D20 'philosophy' cramping my style

[Drifter Bob]

No, I won't.
If you choose to actually give me your name, it turns out that you're a real rpg writer, then I will simply be satisfied, and you will stop looking like a faker.

Exactly. I would be exposing myself to god knows what kind of mischief (and I have already been threatened with boycotts in this thread ) just to please you, and maybe two or three other people who can't be bothered to find out who I am on their own.

Since I am not a faker, I don't care if a small number of people think I am. For that matter, hardly anybody agrees with any of my opinions, in fact many find them wrongheaded, to put it politely, that doesn't daunt me either.

DB

 

[Dark Jezter]

So what is your real name, address, and home phone number then, "Dark Jester"?

DB

Rest assured that if I ever publish a thesis, book, or article, I'll be publishing it under my name rather than anonymously. You can also rest assured that if I ever start claiming that I'm an RPG industry insider who has published products, I'll mention exactly which ones they were.

 

[Gnarlo]

This catfight has started back up? Oh, KEWL!!! Things have been WAY too quiet and civil around here lately.

 

[Nisarg]

Rest assured that if I ever publish a thesis, book, or article, I'll be publishing it under my name rather than anonymously. You can also rest assured that if I ever start claiming that I'm an RPG industry insider who has published products, I'll mention exactly which ones they were.

What he said.

Nisarg

 

[dreaded_beast]

So what is your real name, address, and home phone number then...

Must fight...must fight...must....ah, the hell with it...

It's easy DB! (heh, those are my intials too)

Mac Ferrer
Honolulu, HI 96818

I live in Foster Village, right next to Radford High School. The area is known as either Salt Lake or Aliamanu. Pearl Harbor is just down the road, next to the Arizona Memorial. If you know where Aloha Stadium or Ice Palace is, I'm right up the road from there too.

Won't give me street address or telephone number though, that would just be silly!

Now you try it DB!

 

[Drifter Bob]

Must fight...must fight...must....ah, the hell with it...

It's easy DB! (heh, those are my intials too)

Mac Ferrer
Honolulu, HI 96818

I live in Foster Village, right next to Radford High School. The area is known as either Salt Lake or Aliamanu. Pearl Harbor is just down the road, next to the Arizona Memorial. If you know where Aloha Stadium or Ice Palace is, I'm right up the road from there too.

Lucky you. I've never been to Hawaii, but I'd sure like to. I hear the climate is a lot nicer than it is here.

Won't give me street address or telephone number though, that would just be silly!

Now you know how I feel about my name and (especially) those of companies I have worked for and may plan to again in the future.

DB

 

[dreaded_beast]

Now you know how I feel about my name and (especially) those of companies I have worked for and may plan to again in the future.

Heh, but your product got 4.00 Stars here at EN World.

You should be proud!

 

[Kashell]

You are the DM. If you say that rolling a 1 blows up the world, then it does.


For goodness sake..

 

[eyebeams]

Actually, he was given several solutions, within the rules. He merely didn't like them. Some of the solutions merely required moving the existing skill points already spent on the basic Imp. This wasn't a workaround.

. . . .

I suggest you read the DMG, pages 6 and the first paragraph of page 8. They did.

1) No. He was given a couple of workarounds. A workaround is not a solution. Sometimes a workaround is nearly as good as a solution, but it's not the same thing. This is the dynamic DB is actually talking about.

2) Design is not the same thing as DMing advice. For example, DMing tells you how to use CR and ECL. Design tells you what those actually represent in terms of the capabilities of the challenge.

That said, if there's a satisfactory workaround in the rules (as there appears to be with the Imp), then it's probably best to use it. But the useless pedantry involved in objecting to chucking a measely 4 skill ranks on top of a creature's profile is a perfect example of the negativbe side of D20's System Mastery design goal.

Looking forward, it looks to me like nonsense like this can be vanquished once and for all by coming out with another book like Unearthed Arcana that talks about the "wiggle room" in various game concepts as elements of design, instead of just DMing. Then it can go into SRD canon and everyone will agree with it, just as they did when the legions of folks who, for example, defended to death the idea that monks should be crappy with a staff all changed their tune once the 3.5 SRD said otherwise. Such is the flexible spine of a pedant.

 

[Saeviomagy]

1) No. He was given a couple of workarounds. A workaround is not a solution. Sometimes a workaround is nearly as good as a solution, but it's not the same thing. This is the dynamic DB is actually talking about.

Ok, define workaround and define solution.

Whenever I've seen it done, a workaround is something that is not a full-blown solution, because it involves some sort of shortcut with ugly side-effects or otherwise onerous task which makes the solution painful to implement.

Something which none of the solutions were.

What you have here is, apparently, someone who's a professional module author, who doesn't like having to use the rules to the game, or know the rules to the game, and hates those who do.

Which seems analogous to someone who's working as an electrician who doesn't like using the various electrical laws, doesn't know the electrical laws, and hates those who do.

The second would be declared incompetent and ignorant to boot. The first is apparently some sort of visionary. What gives?