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<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6662063" data-attributes="member: 996">Celtavian had free admitted that he is a committed Caster Supremacist.&nbsp; &nbsp;Only if you think games should be remotely balanced or in any way reflect the genre.&nbsp;Nod.&nbsp; There's an idea that older D&amp;D was rules lite, and an idea it was DM-empowering (though no on would have thought of it as such, at the time, 'empowerment' not yet being a buzzword in the late 70s).&nbsp; The latter is closer to the truth.&nbsp; DMs heavily modified older versions of D&amp;D (because, really, they /needed/ to), often, but certainly not always, paring them away to be much simpler.&nbsp;Experiences differ.&nbsp; For instance, I was the only DM I knew who used weapon vs armor adjustments (and they were to hit, not damage, btw).&nbsp; OTOH, I rarely saw campaigns where level limits were ignored - and they were generally disasters if they actually reached the levels where it mattered.&nbsp; What I did see a lot of where low-level games dominated by non-/demi-human PCs, yet high-level games with all (almost all - there was one halfling Thief, once) human PCs (mostly magic-users).&nbsp; <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink&nbsp; &nbsp; ;)"&nbsp; data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" />&nbsp;Something about 3e seemed to really provoke a RAW-obsession.&nbsp; My sense is that it came in from the CCG side of the house.&nbsp; But, outside of D&amp;D, there have been games going either way.&nbsp; In general, it tracks the quality of the rulesets.&nbsp; Games with solid, carefully playtest or elegant or just very ambitious systems tend to inspire their fans to stick to those rules, while those that are less functional, balanced, clear or more casual and slap-dash or 'rules lite,' tend to get messed with more.In D&amp;D, though, I'll admit, there's been a clear trend from enthusiasm for variants, to enthusiasm for settings, to RAW, to edition warring, to DM empowerment.&nbsp; So, full circle, sorta.&nbsp;That's not new, either. There were decidedly adversarial or 'killer' DMs back in the day, too, general openness&nbsp; to rule variants notwithstanding.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 6662063, member: 996"] Celtavian had free admitted that he is a committed Caster Supremacist. Only if you think games should be remotely balanced or in any way reflect the genre. Nod. There's an idea that older D&D was rules lite, and an idea it was DM-empowering (though no on would have thought of it as such, at the time, 'empowerment' not yet being a buzzword in the late 70s). The latter is closer to the truth. DMs heavily modified older versions of D&D (because, really, they /needed/ to), often, but certainly not always, paring them away to be much simpler. Experiences differ. For instance, I was the only DM I knew who used weapon vs armor adjustments (and they were to hit, not damage, btw). OTOH, I rarely saw campaigns where level limits were ignored - and they were generally disasters if they actually reached the levels where it mattered. What I did see a lot of where low-level games dominated by non-/demi-human PCs, yet high-level games with all (almost all - there was one halfling Thief, once) human PCs (mostly magic-users). ;) Something about 3e seemed to really provoke a RAW-obsession. My sense is that it came in from the CCG side of the house. But, outside of D&D, there have been games going either way. In general, it tracks the quality of the rulesets. Games with solid, carefully playtest or elegant or just very ambitious systems tend to inspire their fans to stick to those rules, while those that are less functional, balanced, clear or more casual and slap-dash or 'rules lite,' tend to get messed with more. In D&D, though, I'll admit, there's been a clear trend from enthusiasm for variants, to enthusiasm for settings, to RAW, to edition warring, to DM empowerment. So, full circle, sorta. That's not new, either. There were decidedly adversarial or 'killer' DMs back in the day, too, general openness to rule variants notwithstanding. [/QUOTE]

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