How Important is Magic to Dungeons and Dragons? - Third Edition vs Fourth Edition

[LostSoul]

If exploration/roleplaying with the DM as a judge is your preferred playstyle then 4E just isn't going to work.

This points to a question I've asked a bunch of times in this thread: why not?

I find this line interesting:

Your DM might rule that you can't use powers in special circumstances, such as when your hands are tied.​

 

[Ariosto]

I see no need at all for FRPG games to limit "the impossible" to just magic.

I, in contrast, see no need to deny the magical in my fantasy games.

If one accepts that breaking the laws of physics is not in itself magical, then I don't think one is likely to complain about 4E doing likewise.

To me, that is a blow against magic. Science has already "disenchanted" the world to a tremendous extent. Countless "magics" of former eras' tales of wonder have been reduced to commonplace gadgets.

Now, it is proposed that even the remaining, common-sense reserve for the endangered species should not be inviolate even in a genre founded on it. It is proposed indeed that mystery -- formerly magic's native habitat -- should be made the one place it cannot reside.

Now, nothing is to be "magical" unless it has been systematically labeled and mechanized, transformed into another technology. To judge from one poster's argument, we should have no more magical flights of hippogriffs.

 

[ExploderWizard]

This points to a question I've asked a bunch of times in this thread: why not?

I find this line interesting:

Your DM might rule that you can't use powers in special circumstances, such as when your hands are tied.
​

Do not confuse exploration/roleplaying playstyle with general exploration and roleplaying taking place in a game session. If the DM and the players are collaboratively creating a story together as the objective of the session, that does not preclude roleplaying and exploration in that game session no matter what system is used to run it.

4E doesn't work for exploration/roleplaying as a playstyle because there are powers and abilities that work for no other reason than to support the story. You could always play earlier editions in the storytelling style if you wanted but the rules functioning within the context of the setting did not depend on that.

LS to answer your question directly, yes the DM can rule that certain powers cannot function under prescribed circumstances if that better fits the story the DM and players are creating together. The DM can also just say that the power works just fine if it was dramatically appropriate. Oh no! We're back to "mother may I!!"

In a game world not dependent on cooperative storytelling to determine what is or is not possible in a given circumstance the player knows that casting spells will not work while bound or gagged and the character will have to come up with another plan. This doesn't mean that the game needs a codified rule for everything.

 

[BryonD]

I, in contrast, see no need to deny the magical in my fantasy games.

I'm gonna leave 4E completely out, because it has nothing to do with my point on it.

But I completely reject that this denies magic in any way.

To stay with my climbing under glass example, improving skill at climbing involves getting better and better at finding holds and establishing / maintaining grip. (I am not a climber, I'm certain it is far more complex, knowledge of equipment, etc... but not really relevant to this fantasy RPG comversation)

At some point physics and the human body reach a point where any further improvement is impossible and/or negligible. But in 3E, you can just keep gaining ranks. Rather than diminishing returns, the effect continues linearly. At no point does this become magic. And I doubt the 20th level rogue has shown up magic in any way when as he clings to the glass with all fours he watches as a 1st level spider climbing mage trots by.

Is splitting an arrow magic to you?
You are being far too black and white for my taste.

 

[LostSoul]

4E doesn't work for exploration/roleplaying as a playstyle because there are powers and abilities that work for no other reason than to support the story.

I think the powers are there to give players more interesting tactical options. I think that's why they were included in the first place. I don't think they have anything to do with supporting collaborative story creation.

LS to answer your question directly, yes the DM can rule that certain powers cannot function under prescribed circumstances if that better fits the story the DM and players are creating together. The DM can also just say that the power works just fine if it was dramatically appropriate. Oh no! We're back to "mother may I!!"

Creating a story isn't the only reason for a DM to make a ruling.

Why can't he make a ruling that the attempted action (be it a power or whatever) doesn't work because it doesn't make sense in the fictional situation - and the reason he's doing this is to maintain a consistent world in order for players to anticipate, learn, explore, and generally be challenged.

Okay, but given that, why wouldn't a 4E DM make a ruling that says a power can't work? Are there other implications that I haven't seen (other than the players having to pay more attention to the fiction and key off of it instead of the battlemat)?

 

[Scribble]

I, in contrast, see no need to deny the magical in my fantasy games.

Well, you're not really. It's just that "Magic" has a somewhat specific nature in D&D, that seperates it for game rules.

IE so that we can have rules for the game part, we need to say magic is X and is effected by A, B, and C, but not H.

This way we can have other effects that in the real world might seem magical in nature if we want, (or at the least super human in nature) but since they aren't magic (as defined by the game) then they aren't effected by the same things that effect what you HAVE defined as magic.

This opens up possibilities as far as I'm concerned. In game it alllows different classes to have different abilities, strengths and weaknesses, while out of game it allows even the mundane to be a little more fundane. (Which is pretty much what D&D has always bowed to, eve before it started to really label categories of abilities and powers.)

 

[ExploderWizard]

Creating a story isn't the only reason for a DM to make a ruling.

Why can't he make a ruling that the attempted action (be it a power or whatever) doesn't work because it doesn't make sense in the fictional situation - and the reason he's doing this is to maintain a consistent world in order for players to anticipate, learn, explore, and generally be challenged.

The DM can make such rulings but thats against the stated design goals of 4E and the powers system. The powers system was designed to make the play experience equal for the player at the table. Whats going on in the fictional world must bend around that. A power just kind of works for whatever reason so that player A can feel equal to player B on a round by round basis. Justify the whys and wherefores to taste.

Okay, but given that, why wouldn't a 4E DM make a ruling that says a power can't work? Are there other implications that I haven't seen (other than the players having to pay more attention to the fiction and key off of it instead of the battlemat)?

Because a player might feel like the DM was infringing on his fun? The right to have powers function as written is part if the guaranteed fun contract that players are entitled to. If you were to rule that a power doesn't function due to consistency/common sense issues for player A then you couldn't let a power that made sense function for player B because that be unfair to player A and could result in unfun.

 

[Ariosto]

Simply hitting one arrow with another is not terribly amazing. I have parted cedar arrows along several inches of their length simply with the shattering force of a target-shooting tip -- and I was a pretty poor marksman!

Splitting the full length of a wooden shaft is highly improbable because (for one thing) the blade tends to follow the twisting grain of the wood. I suppose it might have occurred, but I think the feat was clearly meant to highlight the "larger than (real) life" nature of Robin Hood, a figure of legend.

The ability to accomplish such a shot regularly by choice with a given try would be to my mind as magical as a similar ability to win a game of chance such as a state lottery.

That in fact falls short of literally breaking any known law of physics, if the "by choice" bit is actually just coincidence. Stretch those laws far enough into the realm of improbability -- into the domain of things that might happen once in a number of universes surpassing the number of stars in our own -- and they can accommodate miracles indeed.

So, if actually breaking them is not warrant enough for magic, then what is left as a standard of definition? Only superficials, I fear. To me, that saps wonder not only from the supernatural but also from the natural in contrast with which it has traditionally been defined.

Perhaps the rejection of magic may express, more deeply than its embracing, a flight from reality.

 

[Mallus]

The DM can make such rulings but thats against the stated design goals of 4E and the powers system. The powers system was designed to make the play experience equal for the player at the table.

I think you're reading way too much into the powers system. It is designed with balance between classes in mind, and it does tries to avoid getting bogged down with rules for every corner case (therefore you can trip an ooze!).

However, to suggest that it somehow prevents, or even cautions against, a DM making conditional common sense judgments (and restrictions) seems like a deliberate misreading, one pegged to that already tired argument about how latter-edition players suffer from a sense of entitlement (though I admit, I could be reading too much into your point!).

 

[Ariosto]

Stated or not, the philosophy to which Exploder Wizard referred seems to me pretty clearly expressed in the design. To apply realistic considerations wholesale would, I think, be likely to mess up the game unless done with care on par with the designers' original work. The return on personal effort does not appeal to me -- but who can say what might arise from collective effort over the next few tears?

In the meantime, 4E is definitely not what I would choose for any scenario in which verisimilitude matters. Its strengths by design lie in other areas.