Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 5985687" data-attributes="member: 42582">It seems to me that you have missed the most important function of keywords. (A function that, unfortunately, the 4e books spell out only in the discussion of damaging objects - the designers seem to have thought that it was otherwise so obvious it didn't need spelling out.)Keywords are the principal - sometimes sole - anchor between mechanics and fiction in 4e.Consider the Deathlock Wight's Horrific Visage power: it is a close blast that attacks Will, does psychic damage, pushes those that it hits, and has the Fear keyword. In the fiction, what is happening when that power is used? The Wight is looking at its enemies (hence a blast - those behind the Wight don't see its face); revealing its true undead visage (normally hidden under a fairer form, I imagine); sending those of weak will fleeing (the push), demoralised (the psychic damage).Take away the damage type, the fear keyword, and will as the defence, and what do we know about what is happening in the fiction when that power is used? Nothing. The keywords are inelminable from an understanding of that power, of why it won't hurt furniture(immune to Will attacks and pyschic damage). Similarly, the Fire keyword is crucial to explaining why Burning Hands will hurt (wooden) furniture - by setting it alight (attacks Reflex, not Will, and tables don't dodge very well).It's true that keywords also play a mechanical role, of hanging other feats and the like on them. But that is secondary to their role in mediating the fiction and the mechanical resolution.It is also true that a typical class wouldn't break if you changed some of it's keywords (though martial PCs without weapon keywords wouldn't work very well, given they have no implement proficiencies). But a magic-user doesn't break if you swap one spell for another. That doesn't prove that there is no meaningful differences between classic D&D spells.In other words, this.</blockquote>

Verification