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You can say it all you want, it doesn't make it true. Who said anything about not using high level spells without advance notice? That's never been a requirement in any game that I've ever run. I'm talking about players jettisoning from the current campaign context and going off to pursue goals...

I'll agree that the presence of a skill system encourages the use of said skill system. That's as near a tautology as makes no difference. However, I think the distinctions being raised are blown way our of proportion in terms of the actual play and the effect they have on the feel of that play...

I think this is where my disconnect with the OSR must spring from. Other than a few, very rare, people I've encountered only through the internet, I've never encountered a player of any edition of D&D (or any other RPG for that matter) who thought that players using deductive reasoning or...

I have a pretty strong appreciation for the "old school" when it comes to D&D and remember a lot of good times being had playing in the lateral-thinking, game-within-a-game style. However, I have to say that most of these Old School Rennaissance blog posters make it seem like every second at the...

Great point. XP for you!

That's not been my experience at all. As long as the players are on board with the "If you want to do something outside the current campaign context, give the DM some advance notice"-guideline, everything works just fine.

I'm finding a lot of variance in how long the fights take based on the creatures used. A "standard" encounter, where I have one level-equivalent monster per character, usually lasts about 3-4 rounds. For every additional level I bump up the monsters (for example, a level 4 encounter vs. level 3...

As demonstrated by the underlined above, the generic classes option doesn't fix this... So, while it's a good way to make a class system look more like a points-based system, it doesn't get you all the way there.

I think the most important thing I've learned as a player is that (at least to me)... detailed and interesting encounter > detailed and interesting adventure > detailed and interesting campaign setting In other words, the micro-level stuff is much more important to a succesful gaming session...

This is the limitation of class-based systems. As soon as you start taking PC characteristics and grouping them into packages, you're going to run into situations where a certain packet of features comes saddled with one or more features that don't fit what you're looking for. The two solutions...

OK, if we're talking about that level of detail, then yes, I agree. If you're shooting for creating maps and encounter keys for every building (or even every major building) in your city before you start the campaign, then you'll be one very prepared DM. I wish you luck in getting to that point...

I'm still dubious that, even with 6 months time, you're going to have notes on this city that are as detailed as the Ptolus campaign setting (including all the additional supplemental material for that product). As I said, even with the voluminous amounts of information Ptolus and its...

I don't think the question is "Will you be able to handle it?", the question is "Will you need to rely primarily on improvisation?". Even with a volume the size of Ptolus (plus all the supporting material) as a backdrop for my current 4e campaign, I'm still improvising quite a bit every session...

Exactly my point. The players are already choosing to be more effective rather than the option that sunrisekid is hoping will create a better play experience for them. To me, that says whatever gains he thinks will be made by limiting at-will powers to daily use will be offset by the players...

If it's the players doing the complaining, why aren't they just choosing basic attacks rather than at-wills on their turn? It seems to me that, rather than changing the rules, you could just tell them to pick whatever method of attack makes their playing experience better. It's obvious that...

That was essentially my earlier point. I've never encountered a player who would do something that extreme or would feel like the freedom to do something like that made for a better game. I've also never encountered a DM who prepared to the extent that the players could literally eject from the...

Oooh zing! Show me one train system where the passengers lay out the rails or control the switches and you might actually have a leg to stand on. Majoru said in his second post on the subject that there were multiple ways for the PCs to approach the "save the princess" scenario. So if the...

I come by that notion because the term "railroad" is a metaphor which applies to a certain, real-world apparatus that has very definitive features, one of which is that you can't deviate from the path between two points. If the rails that run from Chicago to New Orleans pass through St. Louis...

That is NOT what railroad means in this context. If there are multiple paths to reach the same conclusion it's in no way a "railroad". A railroad runs on rails that go in a straight line from point A to point B to point C to point D. A train cannot jump the tracks, take a detour to point M, skip...

But again, this is a purely artificial and theoretical construct that has nothing to do with the way people actually prepare for games. Probably 90% of any given adventure the PCs go on is composed of things they haven't interacted with until that specific game session, does that mean the...