How do you feel about Fluff in your Crunch?

[Wormwood]

I'd say, based on everything we've seen, there is one. It doesn't have a name or nations or NPCs or anything, but it seems one will be referred to in the core books.

Looks like it to me.

As a lazy DM, I can only express my appreciation.

 

[Simia Saturnalia]

Looks like it to me.

As a lazy DM, I can only express my appreciation.

I like homebrewing, but I'm a top-down kind of guy, so I appreciate having something to run while I fill binders.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I like a bit of fluff in my crunch, when it is brief and really good fluff. Otherwise, I'd just as soon not have it. Plus, my preferences for what is "really good fluff" are apparently different than most other peoples' preferences. However, having been this way my whole life, I long ago learned to read past the fluff as if it wasn't even there. I've always separated the mechanical aspects of the game from the flavor actually happening in the campaign going on at the table. (For example, there are no "fighters" in our D&D campaigns, as far as the people in the campaign are concerned. There are various warriors, soldiers, etc that we model mechanically as fighters.)

So I'm mainly down for "don't care"--with the caveat that I don't want to have to read through a whole lot of fluff to find a ruling. But silly names for feats? Doesn't bother me.

 

[Uzzy]

Looks like it to me.

As a lazy DM, I can only express my appreciation.

As a lazy DM, I can only express my annoyance at having to strip out these 'fluffy' names from what should be a core book, in order for them to make sense in my campaign, which then means I have to deal with the 'Wait, when we say 'Shape Spell', we should be looking up the 'Golden Wyvern Adept' feat?' issues.

Believe me, I love pouring through fluff. I love it when the fluff of a setting impacts on the crunch, but I don't like being forced to strip out fluff before adding my own in. Just keep it out the main books! Don't force the core, assumed setting down the throats of everyone.

 

[Najo]

The main issue is traditionally, D&D has been about core rules with little fluff and then settings that add fluff on. It also has had class abilities, feats, powers and spells that for the most part you undertood the names of them and what they do. Here they seem to be changing that.

The problem, it will make it harder for settings to plug on like they have in the past. That in my opinion is bad.

It also seems that by taking away flexibility and attaching fluff to the chrunch, they are taking something that is very subjective (whether or not you like golden wyvern adept) and using it in place of something that would disappear into the background and run as a mechanic out of sight (using a name like shape spell instead for example).

That is the issue. We need mechanics that can disappear so our own stories can come forward, not be forced to use poorly concieved fluff that is fluff just for fluff's sake.

 

[Wormwood]

Don't force the core, assumed setting down the throats of everyone.

I unserstand your frustration, but the more fluff is in the main book---the more fluff will make it to my table.

 

[Counterspin]

They could number the classes and the feats for all I care. I want the system to be strong and I could not possibly care less about the names. We don't use build information (class, feats, etc.) at my table anyway. I hope all the spell shaping spells will have the Golden Wyvern prefix, because that will make finding them easier, but other than that I don't see any name having any impact on my game.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

I want an option that reads:

I like fluff, but not this fluff. This fluff is awful. Also, even if I liked this fluff, put it in a sidebar for core mechanics like wizard categories and feats. Keep the organizations and schools and things to the campaign settings where they belong.

 

[Lonely Tylenol]

Listen to Thornir, he is wise.

People complained endlessly that 3e's core books were bland and boring. Absolutely no flavour. Well, be careful what you wish for. You wanted flavor in your core books, now you got it in spades.

Who complained this? Not I. I complained that they were using the presence of Greyhawk as the implied setting as an excuse to not publish a Greyhawk supplement. I didn't want all sorts of fluff in the core books. Look at the organization that is appended to the Complete Arcane Warmage as a sidebar. Perfect example of how fluff should work. Here's the mechanical part with generic fluff ("warmages study at martial schools where they learn magic"), here's the more specific fluff that you can keep or throw away (a particular warmage school based in a Greyhawk location).

 

[Li Shenron]

People complained endlessly that 3e's core books were bland and boring.

That's not true. For instance, when they removed all the wizardly names like Mordenkainen from spells, most people said that WotC was doing a good move.

You are confusing the core books with supplements: part of the gamers (but probably the minority anyway) complained that there were too many crunch-heavy supplements and wanted some fluff-heavy books for a change.