4E being immune to criticism (forked from Sentimentality And D&D...)

[Storm Raven]

Frankly, I'm sick of fanaticism on all sides. It's undermining the entire online RPG community. It's a far angrier, far less welcoming place than it was not too long ago.

Well, if you'd just designed a better version of D&D, then everyone would be happy.

 

[mmadsen]

Telling stories or running games which are full of mundane guys with swords is fine. I like low fantasy, too. I like playing in those sorts of campaigns, sometimes, too.

I think we should qualify our terms: Do Robert E. Howard's Conan stories and Tolkien's Lord of the Rings stories qualify as "low fantasy" to you?

At any rate, I think that many, many people would like D&D to resemble something along the lines of Conan or Lord of the Rings. I know I would.

But how do you "realistically" explain those mundane guys with swords, who we're declaring to be, essentially, "not much different" from any normal fellow here in our own real world who happens to have trained a lot in fighting with a sword, slaying things like ancient dragons and incorporeal dread wraiths and death titans and hordes of demons and incredibly powerful magic-wielding liches and exarchs of GODS?

If I may cite one REH:

"There's nothing in the universe cold steel won't cut," answered Conan. "I threw my ax at the demon, and he took no hurt, but I might have missed in the dusk, or a branch deflected its flight. I'm not going out of my way looking for devils; but I wouldn't step out of my path to let one go by."​

And, really, if we look to Tolkien, Smaug was killed by a mortal man with a bow and arrow -- a single arrow, by the way -- and the Witch King of Angmar was killed by a little hobbit and a mortal woman. These impressive foes didn't fall to the heroes' flashy super-powers.

 

[phloog]

I think we should qualify our terms: Do Robert E. Howard's Conan stories and Tolkien's Lord of the Rings stories qualify as "low fantasy" to you?

At any rate, I think that many, many people would like D&D to resemble something along the lines of Conan or Lord of the Rings. I know I would.
If I may cite one REH:

"There's nothing in the universe cold steel won't cut," answered Conan. "I threw my ax at the demon, and he took no hurt, but I might have missed in the dusk, or a branch deflected its flight. I'm not going out of my way looking for devils; but I wouldn't step out of my path to let one go by."
​

And, really, if we look to Tolkien, Smaug was killed by a mortal man with a bow and arrow -- a single arrow, by the way -- and the Witch King of Angmar was killed by a little hobbit and a mortal woman. These impressive foes didn't fall to the heroes' flashy super-powers.

That's one of my favorite stories quoted above, by the way.

Your last paragraph is pretty much a spot-on description of how I want my campaigns to work. Which leads to my issues with 4e and my world - - the CAGI Effect/Mystical everything, and even things like how 'beefy' and combat-ready all classes are right out of the chute (different issue/thread).

 

[tomBitonti]

Witch King of Angmar was killed by a little hobbit and a mortal woman. These impressive foes didn't fall to the heroes' flashy super-powers.

While I mostly agree ... the Witch King was wounded by a hobbit wielding a blade enchanted specifically to harm him (or maybe his ilk). And, I would say that the mortal woman had prophecy on her side.

Nonetheless, the fatal blow was mundane, was it not?

 

[Thasmodious]

And, really, if we look to Tolkien, Smaug was killed by a mortal man with a bow and arrow -- a single arrow, by the way -- and the Witch King of Angmar was killed by a little hobbit and a mortal woman. These impressive foes didn't fall to the heroes' flashy super-powers.

Of course they did.

Merry used Dazing Strike (rogue enc. 1) on the Witch King to set him up and Eowyn used a Brute Strike (fighter daily 1) to kill him, with the added superpower of 'F'. Bard killed Smaug by firing a magical arrow at the one vulnerable spot on the dragons body, while it was in flight. Hawkeye couldn't have made a better shot. Bard used Hawk's Talon (ranger enc 7).

""The dragon swooped once more lower than ever, and as he turned and dived down his belly glittered white with sparkling fires of gems in the moon - but not in one place. The great bow twanged. The black arrow sped straight from the string, straight for the hollow by the left breast where the foreleg was flung wide. In it smote and vanished, barb, shaft, and feather, so fierce was its flight."

That sound like a mundane shot from an upjumped farmer to you? Sounds like a ranger power to me.

 

[tomBitonti]

Re: Opinion and truth, while we are quoting Conan, I thought this one was a gem:

Let teachers and priests and philosophers brood over questions of reality and illusion. I know this: if life is an illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, and I am content. — “Queen of the Black Coast“, Robert E. Howard, Weird Tales, May 1934.

 

[billd91]

And, really, if we look to Tolkien, Smaug was killed by a mortal man with a bow and arrow -- a single arrow, by the way -- and the Witch King of Angmar was killed by a little hobbit and a mortal woman. These impressive foes didn't fall to the heroes' flashy super-powers.

True, but it's not like Bard was a normal man, nor was his arrow normal. Bard was of the line of Girion, and in Tolkien, family lines matter. And the arrow had never failed him, always returning to him, and handed down through generations.

No flashy super power, but not truly mundane either. But I would agree that it was pretty magical stuff using the trappings of more mundane behavior.

 

[mmadsen]

Merry used Dazing Strike (rogue enc. 1) on the Witch King to set him up and Eowyn used a Brute Strike (fighter daily 1) to kill him, with the added superpower of 'F'.

(I have no idea what the added superpower of 'F' might entail, but the Witch King of Angmar appears to have around four hit dice -- and a low AC? -- by that interpretation.)

Anyway, your interpretation misses the point. Some 4E exploits are perfectly reasonable for "mundane" adventurers, while some are not. There's nothing flashy or borderline magical about doing 3[W] damage or dazing a foe -- although it is quite meta-gamey to declare where and when these things happen once per encounter or once per day.

Bard killed Smaug by firing a magical arrow at the one vulnerable spot on the dragons body, while it was in flight. Hawkeye couldn't have made a better shot. Bard used Hawk's Talon (ranger enc 7).

Again, some 4E exploits are perfectly reasonable for "mundane" adventurers, while some are not. Using Hawkeye as an example of a superhero is pretty silly, considering he's meant to be a mundane human of exceptional skill. Using Batman would be a similarly bad example.

That sound like a mundane shot from an upjumped farmer to you?

I don't know what an upjumped farmer is supposed to be, but that passage describes a miraculous shot by an excellent archer. Real-life archers have demonstrated an ability to shoot coins out of the air, so it's not like it's a magical power with no possible "mundane" explanation.

Sounds like a ranger power to me.

Again, some 4E exploits are perfectly reasonable for "mundane" adventurers, while some are not.

 

[Thirsty]

Of course they did.

Merry used Dazing Strike (rogue enc. 1) on the Witch King to set him up and Eowyn used a Brute Strike (fighter daily 1) to kill him, with the added superpower of 'F'. Bard killed Smaug by firing a magical arrow at the one vulnerable spot on the dragons body, while it was in flight. Hawkeye couldn't have made a better shot. Bard used Hawk's Talon (ranger enc 7).

""The dragon swooped once more lower than ever, and as he turned and dived down his belly glittered white with sparkling fires of gems in the moon - but not in one place. The great bow twanged. The black arrow sped straight from the string, straight for the hollow by the left breast where the foreleg was flung wide. In it smote and vanished, barb, shaft, and feather, so fierce was its flight."

That sound like a mundane shot from an upjumped farmer to you? Sounds like a ranger power to me.

Heh I thought Bard was playing MERP and open ended high

 

[Thasmodious]

(I have no idea what the added superpower of 'F' might entail, but the Witch King of Angmar appears to have around four hit dice -- and a low AC? -- by that interpretation.)

Anyway, your interpretation misses the point. Some 4E exploits are perfectly reasonable for "mundane" adventurers, while some are not. There's nothing flashy or borderline magical about doing 3[W] damage or dazing a foe -- although it is quite meta-gamey to declare where and when these things happen once per encounter or once per day.
Again, some 4E exploits are perfectly reasonable for "mundane" adventurers, while some are not. Using Hawkeye as an example of a superhero is pretty silly, considering he's meant to be a mundane human of exceptional skill. Using Batman would be a similarly bad example.
I don't know what an upjumped farmer is supposed to be, but that passage describes a miraculous shot by an excellent archer. Real-life archers have demonstrated an ability to shoot coins out of the air, so it's not like it's a magical power with no possible "mundane" explanation.
Again, some 4E exploits are perfectly reasonable for "mundane" adventurers, while some are not.

F=female.

You chose those examples to illustrate your point that these acts were carried out without the need for "superpowers" which is how you choose to derogatorily describe the 4e power framework. I coutnered by showing how the examples YOU CHOSE could play out in 4e.

Yes, there are a couple of powers that, when looked at in a certain way, could be seen as a bit beyond the pale as martial powers. But there are only a few of them, and you really do have to cock your head sideways and stick out your tongue to see them that way. Come and Get It only seems like a superpower if you insist on looking at it as some magical compulsion that force pulls opponents into orbit around the fighter. That, to me, is cocking your head sideways and sticking out your tongue. Especially when a dozen posters describe two dozen other ways to conceive of that effect. It's not a stretch, its not scrambling for some kind of justification, it's simply the narrative.

What you are calling metagame is nothing more than a shift in the narrative. It's no more metagame for the player to describe the effect than it is for the DM. It's just a shift, putting some of the immediate narrative in the hands of the players instead of the DM, in a limited fashion. It's not somehow more metagame-y for the player to say "I stun him" than it is for the DM to say "You stun him." It's just a sharing of the combat narrative.