Menu
News
All News
Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
Pathfinder
Starfinder
Warhammer
2d20 System
Year Zero Engine
Industry News
Reviews
Dragon Reflections
Columns
Weekly Digests
Weekly News Digest
Freebies, Sales & Bundles
RPG Print News
RPG Crowdfunding News
Game Content
ENterplanetary DimENsions
Mythological Figures
Opinion
Worlds of Design
Peregrine's Next
RPG Evolution
Other Columns
From the Freelancing Frontline
Monster ENcyclopedia
WotC/TSR Alumni Look Back
4 Hours w/RSD (Ryan Dancey)
The Road to 3E (Jonathan Tweet)
Greenwood's Realms (Ed Greenwood)
Drawmij's TSR (Jim Ward)
Community
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Resources
Wiki
Pages
Latest activity
Media
New media
New comments
Search media
Downloads
Latest reviews
Search resources
EN Publishing
Store
EN5ider
Adventures in ZEITGEIST
Awfully Cheerful Engine
What's OLD is NEW
Judge Dredd & The Worlds Of 2000AD
War of the Burning Sky
Level Up: Advanced 5E
Events & Releases
Upcoming Events
Private Events
Featured Events
Socials!
Twitch
YouTube
Facebook (EN Publishing)
Facebook (EN World)
Twitter
Instagram
TikTok
Podcast
Features
Top 5 RPGs Compiled Charts 2004-Present
Adventure Game Industry Market Research Summary (RPGs) V1.0
Ryan Dancey: Acquiring TSR
Q&A With Gary Gygax
D&D Rules FAQs
TSR, WotC, & Paizo: A Comparative History
D&D Pronunciation Guide
Million Dollar TTRPG Kickstarters
Tabletop RPG Podcast Hall of Fame
Eric Noah's Unofficial D&D 3rd Edition News
D&D in the Mainstream
D&D & RPG History
About Morrus
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
Forums & Topics
Forum List
Latest Posts
Forum list
*Dungeons & Dragons
Level Up: Advanced 5th Edition
D&D Older Editions
*TTRPGs General
*Pathfinder & Starfinder
EN Publishing
*Geek Talk & Media
Search forums
Chat/Discord
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
The
VOIDRUNNER'S CODEX
is coming! Explore new worlds, fight oppressive empires, fend off fearsome aliens, and wield deadly psionics with this comprehensive boxed set expansion for 5E and A5E!
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
D&D Older Editions
Keith Baker on 4E! (The Hellcow responds!)
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="Ximenes088" data-source="post: 4125726" data-attributes="member: 59899"><p>Well, suppose you do run a political, low-combat game. What advantage is gained by allowing players to eliminate their combat skills and double their noncombat skills? The end result will be a group of PCs with roughly identical levels of noncombat skill... which is exactly the same result as you get if you let them all stay baseline. </p><p></p><p>It's the D&D equivalent of taking "Save or die versus laser damage" as a character weakness in a campaign with no lasers, and then getting perks in exchange for the "weakness". If D&D is designed to allow people to utterly gimp themselves in talents they will never need in exchange for being doubly good in talents they will always need, then I can't help but see it as a fundamental destabilization of the system. It opens the gap between PC capabilities yet wider for a given power level, because a given challenge can no longer assume that the PCs will have around X resources available, but must contend with the risk that one or more of the PCs may have as little as 0 or as much as 2X of the relevant mojo. That's just not good design for a game like D&D.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Ximenes088, post: 4125726, member: 59899"] Well, suppose you do run a political, low-combat game. What advantage is gained by allowing players to eliminate their combat skills and double their noncombat skills? The end result will be a group of PCs with roughly identical levels of noncombat skill... which is exactly the same result as you get if you let them all stay baseline. It's the D&D equivalent of taking "Save or die versus laser damage" as a character weakness in a campaign with no lasers, and then getting perks in exchange for the "weakness". If D&D is designed to allow people to utterly gimp themselves in talents they will never need in exchange for being doubly good in talents they will always need, then I can't help but see it as a fundamental destabilization of the system. It opens the gap between PC capabilities yet wider for a given power level, because a given challenge can no longer assume that the PCs will have around X resources available, but must contend with the risk that one or more of the PCs may have as little as 0 or as much as 2X of the relevant mojo. That's just not good design for a game like D&D. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Community
General Tabletop Discussion
D&D Older Editions
Keith Baker on 4E! (The Hellcow responds!)
Top