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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Crazy Jerome" data-source="post: 5637336" data-attributes="member: 54877">Yesway, if the only possible choices were the 3E way and the 4E way, when it came to having fairy tale things act with their full oomph, then I might agree with you.  At the very least, I'd be happy to have both systems to choose from, so that I could switch my priorities with my system, as needed. But having recognized the issue in the 3E way, why would it be necessary for 5E to undo what 4E did to solve the new issue?  In another topic, I'm already on record as saying that I think artifacts and rituals should be explicitly fenced off from the rest of the system, allowed to be wildly unbalanced, and be a lot more prevalent.   That is, if you ask me in D&D if a wizard should be able to shout Hocus-cabra, and nigh instantly turn his foe into a toad, and failing a save, he stays that way until changed back--I vote no.  Have a much weaker version or not (your choice) for combat.  Probably have it, as you don't have to use it if you don't want.  But then the really effective, mythologically evocative, version can be a ritual, take some time, etc.  If the bad wizard can pin the hero down long enough, toad-dom here we come. And I'll keep right on saying that as long as a wizard spell means, "mark off a slot and nasty thing happens, absent saving throw."  It bypasses the whole hit point mechanic, with all kinds of bad side effects.  In Fantasy Hero, for example, we don't have that issue.  Spells can fail and cost energy--and the stronger the effect, the greater the risk and cost.  If the caster wants to get the opportunity cost back down to something reasonable, they have to start taking lots of extra time or make it easier to disrupt or all kinds of choices. Now, if you wanted to say that (low-grade) Powers or (stupendous) Rituals is too binary, and you'd like something in the middle, then that is definitely a design hole.  I'm not sure how well it can be filled in the D&D manner, but it is a hole. However it is filled, if at all, the costs of doing things in the middle needs to be inline with the results. And like I'm sure that we could never have had 4E without the effort that 3E put into standardization, I'm sure that 5E can improve on 4E--in part because 4E solved some problems, and made the next set more apparent.</blockquote>

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