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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 10:32AM
#141
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Date Joined:
Jan 15, 2009
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To be a little more clear .. the video game that came to mind back in 1e era when I was interacting with this first ... was pac-man... not WoW.
Ahh, so THAT was the quest! Eat the power up and then consume the blue souls of the dead to come back to life 
Clawing your way to the top of the pile of corpses.. at the feat of an uncaring demon lord... is just a strength/wis/cha check or two.
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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 10:33AM
#142
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Date Joined:
May 19, 2011
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I like death to mean more and be infrequent.. the characters feel like silly little video game units otherwise.
I would like living to mean more. In a game with heavy player rules bias, staying alive or succeeding at adventures is cheapened. I want a real and nearly constant risk of death, and player (translated to character) skill at the game to be the deciding factor. Its not about frequency to me, but meaning.
I agree death shoul;d always be a possibility if you screw up or get really unlucky.
My only problem is when I talk to people about it, usually their definition of "constant threat of death" is "Sneak attack Medusas and Bodaks everywhere."
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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 10:39AM
#143
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I agree death shoul;d always be a possibility if you screw up or get really unlucky.
My only problem is when I talk to people about it, usually their definition of "constant threat of death" is "Sneak attack Medusas and Bodaks everywhere."
I write adventures usually to the best writing guidelines I can find for a given game. I do put the occasional encounter in that the characters are supposed to avoid, but they are pretty obvious. Even in the old days of 1e and 2e I didn't put SoD creatures in an adventure without a lot of foreshadowing. If the characters went into the medusa city without mirrors or reflective shields it was pretty much their own damn fault.
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.
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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 10:42AM
#144
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I disagree. I think that the relation between computer RPGs and Tabletops RPGs is greater them most people think. After all, these games have great histories, too. The major differences are caused by the limitation of the media (it's a computer). And here we are with the "It's a MMO" old stuff. No, it's not. The process of making 4E a MMO would needed lots of changes to the system.
This right here.
As near as I can tell, the only thing 4E took from MMOs is the concept of the "Mark." Everything else (abilities w/ varying refresh times, the "sweet spot" where every player contributes relatively equally to the party's success, roles, etc) already existed in D&D in some form or another. The major difference between marks in D&D and taunts in MMOs is that the mark does not restrict the monster's choice of target. It simply makes the choice more difficult. Do I hit the squishy rogue, and possibly get punished for it, or do I let the rogue keep stabbing me while I try to shake this tick that is the fighter off of me.
4e brought a new concept to the table, which is non-magical healing. Most MMOs don't even kill this cow. Non-magical healing owes its existence to action movies and fantasy literature. It represents the ability of the hero to dig deep and keep fighting, even when the villain has the upper hand. Easy to understand and justify if you accept that hit points are abstact, nearly impossible to do so if you consider hit points to be solely a measure of how much physical damage you can sustain.
Some of the other influences I could detect were in the new names of most of the classes. Also, the concepts of combat roles such as controller, stirker, etc., although discussed a little bit in the later 3.5 books, became a core design concept in 4E. Those concepts were taken straight from MMORPG forums. Finally, I've just started playing a 4E campaign, and realized that if I lay out all my power cards, it looks just like my WoW action bar. 4E is not a copy of any MMO, but it is heavily influenced by them. It's just a fact.
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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 10:44AM
#145
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Date Joined:
Mar 29, 2005
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Some of the other influences I could detect were in the new names of most of the classes. Also, the concepts of combat roles such as controller, stirker, etc., although discussed a little bit in the later 3.5 books, became a core design concept in 4E. Those concepts were taken straight from MMORPG forums. Finally, I've just started playing a 4E campaign, and realized that if I lay out all my power cards, it looks just like my WoW action bar. 4E is not a copy of any MMO, but it is heavily influenced by them. It's just a fact.
The "roles" that MMOs use were copied from the classical roles of D&D classes. D&D is copying itself. Indungeonception.
Ever feel like people on these forums can't possibly understand how wrong they are? Feeling trolled? Don't get mad. Report Post.
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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 11:02AM
#146
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Date Joined:
May 19, 2011
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I agree death shoul;d always be a possibility if you screw up or get really unlucky.
My only problem is when I talk to people about it, usually their definition of "constant threat of death" is "Sneak attack Medusas and Bodaks everywhere."
I write adventures usually to the best writing guidelines I can find for a given game. I do put the occasional encounter in that the characters are supposed to avoid, but they are pretty obvious. Even in the old days of 1e and 2e I didn't put SoD creatures in an adventure without a lot of foreshadowing. If the characters went into the medusa city without mirrors or reflective shields it was pretty much their own damn fault.
Using SoD creatures like that is fine.
Constant sneak attack use turns less into "fearing death" and more "a minor inconvienience that grinds the game to a halt while I make a new character" thing.
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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 11:04AM
#147
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Some of the other influences I could detect were in the new names of most of the classes. Also, the concepts of combat roles such as controller, stirker, etc., although discussed a little bit in the later 3.5 books, became a core design concept in 4E. Those concepts were taken straight from MMORPG forums. Finally, I've just started playing a 4E campaign, and realized that if I lay out all my power cards, it looks just like my WoW action bar. 4E is not a copy of any MMO, but it is heavily influenced by them. It's just a fact.
The "roles" that MMOs use were copied from the classical roles of D&D classes. D&D is copying itself. Indungeonception.
The roles may have been in use in play, but the vocabulary was not codified until MMOs. The roles are also much more rigid in MMOs. The purpose of the vocabulary is to enable four people in a MMO dungeon who've never met to work as a team in real time. In a tabletop RPG, you have the luxury of discussing your strategies during the turn. In the old days, you had your ranged PC, your magic-users, your healers, and your fighters. We never talked about tanks or controllers back in the day.
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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 11:04AM
#148
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Date Joined:
Sep 19, 2007
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Some of the other influences I could detect were in the new names of most of the classes.
If you go back far enough, into AD&D, you will discover that most of the class names have their origin in the leveling table for each class. Periodically, your Fighter went from being a Veteran to a Warrior to a Myrmidon to a Lord. A Scout was a third level Ranger long before it was a class.
Also, the concepts of combat roles such as controller, stirker, etc., although discussed a little bit in the later 3.5 books, became a core design concept in 4E. Those concepts were taken straight from MMORPG forums.
Roles existed long before. The Cleric was always "the healer." The Wizard was either a "blaster" or "controller," dependant on their spell selection. The rogue was usually "the face." The Fighter was usually "the tank." MMOs simply standardized the roles and gave them official names. 4E's mistake, corrected later" was in saying that all Fighters are Defenders, all Wizards are Controllers, etc.
Finally, I've just started playing a 4E campaign, and realized that if I lay out all my power cards, it looks just like my WoW action bar. 4E is not a copy of any MMO, but it is heavily influenced by them. It's just a fact.
Funny, I used to make spell cards for my clerics and wizards so that I didn't need to dig through books to know what I could do. The WoW action bar looks a heck of lot like my tabletop used to when I would lay out my spells for the day.
In the end, good ideas are good, bad ideas are bad. We, as a group, need to get over our sense of elitism against the video game industry. A lot of the young people playing video games right now are the future market for D&D. If we snub our noses at them instead of welcoming them with open arms, D&D dies with all of us crotchety old folks.
Video games have stolen D&D's good ideas for years. Why can't D&D take some of video gaming's good ideas in return?
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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 11:05AM
#149
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Date Joined:
May 19, 2011
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Some of the other influences I could detect were in the new names of most of the classes. Also, the concepts of combat roles such as controller, stirker, etc., although discussed a little bit in the later 3.5 books, became a core design concept in 4E. Those concepts were taken straight from MMORPG forums. Finally, I've just started playing a 4E campaign, and realized that if I lay out all my power cards, it looks just like my WoW action bar. 4E is not a copy of any MMO, but it is heavily influenced by them. It's just a fact.
The "roles" that MMOs use were copied from the classical roles of D&D classes. D&D is copying itself. Indungeonception.
The roles may have been in use in play, but the vocabulary was not codified until MMOs. The roles are also much more rigid in MMOs. The purpose of the vocabulary is to enable four people in a MMO dungeon who've never met to work as a team in real time. In a tabletop RPG, you have the luxury of discussing your strategies during the turn. In the old days, you had your ranged PC, your magic-users, your healers, and your fighters. We never talked about tanks or controllers back in the day.
Fighter was always the "tank" character, he was just really bad at his job until 4e.
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5 months ago ::
Dec 28, 2012 - 11:10AM
#150
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Date Joined:
Oct 21, 2012
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I have been known, from time to time, to use strong language to drive my point home. However, I'm struggling to see where I did so and what I said that offended you so. Here is my post, for reference
This question has been answered. The answers are called "Castle Ravenloft", "Wrath of Ashardalon", "Legend of Drizz't" and "Dungeon!" These are the games designed to ease people whose normal game experience is Monopoly, Life or Ticket to Ride into Dungeons and Dragons.
Those games have nothing do with role-playing, so they answer nothing. The bolded part is where you use these non-applicable examples In an attempt to abruptly dismiss the thread topic. A desire which is further indicated in your next post:
As the default? Heck yes I am dead set against it. ...
But for the core assumption of the game be that every adventure is a one-shot? No, I do not support it in the least.
As it stands you haven’t contributed, you haven’t swayed the debate one way or the other, and you haven’t made anyone smile.
So I have taken this time to help you out, now why don’t you go find another thread to vomit on Malaklightfoot.
and this
I understand that you are trying to support your downtrodden friend...
weaken your contribution to any meaningful discussion. These are examples of the most reviled tactic in debating: when you cannot argue against the position, you attack the person.
Vomit refers to your use of non-applicable examples, it is an indictment of your argument.
“Downtrodden friend” speaks to the appearance of Mirtek's intervention; it looks like he is riding to the rescue of someone in need, which is not at all the case. I’m pretty sure that’s irony. But that always confuses me a bit.
I do not need anyone to support or protect me or my position, we stand up just fine on our own. I will be happy to continue the debate when you prove willing to argue the matter at hand. On the other hand, if you continue to attack me personally, I will show you all the respect and consideration that you deserve.
Its interesting that you choose to end your note with the idea that I have attacked you personally.
Are you 23 years old? I always like to guess those things.
I look forward to your continued respect and consideration.
Thanks for taking the time to explain your position.
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