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"Hot" take: Aesthetically-pleasing rules are highly overvalued
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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8112633" data-attributes="member: 82106"><p>Verbatim duplication would avoid any interpretation/consistency issues. If that's needed in some places, so be it. IIRC 4e duplicated a very few subsystem-like rules, like the Stealth rules, in a couple places. There was also one place where it restated a part of the combat rules (mostly about cover and such). That actually wasn't good, it turned out to be confusing and contradictory!</p><p></p><p>There are generally a few hurdles that D&D has here. There is a long expectation from the established player base that rules will be "realistic" in some sense, as in 3e's approach, such that "an animal" has a single representation in the game regardless of its actual function within the mechanics or fiction. 4e ignored this, and a lot of angst was generated, although at least 4e companions do have stat blocks (albeit they are not identical to those of monster versions of similar animals). </p><p>The other hurdles of course just revolve around the disconnected nature of combat vs 'exploration' or 'general play' and how anything which operates in one of these areas can vary hugely in game impact depending on how a given game is run. So, the BM Ranger in 4e is actually almost TOO strong in a game with little combat, since the beast has almost limitless potential applications in other modes of play. </p><p>Other types of game should handle these things better. One cure would be to have a truly unified system of resolution that was identical for combat and other things. Obviously D&D will never do that!</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 8112633, member: 82106"] Verbatim duplication would avoid any interpretation/consistency issues. If that's needed in some places, so be it. IIRC 4e duplicated a very few subsystem-like rules, like the Stealth rules, in a couple places. There was also one place where it restated a part of the combat rules (mostly about cover and such). That actually wasn't good, it turned out to be confusing and contradictory! There are generally a few hurdles that D&D has here. There is a long expectation from the established player base that rules will be "realistic" in some sense, as in 3e's approach, such that "an animal" has a single representation in the game regardless of its actual function within the mechanics or fiction. 4e ignored this, and a lot of angst was generated, although at least 4e companions do have stat blocks (albeit they are not identical to those of monster versions of similar animals). The other hurdles of course just revolve around the disconnected nature of combat vs 'exploration' or 'general play' and how anything which operates in one of these areas can vary hugely in game impact depending on how a given game is run. So, the BM Ranger in 4e is actually almost TOO strong in a game with little combat, since the beast has almost limitless potential applications in other modes of play. Other types of game should handle these things better. One cure would be to have a truly unified system of resolution that was identical for combat and other things. Obviously D&D will never do that! [/QUOTE]
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"Hot" take: Aesthetically-pleasing rules are highly overvalued
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