Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Ariosto" data-source="post: 4773626" data-attributes="member: 80487">Fanaelialae's post on the previous page illustrates, I think, the fundamental approach to powers in 4E. Druid and Warlock are supposedly &quot;magical&quot; classes, but they can be treated as representing a &quot;martial&quot; character who uses machinegun and grenade.It's like Risus, only orders of magnitude more complicated. It's also reminiscent of the generic powers with &quot;special effects&quot; overlaid in Champions.That's a fine kind of game, and I don't think discussions such as this would have arisen in the first place if it had been called &quot;Magic: The Ambiguation&quot; instead of &quot;Dungeons &amp; Dragons&quot;.Relative to D&amp;D, it's upside-down and backwards. Instead of starting with an imagined world and then making up algorithms to represent it, abstract rules take precedence and the world is made to conform to them.The distinction may be lost on those long accustomed to treat D&amp;D as a set of literal rules rather than a collection of guidelines, which I think was not as far from the intent of the designers of 3E as from that in previous versions. With 3E, the attempt was made to provide a comprehensive &quot;world machine&quot; analogous to that in Champions, something into which one could put a &quot;what if&quot; question and get out an answer with some internal consistency and a genre-reflecting sort of verisimilitude.The rules-lightnesses at the core of the TSR games can from that perspective be misleading. What Armor Class and Hit Points &quot;mean&quot; is a subtle matter, an abstraction derived from experience with historical war-gaming. A combat that literally consists of nothing but &quot;roll to hit, roll for damage&quot; with set factors, the numerical results being interpreted after the fact into a narrative, differs only in simplicity from the richness of abstract &quot;tactical options&quot; in 4E.However, that is just a starting point. The examples of elaboration in supplements and later editions are notably directed at &quot;simulation&quot; of one aspect or another of the imagined situation. It was not presumed that such charts and procedures were either necessary or sufficient for proper adjudication of the myriad circumstances that arise in play. Any referee worth his salt would bring to bear a vastly more copious &quot;tool kit&quot; of common sense, knowledge and reason. Experience of the real world was the baseline, the default &quot;set of rules&quot;.In other words, what was intended (and by the target demographic generally understood) as descriptive is misunderstood as prescriptive. Most of the old familiar criticisms of D&amp;D begin with that fundamental misunderstanding.Some elements of the classic design certainly are &quot;pure game&quot;. Getting experience points for treasure comes to mind as one commonly house-ruled, and notably changed in the &quot;official, standard&quot; rules of some later versions. Understanding the rationale behind it may be helpful even to those desiring a different method. The same can apply to other features.What seems to be coming to a head now is a long-brewing disjunction between the original &quot;prototype first, malleable rules&quot; view and the more recent &quot;model first, malleable world&quot; view. (Other rifts are also very evident, but perhaps less germane to the discussion at hand).One thing I have learned the hard way is that it is easier to complicate a basically simple and modular game than to simplify (or to change the &quot;paradigm&quot; of) a complexly integrated one. Wizards of the Coast came out of the gate with the latter, and 4E stays that course. Its major departure is in what it's trying to accomplish.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Ariosto, post: 4773626, member: 80487"] Fanaelialae's post on the previous page illustrates, I think, the fundamental approach to powers in 4E. Druid and Warlock are supposedly "magical" classes, but they can be treated as representing a "martial" character who uses machinegun and grenade. It's like [B]Risus[/B], only orders of magnitude more complicated. It's also reminiscent of the generic powers with "special effects" overlaid in [B]Champions[/B]. That's a fine kind of game, and I don't think discussions such as this would have arisen in the first place if it had been called "Magic: The Ambiguation" instead of "Dungeons & Dragons". Relative to D&D, it's upside-down and backwards. Instead of starting with an imagined world and then making up algorithms to represent it, abstract rules take precedence and the world is made to conform to them. The distinction may be lost on those long accustomed to treat D&D as a set of literal rules rather than a collection of guidelines, which I think was not as far from the intent of the designers of 3E as from that in previous versions. With 3E, the attempt was made to provide a comprehensive "world machine" analogous to that in Champions, something into which one could put a "what if" question and get out an answer with some internal consistency and a genre-reflecting sort of verisimilitude. The rules-lightnesses at the core of the TSR games can from that perspective be misleading. What Armor Class and Hit Points "mean" is a subtle matter, an abstraction derived from experience with historical war-gaming. A combat that literally consists of nothing but "roll to hit, roll for damage" with set factors, the numerical results being interpreted after the fact into a narrative, differs only in simplicity from the richness of abstract "tactical options" in 4E. However, that is just a starting point. The examples of elaboration in supplements and later editions are notably directed at "simulation" of one aspect or another of the imagined situation. It was not presumed that such charts and procedures were either necessary or sufficient for proper adjudication of the myriad circumstances that arise in play. Any referee worth his salt would bring to bear a vastly more copious "tool kit" of common sense, knowledge and reason. Experience of the real world was the baseline, the default "set of rules". In other words, what was intended (and by the target demographic generally understood) as [I]descriptive[/I] is misunderstood as [I]prescriptive[/I]. Most of the old familiar criticisms of D&D begin with that fundamental misunderstanding. Some elements of the classic design certainly are "pure game". Getting experience points for treasure comes to mind as one commonly house-ruled, and notably changed in the "official, standard" rules of some later versions. Understanding the rationale behind it may be helpful even to those desiring a different method. The same can apply to other features. What seems to be coming to a head now is a long-brewing disjunction between the original "prototype first, malleable rules" view and the more recent "model first, malleable world" view. (Other rifts are also very evident, but perhaps less germane to the discussion at hand). One thing I have learned the hard way is that it is easier to complicate a basically simple and modular game than to simplify (or to change the "paradigm" of) a complexly integrated one. Wizards of the Coast came out of the gate with the latter, and 4E stays that course. Its major departure is in what it's trying to accomplish. [/QUOTE]

Verification