D&D 5E [+] Ways to fix the caster / non-caster gap

[Gammadoodler]

Right.

That's what I was trying to get at with my next comment in that post about imagining people in the Marvel universe arguing about whether they really needed too classes or not. (I should have been clearer).

 

[Tony Vargas]

Nothing really to do with the thread topic though, just found this more interesting than the endless bickering about fighters and wizards... :shrug

What it has to do with the topic is that there is a double- (even triple) standard in D&D when it comes to realism vs fantasy.

Magic, the stuff anti'd by anti-magic spheres &c, has no standard to conform to, it can do prettymuch anything, if there's standard, it's that it must be superior to non-magical. Realism only comes into it if a player has a bright idea about using an implied/indirect application of a spell to do something useful via physics, like, IDK, Fog Cloud and Boyle's Law or something. The many limitations & restrictions placed upon magic by RL beliefs, the broader genre, and the older versions of the game itself, are blithely ignored.

Non-magic, OTOH, is mostly held to a modern perspective of human ability and medieval level technology. Which, tends to discount even RL evidence, if it is at all remarkable.

In-between, there's the Dragons and Giants (esp giant arthropods). They break the laws of physics, yet don't collapse under their own weight and suffocate in an anti-magic field.

 

[Micah Sweet]

What it has to do with the topic is that there is a double- (even triple) standard in D&D when it comes to realism vs fantasy.

Magic, the stuff anti'd by anti-magic spheres &c, has no standard to conform to, it can do prettymuch anything, if there's standard, it's that it must be superior to non-magical. Realism only comes into it if a player has a bright idea about using an implied/indirect application of a spell to do something useful via physics, like, IDK, Fog Cloud and Boyle's Law or something. The many limitations & restrictions placed upon magic by RL beliefs, the broader genre, and the older versions of the game itself, are blithely ignored.

Non-magic, OTOH, is mostly held to a modern perspective of human ability and medieval level technology. Which, tends to discount even RL evidence, if it is at all remarkable.

In-between, there's the Dragons and Giants (esp giant arthropods). They break the laws of physics, yet don't collapse under their own weight and suffocate in an anti-magic field.

Yeah. Short of being loose enough with the nonmagical stuff to allow for RL evidence, I have no problem with any of that. Real world + magic.

 

[Gammadoodler]

Yeah. Short of being loose enough with the nonmagical stuff to allow for RL evidence, I have no problem with any of that. Real world + magic.

The problems are that:

1. Most GMs, players, and game designers have hilariously incomplete, incorrect, or flawed (or all of the above) understandings of how RL stuff works (myself included).
2. The only directly applicable use cases for humans and whatever portions of the MM are made up of real world creatures.
3. Something still must be done with everything else.
4. That "everything else" is composed, very specifically, of stuff that is specifically and intentionally unrealistic.

So the folks that need this fidelity with real world expectations take their often imperfect understanding of the real world, apply it to the directly applicable cases and then realize that they've covered a tiny tiny tiny fraction of the content in D&D.

Then in an effort to paper over the gap, they have to start making some questionable assumptions with no narrative support.

Assumptions like:
"Well all PC races must be basically as physically capable and durable as humans"
Or..
"Well xyz creature must be magic"

Etc.

While these assumptions arent based on any particular narrative consideration, they have to come from somewhere. Typically it winds up being a matter of stylistic preference and/or game balance.

And the result is an often pseudological unbalanced incoherent mess that ignores the fundamental intended play experience of the game where fantasy adventurers in fantasy worlds grow in fantastical ways as they use fantasy tools to overcome fantasy problems.

 

[Micah Sweet]

The problems are that:

1. Most GMs, players, and game designers have hilariously incomplete, incorrect, or flawed (or all of the above) understandings of how RL stuff works (myself included).
2. The only directly applicable use cases for humans and whatever portions of the MM are made up of real world creatures.
3. Something still must be done with everything else.
4. That "everything else" is composed, very specifically, of stuff that is specifically and intentionally unrealistic.

So the folks that need this fidelity with real world expectations take their often imperfect understanding of the real world, apply it to the directly applicable cases and then realize that they've covered a tiny tiny tiny fraction of the content in D&D.

Then in an effort to paper over the gap, they have to start making some questionable assumptions with no narrative support.

Assumptions like:
"Well all PC races must be basically as physically capable and durable as humans"
Or..
"Well xyz creature must be magic"

Etc.

While these assumptions arent based on any particular narrative consideration, they have to come from somewhere. Typically it winds up being a matter of stylistic preference and/or game balance.

And the result is an often pseudological unbalanced incoherent mess that ignores the fundamental intended play experience of the game where fantasy adventurers in fantasy worlds grow in fantastical ways as they use fantasy tools to overcome fantasy problems.

No wonder every game except the ones you evidently prefer is actually terrible! Thank you for clearly that up.

 

[Tony Vargas]

While these assumptions arent based on any particular narrative consideration, they have to come from somewhere. Typically it winds up being a matter of stylistic preference and/or game balance.

Game balance would certainly be a solid place to go when resolving something like that.

But, the RL/magic double-standard is constantly brought up to justify class imbalance.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Game balance would certainly be a solid place to go when resolving something like that.

But, the RL/magic double-standard is constantly brought up to justify class imbalance.

My preferred game isn't all that unbalanced in that way, but it is more restrictive on casters than a lot of people prefer.

 

[Gammadoodler]

No wonder every game except the ones you evidently prefer is actually terrible! Thank you for clearly that up.

Didn't say it was bad, just that it is messy, frequently unbalanced, and often enough factually incorrect. But all those things can pretty much be said of vanilla D&D as well.

The core problem, for me, is that the proponents of that approach often signal that it is somehow more "intellectually rigorous" AND..the conclusions are tilted against one type of PC.

"Of course you can't jump x high"
"Of course you can't fall x far"
"Of course you can't lift x much"
"Of course you can't break x thing"
"Of course x thing is immediately fatal"
"Of course a martial PC can't do x"
"The alternative would be nonsense"

But you look under the hood, and it isn't any more rigorous..and it kinda can't be by definition.

So if I'm to choose between two equally rigorous approaches (i.e. not rigorous). And one approach can yield balanced PC classes and the other doesn't, I choose the one that yields balanced PC classes.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Didn't say it was bad, just that it is messy, frequently unbalanced, and often enough factually incorrect. But all those things can pretty much be said of vanilla D&D as well.

The core problem, for me, is that the proponents of that approach often signal that it is somehow more "intellectually rigorous" AND..the conclusions are tilted against one type of PC.

"Of course you can't jump x high"
"Of course you can't fall x far"
"Of course you can't lift x much"
"Of course you can't break x thing"
"Of course x thing is immediately fatal"
"Of course a martial PC can't do x"
"The alternative would be nonsense"

But you look under the hood, and it isn't any more rigorous..and it kinda can't be by definition.

So if I'm to choose between two equally rigorous approaches (i.e. not rigorous). And one approach can yield balanced PC classes and the other doesn't, I choose the one that yields balanced PC classes.

Well, I choose the one that makes more sense to be in an imaginary world populated largely by people with abilities broadly similar to Earth humans. When presented with new evidence, I'm happy to re-examine my assumptions and perhaps make changes.

 

[Gammadoodler]

Well, I choose the one that makes more sense to be in an imaginary world populated largely by people with abilities broadly similar to Earth humans. When presented with new evidence, I'm happy to re-examine my assumptions and perhaps make changes.

I mean you are certainly free to do whatever. I think that your version of real world expectations is likely fairer than most.

That said, I don't know what evidence you'd need byond that there are 9 PC races in the PHB, and only one of them is human; that AFAIK, there is nowhere that the game indicates that the setting is Earth or near-Earth, or that most every page in the PHB, monster manual, and DMG includes some creature, ability, or effect that has no real world analogue.