What I don't like is "complexity creep," where, in adding options, you also end up slowing the game down. There could be more things to resolve, more complicated resolution, more things to track, and more times when someone will need to look up a rule or think about how two rules interact.
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D&D General Is power creep bad?
- Thread starter Redwizard007
- Start date
Lanefan
Victoria Rules
Simple answer: yes. Power creep is the parasite that eventually kills whatever game it has infected.
No dissertation required.
Bill Zebub
“It’s probably Matt Mercer’s fault.”
As a lover (dare I say connoisseur) of metaphors and analogies, I totally agree.
And sometimes a metaphor/analogy fails even at the narrow point the person was trying to make.
P.S. And also, given that I am a Power Creep, I find this whole thread offensive.
Snarf Zagyg
Notorious Liquefactionist
When you played D&D before
Couldn't look you in the eye
You just like to roleplay
Your champion fighter makes me cry
You just like the fluff
And the lore of the campaign world
I wish I was special
Gonna make my character so special
But I'm a creep
I'm a powergamer
What the hell am I doin' here?
I don't belong here
I don't care if pun-pun is lame
I wanna have control
I’m gonna play the perfect game
It won’t matter what I roll
I want the DM to notice
When my PC is not around
So friggin' special
My multiclassed optimized PC is special…
But I'm a creep
I'm a powergamer
What the hell am I doin' here?
I don't belong here
Bill Zebub
“It’s probably Matt Mercer’s fault.”
That made me smile, despite the fact that I don't recognize the song (poem?) it's based on.
Snarf Zagyg
Notorious Liquefactionist
Since they say imitation is the sincerest form of ripping off good ideas and calling them a homage:
Book came out yesterday
Makes me wanna play
What they said wasn't real
Makes a rogue wanna steal
Adventurin' underground
Guess I'm playin', accuracy bound
All's I got is an urge
Got no meanin' just action surge
Take time with a wounded bard
'Cause she likes to heal
Take time with a wounded rogue
'Cause she likes to steal
Take time with a wounded bard
'Cause she likes to heal
The rogue likes to steal
I'm half the Fighting Man I used to be
(This I feel as I drown)
(My relevance fades away)
Well, I'm half the Fighting Man I used to be
(This I feel as I drown)
(My relevance fades away)
Well I'm half the Fighting Man I used to be
Half the Fighting Man I used to be
Feelin' uninspired
The Wizard makes a fire
Everybody run
The Monk's got a gun
Think the new book's kinda neat
Then the DM tells me it's power creep
Errata don't mean a thing
Guess I'll leave it up to me
DeviousQuail
Hero
I voted Meh, whatever and others have already posted my reasoning. So instead of cluttering this thread with things you've already heard I'm going to tell a story about "power creep" that means a lot to me.
My senior thesis for my econ degree was about alumni donations to schools based on how well the school's football and men's basketball teams performed. As you might have guessed, a school that performed really well saw an uptick in alumni giving for roughly 1-3 years if their school made a deep run in March Madness (single elimination basketball playoff) or had a great football season (10+ wins and/or a major bowl game appearance). Not really shocking if you've ever followed these sports and are aware of how rabid fanbases can be. One of the interesting finds during my research* was that schools not only saw more alumni donations, they also got better students. Do well in a basketball tournament and the average GPA, SAT, and ACT scores of next years incoming class would increase. That feels stupid but also totally in line with a teenager's decision making process.
Schools gets many times more applications than spots available in a given year. Those applications follow a standard bell curve of scores and schools are incentivized to pick students on the higher end of that bell curve. Students higher on the bell curve are more likely to have better grades, earn academic prestige for the school, and graduate. All good things for the school's image and bottom line. The interesting part for me was that these schools weren't getting better applicants due to their sporting success. They were just getting a bigger pool of applicants. With the number of applicants increasing and the pool of positions available staying the same the school could be more picky with it's selections, which leads to better incoming classes.
Circling back around to the topic of power creep, my thesis taught me a lot. The first thing it taught me is that Stanford's alumni give a ridiculous amount of money to their school. Back in the late 90s and 2000s they regularly received 2 to 3 times the amount of alumni donations as the next highest schools. It was unreal and kinda upsetting. The second thing it taught me was that power creep can happen even if you don't add better options. The act of increasing your options is enough. It can happen with incoming classes at universities and it can happen with D&D. This assumes your new options are not bland variations on the Chef feat or Four Elements Monk of course. And third, if we want to tackle the issue of power creep we've got to increase our positions available instead of options available. That's right. This has secretly been a lead up to what we really need. No backwards compatibility. No more splat books. No more third party content. No more wishy-washy 'will it be 5.37e or 5.38e' speculation posts. End the power creep. Begin the new age of 6e!
*From other already published papers which my analysis aligned with.
/SPOILER]
Schools gets many times more applications than spots available in a given year. Those applications follow a standard bell curve of scores and schools are incentivized to pick students on the higher end of that bell curve. Students higher on the bell curve are more likely to have better grades, earn academic prestige for the school, and graduate. All good things for the school's image and bottom line. The interesting part for me was that these schools weren't getting better applicants due to their sporting success. They were just getting a bigger pool of applicants. With the number of applicants increasing and the pool of positions available staying the same the school could be more picky with it's selections, which leads to better incoming classes.
Circling back around to the topic of power creep, my thesis taught me a lot. The first thing it taught me is that Stanford's alumni give a ridiculous amount of money to their school. Back in the late 90s and 2000s they regularly received 2 to 3 times the amount of alumni donations as the next highest schools. It was unreal and kinda upsetting. The second thing it taught me was that power creep can happen even if you don't add better options. The act of increasing your options is enough. It can happen with incoming classes at universities and it can happen with D&D. This assumes your new options are not bland variations on the Chef feat or Four Elements Monk of course. And third, if we want to tackle the issue of power creep we've got to increase our positions available instead of options available. That's right. This has secretly been a lead up to what we really need. No backwards compatibility. No more splat books. No more third party content. No more wishy-washy 'will it be 5.37e or 5.38e' speculation posts. End the power creep. Begin the new age of 6e!
*From other already published papers which my analysis aligned with.
/SPOILER]
There are many reasons for having rule sets in TTRPGs. A critical one is for communication and standardization. If you meet a group of people and they say "We're playing a game of E&E 2nd Edition", and you are familiar with the rules of E&E 2nd edition, you should be able to sit down and play at the table with minimal effort. There may be some difficulties is working out the details; every table will have at least a couple house rules that need to be properly communicated for players, and there will always be social issues to consider. But for the most part, once a you have identified the rules set being used (including edition) the hope is that you have also communicated enough information to start sharing a game.
Power creep makes that difficult. When multiple rules supplements are added that continually increment the power levels of the players, it means the game is no longer standardized. At some point, you can no longer communicate the rules of the game just by saying the name and edition. In D&D 3.5e for example, playing a core only game is very different from playing a game with the first generation of splat books (i.e. the class books), which was even more different from playing a game at the end of 3.5e with the Book of 9 Swords, Magic Item Compendium, and PHBII. You cannot just say "We're playing D&D 3.5e", you have to say "We're playing D&D 3.5e with this list of allowed supplements..." or a player will not know how to start building a character.
Power creep is, essentially, bad for communication. The more power creep a game has over time, the more specific players have to be with others to ensure they're still playing the same game. When power creep happens fast, the power changes to be communicated quickly and accurately across the entire player base, or the player base will start to fragment. When power creep gets large, its is critical to document that power creep for new players, or they will learn only the base power level of the game and be more confused when they try to enter the gaming community (that is, power creep can be a form gatekeeping).
Power creep makes that difficult. When multiple rules supplements are added that continually increment the power levels of the players, it means the game is no longer standardized. At some point, you can no longer communicate the rules of the game just by saying the name and edition. In D&D 3.5e for example, playing a core only game is very different from playing a game with the first generation of splat books (i.e. the class books), which was even more different from playing a game at the end of 3.5e with the Book of 9 Swords, Magic Item Compendium, and PHBII. You cannot just say "We're playing D&D 3.5e", you have to say "We're playing D&D 3.5e with this list of allowed supplements..." or a player will not know how to start building a character.
Power creep is, essentially, bad for communication. The more power creep a game has over time, the more specific players have to be with others to ensure they're still playing the same game. When power creep happens fast, the power changes to be communicated quickly and accurately across the entire player base, or the player base will start to fragment. When power creep gets large, its is critical to document that power creep for new players, or they will learn only the base power level of the game and be more confused when they try to enter the gaming community (that is, power creep can be a form gatekeeping).
Maxperson
Morkus from Orkus
I like a little power creep. It makes the game more fun in my opinion. Players in general like their PCs to gain power. It's why leveling is fun. It's one reason why we like to find magic items. Power creep is on the list. It's when the creep happens to quickly or in too large a chunk that the game gets thrown for a loop.
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