There is only one thing you bought up that I haven't really addressed conclusively in that post.
Except for the classes that are extremely good in melee and then forget how they use a weapon outside their turn? While I don't houserule melee training for free, I do agree the arguments people make that a battlemind or swordmage should be able to make effective opportunity attacks without needing a feat is a compelling argumet. Of course, Wizards are addressing this (I hope, at least Mike Mearls said they were looking into options), but it also funnily enough fits into this thread very easily.
A melee weapon based defender like the swordmage and battlemind that is equal to the fighter on their turn and utterly incompetent outside of it on an opportunity attack, (often important for a defender) is a pretty curious flaw in 4E. It's almost certainly something that I will do something about, because unlike the tangents on swarms and other things - this heavily impacts non-strength defenders ability to perform their roles. I agree a wizard doesn't need a good OA, but a battlemind and swordmage does. Otherwise they have difficulty actually being a defender.
And here we have an opportunity (opportunity argument?) to actually take a look at what is going on here. The reason people are offended by the fact that a rogue (for instance) can't make particularly effective OAs is "it doesn't make sense". Like it or not the game system IS a way of adjudicating some sort of action which is fundamentally rooted in people's common perception of reality. Characters are fictional PEOPLE, they live in a fictional WORLD. Now, admittedly, that world isn't exactly our world and the fictional people aren't exactly ordinary people, even in that world, but just like ANY other form of fiction a D&D game tries to live in some region of suspension of disbelief. The more you examine the game, the more you find that it fundamentally depends on assumptions based in this common understanding.
The question is how do we choose to resolve the tension between the GAME aspect of an RPG and the FICTION/STORY aspect? While some people would try to say that there is some clear line here the truth is that there isn't. This is well illustrated by the somewhat haphazard application of various 'realistic' rules like undead being immune to poison. Sometimes the designers chose fiction over game, and in other cases they chose game over fiction. It is really a fairly arbitrarily drawn line. Beyond that the game is catering to a wide range of different groups. Some groups want to play a pure abstract wargame with at most a thin veneer of plot where game considerations are paramount. Other groups want to play a different type of game where the logical consistency of the world is driven by considerations of fiction and not so much by rules.
No one approach is best for all groups and no one set of rules is going to be ideal in all situations for both types of play. Plenty of groups reduce monster hit points, increase damage, and use various other types of house rules for game reasons. Plenty of groups interpret the rules through the lens of fiction too. I know what type of game I and the people I play with prefer. Honestly, after DMing for THIRTY FIVE YEARS this way I think I'm qualified to handle dealing with the balance between what the players see as fictionally consistent and some sort of rules apocalypse.
[MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION] Sorry, with me at least, you're just not barking up the right tree. I think there are a number of things that DMs do for the game. Being dictator isn't one of them, but for lack of a better term I will say that 'director' is a pretty good description of the DM's core role. Ultimately at some point someone at the table DOES have to have the ability to make a decision. This is necessary for the game to progress smoothly. When 2 players have a dispute about the rules SOMEONE has to be able to say "OK guys, this is the way we're going to do it." There may be plenty of talk about what got done later, maybe even some retcon or an acknowledgment that it will be done differently next time or a group decision.
The DM MOST CERTAINLY IS in charge of many elements of the plot. Now, you could adjust the plot responsibility quite a bit, but without putting the DM in charge of the plot at SOME level at least many things will not be possible. Sure you could run a murder mystery plot with all the players deciding the plot, but there will be no suspense for the players. This would be fine if you're staging a play, but in a play the audience and the actors are (usually) not the same people. In an RPG the actors are the audience. This has a lot to do with shaping the form the game takes and is a determinant factor in much of the DM's role.
Now, none of this means the DM is any sort of dictator or even any kind of boss. I'm SURE as heck not the boss of any group I run games for. I know a lot of people THINK that is the way to be a DM. If your guy Victor is, as I pretty much gathered, simply saying in a rather elaborate way that this is not true then I agree with him. However the game master DOES have a central role as I've said before. It is an enabling role, but it does also include a certain degree of arbitrating. While the DM should respect player's resources (the character's abilities for instance) that isn't sacrosanct. There are many cases where a game master should grab hold of the story and bend or break the rules for a greater end. The players could do this as well, as long as they all agree that is the way to go, but as I showed earlier the DM has a hold on the plot, a perspective that the player's as audience cannot have. That gives them a responsibility to edit the rules now and then.
