Oh, and to N'raac, I think it was above: (my internet is on cell tower right now, its a struggle to quote) , no, I'm not judging player oratory (in diplomacy check) skill, I just love getting some dialog in those situations, even if plainly stated. A negative modifier would only occur if the player purposely said something very silly, to give us all a laugh, and they would still have the benefit of their skill. And they would know they were incurring a penalty, so its all in good fun. "Hey sexy. You gonna let me see the King?", and they crit the roll despite the penalty, and we all laugh hysterically, that kind of thing... you know quotable moments can be great campaign memories , even memes...
Fighters vs. Spellcasters (a case for fighters.)
- Thread starter cross ofth carpenter
- Start date
Ahnehnois
First Post
[MENTION=221]Wicht[/MENTION]
Exactly. It's far more likely that the players will feel constrained by the rules and ask the DM for an exception than that they will fill constrained by the DM and throw the rules in his face.
And ideally, neither of those things will happen.
Exactly. It's far more likely that the players will feel constrained by the rules and ask the DM for an exception than that they will fill constrained by the DM and throw the rules in his face.
And ideally, neither of those things will happen.
Sure. The DM doesn't have to say "no". He simply says something other than "yes, I'll do whatever you want".
ImperatorK
First Post
Yeah, that was kinda my point...
Ahnehnois
First Post
I'm agreeing.
Wicht
Hero
I think his point was nobody was arguing otherwise... The beauty of an open system is that there are a near infinite number of possibilities as to how it will play out. The players do not have to have automatic success as they envision to still have eventual success. Saying that the set-up may preclude possibility A working exactly as desired does not mean that there are not other avenues still open. But some want to make it either/or, and it very rarely, in most games I have observed, been that way; especially when playing with adults and not teenagers on a power-fueled-ego trip.
Aenghus
Explorer
One reason for the use of DM force is to patch inconsistencies between the simulated depiction of the world within the rules and how the DM wants the world to work. I've seen and read DMs who think 0-level rulers exist in D&D worlds and have real power. Further, while ruler being a pawn of the power behind the throne is common, I have seen assertions that 0-level or non-classed rulers can stil have real power.
But such figures are easily killed or manipulated, the latter especially by magic, so access to such people needs to be controlled to forbid undesirables (typically including the PCs, (correctly in many cases)).
Charm Person as a spell has steadily lowered in power through the editions. I don't know the really early days, but I first encountered it in AD&D where it could be the only offensive spell of a 1st level M-U and so players were really encouraged to talk it up as much as possible, and Dm's were inclined to let it be useful (also to give players an option to just casting Sleep). Charm person in 1e could last for weeks between saves, and was often treated as virtual slavery - I remember articles and at least one adventure with such an interpretation.
A M-U having a charmed fighter bodyguard recruited from their foes was typical in some of my early games.
In later editions there were more options, more spell slots, and players could generally pick their starting spells, which meant Charm Person dwindled in power to something more appropriate to a 1st level spell.
Whether npcs could recognise subtle magic attacks was another issue lacking rules in earlier editions, and the Dm's and players opinions on this would colour the effectiveness of subtle vs flashy magic. Most D&D games I am familiar with allowed a certain amount of stealth casting of spells like charm person, possibly with the risk of discovery. In a lot of games even being discovered casting didn't reveal the spell involved in most cases. Naive Dms could have even low level adventurers stamp all over low level NPCs. Which often caused a backlash, making those NPCs invulnerable instead, which preserved the DM's plot but often at the cost of railroading the players.
But such figures are easily killed or manipulated, the latter especially by magic, so access to such people needs to be controlled to forbid undesirables (typically including the PCs, (correctly in many cases)).
Charm Person as a spell has steadily lowered in power through the editions. I don't know the really early days, but I first encountered it in AD&D where it could be the only offensive spell of a 1st level M-U and so players were really encouraged to talk it up as much as possible, and Dm's were inclined to let it be useful (also to give players an option to just casting Sleep). Charm person in 1e could last for weeks between saves, and was often treated as virtual slavery - I remember articles and at least one adventure with such an interpretation.
A M-U having a charmed fighter bodyguard recruited from their foes was typical in some of my early games.
In later editions there were more options, more spell slots, and players could generally pick their starting spells, which meant Charm Person dwindled in power to something more appropriate to a 1st level spell.
Whether npcs could recognise subtle magic attacks was another issue lacking rules in earlier editions, and the Dm's and players opinions on this would colour the effectiveness of subtle vs flashy magic. Most D&D games I am familiar with allowed a certain amount of stealth casting of spells like charm person, possibly with the risk of discovery. In a lot of games even being discovered casting didn't reveal the spell involved in most cases. Naive Dms could have even low level adventurers stamp all over low level NPCs. Which often caused a backlash, making those NPCs invulnerable instead, which preserved the DM's plot but often at the cost of railroading the players.
This is roughly how Burning Wheel works. It depends fairly heavily on a fairly tight constraint (by D&D standards) on PC power levels. And it also has other mechanical devices (both with respect to player resources and action resolution) to ensure that players can achieve finality in resolution, without everything being dependent on GM adjuciation of when, in "reality", a task would have been successfully completed.
It's an interesting system, which in my view resolves many of the problems facing gritty games like Runequest and Rolemaster.
Because I've never tried, I'm not sure how amenable 3E is to being run this way. I suspect you could probably play E6 or P6 along these sorts of lines.
No. In my experience, at least, good CoC play (i) is a lot of fun, and (ii) depends almost entirely on GM force.
But GM force is not the only technique going, and I personally prefer, as a GM, to use other techniques and to use a system that will support those other techniques without the need for force. (Adding for completeness: I don't regard myself as good CoC GM material.)
In my case, "DM plans" = framed scenes. If they're boring, you just bring them to an end (eg NPCs surrender; the PCs succeed; conflict otherwise is resolved in the PCs favour).
If you have a GM who, on a regular basis, can't frame interesting scenes, that's a basic GMing problem which system, or force, won't fix.
If you have PC builds which, on a regular basis, cause scenes which should be interesting to become boring in resolution, that's a system issue. Scry-buff-teleport is frequently an instance of this; so, I believe, is 3E Diplomacy in at least some uses. Save-and-die more generally is subject to criticism on these grounds.
In the indie playstyle, the stakes are generally set by the players in the abstract - "Here are the things we, via our PCs, care about" - and by the GM in the particular - "Here's a scene in which one of those things is under threat". If the GM says yes, and therefore gives the players want they want and the players were hoping to struggle for it, that is bad GMing. (Luke Crane has a nice discussion of this in the BW Character Burner.) If the game doesn't create engaging play, for a table, out of the PCs' struggle, then as I just noted that is a sign of a system problem.
In the wargame playstyle, the stakes are generally set by the GM. Classic D&D tournament play is a limiting case of this.
Different systems have different ways of resolving this. It also depends on what is action resolution and what is scene framing. [MENTION=16586]Campbell[/MENTION] said some sensible things about this 20 to 30-odd posts upthread.
Campbell said some sensible things about this too, to do with the transparency to the players of what is at stake and what is possible within a given situation.
Agreed.
My own preference is for a game system which doesn't require the GM to oversee PC build in this sort of way.
Wicht
Hero
So I got ahold of the 4e DMG just to see what it said. Glancing through the book, I must admit that it seems to go out of the way to reduce DM authority and elevate player authority, making it the only DnD DMG to do this that I have seen. There is no explicit statement making the DM the final authority, seeming to prefer group votes, and even, in one example bragging on allowing a 9 yr old to dictate to the DM what was in a room. There are references to the DM as referee, but it goes out of its way to downplay the idea that a Dungeon Master should be the one ultimately in charge of a game.
Having seen thus that in Moldvay, 1e, 2e, 3e, and PF, explicit statements telling DM's that they have the authority to do whatever is necessary to make a game run smoothly, 4e stands as a striking departure from this tradition. I guess I somewhat better understand then why those that prefer 4e, and whose most recent experiences are 4e, might find DM authority troubling. It might even explain the colored memory some have towards these other editions.
Having seen thus that in Moldvay, 1e, 2e, 3e, and PF, explicit statements telling DM's that they have the authority to do whatever is necessary to make a game run smoothly, 4e stands as a striking departure from this tradition. I guess I somewhat better understand then why those that prefer 4e, and whose most recent experiences are 4e, might find DM authority troubling. It might even explain the colored memory some have towards these other editions.
So for 10 years you've been arguing about this? Sounds like it's pretty serious to you.
Here's all I have to say on what I think is the subject here, though perhaps I'm missing the point:
I like Fighters and Paladins. Always have, and I've never seen them as unplayably weak. I only dislike them (and everything else) if I'm playing 4e, which makes them too caster like in its obsession with "balance". I also like Clerics and Wizards, in any non-4e version, but a guy with a sword and bow is a lot of fun, and I'll pick it more often than not.
I do not think MU/Wizards/Sorcerers, etc. are "better" or cooler than Fighter-types, any more than I think Radiomen in RECON (Vietnam/modern warfare RPG) are cooler than snipers, machinegunners, medics, combat engineers, dog handlers, or pointmen. I do not think there's anything "broken" about only a Radioman being able to act as a Forward Air Controller, or the enemy concentrating aimed fire on the radio operator (identifiable at close range by the tell-tale antenna on his back/lack of armor in D&D) and then any heavy weapons operators. It's just playing the NPC's accurately to their intelligence, and letting each PC do that PC's thing.
If your players aren't primarily concerned with one-ups-man-ship of each other and are faced with truly dangerous challenges, surviving and winning as a team is much more important than worrying about who had the signal honor of radiotelephoning in the fire request that result in the most enemy KIA's, rather than the honor of first detecting the enemy presence, or suppressing them with the M-60 until the support comes on line, or dragging the wounded guy to safety, etc.
If you go by valor citations in the real world, most people think "clerics" are way braver/cooler than "wizards". Any you know what? In the "Temple of Elemental Evil" computer game that tracked my stats, my clerics always had the most kills, due to tons of undead blasting. So are CLERICS unbalanced? I say "no/who cares, just play the game".
Which is a long way of saying: I'm pretty sure the rules/concepts that seem wrongbadfun to you seem fine to me. But after 10 years, no one is going to convince anyone to understand RPG's differently.
Well that's not true. Just in the last year alone I've changed my understanding of RPGs thanks to conversations like this on En World. I say, carry onward! Discussions should be heated and passionate, just not personal, and for the most part, these conversations haven't been, when potentially they could have been.
We need to continue talking about these things, not necessarily for our own benefit, but for those who might be watching and listening and discovering their own preferences.
Similar Threads
