D&D 5E 2024 D&D is 2014 D&D with 4E sprinkled on top

[MuhVerisimilitude]

I'm having a difficult time replying to these because of the split quotes.

Ding ding ding. We have a winner. This is always an argument about narrative control. What it exposes is the belief system that, according to some (not you, BrokenTwin), non-magical characters and the players who are foolish enough to play them do not DESERVE as much narrative control as magical characters.

In my opinion it is essential that martials are also competent. My problem is with the way this is currently handled (they're not) and also that a lot of people seem to want martials to suck.

I suspect we are talking past each other.

My desire is that it should be possible to play a character who does not use any magic whatsoever and that character should be fully playable up to high levels while being properly balanced with casters.

According to some in this thread: nothing! Because literally anything that transcends normal human capability even a little bit is magic.

Exactly. This is a highly frustrating problem.

Exactly. There is even a term for this, from the late lamented wizards CharOpt forum (in Armisael's signature so I assume he invented it):

Mountain Cleave Rule: You can have any sort of fun, including broken, silly fun, so long as I get to have that fun too (e. g., if you can warp reality with your spells, I can cleave mountains with my blade).

But what a lot of people seem to be saying is that the Mountain Cleave Rule does not apply. Magic McMagic can warp reality with his spells, but Normal Guy With A Sword? Screw that guy. He can't do anything even remotely "magical" to break reality.

Accurate.

 

[Scribe]

His point was that the initial claim is what is absurd. That by watering down "magic" that far, you've debased the term until it can be applied to almost anything now. Far from keeping magic magical, you've trivialized it so that nearly anything is "magic", no matter how absurd that becomes.

Not at all, but if that's the depth of the debate, it's an even more pointless conversation than it was.

 

[TwoSix]

[Further developing the reductions in top-end caster power, without going back to the bad old days of "ope, you ran out of your 3 spells, time to fling darts!" because...that's not what people today find fun or engaging.

Which, to my mind, already exists in the form of the Warlock. Has a small reservoir of spells that can recharge every fight or two, can opt into more options OR more resource depth with invocations, has solid at-will options, and can pick a small handful of impactful 6+ level spells in Tiers 3 and 4.

Personally, I would change mystic arcanum into a slew of high-level invocations, only some of which are spells, but warlock is close to ideal for me in how a spellcaster should function.

 

[Scribe]

1) The opposite of mundane is not "magic". It could be supernatural, or paranormal, or transmundane, or preternatural. But not specifically "magic". "Magic", in a fantasy game, is constrained to practioners who say magic words and use rituals and special ingredients.

Supernatural, is magic.
Paranormal, is magic.
Transmundate, is magic.

If its beyond the 'normal' of the world, our world, game world, setting, whatever, its not mundane and is 'magic'.

Mundane : Magic, thats it.

Its not constrained to practitioners of magic words and special ingredients. Indeed, "Magic" spells can be innate.

2) Using "magic" in a fantasy game to describe someone capable of supernatural feats that don't involve chanting and rituals weakens the word, and confuses the discourse. Update your verbiage. Superman is not magic. Saitama is not magic. They are something else.

No. Yes they are.

3) D&D (as a genre) does not exist in a mundane world, or a world of magical realism, or a world operating within fairy tale logic, where normal people wander into a magical otherspace. D&D exists in a supernatural world.

D&D is a world, if there is a single given 'default' of magic. Its environments are magic, its people are magic, its animal and plant life, is magic. Magic is saturating everything.

Which is why a mundane fighter actually improves everything, but I'm not sure folks are ready for that truth.

4) In a supernatural world, mundane limits only exist until some kind of mechanism demonstrates why they do not. It is entirely possible for mundane actions to produce a supernatural result.

Nope, at that point its magic.

There is that scene in One Piece, where the guy with the tiny sword 'cuts a galleon in half'.

1. Nonsense.
2. Magic.

 

[GobHag]

I mean we can reach for absurdities if you like.

Drawing and swinging a sword is Magic? Sure.

Yep! Since there's no rule about being exhausted--no Action sugring--again and again for an entire day that means they must be magic!

 

[GobHag]

Supernatural, is magic.
Paranormal, is magic.
Transmundate, is magic.

If its beyond the 'normal' of the world, our world, game world, setting, whatever, its not mundane and is 'magic'.

Mundane : Magic, thats it.

Its not constrained to practitioners of magic words and special ingredients. Indeed, "Magic" spells can be innate.



No. Yes they are.



D&D is a world, if there is a single given 'default' of magic. Its environments are magic, its people are magic, its animal and plant life, is magic. Magic is saturating everything.

Which is why a mundane fighter actually improves everything, but I'm not sure folks are ready for that truth.



Nope, at that point its magic.

There is that scene in One Piece, where the guy with the tiny sword 'cuts a galleon in half'.

1. Nonsense.
2. Magic.

No no. Magic is mundane, everything in the DnD world is bound by the weave. Ergo, evrything that is done in DnD is Magic.

Oh cutting a Galleon in half? I'm not sure why you think that's magic though. My dad can do that

 

[Scribe]

Sure bro. Have a good one.

 

[TwoSix]

Supernatural, is magic.
Paranormal, is magic.
Transmundate, is magic.

If its beyond the 'normal' of the world, our world, game world, setting, whatever, its not mundane and is 'magic'.

You can obviously use whatever incorrect definitions you wish, but all you're doing is muddying up discussion and preventing clarity.

If that's your goal, of course, then you do you.

 

[GobHag]

Sure bro. Have a good one.

Yep. Glad we can agree that everything is magic

 

[Scribe]

You can obviously use whatever incorrect definitions you wish, but all you're doing is muddying up discussion and preventing clarity.

If that's your goal, of course, then you do you.

It's not muddying up anything.

These terms (Supernatural, Transmundane, Magic) all amount to the same thing in 5.0/5.5. The system is not nearly granular enough.

If we were talking about PF1, we could have a debate about this, and 4e, but thats not the reality of the world we live in.

5.0 is (unsatisfying for both sides!) the 'lets try and just appease everyone a little' edition, but if its not actually mundane, blood and sinews, then it is in fact, some kind of magical/fantastical/whatever.

In no world is a javelin toss of 1600 meters, anything but magic.