Mearls: Abilities as the core?

[BryonD]

Yeah, maybe we read different forums. I haven't seen anyone say there was 'no difference'. I think there are a wide variety of opinions on what the differences are and what significance they have.

I guess so. I see it over and over.

I guess I would need a citation on that.

Ok. It makes no difference to me if you personally go find it or not. You can take a "see no evil" view, you can go find out for yourself, or you can believe. It doesn't really matter. Andy said it and I see it when I look. You are entitled to whatever opinion you want based on as little or as much information as you wish to seek out.

I think the idea that someone designed the mechanics in isolation from what narrative concepts they were intending to model is frankly preposterous.

Shrug. The whole "isolation" thing just shows the problem. Quit putting things in such absolute terms and you will do better. They very intentionally adjusted the focus in a significant manner. Nothing was in "isolation."

The mechanics are just a tool. We don't start out with a set of mechanics and just play a game and try to figure out how to explain them.

Agreed. But none of your comments change the difference between the various actual systems.

Personally I don't think there's a way to 'rate' games in any hard and fast way.

Hard and fast? Absolutely not. I think my example rating was clearly a simple concept.

I don't think ANY serious posters here have ever asserted that all systems are equal.

"All?" No, but over and over I'm told that 4E plays exactly the same as 3E. And, further, I believe most if not all of the people saying it are honestly and accurately describing their personal games. But when you say "all systems" you are completely losing the point. And when you say you haven't seen it I'm forced to presume you haven't been reading enough of the debate over the past few years to have an well informed comment.

Honestly though, there is a pretty strong subtext to your posts. It reads like 3.x was a good tool for role play and 4e is mostly only good for hack-n-slash. Personally I think the opposite.

If my text comes across as SUB then I apologize for being unclear.

I don't care what you opinion is and don't see any reason you should care what mine is. The question is, do you want to understand why people see it differently or not.

But when you say you can't come close to Conan in 3E, you just sound laughable. Maybe YOU can't. I don't know. So that tells me a lot right there.

My point is NOT REMOTELY that you can't do Conan in 4E. You CAN. 100%.
BUT, you will be creating a really good game board piece that relates to other game board pieces in a manner that purely reacts mechanically. There are other systems that are far less tied to mechanical balance and homogeneous capabilities.

And just to pick on one of my 4E peeves, your 4E Conan will automatically get better at everything as he gains in level. I'd call that wrong right there. But that is just my opinion. It has no intended bearing on your game experience.

But, really, there is no point is sitting and arguing your personal game against mine. If you assessment was a quality view of the overall market, then this conversation would not be happening in the first place.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I guess so. I see it over and over.

Ok. It makes no difference to me if you personally go find it or not. You can take a "see no evil" view, you can go find out for yourself, or you can believe. It doesn't really matter. Andy said it and I see it when I look. You are entitled to whatever opinion you want based on as little or as much information as you wish to seek out.

Well, you made a rather incredible statement, so I figure you'd have source for that. You're right of course, OTOH I think extraordinary statements are things I am probably not going to swallow on the basis of hearsay. In any case it is immaterial what Andy Collins said. I've worked on games. Any such statement is as credible as pink flying elephants. It clearly wasn't designed that way. I don't at all doubt they had a core concept and resolution mechanisms and such, those are obviously parts of a game you design from a basically mechanical perspective, but it just isn't possible to design classes and such that way any more than it is for elephants to fly.

Shrug. The whole "isolation" thing just shows the problem. Quit putting things in such absolute terms and you will do better. They very intentionally adjusted the focus in a significant manner. Nothing was in "isolation."

I'm actually not really so sure that was the intent. I think some aspects of the game were aimed at being easier to refluff. I don't know that the general idea was to make the game in any way less of an RPG. In fact the game shows many signs that they thought deeply about the nature of RP and how it should relate to game mechanics. You may well disagree with them on that and see it differently.

"All?" No, but over and over I'm told that 4E plays exactly the same as 3E. And, further, I believe most if not all of the people saying it are honestly and accurately describing their personal games. But when you say "all systems" you are completely losing the point. And when you say you haven't seen it I'm forced to presume you haven't been reading enough of the debate over the past few years to have an well informed comment.

Well, I can't say what you read and where you read it. I regularly read a number of game design related sites and what AFAIK are the main sites where 4e is a regular topic. Yet I have NEVER seen anyone seriously assert that 4e and 3e play the same. I say 'seriously' because of course the Internet is filled with all sorts of odd opinions, but this is not IME a major theme or even a significant opinion. I get the impression that you're being hyperbolic, but perhaps there is a whole 'net full of sites I know nothing about where this peculiar opinion holds sway. Anything is possible...

If my text comes across as SUB then I apologize for being unclear.

I don't care what you opinion is and don't see any reason you should care what mine is. The question is, do you want to understand why people see it differently or not.

But when you say you can't come close to Conan in 3E, you just sound laughable. Maybe YOU can't. I don't know. So that tells me a lot right there.

You can make a big strong warrior, yes, but you cannot PLAY said character as such because you'll be completely overshadowed by any garden variety full caster. Your plot significance is nil and your only real function in combat is to clean up the threats that aren't worth bothering with a spell for and playing lineman for the casters. This is perfectly fine, it doesn't make a bad game, it just makes a LIMITED game. One who's limitations IMHO have been overcome by a more flexible design.

My point is NOT REMOTELY that you can't do Conan in 4E. You CAN. 100%.
BUT, you will be creating a really good game board piece that relates to other game board pieces in a manner that purely reacts mechanically. There are other systems that are far less tied to mechanical balance and homogeneous capabilities.

Right, there's some kind of rule in 4e or lack of some rule that turns my character into a 3 dimensional fully realized character? This is utterly preposterous. Nothing about 4e characters is 'homogeneous' either. The game simply allows all characters to participate and doesn't ABSOLUTELY DEPEND on specific elements of play. Sometimes I have to wonder if people who make these kinds of statements have played with an even moderately talented DM. YOU may have experienced 4e this way, and I feel your pain, but I think you're confusing cause and effect here.

And just to pick on one of my 4E peeves, your 4E Conan will automatically get better at everything as he gains in level. I'd call that wrong right there. But that is just my opinion. It has no intended bearing on your game experience.

Yes, well, that won't happen in 3e. Instead you're just pigeonholed into a few (and in the case of a fighter a VERY few) narrow skills. We can debate the pros and cons of different skill system mechanics all day, but IME there is no perfect solution. My opinion is that people spend far too much time harping on these kinds of largely theoretical 'issues'. Who cares if my 30th level fighter is roughly as knowledgeable about Arcana as an optimized 1st level wizard? Is he really ever going to compare his Arcana skill to that of a situation intended for low level characters where this is going to matter? It is just irrelevant. In all my 35 years of DMing I have yet to see this situation arise.

But, really, there is no point is sitting and arguing your personal game against mine. If you assessment was a quality view of the overall market, then this conversation would not be happening in the first place.

Why thank you.

 

[Greg K]

Who cares if my 30th level fighter is roughly as knowledgeable about Arcana as an optimized 1st level wizard? Is he really ever going to compare his Arcana skill to that of a situation intended for low level characters where this is going to matter? It is just irrelevant. In all my 35 years of DMing I have yet to see this situation arise.

I care. The gamers that I know care. That you don't comes down to a difference in preference as to how characters are represented mechanically and what that means in relation to the other characters in the "world" of the campaign.

 

[AbdulAlhazred]

I care. The gamers that I know care. That you don't comes down to a difference in preference as to how characters are represented mechanically and what that means in relation to the other characters in the "world" of the campaign.

Yeah, there are differences in taste between different players/groups/DMs. I don't mean to insult anyone's opinions. I am just stating a very reasonable counterpoint. My feeling is that this is exactly the position the 4e devs were coming from, that advancing skill checks based on level would keep all the PCs roughly in the ballpark where any of them could in a pinch at least TRY a good variety of skill checks, thus both reducing the chances of an adventure derailing and increasing the opportunities for players to participate. The downside being what I consider a pretty small corner case that again will simply never come up in play. I mean as a DM if I want to have an NPC that is portrayed as far more knowledgeable about Arcana than the 30th level Barbarian, he's going to have an Arcana score far beyond what some low level apprentice wizard has. And said apprentice wizard would simply never show up in a campaign running at that level. Remember, NPCs don't run by PC rules, their skill bonuses effectively are nothing more than DCs and can be set as appropriate (maybe the wizard IS an apprentice, but if so he's the greatest prodigal apprentice wizard in history and has an Arcana of 40, an eventuality which 4e is perfectly willing to countenance). In fairness you could do the same thing in 3.5 or PF too if you wished. These kinds of issues are only issues if you insist that the numbers are some kind of 'physics engine' for describing the world instead of tools to help you tell the story you want to tell. Again, you can view it however you want and that's OK, but it is meaningless to criticize 4e based on criteria that 4e isn't interested in being measured by. All you can say is "I'll play something else", which is great. I just don't understand why people insist on calling it a fault in 4e when it has no practical impact in play whatsoever.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

All you can say is "I'll play something else", which is great. I just don't understand why people insist on calling it a fault in 4e when it has no practical impact in play whatsoever.

And if the answer is, "I don't want to play something else," because most of the rest of the game, you like, then it is trivially easy to fix this edge case. Just put in a house rule that every PC has to pick a few skills that don't get the 1/2 level bonus, and can never be trained.

I mean, if the objection is that the Barbarian ends up too good at Arcana, then it is trivially easy to fix this. And if your group covers the skills well enough, and you think about the implications for skill challenges for a few minutes, it won't even have nasty side effects.

OTOH, then if this is one thing out of many, then we are back to "I'll play something else." I say this, because it seems to come up all isolated, but if you look at the complaints, it is over here, "I wish they'd change X," and then two days later, "I wish they'd hadn't done Y," and so on. At some point, it comes back to the real complaint, which is, "I want the latest version of D&D to cater to my preferences." I can appreciate the desire, and I can appreciate such a push for preferences to influence the next version, whatever it is. However, I don't think that, "Hey, 4E designer, you failed to cater to me when you weren't trying to, you dolt," is going to gain much traction towards that end.

 

[Greg K]

Agreed - epic level fighters who are fighting the servants of the gods themselves in 4e have increased in skill to better fit as epic level fighters, fighters in 3e that try to fight servants of the gods are still hilariously unable to swim due to it's skill system.

Let's see.
1. If you want your character to know how to swim, buy a couple of ranks using those X4 at first level instead of min/maxing. Swim is a class skill.

2. If your character didn't know how to swim at the start and had opportunity to learn later on, buy a rank or two.

3. Concerned about the paltry number of skill points the fighter gts
a. Give him enough Int.
b. Use the Customizing a Character section to show you how to customize the fighter for extra skill points/per level.

In other words, if your character cannot swim, you have yourself to blame for not taking ranks in swim .

 

[Pentius]

Let's see.
1. If you want your character to know how to swim, buy a couple of ranks using those X4 at first level instead of min/maxing. Swim is a class skill.

2. If your character didn't know how to swim at the start and had opportunity to learn later on, buy a rank or two.

3. Concerned about the paltry number of skill points the fighter gts
a. Give him enough Int.
b. Use the Customizing a Character section to show you how to customize the fighter for extra skill points/per level.

In other words, if your character cannot swim, you have yourself to blame for not taking ranks in swim .

Whoa, there. First you accuse people who don't normally take Swim of min/maxing, which is pretty much uncalled for. I mean, looking at the Fighter's skill list, you might reasonably be interested in Climb, Jump or Ride, since hey, those are all things I'd expect a heroic warrior to be able to do, too. No min/maxing about it.

Then, after tossing that out, you direct us to the Customizing a Character section as if that's a real solution. Here's what that section tells you to do: Haggle with your DM. Haggling with the DM to trade one mechanic for another is the first trick in any min/maxer's arsenal. So which is it, are we min/maxing, or are we stopping the min/maxing? It could be worth a shot, but it is not an acceptable substitute for actually having the rules on your side.

Then you finish by telling anyone who wants their Fighter to Swim that it's their own fault if they can't, which is arguably true, but not actually the nature of the complaint. The complaint against the 3e skill system is that even if you do give your Fighter a decent Int score(which would provide him no advantage other than skills), the system fails to let the Fighter cover the sorts of things you could reasonably expect a hero who makes his living being strong to be able to do.

 

[Greg K]

Whoa, there. First you accuse people who don't normally take Swim of min/maxing, which is pretty much uncalled for. I mean, looking at the Fighter's skill list, you might reasonably be interested in Climb, Jump or Ride, since hey, those are all things I'd expect a heroic warrior to be able to do, too. No min/maxing about it.

With a minimum of 8pts (assuming no Int bonus), one an buy ranks, Climb, Ride, Jump, and Swim. Give me time, and I can, actually, find posts where players state (not in this thread) that they don't put ranks in swim, because fighters don't get enough points and Swim rarely comes up. That to me is min/max or power gaming. However, I did not mean to insinuate that the person I was responding to necessarily takes part in min/max or power gaming. I was using it in a general sense.

Then, after tossing that out, you direct us to the Customizing a Character section as if that's a real solution. Here's what that section tells you to do: Haggle with your DM. Haggling with the DM to trade one mechanic for another is the first trick in any min/maxer's arsenal. So which is it, are we min/maxing, or are we stopping the min/maxing? It could be worth a shot, but it is not an acceptable substitute for actually having the rules on your side.

Min/Maxing is a player problem. If you have a problem player I suggest not playing with them. The example is there to help players and DMs tailor characters abilities to background and assumes it will be done in good faith. There are further suggestions for such tailoring in the DMG.

Also note at the start of Customizing a character:
"The rules for creating your character provide a common ground for players, but you can tweak the rules to make your character unique. Any substantive changes, however, must be approved the DM".

Further down, under Race:
"The rules for the character of a given race apply to most, but not all people of a race". It then discusses how if a dwarf grew up among humans they would not be expected to have certain dwarven features.

In other words, you should be tailoring to background/culture etc. The reason to talk to your DM? My guss goes back to rule 0. They are, theoreticallly, going to know the cultures and what is plausible for their campaign. They are also responsible for ensuring balance among PCs.

The tools and/or suggestions are there. If the DM is not willing to use them, find another DM.

Then you finish by telling anyone who wants their Fighter to Swim that it's their own fault if they can't, which is arguably true, but not actually the nature of the complaint. The complaint against the 3e skill system is that even if you do give your Fighter a decent Int score(which would provide him no advantage other than skills), the system fails to let the Fighter cover the sorts of things you could reasonably expect a hero who makes his living being strong to be able to do.

You and some others might assume that they should be able to cover such things and a certain level of proficiency. I and some others hold no such assumptions- campaign setting, cultures, individual character backgrounds, and later adventuring experience are the determining factors in what skills thy should have and at what proficiency level.
And, Intelligence does do more besides skills ( I am assuming you are including bonus modifiers to rolls for appropriate skills). There are feat trees that have Int scores of 13+ as a prereq.

 

[Pentius]

With a minimum of 8pts (assuming no Int bonus), one an buy ranks, Climb, Ride, Jump, and Swim. Give me time, and I can, actually, find posts where players state (not in this thread) that they don't put ranks in swim, because fighters don't get enough points and Swim rarely comes up. That to me is min/max or power gaming. However, I did not mean to insinuate that the person I was responding to necessarily takes part in min/max or power gaming. I was using it in a general sense.

I'm sure that you could find such posts. And since not putting ranks into Swim specifically because you don't think it will come up is making a character decision based on a cost/benefit analysis, it could also qualify as min/maxing or power gaming. However, such a decision is to min/maxing as picking your character's hair color is to roleplaying, that is, it qualifies, but just barely, and that alone does not a roleplayer or min/maxer make.

And that still doesn't address the fact that there was no reason to bring min/maxing into this at all.

Min/Maxing is a player problem. If you have a problem player I suggest not playing with them.

Except that no one here is having that problem. It's something you brought up. Not that I kick a player for not putting ranks in Swim anyway.

The example is there to help players and DMs tailor characters abilities to background and assumes it will be done in good faith. There are further suggestions for such tailoring in the DMG.

Also note at the start of Customizing a character:
"The rules for creating your character provide a common ground for players, but you can tweak the rules to make your character unique. Any substantive changes, however, must be approved the DM".

Further down, under Race:
"The rules for the character of a given race apply to most, but not all people of a race". It then discusses how if a dwarf grew up among humans they would not be expected to have certain dwarven features.

In other words, you should be tailoring to background/culture etc. The reason to talk to your DM? My guss goes back to rule 0. They are, theoreticallly, going to know the cultures and what is plausible for their campaign. They are also responsible for ensuring balance among PCs.

The tools and/or suggestions are there. If the DM is not willing to use them, find another DM.

Yes, I read the section. Yes, DMs should be willing to work with a player to ensure they get the best play experience. But it's still a false solution. I claim it doesn't work very well, you refer me to a section that tells us to just house rule it. But I'm not displeased because I never thought of house ruling it, I'm displeased because I would have to house rule it.

You and some others might assume that they should be able to cover such things and a certain level of proficiency. I and some others hold no such assumptions- campaign setting, cultures, individual character backgrounds, and later adventuring experience are the determining factors in what skills thy should have and at what proficiency level.
And, Intelligence does do more besides skills ( I am assuming you are including bonus modifiers to rolls for appropriate skills). There are feat trees that have Int scores of 13+ as a prereq.

You're right. I absolutely am operating under the assumptions that a given character should be able to cover given things. And that's cool that you don't assume those things. I still think it's silly that my hypothetical epic level fighter is in more danger from a shallow river than from the servants of the gods.

 

[Mark CMG]

(. . .)... play a game with a good skill system that assumes your character gets better at doing things as he levels.

Odd you use the word "good" when that sort of one-size-fits-all, auto-improve-across-the-board system doesn't seem to appeal to everyone. What of someone from a land where water is either frozen or so cold even limited exposure means death? What about someone, from anywhere, that has a phobia that would negate any chance of ever learning to swim? Could these people still be heroes in all other respects? And the time they don't spend learning to swim, coudn't it be devoted to becoming a better climber? Or are we now haggling and is that bad? Naw. The generc nature of a system where everyone simply gets better at all skills, right along side and in parallel with all of his comrades, regardless of whether they devote any effort to learning, by virtue of gaining XP by killing things doesn't sound "good" to me.