An Open Letter: 'Missing the Mark: Mike Mearls’s ‘Revised’ Ogre Mage'

[Hussar]

That sums it up well. It's like highjacking flavor to legitimize the mechanics.

But, this is done all the time. Iconic creatures like giants, demons, devils and dragons have gone through HUGE revisions between editions. About the only similarity between a 1e dragon and a 3e dragon is the breath weapon type. Additional attacks, massive magical additions, immunities, you name it, dragon's have been mechanically redone. Giants, maybe not so much, just made a heck of a lot bigger.

Then again, look at the piercer and it's 3e counterpart, the darkmantle. To me, this is exactly the same as what was done to the rust monster. The piercer was a living trap. You walked under it, it fell down, maybe did damage and that was it. It couldn't do anything after it dropped. The darkmantle still drops from the ceiling, but, now it can fly, cause darkness and choke you to death.

Granted, I suppose, the name was changed, but, the basic idea of the creature is still very much the same. What Mearls did with the O-M is effectively the same thing. He took a pretty much useless as written creature, the 3e O-M and changed it to something that works. Not the same as it was in earlier editions, but, something that works.

If that's hijacking flavour, well, more power to him.

 

[Mark CMG]

But, this is done all the time. Iconic creatures like giants, demons, devils and dragons have gone through HUGE revisions between editions. About the only similarity between a 1e dragon and a 3e dragon is the breath weapon type. Additional attacks, massive magical additions, immunities, you name it, dragon's have been mechanically redone. Giants, maybe not so much, just made a heck of a lot bigger.

Then again, look at the piercer and it's 3e counterpart, the darkmantle. To me, this is exactly the same as what was done to the rust monster. The piercer was a living trap. You walked under it, it fell down, maybe did damage and that was it. It couldn't do anything after it dropped. The darkmantle still drops from the ceiling, but, now it can fly, cause darkness and choke you to death.

Granted, I suppose, the name was changed, but, the basic idea of the creature is still very much the same. What Mearls did with the O-M is effectively the same thing. He took a pretty much useless as written creature, the 3e O-M and changed it to something that works. Not the same as it was in earlier editions, but, something that works.

If that's hijacking flavour, well, more power to him.

Explaining what something already does or what it has with different mechanics is not the same as creating a whole new thing and calling by a name previously used by something different.

 

[turbo]

(Emphasis added) Nice... enjoy hyperbole much?

That's not hyperbole. Hyperbole is a purposeful exagerration meant to be understood as such.

An example from the poetry of John Donne:

But yet thou canst not die, I know;
To leave this world behind, is death,
But when thou from this world wilt go,
The whole world vapours with thy breath.

Here, Donne expresses his intense feelings for his sick wife through the hyperbolic equation of her existence with that of the world. He's exagerrating for effect, and we all know it.

I wasn't exagerrating for effect, and you and I and everyone else, all know it.

I was saying with no rhetorical flourish that the revisions focus entirely on usefulness for encounters and not at all on usefulness for campaigns (except for campaigns understood only as a series of encounters).

You disagree with that assertion, but, instead of arguing a counter-point, you've tried to discredit it through mischaracterization.

Unfortunately, I doubt it was willful mischaracterization...[emphasis mine]

Oh well! Learn as you go!

 

[Garnfellow]

There is an entire chapter in the Chivalry & Sorcery Sourcebook (circa 1980) on designing the monster mechanics from the flavor of the original source material. It lambasts D&D for making the Hydra a multiheaded dinosaur instead of the actual foe of Hercules as the starting point. It mocks the weird treatment of trolls, instead of the more impressive beasts that made Beowulf legend. It also spends time to make a "superior" version of the Umber Hulk and Giant Slug as examples of good D&D ideas that could be done better.

That's the essay I was thinking of!

 

[painandgreed]

That sums it up well. It's like highjacking flavor to legitimize the mechanics.

And of course, after reading the 4E thread, it becomes obvious why they are doing this. Mearls has been brought in to redesing D&D for 4E, and 4E will be a DDM centric game and the redesign is towards making monsters that are easier to use in tactical minature combat. Losing a weapon becomes problematic, so it becomes a penalty to hit. Charm and sleep aren't good in point balanced skirmish games, so it becomes more easily used combat abilities. The only reason that he is looking at the "design" of these monsters is to try and place the thought in our heads that they need to be redesigned so people are agreeable with the 4E redesign. The process has already begun. Look for announcement at GenCon '07 or '08 for release the next year.

We'll have to see how he herds the design of the Beholder at GenCon. I suspect that Charms will fall to the wayside. Sleep will also because it has a different mechanic than the spell and they won't want to print the other mechanics on the card that comes for the minature. Finger of Death will be replaced with a level appropriate level of damage. Telekinisis, serving no purpose during combat, will go. Replacing the things that leave will be some battelfield control spells.

Now that I see what 4E will be like and all about, I have less fear of these redesigns. I know I won't be interested in 4E and only have to worry about 3E. Much like how WW ruined WoD in the late 90's and then came out with a game and system that I didn't like ehough to leave the old one. The sooner it happens, the sooner I can stop worrying about metaplots, stupid canon, and bizarre additions and get down to playing with a know set of rules.

(Ya, I'm kidding, but I'm laughing with a nervous sort of laughter.)