D&D General How do you like your ASIs?

[Crimson Longinus]

I must be missing that part of the conversation, because I haven't seen anybody get offended by the assertion that they are conflicted between choosing +1 or the race they'd like to play.

Or maybe you are referring to the use of the word "powergaming". Since it has a negative connotation, I can see how the people in the previous paragraph might be offended by that term.

Perhaps. 'Powergaming' is a strong term and has negative connotations. But I don't think 'optimising' was fondly receiver either. I don't know, I think there should be neutral term for caring about character competence.

Then you get to use whatever rules you want, whether or not they are in the books. Right?

Sure. And I do houserule my game heavily. But ultimately less I want to use the rules as they are, less incentive I have to actually buy WotC products. I have written game systems from scratch for my own use in the past, and whilst I really am not that interested in doing that again, at some point it becomes easier to do that than try to extensively houserule a system that's not working for you. Not that the ASIs are such an issue, they're really easy to houserule. Granted, these threads have made me question the viability of the whole ability score framework in the game, and that is far more fundamental and harder to address issue.

 

[Maxperson]

Fantasy isn't niche anymore and hasn't been for decades now. Even among D&D newbs, dwarf warriors and elf wizards have been done to death in vigeo games, board games, war games, books, TCG, movies, anime, manga, manwha, minis, cartoons.

And Garden Gnomes

I'm pretty sure my wife has at least 1 gnome wizard, the Iron Throne Gnome, 3 witch gnomes and a zombie gnome in with our plants.

 

[Maxperson]

I just realized something. I keep seeing these two arguments against floating ASIs:

1) "This is about people wanting to be special snowflakes."

2) "This is going to result in no meaningful differentiation between characters."

Hmmmmm.

And the most common argument 3) if you're going to represent a race as stronger than other races, the strength score should get a bonus to reflect that, otherwise they aren't truly stronger than the other races. Same with the other stats and other races. If you represent strength only through racial abilities, but not the strength score, you have a race which is simultaneously stronger and not stronger than other races, which is nonsensical.

 

[Bill Zebub]

I didn't ask you about technology.

I asked you about floating ASI's.

Do you really think people who like this rule want the world to cater to them? Are you critiquing the rule or the people?

You are forgetting that people who like floating ASIs and people who post every detail of their life on Instagram in order to generate likes are the same people.

At least, that is, according to Get Off My Lawn (tm) theorists.

 

[Lanefan]

Yeah but mechanics can matter.

If I don't wanna play a spellcaster, I don't wanna play a spellcaster. And in 5e, that leaves you will 3* options.

*Monks don't count.

Talk to the 5e designers about that one, not me, as I agree there's way too many caster classes.

 

[Lanefan]

I can see how you'd reach that conclusion, but no, I would never eliminate classes. They do constrain your options, but they offer major benefits to make up for it. Ability scores (IMO) do not.

The class system allows the designers to custom-tailor a suite of mechanics to fit a particular concept; ensure those mechanics work in harmony; balance them against other classes across a range of power levels; and present the entire package as a single choice to be made at chargen. This is incredibly helpful to the novice gamer, who can just pick an option off the menu and be done. And for the veteran, these customized suites greatly extend the replay value of the game. Bored with playing wizards? Try a warlock, or a fighter, or a rogue--it's a whole different way to D&D*.

This kind of thing, where you get a packet of mechanics bundled together in service to a concept, is one of D&D's strongest features. But I want the packets to be as independent as possible, allowing them to be mixed and matched. So you pick your class, and your race, and some skills; and ideally any combination of these things should result in an effective character. That ideal may be impossible to achieve in practice (and feats are a whole other can of worms), but it's possible to get tolerably close.

The bolded undercuts the rest of what you're saying, I think; as if the packets are fully mixable and matchable then you've got a system where the classes are nothing but pre-fab packet kits with cool names attached for new players or those who needs a PC Right Now.

Ability scores introduce a ton of unnecessary dependencies. Class, skills, and (until TCoE) race all hook into ability scores, and you get punished mechanically for choosing combinations that don't fit.

As I prefer that there be some advantage to leaning into an archetype as opposed to trying to fight it, I don't mind that going against type means a bit of swimming against the tide.

On top of that, ability scores themselves have concepts attached to them, telling you that your character is strong or weak, smart or dumb--so that's another factor pushing and pulling at your stat picks, depending on how much you care about it.

What other mechanism would you use as a means of comparison between creatures as to their physical and mental abilities (or lack of)? E.g. this dog is smarter than that dog, and both of them intellectually blow away this pigeon...but by how much, in each case?

After that, how would you numerically abstract the results of said comparison in order to make them both understandable by the players/DM and mechanically useful in play?

And they add substantially to the complexity of the game, and the concepts attached to them are sloppy and ill-defined (is Wisdom perceptiveness or willpower? and why the hell would you describe either one as "wisdom?"), and they've got the silly split between "bonus" and "score" where you almost always care about the bonus but once in a while you want the score instead.

I agree that some of the definitions could use some work. But I've no problem with needing the score sometimes (I use a roll-under system which makes the actual score quite relevant) and the bonus other times - I don't think that "split" really adds tany more complexity than needing to roll a d20 for some things and a d6 for others.

 

[Azzy]

There is a huge influx of new players to the game that find rules "boring and hard". These people want 5e to be more "free form" aka easier to play. There are those of use who recognize the roots of the game are based on a brutal game. Chars died often. Failure was omnipresent.

But that kind of game does not fly with the new players, who watch Critical Role, which has zero in common with the older D&D.

Narrative play, not fantasy Vietnam, has been what most players have wanted since 2e (maybe even late 1e). Hell, I started in 86 and had no desire for Gygaxian play.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Narrative play, not fantasy Vietnam, has been what most players have wanted since 2e (maybe even late 1e). Hell, I started in 86 and had no desire for Gygaxian play.

Fair enough, but should we always cater to what the majority wants? Is some kind of compromise possible? And how far along the path of narrative play is too far? 5e (actually, Level Up) is about as far in that direction as I want to go, personally.

 

[BookTenTiger]

Fair enough, but should we always cater to what the majority wants? Is some kind of compromise possible? And how far along the path of narrative play is too far? 5e (actually, Level Up) is about as far in that direction as I want to go, personally.

Who is "we?"

If the question is "should WotC cater to what the majority wants" then I imagine the answer is... yes?

If the question is "should Micah Sweet cater to what the majority wants" then I imagine the answer is no?

 

[Crimson Longinus]

People make such weird correlations. What not liking fantasy Vietnam has to do with wanting halflings who are as strong as half-orcs? Because I don't want either, nor I think these things have anything to do with each other.