The "real" reason the game has changed.

[Ariosto]

What constitutes it, my dear pemerton, is your claim that it really is not at all what the 4e designers put in the 4e rules books, but rather nothing more than just a GM's notes about ways to handle things that might happen.

I have said very plainly that I have nothing against that. I have said very plainly what I do dislike, with direct reference to the 4e text.

If "4e skill challenge" is really just garbled gabble signifying nothing whatsoever in practice, then of course there is nothing whatsoever to like or dislike, defend, debate, or have any sort of relationship with or to.

 

[billd91]

No, it's not. It's the "4e skill challenge".

But that's exactly what a skill challenge is. You can stick your fingers in your ears and stop your feet all you want, but that's still exactly what a 4e skill challenge is.

Then we would not be using "4e skill challenges".

Sorry, man. Just trying to put it in an example you should be able to understand. My mistake.

Says who?

How about let's suppose it's something they actually want to do. Is that hard? Is it so hard to believe the players might actually be choosing to do something heroic and, given the situation, this is what they are attempting to do?

And either it does or it does not. That depends on
(A) the situation
and
(B) what they are doing
and
(C) usually a chance factor to represent the myriad imponderables that Von Clausewitz called "friction".

What it does not depend upon is the arbitrary structure of a "4e skill challenge".

If I light a wood fire, then there is a fire. If you pour on enough water, then the result is dead ashes; too little, and the result is still hot embers. In the latter case, the addition of tinder may get the fire going again.

See? There are causes and effects, not "X successes before 3 failures". Choose a cause of failure -- such as pouring kerosene instead of water when you want to put out the fire -- and you get failure. Choose a cause of sooner success -- such as applying Aquaeus Fire Fighting Foam -- and you get success sooner.

And why do you assume that the successful use of skills would be arbitrary in a well-designed or executed skill challenge? Or that only a fixed set of skills would necessarily apply? One of the whole points is that there may be multiple factors that work together to advance the group to achieve a common objective - or through sufficient numbers of failures, leave group unable to achieve that objective or suffer some other cost. If the pilot blows his flying, the engineer can't coax more power, and the sensor operator fails to detect some hazard that may slow the ship, it won't matter if the navigator manages to plot a course that cuts a few hours off the travel time. It's too little to make the necessary difference. But if 3 of those 4 crewmen make their checks, then it's OK if the fourth fails. The successes of the 3 are sufficient to have the ship overtaking the tanker. That's the main thrust of a skill challenge - giving a DM structures upon which to adjudicate a more complex task than a single skill check.

 

[Raven Crowking]

I agree that the two things you characterise here are different. But I don't think there is much, if any, of the latter in 4e.

I am not making any specific claim that there is; I am responding to the "X = Y" meme.

However, I would note that the minute a person (and I don't mean you here) starts to argue that "X has always had Y, so Z having Y shouldn't be a problem" has lost the ability -- once it is demonstrated that X has not always had Y -- to then effectively argue that obviously Z doesn't have Y either.

Again, I have problems with some of the arguments being used here (and this is not exclusive to one "side" or the other); 4e has now grown well beyond my personal knowledge of what it does, or does not, contain. I've lost interest, apart from some of the better ideas of the original Core, and what adventures I can convert to my own system of choice.


RC

 

[pemerton]

RC, I can understand why you're using somewhat vague and allusive language. Because it's somewhat vauge and allusive, I'm not quite sure I entirely follow it, but as far as I can tell it's not important that I do, because I agree with you that I'm not using the pattern of argument that you are interested in criticising.

I do think AD&D had some elements where narration came after the dice. Besides the abstraction vs detail point I made in the post you've quoted from - which applies not just to AD&D but to heaps of other games - there is the description of saving throws in the DMG, which (as I recall it, at least) suggests that what the successful saving throw actually means - dodging, finding a ledge to cower behind, manipulating the magic, etc - can be worked out after we know that we need to account for a successful save.

I think that 4e has similar elements - to an extent in to hit rolls, though maybe not any more than in earlier editions (what I've got in mind is that, if character A misses character B, we mightn't decide until after we know that whether A attempted a good blow but performed a bad blow, or whether A attempted and performed a good blow but B performed an even better dodge or parry) - but more obviously, and more notoriously, in relation to the ingame interpretation of hit point attrition.

Even with 4e hit points, in my experience it doesn't normally come up until one of the thresholds that is not merely numerical is crossed - bloodied or dying. With bloodied, I tend to describe some blood being drawn, but not so much that recovery (whether by PC or NPC) would strain credulity. With dying - which only applies to PCs - I may describe the blow, but tend to avoid describing the injury altogether until the upshot has been resolved. (It's very different from GMing Rolemaster, where the crit charts state the gritty details of every blow struck!)

As to following 4e - given you don't play it, you're not missing out on too much by not following it. There are the D&D-standard ever growing lists of monsters, spells etc, many of which are technically very clever but none of which is so thematically compelling that I'd say a non-4e player who doesn't look at it is missing out. And there are the D&D-standard ever growing campaign elements (in books like Underdark, The Plane Above, etc) which I would recommend for anyone looking to build an interesting fantasy campaign roughly along D&D lines, but which are hardly essential for that purpose.

As for adventures - if you find any good ones, let me know! To date, Thunderspire Labyrinth (H2) and Heathen (from an early 4e number of Dungeon) are the only two that have really interested me, and both need extensive revision to be playable. I borrowed some maps from another (Scepter Tower of Spellgard, I think) but that's about it.

After the time-travel exploration session I posted about I'm planning to use another vignette from that Eden Odyssey book. I've also got a series of feywild encounters planned to build on the witches storyline, should the players be so inclined, which if they play out as I think is likely will culminate in The Demon of the Red Grove (a scenario in the HeroWars narrator's book, about removing the demonic possession of a magical apple grove - a good feywild scenario, I think, which - because of the demon - can be given a Correlon vs Lolth tie-in).

If the players instead press on to the city they were heading to, I've got some plans for an adventure that will mix bits of Heathen (4e) with bits of The Speaker in Dreams (3E) with bits of Night's Dark Terror (Moldvay/Cook D&D).

Having GMed RM for so many years, I'm not at all troubled by the need to mechanically convert material to fit my preferred system (there is - or, rather, there used to be - quite a bit of stuff published for RM, but a lot of it was fairly ordinary, and it has never compared to the quantities of D&D stuff). What I mostly want in a published adventure is some sort of idea or theme that I wouldn't have come up with myself (and preferably that I can see ways of embellishing to make it better fit my game), and also interesting maps/locations (I can do these at a pinch, but am by no means an expert). Published 4e adventures tend to be lacking in the first, and surprisingly often are not even that strong in respect of the second.

 

[pemerton]

What constitutes it, my dear pemerton, is your claim that it really is not at all what the 4e designers put in the 4e rules books, but rather nothing more than just a GM's notes about ways to handle things that might happen.

But I never said such a thing!

I said that the GM's role in setting up the starting situation and skethcing out how it might be expected to evolve is like that.

I said the rules according to which DCs are set, and the structure for successes and failures, is different.

Which is to say, a skill challenge resembles in some but by no means all respects the way that non-combat activity is resolved in traditional RPGs. I said this, and continue to assert it. But in no way does this entail, or even come close to implying, that your Traveller game is full of skill challenegs. In fact - and as I said - it entails the opposite. Traveller, Runequest, Rolemaster, Chivalry and Sorcery, AD&D played with NWP, etc, etc do not have skill challenges, because (i) they lack level-based setting of DCs, and (ii) they lack the "X successes before Y failures" that is crucial to resolving (but not to setting up) a skill challenge.

 

[Piratecat]

Ariosto won't be able to answer that. It turns out that when you're coming back after a brief suspension for rudeness, posting condescending insults isn't a great way to impress people.

Sorry about that. Carry on.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Pemerton,

AFAICT, we largely agree as far as this topic goes.

I do understand the arguments of some others, though, because they echo my initial reaction to 4e. My understanding is that some of the later books have cleared up some of the problems of the earlier books, and I applaud WotC for addressing the concerns I (and others) voiced earlier.

I did pick up the Underdark book (although I admit I haven't given it more than a skimming, followed up by reading some spots of interest). Some of the adventures have interesting material, and convert easily enough. I have gotten good enough at conversions now that I can run 1e, 3e, and 4e materials for my ruleset while performing conversions on the fly for almost everything. Complex NPCs still require about 5 minutes each to convert in pre-prep.

With all of these doom-n-gloom threads out right now, I hope that WotC pulls itself together, dusts itself off, and revitalizes itself by producing more interesting adventure material.

And dropping the Delve format. The Delve format reduces the value of their offerings, to me at least, by a significant degree. The Delve format reinforces a lot of the negative opinions/arguments re: 4e IMHO. Please, WotC, please drop it!

Let's return to the Forbidden City with a poster-sized, detailed map! I would gladly pay for a boxed set, if the overview maps were well designed, and not scaled to minis. You can include tiles for combat if you like, but the overview should be beautiful and useful as an overview! I am certain that I am not alone in finding this idea exciting.

(Actually, I would like a well done, detailed ruined city from anyone!)

Rules may be more profitable, but well-written adventures and setting keep people interested in the game.



RC

 

[Lanefan]

With all of these doom-n-gloom threads out right now, I hope that WotC pulls itself together, dusts itself off, and revitalizes itself by producing more interesting adventure material.

And dropping the Delve format. The Delve format reduces the value of their offerings, to me at least, by a significant degree. The Delve format reinforces a lot of the negative opinions/arguments re: 4e IMHO. Please, WotC, please drop it!

I second this motion. All in favour?

Let's return to the Forbidden City with a poster-sized, detailed map! I would gladly pay for a boxed set, if the overview maps were well designed, and not scaled to minis. You can include tiles for combat if you like, but the overview should be beautiful and useful as an overview! I am certain that I am not alone in finding this idea exciting.

(Actually, I would like a well done, detailed ruined city from anyone!)

Rules may be more profitable, but well-written adventures and setting keep people interested in the game.

Agreed, with one minor edit: "...well-written adventures ***that are malleable enough for anyone to drop into their ongoing campaign yet robust enough to be played as stand-alone*** keep people interested..."

Lan-"I too could use a ruined city about now, preferably Greek"-efan

 

[pemerton]

Lanefan and RC, I'll second your motion.

And RC, agree on dropping Delve format. It's a useless format. And (as you posted in the other thread) it encourages railroading, which encourages bad play experiences, which discourages the spread of both 4e and of RPGing in general.

 

[Raven Crowking]

It is the end of days.