D&D General D&D Evolutions You Like and Dislike [+]

[Maxperson]

It's not a source thing. It's...it's just the meaning of what a "team based game" is.

If it's team based, you need teamwork to succeed. Otherwise, your success is blind luck.

No. If it's a team based game, teamwork tends to work better, just like in every edition of D&D. I doubt anyone here will argue that basketball isn't a team based game, but you still have some superstars who ball hog and scores lots and lots of points when "leading" their team to victory.

 

[Maxperson]

no worries, there was no offence taken, though i am a bit surprised that Command is not on the Wizard list, feels like something they'd have, to me at least.

They get charm spells. Command has always been a cleric thing.

 

[Maxperson]

For 4e Warlord abilities at least, the difference is physical. The warlord can push/pull/slide allies because they are doing something context dependant to make it easier for their allies to move. And if the ally doesn't want to move, they don't, because the technical definition of an ally means you are a willing target of a power.

If they want to use forced movement on an enemy, they need to be doing something that forces them to do that (the vast bulk of these abilities involve hitting the intended with something dangerous) and if you want to use one of these on a member of your party or a friendly/neutral NPC, you just designate them as an enemy first. But you'll still have to hit them to get them to move.

In general 4e, martials tend not to get Creature targeting effects - things that take effect regardless of willingness - they tend to use the Ally/Enemy split to make it clear that, in general (before someone brings up Come and Get It) it's physical force that's causing movement.

Right, but generally the Warlord isn't going to be pushing/pulling/sliding allies unless it's beneficial for the allies to be doing that. If the allies are constantly rebelling against that and refusing to move, it's disruptive to the Warlord player's choice of class and abilities, which also isn't a good thing.

 

[Remathilis]

no, but see, there's that emotional possessiveness i was just talking about, you'd like to believe your character was more sensible than that, that they'd see through the ruse, that they wouldn't buy the coloured water, but part of roleplaying is accepting the scenario you are presented with, you failed the insight check, so your character thinks those bottles are full of potion, you don't get to think better than your character because you don't like the scenario.

If I (the player) can see though the ruse, I am allowed to act based on the knowledge I possess. If I can't, I'm not roleplaying. I might as well roll randomly to determine everything my character does.

OS Players talk a lot about "challenging the player" when it comes to the game. The classic example is the player walking into a room and declaring they roll for perception to find any secret doors (as opposed to actually stating where they look and what they are interacting with). This is the RP equivalent to that. If I believe there has to be a secret door in this room, my belief doesn't change because I failed the perception roll to find it. I just lack proof to support my hypothesis. The same is true of the con man selling colored water. My failure to win the insight check doesn't mean I instantly believe what he's selling is genuine, but that I cannot find evidence to support my feeling it isn't. And I may be wrong and the potions are legit, but that is something I will believe when I drink one and get back 2d4+2 HP.

If you want to treat all characters like chess pieces, be my guest.

 

[Swarmkeeper]

Are they having that conversation in-character in mid-combat?

Of course. Unless they're not.

The imperfect nature of RPGs, IMO, is why it doesn't matter. For one, the game is not unfolding in real time so there is plenty of room in the fiction that the PCs could just know - through countless hours of off screen bonding, practice, conversations, strategizing, whatever - what their teammates might want in the moment. I mean, we're playing reasonably capable adventurers who have abilities beyond what the players are capable of, why wouldn't the characters have a strong sense of how to work as a team? Sure, mistakes might be made but its all part of the story, too.

A player asking another player if they want the buff of a Commander's Strike mid-combat can be seen in the fiction as the character asking their teammate verbally or with a simple knowing look or something else entirely. The DM could even ask the players to describe what that looks like on the battle field to add some narrative flair to the session. It needn't be done "in-character" by the players to have an enjoyable session.

Let me ask you this, having a good sense of how you play by your contributions here over the years: If they don't have that conversation mid-battle "in-character" would you, as DM, negate the effect?

 

[CreamCloud0]

If I (the player) can see though the ruse, I am allowed to act based on the knowledge I possess. If I can't, I'm not roleplaying. I might as well roll randomly to determine everything my character does.

OS Players talk a lot about "challenging the player" when it comes to the game. The classic example is the player walking into a room and declaring they roll for perception to find any secret doors (as opposed to actually stating where they look and what they are interacting with). This is the RP equivalent to that. If I believe there has to be a secret door in this room, my belief doesn't change because I failed the perception roll to find it. I just lack proof to support my hypothesis. The same is true of the con man selling colored water. My failure to win the insight check doesn't mean I instantly believe what he's selling is genuine, but that I cannot find evidence to support my feeling it isn't. And I may be wrong and the potions are legit, but that is something I will believe when I drink one and get back 2d4+2 HP.

If you want to treat all characters like chess pieces, be my guest.

see, i feel like you're the one treating your character like a chess piece, cause you're not respecting their perspective and POV in the world, you're just treating them as a piece to be moved as you see fit for your goals, i don't care about challenging the player, not in any sense you're talking about, i'm talking about roleplaying, if your character doesn't know the secret door is there, if they don't know about the water potions, then what right do you have to override the fiction of the world?

 

[Remathilis]

see, i feel like you're the one treating your character like a chess piece, cause you're not respecting their perspective and POV in the world, you're just treating them as a piece to be moved as you see fit for your goals, i don't care about challenging the player, not in any sense you're talking about, i'm talking about roleplaying, if your character doesn't know the secret door is there, if they don't know about the water potions, then what right do you have to override the fiction of the world?

There is no "overriding the fiction". The potions are real or water based on what the DM says. But if my character is forced to believe they are real because the dice say i believe they are real, then I'm NOT actually playing my character. No more so than when the Life deck said I bought a helicopter. The game tells me what I think or feel. That's not playing a character, that's randomly generating a mad libs. If anyone else can play my character and end up with the exact same results as me playing them (assuming the same dice rolls) then the character is just a toon and not a roleplaying character.