|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 11:44AM
#31
|
|
|
ok, I'm not going to watch the 4hrs of pannels I already watched to find a 20 second comment by mearls... he said that they didnt plan to release further editions after this one, that they would plan on releasing "updates" though to fix or re-write some confusing or unpopular rules. when he said that I didnt really buy it... kind of like saying "well were going to come up with a new edition but were not going to call it an edition... were going to call it an "update" etc.
Is this what you were thinking of?
|
|
|
|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 11:46AM
#32
|
|
|
And there was the Wizard's Spell Compendium that was 4 volumes softbound.
Kalex the Omen Dungeonmaster Extraordinaire Concerning Player Rules Bias
Show
Gaining victory through rules bias is a hollow victory and they know it.
The argument goes, that some idiot at the table might claim that because there is a "default" that is the only true way to play D&D. An idiotic misconception that should be quite easy to disprove just by reading the rules, coming to these forums, or sending a quick note off to Customer Support and sharing the inevitable response with the group. BTW, I'm not just talking about Next when I say this. Of course, D&D has always been this way since at least the late 70's when I began playing.
|
|
|
|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 11:52AM
#33
|
|
|
And there was the Wizard's Spell Compendium that was 4 volumes softbound.
Precisely. 2nd Edition was just as bloated as any other Edition that followed it. People either simply don't seem to notice that or didn't mind the bloat back then.
|
|
|
|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 11:54AM
#34
|
- Forum Guide
- Hero Craftsman Gold Medalist
- Master Dungeon Master
Date Joined:
Jun 23, 2005
|
2d edition was 13 years old when 3e came out. That's as long as 3.0, 3.5, and 4e combined. I'll take the 2e rate of bloat over 3e and 4e's rate of bloat any day.
|
|
|
|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 11:56AM
#35
|
Date Joined:
May 24, 2012
|
To those who argue that 2nd Edition kept bloat to a fair minimum, I would like to point out they had to publish a 3 volume softback set just to collate magic items from all of their splat books. While they didn't have Feats yet, most of the Complete Book of X series contained 6 or so Kits, which in some cases were essentially completely new classes starting at first level (Ninjas comes to mind). To say 2nd Edition didn't have much bloat (note we aren't even talking about the Player's Option series) is to look at that edition through rose colored glasses.
2nd edition had bloat for spells and magic items (it was 4 volumes, btw) but what it didn't have was system bloat, which is what I think this thread is about. It didn't have tons of races and classes and optional mechanics. All the "bloat" that 2nd edition had never affected the core rules of the game.
Yes toward the very end of its life, the Player's Option books came out, introducing a lot of optional mechanics, but that's not bloat.
|
|
|
|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 11:59AM
#36
|
|
|
Yes toward the very end of its life, the Player's Option books came out, introducing a lot of optional mechanics, but that's not bloat.
Why not?
I'm not familiar with those books, and I don't have an opinion one way or the other. I'm genuinely interested to hear what you see as the difference.
|
|
|
|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 12:03PM
#37
|
Date Joined:
May 24, 2012
|
Yes toward the very end of its life, the Player's Option books came out, introducing a lot of optional mechanics, but that's not bloat.
Why not?
I'm not familiar with those books, and I don't have an opinion one way or the other. I'm genuinely interested to hear what you see as the difference.
The difference is that we're talking about three books (four if you include the one for DM's running high level campaigns). I don't think of three/four books that came out within the same year as part of a series specifically defined as "the books where the optional mechanics live" as bloat.
3e and (more so) 3.5 bloat happened because virtually EVERY book had optional mechanics.
I don't know 4e, so I can't comment on its level of bloat.
|
|
|
|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 12:08PM
#38
|
|
|
To those who argue that 2nd Edition kept bloat to a fair minimum, I would like to point out they had to publish a 3 volume softback set just to collate magic items from all of their splat books. While they didn't have Feats yet, most of the Complete Book of X series contained 6 or so Kits, which in some cases were essentially completely new classes starting at first level (Ninjas comes to mind). To say 2nd Edition didn't have much bloat (note we aren't even talking about the Player's Option series) is to look at that edition through rose colored glasses.
2nd edition had bloat for spells and magic items (it was 4 volumes, btw) but what it didn't have was system bloat, which is what I think this thread is about. It didn't have tons of races and classes and optional mechanics. All the "bloat" that 2nd edition had never affected the core rules of the game.
Yes toward the very end of its life, the Player's Option books came out, introducing a lot of optional mechanics, but that's not bloat.
I'd urge you to reread the Complete Book of X series. There are a lot of classes and kits added in them. The Bladesinger and a Spellthief like kit from the Book of Elves come to mind. There's also divine and arcane spellcasting Ninja class variants. Those are just the ones off the top of my head from the two books I'm most familiar with.
If that's not bloat, we may not be agreeing on the definition of the term.
|
|
|
|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 12:09PM
#39
|
Date Joined:
May 27, 2012
|
I would define bloat as unnecessary redundancy. If you already have a perfectly adequate way of modeling, say, a swashbuckler then you don't need to go and make an entire class focused around that concept as well. If you want to create a character, and you have that character well-defined in your head, but you cannot determine which set of mechanics best describe that character, then the system suffers from bloat.
The default example that I always remember was the 3.x feat, "Lightning Reflexes". The purpose of the feat was to represent a character with exceptional reaction time, who was good at getting out of the way of stuff; it did this with a static bonus to Reflex saves. Later, one of the books introduced a feat which allowed you to re-roll a Reflex save, so many times per day ... to represent a character with exception reaction time, who was good at getting out of the way of stuff. Yet later still, another book introduced a feat that would let you re-roll a Reflex save whenever you felt like it, but using the feat caused you to fall prone.
If I wanted to make a character with exceptional reaction time, who was good at getting out of the way of stuff, then even if I had a summary list to help my narrow my options down I would still be uncertain of which feat to take. That is the purest form of bloat, to me.
The metagame is not the game.
|
|
|
|
8 months ago ::
Oct 12, 2012 - 12:17PM
#40
|
Date Joined:
Apr 22, 2001
|
I personally agree with Mikes concept and I don't think its hard to achieve at all, in fact, the OPS statement that "no other RPG has ever done it" is completetly factually incorrect, its far more accurate to say that the large majority of RPG's have acomplished it, at least those around long enough to put out new editions.
The simple truth is that if a gaming system is not modular its destined for bloat. You can't keep putting out "here are some additional rules" books without that happening. What you can do is put out "here are some OPTIONAL" rules that you can use. A distincition without a difference unless you core rules change every edition and you effectively try to re-invent the core system, which is at the heart of the problem for D&D.
Take GURPS as an example, 4 edition, 1st edition modules are as valid today as they where when 1st edition was around. With "minor" and I mean MINOR in every sense of the word, adjustments, you can take a 1st edition book and apply it to a 4th edition game. It has modules for different types of game worlds, different types of sub systems (be they narrative, simulationist or something in between) and there is no limit to how many books you can release without an inch of bloat as ONLY the core rules are rules, everything else are optional rules at the discretion of the GM and tastes of the players.
This is what Mike Mearls is tyring to acomplish and as long as the Core game is light and D&D flavored there should be no reason to ever release another game system... in fact with 3rd edition there wasn't any reason to release another game syste... all they needed to do was what Pathfinder did for them, updated it, correct some mistakes and move on. Just like 3.5 was an updated to 3rd edition, 4th edition should have been an updated to 3.5... the only problem they had and the reason they are in the predicement they are today is because they chose to instead try to "re-invent" the wheel.
So yeah... Mike Mearls has it right and bloat will be a none issue since everything beyond the core books should be 100% optional and not part of the official base rules.
The key to the whole thing is to ensure that 5th edition core is really the absolute most basic aspects of D&D on which other systems can be built, both player and official ones.
|
|
|
