Characters defined by "their stuff"

[Plane Sailing]

I read the following on the WotC site, the latest in their "nasty surprises" column

Magic items are one of the big ways characters are differentiated from one another, and a great deal of the mastery players feel comes through their stuff. Thus, threatening magic items doesn't simply reduce a character's effectiveness, it actually threatens the total existence of the character.

It reminds me of a perceptive comment made, I believe, by Numion some while ago about the unfortunate degree to which characters are defined by "their stuff" in D&D, and that sometimes a line of continuity is drawn through a PC's stuff rather than his life (especially if there isn't a raising from the dead but instead a new character who gets given the old characters stuff, which may happen in some cases!)

It bothers me.

One of the things that drove me away from D&D in the 80's was that most PCs' game abilities (not RP personalities etc) were literally defined by their magic items. One of the things that was most appealing about 3e was that the feats and skills allowed genuine differentiation between two characters with the same class in a way which wasn't really possible before. However, as time has gone on and higher levels have been reached in the game it seems clear that standard D&D is predicated upon the PC's getting lots of "stuff"; high level challenges expect the PCs to have a certain amount of wealth in order to meet them.

One of the bizarre side effects of this is that the stuff can become more important than the character. Death from 9th level onwards is a mere speedbump in the characters life (and from 17th level it isn't that since true resurrection applies no penalties at all), yet the spell Mordenkainens Disjunction has the ability to strip a party of its effectiveness and with no means of redress or recovery.

It seems a little strange to have a situation where it might be common for a player to be more concerned about his PC losing his stuff than losing his life!

Thankfully the DMG etc encourages DM's to change things as they wish for their own campaigns, but even so - this baseline to D&D leaves me feeling a little sad. After all these years is D&D still mostly about "the stuff"?

Cheers

 

[hong]

D&D is mostly about "the stuff" because that's half of "killing things and taking their stuff", and that is, essentially, the core philosophy of 3E. Did you figure this out only now?

You can cut back on the amount of treasure in your campaign, if you don't like it. This will have varying consequences, depending on what else you do. If you do nothing, then high-level spellcasters will outshine everyone else, and many monsters become much harder to kill. If you nerf magic, then few people will want to play spellcasters. If you use an imbued magic mechanic, then things can continue smoothly, but juggling the numbers can become tricky. If you just end the campaign early, then the problem becomes moot.

Since this topic was old two years ago, here are some random pictures of dinosaurs.

 

[jasper]

D&D is mostly about "the stuff" because that's half of "killing things and taking their stuff", and that is, essentially, the core philosophy of 3E.
.

The core philosophy of any edition is killing things and take their stuff.

 

[hong]

The core philosophy of any edition is killing things and take their stuff.

I don't think 2E had a core philosophy. I think it was like a Mars Bar or something: crunchy, with a soft centre.

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

It can be a problem, but I think it's something that people need to talk through with players. Encourage them to get involved in the setting, give them rewards that they don't carry around with them all the time (eg castles, titles, Church political power) and then it's not threatened in the same way.

I'm making a real effort now to go concept first, personality second, stats third, items last, and I'm finding my characters are much more interesting to play.

 

[Beard in the Sky]

I agree with Hong; not with his tone, but with his opinion. When you start tweaking stuff like this, it really throws the game off balance. Now, if -balance- isn't a big deal to your players, it may be fine. Lessening the amount of magical items given to melee classes -will- overpower your clerics and wizards. I don't like the profusion of magic items and the reliance on them either, but it seems like a hard problem to solve.

 

[Gnarlo]

I think it must be because I went from playing 1e to a long hiatus to 3e that this seems quite natural to me. Characters have always had backgrounds, stories, personalities, etc. in our games but have also always been like the players KOTD looking for that Hackmaster +12 or Crossbow of Doom.

Even most fictional characters appear this way to me. Frodo without his Mithril coat and Sting could change his name to 'second breakfast'. Elric without Stormbringer would be getting atomic weggies from all the jocks. Conan sans loincloth would go back to his porn job.

 

[Inconsequenti-AL]

I've found this a problem as well.

I agree with Hong, I've seen vastly lowered wealth levels and it had some strange effects on the game... as said, particularly for non spellcasters. Also made variations between players stats really pronounced.

Going to try a new experiment for next campaign. Each player will end up with 1 or 2 major items that level with them/are modifiable in various ways. The host of 'minor' items that normally get collected will be replaced mostly with innate abilities and a few 'non magical' bonuses.

For example a '+2' shield isn't actually magical - just made out of special McGuffin metal. A +2 enhancement bonus comes from a months study under a legendary teacher... etc.

IMO, these changes are mostly cosmetic. Hopefully taking the power away from the toys and making it more part of the character... As long as I get the balancing act right, I think it'll mostly be a flavour change.

Still, I'll probably be back here shouting 'Help!' when it all goes horribly wrong.


If your feeling adventurous, I suggest checking out the D20 Star Wars system -just finished playing in a fun campaign - it's familiar D20 but has very little reliance on toys, items and gizmos. It is pretty lethal...

 

[hong]

I agree with Hong; not with his tone, but with his opinion. When you start tweaking stuff like this, it really throws the game off balance. Now, if -balance- isn't a big deal to your players, it may be fine. Lessening the amount of magical items given to melee classes -will- overpower your clerics and wizards. I don't like the profusion of magic items and the reliance on them either, but it seems like a hard problem to solve.

The problem exists because people have difficulty seeing powers derived from items as being inherent to a character. Now, ASSUMING you don't just want to run a low-power campaign, there are ways to get around this problem while still having as many toys as you want.

Dragon 289 (the ninja issue) has an article about imbued items, which basically cost XP to activate instead of gp to buy. They only work for one character, the person who activated them, and are essentially as inherent to that character as any class ability like rage or spellcasting or whatnot.

AEG's Magic of Rokugan book devotes space to explaining the concept of nemuranai, spirits that inhabit items and produce these items' magical abilities. Basically these items work only when in the possession of one person, namely their owner. The concept is easily ported to most campaigns.

Taken together, these concepts can go a long way to toning down the "it's all about the stuff" feel. I have a page of imbued magic rules that draws on these for inspiration:

http://www.zipworld.com.au/~hong/dnd/imbued_magic.htm

We're finding that the numbers get a bit wonky past about 10th level, but nothing that can't be fixed.

 

[thundershot]

I've got the same problem in my campaign. Characters are always being defined by their stuff. In fact, entire character concepts are revolved around the stuff. And if I took the stuff away, the player may abandon the character because he says it's not "fun" anymore... So, as much as it bugs me, I want everyone to have fun... I just thought it was good for the character to be stripped of all his stuff so he can evolve past the stuff, but I'm not going to do it at the expense of a player playing his character...


Chris