Given that I was talking about the former, I have no issue with that position.
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D&D 5E Am I no longer WoTC's target audience?
- Thread starter der_kluge
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Given that I was talking about the former, I have no issue with that position.
Almost certainly! In some quarters that seemed to be the received approach.
Baker contrasts In a Wicked Age with Dogs in the Vineyard - because the latter does have teeth. As he puts it, a player can't decide what/how to raise until s/he knows what the first player is doing. But I'm sure there is degenerate DitV play, where someone just declares I'm using words or I'm using my gun and then goes to the dice.
No one is asserting that because they're art they're not technology. Industrial design is a real thing. A transistor radio can look attractive or look ugly. And the fact that it's a transistor imposes demands on the asethetics that are different from an older radio with valves.
People are denying that they are technology because they aren't more-or-less function-oriented devices for achieving utilitarian ends. Throwing dice is a technique or, if you like, an instance of technology. Deciding whether it is good or bad that your game should tend to generate tied results on its dice throws is not about technology. It's about the aesthetics of play. One thing I like about the dice pool systems I've been playing in recent years (Burning Wheel, Prince Valiant) and about the narrower 2d6 range in Traveller is that they produce quite a few ties. In conjunction with some other adjudicative techniques (eg Let it Ride) this can be used to force the conflict into new unexpected fields.
D&D used to have ties be fairly common in the context of initiative. WotC D&D eschews ties. I (and I assume @GreyLord) am denying that the move in D&D away from tied results is an instance of technological improvement. It's a difference in feel that (presumably) reflects a difference in taste and desired experience.
How can one empirically measure whether individual or "side" initiative is better? Whether ties (for initiative or for anything else) are desirable or should be reduced/eliminated as much as possible?
And if rules design really was comparable to technological advance, how come it peaked with Prince Valiant and then again, perhaps, with Apocalypse World, but with so many dips between and since? Or if those are not peaks, why not? Do you think this can be shown empirically?
What about RPGs which don't feature worldbuilding or adventure storylines? The two I mentioned arguably fall into this camp. There are others which do also.
Is it technological improvement, or not, to have worked out how to reliably use mechanical systems to produce shared fiction with no need for single-person authorship? And what should we make of systems which (like, in my play experience of it, Classic Traveller) which go a lot of the way there twenty to thirty years earlier? Are they nevertheless now obsolete like Model T Fords are? In what way is 1977 Traveller an obsolete RPG system?[/QUOTE]
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GreyLord
Legend
I'm not sure if you realize this as a physicist, but today some forms of art ARE technology.
When you go to watch an animated film these days, 90% of the major blockbusters (I'd say 100% but there's always that anomaly) are done by computer...technology.
Feeling art and technology are non-connected is to be very disconnected to the modern art scheme of things.
When I did one of my last books the art was done by hand, but all the formatting and integrating of it into the book itself was via technology, including the melding of it into text and the backgrounds.
Games ARE an artform, especially game design, just as much as many other forms of the arts (painting and photography are one form, but if you noticed one of the artists today that I listed is also involved with other forms of artwork, some that utilize computers in safety and other protocols).
Art as a form has probably been far more highly effected by advances in technology than RPGs at this point, and the similarities are basically the same.
That's even BEFORE the advances in how to utilize light, coloration, and aspects are even taken into effect.
Looking at more traditional art forms being created today (drawings, pictures, sculpture, animation) computers are deeply integrated in many artists lives, while others eschew the technology to a certain point. However, whether the art is good or bad or better or worse is still up to the individual in regards to perspective and opinion. One can say a piece from the 16th century is one of the greatest pieces of art and have a greater following than a modern piece of sculpture (and vice versa) without saying one is definitely better than the other because of advances in technology.
ONE major difference between simply saying something is technology and thus an improvement tech wise, vs that of art is that of empirical vs. opinion.
I haven't seen empirical evidence that RPGs have advanced technologically in a way which we can say the evidence points that this is absolutely a better way of doing things. What studies on this can you list? What hard evidence regarding the university or corporate research do you have to back that up?
Car companies do research on everything from better gas mileage on an engine and transmission to that of safety and how the cars react in a crash.
Compare that to RPGs and normally what you have may be sales numbers (if they release them) and opinions. This is more related to how one judges art (is a movie good or bad, how did the critics think of it, how was the box office, did it get an Oscar?) or other forms of art (is the sculpture place in front of the London Library pleasing, was the money well spent, is it aesthetically thoughtful?).
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reelo
Hero
You're seriously saying 5E is less complex than BX? That's crazy. And wrong.
Sadras
Legend
@Sabathius42 I agree with @reelo on B/X being simpler than 5e, but I'm curious to hear how you came by your conclusion though.
JiffyPopTart
Bree-Yark
vs.
The 5e example is not only less than half as long (BECMI grappling continues on the next page), it includes the base rules for grappling, a feat that improves grappling, and two conditions which are universal but that are used when grappling.
Or another example...
5e: New Player, you found a magic shield! It's a simple +1 shield which means you get to add an extra 1 to your Armor Class. You used to have an 18, so when you use the +1 shield your AC is 19.
BECMI: New player, you found a magic shield! It's a simple +1 shield which means that you get to subtract an extra 1 from your Armor Class. You used to have a 2, so when you use the +1 shield you have a 1.
Or another example...
5e: New player, in order to figure out what animal left that track roll a D20 to make a Nature Check. 20! Awesome, that means you did really well and know its a bear, and that its wounded. snip time You swing at the bear with your sword, roll a D20 to hit. 20! Awesome again. Thats a critical hit and does extra damage.
BECMI: New player, in order to figure out what animal left that track roll a D20 to make a Nature Check. 20! Oh man, not good. You think its an antelope or something. You actually wanted to roll low. snip time You swing at the bear with your sword, roll a D20 to hit. Oh man, another 20, these dice are crap. No, 20 is good! That can hit anything in the book. ???
Oofta
Legend
But ... but ... it's easier because there's so much missing! And charts to see if you hit, and different damage based on target size is awesome! Ooh! What kind of armor are they wearing because that makes a difference too!
P.S. Yes, I know I'm mixing and matching old edition rules a bit. I just think what some people feel is "better" is just a nostalgic preference or what they're used to. Which is perfectly fine. Personally? I think some of the older editions were a hot mess and I'm happy 5E cleaned it up while retaining most of the feel of the old games.
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Urriak Uruk
Gaming is fun, and fun is for everyone
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Well, Wizard's empirically measures strength of gameplay through having groups of players play different rules, and by releasing UA articles that then come with polls. The former is a measure of how fun the rules and adventure are, the latter is usually a measure of game balance and popularity.
As for the latter point, when you look up the definition of art, the latter part says "producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power." Primarily is the key word there, but I personally find rules design is not really trying to bring about an emotional response; it is instead a vehicle for people to tell stories and games that do (subtle difference but I think it exists).
So a game that does not have much story or worldbuilding is not by itself art, but it can still be used as a vehicle for people to create stories and worlds. It's one degree of seperation away from art, if that makes sense.
Funny, I believe the exact opposite.
My personal opinion is that WoTC screwed the pooch with 3rd edition and they've been trying to fix the issues they interjected into the game ever since.
5E is their next attempt to get the game closer to in line with how good it was in the past. Although, I was never really a fan of AD&D. I think B/X is the gold standard for the D&D game.
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