In my opinion:
Games in which the imagined material has an effect on the mechanical resolution.
That has a subtlety to it that I didn't notice upon a first, cursory glance. Care to expand on this?
This reminds me of the what I would call the Uber Rule: DM Fiat. It also reminds me of that excellent house rule
"The Virtual Roll" from the Ars Ludi blog where instead of a making a die roll for a social skill check, the player roleplays the situation and the DM assigns a number from 1-20 based upon how well the player roleplays.
This approach could be applied to any situation to some degree, even combat. For example, the DM could assign a "heroic bonus" based upon how the player describes their character's attack action.
Huh?? Is this another suggestion that all us "old-school" players must be freaking geniuses because we can handle tossing six-sided dice sometimes?
At semi-random ...
Slaying Strike Rogue Attack 15
[... eight lines of specifications ...]
Special: If the target is bloodied, this attack does 5[W] + Dexterity modifier + Strength modifier damage on a hit (half damage on a miss) and can score a critical hit on a roll of 17-20.
Well, that's sure got plenty of, uh, sturdy viscera of plasticine, or something. Not like the rocket science involved in rolling 5 dice for damage ... oh, except that you are rolling 5 dice for damage ... except on a hit against a target that's not bloodied, when you roll 3 ... or on a miss, when you do half damage. Ah, but at least those are all d20, eh? Er, no. D6? Well, actually, it depends on the weapon -- maybe d6, maybe d8, maybe d4.
You're taking this a bit further than I meant it. I am contrasting the core d20 game engine with the "heapism" of earlier editions in which different actions require different mechanics.
Now the problem comes (and came) when you add on all sorts of conditional modifiers (see Shades of Green quote below) and end up with an even more complex game, and all because the core mechanic
is simpler and thus can "hold" more complications.
So yeah, the d20 game engine is simpler than previous editions, but the game (3E) is more complicated because of the vast array of modifiers and options that have been attached to it. It is a case of enantiodromia, really.
The problem with 3E is not its core mechanic. To the contrary, the unified, simple, intuitive core mechanic (1d20+mods for target number or higher, higher total = better), as well as the reduction of restrictions on class and race combinations, were some of its best innovations.
The problem with 3E is that, on that simple core mechanic, a lot of additional rules and statistics are heaped. Stat blocks are long; character sheets are crowded; and therefore designing anything - PC, NPC, monster, spell and so on - takes a lot of time. This made prep into a chore as a DM, and levelling up a character was also a bit complicated (especially in regard to skills).
Well, exactly. This is where many, myself included, take issue with 3E. That, with its ugly and despised cousin named
System Mastery, which is basically just another variant on Revenge of the Nerds.
The way I see it, there are two schools of thought as regards character creation. I'm going to call them the "prix fixe" and the "a la carte" schools.
SNIP
Nice post. And yeah, I think you are right about these two approaches, both of which can be seen quite clearly in the Talislanta game; 1-4th editions were "prix fixe," 5th edition was "a la carte."
My view is that D&D
should accomodate both, including the extremes of both rather than only its "left of center" approach ("left" being the more liberal a la carte method). Why not have three general options:
1) Archetypes or templates that would represent common and/or well playable character types. They could be pre-set race-class-culture combos or builds specific to a campaign setting (e.g. "Dunedain Ranger of the North" or "Red Wizard of Thay"). The only thing the player would have to do would be to assign ability scores and maybe choose a race.
2) Standard race-class combinations. Could still be the default mode of play.
3) Class-less play. You choose a race and then you build from there. This could also be done with a neutral class like "Adventurer" in which you can pick and choose your capacities. This wouldn't necessarily be a jack of all trades as it could be a specialist, and the player could define the character as he or she advanced rather than planning a career path from the get-go (which is somewhat inevitable with the current system, especially with the prerequisites required for many paragon paths).
D&D has never done the third option, afaik, or at least not well.
If we go back to the idea that 5th edition "should" be modular and include a simpler core set with advanced options, the core set would include the first two options with character Archetypes set to the default setting and a few core races and classes (say, human, elf, dwarf, and halfling; and fighter, wizard, rogue, and cleric). Only with later supplements would the 3rd option be introduced, as well as other races and classes.
This is sort of how I am modeling my homebrewed rules mashup. Three classes: fighter, cleric, magic user each with a variety of themes to choose from that grant different abilities. The skills system is independent of class and more focused on the benefits of training rather than having sky high ability scores. Each class gets equal levels of skill training and no restrictions on skill choice. Want a thief? Just choose a fighter theme focused on light weapons and quickness and train thief skills as your primary skillset-done.
