(LONG)-Getting back to basics, role-playing?

[Ranger REG]

Who is making you?

The OP believes it's WotC's doing. Now he's considering C&C.

That begs a question, though: is having too many rules a bad thing?

 

[Rothe]

See, I remember D&D always using minitaures. They were not mentioned or shown specifically in the rule book, nor did we have the distinction between Small, Medium and Large base sizes and such but there were always a ton of minis involved.

When I first started playing D&D back with OD&D, the guy that ran a lot of our games had a massive fishing tackle box full of tiny drawers. It was stuffed with minis, of every creature type and race. Of course minis were lead back then; that thing must have weighed 40 pounds or more. All the DM's usually had a collection of minis, and they were almost always used.

There were just as many books 'back then', too. Remember all the small hardbacks TSR pumped out? Unearthed Arcana, Wilderness Survival Guide, and the rest - plus the issues of Dragon that had rules or classes you wanted to use, and that's if you're not counting third party materials? 2E had all the Complete XX Handbooks, as well as the Player's Option books later on. Both iterations of the game would require you, if you wished to use all the options, to lug around tons of books. This is again not a new thing.

The tactical/role-playing arguement has been going on for 30 years. It's not a new thing. 1E was not some magical wonderland where people stayed in character and everything was story driven. Those campaigns were exceptions. Most people played D&D as a beer-and-pretzels exercise, not all that far removed from a more complex board game.

It wasn't some rules-light wonderland, either. There were rules vacuums, and gamers abhore a vacuum more than nature does. Any GM worth his salt had pages of alternate rules, his own skill system, tons of tables about everything from social status to what color your hair was, and more besides.

No system is going to make your players want to roleplay rather than follow the carrot-stick of level-power-gold-magic items-level treadmill if they don't want to. None. Not C&C, not True20, not Savage Worlds, not Risus, nothing.

QFT

All my miniatures, lead they all be, came from 1e AD&D days. I truly wonder about the apparent contradiction in how the "good old days" are viewed. On one hand it is held out as more about role playing, on the other hand such things are abhored and it was all about killing things and taking stuff, which I guess is a role but one not different from tactical killing machine.

I will agree with the OP that the volume of rules on a particular aspect of an RPG can lead people to foucs on it; if nothing else through the power of repetative reinforcement. A potential simple solution, award xp for the "role-playing" you miss, this may encourage it.

 

[MoogleEmpMog]

All the books I bring to a game today weigh less than my three binders of 2e Monstrous Compendiums, much less the PHB + DMG + Complete Book of Humanoids + Spelljammer Boxed Set + War Captain's Companion + Monster Mythology. That for 2e. I do recall it as the days of beautifully crafted and fascinating worlds that I actually wanted to explore, though. 3e's campaign settings haven't fired my imagination nearly as much.

Basic D&D I do remember as requiring considerably less. One book plus the 'Jammer material and the conversion document. Still, I wouldn't have wanted to use a 'small book bag.' Plus minis, because I always used minis. I recall BD&D as the game I actually had fun exploring those fascinating worlds in.

As for 1e, I never ran it. (Never played OD&D at all). I did, however, play enough 1e to remember the days of losing multiple PCs in a single session in meat grinder dungeons and considering myself comparatively fortunate. As a player, I was more challenged, but 'in character' was a foreign language. The 'world' was, Diablo-style, the town where your new PCs got kitted out before plunging into the dungeon.

With that said, I've had much better roleplaying in SilCore and HERO than any version of D&D, but frankly I attribute it entirely to the players involved, not the systems.

 

[Shadowslayer]

Everyone's version of the "good old days" is different. In the circles I ran in, no one used minis, though such games were not unheard of. And it wasn't really a matter of choice or playstyle...we never thought "Playing with minis sucks"...we just didn't use them. It wasn't integral to the game.

You can say it still isn't, but the amount of space in the combat sections of the PHB given to their use, with pictures and examples, says otherwise.

Anyway, I get the feeling the OP is not so concerned about dependence on minis.

So here's the thing that separates the old days from now: In those AD&D games of old, there wan't a whole lot of variances between 2 characters of the same character class. Ability wise, my 6th level magicuser was pretty much the same as anyone else's 6th level magicuser. Roleplay is the thing we used to make one character different from the next. I doubt that was a conscious idea though...we just did it.

Now, the current versions have so many different options built in that you don't have to roleplay at all to have a different character than the next guy. You can still roleplay if you want to, but your "having a character different from the next guy's" doesn't depend on it. (not unless you're playing a LOT of D&D)

So you've got the players sitting around the table. Each guy has different abilities, combat options, feats, skills etc...and you need to challenge them on that level, because that's why they've mixed and matched and planned all of their abilities for. That's the G in the RPG, and after a while, it can seem like too much work for too little reward for the DM.

I've got no beef with 3x D&D, but for me, I'll take a game with a lighter ruleset. C&C is the one I found and its the one I like. Others like True20 and whatever is out there.

Bottom line for me is that homegrown adventures are easier to write. I spent almost a year playing every week, and the only prep I did was on my lunch and coffee breaks at work...and maybe an hour at home doing handouts on the computer. Anyway, a stat block can take one or 2 lines of text. (4 X monster A: hp 10. HD 2. AC 8, Move 30, Physical prime, Dam Longsword d8) Challenges are simple (Stuck door, Str challenge 3) This frees you up immensely to do the sort of campaign work you enjoy, which for you, is the story and setting elements. Many DMs turned CK find this change in rulesets liberating.

The trick is to get players that will buy into a game with a lot less options for them. Guys that will use roleplay rather than in-game abilities to make their character different. That's the hard part. 3x is the big dog, so most players will rate lighter games against it. For many that are used to all of 3x's options and choices, it comes up short, and you'd need to be ready that some of your gang won't be interested. As WayneLigon said: "No system is going to make your players want to roleplay rather than follow the carrot-stick of level-power-gold-magic items-level treadmill if they don't want to. None. Not C&C, not True20, not Savage Worlds, not Risus, nothing." And I agree.

But I'd disagree with anyone that says that the rules and presentation of the 3x game doesn't promote the "carrot-stick of level-power-gold-magic items-level treadmill", because I think it does. So now I found a game that doesn't.

And, as I said, you can still use your minis if you want to.

 

[Teflon Billy]

Remember role-playing, not roll-playing?

I'm out :\

 

[Shadowslayer]

Remember role-playing, not roll-playing?

I agree this is usually an annoying argument...but it's a valid observation in the OP's context. I see no pretentiousness here.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I have several ideas on cutting down on the effort neccessary to run D&D:

- I don't use rules supplements. I only use the Core Rules - that's it. If the players want to use stuff from some rules expansions, fine - I'll read through to these additional rules and then say yea or nay. But I refuse to spend money on them and to carry them around with me.

- Instead of miniatures, I use little pins like you find them in office supply stores. I draw my maps on grid paper and then put them on a block of styrofoam (a cardboard box will do in a pinch). The pins (in different colors, and with flags for PCs) are used to show the position of the PCs and NPCs. Though it might not look as nice, this setup otherwise can do everything minis can do, at a fraction of the cost - and the maps can be at a much larger scale, too!

- I started the d20 NPCs Wiki so that I don't have to create all sorts of NPCs by myself - instead, everyone can use the NPCs others have created (and submit new content, too). And it now has accumulated a couple of hundreds of NPCs, which allows the DM to concentrate more on adventure design instead of working out NPC stats.

Try these things out - or otherwise, try out another RPG system. After all, D&D isn't the only game on the market!

 

[Philotomy Jurament]

Bottom line for me is that [C&C makes] homegrown adventures...easier to write...Many DMs turned CK find this change in rulesets liberating.

QFT.

The trick is to get players that will buy into a game with a lot less options for them. Guys that will use roleplay rather than in-game abilities to make their character different. That's the hard part. 3x is the big dog, so most players will rate lighter games against it. For many that are used to all of 3x's options and choices, it comes up short, and you'd need to be ready that some of your gang won't be interested.

Also, sometimes I think there's a false assumption about the options thing. People tend to think about more rule==more options, but that's not necessarily the case. The SIEGE engine approach to handling skill and feat-like manuevers actually opens up your options, IMO. That is, you're not restricted to a certain list of skills and feats that you picked. Instead, your PC's class and background are a guideline to the types of "skills" you'd be good at, and you can still attempt feat-like manuevers. Mechanically, the selection of Prime abilities lets you differentiate PCs, too. For example, a Fighter who has Str, Dex, and Con as Primes will be quite different from a Fighter who has Str, Int, and Cha as primes.

 

[buzz]

The tactical/role-playing arguement has been going on for 30 years. It's not a new thing. 1E was not some magical wonderland where people stayed in character and everything was story driven. Those campaigns were exceptions. Most people played D&D as a beer-and-pretzels exercise, not all that far removed from a more complex board game.

It wasn't some rules-light wonderland, either. There were rules vacuums, and gamers abhore a vacuum more than nature does. Any GM worth his salt had pages of alternate rules, his own skill system, tons of tables about everything from social status to what color your hair was, and more besides.

No system is going to make your players want to roleplay rather than follow the carrot-stick of level-power-gold-magic items-level treadmill if they don't want to. None. Not C&C, not True20, not Savage Worlds, not Risus, nothing.

A-f'ing-men.

I found that as the DM 95% of the time it falls on my shoulders the majority of the time to keep the game moving, balanced and fun to play.

You maybe need to find a new group, then. All of the games mentioned so far (except maybe Risus) lay the majority of prep work on the GM's shoulders. That doesn't mean players should be sitting around waiting to be entertained. If you're really doing 95% of the work at the game table, you're either railroading the bejeebus out of your players, or your players are asleep.

Has anyone out there found a way to use the d20 system in a way that encourages less minis/combat action?

If you want less minis-combat action, play a system that doesn't focus on minis-combat action, and find some players who are interested in a game that doesn't focus on minis/combat action. System-wise, my personal recommendation would be Burning Wheel.

Another suggestion I would make is: if what you're after is story, write a novel.

If, otoh, you want players to contribute to the game and drive action, avoid story like the plague. Story comes out as a result of play. If you're forcing a plot on your players, you're going to get nothing but players interested in combat. Why? Because it becomes the only part of the game where they probably feel they have any input. You see this in any game where the GM has a heavy hand and is forcing action to an inevitable outcome.

That said, your players may also simply enjoy combat more than other aspects. And D&D 3.5 is a great tool for running tactical, combat-heavy games.

Basically, my advice is this: we're not the people you should be talking to. Get your group together and talk about what kind of play you want. If they're not interested in what you are, you need to find a new group.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Thanks guys! I understand that it looks a lot like the problem might just be me or my players and I thought so too for a while.

And, I am certain, you will be told many, many times to come that it is your fault, and not the fault of the game. Not that the game rules don't influence players, of course, but....well, let's just say that the minute you suggest that X edition isn't perfect, the defenders of X edition rear their ugly head....

D&D 3.X can do more than any previous edition, but if you want your players to focus on more role-playing and more exploration, you really need to make sure that your game is set up to accomplish this. You might consider reprinting some of the advice from the 1e PHB and giving it to your players.

You might also consider looking for 3rd party suppliments that help you to focus on the aspects of the game you want to. Personally, I recommend Dynasties & Demogogues to motivate role playing. Specifically, I'd adopt Action Points and give every player a free Personality Feat. That's a big bonus right there.

RC