Minion Fist Fights

[hong]

And yet some people are willing to pay WotC for the privilege to keep doing it.

Clearly not as many as are willing to pay WotC to take it out.

 

[Kishin]

I'm writing the history of my world, and I want to know if it's sensible to have an army of average soldiers hold off a demon horde for...a day? A week? A month?

J. Michael Straczynski, creator of Babylon 5, was once asked how fast White Stars (a highly advance ship type in the B5 universe) moved. He responded with 'at the speed of plot'. If the story was served by them getting there in time, they did. If not/if it required them to not be there, they weren't.

Thus, in the end, what makes a better story wins out.

I know I just totally spouted anathema to you, but maybe you should give it a second thought.

 

[Lizard]

Make it up.

Then what will WOTC sell me?

 

[hong]

Then what will WOTC sell me?

I don't know. Do you want to buy what WotC is selling?

 

[Lizard]

J. Michael Straczynski, creator of Babylon 5, was once asked how fast White Stars (a highly advance ship type in the B5 universe) moved. He responded with 'at the speed of plot'. If the story was served by them getting there in time, they did. If not/if it required them to not be there, they weren't.

Yes, and if you think that didn't make writing the Galaxy Guide a total PITA, you're wrong.

I know I just totally spouted anathema to you, but maybe you should give it a second thought.

I do that when I have to. But I often find it more interesting to derive plots from the universe, then to impose my plots ON the universe. That's why I have trouble with 4e. In 3e, I could get plots from stat blocks; in 4e, I decide on my plot and then build stat blocks for it.

It's an interative process, of course. One the story is in motion, narrative law predominates. But the setup and worldbuilding is my favorite part of DMing.

 

[Kishin]

Yes, and if you think that didn't make writing the Galaxy Guide a total PITA, you're wrong.

I doubt he had the Galaxy Guide in mind at the time.

It also amuses me that I brought up that example, only to bounce over to the other thread and see you mention Straczynski there.

I do that when I have to. But I often find it more interesting to derive plots from the universe, then to impose my plots ON the universe.

I don't find the two to be mutually exclusive (I'm not sure if you're saying you do, though). I guess I don't see 4E preventing me from deriving plots from worldbuilding, which I also enjoy.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

I too am afraid that may be the case. I hope not, but I can't know untill I see the books. Again, I don't demand the rules emulate our reality, just that they stay true to their own and there is no pretense that this isn't really how things work.

It isn't that things don't "really" work that way. They do work that way. For the PCs during the course of their adventure.

It's a lot like saying that nearly every fantasy novel ever written took place in a world with an extremely low mortality rate since the residents of those worlds manage to survive amazingly dangerous things constantly(Or at least the heroes do, and since the books normally concentrate on the heroes, that's all we see of the world).

Of course, that isn't the case at all. The heroes of these books/movies/tv shows all live in worlds where the vast majority of things work exactly the same way they do in real life. However, the heroes are extremely lucky. When something would have a 95% chance of killing any normal person, it might have a 5% chance of killing the heroes. Technically, it had a 0% chance of killing the heroes, since it is a story and there's a writer who decided on his own what was going to happen based on story considerations and not on what was "realistic" or "consistent".

And that's the point. The D&D rules don't attempt to model "reality" anymore. They don't model what happens to 99% of the world. They just model what happens to a group of players around a table playing a game of D&D.

For a literary example consider Terry Pratchett's Diskworld novels. This is a world of narrative causality, and the people who live in that world know it. This occasionally results in them trying to game the system, sometimes it works, usually it's just funny.

And that's rather the point. These books are supposed to be funny by how absurd it is that the people are essentially living in a game of D&D and know the rules when they shouldn't.

I'm not saying that while playing 3.x D&D I forget I'm playing a game, but I don't feel like my character is being beaten about the face and shoulders with the unreality of his own world. :/

I don't think he IS beaten about the face with that. From your character's point of view he goes on an adventure, defeats some monsters, some of which he takes down quickly as he catches them off guard or they are just poor fighters. Some of them managed to dodge out of the way or deflect his blows and it takes him a while to break through and strike that final blow.

He knows that despite these things being easy for him to defeat, any normal villager out there would likely die a horrible death in combat with them. Which is why he needs to be around to protect them. A great hero.

Sure....out of character you know that the creature is a minion and it only has 1 hitpoint and whether or not a villager would win against it is entirely up to the DM's opinion of how tough the standard orc is and how tough the standard villager is. But you have faith that the DM will make a reasonable decision as you could probably see there being a chance(depending on circumstances) that either of them could win. The villager might be able to sneak up behind the orc with a knife or might attack the orc after he tripped over a cat crossing the street and win. That villager might have been trained in combat. There's so many factors involved that it would take a super computer weeks to calculate all of the things that might allow one side to win over the other one.

No one would be able to predict the results of that accurately. Certainly no set of rules that a human could understand and process in a couple of minutes. So, pretty much any answer the DM comes up with is going to be an abstraction. Might as make it one that is interesting to the storyline rather than a random one.

 

[Lizard]

I doubt he had the Galaxy Guide in mind at the time.

It also amuses me that I brought up that example, only to bounce over to the other thread and see you mention Straczynski there.

As a writer of brilliant tales, deeply moving, with complex character arcs and the ability to fairly easily respond to radical changes in cast and timing imposed on him by external factors....he is a master.

As a builder of wholly consistent worlds....erm...well, let's put it this way, I found THREE dates for the first lunar colony in canon sources.

I don't find the two to be mutually exclusive (I'm not sure if you're saying you do, though). I guess I don't see 4E preventing me from deriving plots from worldbuilding, which I also enjoy.

I am of the type who, when desperate, will flip open a monster manual until I find a critter which implies a plot to me, then build a plot around it -- at least enough to get by. (I rarely do more than 30 minutes prep for my 3e games; indeed, I'll sometimes brag to players that "Hey, I actually did prep work this time!") From what I've seen of 4e, it works the other way -- you get an idea then find monsters to fill it. Everything has a niche, a role, a purpose, and can't easily go beyond it. Encounters are more complex, involving larger numbers of monsters. Terrain and tactical options are more important. Everyone says it's easier to ad-hoc things in 4e, but I don't see how; stuff I used to fudge because it didn't matter now becomes vital due to expanded player movement abilities and the wide range of tactical positioning options.

 

[hong]

I am of the type who, when desperate, will flip open a monster manual until I find a critter which implies a plot to me, then build a plot around it -- at least enough to get by. (I rarely do more than 30 minutes prep for my 3e games; indeed, I'll sometimes brag to players that "Hey, I actually did prep work this time!") From what I've seen of 4e, it works the other way -- you get an idea then find monsters to fill it. Everything has a niche, a role, a purpose, and can't easily go beyond it. Encounters are more complex, involving larger numbers of monsters. Terrain and tactical options are more important. Everyone says it's easier to ad-hoc things in 4e, but I don't see how; stuff I used to fudge because it didn't matter now becomes vital due to expanded player movement abilities and the wide range of tactical positioning options.

Life wasn't meant to be easy.

 

[Fallen Seraph]

Everyone says it's easier to ad-hoc things in 4e, but I don't see how; stuff I used to fudge because it didn't matter now becomes vital due to expanded player movement abilities and the wide range of tactical positioning options.

It is easier in that, since you have complete monsters in various forms, you can quickly go. Okay, I need a orc who can take a lot of damage, *finds a Orc Brute puts in game*.

3e was like this: You had to build a monster to fit a slot in the game, sometimes if your good this slot can work only half complete.

4e gives you that monster that completely fills the slot and with possible extension points, that other slots can be added onto.