D&D General ENWorld is better that the pundits…change my mind

[MichaelSomething]

I honestly don't know how to respond to the rest of your post. Your anecdotal experiences are so alien to my own anecdotal experiences that we seem to be living in completely different spheres. I don't know which of us, if any, is the outlier.

Do you think D&D can accommodate the both of you? If not, which one of you should be catered to and which one should be ignored??

 

[guachi]

Heck, you even get a subset of folk for whom the very notion of "building" a character is anathema - so we have everyone covered regardless of preference (for good or ill).

In a Level Up game I'm running one of the players didn't like his PC. He made a new one focused on having as high a Perception as he could manage (19 Passive Perception at level 3) and he also ended up with a really high Insight.

Mechanically, he was a really good build. All of the other players, who are new to RPGs, thought the players old PC was a much better character. He wasn't just stats on a page. He was cool. I felt the same way.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Yeah, this is something I saw several times among people who bounced off PF2E. The game assumes a decent amount of cooperation between characters, and many people couldn't just "play the character they want", they had to engage with the system. Put four people together "just playing the characters they want" and things can get ugly in PF2E.

A DM can always adjust for it, of course.

Okay, this is something I can work with.

It immediately invites a follow-up question:

Why do people want to play a cooperative game that expects teamwork...by playing whatever they want with zero consideration of their friends and what they're doing?

Because that, that very specific thing, is what I meant by asking for a triangle and then demanding that it have four sides. That is, you sign up for something that tells you, over and over, in no uncertain terms, that it's for teamwork. Meaning, the team should work together. You should be thinking about that. You should not be totally 100% self-focused with zero interest in or understanding of your friends and what they're doing/interested in.

But to "just play the characters they want", you are very specifically saying that the players completely ignore their so-called teammates. Each one focuses on herself and only herself. Each one selfishly pursues his own gains and benefits, without any thought to cooperation.

Those two things are incompatible demands. If D&D is to be a team game--and by all indications, the overwhelming majority desires it to remain so!--it cannot also be a game designed to let players select their characters with significant (or even total) disregard for what their allies are doing.

 

[payn]

Okay, this is something I can work with.

It immediately invites a follow-up question:

Why do people want to play a cooperative game that expects teamwork...by playing whatever they want with zero consideration of their friends and what they're doing?

Because that, that very specific thing, is what I meant by asking for a triangle and then demanding that it have four sides. That is, you sign up for something that tells you, over and over, in no uncertain terms, that it's for teamwork. Meaning, the team should work together. You should be thinking about that. You should not be totally 100% self-focused with zero interest in or understanding of your friends and what they're doing/interested in.

But to "just play the characters they want", you are very specifically saying that the players completely ignore their so-called teammates. Each one focuses on herself and only herself. Each one selfishly pursues his own gains and benefits, without any thought to cooperation.

Those two things are incompatible demands. If D&D is to be a team game--and by all indications, the overwhelming majority desires it to remain so!--it cannot also be a game designed to let players select their characters with significant (or even total) disregard for what their allies are doing.

It’s always been a team game even the loneliest of wolves must work with the other players to become a godwizard. The difference is the team work is more passive and the individuals can contribute individually alongside the others as opposed to the design making them a team that must “bump, set, spike” off one another to succeed.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

It’s always been a team game even the loneliest of wolves must work with the other players to become a godwizard. The difference is the team work is more passive and the individuals can contribute individually alongside the others as opposed to the design making them a team that must “bump, set, spike” off one another to succeed.

Over the years we did some crazy stuff with party composition. But even with evil parties, it was mutual aid to win the day.

In 1e we ran all one class a few times…or primarily one class with an add on…

Our only real limit was generally compatible alignment…a paladin in a party of evil assassins was not gonna be fun.

 

[payn]

Over the years we did some crazy stuff with party composition. But even with evil parties, it was mutual aid to win the day.

In 1e we ran all one class a few times…or primarily one class with an add on…

Our only real limit was generally compatible alignment…a paladin in a party of evil assassins was not gonna be fun.

I think that highlights a good point as well. Folks who play a more old school West Marches style cant count on having a full team set of roles represented to make the game work every week. Neither could Adventure League now that im thinking about it.