D&D's abstraction level

[rounser]

I think I've pinpointed something that's fundamentally changed about the game. In Talisman and Magic: The Gathering, you don't necessarily think about the gameworld implications of a game mechanic like the Prophetess drawing an extra card and choosing between them, or the Llanowar Elves adding a green mana. In D&D, you do.

D&D has always had world-affecting abilities: Continual light streetlamps. Sieges and plagues nixed by Create Food & Water and Cure Disease. Paladins detecting alignment on every NPC they meet etc. The handwaving seems to have become a lot harder all of a sudden, though. The abilities and roles seem more unbacked by flavour than ever, and therefore more difficult to justify in terms of suspension of disbelief. Even rules like 1 HP minions that make sense in Hollywood logic seem phoney when you see the naked statistics.

In time the goal posts will move and suspension of disbelief will stretch to accomodate all this, because the D&D brand is behind it. Mearls was still wrong about his "rust gets better" rust monster, though, IMO - it's a pity that an entire edition has been brought out based on such game logic.

P.S. Although applying M:tG's exception rules system to D&D may make sense superficially, I expect D&D 4E to be much less robust than M:tG, and that the new books people are waiting on to "complete" the game are likely to break it in short order. A broken card in M:tG will still only appear four times in a deck, whereas a broken at-will ability will appear continually in a substantial amount of the campaign.

Then again, D&D being broken doesn't seem to have mattered much in the past, except in terms of people eventually getting fed up and wanting a new edition...broken splatbooks (e.g. 1E Unearthed Arcana) or broken entire core classes (e.g. overpowered clerics and "specialty priests", underpowered theives) are nothing new. Just don't get your hopes up too much for this edition being anything new in that department, I guess. At least 3E's core books were technically complete before breaking the game...

We'll see.

 

[noretoc]

I think I've pinpointed something that's fundamentally changed about the game. In Talisman and Magic: The Gathering, you don't necessarily think about the gameworld implications of a game mechanic like the Prophetess drawing an extra card and choosing between them, or the Llanowar Elves adding a green mana. In D&D, you do.

D&D has always had world-affecting abilities: Continual light streetlamps. Sieges and plagues nixed by Create Food & Water and Cure Disease. Paladins detecting alignment on every NPC they meet etc. The handwaving seems to have become a lot harder all of a sudden, though. The abilities and roles seem more unbacked by flavour than ever, and therefore more difficult to justify in terms of suspension of disbelief. Even rules like 1 HP minions that make sense in Hollywood logic seem phoney when you see the naked statistics.

I agree completley, it is the largest reason why I can't embrace the new rules. There are two argument to this, neither which I agree with, but I'll state em, to be fair.
one: there was always abstraction.... Hit points, even attack rolls were supposed to be a series of vollys either resulting in damage or not.
two: Any game mechanic can be explained in game by a good DM.

 

[jdrakeh]

D&D 4e uses Magic: The Gathering's rule system? That's news to me.

 

[rounser]

D&D 4e uses Magic: The Gathering's rule system? That's news to me.

Not the actual rules as such, but the game design philosophy on which the rules are built.

Simple basic rules with thousands of exceptions is how they describe the new D&D in one of the books - and that's the M:tG rules model in a nutshell, as any card-carrying M:tG geek who follows the online community knows.

 

[jdrakeh]

Simple basic rules with thousands of exceptions is how they describe the new D&D in one of the books. . .

That also describes the original D&D rules printed in 1974. So, to be clear, you're deliberately indulging hyperbole (e.g., claiming that D&D 4e uses the M:TG rules and that simple rules with lots of exceptions is only analogous to M:TG) in an attempt to provoke a heated response, right?

 

[rounser]

That also describes the original D&D rules printed in 1974.

Spells and magic items suggest that to a degree, yes.

I'd argue that it's being stressed significantly more this iteration, because I doubt we'll see fighters with choices of just "Attack Normally", "Charge", "Set Spear" or "Sweep" ever again like we had in 1E, if they even count as exceptions. Today's fighter is a much more...exceptional creature, and if new rules come out for them they will only become moreso. (What are the chances of that, cough cough...)

So, to be clear, you're deliberately indulging hyperbole (e.g., claiming that D&D 4e uses the M:TG rules and that simple rules with lots of exceptions is only analogous to M:TG) in an attempt to provoke a heated response, right?

Whoa there. I never meant to suggest that 4E uses M:tG rules. I'm just suggesting that the exception model is more pronounced than ever before. WOTC pointed it out as being a defining factor of their new game, and I've never even seen it being mentioned in relation to D&D before (even though it was present in the past to an extent in spells, and gaining in prominence - feats saw more exception creep as of 3E for instance).

If you don't think that the new D&D is more exception-based than the old one, then I'm not sure I agree. One of the first impressions I got was "this is very M:tG" when leafing through the PHB and the MM, and I'm far from the only one. Like 3E's crunch/fluff dichotomy was for that edition, I think it's one of the guiding design principles for this edition, given that they explicitly refer to it.

And unlike the "video-gamey" canard is used by some others, I don't think comparing something to M:tG is a perjorative. I just don't think that what works well for a card game will necessarily map equally as well to D&D, for similar reasons to what works for a monster may not work for a PC - too much screentime for a particular power or exception that would not be a problem were it on a M:tG card or an NPC monster...or an oldschool D&D spell (because all three of these get much less game presence than an at-will new game PC power).

 

[Orryn Emrys]

I think I've pinpointed something that's fundamentally changed about the game. In Talisman and Magic: The Gathering, you don't necessarily think about the gameworld implications of a game mechanic like the Prophetess drawing an extra card and choosing between them, or the Llanowar Elves adding a green mana. In D&D, you do.

To me and mine, this is one of the fundamental distinctions between a "roleplaying" game and any other game. My wife gets disgusted when people highlight "roleplaying" aspects of Magic: The Gathering. And even though it's all in fun, the fact that the rules are fundamentally stilted in terms of representing anything beyond what the game is intended to be (go figure!) makes it patently ridiculous, in my humble opinion, to regard it as comparable in any way. And, of course, most people don't. Because the game world in M:tG or Talisman isn't designed to function outside the context of the game's specific goals. Whereas RPGs, even the simpler ones, are constructed to allow the storyteller to take the game anywhere he and his players desire.

I do, by the way, agree with your sentiment. I'm struggling to decide how best to represent and explain any given action or the relationship between my PCs and their environment, from the micro scale to the macro, even as we speak... er... post.

 

[jdrakeh]

Spells and magic items suggest that to a degree, yes.

Spells and magic items are specifically designed as mechanical exceptions to the implied 'reality' of the OD&D world (hence, the appeal of being a Magic User). There are also two different combat systems (one of whcih is full of creature-specific exceptions), thief skills (from Supplement 1), etc. The game is built entirely on a foundation of simple rules with special case exceptions (as were many RPGs of that era).

 

[Imaro]

That also describes the original D&D rules printed in 1974. So, to be clear, you're deliberately indulging hyperbole (e.g., claiming that D&D 4e uses the M:TG rules and that simple rules with lots of exceptions is only analogous to M:TG) in an attempt to provoke a heated response, right?

I think one of Rounser's main points is that exception based design for everything is much harder to achieve balance for. When you have a finite number of exceptions it is easy (comparatively) to balance, this is harder to do with D&D's model of continual power, feat, class, paragon path, epic destiny, singular monster, etc. philosophy... unless one continues producing the same exceptions in different coatings (which ultimately leads to no real expansion of the game). You have to balance things against a steadily growing number of options that are divergent to the core mechanic in and of themselves.

In MtG the answer was to make certain cards illegal in tournament play, however I don't think this would go over well for players of D&D, especially if they've spent the money on a book to get a particular class, power, etc. Take the Swordmage for example, not only is it in a campaign specific book so those who want the class but have no interest in FR have to spend 30+ dollars to get it, now imagine if WotC was forced to admit it was an unbalanced class. As a player I would be pissed, especially if my DM adopted that stance and I had already bought the book.

 

[Scribble]

The abilities and roles seem more unbacked by flavour than ever, and therefore more difficult to justify in terms of suspension of disbelief. Even rules like 1 HP minions that make sense in Hollywood logic seem phoney when you see the naked statistics.

In time the goal posts will move and suspension of disbelief will stretch to accomodate all this, because the D&D brand is behind it. Mearls was still wrong about his "rust gets better" rust monster, though, IMO - it's a pity that an entire edition has been brought out based on such game logic.

I partially agree with the sentiment, but also dissagree.

D&D has Always been about abstraction. Just pick your abstraction.

Is armor something that blocks a hit? Or does it somehow allow me to dodge better?

How come even though I've been adventuring with my wizard friend for umpteen days/weeks/months/years I STILL have no clue about anything magical?

How can a huge lizard fly? Or breath fire?

How come your ability to be hurt is somehow linked to your job?

I'd argue that the reason D&D has been so much more popular then any other system is BECAUSE of the many levels of abstraction. It doesn't function as a weird RPG ant farm model of a world. It takes it's weird abstractions and laughs. It lets your brain kind of shut off realworldness, and play the game.

Games that try to account for everything I think end up just getting in a chaotic jumble of rules, and plus or minuses. Doing lots of math isn't fun for me, and I'd guess for a lot of other people.

My guess is the reason people are upset is because they've changed the way people abstract a few things. change is scary.


I know I'm going to get the internal consistency comment in a few posts, but I disagree with that. It's as internally consistent as it always has been.