What Do You Think Of As "Modern TTRPG Mechanics"?

[Thomas Shey]

I think one would need to be a whole lot clearer about what 'serving the interests of the GM' actually means if one wanted to make claims about games that do that (or not). I mean really, the GM is running the world, it's a much bigger job that any of the players take on, so at some level I would expect most systems to 'serve the interests of the GM' to some extent. I suspect though that in using this phrase something more particular is meant.

If that was directed at my point, I think my point was about it "serving the interests of GMs with a simulationist bent. " I think I can demonstrate pretty well why it wouldn't serve a lot of other interests meaningfully. The only question that can be argued is how many GMs do or don't have that sort of bent.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I think that D&D clerics and paladins, as originally presented, are two mechanical variants on the one idea: a heavily armed and armoured worker of miracles (heal with a touch, dispel evil spirits, etc). The miracle-working knight (or king) is something that is found in mediaeval legend. D&D immediately makes them weird, though, by having them enter dungeons in search of loot, rather than doing the sorts of things that mircale-working knights actually do in the legends that they belong to.

I still stand by the opinion the original Greyhawk paladin was extremely heavily modelled on one particular character from one specific book (and there are strong reasons to think that from the specifics of the class features and supporting material. He may have then claimed it applied to some other concepts, but its every bit as distinct in this regard as the Strategic Review Ranger was in this fashion, if not moreso.

 

[Micah Sweet]

If that was directed at my point, I think my point was about it "serving the interests of GMs with a simulationist bent. " I think I can demonstrate pretty well why it wouldn't serve a lot of other interests meaningfully. The only question that can be argued is how many GMs do or don't have that sort of bent.

I've never considered that last point all that important to anyone not actively publishing RPG product, so I don't really care about how popular anyone's interests are particularly. But I know you like to talk about what other people may or may not prefer (even though we can only definitively discuss our own preferences), so I don't expect agreement here.

 

[Lanefan]

Not even close. I can not think of one legend (although there probably is one) where he broke out the healing magic or turned undead.

Not sure about turning undead but I can think of one rather famous example of a prophet-like (i.e. Cleric-like, in the days before heavy armour was a thing) person busting out some healing magic now and then.

The book about him is the most-published work of all time.....

 

[Lanefan]

In the case of the second, this is claimed far more than it was seen in the field in my experience. Its one of those things that was probably true in some areas, but the only time I saw a character group actively avoid combat in the West Coast games I saw was when they got advanced information about the opposition and it was clearly over their heads. They'd try to bake a cake on the fight as much as possible (at the lower levels the application of sleep spells or clerical turning could simplify many fights seriously against common low-level opponents), but if that wasn't possible and it looked like there was a reason to get into the fight, they'd get into the fight.

This is why there was often a sort of equivelent of the DCC funnel at lower levels in practice; people would go through a fair bit of low level character untl they hit 3-4th level when they were a bit less brittle and/or there were often PC clerics around who would bother to raise them or their compatriots had accumulated enough money to pay NPC clerics for.

Oh, indeed; though at 3rd-4th level the PCs were still a long way from being able to do their own revival magic. (Raise Dead is 5th level, thus needing a 9th+-level caster, and Revivify didn't exist yet)

The element you missed in the first paragraph here, though, is that unlike modern play where the tendency seems to be to stand in till the bitter end even when they're getting thrashed, in older play oftentimes players were more willing to abandon a lost cause and have their characters flee, leaving those still fighting (or already down) to their fates.

End result: a higher overall kill count but very few if any outright TPKs.

 

[Lanefan]

You are welcome to think so, but from my perspective the difference is negligible, as I suggested above. And it's the best example I've seen.

Though I want granularity in resolution, there does come a point where the complexity overwhelms the (real or perceived) returns and a simpler method starts looking real attractive.

Two classic 1e D&D examples are weapon vs armour type and as-written initiative. One of those systems is IMO needlessly complex for what it purports to add to the game; while the other - as-written initiative - IMO actively detracts from the game.

And so, stripping out weapon vs armour type (which as far as I can tell was a very common kitbash at the time) is an easy fix that has surprisingly few knock-on effects - a few weapons become relatively better or worse than they should be, is all; and it's trivially easy to tweak their damage dice to bring them back in line - and makes things immensely less complex.

Initiative needed a complete rewrite. Many ideas have been floated over time, some better than others but none of them anywhere near as complex as what 1e had as RAW.

Today, I find the area where complexity has surpassed the point of usefulness, at least in D&D, is character generation.

 

[RenleyRenfield]

....

Today, I find the area where complexity has surpassed the point of usefulness, at least in D&D, is character generation.

I think this statement is worthy of its own entire thread. I would love to hear discussion on mechanics, design, and player usefulness when it comes to various systems and their manner of character creation and options for character creation.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I've never considered that last point all that important to anyone not actively publishing RPG product, so I don't really care about how popular anyone's interests are particularly. But I know you like to talk about what other people may or may not prefer (even though we can only definitively discuss our own preferences), so I don't expect agreement here.

But of course I am talking about in the context of people publishing RPG products. You may not think that's a factor they should be paying attention to, but it is absolutely one they do pay attention to.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Oh, indeed; though at 3rd-4th level the PCs were still a long way from being able to do their own revival magic. (Raise Dead is 5th level, thus needing a 9th+-level caster, and Revivify didn't exist yet)

It wasn't that they could do it themselves, but that there'd potentially be other PCs in play who'd consider it worth their trouble. And of course as I said on the second part, they might be able to scrape the money together to pay NPCs.

The element you missed in the first paragraph here, though, is that unlike modern play where the tendency seems to be to stand in till the bitter end even when they're getting thrashed, in older play oftentimes players were more willing to abandon a lost cause and have their characters flee, leaving those still fighting (or already down) to their fates.

That's because I almost never saw it, because at least outside, their chance of escaping approached nil. Too many things moved as or faster than the PCs.

End result: a higher overall kill count but very few if any outright TPKs.

Oh, I rarely saw a TPK either. But that didn't effect the overall mortality much.

 

[Fenris-77]

I've never considered that last point all that important to anyone not actively publishing RPG product, so I don't really care about how popular anyone's interests are particularly. But I know you like to talk about what other people may or may not prefer (even though we can only definitively discuss our own preferences), so I don't expect agreement here.

So I publish RPG material, and frankly I can't imagine doing so without taking this into account. How popular, for which we might read common, a particular play style is, or a set of expectations is, pretty obviously needs to be accounted for by anyone publishing any kind of material for RPGs.