3000 miles? That reminds me of one of my all-time favorite songs 
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D&D 4E The Best Thing from 4E
- Thread starter TarionzCousin
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D'karr
Adventurer
Rituals were one of the mechanics that did not see a lot of use in most campaigns I ran though they are a very cool way of emulating the "high magic of a lost empire" vibe.
However in one campaign in particular I made two changes because I wanted to play a different campaign setting. I used Earthdawn as the inspiration for the campaign, a world ravaged by monsters brought around by the increasing buildup of magical energy. In this campaign I made two changes, I gave out a lot of rituals as treasure. Rituals were used but not a lot. After a TPK I rebooted and in this case I made the change of having everyone get the Ritual Caster Feat for free, and Wizards and Clerics gained a bonus to any ritual casting. Ritual use then caught on. It made the Earthdawn campaign a heck of a lot more interesting.
The Crimson Binome
Hero
One of the things I hate about Pathfinder is how you absolutely need certain specific spells if you want any hope at maintaining the party over moderate-to-high levels. You need someone who can Raise Dead (or Reincarnate). You need someone with Restoration. You need Remove Curse, Neutralize Poison, Remove Disease, etc. Even if you had the HP situation under control, it pretty much mandated that someone in the party play a cleric (or oracle).
I never had to worry about that in 4E.
AbdulAlhazred
Legend
Yeah, rituals are a great thing, and I was REALLY annoyed that they borked it up in 5e. Its like jeeze, you can't get even one good thing right?
I mean, truthfully a lot of the 4e rituals weren't that well written, not terrible, but they could have more consistently scaled both in effect and price. Still, it was a really good concept, and mostly worked as intended.
I mean, truthfully a lot of the 4e rituals weren't that well written, not terrible, but they could have more consistently scaled both in effect and price. Still, it was a really good concept, and mostly worked as intended.
D'karr
Adventurer
A lot of people complain about Essentials. I'm not one of them, I saw the expansion as another way of doing things. Most things worked side by side with the existing stuff with no impact. However one of my complaints about Essentials is that they "dropped" rituals. It was a missed opportunity to tweak them to something much more usable, and to "fix" the system.
Manbearcat
Legend
I completely agree. Even if other posters here don't
Yeah, it never much sounded like my style, but I read about the EN World mods getting to play in one of his games, and it sounded like a blast. I would probably have a great time playing in your game
Though I do wonder how much of my joy (and many other posters here, I'd imagine) would come simply from playing for once, instead of GMing...
Truth in that.Having gotten to mostly play for the past couple of years instead of GM, I'm finding I'm having a blast.
You're totally invited to my game if you don't mind the 3000 mile trip.
Pile O' Quoted Posts!
I just thought there was something interesting to talk about here regarding long time and/or exclusive GMs. There are a few unfortunate things that happen as a result of this. The trivially obvious one is players who might otherwise want to try their hand in GMing become completely intimidated that they won't be able to run a game as well as the long-time GM that has been running games for them. And so they don't even try. This is one reason why long-time GMs don't get to play much.
However, there is another interesting reason. I've GMed for several long-time GMs who have also gotten to play now and again. They come to my table and immediately want to defer because they have an opportunity to play. And I don't care much to play so good for us all I guess.
What is interesting though is what had happened a few times in the past where a few of the very good GMs I run games for (of which I've witnessed their craft first-hand and can attest to their skill...so it isn't an intimidation thing) wanted to switch out and run games for the group but won't because they won't run a game for me! This is because I've basically exclusively GMed for 31 years. The hypothesis is that because of this, I have sort of programmed my mental framework to only be interested in inhabiting, and thus advocating for, multiple, disparate fronts/individuals/forces while gaming. Hence, I wouldn't be capable of maintaining interest in advocating for a singular player character for any length of time so they would be incapable of making a fun game for me. They may explain it differently, but this is my take on, in effect, what they've said.
Like I have some kind of GM personality disorder
Anyone ever get that?
AbdulAlhazred
Legend
Pile O' Quoted Posts!
I just thought there was something interesting to talk about here regarding long time and/or exclusive GMs. There are a few unfortunate things that happen as a result of this. The trivially obvious one is players who might otherwise want to try their hand in GMing become completely intimidated that they won't be able to run a game as well as the long-time GM that has been running games for them. And so they don't even try. This is one reason why long-time GMs don't get to play much.
However, there is another interesting reason. I've GMed for several long-time GMs who have also gotten to play now and again. They come to my table and immediately want to defer because they have an opportunity to play. And I don't care much to play so good for us all I guess.
What is interesting though is what had happened a few times in the past where a few of the very good GMs I run games for (of which I've witnessed their craft first-hand and can attest to their skill...so it isn't an intimidation thing) wanted to switch out and run games for the group but won't because they won't run a game for me! This is because I've basically exclusively GMed for 31 years. The hypothesis is that because of this, I have sort of programmed my mental framework to only be interested in inhabiting, and thus advocating for, multiple, disparate fronts/individuals/forces while gaming. Hence, I wouldn't be capable of maintaining interest in advocating for a singular player character for any length of time so they would be incapable of making a fun game for me. They may explain it differently, but this is my take on, in effect, what they've said.
Like I have some kind of GM personality disorder
Dude, that's the first I've ever heard that! Now, I'd say I'm an 80/20 DM/Player, but I DO play some reasonable amount of the time, though I must admit to having 95% DMed 4e, which is a bit odd even for me. In any case, I think DMing for other DMs is usually pretty good. I mean that way I get players who are practiced at coming up with plots and motivations, generally know what sort of things make a DM's life easier, etc. I guess the worst I've run into is a few "I'm going to be lazy now" DM types that didn't want to pull their weight as players. Maybe they didn't have the best players? Maybe they're just not really cut out to BE players, I dunno. So I can see where maybe now and then a long-time DM doesn't make the greatest player, but I think its more likely they'll be pleasant players at least than when you get Joe random player, who may have any amount of craziness under the hood!
Gilladian
Adventurer
The only time I ever get to play anymore is when Abdul Alhazred runs a game for us; it used to be online, now we live in the same town again, and he HASN'T run anything! Grrr.... Then again, our play has been so intermittent, and I know he'd rather run 4e, which at least one of the group won't play, so I don't know when he'd do it... But I do get tired of being almost exclusively the DM.
AbdulAlhazred
Legend
Well, it seemed like a good idea to at least try out 5e, and playing an egotistical dwarf wizard is fairly amusing!
D'karr
Adventurer
I'm on the DM side about 95% of the time. It's only in recent years that we've been playing such a variety of games that I've had the opportunity to play more often. Before that my play was mostly through organized play. This past year has been the one where I've had the opportunity to play the most. At this point I'm at about 70% DM and 30% player. I'm having a good time playing but DMing is definitely my first love.
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