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<blockquote data-quote="francisca" data-source="post: 1578532" data-attributes="member: 9734"><p>Well, one of the things 3E purports to do is to standardize these sorts of things, for better or worse:</p><p></p><p>(Preface all of this with "In my opinion,")</p><p>For the better: </p><p>1) Rookie DMs have some guidelines and are less likely under or over challenge the players. Of course, this is dependent on the CR and other assorted ratings being close to reasonable for the character party.</p><p>2) DMs are encouraged to create interesting opponents. They are encouraged because they have the backing of the rules, which at least make an honest attempt at balance by providing a CR and how to recalculate it as you add templates, etc... Without a rule in print, many DMs (especially those who didn't play previous editions) don't want to do this sort of thing. You have to worry about that Kobold standing in the back of the room now (well, at least more often than in 1E). Is he casting a spell?</p><p></p><p>For the worse:</p><p>1) If you do it by the book, as many players and DMs insist, you cannot wing it unless you have a good portion of the ruleset memorized, or have incredibly good organization and can quickly find the info you need. Without what amounts to "instant access" to the particular rule/feat/skill, etc.. the game will bog down while you flip pages. Either way, the DM must spend a lot of extra time before or during the game to locate, memorize, or organize all the materials. There is no getting around it. there is simply way more info to process than in previous editions.</p><p>2) Astute rules-oriented players can guess what sort of power their opponents are wielding, because they can consult the same rulebooks as the DM. To me, this changes the game to a resource management problem, rather than a game of heroic adventure.</p><p>3) If you deviate from the rulebooks to keep your players off balance, you will probably run afoul of a good portion of 3E players because of your ad-hockery and disregard for game balance.</p><p></p><p>So, there is the give-and-take as I see it. In 1E, you had to trust the DM not to screw you. An inexperienced DM who tinkers with creatures by adding spellcasting, etc.. can realy hose the players bad. But come to think of it, so can a 3E DM. But at least with 3E, the players can point to the rule book and say that a particular encounter had too high of CR, etc... (Yet another example of how 3E is player-oriented, rather than DM-centric.)</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="francisca, post: 1578532, member: 9734"] Well, one of the things 3E purports to do is to standardize these sorts of things, for better or worse: (Preface all of this with "In my opinion,") For the better: 1) Rookie DMs have some guidelines and are less likely under or over challenge the players. Of course, this is dependent on the CR and other assorted ratings being close to reasonable for the character party. 2) DMs are encouraged to create interesting opponents. They are encouraged because they have the backing of the rules, which at least make an honest attempt at balance by providing a CR and how to recalculate it as you add templates, etc... Without a rule in print, many DMs (especially those who didn't play previous editions) don't want to do this sort of thing. You have to worry about that Kobold standing in the back of the room now (well, at least more often than in 1E). Is he casting a spell? For the worse: 1) If you do it by the book, as many players and DMs insist, you cannot wing it unless you have a good portion of the ruleset memorized, or have incredibly good organization and can quickly find the info you need. Without what amounts to "instant access" to the particular rule/feat/skill, etc.. the game will bog down while you flip pages. Either way, the DM must spend a lot of extra time before or during the game to locate, memorize, or organize all the materials. There is no getting around it. there is simply way more info to process than in previous editions. 2) Astute rules-oriented players can guess what sort of power their opponents are wielding, because they can consult the same rulebooks as the DM. To me, this changes the game to a resource management problem, rather than a game of heroic adventure. 3) If you deviate from the rulebooks to keep your players off balance, you will probably run afoul of a good portion of 3E players because of your ad-hockery and disregard for game balance. So, there is the give-and-take as I see it. In 1E, you had to trust the DM not to screw you. An inexperienced DM who tinkers with creatures by adding spellcasting, etc.. can realy hose the players bad. But come to think of it, so can a 3E DM. But at least with 3E, the players can point to the rule book and say that a particular encounter had too high of CR, etc... (Yet another example of how 3E is player-oriented, rather than DM-centric.) [/QUOTE]
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