Forked Thread: all about the minis!

[AllisterH]

As mentioned, Gates of Firestorm Peak was designed explicitly for Player's Option series of books.

I think Combat & Tactics by itself brought back minis to the forefront of D&D. AS mentioned, in the pre PO world of 2e, the only type of representation of characters you might need is marching order and whether or not you were in the range of the fireball.

With C&T, introducing Combat Advnatage, Attacks of Opportunity and Flanking, yeah, minis were more necessary...

Personally, I"m of the side that believes it is a good thing that players are focused on the 4e combat table since I tended to dislike the focus on the pre-game build...

 

[MadMaligor]

Just as an aside, the game assumes nothing. We are discussing what the designers assume. And, it makes no sense to say that the designers assume that you will and that you will not use minis, unless of course, by that you mean that "the designers knew that you might use minis, but didn't assume that you did".


RC

Hehehe all of the debate we are having is proof positive that we are looking at the same mirror on different sides.

You are seperating game rules from game designers. Which means you can seperate their personal intention or personal game habits from actual game design. That then allows you to back the argument that miniatures were not meant to be used, because someone of Gary's stature felt the game was "meant" to be played without them. The problem with that is we don't have a direct statement from each designer about their intent regarding the use of miniatures. So people assume things based on Gygax's personal feelings or gaming habits. If you take that stance then you can assume just the opposite if other designers use them.

All of that is very interesting, and great conversation.

It still does not make the statement that "Dungeons and Dragons was meant to be played without miniatures" true.

Like I said I feel like a rules lawyer...hehehehe.

It doesn't matter what percentage of players use miniatures. It doesn't matter which designers used them and which didn't. It only matters that the game was designed with the idea that miniatures would be used, could be used, may be used, may not be used, or use of miniatures in some games was strickly prohibited, or required.

Let me ask you a question. Is the game meant to be played with dice?

 

[MadMaligor]

Another way to look at it would be to say...

If Gygax and Arneson were designing a game to be played without miniatures, why not say "This game is about imagination and creating a world that exists only in the minds of the DM and the PC's. The use of miniatures is not intended, and though we encourage you to create your own rules and play as you wish, we will not be writing rules that accomodate the use of miniatures."

Simple, straightforward, and it alleviates any question about the intent of the designers.

They didn't do that for a reason.

The reason. Because the game can, *edit*, might, won't, will, and will not be played with miniatures.

I think people get confused and think that "meant" is somehow defined as "have to", "Must", or has some definative meaning. It also can carry the connotation that an inference of something is a requirement of some kind.

All right RC...my head is about to "assplode!" hehehehe. If it means something to you, I will just stop and say that I agree to disagree with ya and that you have nothing but my understanding and respect.

*edit* I removed the word "should" because that was a bad example and implies something negative if miniatures are not used. Exuse my hasty writing.

 

[Ariosto]

As someone who played (O)D&D, AD&D 1E, AD&D 2E, D&D 3.0/3.5 and 4E, mostly using minis with all editions (because I like them), I believe that 3.0 was the first edition where it was easier to use minis then not to use them and that with 4E it is much more difficult to play the game without them. It's not impossible to play without them, but it really is a different game and not written to be played without minis, IMO.

My view is basically the same.

One reviewer of the original D&D set apparently got the idea that it was meant to be played by telephone! I think that's now clearly erroneous, but it points up that the verbal component is what really stood out. "There's no board, because the action takes place in your imagination" was a key innovation.

This game doesn’t have a board, because you won’t need one. Besides, no board could have all the dungeons, dragons, monsters, and characters you will need!

The game requires at least two players, one of whom is the Dungeon Master and has prepared the dungeon, the set of dice, pencil and paper for keeping records and maps, and optionally, a table top to represent the locality of the adventurers with some form of markers for the characters and the monsters they encounter.

Since DUNGEONS & DRAGONS was originally written for wargamers who are used to miniature figures, distances are often given in inches.

The Moldvay and Mentzer sets gave distances directly in feet, obviating that explanation (and the need to add a zero to the end of each figure).

It was a matter of conveying a radically new game concept in terms familiar to the intended audience. OD&D was aimed at wargamers, and 1st ed. AD&D at players of OD&D (or at least of Holmes Basic).

Contrast that with the focus in 3E, and even more in 4E, on defining things in terms of squares on a board. The traditional three-man frontage in a 10-foot-wide corridor does not work so well with five-foot squares!

 

[Raven Crowking]

Hehehe all of the debate we are having is proof positive that we are looking at the same mirror on different sides.

You are seperating game rules from game designers.

No; I am recognizing that a game cannot make assumptions, any more than a rock or a table can.

Let me ask you a question. Is the game meant to be played with dice?

Yes.


RC

 

[Ariosto]

As an aside, can someone explain to me how, previously, 3.0's focus on minis was a good thing because it avoided all the vagueness of position that plagued earlier editions, when (apparently) everyone was playing every edition with the same use of minis?

Colour me confused.

It's pretty simple: Well before 3E, most D&D players were drawn from beyond the wargaming culture that had supplied most of the first batch. The treatments of space, time and so on carried forward from Chainmail were no longer par for the course of previous experience but instead pretty strange.

(I submit that they were already an awkward match for the rules in AD&D, especially with everything that I think likely to be used at the tournament level, but that's a matter of "simulationist" perception.)

 

[Raven Crowking]

It's pretty simple: Well before 3E, most D&D players were drawn from beyond the wargaming culture that had supplied most of the first batch. The treatments of space, time and so on carried forward from Chainmail were no longer par for the course of previous experience but instead pretty strange.

(I submit that they were already an awkward match for the rules in AD&D, especially with everything that I think likely to be used at the tournament level, but that's a matter of "simulationist" perception.)

Ariosto,

What confuses me is how some can believe that there were always minis used by everyone, but that there was also a headache figuring the space based on the lack of use of minis.....an argument I heard quite often when I criticized the use of minis in 3e re: Sense of Wonder. (I argued that using minis, and esp. rulesets created to foster the use of minis, dramatically slow play, and hence reduce SoW into Sense of Bookkeeping.)

RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

It still does not make the statement that "Dungeons and Dragons was meant to be played without miniatures" true.

This might be why you fail to address the arguments presented. You proceed from a false assumption: no one is arguing that D&D was meant to be played without miniatures.

"Use of minis was not assumed" =/= "Assumed to be played w/o minis"


RC

 

[AllisterH]

The funny thing about the use of squares in 4e is that I didn't associate them with minis...

I associated them with one of my personal requests a.k.a don't use imperial.

I'm canadian and yards and miles and converting from feet to yards, miles absolutely made NO SENSE...At my group's table, anything involving movement would cause a player (especially a new one) "um, how many meteres is that again?"

 

[Agamon]

The funny thing about the use of squares in 4e is that I didn't associate them with minis...

I associated them with one of my personal requests a.k.a don't use imperial.

I'm canadian and yards and miles and converting from feet to yards, miles absolutely made NO SENSE...At my group's table, anything involving movement would cause a player (especially a new one) "um, how many meteres is that again?"

Really? I'm fairly comfortable with both (with the exception of volumetric measures) though I can only guesstimate how tall or heavy I am in meters and kilograms...

Back on topic, if you'd have told me in 1981 that D&D didn't need minis, I'd have given you a pretty funny look. Then, after some thought, I would have agreed. I've used board game pieces in a pinch, too.