The Art of Roleplaying OR Why I Hate DnD/Pathfinder [Opinion]

[Chained_Icarus]

Posted on Facebook, would like the opinion of you fine ladies and otherpeople:

I don't like Pathfinder, or DnD. Wait, what?

Drumroll.

I love Roleplaying. I do. Partly to escape my own mundane existence, but also because it's fun, it's liberating, it lets me do things I CANNOT do in reality. It's a fantastic creative outlet and a wonderful source to allow those participating to create and share an interactive story that we write as a group.That said, I despise Pathfinder/Dungeons and Dragons. Why?

Because it's bad. Time and time again I come across really cool character concepts (not always mine, other people's), or story ideas, or whatnot that would be fun and fantastic to play... But the rules don't support them. Yes yes yes, I know, the front of the book says "Always open to the group to pick and choose the rules, blah blah blah." But what if you're in a group that is a RAW group? (RAW = Read As Written. Taken literally. Etc. Etc). I deslike RAW. I've always, always hated RAW in any system. But Pathfinder/DnD seems to run into it the most.Most character concepts, too, because of the rules, can't be done VIABLY. Say I want to be a staff-wielding martial artist - Similar to Son Wukong of legend (the Monkey King, you uncultured...). CAN I be? Sure, there's a quarter-staff and I can wield it as a monk. But the staff itself is pretty weak with no real way to fix that, and almost all the monk abilities want you to be unarmed. And yeah, you can play around mixing and matching classes to get the powers you want to make it work, but it becomes increasingly harder and harder to, plot wise, justify why your character is suddenly picking up some of these abilities.

The rules problem hit a head the other day when my group was planning a Round-Robin DM game. I'd been excited about the character concept I had drafted up, worked on it for over a month, and even wrote a very extensive backstory for him, and his family members (and relevant big-name characters). Even made a cliff-notes version for whoever was DMing at the time. I poured my heart and soul into this character, and was super excited to play him.Group denies letting me play him because he's not a core race (He's a Kitsune). They tell me to stop trying to be "weird." Stick to the core rules. I'm not trying to be weird...I first played Dungeons and Dragons back in 1999. 2nd Edition. It was confusing and annoying, but it was cool and I kinda liked it. I quickly adopted and moved on to 3rd edition in late 2000. Took up 3.5 the same year it came out (2003). I jumped on to 4th edition when it came out and fell in LOVE with 4th over 3rd. Why?

4th was different. It encouraged different. Sure, it was more "gamey," but it allowed SO MANY MORE OPTIONS for how a character PLAYED, and made so many choices "purely cosmetic," but it let me do more with a story and a concept.4th was widely rejected by my friends, so we adopted Pathfinder (3.7 edition of DnD, really). While it fixed a lot of crap from 3.5, it still was basically the exact same game. See the problem yet?It's 2012. I've been playing the same game, with the same races, with the same classes, with the same choices, for 12~13 years, give or take. I've played every race and class that's interested me, every combo of those, and multi-classed in ways that were absolutely stupid story-wise but the only way to make a character viable gameplay wise.

I'm not being weird. I'm finding ways to turn a system I am so completely and utterly burnt out on into something fun for myself, FOR THE SAKE OF MY FRIENDS.I'm not doing these "weird" things because I'm trying to be a pain or quirky. I'm doing it so that we can keep doing what they want to do. I'm trying to make the best of a bad situation. And this makes it worse.So now Axl Brightspark, my Kitsune Archeaologist, which was built - mechanic and storywise - to make the entire party function better (because I'm only playing Pathfinder these days because I enjoy watching my friends have fun), with a story I was super proud of, is shelved. Indefinitely. Because he was hand-crafted specifically for this campaign and the group I knew we'd have. A character I was super excited to play and roleplay is put back into storage because... why? The rules weren't complex (Short version: Kitsune is Gnome, only Medium sized, bonus to Enchant instead of Illusion, and can shape-shift into a form with a 1d4 natural bite attack), and for all intents and purposes, he was basically human as far as MECHANICS went. The character wasn't that weird - but his story and character RELIED on him being that race (due to their racial history). I get they want to keep a round-robin game simple, but it was literally no extra book-keeping on their end.

So now? Well, yeah, I've made a new character, but I'm not nearly as stoked about him, and I'm having to force myself to get excited. I'm trying hard to stay upbeat and excited about it, but quite simply? I'm not. I'm really about a coin-flip away of just opting out of playing, because the joy isn't there.

I think I might just end up making their game session nights the nights I go to Battle and Brew and kick it with whomever is available. The group can still play whether I'm there or not.

Point of this story?

Once again, game rules and mechanics have trumped a good story and a player's enjoyment. What's the point of even playing these games, then? What is the point, indeed. Oh well, at least I've still drafted up an awesome badass sniper for when we play that other system I found.



Only we never play the other systems I find.

[eggs]

You're complaining about your group, but attributing the problems to the system. D&D has a lot of problems, but your buddies not liking the choices you made isn't one of them.

[Psyren]

You may be better off with a less rules-heavy system. That doesn't make D&D or PF "bad," it just means that something more open will likely suit your tastes better.


Rules-heavy systems are popular for a couple of reasons:

(a) clear, bright lines prevent arguments and confusion (You want to attack that guy from 10 feet away while on the ground? The rules tell you what you need to make that happen.)

(b) They reward system mastery. Folks with encyclopedic knowledge of races and classes can have fun helping others without that knowledge to realize a class concept or counter a specific tactic.

[Chained_Icarus]

You're complaining about your group, but attributing the problems to the system. D&D has a lot of problems, but your buddies not liking the choices you made isn't one of them.

It's both, really.

Group is set on one game, exactly how it's written.

Exactly how it's written is dull, limited, and does not encourage players to try fun things for the sake of Roleplaying.

Look up anything for DnD and Pathfinder, and you'll find infinitely more on the topic of min/maxing characters than you will on fleshing out characters, people recounting cool stories/concepts, etc.

Didn't feel like it used to be this way. People didn't like 4e because it was too "gamey," and yet everyone I see is playing DnD/Pathfinder purely for the game mechanics and the abuse thereof.

Yes, primarily, it's my groups fault. I really should find another group to play with, but, roomies, whacha gonna do?

But I encounter this problem more with Pathfinder/DnD than I have with any other tabletop. Even Vampire, and I feel Vampire has EXTREMELY limited choices in comparison (but the RP material is so damn solid. All that backstory on each bloodline is so tasty).

I just feel other systems contribute more to actually roleplaying, and get caught up on rules less.

[Zilzmaer]

You're complaining about your group, but attributing the problems to the system. D&D has a lot of problems, but your buddies not liking the choices you made isn't one of them.

+1

D&D explicitly states that, if the DM and players are fine with it, you can add as many splatbooks as you want. Your group chooses to not do so. That's not D&D's fault.

[Snowbluff]

2 things:

1) PF is NOT "3.7" and they did NOT fix the worse problems of 3.5.

2) Fluff is mutable, and Roleplaying is done at the table. Really, if you have problems with how the system "makes" you do anything, you are blaming a system for a table problem.

[Chained_Icarus]

[QUOTE=Psyren;14356049]
Rules-heavy systems are popular for a couple of reasons:

(a) clear, bright lines prevent arguments and confusion (You want to attack that guy from 10 feet away while on the ground? The rules tell you what you need to make that happen.)


Clear bright lines? In some cases, sure. But I see more threads about people arguing over the vague parts (the whole RAW vs RAI argument) of the rules.

I've been in so many sessions where the session broke down over how a feat was worded.

A specific example comes to mind: the spell Comprehend language.

A cleric in our group used it on two other players who were playing as Twin brothers. They had developed their "own language" as they put it (for free, apparently, without any feats or burning a bonus language on it). Cleric argued the spell should let him understand it (I agreed), while they claimed the spell only let him know "REAL" languages.

Tomatoes.

And yes, I know the system isn't "bad" as in it doesn't work. But I feel that it does encourage "rule nazism." People who truly understand the rules can game and break them and create situations that totally undermine most of the party. Other systems can do this too, but it's usually less pronounced. And I've played some strict systems.

Regardless, I'm trying to get my group to switch over to Mouse Guard with some success.

-------

Side note - Despite me being "barred" from playing a Kitsune, the current DM this go round is letting his girlfriend play a Changling, and he's playing a Aasimar. :/ The hell?

[Chained_Icarus]

Actually the more I read, the more I feel like I just keep finding **** groups.

And I guess since Pathfinder/DnD is the most prevailant of the systems, I keep finding more groups in that system that are rule nazis and manipulative min/max munchkins.

I appreciate the insight guys.

[Snowbluff]

Side note - Despite me being "barred" from playing a Kitsune, the current DM this go round is letting his girlfriend play a Changling, and he's playing a Aasimar. :/ The hell?

Yeah. Table problems to the max.

Your welcome. If you have a hankering for some RP, and you don't mind playing over a forum, you can try the GitP Play by Post section.

[Chained_Icarus]

+1

D&D explicitly states that, if the DM and players are fine with it, you can add as many splatbooks as you want. Your group chooses to not do so. That's not D&D's fault.

I bring that up a lot. And I tend to get told "That's stupid."

We actually took a vote as a group on whether to allow it or not, and it was a tie. Since he was DMing the FIRST session, he said tie goes to a "no."

[CarpeGuitarrem]

On the other hand, you can't handwave away everything with Rule 0, because technically you could houserule the entire game into something which is identical to some other rules system, and still claim it was D&D.

It's okay to admit that there's problems with the rules, because there are, and they are glaring problems. There are ways in which it's one of the inferior systems for making a story (and making cool story stuff). There are times in which the rules neither encourage cool stories nor get out of the way adeptly enough for cool stories to happen.

[Psyren]

Clear bright lines? In some cases, sure. But I see more threads about people arguing over the vague parts (the whole RAW vs RAI argument) of the rules.

Well... yeah, of course you do. If they weren't vague, there would be nothing to argue about. So, most threads (especially multi-page threads) about rules tend to be about the vague ones.

And there is some fun to be had in debate, though some people around here read RAW way too narrowly and slavishly. But also, even with 3.5 and PF as old as they are, people are still finding new rules quirks to bring to the community's attention.

But to reinforce what everyone else is saying - the primary culprit here is your table, and specifically your DM.

[Morty]

Because it's bad. Time and time again I come across really cool character concepts (not always mine, other people's), or story ideas, or whatnot that would be fun and fantastic to play... But the rules don't support them. Yes yes yes, I know, the front of the book says "Always open to the group to pick and choose the rules, blah blah blah." But what if you're in a group that is a RAW group? (RAW = Read As Written. Taken literally. Etc. Etc). I deslike RAW. I've always, always hated RAW in any system. But Pathfinder/DnD seems to run into it the most.Most character concepts, too, because of the rules, can't be done VIABLY. Say I want to be a staff-wielding martial artist - Similar to Son Wukong of legend (the Monkey King, you uncultured...). CAN I be? Sure, there's a quarter-staff and I can wield it as a monk. But the staff itself is pretty weak with no real way to fix that, and almost all the monk abilities want you to be unarmed. And yeah, you can play around mixing and matching classes to get the powers you want to make it work, but it becomes increasingly harder and harder to, plot wise, justify why your character is suddenly picking up some of these abilities.


While I do agree with other people that many of the problems you describe aren't caused by the game, I think this is indeed a massive flaw of 3rd edition D&D and Pathfinder and there's really nothing even a good GM and group can do about it. They're both extremely restrictive of character concepts. Many obvious ones - like your example - involve a lot of jumping through hoops for no good reason.

[Deadline]

I feel like I'm missing something. Can't you just use the mechanics for a human and fluff the rest? Or is that shapechanging ability integral to your character from a non-mechanical standpoint? And if so, aren't there other ways of getting it? You mentioned how delightful 4th ed is when it comes to re-fluffing, but the reality is that you can accomplish the same things with 3.5 (it's just less obvious and often a little harder to do).

It's also possible that your group looked at the kitsune and assumed you were a furry.

Just to be clear, I do think your group is being a little overly restrictive, but I'm betting that the fine folks here could help you mechanically design the character you want to play within the given restrictions.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

While I do agree with other people that many of the problems you describe aren't caused by the game, I think this is indeed a massive flaw of 3rd edition D&D and Pathfinder and there's really nothing even a good GM and group can do about it. They're both extremely restrictive of character concepts. Many obvious ones - like your example - involve a lot of jumping through hoops for no good reason.
+1 this. Refluffing is a nice hackaround, but it's still a hackaround.

Might I humbly suggest Fate Core (http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/evilhat/fate-core) as a simple-enough system that lets you play pretty much any concept you want in a flavorful, story-centric way? Backing the Kickstarter for a single dollar gets you the preview PDF, and it's (finally) an easy-to-understand version of the game.

Just a thought.

[Gavinfoxx]

I wrote an essay about this sort of thing! You should read it!

D&D 3.5e is a very...interesting game system. At it's heart, it is a game which started with several assumptions: that fantastically wealthy, violent hobo land pirates go underground to the homes of things that look different than them, kick down the doors to these homes, kill the inhabitants, and take their stuff. Then they go back to town, sell most of the stuff, keep the useful bits, buy things that help them go to newer and different places where things that look MORE different then they, kill them, take their stuff, et cetera. It is a game where the stalwart fighter stands in the front and swings his sword, the rogue looks for and disables traps, or perhaps sneaks around to stab bad things with a dagger, the Wizard stands in the back and blasts things, and the Cleric keeps all of them healed while doing this. This is the 'heart' of the game because that was how the game was played in the past, in the editions before 3.5e, often because it was a competitive, team event played at tournaments where people wargame for points, and there is a single team which is the winner. Further, you might not know the people on your team, having just met them five minutes ago at a convention, and so everyone played a simple role that was easy to understand and pick up and go, and in the old rules, was actually generally a fairly solid way to get through modules in a short amount of time. This is also where the idea of an adversarial GM that is trying to kill the player characters comes from. Every assumption that is 'weird' or arbitrary in the game stems from things inherited from this idea (or similar ideas from 'back then') regarding how the old games used to work.

However, that's not often how the game is *played* these days, and for the most part, we aren't interested in playing that particular legacy game with it. It has been quite some time since 3.5e books started coming out, and people have had lots of time to look at them and think about them and tinker with them and figure things out. They've come up with several interesting conclusions. Namely, that if you look at the toolset represented by all these books, you essentially have a fantastic array of lego pieces to make characters to tell any sort of fantasy story you want, because Wizards of the Coast tried to be inclusive of a huge variety of fantasy gaming styles in their rules. People have also figured out that there is a dramatic and huge variation in the power level of the 'lego pieces' -- that is the classes and options tied to them -- when you start doing things with them other than the old edition legacy assumptions. So given that, the question is this: what sort of story do you want to tell with your characters, and what power level and complexity level do you want in the rules? Do you want to be people altering the fabric of reality to fit their very whims, or the gritty soldier for whom permanent death is a real possibility in any fight -- in other words, something lower power level like Lord of the Rings, or the wuxia swordsman who is somewhere in between the two examples? Any sort of Fantasy story is a possibility, but you have to know what you want, first!

Of course, just because anything is possible, doesn't mean that there isn't something close to a consensus amongst experts as to what the system is best at. What they say is something along these lines: the system is best for fantastic characters, fantasy superheroes of some sort (but not silver age uber-superheroes though), doing crazy, incredible things to the world around them, things which are overtly superhuman and heroic. While 3.5e is capable of much lower power and grittier things, it really starts to shine when you accept the power level of 'everyone has superpowers of some sort', provided you make choices of the correct legos appropriate to that power level. This is the case especially because of, if you are attempting to actually simulate reality with the game rather than simulate certain types of stories, things get 'wonky'. Of course, if you want to use rules based on D&D 3.5e to simulate actual reality, there are third party products such as Codex Martialis which do this admirably.

Also, there is a reason we aren't playing 4th edition. The reason is this: Wizards of the Coast realized that D&D 3.5e was laughably, ridiculously unbalanced. However, in their quest to make something manageable, they have reduced the game to only a miniatures tactical combat system where the scope of the sorts of things the characters can do which the actual rules can cover is very, very limited. This is intentional on their part, and is maybe what they had to do to balance the game. Unfortunately, it does greatly limit the sorts of stories that can be easily told with the rules in the system, even if you know your way around it backwards and forwards. This has been mitigated somewhat as 4e went on, but is still somewhat true. This is not the case with 3.5e -- if you know your way around it, you can make anything for any sort of Fantasy story.

Finally, I thought I should make a note about some of the continuations of 3.5e which you might have heard of, such as Pathfinder and it's lesser known cousin Trailblazer. Some folk may have claimed that these fix all of the balance problems in the game. This is not true; what they do is merely continue support for the game, though they do attempt to fix some balance problems that become issues for several groups, but they for the most part ignore the inherent power and versatility differences of the 'legos' themselves, though they have been gradually adding options that allow improvements in the capability of the lower performing classes, much like D&D 3.5e did in it's actual run. They do attempt to make changes so that everyone, especially those very low-optimization level players, has some interesting and fun things to do, and for the most part, they succeed in providing obvious options for lower power gamers. However, you should note that there is at least ONE D20 system which provides the breadth of possible abilities and feel of classes and customizability that 3.5e offers, and large parts of the 'feel' of 3.5e, while keeping balance intact between the classes. This system is Ruleofcool's Legend, and I encourage you to check it out.

[Psyren]

While I do agree with other people that many of the problems you describe aren't caused by the game, I think this is indeed a massive flaw of 3rd edition D&D and Pathfinder and there's really nothing even a good GM and group can do about it. They're both extremely restrictive of character concepts. Many obvious ones - like your example - involve a lot of jumping through hoops for no good reason.

Eh, I don't think making a viable staff-wielding monk requires all that many hoops, particularly in PF.

His other example (Kitsune Archaeologist) was shelved due to the table rather than the game.

[Dr.Epic]

To reiterate what everyone else has been saying:

-It sounds more like a group problem than a game mechanics problem.

-Any rule you don't like you can change.


The rules problem hit a head the other day when my group was planning a Round-Robin DM game. I'd been excited about the character concept I had drafted up, worked on it for over a month, and even wrote a very extensive backstory for him, and his family members (and relevant big-name characters). Even made a cliff-notes version for whoever was DMing at the time. I poured my heart and soul into this character, and was super excited to play him.Group denies letting me play him because he's not a core race (He's a Kitsune).

Okay, a few things about this:

1. You made a character before you knew what the DM had in mind. That's a really big mistake. You can't just assume the DM will go with whatever it is you come up with. It's better to just wait until you know the specific restrictions for that campaign. There are plenty of characters I make in my spare time, but I don't expect every DM to accept them into their campaign.

2. That character isn't wasted. You can always use it in another campaign. There's nothing anywhere against recycling a character.

Also, what's a kitsune?:smallconfused:

[AmberVael]

Let me very quickly summarize my reactions to your post.

First, I think I want to somewhat disagree with what others have said. I do think many of the problems you're experiencing can be linked to the system- not all, of course, and a good group could alleviate and help you with these problems- but a different system could help just as much. Of course, I'd recommend both if you can snag it.

I also want to say that I disagree in part with you. I don't think D&D 3.5 is a bad system. It has some gaping flaws, and I might even say that what I find good about it was more accident on the part of the designers, given how they handled 4th edition, but I do find a great deal of enjoyment in 3.5, and think there are good games to be found.

But, D&D 3.5 doesn't seem cater to what you want. What I find interesting in 3.5 is tactical combat, character creation, mechanical reinterpretation and optimization, and some roleplay as well. And 3.5 provides a very neat outlet for that. Its rules, however, definitely reward certain builds and character types over others. And if you have a group that dislikes fluff reinterpretation, homebrew, and even splat books, then your choice of characters dwindles drastically. In addition, while there is no truly default setting, the mechanics make a number of assumptions about the world and game type. You can work around that, but it isn't particularly designed for anything but a somewhat high magic fantasy world.

With mastery of 3.5 and a more open group you can add a lot more variety and options, but that does take time and effort to acquire, and the system really isn't working with you to accomplish that. By contrast, if you use a system like Mutants and Masterminds, you can represent quite an array of different settings and character ideas right off the bat, because it is designed to be versatile.

If you're not as interested in the heavy tactical combat stuff, I'd also agree with Psyren that a more rules light system might appeal to you more. To give a specific example, the various Fate rule systems are not only a bit lighter than 3.5, but incorporate some very simple mechanics to help represent a wide number of character concepts and rewards use of their personality and skills pretty evenly compared to D&D.

[Gavinfoxx]

Also, what's a kitsune?:smallconfused:

Japanese Shapeshifting Multi-tailed Fox Fae-Spirit. Illusionists and tricksters. More tails = stronger.

[Morty]

Eh, I don't think making a viable staff-wielding monk requires all that many hoops, particularly in PF.

His other example (Kitsune Archaeologist) was shelved due to the table rather than the game.

Yet it does involve some hoop-jumping, and it's a relatively simple concept. Other examples include a dexterous fighter - Pathfinder makes it easier but still a pain in the butt, and in core-only 3e it's more or less impossible. Or a crossbow-using rogue - I'm not sure how one would work in PF, but in 3e your efforts to be effective with such a character are resisted by the system at every turn.

[Psyren]

Also, what's a kitsune?:smallconfused:

In Japanese mythology they are fox-spirits, but in Pathfinder they're actually fox-like humanoids. (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/races/other-races/uncommon-races/arg-kitsune)


Yet it does involve some hoop-jumping, and it's a relatively simple concept. Other examples include a dexterous fighter - Pathfinder makes it easier but still a pain in the butt, and in core-only 3e it's more or less impossible. Or a crossbow-using rogue - I'm not sure how one would work in PF, but in 3e your efforts to be effective with such a character are resisted by the system at every turn.

I think our definitions of "hoop" are a bit different here. To me, a build is only painful if I need more than 4 classes to pull it off.

[Dr.Epic]

Japanese Shapeshifting Multi-tailed Fox Fae-Spirit. Illusionists and tricksters. More tails = stronger.

So...Naruto?:smallconfused:

[KoboldCleric]

While I do agree with other people that many of the problems you describe aren't caused by the game, I think this is indeed a massive flaw of 3rd edition D&D and Pathfinder and there's really nothing even a good GM and group can do about it. They're both extremely restrictive of character concepts. Many obvious ones - like your example - involve a lot of jumping through hoops for no good reason.

To be fair, this is as much an attitude issue as it is a system flaw. It is unreasonable to expect any class-based system to support your every character concept in its own neat little bow-on-top box.

[GolemsVoice]

A shapechanging fox-demon from Japanese mythology, as far as I know.

But yeah, I'm going to echo the others, that sound much more like a table problem than a real D&D problem, but even so, D&D seems to not be for you, which is totally fine. That, however, doesn't make it bad, it makes it bad for YOU (again, nothing wrong with that). So maybe you're better off looking for another group AND another system, even though I know that's easier said than done.

However, what I dislike about other, more modulate systems, is that they precisely LACK the customization ability and the rules for doing the stuff I want.

In a system without feats, for example, how is my fighter with a two handed sword different from a monk with a quarterstaff? Maybe they have different ability scores, and of course they'll be doing different amounts of damage, but besides?

However, I don't really have a problem with these, too, I'm fine with most systems, in the end.

[Greylond]

Most RPGs are written with a Theme or Genre. And therefore most groups that play a certain game play it along with that Theme/Genre. Playing something outside of that Theme/Genre is either hard to support/not played by a very wide audience of that game. To find a group that supports a game played with an alternate accepted Genre of a published game is very hard. Personally I think you should be playing another game or with another group if that is what interests you because it sounds like your group doesn't want to play that way.

It would be like wanting to do improv comedy during a Broadway Musical.

[Morty]

To be fair, this is as much an attitude issue as it is a system flaw. It is unreasonable to expect any class-based system to support your every character concept in its own neat little bow-on-top box.

This explanation works for out-of-the-box character concepts. Is a fighter who focuses on Dexterity rather than Strength (like, say, Drizzt) outlandish? A fighter who fights with a pair of shortswords or daggers? A rogue who relies on a crossbow in combat (heck, anyone who uses a crossbow and doesn't suck)? A monk who fights with a quarterstaff? A ranger who uses neither a bow nor two weapons? A priest who isn't an armored secondary combatant?


In a system without feats, for example, how is my fighter with a two handed sword different from a monk with a quarterstaff? Maybe they have different ability scores, and of course they'll be doing different amounts of damage, but besides?


And the difference between using a two handed sword and a quarterstaff in D&D is... that the quarterstaff deals less damage. Yep.

[Kelb_Panthera]

So...Naruto?:smallconfused:

The nine-tailed fox bound inside the titular character of Naruto was probably inspired by the kitsune of folklore (it's virtually a given) but it diverges wildly from the folklore, if I'm not mistaken, as does most any other reference to traditional folklore in the show.

[Hiro Protagonest]

So...Naruto?:smallconfused:

No.

This guy.
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs49/f/2009/235/9/9/Kitsune_samurai_by_PVTjoe.jpg
---

I think one of the big problems with 3.X was that Wizards of the Coast really didn't know what they were doing back then. They kept the rustic and simple sort of look, but the only thing really holding the system together was the assumption that it would be played like AD&D. But it wasn't AD&D. All clerics would heal and buff allies. All wizards would use Fireball a lot. The fighters would stand in front and the enemies would attack him. The rogues would put ranks into Search and Disable Device and also sneak around a lot.

These assumptions fall apart as soon as you realize that the characters scale in a fashion similar to shonen protagonists, and that the standard options that both the players and monsters use are completely genre blind. Why would the cleric heal the fighter for less than the damage dealt when he could use that same spell slot and turn to summon a few monsters? Why don't the monsters attack the cleric standing behind the fighter healing him? Why is the wizard casting a spell that seems to do a few points of damage to a couple of enemies when he could summon a few monsters, or turn the rogue invisible?

The problem is, the fighter and rogue are made entirely based on those assumptions, while the wizard and cleric aren't.

4e is not perfect. But it has not even close to as many lies about what it is. There are very few truly bad options, and only with hybrids is there any way to make a build that's useless. 4e isn't realistic. Great! Neither was 3.5. 4e is a tactical wargame. ...So was 3.5. In 4e, choices don't matter. No, choices just don't affect power level so much, although it is definitely possible to optimize (you can talk to Surrealistik (is that how it's spelled?) about that).

The thing people seem to dislike about 4e is that its shortcomings are more clear. It doesn't take the same level of knowledge or experience to find them as it does in 3.5. It isn't a generic fantasy game, it has little support for non-combat encounters (although it has more than 3.5 ever did, what with skill challenges and much more flavor text), and a good portion of your superhuman power comes from items. Oh, and your choices matter less in your overall power level (but at least mundanes aren't forced down a narrow path or else be weak).

[Gavinfoxx]

So...Naruto?:smallconfused:

Uhhh... you need to back further, to the mythological roots, rather than, you know. Animes that take a few minor tidbits from the mythology, and ignore 90% of the mythology, due to assumptions that the native audience already knows what the myths are talking about.


http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/cf/Prince_Hanzoku_terrorised_by_a_nine-_tailed_fox.jpg/393px-Prince_Hanzoku_terrorised_by_a_nine-_tailed_fox.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/05/NineTailsFox.JPG
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c6/Kuniyoshi_Kuzunoha.jpg/429px-Kuniyoshi_Kuzunoha.jpg

[Phelix-Mu]

Stick with the kitsune, really. Just be a human convinced he's half fox. If your group shafts you on the rules, bite them in the you-know-what with the stuff they can't control, your role playing. In fact, you could even be a human with some weird birth defect that looks like some other race, maybe even lived with the other race. As long as it doesn't impact mechanics or rules, kill em with fluff.

This way you can keep your flavor and weirdness, and the rest of the group can't do anything about it.

[Fibinachi]

Talk with the group at large about this.
The system itself is neutral - given that you can, at any given time, as long as the people you are playing with agree, change the system. Want no class skills and fighters based on Int? SURE, ALL IN FAVOUR SAY AYE.
That makes it just about as neutral as I can imagine.

Your character concept sounds interesting! And you put a lot of time and effort into it. Awesome. Good for you. That phrase gets used so much I realize it sounds sarcastic, yet I genuinely mean it as a thing that is good for you and allows you to flex your creative muscles. Lovely! Now talk to your group about why you want to play this character, and then, hopefully arrive at the conclusion that you can play this character. If they really can't have that, figure out a workable compromise that makes people happy.

If all else fails, be mean and point out that strictly speaking, Kitsunes are in Core. Any rules are core rules when used, given that they make up the core of your game.
It's a weak argument, but it's there.
But that's exactly the kind of thing you shouldn't need to get into, because, well:

When the thing you want to play is vetoed by someone else, the problem is "That Someone Else", Yourself and your group and not the system everyone is playing, because in any given group the players should get together to figure things out so everyone plays what they want to play and the rules ultimately accommodate this.
If they don't, change the rules and your own input until everything is in order.

Or, I should rephrase somewhat. I've found that the specific combination of a literal mindset and the system tends to interact in a peculiar way. In this sense, the system of D&D and Pathfinder is not really neutral and it can get strangely annoying. It's as if, indeed, RAW interpretations of rules seem to bring up something... weird. Hell, the phrase:


They tell me to stop trying to be "weird." Stick to the core rules.

encapsulates this perfectly. OP, My good Person, your beef is not with the system. Your beef, if indeed beef it is, is with the people you are playing with who say that you are being weird for wanting to play something and then expect you to not do so because, hah, being weird is wrong and you need to stop because I say so.

Perhaps D&D, with it's fantastic array of books, lend itself well to the kind of finnicky fiddly discussion that spring up all the time where people pull out different interpretations of RAW and argue their point. Off the top of my head, from the last few hours I've idly been browsing the forum here, mhm...

"...Homebrewed monsters skewer a players ability to game the odds, so homebrew is bad..."

"The definition of [This Alignment] according to [This Page] is [This statement], so your [Character Class] is definitively going to [Place].
Fill-in-the-blanks."

"Oh? Lawful Evil monk doing [This awesome thing] sounds cool and maybe you can [Do this cool plot related thing]"
"Actually I think he's NG"
"Monks can't be NG, they must be lawful, it's in every book and has been so for years, every edition. It's also on the SRD. Monks can only be lawful!"

I'm paraphrasing, but you get the point. These debates can be cool to have and even interesting, as different interpretations is brought to light, but the ultimately fallacy I keep arriving at is that it doesn't make any bloody sense. And my personal opinion and fallback ends up being: "I don't care, moving on". Who cares that in the PHB for Pathfinder there is a class skill list and that fighters, on this list, don't get Knowledge Nobility?
That's bloody atrocious, maybe 'my' fighter studied nobles as a hobby obsessively! I'll drop dungoneering and take it instead.
I can't? Why not?

Ultimately the DM and the players make everything up as they play. It's why my mind zones out when someone talks about their level-20-multiclassed-in-20-different-things-can-one-shot-everything-character-with-stuff-from-20-different-books-and-very-strict-readings-of-feats. I too enjoy playing with Lego's and assembly line bricks to make things, but I prefer more than that in my role playing games. My usual response is: I'm the bloody DM. I just ruled the monster you're fighting is invincible and hits for 200d10, enjoy your character death.
Why?
Because I can. It's a game of make believe. The rules are there to help us make stuff up and envision the world, but the rules are appropriated from sources based on other people's games and how they went down and what things they made up, ad hoc.

Gavinfoxx makes a fantastic point about the tournament / war game / simple construct / Hero VS Dungeon heritage that D&D draws from. You ever played Return to Castle Greyhawk or Dungeonland modules? Those aren't role playing games, they're challenges you're meant to overcome like a game of chess. With more rules.
That can be fun! Exciting even. Great way to spend an evening.
But ultimately that lends itself very, very poorly to imagination and fantasy because it relies on strict (sacroscant, really) rules. Because if people starting making up the moves for their rooks, chess would fall apart! Imagine someone arguing over the movement patterns of a Queen at the word chess championships?

That's why fighters don't get Knowledge Nobility: It's because in a 4 man group, synergy is achieved by specialization so each member is dependent on the other - so the rogue and cleric and bard gets the knowledge checks and the fighter gets the sword That's... that's all it is. I don't like it, so I change it. I think its silly and needlessly restrictive.

This makes me sound needlessly vindictive - petty, even - and can be counter productive to the point I am trying to make, but I think it pretty much explains it too.

Also! It gets even weirder when you think about class variants in relation to optimization.
People are apparently fine using class variants, sourced and everything, in their highly optimized builds because the abilities those variants get are useful for the person making the character at the time (So you'll dip into [This variant class from this publication at this level] and get [this neat ability]).
... But Fighter's still don't get Knowledge: Nobility, because that'd be making stuff up and we can't have that.
Unless you pick this class variant from this publication!
Then it's suddenly okay.
Sod it.

I like optimization, I like making up characters, I like generating, and I like making stuff up so I can play around with the cosmology of an entire universe in my head while overdosing on music and caffeine. I'm just aware that, at the core, everything is made up, ad hoc, make-do.

The basic rulesystem of Pathfinder and D&D is "Modified D20 rolls to deduce success against DC's set by the DM".
Anything else is modifying this. So make it the kind of thing you want to.

Your problem is your group, the attitude they bring to the table, and the atmosphere there. Talk to them about this, as politely and awesomely as possible, because they sound like your friends.

Don't turn your playing into a duty that you have to do because else you're a bad friend. Enjoy yourself, or leave. Don't leave out of hand, at the slightest whim, try to talk things out, but if you don't get to do what you want to do, then no one wins, and so it's perfectly okay to just walk away.

Coincidentally, to add, have a chat with them about expanding their preferences for material beyond "Core rules" as well so everyone benefits.
I mean, really. The Alchemist is kind of a cool base class in Pathfinder and Tieflings are a fun race. So's the Kitsune. Pfh. People.

[nedz]

I think you've just outgrown your group. Clearly it's not a system thing — because you did make your character — albeit not quite how you originally conceived it, but so what.

Perhaps you should try DMing for them ?
Then you could try out all of your ideas.
Then you could demonstrate that your ideas are not crazy, or maybe that they are ?

[eggs]

Look up anything for DnD and Pathfinder, and you'll find infinitely more on the topic of min/maxing characters than you will on fleshing out characters, people recounting cool stories/concepts, etc.

I get this.

D&D never went too far from its wargaming roots, and doesn't do a whole lot to specifically frame or promote the collaborative storytelling parts of the game.

Plus, it's way more complex (or "frustrating"/"interesting," depending on whether you're into it) to make a something like an effective fencer in D&D than it is to just grab a concept and run with it in a lighter system like Fate, where you just push the related skill to "Great" and call it a day.

Those system traits might be a good reason to dislike D&D if they aren't your cup of tea, but they also do a good job making a system to support a min-max-y tactical dungeoncrawller, which can be a pretty fun game in its own right.

tl;dr - strawberry and chocolate have nothing on peppermint swirl!

[Flickerdart]

Is a fighter who focuses on Dexterity rather than Strength (like, say, Drizzt) outlandish?
Shadow Blade feat.


A fighter who fights with a pair of shortswords or daggers?
TWF line.


A rogue who relies on a crossbow in combat (heck, anyone who uses a crossbow and doesn't suck)?
It's pretty simple to build a TWF+RS character that fires tons of bolts every round, to deadly effect.



A monk who fights with a quarterstaff?

Take the Scorpion Kama's property, put it on a stick, or be a Swordsage.


A ranger who uses neither a bow nor two weapons?
Rangers have a ton of alternate fighting styles.



A priest who isn't an armored secondary combatant?

Cloistered Cleric.

Your issue seems to be the inability to separate class from job title. A "fighter" isn't anything in the actual game world. Neither is a "ranger" or a "rogue". If you want to be a ranger, just call yourself one and then take fighter and scout or rogue levels to create a custom combat style, nobody's going to stop you.

[navar100]

Japanese Shapeshifting Multi-tailed Fox Fae-Spirit. Illusionists and tricksters. More tails = stronger.

Illusionist/Druid/Arcane Hierophant who likes to wildshape into a fox, cast spells using Natural Spell is one way to do it in 3E.

Summoner class, Synthesist archetype. Choose Eidolon evolutions to suit your taste and flavor text appearance is one way to do it in Pathfinder.

[Akal Saris]

Frankly, my favorite part of this thread is the Japanese mythology pictures :smalltongue:

My 2c: Play something else for a while, either on PBP gaming or through a local meetup group/game shop event. There must be at least a 4E group or two in your area if you look hard enough!

I've played D&D for about 16 years now (probably more), and frankly I'm pretty picky these days about whether or not I will join a game or a gaming group.

I've enjoyed 4E, Earthdawn, and a few other RPGs, but as much as I enjoy them, I tend to eventually come back to PF (or some 3.5 games) because it's my favorite system & setting so far. But I wouldn't like it as much without taking a break from it every now and then. So yeah...I think if you want to enjoy PF, then go play 4E for a while!

[Snowbluff]

It's pretty simple to build a TWF+RS character that fires tons of bolts every round, to deadly effect.


With Crossbow Sniper their precision damage range doubles as well.

[elonin]

I'm curious how 4th edition does what you are looking for. IMHO when I looked at that game I felt like it tried to pigeonhole everyone. Did I misunderstand the OP? Also, I once belonged to a group that customized every game it got its hands on.

[GoddessSune]

Look up anything for DnD and Pathfinder, and you'll find infinitely more on the topic of min/maxing characters than you will on fleshing out characters, people recounting cool stories/concepts, etc.

Didn't feel like it used to be this way.


I will never get the idea that the game must have specific rules to make a player role-play. The idea that you can't be a pirate, unless you take the 'pirate feat', just makes no sense to me. And it makes even less sense when just as your character gets a +2 on rolls to party like a pirate that somehow that makes a player role-play more and not just sit there.

Unless your just talking about pure combat. Sure your 'staff monk' might look and feel bland next to other characters as he has no 'special staff stuff'. While other characters are doing amazing things in combat, the staff monk just hits them with his staff, again.

But if your talking about role-playing, then all the rules don't matter much. You can play a smart sage and not have a +2 to know stuff or you can play a thief and not have a +2 to stealing.

[Flickerdart]

But if your talking about role-playing, then all the rules don't matter much. You can play a smart sage and not have a +2 to know stuff or you can play a thief and not have a +2 to stealing.
Objection. If you don't know any more than the average Commoner, then you can't back up the claim that your character is a "smart sage". Your character cannot perform the duties that such a sage would, because he can't answer any questions about his area of expertise. He might act like he can, but then what you're roleplaying isn't a sage, it's a guy that tries to fool people into thinking he's a sage.

A swordsage with a quarterstaff, on the other hand, can do everything that a martial artist with a staff should be able to, and thus there's no issue when he calls himself a monk.

[GoddessSune]

Objection. If you don't know any more than the average Commoner, then you can't back up the claim that your character is a "smart sage". Your character cannot perform the duties that such a sage would, because he can't answer any questions about his area of expertise. He might act like he can, but then what you're roleplaying isn't a sage, it's a guy that tries to fool people into thinking he's a sage.


But your going back to ''if you don't get a +2 to know stuff'', then you can't be a sage. But a sage character in D&D would have knowledge skills, with a couple more ranks then an average commoner. So chances are that a sage, with say a +10 in knowledge would know more then a commoner with 0 ranks. But the sage still does not need the ''know-it-all-feat that gives them a +2 to knowledge checks''.

But none of that stops you from role-playing a character. Any player can just roll a dice and say ''oh my character knows all about history''. Though a role player can still talk in a raspy voice, add in details and flair and make the history fun and entertaining.

[Flickerdart]

But your going back to ''if you don't get a +2 to know stuff'', then you can't be a sage. But a sage character in D&D would have knowledge skills, with a couple more ranks then an average commoner. So chances are that a sage, with say a +10 in knowledge would know more then a commoner with 0 ranks. But the sage still does not need the ''know-it-all-feat that gives them a +2 to knowledge checks''.

But none of that stops you from role-playing a character. Any player can just roll a dice and say ''oh my character knows all about history''. Though a role player can still talk in a raspy voice, add in details and flair and make the history fun and entertaining.
I'm not entirely sure what you're talking about. What know-it-all feat? I certainly expect a character that claims to be an expert at knowing things to have devoted some resources to knowing things.

[eggs]

I will never get the idea that the game must have specific rules to make a player role-play. The idea that you can't be a pirate, unless you take the 'pirate feat', just makes no sense to me. And it makes even less sense when just as your character gets a +2 on rolls to party like a pirate that somehow that makes a player role-play more and not just sit there.
This brings up a couple points that don't necessarily relate.

On whether specific rules can make a player roleplay - well, they can. In extreme cases like Fiasco or Penny for Your Thoughts, there's just no game to play if players aren't doing character-driven improv; in more restricted cases like Dogs in the Vineyard, Fate or Dust Devils, the system bribes players to frame the story with their characters' values.

Contrast with D&D, where the system is perfectly playable without once addressing character motivations, personal traits or backstories. That doesn't mean a player can't roleplay (though it does add complications when dice rolls contradict RPed game fiction), but it's not something the system makes players do.

But on the far opposite side of the spectrum, a BD&D group I used to play with would roll on a table at the end of the session to see what everybody's character did until we'd meet again the following week. Those sorts of rolls, where a character's actions are determined without player input, did actively impede roleplaying by muddling what kind of roles, exactly, the players were supposed to be playing. The no-nonsense stick-in-the-mud teetotaler elf might start the next session with a 10k gp bar tab and a lizard tattooed across his face, and the child-hating necromancer might find out that he's been taking the Elf Scouts out on camping trips in his free time. Those were probably houserules, or maybe ripped from Dragon magazine, but they provide an example of potential RPG rules that can make character-based roleplaying more difficult than it would otherwise be.

But the second subject is about how character stats affect player RP involvement. I agree that a minor bonus on rolls doesn't necessarily make a player more likely to engage with a particular event, but this becomes more of an issue with another prominent RPG paradigm, in which some characters are allowed to interact with a scene, while the other players sit on the sidelines. This is usually called something like the hacker problem, for hacker characters in spy/scifi games playing a different set of minigames and having to have their own, specially-allocated, screen time. Parts of games where this occurs (usually in gameplay involving piloting or computers) does force players shoved out of a scene to disengage, and from a practical perspective, can make it hard to reel the sidelined players' attentions back into the roleplaying.

[Darius Kane]

Hate the player, not the game.

[Unusual Muse]

Some interesting discussion going on here. As an aside, it sounds like the system you're looking for may be the Amber Diceless system; it's almost *all* built around storytelling and roleplaying, with extremely simple (and elegant, for storytelling purposes) mechanics.

[ThiagoMartell]

So it looks like the "art of roleplaying" comes down to "choose a system that does what you want" and "make sure all players want the same thing".

However, just thinking about it as an art is a huge mistake anyway. If you want to roleplay as an art, you are better off acting in a theater. It is a roleplaying game for a reason, after all.

[Mithril Leaf]

Regarding something that hasn't been addressed to my personal satisfaction:
To the person who stated their issue with the fact that people commonly use a ton of variant rules but don't allow things like allowing a fighter to have knowledge: nobility.
That's entirely due to the fact that such discussions are based entirely on the mechanical aspect of the game, and if we don't have a common rule basis to draw from, the whole things is pointless. Anyone can say that X is a crazy awesome diplomat if they create all the qualities of X. It is a game and competition of system mastery to take X, Y, and Z from rule set K and make a crazy awesome diplomat from them.

[HalfGrammarGeek]

Posted on Facebook, would like the opinion of you fine ladies and otherpeople:
No gaming is better than bad gaming!

Honestly, I've been in similar situations and you have my sympathies. I hear the words "core only" and I don't even listen to the DM's pitch anymore. I've played core to death, seen its brokenation in play, and have no interest in being forced into an arbitrarily narrow range of options anymore.

This is one of the many reasons I'm partial to 4e; whether because of 4e's "everything is core" line, or because 4e is just more balanced, I don't know. But I've never met a 4e DM who put arbitrary restrictions on character options.

So good luck finding a more interesting group, and hopefully a more agreeable game. :)

[nedz]

So it looks like the "art of roleplaying" comes down to "choose a system that does what you want" and "make sure all players want the same thing".

However, just thinking about it as an art is a huge mistake anyway. If you want to roleplay as an art, you are better off acting in a theater. It is a roleplaying game for a reason, after all.

Unless you take a simulationist view where the game system is just used to simulate reality.

[ThiagoMartell]

Unless you take a simulationist view where the game system is just used to simulate reality.

That's not really what simulationism means... and even if it was that, I still don't see how it relates to what I said. You think roleplaying is an art when it comes to simulationist games? :smallconfused:

[Krazzman]

1st off:
Sun Wukong in PF is possbile to be a sixth level Ape-Shaman (awakened Ape or a Vanaara). In dnd 3.5 I would root more for a vanaaran Swordsage. simple as that. no hoops needed, although an "obscure" sourcebook. Dunno what Sun Wukong had in abilities but the rest can either be done via magic items or dips in other classes.

With this no longer on my mind:
The problems you have are known to me. In my old group I liked the fighter shtick. Being a melee, wading into combat in the one or other way and thinking about possibilities. The problem with that group was... powergaming or min/maxing or whatever. As soon as the DM smelled it he started ramping up enemies and layed boulders in his way... I for once tried a mounted raging barbarian charger and took spirited charge. Guess what? My trained riding dog had fear of the giant lizard... no save no aura nothing.
But this is was not the games fault, it was the GM's and other player who showed me "the trick", who then said that this character would've been quite ineffective...
I tried also to introduce new books to the few books we had. Most of the times we would use Core + CompArc, CompWar, CompAdv and CompDiv later the races of wild and stone as well as libris mortis and heroes of horror were allowed too. But Phb2? no chance. Comp Mage? was allowed after i had bought it and one dm read it and thought: hey that ability is cool!, ToB? was considered totally insanely OP when I first mentioned it (I just mentioned Crusaders Strike). Psionics, I managed to play a completly shafted psion and a considered as OP Soulblade.
The last "campaign" with that DM was a PF all Dwarven group. I asked here, as we soon would have the ability to reach level 5 (wild-shape) which would be "thematically sound animals to transform to for a dwarf that ventured once to a city and so far has only seen: goblindogs, rats and one owl." The responses were nonsensical... but the DM saw this and were starting to rant about it's role-playing not optimize-character when I pointed him again to the Opening Post. Then he cooled down when he realized why and what I asked.
For the new Group I asked at the beginning if ToB would be allowed. He told me if he could read it, he would decide. At first he made the mistake and thought every level a new level of maneuver would be open (9th level warblade with 9th-level maneuvers) but as we sit together and talked about the things I had in mind and such he allowed it.
If he had said no: then I would not have any reason to complain as that source would give me options that he is unfamiliar with and not able to calculate into his already somewhat planned campaign.
My point is you now say the system is becoming blant for you. Fine, that means you had your time of fun with it. As I had my "fun" with DSA, although the DM I had for that really diverted me from it and made me realize it is not a system in which I would like to play.

But back to your point about nearly only optimization. Yes some of this is true. Some like the Generating-Mini-game and like to tack on abilities or make really strong combinations. But the most I have seen, and I hope my questions most of the time were grasped as this, is that people have a concept but don't really know how to ideally adjust it so that the character isn't a "failure" compared to others or that it is even achieved.

And yes, after 10 years of gaming and having tested every possbile combination I would probably be bored too... but I don't think so as in those past ~5 years I play the first 2 were just every weekend another one-shot. I played rogues, fighter, rogue fighter, barbarians, rogue barbarians, clerics, wizards, sorcerers, sorcerer fighters, rangers, swashbuckler, ninja, ninja/rogues, warlocks, wu jen, etc. although always for short 2 sessions maybe 4 sessions tops. Form the core rulebook the only class I haven't played yet is the paladin. Outside of Core 3.5 I still have some classes I haven't played yet. But this might change, and even then, not having had this specific combination... but until this time comes... I will probably have either switched to a newer system or quit the hobby... but again this isn't the fault of the system. In those mentioned "one-shots" i played many fighters, many barbarians, many rogues, a few clerics and a few other classes once some more.
For me characters aren't the same, the one might go for a strong two-handed attack, the other for sword and board and yet another wields a chain to trip/disarm his enemies. And this is only mechanically speaking: motivation, background, reactions all are different and the campaign always changes.
But to stay interested in those things and not have the feeling of burn out... well I would say to step a bit back, think about stuff you want to play and talk with your dm about it. If the group disliked your Kitsune: ask them about it. Why exactly allow a frigging angelspawn and something that looks like wearing tights over it's head and not this?
If they tell you "hurr" because it's core then argue about the fact that Aasimar is B1 not Core Rulebook. Changeling isn't even in B1 afaik... but always remember the DM set's/chooses/adjusts the rules in a certain degree to which you play. If you can't generate more fun out of it then it's not the fault of the system. It gave you fun. Hell the time with my old group made fun too but when it no longer does? Why still stay with it?

(Edit because pressed send too fast.)

[Sewercop]

Long backstory before the gm even told him what game he was running?
Yeah, thats a problem.

Tell us the level of the character, show us the backstory, etc.. makes it easier to give a straight answer.

Sounds more like you dont fit in with the group.

[Dr.Epic]

The nine-tailed fox bound inside the titular character of Naruto was probably inspired by the kitsune of folklore (it's virtually a given) but it diverges wildly from the folklore, if I'm not mistaken, as does most any other reference to traditional folklore in the show.


No.

This guy.
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs49/f/2009/235/9/9/Kitsune_samurai_by_PVTjoe.jpg


Uhhh... you need to back further, to the mythological roots, rather than, you know. Animes that take a few minor tidbits from the mythology, and ignore 90% of the mythology, due to assumptions that the native audience already knows what the myths are talking about.


http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/cf/Prince_Hanzoku_terrorised_by_a_nine-_tailed_fox.jpg/393px-Prince_Hanzoku_terrorised_by_a_nine-_tailed_fox.jpg
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/05/NineTailsFox.JPG
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/c/c6/Kuniyoshi_Kuzunoha.jpg/429px-Kuniyoshi_Kuzunoha.jpg


Oh! I think I get it now.

So...Kurama then?:smallconfused:

[Gavinfoxx]

Oh! I think I get it now.

So...Kurama then?:smallconfused:

Why don't you just read the wiki article?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitsune

[Talya]

By default, all WotC 3.0 and 3.5 sourcebooks are RAW and allowable in a D&D 3.5 game. Disallowing certain books and options is a houserule.

[Zubrowka74]

Rangers have a ton of alternate fighting styles.

In PF there's even archetypes for THF rangers, or even Sword'n'board.

[Talya]

This is one of the many reasons I'm partial to 4e; whether because of 4e's "everything is core" line, or because 4e is just more balanced, I don't know. But I've never met a 4e DM who put arbitrary restrictions on character options.


Of course, almost every "option" in 4e feels the same as every other option...

[Spuddles]

Your issue seems to be the inability to separate class from job title. A "fighter" isn't anything in the actual game world. Neither is a "ranger" or a "rogue". If you want to be a ranger, just call yourself one and then take fighter and scout or rogue levels to create a custom combat style, nobody's going to stop you.

I think the real issue is that you referenced close to requiring 5 different books and a handful of magazines published over nearly as many years to execute those builds.

[HalfGrammarGeek]

Of course, almost every "option" in 4e feels the same as every other option...
If you really want to get into edition war BS, start a new thread and I'll be happy to explain how that argument goes both ways.

[Morbis Meh]

Of course, almost every "option" in 4e feels the same as every other option...

Agreed x100 I cannot stand 4e, I gave it an honest try and I just found it so bland, boring and mindnumbinly restrictive outside of combat (the last part was more with the group I believe or just how the game was ran); however, like many of the good people on this lovely board has stated: Your problem is not a system one it is in fact a table one. At my table go nuts, play your rasically fox spirit digger to your hearts content, the more detail you give me in your backstory the more I can implement said character into the world I am building. Heck, PF has a kitsune race last time I checked and it isn't hard to refluff a standard human into one in straight 3.5 (I would even implement quests for the kitsune to grow stronger thus adding more tials/abilities in its fox form).

In conclusion the system isn't saying "Thou shall not play as a fox eared abomination!" it's your group, who apparently are supposed to be your friends (though they seem needlessly restrictive). Talk to the DM work out a compromise if you still want to play, if not fix the problem with fire, lots and lots of fire and if it doesn't solve the problem you have not used enough fire :smallbiggrin:

[HalfGrammarGeek]

Agreed x100 I cannot stand 4e, I gave it an honest try and I just found it so bland, boring and mindnumbinly restrictive outside of combat (the last part was more with the group I believe or just how the game was ran)...
And right there, you hit the nail on the head! Almost any complaint about a game can be attributed to the group. Chained Icarus is being told that it's all his group's fault, and certainly the [selectively] core-only part is their doing. Similarly, I could attribute your dissatisfaction with 4e to your group, or your DM, or to lack of understanding a new system. Or maybe you played early in its life when it just didn't have as many options as 3.x did at the time. Or any number of things.

This is why I suggest that Chained Icarus not only look for a new group, but preferably one that plays a game he's never played before. This way he can learn to identify what kinds he likes, and form opinions of his own without relying on those of interweb edition warriors. Plus, a bit of variety and experience with different systems is good for a gamer's character.

Bad pun intended. :smallbiggrin:

[Hiro Protagonest]

Eh, 4e has plenty of options. I mean, sure, Runepriest is a slightly different Battle Cleric, but what did you honestly expect from a a melee divine leader? Archer Rangers require a different set of tactics than Rageblood Barbarians, and even Skirmishing Warlords view the battlefield differently from melee Warlords, what with having to worry about difficult terrain less and cover/concealment more. You also gain more feats than in 3.5.

The thing is that 3.5 is more modular. 4e has a set power level, and changing that power level requires some high skill and op-fu. The power is roughly tier 4, in 3.5 terms, but some classes can get to tier 3 (like wizard, which has tons of support). Optimization in 4e just increases the numbers.

In 3.5, though, there's the "typical" party fighting monsters that don't grasp basic tactics, the warblade/factotum/controller/buffer setup that can take down smarter enemies, and Conjurer, barb/war/FB, druid, and artificer fighting smart and retooled enemies. It supports more styles of play.

[Morbis Meh]

And right there, you hit the nail on the head! Almost any complaint about a game can be attributed to the group. Chained Icarus is being told that it's all his group's fault, and certainly the [selectively] core-only part is their doing. Similarly, I could attribute your dissatisfaction with 4e to your group, or your DM, or to lack of understanding a new system. Or maybe you played early in its life when it just didn't have as many options as 3.x did at the time. Or any number of things.


The last one was attributed to the group however the fact that the classes really seemed very similar bothered me, the power set up, how they do very mechanically similar things etc etc bored me to tears sure it's balanced but there are only so many flavours of cake you can eat before you are just sick of cake. That said I shall not partake in 4e but I love other systems to bits... oh paranoia and Call of Cthulu....

[Arcanist]

I'm not entirely sure what you're talking about. What know-it-all feat? I certainly expect a character that claims to be an expert at knowing things to have devoted some resources to knowing things.

This isn't entirely true. You can actually Roleplay an All-Knowing entity without having a single rank in a Knowledge, the Lore Class feature, the Bardic Knowledge Class feature, Collector of Stories, etc. Your character doesn't have to have a mechanical feature to fit there fluff features and vice versa.

[AmberVael]

This isn't entirely true. You can actually Roleplay an All-Knowing entity without having a single rank in a Knowledge, the Lore Class feature, the Bardic Knowledge Class feature, Collector of Stories, etc. Your character doesn't have to have a mechanical feature to fit there fluff features and vice versa.

I have attempted formulating numerous replies to this, but I'm just really having difficulty here. So lets make this simple. This claim seems highly doubtful, and I think you need to make a much more detailed and compelling argument if you want your claim to be taken seriously.

[Flickerdart]

This isn't entirely true. You can actually Roleplay an All-Knowing entity without having a single rank in a Knowledge, the Lore Class feature, the Bardic Knowledge Class feature, Collector of Stories, etc. Your character doesn't have to have a mechanical feature to fit there fluff features and vice versa.
No, you can't. Because as soon as you need to know anything (which, if you claim to be all-knowing, will probably be soon) it becomes pretty explicit that you're not all-knowing, or anything-knowing. All you're doing is roleplaying someone who's pretending to be all knowing and really isn't.

[Kelb_Panthera]

This isn't entirely true. You can actually Roleplay an All-Knowing entity without having a single rank in a Knowledge, the Lore Class feature, the Bardic Knowledge Class feature, Collector of Stories, etc.
Your character doesn't have to have a mechanical feature to fit there fluff features and vice versa.

Please tell me you see how self-contradictory your post is.

[Dusk Eclipse]

Oh! I think I get it now.

So...Kurama then?:smallconfused:

Both kuramas (Yu-Yu-Hakusho and the nine-tails from Naruto) are based on the myth of the kitsune, a japanese shapeshifting trickster "demon"/spirit whose powers increased as they aged and were naturally fox-shaped. As an aside I think kitsune is actually the japanese word for fox, though I am not sure.

[Yukitsu]

Both kuramas (Yu-Yu-Hakusho and the nine-tails from Naruto) are based on the myth of the kitsune, a japanese shapeshifting trickster "demon"/spirit whose powers increased as they aged and were naturally fox-shaped. As an aside I think kitsune is actually the japanese word for fox, though I am not sure.

It is.

A kitsune spirit was synonymous with a mundane fox. A fox that lived to be over 100 was said to be a mythical spirit with various powers, but it was still a fox. Part of their magic was the ability to take the form of a human, but when they did, they looked like a completely mundane human with a handsome or beautiful looking face with narrow eyes.

So in sum, play an awakened fox, cuz that's what a Kitsune is.

[Morph Bark]

And this is why great DMs make good use of Rule 0 to make the game more fun for all the players.


While I don't see myself as a great DM, I do think I'm a good one. One of my players, who is very new to DnD (only played one session with us before we started the current campaign in which he's a regular) wanted to have a pet pig that he could ride, while also being useful in both melee and ranged combat, as long as the class was fun. Since we were playing with Flaws, I recalled the Commoner Flaw that prettymuch grants you a pig, but of course I modified it to be more lenient. He liked the fact that the original Flaw summoned up Orcus to kill him if the pig ever died, so we kept that in, except I thought he'd thought it would be more fun if instead of Orcus, it'd be Cthulhu. He loved the idea, and we went through it. He's still loving that pig immensely.

I never play Core only, or by strict RAW. About half my campaigns are mostly homebrew, and all the players have a blast. The campaigns are mostly roleplaying too. A lot of people have told me 4 combat encounters per session is the norm, but we usually end up with 1 or 2. Good roleplaying or inventive thinking or doing something unique can get players small bonuses and advantages.

[Hawkings]

The core problem you're expressing is neither with the group nor D&D mechanics, it's instead expectation. You've put a enormous amount of work into a character before it was ever approved, undoubtedly imagined plans and ideas of what your character would do, and when that was not possible it ruined everything for you. Had you never put that effort or thought into the character and instead used the random background generator provided in the Hero Builder's Guidebook and used the fox theme for class would you have felt so bad when it wasn't possible?

No one else can be held responsible for your unmet expectations, your group may not be the most encouraging of creativity but it seems like you knew that before hand, and D&D and WotC cannot predict or be accountable for the experiences, expectations or desires of every player, so quitting D&D won't change a problem that it's mechanics didn't create.

It's unfortunate you couldn't play your character, had you been in my game I'd have encouraged that character. In the first game I DMed one player was a psionic fox and all loved her bizarre charm; coincidentally she was named Kitsune.

You can easily make a nine-tails fox with a Hengeyokai from Oriental Adventures for just a +1LA.
You could also use the Tibbit from Dragon Compendium that you could change the werecat theme to fox and be essentually the same thing for I think a +0LA race.

Putting Ki Strike is a +1 enchantment that you can put on a quarterstaff to make it function like an unarmed strike for many monk abilities, you can also get Elongating which is also a +1 enchantment on it to make is stretch. although technically it's suppose to only work on flexible melee weapons you could argue that stretching a stick isn't too unreasonable, heck that technology already exist for many cleaning devices that feature extendable reach.

[Kelb_Panthera]

@Hawkings: Where can I find this elongating enhancement. It may help me finish a concept I had to shelve a while back.

[Gavinfoxx]

Hengeyokai had their LA reduced in the Dragon Magazine update.

[Hawkings]

@Hawkings: Where can I find this elongating enhancement. It may help me finish a concept I had to shelve a while back.
Arms & Armor v3.5 by Jim Butler, Steve Creech, and Kevin Ruesch
aka Arms And Armor Revised, it has just about everything you can want for your weapons in that book, I seriously love it.


Hengeyokai had their LA reduced in the Dragon Magazine update.

Didn't know that, glad to hear because they didn't seem to deserve that LA.

[HalfGrammarGeek]

The last one was attributed to the group however the fact that the classes really seemed very similar bothered me, the power set up, how they do very mechanically similar things etc etc bored me to tears sure it's balanced but there are only so many flavours of cake you can eat before you are just sick of cake.
Funny, I could say the same thing about 3.x. Fighty classes roll a d20 and then damage, casters cast their spell and announce the save DC. Or just win. Yawn. Sure some of them get really angry when they fight, and some have ambiguously innate magic, but there's only so many variations of 'roll a d20' and 'select your win buttons from this list' I can take before wanting something different.

4e has its flaws, but most complaints and corresponding arguments can be made any way you care to aim them.

[ThiagoMartell]

Funny, I could say the same thing about 3.x. Fighty classes roll a d20 and then damage, casters cast their spell and announce the save DC. Or just win. Yawn. Sure some of them get really angry when they fight, and some have ambiguously innate magic, but there's only so many variations of 'roll a d20' and 'select your win buttons from this list' I can take before wanting something different.
That simply does not apply to 3.5, man. And I'm sure you know it. Don't beat at each other with strawmen, please.

[Snowbluff]

That simply does not apply to 3.5, man. And I'm sure you know it. Don't beat at each other with strawmen, please.

Yeah. Strawmen are subpar weapons. You have to take the improvised weapon penalties, and they are made of straw, which is unsuitable for weapon material. The damage is non-lethal and doesn't work against armored foes like the whip.

[Arbane]

Dunno what Sun Wukong had in abilities

In short: EVERYTHING :smallbiggrin:

Sun Wukong was a munchkin before the term existed. He was immortal, invulnerable, a master of magic, superstrong and a superb fighter, King Of The Monkeys, and beat up half of Heaven before Buddha beat him at a dare and dropped a mountain on him to stop his rampage.

And he was Chaotic Neutral, to boot.

Anyway, back to the original argument. Part of the problem I see with D&D is that it IS possible to be DOIN IT WRONG with your ideas, if you actually care about your character winning fights. I never heard the term "character build" applied to tabletop RPGs before D&D 3. :smallmad:

[icefractal]

I have to say, the fact that you can't play a Kitsune, but they're allowing Aasimar and Changeling? That sounds like the group (or at least that DM) are being *****. If you were otherwise enjoying it, maybe this would be the time to bite the bullet; since you're not, why not demand an explanation? Maybe there's another issue going on here.


Side note: Sun Wukong. There's a number of ways you could represent him, most of which don't involve Monk. However, if I had to do it in core only? Rogue. He's got lots of skills, can use a quarterstaff quite effectively, a tricky weakness-exploiting fighting style fits the character, and IIRC, he's always taking (and using) other peoples' magic stuff, which UMD would be helpful with.

[HalfGrammarGeek]

That simply does not apply to 3.5, man. And I'm sure you know it. Don't beat at each other with strawmen, please.
RW Diplomacy Protip: It helps to address both parties when attempting to find common ground and calm a debate. Unless of course you're really just another partisan looking to 'score points' for your team.



Yeah. Strawmen are subpar weapons. You have to take the improvised weapon penalties, and they are made of straw, which is unsuitable for weapon material. The damage is non-lethal and doesn't work against armored foes like the whip.
Which is why I cast *Nystul's Magic Strawman*. Looks like a strawman, is actually Chuck Norris.

[Krazzman]

Sun Wukong was a munchkin before the term existed. He was immortal, invulnerable, a master of magic, superstrong and a superb fighter, King Of The Monkeys, and beat up half of Heaven before Buddha beat him at a dare and dropped a mountain on him to stop his rampage.

And he was Chaotic Neutral, to boot.


... I have to play a character like him.... RIGHT NAOW!!!! No seriously then this fits even better in Pathfinder to be an Ape-Shaman with the Rage-classfeature (there was a way... forgot it thought...) Wielding a "quarterstaff" with shillelagh, and other extra dmg enchantments and going to town. Maybe adding a bit of Barbarian or MomS-Monk for Rage and Styles...

[White_Drake]

@ HalfGrammarGeekYou want the core mechanic to change everytime you make an action?

Edit: Perhaps I should clarify, saying all attacks/spells/whatever are the same in 3.5 because they almost all use a d20 roll to determine the results is like saying all PC games are identical because they all use a keyboard and mouse.

[Deepbluediver]

Group is set on one game, exactly how it's written.

Exactly how it's written is dull, limited, and does not encourage players to try fun things for the sake of Roleplaying.

Look up anything for DnD and Pathfinder, and you'll find infinitely more on the topic of min/maxing characters than you will on fleshing out characters, people recounting cool stories/concepts, etc.

D&D has tons of fully official game-resources that players can use; if your group is dead set against anything except core, how is this the systems problem? Any system will have a certain amount of "this is just a suggestion" to it, and your group will need to either go along with that or reject it.

If you are looking for a really simple, really abstract system, then a recent poster in the Homebrew forum put up this: STaRS (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=14272505)
but if you can't get your group to try something new, none of it will matter.

I'm going to read through more of this thread now, but what if you took a turn DMing and entire game? That will give you the chance to define the rules and set up situations outside the norm. One of the groups I played with a couple of years ago would frequently do one shots or short games with the limitation of "no core classes or races"; it was very funny to see what people would come up with.

[Morbis Meh]

Funny, I could say the same thing about 3.x. Fighty classes roll a d20 and then damage, casters cast their spell and announce the save DC. Or just win. Yawn. Sure some of them get really angry when they fight, and some have ambiguously innate magic, but there's only so many variations of 'roll a d20' and 'select your win buttons from this list' I can take before wanting something different.

4e has its flaws, but most complaints and corresponding arguments can be made any way you care to aim them.


@ HalfGrammarGeekYou want the core mechanic to change everytime you make an action?

Edit: Perhaps I should clarify, saying all attacks/spells/whatever are the same in 3.5 because they almost all use a d20 roll to determine the results is like saying all PC games are identical because they all use a keyboard and mouse.

I concur with White Drake, unless you're playing a freeform system then of course mechanics will not change. 4e everyone gets the same amount of powers that just all seem bland and really number crunched. A zero level spell in 3.5 eg prestidigitation can do a wide variety of tasks and can be used creatively. Powers in 4e are pretty cut and dry with what they can and can't do, I personally prefer have the little bits of wiggle room that allow some creative freedom in the game.

The fact that you prefer 4e and I prefer 3.5 means nothing, what is important is that we have found a hobby we both enjoy thus there is no need to argue which one is better but to just have fun and realize different people enjoy different things.

[Larkas]

... I have to play a character like him.... RIGHT NAOW!!!! No seriously then this fits even better in Pathfinder to be an Ape-Shaman with the Rage-classfeature (there was a way... forgot it thought...) Wielding a "quarterstaff" with shillelagh, and other extra dmg enchantments and going to town. Maybe adding a bit of Barbarian or MomS-Monk for Rage and Styles...

For the record, Sun Wukong is also known as Son Goku in Japan :smallwink:

[kumada]

I've been playing the same game, with the same races, with the same classes, with the same choices, for 12~13 years, give or take. I've played every race and class that's interested me, every combo of those, and multi-classed in ways that were absolutely stupid story-wise but the only way to make a character viable gameplay wise.

This, right here, feels like it's the core of the complaint.

You've been doing the same thing for an exceedingly long time, and it's frustrating being told not to try and do something different.

For me, DnD is a beer* and pizza game. It's part cooperative board game, part table banter, and part roleplay shenanigans. As much as a lot of the supplements have tried to make it edgy and character-centric and story-driven, that's not really its niche market. White Wolf realized that back when they were making AD&D supplements and promptly split off to do their own thing.

It sounds like you would have a lot of fun playing something different, but maybe your DnD group wouldn't. If you still like them as friends, that's okay. If you still enjoy gaming with them, keep doing it. It just means you have to find your other game somewhere else.**

*or age-appropriate non-alcoholic beverage substitute

**these here boards, for example. Any particular systems you were interested in playing or running?

[Zubrowka74]

For the record, Sun Wukong is also known as Son Goku in Japan :smallwink:


And Son House in the Southern US... :smallbiggrin:

[Eric Tolle]

Given that 3rd edition was designed to be an rpg version of Magic the Gathering, it's no surprise that roleplaying takes a back seat to coming up with the most optimized power combinations. That said, the OP is almost certainly better off with a different group and game. Games ranging from FATE to Mutants and Masterminds are better at allowing distinctive characters and promoting roleplay.



However, what I dislike about other, more modulate systems, is that they precisely LACK the customization ability and the rules for doing the stuff I want.

In a system without feats, for example, how is my fighter with a two handed sword different from a monk with a quarterstaff? Maybe they have different ability scores, and of course they'll be doing different amounts of damage, but besides?

Easily done in FATE. For a start, the swordsman maxes out Weapons, while the monk makes his highest skill Agility. So one is better with weapons, the other with dodging. Add a couple aspects like "Big Guy with a Big Sword" or "Trained in Tiger Style", and you get bonuses where they apply. Lastly, add a couple stunts, say one that increases the zweihanders damage, or increases agility when fighting groups, and there you have it: two highly distinctive fighters.

[Unusual Muse]

For me, DnD is a beer and pizza game. It's part cooperative board game, part table banter, and part roleplay shenanigans.

That's an excellent summation. :smallsmile:

[LordHavelock]

Sounds to me like the problem is one with your group of players. If they're a RAW group (as you put it) then they're taking a very strict constructionist view of the rules. Granted, I'm with you in that I love systems like Shadowrun, FATE, and others that don't have defined character classes and instead let you run with a concept that you build on a point buy basis or what have you. As a player myself, I've run in to exactly what you have experienced, in that I can only get so creative with my character before I run in to the fact that the way the rules are set up, I'm going to have to compromise either my concept, or my characters ability to function effectively in their defined class and role (on or off the battlefield). That's not a fun choice to have to make, but most players want to keep things fair, and want to maximize their characters effectiveness, and that usually means compromising story and role play character elements (especially since that's what most groups want to do).

However, that's not every group. And as a GM, I've found the most fun I've had is when a character comes to me with an interesting concept, one that lies a little outside the realm of the rules (certainly outside the RAW standard) and together we flesh out exactly how this is going to function. Fact is, D&D and Pathfinder have specific rules for almost every situation, but it's at times like these that I like to capitalize on the fact that most players don't read all of them, or can't keep them all in mind all the time. As long as I provide a ruling that sounds fair, and they roll a d20 and apply negative and positive modifiers, the game moves on and everyone gets to have fun.

It sounds like your play group is on the whole, to Vanilla for what you like to get out of your role playing experience. They're probably their to kill monsters, get loot, and derive the most satisfaction from making their characters the best they can be, as opposed to your view which seems to be make the best character and not worry about maximizing returns on xp/loot.

[HalfGrammarGeek]

I concur with White Drake, unless you're playing a freeform system then of course mechanics will not change. 4e everyone gets the same amount of powers that just all seem bland and really number crunched. A zero level spell in 3.5 eg prestidigitation can do a wide variety of tasks and can be used creatively. Powers in 4e are pretty cut and dry with what they can and can't do, I personally prefer have the little bits of wiggle room that allow some creative freedom in the game.
Perhaps you've heard of the 4e Esstentials and psionic classes? Which differ significantly in number of powers and mechanics. And perhaps you've noticed that the 4e wizard also has cantrips, and that nothing in the rules say "Thou shalt use powers for combat, and never creatively." The only thing stopping you from using them creatively is your DM...which brings us back to the "It's your group/DM's fault" argument that Chained Icarus has been repeatedly told.



The fact that you prefer 4e and I prefer 3.5 means nothing, what is important is that we have found a hobby we both enjoy thus there is no need to argue which one is better but to just have fun and realize different people enjoy different things.
Agreed. I'd also append that there's no need to jump on the edition warrior bandwagon that Talya began and start throwing around passive aggressive comments about being bored to tears just because another game isn't to your liking. If you're truly confident that 3.x is an awesome game -- and it is, even if it's not my favorite -- there's no need to put down other games.

[HalfGrammarGeek]

@ HalfGrammarGeekYou want the core mechanic to change everytime you make an action?
I could ask a similar question in response to complaints that 4e is too "samey."

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Easily done in FATE. For a start, the swordsman maxes out Weapons, while the monk makes his highest skill Agility. So one is better with weapons, the other with dodging. Add a couple aspects like "Big Guy with a Big Sword" or "Trained in Tiger Style", and you get bonuses where they apply. Lastly, add a couple stunts, say one that increases the zweihanders damage, or increases agility when fighting groups, and there you have it: two highly distinctive fighters.
If anything, FATE is more distinctive. In fact, FATE easily lets you make two-handed builds (or staff-monk builds, or shadow-rogue builds, or builds of any character archetype you can think of) that feel different from one another.

[LordHavelock]

If anything, FATE is more distinctive. In fact, FATE easily lets you make two-handed builds (or staff-monk builds, or shadow-rogue builds, or builds of any character archetype you can think of) that feel different from one another.

God I love the FATE system for that ability. Especially Spirit of the Century. Never have I had a more diverse group of players with a better reason to be acting in concert as a party with more outrageous builds and backstories working so well in the context of the campaign.

[Arcanist]

Please tell me you see how self-contradictory your post is.

Think of it this way. A village elder can be considered all knowing simply because they've experienced much more then anyone else in the village. To be more accurate, Omniscience is technically impossible since that would imply you know everything that ever is, was and will ever be at which point you matter as well just put your head in a bucket and call it a day. Omniscience from the point of view of a finite species (i.e Humans) would be knowing everything that we as a species known. To summarize, If you are the first of your kind to make fire, you are the most intelligent person of your kind and by default the All-knowing elder (yes, even if you are a toddler).


No, you can't. Because as soon as you need to know anything (which, if you claim to be all-knowing, will probably be soon) it becomes pretty explicit that you're not all-knowing, or anything-knowing. All you're doing is roleplaying someone who's pretending to be all knowing and really isn't.

Having a high enough int score can easily replicate omniscient. Not as well as having max ranks, but it can get the job done. Hell a village sage could have an intelligence score of 12 and be considered omniscient since on average he knows more about a subject then anyone else would. Let's not even pay attention to the fact that "All-Knowing" can be replicated by a 2nd level cleric spell.


I have attempted formulating numerous replies to this, but I'm just really having difficulty here. So lets make this simple. This claim seems highly doubtful, and I think you need to make a much more detailed and compelling argument if you want your claim to be taken seriously.

Spells, a high enough modifier (wisdom or intelligence), masterwork knowledge tools (call it an Encyclopedia), but the thing about actual roleplaying is that it's all make believe. The funniest thing you can ever do to become All-Knowing is writing in your backstory "I've read from the Akashic Records" (which is as likely to get thrown out as fast as writing Knowledge (System Mastery) on your character sheet, but more or less the same thing, with another name).

In conclusion. Omniscience is relative to your cultures advances. A civilization could be a place where knowledge and education is honored and treated with great prestige or it could be a place where it is illegal to read and write. A more easier to understand example would be traveling back in time with a lighter and helping Cavemen discover fire.

[Hiro Protagonest]

That's an excellent summation. :smallsmile:

Oh yeah. I never really got why people take the mechanics of ANY edition of D&D seriously, except as a way to stave off boredom. D&D, when compared to other game systems, has nothing going for it except for detailed combat (which honestly still isn't that much greater than other combat systems), disproportionate popularity, and more shapes of dice than other systems.

[Kelb_Panthera]

@ Arcanist: "omnicience" doesn't work that way. Either you have it or you don't. In D&D nothing has it, so it's a concept that's completely irrelevant to the game. The closest anything comes are gods and wierds; creatures that know, or can learn in short order, so much information that they appear to know literally everything, even though they don't.

What you've described is simply having expertise in one or more fields of study, or simply being smarter or more travelled than those around you. These things can get you a reputation as a sage, but how well that reputation holds and how far it reaches depend on your ability to deliver information or advice when prompted.

The contradiction I was attempting to highlight was that several alternative mechanics were listed for fulfilling the sage role, followed by a statement that mechanics were unnecessary.

To be considered a sage, as you've described, requires that you have -some- mechanical aspect of your character be able to explain why you're percieved as such by those around you. On the level of a village, sure, a higher than average int or wis score will get the job done. For a small town that's not on any trade routes and the surrounding villiages, perhaps a rank in each of a few knowledge skills to uncap what you know.

If you want to be known as a sage on any grander scale than that, though, you're going to have to sink a noteworthy portion of your resources into it; either keeping a knowledge skill maxed, to be known as a learned person in that field, or one or another of the alternative mechanics such as bardic knowledge or lore, to be known as a person who knows many things. In all cases, you must be willing to share that information to be considered a sage. A guy with a bunch of knowledge noone knows about is just Tim, who lives in the house on baker street.

Alternately, you can be known as a sage who knows many things by being a player in the game. Setup an information network and use the information gathered in a seemingly helpful manner to manipulate the politics of the area around you. A decent wisdom and intelligence score and ranks in the appropriate social skills accomplish this nicely. Spellcasters can, naturally, accomplish this with copious scrying and other divinations, though they're likely as not to gain a reputation as more of an oracle than a sage depending on how they manage their image.

Bottom line: to be known as a sage at all has some basic RP requirements and to be known as a sage on a scale where such a reputation is meaningful -does- require mechanics to support it, though there's a broader array of mechanics for accomplishing this than was initially possited.

[Morbis Meh]

Agreed. I'd also append that there's no need to jump on the edition warrior bandwagon that Talya began and start throwing around passive aggressive comments about being bored to tears just because another game isn't to your liking. If you're truly confident that 3.x is an awesome game -- and it is, even if it's not my favorite -- there's no need to put down other games.

I never said 4e was a bad game I just said that i didn't like it and listed the reasons why I did not enjoy it. It was a completely subjective statement nothing more nothing less and no I have not heard or seen any of the references you pointed out since I will not put that amount of effort into something that i do not find entertaining. Personally I dislike any VS threads since they are pointless bickering among fanboys/girls I much prefer enjoying the experience for myself instead of trying to validate my positive feelings toward said activity by trouncing on someone elses.

[HalfGrammarGeek]

I never said 4e was a bad game I just said that i didn't like it and listed the reasons why I did not enjoy it.
You also used overly dramatic language to say why you don't like it, and you piggybacked on a flagrantly edition-war post. Imagine if Talya had said "All 3.x rules are ill-conceived, overly legalistic, confusing, overbearing and filled with loopholes." And then me piggybacking with "Yeah, I tried 3.x and the rules made me want ram an ice pick through my skull...hey, I'm just telling you why I don't like it." Yeah, I would be telling you about my subjective feelings about it. And I'd also be acting like a [four letter word] edition warrior.

[GolemsVoice]

Easily done in FATE. For a start, the swordsman maxes out Weapons, while the monk makes his highest skill Agility. So one is better with weapons, the other with dodging. Add a couple aspects like "Big Guy with a Big Sword" or "Trained in Tiger Style", and you get bonuses where they apply. Lastly, add a couple stunts, say one that increases the zweihanders damage, or increases agility when fighting groups, and there you have it: two highly distinctive fighters.

As I said, it's not universal, and my comment certainly was a generalization. I'm aware that this doesn't apply to every game out there

[White_Drake]

Perhaps you've heard of the 4e Esstentials and psionic classes? Which differ significantly in number of powers and mechanics. And perhaps you've noticed that the 4e wizard also has cantrips, and that nothing in the rules say "Thou shalt use powers for combat, and never creatively." The only thing stopping you from using them creatively is your DM...which brings us back to the "It's your group/DM's fault" argument that Chained Icarus has been repeatedly told.


Agreed. I'd also append that there's no need to jump on the edition warrior bandwagon that Talya began and start throwing around passive aggressive comments about being bored to tears just because another game isn't to your liking. If you're truly confident that 3.x is an awesome game -- and it is, even if it's not my favorite -- there's no need to put down other games.

I never said anything about 4th edition; you are jumping to conclusions. I have neither the knowledge nor the inclination to make an effective argument against fourth edition. As for variety in 3.x mechanics, I would direct you to psionics, martial maneuvers, and maybe (never used it, so I can't say for certain) incarnum. I don't know why you're going on about how things can be used creatively in 4th edition, because A) I don't believe anybody challenged how it is possible to make creative use of your powers in 4e, and B) creativity translates into virtually any RPG, that's what makes them unique (as opposed to pre-scripted games such as video games).

[Hiro Protagonest]

I never said anything about 4th edition; you are jumping to conclusions. I have neither the knowledge nor the inclination to make an effective argument against fourth edition. As for variety in 3.x mechanics, I would direct you to psionics, martial maneuvers, and maybe (never used it, so I can't say for certain) incarnum. I don't know why you're going on about how things can be used creatively in 4th edition, because A) I don't believe anybody challenged how it is possible to make creative use of your powers in 4e, and B) creativity translates into virtually any RPG, that's what makes them unique (as opposed to pre-scripted games such as video games).

Er, he wasn't responding to your post.

[White_Drake]

Oops... Well umm.... If any of that's still at all relevant the point stands...:smallredface:

[Spuddles]

Think of it this way. A village elder can be considered all knowing simply because they've experienced much more then anyone else in the village. To be more accurate, Omniscience is technically impossible since that would imply you know everything that ever is, was and will ever be at which point you matter as well just put your head in a bucket and call it a day. Omniscience from the point of view of a finite species (i.e Humans) would be knowing everything that we as a species known. To summarize, If you are the first of your kind to make fire, you are the most intelligent person of your kind and by default the All-knowing elder (yes, even if you are a toddler).



Having a high enough int score can easily replicate omniscient. Not as well as having max ranks, but it can get the job done. Hell a village sage could have an intelligence score of 12 and be considered omniscient since on average he knows more about a subject then anyone else would. Let's not even pay attention to the fact that "All-Knowing" can be replicated by a 2nd level cleric spell.



Spells, a high enough modifier (wisdom or intelligence), masterwork knowledge tools (call it an Encyclopedia), but the thing about actual roleplaying is that it's all make believe. The funniest thing you can ever do to become All-Knowing is writing in your backstory "I've read from the Akashic Records" (which is as likely to get thrown out as fast as writing Knowledge (System Mastery) on your character sheet, but more or less the same thing, with another name).

In conclusion. Omniscience is relative to your cultures advances. A civilization could be a place where knowledge and education is honored and treated with great prestige or it could be a place where it is illegal to read and write. A more easier to understand example would be traveling back in time with a lighter and helping Cavemen discover fire.

What the hell are you smoking.

[Gavinfoxx]

What the hell are you smoking.

Yea, I'm inclined to agree with this. Omniscience has a very specific definition, and very specific capabilities are required to get something like that in a D&D game.

[RFLS]

Perhaps you've heard of the 4e Esstentials and psionic classes? Which differ significantly in number of powers and mechanics. And perhaps you've noticed that the 4e wizard also has cantrips, and that nothing in the rules say "Thou shalt use powers for combat, and never creatively." The only thing stopping you from using them creatively is your DM...which brings us back to the "It's your group/DM's fault" argument that Chained Icarus has been repeatedly told.


Agreed. I'd also append that there's no need to jump on the edition warrior bandwagon that Talya began and start throwing around passive aggressive comments about being bored to tears just because another game isn't to your liking. If you're truly confident that 3.x is an awesome game -- and it is, even if it's not my favorite -- there's no need to put down other games.


I could ask a similar question in response to complaints that 4e is too "samey."


I never said 4e was a bad game I just said that i didn't like it and listed the reasons why I did not enjoy it. It was a completely subjective statement nothing more nothing less and no I have not heard or seen any of the references you pointed out since I will not put that amount of effort into something that i do not find entertaining. Personally I dislike any VS threads since they are pointless bickering among fanboys/girls I much prefer enjoying the experience for myself instead of trying to validate my positive feelings toward said activity by trouncing on someone elses.


You also used overly dramatic language to say why you don't like it, and you piggybacked on a flagrantly edition-war post. Imagine if Talya had said "All 3.x rules are ill-conceived, overly legalistic, confusing, overbearing and filled with loopholes." And then me piggybacking with "Yeah, I tried 3.x and the rules made me want ram an ice pick through my skull...hey, I'm just telling you why I don't like it." Yeah, I would be telling you about my subjective feelings about it. And I'd also be acting like a [four letter word] edition warrior.


I never said anything about 4th edition; you are jumping to conclusions. I have neither the knowledge nor the inclination to make an effective argument against fourth edition. As for variety in 3.x mechanics, I would direct you to psionics, martial maneuvers, and maybe (never used it, so I can't say for certain) incarnum. I don't know why you're going on about how things can be used creatively in 4th edition, because A) I don't believe anybody challenged how it is possible to make creative use of your powers in 4e, and B) creativity translates into virtually any RPG, that's what makes them unique (as opposed to pre-scripted games such as video games).

Pretty sure strawberry with chocolate sauce is better, guys.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

Pretty sure strawberry with chocolate sauce is better, guys.
What's wrong with you? Strawberry with chocolate sauce is a cheap money-grab from the ice cream makers who screwed over their loyal strawberry lovers, just so that they could attract a new fanbase.

You disgust me. You're such a choco-noob. :smallsigh:

[RFLS]

What's wrong with you? Strawberry with chocolate sauce is a cheap money-grab from the ice cream makers who screwed over their loyal strawberry lovers, just so that they could attract a new fanbase.

You disgust me. You're such a choco-noob. :smallsigh:

Yeah? Then what is it YOU think is best, snob? Jeeesh, freaking hipsters in here.

[White_Drake]

Actually, I dislike both chocolate and strawberry; I prefer vanilla. Call me boring if you must.

[Hiro Protagonest]

The best flavor is obviously vanilla, you can customize it with any ice cream toppings and it'll taste good!

[Snowbluff]

The best flavor is obviously vanilla, you can customize it with any ice cream toppings and it'll taste good!

Yeah. Chocolate ice cream always tastes the same no matter where you get it, anyway.

[Spuddles]

Yeah. Chocolate ice cream always tastes the same no matter where you get it, anyway.

Clearly you've never had a quality ice cream.


/not even joking
/takes ice cream way too seriously

[Snowbluff]

Clearly you've never had a quality ice cream.


/not even joking
/takes ice cream way too seriously

So you take the worst flavor, slap a Haagen Das label on it, and it suddenly grows quality? I think not, good sir.

Vanilla is strictly better, even if it were not for the variety you get by varying quality of ingredient.

And I am not talking double chocolate fudge chocolate ice cream versus chocolate variation #26 from the same company. I am saying, outright, that you can not get better chocolate ice cream.

/not even joking
/chocolate makes cheesecake bad too

[White_Drake]

/chocolate makes cheesecake bad too

Even if it's just chocolate chip cheesecake?

[RFLS]

So you take the worst flavor, slap a Haagen Das label on it, and it suddenly grows quality? I think not, good sir.

Vanilla is strictly better, even if it were not for the variety you get by varying quality of ingredient.

And I am not talking double chocolate fudge chocolate ice cream versus chocolate variation #26 from the same company. I am saying, outright, that you can not get better chocolate ice cream.

/not even joking
/chocolate makes cheesecake bad too

Woah. Woah. Chill out, dude. Vanilla's just so...vanilla. It's boring and there's nothing you can do to make it better.

[ThiagoMartell]

Woah. Woah. Chill out, dude. Vanilla's just so...vanilla. It's boring and there's nothing you can do to make it better.

You have obviously never heard of milk-shakes. They take the best out of vanilla and make it even better, without that pesky boringness.

[Snowbluff]

Even if it's just chocolate chip cheesecake?

Nah, the chocolate flavor is typically so strong that you can't taste the cheesecake anymore. Why eat cheesecake if you can't taste the cheesecake?

[CarpeGuitarrem]

So you take the worst flavor, slap a Haagen Das label on it, and it suddenly grows quality? I think not, good sir.

Vanilla is strictly better, even if it were not for the variety you get by varying quality of ingredient.

And I am not talking double chocolate fudge chocolate ice cream versus chocolate variation #26 from the same company. I am saying, outright, that you can not get better chocolate ice cream.

/not even joking
/chocolate makes cheesecake bad too
Freaking grognard.

[Snowbluff]

Freaking grognard.

You do know that is a compliment when you say it to me? I like being considered hardcore. Sets me apart from the mouth breathing meme lovers. Yeah I know I am being a jerk, but meme people treat me poorly.

So I thank you, mister. :smallsmile:

[Hyde]

I dunno, write a book or something if you've just got so much imagination. Complaining to people on a forum about subjective problems where the very nature of the forum means that those people's average default attitude (TM) will be disagreement seems like a very counterproductive endeavor and will not amount to much more than "look at this box of ****s oh man there aren't any what gives? not me, because clearly there are no ****s here".


You want to do something different, then run the game. Actually, this can best be summed up with a quote from my raiding days:

"You're right, your $14.87 entitles you to play the game how you want. However, the rest of the raid's $356.88 means know your role and quit ****ing up".

Basically, your group is a group, which means you get to operate under a consensus.

[Edit] Incidentally, Mutants and Masterminds is a pretty great system for making inherently flavorful characters with no base "classes" to fall back on, and it even looks a lot like 3.5 to boot. Fun when I played/ran it, though teaching it is like herding cats.

[Spuddles]

So you take the worst flavor, slap a Haagen Das label on it, and it suddenly grows quality? I think not, good sir.

Vanilla is strictly better, even if it were not for the variety you get by varying quality of ingredient.

And I am not talking double chocolate fudge chocolate ice cream versus chocolate variation #26 from the same company. I am saying, outright, that you can not get better chocolate ice cream.

/not even joking
/chocolate makes cheesecake bad too

Friend, if you do not like chocolate, then it is fair that you do not like chocolate ice cream. But to say that all ice creams are the same is to be grossly misinformed about the nature of ice creams. That you reference a slightly more costly supermarket ice cream with a fak scandinavian name suggests that you know less on the subject than you should.

[Hyde]

Friend, if you do not like chocolate, then it is fair that you do not like chocolate ice cream. But to say that all ice creams are the same is to be grossly misinformed about the nature of ice creams. That you reference a slightly more costly supermarket ice cream with a fak scandinavian name suggests that you know less on the subject than you should.

Heck, Ice creams aren't even the same within the same flavor. Ben and Jerry's Cookie Dough (or anything else) is wicked good but Braums (might be a regional store? Kind of like Marble slab except without the marble slab) is not so much.

[kardar233]

Heck, Ice creams aren't even the same within the same flavor. Ben and Jerry's Cookie Dough (or anything else) is wicked good but Braums (might be a regional store? Kind of like Marble slab except without the marble slab) is not so much.

Marble Slab is in my experience greatly inferior to Coldstone, which is a shame as the local Coldstone is ages away and the local Marble Slab is just downtown. This is primarily a function of the greater amount of smurshing (that's a word now) that they do at Coldstone, the fact that they have real brownies for mix-ins and that they keep the strawberries hydrated rather than half-frozen.

There's plenty of variance between basic chocolate flavours. I'm unsure as to why someone would pollute perfectly good ice cream by putting it on cheesecake. I'm also unsure as to why anyone would willingly eat cheesecake.

[Snowbluff]

Heck, Ice creams aren't even the same within the same flavor. Ben and Jerry's Cookie Dough (or anything else) is wicked good but Braums (might be a regional store? Kind of like Marble slab except without the marble slab) is not so much.

The difference between chocolates is significantly different than the difference between other flavors made by different brands.

If anything, Spuddles, your comments agrees with me more than it disagrees. The label I mentioned was merely a really frakking appropriate example.

[ThiagoMartell]

Snowbluff has derailed this thread into the best discussion this forum has had in months, pastiche or not.

[Yukitsu]

Snowbluff has derailed this thread into the best discussion this forum has had in months, pastiche or not.

It's the same sodding derail this forum does every time someone gets uncomfortable. Honestly, I'm getting sick of it.

[Snowbluff]

Snowbluff has derailed this thread into the best discussion this forum has had in months, pastiche or not.

To be honest, it's not my fault. I think someone else brought it up. The verbose and comprehensive manner in which I speak may have something to do with it. Thank you anyway. :smallsmile:

[Hyde]

To be honest, it's not my fault. I think someone else brought it up. The verbose and comprehensive manner in which I speak may have something to do with it. Thank you anyway. :smallsmile:

Doesn't bother me, the original topic is self-serving and kind of dumb. I have an extensive working knowledge of a number of other cultures that gets tabled because no one else has a clue nor the inclination to care about what I'm talking about. Ice cream is much better.

Anyway, I think we might live in the same area, because my coldstone is balls far away, and the marble slab is down the proverbial and literal road, person who mentioned those things.

[Snowbluff]

Doesn't bother me, the original topic is self-serving and kind of dumb. I have an extensive working knowledge of a number of other cultures that gets tabled because no one else has a clue nor the inclination to care about what I'm talking about. Ice cream is much better.


Yeah, I wasn't going to mention how awful and offensive I found this topic. Chocolate ice cream is strictly better than this topic. That should speak volumes, considering my conniptions.

EDIT: Thiago, Hyde's comment has made me decide to immortalize the conclusion of this thread in my signature. Never has derailment done such a service to this forum.

[Hyde]

Yeah, I wasn't going to mention how awful and offensive I found this topic. Chocolate ice cream is strictly better than this topic. That should speak volumes, considering my conniptions.

Shamelessly sporting Thaigo's complement, and the thread isn't even cold yet. Or I guess it might be with all this Ice cream.

[Spuddles]

To be honest, it's not my fault. I think someone else brought it up. The verbose and comprehensive manner in which I speak may have something to do with it. Thank you anyway. :smallsmile:

I for one like this derail. It's better than other derails because it's familiar and appeals to many people, but contains anpot of nuance when you delve deeper.

What kind of derail to you prefer, something about pop culture?

[ThiagoMartell]

Thiago, Hyde's comment has made me decide to immortalize the conclusion of this thread in my signature. Never has derailment done such a service to this forum.

Ice cream, for great justice!

[Hyde]

Whatever derail distracts from how soul-crushingly hollow my life is that I can spend it on a forum.

[ThiagoMartell]

Whatever derail distracts from how soul-crushingly hollow my life is that I can spend it on a forum.

Do you need a hug, man? I think you need a hug.
*hugs*

[Kelb_Panthera]

It's the same sodding derail this forum does every time someone gets uncomfortable. Honestly, I'm getting sick of it.

In all fairness, I've only ever seen this particular derailment used as a way to mock both parties whenever a "which game is objectively better" argument starts up.

Frankly, I think that anyone foolish enough to think that fun can ever be objective deserves to be mocked.

[Snowbluff]

Thanks, Spuddles.


Ice cream, for great justice!

Take off every zig. :smallbiggrin:


Whatever derail distracts from how soul-crushingly hollow my life is that I can spend it on a forum.

Yeah. Distractions are good. /hug

[Hyde]

Man I need all the hugs. Thank you.

Everything is just trying to murder me today... it's been pretty awesome. Seriously, it's like... if Final Destination were kind of boring. It's like "oh look out, some guys brake lights down work and he's gonna stop for no reason!" and "man, that tortilla chip is kinda sharp and now you're gonna choke on it!" and "geeze, why did you have to hold up this bank while I'm at it, you jackass? Also, this is Texas and I think like, fifteen of these people have guns, what are you thinking?"

Okay. I may have made that last one up. There was really just another guy making an illegal u-turn into my passenger seat. It was pretty awesome.

[Unusual Muse]

Maybe we should give this its own thread... but I think the entire "chocolate vs. vanilla / intrabrand vs. extrabrand" issue becomes moot when the subject of Talenti is raised; because everything they make blows every other brand and flavor out of the water. But technically it's gelato... so, the real question becomes, is gelato considered "non-core" or "third-party?" We'll leave out the "homebrewers" who make their own ice cream, because that would just be silly. :smallsmile:

[ThiagoMartell]

I was all like "holy crap, they allow guns inside banks in Texas" but thankfully that didn't happen :smallbiggrin:

[Hyde]

I was all like "holy crap, they allow guns inside banks in Texas" but thankfully that didn't happen :smallbiggrin:

Oh sure, as long as you have a CnC permit (kinda pricey). Really the only place you can't take them is a school.

And the kinds of people that get CnCs probably don't care where they can't take them anyway. :smallfrown:

[Yukitsu]

In all fairness, I've only ever seen this particular derailment used as a way to mock both parties whenever a "which game is objectively better" argument starts up.

Frankly, I think that anyone foolish enough to think that fun can ever be objective deserves to be mocked.

I just don't like it in particular because I hate ice cream. :smallannoyed:

[Kelb_Panthera]

I just don't like it in particular because I hate ice cream. :smallannoyed:

Fair enough.

I like it, but I can't eat it very often because my teeth don't. When I'm in the mood for ice-cream, I say you can't beat a good ice-cream sandwich. A neopolitan ice-cream sandwich.

...... disturbing realization: just as I can't read necropolitan without thinking of ice-cream, it seems I can no longer read neopolitan without thinking of undead......

[Morph Bark]

Clearly the best thing here would be for ice cream to have stats in DnD, with different bonuses for flavour and higher bonuses for higher quality.

Fruit-flavoured ice creams get better the fresher the fruit, for one. I may prefer high-quality chocolate most of all, but if a store sells ice cream made with fresh fruit, rather than faking it or such, I'll take it over any other flavour any day of the week.

Vanilla is always a good flavour to fall back on, but sadly I've never encountered some that was very much above all other vanilla ice creams.

[nedz]

Vanilla, or real vanilla — there is a difference.

Besides there is Ice Cream and then there is Phish Food.

[kardar233]

I think we should all pause for a moment to remember Zaq's sacrifice. His service to the community left him unable to participate in this particular thread.

[Morph Bark]

I think we should all pause for a moment to remember Zaq's sacrifice. His service to the community left him unable to participate in this particular thread.

Who? I didn't know J-pop girl bands were masculine.

[ThiagoMartell]

Who?
You do remember Zaq (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/member.php?u=42529), right? Though the famous quote is by Doc Roc.

[White_Drake]

He lost the ability to taste ice cream when he wrote the Truenamer's Handbook.

<Moment of Silence>

/moment of silence

At any rate, Kardar233, I'm afraid that you are missing one of man's greatest accomplishments when you abstain from cheesecake. coconut chocolate cheesecake is the best desert I've eaten.

[kardar233]

At any rate, Kardar233, I'm afraid that you are missing one of man's greatest accomplishments when you abstain from cheesecake. coconut chocolate cheesecake is the best desert I've eaten.

I do not mourn my lack of partaking in your cake-facsimile dessert. Especially as I detest coconut.

True cake consists only of chocolate and chocolate-related items. However, honey cake is an honorary cake.

[Morithias]

Only on this forum would this discussion make any bloody sense.

By all means continue though. I'm laughing my ass off at this debate.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

He lost the ability to taste ice cream when he wrote the Truenamer's Handbook.

<Moment of Silence>

/moment of silence

At any rate, Kardar233, I'm afraid that you are missing one of man's greatest accomplishments when you abstain from cheesecake. coconut chocolate cheesecake is the best desert I've eaten.
Why on earth are you bringing coconut into this? This is not a discussion of third-party material!

[White_Drake]

I like coconut! I Will Not Be Silenced! :smallfurious:

[Hyde]

Coconut is horrible. It's like licking the abrasive skin of some shark-based elder horror bent on convincing everyone it's their friend before devouring their brains.

[White_Drake]

Coconut has both a delightful taste and texture. I do not understand how one can hate such a delicious fruit.

Also, come to think of it, has anybody ever seen coconut ice cream?

In addition to my previous addition, I argue that if it's balanced and suitable to the campaign it is completely unreasonable to ban 3rd party material. WotC is far from infallible. I'm sure that playtasting will reveal coconut to be a fine addition to the campaign.

[Larkas]

I don't even know why you're discussing ice cream, and all the variations of it. In my opinion, all you need is sugar. With sugar, you can cook pretty much any dessert you want, be it as simple as a chocolate brownie or as complex as a baklava. You can also add it to yogurt, freeze it and have something very similar to ice cream. What's best, if all you want is a quick, simple rush, you can even eat it pure! It does tend to get old fast if used that way, though.

[Snowbluff]

I don't even know why you're discussing ice cream, and all the variations of it. In my opinion, all you need is sugar. With sugar, you can cook pretty much any dessert you want, be it as simple as a chocolate brownie or as complex as a baklava. You can also add it to yogurt, freeze it and have something very similar to ice cream. What's best, if all you want is a quick, simple rush, you can even eat it pure! It does tend to get old fast if used that way, though.

Please don't try to derail the thread. lol jk

[Theoboldi]

Sugar? Are you kidding me? Sure, one or two teaspoons of sugar can be a good addition to any recipe, but straight sugar is one of the weakest meals you can create. Also, most of the sugar variants out there are third-party and most of them differ in color only.

[nedz]

Please don't try to derail the thread.

LOL — have a Cookie.

[Snowbluff]

LOL — have a Cookie.

(>'.')>(::)

Thank you . /)(::)^3^(\

[Dr.Epic]

Why don't you just read the wiki article?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitsune

Why would I do that?:smallconfused:

[Unusual Muse]

This thread should be Sticky'd... both as a reminder of the inevitable devolution of Edition Wars, and also as a tribute to how awesome Playgrounders are. :smallsmile:

And while I'm on the subject: Someone should make a new gaming system called "Edition Wars!" Who's in?

[navar100]

LOL — have a Cookie.

Better be a chocolate chip cookie! A black & white is ok, but it's a lower tier.

[CarpeGuitarrem]

I don't even know why you're discussing ice cream, and all the variations of it. In my opinion, all you need is sugar. With sugar, you can cook pretty much any dessert you want, be it as simple as a chocolate brownie or as complex as a baklava. You can also add it to yogurt, freeze it and have something very similar to ice cream. What's best, if all you want is a quick, simple rush, you can even eat it pure! It does tend to get old fast if used that way, though.
Sheesh, what's with these hippie indie kids nowadays? Next I expect you'll be spouting off about "shared flavor control".

[Hyde]

This thread should be Sticky'd... both as a reminder of the inevitable devolution of Edition Wars, and also as a tribute to how awesome Playgrounders are. :smallsmile:

And while I'm on the subject: Someone should make a new gaming system called "Edition Wars!" Who's in?

In. I'll mock up something by the beginning of the week. Representation for ADnD, 2nd, 3.5 and 4th, or do we want to be more exclusive than that?

I'm thinking ADnD characters have an ability called "Primary Source" that forces everyone to use their rules for Armor Class. Oh, you can only hit a 42 with that? so sorry, that much higher than a -7. You miss.

[Morph Bark]

Edition Wars! Huh! Yeah...
What is it good for?
Absolutely nothing, oh ho, oh,
Edition Wars! Huh! Yeah...
What is it good for?
Absolutely nothing, say it again y'all;
Edition Wars! Huh! Good God...
What is it good for?
Absolutely nothing, listen to me!

[Hiro Protagonest]

I think we should all pause for a moment to remember Zaq's sacrifice. His service to the community left him unable to participate in this particular thread.
...For a moment there I thought Zaq had been banned. Sheesh.

Why would I do that?:smallconfused:

Why wouldn't you do that?

[Unusual Muse]

In. I'll mock up something by the beginning of the week. Representation for ADnD, 2nd, 3.5 and 4th, or do we want to be more exclusive than that?

I'm thinking ADnD characters have an ability called "Primary Source" that forces everyone to use their rules for Armor Class. Oh, you can only hit a 42 with that? so sorry, that much higher than a -7. You miss.

It could use something along the lines of Planescape's factions or Vampire's clans for each edition...

[Alabenson]

Snowbluff has derailed this thread into the best discussion this forum has had in months, pastiche or not.

Eh, I still prefer the time a thread was derailed into a spontaneous D&D version of Bohemian Rhapsody :smalltongue:.

[RFLS]

Pretty sure strawberry with chocolate sauce is better, guys.


Snowbluff has derailed this thread into the best discussion this forum has had in months, pastiche or not.

=/ Sad panda. All I wanted was strawberry to be acknowledged.

[Hyde]

The day I found out I could blend milkshake flavors at Sonic, the first thing I got was a StraberryChocolate Shake. It was glorious.

[ThiagoMartell]

Eh, I still prefer the time a thread was derailed into a spontaneous D&D version of Bohemian Rhapsody :smalltongue:.

But that was awesome, but it was also long, long ago. :smallwink:

[Hyde]

I once got an elevator to sing "you remind me of the babe" from Labyrinth. What made it truly hilarious is when it doors opened to a Jareth cosplayer (at a con, clearly). She couldn't figure out why we were laughing so hard.

[nedz]

Better be a chocolate chip cookie! A black & white is ok, but it's a lower tier.

Raspberry and White Chocolate Chip. Now normally I don't hold with white chocolate, but.

[White_Drake]

White chocolate seems pretty oxymoronic. I'm pretty sure that white chocolate is by definition not chocolate. After all, if you take out the cocoa from chocolate it's like taking the grapes out of grape jelly; it is no longer what it is named for, ironically enough.

[Morph Bark]

But that was awesome, but it was also long, long ago. :smallwink:

In a galaxy far, far away.

[Zubrowka74]

White chocolate seems pretty oxymoronic. I'm pretty sure that white chocolate is by definition not chocolate. After all, if you take out the cocoa from chocolate it's like taking the grapes out of grape jelly; it is no longer what it is named for, ironically enough.

Yes and no. Chocolate is made from cacao butter and cacao powder, plus potentially sugar and milk. White chocolate is cacao butter, sugar and milk. Pretty close.

[Unusual Muse]

I once got an elevator to sing "you remind me of the babe" from Labyrinth.

I think the more appropriate choice for the elevator would have been "Underground" (if it was going down) or "As the World Falls Down" (if it was going up, for paranoid irony).

P.S. - She chose dowwwwwwwwn?? She chose dowwwwwwwn!!!

[navar100]

Which is the harder bridge to cross? Where you need permission or know your favorite color?

[Ravens_cry]

Yes and no. Chocolate is made from cacao butter and cacao powder, plus potentially sugar and milk. White chocolate is cacao butter, sugar and milk. Pretty close.
You find cocoa butter in some hand creams. Are those chocolate?
Also, depending on local food labelling rules, I don't think you even need cocoa butter for white chocolate.
Of course, 'ware anything that says 'chocolaty' or 'fudge'.:smallyuk:
The worst I ever saw didn't even include cocoa, just fat, flavour and colour.

[Zubrowka74]

You find cocoa butter in some hand creams. Are those chocolate?
Also, depending on local food labelling rules, I don't think you even need cocoa butter for white chocolate.
Of course, 'ware anything that says 'chocolaty' or 'fudge'.:smallyuk:
The worst I ever saw didn't even include cocoa, just fat, flavour and colour.

Well, if people settle for chocolate NOT made with cacao butter it's THEIR choice ;)

But more seriously, of course white "chocolate" is not chocolate anymore once you take out the only other element that comes from the cacao bean.

You find cocoa powder in scented candles or other non chocolate products, does this make "brown" chocolate not chocolate ? And since this thread has already derailed more than it should have, you also find fish parts in lipstick, seeweed in milkshakes and pork gelatine in yogurt. (double yuk)

[Ravens_cry]

Well, if I was vegan or of a religious persuasion that cared about those things, yeah, I'd care.
But truly I say unto thee, only when the cocoa and the butter art combined in one mass, with some measure of sugar so as to be palatable, and milk if that art thy thing (though without be also scrumptious), only then dost it be True Chocolate*.
* I really, really apologize to any scholars of Early Modern English in the audience for any ignorant mistakes.

[Snowbluff]

Well, if I was vegan or of a religious persuasion that cared about those things, yeah, I'd care.
But truly I say unto thee, only when the cocoa and the butter art combined in one mass, with some measure of sugar so as to be palatable, and milk if that art thy thing (though without be also scrumptious), only then dost it be True Chocolate*.
* I really, really apologize to any scholars of Early Modern English in the audience for any ignorant mistakes.

I think the existence of White Chocolate speaks volumes about what people like about the treat. The texture! I wonder what would happen if the chocolate flavor was entirely replaced with kola or coffee (2 similiar, caffeine bearing beans).

[Ravens_cry]

I think the existence of White Chocolate speaks volumes about what people like about the treat. The texture! I wonder what would happen if the chocolate flavor was entirely replaced with kola or coffee (2 similiar, caffeine bearing beans).
Coffee goes well with chocolate, but I wouldn't want to replace it.

[Unusual Muse]

Which is the harder bridge to cross? Where you need permission or know your favorite color?

Depends on whether you're using Core-Only swallows or allowing swallows from splatbooks.

[White_Drake]

Well, if people settle for chocolate NOT made with cacao butter it's THEIR choice ;)

But more seriously, of course white "chocolate" is not chocolate anymore once you take out the only other element that comes from the cacao bean.

You find cocoa powder in scented candles or other non chocolate products, does this make "brown" chocolate not chocolate ? And since this thread has already derailed more than it should have, you also find fish parts in lipstick, seeweed in milkshakes and pork gelatine in yogurt. (double yuk)

The point was that cocoa makes chocolate chocolate, and therefore the removal of it changed so-called "white chocolate" into something else entirely. Cake has butter in it, does this mean that butter cookies aren't butter cookies? Of course not.

[Alabenson]

Depends on whether you're using Core-Only swallows or allowing swallows from splatbooks.

Everyone knows European swallows are completely broken; you should use African swallows instead.

[White_Drake]

Everyone knows European swallows are completely broken; you should use African swallows instead.

It took me entirely too long to get that reference.

[navar100]

I like chocolate and white chocolate, but if it's not churned by waterfall then it's inferior quality.

[Optimusnorm]

It's both, really.

I just feel other systems contribute more to actually roleplaying, and get caught up on rules less.

I agree D&D is not the first system of choice when thinking of deeper, richer roleplaying. I have been gaming since the late 1980s and only know one D&D group that has any kind of rich roleplaying experience...and that group uses heavily modified AD&D rules.

As others have said though it is ultimately the fault of the group not the rules. Yes some systems are just better at encouraging roleplaying over min/maxing and numbers but it will always be the group first and the game system second.

Hate to say this but you have outgrown your group and need roleplayers not roll players.

O.

[Talya]

Because it's bad. Time and time again I come across really cool character concepts (not always mine, other people's), or story ideas, or whatnot that would be fun and fantastic to play... But the rules don't support them. Yes yes yes, I know, the front of the book says "Always open to the group to pick and choose the rules, blah blah blah." But what if you're in a group that is a RAW group? (RAW = Read As Written. Taken literally. Etc. Etc). I deslike RAW. I've always, always hated RAW in any system. But Pathfinder/DnD seems to run into it the most.Most character concepts, too, because of the rules, can't be done VIABLY. Say I want to be a staff-wielding martial artist - Similar to Son Wukong of legend (the Monkey King, you uncultured...). CAN I be? Sure, there's a quarter-staff and I can wield it as a monk. But the staff itself is pretty weak with no real way to fix that, and almost all the monk abilities want you to be unarmed. And yeah, you can play around mixing and matching classes to get the powers you want to make it work, but it becomes increasingly harder and harder to, plot wise, justify why your character is suddenly picking up some of these abilities.
...
4th was different. It encouraged different. Sure, it was more "gamey," but it allowed SO MANY MORE OPTIONS for how a character PLAYED, and made so many choices "purely cosmetic," but it let me do more with a story and a concept.4th was widely rejected by my friends, so we adopted Pathfinder (3.7 edition of DnD, really).


Really? 3.x/PF lets you play anything. Sure, some things are harder to make work than others, but there's always a way to make a concept work "viably."

4e only lets you play one thing. Every class is cookie-cutter identical...there's no variety. It's not just that the choices are purely cosmetic - the cosmetics are bad. No matter how much lipstick you put on the pig, it still looks like a pig.

[JusticeZero]

Grab a DM screen and run a game. Ban core. My last campaign banned all arcane and divine casting in favor of lots of psionics, and it worked great. Next one, I get to play with Akashic and PoW stuff. And some funky races. And no elves or dwarves. Seriously, push the envelope of your playgroup.

[Yahzi]

I don't like Pathfinder, or DnD.
If you're playing your characters solely for their mechanical differences in combat, you're going to get bored of pretty much any game system pretty quickly.

What you need to do is stop focusing on how your character achieves things, and start thinking about why he does.

It's true that the mechanics of a game system affect the kinds of stories you can tell. You're not going to have effective murder mystery adventures in a world with Zone of Truth and Speak with Dead. But the desire to change the world - either to impose justice or merely to make a safe place to raise your family - is universal.

I suggest running a character who has a dependent child, say a 3 year old. Think about every adventure, every action, in light of how it affects your goal of providing for your child. The mechanics of your class simply become a tool by which you achieve that goal, rather than the focus of the game. I would even suggest you roll up a character randomly to get started.

[Talya]

merely to make a safe place to raise your family

Ah, Necromancy is always fun.

[Oko and Qailee]

It's both, really.

Group is set on one game, exactly how it's written.

Exactly how it's written is dull, limited, and does not encourage players to try fun things for the sake of Roleplaying.
.

Except your post doesn't reflect that, you even made the fleshed out character within the rules, proving that the system isn't limiting. The problem seems to be your group.

The idea that RAW doesn't let you do stuff is false, by RAW you can nearly build every fictional concept or character, you just have to want to dig deep enough or be creative enough or use psionic fiends of possession enough.

[Flickerdart]

Except your post doesn't reflect that, you even made the fleshed out character within the rules, proving that the system isn't limiting. The problem seems to be your group.

The idea that RAW doesn't let you do stuff is false, by RAW you can nearly build every fictional concept or character, you just have to want to dig deep enough or be creative enough or use psionic fiends of possession enough.
OP hasn't been active on the forum since January. This thread has been dead for two years. You're not going to get much out of addressing him.