PeterWeller
First Post
JohnSnow said:
This.
Fluff vs Crunch
- Thread starter Agamon
- Start date
This.
BryonD
Hero
I thought one of the very most important elements of design basis for 4E was to make things easier and grow the pool of starter DMs.JohnSnow said:
That said, as an advanced DM, I would also find this trivially easy. It is WotC piling an extra bit of arbitrary random memorization on my (vastly more casual than me) players that ticks me off.
Angel Tarragon
Dawn Dragon
No, you aren't. Fluff is an extension of crunch. If a DM doesn't like it, they are free to change it. As a matter of fact, that is part of what makes a good DM a good DM.Agamon said:
Falling Icicle
Adventurer
Agamon said:
This was being compared to the at will powers Wizards and all other classes will get in 4e. And at least in 3.5 and earlier editions, low level wizards have very, very few spells per day. If you are going to use a wand over, say, a crossbow, you will be using it quite often. I certainly needed alot more than 50 crossbow bolts for my low level wizard.
Whether changing fluff names is a problem depends on the scale.
If Golden Wyvern Adept is the only feat of its kind (or perhaps one of three or four feats), sure, I can rename it and it's not a major issue. If there are twenty of these feats, however--plus spells, monsters, God knows what else--then it's a much bigger problem to laboriously strip all those names out of the PHB, and virtually impossible to get players to remember the changes. Every DM will effectively be stuck with a Golden Wyvern tradition.
We have seen little of the actual rules, so I and many others are concerned that the latter will be the case. Will it, in fact, be so? No way to know for sure; BUT, the time to complain is now. If there are only a handful of fluffy names and we complain, the only harm done is that we look silly when 4E comes out. If there are a lot of fluffy names and we don't complain, though, we'll be stuck with them once the PHB is released.
And the 3.5E gods and their portfolios are a bad comparison. The 3E gods are how they should have done wizard traditions; they're all locked away in their own section of the rulebook, all the associated rules are modular, and with the sole exception of Boccob's blessed book (a 2E holdover), their names are found only in that section. If you don't like the standard pantheon, you can make up your own without having to go through the whole PHB crossing out "Pelor's this" and "Hextor's that."
Also, the idea that Golden Wyvern Adept is descriptive because of some of the lesser-known interpretations of medieval heraldic symbols? I don't know about you, but not all of my players are up on their medieval heraldry. In fact, I should say none of my players are up on their medieval heraldry. The fact that you have to resort to this type of esoteric knowledge only reinforces the point that GWA is not new-player-friendly; it only suggests a meaning once you're already well-versed in the system.
"Power Attack," on the other hand, clearly conveys that this is a way to make your attacks more powerful. You can look up the details when you need them, but if you're trying to pick a new feat and want more damaging attacks, "Power Attack" should draw your attention. If you're in the middle of a battle and need to hit a monster really hard, and you glance down your character sheet looking for options, "Power Attack" is likely to jump out at you.
If "Golden Wyvern Adept" meant that you had learned to control and ride the elusive golden wyvern, it would be descriptive (though "Golden Wyvern Rider" would be even better). Letting you shape your spells? Not descriptive.
If Golden Wyvern Adept is the only feat of its kind (or perhaps one of three or four feats), sure, I can rename it and it's not a major issue. If there are twenty of these feats, however--plus spells, monsters, God knows what else--then it's a much bigger problem to laboriously strip all those names out of the PHB, and virtually impossible to get players to remember the changes. Every DM will effectively be stuck with a Golden Wyvern tradition.
We have seen little of the actual rules, so I and many others are concerned that the latter will be the case. Will it, in fact, be so? No way to know for sure; BUT, the time to complain is now. If there are only a handful of fluffy names and we complain, the only harm done is that we look silly when 4E comes out. If there are a lot of fluffy names and we don't complain, though, we'll be stuck with them once the PHB is released.
And the 3.5E gods and their portfolios are a bad comparison. The 3E gods are how they should have done wizard traditions; they're all locked away in their own section of the rulebook, all the associated rules are modular, and with the sole exception of Boccob's blessed book (a 2E holdover), their names are found only in that section. If you don't like the standard pantheon, you can make up your own without having to go through the whole PHB crossing out "Pelor's this" and "Hextor's that."
Also, the idea that Golden Wyvern Adept is descriptive because of some of the lesser-known interpretations of medieval heraldic symbols? I don't know about you, but not all of my players are up on their medieval heraldry. In fact, I should say none of my players are up on their medieval heraldry. The fact that you have to resort to this type of esoteric knowledge only reinforces the point that GWA is not new-player-friendly; it only suggests a meaning once you're already well-versed in the system.
"Power Attack," on the other hand, clearly conveys that this is a way to make your attacks more powerful. You can look up the details when you need them, but if you're trying to pick a new feat and want more damaging attacks, "Power Attack" should draw your attention. If you're in the middle of a battle and need to hit a monster really hard, and you glance down your character sheet looking for options, "Power Attack" is likely to jump out at you.
If "Golden Wyvern Adept" meant that you had learned to control and ride the elusive golden wyvern, it would be descriptive (though "Golden Wyvern Rider" would be even better). Letting you shape your spells? Not descriptive.
HP Dreadnought
First Post
I don't care how much embedded meaning there is in a name or not.
If a name is cheesy and bad, like GWA, its cheesy and bad no matter how meaningful it is.
In addition, trying to define exactly what qualities make it cheesy and bad is a philisophical question that bears little relevance to the fact that it *is* cheesy and bad.
WotC, you're a great company, and I'm excited about 4th edition. But get your act together on these names! Its like a clan of rabid 13 year olds took over the Corporate offices and it frankly smacks of amateurism.
A name in D&D doesn't have to be "fantasy sounding." If you can't come up with a good "fantasy sounding" name, just make it functionally descriptive and it will work fine.
If a name is cheesy and bad, like GWA, its cheesy and bad no matter how meaningful it is.
In addition, trying to define exactly what qualities make it cheesy and bad is a philisophical question that bears little relevance to the fact that it *is* cheesy and bad.
WotC, you're a great company, and I'm excited about 4th edition. But get your act together on these names! Its like a clan of rabid 13 year olds took over the Corporate offices and it frankly smacks of amateurism.
A name in D&D doesn't have to be "fantasy sounding." If you can't come up with a good "fantasy sounding" name, just make it functionally descriptive and it will work fine.
Lurks-no-More
First Post
Golden Wyvern Adept is nothing compared to Tsojcanth, Zagig Yragerne or the other various pun names Gygax came up with. If people can play Greyhawk without problems, they can and will get over GWA... unless they want to be aggrieved.HP Dreadnought said:
