D&D 5E D&DN going down the wrong path for everyone.

[Philousk]

I think ONE answer, mine at least, is that verisimilitude isn't "in the rules", it never really was. In 4e when the fighter goes up against the giant and uses Tide of Iron verisimilitude would come out of the narrative, which the player is free to construct. So instead of the game trying to say "you can't really do that" as 3e would do with all sorts of penalties to pushing a giant back, 4e just says "fine, that's cool, you decide how it happens" and that's what you do. The DM could (and I'd generally argue should) require some sort of explanation. He might also help supply one, but the players should have the narrative authority to do do it. The fighter player might say something like "as the fighter threatens to skewer the giant's foot with his longsword the huge creatures stumbles backwards in an attempt to open up the distance between them so it can get a clear shot".

Now, consider 3e in the same situation, the PC gets a penalty to push a giant, but the rules don't help you when you STILL SUCCEED, the same verisimilitude issue didn't go away. You have to describe the whole thing in the fiction. Yes, you can say "well, its harder to push giants", but if the idea is construct cool stories around your successes and failures it doesn't really matter. The successes should be frequent enough to provide good forward momentum to the story and make it fun for the player, but in other respects it just isn't relevant. In fact from a standpoint of FUN its probably better if the more dangerous and exciting tasks succeed often.

This ties into Pemerton's sort of techniques in that the key aspect of the game there is what the players decide to do or signal that they are interested. in. If a player decides his character is interested in pushing giants off the bridge, well, then lets make some interesting narrative about that! Not that the character will necessarily succeed, but success/failure is much more about mixing it up and making the story telling interesting than it is about the believability of the story. At least that's how I see it.

I just read Tide of Iron, and I note that it requires the use of a shield as a necessary condition and that this power is solved by a test based on strength against AC. Therefore, I do not see too the relevance of this preposterous story about a fighter threatening to skewer the giant's foot with his longsword and, by peak of misfortune or awkwardness, this giant stumbles in the flowers of the carpet...


Furthermore, I applaud your brilliant easier to twist the fiction of the current action to lend credibility to the effect of the power, but I'm not sure that it will be the same for most people, especially if they are novice with the game.

However, I understand your initial idea even if I agree with very difficult, but let's face it, the example was not the most appropriate or objectively, embroider the narration whatever the power in DD4 with all these conditions and parameters is often doomed to fail or result in a deficient verisimilitude except if we are as clever as you once again.


So I do not know if the rules for this power DD4 have something planned for the case of a huge gelatinous cube advancing inexorably towards you. How tall story will you tell us as DM (or as PC) for us to swallow the pill this time?

 

[Balesir]

One of the things I like about 4E is that the DM can say, "Yeah, no, I don't see it." Since powers aren't really reflective of what the PC is doing, I think the DM can step up and make sure that verisimilitude is respected. (I'm pretty sure that [MENTION=27160]Balesir[/MENTION] has the exact opposite attitude!) One of the things I don't like about 4E is that it doesn't ask you to justify your actions in game-world terms. I think that, if you do that, the game becomes incredibly rich and immersive thanks to the ease of adjudicating non-standard actions.

Not quite the opposite, but I would say that I'm glad that speaking the explanation out isn't mandatory in the rules. If that's what you want at the table that's absolutely fine - and speaking out the details of the outcome should certainly not be banned! - but I'm glad it's optional. My reason for this is that, under certain conditions, I think the game can actually work better if each player is allowed to envision the details of the resolution in his or her own way. Occasionally, people's world models differ, and this is one way to step around that without it becoming an issue.

Asking a player for an interpretation is certainly possible, though, and if your group wants it to be mandatory, cool.


Sent from my ASUS Transformer Pad TF300T using Tapatalk 2

 

[Manbearcat]

So I do not know if the rules for this power DD4 have something planned for the case of a huge gelatinous cube advancing inexorably towards you. How tall story will you tell us as DM (or as PC) for us to swallow the pill this time?

Working off the premise that every creature requires equilibrium to maintain uprightness, perceive its orientation and be mobile in whatever medium its attempting to move through (typically liquid or gas), its quite easy in the same way the knocking an ooze "prone" is quite easy to swallow if the aesthetics of "prone" are relaxed and attributed to the more open quality of "off balance" (of which "prone" is a derivative of) or that its equilibrium is disoriented.

In your case above with the giant, just use the shield as the causal mechanism instead of the sword. In the case of the ooze, just determine that its spatial orientation or its sensory perception is undone/upended leading it to be "off balance/kilter" (equilibrioception short-circuited). Loss of balance doesn't have to mean that requisite force was applied. Auditory of olfactory effects, nauseating pain, or something obstructing spatial awareness will do the trick just fine; to the very big and the very small alike. That is easily enough done and has worked for my table forever (which has two members whose professional fields or study would lend themselves to being "put out" by grossly interpreted issues of kinesiology or biology).

I mean, we're ok with giant arthopods, giant protoplasm and massive flying creatures without the requisite thrust or trim characteristics...but knocking them off balance is HEYWAITAMINUTE?

 

[Derren]

One of the things I like about 4E is that the DM can say, "Yeah, no, I don't see it." Since powers aren't really reflective of what the PC is doing, I think the DM can step up and make sure that verisimilitude is respected. (I'm pretty sure that [MENTION=27160]Balesir[/MENTION] has the exact opposite attitude!) One of the things I don't like about 4E is that it doesn't ask you to justify your actions in game-world terms. I think that, if you do that, the game becomes incredibly rich and immersive thanks to the ease of adjudicating non-standard actions.

I am with Balesir with that.
In 4E the expectation is that the power just happens. There were several discussions about this already and the general tone was that the effect might look different but what the power should do happens.
I "blame" it on, like Balesir said, the disconnection between powers and the actual world and the high gamist focus of 4E which is much more concerned to have balanced combat instead of simulating a world.

 

[Manbearcat]

4E which is much more concerned to have balanced combat instead of simulating a world.

Of which I'm very much appreciative as it alleviates my "sorting out balance" mental overhead and table handling time as GM such that I can focus on maintaining genre coherence, extracting just the right amount of functional color (in-filling causal logic as required), and creating situations for my players to engage with that are charged with conflict and adversity. My brain and attention span is a limited resource. I want none of it spent on wonky system issues at the table.

 

[Derren]

Of which I'm very much appreciative as it alleviates my "sorting out balance" mental overhead and table handling time as GM such that I can focus on maintaining genre coherence, extracting just the right amount of functional color (in-filling causal logic as required), and creating situations for my players to engage with that are charged with conflict and adversity. My brain and attention span is a limited resource. I want none of it spent on wonky system issues at the table.

But it has the downside that in order to maintain balance every power must work all the times no matter the situation.

 

[Scrivener of Doom]

But it has the downside that in order to maintain balance every power must work all the times no matter the situation.

And that's a downside I can live with.

We can play with the story "on the fly" - and we do! - but that's enjoyable. Fixing "wonky systems issues" as [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] said is not so fun at the table. It's also not fun away from the table. I mean, one of the things that 4E did with focussing on combat balance is actually produce a system of monster and NPC creation where you basically know your monster or NPC is not going to die before it rolls initiative or, conversely, completely wipe the floor with the party before they roll initiative.

And in 3.xE, both sorts took the same number of hours to create.

 

[Hussar]

But it has the downside that in order to maintain balance every power must work all the times no matter the situation.

Where is that written?

Where is it written that if you don't allow Power X to Trip the Cube, that balance isn't maintained? Sure, this particular fight might have balance issues, but, who cares? It's one scenario out of the hundreds that will happen over the course of a campaign.

There are tons of situations where a character's powers won't work. Teleport requires line of sight. A blinded character cannot teleport (usually - there are a few teleport powers that do not need LoS). Does that mean that the game goes wahoonie shaped? Nope.

 

[Mistwell]

How is this not edition warring?

 

[Warbringer]

How is this not edition warring?

It's actually pretty civil and informative . There's a lot of why behind the preferences, and in a topic around playtest of new edition, very enlightening.