Falling Icicle
Adventurer
The whole point of my post was to point out that the first of those three limitations is completely unnecessary.
Can someoone explain the "Daily Hate" for me?
- Thread starter steeldragons
- Start date
The whole point of my post was to point out that the first of those three limitations is completely unnecessary.
Why should he? Are you paying him for this time?
In addition to other cons mentioned so far, and I'm going to purposefully use hyperbole, but I find that the daily can be a Slayer of in-game Hope.
I am predestined to hit exactly 1 home run today, just like last game, yay
You can sub that example with the anticipation of getting a straight flush, setting up a check, seeing an opening for a takedown, or whatever.
That's not a dealbreaker, but it's one reason why I dislike it. 'Predestined' dailies are well-suited for tactical and narrative play, not at all for emulating the character's POV.
Do I want to make a bunch of annoying rolls every turn looking for an opening? No, but exploring other mechanical abstractions that finds a balance away from pure resource management is a good thing IMO.
Neonchameleon
Legend
FireLance
Legend
Well, this assumes that using a daily is the only way to hit a home run. This shouldn't be the case (IMO, anyway) for a well-designed game (or, for that matter, a well-designed daily ability).
A slightly better way to handle the ability might be for it to guarantee hitting a home run (as opposed to being the only way to hit a home run). This adds a bit more decision-making and resource management into the game (one of the things that I like about daily powers, by the way), but in a situation where you know the relative strengths of the pitchers you will encounter, the decision becomes simple and uninteresting: just use it when you're facing the most skilled pitcher.
Under such a scenario, it might make the decision more interesting (and possibly more impactful) if the game were to be changed (say, to a situation where the hitter would be unsure what the relative strengths of the pitchers were) or if the ability were changed so that it granted a small bonus to the chance of hitting a home run before it was used, and no bonus afterward (this makes the timing of when it is used important: the player has to trade off the advantage of a guaranteed home run now versus a lower chance to hit home runs in the future), or both.
Granted, you don't need daily abilities to have resource management. Stepping away from the sport example into more familiar (at least for me) fantasy territory, charged and one-shot magic items (and other special but mundane equipment such as poisons and alchemical items) are another way to bring resource management into the game. However, daily abilities do have the advantage (from the player's perspective, I guess) of being regained more reliably and cheaply. Any further elaboration should probably be in a thread to explain "daily like", however.
FireLance
Legend
This article says 68 in England, 9 in Scotland, 6 in Wales and 3 in Northern Ireland, but I think one closed recently due to a phone hacking scandal.
How do you get the ink off your lips?
I blame journalism.
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Mustrum_Ridcully
Legend
4E milestone mechanic is interesting as a basic concept. Instead of having a fixed "Daily" thing, you basically have to achieve something in game (Beat encounters is 4E take, but it doesn't have to be that) and recover some ability (in 4E, it's not actually recovering an ability but gaining a different one in form of action points).
I think that works just great for non-magical abilities in D&D. Depending on what you do, maybe you can use your Brute Strike once per day or 20 times a day.
It can be more complicated in other areas
1) Vancian Magic. Having a non-predictable moment for an abstract martial maneuver to recover works, but if the idea of Vancian magic is that you consciously prepare a spell, then cast it, and then prepare a spell again, it seems weird when you recover spell slots seemingly random. But it only seems weird because the "Daily" nature of Vancian magic in D&D is so ingrained in us. In the end, magic can follow any arbitrary rule and doesn't have to make sense to us, since it's magic.
2) Healing physical damage (be it hit point damage or a real wound system) via such milestones doesn't work so well to be believable.
So, my take would be:
1) hit points are explicitly never physical damage. But taking hit point damage can cause wounds. (specifics to be decided, but for example, everytime you lose 1/4 of your total hit point value, you suffer a wound, or some such)
2) You recover hit points via a limited set of recoveries.
3) You may be able to ignore most wounds most of the time, but they can lead to penalties and death.
4) Any wounds you suffer require rest to heal, and that rest can be significant. Magical Healing of course could fix them in any manner.
5) Characters have access to certain special abilities. Each has one or more uses. Some abilities may be flexible in what specific effect they have (basically, something like psionic power points where you can select which power you use)
6) At certain intervals or to certain occasions (for example, you kill a foe, you complete a combat, you kiss a princess, solve a murder, achieve a long-term character goal, reach an important location, spend a standard action studying an object), you can recover some uses of abilities. There can be special rules for this - maybe a Wizard regains a spell slot but must still spend a few minutes to prepare a spell in it, or maybe you recover abilities based on groupings by power level or thematic relevance. (Say, you can only recover 1 Lesser Akashic Memory and 1 Greater Akashic Memory, instead of any 2 of your abilities, or you recover only social abilities after kissing the princess.)
Time is only used to recover stuff that is highly "physical", like wounds or your weekly rent, but not for more "gamey" resources - like tactical maneuvers, spell, action points and so on.
I think that works just great for non-magical abilities in D&D. Depending on what you do, maybe you can use your Brute Strike once per day or 20 times a day.
It can be more complicated in other areas
1) Vancian Magic. Having a non-predictable moment for an abstract martial maneuver to recover works, but if the idea of Vancian magic is that you consciously prepare a spell, then cast it, and then prepare a spell again, it seems weird when you recover spell slots seemingly random. But it only seems weird because the "Daily" nature of Vancian magic in D&D is so ingrained in us. In the end, magic can follow any arbitrary rule and doesn't have to make sense to us, since it's magic.
2) Healing physical damage (be it hit point damage or a real wound system) via such milestones doesn't work so well to be believable.
So, my take would be:
1) hit points are explicitly never physical damage. But taking hit point damage can cause wounds. (specifics to be decided, but for example, everytime you lose 1/4 of your total hit point value, you suffer a wound, or some such)
2) You recover hit points via a limited set of recoveries.
3) You may be able to ignore most wounds most of the time, but they can lead to penalties and death.
4) Any wounds you suffer require rest to heal, and that rest can be significant. Magical Healing of course could fix them in any manner.
5) Characters have access to certain special abilities. Each has one or more uses. Some abilities may be flexible in what specific effect they have (basically, something like psionic power points where you can select which power you use)
6) At certain intervals or to certain occasions (for example, you kill a foe, you complete a combat, you kiss a princess, solve a murder, achieve a long-term character goal, reach an important location, spend a standard action studying an object), you can recover some uses of abilities. There can be special rules for this - maybe a Wizard regains a spell slot but must still spend a few minutes to prepare a spell in it, or maybe you recover abilities based on groupings by power level or thematic relevance. (Say, you can only recover 1 Lesser Akashic Memory and 1 Greater Akashic Memory, instead of any 2 of your abilities, or you recover only social abilities after kissing the princess.)
Time is only used to recover stuff that is highly "physical", like wounds or your weekly rent, but not for more "gamey" resources - like tactical maneuvers, spell, action points and so on.
Libramarian
Adventurer
That's a good comparison. They're both very artificial concepts that would never arise spontaneously in other fantasy RPGs. They're basically the RPG system equivalent of patching something up with duct tape rather than making a more fundamental repair.
The truth is I have a fondness for THAC0. But probably just because of tradition/prior experience. I am willing to accept that.
Steely_Dan
First Post
I don't hate daily resources in general. I like them, actually. I really hate Vancian magic, though.
Thematically, I hate it because it turns every magic user into a part-time caster. Wizards only cast a number of times per day, and then they're reduced to throwing darts or stabbing things or whacking things with a stick. To me, a wizard who has run out of magic ceases to be a wizard and becomes just a really smart guy who sucks at fighting. Has the cleric's deity just decided that each cleric gets only a certain amount of prayers per day, no matter how dire the circumstances may be?
It really makes no sense to me, and that stems from my philosophy that a class should be performing that class' core functionality 100% of the time in combat. A Fighter should be fighting, whether swinging sword, bull rushing, grappling or whatever. A cleric should always be capable of receiving help from his deity, whether he's actively casting spells or not. A wizard should be casting spells or somehow taking advantage of the effect of a spell he's cast (like wading into melee after polymorphing himself into an ogre or troll).
The terminology also gets me. I spend so long to memorize a spell, then I cast it and all of the sudden, I forget it. Vancian casters have the worst short-term memory ever. Did I memorize it or not? If so, why have I suddenly forgot it when I just cast the thing? I understand that I'm simply "storing" these spells in my mind only to release them later, but it's really semantics at that point. Apparently, spellcasting is just like cramming for an exam. Study really hard for a few hours and then forget everything after the test.
This is a major reason why I was so taken with 4E. It allowed clerics a constant connection to their gods. Wizards could cast spells every round, even if they were a bit weak, damage-wise. I liked that more powerful spells were limited, too. I do think that wizards should be casting every round, but I don't think they should be casting Fireball every round or tossing out Power Word: Kill with reckless abandon.
Thematically, I hate it because it turns every magic user into a part-time caster. Wizards only cast a number of times per day, and then they're reduced to throwing darts or stabbing things or whacking things with a stick. To me, a wizard who has run out of magic ceases to be a wizard and becomes just a really smart guy who sucks at fighting. Has the cleric's deity just decided that each cleric gets only a certain amount of prayers per day, no matter how dire the circumstances may be?
It really makes no sense to me, and that stems from my philosophy that a class should be performing that class' core functionality 100% of the time in combat. A Fighter should be fighting, whether swinging sword, bull rushing, grappling or whatever. A cleric should always be capable of receiving help from his deity, whether he's actively casting spells or not. A wizard should be casting spells or somehow taking advantage of the effect of a spell he's cast (like wading into melee after polymorphing himself into an ogre or troll).
The terminology also gets me. I spend so long to memorize a spell, then I cast it and all of the sudden, I forget it. Vancian casters have the worst short-term memory ever. Did I memorize it or not? If so, why have I suddenly forgot it when I just cast the thing? I understand that I'm simply "storing" these spells in my mind only to release them later, but it's really semantics at that point. Apparently, spellcasting is just like cramming for an exam. Study really hard for a few hours and then forget everything after the test.
This is a major reason why I was so taken with 4E. It allowed clerics a constant connection to their gods. Wizards could cast spells every round, even if they were a bit weak, damage-wise. I liked that more powerful spells were limited, too. I do think that wizards should be casting every round, but I don't think they should be casting Fireball every round or tossing out Power Word: Kill with reckless abandon.
Tony Vargas
Legend
Lest someone mis-understand, the 4th Ed of Gamma World is from 1992. It also used a stat mod of +/-1 per 2 points difference from 10, which 3e D&D adopted. The current "D&D" Gamma World, using a system only vaguely like 4e D&D, is actually the 7th edition of Gamma World. Gamma World has a very small but enthusiastic fan-base, and has been periodically dusted off to promote whatever core system TSR or WotC or Hasbro was pushing at the time. The 3rd ed used the Marvel Superheroes system, the 5th, Alternity, and the 6th by Sword & Sorcerer Studios, used d20 modern. The 7th edition tested the waters for a CCG mechanic shortly before 'Fortune Cards' were introduced.
It's an great little game that prettymuch gets used as a crash-test-dummy. Not that I'm bitter or anything.
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