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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Clavis" data-source="post: 3761195" data-attributes="member: 31898">I, on the other hand, am shamelessly and unrepentantly old-school. I do not buy into the current game design philosophy WOTC, or their apparent vision of the emasculated DM. I believe the best DMs are equal parts referee, storyteller, world-builder, social director, game-designer, and stage magician. The stage magician part comes in with misdirecting the players into believing you mean to kill their PCs them while actually trying to keep them alive.IMHO all the "empowerment" of players is an attempt to appeal to CRPG and MMORPG players who are used to playing without a DM. It's ultimately wrong-headed, because a tabletop game can never do what a computer can do better. If our hobby is to survive, it must emphasize what cannot be replicated on a computer. Social interaction. PCs who can wander off the map. Spontaneously generated and constantly evolving storylines. Attempting action for which there are no written rules. All of that requires a strong DM to anchor the game, and a flexible rules set that in no-way straitjackets his or her power. Unfortunately, I see WOTC going the way of post-Gygax TSR. Game decisions are being made for business-model reasons, and all of us player (and especially the pesky DMs) had better shut up and buy what we're told. I am not at all convinced that 4th edition is going to solve the fundamental problem with 3rd edition; its OVER-DESIGNED. Instead of just cleaning up the essential mechanics of the game, they fundamentally changed the game into something it was not, an seem set to continue on that path.I don't like Action Points, not because I'm a "killer DM" with delusions of grandeur, but because they are not organic to the game. They seem necessary because of the incessant power-creep (which has frankly become a power run) that infects the "official" materials. If there's little the PCs can't do, there's little way to really challenge them. I have no hope whatsoever that the 4th edition is going to solve this. In fact, everything I seen so far indicates the opposite.</blockquote>

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