I'm primarily interested in this question from the D&D perspective, but to the extent other fantasy RPGs overlap with it, they'll do too. Nor do I care exactly which edition you use or even various clones, though I think the activities shift some. By "core activities" I'm talking about the major categories of things that characters routinely do. Some things are too niche to be core, even if they do come up a lot. Some things are too broad, in that almost all characters do them constantly--such as taking damage from creatures, the environment, etc. A good way to think about it is that if your character had to choose to be good at one core activity at the expense of another, which ones would get serious consideration? Or what would be your list such that you would consider it a notable opportunity cost to not have one?
This is a fuzzy question because if I knew how to ask it better, I wouldn't need to ask it. All I can do is give an approximation of my incomplete answer as a means to illustrate the question:
- Fighting monsters with weapons is probably in. Ranged different enough to think of it differently?
- Casting spells -- sure. Is it one category, or is it Arcane/Divine, or is it something else?
- Finding treasure and hauling it out for reasons -- in to iffy depending on edition?
- Running from monsters, hiding from monsters, talking to monsters -- probably in as one form or another but the nature changes quite a bit?
- Finding and avoiding traps and other hazards -- too niche?
- "Exploring" -- too broad! Maybe if broken down somehow. Wilderness and Dungeon (and to a lesser extent City and Seafaring) are the traditional categories. Though I think it is probably more likely "Dungeon" and "Everything Else".
- Politics and Intrigue -- when it is in, it is really in, but often it isn't.
- Followers -- see previous entry.
Finally, is this asking a wrong-headed question? That is, is the act of classifying all the core activities likely to suck the magic out of all the oddball things that D&D characters do?
Last things first; to the degree that I understand the question (it's a bit oddly laid out and not sure how specific or general you want an answer), I believe that it's a useful question from a design POV as well as a GMing one. From a design POV it tells you what you should focus on when coming up with character abilities and certain rules (combat, chases, social, etc.). And from a GMing POV it tells you what sort of activities you should keep in mind when writing adventures and coming up with different types of scenarios and potentially challenges.
In terms general categories, some stuff that comes to mind includes:
- Combat: Personal (Melee/Grappling/Ranged use different rules), Vehicle and Siege.
- Magic: Spell Casting, Ritual Casting, Magic Research, Enchantment, Astral Projection/Trance Work (not common in D&D, but relevant to mystical work and some games). Personally I don't like the Arcane/Divine split and don't really think they're functionally district enough to be different activities.
- Crafting: Build, Repair, Design, Cooking, Engineering, Create Medicine, Create Drugs, Create Poison.
- Subterfuge: Scouting, Infiltration, Disable Devices, Sleight of Hand (Pickpocket, Slip, Palm), Sneaking, Assassination, Trailing/Stalking.
- Investigation: Spot/Notice, Trap Finding, Secret Doors, Tracking, etc.
- Travel: Foot, Mounted, Ground Vehicles, Water Vehicles, Space Vehicles. Focused on time/distance and special happenstance.
- Chases: Same sub-categories as travel, but with round to round contested rolls.
- Device Use: Magical or Technological.
- Exploration: Dungeoneering, Navigation, Orienteering, Trailblazing.
- Medicine: Stabilize, Treat Injuries, Treat Disease, Treat Toxin, Treat Psychosis.
- Social: Trade, Negotiation, Diplomacy, Interrogation.
- Animal Handling: Tame, Train, Calm.
And probably other stuff that I'm forgetting right now. Some of this stuff could narrowed further or refined. Maybe made into broader categories as well, but it wasn't entirely clear from the OP how broad or narrow specifically this needed to be.
VisionStorm, it is where to draw the lines on too broad and too narrow that is prompting the question.
For example, I like a lot of the items in your list, but I'd say Animal Handling is usually too narrow. Lots of players would give up that entire category for their characters in a typical D&D game, and they wouldn't think twice about it. Whereas Medicine is maybe a little narrow, but it's not so open and shut in my mind. That's one where the players want someone and a backup to have it, but they all don't necessarily want it bad enough to give up something to get it.
Though I suppose a better way to ask it is perhaps from the party approach, not the character. Medicine is questionable as a character core activity but fairly strong as a party core activity. That's where the "someone has to play the cleric" mindset comes in.
I'm considering this from both design, GM perspective, and players building characters perspective.
In that case I would say that "Animal Handling" is a subset of "Interaction" (Social), and could probably be placed along with other "social" activities, since it basically involves a type of interaction, but with animals. Maybe "Interaction" would be a more appropriate name for that category in that case, since having "animal handling" inside a "social" category might seem weird.
For Medicine the best broader category I can think of is "Support", which would also include buffer effects (which may sometimes overlap with Magic, but then again so does "medicine" if it's from healing spells) or any type of party aid.
Interaction between the DM and the players. That's the essence of it.
Quote from: bryce0lynch;1136915Interaction between the DM and the players. That's the essence of it.
I'd say that's the core activity of the players (and the DM). It's not the core activity of the characters. Or is that your way of voting for my last option of the question is the wrong one to ask? :)
It seems like what you're looking for is basically a skill list; not too detailed (i.e. not so trivial that it's not worth selecting; see your example of animal handling), but not to general either (i.e. your question about whether ranged is sufficiently distinct from melee combat to a separate item).
So, in that vein I'll just give you what my game uses...
Six Attributes with a dozen abilities and skill in weapons, armor and implements.
- Strength (no abilities; determines load, climb/jump/swim speed and is default for melee attacks*).
- Endurance (Fitness** ability; also determines your deep reserves of stamina used to keep going and fuel powerful spells).
- Reflexes (Acrobatics and Stealth• abilities; default for ranged attacks).
- Wits (Insight••, Medicine and Nature abilities; also used for primal magic).
- Intellect (Arcana, Culture and Engineering• abilities; also used for wizard and gadgeteering magic).
- Presence (Deceit, Intimidate and Persuade abilities; also used for astral magic).
* Fighter classes learn to use light melee weapons using Reflexes and to use bows using Strength (easier to aim when you can actually hold the draw weight for more than a second). Non-warriors are stuck using the defaults
** Fitness is endurance-based because it is mainly used to push past your normal limits of Strength and to resist fatigue, hold your breath and resist environmental extremes.
• Rather than have a specific "thief skill", sleight of hand/picking pockets is a function of stealth while picking locks and disabling traps is a function of Engineering. Climb, Hide/Move Silently and Find Traps have been separated out for awhile.
•• Perception as a skill you can train is silly to me. Your eyes see what they see, your ears hear what they hear. What you're training is your Insight; your ability to recognize what you're sensing as important and recall details of your environment. This is equally good at reading cues from people.
The above array has covered everything I've ever had a playtester attempt. Note that the reason weapons and magic aren't just abilities like Fitness, Arcana or Insight is because I've siloed the combat and non-combat options into classes and backgrounds respectively. Abilities are gained from your background (along with benefits called boons you gain as you level up; this includes non-combat spells), while skill with weapons and attack spells is gained from your class.
Classes are broken down into two groups; Fighters and Spellcasters;
Fighter classes are Brigand, Captain, Defender, Disabler, Mastermind, Sentinel, Sharpshooter, Slayer and Striker. Each class also chooses a combat style (Strong, Swift or Berserker) and combat focus (Daring, Tactical or Wary).
Spellcasting classes are Abjurer, Benedictor, Empowered, Interdictor, Maledictor and Summoner. They also pick a spellcasting path (Astral, Gadeteering, Primal or Wizardry) and each path has sub-subpaths (astral has the faithful, militant and zealous paths; gageteers have the big lug, monkeywrencher, troubleshooter and mad genius; primal has covenant and sorcerous origin with patron spirits that are either potent, swift, clever or insightful; and wizards have lore, social and war variations).
These then combine with a background; Arcanist, Aristocrat, Artisan, Barbarian, Commoner, Entertainer, Military, Outlaw, Religious or Traveler. Each background has a list of six of the abilities associated with it. The character gets two and then any one other ability (on the list or not on the grounds that no background can cover every permutation) and two boons from the background's list (for arcanists these are usually utility magic while an artisan might get "burn the midnight oil" or "rapid jury-rig" (aka McGyver-ing) and a military character might get "battlefield medicine" or "combat engineering").
So that's how I have things divided out in my system.
Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1136878By "core activities" I'm talking about the major categories of things that characters routinely do. Some things are too niche to be core, even if they do come up a lot. Some things are too broad, in that almost all characters do them constantly--such as taking damage from creatures, the environment, etc. A good way to think about it is that if your character had to choose to be good at one core activity at the expense of another, which ones would get serious consideration? Or what would be your list such that you would consider it a notable opportunity cost to not have one?
This is a fuzzy question because if I knew how to ask it better, I wouldn't need to ask it. All I can do is give an approximation of my incomplete answer as a means to illustrate the question:
- Fighting monsters with weapons is probably in. Ranged different enough to think of it differently?
- Casting spells -- sure. Is it one category, or is it Arcane/Divine, or is it something else?
- Finding treasure and hauling it out for reasons -- in to iffy depending on edition?
- Running from monsters, hiding from monsters, talking to monsters -- probably in as one form or another but the nature changes quite a bit?
- Finding and avoiding traps and other hazards -- too niche?
- "Exploring" -- too broad! Maybe if broken down somehow. Wilderness and Dungeon (and to a lesser extent City and Seafaring) are the traditional categories. Though I think it is probably more likely "Dungeon" and "Everything Else".
- Politics and Intrigue -- when it is in, it is really in, but often it isn't.
- Followers -- see previous entry.
Finally, is this asking a wrong-headed question? That is, is the act of classifying all the core activities likely to suck the magic out of all the oddball things that D&D characters do?
1: Lets see. In D&D and any RPG nothing is actually core because each tables idea of what is important can vary so massively.
2:
In original play combat was not core. It was actually something to be avoided. That was also true with the first group I joined as a player.
Casting spells is also not core. In fact early on mages are encourages to NOT cast spells. Save them for emergencies. This was also a thing in that first group.
Finding treasure has shifted back and fourth ALOT. Early play it was the focus. Then not so much a focus, then somewere in between or whatever.
Avoiding monsters ties into the fighting part. As one takes presedence the other falls away and back and fourth. Interaction is not the same thing.
Traps are somewhat a core of the game, or were. It feels like in 5e they have fallen out of the focus in favour of more monsters and fighting or interacting.
Exploring is broad and its not allways core in the sense its a focus for every table. Dungeon exploring, wilderness exploring. Those are the two big ones with city exploring coming in on rare occasions. And again not everyone explores.
Interaction is one of those from table to table things and never a core feature. Some players love to, some hate to and some campaigns are all intrigue and some you never hear a peep of it.
Followers has probably taken the biggest hit. Its gone from a core and vital aspect to practically non-existent now.
3: Its more that you are trying to classify something that cannot be classified. There is no core because there is no one style. Its like trying to define "the core style of playing D&D". Its impossible because no such thing really exists due to the sheer variety in approaches in all aspects.
X: Other things that might be core for group A but not group B.
-Start towns and home towns and base towns: totally not a thing for travelling groups that never settle. Or not a factor for groups that dont do anything in town other than shop and get quests.
-Mounts: even for a travelling party mounts may not be a factor. For others its vital. Same for mobile bases like caravan homes.
-Encumbrance: this ones another thats gone back and fourth and currently seems on the decline again. Some hold it as a core element, others hate it.
-Food and shelter: This is a odd one as to some players and parties its vital and to others it for all intents and purposes doesnt exist.
-Friendly monsters: This one really varies from table to table. You'll have ones where everything that isnt the PCs is hostile, to ones where the hostile critters are few and far between. Same with NPCs.
- NPCs: This is another weird one. Some tables theres lots of NPCs doing this or that. And in others you'd think the PCs are the only people on the planet and everything else is monsters.
And so much more.
Chris and Omega,
I'm interested in the discussion itself as much as the particulars. In that sense, both of your answers are helpful, but both of your answers put together are even more helpful. :D
For what is worth, I'm monkeying around with a design that I'm almost assuredly not going to finish. Rather, the process itself is an exercise for me to get some design concepts straight in a much more manageable package than my main design (which isn't really D&D at all). I'll probably get it to a prototype stage, test it a little, and then shelve it. (At least until WotC goes completely off the deep end and I need to finish to scratch my D&D itch.) You could describe the design as BEMCI level of complexity but willing to basically abandon almost any tradition if doing so simplifies the design while preserving those core activities.
Quote from: Chris24601;1136924It seems like what you're looking for is basically a skill list; not too detailed (i.e. not so trivial that it's not worth selecting; see your example of animal handling), but not to general either (i.e. your question about whether ranged is sufficiently distinct from melee combat to a separate item).
So, in that vein I'll just give you what my game uses...
Six Attributes with a dozen abilities and skill in weapons, armor and implements.
- Strength (no abilities; determines load, climb/jump/swim speed and is default for melee attacks*).
- Endurance (Fitness** ability; also determines your deep reserves of stamina used to keep going and fuel powerful spells).
- Reflexes (Acrobatics and Stealth• abilities; default for ranged attacks).
- Wits (Insight••, Medicine and Nature abilities; also used for primal magic).
- Intellect (Arcana, Culture and Engineering• abilities; also used for wizard and gadgeteering magic).
- Presence (Deceit, Intimidate and Persuade abilities; also used for astral magic).
* Fighter classes learn to use light melee weapons using Reflexes and to use bows using Strength (easier to aim when you can actually hold the draw weight for more than a second). Non-warriors are stuck using the defaults
** Fitness is endurance-based because it is mainly used to push past your normal limits of Strength and to resist fatigue, hold your breath and resist environmental extremes.
• Rather than have a specific "thief skill", sleight of hand/picking pockets is a function of stealth while picking locks and disabling traps is a function of Engineering. Climb, Hide/Move Silently and Find Traps have been separated out for awhile.
•• Perception as a skill you can train is silly to me. Your eyes see what they see, your ears hear what they hear. What you're training is your Insight; your ability to recognize what you're sensing as important and recall details of your environment. This is equally good at reading cues from people.
The above array has covered everything I've ever had a playtester attempt. Note that the reason weapons and magic aren't just abilities like Fitness, Arcana or Insight is because I've siloed the combat and non-combat options into classes and backgrounds respectively. Abilities are gained from your background (along with benefits called boons you gain as you level up; this includes non-combat spells), while skill with weapons and attack spells is gained from your class.
Classes are broken down into two groups; Fighters and Spellcasters;
Fighter classes are Brigand, Captain, Defender, Disabler, Mastermind, Sentinel, Sharpshooter, Slayer and Striker. Each class also chooses a combat style (Strong, Swift or Berserker) and combat focus (Daring, Tactical or Wary).
Spellcasting classes are Abjurer, Benedictor, Empowered, Interdictor, Maledictor and Summoner. They also pick a spellcasting path (Astral, Gadeteering, Primal or Wizardry) and each path has sub-subpaths (astral has the faithful, militant and zealous paths; gageteers have the big lug, monkeywrencher, troubleshooter and mad genius; primal has covenant and sorcerous origin with patron spirits that are either potent, swift, clever or insightful; and wizards have lore, social and war variations).
These then combine with a background; Arcanist, Aristocrat, Artisan, Barbarian, Commoner, Entertainer, Military, Outlaw, Religious or Traveler. Each background has a list of six of the abilities associated with it. The character gets two and then any one other ability (on the list or not on the grounds that no background can cover every permutation) and two boons from the background's list (for arcanists these are usually utility magic while an artisan might get "burn the midnight oil" or "rapid jury-rig" (aka McGyver-ing) and a military character might get "battlefield medicine" or "combat engineering").
So that's how I have things divided out in my system.
Using skills is one way to approach it, though perhaps a little more detailed than what I'm thinking. I admit to developing a little bit of a twitch when it comes to skills in D&D. Though I very much agree with you on perception not being one, at least not in a fantasy game. (In a modern or future game with advanced specialization training available, I can kind of see it, though even that is a special case of recognizing what you are seeing.)
I can see "primal" magic being in there, though I don't otherwise have a beef with arcane/divine. I was going wizardry/divine so far, but I could see wizardry/primal/spirit as a useful breakdown, too.
Your ideas on "thief" skills are similar to mine, though again perhaps some minor differences in details. I like "Stealth" as very much its own narrow thing, because like Perception as an activity, so many characters want to do it. Where you've got Engineering I've got Devices, but probably not a dime's worth of difference in practical application. It's still something rogues and dwarves are going to be attracted to, which for a dungeon crawl work out about the same.
If every class is either a fighter or spellcaster, then points back to your silos, right?
1. Killing them.
2. Taking their stuff.
Quote from: Omega;11369251: Lets see. In D&D and any RPG nothing is actually core because each tables idea of what is important can vary so massively.
2:
In original play combat was not core. It was actually something to be avoided. That was also true with the first group I joined as a player.
Casting spells is also not core. In fact early on mages are encourages to NOT cast spells. Save them for emergencies. This was also a thing in that first group.
Finding treasure has shifted back and fourth ALOT. Early play it was the focus. Then not so much a focus, then somewere in between or whatever.
Avoiding monsters ties into the fighting part. As one takes presedence the other falls away and back and fourth. Interaction is not the same thing.
Traps are somewhat a core of the game, or were. It feels like in 5e they have fallen out of the focus in favour of more monsters and fighting or interacting.
Exploring is broad and its not allways core in the sense its a focus for every table. Dungeon exploring, wilderness exploring. Those are the two big ones with city exploring coming in on rare occasions. And again not everyone explores.
Interaction is one of those from table to table things and never a core feature. Some players love to, some hate to and some campaigns are all intrigue and some you never hear a peep of it.
Followers has probably taken the biggest hit. Its gone from a core and vital aspect to practically non-existent now.
3: Its more that you are trying to classify something that cannot be classified. There is no core because there is no one style. Its like trying to define "the core style of playing D&D". Its impossible because no such thing really exists due to the sheer variety in approaches in all aspects.
X: Other things that might be core for group A but not group B.
-Start towns and home towns and base towns: totally not a thing for travelling groups that never settle. Or not a factor for groups that dont do anything in town other than shop and get quests.
-Mounts: even for a travelling party mounts may not be a factor. For others its vital. Same for mobile bases like caravan homes.
-Encumbrance: this ones another thats gone back and fourth and currently seems on the decline again. Some hold it as a core element, others hate it.
-Food and shelter: This is a odd one as to some players and parties its vital and to others it for all intents and purposes doesnt exist.
-Friendly monsters: This one really varies from table to table. You'll have ones where everything that isnt the PCs is hostile, to ones where the hostile critters are few and far between. Same with NPCs.
- NPCs: This is another weird one. Some tables theres lots of NPCs doing this or that. And in others you'd think the PCs are the only people on the planet and everything else is monsters.
And so much more.
Omega, fair enough. Where would you draw the lines for a table of you and like-minded individuals?
I get that a lot of people don't like encumbrance for example. I can't say that I'm terribly enamored of the details in most games, either. However, I do very much like the sense of "mundane resource management" to a degree, and some kind of economy and practical carrying limits has to be a part of that. Or to put it another way, to me a core activity in D&D is choosing between that extra quiver of arrows and the climbing gear, but it is only fun to me when the player has a handful of such decisions. (I've got too many casual players that go into complete analysis paralysis when confronted with something like the AD&D equipment list.)
Dunno if this will help, but when writing up an adventure, I tend to use some broad categories when designing encounters.
There are three basic types of activities.
1. Combat. This is the bread and butter of many RPGs. A bunch of baddies that oppose the characters. The solution to this encounter may be to defeat them, or kill them, or drive them off or avoid them.
2. Problem solving. This is any encounter where the characters have to use their skills and abilities, or the players have to decide on a course of action to overcome an obstacle. Can be a trap or locked door, a suspect to question, or a river to cross.
3. Role playing. This is my catch-all for encounters that deliver lore about the world, or the NPCs that inhabit it. Tomes of history, frescoes on the walls, NPCs to meet and talk to. Technically, everything in an RPG is role-playing, but this category is more about the role playing and less about the gaming systems.
Those things are not mutually exclusive. An encounter can involve two or three categories easily, but by organizing them into these three categories in my head, I can make an adventure as varied and interesting as possible.
Separating activities along ability scores is one way to approach this, another could be to separate them epistemologically. For example, it's popular to include Climbing and Swimming under a single umbrella, but while both might entail a "strength roll" of some sort, IMO the effects of that role are different enough to warrant their own section of explanation. Sometimes, I see the umbrella category being used, with a separate stanza of description for each specific application ... in which cases the umbrella itself seems vestigial and feels contrived to me.
Conversely, activities such as searching for secret doors, tracking, or finding traps all can be described as a single mechanic: if you succeed at your roll, you find the thing.
I like this approach because it focuses on clarity, comprehension, and ease of use. I find that it translates to play better than, say, going for an abstract and balanced aesthetic. Overall, I feel that if categorization itself doesn't add information, then it's just cognitive noise.
Quote from: Valatar;11369481. Killing them.
2. Taking their stuff.
In my opinion, that's it right there. It's a cliche, but it's your starting point for "core activities."
to broaden it out, you could change it to "defeat enemies and take their stuff." How you defeat them will vary. Main force, magic, deception, whatever. Likewise, why you want their stuff and what you do with it will vary too.
to that core, I would add "stay alive." That's how you keep going. That core goal includes your tricks and traps, running away from threats, sweet-talking them etc.
I would also add "progressively increase your personal abilities, power and resources." That's your skill growth, new toys and tools, magic knowledge and items, and of course, wealth.
And finally, explore the world the DM has (hopefully) created, but (more likely) purchased.
Diplomacy and intrigue play into all of those core goals.
So, the core is, 1) stay alive and 2) increase your abilities/resources so you can 3)defeat progressively nastier things and take progressively better stuff, allowing you to 4) more deeply explore the DMs world.
Maybe broader than you're looking for, but seems like the core to me.
Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1136947I can see "primal" magic being in there, though I don't otherwise have a beef with arcane/divine. I was going wizardry/divine so far, but I could see wizardry/primal/spirit as a useful breakdown, too.
Primal and Astral comes down to a setting specific conflict between the monotheistic elemental Old Faith (primarily followed by post-Cataclysm tribes and remnant cultural groups) and polytheistic worship of the astral gods who embody elements of civilization (as exemplified by the Via Praetorum; state religion of the recently fallen Praetorian Empire; Bestianism and the elven Astral Court).
Primal magic is based more on insight and friendship with primal spirits; nature spirits that are believed to be servants of The Source (a wellspring of infinite energy and spiritual power at the heart of creation... depending on your religious beliefs it's either a nonsentient source of power akin to a spiritual nuclear reactor -or- the all powerful supreme being who willed creation into existence). The foundation of this is The Covenant that marks the caster as kin to the primal spirits, though some mortals are born with a natural connection to the primal power of The Source (and thus are called Sorcerers).
Astral magic is based on formal pacts (to the tune of "I give that you grant") made with Astral powers that allow the caster the ability to create specific effects. These pacts can't be revoked once granted so significant displays of devotion are usually required before spellcasting is granted, though their later actions can often serve as a spiritual resume for later pacts (they don't all have to be made with the same Astral god or power; the faiths are properly polytheistic; as long as you can meet your promised obligations to a god, they don't care what other promises you've made with another god).
Arcane magic (gadgeteering and wizardry) falls under the "sufficiently advanced technology" rubric in that they involve spells/programs written in what is essentially an arcane programming language and the existence of what is called the Arcane Web. Spellbooks are important because you can encode very complex programs into them with just a few key variables (ex. vector and distance) left blank and a short phrase that serves as a sort of "hotkey." Using special inks and reagents connects this program to the Arcane Web allowing anyone who knows the "hotkey" to launch the program. Duplicating spell books make the spell harder to destroy (if every copy was destroyed it couldn't be cast through the Arcane Web) and vain creators have created dozens of cosmetic variations over the ages. Wizards employ attuned implements to improve their connection to the Arcane Web to cast these spells. Gadgeteers build devices that encode spells directly within them and can be activated at the push of a button.
QuoteYour ideas on "thief" skills are similar to mine, though again perhaps some minor differences in details. I like "Stealth" as very much its own narrow thing, because like Perception as an activity, so many characters want to do it.
The gist in my case is I wanted to keep the skill list down to about a dozen (of which each character will have exceptional scores in a quarter to a third... a party of 4-5 should be able to cover them all) and picking pockets and sleight of hand are mostly about moving things without others being aware that you're doing it... smaller scale stealth essentially.
QuoteIf every class is either a fighter or spellcaster, then points back to your silos, right?
Sort of... ultimately it comes down to Fighters = makes weapon attacks and Spellcasters = makes spell attacks. There can be some overlap; one of the talents you can take is multiclassing and that could be with one from another group (you only get one though) to gain some of the traits from another class with each talent you spend; but ultimately classes are just your combat abilities so weapon or spell attack is a convenient split.
Non-combat magic is handled in the backgrounds. A fighter class with the arcanist background might learn many utility spells and rituals to transmute, teleport, control weather, etc. but when a fight breaks out they trust in their skill with steel arms and armor not magic.
By contrast, a wizard with the military background would be comfortable lobbing battle magic in the thick of a fight, but see little use in it for mundane purposes, instead learning skills like battlefield positioning, combat engineering or inspiring demoralized troops to keep fighting.
Unlike 5e and other editions of D&D, your background is as important as your class in determining your abilities. It's not just an extra skill and small starting benefit; it's ALL your skills and non-combat benefits that continue to acrue throughout your career.
Essentially, Class + Background = a D&D class.
The classic thief would be a Swift Wary Brigand class with the Outlaw background. A classic fighter would be a Strong Daring Striker with the Military background. The classic cleric is an Astral Militant Benedictor with the Religious background. The classic Wizard would be a Lore Wizard Interdictor with the Arcanist background.
Mix and match to create any of the other classes... A post-3e Ranger is probably a Swift Wary Striker with the Barbarian background. A 4E style fighter is a Strong Wary Defender with the military background. A warlock is an Astral Maledictor (they make pacts with lesser astral powers) with the Arcanist background (dabbles in all sorts of hidden lore). A Paladin might be an Astral Militant Abjurer with the Aristocrat background -or- a Strong Daring Fighter class of choice with the Religious background depending on just how magical your idea of a Paladin is.
The idea of making it modular too is that not only does it allow players to freely mix and match, but it also allows GMs to more easily target restrictions to better fit their campaign. If you don't want primal spellcasting in your world just ban that path... you don't need to nuke entire classes that might otherwise be valid. If you want no combat magic at all... banning spellcaster classes entirely while still allowing arcanists and religious backgrounds gives you that too.
If you want a campaign centered on an urban criminal gang you could ban everything but the commoner, outlaw and traveler backgrounds (each background has enough boon options that several players could share the same background but each have a different focus).
Similarly, if you want a more old school feel you can prebuild each class/background combo to fit what you think they should be (and use the random attributes and zero level optional rules to further dial in the flavor) and say "these are your options." Similarly, limiting species to full-blooded humans, unaugmented dwarves and elves (halflings are "low elves" mechanically) gives you your "Core Four" playable races.
In that sense it's a modular toolkit to make the game you want. The default is a kitchen sink full of options though because it's always easier to remove options (particularly modular ones) than it is to create your own.
Quote from: Zalman;1136965Separating activities along ability scores is one way to approach this, another could be to separate them epistemologically. For example, it's popular to include Climbing and Swimming under a single umbrella, but while both might entail a "strength roll" of some sort, IMO the effects of that role are different enough to warrant their own section of explanation. Sometimes, I see the umbrella category being used, with a separate stanza of description for each specific application ... in which cases the umbrella itself seems vestigial and feels contrived to me.
Conversely, activities such as searching for secret doors, tracking, or finding traps all can be described as a single mechanic: if you succeed at your roll, you find the thing.
I like this approach because it focuses on clarity, comprehension, and ease of use. I find that it translates to play better than, say, going for an abstract and balanced aesthetic. Overall, I feel that if categorization itself doesn't add information, then it's just cognitive noise.
I agree, especially for simpler game. The toolkit approach outlined by Chris is outside the scope of this effort, though I'm using simpler version of the mix and match approach. What I am thinking about here wouldn't be explicit in the game (though anyone interested could reverse engineer it approximately). As with any prototype effort, it is important to not get too attached to the prototype itself. Once it has conveyed the information you are seeking, it has served its purpose and can be tossed.
Quote from: Zirunel;1136969In my opinion, that's it right there. It's a cliche, but it's your starting point for "core activities."
to broaden it out, you could change it to "defeat enemies and take their stuff." How you defeat them will vary. Main force, magic, deception, whatever. Likewise, why you want their stuff and what you do with it will vary too.
to that core, I would add "stay alive." That's how you keep going. That core goal includes your tricks and traps, running away from threats, sweet-talking them etc.
I would also add "progressively increase your personal abilities, power and resources." That's your skill growth, new toys and tools, magic knowledge and items, and of course, wealth.
And finally, explore the world the DM has (hopefully) created, but (more likely) purchased.
Diplomacy and intrigue play into all of those core goals.
So, the core is, 1) stay alive and 2) increase your abilities/resources so you can 3)defeat progressively nastier things and take progressively better stuff, allowing you to 4) more deeply explore the DMs world.
Maybe broader than you're looking for, but seems like the core to me.
That prompts the question: Did the radical change in the nature of the "thief" from its introduction to now come about because of dropping the importance of gold (for experience and having it)? When the thief was barely better than the wizard at combat, didn't have much armor or hit points, and started with skills that seldom worked--it was compensated in that the thief could potentially score big on hauling something out that would translate directly to a better chance next time--and that has an even bigger hit considering the faster progression of the thief experience chart.
Assuming that "stuff" matters in the game, I could see core activities of:
Combat
Magic
Exploration (including travel and problem solving)
Acquiring and using stuff (including gear, domains, henchman, etc.)
Various modest advantages in social abilities and the like could cross over all of those as flavor without being core. (I'm fairly certain that I don't want discussion of the "face guy" to be a thing at all. Everyone talks in their area of expertise.)
Exploration and Acquiring might work, because sacrificing somewhat on Combat and Magic to get them means you've got an alternate way to succeed on whatever the goal is.
My revised list so far following this thought exercise includes the following. Some of these items may sometimes overlap or affect each other. Crafting, for example, may affect your Resource Management, since it allows you to create extra goods or gear you may use or sell, and Magic/Power Use potentially affects everything (combat, crafting, investigation, the works). But I treat them as separate categories because each invariably has their own separate rules to handle related tasks.
Obviously, the actual range of activities may vary by campaign or game group, but they tend to fall into some variation of the following (probably still missing a few):
Categories - Chases
- Combat
- Crafting
- Device Use
- Interaction
- Investigation/Puzzle-solving
- Magic/Power Use
- Outdoors
- Physical Tests
- Resource Management
- Support
- Travel
Subcategories Chases
- Personal (Foot/Self-Powered Movement)
- Vehicles
Combat
- Personal (Melee/Ranged/Grappling)
- Siege
- Vehicles
Crafting
- Build
- Chemistry (Medicine, Poisons, etc.)
- Cooking/Brewing
- Enchantment
- Engineering
- Repair
Device Use
- Hacking (Disable/Manipulate Device)
- Operate Device
Interaction
- Animal Handling
- Bribery/Deception
- Diplomacy
- Interrogation
- Linguistics
- Trade
Investigation/Puzzle-Solving
Magic/Power Use
- Casting
- Ritual
- Trance (Astral Sight/Projection)
Outdoors/Exploration
- Camping/Fire-building
- Dungeoneering
- Orienteering/Navigation
- Survival (Terrain)
- Trailblazing
Physical Tests
- Athletics (Climb, Jump, etc.)
- Evasion
- Physical Force (Lift/Break)
Subterfuge
- Misdirection/Distraction
- Sleight of Hand
- Stealth
Support
- Aid/Assist
- Buff
- De-buff
- Heal
Resource Management
- Encumbrance
- Equipment (Weapons, Armor, Devices, Tools, Containers, Clothes/Jewelry, Miscellaneous)
- Followers/Hirelings
- Holdings (Land, Goods, Storage, Structures, etc.)
- Money
- Mounts/Vehicles
Travel
Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1136949Omega, fair enough. Where would you draw the lines for a table of you and like-minded individuals?
I get that a lot of people don't like encumbrance for example. I can't say that I'm terribly enamored of the details in most games, either. However, I do very much like the sense of "mundane resource management" to a degree, and some kind of economy and practical carrying limits has to be a part of that. Or to put it another way, to me a core activity in D&D is choosing between that extra quiver of arrows and the climbing gear, but it is only fun to me when the player has a handful of such decisions. (I've got too many casual players that go into complete analysis paralysis when confronted with something like the AD&D equipment list.)
1: Varies, alot.
In one campaign we have a sort of base town we have been ranging out from. We have our own place in town and I have a caravan home I take with whenever possible. There is not alot of exploration as the region is fairly known. But mostly the general details, not the particulars, so we go in and map or not as we have time to. Encumbrance and tracking provisions is important. Spells need to be used judiciously as you never know when your next chance to rest will be. There is a fair amount of interaction with NPCs and monsters.
In the ongoing Spelljammer campaign I play in the group is pretty much always on the move and rarely does much at the main space base we are aligned to. Practically no interaction there, but tons of interaction everywhere else. Combat tends to be on the lower side and its mostly get in, get treasure, get out. Lots of investigative work too. Encumbrance and food are not a factor. Treasures we actually get to keep has been few and far between.
The 3e campaign I played in was a little of everything with a slight leaning to combat.
2: if theres anything that is core to D&D and most other RPGs it is probably this. Choices. You have to make a decision and roll with it. Especially in older D&D fro spellcasters as they had to pre-load spells and then make the most of what they had if what they had was not optimal or of use at all for the situations.
Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1136878A good way to think about it is that if your character had to choose to be good at one core activity at the expense of another, which ones would get serious consideration? Or what would be your list such that you would consider it a notable opportunity cost to not have one?
One thing that occurs to me, with this being the goal, is you have to assume that proficiency at the types of activities are sufficiently dependent upon game mechanics. Some types of activities may lend themselves more to being mechanical than others. And that, more than the breadth of scope, may be the challenge. The following example in particular caught my attention:
Quote- "Exploring" -- too broad! Maybe if broken down somehow. Wilderness and Dungeon (and to a lesser extent City and Seafaring) are the traditional categories. Though I think it is probably more likely "Dungeon" and "Everything Else".
This reminded me of a couple of years ago in a 1E discussion group. You can almost set your calendar by certain gripes that arise with a fairly steady frequency. One of them is the old, do you give magic-users bonus spells? If not, aren't you horrible DM? I mean, 1st level MU's are useless, right? You get one trick you can do. Then the rest of the adventure you're pretty much just lugging the other party members loot around. What is a magic-user to do once he blows his money shot?
And my answer was basically exploration. The person responded with something like "But there aren't that many low level magic-user spells that are good for exploration; you're still useless once you've spent your one spell; and any NWPs that a MU might have, every other class can just as well have."
I was a bit stunned by this response. Have other gamers not had, or else forgotten, exploring a dungeon, wondering what's behind the next corner, filling out your map? Exploration is accomplished by little more than "I go west." It's got nothing to do with skills, spells, feats, widgets, or whatever other game-defined buttons that are there for you to push. As such, one doesn't lack skill at going west. One doesn't right out of turning east. This is available to all characters at all times such that no character is ever left without capability just because they've spent all their bennies. This somehow seems lost.
If I were to guess, I would say 70-80% of my game time call for no reference to rules. My concern with even asking the question you're asking is that it would bias the answers towards, for the sake of symmetry or balance, forcing mechanics into things that maybe should be left alone.
Lunamancer, yep, that's part of the problem. Though to have classes is to implicitly support the idea that the classes can do something different and useful that the other classes cannot. Thus I guess the debate that started immediately as soon as the thief was introduced. I do think there is probably two different things that people mean by exploration:
A. The general exploration as you talked about, which any character can do, and is truly core to the game.
B. More specialized abilities that contribute to exploration but don't forestall others from doing it.
For the latter, I'm thinking things like the thief climb ability (for difficult climbs without gear) separate from the general exploration "lower a rope and we'll all climb down" kind of thing. The ranger typically had some advantages there too, in the "go see what is over there without getting surprised" aspect, but that didn't stop others from going to see.
Though I have a funny story about magic users and their one spell. One player really enjoyed playing the MU, but got the flak about being worthless once his spell was gone from some of the other players. He pointed out that he was a person who could help carry the treasure out that they didn't have to pay or worry about running off. Shortly thereafter, they had an amazing series of bad luck with morale checks for "link boys" which led to the death of several characters. They decided that the main job of the MU was to carry the light source. :)
So it seems to me that if "resource management" is core to the design, then that aspect spreads throughout a lot of the other decisions. That is, it isn't something you can just take out or graft on later.
On magic, a slight tangent but maybe not: I think a key element is that spells do weird, specific stuff that gives the players a little room to monkey with the outcomes. 5E backed away hard from the 4E "it only does what it says, nothing more and nothing less" aspect of rules, but you can still see the vestiges in some of the spell designs. That necessarily means that some spells will be a problem in the hands of a GM that can't adjudicate, but I'm not worried about that for this exercise.
To make that easier to manage, I'm also probably going to partially abandon the "zero to hero" range of power levels in favor of a more incremental approach from a slightly stronger starting place. Starting from first level nobody is core D&D, but inevitably it does wonky things to the math unless you also put some firm limits on the upper end. Basically, I want the "elven fighter/mage" or the "halfling fighter/thief" to be a thing, but without the huge advantages they had out of the gate in AD&D. That means the dedicated fighter, wizard, etc. gets a little boost.
For D&D
- Combat (of course)
- Exploration - can be broken down somewhat but it usually involves room by room exploring, or location by location exploring. There even used to be procedures for this. (It's strange how the art of this seems to have been lost as it seems so obvious - but I see a lot of games that confuse maps for exploration with combat maps and never really change scale - online games seem to be particularly bad for this).
- Other forms of exploration that are less common (eg Hex Crawling).
- Journeying/Travelling - usually done badly and poorly supported by rules systems.
- Social interactions -(for some reason this is often called 'role-playing' - which makes me confused about what people think they're doing the rest of the time.)
- Shopping - (abstracted looking through books and buying things from abstracted NPCs - thankfully minimised without the magic item mart.)
- Perhaps Domain play (although in my experience it's usually pretty similar to shopping).
- Building (ie looking through the books and making decisions about the future paths of characters - can be done outside of actual game time).
a lot of "story game" aspects are in my experience handled in or as part of downtime, ie a description like "3 months pass during which construction of the temple is completed and the north wall is repaired, the bishop sends you 20 more spearmen and a small bag of 50 gold with a letter asking for an eta on the next ore shipment".
I am still having trouble making sense of this topic. :confused: In a world where I used D&D for a cooking fantasia and repeatedly joked it can be used to roleplay milkmaids finding a good marriage, I am at a loss trying to pigeonhole life, imagination, and socializing into a program script. Best of luck and godspeed brave explorers! :)
Quote from: Steven Mitchell;1136878I'm primarily interested in this question from the D&D perspective, but to the extent other fantasy RPGs overlap with it, they'll do too. Nor do I care exactly which edition you use or even various clones, though I think the activities shift some. By "core activities" I'm talking about the major categories of things that characters routinely do. Some things are too niche to be core, even if they do come up a lot. Some things are too broad, in that almost all characters do them constantly--such as taking damage from creatures, the environment, etc. A good way to think about it is that if your character had to choose to be good at one core activity at the expense of another, which ones would get serious consideration? Or what would be your list such that you would consider it a notable opportunity cost to not have one?
Off the top of my head these would be some:
Exploration and travel over land
Dungeon Exploration
Interacting with NPCs
Fighting Monsters and Threats
Going on Missions
Hunting monsters/enemies/threats/etc
Growing their power, influence and/or prestige
QuoteFinally, is this asking a wrong-headed question? That is, is the act of classifying all the core activities likely to suck the magic out of all the oddball things that D&D characters do?
I think it is wrongheaded to a degree. I am not sure what value compiling this list would have. If there is a particular goal in mind, that might change how thoroughly people examine their answers (if it is about making sure a game has mechanics for everything on the list, people might change their answers if they want/don't want mechanics for a particular thing for example). I am also not sure how narrow you want this to be. There were things I wanted to add, but felt they overlapped with other entries, were possibly too niche, etc.
Quote from: Valatar;11369481. Killing them.
2. Taking their stuff.
I see you've played this game before?
Supposedly; D&D is about Exploration, Social Interaction, and Combat.
Quote from: Razor 007;1137237Supposedly; D&D is about Exploration, Social Interaction, and Combat.
Yeah, that also is part of what prompted the question. I don't think WotC got the 3 pillars quite right. In the process of trying to make it fit into their pillars, they did exactly the thing that several people have warned about in this topic--you start trying to make rules to make it be about those things, instead of letting what it is about make the rules.
OTOH, maybe "social interaction" is a core thing, and WotC keeps botching the execution. They keep making it too specific--have moderate to high Cha, select certain skills, select certain classes and you are the face guy. Or usually the face guy. Whereas, I think that maybe the characters with a high Cha might talk more than others, all else being equal, but the skill and class things cut across a different grain. Your wizard knows a lot of magic lore. So if you need someone to talk to another wizard about the quest, anyone (and everyone) can do that. If you need someone to talk to another wizard about magic, or the other wizard is an academic snob, or they don't like non-wizards going into the wizard college, then you get your wizard to do the talking. Whereas when you need someone to talk to a seedy mercenary, chances are you'll go with someone a little more warlike. This approach is opposed to a general "persuasion" skill that stacks on top of your Cha mod and makes your roll so high that no one else wants to talk.
I suppose that is the long way around to the option that the 5E background take the place of skills. Leave the skills out, and the background tells you what you can do and talk about. I don't mind that, but I do want just a little bit of simple boosts for customization sake as the character increases in level. Not "before I didn't have this skill and so I had a +3 to my roll; now I have the skill so I have a +7 to my roll." Instead, something akin to "yesterday I didn't know much about ships; now I've got the Sailing perk which means that I've spent a lot of time on ships, around crews, etc." It's not full-blown Sailor profession, but familiarity with it which could give a +1 or +2 to a Dex check to climb rigging in a fight, or similar bonus when talking to sailors, or a little bump when navigating by the stars. My buddy the bard didn't pay much attention to the sailors, because he was busy learning the rudiments of a language from another traveling companion.
A couple of comments:
Social interaction is definitely a core activity, but I specifically excluded it from the rules for my current game. I prefer such things to be done free-form and I've never found a set of rules that provided a better experience than this.
Similarly, problem solving is core, but I consider that a player rather than a character activity. Anything involving decision-making should not be resolved with a die roll.
Magic is problematic to classify. On the one hand, it makes sense to call it core. On the other hand, any time you are using magic, you are trying to do something that can be better described as part of another core activity, like combat, travel, social, etc. I would tend not to include it in a list of core activities for this reason.
My list would probably be combat, social, stealth, chase, travel, athletics (climb, jump, swim, etc), investigative, exploration (in the strict sense of "go someplace and see what's there"), and environmental survival, And as I mentioned, not all of those actually need rules.