TheRPGSite

This may sound like a rant but I dont intend it as one. As I have mentioned many times on this site I have been gaming for decades but admittedly havent been exposed to the hobby at large for the most part until very recently. As a result I find myself discovering what is old news and clearly obvious to many of you. Forgive me if I sound completely uninformed and naive when I choose to comment on one of these discoveries.

Recently I have come across various discussions that seem to be centered around a ridiculous amount of effort in a characters stats, abilities, skills, feats or what have you. Players are comparing this skill with another one and complain they arent balanced or that this character type is disadvantage because of this ability v.s. another one. A tremendous amount of discussion surrounds why a character should be made this way v.s. another way, how it may limit their combat options or force them to be played in a given manner to take advantage of this or that trait.

I will admit Im reading these and thinking WTF? We are talking about a Roleplaying game right? The rules are there to emulate the character, they govern and regulate the actions of an imagined individual, not a block of mechanics. This isnt a boardgame or wargame afterall.

I cant remember a time where I, or anyone at my table, assigned a trait, skill, ability, stat or anything else to a character for any other reason than that is how how we envisioned the character! If I imagine my character as having a certain ability its seems crazy to drop that ability because by thumbing through the book I found one that will perform a bit better. Better, Worse, Good, Bad - these are all relative terms and I dont see how they should influence the building of an individual with a background, personality, habits etc.

If a choice of a skill or something was discovered to be a disadvantage to a character, thats simply what that person has to deal with in life. They can work around it, learn something else eventually or whatever but the very notion of spending a long periods, min-maxing over what abilities to choose and how they, mechanically, relate is so foreign to me I find it hard to grasp.

Am I a rarity in this?

No, not a rarity at all.

Character Generation is the start of the proicess for me. As soon as the PC is in play, it starts to change, so after 20 sessions it will be very different to that created in chargen

We choose skills etc based on how we see the PC, not on the best combination of skills/abilities.

I think you are. I think that is one of the reasons disadvantage systems became popular. I've run across enough players in my time who won't RP a characters negative traits to strongly favor systems that give me something for playing an imperfect character. I got tired of being penalized for having a PC with some flaws, but I like PCs who have some character.

Min / Maxing is also a thing, seeing as how there is an actual term for the behavior. I'm not fond of that either as I prefer to build a character as I see him, not necessarily the most efficient way to do so.

So yes, if you have avoided these things until recently, count yourself lucky.

I think to a certain extent everyone optimizes their characters to a certain degree imo. I have seen both sides of the issue. Characters that optimize too much and others that are so non-optimized as to be useless at the table. I tend to want to DM and play with the first more than the second. I can handle a optmizer. The second tends to involve more work as a DM. Build the low Str and Con Fighter in a game of D&D. Yet somehow wants to be as good as the other player who does the opposite. Then instead of blaming themselves for their choices at character development then it's everyone else. No one forced anyone to build a character who can't carry enough weight, does less damage, hit less and can take less damage. I will give advice as a DM and player during character creation. Feel free to ignore it. I DON"T want to hear whining and complaining later. Mind you depending on the rpg one can do the above. Gurps, Hero and Savage Worlds it can be done. With D&D not so much. Even then I see why some use, make and talk about character builds because their is so many trap and crap options in Pathfinder. A description that has great fluff yet the crunch sucks balls. Another issue with rpgs that are so dependent on attributes like D&D is that one has to have them high enough for certain abilites to be effective. One wants to play a character that uses many Enchantment/Charm style spells. Better have a decent Int or Cha otherwise good luck affecting anyone with those spells. Build your low Str Fighter don't expect me or the others at the table to automatically be your pack mules. Or expect me as a DM to throw in items that boost Str and Con. Especially don't whine and complain when all advice given is ignored. Build the character one wants assume the responsabilites of ones own chocies.

Quote from: rgrove0172;988844We are talking about a Roleplaying game right?

Most role-players don't role-play. See fat neckbeards parked at game tables, doing nothing.

Yes, we are rarities.

It's one of the reason I hate 3rd edition and later.  I can tolerate complicated character generation in a complex point buy game like CHAMPIONS, but modern D&Ds combination of levels, skill points, and feats is a hellish 17-sided clusterfuck of gaming fail.

Added to by the fact that the rules are garbage; rather than playtesting, the asswipe in charge at one point said that bad choices were left in the rules to "encourage system mastery," which is fancy language for "we don't know what we're doing."  In Star Wars d20, for example, there are rules that actually do the opposite of what the text says they do.

Stormwind called and it wants it's Fallacy back.

The bullshit that one is unable to roleplay if one has a slightly optimized character is just that pure 1000% prime bullshit. Every edition encouraged it imo. With 3E and later it's more obvious. With 2E their was actual penalties to dump stating so their was less of that. Yet people optimizing characters by taking certain proficiences and attributes it was still there. Then again it's the same in the hobby. Every edition of a rpg a gamer likes is above reproach. The ones they don't like of course inevitably encourage rollplaying. 2E had it's share of clusterfuck of gaming fail imo. Unclear rules, the crap about penalizing demi-humans. Uneven Kit design where some were better or some were worth ripping out the page and using it for toilet paper. Over the year and with many gaming groups 90% of the time we have been able to build optimized characters of various degrees and still roleplay. The other 10% it's the few who refuse to roleplay no matter the edition or simply want to game together kill some stuff and take their treasure.

No we are not rarities. We can think that we are but we are not. About as rare as oxygen in the air.

It's a lot harder to "optimize"* when you take out all the widgets. There's a difference between buying better armor and planning your "build" 10 levels in advance. Of course, I'm sure you can RP using any system, whether you munchkin it up or not. I'd just rather not wait two hours for you to roll your PC out the garage, when we could be 10 miles down the road already while you where constantly checking under your hood for that extra module to bolt on.

*euphemism for unabashed min-maxing.

Good point yet every rpg that has a significant release schedule suffers from that issue. Not just 3E D&D. Many sourcebooks is both a curse and a blessing. It's also part of gamer dna to want to find the best option or at the very least look at all options. Not to mention their is session zero where the group meets to make characters. Our rule of thumb is make characters first then game. It solves so many problems.

PC build culture did not begin with 3e, but the D20 explosion brought the concept into the mainstream of gaming. Pre-2000, PC build culture was mostly limited to Hero fans and other fans of point-buy games. It was an inherent part of Champions RPGing. AKA, you have 200 points, go forth and do what thou wilst as long as you only use 200 points. Thus, many players did everything possible to squeeze the maximum out of those 200 points. Not a big surprise. Of course, there was also Car Wars, where a similar PC build culture exists. AKA, you have $20,000 and you want to max out your ride for the arena.

Also no surprise that PC build culture players were / are often those players who prefer the mathematics of RPGing (and thus, the combat effectiveness of their PC) over the theatrics of RPGing. Not always, but often.

This gets exacerbated to the extreme online because it's easy to have a gazillion threads on "what's the best combat feat tree" vs. threads on "how do I play a dwarf more dwarfy to achieve maximum dwarfiness"?

Quote from: rgrove0172;988844Am I a rarity in this?

Yes.

Probably not as rare as the annoying white-room theory wonks who obsess about builds though.

Quote from: cranebump;988866It's a lot harder to "optimize"* when you take out all the widgets. There's a difference between buying better armor and planning your "build" 10 levels in advance.

Correct. I am always puzzled by the latter. It's like those parents sending their baby to baby pilates and assigning half-hour periods of the day for wooden toys, for music, for books and so on, and choosing which kindergarten to send their kid to so they have the best chance of going to Harvard.

Ambition is nice, but come on, seriously?

Quote from: sureshot;988853Build the low Str and Con Fighter in a game of D&D. Yet somehow wants to be as good as the other player who does the opposite. Then instead of blaming themselves for their choices at character development then it's everyone else. No one forced anyone to build a character who can't carry enough weight, does less damage, hit less and can take less damage. I will give advice as a DM and player during character creation. Feel free to ignore it. I DON"T want to hear whining and complaining later.

Some would call that character development. No a weak, sickly fighter shouldn't be as good in combat as a strong healthy one, but as a player there should be some aspect to reward a more interesting character, additional skills (with age comes wisdom), maybe he makes up for his weakness with dirty tricks. He has been around a long time and probably has many contacts or a positive reputation.

Playing an aging has been fighter should be an interesting option, a good GM / system will reward the player in some regard. Failure to do so leads to everybody playing boring Mr. 18/00 and where is the fun in that.

Quote from: Toadmaster;988902Some would call that character development. No a weak, sickly fighter shouldn't be as good in combat as a strong healthy one, but as a player there should be some aspect to reward a more interesting character, additional skills (with age comes wisdom), maybe he makes up for his weakness with dirty tricks. He has been around a long time and probably has many contacts or a positive reputation.

Character development is all good if the character playing the sickly weak fighter accepts his limitations. Not build that type of character then expect to do the same as the strong healthy high Str character. While claiming the high Str character is a munchkin optimizer. That type of bullshit happens to much. I have roleplayed weaker characters on occasion. I played a clumsy Thief in second edition and it was one of those groups where their was a second Thief and he had higher DEx. I was not trying to do same as the other character or claim he was a optimizer. Gamers want to build the character they want but they don't want to assume responsabilties for their choices during character creation

Quote from: Toadmaster;988902Playing an aging has been fighter should be an interesting option, a good GM / system will reward the player in some regard. Failure to do so leads to everybody playing boring Mr. 18/00 and where is the fun in that.

I'm not saying don't play the character. Build the aging Fighter yet know the limitation of the character. Playing the aging Fighter that charges like a idiot into battle and gets knocked out or killed. Or the younger stronger Fighter is better in combat then bitch about yeah I'm going to call you out on your bullshit at the table. Both as a player and as a DM.

I don't put up with that crap in games I ref, but most of the games have random generation so it's not really an issue. You get what you get and you play it. I have no patience for "optimizing" based on rules and percentages and what not. I remember playing Hero system aka Champions and discovering this world of "builds" and skimming/shaving points and following the letter of the law over the spirit...I quickly tired of dealing with  characters with a Con of 23 and an Int of 18 (or whatever the breakpoints were). I never really understood the object, it was like a contest between players to see who could cheat the best without actually cheating or something. I don't get it.

Quote from: rgrove0172;988844If a choice of a skill or something was discovered to be a disadvantage to a character, thats simply what that person has to deal with in life. They can work around it, learn something else eventually or whatever but the very notion of spending a long periods, min-maxing over what abilities to choose and how they, mechanically, relate is so foreign to me I find it hard to grasp.

Am I a rarity in this?

B: No you are not a rarity. I feel exactly the same. But sometimes it sure feels it!
I like to create characters. Sometimes those characters are fairly competent. But very often I take skills or equipment that is not "optimal" because it fits the character concept or just interested me at the time. Or during play I'll tend to keep my first magic weapon or item I found as it is usually something early on and hard fought to have lived to walk away with.

A: Some fora are worse than others. BGG/RPGG comes to mind now and then. Though thats died down over the last few years. Somewhere if I think the late 70s or early 80s these sorts started to crop up. Rare. But vocally obnoxious. Enough that they got commented in increasingly derisively in gaming magazines. Youd see in with Gurps alot too. Then along came 3e D&D/d20 and BOOM! Am RPG that pretty much required you to plot out your characters future and optimize.

Quote from: cranebump;988866It's a lot harder to "optimize"* when you take out all the widgets. There's a difference between buying better armor and planning your "build" 10 levels in advance. Of course, I'm sure you can RP using any system, whether you munchkin it up or not. I'd just rather not wait two hours for you to roll your PC out the garage, when we could be 10 miles down the road already while you where constantly checking under your hood for that extra module to bolt on.

*euphemism for unabashed min-maxing.

2e has a LOT of character building involved if you use kits etc. - it just mostly happens at first level instead of being spread out.  (Other than duel-classing, which from an optimizer's view was the only reason to play a human unless playing a human-only class or actually anticipating very high levels.)

Really though - what's with all of the badwrongfun complaints here?

I was a min maxer for many years. All through 2e, 3e, shadowrun and a bunch of systems. Our whole group was. And it works fine as long as you all are. And yes we roleplayed heaps, no worry about that. Minmaxing is no bar to having cool RP moments/stories.

Where it falls apart is when not everyone is minmaxing, then it inevitably results in an early campaign death - either because the other players get jack of your mixmaxed beast, or the GM accidentally TPK's the whole party trying to challenge your minmaxed PC. Over time however, starting around 4e  I guess (perhaps others in my group earlier than me, or a bit later, doesnt really matter i suppose) came to the realisation that minmaxing doesnt really help. If the whole party is doing it, and keeping up, then the GM just adds more monsters/makes them more powerful = zero net gain. If only some of the PCs are doing it, the campaign ends early and you start again (for reasons above).

So, to my mind, minmaxing doesnt really help/make the game more fun in the long term. Yes it can be a fun intellectual exercise but, often, it is downright detrimental to a campaign and can f*ck it up completely. Better to spend your time on other things.

The person running this website is a racist who publicly advocates genocidal practices.

I am deleting my content.

I recommend you do the same.

Quote from: Psikerlord;988941If the whole party is doing it, and keeping up, then the GM just adds more monsters/makes them more powerful = zero net gain. If only some of the PCs are doing it, the campaign ends early and you start again (for reasons above).

So, to my mind, minmaxing doesnt really help/make the game more fun in the long term. Yes it can be a fun intellectual exercise but, often, it is downright detrimental to a campaign and can f*ck it up completely. Better to spend your time on other things.

I'll say - I enjoy coming up with interesting builds and seeing what I can make work.  (copy-pasting internet builds is boring to me)  I enjoy coming up with oddball concepts which I can make work through power-gaming the crap out of it to make it viable.

Quote from: sureshot;988865Every edition encouraged it imo. With 3E and later it's more obvious. With 2E their was actual penalties to dump stating so their was less of that. Yet people optimizing characters by taking certain proficiences and attributes it was still there.

Quote from: Spinachcat;988874PC build culture did not begin with 3e, but the D20 explosion brought the concept into the mainstream of gaming. Pre-2000, PC build culture was mostly limited to Hero fans and other fans of point-buy games.

It's true that shuffling and optimizing of stats and skills didn't begin with 3e. But still, there's minmaxing and there's builds. It's a difference whether I minmax a few stats at character creation or whether I have to pre-plan my experience track for 20 levels.

But 3e wasn't the game to begin this. The first game where I saw players pre-planning advancement and class dipping (or rather, career dipping) was WHFRP. But it wasn't as "bad" as with 3e because there were no trap choices and as many prerequisites to meet.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;988859Yes, we are rarities.

It's one of the reason I hate 3rd edition and later.  I can tolerate complicated character generation in a complex point buy game like CHAMPIONS, but modern D&Ds combination of levels, skill points, and feats is a hellish 17-sided clusterfuck of gaming fail.

Added to by the fact that the rules are garbage; rather than playtesting, the asswipe in charge at one point said that bad choices were left in the rules to "encourage system mastery," which is fancy language for "we don't know what we're doing."  In Star Wars d20, for example, there are rules that actually do the opposite of what the text says they do.

Come on, Gronan, just tell us already how you really feel about 3rd edition and later:D!

For the record, I don't like those editions, either, because the optimization usually doesn't correspond to anything in the game world. OTOH, I'd gladly play Legends of the Wulin, which is a game of heavy optimisation, but every part of it corresponds to very concrete things in the game world;).

I'll see your Gronan and raise you an "all RPGs suck".

I don't like games where gaming the system is a large part of play. 3e really started the ball rolling on this one. Yes, GURPS and Champions reward system familiarity and have more or less efficient ways to spend character points, but an experienced character is not as likely to be crippled by a choice you didn't realize you were making at the start.

I think it has also given players the expectations of unlocking all sorts of new k3wl powerz when they "level up". Maybe my old school roots are showing, but I prefer slow incremental growth.

Min-maxing has always been a thing. People have been complaining about munchkins since the AD&D cartoon was on Saturday mornings.

Character builds really came into prominence during 3E, I think, because of a combination of the traditional D&Dism "everyone plays a different role and pulls his own weight, so that together we win" with the fact that the system was so terribly balanced and (intentionally) filled with "trap options" meant that you almost HAD to optimize, just so your martial character could keep up for at least a little while with CoDZilla. 3.5E punches you in the arm and whines until you DO embrace optimization, whether you want to or not. Nobody wanted to have a TPK because the Paladin sucked--so you'd better build him so he works as well as he can. Oh, here's another book of options to look through. Oh, and another. Have another...

With so much mechanical cruft to pore over, it's no wonder optimization boards became a thing. If you just wanted to play a Fighter and have fun, and not have the other players wishing they hadn't brought you along because your Fighter is a burden, then you might have to look up some tips online. It's the equivalent of pulling out your old Game Genie because you're just tired of the frustration.

Character optimization tends to be a little different in other games. In some games, you'll just realize, hey, if you take this option and combine it with this option, and then take this advantage on top of that, you can do This Cool Thing. And you'll say to yourself, "Hey, I think I'd like to do That Cool Thing. Next time I make a character for this game, I'm going to try this." Nothing wrong with that, but if it's the kind of thing you really enjoy, you ought to try GMing instead--then you get to build characters with wonky gimmicks all the time.  

And if it's the type of game where the PC's don't stick together all the time and go on missions, but split up to pursue their own agendas and get back together occassionally to compare notes and maybe work together on a big caper/boss fight, then optimizers tend to be a lot less of a problem. That one guy optimized his character, and the rest of us didn't? Good, when he hares off on his own, he can get ambushed by Blue Wubblies, they have more hit points. The rest of us will be adequately challenged by the more common Orange Wubblies.

Quote from: Barghest;989010Character builds really came into prominence during 3E, I think, because of a combination of the traditional D&Dism "everyone plays a different role and pulls his own weight, so that together we win" with the fact that the system was so terribly balanced and (intentionally) filled with "trap options" meant that you almost HAD to optimize, just so your martial character could keep up for at least a little while with CoDZilla.

Plus it came out just as the internet became semi-ubiquitous.  I know MtG has ALWAYS been about builds, but it became less okay to bring lame decks around then too.  (albeit since it's not co-op, it's entirely different social situation)

I shouldn't need to say it, but there is a difference between min/maxing the system and min/maxing in character.

Example being I once made an aging gunfighter for an old west game. Based on the age and treachery trumps youth and skill concept he had a variety of weapons to match each to the right situation. Granted this was based on rules, but in character these things matter as well.

The GM had a hissy fit about cheating and min-maxing because he always had the right tool for the job. That was basically the point, that was his thing. His stats were average, but he could usually come out on top through skill and having the perfect tool for the situation. Ironically, from a purely rules based examination, he wasn't a particularly efficient build.

He was loosely based on Lee van Cleef's intro from For a Few Dollars More and his horse mounted tool roll of deadly wonder (TM), with a large dose of Brian Keith's Buckshot Roberts (Young Guns) and a touch of Clint Eastwood's William Munny from Unforgiven. Just a tough old codger who used his experience to best advantage, and felt fair fights were for suckers.

He sounds just right for a character in Boot Hill.

The person running this website is a racist who publicly advocates genocidal practices.

I am deleting my content.

I recommend you do the same.

Thanks for the corrections.

And D&D writers finding out that people are, in fact, pretty fucking stupid goes back to 1974, so my sympathies to the new kid.

Quote from: Spinachcat;988874PC build culture did not begin with 3e, but the D20 explosion brought the concept into the mainstream of gaming. Pre-2000, PC build culture was mostly limited to Hero fans and other fans of point-buy games. It was an inherent part of Champions RPGing. AKA, you have 200 points, go forth and do what thou wilst as long as you only use 200 points. Thus, many players did everything possible to squeeze the maximum out of those 200 points. Not a big surprise. Of course, there was also Car Wars, where a similar PC build culture exists. AKA, you have $20,000 and you want to max out your ride for the arena.

Not true, it was done with magic items rather than formal character mechanics and skills.

Quote from: estar;989067Not true, it was done with magic items rather than formal character mechanics and skills.

Didn't 3E initiate feat trees?

I will never understand why it's considered terrible to create a character with an eye toward mechanics competence, or even optimization. I'll give you a specific example: I once decided to build an "ideal samurai," one who had all the skills a samurai was supposed to have, ideally. The combat skills were at 15, the non-combat were at 12, and I worked out the ideal values for DX and IQ. Result: 12 IQ, 13 DX, and enough points left to buy up ST and HT, plus a point in something else, I can't remember where I spent it. So character optimization led to reasonable stats, a broad range of skills, and an overall well-rounded character. I see nothing wrong in that. Or in D&D and similar, your character is a professional fighter, or bard, or sorceror, or whatever, in a  high risk business. Do you honestly think that the character isn't going to know anything about how to be effective in that profession? Or do you honestly believe that a modern day mercenary fighter doesn't put time into studying different situation,s different weapons, different load outs, to know what's most effective for a given situation?

Frankly, the idea that it's somehow morally wrong to create a character who can actually do something well is just incomprehensible to me.

Quote from: Whitewings;989071Frankly, the idea that it's somehow morally wrong to create a character who can actually do something well is just incomprehensible to me.

I don't think anyone is talking about that so you're either misunderstanding the topic or being disingenuous.

Well, considering that the OP states he finds it completely incomprehensible that anyone might ever make any character creation or development choice for any reason other than "it's my concept!" and that such concerns as actually being effective should be left to board games and war games...

Quote from: Bren;989055He sounds just right for a character in Boot Hill.

Western HERO, but yeah. It was an attempt to avoid the "fastest gun in the west" syndrome not uncommon in point buy systems. We had a Russian nobleman / big game hunter, a female gambler and the rest were basically gun fighters who spent a ton of points in fast draw from a resulting "bidding war" of trying to be the fastest draw in the party. Funny thing the only time we actually had the classic fast draw in the street it turned into a TPK since the GM set it up as an ambush and railroaded us into blindly walking into it. It was fun up to that point.

Quote from: estar;989067Not true, it was done with magic items rather than formal character mechanics and skills.

cough Long Sword cough

Quote from: Whitewings;989071I will never understand why it's considered terrible to create a character with an eye toward mechanics competence, or even optimization. I'll give you a specific example: I once decided to build an "ideal samurai," one who had all the skills a samurai was supposed to have, ideally. The combat skills were at 15, the non-combat were at 12, and I worked out the ideal values for DX and IQ. Result: 12 IQ, 13 DX, and enough points left to buy up ST and HT, plus a point in something else, I can't remember where I spent it. So character optimization led to reasonable stats, a broad range of skills, and an overall well-rounded character. I see nothing wrong in that. Or in D&D and similar, your character is a professional fighter, or bard, or sorceror, or whatever, in a  high risk business. Do you honestly think that the character isn't going to know anything about how to be effective in that profession? Or do you honestly believe that a modern day mercenary fighter doesn't put time into studying different situation,s different weapons, different load outs, to know what's most effective for a given situation?

Frankly, the idea that it's somehow morally wrong to create a character who can actually do something well is just incomprehensible to me.

It is the focus on best way to mechanically build vs what makes sense for the character concept that I think bugs most talking about it. I don't think anybody has an issue with an efficiently designed character if it fits the character description.

Quote from: Whitewings;989071I will never understand why it's considered terrible to create a character with an eye toward mechanics competence, or even optimization. I'll give you a specific example: I once decided to build an "ideal samurai," one who had all the skills a samurai was supposed to have, ideally. The combat skills were at 15, the non-combat were at 12, and I worked out the ideal values for DX and IQ. Result: 12 IQ, 13 DX, and enough points left to buy up ST and HT, plus a point in something else, I can't remember where I spent it. So character optimization led to reasonable stats, a broad range of skills, and an overall well-rounded character. I see nothing wrong in that. Or in D&D and similar, your character is a professional fighter, or bard, or sorceror, or whatever, in a  high risk business. Do you honestly think that the character isn't going to know anything about how to be effective in that profession? Or do you honestly believe that a modern day mercenary fighter doesn't put time into studying different situation,s different weapons, different load outs, to know what's most effective for a given situation?

Frankly, the idea that it's somehow morally wrong to create a character who can actually do something well is just incomprehensible to me.

I'm not sure that a well-rounded character would be considered "optimized?" And no one's arguing for self-gimping. But you shouldn't "have" to have some sort of "optimal" build to sit at the table. You shouldn't have to be a system master.

Speaking of, that term is the eternal crux of the argument. A system master, i.e., optimizer, assumes there's one "best" way to make a character. And the more widgets, bells & whistles there are in a chargen system, the greater chance this view will hold sway at that table. Take class X, dip into class Y, so you can take Feat Q to create the perfect "I win" button. That's what "optimization" too often looks like. Hence my main beef--nothing much is learned from perfection, save that perfection is a dead end. There's nothing heroic about storming Omaha beach inside an Atlas mech. But that is, evidently, how some optimizers want to feel, all the time.

In the end, it's just a control issue. Some handle lack of control with panache, others with whining, making chargen a true, character-revealing process, in more ways than one.

Quote from: Bren;989069Didn't 3E initiate feat trees?

Yes. The thing all the people espousing "it's always been thus" in the context of D&D are overlooking are two factors that were new with 3.x:
1) Officially-sanctioned non-random attribute generation, coupled with choice in assignment. In previous editions it was all-random rolls, and if you were lucky you might be able to choose how you assigned them. 3.x gave you official options to not roll at all, and make your stats the way you wanted to.
2) Significantly more options for customisation, and a generally more complex game. In earlier editions you had attributes, class/race (which might be the same thing), equipment. In 3.x it's attributes, class, race, Feats, assign skill points, equipment. Given you can choose what you get for the first, that means many more opportunities in the other bits given the greater complexity.

Quote from: Toadmaster;989076It is the focus on best way to mechanically build vs what makes sense for the character concept that I think bugs most talking about it. I don't think anybody has an issue with an efficiently designed character if it fits the character description.

Well, the whole field seems rather abstruse to those of us used to "Roll 3d6 in order six times and get on with it!"

Quote from: Kiero;989082Yes. The thing all the people espousing "it's always been thus" in the context of D&D are overlooking are two factors that were new with 3.x:

This is an out of game behavior, the fact that as far as D&D editions 3.X introduced novel (for D&D) mechanics didn't change the underlying fact that a good deal many hobbyists engage in character optimization irregardless of system. In OD&D/AD&D it was the optimal loadout, in 2E it was loadout and picking kits. Then came along 3e. Along the way you had Traveller grognards arguing over the relative merit of FGMP versus Gause rifle. Or what one should pack in a triple turrent. Or you had Runequest hobbyist plotting their way through the training rules figuring which cult offer the most bang for lunar spent.

What 3.X did is just snatch out all the hobbyists that were interested in character customization and combat system with some level of tactical detail. Before the trend was for these hobbyist to migrate to games like GURPS, Runequest, or any of the Storyteller games. It quite apparent after the initial explosion of interest in D&D that that many (not all or most) players prized being able to customize their characters and have more options during combat or other action resolution.

That the original sin, in my view, was catering to the convention tournaments in what was published. And with AD&D that the solution fix one's ills with tabletop roleplaying is more fucking rules.

For me I was forced to confront the issue of character optimization early on. Circa 1980 in my hometown in rural northwest PA, among the gamers younger than 1st year college, what many did was hop from campaign to campaign with their characters. It was a thing to say, "Hey Johnny is running a game over on Elm Street let's grab some characters and go." It was a rare referee that had was called a closed campaign among middle school and high school gamers. Optimal builds, in the form of magic item loadouts, was rampant. There was several players who were notorious for taking innocuous magic items and combining them into game breaking tactics.

I was the referee that was known for letting people trash my campaign. At first with a homebrew, then with Greyhawk, finally with the Wilderlands of High Fantasy which I stuck with to this day. I also was a gamer who liked to referee more than playing which meant I had people asking me to run stuff more often than not. The deal with my campaign that yes you could trash it but it would be a challenge. And while I would let players bring characters from outside, they are limited in the magic items they could bring and they had to keep a separate copy for my campaign afterwards.

Now I am a decent gamer and win more often than I lose. However there are many who are better than me. I am the person who more likely to place high rather than win a tournament. So I had to deal with friends and acquaintances that were one step ahead of me when it came to charops.

The typical response was become draconian in the rules and be miserly with what one hands out. Even in middle school I was self-aware enough to see widespread dislike of this style. So I opted to figure out how to make it a challenge to trash my setting even if the player or players are capable of killing any individual they encounter.

And for the most part I succeeded. How? The biggest one at first was the fact that the previous campaign became the background of the next campaign. Most referees then and now would make a new setting from scratch. In contrast the characters from the previous campaign became the NPCs of the next campaign. This included any of those who a product of extreme charops for the time. Later I became more adept at creation situation where being able to kill any single individual in the immediate environment wasn't a optimal solution for what the players wanted. I took advantage of the fact that  most players when they want to be king don't want to rule over a kingdom of graves.

Flash forward to today, I am a referee who has magic item shops and prices lists.  A referee that rolls with whatever whacked out scheme the players come up with. In fact right now I am running a OD&D campaign, the Majestic Wilderlands, two of the players never played before and one of them is a friend who is notorious for doing charops. Of course he zeroed in on the magic item price list.  But now a couple of months later some of his plan worked out but he worked at making those happen through his adventures.

The deal is this, I don't view it as an issue. You fix it by how you design your campaign. You play the campaign, and then the results go into the next. It that simple.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;989084Well, the whole field seems rather abstruse to those of us used to "Roll 3d6 in order six times and get on with it!"

I like point buy systems because I can design exactly what I want, but I certainly don't hate random character gen. Being able to as you say, "just roll your dice and get on with it" is definitely a perk of that method. I've had some really fun characters that were not at all what I had wanted to play.

Most fellow gamers are in the middle imo. Optimize to a certain extent yet not so much as to be a power gamer. I have seen players with gimped characters try and roleplay their way through everything. Sometimes one just can't. As well as one trick combat tanks who can't roleplay their way through a wet paper bag. The main problem I think beyond the players is the game mechanics. The system rewards someone with higher attributes while penalizing those with lower ones. Combat oriented characters in D&D can get by if a player runs them careful. Casters in later editions kind screw themselves imo because low primary attribute means that certain spell levels are unavlaiable and saving against those spells is fairly easy. The funny and sad thing about is that those who ignore that tend to be penalized later by the system. Casting a Charm Person spell with a int or cha of 12 the DC to save against it is 12 and expect it to be very effective.  Good luck with that. Some rpgs can work with low primary attributes mostly generic ones.

With Pathfinder which has so many trap options character builds while not a must do help imo. I don't think it's a bad thing either.

Quote from: Toadmaster;989118I like point buy systems because I can design exactly what I want, but I certainly don't hate random character gen. Being able to as you say, "just roll your dice and get on with it" is definitely a perk of that method. I've had some really fun characters that were not at all what I had wanted to play.

I've used both a great deal and my opinion on which is better keeps switching. I'm playing in one campaign and running another where all the player-characters are based on point-buy and they are both good campaigns. However, the next campaign I run is not only going to be random chargen but it's going to be full-on lifepath.

Quote from: Toadmaster;989076Western HERO, but yeah. It was an attempt to avoid the "fastest gun in the west" syndrome not uncommon in point buy systems. We had a Russian nobleman / big game hunter, a female gambler and the rest were basically gun fighters who spent a ton of points in fast draw from a resulting "bidding war" of trying to be the fastest draw in the party. Funny thing the only time we actually had the classic fast draw in the street it turned into a TPK since the GM set it up as an ambush and railroaded us into blindly walking into it. It was fun up to that point.



cough Long Sword cough



It is the focus on best way to mechanically build vs what makes sense for the character concept that I think bugs most talking about it. I don't think anybody has an issue with an efficiently designed character if it fits the character description.

This

Is this just a long winded " get off my lawn, amiright?" thread?

To you, I'm sure, yes.

Quote from: CRKrueger;989190To you, I'm sure, yes.

Gotcha, thanks. Just wanted to make sure before I delved into 5 pages of bickering about onetruewayisms

Quote from: Batman;989188Is this just a long winded " get off my lawn, amiright?" thread?

Considering there are opponents/proponents of "optimization" presented throughout, I'd say it's a fairly balanced response to the question, overall.  

But, you're right, so...."Charop is the suckiest suckage suckers have ever sucked in their sucking suckiness.:-)

(P.S. It's a rather tame thread, tbh, with some well-considered answers on both sides [not mine, of course, but they're there]).:-)

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;989084Well, the whole field seems rather abstruse to those of us used to "Roll 3d6 in order six times and get on with it!"

It probably helps that we grew up and got used to systems, O and BX, where stats were allso not as important to gameplay. AD&D bumped that up a notch and I think its there that we started to see the min/maxers and stat cheaters, and stat bitching really start to crop up.

Quote from: rgrove0172;988844This may sound like a rant but I dont intend it as one. As I have mentioned many times on this site I have been gaming for decades but admittedly havent been exposed to the hobby at large for the most part until very recently. As a result I find myself discovering what is old news and clearly obvious to many of you. Forgive me if I sound completely uninformed and naive when I choose to comment on one of these discoveries.

Recently I have come across various discussions that seem to be centered around a ridiculous amount of effort in a characters stats, abilities, skills, feats or what have you. Players are comparing this skill with another one and complain they arent balanced or that this character type is disadvantage because of this ability v.s. another one. A tremendous amount of discussion surrounds why a character should be made this way v.s. another way, how it may limit their combat options or force them to be played in a given manner to take advantage of this or that trait.

I will admit Im reading these and thinking WTF? We are talking about a Roleplaying game right? The rules are there to emulate the character, they govern and regulate the actions of an imagined individual, not a block of mechanics. This isnt a boardgame or wargame afterall.

I cant remember a time where I, or anyone at my table, assigned a trait, skill, ability, stat or anything else to a character for any other reason than that is how how we envisioned the character! If I imagine my character as having a certain ability its seems crazy to drop that ability because by thumbing through the book I found one that will perform a bit better. Better, Worse, Good, Bad - these are all relative terms and I dont see how they should influence the building of an individual with a background, personality, habits etc.

If a choice of a skill or something was discovered to be a disadvantage to a character, thats simply what that person has to deal with in life. They can work around it, learn something else eventually or whatever but the very notion of spending a long periods, min-maxing over what abilities to choose and how they, mechanically, relate is so foreign to me I find it hard to grasp.

Am I a rarity in this?

I am of multiple minds on responding to this. Part of me, like Sureshot and Batman, just want to call out bullshit we can imagine grognards patting themselves on the back about how much more mature people played 'back-in-the-day.' And part of me wants to agree with Gronan that 3e is the apex of this trend (for D&D and D&D-alikes) and that it just doesn't work as well for D&D than it does for point buy systems (and then I want to point out to him that 5e does a really good job of reigning it back in, and how most 'optimal' builds end up as traps). And then I want to go back and point out how people are right that before character builds, it was magic item builds (and ship builds for Traveller) and how there's nothing new under the sun. And then back to the frustration I have with online discussions and people using terms like RAW and white-room-analysis and when did this become tactical analytic amateur hour, emphasis on amateur? ...and then I calm myself. Because rolling my eyes at people pretending they were better than other, usually hypothetical, others is where I started and I've just become what I hate. :-P

Truly, the one takeaway that I have is this: People spend a whole lot of time talking about optimal builds ONLINE. A significant part of that is because it is a common language, and because coming up with the perfect combination is a form of one-upmanship that can be communicated on a forum. That does not mean that the average 'modern' gamer sits down with a character concept that they took from a character optimization forum, and plays-to-win with their perfect combo. As far as I can tell, most players still decide on character concepts, and play close to that. They just then go to their computers and debate for hours whether it is better to use a two-handed weapon or weapon-and-shield, or other, more complex character build debates.

Right. The internet and fora are not the general public.

Players and ESPECIALLY designers seem to far too often think that the internet is some sort of vital representation. It is far far far from that.

I've discussed this elsewhere, but I think focus on 'builds' can be traced back to bad GMing. Here's the steps.

-Play a fairly light RPG with few mechanical levers for players. B/X counts here. Alternatively a game where nobody really understands the rules (due to kids having poor reading comprehension or the game being a complicated mess). The game runs largely off 'GM Fiat'/'Rulings not Rules'.
-GM is a powertripping bastard who siezes control of the flow of the game, kills you unfairly, has stuff happen with you having no input, and generally removes your agency.
-You have no recourse against this, since the rules are basically 'whatever the GM says'
-It sucks.
-Now. Play a new game with lots of mechanical levers for players. Alternatively, actually read and understand the game system. Skills and feats and special abilities and powers. All of them mechanically defined.
-Now you can point at the rules, and the dice rolls, and tell your GM 'no, the rules say this thing happens'.
-You can therefore get agency back by applying your mechanical abilities successfully.
-However, 'successfully' means you need to succeed at the mechanic;
-Shitty GM tries to pull back control by making everything too difficult for you.
-You try to pull back control back again by having a character strong enough that you can mechanically beat your GM's artificially inflated difficulty.
-hense the need to be a powerful character, hense builds.

It's a pattern I've seen repeatedly. Players who are (for want of a better word) traumatized by shitty power-tripping GMs find the best way to have agency in the game is to be mechanically powerful, and so learn to abuse the game mechanics in an arms-race with the GM. This behaviour is infectious, as well. Once a player is wrecking a campaign with a character far stronger than the game expects them to be, the GM is liable to get pissed and respond by smacking them down with overwhelming challenges, which leads to the lack-of-agency-countered-by-mechanical-power behaviours in the whole group. It's a vicious cycle.
I've found the best cure is to get them to play something weird and lethal and funny like paranoia.

I mostly lost interest in video games a long time ago. My brothers are still big into them. Two of my brothers also happen to be extremely smart. They observe "charopers" all around them. They sometimes get told their character doesn't have enough "dps" to join in any reindeer games. Thing is? They absolutely out-perform the charopers on a consistent basis.

How?

Optimization occurs in a bubble. How does one calculate DPS? Rate of attacks, times hit probability, times damage. But how can anyone actually know what these numbers are? Rate of attacks seems pretty straight forward, until you realize mobs don't just stand on conveyor belts that lead right to you. 6 attacks per round isn't 3 times as good as 2 attacks per round if you don't have the movement speed to get to the next guy after you cut down one enemy. It depends on how the "battlefield" is laid out. On the flip side, having the same dps over a greater number of attacks can be more effective than having it over fewer attacks if you're fighting weak creatures, especially ones that go down in one hit either way. As for damage and hit probability, in D&D the latter depends on your opponent's AC. Some RPGs use an armor absorb system instead, so the former would vary. And I suppose some even use both.

And that's only scratching the surface. There can be factors of damage type vs defense type, such as poison damage when enemies may have poison resistance, or lightning damage against someone in full metal armor. Depending how detailed the game is, armor may have different ratings to blunt, piercing, and slashing attacks.

In short, my brothers recognize that there's no such thing as optimal. It's dogma. Everything is situational. So instead, they either cover their bases, or at least recognize they're going to be weak in certain areas and rely on others to handle those cases.

In a tabletop campaign, or perhaps I should clarify, when I run a tabletop campaign, it's even more futile to optimize a character build. In fact, I've become more staunch about having some kind of random element during character creation. Not to thwart optimizers, but as sort of a warning. If you can't hack random chargen without complaining, you're not going to be able to hack the campaign. Things will or may happen to your character through the course of play that disrupt your 10-level plan. Your character might lose an eye and have a penalty to ranged attacks and peripheral vision which may screw up your teh awesum archery build. Or you might stick your arm into a pool up to your elbow and it turns your flesh into iron in permanent fist form. It can function as a buckler, giving you shield protection vs one attack, or give you an additional fist attack for 1d6 damage with no off-hand penalty. But it's going to screw up your two-handed sword build, or your dual-wield build. Maybe even your thief build. Or your rust-monster slayer build.

Quote from: cavegirl;989544It's a pattern I've seen repeatedly. Players who are (for want of a better word) traumatized by shitty power-tripping GMs find the best way to have agency in the game is to be mechanically powerful, and so learn to abuse the game mechanics in an arms-race with the GM. This behaviour is infectious, as well. Once a player is wrecking a campaign with a character far stronger than the game expects them to be, the GM is liable to get pissed and respond by smacking them down with overwhelming challenges, which leads to the lack-of-agency-countered-by-mechanical-power behaviours in the whole group. It's a vicious cycle.
I've found the best cure is to get them to play something weird and lethal and funny like paranoia.

I agree about the cause; hence "Gronan's Three Laws of Gaming" (per Asimov)

1)  The rules can't fix stupid
2)  The rules can't fix asshole
3)  Anything that happened when you, or the referee, were 14, does not constitute a need to change the rules.

But it's amazing how people hold on to things.

Quote from: CRKrueger;989190To you, I'm sure, yes.

As opposed to a "drive-by snarking..."

(him, not you)

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;989591I agree about the cause; hence "Gronan's Three Laws of Gaming" (per Asimov)

1)  The rules can't fix stupid
2)  The rules can't fix asshole
3)  Anything that happened when you, or the referee, were 14, does not constitute a need to change the rules.

But it's amazing how people hold on to things.

Have to +1 that.

Specifically, I think the GM's ability to establish rapport with players makes all the difference and yet it never gets mentioned.

If you're worried about this, just play a game where it's not possible. 1st ed. Ghostbusters or Toon come to mind.

It's interesting to me that "build" and "optimization" are being used interchangeably in this thread. In my experience, people that talk about "character builds" are not merely optimizing, but planning out the entire career of the character ahead of time. It's the difference between deciding to "specialize in longsword" and deciding to "add specialization feat now, uber-specialization at 3rd, gain +1 longsword at 5th, add extra-crit longsword at 6th, etc."

In this sense there's a major leap between "feats" and "feat trees".

I don't mind builds when they're clearly meant for the sake of utility: you want to be a Beastmaster Ranger? take these options. A Fey-Pact Warlock? Start with these. It's a quick way to cover popular archetypes that players will want.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;989593As opposed to a "drive-by snarking..."

(him, not you)

Hahaha, it was an honest question. Especially since the concept of "builds" has been around for a LONG time in TTRPGs. Is it really that jarring of a notion to plan out options in advance considering the massive amount there are in most RPGs today? And to link any causality between players who build their character and their ability to role-play (or lack thereof) is pretty silly.

Quote from: Vargold;989665I don't mind builds when they're clearly meant for the sake of utility: you want to be a Beastmaster Ranger? take these options. A Fey-Pact Warlock? Start with these. It's a quick way to cover popular archetypes that players will want.

I find it amusing that a "fey-pact  warlock" is supposed to be an archetype. I don't even know what that means. At least "beastmaster ranger" seems clear:   a Marc Singer wannabe. Does he summon a Tanya Roberts sidekick at a certain level?

Quote from: Dumarest;989745I find it amusing that a "fey-pact  warlock" is supposed to be an archetype. I don't even know what that means.

pact.
noun
a formal agreement between individuals or parties.

Fey
noun
having supernatural powers of clairvoyance. In Dungeons & Dragons, it usually pertains to otherworldly beings. Usually in reference to creators of elves

Warlock
D&D - an arcane caster of unconventional means.

Quote from: Batman;989753pact.
noun
a formal agreement between individuals or parties.

Fey
noun
having supernatural powers of clairvoyance. In Dungeons & Dragons, it usually pertains to otherworldly beings. Usually in reference to creators of elves

Warlock
D&D - an arcane caster of unconventional means.

Yes I'm familiar with the words. I am talking about the idea that a fey-pact warlock  is an archetype. Just shows how D&D has jumped the shark. :D

Quote from: Dumarest;989754Yes I'm familiar with the words. I am talking about the idea that a fey-pact warlock  is an archetype. Just shows how D&D has jumped the shark. :D

Someone who bargained for supernatural powers that isn't evil or isn't in correspondence with nefarious beings could certainly be an archetype.

Edit: also unfortunate to see one true way-ism isn't dead yet

Quote from: Batman;989761Someone who bargained for supernatural powers that isn't evil or isn't in correspondence with nefarious beings could certainly be an archetype.

Could be, but not as a "fey-pact warlock." I think we can acknowledge how silly the name is.

Sure, you can acknowledge your opinion all you want :D

Quote from: Batman;989743Hahaha, it was an honest question. Especially since the concept of "builds" has been around for a LONG time in TTRPGs. Is it really that jarring of a notion to plan out options in advance considering the massive amount there are in most RPGs today? And to link any causality between players who build their character and their ability to role-play (or lack thereof) is pretty silly.

Hard to "build" something that has no feats, skills, prestige classes, class dipping and other such widgets. I can't remember a time I planned out my Fighter build in B/X ("and when I reach level 6, I'm gonna...roll for more HP's...")

Quote from: cranebump;989799Hard to "build" something that has no feats, skills, prestige classes, class dipping and other such widgets. I can't remember a time I planned out my Fighter build in B/X ("and when I reach level 6, I'm gonna...roll for more HP's...")

Like I said "most RPGs today"

Quote from: cavegirl;989544It's a pattern I've seen repeatedly. Players who are (for want of a better word) traumatized by shitty power-tripping GMs find the best way to have agency in the game is to be mechanically powerful, and so learn to abuse the game mechanics in an arms-race with the GM. This behaviour is infectious, as well. Once a player is wrecking a campaign with a character far stronger than the game expects them to be, the GM is liable to get pissed and respond by smacking them down with overwhelming challenges, which leads to the lack-of-agency-countered-by-mechanical-power behaviours in the whole group. It's a vicious cycle.
I've found the best cure is to get them to play something weird and lethal and funny like paranoia.

I disagree entirely.  Some of us just enjoy the sub-game of character building and having mechanical representation of our character play significantly differently from those other Warrior level 8s (or whatever).

Quote from: Batman;989802Like I said "most RPGs today"

You said they'd been around a long time. I was therefore contemplating my old builds. Like that time I planned out my B/X thief build to level 9 and..,no wait, I died at lvl 4:-)

Quote from: Dumarest;989745I find it amusing that a "fey-pact  warlock" is supposed to be an archetype. I don't even know what that means. At least "beastmaster ranger" seems clear:   a Marc Singer wannabe. Does he summon a Tanya Roberts sidekick at a certain level?

I would have said, Hosteen Storm instead of Marc Singer. Totally with you on not getting how "fey-pact warlock" is an archetype.

Quote from: Batman;989770Sure, you can acknowledge your opinion all you want :D

I see the "muh opinion" non-response is still alive and well, too.

The thing about archetypes is, one person's opinion doesn't make them or break them. We have stories or myths of all sorts with all sorts of characters. Some of these stories and characters are loved. Some are not. And people have made observations--even done serious studies--about certain recurring patterns that seem to resonate with audiences. And those observations are just that. Observations. They may be observations about opinions. But they're still observations. Not opinions as such. And sure. Opinions can and will vary. But from a bird's eye view, there's still an apparent pattern to it. You can stomp your feet all you want, hell can even get a t-shirt that says "Not My Opinion" but that doesn't change the simple fact of reality that it's there. Some things resonate and some things don't. It's a thing.

Now I happen to think that all the way up to AD&D 1st Ed, the game line did a pretty good job looking at myths, legends, folklore, and fiction and pin-pointing things that just popped to include in the game, whether it was character types, or magic items (how the nature of the magic synced up with the object enchanted with the power), and so on. Maybe not perfect. But a pretty decent job. What I find unfortunate about the evolution of D&D after that point though is, it seems to me the standard was no longer "Does this resonate?" but rather it became "Does this fit neatly into a formula?"

Take paladins. There was an archetype that popped. The ultimate knight in shining armor. You can find the knight in shining throughout all sorts of stories. It resonates. Then what? "Ga'huk, well if they can be super good, why not have the exact same thing only super evil?" and "Hey, guys, did you know we have 9 alignments and only 2 paladins? We can have like... seven more different paladins if we just apply the idea equally. Ain't I a creative genius" and finally, "Duhhhh... ya know, what's so special about divine magic? Why can't we also have a character who uses arcane magic instead?" and now we have Eldritch Knights.

Is permutation creative? No. Is there any evidence in history or pop culture that this is an archetype the audience is going to identify with? No. But damn, does it make the game nice and symmetric.

Quote from: cranebump;989818You said they'd been around a long time. I was therefore contemplating my old builds. Like that time I planned out my B/X thief build to level 9 and..,no wait, I died at lvl 4:-)

Long time is relative, I guess. I saw it as early as AD&D in the 90's so for me nearly two decades is a long time. But the fact that early editions were mostly low on options isn't lost on me.

Quote from: Bren;989821I would have said, Hosteen Storm instead of Marc Singer. Totally with you on not getting how "fey-pact warlock" is an archetype.

I just pulled some examples from 5E. The specifics don't matter here: the fact is that builds are a technique in games for getting players up to speed quickly. Technically, every one of the templates in WEG 1st edition Star Wars is a build--they're all built on the same number of points, and it's very easy to reverse-engineer them to get the basic schema. (I used to do this in the early 1990s to make up new templates that were balanced with those in the book.) But rather than say, "You have X points to spend on Attributes and Y points on Skills," you give the build: Brash Pilot, Quixotic Jedi, Young Senatorial.

Quote from: Bren;989821I would have said, Hosteen Storm instead of Marc Singer. Totally with you on not getting how "fey-pact warlock" is an archetype.

I've only read her Solar Queen stories so far, so I don't know enough about Norton's Beast Master. I just know the cheesy beefcake version.

Quote from: Batman;989761Someone who bargained for supernatural powers that isn't evil or isn't in correspondence with nefarious beings could certainly be an archetype.

Edit: also unfortunate to see one true way-ism isn't dead yet

Okay, so we're clear that you like silly classes. Now quote where I said I don't. Gee, you can't . Does the landing  hurt after you jump to conclusions? I just acknowledge D&D has morphed into innumerable silly classes that  are by no means archetypes. Hurts your feelings? :(

Quote from: Dumarest;989841Okay, so we're clear that you like silly classes. Now quote where I said I don't. Gee, you can't . Does the landing  hurt after you jump to conclusions? I just acknowledge D&D has morphed into innumerable silly classes that  are by no means archetypes. Hurts your feelings? :(

Yep, super hurt. Honesty I'm not sure how I'll go on?

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;989591I agree about the cause; hence "Gronan's Three Laws of Gaming" (per Asimov)

1)  The rules can't fix stupid
2)  The rules can't fix asshole
3)  Anything that happened when you, or the referee, were 14, does not constitute a need to change the rules.

But it's amazing how people hold on to things.

Any time somebody brings up the specter of a GM who is both stupid and an asshole as a reason why some rule is necessary, I always wonder, "Why would I waste an afternoon playing games with a stupid asshole? Life is short. It's just a game."

Quote from: Lunamancer;989827Is permutation creative? No. Is there any evidence in history or pop culture that this is an archetype the audience is going to identify with? No. But damn, does it make the game nice and symmetric.

Yeah sword-wielding warriors who use mystical arts that people identify with.....I mean are you familiar with Jedi and the Star Wars universe? And what about Elric? Wasn't he an accomplished sorcerer and wielded a pretty awesome sword that enhanced his combat prowess. Nope no pop culture references there. Yeah we'll go with symmetry

Quote from: Lunamancer;989827I see the "muh opinion" non-response is still alive and well, too.

The thing about archetypes is, one person's opinion doesn't make them or break them. We have stories or myths of all sorts with all sorts of characters. Some of these stories and characters are loved. Some are not. And people have made observations--even done serious studies--about certain recurring patterns that seem to resonate with audiences. And those observations are just that. Observations. They may be observations about opinions. But they're still observations. Not opinions as such. And sure. Opinions can and will vary. But from a bird's eye view, there's still an apparent pattern to it. You can stomp your feet all you want, hell can even get a t-shirt that says "Not My Opinion" but that doesn't change the simple fact of reality that it's there. Some things resonate and some things don't. It's a thing.

Now I happen to think that all the way up to AD&D 1st Ed, the game line did a pretty good job looking at myths, legends, folklore, and fiction and pin-pointing things that just popped to include in the game, whether it was character types, or magic items (how the nature of the magic synced up with the object enchanted with the power), and so on. Maybe not perfect. But a pretty decent job. What I find unfortunate about the evolution of D&D after that point though is, it seems to me the standard was no longer "Does this resonate?" but rather it became "Does this fit neatly into a formula?"

Take paladins. There was an archetype that popped. The ultimate knight in shining armor. You can find the knight in shining throughout all sorts of stories. It resonates. Then what? "Ga'huk, well if they can be super good, why not have the exact same thing only super evil?" and "Hey, guys, did you know we have 9 alignments and only 2 paladins? We can have like... seven more different paladins if we just apply the idea equally. Ain't I a creative genius" and finally, "Duhhhh... ya know, what's so special about divine magic? Why can't we also have a character who uses arcane magic instead?" and now we have Eldritch Knights.

Is permutation creative? No. Is there any evidence in history or pop culture that this is an archetype the audience is going to identify with? No. But damn, does it make the game nice and symmetric.

I assume you're not including UA with classes like Acrobat? Hardly an archetype that 'pops.'

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;989591But it's amazing how people hold on to things.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;989084Well, the whole field seems rather abstruse to those of us used to "Roll 3d6 in order six times and get on with it!"

Champions debuted in 1981, and is widely acknowledged as the first game to use a point-buy character creation system. Point-buy has been a standard in hundreds of games since then.  

Abstruse means obscure or difficult to understand.

You find something to be abstruse that has been a standard in the gaming industry for thirty-six years.

So, yes, pot, that kettle is fairly black... ;)

Quote from: Lunamancer;989827Take paladins. There was an archetype that popped. The ultimate knight in shining armor. You can find the knight in shining throughout all sorts of stories. It resonates. Then what? "Ga'huk, well if they can be super good, why not have the exact same thing only super evil?" and "Hey, guys, did you know we have 9 alignments and only 2 paladins? We can have like... seven more different paladins if we just apply the idea equally. Ain't I a creative genius" and finally, "Duhhhh... ya know, what's so special about divine magic? Why can't we also have a character who uses arcane magic instead?" and now we have Eldritch Knights.

We had eldritch knights (or what they represent) since the LBBs--we called them elves.

Anyways, I'm not sure how we got here. I was suspicious that the original topic was just a SNL 'drunk uncle' routine about 'kids these days, with their caring about the system, and using the rules to win, what happened to trying to emulate a character (please ignore the bevy of threads around here badmouthing storygaming and how the true goal of RPGs is to excel within the ruleset, and not to tell a story, those are totally different)?,' but it actually appears to be based on a true sense of the game changing out from under the OP. I think it's a mistaken sense, this kind of thing has been around since the beginning, but that's neither here nor there. It's an honest reflection and I respect that.

This discussion of achetypes and classes (and frankly quite a bit just class nomenclature) seems to be the real tribal-oneupsmanship contest. And it is silly. Is a Fey Pact Warlock an intuitive concept? Not on the same level as 'illusionist,' and yes, 5e uses the term archtype a bit outside of what it truly means (not the first time that's ever happened). However, on a game where cranebump's B/X game could include the player statement, "My character is Zelf the Elf. I named him after the famous Melf the Elf. He's an elf so that is his race and his class. His favorite magic item is his Daern's Instant Fortess, which allows them to sleep without getting ambushed by Displacer Beasts, those are six-legged panthers with paralytic tentacles coming off their shoulders who always appear to be a couple feet away from where they actually are."-- the fey pact warlock is not the outlier.

As much as I love D&D--I think a game that can't quite abandon, say, the overlap between the heavily armored cleric and the paladin, or all rangers having spells, or similar D&D "traditions" that were tacked on more than archetypes--can hardly be used as the basis for arguing that certain options are or are not sensible.  It's crazy all the way down.  Sometimes a good crazy, granted, and largely what you make of it.

As for builds as mechanical things, whether 3E/PF style class bits or 4E style powers or any D&D equipment or Hero or GURPs or whatever:  I'm fine with a certain minimal amount for characterization, but there are diminishing returns.  Fairly quickly, the accounting overhead can suck all the fun out of the thing, if you aren't careful.  That's true even when the particular accounting you are doing is central to the game being played.  For example, if you are playing the dungeon crawl resource game, then encumbrance and equipment matters, but you probably still don't want to detail the exact composition of every food source or do a big diagram of exactly how the backpack is stacked.  To me, that's what 3E/PF accounting on characters is equivalent to.  Not enough payoff for the work.  For a sizable fraction of that work, I could do more, and more elegantly, in Hero or GURPS.

Char builds are a mini-game for when you cannot game. It's a fun mental exercise if you're very bored and won't get your RPG fix anytime soon, but it's always important to remember theoretical is not applied. I find, outside of discovering the Red Shift Event Horizons of any defined system, it's mainly mental masturbation that could be better applied to world building my campaigns instead. But no one ever accused masturbation of not getting you off, or discovering your functional range boundaries, so... :rolleyes:

Quote from: Batman;989845Yeah sword-wielding warriors who use mystical arts that people identify with.....I mean are you familiar with Jedi and the Star Wars universe? And what about Elric? Wasn't he an accomplished sorcerer and wielded a pretty awesome sword that enhanced his combat prowess. Nope no pop culture references there. Yeah we'll go with symmetry

So your two rebuttal examples are Elric, who isn't all that well known or popular to a broader audience, but who the creators of D&D were clearly familiar with and highly influenced by but yet chose not to include the archetype, and the Jedi whose existence is practically monastic and whose devotion to the force, the source of their power, is repeatedly referred to as a "religion"? What can I say. I guess you got me. I concede.

Quote from: Voros;989879I assume you're not including UA with classes like Acrobat? Hardly an archetype that 'pops.'

Yeah, I really am not fond of the UA material exactly for that reason. I don't get too hung up on the power creep. You actually can see the seeds of abandoning classic archetypes in favor of rationalized abstract categories. Previously, a ranger/druid character had not been possible because a ranger had to be good-aligned while the druid had to be true neutral. UA drew an exception to the alignment restrictions just to allow this combo. And elves who previously weren't allowed to be rangers now are. Why the changes? No apparent reason other than the druid, the elf, and the ranger all hang out in the forest and pick berries together.

Players don't spend a lot of time thinking about options when the game doesn't provide many, or the game's rules don't severely punish them for choosing "bad" options. This doesn't mean they're better players; it' means they're not playing the same game.

A Fighter with these stats in AD&D can be pretty interesting:
9 STR/12 DEX/11 CON/15 INT/7 WIS/17 CHA

Those stats are fucking garbage in 5e. And it's not because the players are different or all a bunch of munchkin min-maxers or the DMs are douchebags, it's because the rules don't provide Fighters with useful things to do with high INT or CHA, and kick him in the balls for not having high STR, DEX, or CON (in terms of the game's design, 9 STR for a 5e Fighter is like having an AD&D fighter with 3 STR, which isn't even legal). It's really that simple. You don't spend time thinking about "builds" when there is nothing to "build" and/or your "build" doesn't matter much.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;990037Players don't spend a lot of time thinking about options when the game doesn't provide many, or the game's rules don't severely punish them for choosing "bad" options. This doesn't mean they're better players; it' means they're not playing the same game.

A Fighter with these stats in AD&D can be pretty interesting:
9 STR/12 DEX/11 CON/15 INT/7 WIS/17 CHA

Those stats are fucking garbage in 5e. And it's not because the players are different or all a bunch of munchkin min-maxers or the DMs are douchebags, it's because the rules don't provide Fighters with useful things to do with high INT or CHA, and kick him in the balls for not having high STR, DEX, or CON (in terms of the game's design, 9 STR for a 5e Fighter is like having an AD&D fighter with 3 STR, which isn't even legal). It's really that simple. You don't spend time thinking about "builds" when there is nothing to "build" and/or your "build" doesn't matter much.

Yea, seriously... If I was playing in an OD&D campaign that used my house rules/clarifications, which is straight 3d6 down the line for stats, I'd seriously consider playing those stats as a Paladin. If he can manage to get one more point of Str somewhere, he would get a +5% XP bonus (the Int 15 gives him 3 more points of Str from the perspective of XP bonus, to a 12 with 13 needed for +5%), but that 17 in Cha is gold. In all my OD&D play since 2006, I've only seen 5 or 6 Cha 17+, and one of those was on a sheet of about 20-30 stats I rolled up as potential henchmen.

Frank

Quote from: fearsomepirate;990037Players don't spend a lot of time thinking about options when the game doesn't provide many, or the game's rules don't severely punish them for choosing "bad" options. This doesn't mean they're better players; it' means they're not playing the same game.

A Fighter with these stats in AD&D can be pretty interesting:
9 STR/12 DEX/11 CON/15 INT/7 WIS/17 CHA

Those stats are fucking garbage in 5e. And it's not because the players are different or all a bunch of munchkin min-maxers or the DMs are douchebags, it's because the rules don't provide Fighters with useful things to do with high INT or CHA, and kick him in the balls for not having high STR, DEX, or CON (in terms of the game's design, 9 STR for a 5e Fighter is like having an AD&D fighter with 3 STR, which isn't even legal). It's really that simple. You don't spend time thinking about "builds" when there is nothing to "build" and/or your "build" doesn't matter much.

I don't know it's true that build doesn't matter much. This fighter will be very different from one with a 17 STR and 15 CON. And what jumps out at me here is high charisma, great not only for loyalty and henchmen, but also the initial NPC reactions. And that's where the high INT is also a boon. More languages. It's a lot easier to parley when you know the other person's language.

There is a certain irony that a later, supposedly more refined version of the game, with tons more options and widgets, where there was more of a conscious effort to "balance" things is so terrible at providing a variety of viable options.

Quote from: Lunamancer;99007There is a certain irony that a later, supposedly more refined version of the game, with tons more options and widgets, where there was more of a conscious effort to "balance" things is so terrible at providing a variety of viable options.

Perhaps in 3e and 4e, yes. However, 5e has come back to it. If you use persuasion/deception/intimidation rolls (so like an optional reaction table rule), then there is still a place for a high charisma fighter character who talks their way out of fights they might be less good at fighting than a 18 strength fighter. The only real difference is that you do not see many strength 9 fighters, which is also the case for B/X or BECMI as well. Only really OD&D (where the scores barely mattered) or AD&D (where it had to be playable without a prime req. stat boost, since most of the boosts started at ~15) were there not more serious consequences to playing a low str fighter, low int MU, etc. (and in AD&D a low int MU was still pretty rare).

That Fighter would be a liability at any edition of D&D imo. Carrying 35 pounds max of gear before being encumbered. As a DM I do track otherwise players will take everything of value not nailed down. While taking a small penalty to saves against spells such as Charm Person. Con is OK nothing to write home about. Not a useless character but not one I would play.

%E has it's flaws at least with 5E Fighters can do more than "I swing and I hit" over and over unlike in Pathfinder.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;990037Players don't spend a lot of time thinking about options when the game doesn't provide many, or the game's rules don't severely punish them for choosing "bad" options. This doesn't mean they're better players; it' means they're not playing the same game.

A Fighter with these stats in AD&D can be pretty interesting:
9 STR/12 DEX/11 CON/15 INT/7 WIS/17 CHA

Those stats are fucking garbage in 5e. And it's not because the players are different or all a bunch of munchkin min-maxers or the DMs are douchebags, it's because the rules don't provide Fighters with useful things to do with high INT or CHA, and kick him in the balls for not having high STR, DEX, or CON (in terms of the game's design, 9 STR for a 5e Fighter is like having an AD&D fighter with 3 STR, which isn't even legal). It's really that simple. You don't spend time thinking about "builds" when there is nothing to "build" and/or your "build" doesn't matter much.

Yeah, but I wanna be an archetypical fey-pact warlock modeled on all those famous fey-pact warlocks from various mythologies and literature. :p

Quote from: ffilz;990069Yea, seriously... If I was playing in an OD&D campaign that used my house rules/clarifications, which is straight 3d6 down the line for stats, I'd seriously consider playing those stats as a Paladin. If he can manage to get one more point of Str somewhere, he would get a +5% XP bonus (the Int 15 gives him 3 more points of Str from the perspective of XP bonus, to a 12 with 13 needed for +5%), but that 17 in Cha is gold. In all my OD&D play since 2006, I've only seen 5 or 6 Cha 17+, and one of those was on a sheet of about 20-30 stats I rolled up as potential henchmen.

Frank

I'd play that as a Paladin in a minute XP bonus or no.  In 44 years I've only had 2 Paladins rolled up in my campaign.  Considering how bloody powerful they are even at low level, that's a good thing.

Quote from: Lunamancer;990076There is a certain irony that a later, supposedly more refined version of the game, with tons more options and widgets, where there was more of a conscious effort to "balance" things is so terrible at providing a variety of viable options.

No one said you can't play a Fighter with those stat in any edition of D&D. You're not as likely to hit monsters, true, but there are other ways of coming up with viable options that can make up some of the difference. In 3e there's always feats like Weapon Finesse that utilize your slightly higher Dexterity score for some weapons. So a 1st level Fighter with 9 STR/12 DEX/11 CON/15 INT/7 WIS/17 CHA is still getting a +2 to hit or +3 if he also takes Weapon Focus (rapier) and deals 1d6-1. With Scale and a shield this characater's AC is still 17 (though I'd probably go with a bow) and he'll have a lot more Skill points. Heck you could also take feats like Intimidating Strike and utilize some of that extra Charisma in combat.

In 4e I wouldn't use these for a Fighter but it could make for a serviceable Warlord. Commander's Strike is simply using your action to give an ally a free attack with your Intelligence modifier as extra damage (basically pointing out an enemy's flaw or opening). Lots of Warlords in 4e didn't put much into Strength because there were abilities that basically just gave other people your attacks. Then there are Skills and even Skill powers that would go nicely with a higher Intelligence or Charisma score too.

In 5e, again I'd either go with a Bow or use Finesse weapons (you don't even take a penalty on damage rolls like you do in 3E) and you're still good to go at 1st level with +3 to attack rolls. AC is still decent with Scale and a shield with a solid AC 17 and since most of the rolls are Ability checks AND you can grab skills from a wide variety of backgrounds, a Fighter with the Sage or Entertainer background will really utilize their Intelligence and Charisma scores.

Quote from: Dumarest;990082Yeah, but I wanna be an archetypical fey-pact warlock modeled on all those famous fey-pact warlocks from various mythologies and literature. :p

Amazingly I was somehow still able (despite the name's lack of pedigree) to take advantage of centuries of fairy lore and fairy tales and changeling-stories and use them as inspiration for the gets-his-magic-from-the-fairies warlock I played in my one 5E experience.

Also, that stat array? Would make an awesome Lazy Warlord in 4E.

Quote from: Vargold;990093Amazingly I was somehow still able (despite the name's lack of pedigree) to take advantage of centuries of fairy lore and fairy tales and changeling-stories and use them as inspiration for the gets-his-magic-from-the-fairies warlock I played in my one 5E experience.

Also, that stat array? Would make an awesome Lazy Warlord in 4E.

Love me some Lazy-Lords! Great concept and a lot of fun to play.

Quote from: Batman;990095Love me some Lazy-Lords! Great concept and a lot of fun to play.

Eilonwy, Daughter of Angharad, is definitely a Lazy Warlord.

Quote from: Vargold;990096Eilonwy, Daughter of Angharad, is definitely a Lazy Warlord.

I've, unfortunately, never seen Disney's Black Cauldron. Though after reading a bit about her, she seems like a feisty princess which works well with the Lazy Warlord concept. :-)

Quote from: Batman;990103I've, unfortunately, never seen Disney's Black Cauldron. Though after reading a bit about her, she seems like a feisty princess which works well with the Lazy Warlord concept. :-)

She might have to do some sort of multi-class or hybrid-class with Wizard, but she's a total Lazy-Lord: "Pig-Boy, take care of this for me, will you?"

9 STR/12 DEX/11 CON in AD&D means (among other things):
* No attack/damage adjustment
* 500 cn carry weight
* No hp adjustment
* No defensive adjustment

A typical 1e fighter's hit and damage adjustment runs between 0 and +1 at 1st level. This covers the STR range from 9 to 17. You might get really lucky, but if you got more than that, it was really lucky.

A typical 5e fighter's hit and damage adjustment runs between +2 and +3 at first level. This covers the STR range from 14 to 17.

See the difference? The adjustment range is the same, but the base the game is designed around is +2, not +0, and the adjustment range covers a much smaller range of ability scores. This is why the "build" matters. A fighter with 11 STR is fucked. He's got an effective -2 penalty to attack and damage relative to the baseline, which in AD&D is like trying to swordfight with 4 STR.

Quote from: Batman;990095Love me some Lazy-Lords! Great concept and a lot of fun to play.

The day I finally understood what a warlord was for was a great day.

Quote from: Dumarest;989745I find it amusing that a "fey-pact  warlock" is supposed to be an archetype. I don't even know what that means. At least "beastmaster ranger" seems clear:   a Marc Singer wannabe. Does he summon a Tanya Roberts sidekick at a certain level?

Prospero from the Tempest.

Quote from: Dumarest;989765Could be, but not as a "fey-pact warlock." I think we can acknowledge how silly the name is.

This is why players should never ever be allowed to make up nicknames or please god no, terms, for anything. EVER. And thats not even the most stupid of them.

Fey-pact-warlock is really just shorthand for a 5e Warlock with a Fey patron. Probably pact of the chain as otherwise theyd call it something else. And no. Its not an archetype. Its just a path someone might take out of several. Ive been playing what Id guess theyd term an Old One-blade-Warlock.

Fey-pact warlock? One-blade warlock? In 5e?

I suddenly feel like an elderly person struggling to use a smartphone.

Quote from: Batman;990103I've, unfortunately, never seen Disney's Black Cauldron. Though after reading a bit about her, she seems like a feisty princess which works well with the Lazy Warlord concept. :-)

Or dear Lord, read the books! They are quick and go down easy.  Eilonwy is the basis for the "Nobleman's Wild Daughter" playbook in Beyond the Wall.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;990206Fey-pact warlock? One-blade warlock? In 5e?

I suddenly feel like an elderly person struggling to use a smartphone.

And people wonder why I say I don't even recognize 5e as D&D.

Quote from: Dumarest;990082Yeah, but I wanna be an archetypical fey-pact warlock modeled on all those famous fey-pact warlocks from various mythologies and literature. :p

  I'll see your complaints about the fey warlock (someone gifted with sorcery by the Good People) and raise you the tremendously archetypal and mythically grounded figure of the cleric. ;)

Every edition of D&D is easily recognizable. It's a rpg not rocket science. It's about as difficult to understand as one wants it to be. That's not the fault of the rules of any edition it's on you.v

Quote from: DavetheLost;990230And people wonder why I say I don't even recognize 5e as D&D.

"Old One"-blade-warlock. Really it's not that hard. "Warlock" = PC that uses magic. "Fey Pact" = Power from fairies. "Old One Pact" = Cthulhu provides you your charge-ups. I know you can do it.

OTOH maybe I only get it because I'm one of those durn kids playing on the D&D lawn ... since 1980.

To get back on topic, "builds" as starting packages for a given fantasy or SF or horror or name-your-genre-experience are fine. I never bothered with "builds" as "roadmaps for advancement," largely because (in 4E) the system was robust enough that you maintained a decent level of effectiveness even if you never char-opped. But I'm not for 'em in the abstract.

Quote from: Vargold;990243"Old One"-blade-warlock. Really it's not that hard. "Warlock" = PC that uses magic. "Fey Pact" = Power from fairies. "Old One Pact" = Cthulhu provides you your charge-ups. I know you can do it.

OTOH maybe I only get it because I'm one of those durn kids playing on the D&D lawn ... since 1980.

Well, that, and they are trivially easy to ignore.  I did for my two 5E campaigns, because I don't like them, and didn't want the players to deal with their mechanics.  Same with the Battlemaster path.  And no one around me wants to play a monk.  The game works just fine with the old standbys.

Quote from: Dumarest;990082Yeah, but I wanna be an archetypical fey-pact warlock modeled on all those famous fey-pact warlocks from various mythologies and literature. :p

Irish, Greek and some Native American stories have the equivalent. Probably more from lands Im just not aware of or remembering at the moment. People who one way or another gain the favour, equipment, and sometimes magic from a patron in the outer realm.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;990206Fey-pact warlock? One-blade warlock? In 5e?

I suddenly feel like an elderly person struggling to use a smartphone.

Old one patron - pact of the blade - warlock.

Quote from: DavetheLost;990230And people wonder why I say I don't even recognize 5e as D&D.

Because you are an idiot for dismissing it because some other idiots made up idiotic terms?

Quote from: Omega;990284Irish, Greek and some Native American stories have the equivalent. Probably more from lands Im just not aware of or remembering at the moment. People who one way or another gain the favour, equipment, and sometimes magic from a patron in the outer realm.

Give me some names so I can educate myself then!

Quote from: Dumarest;990297Give me some names so I can educate myself then!

First one that comes to mind from Greek is Perseus. He gets a magic shield, a sword and effectively a "flesh to stone" via medusa head, and "Fly" via Pegasus. Theres others. In NA tales one was recently reading about was Burnt Face. Who was healed and himself gained healing powers from the "little people" another where a child was lost and adopted by them and gained some of their magic, becoming very strong. And so on. And thats just from what I've hears myself and a quick glance online for just one region. For others try the Tuatha Dé Danann and branch out from there.

There was a series of these books in our library way back. Each one covering a different region. All I remember those were the Native American and the Russian ones. Id love to find those again but Im not even sure the name of the set.

Perseus is a terrible analogy, nothing even remotely close to a Pact Warlock of any type in any way, really.  Folktales have people who become enhanced through a bargain with supernatural forces, and there's always good old Faust.

It's WotC D&D.  It's going to be filled with lame-ass compound words, MtG-like metadata tags for everything, and even in supposedly "retro" 5e, full of widgets to build your dec...err character with.  You either grit your teeth still they stop itching, or play something else.

That having been said, considering the system, the Warlock is a well-put together class that works as a good archetype within the assumptions of the D&D cosmology, not our reality.

Quote from: CRKrueger;990370Perseus is a terrible analogy, nothing even remotely close to a Pact Warlock of any type in any way, really.  Folktales have people who become enhanced through a bargain with supernatural forces, and there's always good old Faust.

Yeah Faust seemed the obvious example to me as well.

Ooooooh~! :) That stat line looks delicious! 9str, 12dex, 11 con, 15int, 7wis, 17cha. All those odd numbers to tease. I feel the urge to spooge over this topic! ;)

Juliette's Romeo
Human Fighter, Noble
Lvl 1. PB +2. Saves: STR, CON. Alignment: NG
HD: d10. HP: 11. AC: 14 (16 w/ shield).

STR 10 (0), DEX 13 (1), CON 12 (1), INT 16 (3), WIS 8 (-1), CHA 18 (4)

Lang: Hu Common 1, Hu Common 2, Hu Common 3 (bkrd).

Race: Human -- All stats +1.

Class
Armor: All armor & Shields.
Weapons: All simple & martial.
Tools: Chess Set (bkrd).

Skills: History +5 (bkrd), Insight +1, Intimidation +6, Persuasion (bkrd) +6.

Fighting Style, Duelist -- when one-handed melee (no other weapons) +2 dmg.
Second Wind -- bonus act, regain (1d10 +fighter lvl) HP; recharge Short or Long rest.

Background - Noble
Feature: Position of Privilege.
Personality: Flatterer. Ideal: Family.
Bond: Star-Crossed Love. Flaw: Scandalous Secret.
Gear: fine clothes, signet ring, pedigree scroll, purse +25 gp.

Wealth: ?? (@ 25 gp petty cash)

Armor:
Chain Shirt - 50 gp, AC 13+DEX (max 2).
Shield - 10 gp, +2 AC.
Weapons:
Rapier - 25 gp. +3 atk. 1d8+1 (+3 duel) p. finesse.
Whip - 2 gp. +3 atk. 1d4+1 (+3 duel) s. finesse, reach.
2x Dagger - 2 gp. +3 atk. 1d4+1 (+3 duel) p. finesse, light, thrown (rng 20/60).

Gear: Explorer's Pack (backpack, bedroll, mess kit, tinderbox, 10x torches, 10x rations, water skin, rope hemp 50') - 10 gp. Plus Noble stuff!

And now I want roving noble youth gangs and whip duels in the streets of fair Verona. :)

The basic concept of someone having made a pact with ancient/cosmic forces to gain power certainly predates D&D. "Fey" is just another word for "faerie," but one teenage boys won't snigger at (jklol yes they will). So basically a Pact of the Archfey Warlock is someond who's made bargain with some kind of faerie king for power (strangely enough, every single ancient, cosmic force available for pact-making seems to make the exact same deal: you can attack several times per turn to do 1d10+CHA force damage). It's not exactly ripped  straight from a classical myth or 1960s pulp fantasy, but it's also not a wholly original concoction of WotC, either.

IMO the Cleric was a pure Gygaxianism. Maybe the armor-clad, mace-wielding, zombie-frightening, party-buffing healer appears somewhere in myth...but clearly it's not a popular enough trope for me to know where. So it's not like 'I can identify which European myth this comes from' is the sine qua non of being in D&D. It's always been a mix of the classic and original.

Dude, Bishop Odo and Van Helsing totally had a baby together.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron;990206Fey-pact warlock? One-blade warlock? In 5e? I suddenly feel like an elderly person struggling to use a smartphone.

Quote from: DavetheLost;990230And people wonder why I say I don't even recognize 5e as D&D.

Perhaps, but (depending on when your first D&D edition was) I hope you had the same reaction in '75 when the Greyhawk expansion added these new-fangled things like a percentile roll after your 18 strength, or in '85 when AD&D picked up these new-fangled 'proficiencies.' Because there Is. No. Difference. 'Archetype,' 'Fey-pact warlock,' and 'one-blade warlock' aren't  even the in-the-book terms, that's just forum shorthands. 'THAC0' at least is an in-the-book term and is genuinely nonsensical unless you are in-the-know.

Quote from: Dumarest;990297Give me some names so I can educate myself then!

As CRKrueger mentioned, Faust (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faust) would be to D&D Warlocks what Aragorn would be to D&D Rangers. His pact was with the devil (perhaps 'a devil' in D&D terms). Depending on how you want to interpret them, 'cults' and 'cultists' to things that should be able to grant clerical powers are also warlocks, so heart-rip-out guy from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom would be another warlock.And thus the Warlock class was born. The mechanics of the class filled a niche ("I want to play a 'wizard-y' character, but the whole picking-your-spells every morning bit is too fiddly for my tastes. I just want to fight people with magic instead of swords'). But people cared about the fluff and asked, 'should all of them make pacts with devils, or can we add some more myth/literature/folklore things to this type?' and that included pacts with the fae. As Headless mentioned, Prospero from the Tempest (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tempest) would be a very good Warlock with a Pact of the Fae. So would True Thomas (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_the_Rhymer), if you're familiar with that folklore. Peter Pan could arguably also be one.

Quote from: CRKrueger;990375It's WotC D&D.  It's going to be filled with lame-ass compound words, MtG-like metadata tags for everything, and even in supposedly "retro" 5e, full of widgets to build your dec...err character with.  You either grit your teeth still they stop itching, or play something else.
That having been said, considering the system, the Warlock is a well-put together class that works as a good archetype within the assumptions of the D&D cosmology, not our reality.

5e is bald-facedly trying to be all things to all people. They want the people who think ThAC0 is new-school, and people who are too green to have ever heard of it. Of course they are going to include the language, concepts, and some of the widgets of the stuff that came out in the past 18 years.  And agreed on the Warlock class. It makes sense within mythic archetypes, is a class-type that a lot of people had wanted for a while. And frankly, should be something that the OSR crowd should appreciate ("enough with more rules already. I have an adventurer. I'm defining him as a wizardly dude, so he fights with spells, but can he just use the normal combat mechanics? Why does this book have to include dozens of pages of spells?").

Quote from: fearsomepirate;990413IMO the Cleric was a pure Gygaxianism. Maybe the armor-clad, mace-wielding, zombie-frightening, party-buffing healer appears somewhere in myth...but clearly it's not a popular enough trope for me to know where. So it's not like 'I can identify which European myth this comes from' is the sine qua non of being in D&D. It's always been a mix of the classic and original.

Well, the armor-clad was because everyone except the magic users could use armor then (pre-thief). The zombie-frightening (well vampire) is hammer horror. The mace was flavor + accidental (/obvious outgrowth of 'can't use magic swords,' which was there as a balancing agent). The healing was probably the second role they were given after 'Sir Fang'-hunter, so that at least was a definitional thing (and fairly consistent with the folklorish priest/cleric/monk/friar). Buffing, I don't know how that became a thing.

Anyways, you are right. Clerics (as they evolved in the game) are, by all accounts, a pure D&D-ism. Which is wonderfully cool. But it does highlight the point that these things have happened since the dawn of the game.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;990483The mace was flavor + accidental (/obvious outgrowth of 'can't use magic swords,' which was there as a balancing agent).

Historically there were some priestly orders (or monks or something - I can't remember exactly - but associated with The Church) who had sworn never to take up a sword (originally meant to be peaceful).  So - they cheated the rule by using maces/hammers instead.  Probably where that came from.

Quote from: Charon's Little Helper;990502Historically there were some priestly orders (or monks or something - I can't remember exactly - but associated with The Church) who had sworn never to take up a sword (originally meant to be peaceful).  So - they cheated the rule by using maces/hammers instead.  Probably where that came from.

Within the boundaries of one witnesses' (Gronan's) recollection (and that that editor's correction is correct), we know (https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/15358/why-cant-clerics-use-sharp-weapons) where it came from. "The bit about edged weapons was from Gary's reading the old stories about Archbishop Turpin [ed: later clarified to be Bishop Odo], who wielded a mace because he didn't want to shed blood ("who lives by the sword dies by the sword")."

I've heard that bit about orders too, but no one ever seems to have a reference to what they are talking about. I wonder if it is just everyone else retelling each other's half remembered reference to Odo.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;990483Anyways, you are right. Clerics (as they evolved in the game) are, by all accounts, a pure D&D-ism. Which is wonderfully cool. But it does highlight the point that these things have happened since the dawn of the game.

And note that the D&D cleric has itself become a larger fantasy trope. I've seen "Cleric" as "Armored magic man with a blunt weapon" many times outside of D&D, mostly video games.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;990507And note that the D&D cleric has itself become a larger fantasy trope. I've seen "Cleric" as "Armored magic man with a blunt weapon" many times outside of D&D, mostly video games.

I certainly saw it during my computer game days, and most of that is 80s or before (excluding 'card/board games, online, and the occasional Civilization). I don't remember if Dungeon or Rogue had clerics, but Wizardry, Ultima, and DragonQuest  (usually referred to as some of the first well known full graphic, desktop-intended RPG-like computer games) all had them. Final Fantasy was a straight-up 1e AD&D rip-off (to the level where the "wizard" enemy you could run into was visually clearly a Mind Flayer). It had a "white mage," so not a priest, per se, but again they could only use staves and hammers.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;990504Within the boundaries of one witnesses' (Gronan's) recollection (and that that editor's correction is correct), we know (https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/15358/why-cant-clerics-use-sharp-weapons) where it came from. "The bit about edged weapons was from Gary's reading the old stories about Archbishop Turpin [ed: later clarified to be Bishop Odo], who wielded a mace because he didn't want to shed blood ("who lives by the sword dies by the sword")."

I've heard that bit about orders too, but no one ever seems to have a reference to what they are talking about. I wonder if it is just everyone else retelling each other's half remembered reference to Odo.

  Fourth Lateran Council (1215), Canon #18:

"No cleric may decree or pronounce a sentence involving the shedding of blood, or carry out a punishment involving the same, or be present when such punishment is carried out. If anyone, however, under cover of this statute, dares to inflict injury on churches or ecclesiastical persons, let him be restrained by ecclesiastical censure. A cleric may not write or dictate letters which require punishments involving the shedding of blood, in the courts of princes this responsibility should be entrusted to laymen and not to clerics. Moreover no cleric may be put in command of mercenaries or crossbowmen or suchlike men of blood; nor may a subdeacon, deacon or priest practise the art of surgery, which involves cauterizing and making incisions; nor may anyone confer a rite of blessing or consecration on a purgation by ordeal of boiling or cold water or of the red-hot iron, saving nevertheless the previously promulgated prohibitions regarding single combats and duels."

   (Sourced from http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Councils/ecum12-2.htm (http://www.papalencyclicals.net/Councils/ecum12-2.htm))

  The broader principle of this canon is one of several reasons I've grown more uncomfortable with the conflation of "cleric" and "priest" in D&D.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;990504Within the boundaries of one witnesses' (Gronan's) recollection (and that that editor's correction is correct), we know (https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/15358/why-cant-clerics-use-sharp-weapons) where it came from. "The bit about edged weapons was from Gary's reading the old stories about Archbishop Turpin [ed: later clarified to be Bishop Odo], who wielded a mace because he didn't want to shed blood ("who lives by the sword dies by the sword")."

I've heard that bit about orders too, but no one ever seems to have a reference to what they are talking about. I wonder if it is just everyone else retelling each other's half remembered reference to Odo.

It is a common enough bit of folklore that when I heard about it in D&D my reaction at age 16 was "oh, of course."  As to the original source, who the hell knows?

Archbishop Turpin not only has a sword in the Song of Roland--he even has a named sword (Almace, possibly from German all macht). Friar Tuck is also a sword-wielder. So the cleric restriction is something that comes less from the mythic idea of the fighting priest and more from canon law on the one hand and the depiction of Bishop Odo with his mace in the Bayeux Tapestry.

Quote from: fearsomepirate;990413IMO the Cleric was a pure Gygaxianism. Maybe the armor-clad, mace-wielding, zombie-frightening, party-buffing healer appears somewhere in myth...but clearly it's not a popular enough trope for me to know where. So it's not like 'I can identify which European myth this comes from' is the sine qua non of being in D&D. It's always been a mix of the classic and original.

The Cleric came over from Dave Arneson's campaign. The thing to remember that in Blackmoor the good guys and bad guys were players. One of the bad guys, Dave Fant, managed to get himself turned into a Dracula style vampire.

As as result Dave Fant's character was viewed as neigh unbeatable by the good guys. Then one of the player ask wouldn't it be logical that there will be a Van Helsign to Fant's Dracula. So Dave added a dash of medieval catholic church, a dash of Charlemange paladin, some healing, and of course the ability to put the hammer down on the undead.

Gygax was exposed when Dave came down to Lake Geneva to run Blackmoor and thus included his take in the original manuscript.

So yes the specifics of the cleric class as implemented are Gary Gygax, but the concept originated with good reasons from the Blackmoor campaign.

The D&D cleric is properly viewed as Van Helsing combined with a priest casting diving magic, combined with a healer.

Like much of OD&D it isn't some random shit that Gygax when ho ho ho lets inflict that on my reader. Rather it born of his and Dave's Arneson experience with running fantasy campaigns, and miniatures wargames. And it was refined through many sessions of actual play. As opposed to be written up, a few session run, and then published like many modern RPGs.

Quote from: estar;990559some random shit that Gygax when ho ho ho lets inflict that on my reader

It's amazing how many times I've heard this.  Or "rules to screw players" or "rules to make the game less fun."

I kind of wonder what kind of pictures people get in their head when they write things like that.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;990592It's amazing how many times I've heard this.  Or "rules to screw players" or "rules to make the game less fun."

I kind of wonder what kind of pictures people get in their head when they write things like that.

It's not hard to figure out what people think Gary was like. The memes are out there
[ATTACH=CONFIG]1544[/ATTACH].

As to why, possibly Tomb of Horrors--and let's be clear, how fair or unfair the actual module is is immaterial, only the reputation. Or it might just be a permutation of the idea that he was at war with D&D's fanbase (or just amazingly tin-eared to their needs/desires). Or he catches the flack from T$R angering its' fans in the 80s/90s (yes, super-unfair given that they'd booted him by then).

Actually, a lot of people just don't seem to like a hard game.  Ear seekers are the natural response to listening at doors.  Our reaction was "Ho ho ho!  Pretty damn sneaky!" not "Waah waah waah, that's not fair!"

https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?721355-The-ethics-of-Rust-Monsters
https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?721993-What-are-the-most-quot-the-DM-is-a-jerk-quot-things-in-D-amp-D

Honestly, a lot of people seem to have incredibly fragile dinkies.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;990599It's not hard to figure out what people think Gary was like. The memes are out there
[ATTACH=CONFIG]1544[/ATTACH].

As to why, possibly Tomb of Horrors--and let's be clear, how fair or unfair the actual module is is immaterial, only the reputation. Or it might just be a permutation of the idea that he was at war with D&D's fanbase (or just amazingly tin-eared to their needs/desires). Or he catches the flack from T$R angering its' fans in the 80s/90s (yes, super-unfair given that they'd booted him by then).

Eh. I dunno about that. I've seen a lot of different opinions about Gary. Some of them hilariously based on things that aren't even close to being true. But when I see this meme, while I know it's not true of Gary, I can't help but pass it along as a statement or a battlecry. My own. So I don't see things like this as really being evidence of what people think about Gary. I think it's evidence of what gamers think of themselves--the GM who fancies himself a bad-ass, for example.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;990606Actually, a lot of people just don't seem to like a hard game.  Ear seekers are the natural response to listening at doors.  Our reaction was "Ho ho ho!  Pretty damn sneaky!" not "Waah waah waah, that's not fair!"

https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?721355-The-ethics-of-Rust-Monsters
https://forum.rpg.net/showthread.php?721993-What-are-the-most-quot-the-DM-is-a-jerk-quot-things-in-D-amp-D

Honestly, a lot of people seem to have incredibly fragile dinkies.

Personally I find it to be a riot when clever bad things happen to my PCs due to my carelessness...

Plus... what fun is it if "Standard Door Listening Protocol #1" always works 100% of the time?

Of course, a lot of gamers also seem to have all the sense of humor of a compound fracture.

I had a friend with a PC in heavy armor who once decided to try to walk across a rotted plank over a chasm...

http://greyhawkgrognard.blogspot.com/2010/08/magicians-ring.html

Yes, Lessnard was one of my characters.

And a friend in a super hero game whose Iceman ripoff PC thought he could save a burning building by creating a glacier on top of it, thinking the melting water would extinguish the blaze, but not thinking of the weight of all that ice atop a small apartment building...

Jim Ward actually had a column in early issues of Dragon retelling some stories from the early days. "The Adventures of Monty Hall", with EGG clearly being Monty. It gives a very different insight than the stuff Gronan and the White Boxers peddle. I can understand people not being upset by losing characters because they just dragged out another one immediately with the same stuff (Erac's cousin is an example of this). Or had Wish spells to get out of any serious trouble.

While clearly it was written to be over the top, much of it rings true and explains a lot of the changes that made it into AD&D. Like players not playing monster characters (given the example of the recurring Monty Haul character that was a magical sword wielded by an iron golem)

Quote from: Dumarest;990635I had a friend with a PC in heavy armor who once decided to try to walk across a rotted plank over a chasm...

Heh, that's actually how my first character ever died. Only it was a tree. And despite it being 1978 and such things supposedly not existing, I failed a dexterity check. Eh, I was 7

Quote from: Dumarest;990649And a friend in a super hero game whose Iceman ripoff PC thought he could save a burning building by creating a glacier on top of it, thinking the melting water would extinguish the blaze, but not thinking of the weight of all that ice atop a small apartment building...

Still, that sort of illustrates one of the differing philosophies in RPGs.

Does the character only know what the player does? Or does the character have some common sense and knowledge gained from his life (in this case, growing up having ice powers) that might not be obvious to the player (who of course, doesn't).

Quote from: JeremyR;990655Still, that sort of illustrates one of the differing philosophies in RPGs.

Does the character only know what the player does? Or does the character have some common sense and knowledge gained from his life (in this case, growing up having ice powers) that might not be obvious to the player (who of course, doesn't).

Well, in this instance we were playing Villains & Vigilantes by the book, therefore he was playing himself as a character.

My only problem with ear seekers was that they just led to Standard Door Opening Procedure #2 (now with glass).

Quote from: Vargold;990525the cleric restriction is something that comes less from the mythic idea of the fighting priest and more from canon law on the one hand and the depiction of Bishop Odo with his mace in the Bayeux Tapestry.

In I think it was Mount & Blade, foes downed with sharp weapons were slain, but if downed with blunt weapons they survived. This matches what we see in movies - someone's donked on the head, they wake the next day with a bad headache and no long-lasting effects. Nonsense, of course, but like fireballs and dragons and potions of healing, fun nonsense.

So I thought: if this were a house rule - knocked below 0HP with a sharp weapon, bleed out to death, with a blunt weapon, don't bleed out - this could explain the clerical prohibition on blunt weapons. Good clerics would rather not kill people, lawful clerics want the killing to be done by means of execution after a trial, and evil clerics want to keep you alive to enslave you and/or sacrifice you to their evil god.

Yes, I know in AD&D1e we already had subdual rules, but they're in the DMG so players always forget them. Blunt weapons not killing you straight up most of the time (apart from the occasional heavy hit that takes you to heavy negatives, or the PC just keeps bashing the unconscious foe) works more simply.

Again, I don't care where the original came from or if it's "realistic", I just care that it's fun. And when NPC evil clerics keep the PCs alive to enslave or sacrifice them later, or PC clerics are stuck with a bunch of prisoners to deal with, that's fun :D

Plus, it gives other players the option to just go around knocking foes out.

5E has made knocking someone out easy mechanically (when you reduce a foe to 0hp you can decide to knock them out instead of kill them)  which I like for many of the same reasons as Kyle.

Quote from: Voros;9909245E has made knocking someone out easy mechanically (when you reduce a foe to 0hp you can decide to knock them out instead of kill them)  which I like for many of the same reasons as Kyle.

   Another item they borrowed from 4E. :)

Quote from: Voros;9909245E has made knocking someone out easy mechanically (when you reduce a foe to 0hp you can decide to knock them out instead of kill them)  which I like for many of the same reasons as Kyle.

Agreed. This is one of the 5E (or, evidently 4E) rules I like and use.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;990592It's amazing how many times I've heard this.  Or "rules to screw players" or "rules to make the game less fun."

I kind of wonder what kind of pictures people get in their head when they write things like that.

The sorts of players where any sort of threat to their character (or sometimes "story") is a bad rule or deliberate malicious intent by the designer.

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;990933Another item they borrowed from 4E. :)

Quote from: cranebump;990978Agreed. This is one of the 5E (or, evidently 4E) rules I like and use.

Greataxe and two-handed sword, those famed slaver's weapons. :D

Quote from: Armchair Gamer;990933Another item they borrowed from 4E. :)

Which 4e borrowed from AD&D. Subdual damage. You just wacked them with the flat, or not as hard to KO them, not to kill..

Quote from: Omega;991090Which 4e borrowed from AD&D. Subdual damage. You just wacked them with the flat, or not as hard to KO them, not to kill..

And OD&D talks about subduing dragons, and it took us about 0.3 seconds to realize that if you could subdue dragons, you could "strike to subdue" other things too.

Quote from: CRKrueger;991089Greataxe and two-handed sword, those famed slaver's weapons. :D

You just wave it at them for damage.:-)

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;990592It's amazing how many times I've heard this.  Or "rules to screw players" or "rules to make the game less fun."

I kind of wonder what kind of pictures people get in their head when they write things like that.

They get the picture of their character doing all the k3wl thingz, never dying, never needing to worry about food, encumbrance, movement rates, morale or anything else.

Last session I had players who did not seem to get the concept that it might take them multiple combat rounds to cross a half-mile of open field. Said field being under fire from the enemy.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;991095And OD&D talks about subduing dragons, and it took us about 0.3 seconds to realize that if you could subdue dragons, you could "strike to subdue" other things too.

One of my players took one look at the three-headed boar they had encountered, decided he wanted it for a mount and asked "can I hit it to knock it out without killing it?"  Knock out or subdual damage should be pretty much inherently obvious.

Yeah, and if you extend the same courtesy to NPCs, GMs that hate killing PCs no longer need to fudge rolls:). It's a rule I approve because I'm tired of people whining about being afraid to TPK the party.
Besides, hit points are hit points, what happens when you run out of hit points is that you lose. Doesn't have to mean "you die", so if you have abstract damage rules, you can use them to reduce the whining on many, many tables;).

Though frankly, I prefer the approach in Backswords and Bucklers, where what happens when you lose your hit points depends on whether the next hit you take is from a bashing, slashing, or piercing weapon. It's a nice little game where all weapons deal 1d6 damage, and this rule fits very well with the setting:D!

Quote from: Vargold;989837I just pulled some examples from 5E. The specifics don't matter here: the fact is that builds are a technique in games for getting players up to speed quickly. Technically, every one of the templates in WEG 1st edition Star Wars is a build--they're all built on the same number of points, and it's very easy to reverse-engineer them to get the basic schema. (I used to do this in the early 1990s to make up new templates that were balanced with those in the book.) But rather than say, "You have X points to spend on Attributes and Y points on Skills," you give the build: Brash Pilot, Quixotic Jedi, Young Senatorial.

The word at issue was "archetype" not build and certainly not template. The templates in 1st edition WEG Star Wars are genius.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;990592It's amazing how many times I've heard this.  Or "rules to screw players" or "rules to make the game less fun."

I kind of wonder what kind of pictures people get in their head when they write things like that.

I picture a guy hiding behind a file cabinet while repeatedly making rocks fall on the heads of all the PCs.  :p

Why what do you picture?

Quote from: Bren;991303I picture a guy hiding behind a file cabinet while repeatedly making rocks fall on the heads of all the PCs.  :p

Why what do you picture?

Gary sitting around in his penthouse office on the 1000000th floor of TSR Towers in Lake Geneva, sitting at his desk while wearing his Armani suit, smoking hand rolled Cuban cigars lit with thousand-dollar bills and sipping single malt chilled with ice made from the tears of players whose characters died in Tomb of Horrors, and thinking up new ways to "screw the players".

That's a nice picture.

Quote from: DavetheLost;991176They get the picture of their character doing all the k3wl thingz, never dying, never needing to worry about food, encumbrance, movement rates, morale or anything else.

Man that sounds pretty dumb. In every edition I ran, things like encumbrance, movement, food (albeit not as much in 4e and 5e), morale, and ammo tracking were things we did. In our 4E games there's a rogue trick that allows him to throw sand and debris in people's eyes and I have disallowed him using that power then they were in places that had a lack of it. So he carried around a few pouches of dirt, sometimes fine sand, etc. I also don't get the fun about never really dying. I mean, in a game where raise dead and resurrection are easily found or created you'd think this wouldn't be such a big deal.

Quote from: DavetheLost;991176Last session I had players who did not seem to get the concept that it might take them multiple combat rounds to cross a half-mile of open field. Said field being under fire from the enemy.

Assuming everyone runs at 30-ft a round and assuming that running (non-combat move) about 120 ft. (ie. 40 yard dash in 6 seconds) per round you're going to move that distance in 22 combat rounds or just over 2 minutes in time (which is FAST with gear and armor). I'd probably say they take a penalty or have some sort of exhaustion or endurance check because that's difficult.

What medieval weapon had a half mile range?  If its a trebucht I can't imagine they had any risk of actuuly being hit.  Its accurate enough to hit a city, a person is a bit much.  Especially since a person can see it coming.  

Now a block of Calvary or pikemen might be at risk, but a party of a half dozen?  I wouldn't worry.

Mutant Future game, lasers and gunpowder are in play. What was odd was the players' idea that they would go from half a mile away to melee range in a single footstep.  They were actually surprised when the first, and then the second volley hit them and they were still quite a ways off...  Party of 13, including a 23' tall squid-headed giant.

Quote from: DavetheLost;991709Mutant Future game, lasers and gunpowder are in play. What was odd was the players' idea that they would go from half a mile away to melee range in a single footstep.  They were actually surprised when the first, and then the second volley hit them and they were still quite a ways off...  Party of 13, including a 23' tall squid-headed giant.

Well, I hope they learned.  If not, keep killing them.

And yeah, that's not much with modern weapons.  A tripod mounted M60 will cover 1000 yards effectively.

Quote from: DavetheLost;991709Mutant Future game, lasers and gunpowder are in play. What was odd was the players' idea that they would go from half a mile away to melee range in a single footstep.  They were actually surprised when the first, and then the second volley hit them and they were still quite a ways off...  Party of 13, including a 23' tall squid-headed giant.

Ahhh!

When my players do something like that I figure they don't understand something.  Their expectations are wrong some how.  Which is on me.  I am their senses and their history.  

Could they see the machine guns and lazar emplacements a half mile away?  Did you tell them "none of you expect to make it to the other side of the field." ?

You are going to be in effective kill range for 20 rounds.

Yeah, that situation does sound so ridiculous (that they would expect to get there in one round) that it seems like we're missing something from their thought process.

As far as I can tell their thought process is "This is a combat scene. So I draw my sword and fight"  I explained repeatedly that they were half a mile away, and the first two characters to try crossing the field were both met by agressive volleys, so it should hardly have been a surprise that the enemy would shoot at them.  Their play style seems heavilly influenced by video games or something. Just kill things, everything else will fall in your lap.

I have been taking Gronan's advice and killing them until they learn better.

Well if they understand the situation.  I guess.  

It might be the only way to re-aligne their expetations.  I am still really curious how they thought they were going to cross that field.

Quote from: DavetheLost;991756As far as I can tell their thought process is "This is a combat scene. So I draw my sword and fight"  I explained repeatedly that they were half a mile away, and the first two characters to try crossing the field were both met by agressive volleys, so it should hardly have been a surprise that the enemy would shoot at them.  Their play style seems heavilly influenced by video games or something. Just kill things, everything else will fall in your lap.

So two of them started across the field, and they were shot at, and then the whole of them just drew swords and charged into said volleys? I'm sorry, I'm not trying to say I'm doubting this, it just sounds like we're not understanding because that sounds more like a Monty Python routine than typical clueless gamers. Is this a completely new group to you?

I'm hardly an expert on modern video games, but 'everything will fall into your lap' is about the one thing that they don't do. There absolutely is a 'don't do that, you're walking into a killbox and will be picked off before you have a chance to shoot' thing going on. Now, video games might teach one that it doesn't matter because you can just respawn and try again, but it should teach 'doing that will get you killed.'

QuoteI have been taking Gronan's advice and killing them until they learn better.

If that's what they are truly like, then it sounds like a good idea. However, with this level of misplaced expectations, you might consider an after-action discussion starting with something along the lines of, "okay, let's go over this. What did you think would happen and let's figure out why this went south."

Depends on the video game. I'd expect to turn into swiss cheese crossing that field in STALKER. World of Warcraft? I'd expect the bullets to make a lot of cute pinging noises off my heater shield as I marched up and started stabbing people.

I'd guess the assumption was, if "swordsman" is a valid character concept a game where high-powered firearms are available, then the concept must have some ability to soak or weave through gunfire. Corrective killings might work, reading the rules more closely might work as well.

They mostly need to start looking for options beyond "I punch it in the face with my sword". Even "I shoot it in the face with my gun," would be a tactical step up.

They did figure out ways to get across the killing field eventually, but I never thought they would expect to be able to just walk across it with no risk.  They are young and inexperienced, but I still remember gaming when I was there age and we were never quite that green.

Quote from: DavetheLost;991756I have been taking Gronan's advice and killing them until they learn better.

All they may "learn" is that you are a killer DM and go seek a real DM.

Instead try... talking to them!

No. Really. Just say "Um gang? You are aware that it doesnt work that way right? No? Let me explain this then. Theres a span between where you are and where they are. Its gong to take X number of turns to cross and you will be under fire and likely to be wiped out with a frontal assault. Try possibly looking at alternatives? And if you keep acting stupid then its on you when I next say "Your dead. Roll new character.""

"I'll just kill their characters to teach them a lesson" is fucking stupid.

Talk first. THEN kill their characters if they keep acting stupid.

They like rolling new characters. In fact they will ask every few sessions if they can roll a new character because they are bored with the one they have. I just had one intentionally suicide charge hoping to get killed.

And I have tried talking to them. Repeatedly. They don't listen.

Okay, that's a different beast. "Don't care," is a tougher nut to crack than, "dumb" or "not thinking strategically."

Quote from: DavetheLost;992000They like rolling new characters. In fact they will ask every few sessions if they can roll a new character because they are bored with the one they have. I just had one intentionally suicide charge hoping to get killed.

And I have tried talking to them. Repeatedly. They don't listen.

A GM has a right to the fun of presenting a living, breaing world with its own coherency. It seems like they just see you as some sort of MMO server (or whatever) than a real human being who wants to enjoy social company by sharing your own creations (or at least interactions). That's a whole other talk -- and eventually putting your foot down by openly not giving them what they want, repeatedly. If they are not respecting you as a person at the table (including your words, your time, your efforts, etc.), why reward them with giving them the experience they want?

Basically, you've stated your piece, and instead of listening they try to end run you by forcing your hand. That's grounds for an open warning, denial of said passive-aggressive tactic, and preparations to fire them as a player. I've had to pull this in over half of my friendly groups, many with long-time friends. But I do it gladly and without reserve everytime.

I first expect respect. I will then ask for respect. Next I just pull the trigger on a PC's kneecap. If I have to ramp up to demanding respect, talks obviously broke down, and the not-listening is deliberate. I now need to get your attention. After that last talk we're in pulling invitations territory. If you can't hang, won't talk, and don't listen, I eject the hassle of dealing with petulant you.

Some of my friends can travel in more than one circle of my interests, others can't. Regardless, no great loss. We're expected to be adults and I'd hope to see you elsewhere being mature with me.

Quote from: Opaopajr;992021I first expect respect. I will then ask for respect. Next I just pull the trigger on a PC's kneecap. If I have to ramp up to demanding respect, talks obviously broke down, and the not-listening is deliberate. I now need to get your attention. After that last talk we're in pulling invitations territory. If you can't hang, won't talk, and don't listen, I eject the hassle of dealing with petulant you.

Some of my friends can travel in more than one circle of my interests, others can't. Regardless, no great loss. We're expected to be adults and I'd hope to see you elsewhere being mature with me.

(https://www.swordsknivesanddaggers.com/swords-knives-daggers/skd-viking-helmet-hm-1014-c.jpg)

Wear it proudly.

Quote from: Opaopajr;992021A GM has a right to the fun of presenting a living, breaing world with its own coherency. It seems like they just see you as some sort of MMO server (or whatever) than a real human being who wants to enjoy social company by sharing your own creations (or at least interactions). That's a whole other talk -- and eventually putting your foot down by openly not giving them what they want, repeatedly. If they are not respecting you as a person at the table (including your words, your time, your efforts, etc.), why reward them with giving them the experience they want?

Basically, you've stated your piece, and instead of listening they try to end run you by forcing your hand. That's grounds for an open warning, denial of said passive-aggressive tactic, and preparations to fire them as a player. I've had to pull this in over half of my friendly groups, many with long-time friends. But I do it gladly and without reserve everytime.

I first expect respect. I will then ask for respect. Next I just pull the trigger on a PC's kneecap. If I have to ramp up to demanding respect, talks obviously broke down, and the not-listening is deliberate. I now need to get your attention. After that last talk we're in pulling invitations territory. If you can't hang, won't talk, and don't listen, I eject the hassle of dealing with petulant you.

Some of my friends can travel in more than one circle of my interests, others can't. Regardless, no great loss. We're expected to be adults and I'd hope to see you elsewhere being mature with me.

Or you could just say, "guys, I'm really not interested in GMing this."

Quote from: DavetheLost;992000They like rolling new characters. In fact they will ask every few sessions if they can roll a new character because they are bored with the one they have. I just had one intentionally suicide charge hoping to get killed.

And I have tried talking to them. Repeatedly. They don't listen.

What you say is "This game is no fun for me.  I will not run a game I am not enjoying."

Different people like different things.  Sometimes the difference is so great they can't game together.  And that's perfectly all right.

Quote from: Gronan of Simmerya;992044What you say is "This game is no fun for me.  I will not run a game I am not enjoying."

Different people like different things.  Sometimes the difference is so great they can't game together.  And that's perfectly all right.

That would be the mature, adult thing to do which would earn their respect, would it?

Quote from: Opaopajr;992021A GM has a right to the fun of presenting a living, breaing world with its own coherency. It seems like they just see you as some sort of MMO server (or whatever) than a real human being who wants to enjoy social company by sharing your own creations (or at least interactions). That's a whole other talk -- and eventually putting your foot down by openly not giving them what they want, repeatedly. If they are not respecting you as a person at the table (including your words, your time, your efforts, etc.), why reward them with giving them the experience they want?

Basically, you've stated your piece, and instead of listening they try to end run you by forcing your hand. That's grounds for an open warning, denial of said passive-aggressive tactic, and preparations to fire them as a player. I've had to pull this in over half of my friendly groups, many with long-time friends. But I do it gladly and without reserve everytime.

I first expect respect. I will then ask for respect. Next I just pull the trigger on a PC's kneecap. If I have to ramp up to demanding respect, talks obviously broke down, and the not-listening is deliberate. I now need to get your attention. After that last talk we're in pulling invitations territory. If you can't hang, won't talk, and don't listen, I eject the hassle of dealing with petulant you.

Some of my friends can travel in more than one circle of my interests, others can't. Regardless, no great loss. We're expected to be adults and I'd hope to see you elsewhere being mature with me.

What happens with those real life friendships though? Do they stop being friends with you?

Often it's hard to GM problems with real life friends because you can't just kick them out if there is a problem. Though I've had just as many friends who make it much easier because they're understanding.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;992049That would be the mature, adult thing to do which would earn their respect, would it?

It would be the mature, adult thing to do, yes.  Whether it earns their respect or not depends on them.

People who can't handle that other people have drastically different tastes, I don't want to game with anyway.

Quote from: mAcular Chaotic;992052What happens with those real life friendships though? Do they stop being friends with you?

Often it's hard to GM problems with real life friends because you can't just kick them out if there is a problem. Though I've had just as many friends who make it much easier because they're understanding.

Friendships can survive MUCH WORSE. Trust any adult with any sort of libido and a daring liver. Establish boundaries, cross the street away from crazy, and shrug away the bullshit that won't matter a year from now. "How to Pretend Correctly" is so far down the list it's laughable.

Deep down I think you know this too. ;) Give your confident self a go. You might like it.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;992026Or you could just say, "guys, I'm really not interested in GMing this."

That is logically presumed in "asking for respect," because you are having The Table Talk by then. Beforehand you are logically presumed in "expecting respect" because you've shared your play expectations and table ground rules. By the time we get to "demanding respect" we're getting into punishments for breaking explicit ground rules twice.

If you mean giving up the campaign in response, you're nuking the table instead of laser-removal excising of the problem. The troublemakers, they're already not listening to you. Anyone on the fence, they're now bystander victims. You've just made a fun new game for those trolling you, how fast we can spoil the GM's fun AND any hapless victim at the table by nuking the table.

Trust me, hyper-competitive munchkin trolls derive their fun from others' misery. It's toxic and infectious behavior, and they know it. You spoil their fun first, kick them out as needed, and concede nothing to their twisted meta-game. It's the only way to be sure. ;) That IS the most adult thing to do.

I think we're just seeing different scenarios within DavetheLost's situation. I'm reading it as an entire group what wants to play what I will call 'kick in the door and fight the orcs' style play, while he wants to DM a more strategic game. That, to me, is a DM-player-expectation-mismatch. You (if I'm following) see more of a situation where there are a few ne'er-do-well, trollish types.

The correct response is undoubtedly different. I'm just having difficulty reconciling the statements of demanding respect with something bearing a trigger next to their (PC's) kneecaps and the idea the I/you/we/team-DavetheLost are somehow the mature, adult people in this scenario.

Willie has it about right. A substantial subset of my players want "kick in the door, fight the orcs" murder hobo style play, some seem not to know how to do anything else but seem to be becoming disillusioned with that play style, and a couple want more actual role-play.

I want a more roleplay centric game with more nuanced combat that just charge and punch it in the face.

I am running games at our local public library for a drop in group of anywhere from 3 to 13+ mostly teens. Yesterday they actually ran away from a fight they though was going to be too tough.Or at least they tried to run away, they are getting pursued. I also heard a couple of tem express a desire to not just murder hobo everything. Gives me hope.  Saddly some of our more role-play and tactically adept players have missed the last few sessions.

Wait... you said you talk to them, repeatedly, and they don't listen. So that means you said, "Hey guys, I'm running things with more logical tactics besides 'kick in the door and attack orcs', (or more to the point, 'run blindly forward and die horribly')." And so they smile and nod and their next A-game play is charging headlong into machineguns for a half mile.

That leaves two sane choices about what they are doing. That is either their A-game (obvious incompetence), or they don't give a shit about what you said. There's no mismatch here, you're hunting for excuses for them and you're not being honest with yourself. You cannot have a talk -- repeatedly -- and get such a consistent mismatch of play expectations.

Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result? Quit joshing us here. What's really going on and why do you let this obvious nonsense slide? Are they special needs adults (teens)? I just don't buy this perfect helpless scenario.

edit: Wait! I think I might be too old to remember what it was like to be a teenager... Are you sure this is their A-game and they are s-l-o-w-l-y improving? Because you're making me sad for the future, man.

I much prefer games in which actual play decisions matter, not which widgets you chose at last level up. This preference comes from a desire to simply play a game not spend an inordinate amount of time building and selecting the playing piece.

I enjoy quick and random character generation. During play, particularly at the lowest levels, shit tends to happen and life expectancy isn't the best. I would rather be able to re-roll and get back in the game in about 10 minutes then have to labor over the construction of another complex machine.

Of course these complex characters lead to game design decisions that involve making them nearly death proof so as not to piss off players who put so much effort into them. Once you feel the need to file down the sharp edges on the consequences of failure just to placate the build snowflakes, the integrity of game play is shot to hell and the "game" becomes hardly worth playing.

So, while tinkering with builds can be kind of fun as its own exercise, if the practice drives the game to compromise on the "game" aspect of play, it isn't worth it.

Quote from: Willie the Duck;990504Within the boundaries of one witnesses' (Gronan's) recollection (and that that editor's correction is correct), we know (https://rpg.stackexchange.com/questions/15358/why-cant-clerics-use-sharp-weapons) where it came from. "The bit about edged weapons was from Gary's reading the old stories about Archbishop Turpin [ed: later clarified to be Bishop Odo], who wielded a mace because he didn't want to shed blood ("who lives by the sword dies by the sword")."

I've heard that bit about orders too, but no one ever seems to have a reference to what they are talking about. I wonder if it is just everyone else retelling each other's half remembered reference to Odo.

Odo and William both carried those war clubs as symbols of rank and legal authority. Both proved quite adept at shedding blood.

Quote from: Vargold;990692My only problem with ear seekers was that they just led to Standard Door Opening Procedure #2 (now with glass).

That's funny because one of the players in my very first group did the exact same thing after seeing Archie Bunker do it on TV. Our DM figured out where he got the idea and had an orc deal with the eavesdropper the same way Meathead did in that episode (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z734xov1Hzo): By pounding the door on the other side -stunning the guy with the listening glass.

Quote from: Vargold;990474Dude, Bishop Odo and Van Helsing totally had a baby together.

Except Van Helsing wasn't a clergyman. His garlic, crosses, holy water/wafers and circles of protection worked for others as well as for the Doctor.

Quote from: cranebump;989799Hard to "build" something that has no feats, skills, prestige classes, class dipping and other such widgets. I can't remember a time I planned out my Fighter build in B/X ("and when I reach level 6, I'm gonna...roll for more HP's...")

Not hard at all. Dual-classed characters usually do this, as does the 1E bard: They try to switch at just the right time to max out abilities while speeding advancement.

Quote from: Elfdart;992359Odo and William both carried those war clubs as symbols of rank and legal authority. Both proved quite adept at shedding blood.

That's still where it came from. Whether it was accurate or true or even believed at the time or later (and honestly, who believes that someone getting their head caved in with a friggin' mace won't bleed?), that's where it came from.

QuoteThat's funny because one of the players in my very first group did the exact same thing after seeing Archie Bunker do it on TV. Our DM figured out where he got the idea and had an orc deal with the eavesdropper the same way Meathead did in that episode (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z734xov1Hzo): By pounding the door on the other side -stunning the guy with the listening glass.

2e Complete Thieves' guide just had ear horns or whatever with a wire mesh. Standard Door Opening Procedure #2 indeed. :p

QuoteExcept Van Helsing wasn't a clergyman. His garlic, crosses, holy water/wafers and circles of protection worked for others as well as for the Doctor.

I'm really not sure what your point is...?