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Kiero
2007-07-12, 04:17 AM
One of the criticisms I've seen levelled against Castles and Crusades repeatedly is that there's no "differentiation" because classes are mechanically identical. And yet this is exactly the situation in all the pre-3.x editions of D&D. AD&D 2e had the optional Weapon and Non-weapon Proficiencies, but even then they weren't anywhere near as comprehensive nor as complicated as Feats. Especially lacking that whole "you must get these Feats at exactly this level, and plan in advance where you want to go" that you get in 3.x.

So what gives? Has 3.x completely shifted people's expectations as to what constitutes a character in D&D? Are we saying that before Feats were invented, we simply all played the same character, where one Fighter was the same as another, aside from race and choice of weapons?

Kurald Galain
2007-07-12, 04:32 AM
I'm unfamiliar with C&C, but I think the point is that you shouldn't compare it to earlier editions of D&D, but to other roleplaying systems.

That said I don't see why it would be a problem that things are "mechanically identical" - what exactly is meant by that? Of course they all use the same dice mechanic, it would be silly to use dice>difficulty for fighters, dice pool for wizards, and draw-a-card for clerics.

Kiero
2007-07-12, 04:36 AM
I'm unfamiliar with C&C, but I think the point is that you shouldn't compare it to earlier editions of D&D, but to other roleplaying systems.

C&C is essentially a cut-down version of AD&D 1st edition. It is usually compared directly to D&D 3.x when people are evaluating it. Indeed one of its selling points is that its simpler than 3.x.


That said I don't see why it would be a problem that things are "mechanically identical" - what exactly is meant by that? Of course they all use the same dice mechanic, it would be silly to use dice>difficulty for fighters, dice pool for wizards, and draw-a-card for clerics.

Mechanically identical, meaning as far as rules go, the abilities of one 4th level fighter and another are exactly the same. There's no "special abilities" which you get to choose or the like. There's pretty much no optimisation or build.

Unlike in 3.x where two 4th level fighters could have very different combinations of Feats, and thus be very different as far as the rules they are using go. Least before Proficiencies, Kits and the Players' Option series (for 2nd edition).

its_all_ogre
2007-07-12, 04:43 AM
i will get shot down for this but there you go..................

pre 3.x fighters were pretty much identical mechanically apart from what weapons/armour you used. stat scores were the primary and often only difference MECHANICALLY. i caps that to stop scores of moaners from stating RP etc.

pre feats a levels 8 fighter with higher str/dex/con was simply better than an identical fighter with slightly poorer scores. especially str. a str 18 fighter was much much more powerful than a str 17 ftr.

i have been back to 2nd ed once after memories of great games etc and it just sucked (for me) due to lack of options.

B!shop
2007-07-12, 04:54 AM
I agree with its_all_ogre about the mechanically part of a character.

Difference in earlier edition was all in play style and role playing.
Untrackable with tables, mechanics and rules.

Swooper
2007-07-12, 04:55 AM
Well, there was kits. Those were kind of like templates added to classes. I remember a friend of mine playing the thief (that's AD&D rogue) kit "Bounty Hunter" that gave you all the weapon proficiencies at the cost of some of your thieving skills. I also remember the "Witch" wizard kit, which gave you some special abilities as you leveled up (like flight and being able to curse) at the cost of some restrictions (at some point, flowers would wilt around you and animals would fear you).

Apart from those, only wizards had the potential to be different from one another by choosing different spells. There was a maximum number of spells you could learn per spell level, based on your int score, so you couldn't just buy scrolls and write them down.

AtomicKitKat
2007-07-12, 05:35 AM
It was all pretty optionless until Players' Options. I have Spells and Powers, and they explored stuff like Spontaneous Casting(which, if translated to 3.x, would probably look pretty similar to the current incarnation of Sorceror). Also stuff like Defiling/Preserving, making pacts with other powers, etc.

Premier
2007-07-12, 05:37 AM
First point I'd like to make, it would be better to compare 3.x with editions predating 2E in this regard, since the farther you go back, the clearer the difference gets.

Now, regarding feats, there are two main issues here:

One, as people have already said, all characters of the same class (say, all fighters) used to mechanically "identical", save for ability scores and the like. However, what these people neglected to say is that this is because other than class-specific abilities (spellcasting, thief skills, etc), every character can do everything in old editions. The dozens and hundreds of skills and feats are present in 3.x because the system is built on the basic philosophy of "if you don't have the appropriate skill, you can't do it". Old editions, however, havea completely different philosophy. In Classic D&D, the basic assumption is that your character can attempt to do anything he wants.

As an example, let's say you want to intimidate a tied-up prisoner to make him spill his beans. In 3.x, it's a question of "Do you have the Intimidation skill? No? Sorry, you can't do it." In old editions, there's no such irrealistic restriction. The DM just thinks about it for a moment, than say, for example, "Okay, roll against your charisma with a bonus of 4 (for a blood-smeared barbarian with 18/74 STR) / penalty of 4 (for a weasely teenage wizard in spectacles).

Now, I anticipate that some people might object, crying "But that doesn't count, since the DM had to make up the mechanic on the spot!" Well, that he did. And there's nothing wrong with that. Unlike the gaming culture of 3.x, the culture of old editions does not consider in-the-spot ruling a sign that the "official" rules have a hole, but instead take it for granted - this is the way the game is supposed to be played.

So to reiterate the point: old editions characters didn't have mechanically differentiated abilities because in old editions everybody could try everything.


Second point, about combat feats and the like. In old editions, combat is abstract. In 3.x, combat is claimed to be abstract, but isn't. In the former, it's assumed that different fighters have different styles - some might depend on heavy strikes to break through, others might be flashy sword-twirlers, whatever; but all of these differences are just compressed into one single attack roll per round, going with the assumption that each fighter uses the perks of his personal style to the optimum.

In contrast, 3.x introduces uncountable, mechanically differentiated feats. However, in doing so, it abandons the abstract combat it claims to represent. When every single attack roll represents a single strike, and when every slightly faster, stronger, more curvy or whateverthehell strike is represented by a mechanically different roll, that is not abstraction, but a half-assed attempt at detailed simulationism (half-assed because important aspect liek HP or armour still work abstractly).


So to answer the question of the original poster: Yes, 3.x has changed people's expectations of what a character is. And yes, many people say that before Feats were invented, we simply all played the same character, where one Fighter was the same as another, aside from race and choice of weapons. However, for every person like that, there's another one who says that 3.x is not about roleplaying fantasy characters in search of adventure, but about conducting accountancy on forms with the words V.A.T. and Annual Revenue are crossed out and replaced by Base Attack Bonus and Feat List. Only you won't meet the latter people on this particular board.

Kurald Galain
2007-07-12, 06:34 AM
Ah, I get that. Part of it was roleplaying. Also, (I'm not sure about 1st ed) in 2nd ed there were "secondary skills", basically saying that "before I became an adventurer, I used to be a sailor" or something, which nets you related skills, and there were the weapon/non-weapon proficiencies. Even before skills-n-powers, fighters were different in their choice of weapon profs (e.g. archer, TWF, etc).

Note that the diversity is not necessarily much better in 3rd ed: A fighter with 18 str is still much, much better than a fighter with 17 str (moreso, in fact, since ability scores have become more important in 3rd ed) and while there are indeed zillions of feats, consensus about which ones you "must have" for your good build is pretty strong.


Also, what Premier said.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 07:06 AM
First Edition did indeed have Secondary Skills and, later on, it also had Non Weapon Proficiencies.

I pretty much agree with what Premier has to say on the subject, though I have to point out that a lot of what 3.x limits is an illusion. You can still do many of the things you could do in previous editions, but it requires a DM who recognises that and is willing to make up rules.

Also, The Complete Fighter's Handbook (1989) was the first major step along the 'combat diversity' road.

Blackbrrd
2007-07-12, 07:26 AM
What Premier says is quite true, previous editions were more flexible and put more power in the hands of the DM. The newer editions (3.0, 3.5) gives some of that power to the player. "It says that I can do x on my character sheet, so I am gonna do it".

The biggest difference when it comes to combat is probably the change in round-length. From 60 seconds in AD&D to 6 seconds ind Dnd 3.x. This changed the way combats were fought..

Kurald Galain
2007-07-12, 07:32 AM
What Premier says is quite true, previous editions were more flexible and put more power in the hands of the DM. The newer editions (3.0, 3.5) gives some of that power to the player. "It says that I can do x on my character sheet, so I am gonna do it".
However, this does lead to "one trick pony" characters, like the fighter trip build that essentially can't do anything but trip, or won't do anything but trip.


The biggest difference when it comes to combat is probably the change in round-length. From 60 seconds in AD&D to 6 seconds ind Dnd 3.x. This changed the way combats were fought..
I do believe most everybody houseruled AD&D combat rounds to <10 seconds because 60 seconds really doesn't make any sense. At any rate, given that combat is as abstract as it is, I haven't seen it making a big difference except flavor-wise.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 07:33 AM
Interestingly, the Combat Round had already been 10-15 Seconds in various guises. I think one of the editions of Basic D&D had a 10 Second Combat Round, (A)D&D Combat and Tactics definitely had a 10-15 Second Combat Round.

Raum
2007-07-12, 07:33 AM
Feats have become limitations in 3.x. In older versions we didn't need feats, as Premier mentions, we'd simply describe what we wanted to accomplish and negotiate the how with the DM. Want to track deer through the forest? It might be an Int check, or possibly Wis. It depends on how you describe it and what the DM thinks is appropriate. Now you can't follow tracks with a DC over 10 unless you have the track feat.

Sure, mechanically all level 4 fighters were the same, but they were equally capable. Now they're different, but it's the limitations differentiating them.

Kiero
2007-07-12, 07:33 AM
The biggest difference when it comes to combat is probably the change in round-length. From 60 seconds in AD&D to 6 seconds ind Dnd 3.x. This changed the way combats were fought..

I'd say the amount of stuff you actually have to do as a player is more significant. Unless you've done your prep-work before the session, combat in 3.x with all those options is much slower.

Dhavaer
2007-07-12, 07:43 AM
A fighter with 18 str is still much, much better than a fighter with 17 str (moreso, in fact, since ability scores have become more important in 3rd ed)

Didn't 2ed have some 'great strength' rule or something if you have 18 str?

Matthew
2007-07-12, 07:50 AM
Yeah. These were the scores:

{table=head]Attribute Score|Attack Bonus|Damage Bonus|Weight Allowance|Maximum Press|Open Doors | Bend Bars
14-15 | Normal | None | 55 | 170 | 8 | 7%
16 | Normal | +1 | 70 | 195 | 9 | 10%
17 | +1 | +1 | 85 | 220 | 10 | 13%
18 | +1 | +2 | 110 | 255 | 11 | 16%
18/01-50 | +1 | +3 | 135 | 280 | 12 | 20%
18/51-75 | +2 | +3 | 160 | 305 | 13 | 25%
18/76-90 | +2 | +4 | 185 | 330 | 14 | 30%
18/91-99 | +2 | +5 | 235 | 380 | 15(3) | 35%
18/00 | +3 | +6 | 335 | 480 | 16(6) | 40%
[/table]

It was annoying when your Fighter had Strength 15 and his companion had Strength 18/00. Anyway, yeah, the difference between 17 and 18 wasn't too great, but Exceptional Strength made it crazy.

Premier
2007-07-12, 07:52 AM
Didn't 2ed have some 'great strength' rule or something if you have 18 str?

Percentile STR. If you have STR 18 and you are a fighter, then you roll d100, and get a STR score like "18/64", which would give you better to hit and damage bonuses than a simple 18. The whole thing WAS criticised pretty heavily for being illogical and not just calling these values 19, 20, etc. Eventually, the Dark Sun setting replaced percentile strength with over-18 values for simplicity's sake.

its_all_ogre
2007-07-12, 07:54 AM
yes exceptional strength. 17 str gives +1 to hit and damage. 18 str gave between +1 to hit and +2 damage all the way up to +3 to hit and +6 to damage.
i think that a variation of +2 to hit and +5 to damage is much much higher than +1 to both? unless my maths is totally different to yours.
in addition monsters generally had fewer hps than in 3.x and hence +6 damage actually meant more.
dammit ninja'ed!

Matthew
2007-07-12, 07:54 AM
Percentile STR. If you have STR 18 and you are a fighter, then you roll d100, and get a STR score like "18/64", which would give you better to hit and damage bonuses than a simple 18. The whole thing WAS criticised pretty heavily for being illogical and not just calling these values 19, 20, etc. Eventually, the Dark Sun setting replaced percentile strength with over-18 values for simplicity's sake.

Did it? Attribute Scores already went up to 25, what did they do in Dark Sun? [Edit] Never mind, I forgot that I had a PDf of the Campaign Setting.

Personally, I preferred the Basic D&D version:

{table=head]Attribute Score|Modifier
3 | -3
4-5 | -2
6-8 | -1
9-12 | -
13-15 | +1
16-17 | +2
18 | +3
[/table]

SoulCatcher78
2007-07-12, 08:07 AM
First point I'd like to make, it would be better to compare 3.x with editions predating 2E in this regard, since the farther you go back, the clearer the difference gets.

Now, regarding feats, there are two main issues here:

One, as people have already said, all characters of the same class (say, all fighters) used to mechanically "identical", save for ability scores and the like. However, what these people neglected to say is that this is because other than class-specific abilities (spellcasting, thief skills, etc), every character can do everything in old editions. The dozens and hundreds of skills and feats are present in 3.x because the system is built on the basic philosophy of "if you don't have the appropriate skill, you can't do it". Old editions, however, havea completely different philosophy. In Classic D&D, the basic assumption is that your character can attempt to do anything he wants.

As an example, let's say you want to intimidate a tied-up prisoner to make him spill his beans. In 3.x, it's a question of "Do you have the Intimidation skill? No? Sorry, you can't do it." In old editions, there's no such irrealistic restriction. The DM just thinks about it for a moment, than say, for example, "Okay, roll against your charisma with a bonus of 4 (for a blood-smeared barbarian with 18/74 STR) / penalty of 4 (for a weasely teenage wizard in spectacles).

Now, I anticipate that some people might object, crying "But that doesn't count, since the DM had to make up the mechanic on the spot!" Well, that he did. And there's nothing wrong with that. Unlike the gaming culture of 3.x, the culture of old editions does not consider in-the-spot ruling a sign that the "official" rules have a hole, but instead take it for granted - this is the way the game is supposed to be played.

So to reiterate the point: old editions characters didn't have mechanically differentiated abilities because in old editions everybody could try everything.


Second point, about combat feats and the like. In old editions, combat is abstract. In 3.x, combat is claimed to be abstract, but isn't. In the former, it's assumed that different fighters have different styles - some might depend on heavy strikes to break through, others might be flashy sword-twirlers, whatever; but all of these differences are just compressed into one single attack roll per round, going with the assumption that each fighter uses the perks of his personal style to the optimum.

In contrast, 3.x introduces uncountable, mechanically differentiated feats. However, in doing so, it abandons the abstract combat it claims to represent. When every single attack roll represents a single strike, and when every slightly faster, stronger, more curvy or whateverthehell strike is represented by a mechanically different roll, that is not abstraction, but a half-assed attempt at detailed simulationism (half-assed because important aspect liek HP or armour still work abstractly).


So to answer the question of the original poster: Yes, 3.x has changed people's expectations of what a character is. And yes, many people say that before Feats were invented, we simply all played the same character, where one Fighter was the same as another, aside from race and choice of weapons. However, for every person like that, there's another one who says that 3.x is not about roleplaying fantasy characters in search of adventure, but about conducting accountancy on forms with the words V.A.T. and Annual Revenue are crossed out and replaced by Base Attack Bonus and Feat List. Only you won't meet the latter people on this particular board.

Well said.

Back to the OP-comparing C&C (which I haven't played) to D&D3.xx is like apples and oranges, they're two different games where the only thing in common is the fantasy RPG link. C&C is apparently touted as being a simplified system for those of us who dislike having to learn 52 new rules to run a round of combat. While both systems will have their particular cheerleaders, whichever type of system you prefer is the one that's better.

its_all_ogre
2007-07-12, 08:09 AM
i was referring to 2nd ed ad&d str scores.
plus i disagree with the higher str = better fighter.
3rd ed str 18 dex 15 con 18 two weapon fighter.
vs str 16 dex 13 con 16 two handed weapon fighter. assuming both level 4 who would win?
my money is on two handed fighter.

in 2nd ed the first fighter would win. full stop.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 08:13 AM
Actually, I was addressing Premier's comment about Dark Sun, but you posted before I did (if indeed you are addressing something that I said). I have edited the post for clarity.

its_all_ogre
2007-07-12, 08:31 AM
Actually, I was addressing Premier's comment about Dark Sun, but you posted before I did (if indeed you are addressing something that I said).

heh indeed i was. and yes darksun used either 5d4 or 4d4+4 depending on dm choice for stat generation.
which made the percentile strength issue worse not better imo.
after all now you could have str 17 +1/+1 to hit/damage and if you rolled two higher you would have str 19 +3/+7 to hit damage. no doubts there which would be better 'mechanically'.
you can have fun with poor stats, unless the guy opposite you is playing exactly the same character type and has much better stats to the point that you feel you add nothing to the game.
this was also a weakness of 'everyone can do everything' style games. you could be outclassed at everything by one player purely because they rolled better stats.
now a skillful dm can avoid this by dm fiat, but should they have to do that?
my answer is no.

Serenity
2007-07-12, 08:33 AM
It's hardy impossible to intimidate someone without the skill. It still says in the DMG that the DM should provide bonuses or penalties based on the situation, and most are willing to let you use your strength attribute to modify your roll. So, yes, you can intimidate tied up prisoners without the skill. Perhaps you won't be able to intimidate the battle-hardened general trained to resist interrogation, but that's the point isn't it?

Matthew
2007-07-12, 08:36 AM
It looks like it wasn't quite as bad as all that. Strength 19 in Dark Sun meant +2 AB and +3 DB. I do agree, though, it is irritating as hell to have someone with high Strength outshining your Character of the same type.


It's hardy impossible to intimidate someone without the skill. It still says in the DMG that the DM should provide bonuses or penalties based on the situation, and most are willing to let you use your strength attribute to modify your roll. So, yes, you can intimidate tied up prisoners without the skill. Perhaps you won't be able to intimidate the battle-hardened general trained to resist interrogation, but that's the point isn't it?

Indeed, but the scale of difference is crazy. Anywho, the point is that D&D 3.x mechanics work fine with a good DM, but so did ()A)D&D mechanics.

Tengu
2007-07-12, 08:38 AM
All the "in our days, we actually RPed some stuff, today the mechanics take care of it all, blah blah" replies are rather amusing. What is better in a system that gives you less options?

Matthew
2007-07-12, 08:40 AM
Missed the point there, Tengu. (A)D&D and 3.x have exactly the same number of options. The only difference is that D&D 3.x has codified more of them and created an illusion of limitation.

Kiero
2007-07-12, 08:43 AM
Back to the OP-comparing C&C (which I haven't played) to D&D3.xx is like apples and oranges, they're two different games where the only thing in common is the fantasy RPG link. C&C is apparently touted as being a simplified system for those of us who dislike having to learn 52 new rules to run a round of combat. While both systems will have their particular cheerleaders, whichever type of system you prefer is the one that's better.

I know they're not a lot alike, not least because C&C is based on AD&D 1st edition, not 3.x. But that's the comparison often made, not least because nowadays 3.x is a touchstone that many people are familiar with.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 08:46 AM
What are the kinds of differences between OSRIC and C&C?

Kiero
2007-07-12, 08:51 AM
What are the kinds of differences between OSRIC and C&C?

C&C is a cut-down version of AD&D1e with an eye to simplification. OSRIC is basically a rehash near-verbatim of AD&D1e as I understand it.

There's also Basic Fantasy RPG, which again I think is based on AD&D1e. Reason for all these is that it's under some kind of open license now.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 08:56 AM
So how do, for instance, Attribute Scores work in C&C? Have they simplified them or are they still as Byzantine as the (A)D&D Tables?

Fixer
2007-07-12, 08:58 AM
I really liked the kits in 2nd edition. Nearly all of the players took a kit that expressed how they wanted to play their characters. One guy always took Bard-Blade, for example.

I used one of the books to create a completely broken cleric by the rules once. Skills and Powers, I think it was.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 09:04 AM
Yeah, a lot of people claim to have done that via Skills and Powers or Spells and Magic. Unfortunately, the rules in those supplements are rather complicated and in most cases it turns out that they have made a mistake when calculating Character Points. There is some errata on the Wizards Website that plugs a couple of holes, but regardless those supplements have to be used with care.

AtomicKitKat
2007-07-12, 09:06 AM
I'm pretty sure back in AD&D it was:

1 round=6 seconds
1 turn=10 rounds=60 seconds

Or maybe I have it backwards. I miss simultaneous initiative. It was semi-chaotic, sure, but it made combat feel more "real". I think with the loss of facing rules, is one of the biggest losses in the combat system from edition change.:smallfrown:

Premier
2007-07-12, 09:06 AM
C&C is a cut-down version of AD&D1e with an eye to simplification. OSRIC is basically a rehash near-verbatim of AD&D1e as I understand it.

There's also Basic Fantasy RPG, which again I think is based on AD&D1e. Reason for all these is that it's under some kind of open license now.

Let me correct that a bit. Yes, OSRIC is basically a rehash of AD&D. As a sidenote, that's because it isn't actually meant to be played as a system. It's just a legal "trick" (legal in both senses of the word) to allow people to publish and sell adventure modules and the like for 1st edition.

BFRPG is different, in that its rules are based on the pre-AD&D versions of the game, and it also takes significantly greater liberties. So, it's not a "restatement" of the rules like OSRIC, but more like the creator's personal take on the matter. Sort of. I didn't have the time to fastidiously compare it with O/B/CD&D yet.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 09:08 AM
I'm pretty sure back in AD&D it was:

1 round=6 seconds
1 turn=10 rounds=60 seconds

Or maybe I have it backwards. I miss simultaneous initiative. It was semi-chaotic, sure, but it made combat feel more "real". I think with the loss of facing rules, is one of the biggest losses in the combat system from edition change.:smallfrown:

Nah, that's just how it was in Baldur's Gate, which took it's cue from the Player's Option Series (c. 1995). I think one version of Basic D&D used a similar time scale, but don't quote me on that.


Let me correct that a bit. Yes, OSRIC is basically a rehash of AD&D. As a sidenote, that's because it isn't actually meant to be played as a system. It's just a legal "trick" (legal in both senses of the word) to allow people to publish and sell adventure modules and the like for 1st edition.

Hmmn. Yes and no. There are some changes here and there (Monster THAC0 to Hit Dice, for instance) and there does appear to be an intention to publish more 'core' books and possibly not only as PDFs. It's main function is, as you say, though.

its_all_ogre
2007-07-12, 09:16 AM
dark sun used standard 2nd ed ad&d stats so str 19 was +3 +7 ab/db.
it was 2nd ed, unless you are referring to another version that i did not play.

dark sun also introduced the half-giant who got to double their rolled hps (not con bonus) which was ridiculous as it meant a 8th level half giant fighter in my group had more hps than the dragon of tyr!! (side rant over)

kjones
2007-07-12, 09:19 AM
I am AFB at the moment but I am positive that the AD&D PHB defines a round as 60 seconds. We used to have great fun describing how a simple sword attack or arrow shot would take an entire minute... The PHB describes it along the lines of, "Most of combat is parrying, feinting, and looking for an opening." Sure, but... one hit every minute? Bit excessive, in the opposite direction of "my dervish can attack sixteen times in six seconds."


As an example, let's say you want to intimidate a tied-up prisoner to make him spill his beans. In 3.x, it's a question of "Do you have the Intimidation skill? No? Sorry, you can't do it." In old editions, there's no such irrealistic restriction. The DM just thinks about it for a moment, than say, for example, "Okay, roll against your charisma with a bonus of 4 (for a blood-smeared barbarian with 18/74 STR) / penalty of 4 (for a weasely teenage wizard in spectacles).


Actually, it would be more like, "Do you have the Intimidation skill? No? Okay, then make an unskilled, opposed Charisma check." The only difference between 2nd edition and 3rd edition here is that in 3rd edition, you have the option of becoming really good at intimidation by taking ranks in it. Same thing with Listen, Search, and Spot. Any 2nd edition DM would have said, "Make a Wisdom/Intelligence check." This is identical to an untrained Lis/Srch/Spot check, but 3rd edition has the option of becoming very good at these things by taking ranks.

So, remind me again how having more options is a bad thing?

Kiero
2007-07-12, 09:22 AM
So how do, for instance, Attribute Scores work in C&C? Have they simplified them or are they still as Byzantine as the (A)D&D Tables?

IIRC, ability scores weren't much changed, though exceptional strength went. The only part of the attribute table that's retained though, is the generic modifiers. All the stuff about lifting capacity and so on is gone. Stats are also used for saving throws, and the SIEGE mechanic which is used for everything outside of combat.

I don't mean to fob you off, but there's a pretty comprehensive review here (http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/11/11008.phtml), and another one here (http://www.rpg.net/reviews/archive/12/12674.phtml).

its_all_ogre
2007-07-12, 09:25 AM
i think the best thing about 3.x is that you can gain benefits from good stats that are not linked to your main class ability in a mechanical way.
that is a fighter with int 15 gains extra skill points and access to better feats.
a wizard with good dex gets bonuses on hiding and sneaking, etc etc.

2nd ed was a lot more 'primary stat matters' and the others could fall by the wayside. 3rd ed is too don't get me wrong, but mechanically a good int does more for you now than it did in 2nd ed.
i know you can RP it in but mechanical benefits are much more definite, some dms do not allow RP benefits (if you see what i mean)

Matthew
2007-07-12, 09:28 AM
dark sun used standard 2nd ed ad&d stats so str 19 was +3 +7 ab/db.
it was 2nd ed, unless you are referring to another version that i did not play.

dark sun also introduced the half-giant who got to double their rolled hps (not con bonus) which was ridiculous as it meant a 8th level half giant fighter in my group had more hps than the dragon of tyr!! (side rant over)

I'm looking at the Revised Campaign Setting. The Tables list Strength 19 as +2 AB and +3 DB. Probably part of the revision.

Kiero: Okay, I will take a look.

Kjones: Yep, they changed it in the Player's Option Series. I have a feeling it was different in the Red Box Basic D&D, as our group was definitely under the impression when we started with (A)D&D that a Round was 10 seconds.

It's all Ogre: Dunno about that. Bonus Proficiencies were still a product of Intelligence in (A)D&D.

Kurald Galain
2007-07-12, 09:29 AM
It's hardy impossible to intimidate someone without the skill. It still says in the DMG that the DM should provide bonuses or penalties based on the situation

Correct. But a consequence of the many rules and subrules of D&D appears to be that (too) many DMs don't in fact do this. D&D doesn't actually encourage the DM to improvise, the way most other RPGs do. It allows it but effectively discourages it.



Yeah, a lot of people claim to have done that via Skills and Powers or Spells and Magic.
Those books rather obviously rise the power level. Whether people consider it overpowered is a matter of taste, but it's definitely a higher level.




that is a fighter with int 15 gains extra skill points and access to better feats.
a wizard with good dex gets bonuses on hiding and sneaking, etc etc.
Likewise, in 2nd ed a fighter gets more NWPs. Apart from a few class-limited details (e.g. you can't sneak unless you ARE a thief, but then in 3E you can't sneak well unless you're a rogue/bard either) the variety is equally there.
Mechanically, every stat does more for you in 3rd ed. That's why it has become more important to have your good stats in the right spot than it used to be, leading to less variety (e.g. virtually every fighter uses wis/cha as their dump stats, etc)

kjones
2007-07-12, 09:36 AM
Correct. But a consequence of the many rules and subrules of D&D appears to be that (too) many DMs don't in fact do this. D&D doesn't actually encourage the DM to improvise, the way most other RPGs do. It allows it but effectively discourages it.

I think that really depends on your personal DMing style. The rules are quite extensive as to what circumstances might grant a bonus (masterwork items, aiding another) and how much so, as well as how to set DCs. However, are you really saying that 3rd edition discourages the use of situational modifiers? The DMG references the "DM's best friend": Favorable conditions add a +2, unfavorable conditions, a -2. I don't think you can call that "discouraging improvisation".

I think what most people are trying to say is that while 2nd edition encourages creating unique mechanics for unusual situations, 3rd edition tries to fit them within existing mechanics. Let's take the example of a monk who wants to swing from a chandelier into melee. Neither edition has explicit rules for this; what do you do? In 2nd edition, you might ask for a strength or dexterity check, or some combination of the two, with modifiers for (say) elevation and the specifics of locations. You might assign a percent chance of success and come up with different results for different degrees of failure. In 3rd edition, you might try to treat this as a charge (+2 attack, -2 AC) since it's equivalent in many ways, and require a Jump or Tumble check. Functionally, these are pretty similar, but having a system of different skills that can be applied pretty broadly is a great stride in internal cohesion.

3rd edition is not a CRPG. Players are not limited by the system as to what they can and cannot do. If they are limited, it is by unimaginative DMs, who are a problem in any system.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 09:36 AM
Kurald: Actually, in some ways they lower the power level (the Character Points exchange for Bonus Proficiencies from Intelligence sucked). I'm yet to see a legal Character built with those books that was more powerful than what could already be done via Kits.
[Edit] Not counting the 'Sub Attribute' Rules - they certainly were broken.

Kjones: Sure, it's only the illusion of limitation.

Tengu
2007-07-12, 09:51 AM
Missed the point there, Tengu. (A)D&D and 3.x have exactly the same number of options. The only difference is that D&D 3.x has codified more of them and created an illusion of limitation.

Mechanical options. In DND 3.x, two fighters with the same stat array can be completely different mechanically. In AD&D, the only difference is how you roleplay them and the weapons they use.

Kiero
2007-07-12, 09:58 AM
It's all Ogre: Dunno about that. Bonus Proficiencies were still a product of Intelligence in (A)D&D.

As were number of languages known.

Kurald Galain
2007-07-12, 10:01 AM
Favorable conditions add a +2, unfavorable conditions, a -2. I don't think you can call that "discouraging improvisation".
Actually, I call that "limiting improvisation" considering a +2 and -2 aren't all that significant on a d20 roll. Creativity should be rewarded more than that.


3rd edition tries to fit them within existing mechanics.
That's true, but the fallacy behind this is that you can never cover every situation.


Not counting the 'Sub Attribute' Rules - they certainly were broken.
To be quite honest I stopped reading after that point, and banned the book. But I've heard some exotic stories about the "character point" special buys.


Mechanical options. In DND 3.x, two fighters with the same stat array can be completely different mechanically. In AD&D, the only difference is how you roleplay them and the weapons they use.
And also, their kits, weapon style, secondary skills and NWPs.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 10:04 AM
Tengu, are you familair with (A)D&D? There were many different mechanical options for Fighters. The whole 'they were all the same' thing is a myth. Regardless, many of the 'options' of 3.x are limitations.

its_all_ogre
2007-07-12, 10:11 AM
i am aware of that.
and this helps a fighter do the fighting part of his role how exactly?
when compared to extra ranks in intimidate?
compared to the many feats that require int 13+?

as for non-rogues cannot sneak: totally not true. a fighter wearing magical studded leather wearing boots/cloaks of elven kind with maxed ranks in move silently and hide and stealthy feat and skill focuses can.
in 2nd ed going by the rules a naked fighter cannot move silently or hide mechanically at all. by dm fiat and common sense he can of course.
but i had a number of arguments about this fact with many a dm. and back stab? the number of dms that made you make ms/hs rolls before you could use it was stupid. it was either hugely powerful or useless depending on your dm. now it has codified rules on how it works. much better! (all imo)

Matthew
2007-07-12, 10:23 AM
It's all Ogre: It helps him because those extra Proficiencies can be traded for Weapon Proficiencies/Specialisations/Fighting Styles via The Complete Fighter's Handbook.

As for the Sneaking/Hiding thing, that is total nonesense. Thief Abilities are not the same thing as Sneaking and Hiding. Success at Move Silently and Hide in shadows rendered a Character undetectable. Sneaking and Hiding are different things. Exactly how you choose to handle them is up to you.

Kurald: Yeah, most of those Character Point Builds either turn out to be illegal or 'just not that great'. I cannot claim to have examined them all, though. The Sub Attribute Rules were universally reviled, as I recall. I often forget they exist.

Tengu
2007-07-12, 10:24 AM
Tengu, are you familair with (A)D&D? There were many different mechanical options for Fighters. The whole 'they were all the same' thing is a myth. Regardless, many of the 'options' of 3.x are limitations.

I only know AD&D from computer games (Baldur's Gate et cetera), and people's voices at these forums - and you're the only one who says that there are many options in AD&D. Care to elaborate?

And I know about kits.


Though, characters in DND 3.x, in comparison to other RPGs, are pretty limited in their options too.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 10:27 AM
So you know about Kits, yet you still say there weren't mechanical options? The various Sub Class and Race Books contain most of the mechanical options via Style Specialisation and Weapon Specialisation. The Player's Option and Dungeon Master's Optiosn books provide a ton more mechanical options.

I'm certainly not the only one here to ever voice this viewpoint, not even on this Forum. It gets brought up every time. Honestly, if you only know (A)D&D from Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale it's no wonder you have such a view.

Kurald Galain
2007-07-12, 10:30 AM
as for non-rogues cannot sneak: totally not true. a fighter wearing magical studded leather wearing boots/cloaks of elven kind


Woot. A 10th level fighter spending all his skill points on cross-class skills, with two magical items, using up body slots he could otherwise use for something more effective, and an otherwise-useless feat gets a stealth bonus as good as the average rogue of three levels lower, without any special gear.

Using magical items doesn't count. Anyone can be unseen with a ring of invis. Point stands that unless hide/sneak is on your skill list, you effectively can't sneak worth a penny.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 10:32 AM
Whilst there was nothing stopping your Fighter sneaking in (A)D&D, you tell the DM your Fighter is Sneaking, he comes up with a percentage chance for success. Job done.

its_all_ogre
2007-07-12, 10:32 AM
It's all Ogre: It helps him because those extra Proficiencies can be traded for Weapon Proficiencies/Specialisations/Fighting Styles via The Complete Fighter's Handbook.

As for the Sneaking/Hiding thing, that is total nonesense. Thief Abilities are not the same thing as Sneaking and Hiding. Success at Move Silently and Hide in shadows rendered a Character undetectable. Sneaking and Hiding are different things. Exactly how you choose to handle them is up to you.



complete fighters hand book and dm fiat.
so no RAW way then is what you are saying?

and i agree with the stat splitting thing, that was obscenely silly!:smallbiggrin:

Matthew
2007-07-12, 10:34 AM
What? You're confusing RAW with CORE. DM Fiat was the rule with (A)D&D, not the exception.

Tengu
2007-07-12, 10:37 AM
So you know about Kits, yet you still say there weren't mechanical options? The various Sub Class and Race Books contain most of the mechanical options via Style Specialisation and Weapon Specialisation. The Player's Option and Dungeon Master's Optiosn books provide a ton more mechanical options.


Kits are class variants, basically. In 3.x, two characters with the same obscure class (variant) can, and usually will, still be very different mechanically. Can the same be said about AD&D and characters with the same kit?

And there's the matter of advancing your character. In DND 3.x, most characters gain more options as they level up. From what I know, in AD&D you only get better at what you do (apart from casters who get access to higher spells) - no new features to play with.

PS. I find DM fiat as a rule ridiculous in a game you have to pay for. It's okay in something free and homebrew, but commercial RPGs should have a well-designed world and a well-designed set of rules.

its_all_ogre
2007-07-12, 10:41 AM
people said 'a fighter cannot sneak' i have showed you that he can.
you then argue he cannot do it 'effectively' which imo is entirely different to 'he cannot do it at all'

then you resort to expansions or 'splat books' to show their other options.
i do not want to list them all but 3.x has many many splat books. eventually i would find a warrior class who can access full ranks in hide/move silently.

so are we going with RAWon this or splat books?
(i really enjoyed ad&d 2nd ed while playing it. but years ago i used to enjoy space invaders too. something better comes along, it happens :smallfrown: )

Matthew
2007-07-12, 10:41 AM
Yes, two Characters with the same Kit can be mechanically different. The easiest way is via Skills and Powers.

There is more option for customisation with Character progression in 3.x than stripped down (A)D&D, for sure. (A)D&D with all the bells and whistles still doesn't have the same level of customisation by level, but that's not what is being asked, as far as I can see. Can two Fighters in (A)D&D be mechanically different, answer - yes.

[Edit] Sure, Tengu, and that's a fundamental differentiation between 'old school' and 'new school' type play. It will never be resolved because people want different things from their games. (A)D&D was designed with the basic premise that the DM would change it to suit his game. It was a big tool box, which is not the same thing as what modern systems seek to present (including D&D 3.x). Indeed, the encouragement of DM fiat is the very core of this discussion.

It's all Ogre: The tag line for (A)D&D was 'only limited by your imagination'. If you had a DM who wouldn't let your Fighter sneak when naked, it was his failure.

RAW - Rules as written (i.e. all rules, including official spalt books)
CORE - The three Core books.

Fax Celestis
2007-07-12, 10:43 AM
And also, their kits, weapon style, secondary skills and NWPs.

Except, beyond weapon choice, those are all optional rules.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 10:47 AM
Indeed. But Paladins are optional rules in (A)D&D 2.x, as are Proficiencies and Specialisation. Everything is optional (just about).

It's a design difference. (A)D&D *could* be played out of the box, but you just have to read the introduction to see that (apart from at official events, which used their own codification and 'House rules') this was not the intent. The nebulous nature of the game is what led to its codification in 3.x.

Premier
2007-07-12, 11:06 AM
PS. I find DM fiat as a rule ridiculous in a game you have to pay for. It's okay in something free and homebrew, but commercial RPGs should have a well-designed world and a well-designed set of rules.

Going by that reasoning LEGO is a bloody ripoff, since even though you pay for it, it operates on the assumption that most of the user's fun will be derived from inventing his own stuff (cf. "houseruling") that deviates from the blueprint.

Roderick_BR
2007-07-12, 11:10 AM
(...)Now, regarding feats, there are two main issues here:

One, as people have already said, all characters of the same class (say, all fighters) used to mechanically "identical", save for ability scores and the like. However, what these people neglected to say is that this is because other than class-specific abilities (spellcasting, thief skills, etc), every character can do everything in old editions. The dozens and hundreds of skills and feats are present in 3.x because the system is built on the basic philosophy of "if you don't have the appropriate skill, you can't do it". Old editions, however, havea completely different philosophy. In Classic D&D, the basic assumption is that your character can attempt to do anything he wants.

As an example, let's say you want to intimidate a tied-up prisoner to make him spill his beans. In 3.x, it's a question of "Do you have the Intimidation skill? No? Sorry, you can't do it." In old editions, there's no such irrealistic restriction. The DM just thinks about it for a moment, than say, for example, "Okay, roll against your charisma with a bonus of 4 (for a blood-smeared barbarian with 18/74 STR) / penalty of 4 (for a weasely teenage wizard in spectacles).

Now, I anticipate that some people might object, crying "But that doesn't count, since the DM had to make up the mechanic on the spot!" Well, that he did. And there's nothing wrong with that. Unlike the gaming culture of 3.x, the culture of old editions does not consider in-the-spot ruling a sign that the "official" rules have a hole, but instead take it for granted - this is the way the game is supposed to be played.

So to reiterate the point: old editions characters didn't have mechanically differentiated abilities because in old editions everybody could try everything.
(...)

In 3.x it's like that too. It just have a set of pre-made selections. In your intimidation example, if you don't have the skill, you just roll your charisma. If you do, you add it to your charisma. So, a character that trained it (dedicated skill points), is better at it. It's more realistic. Now, in 2nd edition, there had the skill points too, but some of the rogue's skills were completely forbidden from being used by others.
"I want to pick the dagger without him noticing"
"Do you have pickpocket?"
"No"
"Then you can't".
Listen and Climb could be used by anyone, but only rogue could put "skill points" in it to rise the chances of success. That's kinda the base of the 3.x skill system.


Second point, about combat feats and the like. In old editions, combat is abstract. In 3.x, combat is claimed to be abstract, but isn't. In the former, it's assumed that different fighters have different styles - some might depend on heavy strikes to break through, others might be flashy sword-twirlers, whatever; but all of these differences are just compressed into one single attack roll per round, going with the assumption that each fighter uses the perks of his personal style to the optimum.

In contrast, 3.x introduces uncountable, mechanically differentiated feats. However, in doing so, it abandons the abstract combat it claims to represent. When every single attack roll represents a single strike, and when every slightly faster, stronger, more curvy or whateverthehell strike is represented by a mechanically different roll, that is not abstraction, but a half-assed attempt at detailed simulationism (half-assed because important aspect liek HP or armour still work abstractly).
What? I really didn't understand it. In pre 3.x, you could say you did a different attack, but all with the same roll, and in 3.x, you can do different attacks by giving bonuses? I don't see anything wrong with it.

I just think that 3.x changed character customization in the rules, and that's it. Everything you could do in pre 3.x, you can still do it now.

Tengu
2007-07-12, 11:12 AM
Going by that reasoning LEGO is a bloody ripoff, since even though you pay for it, it operates on the assumption that most of the user's fun will be derived from inventing his own stuff (cf. "houseruling") that deviates from the blueprint.

Since when lego is an RPG?

And since when are games with non-consistent, nebulae mechanics for more creative people?

Matthew
2007-07-12, 11:16 AM
In 3.x it's like that too. It just have a set of pre-made selections. In your intimidation example, if you don't have the skill, you just roll your charisma. If you do, you add it to your charisma. So, a character that trained it (dedicated skill points), is better at it. It's more realistic. Now, in 2nd edition, there had the skill points too, but some of the rogue's skills were completely forbidden from being used by others.
"I want to pick the dagger without him noticing"
"Do you have pickpocket?"
"No"
"Then you can't".
Listen and Climb could be used by anyone, but only rogue could put "skill points" in it to rise the chances of success. That's kinda the base of the 3.x skill system.

That's not how it was supposed to work, though. If you wanted to try and pick a pocket, you could, the DM came up with the probability. Of course, you are pretty much right that you couldn't increase the chances via Skill Points (but, then, open DCs and Skill Caps by Level have been a two edged Sword). There was a proficiency for 'picking pockets' towards the end, I seem to recall, which was similar to the Mountaineering/Climb walls Cross Over.

Tengu: It's not for more creative types, it's just a different style of play and design philosophy.

DeathQuaker
2007-07-12, 11:20 AM
As has been suggested, I think it's VERY important not to confuse DM flexibility with System Flexibility.

I've played games of AD&D where the DM said "if it's not on your character sheet, you can't do it." End of story, no ability checks, nothing.

I've played games of D&D 3.x where the GM has adapted to unusual situations, coming up with either new mechanics on the fly or managing to avoid unnecessary die rolls through arguments based on reason, allowing the players to accomplish more than the rules as written would allow.

Those GMs do not make the systems themselves better or worse, flexible or inflexible. They simply themselves are different kinds of DMs.

The difference between AD&D and D&D 3.x is that with the FIRST type of GM, the one who says, "If it's not on your character sheet, you can't do it," the players still have the option, using core rules only, to make their characters a lot more customized and do a lot more non-combatively in 3.x than they could do in AD&D.

Of course, the tradeoff is that 3.x makes it easier--and admittedly, more tempting to a tired GM--for even a flexible GM to sometimes rely on die rolls/existing systems even when perhaps it would be more interesting to try a different approach.

Personally, I think that's a fine tradeoff. Based on what is on my character sheet only (not on roleplay or GM allowances), if 3.x allows me to customize my character and play them the way I want to, even with the most inflexible GM, then I appreciate that very much. And based on my own gaming experiences, I do feel CORE 3.x allows that in a way CORE AD&D never was able to do.

And if I'm playing with a flexible GM, it frankly doesn't matter what system I use, because they'll make the system work the best way they can. But that's their skill, not the allowances provided by the rules of the game itself.

Those who feel otherwise have probably have had dramatically different gaming experiences than I have, though I encourage any and all to be sure it wasn't their GM that was making the game "better" or "worse," not the system itself.

Kiero
2007-07-12, 12:19 PM
Indeed. But Paladins are optional rules in (A)D&D 2.x, as are Proficiencies and Specialisation. Everything is optional (just about).

It's a design difference. (A)D&D *could* be played out of the box, but you just have to read the introduction to see that (apart from at official events, which used their own codification and 'House rules') this was not the intent. The nebulous nature of the game is what led to its codification in 3.x.

Absolutely. For me a major difference between the editions is the paradigm. In the older editions, it's "everything not expressly forbidden is allowed [subject to GM fiat]". In 3.x it's "everything not expressly allowed is forbidden" - Feats being the enabler that switches something from forbidden to allowed.

Dervag
2007-07-12, 12:34 PM
It's hardy impossible to intimidate someone without the skill. It still says in the DMG that the DM should provide bonuses or penalties based on the situation, and most are willing to let you use your strength attribute to modify your roll. So, yes, you can intimidate tied up prisoners without the skill. Perhaps you won't be able to intimidate the battle-hardened general trained to resist interrogation, but that's the point isn't it?Yes, but by providing a designated mechanic for intimidation (rolling Intimidate checks), the 3.x system makes it less likely that characters who aren't specifically practiced at intimidation will try (because they don't think of themselves as having that skill), and more likely that they will fail if they do try (because their DM is quite likely to make them roll a check).


Actually, it would be more like, "Do you have the Intimidation skill? No? Okay, then make an unskilled, opposed Charisma check." The only difference between 2nd edition and 3rd edition here is that in 3rd edition, you have the option of becoming really good at intimidation by taking ranks in it. Same thing with Listen, Search, and Spot. Any 2nd edition DM would have said, "Make a Wisdom/Intelligence check." This is identical to an untrained Lis/Srch/Spot check, but 3rd edition has the option of becoming very good at these things by taking ranks.Because there are now lots of things that have DCs high enough that an untrained person can't do them, or can't do them reliably enough to make it worth trying.


So, remind me again how having more options is a bad thing?It isn't. But codifying lots and lots of options means that the DM has to specifically override the rules every time they want to do something those options don't cover. A DM who isn't perfect will tend to just say "roll an Intimidate check."


The difference between AD&D and D&D 3.x is that with the FIRST type of GM, the one who says, "If it's not on your character sheet, you can't do it," the players still have the option, using core rules only, to make their characters a lot more customized and do a lot more non-combatively in 3.x than they could do in AD&D.

Of course, the tradeoff is that 3.x makes it easier--and admittedly, more tempting to a tired GM--for even a flexible GM to sometimes rely on die rolls/existing systems even when perhaps it would be more interesting to try a different approach. That sums it up very well. Of course, the catch is that by codifying the rules so extensively, 3.x makes it harder to be flexible and stick to the rules. In earlier editions, there were many situations that the rules simply did not cover, and thus the DM could safely make a ruling on them.

In AD&D, "my character tackles the wizard" can mean almost anything mechanically. The DM has to come up with a way to model it, which is a drawback.

In 3.x, "my character tackles the wizard" has a very specific mechanical interpretation. The DM does not have to come up with a way to model it, but the temptation to use that mechanical interpretation even when it penalizes the character is stronger. If I neglected to make sure my character is a good grappler because I was busy making him a good fencer or a good archer, then I'm likely to fail.

DeathQuaker
2007-07-12, 12:46 PM
Absolutely. For me a major difference between the editions is the paradigm. In the older editions, it's "everything not expressly forbidden is allowed [subject to GM fiat]".

See, I don't remember that assumption in AD&D. Maybe I'll have to check my old rulebooks when I get home, but I think different gaming groups made that assumption. I've seen games played where "everything not expressly forbidden" is simply ignored.

One main thing is D&D was originally designed largely to mediate combat. As gamers got more creative and wanted to do more than crawl dungeons, there came up questions as to how to handle such things mechanically. They ended up making rules for them because, frankly, in a lot of situations, "GM fiat" wasn't enough. There were GMs who would let their players get away with anything, and those who wouldn't let them do anything if they didn't have the appropriate NWP, etc.

If it had worked well in most cases, I doubt they would have tried to change it.



In 3.x it's "everything not expressly allowed is forbidden" - Feats being the enabler that switches something from forbidden to allowed.

But a GM is still free to change that if they really want to. ANY game is ultimately down to GM fiat. The corebooks pretty much state that when it's questionable, it's up to the GM, not the rulebook. The DMG gives guidelines to GMs on changing rules; sure, they're cautionary about it, but largely just to ensure the GM maintaining game balance.

Heck, I had a player arguing with me about the fact that he should be able to hunt without the Tracking feat. I said, "Fine. You can try to hunt, but you're at a -4 because you're not trained in it."

He continued to complain, because "in 2nd edition you could do anything you wanted" and "Everyone should know how to hunt" and "feats just keep you from doing what you should be able to do," and so on.

I said, "Let me clarify. You are a city-bred gnome priest of the god of knowledge, who has spent his entire life with his nose in a book. It is dark outside, and you have very few appropriate tools or weapons with which to hunt. You DON'T KNOW HOW TO HUNT. 'Not having the 'tracking feat' is just in the end, a mechanical shorthand that is reflective of your character's concept. If we were playing 2nd Ed, I could claim that you didn't have the Hunting NWP and couldn't hunt because of that. However, in either case, I am allowing it because you're right--anyone should be able to TRY their hand at hunting. I am giving you the difficulty because you are not trained--in other words, your character, based on the background you provided me, would have great difficulty in these circumstances, trying to achieve what you want to do."

To this day he still somehow believes the fact that he had to do this at a -4 difficulty is 3.5 edition's fault and the existence of the "Tracking" feat, and not to do with my ruling that was ultimately based on his character concept and the situation at hand. I was "flexing" as much as I would running 2e. Perhaps moreso, as I have clearer guidelines in 3.5 as to how to handle such situations.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 01:13 PM
I think you are doing a very good job of describing two different play styles here, Death Quaker. The (A)D&D Books do indeed support the idea of 'everything not expressly forbidden' is permitted. More explicitly so in First Edition than Second Edition, mind. I don't think the 3.x Books take the opposite view, I think that's just a by product of having so many rules (the illusion of a comprehensive system).

DMs who only operate by the RAW are not for me, or for anyone really, otherwise we would have no deaths by drowning in 3.x. The main thing that 3.x allows is for the DM to deal with more situations 'by the RAW' than (A)D&D. It still doesn't even begin to cover every possible action, of course, or circumstance. In some ways, that's an advantage, in others it's a disadvantage. For marketing a game, it's definitely an advantage.

In short, when I'm playing 3.x, I feel like I'm playing somebody's House Ruled version of (A)D&D. When I play (A)D&D I'm playing my House Ruled version of (A)D&D. That's why I only play 3.x for published adventures, and continue to play (A)D&D for my Home Brewed Campaigns.

Kiero: Just read those C&C reviews. Interesting stuff. I particularly like that they are using the Classic Attribute Modifier Range [i.e. 13-15 = +1, 16-17 = +2, 18 = +3]. Not clear if they allow Attributes above 18 or how they handle them.

MrNexx
2007-07-12, 01:39 PM
The biggest difference when it comes to combat is probably the change in round-length. From 60 seconds in AD&D to 6 seconds ind Dnd 3.x. This changed the way combats were fought..

Actually, that happened with the Player's Option Books; there was a section talking about durations listed in "rounds", and whether you should convert them to minutes outside of combat, and leave them as rounds inside.

MrNexx
2007-07-12, 01:46 PM
dark sun used standard 2nd ed ad&d stats so str 19 was +3 +7 ab/db.
it was 2nd ed, unless you are referring to another version that i did not play.

The Revised and Expanded Boxed set (which was alternately hailed and reviled) changed the strength tables into a smooth advance from 1-30, with 18/01 being considered the new 19.


dark sun also introduced the half-giant who got to double their rolled hps (not con bonus) which was ridiculous as it meant a 8th level half giant fighter in my group had more hps than the dragon of tyr!! (side rant over)

Why not? The Borys was just a wizard, after all. It's not like your guy was also slinging around the powers of a 30th level psionicist and a 30th level wizard.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 01:50 PM
Hmmn, I'm looking at the Revised Dark Sun Boxed Set PDF and Attributes only appear to scale from 1-25. Was the 1-30 version somewhere else?

MrNexx
2007-07-12, 02:14 PM
In 3.x it's like that too. It just have a set of pre-made selections. In your intimidation example, if you don't have the skill, you just roll your charisma. If you do, you add it to your charisma. So, a character that trained it (dedicated skill points), is better at it. It's more realistic. Now, in 2nd edition, there had the skill points too, but some of the rogue's skills were completely forbidden from being used by others.
"I want to pick the dagger without him noticing"
"Do you have pickpocket?"
"No"
"Then you can't".

Prestidigitation Proficiency, page 54 of Spells and Magic. Not precisely pickpocketing, but close enough to work for a check at a penalty.


Listen and Climb could be used by anyone, but only rogue could put "skill points" in it to rise the chances of success. That's kinda the base of the 3.x skill system.

Yes, but how effective is it to put skill points in cross-class skills that, due to maximum rank limitations, give you little real chance of detecting an enemy?

And, as for your objection... there's the Alertness proficiency (pg 79 of Combat and Tactics), which reduces your chance of being surprised, even if you might possibly be surprised automatically (hidden thief backstabbing you). There's also the Trouble Sense proficiency (page 80 of Combat and Tactics) which allowed you to notice danger before it happened.

Finally, we've got the difference between the two systems... the Hear Noise percentage in 2nd edition "...should only be used when hearing is difficult or there are extraordinary circumstances involved." The examples given involve listening at dungeon doors (and the mistakes that can be made) and hearing a captain over the fury of a storm... and is assumed to take a round (which, in the writing of page 128 of the DMG, was a full minute) or so. The 3.x Listen skill is used to "hear approaching enemies, to detect someone sneaking up on you from behind, or eavesdrop on a conversation." It subsumes many of the functions of the 2nd edition Surprise roll (as does Spot), in addition to implicitly being for more clarity than 2nd edition's Hear Noise.


What? I really didn't understand it. In pre 3.x, you could say you did a different attack, but all with the same roll, and in 3.x, you can do different attacks by giving bonuses? I don't see anything wrong with it.

2nd edition, you said "I want to trip him." The DM either made a ruling or knew the rule (page 45 of C&T; I imagine there was something similar in Complete Fighters), and you could do it. 3rd edition is similar, though you can take feats to specialize in it, and you're opening yourself up to attack if you don't have the feat.

MrNexx
2007-07-12, 02:17 PM
Hmmn, I'm looking at the Revised Dark Sun Boxed Set PDF and Attributes only appear to scale from 1-25. Was the 1-30 version somewhere else?

Might have misremembered. It happens.

Kiero
2007-07-12, 03:36 PM
Kiero: Just read those C&C reviews. Interesting stuff. I particularly like that they are using the Classic Attribute Modifier Range [i.e. 13-15 = +1, 16-17 = +2, 18 = +3]. Not clear if they allow Attributes above 18 or how they handle them.

I've only got the old boxed set which only has four classes and goes up to level 10. In that at least, attributes only range from 3-19.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 03:59 PM
Nexx: Yeah, I know that feeling. Yeah, it appears that Dark Sun Strength 25 is equivalent to (A)D&D Strength 20/21 (i.e. Open Doors and Bend Bars are as 20, all other modifiers are as 21)

Kiero: Looks like they adopt a 2:1 progression after 15 [i.e. 18-19 = +3, 20-21 = +4, 22-23 = +5, 24-25= +6. Not my favoured solution, but seems okay. Apparently, the current edition goes up to Level 12.

Kurald Galain
2007-07-12, 04:22 PM
"I want to pick the dagger without him noticing"
"Do you have pickpocket?"
"No"
"Then you can't".

"I want to cast magic missile."
"Are you a wizard?'
"No."
"Then you can't".

How's that different?
(yes, yes, sorcerers and bards can also cast it. Not the point)

(besides, in 3rd ed, pickpocket is a trained-only skill, so the fighter is explicitly forbidden from doing it unless he spends the points on it)




Because there are now lots of things that have DCs high enough that an untrained person can't do them, or can't do them reliably enough to make it worth trying.
Exactly. Just about every skill that is cross-class can't be raised enough to be worth the trouble, unless you spend a horrendous amount of feats and magical items on improving it.

kjones
2007-07-12, 05:41 PM
Just about every skill that is cross-class can't be raised enough to be worth the trouble, unless you spend a horrendous amount of feats and magical items on improving it.

Why is this a bad thing? If you want to play a fighter who can sneak, multiclass him as a rogue. Sure, he won't be as good as a full fighter in a straight-up fight, but should he be? It's a sacrifice you make for having an advantage that most other fighters wouldn't.

The problem with making decisions based on DM fiat is that they tend to lack consistency. Why should you have to come up with entirely new rules on the fly for everything? Isn't it easier to think, "OK, this action is sort of like this other action, which is in the rules", and modify accordingly?

Of course everything won't fit neatly. That's why we're DMs instead of computers, and that's why Neverwinter Nights sucked monkeys.

Notable is that in my 2nd edition PHB, Chapter Five: Proficiencies is subtitled (Optional). Doesn't it make much more sense to have built-in mechanics for, say, a fighter who wants to sneak, rather than having to rely on some optional, external mechanic?

Matthew
2007-07-12, 05:48 PM
Only if that's the design philosophy behind your game. It's not really difficult to decide what the chances of a Fighter successfully sneaking might be. You don't even have to do it 'on the fly'. If it's something likely to come up, you create a set of mechanics in advance.

The point is, (A)D&D was a collection of suggestions and possibilities. Half the fun was (and still is in 3.x) making up rules to govern the game.

Kiero
2007-07-12, 05:49 PM
Doesn't it make much more sense to have built-in mechanics for, say, a fighter who wants to sneak, rather than having to rely on some optional, external mechanic?

Depends entirely on the preferences of the group. For those who would rather do without stuff spelled out (that they'd then have to learn), and trust their GM to be reasonable, why bother?

Fax Celestis
2007-07-12, 06:47 PM
Depends entirely on the preferences of the group. For those who would rather do without stuff spelled out (that they'd then have to learn), and trust their GM to be reasonable, why bother?

Because that's the purpose of having a gaming system. If you don't want to have to read stuff (OMGONOEZ Reading!), then go systemless RP.

Kurald Galain
2007-07-12, 07:02 PM
Because that's the purpose of having a gaming system. If you don't want to have to read stuff (OMGONOEZ Reading!), then go systemless RP.

Yes, obviously people will have to use either a complicated ruleset or no ruleset at all. Really.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 07:23 PM
I have to agree. There is a world of difference between a systemless game and a 'light system'.

kjones
2007-07-12, 07:29 PM
Because that's the purpose of having a gaming system. If you don't want to have to read stuff (OMGONOEZ Reading!), then go systemless RP.

QFT.

You can make up your own rules for, say, sneaking in 3rd edition, if you want. If you make up enough of your own rules, however, you're not really playing D&D, and you just wasted $$ on some books.

Now, 3rd edition has a much more cohesive ruleset than 2nd edition. It's easier to figure out rules for "non-standard" actions, like a fighter sneaking, because the rules are more standardized and generalized. If you want to give a fighter a flat percentage chance of success, go right ahead... but then why exactly are you playing D&D again?

Furthermore, D&D, of any edition, makes a terrible "light" rules system. If you've ever taught the game to a complete newcomer, you'll understand what I mean here. Go for Risus or FUDGE if that's what you're interested in, but why bother making D&D "lighter"?

Matthew
2007-07-12, 07:31 PM
Umm, well Attribute Checks are the default way for handling everything in 2.x. If you take a look at First Quest or Dragon Quest you can see how truly rules light D&D and (A)D&D could be.

It's nonesense to say that a Light System or a Tool Box resource is a waste of money. It's even moreso nonesense to say that you aren't playing D&D if you change the rules. By that logic I'm not playing D&D if I allow anybody to drown instead of resetting to 0 Hit Points. Total rubbish.

Indeed, I played D&D and (A)D&D as a newcomer, it wasn't hard to learn at all or to teach. If you ignore all the 'optional rules' (including Paladins, proficiencies, etc...) it's a very, very simple game.

greenknight
2007-07-12, 07:40 PM
The PHB describes it along the lines of, "Most of combat is parrying, feinting, and looking for an opening." Sure, but... one hit every minute? Bit excessive, in the opposite direction of "my dervish can attack sixteen times in six seconds."

Don't forget, that wasn't one hit, it was one attack. Even after spending an entire minute on feints and looking for an opening, it was still possible to miss. At least in theory, a one-on-one fight could go on for hours in-game, if each character only made one attack per round and missed 19 times out of 20.

The round length was 1 minute in original D&D, 1st Ed AD&D and 2nd Ed AD&D. It was changed in PO: Combat & Tactics to a much more reasonable 10 - 15 seconds. However, the Revised 2nd Ed AD&D PHB (which came out about the same time) still lists the combat round as 1 minute.


It's all Ogre: Dunno about that. Bonus Proficiencies were still a product of Intelligence in (A)D&D.

Yes, but it was a one-off benefit only available at 1st level. In 3.x, you still get the one-off benefit (4x skill points), but you also get an ongoing benefit.


Likewise, in 2nd ed a fighter gets more NWPs. Apart from a few class-limited details (e.g. you can't sneak unless you ARE a thief, but then in 3E you can't sneak well unless you're a rogue/bard either) the variety is equally there.

In 2nd Ed AD&D RAW, you can't sneak at all. If you use Hide in Shadows, you have to remain virtually motionless, so unless you move very slowly (maybe a couple of feet per minute) you can't really move around. Computer games such as Baldur's Gate realised how silly that was and did provide an actual Sneak option for Thieves.

And aside from the bonus proficiencies, the point is that all Fighters in 2nd Ed AD&D get the same number of NWPs. Assuming you use the 2nd Ed PHB NWP system at all (there were 3 ways to determine what a character knows and how well the character knows it in the PHB, and PO: Skills & Powers changed the NWP mechanic).

Finally, 3.x provides a couple of ways for different characters to sneak around. First, characters can simply purchase the skill cross-class. After a few levels, the character should have enough ranks to sneak by other relatively unobservant folks, provided the character is wearing suitable gear (in other words, sneaking around in full plate usually doesn't work too well). Or assuming Hide/MS isn't on your class skill list (and it is for Bards, Monks, Rangers and Rogues, and Hide is for Clerics with the Trickery Domain), then you could always multiclass to some class where it is. That removes the cross-class cap on those skills even if you leave that class later on.


virtually every fighter uses wis/cha as their dump stats

That was very true in oD&D and AD&D, in fact there were lots of potential dump stats in those systems because there were huge ranges that did very little. For example, mechanically there's not a lot of difference between 14 Wisdom and 8 Wisdom in 2nd Ed AD&D unless your character uses Wis for spellcasting, which made it a commonly used dump stat for Fighters. But 3.x Fighters would be in a lot of trouble dumping Wisdom, because that affects all their Will saves, which is a bad save for them anyway.


Actually, I call that "limiting improvisation" considering a +2 and -2 aren't all that significant on a d20 roll. Creativity should be rewarded more than that.

The same page which states the circumstance modifiers (3.5e DMG, p30) also says that the DM can change that to anything from +2 to +20 (or -2 to -20). When you get to the high end of that scale, it gets pretty significant, IMO.


That's true, but the fallacy behind this is that you can never cover every situation.

You're correct, but what 3.x really tries to do is provide one fairly consistant mechanic which can be adapted to almost everything. This is different to 2nd Ed, which had different mechanics for many things like Initiative, attack rolls, saving throws and ability checks.


And also, their kits, weapon style, secondary skills and NWPs.

Kits only appeared in 2nd Ed AD&D splatbooks, they never made it to Core and weren't even thought of in 1st Ed (although the Dragonlance game setting came close, and kits could certainly be adapted to 1st Ed rules). Ditto with weapon styles. Secondary skills and NWPs were mutually exclusive (and completely optional) rules.

If you factor in Kits and WP / NWPs from the splatbooks, 2nd Ed Fighters could be very different mechanically. Although even then they don't quite reach the degree of difference possible in 3.x.


and back stab? the number of dms that made you make ms/hs rolls before you could use it was stupid. it was either hugely powerful or useless depending on your dm. now it has codified rules on how it works. much better! (all imo)

Nah. By 2nd Ed RAW, backstab was always practically useless. Not only did you have to get behind your (humanoid only) foe undetected (which could be quite a feat all by itself), you only had one backstab attack in the entire encounter, and all it did was multiply base weapon damage (before strength or weapon modifiers are counted). In other words, even for a high level Thief who did somehow manage to get in a backstab, the extra damage was pitiful - around 20hp extra damage with a Longsword on average, once per encounter.


As for the Sneaking/Hiding thing, that is total nonesense. Thief Abilities are not the same thing as Sneaking and Hiding. Success at Move Silently and Hide in shadows rendered a Character undetectable. Sneaking and Hiding are different things. Exactly how you choose to handle them is up to you.

That's the problem - the rules weren't really all that specific. But in many ways, Hide/MS were the same as sneak. Fail your Hide/MS check and you were automatically detected, you didn't get another chance to be unseen / unheard. If you give a non-Thief character a better chance to hide / MS than a Thief who has point points into it, you aren't being very fair to the Thief (who doesn't really get much in AD&D anyway).


Yeah, most of those Character Point Builds either turn out to be illegal or 'just not that great'. I cannot claim to have examined them all, though.

Check out the potential of a Half-Elven Fighter / Cleric / Mage at the low to mid levels using both Skills & Powers and Spells & Magic. Take Infravision, Less Sleep & Sword Bonus as your racial benefits. Fighter allows a couple of possibilities, but just taking Multiple Specialization is a good choice. Cleric is downright abusive, since it gives so many CPs and the Wizard side of the character can fill in with certain types of magic. Be sure to pick up Weapon Selection (a bargain at 10CPs, which allows any weapon to be used). Likewise, the Mage side can be optimized by not choosing schools which duplicate spheres you already have access to. Make sure you get the full Armor option from Spells & Magic (15CPs). Also get Reduced Hit Points (gives you 10 more CPs) - since you're going to be dividing the number of HPs you get from Mage by 3 anyway, the difference is nonexistant. Unlike the Cleric side, you don't need Weapon Selection, since it's an issue of training (which your Fighter class gives you) rather than a code of practice.

At this point, you have a character with the THAC0 of a Fighter, specialization with any weapon, the ability to wear full armor and cast both Cleric and Mage spells (although using a shield prevents casting mage spells), and fully optimized spell selections (spheres and schools). You only need 4 hours rest to start re-preparing spells, can see in the dark, and have a nifty bonus to hit with swords. Seems broken to me.

For higher level games, a Human Cleric can be customized to replace a Fighter and still be a pretty decent Cleric as well (it would cost 65 of the 120 CPs Clerics get, but that still leaves enough for some nice stuff).


The tag line for (A)D&D was 'only limited by your imagination'. If you had a DM who wouldn't let your Fighter sneak when naked, it was his failure.

"Products of your Imagination", although I think that was dropped in 2nd Ed AD&D.

By RAW, there's no way a Fighter should be able to sneak in 2nd Ed AD&D. Even a Thief couldn't do that, and they were supposed to have been trained in staying unseen. Blame the utterly stupid Hide in Shadows rules, and the idea that if you weren't hiding, you were automatically seen.


Indeed. But Paladins are optional rules in (A)D&D 2.x, as are Proficiencies and Specialisation. Everything is optional (just about).

It's a design difference. (A)D&D *could* be played out of the box, but you just have to read the introduction to see that (apart from at official events, which used their own codification and 'House rules') this was not the intent. The nebulous nature of the game is what led to its codification in 3.x.

Very, very true, and this is the main reason I'll never go back to AD&D. Each DM had his or her own rules, and the game could vary quite dramatically between one DM and another (or in gaming groups where the DM role was shared around, between one gaming group and another, since the DMs in the group usually agreed on a common set of rules). Even if you work strictly off the published books, you could have different games because so much optional stuff was presented even in the PHB (one group using Paladin and another not allowing it, to use your example). Some people love that, and loathe 3.x because it does codify so many more things. Others hate it (myself included) and they're the ones who moved on (not necessarily to 3.x, although many did).


Yes, but by providing a designated mechanic for intimidation (rolling Intimidate checks), the 3.x system makes it less likely that characters who aren't specifically practiced at intimidation will try (because they don't think of themselves as having that skill), and more likely that they will fail if they do try (because their DM is quite likely to make them roll a check).

AD&D also had a designated mechanic for intimidation. It was called the Reaction Adjustment to Charisma.


It isn't. But codifying lots and lots of options means that the DM has to specifically override the rules every time they want to do something those options don't cover. A DM who isn't perfect will tend to just say "roll an Intimidate check."

And there we see the basic difference in philosophy between the two systems. In AD&D, there were lots and lots of things which weren't covered by the rules, and it was hard to even determine a consistant game mechanic, so a DM would often have to come up with rules on the spur of the moment. And unless the DM had a good memory or wrote those rules down, the next time a similar situation came up the DM could come up with an entirely different way to resolve the issue. The DM could still overrule RAW, but because the RAW didn't cover as many situations, it didn't come up as often as it does in 3.x. So here the problem is that there aren't enough rules and the DM has to come up with new ones quite regularly.

In 3.x, there's a pretty broad general mechanic as well as specific rules which cover lots of situations. There's still plenty of situations where the specific rules don't cover what's happening, but the general mechanic normally provides some idea on how to resolve it. Because there's plenty of specific rules, there will be more times when the DM runs up against mechanics which he or she doesn't like (Diplomacy being a very good example, IMO). In this case, the problem isn't that there's too many rules, but that the rules which exist aren't suitable.

Personally, I consider that to be an advantage. By having the rule there, the DM can reference it and use it if it seems ok. If it's not a good rule, then at least the DM can think about it and modify it. This is the same as the AD&D DM coming up with a rule on the fly, except that the 3.x DM has an opportunity to consider the problem in advance. If the rule doesn't work in a satisfactory way, then the DM can just change it later. In the case of the 3.x DM, that does mean overruling the RAW, for the AD&D DM, that means overruling a previous DM ruling, and both have the potential to generate complaints from the players.


In 3.x, "my character tackles the wizard" has a very specific mechanical interpretation. The DM does not have to come up with a way to model it, but the temptation to use that mechanical interpretation even when it penalizes the character is stronger.

AD&D also has rules for wrestling and punching, with punching sometimes producing some very strange results IMO. For example, on an attack roll of less than 1 (pretty bad), you could hit with a haymaker doing more damage than many other results and have the highest chance of knocking out your foe. Even a result of 20+ didn't give that good a chance of KO'ing a foe.


"I want to cast magic missile."
"Are you a wizard?'
"No."
"Then you can't".

How's that different?
(yes, yes, sorcerers and bards can also cast it. Not the point)

A character could have a Wand of Magic Missiles and the UMD skill, that's different. And you're giving an example involving magic, which is something which logically normal people can't do. Another example would be flying, without using magic or natural wings (or some other method to stay airborne). In both AD&D and 3.x, a character could try to fly without those things, but it just won't happen.

On the other hand, things like spotting a foe and hiding from view are things a normal character should be able to do, although with different degrees of success. In AD&D, you had a chance to surprise a foe if you were a member of a particular race or class and met some specific requirements (or you used magic which enabled it), but generally speaking otherwise it wasn't possible without DM fiat. In 3.x, there's a Hide/Spot and MS/Listen opposed check you can use, so you can have more observant characters as well as characters who are better trained at sneaking around.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 07:58 PM
Yes, but it was a one-off benefit only available at 1st level. In 3.x, you still get the one-off benefit (4x skill points), but you also get an ongoing benefit.

Quite true. Once you start you were pretty much locked in.


In 2nd Ed AD&D RAW, you can't sneak at all. If you use Hide in Shadows, you have to remain virtually motionless, so unless you move very slowly (maybe a couple of feet per minute) you can't really move around. Computer games such as Baldur's Gate realised how silly that was and did provide an actual Sneak option for Thieves.

Rubbish. You can sneak as much or as little as you like. Attribute Checks are the first way (much disliked) and assigned chances are the second. The latter method, unfortunately, is only outlined in First Edition (A)D&D Core Rulebooks, though it reappears in Second Edition expansions.


That's the problem - the rules weren't really all that specific. But in many ways, Hide/MS were the same as sneak. Fail your Hide/MS check and you were automatically detected, you didn't get another chance to be unseen / unheard. If you give a non-Thief character a better chance to hide / MS than a Thief who has point points into it, you aren't being very fair to the Thief (who doesn't really get much in AD&D anyway).

Not so, fail your Hide or Move Silently Check and you failed, to be perfectly silent or perfectly hidden. After that, well, it was up to your DM.


Check out the potential of a Half-Elven Fighter / Cleric / Mage at the low to mid levels using both Skills & Powers and Spells & Magic. Take Infravision, Less Sleep & Sword Bonus as your racial benefits. Fighter allows a couple of possibilities, but just taking Multiple Specialization is a good choice. Cleric is downright abusive, since it gives so many CPs and the Wizard side of the character can fill in with certain types of magic. Be sure to pick up Weapon Selection (a bargain at 10CPs, which allows any weapon to be used). Likewise, the Mage side can be optimized by not choosing schools which duplicate spheres you already have access to. Make sure you get the full Armor option from Spells & Magic (15CPs). Also get Reduced Hit Points (gives you 10 more CPs) - since you're going to be dividing the number of HPs you get from Mage by 3 anyway, the difference is nonexistant. Unlike the Cleric side, you don't need Weapon Selection, since it's an issue of training (which your Fighter class gives you) rather than a code of practice.

At this point, you have a character with the THAC0 of a Fighter, specialization with any weapon, the ability to wear full armor and cast both Cleric and Mage spells (although using a shield prevents casting mage spells), and fully optimized spell selections (spheres and schools). You only need 4 hours rest to start re-preparing spells, can see in the dark, and have a nifty bonus to hit with swords. Seems broken to me.

For higher level games, a Human Cleric can be customized to replace a Fighter and still be a pretty decent Cleric as well (it would cost 65 of the 120 CPs Clerics get, but that still leaves enough for some nice stuff).

I've heard talk of this before. You would have to take me through point by point, as I know there are some failsafes to prevent stuff like this (which are very often overlooked. It's to do with how many Character Points you can carry over from stage to stage. Point is, these combinations were no more broken than the rules already allowed. Elf Fighter/Mages, for instance, could already do some pretty broken stuff at Level 1. [Edit] In fact, I'm pretty sure I could build a better Half Elf Cleric/Mage/Fighter prior to Skills and Powers than the one you propose. Clerics of specific Mythos' created some horrifying builds and were allowed in Multi Class combinations.


"Products of your Imagination", although I think that was dropped in 2nd Ed AD&D.

Hmmn. I wasn't thinking of that tag line. I'm sure there was one floating about in second edition as I quoted. I could be misremembering, though.


By RAW, there's no way a Fighter should be able to sneak in 2nd Ed AD&D. Even a Thief couldn't do that, and they were supposed to have been trained in staying unseen. Blame the utterly stupid Hide in Shadows rules, and the idea that if you weren't hiding, you were automatically seen.

Not true, for the reasons stated above.


Very, very true, and this is the main reason I'll never go back to AD&D. Each DM had his or her own rules, and the game could vary quite dramatically between one DM and another (or in gaming groups where the DM role was shared around, between one gaming group and another, since the DMs in the group usually agreed on a common set of rules). Even if you work strictly off the published books, you could have different games because so much optional stuff was presented even in the PHB (one group using Paladin and another not allowing it, to use your example). Some people love that, and loathe 3.x because it does codify so many more things. Others hate it (myself included) and they're the ones who moved on (not necessarily to 3.x, although many did).

Sure, and that's a preferential thing. What I see in 3.x, though, is a game heavily in need of 'fixing' in many aspects. It still has the same problems that previous editions had and more, it's just legislated for more situations.
Personally, I love tinkering with the rules and I would hate to see something that was 'true D&D', as that doesn't embrace the spirit of the game for me.

However, there was a very basic skeletal structure to (A)D&D. You can see it in First Quest and it was very simple and very consistant. How you built off of that structure was up to you.

That's not to say I have some sort of hate for 3.x. I appreciate that they have put out a more comprehensive system that they can publish more consistant adventures and campaigns for. It's not my cup of tea, though, and so I only play it within the bounds of those publications. It's one of the reasons I resist House Ruling 3.x, because if I did, it would end up looking exactly like my (A)D&D Game!

Ulzgoroth
2007-07-12, 08:39 PM
With regard to cross-class skills being generally useless, there's something rather vital being missed in that assumption. Most enemies don't have everything under the sun as class skills either. A fighter who doesn't crash wisdom and pumps spot can notice an ambush party at 15 ft. + 5ft/level when taking ten (a good idea when moving). Because the ambush party probably includes someone with no dex bonus and no hide ranks, like typical orc warriors. Admittedly you still get spitted helplessly by the surprise-charge until level 3, if you don't have Alertness.

Admittedly (a) fighters get very few skill points, so this is expensive (though what you meant to buy off their pitiful list I don't know), and (b) in a usual party, the fighter can get away with counting on someone else to have sensory skills. Stealth skills are another matter, though. A fighter with cross-class Hide/move silently and some dex, and without his Costume of Armor Check Penalty on, can sneak quite adequately so long as the opposition is not a ranger/rogue/monk/druid or applicable Expert (with a high chance of being heard but not seen by a barb or bard who buys heavily into listen).

If the opposition has taken usual build wisdom, the fighter could guarantee successful stealth to just outside 50 feet of a great many enemies at level 3 (and very likely get closer...they get a chance at 30 feet, with DC 18. Then they get a partial charge to the flat-footed face). If he takes Stealthy, at level 9 (or sooner if he boosts past +2 dex) he can take-ten right up to an enemy who hasn't bought perception skills and tap them on the shoulder with no chance of being spotted so long as he can remain in cover or concealment at all times.

There are also a number of significant low DC targets. For instance, two skill points buys a Wis-dumper the ability to feed themselves reliably while traveling at a moderate pace in typical wilderness. Not bad. (speaking of which, anyone can hunt. Survival is an untrained skill and covers general gathering of food.

EDIT:
I don't know much about 'light' rule systems except that they exist, but I hope that you do them a disservice by equating 'light' with 'incomplete'. Having no mechanics for stealth, in nearly any RPG that has mechanics at all, is not excusable as 'rules lightness'.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 08:49 PM
EDIT:
I don't know much about 'light' rule systems except that they exist, but I hope that you do them a disservice by equating 'light' with 'incomplete'. Having no mechanics for stealth, in nearly any RPG that has mechanics at all, is not excusable as 'rules lightness'.

For the bjillionth time. If you really needed iron clad rules for stealth you could use an Attribute Check. It's exactly the same concept as 3.x 'Sneaking', except you cannot put points into it. If you had a Dexterity of 10, for instance, you're base chance would be 50% (or in 3.x terms +10 to reach DC 21). The DM then modifies that chance (or DC) according to circumstances.

[Edit]
And yes, a 'Rules Light' system may be considered by people who want more rules to be incomplete. That's kind of implicit. D&D 3.x is 'incomplete' in that it doesn't cover every conceivable situation with a specific rule.

Here's a quick excerpt from the 2.x DMG that might help illustrate the ethos behind the game:


Creating Vivid Combat Scenes

Since this isn't a combat game, the rules are not ultra-detailed, defining the exact effect of every blow, the subtle differences between obscure weapons, the location of every piece of armor on the body, or the horrifying results of an actual sword fight. Too many rules slow down play (taking away from the real adventure) and restrict imagination. How much fun is it when a character, ready to try an amazing and heroic deed, is told, "You can't do that because it's against the rules."
Players should be allowed to try whatever they want--especially if what they want will add to the spirit of adventure and excitement. Just remember that there is a difference between trying and succeeding.
To have the most fun playing the AD&D game, don't rely only on the rules. Like so much in a good role-playing adventure, combat is a drama, a staged play. The DM is both the playwright and the director, creating a theatrical combat. If a character wants to try wrestling a storm giant to the ground, let him. And a character who tries leaping from a second floor window onto the back of a passing orc is adding to everyone's fun.
The trick to making combat vivid is to be less concerned with the rules than with what is happening at each instant of play. If combat is only "I hit. I miss. I hit again," then something is missing. Combats should be more like, "One orc ducks under the table jabbing at your legs with his sword. The other tries to make a flying tackle, but misses and sprawls to the floor in the middle of the party!" This takes description, timing, strategy, humor, and--perhaps most important of all--knowing when to use the rules and when to bend them.

MrNexx
2007-07-12, 11:07 PM
I'm starting to get interested in these conversations as a meta-conversation, in and of themselves.

Anyone else notice that the example brought up is always "In 2nd edition, a fighter couldn't sneak"? No one ever brings up a cleric, who's just as encumbered and more likely to have a low Dex (due to MAD)... just a fighter. Personally, my method is usually via Surprise checks, rather than straight attribute checks.

I also note that people stay religiously away from discussions of magic in these; it's seldom mentioned as a difference between the two editions though, in fact, there's some pretty big differences between them that accounts for some of the difference in playstyle between those who've acclimated to the new system and those who've stayed old-school. Memorization/preparation time, bonus spells, save paradigms; all these changes in ways that had a pretty big impact on the game, but it's not brought up as a difference.

Just me musing; I've gotten tired of arguing with people who like 3.x better than 2.x, since I'm not going to change their mind, and am unlikely to change mine.

Raum
2007-07-12, 11:20 PM
I also note that people stay religiously away from discussions of magic in these; it's seldom mentioned as a difference between the two editions though, in fact, there's some pretty big differences between them that accounts for some of the difference in playstyle between those who've acclimated to the new system and those who've stayed old-school. Memorization/preparation time, bonus spells, save paradigms; all these changes in ways that had a pretty big impact on the game, but it's not brought up as a difference.Casting time is probably the single difference with the most impact on game play. IMO changing it had more of a fundamental affect than either skills or feats.


Just me musing; I've gotten tired of arguing with people who like 3.x better than 2.x, since I'm not going to change their mind, and am unlikely to change mine.Well they're only better or worse in reference to personal tastes so assigning them a rating everyone will agree on is...difficult. :)

I do agree with you though, discussing the differences between games systems is enjoyable. I even had to dig out my AD&D books earlier. Sigh, now I have to get the boxes put back in the garage.

TheLogman
2007-07-12, 11:24 PM
I played 1st edition way back when. We had no feats, which pretty much made all characters the same. If Tommy the Wizard got Mauled down in the Dungeons by rats, I just rolled up Timmy, who, because we had no skills or feats back then, was pretty much the same as Tommy, except he has 1 less intelligence, and his physical stats are a little better. (We had to keep the rolls in the order we rolled them, so we basically decided our characters on what stats were the highest) Because there were less spells back then too, Tommy pretty much had the same spellbook as Timmy too.

MrNexx
2007-07-12, 11:40 PM
Casting time is probably the single difference with the most impact on game play. IMO changing it had more of a fundamental affect than either skills or feats.

There's a lot more than just casting time; since they also took out weapon speed, casting time was, IMO, a minor alteration.

Spell memorization/preparation is now lightning fast compared to 2nd edition. 3.x? 1 hour per preparing class, 15 minutes per spontaneous. 2nd edition? 10 minutes per level of the spell. At low levels, this means that a 2nd edition memorizes a lot faster than his 3rd edition counterpart. After that, the time required to completely replace your spells increases sharply; an 18th level wizard requires just shy of 24 hours to completely replenish his spells in 2nd edition, which limits the 3rd edition tactic of teleport in, throw everything you have, teleport out and come back the next day, with a complete set of spells; one night's rest will have you ready to memorize, but it's going to be a while until you have them all ready.

The entire paradigm of saving throws changed; in 1st/2nd edition, they were partially skill, but in a large part luck. In 3rd edition, this has somewhat been retained, but it is now far more difficult to make saving throws as the game progresses, changing the very nature of magical attack. The Guide to Being Batman wouldn't have existed in 2nd edition; saving throws would've made much of its advice simply WRONG. As you got to higher levels, people saving wasn't unusual or hard, and so you concentrated on spells that would do something... and often, these were damaging spells. The blaster-caster is an outgrowth of the older paradigm of spell magic (and that fact that it's cool).

Then there's even the minor changes like bonus spells (which a lot of people were doing, anyway) and casting times.

Matthew
2007-07-12, 11:43 PM
If you're still interested in the meta dialogue, here's a link to the same conversation that was had almost exactly one year ago: Second Edition (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=20256). Many of the faces are the same, some have passed on. It was the inability of naked Wizards to sneak in that Thread.

Dervag
2007-07-13, 12:37 AM
Spell memorization/preparation is now lightning fast compared to 2nd edition. 3.x? 1 hour per preparing class, 15 minutes per spontaneous. 2nd edition? 10 minutes per level of the spell. At low levels, this means that a 2nd edition memorizes a lot faster than his 3rd edition counterpart. After that, the time required to completely replace your spells increases sharply; an 18th level wizard requires just shy of 24 hours to completely replenish his spells in 2nd edition, which limits the 3rd edition tactic of teleport in, throw everything you have, teleport out and come back the next day, with a complete set of spells; one night's rest will have you ready to memorize, but it's going to be a while until you have them all ready.Wow.

You know, I never realized just how important that was, come to think of it.

Goes a long way towards balancing wizards. Even a powerful wizard has an incentive not to throw their most powerful spells unless they face an enemy who can't be defeated by weaker spells.

albertstoop
2007-07-13, 06:15 AM
I like the skills in 3.x, because it improves.
2nd: a level 1 blacksmith (NWP blacksmith) was the same as a level 20 blacksmith (NWP blacksmith).
3rd: a level 1 blacksmith (craft(blacksmith): 4) has difficult to make a simple dagger and an level 20 blacksmith (craft(blacksmith): 23) can make a difficult weapon

i like also the opposte skill checks:
3rd: rogue with hiding +10 can hide from a simple guard (spot +4) but not the guard who is before the grand jewely of the king (spot +23)
2nd rogue has the grand jewely of the king because he has hide 100% (or more)

i like also the simple feats
2nd wizard had to get WP: quarterstaff to use it... if he finds a dagger or 2h sword to bad. he had to take other WP to use other weapons
3nd wizard can use quarterstaff and dagger as normal weapons. For a 2h sword he still needs use a feat.

Matthew
2007-07-13, 07:24 AM
I like the skills in 3.x, because it improves.
2nd: a level 1 blacksmith (NWP blacksmith) was the same as a level 20 blacksmith (NWP blacksmith).
3rd: a level 1 blacksmith (craft(blacksmith): 4) has difficult to make a simple dagger and an level 20 blacksmith (craft(blacksmith): 23) can make a difficult weapon

Total nonesense. First of all there were no Blacksmith 20's, all Non Classed Characters were 0 Level. Secondly, you could improve Proficiencies by spending more Slots/Character Points. Here's an excerpt from the 2.x DMG that blows this nonsensical statment out of the water:


0-Level Characters

The great mass of humanity, elf-kind, the dwarven clans, and halflings, are "0-level" (zero-level) characters. They can gain in wisdom and skill, but they do not earn experience points for their activities. These common folk form the backbone of every fantasy world, doing the labor, making goods, selling cargos, sailing oceans, building ships, cutting trees, hauling lumber, tending horses, raising crops and more. Many are quite talented in the various arts and crafts. Some are even more proficient than player characters with the same training. After all, 0-level characters earn their livings doing this kind of work. For player characters such proficiencies are almost more of a hobby.
For the vast majority of 0-level NPCs you create and use in your game, all you need to know is a name, a personality, and an occupation. When the characters deal with the blacksmith or the innkeeper, there's no need to create ability scores, THACO, to-hit adjustments, Armor Class, and the like. This does assume, of course, that your player characters don't go attacking every blacksmith and innkeeper in sight. If they do, you need to know a little more about 0-level characters.
Ability Scores: These range from 3-18. For simplicity, don't worry about racial modifiers for the demi human races. Racial modifiers to combat, Armor Class, hit points, etc., do apply.
Proficiencies: At best, a 0-level character will have one weapon proficiency, if that character's profession reasonably allows for it. For example, a blacksmith could be proficient with a war hammer and an innkeeper might be allowed skill with a club (the axe handle under the bar...), but there's little chance a clerk is going to be skilled with any type of weapon.
In non weapon proficiencies, 0-level characters have as many as are needed (and reasonable) given their profession and age. Thus, a blacksmith might be quite accomplished at the forge, having spent several proficiencies on the slot. Novices and incompetent craftsmen have the bare minimum training and skill. Typical journeymen spend two or three slots on their main skill. Experts and brilliant artists usually devote all their ability to a single proficiency. Masters, who watch over the work of journeymen and apprentices, are normally no more accomplished than journeymen but have additional proficiencies in other business areas.
Hit Points: The majority of people have from 1-6 hit points. Dwarves and gnomes average from 1-8 hit points. Adjustments can be made for occupation or condition as indicated on Table 10, below.

There were some basic rules for crafting in the PHB and DMG. The Complete Fighter's Handbook presented a more detailed system.


i like also the opposte skill checks:
3rd: rogue with hiding +10 can hide from a simple guard (spot +4) but not the guard who is before the grand jewely of the king (spot +23)
2nd rogue has the grand jewely of the king because he has hide 100% (or more)

*Sigh* Not even close to how it worked:


Move Silently: A thief can try to move silently at any time simply by announcing that he intends to do so. While moving silently, the thief's movement rate is reduced to 1/3 normal. The DM rolls percentile dice to determine whether the thief is moving silently; the thief always thinks he is being quiet. Successful silent movement improves the thief's chance to surprise a victim, avoid discovery, or move into position to stab an enemy in the back. Obviously, a thief moving silently but in plain view of his enemies is wasting his time.
Hide in Shadows: A thief can try to disappear into shadows or any other type of concealment -- bushes, curtains, crannies, etc. A thief can hide this way only when no one is looking at him; he remains hidden only as long as he remains virtually motionless. (The thief can make small, slow, careful movements: draw a weapon, uncork a potion, etc.) A thief can never become hidden while a guard is watching him, no matter what his dice roll is--his position is obvious to the guard. However, trying to hide from a creature that is locked in battle with another is possible, as the enemy's attention is fixed elsewhere. The DM rolls the dice and keeps the result secret, but the thief always thinks he is hidden.
Hiding in shadows cannot be done in total darkness, since the talent lies in fooling the eye as much as in finding real concealment (camouflage, as it were). However, hidden characters are equally concealed to those with or without infravision. Spells, magical items, and special abilities that reveal invisible objects can reveal the location of a hidden thief.

Please note that you cannot use Move Silently or Hide in Shadows to somehow steal the Crown Jewels just by virtue of having 100% in either. It's not 'turn invisible', that's Baldur's Gate you're thinking of. As for more conventional forms of stealth, see the above discourse.


i like also the simple feats
2nd wizard had to get WP: quarterstaff to use it... if he finds a dagger or 2h sword to bad. he had to take other WP to use other weapons
3nd wizard can use quarterstaff and dagger as normal weapons. For a 2h sword he still needs use a feat.

Without Weapon Proficiencies, a Character could use any weapon available to his Class without penalty. If you were using Weapon Proficiencies, though, then a Character could only become Proficient in weapons on his Class list and only those he was proficient with could he use without penalty. Nothing is stopping a Character actually using these other weapons, he just does so at a penalty.
Later versions codified things so that a Wizard could learn any weapon, but had to spend more Character Points/Slots. Not much difference there, but admittedly that's not 'core'.

Let's try and prevent this Thread from turning into another 2.x vs. 3.x discussion. The original inquiry was 'How were things done in previous editions?' (or rather the title paraphrased, looking at the actual original post, it's even clearer how far we have strayed from the original topic). We should probably try to stay focused on that, rather than comparing mechanics.

Ethdred
2007-07-13, 08:06 AM
I'm starting to get interested in these conversations as a meta-conversation, in and of themselves.

<snip>

Just me musing; I've gotten tired of arguing with people who like 3.x better than 2.x, since I'm not going to change their mind, and am unlikely to change mine.

Yep, that's why I'm not going to post what I was going to post - besides, I think all my views been pretty much expressed. Props to Deathquaker for her views - much more sensible than what I was going to say. In the end it does come down to the DM. Though one of my DMs, who grew up on the old editions and is as much of a munchkin as me, has now become much less flexible since we switched to 3.x. Wants everything to be done by skill checks, even when this will slow the game down and not have any material difference.

One thing I noticed about pre-3.x DMing (in my experience only) was that the chance of doing something was related to its importance to the plot. Just trying to track everyone on the off chance of finding something interesting was doomed to fail, but if you wanted to follow the guy with all the amswers, mysteriously he left an obvious trail of foot prints. Unless the DM didn't want you to encounter him yet. I see too many examples on forums and elsewhere of 3.x campaigns that go wonky because someone makes or doesn't make the wrong roll (see the recent thread about ludicrous results from a natural 20s). Also, that did away with the idea that having a hulking great barbarian pointing a sword at your throat isn't intimidating because CHR was his dump stat.

Of course, my DMing also took into account how funny the idea was in determining success or failure, but that was just me.

In response to the issue of time mechanics, in 1st edition, we had segments

1 segment = 6 seconds
1 round = 10 segments
1 turn = 10 rounds

Casting times were expressed in segments (usually 1 seg/spell level), but you couldn't cast more than one spell a round whatever the casting time was. It was more used to determine combat order - you had less chance of being disrupted casting a 1 seg spell. Each weapon had a speed in segments as well, but we never used that rule.

MrNexx
2007-07-13, 09:28 AM
Wow.

You know, I never realized just how important that was, come to think of it.

Goes a long way towards balancing wizards. Even a powerful wizard has an incentive not to throw their most powerful spells unless they face an enemy who can't be defeated by weaker spells.

Precisely. Add in that there's now a decreased chance of saving against spells, and you have wizards becoming a lot more powerful, just from two, fairly innocuous, changes to the system.

Shatteredtower
2007-07-13, 09:37 AM
Precisely. Add in that there's now a decreased chance of saving against spells, and you have wizards becoming a lot more powerful, just from two, fairly innocuous, changes to the system.Sadly, if you played Ravenloft, you found all the liches got to renew their prepared spells within 24 hours (at least if you used the van Richten guides). Even without that in place, liches were the unlimited wish factory compared to most spellcasters, beyond aging.

Of course, what really torqued me off was how often NPCs were allowed to ignore the rules for spellcasting limitations in 1st-2nd Edition modules. I got awfully tired of seeing clerics with 14 Wisdom casting 7th level spells.

Extended prep time is a good thing, however.

MrNexx
2007-07-13, 09:47 AM
Of course, what really torqued me off was how often NPCs were allowed to ignore the rules for spellcasting limitations in 1st-2nd Edition modules. I got awfully tired of seeing clerics with 14 Wisdom casting 7th level spells.

Oh, I'm a big proponent of any NPC that breaks the rules having a clear-cut reason for doing so.

Ethdred
2007-07-13, 10:28 AM
Precisely. Add in that there's now a decreased chance of saving against spells, and you have wizards becoming a lot more powerful, just from two, fairly innocuous, changes to the system.

I really think the changes to saving throws are the main reason why wizards became so powerful in 3.x, and why blaster mages became a 'bad idea' - even more so than the increased HP levels. For those not in the know, in previous editions, your saving throws all increased every level or HD, and the caster or spell level had no effect on these. So there's no point in throwing around disintegrates or fingers of death when the target could have a 75% + chance of saving. Much better to lay out a fireball that will at least do something to it when it makes its easy save. I always used to wonder why they put in so many high level single target spells that were all or nothing on a save. At least magic resistance was lower for high level casters.

Kiero
2007-07-13, 01:00 PM
I sometimes wonder if many people on this board's only actual experience with AD&D 2e was from playing Baldur's Gate.

Kind of ironic in a way, given my only active experience of 3.x is from Neverwinter Nights.

Arbitrarity
2007-07-13, 01:47 PM
I think the 10 mins/spell level is a good houserule. I should put that in.

Also, NWN uses some 2.x rules apparently. It has spells with durations of turns, and some with rounds.

MrNexx
2007-07-13, 03:25 PM
I really think the changes to saving throws are the main reason why wizards became so powerful in 3.x, and why blaster mages became a 'bad idea' - even more so than the increased HP levels. For those not in the know, in previous editions, your saving throws all increased every level or HD, and the caster or spell level had no effect on these. So there's no point in throwing around disintegrates or fingers of death when the target could have a 75% + chance of saving. Much better to lay out a fireball that will at least do something to it when it makes its easy save. I always used to wonder why they put in so many high level single target spells that were all or nothing on a save. At least magic resistance was lower for high level casters.

It's a big reason. (http://rpg-crank.livejournal.com/9155.html)

Raum
2007-07-13, 04:28 PM
There's a lot more than just casting time; since they also took out weapon speed, casting time was, IMO, a minor alteration.There were definitely a lot of changes, but casting times seem to stand out - at least the way we adjudicated them. This was before metamagic, so casting was obvious. Once a caster started a spell he started chanting and waving his hands around, which was basically the signal to go smack the caster and interrupt the spell. Timestop, for example, took 9 segments to cast. With longer casting times you were able to do so without readying an action and possibly losing it if the caster chooses to do something else. This tended to make combat casting less powerful and somewhat risky. There were certainly other factors, but that was significant.

Spell memorization was somewhat of a factor, but in most cases you were able to take the time you needed. Timed adventures were (and should be IMO) the exception not the rule.

Saving throws also changed significantly, in many ways becoming more difficult. But the addition of ability bonuses to saving throws probably mitigates it to a degree. I'm not masochistic enough to do the math though. :)

Matthew
2007-07-13, 04:41 PM
Heh, heh. I have been thinking about doing the Maths behind that for a while. One thing that skews the idea is the concept of 'Attribute Checks as Saving Throws'. I'm never sure how much of that went on in (A)D&D 2.x. I know I used it whenever I was playing without the books (which was quite often when I was in school).

Certainly, a Level 20 Fighter with +5 Armour (which also granted +5 to Saving Throws) was looking at a 2+ on just about every Saving Throw.

Kalirren
2007-07-13, 05:23 PM
Okay, so this is going to be a little disruptive, but I just thought I had to mention this for the sake of someone I know and game with iRL.

Why RAW is stupid

Consider the existence of the Book of Erotic Fantasy, and contemplate what that means for D&D characters in the realm of Rules-As-Written, in light of this thread. "What do you mean I can't do such-and-such because I have no ranks in Prowess?"

Dhavaer
2007-07-13, 06:25 PM
Okay, so this is going to be a little disruptive, but I just thought I had to mention this for the sake of someone I know and game with iRL.

Why RAW is stupid

Consider the existence of the Book of Erotic Fantasy, and contemplate what that means for D&D characters in the realm of Rules-As-Written, in light of this thread. "What do you mean I can't do such-and-such because I have no ranks in Prowess?"

The description of Perform (sexual techniques) says "Without this skill, you are not a bad lover, just untrained in the finer, more subtle aspects of lovemaking". You can still do it, and do it pretty well without ranks.
Prowess is from the Guide to Unlawful Carnal Knowledge, btw.

TheElfLord
2007-07-13, 07:40 PM
One think I will say about Second Eds supossed lack of options is that while mechanically different characters of the same class would be similar, it left no room for optimization. You didn't have people thinking up all sorts of crazy builds that would let an optimized character slaghter a normal one. It created a level of equality within the class.

Jimp
2007-07-13, 07:41 PM
So, that was the first time I've ever seen a rules dispute concerning those books. Truly a unique experience.

Matthew
2007-07-13, 07:43 PM
One think I will say about Second Eds supossed lack of options is that while mechanically different characters of the same class would be similar, it left no room for optimization. You didn't have people thinking up all sorts of crazy builds that would let an optimized character slaghter a normal one. It created a level of equality within the class.
Hmmn, well I wouldn't say that. Some Players will always be looking for an edge. Two Weapon Fighting Blade Singing Elven Fighter/Mages were pretty broken, as these things go (or even just Two Weapon Fighting Blade Singing Elven Fighters). The disparity, though, was on a lot shorter scale.

TheElfLord
2007-07-13, 08:02 PM
Hmmn, well I wouldn't say that. Some Players will always be looking for an edge. Two Weapon Fighting Blade Singing Elven Fighter/Mages were pretty broken, as these things go (or even just Two Weapon Fighting Blade Singing Elven Fighters). The disparity, though, was on a lot shorter scale.

Well yeah, I'm not saying there weren't some broken parts of second ed. And some kits are better than others. But at the same time your abilty to optimise was very limited.

Matthew
2007-07-13, 08:05 PM
Don't get me wrong, I am in general agreement; I was just worried about the "no room for optimization" part of your statement. I like to err on the side of caution in these sorts of discussions.

TheElfLord
2007-07-13, 08:13 PM
True, its better to avoid blanket statements.

MrNexx
2007-07-14, 11:10 AM
Hmmn, well I wouldn't say that. Some Players will always be looking for an edge. Two Weapon Fighting Blade Singing Elven Fighter/Mages were pretty broken, as these things go (or even just Two Weapon Fighting Blade Singing Elven Fighters). The disparity, though, was on a lot shorter scale.

Unless you went into Skills and Powers or, Gods help you, Spells and Magic.

"I made a cleric with Spells and Magic!"
"Great, what spells can you cast?"
"Spells? What do you mean, spells?"

Matthew
2007-07-14, 11:15 AM
I dunno, I keep hearing this, but the example provided by Green Knight above doesn't sound any more broken to me than the normal Half Elf Fighter/Cleric/Mage (especially in conjunction with Priests of specific Mythos rules).

I have yet to see a legal Player's Option Build that was far and away more powerful than what could already be accomplished.

[Edit]
Though I hasten to add, I'm not talking about the Sub Attribute Rules, they always looked broken to me.

MrNexx
2007-07-14, 11:44 AM
I dunno, I keep hearing this, but the example provided by Green Knight above doesn't sound any more broken to me than the normal Half Elf Fighter/Cleric/Mage (especially in conjunction with Priests of specific Mythos rules).

I have yet to see a legal Player's Option Build that was far and away more powerful than what could already be accomplished.

[Edit]
Though I hasten to add, I'm not talking about the Sub Attribute Rules, they always looked broken to me.

Give me a bit to work on it, and I'll see what I can come up with. And the only sub-attribute I ever used was the Leadership/Appearance split. The others were way too easy to min/max.

Matthew
2007-07-14, 12:14 PM
Give me a bit to work on it, and I'll see what I can come up with. And the only sub-attribute I ever used was the Leadership/Appearance split. The others were way too easy to min/max.

If you do come up with something, make sure to check the errata for the books on the Wizards Website Old Edition Downloads Page; there are some restrictions on how you can spend Character Points that the books fail to make clear.

I look forward to the results.

MrNexx
2007-07-14, 12:50 PM
First of all, we start with an elf, because we want some abilities from them. We take Infravision (10), Resistance (10), Secret Doors, and Spell Abilities (15). That's a total of 40, leaving 5 as carry-over to the next stage.

Our class is cleric, because that gives us 125 CPs and a lot of options. But 125 CPs aren't worth all that much, so we get in a weirder place by taking restrictions... mostly on spellcasting, because I'm not intending on having much.

Awkward Casting Method +5
Difficult Spell Acquisition +5
Hazardous Spells +10
Limited Spell Selection +5
Reduced Spell Progression +15
Slower Casting Times +5
Talisman/Symbol +8

That's another 53 points right there. To justify these restrictions, I'll take Minor Access to All (3 points), which means I'm technically a spellcaster, and have 175 points to spend.

Now, we've got to worry about combat, since we want to equal to a fighter. Combat Bonus, Hit Point Bonus, Armor Class Improvement and Unarmed Combat Skills. I'll also add the restrictions of Armor Restriction (+15, no armor) and Weapon Restriction (+5, limiting me to staff, club, war hammer, horseman's mace and horseman's flail). My net cost is 50, and while I'm not quite on par with a fighter, at low levels I'll hold my own, and my granted powers are going to make up for it.

Now we get nasty. Instead of relying on a breadth of abilities, we rely on sneakiness. Now, the limitation on Granted Powers is no more than 1 per 2 levels, and a maximum of 6th level spells. I'll also throw down 18 points for a Constant Tenser's Transformation at 1st level (6th level Wizard spell, 22 points). My 3rd level granted power will be a Constant Invulnerability to Normal Weapons (5th level wizard spell; 20 points). My 5th level Granted power will be a Constant Invulnerability to Magical Weapons (6th level Wizard Spell; 22 points). My 7th level granted power is a Persistent Globe of Invulnerability (6th level wizard spell; 22 points). I've spent another 86 points, but I'm immune to most forms of attack, and deadly as heck. Who cares about armor at this point, really? After 7th level, my saving throws will be good enough that I can resist most of the stuff that isn't getting completely ignored, and before 7th level, they're not bad.

Now, with 39 points left, I should look at other options. I'm going to throw in Lay on Hands; that's 10 points there, but it gives me some healing ability. Just for fun, let's throw in some thief abilities... Move Silently, Hide in Shadows, Backstab, and we'll also take the ability to use Rogue group proficiencies. That's 35 points, there, giving me 4 points left... which I guess I'll carry over to proficiencies.

Now, this character isn't quite on par with a wizard in terms of spell-hurling power... however, at the lower levels, where wizards are less of a threat, he's ignoring a lot of the problems that others are facing. His Tenser's Transformation takes care of the need for armor, and while he can't make use of the dagger abilities of Tenser's Transformation, his abilities with a staff aren't poor, and he's a martial artist; his staff can be a bo stick, and specializing in style A will let him make 2 attacks a round with his staff... which can be magical.

And he can only cast a very, very limited supply of spells... but who really cares?

Matthew
2007-07-14, 01:13 PM
Sorry Nexx, you appear to be calculating Granted Powers Wrong:

For instance, Tenser's Transformation would be 32 Points [i.e. 10 (Base) + 10 (persistant) + 12 (Spell Level)]

So:

Combat Bonus (20)
Hit Point Bonus (10)
Armor Class Improvement (15)
Unarmed Combat Skills (15)

1st Level - Tenser's Transformation at 1st level (32)
3rd level - Constant Invulnerability to Normal Weapons (30)
5th level - Constant Invulnerability to Magical Weapons (32)
7th level - Persistent Globe of Invulnerability (32 points)

Total: 186 Points of 195.

So, as presented, an illegal build (which is fairly typical of my experience). Not bad choices of powers, though. Still, he would have a hard time living past Level 1.

[Edit]
Tenser's Transformation is a hard one to adjudicate, since a persistant version isn't actually renewable, it's still only invoked once per week [i.e. you get +X Hit Points that never come back and ever afterwards take double damage - is there a persistant rule, somewhere? I think it just means permanent duration, but a more broad definition I can see an argument for as well].

Globe of Invulnerability is immobile, not at all sure how making that persistant would be helpful, since you are still casting it only once per week (though for an extra 10 Points you could cast it six times per day).

Where are Invulnerability to Magical and Normal Weapons from? I cannot seem to find them in my PHB, Spells and Magic or Tome of Magic. [Edit] Ah found them, in The Complete Wizard's Handbook. I'm pretty sure they're immobile, since they are Area of Effect, unlike Protection from Evil 10' Radius, which is area of effect around the Caster. I suppose the ability to make a continuous one once a week could be handy, but not game breaking.

Still, 26 CP for the persistent power to fly would be pretty neat; I can see why this area is subject to DM limitation. I think if I were to rule on it, I would only allow Spells of Level = 1/2 Priest Level Rounded up to be available as granted powers (which is relatively in line with most other examples).

Mike_G
2007-07-14, 01:44 PM
That's not how it was supposed to work, though. If you wanted to try and pick a pocket, you could, the DM came up with the probability. Of course, you are pretty much right that you couldn't increase the chances via Skill Points (but, then, open DCs and Skill Caps by Level have been a two edged Sword). There was a proficiency for 'picking pockets' towards the end, I seem to recall, which was similar to the Mountaineering/Climb walls Cross Over.


The problem with having a codified set of rules for some (Thieves) and just a "wing it and guess a percentage" system for others (everybody else) is that these are often wildly inconsistent.

I've seen DM's arbitrarily give chances for Fighters to sneak that were better than those for a Thief a level or two lower, which isn't reasonable, or even just a "roll under your Dex" resolution which was often better than the Thief's chance.

The ad hoc rulings almost never factored in level, so 1st level Thieves generally were worse at their skills than the guy who said "My Fighter tries to sneak," and got a Dex check ruling, unless the DM really worked at it.

So, Attribute bonus + Skill ranks + situational mods vs DC is a nice, easy system that is consistent and generally works, rewarding those who put points into skills, but allowing those who didn't a chance.

It's one of my favorite things about 3e.

Matthew
2007-07-14, 01:54 PM
I knew you'd say that, Mike. In fact I have been waiting for you to weigh in with that exact example! :smallwink: Yeah, it wasn't necessarily a good mechanic (because it relied on the DM almost entirely), but it was a mechanic, which was the refutation being given .

Of course, the Thief's ability to [I]Hide in Shadows and Move Silently weren't the same things as 'conventional stealth', though they were pretty close. If I were going to have a Fighter use the above Abilities I would use the base percentages in the Thief entry, modified by Attribute and Race, as a guideline for the percentage chance. [i.e. unmodified 5% and 10% respectively].

Worse comes to worse, anything the Fighter can do, the Thief can do too. However, you are quite correct that there was no way to increase this Attribute based chance, except by DM fiat.

[Edit]
Just to be clear, I folded all the Thief Abilities into a Proficiency List for my House Ruled (A)D&D Game before I ever heard of Third Edition, which ought to tell you what I think of [Skill + Attribute Modifier + Circumstance Modifier] - I love it and use it for Combat as well [i.e. Weapon Proficiency Modifier + Attribute Modifier + Circumstance Modifier].

KoDT69
2007-07-14, 02:17 PM
I will stand by this arguement until my books are rotted away...

3.0 was nothing more than a compilation of the 2.5 PHB, DMG, Player's Option Skills and Powers, Player's Options Combat and Tactics, and each of the Complete Handbooks. Stuff from all of those sources can be found in the 3.0 core set. The Complete Fighter's Handbook was the main driving factor for the feat system. All they really did was change al the numbers to positive (-10 AC was the same as a 30AC now) and removed the cap on how high stats can go.

For the record, aside from the removed stat cap, my gaming group had diverse characters and did many more spectacular things BEFORE 3.0 than we have after switching. They basically changed it to be easier to teach to youbger kids to expand their target audience. It's al about the money. Now, all you have to do is make 21st level and the game is rediculous beyond compare. In 2nd edition I had games with 60th level characters, still epic mind you, but without that rediculous Epic Spellcasting crap.

JadedDM
2007-07-14, 02:27 PM
You know, it's funny. But I've been running 2nd Edition for years now, and the whole "but what if my fighter wants to pickpocket" thing has never come up. Ever. My players just seem to stick to their roles of their own accord. If a situation called for pickpocketing or sneaking, the fighter didn't even try. The thief would. If there was no thief, the party would hire one or have a caster use a spell that mimicked it--or failing that, just tried to go without it.

This leads to better teamwork, I think, because this way no player, regardless of class or abilities, attempts to do everything. Even the fighter with 18 DEX will stand aside and let the party thief shine when a situation comes up that requires stealth or slight-of-hand.

Matthew
2007-07-14, 02:32 PM
Heh, I think that is the default assumption of (A)D&D and the reason for a lack of explicit rules regarding those aspects.

However, I have definitely had occasion when a Fighter has wanted to sneak - or even worse a published adventure that says 'the party will need to be stealthy during section X'. So, I ended up with a more elaborate Proficiency System when I sought to codify rules to handle such events (because I wasn't happy with Attribute Checks).

Mike_G
2007-07-14, 04:09 PM
I knew you'd say that, Mike. In fact I have been waiting for you to weigh in with that exact example!


Yeah, I'm predictable sometimes.

I just hate the "Well, there doesn't need to be a rule, since the DM can make one up" argument, since most DM rulings I ever experienced were "Roll under your Dex" and that just doesn't mesh with the "percentile increasing by level" thing that Thieves had.



Of course, the Thief's ability to Hide in Shadows and Move Silently weren't the same things as 'conventional stealth', though they were pretty close. If I were going to have a Fighter use the above Abilities I would use the base percentages in the Thief entry, modified by Attribute and Race, as a guideline for the percentage chance. [i.e. unmodified 5% and 10% respectively].



See, that works, but I've had some math-impared DMs in my time, and it's nice that now I have my "Move Silently" skill written right there on my sheet, so there doesn't need to be an argument or spot ruling.



You know, it's funny. But I've been running 2nd Edition for years now, and the whole "but what if my fighter wants to pickpocket" thing has never come up. Ever. My players just seem to stick to their roles of their own accord. If a situation called for pickpocketing or sneaking, the fighter didn't even try. The thief would. If there was no thief, the party would hire one or have a caster use a spell that mimicked it--or failing that, just tried to go without it.


So Climbing or sneaking were never, ever useful for the non thieves? You never ran into a locked door or trapped corridor with the party thief unconscious or paralyzed or dead? Hard to place a classified add in the middle of the Tomb of Horrors



This leads to better teamwork, I think, because this way no player, regardless of class or abilities, attempts to do everything. Even the fighter with 18 DEX will stand aside and let the party thief shine when a situation comes up that requires stealth or slight-of-hand.

It's not that the Fighter ever wanted to replace the Thief, it's that sometimes, the wrong guy is in the right place at the right time, and there's no logical reason my Fighter couldn't try to sneak, or climb or whatnot. Having a mechanic for this is a GOOD THING. I will never understand how people think a comprehensive skill system is bad.

If we think rules stifle creativity, why have any system for combat or skills? Why not go diceless, like the Amber RPG and just pick what your character is good at and have the DM interpret success or failure?

MrNexx
2007-07-14, 10:36 PM
Sorry Nexx, you appear to be calculating Granted Powers Wrong:

For instance, Tenser's Transformation would be 32 Points [i.e. 10 (Base) + 10 (persistant) + 12 (Spell Level)]


Oops, so I did.



Tenser's Transformation is a hard one to adjudicate, since a persistant version isn't actually renewable, it's still only invoked once per week .

It doubles your Hit Points; while they function as temporary HP would in 3.x, that concept didn't really exist in 2.x, so doubled HP is doubled HP.


[I]Globe of Invulnerability is immobile, not at all sure how making that persistant would be helpful, since you are still casting it only once per week (though for an extra 10 Points you could cast it six times per day).

You know, we never played it as immobile? It was always "moves with caster".


Where are Invulnerability to Magical and Normal Weapons from? I cannot seem to find them in my PHB, Spells and Magic or Tome of Magic. [Edit] Ah found them, in The Complete Wizard's Handbook. I'm pretty sure they're immobile, since they are Area of Effect, unlike Protection from Evil 10' Radius, which is area of effect around the Caster. I suppose the ability to make a continuous one once a week could be handy, but not game breaking.

They actually are; I looked at the spells in the Wizard's Spell Compendium.

However, since it's as you said, let's go with a bit of recalc.

First of all, we start with an elf, because we want some abilities from them. We take Infravision (10), Resistance (10), Secret Doors, and Spell Abilities (15). That's a total of 40, leaving 5 as carry-over to the next stage.

Our class is cleric, because that gives us 125 CPs and a lot of options. But 125 CPs aren't worth all that much, so we get in a weirder place by taking restrictions... mostly on spellcasting, because I'm not intending on having much.

Awkward Casting Method +5
Difficult Spell Acquisition +5
Hazardous Spells +10
Limited Spell Selection +5
Reduced Spell Progression +15
Slower Casting Times +5
Talisman/Symbol +8

That's another 53 points right there. To justify these restrictions, I'll take Minor Access to All (3 points), which means I'm technically a spellcaster, and have 175 points to spend.

Now, we've got to worry about combat, since we want to equal to a fighter. Combat Bonus, Hit Point Bonus, Armor Class Improvement and Unarmed Combat Skills. I'll also add the restrictions of Armor Restriction (+15, no armor) and Weapon Restriction (+5, limiting me to staff, club, war hammer, horseman's mace and horseman's flail). My net cost is 50, and while I'm not quite on par with a fighter, at low levels I'll hold my own, and my granted powers are going to make up for it.

Let's start with a persistant Immune to Weapons (6th level Priest spell, Priest Spell Compendium, volume Two, page 347). That's 26 points. We'll also throw in Spell Shield (level 3 Priest spell, page 571 of the Priest Spell Compendium, Volume 2; +3 save, immune to Ill/Pha and Enc/Cha, and -1d2 from each damage die of spells). That's another 23 points. And let's also throw in a 4 times a day Stoneskin (4th level wizard spell), which is 26 more points. We're now at 75 points and, while we're not immune to all magic and weapons by 7th level, we're doing really well.

We've got 50 points left, now. We'll take Immunity to three types of Magic... Alterations, Invocations, and Necromancies. That means we're +7 to save against some of the most common attack magics, between this and Spell Ward, and can save against the unsavable spells. The last 5 points will let us use Rogue group proficiencies; between that and Priest, it covers a goodly number of them.

JadedDM
2007-07-15, 12:21 AM
I don't know if this makes any difference or not, but both Matthew and Mike mentioned published adventures (Tomb of Horrors) and I've never used one before.


So Climbing or sneaking were never, ever useful for the non thieves? You never ran into a locked door or trapped corridor with the party thief unconscious or paralyzed or dead?

There are rules for climbing with non-thieves in the DMG. But otherwise, nope. Like I said, if the party knew they were going to be in a position where there might be locked doors or trapped corridors, and they didn't all ready have a thief, they'd either recruit one or just find some other way around it (bash the lock, cast Silence or Invisibility, cast Detect Snares and Pits, etc.) I mean, why would they go into a dungeon at all without a thief? Unless they somehow didn't expect it. And just what are the odds of that (Surprise dungeon! That would be a funny thing for a random encounters table.)


I will never understand how people think a comprehensive skill system is bad.

I never said it was bad. I just said it's never been any kind of issue for me or my players.

MrNexx
2007-07-15, 01:46 AM
Yeah, I'm predictable sometimes.

I just hate the "Well, there doesn't need to be a rule, since the DM can make one up" argument, since most DM rulings I ever experienced were "Roll under your Dex" and that just doesn't mesh with the "percentile increasing by level" thing that Thieves had.

You see, that would also come down to the DM making a poor call. If it's going to be under Dex, why not use d%, instead of a d20? It may be slightly better than a 1st level thief (especially one who didn't put any points in it), but it's not going to overshadow their abilities.



So Climbing or sneaking were never, ever useful for the non thieves? You never ran into a locked door or trapped corridor with the party thief unconscious or paralyzed or dead? Hard to place a classified add in the middle of the Tomb of Horrors

Again, Mike:

Page 122 of Player's Handbook: Climbing
Page 118 of the DMG: Effects of Light Sources
Page 129 of the DMG: Listening

Can you climb it? 40% chance, modified by race. Can you be seen? Can you be heard? That depends on who's doing the looking, and where they're looking to and from.

That doesn't even include page 102 of the DMG, Surprise.

And if the party thief is unconscious, paralyzed, or dead? The party dwarf might be able to find things (50% chance to detect stonework traps; 66% to detect sliding walls). The party gnome might catch some of them (70% for unsafe walls, floors, and ceilings). Depending on the DM, you might be able to disable some traps, either through brute force, cleverness, or using some of your proficiencies.

What's a party to do in 3.5 if their rogue is unconscious, paralyzed, or dead? While a fighter may have put points in Disable Device, it's not common.


I will never understand how people think a comprehensive skill system is bad.

No one ever said having one was bad. However, not having one is not necessarily the sign that your game can't go on.

Matthew
2007-07-15, 08:31 AM
It doubles your Hit Points; while they function as temporary HP would in 3.x, that concept didn't really exist in 2.x, so doubled HP is doubled HP.

Hmmn. Yeah, I suppose. A difficult Spell to adjudicate all round in this context. The implication in the text is that when they are lost, they are lost, but I can see the justification for 'Healing' them back up afterwards.


You know, we never played it as immobile? It was always "moves with caster".

Yeah, I think the folks at Bioware had the same interpretation. I doubt you would have been the only group to have played it that way.


They actually are; I looked at the spells in the Wizard's Spell Compendium.

Immobile or not immobile? I don't have access to the Spell Compendiums and I'm not clear which you mean.


However, since it's as you said, let's go with a bit of recalc.

First of all, we start with an elf, because we want some abilities from them. We take Infravision (10), Resistance (10), Secret Doors, and Spell Abilities (15). That's a total of 40, leaving 5 as carry-over to the next stage.

Okay, Elves are badasses, after all (with or without Skills and Powers).


Our class is cleric, because that gives us 125 CPs and a lot of options. But 125 CPs aren't worth all that much, so we get in a weirder place by taking restrictions... mostly on spellcasting, because I'm not intending on having much.

Okay, so:

Awkward Casting Method (-5), Difficult Spell Acquisition (-5), Hazardous Spells (-10), Limited Spell Selection (-5), Reduced Spell Progression (-15), Slower Casting Times (-5), Talisman/Symbol (-8), Armour Restriction (-15), Weapon Restriction (-5).

125 + 73 = 198

Combat Bonus (20), Hit Point Bonus (10), Armor Class Improvement (15) and Unarmed Combat Skills (15), Minor Access All (3).

198 - 63 = 135.

Okay, so far:

Elven Priest
THAC0: [21 - (1 per Level, maximum 1 at Level 20)],
Armour Class: [10 - (1 per 2 Levels, maximum 2 at Level 16)],
Hit Points: 1D10 per Level,
Equipment: Staff,



Let's start with a persistant Immune to Weapons (6th level Priest spell, Priest Spell Compendium, volume Two, page 347). That's 26 points. We'll also throw in Spell Shield (level 3 Priest spell, page 571 of the Priest Spell Compendium, Volume 2; +3 save, immune to Ill/Pha and Enc/Cha, and -1d2 from each damage die of spells). That's another 23 points. And let's also throw in a 4 times a day Stoneskin (4th level wizard spell), which is 26 more points. We're now at 75 points and, while we're not immune to all magic and weapons by 7th level, we're doing really well.

Okay, now we're kind of out of my knowledge. I don't have access to the Spell Compendiums, so I will have to take your word for it. I suppose I could make a lame argument that they aren't in the Spell Index in Spells and Magic, but it would be weak at best.

So, we're looking at:

Level 1: Continuous Immunity to Weapons (1 per Week) (26)
Level 3: Continuous Spell Shield (1 per Week) (23)
Level 5: Stone Skin (4 per Day) (26)

135 - (26 + 23 + 26) = 60



We've got 50 points left, now. We'll take Immunity to three types of Magic... Alterations, Invocations, and Necromancies. That means we're +7 to save against some of the most common attack magics, between this and Spell Ward, and can save against the unsavable spells. The last 5 points will let us use Rogue group proficiencies; between that and Priest, it covers a goodly number of them.

I would probably have spent the last 15 Points (you miscounted, I think) on some Thief Abilities, rather than Cross Class Proficiencies.

Hmmn, that Immune to Weapons Spell from the Spell Compendium pretty much scuppers my thoughts on this, since that is blatantly overpowering at Level 1 (that is, if it does what it says on the tin). Indeed it is pretty much the signature ability of this build, all the rest is pretty much just window dressing. Without it, I would have said there were plenty of Multi Classed Fighter/Speciality Priests of similar power (and that the trade off was barely worth it).

All the same, one good Dispel Magic and things would go FUBAR for this guy at Levels 1 and 2, as he still can only cast Immune to Normal Weapons once per Week. You should probably pay the extra Six Character Points to cast it twice per day (or more) to be on the safe side.



I don't know if this makes any difference or not, but both Matthew and Mike mentioned published adventures (Tomb of Horrors) and I've never used one before.

Yeah, if you have never run a published adventure, then it might make a difference to your expectations.

Kiero
2007-07-15, 10:32 AM
I will never understand how people think a comprehensive skill system is bad.

Because "comprehensive" can mean overwrought, overcomplicated and far too granular. I can do quite adequately without skills at all, especially when there are already lots of other components of a character, but if I must have them, there should be less than twenty, broad ones.

MrNexx
2007-07-15, 11:35 AM
Immobile or not immobile? I don't have access to the Spell Compendiums and I'm not clear which you mean.

They're immobile.



Okay, now we're kind of out of my knowledge. I don't have access to the Spell Compendiums, so I will have to take your word for it. I suppose I could make a lame argument that they aren't in the Spell Index in Spells and Magic, but it would be weak at best.

That's where game-breakers make their time... plus, I was trying to do it quickly. Briefly, Immune to Weapons makes you immune to normal weapons until 12th level, +1 weapons after 12th, +2 after 12th, etc.

Even without those two powers, though, we'd dump more points into a stoneskin granted power, which isn't bad as a "immune to weapons" spell.



All the same, one good Dispel Magic and things would go FUBAR for this guy at Levels 1 and 2, as he still can only cast Immune to Normal Weapons once per Week. You should probably pay the extra Six Character Points to cast it twice per day (or more) to be on the safe side.

No, it doesn't; since they're constant granted powers, I don't think they'd go down with a Dispel Magic.

Matthew
2007-07-15, 11:55 AM
They're immobile.
Okay


That's where game-breakers make their time... plus, I was trying to do it quickly. Briefly, Immune to Weapons makes you immune to normal weapons until 12th level, +1 weapons after 12th, +2 after 12th, etc.

Even without those two powers, though, we'd dump more points into a stoneskin granted power, which isn't bad as a "immune to weapons" spell.

Too true. Granted Powers have a lot of potential here. I think they're a lot like Custom Magic Items in 3.x, though, in that they are subject to DM inclusion, rather than to DM exclusion. Not that it makes much of a difference.


No, it doesn't; since they're constant granted powers, I don't think they'd go down with a Dispel Magic.

That sounds doubtful to me. Persistant/Continuous is undefined, but I suspect that the fact that you can combine the effects with X/per day castings and that the base is 1/per week indicates that it's just the duration of the Spell that is Continuous, not the effects [i.e. you have to cast the Spell to have it be continuous, in which case it is subject to dis spelling.]

It all rather depends how you interpret this clause:


Regardless of the amount of points paid, a priest may not have a spell-like granted power of 6th or higher level and is limited to no more than one granted power per two levels—one at 1st level, one at 3rd, one at 5th, and so on. The DM should carefully review any proposed granted powers. Note that when the priest invokes a power, factors such as range, damage, duration, and other effects are determined as if he had actually cast the spell.

and how we define persistent/continuous:


Persistent spell effect (15 +2/spell level): The wizard may select one spell that he knows (and can cast) to have a persistent, permanent effect. He must give up one spell slot of the appropriate level, so a wizard who wants to have ESP as a persistent power must leave one 2nd-level spell slot empty. Only spells with noninstantaneous, nonspecial durations may be selected as persistent powers, and the spell must be one which affects the caster. By concentrating, the wizard may invoke the power and maintain it for as long
as he continues to concentrate. Changing the persistent spell requires a full week of uninterrupted work. If the wizard is struck by a dispel magic, the persistent effect fails.
First-level spells that are appropriate for persistent effects include: change self, chill touch, detect undead, feather fall, gaze reflection, jump, protection from evil, shield, spider climb, and ventriloquism.



Persistence
(Invocation/Evocation)
Range: 0 Components: V, S, M
Duration: 1 day/level Casting Time: 1 turn
Area of Effect: The caster Saving Throw: None
Subtlety: +6 Knockdown: None
Sensory: None Critical: None
Related to both the contingency and permanency spells, persistence allows a
wizard to cast a spell of 6th level or lower and then hold it until it is needed. There are two general uses for persistence: to use a personal spell effect as needed up to the maximum duration of the persistence itself, or to prepare an instantaneous spell and hold it ready until the caster wishes to use it.

A. Personal effect. Any spell that augments the wizard’s natural abilities—detect magic, protection from evil, jump, infravision, fly, wraithform, or other caster-affecting spells—can be made persistent by use of this spell. The wizard casts persistence and then immediately follows with the desired spell. Instead of taking effect immediately, the magic of the persistence holds it ready for use by a simple act of will. The wizard can then “turn on” or “turn off” the girded spell as often as he likes over the course of the duration of the persistence. The duration of the girded spell only runs while the spell is
active, so a 15th-level wizard who makes a fly spell persistent will be able to use 1d6+15 turns of flight (the normal duration of fly) over the next 15 days (the duration of the persistence) as he sees fit.
This is especially useful because it allows the wizard to cast the girded spell and the persistence and have the girded spell’s effects available while he then memorizes another spell in place of the spell made persistent. It is also useful because the girded spell can be activated instantly by an act of will. The main difference between this spell and contingency lies in the fact that a persistent spell may be invoked several times (up to the limit of its normal duration) while a contingency functions once only.

B. Held spell. Spells that have an instantaneous effect, such as most attack spells and some movement spells like teleport or dimension door, can be rendered persistent as well. The held spell may be activated or discharged at any time during the duration of the persistence, but its magic is then exhausted as if it had been cast normally. This resembles the effect of a contingency spell, but the effect has no predefined conditions and simply occurs when the caster wills it to. Damaging or offensive spells that have a duration (for example, flaming sphere or wall of fire) cannot be rendered persistent. A wizard may have no more than one persistence spell active at any given time; if he girds a new spell while an old one is still persistent, the old spell is simply replaced by the new one. The material component is a
crystal chalice of exquisite workmanship worth at least 2,000 gp.

The material component of a held or girded spell is expended when the spell is made persistent.


...or as a Magic Item, such as a Sword +1, which is also described as having 'persistent effects'.

I guess it would be up to the DM, but in my opinion, the text around the Ability Entry strongly suggests it can be dispelled.

AllisterH
2007-07-15, 12:14 PM
Again, Mike:

Page 122 of Player's Handbook: Climbing.
Page 118 of the DMG: Effects of Light Sources
Page 129 of the DMG: Listening

Can you climb it? 40% chance, modified by race. Can you be seen? Can you be heard? That depends on who's doing the looking, and where they're looking to and from..

That's not the entire story though. See page 160 of the 2E PHB (black cover). If you didn't use the NWP slot system, non-thieves simply couldn't climb the following Surfaces: Very Smooth, Smooth and cracked, Rough and Ice Walls (pg. 163, Table 67). Straight up, you had 0% chance. Basically, IIRC, in Dragon it was basically defined as "Could you as a player climb it? No, then unless you're a thief, your character couldn't" since this would've negated the use of the thief. Even if you did have the mountaineering proficiency, unless you had the tools to go with them, you became as effective as a non-thief.


.


And if the party thief is unconscious, paralyzed, or dead? The party dwarf might be able to find things (50% chance to detect stonework traps; 66% to detect sliding walls). The party gnome might catch some of them (70% for unsafe walls, floors, and ceilings). Depending on the DM, you might be able to disable some traps, either through brute force, cleverness, or using some of your proficiencies.

What's a party to do in 3.5 if their rogue is unconscious, paralyzed, or dead? While a fighter may have put points in Disable Device, it's not common.
.


I don't think that really answers the problem, I mean what happens if you're a human only party in 1e/2E in the above situation?

The 3.x version of a fighter in a situation can do every non-trained skill but he can't do it well versus an OPPOSED roll which I think is an improvement. For example, a high dex fighter with no ranks in Move Silently has a better than average chance of sneaking past the normal orc guards (low wis).

Take a look at the DC for many skills and honestly, most DCs are in the 10-20 range meaning that just having an above average score will do the job. The reason it seems like fighters can't do anything is because most "plot-defining" rolls are opposed rolls where the fighter is either facing something that has put a lot of skills ranks into or the creature has an absurbdly high attribute score.

Matthew
2007-07-15, 12:23 PM
Unclimbable Walls, aside (which I suppose in 3.x would be Walls with very high DCs).

As pointed out repeatedly in this Thread, a modified Attribute Check (which translates in 3.x terms to [1D20 + Attribute Score] to reach [DC 21 + Modifiers]) would suffice for any task where there was a risk of failure. If you were using First Edition, then you were instructed to simply assign a Probability for anything not covered by the rules.

As Mike has indicated, it did require a reliable and consistant DM and there was no mechanical way to 'get more skilled', but the mechanic itself did exist (and worked more or less the same as a 3.x Skill Check).

[Edit] Also, if you really felt you needed to, you could create Sneaking and Hiding Non Weapon Proficiencies (as per the DMG guidelines) and get better at them via Non Weapon Proficiency Slots.

MrNexx
2007-07-15, 03:14 PM
That's not the entire story though. See page 160 of the 2E PHB (black cover). If you didn't use the NWP slot system, non-thieves simply couldn't climb the following Surfaces: Very Smooth, Smooth and cracked, Rough and Ice Walls (pg. 163, Table 67). Straight up, you had 0% chance. Basically, IIRC, in Dragon it was basically defined as "Could you as a player climb it? No, then unless you're a thief, your character couldn't" since this would've negated the use of the thief. Even if you did have the mountaineering proficiency, unless you had the tools to go with them, you became as effective as a non-thief.

So, 3e terms, a non-thief can't climb DC 25-30 walls (since the ice walls would be slippery)? You know, unless they make them climbable via ropes.



I don't think that really answers the problem, I mean what happens if you're a human only party in 1e/2E in the above situation?

Then your party lacks the necessary diversity. A big part of being in a party is having a diversity of skills and talents so you can succeed.

AllisterH
2007-07-16, 04:00 AM
So, 3e terms, a non-thief can't climb DC 25-30 walls (since the ice walls would be slippery)? You know, unless they make them climbable via ropes..

Ah, but that's a choice your character makes. You decide you don't want to be skilled at climbing, and better yet, you can change it during the course of the game. As I pointed out, it didn't matter if you were a 1st level cleric or a 20th level fighter, you simply couldn't do it thus a DC 20+ means nothing.



Then your party lacks the necessary diversity. A big part of being in a party is having a diversity of skills and talents so you can succeed.

But since when should RACE play such an important factor? What happens if you're playing a post-LotR age where there are no elves running around? Or if your campaign setting simply has no dwarves? I don't think race should play that big a deal. More importantly, most DMs wouldn't factor in the effect of race on mechanical aspects of the game. Role-playing aspects, sure? But a DM that actually balanced encounters based on things like the infravision or the lack of it, were rare. TSR in their modules certainly didn't.

As for Sp&M, the real abuse wasn't there. It was the specialty priests of Faith & Avatars which you had to look out for. The Complete Priest's Handbook resulted in worse clerics than the standard cleric (and regularly ranked damn near the bottom of r.g.f.d list of "Rank the complete handbook" list) so you didn't hav to worry about priest kits but oh, my Specialty Priests of Mystra? Ok, now we're talking problems

MrNexx
2007-07-16, 05:47 AM
Ah, but that's a choice your character makes. You decide you don't want to be skilled at climbing, and better yet, you can change it during the course of the game. As I pointed out, it didn't matter if you were a 1st level cleric or a 20th level fighter, you simply couldn't do it thus a DC 20+ means nothing.

Rope Use proficiency: 1 slot for everyone.
Mountaineering Proficiency: 1 slot for Fighters, Rangers, Paladins, Bards, and Druids (Bard's don't need it, but still). 2 Slots for Wizards, Clerics, and Thieves.



But since when should RACE play such an important factor?

Fine, I declare you a porpoise. Turn in your opposable thumbs and speech-capable voice-box at the door. On the upside, you can swim, and hold your breath longer, and echo-locate in water.


As for Sp&M, the real abuse wasn't there. It was the specialty priests of Faith & Avatars which you had to look out for. The Complete Priest's Handbook resulted in worse clerics than the standard cleric (and regularly ranked damn near the bottom of r.g.f.d list of "Rank the complete handbook" list) so you didn't hav to worry about priest kits but oh, my Specialty Priests of Mystra? Ok, now we're talking problems

Yeah, the specialty priests were pretty broken, with far too little control on them.

Matthew
2007-07-16, 05:51 AM
Er, wait a second, let's look at the 3.x Climb rules before we start making wild assertions about the virtues of X versus Y.

First of all, in 3.x a perfectly smooth surface is unclimbable (it is listed as DC -). In (A)D&D, a Thief can attempt to climb such a surface.

Second, (A)D&D climbing surfaces classified as Smooth and Rough are equivalent to DC 25 (to judge from the parallel descriptions). That pretty much makes them unclimbable in 3.x without some Ranks in the appropriate Skill (or a significant Strength Bonus). That (A)D&D requires additionally that a Character with Mountaineering also have the 'appropriate' equipment is hardly a fanciful idea.

2.x Mountaineering Proficiency is pretty much exactly the same as 3.x Climb 2(2). You can sink extra Proficiency Slots into Mountaineering to improve the Proficiency (or Character Points if you are using Skills and Powers):


Mountaineering: A character with this proficiency can make difficult and dangerous climbs up steep slopes and cliffs with the aid of spikes, ropes, etc. If a character with mountaineering proficiency leads a party, placing the pitons (spikes) and guiding the others, all in the party can gain the benefit of his knowledge. A mountaineer can guide a party up a cliff face it could not otherwise climb. A character with this proficiency gains a 10% bonus per proficiency slot spent to his chance to climb any surface. Note that mountaineering is not the same as the thief's climbing ability, since the latter does not require aids of any sort.

So, let's take a look at the chances of an average Level 1 Human Character to climb a Tree under both systems.


(A)D&D 2.x:
Characters without Mountaineering have an 80% Chance [40% Base + 40% for abundent Hand Holds]
Characters with Mountaineering have a 90% Chance and with 2 Slots 100%.

In the latter case the DM need not even call for a roll if he considers that action to be 'routine'. Furthermore, he need not even use the Climbing Rules at all if he wants to make the action an Attribute Check.

D&D 3.x
Characters without Climb have to meet DC 15 with a +0 Modifier (i.e. they have a 30% Chance).
Characters with Climb 4(4) have a 50% Chance.
Characters with Climb 4(4+X) via Skill focus or a high Strength Score have a 100% Chance to climb a Tree (i.e. by 'Taking 10').

Now, personally, I don't really see a lot of difference between these two systems. Sure, Skills are more customisable in 3.x than 2.x Proficiencies (without Skills and Powers), but the actual ins and outs of what can and cannot be done remain more or less the same.

Which system is better? I don't think one is 'better' than the other. Both are pretty poor mechanically without significant DM interaction.

[Edit] Darn, Nexx Ninja'd me.


As for Sp&M, the real abuse wasn't there. It was the specialty priests of Faith & Avatars which you had to look out for. The Complete Priest's Handbook resulted in worse clerics than the standard cleric (and regularly ranked damn near the bottom of r.g.f.d list of "Rank the complete handbook" list) so you didn't hav to worry about priest kits but oh, my Specialty Priests of Mystra? Ok, now we're talking problems



Yeah, the specialty priests were pretty broken, with far too little control on them

Whoah, what? The Complete Priest's Handbook allowed for very similar Spell like Abilities as Spells and Magic. All it took was one overpowered Priesthood to make a Speciality Priest more powerful than a Cleric (such as Priests of Mystara) and the guidance was *very* general.

AllisterH
2007-07-16, 12:03 PM
Whoah, what? The Complete Priest's Handbook allowed for very similar Spell like Abilities as Spells and Magic. All it took was one overpowered Priesthood to make a Speciality Priest more powerful than a Cleric (such as Priests of Mystara) and the guidance was *very* general.

There was a reason why many of us on r.g.f.d (back when TSR still existed) ranked the Complete Priest's Handbook as the worse since basically you ended up with the equivalent of the CW samurai (a.k.a, "why the hell don't I just play a regular fighter?")

F&A, while arguably the greatest campaign accessory of 2E, had serious balance problems. Even with the higher XP table, some of those specialty priests (I'm looking at you Mystra) were just plain too damn strong.

Don't actually force me to search for my copy of Sp&M as I remember once writing down the points total of my favourite F&A deity (go Selune's Moonstars!!) and even she came over the limit by a decent margin and I think I have the points total for a couple of other ones in my book. :smallbiggrin: Mystra was just obscene....

re: Mountaineering
Mountaineering was an optional system as was the entire NWP system as I knew many 1E DMs from r.g.f.d that secondary skills were all that was needed.

(I kind of miss those 1e vs 2e debates from r.g.f.d. True, I was a 2E man myself all the way but those 1E people had some good points like the "renaming" of devils and demons and the fact that while almost impossible to find anything in the 1E DMG (index? What's an index?) it was way superior than the 2E version)

Another weird thing about Mountaineering was that it was the only skill/nwp that actually could be improved over the course of a character's life (I actually have had to look through my 2E PHB which I don't think has been opened in YEARS, geez, there are so many scribbles/writings/pictures by me in it...)

NWPs seem to exist in a weird state between being skills and feats. For example, both Blindfight and Track would be considered feats (wasn't someone mentioning earlier in the thread that a player of his was resentful since he needed Track in 3E and wouldn't in earlier editions? That doesn't appear to be true since looking at the NWP, only rangers and people with the Track NWP could actually Track something) whereas Mountaineering would be a skill. The Skills & Powers version was such a better system.

re: Core 2E.
What exactly was core 2E anyway? I don't know of anyone that actually played core-only 2E, however the original poster wanted to know what 2E was like and 2E core is vastly different than 2E + handbooks which itself vastly different than 2E + the PO series. For example, Complete Warrior the 3E melee splatbook is nothing more than an expansion of the 3E PHB. Its got feats, PrC and weapons which all appear in the core-game. Compare this with Complete Fighter's Handbook where Fighting Styles are an entirely different mechanic and C&T which introduced the AoO system.
The closest analogue to 2e + noncore would be 3e+ToM and ToB as both accessories introduce new mechanics. to the game.

re: Ability Check
Your default system of resolving things was the ability check system a la the NWP check system?. No offense, but that sucked big monkey balls. :smallwink: Oh how I hated that...What I remember defaulting to was the thief system and basically 9 times out of 10, that covered any unknown situation.

re: Magic
I don't think magic has gotten more powerful which a lot of people admittedly think rather I believe that it has changed. Some problematic spells still exist (people complain about the headaches about polymorph in 3E but what about the 1st level spell Chromatic Orb from 2E? 1st level spells should not scale that powerful that you can 1 shot grand wyrms)

For example, if you're a 3E 20th level mage, nobody bothers using a 3rd level fireball against the BBEG as a) the damage cap of 10, b) the fact that the BBEG has way more HP and c) the fact that it was more easily resisted due to the spell DC.

In 2E, that same 20th level mage can potentially end battles with a couple of 3rd level spell as the above drawbacks don't apply AND the added effect of vastly lower hp (20HD character in 2E, 90 Hp on average whereas I've seen 15th level 3E wizards with more HP). Magic Resistance was introduced not to screw over the Save or Die spells (since pretty much high HD characters would make their saves) but to nerf the power of the evocation school.

The real difference is that people actually use those different spells but then again I hate the SoD nature of some of those spells. Hmm...I hate the fact that a single simple die roll will determine the end of an epic adventure in 3E but I also hate the fact that in 2E, in epic adventures, the only spells ever used were evocation spells.

Then there are the spells which irrespective of editions are just strong. Ex: Ott's irrestible Dance in 3E is just plain mean but in 2E, it was actually even worse since unlike 3E, ALL of your saving throws were affected not just reflex and you didn't even have to make a touch attack, just be in melee range.

Some spells though got evened up which in effect powered them up. Ex: Gate no longer ages you but then since it was a fixed value, elven wizards could throw Gate spells left right and centre since what was 5 years to an elf?

re: Race
I disagree with having Race having such a mechanical influence on the game especially since without fail, it always made humans worthless to play. The system had so many damn features favouring demihumans that admittedly unless one played a paladin, noone took human. Multiclassing was superior, being a demihuman was mechanically "better" at low levels and nobody seemed to enforce the demihuman limits.

MrNexx
2007-07-16, 12:59 PM
There was a reason why many of us on r.g.f.d (back when TSR still existed) ranked the Complete Priest's Handbook as the worse since basically you ended up with the equivalent of the CW samurai (a.k.a, "why the hell don't I just play a regular fighter?")

F&A, while arguably the greatest campaign accessory of 2E, had serious balance problems. Even with the higher XP table, some of those specialty priests (I'm looking at you Mystra) were just plain too damn strong.

I agree with this; while the world information from the F&A series was great... 3e's Faith's and Pantheons is a pale shadow... the Specialty Priests were too powerful.



re: Mountaineering
Mountaineering was an optional system as was the entire NWP system as I knew many 1E DMs from r.g.f.d that secondary skills were all that was needed.

I think we had some very different experiences; my DM was pure 2nd edition (i.e. never played 1st), so proficiencies were his thing. Even if you have secondary skills, though, choosing the correct one would give you a good number of abilities.


re: Core 2E.
What exactly was core 2E anyway? I don't know of anyone that actually played core-only 2E

We played full-core 2e before Combat and Tactics came out.

re: Ability Check
Your default system of resolving things was the ability check system a la the NWP check system?. No offense, but that sucked big monkey balls. :smallwink: Oh how I hated that...What I remember defaulting to was the thief system and basically 9 times out of 10, that covered any unknown situation.



re: Race
I disagree with having Race having such a mechanical influence on the game especially since without fail, it always made humans worthless to play. The system had so many damn features favouring demihumans that admittedly unless one played a paladin, noone took human. Multiclassing was superior, being a demihuman was mechanically "better" at low levels and nobody seemed to enforce the demihuman limits.

One of the things that I loved about 3.x is that they made humans an attractive character choice, and they did so in a way that made sense with their fluff text. However, that does not mean that I think race shouldn't have an impact on such things.

nagora
2007-07-16, 01:07 PM
I do believe most everybody houseruled AD&D combat rounds to <10 seconds because 60 seconds really doesn't make any sense. At any rate, given that combat is as abstract as it is, I haven't seen it making a big difference except flavor-wise.

I never encountered anyone in the decade I was playing 1st edition on a weekly basis who changed the length of a combat round. It simply worked well most of the time, and better as level increased. It failed badly on rare occasions, at which point the Dm could step in and say "that's silly; here's what really happens" (hit points shared this characteristic). One minute rounds worked well and the reasons for them were explained in detail in the DMG.

Throwing out the 1 minute rounds and almost forcing the use of minis is one of the biggest blunders in 3rd ed.

nagora
2007-07-16, 01:33 PM
Kits are class variants, basically. In 3.x, two characters with the same obscure class (variant) can, and usually will, still be very different mechanically. Can the same be said about AD&D and characters with the same kit?

Does it have to be? Our group had two fighters: 12th level and 13th level. In 1st edition they were mechanically almost identical; in actual fact they were played totally differently. Different characters, different styles, different roles. More mechanics can get in the way of the role-playing.


And there's the matter of advancing your character. In DND 3.x, most characters gain more options as they level up. From what I know, in AD&D you only get better at what you do (apart from casters who get access to higher spells) - no new features to play with.

Social power usually grows with time and increasing renown which gives many new features to play with. Skills and feats are really just toys compared to hacking out your own kingdom in the borderlands between two rival empires.


PS. I find DM fiat as a rule ridiculous in a game you have to pay for. It's okay in something free and homebrew, but commercial RPGs should have a well-designed world and a well-designed set of rules.

A well designed world is fine if you pay for it, but a good set of rules should never hogtie the DM.

AllisterH
2007-07-16, 01:54 PM
I agree with this; while the world information from the F&A series was great... 3e's Faith's and Pantheons is a pale shadow... the Specialty Priests were too powerful.
.

To this day, Faith & Avatars is the only RPG accessory I actually have read from start to finish non-stop. I always jump to certain sections that I find interesting (new spells, new NPCs etc) in RPG products or I put down the book to get lunch/telephone but I started reading the "History of the gods" with how Ao formed Selune and Shar and I didn't put it down till I read the last entry which I think was the Shaman class (my F&A has literally fallen apart over use).

It really was that good (oh how Faith & Pantheons blew monkey chunks compared to F&A) and I remember it was the only accessory to ever be universeally praised in rec.games.frp.dnd. While a lot of the actual SP were too strong, the ideas/examples they gave inspired many a DM.

Frankly, this was "THE Priest's Handbook" and not that waste of ink and paper.

Matthew
2007-07-16, 02:04 PM
There was a reason why many of us on r.g.f.d (back when TSR still existed) ranked the Complete Priest's Handbook as the worse since basically you ended up with the equivalent of the CW samurai (a.k.a, "why the hell don't I just play a regular fighter?")

F&A, while arguably the greatest campaign accessory of 2E, had serious balance problems. Even with the higher XP table, some of those specialty priests (I'm looking at you Mystra) were just plain too damn strong.

I still don't quite understand what you're saying here. The Kits weren't up to much, but the plethora of pregenerated Speciality Priesthoods seemed fine to me. Faiths and Avatars would be as unlikely to match up to Core (A)D&D as Drizzt's stats, I would imagine.


Don't actually force me to search for my copy of Sp&M as I remember once writing down the points total of my favourite F&A deity (go Selune's Moonstars!!) and even she came over the limit by a decent margin and I think I have the points total for a couple of other ones in my book. :smallbiggrin: Mystra was just obscene....

Yeah, none too surprising. Monstrous Mythology contained the same sort of thing.


re: Mountaineering
Mountaineering was an optional system as was the entire NWP system as I knew many 1E DMs from r.g.f.d that secondary skills were all that was needed.

Yep, Mountaineering was optional, but it was also a Secondary Skill. However, the Climbing Rules weren't optional, they just incorporated the possibility that you might be using Secondary Skills or Mountaineering.


(I kind of miss those 1e vs 2e debates from r.g.f.d. True, I was a 2E man myself all the way but those 1E people had some good points like the "renaming" of devils and demons and the fact that while almost impossible to find anything in the 1E DMG (index? What's an index?) it was way superior than the 2E version)

Yep, there's much to love in the old First Edition Manuals.


Another weird thing about Mountaineering was that it was the only skill/nwp that actually could be improved over the course of a character's life (I actually have had to look through my 2E PHB which I don't think has been opened in YEARS, geez, there are so many scribbles/writings/pictures by me in it...)

Nah, that's just plain wrong. Any and all Non Weapon Proficiencies could be improved by expending another slot on them. Nobody ever did in our group, to my knowledge, but there you go. Basically, it was a modifier to the Ability Check.


NWPs seem to exist in a weird state between being skills and feats. For example, both Blindfight and Track would be considered feats (wasn't someone mentioning earlier in the thread that a player of his was resentful since he needed Track in 3E and wouldn't in earlier editions? That doesn't appear to be true since looking at the NWP, only rangers and people with the Track NWP could actually Track something) whereas Mountaineering would be a skill. The Skills & Powers version was such a better system.

Skills and Powers did indeed present a clearer system (and wasn't the first to do so, Dragon was full of revised Proficiency Rules). Blind Fighting I can see as a Feat, but Track, not so much.


re: Core 2E.
What exactly was core 2E anyway? I don't know of anyone that actually played core-only 2E, however the original poster wanted to know what 2E was like and 2E core is vastly different than 2E + handbooks which itself vastly different than 2E + the PO series. For example, Complete Warrior the 3E melee splatbook is nothing more than an expansion of the 3E PHB. Its got feats, PrC and weapons which all appear in the core-game. Compare this with Complete Fighter's Handbook where Fighting Styles are an entirely different mechanic and C&T which introduced the AoO system.
The closest analogue to 2e + noncore would be 3e+ToM and ToB as both accessories introduce new mechanics. to the game.

Core 2E, by the end, was the PHB + DMG + MM. Within those books, anything labelled optional was optional. The only Non Optional Core Sub Classes were Fighter, Cleric, Mage and Thief. There would be no Specialisation and no Proficiencies at all. However, 'Core Books' in the sense of 'Non Campaign Specific' were much more numerous; pretty much anything without a Campaign Logo on it.


re: Ability Check
Your default system of resolving things was the ability check system a la the NWP check system?. No offense, but that sucked big monkey balls. :smallwink: Oh how I hated that...What I remember defaulting to was the thief system and basically 9 times out of 10, that covered any unknown situation.

Now, now, I didn't say that. I said it was the system's default mechanic. The important paragraph in the First Edition DMG about how to adjudicate unlegislated events (i.e. assign a percentage) was unfortunately cut, and only a slim reference in the Secondary Skills section remained.

However, Attribute Checks, as I have said were no big deal anyway. In Third Edition terms they look like this:

Default DC for any task with risk of failure = 21

DM modifies the DC in accordance with the difficulty and other 'circumstances'.

Roll 1D20 and add the relevant Attribute.

AllisterH
2007-07-16, 02:20 PM
The problem I had with the Priest's handbook was that the kits basically nerfed the cleric (and this was when the cleric was only seen as a healbot as the original Tome of Magic with the new spheres hadn't come out as yet IIRC)

Basically, the guidelines basically would result in a priest that was "mechanically weaker" than the core cleric. For example, a martial cleric (a.k.a I can use bladed weapons) gave up way too many spheres for that "privlege".

While the campaign advice and discussion on religion was nice, the priest's handbook was superseded in EVERY way (discussion of religion in the campaign world, integrating new mthologies into your world, designing new priesthoods) by F&A.

Sure, some of the SP from F&A needed to be nerfed (Azuth's SP were no slouches either, what is it with the gods of magic having such strong SP?) but everything surrounding that was all kinds of awesomeness.:smallbiggrin:

Matthew
2007-07-16, 11:07 PM
Yeah, that wasn't the Kits (which were by and large ineffective), but the Speciality Priesthoods, which yanked two thirds of the Spheres available, in general.

Monster Mythology completely blew all that away with suped up Speciality Priests with tons of Spheres.

What was good about The Complete Priest's Handbook was that it offered some guidelines. For the most part I used 'combined Priesthoods', adding together the Specialities to make Priesthoods of similar power to Clerics. I forgot that was what I had done.

Kurald Galain
2007-07-17, 04:25 AM
If you didn't use the NWP slot system, non-thieves simply couldn't climb the following Surfaces: Very Smooth, Smooth and cracked, Rough and Ice Walls
How is that different from saying that only rogues can find/remove traps with DC 21 and up? Or indeed any task that has a DC that is effectively outside your dice range? Or saying that a 10th-level highly intelligent wizard with a huge library can't use the legend lore ability of a 1st-level bard?



Take a look at the DC for many skills and honestly, most DCs are in the 10-20 range meaning that just having an above average score will do the job.
No, having an above average score will randomly do the job some of the time.



Ah, but that's a choice your character makes. You decide you don't want to be skilled at climbing, and better yet, you can change it during the course of the game.
In 2e, you can take a level in thief, easy as pie. Most races allow a fighter/thief combo, and multiclassing in 2e is easier than in 3e. Still a choice your character makes.



But since when should RACE play such an important factor?
Er, hello, most obviously defining characteristic of any character?



re: Magic
I don't think magic has gotten more powerful which a lot of people admittedly think rather I believe that it has changed.
True. In 1e, many spells were written simply with dungeon-crawling in mind, and have silly side effects when used in social situations. This is improved slightly, but not that much, in 2e. For instance, invisibility lasts 24 hours. For another, ESP as written (now Detect Thoughts) lets you read people's mind, which means that in most published modules the bad guys will have some Amulet of Protection From ESP or it'll ruin the plot.



Any and all Non Weapon Proficiencies could be improved by expending another slot on them.
True, but that gave you a whopping +1 on your checks, which is why nobody ever found it worth the trouble.

Speaking of kits, I found them varying wildly between books. In many books they were mostly about flavor - but for instance the complete bard's handbook kits were mostly about tacking on more and more powers.

MrNexx
2007-07-17, 04:59 AM
Speaking of kits, I found them varying wildly between books. In many books they were mostly about flavor - but for instance the complete bard's handbook kits were mostly about tacking on more and more powers.

Gotta speak up for my CBH. It was not about tacking on more and more powers; if you looked at the "True Bard" kit, and the features common to all bards, most of the kits replaced things about the standard bard, not added to it.

Every bard, as a standard, got spell progression, thief abilities, using any written magic item at 10th level, and followers at 9th level. From there, each bard kit got four NWPs and four Special abilities.

For example, the True Bard got the NWPs of Singing, Musical Instrument, Reading/Writing, and Local History; this is straight out of the PH. They got the Special Benefits of Influence Reactions, Rally Allies, Counter Song and Legend Lore... all of the abilities of the PH Bard.

The Blade got Reading/Writing, Local History, Blind Fighting and Juggling for his NWPs; their special abilities were Weapons Display, Handle Weapon, Trick Throw and Defensive/Offensive Spin... but they lost the standard ability to use any written magical item, and had NONE of the True Bard's abilities, except those that were common to all bards.

Matthew
2007-07-17, 07:53 AM
True, but that gave you a whopping +1 on your checks, which is why nobody ever found it worth the trouble.

Absolutely. Good for NPCs, though, since they were just allocated as many Non Weapon Proficiency Slots as was appropriate, which meant you could actually hire specialist NPCs who were better at stuff than PCs, but still 0 Level.


Speaking of kits, I found them varying wildly between books. In many books they were mostly about flavor - but for instance the complete bard's handbook kits were mostly about tacking on more and more powers.

They were indeed very variable. For instance, the Bounty Hunter, Thug and Scout Kits all provided mechanical improvements, whilst the Spy and Investigator Kits were just window dressing. There was a greater propensity to have Kits make mechanical changes after the four basic books (Fighter, Thief, Priest and Wizard). For the most part, I didn't use them, but there were exceptions.

nagora
2007-07-17, 02:11 PM
The ad hoc rulings almost never factored in level, so 1st level Thieves generally were worse at their skills than the guy who said "My Fighter tries to sneak," and got a Dex check ruling, unless the DM really worked at it.

Rule of thumb here was: if a thief can do it and you're not a thief then you have half the chance a thief with your level and ability scores would have. Same applied to tracking and such; ad-hoc was never better than 50% of a professional of the same level, often less. Not that it ever came up that often to really matter.


So, Attribute bonus + Skill ranks + situational mods vs DC is a nice, easy system that is consistent and generally works, rewarding those who put points into skills, but allowing those who didn't a chance.

It's one of my favorite things about 3e.

It's one of my least favorite things; it dilutes the concept of classes too much and tends to lead to playing the stats rather than the character, IMHO. A D&D skills system needs to be simpler and more class-based, I feel. The skill system in 3ed looks like it wandered in from some other (prefectly reasonable) game.

I'm just about to start a 1st ed campaign set in 800AD England and I'm toying with adding in a skills system. I'm not convinced it matters enough but we have two younger players who probably expect to have skills and haven't played D&D before.

On the other hand, we rarely roll dice any more in our games (outside of combat, which is itself very rare) so it might just be a case of having/not having a skill and not bothering with any rating score at all.

Matthew
2007-07-18, 03:37 PM
It's one of my least favorite things; it dilutes the concept of classes too much and tends to lead to playing the stats rather than the character, IMHO. A D&D skills system needs to be simpler and more class-based, I feel. The skill system in 3ed looks like it wandered in from some other (prefectly reasonable) game.

I don't know about this. I mean, it looks almost exactly the same as an Attribute/Proficiency Check.