Quote from: Dodger;524613So what you're saying is that a lot of people have no imagination or creativity and lack the ability to think for themselves?

I don't really care about those people.

Saying "you have the option to do something different" without providing those options is basically just giving permission to house-rule, which I don't need permission to do. If I'm told "yeah, you can have random encounter tables in your game, but we won't actually provide them, but we will provide structured encounter "challenge rating" guidelines", its the same as just saying those "guidelines" are in fact the rule, and everything else is the exception.

Its also the same as saying "sure, you can do that, but you'll have to do several hours of work making your own encounter tables for a dozen different terrains"; at which point my response will likely be to just go and play an edition of D&D that actually has what I want in the first place.

RPGPundit

@Pundit, what is your feeling they will give us those random tables as a choice against structured CR ratings? Or is that an NDA thing?

I don't see how this is an "us against them" thing. Sometimes people need examples of what to do when a slated problem comes up. Sure it is understood some people are more creative than others. But this is about new (or returning) players and customers, not some sort of zero sum game.

If no one sits and explains the pros and cons of differing solutions, or talks meaningfully where GMs may want to focus on their own personalized solution, then you are going to be left with issues in the community. Some will just be frustrated and walk (or return to their product that dealt with this better), others will merrily skim the work and do what they're gonna do anyway, and others will dogmatically read it as holy script. But you want to at least make it approachable to the first group because they're the only group you have a chance to meaningfully assist.

Natural creatives are gonna experiment anyway (and good for them), and dogmatics are gonna start crusades anyway (and woe betide the table that suffers them gladly). But with the ones who are new, or veterans who at least want a spread of old and new options, why would you antagonize them when you can just provide both/all such things in the first place? Showing multiple valid solutions to an issue can only enrich the experience for players to "create their own version of spaghetti."

Quote from: Opaopajr;524800I don't see how this is an "us against them" thing.

Everything is us against them. Don't you know we're at war? At several wars, actually

Quote from: ggroy;524642If WotC is pursuing a modular type system for 5E, in principle they can publish supplement books for the "add on" layers or just make them "online only" in the form of a character builder.

I'll be blunt, making any rules of the game (or necessary items like the character builder for 4e, technically not needed but realistically a requirement for reasonable use of the game) available by monthly subscription only will automatically make the game DOA for me. I will not pay a monthly fee to play a tabletop RPG.  I want to own everything I need for a tabletop RPG. I do not want to depend on a company's good will to keep access available

QuoteThough the question is whether an online character builder, would weaken or strengthen the "Cult of the RAW".

Strongly strengthen it if it was done anything like 4e's character builder where added third party rules and major houserules to it was next to impossible.  

Worse, if the errata is added automatically, the GM looses control of the rules of his campaign. Perhaps some of the errata added would completely ruin his campaign or some of the PCs in it. This is especially true if some of the errata isn't because of real problems in the rules but because the company needs to change some of the existing rules to make its new $$$$ splatbook work or because the rules are only problems in tournament/RPGA type settings, or because the rules are being modified because charop players have found some way to abuse them even though non-charop players would nevcer see the problem being fixed.

I want to control my campaign and i do not want to turn control of the rules used to the publisher.

Quote from: Imperator;524819Everything is us against them. Don't you know we're at war? At several wars, actually

Ready . . . fire . . . aim!

I roll initiative.

Quote from: RandallS;524825I'll be blunt, making any rules of the game (or necessary items like the character builder for 4e, technically not needed but realistically a requirement for reasonable use of the game) available by monthly subscription only will automatically make the game DOA for me. I will not pay a monthly fee to play a tabletop RPG.  I want to own everything I need for a tabletop RPG. I do not want to depend on a company's good will to keep access available.

Agreed; vigorously.

Quote from: RandallS;524825Worse, if the errata is added automatically, the GM looses control of the rules of his campaign. Perhaps some of the errata added would completely ruin his campaign or some of the PCs in it. This is especially true if some of the errata isn't because of real problems in the rules but because the company needs to change some of the existing rules to make its new $$$$ splatbook work or because the rules are only problems in tournament/RPGA type settings, or because the rules are being modified because charop players have found some way to abuse them even though non-charop players would nevcer see the problem being fixed.

I want to control my campaign and i do not want to turn control of the rules used to the publisher.

Yes, this as well.  This happened to my group and eventually caused problems because not everyone in the group had the Character Builder, and some were just using the hard copy books they purchased.  It eventually because big issue in play because we would have to constantly check to see if the non-CB players had compliant versions of stuff with the current errata.  It became such a hassle and headache for one of the non-CB players that he gave up on 4e D&D altogether because he didn't want the book work of checking every character and their powers against hard copy errata just to be on par with those players that had their characters automatically updated through the CB.

I disbelieve.

Quote from: Drohem;524856This happened to my group and eventually caused problems because not everyone in the group had the Character Builder, and some were just using the hard copy books they purchased.  It eventually because big issue in play because we would have to constantly check to see if the non-CB players had compliant versions of stuff with the current errata.  It became such a hassle and headache for one of the non-CB players that he gave up on 4e D&D altogether because he didn't want the book work of checking every character and their powers against hard copy errata just to be on par with those players that had their characters automatically updated through the CB.

I heard of this story. However when I talked to other 4e fans they said it was mostly text editing issues and that rules errata for powers, feats, and the like were overblown. Not invested in 4e, I had no personal experience to provide a point of contention. So all I can ask is how common is this experience of people's previous 4e books being corrected with errata into non-utility?

Quote from: Opaopajr;524903I heard of this story. However when I talked to other 4e fans they said it was mostly text editing issues and that rules errata for powers, feats, and the like were overblown. Not invested in 4e, I had no personal experience to provide a point of contention. So all I can ask is how common is this experience of people's previous 4e books being corrected with errata into non-utility?

I don't know about other people but it was the number one reason I gave up on 4e.

Quote from: RPGPundit;524784If I'm told "yeah, you can have random encounter tables in your game, but we won't actually provide them, but we will provide structured encounter "challenge rating" guidelines", its the same as just saying those "guidelines" are in fact the rule, and everything else is the exception.

Its also the same as saying "sure, you can do that, but you'll have to do several hours of work making your own encounter tables for a dozen different terrains"; at which point my response will likely be to just go and play an edition of D&D that actually has what I want in the first place.

I felt like I was missing something here so I did some research on the Google and ended up reading the Pathfinder encounter design rules.

So, I'm now thinking that, conservatively, you're looking at a minimum of 20 challenge rating levels, multiplied by, say, half a dozen different terrains and you probably want at least ten options in each table. So you're basically looking at 1,200 different encounters. Even if you manage to squeeze 40 encounters onto each page, that's still 30 pages.

Would you expect to find that many pages in a core rulebook dedicated to random encounter tables?

Quote from: Marleycat;524787@Pundit, what is your feeling they will give us those random tables as a choice against structured CR ratings? Or is that an NDA thing?

I have no idea at this time, its too soon to tell. I'm certainly trying to fight for it.

RPGPundit

Quote from: RPGPundit;525063I have no idea at this time, its too soon to tell. I'm certainly trying to fight for it.

RPGPundit

Good, hopefully they will listen to you. It's not like it would be that hard to do and wouldn't change the game at all unlike say something to do with the actual rules or something.

Quote from: RPGPundit;525063I have no idea at this time, its too soon to tell. I'm certainly trying to fight for it.

RPGPundit

We're all trying to get them the feedback they need (and I mean constructive feedback on my part, not the uncompromising rants I'm reputed for here), but I have to say that in some instances at least, it feels like an uphill battle. These guys are way too eager to fuck with the baseline of the game. I find myself crossing my fingers hoping they won't fuck too much with the game's legacy way too often these days, reading these columns in particular.

D&D is successful because it *is* D&D. It's not that hard to understand, is it?