Clerics can't heal (NPCs)?

[Vempyre]

One of the best things in a well run campaign is coming back from A Trip Over Yonder and finding the world has *changed*. That bar wench now has a baby, and it looks a lot like you. Your grampa died of something no cleric can fix. The slimy advisor to the mayor...is now the mayor. Your pesky kid brother has got his first PC level and he's rarin' to go kill some kobolds.

We don't need rules for that. Most explicitly, there is no rules for that.

When a DM defines the world only around the PC's bubble of influence that doesn't stop the above quoted exemple from being possible from happening. You simply define that when the PCs come back to town, if they do, instead of predetermining it all in advance. In the end it's all determined by the DM anyway, so what difference it makes if you define it only when you need it (when the players are around or get knowledge an area)? Saves you a lot of work and you still have a great world that seems to live outside of what the PCs do.

Seems here is the keyword. Because wether or not you define it all in advance like you love to do or define it only when the PCs become aware of it like many others do, all of it is a make-believe story cooked up by the DM, mostly.

 

[hbarsquared]

You do not need "that bar wench" to have healing surges in order for her to have a baby that looks like you.

The "slimy adviser to the mayor" does not need the Wizard's 7th-level utility spell fix election in order to become the mayor.

If the DM decides to have the world change "off-camera," the DM is doing it for the players. The world changes because it will enhance the game for the players.

And, as Vempyre just said, "there are no rules for that." In fact, Fallen Seraph has the right idea, in that the ease of creating the mechanical world around the PCs allows the DM more time to tell these kinds of stories.

 

[HeinorNY]

One of the best things in a well run campaign is coming back from A Trip Over Yonder and finding the world has *changed*. That bar wench now has a baby, and it looks a lot like you. Your grampa died of something no cleric can fix. The slimy advisor to the mayor...is now the mayor. Your pesky kid brother has got his first PC level and he's rarin' to go kill some kobolds.

I agree but do we need pregnancy rules for that? Do we need rules for running medieval political elections? That has nothing to do with the rules, with NPC/monster creation, whatsoever.

That's all about the guy behind the screen.

It's art, not science.

 

[VannATLC]

Having played in both editions currently under discussion (as well as most prior ones), I cannot begin to fathom how the above has anything to do with the 3E vs. 4E debate. I, too, prefer worlds where the PCs' actions matter, and things may happen "off-camera." But that has zero (0) intrinsic relationship to the complexity of NPC building, or whether PCs and NPCs are built with the same rules.

I couldn't agree with you more.

This is a function of the creativity and capability of the DM at hand.. not the ruleset.
It should *not* be part of the ruleset, and in a very real sense, *cannot* be part of the ruleset.

The rules are the toolset by which the players manipulate the objects that are the PC's.

You can set your setting as independant, run multiple different groups in there, have each effect each other.

It is still an artifact of your creation, nothing more. The PC's are special because they are the *only* agents of change, other than you, the DM. Everything else is scripted, or random.. and even randominity is an expression of the DM's will against the setting. Only PC's change be real change, and only through the toolset of the rules.

/shrug.

Essentially, as I said above, I agree with Ari. The vibrancy of a world is dependant on its creator and maintainer, and is indifferent to a ruleset.

 

[Vempyre]

The setting is a thing unto itself; it is a project apart from the players and their game. When the players seat themselves at my table, they are attempting to immerse themselves in the setting. It is not their plaything; it is something they must interact with. There is give-and-take in both directions: they benefit from the setting, by having an evening of entertainment, while the setting is enriched by their interaction with it.

There is a simple definition for the above: you are not running a game, you are running a simulation.

It can be perfectly fine and entertaining to the right ppl but it is not the basis of what DnD has been built for. It is not what it aims for. Any version of DnD. 3E might have enabled a way to achieve the above with less pain than other iterations of DnD, but it was too much and off the market. The market wants a game, not a simulation.

 

[mach1.9pants]

One of the best things in a well run campaign is coming back from A Trip Over Yonder and finding the world has *changed*. That bar wench now has a baby, and it looks a lot like you. Your grampa died of something no cleric can fix. The slimy advisor to the mayor...is now the mayor. Your pesky kid brother has got his first PC level and he's rarin' to go kill some kobolds.

Agreed. A living world is more immersive.
However whether your campaign achieves this is pretty much rules independent, it is up to the DM to make this happen. How many important things happen without the PC's being involved is pretty much rules independent. A 4E conceit (AFAIK) is to encourage the PC's to be involved with most of the important events relevant to level. Heroic=local, Paragon=regional, Epic=world-wide. But you don't have to let your PC's be the only movers and shakers, that is up to the DM.
Edit: Ninjaed to a bloody pile of shurikened flesh!

 

[GnomeWorks]

In advance, I apologize for any tone. I like philosophical arguments, and I mean the following solely as a debate, and do not mean any insult.

Fair enough, but I'll warn you - I'm a student, and majoring in philosophy. I think about crazy stuff all the time.

This is wrong. Unless you believe every creative endeavor never actually originates with its creator, but is instead a portal to another universe in which Elizabeth and Darcy well and truly exist.

The setting is created by the DM and the players (and the game designers, and novelists, etc). It is not a thing unto itself, it is not a project apart.

It is, by definition, their plaything.

I disagree.

While I'll concede that the setting is created by the creator, my setting is not a group effort - it is mine and mine alone. That means that when the players sit down to play in my setting, they are in my playground; they can interact with it, but it is ultimately mine.

I would like to create the illusion, as much as possible, that the game is a window into "another world," as it were, in which dragons and such other absurdities exist. Anything that gets in the way of that is dentrimental, IMO, to the experience and immersion.

As a world-builder, my goal is to remove my whims as much as possible from the world, and let it run its course. Of course, that's not really feasible, but that's the ideal situation: I'm going to fall short, and I recognize that, but I still work towards it.

 

[GnomeWorks]

There is a simple definition for the above: you are not running a game, you are running a simulation.

Ding! We have a winner. Though I think the two can be reasonably reconciled into one system.

It can be perfectly fine and entertaining to the right ppl but it is not the basis of what DnD has been built for. It is not what it aims for. Any version of DnD. 3E might have enabled a way to achieve the above with less pain than other iterations of DnD, but it was too much and off the market. The market wants a game, not a simulation.

I agree. That's why I'm not going to 4e, and I'm leaving 3.5.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

1+Con Bonus? (Minimum 1)
Based on role? (Soldiers more, skulkers less?)
Based on minion, normal, elite, solo?

Well considering the WotC employee who posted stated quite explicitly that it was an easy to remember number that didn't need to be written down on the stat block, I expect that NO, it's not effected by any of your suggestions and is, in fact, a good, solid, unmodified NUMBER.

Fitz

 

[ruleslawyer]

I fail to see what point you're trying to make by misattributing a Shakespearian quote to "some Danish dude."

Please tell me you're kidding here, GW. (Even if you are, it's not so funny.)

Regardless, I have to say that I disagree with the entire set of concepts you're promulgating. a) There's no reason for players to know an NPC's statblock; b) there's no reason why that statblock needs to contain data that's not relevant to the PCs' actual interaction with that NPC; AND c) there's no reason why either issues a or b should have anything to do with how consistent and effective a world one can build using the rules. But whatever.