Coherence as a Critical Goal for 5e

[Crazy Jerome]

I think the reason I started this thread was because I wanted to discuss if that's a net positive for 5e--or if it will ultimately end up with mostly dissatisfied customers "kind-of, sort-of" putting up with its weaknesses, because, well, "It's D&D. It's what we all agreed to play."

Seriously, there are options that a lot of people want. And then there are options that can be made to work (given their inherent nature, limits of D&D, talent of the designers, time, money, etc.). The intersection of options that can work and that a lot of people want are the ones that they should provide. A common structure should emerge from this. Then they should only provide additional (less popular, less functional) options if those happen to fit that structure well enough.

To the extent that they compromise that structure to "kind-of, sort-of" slide other things in, they whole thing will become weaker, and will tend to end up as you suggest above. Not that this is an all or nothing deal, but doing great design is difficult.

If they do as well as my Ryobi on the first try, I'll be thrilled. It's my own fault I haven't gotten around to buying the other five attachments, not Ryobi's.

 

[Guest 85555]

In addition to making me laugh, this post has a lot of truth to it. If there's "angst" out there surrounding 5e's development, I think it secretly stems from this fear that "modularity" is really going to be nothing more than forcing us to use different "ends" for our RPG "outside yard maintenance secondary tools," instead of actually supporting our preferred style.

I think the reason I started this thread was because I wanted to discuss if that's a net positive for 5e--or if it will ultimately end up with mostly dissatisfied customers "kind-of, sort-of" putting up with its weaknesses, because, well, "It's D&D. It's what we all agreed to play."

The modular approach is an interesting solution provided it is built atop a broad appeal base. This isn't very different from how 2e had a ost of optional rules (though it seems to be turning the concept up to 11). But I am a bit wary of it. It will essentially codify houserules into the system so there will be like three to four different possible games being played using it. Modules and other source material wont be able to assume one of the four approaches. At the table things will get tough when people disagree over options. It is going to have its issues. But I really think their options are limited now. The base is split, people are firmly in different camps; how do you unit them? A single rules sytem cant do it. You have to either cater to one camp or go the optional rules approach. One other problem the modular method creates: identity issues. Can D&D be four different things at once?

 

[howandwhy99]

But is this a "coherent" goal? Can the rules really support multiple styles simultaneously without radically shifting the baseline assumptions? If done right, I think 5e will successfully support multiple play styles, but I am also convinced that there will be one play style that will be the "assumed" default mode, and that many design decisions will have to enforced for that assumed mode to work.

A customizable rule set can support multiple play styles. Can they all be supported at one table? Well, a far narrower ranger I would think. And many won't be simultaneous, but according to player.

For example:
we have sandbox & adventure path play. I don't see both supported in one campaign or per player. Could the game be designed to accommodate both per table or campaign? I think so.

Where they are likely to exclude play styles is outside that range even table to table. The only way I know how to avoid this is by actually publishing multiple games and then using the same pieces from the game tool kit to customize them.

For example:
There are competitive, cooperative, and collaborative play styles and game designs. Can a game focus its design on one or another? Sure, but designing to promote two or more during the same playing would be a real feat indeed.

So what should D&D 5e's default "coherence" be? Should D&D 5e both implicitly and explicitly promote a particular game style that is most compatible with its rules structure, even if its "modularity" allows for significant "drift" away from it?

I think we'll get a collaborative story game with 4e design and balancing sensibilities, but a lot of options covering versions of D&D from every era. This may be more or less modifiable in the narrower sense above, more in the long run with more modules, but it will be exclusive as a collaborative-only only game, at least I predict.

Early D&D was designed more like a cooperative puzzle game anyways. Later stuff was rather incoherent, I'd have to agree, but everything recent seems to follow the collaborative story ethos without fail. That's where I suspect it will end up not being the game for everyone, but, as they say, more of a game to emulate many iterations of the game and how individual groups have actually played it over time.

 

[Andor]

The modular approach is an interesting solution provided it is built atop a broad appeal base. This isn't very different from how 2e had a ost of optional rules (though it seems to be turning the concept up to 11). But I am a bit wary of it. It will essentially codify houserules into the system so there will be like three to four different possible games being played using it. Modules and other source material wont be able to assume one of the four approaches. At the table things will get tough when people disagree over options. It is going to have its issues. But I really think their options are limited now. The base is split, people are firmly in different camps; how do you unit them? A single rules sytem cant do it. You have to either cater to one camp or go the optional rules approach. One other problem the modular method creates: identity issues. Can D&D be four different things at once?

I don't think this is true at all. It simply depends on what you mean by 'modules.'

For example in 3e, I can radically change the feel of the world/play styles allowed by altering the available class mix.

Pure old school with only vancian casters? Fighter/Cleric/Wizard/Rogue/Barbarian/Ranger/Paladin.

Spontaneous casting only? Swap out Cleric and Wizards for Favored Soul and Sorcerer and add in the Bard.

Blast all day? Trade again for Warlocks and Dragon Shamans and Binders.

An Earth Dawn like feel where everyone has magic? Ditch the Barbarian, Fighter, and Rogue and bring in the Spellthief, Duskblade and Hexblade.

Hell, you want Naruto? Enforce the training costs per level and run a gestalt game with a specific seletion of classes for one half like the Ninja, Rogue or Sword Sage.

You could even change the feel of magic entirely. For example use Incarnum and Artificers to create a world where all magic has to be embeded in an object to work.

Or a more Voudoun feet with Binders, Totemists and Necromancers.

The point being that a 'module' that completely changes the feel of the world and play of the game need be nothing more compicated than a list of suggested classes. It does not need to be as different as Runequest and the Hero system.

 

[Lord Mhoram]

What D&D has tried to do in the past is the same thing I've done when I'm trimming hedges or around the drive way. You hold the thing you have at an ackward angle and make it work. That can carry you so far, but then you pull your hip out of joint and decide that a more specific tool/attachment might be in order. So now they are trying to zoom out a bit to that wider Ryobi model, and make something coherent for a lot of the main styles of D&D. Not all the styles of D&D every practiced.

I think you hit the nail on the head good sir.

 

[Andor]

On topic I do think coherance is important. I really dislike those cognitive rules dissonance systems which tell you about how grand and free form and heroic everything is and then give you 6 hit points and a heinous wound tracking system. It's hard to feel heroic when a barmaid is even-odds to one shot you with a frying pan.

The trouble is that both 3e and 4e were very coherant, to completely different goals.

3e was by far the 'sim'est version of D&D. You knew how the world worked. You knew what a skill point meant, how scary a dagger was, you could do a reasonable job of modeling the life of anything from a baker to a dragon.

4e said "Screw that! I don't need to know or care if the orc is an expert basketwever with a fondness for pressed flowers! I just want to kill him and eat his pie!" And as a result while it is great for people who want to kill orcs and eat their pies it is a bit lacking for those of us inclined to wonder where the orc got the pie.

I'm not sure there is a coherant way to please both camps. Well... there probably is. I think the sane way to do it is to go for a sort of old schoolish middle ground with options for complexity or simplification.

So an Orc might be:

Default:
Orc
1st level Warrior Monster
8hp
AC 12 (Mouldy studded leather armour)
Att +3 to hit 1d8+2 Damage (Rusty longsword)
Perception +3
Morale: Standard

Kick Butt and forget names mode:
Orc Warrior
1st level foe
AC 12
Att +3 1d8+2

Fullly Detailed Mode:
Orc
1st level Warrior Monster
8hp
AC 12 (Mouldy studded leather armour)
Att +3 to hit 1d8+2 Damage (Rusty longsword)
Str 14, Dex 9, Con 12, Int 8, Wis 13, Chr 4
Skills: Underwater Basket Weaving +2, Ikebana +1, Torturing Wildlife +7, Baker +2
Morale: Standard

Of course having multiple modes means you can also give the abbreviated stat block in the encounter and leave the full description with all the bells and whistles in the appendix, like we used to do in the old days when modules were printed on clay tablets and you were lucky if they fired them properly.

 

[Guest 85555]

I don't think this is true at all. It simply depends on what you mean by 'modules.'

For example in 3e, I can radically change the feel of the world/play styles allowed by altering the available class mix.

Pure old school with only vancian casters? Fighter/Cleric/Wizard/Rogue/Barbarian/Ranger/Paladin.

Spontaneous casting only? Swap out Cleric and Wizards for Favored Soul and Sorcerer and add in the Bard.

Blast all day? Trade again for Warlocks and Dragon Shamans and Binders.

An Earth Dawn like feel where everyone has magic? Ditch the Barbarian, Fighter, and Rogue and bring in the Spellthief, Duskblade and Hexblade.

Hell, you want Naruto? Enforce the training costs per level and run a gestalt game with a specific seletion of classes for one half like the Ninja, Rogue or Sword Sage.

You could even change the feel of magic entirely. For example use Incarnum and Artificers to create a world where all magic has to be embeded in an object to work.

Or a more Voudoun feet with Binders, Totemists and Necromancers.

The point being that a 'module' that completely changes the feel of the world and play of the game need be nothing more compicated than a list of suggested classes. It does not need to be as different as Runequest and the Hero system.

I am not sure this approach of just offering a list of classes for different styles of play would work (dont see this fix of 3e satisfying the 4e crowd very much, probably not going to be a big hit with the old school crowd either). But more importantly this doesn't appear to be what they mean when they talk abou a modular approach. I could be wrong but it essentially looks like they are talking about optional rule packets hat stack on the core system to essentially produce a 4e, 3e or old school feel.

 

[Guest 85555]

I'm not sure there is a coherant way to please both camps. Well... there probably is. I think the sane way to do it is to go for a sort of old schoolish middle ground with options for complexity or simplification.
.

And D&D has historically (i would argue even with 3e, though it was certainly less so) been in more of a middle ground that allowed the broadest possible range of players to be at the table. Thus coherence should not be the goal of D&D next. If ever there was a test of coherence, it was 4e and I just think it produces too narrow of a focus to get the hundreds of thousands of players you need for D&D. Coherence is fine for a niche product but not a good idea for a widely popular line like D&D.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I'm not sure there is a coherant way to please both camps. Well... there probably is. I think the sane way to do it is to go for a sort of old schoolish middle ground with options for complexity or simplification.

I know this is not exactly what you meant, but I'll take advantage of your post to contrast it slightly with a more extreme version of what you posted. I think what you suggest, when taking to its ultimate conclusion by well-meaning game developers is incoherence. It doesn't have to, inherently, but somehow it always does.

What I advocate instead, is stop filing off the rough edges trying to make disjointed things fit seemlessly together when they can't. You have to do some filing off of rough edges, lest the immersionist crowd have nothing to connect to, but don't go all the way down that road. People will sometime say that they want a dog/cat combo, even though plenty of pet owners like their dogs to be dogs and their cats to be cats. People get it in their heads that they'd like a "pat"--an animal that is fairly independent, but loves you unreservedly. If we tried to make one, we'd get a "cog" -- an animal that shreds your curtains and pees on your bed if you don't walk it every day.

So I'd do it something like this (trying to stick to the same neighborhood as your example):

Default:
Orc, 1st level Warrior Monster
8 hp
AC 12 (leather)
Att +3, 1d8+2 damage (longsword)
Str 14, Con 10, Dex 10, Int 8, Wis 10, Cha 8
Core Mod +3

Tactical:
Ferious Charge, +2 to hit, +4 damage on charge
Morale: Standard

Background and Personality:
Skills: Underwater Basket Weaving +2, Ikebana +1, Torturing Wildlife +7, Baker +2
Traits: Orcish clan warrior

Lore:
(Insert here things that people know or think they know about orcs)

And then probably a few others such headings and entries in those after the default, because I suspect there are 3-5 main D&D styles, and we want to support them all.

The ability scores are in the default listing, because so much on the core is riding on them. You may not care about skills or tactics or background, but if you are running off the core, you need that ability score to do almost anything outside of standard attacks. Then the "Core Mod" is the number you use when you don't want to use a subsystem, but you want to keep the monster roughly balanced. If you throw the tactics bit out, then you give the Orc +3 to hit and damage. If you throw the skills out, you give the Orc +3 to any skill check that you think is sufficiently orcish or fits this particular orc's place in your adventure. (The "Core Mod" might need to be somewhat more complicated than a simple +N, but I can hardly know that until we see more of the system.)

Basically, everything that comes after the "Default" elaborates on something in the default, if only expressing more fully what "orc" or "orc warrior" means. Then you just need to arrange this additional information such that people who like a particular style can focus on the ones that matter to them and ignore the rest.

 

[Andor]

I know this is not exactly what you meant, but I'll take advantage of your post to contrast it slightly with a more extreme version of what you posted.

I actually like your example very much, in particular your "Core mod" is almost exactly what I've been suggesting should be included for "baseline" PCs to bring them in line with PCs that have all the bells and whistles.

Although looking at your example I think the way to do it is to include in each optional model a stacking core mod. So it you turn off the tactical model the orcs get a +2 core mod and if you turn off the skills module they get a plus 1. So with everything off it's the same number but accouts for GMs who have some of the options turned on.

I think what you suggest, when taking to its ultimate conclusion by well-meaning game developers is incoherence. It doesn't have to, inherently, but somehow it always does.

What I advocate instead, is stop filing off the rough edges trying to make disjointed things fit seemlessly together when they can't.

I can think of at least three different things you might mean there, and I agree with two of them.

For example in 3e the systems coherancy actually breaks down the most, when they try to refine it. E.G: Disarming or grappling. Leave these systems simple and you lose some granularity but make up for it in elegance and ease of play.

Conversely I think a 'disjointed' system is actually an extremely powerful game design tool when it's used to represent something that is actually very different within the world. I keep using the RuneQuest vs HeroQuest magic systems as my example here so let me think of something different.

...In AD&D Psionic combat was completely it's own bag. As soon as it happened the rest of the game halts while this lightning speed mental conflict takes place. Suddenly the standard attack vs AC goes away and there is this 5-element rock/paper/scissors conflict with weird statuses and stat damage.

And this is good. Because the fact that suddenly the whole flow/mode of the game has changed let's you know that this is not simply swinging your brain at the other guy and hoping to have a bigger cerebellum in some exact parallel to physical combat.

This is part of where 4e failed I think, as initially presented at least, in that there is no mechanical difference between magic or brains or muscle. It was all the same unified mush of at-will, dailys and encounter powers with stat blocks that were pretty much identical.