D&D General Styles of Roleplaying and Characters

[Aldarc]

Ok, in 3e (which I'm not playing) a Dragon's fear is Extraordinary, not Magical. There, I said it. How does that change anything substantive here? (If anything, I'd think this suggests that WotC realized that the term "Extraordinary" causes exactly this problem so they ditched it.)

It's to point out that many people had no problems with some nonmagical abilities and effects affecting their character's emotions or psychological state in a previously popular edition of D&D that essentially had 15+ years of active support between 3e and Pathfinder, and that this whole "magic is the exception" is generally not consistently applied.

I'd also like to understand why what I described sounds arbitrary to you. I'll state it again: the dividing line for me is between spells/abilities/whatever that explicitly state what the effect on a targeted creature will be, and those that do not. Where is the arbitrariness?

My apologies. I read that as this being how you defined whether or not something is magic. Your position makes more sense in retrospect, though it obviously lies outside of my own preferences or opinions.

Edit: By the way, I may have found a video showing contests in Cortex Prime on YouTube, so that is coming. I just wanna review it first.

 

[Xetheral]

To me that's effectively people trying to rhetorically dodge the fact that their Frightful Presence is explicitly nonmagical. Remember that 3e D&D also distinguishes between Extraordinary abilities and Supernatural abilities. Frightful Presence is the former and NOT the latter.

Your opinions are noted, but I'm talking about the facts of the game. I think that you're both trying to dodge the fact this ability is explicitly nonmagical in the framework of the 3e rules. Again, WotC could have made Frightful Presence a Supernatural ability, but they didn't. It's Extraordinary, which is nonmagical per the rules. It would be cool if you could actually acknowledge the point that the ability nonmagical per the rules instead of trying to finangle out of that fact.


Seems arbitrary to me, but I doubt that I will be able to convince anyone glued to adhering to that sort of logic.

I think the previously noted distinction between magic influence and non-magical influence could be better characterized as realistic vs unrealistic. If a creature has an explicit mind control ability that would be impossible in the real world, that's "magic" enough for me to categorize it differently from ordinary persuasion, even if under the game rules it wasn't sufficiently magical to fail in an antimagic field.

3.5 put a lot of abilities that would be impossible in the real world in the Extraordinary category where they weren't impeded by an antimagic field despite (often) being entirely unrealistic. In 5e, according to Crawford, such abilities would qualify as "background magic" rather than the "concentrated magic" that would fail in an antimagic field.

In terms of my own preferences, I'm more likely to be ok with a mechanic that overrides my authority to author my character's feelings and/or decisions if it simulates an explicit in-fiction effect separate from and beyond the level of influence possible in the real world. I call that "magic" for short, but I don't care whether the particular edition we're using defines that ability as sufficiently magic to be affected by an antimagic field.

By contrast, I'm less likely to be ok with a mechanic that overrides my authority to author my character's feelings and/or decisions if it's simulating ordinary influence like persuasion or cajoling. For example, I wouldn't like a mechanic that forces my character to do something "against their better judgement" via ordinary persuasion, because I'm prefer to not just be the author of my character's better judgment--I prefer to be the author of their foibles and flaws too.

 

[Oofta]

Your opinions are noted, but I'm talking about the facts of the game. I think that you're both trying to dodge the fact this ability is explicitly nonmagical in the framework of the 3e rules. Again, WotC could have made Frightful Presence a Supernatural ability, but they didn't. It's Extraordinary, which is nonmagical per the rules. It would be cool if you could actually acknowledge the point that the ability nonmagical per the rules instead of trying to finangle out of that fact.


Seems arbitrary to me, but I doubt that I will be able to convince anyone glued to adhering to that sort of logic.

For purposes of this thread, it doesn't matter. On the other hand, from the Sage Advice for D&D 5E:

Is the breath weapon of a dragon magical?​

If you cast antimagic field, don armor of invulnerability, or use another feature of the game that protects against magical or nonmagical effects, you might ask yourself, “Will this protect me against a dragon’s breath?” The breath weapon of a typical dragon isn’t considered magical, so antimagic field won’t help you but armor of invulnerability will.​

​

You might be thinking, “Dragons seem pretty magical to me.” And yes, they are extraordinary! Their description even says they’re magical. But our game makes a distinction between two types of magic:​

​

• the background magic that is part of the D&D multiverse’s physics and the physiology of many D&D creatures
• the concentrated magical energy that is contained in a magic item or channeled to create a spell or other focused magical effect

In D&D, the first type of magic is part of nature. It is no more dispellable than the wind. A monster like a dragon exists because of that magic-enhanced nature. The second type of magic is what the rules are concerned about. When a rule refers to something being magical, it’s referring to that second type. Determining whether a game feature is magical is straightforward. Ask yourself these questions about the feature:​

​

• Is it a magic item?
• Is it a spell? Or does it let you create the effects of a spell that’s mentioned in its description?
• Is it a spell attack?
• Is it fueled by the use of spell slots?
• Does its description say it’s magical?

If your answer to any of those questions is yes, the feature is magical.​

​

Let’s look at a white dragon’s Cold Breath and ask ourselves those questions. First, Cold Breath isn’t a magic item. Second, its description mentions no spell. Third, it’s not a spell attack. Fourth, the word “magical” appears nowhere in its description. Our conclusion: Cold Breath is not considered a magical game effect, even though we know that dragons are amazing, supernatural beings.​

 

[Aldarc]

@Oofta, you're talking about Breath Weapon in 5e. I'm talking about Frightful Presence in 3e.

Edit: Also, where was Jeremy Crawford's whole "background magic" thing when people were complaining in 4e about the Warlord's abilities?

 

[Bill Zebub]

I think the previously noted distinction between magic influence and non-magical influence could be better characterized as realistic vs unrealistic. If a creature has an explicit mind control ability that would be impossible in the real world, that's "magic" enough for me to categorize it differently from ordinary persuasion, even if under the game rules it wasn't sufficiently magical to fail in an antimagic field.

Yeah, this.

However, I can also see the argument that magic isn't needed to explain why people would run away screaming from an office-building sized flying monster that breathes fire.

But if the fear effect were mundane, then a fluff description would be sufficient, "Many people will be overcome with terror." Or it could be left out entirely. Either way, players can simply decide how to roleplay this, and the DM could decide how the peasants react.

But it's written into the creature as an ability, therefore (in my book) somehow it is tied to the essence of this magical creature.

For an example of truly mundane fear, find and read the story about the "15 HP Dragon" in Dungeon World. No explicit "fear" mechanism needed: the players were genuinely terrified. (Experiential roleplaying FTW!)

 

[Bill Zebub]

I suppose it comes down to this:

There is a conflict between the reality that an actual dragon would cause terror in human beings, and the common trope in fiction (of many genres) of the hero charging toward that from which others flee.

So the question is whether the decision to act that way should be left entirely in the hands of the player, or whether the game determines how the hero reacts, and the player's job is to enact it. (And this specific example is just one of many involving human emotions.)

My answer is that the it's always the player's decision....unless the rules explicitly state otherwise.

And, if they do, it's some kind of "magic".

 

[Xetheral]

I suppose it comes down to this:

There is a conflict between the reality that an actual dragon would cause terror in human beings, and the common trope in fiction (of many genres) of the hero charging toward that from which others flee.

So the question is whether the decision to act that way should be left entirely in the hands of the player, or whether the game determines how the hero reacts, and the player's job is to enact it. (And this specific example is just one of many involving human emotions.)

My answer is that the it's always the player's decision....unless the rules explicitly state otherwise.

And, if they do, it's some kind of "magic".

(Bold emphasis added.) I think differences of opinion on this point may be related to different conceptions of self and decisionmaking in the real world.

For example, if, in the real world, someone cowers in terror despite ostensibly preferring to act, should that be classified as (e.g.): (i) a realized preference for and decision not to act, (ii) a subconscious decision not to act overriding a conscious preference for action, or (iii) a physical inability to act overriding a conscious decision to act. That's not an easy question to answer, and the entire question can appear different depending on whether you start from a neurological or a philosophical perspective. (Then add additional uncertainty due to the terms "conscious", "subconscious", "decision", and "preference" having potentially divergent definitions and connotations.)

I would not be surprised at all if differences in how "magical" an effect must be to be a palatable external influence correlates with differences in how one views human volition, further complicated by differences in how one sees the relationship between the player and their character.

 

[Oofta]

@Oofta, you're talking about Breath Weapon in 5e. I'm talking about Frightful Presence in 3e.

Edit: Also, where was Jeremy Crawford's whole "background magic" thing when people were complaining in 4e about the Warlord's abilities?

I'm talking about the fact that many things in D&D are inherently unnatural, hence supernatural, while not being explicitly labelled as a magic spell. Spells can be dispelled or suppressed by other spells or spell effects.

How do you explain ghosts as being anything other than supernatural? Ghost exist in D&D, not the real world. In the real world, I don't care how persuasive someone's argument is, it may or may not convince me. In D&D I don't want someone with a higher roll making a difference in what my PC thinks.

 

[loverdrive]

I guess this is where experiences differ. In my group this comes up a lot. We're always having debates about whether we really need to fight (some of us more bloodthirsty than others) and we frequently use non-lethal damage...and then have more debates about how to handle captives.

And sometimes how we handled previous situations comes up later as a point of contention, with accusations and recriminations and even remorse. (All in good fun...not genuine animosity between players.)

Debating "whether should we fight" or knocking people out is one thing. Raising one's weapon, going for a killing blow and then stopping, because killing people is mentally hard is completely another.

 

[Aldarc]

I'm talking about the fact that many things in D&D are inherently unnatural, hence supernatural, while not being explicitly labelled as a magic spell. Spells can be dispelled or suppressed by other spells or spell effects.

How do you explain ghosts as being anything other than supernatural? Ghost exist in D&D, not the real world. In the real world, I don't care how persuasive someone's argument is, it may or may not convince me. In D&D I don't want someone with a higher roll making a difference in what my PC thinks.

"Supernatural" is not the same thing as "Extraordinary" in 3e when it comes to abilities.

Just remember that in 5e, if it makes you feel any better, whoever rolls higher on social skills just performed better "background magic" than you were able to resist.