe--_maybe_--as a purely optional rule, fully labeled as such, buried somewhere in the DMG.




Under a sticker that says "removing this label will void your warranty".


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## TwinBahamut (Oct 14, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> Money spent on adventuring gear is an investment.  The more powerful you are, the more loot you can get.  Unwary adventurers accumulate enemies, so adventuring gear is also insurance.  Adventurers handle adequate amounts of treasure that at high levels, a comfortable lifestyle (if you aren't Mordekainen's Mansioning it) is merely a rounding error in the accounting.



This is the exact problem. Throughout the character's careers, they are always investing in new equipment. Or rather, _every_ character _must_ invest, and no other options are available.




> DnD (all editions), WoW, Everquest, Diablo, EQ2 etc... all fall into the category of powerups-through-loot.  They all dominated their market and were only replaced by another game who also followed the same design.  The situation is less clear in non open-ended games (later FFs, for example), but those games provided an incentive for playing: win the game.  In an open-ended game you need something else.  The dominant design has been loot.  Other designs work, but they end up as comparatively niche products.



I still disagree. First, WoW, Everquest, and Diablo are all a very limited sample of games, and should not be used to determine what is average for all kinds of games, since they are all similar to each other, and different from other games.

However, you yourself have pointed out that "winning the game" is an alternative incentive. I would claim that it is the primary incentive for RPGs, including D&D. Yes, I am claiming that it is possible to "beat D&D", or more specifically, to defeat a BBEG, save the kingdom/world/etc, and bring a campaign and story to a satisfying conclusion. I think far more D&D campaigns prioritize a long-running story, than merely have the characters running around on a loot hunt with no plot.

As a whole, I can name _many_ counter-examples to your claim. There are many games, among both tabletop RPGs and videogame RPGs, in which loot is just a perk, rather than the goal. In fact, I can name many games which lack either money, or equipment, or both. HERO Champions and BESM both come to mind here, as well as D20 Modern (abstracts it and doesn't use it as a reward by the RAW), come to mind for tabletop games. There are many variations among videogames. Other than MUDs and MMORPGs, I can't think of a single computer/videogame RPG which doesn't have a central plot. Even open-ended games like Diablo have an ending.


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## Rechan (Oct 14, 2007)

> Older D+D can do all these.  3.x can as well provided the DM throws out the CR/EL tables and wealth-by-level guide and wings it.Agreed.




Of course it CAN. You _can_ use a butcher knife to make a peanut butter sandwich, but it's not the intended purpose. You could run those games with D&D, it's just _harder_.


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## Kraydak (Oct 14, 2007)

TwinBahamut said:
			
		

> This is the exact problem. Throughout the character's careers, they are always investing in new equipment. Or rather, _every_ character _must_ invest, and no other options are available.




If you want your business to grow maximally, invest maximally.  If you don't, don't.  You can choose not to invest in magic items.  It will hurt your adventuring power.  I don't see the problem here...  You will adventure against lower CR opponents, raising the GP/XP ratio and climb back up if your gear falls too far below spec.

The only decent alternative to having wealth/level guidelines is to not have any relevant gear.  This isn't genre appropriate.  It isn't an historically market dominating design philosophy.



> I still disagree. First, WoW, Everquest, and Diablo are all a very limited sample of games, and should not be used to determine what is average for all kinds of games, since they are all similar to each other, and different from other games.
> 
> However, you yourself have pointed out that "winning the game" is an alternative incentive. I would claim that it is the primary incentive for RPGs, including D&D. Yes, I am claiming that it is possible to "beat D&D", or more specifically, to defeat a BBEG, save the kingdom/world/etc, and bring a campaign and story to a satisfying conclusion. I think far more D&D campaigns prioritize a long-running story, than merely have the characters running around on a loot hunt with no plot.
> 
> As a whole, I can name _many_ counter-examples to your claim. There are many games, among both tabletop RPGs and videogame RPGs, in which loot is just a perk, rather than the goal. In fact, I can name many games which lack either money, or equipment, or both. HERO Champions and BESM both come to mind here, as well as D20 Modern (abstracts it and doesn't use it as a reward by the RAW), come to mind for tabletop games. There are many variations among videogames. Other than MUDs and MMORPGs, I can't think of a single computer/videogame RPG which doesn't have a central plot. Even open-ended games like Diablo have an ending.




There are non-loot centric open-ended RPGs out there.  DnD crushes them beneath its +5 booted heel, market share wise.  I'm pretty sure there are non loot-centric MMORPGs out there.  WoW crushes them beneath its purple heel.  I find the arguement that DnD should give up its loot-centric design to be absurd.  It works.  It dominates markets.  What more does a game designer who wants his game to be a commercial success need?

(all of this is seperate from the issue of a gold<->item market, which helps preserve realism and provides actual value to gold.  without such a market, gold *would* become utterly meaningless at high levels, even in a game without magic items, but with DnD's power structure)


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## A'koss (Oct 15, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> (all of this is seperate from the issue of a gold<->item market, which helps preserve realism and provides actual value to gold.  without such a market, gold *would* become utterly meaningless at high levels, even in a game without magic items, but with DnD's power structure)



Funny, 1st and 2nd edition D&D seemed to do just fine without having a magic item market. And all you need to do is read this thread if you're looking for suggestions on what to do with that hard earned gold other than spending it on magic.

I agree that removing magic _entirely_ from the market isn't very realistic, but if you limit it to only low level magic (mid level and & high level magic is too rare to be available) - then that frees up higher level PCs to spend their larger sums elsewhere (eg. towards long-term goals that _add_ something to the campaign).


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## Cbas_10 (Oct 15, 2007)

Treebore said:
			
		

> I agree that it comes down to play preferences, or "styles", but 3E definitely did not support my preferred style, where the players play "characters" who have a long history and a worked out personality. I am not saying full immersion role play by any stretch of the imagination, but to have characters that own lands, that have a keep or even a castle or temple, who hold titles of nobility, and where owning and have these titles have an impact on what the character does and does not do.
> 
> Like my son plays a Paladin, has a 100 square miles of prime land. He even has several mines (lucky friggin percentile rolls), and has built a Castle and fortified town over a 5 year period. He has gone aon "recruiting" campaigns where he entices people to move to his lands, because he needs more bodies to work the land to its fullest potential.
> 
> ...




That sounds like an awesome game!  However, I totally disagree with your statement that it cannot be run under 3E rules.  I've run games of a similar theme, and I've played in some.



			
				Rechan said:
			
		

> The question that I think comes down to here is: what do we want D&D to be?
> 
> As a poster earlier pointed out, D&D is a wargame. If you try to take the combat out of D&D, and run say, a social game, it falls apart. So how flexible should the system be to facilitate other types of campaigns?
> 
> ...




The D&D minis game is a wargame.  Dungeons and Dragons, however, really is a role-playing game.  I would be an idiot if I ignored the fact that it is a game heavily leaning towards the combat side of things, but there is a ton of room for genuine role-playing, micro-managed castles, court intrigues, and more.  As for a game falling apart if you take out the combat and go all-social?  That could be true...and it could be true that a game would fall apart if you take all of the social or micro-managing.  It totally depends on your group.  And it demonstrates that D&D (so far...) is a very versatile game.  It is just a framework for DMs and players to build upon.  

However, the main glitch when talking about social games is when people think there should be rules for social aspects.  DMG II has a few basic rules for contacts, favors, organizations, and all that...but how effective can a set of rules be for something so abstract and variable as conversations, relationships, and such?

In any case, here, removing money from the game or restricting the ways that players can spend money would surely change the game into something no longer resembling a _role-playing_ game.


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## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Cbas_10 said:
			
		

> However, the main glitch when talking about social games is when people think there should be rules for social aspects.  DMG II has a few basic rules for contacts, favors, organizations, and all that...but how effective can a set of rules be for something so abstract and variable as conversations, relationships, and such?



Other games have managed it.

For example, I can pick up Exalted right now and run a non-combat game between diplomats and spies. There are specific powers (called Charms) that relate specifically to dealing with bureaucracies and social situations. 

For instance, one charm basically lets you look into someone's heart and know the one thing that they desire above all else; if you were going to bribe them, offer this and you will succeed. You would know that curing the minister's sick mother of her rare ailment would get the minister to do what you want, you _now know it_. 

Further, here's a question: You go to the King, to convince him to not invade a country. Or to end a war. What's the CR of the situation? Is it the king's level? Doesn't the situation (war) raise the EL? How much? And once you get there to convince him, you... roll diplomacy. Even if you roll two diplomacies, that's... really not that exciting, is it? Social skills in D&D boils down to 'make a bluff vs sense motive check' or 'diplomacy/intimidate vs HD check'.


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## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> For example, I can pick up Exalted right now and run a non-combat game between diplomats and spies. There are specific powers (called Charms) that relate specifically to dealing with bureaucracies and social situations.



 I love Exalted.

I wonder if their Wealth Dot mechanic could be ported over to d20.

Did d20 Modern have this sort of system? Or Spycraft d20? Anyone?

Thanks, -- N


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## HeavenShallBurn (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> I love Exalted.



So do I, but I'm not too hot on dice-pool mechanics and don't play that much.


			
				Nifft said:
			
		

> I wonder if their Wealth Dot mechanic could be ported over to d20.
> Thanks, -- N



Don't know about Spycraft, d20 Modern has a wealth system but not wealth dots like Exalted and it's kind of clunky.  A Game of Thrones has a wealth dot system and in my opinion it's the best d20 wealth system I've seen yet for Fantasy purposes. (edit: it even resembles Exalted enough that I wonder if it isn't an indirect port.)


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## Treacherous_B (Oct 15, 2007)

Gold should be broken into two pieces: Gold and "Gold".

Gold would be used for shininess factor (at the end of the dungeon is a chest filled with thousands of pieces of gold, and that sconce seems like it was put there -just- to make the spoils sparkle) and as something to hoard (for Dragons certainly, see the shininess factor, but also for PCs interested in funding large-scale projects like keeps all the way up to kingdoms). If the party isn't interested in hoarding, they could go from hoarding to whoring and have no gold to their names.

"Gold" would be the arbitrary point system used to indicate things such as what power-level of magic item a character of level X could be expected to have and have it not ruin game balance. In this sense the word could be anything, and "gold" would only really be there because it's what we've used in 3.x and is familiar.

As far as the good stuff goes (re: magic items), I'd much rather see a by-level improvement system that doesn't require money to work. Like...each level after 1st a character gets 2 "legacy points", and can choose to spend said points to improve an item they've been using. Saving the points leads to better "legacy items" further along in the character's career (the paladin wait until level 10 to spend any of them, spend 10 on his sword to make it his own Holy Avenger and the rest on his shield to compliment it, etc.).


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## Cbas_10 (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Other games have managed it.
> 
> For example, I can pick up Exalted right now and run a non-combat game between diplomats and spies. There are specific powers (called Charms) that relate specifically to dealing with bureaucracies and social situations.
> 
> For instance, one charm basically lets you look into someone's heart and know the one thing that they desire above all else; if you were going to bribe them, offer this and you will succeed. You would know that curing the minister's sick mother of her rare ailment would get the minister to do what you want, you _now know it_.




Ohhh...well, D&D has that right now.  Spells and items can increase your ability scores or provide bonuses to skills.  Other spells and items provide situational modifiers to social skills.  Numerous examples are all over the game.  However, the more recently printed a book is, the harder it becomes to find something that applies outside of combat.



> Further, here's a question: You go to the King, to convince him to not invade a country. Or to end a war. What's the CR of the situation? Is it the king's level? Doesn't the situation (war) raise the EL? How much? And once you get there to convince him, you... roll diplomacy. Even if you roll two diplomacies, that's... really not that exciting, is it? Social skills in D&D boils down to 'make a bluff vs sense motive check' or 'diplomacy/intimidate vs HD check'.




Hmm.  I had never even thought of applying a CR to role-playing situations.  To me, that would seem like awarding XP to players for something that has little do do with the game itself.  I would not find it fair that the better actor or more articulate speaker should be NEEDED to succeed in a situation.  If we were playing in a LARP, that is different.

I read something about 4E placing CR or EL (or whatever it will be called now) on social encounters.  I am genuinely curious to see how such a thing can be done.  Off the top of my head, the only way I can see that happening is for the game to detail specific outcomes and maybe even specific choices during the conversation.  I really really hope that the developers have a better imagination than I do in this aspect.  I would imagine they do...which is why I am so curious.


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## JoeGKushner (Oct 15, 2007)

A'koss said:
			
		

> Funny, 1st and 2nd edition D&D seemed to do just fine without having a magic item market. And all you need to do is read this thread if you're looking for suggestions on what to do with that hard earned gold other than spending it on magic.
> 
> I agree that removing magic _entirely_ from the market isn't very realistic, but if you limit it to only low level magic (mid level and & high level magic is too rare to be available) - then that frees up higher level PCs to spend their larger sums elsewhere (eg. towards long-term goals that _add_ something to the campaign).




Well, in 1st ed at least (unless I'm completely misremembering due to old age), one huge motivation for gold and magic items is that you got xp for 'em. The larger the horde, the better the xp take.


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## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Cbas_10 said:
			
		

> Ohhh...well, D&D has that right now.  Spells and items can increase your ability scores or provide bonuses to skills.  Other spells and items provide situational modifiers to social skills.  Numerous examples are all over the game.  However, the more recently printed a book is, the harder it becomes to find something that applies outside of combat.



Just giving you a +10 to Diplomacy or +10 to Bluff isn't cutting it. Going back to it, as I said, social interaction comes down to Bluff vs Sense Motive and Diplomacy/Intimidate vs HD check. 

Even if you put "Detect Thoughts" and "Zone of truth", there's still just not enough options, and not enough material to make a social game viable. It's like a car with square wheels. Sure, you can get where you're going by using d20 rules as written, but it's going to be a real hard trip. 



> Hmm.  I had never even thought of applying a CR to role-playing situations.  To me, that would seem like awarding XP to players for something that has little do do with the game itself.



Little to do with the game itself? Going back to the 'Convince the King not to invade/to broker a peace for war", that's _a big part_ of a game. Or if they're trying to convince the baron to help them. Or to talk their way out of being eaten by a much more powerful monster. Or hell, I think that a high level paladin with a high enough diplomacy skill could get some enemies to _convert_. 



> I would not find it fair that the better actor or more articulate speaker should be NEEDED to succeed in a situation.  If we were playing in a LARP, that is different.



That's not the case at all. This is a _dice_ game after all, and so rolling is part of it. I would give a player a +1 modifier if he roleplayed it well, but that by no means is necessary.


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## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Treacherous_B said:
			
		

> Gold should be broken into two pieces: Gold and "Gold".
> 
> Gold would be used for shininess factor (at the end of the dungeon is a chest filled with thousands of pieces of gold, and that sconce seems like it was put there -just- to make the spoils sparkle) and as something to hoard (for Dragons certainly, see the shininess factor, but also for PCs interested in funding large-scale projects like keeps all the way up to kingdoms). If the party isn't interested in hoarding, they could go from hoarding to whoring and have no gold to their names.
> 
> ...



I agree with this, a lot.

Wealth separate from magical items.

Among other things, it'd be nice if magical items were classified as something. Like say, 'Minor' would be a little magical trinket (Bag of holding, hat of disguise, slippers of spiderclimb). Then a major would be "Weapon, armor, other". As you level, your Minor is modified and so is your Major. So a 5th level PC might have 3 minor, 1 major (+1). A 10th level character might have 5 minor, 2 major (+2 each).

Your Minor magical items might increase in power or versatility. So instead of having a whole bunch of little things, you could have say, a Cloak of the Arachnid, Boots of Striding and Springing, and a Portable hole. Then a cloak of the montebank, etc etc.


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## Li Shenron (Oct 15, 2007)

Treebore said:
			
		

> Like my son plays a Paladin, has a 100 square miles of prime land. He even has several mines (lucky friggin percentile rolls), and has built a Castle and fortified town over a 5 year period. He has gone aon "recruiting" campaigns where he entices people to move to his lands, because he needs more bodies to work the land to its fullest potential.
> 
> There is a party member who plays a Druid (my Daughters). The druid and the paladin works together to make sure the land doesn't become overworked and ruined.
> 
> ...




* I think that is really cool *


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## AllisterH (Oct 15, 2007)

A'koss said:
			
		

> Funny, 1st and 2nd edition D&D seemed to do just fine without having a magic item market. And all you need to do is read this thread if you're looking for suggestions on what to do with that hard earned gold other than spending it on magic.
> 
> ).




However, in those earlier editions, gold WAS useless unless it was for training/xp (personally, I alwats thought that weird since you're basically adventuring to find money to train so you can adventure once again. HUH?!?!?).

The suggestions posted all basically say "Ok, you're adventuring to be a landholder". What happens if the player isn't interested in that? That _IS_ a style of campaigning and given how badly Birthright did, I don't think even in 2E many people were interested in that type of campaign.


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## Reynard (Oct 15, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> The suggestions posted all basically say "Ok, you're adventuring to be a landholder". What happens if the player isn't interested in that?




The idea is, I think, that if gold isn't useful for increasing character abilities, but is useful for running guilds or building domains, then players who don't care about those things won't have to go fishing for loot.


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## FireLance (Oct 15, 2007)

I think it would be interesting if gold was the "roleplayer's reward" in that it will allow the player to make broad changes to the campaign setting. So, while XP measures a character's personal power, his weath is a (crude) measure of the degree of influence he has over the world.

Say, at about 5th level or so, the average character will have enough gold to make changes at the local level: a cleric could set up a village church, a fighter could attract the patronage of the local baron and be made a sheriff, etc. At 15th level, perhaps an average character would have enough wealth to raise armies for a crusade, or to carve out a dukedom, or to win the hand of a princess.

Writing out actual rules for this (as opposed to each individual DM setting out the "cost" of the changes that the players want to make to his campaign) would be rather difficult, though!


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## ehren37 (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> No, I see what you're doing there is basically taxing characters for going where they have to go in the adventure. "You want to follow this adventure? Fine, you're going to lose money for it."




Lots of "old school" DM's love "scrabbling dirt farmer" type games. Lets them keep a better stranglehold on their so-called friends. Were I collecting treasure for a zero sum game of bribes and taxes, I'd walk pretty fast.

Also consider that weapon choices matter more in 4e. Spear fighters are rather different from sword fighters. So unless the DM stops rolling for treasure, or only has you fight guys who conveniently use the same weapons and armor as you, you'll end up with a bunch of crap no one can use. What then? You certainly cant sell if for some stupid reason (despite the fact that you'd want to buy something along those lines). Loot distribution gets that much harder when you cant tailor anything.


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## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

HeavenShallBurn said:
			
		

> A Game of Thrones has a wealth dot system and in my opinion it's the best d20 wealth system I've seen yet for Fantasy purposes. (edit: it even resembles Exalted enough that I wonder if it isn't an indirect port.)



 Ooo, awesome. I have that but didn't get much past the artwork & flavor text.

Time to dig. 

Thanks! -- N


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## ehren37 (Oct 15, 2007)

Treebore said:
			
		

> I agree that it comes down to play preferences, or "styles", but 3E definitely did not support my preferred style, where the players play "characters" who have a long history and a worked out personality.




It supported this style just fine, it just offered OTHER playstyles a chance as well. You can have a keep, or spend hours detailing your militia's scabbards and what not. I'm not sure where you are getting that it doesnt.


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## Reynard (Oct 15, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Lots of "old school" DM's love "scrabbling dirt farmer" type games. Lets them keep a better stranglehold on their so-called friends. Were I collecting treasure for a zero sum game of bribes and taxes, I'd walk pretty fast.




One might conclude that not walking by some players would indicate it isn't just passive agressive DM types that enjoy this type of game.


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## ehren37 (Oct 15, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> One might conclude that not walking by some players would indicate it isn't just passive agressive DM types that enjoy this type of game.




Sure, there are a lot of players willing to take any game they can get. I'm not a fan of chasing a carrot perpetually held out of my reach, and I readily admit that. I like my characters to see gains from adventures, rather than get just enough cash to scrape by, pay my fines and buy my adventure boarding pass to the next round.


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## Crazy Jerome (Oct 15, 2007)

I don't see the point in tying magic items to the 3E/3.5 suggest wealth guidelines, except as a small nod towards a simulated economy.  It would be better, from a balance and clarity POV, to cut out the middle man.  Instead of, "PC Level N should have about X gold, which means he can buy these particular magic items," it should be, "PC Level N should be able to have X major items appropriate to his level, and a lot of minor items."  Since they are giving magic items "levels", it appears they are doing the hard work to make this possible.  Not only does this cut gold out of the equation, it makes it easier to balance.  (A 10th level D&D character with a +3 sword and 3 minor potions isn't noticeably more effective than the same guy with the sword and 20 minor potions.  Let the guy convert 17 potions into gold, and then into something nice, and you'll see a difference.)

Then if the group wants a greater or lesser amount of equipment, simply change the number of major items allowed, and tell the DM to be generous or stingy on the minor ones.  This is orthogonal to wealth accumulation, as it should be.

To simulate the economy, return to some first principles that makes sense in a game world's model economy.  Wealth is for buying expertise that you don't have.  Wealth is for buying time.  That's pretty much it.  Without the personal power to take over a small duchy, a mercenary army brings handy expertise.  Without the ability to make a sword, a swordsmith brings the necessary expertise.  Contrawise, maybe the character does have the ability to take over a small country or make a sword, but has better things to do with his time.

Wealth is also useful for getting even more wealth, but if you never do anything else with it, that's rather pointless.

To this end, I'd like to see a lot of suggestions for using money to buy time. Maybe there is never a +3 sword for sale.  You can go take one of the known ones, and make some enemies, which you would rather not.  Or you can spend months digging up tedius information about where one might have disappeared into a dungeon.  Or you can spend a lot of gold to have some researchers do the tedius investigation, perhaps leaving one or two exciting bits for the party.  That doesn't turn gold into a sword.  But it does tell the party a better place to adventure to get one.

If a character spends all his money on ale and whores, it's because he doesn't value the expertise or the time savings (much less straight wealth accumulation).  And if you think about such a character's personality, he'd probably be perfectly willing to go get the first +3 sword that came to his attention, enemies or not.   

Either way, all types of characters can thus play in the same campaign, without power imbalance.  The wealthy ones simply have some different options to pursue on the kind of adventures they would like to do.


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## ehren37 (Oct 15, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> The idea is, I think, that if gold isn't useful for increasing character abilities, but is useful for running guilds or building domains, then players who don't care about those things won't have to go fishing for loot.




Man, it sucks to be one of those guys who thought D&D was about killing things and taking its stuff. On the other hand, if you are one of the 1% of the gaming population who gets their jollies around how many units of flour per month your mill cranks out, I'm sure you're salivating for the Complete Accountant to be released.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

ruleslawyer said:
			
		

> 2) You can play any genre of fantasy you like without warping balance. Want a Conan-style game where the PCs amass huge fortunes and start the next session broke? An LotR campaign where money is simply irrelevant in th context of larger conflicts? A post-apocalyptic savage world setting in which there's basically no minted coin whatsoever and the most prized possessions are clean water and solid food? All possible and easy.




Well, any genre except the ones in which gold is worth something.  Given that gold being worth something might be important to some people, and may even impact verisimilitude ("So, we killed the dragon, took its horde, and now we can't spend it on anything but ale and whores?  Are you nuts?"), I think that abandoning the concept of money entirely might not be the best idea.



> 3) PCs can actually USE their money to drive the campaign! Wealth feats are a partial implementation of this in IH, but investment in a merchant coster, purchase of a ship, or setting up a realm or stronghold can be BIG campaign drivers. One of the PCs in my current campaign is a merchant-tinkerer of Gond (FR) who is adventuring in part to amass a fortune to return to his native island of Lantan for a life of ease, but also to fund his own workshop wherein he plans to create a variety of constructs and other techno-magical devices. Another PC (a noble of Waterdeep) might gain fortunes and glory for his family. And so on.



Well, that's great if you care about that type of stuff.  But your Butt-Kicker archetype player isn't going to give a flumph's fart about building his own restaurant, or whatever.

Given that magic items are going to be "nice, not necessary", I think there's still a lot of room for spending your loot on equipment.  It's just not going to have the same christmas-tree effect as it does in 3.x.  When you blow your loot on a suit of magic armour, it doesn't give you +X to AC, making you difficult to hit and necessitating an attack bonus/AC arms race.  Perhaps it's "spiritual armour", and you can, as a swift action, trade the AC bonus it provides for Will defense until your next turn.  Or maybe it lets you dimension door once per combat.  Or something other nifty effect that provides a benefit but does not make you numerically stronger compared to a character with no magic items.  I envision magic items increasing your versatility, not your raw mechanical advantages.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Not at all. Tolls apply on all Lawful planes; bribes work well on all Chaotic planes. Good planes like donations; Evil planes like tribute. Everyone wants money. (For proof of this, see every _planar ally_ spell.)




I'm looking.  I see gold = mechanical advantage.  A planar ally is just a very powerful, very expensive, short-term magic item.  If you bind it by presenting it with a pile of gold it's functionally no different than buying a super-powered one-shot Summon Monster item.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> But yes. If you're in Hell voluntarily, and you have a goal which requires your attention, and you disregard that goal to endanger yourself and others because you don't want to pay a toll *only because the toll-keeper is evil*, then I'd say your action is lawful stupid. Unless you object to all tolls (and always resort to combat in place of paying), in which case your action would be chaotic stupid.




Okay, I'm a paladin in hell.  First of all, I expect that everything down here is pretty much going to want to kill me anyway, so I'm prepared to fight my way through.  Second, I come across a fiend sitting in a toll booth.  He asks for some ching.  I know that every gold piece I fork over is going to mean pain and misery for some poor innocent somewhere, because I know that capital-E Evil is the only thing that fiends do with their money.  If I give him the money, I'm willingly supporting evil, and so I violate my code, lose my powers, and feel like a jackass.  I can either go back to plan A, and hack my way through, or I can find some way of circumventing the toll booth so I don't have to donate to the "Widows and Orphans: we need more of them" fund.

I hardly think that not providing monetary support to beings that exist only to be evil counts as Lawful Stupid.  That's "ends justify the means" morality, and it specifically violates the "will not work with evil characters" part of the paladin's code.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Actually, that's my line. I'm presenting things you can do with wealth outside of combat, and you've been replying that combat enhancement is the only useful expenditure.




That's not how I'm reading it.  He's arguing that combat enhancement is one of many valid ways to be allowed to spend accumulated wealth.  He's saying that the 3.x system in which you force people to spend gold on combat enhancement is no good.  He's also claiming that other gold sinks, as the sole option for players, are no good.  

I've seen two other proposals for "gold sinks" in this thread.  First is the "ale and whores" sink.  You spend money on stuff that gets you absolutely nothing.  You bought a set of satin curtains for your keep.  That's awesome if you're the sort of player who loves that kind of thing, but not awesome if you don't care about it.  Second is the "bribes, status, and power" sink.  Gold translates directly into game-world influence, which means that gold allows you to dictate things about the campaign world that normally the DM would decide.  Can you get into the party?  Ching.  Can you get past the toll booth?  Ching.  Can you get the duke to lend you some soldiers?  Ching.

He's arguing that if you force the system to allow only one of these sinks, without allowing for other play styles, there is something wrong with the system.  He's saying that there is something wrong with 3.x for precisely this reason, and that a fix does not amount to forcing your players to spend their money on ale and whores, or bribes, or magic items.


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## lukelightning (Oct 15, 2007)

Shroomy said:
			
		

> If the preserve some of the elements from the Weapon of Legacy system, then you will need gold to unlock the powers of your magic items.




I just pictured a coin-operated vorpal sword.  "Please insert 10gp for each additional round of head-lopping..."


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## A'koss (Oct 15, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> However, in those earlier editions, gold WAS useless unless it was for training/xp (personally, I alwats thought that weird since you're basically adventuring to find money to train so you can adventure once again. HUH?!?!?).
> 
> The suggestions posted all basically say "Ok, you're adventuring to be a landholder". What happens if the player isn't interested in that?



There are countless things to spend money on other than property - say you want to start your own guild, your own knighthood, spy network, build a church, help the needy in a poor city, start your own merchant company, build a war galleon of your own design... As I said in my previous post, I would encourage PCs to come with long-term goals, to _create_ something for the campaign that would outlive the character who built it.

In 3e, you're pigeonholed into doing just *one* thing with your money. And it's not like adventurers are not finding magic items on their travels. And if there was a specific item they were looking for - that could make for a good side-trek adventure chasing down a rumor, legend or whathaveyou. Again, I think low-level items being available to purchase from powerful wizard guilds makes sense, just take the mid to high level stuff off the market due to it's extreme rarity. That frees up the gold at higher levels for other things.


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## lukelightning (Oct 15, 2007)

pawsplay said:
			
		

> In AD&D, a death knight had a 75% chance of having a magic sword. Like that.




Yeah, but you also played modules where a dozen orcs attacked and each had a +1 longsword.


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## YourSwordIsMine (Oct 15, 2007)

I hope they institute a more realistic economy. PC wealth was partly inflated because gold=exp earned; so it was fundamentally more than it should have been. When 3.x  launched and exp gained wasnt tied to the gold peice anymore but unfortunately IMO the treasure rewards didnt change either. By 10th level a party of adventurers could buy a medium to large country with their amassed wealth. I think this is what lead to the Christmas Tree effect.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 15, 2007)

I can see there are those who like the 3.x money/wealth system, and those who don't.  I don't think I'm going to change anyone's mind here with my post, but I'll say my piece FWIW.

I want a system where gold can be spent on pretty much anything _execpt _ straight-up mechanical benefits.  If the system designers are assuming that a 20th level Fighter has a BAB of +25, just give him a BAB of +25.  Don't give him +20 and assume he's got a +5 longsword.  That vastly narrows the types of campaigns that can be played.

In a system where gold (beyond basic equipment purchases) cannot be used for in-combat advantages, you have a lot more creative space for the types of PC's you play.  As a simple for instance, it would be really hard to play a Sherwood Forest campaign using 3.x.  You couldn't give the Sheriff's money to the poor without gimping yourself; and spending all that money on a +3 longbow sure isn't charitable.

I hope 4e goes this route.  That would mean that, out of the box, it could support:
 - pre-3e Forgotten Realms
 - Dark Sun
 - Dragonlance
 - Any campaign where someone actually wears a _Hat of Disguise_ or a _Cloak of the Bat_.
 - Sherwood Forest (any "Noble bandit" campaign)
 - An Arthurian Quest (Paladins only, please)
 - A quest to establish a new point of light (needs money for the defenses) / Birthright
 - A more Conan-esque quest
 - &c.

It would not support Eberron as-is.  That's one of the reason I am worried it won't fully go my way, since I see that Eberron and post-3e Forgotten Realms (with its Thayvian Magic-Marts) are going to be the primarily supported settings.

In full disclosure, I am currently playing in an Iron Heroes campaign because I wanted to play in pre-3e Forgoten Realms, and D&D 3x doesn't really support that.  Iron Heroes (with some house rules) does.

I also realize that if I get the 4e I want, some of you are going to be disappointed.  Oh well.  Can't please everyone all of the time ...


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## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Given that magic items are going to be "nice, not necessary", I think there's still a lot of room for spending your loot on equipment.  It's just not going to have the same christmas-tree effect as it does in 3.x.  When you blow your loot on a suit of magic armour, it doesn't give you +X to AC, making you difficult to hit and necessitating an attack bonus/AC arms race.  Perhaps it's "spiritual armour", and you can, as a swift action, trade the AC bonus it provides for Will defense until your next turn.  Or maybe it lets you dimension door once per combat.  Or something other nifty effect that provides a benefit but does not make you numerically stronger compared to a character with no magic items.  I envision magic items increasing your versatility, not your raw mechanical advantages.



Know what that reminds me of?

King Arthur's scabbard. 

Excaliber was a potent magical sword, yes. But the scabbard actually prevented Arthur from bleeding from a wound. 

So you could have a magical item that auto-stabilizes you when you go past 0, and prevents you from ever being Wounded (1 point of damage per round). These two qualities are so infrequently applied, but when it happens it's real useful.


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## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Okay, I'm a paladin in hell.  First of all, I expect that everything down here is pretty much going to want to kill me anyway, so I'm prepared to fight my way through.  Second, I come across a fiend sitting in a toll booth.  He asks for some ching.  I know that every gold piece I fork over is going to mean pain and misery for some poor innocent somewhere, because I know that capital-E Evil is the only thing that fiends do with their money.  If I give him the money, I'm willingly supporting evil, and so I violate my code, lose my powers, and feel like a jackass.  I can either go back to plan A, and hack my way through, or I can find some way of circumventing the toll booth so I don't have to donate to the "Widows and Orphans: we need more of them" fund.



Not only that but:

1) If your paladin is using a toll road, that pretty much lets him get seen. That devil manning the toll bridge is going to send word to the higher ups that some guy in shiny armor that radiates Goody Good is comin'. 

2) Why doesn't the toll devil just kill you? Or try to. The bounty he could get for you is probably more impressive than your measly pittance.

3) Killing the toll fiend - you get his bucket of tolls he's collected.


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## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> - Any campaign where someone actually wears a Hat of Disguise or a Cloak of the Bat.
> 
> ...
> 
> It would not support Eberron as-is.  That's one of the reason I am worried it won't fully go my way, since I see that Eberron and post-3e Forgotten Realms (with its Thayvian Magic-Marts) are going to be the primarily supported settings.



It's actually kind've funny; the warlock in my Eberron campaign uses her hat of disguise _all the time_.

But then, it's a city based Mystery game, she's evil, and the only optimized character is the Cleric.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> Actually, having good magic items is actually ideal.  The 3e christmas tree only really comes into play when, at lvl 10 or so, it becomes worth it to blow 2k gp on an item, ANY item to go into your empty slots.  Reducing the number of slots and increasing the non-slotted penalty would result in PCs with fewer, but more cherished and signature, items.




I would love it if most of the time a given character is the only one who has a particular sort of magic item.  That's one of the things I liked the most about Weapons of Legacy, and I hope that that sort of system comes built into 4E.  I like the idea of a player being proud that they own the only Staff of Boris in the world.


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## ehren37 (Oct 15, 2007)

A'koss said:
			
		

> There are countless things to spend money on other than property - say you want to start your own guild, your own knighthood, spy network, build a church, help the needy in a poor city, start your own merchant company, build a war galleon of your own design... As I said in my previous post, I would encourage PCs to come with long-term goals, to _create_ something for the campaign that would outlive the character who built it.




And thats great. IF you're a type of player who enjoys empire building. I fully agree that there needs to be material that covers it. I bought Magical Mystical Society: Western Europe for that reason: to help facilitate one of my players style of play. Out of the other 3, one of them enjoys getting cool art objects and gems to show off. The other 2 are "but kickers" and routinely use gold for raw gear upgrades. All 3 styles of play are supported by 3rd edition. Take out the option to buy new gear and one play style is shafted. Arguably a play style that is more wide spread than the empire builder type of player.



> In 3e, you're pigeonholed into doing just *one* thing with your money.




How so? You can spend it all on mega ale and mega whores, or windmills or whatever you want to in 3.5.



> And it's not like adventurers are not finding magic items on their travels.




And what do you do with all that crap no one wants? Your 3rd sword +1? In 1st edition you gave it to your goons. In 2nd edition, it rotted in a bag of holding. In 3rd edition you traded it for something useful.

One of these lerads to useless treasure. 3rd edition may have had an unrealistic economy, but at least it was geared towards players. I personally dont care if the economy works for NPC's... IMO the system should be geared towards adventurers.


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## Kraydak (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> That's not how I'm reading it.  He's arguing that combat enhancement is one of many valid ways to be allowed to spend accumulated wealth.  He's saying that the 3.x system in which you force people to spend gold on combat enhancement is no good.  He's also claiming that other gold sinks, as the sole option for players, are no good.
> 
> I've seen two other proposals for "gold sinks" in this thread.  First is the "ale and whores" sink.  You spend money on stuff that gets you absolutely nothing.  You bought a set of satin curtains for your keep.  That's awesome if you're the sort of player who loves that kind of thing, but not awesome if you don't care about it.  Second is the "bribes, status, and power" sink.  Gold translates directly into game-world influence, which means that gold allows you to dictate things about the campaign world that normally the DM would decide.  Can you get into the party?  Ching.  Can you get past the toll booth?  Ching.  Can you get the duke to lend you some soldiers?  Ching.
> 
> He's arguing that if you force the system to allow only one of these sinks, without allowing for other play styles, there is something wrong with the system.  He's saying that there is something wrong with 3.x for precisely this reason, and that a fix does not amount to forcing your players to spend their money on ale and whores, or bribes, or magic items.




But if you can't turn gold into tangeable power (magic items, xp), you have to ask why anyone with power wants gold.  Because low level characters simply don't register on the power radar, being able to hire large numbers of them is meaningless.  But, as high level characters can't spend gold on boosting their power, they can't be bought with gold.

If you can spend money on making your character more powerful, most people will.  If you can't, *no one significant* will care much for gold.


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## Kraydak (Oct 15, 2007)

Another aspect of gold<->magic items I think a lot of people don't want to consider is the out of game issues.  In MMORPGs, virtually every raiding level guild breakup is due, at its core, to loot distribution issues.  In tabletop games, gross inequity is easier to handle.  With face-to-face interactions you can notice problems building and deal with them before they explode (most of the time), but, without an actual magic item market, defusing a problem situation involves the DM placing specific items for specific characters in the loot piles.  This can cause futher issues if the DM misinterprets what the players want (which happens all the time).  A magic item market neatly circumvents the entire loot distribution fairness issue.

I know lots of people will say that loot distribution isn't a problem for their group.  If so, it will be because any inequity was removed before it was too large a problem for too long.  I have seen the issues explode in completely mature groups too often not to recognize the importance of percieved fairness, and greatly appreciate magic item markets as a way of not having to worry about it, ever.


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## Stone Dog (Oct 15, 2007)

How does the Conan RPG handle wealth?  I thought that there was an actual mechanical benifit for the Ale and Whores sink, but I can't remember.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 15, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> But if you can't turn gold into tangeable power (magic items, xp), you have to ask why anyone with power wants gold.




I agree, no reason.  Creature comforts just don't translate well into the DnD game, even though it's the bulk of what people IRL spend their money on (because hiring personal armies is frowned upon I suppose - well, mostly).



			
				Kraydak said:
			
		

> Because low level characters simply don't register on the power radar, being able to hire large numbers of them is meaningless.




If you use the Mob template you can actually turn 48 commoners into a CR 10 monster (or something like that).  Then it's just about DM fiat.  "But sending 48,000 commoners into the dungeon is not heroic!" I can hear the DM saying.  Being rich and solving your problems by spending money isn't heroic I guess.  If you can't spend money to solve your problems, I don't think money has much use.


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## hopeless (Oct 15, 2007)

*Interesting question*



			
				SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> One of the things we keep hearing about 4E is that the "christmas tree" effect is gone (and good riddance, I say).  One of the things that's weird about it is the question of what to do with the gold pieces.
> This, of course, had the unfortunate effect of making the PCs dependent on their wardrobe (according to the RAW, we can quibble about how "good" DMs can tweak it somewhere else).  If this is going away though, what do we do with treasure?  I *like* getting treasure. It makes your pockets jingle, all jingly like.  But if it's just so much debris...
> I hear there are still ways to make magic items, but to be honest, I miss the "wow" factor of going out and actually finding one.
> I dunno.  What do you guys think?




Ever played Conan?
I have heard that in that game if it runs true to the stories it was based around then you would be lucky to have two pennies by the end of the adventure and more often than not that money was spent before you got into the thick of things that is if the dm would let you.
I suspect this might be the same except the treasure may not be as coin orientated as before.
After all dragons may sleep on beds of coins but nobody could ship away enough if they don't have something to carry it all in (Bags of holding for example) I suspect adventures should be keyed in on this so it might be a bad idea to grab all the loot you can carry if the villain made sure to curse the lot if anyone other than a true follower took it and even then they might not be spared!
Ultimately as always its up to the dm to decide, but time will tell which way they will decide to follow on this.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Know what that reminds me of?
> 
> King Arthur's scabbard.
> 
> ...



Right, exactly.  Stuff that's super useful but possession of which doesn't require the DM to ramp up the monsters, requiring the other players to also get kewl stuff, requiring the DM to ramp up monsters again, etc.


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## Terraism (Oct 15, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> How so? You can spend it all on mega ale and mega whores, or windmills or whatever you want to in 3.5.



Well, sure, you can.  But it's not a _viable_ option in 3E - by spending your gold on anything other than magical items, you wreck the curve and, especially if everyone doesn't do the same, you can no longer contribute in the same fashion.

The point from folks saying "you can't do that in 3E" isn't that you're outright inhibited from doing so, but that if you do, you can't play in the same game as anyone else.  A 10th level character with recommended items is _challenged_ by a CR10... a 10th level character without items often can't hurt it.  That is a problem, and makes that option a non-solution.



			
				Kraydak said:
			
		

> But if you can't turn gold into tangeable power (magic items, xp), you have to ask why anyone with power wants gold.



I'd point you towards reality, and the fact that a trained soldier can easily manhandle most rulers/politicians, but it's the latter who have power... and the money.  Gold _is_ power, without it being just XP or magic items.


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## TwinBahamut (Oct 15, 2007)

lukelightning said:
			
		

> I just pictured a coin-operated vorpal sword.  "Please insert 10gp for each additional round of head-lopping..."



Actually, this isn't as bad of an idea as you might think. Time to break out videogame examples again.

In the videogame RPG Fire Emblem 4, the weapons all essentially work like a "coin-operated corpal sword". Every weapon in the game has a set number of uses, and when that number is used up, the weapon breaks and needs to be repaired for it to be used again. Different weapons have different repair costs, with more powerful weapons being more expensive.

At the same time, most characters join your side in that game with both cheap common weapons (like Iron Swords), and incredibly powerful unique weapons (like the Baldo-bloodline Holy Sword Tyrfing). When a character is poor, they can only afford to use the cheap weapons, but when they are rich, they can destroy enemies easily with their Holy Bloodline Weapons.

I think it is an interesting system, myself, especially since it permits a character to have an incredibly unique and interesting weapon from the beginning, but still prevents that character from using it freely.


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## A'koss (Oct 15, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> And thats great. IF you're a type of player who enjoys empire building. I fully agree that there needs to be material that covers it. I bought Magical Mystical Society: Western Europe for that reason: to help facilitate one of my players style of play. Out of the other 3, one of them enjoys getting cool art objects and gems to show off. The other 2 are "but kickers" and routinely use gold for raw gear upgrades. All 3 styles of play are supported by 3rd edition. Take out the option to buy new gear and one play style is shafted. Arguably a play style that is more wide spread than the empire builder type of player.



If it was next to impossible to aquire magic at all, I'd agree. But as an adventurer - magical loot is out there. 



> How so? You can spend it all on mega ale and mega whores, or windmills or whatever you want to in 3.5.



Sure you can - but what happens when one character spends all his money on magical power while the other spends on it charity? The game's balance is built upon the fact that you spend your money on magic items. Now how do you appropriately challenge a group with a large (and increasing) disparity in personal power? At lower levels it's not so much a concern, but at higher levels it is a _significant_ concern. 

The bottom line is you can't have it both ways. Either you curb what magic you can buy on the open market, which opens up other spending options at higher levels or you accept the fact that PCs won't spend large sums of money on anything else, no matter how much they may want to.


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## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Right, exactly.  Stuff that's super useful but possession of which doesn't require the DM to ramp up the monsters, requiring the other players to also get kewl stuff, requiring the DM to ramp up monsters again, etc.



There are artifact swords in Forgotten Realms called Moonblades. There's only like forty of them, and the only person who can use them is an elf who inherits it from a family member - so one sword per bloodline. Each wielder adds a new power to the sword. Some of those powers displayed is like never being caught off guard, summoning ghostly versions of previous wielders, etc. 

This could easily be adopted so that every adventurer only gets one or two Magical Items in his career, but the item becomes multi-purpose as he levels. Not "It goes from +1 to +2 to +2 flaming) but "It gets a utility ability that makes it unique". 

There are some things that just do not break the game. Like 'You can summon your sword to your hand as a standard action'. That's not even worth a +1; it's just a frill. Having a system where all characters are expected to get some mechanical and some frill benefits, and scaling those benefits throughout the levels, would avoid the "DM's gotta ramp up the monsters".


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## Crazy Jerome (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> That's not how I'm reading it.  He's arguing that combat enhancement is one of many valid ways to be allowed to spend accumulated wealth.  He's saying that the 3.x system in which you force people to spend gold on combat enhancement is no good.  He's also claiming that other gold sinks, as the sole option for players, are no good.
> 
> I've seen two other proposals for "gold sinks" in this thread.  First is the "ale and whores" sink.  You spend money on stuff that gets you absolutely nothing.  You bought a set of satin curtains for your keep.  That's awesome if you're the sort of player who loves that kind of thing, but not awesome if you don't care about it.  Second is the "bribes, status, and power" sink.  Gold translates directly into game-world influence, which means that gold allows you to dictate things about the campaign world that normally the DM would decide.  Can you get into the party?  Ching.  Can you get past the toll booth?  Ching.  Can you get the duke to lend you some soldiers?  Ching.
> 
> He's arguing that if you force the system to allow only one of these sinks, without allowing for other play styles, there is something wrong with the system.  He's saying that there is something wrong with 3.x for precisely this reason, and that a fix does not amount to forcing your players to spend their money on ale and whores, or bribes, or magic items.




"Gold sinks" aren't any good, whether you have one or many.  That is what I was arguing in post #160, though I didn't use the term.  What would be even better than multiple gold sinks is zero gold sinks.  

The whole idea behind a gold sink is to make players want to go after the loot, by giving them something to sink it into.  However, if that sink involves direct, personal power, in any way (e.g. magic items, reliable highly useful allies), then it forces a style of play.  

Really, I'm not satisfied with any system that creates an environment where I have to get the players to all agree on one style.  In a great tabletop game, I ought to be able to equally accommodate the player that goes the "ale and whores" route, the player that builds the stronghold, the player that does bling/bribes, and even the player that wants to amass a bunch of wealth (to "keep score", to lend to his buddy player characters to do their thing).  All within the same game.  If the game ties money into _anything_ that prevents this scenario, then the design is trying to hard to create a sink.

Let money lead to convenience.  Let it be an aid to characters getting what they want faster and/or "easier", but not without them running some risks still.  If your adventure is take the magic whatzit from the ghoul king so that you can blow the other treasure, fine.  If your "adventure" is chase down the thieves guild that ran off the whatzit before a merchant can deliver it to you, fine.  Just don't set it up so that you pays your money and gets your whatzit.   

And for that matter, the same applies to the stronghold, the bling/bribes, etc.  Every use of money should bring with it some trouble.  And that leads to all kinds of interesting options where the character avoid accumulating weath precisely to avoid that kind of trouble.

Summary:  No direct, personal power from weath.  Allow wealth to be an aid towards indirectly accumulating some personal power, but not without risk.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 15, 2007)

Terraism said:
			
		

> I'd point you towards reality, and the fact that a trained soldier can easily manhandle most rulers/politicians, but it's the latter who have power... and the money.  Gold _is_ power, without it being just XP or magic items.




But gold isn't identical to power and it's that lack of identity that's the problem.  Because while in the real world gold might easily purchase power, in DnD being a DM is power and the DMs rulings can nerf what gold is capable of doing.  A real world politician just sends 100 soldiers after the renegade soldier and the situation is taken care of.  

The 100 soldiers that are hired all enjoy ale and whores (let's say) and so the money paid to them has actual meaning.  But spending gp to hear the DM describe to you an imaginary encounter with a mug of ale does not motivate players.  Ale (and whores, I'd imagine) are far more fun IRL than in the game.  What's fun in the game is killing monsters, and for all but the most imaginative, that's about it.  I would say 99% of players don't care whether their character wears burlap or silk, whereas 99% of people in real life would care very much AFAIK.  

Plus, you can't hire soldiers when your DM says "no, just you and 3 friends are going into this dungeon, the army stays home."  Real life doesn't care if the challenges are balanced for you level, but a lot of DMs do.


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## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> I'm looking.  I see gold = mechanical advantage.  A planar ally is just a very powerful, very expensive, short-term magic item.  If you bind it by presenting it with a pile of gold it's functionally no different than buying a super-powered one-shot Summon Monster item.



 Yes, that's how it works in 3.5e. And it's bad.

 -- N


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## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Okay, I'm a paladin in hell.



 You are the first person to bring a Paladin into this discussion. Paladins are different, and have their own set of baggage.



			
				Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> I hardly think that not providing monetary support to beings that exist only to be evil counts as Lawful Stupid.  That's "ends justify the means" morality, and it specifically violates the "will not work with evil characters" part of the paladin's code.



 Again, Paladins are special. We weren't talking about them.

However, honestly, you are describing Lawful Stupid to a tee. Let me show you how the Most Sinister Fiendish Thaumaturge turns your *predictable behavior* into an iron-clad Paladin detector: he sets up toll bridges at regular intervals within his kingdom, and binds Imps to collect the tolls.

Now you have a choice: pay a toll to a being of pure Evil, or out yourself as a Paladin whenever you cross a river.

 -- N


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> There are artifact swords in Forgotten Realms called Moonblades. There's only like forty of them, and the only person who can use them is an elf who inherits it from a family member - so one sword per bloodline. Each wielder adds a new power to the sword. Some of those powers displayed is like never being caught off guard, summoning ghostly versions of previous wielders, etc.
> 
> This could easily be adopted so that every adventurer only gets one or two Magical Items in his career, but the item becomes multi-purpose as he levels. Not "It goes from +1 to +2 to +2 flaming) but "It gets a utility ability that makes it unique".
> 
> There are some things that just do not break the game. Like 'You can summon your sword to your hand as a standard action'. That's not even worth a +1; it's just a frill. Having a system where all characters are expected to get some mechanical and some frill benefits, and scaling those benefits throughout the levels, would avoid the "DM's gotta ramp up the monsters".



I agree that a certain amount of mechanical benefit is just fine, but it has to be scaled properly.  A +6 wand, for example, might be the best you can get.  At high levels, +6 might not be a particularly large benefit, but a desirable one.  It's all a question of what you need to roll on a d20 in order to succeed.


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## Crazy Jerome (Oct 15, 2007)

> But gold isn't identical to power and it's that lack of identity that's the problem. Because while in the real world gold might easily purchase power, in DnD being a DM is power and the DMs rulings can nerf what gold is capable of doing. A real world politician just sends 100 soldiers after the renegade soldier and the situation is taken care of.




Right.  And in the real world, or in a game that cares about money in any kind of logical way, the key word in "gold might easily purchase power," is "purchase".  When you purchase power, you had to buy it from someone.  That means, that someone might not follow through, or more people know, etc. Or in other words, wealth has characteristic limits, same as any other avenue to acquiring power.  

You can't get elected, for example, President of the United States, without a bunch of people contributing a lot of money.  OTOH, there is no amount of money that will get Bozo the Clown elected President.  

Really, I think a big part of the problem is the attitude that spending money will always translate into results.  Make purchasing even semi-realistically unreliable, and a big part of the problem goes away.


----------



## Kraydak (Oct 15, 2007)

Terraism said:
			
		

> Well, sure, you can.  But it's not a _viable_ option in 3E - by spending your gold on anything other than magical items, you wreck the curve and, especially if everyone doesn't do the same, you can no longer contribute in the same fashion.
> 
> The point from folks saying "you can't do that in 3E" isn't that you're outright inhibited from doing so, but that if you do, you can't play in the same game as anyone else.  A 10th level character with recommended items is _challenged_ by a CR10... a 10th level character without items often can't hurt it.  That is a problem, and makes that option a non-solution.




If you are an adventurer who doesn't invest in adventuring but rather something else, then you are a part-time adventurer, who doesn't adventure as well as a full time one, but hopefully has other benefits.



> I'd point you towards reality, and the fact that a trained soldier can easily manhandle most rulers/politicians, but it's the latter who have power... and the money.  Gold _is_ power, without it being just XP or magic items.




In the *real* world, large numbers of weak goons can take small numbers of elite troops.  In *DnD* no number of lvl 1 goons can take a CR 15 entity.  If there are lvl 15 people running around, then having the ability to hire large number of lvl 1 people becomes politically irrelevant.  In RL, money buys power because you can (almost always) find people willing to fight for you if you pay them.  In DnD, gold buys power only if powerful people want gold.  For them to want gold, they need to have a use for gold.  Creature comforts don't count, because powerful people can simply *take* the creature comforts (if they do it through political channels, its called taxes).  DnD is a world with primative grunts with spears coexisting with mecha-pilots.  If there is no gold to xp/item equivilancy, then the grunts with spears use gold as a currency while the mecha pilots use intergalactic credits, with no currency exchange.  You won't be able to hire the mecha pilots with gold.  And, as mecha pilot trumps goon with spear, political power won't flow from a gold mine.


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## Mallus (Oct 15, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> Because while in the real world gold might easily purchase power, in DnD being a DM is power and the DMs rulings can nerf what gold is capable of doing.



Then the problem is the DM.


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 15, 2007)

Crazy Jerome said:
			
		

> Summary:  No direct, personal power from weath.  Allow wealth to be an aid towards indirectly accumulating some personal power, but not without risk.




The visceral reaction that a peasant in folklore has when standing before a big mound of gold (or holding a leprechaun, or commanding a genie, or any of the equivalents) has been one of extreme avarice.  Now granted, the outcomes are not always pleasant because many of these stories are morality tales of some sort (no one wants commoners to get all uppity).  But IMO the reaction of people to huge mounds of gold is a consequence of reality, and the reality is that money makes things better across the board in all ways.  Regardless of what a lord would want his serfs to believe.  

So if players don't see money as potentially fulfilling any of their desires (proportional to the amount of course) then money loses the effect that it has in the real world.  Part of the problem IMO is that ale in DnD doesn't taste like anything to the player.  

No, I am not happy with the current "Christmas Tree" situation in 3E.  I would like power levels to be less dependant on gadgets.  But if I my players can't find anything to do with gold that appeals to them, I can't expect them to value gold much.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> That's not how I'm reading it.  He's arguing that combat enhancement is one of many valid ways to be allowed to spend accumulated wealth.  He's saying that the 3.x system in which you force people to spend gold on combat enhancement is no good.



 If you read a bit further, you'd see we agreed about that.



			
				Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> He's arguing that if you force the system to allow only one



 Who's forcing what now?

Originally, he was dismissing something as useless, and I was arguing that it is indeed useful. Specifically, bribes and influence.

This is a bit of a gloss, though, because really what the PC's gold would buy is narrative influence for the player. That's why I've been calling this *Plot Hacks* rather than just bribes.

Cheers, -- N


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## Mallus (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Yes, that's how it works in 3.5e. And it's bad.
> 
> -- N



You are correct, sir. 

Personally, I don't like the explicit monetizing of character abilities in 3.0/3.5. Let wealth buy what wealth buys in the real world, or at least in Middle Earth.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 15, 2007)

Crazy Jerome said:
			
		

> Really, I think a big part of the problem is the attitude that spending money will always translate into results.  Make purchasing even semi-realistically unreliable, and a big part of the problem goes away.




But purchasing isn't unreliable except in the most extreme cases.  For the most part you just hire people to do the thinking for you.  Now some DMs will handle this by having this person screw you over, and certainly that does happen from time to time in real life, but while the DMs NPC can rip off a player and then slip back into the faceless masses, a real consultant will have a community, a reputation, relatives and friends, etc. and the situation is much more complicated IMO than DMs make it.
(BTW - elections/politics are probably a bad example because there are laws to make sure that money has only limited usefulness.  It's a testament to the power of money that campaign finance laws exist.)


----------



## Mallus (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Originally, he was dismissing something as useless, and I was arguing that it is indeed useful. Specifically, bribes and influence.
> 
> This is a bit of a gloss, though, because really what the PC's gold would buy is narrative influence for the player. That's why I've been calling this *Plot Hacks* rather than just bribes.
> 
> Cheers, -- N



Of course, if you play in a game where there is no plot to hack, per se, I can see the appeal of using gold to transform your character into a human-shaped Abrams tank. The question is "should the rules assume that is the dominant mode of play?"


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> You are the first person to bring a Paladin into this discussion. Paladins are different, and have their own set of baggage.



Paladins are a nice acme of lawful good behaviour because:
1. lots of parties have them
2. they aren't allowed to bend and break their moral code like other LG characters are

If the adventure design specifically hoses paladins because they are paladins, there's something wrong with the adventure design.  The same goes for garden-variety LG characters, just to a lesser extent because they are allowed to tread into grey areas a bit.



> Again, Paladins are special. We weren't talking about them.
> 
> However, honestly, you are describing Lawful Stupid to a tee. Let me show you how the Most Sinister Fiendish Thaumaturge turns your *predictable behavior* into an iron-clad Paladin detector: he sets up toll bridges at regular intervals within his kingdom, and binds Imps to collect the tolls.
> 
> ...



That sounds less to me like a problem and more like reasonably competent behaviour by a boss villain.  It's a "loyalty test" of the kind that gangs run on their new members: do something that you know is wrong to show that we can trust you.  Heck, make sure that the imps describe exactly what the administration plans to do with the money, to see if the visitors squirm.  On the other hand, if heroes of low moral fibre can just buy their way to your front door, you've got a different kind of security problem.

Even if you're not a paladin, handing over cash to help pay for a new soul-powered pain engine is going to leave some black marks on your conscience.  If you don't like it, either stay out of hell, kill the thing that's asking for it, or find another way to navigate the plane.  But this isn't an argument in favour of a gold = travel equation.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 15, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> Then the problem is the DM.




This is a little vague but the tone of what you're saying here I don't agree with.  Yes, the choices that the DMs make affects the way that money is used in the game.  But the DM can't be blamed for wanting his players to have some fun.  If every game session that I DMed involved me saying "ok, well, you spent your 100,000 gp on an army, they went out, raided a country, and brought back 300,000 gp.  See you next week".  Then neither me nor my players would have fun, and in the long run it wouldn't matter whether or not these scenarios conformed to real life. 

Sure, there are ways to turn this sort of thing into a game I guess.  Palace intrigue and such could become the focus of the game.  But then "dungeon crawls" seem to be the lowest common denominator, so at least one of the players would probably be shouting at the others "look, I don't care about the machinations of your concubines this week, can't we go out and kill a dragon!?"

So the DM isn't the problem, but the problem must ultimately be mitigated by the DM in some way if the rules aren't going to magically fix it.


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## Crazy Jerome (Oct 15, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> The visceral reaction that a peasant in folklore has when standing before a big mound of gold (or holding a leprechaun, or commanding a genie, or any of the equivalents) has been one of extreme avarice.  Now granted, the outcomes are not always pleasant because many of these stories are morality tales of some sort (no one wants commoners to get all uppity).  But IMO the reaction of people to huge mounds of gold is a consequence of reality, and the reality is that money makes things better across the board in all ways.  Regardless of what a lord would want his serfs to believe.
> 
> So if players don't see money as potentially fulfilling any of their desires (proportional to the amount of course) then money loses the effect that it has in the real world.  Part of the problem IMO is that ale in DnD doesn't taste like anything to the player.
> 
> No, I am not happy with the current "Christmas Tree" situation in 3E.  I would like power levels to be less dependant on gadgets.  But if I my players can't find anything to do with gold that appeals to them, I can't expect them to value gold much.




Who said anything about the player not being able to find anything to do with gold that appeals to them?  Unless, of course, all the things that one can do with gold are inherentlly uninteresting, then it is OK if the player opts out.  He isn't substantially, mechanically impaired in his adventuring.  He simply won't have the option of hiring a legion of research assistants on the Ghoul King's Tomb or whatever his buddy the merchant does.  He also won't have to spend effort guarding his wealth. 

I submit that the outcomes of a lot of those fables are unpleasant for a heck of a lot more reasons than keeping peasants in their place.  Witness, for just one example, the poor track record of modern lottery winners managing to not wreck their personal lives. Great wealth is very handy for people that know how to handle it.  In other hands, money can, and has, made things a great deal worse, across the board sometimes, and sometimes in very narrow but meaningful ways.

And if the players don't care for any of the ways that wealth really works, then why bother giving them a ton of wealth so that they can stand around greedily for 5 minutes before converting it into magic items (or a stronghold or whatever).  Just ask them what they want, and give them that.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Yes, that's how it works in 3.5e. And it's bad.
> 
> -- N



I agree.  But I'm also responding to your suggestion that gold ought to be used, among other things, to bribe extraplanar entities.  Gold is already used to bribe extraplanar entities, and that's bad.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> Of course, if you play in a game where there is no plot to hack, per se, I can see the appeal of using gold to transform your character into a human-shaped Abrams tank. The question is "should the rules assume that is the dominant mode of play?"



A better question is, "should the rules assume a dominant mode of play?"  Or perhaps "should there be a set of dominant modes of play that the rules assume and support better than others."  I'd answer no to the first, and yes to the second.  I think that there are probably a few major categories into which we could frame most of the play styles in this thread, and then robustly support them.  That's better than supporting one play style, or supporting none with wishy-washy game mechanics.

Perhaps the ability to choose how gold functions might be a good approach.  If you want to allow players to buy mechanical advantage, you use option 1.  If you want players to buy ale and whores, option 2, etc.  Flesh them out in the DMG, and set out the mechanical changes that need to occur to support each style.  Of course, a system that supports mechanical advantages as well as ale and whores without changing anything would be preferred.


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## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> Of course, if you play in a game where there is no plot to hack, per se, I can see the appeal of using gold to transform your character into a human-shaped Abrams tank. The question is "should the rules assume that is the dominant mode of play?"



 IMHO, hell no.

I think wealth should be able to let you do things more often, but not harder or better -- Pearl of Power gets the thumbs up, Headband of Intellect gets the boot.

Healing is probably fine. A bonus to damage (above a certain very low point) is bad. Buying the ability to do your thing more often is cool. Buying the ability to do your thing better must have limits.

I feel gold should be able to buy you convenience, not raw power. So items that enhance your out-of-combat stuff might be okay, depending on the particulars.

Equipment costs gold, and good equipment should be better -- but there should be hard, tight limits to how much better your equipment can make you perform. A rich fop with all the bling in the world shouldn't be able to best a true master swordsman with a half-decent blade.

These are my opinions, but feel free to take them home and share with your whole family.

Cheers, -- N


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## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> I agree.  But I'm also responding to your suggestion that gold ought to be used, among other things, to bribe extraplanar entities.  Gold is already used to bribe extraplanar entities, and that's bad.



 Context, context, context!

I was responding to the assertion: "bribes are only useful on Lawful Evil planes".

My point was that *right now* all alignments want money.

As above, so below.

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> This is a bit of a gloss, though, because really what the PC's gold would buy is narrative influence for the player. That's why I've been calling this *Plot Hacks* rather than just bribes.



Yeah, but gold shouldn't be the only way to get narrative influence.

Pcs at say, 12th level, are superhuman. They have a lot of abilities at their fingertips. They should be able to have influence simply by saying 'Hey, Noble dude, do this for me, and I'll do this for you by using my amazing PC abilities'. PCs shouldn't be chumps in the gameworld until they can get some $$ to get attention. Shouldn't the PCs also have Reputation and Renown, and that effect the game? If Hercules said "Hey everybody, drink Fartworth Wine!" there would be a line out the door for Fartworth wine. 

And it really sucks if the only balancing factor against this is "Well there are also other 12th level NPCs who can do what you can do so just shut up and get back in the dungeon until you have gold".

Not to mention that a 10th level rogue PC with maxed Diplomacy, Bluff and Sense Motive should be able to be a mover and shaker, even if he's a poor SOB, simply because he's got the _raw talent_ to get people to agree with him.

Look at the service prices for spellcasting. If, during down time, or to make a quick buck, the party sorcerer could walk into town x or city y with a cardboard sign that lists what spells they can cast, and shave off 10% from the service charge. 

The _only_ thing that could stop them from doing this is if one of the local spellcasters-for-hire gets pissed off that their prices are getting gouged. However, what happens if the local NPC spellcaster doesn't have the spells your PC does? Or if there's no local Druid? Or if there's no cleric in fifty miles that can cast Raise Dead?


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## Mallus (Oct 15, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> Yes, the choices that the DMs make affects the way that money is used in the game.



Typically, the DM is in charge of running the setting. Ergo, the DM controls the possible uses for wealth. 



> If every game session that I DMed involved me saying "ok, well, you spent your 100,000 gp on an army, they went out, raided a country, and brought back 300,000 gp.  See you next week".



What you've just described is a problem with execution. A good DM could take that scenario and build a whole mid-to-high level campaign out of it. All it takes is a willing to conceive of an encounter as something other than a room full of monsters in some nightmarish underground bank.



> Sure, there are ways to turn this sort of thing into a game I guess.  Palace intrigue and such could become the focus of the game.



Yup.



> But then "dungeon crawls" seem to be the lowest common denominator...



The basic problem with this is that dungeon crawls have a limited window of utility, ie, they work for few levels, then they start becoming silly. Well, sillier.

AD&D handled this by transitioning PC's from dungeon crawlers to generals/warlords, popes, and guildmasters, thus providing for a different set of challenges as characters leveled, something other than 'dig treasure out of the ground'.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> Sure, there are ways to turn this sort of thing into a game I guess.  Palace intrigue and such could become the focus of the game.  But then "dungeon crawls" seem to be the lowest common denominator, so at least one of the players would probably be shouting at the others "look, I don't care about the machinations of your concubines this week, can't we go out and kill a dragon!?"



FWIW, I hate intrigue games.  They bore me to tears.  I don't run that kind of game.  Large-scale political stuff, sure, but I can't stand keeping track of who said what to whom and who is going to betray whom and which member of court is plotting with which other member, etc.  I get the impression that there are plenty of DMs and players who hate political games, dungeon crawls, deep roleplaying, or any other style.  But the balance of what sort of adventures will be more or less difficult to run will to a certain extent depend on what you do with wealth.  If wealth is basically only good for buying keeps, then you'd better like keep-focused games.  This is exactly the problem with 3.x.  You had better like outfitting your character with gear.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 15, 2007)

Crazy Jerome said:
			
		

> He also won't have to spend effort guarding his wealth.




Do rich people spend any time guarding their wealth?  I figured they hired someone to do that for them.  And then hired someone to watch that person.  And then hired someone to watch the person watching that person.

IME if the PCs can spend their money on the stuff that appeals to them, then they won't take any interest in money.  That might not be objectionable to some/most people, I don't know.  What appeals to PCs IME is magic stuff that improves their power.  If the magic items aren't available, then they'll hire soldiers (or ask why they can't).  In any case, most all but the least aggressive players will find a way to turn gold into power, in which case we are back to some version of the "Christmas Tree" effect.



			
				Crazy Jerome said:
			
		

> I submit that the outcomes of a lot of those fables are unpleasant for a heck of a lot more reasons than keeping peasants in their place.  Witness, for just one example, the poor track record of modern lottery winners managing to not wreck their personal lives. Great wealth is very handy for people that know how to handle it.  In other hands, money can, and has, made things a great deal worse, across the board sometimes, and sometimes in very narrow but meaningful ways.




Are you sure that the "lottery winner" stories aren't modern versions of the same fable?  Many modern urban legends follow the same underlying themes as earlier mythology.  I'm sure some lotter winners somewhere make a wreck of their lives, but then so do poor people.  Does it happen with greater frequency?  I suppose there would be a study somewhere.

In any case, I suspect that many of the realistic emotional or cultural issues that come with a sudden accumulation of wealth would be hard to enforce in a game for the same reason that it's hard to get players to enjoy the taste of DnD ale.



			
				Crazy Jerome said:
			
		

> And if the players don't care for any of the ways that wealth really works, then why bother giving them a ton of wealth so that they can stand around greedily for 5 minutes before converting it into magic items (or a stronghold or whatever).  Just ask them what they want, and give them that.




I'm not sure what you're saying here.  I don't "give" my players anything or ask them what they want.  They find stuff in the "dungeon" and take it (or not).


----------



## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Yeah, but gold shouldn't be the only way to get narrative influence.



 Who says it has to be? I've seen lots of suggestions for non-monetary rewards which boil down to plot hacks. I'm just saying that even as favors can be monetized, so can monies be *narratized*. 

All I'm saying is that it's possible to keep the traditional "kill things, take stuff" mechanic for some games but use those rewards to fuel other play styles.

Cheers, -- N


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## ehren37 (Oct 15, 2007)

Terraism said:
			
		

> Well, sure, you can.  But it's not a _viable_ option in 3E - by spending your gold on anything other than magical items, you wreck the curve and, especially if everyone doesn't do the same, you can no longer contribute in the same fashion.
> 
> The point from folks saying "you can't do that in 3E" isn't that you're outright inhibited from doing so, but that if you do, you can't play in the same game as anyone else.  A 10th level character with recommended items is _challenged_ by a CR10... a 10th level character without items often can't hurt it.  That is a problem, and makes that option a non-solution.




You arent as powerful as the other guy no. But presumably you play what you enjoy, be it a guy that blows his money on outer planar hookers or mead from Kords own festhall or on another +3 sword. You can play a fighter/sorcerer/wizard/monk, despite that combo stinking, and take a bunch of garbage feats like stealthy and athletics. You play the style you enjoy. Its an option, even if its "sub optimal".

What I think sucks is demanding everyone cop to that play style, ala Harrison Bergeron.

Magic item influence on character net power is supposedly being toned down for 4e... which I totally think is a good thing. That also helps remove the imbalance issue. However I think its a bad idea for the game as a whole to ditch the ability for players to buy and trade magical equipment.


----------



## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> All I'm saying is that it's possible to keep the traditional "kill things, take stuff" mechanic for some games but use those rewards to fuel other play styles.



Just as long as that isn't the _only viable option_ for GP.

And as long as say, spending your money on a keep doesn't cripple you when you y'know, try to defend it from a dragon.

Peasant: "Well if only you had bought a +2 Icy Burst with that money you spent to get us plumbing!"


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Context, context, context!
> 
> I was responding to the assertion: "bribes are only useful on Lawful Evil planes".
> 
> ...




Okay, I'm not sure what you're getting at anymore.  Rechan said this:


			
				Rechan said:
			
		

> Sure, it's nice if you're in a type of campaign where that sort've thing is useful. Not so much when you're traveling the planes or going after that Evil Lich or Nefarious Blackguard.




And you said this:


			
				Nifft said:
			
		

> I would disagree -- when my PCs travel the planes, they find border guards, tariffs, taxes and tolls all over the place -- particularly the more Lawful of the Evil planes.
> 
> They've bribed Yugoloth mercs to abandon their current masters en route to killing those masters.
> 
> Evil minions are exactly the kind who love bribes most! IMHO, of course.




...which suggests to me that you're suggesting that bribes are a good example of something besides equipment in which to sink gold.  Then someone (I didn't bother to find it) tried to make it into a corner case by saying that only Lawful Evil planes really care about bribes, and you pointed out that everyone is interested bribes, sometimes dressed up as "tribute" or "donations", making reference to Planar Ally.  I indicated that Planar Ally, as an example of what bribes are good for, shows that bribery is just mechanical enhancement in drag.  You agree that this is a bad thing, but you started out saying that bribes are a good thing.

So where did I lose the thread?


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> You arent as powerful as the other guy no. But presumably you play what you enjoy, be it a guy that blows his money on outer planar hookers or mead from Kords own festhall or on another +3 sword. You can play a fighter/sorcerer/wizard/monk, despite that combo stinking, and take a bunch of garbage feats like stealthy and athletics. You play the style you enjoy. Its an option, even if its "sub optimal".
> 
> What I think sucks is demanding everyone cop to that play style, ala Harrison Bergeron.



Well, the bottom line isn't just that you're sub-optimal, it's that being sub-optimal gets you, and perhaps your party, killed.  That's the problem with magic item dependency.  If you don't toe the line, you die.


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 15, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> AD&D handled this by transitioning PC's from dungeon crawlers to generals/warlords, popes, and guildmasters, thus providing for a different set of challenges as characters leveled, something other than 'dig treasure out of the ground'.




The AD&D rules did this but IMO not well.  IMO the Basic rules (BECMI version) did this better.  But I've never seen the real execution of either.  One of the glaring problems IMO with doing this in ADnD was a lack of playable mass combat rules.  Of course it's debateable whether or not Battle System solved this problem, I suppose for most people it didn't.  Consider especially old-school ADnD games, the ones involving mass combat and rulership of any sort (and I can only think of the Throne of Bloodstone series) compared to the dungeon crawls for "name level" characters.  There are far more of the latter.  And so I think the "PCs above 9th level should build keeps" style of gaming is more of a theory than a practice.

The other problem is that the game is essentially about 4 people doing stuff as a team.  If one is the Pope and the other is the Guildmaster of Assassins, you can't really play the game anymore.  This has been my experience with this style of play actually, the more the PCs have had individual interests, the harder it is to get the group together to do anything.  (If I knew more about Birthright, maybe that would have some bearing on this.)


----------



## ehren37 (Oct 15, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> Then the problem is the DM.




Not really. Boardrooms and Bureaucrats never really sold many copies. I'd assume most D&D players actually want their character to go on adventures rather than manage hirelings.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> AD&D handled this by transitioning PC's from dungeon crawlers to generals/warlords, popes, and guildmasters, thus providing for a different set of challenges as characters leveled, something other than 'dig treasure out of the ground'.



Tales of Wyre handled this by changing the definition of dungeon.  There was a lot of planar politics and such, but also regular battles over who got to control what section of the multiverse, which involved lots of heightened, maximized sonic fireballs.


----------



## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> You arent as powerful as the other guy no. But presumably you play what you enjoy, be it a guy that blows his money on outer planar hookers or mead from Kords own festhall or on another +3 sword. You can play a fighter/sorcerer/wizard/monk, despite that combo stinking, and take a bunch of garbage feats like stealthy and athletics. You play the style you enjoy. Its an option, even if its "sub optimal".



This is faulty for two reasons.

1) The game assumes you're optimized. If you don't x magic item by level y, you are going to get your clock cleaned. I don't think someone should have to sacrifice, well, effectiveness for playing sub-optimally. Reminds me of the party whose only healer was a Cleric2/Pal3 and whose only caster was a Sor2/rogue3 (choices made because it fit their character) and they got their _clocks cleaned regularly_ because the DM threw standard 5th level challenges at them. 

2) The system is built so that newbies choose stupid feats and learn from their mistakes. Toughness is _not_ meant to be balanced. Monte Cook basically said when they were designing 3e, the intention was that "The system rewards players who learn how to optimize". That's a horrible design. The system shouldn't be littered with sucky options as newbie traps.


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> FWIW, I hate intrigue games.  They bore me to tears.




Yea, that's what I was recognizing.  At least one of my players IME is not going to want to do the politics thing, and because dungeon crawling IME is something that the other players can at least tolerate, that's what they'll do.


----------



## A'koss (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Well, the bottom line isn't just that you're sub-optimal, it's that being sub-optimal gets you, and perhaps your party, killed.  That's the problem with magic item dependency.  If you don't toe the line, you die.



Exactly. And obviously the higher the level you are, the more this problem is exasperated. High level game balance is dodgy enough at high levels even when you do toe the gold -> magic line...


----------



## ehren37 (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Well, the bottom line isn't just that you're sub-optimal, it's that being sub-optimal gets you, and perhaps your party, killed.  That's the problem with magic item dependency.  If you don't toe the line, you die.




Sorry, I edited my post later. I understand that is somewhat of an issue with 3e. But if 4e reduces the net influence of items, then I dont see a reason to prohibit people from buying/trading items.


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> "The system rewards players who learn how to optimize". That's a horrible design. The system shouldn't be littered with sucky options as newbie traps.




I agree.  The 1st level character whose player hasn't played before and the one whose player is a 30 year veteran of DnD are _both 1st level characters_.  Why would it make sense that one character would know what combat options to take and the other wouldn't.  IMO that's an inappopriate use of player knowledge to affect a character.  Some players really like this metagame aspect of maximal builds, I don't.  IMO it makes no sense that Conan wouldn't know the optimal skill choices to make because of his battlefield experience.  I just can expect my players to have that same kind of intelligence.  After all, they're not the warrior-king, their _character_ is.  Some metagaming IMO is ok because it keeps the players involved, but too much IMO is undesireable.


----------



## Mallus (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Tales of Wyre handled this by changing the definition of dungeon.  There was a lot of planar politics and such, but also regular battles over who got to control what section of the multiverse, which involved lots of heightened, maximized sonic fireballs.



Sep's a genius at D&D (or outside of D&D, for that matter). The nice folks at WoTC could learn a lot from him.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> So where did I lose the thread?



 Oy vey, I wish we had those jump-back links on quotes like they do on the WotC boards.

Does it matter? If so, I'll dig up the whole chain, but you're rekindling the fiery part of a discussion that ended agreeably for both parties.

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Just as long as that isn't the _only viable option_ for GP.
> 
> And as long as say, spending your money on a keep doesn't cripple you when you y'know, try to defend it from a dragon.
> 
> Peasant: "Well if only you had bought a +2 Icy Burst with that money you spent to get us plumbing!"



 Yeah, exactly.

My preference would be to design around a low assumed wealth, then allow a few very strictly limited bonuses to enhance combat prowess -- so you can feel good about investing in it, but you aren't forced to do so if you'd rather get bonuses elsewhere.

I've got some ideas on how to do this, but they're not ready for public viewing just yet.

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Mallus (Oct 15, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> The AD&D rules did this but IMO not well.



It didn't say they handled it well. I was merely pointing to the fact that the rules acknowledged a change in the timbre of play at name level.  



> The other problem is that the game is essentially about 4 people doing stuff as a team.  If one is the Pope and the other is the Guildmaster of Assassins, you can't really play the game anymore.



Of course you can. Like I said before, it all a matter of execution. I argue it's at that point the game gets most interesting, since the players have a more invested in their characters and the setting. The adventures tend to write themselves.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Oy vey, I wish we had those jump-back links on quotes like they do on the WotC boards.
> 
> Does it matter? If so, I'll dig up the whole chain, but you're rekindling the fiery part of a discussion that ended agreeably for both parties.
> 
> Cheers, -- N



Ehh, never mind.  My point, and apparently yours, is that a single way to use gold sucks because it forces the campaign into directions that might not be desirable for everyone.  I'm starting to think that "what you can do with money" is a keystone concept around which a large part of the game revolves.  By changing it, you change the game, and so you really have to know what you're doing in order to avoid trading one forced style of play for another.


----------



## Crazy Jerome (Oct 15, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> Do rich people spend any time guarding their wealth?  I figured they hired someone to do that for them.  And then hired someone to watch that person.  And then hired someone to watch the person watching that person.
> 
> IME if the PCs can spend their money on the stuff that appeals to them, then they won't take any interest in money.  That might not be objectionable to some/most people, I don't know.  What appeals to PCs IME is magic stuff that improves their power.  If the magic items aren't available, then they'll hire soldiers (or ask why they can't).  In any case, most all but the least aggressive players will find a way to turn gold into power, in which case we are back to some version of the "Christmas Tree" effect.




I said "effort", not time.  If you have something valuable, then you have to spend money, time, something keeping it safe.  Some people would prefer to spend their effort elsewhere.

As for the rest, if the only thing the players are interested in buying is direct power, and you cater to that, then yes, you will get some version of the "Christmas Tree" effect.  I think that players will have more fun if they can be weaned off of such.  Or alternately, if everyone agrees they don't want to change that, then it is not as if adding the "Christmas Tree" effect back in to my kind of design is all that difficult:  You got gold.  Instead of buying the hints to the Ghoul King's Tomb, you bought a magic sword from a merchant.  You pay the money, you get the sword--no complications.  Anything that appears to be a complication but isn't is just "color" added to pretend that the player isn't buying a magic sword outright.



			
				gizmo33 said:
			
		

> Are you sure that the "lottery winner" stories aren't modern versions of the same fable?  Many modern urban legends follow the same underlying themes as earlier mythology.  I'm sure some lotter winners somewhere make a wreck of their lives, but then so do poor people.  Does it happen with greater frequency?  I suppose there would be a study somewhere.
> 
> In any case, I suspect that many of the realistic emotional or cultural issues that come with a sudden accumulation of wealth would be hard to enforce in a game for the same reason that it's hard to get players to enjoy the taste of DnD ale.




Such studies are necessarily spotty at this time.  However, there have been some long-term followups of lotteries in particular geographic areas where it was shown that money was certainly no impediment to screwing up a life.  I believe some slices approach 70% to 80% massive screwup.  Who knows, those particular individuals could have been on a downward spiral already?  If Bill Gates picked 10 people at random today, and gave them $5,000,000 each, would you expect 7 of them, by 2012, to have blown most of the money, estranged most friends and family, picked up addictions, etc?  I know I wouldn't, but it happens surprisingly frequently with lotteries.

But my larger point is that the fables weren't only saying that money was this great problem that should be avoided.  Obviously, the desperately poor peasant comes out ahead even if all he manages during the rollercoaster ride is upgrading his cottage and gaining some livestock.  (And not many in this topic have been talking about the desperately poor climbing out of subsistence level into something slightly better, which is really a different game issue altogether.)  Acquiring great wealth suddenly is a huge change, that attracts attention.  All huge changes that attract attention are problems in the real world and a D&D world.   





			
				gizmo33 said:
			
		

> I'm not sure what you're saying here.  I don't "give" my players anything or ask them what they want.  They find stuff in the "dungeon" and take it (or not).




I was saying that if you had a game where the players were always going to turn gold into a magic sword, you'd do better to cut out the middleman, and just let them find the magic sword.  Or if you don't want them to tell you what they want, let them find or earn a favor from a wizard that will make them the magic sword.  If wealth can be turned directly into power, then you *will* get the "Christmas Tree" effect, unless you highly limit wealth.  It's all color.  It's _functionally_ no different than if they had found the sword.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> 1) The game assumes you're optimized. If you don't x magic item by level y, you are going to get your clock cleaned.



 Yep yep yep.

Over-specialization is another thing that needs to go.

SW Saga style "general competency" is a good solution to both, IMHO.



			
				Rechan said:
			
		

> 2) The system is built so that newbies choose stupid feats and learn from their mistakes. Toughness is _not_ meant to be balanced. Monte Cook basically said when they were designing 3e, the intention was that "The system rewards players who learn how to optimize". That's a horrible design. The system shouldn't be littered with sucky options as newbie traps.



 Ironically, the pleasure one feels at system mastery is part of what makes D&D -- or any other system -- addictive for some people. If WotC is smart (and they are) there will still be some of this in 4e. Hopefully it will be less necessary, and less powerful in absolute terms, but no less fun to exploit explore. 

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Mallus (Oct 15, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Not really. Boardrooms and Bureaucrats never really sold many copies.



Are you sure about that? 



> I'd assume most D&D players actually want their character to go on adventures rather than manage hirelings.



I assume most D&D players want challenges to overcome. I also assume they prefer the nature of those challenges to _change_ as they rise in level.  Or they can mine treasure out of the monster-infested ground until they're demigods, if that works for them.

All I'm saying is that the game has traditionally supported a change in the nature of play at "name level", to something more like a builder sim. Oddly, it's one of the D&D traditions I like the most.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> My point, and apparently yours, is that a single way to use gold sucks because it forces the campaign into directions that might not be desirable for everyone.  I'm starting to think that "what you can do with money" is a keystone concept around which a large part of the game revolves.  By changing it, you change the game, and so you really have to know what you're doing in order to avoid trading one forced style of play for another.



 Right.

I like the idea of having a single liquid currency of reward. (As opposed to XP, which are not liquid.)

What I'd really like would be a system that allows PCs to spend this liquid currency to do whatever gives them a happy: buy another masterwork sword to replace the one that got sundered last adventure (= buy spotlight time in combat), or buy a Writ of Immunity from the Duke (= buy spotlight time out-of-combat), or whatever. Hell, they can give the gold to orphans and thus buy some "saving grace" points to save their butts when they bite off more than they can chew.

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Kraydak (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Just as long as that isn't the _only viable option_ for GP.
> 
> And as long as say, spending your money on a keep doesn't cripple you when you y'know, try to defend it from a dragon.
> 
> Peasant: "Well if only you had bought a +2 Icy Burst with that money you spent to get us plumbing!"




*blink*  *blink*  *blink*

As far as I can tell, for you, if there is *any* mechanically rewarding use for gold, then the mechanically rewarding uses for gold become the only viable options.  You feel than having restricted viable options is bad, and seem to be argueing that there should be no mechanically rewarding uses for gold.  Note that bribery is mechanically rewarding...

If there is a mechanically rewarding use for money, players will find it and spend money on the best investments.  Like the smart people their characters tend to be.  The only way to avoid people spending their money wisely is to not let there be anything wise to spend the money on.  Which, of course, means that no one has any use, at all, for money.  At least taxes would be low... not that anyone would mind paying them with the useless cash.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> As far as I can tell, for you, if there is *any* mechanically rewarding use for gold, then the mechanically rewarding uses for gold become the only viable options.



 I think he's saying that in 3.5e, the mechanical benefits are *so good* that it's irrational to spend gold on the common optimal choices, and that these choices are *so common* that they are assumed by monster and adventure designers.

That's what I'd say anyway. 

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Irda Ranger (Oct 15, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> But presumably you play what you enjoy, be it a guy that blows his money on outer planar hookers or mead from Kords own festhall or on another +3 sword. You can play a fighter/sorcerer/wizard/monk, despite that combo stinking, and take a bunch of garbage feats like stealthy and athletics. You play the style you enjoy. Its an option, even if its "sub optimal".



Not really, because even if you ignore the CR system you still have intra-party balance to worry about.  Non-spellcasters are hurt a lot worse by reduced equipage than spellcasters; so if you played a "low wealth" campaign you'd constantly be in the posistion of the Fighters and Rogues playing second fiddle to the Wizards and Clerics.  Heck, you'd be in the position of having a Fighter with Leadership playing second fiddle to his own Cleric cohort, despite the level difference between them.



			
				Nifft said:
			
		

> Ironically, the pleasure one feels at system mastery is part of what makes D&D -- or any other system -- addictive for some people.



I agree, but ...



			
				Nifft said:
			
		

> If WotC is smart (and they are) there will still be some of this in 4e.



Er, I'm not sure that's possible.  You either have to optimize, or you don't.  I don't think you can have a system with "a little optimization", any more than you can be a little pregnant.



			
				Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> A better question is, "should the rules assume a dominant mode of play?" Or perhaps "should there be a set of dominant modes of play that the rules assume and support better than others."



Yes.  

First, you must recognize that you simply *can't* cater to all tastes.  The guys who want to play Hackmaster simply aren't going to be pleased with Vampire; unless you change it so drastically that the people who used to be playing Vampire abandon the game, because it's not fun for _them_ any more.

Then, once you're realized that you simply can't cater to all tastes, you need to decide who you are going to cater to.  Are you going to try to please the char-gen optimizers and feat number-crunchers, or are you going to cater to the people who want to roll up a character with minimum fuss or stress and "get to the fun part" - i.e., killing orcs.

Once you've made that decision, only then can you design your game, and just do the best job you can.  When you come to a question about game design you just have to ask yourself "Which choice makes this game more fun for the people I have chosen to cater to."

Me, I'm definately in the "fast char gen, lots of in-game tactics and strategy" camp.  I hate, with a passion, character build optimization.  I hope 4e comes my way.  I'll hardly be too upset about it though, as I'm having fun with Iron Heroes now and SWSE looks cool, and even if 4e is a flop for me, I bet there will be salvagable ideas in there.

But don't pretend that it's even possible for everyone to be happy with the answer to the question "What will gold be for", because the answer to that question will be so intrinsic to the game system that I don't think it will be possible to provide a way for playing both "kind of like 1e" and "kind of like 3e".  One, or the other, or something new - but not all three.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> I think he's saying that in 3.5e, the mechanical benefits are *so good* that it's irrational to spend gold on the common optimal choices, and that these choices are *so common* that they are assumed by monster and adventure designers.
> 
> That's what I'd say anyway.
> 
> Cheers, -- N



Correct.  The game theorist in my agrees with you and he.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Er, I'm not sure that's possible.  You either have to optimize, or you don't.  I don't think you can have a system with "a little optimization", any more than you can be a little pregnant.



 Disagree. Even within D&D 3.5e, there are *degrees* of optimization.

As a counter example, I'd hold up Star Wars Saga Edition. It's a lot harder to make an ineffectual character by accident -- and probably harder to do so on purpose, too. People can contribute even if they are forced outside their specialized fields. Level matters more than equipment.

Cheers, -- N


----------



## Kraydak (Oct 15, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> I think he's saying that in 3.5e, the mechanical benefits are *so good* that it's irrational to spend gold on the common optimal choices, and that these choices are *so common* that they are assumed by monster and adventure designers.
> 
> That's what I'd say anyway.
> 
> Cheers, -- N




To which I reply that if you drop your return on investment much from 3ed (removing the purchasing of magic items, mainly), then gold completely devalues.  Because DnD power is personal rather than societal (high level people don't need armies, they *are* armies), people don't actually have anything to spend money on and so don't value it.  Instead, high level people work with a currency based on the +1 longsword rather than the gold piece, the magic item market reforms etc...

If you remove useful magic items altogether, you lose one of the basic (and succesful) design principles of DnD.

The question of what is gold useful for is a good one, but given DnD's power structure, the answer becomes "buying power" or "nothing" very fast.  Which is cool in its own right.  A "colonialism on crack" DnD world with high level characters playing the part of westerners wandering around a world filled with local (but to the HLCs irrelevant) potentates.  Without access to real power (levels) or wealth to which to bribe people with real power (magic items or gold to turn into items), the locals would be background while the HLCs duke it out over "natural resources" (adventuring sites).  Watching players try to come up with some amusing use (there is no practical one) for a few 100k gp might be fun.


----------



## Doug McCrae (Oct 15, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Are you going to try to please the char-gen optimizers and feat number-crunchers, or are you going to cater to the people who want to roll up a character with minimum fuss or stress and "get to the fun part" - i.e., killing orcs.



Or we could have a game where PCs are simple at the start, even providing package deals for players who want to avoid the small amount of initial char gen, but which increases in complexity as characters go up levels.

Y'know, like 3e D&D.


----------



## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> As far as I can tell, for you, if there is *any* mechanically rewarding use for gold, then the mechanically rewarding uses for gold become the only viable options.  You feel than having restricted viable options is bad, and seem to be argueing that there should be no mechanically rewarding uses for gold.  Note that bribery is mechanically rewarding...



Um, what?

I have spent several pages railing against the Bribe/Bling-Only argument because I think that some mechanical benefit and some combat enhancement is _good_.

How did you miss "As long as it's not the only option, and as long as not spending it on combat enhancement gimps other PCs"?


----------



## ruleslawyer (Oct 15, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Well, any genre except the ones in which gold is worth something.  Given that gold being worth something might be important to some people, and may even impact verisimilitude ("So, we killed the dragon, took its horde, and now we can't spend it on anything but ale and whores?  Are you nuts?"), I think that abandoning the concept of money entirely might not be the best idea.



My point was that the OPTION to run a game without needing to adhere to a particular standard distribution of wealth is an advantage of the removal of PC equipment dependency.


> Well, that's great if you care about that type of stuff.  But your Butt-Kicker archetype player isn't going to give a flumph's fart about building his own restaurant, or whatever..



If said "Butt-Kicker" is not interested in _buying things_, then why oh why does your Butt-Kicker archetype even give a rip about _money_? At the very least, he could use the money to hire mercenaries, if he wants some advantage in combat.

Amassing huge fortunes for the sake of increasing your ability to go out and amass huge fortunes isn't really a standard archetype of fantasy literature or movies, and it's not necessary to a well-functioning game engine. It also creates weird diseconomies. So why protest so much at the idea of PCs actually using money in game for purposes that have some verisimilitude?


----------



## ruleslawyer (Oct 15, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> To which I reply that if you drop your return on investment much from 3ed (removing the purchasing of magic items, mainly), then gold completely devalues.  Because DnD power is personal rather than societal (high level people don't need armies, they *are* armies), people don't actually have anything to spend money on and so don't value it.  Instead, high level people work with a currency based on the +1 longsword rather than the gold piece, the magic item market reforms etc...



To which I say fine (except that we're probably ditching the tradeable +1 longsword for the most part as well.) Money becomes a campaign element, much like strongholds, hirelings, and other assets. It's more interesting that way in any case.


----------



## Crazy Jerome (Oct 15, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> To which I reply that if you drop your return on investment much from 3ed (removing the purchasing of magic items, mainly), then gold completely devalues.  Because DnD power is personal rather than societal (high level people don't need armies, they *are* armies), people don't actually have anything to spend money on and so don't value it.  Instead, high level people work with a currency based on the +1 longsword rather than the gold piece, the magic item market reforms etc...
> 
> If you remove useful magic items altogether, you lose one of the basic (and succesful) design principles of DnD.
> 
> The question of what is gold useful for is a good one, but given DnD's power structure, the answer becomes "buying power" or "nothing" very fast.  Which is cool in its own right.  A "colonialism on crack" DnD world with high level characters playing the part of westerners wandering around a world filled with local (but to the HLCs irrelevant) potentates.  Without access to real power (levels) or wealth to which to bribe people with real power (magic items or gold to turn into items), the locals would be background while the HLCs duke it out over "natural resources" (adventuring sites).  Watching players try to come up with some amusing use (there is no practical one) for a few 100k gp might be fun.




Maybe the disconnects in this discussion are over terms.

The problem here is that we are using "gold" in the 3.5 sense to mean "wealth"--from buying that first basic longsword to the millions of gold pieces necessary to buy that 3.5 complete set of +5 everything, plus widgets.     But if we let wealth scale in that fashion, then we ignore the stages of wealth.  And 3.5 pretty much does ignore the stages.  At first level, by the RAW, you can be hurting a little for money, but the characters are hardly poor (usually).  By 2nd level, by the guidelines, the characters are already outfitted well.  By 4th, they have access to ever piece of mundane equipment they could possibly want, except for their own galley or such.

In D&D, there are potentially three useful layers of wealth.  I'll label them in D&D terms, but don't get too caught up in the labels.  I think the issue we are seeing is the way characters can accumulate a lot one layer which translates directly into something in a higher layer:

1. Copper/Silver Wealth - Where a character fits on the basic subsistence scale.  A guy without two coppers to rub together has to find a job with room and board just to stay afloat.  A guy rolling in silver has no mundane needs that aren't being met, but there are definite limits on what he can buy.  (He can hire a few guards long term, or a small army short term, but not more, for example.)

2. Gold/Platinum/Gem Wealth - Where a character fits in the "mover and shaker" scale.  Here, you can hire armies, build keeps, do extensive bribes, throw lavish parties, have your own information network, etc.  You can also buy any kind of minor magic that qualifies as a commodity.  This only translates into personal power indirectly, based on the character's skill (and luck) at using the wealth.

3. Major Item/Unique Treaure Wealth - Things that may not be exactly priceless, but nevertheless command a price way out of scale with what you would expect at first glance.  These are not commodities in any shape, form, or fashion.  Characters with this kind of wealth can translate it directly into personal power, when it isn't already.  That diamond as big as your fist isn't measured in "gold pieces".  It's measured in how good a magic sword you can trade for with it.

Here I'm using "minor" magic item to mean anything that you can buy as a commodity, and "major" magic item to mean anything you can't.  Necessarily, each group would draw the line in different places.  The only way you could spend "gold" to get a "major" item is for special story reason combined with a lot of it.  For example, you have 100,000 gold, and the wizard that has no liquid cash is willing to sell you that major sword for it, even though it's practically a steal.

D&D 3.5, especially the Magic Item Compendium with its reduced prices, works hard to collapse the distinction between the layers.  Even the near artifacts have prices.  But it doesn't have to be this way.  It's perfectly reasonable, for example, to have a campaign world where "+2 swords are a necessary part of every talented warriors equipment, but +3 swords and better are one-of-a-kind heirlooms, attainable only by force or by trading something equivalent."  In order for each DM to set that point where they want, you need a way to divorce "gold" from "major magic item acquisition".


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## Rechan (Oct 15, 2007)

ruleslawyer said:
			
		

> If said "Butt-Kicker" is not interested in _buying things_, then why oh why does your Butt-Kicker archetype even give a rip about _money_?



Because at current, the Butt-Kicker can spend money on making himself kick more butt. He's not amassing treasure to amass more treasure, he's upgrading so he can kill more stuff.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 15, 2007)

There's a GM in our group who loves the PCs-as-leaders bit. In his games we're forever finding ourselves as leaders of a crime gang, nation rulers, even (once) running a hotel in Sigil for a session.

I hate it. I keep trying to get rid of the responsibilities he puts on us. I enjoy the core D&D activities of exploration and monster bashing, which really is what I should be able to expect when I sign up for a game (so long as it's not Birthright).


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## ruleslawyer (Oct 15, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> In the *real* world, large numbers of weak goons can take small numbers of elite troops.  In *DnD* no number of lvl 1 goons can take a CR 15 entity.  If there are lvl 15 people running around, then having the ability to hire large number of lvl 1 people becomes politically irrelevant.  In RL, money buys power because you can (almost always) find people willing to fight for you if you pay them.  In DnD, gold buys power only if powerful people want gold.  For them to want gold, they need to have a use for gold.  Creature comforts don't count, because powerful people can simply *take* the creature comforts (if they do it through political channels, its called taxes).  DnD is a world with primative grunts with spears coexisting with mecha-pilots.  If there is no gold to xp/item equivilancy, then the grunts with spears use gold as a currency while the mecha pilots use intergalactic credits, with no currency exchange.  You won't be able to hire the mecha pilots with gold.  And, as mecha pilot trumps goon with spear, political power won't flow from a gold mine.



I think that's an extreme view of any campaign world. I'll avoid the economics essay, but suffice it to say that if low-level people care about creature comforts at all, then money has value. If money has value, and all high-level individuals aren't brigands or interested in running a government that provides necessary public goods (itself potentially a lot of work), then money has value even to those high-level folks. Moreover, unless you can fulfill all your demand for creature comforts yourself via magic or the like, you will either be an ascetic, a consumer, a governor, or rule an empire of slaves who labor to provide you with a life of luxury... kinda like it is already in fantasy literature.


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## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> There's a GM in our group who loves the PCs-as-leaders bit. In his games we're forever finding ourselves as leaders of a crime gang, nation rulers, even (once) running a hotel in Sigil for a session.



 Sucks for you. Hope at least one of the players is enjoying it... or y'all should stop letting that dude GM!

(My players are a mix -- one wants to foment a revolution, one wants to be an officer in the army, one just wants to _overland flight_ and _meteor swarm_ the site from orbit, since it's the only way to be sure.)

Cheers, -- N


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 15, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> All I'm saying is that the game has traditionally supported a change in the nature of play at "name level", to something more like a builder sim.



I don't think that's true. In 1e if you compare the page numbers devoted to controlling a stronghold to the pages devoted to going down dungeons, killing the inhabitants and taking their stuff I suspect the ratio would be 1:100 or worse.

Strongholds were supposed to be a very minor part of the game, a source of men-at-arms for your next dungeon trip. Or an excuse for more monster bashing.


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## ehren37 (Oct 15, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> Are you sure about that?




Lets see... Birthright is hardly heralded as a groundbreaking success. The Stronghold Builders Guidebook is ranked very low in sales on Amazon... we havent seen uch supplements in the way of this type of play for 3.5. So yeah, I'd say that style of play isnt terribly popular, and will continue to wane as the old wargaming grognards die off. Newer players who are interested in counting units of lumber will be drawn into computer strategy games.


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## Kraydak (Oct 15, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Um, what?
> 
> I have spent several pages railing against the Bribe/Bling-Only argument because I think that some mechanical benefit and some combat enhancement is _good_.
> 
> How did you miss "As long as it's not the only option, and as long as not spending it on combat enhancement gimps other PCs"?




You were complaining about someone getting penalised for not adequately investing in his personal gear, and not being able to defend his stuff.  If you replace investing in gear with investing in politics, then someone will get rolled because he spend his money on a collection of well painted minatures rather than political influence.  An argument that applies as long as there is *any* purchasable mechanical bonus.


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## Kraydak (Oct 15, 2007)

ruleslawyer said:
			
		

> I think that's an extreme view of any campaign world. I'll avoid the economics essay, but suffice it to say that if low-level people care about creature comforts at all, then money has value.



Say rather, money has value to low-level people.


> If money has value, and all high-level individuals aren't brigands or interested in running a government that provides necessary public goods (itself potentially a lot of work), then money has value even to those high-level folks. Moreover, unless you can fulfill all your demand for creature comforts yourself via magic or the like, you will either be an ascetic, a consumer, a governor, or rule an empire of slaves who labor to provide you with a life of luxury... kinda like it is already in fantasy literature.




This is where not having a mundance cash->personal power conversion gets really wierd.  Without such a conversion high level characters don't get any benefit from mundane wealth.  This means that a lvl 15 character who is the king of some place is *no more powerful* than a lvl 15 wanderer.  If anything, because he has a kingdom to defend, he is weaker.  In the same sense than a helpless dependent is a disadvantage in GURPS.  All the resources his kingdom produces... are meaningless in the calculus of a world where personal power trumps raving hordes.  If you want titles of nobility to mean things in DnD, you *need* a way to convert mundane wealth (taxes) to real power (which, in DnD, is largely equivalent to adventuring gear).


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## Nifft (Oct 15, 2007)

Here's my current thinking:

- Equipment should have limits on how much better it can make you.

- The best mundane equipment should be as expensive as many magic items.

- You should risk breaking your equipment when you use it.

Thus, being wealthy means you can easily replace your Masterwork sword when it gets Sundered -- you will remain effective. It should not mean you have a twice-as-good More Masterwork sword.

Wealth then becomes more like HP than like an Enhancement bonus. It keeps you in the fight rather than winning it sooner. (But on a strategic level, rather than a tactical one.)

Cheers, -- N


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## Rechan (Oct 16, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> You were complaining about someone getting penalised for not adequately investing in his personal gear, and not being able to defend his stuff.  If you replace investing in gear with investing in politics, then someone will get rolled because he spend his money on a collection of well painted minatures rather than political influence.  An argument that applies as long as there is *any* purchasable mechanical bonus.



No, because the purchase of an item that only gives a +1 or so to a stat, or raises a DC for spells by 1, does not mean the difference between Dead PC and Living PC. 

But a 15th level character with a +1 sword and a bag of holding in his keep is going to get ganked by a 15th level character with +4 weapons, armor, and ability boosters. 

There's a grand canyon between "I spent my loot to make my magic sword do 1d6 of flaming" and Naked Fighter vs. Magical Abrams Tank.

It's like you're saying my argument is "Because you don't let PCs have vorpal swords, you won't let them have weapons."


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> I don't think that's true. In 1e if you compare the page numbers devoted to controlling a stronghold to the pages devoted to going down dungeons, killing the inhabitants and taking their stuff I suspect the ratio would be 1:100 or worse.
> 
> Strongholds were supposed to be a very minor part of the game, a source of men-at-arms for your next dungeon trip. Or an excuse for more monster bashing.



I may have overstated things a little with the builder sim remark...

...even so, the holdings that 1e PC's eventually got weren't merely a good source of fodder --at least by my experiences-- they were a way shift the play imperatives away from strict dungeon crawling.


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Lets see... Birthright is hardly heralded as a groundbreaking success. The Stronghold Builders Guidebook is ranked very low in sales on Amazon... we havent seen uch supplements in the way of this type of play for 3.5. So yeah, I'd say that style of play isnt terribly popular, and will continue to wane as the old wargaming grognards die off. Newer players who are interested in counting units of lumber will be drawn into computer strategy games.



And most adventures didn't sell well in the 3.0/3.5 era. Does that mean D&D players no longer went on adventures (ie, sales figures don't necessarily prove anything here).

It's my experiences that D&D campaigns, regardless of edition, either moved away from straight dungeoncrawls as the PC's leveled, or they ended and the group started over.


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## Imp (Oct 16, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Here's my current thinking:
> 
> (snip)
> 
> ...



On point 2: Full plate, ships: what else would you add?  One thing I would add – another 3e house rule I've never gotten around to implementing – are advanced animals and mounts: a really fantastic horse that survives fights a normal horse wouldn't; a guard dog with phenomenally keen senses; etc.  Basically, class levels for animals.  I don't see why not.

On point 3: The main obstacle here is not a lack of rules so much as it's a pain to bring that into the adventure.  You'd have to simplify it a good deal to bother looking at that stuff.  People already complain about bookkeeping encumbrance; Diablo-style item durability points would be 80% ignored.  I'd like to see this too, no doubt, but how would you go about it so that it's both fairly easy, and fair?  It's a puzzle.


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## Lanefan (Oct 16, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> - You should risk breaking your equipment when you use it.





			
				Imp said:
			
		

> On point 3: The main obstacle here is not a lack of rules so much as it's a pain to bring that into the adventure.  You'd have to simplify it a good deal to bother looking at that stuff.  People already complain about bookkeeping encumbrance; Diablo-style item durability points would be 80% ignored.  I'd like to see this too, no doubt, but how would you go about it so that it's both fairly easy, and fair?  It's a puzzle.



It's easy; I've been doing this for years.

There's two ways (usually) to break items: 

1. Fumbles.  Introduce the idea of fumbles to the game - we use 1/d20 followed by 1/d6 gives a major fumble, and a roll where penalties bring it to 1/d20 or less followed by 1/d6 gives a minor fumble.  Then design a fumble table.  On a fumble, get the player to roll d% and you then tell them from the table what's happened.  Common results are damage self or friend, break weapon, drop (or throw) weapon, stumble and-or fall, etc.  Magic items get a save to avoid breaking, mundane ones do not.

2. Failed saves.  Every time a PC fails a save vs. area damage, *every* item that person is carrying should have to make a save based on what it's made of, how magical it is, and what type of damage it received.  3e nerfed this down such that only one item could ever break in any one incident and it needed a natural '1' on the save to do so (probably to save time, because this *can* be time consuming) and that's a shame.

Never mind that when magic items break all that magical energy stored within has to go somewhere...wild surges are always fun! 

Lanefan


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## Kraydak (Oct 16, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> No, because the purchase of an item that only gives a +1 or so to a stat, or raises a DC for spells by 1, does not mean the difference between Dead PC and Living PC.
> 
> But a 15th level character with a +1 sword and a bag of holding in his keep is going to get ganked by a 15th level character with +4 weapons, armor, and ability boosters.
> 
> ...




The difference in *price* between a +4 and a +5 weapon is large.  Not at much as another +4, but still large.  You can afford "good enough" (1 + down) and save huge sums to spend elsewhere.  The naked fighter vs abrams isn't a real scenario unless you are spending *all* your cash on non-adventuring stuff.  In which case, you *aren't* and adventurer and have *no* right to complain about profenssional adventurers out adventuring you


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## Nifft (Oct 16, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> 1. Fumbles.  Introduce the idea of fumbles to the game - we use 1/d20 followed by 1/d6 gives a major fumble, and a roll where penalties bring it to 1/d20 or less followed by 1/d6 gives a minor fumble.  Then design a fumble table.  On a fumble, get the player to roll d% and you then tell them from the table what's happened.  Common results are damage self or friend, break weapon, drop (or throw) weapon, stumble and-or fall, etc.  Magic items get a save to avoid breaking, mundane ones do not.



 Right. Determine how often you want weapons to break, and make a secondary mechanic based on that. Make it happen no more often than Critical Confirms, and the game won't slow down appreciably.



			
				Lanefan said:
			
		

> 2. Failed saves.  Every time a PC fails a save vs. area damage, *every* item that person is carrying should have to make a save based on what it's made of, how magical it is, and what type of damage it received.  3e nerfed this down such that only one item could ever break in any one incident and it needed a natural '1' on the save to do so (probably to save time, because this *can* be time consuming) and that's a shame.



 I actually like the idea behind the 3.5e rules -- only one of your items is going to bite it each "attack", so you have attrition rather than a sudden, "wait, I'm naked?!"

I also liked that the attacks would target items in a specific order -- so if you want to be sure to protect your robe, you always wear a cloak. I like that it gave some control to the players.

Still, the implementation left a LOT to be desired. 

Cheers, -- N


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## Nifft (Oct 16, 2007)

Imp said:
			
		

> On point 2: Full plate, ships: what else would you add?  One thing I would add – another 3e house rule I've never gotten around to implementing – are advanced animals and mounts: a really fantastic horse that survives fights a normal horse wouldn't; a guard dog with phenomenally keen senses; etc.  Basically, class levels for animals.  I don't see why not.



 I love the idea of animals with levels. That's brilliant, and solves a lot of issues.

I wasn't even thinking of ships, though -- fullplate, weapons and a well-trained mount should be really expensive. Particularly in a world where you get a level-based bonus to your Reflex defense, and thus don't strictly need armor to survive.



			
				Imp said:
			
		

> On point 3: The main obstacle here is not a lack of rules so much as it's a pain to bring that into the adventure.



 Four words: damage threshold + condition track. 

Cheers, -- N


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## Imp (Oct 16, 2007)

I eschew Pangeas, so ships have always been pretty important in my settings, and the interesting places don't have handy shuttles going back and forth, so procuring a ship and crew is usually a priority for PCs by about 6th level or so.

Re item breaking, the condition track is a good idea I think. I've avoided fumbles in 3e because they screw high-level characters with many attacks – in 4e that may not be a problem.  (In a very detailed system it would be interesting to have fumble results as an additional balancing lever for weapons: flails/ early gunpowder/ exotics vs. good ol' spears/ maces/ axes springs to mind...)  The failed-save item-nuke was "RAW" in 1e, wasn't it?  But I never used it then because it was always a pain to look up that table.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 16, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> Or we could have a game where PCs are simple at the start, even providing package deals for players who want to avoid the small amount of initial char gen, but which increases in complexity as characters go up levels.
> 
> Y'know, like 3e D&D.



That's just as bad.  Whether you spend 2 hours at character creation or "just" an hour every time you level up, you're still "wasting your time" on "stuff that doesn't matter."

That's really how I feel.  Every minute spent thinking about the rules "as rules" is a minute wasted.  I could have spend that minute "in the game", doing "stuff that matters", like "killing orcs."

I hope 4e allows me to spend _as little time as humanly possible_ on character design and character sheet maintenance.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 16, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> This is where not having a mundance cash->personal power conversion gets really wierd.  Without such a conversion high level characters don't get any benefit from mundane wealth.  This means that a lvl 15 character who is the king of some place is *no more powerful* than a lvl 15 wanderer.  If anything, because he has a kingdom to defend, he is weaker.  In the same sense than a helpless dependent is a disadvantage in GURPS.  All the resources his kingdom produces... are meaningless in the calculus of a world where personal power trumps raving hordes.  If you want titles of nobility to mean things in DnD, you *need* a way to convert mundane wealth (taxes) to real power (which, in DnD, is largely equivalent to adventuring gear).



First, you spell "weird" incorrectly.  Sorry; it's the drafter in me.

Second, I really disagree that there's no benefit from "mundane wealth."  That's 100% dependent on the campaign you want to play in.  As a for instance, a 15th level King *is *more powerful than a 15th level wanderer in most situations other than one-on-one combat.  A King can simply have the wanderer arrested, or killed, or have his assets seized and his family arrested.  The 15th level wanderer is a bit like Rambo (he has more options for fighting back than a 1st level Commoner), but that doesn't make him *immune *to the power of the King's "mundane" wealth.

Also, imagine a setting where the PC's are the heroes of "the Realm", and they learn than HORDE of demons / orcs / whatever are about to descend on their fair land.  No matter how powerful they are, they can't win against 10,000 opponents without the aid of an army; you only get 4 attacks per round.  Even if your PC is unkillable from the point-of-view of the common orc warrior, 100 orcs can pin you while the other 9,900 sack the city and rape all the villagers.  

The whole "four encounters per day" and "fight a monster equal to your party's CR" and all that other b-s that 3e has mind-washed the community with has really been poisonous to a lot of people's ability to see a larger context.  Sometimes "mundane" wealth is more powerful than any 9th level spell.  Sometimes you need an army.

I'm not saying that everyone needs to play that way (I'm sorry for Doug McCrae being forced to be a Innkeeper), but some of us do.  We like the larger context than "kill things; take stuff; upgrade longsword."  That just seems like a very small world to me.  I hope 4e comes back to the larger context, because 3e has just about ruined my type of gaming.


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## WayneLigon (Oct 16, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> 1) The game assumes you're optimized. If you don't x magic item by level y, you are going to get your clock cleaned. I don't think someone should have to sacrifice, well, effectiveness for playing sub-optimally. Reminds me of the party whose only healer was a Cleric2/Pal3 and whose only caster was a Sor2/rogue3 (choices made because it fit their character) and they got their _clocks cleaned regularly_ because the DM threw standard 5th level challenges at them.




The game also assumes you have a DM who is not a secret clockwork mechanism only pretending to be human. If they got their clocks cleaned, it's because the GM isn't doing his job, which is to provide an exciting play experience while at the same time watching the other spinning plates to make sure they don't crash.

It all depends on the GMing. Right now, we're in the middle of an Eberron campaign. They're 12th level, facing EL 12h-14 challenges. They have no pure arcane caster, no pure rogue, and no pure fighter. Their A#1 best magic weapon is a +2 Holy longsword and their best defensive item is a Ring of Protection +2. We don't suffer regular TPKs because I keep a careful watch on what resources they have and I pay attention to how well or badly they do in various encounters.


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## Nifft (Oct 16, 2007)

Imp said:
			
		

> I eschew Pangeas, so ships have always been pretty important in my settings, and the interesting places don't have handy shuttles going back and forth, so procuring a ship and crew is usually a priority for PCs by about 6th level or so.



 Okay, so we're talking a skirmish-scale schooner rather than a gargantuan galleon... cool, yeah, those should run about the same price range as a Carpet of Flying, give or take a factor of two. 



			
				Imp said:
			
		

> Re item breaking, the condition track is a good idea I think. I've avoided fumbles in 3e because they screw high-level characters with many attacks – in 4e that may not be a problem. [...] But I never used it then because it was always a pain to look up that table.



 My thinking is similar. I don't want any extra tables, just something like:
- "You cracked your sword!"
- "The tip of your blade has snapped off! The remaining portion is sharp but no longer well balanced."
- "You could use a new sword."

... so the player has ample warning and can grab a new one off one of his vanquished foes.

Cheers, -- N


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## Kraydak (Oct 16, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> First, you spell "weird" incorrectly.  Sorry; it's the drafter in me.



Ooops, thanks.  I'm sure I'll forget   



> Second, I really disagree that there's no benefit from "mundane wealth."  That's 100% dependent on the campaign you want to play in.  As a for instance, a 15th level King *is *more powerful than a 15th level wanderer in most situations other than one-on-one combat.  A King can simply have the wanderer arrested, or killed, or have his assets seized and his family arrested.  The 15th level wanderer is a bit like Rambo (he has more options for fighting back than a 1st level Commoner), but that doesn't make him *immune *to the power of the King's "mundane" wealth.



Explain to me how "mundane" (meaning low level) forces will arrest or kill a lvl 15 character.  His family, maybe, but that leaves the entire kingdom open to vengeance.


> Also, imagine a setting where the PC's are the heroes of "the Realm", and they learn than HORDE of demons / orcs / whatever are about to descend on their fair land.  No matter how powerful they are, they can't win against 10,000 opponents without the aid of an army; you only get 4 attacks per round.  Even if your PC is unkillable from the point-of-view of the common orc warrior, 100 orcs can pin you while the other 9,900 sack the city and rape all the villagers.
> 
> The whole "four encounters per day" and "fight a monster equal to your party's CR" and all that other b-s that 3e has mind-washed the community with has really been poisonous to a lot of people's ability to see a larger context.  Sometimes "mundane" wealth is more powerful than any 9th level spell.  Sometimes you need an army.



In a fight between a lvl 15 adventuring party and *every* CR3- in the entire world, the smart money is on the lvl 15s.  As long as the CR3-s don't engage in reproduction, of course, which would result in a stalemate until the adventurers died of old age (CR3-=no xp/worthy=no gaining access to longevity magic).  It would be a long battle, involving many retreats to sleep and reload spells, but the victor is clear.


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## pemerton (Oct 16, 2007)

A'koss said:
			
		

> Either you curb what magic you can buy on the open market, which opens up other spending options at higher levels or you accept the fact that PCs won't spend large sums of money on anything else, no matter how much they may want to.



Isn't there another option, of changing magic so that the mechanical advantage of purchasing magic items does not radically outstrip the advantages of other forms of expenditure.

A simple example: the typical cost of a bribe should not be out of whack of the typical cost of a wand of charm person.

A more complex example: the expenditure required to maintain a healer servitor in one's stronghold shouldn't be out of whack with the cost of a wand of cure light wounds.

And an inference: if nothing non-magical can give the mechanical advantage of a +6 sword, then (on this line of thinking) there should be no +6 swords in the game.


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## JDJblatherings (Oct 16, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> Gold isn't for anything. It doesn't exist in Lord of the Rings type games.




Ever read  "The Hobbit" ?  Gold is a motivator for a lot of that book.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 16, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> Explain to me how "mundane" (meaning low level) forces will arrest or kill a lvl 15 character.  His family, maybe, but that leaves the entire kingdom open to vengeance.



Probably the same way a chubby rent-a-cop arrests Chuck Norris - Chucks lets him put the cuffs on because, even though he could kill the rotund fool with one hand, the consequences of such an action are unacceptable.  As a simple example, my wife's 8th level assassin character in my current campaign can kill any Guardsman in Waterdeep, but she isn't interested in banishment from the city, so she doesn't.

But that's neither really here nor there; I already conceded that the 15th level "Man with no name" really is a bit of a loose wrecking ball - but that's the difference between "The King can do nothing" and "the King can really piss me off."



			
				Kraydak said:
			
		

> In a fight between a lvl 15 adventuring party and *every* CR3- in the entire world, the smart money is on the lvl 15s.  As long as the CR3-s don't engage in reproduction, of course, which would result in a stalemate until the adventurers died of old age (CR3-=no xp/worthy=no gaining access to longevity magic).  It would be a long battle, involving many retreats to sleep and reload spells, but the victor is clear.



You totally missed my point.  The 15th level group simply can't kill all the orcs before the orcs totally sack, loot, rape and pillage their way through the Kingdom.  It just doesn't matter that the PC's can kill them eventually ("Just hold still, darn it!"), the PC's simply don't have enough hours in the day to do it themselves.

And what is this "Rest and reload spells" you speak of?  Are the Orcs giving the PC's a break to recup out of some sense of fair play, or are the PC's Teleporting away to safety for 8 hours, leaving the Kingdom defenseless in the mean time?


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## Reynard (Oct 16, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> You totally missed my point.  The 15th level group simply can't kill all the orcs before the orcs totally sack, loot, rape and pillage their way through the Kingdom.  It just doesn't matter that the PC's can kill them eventually ("Just hold still, darn it!"), the PC's simply don't have enough hours in the day to do it themselves.
> 
> And what is this "Rest and reload spells" you speak of?  Are the Orcs giving the PC's a break to recup out of some sense of fair play, or are the PC's Teleporting away to safety for 8 hours, leaving the Kingdom defenseless in the mean time?




I want to run this now -- a 15th level party takes exception to existence of a nation and decides to do something about it.


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## AllisterH (Oct 16, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> And most adventures didn't sell well in the 3.0/3.5 era. Does that mean D&D players no longer went on adventures (ie, sales figures don't necessarily prove anything here).
> 
> It's my experiences that D&D campaigns, regardless of edition, either moved away from straight dungeoncrawls as the PC's leveled, or they ended and the group started over.




Still, given how "poorly" Birthright did in 2E, I'd be surprised if players are actually interested in that.

Make no mistake, the Birthright rules on running a kingdom and how to run a game like that are VERY well done but it just seems like few were interested in that.


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## glass (Oct 16, 2007)

Treebore said:
			
		

> Not to mention totally destroy my verisimilitude.



How so?

I'm hoping the WoL mechanics are not let anywhere near 4e (on account of their being awful), but the overall concept of magic items that are more potent with a more potent wielder seems fine to me.



glass.


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## Nifft (Oct 16, 2007)

glass said:
			
		

> the overall concept of magic items that are more potent with a more potent wielder seems fine to me.



 +5 appeal to historical authority: like the rings of power in Tolkien. 

Cheers, -- N


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## Kraydak (Oct 16, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Probably the same way a chubby rent-a-cop arrests Chuck Norris - Chucks lets him put the cuffs on because, even though he could kill the rotund fool with one hand, the consequences of such an action are unacceptable.  As a simple example, my wife's 8th level assassin character in my current campaign can kill any Guardsman in Waterdeep, but she isn't interested in banishment from the city, so she doesn't.



Now put her, rather than in Waterdeep, in a city with *only* low level guardsmen and up her level some, to the point where she can take *every* guardsman in the city at the same time...  She doesn't have to kill them for them to be utter unable (and especially unwilling) to try and arrest her.


> You totally missed my point.  The 15th level group simply can't kill all the orcs before the orcs totally sack, loot, rape and pillage their way through the Kingdom.  It just doesn't matter that the PC's can kill them eventually ("Just hold still, darn it!"), the PC's simply don't have enough hours in the day to do it themselves.
> 
> And what is this "Rest and reload spells" you speak of?  Are the Orcs giving the PC's a break to recup out of some sense of fair play, or are the PC's Teleporting away to safety for 8 hours, leaving the Kingdom defenseless in the mean time?




If the PCs got any advance warning, they could stop the army far enough out (Control Weather FTW), otherwise you lose a border city or town.  (talk of armies capable of stopping 100k hordes kind up assumes *large* kingdoms anyways)


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 16, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Here's my current thinking:




- Equipment should have limits on how much better it can make you.
*Agree! But mostly because I'd like to see all "non-mandatory" bonuses scaled back to a +5 cap. (That is to say, my reasoning is not, "Because equipment can only make you so good.")*

- The best mundane equipment should be as expensive as many magic items.
*Agree!*

- You should risk breaking your equipment when you use it.
*Disagree!*

Thus, being wealthy means you can easily replace your Masterwork sword when it gets Sundered -- you will remain effective. It should not mean you have a twice-as-good More Masterwork sword. Wealth then becomes more like HP than like an Enhancement bonus. 
*Hmm... That is a pretty interesting take...*


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## Terraism (Oct 16, 2007)

Rechan said:
			
		

> Because at current, the Butt-Kicker can spend money on making himself kick more butt. He's not amassing treasure to amass more treasure, he's upgrading so he can kill more stuff.





			
				Kraydak said:
			
		

> The naked fighter vs abrams isn't a real scenario unless you are spending *all* your cash on non-adventuring stuff.  In which case, you *aren't* and adventurer and have *no* right to complain about profenssional adventurers out adventuring you



Here's where I've got a question for you both.  Why?  Why is the Butt-Kicker upgrading so he can kill more stuff?  Why do Kraydak's "professional adventurers" adventure professionally - what are they _after_?  I mean, nobody regularly puts themselves in highly-lethal situations regularly unless they're getting something they _want_ out of it.


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## Hussar (Oct 16, 2007)

Terraism said:
			
		

> Here's where I've got a question for you both.  Why?  Why is the Butt-Kicker upgrading so he can kill more stuff?  Why do Kraydak's "professional adventurers" adventure professionally - what are they _after_?  I mean, nobody regularly puts themselves in highly-lethal situations regularly unless they're getting something they _want_ out of it.





Did you miss the "Butt kicker" tag?  He's adventuring solely for the pleasure of kicking someone's ass.  It's pure metagame and has no real justification in game.  And, it doesn't need any because, if he's really a Butt-Kicker, in game justifications mean diddly to him.


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## Kraydak (Oct 16, 2007)

Terraism said:
			
		

> Here's where I've got a question for you both.  Why?  Why is the Butt-Kicker upgrading so he can kill more stuff?  Why do Kraydak's "professional adventurers" adventure professionally - what are they _after_?  I mean, nobody regularly puts themselves in highly-lethal situations regularly unless they're getting something they _want_ out of it.




Fun.  Adventurers are probably adrenaline junkies.
Power.  With levels and gear comes power.  People seeking to perfect themselves and their skills are in genre.
Wealth.  High level characters carry the wealth of nation on their backs.  They leave the wealth of cities behind in the dungeon because its too much trouble to carry out.
Fame.  Celebrity can be a goal in and of itself.
Vengeance.  Campaign specific.
Divine Command.  Religion specific.
*shrug* There are lots of potential reasons.  DMing becomes hard if the players don't choose compatable (or any) goals.  Why do RL adventurers adventure?  (I don't really know, I'm not one of them)


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## Greg K (Oct 16, 2007)

Hussar said:
			
		

> Did you miss the "Butt kicker" tag?  He's adventuring solely for the pleasure of kicking someone's ass.  It's pure metagame and has no real justification in game.  And, it doesn't need any because, if he's really a Butt-Kicker, in game justifications mean diddly to him.




If in game justification means nothing to him, the groups that I know would remove him. Problem solved  and the butt kicker is free to find a group that caters to his style.


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## Greg K (Oct 16, 2007)

WayneLigon said:
			
		

> The game also assumes you have a DM who is not a secret clockwork mechanism only pretending to be human. If they got their clocks cleaned, it's because the GM isn't doing his job, which is to provide an exciting play experience while at the same time watching the other spinning plates to make sure they don't crash.




QFT.  I don't know why this point seems to get missed so often.


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## Nebulous (Oct 16, 2007)

Atlatl Jones said:
			
		

> To blow on ale and whores!




A mandatory 10% of all earnings deducted by the DM every game month.  To simulate the party's wanton lasciviousness.


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## ehren37 (Oct 16, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> And most adventures didn't sell well in the 3.0/3.5 era. Does that mean D&D players no longer went on adventures (ie, sales figures don't necessarily prove anything here).  It's my experiences that D&D campaigns, regardless of edition, either moved away from straight dungeoncrawls as the PC's leveled, or they ended and the group started over.




Thats a poor conclusion. I've provided evidence that the empire builer campaign was a worse sdeller than OTHER types of campaigns. That books on stronghold building were worse sellers than books on character building. Heroes of Horror SOld better than Heroes of Battle. I'm providing evidence... outside of JUST my personal experience, that people arent very interested in running these sorts of games compared to standard dungeon crawls.


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## ehren37 (Oct 16, 2007)

Terraism said:
			
		

> Here's where I've got a question for you both.  Why?  Why is the Butt-Kicker upgrading so he can kill more stuff?  Why do Kraydak's "professional adventurers" adventure professionally - what are they _after_?  I mean, nobody regularly puts themselves in highly-lethal situations regularly unless they're getting something they _want_ out of it.




Power in and of itself. 
Honestly, were I D&D, I wouldnt even dream of telling my Billy Butt Kicker to take a hike... that his dolla isnt welcome here. There just arent enough of Eddie Empire Builder or Freddy Fluff to float the game. D&D has historically been a game of avatar empowerment. Outside of forums, where everyone pulls on their frilly "RP'er than Thou" shirts, a huge portion of the games played revolve around kicking ass and taking names (and treasure).

Look at what books sell: character power up books. Oh, and a little something called the magic item compendium... chalk full of those things "real RP'ers" supposedly dont care about.  While I'm sure many would drool over a book of fluff only feats like "Never have a bad hair day", I think WOTC should cater to their player base.


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> I've provided evidence that the empire builer campaign was a worse sdeller than OTHER types of campaigns.



Purchasing != running.



> I'm providing evidence... outside of JUST my personal experience, that people arent very interested in running these sorts of games compared to standard dungeon crawls.



Personal experience is nice when more external evidence is unreliable or contradictory. Where's your evidence that standard dungeon crawls are popular, in light the the overall poor sales of modules?


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## ehren37 (Oct 16, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> Purchasing != running.
> 
> Personal experience is nice when more external evidence is unreliable or contradictory. Where's your evidence that standard dungeon crawls are popular, in light the the overall poor sales of modules?




Ok, then by your bizarro logic, I guess people are just buying those other types of books, then sacraficing them to their little shrines to appease the divine gods of out-dated game styles, in the hope that their mills generate extra units of flour per month.

If you want to draw a conclusion from adventure sales, compare adventure sales where the topic is based around army management to dungeon crawl adventure sales. THEN you'd have some evidence. See what style sells better overall. Of course, you'd have to find some ... But I'm sure with the staggering demand for that play style you should be able to find plenty of exmaples eh?

I've provided both anecdotal and some measure of empircal evidence that keep building and bean counting "adventuring" isnt in favor. You've provided some anecdotal evidence. Umm... balls in your court chief, cuz by my count, our personal experiences pretty much counter one another.


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## AllisterH (Oct 16, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> Purchasing != running.
> 
> 
> Personal experience is nice when more external evidence is unreliable or contradictory. Where's your evidence that standard dungeon crawls are popular, in light the the overall poor sales of modules?




Um, I think you're focusing on the wrond thing here Mallus.

Birthright was arguably the weakest selling campaign setting that TSR ever tried in the 2E era. Even spelljammer sold better apparently. Hell, did the BATTLESYSTEM have ANY fans back in the day?

I haven't seen the figures but I'm not surprised that Heroes of Battle sold worse than Heroes of Horror. 

The thing is, WOTC/TSR has TRIED (and Birthright, I stand by its quality as I remember it) to get D&D players interested in Keep/Castle/Empire running but it just doesn't seem like people want it.

Just because people play and love RPGS like Baldur's Gate, doesn't mean they are going to be fans of games of the Masters of Orion genre (what _IS_ the name for that genre?).


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

ruleslawyer said:
			
		

> My point was that the OPTION to run a game without needing to adhere to a particular standard distribution of wealth is an advantage of the removal of PC equipment dependency.
> If said "Butt-Kicker" is not interested in _buying things_, then why oh why does your Butt-Kicker archetype even give a rip about _money_? At the very least, he could use the money to hire mercenaries, if he wants some advantage in combat.
> 
> Amassing huge fortunes for the sake of increasing your ability to go out and amass huge fortunes isn't really a standard archetype of fantasy literature or movies, and it's not necessary to a well-functioning game engine. It also creates weird diseconomies. So why protest so much at the idea of PCs actually using money in game for purposes that have some verisimilitude?



Because not everyone cares about having a simulationist-friendly economy, and instead feel that buying a really kick-ass sword is lots of fun.  Also, I'm not protesting it.  I'm protesting the notion that the butt-kickers should be left in the cold.  Remove magic item dependency with a scalpel, not an axe.  If it can be arranged so that if you spend all your gold on magic items, you're not a total combat monster compared to the player who spent all his gold on an antique tea service, you don't have to remove mechanical advantages from the list of things gold is for.


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## cignus_pfaccari (Oct 16, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> Just because people play and love RPGS like Baldur's Gate, doesn't mean they are going to be fans of games of the Masters of Orion genre (what _IS_ the name for that genre?).




4x, I think...I forget what the Xs are, though.  EXplore, EXterminate, EXpand, etc.

And, yes, running a D&D game like it's a game of Civ is not for everyone.  (Apparently my DM, who changed the rules on us just as my guild network was about to take off...)

It's a pity that Birthright didn't sell that well, the materials were very well-done and it was a great world for adventuring.

Brad


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Sucks for you. Hope at least one of the players is enjoying it... or y'all should stop letting that dude GM!
> 
> (My players are a mix -- one wants to foment a revolution, one wants to be an officer in the army, one just wants to _overland flight_ and _meteor swarm_ the site from orbit, since it's the only way to be sure.)
> 
> Cheers, -- N



I'm kind of funny that way.  When I play characters, I've been all those things, but I do them one at a time.  I tend to make very genre-focused characters.  When I'm nuking things from orbit, I don't want to think about talking to the rebel army or raising funds to support my trade syndicate.  And vice versa.


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> Um, I think you're focusing on the wrond thing here Mallus.



My point's gotten a little muddied, yes. I'll try and clean it up... I didn't intend to come off as a staunch defender of the Birthright setting, seeing as I never played it.... 

My position is that D&D campaigns typically either increase in scope as the PC's level, or they end. This increase in scope can include, but certainly isn't limited to, builder-sim elements, and this mode of play was supported to some degree as far back as 1e AD&D. Stated more generally, the PC's game more influence over the setting (which doesn't necessarily mean they start building flour mills willy-nilly...). And in these modes of play, a 'mundane' resource like gold becomes more important as the PC's level, because they have increased opportunity to purchase control/influence over the game environment.

You could just as easily say they're buying the plot (and not grain mills). Which is what I should have done in the first place.

edit: I should add, I'm not necessarily knocking '20 levels+ of dungeon crawls'/'pure power-up campaigns'. I've just never seen them work. Either the play imperatives/player goals shifted over time, or the campaign's narrative goal was met, or the game died.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

Terraism said:
			
		

> Here's where I've got a question for you both.  Why?  Why is the Butt-Kicker upgrading so he can kill more stuff?




Because he's a butt-kicker.  He's playing the game so he can kill stuff.  That's the definition of the butt-kicker.  Killing stuff is an end in itself.  He keeps buying better gear so he can kill stronger enemies.  Being more powerful is an end in itself.  He is rewarded by getting a kick-ass sword, and then rewarded again by using that sword to kick butt.

Butt kickers like to level up, and they like to get new gear.  It's a style of play, and one that 3.x supports very, very well.  However, if we want 4E to support other styles, it should not just abandon this style in order to do so.



> Why do Kraydak's "professional adventurers" adventure professionally - what are they _after_?  I mean, nobody regularly puts themselves in highly-lethal situations regularly unless they're getting something they _want_ out of it.



Yeah they do.  What the heck do you think "extreme sports" is about?  People jump out of airplanes in order to have jumped out of airplanes.  They climb mountains in order to have climbed mountains.  They jump motorcycles over flaming buses, sometimes.  That people die doing these things only makes them more attractive.  It's reasonable to think that a proportion of the adventurer population are in it for the adrenaline.


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> I've provided evidence that the empire builer campaign was a worse sdeller than OTHER types of campaigns.



Sales evidence can be inconclusive given the do-it-yourself nature of the hobby. The fact that a pirate-themed campaign book sold poorly doesn't prove that D&D players don't like playing pirates. It proves that they didn't buy/like the pirate book.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 16, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> the Masters of Orion genre (what _IS_ the name for that genre?).



"Awesome."

Sometimes known as Chiang-Quai, meaning "the genre that is better than all the others."

Less commonly referred to, by infidels, as "4X" - Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate.


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> Less commonly referred to, by infidels, as "4X" - Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate.



Thanks... for the life of me I couldn't remember "exploit".


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

Greg K said:
			
		

> If in game justification means nothing to him, the groups that I know would remove him. Problem solved  and the butt kicker is free to find a group that caters to his style.



That doesn't make any sense in the context of the thread.  The issue is not whether a given group does or does not cater to the butt-kicker style.  The issue is whether the edition does, and whether it also caters to other styles.  The problem with 3.x--perhaps a tacit assumption of the thread--is that it caters too strongly to butt-kickers at the expense of other styles.  However, some posters are advocating a complete abandonment of butt-kicking in favour of lumber counting, court intriguing, or doily purchasing.  Some of us, myself included, are arguing that doing so would be taking things too far in the other direction.  Certainly, various play styles should be supported by the mechanics, but butt-kicking should be one of those styles (and it is inconceivable to me that it might be evicted from D&D, so I don't think the butt-kickers have much to fear).

This all revolves around the question of what gold is for; for the butt-kicker, the answer is "buying things that let me kick more butt."  Butt-kicking is a perfectly valid playstyle, and whether your own group is interested in it is irrelevant to the discussion.


----------



## Kraydak (Oct 16, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> "Awesome."
> 
> Sometimes known as Chiang-Quai, meaning "the genre that is better than all the others."




Amen.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 16, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Butt kickers [...]  It's a style of play, and one that 3.x supports very, very well.  However, if we want 4E to support other styles, it should not just abandon this style in order to do so.



 Very much agree.

Butt-kicking has been one of the few central attributes of D&D in all its incarnations, and indeed in pretty much all RPGs that I've enjoyed ever (including Mage). D&D needs to keep its support for this play style.

And grow support for other play-styles, too. Butt-kicking is necessary, but not sufficient.

Cheers, -- N


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> Butt-kicking is necessary, but not sufficient.



True + succinct = win!


----------



## Reynard (Oct 16, 2007)

Greg K said:
			
		

> QFT.  I don't know why this point seems to get missed so often.




So if the PCs don't win, the DM isn't doing his job?  I have to vehemently disagree.  First of all, the DM is not solely responsible for everyone's fun -- everyone is responsible for everyone's fun; it just so happens that the DM gets the bigger part of that responsibility, commesurate with his responsibility over the game and his power over it.  Second of all, PCs losing a fight, having to run or otherwise "not winning" does not equal "not fun" all the time.  And third, the players are responsible for running their characters and interacting with the world and situations.  They make choices at every level of interaction with the game.  Assuming those are informed choices, the results are as much the responsibilities of the players as they are the rules, the dice and the DM.


----------



## Clavis (Oct 16, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Look at what books sell: character power up books. Oh, and a little something called the magic item compendium... chalk full of those things "real RP'ers" supposedly dont care about.  While I'm sure many would drool over a book of fluff only feats like "Never have a bad hair day", I think WOTC should cater to their player base.




Of course, heroin sells pretty well too, but I don't think anyone thinks its a good idea to promote that.

Just because something sells doesn't mean it's actually good for the players, or the hobby. In my experience the overdone PCs who are dripping with powers and magic items get seriously boring very quickly. Players _think_ they want to play those characters, but if they have any maturity at all they'll get bored at the lack of challenge. Extreme super-powers are addictive, but ultimately game-destroying.


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## Greg K (Oct 16, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> So if the PCs don't win, the DM isn't doing his job?




No. A DM that fails to take into  the capabilities of the characters when designing challenges is not doing their job. If necessary, the DM should be making adjustments to fit their game. One wouldn't expect a DM of a low magic campaign to be throwing in monsters only capable of being hit only  by +5 weapons if the best item in the party is +1 unless either there is some other way to defeat the monster or the monster serves some purpose other than to fight.  So, why shouldn't the DM be adjusting the challenges  for a party in which all or some of the characters are not optimized to the default assumption of core?


----------



## SpiderMonkey (Oct 16, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> Of course, heroin sells pretty well too, but I don't think anyone thinks its a good idea to promote that.
> 
> Just because something sells doesn't mean it's actually good for the players, or the hobby. In my experience the overdone PCs who are dripping with powers and magic items get seriously boring very quickly. Players _think_ they want to play those characters, but if they have any maturity at all they'll get bored at the lack of challenge. Extreme super-powers are addictive, but ultimately game-destroying.




False analogy: just because you don't like an element of the game does not make it like heroin.  Not analogous at all.

Just because something sells, from a business standpoint, is reason enough to sell it.  WOTC is not a social service organization.  Whether or not it's "good for the players or hobby" is not relevant.  You seem to be using these terms to conflate your opinion with what is good for the hobby.  Again, not analogous.


----------



## AllisterH (Oct 16, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> "Awesome."
> 
> Sometimes known as Chiang-Quai, meaning "the genre that is better than all the others."
> 
> Less commonly referred to, by infidels, as "4X" - Explore, Expand, Exploit, Exterminate.




HEH. Thanks.

So what is Masters of Orion 3 and Star Control 3 then called? The Uwe Bolls?

re: *Sell things players want*

I'm not so sure this is a good thing and WOTC itself recognizes that. For example, in MTG, there's a restricted list of cards that they'll never reprint even though  they would sell like gangbusters but for the lonterm health of M:TG, WOTC will never reprint them.

So, no, what sells wonderfully might NOT be in the best interests of WOTC.


----------



## Clavis (Oct 16, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> False analogy: just because you don't like an element of the game does not make it like heroin.  Not analogous at all.
> 
> Just because something sells, from a business standpoint, is reason enough to sell it.  WOTC is not a social service organization.  Whether or not it's "good for the players or hobby" is not relevant.  You seem to be using these terms to conflate your opinion with what is good for the hobby.  Again, not analogous.




But _my hobby_ is _not _a business. And I don't have to buy something just because it would be good for WOTC's business if I did buy it. I will choose to buy something based on whether or not it's _good for the game_. Furthermore, I am more likely to want to buy game materials written by people who I believe care about the game, and not their bottom line.

My original point was that just because somethings sells doesn't mean it's right to sell it. My analogy wasn't false at all. Yes, I'm one of those who believes corporations ought to care about things other than money. I care about whether or not game-destroying materials are sold as official, because it directly impacts the expectations of new players.


----------



## Kraydak (Oct 16, 2007)

I personally think that Empire building is a bad match for table top RPGs.  The demand on the DM is far greater than in a dungeon crawl campaign (who needs to run many non-allied factions simultaneously, with far more power at his immediate disposal).  Such games run a far greater risk of becoming a mother-may-I or railroads.  While there may be individual DMs and groups up to it, empire building is a niche market at best.

The obvious solution is splitting the DMing load by going to an MMORPG system with every faction being run by players.  It has been tried, and to my knowledge (I haven't made a detailed study) the only succesful one is EVE-Online.  Which, market scale-wise doesn't even register as a blip on WoW's bootkicking scale.  Some of that is EVE's mediocre design, mind, but the difference in numbers is striking, as has been the failure of every other PvP based player run faction MMORPG I've ever heard of.


----------



## SpiderMonkey (Oct 16, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> But _my hobby_ is _not _a business. And I don't have to buy something just because it would be good for WOTC's business if I did buy it. I will choose to buy something based on whether or not it's _good for the game_. Furthermore, I am more likely to want to buy game materials written by people who I believe care about the game, and not their bottom line.
> 
> My original point was that just because somethings sells doesn't mean it's right to sell it. My analogy wasn't false at all. Yes, I'm one of those who believes corporations ought to care about things other than money. I care about whether or not game-destroying materials are sold as official, because it directly impacts the expectations of new players.




And if there are enough people who agree with you, their buying practices will impact those sales, and the vendor will have to react accordingly.  I like having options.  I don't want somebody deciding what's good for me or my hobby, and getting rid of options based on those subjective *value judgements*

However, *my* point is that conflating your opinion with what is "good for gaming" (whatever that means) is a false analogy, and pretty much labelling other playstyles as wrong.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> Players _think_ they want to play those characters, but if they have any maturity at all they'll get bored at the lack of challenge.



Are you trying to suggest that butt-kickers are either deluded or immature?  That's the way it sounds to me, and either way you're being insulting.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

Greg K said:
			
		

> No. A DM that fails to take into  the capabilities of the characters when designing challenges is not doing their job. If necessary, the DM should be making adjustments to fit their game. One wouldn't expect a DM of a low magic campaign to be throwing in monsters only capable of being hit only  by +5 weapons if the best item in the party is +1 unless either there is some other way to defeat the monster or the monster serves some purpose other than to fight.  So, why shouldn't the DM be adjusting the challenges  for a party in which all or some of the characters are not optimized to the default assumption of core?



Sometimes you run into the catch-22 in which either the optimized characters can just walk through every monster without a scratch, without needing the non-optimized characters at all, or else the non-optimized characters are in over their heads and keep dying in fights that challenge the optimized characters.


----------



## Clavis (Oct 16, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Are you trying to suggest that butt-kickers are either deluded or immature?  That's the way it sounds to me, and either way you're being insulting.




Action is what the game is about, so there's certainly nothing wrong with players who want to kick some monster butt.

In my experience, however, the game breaks down when PCs have too many powers. It becomes more and more difficult from a DM to create thrilling challenges. Furthermore, the player loses the thrill of acquiring power when power comes easily. So, to maintain the _player's_ thrill of kicking butt, the _PC's_ power level needs to increased only slowly. It's human nature to want a lot of power quickly. In my experience, however, players have a more satisfying game experience when they are constantly acquiring small power increases, rather than getting a lot of power quickly.


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 16, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> False analogy: just because you don't like an element of the game does not make it like heroin.  Not analogous at all.




Why not?  It's his analogy.  If I don't like heroin, and I don't like a game element, then the two have that in common and the analogy stands.  Granted, it's a bit exaggerated.  Just because you don't like the implications of an analogy doesn't make it a false analogy.  If he's trying to suggest that an element of DnD is unhealthy for you the way heroin is, then it's a simple matter of saying "I don't agree".


----------



## SpiderMonkey (Oct 16, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> Action is what the game is about, so there's certainly nothing wrong with players who want to kick some monster butt.
> 
> In my experience, however, the game breaks down when PCs have too many powers. It becomes more and more difficult from a DM to create thrilling challenges. Furthermore, the player loses the thrill of acquiring power when power comes easily. So, to maintain the _player's_ thrill of kicking butt, the _PC's_ power level needs to increased only slowly. It's human nature to want a lot of power quickly. In my experience, however, players have a more satisfying game experience when they are constantly acquiring small power increases, rather than getting a lot of power quickly.




Now if you'd have worded it this way, I wouldn't have taken umbrage.  I actually agree 100%.  Because you've limited your claims _ to your experience _ (which syncs with mine), your statements here are more valid than in previous posts.

I just tend to take exception to claims of badwrongfun, regardless of how they're worded.  The funny thing is, I actually agree with your point: I prefer slow increases in power, and I'd like a game where money is usuable outside of combat concerns without worries for sub-optimization.

The key word here is "prefer."  I apologize about the rather polemic nature of my previous replies to your statements.


----------



## SpiderMonkey (Oct 16, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> Why not?  It's his analogy.  If I don't like heroin, and I don't like a game element, then the two have that in common and the analogy stands.  Granted, it's a bit exaggerated.  Just because you don't like the implications of an analogy doesn't make it a false analogy.  If he's trying to suggest that an element of DnD is unhealthy for you the way heroin is, then it's a simple matter of saying "I don't agree".




The reason it's a false analogy is exactly _because_ it presupposes that an element of D&D can be unhealthy, not just for him but for _all_ players.  As I mentioned before, I agree with his points as long as he limits their validity to his own experience and values; traipsing them out as some form of absolute for all play styles is somewhat insulting, otherwise.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Oct 16, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> HEH. Thanks.
> 
> So what is Masters of Orion 3 and Star Control 3 then called? The Uwe Bolls?



Sadly, yes.  It's a well known fact that any 4x Game with the number "3" in the title sucks.  _See also_, Civilization 3.

I hope that Stardock either breaks this curse or skips directly to Galactic Civilizations 4.  I would hate to see the "curse of the 3" befall them.

That doesn't make the genre any less awesome though.  _See also_, GalCiv 1 and 2, Civilization 1, 2 and 4, Master of Orion 1 and 2, Master of Magic (an under-appreciated classic), and many others.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> Action is what the game is about, so there's certainly nothing wrong with players who want to kick some monster butt.
> 
> In my experience, however, the game breaks down when PCs have too many powers. It becomes more and more difficult from a DM to create thrilling challenges. Furthermore, the player loses the thrill of acquiring power when power comes easily. So, to maintain the _player's_ thrill of kicking butt, the _PC's_ power level needs to increased only slowly. It's human nature to want a lot of power quickly. In my experience, however, players have a more satisfying game experience when they are constantly acquiring small power increases, rather than getting a lot of power quickly.



Not having too many powers doesn't necessarily mean getting fewer new powers, or gaining them more slowly.  Look at Bo9S for an example of how this might be accomplished.

Also, does this mean you retract your earlier statement concerning players who like power acquisition?


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## gizmo33 (Oct 16, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Ok, then by your bizarro logic, I guess people are just buying those other types of books, then sacraficing them to their little shrines to appease the divine gods of out-dated game styles, in the hope that their mills generate extra units of flour per month.




"Out-dated"?!  This is Dungeons and Dragons.  Go tell the next person you meet that you play Dungeons and Dragons.  And then tell them "but I play a more modern style".    Anyway, if someone enjoys a certain kind of game, who cares?  As for the rest of this, it's imaginative but weird.  I wouldn't give flour bonuses for sacrificing game books - you must be talking about the Storyteller system.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> Why not?  It's his analogy.  If I don't like heroin, and I don't like a game element, then the two have that in common and the analogy stands.




Godzilla is not a mammal.  Big Bird is not a mammal.  They have "not being a mammal" in common, and so for the purposes of argument from analogy, Big Bird is identical to Godzilla.

Or perhaps analogy is more than just linking together two unrelated concepts by virtue of trivial similarities.


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## Clavis (Oct 16, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> And if there are enough people who agree with you, their buying practices will impact those sales, and the vendor will have to react accordingly.  I like having options.  I don't want somebody deciding what's good for me or my hobby, and getting rid of options based on those subjective *value judgements*




Manipulating the market to create a demand for what one is selling is an important part of any competently-run advertising campaign. For example, WOTC is now trashing the same 3rd edition combat system that they once passionately defended. This is to create a dissatisfaction with 3rd edition, and a demand for 4th edition. Companies don't just listen to consumers and create products based on consumer demand. Often, promotions departments are tasked with marketing products that the public may never have asked for, but the company wants to sell. Sometimes, the consumers come to believe that they always wanted the product they were manipulated into buying.

A perfect real-world example is the historical destruction of the Los Angeles electric trolley system, which was bought up by National City Lines (a front for a cartel consisting of General Motors, Mack Truck, and various oil companies) for the express purpose of eliminating it and forcing LA to become a car-centered city. The people of Los Angeles didn't ask for their trolleys to be eliminated; the choice was made for them.

My point is _somebody is always deciding what's good for you_, whether you realize it or not.


----------



## Clavis (Oct 16, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> Now if you'd have worded it this way, I wouldn't have taken umbrage.  I actually agree 100%.  Because you've limited your claims _ to your experience _ (which syncs with mine), your statements here are more valid than in previous posts.
> 
> I just tend to take exception to claims of badwrongfun, regardless of how they're worded.  The funny thing is, I actually agree with your point: I prefer slow increases in power, and I'd like a game where money is usuable outside of combat concerns without worries for sub-optimization.
> 
> The key word here is "prefer."  I apologize about the rather polemic nature of my previous replies to your statements.




I likewise apologize if my posts have come across as needlessly polemic. I admit to sometimes exaggerating for dramatic effect.


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 16, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> The reason it's a false analogy is exactly _because_ it presupposes that an element of D&D can be unhealthy, not just for him but for _all_ players.  As I mentioned before, I agree with his points as long as he limits their validity to his own experience and values; traipsing them out as some form of absolute for all play styles is somewhat insulting, otherwise.




The analogy is sufficient to establish the possibility that something is profitable in the short term without necessarily being good for the hobby.  Obviously you disagree and so the analogy is unconvincing, but conflating this with some sort of logical error IMO is mistaken.  You object to the premise of the analogy (I personally am not clear on what it is) but that's not grounds for assuming a logical error.  I happen to like hack-n-slash type games (other types as well) but I don't find anything logically implausible about him saying that such games, or rolling d20 dice in general, is somehow bad for everyone's health.  I don't know enough about the context to know whether or not his opinion, which I don't agree with, is insulting or not.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> My point is _somebody is always deciding what's good for you_, whether you realize it or not.



Which makes me glad that the folks who are writing 4E aren't a bunch of soulless economists, but are actually a group of people who really love the game and want more people to play it.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> The analogy is sufficient to establish the possibility that something is profitable in the short term without necessarily being good for the hobby.  Obviously you disagree and so the analogy is unconvincing, but conflating this with some sort of logical error IMO is mistaken.  You object to the premise of the analogy (I personally am not clear on what it is) but that's not grounds for assuming a logical error.  I happen to like hack-n-slash type games (other types as well) but I don't find anything logically implausible about him saying that such games, or rolling d20 dice in general, is somehow bad for everyone's health.  I don't know enough about the context to know whether or not his opinion, which I don't agree with, is insulting or not.



Claiming that something is a false analogy is not usually a claim as to the logical validity of the argument, but rather the applicability of the invoked metaphor to the situation under discussion.  The heroin argument is therefore a false analogy by virtue of its inapplicability to most situations, specifically those in which crunch-based game books are not harmful to the people who buy them.


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 16, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Godzilla is not a mammal.  Big Bird is not a mammal.  They have "not being a mammal" in common, and so for the purposes of argument from analogy, Big Bird is identical to Godzilla.




An analogy doesn't presume that two things are identical, so I don't know what you're reasoning is trying to show here. 



			
				Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Or perhaps analogy is more than just linking together two unrelated concepts by virtue of trivial similarities.




Trivial is in the eye of the beholder.  It's uninformative to just throw in adjectives in places where the issue is actually in dispute.  I would guess that whatever similarities a person is trying to show with an analogy, that person finds those similarities to be significant.  

Now you have an opinion about how important you feel that information is, that's cool.  But acting like there some logical grounds for making a distinction between trivial and non-trivial IMO is unwarranted.


----------



## SpiderMonkey (Oct 16, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Claiming that something is a false analogy is not usually a claim as to the logical validity of the argument, but rather the applicability of the invoked metaphor to the situation under discussion.  The heroin argument is therefore a false analogy by virtue of its inapplicability to most situations, specifically those in which crunch-based game books are not harmful to the people who buy them.




Doh!  Beat me to it.

Gizmo, to answer when you say "You object to the premise of the analogy (I personally am not clear on what it is) but that's not grounds for assuming a logical error,"  a False Analogy is a type of material logical fallacy.  By definition it is the grounds for assuming a logical error.

I'm willing to tentatively agree with you that Clavis has a valid claim that (in your wording) what might be good for business in the short term might not be good for the hobby in the long run.  It's just that I'm not seeing a convincing enough argument to fully agree.

I think I might be waffling here.  Does this make any sense?


----------



## ehren37 (Oct 16, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> Of course, heroin sells pretty well too, but I don't think anyone thinks its a good idea to promote that.
> 
> Just because something sells doesn't mean it's actually good for the players, or the hobby. In my experience the overdone PCs who are dripping with powers and magic items get seriously boring very quickly. Players _think_ they want to play those characters, but if they have any maturity at all they'll get bored at the lack of challenge. Extreme super-powers are addictive, but ultimately game-destroying.




I love it when people who are having fun are too dumb to realize they aren't actually having fun. Thanks for illuminating us.

Regardless, my point was LOTS of gamers are interested in new, cool toys. Be they feats, classes or magic items. The butt kicker player is a bigger part of D&D than I think is represented on this board. Ignoring that would be unwise. 

I'm perfectly fine with toning down the amount of extra butt kicking points gold can buy (I've actually argued for less magic item dependence). I'm just saying some type of means for such players to spend their wealth is a necessity.


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 16, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> I think I might be waffling here.  Does this make any sense?




The core of the issue AFAICT is that you're trying to suggest that there is a logical fallacy where it's really a case of you not agreeing with his premise, or the characteristics of the things that he's drawing an analogy from.  His analogy, AFAICT established that as long as he believed a certain thing about the situation (that a certain style of gaming was bad) that telling him that it was profitable was not going to be a convincing argument.  The reason I would not say there is a logical fallacy here is that basis that you use to show that the two elements of the analogy are not related is a matter of opinion.


----------



## ehren37 (Oct 16, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> "Out-dated"?!  This is Dungeons and Dragons.  Go tell the next person you meet that you play Dungeons and Dragons.  And then tell them "but I play a more modern style".




Compared to the squad based game D&D evolved from? Yeah, its a somewhat more modern style.



> Anyway, if someone enjoys a certain kind of game, who cares?




I dont. I've in fact been arguing for all types of play to be supported.



> As for the rest of this, it's imaginative but weird.  I wouldn't give flour bonuses for sacrificing game books - you must be talking about the Storyteller system.




Hey, its his weird logic that comes to the conclusion that gaming styles that dont sell tons of books are played more often than those that do. I was left scratching my head about how that could be... my book sacrafice theory is the best I could do at the time.


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## Clavis (Oct 16, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Claiming that something is a false analogy is not usually a claim as to the logical validity of the argument, but rather the applicability of the invoked metaphor to the situation under discussion.  The heroin argument is therefore a false analogy by virtue of its inapplicability to most situations, specifically those in which crunch-based game books are not harmful to the people who buy them.




The purpose of the analogy was to provide an example of a situation where giving people what they want is not the morally correct thing to do, because it is not in the consumer's best long-term interests. It was an extreme example, meant to startle and provoke conversation. Obviously, the analogy shouldn't be taken too literally. Game books can only directly harm players when they fall on someone's head from a high shelf, for example.

I am well aware that argument from analogy and metaphor is bad logic. The analogy I used was meant as an illustration only.


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 16, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Compared to the squad based game D&D evolved from? Yeah, its a somewhat more modern style.




Your still playing Dungeons and Dragons though.  That's a game from the '80s, at best.  Then again, that was my point - who really cares?  In fact, the game is about stealing tropes from ancient and medieval history - so something being old fashioned, you would think would be a virtue.  In any case, from a 50,000 foot view of the situation, I was having a hard time seeing how one form of DnD was cool and another wasn't since most people in the world would laugh at the idea.  



			
				ehren37 said:
			
		

> I dont. I've in fact been arguing for all types of play to be supported.




You seem to come down very hard on games with flour mills.  I remember a magical mill as one of my more interesting encounter areas, so it hurt my feelings.



			
				ehren37 said:
			
		

> Hey, its his weird logic that comes to the conclusion that gaming styles that dont sell tons of books are played more often than those that do. I was left scratching my head about how that could be... my book sacrafice theory is the best I could do at the time.




I'm the DM about 95% of the time in the games I play, and the people I play with own lots of books but they probably play 95% of the time.  Now they've got tons of books for all sorts of things and they read them for fun, or maybe try to talk me into incorporating an element from a book into my game.  But I don't buy many new books at all.  So what we actually *use* during the game is different than what people own.  Is it different enough to say that there's no correlation between what people buy and gaming style?  I'm not sure, but it doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility to me that what people buy and what they do might not match up 100%.  (Also, some of the things I have bought I wish I didn't.)


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## Charwoman Gene (Oct 16, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> I love it when people who are having fun are too dumb to realize they aren't actually having fun. Thanks for illuminating us.




Excellent use of the badwrongfun argument.


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Hey, its his weird logic that comes to the conclusion that gaming styles that dont sell tons of books are played more often than those that do.



What I actually said was that sales data isn't always a reliable metric. Which isn't the same thing as saying that it proves one playstyle is more popular than another. At all. In fact, it's kinda the opposite of that.

But hey, you're free to read my words any way you like. I'm not possessive.


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> You seem to come down very hard on games with flour mills.



He does seem to have it in for milling, doesn't he?



> So what we actually *use* during the game is different than what people own.



Exactly. And a specific play style might be popular among players even if the published supplements in a similar vein don't sell well. 



> Is it different enough to say that there's no correlation between what people buy and gaming style?  I'm not sure, but it doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility to me that what people buy and what they do might not match up 100%.  (Also, some of the things I have bought I wish I didn't.)



What I was saying is that you can't assume too much out of a correlation between sales and gaming styles. Specifically, because of the DIY nature of gaming.


----------



## allenw (Oct 16, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Godzilla is not a mammal.  Big Bird is not a mammal.  They have "not being a mammal" in common, and so for the purposes of argument from analogy, Big Bird is identical to Godzilla.
> 
> Or perhaps analogy is more than just linking together two unrelated concepts by virtue of trivial similarities.




  Certainly, we should focus on the non-trivial similarity between Big Bird and Godzilla. 
  As Harry Knowles (of Ain't It Cool News) would say:: 

MANINSUITMANINSUITMANINSUITMANINSUITMANINSUITMANINSUITMANINSUITMANINSUIT!


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 16, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> The purpose of the analogy was to provide an example of a situation where giving people what they want is not the morally correct thing to do, because it is not in the consumer's best long-term interests.



Sure, but then you have to explain why butt-kicker-centric books are bad for our long-term interests.  The weight of evidence shows that, so far, butt-kicker books have carried the game through three editions, and there is no indication that butt-kicking is going out of style.


----------



## ehren37 (Oct 16, 2007)

Charwoman Gene said:
			
		

> Excellent use of the badwrongfun argument.




Hey, I wasnt the one who threw it out.


----------



## ehren37 (Oct 16, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> What I actually said was that sales data isn't always a reliable metric. Which isn't the same thing as saying that it proves one playstyle is more popular than another. At all. In fact, it's kinda the opposite of that.
> 
> But hey, you're free to read my words any way you like. I'm not possessive.




According to you, people dont buy books about stuff they like. Thats why empire building books dont sell.. becomes everyone loves those types of games. People buy books about stuff they dont like. Hence the huge sales of feat/prc/magic item/spell splat books. Because there are more empire builders than butt kickers. 

When you make some sense, I might take you seriously.

Hell, lets assume that there are in fact TONS of players who want to run resturaunts, town militias or what have you. Apparently very few of them actually buy books on the subject, as represented by the low sales of related supplements. Lets assume that theres just a tiny group that seems to enjoy books based on new abilities. They apparently support tyhe bulk of RPG sales. Why would WOTC want to ignore them and support a group that doesnt spend?


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 16, 2007)

I've skimmed but not read in full more than one or two posts in the last two pages. Can you guys please take this to e-mail?


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## Mallus (Oct 16, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> When you make some sense, I might take you seriously.



If you're not going to be civil, you could at least be funny. It's not much to ask...

<end pointless hijack mode>


----------



## Doug McCrae (Oct 16, 2007)

There are three possibilities for high level play:

1) It doesn't occur. Campaigns end when the sweet spot (levels 5-14 or so) ends.
2) It's much the same as low level play except you fly to the dungeon instead of walking and the BBEG is threatening the universe instead of a village.
3) The game changes significantly, becoming more focused on politics and rulership.

Mallus's experience is (3). Mine has been (1). Of course, being biased, we all expect our own experience to accord with the majority.


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## Lanefan (Oct 17, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> There are three possibilities for high level play:
> 
> 1) It doesn't occur. Campaigns end when the sweet spot (levels 5-14 or so) ends.
> 2) It's much the same as low level play except you fly to the dungeon instead of walking and the BBEG is threatening the universe instead of a village.
> ...



While my experience has largely been (2).   But in all three, the question remains: what are they gonna spend their money on?

Lanefan


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## JDJblatherings (Oct 17, 2007)

books on empire building...we dont' really need them to do an empire building campaign.

All one needs is the cost of men at arms, a simple mass combat system ,how to calculate tax revenues, the cost of castles along with simple siege rules (hardness/hp of walls and siege engine dmage ratings).  

I've played in many campaigns that had empire building and the original DMG had almost all of what one needed to do so (no mass combat system). The BECM series of D&D boxed sets made it even easier (more detail in running a domain and a mass combat system).  D&D has historically had this stuff and it didnt' take volumes and volumes to do it correctly just a few pages here and there.


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 17, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> D&D has historically had this stuff and it didnt' take volumes and volumes to do it correctly just a few pages here and there.




A lot of stuff that D&D has historically had are goin' bye-bye. With every new edition we lose a little bit more. 

The crucible of Design continues to fire the impurities out of the gold.

This is not to say that a lot of this stuff is unwelcome or ultimately prohibited-- simply that it _should_ be properly separated from the essence of the system.


----------



## JDJblatherings (Oct 17, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> A lot of stuff that D&D has historically had are goin' bye-bye. With every new edition we lose a little bit more.
> 
> The crucible of Design continues to fire the impurities out of the gold.
> 
> This is not to say that a lot of this stuff is unwelcome or ultimately prohibited-- simply that it _should_ be properly separated from the essence of the system.





Becoming  a lord  at name level was/is  indeed part of the "essence of the system". It's is actually what is different between 3.x and earlier versions of the game. Some players need a "concrete" reason to adventure, they need a goal and buidling a castle and becoming a lord is a fine and dandy reason for some of those folks. Becoming part of the campaign setting instead of simply pillaging ones way accross it is a very different way to look at the game.


----------



## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 17, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> Becoming  a lord  at name level was/is  indeed part of the "essence of the system". It's is actually what is different between 3.x and earlier versions of the game. Some players need a "concrete" reason to adventure, they need a goal and buidling a castle and becoming a lord is a fine and dandy reason for some of those folks. Becoming part of the campaign setting instead of simply pillaging ones way accross it is a very different way to look at the game.




No, becoming a lord with a keep and holdings was never part of the "essence" of D&D.

The essence of D&D is going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff. 

That is the CORE STORY.

It's really not up for debate.


----------



## Thornir Alekeg (Oct 17, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> Becoming  a lord  at name level was/is  indeed part of the "essence of the system". It's is actually what is different between 3.x and earlier versions of the game. Some players need a "concrete" reason to adventure, they need a goal and buidling a castle and becoming a lord is a fine and dandy reason for some of those folks. Becoming part of the campaign setting instead of simply pillaging ones way accross it is a very different way to look at the game.



 What if a campaign didn't use a feudal system of governing?  What if a PC had no desire to command others?  What if the character did things to tick off the King?  He still gets to be a Lord because he reached a certain level, has so much gold and the PHB says so?

The core rules should not contain items that constrain the creativity of the individual campaigns.  If they want to put things like this as suggestions for rewards in a book such as the 3.5 DMG II, I have no issue.  As part of the PHB, no way.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> Becoming  a lord  at name level was/is  indeed part of the "essence of the system". It's is actually what is different between 3.x and earlier versions of the game. Some players need a "concrete" reason to adventure, they need a goal and buidling a castle and becoming a lord is a fine and dandy reason for some of those folks. Becoming part of the campaign setting instead of simply pillaging ones way accross it is a very different way to look at the game.



Being a lord was never an important factor in my 1st edition games.  If it's supposed to be part of the "essence" of D&D, I can't imagine why I could have avoided it.  The essence is finding enemies, killing them, and taking their stuff.  "Name level" is a tacked on justification for this process, just like all the other tacked-on justifications that players and DMs have come up with over the years.  The game is about adventuring.  Everything else is just how you got to the adventure and what you did with the loot.

edit: Or, what Wulf said.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 17, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> No, becoming a lord with a keep and holdings was never part of the "essence" of D&D.
> 
> The essence of D&D is going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff.
> 
> ...



I'd debate that.  I've done a lot of "going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff", but such activities were means to the end, not the ends of themselves.  The "ends" were either the in-game ends of building the castle or saving the Kingdom, or the out-of-game ends of doing something fun with friends on a Sunday afternoon.  I've never gotten a thrill from kills orcs per se.


----------



## Sundragon2012 (Oct 17, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> I personally think that Empire building is a bad match for table top RPGs.  The demand on the DM is far greater than in a dungeon crawl campaign (who needs to run many non-allied factions simultaneously, with far more power at his immediate disposal).  Such games run a far greater risk of becoming a mother-may-I or railroads.  While there may be individual DMs and groups up to it, empire building is a niche market at best.
> 
> The obvious solution is splitting the DMing load by going to an MMORPG system with every faction being run by players.  It has been tried, and to my knowledge (I haven't made a detailed study) the only succesful one is EVE-Online.  Which, market scale-wise doesn't even register as a blip on WoW's bootkicking scale.  Some of that is EVE's mediocre design, mind, but the difference in numbers is striking, as has been the failure of every other PvP based player run faction MMORPG I've ever heard of.




Horrible, horrible idea. Keep your MMORPG away from my D&D.

Empire building, running castles and kingdoms, raising and battling armies, playing with the power-brokers of the setting, defending nations, carving nations, becoming the heroes from the setting's storybooks, becoming a legend, etc. is what High Level gaming IMO is all about. It is ridiculous that heroes of 10th+ level have as their only goal to enter the next big, dumb dungeon. Then at 20th level they can find a 20th level dungeon to go into. Blech.

I never could understand why, if people don't want to have characters that actually impact the setting, why bother with these silly super-dungeons when video games like Elder Scrolls: Oblivion does the who dungeoneering thing so much better than a tabletop game ever could. I am not claiming that this game is real role-playing in the sense of being in character and getting into your role. However it is role-playing as in "_you are playing a role so its role playing   :\ "_ and as much a role-playing experience as the giant endless dungeon modules that came out for 3.5

Yeah I know D&D is all about _killing things and taking their stuff_....a phrase that jumped the shark long ago. MMORPGs and even single player option games like Oblivion are more gratifying IMO in that mode of play than D&D can ever be. Better visuals, more immersion, and more viceral excitement is what video games of this type give. It is perfect for players who only want the kill and rob mode of play. Who really cares about character development in the world of endless dungeons? There is no reason to care. D&D can never compete with computer and console RPGs in the modern era on their level....never.

If D&D isn't run as a game that can offer a far, far richer role-playing experience than the MMORPGs D&D will die for certain. It has to be advertised as something more than a tabletop videogame. 

*Ultimately D&D is a social, storytelling, adventure game that allows, within the bounds of the millieu used, nearly limitless choices and allows a deep sense of identification with one's chosen character, a character who can actually have impact on a setting and environment in a campaign that can last for 5, 10, 15, 20+ years. It is a game that will allow you to model your favorite fantasy fiction and create grand interactive stories that you can talk about with friends for years.*

NO video game can ever do this. D&D has its strengths and MMORPGs have their. If either tries to pretend it can do what it does as well as the other then....well its D&D that is going to lose. There are already people that really believe the WoW and Baldur's Gate are real RPG experiences when all that seperates them from Legacy of Kain, Half-Life 2, Halo, etc. is that there is more resource management and more scripted dialogue. Half Life 2 and the Halo series have as good a story as anything I have ever seen in  CRPGs. In all instances you are trapped in a world that have every little options, no character immersion, allows nothing to happen that isn't somehow pre-scripter and allows you to rebook from save or spawn points after something goes wrong. Even D&D isn't this forgiving, even with True Resurrection. At least you aren't starting you character over from before the fight with the BBEG after you get raised. 

MMORPGs serve the broadest common denominator the same way WWE wrestling serves a broader common broader denominator of potential fans than PBS's Nova or a Ken Burns documentary or a serious drama like Mystic River for example. WWE is silly, artificial, simplistic and ultimately adolescent. Nothing that raises the bar above sex and violence can ever compete societally with the WWE on its level because in WWE wrestling you have all the ingrediants necessary to activate the most primal purient interests of millions and millions of people.

I know I may draw some ire with this but, hack and slash gaming is to immersive role-playing what US Weekly is to the New Yorker. CRPGs and MMORPGs do the whole kill and rob thing better than D&D. D&D does social interaction, storytelling, impact and consequences, free choice, activating the imagination, character depth, potentially endless play in one setting let along the many settings currently on the market and character player identification better than CRPGs and MMORPGs ever can.

D&D has to play to what makes it different from MMORPGS and CARPGs while at the same time allowing the kill and rob playstyle some enjoy but not marketing that style as its greatest strength when it isn't.



Sundragon


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## DandD (Oct 17, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> I'd debate that.  I've done a lot of "going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff", but such activities were means to the end, not the ends of themselves.  The "ends" were either the in-game ends of building the castle or saving the Kingdom, or the out-of-game ends of doing something fun with friends on a Sunday afternoon.  I've never gotten a thrill from kills orcs per se.



 Then kill dragons. They're more fun to kill, as soon as you're strong enough to do it.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

Sundragon2012 said:
			
		

> I never could understand why, if people don't want to have characters that actually impact the setting, why bother with these silly super-dungeons when video games like Elder Scrolls: Oblivion does the who dungeoneering thing so much better than a tabletop game ever could.
> *snip*
> 
> Yeah I know D&D is all about _killing things and taking their stuff_....a phrase that jumped the shark long ago. MMORPGs and even single player option games like Oblivion are more gratifying IMO in that mode of play than D&D can ever be. Better visuals, more immersion, and more viceral excitement is what video games of this type give.



Actually, video game monster grinding is about the most boring version of that style of play I've ever encountered.  Swinging a sword at an endless stream of monsters without the kind of tactical options and variety of encounter frameworks that D&D provides, "jumped the shark" somewhere around the Diablo II expansion.  

It is exactly why I only played Neverwinter Nights II for a few hours before uninstalling it.  All they could manage to challenge me with was yet another walking bag of hit points.  That game is based very closely on D&D, but it fails to capture the interesting parts of killing things and taking their stuff.


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## ehren37 (Oct 17, 2007)

Sundragon2012 said:
			
		

> Empire building, running castles and kingdoms, raising and battling armies, playing with the power-brokers of the setting, defending nations, carving nations, becoming the heroes from the setting's storybooks, becoming a legend, etc. is what High Level gaming IMO is all about. It is ridiculous that heroes of 10th+ level have as their only goal to enter the next big, dumb dungeon. Then at 20th level they can find a 20th level dungeon to go into. Blech.




I dunno, the adventure paths were pretty well received. They go to level 20+. None of them have centered on pushing units around ala Axis and Allies. 



> I never could understand why, if people don't want to have characters that actually impact the setting, why bother with these silly super-dungeons when video games like Elder Scrolls: Oblivion does the who dungeoneering thing so much better than a tabletop game ever could.




High level adventuring DOES impact the setting. You save the world and are the big cheese in Age of Worms and Savage Tides (I havent read shackled city). No fortress sitting required. My 3.0 anachronistic Al-Quadim game went to level 20, all the players were members of a band. One guy described it as "The Beatles who Save the World and Fight Godzilla". It was a resounding success, despite having several "boring" high level dungeon crawls, planar intrigue, demon bashing and not one PC owned fort, militia or restuarant. Unless you want to count them selling t-shirts and action figures of themselves (Hey, it was a humerous game). MOST of the time, they went out, solved mysteries and kicked ass, and that certainly didnt resolve things through ordering minions around.  

Moreover, I find D&D combat usually more exciting than computer game combat. Particularly MMO's, where 99% of the monsters are killed fairly thoughtlessly (its called a grind for a reason). Mob AI is limited, as are your options. I enjoy a high level of cinematic action in my games. Breaking through plaster walls, kicking a crate at someone across the room to trip them, swinging on chandoliers, dunking someone's head in a deep fryer. I can get that in D&D. Not so with the gussied up large rats I killed for the vast majority of my stint in WoW from 1-60. I enjoy interacting with NPC's in a more meaningful fashion than "accept/decline" quest or a canned series of responses. I enjoy getting more back from them as well.

Also, if you believe that Oblivion handles high level combat and dugneon crawls better... why doesnt it handle low level combat dungeon crawls better? Should we just cut out the combat of D&D? Good luck finding a game with the 6 players scattered throughout the world still interested in the game


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## Clavis (Oct 17, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> No, becoming a lord with a keep and holdings was never part of the "essence" of D&D.
> 
> The essence of D&D is going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff.
> 
> ...




I think somebody should ask a certain Mr Gygax about the essence of D&D before debate is ended.


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 17, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> I'd debate that.  I've done a lot of "going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff", but such activities were means to the end, not the ends of themselves.  The "ends" were either the in-game ends of building the castle or saving the Kingdom, or the out-of-game ends of doing something fun with friends on a Sunday afternoon.  I've never gotten a thrill from kills orcs per se.




If you were on the Design team, debating it might get you somewhere. 

But in practical terms the debate is over and decided.


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## Thunderfoot (Oct 17, 2007)

Mouseferatu said:
			
		

> Oh God, no. Keep training as far away from my core rules as possible, thanks. Maybe--_maybe_--as a purely optional rule, fully labeled as such, buried somewhere in the DMG.
> 
> But as an assumed part of the default core? There aren't enough syllables in the word "No" to fully express the no-ness of it.



I can understand this attitude, I had it at one time...until I realized that in actual game time my current group went from level 1 to level 9 in 1 year, 1 month and 9 days. (Yes I actually keep track of the calendar in game.)

While I think that training should be 'off screen', I think it needs to make a come back.  Frankly, auto leveling is a thing of video game gout that should be operated upon immediately and removed.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> I think somebody should ask a certain Mr Gygax about the essence of D&D before debate is ended.



We all know that this is the only statement needed about the essence of D&D (cribbed from Olgar Shiverstone's sig):

"The Soul of D&D? It's rolling a natural 20 when you're down to 3 hit points and the cleric's on the floor and you're staring that sunnavabitch bugbear right in his bloodshot eye and holding the line just long enough to let the wizard unleash a fireball at the guards who are on their way, because they're all that stands between you, the Foozle and Glory." - WizarDru

This cannot be provided by WoW, Neverwinter Nights, or farming sims.  Q.E.D.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

Thunderfoot said:
			
		

> I can understand this attitude, I had it at one time...until I realized that in actual game time my current group went from level 1 to level 9 in 1 year, 1 month and 9 days.




Um...so?


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## Clavis (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> We all know that this is the only statement needed about the essence of D&D (cribbed from Olgar Shiverstone's sig):
> 
> "The Soul of D&D? It's rolling a natural 20 when you're down to 3 hit points and the cleric's on the floor and you're staring that sunnavabitch bugbear right in his bloodshot eye and holding the line just long enough to let the wizard unleash a fireball at the guards who are on their way, because they're all that stands between you, the Foozle and Glory." - WizarDru
> 
> This cannot be provided by WoW, Neverwinter Nights, or farming sims.  Q.E.D.




I can't find a single thing to disagree with in that.


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## Reynard (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> We all know that this is the only statement needed about the essence of D&D (cribbed from Olgar Shiverstone's sig):
> 
> "The Soul of D&D? It's rolling a natural 20 when you're down to 3 hit points and the cleric's on the floor and you're staring that sunnavabitch bugbear right in his bloodshot eye and holding the line just long enough to let the wizard unleash a fireball at the guards who are on their way, because they're all that stands between you, the Foozle and Glory." - WizarDru




And the reason is that when you get to that point, you _care_.  It might be for a different reason than I care, but we share the same emotional attachment to the outcome.  That makes it fun.  And that is totally independent of whether killing things and taking their stuff is the most important aspect of the game to you, or if building a mighty fortress is.


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## Thunderfoot (Oct 17, 2007)

Sundragon2012 said:
			
		

> <SNIP>I know I may draw some ire with this but, hack and slash gaming is to immersive role-playing what US Weekly is to the New Yorker. <SNIP>



You win the Internet!!!!!

Bravo, Bravo!!!


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## Reynard (Oct 17, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> High level adventuring DOES impact the setting. You save the world and are the big cheese in Age of Worms and Savage Tides (I havent read shackled city). No fortress sitting required.




It only impacts the setting insofar as you continue to play in the setting afterwards, and the events that occurred have consequences.  If the PCs fail, or a not-so-BBEG survives, then the level 1 to 20 dungeon campaign can have an impact.  Otherwise, only what the characters build -- artifacts, nations, families, institutions, legends --impact the setting.  i think part of the difference is that older versions provided for longer term play to reach the "endgame" of the top levels.  With slower levelling and therefore fewer mechanical cookies, players did a lot more building.  In addition, I think (and I have no evidence for this other than my own experiences and those others have related to me) playing multiple, subsequent campaigns in the same world was more common.


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## Thunderfoot (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Um...so?



This is akin to being promoted from Private to Colonel in the same time.  You don't progress that fast in anything...it just isn't right and completely blows the 'feel' of the game.  It isn't in the remotest sense of the word, believable.  I realize this is a fantasy game, but one reason that the LotR was different than the rest of the pulp crap that was out there at the time.  There was a sense of realism that held it together.  

When it is missing from a game, it does a lot to sour the aspect of Epic and makes it look more Cartoonish.


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## Patryn of Elvenshae (Oct 17, 2007)

Thunderfoot said:
			
		

> You don't progress that fast in anything...it just isn't right and completely blows the 'feel' of the game.




This is the DM's fault for not pausing after the first adventure and stating, "Six months later ..."


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## Thunderfoot (Oct 17, 2007)

Patryn of Elvenshae said:
			
		

> This is the DM's fault for not pausing after the first adventure and stating, "Six months later ..."



Well, that's the problem...it's been a single stream of events, there hasn't been time to break like that yet, hence the comment.  If the game is more than just a combat go to a dungeon clear it kind of thing, then there are scenarios, like the one I'm involved in, where it doesn't mesh.

Of course without the added, I can't level without training hook, the group doesn't pull back and keeps pushing forward.  Similar to 'hunting slimes' IMO.


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## Kraydak (Oct 17, 2007)

Sundragon2012 said:
			
		

> Horrible, horrible idea. Keep your MMORPG away from my D&D.
> 
> Empire building, running castles and kingdoms, raising and battling armies, playing with the power-brokers of the setting, defending nations, carving nations, becoming the heroes from the setting's storybooks, becoming a legend, etc. is what High Level gaming IMO is all about. It is ridiculous that heroes of 10th+ level have as their only goal to enter the next big, dumb dungeon. Then at 20th level they can find a 20th level dungeon to go into. Blech.
> 
> ...




I have played DnD with bad DMs, mediocre DMs and a few superb DMs.  *None* of them, not even the best, could run an Empire building game at a level that would interest me.  The DMing load would simply be too great and DM whim would become utterly dominant.  In a dungeoncrawl there will be 2-3 different factions, with specific relations and intrigues.  In an Empire campaign, there will be 10s of different factions, and 100s to 1000s of faction-faction relationships.  All respect to DMs, but running that well is beyond any human.  Which results in either a "mother-may-I" campaign or a campaign with curiously passive NPCs waiting to get rolled when the PCs get around to it.

Empire games are about political relations, and the problem of vast numbers of factions is best solved by having vast numbers of players.  The advantage of tabletop RPGs over CRPGs/MMORPGs lies in tactical flexibility, rather than political complexity.

With current technology, the advantages and disadvantages are:
CRPGs: no need for a group, high dev time/play time ratio at the cost of tactical flexibility due to programming limitations
Table-top: high tactical flexibility at the cost of low dev time/play time ratios and low complexity due to human limitations of the DM
MMORPG: as per CRPG, with added possibility of high tactical/political complexity with PvP at the added cost of policing anti-social behavior (griefing)


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## Kraydak (Oct 17, 2007)

Thunderfoot said:
			
		

> This is akin to being promoted from Private to Colonel in the same time.  You don't progress that fast in anything...it just isn't right and completely blows the 'feel' of the game.  It isn't in the remotest sense of the word, believable.  I realize this is a fantasy game, but one reason that the LotR was different than the rest of the pulp crap that was out there at the time.  There was a sense of realism that held it together.
> 
> When it is missing from a game, it does a lot to sour the aspect of Epic and makes it look more Cartoonish.




The rate of promotion is genre appropriate (look at the obnoxiously overrepresented "farm boy saves the world" books).


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 17, 2007)

Sundragon2012 said:
			
		

> I know I may draw some ire with this but, hack and slash gaming is to immersive role-playing what US Weekly is to the New Yorker.




I know I may draw some ire with this, but immersive role-playing has as much to do with D&D Design as ice carving has to do with chainsaw design.


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## Simia Saturnalia (Oct 17, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> I know I may draw some ire with this, but immersive role-playing has as much to do with D&D Design as ice carving has to do with chainsaw design.



Wulf's got it.

Doesn't speak to the value of immersive roleplaying, mind - which I choose not to here - but it's certainly true.


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## Patryn of Elvenshae (Oct 17, 2007)

Thunderfoot said:
			
		

> Well, that's the problem...it's been a single stream of events, there hasn't been time to break like that yet, hence the comment.




Well, that's the issue.

If the DM doesn't want the players to go from 1st to 20th in a month, he needs to plan adventures such that the players don't go from 1st to 20th in a month.

That means building in appropriate break points.

Advice on doing this should probably be in the DMG.


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## ruleslawyer (Oct 17, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> I have played DnD with bad DMs, mediocre DMs and a few superb DMs.  *None* of them, not even the best, could run an Empire building game at a level that would interest me.



Come play in my game! Are you near NYC?  


> _The DMing load would simply be too great and DM whim would become utterly dominant.  In a dungeoncrawl there will be 2-3 different factions, with specific relations and intrigues.  In an Empire campaign, there will be 10s of different factions, and 100s to 1000s of faction-faction relationships._



Keep in mind, however, that you don't need to shift the actual game engine over to Civ 4 just because nations and empires are involved. You'd still be running the game from the POV of the PCs, which means that only developments that affect the PCs should be relevant. It's just like running a campaign world with a cast of thousands and myriad factions; I don't keep track of what every single major power player in the Lords of Dust or the Red Wizards of Thay is doing, I just have their actions become relevant when they enter the PCs' sphere of interest. Hence the emphasis on verisimilitude rather than accurate simulation: Developments in the campaign need to _feel_ logical, rather than be determined according to a gigantic external machinery.


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## ehren37 (Oct 17, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> It only impacts the setting insofar as you continue to play in the setting afterwards, and the events that occurred have consequences.  If the PCs fail, or a not-so-BBEG survives, then the level 1 to 20 dungeon campaign can have an impact.  Otherwise, only what the characters build -- artifacts, nations, families, institutions, legends --impact the setting.




Wouldnt the same stipulation apply? I mean, if world saving antics, cabal busting and demigod slaying throughout Age of Worms doesnt impact the setting if you cease to play, then wouldnt fort building not impact it as well?


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## ruleslawyer (Oct 17, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> I know I may draw some ire with this, but immersive role-playing has as much to do with D&D Design as ice carving has to do with chainsaw design.



I agree with this entirely. Consequently, I think that the better-developed a set of tools for running dominions, large-scale battles, and social encounters in the rules (a separate book is fine), the more dimensions one can lend to a high-level campaign.

I really think this is one area in which BECMI D&D got it exactly right: Killing things and taking their stuff may be something you do at all levels of the game, but the large-scale underlying reasons for killing things et al, as well as additional goals and obstacles in the game, can and should change from low to high levels.


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## Kraydak (Oct 17, 2007)

ruleslawyer said:
			
		

> Come play in my game! Are you near NYC?




For an average american, yes.  For practical purposes... no, Rochester doesn't really count unless you are willing to foot the bill for air travel   (writing on a Mac, so no VTT for me   )

Also, fair warning, if it isn't already painfully obvious from my posts, I am about as far are you can go along the simulationist axis while still being take any enjoyment from gaming at all...



> Keep in mind, however, that you don't need to shift the actual game engine over to Civ 4 just because nations and empires are involved. You'd still be running the game from the POV of the PCs, which means that only developments that affect the PCs should be relevant. It's just like running a campaign world with a cast of thousands and myriad factions; I don't keep track of what every single major power player in the Lords of Dust or the Red Wizards of Thay is doing, I just have their actions become relevant when they enter the PCs' sphere of interest. Hence the emphasis on verisimilitude rather than accurate simulation: Developments in the campaign need to _feel_ logical, rather than be determined according to a gigantic external machinery.




I feel that that works for the minimal political effects deriving from the power of HLCs in a butt-kicking campaign, but likely not for a deliberately political campgain...  I'd like to be proven wrong, but it sounds unlikely  :\


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

Clavis said:
			
		

> I can't find a single thing to disagree with in that.



Hold on, wait.  Am I still on the internet?


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

Thunderfoot said:
			
		

> This is akin to being promoted from Private to Colonel in the same time.  You don't progress that fast in anything...it just isn't right and completely blows the 'feel' of the game.  It isn't in the remotest sense of the word, believable.  I realize this is a fantasy game, but one reason that the LotR was different than the rest of the pulp crap that was out there at the time.  There was a sense of realism that held it together.
> 
> When it is missing from a game, it does a lot to sour the aspect of Epic and makes it look more Cartoonish.



I'd wager that I could get myself up to a decent competitive level in fencing in a year if it was all I ever did.  Likewise, a year is plenty long to get to level 9, considering how many hours a week adventurers put into their myriad shticks.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 17, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> I have played DnD with bad DMs, mediocre DMs and a few superb DMs.  *None* of them, not even the best, could run an Empire building game at a level that would interest me.




Your assessment is what I also believe most of the time.  However, I wonder whether or not some computer software, combined with a "heroes of battle" type approach of presenting things from the PC perspective, could be used to create something interesting.  After all, I don't think anyone is so much of a simulationist that they expect the DM to play the NPCs when they're not interacting with the PCs, or that the DM is supposed to develop a dungeon naturally by playing out the thousands of random events that led up to it's creation.  In theory it seems that all you would need would be enough simulation to suspend your disbelief and then you'd have what you have with normal dungeon crawling.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> I'd wager that I could get myself up to a decent competitive level in fencing in a year if it was all I ever did.  Likewise, a year is plenty long to get to level 9, considering how many hours a week adventurers put into their myriad shticks.




Being competative in fencing is not the same thing as being 9th level in DnD IMO.  Unless competitive fencers can kill dozens of adversaries at once and swim around in pools of lava without dying.  There's a certain aura that 9th level adventurers have and it's a little uncomfortable to think about a character transforming into one in the course of a year.


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## LordVyreth (Oct 17, 2007)

Okay, here's how I would handle gold and magic items, if I was soley responsible for 4th Ed.

1. Stat boosting primary magic items.  Here we have our +x swords, items of important attribute bump (strength for fighter, intelligence for wizard, dexterity and constitution for pretty much everyone,) rings of protection, etc.  These are legacy items and are automatically improved by leveling, and only by leveling.  These make a character better in combat for the most part, and everyone gets them.  No money is involved here.

2. Useful magic items.  This category contains wings of flying, cloaks of the montebank, bottles of air, portable holes, etc.  Few of these directly improve combat, though they do improve combat options.  They mostly open up possibilities for adventures, and the game assumes someone in the party spends gold to get them.  Nobody, however, _has_ to.  If one player does but another has other interests for money, that's fine.  The former player has more combat/dungeon versatility, but the party as a whole still can go off and adventure underwater, in flying castles, and other places that need such magic items.  And if nobody wants to buy those items, either they aren't interested in such adventures or the DM creates some other setting-specific ways to get the party involved (like a generous NPC benefactor or a random magic teleporter.)  The expectation is that the characters also get some potions, scrolls, wands, and other expendible items, but most of these can be found instad of bought.

3. This leaves a sizeable discretionary incombe, giving the player many options.  Players eager to play generous characters can give it to charity.  Hedonist characters can spend it on the usual ale/whores (which could actually justify bringing back the old 1ed prostitute table, ironically!  Except it could be level-based, featuring upper level categories like "15th level half-demon bard," and "Selune.")  Prestige-obsessed characters can spend it on clothing, jewelry, and other luxury items, and ambitious players can buy castles, armies, airships, or businesses.  

And what about the consummate professionals with no interest in any of these things?  They can spend the money on more level 2 items or the even less useful level 3 items.  These include cubic fields, decks of illusion, bags of tricks, that sort of thing.  They also can get lesser equivalents of their legacy items to specific situations.  For example, a fighter with the 4th ed equivalent of a +5 sword as a legacy item can also buy a +3 club specifically to fight undead.  Tertiary attributes can also be found here.  A fighter has little combat benefit to an intelligence booster, but if the player wants this option, it can be found here.  This way, all players are about equivalent for most combats, but the adventure, combat, or dungeon focussed player won't feel like money is a waste.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 17, 2007)

ehren37 said:
			
		

> Also, if you believe that Oblivion handles high level combat and dugneon crawls better... why doesnt it handle low level combat dungeon crawls better? Should we just cut out the combat of D&D? Good luck finding a game with the 6 players scattered throughout the world still interested in the game



That's what I thought. Sundragon's argument, if correct, doesn't just apply to high level D&D but to all levels. It would mean removing the *dungeon* bashing from *Dungeons *& Dragons, which seems a little strange, to say the least.

I agree with Wulf that exploring the unknown, killing what lives there and taking its stuff is the core or essence of the game. It's certainly what I enjoy the most.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 17, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> I'd debate that.  I've done a lot of "going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff", but such activities were means to the end, not the ends of themselves.  The "ends" were either the in-game ends of building the castle or saving the Kingdom, or the out-of-game ends of doing something fun with friends on a Sunday afternoon.  I've never gotten a thrill from kills orcs per se.



Essence <> ends.

The reason for going down the dungeon is ultimately fairly unimportant. It's just an excuse for violence. Good-aligned parties are doing it to save the kingdom or the reputation of Queen Guinevere. Neutral or evil parties are doing it for the loot. They're both in the same place ain't they? Doing the same things, killing the same beholders.


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## allenw (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> I'd wager that I could get myself up to a decent competitive level in fencing in a year if it was all I ever did.  Likewise, a year is plenty long to get to level 9, considering how many hours a week adventurers put into their myriad shticks.




  What always blows my suspension of disbelief is:  If an "elite" person can make it to Level 20 in, say, two years, surely a regular person could do it in, say, 10 years.  That being the case, why isn't the (adult) world mostly populated by 20th+ level characters?  Especially when you start talking about dwarves and elves...

  Sadly, rapid level advancement is the default norm in the 3Ed RAW.  Just look at something like Return to the Temple of Elemental Evil, in which the PCs *must* go from 4th to 14th level in a practically non-stop series of episodes (which should logically take under a year) in order to save the world?


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> Being competative in fencing is not the same thing as being 9th level in DnD IMO.  Unless competitive fencers can kill dozens of adversaries at once and swim around in pools of lava without dying.  There's a certain aura that 9th level adventurers have and it's a little uncomfortable to think about a character transforming into one in the course of a year.



Okay, so how many hours of practice do you think you would need before you could swim around in a pool of lava?  All we have to do then is aim for 9th level characters to have that much time to practice.   

I think it makes more sense for the purposes of argument to say that low-level characters are "barely competent", mid-level characters are "competent," and high-level characters are "the best there is."  When we break it down like that, the vagaries of D&D physics matter less and comparisons to real-world learning curves--which is what you're using as a benchmark for your "one year is too short" comment--become more viable.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

allenw said:
			
		

> What always blows my suspension of disbelief is:  If an "elite" person can make it to Level 20 in, say, two years, surely a regular person could do it in, say, 10 years.  That being the case, why isn't the (adult) world mostly populated by 20th+ level characters?  Especially when you start talking about dwarves and elves...




That's not a question of advancement speed.  It's a question of why everyone isn't being an adventurer.

Really, that's something that goes pretty deep into the assumptions of the game world.  Why settle for being a warrior or expert when you could be a fighter or wizard?  Why be a commoner when you could be a rogue?  Even if you're stuck being a warrior, why be a guard, when you could find some other guys with swords and go loot a dungeon?  Certainly, if you become an adventurer, you're going to get powerful pretty quickly.  However, you have to be one first.  Why isn't everyone.

It's not a question of advancement speed because even if it takes 20 years to get to level 20, rather than 2, everyone over the age of 35 would be level 20, assuming that advancement speed is the only thing holding them back.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 17, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> I feel that that works for the minimal political effects deriving from the power of HLCs in a butt-kicking campaign, but likely not for a deliberately political campgain...  I'd like to be proven wrong, but it sounds unlikely  :\



Be happy: you're wrong.  Just sayin'.  I'm in his group.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> That's not a question of advancement speed.  It's a question of why everyone isn't being an adventurer.



In the real world fully half of the population is smart enough to be a lawyer or doctor, but most people just don't go to law school.  It's too hard.  It's easier to just hold down your current job and play X-Box at night.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Okay, so how many hours of practice do you think you would need before you could swim around in a pool of lava?




I'm not sure, I don't usually watch the Olympics.      Seriously though, I do think that if the analogy suits you for purposes of your argument, I can understand that but the very analogy misses one of the main reasons why I might disagree and that is because a 9th level character IMO has an essence to him that does not have a real world analogue.  So what it means to be 9th level is then fundementally different for me than it is for you based on your willingness to use the analogy.

That's cool.  I don't think it would be impossible to come up with some sort of compromise system.  At the simplest I'll just do what I do now, hand out 50% of the recommended XP totals (or whatever the magic number winds up being).  I'd also like the power curve to be less than in 3E, but I won't hold my breath for that one.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 17, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> In the real world fully half of the population is smart enough to be a lawyer or doctor, but most people just don't go to law school.  It's too hard.  It's easier to just hold down your current job and play X-Box at night.




In the real world people also get killed for being adventurers.  In fact the real world's DM is apparently an RBDM.  There's no protests of "hey, this isn't a level appropriate encounter!" when the local natives are swarming down on you by the hundreds.  And real world adventurers can't complain about "unfun" when they're getting exotic diseases, being tortured in ingenious ways, or being imprisoned for violating obscure laws or having a forged passport.  Real world adventurers die from exposure, starvation, and a myriad of other "unheroic" misfortunes that have been sanitized from RPG rules.  Give me X-Box any day.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 17, 2007)

Having had a further look at the 1e rules, they are actually insufficient to run a dominion (unlike BECMI or Birthright). There is nothing about earning money from your holding. There are no rules for mass battles (only for siege engines). There are no rules for the PCs as political movers and shakers - just a list of government types and titles. This is very much in contrast to a game like Pendragon, in which the PCs are expected to be knights and (as the game progresses) rulers. There is one single page about ruling a territory (DMG 93-4) which is all about getting rid of the monsters that already live there and how long it will take to civilize it.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 17, 2007)

So we're not sure what this game, Dungeons & Dragons, is all about. Romance and relationships? Power and politics? Murder mysteries?

Perhaps there's a clue in the name. Perhaps Dungeons & Dragons is about going into dungeons and killing the dragons that live there? Kind of a weird idea, I know, but I just throw it out as a suggestion.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> In the real world fully half of the population is smart enough to be a lawyer or doctor, but most people just don't go to law school.  It's too hard.  It's easier to just hold down your current job and play X-Box at night.



There's a pretty good answer.  Being an adventurer is hard work, and it's easier to just make shoes.


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## SpiderMonkey (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> There's a pretty good answer.  Being an adventurer is hard work, and it's easier to just make shoes.




Yup.  I'm working on a Ph.D. now, and I wish I were making shoes.  Or playing XBox.  More specifically Halo 3.  My students are playing Halo 3, and I hate them for it.  Just sayin'.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

SpiderMonkey said:
			
		

> Yup.  I'm working on a Ph.D. now, and I wish I were making shoes.  Or playing XBox.  More specifically Halo 3.  My students are playing Halo 3, and I hate them for it.  Just sayin'.



I study song sparrows.  I'd rather be playing D&D.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 17, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> Having had a further look at the 1e rules, they are actually insufficient to run a dominion (unlike BECMI or Birthright).




I agree, more or less, that the detail isn't there.



			
				Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> There is nothing about earning money from your holding.




IIRC you can get that information from the character class descriptions in the PHB.  Each character class earns a certain sp amount per inhabitant.



			
				Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> There are no rules for mass battles (only for siege engines).




Chainmail was the recommended mass-combat system in the old days.  Battle System was the supplement for ADnD.  Seems that Gary Gygax was running mass combat scenarios for his Greyhawk campaign in ADnD days (see Dragon Mag), although I suspect he was using Chainmail, I suspect that the rules weren't completely compatible with AdnD.



			
				Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> There are no rules for the PCs as political movers and shakers - just a list of government types and titles. This is very much in contrast to a game like Pendragon, in which the PCs are expected to be knights and (as the game progresses) rulers. There is one single page about ruling a territory (DMG 93-4) which is all about getting rid of the monsters that already live there and how long it will take to civilize it.




Gygax's comments about high level gaming, and the shared culture as reinforced by Dragon magazine et. al., made the concept of running a barony at 9th level a very familiar one to those of us who played ADnD.  IMO you can't look at the rules and see this clearly.

There were no rules for PCs as political movers and shakers because those were situations that common sense and/or a healthy dose of familiarity with history and creativity was supposed to provide.  Just as there were no rules per se on how to design an orcish society, and yet you could assume that many people's ADnD campaigns had orcish societies.

That being said, I think "Empire Building" scenarios, at best, were the province of old-old-school wargamers who played DnD and not the focus for those of us who were kids at the time and played ADnD for dungeon crawls.  We were probably aware that the ideal was to make high level adventuring more about politics, but I don't think the practice was as frequently in line with this.


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## Mallus (Oct 17, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> So we're not sure what this game, Dungeons & Dragons, is all about. Romance and relationships? Power and politics? Murder mysteries?
> 
> Perhaps there's a clue in the name. Perhaps Dungeons & Dragons is about going into dungeons and killing the dragons that live there? Kind of a weird idea, I know, but I just throw it out as a suggestion.



See, that's part of the game's enduring brilliance. Everything you mentioned is D&D.

In the campaign I run, the PC's are currently 12th level. They've been through exactly *one* dungeon and fought precisely *zero* dragons. What they have done is live the made-up lives of adventure story protagonists. The players seem to like, as do the readers of the Story Hour based on the campaign. As strange as it gets, it's still recognizably D&D. 

"Back to the dungeon!" was wonderful marketing flack... but it's far too reductive to serve as a kind of motto for running D&D.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 17, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> IIRC you can get that information from the character class descriptions in the PHB.  Each character class earns a certain sp amount per inhabitant.



You're right, I stand corrected.


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## Greg K (Oct 17, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> So we're not sure what this game, Dungeons & Dragons, is all about. Romance and relationships? Power and politics? Murder mysteries?
> 
> Perhaps there's a clue in the name. Perhaps Dungeons & Dragons is about going into dungeons and killing the dragons that live there? Kind of a weird idea, I know, but I just throw it out as a suggestion.




I don't know. In my campaign dating back to 2e, the PCs  have only been in 4-6 dungeons and have only encountered three dragons. None of the dragons were encountered in a dungeon and one would have killed the party without blinking if they had attacked it.  Most of the encounters have been above ground (often in towns or cities) and involved dealing with undead, cultists and wizards.

Oh, there have also been entire sessions dealing with romance, relationships, politics, and murder mysteries.


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## allenw (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> That's not a question of advancement speed.  It's a question of why everyone isn't being an adventurer.
> 
> Really, that's something that goes pretty deep into the assumptions of the game world.  Why settle for being a warrior or expert when you could be a fighter or wizard?  Why be a commoner when you could be a rogue?  Even if you're stuck being a warrior, why be a guard, when you could find some other guys with swords and go loot a dungeon?  Certainly, if you become an adventurer, you're going to get powerful pretty quickly.  However, you have to be one first.  Why isn't everyone.




  Presumably, not everyone *can* be a PC class.  But the original question still holds even if you restrict it to PC classes, or still further to "adventurers":  why aren't most of them 20th level?  "Because 99% of them die permanently before they get that far" is a valid answer, but doesn't bode well for the PC's prospects (though Eberron seems to have a workable variant, "They were all recently killed off in a big war").


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 17, 2007)

Greg K said:
			
		

> Oh, there have also been entire sessions dealing with romance, relationships, politics, and murder mysteries.




I've had entire D&D sessions dealing with aliens, robots, and laser guns.


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## allenw (Oct 17, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> At the simplest I'll just do what I do now, hand out 50% of the recommended XP totals (or whatever the magic number winds up being).




Been there, doing that.   As I expect you've noticed, if you don't cut down on the treasure, this will tend to make your PCs become vastly over-equipped for their levels (compared to RAW expectations).


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> I've had entire D&D sessions dealing with aliens, robots, and laser guns.



And completely harmless little white rabbits sitting on completely harmless tree stumps.


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## Mallus (Oct 17, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> I've had entire D&D sessions dealing with aliens, robots, and laser guns.



Now you're talking!


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## ruleslawyer (Oct 17, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> For an average american, yes.  For practical purposes... no, Rochester doesn't really count unless you are willing to foot the bill for air travel   (writing on a Mac, so no VTT for me   )



Hey, it's the same state! 


> _I feel that that works for the minimal political effects deriving from the power of HLCs in a butt-kicking campaign, but likely not for a deliberately political campgain...  I'd like to be proven wrong, but it sounds unlikely  :\_



Well, to begin with, people who have the personal, financial, and magical power required to change the world (like HLCs) are not going to generate "minimal political effects" unless they're deliberately trying to stay in the shadows. Numerous examples abound in fantasy literature; Gandalf, Sparrowhawk, and the like can't _help_ but change their worlds through the pursuit of their own (sometimes more esoteric) goals. 

That said, since my personal campaign anecdotes are likely to be less convincing to you (you don't know me), I'd encourage you to read the C/M module series for a published-module example of how high-level characters can be the levers in a political campaign... and those modules (especially CM1 _Test of the Warlords_ and M1 _Into the Maelstrom_) are all about politics on a world-shaking scale. I ran a hugely political campaign around that module series that was a whirlwind of intrigue and ended with the empire-builder PC (the other three PCs being the kingdom's general, its chief loremaster, and its queen/empress) ruling a vast swath of the Known World and building a gigantic empire into whose future he was forced to travel in order to save it (and the world) during the reign of his great-great-granddaughter. 

Another campaign I ran had the PCs establish a small realm centered around the town of Glister (in the FR) and eventually sweep out into a vast kingdom across the northern Moonsea. Tons of intrigue involving the internal and external machinations of Zhentil Keep and Mulmaster, the merchant-lords of Melvaunt and Thentia, and the greed of various autocratic factions in Hillsfar, as well as monstrous kingdoms, disaffected ogres with spelljamming connections, raiding drow cities, etc. I ported over the dominion and combat rules from BECMI (though I would have preferred something more complicated), and players got very, very into how the crops were doing, whether one of their vassals had been the victim of espionage or corruption, and the like. I even ran a second campaign after that one in which the PCs were spies of the former PCs' kingdom's Archmage.

[EDIT: If anything, the problem with running empire-building campaigns is the same one as running campaigns involving endless dungeon crawls: Some players may be turned off by the style of play. Players may WANT freedom for their PCs, and the ability to run around and explore the gameworld without being forced to look in on their kingdoms.]


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## ruleslawyer (Oct 17, 2007)

Mallus said:
			
		

> See, that's part of the game's enduring brilliance. Everything you mentioned is D&D.



QFT. IMHO, there is no one playstyle encouraged by the rules; where 3e shines is in having further developed a number of the rules governing non-combat options (social skills, Craft rules, Leadership, etc.). Likewise, BECMI shines for its introduction of rules to cover dominions, wars, etc. (Some third-party d20 stuff also does a good job of this; Fields of Blood comes to mind.)


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## gizmo33 (Oct 17, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> There's a pretty good answer.  Being an adventurer is hard work, and it's easier to just make shoes.




"Hard work"?!  Yea, I'd say losing your nose to frost bite, getting the plague in a foreign swamp and having your nuts snipped off by the King's executioner because you were in the wrong place during an attempted coup is "hard work".  

"Easier" IMO doesn't do it justice.  First of all the skills required are peculiar - especially in the case of a rogue.  In fact you could be a "rogue" in real life, I doubt the reasons that you're not have something to do with being lazy.

Plus, players of the game ingore all of the hardships and realities of such a life.  Players come with a built-in background that gives them their skills and yet doesn't include any of the demeaning possibilities inherent in such backgrounds.  The players are also handed relatively morally-pure quests with an assumption that they aren't going to be annihilated in the first encounter.  In short, basically the only reason that players pretend to be adventurers is that IMO it's nothing like real life, and anyone who is too critical of commoners for being lazy should be made aware of this.

So your choices could be 

1.  Join the army, get stationed on a border and learn nothing for 10 years except how to survive scurvy.  
2.  Join the thieves guild, get arrested on your first heist because you don't know what you're doing and have both of your eyes put out. 
3.  Be a farmer, earn an honest living, sleep on a bed, get married, and live in a village full of people that like you.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 17, 2007)

allenw said:
			
		

> Been there, doing that.   As I expect you've noticed, if you don't cut down on the treasure, this will tend to make your PCs become vastly over-equipped for their levels (compared to RAW expectations).




Yea, experience totals were just one of a number of changes I made to 3E to make it compatible in spirit with my campaign.


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## ruleslawyer (Oct 17, 2007)

allenw said:
			
		

> Presumably, not everyone *can* be a PC class.  But the original question still holds even if you restrict it to PC classes, or still further to "adventurers":  why aren't most of them 20th level?  "Because 99% of them die permanently before they get that far" is a valid answer, but doesn't bode well for the PC's prospects (though Eberron seems to have a workable variant, "They were all recently killed off in a big war").



Well, I think that the explanation for this (as for many other things) is "the PCs are special." 

Now, not everyone likes that particular explanation, but it suits me just fine. The PCs are the heroes, and hence have narrative fiat to back up their actions, their survival in the face of desperate odds, and so on. I play D&D in order to indulge my love of escapist fantasy tropes, and in most of my favorite books and movies, it's pretty darn clear that the characters at front and center are supposed to be special. Luke and Vader are the ones that turn the tide of the Force in Star Wars; sure, the Old Republic existed for thousands of years and there were probably heroes back then, but THIS ISN'T THEIR STORY. It's Vader and Luke's story, so that's what's front and center and those are the ones who survive to the ending.


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## JDJblatherings (Oct 17, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> No, becoming a lord with a keep and holdings was never part of the "essence" of D&D.
> 
> The essence of D&D is going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff.
> 
> ...




You are ignorant of the origins and early days of the game.  Going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff was not the CORE STORY. Learn about the origins of the game and how early camapigns were played and then tell me what I have been doing wrong for about 30 years now by having campaigns where the CORE STORY was going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff so one could become a lord of their own domain.  9th level fighters were LORDS not vagabonds.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> "Hard work"?!  Yea, I'd say losing your nose to frost bite, getting the plague in a foreign swamp and having your nuts snipped off by the King's executioner because you were in the wrong place during an attempted coup is "hard work".
> 
> "Easier" IMO doesn't do it justice.  First of all the skills required are peculiar - especially in the case of a rogue.  In fact you could be a "rogue" in real life, I doubt the reasons that you're not have something to do with being lazy.
> 
> ...



So, yeah.  Why everyone is not an adventurer: superlative edition.  I think this is much more convincing than the "slow advancement" theory.


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## JDJblatherings (Oct 17, 2007)

Kraydak said:
			
		

> I have played DnD with bad DMs, mediocre DMs and a few superb DMs.  *None* of them, not even the best, could run an Empire building game at a level that would interest me.  The DMing load would simply be too great and DM whim would become utterly dominant.  In a dungeoncrawl there will be 2-3 different factions, with specific relations and intrigues.  In an Empire campaign, there will be 10s of different factions, and 100s to 1000s of faction-faction relationships.  All respect to DMs, but running that well is beyond any human.  Which results in either a "mother-may-I" campaign or a campaign with curiously passive NPCs waiting to get rolled when the PCs get around to it.





Running such a campaign is hardly beyond human. I've done it. I've known a number other DMs who did it as well.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 17, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> 9th level fighters were LORDS not vagabonds.



In your campaign, anyway.  In mine they didn't bother with all that.  They were too busy looking for bigger fish to fry.  However, the common element between our two campaigns was the dungeon -> killing -> loot equation.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 18, 2007)

EDIT: Sure, OK.



			
				JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> Going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff was not the CORE STORY. Learn about the origins of the game and how early camapigns were played and then tell me what I have been doing wrong for about 30 years now by having campaigns where the CORE STORY was going into dungeons, killing the bad guys, and taking their stuff so one could become a lord of their own domain.  9th level fighters were LORDS not vagabonds.



I think you're just as wrong as Wulf, and for the same reason.  There's no "*one true* core story" to D&D; it can be a lot of different games.  That's part of its "enduring brilliance."  9th level fighters may be "LORDS" in your campaign, but maybe they're not in Wulf's or mine; and no one is doing anything wrongbadsuck.


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## gizmo33 (Oct 18, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> So, yeah.  Why everyone is not an adventurer: superlative edition.




Thanks, I'm not quite sure what you mean by superlative but it has the word super in it so I'll take it as a complement.   

(BTW, your sig is hilarious.  I'm still laughing about the "half-hearted explanations to a parrot" thing.  That's brilliant.   )


----------



## gizmo33 (Oct 18, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> And you're a pretentious ass.  If I were a mod I'd find a nice way to say that and then really make my point by giving you a timeout from the thread. But I'm not a mod, so I'll just call it like I see it.




"Ignorant" is one of those tricky words that has a plausible and sensible definition but is also a slur and so someone can reasonably pretend to use it one way and mean another.  I agree with you and I think it's best avoided lest the person reading it think that you're trying to be weasily about insulting someone while pretending not to.


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## A'koss (Oct 18, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> In your campaign, anyway.  In mine they didn't bother with all that.  They were too busy looking for bigger fish to fry.  However, the common element between our two campaigns was the dungeon -> killing -> loot equation.



Hunh... back in those days the prevelent attitude in my games was - once you could afford to buy a keep, you did. Because then you "made it", you were _somebody_ now. *Lord* somebody in fact.

When Test of the Warlords came out we still played it with 2e rules, but that solidfied the breakpoint -15th level- where everyone starting looking at where to build their castle (Dragon Mag had several cool designs in one ish.), tower (modeled after the High Clerist tower, of course), or exotic fortress (built into a cliffside, tree-town, desert monolith, etc.). Except the theives of course, who would half the time start their own guilds, the other half mooch off the PCs who did drop the cash on the castle. 

The PCs still went out and adventured, but there would be bigger jumps in time between them. I think a lot of the attraction was having your own "home base", the grander the better as well as having your own "home town", just the way you like it (and tax it   ). From there (remembering that castles were just a means to an end, not an end in itself), outside of the usual adventuring, PCs would usually push on with their "dreams" - the long-term goal stuff I talked about before.


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## Umbran (Oct 18, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> And you're a pretentious ass.  If I were a mod I'd find a nice way to say that and then really make my point by giving you a timeout from the thread. But I'm not a mod, so I'll just call it like I see it.





...and get _yourself_ booted from the thread for your trouble.  Don't post in here again.

Next person who cannot control his or her more base impulses in here gets a ban.  If, for some reason, you cannot understand why, please feel free to e-mail me or another mod to discuss it.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 18, 2007)

gizmo33 said:
			
		

> Thanks, I'm not quite sure what you mean by superlative but it has the word super in it so I'll take it as a complement.




It means "to the MAXX!!!" 



> (BTW, your sig is hilarious.  I'm still laughing about the "half-hearted explanations to a parrot" thing.  That's brilliant.   )



Go read the webcomic I stole it from.


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## Piratecat (Oct 18, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> You are ignorant of the origins and early days of the game.



And let's not tell people they're ignorant because they don't agree with you, eh? There are better ways to get a point across, and they don't involve being rude.


----------



## Nifft (Oct 18, 2007)

So, how 'bout that gold. It's shiny and we like it. In real life, we'd use it to indulge in pleasures of the flesh, but D&D has consistently failed to deliver any reasonable simulation of THAT, so let's think of other stuff we could buy.

- Expensive material components: Sure, you can cast _greater restoration_ at will. Cash up front please.

- Tolls, tariffs & taxes: "Material components" for mundane transport.

- Alchemical goodies: more mundane "material components".

- Bribes, tithes & tribute: what I've been calling "plot hacks" -- using in-game rewards to purchase narrative control.

Cheers, -- N


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## FireLance (Oct 18, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> So, how 'bout that gold... let's think of other stuff we could buy.



"Setting control" - fund a crusade or a evangelical drive that makes your church the leading religious power in the barony/kingdom/world, win the hand of the princess, raise troops to carve out a kingdom in the wilderness/overthrow a despot/conquer the world, etc.


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## ruleslawyer (Oct 18, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> In your campaign, anyway.  In mine they didn't bother with all that.  They were too busy looking for bigger fish to fry.  However, the common element between our two campaigns was the dungeon -> killing -> loot equation.



Which is great!  However, it is worth noting (and maybe the point that JDJBlatherings was intending to express) that the "core" rules for 1e do have "name" level (9th-11th depending on class) characters automatically gaining access to a stronghold and followers. This does hardwire a certain playstyle CHOICE, at least, into the game.


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## Imp (Oct 18, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> So, how 'bout that gold. It's shiny and we like it. In real life, we'd use it to indulge in pleasures of the flesh, but D&D has consistently failed to deliver any reasonable simulation of THAT, so let's think of other stuff we could buy.



I did like the suggestion earlier (in this thread? I lose track) of being able to spend it on various pleasures or sacrifices or donations, whatever is in character, and having that translate into morale bonuses or, I don't know, maybe something more limited, action points or sub-action-points, something you can spread out when you need it.

Like... say 100 gp spent at whatever in-character activity - buying a statue for your temple, getting a new house, les pleasures of the flesh, lab equipment - translates into 1 point of damage, which you can add to any attack roll, possibly up to a certain maximum per hit if things are looking unbalancey.  Something like that.  Things that don't translate into game-world power, but provide the character satisfaction.


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## ptolemy18 (Oct 18, 2007)

Mouseferatu said:
			
		

> Ditto. If the plan is indeed to have a new DMG every year, then there should be _plenty_ of room to include stronghold and territory rules for high-level characters.




This would be nice.... assuming they're willing to support the idea of strongholds and fortresses and stuff like that, since I recall they also have talked about "lowering the power of extremely high-level PCs". Statements like how the characters "are too weak at low-level and too strong at high-level."

At any rate, I, too, don't understand exactly what the point of gold will be in a game where you can't buy magic items as freely. It could be good for role-playing, or it could sort of invalidate the point of treasure altogether. I assume they're too smart to do the latter, hopefully, so I guess I'll wait and see.

The one thing I hope they DON'T do? Go back to making gold = XP, like in some older editions. BLEARGGH!


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## Lanefan (Oct 18, 2007)

Patryn of Elvenshae said:
			
		

> This is the DM's fault for not pausing after the first adventure and stating, "Six months later ..."



This doesn't happen IME.  Why?  Because in my case that would be exactly as far as I would get into that sentence before at least one player would interrupt with a variant on: "Hey!  If we just had 6 months off I won't have been doing nothing...I'll go off on my own adventure while everyone else stays put, unless they wanted to come along...." at which point the wheels come off.

The only ways to get parties to put in some downtime is by training, or by having them somehow get themselves involved in a non-adventuring project that eats up time...building a party stronghold, helping with the local harvest, preparing for a particular celebration or event, etc.

Lanefan


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## FireLance (Oct 18, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> The only ways to get parties to put in some downtime is by training, or by having them somehow get themselves involved in a non-adventuring project that eats up time...building a party stronghold, helping with the local harvest, preparing for a particular celebration or event, etc.



Or you know, talking to the players and explaining that their characters can either wait six months game time for the next adventure, or you are going to house-rule the rate of advancement so that it requires six months of constant adventuring to make a level.

If the players don't don't realize how important it is to you that the PCs advance more slowly in terms of game time, you can always stop DMing for them.


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## JDJblatherings (Oct 18, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> EDIT: Sure, OK.
> 
> 
> I think you're just as wrong as Wulf, and for the same reason.  There's no "*one true* core story" to D&D; it can be a lot of different games.  That's part of its "enduring brilliance."  9th level fighters may be "LORDS" in your campaign, but maybe they're not in Wulf's or mine; and no one is doing anything wrongbadsuck.





There is no "one true story".  But the rules did support "go get rich and build yourself some worldly power" . In the old days the rules told you your 9th level fighters were Lords, it was part of the rules. Playing it otherwise was playing it in a spirit different from the rules.  All the gold collected along the way was supposed to be spent on being a lord and spent on training (another hugely ignored rule that got washed away, thankfully).


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## JDJblatherings (Oct 18, 2007)

Piratecat said:
			
		

> And let's not tell people they're ignorant because they don't agree with you, eh? There are better ways to get a point across, and they don't involve being rude.





sorry piractecat, ignorance doesn't = stupidity.  I don't consider it an insult to be pointed out there is something I don't know. I apologize if someone feels that to be an affront.


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 18, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> sorry piractecat, ignorance doesn't = stupidity.  I don't consider it an insult to be pointed out there is something I don't know. I apologize if someone feels that to be an affront.




I don't consider "ignorant" a slur either.

And trust me, fella, I'm not ignorant about the origins of the game. Whatever ignorance is on display in this thread, it's not coming from me.


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## JDJblatherings (Oct 18, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> I don't consider "ignorant" a slur either.
> 
> And trust me, fella, I'm not ignorant about the origins of the game. Whatever ignorance is on display in this thread, it's not coming from me.





great! 

So why purge the castle lording/empire building element from the game? It's a great gold pump and a reason to keep adventuring. Adventuring goes from grubby dungeon crawling for scaps to protecting ones realm and people (while hopefully getting larger scraps). Players having PCs build estates and enterprises provide many channels to cearte a unique campaign  in a fashion  that romping thru dungeons alone will seldom if ever accomplish.


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## Piratecat (Oct 18, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> sorry piractecat, ignorance doesn't = stupidity.  I don't consider it an insult to be pointed out there is something I don't know. I apologize if someone feels that to be an affront.



Calling someone ignorant has much more of a subtext than claiming that they're not familiar with a fact. We expect folks to use good judgment and err towards the side of civility, because without body language it's easy to infer an  innocent comment as an insult.  

In the future, incidentally, please drop me (or any mod) an email instead of discussing moderator comments in the thread. We like to handle discussion off-line.


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 18, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> So why purge the castle lording/empire building element from the game?




For all intents and purposes THERE IS NO EMPIRE BUILDING ELEMENT TO D&D. Any castle lording/empire building element to D&D is peripheral to its core design. _Very_ peripheral.

One line on the 9th level fighter's advancement table does not a Lord make. Two or three pages of castle construction costs does not a fiefdom make.

Your subjective experience with the game simply does not square with objective reality.

*This is not an indictment of your playstyle.*

There are a few folks for whom this element of the game is important. From time to time a designer will revisit the subject, and a publisher might "take a gamble" every now and then with a product solely dedicated to this playstyle.

Birthright was the most ambitious attempt to cater the design to this playstyle. I will let that speak for itself.

You point me to any evidence you have that D&D is about empire building, and I will give you 10-to-1 evidence that it is about dungeon delving. 

That's what the vast preponderance of the rules are designed for, it's what the vast preponderance of the published material supports, and it's how the vast preponderance of players play the game. 

It is simply not open to debate. 

You should take some pride in the fact that you have transcended the game for 30 years. Games such as yours (and others here, apparently) that transcend the game are typically lauded as a testament to the DM, and for good reason: because it's recognized that the DM has managed to make something more of the game than the rules easily support.

But that is no reason to hold on to a romanticized notion of what the game was and is designed and marketed for. 

I refer you again to the ice carving/chainsaw analogy.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 18, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> There is no "one true story".



It depends on what you mean by that.

The default adventure for D&D is the dungeon bash.
The default adventure for Birthright is part dominion management/part dungeon bash.
The default adventure for Call of Cthulhu is investigative.

The games aren't the same, they don't support the same style of play.

Yes you can play D&D as part dominion management. Yes you can play investigative scenarios. Yes you can run a dungeon bash with Call of Cthulhu. Yes, you can use a pair of pliers to hammer in a nail.

More than any other style of play, D&D supports the dungeon bash. It's what 95% or more of the game text is about. This is what it means to say the dungeon bash is the essence, or core, of D&D.


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## GlassJaw (Oct 18, 2007)

The last I checked, almost all of the early modules involved various locales filled to the brim with baddies for the players to kill.  The plots were extremely thin but the overwhelming "core" element to them was:

1.  Go to XYZ place.
2.  Kill everything.
3.  Take their stuff.
4.  Repeat 1-3.

Simple as that.


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## Reynard (Oct 18, 2007)

GlassJaw said:
			
		

> The last I checked, almost all of the early modules involved various locales filled to the brim with baddies for the players to kill.  The plots were extremely thin but the overwhelming "core" element to them was:
> 
> 1.  Go to XYZ place.
> 2.  Kill everything.
> ...




When _was_ the lasty time you checked?  Because while you are correct, it isn't the whole story.  Those old modules also had people to talk to, mysteries to solve, wilderness and ruins to explore.  Yes, the dungeon is at the heart of D&D but it has always been surrounded with much, much more.

As much as us grognards can often look back with rose colored glasses, others look back through the lens of snark and stereotypes that aren't any more true of old school play.


----------



## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 18, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> As much as us grognards can often look back with rose colored glasses, others look back through the lens of snark and stereotypes that aren't any more true of old school play.




I think part of your problem is that you think "Kill the bad guys and take their stuff" is snarky.

It's not snarky, it's friggin _genius_.


----------



## Reynard (Oct 18, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> I think part of your problem is that you think "Kill the bad guys and take their stuff" is snarky.
> 
> It's not snarky, it's friggin _genius_.




I don't the statement is snarky -- I think it is simplistic and all too often used in a denigrating fashion.

The concept -- absolutely genius.


----------



## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 18, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> I think it is simplistic and all too often used in a denigrating fashion.




By whom? Who uses "Kill the bad guys and take their stuff" in a denigrating fashion?

Why can't I, who enjoys Killing bad guys and taking their stuff, use that phrase?

I'm seriously at a loss here.

I'm sitting here feeling like... I dunno. Like I just said, "Damn, I love cheap beer!" and somehow the wine connoisseur feels insulted.


----------



## Plane Sailing (Oct 18, 2007)

I understand that 'kill the bad guys and take their stuff' can be usefully used as a core story of D&D, and I'm sure I read an article on the WotC site saying as much.

However, I think that the original core story of D&D was dungeon exploration.

case 1: the basic setup has a DM with perfect knowledge of a situation and 1 or more players who don't know the situation and explore the dungeon (most commonly) or situation/mystery (gradually became more common) in order to have fun 'resolving' it.

case 2: when Gary Gygax DMed and adventure for some lucky mods at Gencon this year, IIRC it was largely about exploration (Piratecat or someone else who was there might be able to comment on that).

"kill the bad guys and take their stuff" has a thriving internet meme behind it, for very good reasons, but I'd never heard D&D described that way in the pre-internet days.

Might be worth thinking about.

Cheers


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 18, 2007)

Plane Sailing said:
			
		

> I understand that 'kill the bad guys and take their stuff' can be usefully used as a core story of D&D, and I'm sure I read an article on the WotC site saying as much.
> 
> However, I think that the original core story of D&D was dungeon exploration.
> 
> ...



This might be splitting hairs a bit when the question at issue is whether D&D is fundamentally about building keeps or killing monsters.  If the core idea is that you go into dungeons and kill monsters, or explore wildernesses and kill monsters, or talk to people in town to find out which one of them is the werewolf and then kill him, it's much closer to "kill things and take their stuff" than it is to "build a keep and tax the commoners".


----------



## Doug McCrae (Oct 18, 2007)

I agree the exploration is as important as the killing and looting.

My formula would be:
Explore the unknown, kill what lives there and take its stuff.

Gary's description of what games revolved around in the early days, taken from an ENWorld post -

"The usual was explore, solve problems, locate adversaries, combat adversaries, run away from triumphant foes or loot defeated ones."


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 18, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> I agree the exploration is as important as the killing and looting.
> 
> My formula would be:
> Explore the unknown, kill what lives there and take its stuff.
> ...



Yeah, that's pretty much the formula as it stands today.  Kill Things & Take Their Stuff is a subset of this.


----------



## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 18, 2007)

Plane Sailing said:
			
		

> "kill the bad guys and take their stuff" has a thriving internet meme behind it, for very good reasons, but I'd never heard D&D described that way in the pre-internet days.
> 
> Might be worth thinking about.




That's akin to saying that gravity did not exist before Newton.

The fact that nobody was thinking about D&D on that particular level of design does not mean that the "core story" didn't exist.

Design is evolving.

I don't even want to start the argument about what was or wasn't discussed much before the Internet. The Internet has facilitated the transmission of knowledge in ways that are significant far beyond this hobby.

1e D&D awarded XP primarily for killing monsters-- and for each gold piece found on a 1:1 basis! Call me crazy, but that's a pretty clear indicator of intent.


----------



## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 18, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> Gary's description of what games revolved around in the early days, taken from an ENWorld post -
> 
> "The usual was explore, solve problems, locate adversaries, combat adversaries, run away from triumphant foes or loot defeated ones."




He went on to add, "Oh, and levying taxes upon the peasants, of course."


----------



## Plane Sailing (Oct 18, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> That's akin to saying that gravity did not exist before Newton.
> 
> The fact that nobody was thinking about D&D on that particular level of design does not mean that the "core story" didn't exist.
> 
> ...




Any particular reason why you are quoting part of my post and responding to it out of context?

sheesh.


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## Reynard (Oct 18, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> I don't even want to start the argument about what was or wasn't discussed much before the Internet. The Internet has facilitated the transmission of knowledge in ways that are significant far beyond this hobby.




Knowledge ain't the only thing, sadly.



> 1e D&D awarded XP primarily for killing monsters-- and for each gold piece found on a 1:1 basis! Call me crazy, but that's a pretty clear indicator of intent.




If you look at the ratio of XP for killing things vs taking their stuff, it becomes pretty apparent that the taking of stuff was far more important than the killing of things.  Exploration in search of treasure -- gold and glory -- are at the heart of the game and it is something I think "story oriented" groups forget (I blame 2E).  The killing of things is only one component of making the treasure worth getting, along with traps and puzzles and secrets.

But my point was this: describing D&D simply as, or _only_ as, "killing things and taking their stuff" does a disservice to the game and its players.


----------



## JDJblatherings (Oct 18, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> For all intents and purposes THERE IS NO EMPIRE BUILDING ELEMENT TO D&D. Any castle lording/empire building element to D&D is peripheral to its core design. _Very_ peripheral.
> 
> One line on the 9th level fighter's advancement table does not a Lord make. Two or three pages of castle construction costs does not a fiefdom make.
> 
> ...




No romanticized notion at all there were rules in original, 1st, 2nd and the boxed series that supported the notion that characters at "name level" would begin to act the part of lords. The description of the fighting men in  "Men & Magic"spells all of this out right in the description of the class on the 6th page of the rules.

In various versions the rules told one how many followers turned up when they built a castle, stronghold, thieves guild, wizards tower or temple. In the DMG it spelled out how much and for how long one had to clear terriotry to claim it as their own.   Darksun even had a different range of followers becasue it was so radically different from 2nd  ed D&D, clearly thisbeing  lord of their own domain at name level WAS part of the game.

It was spelled out in a diffrent and more deatiled manner in the D&D boxed lines of games ( which were also D&D last time I checked). They weren't peripheral rules they were the rules. As much as alignments and ability scores (heck they had more coverage then ability scores did under soem versions of the game).

 I'd love to see some of this back in the core rules, in part becasue it expalins why the  immensely wealthy folks coninute to risk their lives (and souls in some cases) and encourages PCs to become part of the campaign instead of simply rummaging about in it.


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 18, 2007)

Plane Sailing said:
			
		

> Any particular reason why you are quoting part of my post and responding to it out of context?
> 
> sheesh.




Sorry PlaneSailing-- no offense was intended. If there's a part of my post that seems like it should properly refer back to your larger post, I'll be happy to put it back in. 

I was specifically referring to the fact that "core story" is a new concept to design. And to the best of my knowledge, there simply _was_ no shared language for game design, _at all_, certainly pre-Internet and even largely persisting today. 

If anything is out of context it is the last line of my post which wasn't at all directed at you. I should have made that clear.


----------



## Lanefan (Oct 18, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> For all intents and purposes THERE IS NO EMPIRE BUILDING ELEMENT TO D&D. Any castle lording/empire building element to D&D is peripheral to its core design. _Very_ peripheral.
> 
> Birthright was the most ambitious attempt to cater the design to this playstyle. I will let that speak for itself.



Birthright's fate was sealed by its release timing...2e and the hobby in general was already in steep decline when BR came out (1995, according to the (c) date on mine) so no wonder it didn't sell: nobody cared.  Whcih is a shame, because it's one of the few really good releases to come out of the whole 2e era as far as I'm concerned.

If it had come out in 1984 as an add-on for 1e things would be different; 1e *did* support empire-building and BR would have fit right in. 

Lanefan


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## Umbran (Oct 18, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> For all intents and purposes THERE IS NO EMPIRE BUILDING ELEMENT TO D&D. Any castle lording/empire building element to D&D is peripheral to its core design. _Very_ peripheral.




Would you say that for all intents and purposes, there is no social interaction element to D&D, because there are so few rules about it?

Well, then, I submit that the core story is actually casting spells - I think the PHB has more pages on spells and spellcasting than about melee combat, by far.  Those sword-swinging fighters are an afterthought by comparison.

Yes, it is reductio ad absurdum - the point is that you are drawing a line based on your own sensibilities.  You've decided how much rules-content is required to make something "the core story", in your own head.  The interior of your head may be an interesting place, Wulf, but I'm not sure we should be taking it as a source of objective truths


----------



## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 18, 2007)

Umbran said:
			
		

> The interior of your head may be an interesting place, Wulf, but I'm not sure we should be taking it as a source of objective truths




How fortunate then that there's ample objective evidence to back me up.

Hundreds of products, thousands upon thousands of pages dedicated to dungeon delving. It's the core of the game. 

It really isn't subjective to me.

I'm frankly baffled at the need to argue against this. Not simply baffled at the fact that anyone would _try_ to argue it in light of the overwhelming evidence, but quite simply baffled at the _need_ to argue it. I'm still not sure why the fact that D&D is designed to do one thing very well, _followed by the equally obvious fact that many folks have demonstrated an artistry to take the game beyond its core function,_ is an affront to your sensibilities.

Anyway, there's no point picking fights with _me_. D&D is what it is, and 4e is going to be EVEN MORE of what it is.

(<-- Thinks that's a good thing.)


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## GlassJaw (Oct 18, 2007)

Perhaps the word "story" in the phrase "core story" isn't the right one.  Perhaps core "essence" is better.

But I wholeheartedly agree with Wulf.  The essence of D&D, especially the _design_, is about killings things and taking their stuff.  Of course there are other elements to D&D but that is what is always at the center.  Everything else (social interaction, building castles, solving puzzles, etc) is a small satellite that orbits the core (killing things, taking stuff).

If it wasn't, you wouldn't need things like classes, levels, balance between classes, varying power of monsters, a variety of treasure and magic items, etc.

95+% of the rules are things to kill, ways to kill them, rewards you get after you kill things, and new abilities you learn when you kill enough things.


----------



## Reynard (Oct 18, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> Anyway, there's no point picking fights with _me_. D&D is what it is, and 4e is going to be EVEN MORE of what it is.
> 
> (<-- Thinks that's a good thing.)




Is it?  I think it is going to be far more about combat, far more about instant gratification and far more about emulating far more financially successful gaming enterprises.  Is it going to be "more D&D than D&D" -- I highly doubt it.  When you start things off by turning a dungeon into a gauntlet-arena hybrid, you've undone D&D.

EDIT: Plus, it looks like the "taking their stuff" part is getting the shaft, too.


----------



## Clavis (Oct 18, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> So, how 'bout that gold. It's shiny and we like it. In real life, we'd use it to indulge in pleasures of the flesh, but D&D has consistently failed to deliver any reasonable simulation of THAT, so let's think of other stuff we could buy.




That's why 1st ED. characters needed to know whether they encountered a "common streetwalker" or an "expensive doxy"! 

Higher level character need higher-priced whores to waste their money on! I've watched my player's PCs squander rubies and diamonds on prostitutes, and buy rounds of imported wine for the house in almost every tavern the could. Let them know that things like gold-plated armor exists (complete with ermine fur cape!), and I can testify that getting the players (at least male players) to waste their PC's money isn't difficult.

Players get a sense of success when they watch their characters go from paying 1 copper for a handjob from a half-orc in a rat-infested alleyway, to paying 1000s of gold pieces for a night with a famous elven courtesan.

I've actually seen PCs buy a brothel, and become Pimps!


----------



## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 18, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> Is it?  I think it is going to be far more about combat, far more about instant gratification and far more about emulating far more financially successful gaming enterprises.




In fact, what has happened is that those far more financially successful gaming enterprises have done a better job of delivering on the core essence of D&D than D&D has done to date: Killing things, taking their stuff, powering up, repeat.

World of Warcraft-- let's stop beating around the bush-- has some built in advantages. The game is "easier to play" because all of the burdensome rules management is shifted to a computer. WoW doesn't suffer from "20 minutes of fun in 4 hours" (arranging big Raids notwithstanding).

So the obvious goal for D&D design was to further streamline that core experience; but D&D has the added advantage of _also_ supporting many different kinds of peripheral play styles that a computer simply can't do as well (if indeed at all).

So-- redesign D&D to deliver on its core experience as efficiently as possible, or abandon the core of D&D and try to reinvent it?

It's utterly preoposterous to think that WOTC should abandon D&D's core experience to a competitor, declare defeat, and instead retrofit the game to "retain" an insignificant minority of pissy grognards.


----------



## Hairfoot (Oct 19, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> So-- redesign D&D to deliver on its core experience as efficiently as possible, or abandon the core of D&D and try to reinvent it?
> 
> It's utterly preoposterous to think that WOTC should abandon D&D's core experience to a competitor, declare defeat, and instead retrofit the game to "retain" an insignificant minority of pissy grognards.



Exactly.  Just as Hollywood now concentrates on basic, formulaic action films for teenage boys, rather than target an "insignificant minority" of people who appreciate good cinema.  Never go for quality when there's volume at stake.


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## GlassJaw (Oct 19, 2007)

Hairfoot said:
			
		

> Exactly.  Just as Hollywood now concentrates on basic, formulaic action films for teenage boys, rather than target an "insignificant minority" of people who appreciate good cinema.  Never go for quality when there's volume at stake.




A horrible analogy.

There are plenty of very good action films.  Why can't a D&D experience that focus on the core elements be well-designed?  

I think what Wulf is saying is that all that peripheral "stuff" you don't really need rules for.  People will always adapt the rules to their preferred play style.  That's what makes the RPG hobby so great.

However, if the designers _don't _start at the core essence of the game - killing things and taking their stuff - no one has a game to play because that means there is no balance, no power curve, no incentives, etc.


----------



## Hairfoot (Oct 19, 2007)

GlassJaw said:
			
		

> I think what Wulf is saying is that all that peripheral "stuff" you don't really need rules for.  People will always adapt the rules to their preferred play style.  That's what makes the RPG hobby so great.
> 
> However, if the designers _don't _start at the core essence of the game - killing things and taking their stuff - no one has a game to play because that means there is no balance, no power curve, no incentives, etc.



I'm sure Wulf can speak for himself, but what he seems to be saying is that D&D should be pared down to a system of combat and power-ups, without guidelines for anything outside that MMO dynamic.  What _you_ mention - excessive detail of "peripheral "stuff" you don't really need rules for" - is precisely what the "pissy grognards" dislike about 3E.


----------



## GlassJaw (Oct 19, 2007)

Hairfoot said:
			
		

> I'm sure Wulf can speak for himself, but what he seems to be saying is that D&D should be pared down to a system of combat and power-ups, without guidelines for anything outside that MMO dynamic.  What _you_ mention - excessive detail of "peripheral "stuff" you don't really need rules for" - is precisely what the "pissy grognards" dislike about 3E.




Wow, you are doing a great job of 2 things:

1.  Not reading what people actually write:  Yes, Wulf can certainly speak for himself but I'm pretty sure he never said D&D should be "pared down".

2.  Putting words in people's mouths.  Nowhere did I use the word "excessive" when referring to what people bring to their own campaign and play styles.

As far as grognards go, I would say that you can't design to please them anyway so that demographic should be a factor.


----------



## hong (Oct 19, 2007)

"Sometimes, the squeaky wheel gets the grease. Other times, it gets replaced."


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## Hairfoot (Oct 19, 2007)

GlassJaw said:
			
		

> Not reading what actually write



I can't be sure what that means, so I won't address it.



			
				GlassJaw said:
			
		

> Putting words in people's mouths.  Nowhere did I use the word "excessive" when referring to what people bring to their own campaign and play styles.



What you mentioned was:


			
				GlassJaw said:
			
		

> peripheral "stuff" you don't really need rules for. People will always adapt the rules to their preferred play style.



The usual "grognard" position is that there needn't be a rule for everything, so I agree with you.  But Wulf's post suggests that the D&D can be summed up as "killing things, taking their stuff, powering up, repeat".

To me, that describes a shallow game, and an RPG model which would leave the potential market wondering why they should go to the trouble of PnP, when the MMO does all that already.

The issue at stake is that, while combat and looting has always been at the heart of D&D action, the reason it has a greater scope than computer games is because it allows a campaign to become so much more.


----------



## hong (Oct 19, 2007)

Hairfoot said:
			
		

> To me, that describes a shallow game, and an RPG model which would leave the potential market wondering why they should go to the trouble of PnP, when the MMO does all that already.




Because nothing beats trash-talking someone face to face. Duh.


----------



## Hairfoot (Oct 19, 2007)

hong said:
			
		

> Because nothing beats trash-talking someone face to face. Duh.



And it's sort of redundant when the other players are named "1337poOpiSS" and "haXorbumcleftpwner88".


----------



## hong (Oct 19, 2007)

Hairfoot said:
			
		

> And it's sort of redundant when the other players are named "1337poOpiSS" and "haXorbumcleftpwner88".




Exactly.


----------



## pemerton (Oct 19, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> I think it is going to be far more about combat



4e will probably have the best-developed rules of any version of D&D for the design and the resolution of combat challenges. But if the rumours are true, it will also, probably, have the most sophisticated set of rules both for both the design of, and the resolution of, social and environmental challenges.

So I don't think it fair to say that it will be far more about combat. It _will_ be more about rules - rules for character building, rules for challenge design, rules for action resolution - and therefore will be even less like 1st ed AD&D, but that is a different matter. AD&D's absence of rules is extremely unusual for an RPG (compare it to any of its contemporaries - even T&T has more sophisiticated rules both for character build and action resolution), so it's not that surprising that D&D has become more typical as it has gone through iterations.



			
				Reynard said:
			
		

> [it is going to be] far more about instant gratification



If you mean "instant gratification of the PCs within the gameworld" then, again, there is no reason to believe that to be true. PCs in 4e will suffer from time to time, just as PCs in every other RPG suffer.

If, on the other hand, you mean "instant gratification of the _players_ at the gaming table", then I hope so! When I sit down to play any other game, I get the instant gratification of the pleasure that particular gaming experience delivers. Why should D&D, which is (after all) a game, competing for my time with other possible games, not also be fun to play?

Now, if your point is really that you don't enjoy playing a game where much of the play experience is interacting with, and mediated via, the rules, then that is a different thing. For such a person, 4e will _not_ be gratifying, whether instantly or otherwise.


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## Lanefan (Oct 19, 2007)

pemerton said:
			
		

> If you mean "instant gratification of the PCs within the gameworld" then, again, there is no reason to believe that to be true. PCs in 4e will suffer from time to time, just as PCs in every other RPG suffer.
> 
> If, on the other hand, you mean "instant gratification of the _players_ at the gaming table", then I hope so! When I sit down to play any other game, I get the instant gratification of the pleasure that particular gaming experience delivers. Why should D&D, which is (after all) a game, competing for my time with other possible games, not also be fun to play?



Here we need to define "gratification".  The game design over time seems to have originally defined it as a) the fun of killing (and looting) things along with role-playing with the other people at the table - in other words, enjoyment of what your character and party *does* in the game; moving today to a more mechanical definition b) that equates to power-ups and level bumps, in other words enjoyment of the *rewards* from what the character did in the game rather than the actual doing of it.  I hope that makes sense; it's awkward, but I can't think of a better way to put it.

From there, how - and how often - does that gratification occur?  In definition a) it occurs just about every time you sit down at the table and play, simply via the act of playing...even when bad things happen, you've still got stories to tell afterwards.  In definition b) it occurs only on either level-up or on acquiring a new item, and thus the design has made sure those things occur more often via faster advancement through more levels and relatively easy-to-acquire magic.

Of course, many players gain gratification from both a) and b), but the design focus has certainly shifted over time.







> Now, if your point is really that you don't enjoy playing a game where much of the play experience is interacting with, and mediated via, the rules, then that is a different thing. For such a person, 4e will _not_ be gratifying, whether instantly or otherwise.



I'd rather have much of the play experience be interacting with the other players and the game world, mediated by the DM, with the rules hovering somewhere over on stage left ready to make their presence known only when required.

Lanefan


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## pemerton (Oct 19, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> The game design over time seems to have originally defined it as a) the fun of killing (and looting) things along with role-playing with the other people at the table - in other words, enjoyment of what your character and party *does* in the game; moving today to a more mechanical definition b) that equates to power-ups and level bumps, in other words enjoyment of the *rewards* from what the character did in the game rather than the actual doing of it.  I hope that makes sense; it's awkward, but I can't think of a better way to put it.



I don't know if I fullly agree with your characterisation of (b) - is the pleasure in the power-up itself, or in the mechanical options (especially wrt character build) that the power-up gives rise to? I've read 4e designers expressly saying they want more of the latter (that is, more meaningful character build with each level).



			
				Lanefan said:
			
		

> From there, how - and how often - does that gratification occur?  In definition a) it occurs just about every time you sit down at the table and play, simply via the act of playing...even when bad things happen, you've still got stories to tell afterwards.  In definition b) it occurs only on either level-up or on acquiring a new item, and thus the design has made sure those things occur more often via faster advancement through more levels and relatively easy-to-acquire magic.



Agreed, even with my suggested revision of gratification type (b) - to get the pleasures of character build, the relevant opportunities - which in D&D are level-up and magic item acquisition - must be granted.

Though with respect to type (a), I would add that sometimes the gratification doesn't come just from sitting down at the table - for example, if my PC is dead or otherwise precluded from participating in the events of the gameworld, then typically I don't get to do much participating at the table. Aspects of the 4e rules - per-encounter abilities, changes to save-or-die, etc - are designed to overcome this problem (whether successfully or not remains to be seen, but I'm moderately optimistic).



			
				Lanefan said:
			
		

> Of course, many players gain gratification from both a) and b), but the design focus has certainly shifted over time.



No doubt about that. I'm one of those who think that 3E and 1st ed AD&D are the same game in brand name only.



			
				Lanefan said:
			
		

> I'd rather have much of the play experience be interacting with the other players and the game world, mediated by the DM, with the rules hovering somewhere over on stage left ready to make their presence known only when required.



As I think I replied to you on an earlier thread, I think that 4e is not going to support the sort of play you're looking for all that well. But it occurs to me now that I may be wrong: it is possible that the changes to the action resolution rules will be such that you can get more type (a) gratification, and that this will outweigh (for you) the unhappy impact of those parts of the rules designed to offer type (b) gratification.


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## JDJblatherings (Oct 19, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> Hundreds of products, thousands upon thousands of pages dedicated to dungeon delving.




Becasue it's the hard part , doing a good dungeon is  time-sink for a DM. One can transplant a dungeon into pretty much any setting. 

There should be a reason for all the gold beyond going adventuring some more.


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 19, 2007)

pemerton said:
			
		

> 4e will probably have the best-developed rules of any version of D&D for the design and the resolution of combat challenges.




Bingo.



> But if the rumours are true, it will also, probably, have the most sophisticated set of rules both for both the design of, and the resolution of, social and environmental challenges.




What I have been trying to say consistently is that the CORE of D&D is killing things, taking their stuff, and powering up so that you can repeat the process. The challenges and the scenery change, but the core experience is the same. I have never said that that was the TOTALITY of the D&D experience.

Folks, the free market has adequately proven that people want to "Kill things, take their stuff, power up, repeat." It makes sense for D&D to continue to design to its core function, to make it play as smoothly as possible-- approaching but of course never eclipsing the ease and efficiency that World of Warcraft has achieved in that respect. 

However, as a starting point for design, D&D needs to serve that core function with ever greater efficiency.

AND THEN...

Design has the luxury to go back and improve the efficiency of the other peripheral promises of D&D.



> So I don't think it fair to say that it will be far more about combat.




No, but it's absolutely fair to say that when it IS about combat, the combats will be bigger and more exciting and they'll run a lot smoother than they used to, and you'll be able to do it over and over in the same session without bringing the session to a halt for any one of a number of stumbling blocks.

If killing things, taking their stuff, and levelling up is what you want to do-- and I suspect that's what most people want to do-- then 4e should be the best edition of D&D yet to do it.



> If, on the other hand, you mean "instant gratification of the _players_ at the gaming table", then I hope so! When I sit down to play any other game, I get the instant gratification of the pleasure that particular gaming experience delivers. Why should D&D, which is (after all) a game, competing for my time with other possible games, not also be fun to play?




That's a huge issue. 4e is going to run more efficiently...

Supposedly... I have my concerns about 4e, but the design _impetus_ and design _philosophy_ are not on the list.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 19, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> Is it?  I think it is going to be far more about combat



How, exactly, could a game be _more_ about combat than 3.5 is?  The overwhelming majority of the rules are about combat, combat scenery, combat equipment, uses of skills in combat, combat spells, places to have combats in, things to have combats with, etc.  That it is possible to do something with the system besides run combats is, frankly, amazing.  In fact, most of the time, non-combat situations do not interact with the rules in any way.  You can get through a whole session without rolling a die as long as you don't fight anyone.  But as soon as you roll initiative, you're cracking open the books full of combat rules.

If you wanted to squeeze more about combat into the rules, you'd have to start removing flavour text to fit it in.  But there seems to be a bent toward providing extra flavour text, to the chagrin of those who don't really want that much of it.

I think the only realistic way to increase the amount of combat there is would be to just ban roleplaying.  No playing in character, no scene description.  Just one room full of monsters after another ad infinitum.  Kill kill kill.

That isn't going to happen, and therefore 4E isn't going to be more combat focused than 3.5.  If the focus on combat changes at all, it will be reduced, since that's the only direction it can really go from here.


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## Reynard (Oct 19, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> I think the only realistic way to increase the amount of combat there is would be to just ban roleplaying.  No playing in character, no scene description.  Just one room full of monsters after another ad infinitum.  Kill kill kill.
> 
> That isn't going to happen, and therefore 4E isn't going to be more combat focused than 3.5.  If the focus on combat changes at all, it will be reduced, since that's the only direction it can really go from here.




There's actually a couple ways.  One is to redefine the dungeon as a gauntlet and an arena instead of a place to be explored, where layout and occupation are designed specifically to flow monsters at the PCs continually, instead of pointing your design at promoting exploration, discovery and other non combat elements.

You could also redefine social interaction as combat without the blood, removing the need to engage in roleplaying and instead making sure the players' focus is on the numbers written down on his character sheet instead of the DM.

You could ensure that there are no effects or dangers that are so deadly that they would make the PCs consider options other than combat when faced with them, choosing instead, perhaps, to flee or parlay or find an alternate route (which would be impossible anyway, since the dungeon wouldn't have alternate routes).

Finally, you could eliminate resource management that directly affects combat so that the players have to make strategic decisions about when, how and under what circumstances they decide to engage in battle when other alternatives might exist.

But you're right -- none of those things would ever happen.


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 19, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> There's actually a couple ways.  One is to redefine the dungeon as a gauntlet and an arena instead of a place to be explored, where layout and occupation are designed specifically to flow monsters at the PCs continually, instead of pointing your design at promoting exploration, discovery and other non combat elements.
> 
> You could also redefine social interaction as combat without the blood, removing the need to engage in roleplaying and instead making sure the players' focus is on the numbers written down on his character sheet instead of the DM.
> 
> ...




Good post, Reynard.

I think you're a bit unfair on point #2, since players have been asking for years and years for a system that allows their PCs to be more intelligent, more wise, and more charismatic than the players themselves are. 

It's not fair to take a player who is otherwise unequipped and put him on the spot, demanding that he roleplay the encounter where he seduces the elf queen with the butter supple loins. 

In this circumstance, "Ok, give me a roll!" is every bit as fair. 

We do not require the _player_ to prove that he can bend a 1" thick steel bar before allowing his _character_ to make his escape; so should it rightly be with any other kind of encounter.

(More to the point, 4e will still allow you to roleplay out the encounter if you so choose.)


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 19, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> There's actually a couple ways.  One is to redefine the dungeon as a gauntlet and an arena instead of a place to be explored, where layout and occupation are designed specifically to flow monsters at the PCs continually, instead of pointing your design at promoting exploration, discovery and other non combat elements.



The designers have said nothing whatsoever which suggests that this will be the case.



> You could ensure that there are no effects or dangers that are so deadly that they would make the PCs consider options other than combat when faced with them, choosing instead, perhaps, to flee or parlay or find an alternate route (which would be impossible anyway, since the dungeon wouldn't have alternate routes).



3e specifically recommends that 5% of encounters be overpowering, with an EL 5 or more above the party level. I see no reason 4e will be different. In fact Mike Mearls mentioned Keep on The Shadowfell would have an overpowering encounter. There's your dangers so deadly other options have to be considered.

And why should a piddling SoD make you reconsider? Get Death Ward up and wade right in.



> Finally, you could eliminate resource management that directly affects combat so that the players have to make strategic decisions about when, how and under what circumstances they decide to engage in battle when other alternatives might exist.



We know that Scorch, a powerful attack will be 1/day. So will Second Wind. Vancian casting is still in. Resource management is still in except now it's for all the party, not just the wizard and cleric. Environmental factors are still in.



> But you're right -- none of those things would ever happen.



Yep.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 19, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> There's actually a couple ways.  One is to redefine the dungeon as a gauntlet and an arena instead of a place to be explored, where layout and occupation are designed specifically to flow monsters at the PCs continually, instead of pointing your design at promoting exploration, discovery and other non combat elements.




You seem to be suggesting that this is what they're doing.  I can only assume you're referring to Mike Mearls's post on the subject of creatures from adjacent rooms being able to respond to the din of combat without totally hosing the party by throwing off the delicate EL balance.  This isn't "flowing monsters at the PCs continually."  This is addressing the problem in which the orcs in room 2 don't come to see what all the noise in room 1 is.  The dungeon isn't being designed to funnel monsters down onto the PCs' swords.  Rather, they're expanding the idea of a combat area to include _more than one room at a time._  Mind-boggling, I know, but there you have it.

Also, since when have dungeons not been, to some extent, a gauntlet/arena in which fights are set up to occur?  You go into the Caves of Chaos.  Lizardfolk are there.  You fight them.  They were put there for you to fight while you explored the Caves of Chaos.  If we see this sort of thing in 4E it's not because they're ramping it up, but because we've always been doing it.



> You could also redefine social interaction as combat without the blood, removing the need to engage in roleplaying and instead making sure the players' focus is on the numbers written down on his character sheet instead of the DM.



So, are you trying to say that The Burning Wheel is more combat-heavy than D&D 3.5?  That's certainly a unique thesis.



> You could ensure that there are no effects or dangers that are so deadly that they would make the PCs consider options other than combat when faced with them, choosing instead, perhaps, to flee or parlay or find an alternate route (which would be impossible anyway, since the dungeon wouldn't have alternate routes).



I'm not sure how they would remove the concept of "monsters, traps or other challenges that are too dangerous for you to fight, disarm, or otherwise overcome," but I'll believe it if you can cite it.  Are you suggesting that there is going to be something built into the game that prevents a DM from having his players run into a giant and being forced to parlay because they'd never be able to kill him?  Or that a DM couldn't place a trap that can kill any of the PCs outright, forcing them to take another route?  Traps go up to level 30 now, so I expect finding one will be easy.

And where are you getting this idea that dungeons (or adventures in general, perhaps) are now one long tunnel down which monsters run to their inevitable doom at the hands of the PCs?  If you have some evidence that I won't be able to take any existing published adventure, from any source, and convert it to 4E, I'd like to see it.



> Finally, you could eliminate resource management that directly affects combat so that the players have to make strategic decisions about when, how and under what circumstances they decide to engage in battle when other alternatives might exist.




3rd edition wizard: Well, we've been adventuring for ten minutes, and now I'm out of spells.  We need to rest for 8 hours.
3rd edition cleric: You mean 24.  I only get my spells back once per day.
3rd edition fighter: Man, these bloody spellcasters and their "strategic decisions!"  I'm still almost at full hit points!
3rd edition cleric: Why do you think I'm out of spells?  I had to convert them to heal you, just like I do every single time we go adventuring.

4th edition wizard: Okay, we've been adventuring for a couple of hours, and I'm all out of my big once per day effects.
4th edition fighter: Yeah, and I'm starting to get pretty beat up, since I've used up my second wind already and the cleric is out of healing.
4th edition cleric: So, do we call it quits for now, or do we go for one more combat?

...so yeah.  Strategic decisions.

Or are you trying to say that resource attrition is going to be excised entirely from the new edition?


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 19, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> 4th edition cleric: So, do we call it quits for now, or do we go for one more combat?



That's an interesting point. With PCs never being below 80% resources the decision over whether to continue or stop becomes much trickier.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 19, 2007)

Doug McCrae said:
			
		

> That's an interesting point. With PCs never being below 80% resources the decision over whether to continue or stop becomes much trickier.



Well, we don't know that they'll never be below 80% resources.  We haven't seen any indication that there is limitless healing, or that any class other than the wizard has 80% at-will and per-encounter abilities.  But you get my point, which is that there are actually now strategic decisions in a place that before there were not.  In 3.5, you hit a wall when the casters are out of spells.  In 4E, you can keep going, but you don't know whether you're going to discover that you really, really need that per-day ability that you already used up.

The strategic decisions are different than 3rd edition's strategic decisions.  But they are certainly still there.


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## howandwhy99 (Oct 19, 2007)

The old debate that there should be a roll to emulate high Cha characters was won before it began IMO.  The game has had a Reaction Adjustment since the beginning.  It was a simple 2d6 roll with a slight chance of your character having an ability modifier to it.  (13-15 +1, 16-17 +2, 18 +4... and yeah, +4 was too much)

I prefer to give players an incentive to roleplay by letting them know what they do can affect that roll too.  (just like any roll)  Reaction Adjustment can even be dropped, if you want to roleplay without random consequences.  Even then that's just applying the rules for PC vs. PC to NPCs.  The game never expected players to have to change their minds because someone rolled better than they did when they talked to each other.  They just wanted to roleplay and have fun.  No one wanted a super smooth PC to force their PC into agreeing with them just because the dice said so. 

When interacting with NPCs, I have no problem allowing roleplaying to decide results alone when those end results are in the PCs' favor.  In such a case, I would still make a roll, but it'd be a roll with modifiers so high it could not fail.  In the opposite case, where they failed horribly at roleplaying (like foully insulting the king), I'd try and think of _some_ way for them to succeed and then apply a negative modifier on their roll that does not negate the possibility of success.  

Do they need to know some rolls are automatic successes beforehand?  No.  But roleplaying is rewarded when it is the only significant means to modify the roll.  Making characters with mechanical bonuses beyond what roleplay can alter, roleplaying is actually hindered. Roleplaying should always be the most important modifier to a roleplaying encounter's success.

Is it okay once in awhile for it not to be? Sure, but it shouldn't be the status quo according to the rules IMO.  Roleplaying game rules should encourage and reward roleplaying rather than stifle it.


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## pemerton (Oct 19, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> What I have been trying to say consistently is that the CORE of D&D is killing things, taking their stuff, and powering up so that you can repeat the process. The challenges and the scenery change, but the core experience is the same. I have never said that that was the TOTALITY of the D&D experience.



Sure. I wasn't really responding to your particular claim, but to Reynard's analysis of 4e.



			
				Reynard said:
			
		

> You could also redefine social interaction as combat without the blood, removing the need to engage in roleplaying and instead making sure the players' focus is on the numbers written down on his character sheet instead of the DM.



It's extremely contentious to say that, because a system has social conflict resolution mechanics, it is therefore combat-focused. Because if that were so, it would follow that The Dying Earth, and HeroWars/Quest, and (as Dr Awkward notes) Burning Wheel are all more combat-focused then any edition of D&D to date, and do less to encourage roleplaying as part of their play experience. And that conclusion is just too absurd for words.


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## Reynard (Oct 20, 2007)

pemerton said:
			
		

> It's extremely contentious to say that, because a system has social conflict resolution mechanics, it is therefore combat-focused. Because if that were so, it would follow that The Dying Earth, and HeroWars/Quest, and (as Dr Awkward notes) Burning Wheel are all more combat-focused then any edition of D&D to date, and do less to encourage roleplaying as part of their play experience. And that conclusion is just too absurd for words.




It is "combat focus" in the sense that it requires a "build", it requires tactical game based decisions, and it draws the players attention to his character sheet instead of the game happening at the table.


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## Reynard (Oct 20, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> 3rd edition wizard: Well, we've been adventuring for ten minutes, and now I'm out of spells.  We need to rest for 8 hours.




This is a very tired argument.  If the PCs are "done" at 10 AM, that is a playstyle problem, not a systemic one.  Either the DM is chucking combat encounters at the PCs entirely to quickly, or the PCs are blowing their wads at the first sign of trouble, or some combination of the two.  in either case, the game isn't designed that way.  Hell, prior to 3E every fight was a minimum of 10 minutes of game time and it took hours, as it should, to work ones way through a labrynthine underground complex.



> 4th edition wizard: Okay, we've been adventuring for a couple of hours, and I'm all out of my big once per day effects.




I see what you did there.  Very subtle, but ultimately bad form.



> Or are you trying to say that resource attrition is going to be excised entirely from the new edition?




It look a lot like it to me.  however, I concede that since we don't have a single bit of hard information yet aside from one monster's stat card dor DDM, I could be wrong.  Most of my issues with 4E are based entirely on the presentation.  Since the presentation at this stage is being directed at a very particular subset of gamer, it may not be an accurate indication of what the final game will look like.  But I am not confident for exploratory dungeon crawl, resource management, save-or-die or sword-and-sworcery flavor at this point.


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## hong (Oct 20, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> You could also redefine social interaction as combat without the blood




Oxymorons are.


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## hong (Oct 20, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> This is a very tired argument.  If the PCs are "done" at 10 AM, that is a playstyle problem, not a systemic one.




It is a systemic problem that encourages a playstyle problem.



> Either the DM is chucking combat encounters at the PCs entirely to quickly,




No, the DM is chucking combat encounters at the PCs at the rate he wants to, and the system is unable to handle it.



> or the PCs are blowing their wads at the first sign of trouble,




No, the PCs are using their abilities to engage in enjoyable destruction and mayhem the way they want to, and the system is unable to handle it.



> in either case, the game isn't designed that way.




Because it's a bad system.



> Hell, prior to 3E every fight was a minimum of 10 minutes of game time and it took hours, as it should,




No it shouldn't.



> It look a lot like it to me.




In the context of per-encounter balancing, a 1/encounter ability is a resource to be managed. The ability of one to grok that context is another thing entirely.



> But I am not confident for exploratory dungeon crawl, resource management, save-or-die or sword-and-sworcery flavor at this point.




That's better.


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## Reynard (Oct 20, 2007)

hong said:
			
		

> It is a systemic problem that encourages a playstyle problem.
> 
> 
> 
> ...




No.  If you try and use a shovel to put a nail in, it means you're using the wrong tool for the job.  Same thing here.  Systems support playstyles and discourage others.  if the system is inherently incompatible with the playstyle, you're using the wrong system.  It has nothing to do with whether the game is good or bad or well designed or not.  What matters is that you are using the wrong tool and then blaming the tool.




> No it shouldn't.




Yes it should.

There, see how much fun we are having discussing this?



> In the context of per-encounter balancing, a 1/encounter ability is a resource to be managed. The ability of one to grok that context is another thing entirely.




It isn't a long term resource and therefore has nothing to do at all with what I am talking about.  You know, in context.




> That's better.




You're so very clever.  Maybe one day, if you practive, you'll be able to boost your post count with responses longer than 10 words per.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 20, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> No.  If you try and use a shovel to put a nail in, it means you're using the wrong tool for the job.  Same thing here.  Systems support playstyles and discourage others.  if the system is inherently incompatible with the playstyle, you're using the wrong system.  It has nothing to do with whether the game is good or bad or well designed or not.  What matters is that you are using the wrong tool and then blaming the tool.



You're making his point for him.  The tool is unsuitable for what its users want to do.  The tool demands X encounters of level Y per day, and breaks if you stray too far from X or Y.  Since different players have different ideal levels of X and Y, the tool fails for them, and so we redesign the tool to handle better variance in X and Y.

You have just pointed out that there is a problem with the tool.  The designers noticed that too.  So they changed it.


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## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 20, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> I see what you did there.  Very subtle, but ultimately bad form.



I see what you think I did there.  What I actually did was acknowledge that if you have both per-day and per-encounter resources, instead of only per-day resources, you will blow through your per-day resources more slowly since you can use per-encounter (and at-will) resources instead.  So you get hours of adventuring rather than minutes.


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## rangerjohn (Oct 20, 2007)

*D&D Insider*

Is anyone else having trouble with this?  It will not let me log in.  I first tried migrating  my forums account, ng go.  Then I went through trouble of creating a new account at Gleemax, which entailed creating a new email account.  I can get into Gleemax now, but not D&D Insider.  What gives?

Ranger John


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## hong (Oct 20, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> No.  If you try and use a shovel to put a nail in, it means you're using the wrong tool for the job.  Same thing here.  Systems support playstyles and discourage others.  if the system is inherently incompatible with the playstyle, you're using the wrong system.




Exactly. And so we change the system.



> It has nothing to do with whether the game is good or bad or well designed or not.  What matters is that you are using the wrong tool and then blaming the tool.




If enough people want to do something with a tool that the tool cannot do, then the tool is bad.



> Yes it should.




No it shouldn't.



> There, see how much fun we are having discussing this?




Indeed. Aren't we having fun?



> It isn't a long term resource and therefore has nothing to do at all with what I am talking about.  You know, in context.




Yes. In context. And what you want to talk about is, unfortunately, irrelevant to the context of per-encounter balancing.



> You're so very clever.  Maybe one day, if you practive, you'll be able to boost your post count with responses longer than 10 words per.




Brevity is the soul of.


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 20, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> No.  If you try and use a shovel to put a nail in, it means you're using the wrong tool for the job.  Same thing here.  Systems support playstyles and discourage others.




As in the last few pages where I suggested that D&D supported and encouraged dungeon delving, but kingdom-building, not so much.


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## Reynard (Oct 20, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> As in the last few pages where I suggested that D&D supported and encouraged dungeon delving, but kingdom-building, not so much.




D&D supports kingdom building because I can use the domain rules and War Machine from the companion set with pretty much any edition.


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## Reynard (Oct 20, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> You're making his point for him.  The tool is unsuitable for what its users want to do.  The tool demands X encounters of level Y per day, and breaks if you stray too far from X or Y.  Since different players have different ideal levels of X and Y, the tool fails for them, and so we redesign the tool to handle better variance in X and Y.
> 
> You have just pointed out that there is a problem with the tool.  The designers noticed that too.  So they changed it.




It doesn't mean the tool is bad.  it means the users need a different tool, because they are engaging ina  different task.  That's fine.  Find a different tool.  But leave mine, which works perfectly for what I want it to do, which would be the job it was designed to do in the first place, the hell alone.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 20, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> It doesn't mean the tool is bad.  it means the users need a different tool, because they are engaging ina  different task.  That's fine.  Find a different tool.  But leave mine, which works perfectly for what I want it to do, which would be the job it was designed to do in the first place, the hell alone.



Well, they are.  They're making an entire new edition.  The old edition will be untouched.


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## Reynard (Oct 20, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> Well, they are.  They're making an entire new edition.  The old edition will be untouched.




True.  But it isn't like there is no downside to choosing to play an "outdated" version of the game.  Finding players, for example.

Nonetheless, I reserve the right to be pleasantly surprised by 4E come May/June.  The information we have as of yet barely qualifies for that definition, so there's a lot of conjecture and a lot of emotional reaction.  Should actual information, like mechanics and such, come out that suggest it is not in fact so different as to longer play like D&D for me, I'll give it a go.  I just don't happen to be very optimistic.


----------



## pemerton (Oct 20, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> It is "combat focus" in the sense that it requires a "build", it requires tactical game based decisions, and it draws the players attention to his character sheet instead of the game happening at the table.



"Combat focus" is not really a synonym for "a game", even in the sometimes obscure jargon of RPGing. And I'll say again that, if your claim was correct, then games like The Dying Earth, HeroWars/Quest, Burning Wheel - and even classic Traveller or RM2, both of which have social skills and simple mechanics for using them - would draw players' attention to their character sheets rather than the game. And I still think that such a claim is too absurd for words.



			
				Reynard said:
			
		

> Either the DM is chucking combat encounters at the PCs entirely to quickly, or the PCs are blowing their wads at the first sign of trouble, or some combination of the two.



Alternatively, the players are looking to have their PCs do things, and the PCs (especially the spell-users) don't have enough things to do.

It should also be noted that this problem can happen in a context where none of the encounters are combat challenges - in RM, for example, a sequence of social encounters can lead to the PC enchanter running out of spell points, as s/he uses buffing, influencing and mind-reading magic. The problem arises from a mismatch between the timing of encounters and ability usage - it is not particularly linked to combat.



			
				Reynard said:
			
		

> Most of my issues with 4E are based entirely on the presentation.  Since the presentation at this stage is being directed at a very particular subset of gamer, it may not be an accurate indication of what the final game will look like.  But I am not confident for exploratory dungeon crawl, resource management, save-or-die or sword-and-sworcery flavor at this point.



Not much dungeon crawl, save-or-die flavour, that is true. There will still be resource management within individual encounters, and there may be long-term management of non-supernatural resources (like food, water, equipment etc) depending on what happens to spells like Create Food & Water, Fabricate etc.

I don't see what any of the above has to do with sword-and-sorcery which, as a literary genre, doesn't read very much like dungeon crawls play. If I had to think of a literary equivalent to dungeon crawling I'd think of a certain type of espionage or military writing, not Conan.



			
				Reynard said:
			
		

> Nonetheless, I reserve the right to be pleasantly surprised by 4E come May/June.  The information we have as of yet barely qualifies for that definition, so there's a lot of conjecture and a lot of emotional reaction.  Should actual information, like mechanics and such, come out that suggest it is not in fact so different as to longer play like D&D for me, I'll give it a go.  I just don't happen to be very optimistic.



Personally, I think your pessimism is entirely warranted. But I don't understand at all why you want to link it to a combat focus. And I also don't understand why you apparently deny that non-dungeon crawling play can still be roleplaying.


----------



## Lanefan (Oct 21, 2007)

Dr. Awkward said:
			
		

> You're making his point for him.  The tool is unsuitable for what its users want to do.  The tool demands X encounters of level Y per day, and breaks if you stray too far from X or Y.  Since different players have different ideal levels of X and Y, the tool fails for them, and so we redesign the tool to handle better variance in X and Y.
> 
> You have just pointed out that there is a problem with the tool.  The designers noticed that too.  So they changed it.



OK, they changed it.  But did they fix it, is the question.

Lanefan


----------



## Reynard (Oct 21, 2007)

pemerton said:
			
		

> I don't see what any of the above has to do with sword-and-sorcery which, as a literary genre, doesn't read very much like dungeon crawls play. If I had to think of a literary equivalent to dungeon crawling I'd think of a certain type of espionage or military writing, not Conan.




I beg to differ.  Conan spends quite a bit of time in the dungeon.  However, my remark regarding sword-and-sorcery was more related to certain qualities of flavour.  To be fair, though, I have been working hard to create that sense in every edition after 1st, so it isn't fair to saddle 4E with it exclusively.



> Personally, I think your pessimism is entirely warranted. But I don't understand at all why you want to link it to a combat focus. And I also don't understand why you apparently deny that non-dungeon crawling play can still be roleplaying.




Every single preview we have seen has gone to extremes to remind the reader how much more awesome D&D combat is going to be in 4E, often to the detriment of other aspects of the game.  Dungeon crawling happens to have nothing to do with role playing; dungeon crawls have to do with a great number of elements that D&D does well.  It is not that if you are not dungeon crawling you aren't playin D&D, it is that if the system makes dungeon crawling -- actual dungeon crawling, with all that implies -- difficult or impossible, then the game isn't D&D anymore, any more than it would be if they took dragons out of the MM.


----------



## Irda Ranger (Oct 21, 2007)

I hope my 3-day time-out is OK ...



			
				Reynard said:
			
		

> Every single preview we have seen has gone to extremes to remind the reader how much more awesome D&D combat is going to be in 4E, often to the detriment of other aspects of the game.



Actually, I'm not sure this has been shown by the 4E previews.  The "more awesome" has been shoveled by the ton, but I'm not sure it's really "to the detriment of other aspects of the game."  As a simple for instance, the racial choices are almost a non-issue, because gnomes are in the MM as a playable race and you can always ban tieflings and eladrin; so no big whoop.  

As for the "pure role-playing" aspects of the game, those have always been fairly "rules independent."  There's never been a rule for how many favors you can ask the local Baron for, or whether he not he'll grant them, or whether there will be a rude courtier who will insult your dress and call your PC's "peasant simpletons."  That's just as easy/hard in 4e as any other edition.

So where's this "detriment" you speak of?

And isn't this a "what to do with gold" thread?  Sorry if I've lost the 'thread' of the conversation...



			
				Reynard said:
			
		

> Dungeon crawling happens to have nothing to do with role playing;



I'm pretty sure that's not true, but even if it were, having rules that allow a DM to adjudicate a dungeon crawl is not inherently harmful to the DM's ability to role-play time spent at the Castellan's dinner table.



			
				Reynard said:
			
		

> if the system makes dungeon crawling -- actual dungeon crawling, with all that implies -- difficult or impossible, then the game isn't D&D anymore, any more than it would be if they took dragons out of the MM.



Agreed; though I'm running a PC through the Caves of Chaos right now using a Book-of-Nine-Swords/SWSE/D&D 3.75 hybrid, and I can assure you, the dungeon crawl works perfectly.  I have seen ZERO evidence that 4E would suddenly make it impossible.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 21, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> I'm pretty sure that's not true, but even if it were, having rules that allow a DM to adjudicate a dungeon crawl is not inherently harmful to the DM's ability to role-play time spent at the Castellan's dinner table.



Well, I think that someone else squashed role-playing into the equation.  He's saying, if I read him correctly, that he's afraid that 4E will suddenly make dungeon crawling impossible because it'll turn D&D into this elaborate, extended game of whack-a-mole, with giants and dragons taking the place of the moles.  He thinks that the proposed changes to resource management will make it so that you can't carefully explore an ancient ruin.  I don't understand why he's saying this, but it's what I've got out of his end of the thread.  He's not talking about role-playing.




> Agreed; though I'm running a PC through the Caves of Chaos right now using a Book-of-Nine-Swords/SWSE/D&D 3.75 hybrid, and I can assure you, the dungeon crawl works perfectly.  I have seen ZERO evidence that 4E would suddenly make it impossible.



This, I like to see: People actually jury-rigging their games to try out some of the new stuff.  Very cool.


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## AllisterH (Oct 21, 2007)

Lanefan said:
			
		

> Birthright's fate was sealed by its release timing...2e and the hobby in general was already in steep decline when BR came out (1995, according to the (c) date on mine) so no wonder it didn't sell: nobody cared.  Whcih is a shame, because it's one of the few really good releases to come out of the whole 2e era as far as I'm concerned.




I tend to disagree. Planescape came out 1 year before and it pretty much CRUSHED Birthright in terms of popularity. Seriously, am I the only one here that honestly believes that D&D players, by and large, just aren't interested in Fief-building and ruling?

Birthright was GOOD, real good IMO. Yet it just didn't ring any bells for a lot of people. Hell, of the people I do know who liked Birthright actually prefer it not because of the Kingdom-running rules but for the low-magic feel of the setting and the history of the races.


----------



## hong (Oct 21, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> True.  But it isn't like there is no downside to choosing to play an "outdated" version of the game.  Finding players, for example.




Well, life wasn't meant to be easy.


----------



## hong (Oct 21, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> I beg to differ.  Conan spends quite a bit of time in the dungeon.




He also spends a lot of time out of the dungeon. As does every character in every book or movie I know. And those times out of the dungeon are generally not just downtime to be handwaved away either.



> Every single preview we have seen has gone to extremes to remind the reader how much more awesome D&D combat is going to be in 4E, often to the detriment of other aspects of the game.




As in, to the detriment of one other aspect of the game, namely dungeon crawling?



> Dungeon crawling happens to have nothing to do with role playing; dungeon crawls have to do with a great number of elements that D&D does well.  It is not that if you are not dungeon crawling you aren't playin D&D, it is that if the system makes dungeon crawling -- actual dungeon crawling, with all that implies -- difficult or impossible, then the game isn't D&D anymore, any more than it would be if they took dragons out of the MM.




I am not sure when we suddenly found that "dungeon crawling" == "dungeon without fighting", which is basically what you're implying. Maybe it's related to that whole "social rules == combat" thing.


----------



## hong (Oct 21, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> I tend to disagree. Planescape came out 1 year before and it pretty much CRUSHED Birthright in terms of popularity. Seriously, am I the only one here that honestly believes that D&D players, by and large, just aren't interested in Fief-building and ruling?




Don't think I've ever met any player who was interested in that, in the last ~20 years or so. Getting rid of that cruft was one of the great decisions in 3E. Now whether they found an adequate replacement for it, is another issue....


----------



## Nifft (Oct 21, 2007)

hong said:
			
		

> Brevity is the soul of.



 On a side note, that used to be my answering machine message. "Brevity is the soul of -- _*BEEP*_"

You know, back when there were answering machines.

Old, -- N


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 21, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> Seriously, am I the only one here that honestly believes that D&D players, by and large, just aren't interested in Fief-building and ruling?



No.  I *am* interested in Fief-building, but I realize I'm in the minority in that regard.



			
				AllisterH said:
			
		

> Birthright was GOOD, real good IMO. Yet it just didn't ring any bells for a lot of people.



It didn't do anything for me, that's for sure.  Which is funny, because as a Civ4 aficionado and general fied-builder, you'd think it would; but nope.  The world itself just didn't do anything for me.  I built my fiefs in Dark Sun, Dragonlance, etc.


----------



## A'koss (Oct 21, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> I tend to disagree. Planescape came out 1 year before and it pretty much CRUSHED Birthright in terms of popularity. Seriously, am I the only one here that honestly believes that D&D players, by and large, just aren't interested in Fief-building and ruling?
> 
> Birthright was GOOD, real good IMO. Yet it just didn't ring any bells for a lot of people. Hell, of the people I do know who liked Birthright actually prefer it not because of the Kingdom-running rules but for the low-magic feel of the setting and the history of the races.



Yeah, I don't belive Birthright is by any means a measure of the popularity in fief-building. You have to like the setting first, and it has to be more appealing than the one you're already running (and likely heavily invested). 

In my games fief-building was common but our group had been running around in Greyhawk (and later a Planescape-Greyhawk hybrid game) for years and years and nothing in Birthright (as a setting) seemed interesting enough to want to switch. I remember one of my players bought it and I gave it a once-over and didn't think much of it other than some of the montrous rulers to steal. Planescape was a much bigger departure from typical D&D settings and Monte hit that one right out of the park for outright coolness. Birthright was just too similar to other more established settings to really gain a toe-hold IMO.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 21, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> On a side note, that used to be my answering machine message. "Brevity is the soul of -- _*BEEP*_"
> 
> You know, back when there were answering machines.
> 
> Old, -- N



Grand Central 

Check it out.  It rocks.


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## Irda Ranger (Oct 21, 2007)

hong said:
			
		

> Don't think I've ever met any player who was interested in that, in the last ~20 years or so.



We've exchanged emails regarding _Iron Heroes_, does that count?  And you've met my DM, so we've almost met ...


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## hong (Oct 21, 2007)

I hate it when that happens


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## AllisterH (Oct 21, 2007)

Irda Ranger said:
			
		

> It didn't do anything for me, that's for sure.  Which is funny, because as a Civ4 aficionado and general fied-builder, you'd think it would; but nope.  The world itself just didn't do anything for me.  I built my fiefs in Dark Sun, Dragonlance, etc.




That might've been a problem with the setting...Birthright was a low-magic setting (lower-magic than even GH) and as much as people say "I prefer low-magic settings", it doesn't seem that true in terms of support.


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 21, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> Seriously, am I the only one here that honestly believes that D&D players, by and large, just aren't interested in Fief-building and ruling?




Welcome to the thread.


----------



## pemerton (Oct 21, 2007)

Reynard said:
			
		

> I beg to differ.  Conan spends quite a bit of time in the dungeon.



Sure, but not with a 10' pole searching for secret doors in every room. From my memory of the Conan stories, he tends to stumble across traps and secret doors either by inadvertently triggering them, or by having foes come through them.



			
				Reynard said:
			
		

> Dungeon crawling happens to have nothing to do with role playing; dungeon crawls have to do with a great number of elements that D&D does well.  It is not that if you are not dungeon crawling you aren't playin D&D, it is that if the system makes dungeon crawling -- actual dungeon crawling, with all that implies -- difficult or impossible, then the game isn't D&D anymore, any more than it would be if they took dragons out of the MM.



I guess I just can't agree that dungeon crawling, _with all that implies_ - ten foot poles, iron spikes, searching for traps and secret doors, in short all the trappings of 1st ed AD&D operational play - is essential to D&D. Adventures can happen in dungeons - that is, in underground labyrinths - without that sort of operational play taking place. And James Wyatt's recent dungeon craft suggests that underground adventuring will still be part of the game.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 21, 2007)

AllisterH said:
			
		

> Seriously, am I the only one here that honestly believes that D&D players, by and large, just aren't interested in Fief-building and ruling?



Part of the genius of the 3e design team was to realise that players are, on the whole, much more interested in the action adventure parts of the game.

Birthright is, imo, a great setting. But it doesn't appeal to the vast majority of D&Ders.


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## Doug McCrae (Oct 21, 2007)

pemerton said:
			
		

> I guess I just can't agree that dungeon crawling, _with all that implies_ - ten foot poles, iron spikes, searching for traps and secret doors, in short all the trappings of 1st ed AD&D operational play - is essential to D&D.



In many respects, old school D&D is identical to Paranoia.

Including the clones.


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## Aexalon (Oct 22, 2007)

*Down with the dungeon crawl!*

*posts in support of fief-building*

Why must all protagonist actions invariably be offensive? What is so horrrible about doing something defensive and/or constructive for once?

And note that stronghold construction/management (somewhat akin to Crossroads Keep in NWN2) need not lead all the way to kingdom/empire building/management (akin to Birthright).


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 22, 2007)

Aexalon said:
			
		

> *posts in support of fief-building*
> 
> Why must all protagonist actions invariably be offensive? What is so horrrible about doing something defensive and/or constructive for once?




Well, not to be pedantic, but technically the protagonist _has_ to act.

Playing defense is ok, for a while, but this carries a heavy price, and eventually the protagonist is forced to act.


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## ptolemy18 (Oct 22, 2007)

About the de-emphasis of magic items... to me, this has one potentially negative effect, and one potentially positive effect. The negative outweighs the positive, though.

NEGATIVE EFFECT:
In previous editions, magic items always functioned as a sort of "parallel improvement track" to XP. By parcelling out the treasure and magic items, the DM could essentially steer the rate of advancement and also set the tone of the campaign to an extent. The difference between high-magic and low-magic, between Monty Haul and sparse and difficult. I think it's good to allow this option to be in the hands of the individual campaign. Furthermore, when you're playing a character, you always know approximately how long it'll take you to get to the next level... but you MIGHT find some really awesome magic item in your next encounter, so that's always something to look forward to.

Furthermore, highly powerful magic items allow players to make character builds which step out of the boundaries of "class" a little. (Apart from D&D, I've always preferred more skills-and-powers-based games as opposed to class-based games.) A fighter-type with Boots of Flying is suddenly stepping in the territory of the spellcasters, and I think that's perfectly okay. A mage with a powerful magic sword is suddenly just a little bit more able to compete on the level of the martial classes. (And to digress, I wonder... if every mage has some sort of automatic per-round mage strike-type attack, will that sadly mean the end of cross-class "utility mages" who use their magic primarily to boost their melee or rogue abilities?) And then there's the various skill-duplicating items like the Cloaks of Elvenkind and so on. I think that allowing more variety in character design is always good, and that means including various ways to make hybrid characters, using things such as magic items to fill in the gaps in one's strength. The core characters should be simple enough that you can expand them off in a million zillion directions and fighting styles, and one of the ways to support this is with a different selection of magic items. A fighter who wants to become roguelike by using Silent Shadowy Armor +1 *should* be able to do that. 

So I hope they don't narrow the functions of magic items too much. The whole *point* of magic items is to give you an unexpected boost, an unexpected power, to broaden and expand your character. And unlike character class and race traits, it's up to the DM whether to include specific magic items in the campaign, so issues of "balance" are ultimately in the DM's hands and can be customized by each DM (particularly if the system doesn't allow magic item creation).

POSITIVE EFFECT: 
The positive effect of reducing the strength and importance of magic items, IMHO, is that it'll make it more socially acceptable for the DM to run adventures where the PCs lose all their stuff. The old "attacked by the rust monster", "taken prisoner", "pickpocketed" kind of adventures. If items aren't as much of a core character trait -- if your Iron Heroes-style berserker can break out of his chains and grab a rock off the floor and wield almost as much damage as he did with his battleaxe, while he's breaking out of jail -- then it allows some new adventure hooks. (Well, fun for me as the DM, anyway... so maybe this is a bit tasteless to list as a positive effect.) :/ In a way it's interesting because it will create a more "low magic" effect (perhaps) and makes characters less dependent on fancy stuff. But in another way it's bothersome because it reduces one of the core motivations/methods of character improvement.

(And of course, lest anyone say I'm forgetting it... of course there is always role-playing and in-character goals and other reasons to keep playing, apart from getting buffer and buffer. But for now, let's just talk about the "making your character more bad-ass" element. I hear that MMORPG designers have difficulty getting players excited about In-Game Titles ("Your character is now the Duke of Blah!") and fortress-building (like in poor old Ultima Online) and other things which don't translate to simple, raw increases in badass-ishness. So if D&D4E emphasizes either of these things -- although I haven't seen much evidence that they will apart from speculations on this thread -- perhaps they will actually be bucking the MMORPG play style.)

Of course, in the end it's probably moot because I'm sure that Wizards will release more and more magic items in future supplements until there's as much stuff out there as there was in 3rd edition. Well, maybe.


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully (Oct 22, 2007)

ptolemy18 said:
			
		

> So I hope they don't narrow the functions of magic items too much. The whole *point* of magic items is to give you an unexpected boost, an unexpected power, to broaden and expand your character.



That might have been a point, but in D&D, most of your gear is not there to get you an unexpected power or broden your character (or his abilities), but just to increase the numbers.
A +5 Sword doesn't broden anything, and it's not really doing something unexpected.

I wouldn't mind if the reliance on such items would shrink a lot. Adding abilities like Flying, adding fire damage (because fire from a sword is unexpected, but just extra damage is not) to a weapon, or allowing you to throw a pearl that explodes on impact in a nice fireball are fine with me - Provided they aren't not so useful that you would never want something else and that you are not expected to have. Ring of Protection, Amulet of Natural Armor, Enhancement Bonus to Armor, Gloves of Dexterity, they all came "expected" for most characters...


----------



## JDJblatherings (Oct 22, 2007)

a further note on Gold and Fiefs-  

A fief/strnghold/castle- gives a PC  place to keep his or her loot. At 50gp to the pound a 150,000 gp personal fortune is tricky to run about with (and portable holes aren't the solution when the dispel magics start flying).


A secure base is proactive.


----------



## Baby Samurai (Oct 22, 2007)

Mouseferatu said:
			
		

> Oh God, no. Keep training as far away from my core rules as possible, thanks.




Yeah, I don't remember Conan, Aragorn, or Elric or what have you having to train with Jake the Trainer to gain experience/power.  You would think just fighting a beholder would be training enough, not _then_ having to dance around the ring with some schmuck in order to go up a level.


----------



## JDJblatherings (Oct 22, 2007)

Baby Samurai said:
			
		

> Yeah, I don't remember Conan, Aragorn, or Elric or what have you having to train with Jake the Trainer to gain experience/power.  You would think just fighting a beholder would be training enough, not _then_ having to dance around the ring with some schmuck in order to go up a level.




The "training sequence" is a stand-by of action/combat films.  High end proffesional soldiers and rescue workers constantly train also. Even little Harry Potter is training between (and during) his adventures.  In martial arts just because one is capable of learnign a specific weapon kata it doesn't mean they've been taught it or practiced it enough to use it in competition or an actual fight.  Fencers are taught progressively more difficuly techniques as they gain experience, they don't just magically know all of them. There are plenty of valid arguments supporting training. 

That said: Training should be used as a way to promote character and campaign development  not as a means to foil or keep the players down.

I use mostly "off screen" training myself as a means to reward a player that sinks resources into that. 1gp  spent on training (with a limit of 100xlevel a week)  earns a character 1 exp assumign they can find the means to train.


----------



## Mustrum_Ridcully (Oct 22, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> The "training sequence" is a stand-by of action/combat films.




Yes, but usually only for beginner characters. John McLane, McGuyver, James Bond, Jack Bauer and many others never train*. In D&D terms, Training seems to be something only done in the first 1-3 levels (maybe even before that - the thing you do to avoid becoming a Commoner)

*) There might be a corner case with James Bond. But it might have been a test, not a training.


----------



## Lonely Tylenol (Oct 22, 2007)

JDJblatherings said:
			
		

> The "training sequence" is a stand-by of action/combat films.



The training sequence happens once over the course of the character's lifetime, involves training with someone who has specialized knowledge or unique expertise in the field, and generally marks the transition from a talented amateur to a trained professional.

In D&D terms, this is really only appropriate to invoke when a character gains a prestige class.  For example, Order of the Stick has its only training montage scene when Elan gains his PrC.

We already have optional rules for training to learn a PrC, and some PrCs even mandate this in terms of "contact with a member" prerequisites.



> High end proffesional soldiers and rescue workers constantly train also.
> Even little Harry Potter is training between (and during) his adventures.



In Harry Potter and in many military movies, the training is actually the story, and so it's appropriate to those genres.  You'll notice that as the series wears on, Harry's training goes more and more off-camera, and the more interesting bits become the focus.  Eventually, training sessions are only mentioned in order to act as a staging device for a story-relevent event, such as Harry's dueling training 



Spoiler



in which it is revealed he speaks Parseltongue


.


> I use mostly "off screen" training myself as a means to reward a player that sinks resources into that. 1gp  spent on training (with a limit of 100xlevel a week)  earns a character 1 exp assumign they can find the means to train.



You could also just as easily assume that the characters are getting slightly more gold than noted, and spending that extra on training.  Functionally, all you'd need to do is mandate downtime between levels.  Of course, that doesn't work in many campaigns in which time-sensitive story arcs span multiple levels.  So it doesn't make sense to integrate training into the standard rules, which is, of course, what's at issue here.  Training rules are an option, and they're fine as an option.  They're not fine as the core assumption, because they mess up too many styles of play.


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## JDJblatherings (Oct 22, 2007)

I've seen McGyver, Skully, TJ Hooker and the X-men all training long after they were beginners. Training turns up again and again in fiction. It's not a bad device but should never be used to hold PCs back.


----------



## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 22, 2007)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOUMIzN9FVU


----------



## ptolemy18 (Oct 23, 2007)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:
			
		

> That might have been a point, but in D&D, most of your gear is not there to get you an unexpected power or broden your character (or his abilities), but just to increase the numbers.
> A +5 Sword doesn't broden anything, and it's not really doing something unexpected.
> 
> I wouldn't mind if the reliance on such items would shrink a lot. Adding abilities like Flying, adding fire damage (because fire from a sword is unexpected, but just extra damage is not) to a weapon, or allowing you to throw a pearl that explodes on impact in a nice fireball are fine with me - Provided they aren't not so useful that you would never want something else and that you are not expected to have. Ring of Protection, Amulet of Natural Armor, Enhancement Bonus to Armor, Gloves of Dexterity, they all came "expected" for most characters...




Actually, I totally agree with you. I prefer magic items that broaden the character or give you unexpected powers (like the weird Wondrous Items and so forth). The ability-enhancers and the +1~+5 weapons and armor are consideralby less interesting.

Here's hoping that it's the flat "bonus-adding" magic items which are made less common or more expensive... but I don't have a great deal of hope that they're doing this. Why? Well, for one thing, they've announced that Wizards are going to be using various implements for their casting, and these implements will have potential magic bonuses, like a +3 wand. Which seems to indicate that the bonus-inducing items will stay in the DMG. (Not that I ever wanted them completely kicked out... but they're the least interesting part of the magic items list.)

So here's me hoping that D&D4E still has lots of weird Wondrous Items and so forth. This is what I read a magic items list for...!


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## Mustrum_Ridcully (Oct 23, 2007)

ptolemy18 said:
			
		

> Actually, I totally agree with you. I prefer magic items that broaden the character or give you unexpected powers (like the weird Wondrous Items and so forth). The ability-enhancers and the +1~+5 weapons and armor are consideralby less interesting.
> 
> Here's hoping that it's the flat "bonus-adding" magic items which are made less common or more expensive... but I don't have a great deal of hope that they're doing this. Why? Well, for one thing, they've announced that Wizards are going to be using various implements for their casting, and these implements will have potential magic bonuses, like a +3 wand. Which seems to indicate that the bonus-inducing items will stay in the DMG. (Not that I ever wanted them completely kicked out... but they're the least interesting part of the magic items list.)
> 
> So here's me hoping that D&D4E still has lots of weird Wondrous Items and so forth. This is what I read a magic items list for...!



I think I can live with +x magic weapons (and wands), but having approximately 12 different +x items that every character needs felt always a bit too much in 3rd edition.


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## Nifft (Oct 23, 2007)

ptolemy18 said:
			
		

> Actually, I totally agree with you. I prefer magic items that broaden the character or give you unexpected powers (like the weird Wondrous Items and so forth). The ability-enhancers and the +1~+5 weapons and armor are consideralby less interesting.



 Yup yup yup.

My new house rule goal is to eliminate numerical boosters, and instead give cool situational boosters or character broadeners.

I want magic to be *cool* again.

Cheers, -- N


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## Wulf Ratbane (Oct 23, 2007)

Nifft said:
			
		

> My new house rule goal is to eliminate numerical boosters, and instead give cool situational boosters or character broadeners.




Just as a very quick example, a sword of _mighty cleaving_. I always thought that was a cool power for a weapon-- except that by the time any fighter was likely to find one, he probably already had Cleave.


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## allenw (Oct 23, 2007)

Mustrum_Ridcully said:
			
		

> Yes, but usually only for beginner characters. John McLane, McGuyver, James Bond, Jack Bauer and many others never train*. In D&D terms, Training seems to be something only done in the first 1-3 levels (maybe even before that - the thing you do to avoid becoming a Commoner)
> 
> *) There might be a corner case with James Bond. But it might have been a test, not a training.




  The main counter-example I can think of is Buffy (the Vampire Slayer   ), who had fairly regular training/practice scenes through at least her first 5 seasons (she kinda slacked off in Season 6 (though "Once More With Feeling" featured an honest-to-Joss training montage), and spent Season 7 training other people).  But still, she's an exception.


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## GlassJaw (Oct 23, 2007)

Wulf Ratbane said:
			
		

> Just as a very quick example, a sword of _mighty cleaving_. I always thought that was a cool power for a weapon-- except that by the time any fighter was likely to find one, he probably already had Cleave.




Yeah, I'd definitely like to see more effects rather than plan ole bonuses.  I'd even like to see them get rid of the requirement that a weapon has to have a + enhancement in order to have additional effects.

Why couldn't you have a weapon with mighty _cleaving, flaming, wounding, _etc without an enhancement mod?


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## Nifft (Oct 23, 2007)

GlassJaw said:
			
		

> Why couldn't you have a weapon with mighty _cleaving, flaming, wounding, _etc without an enhancement mod?



 I can answer that for 3.x -- because _greater magic weapon_ exists. :\

So we'll have to get rid of that, too.

Cheers, -- N


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