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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 5:59AM
#31
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Date Joined:
Apr 17, 2008
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Decivre and Dragoncat pretty much took my thoughts and turned them into equally elegant forms.
Crimson Lancer also put it well.
There's what is called False Difficulty in games, in which the game mechanics themselves are the only reasons a given encounter, boss fight or what have you make the game difficult.
Resident Evil 5 actually is a prime example of False Difficulty (and it's not even that hard).
Most games have since abandoned "Move or shoot" for the more realistic and fluid Move and Shoot. mechanics. Defenders of RE will say "BUT IT IS TRADITION AND IT MAKES TEH GAMEZ SCARY!" Dead Space scared the crap out of me multiple times and I could move and shoot. Dead Space didn't fail to deliver on atmosphere or an actual Challenge to it's player. RE5? It's not a horror game it's an action shooter with outdated controls. It wasn't scary at all.
The only thing that makes RE5 a challenge is it's control scheme, not it's actual difficulty. Random mechanics, such as Stats and Hp rolls and SODs are just like RE5s control scheme. They really don't do anything to enhance the gameplay, and infact make it more difficult not through a legit challenge. You aren't overcoming an actual challenge you are overcoming inferior controls so to speak.
Also throwaway characters for most people actually aren't fun to play. Hell Gygax and his Cronies even said "don't name your character before level 5". Because getting attached to the Throwaway isn't very smart.
The old mechanics were there as an active Screw You in the system that was there to make it "hard" in instances in many cases where the game shouldn't be, or make it hard so that even an incompetent dm could pull off killing his party since it was about You vs Them. (which makes no sense in a cooperative Narrative style game)
As for non combat stuff, other people have also said my stance on this much better. But I'll throw in my own twist on the subject matter.
I'm not going to fail at making something or doing my job, if I am trained in doing it at all. If I'm going to make house, I am going to make a house there's no failure at it. If I'm going to weld something together and I know how to weld properly, guess what I'm going to weld it. The only way I'm not going to successfully weld it, is if I don't even try to weld it if I know how to weld.
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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 6:09AM
#32
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Date Joined:
May 10, 2009
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The "better game design" line is nonsense. There's no way to factually "prove" that 4E is a better designed game than 3.x, 2E, 1E, or even Basic/Advanced or the pre-1E booklets. Each version was different from the others; whether or not they were "better" is a matter of personal opinion and should not be discussed as if it were a factual matter.
In addition, I keep hearing players say things like "I suspect it's a change over D&D used to be played. Back in the day, it was mostly the DM vs the players. The Tomb of Horrors was just an excuse to kill characters." and I have to physically restrain myself from rolling my eyes. I was there "back in the day", and know from experience that the entire players vs. DM thing has as much resemblance to reality as a Ralph Bakshi cartoon.
In my opinion, yes, it is a generational thing, and it isn't just restricted to D&D, but to any kind of game. Oh boy they jump at the challenge, but make the consequences of failure too strict, or even make the chances of failure too high, and these boys balk and want to do something else.
Example the First: I was discussing the Traveller game with them, and mentioned that, while generating your character, there was every chance that you could (for instance) enlist in the Navy, then wash out your first term. I believe the exact words one of my son's friends used were "Wait... you mean I couldn't be a space-navy guy even if I wanted to, then? That's utterly messed up!" By the rules of the game, he would be restricted in what he saw was his natural right to do whatever the heck he wanted to do, and to him, that was intolerable.
When I and my friends first encountered the same game, way back in 1981 or 1982, we thought the fact that you could die during character generation (a trait the most recent edition of the game has taken out of the character generation process) was cool! It was a huge challenge! A dare even. As in, "I dare you to try to get one more term of service in!"
Different generation, different attitude.
What's the cause of the difference? No idea, really. But I know one thing. It's not "better game design". There's nothing inherently "better" about 4E over its predecessors, other than the preferences of one individual for a specific edition over another.
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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 6:20AM
#33
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Date Joined:
May 12, 2009
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Chess is a great game. It is ancient and will be played for centuries to come. The Game of Life is not a great game. The chances that it will be played by the next few generations is pretty low.
The games that we've passed down through centuries, and that we most highly regard today, aren't games of random chance. They're tactical games in which chance is as small a factor as possible. Chess and its ilk -- other variations of chess, go, even checkers -- have no randomness. The more randomness a game has, the less a player's choice matters. The more random, the less room there is for tactical decisions to make a difference. The less your decisions make a difference, the less skill the game takes to play. Randomness becomes a ceiling on the learning curve.
The idea that our generational forebears were more accepting of chance in their games doesn't really hold. People will play a lot of different games to kill time, and many of these games are poorly designed games of chance. But the games that time doesn't kill aren't games of chance.
In some games, elements of chance still persist. Card games are games where one has to figure the odds and go with them. The key in these games is to eliminate chance as much as possible -- by reading your opponents, knowing the internal math of the game and suchlike. Almost all of these games are designed to facilitate gambling. I think they survive because peole get a rush out of putting somethin valuable to them on the line and because those who actually are good at the games can make a killing.
D&D is another game with elements of chance. Playing it well involves mitigating chance as much as possible. Because of the nature of the game, things like board positioning and power selection can decrease chance -- you can move into flanking positions or use powers or weapons that give a bonus to hit. So while randomness does limit the value of tactical decisions on the parts of the players, the decisions you make in D&D take the randomness into account and so give you meaningful options.
One of the major advances in 4e over previous editions is that it has removed a great deal of randomness over which players have no tactical control. If hit with a Save or Die effect, a character has no decision to make. They roll their save and, pass or fail, they get a result over which they have no control. The linear structure of a dungeon probably meant they didn't have much control over whether they'd even be exposed to the Save or Die effect. Because of this, Save or Die powers limit the ability of a game player to play the game, and reduce the meaning of their decisions within the game.
Rolling Hit Dice at level up for HP is another example of non-tactical randomness. There is no decision you can make to mitigate a bad outcome. There's no decision you can make to take maximum advantage of a good outcome. You won't roll enough dice over the course of your character's career to even pull a statistical average, in many cases. Hit Dice for HP doesn't add anything to the game and can, without reason, result in a character that is either stronger or weaker than he should be.
It's not better game design just because it's more popular. It's better game design because it makes the game a better game. Players have more opportunity to engage in decision-making using the game's rules. They have more opportunity to succeed or fail on the quality of the decisions they are making. That sort of thing is at the core of mental game -- people engaged in a problem-solving exercise according to certain rules and limitations. Randomness undermines all that and leads to a worse game.
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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 6:29AM
#34
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Date Joined:
Jun 14, 2006
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It has no bearing on D&D. I am assuming that a game like Life would be TOO random to be a hit in todays culture. Games that are a success today, offer more control then just spinning a wheel. You can see the same trend in video games with easyness, retries, infinite lives ect. We see a similar trend in D&D (fairer, less random, maybe easier ect). Are all these trends due to a changing culture and changing demands from games?
I almost think the "better game design" line is a cop out. Why is it better? Because people like it. Why did people like snakes and ladders before? Because they were primitive people? I don't think so. Blackjack is still popular, better game design or not.
I think we are taught to believe if we try hard we can become anything, if you arent treated fairly you can sue, if you cant afford a home get the loan anyways, ect ect.
Maybe a generation born to leave their country to work in america, or a generation who saw people die en masse in WW2 (for instance), is more inclined to accept randomness and unfairness in their games.
I mean static hitpoints isn't really an original idea. We didnt need game design scientists to come up with it. Its even MORE of an intuitive idea then die rolls. So why did Gygax and the gang make people roll hitpoints with dies? Maybe they enjoyed randomness and unfairness in a way that we just dont. Or maybe they expected randomness and unfairness in games, because they also expected it from life.
Playing life just requires me and any random person to sit down for a bit.
To play a game of D&D, I have to find 2 or more other people, coordinate our schedules so we can meet weekly or bi-weekly for the next couple months. Write a campaign arc. Let them design characters with backgrounds and goals. THEN we can start the process of playing, which can generally consist of a dozen or so 4 hour long playing sessions.
Randomness becomes less and less attractive the more you invest in something.
Static hit points were an original idea... once. Just about everything since D&D and other electronic games have come out has been new. They are an entirely new medium and have gone through evolution as people try to figure out what seems to work better than others.
Generally, it's the fact that now we realize the stories and exporiences we can create with games. We don't have to rely on the primal thrill of awaiting the result of a random dice roll or the anxiety of being kicked out of the game entirely as an impetus to continue. There are other appealing ways they have found to keep people wanting to play a game for as long as possible.
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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 6:41AM
#35
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Date Joined:
Nov 21, 2008
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Example the First: I was discussing the Traveller game with them, and mentioned that, while generating your character, there was every chance that you could (for instance) enlist in the Navy, then wash out your first term. I believe the exact words one of my son's friends used were "Wait... you mean I couldn't be a space-navy guy even if I wanted to, then? That's utterly messed up!" By the rules of the game, he would be restricted in what he saw was his natural right to do whatever the heck he wanted to do, and to him, that was intolerable.
When I and my friends first encountered the same game, way back in 1981 or 1982, we thought the fact that you could die during character generation (a trait the most recent edition of the game has taken out of the character generation process) was cool! It was a huge challenge! A dare even. As in, "I dare you to try to get one more term of service in!"
I don't think it's intolerable, just boring and lame. Seriously, if you could die before even playing, why bother? Part of the fun of creating a character and roleplaying is to live out a fantasy as a character you create. I get that it's a cool idea that your character maybe didn't get promoted in the Navy or whatever, and that that adds a level of realism, but where is the fun in playing? What's to stop me from making the same character over and over until he doesn't die in childbirth? Then, I might as well have just been allowed to play the character in the first place. That is absolutely one mechanic I have never, and will never understand. I thought the entire idea of most RPG's, and especially D&D, is that your character IS the exception. Just by virtue of the fact that you're involved in the adventure, your character has already excelled above and beyond what normal people accomplish. I honestly cannot possibly comprehend what this adds to any game. "Oh, sorry, you had a nice idea that you were expecting to play, but you rolled above 60% on the dice, so he's dead. No, I understand that you were expecting life threatening challenges to start popping up once we were actually playing, that being the core idea of the game and all, but it turns out that you fell out of a tree at age 9 and shattered your spine. Anyway, think of another character and you might get to play tonight after all."
That would be like a video game with a 40% chance that you wouldn't even be able to turn it on, or Monopoly boards that burst into flames when you open the box.
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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 6:43AM
#36
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Date Joined:
Feb 25, 2004
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I'll throw in my 2 cents: 4e has a better game design than older editions. There have been countless posts sustaining this argument. Whether or not it is more fun to you as an individual or you personally think it is better is totally up to you.
Now as to the original question: "Do players demand a fairer, easier game?" Let's break it down:
Fairness - Do players demand a fair game? Yes, certainly. A game where there is no chance to win isn't much fun but neither is a game where there is no chance to lose.
Easiness - Do players demand an "easy" game? This really involves the definition of easy. All versions of D&D are easier than doing "real work".
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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 6:46AM
#37
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Date Joined:
Aug 13, 2007
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I'll throw in my 2 cents: 4e has a better game design than older editions. There have been countless posts sustaining this argument. Whether or not it is more fun to you as an individual or you personally think it is better is totally up to you.
Now as to the original question: "Do players demand a fairer, easier game?" Let's break it down:
Fairness - Do players demand a fair game? Yes, certainly. A game where there is no chance to win isn't much fun but neither is a game where there is no chance to lose.
Easiness - Do players demand an "easy" game? This really involves the definition of easy. All versions of D&D are easier than doing "real work".
Be careful with the term "Better" design... no one wants to admit it even though it is true.
 Never Point a loaded party at a plot you are not willing to shoot. Arcane Rhetoric. My Blog.
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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 6:54AM
#38
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Date Joined:
May 10, 2009
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One of the major advances in 4e over previous editions is that it has removed a great deal of randomness over which players have no tactical control. If hit with a Save or Die effect, a character has no decision to make. They roll their save and, pass or fail, they get a result over which they have no control. The linear structure of a dungeon probably meant they didn't have much control over whether they'd even be exposed to the Save or Die effect. Because of this, Save or Die powers limit the ability of a game player to play the game, and reduce the meaning of their decisions within the game.
It could be argued that your statement here is supporting the idea that the gamers of today want as little risk as possible in their gaming. "Removing the randomness" is another way of saying "making things less risky", after all.
It's not better game design just because it's more popular. It's better game design because it makes the game a better game.
But how do you define "better game"? This is why I stated that arguing from the point of "better game design" is nonsense, because there's no way to solidly define "better" in a way that covers everyone's opinion. Even two people who both think that 4E was an "improvement" on 3.x might have very different reasons for thinking thusly, after all.
Players have more opportunity to engage in decision-making using the game's rules. They have more opportunity to succeed or fail on the quality of the decisions they are making. That sort of thing is at the core of mental game -- people engaged in a problem-solving exercise according to certain rules and limitations. Randomness undermines all that and leads to a worse game.
In your opinion. 
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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 6:55AM
#39
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Date Joined:
May 10, 2009
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I don't think it's intolerable, just boring and lame.
See what I mean? Different generations, different attitudes. Thank you for supporting my point.
Be careful with the term "Better" design... no one wants to admit it even though it is true.
When you can give me a solid, universal definition for "better" that doesn't depend on personal opinion and applies to 4E, it will be true. Until then, its nothing but opinion.
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4 years ago ::
May 13, 2009 - 6:58AM
#40
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Date Joined:
Nov 21, 2008
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See what I mean? Different generations, different attitudes. Thank you for supporting my point.
QUOTE]
You have no idea how old I am or how long I have been playing.
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