|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 10:59AM
#51
|
Date Joined:
Nov 13, 2011
|
@The_Othe_GM: So... the DM doesn't get to have some fun with building a world and plot, but only gets to be the human jukebox that has to provide endless entertainment for the players and must subjugate every single one of his ideas to the players' approval?
I know that it is (or rather, should be) a give and take from both DMs and players, compromising on what to include in the campaign and what material is allowed. I also know that either side can be pretty stubborn and unrelenting. But the current default layout really doesn't make it easy for the DM to include restrictions/modifications in the game without running the risk of facing stern opposition.
My primary gripe with "everything is Core" is actually another one: the differences between the settings get watered down and diluted. Eberron has genasi, earthmotes and swordmages. FR has warforged, elemental powered airships and dragonmarks. Ravenloft has thri-kreen, gladiators and people turning into sorcerer kings. Dark Sun has pixies, living undead and arcane healers. But that's a topic for a different thread...
hey, if we're going to be jumping on the Hyperbole Train to Fallacydale, do you mean to imply that the players need to be returned to their role of subserviant and removed of all free will, existing only to listen in a non-interactive manner to his holyness and slam-dunk champion of the multivers, Lord Emperor-King Dungeon Master?
i doubt you are but making statements like the first quoted paragraph doesn't help your cause.
|
|
|
|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 11:00AM
#52
|
Date Joined:
Jan 15, 2009
|
The Dark Sun example is more appropriate, and of all the dozens of people I've gamed with, I don't think any one of them would fight any DM on that.
Heh, I think flavor is flexible enough when I give it a whipping - a source doesnt necessarily define the flavor of a character
|
|
|
|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 11:37AM
#53
|
Date Joined:
Dec 21, 2004
|
hey, if we're going to be jumping on the Hyperbole Train to Fallacydale, do you mean to imply that the players need to be returned to their role of subserviant and removed of all free will, existing only to listen in a non-interactive manner to his holyness and slam-dunk champion of the multivers, Lord Emperor-King Dungeon Master?
i doubt you are but making statements like the first quoted paragraph doesn't help your cause.
I thought it was pretty obvious that I was exaggerating in the first paragraph.  But if you ask me seriously... meh, it's been working that way for several decades (up until the advent of 4E also in D&D and is still well alive and kicking in other systems - Ars Magicka, Shadowrun, Earthdawn, ...) so why should it suddenly stop working?
Anyway, I think you're missing the point. Players have always had pretty much full control over their side of the screen within the limits set forth by the DM (what characters are appropriate for the campaign, which splatbooks are allowed, etc). The DM was by tradition in control over the campaign, the plot and said limits. However, in 4E the players have gotten more and more control over the DM's side of the screen - all books from all settings are allowed by default and the players should always get any magic items they want and any deviation from that is strongly frowned upon.
A player telling the DM "you must allow me to play race whatevertheheckIwant and class IwonderwhatfreakingcomboIcandigoutfromCharOp in your campaign with feats and items from the omgitsfullofpowercreep book because the rules say so" is imho in the same league as a DM telling the player "no, your character doesn't do that because his alignment is lawful stupid" - it's infringing on the other side of the screen where you don't have any business nosing around.
----
Heh, I think flavor is flexible enough when I give it a whipping - a source doesnt necessarily define the flavor of a character
Flavor is indeed very flexible, but at some points it's being stretched too thin. Your vampire example is one of the instances where I personally think that the reflavoring went too far.
It's like saying that a swordmage doesn't use arcane magic to create blasts of fire, but instead just wiggles his sword really fast to make the air around him heat up. And he also doesn't teleport around, he can simply run very fast so that no one can see/stop/hit him... but not more often than once per round and not further away than 50ft and he can run so very fast even if he was otherwise immobilized or restrained.
I'm not saying that you can't or shouldn't reflavor things (I've done so myself, too) I'm just saying that your example doesn't quite cut it from my perspective.
|
|
|
|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 12:20PM
#54
|
Date Joined:
Jun 24, 2009
|
I personally play 3/3.5e (I honestly don't see the difference) and have moved on to pathfinder (did I say moved on? I meant tried, no one plays DnD in my locale >.>') but I have tried 4e with an open mind.
The thing is, I find the only thing I dislike about 4e is that my lack of player groups means the one I'm stuck with has me playing 4e (I have a variety of other dislikes in this regard, but they pertain ONLY to my gaming group, their latest bad habits stem from a misuse of 4e, but it certainly isn't 4e's fault). I find that if a DM wanted to have more control over the group, he CAN be heavy handed (at the cost of coming off as a bad DM) or he can 'cooperate' with his players, so long as the players are ready to accept the consequences (you want to be a drow? Fine, but you're not drizzt, but it's not because drizzt is a precursor to twilight's main vampire, it's because drizzt is an ACCEPTED drow in many places, YOU are a trophy waiting to be mounted), consequences which RP-wise have a good bargain on the other end of the scale (you walk into a drow city with your allies shackled to you, looking like slaves, and no one cares to consider your true allegiances), provided the other end of the scale actually has a location that features in your story.
On a quick note, if I had a huge list of gaming groups to join, I'd have no grief with 4e. I find that 3/3.5e and now pathfinder have released so much source material that you'll never be lacking in things to do, things to have, places to visit. The only true fear of 4e SHOULD come from the fear that no more source material will be released (and even then, unless you've tried everything that 3/3.5 has to offer, you have nothing to complain about), and with pathfinder, that fear is no longer viable. I find 4e's release no different than if another edition of exalted/world of darkness/vampire the masquerade/werewolf the forsaken came out, it doesn't impact me at all (save for my lack in gaming groups, but THAT is not 4e's fault). I personally don't understand the edition flame wars, I don't like 4e, but I don't like exalted either and nothing is forcing me to play THAT system, so why all the grief?
EDIT: Also, cut out the hybrid class, there is no possible way to imagine all the class combinations that system can provide. I have a friend who is creating (without his DM knowing) a broken character who can one-shot tiamat with what is either an unpredicted power/weapon/feat combo or the secret technique passed down through thousands of generations of mortals to finally land in a revenant battlemind hybrid with some other class (I think it's paladin)'s hands. I know nobody likes the call of 'broken!', but clear this up for me please, isn't one-shotting a draconic deity with an AT-WILL maybe a TAD unbalanced? Sadly, this resides in the simple mis-wording of one of the powers involved in this, and the player's total willingness to exploit it, and given that it doesn't break the rules, the DM has his hands tied. Hybrids can create a MYRIAD of character concept possibilities, but it opens many doors to unbalanced characters (this revenant is the SECOND overpowered hybrid this guy has created).
|
|
|
|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 12:25PM
#55
|
Date Joined:
Nov 13, 2011
|
honestly, the only problem i see in what you said is a failure on the GM's to clarify the material allowed pre-game and this is system-neutral problem.
every game i've ever played in or run was prefaced with "i am running system X, the setting is Y, allowed material is A, B, C" at that point the players can accept to join or not. i've declined playing and running games before due to not liking the system, the setting or the allowed material.
now, if you're running the game on behalf of someone else, like the encounters program (which has it's own list of restricted books) or as a promotion for the the FLGS (who may give a list of restricted books or simply say "let them play whatever"), then your hands are tied. but for your home games? it's your choice.
you can't expect the players to make an informed decision about what game to play in if they're missing some information.
if you were to say "hey, i'm running a cyberpunk GURPS game set in the near future", you might find yourself (un)pleasantly surprised to see my character being a tricked out street samurai with gear found in the Future Tech supplement when you were expecting only the base rules.
or for a closer to home "hey i'm running a 7th level game of 3.5" and i come in with a lion-totem barb frenzied 'zerker and you wanted a core-only game
or my coming into a 2nd ed with a fighter/theif/mage who's got 3 kits and NWPs from a wide array of sources.
it's not my fault as a player you didn't say "hey i'm running a game with only these supplements allowed" nor is my fault for failing to anticipate the material you allowed. to be told that i can't play the character i've invested time into because you failed to tell me what you allowed is a bit of a pain.
either way, i've never ran into that issue or those kinds of players: just make it clear what material you're allowing before the game otherwise me and pretty much every player i've met have always simply assumed anything is fair game.
|
|
|
|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 12:53PM
#56
|
Date Joined:
Jan 15, 2009
|
I'm not saying that you can't or shouldn't reflavor things (I've done so myself, too) I'm just saying that your example doesn't quite cut it from my perspective.
It doesnt even have crap for religion skill and it reaks of blood not a single glowing radiant attack sheesh... divine prejudice really should be/looks scrubbed to me. An "undead" templar of the Dragon. tightening its control over itself and leaking it bloodlust in to its allies...
|
|
|
|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 2:04PM
#57
|
Date Joined:
Dec 21, 2004
|
It doesnt even have crap for religion skill and it reaks of blood not a single glowing radiant attack sheesh... divine prejudice really should be/looks scrubbed to me. An "undead" templar of the Dragon. tightening its control over itself and leaking it bloodlust in to its allies...
It's not prejudice, my "criticism" (sheesh, didn't I already say that it was only a personal opinion?) is that you put a different label on divine classes and try to emulate something with them for which they were never intended. Also, if you go down this route the DM has to reflavor other rules elements as well.
For example, what if your character finds a real holy symbol in an ancient long abandoned vault, a derelict tempel of a long forgotten deity? Technically your character could use and benefit from any holy symbol, but because your character is a "vampire" she shouldn't be able to use it.
Or what if the tempel contains a few last remnants of divine power in the form of Angelic Lanterns? Following the same argumentation as above, your character could benefit from them but really shouldn't.
This very concept could equally well be emulated with a martial character (fighter, warlord or rogue, perhaps hybrid/multiclass into the non-essentials assassin for some darkness/mobility stuff) or the vampire "class" (but using vampire as a class feels wrong to me on so many different levels I can't put it in words...  ) without having to reflavor pretty much every power the character takes and without running into a red tape of reflavoring that bleed into other aspects of the game (feats, boons, items, fantastic terrain, ...).
Angelic Lantern
Show
Angelic lanterns are faint manifestations of divine will. These tiny, pulsating balls of light float in a square, shedding bright light in a 20-square radius.
Effect: A creature in a square containing an angelic lantern gains a +1 bonus per tier to attack rolls with divine or radiant attack powers. Once an angelic lantern grants this bonus to a creature, it winks out of existence at the end of the turn in which it granted the bonus. [...]
Published in Manual of the Planes, page(s) 21.
|
|
|
|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 2:16PM
#58
|
Date Joined:
Aug 11, 2006
|
> but because your character is a "vampire" she shouldn't be able to use it.
Psst. The actual vampire class can use holy symbols!
I'd imagine that dragon templar doing some creative redecoration of the holy symbol before using it, anyway.
"Holy symbol" is just as fluff-mutable as the character's class.
|
|
|
|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 2:18PM
#59
|
|
|
because your character is a "vampire" she shouldn't be able to use it.
Why not?
Another day, another three or four entries to my Ignore List.
|
|
|
|
1 year ago ::
Dec 31, 2011 - 2:33PM
#60
|
Date Joined:
Jan 15, 2009
|
It doesnt even have crap for religion skill and it reaks of blood not a single glowing radiant attack sheesh... divine prejudice really should be/looks scrubbed to me. An "undead" templar of the Dragon. tightening its control over itself and leaking it bloodlust in to its allies...
It's not prejudice, my "criticism" (sheesh, didn't I already say that it was only a personal opinion?) is that you put a different label on divine classes and try to emulate something with them for which they were never intended. Also, if you go down this route the DM has to reflavor other rules elements as well.
For example, what if your character finds a real holy symbol in an ancient long abandoned vault, a derelict tempel of a long forgotten deity? Technically your character could use and benefit from any holy symbol, but because your character is a "vampire" she shouldn't be able to use it.
[/sblock]
Besides you are running Darksun why are we having to worry about running in to very much "actual" divine? Everything on my wish list would be flavored appropriately you can bet on it
Ie, the DM really has control over what I find and if he wants it to be a divine item for me to use it ought to be a Vampire or maybe even Defiling themed in flavor it might be a Bloodstone or bleeding dagger or some similar thing maybe plot items to let me resist the control of other vampires shrug.
Turn that angelic light in to a creepy silver heart floating radiating the sound of a heart beat.. throbbing and accelerating the heart beats of those who hear its sound or atleast the ones associated with me.
Yes it does involve accepting the character as one of the protagonists around whom you plan for things like that .. rather like when I make language skills useful in my game because I have a couple players who took the linguist feat and rather like I include plenty of ritual components... because I sometimes have three which have ritualist ;p
The blood manipulator vampire you see in this character isnt buildable based on any of the classes you are talking about and definitely not the Vampire class... perhaps a bard could do the trick and instead of being a high discipline wisdom style character desperately clinging to a sense of humanity it would be an influencer with higher charisma or something similar... a Warlord might manage it without the attribute shifting (but I think has fewer wisdom secondaries ... hmmm maybe I should investigate that)
But to be honest I dont normally like clerics at all and there is an irony in transforming them in to a blood sucker which I like - also there were specific powers which properly flavored fit the Bloodwright very well.
|
|
|
