4E being immune to criticism (forked from Sentimentality And D&D...)
- Thread starter thecasualoblivion
- Start date
firesnakearies
Explorer
Yeah, I can see this. I suppose the abilities of the purely "Martial" characters do seem somewhat more mystical or magical than before. I, personally, like that. But I can see how a lot of people wouldn't.
Mustrum_Ridcully
Legend
Well, to use the specific example of Come and Get It... I always invision a scene like Neo provoking Agent Smith to attack him. There is no doubt for me that this is what should happen. Did Neo really make a "taunt" skill check against Smith Will defense? (Which might be how some games resolve this) - does this make me feel "more immersed" - or am I just worrying to much about game mechanics instead of just having things happen because they seem to make sense?
I could see a 3E implementation of this power. Roll a Bluff check against 10 + opponents HD, then he rolls a Will Save DC 10 + 1/2 your level + CHA modifier. And I could do this every round. In some round, it will probably work, Why not just say that it works only once per encounter (which means you can't accidentally break it because the PC boosted the DC or the enemy has a sucky Will Save). It's like taking 20 - you do as if you happened to have rolled a 20, but you took 20 times as long for this as if you had really bothered to roll.
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I am not sure if I am actually addressing your point. Probably not. I guess I just don't bother often enough to discuss why something happens and more what happens. Because I couldn't do this in the real world, either. If I call someone on the street an
and he hits me in the face for it, did I overcome his Will Defense with my Taunt? Or did I fail my Diplomacy check? Did he really beat my Armor Class and did deal hit point damage? Did I take any wounds? Am I blooded? That's not terms or concepts the real world operates on...Your response is a better expression of my issue than I put in the original post - - the issue IS for me probably limited to martial characters getting freakish stuff...anything you want to give a wizard can be handled with 'It's the World of Illusion!' (sorry, channelled Doug Henning there), but fighters being able to force a genius-level IQ, Supremely Willful wizard with no weapon to move next to him demands the huge narrative stuff.
So I don't know if it's superheroic or not, but the suspension of disbelief, or the narration required to reconcile the effect with a mundane cause, is a big problem for me. It makes 4e a LOT easier to integrate with your campaign if you tend toward the over-the-top stuff.
thecasualoblivion
First Post
No more 'dance of the narrative' then is required to explain people shooting fireballs out of their fingertips or raising people from the dead. The only difference is that in D&D, fireballs and resurrection have tenure.
We are talking about a fantasy world here, with fireballs and dragons and beholders and stuff. I don't see where mundane guy who owns a sword really fits in, or has any business looking for the trouble that exists in that world. Still, the guy with a sword is a fantasy mainstay, and people want to play them. How do we make this mundane guy with the sword logically fit into this world? By letting him do the sort of things action heroes do, thats how.
I actually find it made less sense before, when your special powers consisted solely of "owns a sword".
I think you and I have talked about this before. I remain fearful that this thread will turn into CAGI Discussion #286, but for a bit:
the problem I have is the admittedly corner-ISH case of villains that have a strong willpower, a great intellect, and no desire to move next to the hero.
The Neo thing doesn't work for me because as is obvious from the rest of the film, Smith is an absolute hothead - he doesn't have a great deal of control.
For me the only fitting resolution would be to say that the power doesn't work on certain people, or grants a save, which then possibly 'nerfs' it to less than useless....I don't know.
The problem is not that I'm obsessed with mechanics, but that the effect APPEARS to be far from mundane (no save, you become a completely insurmountable force drawing all into you) but is given to a class that for me has in all prior editions been the most mundane. As Firesnakearies pointed out, for a lot of campaigns this is no biggie...for mine it is.
WalterKovacs
First Post
I've seen it in play for a while on another forum. Basically, people can give you Xp if they agree with your post. Your post count (depending on the system) and your total xp determines how much xp you can give. The idea being the more "respect" someone has, the more their opinion counts in giving other people "respect". The basic idea is that, over time, someone who makes lots of good points would get lots of XP, and people they feel make good points would get lots of XP, etc ... and thus the various levels can give other users an indication of their post history.
The whole thing breaks down however when there are "rep fests", an equivalent of posting to up your post count which has taken place on other forums, where a group constantly rep each other to increase their reputations ... of course that really only served to undermine the whole system for the most part. It's still useful for the pseudo PM to let someone know you agree with their post without having to reply to it. [especially if it's an "I agree" or "Zing!" type comment.
The difference actually is that in this world of magical powers, in MY campaign not everyone has them, and some have to get by just by their wits and weapons. The mundane guy fits in because he is the most common, and in fact is the Everyman essentially. I've always found fiction about more normal heroes far more interesting than reading about the angst of the poor teen wizard.
We obviously play a different type of campaign, since you can't see how a mundane guy with just a sword can fit into your campaign. I consider Aragorn, Conan, et al. to be fairly mundane, just with exceptional skills...but skills that while they might push the human limits, are non-magical and easily described in non-magical terms.
I let this character fit into my world by making sure that from a rules perspective and a storyline/attention perspective, he's on an even footing. I don't have to give him magical powers to make him 'fit in' - I have to make sure that his mundane talents keep him on par.
We also apparently read different action/fantasy stories, as I have no recollection of Conan or Kull mystically causing all around him to be drawn into striking range and hit.
You appear to have no narrative issues, because you feel free to assign magical/mystical abilities to ALL. Or did I read that wrong? (a possibility) If this is true, that is fine for your campaign, but it means you're okay with everyone having some form of mystical powers.
I don't list 'overrides all mental resistances of all targets to force them to move in and be attacked' among the things that typical 'action heroes do'
...and with respect to the fighters in my world having only the special power of 'owns a sword'...no...their special 'powers', if you must have powers for all creatures, are that they own a sword, know how to use it better than any other class, know various techniques and tactics, know how to exploit defenses, etc...all expressed in very graceful mechanics involving hit chances, damage, etc. No witchiepoo required.
WalterKovacs
First Post
At the same time though ... it's a matter of perspective. For a narrative ... the fighter is able to trick an opponent ONCE into falling for some sort of baiting. It's an encounter power in part because it isn't going to work on the same guy twice.
The main problem is that, in other editions, you have to explain "but why did it happen?" In this case it's just a matter of, whatever save would have been made ... wasn't. The fighter, because he trained in that power, has found ways to trick even the smartest and most willful of foes to temporarily lose their cool.
There is more narrative footwork in part because more people have demanded it ... and because 3.5 was very "this is how the world works" mechanics wise, explaining how everythng works the same for NPCs, monsters, PCs, etc ... 4e's exception based design doesn't fiddle with the internal stuff. It knows about point A and point B ... it doesn't talk about what happens in between.
Instead of having a taunt mechanic that explains how the concept of taunting an opponent works, etc, etc, etc, they just have it. Instead of having powers that work against most enemies, but not against all, they just have it work all the time.
The times where it makes sense should outway the times it doesn't. Also, if a fighter already has the magnet that is the mark ... he can use that same "power" for pulling people towards him.
The thing with the narrative footwork is ... that is all that can be used to explain "what happens during a power". It isn't a case of a number of mechanic effects combined to create a single effect. It's a power that is intentionally "make your own flavor text" and just gives you cause and effect, so to speak, so any flavor you want to put onto it can work.
You can come up with an action movie cliche, or a super hero genre explanation, etc. Ultimately though, the powers work because the PC is invoking plot control on the narrative game. "I want to taunt that guy and have him come at me". Instead of having to make some sort of check, he has a power he can only use once during a fight.
EDIT:
Ultimately, a figher/rogue/ranger (not going to get into warlord healing) doesn't have to be "mystical" or "magical". It is possible, using mundane explanations, to have someone, for example, draw their opponent in and attack them. It may not make sense that it works every time, but it is possible that an action hero starts hurling insults and challenges and the bad guys go for it. The game takes narrative shortcuts. Instead of having all the parts of the game built on simulationist framework where they explain how everything works, they just say what happens when you use the power. Unfortunately, if you just say "ths happens" it's probably going to seem like magic.
The thing is ... sure he can pull a smart guy that shouldn't fall for it towards him ... but then again, that smart guy was awfully close to him in the first place.
The sliding powers of the rogue and fighter involve a combat situation where a martial character is trained in leading the person he's fighing about the battlefield, forcing them to go where they want to go. Many of these powers are not at-will ... it means you CAN pull it off, but it only works once, and then the enemy learns from that mistake. Instead of having a whole system in place to figure out whether or not it works just as a means for explaining how it works in the first place seems like a lot of work just to justify giving them something they can concievably do, but seems odd they can do so frequently and reliably.
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This is why I never criticize people for liking 4e, and why I just can't reconcile it with my own campaign/style, and why 4e and I can just enjoy a cup of coffee, politely say farewell, and then I go off and play True20.
There's nothing wrong with how they're doing it, it just gets way too fiddly for me. Combat is always imagined as lots of moves and lots of swings summarized in one that hits, but now with all these little slides we've actually gotten a bit quantum. I know I saw a thread with Erwin Schroedinger mentioned, but I think that this shifting and such really invokes Heisenberg as well. The fighter collapses waveforms in his favor...the position of the wizard was not certain, but instead a quantum-like superposition of states, from which the fighter chooses one and locks it in. I'm not able personally (admittedly likely my own failing) to get into the rather skirmish minifigs game-like concepts - again, not saying it's a bad game, but based on the fact that we played True20 for ten hours last weekend, with multiple battles, and used improvised figures to represented the combats exactly ONCE, the rest done in the mind, you can see where I balk at a lot of these things. CAGI forces you to recognize space and position on some form of grid/board to adjudicate effect, and then immediately in the narrative explains that all those positions weren't actually as they seemed. Not at all a big deal, just not my style.
There's nothing wrong with how they're doing it, it just gets way too fiddly for me. Combat is always imagined as lots of moves and lots of swings summarized in one that hits, but now with all these little slides we've actually gotten a bit quantum. I know I saw a thread with Erwin Schroedinger mentioned, but I think that this shifting and such really invokes Heisenberg as well. The fighter collapses waveforms in his favor...the position of the wizard was not certain, but instead a quantum-like superposition of states, from which the fighter chooses one and locks it in. I'm not able personally (admittedly likely my own failing) to get into the rather skirmish minifigs game-like concepts - again, not saying it's a bad game, but based on the fact that we played True20 for ten hours last weekend, with multiple battles, and used improvised figures to represented the combats exactly ONCE, the rest done in the mind, you can see where I balk at a lot of these things. CAGI forces you to recognize space and position on some form of grid/board to adjudicate effect, and then immediately in the narrative explains that all those positions weren't actually as they seemed. Not at all a big deal, just not my style.
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