Even more Mike Mearls

[3catcircus]

Sorry - but a few of his comments are *exactly* why I won't be buying 4th edition.

1. On quests: playing RPGs shouldn't require "...a minimum mental or creative requirement?" Maybe so, but then why bother playing the game at all if you don't have to think? Just sit and watch the boob-tube instead.

2. Armor as DR is too hard because it slows down play? Subtraction is too hard?!?!?

2. Sunder breaks the game because PCs and NPCs go around breaking each others' equipment every five minutes? In our group, we rarely use it because it is so difficult to be successful in sundering the bad guy's weapon.

 

[Fifth Element]

1. On quests: playing RPGs shouldn't require "...a minimum mental or creative requirement?" Maybe so, but then why bother playing the game at all if you don't have to think? Just sit and watch the boob-tube instead.

Pure escapism coupled with hanging out with your friends is a valid reason to play. I also think you're taking that quote out of context.

2. Armor as DR is too hard because it slows down play? Subtraction is too hard?!?!?

By adding another step in the process, yes it slows down play. Not much, but some. And this is not the only reason he gave why they are not using DR. He talked about it from a design standpoint as well. Taking this out of context again.

2. Sunder breaks the game because PCs and NPCs go around breaking each others' equipment every five minutes? In our group, we rarely use it because it is so difficult to be successful in sundering the bad guy's weapon.

If you rarely use it, you won't miss it. What's the problem?

 

[La Bete]

If you rarely use it, you won't miss it. What's the problem?

And there's an argument that if you rarely use it, should it stay in the game as-is, or be re-examined?

 

[3catcircus]

Pure escapism coupled with hanging out with your friends is a valid reason to play. I also think you're taking that quote out of context.

Watching Firefly or Star Wars with your friends is also pure escapism - with less thinking. I really don't see why it is so important to simplify the game to the point that it becomes as little "work" as watching tv.

By adding another step in the process, yes it slows down play. Not much, but some. And this is not the only reason he gave why they are not using DR. He talked about it from a design standpoint as well. Taking this out of context again.

Sorry - I just don't buy this as being an extra step. "Does a 22 hit? Yes. Ok - you take 14 points of damage." Player subtracts 5 for his DR and then subtracts 9 points off of his hp total. Really - how hard is it and how long does it take to subtract a small number from a large number? If you can't do the math before your next turn in the initiative due to DR, then it is pretty much a given that you'll slow the game down when attempting to do *other* things like subtract numbers on your to-hit roll due to power attack, or add the extra damage if the power attack is successful.

If you rarely use it, you won't miss it. What's the problem?

Because the rules would be *available*, regardless of whether or not I choose to use them. To have and not need is better than to need and not have...

 

[lkj]

Yeah, it's unfortunate the game forced you to do that. I don't like "agreements" between the DM and the PC's. It reduces involvement in the game if the players think "Oh, he wouldn't do that..." Both sides should "play by the RAW (including HRAW)."

Yeah, I agree. I might have handled it better by house ruling sunder to begin with or introducing repair rules or not making the gear quite as pivotal. But some of that is probably due to the fact that I ported over the campaign from 1st edition where it wasn't an issue.

Truth be told, I like the flavor of Sunder-- in the context of being this dramatic moment where a weapon is broken in the fury of combat. But I wouldn't like it so much as a regular feature of every combat. That said, as you pointed out, the repair rules might solve the issue-- though it might put a player partly out of commission for awhile if they were out in the wilds away from a 'weapon healer'.

Anyway. Something to ponder.

AD

 

[lkj]

It's probably more relevant in 4e. While PC abilities are less item-dependent, there's still going to be magic swords and such. You won't need the sheer variety of weapons 3e did, and they're likely to be rewarded less often.

In that situation, Sunder is a great threat to an object the PC has worked hard to achieve, and will be hard to replace. With fewer magic weapons necessary to give out, they'll show up less often. If a fighter's new sword only lasts a couple sessions before being destroyed, he's effectively being punished for trying to use the reward of his previous labors.

I see where you're coming from, but I don't think that would necessarily be the case. Less item dependence doesn't necessarily mean less magic availability. It just means that getting magic items isn't absolutely necessary for survival.

Your point, however, brings up a separate issue. Sunder can be problematic for two reasons: 1) If characters rely on magic items to survive; 2) If it's a low magic campaign where magic items are very rare.

I've run the latter many a time. My basic approach would probably be to make sure that sundering is pretty hard to do (by houserule if necessary) or to allow the weapons to be repaired (as others have pointed out).

In a low magic item availability campaign, I'd lean toward the first option. I'd basically just make it pretty hard to break a magic weapon-- one of the many reasons they'd be so valued given their rarity. If I did it perfectly, I'd still let weapons be sundered occasionally but it would be a big deal that is worked up to somehow (like, say, with Narsil)

But I haven't thought it through in much detail. I suspect the designers probably have and I'll be interested to see what they come up with (and to see whether I like it).

I think it's an general issue with this kind of discussion-- We simply don't have enough info yet to judge an indvidual rule in 4e. Problems we envision with an individual change might well already have been addressed in the full ruleset.

I like the discussions regardless. It's fun (although I do avoid the debates where people are getting worked up. I don't find that very fun-- at least on an internet board. In person is another matter . . .) But in the end, I"ll probably buy the Player's Handbook when it comes out, read through it, and decide whether it's worth switching then.

But till then, it's fun to speculate.

Cheers,
AD

 

[Fifth Element]

Sorry - I just don't buy this as being an extra step. "Does a 22 hit? Yes. Ok - you take 14 points of damage." Player subtracts 5 for his DR and then subtracts 9 points off of his hp total. Really - how hard is it and how long does it take to subtract a small number from a large number? If you can't do the math before your next turn in the initiative due to DR, then it is pretty much a given that you'll slow the game down when attempting to do *other* things like subtract numbers on your to-hit roll due to power attack, or add the extra damage if the power attack is successful.

Again, Mr. Mearls provided more reasons than this one as to why they're not using armour as DR. Singling one out like this is a strawman.

"Why not use armour as DR? It doesn't slow play down!" skips over all of the other discussion as to why it is not being used.

 

[Fifth Element]

Watching Firefly or Star Wars with your friends is also pure escapism - with less thinking. I really don't see why it is so important to simplify the game to the point that it becomes as little "work" as watching tv.

Because they want it to be accessible to the greatest number of people possible, within reason.

D&D (and gaming in general) has a long history of elitism. In the past, when the simplification of rules was brought up (such as the 1E -> 2E transition), there were grognards that came out in favour of complicated (for the sake of being complicated) rules, to keep out the riff-raff, so to speak. But WotC wants more players, not less. As such they want to design a game that will keep current players happy, and yet be as accessible as possible to newer players.

Their job is not just to keep you happy. There are competing interests they have to address.

 

[Xethreau]

Likewise, remember when Gimli tried to destroy the One Ring at the Council of Elrond and (in the movie at least) his axe shattered? Cool. That's what you get for trying to Sunder the One Ring.

Well, thats Hollywood for you. (Gimli was barely introduced by the closing of the Councel in the book.) Don't get me wrong, I love that movie. My point is that thematics are thematics, and if a DM wants to have an NPC try to break something, only to have the NPC's weapon break, that is his own perogative. One might even say in that situation, if Gimili were a PC, that the DM was not being fair, and that introducing a epic level magic item at their level of play was an unfair advantage.

Movies/books/myth/stuff rarely translate well into D&D, so I find that it is mostly futile to try.


I for one am not sad to see Sunder probably leaving, but I would not mind it staying if it were less complicated. "What's this thing's Hardness and HP?" *shudder*

 

[Oldtimer]

Sorry - I just don't buy this as being an extra step.

Whether you buy it or not, it is an extra step. You can debate the effort involved in the step and/or the intrusiveness of the step, but hardly its existence. :\