Has D&D become too...D&Dish?

[Raven Crowking]

Now, as for magic shops, it did seem awfully artificial that never under any circumstances would magic items be bought or sold. The 2nd Edition book DM's Option: High Level Campaigns was particularly condescending about it (in a book with otherwise good ideas), and even had a silly picture of a wizard shopping at a Wal-Mart like store for magic items with bargain bins of wands to show how magic shops are inherently ridiculous and against the core ideas of D&D.

And yet, in their infinite wisdom, the creators of 3e chose to change the ideas to meet the rules, rather than changing the rules to meet the ideas. :\

As others have noted, 1e and 2e campaigns were not all low-magic settings. Many people included magic shops in their campaigns, even if the majority did not, and doing so did not cause them to re-write the rules to compensate. Conversely, 3.x has the idea of the magic shop firmly planted in the rules. While I don't believe the rules need to be vastly rewritten to preclude them, it does require more work, and many people are under the impression that the system will implode without ready Mage-U-Marts.

I am not alone in thinking that this cheapened the sense of wonder created by the game. Nor is this, as some would love to believe, nostalgia -- sense of wonder requires the unknown or a sense of the unknown. It requires some idea of things that are larger than yourself. It requires, in a word, mystery. 3.x made things so knowable that most of my major revisions were designed to inject mystery back into the rules.

RC

 

[wingsandsword]

I am not alone in thinking that this cheapened the sense of wonder created by the game.

I am not alone in thinking that this made the worlds of D&D make far more sense, and strain suspension of disbelief far less, to make magic items a tradable and valuable commodity.

As for all the vaunted "mystery" of playing D&D, I do think that's nostalgia speaking. When you're new, it's all shiny and fresh, and you really are wondering what that does and what that's like. Magic stores didn't take the mystery away, playing and running D&D for many years did. Magic stores not being in the way you remember things is what takes it away.

When I first played D&D, yes, there was so much mystery in everything, what is that monster, what does that spell do, how can they do that? Later, as you get higher level with your characters and learn more of the rules, play other classes, even run a few games yourself and create a homebrew world maybe, you answer many of those questions.

Magic shops aren't against the core ideas of D&D, and nothing short of a mindwipe for the player will restore that same wide-eyed freshness that the game had back when you were first sitting down at it.

 

[Hussar]

Conversely, 3.x has the idea of the magic shop firmly planted in the rules.

Source please?

I've got a poll floating around here that shows that magic shops are by no means the rule of the day in most campaigns. While buying magic is possible in most campaigns, and many mention that it is mostly limited to potions and scrolls and wands, the idea of wide open magic shops is most definitely not hard wired into the rules.

 

[Nebulous]

It boggles my mind that you think pinning down fantasy as a quantifiable cause-and-effect thing (i.e. a science) is going to improve sensawunda, instead of inevitably grinding it to dust.

Not improve, it's just another option. I prefer the old style sense of wonder in magic myself, but i have no problem with settings and authors exploring all the options out there. Regardless, it will appeal to someone, somewhere.

 

[Raven Crowking]

I am not alone in thinking that this made the worlds of D&D make far more sense, and strain suspension of disbelief far less, to make magic items a tradable and valuable commodity.

True. But that doesn't mean that making magic items a valuable commodity should be hard-wired into the game.

As for all the vaunted "mystery" of playing D&D, I do think that's nostalgia speaking.

Nah. Any DM worthy of the title can create mystery and a sense of wonder in a setting. I'll go so far as to say that, within Eberron, the presence of magic-as-technology can be used to create a sense of mystery and wonder in much the same way that steamworks in a Victorian setting can be used. In a recent thread, Wizzbang Dustyboots mentioned changing the description of bugbears to owl-headed humanoids for an adventure, so that the creatures would seem like something new and unknown. This has nothing to do with nostalgia; it is a primary component of sense of wonder.

Magic shops can certainly work within a world, but they take more work than they are generally given to avoid feeling cheap. In 2e, magic shops were specifically part of the Spelljammer setting, where the authors attempted to interject a sense of the wondrous to them through the creation of the Arcane. The Arcane were also an attempt to deal with the obvious "Why not just steal from the magic shop?" question.

Are magic shops against the core ideas of the D&D rules, at least in previous editions? Somebody wise once said

Now, as for magic shops, it did seem awfully artificial that never under any circumstances would magic items be bought or sold. The 2nd Edition book DM's Option: High Level Campaigns was particularly condescending about it​

which makes it seem as though he believed that the designers thought it was against the core ideas of the game. However, I could be mistaken.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Source please?

The equipment lists in the Player's Handbook is a fairly simple place to start.

IMHO, your poll shows that people do not automatically accept the assumptions in the rules; it does not show that the assumptions are not there.

RC

 

[WayneLigon]

Source please?

The equipment lists in the Player's Handbook is a fairly simple place to start.

The only magical items mentioned in the PHB equipment lists are Holy Water and the Everburning Torch, both of which are the absolute simplest items to make without an XP cost. (Back in 1E and 2E you had the same thing; after the cleric hit third level nobody ever bought a lamp, candle, torch or any other form of lighting ever again.) The rest of the unusual stuff in there is mundane alchemical equipment that anyone with enough ranks could make.

Now there is the phrase about you generally being able to find anything under 3000gp that you might want but even then it says for something like a +2 long sword you might have to travel to a large city that deals in rare items (emphasis mine), or find someone willing to make the trip, or commission it.

All in all, I'd prefer the (at last) stated ability to simply commission or maybe outright purchase such items than treating every +1 hunk of tin like a king's ransom, or having
'DM advice' such as suggesting that pretty much every attempt at magic item purchase lead to fraud.

 

[Raven Crowking]

The only magical items mentioned in the PHB equipment lists are Holy Water and the Everburning Torch, both of which are the absolute simplest items to make without an XP cost.

Your PHB doesn't list scroll and potion costs? Did they drop that with 3.5?

Now there is the phrase about you generally being able to find anything under 3000gp that you might want but even then it says for something like a +2 long sword you might have to travel to a large city that deals in rare items (emphasis mine), or find someone willing to make the trip, or commission it.

The rules dealing with what can be purchased in a community in the DMG are also a fairly obvious place to look.

RC

 

[ThirdWizard]

In 3e, what is the standard combat round like?

...

For my money, something that is streamlined goes faster. 3e is elegant (unified mechanic) but not streamlined.

Your 3E combats are very unlike mine. I guess your 1E/2E combats were also unlike mine.

But, yes, 3E combat rounds are longer. I don't think that means they're less streamlined, though. You can do more in a 3E combat round than you could in a 2E combat round, so they're going to be longer.

The rules dealing with what can be purchased in a community in the DMG are also a fairly obvious place to look.

There are a lot of things wrong with those equasions... If anything in 3E should have been changed for 3.5, that's it. What were they thinking???

On a side note you can make a pretty wonderous magic shop. Well, weirder stuff is easier in Planescape, so I might be biased. But, its still one of the more interesting and strange places the PCs frequent and has turned into a place to go for more than just magic items.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Your 3E combats are very unlike mine. I guess your 1E/2E combats were also unlike mine.

It seems likely.

But, yes, 3E combat rounds are longer. I don't think that means they're less streamlined, though. You can do more in a 3E combat round than you could in a 2E combat round, so they're going to be longer.

It seems to me that it isn't what you can do that makes the round take so long, but figuring out what to do. From my perspective as DM, I can move the opponents as fast as ever. I either have notes as to what they will do, or I don't care if their actions are sub-optimal. I want to keep the game flowing.

From the PC side of the table, though, sub-optimal actions are potentially lethal actions. So, from that plethora of choices, what do you choose to do? Moreover, although the system is designed to allow the PCs to perform cool stunts, all too often all that hemming and hawing about what to do ends up with the exact same set of combat actions that happened the round before.

I really need to inject an extra helping of Iron Heroes into the combat rules at my table. At least that way, for the time spent, there'll be more bang for the buck. Otherwise, thus far, swashbuckling cards and action points seem to be the best bet.

There are a lot of things wrong with those equasions... If anything in 3E should have been changed for 3.5, that's it. What were they thinking???

Here we agree.

On a side note you can make a pretty wonderous magic shop. Well, weirder stuff is easier in Planescape, so I might be biased. But, its still one of the more interesting and strange places the PCs frequent and has turned into a place to go for more than just magic items.

Again, I agree that it can be done. H.G. Wells wrote a story or two, for example, about magic shops that were pretty well done. But I also think it most often is not done well. Nor is a magic shop the kind of thing that works well in every setting. IMHO, and IME, the magic shop hurts more games than it helps (but those that it helps can be spectacular).

RC