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  1. - Top - End - #61
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    OldWizardGuy

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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    I guess there's two ways of looking at it - how much is excluded, and how much is included.

    And no matter how much is excluded, there's an unlimited set of characters inside just about any kind of bounds - even single race, single class, or single alignment. Most characters in most fiction are just plain vanilla humans, with no special abilities, and yet they are still very distinct.

    So I think it's just a matter of knowing what the boundaries are, and picking a point inside that still-limitless space.

    In my experience, people that hate boundaries will always want to pick something outside of the boundaries, no matter where those are drawn. The draw to them literally is being outside the boundary. People that can work with boundaries are mostly happy regardless of where they are.
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by Tanarii View Post
    Or if you're okay with the systems, join D&D or Pathfinder official play. Then you can have your unique PC walk into a bar with an entire fantasy menagerie party.

    Official play is ripe grounds for finding players for a homebrew open table living world campaign that actually has limits if you run them in the same game stores.
    Great advice, I should have added "public play" in my answer.

    Quote Originally Posted by kyoryu View Post
    And no matter how much is excluded, there's an unlimited set of characters inside just about any kind of bounds - even single race, single class, or single alignment. Most characters in most fiction are just plain vanilla humans, with no special abilities, and yet they are still very distinct.
    Yes.
    In my experience, people that hate boundaries will always want to pick something outside of the boundaries, no matter where those are drawn. The draw to them literally is being outside the boundary. People that can work with boundaries are mostly happy regardless of where they are.
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  3. - Top - End - #63
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by kyoryu View Post
    I guess there's two ways of looking at it - how much is excluded, and how much is included.

    And no matter how much is excluded, there's an unlimited set of characters inside just about any kind of bounds - even single race, single class, or single alignment. Most characters in most fiction are just plain vanilla humans, with no special abilities, and yet they are still very distinct.
    I think there's clearly a point at which a line is crossed ... and that line depends heavily on the system.

    If for example we're going to play the Spartans from 300, we can all be Human Fighter (class) Warrior(backgrounded). But the system better give us more to do during a fighting sequence than "I attack".

    Personality can only make one stand out so much. Going back to 300 ... I couldn't distinguish between the warriors at all once they had their helmets on. It wasn't until afterwards when someone was talking about the narrator and the one guy & his son that I realized that I didn't even realize the narrator had left the battle nor that there was any difference between narrator and the one guy and his son. There was the Leader, and there were Line Troops.

    Incidentally this is why Hollywood always wants to show the audience faces instead of helmets, personality alone isn't enough to make characters stand out. The same principle applies to TTRPGs, personality alone isn't enough, it's what the character is seen to be doing at the table that counts. (Which can of course be driven by personality.)

    Of course, what many players forget is that under the same principle, no one cares or even remembers that you are a Goblin or Catfolk or Edgelord instead of a human. Unless it becomes relevant at the table. And even those players that don't forget that tend to try and address it by hamming it up.

  4. - Top - End - #64
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by Tanarii View Post
    Incidentally this is why Hollywood always wants to show the audience faces instead of helmets, personality alone isn't enough to make characters stand out. The same principle applies to TTRPGs, personality alone isn't enough, it's what the character is seen to be doing at the table that counts. (Which can of course be driven by personality.)
    Very true, and it applies to mechanics as well - it's not what's written on your character sheet that matters, it's what results that produces in play. If you have to say "just look at my character sheet* / read my backstory and you'll see that my character's interesting" then it isn't yet interesting, and you should figure out how to convey that interesting-ness in play.

    Yes, this does mean that "character who's been involved with all kinds of crazy **** but pretends to be totally normally (and is good at that)" is a rather difficult concept to make work unless you get some help from the GM (having that crazy **** come up in-game in ways that make sense). I've tried this and failed, and I realized the problem was that in media, you'd cut-away to the character's flashbacks or show them doing stuff alone that contradicted their mild-mannered image, but in most TTRPGs that kind of "camera shift" isn't a thing, and would be kinda spotlight-hogging if only one player was doing it.

    Of course, what many players forget is that under the same principle, no one cares or even remembers that you are a Goblin or Catfolk or Edgelord instead of a human. Unless it becomes relevant at the table. And even those players that don't forget that tend to try and address it by hamming it up.
    Also true, but I don't think hamming it up is a bad thing. IME, in the significant majority of campaigns the characters aren't super-deep, are in fact somewhat stereotypical, and that's fine.

    *Ok yes, there's also being interesting on a purely mechanical level, like "I made a healer+exorcist without any levels in divine classes", which does generally involve looking at the character sheet, but that's different than being interesting in-play.
    Last edited by icefractal; 2023-04-14 at 01:36 PM.

  5. - Top - End - #65
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by icefractal View Post
    Also true, but I don't think hamming it up is a bad thing. IME, in the significant majority of campaigns the characters aren't super-deep, are in fact somewhat stereotypical, and that's fine.
    Having taken a "boring" basic 4e Human Cleric Str pre-build and hammed up the battle cries to Pelor for a few weeks of play, it got compliments. Not sure if it would have gotten old, otoh if it had been a regular group instead of open play it might have only been necessary for occasional reminders after it was burned into everyone's brains.

    But conversely I've seen enough hammed up beer or ale swilling Scottish dwarf fighters to last a lifetime. Would it kill folks to play them as Norse dwarves for once?

    Edit: Of course, on the second point that's one of the reasons why folks want to make a manic pixie catfolk sorcerer or something in the first place. But still "I'm not the human you see sitting in front of you" is a necessary reminder one way or the other.

  6. - Top - End - #66
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by kyoryu View Post
    I guess there's two ways of looking at it - how much is excluded, and how much is included.

    And no matter how much is excluded, there's an unlimited set of characters inside just about any kind of bounds - even single race, single class, or single alignment. Most characters in most fiction are just plain vanilla humans, with no special abilities, and yet they are still very distinct.

    So I think it's just a matter of knowing what the boundaries are, and picking a point inside that still-limitless space.

    In my experience, people that hate boundaries will always want to pick something outside of the boundaries, no matter where those are drawn. The draw to them literally is being outside the boundary. People that can work with boundaries are mostly happy regardless of where they are.
    I feel like this is a bad faith argument, even if its not meant to be. Just saying "There's an unlimited set of characters no matter how much is excluded because different personalities exist" isn't worth anything because RP personalities aren't worth much to begin with when it comes to significantly differentiating a character. If there's only a single class/race/build/ect., then Joe the Cowardly Fighter is exactly the same a Bob the Brave Fighter. The only difference is it takes longer for Joe to get into combat. Once the mechanics of the game start being applied, they are exactly the same.


    I also feel that your experience might not be that widely shared. For example, I play in a game with a decent number of boundaries. One being that the Druid class is banned completely for in-game story reasons. Now, I'm very much a person who hates boundaries. I've convinced a DM to let me player an Awakened Maple Leaf that was named Lief Oakenbranch as an actual character for a year long campaign. But I'm also more than willing to work within boundaries as long as they are reasonable.

    I had said it in a previous post of mine on the last page: But Limiting options becomes stifling once you are no longer able to effectively create your idea. And the key word is "effectively". For me, that's mechanical builds, cause I find the mechanics of a game to be far more fun, engaging, and interesting than RP. For others, that could be RP. But in either case, the line remains in the same place: The moment you can't effectively create what you set out to make, then its stifling.
    Never let the fluff of a class define the personality of a character. Let Clerics be Atheist, let Barbarians be cowardly or calm, let Druids hate nature, and let Wizards know nothing about the arcane

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  7. - Top - End - #67
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by kyoryu View Post
    Most characters in most fiction are just plain vanilla humans, with no special abilities, and yet they are still very distinct.
    I'm going to challenge you on that and say that no, they aren't all that distinct, and that there isn't even room for them to be all that distinct.

    Why? Because empirical factor analysis on how human personality traits correlate does not support an infinite or even large number of independent dimensions to it. Using HEXACO as baseline example, we have six dimensions. From that, by varying each dimension between low, middle and high result, we get 3^6=729 personality archetypes.

    Now, you might argue that the variance within dimensions is more granular than that, and that's how we'd get a much larger amount of different possible people. That would be true, but only in a technical sense that doesn't make much practical difference. These colors are all of a different hexadecimal value, but how many do you see, nevermind have distinct names for? Telok's findings in the "Sweetspot for chance of success" thread becomes relevant here. People are good at noticing difference between zero and none, and 90% versus 10%, but middle values are hard and 60% versus 40% is regularly considered 50/50. Minor variation, especially in middle results, is lost to everyday observers.

    Now consider if I took a deep dive in TV Tropes and caught you 729 pages worth of archetypes. How much of fictional characters you think that'd cover? I'm reasonably sure a fraction of that would be enough to cover vast majority of popular characters. Because they aren't even that distinct in personality and motifs.

    Furthermore, there is a practical limit, relevant to roleplaying games, that has to do with player skill. It takes effort, from the confines of your own personality, to convincingly play someone of different personality. So, do you have any confidence that a player showing up to your table would be able to play even 729 different personalities? Hell, can you name a professional actor that's even come close to that number? Indeed, many professional actors notably play same kinds of roles over and over.

  8. - Top - End - #68
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by kyoryu View Post
    The vast majority of fiction we've read and consumed, the vast majority of characters we've loved, are plain jane humans, often with no special powers.
    To add to what Vhan said, this statement is untrue in a literary sense. Unless you're looking specifically at an underdog type of story, very few beloved characters are plain jane humans with no special powers. Be it in literature, movies, video games, and more. A majority of well beloved characters are exceptionally special. Luke Skywalker is not a "plain jane Human", Harry Potter is not a "plain Jane Human". John Wick, James Bond, Batman, Superman, Spider Man, Hulk, The Master Chief, Doom Guy, Link, all of them have special powers of some sort that set them above and beyond the rest. In fact, I'd go on a limb and say most of them are mary sues in their own little way. But you could never say they're regular Humans, because none of them are. Not a single one.

    In fact, off the top of my head, the only character that would come close to being a main character with no special powers is Frodo Baggins. But he's sort of an exception to the rule because the entire point of Frodo is that he is just a regular guy. He is just some regular guy with nothing special about him, that was given the responsibility of saving the entire world, and is surrounded on all sides by insanely powerful heroes and villains. Which is the entire point of that narrative.


    And all those powers, or lack there of in the case of Frodo, are used in tandem with their personalities to make each character distinct. Personality is only half of the coin, and the application of what makes a character special is the other half.
    Last edited by sithlordnergal; 2023-04-15 at 06:37 AM.
    Never let the fluff of a class define the personality of a character. Let Clerics be Atheist, let Barbarians be cowardly or calm, let Druids hate nature, and let Wizards know nothing about the arcane

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  9. - Top - End - #69
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Once you consider field of fiction as a whole, kyoryu probably is right that vast majority of characters are ordinary humans. I'm not contesting that part; I'm contesting the idea that they are distinct in terms of personality.

    If we were talking about "special powers", I'd point out the same logic applies to them: there isn't an unlimited amount of ideas for them that are both usable and interesting. Which is why, if you take a selection of fictive works centered around "special people", you will find some powers reoccur time after time, while others appear maybe once as a joke. Of the above short list (Luke Skywalker, Harry Potter, John Wick, James Bond, Batman, Superman, Spider Man, Hulk, The Master Chief, Doom Guy, Link), every single one represents a whole genre of protagonists, and even on this list some already share a genre (go ahead, tell me with a straight face how distinct Master Chief is from Doom Guy. I dare you. I double dare you.).

  10. - Top - End - #70
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by sithlordnergal View Post
    I feel like this is a bad faith argument, even if its not meant to be. Just saying "There's an unlimited set of characters no matter how much is excluded because different personalities exist" isn't worth anything because RP personalities aren't worth much to begin with when it comes to significantly differentiating a character. If there's only a single class/race/build/ect., then Joe the Cowardly Fighter is exactly the same a Bob the Brave Fighter. The only difference is it takes longer for Joe to get into combat. Once the mechanics of the game start being applied, they are exactly the same.


    I also feel that your experience might not be that widely shared. For example, I play in a game with a decent number of boundaries. One being that the Druid class is banned completely for in-game story reasons. Now, I'm very much a person who hates boundaries. I've convinced a DM to let me player an Awakened Maple Leaf that was named Lief Oakenbranch as an actual character for a year long campaign. But I'm also more than willing to work within boundaries as long as they are reasonable.

    I had said it in a previous post of mine on the last page: But Limiting options becomes stifling once you are no longer able to effectively create your idea. And the key word is "effectively". For me, that's mechanical builds, cause I find the mechanics of a game to be far more fun, engaging, and interesting than RP. For others, that could be RP. But in either case, the line remains in the same place: The moment you can't effectively create what you set out to make, then its stifling.
    I get that you want to represent an idea effectively, though my experience is that the issue is more about the fundamental game system than about a restrictive subset of features being enforced. I usually play 5th edition d&d and I find that wherever I try and follow some kind of character concept rather than optimize, my characters are exceptionally weak. The game itself supports certain clusters of options very well but the spaces between the classes are poorly supported.

    If my issue is about not being able to play a concept I like, then I am as likely to reject a game on the basis of the system as any other restrictions.

    Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
    People are good at noticing difference between zero and none, and 90% versus 10%, but middle values are hard and 60% versus 40% is regularly considered 50/50. Minor variation, especially in middle results, is lost to everyday observers.
    Well yes... but that's what happens when you use the wrong tool. If you want changes to the extremes on the same scale as the middle, you can just use log-odds.

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    Quote Originally Posted by MrStabby View Post
    If my issue is about not being able to play a concept I like, then I am as likely to reject a game on the basis of the system as any other restrictions.
    Agreed. And sometimes the worst GM restrictions are ones that attempt to make a whole system work like something it doesn't in pursuit of a cluster of concepts.

    Take WotC D&D and anything inherently low magic. This includes basically any classical concept, but in particular it kills Swashbuckling Pirates / Musketeers and Medieval Knights and Vikings, but also Victorian unless you want to go full Magitech/Eberron-style Victorian.

    And both TSR and WotC D&D can't handle Intrigue, Mystery, or Horror. Including things that are a blend like Werewolf/Dracula (c.f. see the failed attempt that is Ravenloft) nor Cthulhu.

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    Quote Originally Posted by MrStabby View Post
    I get that you want to represent an idea effectively, though my experience is that the issue is more about the fundamental game system than about a restrictive subset of features being enforced. I usually play 5th edition d&d and I find that wherever I try and follow some kind of character concept rather than optimize, my characters are exceptionally weak. The game itself supports certain clusters of options very well but the spaces between the classes are poorly supported.

    If my issue is about not being able to play a concept I like, then I am as likely to reject a game on the basis of the system as any other restrictions.
    Interesting, I haven't ever had any real issue with creating a concept via the fundamental game systems. I only run into issues when a GM starts restricing things. But then again, that might be because I put a higher focus on the mechanical side of a build. The restrictions from the game system tend to make it a more interesting challenge, and while they can be restrictive I tend to find you can still do it effectively.

    I wonder if the way the system handles the rp makes it harder to effectively make the character you're after? I honestly am not sure, as I don't really focus on the rp side of things.
    Last edited by sithlordnergal; 2023-04-15 at 06:38 PM.

  13. - Top - End - #73
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by Tanarii View Post
    Agreed. And sometimes the worst GM restrictions are ones that attempt to make a whole system work like something it doesn't in pursuit of a cluster of concepts.

    Take WotC D&D and anything inherently low magic. This includes basically any classical concept, but in particular it kills Swashbuckling Pirates / Musketeers and Medieval Knights and Vikings, but also Victorian unless you want to go full Magitech/Eberron-style Victorian.

    And both TSR and WotC D&D can't handle Intrigue, Mystery, or Horror. Including things that are a blend like Werewolf/Dracula (c.f. see the failed attempt that is Ravenloft) nor Cthulhu.
    There are limits on how many concepts any given mechanical system can support at similar levels of efficacy. TTRPGs, being inherently mathematically simplistic systems attempting to represent an extremely large range of outputs, have this problem really bad, but even video games with significantly more robust mechanical systems and a greatly restricted set of inputs and outputs still have this problem. For example, later-era Dynasty Warriors style beat 'em up games tend to have over 50 playable characters, each of who represents a different combat concept (usually weapon+style variations), but if you play those games a bunch you'll find that a small fraction of the characters, probably around 20%, end up being top-tier and are just better at meeting the game's core needs than everyone else.

    This presents an argument that a system should limit the available options to only those it can effectively support. The problem for TTRPGs is that the combination of simple mathematical models and a wide range of inputs/outputs means that doing this produces a list of options that is tiny. A good example is found in the Owlcat Pathfinder games, which are written in such a fashion that they demand relentless optimization from the player to meet in game benchmarks and therefore despite supposedly having access to thousands of potential ability combinations, only an extremely limited array of builds can be utilized in successful play.

    This sort of design failure is sometimes described as a 'one true build' problem, and it is a very clear case where limited options stifle play. It's also an important example of how the options a system claims to offer may have no resemblance to the options in fact available to the players (or the GM if players utilize highly optimized builds and the GM wishes to build opponents capable of legitimately challenging them) for use in play.
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    Quote Originally Posted by sithlordnergal View Post
    Interesting, I haven't ever had any real issue with creating a concept via the fundamental game systems. I only run into issues when a GM starts restricing things. But then again, that might be because I put a higher focus on the mechanical side of a build. The restrictions from the game system tend to make it a more interesting challenge, and while they can be restrictive I tend to find you can still do it effectively.

    I wonder if the way the system handles the rp makes it harder to effectively make the character you're after? I honestly am not sure, as I don't really focus on the rp side of things.

    I guess it depends on what you want to play. A few characters I had issue with win D&D 5e:

    An excorcist - this was something I thought would be cool. Using magic to defeat fiends and undead. Fiends tend to be magic resistant so the concept doesn't work unless you can find enough good spells that use attack rolls. Basically you can only really play a warlock and even then you are denying yourself a huge chunk of heir spell list trying to keep even remotely close to theme.

    A knight in service to Kossuth - If you want to have a fire themed marial character, you are hurting again. It isn't like you can't remotely make such a character, its just if you do then its bad. A light cleric with greenflame blade will do something - but not much and when you want to be putting feats into martial prowess it doen't leave a lot of space and an eldritch knight using its sparse spell slots for fire damage isn't great either.

    Any kind of wizard specialising in a particular type of magic. There is no benefit and just the downside of missing lots of really good spells.

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    Quote Originally Posted by MrStabby View Post
    Well yes... but that's what happens when you use the wrong tool. If you want changes to the extremes on the same scale as the middle, you can just use log-odds.
    I was talking of human ability to spot changes in distributions, as applied to human personalities; the tool being used is human perception and I'm not sure what your suggestion is even supposed to mean in that context.

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    Quote Originally Posted by kyoryu View Post
    Most characters in most fiction are just plain vanilla humans, with no special abilities, and yet they are still very distinct.
    Quote Originally Posted by sithlordnergal View Post
    To add to what Vhan said, this statement is untrue in a literary sense. Unless you're looking specifically at an underdog type of story, very few beloved characters are plain jane humans with no special powers. Be it in literature, movies, video games, and more.
    And it’s even less true for RPG-style characters in media.

    Elminster is an immortal human Wizard with “Chosen of the gods” plot powers.

    Drizzt is a Dark Elf Ranger who duel-wields magical scimitars (one named Twinkle) with enough skill to solo dragons, summons the displacer beast whose name starts with G, and can dodge spells that auto-hit, like Magic Missile.

    Raistlin is a former human deity Wizard with a sickly body and Chronomancer eyes.

    I think that’s the top 3 big named protagonists from the top RPG brand, and they don’t sound terribly ordinary to my ears.

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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    It's almost like I used the generic term "fiction" on purpose.

    Weird, that.

    Yes, obviously that's less true in genre fiction.
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    When you only allow thieflings, it becomes sthiefling.
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by kyoryu View Post
    It's almost like I used the generic term "fiction" on purpose.

    Weird, that.

    Yes, obviously that's less true in genre fiction.
    But the vast majority of TTRPG settings are genre fiction.

    And IMO that's not by coincidence. A great writer can make virtually any premise compelling, but most GMs (including myself) aren't great writers. The typical situation is more like an amateur improv group with varying degrees of enthusiasm. The premise has to carry a lot more water.

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    Quote Originally Posted by icefractal View Post
    But the vast majority of TTRPG settings are genre fiction.

    And IMO that's not by coincidence. A great writer can make virtually any premise compelling, but most GMs (including myself) aren't great writers. The typical situation is more like an amateur improv group with varying degrees of enthusiasm. The premise has to carry a lot more water.
    Also, producing a compelling story for an audience is not the goal of D&D gameplay (and attempts to use D&D for this purpose tend to bend the rules is very substantial ways for this reason). The goal is for the participants to have a good time, usually in a fairly low-brow, lightly comedic way, and often with a large number of repeated, similar tasks with minor variation.

    A wide range of options, notably, is a means to fight boredom. A game where the characters perform the same attack over and over in every fight because it represents the most optimal approach (there are many cRPGs like this, were the most efficient option is normal attacks + out of combat healing) rapidly becomes bland, especially given that TTRPG combat is inherently slow paced compared to video games - in an arena fight in something like Borderlands 3 each player might kill hundreds of opponents in 10 minutes. Doing that in tabletop might take days. D&D has a zillion monsters all with their own slightly different quirks because this provides variety to combat encounters.

    The needs of a fun game and a compelling story are often in tension, this is one of the many reasons video game adaptations often fail. This is compounded in that a writer will often produce a fictional setting specifically to tell a single story. The world only needs to support that one scenario. A TTRPG setting however, needs to build dedicated fans who play many campaigns over time. That means producing new and different options for veteran players who have already used all the old ones. The problem with this is that option creep destroys both mechanics and fluff as they accrete.
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    Quote Originally Posted by Mechalich View Post
    Also, producing a compelling story for an audience is not the goal of D&D gameplay (and attempts to use D&D for this purpose tend to bend the rules is very substantial ways for this reason). The goal is for the participants to have a good time, usually in a fairly low-brow, lightly comedic way, and often with a large number of repeated, similar tasks with minor variation.

    A wide range of options, notably, is a means to fight boredom. A game where the characters perform the same attack over and over in every fight because it represents the most optimal approach (there are many cRPGs like this, were the most efficient option is normal attacks + out of combat healing) rapidly becomes bland, especially given that TTRPG combat is inherently slow paced compared to video games - in an arena fight in something like Borderlands 3 each player might kill hundreds of opponents in 10 minutes. Doing that in tabletop might take days. D&D has a zillion monsters all with their own slightly different quirks because this provides variety to combat encounters.

    The needs of a fun game and a compelling story are often in tension, this is one of the many reasons video game adaptations often fail. This is compounded in that a writer will often produce a fictional setting specifically to tell a single story. The world only needs to support that one scenario. A TTRPG setting however, needs to build dedicated fans who play many campaigns over time. That means producing new and different options for veteran players who have already used all the old ones. The problem with this is that option creep destroys both mechanics and fluff as they accrete.

    Whilst this is true, I am also struck by the extent to which it almost isn't.

    The elements of a good story are often the elements of a good D&D type game. Compeling characters, a good cause and all that for sure, but also something about the combats.

    A fight should be tense in both - balanced enough to feel genuine threat. Where fights are not balanced and he antagonists are superior, this should be clearly telegraphed such that either an epic heroic death is earned or a tense flight ensues. Whilst the overlap isn't complete, a great game world is also frequently a great world for stories.

  22. - Top - End - #82
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by kyoryu View Post
    It's almost like I used the generic term "fiction" on purpose.

    Weird, that.

    Yes, obviously that's less true in genre fiction.
    I can't even say that's true for general fiction. Even when looking at stories that are set in a world of just Humans, with no magic or super powers at all, the character the consumer roots for tends to have some special ability that makes them stand out, above the rest of the crowd. This could be a higher intellect, greater perception, an understanding of something beyond what the normal populace has. But relative to the rest of the world they are in, they do tend to have some sort of special ability that makes them above the general populace.

    Now, I do say "tend to", because there are are at least a few genres that buck that trend. Anne of Green Gables doesn't really have any special powers to speak of. That is a book that falls into fiction. But for every Anne of Green Gables, you have two or three Sherlock Holmes. Human characters in a world just like our own, blessed with some sort of special ability that makes them stand above the crowd.


    EDIT: Also, just using the general term "fiction" on its own applies to such a wide descriptor of things that its borderline meaningless. Anne of Green Gables, Sherlock Holmes, Star Wars novels, the Forgotten Realms books, 1984, A Brave New world, they all fall under the massive umbrella that is the term "fiction". But I doubt you could really put Anne of Green Gables, 1984, and Gauntlgrym on the same table and say "These are all similar books".
    Last edited by sithlordnergal; 2023-04-16 at 08:30 PM.

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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    It is too stifling anytime there is a class system in place
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by Easy e View Post
    It is too stifling anytime there is a class system in place
    I see your "class systems are too stifling" and raise you "having a system is too stifling" =p
    Never let the fluff of a class define the personality of a character. Let Clerics be Atheist, let Barbarians be cowardly or calm, let Druids hate nature, and let Wizards know nothing about the arcane

    Fun Fact: A monk in armor loses Martial Arts, Unarmored Defense, and Unarmored Movement, but keep all of their other abilities, including subclass features, and Stunning Strike works with melee weapon attacks. Make a Monk in Fullplate with a Greatsword >=D


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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by Easy e View Post
    It is too stifling anytime there is a class system in place
    A Point Buy system is no better because you never have enough build points.
    Quote Originally Posted by OvisCaedo View Post
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  26. - Top - End - #86
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by MrStabby View Post
    The elements of a good story are often the elements of a good D&D type game. Compeling characters, a good cause and all that for sure, but also something about the combats.
    A good D&D game maps well to a type of fairly simple form of story. Specifically, the kind of short story that unfolds as 'go to place A, face problem B and complication C, overcome using cool stratagem X and plucky effort Y, grab rewards and go home. Many of the Sword & Sorcery short stories that inspire D&D - Conan, Nehwon, etc. - do in fact unfold in this fashion. In more modern parlance a lot of effective TTRPG storytelling represents the better class of procedural TV episode - there's a team of characters, they are presented with a problem, and they solve it while dealing with various complications. Games set in modern settings can in fact be built explicitly off this model (ex. The Mentalist can be modeled without basically any alteration at all as an oWoD Technocracy game).

    However, there are complications. 'Don't split the party' is a very obvious one. Splitting the party is an incredibly useful storytelling technique that is widely employed in fiction for all kinds of reasons, but it destroys tabletop games (games in modern settings can get around this through the miracle of cell phones) because it demands all the principles be in every scene.

    Quote Originally Posted by Pex
    A Point Buy system is no better because you never have enough build points.
    Point buy systems mostly represent a shift in responsibilities. The whole point of a class-based system is to provide option sets that are intended to be viable for gameplay needs simply by picking them (insofar as this often doesn't work, that is a major design issue). In point buy, the GM and player have to evaluate the resulting capabilities of every character and ensure that the character is neither useless nor absurdly OP, something that often requires considerable system mastery to do effectively. For example, it was widely joked that every WW 'sample character' ever made (and this is literally hundreds across dozens of books) was jaw-droppingly terrible and often completely incapable of doing the things the write-up stated the character must to be able to do.

    A properly-designed class system is limiting, but it's limiting in that it cuts out the vast array of theoretical outputs that won't fit the system. cRPGs, which often do math hammer out the outputs, tend to be good at this, with games with active management like MMORPGs constantly tweaking those outputs to make sure the classes remain balanced. It's worth noting that most point-buy systems include guardrails of this kind too, such as the FATE pyramid, that are designed to keep characters within certain boundaries.
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  27. - Top - End - #87
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    BardGuy

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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by sithlordnergal View Post
    To add to what Vhan said, this statement is untrue in a literary sense. Unless you're looking specifically at an underdog type of story, very few beloved characters are plain jane humans with no special powers. Be it in literature, movies, video games, and more. A majority of well beloved characters are exceptionally special. Luke Skywalker is not a "plain jane Human", Harry Potter is not a "plain Jane Human". John Wick, James Bond, Batman, Superman, Spider Man, Hulk, The Master Chief, Doom Guy, Link, all of them have special powers of some sort that set them above and beyond the rest. In fact, I'd go on a limb and say most of them are mary sues in their own little way. But you could never say they're regular Humans, because none of them are. Not a single one.

    In fact, off the top of my head, the only character that would come close to being a main character with no special powers is Frodo Baggins. But he's sort of an exception to the rule because the entire point of Frodo is that he is just a regular guy. He is just some regular guy with nothing special about him, that was given the responsibility of saving the entire world, and is surrounded on all sides by insanely powerful heroes and villains. Which is the entire point of that narrative.


    And all those powers, or lack there of in the case of Frodo, are used in tandem with their personalities to make each character distinct. Personality is only half of the coin, and the application of what makes a character special is the other half.
    You're overlooking whole genres of humans:
    The entire romance genre. 1000s of books, people who bought dozens of them and could tell which characters are in which books
    The "Soap Opera"
    Most Sitcoms
    Most Sims and most Sim games (eg SimCity)
    Historical(ish) games like Civilization and Europa Universalis are all about people
    The overwhelming majority of police procedurals like NCIS (OK, not actual cops as such in this case)
    Most Sci Fi - Star Trek, Bab-5, stargate. Normal humans are central. Aliens etc are generally normal for their people and are mostly secondary characters
    While Luke isn't a normal human, Han and Leah are.
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  28. - Top - End - #88
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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    Quote Originally Posted by Duff View Post
    You're overlooking whole genres of humans:
    The entire romance genre. 1000s of books, people who bought dozens of them and could tell which characters are in which books
    The "Soap Opera"
    Most Sitcoms
    Most Sims and most Sim games (eg SimCity)
    Historical(ish) games like Civilization and Europa Universalis are all about people
    The overwhelming majority of police procedurals like NCIS (OK, not actual cops as such in this case)
    Most Sci Fi - Star Trek, Bab-5, stargate. Normal humans are central. Aliens etc are generally normal for their people and are mostly secondary characters
    While Luke isn't a normal human, Han and Leah are.
    So while there are genres that include regular humans, such as the ones you listed, I would contend that the number of genres that include a main cast that are above and beyond regular humans relative to their world is greater. Additionally, I would say that most sci-fi actually do contain humans that are "plain jane humans with no special powers". Now, keep in mind that everything is going to be relative to the world they're from. But for example, I couldn't really call most main characters from something like Star Trek "plain jane humans with no special powers". The show tends to focus on the best of the best, with the most average of all being, weirdly enough, the captain. But even then? I can't really call Picard, Janeway, Kirk, or Sisco average.

    Though I guess Star Trek does have a way to writing their characters in such a way to seem pretty average despite being well beyond the average character for the universe.
    Never let the fluff of a class define the personality of a character. Let Clerics be Atheist, let Barbarians be cowardly or calm, let Druids hate nature, and let Wizards know nothing about the arcane

    Fun Fact: A monk in armor loses Martial Arts, Unarmored Defense, and Unarmored Movement, but keep all of their other abilities, including subclass features, and Stunning Strike works with melee weapon attacks. Make a Monk in Fullplate with a Greatsword >=D


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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    I think there's also a distinction between "normal human" and "average/normal person".

    Tony Stark is a "normal human", in the sense that he's biologically/physically within normal human parameters, and doesn't have any inherent abilities outside the unmodified human range (yes, he's a genius, but not beyond what other genius characters in the setting are).

    However, being extremely rich, a genius, having all kinds of advanced technology that the population at large has no access to (and being able to build more), having gone to other planets and dimensions, etc, etc - he's very much not "normal" in the sense of "just some normal dude".
    Last edited by icefractal; 2023-04-17 at 11:19 PM.

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    Daemon

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    Default Re: When Do Limited Options Become Stifling?

    For me, the limitations are the entire point. But then again, I think I approach characters differently than many here. I don't have a mechanical "build" in mind or even a mechanical niche. I generally start with an archetype--what FATE would call a "high concept"--picked from the "supported archetypes" of the game system and then go from there. Generally, I have little in mind for where I want the character to go past the starting point, just some open ended motivations and unknowns. In part, that's because discovery (what's over that hill?) is one of the major sources of fun. I want to see how the character evolves both mechanically and personality.

    And mechanics only exist (for me) to bring out pieces of the character--since I don't have a power set in mind or even a really strict theme, I can play it by ear. Systems where I can't and have a reasonably effective character (aka 3e D&D and PF, both versions, all of which demand "build thinking" from the get-go) annoy me.

    So for me, a system, world, or even campaign having strong thematics and restrictions enhances my fun, as long as the overall thematics is something I enjoy[1].

    This also makes me prefer class-based systems over point-buy, since class-based systems inherently (or at least when they're not trying to do point-buy, but badly[2]) promote strong archetypes. The Noble Paladin, Guardian of the Weak. The Strong Barbarian, Raging Terror. The Nimble Rogue, Sly Shadow Sneak. The Learned Wizard, Scholar of the Arcane. They clearly say "this is what our game supports and encourages." And I like that.

    [1] by which I mean things like "I don't like evil campaigns" or "horror isn't my jam".
    [2] often, trying to provide build granularity ends up giving you a menu of directly-comparable things of varying value...but all the same cost. CF D&D spells, where even spells of the same level (and thus cost) vary tremendously even for the same mechanical niche. Or D&D feats, with 3e/PF/PF2 having the worst versions of this. If you're going to do a point-buy, build-a-bear system...go all in. Don't do point-buy badly. Some parallel power-structures are ok, especially when they're truly parallel. So you're not trading off the thing you're supposed to be good at for a shiny-but-weak toy or worse, encouraged to spend your theoretical "versatility picks" on pumping your numbers higher. Or yet even worse, tricked into thinking that you have freedom...when all you have is freedom to make the wrong choice and fall behind. Where if you pick optimally, you keep up with the system's baseline, but if you don't you fall inescapably behind expectations. D&D 4e with the Weapon/Implement Focus feats, I'm looking at you with both eyes on that one.
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