Are D&D rulebooks stuck in the 70's?

[Agamon]

My last session had not a single fight. But I think as a group we only made less than a dozen rolls. RPGs need rules for combat, but I don't think it needs them so much for roleplaying, it just bogs it down.

 

[TalonComics]

I agree reapersaurus, combat does tend to be over-emphasized in D&D, mosty due to the fact that it carries few repurcussions. I mean, you whack a baddie with a sword, shave some hps off, and keep up the process until he drops. Under the core rules, there is no danger of permanent damage, maiming, or loss to the character- its all pretty much reversible with high enough powered spells. In addition, most DMs treat combat at not only necessary, but acceptable in almost any situation, and sometimes even discourage non-violent problem resolution. When there are no costs associated with fighting, it tends to dominate the game at the expense of role-playing or skill use.

Having said that, its more important to have solid combat rules since few gamers are familiar with the reality of battle. You can much more easily role-play through a situation discussing treaties with a baron than how you are going to go about planning the next six maneuvers needed to draw an orc's gaurd away to strike a killing blow. It all really depends on how the DM and players protray the world I suppose: if the world is simple with few consequences, combat is the order of the day. In a more realistic game, combat tends to be de-emphasized for the more subtle aspects of role-playing.

Don't forget defeating things in combat gets you experience which in turn makes your character more powerful. Take away that aspect and I bet you'll see less combat.

~D

 

[Bendris Noulg]

I started co-DMing a homebrew campaign setting a few months ago. We (the DMs) decided to adopt a "core books only" approach. In other words, no splat, no Faerun feats, etc. (we have been playing a Silver Marches campaign). I told the group that this would be core rules, but I would be using a few of the variants in the game. One of them was "Story-Based" XP awards as opposed to straight combat/CR awards. I wrote up a lovely little pdf and sent it to the players explaining how there characters needed goals and that it was by judging the goals' difficulty and their progress towards the goal(s) that their XP would be based. I also suggested that we get everyone together and make characters as a group, that way the DM(s) would be available to answer questions, approve character story hooks, etc...

Mind sending that pdf my way? I'd like to read it.

PG: (Aghast) "But that's not really IN the RULES, that's just -like- a theory!"

ROFLMAO!!!

On topic, agree that combat requires more rules where the RP side can be rules light; By the same merit, I also agree that the lack of RP-based material compared to the over-abundance of combat rules does alter the perception of the game.

For me and my group, our game could easily be summed up as 75% role-play, 20% skills use/problem solving, and 5% extreme bloody violence and gore.

 

[s/LaSH]

Largely combat-oriented. To paraphrase my point: Starship Negotiators just wouldn't have been the same film. "Oh no! A hundred thousand alien lawyers!" (Yes, I know Heinlein's book from the 60s had much less combat. And powered armour. It was cool, but it had a different feel.)

That's not to say my group is just about killing the monsters. The players all have great character motivations and stuff, they all hate each other on some levels. And we've had some great encounters that were almost completely combat-free (the infamous Chase The Wagon session, for example). But in the end, once you've resolved the intrigues, identified the villains, tracked down their minions and discovered their evil plans, it's often more fulfulling to remove their head without anaesthetic than to slap them on the wrist and let them go with a stern moral lecture.

At a slightly higher level of discussion: D&D is oriented on combat, but I think that's always the case with RPGs. How many games have hit points? Now, how many have embarassment points? (Or something similar - morale, social standing, fluffy stuff like that.) A conversation can be simulated by standing around a room talking. A combat can be simulated by hitting your friend with a sword, but that tends to leave a mark - we need extra rules to simulate something that can't be easily done in real life.

Now would probably be the time to point out that my homebrew system (now being formatted for a web demo release) can resolve a combat without anyone even drawing a sword, all by rolling the dice. Mental damage can account for seduction, combat trauma, or big scary men telling you to go away now. It was specifically designed to allow for a paradigm where death wasn't the only answer (although you can still goad someone weak into fighting you if you're persuasive enough with this system). Quite the opposite of my D&D game, in fact, if you don't count the combat system where a dagger really is better than a sword in the right hands - I've tried to make every aspect of Twilight make sense. It is, after all, supposed to be universal, and you can't run a Cthulhu game without some good rules for tracking down financial records for an old asylum or getting your brain curdled by undimensional horrors. (I think. Never played Cthulhu.)

 

[Henry]

Anecdote from this week's d20 Modern game:

I devised a scenario that involved investigation of a cult compound. The PC's were to infiltrate, find out what was going on, and either get out or call for backup if it was too hot to handle. I tried to figure every eventuality: Disguise as cultists, or posing as ATF agents, or simply sneaking in.

They blew the hell out of the place. I've never seen so many grenades, LAW rockets, automatic fire, and treat injury and surgery checks in my life.

The reason? Bad week at the office for several players.

Moral of the story: RPG's may have focus on roleplaying, but combat is still COMBAT. There may be whole sessions of little or no COMBAT, but don't let anyone fool you. Most groups still have COMBAT as a large focus.

The funny thing is, you need far more rules to describe physical action than you do social interaction. The only game that I ever saw break that pattern was the Continuum RPG - because physical combat was often overshadowed by PC's who could be anywhere, at any time, most of the game revolved around why got the drop on whom, and how. Most sessions pass by with 5 or 10 rolls from the group, total, in my experience.

 

[Hadit]

EDIT: Although I won't step within a 10 foot pole's reach of a dungeon. That, to me, is trite, cliche and tres boring. But I've been dubbed the latte set of d20 gamers before, so that doesn't mean that opinion is necessarily prevalent. [/B]

Eh... not really.
Are you attempting to elevate your opinion of yourself by suggesting that others are beneath your 'style' because they stoop to the use of 'dungeon' exploration in their games of DUNGEONS & Dragons?
Criminy, that's arrogant!
That's about the most tedious and self-satisfying thing I've read in awhile.

 

[Fenes 2]

As far as I understand it, JD clearly stated that he thinks dungeons are boring, but I found no trace of arrogance or contempt for others in that passage you quote, just a strong opinion.

 

[diaglo]

As someone mentioned earlier, there are alot more rules for combat because roleplaying can be done with no dice rolls at all if you like, but combat requires a great deal more in the way of rules and regulations.

and this is the way i've been playing D&D since the 70's. stuck in the 70's. heck yeah. otherwise i wouldn't play it.

Original D&D(1974) is the only true game. All the other editions are just a poor imitation of the real thing.

 

[kengar]

I'm pretty sure that the soy latte set only plays d20 under duress, extoling the virtues of some other system the whole time!

I have no response to this nigh-perfect riposte

 

[Desdichado]

Eh... not really.
Are you attempting to elevate your opinion of yourself by suggesting that others are beneath your 'style' because they stoop to the use of 'dungeon' exploration in their games of DUNGEONS & Dragons?
Criminy, that's arrogant!
That's about the most tedious and self-satisfying thing I've read in awhile.

What do you mean not really? Are you trying to tell me that dungeons aren't really boring to me, or that my opinion that I'm not the majority in that opinion is the "not really" here. And how is any of that arrogant, anyway?

And how is such a short post tedious to read anyway? Or self-satisfying?

I think you're reading something between the lines that clearly isn't there.