Of all the complaints about 3.x systems... do you people actually allow this stuff ?

Rechan · Jan 22, 2012

malkav666 said:
As far as magical disparity. All the big nasty spells and neat tricks the players have the enemies also have. They exist in world where big scary magic is present and the bad guys know it is present and worse have access to it.

1) That doesn't address simple problems like Save or Die/Save or Suck. If your response to "He casts Hold Person" is "Well an enemy mage can cast that too", well great. But that means that it's mage on mage, and party fighter is left out. Or rather, he just winds up getting hit with various Save or Die effects while trying to stab the enemy wizard/deal with summoned monsters.

2) Do you see exactly how much effort you have to put into countering spellcasting? You need an intelligent organization who has far reaching capabilities, the capacity to watch the PCs and instigate plans just to address one or two classes? All the time. Not every foe the PCs will face will be uber-intelligent and prepared.

Furthermore, super-smart/capable enemy completely neglects situations where it doesn't work. Ok, the PCs bust into a crypt filled with undead and other monsters, and they bring the big nasty spells. So, what do the enemies do? Their reach doesn't extend further past the dungeon. Or take "Against the Giants" as an example. It's a long string of big brutes. How exactly do they deal with high powered spells - send giants out to watch the PCs and then hire wizards to deal with them?

If I have a choice been "10x the work just to counter the capabilities of high level casters" and "A system that's balanced so that I don't have to deal with that crap", I'm going to go with the latter and not sweat it.

Lilaxe · Jan 22, 2012

Evenglare said:
Hmm, I just thought of an interesting house rule for spell regaining. What if you didnt have to regain all of them at a single time. Sort of replenish them during the day, say a spell set a number of hours equal to the spell level or perhaps twice the hours. Except make your highest level spells only refill after a day's rest.

Example would be regaining the first levels spell every hour (or 2) throughout the day. 2nd level spells every 2 (or 4 hours a day).

Or something similar?

Good Idea! So good in fact this was the actual written rule in the 1E DMG. Although its written such that it's open for interpretation. Many people played 0E or Basic spells per day despite this rule in the DMG.

Ahnehnois · Jan 22, 2012

3.X has its problems.

There was excessive complexity with 3.X, there were balance issues, there were things that were confusing. There were things the game didn't do well.

However, 15 minute adventuring days, long DM prep, save or die, the fighter/caster imbalance, and most of the other ones that 4e "fixed" were not among them. At best, they're overstated or symptomatic of deeper issues. At worst, they're just examples of various malcontents and incompetents abusing the rules.

You can't make the game idiot-proof.

Izumi · Jan 22, 2012

This whole 20 minute adventuring day cliche is entirely the DMs fault. Yes, I said it, and it's true. Think about it deeply.

Minigiant · Jan 22, 2012

One other problem with the 15 minute day is that it kills stupid enemies. Magical beasts and primitive villains wont always be able to rush the party or up their danger level. A large pack of ice breathing wolves wont set traps when you kill four of them. Orges with always need a Orge Mage/Oni bodygaurd. It is annoying.

Oh and the WORST thing is when a powerful caster is actually role played as a "I'm better than you. You all suck. Stand back and let me solve the problem. I used 3 spells so we should rest because I am the most important." wizard. Because then the problem is ingrained in the character's personality. It's okay when the fighter type is an arrogant blowhard, but when the caster does it.

Then the other PCs get angry and either eventually all die because they have a weak pack mule where their wizard should be, the DM has to constantly adjust encounters, or go back to town after every 2 encounters.

Though in that game, every PC was jacked up: Lawful stupids, pacifists, kleptos, and berserkers.

Hassassin · Jan 22, 2012

Ahnehnois said:
You can't make the game idiot-proof.

Agreed, but it would have been nice if they had addressed this in the DMG.

Fanaelialae · Jan 22, 2012

Ahnehnois said:
3.X has its problems.

There was excessive complexity with 3.X, there were balance issues, there were things that were confusing. There were things the game didn't do well.

However, 15 minute adventuring days, long DM prep, save or die, the fighter/caster imbalance, and most of the other ones that 4e "fixed" were not among them. At best, they're overstated or symptomatic of deeper issues. At worst, they're just examples of various malcontents and incompetents abusing the rules.

You can't make the game idiot-proof.

It's true that you can't make the game perfect. That doesn't mean you can't make it better.

As I stated, I played under a 15MWD DM in both 3e and 4e. In 3e it was a massive problem. We rested after virtually every single fight. In 4e, we had the reserves to press on, because resources were managed much differently. The adventure day was still shorter than typical for 4e, but it was considerably longer than 15 minutes.

Now, I'd agree with you if you were to say the 4e, particularly in the beginning, went too far. That doesn't, however, imply that things should swing back to 3e. I believe that there's a sweet spot somewhere between the two, where preventing constant abuse requires neither saintly players (or a particular play style) nor tyrannical DMing, and also allows more freedom than seen in the 4e "core" structure.

SageMinerve · Jan 22, 2012

Ahnehnois said:
3.X has its problems.

There was excessive complexity with 3.X, there were balance issues, there were things that were confusing. There were things the game didn't do well.

However, 15 minute adventuring days, long DM prep, save or die, the fighter/caster imbalance, and most of the other ones that 4e "fixed" were not among them. At best, they're overstated or symptomatic of deeper issues. At worst, they're just examples of various malcontents and incompetents abusing the rules.

You can't make the game idiot-proof.

Long DM prep, not among them?
Fighter/Caster imbalance, not among them?

(I'll put aside the fact that your "idiot-proof" remark seems to suggest that people disagreeing with that are, in your eyes, idiots.)

I don't have a problem with people that prefer 3.X to 4th or other editions. There are numerous things that can be an argument: Multiclassing, vancian magic, prestige classes, etc. But that said, there ARE problems with it.

*On AVERAGE (meaning no min-maxing), the 15th level mage will completely overshadow martial characters, simply because of: 1) No misses (a fighter has to hit); 2) Can target pretty much any number and/or anyone on the battlefield (the fighter can generally hit only people in melee).

And on the other side of the pendulum, there are progression choices in 3.X that are traps for unaware (read: inexperienced) players. One of my players wanted to play a, I think it was a Horizon Walker (?) prestige class (it sounded cool to him). Nobody is going to convince me that, without going crazy trying to min-max, a ranger 9 - horizon walker 6 is on par with most other combos. When the player saw what some other PCs could do at 15th level and compared it to what he could do, he was feeling a bit cheated. And it only got worse as they went up in levels. Never had that problem in 4th, because it's almost impossible to have a "dead weight" character.

*There's no doubt, having DMed for numerous years 3.X and 4th, that 3.X is a lot longer to prep, especially as soon as you customize opponents (of course if you only take monsters as they are out of the MM, the edition isn't really a factor...).

ferratus · Jan 22, 2012

Ahnehnois said:
However, 15 minute adventuring days, long DM prep, save or die, the fighter/caster imbalance, and most of the other ones that 4e "fixed" were not among them.

The DM prep took the most amount of time of all the editions. I've got kids and a job, I can't take the time to create a something that has the same complexity as a PC everytime I create an NPC. I also don't have time to change every monster into the complexity of a PC whenever I want to customize them. The amount of time 4e has saved me ensures I will never DM 3e ever again.

As for the fighter/caster imbalance, Fighters are somewhat overshadowed by spellcasters. There is a reason that overpowered builds aren't called FoDzillas. If you want to play the most powerful build you can, generally you start with a druid, wizard or (especially) cleric.

As for save or die, it all depends whether the story arc of the characters or the world/dungeon is more important. People have their preferences.

The 15 minute adventuring day generally was the biggest problem in AD&D for me, because healing resources were so scarce. Generally running out of spells generally doesn't cause my players to rest, but running out of healing does. If anything, players wait until the boss encounter before "going nova". So in 3e I have long grinding minion fights leading up to the final encounter, followed by a one-round kill of the final boss. The best encounters were always with the cool lieutenant because they didn't go nova, but they treated him as a serious threat and used some good (but not essential) spells on him.

I have to say that having the dungeon "change tactics" is generally not feasible all the time. I certainly have allowed PC's to rest where they shouldn't, or come back and find the dungeon hasn't changed much. Why? Because that would take work to rearrange all the encounters, and I got other stuff to do than spend a lot of time on my hobby of playing make-believe.

For all the protests on this thread, I think people aren't admitting that they do the same damn thing all the time.

At best, they're overstated or symptomatic of deeper issues. At worst, they're just examples of various malcontents and incompetents abusing the rules.

You can't make the game idiot-proof.

The problem isn't idiots. The problem is that there are 4 smart players (PC's) trying to get advantages over another player (DM). The DM in turn is constrained by the fact that he wants his players to come back, so he wants to show them a good time.

If I was playing a game where the DM resorted to some of the douchey tactics mentioned on this thread to "fix" problems that should have been solved at the design level, I'd probably find something else to do on Sundays. Or else tap into the sentiment of fellow players and stage a coup of the DM's chair.

Ahnehnois · Jan 22, 2012

SageMinerve said:
Long DM prep, not among them?
Fighter/Caster imbalance, not among them?

I can't understand how prep for any game is a function of anything other than the time you choose to put into it. You can easily run 3.X in an improv style or straight out of a published adventure with no prep whatsoever. Stat blocks are very easy to chop down if you know you only need combat (or noncombat) statistics. I've seen many people complain about 3.X prep time relative to other games, but I don't understand how the specific rules lengthened their prep time that much. 2e was enormously complex and time consuming, and I shudder to think about having to pick a retinue of powers for every NPC worth detailing. I think it's a style that lengthens prep time, not so much the rules. A rules-lite game is of course easier to prep, but D&D hasn't been that for a long time (we'll see about 5e).

I read the books and see that there are fighter/caster issues. Fighters are not good enough at high level, casters cast too many spells too easily. That said, the basic assumptions of D&D are this: wizards can teleport, control minds, and grant wishes. That will never be balanced with nonmagic abilities, nor should it be. So I see a lot of room for improvement in specific class, spell, and feat mechanics, but I don't agree that simply because magic is unbalanced it breaks the game, or that magic and nonmagic mechanics should be balanced.

I would quite happily see increased costs and difficulty for spellcasting and more powerful high-level fighter abilities. I've adopted several substantial fixes to that effect for my game. Of course, that's part of the reason 3.X is still a viable game; it's very option-friendly, very receptive to UA-type changes.

My experience in actual play over playing 3.X from its release until this day has been that fighters are the most popular and enjoyed class at all levels, and rangers and rogues are up there, although I understand that's not everyone's experience. Magic is a challenge, but there's no need to throw the baby out with the bathwater to fix it.

In any case, I think there are larger issues that are often ignored.

(I'll put aside the fact that your "idiot-proof" remark seems to suggest that people disagreeing with that are, in your eyes, idiots.)

My intent is not to offend; I'm speaking more about some of the abuses of polymorph or any number of min-max build experts who break the game on purpose, or DMs who abuse save-or-die abilities and alienate their players from lethality. There are many complaints that do not fall into this category. I do believe that...

I don't have a problem with people that prefer 3.X to 4th or other editions. There are numerous things that can be an argument: Multiclassing, vancian magic, prestige classes, etc. But that said, there ARE problems with it.

3e is flawed in many ways. I totally agree. I started my original post with that. I had to adopt a ton of variants to make it marginally fit my needs. What I'm doing is agreeing (strongly) with the OP's contention that it is very important that game design be shaped by the experiences of everyone playing the game, not just the ones who make the most noise.