What direction will D&D head in?

[Hussar]

My experience is that the amount of role-playing has stayed fairly constant.

/snip

As I said earlier: The reason I prefer classic D&D is not because I think the rules somehow prohibit role-playing in 3e or 4e. It’s because preferring less focus on combat, there’s little sense in using such complex combat rules.



Agreed.

Do you see a contradiction here?

 

[haakon1]

You know, that's a very good point. The keep was much more interesting than the caves of chaos....

For some reason, though, I can't remember the name of even one NPC in the keep. It's almost as if the only thing the module actually said about the keep was the names of the buildings, what could be bought and sold, and what loot could be obtained if the PCs decided to slaughter the entire town.

I believe they didn't have names, more titles. I think the idea was "bring your own culture", instead of TSR imposing that everyone must have French, or German, or whatever sounding names. "Keep on the Borderlands" was a stand-alone setting, not originally meant to fit in a particular campaign setting -- thus the generic name of the fortress (the Keep) and its environs (the Borderlands).

 

[haakon1]

D&D's spec is not "simulate an action movie". It would be no more accurate to say that it's something like "simulate a fantasy world", or "simulate a fantasy novel". D&D is not a movie, novel, worldsim, computer game, nor boardgame, but is "something like" all of these.

Interesting question of what D&D is trying to do.

Originally, it was trying to simulate the world of fantasy pulp novels.

Now, it's trying to simulate itself with better rules, I think.

 

[haakon1]

It's not about arguing for one or the other, but rather that the balance has swung too far towards one extreme. Too much flavour and believability has been sacrificed on the altar of convenient game design of crunch, when much more of a compromise between the two should have been shot for.

This, and not "D&D needs to simulate everything" is the real anti-4e argument, IMHO.

Now, some folks here have cast-iron suspension of disbelief, and for them this will pose no problem. Not everyone's like that, though, and I think D&D can do much better in this department, which is supposed to be one of it's fortes.

I don't think it's that crunch gamers/4ers are better at suspension of disbelief, necessarily. I think it's just that they are not interested in the same things as "fluff gamers" like you and me.

Interesting, I saw this fluff/crunch dispute in many 3e era online conflicts. The birth of 4e gave these disputes a lot of (hot) air to flame up, arguably because 4e is the triumph of the crunchers.

 

[haakon1]

Cut the veiled edition wars, folks. ~ Piratecat

 

[Celtavian]

re

My group seems a bit reluctant to try 4e, and have suggested waiting for 4.5 or 5e to see if it heads back in a "more roleplaying, less combat focused" direction. Personally, I don't think it will... I think it will continue on the path it's on, with a heavy focus on combat powers and relatively few utility powers and rituals in future editions, though inevitably supplements will expand the number of rituals (and possibly introduce some classes with more Utility powers than Attack powers).

What do you guys think? Where do you think it's headed? Any experience in using 4e with a group heavily focused on roleplaying and social encounters, with maybe 1 combat every 3-4 game sessions, and how well did it work?

Roleplaying is what you and your group make of it. Every edition of DnD rewarded combat more than any other activity. 3rd edition was very guilty of this as well.

And I kind of like some of the roleplaying options in combat in this game. I was reading some of the flavor text for some of the powers and I was quite impressed. I can see the powers occurring on the battlefield.

In my case the powers aren't as interesting for adventure hooks and elaborate spell strategies as previous editions, but they do seem to involve some nice interplay in the party. As I stated in another thread, I hope the they re-empower the wizard once they get a feel for this new design philosophy and what they can do with it. I didnt' think there was any need to ruin the feel of the fantasy wizard to empower the other classes. I don't accept that the wizard wasn't weakened substantially, because he was. He's a big old weinie compared to previous editions and I doubt I will ever play one.

That being said, I think roleplaying is up to the DM, has always been up to the DM, and shall always be up to the DM. You can't create rules for roleplaying, only rules to resolve roleplaying scenarios.

Personally, I never liked Diplomacy checks to resolve roleplaying discussions. I like to make my players think up a convincing argument for a given position and if I find it compelling when I am roleplaying my NPC, then I go with it. As a DM I take into account if the person has an 18 or higher charisma even if the player is a stuttering, average looking schlub that is getting ideas from his fellow players. I just envision his character telling me the ideas. That comes from intuitive DMing.

I see my job as DM to provide a fun experience. As far as roleplaying goes I want the guy across the table to feel like he is interacting in a situation. All you have to do for that is give the player enough to chew on that he'll give you some modicum of roleplaying back. There aren't many thespians playing DnD, so I don't expect a super roleplaying performance. I want just enough to make it feel fun and draw the player into his character's personality a bit. I can do that with any edition.

Heck, nothing is more fun than staring your player in the eyes while DMing and shouting curses at him as though the enemy NPC I'm roleplaying is shouting curses at him. That gets alot of my players going. I recommend any DM that doesn't do this to begin with to try it. Just look them dead in the eyes like you want to beat their behind and talk mad crap to them, see how they react. I had one guy practically leap across the table and attack me. That was a blast. I can definitely do that in 4th edition.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Ah, soft drinks.

0) Once upon a time, a wise man invented Coca-Cola and sold it to soda fountains and drug stores. It was good.

1) Then people bottled it. Everyone drank it, and it was good. Some people still liked it better from the fountain though.

2) Then people canned it. This was good, because it was easy to buy from soda machines. Some people like bottles better than cans, because they are prettier and more old fashioned Coca-Cola design. But it's the same drink as Coca-Cola in bottles, and you can mix the two without noticing any difference.

x) Some idiot changed the formula to Coke with collectible dice in it, and the company nearly died.

3) Some people on went to a slightly cheaper formula -- high fructose corn syrup instead of sugar -- but kept the flavor the same, and sold it in bigger, 20 oz. bottles. Most people said "OK". Some people preferred "parallel import" Mexican Coca-Cola in big glass bottles, made from sugar, but most people didn't care enough to pay extra.

4) Then someone came out with another new Coke. This one is based on the successful model of Red Bull for lots of weird herbal ingredients, plus it has an XTREME! logo from "Can of Whipass" energy drink, and it's the color of radiator fluid just like "Mountain Dew"! A lot of people, mostly in the 12-18 male core demographic for soft drink taste establishment, think it's super cool. Coke marketing is very excited about this.

Other previously loyal customers say "yuck" and are scrambling for some imports of the real stuff that's still being made in the little town of Paizo, Mexico. It's technically legal, for now, but Coke corporate doesn't like it much, because it's not true to the spirit of Coke corporate gets all the glory and filthy lucre that SHOULD have been in the original agreement with Coke Mexico, but was left out.

This is funny. (Not really veiled edition war be damned...)

 

[hong]

This is not so consistent with your message above. Your argument was that what is most important is to have "fun" and fun can be found in many mediums such as playing, read books, and watch movies. So I am saying that I have fun with 4e as a boardgame gameplay experience but not as a roleplaying game. You should have no problem with this or think is ridiculous or insulting if you believe what you wrote above first place.

The 5 stages of coping with an edition change:

Grief: I won't play 4E or buy the books.

Anger: I'll buy the books, but I won't play 4E.

Bargaining: I'll play a 4E one-shot, but not a campaign.

Depression: I'll play 4E, but I won't roleplay. <------------

Acceptance: I love 4E with all of my body including my pee-pee.

 

[hong]

And a system that is fun in an abstract sense doesn't necessarily create a fun or believable immersive experience.

Storytelling is fun. Creating worlds is fun. Creating heroic sagas is fun. Creating villains is fun. These are all types of fun that D&D needs to support, and hinge on the ability of the ruleset to represent a believable fantasy world and reality, without handwaving to the point that suspension of disbelief fails.

All of these are perfectly possible in the context of a ruleset that simulates action movies. After all, WoW has a pretty well-detailed world supporting lots of villains, and ppl write all kinds of fanfic about what their heroes do.

It's not about arguing for one or the other, but rather that the balance has swung too far towards one extreme. Too much flavour and believability has been sacrificed on the altar of convenient game design of crunch, when much more of a compromise between the two should have been shot for.

I have no problems coming to grips with action movie reality. Perhaps you need to play more WoW, so as to familiarise and immerse yourself in the tropes of such a fantasy world.

 

[rounser]

All of these are perfectly possible in the context of a ruleset that simulates action movies. After all, WoW has a pretty well-detailed world supporting lots of villains, and ppl write all kinds of fanfic about what their heroes do.

I'm not in the same discussion as you are, Hong. I've already told you that I consider your premise that D&D is an action movie simulator is baloney, and given you a detailed reasoning as to why this is so, yet you're continuing as if it's gospel.

I have no problems coming to grips with action movie reality. Perhaps you need to play more WoW, so as to familiarise and immerse yourself in the tropes of such a fantasy world.

You still don't have an argument, do you? Your original interjection was an attempt to prove that there was one in answer to my and ProfessorCino's question, and pages down the track you still haven't come up with one.