Defining its own Mythology

[resistor]

A lousy core system will try to re-shape your home game out of the box to it's own whims, rather than indulging yours.

That's exactly what I feel is happening, from the information so-far released about 4e.

 

[Rechan]

Huh. I thought flexibility and hodgepodge, simulating anything, was the thing of GURPS.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I thought flexibility and hodgepodge, simulating anything, was the thing of GURPS.

Well, it can be D&D's thing, too.

And with stronger reliance on archetype and more smoothness than GURPS is really generally capable of.

 

[resistor]

Huh. I thought flexibility and hodgepodge, simulating anything, was the thing of GURPS.

D&D is to other fantasy RPGs as GURPS is to all other RPGs. ;-)

More seriously though, I don't think my setting and playstyle is particularly abnormal. I generally play in settings that are or were at some time officially supported, and my adventures are usually fairly straight-up fantasy. No genre-bending or anything.

And yet I feel like the games that I want to play are being squeezed out by the "new, unified D&D experience."

 

[Rechan]

D&D is to other fantasy RPGs as GURPS is to all other RPGs. ;-)

Bland and atrocious?

More seriously though, I don't think my setting and playstyle is particularly abnormal. I generally play in settings that are or were at some time officially supported, and my adventures are usually fairly straight-up fantasy. No genre-bending or anything.

And yet I feel like the games that I want to play are being squeezed out by the "new, unified D&D experience."

I fail to see how. Did Planescape have half-orcs and monks?

The 3.5 DMG had the Red Wizard of Thay. Where was the shrieks of horror that FR was being pushed into your game?

You either put the stuff in the books in your campaign, or you don't.

 

[HeavenShallBurn]

Huh. I thought flexibility and hodgepodge, simulating anything, was the thing of GURPS.

GURPS isn't really any more flexible or adaptable than D&D, and they both have their particular core assumptions flavoring the mechanics that get hard to reconcile as you reach the outer limits of what's possible under the system. Quite a few people myself included like the core assumptions of D&D such as the power-curve and leveling scheme but also like the ease with which we can use that basic framework to do game styles and campaigns as we feel like without being hindered by flavor inseparably welded to all the mechanics.

 

[Rechan]

GURPS isn't really any more flexible or adaptable than D&D, and they both have their particular core assumptions flavoring the mechanics that get hard to reconcile as you reach the outer limits of what's possible under the system.

Well, I was more just making the comment given that GURPS has a book for basically every genre imaginable. So it can do them. Just... not well.

Quite a few people myself included like the core assumptions of D&D such as the power-curve and leveling scheme but also like the ease with which we can use that basic framework to do game styles and campaigns as we feel like without being hindered by flavor inseparably welded to all the mechanics.

And quite a few people, myself included, care jack about the flavor and play D&D because it's the easiest game to get players for since everyone knows it.

 

[resistor]

I fail to see how. Did Planescape have half-orcs and monks?

The 3.5 DMG had the Red Wizard of Thay. Where was the shrieks of horror that FR was being pushed into your game?

You either put the stuff in the books in your campaign, or you don't.

Planescape has the nice trait of being able to absorb lots of new additions.

I don't particularly like the Red Wizards being in the 3.5e DMG. If I had my way, they wouldn't be. However, what has really pushed me over the edge from "discontent but still holding out hope that it'll be better than it seems" to "almost certainly not buying it" was when the redefined flavor started to spill over from "examples" (like, say, a Red Wizard) to more central mechanics.

I think the Golden Wyvern Adept feat (discussed in other threads) is a good example of this phenomenon. Yes, I could rename it. But do you know how hard it is to get players who aren't as invested as me to remember the names of their abilities? Even when the names MEAN SOMETHING? How much harder do you think it will be when the name on the sheet doesn't match the name in the book?

With something like that, it's not just a matter of saying "I'm not using that" (like I could with the Red Wizards). I actually have to hand all my players a list a "table errata," and train them all to use different names for things.

That's is the designers actively getting in the way of me running a non-unified experience game (i.e. one that has no place for Golden Wyverns).

 

[Rechan]

So, Planescape can absorb things, but you can't?

Have you guys completely ignored Paizo? Necromancer games? They, it seems, hate the fluff decisions. And will be re-designing the fluff asap.

Seriously, just wait a month or two and you'll have all your 'generic and bland abilities' and 3e Wheel Cosmology and the Blood War right back where it was, like they promised.

I just don't see it. I mean, in my games I don't use alignment. And yet I manage. Despite how everything depends on alignment, from spells to asking you straight up, I just don't bother with it. I hate the core races with the intensity of a thousand suns. And I manage. I hate playing in generic pre-disposed core games where alignment and all the core races are present. I have no empathy for "Well it's just being pushed on me".

So, sorry you don't like it. Welcome to the party.

 

[resistor]

So, Planescape can absorb things, but you can't?

Have you guys completely ignored Paizo? Necromancer games? They, it seems, hate the fluff decisions. And will be re-designing the fluff asap.

Seriously, just wait a month or two and you'll have all your 'generic and bland abilities' and 3e Wheel Cosmology and the Blood War right back where it was, like they promised.

I just don't see it. I mean, in my games I don't use alignment. And yet I manage. Despite how everything depends on alignment, from spells to asking you straight up, I just don't bother with it. I hate the core races with the intensity of a thousand suns. And I manage. I hate playing in generic pre-disposed core games where alignment and all the core races are present. I have no empathy for "Well it's just being pushed on me".

So, sorry you don't like it. Welcome to the party.

Did I ever say Planescape is all I play? I happen to like it, but I've played in Eberron and in homebrews in the recent past. And no, they don't all absorb things as well as Planescape does.

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So your argument boils down to "I'm not happy with the status quo, so other people are wrong for being happy with it?"

I'm sorry, but I don't think I can have a productive discussion with that sentiment in play. G'day.