Unpopular opinions go here

[MGibster]

The best thing WotC could do for goblins, orcs and other "humanoids" would be to create a setting with no player character humans, elves, dwarves or halflings, forcing them to really invest in making the other ancestries well-rounded peoples. (Something they also haven't managed for halflings, IMO.)

Baldur's Gate 3 has done a pretty darn good job of making goblins interesting.

Modules are the worst thing that ever happened to RPGs.

The original Ravenloft module from 1983 would like to have word with you.

White Wolf, and then Onyx Path, actually made phenomenal settings. It was just the rules that didn’t quite gel. Exalted is daunting, for example.

Exalted is one of the few games that I read the rules to, made a character, and then said "$%#@ it" and decided not to play. I'd rather play any edition of Shadowrun than Exalted.

Tabletop RPGs could learn a lot from both video games and board games. A lot of people are...resistant...to the idea.

I opened a thread here asking what TTRPGS could learn from video games. It didn't go so bad.

Not equal, but my groups tend to view that the ability to fight to some degree is required of every PC, except healers. But I expect that is because similar expectations are what holds the group together. Its not a universal notion, but I would say it is a common one.

Even the corpsman carries a rifle!

 

[MGibster]

I'm not that interested in zero to hero campaigns. Let me character start out competent and let's go from there.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Why? The only possible explanation is that the people involved have decided that combat is the most important aspect of the game. Minus that, it isn't particularly important at all.

Do I have to emphasize, again, there's a difference between "pretty big part" and "most important part"? I don't actually use qualifying phrases accidentally. People can not think combat and related is the most important part while still thinking its important.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Plenty of RPGs have far fewer pages devoted to combat, some even have none at all. It's not an inherent part of RPGs, it's something that D&D chooses to focus on.

Though its hardly the only one, if you look at the more popular games (and of course its hard to even make a statement about some broad types of games since they vary so much internally in how much emphasis they put on it. But, as an example, if someone wanted to tell me it wasn't a major part of RQ or most of even the CoD, I'd kind of laugh at them.)

 

[teitan]

Argue all you want, but you can't escape the truth:
D&D only needs four classes.

3. Thieves are useless.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

The people -- who typically don't play those characters -- saying that it's fine that the character can't do anything but offer advice or throw darts are basically saying that it's OK for one character to stop being fun after doing their one big thing.

I do play casters- full/half/pseudo; single classed and multiclassed- and I never saw a problem with having to ration spells/powers.

Part of that is I play somewhat like my aforementioned friend (though not with anything approaching his skill*).

But also, my mindset is that every PC has times when they can’t do what they’re awesome at doing…in any RPG you can point at. So you need to have thought of other ways to contribute; other ways to have fun.

Imagine, for instance, playing a sniper in a modern/sci-fi game, and the session features mostly diplomacy and espionage, and the only combat is close quarters.

Or a melee specialist in a combat featuring flying foes you can’t reach. (Saw that happen at a “gameday”.)

Hell, ever played Shadowrun with someone playing a Decker? A lot of times- especially in 1Ed, game night was a binary situation: either the Decker did almost nothing they’re skilled at, or it was an episode of “That Decker Show!” while everyone else was a spectator.





* because I’m not always casting the same spells

 

[teitan]

Are one man shows theater?

Are you doing it in a room by yourself for your own entertainment or an audience?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I'm not that interested in zero to hero campaigns. Let me character start out competent and let's go from there.

I like zero to hero, but also the model you described as well. And D&D does NOT support that.

One reason why HERO is my favorite system is that I can design a PC whose abilities are essentially set in stone, and mechanical evolution is in the form of improvement of those abilities. To put it in D&D terms, a mage would start off with a suite of spells he knows, and learns how to improve their punch and flexibility as he advances.

One of the latest 3.5Ed PCs I designed was envisioned as a warrior who had Fey ancestry. His only magic were a suite of spell-like abilities. But in 3.5Ed, the effects of those abilities are capped, AND he accumulated them over time. An analogous Fantasy HERO PC could have all of those powers from the first night if play- they just wouldn’t be powerful. But they COULD become more powerful over time.

 

[teitan]

.



I would be OK with B/X if it dropped race = class and had just a bit more variety in chargen. I particularly like that rounds had phases as an elegant solution to some problems of turn based combat.

have you heard of Old School Essentials Advanced Fantasy? You can have both and it Works. The only thing I change is how many spells wizards can get.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

I do play casters- full/half/pseudo; single classed and multiclassed- and I never saw a problem with having to ration spells/powers.

OK. That's not what I was saying, though.