"'Kill it before it grows'...he said 'Kill it before it grows'..."

[Celebrim]

No separate XP progression, either. Along with randomness, I think its inimical to a balanced play experience.

I'm not interested in bringing separate XP progression back either, but I think this is poor logic. Separate XP progression is a reasonable tool for bringing balance where it would otherwise be difficult. One of the problems D&D has always faced is that some classes power level increases more exponentially than others. Differing XP progression is a way to turn a more linear classes power progression into a more exponential progression.

And its pretty easy to implement as an option as well. Everyone uses a unified XP progression table, but have the classes that need a boost to balance them gain an X% bonus on earned XP. So if you want rogues to advance slightly faster than other classes because you think they've been nerfed, give them a 8% bonus on earned XP. Or if think Bards and Monks suck, give them a 12% bonus on earned XP. One advantage here is that you can tweak that number to a very fine degree - probably finer than you can reasonably expect to estimate the difference in utility of the classes.

What a nightmare that was back in 1e/2e with individual XP awards. D&D is a cooperative game where the party should rise and fall together.

Huh? I don't understand that at all. To be frank, it sounds like you got burned by an unfriendly social dynamic and are blaming it on the system. I still use individual XP awards, and I haven't had any real problems. Do you award XP to an individual who wasn't even there? Suppose one member of your party is separated from the rest and solos a CR+2 monster by himself, barely surviving, while his friends who are looking for him run over a CR-2 encounter with ease? Do you give them the same XP? If you do, don't think that giving the same XP in that situation is just as likely to cause social conflict in a table prone to it as not giving the same XP would in another situation? If the table is prone to competitiveness to the point of arguing over a difference in 10 or 100 XP, then its just going to argue about unfairness regardless of what you do.

And no save or die/suck/lose. I want to PLAY D&D. Not fail a die roll and watch my friends play. As someone else posted, if the only action I can take for ten minutes is to go get another beer, the game has failed me.

Yeah, I have a feeling that we should never game together. I'm ok with having mechanics that mitigate luck and prefer graduated failure to sudden failure, but I see no fundamental difference between failing a saving throw and being paralyzed and recieving a critical and being knocked unconscious. If you demand 'no save or suck', then it seems like you are ultimately suggesting 'my character shouldn't ever fail, because if it does the game has failed me'. I don't see how I can reconcile that with any game I'd want to play.

 

[Hassassin]

That's really interesting (no snarky intended) I was assuming that most people these days like point buy. I guess it depends on what edition you are playing.

In my experience when a char was crippled people just give up the game or asked for rerolling a new char, so rolling was banned from my games.

At least in 3e, the difference between poor rolls and great rolls isn't all that much in the end.

If you use the standard rolling method (4d6 - lowest, reroll if all < 14 or sum of modifiers < +1), your main ability will have at most a -2 effect (compared to perfect) on the things you do. That's a difference of 10% units on a d20. For secondary scores the difference will usually be even smaller, and on average you'll have better secondary abilities than with point buy.

Sure, character optimizers care, but it's not going to ruin a game.

 

[Felon]

There no shortage of those kinds of people talking about D&D online. Do you honestly think they accurately represent the majority of D&D players? If so, why?

I have one deal-breaker re: 5e. It has to play faster than 3e or 4e (at least in its default configuration).

Why do you feel that the online community doesn't mirror the actual community? I actually am also referring to sessions at the local hobby shop where there's a melodramatic outburst a couple of times per night. I'm talking about sessions at conventions where the DM tosses out a few hold persons and silenced arrows and the session's over. I'm talking about people that I counted as friends for many years but eventually outgrew playing D&D with.

Some people are attracted to D&D--and DM'ing in particular--because it makes them feel empowered. There are folks who fantasize about having authority, and DM'ing is that outlet. Of course, not having experience with actual authority, they don't know how to exercise it. They feel that belligerence or derision are the proper way to react when someone challenges them.

Then are the "auteur" DM's who feel that the PC's job is to follow the script and hit their marks. The gaming community is steeped with these people. Such DM's might let players create whatever characters they want (because the characters are ultimately just spectators), but they're also likely to strip all those needless choices away (because the characters are ultimately just spectators).

Ultimately, I would say that in this hobby, most people are either introverts or extroverts, and it's a minority that actuality fall towards the center of that spectrum. And beyond gaming,, people in general have poor conflict resolution skills.

 

[Dragonblade]

I'm not interested in bringing separate XP progression back either, but I think this is poor logic. Separate XP progression is a reasonable tool for bringing balance where it would otherwise be difficult. One of the problems D&D has always faced is that some classes power level increases more exponentially than others. Differing XP progression is a way to turn a more linear classes power progression into a more exponential progression.

I think trying to fix class imbalance by slowing progression is putting the cart before the horse. The real problem is the fact that classes are imbalanced in the first place. Fix that and there ceases to be a need for different rates of advancement.

Huh? I don't understand that at all. To be frank, it sounds like you got burned by an unfriendly social dynamic and are blaming it on the system. I still use individual XP awards, and I haven't had any real problems. Do you award XP to an individual who wasn't even there? Suppose one member of your party is separated from the rest and solos a CR+2 monster by himself, barely surviving, while his friends who are looking for him run over a CR-2 encounter with ease? Do you give them the same XP? If you do, don't think that giving the same XP in that situation is just as likely to cause social conflict in a table prone to it as not giving the same XP would in another situation? If the table is prone to competitiveness to the point of arguing over a difference in 10 or 100 XP, then its just going to argue about unfairness regardless of what you do.

My preferred method of advancement is not even track XP at all and just let the DM decide when everyone levels up based on the needs of the narrative and the group itself. Thats how I usually run things, but sometimes I'll do XP.

For players who achieve something dramatic like defeating a monster by themself, I think you can offer alternative awards. In 4e parlance, I would give out boons, treasure, bonus action points etc.

And yes if someone misses a session they get the same XP and advance at the same rate as everyone else. Having PCs of different level makes it harder to design encounters for the group as a whole and its something that should be strictly avoided, IMO.

All of the petty bickering and spotlight stealing squabbles disappeared once we went from 2e to 3e with its unified XP progression. 2e also had a system of bonus XP that differed from class to class. It made my job easier as DM when I no longer had to track that stuff on a player by player and class by class basis. Based on my own experiences, I can say that one set of rules encouraged player resentment and spotlight stealing and one didn't.

Yeah, I have a feeling that we should never game together. I'm ok with having mechanics that mitigate luck and prefer graduated failure to sudden failure, but I see no fundamental difference between failing a saving throw and being paralyzed and recieving a critical and being knocked unconscious. If you demand 'no save or suck', then it seems like you are ultimately suggesting 'my character shouldn't ever fail, because if it does the game has failed me'. I don't see how I can reconcile that with any game I'd want to play.

Not wanting save or die is a completely different issue. I get to play for 3-4 hours a week. Our current DM is running Pathfinder. In the first combat, I failed a save and was paralyzed for long enough that I was out the whole encounter. That encounter ended up lasting most of that three hour session.

Essentially I drove to my friend's house to play for about 5 minutes and then spent the rest of the night watching them play D&D. Maybe for some people that sense of verisimilitude is an acceptable tradeoff for sitting there and doing nothing. But it is not for me.

My time is valuable to me and I play games like D&D to have fun and relax. If I wanted to go play video games in the other room, then I could have done that at home.

This also has nothing to with thinking my character shouldn't fail. I have no problem with a penalty for failure, including character death, if it is the cumulative result of multiple meaningful choices, or a combination of choices and die rolls.

But when failure occurs in the first round of die roll before you can even act, I have made no meangingful choices in the game, nor even gotten to make any choice. I suppose you could say I got to make two die rolls. I rolled initiative before I was hit and paralyzed, but that doesn't really help your case, IMO.

The cost of a failure is way out of proportion to the path it takes to get there. One die roll and you are potentially sitting out your whole game session. And the other is that the failure of my character ends up unduly punishing me as a player and directly affecting my ability to participate in the game itself.

 

[Henry]

Yeah, as I've grown older, most of my groups no longer use XP in determining levelling, not because of unfairness or verisimilitude, but out of the needs of gaming as time for gaming grows shorter.

First of all, in most editions of D&D, even a 1 level difference means a pretty disparate power curve. Some people can't play in one weekend because their child is sick, others can't play because it's their anniversary, or a company christmas party; still others because of a work project that begs overtime. Trying to keep up with experience awarded to these people is more trouble than it's worth, so we just say "you're all X level" after a certain point in the campaign. In Pathfinder Adventure Paths, they make this stupidly easy for us -- "Before entering the Tower of the Elephant, the PCs should be 3th level." "By the time the PCs have reached the Fane of Sauron, they should be 9th level." etc. So rather than keep up with XP awards, the DM says, "thanks to your valiant efforts, Harrowstone has been cleared of evil. You all make it to 4th level; which is fortunate for you, because the Mayor has just asked you to deliver a package to Lepistadt, meaning a long road journey."


For us, it's pointless because we roleplay as much as we want to roleplay, or as little, if I have had a rough week and didn't feel like roleplaying out a big scene with the GM to get extra XP, I don't suffer for it.

 

[Celebrim]

I think trying to fix class imbalance by slowing progression is putting the cart before the horse. The real problem is the fact that classes are imbalanced in the first place. Fix that and there ceases to be a need for different rates of advancement.

Agreed, which is why I said that I wasn't looking for it to come back.

My preferred method of advancement is not even track XP at all and just let the DM decide when everyone levels up based on the needs of the narrative and the group itself. Thats how I usually run things...

Which is fine, but opting out of the XP system means that you just don't care what XP system is implemented. Everyone levels up as needed when you want. However, people that use an XP system have a vested interest in getting a good one.

For players who achieve something dramatic like defeating a monster by themself, I think you can offer alternative awards. In 4e parlance, I would give out boons, treasure, bonus action points etc.

That's a possibility, but sometimes it would break the 4th wall to do this in the game, and sometimes other meta awards (like destiny points in my own game) aren't sufficient reward for a job well done. For my part, I find that separate XP ensures that players are rewarded for participation and in increases party participation and reduces the tendency to split the party (because players don't want to miss out). Makes my job easier.

Having PCs of different level makes it harder to design encounters for the group as a whole and its something that should be strictly avoided, IMO.

I haven't really had that problem.

All of the petty bickering and spotlight stealing squabbles disappeared once we went from 2e to 3e with its unified XP progression.

Could also be just that you got older, but whatever works for you is fine with me.

Not wanting save or die is a completely different issue. I get to play for 3-4 hours a week. Our current DM is running Pathfinder. In the first combat, I failed a save and was paralyzed for long enough that I was out the whole encounter. That encounter ended up lasting most of that three hour session.

That's your real problem. Single encounters shouldn't take three hours.

My point is that you could have had your first encounter with a band of frost giants, got crit'd by a gargantuan two-handed axe on round one, taken 90 damage and been instantly dead without even getting a die roll and had the exact same issue of getting to play for 5 minutes of a 3-4 hour session.

Ultimately, we either have a game were your character can fail and be put out of play, or we don't. If you have the possibility of character death of any sort - even if its just a Toon like 'miss remainder of scene' - you are going to have the issue you are complaining about.

But when failure occurs in the first round of die roll before you can even act, I have made no meangingful choices in the game, nor even gotten to make any choice.

Yes. So? It's simply impossible to design around that eventuality without completely removing the possibility of failure.

The cost of a failure is way out of proportion to the path it takes to get there. One die roll and you are potentially sitting out your whole game session. And the other is that the failure of my character ends up unduly punishing me as a player and directly affecting my ability to participate in the game itself.

Yes. So? I mean, it's not that I'm unsympathetic. What you describe sucks. I agree that the cost of failure in that case was out of proportion to the path it takes to get there. Even worse from my perspective is that the cost of failure is probably out of proportion to the choices you made to get there. And sure, you can design into the game things to mitigate that problem. In my game you have destiny points that let you buy rerolls or cancel enemy crits so that they are normal hits, which tends to reduce the random bad luck. And its reasonable to design save or suck powers to be incremental or else have limited durations (save ends, etc.). But I don't think its reasonable to expect to design an RPG where there is a risk of failure and what you describe can't happen.

 

[Felon]

And if that's somehow not good enough for people -- if they want everyone else who plays to be limited, too -- then, it crosses over into petty pointlessness, and they are clearly denied the right to tell other people how they should play their own games.

We live in a time when self-esteem is a susbstitute for personal achievement rather than a by-product of it. A person can be close-minded, lazy, fickle, foolish, inarticulate, and truculent, and that's all okay as long as they stand tall and proud. Hey, who's anybody to judge anybody else?

Rules are not the problem with achieving unity in our community. Complacency and--most of all--selfishness are the major hurdles. Making the most of D&D is like making the most of any group activity: the prime ingredient is the capacity to value other people's satisfaction as well as your own. I think that a lot of gamers--notably those in the DM's seat--don't make that connection. They are mired what is essentially a competitive frame of mind where they must be the ones to have their way. That's why we see people who think that the satisfaction of other players at the table should take a backseat to "flavor" or "verisimilitude" or some other fine abstraction.

I don't think there's been an edition that has embraced modularity like it seems 5e is going to. OD&D through to 4e all presented a "core" that was fairly extensive, such that paranoid DMs could banish all non-core materials for their games and fool themselves into thinking they were running a perfectly balanced machine.

It's more than paranoia. There are "yes" DM's and then there are "no" DM's. Some of the "no" DM's want to create the impression that they're more fair and just than they actually are. They do so by specifying that anything from point A to point B is okay, even they think it's overpowered, but anything else is verboten. Pure self-deception.

Bottom line: I don't think rules or editions were ever the prime reasons our community got divided. I think people divided themselves with their disinterest in compromise. They drew lines in the sand and patted themselves on the back for their obstinance.

 

[Lanefan]

Go look in the "Cast Raise Dead on a Game Element" thread. There was more than one voice advocating bringing racial class restrictions back. [...] In a completely straight-faced manner, the idea of two players wanting to play a halfling wizard is presented as a serious issue because it thretens "racial flavor". What do you think: in all likelihood, do the players in his campaign obsess over racial flavor to the extent they happily sacrifice freedom of race/class choice? Ultimately, who benefits from race/class restrictions?

Er...are you saying a DM may not (in your view) decide how such things work in her own game irregardless of what the rules do/do not allow? If yes, we have a serious argument. If no, please clarify.

If I've designed a world where Hobbits don't do magic and Elves can't see in the dark, then that's what I'm going to run. You can play in it or not, as you wish; assuming I'll have you in.

And I wouldn't say my players "obsess over racial flavor"; but they accept the world as it is (despite their characters' best attempts to destroy it now and then, but that's another story) and if they want it to be different they'll design their own world and run that.

When I played 2e, I was very interested in trying out the Player's Options supplements (Combat & Tactics and Skills & Powers), but I never found a campaign that allowed them. DM's provided various rationales, but at the end of the day, it was perceived as goodies that ramped up player power, and that was just plain unfair to the DM and his menagrie.

When I played 3e, I almost never got to play a prestige class. Had they been in the PHB, I could have played one because they would have been accepted--if only begrudgingly--as a core part of the game. But being an option, DM's shut them down because they wanted players to pick a fixed, unchanging pool of options.

The DM is in the right here for several reasons:

1. Internal consistency within the game. If overpowered supplement X comes out a year after the campaign starts and someone wants to play something from it I'm either going to have to spend time dialling it back to fit in with the pre-existing game, or just say 'no'.

2. Power creep has happened within every edition to date. 2e Players' Options and 3e Prestige Class supplements are by and large two excellent examples of it. Power creep is inherently evil if only because one of two things happens: the game balance starts to tilt more or less wildly in favour of the player characters (which gets boring for all involved after a while) or the DM gets caught in an arms race, redesigning monsters and game elements to keep up with the PCs (which gets tedious immediately, and accomplishes nothing in the end).

Now if you are of the opinion that the game balance *should* be skewed more to the players' side, that's a different discussion entirely.

3. Every time you-as-player bring in a new book/supplement/whatever and expect to be able to use it, realistically the DM has to go get one as well. That can get expensive...

Many DM's assume that any options outside of core lead to power creep and excessive complexity.

So far 3 out of 4 editions agree about the power creep; I haven't looked into 4e supplements much at all so the jury's out on that one. Only in 2e did the added-complexity issue become relevant.

Lanefan

 

[JRRNeiklot]

Not wanting save or die is a completely different issue. I get to play for 3-4 hours a week. Our current DM is running Pathfinder. In the first combat, I failed a save and was paralyzed for long enough that I was out the whole encounter. That encounter ended up lasting most of that three hour session.

Essentially I drove to my friend's house to play for about 5 minutes and then spent the rest of the night watching them play D&D. Maybe for some people that sense of verisimilitude is an acceptable tradeoff for sitting there and doing nothing. But it is not for me.

I'd say you were lucky. A 3 hour combat would put me to sleep. The problem isn't getting paralyzed, the problem is the 3 hour combats.

 

[the Jester]

The only one of your three dealbreakers that I think you're unlikely to see is the non-unified xp chart, but I could be wrong.

Personally, I don't want that one back, but rolling stats is a must for me. I also prefer a higher lethality sort of game.