Discussion - General Discussion Thread 2010-17

[Rae ArdGaoth]

Hey, cool, that's three! Under the current rules, that's enough to approve a proposal. And we only need two for an adventure. If anybody has an idea for an adventure, there's no need to wait, just go for it!

On a different tack, do you think that the character approval process is an unnecessary barrier to entry?

I have my own opinions, but I'd like to hear what others think.

 

[jkason]

I'm still subscribed to the general thread, though I'll admit I've not put any energy in the direction of LEW in ... a while.

The other living games also have an approval requirement, so I don't think that's really a barrier so much as I think the rules edition is naturally falling to the wayside. I'll admit, at this point, I've been playing Pathfinder long enough that it actually takes me a fair bit of brain-twisting to remember 3.5 for the odd character approval I get to (despite giving it a decent go over on L4W, 4e never really clicked for me).

Unless 5e really does allow for incorporating 3.5 material in a meaningful way, I'm not sure there's really much that can be done to curb a natural move for folks away from the ruleset on which LEW's based.

 

[Rhydius]

On a different tack, do you think that the character approval process is an unnecessary barrier to entry?

Having just been through the approval process, I think it works well. Having not put together a character in a while, I had several mistakes pointed out to me that could have become issues later on if my character hadn't been reviewed.

 

[Rae ArdGaoth]

I never liked the 4e rules, but maybe I'm just crotchety. =)

I also like the approval process, though I will be the first to admit that I could be a lot more prompt in responding to requests. If you guys create a sense of urgency for me by starting adventures, I will be faster, I promise.

 

[covaithe]

When I set up the approval process for L4W (cribbing heavily from LEW's rules), I was primarily concerned with preventing attempts to cheat. As far as I can tell, that just doesn't happen. People don't seem to want to cheat at PbP. They make mistakes, yes, and having someone else go over your sheet to look for mistakes really is helpful, but I don't think it's nearly as important now as I thought it was back then.

In particular, I don't think it's very important to have all the mistakes fixed before starting an adventure. Yes, it's probably better to find out your +4 should be +3 before you start making attack rolls... but it's not game breaking if you swing a few times with the wrong bonuses.

So IMO if we think that the approval process is interfering with playing the game in some way, there's plenty of room to relax the process without risking disaster. On the other hand, it's not clear to me that the approval process is a problem for LEW. It seems like the (fairly few) people who submit characters get prompt responses -- at least compared to L4W, where we suck at this. If the process of actually filling out the character sheet is too hard... well, maybe. What could we do about that? Not clear to me.

 

[Scott DeWar]

I always liked the approval process because it showed what my mistakes were.

 

[Rae ArdGaoth]

So, who's got an adventure to run?

 

[Kaleva]

I have been interested in started an adventure. What party level would be best?

 

[epicbob]

I'd start one but I'm not yet familiar with LEW's setting.

The one I AM familiar with would be best started in the "Playing the Game" section.

 

[Rae ArdGaoth]

I think low-level, like 1 or 2, would be best. There are plenty of low-levelers already, and it would be available to any new folks who are just lurking.

I also humbly recommend that your first adventure be incredibly small in scope. I planned for Parade II to have three encounters and last one month. We've just now barely finished encounter one, and it's been five months. (Admittedly, that's largely a fault of my own deliquence, but it's never as short as you think it will be.)