Dear Gary,
I have to say, all the products that you and what came from you, have been very nice, over the many years, although that I have only been enjoying them for less then a fourth of the time they have been out. I started playing on 2e AD&D back in 90's (late I would assume having a memory flux) to 3.5 2-3 years back. From my time in the 'trenches of roleplaying' it would seem that the very attention of the game has shifted from well thought out fun characters to fairly well thought up characters that are rolled play. More and more playing has went from: I want to pick the lock, so I tkae out my tools, and stick them in the key hole picking around' to 'I pick lock, I rolled a 23, did it work?'
Again, I dont blame the compaines that make the sytems and ideas but the players that are making it more and more acceptable to not 'act out' as I remember in games of old. Maybe it was this way the whole time, maybe I was just naive having only limited groups that I played in, but what ever the reason and when ever it statred, I would like to see it stop (or slolw down) soon.
Personaly, I think there is a few reasons why this is happening. The first one of which is what I call: 'dead rules'. Dead rules are what simple rules in the game that most Dms leave out, and when playing with second generation or first time players, they new players will leave out when they start dming, not even knowing they are there. The Dead rules, which I cant remember at the moment (Ironic, isn't it?) take away role playing aspects. Oh wait, I do remember!
1) Training to gain class levels and skills. This has turned into a assumbstion in 3.5 (that you do take the training) and now the assumtion is ignored so its: You kill the tribe of goblins. 'Ding' You know learned a item creation feat and have 3 more ranks in Profession (sailor).
Ok, so that is the only one I remember off hand.
Alot of the role playing reasons have been removed from the game, and are viewed simply as a 'mechanic' that is ethier 'too weak' or 'over powered' When I do think people really understand what that means anymore.
Another think I cant say is that I know for a fact what the reasons behind the way you desisgned the game (which is to say: the role playing and mechanical aspects that entail the world) But I would like to think it was for role playing first. This is why I strongly disagree with game designers like Monte Cook. Most of Monte's ideas will make a role playing game feel more like a acrade game then a role playing. In a post that was well recieved on this forum, monte introduced a idea that I thought, ruined spell casters. Instead of spell casters having to be thoughtful in picking and choosing what spell to prepare and use for out the day, Monte's idea alowed casters a near infinite amount of spells, only limiting the spells per encounters. This is to say, a Wiz can can fireball 3 times in one battle, three times in another battle, three times again, and again and again. This ruins the wizard from being a thoughtful know-it-all to a magic powerhouse of firery death. I absoltely hate the idea of making D&D into a acrade just so a class can be thought to be more balanced, the idea is just wrong.
So, to make my rant at least some one relavnt and not all a idealistic zealot rant: Yes or no- Will 4th ED be a point buy sytem like the other games that d20 is buying out?
Sorry for any typos in advance.
---Rusty
