I was, at one point, developing my own pen and paper system, and had a group of friends testing what I had so far. One of my friends, playing a dwarf, made it a character trait that he would constantly act without thinking. I made up a status effect on the fly just for him, and every time he did something stupid without thinking, I'd have him get hit with this effect (double vision) which mechanically decreased his chances to hit and perceive things. I punished him for being a moron, but gave him an out. As a dwarf, drinking any sort of alcohol would get rid of double vision, but penalize him if he got too drunk.
I penalized him for something in character. Something he didn't know about or agree to. And you know something? He did more stupid things in-game more often, just so his character would be effected. I was trying to punish him for being stupid and unthinking. He saw it as fun. It wasn't planned that way, but that's how it turned out. And I decided to do it even if he'd have gotten ticked at me because that's what you can do as DM.
See, for that I would have rewarded him with bonus experience. Whenever someone comes up with something cool dealing with RP, I'll reward it. When it can and will sometimes work to the detriment of the character, I'll reward it even more. Things like that work to create "real" personalities, and that's a plus in my book.
I think 3.5 and 4th are close enough for comparison.
Not when it comes to AC and attack bonus. 3rd ED assumed you were going to hit, and the extra attack bonus was mainly for power attack. 4th ED assumes you have a decent chance of missing, but there's no need to sack half your attack to get your damage up to par. Toss in miss chances, 3rds totally random method of assigning monster AC and the massive list of buff spells that were assumed in 3rd and you get two systems that act similarly but perform vastly differently.
Not when it comes to AC and attack bonus. 3rd ED assumed you were going to hit, and the extra attack bonus was mainly for power attack. 4th ED assumes you have a decent chance of missing, but there's no need to sack half your attack to get your damage up to par. Toss in miss chances, 3rds totally random method of assigning monster AC and the massive list of buff spells that were assumed in 3rd and you get two systems that act similarly but perform vastly differently.
But unless the fighter and cleric are both hitting on 2+ then the extra BAB is relevant.
See, for that I would have rewarded him with bonus experience. Whenever someone comes up with something cool dealing with RP, I'll reward it. When it can and will sometimes work to the detriment of the character, I'll reward it even more. Things like that work to create "real" personalities, and that's a plus in my book.
Oh, he got bonus experience as well. Not much, but enough for the other players to want to find something to define themselves as characters as well.
Come to think of it, that might be the reason he kept up with it. He might have figured he'd get more XP if he just pushed a little farther.
"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody." --Bill Cosby (1937- )
Vanador: OK. You ripped a gateway to Hell, killed half the town, and raised the dead as feral zombies. We're going to kill you. But it can go two ways. We want you to run as fast as you possibly can toward the south of the town to draw the Zombies to you, and right before they catch you, I'll put an arrow through your head to end it instantly. If you don't agree to do this, we'll tie you this building and let the Zombies rip you apart slowly. Dimitry: God I love being Neutral. 4th edition is dead, long live 4th edition. Salla: opinionated, but commonly right. fun quotesShow
If you can't understand how someone yelling at another person would make them fight harder and longer, then you need to look at the forums a bit closer.
quote author=56832398 post=519321747]Considering DnD is a game wouldn't all styles be gamist?
First, you can totally make a TWF warlord. There are TWF feats that improve your ability to deal damage, defend yourself, make opportunity attacks, and more. None of these require a power that specifically uses two weapons. The rogue in our group dual-wields, and he doesn't have a single two-weapon power. This might be considered to be suboptimal by some, but you have advantages you can still maneuver -- you can gain the benefits of two weapon properties at once, and you can choose which weapon to attack with, allowing you to make use of item powers as the situation calls for. And of course, let's not forget multiclassing, which gives you access to two weapon powers.
But wouldn't you say that a ranger's power approximately two weapon fighting (at least in movies) better than +1 damage and +1 AC? The ranger's powers specifically mention main weapon attacking and off-handed weapon attacking. This has also been extended to the Tempest Fighter, so equating two weapon fighting with two attack rolls seems fine.
Second, Liu Bei is not automatically a Warlord in 4E D&D. Warlords are explicitly stated to be squad leaders. They lead small groups of people in combat. They are not inspirational leaders of entire armies and nations (necessarily). They can be, but so can a member of any other class. All you need for that are Diplomacy (or Intimidate) and a good Charisma modifier.
But if you examine Liu Bei and compare him to DnD classes presented in 4th Edition, I think he's most similar to an inspirational warlord.
Third, Liu Bei is not necessarily a good D&D character, at least in canon (the Dynasty Warriors version could certainly work). He wasn't a good fighter. D&D is about adventuring, which involves a lot of fighting, so a D&D hero needs to be pretty good at that. Liu Bei would make a great NPC to work for, but the PCs should really be Zhao Yun and such.
Yes, Liu Bei is not the posterboy DnD character, but he surely could contribute to adventuring. He would not be primarily there for damage and he'd buff his friends. That seems pretty leader-like to me.
By the way, this entire conversation on two weapon fighting was based upon a simple question of what I miss from 3.x compared to 4th edition. I think I originally stated a two weapon fighting rogue or cleric actually. I just used Liu Bei to illustrate the point. His specifics are actually not relevent since other examples could be made.
I also think saying that there's a lot of misinformation is pretty strong. It seems to all be opinion based.
I think you're right. I remember discussing a very similar issue not long back that looked at the division between 'balance' and 'choice' and the different lengths people would sacrifice one over the other. From what I took away is that some people prefer more to the other and 4e just so happens to have more balance over variety.
That being said, I feel that the majority of characters that proceed beyond the collection of optimized builds are far more viable in 4e than they were in 3e. They're more 'fair', I suppose, and it takes a lot of burden of looking through mounds of resources and doing lots of research off both the DM and players.
Yeah, I think people have to realize that their choice of balance vs options isn't the only one out there.
Honestly, I like 4th Edition. But I also like 3.x. And I hate when people act like the only reason people like 3.x is because they were a caster (which I often was not). Especially since most those people bashing it were probably playing 3.x 1-2 years ago!
You're still doing it. 50 builds that, while weaker than other builds, still "work" vs 35 builds that work.
Scypio wrote:
Not strong does not equate to useless. There'll always be differing degrees of power. Anything that's not the best in terms of power does not automatically become useless.
For me, it isn't a question of "power". If a character cannot contribute something unique to the party, then that character has no use. Role-play wise, people tend to be different enough in personality that [s]two three "tall, dark, and brooding" male characters can all have different personalities. I played one of the three in a Deadlands game.
If a character cannot contribute something unique mechanically, the player feels frustrated, because he's not getting his chance to shine. I should know, that Deadlands character was a mundane, in a party of mostly Hucksters. One of the Huckster players was frustrated because the player has bad luck with dice, and always rolled the lowest. Because of that, the enemies were often dead before his turn, so he never got to contribute.
Ironic, a "god"-class was useless, but it was because of a trait that the player couldn't control. It wasn't the power-level that made him useless, it was his inability to contribute on an equal-basis with the rest of the party.
D&D 4E Herald and M:tG Rules Advisor I expect posters to follow the Code of Conduct, use Basic Etiquette, and avoid Poor Logic. If you don't follow these guidelines, I consider you to be disrespectful to everyone on these forums. If you respond to me without following these guidelines, I consider it a personal attack. I grew up in a bilingual household, which means I am familiar with the difficulties in adopting a different vocabulary and grammar. That doesn't bother me. Persistent use of bad capitalization, affirming the consequent, and flaming bother me a great deal.
204.1b Some effects change an object’s card type, supertype, or subtype but specify that the object retains a prior card type, supertype, or subtype. In such cases, all the object’s prior card types, supertypes, and subtypes are retained. This rule applies to effects that use the phrase “in addition to its types” or that state that something is “still a [card type].” Some effects state that an object becomes an “artifact creature”; these effects also allow the object to retain all of its prior card types and subtypes.
"Eight Edition Rules Update" We eventually decided not to change this template, because players are used to “becomes an artifact creature,” and like it much better.
Players were used to Combat on the Stack, but you got rid of that because it was unintuitive. The only phrase needed is "in addition to its types"; the others are misleading and unintuitive.
Omce upon a time there was no such fomral concept as "game balance". Low levle wizards were useless; high level wizards were gods; rogues were the only ones who could open locked doors (and bards, but no one ever played them); and people flipped coins to see who would be stuck player the cleric (they still do, but not as much).
Then 3rd edition happened, and before very long (Im not sure exactly when, but is definately a product of 3.0) people got itinto ther heads that everyone should be perfectly equal. Balance was no longer something you strove for towards the end of making the game more fun - it became an end in and of itself, at the expense of fun if necessary.
At first I was of the opinon (as some still are) that 4e represented the ultiamte expression of this philosophy, buit the more books I buy the more convinced I am that its makers understand that sometimes "because its cool" is all thereaso you need to do something, and that not everyone needs to be perfectly equal at everything, so long as they're good enough that you can have fun playing them.
I think the focus of 4th edition is less about balance and more about feeling useless or left out. Instead of the high CHA guy chating up the nearest woman while Mr. ugly fighter sits and waits to smash things and the wizard whining about his lack of spells left for the day, etc, you have a system that lets each person be their own hero-type character, and lets them all be important, not only to themselves but to the party. It's not just waiting for your time to shine, it's about working as a team.
What can I say? I'm idealistic. :D
"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody." --Bill Cosby (1937- )
Vanador: OK. You ripped a gateway to Hell, killed half the town, and raised the dead as feral zombies. We're going to kill you. But it can go two ways. We want you to run as fast as you possibly can toward the south of the town to draw the Zombies to you, and right before they catch you, I'll put an arrow through your head to end it instantly. If you don't agree to do this, we'll tie you this building and let the Zombies rip you apart slowly. Dimitry: God I love being Neutral. 4th edition is dead, long live 4th edition. Salla: opinionated, but commonly right. fun quotesShow
If you can't understand how someone yelling at another person would make them fight harder and longer, then you need to look at the forums a bit closer.
quote author=56832398 post=519321747]Considering DnD is a game wouldn't all styles be gamist?
You're still doing it. 50 builds that, while weaker than other builds, still "work" vs 35 builds that work.
But I think that's entirely the point. People have been saying that options which are too weak are not options at all. These 50 builds would probably be considered "too weak". T.Hawk still works in SF. You can play the game and beat it with him. But there's no way he's balanced compared to the top tier. I doubt he has much use in a tournament against the Sagats of the world.
For me, it isn't a question of "power". If a character cannot contribute something unique to the party, then that character has no use. Role-play wise, people tend to be different enough in personality that [s]two three "tall, dark, and brooding" male characters can all have different personalities. I played one of the three in a Deadlands game.
If a character cannot contribute something unique mechanically, the player feels frustrated, because he's not getting his chance to shine. I should know, that Deadlands character was a mundane, in a party of mostly Hucksters. One of the Huckster players was frustrated because the player has bad luck with dice, and always rolled the lowest. Because of that, the enemies were often dead before his turn, so he never got to contribute.
Ironic, a "god"-class was useless, but it was because of a trait that the player couldn't control. It wasn't the power-level that made him useless, it was his inability to contribute on an equal-basis with the rest of the party.
I've never played Deadlands, so I can't comment on the specifics. But I disagree that you need to be able to contribute something that's unique mechanically to a party. If there are two orb wizards in the same party, it doesn't mean that one of them is useless.
While, yes, it would be desirable that players get to contribute to the party, I do not think everything needs to be divided out precisely, especially on a encounter by encounter basis like some have advocated.
