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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 6564347" data-attributes="member: 82106"><p>Hmmmmm, I don't know. I found 4e's rules very logical and easy to assess as both a DM and a player. The difficulties of things for instance were pretty easy to know. Yes a task might be easy or hard, but it wasn't really THAT tough to figure out which was likely to be which. Obviously the DM can bias things by making checks easier or harder, or making them higher or lower level, but the DMG and PHB actually spell out the actual DCs of a pretty fair number of the most common situations. </p><p></p><p>I don't understand your statements about stunts. In previous editions there were no really coherent rules about them at all. Certain classes had features that let them do specific things, and maybe there were in 3.x some slightly more generalized rules, but it was pretty much up to the DM and the tradition was you could just tell people to pick up any old dice and make a throw, it was basically open season on the players. 4e built on the d20 foundation of 3e and tamed it all. You have 17 specific skills, each of which covers a separate field and almost never overlap. You have a defined set of DCs and a recommended damage progression. DMG2 even formalizes this into 'terrain powers' for instances where the DM is pretty sure someone will attempt something. I don't think you could circumscribe things more MECHANICALLY and still be playing an RPG.</p><p></p><p>Which brings me to the only conclusion I can come up with, which is that you're not talking about mechanical certainty at all fundamentally, but about narrative certainty. 4e leaves the narrative much more up in the air, at least potentially. However I'm still unclear how this relates to the 'Illusionism' that was being discussed earlier, which IMHO was all about DMs playing fast and loose with the mechanics in order to rearrange the narrative to suite themselves. </p><p></p><p>Of course its a blurry line, such DMs also generally are controlling and keep the narrative situation in hand by other means as well. For years the main AD&D DM that I played with was like this. He was a great DM in terms of having a fun game and all, but you had to give up any notion that you were going to be allowed to affect the flow of events in an appreciable way. It just wasn't going to happen. At least it wasn't going to happen by the sort of usual means most players envisage. What your character did mattered, but more in terms of what the DM was inspired to do in reaction. If you were trying to bend his world to your will directly, it never worked. His style of play would just not work well at all in 4e. At least not without a good deal of evolution.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 6564347, member: 82106"] Hmmmmm, I don't know. I found 4e's rules very logical and easy to assess as both a DM and a player. The difficulties of things for instance were pretty easy to know. Yes a task might be easy or hard, but it wasn't really THAT tough to figure out which was likely to be which. Obviously the DM can bias things by making checks easier or harder, or making them higher or lower level, but the DMG and PHB actually spell out the actual DCs of a pretty fair number of the most common situations. I don't understand your statements about stunts. In previous editions there were no really coherent rules about them at all. Certain classes had features that let them do specific things, and maybe there were in 3.x some slightly more generalized rules, but it was pretty much up to the DM and the tradition was you could just tell people to pick up any old dice and make a throw, it was basically open season on the players. 4e built on the d20 foundation of 3e and tamed it all. You have 17 specific skills, each of which covers a separate field and almost never overlap. You have a defined set of DCs and a recommended damage progression. DMG2 even formalizes this into 'terrain powers' for instances where the DM is pretty sure someone will attempt something. I don't think you could circumscribe things more MECHANICALLY and still be playing an RPG. Which brings me to the only conclusion I can come up with, which is that you're not talking about mechanical certainty at all fundamentally, but about narrative certainty. 4e leaves the narrative much more up in the air, at least potentially. However I'm still unclear how this relates to the 'Illusionism' that was being discussed earlier, which IMHO was all about DMs playing fast and loose with the mechanics in order to rearrange the narrative to suite themselves. Of course its a blurry line, such DMs also generally are controlling and keep the narrative situation in hand by other means as well. For years the main AD&D DM that I played with was like this. He was a great DM in terms of having a fun game and all, but you had to give up any notion that you were going to be allowed to affect the flow of events in an appreciable way. It just wasn't going to happen. At least it wasn't going to happen by the sort of usual means most players envisage. What your character did mattered, but more in terms of what the DM was inspired to do in reaction. If you were trying to bend his world to your will directly, it never worked. His style of play would just not work well at all in 4e. At least not without a good deal of evolution. [/QUOTE]
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