Unpopular D&D Opinions

[Witty Username]

Well it is the nature of the beast that we don't have a good idea of how widely held our opinions are until we voice them.

[KorvinStarmast]

you want to truly use DnD for everything,

As I never said that, and my post seemed to have touched a nerve, maybe let's step back a moment and take a breath.
I've played a number of other games over the years. There are some others that I am interested in trying but the opportunity has not come up.
Here's my disappointment put a different way:

If one wishes to advocate for (a game that isn't D&D) I am all for promoting lots of RPGs. Variety is the spice of life. Tell me of its virtues! Sing me a new song!

If one is just going to crap on D&D, and crap on how others use it, which is the problem / disappointment that I was alluding to, then maybe one ought to take my grandma's advice:
"If you haven't got something nice to say, then don't say anything."
Kvetching about D&D is, seriously, a case of First World Problems.

I have often referred, jokingly, to D&D as the gateway drug into RPGs. I think that it is still, these days, fulfilling that role for some people. Something along the lines of New RPGer .. "Hmm, Ok, we've been slaying dragons and demons for a bit, what about something like a scary movie?" Friend who has another game "Well, we've got this Call of Cthluhu game that's different and fun in its own way, wanna try that?" (Sub in Hero System or Mutants and Masterminds if someone is hungering for the the genre of the Superhero.

In the late 70's and early 80's, RPGs covering all kinds of genres were cropping up all over the place, and we tried out all kinds of stuff. Space Quest is one I remember fondly, but we only got to play a few. Boot Hill had its moments. (Very much a case of "the quick and the dead" at our tables). Top Secret had a lot of promise but the guy running it graduated and nobody else picked up the reins ... Traveller, arrgh, so many starts, and so many failed campaigns due to various RL things, to include a gaming group that broke up with some serious acrimony ...

To put this conversation in perspective: this is a hobby we are talking about.

[kyoryu]

As I never said that, and my post seemed to have touched a nerve, maybe let's step back a moment and take a breath.
I've played a number of other games over the years. There are some others that I am interested in trying but the opportunity has not come up.
Here's my disappointment put a different way:

If one wishes to advocate for (a game that isn't D&D) I am all for promoting lots of RPGs. Variety is the spice of life. Tell me of its virtues! Sing me a new song!

So what you're saying here is not "use D&D for everything". It's more "advocate for other systems by saying what they're good at and what they're good tools for, rather than saying why D&D is bad"?

That seems ridiculously reasonable. D&D is not a bad game. It may not be my favorite game (and differentiating between "I don't like it" and "it's bad" is a whole other conversation), but it's pretty good at a lot of things.

Also, "your favorite game is bad" is usually not a good way to get people to try things.

[Xervous]

Also, "your favorite game is bad" is usually not a good way to get people to try things.

But League of Legends is a terrible game! I love its existence because that means I don’t play as many games with League players!

[georgie_leech]

But League of Legends is a terrible game! I love its existence because that means I don’t play as many games with League players!

You owe me a new coffee and a screen cleaning

[Anonymouswizard]

That seems ridiculously reasonable. D&D is not a bad game. It may not be my favorite game (and differentiating between "I don't like it" and "it's bad" is a whole other conversation), but it's pretty good at a lot of things.

The way I look at D&D 5e is not 'it's bad' but rather 'it's outdated'. Sadly, I think that's been true since release, at least if you look at what people say you should be doing with it.

Now if you want a game that does what D&D5 does well then it is the perfect game for that, but I'm not sure that's what most people use it for. Although to be honest that's nothing new with D&D, while the current trend is to try to treat the fantasy superhero emulator as a narrativist engine I believe that back in the TSR days many people rated the dark dungeon crawler as a fantasy superhero emulator.

What I'm saying is that in 20 years D&D will be a storytelling engine that people use to simulate political power struggles. Or something. But it'll be one thing and people will use it for something else.

Which is really the sad thing. If I want to be a half-elven mad scientist blowing up dragons D&D is the game for that (and honestly I'll have a lot of fun as Baron Enkidu von Klucksburg, Scientist Extraordinare!). It's just not the game if I want to be a half-elven mad scientist trying to corner the market on hair removal potions.

[KorvinStarmast]

But League of Legends is a terrible game! I love its existence because that means I don’t play as many games with League players!

I am so unhappy with how they changed Gangplank (when the barrels arrived) that I began playing less ... and now I don't play except now and again my son and I play, I do Corky, and we do bot games with a light heart.

at least if you look at what people say you should be doing with it.

I have to face palm here. That italicized bit seems to escalate into an odd place, and in particular in escalates in forum or Twit-land discussions when simply playing it as is, and learning how to adjust it through play gives very satisfying results.

(On a personal note, I have grown tired of "Here is this cool character I saw in a movie, how do I
make a D&D 5e character that is him/her?" (Gandalf, Luke Skywalker, Green Lantern, Fa Mulan, whatever).

What I have always liked best about making a character ex nihilo in a D&D game (and in Traveller games back in the day, for example) is that this character hasn't had their story told yet. The story emerges from play. We don't know what stories will tell about him or her until we play and discover what they do or did. We play and find out.

Story could be: "Here lies Fred, the mimic made him dead"
or
"Cornosia, bane of the mind flayer elder brain" who now resides in a tall tower in (mythical city in the Dm's world) training new rangers in the art of hunting monstrosities ...
or we do a cut scene to (at 7th level)

"Belglavo, who has gotten away with theft, murder and worse. He now sits in a forcecage in the capital city: Five Spires. He is guarded 24/7 by humorless armed dwarf mercenaries. He'll be executed at dawn unless he, once again, figures out a way to escape his well deserved fate at the hands of the King's executioner..." (That campaign was a long time ago).

[Anonymouswizard]

I have to face palm here. That italicized bit seems to escalate into an odd place, and in particular in escalates in forum or Twit-land discussions when simply playing it as is, and learning how to adjust it through play gives very satisfying results. .

I stand by what I said, as a storytelling game D&D is outdated. As a combat sim, and to a more limited extent a dungeon crawler, it performs very well.

That's not too say that stories can't grow from D&D. It's that if your intent is to emulate narrative arcs D&D won't help you with that (and in modern D&D will hinder any arc that requires losing capability). An emergent story is a great thing to get, but it's probably not going to match the character development beats that are common to fiction.

So my advice to people playing D&D is not to go in expecting to tell a story. If you wind up with a decent sorry that's great, if you don't it doesn't matter.

[KorvinStarmast]

That's not too say that stories can't grow from D&D. It's that if your intent is to emulate narrative arcs D&D won't help you with that

There is no such restriction, except inside of your own mind. I suspect that we are at an impasse here.

[Quertus]

Yeah it feels consistently good, unlike DnD, where DnD out of combat has a constant chance of cartoonish failure while DnD Combat due to having more rolls has an even higher chance of cartoonish failure because DMs insist on natural 1's being their opportunity to make character looks like clowns for the sake of cheap laughs like its some Fantasy Pratfall Simulator.

… what?

GM: "make a Spellcraft, DC 20."

Player: "my bonus is triple digit…"

Yes, bad GMs can make the game bad. No argument there. But D&D doesn't ship with cartoonish fumble tables, and, while *some* editions have bounded accuracy, others have "off the RNG". So you can't really claim that this behavior is "D&D" - at least not any more easily than someone could claim, "editions that are that pants-on-head clowns shouldn't be considered D&D".

Mechanically, that's true. I think the point with games like Fate is that the "meaning" and "interest" should get pushed to the level of plot and the effects/side effects/etc. IOW, the point isn't that it's mechanically different and more interesting - it's that punching someone is a different action and has different and interesting results in comparison to fixing a car.

Both sides have pros and cons. Mechanical interest is useful in a lot of situations where the players have less overall agency, but can often require more prep and can have spots that aren't well supported. By pushing the decision-making into "how do I do X?" the players can engage more heavily at that level, and the overall structure of the game can be less important. The Fate approach is more useful in cases where players have higher levels of agency and so there's a greater ability to focus on the impacts of hte actions, and a higher chance of needing to do unexpected actions. Heavier and crunchier systems can be more unwieldy if you can't prep in advance.

Neither is objectively better. That's why examples of each thrive and have strong adherents.

I can see the argument, "crunchier systems require more prep". I can see, "planning ahead is good". I can see "GMs become invested in their work, and don't want their planning to go to waste". I can see the argument, "prep heavy GMs are more likely to railroad".

But what i cannot see is any inherent connection between "crunchy" and "low agency".

Indeed, its that focus on failure that I find its a detriment to roleplaying because I can't pull my all into any of my actions. any action could lead to failure my character looking foolish or worse. so I find myself being cautious and holding back my character for the "smart/cautious" decision and instead of playing them more naturally. now you can argue that it means that this IS proper roleplaying because the characters are "SUPPOSED" to have that mindset, but it doesn't really work for a reckless barbarian who flies into rages or a bold and adventurous bard or whatever.

"Detriment to roleplay"? You've got my attention.

"Focus on failure" / forced to pay cautious? As a detriment to roleplay? Eh… "I'll use bubblegum - only 2 of the last 5 space ships I repaired this way blew up because of it"? There's a time for "reasonable / responsible caution", and a time for trash action. Can you demonstrate that the system was actually wrong, that your intended actions really should be valid? And also that this is a system failure, not another "bad GM is bad" moment?

Well, I'd go with:

a) it works
b) you need something to get it to work (parts, equipment, expertise, etc.)
c) it works, but not well (flaky, reduced performance)
d) you need more time to get it to work
e) it doesn't work. Figure something else out.

And sure, a set of possible results could be useful (which I'd say is slightly different than a "vehicle repair subsystem"). But having one of those for everything can be a toooon of things.

Personally I like to think in generalized terms of risk/cost - time, materials, connections, physical risk, etc. It's pretty easy, in most cases, to start with this generalized list and come up with some specific downsides for your situation.

But really, I'd say ultimately it just depends on where your game focuses - if resolving the scene/question is the interesting bit, then you'll want a variety of mechanical systems that have sufficient depth and complexity to be fun to engage with on their own (a lot of times these presume everything should be "beatable"). If the results of the resolution are really the interesting bit, that's a different set of design criteria (these types of games often assume that you shouldn't beat everything, and things shouldn't always go your way)

Not sure how well this works in all systems, but… I prefer if it can be part of the characterization of the character as to which is more likely.

Me fixing a car? "Requires additional time" + "asks other people" (taps resources?) seems very likely.

My dad? "Takes damage" / "car takes damage" (now unfixable / requires additional parts / something extra to fix) might appear on the random encounter table.

As this is the "unpopular opinions" thread, I suppose I'll say that I'm opposed to systems that don't give players the agency (actively remove from players the agency?) to characterize their characters through how they approach the problem impacting what kinds of results they are likely to see.

But, yes, although incomplete, your list is exactly the kind of thing i like to see as possible outcomes.

It's very much an Explicit Rules vs Non-Explicit Rules kind of thing.

Consider the following system:

All characters have the following three stats:
Body: All physical tasks
Brain: All mental tasks
Speech: All Social tasks
Allocate a total of 25 points between the three stats to build a character.

To resolve a test, roll 1d20+ the appropriate stat, depending on if the action in question is Physical, Mental, or Social.
If a task has multiple components, split it into separate tests, one for each relevant stat.
If the result of your roll meets or exceeds the target number, you succeed.

This system can theoretically model any potential action, simply because any action can reasonably fall into one of those three categories with a bit of thought, and, since the rules are so generic, it's hard to find something that they CANNOT handle, because the rules explicitly cover everything.

Now, consider something like this classic scenario: You are fighting a vampire, and want to stab a stake into it's heart, buffy style.

The above simple system would call that a straightforward Body Check, albeit a difficult one for hitting a small target.


D&D 5e has no rules for called shots. While Vampires have stats, their rules explicitly call for driving a stake into their hearts while they are in their resting place. A buffy-style Combat Staking, despite being reasonably feasible (And well within the fictional domain D&D operates in) doesn't have any good way to model it.

"Attacking somebody in a precise manner" is modeled as a Sneak Attack, but that implies that only Rogues can stake a Vampire, and even then only when they have advantage or an ally nearby. Buffy, despite her supernatural combat skills, can't stake a vampire unless she's explicitly a rogue.
"An attack in an especially vulnerable location" is modeled as a Critical Hit, but that tells us that Buffy can't actually CONTROL when she stakes a vamp, she just has to keep rolling until she gets a 20. 95% of her attacks are just stabbing the vampire elsewhere.

Even if we get that worked out, while the Vampire statblock has rules for staking a vampire, they explicitly call out staking an incapacitated vampire in it's resting place. A staking mid-combat does nothing special beyond damage dealt by a nonmagical improvised weapon.


Because the system already models things like Attacking and Attacking precise weak points in ways that don't neatly map to staking a vampire, we can't just assume that "Staking a vampire" falls into one of those categories.


It's possible to build a system capable of modeling this and more by explicitly outlining rules for every potential action, but a highly generalized system like the one above does so by Default.

1) that system has a much harder time modeling any possible character (say, a graceful dancer or marksman who can't bench press me)

2) D&D has vampires (and humans, and cows, and Tarrasque, and…) with the super power "immune to (such) effects unless incapacitated". It's not that a D&D character cannot target the heart - they can do so just as well as I could in a fight. Rather, all the D&D beings that they fight aren't vulnerable to that move. If they fought Buffy vampires, they'd (be able to, once someone told them it was a good idea) stake vampires with ease. Whereas her Scooby gang would find D&D vampires strangely resistant to their usual techniques.

I was really hoping for martials that they would have gone with a structure more like "lots of at-wills to be used conditionally" where the game for martials was more about picking the right at-will for the situation.

6e designers, take note!

D&D 3.x is my anti-game.

It is also my least favorite version of D&D.

(Note: 2e is my least useful version of D&D)

2e… "least useful"? What do you mean by this, and how so?

Something else that D&D doesn't do well, but is somewhat important for swashbuckling is mechanically different styles with the same sword. It's weapon rules are very broad, which is great for dungeon crawling but not great when two characters with rapiers (or sabres) are dueling. (Oh, and the firearms times are pretty terrible).

Plus All for One realises that dueling can be just as much about the social side as the physical side. It doesn't do it amazingly, but at least it has a social dueling system

D&D just fails at running anything that I'd think of as a swashbuckling game. Honestly Exalted does it better.

Yeah, D&D generally falls pretty flat on the combat styles end. Which is sad, given how much it devoted to combat.

The game should label the beginner classes as such if there was explicit design intent to make them beginner classes. I’m looking at you 5e

Agreed. Although there's at least 2 axis of difficulty: creation, and play.

[kyoryu]

I can see the argument, "crunchier systems require more prep". I can see, "planning ahead is good". I can see "GMs become invested in their work, and don't want their planning to go to waste". I can see the argument, "prep heavy GMs are more likely to railroad".

But what i cannot see is any inherent connection between "crunchy" and "low agency".

You literally laid it out.

I guess the missing piece is that if you have a crunchy game, just playing out the combat can be interesting enough that it's less likely to matter if you have low agency. IOW, crunchy games are good for players that want detailed and intricate combat/mechanical complexity, while not caring as much about story-level agency.

Games that have both low mechanical complexity and low agency are just kind of boring in general - you're not making interesting decisions at either level.

So it's not really that crunchy games lead to less agency (though they can, by tempting GMs to railroad or by making improvised scenes just harder to manage). It's more that if you're running a low agency game, you probably want the higher mechanical complexity to provide the same overall level of interest.

2e… "least useful"? What do you mean by this, and how so?

So, let's look at foods. Sirloin steaks, tenderloin steaks, ribeye steaks, and pork chops.

If I want a nice lean steak (usually done blue rare), it's filet all the way. Ribeye doesn't work well for that, since it really needs to be cooked warmer to render the fat.

If I want a more well done steak, I'll do a ribeye medium rare.

Sirloin does neither of these as well. Price aside, there's basically no place where I'd prefer a sirloin.

That said, in general, I'd still prefer a sirloin to a pork chop. Just because steak > pork chop, in general. Except for times that I don't feel like a steak.

So, sirloin is the least useful to me of the four. It's not the "worst" or my least liked (that's still pork chop), but any time that I'd want a sirloin, there's something else I'd rather have instead (filet or ribeye).

[Mordar]

But what i cannot see is any inherent connection between "crunchy" and "low agency".

You literally laid it out.

I guess the missing piece is that if you have a crunchy game, just playing out the combat can be interesting enough that it's less likely to matter if you have low agency. IOW, crunchy games are good for players that want detailed and intricate combat/mechanical complexity, while not caring as much about story-level agency.

Games that have both low mechanical complexity and low agency are just kind of boring in general - you're not making interesting decisions at either level.

So it's not really that crunchy games lead to less agency (though they can, by tempting GMs to railroad or by making improvised scenes just harder to manage). It's more that if you're running a low agency game, you probably want the higher mechanical complexity to provide the same overall level of interest.

I'm with Quertus on this one - I see no inherent connection. The degree of crunch may help determine how you adjudicate the actions the player/character wishes to attempt, but it does in any way I can conceive limit what the player/character may attempt to do. I would, in fact, argue that crunchier games provide more, not less, agency particularly in character development/design than many more generalized/less crunchy games by providing for actual differences between, for instance, Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser.

- M

[Lord Raziere]

… what?

GM: "make a Spellcraft, DC 20."

Player: "my bonus is triple digit…"

Yes, bad GMs can make the game bad. No argument there. But D&D doesn't ship with cartoonish fumble tables, and, while *some* editions have bounded accuracy, others have "off the RNG". So you can't really claim that this behavior is "D&D" - at least not any more easily than someone could claim, "editions that are that pants-on-head clowns shouldn't be considered D&D".


"Detriment to roleplay"? You've got my attention.

"Focus on failure" / forced to pay cautious? As a detriment to roleplay? Eh… "I'll use bubblegum - only 2 of the last 5 space ships I repaired this way blew up because of it"? There's a time for "reasonable / responsible caution", and a time for trash action. Can you demonstrate that the system was actually wrong, that your intended actions really should be valid? And also that this is a system failure, not another "bad GM is bad" moment?

I've seen it happen across multiple campaigns and GMs- all of them good. Its not a single GM's fault but a cultural idea that Natural 1 = cartoon failure shenanigans.

[Tanarii]

I stand by what I said, as a storytelling game D&D is outdated. As a combat sim, and to a more limited extent a dungeon crawler, it performs very well.

Agreed and that's the way I like it. I don't want a storytelling game, I want a roleplaying game. Specifically for D&D, I want a game for building a team of somewhat above average newbies that goes into excitingly dangerous adventuring sites to find riches and Magic items, and if they make good in-character decisions (roleplaying!) comes out more powerful as a result.

I'm not all that enamored of the speed at which the current game progresses from somewhat above average newbies to functionally demigods, but that's a personal taste.

There are also a few things I feel have fallen by the wayside along the way, like decent game structures for exploration and time management and domain management and mass combat.

[BRC]

You literally laid it out.

I guess the missing piece is that if you have a crunchy game, just playing out the combat can be interesting enough that it's less likely to matter if you have low agency. IOW, crunchy games are good for players that want detailed and intricate combat/mechanical complexity, while not caring as much about story-level agency.

Games that have both low mechanical complexity and low agency are just kind of boring in general - you're not making interesting decisions at either level.

So it's not really that crunchy games lead to less agency (though they can, by tempting GMs to railroad or by making improvised scenes just harder to manage). It's more that if you're running a low agency game, you probably want the higher mechanical complexity to provide the same overall level of interest.

Can't really agree here

As much as I made the whole point about crunchy games sometimes being less able to model specific actions, I don't think that really maps to "Less Agency" just "More likely to run into an edge case that the system doesn't really know how to handle".


I DO think there may be a correlation, but it's not a causation. Games with low mechanical complexity tend to be more likely to fall into the category of "Joint Storytelling" vs what we generally think of as a traditional RPG. This is far from an absolute rule, but a lot of rules-light RPGs I see tend to focus a lot more on being a mechanism for constructing stories with your friends.


You get into this a little, but I disagree with the idea that it's just because Crunchier games can get away with less player agency since there's more mechanical engagement. I think that the type of GM who is attracted to a rules light game is probably going to view it more as a joint storytelling exercise.

Admittedly, this is probably just because the most popular RPG in the world, Dungeons and Dragons, is a rules-heavy game, so anybody who goes beyond D&D is probably selecting a game because they want to get something specific out of it.

So it's less 'If you're running a low-crunch game you want a higher level of agency to keep player interest", and more "If you're running a low-crunch game, it's probably because you intentionally chose it for being more about developing stories than using statistics".

[Anonymouswizard]

Yeah, D&D generally falls pretty flat on the combat styles end. Which is sad, given how much it devoted to combat.

To be fair, it's at least in theory because (modern) D&D focuses on humanoid versus monster combat rather than humanoid versus humanoid. Which is a shame, because I prefer humanoid versus humanoid.

I'm not sure how you'd incorporate it in D&D without completely rebuilding how marital classes work. You'd ideally want interplay between different styles, as well as at least sight mechanical differences between using a style and just flailing like a madman.

[Thrudd]

To be fair, it's at least in theory because (modern) D&D focuses on humanoid versus monster combat rather than humanoid versus humanoid. Which is a shame, because I prefer humanoid versus humanoid.

I'm not sure how you'd incorporate it in D&D without completely rebuilding how marital classes work. You'd ideally want interplay between different styles, as well as at least sight mechanical differences between using a style and just flailing like a madman.

I'd consider anyone with proficiency in a weapon to be "using style" when they fight. Flailing like a madman is what someone does when they don't really know how to fight (and they have disadvantage), so there already is a slight mechanical difference, there.

I think D&D's level of abstraction precludes getting really gritty into different fighting styles, if we're talking about something like different fencing schools or someone that likes to hold their knife with reverse grip or what type of footwork they prefer.

[icefractal]

I've seen it happen across multiple campaigns and GMs- all of them good. Its not a single GM's fault but a cultural idea that Natural 1 = cartoon failure shenanigans.

It's part of what I'd call the "Meme D&D" style - a focus on tropes (usually embracing them but sometimes reversing them), natural 20 means you can do anything (seduce the dragon who was about to eat you and doesn't even like humans), natural 1 means you can fail to do anything (use normal stairs without tumbling down).

It originally annoyed the hell out of me, but then I realized - it's just another RPG style. I mean, Fiasco has that level of absurd results by design, as do some others, so why not a D&D variant? But it can be irritating when people assume it is (or should be) the default/only D&D style.

[Anonymouswizard]

I'd consider anyone with proficiency in a weapon to be "using style" when they fight. Flailing like a madman is what someone does when they don't really know how to fight (and they have disadvantage), so there already is a slight mechanical difference, there.

I think D&D's level of abstraction precludes getting really gritty into different fighting styles, if we're talking about something like different fencing schools or someone that likes to hold their knife with reverse grip or what type of footwork they prefer.

It's five for what D&D does, but I really think there should be a difference between 'I learnt to fight on the street' and 'I learnt to fight at a fencing school'.

But bare in mind this all comes out of my wanting to run a 17th century swashbuckling game. There such things as 'which fencing style did you learn' might be important. But then again these is somewhat of a weird discussion to be having because it's based on me saying I don't want to use D&D precisely because it doesn't model such things. I'm not actually arguing for these things to be added to a system, I'm arguing why said system can't run a great game in a certain style.

[BRC]

To be fair, it's at least in theory because (modern) D&D focuses on humanoid versus monster combat rather than humanoid versus humanoid. Which is a shame, because I prefer humanoid versus humanoid.

I'm not sure how you'd incorporate it in D&D without completely rebuilding how marital classes work. You'd ideally want interplay between different styles, as well as at least sight mechanical differences between using a style and just flailing like a madman.

I can think of a way to do it

Spoiler: Homebrew that I just made up now

Show

So, we start by making up some keywords that can describe different styles. Things like: Brutal, Precise, Wild, Swift, Stalwart, Aggressive.

These provide us with a way to have styles interact with each other without needing to call out individual styles by name. Traits by themselves don't do anything.

You then give appropriate monsters relevant keywords, even if they don't have a fully fleshed out Fighting Style. Orcs get Brutal, Gnolls get Wild, Wolves might have "Swift" and "Wild", Hobgoblins might have "Swift" and "Precise", ect.
A true "Fighting Style" will be saved for Martial PC's and PC-equivalent NPC's.
Fighting Styles provide a list of options and abilities, which are blocked (Or, on occasion, enabled) by an enemy using a fighting style with given traits

A Fighting Style might look something like the following:
Titan's Fist
Requirements: Must be using a weapon with the Heavy keyword
Traits: Brutal, Precise
Abilities
Shaking Blows: Your blows are heavy enough to damage an enemy even through armor If you attack an enemy and miss by less than 5, you may deal 1d4+Str Bludgeoning damage. Blocked By: Swift, Stalwart
Momentum: Even if you miss a foe, you can redirect your weapon towards another. If you attack an enemy and miss, you may spend a Bonus Action to attack a different enemy within range. Blocked by: Swift, Wild.
Titan's Counter: By exposing yourself to an overeager enemy you are able to land a devastating counter-blow. When an enemy attacks you in melee, you may choose to grant them advantage on their attack (So long as they do not already have advantage). If you do, you may make an attack against that enemy as a Reaction. Enabled By: Brutal, Wild.
Stone Giant's Stance: The size of your weapon allows you to use it as a shield against a foe. As a Reaction, gain +2 AC against a specific enemy until the start of your next turn. Blocked by Brutal, Precise.


The Traits provide a connective tissue between different distinct fighting styles. Somebody who is "Just swinging wildly" has No Traits, meaning they are vulnerable to most fighting style abilities, but any enemy with sufficient experience or training is assumed to have at least SOME traits, even if they don't have a particularly modeled Fighting Style.

Having Traits means you know what you're doing in a fight, which is a step below having a Fighting Style.

[Anonymouswizard]

Or I can just use a system that already has this stuff?

Yeah, I'll go for that option.

[BRC]

Or I can just use a system that already has this stuff?

Yeah, I'll go for that option.

I wasn't arguing for you to use D&D + My slapdash homebrew for your swashbuckler game ( I feel like we've done a couple rounds of "Specialized games are better at Their Thing than D&D is" at this point)

Just saying that I could think of a way to do fighting styles in 5e without completely redesigning all the martial classes.

[Cluedrew]

In fact, my personal preference for those is to leave [personality and decision making] almost entirely up to the players and have as few rules as possible.

D&D (5e particularly) can dabble in a lot of areas that aren't its specialty. If any of those areas is the dominant focus of the campaign, you probably want to look elsewhere for a system that specializes in it.

I was going to write separate response to both of these things but it seems we are actually in agreement. Roughly at least, because both of these things are what I was saying to begin with.

What we have here is a breakdown in communication.

Or something along those lines. First one is pretty clear, the really stretched out chain of replies cause some context to get lost. Not sure what happened with the second. Probably some ambiguity between the focus of a game and more general game content.

... I am far too senile to know. [...] That was back a few pages.

Yup. What is that thing 2D8HP always said? "Work is the surge of the gaming class."

Spoiler: [AIs and what is a role-playing game.]

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Best as I can figure, the "AI" is the character, not the player. Or… perhaps it'd make the most sense if I said that the player is a computer, and the character is a program that they run, an emulator perhaps, or an AI. By default, one (presumably / in my example) loads it with a basic understanding of this world, then adds experiences to make it unique.
[...]
So, the question is, if you look very critically (which most people can't do, IME) at when you're in character, running the AI, vs when you're playing the game, the question is, what experiences would you need to feed the AI in order to make its behavior line up with yours?

I gave an example for 5e, of the "reverse education center", where the teacher asks the students questions in order to learn the answers. That's an example of the types of experiences you would need to feed the AI in order to remain in character in 5e.

So, how "pants-on-head" the "default" AI is in the system, how often, and how difficult the code you need to write in order to make the AI perform correctly with what degree of fidelity sound like a good first pass at listing the key components in whether or not something is an RPG (by my definition).

More to the point, when a group of veteran AI coders come up blank on how one would write such code, then it's reasonable for them to declare something "not an RPG" until proven otherwise.

You know what, I left in my scattered thoughts in but we have to take a step back. Let me rattle off my definition and compare it yours as I understand it (which might not be right).

So first what is role-playing (in this sense at least): Making decisions as if you were a different person. Contrasted with acting which is behaving as a different person. A role-playing game is then a game about role-playing, either by intent of design or intent of use. The actual mechanics as well as the quality of the experience don't really matter. More like a puzzle game and less like a first-person shooter in terms of how it is designed.

OK so your definition has something about "it has to support role-playing" which... 4e definitely does. It has all sorts of open ended inputs for you to describe your character and make decisions on them. So it comes down to something like if the system has rules that produces non-sensical results then it is not a role-playing game. Again, I fell that would just make it a bad role-playing game. Also other versions of D&D have moments of insanity to. Last time I mentioned HP (and had a follow up list that I have since forgotten, probably stuff about classes and levels in it), but what about the fact that, in D&D's worlds, no one has a reaction time faster than 6 seconds (or however long a turn is that edition) unless you have mentally prepared yourself ahead of time. (Did not have time to fact check that one, so maybe there is another way to handle it.)

And I'm running out of time. So the most non-sensical moment can't be the deciding factor. Some... I'm going to have to come back to this, sorry.

Spoiler: So many confusing thoughts.

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• Where is the system in this? Its not the computer, that's the player (as are the programmers), the character is the AI and the experiences are... something? It came up in the Batman part so I don't think that is it. Maybe they are connected.
• Even if we dress it up it positive terms like critical thinking, if the thing that causes a problem is not something most people do then its not really a general problem. And if
• The DC to recall something you are established to know ahead of time is 0 in every group I've ever played. I'm not sure why the teacher is making a skill check. Were they given a lesson plan with no prep-time or reference to their subjects? Which is to say, I think this might be a problem with over-rolling. If the outcome is not really in question to begin with, adding randomness will give you strange results.
• By "a group of veteran AI coders" you mean role-players? Who else has this problem? Could they please explain?
• Also this is getting down to a subjective experience with the system again (what if I can program in the Jelly programming language*). And a quality judgement.

* I don't actually know if Jelly is a programming language. Someone who would know said it was the first thing that came to mind for a really hard programming language with up-sides.

I'll second third this notion that rules and structures are good for one's first RPG.

I just went over this with PhoenixPhyre. Sorry, should have proofed that post against people started to read there (or having forgotten the old posts) and not knowing the post's sub-topic. The sub-topic was about personality and decision making mechanics. I'm pretty sure you don't like those. I can't actually recall exactly when you said so to be sure: Do you like rules and structures for your character's personality and decision making? Do you think they would be good for one's first role-playing game?

To BRC: The trait/fighting style system sounds like it has some potential.

[LibraryOgre]

To be fair, it's at least in theory because (modern) D&D focuses on humanoid versus monster combat rather than humanoid versus humanoid. Which is a shame, because I prefer humanoid versus humanoid.

I'm not sure how you'd incorporate it in D&D without completely rebuilding how marital classes work. You'd ideally want interplay between different styles, as well as at least sight mechanical differences between using a style and just flailing like a madman.

I do think some of the idea of style comes down to having specific maneuvers, and a specific slate of maneuvers for each style.

I don't think 5e would do this as well, but, amazingly, 1e and 2e had a semi-workable system in Oriental Adventures and Complete Ninja... you have a base style which gives you some bonuses (AC, number of attacks, a basic damage), and, with experience, you can add more maneuvers from those available to your style. You can come up with different variations on the same ideas... even altering some basic elements of the style can make big changes.

For example, I did some work to bring this to AD&D at large, with the idea that your fighters would take a style as a form of self-defense, and other classes might dabble. The sample style for fighters explicitly assumes you're going to be using armor and some kind of two-handed cleaver weapon... while it is a "Hard Kick" style, those maneuvers are mostly there to give you options while swinging around your big axe. Elves have Bladesinging, half-elves have Bladedancing. The first is a Soft Movement style, the second is a Hard movement style... they have the same sorts of maneuvers, but the half-elf style strikes more often while the elven style avoids more damage (through a superior AC).

The combination of basic statistics plus different maneuvers makes for very different characters, even if both are "fighters".

[KorvinStarmast]

I'm not all that enamored of the speed at which the current game progresses from somewhat above average newbies to functionally demigods, but that's a personal taste.

Might be a side effect of the video/crpg game era's expectations.

There are also a few things I feel have fallen by the wayside along the way, like decent game structures for exploration and time management and domain management and mass combat.

Yeah, would like that to get more love.

But bare in mind this all comes out of my wanting to run a 17th century swashbuckling game. There such things as 'which fencing style did you learn' might be important.

You have triggered a memory of something in the 90's, IIRC, can't remember if it was a Basic D&D book or AD&D 2e book. It had the words sword and coast in it (Or was it the Red Coast?) That whole "which fencing/sword fighting school you learned at" was included in it.
I think it seemed to cater to that swashbuckling motif that you like.
(FWIW, it seems to me that I saw it at about the time I began to pick up a few Birthright setting books, so they may be contemporary. Does that ring a bell?) (Might have been red steel, but that might not be what I am remembering. Savage Coast does ring a bell).

I have not played Seventh Sea: it seems to fit your genre desire though. Does it have that kind of swordplay you are looking for?

Hmm, after some poking around, looks like Savage Coast began as a Basic D&D setting, Savage Coast, in the 80's, Mystara, that got ported into AD&D sometime in the 90's.
I also may have this mixed up in my memory with some Dragon Magazine articles that may have been in the same issue as an article about the Savage Coast.

[BRC]

Might be a side effect of the video/crpg game era's expectations. Yeah, would like that to get more love.
You have triggered a memory of something in the 90's, IIRC, can't remember if it was a Basic D&D book or AD&D 2e book. It had the words sword and coast in it (Or was it the Red Coast?) That whole "which fencing/sword fighting school you learned at" was included in it.
I think it seemed to cater to that swashbuckling motif that you like.
(FWIW, it seems to me that I saw it at about the time I began to pick up a few Birthright setting books, so they may be contemporary. Does that ring a bell?) (Might have been red steel, but that might not be what I am remembering. Savage Coast does ring a bell).

I have not played Seventh Sea: it seems to fit your genre desire though. Does it have that kind of swordplay you are looking for?

Note that Seventh Sea 1st and 2nd Editions are pretty firmly different.

7th Sea 1st edition has the swort of swordplay mechanics you're looking for.

2nd edition DOES have different swordfighting schools, but is otherwise very much of the "RPG's as storytelling generator" school of thought, to the point that a Player is supposed to map out their character's intended story arc ahead of time.
(I have a lot of issues with 7th sea 2nd)

[HidesHisEyes]

So what you're saying here is not "use D&D for everything". It's more "advocate for other systems by saying what they're good at and what they're good tools for, rather than saying why D&D is bad"?

That seems ridiculously reasonable. D&D is not a bad game. It may not be my favorite game (and differentiating between "I don't like it" and "it's bad" is a whole other conversation), but it's pretty good at a lot of things.

Also, "your favorite game is bad" is usually not a good way to get people to try things.

Agreed.

I think D&D 5E is a good game in its own right, on its own terms, and it happens to be pretty flexible and varied, so it makes sense to me that people might treat it as a sort of “default” game that they go back to often and use for a variety of fantasy premises.

For me, it lacks structure of the kind that would make my job as a GM easier for anything other than combat, and for that reason it’s no longer my own default. But absolutely it is better for me to tell people what it is about Dungeon World that made me switch to that (and about the other games I play that make me play them) than to sit here and slag off D&D.

[Lord Raziere]

I do not believe that "positive only" talk is healthy, reasonable or realistic to expect from anyone. That is all I will say on the matter.

[georgie_leech]

Why, afraid you'll say something negative?

More to the point, it's less about "positive talk only" and more about being better able to convince someone to try something new by pointing out how the new thing can be fun, not by trying to convince them they're actually not having fun right now.

[Lord Raziere]

Why, afraid you'll say something negative?

That is not clever or funny. I do not appreciate it.