gimme back my narration

[Fallen Seraph]

I wish my group would do that. A few of the players do but most of them just say "I use [x, y or z power]". In fact, one of them usually doesn't even use his powers at all - he just attacks everything with his basic attacks. Sigh ...

I get the just saying powers as just being how they play. But only using his basic attack, WAAAA? What is his reasoning for that?

 

[pukunui]

I get the just saying powers as just being how they play. But only using his basic attack, WAAAA? What is his reasoning for that?

Beats me. I think he just finds the powers too confusing or too complicated. Sometimes he'll use his powers, but not very often. And he never uses his divine challenge. He definitely finds that to be too complicated or confusing and I don't blame him. If it were up to me, I'd completely remove all marking from the game, but I've been told off for even suggesting it because that would "weaken" the classes that use it, so I haven't done it.


I think the others just let the "gamist" feel of the powers get in the way of their roleplaying. It's really starting to annoy me.

 

[cr0m]

Pak, that sounds like an entire thread right there.

I went away and thought about everything that's been said in this thread, and changed my mind. I know that's not supposed to happen on the internet, but it did.

I think my complaints are going to go away as I learn the powers, and I can spend more mental power on re-describing them.

Also, I think I was too hard on Umbrian. Sorry, Mr. U. I hadn't had my coffee.

 

[pukunui]

Pak, that sounds like an entire thread right there.

Assuming you're addressing me, you're right. I actually hopped on the boards to make my own thread about it when I saw yours. I suppose I could do a "forked thread" thing or something, eh?

 

[darjr]

Disconnecting words-in-book from words-at-table is a bad, frustrating thing. Worst-case example would be darj's example of "a GM that didn't want to hear the name of the powers"; somehow winding up being prohibited from actually referencing the words in the rulebook would be so complicated and frustrating I couldn't conceivably deal with it.

I'd understand that frustration, but you've taken my example to the extreme. The GM in question wasn't doing that. Maybe I over stated things. There was no prohibition. It was simply a matter of the GM wanting the results of the players actions and the players narration.

 

[Delta]

But this is based on the idea that the game assumes the flavor has an effect on the power. The game does not assume such things. If you want them to have an effect, cool, but the game doesn't assume it to be so...

This has been a similar case throughout the game's history.

I'll object to that. To my eye, the whole "flavor text vs. rule text" is both recent and unwelcome. In Classic D&D the whole work was just "rules". There may have been parts easier to change and parts harder to change, but there was no "fence" between them, and any description had potential side-effects you could use to your immediate advantage in-game.

 

[darjr]

Let me say, first, that when I saw the powers in the PHB that night I brought the book home, my heart sank.

I didn't like it one bit. It seemed contrived and gimmicky and fiddly and that I'd never know it all, and didn't want to.

I'm still not entirely happy with powers. I marvel at what it accomplishes at the table, I really do like how it can work, but I sympathize with those that it strikes as 'off'.

I do, now, like the powers mechanic in part because I've realized I don't need to know them all, I don't even need to really know my own powers by heart. For me the format of them makes it easy to reference on my character sheet or, before a good char sheet, keep my thumb in the PHB. (note, using a good character sheet with room for full descriptions, or cards, is a really good idea)

Making up new fluff started as an accident with me, I didn't know it, and had just written down the name and mechanics, so I faked it. I threw something out on the fly. It was 'Sacred Flame' and I just started saying 'TeBeDi wispers a prayer "May Ilmatar bless you and show us the light"' or a variation thereof. Invention being mom and all that.

reflavoring the entire ruleset is a lot of work. I think it's fair to point out how annoying it is.

Yea, don't do that. Reflavoring the entire ruleset, I agree, would be very annoying.

 

[smdmcl]

Using the Righteous Brand example (not entirely fair, as its one of the worst offenders), it doesn't just brand the enemy, it specifically brands him with a glowing rune. And the power is named after the glowing brand, not the fact that I am hitting the guy, or that it makes it easier for my ally to hit him. So when I reflavor the special effect, I am left with a non sequitur name.

In one of my games I am playing an eladrin cleric of Corellon and I am using Righteous Brand on a regular basis as it is my preferred at-will attack. I have always described it as bathing my target in the "light of the fey" which can be seen by my chosen ally. The description echoes faerie fire of previous editions and the mechanics work exactly as written. If I were a dwarven cleric of Moradin I might flavour the spell as hammering a rune upon my enemy's forehead. A human cleric of Kord might batter his opponent with a mighty blow forcing him to drop his defense against an ally.

I guess re-flavouring and re-skinning have never been a problem for me. I find that 4th edition, more than any edition before it, has freed me to tailor the description of my characters actions to the situation. Gone are the days of multi-paragraph spell descriptions which spelled out every detail of the power being used.

Shane

 

[Kwalish Kid]

*blink*

This isn't something new to 4E. 3E (or at least 3.5) had its italicized spell descriptions. Lots of other games do the same.

I'm not trying to be snarky, I just honestly don't for one second see how reflavoring the fluff is any more difficult than making it up from the get-go.

I'm giving this a lot of thought. Too much thought, since I have other, arguably more important academic work to do.

RPGers need something to be able to change their thinking about the texts they use in gaming. Maybe its training, maybe its some kind of epiphany. However, it is clear from comments on the internet that not every playing is able to re-purpose rules and game product text to meet their game play needs.

I think that when a new edition comes out, RPGers actually may have a harder time re-purposing because they are trying to come to terms with the new content. Part of approaching a new edition is to determine whether or not the rules text is correct. In this context, flavour text is used as a guide in the process of evaluating the rules and is thus given normative status in the gaming experience.

OK, I just used "given normative status in the gaming experience" for my own benefit, let me say it more directly.

Because players of a new edition are using the flavour text to make sure that the rules are correct, they stick more closely to that text than they might otherwise stick. In effect, rather than use the rules to produce the flavour they want in the game, they use the rules to play the game and judge the effectiveness of the rules not only on producing the flavour they want but also on producing the flavour in the rulebook. If these match, great; if not, then there is a problem.

 

[Lord Mhoram]

I guess re-flavouring and re-skinning have never been a problem for me. I find that 4th edition, more than any edition before it, has freed me to tailor the description of my characters actions to the situation. Gone are the days of multi-paragraph spell descriptions which spelled out every detail of the power being used.

Shane

I agree.

I have played Champions/HERO for 23 years, and for those that don't know, in the game (for example) you buy X dice of attack. And the player defines what the attack is - Fire, a thrown hammer, mystic bolts of energy, mutant eye beams, what have you. The flavoring of what the character can do is completely up to the player and GM (and is usually set at time of character creation). The term I see for that is "effects based system" - ie the special effects are defined by player.

I took that approach as a gm in 3rd - I loved the binders, but didn't really like the flavor of it - so in my game I renamed all the vestiges and had them be saints and demons. It fit the Good vs Evil feel of my world.

I see 4E being an extension of that - it is very easy to ignore name and flavor, use the mechanics and flavor it however you want. I wanted to play a monk right out of the gate, and my GM and I came to a compromise - I traded in all the armor proficiencies for a bonus to AC, and came up with a new "weapon" - martial arts +3 proficiency bonus and 1d6 damage.
Then I played a 2 weapon ranger, and every time I used an Exploit, I'd come up with some martial artsy name for the attack. Completely different flavor and almost no work.

The fact that the mechanics and the flavor have been divorced in 4E (i.e. separate sections of power descriptions) makes it easy to modify the look and feel of powers for your own need.