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D&D Next Q&A: Warlock Pacts, Patrons, and Iniate Feats
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<blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 6223387" data-attributes="member: 2067"><p>There's plenty of examples of clerics since 2e who can't disrupt undead and have different equipment loadouts, so these can't be said to be definitive. This aspect has changed. It's not something that all clerics share. Since your 2e specialty priest who could turn fire elementals and had no armor was still a cleric, there's gotta be something else that defined him as a cleric.</p><p></p><p>As far as I can see, what all clerics across all editions have in common is basically story. </p><p></p><p>Not that is necessarily must be this way for every game, just that it is this way for D&D. </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>It's true. I'd basically agree that the number of possible classes is essentially infinite -- In D&D, the particular classes that a particular campaign/game/table/setting uses helps define the kinds of <em>story characters</em> the game has a focus on. It's why settings can change the class roster as freely as they change the race roster -- and part of the appeal of playing in other settings (playing different kinds of heroes). Eberron wouldn't be Eberron without an Artificer, defined as a worker of technological magic (whatever the mechanics used to represent that). </p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>I'm not convinced that it is. To me, the 65 HP of healing is in the <em>service of</em> the story of saving your friend from the orcs. The attack bonus, electrical damage, and natural 20 are all in service of the story of slaying Drogthul. The story is clearly the important thing there. You can see this by removing the story entirely: is a player excited about an attack bonus or a die roll when it's just adding and subtracting numbers without a narrative? If you remove the mechanics, is the player excited about slaying Drogthul even if he doesn't have to track attack bonuses or roll dice? </p><p></p><p>Without the mechanics, the story is still interesting. Without the story, the mechanics are kind of pointless. This drills down to the class level: even with different mechanics, a hero who channels the might of his goddess is still interesting. Meanwhile, without the hero, 1d8 recovered hp is kind of meaningless.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="I'm A Banana, post: 6223387, member: 2067"] There's plenty of examples of clerics since 2e who can't disrupt undead and have different equipment loadouts, so these can't be said to be definitive. This aspect has changed. It's not something that all clerics share. Since your 2e specialty priest who could turn fire elementals and had no armor was still a cleric, there's gotta be something else that defined him as a cleric. As far as I can see, what all clerics across all editions have in common is basically story. Not that is necessarily must be this way for every game, just that it is this way for D&D. It's true. I'd basically agree that the number of possible classes is essentially infinite -- In D&D, the particular classes that a particular campaign/game/table/setting uses helps define the kinds of [I]story characters[/I] the game has a focus on. It's why settings can change the class roster as freely as they change the race roster -- and part of the appeal of playing in other settings (playing different kinds of heroes). Eberron wouldn't be Eberron without an Artificer, defined as a worker of technological magic (whatever the mechanics used to represent that). I'm not convinced that it is. To me, the 65 HP of healing is in the [I]service of[/I] the story of saving your friend from the orcs. The attack bonus, electrical damage, and natural 20 are all in service of the story of slaying Drogthul. The story is clearly the important thing there. You can see this by removing the story entirely: is a player excited about an attack bonus or a die roll when it's just adding and subtracting numbers without a narrative? If you remove the mechanics, is the player excited about slaying Drogthul even if he doesn't have to track attack bonuses or roll dice? Without the mechanics, the story is still interesting. Without the story, the mechanics are kind of pointless. This drills down to the class level: even with different mechanics, a hero who channels the might of his goddess is still interesting. Meanwhile, without the hero, 1d8 recovered hp is kind of meaningless. [/QUOTE]
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