Magic, first games and expectations

[Lanefan]

And you know he comes at the issue from that direction and doesn't change (or at least you should if you've been paying attention for the last several years), so exactly what does argument get you?

Maybe a beer, if we were in the same town and it had any pubs open...

 

[prabe]

Maybe a beer, if we were in the same town and it had any pubs open...

I'd sign up for that.

 

[MGibster]

So, if you've seen some of the D&D 5e arguments we've gotten into over the last few months you've probably seen my dislike for challenges that amount to, in my word, "You Must be This Magical to Contribute". I'm opposed to the idea that playing D&D should absolutely require some amount of spell casting. That your party ABSOLUTELY should include a spell caster or two... or more really.

When it comes to fantasy role playing games, I came to the conclusion more than thirty years ago that D&D was it's own particular animal. It was back in 2nd edition days when I tried to plan a campaign based off of a particular fantasy novel, I don't remember which, and I figured out that D&D as a whole was radically different from most fantasy fiction I was reading at the time. I don't say this to knock D&D rather to point out that I have expectations for that particular game that I might not for others.

I would be absolutely flabbergasted if I sat down at a D&D game and not a single other player had a spell caster. I feel as though the game was explicitly designed to include spell casters and published adventures assume there will be one in the party.

Plenty of players on these boards, however, have no problem with this idea. "I'm fine with problems needing magic to solve" basically. A lot of them mentioned, incidentally, having played the pre-3.X editions.

I'm fine with problems that need magic to solve. Just so long as the players actually have access to said magic to solve the problem.

 

[Undrave]

I would be absolutely flabbergasted if I sat down at a D&D game and not a single other player had a spell caster. I feel as though the game was explicitly designed to include spell casters and published adventures assume there will be one in the party.

The Stradh season of AL was particularly punishing on that last point. One time we only had three players show up (already a problem) and it was me with a fighter, a rogue and a ranger... We got into a fight with a werewolf while we had only one silver dagger between the three of us. It went for so long without going anywhere at one point the DM just gave up and had us win.

 

[wingsandsword]

So, if you've seen some of the D&D 5e arguments we've gotten into over the last few months you've probably seen my dislike for challenges that amount to, in my word, "You Must be This Magical to Contribute". I'm opposed to the idea that playing D&D should absolutely require some amount of spell casting. That your party ABSOLUTELY should include a spell caster or two... or more really.

For a normal, textbook, standard party, yeah, there should be magic.

However, I hate the idea that every character should have magical abilities. I think there aren't enough non-magical character options in D&D. I wish spellcasting for Rangers was an optional ability, instead of saying every archer/woodsman just develops Druid-like spellcasting on his own somehow early on in their career, or at least that a non-spellcasting Ranger was a core option. I wish there were more non-magical, non-supernatural character classes (the Noble class from the D&D 3.5 Dragonlance setting would be something I wish had become core).

D&D should be flexible enough to encompass a wide variety of settings and play styles. The standard, textbook, typical party might well be a rogue, fighter, wizard and cleric, in a setting where there are lots of spellcasting priests and mages and spells get cast every adventure. . .but it shouldn't HAVE to be that way.

One of my favorite things about AD&D 2e (really the ONLY thing about it I miss) was the idea that it should be able to replicate a historic or pseudo-historic setting. The "green book" Historic Reference series that TSR put out for using D&D to emulate various historic periods, going from ancient Greece and Rome, all the way up to the 1600's, with everything from historic realism with absolutely no PC magic and the little magic that existed was super-rare. . .to a low-magic D&D version of history where there were wizards and clerics and monsters, just not with magic quite as common as it might be in Greyhawk or Forgotten Realms.

I definitely agree that there should be room in D&D for non-magical characters, and for a spectrum of magical levels of campaigns, from very-low-magic historic roleplaying, all the way to high-magic settings like Eberron and Planescape.