"Oddities" in fantasy settings - the case against "consistency"

[Maxperson]

No, those are mundane skills not parts of a class. But if all magic casters must be Wizard class then why would not all castle owners be name-level fighters?

Sorry. I think I mixed up a few threads. In another thread @ECMO3 was telling me that in order for a master chef to have +12 with cooking tools, you must use the monster creation rules which say that the master chef has to be CR 9 to get there. I think you probably didn't see that thread, which is why my joke caused confusion.

For the record, I stand by my assertion that I can just take an NPC with no stats and give him +12 as the king's master chef. I suspect that we are in agreement with that.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

As someone said, there's a difference between a personal ability and a possession. Its never been clear that magic use is, in fact, something you can just "learn" or something you have to have a personal trait for in the first place. And of course fairly on, you did have a way to do that; it was called dual-classing.

Now, if you're asking why you can't have isolated abilities rather than buying into a whole class, the usual answer is it requires too much training buy-in.

And yet there are people who clearly do basically this, AD&D has both multi-classed characters (all demi-humans appear to be capable of this) as well as dual-classed characters who study more than one thing. Beyond that classes like the 2e Bard sure look like something similar, just expressed as a single class (IE a fusion of thief and wizard in this case). So, clearly that's not a viable answer, even in TSR D&D. It is even less viable in 3e or 5e where all sorts of combinations exist.

So we see, by example, that there's no inherent reason why various permutations of abilities are 'impossible'. They may not work for PCs due to gamist or other reasons, but claiming it is some sort of matter of 'consistency' doesn't really fly.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

OK, I'm going to assume that the main reason to not give a PC a castle is because it gives them an unfair advantage. But if that castle comes with huge debts, including things like armies that have deserted because they're not getting paid or lots of structural upkeep that needs doing,
then the PC don't actually have that advantage. And can easily tell the PC that if they want to have a castle, the GM gets to decide what shape its in.


Of course, it also depends on the game. In Level Up, anyone can at least try to build a castle, if they have enough money. There's a whole chapter on building strongholds.

Right, the argument from castle building/ownership only applies to TSR D&D where Fighters have a freehold class feature. And I agree with your first point, castles are not given to level 1 PCs for gamist reasons (IE because the GM doesn't want one PC controlling some large resource). Your solution sounds interesting. Another would be to constitute the PCs as ALL being lords and ladies of the land.

 

[Lanefan]

To me, the implication there is that any option I use for a humanoid NPC has to be something codified and presented to the players as a PC option, otherwise I'm being unfair.

That's my take, yes...but see velow...

I reject that idea.

As a DM, I'm allowed to make hundreds of classes and thousands of feats or special abilities that are hidden from the players. They're not "locked away" from the PCs, the players are simply unaware of them until they encounter them in-game.

Yet the odds are likely high that the PCs would have, somewhere along the line, at least heard in-setting of some of these amazing things people can do; which means the players should know of them as well.

If the PC follows the same narrative beats the NPC did, then I'm certainly not stopping them from acquiring that ability.

...and here's the "below" to see: agreed.

 

[Lanefan]

Another would be to constitute the PCs as ALL being lords and ladies of the land.

For a game/campaign centered around courtly intrigue and politics, this would rock.

 

[Thomas Shey]

My comments aren’t limited to D&D. It’s fine that others prefer such an approach. I’m just pointing out that it is far from a necessity.

Few things are a necessity in game design; almost all discussion about what things are virtues, and that's always going to vary from person to person. I could go into the reasons I do think its a virtue, but there's no assurance you'd accept my premises, so its unlikely to be worth the effort.

 

[Maxperson]

That's my take, yes...but see velow...

Yet the odds are likely high that the PCs would have, somewhere along the line, at least heard in-setting of some of these amazing things people can do; which means the players should know of them as well.

...and here's the "below" to see: agreed.

I don't necessarily agree with the bolded portion. The world is a wide and wonderfully varied place, and uniqueness abounds. There will be metric craptons of stuff the PCs haven't heard about. While a lot is common knowledge, a lot is not.

 

[Thomas Shey]

OK, I'm going to assume that the main reason to not give a PC a castle is because it gives them an unfair advantage. But if that castle comes with huge debts, including things like armies that have deserted because they're not getting paid or lots of structural upkeep that needs doing,
then the PC don't actually have that advantage. And can easily tell the PC that if they want to have a castle, the GM gets to decide what shape its in.

You can have a situation where the benefits are intrinsically too high so that no cost was acceptable.

But that turns on specifics of campaign types and genre. For example, guys who are Bruce Wayne or Tony Stark types aren't unusual in superhero games, because those games assume it doesn't matter that much. Money is just a justification for how gadgets exist. It might provide some occasional benefits in some ways, but in and of itself it isn't that much because they're not simulationist sensible settings.

 

[Thomas Shey]

And yet there are people who clearly do basically this, AD&D has both multi-classed characters (all demi-humans appear to be capable of this) as well as dual-classed characters who study more than one thing. Beyond that classes like the 2e Bard sure look like something similar, just expressed as a single class (IE a fusion of thief and wizard in this case). So, clearly that's not a viable answer, even in TSR D&D. It is even less viable in 3e or 5e where all sorts of combinations exist.

So we see, by example, that there's no inherent reason why various permutations of abilities are 'impossible'. They may not work for PCs due to gamist or other reasons, but claiming it is some sort of matter of 'consistency' doesn't really fly.

I'm not disagreeing, but I'm just saying that just bolting things on is something D&D has always been, at best, conflicted about.

 

[hawkeyefan]

Few things are a necessity in game design; almost all discussion about what things are virtues, and that's always going to vary from person to person. I could go into the reasons I do think its a virtue, but there's no assurance you'd accept my premises, so its unlikely to be worth the effort.

Yes, few things are a necessity, that's one of the reasons I pushed back against the idea of NPC to PC parity as being a necessity.

That it's a virtue is a matter of opinion, as you state. I'm perfectly fine with folks who prefer it that way. But if they assign some trait to it that I think is inaccurate... or assign a trait to not doing it, as is often the case... then I'll call it out. So when someone says that not having such parity "leads to inconsistencies in the fiction" or "damages verisimilitude", then I'll explain why that's inaccurate.

If you want to elaborate on why you think it is a virtue, feel free. I may or may not agree... but that's fine, as it's all opinon. I don't expect you would agree with my take and its virtues. I'll not try and paint you as belligerent for that.