D&D 5E Blog Post by Robert J. Schwalb

[Raith5]

It's clever but not creative.
It's the difference between colouring in the lines and making your own design. It's taking the Lego set and building what was on the box.

When you're making clever tactical choices and designing a solid build it's mathematically clever yes, but you're still playing the game solely within the confines of the rules. You're playing the game how it was meant to played. You can be tactically clever in a board game. And a miniature combat game. And a chess game. And yes, all of those examples are fun and good and shiny. But they're not creative.

D&D used to be more creative. Because there were giant gaps. You couldn't help but be creative because there was so little else. It was a Lego set in a blank box.

The rules are a crutch. They impose themselves in place of the creativity, taking up room that used to be occupied by nothing, leaving less room from the DM. It's one of those modern Lego sets that is 75% unique pieces and can really only build the one thing.
And to be frank, that IS a good thing. Because it makes it possible to have fun when you aren't feeling creative. It makes the game inherently fun rather than something you can use to basis for fun.
But it's not universally fun. Which is the catch.

The lego analogy is good one that I can relate to! Your distinction between being clever and creative is an interesting one that gives a clear sense where you are coming from and of the key divide between early and more recent editions. And I guess everyone who played early editions of D&D engaged in creative play (because there were quite a few gaps in the rules) and has some sense of nostalgia for that type of gaming.

But I think this type of creativity is highly dependent upon the DM's judgement and whim. D&D is not like you are playing with lego blocks by yourself. Furthermore, I dont think that playing within the confines of the rules negates creativity. The creativity can still be expressed in the way skills and powers are chosen and used. Just like in early editions of D&D that that spell casters had a lot of space to be creative, I like the cinematic vision of 4e (and 3e to certain extent) because I prefer a pile of well thought out and interesting options for all classes. Being cool is just as important as being creative or clever !

I guess I want some mid point between these two poles. I want something between 100% creative play or 100% clever play. I do think 4e could have pushed more towards creative play, but I think it hit a reasonably good point to me.

 

[Greg K]

I'm an advocate of GM involvement in character gen in general, particularly as the number of options in a system increases - and, yes, that includes D&D and Pathfinder.

As am I. Whether it be which official books/options/variants and/or house rules/campaign rules/campaign limits are in play or just ensuring everyone remains on the same page regarding character gen for the campaign in question, I think GM involvement is important.

 

[pemerton]

Yep, that was me. I was confused by his reaction to my post!

Likewise.

I'm sorry that he became so upset by the reaction on his blog but I also think it was a bit silly for him to be surprised by it. On the other hand, I also think that 4e fans shouldn't have been so surprised by his remarks on the edition. He said at the beginning of the 5e playtest process that skill challenges "should die in a fire". At that point I knew that he wasn't really flying the 4e flag amongst the design team.

Agreed with both of these too.

I'm not one of those who cares that he didn't fly the 4e flag. What flags get flown by what designers is an internal matter for WotC and not really any of my business!

My response is not even really to his criticisms of 4e and 3E. It's mostly to those trying to deny that he criticised them; or defending his criticism on the basis that there's no denying the truth of what he said.

I dislike how the 4e DMG lays out different player types, the tactician, the method actor, etc. etc. and implies that the DM should psychologically diagnose their players and customize their adventures to make sure they're maximally entertained. I don't think that all players should be catered to equally.

I don't really use that Robin Laws-inspired psychological diagnosis stuff. But I'm not sure I agree with you that the GM is the most important participant.

I would describe my DMing as watching most of the time.

<snip>

It's not the power of being the mother in mother-may-I that I enjoy per se, it's watching the players struggle with gratuitous difficulty and play a game with an inescapable gambling component where you can't eliminate all of the risk.

I agree with you about some of the pleasures of watching. But I'm not primarily a watcher. [MENTION=6680772]Iosue[/MENTION] led an interesting recent discussion of this in his thread on Calling and Mapping.

 

[pemerton]

For a game focused on conflict

It's not.

My game is. Hence my desire for a system with robust conflict-resolution mechanics.

Some people like to focus more on one aspect than the others, some like to re-cast them as conflict, but the game isn't "focused" on any one aspect, or spinning any of them as "conflict".

I don't see why you use the word "spinning". There is nothing deceptive in my characterisation of combat, and of most interaction, in my game as "conflict".

You agreed many people like exploration, at least as much as they like conflict. So, can you see why a game that downplays one in favor of the other, rather than instead giving tools to downplay it if you wish or not downplay it if you wish, might rub the exploration (non-conflict) people the wrong way?

If peope want to play an exploration-focused game, I have no idea why they would even give 4e a second look. It's obvious, and was obvious from the previews before it was even published, that it is not an exploration-oriented game.

(3E I can't comment on. I don't know it well enough.)

No one thing has ever been the heart and soul of the game for all players, and nobody has claimed otherwise in this thread

Schwalb makes claims about the heart an soul of the game. From the closing paragraph of his blog, which you posted in the OP and with which you expressed agreement:

I believe this game preserves just enough of the customization elements that defined the 3rd and 4th Editions to be recognizable to newer members of the audience, while having reclaimed the heart of the game from the earliest editions and put it back where it belongs.​

That sentence implies that 3E and 4e had abandoned the heart of the game. Stating that "I do not believe there is a right way or a wrong way to play this game" doesn't change the implication.

It's clever but not creative.

<snip>

When you're making clever tactical choices and designing a solid build it's mathematically clever yes, but you're still playing the game solely within the confines of the rules.

<snip>

The rules are a crutch. They impose themselves in place of the creativity

This still is not very clear to me. For instance, a monster is standing next to a cliff. A player decides to have his/her PC push the monster over the edge. How is this "mathematical"? Why is it less mathematical in AD&D than in 4e (one uses the overbearing rules, the other the forced movement rules)?

Why is rolling to hit in 4e not creative, but making a STR check in classic D&D creative?

And stepping back a bit - the claim that the rules are a crutch is bizarre to me. A crutch for what? There are adjectives that might describe a game where all resolution is dependent on GM discretion, but I don't see why "creative" is particularly apt. The implication of your comment is that games where there is no going outside the rules (Fate, MHRP, HeroWars/Quest) of necessity can't involve creativity.

As I said, I'm not following.

 

[Jeremy E Grenemyer]

Schwalb comments on how others play and enjoy the game. He does so in pejorative terms.

And I thought I was the drama queen.

Pejorative implies the intent to belittle or disparage. Objectively--not subjectively--Schwalb didn't do that.

The sky is blue. The sun rises in the east. Everybody will die at some point. Schwalb was not being pejorative.

When you contend that Schwalb is claiming to tell others that how they play the game is what's spoiling it, again you're making things up.

Making observations about how rules systems can lead to trends in player behavior isn't the same thing as telling a group of players they're ruining the game, especially when those statements are made in the broader context of a blog post that's centered on Schwalb's experiences as a player of D&D, on his time working on D&D from ~3.5 to 5E and on his reflections on the game and what's frustrated him over time in the later editions of the game.

And just when we thought things were under control, this next post pops up:

On the precise contrary, it's why it's completely right. Because he makes incorrect, pejorative assertions about what others enjoy about the game. That's the entire problem.

Lolz, you're just here to argue.

To cast Schwalb and by extension, yourself, as Sancho Panza, and to make the blanket assertion that all who disagree are "Don Quixote" is really the height of hypocrisy, when you're talking about people not engaging with perspectives which disagree with their own.

That's hilarious, considering your claim of "solid edition warring" that's "inescapable."

If your intent in putting these claims in the same post with "People understand what Schwalb is saying perfectly well" was to make me laugh...well, you succeeded admirably.

Well done sir!

I bet neither of you bothered to read the comments in the original blog post, did you?

 

[Emerikol]

It's a fact that there is an element of edition defenders who will flay the flesh from your bones for making any statement of preference that is not surrounded by profuse apologies and qualifications.

I think RJSs blog was pretty tame. The fact that even something so innocuously couched brings out the piranhas says something about how defensive certain people have gotten.

Did you really think that the devs were any different in their opinion make-up? It may shock some of you but behind closed doors I'm sure the edition wars rage at game companies just like they do here. If they happen face to face there is probably a bit more politeness.

I agree with Mistwell on the human race overall. I believe though that the internet attracts and encourages brutal verbal combat. Personally as long as you don't ingest too much all at once and let it depress you I find such frankness far more conducive to understanding than the social niceties of "real" life.

I'm going to write a blog soon on what I'll call world first gaming. I don't have the time for it just yet. I think it may though relate to this debate.

 

[VengerSatanis]

Some questions...

Granted, I've skipped a few pages, but isn't this whole thread just a civil edition war fought as politely and gentlemanly as possible... maybe an edition conflict or edition police action, whatever euphemism for one side against another we care to name.? There are some that hate a certain edition or editions of D&D. Others love what the other guys hate and hate what the other guys love. And, of course, there are plenty in the middle. Right?

Instead of "trying to get along", why can't we agree that 5e is the compromise edition (doesn't have to be a good compromise, if you'd like to view it as a bad compromise, that's fine) and stop going on and on and on, page after page, thread after thread, post after post, message board after message board about just why something about edition A is superior, worse, or whatever than edition B and C, and so on and so forth?

God knows why I'm even half-following it. Don't I have precious little free time?

VS

 

[Raith5]

Granted, I've skipped a few pages, but isn't this whole thread just a civil edition war fought as politely and gentlemanly as possible... maybe an edition conflict or edition police action, whatever euphemism for one side against another we care to name.? ...

God knows why I'm even half-following it. Don't I have precious little free time?

If it is being civil and mostly respectful is it really an edition war? I also I dont think anyone here is confident about changing the opinion of others. I know I am not confident in claims of objective claims to knowledge. I only know I am learning about the perspectives of passionate people who have very different gaming styles - perspectives I cant get anywhere else - which is the main reason I spend some of my limited time on these boards. That or procrastination!

 

[pemerton]

There is a lot of going "meta" on this thread.

Schwalb did not just state his own play preferences. He made a post arguing that, in certain ways, 3E and 4e have hurt the game by leading to departures from the "heart" of D&D, and emphasising maths over creativity.

These claims are controversial (and forseeably so). Those who disagree, unsurprisingly, post their disagreements. And then instead of either saying "fair enough", or articulating why Schwalb is right, there is a move to the meta-level, of diagnosing why those who disagree with Schwalb are thin-skinned, or edition warriors, or whatever.

If you don't think Schwalb is right in diagnosing 3E and 4e as having harmed D&D, then why post agreement with him? If you do, then how can you be shocked that not everyone thinks that that is true?

Pejorative implies the intent to belittle or disparage. Objectively--not subjectively--Schwalb didn't do that.

<snip>

When you contend that Schwalb is claiming to tell others that how they play the game is what's spoiling it, again you're making things up.

Making observations about how rules systems can lead to trends in player behavior isn't the same thing as telling a group of players they're ruining the game, especially when those statements are made in the broader context of a blog post that's centered on Schwalb's experiences as a player of D&D, on his time working on D&D from ~3.5 to 5E and on his reflections on the game and what's frustrated him over time in the later editions of the game.

<snip>

I bet neither of you bothered to read the comments in the original blog post, did you?

How do you think I found [MENTION=6688858]Libramarian[/MENTION]'s comment, if not by reading them?

I don't think Schwalb is telling others how to play the game. He's diagnosising certain systems, and the way they're played, as having spoiled the game in a certain way. I don't see how the "broader context" changes this. It just reinforces it, in the way that [MENTION=3400]billd91[/MENTION] observed upthread.

I don't think that the "heart of the game" needed rescuing from 4e. (Others can comment on 3E.) Schwalb zpparently does. That's a point of disagreement between me and him (and those who agree with him), and I don't see why it's so objectionable that I should articulate it.

 

[Campbell]

In this post I'm going to ignore the comments he made about 4e - that's not really my personal bugaboo these days. The writing had been on the wall for awhile there. What I find disheartening about his blog post is the contention on that math and rigorous analysis are directly opposed to creativity and expression. As a software developer with a background in military service and a business education, over the course of my adult life have I continually made decisions that are backed up by data analysis, mathematical models, and a contextual understanding of the processes that make up people's daily lives. The contention that creativity goes out the window the second any analytic skills are applied is particularly harmful to the way we understand and work within the world. All forms of nontrivial problem solving require creativity. To suggest otherwise is to reinforce the harmful belief that engineers, architects, scientists, software developers, and business professionals are simply applying a rote process, rather than applying their judgment to unique and changing circumstances.

This attitude seems particularly worrying to me coming from someone whose job it is to create a game which fundamentally involves numbers that have a significant effect on outcomes. You can ignore this all you want, but it will not change the facts. It will have an effect. If its not dealt with at the design phase it will have to be dealt with by individual groups.

On an unrelated note, [MENTION=6688858]Libramarian[/MENTION] I am with you on the GM not being there as primarily a source of entertainment for the other players. I think it would do the culture surrounding the game a great deal of good if we started to emphasis the responsibility players have to one another for a quality game experience rather than just depending on the GM to police inconsiderate players (not characters) who work at cross purposes. I expect players to be engaging, thoughtful, and considerate of one another. I also view my role when I GM as a player with slightly different responsibilities. That's part of the reason why I find the implicit suggestion that GMs are required to spend hours outside of gaming preparing setting material disruptive. It does not improve my experience of the game or encourage the sort of play I value at the table. Mileage may of course vary on this point.