Narrative Space Options for non-spellcasters

[Warbringer]

That reason is "because they were written that way" - it has nothing to do with the inherent nature of feats, skill checks, and stunts.

This is borderline meaningless without further explanation and discussion. I have no idea what you mean by "inherent" in a tabletop RPG where written rules is how design intent is communicated

 

[Alzrius]

This is borderline meaningless without further explanation and discussion. I have no idea what you mean by "inherent" in a tabletop RPG where written rules is how design intent is communicated

You stated that there is a reason why pre-4E feats, skills, and stunts didn't have narrative options. As you didn't explain what that reason was, it sounded to me like you were saying they had some sort of inherent lack of ability to grant those things, an idea that I was disagreeing with.

 

[Warbringer]

You stated that there is a reason why pre-4E feats, skills, and stunts didn't have narrative options. As you didn't explain what that reason was, it sounded to me like you were saying they had some sort of inherent lack of ability to grant those things, an idea that I was disagreeing with.

Go read the rest of my posts in this thread.

 

[Alzrius]

Go read the rest of my posts in this thread.

I read them. Your unstated reason is not self-evident, so perhaps you could say what it is?

 

[Warbringer]

...

 

[Alzrius]

Well if I failed to communicate my position in previous posts, I guess not

I'm not sure I understand what you mean here. You're saying that you won't/can't explain your reason for why feats, skills, and stunts in pre-4E D&D had no narrative options?

 

[Warbringer]

I'm not sure I understand what you mean here. You're saying that you won't/can't explain your reason for why feats, skills, and stunts in pre-4E D&D had no narrative options?

Tried to delete because it was snarky reply by me

The basic premise of the thread is that the rules are lacking for non-spellcasters.

There reasons I think that current rules fail are

Skills: not enough points for non-spellcasters (rogues excepted), penalty for cross-classing, skill optimization creates effectively autofail for non-specialists

Feats: Non-combat and combat being in the same pool generally means that combat classes optimize to combat rather than put into non-combat, especially when the benefit is often a +2 skill bonus to an already low skill

Spells as narrative tokens: Spellcasters don't have to make a decision to optimize into combat or non-combat, or if they do, its a day by day decision. They can effectively change their point impact on the narrative by changing spell choice. But more importantly, spells, or rather slots, are a token exchange to effect the narrative directly, some that feats and skills don't provide in their current form.

4e solved this part of the problem by far more generous skill construction and all character abilities as a narrative tokens (AEDU)

That's my opinion anyway...

 

[Ahnehnois]

If we refuse to allow that aspect of "luck", do we also prohibit the "Luck Feats" from Complete Scoundrel?[/Devil's Advocate]

I do.

Is it somehow made more tolerable if I define his good fortune being the fact he has Celestial Beings watching out for him due to a distant Celestial ancestor (just like this might explain a Sorcerer or Favoured Soul's abilities)?

Yes.

I don't know the answer, but given many clerical spells draw in divine intercession, why can't a character who gets divine intercession without requesting it by means of spells, or even knowing that is why he gets these benefits, exist?

Personally, I'm all for those sorts of abilities, in principle. I do, however, think that there needs to be at least a vague justification. For example, a (3.5) warlock's powers come from a pretty vague source; the player may or may not have made some kind of pact, his ancestor may or may not have done so, or may or may not be a demon. But supernatural clearly plays into it somewhere. Just putting a [luck] tag doesn't do it for me, and luck feats just aren't very good feats.

 

[Ahnehnois]

There reasons I think that current rules fail are

Skills: not enough points for non-spellcasters (rogues excepted), penalty for cross-classing, skill optimization creates effectively autofail for non-specialists

Agreed.

Feats: Non-combat and combat being in the same pool generally means that combat classes optimize to combat rather than put into non-combat, especially when the benefit is often a +2 skill bonus to an already low skill

I think it's the same as above. Not enough feats, not good enough feats as well.

Spells as narrative tokens: Spellcasters don't have to make a decision to optimize into combat or non-combat, or if they do, its a day by day decision. They can effectively change their point impact on the narrative by changing spell choice. But more importantly, spells, or rather slots, are a token exchange to effect the narrative directly, some that feats and skills don't provide in their current form.

This I don't agree with. Spells are tricks. Some spellcasters do have to make some choices about whether they focus on combat or not.

I think the solutions are pretty clear in this paradigm: fix the existing skill and feat systems, and make the spellcasters make similar choices to the nonspellcasters.

 

[Alzrius]

Skills: not enough points for non-spellcasters (rogues excepted), penalty for cross-classing, skill optimization creates effectively autofail for non-specialists

I think that this one is probably the easiest to fix, simply because the skill system is something unto itself, rather than being a class feature. Given that, it's easy to tweak the skill points given to various classes, and the cross-class penalties. The DCs may be a bit trickier, but it's still not that difficult to adjust them.

Personally, I think that part of the problem here is that modifiers to the skill system allow for runaway bonus inflation. Taking care of that would likely solve half the problem.

Feats: Non-combat and combat being in the same pool generally means that combat classes optimize to combat rather than put into non-combat, especially when the benefit is often a +2 skill bonus to an already low skill

I suspect that tagging feats would help here (e.g. labeling them as "combat," "social," or "exploratory") might work here, and then mandating that feats gained at certain levels be of certain types.

Alternately, when feats would normally be gained, the characters instead gain one feat of each type, rather than having to pick one of the mandated type.

Spells as narrative tokens: Spellcasters don't have to make a decision to optimize into combat or non-combat, or if they do, its a day by day decision. They can effectively change their point impact on the narrative by changing spell choice. But more importantly, spells, or rather slots, are a token exchange to effect the narrative directly, some that feats and skills don't provide in their current form.

Well, bear in mind that this is true on paper, but less so in play. There are limitations here that come up in the course of game-play that act as a greater limit on the practical ability of spells to influence the narrative than show from a theoretical construction of what a spellcaster can do.

That said, [MENTION=2303]Starfox[/MENTION] comes down pretty hard on people who talk about spellcasters in this thread. If we want to keep talking about this, I suggest tapping Z or R twice to do a barrel roll.