D&D General Why the resistance to D&D being a game?

[Micah Sweet]

This is a big reason why 'arcane' is not a power source in Heroes of Myth and Legend. I got real tired of that logic! Martial is a power source, you can muster and practice and enhance the internal 'Chi' to a point where 'stuff happens'. Wizards still exist in HoML as an archetype, they just don't tap into some universal do-all go-to power source. Instead they have to figure it out on a case-by-case basis, but with their deep knowledge of power sources, they have some nice advantages of their own. It makes the various archetypes a lot easier to distinguish (and wizard gets to actually be a bit more interesting itself as being an exception to the normal one-source-per-calling setup).

All of that explanation would be a great thing to have in the book if that's what the game in question intends.

 

[mamba]

Sure, and while, TECHNICALLY, a 4e fighter can just walk into the town square and invoke 'Come and Get It' on randos have any of us ever seen this actually done in play?

that is not really relevant to whether they could if they wanted to

 

[MuhVerisimilitude]

Just no. There is a difference in talking to somebody and mind controlling them to do exactly what I want.

Yes, but often you don't need the general ability to make them do exactly what you want. You often only need the ability, for this particular situation, to make them do what you want at this particular point in time. The taunt, for example, is very narrow and not very useful outside combat.

Sure. But you don't controll if the barkeep is running screaming away or calling the firepaladins or running straight into the kitchen.

Very true, however 100% control is often not necessary. Even in my taunt ability example, the GM is still very much in control of the monsters and choses how he wants to position his monsters.

And the panicked condition does not exist anymore. And also the DM decides how the panic is manifesting. The same way the DM decides what an NPC is doing with the fear condition.

Yes the panicked condition does not exist, but nobody would say that 3.0 or 3.5 were not "D&D" just because there was a non-magical compel effect, so I think it's a fair point to refer to.

Even disregarding the panicked condition and just looking into frightened from 5E it's obviously compelled action. The fact that you are not able to do something is an inherent restriction. Being unable to do X is the same as being compelled to do Not X

Of course their could be mechanics to do so. But that would turn D&D into something Not-D&D.
D&D at its core is: Players decide their Character actions. DM decides the rest.

But that's not true, since you can cast charm person or dominate person or whatever and suddenly the DM has lost control so it doesn't hold even in core D&D 5e.

I as a DM would allow any character in and out of combat to try to taunt one or multiple enemies. If a PC wants to make them angry, so be it. I wouldn't give the Player Character more actions outside of the action economy (free attack) and the NPCs still have free will on how to react to that that makes sense in that situation.

That's what DMs are for in D&D. To adjudicate such PC actions.

I still think it's better to have the abilities outlined in the rulebook even if you don't want to use them. It's a guideline for potential game masters who would shut down their use (a problem casters basically never have to contend with).

 

[Micah Sweet]

But, as I said, there is no substantive difference. In any way which matters for this sort of argument magic and supernatural are cognates. Once someone acknowledges the logically inevitable (IE as per @Manbearcat) supernatural nature of fighters, then 'using magic' in the sense of an overt magical ability is a non-issue, as magic is simply a manifestation of the supernatural. I am fine with an argument about how to COLOR that (IE only wizards get to color it as 'spell casting' and the fighter player has to depict it in some other way). But the LOGIC of being able to do supernatural/magical stuff is a non-issue.

And yet it keeps coming up. Perhaps you're wrong about that.

 

[Micah Sweet]

If fighters are limited to the mundane, they CAN’T make a lot of attacks or kill stuff quickly. My response was prompted by your comment regarding a mundane fighter that would have difficulty fighting off a single lion.

If we assume that wizards are to be mechanically balanced against mundane fighters, “nerfing a few spells (just a few)” isn’t sufficient.

Your opinion. I've seen it done to my satisfaction, if not yours.

 

[Gammadoodler]

Largely because their style of combat is via martial prowess rather than spell, mystical ability, or blatantly reality defying superpower (like a power blast, repulsor beam, psychic attack). There are, of course, legions of examples in fantasy literature to form a baseline - one that John Wick, James Bond, Punisher, Hawkeye, and John McClane fit with very well as action hero analogs. And even Captain America and Black Widow, recipients of super science interventions, would probably slot in below classical mythic figures like Achilles in raw capability. And Achilles kind of pushes the envelope on a fighter exemplar since his gifts aren't even because of his martial prowess but because he wasn't born completely mortal and received a powerful magical intervention (I mean, honestly, he's a fighter with multiple, probably-OP templates attached from a very friendly DM).

Again, somewhat begging the question.

Let's ask it this way. Whose experiences are likely to be more similar to those of a D&D fighter?

Wolverine, Thor, and Captain America
OR..
Robin Hood, James Bond, and John McLain

 

[mamba]

In short in a game not utilizing narrative mechanics the only remaining explanation for such abilities is supernatural.

I am not sure how the narrative game makes it not supernatural

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, sure, but I do! I welcome it in D&D. Heck, I like the D&D genre fine. I just have my particular tastes and there's no argument either of us can make for or against any specific thing being or not being in the game. I wish people would have let WotC support the sort of stuff in 5e that I liked, but nope! It was such an offense against someone's tastes that it had to be utterly eradicated from the game and never again countenanced in any form!

There are plenty of not D&D games that do what you want (and 4e). Also, you can option stuff like that if you insist on adding a narrative framework to the game.

 

[mamba]

Fighty isn't some generic thing, the Fighter class is a unique description of HIM, and nobody else! In all of history there is only one Fighty granted with the ability to do this!

cool, that makes sure this won’t show up in my game…

If you call this the unique ability of one char, not a generic one for one class, you do you. It certainly means it won’t show up in any published material

 

[M_Natas]

Then why can't we have something non-magical with its own set of rules in and out of game?

Like the exact ability that's being discussed.

What about doing some pelvic thrusts and eating an insect makes subverting the idea that the DM gets to decide how NPCs react suddenly okay when it 'broke the game' perviously?

Okay, let me try to explain it:

First I will differentiate some vocabulary:

Ingame fiction is the game inside the world how the characters would see it as ifnthey would really exist.
At the table is the game experience fornthe players.

In D&D at the table, the players decide how their characters act. The DM decides how the rest acts.
That is mirrored by the ingame fiction.
No charavter can compell a NPC to do anything specific with mundane means. They can influence them, by lying to them, persuade them, intimidate them, bribe them and so on, but what exactly the NPC is doing the character can't decide the same way you and I can't controll what any other person in this real world is doing.
Everybody has their own free will and everybody can only try to influence the perception of another being with mundane things like talking to them. The NPCs ingame have a free will. At the table they have the illusion of free will (because yes, they are controlled by the DM).

In D&D Magic can directly influence the mind and compell somebody to do something specific. But it doesn't contradict the mundane reality. Because what Magic does is taking away the free will of a character by magical means. Using magic to controll someone is the equivalent of putting somebody in chains and moving them like a puppet.

It works on the table as a rule and it works in the Ingame fiction of D&D.

For example: Moving a character by magic is the same as grabbing them and moving him by force.

If you would have now mundane non forceful (physical) abilities that allow you to move somebody in the exact same way you did with magic or by grabbing then just by talking to them, you break the Ingame logic.
You take away the "free will" of the NPCs. Suddenly just by talking NPCs do exactly what you want.
On the table that would break immersion, because now the DM has to alter reality in the ingame fiction to accommodate the player action.

It lays bare that the NPC is just a game mechanic at the wims of the players NPC controlling ability.
A Spellnor magical effect doesn't do that, because it is not breaking the ingamr world, because it is part of the ingame world.

It s like in Men in Tights when the stop the Movie and get out the Script. It interrupts the fiction.

Of course you could build a game where you have players controlling the narrative. But that for me is like having 6 directors to direct one movie, not an immerwive Rollplaying experience. In comparison D&D is directed by the DM who's job it is to hold up the illusion of a consistent world.