TwoSix
Everyone's literal second-favorite poster
Why? I'm sure >90% of tabletop gamers also play video games.
Legends & Lore 3/12
- Thread starter I'm A Banana
- Start date
Why? I'm sure >90% of tabletop gamers also play video games.
Ryujin
Legend
Because role playing isn't button mashing.
I'm A Banana
Potassium-Rich
BTW, this is the main thrust of the idea in The Paradox of Choice
I find it fairly directly applicable to the question of "How much complexity is good in D&D?"
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO6XEQIsCoM"]The Paradox of Choice[/ame]
...Conclusion?
More options aren't what we actually need (even though we will always say we want more options, because we do think that more options are inherently good). We need some. We need "enough." What constitutes "enough" is partially what a game designer is there for.
I'm guessing "less than 20 to make a character" is at least a good starting point.
I find it fairly directly applicable to the question of "How much complexity is good in D&D?"
[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO6XEQIsCoM"]The Paradox of Choice[/ame]
...Conclusion?
More options aren't what we actually need (even though we will always say we want more options, because we do think that more options are inherently good). We need some. We need "enough." What constitutes "enough" is partially what a game designer is there for.
I'm guessing "less than 20 to make a character" is at least a good starting point.
Upper_Krust
Legend
Hey Kamikaze Midget! 
Have to massively disagree with you on this.
The Wii/Move/Kinect era was a way to engage non-videogamers and get them playing games. But if you look at those games for the most part they have little if any depth. Neither are they designed for persistent play. Instead they are throwaway games you'll play once or twice at a party until the novelty wears off.
WotC take a similar approach to engage non-roleplayers with boardgames like Castle Ravenloft.
However, if you look at videogames with any degree of depth, then complexity increases dramatically. This is the preserve of the hardcore gamer, because while videogames were simple enough back in the 70s/80s that anyone could play, audiences craved more and more depth as gaming 'grew up'. Gaming got to the point (probably in the early 90s) where a newcomer couldn't just pick up and play because they wouldn't have the necessary skills required. Nintendo realised that videogames started to lose the casual audience and created the Wii to tap them. Now every party has jumped on the bandwagon.
So Mearls is right on the money here.
The key is getting non-gamers to sit up and take note. Hardcore gamers crave more depth now, but at the same time you need something to attract casual gamers otherwise you will isolate and continually shrink your audience.
If Basic 5th Edition D&D is just a boardgame (with a few extras) then it might succeed in bringing in the casual gamers. Then have an Advanced D&D 5th Edition thats all the best bits from 4E/Essentials rolled into one - except this time stagger the book releases a bit more to give us a bit more time to digest what we have and build up anticipation on the next (Players Handbook every other year rather than every year for instance).
Kamikaze Midget said:
Have to massively disagree with you on this.
The Wii/Move/Kinect era was a way to engage non-videogamers and get them playing games. But if you look at those games for the most part they have little if any depth. Neither are they designed for persistent play. Instead they are throwaway games you'll play once or twice at a party until the novelty wears off.
WotC take a similar approach to engage non-roleplayers with boardgames like Castle Ravenloft.
However, if you look at videogames with any degree of depth, then complexity increases dramatically. This is the preserve of the hardcore gamer, because while videogames were simple enough back in the 70s/80s that anyone could play, audiences craved more and more depth as gaming 'grew up'. Gaming got to the point (probably in the early 90s) where a newcomer couldn't just pick up and play because they wouldn't have the necessary skills required. Nintendo realised that videogames started to lose the casual audience and created the Wii to tap them. Now every party has jumped on the bandwagon.
So Mearls is right on the money here.
The key is getting non-gamers to sit up and take note. Hardcore gamers crave more depth now, but at the same time you need something to attract casual gamers otherwise you will isolate and continually shrink your audience.
If Basic 5th Edition D&D is just a boardgame (with a few extras) then it might succeed in bringing in the casual gamers. Then have an Advanced D&D 5th Edition thats all the best bits from 4E/Essentials rolled into one - except this time stagger the book releases a bit more to give us a bit more time to digest what we have and build up anticipation on the next (Players Handbook every other year rather than every year for instance).
renau1g
First Post
And....? Sometimes you want deep immersive role-playing and sometimes after a hard day you want to come home and tear through the hordes of Olympus (God of War 3) or take out a few enemy soldiers (any FPS).
I don't for a second think he's saying video games are the same, nor is he saying WoW is better or the same as D&D or anything like that. It's an example that the vast majority of D&D players can relate to. Therefore, it's a good example. He could've chosen an example that the majority wouldn't know anything about, but what purpose would that have served?
kaomera
Explorer
I don't think it actually a good example, though. It's a simplistic, throwaway example that probably doesn't deserve this much analysis, but it's so simplistic that it doesn't really make his point; or, really any point. 4e options aren't just "not buttons", they aren't even really like buttons, except maybe in that you can count the number of buttons on a controller and you can almost kind of count the number of options in 4e if you ignore the fact that because of the way they interact you really can't.
delericho
Legend
To be fair, very often video gaming isn't either.
Ultimately, the system provides a means to get from "I want my character to do this", and have the game tell us, "okay, here's how it is done."
If the system doesn't provide enough options, it will inevitably feel limited. (This also applies if it has loads of 'options', but a small set of optimal choices, btw.) Similarly, if the resolution mechanic is too complex, playing the game will become a chore rather than a pleasure - every barrier the game puts between us and intuitive resolution of action is a bad thing.
(This is why 'universal mechanics' are usually a good thing, by the way. After describing an action, in 4e I pretty much know I need to roll d20 and add mods. In 2nd Edition, I first have to remember which method is used for the check, and then roll.)
To go to the video game controller analogy, then:
Where the controller only has a few buttons, this allows only a few actions to be easily performed. Sure, you can add all sorts of sequences, but those require memorisation, and are often error-prone. Adding more buttons will allow more actions.
However, sometimes, you can refine things not by simply adding more buttons, but by refining the interface. Replace the buttons for UP, DOWN, LEFT and RIGHT with a "four way" controller, and a lot of games suddenly become a lot more intuitive. And so on.
Frankly, the described X-Box 360 controller sounds like a monstrosity - more buttons than I have fingers, many of which have different meanings based on the game (and often within a single game), and which can be combined in many different ways? No thanks! If I have to read a lengthy instruction manual just to try a game I may not like anyway, I think I'll not bother!
(Analogies between the 800+ pages of the 3e/4e/Pathfinder core rules could be drawn here...)
Once you get to that point, I have to ask if there isn't a better way to do this. Can we reduce the weight of options without 'dumbing down' the game?
(In D&D terms, I think the move to stated At-Will, Encounter and Daily powers was a positive step, to give one example. Whereas 3e had loads of different powers, with lots of different frequencies, 4e mostly got down to just three. And I've already mentioned the move to a universal mechanic. I would submit that the next step is to try to unify the conditions, so that these aren't flying all over the place all the time, and possibly siloing the "numerical bonus" options away from the "doing stuff" options, so that players aren't constantly searching for the "perfect build".)
If you're playing a roleplaying game, you generally only need methods for resolution and the combinations and interesting situations are infinite based on your imagination.
However, if you're playing a tactical boardgame, the combinations and options are only limited to the options presented.
I could run a 4E game with DMG page 42 only and make the game interesting and not boring.
Do we need a list of 100 L337 powerz for each level for each class? Does that make the game more interesting/less boring? Hell no.
There's a reason why Basic D&D had so much traction despite so little rules for "things you can do" - because you could do anything and you didn't need to codify it to some sort of power format.
However, if you're playing a tactical boardgame, the combinations and options are only limited to the options presented.
I could run a 4E game with DMG page 42 only and make the game interesting and not boring.
Do we need a list of 100 L337 powerz for each level for each class? Does that make the game more interesting/less boring? Hell no.
There's a reason why Basic D&D had so much traction despite so little rules for "things you can do" - because you could do anything and you didn't need to codify it to some sort of power format.
Nemesis Destiny
Adventurer
This is a pretty fair assessment, I think, though there is a subset of gamers that won't know what to even try to do without a power or statblock telling them what they can do. I have one in my group. But I do agree in principle, especially with a good, fair DM.
The impression I got from the column, and the questions he was asking, is not that if this is him putting 5e feelers down we're going to end up with a hyper-complicated game in the end (though we might). I think he's looking for the balance point between complex options to keep the "hardcores" interested and simple mechanics and options to keep the more casual sorts engaged and coming back.
How much do we need to put in to satisfy the ones who desire complexity, and how much of our playership do those people represent?
That's just a guess, obviously, but it is what I think he's getting at.
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