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A problem with new school as of 3.x and later. Or is it a problem?
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<blockquote data-quote="delericho" data-source="post: 5070569" data-attributes="member: 22424"><p>There's a difference between "having lots of options", and having the paradigm of 3e where some options were intentionally made more powerful than others, in order to promote 'system mastery'.</p><p></p><p>In my opinion, having lots of options available, at least in supplements to the game, is almost a necessity for a game like D&D, where the intent is to have huge numbers of players playing huge numbers of campaigns over many years. Too few options, and people are likely to get bored.</p><p></p><p>When it comes to system mastery, though, it is my opinion that it is a blight on 3e, and probably the single worst element of that system (worse even than the excessive prep times that are almost required at high-level). Amongst other things, it makes it extremely difficult for new players to sit at the same table as old hands, without one or other group coming away feeling very unsatisfied.</p><p></p><p>Unfortunately, while 4e has made some improvements in this area - rebalancing things a lot, and removing a lot of 'bad' options - a lot of the mentality of system mastery remains. And so we get threads like the recent "How do I tell someone his character sucks?" thread. Frankly, I don't want to have to worry whether my character reaches someone else's arbitary standard of acceptability - mostly, I just want to play, and not end up gimped because I haven't invested hundreds of hours crunching the system.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="delericho, post: 5070569, member: 22424"] There's a difference between "having lots of options", and having the paradigm of 3e where some options were intentionally made more powerful than others, in order to promote 'system mastery'. In my opinion, having lots of options available, at least in supplements to the game, is almost a necessity for a game like D&D, where the intent is to have huge numbers of players playing huge numbers of campaigns over many years. Too few options, and people are likely to get bored. When it comes to system mastery, though, it is my opinion that it is a blight on 3e, and probably the single worst element of that system (worse even than the excessive prep times that are almost required at high-level). Amongst other things, it makes it extremely difficult for new players to sit at the same table as old hands, without one or other group coming away feeling very unsatisfied. Unfortunately, while 4e has made some improvements in this area - rebalancing things a lot, and removing a lot of 'bad' options - a lot of the mentality of system mastery remains. And so we get threads like the recent "How do I tell someone his character sucks?" thread. Frankly, I don't want to have to worry whether my character reaches someone else's arbitary standard of acceptability - mostly, I just want to play, and not end up gimped because I haven't invested hundreds of hours crunching the system. [/QUOTE]
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A problem with new school as of 3.x and later. Or is it a problem?
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