Is 3rd edition too "quantitative"

[Berandor]

Yes, I believe 3rd Edition is too "quantitative". I don't mind the rules, per se. But you can write rules so that they read as rules, or you can write them so that they inspire you.

WotC does the first. Malhavoc, for example, has done the latter (AU).

Estimated Time of Arrival: and I loathe, dislike and despise (but not hate) miniatures combat.

 

[BryonD]

But you can write rules so that they read as rules, or you can write them so that they inspire you.

WotC does the first. Malhavoc, for example, has done the latter (AU).

Interesting how perspectives vary.

I find WotC's rules, because they are just rules, to be more open-ended and thus more inspiring. I found AU to push in a general direction and thus be counter to inspiration. Not anything near absolute, but I'd certainly put AU as less open to inspiration because it has more built in concepts to work around.

 

[ARandomGod]

This is in the DMG. From the notes on the story-immersive game (page 8), the pages and pages of variant abilities, the notes on creating your own cosmology (page 167), the notes on limiting prestige classes - "We encourage you, as DM, to tightly limit the prestige classes available in your campaign" (page 176), there is a great amount of material that can be modified.

Why isn't it in the PHB? Because the players don't need to be confused. In the end, the feel of the game is a group decision, but it is greatly influenced by what the DM wants.

The PHB gives the basic rules of the game - the variants are placed in the DMG and the host of supplements for D&D.

Cheers!

I've read it.
Interestingly enough I think that it's the rules themselves, not the way they're written, that greatly restricts imagination and gameplay. The very nature of the feats and PrC's. The prerequisites. They give all this "flexibility", while simultaniously taking said flexibility away. You can get X. But only if you first have A, B, C. Which means that a player has to decide (s)he want's X some time before getting X. Often at the very beginning of the character's "life". You can't grow into it except perhaps by accident. The way the game is written not only encourages a player to know at the start everything about the character, but actively punishes those who just want to have their character grow. There can be no character development... at least, not outside of what you had better already have figured out.

 

[BryonD]

I've read it.
Interestingly enough I think that it's the rules themselves, not the way they're written, that greatly restricts imagination and gameplay. The very nature of the feats and PrC's. The prerequisites. They give all this "flexibility", while simultaniously taking said flexibility away. You can get X. But only if you first have A, B, C. Which means that a player has to decide (s)he want's X some time before getting X. Often at the very beginning of the character's "life". You can't grow into it except perhaps by accident. The way the game is written not only encourages a player to know at the start everything about the character, but actively punishes those who just want to have their character grow. There can be no character development... at least, not outside of what you had better already have figured out.

WotC points out the merit in adapting and changing materials to fit a given game.
Of course a given standard PClass has fixed prereqs. But if a player decides along the way that their character is evolving into a particular class type, but doesn't meet the prereqs, there is nothing at all wrong in adapting the existing class into a modified version that fits the character concept.

WotC is not punishing players by given examples. But a DM may punish players by confining them to those exact examples.

 

[fusangite]

D&D has finally found its niche (beyond being the first and most popular RPG): it is the quantitative game. When I want to play games that do not emphasize quantitative elements, I don't use D20. But when I do want that codified, quantitative aspect in my gaming, I reach immediately for my D20 rule books. I think it would be terrible if D&D became less quantitative -- then it would go right back to not being good at/for anything. Quantitative, codified gaming is not always what I want to do -- that's why I own other games. I think part of the reason 3.xE is so popular is that D&D has decided to pick a particular thing and do it well; a game system cannot be all things to all people and I hope that D&D doesn't go back to the days when it claimed to be.

 

[mmadsen]

D&D is a game

D&D has finally found its niche (beyond being the first and most popular RPG): it is the quantitative game.

I always found Rolemaster, GURPS, and Hero (Champions) far more quantitative than AD&D, and I'm not sure even the extra crunch of 3E changed that. If anything, the current edition of D&D sets itself apart by acknowledging that it's a game.

 

[Voadam]

D&D is quite quantitative, but the part I find annoying is how complex the quantitative aspects can be, haste doesn't just give you an extra attack it also gives you a +1 dodge bonus, extra movement of a certain amount I have to look up repeatedly, a reflex bonus of a type I have to look up, and an attack bonus. that is just one common spell that means changing stats on a lot of creatures in the middle of combat which might be brought down by dispel magic. And so a summoner with an augmented feat summoning a series of different fiendish creatures then casting group buffs on them quickly takes a bunch of time to crank out the numbers. It makes rapid combat for high level characters against lots of diverse foes more challenging than it needs to be and this is just using pretty core stuff.

 

[Shin Okada]

Rules of current edition of D&D is well-organized and systematic. Far much better then old AD&D rules, which were bunch of unorganized rules just scooped into one bucket.

And now 3.5e has the Basic Game. Something AD&D did not have.

 

[Voadam]

Rules of current edition of D&D is well-organized and systematic. Far much better then old AD&D rules, which were bunch of unorganized rules just scooped into one bucket.

And now 3.5e has the Basic Game. Something AD&D did not have.

?

There was a basic D&D game from the time of AD&D.

 

[Shin Okada]

?

There was a basic D&D game from the time of AD&D.

Wasn't it a Chromatic D&D Basic Game? Chromatic D&D was not AD&D.