Search results

Of course, this is a charge I have heard leveled at every edition of D&D since I was in college in the 1980s, supported by the "obvious" issues in the rules -- the focus on combat rules, the use of wargame influenced descriptions (inches in 1st edition, missile scatter rules, etc.) Such claims...

The OP taked about using criteria that bugs were posted publicly and worked out in a development community. This did not happen under the OGF for core products. Open products did develop in the way referenced above. 3.0 and 3.5 core rules (PHB, DMG, and MM) were not among them. They were...

But under these criteria, 3e and 3.5e core rules also weren't Open Games, either, no matter what Dancey evangelized in 2000. Development and play-testing was not communal, but in-house or closed -- just like 4e, despite the option to use OGC. Is there any commercial RPG that is truly...

The OGL was never the same as open computing, and never intended to create an open official product worked on by the community. Bugs were never posted and fixed by the developer community, the final product was not worked on in the same sense. In fact, an early complaint about the OGL was that...

And, of course, talent trees really come in to 4e through d20 Modern. That's circa 2002. World of Warcraft was unveiled in 2004, with a playtest period for about a year ahead. Talent trees have an origin in d20 games that predate World of Warcraft. Period.

Continuing a brief tangent, I would note that the random boosters are not solely there to get you to buy more or to emulate its trading card heritage. This is actually an interesting solution to getting their product out to more than just hobby stores. From a retail perspective, it's easier to...

Not necessarily. There could reach a point where lack of narrative control by anyone means there is no GM, and task resolution mediation is made fully external. Examples abound in board games, for example, where rules mediate action without a referee. This could theoretically fit into a...

Oops. double post.

Yeah, but most FIFY comments come across as smug, sarcastic, and passive-aggressive IME. Common practice, perhaps not overtly rude, but not necessarily polite, either.

I think of work places where employees have complained publicly about issues that were not brought up in the work place (this procedure sucks, and the office is screwing up). Those employees were generally reprimanded, and our staff was reminded that complaints had to go to supervisors before...

Any time there is any sort of rule in an RPG, it removes narrative control from the GM. However, not all surrender of narrative control places it into the hands of the players. A skill resolution system forces the GM to give narrative control for resolution to the system, changing the GM from...

I have to support Reynard here. I have been playing for 26 years, and I did have 1st edition groups where we talked about how we searched for traps and secret doors, perhaps influenced by the fact that some things (like the example of play in the DMG) did have this as en example. We didn't ask...

Of course, in my snotty "I'm too good to play D&D" days, I and other RPers like me used to characterize D&D that way ourselves. Of course it wasn't a true representation of D&D players, though we all had plenty of anecdotal evidence of D&D play that was just like that and reasons to argue that...

Haven't editions of D&D since AD&D have have some implied setting? The entire section of the AD&D 1st edition DMG detailing artifacts is filled with fluff; the background on monsters talks about their interactions; named spells imply major personages. In 3rd edition, the fluff was much more...

The quest mechanic looks to be an elaborated story award, from what I can tell. To be honest, if I run 4e any time soon (and I'm not sure I will, though reasons would involve time, money and the kinds of players and play I would prefer), I would likely do with XP what I have done for a while...

I get the concern about the XP award. I have addressed this more than once. The problem with what you are saying that is that the XP reward is not part of the cards. That's what I referred when you were conflating two things -- the XP award is determined by DM, but not listed on the card. I have...

D&D has always had artificial barriers because of rules (e.g., abilities defined by an artibrary class.) D&D has largely defined everything around combat from day one. Note that combat rules are detailed. All other rules, brief. Spells are largely combat oriented, rather than (for example)...

The good thing about social encounter systems is that it lets players play characters with a very different level of social skill than they have. Thus, if the player wants to play a witty con-artist, but isn't so good at deception, that can actually be played out in-game. The bad thing is that...

The problem is the unknown. People project their own fears an concerns onto it. WotC is going to continue to push organized play, either through groups such as RPGA or through the DI, consistency of rules will continue to be a concern. They want to make it easy for anyone to hop into a game in...

Since the quest card is just a notation of conversations in-game, there is no mechanic separate from what happened in game. Writing "the Baron promised you 500 gold for killing the McGuffin" is no different from having the Baron promise the characters 500 gold for killing the McGuffin. Except...