|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 3:03PM
#41
|
Date Joined:
Dec 30, 2011
|
A lot of chosen of Mystra were offsprings from a mortal possessed by Mystra. Then we have to explain to players that this godess is not an evil pervert treating mortals like tools for its schemes.
Even if you do not make gods avatars popping everywhere in your FR campaign, there's always something to remind you that FR gods are awfully interventionists (and mostly stupids or careless). The FR setting core portrays gods as interventionists. Even Ao is interventionist, the proof being the avatar inconsequent mess. And Ao himself has to justify his decisions like a child to at least one superior.
You're saying your powerless to portray a setting as you see fit!?
Mr Greenwood puts a lot of focus on baby-sitter profiles for his creations, many all-powerful mother or father figures everywhere. I find it very infantilizing for novels characters or rpg players.
A lot of my dislike about FR novels or campaign setting comes from this, and surely explain why I prefer the 4th edition "adolescent" state of FR, or the "adult" state of Planescape or Dark Sun.
But once you buy the setting it's yours, you do not have to do what Ed does in his novels. You can have Elmister never show up in your campaign. There is no "Elmister has to pop up at least three times in a FR campaign" rule.
I my FR games Elminster never showed up, Drizzt was mentioned once as a rumor and the gods were sometimes at the origine of some plots or "patrons", but the PCs only delt with followers of the gods, agents, emissaries, etc, never the gods themselves. Nobody said it wasn't how the FR should be run or that it was railroaded by the NPCs/gods.
I can understand some people will not like the fluff, but there is no "this is how they should be run/portrayed". That is just a mental blocage.
|
|
|
|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 3:32PM
#42
|
Date Joined:
Jan 10, 2012
|
In the FR there are plenty of high level heros and villans, but I don't think that's a problem. In fact, I really don't understand the idea that the player characters must be the only heros or most powerfull figures in the campaign world to be relevant. My players really like encountering powerfull and famous NPCs. They like having powerfull alies and they know that figures like Elminster most likely won't have the time to solve their petty problems. Except, Elminster might appear out of thin air with his little dog and wand exclaiming, "heal boy heal." It would only be after he vanished, that the PC's would discover that their wounds had been healed. Now, I do recal running a game in Shadowdale and the PCs had the idea that they would knock on Elminsters tower door. They wanted him to teleport them to the moonsea area and thought Elminster would do it for them. Thankfully, I had an old dungeon module that detailed Elminster's Backdoor  We had a load of fun that day. In most cases players like to encounter figures like Jarlaxle or even one of Manshoon's clones. It's true that some of these figures are extremely powerful, but that doesn't make the PC's useless. Those NPCs have their own problems and personal interests. The realms is a huge and dangerous place. Most high level "good guys" just won't have time or the patience to solve simple problems.
|
|
|
|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 3:43PM
#43
|
|
|
Did the players swing their swords and face the dragons?  
Does having a (recurring) NPC show them the secret door out the back of the cave detract from that? 
Yes and Yes
The PCs swung their swords at the dragon and would have ended as a hot cooked dragon meal for their foolishness, if not for DM PC secretly showing them the secret door out of the cave. Ed might write that it takes nothing away from the players, yet that's not the case. What he described in the preceeding article is the exact opposite of this statement he ends with. If adventurers need baby sitters,
I think most NPC would agree that adventurers need babysitters since they're all a bunch of neverdowells that cause just as much trouble as they solve
|
|
|
|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 4:15PM
#44
|
|
|
Did the players swing their swords and face the dragons?
Does having a (recurring) NPC show them the secret door out the back of the cave detract from that?
Yes and Yes
The PCs swung their swords at the dragon and would have ended as a hot cooked dragon meal for their foolishness, if not for DM PC secretly showing them the secret door out of the cave.
If you want to feel foolish then go right ahead, I am not going to stop you.
Pro DnD Member of the Axis of Awesome Fighters: Using socks to kill monsters since 2012 DnD Next: Now with more then 4 minutes of Roleplay per gaming hour Spoiler:
Show
"If you can't make an interesting human fighter, then you aren't ready to play anything else yet" Edymnion
"The idea of resting up between encounters to fill-up on hit points and spells struck my meta-gaming nine-year-old as a distinct possibility. "Are you mad?" says my seven-year-old "This place is full of monsters!" "jamesgrahamuk
All characters have a story. Spoiler:
Show
Sometimes that story is short and sometimes it is long. They can be tragic, comic or absurd. Some teach. Some are just to fill the empty spaces in our lives. Rarely it is a transcendent fugue only half remembered but wondered at. And frequently: "it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." -William Shakespeare
|
|
|
|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 4:24PM
#45
|
|
|
A lot of chosen of Mystra were offsprings from a mortal possessed by Mystra. Then we have to explain to players that this godess is not an evil pervert treating mortals like tools for its schemes.
Sounds like Ed was just being historically accurate. If you have read anything on the Greek or Norse Gods then that is how Gods are supposed to act.
Pro DnD Member of the Axis of Awesome Fighters: Using socks to kill monsters since 2012 DnD Next: Now with more then 4 minutes of Roleplay per gaming hour Spoiler:
Show
"If you can't make an interesting human fighter, then you aren't ready to play anything else yet" Edymnion
"The idea of resting up between encounters to fill-up on hit points and spells struck my meta-gaming nine-year-old as a distinct possibility. "Are you mad?" says my seven-year-old "This place is full of monsters!" "jamesgrahamuk
All characters have a story. Spoiler:
Show
Sometimes that story is short and sometimes it is long. They can be tragic, comic or absurd. Some teach. Some are just to fill the empty spaces in our lives. Rarely it is a transcendent fugue only half remembered but wondered at. And frequently: "it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." -William Shakespeare
|
|
|
|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 4:40PM
#46
|
Date Joined:
Oct 25, 2009
|
I strongly dislike that style of DM interference. When I DM I try to be as fair as possible. I always warn players when they are getting over their head and then if they still bite off more than they can chew I let the dice fall where they may. Sometimes they survive and their success is known to be hard earned and is savored as a result. Sometimes they fail and the party is wiped out. If that means the end of the story and the campaign, so be it. Next week we roll up new characters and start a new story.
My players would kill me if they knew I was pulling punches and rigging everything behind their backs. I'd be unhappy too, because a big part of the thrill of DM'ing is seeing how the story of the campaign has a life of its own, how it grows and changes and develops as a result of everyone's contributions. I don't want the campaign to be my story, I want it to be our story. When the DM relaxes and lets the story go where it will, the world feels more real and less one person's vision where others are just visiting.
Sail where the wind will take you!
Want to know more about the history of D&D, especially how to play older editions of the game? Check out Crazy Monkey's "Tour through the editions":
http://community.wizards.com/crazymonkey/go/forum/view/133793/225799/Asylum_Play-by-Post
The current edition is BECMI, the most popular form of Basic D&D and the adventure is the classic Red Box quest to kill Bargle the evil magic user. Check it out, learn about the games roots, and enjoy the story as it unfolds.
|
|
|
|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 5:44PM
#47
|
Date Joined:
Aug 13, 2004
|
A lot of chosen of Mystra were offsprings from a mortal possessed by Mystra. Then we have to explain to players that this godess is not an evil pervert treating mortals like tools for its schemes.
Even if you do not make gods avatars popping everywhere in your FR campaign, there's always something to remind you that FR gods are awfully interventionists (and mostly stupids or careless). The FR setting core portrays gods as interventionists. Even Ao is interventionist, the proof being the avatar inconsequent mess. And Ao himself has to justify his decisions like a child to at least one superior.
You're saying your powerless to portray a setting as you see fit!?
Mr Greenwood puts a lot of focus on baby-sitter profiles for his creations, many all-powerful mother or father figures everywhere. I find it very infantilizing for novels characters or rpg players.
A lot of my dislike about FR novels or campaign setting comes from this, and surely explain why I prefer the 4th edition "adolescent" state of FR, or the "adult" state of Planescape or Dark Sun.
But once you buy the setting it's yours, you do not have to do what Ed does in his novels. You can have Elmister never show up in your campaign. There is no "Elmister has to pop up at least three times in a FR campaign" rule.
I my FR games Elminster never showed up, Drizzt was mentioned once as a rumor and the gods were sometimes at the origine of some plots or "patrons", but the PCs only delt with followers of the gods, agents, emissaries, etc, never the gods themselves. Nobody said it wasn't how the FR should be run or that it was railroaded by the NPCs/gods.
I can understand some people will not like the fluff, but there is no "this is how they should be run/portrayed". That is just a mental blocage.
Wow, aggressive ! Nice 
It's not a secret I don't like to play in pre 4th ed. FR, so logic is that I never DM old FR.
I DMed a short 4th ed. FR campaign introducing a Renaissance-like movement born with the creation by mortals of a god-free Weave. But a player did a big in-game mistake, the movement became an underground thing, a friend got a little girl, and when we played again, we all wanted some Dark Sun sweetness.
The thing is that if I have to remove all the invasive flaws from FR, then I prefer to to do the same level of work to create my own campaign setting, just like a lot of DMs I know are doing too. Or I work to destroy the setting status quo, and it's really easy to place most of mister greenwood creations on the bad guys side, and force them to doubt their previous interventionist positions.
The only D&D settings I have DMed without alterations are Dark Sun, Planescape, Eberron, and 4th edition FR I suppose, as the things I introduced used the spellplague aftermath to emerge.
It's not mental blocage, it's laziness and ego. If I have to work, I won't loose my time to patch something broken when I can shine with glory by creating my own beast, lol
"They are making it clear that when modern design and common sense come into conflict with tradition, tradition wins." - thecasualoblivion
"Vancian isn't broken, you just have to set your game to the wizard's clock!" - Oxybe
"In many ways, making a new edition of D&D is alot like trying to sell a car to the Amish." - Dwarfslayer
"Encounters are the heart of the AD&D game" - PHB AD&D 2nd edition.
"you shouldn't even bother trying to become like me." - Gary Gygax (Elfcrusher confirmed)
"Feel free to claim I said anything you like. How's someone going to call you out on it? Are they going to be all like, 'I know all of the things that Gary said, and that's not one of them?'"
- Gary Gygax
|
|
|
|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 6:09PM
#48
|
Date Joined:
Aug 13, 2004
|
A lot of chosen of Mystra were offsprings from a mortal possessed by Mystra. Then we have to explain to players that this godess is not an evil pervert treating mortals like tools for its schemes.
Sounds like Ed was just being historically accurate. If you have read anything on the Greek or Norse Gods then that is how Gods are supposed to act.
But greek gods are often enemies of heroes. Greek gods are antagonists to humanity, prometheus as been punished and they created Pandora to counter the gift from prometheus. And it backfired as Pandora's box released the evil that made humanity able to endure and then progress.
I won't comment about Norse gods, as what is known comes from christians clerics and seems to contradict informations from other sources like Tacitus and Julius Caesar. The panteon has been completely reinvented during the Norman period.
Julius Caesar wrote that vikings didn't have druids to preside cults of gods and didn't practiced sacrifice, which contradict Odin as being hungry for blood and sacrifices. Caesar also wrote that vikings only revered gods that they could see, like the sun, the fire or the the moon.
Tacitus wrote that vikings were reluctant to give a human form to their gods, and that they had a common mother earth cult.
Norse culture was shamanic, not religious.
To go back to the comparison to the greek pantheon, gods were frequently challenged by mortals, and a few, like Medusa, died.
In FR, all the big NPC "heroes" bow before at least one of them, the babysitter  .
"They are making it clear that when modern design and common sense come into conflict with tradition, tradition wins." - thecasualoblivion
"Vancian isn't broken, you just have to set your game to the wizard's clock!" - Oxybe
"In many ways, making a new edition of D&D is alot like trying to sell a car to the Amish." - Dwarfslayer
"Encounters are the heart of the AD&D game" - PHB AD&D 2nd edition.
"you shouldn't even bother trying to become like me." - Gary Gygax (Elfcrusher confirmed)
"Feel free to claim I said anything you like. How's someone going to call you out on it? Are they going to be all like, 'I know all of the things that Gary said, and that's not one of them?'"
- Gary Gygax
|
|
|
|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 6:12PM
#49
|
|
|
A lot of chosen of Mystra were offsprings from a mortal possessed by Mystra. Then we have to explain to players that this godess is not an evil pervert treating mortals like tools for its schemes.
Sounds like Ed was just being historically accurate. If you have read anything on the Greek or Norse Gods then that is how Gods are supposed to act.
But greek gods are often enemies of heroes. Greek gods are antagonists to humanity, prometheus as been punished and they created Pandora to counter the gift from prometheus. And it backfired as Pandora's box released the evil that made humanity able to endure and then progress.
So then why can you not use Mystra in the same way?
Gods coming down to earth and taking our jobs and women! 
Pro DnD Member of the Axis of Awesome Fighters: Using socks to kill monsters since 2012 DnD Next: Now with more then 4 minutes of Roleplay per gaming hour Spoiler:
Show
"If you can't make an interesting human fighter, then you aren't ready to play anything else yet" Edymnion
"The idea of resting up between encounters to fill-up on hit points and spells struck my meta-gaming nine-year-old as a distinct possibility. "Are you mad?" says my seven-year-old "This place is full of monsters!" "jamesgrahamuk
All characters have a story. Spoiler:
Show
Sometimes that story is short and sometimes it is long. They can be tragic, comic or absurd. Some teach. Some are just to fill the empty spaces in our lives. Rarely it is a transcendent fugue only half remembered but wondered at. And frequently: "it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing." -William Shakespeare
|
|
|
|
5 months ago ::
Jan 07, 2013 - 6:15PM
#50
|
Date Joined:
Aug 13, 2004
|
A lot of chosen of Mystra were offsprings from a mortal possessed by Mystra. Then we have to explain to players that this godess is not an evil pervert treating mortals like tools for its schemes.
Sounds like Ed was just being historically accurate. If you have read anything on the Greek or Norse Gods then that is how Gods are supposed to act.
But greek gods are often enemies of heroes. Greek gods are antagonists to humanity, prometheus as been punished and they created Pandora to counter the gift from prometheus. And it backfired as Pandora's box released the evil that made humanity able to endure and then progress.
So then why can you not use Mystra in the same way?
Gods coming down to earth and taking our jobs and women!
It's exactly what I always do. Except for the job part, gods are more slaves than workers
"They are making it clear that when modern design and common sense come into conflict with tradition, tradition wins." - thecasualoblivion
"Vancian isn't broken, you just have to set your game to the wizard's clock!" - Oxybe
"In many ways, making a new edition of D&D is alot like trying to sell a car to the Amish." - Dwarfslayer
"Encounters are the heart of the AD&D game" - PHB AD&D 2nd edition.
"you shouldn't even bother trying to become like me." - Gary Gygax (Elfcrusher confirmed)
"Feel free to claim I said anything you like. How's someone going to call you out on it? Are they going to be all like, 'I know all of the things that Gary said, and that's not one of them?'"
- Gary Gygax
|
|
|
