Quote from: Pat on April 19, 2021, 09:27:50 PM

Quote from: Ghostmaker on April 19, 2021, 10:37:51 AM

Quote from: Pat on April 19, 2021, 10:23:40 AM

Quote from: Slambo on April 19, 2021, 09:15:27 AM

Quote from: Ghostmaker on April 19, 2021, 08:44:52 AM
The problem goes back further than 5E. I remember being absolutely floored that Monte Cook wanted to nerf martial types further in 3E and that they were too powerful compared to casters.

I cannot for the life of me understand that line of thought. I liked 3E, even with its flaws, but holy shit, did they beat fighters with the nerf stick.

Wait really? Did he mean in refrence to earlier editions or in refrence to early 3e.

Both. Monte Cook was one of the leads on 3e, and apparently strongly pushed wizards. And for after 3e released, see his variant Player's Handbook, Arcana Unearthed.

Though I think it's less that he thought fighters were overpowered and more that he just really, really liked spellcasters.

I'm not sure the distinction matters. I understand spellcasters are cool and all (I mean, I've got no room to talk as I love to play 'em), but the more I look at 3E, the more I wonder what the hell they were thinking.

I think the psychology behind it matters, because it can help explain why it happened and how to avoid that kind of problem in the future.

Wizard supremacy has a couple of roots. One, is the players most inclined to become rules geeks and thus designers seem to overwhelming prefer wizards. It tickles that geek power fantasy itch, by giving them a physically weak character who can acquire REAL ULTIMATE POWER (cf. Raistlin's popularity). It also tickles the rules geek itch, because it gives them more moving parts to play with.

As a result, there's a strong inherent bias in favor of wizards. That's complicated by a couple of additional factors, one of which is the reality or lack there of of magical powers. If a designer is the the type of geek who is always picking nits, what does that do to fighters? It limits them. Because they start looking at fatigue, encumbrance, whether it's realistic for Fighter Bob to walk away from a 60 foot fall, and so on. The result is a progressive nerfing of the fighter class. And since we're talking about geeks who go over every last detail again and again, this becomes multiple waves of nerfing as everything is overthought and every "realistic" restriction imaginable is put in place. And especially if define fighters are defined as the anti-magic-user class or mundane class, you end up with things like 3e's feat list, where there's not a truly heroic or legendary feat to be found (until epic levels, at which point they're pretty pathetic).

On the converse side, magic is explicitly not realistic. It can't be tested against reality, and how it works varies from source to source. So instead of tending toward harsh limits a la the fighter, the tendency with wizards it to remove limits. Because you can always find an example where it doesn't work like that, so out damn restriction, out! And when it comes to powers, it's even worse, because all those different myths and legends are pillaged for the best and most powerful powers. Some of which are insanely powerful, because magic in stories tends to have plot-based limit, not some kind of internal limits. The reason wizards don't dominate the stories in every way is because they're written that way, not because Merlin is balanced against King Arthur. So you end up with a steady erosion of the natural limits built into the game system, and an endless procession of new powers that are all added on top of each other.

Any good redesign of fighters or mages needs to recognize these tendencies, and counter them.

Interesting points, ill have to keep that in mind.

Agree with Slambo, good points Pat.  I wouldn't have thought about it exactly like you've put it, but I was very conscious of that issue while designing my system.  We'll see if I managed to side-step the landmines when I get it fleshed out and tested more.  Interesting timing, because what I'm working on in the design at the moment is ... putting even more limits on magic.

Quote from: Renegade_Productions on April 16, 2021, 03:20:27 PM
Has to be both, because Hasbro has embraced wokeness for a while now. They won't curtail anything WOTC does unless it severely hurts their bottom line, and Magic dwarfs D&D these days.

Magic money will act as a shield for WOTC to HASBRO.

5e will soon be the longest running edition of D&D WOCT has put out. Any upcoming decline in sales will be spun as an effect of the edition life-cycle playing itself out...

Plus, it takes a while for the woke to take effect and start to impact sales. And the SJW's at WOTC are only now just starting to turn up the dial.

Quote from: Omega on April 16, 2021, 07:14:12 PM
...
WOTC on the other hand is weird in that they talk big, but their product tends to be practically devoid of big displays. And what is in a book tends to be either small, or small to the point of being a single meaningless sentence.
...
Their staff on the other hand can't shut their damn mouths virtue signalling and marketing slapped "warning" disclaimers on every Drive Thru page for any older game they sell as being "problematic".

This disparity is the result of WOTC being almost entirely converged at the employee level, but not quite at the Executive.

Something interesting to look at:
https://www.comparably.com/companies/wizards-of-the-coast/executive-team

The WOTC executive team, while I'm sure are politically left, are a bunch of old white people. Probably grew up being what most would describe as a left-coast mid 90's democrat.  Not rabid SJW's.

But the younger crowd is in the door and is merely awaiting their turn at the wheel.

Proof of convergence from the link above:

"The Wizards of the Coast Executive Team is rated a "C" and led by CEO Chris Cocks. Wizards of the Coast employees rate their Executive Team in the Bottom 40% of similar size companies on Comparably with 501-1,000 Employees.
The HR department and Female employees are more confident in their Executive Team, while Caucasian employees and Male employees think there is room for improvement. "

The people hired to head the HR department are still clearly loyal to the executives. (the VP of HR has been there 9 years and is probably a personal friend of one of the executives...)

But the White male SJW employees are clearly chomping at the bit.

They are clearly being given increased room to play, Exhibit A: Jessica Price working on the Ravenloft book.

But evidently there are limits the SJW's in prime jobs are hesitant to cross. One look at the twitter feeds of Chris Perkins and Jeremy Crawford will show that they are in virtual lock step with the far-left SJW progressive agenda. Yet the product they are in charge of seems to be giving only lip-service. So far...

The SJW's there are starting to slowly turn up the dial. But for now, somewhere in the process someone is putting limits on the madness at WOTC.

In another thread I said that he thing to watch out for at WOTC is Executive changes. When you see musical chairs at the top level – especially in the HR department; watch out!

That will be the sign that WOTC/D&D is about to really start chugging the Kool-Aid...

Quote from: Pat on April 19, 2021, 09:27:50 PM

Wizard supremacy has a couple of roots. One, is the players most inclined to become rules geeks and thus designers seem to overwhelmingly prefer wizards. It tickles that geek power fantasy itch, by giving them a physically weak character who can acquire REAL ULTIMATE POWER (cf. Raistlin's popularity). It also tickles the rules geek itch, because it gives them more moving parts to play with.

The last version of D&D built to curb wizards was 1E AD&D.  But people whined about how easy it was for spells to be disrupted.

Quote from: Eirikrautha on April 17, 2021, 02:19:52 PM

Quote from: KingCheops on April 16, 2021, 02:29:27 PM
I was a little disappointed with the book but then that's because I buy in the wider publishing sphere.  DM's Guild and 3rd party/kickstarter.  The stuff in Tasha's was interesting but more on par with the better produced stuff on DM's Guild.

Yeah, that's a good description.  Recent WotC D&D products have been on the level of (or worse than) fan-made quality.  The WotC employees in charge of the supplements and adventures seem to be lacking the skills of actual "designers," regardless of their titles....

Because they are no more skilled than the hobbyists putting out good stuff on the DM's Guild.

Most of the people working at WOTC now have never had to sell a product on its own merits without it being attached to a known RPG IP like D&D.

They have gotten to, and maintained their place, more due to drive and desire, than any actual special skillset.

Quote from: Steven Mitchell on April 19, 2021, 11:06:00 AM
...
WotC has always had multiple personality disorder when it comes to coherent design and development.  It's not merely "design by committee", though that is certainly an issue.  It's more like a design committee that knows that design by committee knocks the vision and life out of a product.  So they decided to compensate by designing and developing 3 or 4 different visions all at once and hoping it would work out...

I don't think that is an intentional effect. From what few things Pundit has mentioned in passing about his correspondence with Mearls about the design of 5e; there was evidently a lot of back and forth in the design team on how things should be done.

I got the impression that Mearls had to push back a lot on what other designers wanted to do. Very much a design by committee with one member of the committee being only a bit more powerful than the other members. Literally 3-4 different visions competing for page space.

Maybe Pundit could clarify, but I got the impression that the "lead designer" of 5e had a lot less overall authority over how things would be than one would at first think.

Did he pick people like Perkins and Crawford for his team, or were they assigned? That would make a big difference in his perceived authority over the direction of 5e by his supposed underlings.

And then of course all you need to do is take one look at the quality of product that a one man shop like Kevin Crawford can turn out, and it really makes you wonder why they needed so many writers for the three core books...

I am fully willing to be corrected on these assumptions however as it is just my speculation.

Quote from: Pat on April 19, 2021, 09:27:50 PM
...I think the psychology behind it matters, because it can help explain why it happened and how to avoid that kind of problem in the future.

Wizard supremacy has a couple of roots. One, is the players most inclined to become rules geeks and thus designers seem to overwhelmingly prefer wizards. It tickles that geek power fantasy itch, by giving them a physically weak character who can acquire REAL ULTIMATE POWER (cf. Raistlin's popularity). It also tickles the rules geek itch, because it gives them more moving parts to play with. ...

... magic is explicitly not realistic. It can't be tested against reality, and how it works varies from source to source. ... the tendency with wizards it to remove limits. ..., so out damn restriction, out! .... So you end up with a steady erosion of the natural limits built into the game system, and an endless procession of new powers that are all added on top of each other.

I think an additional effect is due to the way WOTC has done feedback/surveys.

As there are far more players than GM's – the responses to these surveys are heavily weighted towards the players wants and desires. And I would be utterly shocked if WOTC ever took the time to try and give equal weight to GM responses.

Players will almost always vote for more magic with less restrictions. And the people who actually have to run the game with their protestations about power creep and balance have their voices drowned out in the crowd.

So we have been in a cycle where WOTC just keeps giving out the DIB's and removing the restrictions on magic because their "survey's" tell them it's what everyone wants...

Quote from: Pat on April 19, 2021, 09:27:50 PM
...
Any good redesign of fighters or mages needs to recognize these tendencies, and counter them.

It would be nice, but I really doubt we'll ever see that. In fact I think D&D has a big legacy issue that keeps that from happening – D&D was never made from the ground up for a particular fantasy setting.

D&D was always a hodge-podge of different Fantasy S&S, and Weird Fantasy sources. If you were to take a step back and curate the next edition of D&D for a particular setting a lot things would need to be re-thought out.

And heaven forbid you do anything that would wind up "nerfing" casters, or even worse, dare to remove one of the playable monster races...

Quote from: Jaeger on April 20, 2021, 09:22:52 PM
And heaven forbid you do anything that would wind up "nerfing" casters, or even worse, dare to remove one of the playable monster races...

Constrained form. Limits are important. They're not just how we keep things in check, but they're the best way to give things a unique flavor. When you have a world that includes every monster, it's going to end up looking a bit like the Forgotten Realms or Greyhawk, no matter what you do. The best way to create a new world isn't to come up with a new spin on existing monsters, but to exclude things.

Same is true with magic. The endlessly growing spell list, and then lumping all magical spell lists into one (two counting the divine) in 2e was a mistake. My first fix is to pare things back, restrict things. Magic-users have their own list, and illusionists have a separate and almost completely distinct one. Same with death masters, incantatrixes, alienists, and sorcerers.

This works well with B/X as a chassis. Magic-users have 12 spells per level, no more. Clerics have 8, no more. And that's the absolute maximum. No additions. Any new spells don't get added to those lists, they're used to make new lists. Don't make the BECMI mistake, give druids their own list with no split-class overlap with clerics. Same can be true for even the partial casters, like avengers and paladins. And correct one of the B/X mistakes, and give elves their own list.

There's a huge list of spells from other editions, and they're easy to convert. But don't use them to keep amping up the magic-user and cleric. Instead, use them to make magic unique, wondrous, and different. Different traditions, different styles, and it all goes back to different spell lists.

Dang, Pat, people are going to think I cribbed from you.  I've got 3 separate magic types, each with their own spells.  No overlap, but some similarities.  For example, every caster has some form of a spell that will provide light, but they are different spells designed to work within what that caster does. 

I agree.  Giant spell lists where every caster and their brothers use a slightly different subset doesn't really do much for magic.