D20 'philosophy' cramping my style

[Drifter Bob]

'I don't want to see D&D nosedive again'
Er, when did it do that?

D&D had become pretty unpopular before the release of 3E... I think it had died out quite a bit before 2E as well. You don't think that could ever happen again?

And based on your comments in this thread, I find your concern a bit ... hard to believe.

So its love it or leave it, eh? Either D&D is perfect or you are a "hater". I run into this attitude quite often . I bet it was very prevalent toward the end of the era of 2E as well....

I will again point out that whether players and DMs cleave to the rules is a completely separate issue than _writers_ cleaving to the rules. The first is a matter of discussion and 'what makes a fun game.' The other is a matter of appealing to a wide audience and giving them what they expect and can _use_ with a certain degree of surety.

Well, if people wonder why published adventures aren't as much fun or as interesting as some of the adventures made up by good DM's at home, maybe they should think about the imoplications of this expectation.

The question isn't whether the DM / adventure writer should stick to and know the rules. The question is in gray areas, whether the audience gives them enough leeway to interpret or make a judgement call within the spirit of the rules, or would instead prefer to take them to task over any and every percieved violation of any number of minor and trivial issues.

DB

 

[Pbartender]

The question is in gray areas, whether the audience gives them enough leeway to interpret or make a judgement call within the spirit of the rules, or would instead prefer to take them to task over any and every percieved violation of any number of minor and trivial issues.

And that, unfortunately for the publishers, is something that will vary widely, depending on which gamer/DM you ask.

So, all you can do, if you are a game designer/writer, is pick the subset of gamers you would most like to placate.

 

[Drifter Bob]

Hey, thanks... Glad to be of help.

You might want to take a look at the Rat Bastard DM forums (follow the link in my sig)... Most of them would be really interested in some of your ideas, and could provide you with some really novel solutions to your problems.

I probably will do that, thanks.

For example, while you were saying, "This encounter doesn't work right because Imps can't bluff very well," everyone else was saying, "Well then, how can we make Imps bluff better without otherwise significantly changing the encounter?"

The thing was, I just wasn't sure in this particular case which approach would be considered "legal". You can know most of the rules system but there are always areas which aren't necessarily clear from the books, or which are ambigious so there is a certain degree of interpretation necessary. Sometimes, there can be a consensus in the online community which is almost like a religious dogma. Which of the several methods listed would be least offensive to the most people? I'm still not certain. Looked like int boost or skill point swapping was the best, but some people aren't going to like even that.

B) I don't think so. I think that's only a problem for the people who aren't looking at the rules closely enough. Not to mention the fact that there are a great many 3rd party publishers that are creating optional rules to make that 'literary' side work within the rules.

But don't forget, thats another avenue open to DM's but closed to writers, you cannot use most 3rd party material or even expanded materail from WOTC. Most publishers insist that anything you use is from the core book rulesset.

I don't think I've ever seen so many plot-oriented adventures out and about for D&D as I do now.

Well, that is encouraging certainly. Can you reccomend a few good ones?

DB

 

[Drifter Bob]

And to me, I wouldn't want to play as a mook in the Legend of Arthur...

....now tell me I can play as Arthur, and you might've got me....

Thanks for poting this. It illustrates my point very well, I think.

So, here are two issus. #1 is that the players should be the center of the story. Well, just because king arthur, or say, merlin have special abilities, doesn't mean that they are the center of the story. They can be minor NPC's who live far away somewhere, perhaps hire the characters to do somehting. What is so different from that as having distant gods which effect the plot.

On the other hand, #2, why can't you have a fun game in which the players are not necessarily the center of all things? I can think of a lot of lower level adventures where the characters are say, apprentices involved in relatively petty intrigues while not matching the power of their masters. Why should that be excluded from the range of possible adventures?

Cant you see how silly it is to insist that the players can do everything every NPC can do?

But it seems that your main problem is one that is relatively simple, and not all that uncommon, and, yes, it has a name for those who view it as an inferior style of gaming too: Drama Queening. Or perhaps Invincible DMing. You're really "just" a fictionist.

Hmm... I've been called many things, but...

d20 is not a forum for telling a story, and if you try to make it such, there are situations where the rules will dissapoint you. It's not just a story.

It's a GAME. It has TEAM ASPECTS. RANDOM CHANCE. And it has RULES. And if you want to PLAY the GAME, you need to realize these, accept these, and work within them.

If you'd rather tell a story, don't bother.

An RPG is a videogame. It is poker. It is Axis and Allies. It is Chutes and Ladders. It is infinately more flexible and enjoyable, and able to benefit much more from creativity and player input, but it is not an excersize in collaborative fiction, and it never. Ever. Ever. will be.

Ok, since you don't seem to realise this, I'll point out what seems obvious to me: the difference between D&D and say, poker, Axis and Allies, and Chutes and Ladders, is that the latter are all direct competitions between players, with no referee or, storyteller involved. There isn't one guy in Axis and Allies drawing the map for you as you play, or someone inventing new poker cards in the middle of that game.

The DM is not just another player compadre. I know some people really, really want this to be the case, but it just isn't, so forget about it. Play magic the gathering if you don't like it.

As for video games, I've written a few of those myself. You as a player have NO IDEA what is going on in the background. In most cases, it's nothing like what you think. More "cheating" goes on in video games than in any RPG.

I mean, to each their own, but that's almost 100% backwards from what I actually enjoy doing on a weekly basis, which is playing a game in which a story takes place. Not telling a story with a d20 roll or two in between monolgoues.

Whatever gave you the impression that I do monologues in my games? Thats a straw dog if I ever heard one. Along the same lines, If you want to play D&D like it's Risk with wizads, go ahead, just don't try to force everyone else in the RPG community to do it the same way.

DB

 

[Pbartender]

The thing was, I just wasn't sure in this particular case which approach would be considered "legal". You can know most of the rules system but there are always areas which aren't necessarily clear from the books, or which are ambigious so there is a certain degree of interpretation necessary. Sometimes, there can be a consensus in the online community which is almost like a religious dogma. Which of the several methods listed would be least offensive to the most people? I'm still not certain. Looked like int boost or skill point swapping was the best, but some people aren't going to like even that.

Oh certainly, which is why it never hurts to ask about it on messageboards like these. But I think people got a little tripped up and side-tracked by the 'downfall of D&D' aspect of your post.

But don't forget, thats another avenue open to DM's but closed to writers, you cannot use most 3rd party material or even expanded materail from WOTC. Most publishers insist that anything you use is from the core book rulesset.

How interesting. I normally wouldn't think it was a problem, if the material was OGC and you credited it properly... Especially if you were using material from a source being published by the publisher who is publishing you.

Well, that is encouraging certainly. Can you reccomend a few good ones?

I'm very fond of the Green Ronin's Freeport series... A bit of cthulhu-esque mystery in a piratey port town. My group found WotC's Speaker in Dreams a lot of fun... It was designed as an event-based adventure (something they should have done more of), rather than a site-based adventure.

Try looking through WotC's free downloadable adventures on their web-site... http://wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/oa/20030530b&page=2 They aren't all great, but some of them are quite good... Some of my personal favorites: Wreck Ashore, Something's Cooking, The Ettin's Riddle, The Alchemist's Eyrie and The Ghosts of Aniel are just a few that come to mind.

 

[I'm A Banana]

But isn't an airplane the exact same thing as a horse-drawn cart? Mustn't an airplane be expected and required to perform exactly as does a horse-drawn cart in all things and in all capacities?

An airplane has a lot in common with a horse-drawn cart, and in the respects that it is similar to a horse-drawn cart, it should be expected to adhere to the same functions as a horse-drawn cart....namely, that it's a mode of transportation, and should transport you somewhere with minimal physical effort on your part. If it fails to do that, it's just walking.

What all those things (videogames, Risk, Axis and Allies, Chutes and Ladders, D&D) have in common is that they are all games, and must adhere to the same functions as games. Namely, that as a game, they should have a ruleset. If you're breaking that ruleset for story reasons, you're looking at the game backwards, IMHO. And while that's perfectly fine when I'm hanging around with my friends in my apartment (Rule 0), it's NOT fine when you're writing an adventure for publication.

 

[Dogbrain]

D&D had become pretty unpopular before the release of 3E... I think it had died out quite a bit before 2E as well. You don't think that could ever happen again?

And that had nothing at all to do with insufficient railroading on the part of published adventures. It had a great deal more to do with TSR deciding that they knew what gamers wanted better than the gamers knew. They decided that they, as "authors" were much better qualified to tell gamers what they would enjoy than the gamers were qualified to know what they enjoy. This was the era of the Great Adventure Railroad school of design. The players were to be mere passive observers of the "story", thankful to be granted the privilige of taking part as elaborate props in the all-holy plot.

What on earth is wrong with "Mongo is an unusually tricky imp and gains a +X Bluff bonus."? Heck, the rules even explicitly permit one to do this sort of thing. Or make up an entirely "new" monster that is exactly like an imp but gets a +X Bluff bonus, if you're going to be so anal-retentive about the letter of the SRD.

 

[Dogbrain]

An airplane has a lot in common with a horse-drawn cart, and in the respects that it is similar to a horse-drawn cart, it should be expected to adhere to the same functions as a horse-drawn cart....namely, that it's a mode of transportation, and should transport you somewhere with minimal physical effort on your part. If it fails to do that, it's just walking.

Are you trying not to get my point? I was giving an example of the "Roleplaying games are storytelling." rubbish, just transposed to airplanes and horse-drawn carts.

 

[Berandor]

Well, having just plowed through seven pages of this thread I feel I must add my 2 cents, too.

IMC, I have given all my players 4 additional skill points. I gave them a free feat. I nixed cross-classing restrictions, and they may buy feats they're not eligible to (but can't use it until they are). That doesn't mean I change all monsters the PCs meet to adhere to the same rules.
Likewise, I might use opponents with abilities taken from books the players don't have access to (like, for example, a creature from Monte Cook's Legacy of Dragons using an Arcana Unearthed spell).
Plus, I would really much rather play Storyteller than D&D.
ETA: I am also a staff reviewer for the German dnd-gate, and I have had two instances where I deliberately looked for adherence to the game rules, one was a book of NPCs, and the other a monster book (both with about 50% of its worth, or more, in rules materials), and EVEN THEN I did not check the skill points of the write-ups except for a few randow checks to see whether they were "generally correct".

All this I just wrote to illustrate that I am in no way a rules-lawyer. In fact, I have a "whatever works"-policy.

BUT I get annoyed when the rules of the game are nixed for no reason whatsoever, in a product I payed for. You cannot possible explain every case of not adhering to the rules in a manner that I understand where you are coming from, because you have a word count limit and must use this limit to put as much adventure into the book as possible. So I don't know why your imp has bluff.
Now, likely, this example is silly, because 90% of all GMs would probably not even notice that this imp has bluff and the standard version doesn't, let alone complain about it. Despite what you say, even this thread doesn't have that many people complaining about changing the imp to have bluff in a reasonable manner, but only some people who think this should be done within the context of the rules.

Now, why don't have imps bluff skills? Or as you put it, "shouldn't they have the ability to lie?". The thing is, an imp can lie all day if it wants to, it just isn't very good at bluffing. It might think it is smarter than it thinks, or it might use more cunning methods of betrayal, like telling half-truths (as long as you regard bluffing as lying, which is an issue that can be, and has been, argued about). I won't retread the myriad of methods open to anyone in achieving the effect you desired that are not only within the rules, but really quite painless.
In fact, I haven't read my core rulebooks faithfully since the advent of 3e, I have just playing the game, and I knew all about these rules.

But that still isn't why I am posting. I am posting because I sincerely hope that you are Jeanry Chandler. Why? Because your signature link to his "manual" has given me the impression that you are. Why is that important?

Really, your stance towards the game you want to write game materials for professionally, and your reaction to your consumer base (even if it is a small minority) has put me back. You start off by belittling the game you are trying to write for, posting an example that does not illustrate your point very well (no matter ho often you claim it does), but rather throws a doubt at your knowledge of the basic rules you are aiming to support with your product. Then, you jump to conclusion regarding the intentions and gaming styles preferred by posters, showing more than a little predisposition to put negative labels on anyone disagreeing with or critizising you. You continue with posting exaggerations, cynical remarks and either severe misunderstaninds caused by the predisposition I already remarked on, or blatant lies concerning the general response and nature of this thread. And after you have stated that you dislike the game you write for, after you have hand-waived even minuscule changes to your design that would lie perfectly in the rules on the basism of some assumed behaviour that has not been proven right in any way in my experience, and after you have belittled or name-called many of your potential customers while keeping a somewhat aloof tone, in short after you have acted childish in a thread started by yourself in reaction to posts requested by yourself, you still expect me you buy this product, should it ever see the light of day?

I am sorry, but I must echo James Heard here. You are not going to get my money, or more precisely, Jeanry Chandler is not going to get my money, and I am glad you stopped that project. I am sorry, and I am sure your home campaign is great fun, but there are a lot of writers out there that need my money as bad as you do, and who don't profess their dislike for their own choice of game system that publicly as well as don't act as immature as you did here. I really don't care whether your imp has bluff, changes into a girl (which I find to be a far, far bigger change to the standard imp), or whether Kind Arthur can only draw the sword out of the stone after drinking a mug of virgin's blood. It's your way of dealing with people trying to help you (in a civil manner, mostly) that has caused this.

Sorry, this was overlong and rantish, but that really riled me up.

P.S.: And if you want to have any chance of succeeding as an author, imo you should read this post, think about it, and then disregard whatever it is I wrote you think doesn't apply to you.

 

[D+1]

So the adventure hinges on the fact that the players do not necessarily know the "little girl" is an Imp right away. They can of course attempt a sense motive roll, if they get suspcious, but here comes the problem. As listed in the SRD, the Imp has no bluff skill.
[snip]
Why shouldn't there be variant Imps?

You tell me - YOU'RE the one writing the game world. If you want or need variant Imps in this world who's stopping you from putting them in?

But this is for an official publication. If I put in a skill which isn't listed in the SRD for that particular monster, I just KNOW I'm going to get somebody raving on and on in a hostile review all about how I didn't even read the rule book and I don't know anything about D&D, and how giving the Imp this skill is unfair and unbalances the game and changes the CR and EL, and the players should be given 4 ranks in a skill of their choice to make it fair, and bla bla bla bla bla.

or the publisher, fearing just such a reaction, might take me to task for it.

Nonsense. At the very worst this imp is an INDIVIDUAL NPC and need not conform exactly to the stats for others of its kind. All imps in the world need not be identical clones. Any publisher worth writing for will know this.

First, explain to me why I am stupid and this is NOT an example of anything being wrong anywhere except in my head (since I know nobody will agree with me) and second, tell me technically if I can give this thing a few bluff skill ranks (and no, using it as an unranked skill isn't going to cut it)

Give it a template, or class levels, or simply REMAKE the imp as a creature for your setting given what you want imps to be able to do in your setting. It IS possible to do what you want within the existing framework of rules if you want. If you don't want to be limited by what the "rules" will allow why the paranoia about taking creative license?

This actually is an example of... what would you call it? Fear of Rules Enforcement over Roleplaying? But it isn't the rules that cause it anymore than they would have with earlier editions so far as I can see. Yes, obsession with anal, precise adherence to rules IS a problem these days but danged if I know where it comes from.