4e causual? (Forked Thread: Necromancer Games NOT going with current GSL)

[AllisterH]

To carry on the M:TG analogy, 3E is CONSTRUCTED, while 4E is Limited (DRAFT).

In Constructed, there are tons of cards (options) yet most are complete crap, but the most important part is the pre-game part. Basically, if you practise with your deck beforehand, a professional magic player can tell if they will win or lose (and percentage chance).

Limited on the other hand, I'd say it is closer to a 50/50 split in that your chance of succeeding depends equally on how you build your deck and how you play.

 

[Mercule]

I have no idea what a casual player is supposed to be either.

My wife is a casual gamer. She's been playing for 15+ years and has dozens of characters in a half-dozen systems. But, she's never owned a gaming book of her own (why should she when I can almost tell you the page number of a rule for many systems?). She doesn't look things up, but will probably read a rule, if you find it for her (spells are an exception -- she'll look those up). She definitely has experience and a good feel for what's a good idea and what isn't and is often the party leader, but any "system mastery" is entirely unintentional. She would not seek out a game if our current group dissolved, but she'd miss it and want it to start up again.

Our group ranges from me -- the only person who frequents message boards or who could make up characters just for fun -- to a couple of people at my wife's level of interest. The casual players aren't any less valuable or active. As I said, my wife is often party leader. They have just as much fun as I do (sometimes more) and their "table manners" are just as serious as mine. Sometimes, the "casual players" are the ones pushing for an extra session, even.

The big difference is that the "casual gamers" at my table don't see any reason to learn new forms of math or follow a trail of impacts from a feat to four or five levels. They're willing to sit down and learn the rules. But they want to play the game, not tinker with rules.

 

[Mallus]

They're willing to sit down and learn the rules. But they want to play the game, not tinker with rules.

I think you've just described the difference between gearheads and non-gearheads.

 

[Mercule]

I think you've just described the difference between gearheads and non-gearheads.

Which may be relabeled as "casual" and "serious" players in RPG lingo. YMMV.

 

[Mallus]

Which may be relabeled as "casual" and "serious" players in RPG lingo. YMMV.

Except that it's possible to be "serious" gearhead/tweaker who doesn't give one whit (or two sh*ts) about the course of in-game events, outside of who they get to unleash wahoo against next, or a "serious" non-gearhead who is deeply engaged with the story action but isn't really interested in the mechanical side of play.

Which is why I think "casual" and "serious" are confusing labels.

 

[ProfessorCirno]

Again, I think it's somewhat unfair that people are saying 3.5 is more complicated after a handful of years and billions of books!"

...Well, yeah.

Wait until we get the already surging in Complete X books for 4e. The "3e is so much more complicated because it has more material!" will disapear rather quickly.

 

[Rechan]

Again, I think it's somewhat unfair that people are saying 3.5 is more complicated after a handful of years and billions of books!"

Honestly I thought 3.5 was complicated with just the core books.

Polymorph and AoOs, to name a few.

I've had a player who took one look at the Bard class, said "Okay that's too complicated," and then just played a swashbuckler.

Then you had the issue of "System Mastery" inherent in the core, which Monte Cook said the system was built to reward players from figuring out which options were the "best".

 

[RFisher]

4e for casual gamers?

I would definitely point casual gamers towards Dungeon Squad or T&T or any number of other games long before I recommend 4e. A game with 768 pages of core rules ain’t casual. Look at the number of RPGs for which the entire core rules is less than the 320 pages of the PHB.

(While page count isn’t a definitive measure here, it’s hard for me to imagine a 768 page system being more suitable for casual gamers than an 128 page one.)

(And though I wouldn’t consider myself a casual gamer, I wouldn’t be offended by anyone calling a game I’m playing casual. I’m happy to play games that are as suitable for the casual gamer as for the rest of us.)

 

[Scribble]

Again, I think it's somewhat unfair that people are saying 3.5 is more complicated after a handful of years and billions of books!"

...Well, yeah.

Wait until we get the already surging in Complete X books for 4e. The "3e is so much more complicated because it has more material!" will disapear rather quickly.

The fact that 8 years after the game was released, there were STILL questions and arguments about AoO and grapple... Says a lot.

For me it was memorizing the various DCs (or failing to mostly) and bonuses and penalties random things gave.

Combine all this with the idea that it was also pretty easy unless I looked carefully, to have my NPCs and enemies last 0 rounds. (in that they were dead before they did anything.)

 

[pemerton]

Which may be relabeled as "casual" and "serious" players in RPG lingo.

I think you've given a reasonable account of the casual/serious distinction. But I still don't see why it follows that 4e would be less attractive to the serious gamer.

I also find it interesting that, on this account of the distinction, the casual/serious distinction doesn't reflect a different approach to the play of the game - which is presumably the core of the RPG experience.