Bring Back Verisimilitude, add in More Excitement!

[Lwaxy]

This type of GMing seems to be fairly uncommon in pathfinder, and even less common in 4e.

Additionally, I've seen some players get pretty upset if you include any houserules, and even more upset if they think the houserules aren't very explicit.

It's very common around here (middle of Germany). You have to, of course, pick your groups. If you have people who depend or insist on the rules then it is not working; however I make it clear from the beginning that the rules are there as a framework to keep the game balanced and fun. When they stop doing that or get in the way of realism, we go with the balance and the realism.

Yup, at times, this leads to discussions as to how exactly something works in such a case. Does that somehow undermine the GMs? Not in our groups.

Maybe I'm pampered because we do not have rules lawyers and argumentative players. We do, however, have a rules guru with an impressive mind for even the slightest rules changes and interpretations of the games we play (including house rules) so we are usually able to keep things consistent pretty well.

However if there would be a rules set fixing such obvious flaws as with the barbarian rage example ( we have had very few sessions without a barbarian actually) I'd be happy.

 

[herrozerro]

And where the disagreement on this is coming from is we don't consider that a valid justification (in an RPG).

This is really the crux, to what level of Verisimilitude should be the default? should the game be totally simulationist and provide rules for every little bit of the world?

Should it be totally naritivist and the rules dont interact with the naritive?

Probably somewhere in the middle. There should probably some some internal consistancy but the ruels shouldnt spell out the world in all it's little details.

 

[Herschel]

And to further that point, no two people will exactly agree upon what that level is and means.

 

[TheFindus]

1. Rules should help support verisimmilitude: Ideally, fire powers set things on fire. Cold powers freeze things. Lightning powers can target pools of water or puddles to extend their range. You could use fire spells on a steel door to act like heat metal. Or use lightning to hit someone around a corner who is standing on a metal floor.

Fire powers do not necessarily set things on fire. Lightning might set things on fire. Metal doors might probably not reflect lightning but instead guide the lighting into the floor. A fireball might not heat metal the way you think it does, because it does not last long enough.
We can have an unnecessary discussion about all of this. If it is in the rules, however, so that the rules dictate what the designers thought is plausible, it is hard to change that. It makes the discussion at the table more difficult. After all, it is in the rules.
So instead of solving and describing these things in a mechanical way, it is much easier to let the gaming group handle it on a narrative level.

2. More Dynamic combat (Martial as well as Casters) than 3.x. I want to see interacting with terrain, running along walls, swinging from chandaliers, knocking down pillars.....

I agree, I want all of that, too. It is all in 4E and should be transferred into the new edition.

3. More detailed out of combat mechanics, ala 3.x, as well as more out of combat abilities (ala 3.x).

I agree with this, we finally need solid out of combat mechanics.
However, 3e did not have detailed out of combat encounter resolution mechanics. 4E has the skill challenge, which does not always work.
I hope that the new edition will bring us more.

5. Don't lock me into a character class. Let me multiclass, /Every Level/ if I so choose.
6. Functional Multiclass casters! Wizard 10/Cleric 10 should be as good a character as a Wizard 20. Wizard 10/Summoner 10 as well. (Kindof like Trailblazer)

I do not think this will work. And why should somebody who tinkers with a lot of things every level be just as good as somebody who concentrates on one thing only? If you mean (since you are talking in 3e terms here) that a wizard should be different in that he can have some abilities of the cleric that shape his character and make him special, I completely agree, though.

7. Lasting Debuffs: Things like attribute damage/drain, or things that lower a stat for a decent duration (minutes), or things that change creature sizes, etc.
8. "Win Button" abilities need to be in. Things like paralysis, disabling limbs, blinding people, sleep, confusion, rage effects, etc. However! Don't limit them to select few classes. Spread them around to the other classes too, not just casters. A monk might use pressure points, etc. Maybe a fighter sucker punches someone and knocks the wind out of them.

No to the attribute/stat drain/damage. Too much bookkeeping and completely unnecessary. WotC went the right way with 4E when they got rid of that and designed debuffs around conditions and -2 etc. modifiers.
As for conditions: 4E has that for other classes other than spellcasters.
I agree it is a good thing and should be kept.
However, a "win button" sucks. The PCs will face these conditions more often, because they fight in every encounter. Whereas the opponents only face these conditions in one encounter, namely the one the PCs win. I do not think that sitting at the table doing nothing for hours because my PC is paralyzed and the spellcaster ran out of anti-paralyze-spells is a fun thing.

13. Ideally: Less of a power gap between levels. It would be nice if 20 level 1s could be evenly matched with 1 level 20.

I do not agree with this at all. I think that a 20th level character should not be challenged by 20 first level opponents on a mechanical level but instead on a narrative level by the fact that he has to decide how to use that power responsibly (or irresponsibly) when dealing with people much less powerful. That is the roleplaying experience. Mechanically he should be challenged by creatures of great power, because that is where the epic story is.

 

[Mallus]

Of course, comments are welcome.

First comment: would you like a pony too? Everything is better with ponies. And monkeys.

0. No rules-based limits on abilities that break verisimilitude: IE - 4e Abilities, Barbarian Rage, etc.

What about "x spells per day per level" for casters, ie Vancian magic?

1. Rules should help support verisimmilitude:

The trouble with this is getting people to agree on what, exactly, supports verisimilitude.

Ideally, fire powers set things on fire. Cold powers freeze things. Lightning powers can target pools of water or puddles to extend their range. You could use fire spells on a steel door to act like heat metal. Or use lightning to hit someone around a corner who is standing on a metal floor.

This is best left to DM rulings at the table.

Trying to encode this into the official rules as anything more than a list of helpful suggestions will significantly increase their complexity of the system. Which means significantly slowing down play.

2. More Dynamic combat (Martial as well as Casters) than 3.x. I want to see interacting with terrain, running along walls, swinging from chandaliers, knocking down pillars, collapsing rooves, breaking through the wall/floor, use of traps in combat, knocking people down stairs, climbing on top of big monsters to attack them from their backs, throwing other characters, etc, as well as combat maneuvers that come up and get used on a regular basis by all melee combatants (unlike 3e, where it takes special training to make using them not generally a definitively BAD idea). Perhaps nonlethal AoOs, such as the guy gives you an opportunity to kick him in the middle of a sword fight, etc.

This is all cool stuff... but the more you rely on explicit rules to handle these situations --as opposed to handling them abstractly and/or with on-the-spot rulings-- the more cumbersome the system becomes.

Meaning it will play slower.

3. More detailed out of combat mechanics, ala 3.x, as well as more out of combat abilities (ala 3.x).

More detailed mechanics = less speed. I sound like a broken record, don't I?

4. Non-Combat statistics on the monsters, as well as combat stats...

This would be great -- just don't include a universal framework for "building" monsters a la 3e.

7. Lasting Debuffs: Things like attribute damage/drain, or things that lower a stat for a decent duration (minutes), or things that change creature sizes, etc.

I'm all for lasting ill effects. But I'm against any implementation of buffs/debuffs that has you recalculating on the fly during combat, or has you playing the bonus stacking game. It's too time consuming.

9. Characters need to have many options they can use in combat, not just "3 daily, 3 encounter, and 3 at-will", and new abilities should never replace old ones: Old ones should get better. The new abilities should be new.

Like other people said, option paralysis is a bad thing. And the more explicit mechanical options you have, the greater the tendency to view everything occurring in-game through the lens of the rules, ie for some people, the options themselves break immersion.

10. Tie available options more to the situation and less to "x/encounter".

The rules can't evaluate the specifics of a situation. Only the DM can. Which means "rulings not rules".

11. Hitpoints need to scale *Less* Combat shouldn't slow to a crawl because HP scale out of proportion with damage.

Absolutely!

13. Ideally: Less of a power gap between levels. It would be nice if 20 level 1s could be evenly matched with 1 level 20.

Savage Worlds kinda does this... it's a nice approach, but I wonder if it's too different from traditional D&D. You can certainly flatten the power scale, to something closer to AD&D than 3e.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

Savage Worlds kinda does this... it's a nice approach, but I wonder if it's too different from traditional D&D. You can certainly flatten the power scale, to something closer to AD&D than 3e.

When you have problems with disparate power across various steps of power, one of the first things you can do to preserve the essential character in the center is lop off the ends. It's a lot easier to balance power of 5, 6, and 7--or even 5, 15, and 25--than it is to navigate zero to 1 or 1 to 2--or exponential growth on the upper end.

Of course, we saw how well it was received in some quarters when D&D characters started as heroes but never got "wishes".

 

[mmadsen]

What about "x spells per day per level" for casters, ie Vancian magic?

In a setting like Jack Vance's Dying Earth, where spells are in fact memorized and forgotten when cast, D&D's spells-per-day mechanics simulate the game world.

In other settings? Not so much.

 

[nnms]

The whole "verisimilitude" argument is a crock.

Only if you think verisimilitude can only mean the exact simulation of reality and forget that you could also be simulating the genre, colour, theme and flavour of a type of fiction.

Any loss of "immersion" due ANY rules set we use is a product of our own bias and imagination shortcomings, not the rules themselves.

So if D&D next comes out and they include a rule that whenever steel touches water, there is an explosion and everyone withing 10 feet takes a bunch of damage because "hey, it's all magic and fantasy and stuff" and people find that jarring or breaking of their immersion, it would be their fault and not the rules?

Really?

 

[DonTadow]

And where the disagreement on this is coming from is we don't consider that a valid justification (in an RPG).

That wouldn't be a better approach though, because we'd have the same problem with that setup as the one its replacing. It's the arbitrary restrictions we have issue with.
Unless you're not okay with "because of game balance" as an explanation, and you expect better than that.

In my opinion if you have to limit something that *narratively speaking, doesn't make sense to have the limit work that way* "because of game balance", that means it's a poorly designed mechanic.

I get what you're saying, again, I feel your pain. Some mechanics rules make no narrative sense. And I agree your barbarian rage example is one of the rare cases where the mechanics wildly put into question the narrative. (however I have seen cartoons and anime that show a raging hero comotose after raging)

So take the second thing i suggested. Why does this not fit your narrative approach. In books, comics, games and classic dnd, a raging barbarian is always winded or tired afterwards.

Why is a per encounter until adequate rest limitation not suitable? Either that or a reduction into the overall power of Rage.

 

[Wormwood]

Why is a per encounter until adequate rest limitation not suitable? Either that or a reduction into the overall power of Rage.

The Encounter as a discrete measurement of time may be 4e's most important contribution to the game. I can only hope it is retained and expanded upon going forward.