When did balance become such a big deal?

[Rutee]

Dominate can do most things, and the old-school Tremere basically could cook up a ritual for any conceivable purpose.

Then of course there's Mages, who really can do anything.

No, Dominate is limitted to "Things that can be accomplished quickly by people with low Resolve + Blood Potency"

And Mages are balanced; Against other Mages. Who they're supposed to be playing with. Also Magic as a whole has trouble making you an effective direct combatant. Forces, Matter, and Fate are good at it, but Forces, especially, can have trouble in non-combat roles.

[Dan_Hemmens]

Nonetheless, not an RPG, and a wargame that tells you to destroy the Chaos Gate in X rounds is still very much a wargame.

So how is a D&D adventure, in which you have X in-character days to destroy the Gate to Baator different to a Warhammer Battle in which you have X turns of combat to destroy a Chaos Gate?


Well, the units have more fluff, perhaps, courtesy of Games Workshop. I doubt the IG Dirt Farmer unit from the planet of Dirtopia has more player-provided background.

I think you'd be surprised. And anyway, you aren't comparing like with like: a single player in 40K will control an army containing dozens of models. I'm damned sure that the Dirtopian Dirt Warrior unit has a whole lot more background than the Party Cleric's Wand of Cure Light Wounds.

[horseboy]

Well, the units have more fluff, perhaps, courtesy of Games Workshop. I doubt the IG Dirt Farmer unit from the planet of Dirtopia has more player-provided background.Yes, yes it does. Wish I had a stable OS so I still had my file on the Spear of Mist and Shadow to share. :smallfrown:

[Mr. Friendly]

Sorry for being overly snark, but I'm overreactive to arbitrary claims about this or that system sucking "because I say so". It's a result of seeing too many WFRPG fanboys bashing D&D with no knowledge about it.

And I could say that sentence, word for word, by replacing D&D with 4e and WFRPG fanboys with 3.X fanboys. :smallbiggrin:

I've played WFRPG, it's an ok system but it gets even clunkier than 3.X does.

[Morty]

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=74621

I'd hardly call bunch of people from not all that big forum representative.


In tournament play they want 3/4 page back story of your army, for which you get scored on.

Strange. Personally, I don't consider backstory all that important anyway, regardless of what I play. I like to define my character by what he or she does in-game, not via long-winded backstory.


I'm not talking about WFRPG, I'm talking about the actual miniature based war game.

Yeah, I know. What I meant by mentioning WFRPG, is that I've seen too many elitist WFRPG players bashing D&D and its players while showing utter ignorance about it at the same time. Which is why I'm easily annoyed by RPG 1 vs. RPG 2 discussions.


And I could say that sentence, word for word, by replacing D&D with 4e and WFRPG fanboys with 3.X fanboys.

You could substitute everything for "WFRPG" and "D&D" here. And it wouldn't even have to be RPGs. It still doesn't change anything.

[Dan_Hemmens]

No, Dominate is limitted to "Things that can be accomplished quickly by people with low Resolve + Blood Potency"

Since "people with low Resolve + Blood Potency" includes the President of the United States, I'd say it can still do a fair old amount. Certainly I'd rather invest my XP in that than in, say, buying a level in every Skill on the list, or boosting a couple of my Attributes.


And Mages are balanced; Against other Mages. Who they're supposed to be playing with. Also Magic as a whole has trouble making you an effective direct combatant. Forces, Matter, and Fate are good at it, but Forces, especially, can have trouble in non-combat roles.

Which is much like D&D magic.

The point is that Vampire isn't more balanced than D&D, it just has less requirement to be balanced. You aren't supposed to be able to eyeball a vampire character and get an immediate idea of exactly the kinds of events that could reasonably challenge him.

[Rutee]

Since "people with low Resolve + Blood Potency" includes the President of the United States, I'd say it can still do a fair old amount. Certainly I'd rather invest my XP in that than in, say, buying a level in every Skill on the list, or boosting a couple of my Attributes.
The president also isn't capable of doing things quickly. Getting to him would, through use of Dominate, would burn more Vitae then you could possibly have until extremely high Blood Potency. It also assumes that there simply aren't other supernaturals in the white house, which is likely an unreasonable assumption. It is far superior to have a dot or two less in disciplines, and then have mundane skills that back them up. If we were talking Changelings or Magi, there might be other factors, but see below.




Which is much like D&D magic.
Right up to the point hwere DnD magic is supposed to play fair with people who can't cast spells. You say "It's unbalanced". I ask you what your measuring stick is; To be unbalanced, you have to be better then something that there's a system expectation to be equal to. What is a Mage supposed to be equal to, that it is not?

[Dan_Hemmens]

The president also isn't capable of doing things quickly. Getting to him would, through use of Dominate, would burn more Vitae then you could possibly have until extremely high Blood Potency. It also assumes that there simply aren't other supernaturals in the white house, which is likely an unreasonable assumption. It is far superior to have a dot or two less in disciplines, and then have mundane skills that back them up. If we were talking Changelings or Magi, there might be other factors, but see below.

Dominate uses Vitae now? Dang I'm out of touch. I'm a Masquerade player.


Right up to the point hwere DnD magic is supposed to play fair with people who can't cast spells. You say "It's unbalanced". I ask you what your measuring stick is; To be unbalanced, you have to be better then something that there's a system expectation to be equal to. What is a Mage supposed to be equal to, that it is not?

I think this is one of those "Autumn is better! Fall is better!" conversations.

Vampire doesn't pretend that 17XP invested in Disciplines will be just as useful as 17XP invested in skills. It's not more balanced than D&D, but it doesn't matter because it's not trying to be.

In Vampire, if one player puts all their points into combat skills, and the other puts all their points into social skills, it's up to the GM to make sure that combat-guy gets as much screen time as social-guy. In D&D, the GM isn't supposed to need to do that. The Fighter should have a protected role in the group which the wizard can't horn in on.

[Mr. Friendly]

Anyway... getting back to the topic at hand...

Why is balance a bad thing? Why does there seem to be (to me anyway) a push to turn 'balance' into a dirty word? Did I miss a memo? Is D&D supposed to realistically and accurately depict life in a pseudo-medieval setting? Or is it supposed to depict larger than life characters kicking in doors, killing the bad guys and (if they live) walking away with treasure and glory?

If it is the former, then yeah, balance is sort of irrelevant since you should be playing a farmer who will die at age 30 (if you live that long). If it is the latter, then balance is important, since everyone should have a chance to kill stuff and get their share of loot and glory.

[horseboy]

Since "people with low Resolve + Blood Potency" includes the President of the United States, I'd say it can still do a fair old amount. Certainly I'd rather invest my XP in that than in, say, buying a level in every Skill on the list, or boosting a couple of my Attributes.Attributes and abilities are there to give disciplines uses. You don't attack with your celerity. You attack with your brawl and dex. Obfuscate will let you wonder around unseen, but what are you doing there? You need a good awareness and Perception to be able to spy well.

Which is much like D&D magic.

The point is that Vampire isn't more balanced than D&D, it just has less requirement to be balanced. You aren't supposed to be able to eyeball a vampire character and get an immediate idea of exactly the kinds of events that could reasonably challenge him.What makes you say that? If you can't eyeball a character and tell what will be a reasonable challenge to them then either the system is non-functional or you've got a bad GM/DM/ST

Oh, Rutee you left out Life and Entropy.

[Dan_Hemmens]

Attributes and abilities are there to give disciplines uses. You don't attack with your celerity. You attack with your brawl and dex. Obfuscate will let you wonder around unseen, but what are you doing there? You need a good awareness and Perception to be able to spy well.

That's the thing, you really don't. How much perception do you need to overhear a conversation that's happening in the same room as you?

As for fighting in combat, you get some dex for free, a couple of dots of brawl is easy to pick up, but after that Celerity does you far better than skills.


What makes you say that? If you can't eyeball a character and tell what will be a reasonable challenge to them then either the system is non-functional or you've got a bad GM/DM/ST


Sorry, let me rephrase:

In D&D, all characters of the same level should be equivalent. In Vampire, it is possible and desirable for characters with the same number of experience points to be wildly differently experienced at different things.

A CR4 encounter presents a challenge to a 4th level party in a straight fight. You can't make the same generalizations with Vampire.

[horseboy]

That's the thing, you really don't. How much perception do you need to overhear a conversation that's happening in the same room as you?

As for fighting in combat, you get some dex for free, a couple of dots of brawl is easy to pick up, but after that Celerity does you far better than skills.
But Celerity with max skills does far better than just celerity, especially given that they're quicker to max out and cheaper to build.



Sorry, let me rephrase:

In D&D, all characters of the same level should be equivalent. In Vampire, it is possible and desirable for characters with the same number of experience points to be wildly differently experienced at different things.

A CR4 encounter presents a challenge to a 4th level party in a straight fight. You can't make the same generalizations with Vampire.Well, that does technically hold true, but then comes the question: Is the CR system a good mechanic? Is it a good thing that characters are held so tightly to their archetype that the player has trouble expressing much else?

[Mr. Friendly]

But Celerity with max skills does far better than just celerity, especially given that they're quicker to max out and cheaper to build.

Well, that does technically hold true, but then comes the question: Is the CR system a good mechanic? Is it a good thing that characters are held so tightly to their archetype that the player has trouble expressing much else?

Eh... having played the WW system, I can say that a "4th level party" in WW is easier to eyeball the challenge for than for the 4th level D&D party. The CR system is so woefully inadequate that it can be impossible to use at times for creating an "appropriate" encounter.

[Dan_Hemmens]

But Celerity with max skills does far better than just celerity, especially given that they're quicker to max out and cheaper to build.

But you could also spend the same XP and come up with something completely useless.

A starting character, for example, could have Celerity 3 Brawl 5, or level 1 in each of three disciplines, and level 1 in each of five skills. The Celerity-brawl monkey is going to be just plain better than Mr Jack of All Trades, and it'll be on the GM to keep the balance between them.


Well, that does technically hold true, but then comes the question: Is the CR system a good mechanic? Is it a good thing that characters are held so tightly to their archetype that the player has trouble expressing much else?

Is it a good thing? For D&D absolutely. If you don't want a game where people play archetypes who have a lot of fights, don't use a classes-and-levels system.

[Indon]

So how is a D&D adventure, in which you have X in-character days to destroy the Gate to Baator different to a Warhammer Battle in which you have X turns of combat to destroy a Chaos Gate?

Under normal D&D, you (as a player) wouldn't be tasked with that. You would be roleplaying characters tasked with that.

Now, you could houserule D&D into a wargame, rather than an RPG, and directly task players with the objectives and give them characters as their forces. But why not just play Warhammer (expenses aside) instead?

Edit: I'll give an example. You're playing a character who is given a mission to wipe out a village of rebels. You decide it would be appropriate for your character to have a change of heart and not fulfill the mission, and ultimately he fails the mission and is branded as a traitor and outcast by his nation. By the paradigm that character objectives=player objectives, you just lost D&D.

[Cuddly]

You're taking something from my post I clearly didn't mean, but I'll run with it. Yes, people should have something fun to do during play, either an action of their own or something cool happening around them.

Well, older, and accepted, forms of balance were limiting useful actions. Spells/day is essentially letting you choose which of the 5 encounters/day you want to nova in, and which ones you will drop a spell here and there and plunk away with your crossbow.


What shouldn't happen is their initiative coming around and them being completely ineffectual. Powerful? Not necessarily.

Clearly, there's a spectrum from completely ineffectual to being powerful. A fighter can still shoot his composite longbow at flying enemies (or drink a pot of fly), the rogue can still stab the skeleton, etc. Balance used to be (somewhat) about giving each character a niche to excel in, while not doing well in others.

I have yet to play in a game of D&D where the figther sits around every turn and doesn't do anything, or is "completely ineffectual". Fighters are powerhouses. They can lay down serious damage- damage that needs to be dealt fast and hard. Especially if the Batman wizard is focusing on control. Somebody still has to do the killing (which, unfortunately, CoDzilla can do almost as well, +100 other things). Balanced play would be 4 characters, each useful 25% of the time, in all situations. As it is, wizards and CoDzilla are useful 60-90% of the time, and everyone else tends to play backup. That isn't balanced.

Characters that are useful sometimes is a classic part of D&D- party members contributing from their own expertise to form a whole that kills dragons and stops liches.


Yes, because of course magic missile is the height of realism. It might have taken a back seat to simulation of a fantasy world, but D&D has never been about realism.

But it has. Weapons used to have different speeds, based on size and historical precedent or whatever. Dire flails are regularly mocked because "they just wouldn't work". That other word that starts with a 'v' (that I can't spell) would have been, and is, a much, much better goal for game design. Internal consistency. Unfortunately, realism often gets in the way. Have you ever had a DM tell you that you can't do that because no normal human could? If not, have you ever heard of that happening? What about the enormous penalties to TWF in 3.0 since it's so much harder than fighting with one weapon? D&D makes many, and unnecessary, appeals to realism, usually implicitly, by letting casters do ANYTHING, and giving fighters feats like dodge or mobility.


If that last point isn't pure sarcastic parody, you need to take a good long look at yourself and see whether you're giving everyone else a fair shake or just being asocial and dismissive of people you don't really know.

Thanks Dr. Phil!


The failure of your example is that the stunt car driver isn't sitting in a chair around a table with a bunch of other people waiting for the whole thing to end so his time wasn't wasted. He's dealing with a possibly unpleasant reality (jungles aren't exactly fun) but he's got meaningful things to do as they relate to him, things that are not covered in D&D. He is LIVING the adventure. None of us are doing that with D&D, we're just pretending really hard.

...ok?


Since everyone seems to be happily blaming hypothetical DMs, here's one: if your character is useless part of the time, it's your DM's fault for not making well-rounded encounters that don't kick characters to the curb. Or maybe the game should have characters who aren't limited by game mechanics to 'I swing a sword, the same way I've been swinging it all game'.

Well, I'm certainly not arguing that 3x isn't horribly rigged in favor of casters. They are certainly more versatile and powerful without trying too hard, in comparison to melee classes, especially past level 5. However, I disagree that encounters should be well-rounded and let everyone show of their talents. Some encounters will inevitably be more favorable to certain classes. What's so wrong with that? Should every character be super successful at everything they try? That certainly breaks real- err, the v-word.


Prove it.

Attended objects get saves.


Cute and subtle. I see grammar wasn't a top subject for you, ah well.

What grammar rules are I breaking?


At any rate, tell me Cuddly, if 4e had *nothing at all* to do with your post, then why have there been so many threads spawned regarding balance since the 4e announcement? I guess it's just a coincidence!

Spawned? I didn't know threads could reproduce. I see linguistics wasn't your top subject.
Aha! Who has the upper hand now?

But I guess you caught me. I hate 4e irrationally and will spend much of my time in internet forums freaking out about how other people might like it.

Oh wait, what the hell does any of this have to do with 4e, outside of Wizards' effort to change the way they balanced the game? Is there even enough data available to make 4e relevant?


Since this has nothing-at-all-whatsoever to do with 4e, please, tell me clearly why you think balance is such a bad thing.

Because only witches use balance, and I don't want to hang out with witches. You may have too much emotionally involved in this game. Seriously dude. Where did I say balance was a bad thing? Other than being *way* too sensitive about your precious, precious precious (that's adjective, adjective noun, for you grammar nazis out there) and reading too much into my question, where would I give you the idea that I don't favor balance in my games?


Hrrm, but then again, perhaps in earlier editions, Fighters and Rogues leveled up faster than Wizards? Maybe Wizards were penalized much more severely and much more limited in what they could do, to, *gasp* balance the game. Maybe the balance problem is that 3e removed most of the restrictions and penalties for casters, thus making them easily outshine every other class in the game.

So your argument here is that earlier editions were so well balanced that no one complained about balanced because they were so balanced.


Player A: Dude, Cuddly, stop going nova and killing everything every fight. I haven't gotten to roll a die for anything besides HP in 10 levels.
Cuddly: Stop whining! Life isn't fair! You are just being narcissistic and self-infatuated!!

Where did that come from? The same place you figured that this was about a game system that isn't even released yet? You jump to conclusions too hastily.

Anyway, that clearly isn't a real argument; that's a strawman. Balance could be- equal in power OR equal in opportunity to use powers. Limiting the number of times you can do something is one way to establish balance. Limiting the times someone is useful is another way of establishing balance. If the game was balanced, then when I went nova in the first fight, I wouldn't do anything the second fight. If I can nova every fight, then it's clearly not balanced.

In the games I've played, it's CoDzilla that overshadows the fighter. A batman buffing and controlling is loved much by the fighter, and batman likes to have some one around to actually do damage to the enemy and kill them.


The problem with 3e is that the wizard's limitations are largely irrelevant at higher levels, given how many really good spells he has access to at all levels. In older editions, the wizard was useful in some situations, and not in others. Resistances, for instance.



I'd also like to say that your last quote is particularly offensive and odious, as I read it, you seem to feel you know all there is to know about D&D and that balance is some abomination that only the 1337-h4xx0r script-kiddies talk about.

Oh, you mean like how you claim to know my feelings on 4e and how this is secretly a thread to demonize it and set up a worldwide cabal of 3.5 players who hate 4e? Or are you just freaking out?


There is also a difference between "having to do cool stuff all the time" and being allowed to do anything at all.

Well, yeah. I don't think anyone is making that argument. I mean, you are, as a strawman, but I'm not taking it very seriously.

I'm just wondering how the definition of balance changed from: unique roles for individual party members, to: everyone contributes all the time! Happy fun time!

I guess it's the perception that if you're not playing a full caster, you can't have fun playing D&D, and that playing core melee is always soooo boring. Which is mostly true.

[Dan_Hemmens]

Under normal D&D, you (as a player) wouldn't be tasked with that. You would be roleplaying characters tasked with that.


But what, functionally, is the difference? Serious question.

How is "roleplaying a character who has to achieve an arbitrary task with limited resources" different to "having to achieve an arbitrary task with limited resources"?

[horseboy]

But you could also spend the same XP and come up with something completely useless.

A starting character, for example, could have Celerity 3 Brawl 5, or level 1 in each of three disciplines, and level 1 in each of five skills.:smallconfused: Which edition are you playing?
The Celerity-brawl monkey is going to be just plain better than Mr Jack of All Trades, and it'll be on the GM to keep the balance between them.He's only going to be just plain better in a fight. Mr. Jack of All Trades is going to be better in other areas, provided there's not a specialist in that area. Then he's going to be supporting that character, either providing a distraction in combat (Oh wait, that was WereWolf) or going to look up something else at the library so they can get it all done in one night instead of two or three. So long as the Storyteller isn't just using White Wolf as an excuse for some gold ol' PvP (a very common theme in White Wolf IMXP) a story will have far more than just a fight. Moreover, Celerity brawler guy isn't restricted just to being a celerity brawler. The more a character can do the more effect they'll have on the story. One of the key problems with the D&D fighter.

Is it a good thing? For D&D absolutely. If you don't want a game where people play archetypes who have a lot of fights, don't use a classes-and-levels system.I'd argue that it would be better for D&D to actually drop the combat focus and "loosen" the restraints on characters some.

[Oslecamo]

Anyway... getting back to the topic at hand...

Why is balance a bad thing? Why does there seem to be (to me anyway) a push to turn 'balance' into a dirty word? Did I miss a memo? Is D&D supposed to realistically and accurately depict life in a pseudo-medieval setting? Or is it supposed to depict larger than life characters kicking in doors, killing the bad guys and (if they live) walking away with treasure and glory?

If it is the former, then yeah, balance is sort of irrelevant since you should be playing a farmer who will die at age 30 (if you live that long). If it is the latter, then balance is important, since everyone should have a chance to kill stuff and get their share of loot and glory.

Because many people see D&D not exactly as a game, but a way to enter a fantasy world and go around doing cool stuff like kiling dragons and exploring dungeons.

This demands that the D&D world feels both fantastic and realistic.

Is the real world balanced? Hmm, certainly not.

Are the fantasy worlds balanced? Also not.

Thus, D&D designers decided that balance was secondary, and making a cool world where the players could do cool stuff was the priority.

[Indon]

But what, functionally, is the difference? Serious question.

How is "roleplaying a character who has to achieve an arbitrary task with limited resources" different to "having to achieve an arbitrary task with limited resources"?

Another example. Your party is told to go destroy that gate... and then you're overwhelmed and imprisoned. The head demon was impressed by how far you got, and you're offered with the choice of teaming up with the demons, in exchange for power.

You, the party rogue, accept the offer. You gain some evil-perk things and your alignment swaps to NE. You do not lose D&D, because while you failed the mission, you did what your character naturally would in the situation.

Your friend, the party paladin, refuses the offer, and is killed for his unwavering devotion to good. He does not lose D&D either, because while he failed the mission, and even died, he did what was appropriate for his character, too - died for his beliefs.

Edit: In the Wargame, nobody cares about what happens to the characters after they're overwhelmed. Game over, you lose.

[horseboy]

I'm just wondering how the definition of balance changed from: unique roles for individual party members, to: everyone contributes all the time! Happy fun time!When people decided that they wanted more from their games than just that one thing everybody does well together.

[Dan_Hemmens]

:smallconfused: Which edition are you playing?

Masquerade 2nd.


He's only going to be just plain better in a fight. Mr. Jack of All Trades is going to be better in other areas, provided there's not a specialist in that area.

In theory. In practice one die is pretty much worthless in the system.


Then he's going to be supporting that character, either providing a distraction in combat (Oh wait, that was WereWolf) or going to look up something else at the library so they can get it all done in one night instead of two or three. So long as the Storyteller isn't just using White Wolf as an excuse for some gold ol' PvP (a very common theme in White Wolf IMXP) a story will have far more than just a fight. Moreover, Celerity brawler guy isn't restricted just to being a celerity brawler. The more a character can do the more effect they'll have on the story. One of the key problems with the D&D fighter.

The thing is, the more a character can do, the less well they can do it, and the less effect they have on the story. A generalist tends to just be able to fail at more things. The GM can throw the player things to do with his low skills, and indeed the game expects him to, but that's still not "balance" in the D&D sense.


I'd argue that it would be better for D&D to actually drop the combat focus and "loosen" the restraints on characters some.

*shrug*

If I want a good, solid RPG with a fantasy setting, I'll play Burning Wheel.

D&D is really, really good at archetypal high-combat fantasy.

[Muyten]

Because many people see D&D not exactly as a game, but a way to enter a fantasy world and go around doing cool stuff like kiling dragons and exploring dungeons.

This demands that the D&D world feels both fantastic and realistic.

Is the real world balanced? Hmm, certainly not.

Are the fantasy worlds balanced? Also not.

Thus, D&D designers decided that balance was secondary, and making a cool world where the players could do cool stuff was the priority.

So just to be clear you are saying that it is not the balance in itself that is bad but that a design based primarily on balance will focus less on stuff you think is more important?

[Indon]

So just to be clear you are saying that it is not the balance in itself that is bad but that a design based primarily on balance will focus less on stuff you think is more important?

I dunno about Oslecamo, but that's what my only beef with balance is.

From long-ago discussions on this forum, I've developed the opinion that a balanced system ultimately does not neccessarily have disadvantages compared to an unbalanced system. The problem is in how systems get balanced in practice.

[Dan_Hemmens]

Another example. Your party is told to go destroy that gate... and then you're overwhelmed and imprisoned. The head demon was impressed by how far you got, and you're offered with the choice of teaming up with the demons, in exchange for power.

"You are overwhelmed and imprisoned" is a very unlikely outcome in D&D. You can't incapacitate a player character without putting them near death, and of course we know that death is the most exciting and interesting outcome possible in an RPG anyway.

Either way, you still failed the mission, and everything that happens next is just the DM trying to salvage things.


You, the party rogue, accept the offer. You gain some evil-perk things and your alignment swaps to NE. You do not lose D&D, because while you failed the mission, you did what your character naturally would in the situation.

Your friend, the party paladin, refuses the offer, and is killed for his unwavering devotion to good. He does not lose D&D either, because while he failed the mission, and even died, he did what was appropriate for his character, too - died for his beliefs.

My friend gives me a lift home afterwards, and we discuss the game.

"What the hell was up with that demon-bargain thing?" says my friend. "I'm a freaking Paladin. What the hell kind of choice is 'serve a demon or die'?"
"Yeah," I reply, "and you know if we complain the DM is going to totally tell us it was all our decision."
"He's such a jerk."
"I know, and what the hell was up with turning my alignment NE? I took his lame-ass 'join or die' deal, what did he expect?"
"He should have just left it as a TPK."
"Yeah. We should really get a new DM."


Edit: In the Wargame, nobody cares about what happens to the characters after they're overwhelmed. Game over, you lose.

In the wargame, nobody cares about what happens after you stop playing the game. That's how games work. The only difference between a wargame and an RPG is that an RPG is a series of linked missions (a "campaign" if you will).

[Snooder]

The thing is, the more a character can do, the less well they can do it, and the less effect they have on the story. A generalist tends to just be able to fail at more things. The GM can throw the player things to do with his low skills, and indeed the game expects him to, but that's still not "balance" in the D&D sense.


The ironic thing about it is that the phrase "jack of all trades" actually comes from "jack of all trades, master of none". The implication in the very phrase is that being a generalist makes you suck.

Though oddly, that idiom stems from an even older phrase wherein being generalist is a compliment. But that's beside the point, current usage is the important thing to focus on here.:smallbiggrin:

[Jayabalard]

Prove it. Prove that it doesn't. Or at least offer some counter examples.

You're better off it you stick to a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition rather than just the automatic gainsaying of any statement the other person makes..


Cute and subtle. I see grammar wasn't a top subject for you, ah well. Grammar flames are pretty lame even on boards which allow flaiming... which this isn't.


Player A: Dude, Cuddly, stop going nova and killing everything every fight. I haven't gotten to roll a die for anything besides HP in 10 levels.
Cuddly: Stop whining! Life isn't fair! You are just being narcissistic and self-infatuated!!I enjoy unbalanced gaming, regardless of whether I'm playing a character on the overpowered, or underpowered side. This is pretty common of the people who are in favor of unbalanced systems, so suggesting that people do it just because they like to go nova and hog the spotlight is no more valid than any other strawman.

[Indon]

Either way, you still failed the mission, and everything that happens next is just the DM trying to salvage things.

I think you would be surprised to find out how many players think the scenario I offered was appropriate and interesting. You don't, obviously, because you apparently play D&D as if it were an extended Wargame, and not a Roleplaying game... at least, that's the only way I can understand how your response to a perfectly understandable plot shift is, "You're playing D&D wrong!"

[Dan_Hemmens]

I think you would be surprised to find out how many players think the scenario I offered was appropriate and interesting. You don't, obviously, because you apparently play D&D as if it were an extended Wargame, and not a Roleplaying game... at least, that's the only way I can understand how your response to a perfectly understandable plot shift is, "You're playing D&D wrong!"

Your "perfectly understandable plot shift" involved, amongst other things:

Forcing an alignment change on a PC.
Putting a Paladin in a classic "fall or die" bind.
Claiming that both of those were good things because they gave the players "opportunities to play their character."

If I was a player, I'd be pissed off.

[Jayabalard]

The only difference between a wargame and an RPG is that an RPG is a series of linked missions (a "campaign" if you will).That's one of the differences between RPGs and wargames... others would be that RPGs don't necessarily missions, linked or otherwise and that RPGs don't necessarily have any sort of resource management.


If I was a player, I'd be pissed off.Understandable, since you are focused on winning D&D, which makes the very idea of a no-win scenario not fun for you. That doesn't mean that it's un-fun for everyone, only that you don't like that style of gaming.

[Dan_Hemmens]

That's one of the differences between RPGs and wargames... others would be that RPGs don't necessarily missions, linked or otherwise and that RPGs don't necessarily have any sort of resource management.

Most RPGs involve some sort of resource management (unless you let your players create their PCs on Infinite Points Buy and let them decide when to run out of Hit Points). Most RPGs involve missions.

I know that some don't - as you might gather most of the games I play don't - but we're specifically talking about the difference (or otherwise) between an RPG "mission" and a wargame "scenario" - between "Destroy the Chaos Gate in five days" and "Destroy the Chaos Gate in five turns."

[Indon]

Your "perfectly understandable plot shift" involved, amongst other things:

Forcing an alignment change on a PC.
Putting a Paladin in a classic "fall or die" bind.
Claiming that both of those were good things because they gave the players "opportunities to play their character."

If I was a player, I'd be pissed off.

That's because that's not how you play D&D.

I had a group in a similar situation once, though with much less pressure. The party caster came out of the situation feebleminded because he was less-than-tactful. I guess because he played his character as the brash individual he was and did something clearly unwise OOC, you would say he was losing D&D. But he clearly didn't think of it that way.

[Tobrian]

Everytime I hear certain players whining about "wizards are too powerful let's nerf them" I could spit nails. It was nonsense then and it is nonsense now. The complainers seem to assume that every wizard
a ) knows every spells in existance,
b ) never runs out of spells,
c ) can cast 5 spells simultaneously, as as free action
d ) will never face enemies with SR or energy resistances or simple making their saving throws,
e ) and has never ever memorized the WRONG spells in the morning, making him completely useless in the encounter.

You know who is the most uberpowered character in the group I GM?? The paladin! Who is as good as immune to magic by now because spells with attack rolls don't hit his AC, and spells which allow saving throws fail against his godly saves.

When I have played wizards (or spellcasters in general) they do run out of spells quite often. Because not every spell the character has prepared is useful or helpful at the given moment. Or my only mega-combat-spell is wasted because I rolled a 1 or the enemy saved successfully.

Most groups I have played in, especially back in AD&D 2nd Ed, did not complain of the wizard being too powerful, they were complaining because the wizard was so damn useless, especially at low and mid levels! "What, you're out of spells already, spellslinger? What kind of loser are you?" Always needs to be protected, always needs his 8 hours of sleep, and another hour in the morning to memorize stuff, and can't get his spellbooks wet, and needs time off for days and weeks on end to learn and scribe new spells in his spellbooks just so that maybe he may become a little less useless to the group.


Oh boy, let's play D&D!
Rogue: I'll handle this!
Wizard: Nah. Knock!
Rogue: :smallfrown:

Rogue: The DC on those locks is 40, that's way too high for me. Can't you do something?
Wizard: Sorry, I didn't memo Knock today.


Fighter: I'll kill this! Great Cleave!
Wizard: Nah. Fireball!
Fighter: :smallmad:

Was the fighter mad because the wizard threw a fireball into melee, hitting the fighter too? Otherwise that reaction is foolish in the extreme. 12-year olds and online gamer play like that. "Oh, killstealer!"

Fighter: Great Cleave! Great Cleave! 4 attacks per round!
Wizard: I throw a fireball.
DM: Your opponent is immune to fire damage.
Wizard: Arg. I cast.... um... no, that won't work... I cast Ray of...
DM: He has readied an action on you. He hurls an axe and hits you for... 38 damage while you are trying to cast. Roll concentration.
Wizard: *blows the roll*
DM: Anyone protecting the wizard? The enemy advances on you.
Wizard: I cast Lightning Bolt!
DM: That hits. Do damage.
Wizard: Um... 16 damage.
DM: The enemy is slightly singed and very pissed off.

or just this:
Last gaming session my spellcaster (Cloistered Cleric/Archivist) wasted two rounds and two spells on casting True Strike (first round) and Splinterbolt (second round), because previous spells had failed against the enemy's saves or SR, and this was his only attack spell which allowed no save, being a ranged attack.
So I rolled the attack, which would have been +25 (+20 from True Strike, +3 BAB, no DEX mod, and +2 from Recitation).
I rolled a natural "1".
So much for that.


DM: There's a large crevasse, you're forced to fight the plot-centric terrasque!
Wizard: Nah, Overland Flight.
DM: :smallfurious:

The only one who would complain about that would be the GM.
Railroading much?

Really, spells were put into D&D to allow a group of PCs to be able to do certain things. Like avoid or go around or charm or petrify a monster instead of having to kill it EVERY TIME. Deal with it.

Most arcane spellcasters are expected to buff the group or protect it from energy attacks or make them invisible, despite WotC thinking they should be "battlefield controllers" or "blasters". (If I want a blaster, I play a Warlock.)

Really, wizards suck at everything beside spellcasting. Lowest HD, lowest base skill points, 1/3 good saves, no combat ability to speak of, few feats.
But oh, they can cast spells! (Um, yes, so can the cleric and the druid, and those two classes get a lot more options and powers than the wizard.)

The problem is that WotC and gamers who are used to MMORPGs seem to view classes only in terms of combat power, as in "If you put two characters into an gladiatorical arena and let them square off with each other, with full preparation, who would win?" That's the wrong question.

I'm resigned to the fact that D&D is geared towards team play and combat, and it's not likely I'll ever see a D&D group with one player playing an old and experienced but psysically frail mage and another playing his young apprentice or the scarred ex-soldier fighter bodyguard for the wizard, with PCs allowed to have different "levels" of power. Things like that are not only possible but almost expected in games like GURPS Discworld or Ars Magica.

People can still have fun playing differently-powered character concepts provided the game master and the players create the characters together and agree on the idea that the point of the game is not to rack up "kills" but to create a memorable story, with character interaction.

[horseboy]

Prove that it doesn't. Or at least offer some counter examples.

You're better off it you stick to a connected series of statements intended to establish a proposition rather than just the automatic gainsaying of any statement the other person makes.I'm sorry, you came here for an argument, not a good argument.

[Oslecamo]

So just to be clear you are saying that it is not the balance in itself that is bad but that a design based primarily on balance will focus less on stuff you think is more important?

Yeah, more or less that.

If wotc could make a perfectly balanced system where you had the versatility of 3.5 then hell yeah I would surely buy it.

For example, let's see those things:
-Summoning and companions
-Self transformation in bizarre things(aka polymorph).
-Dual wielding.
-Lots of cool powerfull magic items
-Charms/dominate

They are all things that got cut in 4e because, honestly, they're just too damn hard to balance effectively.

This may make the game more balanced, but it also kills lots of cool stuff. Where is my evil cleric controling hordes of undeads? Where is my rogue who grabs 2 wands and dual sneack attacks with orbs of fire?

Also, in 4e all classes work in exactly the same way.
Now the warrior and the mage work exactly the same way, and that kills some of the realistic/fantasy feeling when playing. Fighters and mages are suposed to be 2 compleely diferent breeds, not the same thing.


Blinded is now just a -5 penalty. Concealment a -2. This in my opinion is simplifying too much. I want a world where diferent conditions will lead to drastically diferent results, not a world where the diference between being blinded and the enemy being inside a bush is just a single number.

[Dan_Hemmens]

That's because that's not how you play D&D.

I had a group in a similar situation once, though with much less pressure. The party caster came out of the situation feebleminded because he was less-than-tactful. I guess because he played his character as the brash individual he was and did something clearly unwise OOC, you would say he was losing D&D. But he clearly didn't think of it that way.

Depends, how long did the feeblemind last, and did it stop him casting?

Let me put it another way.

You continually bring up examples of where people have "stayed true to their characters", been hosed as a result, and laughed it all off as being part of the fun of the game.

What if you'd docked them experience points?

What if, every time a player did something "true to their character" you docked them 100XP.

Still part of the fun of the game? After all, it's not about getting XP and getting more powerful, is it, it's about playing your character. You should be happy to pay experience points for the opportunity to roleplay your character.

Assuming you don't, how is an IC mechanical penalty (you get feebleminded, you die) better than a metagame one?

[Cuddly]

Everytime I hear certain players whining about "wizards are too powerful let's nerf them" I could spit nails. It was nonsense then and it is nonsense now.

That's nice. Please go start a new thread about this so this one doesn't get derailed.

[Indon]

Depends, how long did the feeblemind last, and did it stop him casting?
Feeblemind is permanent, and it sets your Int and Cha to 1 each (We managed to get him cured, though).


You continually bring up examples of where people have "stayed true to their characters", been hosed as a result, and laughed it all off as being part of the fun of the game.

It's not 'being hosed' if the point of the game is to play a character rather than accumulate mechanical power.


Assuming you don't, how is an IC mechanical penalty (you get feebleminded, you die) better than a metagame one?

Because the metagame for a role-playing game should facilitate role-playing, a function which that measure would not fulfill. The fact is, characters do not always perform the mechanically optimal course of action, unless you're roleplaying a very narrow scope of character types.

If you have characters who always do perform the mechanically optimal course of action, well, you no doubt call it roleplaying, and no doubt others would agree, but I would hesitate, being more inclined to call it wargaming or somesuch, and I would mark it as indicative of the cultural shift that led D&D to considering mechanical balance as a vital part of a roleplaying game.

[Reel On, Love]

This is 20 levels of wrong in a 10-level class.


Everytime I hear certain players whining about "wizards are too powerful let's nerf them" I could spit nails. It was nonsense then and it is nonsense now. The complainers seem to assume that every wizard
a ) knows every spells in existance,
b ) never runs out of spells,
c ) can cast 5 spells simultaneously, as as free action
d ) will never face enemies with SR or energy resistances or simple making their saving throws,
e ) and has never ever memorized the WRONG spells in the morning, making him completely useless in the encounter.
No, we really don't. The wizard knows a relatively specific list of the best spells in the game (two examples: Glitterdust and Overland Flight). He does run out of spells eventually... around the time the party rests, because the cleric's also run out of spells and the Fighter's low on hit points. He casts one (r two, with swift/immediate actions) spells at a time, but.
He faces enemies with SR (no-SR spell, buffs, Assay Spell Resistance, just bumping Spell Penetration), energy resistances (he has next to no energy-based spells) and high saving throws (a CR-appropriate dragon has a 40-50% chance of failing its Will save vs. the wizard's highest-level spell). Sometimes saves get made. It averages out.

No, the wizard has never memorized the WRONG spells, because his spell list has enough always-useful spells to negate that possibility. He's also got some scrolls.

The problem isn't really wizard. It's spells--a lot of spells.


You know who is the most uberpowered character in the group I GM?? The paladin! Who is as good as immune to magic by now because spells with attack rolls don't hit his AC, and spells which allow saving throws fail against his godly saves.
Spell attack rolls don't hit his AC? Do you realize that they're ranged touch attacks? Is the paladin getting a huge touch AC somehow?
His saves are godly? Because he has +CHA to saves? How high is his CHA? Has he neglected his STR for it (making himself weak in melee)?


When I have played wizards (or spellcasters in general) they do run out of spells quite often. Because not every spell the character has prepared is useful or helpful at the given moment. Or my only mega-combat-spell is wasted because I rolled a 1 or the enemy saved successfully.
You're doing it wrong.


Most groups I have played in, especially back in AD&D 2nd Ed, did not complain of the wizard being too powerful, they were complaining because the wizard was so damn useless, especially at low and mid levels! "What, you're out of spells already, spellslinger? What kind of loser are you?" Always needs to be protected, always needs his 8 hours of sleep, and another hour in the morning to memorize stuff, and can't get his spellbooks wet, and needs time off for days and weeks on end to learn and scribe new spells in his spellbooks just so that maybe he may become a little less useless to the group.
In second edition, low-level spellcasters suck. 3E low-level casters pull their weight, and start being critical to winning fights without taking heavy damage as early as level 3 (Glitterdust) or 5 (Deep Slumber, Stinking Cloud, Haste, etc).


Rogue: The DC on those locks is 40, that's way too high for me. Can't you do something?
Wizard: Sorry, I didn't memo Knock today.
"Let me pull out the couple of scrolls I scribed. I'll have to make another one tonight."
Alternatively, have the Fighter break it.


Fighter: Great Cleave! Great Cleave! 4 attacks per round!
Great cleave is a terrible feat.


Wizard: I throw a fireball.
DM: Your opponent is immune to fire damage.
Wizard: Arg. I cast.... um... no, that won't work... I cast Ray of...
DM: He has readied an action on you. He hurls an axe and hits you for... 38 damage while you are trying to cast. Roll concentration.
Wizard: *blows the roll*
DM: Anyone protecting the wizard? The enemy advances on you.
Wizard: I cast Lightning Bolt!
DM: That hits. Do damage.
Wizard: Um... 16 damage.
DM: The enemy is slightly singed and very pissed off.
If this is how you play your wizards, no wonder you have problems.
First of all, you don't throw a fireball. If hurling an axe can hit you for 38 damage (and not kill you) and you're facing a fire-immune foe (who isn't obviously fire-immune, i.e. he's an elemental made out OF fire) you're clearly not level 5. You cast, say, Empowered Ray of Enfeeblement. Then you move away--fly up, or behind cover. If you're scared of this guy, cast greater invis or mirror image instead.

He's enfeebled, so let the melee guys whack. If he doesn't do anything (and is eyeing you), he's probably readying an action. Deal with it (such as by getting cover or out of range). In the meantime, he's not hitting anyone.


or just this:
Last gaming session my spellcaster (Cloistered Cleric/Archivist) wasted two rounds and two spells on casting True Strike (first round) and Splinterbolt (second round), because previous spells had failed against the enemy's saves or SR, and this was his only attack spell which allowed no save, being a ranged attack.
So I rolled the attack, which would have been +25 (+20 from True Strike, +3 BAB, no DEX mod, and +2 from Recitation).
I rolled a natural "1".
So much for that.
Losing a level of spellcasting, even for Turn Undead, is pretty iffy (unless you're pulling horrendous cheese). First mistake.
Casting spells like True Strike in one round, Splinterbolt in the next. Second mistake.
Thinking that rolling a natural one... something that happens, well, one in twenty times... somehow means something... is the third mistake.


The only one who would complain about that would be the GM.
Railroading much?
Teleport skipping entire subplots since you don't need to travel overland, etc. The point is, wizards have great versatility when it comes to overcoming virtually any obstacle.


Really, spells were put into D&D to allow a group of PCs to be able to do certain things. Like avoid or go around or charm or petrify a monster instead of having to kill it EVERY TIME. Deal with it.
Or drop confusion on the group of enemies so they kill each other. Or Glitterdust them so they're non-threats. Or... the point is, a lot of spells are *too good* at what they do/for their level/etc.


Most arcane spellcasters are expected to buff the group or protect it from energy attacks or make them invisible, despite WotC thinking they should be "battlefield controllers" or "blasters". (If I want a blaster, I play a Warlock.)
Wizards should battlefield control (Glitterdust, Grease, Stinking Cloud, Solid Fog), buff (Haste). They shouldn't blast (why was your example wizard casting Fireball and Lightning Bolt, especially against a single enemy who was clearly a threat?). They should also drop save-or-suck/lose spells on the enemy to halt fights in their tracks or reduce them to mop-up.


Really, wizards suck at everything beside spellcasting. Lowest HD, lowest base skill points, 1/3 good saves, no combat ability to speak of, few feats.
But oh, they can cast spells! (Um, yes, so can the cleric and the druid, and those two classes get a lot more options and powers than the wizard.)
Yeah.
And the Cleric and the Druid are widely known as the other two of the three most powerful classes in the game (barring setting-specific Artificers and Archivist cheese).
Wizards can cast spells. They can cast spells from the Sor/Wiz list, which has the majority of the most powerful spells in the game.

Do you want me to quickly build you a 7th or 10th or 15th level wizard and go over his tactics and spell selection?


The problem is that WotC and gamers who are used to MMORPGs seem to view classes only in terms of combat power, as in "If you put two characters into an gladiatorical arena and let them square off with each other, with full preparation, who would win?" That's the wrong question.
Man, are MMORPGs the source of everything bad ever now?! They have nothing to do with is. The wizard is highly effective against enemies, both NPC and from the Monster manual, even moreso against other PCs (who can use their wealth to help protect against a lot of things that monsters can't).


I'm resigned to the fact that D&D is geared towards team play and combat, and it's not likely I'll ever see a D&D group with one player playing an old and experienced but psysically frail mage and another playing his young apprentice or the scarred ex-soldier fighter bodyguard for the wizard, with PCs allowed to have different "levels" of power. Things like that are not only possible but almost expected in games like GURPS Discworld or Ars Magica. [/quoe]
That's not what D&D is for, no.

[quote]People can still have fun playing differently-powered character concepts provided the game master and the players create the characters together and agree on the idea that the point of the game is not to rack up "kills" but to create a memorable story, with character interaction.
But as long as the game involves combat which is potentially lethal and in which your character.
And as long as that combat is a significant part of the game (as it almost always is in D&D--the system focuses on it) playing a character who has to effectively sit combats out? By and large, it sucks.

[Indon]

That's not what D&D is for, no.

D&D, which has so far been the jack-of-all-trades of RPG systems, has not until recently really been for anything, in terms of what the system can and can't do.

[Jayabalard]

Assuming you don't, how is an IC mechanical penalty (you get feebleminded, you die) better than a metagame one?Getting feebleminded or dieing are not, in and of themselves a penalty... as long as the focus of the game is to play a character rather than winning D&D, they're simply an appropriate game result.

A metagame penalty where you lose exp for playing the game well is just a penalty. Since it's entirely metagame, it doesn't add anything to anyone's game (whereas getting "hosed" IC does for some players).

[Dan_Hemmens]

Getting feebleminded or dieing are not, in and of themselves a penalty... as long as the focus of the game is to play a character rather than winning D&D, they're simply an appropriate game result.

Getting feebleminded is by definition a game mechanical penalty - it reduces your game mechanical stats. It applies a penalty to them, in fact.

How long would you carry on playing a Feebleminded Wizard? If you're only interested in playing the character and not worried about "winning D&D" then might it not be legitimate to decide that your character is happier now that he's lost his powers? That playing a feebleminded Wizard is an interesting roleplaying challenge?

I don't want to make too many assumptions, but I'd guess that most people out there who claim that they're all about "playing the character" would either get the character cured sharpish, or else retire them. Which rather puts the lie to idea that you're only interested in playing the character.

[Titanium Dragon]

Understandable, since you are focused on winning D&D, which makes the very idea of a no-win scenario not fun for you. That doesn't mean that it's un-fun for everyone, only that you don't like that style of gaming.

If I put you in a no-win scenario arbitrarily, I'd be a bad DM. 100%. Period. Why? Because at that point, I'm playing your character for you, and if your character HAS no real choices, then it is no fun.


Everytime I hear certain players whining about "wizards are too powerful let's nerf them" I could spit nails. It was nonsense then and it is nonsense now. The complainers seem to assume that every wizard
a ) knows every spells in existance,
b ) never runs out of spells,
c ) can cast 5 spells simultaneously, as as free action
d ) will never face enemies with SR or energy resistances or simple making their saving throws,
e ) and has never ever memorized the WRONG spells in the morning, making him completely useless in the encounter.


These are actually not unfair assumptions.

a) This is probably the least fair of the assumptions, but it also shows you don't really understand. You don't need every spell in existance to be broken, you just need the ones you need to do so. There are dozens of such spells, sure, but there are only dozens, and you don't even need all of the broken spells. Added to that you need the supersceding ones, but polymorph does most of that on its own, and when you really need it, you've got invisibility and overland flight.
b) This is actually an entirely reasonable assumption; if the wizard runs out of spells he's useless, so the party will teleport out and restock on spells. Ironically, if you say "tough" to the wizard, he'll throw a hissy fit.
c) You do realize that Time Stop is one of the problem spells, don't you? And it does exactly this. Quickened spells are less of a problem, but do the same.
d) You clearly don't understand wizards. Most of their broken spells don't allow saves or SR; what breaks them is stuff like Solid Fog, the Orb spells, fly, invisibility, time stop, force cage, polymorph, and the like. None of those allow saves and all allow them to do broken things. This is what a lot of people fail to comprehend; saves and SR are irrelevant after a certain point as a wizard, which is precisely why they are broken.
e) Between divinations, teleport, rope trick, and the versatile broken spells (solid fog, polymorph, time stop, fly, invisibility, ect.) this isn't really an issue.


Most groups I have played in, especially back in AD&D 2nd Ed, did not complain of the wizard being too powerful, they were complaining because the wizard was so damn useless, especially at low and mid levels! "What, you're out of spells already, spellslinger? What kind of loser are you?" Always needs to be protected, always needs his 8 hours of sleep, and another hour in the morning to memorize stuff, and can't get his spellbooks wet, and needs time off for days and weeks on end to learn and scribe new spells in his spellbooks just so that maybe he may become a little less useless to the group.

Incidentally, in second edition wizards had somewhat of a different issue, which is mitigated but not removed in 3e. In 2nd edition, wizards at low levels were incredibly weak and had very few spells, making them incredibly useless until they got up fairly high in level (specialists became useful sooner, incidentally). In third edition, this is still a problem at very low levels, but it is less of one; in 2nd edition, it was nearly crippling.

2nd edition was balanced on the premise that while high level wizards were broken, it was nearly impossible to survive that long; if you did, though, you became very powerful (though not quite the near god of a 3.x edition wizard, mostly because you could STILL die randomly due to your absolutely pathetic hit point total). This wasn't a particularly good form of balance, but it worked a bit better.


Rogue: The DC on those locks is 40, that's way too high for me. Can't you do something?
Wizard: Sorry, I didn't memo Knock today.

Yeah, and then he polymorphs into a dire badger and burrows around it.

[Tobrian]

Yeah, and then he polymorphs into a dire badger and burrows around it.

You mean the druid wildshapes into one of his hundred thousand possible shapes and...

Incidentally the guy who likes to burrow in a group i play in is a ranger with some sort of earth heritage feat. *shrug*


D&D, which has so far been the jack-of-all-trades of RPG systems, has not until recently really been for anything, in terms of what the system can and can't do.

I'm sorry, what? :smallconfused:
GURPS or HERO system are the "jack-of-all-trades of RPG systems".
D&D has always been a system where the rules are strictly modelled for one thing: small-group combat and dungeon crawls, in a Heroic Fantasy genre.

[Oslecamo]

I'm sorry, what? :smallconfused:
GURPS or HERO system are the "jack-of-all-trades of RPG systems".
D&D has always been a system where the rules are strictly modelled for one thing: small-group combat and dungeon crawls, in a Heroic Fantasy genre.

Are there rules in GURPS or HERO for creating your completely custom armies of undeads/constructs/plants/insert here other monster?

Are there rules for picking up a chair and using them to somehow pierce a dragon's vitals?

Or rules for simply being a farmer?

Creating your own planes?

Becoming a god?

[Tobrian]

You're doing it wrong.

I see. Unless I treat every encounter as an exercise in tactical combat and optimise my character accordingly (*snore* boring!), I'm playing it wrong.


Casting spells like True Strike in one round, Splinterbolt in the next. Second mistake.

Unless you tell me how I am supposed to cast two spells in the same round (and no the character doesn't have a feat to quicken his casting), or in general cast True Strike and do an attack in the same round, which AFAIK isn't possible, what's your point?


Are there rules in GURPS or HERO for creating your completely custom armies of undeads/constructs/plants/insert here other monster?

Yep. In fact, that's sort of the point of GURPS. You can customize until the cows come home. Or you can of course look for a template in one of the rulebooks and tweak it.

Seriously, how many D&D GMs build an army where every monster is custom-build? Who has that amount of time?


Are there rules for picking up a chair and using them to somehow pierce a dragon's vitals?

In fact, GURPS has rules for aiming for specific body part locations, which D&D doesn't have to this day. As for using a chair as a makeshift weapon, of course... and if you want to become the god of makeshift weapon combat, pick up the skill attack-with-anything.


Or rules for simply being a farmer?

You can play whatever you want in GURPS. Even rabbits from Watership Down...

Does D&D have rules for being a farmer? Except for "roll your profession (farmer)" and the commoner class which isn't a PC class, no, not really.


Creating your own planes?

You're not familiar with GURPS, are you?


Becoming a god?

GURPS Lensmen. 2,000 point characters. *cough*

How do you define "a god"? Invulnerability, immortality, able to shapeshift, miracles, teleport, omniscience? Sure, use GURPS Supers, GURPS Fantasy, GURPS Religion, GURPS Magic and GURPS Celtic Myth and pile on the special effects. Heck, in 4th edition a lot of that stuff, especially the superpowers, were simply folded into the Core player's book. But frankly, what's the point of having stats for a deity? Are you going to play it against normal characters? Boom you're dead.


Can we get back to the topic of balance? Game balance, play balance, level balance, point balance... different game systems define this differently.

[horseboy]

Are there rules in GURPS or HERO for creating your completely custom armies of undeads/constructs/plants/insert here other monster?

Are there rules for picking up a chair and using them to somehow pierce a dragon's vitals?

Or rules for simply being a farmer?

Creating your own planes?

Becoming a god?Dude, it's GURPS. They have rules for being a Bunny Rabbit.

[Rachel Lorelei]

I see. Unless I treat every encounter as an exercise in tactical combat and optimise my character accordingly (*snore* boring!), I'm playing it wrong.
Nobody said that.
But making a wizard that throws fireballs and lightning bolts, and then complaining that you don't understand why everyone says casters are strong? Doing it wrong.


Unless you tell me how I am supposed to cast two spells in the same round (and no the character doesn't have a feat to quicken his casting), or in general cast True Strike and do an attack in the same round, which AFAIK isn't possible, what's your point?
My point is that Splinterbolt is lame and you should've had other options.

My point is that your statements about how wizards aren't actually all that are totally invalidated by you demonstration of a lack of understanding about why exactly wizards are all that.


Heck, in 4th edition a lot of that stuff, especially the superpowers, were simply folded into the Core player's book.
Ah, yes. Superpowers like "Shank Him Really Hard", "Move Then Shank Him", "Shoot Him In The Face" and "Magic Missile".

???

[Oslecamo]

Dude, it's GURPS. They have rules for being a Bunny Rabbit.

D&D has rules to become a living sandwich. Beat that please. So far, I haven't seen anything in GURPS that D&D can't do.

Oh, and I got promoted to barbarian. Weeee!!!!!!

[Cyclone231]

D&D has rules to become a living sandwich. Beat that please.Please. Hero System has rules for firing ray guns, blasting apart planets, shooting arrows, and controlling the elemental force of flame to burn your foe. And the best part? Those are all the same power, just with different degrees of strength and different advantages and limitations.

Well, I guess you'd probably add an extra attack linked to the fireball one, so they'd burn for a little bit afterwards.

You can play as literally anything you want to.

So far, I haven't seen anything in GURPS that D&D can't do. Subjective morality?

[MeklorIlavator]

I see. Unless I treat every encounter as an exercise in tactical combat and optimise my character accordingly (*snore* boring!), I'm playing it wrong.
Well, your point is that this example disproves the whole "batman" theory, but then your character didn't actually play like batman. Thus, you are playing Batman wrong in this case. The same way if we are arguing about the merits of power attack, and I point out that you can't hit anything if you sink all of your attack bonus into the feat, then I would be wrong, because I am using a acknowleged inferior tactic. This strategy is also known as the “Straw Man” Fallacy.


Unless you tell me how I am supposed to cast two spells in the same round (and no the character doesn't have a feat to quicken his casting), or in general cast True Strike and do an attack in the same round, which AFAIK isn't possible, what's your point?
Well, you pretty much acknowlege the only way to do it without using the handful of spells with casting times of a Move/Swift/Immediate action. Of course the flip side to this is why do you even need true strike? Most spells that require touch attacks are ranged/melee touch attack, which means that your hitting the one AC that is hardest to raise. Plus the fact that as a divinist, you have buffs that will increase your BaB to your Hit die for multiple rounds, so why use the remarkably inferior Truestrike? And why were you and Archivist/Clostered Cleric? Spliting your casting levels not only between two classes but two that run off the same basic spell list seems a questionable move.

[horseboy]

D&D has rules to become a living sandwich. Beat that please. So far, I haven't seen anything in GURPS that D&D can't do.

Oh, and I got promoted to barbarian. Weeee!!!!!!What's a sandwiches's LA? I'll let someone who plays GURPS explain just how much better GURPS is at everything but dungeon hack and slash.

[Kantolin]

Yikes, long topic. I'm probably going to be repeating a lot of things stated, but here's my views on the subject.

Personally, I have absolutely no qualms with playing an unbalanced character. Heck, my first Aberrant character was a character who had absolutely no real place in a physical, social, nor mental competition. Functionally all he could do is heal - and then he couldn't actually heal very much, as the heal power was incredibly weak in that game.

This is fine.

It's also fine when the worldsetting officially states certain units are weaker than others. Another character of mine was essentially an orc in an elven game - where orcs are subserviant to the elves, and are essentially inferior in all manners besides being physically a bit stronger. Elves, in fact, did more damage (Got a bonus feat which was essentially weapon finesse for both to-hit and damage) and were gestalt, orcs were neither - this is the setting the DM set up, and with that I asked to play an orc regardless.

This is also fine.

Now, what's not fine is when I don't want to be a weaker or stronger unit than everyone else, and the game gives you an option, but the option is either overly powerful or useless. If I build a physical-character that's also fairly decent at social areas, I don't want the strictly-mental-character to be better than me at both (Given the same experience/level). If I want to play a gallant knight who slays dragons, I don't want to actually play the guy moving 60 feet unable to reach the dragon while the druid kills it real quick. If I want to play the support-artillery-mage to the grand hero paladin, I don't want to actually be the only person who's doing anything in combat - I want to be contributing, but not soloing it (Nevermind the fact that it makes the DM's life more difficult and overall makes the experience less fun).

I mean, another game I was in was similar to the orc/elf sequence above, only due to quirks, my theoretically weaker character was, in fact, leaps and bounds above all of the stronger ones. That was irritating as heck as it wasn't at all my goal.

If I want to play a weaker character, then I'll do that to myself. This is dramatically easier to do if a game system is balanced than if it isn't.

It's very easy to go from a balanced character to a weaker one, but it's a lot harder when the guy who wants to play a weaker character wants to play a druid, while the person who wants to play the stronger character in the duo wants to play a martial artist. In an unbalanced system, you then have to go do all kinds of headaches to get the monk to be stronger than the druid - or maybe not use either of the two most logical classes for the ideas.

In a balanced system, you'd be able to make the two real quick and then the druid can make himself weaker.

Meh. Gimme a balanced system anyday - I can unbalance it if I so desire once it's balanced in the first place... but balancing an unbalanced system is exactly why I'm shoving money into game designer's pockets. ;P

[Fhaolan]

You know who is the most uberpowered character in the group I GM?? The paladin! Who is as good as immune to magic by now because spells with attack rolls don't hit his AC, and spells which allow saving throws fail against his godly saves.


Out of curiousity, how did the character raise his touch AC to the point that spells with attack rolls can't hit it? That's a fairly hard AC to get raised for a warrior-type.


D&D has rules to become a living sandwich. Beat that please. So far, I haven't seen anything in GURPS that D&D can't do.


In GURPS, I can play a character who is a sessile hive-minded pile of rocks. I'm not sure if that beats a living sandwich, but it at least competes with it. :smallsmile:

[Indon]

When I said, 'jack-of-all-trades', I was implying that D&D had no significant specialty between simulationism, gamism, and narrativism (though it used to lean slightly simulationist, and will soon be full-out gamist).

Though, this is definitely a "What have I done?" moment for me in this thread.

[Oslecamo]

In GURPS, I can play a character who is a sessile hive-minded pile of rocks. I'm not sure if that beats a living sandwich, but it at least competes with it. :smallsmile:

Behold, the path of sandwichness!

http://forums.gleemax.com/showpost.php?p=8570529

The funny part is that you can do this with pretty much any object you want. There is a thread somehwere in the wotc forums wich went deeper into the matter and tried to get the combo to work earlier.

[Rutee]

When I said, 'jack-of-all-trades', I was implying that D&D had no significant specialty between simulationism, gamism, and narrativism (though it used to lean slightly simulationist, and will soon be full-out gamist).

Though, this is definitely a "What have I done?" moment for me in this thread.
Dood, DnD is hardcore Gamist. Always has been. Don't kid yourself about jack of all trades (TOTAL, COMPLETE Lack of Narr. Mechanics, offhand). It has always been all about the dungeon crawl. Just look at the skills.

[Fhaolan]

Behold, the path of sandwichness!

The fun bit with GURPS is that I don't need to follow a series of psionic effects or magic spells from a 20th level character to make a character that is a living sandwich. I can *start* a game as a living sandwich, right from the equivalant of 1st level.

Not that I've done this.

Uhm....

Okay, fine, I *have* brought characters that silly to GURPS games, searching for a GM who was daft enough to let me do it. I usually get a weird look, and a 'No, really, what character do you want to play?' just before being asked to leave the building. :smallsmile:

[Kurald Galain]

When I said, 'jack-of-all-trades', I was implying that D&D had no significant specialty between simulationism, gamism, and narrativism (though it used to lean slightly simulationist, and will soon be full-out gamist).

Yes it does. Compared to other RPGs, D&D is obviously, wholeheartedly, and entirely gamist. It has been so for every prior edition, and will remain so for the upcoming edition.

That it's not simulationist should be obvious from the many "no, the real world Does Not Work That Way" threads in this forum (aside from the fact that, by sheer definition, any level-based system will fail at simulationism). You want simulationist, you try GURPS, or SWORD, or indeed a tabletop wargame.

That it's not narrativist either should be obvious from the almost complete lack of narration in the core rulebooks (as opposed to, oh, pretty much every other RPG ever written) as well as the fact that the vast majority of adventures and modules published for it (including dragon magazine and living campaigns) are straightforwardly linear and resolve nearly every issue through combat. If you want narrativist, you're looking for Whitewolf, or Cyberpunk, or Amber DRP.

[Indon]

(TOTAL, COMPLETE Lack of Narr. Mechanics, offhand).

How does having a system where a conversation can be replaced by a series of die rolls facilitate the narrative facet of a system?

Edit: And Amber is a good example of a narratively _specialized_ system - it's not surprising that it's better at it than D&D.

The "OMG that can't happen IRL" threads are because there are more people analyzing D&D's simulation rules than other systems. Strange, mechanics-based oddities and discrepancies occur in other systems too.

[Rutee]

1. Narrative mechanics don't turn conversations into die rolls. They encourage everyone to, among other things, turn combat into actual roleplay. DnD counters by divorcing tactics and roleplay (http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1235), discouraging the use of different and new tactics (Unless you're a wizard).
2. I didn't say you can't play DnD as Narr. or Sim. I said that the system was hard Gamist. I could turn Exalted, GURPS, or anything else into hard Gamism, if I so wished; Doesn't change the system tilt.
3. Seriously, look at how many pages are devoted to Combat Wombat stuff. Seriously.

[Reel On, Love]

2. I didn't say you can't play DnD as Narr. or Sim. I said that the system was hard Gamist. I could turn Exalted, GURPS, or anything else into hard Gamism, if I so wished; Doesn't change the system tilt.

Exalted is just as gamist is D&D. It's about as crunchy and you can powergame like crazy. It's just *also* narrativist, because contrary to that stupid three-whatsit model games are not limited to being just one thing.

It uses Accuracy Without Distance to kill simulationism from across creation.



ETA: Wouldn't *D&D* be the system that replaces conversations (and descriptions, and etc) with a die roll?

[Rutee]

I suppose I avoid Exalted's gamism about as much as I avoid DnD's so it's less then obvious to me since I never /played/ Exalted with a gamist tilt :P (I still have an Exalt for an IRC RPG that's almost completely done except I haven't.. you know, statted her.)

No, DnD doesn't replace conversations with die rolls, because nobody actually uses Diplomacy.

[Indon]

1. Narrative mechanics don't turn conversations into die rolls. They encourage everyone to, among other things, turn combat into actual roleplay. DnD counters by divorcing tactics and roleplay (http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1235), discouraging the use of different and new tactics (Unless you're a wizard).
That's a hilarious webcomic, and you do have a point, D&D lacks a stunt system. But is a stunt system the only thing that defines a system that promotes narration versus one that doesn't? (Though, this might be getting too far off-track. Do any of us actually subscribe to this model enough to be able to describe in any more depth what narrativism is? 'Cause I don't)


3. Seriously, look at how many pages are devoted to Combat Wombat stuff. Seriously.

D&D mixes a healthy amount of fluff in between mechanics sections, particularly for classes and especially in modules - If D&D came with a module description at the beginning of each of their books, the layout would look very White-Wolf like.

Edit: And charms are magic - they don't kill simulationism. A point against simulationism in Exalted would be, for instance, the lifting/carrying by Str+Athletics table, which was obviously designed with Exalts in mind neglecting that a Mortal could feasibly hit 13 on it (5 Str + 5 Ath + 3 Specialty - Athletics (Carrying stuff)).

[Rutee]

That's a hilarious webcomic, and you do have a point, D&D lacks a stunt system. But is a stunt system the only thing that defines a system that promotes narration versus one that doesn't? (Though, this might be getting too far off-track. Do any of us actually subscribe to this model enough to be able to describe in any more depth what narrativism is? 'Cause I don't)
The model has nothing to do with the definition as far as I'm concerned; Don't get me wrong here, I consider them useful terms, but the model is crap. At most, there's priorities, not mutual exclusivity (As ROL points out, and as I said by pointing out that system tilt doesn't affect the final product).

Narrativism as th Forge defines it is also crap. My definition of it is concern (And prioritization) over the story, as a whole, /as a standalone story/. Mechanics that back this up are generally going to be mechanics that encourage a narratively interesting result to happen.

For instance, Weapons of the Gods has a kind of roll you /can not fail/; A Style Roll. Style rolls are done for things where if you fail, uninteresting things happen. One event I had crop up in gameplay was that the party moved on without one member, because she had business to attend to, and only later decided on a destination. They carved the destination into a rock. I pretty much needed the last player to find the rock, and thought a Style roll would be interesting, to which she agreed. She rolls her search, and rolls really really badly; She explains to me how she finds the rock after tripping, falling into the river the party was walking along, and banging her head on a rock around a bend in the river, upon which the location was scribed. We get a laugh, and move on. The mechanic affected the narrative without sending it in an uninteresting direction, unless you're a mutant and subversive who doesn't appreciate the lost art of physical humor)
Others are mechanics that can allow you to literally improve performance in particularly important situations (White Wolf's Willpower; Eberron's Action Points. M+M's Hero Points).

No, a stunt system isn't inherently Narr. All a stunt system does is stop divorcing roleplay from tactics. It doesn't inherently make you care more about the story (Except that it's a bit better told), it doesn't portray the simulationist aspect. It just mixes mechanics with roleplay.




D&D mixes a healthy amount of fluff in between mechanics sections, particularly for classes and especially in modules - If D&D came with a module description at the beginning of each of their books, the layout would look very White-Wolf like.
Quick opening of my PHB, Clerics have less then a page. A page per class is what, 11 pages of fluff in the chapter? Abilities, Skills, Feats, Equipment, Combat, Adventuring, Magic, and spells are even less fluffy. Chapters 2, and 6 are much more like fluff, and are a total of about 18 pages in length, total. Counting the generous doling out of class fluff, that means about 29 pages in 300 page book are fluffy.


Edit: And charms are magic - they don't kill simulationism. A point against simulationism in Exalted would be, for instance, the lifting/carrying by Str+Athletics table, which was obviously designed with Exalts in mind neglecting that a Mortal could feasibly hit 13 on it (5 Str + 5 Ath + 3 Specialty - Athletics (Carrying stuff)).
5 Str, 5 Athletics, Essence or Not, means you are /really fragging strong/. Heroic Mortals /still/ aren't ordinary humans, and ordinary humans do /not/ have Str. 5 in Exalted. Period. (It may be possible for a human in the real world to acheive this; I feel relatively certain that this person would not be 'ordinary')

[Dan_Hemmens]

That's a hilarious webcomic, and you do have a point, D&D lacks a stunt system. But is a stunt system the only thing that defines a system that promotes narration versus one that doesn't? (Though, this might be getting too far off-track. Do any of us actually subscribe to this model enough to be able to describe in any more depth what narrativism is? 'Cause I don't)

I'll do you one better: I dislike the model enough to describe in depth what narrativism is.

First off, the sarcastic-but-kinda-true answer. Narrativism means "games Ron Edwards likes" (hence Riddle of Steel is "narrativist" despite having been designed specifically because the creator thought D&D wasn't realistic enough).

The party line, however, is that Narrativism is about theme. The idea is that the only things you should be paying attention to in an RPG are things which relate directly to the theme of the game. "Theme" is defined as "a question of moral importance". For example the theme of Ron Edwards' Sorcerer is "what will you sacrifice for power". The key thing here is that the only things that you are supposed to pay attention to in Sorcerer are things about sacrificing **** for power y'all. Dogs in the Vineyard is another classic of the oeuvre, and its "theme" is "How Far Will You Go to Protect the Community". DitV is interesting in that it has a mechanically mandated period of "Reflection" at the end of every scenario in which you essentially Go Home And Thing About What You've Done. Basically you sit down and think important thoughts about what you have learned about your character and yourself as a person as a result of the game.

I am not making this up.

Although I think Forge-definition "Narrativism" is a gigantic crock of steaming Mumak dung which basically involves a bunch of self-important people circle-jerking about how awesome the game they just played was, they have introduced some interesting concepts into gaming. In particular, indie games often manage to get over the idea that your chances of "succeeding" at something IC have to be related to how difficult it would actually be, and can instead be based on something else. It's this tiny concept which has reflections (or precursors, arguably, since it's been out for a while) in things like Exalted's stunt system, wherein if I understand it correctly, it is effectively easier to backflip over a wall than climb over it (because you roll the same pool, but add Stunt Dice).

Exalted isn't "Narrativist" by the Forge definition, it's Simulationist (and arguably "Simulationist by default" - a term of deepest condemnation). It also, according to Ron Edwards actually causes literal brain damage, because people who play White Wolf games tend to disagree with Ron about stuff, and so this must be a sign of a diseased mind.

Again, I am not making this up.

Seriously, though, I see GNS theory as a lot like ether theory. Completely wrong in every particular, but it wound up producing some good practical results.

[horseboy]

Exalted isn't "Narrativist" by the Forge definition, it's Simulationist (and arguably "Simulationist by default" - a term of deepest condemnation). It also, according to Ron Edwards actually causes literal brain damage, because people who play White Wolf games tend to disagree with Ron about stuff, and so this must be a sign of a diseased mind.
Wweeell, WW's mechanics are just a heavily house ruled version of Shadowrun. :smallwink:

[Matthew]

Hah, hah. I'll admit I have just come in at the end of this thread, but those last few posts were entertaining enough to make it worth it. Anyway, just because I cannot seem to let any occasion go by to say so, I will take a moment to say "that stunt with Legolas was exactly how AD&D 2e combat was supposed to be played" (which is not to say it conventionally was). There were almost no rules at all for 'handling' it, but the DMG is pretty clear about the intention.

[Dan_Hemmens]

Wweeell, WW's mechanics are just a heavily house ruled version of Shadowrun. :smallwink:

I'm not acutally sure that Shadowrun came first. I've got a weird feeling that they're actually heavily houseruled Ghostbusters.

[Jayabalard]

In GURPS, I can play a character who is a sessile hive-minded pile of rocks. I'm not sure if that beats a living sandwich, but it at least competes with it. :smallsmile:I'm sure that most GM's would allow you to take an Unusual background: is a sentient sandwich, so in gurps, you can be a living sandwich from the start of the game, you don't have to wait until you can cast certain high level spells.

[Surgoshan]

I will take a moment to say "that stunt with Legolas was exactly how AD&D 2e combat was supposed to be played" (which is not to say it conventionally was). There were almost no rules at all for 'handling' it, but the DMG is pretty clear about the intention.

Hmm, a str/dex check to climb the thing (hooray high elves had +1 to dex!), taking a round. Fight the things on top until they're dead or use a round sawing through the straps, then kill the oliphaunt. Every round you're up there begins with a dex check to not fall off (2d6 falling damage).

[Yahzi]

"Theme" is defined as "a question of moral importance".
I know I keep yakking on about the moral nature of D&D, but I don't want to be confused with this Forge stuff.

I guess basically my complaint about NPCs and PCs being different is this: if they are different, then when the PCs stop hacking in the dungeon and start playing in the world, they wreck the world. If their abilities are too different, then they remake the DMs world in their own image, or they get squashed by DM fiat. Neither of which is particularly fun for anyone.

I don't know if that's narrativist or what; all I know is I want to buy a game system where the designers thought about what would actually happen to their world setting if Bob the Druid could replace the entire modern fertilizer industry, and then told me what effect it would have on my allegedly medieval world, so I didn't have to do that thinking myself (I have other things to think about!)

Which brings us back to balance: it's fine to have a game where some classes are not balanced against others. Just as long as you let us know. D&D comes in for knocks not because wizards are uberriffic, but because Fighter players were told they were equal when they really, really aren't.

[horseboy]

I don't know if that's narrativist or what; all I know is I want to buy a game system where the designers thought about what would actually happen to their world setting if Bob the Druid could replace the entire modern fertilizer industry, and then told me what effect it would have on my allegedly medieval world, so I didn't have to do that thinking myself (I have other things to think about!)For things like that, you're pretty much looking for a game with a built in setting. If I can pimp for a moment (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0YBOYyK1Cc).

[earlblue]

I will start by saying that I have played DnD for 22 years now. From Basic, to ADnD 1st edition, 2nd edition, 3rd edition, a mix of 3 and 3.5... and maybe 4th edition wen it comes out. I have tried some other games, but nothing that last as long as DnD.

I have tried many style. Powergaming, munchkin (for those who can remember this term), reality checks, so on and so forth.

And in the end, it boils down to this: RPG is a social game. My group is about as diverse as it can get. It is small, because where we are, rpging is rare (we are talking South East Asia here), and each of us have other hobbies. Yet, we try to find time to play rpg. All of us are working, and can afford computers and games... and yet we still come back to DnD.

Balance is never a big deal in my group. Hell, it NEVER came up at all (in the 22 years I have played). We literally have played gods and destroy whole cities... but now we usually pick up the books, just put together a character, anything we fancy when we are creating them, and then we have fun.

Ya, some of us do more damage in fights. Some of us do less, but it is the game play that we enjoy, and each others' company. We tend not to overshadow each other in fights, and we look out for each other. If someone is losing out to a monster, we chip in.

We are not up to date with the various classes and such as we do not have that much time to read that many books. We usually play the basic stuff. Yet, I suspect that all this balance issue get that complicated simply because people want to build the next big gun, and be the main hero of the story. It will never end, and reality is, there is no such thing as a balance game, nor is there really anything that is 'fair'.

While games like chess, go and such appeared to be 'balance', and if you want to go that way, then just stick with one class - for everyone. As Henry Ford once said: "They can have it in any color, as long as it is black."

Truthfully, chess, go and such is NOT balance. Whoever goes first has an advantage. The players are rarely equal, and that's why you can win in games like chess and go. We also look at the condition of the players during a chess game, and other factors (other then brain power) can affect a game.

Likewise, in fights, we have to look at other conditions. Regardless of claims, wizards can never be everywhere at the same time. It is easy to say that a wizard tossing a fireball will win over a sword wielding warrior, but is that ALWAYS the case?

Frankly, those who claim that dungeon crawl is the only game type... probably have never truly experience a good city fight. Range is a big factor when you have dragons coming down to you from the skies - where they are truly powerful. Invisibility couple with long range bowmen, or thieves/assasin hidden from sight... try and fireballed that. You have to remember that most detection spells range is only that far, and you can't hit what you can't see.

If 'magic' is what you want.... have fighters who can deal 1d6 (10d6 max) per level with their 'swords' that can 'affect' a 30 feet radius... a number of times they have to determine first thing in the morning! They have to take feats like Maximize Blows that reduces the number of times a can use their 'powerful blows'. Monster now can have 'super thick skin' that the fighter have to 'overcome' or the 'blows' will just 'bounce off'...

and seriously, how many wizards remember knock spell more then once per day, if any? Open locks? Use the thief. That's what they are for!

WE also discount a number of gameplay. A fighter usefulness comes from the fact that a sword can be used many times before you need to replace it, while a wizard (and any spellcaster, in any game system) can only cast magic a definite number of times. If you are stuck in a huge war, where enemies just keep on coming... or a sneak attacks while the casters is resting after they have exhausted their spells for the day...

So what, wizards can just 'port' away and come back another day. What if they can't? what if by running away, they lose, forever?

But that is just simply powergaming. We can if we want to, but it just take too much time to prepare. So instead of arguing about balance, and comtemplate about how to build a bigger gun. Why don't we talk to our players, get to know them better, treat each other nicely and with respect... and have fun?

And if fun means comparing who have the bigger gun and can deal more damage... play computer games in cheat mode.

K

Strangely, the Wizard who cannot work with others, or do not know how to work with others but try to outdo everyone else... must have low intelligence and/or wisdom scores. I rather save my spells for tougher monsters then to fireball everything that is fighting the fighters.

Unbalanced. There is no other way.

I once have a fighter with the spider cloak and flying broom in full shinning silver armor...:smalleek: :smallcool:

[Rutee]

I'm not acutally sure that Shadowrun came first. I've got a weird feeling that they're actually heavily houseruled Ghostbusters.

I'm pretty sure White Wolf was preceded by Shadowrun, but you'd need to check dates to be sure.


Exalted isn't "Narrativist" by the Forge definition, it's Simulationist (and arguably "Simulationist by default" - a term of deepest condemnation). It also, according to Ron Edwards actually causes literal brain damage, because people who play White Wolf games tend to disagree with Ron about stuff, and so this must be a sign of a diseased mind.
Even I'm not that arrogant; Regardless, they're wrong. Simulationist style games /are/ advocated.. but it's in the DB and Lunars' books, not the core book, the Abyssal book, or the Sidereal book. I don't think that makes the game system "Simulationist by default", even by their definition. Especially since the theme of 'Vanilla Exalted' is the reclamation of lost glory.

[horseboy]

I'm pretty sure White Wolf was preceded by Shadowrun, but you'd need to check dates to be sure.
Tom Dowd (http://www.pen-paper.net/rpgdb.php?op=showcreator&creatorid=1326) worked on both systems. That's what I was making a swipe at.

[horseboy]

Usefulness comes from the fact that a sword can be used many times before you need to replace it, while a wizard (and any spellcaster, in any game system) can only cast magic a definite number of times. 1) Not true of all systems
2) If your group things fireball is a powerful spell in 3.x it's not something your really going to have to worry about.
3) While a "fighter" can swing a sword all day, he can only fight so long before injuries force him to stop. Usually after the "healer" runs out of "heals."

[Matthew]

Hmm, a str/dex check to climb the thing (hooray high elves had +1 to dex!), taking a round. Fight the things on top until they're dead or use a round sawing through the straps, then kill the oliphaunt. Every round you're up there begins with a dex check to not fall off (2d6 falling damage).

That would certainly be one way to do it.

[Rutee]

That would certainly be one way to do it.

Isn't the trick making the cool tactics mechanically superior (Or at least equal) to 'standard' ones, rather then simply adjudicating what one is doing?

[Matthew]

Isn't the trick making the cool tactics mechanically superior (Or at least equal) to 'standard' ones, rather then simply adjudicating what one is doing?

Well, indeed, there should be some advantage, or at least no disadvantage, to doing so. I think it is a matter of risk versus reward. If after climbing onto the back of the beast, passing several Attribute checks and killing the crew, Legolas still had to knock off 150 Hit Points just as if he were on the ground, it would have been pointlessly flashy.

Of course, what Legolas does in the film is deliver a killing blow with his bow to the back of the Mumakil, so I would suppose that the AD&D DM ruled that the character could deliver an automatic kill (a much more common event in AD&D than D20) or very damaging attack from that position. The historical footnote is that the riders of War Elephants apparently carried with them a Hammer and Chisel to strike a killing blow if they lost control of the elephant, which I suppose to be the inspiration for this.*

*If you recall, Legolas tries this same little tactic earlier on in the films against the Troll in Moria, but his arrows just bounce off it.

[Rutee]

Oh? That is an interesting way to handle that, the automatic kill. Maybe D20 really is just unusually stratified for DnD :smalltongue:

[Oslecamo]

Isn't the trick making the cool tactics mechanically superior (Or at least equal) to 'standard' ones, rather then simply adjudicating what one is doing?

First, even if there were a special attack that allowed you to climb over much bigger foes to strike them from the back, and it was effecient, nobody would take it, because it would only worck against enemies bigger than you, a somehwat situational ability.

Second, everybody has a diferent definiton of "cool".


For example, what is cooler of the following?

Snaping your fingers and the monster instanlty droping dead whitout a trace, his life essence striped from his body?

Or rain down a series of blasts from far away during several rounds untill it drops dead, charred to the bone?

Would it be cooler for the fighter to snap the neck of that monster with his bare hands, or cuting him in half in one blow? Make a blow strong enough to throw him in the air and then jump over him and pierce his hearth? Maybe make several cuts to wear him down untill he finnaly drops with several gracefull movements?

Wotc tried, but it really can't hope to make a feat/maneuver/prc for every special attack fantasy out there.

[Rutee]

Wotc tried, but it really can't hope to make a feat/maneuver/prc for every special attack fantasy out there.

Guess what; Nobody suggested as much. Exalted has Charms for a lot of situations, but the heart of "I can do any special attack I want" is the Stunt system, which grants mechanical bonuses to any action taken which the players find cool (The guideline for a +3 Dice stunt is that everyone at the table goes "that is freaking cool :smalleek: ), along with Charms that are more general (Excellencies can add to any dice roll related to the ability). ADnD did rely on GM adjudication as well, and /encourages/ it, according to Matt. Seemingly, DnD is the only one that says "Buy an attack that does exactly what we say, and only use it in this one specific situation"

As to "What about different tastes", I would think your GM is in tune with your players' idea of cool, and act accordingly. It's easier sitting around a table then on IRC or PbP though, since you can watch their physical reaction. But there's nothing wrong with "I, for one, find this awesome. Who else agrees?" At least, I'm pretty sure there isn't; It worked when I was passing out Deeds in WotG.

[Indon]

ADnD did rely on GM adjudication as well, and /encourages/ it, according to Matt. Seemingly, DnD is the only one that says "Buy an attack that does exactly what we say, and only use it in this one specific situation"

Well, from what I remember of the system, AD&D encouraged adjudication because the system simply didn't try to account for everything. It seemed perfectly natural to fill in anything the system didn't cover, and the system agreed that this was the sensible and right thing for a DM to do. 3'rd edition D&D doesn't account for everything, either, but the system is considered much more... strictly typed, to use a technical term.

I think much of that is due to cultural changes since the days of AD&D and 3'rd edition, as well as demographics changes in D&D players in addition to Wizards' design intent.

[Matthew]

Oh? That is an interesting way to handle that, the automatic kill. Maybe D20 really is just unusually stratified for DnD :smalltongue:

Heh, heh. As I say, with AD&D it all depends on the DM and how he wants to run the game. If I were looking for some sort of precedent, then I would probably look towards the 2e PHB ruling on sleeping or held opponents:



*If the defender is attacked during the course of a normal melee, the attack automatically hits and causes normal damage. If no other fighting is going on (i.e. all others have been slain or driven off), the defender can be slain automatically.


In the 1e DMG that only applied to magically held or sleeping opponents, but the 2e version would make for quite a good approximation of events (I might also invoke the inescapable death clause if I were feeling rules lawyery).



PC: "Okay, Legolas is going to climb on top of that Mumakil thing and drive the chisel the driver's carrying through it's neck!"
DM: "I'll give Legolas a 70% chance to climb up."
PC: *Roll* (52) "Hah, hah, excellent."
DM: "Okay, Legolas will have to defeat the riders before he can get a clean attack on the Mumakil."
PC: "No problem, Legolas cuts the strap so they all go plummeting off."
DM: "Okay, make a Dexterity check." *Rolls a bunch of attacks*
PC: *Rolls* "No problem."
DM: "Legolas nimbly dodges his enemies and cuts through the strap, sending all his enemies plummeting to the ground!"
PC: "Excellent! Now where's the chisel the drivers use to kill these things?"
DM: "It just went over the side with him."
PC: "Um, can Legolas use his bow?"

[horseboy]

PC: "Excellent! Now where's the chisel the drivers use to kill these things?"
DM: "It just went over the side with him."
PC: "Um, can Legolas use his bow?"
LOL! If that isn't a typical scene I don't know what is!
:smallbiggrin:

[GammaPaladin]

I'd just rule that due to the Elephant's size, and inability to defend itself against a character on it's back, you can Coup de Grace from that position.

[Rutee]

...That's an average of about.. 12.5 + 3x Str Bonus + 3x Enhancement bonus (Probably +2, at best) isn't it? Not a terrifying fort save to make for a 150 hit point huge monster... Or was the Fort Save 10 + Damage dealt?

[Yahzi]

For things like that, you're pretty much looking for a game with a built in setting. If I can pimp for a moment (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g0YBOYyK1Cc).


As Kurt mentioned, Earthdawn gives logical, in-game explanations for all of the D&Disms that are usually taken for granted (dungeons full of treasure and monsters, Player Characters being more powerful than regular folk, etc.).

The Post-Apocopylatic excuse for dungeons full of treasure is straight from "The Dying Earth." At one point Cugel the thief finds a tube of blue concentrate, which he threatens people with to great effect. :D

I have a world-setting I'm working on, and I hope to see what you think of it when I get around to finishing it.

[horseboy]

The Post-Apocopylatic excuse for dungeons full of treasure is straight from "The Dying Earth." At one point Cugel the thief finds a tube of blue concentrate, which he threatens people with to great effect. :D

I have a world-setting I'm working on, and I hope to see what you think of it when I get around to finishing it.Weell, ED takes place in the 4th age. The entirety of recorded history takes place in the 5th age, Shadowrun is the 6th age. So no blue concrete laying about.

Sure, when you get it done, drop me a line and I'll look it over.

[Oslecamo]

...That's an average of about.. 12.5 + 3x Str Bonus + 3x Enhancement bonus (Probably +2, at best) isn't it? Not a terrifying fort save to make for a 150 hit point huge monster... Or was the Fort Save 10 + Damage dealt?

From the movie, i's very probable that Legolas has favored enemey:big nasty monsters.

This is, he can 1 shot kill that giant beast, but can't 1 shot kill an orc carrying a torch.