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Message: <blockquote data-quote="EzekielRaiden" data-source="post: 9890964" data-attributes="member: 6790260">Er...no it isn't? Like it literally isn't?It's simply a way to make all of the other rules completely pointless. Which is why you're, y'know, supposed to literally not use the rules in early-D&D, and instead desperately hope that the GM feels like giving you a so-called "ruling" favorable to you--a "ruling" that may have zero bearing on anything else, ever. Because that's the problem with so-called "rules" that are meant to be cast aside all the time: there are no rules. The only thing there is, is playing the capricious whims of the guy (almost always a guy, back during early-edition D&D) sitting behind the screen.Not at all. They get into actually needing to DESIGN, as opposed to just throwing words at the page because their mechanics literally don't matter, they're going to get ignored.Calling it "extremely useful" is the most ridiculous understatement I've ever seen in my entire life.Magic solves everything. It does so instantly in most cases. And you aren't dependent on the capricious whims of a GM who can do whatever they want, whenever they want, for as long as they want, and all you can do is burn bridges by leaving, or suffer through it.Okay. You have yet to prove that it isn't constant. That's the point. If this is how you balance out the power of the class...and that power is always there, which as far as I can tell it is...then the frustration must, in fact, also always be there. That looks pretty constant to me! So...how is it not so?More importantly: Why is player frustration good? Why is it good to make the player think and feel "this SUCKS, I HATE dealing with this, it's so FRUSTRATING and STUPID"? How does that contribute to the player having a good net experience? I genuinely don't understand how you can get to that conclusion.Keep in mind, I'm not saying something that tons of people absolutely love to shove in my mouth: "Players should always succeed at everything forever!" "I did not succeed" is EMPHATICALLY not the same as "this is frustrating". Frustration is more than just not getting what you want; it is putting in a real effort, having a well-reasoned plan, and giving things your all, only to not just not succeed, but be actually defeated. (Dictionary.com even specifically uses "defeat" and "nullify" in the definition of "frustrate".)Being the GM's favorite? I mean I guess some people might find that fun, but I don't.Yes, but they also get (at least) three chances to bat, don't they? So having a ~1/3 average is, functionally, the same as saying that most players actually do get the chance to play, and don't simply strike out consistently. You're talking about having something like...one specific player on the team gets to wear Sonic shoes, so he can literally run at the speed of sound and thus guarantee a home run if he can just hit one single ball: but he's forced to use the world's least-functional baseball bat, such that he only has a 10% chance of getting one hit out of three attempts. (Meaning, roughly speaking, a 3.451% chance of hitting on any given attack.)More importantly, the "game designers" of baseball (there weren't any, that's not how sports are born) cannot control player hit rates. Like that's...literally not possible for them to control, as it's a function of the player's physical abilities, training/skill, and their ability to read the pitcher and adapt accordingly. That could not be further from the truth with TTRPGs, where the designers have full control over every aspect of combat, and where there is no physical feedback, nor need for constant drills and training and practice.The analogy simply fails, because tabletop games aren't sports. (This, among many other reasons, is part of why I so thoroughly dislike the "Combat-as-Sport" label, or as I see it, flagrant mockery disguised as a mere label.)I can't speak for early-edition D&D. All I can say is, if that occurred in 3e, it means your Wizards weren't being played very well.Okay. Can you argue with a straight face that Gygax ever acted with a "light touch"? Because his words certainly do not support that as far as I can tell! Pretty much the diametric opposite. If he were a mathematician, he'd be using nuclear flyswatters.And see above re: the difference between sports and tabletop games, as the two are nearly nothing alike.Certainly, even to you, they cannot be that much alike, because you love to insist that roulette-wheel-like randomness, where you can have nearly any outcome happen and your plans, efforts, resources, and abilities are a vanishingly small grace note next to "and now chance decides that only bad things happen, only for later things to be the exact opposite, your efforts are meaningless before the unstoppable march of fate."I mean, surely you'd agree that a baseball game isn't something determined almost exclusively by the ungracious whim of luck?Yes, there would be, because it would be NOT FUN in that context.Tabletop games are not sports, and sports are not tabletop games. Trying to apply the logic of one to the other is a GIGO situation.A spellcaster of some kind. Picking nits like this does not suit you. You know what I mean. You know that most people use "Wizard" as the emblematic class for "full spellcasters".Plus, what OTHER caster could even attempt to make such a thing in early editions? Clerics (and 2e Priests) didn't get wish. Illusionists were the only other full-caster in 1e, they were functionally just a specialized type of Magic-User aka Wizard, and they didn't originally get wish either. (It was added in Dragon magazine content.) Sooooo...what exactly are you on my butt about here?And yet it often is! That's precisely the problem. Magic is extremely reliable in many ways. Remember: Every single time--literally every single time--the Fighter wants to do something cool, they have to not only succeed at some roll or the like, they also have to get special GM dispensation. The spellcaster only has to succeed at a roll. Oh, and the spellcasters of OD&D could create their own spells, meaning, they could literally invent entirely new ways to automatically succeed at things.Where does the Fighter have that ability? I'll wait.Er, well, not...all editions. But that would require us to speak of The Edition That Must Not Be Named.Could not care less. Genuinely. I could care more, but I could not care less.I mean, okay, but I can't play "the idealized 5e Lanefan wishes existed". I can't play "the idealized 5e community Lanefan wishes existed". I can only work with the game, and community, that I see. I've had one 5e GM I would consider "generous", and that only relative to how profoundly miserly 5e GMs tend to be. And I've seen many, many, many people, including on this very forum, who have an active antipathy for the idea that players should, eventually (note: EVENTUALLY, as in, it might take a while!) find or purchase magic items that (a) the player actually likes, (b) the character would find particularly useful for the things they're good at doing, and (c) are actually to some degree powerful, not mere "I just think they're neat" knick-knacks.(Note, I am not trying to skewer my current 5e GM, Hussar, on this one. I think he's a great GM and have been perfectly comfortable with the items that have appeared. I also appreciate his good taste in items--often quirky or unusual, but with interesting twists. I'm just saying, the one "generous" 5e GM I've had is much closer to "pretty normal" in my book, it's just that everyone else has been SO bloody stingy with magic items that, by comparison, normal feels generous.)</blockquote>

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