Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 6732487" data-attributes="member: 42582">Yes. I know that.Yes, I know he is saying that. If it's true that you started playing D&D in 1985, then I was familiar with this particular approach to play (especially from the writings of Lewis Pulsipher) before you started playing the game.The thing is, this is not literally true. Most GMs label the rooms on the map, and then have a separate bit of paper on which they right down the details, under the relevant labels. And different GMs write down differing degrees of detail.Suppose, for instance, that the GM doesn't write down the colour of the roof. What happens if the players ask "What colour is the roof?"? The GM can't answer that it is colourless. S/he has to make something up. And making up that stuff can have downstream consequences. For instance, suppose s/he tells the players that the roof is grey in colour. And suppose the players know that the belly of a lurker above is typically grey in colour. The players can then try to have their PCs trick NPCs into not entering the room - "Don't go in there - look up at the roof - that's actually a lurker above!" Which is to say, the improvised detail might actually matter to gameplay down the line.Also, none of that is about trying to work out what method the GM used to generate that content. And it in no way depends on whether the GM generated the content randomly or non-randomly. (Except that if the GM has in fact just rolled a lot of bat-like creatures as wandering monsters than the players could form a hypothesis about their being a lair or passage which is, in fact, just wrong.)Yes, the players need to learn that hill giants live in hills, that fire giants live in volcanoes etc. But they don't need to learn whether the GM put these fire giants in this volcano because s/he rolled on the "volcanic regions encounter table" or because s/he thought it was a good idea.No. There is no rule that tells the GM whether or not s/he can place a monster and/or a treasure in this room or in that. (And Gygax expressly encourages the GM to manage treasure placement so as to avoid too much.)Neither of those sentences is true. The altar to the alien god is on the "gameboard", but the alien god need not be. The GM is allowed to place the altar, then make up stuff after the event. In the real world, this is actually how a lot of GMs invent a lot of stuff!Note that in classic D&D there is no "game score" that is role-relative. All players earn XP in exactly the same ways (enemies defeated, loot collected).It wouldn't be. For instance, that advice would have very little relevance for the players in my game.It can have relevance for a game in which improvisation takes place, however. For instance, none of that advice becomes invalidated if the GM improvises rules for swimming, for jumping, for using insulated poles to try and disarm electricity traps, etc. Because none of that advice has any bearing on the action resolution mechanics.What makes you think that things that happen in the length of a campaign in "non-design, improv sessions called games" can't affect anything or everything else that ever happens? I've had experiences that contradict this.For instance, in an early session of my 4e game the gods gave one of the PCs the task of rebuilding the Rod of Seven Parts. That has affected a great deal else of what has happened in the campaign.I think this claim is in tension with your claim that "it isn't a simulation of everything that anyone could ever think of". I have never had the second law of thermodynamics come up in over 30 years of GMing until one of my players thought of it and brought it into the game!By your measure craps is not a game, given that it has no board or "design". Yet if anything counts as gaming, surely craps does!In the system I was using, the basic rules are quite clear: the player has to roll a d20, add relevant bonuses, and reach a pre-defined target number. The target number is read from a chart with three columns. The GM has to choose which column (Easy, Medium or Hard) is used. I chose the Hard column, for exactly the same reasons that you say "such a powerful effect" and "such a level of effect". The player then generated bonuses to the roll by making choices which the system permits to be made - in this particular case, spending resources (healing surges/hit points). The system is not broken - where did it break?The player is rolling to find out whether or not the PC succeeds at his attempt to seal the Abyss. At that level of description, it's not different from rolling to see whether or not the PC succeeds in hitting an orc in melee.I don't know why you say the effect is unbalanced. Where is the lack of balance? I also don't see why you say it is not possible in the game. One of the explicit uses of Arcana skill, per the game rules, is to manipulate magical effects.As I posted upthread, this is the 4e analogue to creative spellcasting. You may be familiar with the rule in the AD&D books that a Light spell can be cast on a creature's eyes to blind it. Where do you think that rule came from? What would you have done, a GM, the first time a player attempted that? The rulebooks wouldn't have given you an answer.I think the notion of "usurpation" has no work to do here. Suppose it's true that more people enjoy playing my way than your way. And, as seems likely, that many more again prefer playing adventure paths than prefer either your way or my way. That's not a "usurpation" of anything. It's just people engaging in the hobbies they enjoy.</blockquote>

Verification