Legends & Lore: Clas Groups

[Jeff Carlsen]

Only if your assumptions about how it will play out are correct. And odds are they are not because, as I said, you're not a professional game designer and neither am I. It's only a bad thing if it's not done well. I think you will admit classification systems can work well.

It's you're assumption it cannot work out well, or that you fully comprehend what they're doing despite lack of enough information to know how it will play out, that I am questioning. I think it's fair to question what they've said so far, of course, I just don't think your fairly strong conclusions are well supported by the information at your disposal.

Sure, it's possible I'm missing something, but that doesn't invalidate either of my arguments.

Plus, we've seen much of what the designers conclude pass through the forums, so some fans are perfectly capable game designers. Also, the link in my signature is my game company, though the fact that I'm a part-time game designer has no bearing on the legitimacy of my arguments, which must stand on their own merit.

 

[RevTurkey]

Yep Gary Gygax was a professional game designer but I don't think many people are playing Cyborg Commando or Dangerous Journeys...

That said, I like Mistwell's positive take on things. It's easy to be negative and I have have been convinced to think again several times by Mistwell...making interesting and perceptive comments.

i do agree with Wicht though...I don't think this helps much as described so far.

 

[Giltonio_Santos]

A few months ago I started a thread in this exact topic, and I'm still of the opinion that 2E-style class groups are a nice addition. So, you can put me on the "yay!" group for this one.

 

[Remathilis]

That's not really a problem, in my mind. No one needs to get a big bonus out of any particular magic item, and if the party fighter has a lower strength than the party cleric, perhaps the item is a better fit for that cleric, anyway (the fighter is probably a better fit for things that require, say, a high DEX or a high WIS or something -- clearly, that fighter shouldn't be the one doing things that revolve around having a high STR in the party).

I don't see any problem with giving everyone access to all the cool toys, personally. I don't know why anyone who loves swords (from the fighter to the skill-based ranger to the sword-dancing monk to the spell-casting bladedancer to the tanky swordmage to the skald-like bard) shouldn't dream of a vorpal sword, and why all characters who love light weapons (from the light-weapon fighter to the cleric of the nobility to the Musketeer-esque paladin to a wizard-dilletante) can't dream of a rapier of piercing. I also don't see why any character who can cast spells (hexblades and paladins and arcane-tatooed barbarians and runic axe-users and monks who learn elemental ki arts and whatever) can't dream of items that let them use those spells more often (scrolls, wands, whatever).

None of those distinctions make any sense to hard-code into the game. "Oh, I suppose my cleric of bravery and courage can't get the extra bonus from a potion of heroism because I forgot to check the right box during character creation" isn't a situation I want to see. 3e and 4e combined have given me more than my fill of pointless, niche little items that are only useful to very specific kinds of characters.

Nope. Sorry. Unless you are going to allow my 5th level rogue to use the wand of magic missiles, I don't want your mage wearing those boots of the master thief. This reeks of "casters get everything, martials get some" that launch CoDzilla and Batman Wizard threads. I want some unique items that only work just for monks, barbarians, rangers, fighters, rogues, and bards just like I want ones that can only work for wizards, clerics, druids, warlock, paladins, and sorcerers.

 

[Kobold Stew]

Only if your assumptions about how it will play out are correct. And odds are they are not because, as I said, you're not a professional game designer and neither am I.

argumentum ad verecundiam (appeal to [false, revered] authority).

Better: "odds are they are not because you are not part of the paid design team". But then, that's why we're all here, right?

 

[RevTurkey]

Also...surely these are the type of debates that we should have been having at the start of the Playtest I reckon.

i think with every post Mearls alienates somebody or some group of players. I think it is past time he said enough and go off and just make the game.

if I were him and his team I would have a look at the data, soak it all up a bit and then start again. Too many cooks spoil the broth and all. For good or bad I think this game needs more flavour, character and distinction...something I think gets watered down from a long playtest.

At the moment I find it easy enough to sell the idea of playing '13th Age', 'DCC RPG', 'Pathfinder' etc but I struggle to really nail down why they should play D&D Next other than....because it is er...D&D? Anyway...I am going off topic, sorry.

 

[Mistwell]

Come off of it. I've done design work and been paid for it and I think its a generally bad idea. Being a professional game designer is not some guarantee that any given idea will be good.

I think we both agree that classification systems CAN work. Other games do it successfully, and even AD&D essentially did it successfully.

So the question, to me at least, isn't "can this work", it's merely "will the system they chose work out?"

And we won't know that until the final product. But, I'd put the odds pretty high for professional game designers working for the largest TRPG company in the world given 2+ years of design time and a full team to do it of doing it right. Certainly I'd put those odds above the odds of an amateur who got paid a couple times who declares it's not looking right to them.

 

[RevTurkey]

lol

 

[Mistwell]

argumentum ad verecundiam (appeal to [false, revered] authority).

Better: "odds are they are not because you are not part of the paid design team". But then, that's why we're all here, right?

It's not a false authority. A team of professional game designers, working for the largest TRPG company in the world, with the most resources, and 2+ years time to work on it, with another team of playtesters and surveys and public feedback, is not a false authority. That's an actual authority. In court, you could establish those guys as an expert in RPG game design.

I am not saying they WILL design it great, as experts can be flawed. I am saying I'd put odds on it that they will succeed at it if such a system can work out well, and also that I think such systems have worked well in other games including (sort of) a prior edition of D&D.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Nope. Sorry. Unless you are going to allow my 5th level rogue to use the wand of magic missiles, I don't want your mage wearing those boots of the master thief. This reeks of "casters get everything, martials get some" that launch CoDzilla and Batman Wizard threads. I want some unique items that only work just for monks, barbarians, rangers, fighters, rogues, and bards just like I want ones that can only work for wizards, clerics, druids, warlock, paladins, and sorcerers.

Yeah, your assumption of my bias is dead wrong. Honestly, I got no problem with a thief using wands of magic missiles. In the at all. In fact, I prefer magic items that can be used by anyone for whatever reason, but I'm a godless heretic.

But "caster vs. noncaster" is not even the real distinction between that wand and those boots. The real distinction is that a wand is an item designed to give you more uses of a specific ability than you'd otherwise have (a wand gives you X uses of a spell you can cast -- not everyone knows that spell), and the boots are designed to improve one kind of action (the boots improve something that any character can attempt -- everyone can try and be sneaky). So lets compare apples to apples, here.

A fighter using a wand of magic missiles would be like a wizard getting a sword that let them use the fighter's bonus attack for free 20 times. Which, yeah, no real problem with. Also no real problem with requiring that you can use that bonus attack in the first place as a prerequisite to using that weapon. I think sensible prerequisites like "if an item gives you extra uses of an ability, you should be able to use that ability" or "requires a high ability score" (maybe those boots require a high DEX!) are generally unobtrusive and reinforce character uniqueness, so they're not a big problem. They're also not necessary, though, so removing them entirely and letting the rogue sling magic missiles and the fighter use scrolls of fireball won't break D&D for me. Arguably with things like Necklace of Fireballs and Gauntlets of Ogre Strength, that kind of stuff happens anyway (rogues can use fireball! clerics can have high STR!).