Quote from: Hairfoot;318186Brace yourself for disappointment. Obryn's schtick is stalking people across the internet to hurl abuse at them, completely unrelated to gaming. Then he'll run to CM so a few fatbeards who never moved on from high school can pat him on the head for his cleverness.

My own past experiences with Obryn would tend to agree with this analysis; however, I have also witnessed Obryn being a reasonable person. At this point, I'm on the fence, and willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

And even if he is a total douche, and is secretly mocking us while engaging in vaguely civil conversation, running off to CM to engage in said mockery... so? So long as he's being a reasonable person here, then I really don't care what he does elsewhere.

Quote from: noisms;318125Not sure if it's an example of the Tyranny of Fun. What it is, is an example of what a huge crowd of babies 90% of D&D players these days appear to be.

This is my favourite:
Not sure if it's an example of the Tyranny of Fun. What it is, is an example of what a huge crowd of babies 90% of D&D players these days appear to be.

This is my favourite:

QuoteI generally announce who's a minion and who isn't. I'd have angry players on my hands if they dropped a daily (especially a single-target daily) on a minion.  

I mean, I suppose this would be true if your players were seven fucking years old. For the rest of us the idea that this is a concern is (or should be) simply mind-boggling.

Please do not insult seven year olds this way, I've two at this age, and I can tell you my son can take a bit of uncertainty without whining about it being unfair, let alone getting angry.  Albeit we are just doing wargames (Axis & Allies) where it is all about misdirection.

Quote from: GnomeWorks;318189I'm on the fence, and willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Cool.  Just as long as you're not being lulled into thinking he's reasonable.
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Quote from: ColonelHardisson;318187See, I think you don't quite see what I'm getting at. Please don't leave out this bit of what I was saying above, which I feel is most relevant: I guess if you mean "not to my taste," then I can get that. It's just that phrase and "distasteful" carry different connotations. All I need to know is if you use those terms interchangeably, and then I have my answer, and there is no argument.

Wrong. You just (intentionally, it would have to be) ignored the entire post you just quoted. Why quote it, or indeed read it in the first place, if you intend to act as if it was never said? Very strange.

When someone simply says that "this thing is distasteful", that's one thing. If they instead say "I find this thing distasteful" or "this thing is distasteful to me", that is another. BIG difference.

Do you understand now?

Quote from: GnomeWorks;318175Unless you're giving them sufficient DR to ignore the majority of the auto-damage powers... though there are a large number of them, and some of them are capable of crazy damage.

That's more or less the idea.  Auto-damage, by and large, is relatively low; it's usually unmodified, and usually minimal for the PCs' level.  While giving them DR doesn't completely negate the issue, auto-damage is IMO the biggest problem with minions.  It's a patch for something that doesn't quite work as-written.

QuoteHmm... alright, a reread of your post that I quoted does indicate that there is a reading that is more favorable for you than how I initially read it. My apologies. I will admit that I am ridiculously defensive when it comes to simulation-style gaming, particularly because that viewpoint gets a lot of crap from folks.

I have no problem with simulation-style gaming at all.  It doesn't float my boat, but it's not ridiculous.  I was saying it'd be ridiculous to use minions if you want to run a simulationist game - something which I assume you'd agree with.

Quote from: Hairfoot;318186Brace yourself for disappointment. Obryn's schtick is stalking people across the internet to hurl abuse at them, completely unrelated to gaming.  Then he'll run to CM so a few fatbeards who never moved on from high school can pat him on the head for his cleverness.
Posted in Mobile Mode

Yes, clearly replying to a post that interested me on a board I've visited regularly since its inception, and mentioning offhand that you are a dick, is stalking you.  Cry about it some more while googling for more of my 12-year-old Amazon reviews.

-O

Quote from: Xanther;318192Albeit we are just doing wargames (Axis & Allies) where it is all about misdirection.

Which I think is the most important point.  Misdirecting and confusing players is one of the joys of DMing and great fun for players.  Full-scale metagaming that gives players the internal mechanics of their foes in preference to a description is like using a cheat guide.
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Quote from: GnomeWorks;318180How is a metagame concept - like how many hit points a creature has - something that a character would perceive?

I'll give you that lower-level critters, like goblins or kobolds, may give away their minion status by virtue of their equipment. But ogres? Demons or devils?

Like:

"You can gut this foe pretty easily."

Ogres:

"Despite its powerful appearance, there is a fatal weakness in this ogre's defenses that you readily perceive."

Demons/Devils:

"The metaphysical cohesion of this seemingly mighty demon seems unstable. As if it could harmlessly pop with a single strike."

Quote from: paris80;318195Wrong. You just (intentionally, it would have to be) ignored the entire post you just quoted. Why quote it, or indeed read it in the first place, if you intend to act as if it was never said? Very strange.

When someone simply says that "this thing is distasteful", that's one thing. If they instead say "I find this thing distasteful" or "this thing is distasteful to me", that is another. BIG difference.

Do you understand now?

No, I didn't ignore anything. I don't understand your use of the word "distasteful" in this context. I'm not sure why you're becoming accusatory. Would you refer to a new car model you didn't like as being distasteful? A new gaming console? Even if you say "I find that car distasteful" (and I have never heard anyone use it like that) what does that mean? Distasteful has a different connotation than "not to my taste" - "I find their vulgar language distasteful," "Her wearing of a stripper dress in church was distasteful," "that joke he made about how that guy died was distasteful" - those carry the connotation of something that is socially or morally wrong (though in a relatively mild way). I'm am genuinely asking how you see 4e as distasteful using that connotation. I just can't see how game rules, besides something like F.A.T.A.L., the example of which should have been an indication of what I was getting at, can be distasteful, given the common connotation of that word.

Seriously, I'm not just being argumentative. If you mean the 4e rules are distasteful, in the sense they offended your morals, I'm genuinely curious as to why? I'm not trying to be a dick, I promise you! The usual connotation of distasteful is usually synonymous with offensive. Do you see what I mean? If you find 4e offensive, then why? There are plenty of games I don't like, but they don't offend me, and I would never refer to them as distasteful (except the one I mentioned). We're simply having a disconnect in communication here.

Quote from: GnomeWorks;318189My own past experiences with Obryn would tend to agree with this analysis; however, I have also witnessed Obryn being a reasonable person. At this point, I'm on the fence, and willing to give him the benefit of the doubt.

And even if he is a total douche, and is secretly mocking us while engaging in vaguely civil conversation, running off to CM to engage in said mockery... so? So long as he's being a reasonable person here, then I really don't care what he does elsewhere.

Yeah, we've had slapfights before, but I'm honestly not trying to be a douche here.  I'm completely happy to have reasonable conversations about games.  I get torqued off when people spend all their time bitching about shit they don't like, or when they go about pissing on the fun other people are having.  One-true-wayism pisses me the fuck off.  None of that is happening here.

EDIT: Frankly, I don't even remember what the fuck we were arguing about before, so I'm happy to start fresh if you are.

Quote from: Hairfoot;318193Cool.  Just as long as you're not being lulled into thinking he's reasonable.
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Look, if you want to discuss all the ways in which I've wronged you, can you PM me or start a new thread about how I should eat a bag of dicks or something?  Really, stalking me into a game-related thread and shitting it up is kind of poor.

-O

Quote from: GnomeWorksAlso, you double-space between sentences.

There is no smiley that can adequately express my rage at this statement.

Aside from that, I too despise minions.  Their purpose is entirely metagame (waste the players' actions; do piddly damage to the players each round), and they make no sense whatsoever.  I do not care one whit if they represent "mooks," as "mook" is also a metagame concept.  Minions do not represent anything that positively contributes to the game.  Oh, certainly they allow the players to feel big in the pants (or perhaps heroic) because they're wading through a horde of lesser enemies, but I can formulate three objections for this.

First of all, killing a creature with 1 HP is not an accomplishment.  Second of all, making the players feel as though their genitalia have increased in size is not why people should be playing role-playing games.  (If you're compensating for a lackluster life, playing an RPG is probably unhealthy for your psyche.)  Third of all, heroism isn't defined by how many mooks you kill; it's defined by what you do.  (You're not a hero because you killed a bunch of orcs.  You're a hero because you saved the town they were going to raid from utter destruction.)

Now, someone will undoubtedly say that minions are the best thing ever and that 3e didn't allow the players to feel big in the pants because all low-level enemies weren't a credible threat to the PCs.

Well, that's true.  And you know what?  After a certain point, the king's elite guards shouldn't be a credible threat to the PCs.  As the PCs progress in levels, they're going to outgrow certain challenges.  For instance, after about third level, large walls are no longer an issue (assuming you have someone with fly or UMD).  Is this a bad thing?  I don't think so.  Similarly, those 1 HD orcs no longer become a challenge for the PCs fairly soon.  Why?  Because the PCs have progressed beyond mundane things like orc warriors and the king's guards.

But, you say, you want to have a cinematic battle.  (Allow me to state that the word "cinematic" is rubbish and it has no real meaning outside of "I like how I can imagine this in my head.")  You need guards that are a credible threat to the PCs without overwhelming them.  Whatever will you do?

I have three answers for this.  (Be forewarned, the first is less sound than the other two, as it involves making things up.)  My first suggestion would be to give all the mooks--the 1 HD monsters--a bonus on their attack rolls equal to the leader's CR.  This will allow them to hurt the PCs, and it will allow the PCs to one-hit the mooks (unless you have players that are really, really unoptimized).  This accomplishes the same thing as minions in 4e.

The second suggestion is to ignore minions entirely.  The PCs, not having metagame knowledge, won't be able to tell much of a difference between the guards and the king's ultraknights, since they'll all be wearing similar eqiupment.  (Plate mail leaves much to the imagination.)  If the characters want to get to the king, they're going to have to wade through the guards to get to him.  Even if the guards only hit on a 20, the players will have a good incentive to kill them: they're a nuisance.  You're going to have to cast defensively and tumble around them.  While that's not a big deal in and of itself (especially given the low DCs for those tasks), the PCs will probably become exasperated with having to deal with the guards and just kill them as they fight.  (One of fireball's few uses is killing mooks.)  

Thirdly--and this is the one that I plan on doing--you can write out a generic guard statblock.  Make the guards all level 5 warriors or something.  Give them average stats (elite array) and calculate all their saves and attack bonuses and that junk (ignore skills, since they probably won't ever come up), and you'll have a perfect template to use for when the guards come into play.  Give them masterwork armor and weapons.  An attack bonus of +8 isn't going to hit that frequently, but it's also not going to miss as much as an attack bonus of +4.  Add in flanking for better results.

Now, the problem with this method is that you have to keep track of the mook hit points, which is somewhat painful for the DM.  However, the average level 5 warrior will have 10 + 4d10 (22) + 1(5), or 37 hit points.  At the level you're going to want to use these mooks, I'm pretty sure that the PCs can easily churn out more than 37 damage per hit.  And, if nothing else, just give them minimum hit points.

And so my post is finished.

Quote from: B.T.;318209Aside from that, I too despise minions.  Their purpose is entirely metagame (waste the players' actions; do piddly damage to the players each round), and they make no sense whatsoever.  I do not care one whit if they represent "mooks," as "mook" is also a metagame concept.

I agree 100% that minions are a metagame concept.  They are a completely game-rule-based construct.  They exist to fill a game purpose, and not to fill any kind of ecological niche.

QuoteMinions do not represent anything that positively contributes to the game.  Oh, certainly they allow the players to feel big in the pants (or perhaps heroic) because they're wading through a horde of lesser enemies, but I can formulate three objections for this.

That's not really what my group gets out of minions, I guess.  It's not the killing-in-droves that's the fun part; it's the massive battles without the massive bookkeeping.  It's Conan hewing through ravening hordes, Gord and Gellor blowing up demons by the thousands, Buffy slaying weak vampires with a single stake to the heart, and Jackie Chan taking out movie ninjas with a well-placed hit with a ladder.

There's nothing about compensating for a lackluster life, or pretending to have a huge dick.  It's all about wanting fights to work a certain way, and having mechanics to accomplish it.  Nobody yells and screams, "WOOO!  I KILLED A MINION!  I AM GALACTUS, EATER OF WORLDS!!"

QuoteBut, you say, you want to have a cinematic battle.  (Allow me to state that the word "cinematic" is rubbish and it has no real meaning outside of "I like how I can imagine this in my head.")

Why isn't "I like how it would look in a movie" a good definition?  What's wrong with wanting to play a game that fits certain characteristics that you value?  Not everyone should value the same things in a game, right?

Like I said, I have no issue with people who don't like minions in their game.  There are abundant reasons not to use them, depending on what you value in your D&D.  But pretending that the only reason to have minions is to let your players feel like their balls are huge, or saying that the only reason someone could like them is because of how miserable their lives are is ... a stretch.

-O

Quote from: B.T.;318209First of all, killing a creature with 1 HP is not an accomplishment.  Second of all, making the players feel as though their genitalia have increased in size is not why people should be playing role-playing games.  (If you're compensating for a lackluster life, playing an RPG is probably unhealthy for your psyche.)  Third of all, heroism isn't defined by how many mooks you kill; it's defined by what you do.  (You're not a hero because you killed a bunch of orcs.  You're a hero because you saved the town they were going to raid from utter destruction.)

Getting serious for a moment, I agree with you absolutely here, though I think the number of "I killed 70,000 orcs today, now I'm going to go home and be an absolute stallion with my wife...except I don't have a wife and I live in my mum's basement, so I suppose I'll just have a wank" players is actually pretty small. There is a definite ego-massaging element to the idea of minions that I don't think is deniable, but it's just a side benefit to most people.

More concerning for me is the latter part. The minion concept is a weird and in my opinion unhealthy conflation of awesomeness and heroism that people shouldn't really be encouraging. Not necessarily because of any moral or ethical concern; more because it simply doesn't make for a long term satisfactory sense of accomplishment. Heroism (at least any heroism worth the name) is about besting insurmountable odds. Not romping to victory and being home in time for tea.

People might point to heroes of legend (Samson, Achilles, Gilgamesh) and say, "Ah, but didn't they kill thousands of 'mooks' every day before breakfast?" The answer is yes, but that such actions are part of the tragedy of their stories, not the heroism.

The majority of people that I have seen supporting the concept of minions have used the "it lets the PCs feel awesome" argument.  I can only imagine that those who need to feel "awesome" with their fictional characters are trying to compensate for their less-than-awesome existence (particularly given that the stereotypical D&D player is overweight, unattractive, and unhygienic).

Re: Cinematic

I have no issue with the word itself, but its overuse causes a deep clenching within my bowels.  The majority of complaints that I have about 4e are the powers not making sense, and there are plenty of folks who brush that off with inane comments like, "Welcome to cinematic role-playing."  "Cinematic" is a meme and buzzword that 4e shoved to the forefront of D&D when people began criticizing it for lacking verisimilitude.  It is hollow, a husk of word that people bandy about instead of making actual arguments.

...I hate the word "cinematic."  I guess I do have an issue with it.

Sounds lamezorz.

If your characters couldn't know, you can't know. If your characters can figure it out in-game, so can you. Aren't we roleplaying?

Tyranny of Fun? Well, it's not hardcoded in the rules, so I'd have to say no.

Lame ass 4th-wall-breaking DMing?