First off, I apologize for taking me so long to reply. It's been busy in Gaerek's world.
Having said that, I'm enjoying our little conversation. I'm gaining a lot of insight here. I appreciate that.
I feel like I'm learning stuff, and it's a good discussion, so no worries about a late reply
Please correct me if I have the wrong understanding, but I always took the second part of the sentance, the "...and the ability to turn a serious blow into a less serious one." to fall under the perview of everything I mentioned. It's the idea that, "Man, that was going to be a hard hit, but I got lucky and sidestepped at the right time!" or "Good thing that sword only glanced off my armor, or I'd be in a world of hurt right now!" In essense, it covers the "...physical health, mental health, endurance, vitality, ability to mitigate damage, glancing blows, luck, etc." that I mentioned in my last post. I will agree that 4e went further than 3.x, but 3.x HP's were still very abstract and did not completely mean physical wounds.
Turning a blow into a less serious one implies a certain amount of activity to me, not passive forces like luck or fate (unless you can consciously affect those). However, I see how you can draw that interpretation, even if I wouldn't assume that to be the case. I still don't think that's what it means, but I wouldn't argue against it if you were GMing for me
Good point. I didn't think about it like that. I suppose that this is another issue of extremes.
Extremes can really muck up a conversation based on theoretical musings. I'll try to avoid that!
Again, to be clear, I just love playing. I haven't found a system I truly hate. And I certainly don't hate older version of D&D. I tend to DM for the group, so right now, we're more about killing and looting. I have no problem with the other side of the coin, and if my players wanted that, I would adapt the system, or even move over to PF or something else. But for us, right now, 4e is the perfect system, flaws and all.
Yeah, again, makes sense to me. Not sure if there is a perfect system. I created the RPG that my group of six players play once a week (game later today!), and I'm still tweaking rules (mostly expanding to fill rules in cases where GMs would normally have to use fiat, because the system doesn't cover it, like running territories and the like). If I can make my own RPG and not be satisfied, I don't know if there is such as thing as a perfect system for me!
I totally understand. Difference of playstyle. Immersion is great, and for your group it's needed. Not so much for my group. And that's perfectly fine for either of us.
Yep
This is very true. But it's a bit more representitive of our playstyle. Just like permanent death in an MMO would kill off pretty much all the fun, excessive "realistic rules" would pretty much kill off the fun of our tabletop game. Again, difference of opinion and playstyle, and I can respect that.
You know what's funny? Years ago, when I used to play WoW, I used to advocate for a "hardcore" server, where if you died, you had until the mandatory release time to be res'd or that's it, you start over from scratch. I thought it'd be cool. Even in WoW, I wanted permanent death as an option (as in mandatory, but only on one or two servers, which you get to pick). Even in Diablo II (which I didn't play much of), I only ever played on hardcore in the campaign mode. I think I made it through two acts before I got kind of tired of my barbarian and played other games.
But, yeah, different play styles. No right or wrong answer to that
Your DM is going to have a lot of say over what's "needed" in your group. In the "kick in the door" style play that has represented about 75% of the games I've ever played, wand of CLW have pretty much been a staple. We had even nick-named them crack sticks, because of how "addictive" they were.
And the group I ran never went through dungeons or played modules, so they weren't as necessary (though they'd certainly have been useful at times). I've played through a dungeon-like environment or two, but it was low levels (1-3), so they didn't come up (750 gp is a lot to a first level character... way out of his price range).
Sounds like fun, honestly. Just not like the type of game I'm running at the moment. I would enjoy it, my players, not as much.
Well, the amount of combat is basically set by the players. They've tried to avoid fights where possible. The two fights have been instigated by me, when bandits have attacked the PCs when traveling along the road (traveling by yourself means that a group of 4-6 bandits might like their odds when they have ranged weapons and are on the mountainside, waiting for people to pass by). The players could definitely start more fights than they have (they've almost been in, I don't know, probably six fights so far), but they keep letting the negotiator talk people down (that's their preferred plan, but combat was always, "and in case he fails, we jump him...").
I can accept this. It's possible to have it both ways in the same system.
I think so, too. I think they'd have to shift healing surges away from the main healing mechanic (heals don't "activate" healing surges in other PCs anymore, but heal raw damage, even if it's 25% instead of a number). Leaving healing surges as the main mechanic for healing puts arbitrary hard caps on the amount of external healing one could receive in a day, which will still rub people the wrong way.
I also might have a fundamental misunderstanding of how healing works in 4e. And if so, ignore this
And here I disagree with you. In my games, the PCs are always a cut above the rest. If my level 1 PC got into a fight with the town butcher (not that it should happen, but hypothetical), there would be no contest. I've always played this way. I want my PCs to feel like they are something special, that they were somehow, someway, set aside. If an average NPC is 4 HD, and is an actual threat to my 1st level PCs, there's a problem. Take your relatively typical 1st level "quest." We need the PCs to rid the town of the kobold threat. If the NPCs are 4HD, they can do it themselves. Why hire these PCs? I could see a town guard, or militia, or soldiers, or whatever being like this, but your average farmer (in my opinion, YMMV) or whatever, should be anywhere near the PC's in skill, health, etc. Like you said, this is all preference, and it's nice to see a different opinion here. It gives me a broader perspective and helps me see outside the box.
Well, in my game, when you level up, you don't automatically increase in anything (save free skill points, or a feat or stat hop). And, since it's a point buy system, you can dump all of your points into being an amazing butcher if you want to. You can have a 20th hit die scholar with 3 hit points, or a 5th hit die warrior with 50 hit points. So, I put the baseline at 4th hit die to set a certain level of proficiency within professions, not combat (though soldiers might average 4th or 5th level in combat proficiency).
These are also settled adults, which means they aren't new or green. If you pick a fight with them at hit die 1, you will probably lose. As you should, in my mind. If you want to be heroic, start at a higher hit die. I wanted a system that could support a "farmboy to hero" story just as well as a "we're naturally the biggest, baddest guys around with little training" in my game. You can have a grizzled, trained warrior captain with decades of training in tactics and real life wars under his belt, and you can have a farm kid who gets dragged into the adventuring life, and becomes a hero.
In my ideal version of D&D, it should support different narrative ranges. I know that starting at 8th hit die means you miss out on a chunk of the game, but it's preferable to me than not being able to play a "zero to hero" type game, even if I wanted to. Give me the option for either, and let the group decide what to play.
But, like you said, it's preference. I see the real downsides to doing it my way (you lose out on the early hit die, thus you might have a shorter long term game). But the upsides more than make up for it to me. But, it's just preference in what we want in a system. If I had to hazard a guess, I'd guess that you'd rather have a specialized game this resonates with most of your wants, then a general game that adapts to different styles. Many people prefer the "I'd rather all games be specialized, so I can pick a game that is tailored to my wants, and that specializes in the things I desire, rather than doing it halfheartedly." I understand that mindset, but since D&D has such a broad base, I'd rather have it appeal to as many different styles as possible (which is a goal that might, ironically, lose it some gamers).
Certainly, the world moves along. I don't think I explained it right. Basically, in LotR, every single person in that setting, either directly, or indirectly, was affected by the actions of main characters. If Frodo had decided in Rivendell not to take the ring, Sauron would have ended up with the ring, and the world would be a much different place. If Strider hadn't decided to step up and become Aragorn, King of Gondor, the world would be a much different place. If Legolas and Gimli had decided to let their racial differences be an issue (instead of as a place to respect one another) there's a good chance the fellowship would have failed even sooner, and Strider's group would have been killed in one of their many fights. What I'm trying to say is, I present something the world is attempting to do. What happens to the world, is a direct result of the decisions my players make, either positive, or negative. If there's a problem I present, there's a way for them to deal with it. I know this might not be the best way to do things, it might not be everyone's preference, but it goes along with my feeling that heroes should be heroes. And the PC's are heroes. Not regular joes who carry a sword (or wand, or holy symbol, or whatever) and might get good enough to present a challenge to farmer in a fight in a little bit.
I'm okay with this style of play. I don't want it to be the base of all of my games. I want more options. Sometimes, the PCs are the heroes that help defeat the demonic forces from invading the Mortal Realm (happened in my game), while other times they're the evil warlords expanding out (happening later today). Other times, they're orphans raised in service to the crown, and they follow orders (happened in my game), and other times they're outcasts on a human continent looking for a way to survive (happened in my game).
I want a lot of possible narratives in my game, and I don't want all of them to be life-changing, world-altering narratives. Sometimes it's nice to see if the warlords rise to power, or fall trying. Sometimes it's nice to see if the nobles can help a nation build a new frontier town. It really depends on what our group feels like, and I don't want the system to shackle me.
Ok, I can see this. I'm starting an Eberron campaign, and the world is full of faster travel options. But, almost each one presents an opportunity for "Action in the mountain pass!" as you put it. In previous games, I got over this in the Final Fantasy method of travel. You're low level, well, you have to walk everywhere. Oh, you've explored the continent? Well, here's a land vehicle you can use to get around this continent. Oh, action on the next continent! You're going to have to take a boat, but you can't bring your vehicle, you're hoofing it! Oh, you've explored two continents now? Awesome, here's an airship! Now you can fly around the whole world. Oh look, a new island has popped up. You fly there? Well, you're attacked, and now the airship has crashed. You're hoofing it again! Except in my games its more like, by the time they can instant travel in the world, they're planeshopping, so it makes it harder to instant travel. I try to organically prevent fast/instant travel, rather than saying, "Sorry, teleport spell doesn't exist!" That may be what you had in mind, but it didn't look like it.
Nope, not what I had in mind at all. In my game, it's basically all mundane travel unless you have a powerful magician (Passage specialist... basically teleportation magic), and even then, it costs him permanent resources (consumes a bit if his soul, by permanently reducing his Charisma, which you need an 18 or higher to cast spells at all). This makes it very, very rare. I'm not proposing this for D&D, since it's way too radical. I was just stating my preference of overland or boat travel most of the time, since it lets the world evolve. At high levels, with teleportation magic common, it's hard to have an army even begin to form without high level PCs (or even NPCs!) show up and nip it in the bud early. And that kills narratives, in my mind. Making teleportation rare but possible leaves narratives open, so it's my preference.
Did you read his last L&L article? It's obvious he's getting ideas for 5e now, at least to me. I'm pretty excited to see what comes of this.
Yep. I really liked his take on magic items (it's basically what I did for my RPG). I hope he keeps up quality thoughts on the articles. And, just like Mr. Mearls said, "this is something Monte showed me that I liked," I hope we see Mr. Cook say, "this is something I was talking to Mike about. What do you guys think?"
I like the more general skills, but that's preference again, I suppose. This could be another discussion, for another thread, I think.
Yep
I like everything. I think the best term for my games is cinematic. That's just because it fits my group. People want gritty? I can do gritty. But I give my players what they want. Since I've been playing with the same players since 4e came out (prior to 4e, I didn't play at all since about 2003, due to my group moving away), it works well. I'm enjoying the conversation as well. Thanks for it.
Yeah. It's nice to be able to converse and say, "play style difference, but that's cool" and not have the conversation dry up right away. I do find it interesting and informative. I hope others caught in our conversation do as well! As always, play what you like
