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Message: <blockquote data-quote="(un)reason" data-source="post: 6265994" data-attributes="member: 27780">Best of Dragon Magazine 1part 3/6Notes from a Semi-Successful D&D Player: Sometimes trying to apply logic to your fantasy game ruins the fun. Other times, it makes it even more fun, such as Jim Ward's twinky tricks that take advantage of existing spells and equipment, and use them to brutal effect. Polymorphing, poison, blinding, and the now ubiquitous continual light stone. Use them right and you can win a battle in a single strike. After all, when many random monsters can take out a party member every round, (or a whole bunch in the case of beholders) it's only fair. God, that really rubs in how things have changed, given how much effort they've put in since then to keep you from short-circuiting encounters. It's a whole different philosophy. And one which makes what you learn in game more applicable to real life conflicts, where things are almost never fair. I think this is a case where we could learn from the old schoolers, because if we were put in a challenge under an unfamiliar system, they would kick our asses. Tolkien in Dungeons & Dragons: This one I definitely remember. The whole D&D is not just based on Tolkien, just because we used his demihumans rant. This is one where I'm feeling a bit more magnanimous than the first time around. Then, I definitely felt that the writer doth protest too much. Now, I can understand more why they'd be irritated that people take one element of what they did and focussed on it to the exclusion of everything else. And I can definitely understand their preference for episodic tales of adventure rather than making the whole campaign into one epic story of saving the world, as it's hard to run those when you have a large rotating pool of players who may or may not be there each session. I do still think they're overstating Middle-earth's uselessness for other adventures though. It was full of weird little magical bits that didn't fit into the larger picture, like Beorn, Tom Bombadil, talking animals (and purses), vampires, etc, and there was plenty of room for other people to make their mark beyond the stories in the Silmarillion, since there were thousands of years and several continents left uncovered. It's well worth mining some more, especially the unfinished tales and histories. The meaning of Law and Chaos in D&D: This is one I remember very clearly too. Turning D&D from a 3 alignment system to an asymmetrical 5 alignment system, with an 8x11 set of subdivisions within each quadrant as an interim before they went for the full 9 point 3x3 grid. It's just so oddly specific, and yet different from the form they stuck with for 3 editions. (before curiously, moving back toward it in 4e. ) Like their original conception of the planes, I have to wonder where it came from, and why it's so different from the fantasy that was supposedly their inspiration. Here's to uniqueness. After all, it may be risky, but it's what we remember in the long run. D&D is only as good as the DM: In which Gary reminds us that we shouldn't give out xp and magical items too generously, and let players progress beyond the levels the game is designed to handle. As with the Tolkien in D&D article, there's a definite feel that Gary had a personal vision of what D&D should be, and was a little pissed off that other people wound up playing it in such a different way, and tried to add rules to make the game work better for those playstyles. Sometimes you've got to set your baby free to let it reach it's full potential. This does leave me wondering what 2e would have been like if he'd remained at the helm. Obviously the classes from Unearthed Arcana would have stayed in, but would we have missed out on the huge variety of settings and sourcebooks for things like historical time periods in return. It seems quite probable, since even in 1985 he was calling for a return to the roots of gaming, rather than all this froofy obsession with character detail. Definitely stuff worth thinking about here, and a reminder that our history could have gone in a very different direction at several junctions. Gary Gygax on Dungeons & Dragons: Another article that reminds us that Gary's view on D&D history was filled with self-aggrandisement, as he makes it absolutely clear that he was more important to the creation of D&D than Dave Arneson. Sure, it was Dave's idea to turn Chainmail into a game of dungeon delving where each player controlled a single character, but Gary did all the heavy lifting to turn it into a publishable manuscript, and most of the early promotional work, and he was proved right when he published it despite Dave not thinking it was ready. Taking responsibility gives you power, and history is written by the winners. (or at least survivors) How differently would the story have been told if someone else was doing it? Even after 30 years of building up a legend, I'm not one to believe the hype. The Dungeons & Dragons Magic System: Still more ramblings from Gary, as he gets sick of explaining and justifying his design decisions to every new player who doesn't understand why he made it this way and thinks a spell point system would work better. It really isn't rocket science. If spellcasters used a spell point system, they could spam a single spell instead of having to think carefully about their selection and use each one cleverly. Plus if they could use their spells more frequently, the individual spells would need to be weaker for them to remain balanced with other classes. The lengthy memorisation times and rolls to learn spells at all also keep them from being able to dominate the game until they get to high level, and their higher XP costs mean they have to work harder to get to a particular level at all. Really, this serves to point out where both 3e and 4e got it wrong. 3e by removing the logistical checks and balances on wizards and CoDzilla so they no longer had to work harder offscreen to make up for their greater flexibility, and 4e by cutting down their magic selections and capabilities to the point where they were completely nonwondrous in the name of encounter level balance rather than campaign level. No edition has got it entirely right, and this still definitely needs more thinking about. How do we get suitably mythic spellcasters and not leave the warriors feeling overshadowed in out games?</blockquote>

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