D&D - Iron Heroes...between the poles

[ThirdWizard]

The size of the numbers only matter in context.

Well, there's always an exception to everything, which is one reason my definition doesn't really hold any meaning. One problem being I havn't read a lot of different RPGs, so I don't know a wide range of systems to draw upon.

I think people understand what is meant by "high" and "low" powered games. I think the argument here is pretty much all about semantics.

The problem being, one person's low powered game is another person's high powered game. Some people think D&D gets high powered at level 6, others think it gets high powered at level 40. Which is right? Answer: Both! It's an oppinion.

As for IH, its on the same power level as D&D for the most part (maybe a little lower due to lack of certain things D&D characters take for granted). So, if you like the D&D power curve, then you'll like the IH power curve. If you don't like the D&D power curve, you probably won't like the IH power curve.

 

[Malachias Invictus]

The way I see it, the flaw of seeing parties of PCs as "low powered" or "high powered" is that as a DM, you are seeing the capacities of players' characters as things that hinder you potentially as a DM.

I do not feel this is necessarily so. I *prefer* "high powered" PCs. In D&D, that means I enjoy running games for heroes that are very powerful in comparison to the average mook adversary. Great challenges are for great heroes, and all that.

There would be like an invisible line of the amount of capacities PCs can have.

I try to keep away from glass ceilings, as both a player and as a GM.

This is seeing the DM-players relationship as a conflict where one has to have the upper hand on the other. This is an issue of control, and DMing isn't about control - it's about trust.

Agreed on the latter point. I see "high powered/low powered" as nothing but a gauge of capabilities, personally.

 

[Malachias Invictus]

Context: in one game, characters are not intended to fight or even survive against the evil that confronts them, while in the other they are intended to do so.

I disagree. I have seen "hopeless scenarios" in superhero roleplaying (Champions, specifically), where supers that were tremendously powerful were getting batted around by a Big Cosmic Baddie. It was a high-powered game, but the characters had nearly no chance of winning without extreme luck, a McGuffin, or something similar. The funny thing is, the ending was sort of short circuited because one hero, in deperation, attempted a Faster Than Light move-through on the Big Bad, and rolled a 3 on 3D6 to hit. Now *that* was an impressive character death!

So, although both games give the characters abilities, one gives them abilities which allows them to effect change upon their environment much more strongly than the other game allows its characters to do so.

That is one way of measuring relative power, but there are many others.

 

[Malachias Invictus]

I've considered just mixing Weapons of Legacy with Iron Heroes.

Ack! I have found Weapons of Legacy to be an ideal example of "When Good Ideas Go Wrong".

 

[Agamon]

That is one way of measuring relative power, but there are many others.

That's an intriguing statement. My understanding is that most d20 PCs become more powerful through, a) abilities granted through rising a level (including hit die, BAB, feats, spells, etc) and b) items acquired that boost or simulate these abilities. D&D expects a certain amount of b), while IH expects little or no b), and compensating through more of a).

If you put the two together, you either have a game with magic items that the IH PCs don't need, making them more powerful than intended or one without items that leave the D&D PCs behind.

The power of the party as a whole is moot, it's the relative power of the PCs that matters to the players.

I realize that you don't necessarily agree with this, and I'd like to understand how you beleive such a difference can be compensated for.

 

[Agamon]

If you're homebrewing and trying to combine IH and D&D classes (and magic items inherent in the PC progression), well.. I've got nothing for ya.

Good luck with that.

Thanks.

I'm thinking of a Faith related Feat chain, akin to the one posted at Monte's, and maybe a new "Templar" class, built along the lines of the other IH classes, but more "clerical" in flavor.

 

[Crothian]

I think people understand what is meant by "high" and "low" powered games. I think the argument here is pretty much all about semantics.

High powered, low powered, high magic, low magic....thay all have meaning and it is just that some people can't graspit. The D&D game has a baseline, the regular D&D game. High powered, low powered, high magic, low magic is in comparison to that.

 

[Crothian]

Ack! I have found Weapons of Legacy to be an ideal example of "When Good Ideas Go Wrong".

Get the Game Mechancis books that are like it but better.

 

[ThirdWizard]

High powered, low powered, high magic, low magic....thay all have meaning and it is just that some people can't graspit. The D&D game has a baseline, the regular D&D game. High powered, low powered, high magic, low magic is in comparison to that.

In the context of this thread, people haven't been using D&D as a baseline, though. I agree that you can guage higher powered and lower powered based on something, but I don't agree that you can say something like suchandsuch is a high powered game, since there will be others who disagree, and one person's oppinion isn't more valid than another's in this context.

 

[Malachias Invictus]

Get the Game Mechancis books that are like it but better.

Intriguing. Quick review?