Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.
Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="RSKennan" data-source="post: 3737396" data-attributes="member: 8256">I was surprised to see this thread. I've been rejoicing that the purely gamist stuff was getting trimmed, and that the door was opening more for Simulation and Narrativism. Goes to show, given the same facts, perceptions vary. The key for me is that the simulation is changing, not going away. Now instead of trying to simulate the real world one minute, and who knows what the next, it seems that the designers are going with simulating action-adventure fantasy media. This may seem more gamist, as in doing so, they make a tighter game, but things like maneuvers for weapons, repaired attacks of opportunity, straightening out once and for all the fact that one attack roll can represent more than one attack, what they seem to be doing with hit points and critical conditon, etc., make for a better simulation of the source material. D&D still seems to be simulating something, but now it's genre instead of some flawed value of reality.* Since the source material is what it is, these changes also serve narrativist goals of making things more storylike. Add to that the (for now optional) nonviolent conflict resolution system, and story people have a lot to look forward to. *The one thing I'm concerned with that may prove me 100% wrong is Mearl's ideas about nerfing things like the rust monster with temporary consequences that wear off in a few minutes. That kind of stuff kills drama faster than (insert something that kills drama here). If there's a truckload of that kind of thing I'll be unhappy for a few minutes and promptly write a book of optional rules to put it the way I like it. Other than that though, I really respect and admire Mearls' ability and feel like things will turn out well. There are a lot of other opinions involved in the process, and even if he still feels that certain monsters or spells need to be nerfed or altered to work better as a game, I'd hope that other people would outvote him in favor of good story and drama.</blockquote>

Verification