Mearls: The core of D&D

[Crazy Jerome]

I'm reading REH at the moment, much of it for the first time. (I got the collected reprints of Howard's Conan for Father's Day. Yay, kids!)

The only thing I'm seeing so far that would be a so-so fit for D&D hit points (within the parameters of Celebrim's argument) is that morale is such a huge part of who wins and who dies. You'd have to be pretty explicit that hit points are a big part of morale, and thus why running out of it lets you get beheaded in one stroke with a broadsword.

Though the image of the red-eyed barbarian glaring at the wizard and causing him to lose hit points, and thus be so vulnerable, might push the model more than some are willing to accept.

 

[mmadsen]

I'm not arguing that a single combat system can't do them welll; in fact, my position requires that D&D do all three well enough. What I'm stating is that despite signfiicant differences in how combat is portrayed in Tolkien, Burroughs, REH, etc., D&D can be used to simulate all of them. Keep in mind that I'm addressing the complaint, "Of course it can do combat well, because there aren't differences in how combat is portrayed in fantasy literature."

I'm arguing that it shouldn't be hard to provide a generic combat system that works for both Tolkien and Robert E. Howard, even though those two authors wrote in different styles, because adventure-fiction combat hews fairly close to real historical combat -- and where it diverges from reality is fairly consistent across authors, i.e. the hero doesn't die, but he's easily knocked out, etc.

Even though it shouldn't be hard to match Tolkien and Howard with a single, simple system, I don't think D&D does a particularly good job of it, because we need various kludges to handle Tolkien: Bard killing Smaug with one arrow, an orc-captain "killing" Frodo with one spear thrust, until Frodo reveals his mithril mail, Legolas killing a fell beast in the dark with one arrow, Boromir fighting on while mortally wounded with countless arrows, Merry and Eowyn killing the Witch-King with two blows, etc.

For Howard, we need a system where Conan dispatches plenty of trained soldiers in a red haze, but he knows he can't face down a handful of archers, so he gives up, and where one good blow from behind knocks him out.

In my opinion, hit points do work as plot-protection points, which is great for PCs, but many tough opponents shouldn't necessarily have a predictable buffer of toughness -- and many weak PCs should have plenty of plot-protection. If anything, the insignificant hobbits should have more plot-protection points than their protectors, Gimli and Legolas, or their ill-starred foes, like the Witch-King.

 

[pemerton]

Alignment is still a mechanical element in D&D 4. It appears in stat blocks, not flavor text.

It appears in stat blocks, yes, but does virtually no mechanical work. It is relevant to some PC-build options - some divine classes and some paragon paths - and it figures in one paladin PP power. I'm not a DDI subscriber, so it might also appear in a handful of Dragon magazine options. But the relevance of alignment to character building is minimal and to action resolution is almost nil.

On the other hand, the ability of oozes to squeeze through small cracks, which is relevant to action resolution, appears in flavour text rather than stat blocks. (Though there is an argument that the definition of the ooze subtype, by referring to oozes as "amorphous", does imply that they have this squeezing ability.)

So in my view, whether something is in a stat block or flavour text is indicative, but not ultimately determinative, of whether or not it is a mechanical matter.

the objection is not that alignment was or was not in D&D. I know it was, and usually with some mechanical basis. Rather, the objection is that on this particular list of supposedly key mechanics, it is out of place. It is not quite as key as the rest of the list (IMO), but if the list is supposed to be more expansive, then the list is missing some things that are as key as alignment. Mechanical support for multiple races is an obvious missing one.

<snip>

I'm more curious, though, about the kind of thinking that led to alignment making the cut while races and other such things did not. If we did a poll of, say, most important mechanical elements of D&D, where each person ranked a large list in order, does anyone here believe that alignment would beat out all such missing elements? I don't.

It as if someone asked for the most important ice cream flavors, and got vanilla, chocolate, strawberry, and toffee ripple.

I can see the force of this. Even though I think that alignment is more central to D&D play and the D&D experience than do you (at least, this is my impression), I'd probably have to concede that races are more central.

Perhaps races weren't mentioned because they were taken to be subsumed, to an extent, in classes - as per some versions of classic D&D.

 

[pemerton]

Though the image of the red-eyed barbarian glaring at the wizard and causing him to lose hit points, and thus be so vulnerable, might push the model more than some are willing to accept.

The module that comes with the Monster Vault boxed set expressly embraces the "Intimidate check to do hp damage" approach, statting it up as a skill challenge in the final encounter.

 

[rounser]

Mearls' point was that regardless of which of those you were playing in, there were some shared elements, and that is what he is trying to pinpoint. You may certainly have elements that you prefer in your D&D games, but that is very different from saying anyone using elements you don't prefer is not playing D&D.

On that point, I think Mearls may need to consider that it's about as much what he leaves out of the recipe, as what he puts into it.

Chocolate mudcakes might have flour, eggs, cocoa and sugar in them, but if you throw in anchovies and beef stock, then that chocolate mudcake you're making might no longer be a chocolate mudcake.

Likewise, identifying the core components of a "universal D&D" isn't enough. Consider what may un-D&D a game to a large segment of players, such as through:

1) Disassociated mechanics like healing surges that break simulation and suspension of disbelief. I gather it is rumoured that healing surges are Mearls' favorite 4E rule, so may be in for inevitable disappointment there.

2) Including in the core mundane yet fantastic equipment like gluebags, absurd dual weapons and absurdly effective spiked chains that harm D&D's ability to model a pseudomedieval setting. Save it for the splatbooks, IMO.

3) Quirky and specific choice of core races and classes in the core PHB, and the resulting specific nature of the worlds they suggest, as I've already talked about.

I like Hackmaster, but Hackmaster isn't an "everyman fantasy" game which is a good basis to build worlds on in the same way D&D used to be. Not every world I want to make has these specific elements that Hackmaster pushes. 4E has made that same mistake, IMO - in attempting to stay current with fantasy fashion, they've traded in the game's utility as a fantasy toolkit. If Mearls is casting around for ideas as to supplements for 5E, maybe add a "High Fantasy Handbook" and a "Dark Fantasy Handbook" for those who want to take the game in different directions. That way, the dragonborn spiked chain wielders and gluebags can sit in the high fantasy book, and whatever low magic people want can sit in the other.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

I once made some house rules for Fantasy Hero that were strikingly similar to healing surges. The reason was that in default Fantasy Hero, unless you are willing to limit magic by charges, healing becomes effectively unlimited. Things that don't kill you don't really hurt. Hero comes at it from the other side of typical D&D hit points, but the problem is the same--you want a limit, but you want to parse it out over time for narrative pacing. It is a very useful tool in emulation mode.

 

[Ainamacar]

Reading the thread, I think there are two primary modes in which people think about D&D: First, as the rules considered specifically as a game, as well as the implications of those rules. Second, as a (sub)genre, and how well the feel of that genre can be summoned, matched, or imitated by some set of rules.

Is D&D first a game (i.e. mechanics), or a subgenre? As far as I can tell the answer is "yes", but for any given individual the more specific answer is something like {yes, yes}, {yes, no}, or {no, yes}. If you like, add a ", but" after any of those. In your view, is one usually subordinate to the other? If this were linear algebra, they might be basis vectors and could be weighted individually. If this were logic, one might be a premise, and the other a consequence.

If D&D is first a sack of some fixed (here unspecified) mechanics, then the flavor implications of those mechanics are what define D&D settings. And any settings broadly compatible with those mechanics can be D&D. It also lets people expand and flesh out settings, by allowing what the mechanics allow to become part of the setting's reality. For optimizers, this can be quite a lot. If this is the view, then the specific mechanics in the sack is important, hence Mearl's list.

If D&D is first its own subgenre, then the mostly fixed set of flavor requirements is more likely to restrict or define exactly what mechanics are in play, and how. For example:

Again, that's based on setting and adventure design. The rules don't force it on you. I frequently gamed in 1e without access to a cleric, and if you change the assumptions of the setting and the assumptions of adventure pacing you can dispense with clerics entirely in any addition should you desire.

Clearly there can be feedback, where setting informs mechanics, and mechanics informs setting, but when one of these mechanisms is much stronger than the other what counts as "D&D" can rapidly diverge depending on beholder. These feedback mechanisms might work in surprising ways. For example, I think it is likely that most D&D players identify most strongly with their first campaign as the image of D&D. If that first campaign was run by someone with mechanics first tendencies, letting the mechanics define and redefine the reality of the setting, a setting first person might actually define D&D how they do because of the mechanical implications of that first campaign. Similarly, a mechanics first person could do the same for some particular houserule in their first campaign that only exists because their setting first DM wanted to emulate some particular aspect of a non-D&D story.

As for Mearl's list, it isn't clear if it is the union of all the answers he got, the intersection (very unlikely!), a hastily agreed upon consensus in R&D, or what have you. I think union is most likely, in which case individual lists were probably as diverse as ours. Rather than nitpick every item, although I enjoyed reading others' thoughts about them, I asked myself this question: "If all of these things are present, am I possibly or likely playing D&D? If none of them are, am I possibly or likely playing D&D?" My answers are yes and no, respectively, which suggests that even if the list isn't perfect, for at least one subset of those items the answer changes. I think it is likely there are multiple such subsets for me, so that there is a "phase change" from non-D&D to (possibly) D&D that can occur at multiple places given all possible combinations of those mechanics. In that case "D&Dness" is an emergent property of the interaction of its parts, which I think favors the big tent philosophy Mearls is so clearly trying to pursue. That this could be different subsets for the same person, and clearly for different people as well, is exactly the sort of thing they should be finding out.

 

[rounser]

I once made some house rules for Fantasy Hero that were strikingly similar to healing surges. The reason was that in default Fantasy Hero, unless you are willing to limit magic by charges, healing becomes effectively unlimited. Things that don't kill you don't really hurt. Hero comes at it from the other side of typical D&D hit points, but the problem is the same--you want a limit, but you want to parse it out over time for narrative pacing. It is a very useful tool in emulation mode.

It's also a kludge that doesn't match anything much in reality, unless you start invoking Die Hard and marathon runners. The giveaway is that the term "healing surge" is a nonsense term, because there's no expression in real life that describes it. About as close as you can come is "second wind", and even that requires lots of handwaving and gesturing at the Goodyear blimp...

 

[Mallus]

It's also a kludge that doesn't match anything much in reality, unless you start invoking Die Hard and marathon runners. The giveaway is that the term "healing surge" is a nonsense term, because there's no expression in real life that describes it.

Unlike the term "hit points", which is commonly used in medical schools.

Or "hit dice", which has been used in zoological classification since the days of Linneaus.

 

[francisca]

Here is the list:

• The six ability scores—Strength, Dexterity, Constitution, Intelligence, Wisdom, and Charisma—as the categories for measuring a character’s abilities.
  
• Armor Class as the basic representation of a character’s defense.
  
• Alignment (Law v. Chaos, Good v. Evil) as a personal ethos and a force in the universe.
  
• Attack rolls made using a d20, with higher rolls better than lower ones.
  
• Classes as the basic framework for what a character can do.
  
• Damage rolls to determine how badly a spell or attack hurts you.
  
• Gold pieces as the standard currency for treasure.
  
• Hit dice or level as the basic measure of a monster’s power.
  
• Hit points as a measure of your ability to absorb punishment, with more powerful characters and creatures gaining more of them.
  
• Levels and experience points as a measure of power and a mechanic that lets characters become more powerful over time.
  
• Magic items such as +1 swords as a desirable form of treasure.
  
• Rolling initiative at the start of a battle to determine who acts first.
  
• Saving throws as a mechanic for evading danger.
  
• “Fire-and-forget” magic, with spellcasters expending a spell when casting it.

When everything on that list has been re-defined and re-valued, what common ground really remains?

You know, I have this axe which has been in the family since 1750. Sure, its on its 4th head and 6th handle, but you know, its the same pre-American Revolution axe, right? According to Mearls, it is.

I'm not buying it.

I'm wondering what motivates a lead designer to write an article like that, actually.