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Snooder
2008-08-26, 11:48 AM
Seems like often whenever discussing why people dislike 4e, they bring up the point that magic, and specifically magical PCs, are no longer more powerful than non-magical PCs. This seems to break a cardinal rule for them that Magic must, being magic and all, be more powerful/mysterious/special than all mundane arts.

While this sort of rule makes sense in the context of fantasy literature and occassionally makes for interesting plot structure, it's absolutely horrible as game design.

Why? For two good reasons.

1. Let's frame it slightly differently. What if someone said that you MUST make the battleship more powerful than the thimble in Monopoly simply because it's bigger? It wouldn't make sense, would it? Why should a choice of which tool you pick to represent your avatar have such a detrimental impact on your gameplay?

Obviously, Monopoly and D&D aren't exactly the same, so any analogy would fall flat, but I hope my central point is clear.


2. Again, let's frame it slightly differently. What "magic should be more powerful" means to the person who wants to play a fighter (or other martial character) is "your character should suck". (There really can't be any argument about this since it's a binary proposition; either all classes are equally powerful, or one class is better and the other sucks) This is, quite frankly, mean and entirely unfair. Nobody should be forced to play a character that sucks unless they actually want to.

The fighter isn't designed to be, nor should it be designed to be a class that sucks. Some people are fine with playing characters that suck and see no problem with this. Fine for them. They can go play NPC classes that are designed for this purpose. There's no reason why that should impact on the gameplay of other people who don't want to suck and want to play a fighter for a roleplaying reason.


Now, what IS a valid thing to say is that Magic should be special and mysterious in the setting. This is a personal preference, since some people like low-magic, some like high-magic, and some like ubiqitous[sic] magic. Handling the way magic is viewed in the setting is up to the DM to adjudicate, but has absolutely zero bearing on the relative power of PCs.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 11:51 AM
3E isn't intentionally designed for magic users to be more powerful, it is just badly designed. In theory it is suppose to be perfectly balanced. I agree with your general sentiments, i just fail to see how this really realites to 3E/4E discussions
from
EE

Snooder
2008-08-26, 11:54 AM
3E isn't intentionally designed for magic users to be more powerful, it is just badly designed. In theory it is suppose to be perfectly balanced. I agree with your general sentiments, i just fail to see how this really realites to 3E/4E discussions
from
EE

It doesn't, it starts a new discussion about the validity of making magic users more powerful.

chiasaur11
2008-08-26, 11:55 AM
Seems like often whenever discussing why people dislike 4e, they bring up the point that magic, and specifically magical PCs, are no longer more powerful than non-magical PCs. This seems to break a cardinal rule for them that Magic must, being magic and all, be more powerful/mysterious/special than all mundane arts.

While this sort of rule makes sense in the context of fantasy literature and occassionally makes for interesting plot structure, it's absolutely horrible as game design.

Why? For two good reasons.

1. Let's frame it slightly differently. What if someone said that you MUST make the battleship more powerful than the thimble in Monopoly simply because it's bigger? It wouldn't make sense, would it? Why should a choice of which tool you pick to represent your avatar have such a detrimental impact on your gameplay?

Obviously, Monopoly and D&D aren't exactly the same, so any analogy would fall flat, but I hope my central point is clear.


2. Again, let's frame it slightly differently. What "magic should be more powerful" means to the person who wants to play a fighter (or other martial character) is "your character should suck". (There really can't be any argument about this since it's a binary proposition; either all classes are equally powerful, or one class is better and the other sucks) This is, quite frankly, mean and entirely unfair. Nobody should be forced to play a character that sucks unless they actually want to.

The fighter isn't designed to be, nor should it be designed to be a class that sucks. Some people are fine with playing characters that suck and see no problem with this. Fine for them. They can go play NPC classes that are designed for this purpose. There's no reason why that should impact on the gameplay of other people who don't want to suck and want to play a fighter for a roleplaying reason.


Now, what IS a valid thing to say is that Magic should be special and mysterious in the setting. This is a personal preference, since some people like low-magic, some like high-magic, and some like ubiqitous[sic] magic. Handling the way magic is viewed in the setting is up to the DM to adjudicate, but has absolutely zero bearing on the relative power of PCs.

The battleship should be strongest in monopoly, what with all the heavy artillery weapons and all. Somehow, the other players ignore that. They learn not to when the thimble is exploded by heavy fire. Then I get kicked out of the game after attempting a military coup.

Anyway, wizards aren't battleships and therefore shouldn't be able to explode other monopoly peices. QED.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 11:55 AM
It doesn't, it starts a new discussion about the validity of making magic users more powerful.

alight, i see your point.

I agree, it isn't fair to have some classes be inherently weaker unless the game is designed for everybody to have magic like powers (exalted). D&D doesn't work under this basis
from
EE

Evil DM Mark3
2008-08-26, 11:55 AM
3E isn't intentionally designed for magic users to be more powerful, it is just badly designed. In theory it is suppose to be perfectly balanced. I agree with your general sentiments, i just fail to see how this really realites to 3E/4E discussions
from
EE

But, my dear co-evil, people are complaining along the lines he indicates. A fair number of 4e complainers complain because their wizard no longer kicks as much posterior as he used to. They want the Batman wizard back.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 11:58 AM
People who think that magic should be more powerful by default haven't read any myths, where completely human and mortal heroes (we're not talking Greek myths here), without any magic, destroy mountains, create valleys with a single blow of their sword and defeat gigantic armies with a shout.

bosssmiley
2008-08-26, 12:00 PM
Yeah, a lot of people think that magic should be more awesome than muscle, but that's often a reflexive nerdish prejudice in favour of the cerebral talking. :smalltongue:

One of the things 4E got right (and I'm speaking as a 4E refusenik here) is the idea that there should be a level playing field between the classes. At 4th, 16th, 23rd or whatever level you should be this (*indicates benchmark*) bad-ass. The actual source of your bad-assery (booklernin', godbotherin', inherent beefcake, colossally foul language, etc.) is largely immaterial. 'Raw character level' trumps 'nature of power source' in a way that it never did in 3E.

Exactly where that benchmark lies, and how the different classes should make sure they measure up to it, are points that 4E & I sadly disagree on.

nagora
2008-08-26, 12:00 PM
The problem is the definition of "balance". In 1e, fighters and magic-users were quite well balanced but were radically different from each other. in 4e they are balanced by the simple fact of being the same with a different coat of paint.

In 1e, in the right circumstances, magic-users ruled, but in others a fighter was far more use; in others a cleric or a thief would be better than either.

Indeed, a magic-user who allowed a fighter to get too close in 1e was in serious trouble no matter what level, by and large, while a fighter who allowed a high-level magic-user line of sight at range was likewise in deep trouble.

"Balanced" is not the same as "homogenised". 3e screwed up the balance and instead of fixing it, WotC decided on the homogenised option. Same with combat and minions - 3e made PC defense too easy, 4e papers over the cracks with minion rules instead of addressing the mistake.

Jayabalard
2008-08-26, 12:00 PM
While this sort of rule makes sense in the context of fantasy literature and occassionally makes for interesting plot structure, it's absolutely horrible as game design.No, it's a game design that you don't like; there's nothing especially bad about it.


1. Let's frame it slightly differently. What if someone said that you MUST make the battleship more powerful than the thimble in Monopoly simply because it's bigger? It wouldn't make sense, would it? Why should a choice of which tool you pick to represent your avatar have such a detrimental impact on your gameplay?That analogy is not valid; monopoly is a competitive game; D&D is not. In monopoly, only one of you can be the battleship; in D&D both of you can be a wizard.

Besides, even in Monopoly there are imbalances; whoever goes first has an advantage.


What "magic should be more powerful" means to the person who wants to play a fighter (or other martial character) is "your character should suck". (There really can't be any argument about this since it's a binary proposition; either all classes are equally powerful, or one class is better and the other sucks) Nope, there can be plenty of disagreement.

Less powerful != suck. What "magic should be more powerful" means to the person who wants to play a fighter (or other martial character) is "your character should be less powerful than someone who uses magic".


People who think that magic should be more powerful by default haven't read any myths, where completely human and mortal heroes (we're not talking Greek myths here), without any magic, destroy mountains, create valleys with a single blow of their sword and defeat gigantic armies with a shout.Alternatively, that's not the sort of game world that they want to play in.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 12:01 PM
But, my dear co-evil, people are complaining along the lines he indicates. A fair number of 4e complainers complain because their wizard no longer kicks as much posterior as he used to. They want the Batman wizard back.

let me explain fellow member of the EVIL club (EVIL Extremely Vile Intelligent Lords). The complaint isn't so much based upon wanting wizards to be the top dog again, just the changes are too extreme. I understand taht wizards were absurdly over powered you could change that without re vamping the entire system. Same style, same flavor, just balenced. Instead we have a blaster mage.
from
EE

Jimp
2008-08-26, 12:03 PM
People who think that magic should be more powerful by default haven't read any myths, where completely human and mortal heroes (we're not talking Greek myths here), without any magic, destroy mountains, create valleys with a single blow of their sword and defeat gigantic armies with a shout.

Now if the fighter's bonus feats allowed him to do that kind of stuff there would be fewer problems :smallwink:.

Vonriel
2008-08-26, 12:06 PM
Now if the fighter's bonus feats allowed him to do that kind of stuff there would be fewer problems :smallwink:.

Yeah, there would. We all know that if such a thing existed, then all the current 'batman' wizard fans would be all about the fighters, and we'd be in the same mess, just different class. :smalltongue:

In the end, someone will be complaining about something somewhere, because nobody has the right to say "you can't complain", here or otherwise.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 12:08 PM
The problem is the definition of "balance". In 1e, fighters and magic-users were quite well balanced but were radically different from each other. in 4e they are balanced by the simple fact of being the same with a different coat of paint.

In 1e, in the right circumstances, magic-users ruled, but in others a fighter was far more use; in others a cleric or a thief would be better than either.

Indeed, a magic-user who allowed a fighter to get too close in 1e was in serious trouble no matter what level, by and large, while a fighter who allowed a high-level magic-user line of sight at range was likewise in deep trouble.

"Balanced" is not the same as "homogenised". 3e screwed up the balance and instead of fixing it, WotC decided on the homogenised option. Same with combat and minions - 3e made PC defense too easy, 4e papers over the cracks with minion rules instead of addressing the mistake.

Uses the same mechanics != homogenised. By your logic all games that aren't pre-4e DND have homogenised rules with all characters being the same with a different coat of paint. Tell that to an Exalted player and he'll laugh in your face. I wonder one thing - have you actually played fourth edition, or at least read the books and analyzed the powers of all classes?

Jack Zander
2008-08-26, 12:08 PM
4e is bad because everyone is equal. 4e is bad because everyone is the same.

Magic should be completely different from mundane. Swords should always be able to deal more damage, but magic effects should be things no person could dream of doing on their own. Things like levitation, conjuring walls, animating vines and so forth should all be part of a magician's strategy, but they don't need to be more powerful, just different.

4e made everyone exactly the same by giving almost all attacks a damage plus effect to them.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 12:10 PM
Magic should be completely different from mundane. Swords should always be able to deal more damage, but magic effects should be things no person could dream of doing on their own. Things like levitation, conjuring walls, animating vines and so forth should all be part of a magician's strategy, but they don't need to be more powerful, just different.


Guess what? That's exactly how DND 3.x works. With all the balance that follows.

EDIT: Okay, this is just the first page and this thread is already devolving into a typical 4e argument. I'm outta here.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 12:11 PM
Uses the same mechanics != homogenised. By your logic all games that aren't pre-4e DND have homogenised rules with all characters being the same with a different coat of paint. Tell that to an Exalted player and he'll laugh in your face. I wonder one thing - have you actually played fourth edition, or at least read the books and analyzed the powers of all classes?

1) Um, his kinda pointed out how it was homogenized. It doesn't have the variety of the earlier editions, each class works under the same functions
2) Is that you answer to everything?




Guess what? That's exactly how DND 3.x works. With all the balance that follows.

no, in 3E it was "Everything you can do i can do better"
from
EE

nagora
2008-08-26, 12:13 PM
Uses the same mechanics != homogenised. By your logic all games that aren't pre-4e DND have homogenised rules with all characters being the same with a different coat of paint.
I never mentioned mechanics.

have you actually played fourth edition, or at least read the books and analyzed the powers of all classes?
I don't know anyone even prepared to try it; I have read a lot of it, starting a good while ago with WotC's previews and stuff.

Edit: oh, looks like he bailed at the first sign of resistance.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 12:15 PM
1) Um, his kinda pointed out how it was homogenized. It doesn't have the variety of the earlier editions, each class works under the same functions
2) Is that you answer to everything?
from
EE

1. He said that all 4e classes are, to quote, "the same with a different coat of paint". That's going much further than saying that they use the same mechanics.
2. When someone makes baseless accusations about a system, I assume they come from lack of experience with it, yes.
(3.) Ain't gonna post more in this thread. I said what I wanted and this looks too much like flamewar material to me. In fact, small fires are already starting...

Jayabalard
2008-08-26, 12:17 PM
Handling the way magic is viewed in the setting is up to the DM to adjudicate, but has absolutely zero bearing on the relative power of PCs.I totally disagree; the power, risk, commonness, and ease of use of magic should have an enormous impact on the power of PCs, specifically with those PCs that use magic vs those that don't.


EDIT: Okay, this is just the first page and this thread is already devolving into a typical 4e argument. I'm outta here.You could always try not instigating/participating in that part of the discussion and stick to the discussion at hand. It's not that hard.

Akimbo
2008-08-26, 12:18 PM
Yeah, there would. We all know that if such a thing existed, then all the current 'batman' wizard fans would be all about the fighters, and we'd be in the same mess, just different class. :smalltongue:

In the end, someone will be complaining about something somewhere, because nobody has the right to say "you can't complain", here or otherwise.

Except that if both the Fighter and the Wizard are awesome, then they split half and half, and everyone is happy.

Which is why both have to be awesome.

The problem with 4E is that neither is awesome.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 12:19 PM
1. He said that all 4e classes are, to quote, "the same with a different coat of paint". That's going much further than saying that they use the same mechanics.
2. When someone makes baseless accusations about a system, I assume they come from lack of experience with it, yes.
(3.) Ain't gonna post more in this thread. I said what I wanted and this looks too much like flamewar material to me. In fact, small fires are already starting...

1) But you haven't done anything to prove him wrong there, you just said he was wrong
2) How is it baseless, when your response is just as baseless. You haven't really responded, you made a nitpick, then accused him of not reading the book?
3) That might be because of lack of clarity
from
EE

Artanis
2008-08-26, 12:22 PM
The problem with 4E is that neither is awesome.
...in your opinion.


Which really, is the crux of the issue here. Some people feel that magic should be more powerful than non-magic, period. Some people feel that balance is important, and to hell with realism. Some people feel that 4e's characters are bland, mediocre, and too similar. Some people feel that 4e's characters are flavorful and awesome in their own ways, they just happen to be awesome and flavorful to similar levels as each other.

It's all a matter of opinion, and when people with strong opinions get together on the internet...well...

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 12:25 PM
...in your opinion.


Which really, is the crux of the issue here. Some people feel that magic should be more powerful than non-magic, period. Some people feel that balance is important, and to hell with realism. Some people feel that 4e's characters are bland, mediocre, and too similar. Some people feel that 4e's characters are flavorful and awesome in their own ways, they just happen to be awesome and flavorful to similar levels as each other.

It's all a matter of opinion, and when people with strong opinions get together on the internet...well...

Live and let live isn't a solution, its just an excuse when it comes to this discussion. As i said, 4E would be a fine spin off game of D&D, it would be a great rule expansion for the miniature game. HOwever as a new edition is simply falls short
from
EE

Storm Bringer
2008-08-26, 12:27 PM
It's all a matter of opinion, and when people with strong opinions get together on the internet...well...

boom. (http://www.acceleratingfuture.com/michael/blog/images/Nuke2.JPG)

filler filler filler

monty
2008-08-26, 12:30 PM
I don't think magic should be more powerful so much as more versatile. From a realistic point of view, you can only do so many different things by hitting stuff with a sword, but magic can be used to do pretty much anything, limited only by the restrictions imposed on it by the system. So, if magic is stronger than fighting, rather than just more generally useful, then that just means that the designers didn't balance it properly. It doesn't mean that you should bring magic and non-magic to the same level in every way.

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 12:34 PM
Guess what? That's exactly how DND 3.x works. With all the balance that follows.

The problem with 3.5 (and many other systems, games, whatever, 3.5 is just example) is that Fighters already are doing unmundane things, and it could be nicely done, but it isn't.

Think about it : average 12th level Fighter can among the other things :

- survive being hit by massive balls of fire, that have tendency to burn meat. And lightnings and acid, and stuff. And just shout loudly and continue fighting, and recover from those stuff in a week without magical help.
- Hit really small things from a bow from even 1000 feet.
- take a sword slash from fugging 12 000 pound humanoid (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/giant.htm#stormGiant) and take about 50 "damage" instead of being cleaved perfeclty in half.
- damage guys in plate armours with sabre or kukri...
- climb massive rocks or beat the records in vertical jumping in heavy armor, considering focusing on some skills a bit (higher Int?)

And those are just few examples, made about really badly designed class, that can do mostly fight, and doesn't have interesting abilites.
Think about his full BaB fellow - ranger and how many absolutely unmundane stuff he can do.

Breaking mountains and other far fetched, things which would cause only more imbalance and paradoxes (why bother with miners if you can rent such guy for a 5 seconds of work) aren't really necessary (regardless if people like such stuff - I don't , while Tengu apparently likes, for example).

Making such stuuf interesting and comparable to magic, by making magic more interesting as well - not "standard/full action and that's it".

Using D&D example, 4ed made quite a good work in this direction, although few things were made even worse.


I don't think magic should be more powerful so much as more versatile. From a realistic point of view, you can only do so many different things by hitting stuff with a sword, but magic can be used to do pretty much anything, limited only by the restrictions imposed on it by the system. So, if magic is stronger than fighting, rather than just more generally useful, then that just means that the designers didn't balance it properly. It doesn't mean that you should bring magic and non-magic to the same level in every way.

The proper magic should give possibilty do make absolutely unmundane, fantastic things, under some conditions, some cost et cetera.

While in 3.5 it allows you to also do every mundane thing that you want, just rendering other classes and normal people a unnecessary paradox in esistence, while in 4ed it's turned into art of destroying living creatures bodies in many different ways.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 12:34 PM
You could always try not instigating/participating in that part of the discussion and stick to the discussion at hand. It's not that hard.

Good idea - let's ignore the standard edition war (especially since the other side has proven it doesn't possess full knowledge about the 4e system), and discuss the actual topic. I might actually post here after all.


I totally disagree; the power, risk, commonness, and ease of use of magic should have an enormous impact on the power of PCs, specifically with those PCs that use magic vs those that don't.

I disagree. All PCs with the same experience should possess roughly the same power. If in a game magic is immensely powerful, but hard to use (which was never the case in DND - they only had the first element covered), then the magic user has 1000% awesomeness 10% of the time, and 0% awesomeness the rest of the time, while the non-mage has 100% awesomeness 100% of the time. This results in a rat race, where instead of the whole group having fun all the time, in most situations some characters do something contributing while the rest could as well not be there.



Think about it : average 12th level Fighter can among the other things :

- survive being hit by massive balls of fire, that have tendency to burn meat. And lightnings and acid, and stuff. And just shout loudly and continue fighting, and recover from those stuff in a week without magical help.
- Hit really small things from a bow from even 1000 feet.
- take a sword slash from fugging 12 000 pound humanoid (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/monsters/giant.htm#stormGiant) and take about 50 "damage" instead of being cleaved perfeclty in half.
- damage guys in plate armours with sabre or kukri...
- climb massive rocks or beat the records in vertical jumping in heavy armor, considering focusing on some skills a bit (higher Int?)


Unfortunately, all of these examples apart from the last one get boiled down to Hit Very Hard or Survive Getting Hit Very Hard. The last one gets outshadowed by a low-level spell.



Breaking mountains and other far fetched, things which would cause only more imbalance and paradoxes (why bother with miners if you can rent such guy for a 5 seconds of work) aren't really necessary (regardless if people like such stuff - I don't , while Tengu apparently likes, for example).


Y'see, this paradox is easily answered - those people were heroes. They were rare, and usually too busy fighting powerful evildoers/monsters. And, in some cases, lazy bastards without enough motivation to do anything.
I don't think if implementing such things creates imbalance, if done well. Exalted, Scion, Mutants and Masterminds - all these games let you do some pretty sick stuff, without being a mage. And all of them are a crapload of fun.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 12:37 PM
Good idea - let's ignore the standard edition war (especially since the other side has proven it doesn't possess full knowledge about the 4e system), and discuss the actual topic. I might actually post here after all.


But you entire claim of others posseing ignorance is just that, a claim, without any backing. Your entire basis of correctedness isn't based upon anything
from
EE

TwystidMynd
2008-08-26, 12:39 PM
I agree that, in many situations, it seems silly that Magic should be equal to physical prowess. This would make for boring novels and bland movies. The REASON mages are cool in books and movies is because they're special and can accomplish awesome things that no one else can.

The great thing about novels and movies, though, is that they have a central main character who can accomplish this stuff, and you don't have to worry about the other people walking behind him saying to themselves "Well ... I'll just sit over here."

In D&D, though, it's a game. It's cooperative. Main characters don't exist. If one party member is more special than the others, then it makes the whole game lopsided, and unfun for the people who can't share the spotlight.

If you need a game where you're the best, and no one else can touch you, then I'd recommend you play a solo RPG. For these people, 4e and 3.x can serve well, if you've got a DM willing to run a solo adventure. Otherwise, plenty of console/computer RPGs are out there that allow you to be awesome all by yourself.
In a group, though, it's quite simply bad to say "I have an adventure! The mage will be able to make a difference, and the rest of you may watch the story evolve."

As an aside, if the counter argument to this is "Yeah, but you can all be mages!" then doesn't that homogenize the game even more which is, as some claim, a bad thing?

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 12:44 PM
But you entire claim of others posseing ignorance is just that, a claim, without any backing. Your entire basis of correctedness isn't based upon anything
from
EE

Let me present nagora's post. Is he lying?



I don't know anyone even prepared to try it; I have read a lot of it, starting a good while ago with WotC's previews and stuff.

nagora
2008-08-26, 12:44 PM
Good idea - let's ignore the standard edition war (especially since the other side has proven it doesn't possess full knowledge about the 4e system), and discuss the actual topic. I might actually post here after all.
Phew! What a relief!

You can't easily ignore the edition changes in this case. The question is about something that has changed over the editions and in some editions it worked and in at least one later edition it was widely acknowledge to not work. Now, 4e has addressed the problem not by going back to the older system but by introducing a new approach.

Let's put it this way: how would you characterise the solution to this question that WotC have embodied in 4e?

Telonius
2008-08-26, 12:45 PM
Magic should trump fighting if it makes sense within the game setting. If it doesn't make sense within the game setting, it shouldn't trump fighting.

Within the game, magic is one tool among many. In general, if a tool is too all-powerful, it shouldn't be in the hands of the PCs. If, within your setting, magic trumps fighting, almost always, in almost any circumstance, then you should not let any of your PCs use magic. (Or conversely, you should let all of the PCs use magic and send them against very high-powered foes).

Where the line should be drawn is somewhat debatable. Personally I think that magic in standard 3.5 D&D straddles the line. Some spells and spell combinations really are too powerful, and should not be allowed. But others are okay. Magic Missile is fine; Forcecage and DMM cheese with nightsticks are not.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 12:48 PM
Let's put it this way: how would you characterise the solution to this question that WotC have embodied in 4e?

Are you asking me how I understand what they did with 4e, or what direction would I choose to fix the problem if I were the one who made it?

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 12:48 PM
Let me present nagora's post. Is he lying?

that doesn't change his point however, that just changes his experience. If he is wrong, fine, prove him so.


On the subject, magic needs to follow rules, and if you want consistency, you need to measure the usefullness of the magic users with everybody else
from
EE

TheThan
2008-08-26, 12:51 PM
The OP is right, magic users should not trump fighters.

Unfortunately this is the case with 3.5. Why is this the case? Because of one seriously major flaw in the game system.

Dungeon and Dragons uses a level based system. In level based systems each character is supposed to grow in power as they level up. The flaw in the system is that none of the other classes actually grow more powerful each time they level, other than the full spell casting classes. (exepting rogue sneek attack which increases every other level)


Well let’s take an example:

The 3.5 the barbarian’s main ability is the rage ability, it is what the class focuses on. However, he only gains one additional use of his rage ability every 4 levels (gaining the ability at 1st). Hmm, is rage too powerful? hardly, since it just grants extra damage and hit points, at the cost of becoming exhausted afterwards.

Compare that to a wizard.

A wizard gains “+1 additional spellcasting) each and every level. What does this mean? It means every single level the wizard’s spells become more powerful, he gains more spells and more spells per day. That’s an awful lot of power.



As you can plainly see, the wizard’s spell casting has a huge advantage over the barbarian’s rage. Simply because it increases every time your wizard levels. This is even without accounting for many of the spells that are simply too powerful to begin with.


In order to fix this two things need to be done.

The first is to increase the power of the other classes. By increasing each classes special features to scale right. Or by decreasing the rate at which spell casting scales.

The second is to give the other classes capabilities that allow them to contend with the powerful spells that spell casters have access to; or to reduce the power of spells in general.

Wizards of the coast tried to fix this by creating The Tome of Battle: the book of nine swords. Most people on these forums will agree that this book fixes this major flaw by introducing classes that do the above. Which is great, but Does 4.0 do either of these things? Its a new edition, did they learn from their mistakes? Honestly I don’t know. I haven’t read the rules or tried the new system out.

Cybren
2008-08-26, 12:51 PM
People who think that magic should be more powerful by default haven't read any myths, where completely human and mortal heroes (we're not talking Greek myths here), without any magic, destroy mountains, create valleys with a single blow of their sword and defeat gigantic armies with a shout.

Which is completelly out of line for the Robert E. Howard inspired typical fantasy roleplaying setting.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 12:53 PM
Also Tengu, that is essentially magic what your describing, just not called as such
from
EE

Charity
2008-08-26, 12:54 PM
What 'real life' yardstick are we using here to determine why magic should be more powerful than muscle? There is no real magic, sorry to break it to you,
There is no santa either
For every literature example of uber powered magic there is another with low key subtle magic.

You are merely expressing your opinions...
So ask yourselves, does it boil down to it must be so because you say so.?

snoopy13a
2008-08-26, 12:55 PM
Was it 2nd edition where the classes weren't supposed to be balanced but XP levels were different?

For example, the thief wasn't as powerful as the other classes but a thief leveled up quicker then anyone else. On the other hand, paladins and rangers were better then fighters but leveled up slower (and had alignment restrictions).

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 12:55 PM
What 'real life' yardstick are we using here to determine why magic should be more powerful than muscle? There is no real magic, sorry to break it to you,
There is no santa either
For every literature example of uber powered magic there is another with low key subtle magic.

You are merely expressing your opinions...
So ask yourselves, does it boil down to it must be so because you say so.?

so if your strip your snark aside, your point basically is "Your options and points don't matter?"
classy
from
EE

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 12:56 PM
Which is completelly out of line for the Robert E. Howard inspired typical fantasy roleplaying setting.

Show me a protagonist wizard in Conan.


Also Tengu, that is essentially magic what your describing, just not called as such
from
EE

No, it's not magic. These characters do not harness any supernatural powers - they perform these feats just by being that good. In fact, many of them are faithful knights from Christian legends, where if you're a magician, you're a misguided pagan at best, and a black-hearted monster usually.

TheThan
2008-08-26, 12:57 PM
What 'real life' yardstick are we using here to determine why magic should be more powerful than muscle? There is no real magic, sorry to break it to you,
There is no santa either
For every literature example of uber powered magic there is another with low key subtle magic.

You are merely expressing your opinions...
So ask yourselves, does it boil down to it must be so because you say so.?

I’m using game balance as my yardstick.

You know that thing that keeps one character from stealing the show and taking the spotlight.
Because it’s a cooperative game, everyone should be able to contribute to the action of the story.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 01:01 PM
No, it's not magic. These characters do not harness any supernatural powers - they perform these feats just by being that good. In fact, many of them are faithful knights from Christian legends, where if you're a magician, you're a misguided pagan at best, and a black-hearted monster usually.

Your still preforming acts that are impossible. Destroying a mountain with a shout is magic, even if the term isn't quite as fluid. Or a miracle, what have you, it is still a magical like effect
from
EE

Charity
2008-08-26, 01:01 PM
Than my old mukker, I am agreeing with you...

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 01:02 PM
The last one gets outshadowed by a low-level spell.


And that was my whole point, you see. Umnundane and awesome stuff can be bat by some guy who just licked a bit of magic easily.




Unfortunately, all of these examples apart from the last one get boiled down to Hit Very Hard or Survive Getting Hit Very Hard.

ABeacuse that's basically what Fighter should do. Like whole name is pointing out.

The whole concept of 3.5 Fighter shows that he was meant as guy who fights very well. The whole failure is that it isn't making him better fighter than mages.

And of course it don't have to resolve around "being hit hard/hit hard".

Being Fighter cold contain knowledge about tactics, weapon lore, unmatched courage, classic "hero who doesn't know fear", and some actual different strikes, parries, method of overpowering enemies. Who can be even totally mundane and still work well.

Again, 3.5 ed, with it's whole potential fails here, with Fighters from some reason having weak Will save, and Bards having it high.

Cybren
2008-08-26, 01:02 PM
Protagonist? None, because Conan is the protagonist of Conan. But he has teamed up with magicians on some occasions. (Pelias from The Scarlet Citadel comes to mind). Magic in Conan is also legitimately mysterious and unquantified, however, compared to what is necessary in a roleplaying game.
Anyway, I'd argue the most well known myths are the ones where the protagonists are not very far from the norm. The Illiad, Beowulf, Jason and the Argonauts. Heck, take the gods of some mythologies and they're decidedly more mortal than most people expect their D&D characters to be.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 01:04 PM
Your still preforming acts that are impossible. Destroying a mountain with a shout is magic, even if the term isn't quite as fluid. Or a miracle, what have you, it is still a magical like effect
from
EE

If everything that's impossible in real life is magic for you, then yes, magic indeed shouldn't trump fighting. But it also means all player characters should have access to equally powerful magic (because without magic you're can't do crap when compared to these who use it), just different kinds of it.

Doesn't change the fact that the feats described by me weren't magic, and in many cases you'd offend the people who performed them if you called them mages. If they existed and were still alive, I mean.


Protagonist? None, because Conan is the protagonist of Conan. But he has teamed up with magicians on some occasions. (Pelias from The Scarlet Citadel comes to mind). Magic in Conan is also legitimately mysterious and unquantified, however, compared to what is necessary in a roleplaying game.

And did Pelias completely steal the spotlight, being able to do everything that Conan could, only better? I doubt it, because Conan is a world where both magic users and non-magic users have limited capabilities. In DND 3.x, the problem comes from the fact that the limitation on what magic users can do is much less strict than the limitation on what non-magic users can do.

nagora
2008-08-26, 01:06 PM
Are you asking me how I understand what they did with 4e, or what direction would I choose to fix the problem if I were the one who made it?
Both would be good, but I was asking for the former.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 01:09 PM
If everything that's impossible in real life is magic for you, then yes, magic indeed shouldn't trump fighting. But it also means all player characters should have access to equally powerful magic (because without magic you're can't do crap when compared to these who use it), just different kinds of it.

1) Yes actually, that is what magic is. Anything that can't be done in real life. If we want to be nitpicky in D&D terms, then throw psionics into the mix, but hte general ideas is still the same
2) Just because 3E screwed up balance doesn't mean the balance is impossible. A non magic user can in theory be just as powerful as a magic user if the system wasn't screwed up



Doesn't change the fact that the feats described by me weren't magic, and in many cases you'd offend the people who performed them if you called them mages. If they existed and were still alive, I mean.
They were magic. They wouldn't call it magic, and wouldn't imagine it as magic, but that is still magic in the sense of going against the natural rules and telling the laws of phyics to sit down and shut up
from
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Morty
2008-08-26, 01:11 PM
Hm, a Balance or Not Balance thread. Haven't seen one in a while.
Let's see how long will it take for both sides to pull out all their strawmen. Anyway:


Unfortunately, all of these examples apart from the last one get boiled down to Hit Very Hard or Survive Getting Hit Very Hard. The last one gets outshadowed by a low-level spell.


Isn't hitting really hard/fast/precisely kind of what high-level fighters are supposed to be doing? As long as it's made interesting -that is, more than "I full attack/I charge/I trip(you know the drill)- balanced -i.e not overshadowed by magic users- and not too over the top -no destroying mountains with one hit and the like- I'm fine with warrior classes doing nothing but hitting and getting hit. If I wasn't, I wouldn't play a warrior. Then again, I prefer to tone down the magic users rather than pump up "mundane" guys, even in D&D. Not to mention that regardless of the system, I feel that low-level warriors should be nothing more but good swordsmen. Let's reserve doing unbelivable feats of martial prowess for higher levels.

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 01:19 PM
I'm fine with warrior classes doing nothing but hitting and getting hit. If I wasn't, I wouldn't play a warrior. Then again, I prefer to tone down the magic users rather than pump up "mundane" guys, even in D&D.

It's not about "toning them down" - making everything a bit more logical would be sufficent.

If mage just couldn't just survive a blast of fire beacuse of lack the unnatural fortitude of body and spirit that some Fighter have - he would be forced to protect himself by magic.

In 3.5, Wizard indeed have less hitpoints than Fighter, but most probably will have much better Reflex save.

Not to mention ability to have lowly Protection from energy active for 2 hours at 12th level, and what's more ability to cast it from scroll not to waste other spells for that.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 01:20 PM
Both would be good, but I was asking for the former.

They've seen that magic users are too versatile, and limited both their capabilities and the amount of options they have available at once, while increasing the amount of options for other classes. Because the vancian system doesn't have any sense for non-mages, but on the other hand they're too used to it to abandon it completely, they went with something resembling it slightly for all classes - they could do better (base everything even more on ToB, for example), but what they did works well enough.


1) Yes actually, that is what magic is. Anything that can't be done in real life. If we want to be nitpicky in D&D terms, then throw psionics into the mix, but hte general ideas is still the same
2) Just because 3E screwed up balance doesn't mean the balance is impossible. A non magic user can in theory be just as powerful as a magic user if the system wasn't screwed up


1. So Roland of Gilead, V (the masked guy, not Shroedinger's elf) and Ozymandias are mages too?
2. The only ways of having balance in a game where both 100% mundane characters and magic users are viable is to either make the magic very weak, or give the mundanes access to powerful and versatile equipment. And by that, I mean spaceships and rocket launchers, not longsword +1. And even then you can screw up, just look at Arcanum where technology is in theory rooting magic out, but playing as a wizard is much easier than playing as a tinker.



They were magic. They wouldn't call it magic, and wouldn't imagine it as magic, but that is still magic in the sense of going against the natural rules and telling the laws of phyics to sit down and shut up
from
E

These people didn't recite incantations, didn't concentrate magical energies with their mind, didn't perform arcane gestures, didn't receive their powers from a magical/divine being. You can call everything that is not possible in real life magic, but it doesn't change the fact that in many cases, you'll be wrong.

Artanis
2008-08-26, 01:21 PM
2) Just because 3E screwed up balance doesn't mean the balance is impossible. A non magic user can in theory be just as powerful as a magic user if the system wasn't screwed up
The problem here - and the reason for this thread - is that some people want the system to be "screwed up" that way, and those people argue long and hard that 4e is a bad system due to being even remotely balanced on that front.

Aquillion
2008-08-26, 01:30 PM
The original poster misunderstands the game's mechanics. "Power" and "balance" are not the same thing; it is possible for a wizard to be extremely powerful and yet be heavily dependent on the fighter (and the rest of the party) in combat or other situations. This was the case in 2nd edition to a great extent, for instance, because magic was slow and had more drawbacks, the fighter wasn't crippled by 3e's standard attack / full-attack system, and saving throws were harder to overcome overall.

Balancing the 'power' of different classes is not important; what matters is balancing the role of those classes, ensuring that each has something to do that nobody else can. If the fighter can handle up-close brawls and sudden ambushes (while the wizard can't), the rogue can handle delicate social situations or complicated traps (while the wizard can't), then it doesn't matter if the wizard can do amazing stuff -- everyone should still be able to have fun, because everyone still has a role (of course, alternate wizard-like fighter classes could be created for people who want to have fighter fluff and still slice mountains in half... but they'd have to give up some part of the basic fighter role, and become more wizard-like in terms of weaknesses.)

4e uses a much more 'videogame-like' method of balancing; everything is more or less based around the same set of statistics (area, damage/healing, range, and extremely similar-looking debuffs/buffs.) 95% of the powers from 4e could be generated by editing those numerical values, plus a few bits for things like implement requirement and so on.

While I know people hate to hear it (and it's not the same in every way) the roles of 4e have, undeniably, been pared down to the basic MMORPG-style roles (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AnAdventurerIsYou)... and I think a lot of people (myself included) just feel that it's not possible to keep any real 'magical' feel if you stick to those.

4th edition isn't bad in other ways, mind you. And it's a fair trade-off for improved balance. But it is a tradeoff; 4th edition specifically abandoned the sense of magic that earlier editions had strived for in favor of strapping the players into more rigidly-defined roles.

It is possible to make a game where one person wants to be able to teleport around, fly, and turn into a bear; and the other person wants to wade into melee thwacking things with a sword, and let everyone have fun. (D&D has been doing it for decades, after all.) In that case, the character the wizard wants to be is objectively more 'powerful' in many ways, but careful game design can prevent them from overshadowing the rest of the party despite this (and there's nothing wrong with providing martial or skill-based options that are 'powerful' in the same way... but that shouldn't be your only solution, because some people want to play characters that don't cut through brick walls with one slice.)



When people complain about what was done to magic in 4e, what they usually mean is not that it was simply depowered but that it was reduced to choosing whether you want to be a DPSer, nuker, or mezzer, with cookie-cutter abilities to support each and very little outside those rigid roles.

That much, at least, is not something present in any sort of heroic fantasy I've ever read; magic, whether high or low, is all about having an extremely wide variety of strange effects. How many books can you name where 'magic' was just another word for 'AOE attack', and a group of people who felt they needed a wizard could easily accomplish the same thing by getting the equivalent of a Martial Controller?

BigPapaSmurf
2008-08-26, 01:38 PM
The way I understood the concept, which pre-dates 3e, high lvl magic users should be more powerful than non-mus, however their severe limitations make them more suseptable to the unexpected, long battles and low levels. The Fighters get HP, Weps, armor and MR%(In many games) while the Casters get more firepower/versatility. Damage per second isnt the only measure of balance.

As for 3rd edition, it was not designed for table gaming, it was created (besides money-grubbing)solely for the translation of actual game rules to the more profitable D&D video games, which was impossible in 2nd edition. When they found that the new system was a joke/unmanageable on paper games it was tweaked.(more grubbing)

I still cant understand how you folks put up with the newer skills system, what a joke, are you supposed to read two pages of crap every time you make a way too frequent check?

Snooder
2008-08-26, 01:40 PM
Magic should be completely different from mundane. Swords should always be able to deal more damage, but magic effects should be things no person could dream of doing on their own. Things like levitation, conjuring walls, animating vines and so forth should all be part of a magician's strategy, but they don't need to be more powerful, just different.


This is an interesting sidepoint that IMO needs to be addressed. At which point does "versatility" and "uniqueness" translate into power? If a wizard can levitate but a fighter can't, then the flying wizard gains air superiority and is thus more powerful.

We have to remember why the Wizard is called Batman in the first place. Batman as hero has no superpowers, but he is arguably the most powerful of all them. His ability to "outhink" everyone and plan for every eventuality is what makes him pretty much unbeatable. I think WoTC realized that giving wizards such a diverse toolkit that nobody else had is much of what made them so much more powerful than Fighters.



No, it's a game design that you don't like; there's nothing especially bad about it.


No, it's bad game design. It's not a personal opinion to say that kicking someone in the face is a bad thing to do. It's not personal opinion to say that kicking someone in the face who is paying you for the privilege is an even WORSE idea. Forcing someone to play a character that is suboptimal, when they didn't want to do so, is bad game design.



I totally disagree; the power, risk, commonness, and ease of use of magic should have an enormous impact on the power of PCs, specifically with those PCs that use magic vs those that don't.


So are u arguing that there should be a power imbalance between PCs? Are you saying that the fighter should be less powerful than the mage? Cause if you are, we can get a conversation going. I'd like to have a response as to why being mean to people who want to play fighters isn't a bad idea.

AmberVael
2008-08-26, 01:44 PM
I have a rather unusual argument to present here- one that will at first seem silly, but hopefully will make sense as its focus becomes clear.

Magic, indeed, does not trump fighting in a 3.5 setting.

Now while all of you are beginning to prepare your batman, druid, and cleric arguments, I will make this amendment:
While comparatively, the spellcasting classes are far more powerful for their level than the other classes, in the end, taken with the basic DnD rules, within a campaign world magic will be very useful- but a fighter will be the most effective fighter.

Reasoning as below:

PCs are wholly unaffected by this gap in power because it is determined that they begin at the same level. What you will notice, however, is that it is extremely unlikely for them to begin at the same age.
Let us, for simplicity's sake, assume the world is completely populated with humans and no other race.

The base starting age for a human PC is 15 + class modifier. This modifier changes for each class- and mostly notably the spellcasting classes. On average it takes twice as much extra time over the base age to train a wizard as it does a fighter.
To train a fighter to level 1 it will take about 3 and a half years, leaving the PC at 18 and a half. To train a wizard it will take about seven years, leaving the wizard at 22. Thereafter, due to the strange rules of XP, the fighter will advance at the same rate as the wizard.
But-
The fighter has three and a half years to train before the wizard does. Again, because of the linear method of training and the massive XP gain that can be found in a short amount of time, that fighter who started training at the same time as the wizard is going to be about level 20 (or more) by the time the wizard hits level 1.
Ouch?
You also have to keep in mind that it's a lot easier to find someone with the capability of becoming a good fighter than it is to find someone with the capability of becoming a good spellcaster. A good fighter has decent strength or dexterity or con- a good spellcaster must have above average wisdom or intelligence (sorcerers are excluded for reasons listed later).
Furthermore, while as PCs wizards don't have to worry about this- where are all of those spellbooks and scribed spells coming from at first? The components and magical stuff to put them into spellbooks has to come from somewhere. That's a pretty hefty expense- outfitting a lot of people in that way... not so good.

So essentially it's extremely easy for a place to have tons of really high level fighters- and while the spellcasters are more powerful in equal terms of level, the fighters and other mundane folk will have a huge experience lead on the spellcasters and will be able to pummel them senseless while holding off an army by the time they've mastered cantrips. Sure the casters can hold off those of equal level, but it'll just be easier to find a really high level fighter than a really high level caster because of how quickly and en masse they can be trained.

There are two exclusions to this.
1) The sorcerer. The sorcerer is innately tied in with magic and takes one less year than a fighter to train. While it is easy to say that they are rare, the ones that do exist will learn magic so fast that they'll be able to destroy anything around them in record time.
So apparently, sorcerers pwn.

2) The monk. Who would have guessed that the monk got screwed over in yet another way?
...
Yeah, we all did, I'm sure.
Suffice to say, it takes a Monk as long as a spellcaster to train, and they end up worse than the fighters. So you'll be a level one monk trying to punch kobolds while your fighter peers are wrestling dragons.
Waaa waaa waaaaaaa....


Yeah, this is probably a somewhat flawed idea, but I thought it would be a new and interesting view to put up. :smallwink:

Frownbear
2008-08-26, 01:46 PM
The problem is the definition of "balance". In 1e, fighters and magic-users were quite well balanced but were radically different from each other. in 4e they are balanced by the simple fact of being the same with a different coat of paint.

I love that now my Fighter can turn invisible, make himself fly, create walls of ice or flame, and make an extradimensional mansion to have Roman-style orgies in, with his sword!

Aquillion
2008-08-26, 01:48 PM
This is an interesting sidepoint that IMO needs to be addressed. At which point does "versatility" and "uniqueness" translate into power? If a wizard can levitate but a fighter can't, then the flying wizard gains air superiority and is thus more powerful.

We have to remember why the Wizard is called Batman in the first place. Batman as hero has no superpowers, but he is arguably the most powerful of all them. His ability to "outhink" everyone and plan for every eventuality is what makes him pretty much unbeatable. I think WoTC realized that giving wizards such a diverse toolkit that nobody else had is much of what made them so much more powerful than Fighters.

So are u arguing that there should be a power imbalance between PCs? Are you saying that the fighter should be less powerful than the mage?
Power comes in different flavors. For instance, suppose (and this is a fix I've suggested in the past) every spell took at least a full-round action to cast, with some taking even longer? Suppose taking damage automatically broke concentration and made you lose whatever spell you're trying to cast? Suppose saving throws were good enough that a mage could never depend on hitting them reliably against a large group?

In this case, the mage would be more 'powerful' when a spell goes off, and might have a wide variety of spells, but they would have to work with their party both to ensure that spells go off in the first place, and to ensure that the situation when they drop a spell is suitable (because they have to wait a full round for the effect to appear.)

These are just examples, but the point is, it is possible to have magic be a theoretically vast and mysterious power while, as a practical matter, maintaining balance between the classes on the ground.

(Of course, 3e had another, more serious problem -- fighting was heavily gimped by a system that gave them few options. This goes beyond not having the 'slice mountains in two' fighters that I suggested above -- the standard action / full-attack problem was a basic design flaw. Likewise, many ToB / 4e martial maneuvers are not flashy or powerful, but fit the idea of a rough or swift fighter-type just fine. Fixing that would go a long way towards ensuring that everyone has a role, without needing to turn wizards into purely MMORPG-style DPSers, nukers, or mezzers.)


I love that now my Fighter can turn invisible, make himself fly, create walls of ice or flame, and make an extradimensional mansion to have Roman-style orgies in, with his sword!
That would be the 'different coat of paint'. But you cannot focus on any of those things -- they're limited, symbolic parts of the class. The overall role of magic has been reduced to very strict 'DPS, nuke, buff' using a few standardized abilities with little more than flavor differences between classes.

Yes, there are a handful of flavor abilities outside of those, but right now you simply can't build a 4e wizard/warlock without focusing on DPSing, nuking, or mezzing.

In 4e, wizard = nuker, with some lesser options for DPS, crowd-control, and buffing/debuffing.

Tempest Fennac
2008-08-26, 01:50 PM
That is an interresting arguement, Vael (to be fair, I just start all of my characters at whatever the minimum starting age is due to hating the ageing penalty system, so it doesn't really work for me:smalltongue:). I think the main problem with core warriors is that they only really do mundane things while all spellcasters can do things which generally can;t be done in real life, so there is likely to be a power gap between the 2 types of class.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 01:56 PM
1. So Roland of Gilead, V (the masked guy, not Shroedinger's elf) and Ozymandias are mages too?
2. The only ways of having balance in a game where both 100% mundane characters and magic users are viable is to either make the magic very weak, or give the mundanes access to powerful and versatile equipment. And by that, I mean spaceships and rocket launchers, not longsword +1. And even then you can screw up, just look at Arcanum where technology is in theory rooting magic out, but playing as a wizard is much easier than playing as a tinker.

1) non of those people are from ancient myths, those are from modern comic books. I'd certainly say that most of the mythic heros are doing some magical like acts.
2) The only way? Seems a little premature to make that claim isn't it?



These people didn't recite incantations, didn't concentrate magical energies with their mind, didn't perform arcane gestures, didn't receive their powers from a magical/divine being. You can call everything that is not possible in real life magic, but it doesn't change the fact that in many cases, you'll be wrong.
And if we aren't working under the D&D definintion of a mage, then doing those things doesn't matter, only the result.


The problem here - and the reason for this thread - is that some people want the system to be "screwed up" that way, and those people argue long and hard that 4e is a bad system due to being even remotely balanced on that front
But that is far from the majority of anti 4E people, in fact that is a huge minority. Like the people who prefer 2E because of its lack of balence
from
EE

Snooder
2008-08-26, 01:59 PM
Balancing the 'power' of different classes is not important; what matters is balancing the role of those classes, ensuring that each has something to do that nobody else can. If the fighter can handle up-close brawls and sudden ambushes (while the wizard can't), the rogue can handle delicate social situations or complicated traps (while the wizard can't), then it doesn't matter if the wizard can do amazing stuff -- everyone should still be able to have fun, because everyone still has a role (of course, alternate wizard-like fighter classes could be created for people who want to have fighter fluff and still slice mountains in half... but they'd have to give up some part of the basic fighter role, and become more wizard-like in terms of weaknesses.)


That is balancing the "power" of the classes. If Class A is good in situation X but bad in situation Y and Class B is good in situation Y but bad in situation X and situations X and Y both occur in equal amounts, and the relative levels of effectiveness and ineffectiveness are the same, then yes, Class A is exactly as "powerful" as Class B.

The problem with this approach, and the reason it was changed from 2E to 3E is that it relies for too much on making sure that situation X happens as often as situation Y. If situation X happens much more than Y, then Class A is more powerful. In a game like D&D where the each game group has it's own campaign and setting, it's impossible to be certain that X happens as often as Y.

So you end up with a few balanced games, and many imbalanced games. Some of these imbalanced games favor fighters, and some favor casters. Knowing that the game is balanced in the aggregate doesn't help the player at HIS table who isn't having fun because HIS game is unbalanced.

Snooder
2008-08-26, 02:15 PM
These are just examples, but the point is, it is possible to have magic be a theoretically vast and mysterious power while, as a practical matter, maintaining balance between the classes on the ground.


Ok, so just to be clear, you don't think that Wizards should be more powerful than Fighters, you just think that the balance should be adjudicated with a high risk/high reward system where the wizard is less powerful most of the time, but makes up for it with one or two special situations where he shines?

It would be a bad idea to do this because it's impossible to balance multiple separate campaigns across many different gaming groups with that approach. You'd have to enforce the number and ratio of good times to bad times and you can't do that with D&D.


For example, let's take the proposed change, adding longer more interruptible cast times. Either the wizard is in the back, where the change does nothing an he still owns, or he's stuck in melee combat where he'll never cast a spell. (perhaps extreme, but it's much more illustrative of the point) You get a wide disparity between one group where the party wizard got to stand in the back and completely dominated, and another where the DM liked to toss random ninjas around and the wizard never got a spell off. Group A will whine that casters are overpowered and Group B will whine that fighter's are OP, but NEITHER group is as satisfied as they should be.

Ashdate
2008-08-26, 02:25 PM
I have a rather unusual argument to present here- one that will at first seem silly, but hopefully will make sense as its focus becomes clear.

Magic, indeed, does not trump fighting in a 3.5 setting.

Now while all of you are beginning to prepare your batman, druid, and cleric arguments, I will make this amendment:
While comparatively, the spellcasting classes are far more powerful for their level than the other classes, in the end, taken with the basic DnD rules, within a campaign world magic will be very useful- but a fighter will be the most effective fighter.

The base starting age for a human PC is 15 + class modifier blah blah

The fighter has three and a half years to train before the wizard does. Again, because of the linear method of training and the massive XP gain that can be found in a short amount of time, that fighter who started training at the same time as the wizard is going to be about level 20 (or more) by the time the wizard hits level 1.
Ouch?


I think this sounds like one of the silliest arguments yet presented here. God help me, I'm jumping in.

The issue at hand, that has always been at hand, is not about the setting. It's about the simple fact that at level 17, fighters get +1 to their BAB and Wizards get to <i>stop time</i>. Try and squirm your way out of it all you want, it boils down to the fact that (particularly at higher levels) the magic system in D&D 3.5 makes spellcasters more powerful than non-spellcasters.

I know Vael was giving his argument with a grain of salt, but please recognize that such logic is flawed at best, and dangerous at worst. By his logic all of a sudden elves are the weakest race ever, because they take 150 more years to even shoot out a level 1 character (this also makes Half-Orcs the most poweful race because they start adventuring a whole year earlier on average).

And for my two bits, magic shouldn't trump fighting in a game system. Imbalance is an ugly beast which ultimately results in players not having fun, and therefore yes, 4e spell casters aren't as powerful as 3e ones, but they're a lot more balanced compared to the other classes. It's a bad state of affairs when any strictly-core class is out shined completely by another.

- Eddie

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 02:32 PM
2) The only way? Seems a little premature to make that claim isn't it?


I don't see it working in another way. If I'm mistaken, I'd like proof in the forms of games that handled it another way that worked.



And if we aren't working under the D&D definintion of a mage, then doing those things doesn't matter, only the result.


Then how do we define magic? Everything that's impossible in real life? Then Metal Gear Solid is chock-full of mages, man.

Akimbo
2008-08-26, 02:33 PM
The way I understood the concept, which pre-dates 3e, high lvl magic users should be more powerful than non-mus, however their severe limitations make them more suseptable to the unexpected, long battles and low levels. The Fighters get HP, Weps, armor and MR%(In many games) while the Casters get more firepower/versatility. Damage per second isnt the only measure of balance.

As for 3rd edition, it was not designed for table gaming, it was created (besides money-grubbing)solely for the translation of actual game rules to the more profitable D&D video games, which was impossible in 2nd edition. When they found that the new system was a joke/unmanageable on paper games it was tweaked.(more grubbing)

I still cant understand how you folks put up with the newer skills system, what a joke, are you supposed to read two pages of crap every time you make a way too frequent check?

I'm sorry this has got to be a joke.

1) 3rd edition was designed for videogames? Really?

Let's see: Second edition games:

Baldur's Gate I and II/Icewind Dale I/Planescape/probably a bunch of others.

Using 3rd edition: Neverwinter nights/Icewind Dale 2.

Using 3.5: Neverwinter Nights II/Dungeon Tactics.

Seemse to me like they have the same number of games, except that we are in a more videogamy age, so you would expect more. (And apparently it was made just for video games too, so who knows why we have so few.)

2) We remember all the rules for skills? Seriously, it's not that hard. Of course, I know it must be weird to have actual rules for seeing something hiding, or climbing a wall, cause in 2e all you did was ask the DM and then he made something up with no relation to anything at all.

AmberVael
2008-08-26, 02:34 PM
I think this sounds like one of the silliest arguments yet presented here. God help me, I'm jumping in.
Hey, you need someone to break things away from the serious norm. :smallwink:


The issue at hand, that has always been at hand, is not about the setting. It's about the simple fact that at level 17, fighters get +1 to their BAB and Wizards get to <i>stop time</i>. Try and squirm your way out of it all you want, it boils down to the fact that (particularly at higher levels) the magic system in D&D 3.5 makes spellcasters more powerful than non-spellcasters.
Oh aye, I know. It is an unfortunate reality that, by the rules, PC classes are horribly unbalanced for players. I was just trying to point out that there is a heavy difference between what the players experience and what occurs within the setting (which is both strange and unfortunate).


I know Vael was giving his argument with a grain of salt, but please recognize that such logic is flawed at best, and dangerous at worst. By his logic all of a sudden elves are the weakest race ever, because they take 150 more years to even shoot out a level 1 character (this also makes Half-Orcs the most poweful race because they start adventuring a whole year earlier on average).
And by the setting, they should be. I'm not even sure how they're still alive. If it takes you 150 years to learn how to poke something with a sword, that is waaaay too many chances to die of disease, accident, or kobold crossbow-ery.
Also, no offense, but if you refer to me with a male pronoun again I'll shove a stake up your nose. :smallyuk:


And for my two bits, magic shouldn't trump fighting in a game system. Imbalance is an ugly beast which ultimately results in players not having fun, and therefore yes, 4e spell casters aren't as powerful as 3e ones, but they're a lot more balanced compared to the other classes. It's a bad state of affairs when any strictly-core class is out shined completely by another.

- Eddie

No, it shouldn't. I agree that my explanation hardly changes anything for the balance between players (which is what is important), but I thought it would just be something interesting to toss out there. Brings a change to the never ending land of "lol casterz r best an fightrs suxxorz."

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 02:44 PM
Then how do we define magic? Everything that's impossible in real life? Then Metal Gear Solid is chock-full of mages, man.

If I can add something :

It all comes down to your tastes guys.

Tengu likes when fighters breaks mountain sized stuff with sword sized item and <insert all very supernatural and flashy stuff you like, Tengu>

EE does not.

And that's all. Telling if something is magic is not is pointless, beacuse no 2 settings have the same definition of magic, and from certain point of view Metal Gear Solid and Star Wars are indeed full of mages, but they aren't called that way there.

The thing is that Fighters, and generall Full BaBers/high Thac0's in D&D generally don't do stuff Tengu's talking about. They off course could do them, but then it certainly would be kinda differently fluffed game.

And while I agree that Fighters should do not mundane things, in D&D they shouldn't be balanced with magic in way Tengu suggest.

In system with other assumptions - sure they could or even should.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 02:51 PM
Dood, we didn't start talking about computer games, movies and RPGs here. We started with legends. Legends where characters can do really awesome stuff, things that's possible in real life don't even come close. And, wether you like it or not, they do so without magic. And since fantasy RPGs have roots in myths too, saying that fighters should not be able to do such things on the ground that these feats "are magic" is being ignorant on purpose. Tastes don't matter here.

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 02:58 PM
Dood, we didn't start talking about computer games, movies and RPGs here. We started with legends. Legends where characters can do really awesome stuff, things that's possible in real life don't even come close. And, wether you like it or not, they do so without magic. And since fantasy RPGs have roots in myths too, saying that fighters should not be able to do such things on the ground that these feats "are magic" is being ignorant on purpose. Tastes don't matter here.

Oh my, only tastes matter here.

RPG have also roots in actual melee weapon figthing, considering all longswords, plate armours, shields, overunes, disarms et cetera.

Does this mean that one shouldn't be able to do anything to plate wearing opponent while holding a scimitar, for example? Or monky guy with fists and naked chest should have absolutely no chance against any opponent with knife or stick?

RPG is also rooted in myths, like you said.

Does it mean that Barbarians should eat toadstools to rage?

Seriously, are you saying that "this was in myths, fighter must do it"?

RPG system's aren't some "all myths you can think of" simulations, they usually make their own mythology, or at least they're rules states what is magic and what is not in them.

Fiendish_Dire_Moose
2008-08-26, 03:03 PM
They've seen that magic users are too versatile, and limited both their capabilities and the amount of options they have available at once, while increasing the amount of options for other classes. Because the vancian system doesn't have any sense for non-mages, but on the other hand they're too used to it to abandon it completely, they went with something resembling it slightly for all classes - they could do better (base everything even more on ToB, for example), but what they did works well enough.



1. So Roland of Gilead, V (the masked guy, not Shroedinger's elf) and Ozymandias are mages too?
2. The only ways of having balance in a game where both 100% mundane characters and magic users are viable is to either make the magic very weak, or give the mundanes access to powerful and versatile equipment. And by that, I mean spaceships and rocket launchers, not longsword +1. And even then you can screw up, just look at Arcanum where technology is in theory rooting magic out, but playing as a wizard is much easier than playing as a tinker.



These people didn't recite incantations, didn't concentrate magical energies with their mind, didn't perform arcane gestures, didn't receive their powers from a magical/divine being. You can call everything that is not possible in real life magic, but it doesn't change the fact that in many cases, you'll be wrong.

Are you going to make a real argument or what!? All you have done this entire thread is say, "NO! I'm right, you're wrong!"

A man shouts at a mountain it falls over. A man shouts in a crowd, ten people die. Want to know the difference? One is an epic spell, the other is a high level spell and the former genteman had mastered the spell without arcane gestures or incantations! MAGIC CAN BE DONE WITHOUT THEM YOU KNOW.
Let's look at it from an "it's not magic" standpoint. Then surely your gentleman must be a demi-god and it's pure divinity. There happy?

No, such a feat would be magic, or divinity, simply shouting at a moutnain and it falling over isn't just someone being awesome simply because you say so. If it's not the progeny (sp?) of Zeus himself, then it's magic. Taking away his incantations doesn't change it.
Get a real argument instead of saying, "Well you must not have played then/I'm right, you're wrong."

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 03:09 PM
Oh my, only tastes matter here.

RPG have also roots in actual melee weapon figthing, considering all longswords, plate armours, shields, overunes, disarms et cetera.

Does this mean that one shouldn't be able to do anything to plate wearing opponent while holding a scimitar, for example?

RPG is also rooted in myths, like you said.

Does it mean that Barbarians should eat toadstools to rage?

Seriously, are you saying that "this was in myths, fighter must do it"?

RPG system's aren't some "all myths you can think of" simulations, they usually make their own mythology, or at least they're rules states what is magic and what is not in them.

I didn't mean that. I said that if someone's argument is "what these mythical characters are doing is actually magic", they're incorrect.



Let's look at it from an "it's not magic" standpoint. Then surely your gentleman must be a demi-god and it's pure divinity. There happy?


Wrong. I deliberately said we're not taking Greek heroes, or other demi-gods, under account here. What's left is still an impressive pile of impossible-in-real-life feats. Achieved with nothing but strength, determination and/or technique. How the hell something that's purely physical in nature is magic?

Fiendish_Dire_Moose
2008-08-26, 03:11 PM
Wrong. I deliberately said we're not taking Greek heroes, or other demi-gods, under account here. What's left is still an impressive pile of impossible-in-real-life feats. Achieved with nothing but strength, determination and/or technique. How the hell something that's purely physical in nature is magic?!
How is shouting at a mountain and it falling over not? Afterall, for it to be physical you would have to touch it would you not?

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 03:13 PM
He shouted at the mountain with such strength that it fell (you're mixing two of my examples here, by the way, though I'm pretty sure someone accomplished such a feat too). Shouting requires physical effort, too.

If physical feats require touching whatever I'm affecting, than shooting an enemy 10 miles from me in the eye while blindfolded is not a physical feat, because I'm not touching him. Or heck, killing him with a sword is not a physical feat, because I'm not touching him. Try real arguments instead of grasping at straws next time.

Fiendish_Dire_Moose
2008-08-26, 03:17 PM
Enough effort to make it fall over? So some random guy, born of mortals can do that? He can also be hit by a 600 pound sharp object and take merely a scratch... Great, so, why can't everyone do that? And this mighty fighter can do this than why should the mage, known for his squishyness, whom at best can conjure a massive fireball, be more powerful? If I can breathe and a mountain crumbles, why is the arse who can light a candle beating me?

Artanis
2008-08-26, 03:18 PM
But that is far from the majority of anti 4E people, in fact that is a huge minority. Like the people who prefer 2E because of its lack of balence
from
EE
Well yeah, but that doesn't change the fact that the discussion is about said "huge minority".

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 03:19 PM
I didn't mean that. I said that if someone's argument is "what these mythical characters are doing is actually magic", they're incorrect.

The thing is that by most standpoints, some things are magic. Even from quite heroic standpoint of D&D.



Wrong. I deliberately said we're not taking Greek heroes, or other demi-gods, under account here. What's left is still an impressive pile of impossible-in-real-life feats. Achieved with nothing but strength, determination and/or technique. How the hell something that's purely physical in nature is magic?

You must define what things can be achieved by those things. Some things that certainly couldn't be done in physical world, are passable as physical things in for example D&D - that's what fantasy is for.

However, cutting the tunnel trough mountain with single blow is even hard to desrcibe in a way that would resemble something physical, among the other problems. And the only technique that comes to mind is a 1 tonne of C4.

The fact that just everything can be done in fiction doesn't change the fact that it sometimes shouldn't be done just for sake of consistence and some elementar sense.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 03:20 PM
Enough effort to make it fall over? So some random guy, born of mortals can do that? He can also be hit by a 600 pound sharp object and take merely a scratch... Great, so, why can't everyone do that? And this mighty fighter can do this than why should the mage, known for his squishyness, whom at best can conjure a massive fireball, be more powerful? If I can breathe and a mountain crumbles, why is the arse who can light a candle beating me?

Because he trained that much. Everyone has the potential to be a wizard, too (in DND, where it's all booklearning - sorcerers are a different matter), as long as they're smart enough, but not everyone can cast spells because that requires a lot of studying magic beforehand.

You have trouble imagining a mortal breaking a mountain with physical might but not a mortal flying, turning invisible, opening portals and pulling magical towers from his ass? Talk about selective suspension of disbelief.

Fiendish_Dire_Moose
2008-08-26, 03:23 PM
Because he trained that much. Everyone has the potential to be a wizard, too (in DND, where it's all booklearning - sorcerers are a different matter), as long as they're smart enough, but not everyone can cast spells because that requires a lot of learning.

You have trouble imagining a mortal breaking a mountain with physical might but not with a mortal flying, turning invisible, opening portals and pulling magical towers from his ass? Talk about selective suspension of disbelief.

A man can break a moutnain, I'm willing to accept that, I'm willing to accept that a man can fly. But why is the man who can fly, beating the man who can shout a mountain down? Simply because he's smarter? Now who's being selective? Your entire arguement is pro-magic bias. Physical might and magic are VERY different. Magic is something beyond the norm grasped by someone who has learned to do so. Great, one guy can do it. So, if my fighter can shout a moutnain down, why can't I shout the mage into exploding?
Simply saying, "He can do it, simply because he can" is a baseless argument that you have been tossing around this entire thread.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 03:28 PM
Have you actually read the part when I mentioned training? Because I never said "he can do it simply because he can". Also, the first part of your post makes absolutely no sense - if fighters would be able to do what heroes did it legends, it's obvious that, with a good mechanical system, they'd be on par with mages and a duel between two of them wouldn't surely end with the wizard's victory.

WalkingTarget
2008-08-26, 03:30 PM
Well in a number of myths and whatnot there are Great Feats that are done (mountain leveling, etc).

Within the context of that story/setting, the Great Feat is not explained away as being "magic".

If one were to model that hero/story/setting within a particular existing ruleset (D&D 3.5 for example) it gets shoehorned into "magic" because that's the only framework that allows for it.

This seems to be the problem that we're dealing with in recent posts, some people are using "magic" as a blanket term for anything beyond the normal capabilities of a person whereas others object to that usage as whatever particular example they are thinking of uses a different fluff explanation for the Great Feat. Both sides are correct in their usage.

For example: in Tolkien, elves make really nifty stuff naturally. They are not harnessing an external source of "magic" in any way. They are simply naturally almost perfect craftsmen (craftselves?) and their finished product is exactly what that item should be (think Platonic Ideals). However, it's often much simpler to call them (and if you're going to model this ability in a game setting, I think it's essential to categorize them as) magic items. The fluff says one thing, thinking about it from a game perspective almost requires another way to think about it.

If you choose to define a Fighter as a class that has "no magical abilities" and that anything outside of the boundaries of what is theoretically possible is automatically "magic" (vagaries of what HP abstraction allows notwithstanding) then your setting a hard limit on the capabilities of that Fighter class. If characters from settings that are fluffed as being non-magical but do Great Feats are to be modeled in a game, then that Fighter class isn't the way to do it. Personally, I wouldn't use D&D to model them anyway (for the same reasons I wouldn't use it to model Tolkien, the nature of the mechanics is not easily reconcilable with the fluff).

Not that D&D's method of handling magic vs. non-magic classes is the "correct" way of doing things. I don't think that there is a "correct" way. The trick is finding the right system for the game you want to play.

Fiendish_Dire_Moose
2008-08-26, 03:31 PM
Have you actually read the part when I mentioned training? Because I never said "he can do it simply because he can". Also, the first part of your post makes absolutely no sense - if fighters would be able to do what heroes did it legends, it's obvious that, with a good mechanical system, they'd be on par with mages and a duel between two of them wouldn't surely end with the wizard's victory.

Yes, they would. But your character practically sat there yelling at a moutnain most of his life, until one day it finally fell over? What? Are you even arguing the mechanics of D&D anymore?

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 03:36 PM
Yes, they would. But your character practically sat there yelling at a moutnain most of his life, until one day it finally fell over? What? Are you even arguing the mechanics of D&D anymore?

And you have trouble accepting that? Alternatively, he trained combat and his body strength, and since all his muscles are unbelievably strong, so are the muscles in his throat. How's that different from a wizard learning how to cast spells most of his life?

And I'm talking about a general case here, not DND.

Vonriel
2008-08-26, 03:36 PM
1) Yes actually, that is what magic is. Anything that can't be done in real life. If we want to be nitpicky in D&D terms, then throw psionics into the mix, but hte general ideas is still the same

Really? Because they call "Fly, Swift" magic, when I can achieve much the same effect by sticking someone in a cannon with the proper protection and firing them from it. "Fireball" is called magic, despite the fact that I can do much worse with a good hand grenade. "Imprisonment"? Give me a coffin and a back hoe, and I'll show you imprisonment.

Magic isn't strictly what can't be done in real life, but rather a different way of explaining effects that can happen in real life.

As to Vael's example: She's pretty much spot on, here. The only thing I'd like to add is the higher mortality rate among the fighters. :smalltongue:

Fiendish_Dire_Moose
2008-08-26, 03:40 PM
And you have trouble accepting that? Alternatively, he trained combat and his body strength, and since all his muscles are unbelievably strong, so are the muscles in his throat. How's that different from a wizard learning how to cast spells most of his life?

And I'm talking about a general case here, not DND.

I don't have a hard time beleiving it. I have a hard time beleiving he's then taken out by a little fire. Heck, D&D has an Epic tier for a reason.

And the problem with your argument is that no, you're not talking about D&D anymore. Now you're just arguing for the sake of argument. Yeah, a guy can totally be stronger than a mage, I'm loving the power balance of fourth edition. Your argument is just, well, irrelivent (sp?) at this point. A fighter can be stronger than a mage, there was just no reason for the mage to be stronger in 3.5 save for poor mechanics.

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 03:41 PM
Because he trained that much. Everyone has the potential to be a wizard, too (in DND, where it's all booklearning - sorcerers are a different matter), as long as they're smart enough, but not everyone can cast spells because that requires a lot of learning.

You have trouble imagining a mortal breaking a mountain with physical might but not with a mortal flying, turning invisible, opening portals and pulling magical towers from his ass? Talk about selective suspension of disbelief.

Making yourself invisible doesn't change the fact that you still can be spotted. Making portals is kinda complicated even in not very well thought D&D.

The guy that can break the mountain with sword makes all fights pointless. If he can break mountains, all armors are obsolete, any strike against something up to half the size of mountain is deadly.

If he can bring down the mountains with physical might, he can as well carry his home on his back, with some soldiers inside. It's actualy less demanding.

If he can bring mountains down with sword, he is also resistant to avalanches, which this would certainly cause. Or actual mountain falling right on him.

If he has so much physic might, why he doesn't do fishing by removing the water from the lake?

And all surviving the fireballs, and all stuff can be described as the power of his spirit, mind, body and all, quick reflex, control of his body.

Destroying the mountain can be described only by causing massive explosion with a sword. Beacuse it can't for example be explained why his strike broke the whole mountain, and not just broke away large block of rock.

Such inconsistensiuons can be listed on and on.

The inconsistency caused by teleportation in 3.5 are nothing compared to it.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 03:43 PM
I don't have a hard time beleiving it. I have a hard time beleiving he's then taken out by a little fire. Heck, D&D has an Epic tier for a reason.

And the problem with your argument is that no, you're not talking about D&D anymore. Now you're just arguing for the sake of argument. Yeah, a guy can totally be stronger than a mage, I'm loving the power balance of fourth edition. Your argument is just, well, irrelivent (sp?) at this point. A fighter can be stronger than a mage, there was just no reason for the mage to be stronger in 3.5 save for poor mechanics.

http://kevinchiu.org/emote/facepalm.jpg
Have you read the original post? This thread never was about DND and DND alone. You are looking at my stance through the prism of DND 3.5, with changed fluff with the same crunch as before - and, if the fighter was able to pull off such stunts, it's obvious that crunch would change alone with the fluff to reflect it!


stuff

I don't see any inconsistencies - if a hero was able to destroy a mountain with a sword, ordinary warriors were like ants before him, and it took another fighter of equal might to be a challenge for him.

Fiendish_Dire_Moose
2008-08-26, 03:49 PM
http://kevinchiu.org/emote/facepalm.jpg
Have you read the original post? This thread never was about DND and DND alone. You are looking at my stance through the prism of DND 3.5, with changed fluff with the same crunch as before - if the fighter was able to pull off such stunts, it's obvious that crunch would change alone with the fluff to reflect it!



I don't see any inconsistencies - if a hero was able to destroy a mountain with a sword, ordinary warriors were like ants before him, and it took another fighter of equal might to be a challenge for him.

It was my understanding that the thread was about power balance in D&D, with minor mentionings of other games. You know, with the entire first post being about D&D.
And the inconsistencies come from the fact of, if he could destroy a moutnain, what's he doing with his life? Why isn't he doing X, or Y? Albeit a generally moot question.

Morty
2008-08-26, 03:49 PM
I don't see any inconsistencies - if a hero was able to destroy a mountain with a sword, ordinary warriors were like ants before him, and it took another fighter of equal might to be a challenge for him.

Some might say that having so powerful people running around hurts belivability of the gameworld. That was one of the problems with 3ed magic, the ever-present question "Why don't those mages do X?".

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 03:54 PM
It was my understanding that the thread was about power balance in D&D, with minor mentionings of other games. You know, with the entire first post being about D&D.
And the inconsistencies come from the fact of, if he could destroy a moutnain, what's he doing with his life? Why isn't he doing X, or Y? Albeit a generally moot question.

This thread is about DND, but not only about DND. The first post was a general question with DND shown as a specific example.
What's he doing? Fighting other, equally strong people/monsters. Or huge armies, alone.


Some might say that having so powerful people running around hurts belivability of the gameworld. That was one of the problems with 3ed magic.

People had no trouble believing in myths at one point, apparently. Or at least enjoying them. I play Exalted, where you play characters strong as mythical heroes, and I don't think if the world is inconsistent. On the contrary - the way it's written gives DND a run for its money.

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 04:01 PM
People had no trouble believing in myths at one point, apparently. Or at least enjoying them. I play Exalted, where you play characters strong as mythical heroes, and I don't think if the world is inconsistent. On the contrary - the way it's written gives DND a run for its money.

And the everything goes back to the tastes. I don't enjoy heroes breaking down the mountains, and that's it.

Inconsistences are obvious, if you like it or not. I listed few simpler and blatant examples. If you don't mind those, that's fine, Exalted is game for you it seems (although I don't know much about it).

This doesn't mean that stuff like that should be present in other, different systems as well.

Morty
2008-08-26, 04:04 PM
People had no trouble believing in myths at one point, apparently. Or at least enjoying them. I play Exalted, where you play characters strong as mythical heroes, and I don't think if the world is inconsistent. On the contrary - the way it's written gives DND a run for its money.

Myths are, well, myths. They usually take place in some kind of unspecified "long ago" time. In D&D however, we have a living world where everything happens right now, "now" being the time PCs live their lives, and has logical results. And logical results of superpowerful characters almost noone but their equals can match running around aren't to everyone's tastes. Again, it's bad enough when the real power of spellcasters is bigger than the authors of the books assume.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 04:10 PM
And the everything goes back to the tastes. I don't enjoy heroes breaking down the mountains, and that's it.

Inconsistences are obvious, if you like it or not. I listed few simpler and blatant examples. If you don't mind those, that's fine, Exalted is game for you it seems (although I don't know much about it).

This doesn't mean that stuff like that should be present in other, different systems as well.

Here we can agree - it's up for everyone's tastes. Granted, inconsistencies can be found everywhere - DND is rife with them. And tastes of someone who accepts magic-wielding player characters to be uber, but non-magical player characters to be completely mundane in comparison, are very inconsistent.


Myths are, well, myths. They usually take place in some kind of unspecified "long ago" time.

Just to precise, this is often incorrect. Many of those myths take part during a very specific time (the Three Kingdoms era, for example), often not so long from before the myth originated.

Also, DND and most RPGs are "long ago and far away" for us, aren't they?

Morty
2008-08-26, 04:19 PM
Just to precise, this is often incorrect. Many of those myths take part during a very specific time (the Three Kingdoms era, for example), often not so long from before the myth originated.

Hence why I said "usually". However, even myths taking place in a specific time are made up later, and more or less blurred.


Also, DND and most RPGs are "long ago and far away" for us, aren't they?

For us, yes. But for characters we're supposed to roleplay they're Right Here and Right Now.

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 04:19 PM
Here we can agree - it's up for everyone's tastes. Granted, inconsistencies can be found everywhere - DND is rife with them. And tastes of someone who accepts magic-wielding player characters to be uber, but non-magical player characters to be completely mundane in comparison, are very inconsistent.


I've never ever written that they had to be completely mundane. In fact I've joined this discussion with point that even 3.5 Fighters, despite of being class with only feats as their speciality (not very interesting, even for my tastes) and generally badly designed class, are very far from mundane.

But his uncommonness must have reasonable limits, just as a bit of pepper makes stuff delicious and too much make it disgusting.
And, par la force des choses, fighter must be more mundane that a Wizard, beacuse indeed he is fighting stuff with spear in comparison to teleportation, and most fictions, be it myths or Salvatore's books agrees.

It doesn't mean that he must be "weaker". In terms of fighting, he should be stronger, as his Fighter.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 04:24 PM
As long as the fighter is balanced with wizard, it's okay (although I like my food to have a lot of pepper). But that's not the case in DND 3.5. Other games that manage to do so have either fighters being able to pull off non-mundane stuff, wizards being weaker than they are in DND, or high-tech setting that gives access to toys which can outshadow magic on their own.

Morty
2008-08-26, 04:26 PM
Well, DnD 3ed comes from an assumption fighters and wizards are balanced. It's the execution that doesn't work.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 04:27 PM
Yup. Because at that time Wizards didn't know jack about optimization. They seem to know more now, at least, although still they're not experts.

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 04:32 PM
Yup. Because at that time Wizards didn't know jack about optimization. They seem to know more now, at least, although still they're not experts.

I don't know what they have known about optimisation, I'm just amazed how possibly anyone could write a Solid Fog description without immediately realising that it absolutely screws most other classes, who could try to fight a mage.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 04:34 PM
The assumption Wizards made seem to be that most casters will be too busy being distracted by, depending on their class, fireball or cure X wounds, to notice the spells that are actually good. Or rather, they were themselves too distracted.

Morty
2008-08-26, 04:37 PM
It becomes glaringly apparent when you read a setting book, really. Reading Forgotten Realms Campaign Setting, although I really like it, I couldn't help but shake my head at how the writers were unaware of what can a wizard really do if he tries.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 04:46 PM
Need I mention the article where, in one of Wizards' own words, it's obvious they think everyone plays clerics as healbots and wizards as nukers?

Morty
2008-08-26, 04:47 PM
You do, actually, because I've never seen it. Care to provide a link?

arguskos
2008-08-26, 04:47 PM
Need I mention the article where, in one of Wizards' own words, it's obvious they think everyone plays clerics as healbots and wizards as nukers?
Actually, I'd like a good laugh. Could you either post/PM me that link?

-argus

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 04:49 PM
Ugh, now I'll spend ages looking it up. If anyone has a link to it, feel free to be faster than me.

SoC175
2008-08-26, 05:00 PM
I think that magic should be more powerfull than the mundane. And I am the guy who usually plays the rogue or fighter/rogue.

Really, I have no problem with the wizard using knock and saving me the time to unpack my lockpicks. I know that I could have done it if it had mattered and that's enough for me.

I like duelling blade to blade while the fireballs and death spells are flying all over the place, it just creates an atmospheric background for my melee.

To me the credo of anything needing to be equally powerfull seems like an assault infantery player in battlefield complaing about not being able to inflict any notable damage on a battletank and saying "yes, I could also hop into one of them, but I prefer to run around with my M16 and just don't want it to suck against an T-90"

I like playing someone who pushes phsyical laws to the limits but I of course expect someone who casually ignores physical laws to be more powerfull. I am disappointed if he isn't

Spiryt
2008-08-26, 05:09 PM
I think that magic should be more powerfull than the mundane. And I am the guy who usually plays the rogue or fighter/rogue.

Really, I have no problem with the wizard using knock and saving me the time to unpack my lockpicks. I know that I could have done it if it had mattered and that's enough for me.

I like duelling blade to blade while the fireballs and death spells are flying all over the place, it just creates an atmospheric background for my melee.

To me the credo of anything needing to be equally powerfull seems like an assault infantery player in battlefield complaing about not being able to inflict any notable damage on a battletank and saying "yes, I could also hop into one of them, but I prefer to run around with my M16 and just don't want it to suck against an T-90"

I like playing someone who pushes phsyical laws to the limits but I of course expect someone who casually ignores physical laws to be more powerfull. I am disappointed if he isn't

So you are saying that everyone should hop to tanks/ caster classes? While it isn't very good comparison, cause never in history tank was something "better" than an infantry, certainly not in streetfights for example (dunno about Battlefield).

About mundanity we agreed that while Fighter is indeed mundane, his mundanity should be not "normal" mundanity, or not mundanity at all (depending on tastes) in thing like 3.5

And do you seriously like playing thing where Wizard is just much more useful than you in everything, without any logical consequences like learning longer, for example?

Charity
2008-08-26, 05:11 PM
Lets play harry potter and you can be a muggle.

Morty
2008-08-26, 05:14 PM
Lets play harry potter and you can be a muggle.

That's not the best comparision seeing how HP wizards never show the knowledge of any spells that could save them from Hailus of Leadus spell Muggles use.:smalltongue:
(Yeah, I could put "Hail of Lead" in Latin there, but I'm lazy and it's late)

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 05:18 PM
Found it! (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?t=49378) Okay, it's actually Swordguy posting about what his uncle heard from other WoTC folks, but still.

Charity
2008-08-26, 05:30 PM
That's not the best comparision seeing how HP wizards never show the knowledge of any spells that could save them from Hailus of Leadus spell Muggles use.:smalltongue:
(Yeah, I could put "Hail of Lead" in Latin there, but I'm lazy and it's late)

No-one gets shot in HP, and I'm pretty sure they tried to shoot Voldemort.

Morty
2008-08-26, 05:36 PM
No-one gets shot in HP, and I'm pretty sure they tried to shoot Voldemort.

"They" being who? Muggles are unaware of wizards' existence, and most wizards have no idea about firearms and need to have it explained to them.
That said, my post was mostly sarcasm, it's a safe bet someone tried to shoot death-eaters -after all, many wizards opposing them are muggle-borns- and failed.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 05:36 PM
This (http://www.potterpuppetpals.com/newppp/channels/TroubleAtHogwarts.htm) springs to mind.

Zaphrasz
2008-08-26, 05:56 PM
I always had a problem with fighter type classes managing feats such as those you find in mythology. Wizards can get away with it because they are magical in nature. Magic is a force not of this world, so it can operate under any rules the setting requires it to. If those rules are kept consistent, it doesn't matter how ridiculous magic gets. Fighter types, however, are limited to what physics allow. No matter how well you train, you will not be able to shout loud enough to defeat an opposing army. It isn't a matter of being that good, it's a matter of it being a physical impossibility. The same is true for splitting a mountain in two with one strike; neither the material the sword or the fighter is made of allows that to happen.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-26, 06:02 PM
Between dragons being able to fly on their much too small wings and giants having roughly the same proportions as humans, I doubt if most fantasy games have the same set of physics as our world.

Jayabalard
2008-08-26, 08:37 PM
Show me a protagonist wizard in Conan.There's one statted out in CB1 or CB2, I forget which; I forget his name and I'm not sure what I did with them, or else I'd give you better info.


If you need a game where you're the best, and no one else can touch you, then I'd recommend you play a solo RPG. This doesn't really do anything to address the people who enjoy playing linear fighters in a world with quadratic wizards.


As an aside, if the counter argument to this is "Yeah, but you can all be mages!" then doesn't that homogenize the game even more which is, as some claim, a bad thing?No, only if you must all be mages. As long as it's can rather than must it's not homogenizing the game.

EvilElitest
2008-08-26, 09:27 PM
i think the thing with the lack of balence in D&D is taht Wizards doesn't actually know how to play their own game
from
EE

chiasaur11
2008-08-26, 09:51 PM
There's one statted out in CB1 or CB2, I forget which; I forget his name and I'm not sure what I did with them, or else I'd give you better info.

This doesn't really do anything to address the people who enjoy playing linear fighters in a world with quadratic wizards.

No, only if you must all be mages. As long as it's can rather than must it's not homogenizing the game.

So, wait. If all classes work, but are a little similar, it's awful.

But if players either all pick the same class or wind up hosed while the wizard hogs the game, it's excellence?

Just being clear.

Jack Zander
2008-08-26, 09:57 PM
So, wait. If all classes work, but are a little similar, it's awful.

But if players either all pick the same class or wind up hosed while the wizard hogs the game, it's excellence?

Just being clear.

All of those things are horrible. Classes need to be separate but equal, just like our restrooms should be.

Akimbo
2008-08-26, 10:42 PM
So, wait. If all classes work, but are a little similar, it's awful.

But if players either all pick the same class or wind up hosed while the wizard hogs the game, it's excellence?

Just being clear.

No, 3.5 is good because classes are different, and their are multiple different good classes, and even the classes that are crap can still do way better things then anything that happens at all in 4E.

Prophaniti
2008-08-26, 11:34 PM
Oh, a new thread to make my point in!

*clears throat*

Ok, here goes.

Should magic trump fighting? Short answer: No.

Long answer: No, and 'trump' is rarely what anyone truly wants magic to do. They want it different than the mundane, not necessarily or universally better.

In depth answer: Magic should not be the end-all of the setting, unless you want your setting to revolve soley around magic users. This point has been made, and I fully agree with it. What I do not agree with is the attitude that physical and magical should be the same, in terms of capability and power. Magic, in order to be magic, to feel like magic, needs to be capable of things that are otherwise not possible, like flying or summoning demons or turning into animals. Or at the least, incredibly unlikely, like a spell to make it rain in a desert. To phrase it better, it should be possible to do things with magic that simply cannot be replicated with pure muscle, such as all the aforementioned activities.

The thing you have to keep in mind is that magic needs to have a cost on par with its capabilities. If you have world-ending magic, it needs to have world-ending cost. If you have magic with less spectacular capabilities, you still need to keep the cost higher than it would be to reproduce those results without magic, to avoid the donkey problem, or worlds like Ebberon.

As far as this relates to 3.5/4e, it's quite simple. 3.5 had world-ending magic, and even magic that produced more simple, mundane effects. What they forgot was the cost, and how intrinsic that is to having magic at all. 4e, on the other hand, dropped world-ending magic entirely, kept some of the more mundane possibilities, and still didn't remember the cost factor, with the sole exception of Rituals. Rituals resulted from a great idea, adding a significant cost to some spells, but they didn't execute it very well, and chickened out about applying cost to the whole magic system.

3.5 can be fixed to fit this 'magic ideal' simply by applying a suitable cost to spellcasting. And, admittedly, some work rewriting or cutting those spells that were obviously not thought through.

4e may be a little more difficult to fix. Strangely, parts of it approach the ideal more closely than 3.5 (rituals), but the way they are handled, and the parts that don't come close, make it harder to bring to the ideal as a whole. You'd probably end up scrapping everything and reworking it from the ground up.

Bottom line: The power level of magic is dependant on the setting, but to be magic it needs extraordinary capabilities, even if they're not world-shattering ones. To make sense in the system, and not result in a Tippy Society or the like, it needs to have a cost. An easy guideline for the cost is this: If the magical effect is possible to reproduce through mundane means (creating fire, for example, or moving something) the cost of the magic needs to be greater than the cost of the mundane. This is, of course, if you're trying to keep your magic in a typical medieval fantasy setting. If you don't have a problem with 'Ebberon turned up to 11', then by all means, ignore this part. If the magical effect is impossible to reproduce through mundane means (shapechanging), then the cost factor is a little more fluid, but this is still a good guideline to keep in mind; as the effect scales in power/awesome, the cost should scale with it. If it doesn't, or if (like 3.5 RAW) you have no significant cost at all, then you definitely have a setting that is all about the magic-users, and you simply need to accept that.

Helgraf
2008-08-26, 11:51 PM
Was it 2nd edition where the classes weren't supposed to be balanced but XP levels were different?

For example, the thief wasn't as powerful as the other classes but a thief leveled up quicker then anyone else. On the other hand, paladins and rangers were better then fighters but leveled up slower (and had alignment restrictions).

1st & 2nd edition both used seperate XP charts by class.

The problem was, just as the wizard hit the first plateau of real power (5th level & 3rd level spells), his experience chart became _the easiest_ to advance in for quite some time. It went from being the worst to the easiest, and his power continued to grow.


And the everything goes back to the tastes. I don't enjoy heroes breaking down the mountains, and that's it.

Inconsistences are obvious, if you like it or not. I listed few simpler and blatant examples. If you don't mind those, that's fine, Exalted is game for you it seems (although I don't know much about it).

This doesn't mean that stuff like that should be present in other, different systems as well.

So basically, it boils down to "I don't want fighters to be able to do impossible things - that's the sole province of arcanists and the servants of the gods"

Which basically says "Yes, I do want my mages/clerics to be more powerful than my fighters".

If that's your preference, then be bold about it and say so.


Your still preforming acts that are impossible. Destroying a mountain with a shout is magic, even if the term isn't quite as fluid. Or a miracle, what have you, it is still a magical like effect
from
EE

No. Impossible acts != magic. Impossible acts = Impossible acts.

Fighters are allowed to be awesome without having to be constrained to Charles Atlas level ability just because some people insist the Fighter has to be explained according to dark gritty low fantasy setting rules, but his Mage buddy gets to play in open sandbox high magic do whatever you damn please rules. In fact, forcing the two classes to work together with such seperate rule enforcement deliberately and unequivocably always favors the mage and unbalances the system in their favor.


I love that now my Fighter can turn invisible, make himself fly, create walls of ice or flame, and make an extradimensional mansion to have Roman-style orgies in, with his sword!

Ah, if only he actually could do any of that, Frowny, he'd never have to adventure again!


Why? Why should a magic user be ultimately more powerful than a fighter? Keep in mind that a fighter is not a mundane character, he is not peasant #1232 from Randomville. He is King Arthur, Sir Lancelot, Conan the Barbarian, Hercules, Achilles, Lu Bu, and all the other ideas and conceptions of an adventuring hero who solves problems with the blade of a sword. Would you say that Conan is supposed to be weak? That he is supposed to take a backseat to the guy in the robes?

Why yes, that's pretty much exactly what they're saying.


I always had a problem with fighter type classes managing feats such as those you find in mythology. Wizards can get away with it because they are magical in nature. Magic is a force not of this world, so it can operate under any rules the setting requires it to. If those rules are kept consistent, it doesn't matter how ridiculous magic gets. Fighter types, however, are limited to what physics allow. No matter how well you train, you will not be able to shout loud enough to defeat an opposing army. It isn't a matter of being that good, it's a matter of it being a physical impossibility. The same is true for splitting a mountain in two with one strike; neither the material the sword or the fighter is made of allows that to happen.

So what keeps supreme martial study from being a force not of this world but manipulated within it? Why, again, must the fighter's abilities all be explainable within the framework of non-heroic current day human capabilities? Why _must_ the fighter be from a low-fantasy setting when his companions all get to draw from the high-fantasy well?

Snooder
2008-08-27, 12:09 AM
To me the credo of anything needing to be equally powerful seems like an assault infantry player in battlefield complaining about not being able to inflict any notable damage on a battle-tank and saying "yes, I could also hop into one of them, but I prefer to run around with my M16 and just don't want it to suck against an T-90"


The difference here is that the infantryman isn't sitting at a game table with a T-90 playing together for mutual fun and enjoyment. The T-90 is supposed to crush the infantryman, that's its design purpose. The infantryman is supposed to look across a battlefield at a T-90 and just hate his life. A player who chooses a fighter or rogue isn't supposed to resent and hate the player who chose a wizard. A game in which players are frustrated and annoyed simply because of their choice in class is a bad game.



I like playing someone who pushes physical laws to the limits but I of course expect someone who casually ignores physical laws to be more powerful. I am disappointed if he isn't

Why? Why should a magic user be ultimately more powerful than a fighter? Keep in mind that a fighter is not a mundane character, he is not peasant #1232 from Randomville. He is King Arthur, Sir Lancelot, Conan the Barbarian, Hercules, Achilles, Lu Bu, and all the other ideas and conceptions of an adventuring hero who solves problems with the blade of a sword. Would you say that Conan is supposed to be weak? That he is supposed to take a backseat to the guy in the robes?

Swordguy
2008-08-27, 12:23 AM
i think the thing with the lack of balence in D&D is taht Wizards doesn't actually know how to play their own game
from
EE

Incorrect. They just choose to play differently than you (and, evidently, most of their audience that posts on these boards). Read Tengu's link up there.

Charity
2008-08-27, 02:34 AM
All of those things are horrible. Classes need to be separate but equal, just like our restrooms should be.

Obviously never been in a girls restroom.

Aquillion
2008-08-27, 02:39 AM
The difference here is that the infantryman isn't sitting at a game table with a T-90 playing together for mutual fun and enjoyment. The T-90 is supposed to crush the infantryman, that's its design purpose. The infantryman is supposed to look across a battlefield at a T-90 and just hate his life. A player who chooses a fighter or rogue isn't supposed to resent and hate the player who chose a wizard. A game in which players are frustrated and annoyed simply because of their choice in class is a bad game.

Why? Why should a magic user be ultimately more powerful than a fighter? Keep in mind that a fighter is not a mundane character, he is not peasant #1232 from Randomville. He is King Arthur, Sir Lancelot, Conan the Barbarian, Hercules, Achilles, Lu Bu, and all the other ideas and conceptions of an adventuring hero who solves problems with the blade of a sword. Would you say that Conan is supposed to be weak? That he is supposed to take a backseat to the guy in the robes?I think this is a bit of a strawman. There are very few people who really think that fighters should simply be completely dominated by wizards.

It's really closer to a situation where some people want to play a game of tank combat, and others want to duel with rapiers.

The easiest way to see this (and to see why the whole premise of this thread is wrong, to the point of flatly insulting people who like 3e wizards) is to look at the reaction to the ToB, which introduced martial characters who could compete (roughly) with spellcasters:

Very few of the people who like 3e wizards objected to it. In fact, they're some of the people who most heartily embrace it.

The people who objected to it most strongly, in fact, tend to be the same people who like 4e the most now. It isn't really a matter of wanting class X to be stronger or class Y to be weaker; it's a matter of wanting the entire game to be on a different point along the power curve.

TheThan
2008-08-27, 02:48 AM
Obviously never been in a girls restroom.

he said "Should be" not "is"

:smalltongue:

nagora
2008-08-27, 05:49 AM
1st & 2nd edition both used seperate XP charts by class.

The problem was, just as the wizard hit the first plateau of real power (5th level & 3rd level spells), his experience chart became _the easiest_ to advance in for quite some time. It went from being the worst to the easiest, and his power continued to grow.
The odd thing is, though, that it works. I'm not sure why, and I noticed this feature of the charts a long time ago. It's probably something to do with the spells per day chart and the fighters' ever improving hit points and saving throws.

It takes a long time (especially with specialisation rules from UA) for the magic-user to start outstripping the fighter, and even then tactics can bring them down.

Charity
2008-08-27, 05:59 AM
he said "Should be" not "is"

:smalltongue:

Obviously he has...

The New Bruceski
2008-08-27, 07:31 AM
The easiest way to see this (and to see why the whole premise of this thread is wrong, to the point of flatly insulting people who like 3e wizards) is to look at the reaction to the ToB, which introduced martial characters who could compete (roughly) with spellcasters:

Very few of the people who like 3e wizards objected to it. In fact, they're some of the people who most heartily embrace it.

The people who objected to it most strongly, in fact, tend to be the same people who like 4e the most now. It isn't really a matter of wanting class X to be stronger or class Y to be weaker; it's a matter of wanting the entire game to be on a different point along the power curve.

I'm not sure about that. I found ToB very interesting and also highly enjoy 4e. Feel free to explain why I don't count and your statement still holds. :smallbiggrin:

TwystidMynd
2008-08-27, 08:28 AM
I'm not sure about that. I found ToB very interesting and also highly enjoy 4e. Feel free to explain why I don't count and your statement still holds. :smallbiggrin:

Because he used phrases like "very few" and "tend to"! Clearly you don't represent "most" of any population, unless you live with an amputee, so you cannot by yourself be a contradiction to his argument.

And, because the his population is indeterminantly large, there's no sample population large enough for you to present a counter-example with.

In any case, however, I agree with you. ToB was awesome, and so is 4e.

nagora
2008-08-27, 08:47 AM
At the risk of repeating myself somewhat: in a game with classes, it seems an obvious design goal that no one class is the better choice in all cases. On approach to this is to make all classes equal all the time - or try to - another is to try to make all classes fulfill a role in different ways at different times, so that picking any one will allow your character to contribute most in some circumstances, and others' to contribute more in other circumstances.

I subscribe to the latter view and so in answer to "Should magic trump fighting?" I would say "Sometimes but not always".

Thurbane
2008-08-27, 09:02 AM
A big part of the risk in playing a spellcaster in 1E and 2E, was how easy it was to have your spells disrupted. I can't remember the rules verbatim, but I'm pretty sure that getting hit for ANY amount of damage in the round prior to casting your spell meant it was disrupted and lost. No concentration check or saving throw...just gone.

nagora
2008-08-27, 09:07 AM
A big part of the risk in playing a spellcaster in 1E and 2E, was how easy it was to have your spells disrupted. I can't remember the rules verbatim, but I'm pretty sure that getting hit for ANY amount of damage in the round prior to casting your spell meant it was disrupted and lost. No concentration check or saving throw...just gone.
Yes. Changing that was, I think, a big part of the runaway mage effect in 3.5. Fiddling with the saving throws was another. A third part was the changes in the XP chart, and a fourth part was the general ease of levelling up which allowed the other errors to enter play and magnify into importance for far more groups than would otherwise be the case.

Caros
2008-08-27, 09:47 AM
Just my two cents, but I still consider the HP system of 3rd ed to be one of the major imbalances for wizards.

See the 2nd edition hp. Mage gets 1d4+1 (Max, with a 16 con) for 10 levels, then 1 hp every level thereafter.

Bust out the old netherese supliment sometime and checkup Karsus. Level 38 Archmage? 42 HP. ^_^

fractic
2008-08-27, 09:50 AM
Just my two cents, but I still consider the HP system of 3rd ed to be one of the major imbalances for wizards.

Why would HP matter when your opponent can't

Reach you
See you
break through the miss chance of your dissplacement/mirror image/other stuff
get a turn at all

nagora
2008-08-27, 09:50 AM
Just my two cents, but I still consider the HP system of 3rd ed to be one of the major imbalances for wizards.

See the 2nd edition hp. Mage gets 1d4+1 (Max, with a 16 con) for 10 levels, then 1 hp every level thereafter.
Did 2e drop the max Con bonus for non-fighters from 2 to 1?

Caros
2008-08-27, 10:08 AM
Admittedly I had considered those, and at high end, batman wizard brokeness, its much less of a limiting factor.

That said, I've never really found 3.5 edition mages to be all that squishy. 1st and 2nd ed mages of tenth level could be killed by one bad longbow crit to the face, and I've never seen the like come up here.

And I believe it did Nagora.... I might be wrong =.=;

Kletian999
2008-08-27, 10:36 AM
Am I the only one that sees this thread as entirely unnecessary at least in terms of whether or not 4e has made Fighters and Wizards "the same"?

Yes, all powers are damage+effect, but those effects tend to be pretty different between magic and martial:

Magic characters can turn invisible, melee characters can stealth but it's a weaker mechanic that doesn't work without degrees of cover.

Magic characters can create walls and zones, the closest thing melee have are stances that give them an AOE attack aura.

Magic characters can conjure/summon/control things in combat without a Bag of Tricks.

Magic characters can teleport and fly, martials at best get free shifts.


The above differences amount to signficant playstyle and flavor uniqueness between martials and magic. The fact that their damage outputs, the fact that enemies die via HP loss instead of being instant killed, and that some status effects (proze, daze, etc) are widely available isn't really taking much away from that variety.

nagora
2008-08-27, 10:37 AM
That said, I've never really found 3.5 edition mages to be all that squishy. 1st and 2nd ed mages of tenth level could be killed by one bad longbow crit to the face, and I've never seen the like come up here.
1e didn't have crits, BTW. I think they were optional in 2e but I'm not sure.

Dausuul
2008-08-27, 02:17 PM
The people who objected to [Tome of Battle] most strongly, in fact, tend to be the same people who like 4e the most now.

Evidence for this statement? All the gamers I play with absolutely loved the Tome of Battle, and also love 4E.


1e didn't have crits, BTW. I think they were optional in 2e but I'm not sure.

Actually, my recollection is that the 2E DMG specifically advised against having crit rules, because "while it's fun to crit a dragon for huge damage, it's not so fun when the dragon crits a PC."

Back to the original topic: I think wizards should be able to do stuff fighters can't. I also think fighters should be able to do stuff wizards can't - not because the fighter bends physical reality but because the fighter knows martial techniques the wizard never learned and isn't strong or fast enough to pull off.

Bruce Lee could do things, martially, that I cannot do. Not only can I not do them, I could never do them even if I trained for many years - because thanks to genetics, nurture, and what have you, Bruce Lee's body had natural abilities which I do not possess. He played by the same physical laws that I do, but that doesn't equate to us having identical abilities.

Take that to a superheroic extreme, and you get what D&D fighters should (to me) be.

Conversely, even though the wizard may not play by the same physical laws as the fighter, that doesn't mean the wizard automatically trumps the fighter. To extend the Bruce Lee analogy, he died in 1973. I live in the Internet age; this gives me capabilities that Bruce Lee never had. I can go on Wikipedia and conjure information about any topic under the sun. I can pull out my cell phone and call people from almost anywhere in the U.S. I can write computer programs that perform amazing feats of calculation. I can fire up an MMO and enter a whole virtual world.

All these are things that Bruce Lee could not do. This does not change the fact that if you put us in a room together, he could beat the living daylights out of me.

The real issue with 3.X fighter/wizard balance is not that wizards get special abilities fighters lack. It's the lack of any real effort to put limitations on what wizards can do with magic. Fighters were confined, more or less, by the physical laws of the real world. Wizards were not confined by any laws at all. Nobody ever sat down and said, "Okay, the following are things that magic just cannot do."

That, combined with the fact that wizards had access to unlimited spell knowledge, was what led to the Batman wizard who can do literally anything if given a day to prepare.

Jayabalard
2008-08-27, 04:29 PM
Am I the only one that sees this thread as entirely unnecessary at least in terms of whether or not 4e has made Fighters and Wizards "the same"?That's rather irrelevant, since that's not the thread topic (even though people tend to get sidetracked on to it)



The people who objected to it most strongly, in fact, tend to be the same people who like 4e the most now. It isn't really a matter of wanting class X to be stronger or class Y to be weaker; it's a matter of wanting the entire game to be on a different point along the power curve.I see the opposite; people who objected to TOB more often than not object to 4e simply due to the Magic vs Non-magic aspect.

People who really liked TOB due to the semblance of balance it gave martial characters when compared to castes are the strongest supporters of 4e.

People who like gritty game worlds tend to have disliked TOB and dislike 4e; people who like a more over the top heroic style tend to like both TOB and 4e.

MartinHarper
2008-08-27, 05:46 PM
I like prophanti's post, where magic is powerful, with drawbacks. Personally, I like the idea of magic being risky. If you mess up a fireball, you risk spontaneously combusting. If you mess up a Hellblast, you risk being pulled into the abyss by the dark powers you serve.


This doesn't really do anything to address the people who enjoy playing linear fighters in a world with quadratic wizards

Actually, with a balanced game, I can do linear fighters vs quadratic wizards very easily. I simply make fighters have quadratic XP requirements and wizards have linear XP requirements.

Prophaniti
2008-08-27, 08:34 PM
The real issue with 3.X fighter/wizard balance is not that wizards get special abilities fighters lack. It's the lack of any real effort to put limitations on what wizards can do with magic. Fighters were confined, more or less, by the physical laws of the real world. Wizards were not confined by any laws at all. Nobody ever sat down and said, "Okay, the following are things that magic just cannot do."

This exactly. This is the problem with 3.5 magic, and any similar system. It's fine, even right, for magic to do things that people bound by physical laws cannot do. It is not fine, or right, for magic to have virtually no rules at all, and to have what little rules are present be so easy to bypass as to become extraneous. If you're going to let players in a game use magic, it needs to have the same amount of rules that you make your non-magic people follow. They just don't have to be the same rules, that's where the real flavor and feel of magic comes from.

OneFamiliarFace
2008-08-27, 10:16 PM
Conversely, even though the wizard may not play by the same physical laws as the fighter, that doesn't mean the wizard automatically trumps the fighter. To extend the Bruce Lee analogy, he died in 1973. I live in the Internet age; this gives me capabilities that Bruce Lee never had. I can go on Wikipedia and conjure information about any topic under the sun. I can pull out my cell phone and call people from almost anywhere in the U.S. I can write computer programs that perform amazing feats of calculation. I can fire up an MMO and enter a whole virtual world.

This, by the way, is why when your sociology teacher asks you to explain to someone from the 1600's how a car works in a 5 page paper, you should answer: MAGIC!

I did. They failed me. 7 years later, and I'm sitting on a sociology degree. Ah, the wonders of education!

Wait...what were we talking about again?

Prophaniti
2008-08-27, 10:35 PM
This, by the way, is why when your sociology teacher asks you to explain to someone from the 1600's how a car works in a 5 page paper, you should answer: MAGIC!

O_o He asked you to do that? That's pretty ridiculous. There's simply too much foundational understanding about physical laws and properties that is necessary to truly understand how an automobile works. My answer: I'd spend 5 years giving him a basic education so he knows what the #$@! I'm talking about when we start discussing cars. 'Course, I could just tell him "Controlled fire makes wagon move." but I think at that point he'd call me a witch and yell for the hanging squad...

Reminds me of all those english teachers who want you to tell them the "deeper meaning" in a certain book. Of Mice and Men is about how much life sucks and things don't work out! It's obvious! Why should I write a multi-page essay about it when you're just going to read it and give me an F because it's not the same meaning YOU got out of it?!

Sorry... I went away for a bit, but I'm back now. I brought T-shirts and souveniers.

OneFamiliarFace
2008-08-27, 11:06 PM
Reminds me of all those english teachers who want you to tell them the "deeper meaning" in a certain book. Of Mice and Men is about how much life sucks and things don't work out! It's obvious! Why should I write a multi-page essay about it when you're just going to read it and give me an F because it's not the same meaning YOU got out of it?!

Yeah, I had some papers in which I wrote only "I learned nothing from this book," but I passed one of those though. Man, if anyone here is in high school, don't worry. It does get better in college. Tough then you risk getting trapped in Academia!

Speaking of which, wizards aren't better than fighters because the wizards are just part of the college-elite who sit up there with their research and their knowledge, without ever knowing what it's really like as a sword'n'boarder in the field, actually doing something to stop the Dark One.

Actually, this is not a bad analogy. As a lot of fantasy wizards do spend entirely too long studying in trying to stop the Dark One, only to have their minor advice go unheeded by McHacknslash as he bravely confronts, and soundly defeats the D.O. with no help and no idea (until the sequel). Fortunately for our hero, it is easier to solve the problems presented by the Dark One than the problems of, say, poverty...

Inhuman Bot
2008-08-27, 11:20 PM
I feel like I should comment: for those interested in balance, setting's like Iron kingdoms do a fairly good job. For example, no wish, no mordenkainen spells, and using fly simply makes you a target for any rifleman or warjack on the field. Wizards have less acceses to scrolls, and magic items are not permenant (the are powerd usding accumulators), thus providing some obstacles in the way of a batman wizard. Mages are not totaly dstroyed, but they are toned down.
Oh, and also for example, there is a limit on healing (want to heal more then your limit? you might get a stomach ache, or the raw power of the gods may flay your skin off in a blast of divine energy).

Just putting it out there.

Vexxation
2008-08-27, 11:23 PM
Reminds me of all those english teachers who want you to tell them the "deeper meaning" in a certain book. Of Mice and Men is about how much life sucks and things don't work out! It's obvious! Why should I write a multi-page essay about it when you're just going to read it and give me an F because it's not the same meaning YOU got out of it?!

On that topic but not that of the thread, Why is that every "classic" we read as youngsters in English show that life sucks and nothing gets better?
Old Man and the Sea:Trying hard nets you nothing.
Lord of the Flies: People are easily reduced to their base instincts; people are little more than animals
Of Mice and Men: You can't reach the American Dream, not as you pictured it, because something will happen to make it suck.
The Pearl: Others will take advantage of you. Your success will cause nothing but suffering. You're better off to be happy where you are.
Death of a Salesman: Hard work still doesn't net you anything. You can best benefit those you love by dying.
MacBeth: Power will corrupt you. So will the promise of it.

I mean, do we really need to be giving such a bleak view of life to children? 17 years old here, and yeesh, these books would be depressing if I, like so many, took them seriously. It's like telling a kid, "Y'know, you could be President. PSYCHE!! Look into fast-food work."

TheThan
2008-08-27, 11:23 PM
Since we’re on the subject of magic

What I think about magic.

I think that magic should have certain drawbacks that make it inherently dangerous. Magic users need to learn what their capabilities as spell casters are. What they can do safely and what they can’t do safely. Magic users need to be able to pick and choose what and when to cast their magic. I like the idea that magic users have to practice caution and moderation when it comes to magic, lest something really bad happens.

Basically magic should be alive and filled with mystery and danger. Like a living entity, not like a tool you just switch on and off as the situation calls for it.

Aquillion
2008-08-27, 11:43 PM
On that topic but not that of the thread, Why is that every "classic" we read as youngsters in English show that life sucks and nothing gets better?
Old Man and the Sea:Trying hard nets you nothing.
Lord of the Flies: People are easily reduced to their base instincts; people are little more than animals
Of Mice and Men: You can't reach the American Dream, not as you pictured it, because something will happen to make it suck.
The Pearl: Others will take advantage of you. Your success will cause nothing but suffering. You're better off to be happy where you are.
Death of a Salesman: Hard work still doesn't net you anything. You can best benefit those you love by dying.
MacBeth: Power will corrupt you. So will the promise of it.

I mean, do we really need to be giving such a bleak view of life to children? 17 years old here, and yeesh, these books would be depressing if I, like so many, took them seriously. It's like telling a kid, "Y'know, you could be President. PSYCHE!! Look into fast-food work."
Many of those interpretations are wrong.

For example, the point of Death of a Salesman isn't that he benefited them by dying (obviously -- the end makes that clear). The point is that his dreams caused him to neglect and reject the things he could do -- he had many opportunities and talents, but rejected them in favor of his grandiose dreams. (It also isn't necessarily made clear that he's wrong for having those dreams, only that those dreams were unrealistic. Each character gives a different interpretation at his funeral, and none of them are definitively the 'right' one.)

OneFamiliarFace
2008-08-27, 11:56 PM
@Aquillon:
Many of those interpretations are wrong.

For example, the point of Death of a Salesman isn't that he benefited them by dying (obviously -- the end makes that clear). The point is that his dreams caused him to neglect and reject the things he could do -- he had many opportunities and talents, but rejected them in favor of his grandiose dreams. (It also isn't necessarily made clear that he's wrong for having those dreams, only that those dreams were unrealistic. Each character gives a different interpretation at his funeral, and none of them are definitively the 'right' one.)

Let's not get too picky here :-p. Part of the point of literature is to be open to interpretation. These may very well have been his teachers' interpretations that he was talking about. I would have some beefs with his interpretation of Lord of the Flies as well (which is one of my favorite books). As I even disagree with the author on that one! But he can hold his own opinions, and we can all discuss them in another thread somewhere else.
But anyway, as I was saying, fighting beats magic for the following reason:

In the stories, the guy who we think would win IRL never does. Batman beats Superman (as he should), Larry the Dirt Farmer will beat Morthos Deathskull EVERY time (as the prophecy says), and the ditzy blonde lawyer will overcome stuffy old white guys with years of training and practice on her. This is the way the world works.

And, as such, magic SHOULD trump fighting, only because this will invariably mean that fighting will win out over magic. Make sense?

Sucrose
2008-08-27, 11:56 PM
I don't know if I agree that magic should be dangerous to practice regularly (that pretty much ensures that it wouldn't be practical to use as a PC), but I do think that it should be difficult.

I like the old "no concentration, you just fail" idea of magic disruption, along with one round casting time for pretty much all spells. That ensures that whatever incredible effect the player wants, he has to work for it, and also gives a nice "insanely complicated ritual that you just can't allow to be screwed up" vibe. Even though it weakens magic a bit, I feel like it makes things feel more "epic."

Sholos
2008-08-27, 11:59 PM
I was kind of annoyed with the "you get hit you fail your spell" since no one could shield you from getting hit. It basically meant "defensive buffs first, maybe one offensive spell the whole battle".

Akimbo
2008-08-28, 12:07 AM
I was kind of annoyed with the "you get hit you fail your spell" since no one could shield you from getting hit. It basically meant "defensive buffs first, maybe one offensive spell the whole battle".

In 3.5 it would just mean that you use persistent defenses or swift ones like Greater Mirror Image, which is of course what you use anyway.

Artanis
2008-08-28, 12:12 AM
Reminds me of all those english teachers who want you to tell them the "deeper meaning" in a certain book. Of Mice and Men is about how much life sucks and things don't work out! It's obvious! Why should I write a multi-page essay about it when you're just going to read it and give me an F because it's not the same meaning YOU got out of it?!
It's this sort of thing that once prompted me to write a four-page essay proving that symbolism did not exist.

Best.
F.
Ever.

Jade_Tarem
2008-08-28, 12:57 AM
Since we’re on the subject of magic

What I think about magic.

I think that magic should have certain drawbacks that make it inherently dangerous. Magic users need to learn what their capabilities as spell casters are. What they can do safely and what they can’t do safely. Magic users need to be able to pick and choose what and when to cast their magic. I like the idea that magic users have to practice caution and moderation when it comes to magic, lest something really bad happens.

Basically magic should be alive and filled with mystery and danger. Like a living entity, not like a tool you just switch on and off as the situation calls for it.

I keep saying that, but am usually shouted down by people patiently explaining that it will never work, because what the players really want is their fail-proof "magical" auto-cannon, and so that's why 4e is the best thing ever.


And forgive me if someone here has already said this, but I don't care if magic doesn't trump swordsmanship, I just happen to feel that it shouldn't be exactly the same.

Morandir Nailo
2008-08-28, 01:00 AM
I don't know if I agree that magic should be dangerous to practice regularly (that pretty much ensures that it wouldn't be practical to use as a PC), but I do think that it should be difficult.

I like the old "no concentration, you just fail" idea of magic disruption, along with one round casting time for pretty much all spells. That ensures that whatever incredible effect the player wants, he has to work for it, and also gives a nice "insanely complicated ritual that you just can't allow to be screwed up" vibe. Even though it weakens magic a bit, I feel like it makes things feel more "epic."

WFRP does a very good job of making magic fun but dangerous. But that's neither here nor there.

I have to agree with you there; mages should have to work for their power. Magic is supposed to break the rules, that's what makes it Magic. But it should have a heavy opportunity cost.

I think that the problems people have with 3.x magic could be mitigated quite a bit by simply reducing the Wizard's access to spells - no more freebies, fewer spells/day, much tougher item creation/spell research restrictions, and no Mage-Marts. This puts spell access entirely in the hands of the DM, and s/he can decide what is or isn't appropriate for his/her game. When the Wizard has to ration his altering of reality the Fighter won't feel so screwed. The key is to make spell selection each day require careful deliberation, full of trade-offs.

Mor

Baidas Kebante
2008-08-28, 02:09 AM
But anyway, as I was saying, fighting beats magic for the following reason:

In the stories, the guy who we think would win IRL never does. Batman beats Superman (as he should), Larry the Dirt Farmer will beat Morthos Deathskull EVERY time (as the prophecy says), and the ditzy blonde lawyer will overcome stuffy old white guys with years of training and practice on her. This is the way the world works.

And, as such, magic SHOULD trump fighting, only because this will invariably mean that fighting will win out over magic. Make sense?

These are underdog fights and fall under the implication of being in the Right will win the Fight. The requirements for this is that the more powerful source is evil and that good will always find a way. It assumes that power always has a loophole that can be exploited. But this doesn't hold any bearing when you're on the same side, because one trumping the other means that Batman shouldn't even wake up in the morning since Superman can save the hostages, capture the villain and get the girl before breakfast is done.

This is why when they team up it's because Batman can do something that Superman can't - and it's something they do at the same time. This isn't a "sometimes Batman contributes and other times Superman contributes", this is "Batman and Superman contributes together, but in different ways". A lot of posts here seem to be in the mindset that characters in a party should all contribute, but only in specialized scenarios. "A fighter should do well in these situations and a wizard should do well in those situations." But all that does is lead to players saying, "Oh! I get to do something now!"

Characters should be contributing to all things, all of the time. 4E tried to do this with skill challenges, but I feel they fell short on the result. Fighters and wizards should have equal ability to do something in and out of a fight. That means they should have equal destructive power (direct or indirect) and equal utility. I don't care about wizards that are seemingly more powerful because they alter reality. I don't care that wizards created a ball of fire from nothing to incinerate four orcs. I care that if the wizard killed 4 orcs in this fight that means there were eight orcs in total because I killed the other four too.

Wizards are free to trump fighters in fluff all they want. But when it comes to gameplay and real mechanical results, no one should trump another.

PS: Batman has never, in actuality, beaten Superman. The best he has ever done is not die.

OneFamiliarFace
2008-08-28, 04:00 AM
PS: Batman has never, in actuality, beaten Superman. The best he has ever done is not die.

Sir, surely you blaspheme. :smalltongue: Batman has beaten Superman (and in cases, the entire Justice League) on numerous occasions, in the comics and various other media.

And I was really joking about that. But I think you are right, Superman can and rightly should be able to do everything Batman can do better. Yes, even the things Batman does well. Superman is supposed to have a super intellect, he also has a crime lab, and many techy doodads. He also can move at a speed at which it wouldn't really matter. He can almost be in multiple places at once. What stops him though?

The DM. ?

Yep, the DM. Kryptonite presented at the stupidest of moments, or just plain ignoring Superman's abilities (though this is a bad option in a game). Kryptonite here would be Anti-magic fields, or much more commonly, Dispel Magic. This brings in the Decker problem, but there is another, more important factor: The Players.

The Fighter may very well KNOW that the Wizard trumps him in every way and that a Warblade would be a 'better' choice, but he doesn't want any of that. He wants to swing his sword over his head and down again repeatedly. Maybe the actual thrill of the game is not killing things, but the air and bearing of a soldier/gladiator/or other fighter type of some kind, which he wants to roleplay. He may ask the wizards to leave him some of the action in that case, which is a common enough fantasy occurance.

And, since bad guys have the same magic: His job is to take out the mundanes while his wizardy friend is busy counterspelling, buffing, and protecting. He keeps the wizard alive when the wizard can't protect himself. (See Caramon and Raistlin.) So, Fighters away!

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 06:41 AM
O_o He asked you to do that? That's pretty ridiculous. There's simply too much foundational understanding about physical laws and properties that is necessary to truly understand how an automobile works. There were steam engines in the early 1700s; calculus exists as of 1687. So if you had someone who was actually up on cutting edge math and science from the 1600s it wouldn't really be all that hard to explain the nitty gritty of how a combustion engine works.

Artemician
2008-08-28, 07:27 AM
On that topic but not that of the thread, Why is that every "classic" we read as youngsters in English show that life sucks and nothing gets better?
Old Man and the Sea:Trying hard nets you nothing.
Lord of the Flies: People are easily reduced to their base instincts; people are little more than animals
Of Mice and Men: You can't reach the American Dream, not as you pictured it, because something will happen to make it suck.
The Pearl: Others will take advantage of you. Your success will cause nothing but suffering. You're better off to be happy where you are.
Death of a Salesman: Hard work still doesn't net you anything. You can best benefit those you love by dying.
MacBeth: Power will corrupt you. So will the promise of it.

Not wanting to derail the thread, but Oh So Wrong. Very much so.

TwystidMynd
2008-08-28, 08:19 AM
Yep, the DM. Kryptonite presented at the stupidest of moments, or just plain ignoring Superman's abilities (though this is a bad option in a game). Kryptonite here would be Anti-magic fields, or much more commonly, Dispel Magic.
I don't think you'd have to look too hard on these boards to find someone who thinks that's an incredibly bad idea to implement in actual play.



This brings in the Decker problem, but there is another, more important factor: The Players.

The Fighter may very well KNOW that the Wizard trumps him in every way and that a Warblade would be a 'better' choice, but he doesn't want any of that. He wants to swing his sword over his head and down again repeatedly. Maybe the actual thrill of the game is not killing things, but the air and bearing of a soldier/gladiator/or other fighter type of some kind, which he wants to roleplay. He may ask the wizards to leave him some of the action in that case, which is a common enough fantasy occurance.

Forgive me for paraphrasing; I'm not trying to over-generalize your argument, but rather provide a parallel:
"The system may be broken, but you can fix it by (having decent players/houseruling everything you hate)"
This has been called a type of gaming fallacy before, and I feel that it's rather applicable here, too. Just because a broken mechanic can be fixed doesn't mean it's not broken.

If you're giving the players the option to be the soldier/gladiator/othertypeofkickarsefighter or a wizard, I feel that it's the DM's responsibility to ensure that both of those options are equally viable within the game world. The DM can do so most easily by picking a gaming system that supports that, of which there are many.
If the DM prefers a world where magic always trumps fighting, then I feel that the DM should either
-Not give the options to play a fighting class, and instead let the players choose from a variety of casters
-Not give the options to play a magic class, and instead let the players choose from a variety of fighters

Sucrose
2008-08-28, 09:52 AM
The Fighter may very well KNOW that the Wizard trumps him in every way and that a Warblade would be a 'better' choice, but he doesn't want any of that. He wants to swing his sword over his head and down again repeatedly. Maybe the actual thrill of the game is not killing things, but the air and bearing of a soldier/gladiator/or other fighter type of some kind, which he wants to roleplay.

I have few complaints about any of your post except for this part. If all he cares about is the roleplaying, then I'd almost certainly think that he'd be better off playing a Warblade.

They have the same roleplaying versatility as a meleeist fighter (and personally, I've never seen someone really want to play an archer, and choose Fighter over Ranger), while being both simpler to build properly and (IMHO, of course) more entertaining to play.

The only exception is the lack of heavy armor, but that can be corrected with a single feat.

That said, one can certainly have fun playing a Fighter, and if one is, then I've no right to demand that they shell out for ToB. I just happen to own it, like it, and constantly use it for all my melee character needs.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 10:32 AM
I have few complaints about any of your post except for this part. If all he cares about is the roleplaying, then I'd almost certainly think that he'd be better off playing a Warblade.

They have the same roleplaying versatility as a meleeist fighter (and personally, I've never seen someone really want to play an archer, and choose Fighter over Ranger), while being both simpler to build properly and (IMHO, of course) more entertaining to play.

The only exception is the lack of heavy armor, but that can be corrected with a single feat.

That said, one can certainly have fun playing a Fighter, and if one is, then I've no right to demand that they shell out for ToB. I just happen to own it, like it, and constantly use it for all my melee character needs.

Wait, was there any point in this post other than to promote TOB? I think it's assumed that we can substitute fighter for any melee class and wizard for any magic class in the given examples.

Sucrose
2008-08-28, 10:38 AM
Wait, was there any point in this post other than to promote TOB? I think it's assumed that we can substitute fighter for any melee class and wizard for any magic class in the given examples.

Well, yes. He said that one of the reasons that one might play a Fighter is for roleplay possibilities. Those possibilities are not Fighter-exclusive, so it is not a valid reason to choose playing a Fighter over playing a different class. Given that it was given as an example of why one might choose Fighter over (it was specifically stated) a Warblade, I think that your assumptions about how people on the internet feel are misplaced.

Edit: I'll admit that maybe my last sentence was unneeded, though.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 10:44 AM
"The system may be broken, but you can fix it by (having decent players/houseruling everything you hate)"The problem with generalizing it that way is that there are people who honestly don't agree that what you're talking about is "broken" or that it requires fixing at all, which makes your statement not a valid paraphrasing of the original.



If the DM prefers a world where magic always trumps fighting, then I feel that the DM should either
-Not give the options to play a fighting class, and instead let the players choose from a variety of casters
-Not give the options to play a magic class, and instead let the players choose from a variety of fightersOr alternately, they could give the options to play both magic and non-magic classes, make sure that the players to know that they are picking stronger or weaker options, and trust them to pick a class that matches the playstyle that they want to play. Which works just fine; people pick a class that has the appropriate level of bad-ass-ness to it.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 10:48 AM
Or alternately, they could give the options to play both magic and non-magic classes, make sure that the players to know that they are picking stronger or weaker options, and trust them to pick a class that matches the playstyle that they want to play. Which works just fine.

"I want to be a fighter!"
"Okay, but bear in mind that fighters are very weak in this game when compared to casters."
"But aren't fighters the staple of heroic fantasy? I thought this game is called Dungeons and Dragons, not Mage."
"Sucks to be you."

Giving the players a fair warning about a system's lack of balance doesn't make it more balanced. Though it is still better than letting them step on a trap unknowingly.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 10:54 AM
"I want to be a fighter!"
"Okay, but bear in mind that fighters are very weak in this game when compared to casters."
"But aren't fighters the staple of heroic fantasy? I thought this game is called Dungeons and Dragons, not Mage."
"Sucks to be you."I don't really see your point; if someone wants to play a weak class they can. You can replace all instances of the above with "commoner" if you want.

Appealing to "fighters are the staple of heroic fantasy" doesn't really help. As is common in heroic fantasy, if you want to go against a caster and beat them based on your own power then you are out of luck if you're just a fighter. You're going to have to find a better way that involves winning despite the fact that you're weaker.

RebelRogue
2008-08-28, 10:56 AM
I've never seen someone really want to play an archer, and choose Fighter over Ranger
Fighters do make better archers than rangers, IMO. The reason to choose ranger over fighter when opting for such a build (IMO) is flavor (well, that and skills I guess).

Well, I guess I'm off-topic...

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 10:58 AM
Show me a book where two characters are equally important plot-wise, but one of them is a wizard and the other a warrior, and the wizard ends up doing everything important while the warrior could as well not be there? I'll wait.

The problem here is that, when imagining a generic fantasy setting, most people think of a world where adventurers can roughly fit one of these archetypes: warrior, mage, thief, priest. To match these expectations, a game in such a setting should have all these archetypes to be viable. And few descriptions other than "generic fantasy" match DND better.

It's perfectly okay to have casters stronger than non-casters in a game where it's in the premise that players will play casters, like Mage or Ars Magica. But DND, and other games that don't possess such premise, should have them balanced.

TwystidMynd
2008-08-28, 11:05 AM
The problem with generalizing it that way is that there are people who honestly don't agree that what you're talking about is "broken" or that it requires fixing at all, which makes your statement not a valid paraphrasing of the original.

The reason for the paraphrasing is because he was making non-explicit assumptions in his post. By using the word "problem" and suggesting a solution ("He may ask the wizards to leave him some of the action in that case, which is a common enough fantasy occurance.") he implied that there is an aspect of the system which was broken. My goal was to capture his point, but explicitly state that which he meant implicitly, and then refute it. If I mistakenly paraphrased his intent, then feel free to point that out. The fact that "some people" may disagree with his statement has no bearing on my generalization, since I was not suggesting that all people feel the same way that OneFamiliarFace does.

I believe you're misdirecting your post, unless you mean to argue that it is "broken" to think that "A broken system that can be fixed is not broken" is not a fallacy?

Sucrose
2008-08-28, 11:10 AM
Fighters do make better archers than rangers, IMO. The reason to choose ranger over fighter when opting for such a build (IMO) is flavor (well, that and skills I guess).

Well, I guess I'm off-topic...

Oh, for actual archery power, they do (though it's handy to be able to spot enemies from a long way away as a ranged character.) It's just a strange phenomenon that I noticed; it doesn't really make very much sense.

Prophaniti
2008-08-28, 11:15 AM
"But aren't fighters the staple of heroic fantasy?

Well, actually, the most common universal thread throughout all fantasy settings heroic or otherwise would be magic. They pretty much all have it. Only its place in the story or society, and its capabilities, changes.

So really one could make the argument that magic is what all fantasy is about. I would not fully agree, but it's a decent argument.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 11:42 AM
Well, actually, the most common universal thread throughout all fantasy settings heroic or otherwise would be magic. They pretty much all have it. Only its place in the story or society, and its capabilities, changes.

So really one could make the argument that magic is what all fantasy is about. I would not fully agree, but it's a decent argument.

I would fully agree with that. Without magic it's no longer fantasy. It's simply historical fiction.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 11:51 AM
I would fully agree with that. Without magic it's no longer fantasy. It's simply historical fiction.

Even if it has creatures and races that do not exist in real life? Even if it takes place in a nonexistant land?

Magic is not a prerequesite for fantasy.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 11:54 AM
Even if it has creatures and races that do not exist in real life? Even if it takes place in a nonexistant land?

Magic is not a prerequesite for fantasy.

Then it's unhistorical fiction. Magic actually is the prerequisite for fantasy.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 11:57 AM
Seeing that I've never heard the term "unhistorical fiction" before nor seen it on a cover of a book, I'm afraid very few people agree with this definition.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 12:00 PM
Fantasy: Literature. an imaginative or fanciful work, esp. one dealing with supernatural or unnatural events or characters.

Emphasis mine.
#9 from Dictionary.com

Vexxation
2008-08-28, 12:00 PM
Seeing that I've never heard the term "unhistorical fiction" before nor seen it on a cover of a book, I'm afraid very few people agree with this definition.

Well, that's because "unhistorical fiction" is really just "fiction." Any "fiction" that isn't historical is automatically "unhistorical." For example: Harry Potter. It's not historical, so it must be "unhistorical."

The thing is, we already have the classification "historical"so there's no need for "unhistorical" as a classification. For fiction, there's "historical" and "everything else."

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 12:01 PM
Emphasis mine.
#9 from Dictionary.com

1. It says "especially", not "only".
2. Creatures that don't exist in real life qualify as unnatural.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 12:05 PM
2. Creatures that don't exist in real life qualify as unnatural.

They do? Since when?

And I suppose if you have magical creatures that still counts as being fantasy without actually having magic (Unicorns that fly without wings, dragons that fly despite their weight, etc.).

Vexxation
2008-08-28, 12:07 PM
They do? Since when?

And I suppose if you have magical creatures that still counts as being fantasy without actually having magic (Unicorns that fly without wings, dragons that fly despite their weight, etc.).

Natural: Existing in nature. Or, to be better put, actually existing.

Dragons, Hobgoblins, and (D&D-style) Dwarves: Do not exit.

Therefore, Dragons, Hobgoblins, and (D&D-style) Dwarves are not natural, and thus unnatural.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 12:13 PM
Natural: Existing in nature. Or, to be better put, actually existing.

Dragons, Hobgoblins, and (D&D-style) Dwarves: Do not exit.

Therefore, Dragons, Hobgoblins, and (D&D-style) Dwarves are not natural, and thus unnatural.

Yet, a new setting will have it's own definition of nature. Dragons, Hobgoblins and Dwarves are all perfectly natural in the context of their setting.

WalkingTarget
2008-08-28, 12:14 PM
So would a book written in a setting that has dragons and goblins, but no wizards or other overt magic count as fantasy then?

@v - agreed, my opinion is that to be "fantasy" the story has to contain "fantastic" elements whether that's magic or something else. Frankly, a lot of "science fiction" qualifies as a subcategory of fantasy to me (I guess the term "speculative fiction" is the popular way to phrase it these days, though).

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 12:16 PM
Yet, a new setting will have it's own definition of nature. Dragons, Hobgoblins and Dwarves are all perfectly natural in the context of their setting.

Magic is perfectly natural in a world where it exists, too. Which means that there are no fantasy settings, because there are no settings with unnatural elements.


So would a book written in a setting that has dragons and goblins, but no wizards or other overt magic count as fantasy then?

Definitely. There was a time when such book were very popular, in fact.

Vexxation
2008-08-28, 12:17 PM
Yet, a new setting will have it's own definition of nature. Dragons, Hobgoblins and Dwarves are all perfectly natural in the context of their setting.

Well, yes, but the point was they're unnatural to ours.

I mean, setting could deem it that rabbits grow up to be trees and the sky cries donuts when you breathe in too hard. It'd be natural to the setting, but still unnatural to reality.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 12:23 PM
Show me a book where two characters are equally important plot-wise, but one of them is a wizard and the other a warrior, and the wizard ends up doing everything important while the warrior could as well not be there?Again, I'm not sure what your point is other than to perhaps argue against some straw man; the fact that magic is far more powerful than non-magic does not necessitate that the warrior is superfluous.

I can think of plenty of stories where the one person's power is dwarfed by the other person's power without the weaker being superfluous.


The problem here is that, when imagining a generic fantasy setting, most people think of a world where adventurers can roughly fit one of these archetypes: warrior, mage, thief, priest. To match these expectations, a game in such a setting should have all these archetypes to be viable. Viable is not the same thing as "equally powerful".


Giving the players a fair warning about a system's lack of balance doesn't make it more balanced. I missed seeing this (perhaps it was in the edit). To make sure I'm being clear: I'm saying that balance between the power level of the characters themselves is not necessary for a the characters to be viable and fun to play.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 12:26 PM
The problem here, however, is that fighters in DND 3.x are superfluous, while nothing in the setting indicates that they should be. This is bad game design.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 12:32 PM
The problem here, however, is that fighters in DND 3.x are superfluousThat doesn't match with my experience, but either way I don't see what that has to do with the thread. Perhaps you're still caught up in an edition war?


2. Creatures that don't exist in real life qualify as unnatural.Not so; games and stories define what qualifies as natural in them, so creatures that don't exist in real life do not necessarily qualify as unnatural.


Magic is perfectly natural in a world where it exists, too. Generally this is not the case; most stories and games define magic to be part of the supernatural.

The only one that I can think of that even comes close to defining magic as natural is Xanth.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 12:35 PM
That doesn't match with my experience, but either way I don't see what that has to do with the thread. Perhaps you're still caught up in an edition war?

I'm using DND 3.x here as an example of bad game design that should be avoided.


Not so; games and stories define what qualifies as natural in them, so creatures that don't exist in real life do not necessarily qualify as unnatural.

In that case I direct you to my second previous post.



The only one that I can think of that even comes close to defining magic as natural is Xanth.

Would that mean the more common magic is in a setting, and therefore the more natural for it, the further away from fantasy it is? I think everyone can see that's absurd.

BRC
2008-08-28, 12:36 PM
Iv'e always liked the way Shadowrun handled magic.

For those of you who don't know, in shadowrun whenever a mage or shamen cast a spell, they would take stun damage in the form of Drain. Also, in SR damage of any sort makes you generally worse at things, therefore there was always an incentive to do things without magic if possible.

Artanis
2008-08-28, 12:47 PM
Appealing to "fighters are the staple of heroic fantasy" doesn't really help. As is common in heroic fantasy, if you want to go against a caster and beat them based on your own power then you are out of luck if you're just a fighter. You're going to have to find a better way that involves winning despite the fact that you're weaker.
I'm suddenly reminded of The Empire Strikes Back, when Han Solo first runs into Darth Vader in Cloud City. Solo starts shooting, Vader just blocks the bolts with his palm, rips the blaster out of Han's hand from the other side of the room, and appears completely unhurt as he makes a snarky comment that further reinforces how much more badass he is than Han.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 12:54 PM
So would a book written in a setting that has dragons and goblins, but no wizards or other overt magic count as fantasy then?

Personally, I'd say no. I'm not sure which books these are or what they are actually qualified as, but I wouldn't count them as fantasy.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 12:56 PM
I'm suddenly reminded of The Empire Strikes Back, when Han Solo first runs into Darth Vader in Cloud City. Solo starts shooting, Vader just blocks the bolts with his palm, rips the blaster out of Han's hand from the other side of the room, and appears completely unhurt as he makes a snarky comment that further reinforces how much more badass he is than Han.Han is the fighter, Luke is the guy swinging around magic. Both are integral to the story even though Luke is far more powerful than Han. I like stories like that and like to play games with that sort of set up.


Would that mean the more common magic is in a setting, and therefore the more natural for it, the further away from fantasy it is? I think everyone can see that's absurd.Whether something is fantasy or how fantastic it is in our world or not depends on it's relationship to reality in our world.

It all depends on your Point of View: stories that are actually in the D&D world (in-game) that use magic and creatures that exist in in the D&D world as they are in that world would just be fiction to the people who live in that D&D world, not fantasy.


Personally, I'd say no. I'm not sure which books these are or what they are actually qualified as, but I wouldn't count them as fantasy.Totally disagree; magic is not required for fantasy. It's really common, but not a required element.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 12:59 PM
Take a look at Ender's Game vs Star Wars. Star Wars has in fact been in the fantasy sections in libraries at some times (usually when they don't have a sci-fi section). Ender's Game is nothing close to fantasy, even though it still has it's own made up races.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 01:07 PM
Whether something is fantasy or how fantastic it is in our world or not depends on it's relationship to reality in our world.

It all depends on your Point of View: stories that are actually in the D&D world (in-game) that use magic and creatures that exist in in the D&D world as they are in that world would just be fiction to the people who live in that D&D world, not fantasy.


I don't think if that's really against what I've been saying, really. Especially since I was just giving examples to show my point about what is fantasy and what isn't.


Take a look at Ender's Game vs Star Wars. Star Wars has in fact been in the fantasy sections in libraries at some times (usually when they don't have a sci-fi section). Ender's Game is nothing close to fantasy, even though it still has it's own made up races.

That's probably because Ender's Game relies heavily on science, while Star Wars are a fantasy tale transplated into a sci-fi setting.

WalkingTarget
2008-08-28, 01:11 PM
Personally, I'd say no. I'm not sure which books these are or what they are actually qualified as, but I wouldn't count them as fantasy.

That's pretty much what I expected. You choose to define "fantasy" in an unorthodox way (I'm not trying to be antagonistic here, I'm just pointing out that I think there are few people, including publishing firm marketing departments, who would agree with you in that definition).

For example: I have only ever seen the Gormenghast trilogy included in a bookstore's Fantasy section (or combined with Sci-Fi if they're in the same section). As far as I'm aware, there isn't any magic or sentient races other than humans, but it still gets labeled as "fantasy" as there isn't really a better place to put it. Make of that what you will (frankly, I'm ambivalent towards genre distinctions in general; I just want a good story and I don't care what you want to label it as).

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 01:14 PM
I haven't read the third book of Gormenghast, but from what I've heard about it, it appears that it would be best described as sci-fi. The first two books are a perfect example of fantasy without any unnatural elements, though.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 01:22 PM
That's pretty much what I expected. You choose to define "fantasy" in an unorthodox way (I'm not trying to be antagonistic here, I'm just pointing out that I think there are few people, including publishing firm marketing departments, who would agree with you in that definition).

I'm willing to accept that.

But I'd like to know what the difference between sci-fi and fantasy is then.

monty
2008-08-28, 01:25 PM
I'm willing to accept that.

But I'd like to know what the difference between sci-fi and fantasy is then.

Sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. The line is blurry.

Tengu_temp
2008-08-28, 01:28 PM
Sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

The opposite is true too, as any Nanoha fan will tell you.

Sholos
2008-08-28, 01:39 PM
Not wanting to derail the thread, but Oh So Wrong. Very much so.

And this kind of thing is what I hate about English classes. Here, it just means a disagreement of opinion. In class, it means a bad grade. How do you tell somebody their interpretation is wrong and have it actually mean anything?

Prophaniti
2008-08-28, 01:43 PM
I'm willing to accept that.

But I'd like to know what the difference between sci-fi and fantasy is then.
Typically, in a science fiction setting or novel, at least a token effort goes into explaining how the SAT (sufficiently advanced technology) works. This doesn't mean what they do is really possible, of course, but it generally has at least a basis in existing or currently postulated scientific laws.

Fantasy makes no attempt whatsoever to justify the strange things in it from a real-world perspective. Orcs are there because the god Gol'mar made them, not because they evolved that way, or were mutated by a supernova, or whatever.

In a sci-fi setting, if a character can, say, regenerate, there is an explanation for it. He is descended from a long line that has been genetically manipulated to emphasis regenerative qualities over dozens of generations.

If someone in a fantasy setting can regenerate, it is almost universally magic.

Sure, you can do fantasy without much magic, I suppose it's possible to do it without any at all, if you wanted to badly enough. Basically, in a non-magic fantasy setting, if you have a guy that can shatter walls with his fists or do quintuple backflips while kicking you in the face, it is merely explained as some variation of "he's just that good", if it is explained at all.

In a sci-fi setting, someone with similarly implausible abilities would require a more scientific explanation, such as "he's a genetically modified super-soldier psychic mutant." or some such.

But my point still stands, in that magic is a far more common binding tie in fantasy than heroic fighters. Absolute, no. Almost definitely the single most common similarity, though.

nagora
2008-08-28, 01:50 PM
I'm willing to accept that.

But I'd like to know what the difference between sci-fi and fantasy is then.
SF attempts to deal with the potential of humanity and/or its attendant technologies.

Fantasy does not care about potential.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 02:00 PM
I'm willing to accept that.

But I'd like to know what the difference between sci-fi and fantasy is then.They both fall under the umbrella of speculative fiction, and have plenty of sub-genres.

In "Hard" science-fiction the author tends to stick to real science as much as possible, with a minimum of handwaving. The emphasis is on the science. Soft sci-fi will use more handwaving but still uses an "it's science!" based explanation, using scientific terms.

Fantasy generally doesn't explain how things work, or if it does it explains without a resorting to scientific terms, borrowing from various religious, spiritualist, etc terminology for explanations.

It's why some people don't like psionics in their fantasy games: since psionics tend to get defined in semi-scientific fashion, it makes them feel like they are leaving the fantasy genre and moving into the sci-fi genre.

There are certainly places where the line blur's; a couple that leap to mind are:
McCaffery's Dragonrider's series, though it makes it plain pretty early on that it's really sci-fi even though it starts off kind of like it's a fantasy series.
Peirs Anthony's Apprentice adept series, which has both a (very soft) sci-fi world and a fantasy world.
Rick Cook's Wizardry series, which mixes computer programming with magic; the first two are available online through the Baen Free Library (http://www.baen.com/library/)



How do you tell somebody their interpretation is wrong and have it actually mean anything?By backing it up.

RukiTanuki
2008-08-28, 02:12 PM
Back on the original topic: Here's my take.

1) Empirically, magic frequently achieves effects not possible otherwise, or makes said effects easier or more effective.
2) Much of the allure of magic seems to be the ability to create affects not otherwise possible.
3) In the context of a group-focused roleplaying game, it is useful to have characters of different archetypes able to contribute to the game in discrete, meaningful ways.
4) Giving magic an effect different than other forms of group contribution is as effective, if not significantly more effective, than providing a different mechanic that achieves largely the same effect.
5) If, in a group-based roleplaying game, one archetype can contribute to the group using methods A, but another archetype can contribute in A equally (or better) while also contributing B (and C, etc.), this imbalance does not improve the game (at best) and can frequently impede group enjoyment.

Now, to provide a D&D-centered focus.

3rd Edition:
1) Spells are available to achieve nearly every effect, often in a superior form to any non-magical counterpart.
2) Spells allow their user to step outside the boundaries of the rules more than any other gameplay element.
3) Spellcasters with non-limited spell lists can tailor their spells to fit many archetypes. In fact, doing so generally does not prevent them from choosing an entirely different set of abilities the next day.
4) 3e's magic system is limited by strictly defining the amount of power that can be used each day, yet unlimited by allowing that day's selection to be chosen from nearly every ability imaginable.
5) Spellcasters can overcome nearly obstacle more easily than the class designed specifically for that obstacle, given the proper spell(s). Their abilities are limited in two ways: spell use expends a finite per-day resource, and their daily spell selection is limited. These limitations can be circumvented by the use of spell-completion devices, scrolls, and the ability to rest.

4th Edition:
1) Spell powers frequently have unique effects or achieve them more easily.
2) Several effects are not duplicated by martial classes, and even "damage + status" effects come more easily to spellcasters, can be used more often, can be used at range, etc.
3) Wizards, in particular, have an unprecedented ability (relative to the other PHB classes) to alter the battlefield. Warlocks weaken their targets in ways the other damage-focused classes do not.
4) Spellcasters are different in this edition due to the effects they inflict on the battlefield and opponents, not due to the player's use of a separate attack mechanic.
5) Magic still does impressive things, but the power level relative to other heroic people explicitly listed as being the same level is, in fact, roughly equivalent.

These are my observations. I tried to put it all in one post, as it's hard to discuss such a broad topic given the natural tendency to skip from subpoint A to B to C as soon as someone presents a counterpoint to A, then responds to B, etc.

In short, magic should be unique and powerful, but it's detrimental to a group-focused roleplaying game for one character to wield enough of the width and the breadth of magic that other characters get marginalized.

Jack Zander
2008-08-28, 03:04 PM
Hmm... so then shouldn't a setting of Orcs and Dwarves but absolutely no magical effects be considered Sci-Fi rather than Fantasy? The creatures are natural so they evolved that way (unless the setting has gods, and thus has magic). It seems to me the only difference would be the time setting, which we all know can't possibly be how literature is defined.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 03:18 PM
Hmm... so then shouldn't a setting of Orcs and Dwarves but absolutely no magical effects be considered Sci-Fi rather than Fantasy?Not necessarily; it'd be science fiction only if there is sufficient science involved, which is kind of unlikely since it generally takes too much handwaving to explain multiple non-human races that compete with humans to qualify as even pseudoscientific. I'm sure it could be done, but you'd need more much details than the ones you've given.

Vexxation
2008-08-28, 03:30 PM
(unless the setting has gods, and thus has magic)

I shouldn't touch on this, but if Gods lead to magic, then many believe in real-life magic. That would mean that magic was inherent, and would settle the whole "magic = fantasy?" debate.


Um.. not that I want to catch flak from either side of the argument. Just saying.

MartinHarper
2008-08-28, 03:32 PM
I don't know if I agree that magic should be dangerous to practice regularly (that pretty much ensures that it wouldn't be practical to use as a PC)

PCs do dangerous stuff all the time. When you discover that your Mordenkainen's Magic Mansion has been invaded by zombie pirates from the astral plane, that's just another encounter.


It generally takes too much handwaving to explain multiple non-human races that compete with humans to qualify as even pseudoscientific.

There's plenty of science fiction with multiple non-human races. Star Trek and Star Wars, for example.

WalkingTarget
2008-08-28, 03:38 PM
Hmm... so then shouldn't a setting of Orcs and Dwarves but absolutely no magical effects be considered Sci-Fi rather than Fantasy? The creatures are natural so they evolved that way (unless the setting has gods, and thus has magic). It seems to me the only difference would be the time setting, which we all know can't possibly be how literature is defined.

The point others brought up in their descriptions of sci-fi was that to qualify as such the author typically has to explicitly point out the science involved.

Simply being in a setting with other sentient races can go either way. Dwarves, Goblins, Dragons, etc. are tied to ideas that originated in folklore and myth (and end up in "fantasy" because that seems to just be the way things are; I think those mythical underpinnings is what makes them inherently "fantasy" material).

Genetically modified races, aliens, or other things that are given a "scientific" rationale for existence is sci-fi.

As I said in my (edited) first post here today, I tend to subcategorize a large chunk of "sci-fi" within "fantasy" anyway. I don't know about others.

For fun, I suggest you pick up the Dragaera novels by Steven Brust. It's a setting that's "obviously" fantasy (at least 2 forms of "magic", gods, dragons and other interesting animal life, an extremely long-lived race besides humans who have a better-than-you mentality, etc.) but tosses in science fiction curveballs every once in a while. That other race was created by altering human stock and splicing them with the local fauna of the planet (among other things). The humans had colonized that planet on their own before the people doing the splicing found them. Also, at least some of the gods were just the splicers' lab assistants until they rebelled.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 03:40 PM
There's plenty of science fiction with multiple non-human races. Star Trek and Star Wars, for example.Yes, but they aren't on the same planet filling the same niche, and there is far more to the settings than what he told us. With just "humans Orcs and Dwarfs and no magic" it would tend to be fantasy, but could go either way depending on what else you have involved in the setting.

Not that I would generally call Star Wars science fiction...

Vexxation
2008-08-28, 03:44 PM
Yes, but they aren't on the same planet filling the same niche, and there is far more to the settings.

Not that I would generally call Star Wars science fiction... It's space fantasy.

I dunno, Tatooine has Humans, Jawas, and Sand People. The Jawas and Sand People sorta compete for scraps and salvage, and the Sand People compete with the humans, for.. um, well, the stuff the humans own.

Other, more civilized planets, such as Naboo and Coruscant, contain an abundance of different humanoid species living in relative harmony.

But, you are correct in that these exceptions are rare. Nobody on Endor but Ewoks, nobody on Kashyyk but Wookies, nobody on Manaan but Selkath.

Artanis
2008-08-28, 04:04 PM
One of the problems with Fantasy vs. Sci-Fi is that Sci-Fi can refer to two different things: a type of story and a setting. Star Wars is a perfect example. It's much more a fantasy story, but the setting is sci-fi, making it sci-fi as well.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 04:27 PM
One of the problems with Fantasy vs. Sci-Fi is that Sci-Fi can refer to two different things: a type of story and a setting. Star Wars is a perfect example. It's much more a fantasy story, but the setting is sci-fi, making it sci-fi as well.It's setting is space, but it isn't a sci-fi setting any more than spelljammer is. There's no science involved, meaning there's no attempt whatsoever to explain it, so IMNSHO the setting doesn't even qualify as soft sci-fi.

Artanis
2008-08-28, 04:46 PM
Again, story vs. setting. It's spaceships and ray guns, and those things are officially created by some sort of technology. They don't go in to what said technology is, but it's still machines, so the setting is sci-fi. Sci-fi with plenty of fantasy elements (read: The Force), but still sci-fi, even if just barely. Technically.

The story, however, is like you said: barely sci-fi at most.

Knaight
2008-08-28, 05:08 PM
And this kind of thing is what I hate about English classes. Here, it just means a disagreement of opinion. In class, it means a bad grade. How do you tell somebody their interpretation is wrong and have it actually mean anything?

In class having a different taste in books than your teacher means a bad grade. If you have different writing styles, then you have to morph yours, regardless of how bad the teachers writing actually is. But this is way off topic.

As for Starwars, its fantasy. There is tons of fantasy with modern technology, and while the technology is futuristic, its still fantasy, its just fantasy with futuristic technology. Space ships and ray guns just determine what technology level the fantasy is set at, magic/the force/psionic abilities that defy science push stuff into fantasy.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 05:11 PM
In class having a different taste in books than your teacher means a bad grade. If you have different writing styles, then you have to morph yours, regardless of how bad the teachers writing actually is. But this is way off topic.I know that your statements are wrong for the people that I know who teach. It sounds like you just have had bad teachers, which is regrettably all too common now in public schools.

Grommen
2008-08-28, 05:20 PM
Hay can we qualify this as the biggest thread jacking of the year?

How the hell did another debate about magic end up commenting on the validity of Star Wars as Sci-Fi?

Everyone knows it is a Western anyway.

Right so...

Anyone ever heard of the DM? That is the overworked guy in the corner, who's plot everyone else just ran over and set on fire. Their is a point to having one in a D&D game. It's called balance. Never in any RPG game have I ever seen the words written, "This game was writen to have absolute balance between the classes. Everyone will have an equal amount of fun no matter what level, class, race, or abilities you have. No need to worry the monsters and NPC will be just as evenly balanced."

It will never...never happen. Someone will take something and run with it to gain an advantage over someone else. It's the DM's job to make up the story, and keep everyone havening fun. Some people like suck azz characters, others have to have +20 to hit at 1st level, and do 1000 points of damage by 10th or they can't have fun.

If you want balance go play Hero Quest, or Monopoly, or Risk or something. Otherwise get over it. Anyone with half a clue can eventually find some loop hole with any class ever written to gain some advantage. Some classes are easer to abuse than others, but you can do it.

And you know what. Magic should be weired spooky stuff. If you want it to be. In my worlds, magic is a tool like anything else. We easly blend blaster mages, illusions, cleric and Druids right next to our gun toting grizzled, heavy drinking warriors.

Do I take all the advantages that a spell caster can? No. Because that would disrupt the balance of the entire game. I know better. However I don't want to heavy handed force everyone to play the same way. I allow players to set the level of power. In every campaign, every setting, every encounter. If they want to play over powered wizards and cleric's. Then I bring out the heavy hitters for NPC's. They want to rush into a downtown Bar in Seattle in 2065 with Panther Assualt Cannons blazen, the Lone Star Swat team that will hunt them down and kill them will use far worse. You bring Jedi, I bring Vader, etc. You want to bring fuzzy kittens. I'll bring puppy's and Grape Nehi. And if someone gets off the curve, I deal with it.

So no. Magic has never been an issue in my worlds. Not cause it can't. Just because I don't allow it to.

chiasaur11
2008-08-28, 05:21 PM
In class having a different taste in books than your teacher means a bad grade. If you have different writing styles, then you have to morph yours, regardless of how bad the teachers writing actually is. But this is way off topic.

As for Starwars, its fantasy. There is tons of fantasy with modern technology, and while the technology is futuristic, its still fantasy, its just fantasy with futuristic technology. Space ships and ray guns just determine what technology level the fantasy is set at, magic/the force/psionic abilities that defy science push stuff into fantasy.

Don't I know it.
Had a teacher who actually talked with my parents about my reading habits.
Said I should read less SF and fantasy, and more depressing, "Realistic" drudge like "A Day No Pigs Would Die".

(By the way, "A Day No Pigs would Die" review: Sucks.)

Draco Dracul
2008-08-28, 05:25 PM
Just my two cents, but I have a problem with the "fighters limited to what is physically possible" argument. The laws of physics difine what is possible within the universe, if you manage to achive anything that difiies a physical law you have in effect disproved that law of physics. The very fact that spellcasters can defie the Laws of Physics show that in a given fantasy setting that those laws of Physics don't apply. Just as an example, falling damage in D&D increases liniarly rather than quadratically like it would in real life (if speed is doubled force is quadrupled), this show that in D&D gravity and force work differently than in our world. I cannot say that a fighter could do as many amazing feats as a wizard, but the limits of what he can do are different than the limits in our world.

Knaight
2008-08-28, 05:37 PM
I know that your statements are wrong for the people that I know who teach. It sounds like you just have had bad teachers, which is regrettably all too common now in public schools.

Apparently the school I go to was recently called the best in the nation by Newsweek or some other magazine, so what does that say about the rest of them? Not that they have anywhere near enough exposure to know what they're talking about, so Newsweek is kidding themselves if they think that their judgment actually means anything. And the only private school I ever went to wasn't any better, it was heavily religious, to the point where history text books have stuff like "because of the cross painted on the shields of the soldiers, they won the battle". Not "soldiers thought that painting a cross on their shields would allow them to win the battle, "the cross painted on the shields of the soldiers...won the battle". Oh and it was intended for 7 year olds, because thats the only books available saturated with enough religion.

As for your example chiasaur, its gotten to the point where teachers assume people just don't read, so that people who do don't get asked to change what. Teachers aren't going to tell people to read less anything. That said, they also feel that students need to actively read(yes, because apparently reading is passive.) and prove that they read, and stick 50+ sticky notes in every book. Because sticking sticky notes in the book periodically can't possibly affect the flow and thus interest in the book.

The vast majority of teachers these days don't care about what they teach. It doesn't matter to them at all, they go, they pick up their paycheck, they go through the motions, and they don't try to help students at all. They teach straight out of the text book. Then of the minority most of the teachers refuse to accept that they could possibly have problems, and if every student fails, they are all stupid and lazy and the teaching is perfect. For instance at my highschool I was sitting in a hallway during a free period, doing homework and talking to a friend with the same free period when a teacher talking to a staff member(maybe a teacher) walks past. The staff member asks how the teachers classes are going, and she says, and I quote "Tsk. Two entire classes and only one A" in a tone of voice that says that she never considered that if all her students are doing poorly and not just one that it might be her fault. Oh and the school resource officer is convinced that everybody under 18 is in a gang. This is in what is supposedly the best school in the nation. Although after just checking it looks like it was number 518 recently, which is still extremely high.

Orzel
2008-08-28, 05:48 PM
One of my main gripes with D&D is that my 10th level fighter isn't the Hulk with an Axe. The Game holds PC to standards that the Monsters can break. PCs are stuck in reality until they become a demigod, mutate, or are stuck with magic. Many characters can be easiler stronger and tougher than a troll or ogre. So why can't I Hulk Leap with a STR check on dice roll of 3? Why can't I eat magic missiles and punch fireballs back at casters. Why can't I simply Kool Aid Man smash through a wall ... a force wall... grab the force bricks and hurl them in a dragon's eye? Then Looney Tune slam and Loop-de-loop toss the beast through another wall?

Knaight
2008-08-28, 05:52 PM
You should be able to smash a force wall at high enough level. The rest really depends on game. Oh and the sarcasm wasn't helpful.

Orzel
2008-08-28, 06:04 PM
There was no sarcasm.
I want to suplex dragons, make tremors when I stomp, bend eletricity to the ground, toss busses, insult people so bad they can't cast spells, and inhale fireballs.

That's what my Yeti does in my homebrew. Mike "Mr. Suplex" Ortiz.

BRC
2008-08-28, 06:04 PM
One of the big problems with magic in DnD is that there are so many absolutes.

For example, Wall of Force, this is an Absolute. Without a magic item of dispel magic or distentigrate, a mundane character cannot get through a wall of force, no it's, no ands, and no buts.



In the same vein, there are many spells that make other classes obsolete.

Invisibility makes hide checks obsolete, Disguise Self makes anything but disguise-speced rouges obsolete, Knock makes open lock obsolete, Summon Monster makes finding and removing traps obsolete, Detect secret doors, Find Traps, and detect snares and pits makes the search skill kinda pointless, Discern Lies makes Sense Motive pointless, Charm Person and suggestion handle most times diplomacy would be useful, Mage armor and Magic Vestement (Which stack BTW, not only that, but they also stack with Bracers of Armor) mean that anybody who wears less than heavy armor isn't much good compared to a wizard.

Knaight
2008-08-28, 06:17 PM
There was no sarcasm.
I want to suplex dragons, make tremors when I stomp, bend eletricity to the ground, toss busses, insult people so bad they can't cast spells, and inhale fireballs.

That's what my Yeti does in my homebrew. Mike "Mr. Suplex" Ortiz.

Lets just say that Looney-Toon makes it look sarcastic. That said, you might want to have a look at this: http://www.fudgefactor.org/2005/12/call-of-chtoonhu.html

Its for Fudge, a skill based system. In normal Fudge games skills might be along the lines of "Rapier" or "Sniping". This presents us with "Go Postal with Guns".

Starbuck_II
2008-08-28, 06:22 PM
One of the big problems with magic in DnD is that there are so many absolutes.

For example, Wall of Force, this is an Absolute. Without a magic item of dispel magic or distentigrate, a mundane character cannot get through a wall of force, no it's, no ands, and no buts.



In the same vein, there are many spells that make other classes obsolete.

Invisibility makes hide checks obsolete, Disguise Self makes anything but disguise-speced rouges obsolete, Knock makes open lock obsolete, Summon Monster makes finding and removing traps obsolete, Detect secret doors, Find Traps, and detect snares and pits makes the search skill kinda pointless, Discern Lies makes Sense Motive pointless, Charm Person and suggestion handle most times diplomacy would be useful, Mage armor and Magic Vestement (Which stack BTW, not only that, but they also stack with Bracers of Armor) mean that anybody who wears less than heavy armor isn't much good compared to a wizard.

Actually, you might not know this, but Invisibility only gives a bonus to Hide checks. You have full concealment, of course, so you count as hiding.
When you stand still you have +40, but while moving only +20.

Thus, it possible that someone with decent spot check could see a moving Mage in invisibiity by level 7 on average.

The rest of what you said is dead on sadly.

tyckspoon
2008-08-28, 06:33 PM
Mage armor and Magic Vestement (Which stack BTW, not only that, but they also stack with Bracers of Armor) mean that anybody who wears less than heavy armor isn't much good compared to a wizard.

Your wording is a little vague here, so it seems a good place to remind The Audience: while you might be able to convince your DM that Magic Vestments should work (and you should definitely get it cast on your 0-check-penalty, 0-spell-failure mithral buckler), Mage Armor and Bracers of Armor do not stack.

Bandededed
2008-08-28, 07:07 PM
Actually, you might not know this, but Invisibility only gives a bonus to Hide checks. You have full concealment, of course, so you count as hiding.
When you stand still you have +40, but while moving only +20.

Thus, it possible that someone with decent spot check could see a moving Mage in invisibiity by level 7 on average.

The rest of what you said is dead on sadly.

Actually, it's a 20 to know the mages general area. To pinpoint his location is another +20 over and above his hide check (with his +20 - +40), and even if you manage that, you still have a 50% miss chance from total concealment. See spotting invisible stuff in spot on the d20 srd (or is it epic uses?)

Oh yeah, it's epic uses (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/epic/skills.htm#spot)

Knaight
2008-08-28, 07:16 PM
I just noticed that identifying tracks is a DC 60 check. Odd.

BRC
2008-08-28, 07:21 PM
Your wording is a little vague here, so it seems a good place to remind The Audience: while you might be able to convince your DM that Magic Vestments should work (and you should definitely get it cast on your 0-check-penalty, 0-spell-failure mithral buckler), Mage Armor and Bracers of Armor do not stack.

As far as I can tell, they do. Mage Armor (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/mageArmor.htm) provides an Armor bonus to AC, Magic Vestments (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/magicVestment.htm) Provides an Enhancement bonus, and is stated to work on normal clothing in the spell description, and, checking again, Bracers of armor give an armor bonus, not a deflection bonus as I thought originally.
*opens mouth and inserts foot*

Zeful
2008-08-28, 07:21 PM
Hay can we qualify this as the biggest thread jacking of the year?

How the hell did another debate about magic end up commenting on the validity of Star Wars as Sci-Fi?

Everyone knows it is a Western anyway.

Right so...

Anyone ever heard of the DM? That is the overworked guy in the corner, who's plot everyone else just ran over and set on fire. Their is a point to having one in a D&D game. It's called balance. Never in any RPG game have I ever seen the words written, "This game was writen to have absolute balance between the classes. Everyone will have an equal amount of fun no matter what level, class, race, or abilities you have. No need to worry the monsters and NPC will be just as evenly balanced."

It will never...never happen. Someone will take something and run with it to gain an advantage over someone else. It's the DM's job to make up the story, and keep everyone havening fun. Some people like suck azz characters, others have to have +20 to hit at 1st level, and do 1000 points of damage by 10th or they can't have fun.

If you want balance go play Hero Quest, or Monopoly, or Risk or something. Otherwise get over it. Anyone with half a clue can eventually find some loop hole with any class ever written to gain some advantage. Some classes are easer to abuse than others, but you can do it.

And you know what. Magic should be weired spooky stuff. If you want it to be. In my worlds, magic is a tool like anything else. We easly blend blaster mages, illusions, cleric and Druids right next to our gun toting grizzled, heavy drinking warriors.

Do I take all the advantages that a spell caster can? No. Because that would disrupt the balance of the entire game. I know better. However I don't want to heavy handed force everyone to play the same way. I allow players to set the level of power. In every campaign, every setting, every encounter. If they want to play over powered wizards and cleric's. Then I bring out the heavy hitters for NPC's. They want to rush into a downtown Bar in Seattle in 2065 with Panther Assualt Cannons blazen, the Lone Star Swat team that will hunt them down and kill them will use far worse. You bring Jedi, I bring Vader, etc. You want to bring fuzzy kittens. I'll bring puppy's and Grape Nehi. And if someone gets off the curve, I deal with it.

So no. Magic has never been an issue in my worlds. Not cause it can't. Just because I don't allow it to.

That is the Obeneri Fallacy: Because I, the DM can nerf it, it's okay.

For example, my settings have a total wizard population of 7. They are all 20th level and the are the absolute extreme of Tippy/Batman wizards. Any wizard of 9th level are immediately hunted down and killed. As such, I inform my players that wizards aren't a good idea to play. Does this make the class balanced? Not a chance.

The reason wizards aren't balanced isn't because the class is superior, it's because magic has no downside except the opportunity cost. You can manipulate and channel energies that rival current nuclear weapons, without any ill effects, no headache from the immense concentration, no potential blow-up because you lost concentration, just a binary on/off system. The spell succeeds or it doesn't.

BRC
2008-08-28, 07:28 PM
That is the Obeneri Fallacy: Because I, the DM can nerf it, it's okay.

For example, my settings have a total wizard population of 7. They are all 20th level and the are the absolute extreme of Tippy/Batman wizards. Any wizard of 9th level are immediately hunted down and killed. As such, I inform my players that wizards aren't a good idea to play. Does this make the class balanced? Not a chance.

The reason wizards aren't balanced isn't because the class is superior, it's because magic has no downside except the opportunity cost. You can manipulate and channel energies that rival current nuclear weapons, without any ill effects, no headache from the immense concentration, no potential blow-up because you lost concentration, just a binary on/off system. The spell succeeds or it doesn't.
I agree.


While it's theoretically possible for a DM to look at the spellcasting classes, and figure out the perfect nerf that makes them just as viable as non magical classes, while still being fun to play, that would be highly unlikely, and that would still only be one DM. Even if he posted said nerf on the internet, it would still likely reach a very small amount of the gaming population.

No game should be made with the reason "They can change it if they want" a justification for leaving a problem in there.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 08:16 PM
Hay can we qualify this as the biggest thread jacking of the year?

How the hell did another debate about magic end up commenting on the validity of Star Wars as Sci-Fi? It's not as far fetched as you might think; star wars is involved because it happens to be a fairly straightforward magic > non magic story (where magic = jedi). The sci-fi vs fantasy is the actual threadjack



Just as an example, falling damage in D&D increases liniarly rather than quadratically like it would in real life (if speed is doubled force is quadrupled), this show that in D&D gravity and force work differently than in our world. *nitpick* if you fall twice as much distance, you don't wind up with twice as much velocity, because you don't accelerate for twice as much time. As I recall, it's sqrt(2) * V, or about 41% more velocity for falling twice as far.

Interestingly enough, if you fall 4 times as far, you wind up with twice the velocity, which makes for 2 times as much force on impact...

It doesn't really work for anything else; if you fall 9 times as far, you pick up 3x as much velocity so you hit with 3x as much force, but you take 9x as much damage.

Edit: actually, I don't see where the doubling comes from. Force is directly proportional with the impact velocity: F = m *a = m * deltaV/deltaT so the change to force is directly proportional to the change in Velocity

Draco Dracul
2008-08-28, 08:23 PM
*nitpick* if you fall twice as much distance, you don't wind up with twice as much velocity, because you don't accelerate for twice as much time. As I recall, it's sqrt(2) * V, or about 41% more velocity for falling twice as far.

Interestingly enough, if you fall 4 times as far, you wind up with twice the velocity, which makes for 4 times as much force on impact... which works out just right: 4 times as far = 4 times as much force in the real world = 4 times as much damage in D&D.

It doesn't really work for anything else; if you fall 9 times as far, you pick up 3x as much velocity so you hit with 6x as much force, but you take 9x as much damage.

Actually because you are going three times as fast you would take 9x damage as force can be calculated as m*s^2, so falling damage is liniar in real life. Well i'll be danmed.

Knaight
2008-08-28, 08:36 PM
That actually makes a kind of sense.

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 08:45 PM
No game should be made with the reason "They can change it if they want" a justification for leaving a problem in there.I totally disagree; there's nothing wrong with designing a game so that it requires GM adjudication to be playable.

Edit: removed further math geekery; that's just too off-topic, even with the star wards thread jack going on.

Draco Dracul
2008-08-28, 08:49 PM
A three second fall (which has nine times the force of a one second fall) will occur from six times the distance of a one second fall. Gravitational excelleration is about 33 feet per second the first second you 33 feet, the second second you fall 66 feet, and the third and final second you fall 99 feet for a total falling distance of 198 feet rather than 297 feet that you would travel at a constant 99 feet per second. From a 297 foot fall you would be aproaching 132 feet per second. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this.j

Knaight
2008-08-28, 08:58 PM
Sounds about right, although the metric system would be easier to use here.

As for needing GM adjucation to be playable, thats okay for some games. But D&D 3.5 isn't one of them, it has tons of rules, for all sorts of things, its a rules heavy system. Rules heavy systems are there to avoid GM adjucation, which I personally feel just makes it harder on everybody, but thats besides the point. In AD&D, a relatively rules light system, GM adjucation is fine.

chiasaur11
2008-08-28, 09:02 PM
I totally disagree; there's nothing wrong with designing a game so that it requires GM adjudication to be playable.

Edit: removed further math geekery; that's just too off-topic, even with the star wards thread jack going on.

Then I have the best game ever:

Roll a die.
Then roll another die.

Add up the numbers.

If they are numbers, you win!

With enough modification, it will be perfect!

Jayabalard
2008-08-28, 09:33 PM
Then I have the best game ever:

Roll a die.
Then roll another die.

Add up the numbers.

If they are numbers, you win!

With enough modification, it will be perfect!So, were you going to try and make a point, or is exaggerating other people's arguments the best that you can do?

There is nothing wrong with requiring GM adjudication for a game; that doesn't mean that it's best to have only GM adjudication.

I personally prefer systems that require quite a bit of adjudication to work; for example, I like playing 1eAD&D in a very rules lite manner, with the DM making rulings quite a bit; I like the fact that it doesn't have a skill system... it's never stopped me from using my character's skills.

I'm also a fan of GURPS, which is basically a game framework rather than a ruleset. It doesn't function at all unless the GM puts some time into defining how the game works.

Even in a rules heavy system, I expect the GM to do the same sort of adjudication. As I recall, Rifts was a fairly rules heavy system and it definitely required GM adjudication to be fun, since it was far more unbalanced than D&D.

The bottom line: the fact that a game requires GM adjudication is not, in and of itself, a design flaw.


A three second fall (which has nine times the force of a one second fall) will occur from six times the distance of a one second fall. Gravitational excelleration is about 33 feet per second the first second you 33 feet, the second second you fall 66 feet, and the third and final second you fall 99 feet for a total falling distance of 198 feet rather than 297 feet that you would travel at a constant 99 feet per second. From a 297 foot fall you would be aproaching 132 feet per second. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this.jHmm, you're missing out that accelerating is a constant process, and that the distance depends on the average speed during that time interval. Spoilering math geekery.
Using 33 feet per second per second as g (as I recall, 32 is closer but whatever).

The relevant formula for velocity in a free fall is is displacement = (1/2 * g * t2)

In the first second, you fall 16.5 feet (1/2 * g * t2); you start at 0'/s and you end at 33'/s, so that's the average (0+33)/2

after two seconds you've fallen a total of 66 feet, or an additional 49.5 feet. you start at 33'/s and end at 66'/s so that's the average (33+66)/2

After 3 seconds you've fallen a total of 148.5 feet, or an additional 82.5 feet. again, the average (66+99)/2

For deriving the times/velocity I did the following:

let n be the multiple of the distance

h1 = 1/2 * g * t12
h2 = 1/2 * g * t22

h2 = n * h1
1/2 * g * t22 = n * 1/2 * g * t12 (substitution)
1/2 * g * t22 = n * 1/2 * g * t12 (divide both sides by 1/2 * g)
t22 = n * t12
t2 = sqrt(n) * t1 (take the square root of both sides)

v1 = g * t1 (formula for the velocity of an object in free fall)
t1 = v1 / g (solve for t1)
t2 = sqrt(n) * v1 / g (substitue from above)

v2 = g * t2 (formula)
v2 = g * sqrt(n) * v1 / g (substitution)
v2 = g * sqrt(n) * v1 / g (simplify g/g)
so: v2 = sqrt(n) * v1

note: Technically all of the velocities and displacements should be negative since we're travelling down, but I didn't feel like dealing with signs

Knaight
2008-08-28, 09:57 PM
GURPS is pretty much a ruleset. Of course maybe this is because I'm comparing it to Fudge, the game framework/skeleton that I'm used to. GURPS has predefined attributes, skills, gifts, and flaws, not to mention a character creation system. Fudge has rules for attributes, rules for skills, and rules for gifts and flaws(Ok, so this is questionable, since most of them are personality related). Which basically lets one import attributes and skills from other games, or just create their own. That and there are lots of character creation systems.

That said games with nothing but GM adjudication do actually work. I pulled this off for years before I was finally able to get my hands on a copy of D&D. They tended to not be great, since I'm a really nice GM(well usually, there may have been a poisoning death in one of my games recently.), and the players never failed at anything, cheapening successes. 3.5 honestly has too many rules in my opinion, most of which aren't well developed. For instance the whole hit points abstraction, falling damage, healing magic interaction. That and falling damage doesn't automatically take what you fall in into account, although you can do that by modifying the die, and taking dice off, and allowing a tumble check to try to manage safer landings. Which is GM adjudication, and honestly made the game better.

Draco Dracul
2008-08-28, 10:01 PM
So, were you going to try and make a point, or is exaggerating other people's arguments the best that you can do?

There is nothing wrong with requiring GM adjudication for a game; that doesn't mean that it's best to have only GM adjudication.

I personally prefer systems that require quite a bit of adjudication to work; for example, I like playing 1eAD&D in a very rules lite manner, with the DM making rulings quite a bit; I like the fact that it doesn't have a skill system... it's never stopped me from using my character's skills.

I'm also a fan of GURPS, which is basically a game framework rather than a ruleset. It doesn't function at all unless the GM puts some time into defining how the game works.

Even in a rules heavy system, I expect the GM to do the same sort of adjudication. As I recall, Rifts was a fairly rules heavy system and it definitely required GM adjudication to be fun, since it was far more unbalanced than D&D.

The bottom line: the fact that a game requires GM adjudication is not, in and of itself, a design flaw.

Hmm, you're missing out that accelerating is a constant process, and that the distance depends on the average speed during that time interval. Spoilering math geekery.
Using 33 feet per second per second as g (as I recall, 32 is closer but whatever).

The relevant formula for velocity in a free fall is is displacement = (1/2 * g * t2)

In the first second, you fall 16.5 feet (1/2 * g * t2); you start at 0'/s and you end at 33'/s, so that's the average (0+33)/2

after two seconds you've fallen a total of 66 feet, or an additional 49.5 feet. you start at 33'/s and end at 66'/s so that's the average (33+66)/2

After 3 seconds you've fallen a total of 148.5 feet, or an additional 82.5 feet. again, the average (66+99)/2

For deriving the times/velocity I did the following:

let n be the multiple of the distance

h1 = 1/2 * g * t12
h2 = 1/2 * g * t22

h2 = n * h1
1/2 * g * t22 = n * 1/2 * g * t12 (substitution)
1/2 * g * t22 = n * 1/2 * g * t12 (divide both sides by 1/2 * g)
t22 = n * t12
t2 = sqrt(n) * t1 (take the square root of both sides)

v1 = g * t1 (formula for the velocity of an object in free fall)
t1 = v1 / g (solve for t1)
t2 = sqrt(n) * v1 / g (substitue from above)

v2 = g * t2 (formula)
v2 = g * sqrt(n) * v1 / g (substitution)
v2 = g * sqrt(n) * v1 / g (simplify g/g)
so: v2 = sqrt(n) * v1

note: Technically all of the velocities and displacements should be negative since we're travelling down, but I didn't feel like dealing with signs


Thanks for correcting me, I just starting physics.

huttj509
2008-08-29, 12:39 AM
Must....Comment....

The velocities do not need to be negative, as from the problem setup down can be assumed to be positive. Especially since the acceleration being used is positive, so the displacement (which is down) is positive.

You can define any direction as positive, as long as you're consistant (if down is negative at the start of the problem, any acceleration down should be negative, displacement down negative and so forth all through the problem). Especially handy if for a certain problem it makes the math work best if you call the y' axis at 35 degrees from the vertical, as the physics of what happens doesn't care what direction you call x, only the math does (if I call down positive, I do not fall upwards, I just need to change signs, for example).

Sorry, physics TA mode kicked in.

cody.burton
2008-08-29, 06:31 AM
A three second fall (which has nine times the force of a one second fall) will occur from six times the distance of a one second fall. Gravitational excelleration is about 33 feet per second the first second you 33 feet, the second second you fall 66 feet, and the third and final second you fall 99 feet for a total falling distance of 198 feet rather than 297 feet that you would travel at a constant 99 feet per second. From a 297 foot fall you would be aproaching 132 feet per second. Please correct me if I'm wrong on this.j

Seems to me that it's easier to use energy methods, rather than forces. Since gravitational potential energy is mgh, the amount of energy that your body has to absorb is linear with distance fallen. How exactly this energy correlates to "falling damage" is hard to tell, because damage, especially in Dnd, is so abstract.

nagora
2008-08-29, 11:15 AM
Seems to me that it's easier to use energy methods, rather than forces. Since gravitational potential energy is mgh, the amount of energy that your body has to absorb is linear with distance fallen. How exactly this energy correlates to "falling damage" is hard to tell, because damage, especially in Dnd, is so abstract.
Perhaps damage results from the rate of change of momentum at the ground.

This argument has been going on for at least 25 years in AD&D, since EGG said that the damage from a fall should have been printed as 1d6 per 10' per 10' (ie, 10'=1d6, 20'=3d6, 30'=6d6).

Roderick_BR
2008-08-29, 01:12 PM
The battleship should be strongest in monopoly, what with all the heavy artillery weapons and all. Somehow, the other players ignore that. They learn not to when the thimble is exploded by heavy fire. Then I get kicked out of the game after attempting a military coup.

Anyway, wizards aren't battleships and therefore shouldn't be able to explode other monopoly peices. QED.
That's a good analogy. Why is there a choice to play a timble, and a battleship, at "first level"? The player that picks the timble will feel ripped off. That's what happens in D&D. Casters receive too much power for their levels. If some spells were torned down, and the "batman" casters were rare to none, they'd be more balanced with non-casters, balancing their powerful magic with a more weaker defense.
The problem is not magic being more powerful at all, but too much powerful magic being easily accessible for players.