D&D 5E With Respect to the Door and Expectations....The REAL Reason 5e Can't Unite the Base

[timASW]

See, I think this is where it becomes so problematic to create a "unifying" game. People seem to have really, REALLY different definitions of what they want. "Gritty" and "simple mechanics" are not a couple of phrases I'd associate with WoD. WoD is a pretty rules heavy system and IME, isn't gritty at all. It's far closer to super heroes in black trenchcoats. Blade and Underworld type RPG.

So, how is a game designer supposed to please you? It's like people who claim to want process simulation games and love 3e.

just to clarify. I said WoD. Not Mage. Regular humans, maybe hunter. Both systems are really simple and gritty. Even the vampires and werewolves are both pretty simple. Its really only when you get into the wizards that it gets wonky.

 

[pemerton]

This is not my impression except of a tiny subset of 4e. Most 4e appears to be crunch written to match fluff as closely as possible - and then they hand you the crunch. Reskins are something to be done with care

Agreed.

There are a number of reasons I prefer mechanics to have primacy over fluff text.

<snip>

I think the rules, mechanics and descriptive text, should be an aid to clear communication within a group, not an obstacle to be overcome or avoided.

Likewise agreed.

In discussions of "reskinning" in 4e, there is often a confusion between flavour text, which often is not important or even helpful, and keywords (and similar mechanical descriptors), which are the principal anchor between mechanics and fiction.

Why can Icy Terrain freeze a small pond, whereas Burning Hands can't, and vice versa when it comes to setting a library on fire? Because one delivers [cold] damage, and the other [fire] damage.

There are inevitable corner cases where things break down, and the mechanics don't deliver a clear or sensible outcome. When an ooze is knocked prone, according to the rules non-adjacent ranged attacks suffer a -2 penalty to hit. In the typical case of prone-ness, the reason for this is obvious: the much-reduced profile of a prone target. But why should it be so for an ooze?

Another corner case would be damage from scalding steam - for some purposes it would make sense for that to be [fire] damage, but it is not going to set anything on fire.

Yet another corner case might be a halfling armed with a dagger performing Come and Get It against three gnoll hunters. What exactly does the forced movement correspond to in the fiction?

I don't think these sorts of corner cases can be avoided. When they come up, my preferred approach to resolution is group consensus led by (but not necessarily determined by) the GM. In the case of the prone ooze, I'd probably disregard the penalty to ranged attacks. In the case of the steam, I would want to think more about the nature and source of any fire resistance before letting it apply. In the case of the halfling using Come and Get It against the gnolls, I'd ad lib in some explanation for why all the hunters choose to close even though they have an obvious and overwhelming advantage against the halfling from their current position.

If a ruleset, as used, were to constantly generate these sorts of cases, then I might think that was a reason for changing rulesets. But well-designed mechanics, when used with well-designed story elements, shouldn't do so. One way to increase the likelihood of these sorts of cases, I think, is to be sloppy in the design of the rules, and rely upon the flavour text of story elements to carry the weight of action resolution.

 

[Balesir]

just to clarify. I said WoD. Not Mage. Regular humans, maybe hunter. Both systems are really simple and gritty. Even the vampires and werewolves are both pretty simple. Its really only when you get into the wizards that it gets wonky.

Yeah - sorry, but I'm with [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION], here. I love some of the world background that was created for WoD, but when I ran it I ended up using the Theatrix diceless rules because the WoD rules themselves were just horrible. They managed to be heavy and clunky while at the same time producing wildly improbable results in aggregate. The last point, in particular, was made worse by the fact that the probabilities on the dice mechanics they use are anything but intuitive or easy to estimate.

Oh, and the game I was running started out with the PCs as 'normal' humans, too. I think the settings work really well that way - with the "true nature" of the world being made clear (more or less) gradually to them <evil grin>.

 

[Argyle King]

And the task of bringing together all past fans in one big happy revenue stream. And the task of catering two traditional and modern concepts of the classes while keeping them all balanced. And the task of catering to a broad range of play-styles, even though that term has barely been defined. And...

In short, if they pull it off, Hasbro should really spring for dinner at Milliways for the whole design staff.

I'm simply echoing the language WoTC has used to describe what their goals are.

Also -as said- the reason I pointed to the product I did was because it is a product designed to create something akin to the D&D dungeon fantasy experience while still remaining modular. As that is what WoTC has said their goal is, I feel it would be a good idea for them to look at how that product does what it does and see if they can learn anything from it. IMO, it would be a little embarrassing if they can't figure it out when a different company* seems to have been able to. The WoTC design team just has to figure out how to take that approach and make it 'more D&D' and less like the other game I mentioned.


*Especially given the resources WoTC has in comparison to other companies. Though, to be fair; imo, the level of talent and passion for design among the folks over at the other company I mentioned is pretty high overall. That being said; from a corporate level, there is funding that WoTC has to achieve their goal that (I assume -based on size and production values) others do not.

 

[jrowland]

Wow.

I think I must ave left the opposite impression with my post. Seems people are arguing against me with arguments I agree with and I thought I articulated.

When I say Fluff-first, I don't mean "Fluff is better than Mechanics in a hierarchy." I mean literally, start with fluff then work the mechanics.

I also don't mean that it ends there. That is to say, once you have fluff ( I want a spell that shoots a small ball of fire that blossoms into an explosion that damages my foes) you move to mechanics (fire keyword, range, AoE, level, dmg, etc) then you check back with fluff, ie. rinse and repeat.

So, I am sure there are countless examples of areas in 4E that were likely fluff first due to D&D legacy (fireball is a fire spell). But the unified leveling schema of AEDU presented in 4E is clearly a mechanics-first consideration. What fluff is there to unify the same AEDU gains for all classes? What fluff was there that lead to the development of AEDU? Its pure mechanics.

Again, don't get me wrong here. AEDU is fine, but lets not delude ourselves into thinking there was a narrative that led to it development. That it was designed to fit that narrative. It wasn't. In that sense, AEDU in 4E is mechanics first, and why the fluff as to why everyone gets 1 encounter power at level 1 (ie why we all can only do 1 special maneuver before resting) is an add-on (left to the players and DM).

All editions do some of this, its not an all-or-nothing prospect. I agree, tight mechanics are a must. But mechanics should be designed to support the fluff, ie the story/narrative, you are trying to create.

So essentially, I agree, good mechanics are key, and tight specific (non-vague mechanics) are key, but the need to be designed with the purpose of supporting fluff.

e.g. spellcasting mechanics to support the fluff of wizards, sorcerers, and warlocks. We start with the concept (fluff) of each class. Take a moment and ask yourself what is each of those in terms of pure fluff? Then ask does the mechanics presented in the playtest support that? I don't care how good the mechanics are, if they don't allow you to play the fluff you envision, the mechanics will appear flawed.

I think sorcerer is a great case where fluff didn't match mechanics and thus the sorcerer was born. Wizard wasn't working for their vision of an arcane spellcaster. The vancian echanics didn't fit that vision (fluff), and so spontaneous mechanics are born.

I've rambled, but this is all I mean. Fluff comes first, and mechanics are created to express that fluff in the game. You can create mechaincs first, then try and find a narrative that explains them. But looking at the boundry conditions (all or nothing), starting with fluff then designing mechanics (I want a fantasy game with x,y,z elements, let me make mechanics to express x,y,z) makes a hell of a lot more sense than (I have mechanics x,y,z...what sort of game does this give me? Can I make it work for a fantasy?)

my 2 electrum (I ran on more than 2 cp)

 

[Bluenose]

All editions do some of this, its not an all-or-nothing prospect. I agree, tight mechanics are a must. But mechanics should be designed to support the fluff, ie the story/narrative, you are trying to create.

The implication is that D&D has to be simulationist, that you have to start with Fluff/story and develop mechanics to support and reinforce it. That's what works well with games like Pendragon, The One Ring, or L5R and less well with Dragon Age and the new Marvel game. But D&D is expected to handle a far wider range of possible settings with fluff that deviates in lots of ways from that same fluff in a different setting. The mechanics have to compromise, unless you want to cut out a large amount of that diversity. Which might not be a bad thing as games which really know what they want to do tend to be good atthait, but is certainly not going to "unify the fanbase".

 

[timASW]

Yeah - sorry, but I'm with [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION], here. I love some of the world background that was created for WoD, but when I ran it I ended up using the Theatrix diceless rules because the WoD rules themselves were just horrible. They managed to be heavy and clunky while at the same time producing wildly improbable results in aggregate. The last point, in particular, was made worse by the fact that the probabilities on the dice mechanics they use are anything but intuitive or easy to estimate.

Oh, and the game I was running started out with the PCs as 'normal' humans, too. I think the settings work really well that way - with the "true nature" of the world being made clear (more or less) gradually to them <evil grin>.

Umm, you roll a number of D10's equal to your skill, ability and equipment modifier, Minus any penalties. Theres nothing clunky or complicated about that.

Everything 8 or over is a success, so you have a 30% chance of success on each die. Bearing that in mind its not at all hard to estimate the results of any roll.

Where did you guys have trouble?

 

[Remathilis]

I don't think these sorts of corner cases can be avoided. When they come up, my preferred approach to resolution is group consensus led by (but not necessarily determined by) the GM. In the case of the prone ooze, I'd probably disregard the penalty to ranged attacks. In the case of the steam, I would want to think more about the nature and source of any fire resistance before letting it apply. In the case of the halfling using Come and Get It against the gnolls, I'd ad lib in some explanation for why all the hunters choose to close even though they have an obvious and overwhelming advantage against the halfling from their current position.

Here would be my "rulings" on such cases.
1.) The ooze isn't knocked prone, the penalty is negated. Sorry, hope that wasn't an encounter power; next time don't trip to knock an amorphous blob prone.
2.) Steam-heat is heat. I'd rule Fire resistance works.
3.) I'd say that CaGI fails. The gnolls (assuming they're not stupid, I don't know the average gnoll Int off the cuff) have a superior tactical position and the halfling is at horrendous disadvantage. The power isn't wasted, but the halfling hurls threats and insults, the gnolls respond with some arrows that miss, and the halfling reconsiders his tactics.

"But Remy!" I hear the crowd shout out, "That's not fair to arbitrarily decide a power doesn't work! You're robbing the player of his ability to affect the fiction, making his choice of power, sub-optimal, yadda yadda"

Here's my RBDM response: So what?

Fireball's don't work underwater. Neither do slings. You can't burn a fire-elemental. You can't convince the paladin-lord you're his bastard love-child. And I don't care if you have skill focus in Athletics, you're not convincing the king to give you a boat during the skill challenge by doing an absurd number of push-ups!

At a certain point, the fiction doesn't bend enough to allow it. I can craft some pretty convincing rationales and examples, but I seriously doubt any of you would actually believe I'm actually 22 foot tall space alien from Zogtor.

At a certain point, the DM has to say "No." This flies contrary to 4e's "Say yes and explain it later" mode of operation, and it jars me to no end. The thing that killed 4e for me, more than ADEU, more than "the math", more than any single mechanical or fictional element 4e introduced, was the off-hand way the game took the ability for the DM to control his world away. An Ability like CaGI takes the DM's right to play monster's intelligently away from him and reduces them from rationale beings in the world to pawn on the chessboard. The game has to have limits, and I actually hope Next puts more limits back in, so I that never have to have the "the rules say the ooze is prone" argument again.

There are corner case, and then there is rationalizing an onrushing mage charging, dagger first, at a full-plated fighter with a greataxe...

 

[D'karr]

was the off-hand way the game took the ability for the DM to control his world away. An Ability like CaGI takes the DM's right to play monster's intelligently away from him and reduces them from rationale beings in the world to pawn on the chessboard. The game has to have limits, and I actually hope Next puts more limits back in, so I that never have to have the "the rules say the ooze is prone" argument again.

There are corner case, and then there is rationalizing an onrushing mage charging, dagger first, at a full-plated fighter with a greataxe...

I never had that issue with any of my groups. The game was designed as exception based. If I as the DM want to put an exception in place I simply do it.

What do you think the designers did when they printed monster vault? They put an exception on an ooze so it couldn't be knocked prone. Do I have to pay more to get that exception? I don't think so. I just make it so in my game.

With CaGI it's the same thing. All these theoretical "corner cases" with the wizard and the archers, and the halfling with a toothpick are simply that "corner cases" that I'm coming up with in my mind. I think gnoll archers would be highly susceptible to CaGI from a halfling with a toothpick. They are cruel pack animal creatures. They see weakness and they pounce. But that's just me.

That mentality that the "rules" forced the DM out, particularly with 4e seems totally alien to me. I've never played with a group like that, and thankfully never will. YMMV

 

[Balesir]

Umm, you roll a number of D10's equal to your skill, ability and equipment modifier, Minus any penalties. Theres nothing clunky or complicated about that.

Everything 8 or over is a success, so you have a 30% chance of success on each die. Bearing that in mind its not at all hard to estimate the results of any roll.

Well, it was oWoD, so the rules were a bit different - nevertheless, you have a seven dice pool and need two successes - what is your chance of success? No cheating and using calculator or spreadsheet, now...

The net result is that, often, the actual chance of something working is really screwy - but no-one notices, because they can't estimate the success chance!

<snip>

If playing in a world where the dictator GM decides everything, down to whether or not each character can breathe yet, is something you enjoy, you're welcome to it. Just don't bring it near me, thank you.