D&D 4E Is there a "Cliffs Notes" summary of the entire 4E experience?

[piffany]

I
Obviously. It's never suggested as an in character mechanic. Neither is picking up a d20.

Right. What I don't understand about this entire discussion is the sort of hidden assumption that "The DM rolling a die to look up something on a loot table" is somehow less metagamey than the player and the DM collaborating to come up with a plausible continuation to the story they are collaborating on. In other words, I agree that 4e uses a different method to resolve questions like this, but I don't accept the idea that it's somehow morally impure / less RPG-ish than any other system that has been used since 1e.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

I said that the wishlist mechanic, from a character's perspective, makes items you want appear in the world.

No, it does not. It is NOT A MECHANIC. It's DM advice! That's a category error!

But it is not a mechanic that it is possible to use in-character

Because it's DM advice...

It's the way the DMG recommends you awarding items, no?

"The trickiest part of awarding treasure is determine what magic items to give out. Tailor these items to your party of characters. Remember that these are supposed to be items that excite the characters, items they want to use rather than sell or disenchant. If none of the characters in your 6th-level party uses a longbow, don't put a 10th-level longbow in your dungeon as treasure.

A great way to make sure you give players magic items they'll be excited about is to ask them for wish lists....(etc.)"

So the 4e DMG explicitly states that the characters find items they want, and recommends a wishlist as a way to ensure that.

Nope. It's DM advice, not a mechanic, not rules, not "explicitly states that".

So a play experience following those recommendations would have items the characters desire appearing in the treasure hoards.

See the word you used there? Not rules, not mechanics, no forcing, just advice you can follow or not.

No, it isn't.

You are not exactly dissuading me here.

 

[BryonD]

I agree with your characterization of [MENTION=42582]pemerton[/MENTION]'s statements.

The point I find contentious is, of course, your view that roleplaying is only roleplaying if you have any capabilities outside of the purview of your character. Quite simply, it's making a semantic distinction that only serves to antagonize people who enjoy those type of games. It's nonsensical to pursue the distinction, other than to be aware that multiple avenues of roleplay exist.

I completely disagree that it only serves to antagonize.

If you prefer blueberry pie to apple pie, then great.
If I prefer apple pie, you should have no problem with that.

If you say that me calling blueberry pie different than apple pie is untrue and just intended to antagonize people who like blueberry pie then I'm going to look at you funny.

I will agree that people do different things under the label of "roleplaying". I don't have a problem with that. But I do think that when you start specifically discussing the distinction between have the powers of an author and not it suddenly becomes important that the precise meanings of the words are tended to.

If you want to provide alternative words for the two different things, I can live with that so long as they are reasonable.

But, then again, when I'm being told that being able to have the power of an author and not having the power of an author are the same thing, it gets hard to have a conversation period.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

"Real RPGs" is a loaded term.
I think the idea of "roleplaying" as being inside the character and experiencing the abilities and limitations therein is obviously reasonable. If you want to say that something that goes beyond that definition is still a "real RPG", then fine. My point is not to get into a "you are not a gamer" kinda silliness.

Then why did you explicitly deny that a bunch of RPGs (including D&D variants) are RPGs?!

That's so odd.

But it becomes impossible to have meaningful exchanges when words stop meaning things.

Precisely my point. You made the term RPG meaningless by excluding huge numbers of RPGs from the definition. You need a totally different term for what it is you're describing. It's not "RPG".

And, regardless, what Perm specifically said to me on more than one occasion contradicts your reply to KM.

I'm not Perm, so no, it doesn't.

 

[Savage Wombat]

Seems to me that this may be at the heart of the edition wars - that two camps have differing ideas over what constitutes role-playing.

If the Alexandrian (and those who reference him) had referred to "first-person full-immersion games" as a separate thing from "story-games", and left the term RPG out of it - would it have been less "dismissive"? Then we'd just be arguing over which style is preferable for D&D.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

If you're referring to "page 42," then I'm given to understand that this is a shorthand for setting the DC of skill checks, rather than attack actions. Even if it's not, however, it's still a very inelegant design to have two completely different mechanics to resolve the same action "just because." It's also still dissociated that one use of that action in an "encounter" is somehow more effective than all the other times.

Your understanding is totally wrong. I suggest you read page 42.

 

[TwoSix]

But not all games co-opt the player's agency of their character which is the point. The character can try to do anything they want, unless they play 4E.

You mean like casting 42 fireballs in any other edition? How agency stripping!

I'm really not sure where you're going with this, Al. (Can I call you Al? You can call me Betty, if it makes you feel better.) You don't like 4E because it has metagame/narrative/dissociation in its powers. OK. Totally cool. What else do you want people to admit? I'm not going to say it's bad, because I like dissociative powers better! They make me feel like I'm really roleplaying, because I get to stretch my creativity and fill in the gaps to make the story fit the game.

And if "I should be able to do special fighter trick whenever I want because player agency" and "It's OK to only be able to cast one fireball because magic" are both things you want to support, than there's nothing to be reconciled in our aesthetic preferences.

But if you keep insisting my game denies the players agency, you can expect to keep being argued with on it. Because you're factually wrong.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

Seems to me that this may be at the heart of the edition wars - that two camps have differing ideas over what constitutes role-playing.

If the Alexandrian (and those who reference him) had referred to "first-person full-immersion games" as a separate thing from "story-games", and left the term RPG out of it - would it have been less "dismissive"? Then we'd just be arguing over which style is preferable for D&D.

Story-games is typically used dismissively, so not really. If he had specific, no-history terms for both, then yes. That doesn't mean his piece would be good or well-reasoned, just the terms not dog-whistles/dismissive.

 

[I'm A Banana]

No, it does not. It is NOT A MECHANIC. It's DM advice! That's a category error!

It seems like you're getting hung up on the word "mechanic" here. I don't want to get knotted up in semantic quagmires. So lets drop that word and call it a "method."

The wishlist is a method the DM can apply to realize the stated goal of players getting items they want, by having them tell the DM what their characters want.

That method cannot be applied in an in-character way, because characters cannot really control the items that they get (though the player can).

This dissociation is a problem sometimes for some people.

 

[TwoSix]

I completely disagree that it only serves to antagonize.

If you prefer blueberry pie to apple pie, then great.
If I prefer apple pie, you should have no problem with that.

If you say that me calling blueberry pie different than apple pie is untrue and just intended to antagonize people who like blueberry pie then I'm going to look at you funny.

I will agree that people do different things under the label of "roleplaying". I don't have a problem with that. But I do think that when you start specifically discussing the distinction between have the powers of an author and not it suddenly becomes important that the precise meanings of the words are tended to.

If you want to provide alternative words for the two different things, I can live with that so long as they are reasonable.

But, then again, when I'm being told that being able to have the power of an author and not having the power of an author are the same thing, it gets hard to have a conversation period.

I don't disagree with you that authorial power and not having authorial power are different. But please, please stop calling one and only one roleplaying. Just don't. Find a different word. It just riles people up. Don't burden the community with prescriptivist nonsense about dictionary meanings. If you want to convey precise meanings, use enough words to make it clear to everyone, rather than boiling it down to one word and asserting your definition is the correct one.