Of all the complaints about 3.x systems... do you people actually allow this stuff ?

[Tony Vargas]

Couldn't your experiences also be lumped into the 'anecdotal evidence' category? Or anyones for that matter?

Absolutely. They're presented as such.

The 15 minute workday applies to 4e as well. Your dudes could go in blow their dailies rest and do it again. There is nothing in the rules preventing them from doing so and it would provide a huge tactical advantage.

True. 4e does provide some incentives to 'press on' - you accumulate action points, magic item daily uses, and perhaps 'unlock' a better power of an item as you gain milestones - but they are pretty minor incentives compared to getting your healing surges and dailies back.

The big difference is that everyone has dailies, so while the DM might have to adjust encounters a bit if his style or his groups strategies push the campaign toward 5-minute workdays, the classes at least remain balanced with eachother. In 4e, the 5-minute workday is a conceptual problem, in earlier eds it was a serious balance issue.

One of the things that I loved about older editions is that casters and melee were different, sure if you are going to push it to the max or try and hog the limelight you can do it easier with a caster, but why would you want to do that in a game designed around group play?

Possibly because you're a big fat jerk? Or, maybe because you were just chasing a concept, and it got out of hand.

I would rather deal with problem players when they come up than have a system where everything for everyone is largely the same.

I don't like systems that are imbalanced by total lack of choices any more than I like those that are imbalanced by a dearth of viable choices. In a badly balanced system where there's one choice (or, as in 3.x, 3 'tier 1' choices) that's obviously the best, everyone (who matters) is largely the same. In a badly balanced system with no (or vanishingly little) choice, everyone is largely the same. In a well-balanced system, there are many viable choices, few badly under-powered 'trap' choices, few noticeably overpowered choices, and no overwhelming 'must have' choices - and characters are thus widely varied, but all playable & contributing.

 

[hanez]

Absolutely.
Possibly because you're a big fat jerk? Or, maybe because you were just chasing a concept, and it got out of hand.

It seems like a lot of the changes D&D has seen lately is an attempt to manage the jerk in the group, or the inexperienced DM.

Sucks for the groups of friends who play and trust together. Almost like they have to sacfice old players to get new players. My local book shop has a D&D day where you play one shots with random DMs. I would never ever ever consider playing an RPG like that, I want to play with people I like, trust, and with a DM is have some amount of faith in.

I imagine if these min maxed classes I hear about online actually are EVER played in reality, then its in these type of "stranger" situations. With an established
group its hard to imagine people playing that. I remember the errata for 3e that fixed the Druids polymorphy ability. All for people who were abusing the system and polymorphing into special creatures, for me it would have been fixed with some simple DM discretion, but they had to issue errata. Almost like its a MMORPG and they have to download a new patch lol.

As for the 15 minute working day, my players try that now and then. Sometimes its suitable and I allow it, other times they get woken up by prepared dungeon dwellers who stumbled on them. If theyre suprised they lose an initiative round, and Ive ruled that you can sleep in any thing over hide without deductions, so they lose a round puttin there armor on too (or they fight without it). Its still a tactic they can use, now and then, but they know there are costs and risks which seems like a good balance to force the mage to not always go nova.

 

[Tony Vargas]

It seems like a lot of the changes D&D has seen lately is due to manage the jerk in the group, or the inexperienced DM.

Or the inexperienced player, or the more heterogeonous or casual group, yes. It's broadened the apeal and playability of the game enormously, which is a great thing.

Sucks for the groups of friends who play and trust together.

Not really. If you're an experienced group and on the same page about what you want, it's pretty easy to take a balanced system like 4e and add back the imbalanced elements you want for your campaing. Breaking is much easier than fixing.

My local book shop has a D&D day where you play one shots with random DMs. I would never ever ever consider playing an RPG like that, I want to play with people I like, trust, and with a DM is have some amount of faith in.

Well, you might try it some time, with 4e, and even with Essentials+ as low level (which is what you get at D&D Encounters) the system is up to the challenge. I've played games at conventions since the 80s, and AD&D con games could be a real crap shoot, you might get a good DM or one not up to the challenge of running the system, you fellow players could bring in who-knows-what off the wall characters, and rule issues were guaranteed to eat up a lot of play time.

AD&D's need to be 'fixed' made it a much better game for the stable home group using extensive house rules than for casual play. In spite of that, it got used for casual play a lot because of name recognition. New players wanted to try D&D, because they'd never heard of other (better) systems. Who knows how many potential RPGers were lost because they were repelled by bad first experiences?

 

[hanez]

AD&D's need to be 'fixed' made it a much better game for the stable home group using extensive house rules than for casual play. In spite of that, it got used for casual play a lot because of name recognition. New players wanted to try D&D, because they'd never heard of other (better) systems. Who knows how many potential RPGers were lost because they were repelled by bad first experiences?

I tend to agree with most of your sentiments actually. I just wish they would have tried this (IMHO) NEW game with a name of its own. D&D needs rule refinements, more elegancy, updates to keep it interesting. What it seems like we got instead with 4e is a completely different game and lectures on how "its better".

Maybe if WOTC was smart they could have had two successfull RPGs. One more centred on narrativism and the other centered on balanced miniature style combat. Instead they now seem to have a game with no "unity" and a very succesful former partner now competitor (paizo)

 

[malkav666]

True. 4e does provide some incentives to 'press on' - you accumulate action points, magic item daily uses, and perhaps 'unlock' a better power of an item as you gain milestones - but they are pretty minor incentives compared to getting your healing surges and dailies back.


The big difference is that everyone has dailies, so while the DM might have to adjust encounters a bit if his style or his groups strategies push the campaign toward 5-minute workdays, the classes at least remain balanced with eachother. In 4e, the 5-minute workday is a conceptual problem, in earlier eds it was a serious balance issue.

But it problem is there in 4e as well. It is present not just in concept, but in actual play. If you rest after every encounter or two then you always have your best resources and HP, regardless of what edition or game you are playing. But the difference in the two editions is that 4e does have some mechanical benefit for pressing on. In 3.x there is no gamist reason to keep fighting, but rather a narrative one. It doesn't make sense to fight one encounter and then rest and repeat it over and over, unless you are willing to give up all immersion and play the roleplaying game with only one role for everyone: That of a game pawn.

If you play D&D like its a boardgame then it doesn't fare so well as an RPG (but any edition makes for a damn fine board game). I can't think of any published module that is paced where the adventurers are supposed to rest after every encounter. So it seems to me that that the modules were not designed with that in mind and perhaps that the game it self was not designed with 15 MAD as the intended way to play it. If you play a game not really as its intended in a lowest common denominator kind of way, is it really the fault of the system if you are not having fun. The 15 MAD is a CHOICE that the group makes. The system doesn't force or encourage it. Its a playstyle that is relatively easy to stop it regardless of what edition you are playing. But I just don't see how it can be classified as a older edition only problem, its a pacing problem that effects all editions and you combat it the same way for each edition regardless of the ruleset because its a narrative pacing problem and really has nothing to do with rules so much as trying to boardgame the system and always be at full power.

Possibly because you're a big fat jerk? Or, maybe because you were just chasing a concept, and it got out of hand.

In the case of the big fat jerk. I don't really want to game with jerks, regardless of edition. I want to game with people that I would want to be around even if I were not gaming. As far as the concept getting out of hand I would just talk to the player, or let the other players in the group moderate it for me.

I don't like systems that are imbalanced by total lack of choices any more than I like those that are imbalanced by a dearth of viable choices. In a badly balanced system where there's one choice (or, as in 3.x, 3 'tier 1' choices) that's obviously the best, everyone (who matters) is largely the same. In a badly balanced system with no (or vanishingly little) choice, everyone is largely the same. In a well-balanced system, there are many viable choices, few badly under-powered 'trap' choices, few noticeably overpowered choices, and no overwhelming 'must have' choices - and characters are thus widely varied, but all playable & contributing.

You and I seem to share a common wishlist for a good game. I would love to play a game with the bolded concepts in effect. I will be eagerly watching the horizon in hopes that 5e can achieve that, because no edition of D&D has ever pegged that just right. But as far as class tiers and all that business and the imbalance created by variety. I have found it really only crushes your game if you play D&D like its an business accounting get together.

I once had a DM tell my I had 'won' D&D for making a character so optimized that it crushed anything we faced. It was a psychic warrior with a monkey gripped scythe using every trick in the book to maximize crit damage (including supplemental web material releases by WOTC). It was a focused attempt at optimization because the Dm asked me to do just that because he wanted to get the group more into the idea of power gaming. I will tell you honestly I really enjoyed MAKING the toon and trying to make her as good as possible. But in practice it wasn't that fun to actually play for me or for anyone else. My baddass psychic warrior didn't even last a session before she retired, because while she was great on paper, its not that fun to trivialize the encounters in play. I mean, it was fun the first couple of times, but it got old real quick.

Sometimes its more fun to play game and not try and rape the rules and lump everything into neat statistical levels of what is best and just choose stuff you think is cool. If your objective is to be the best statistically then any game system you play will not be fun in the long run, because I think in the end players who enjoy that might just like MAKING characters more than playing them (but I am sure that I am wrong, but it still seems that way). If you have already made the toon that is better than everyone else in your party and all monsters appropriate for your party what is the point of continued play?

Thank you for the reply and discussion.

love,

malkav

 

[Elf Witch]

I had never heard of the 15 minute work day until I came to the forums. It is just not how we play. The casters don't go nova on every encounter they are holding back spells for later in the day. And if by chance they had to go nova well they spend the rest of the day firing crossbows.

As a DM I would not just put the world on hold while the PCs nap things keep going on. Just like if the PCs choose not to follow a clue the bad guys keep on with their plans.

I find the fighter class weak he has nothing to do outside of combat he has not one social skill. I have seen rogues out fight fighters not to mention clerics and paladins. Have yet to see a wizard do it though. Some of the things we have done to make the fighter more fun is to open up the skill list.

I do not think wizards are the issue if played as designed with the limitations of the class. The issue comes in with the creation of magic items that let the wizard or any caster get around those limitations. I limit it by keeping the action moving so the casters don't have the time to be making a ton of items.

I do allow a lot of CLW wands because I have found that limiting healing is a sure fire way to encourage the 15 minute day. A party low on hit points with no healing left is heading for a TPK if they don't stop.

As for the issue of the big spells like teleport our group would never waste it just to get around an encounter we use them as omg we are being killed here run or we have X amount of time to get to the BBEG before he unleashes hell on the world.

Also spells like knock have never been an issue the only time they have ever been used was when the party did not have anyone who could pick locks or in an emergency. None of the casters would waste a spell on something that the rogue could do easier and with less cost.

While I think 3E has its weird fiddly bits and things needed some fixing I don't find it nearly as broken as a lot of people say it is. Right for us it is the best edition for our role playing tastes.

 

[The Human Target]

I was going to post a thoughtful reply, but your self-congratulatory original post and the smug replies have made me realize the futility of it.

Mod Note: Folks, he almost had it, but missed on a crucial point - if you don't want to post a thoughtful reply, DO NOT replace it with a snarky one. If you feel discussion is futile, then don't post. Really, it's simple. ~Umbran

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I had never heard of the 15 minute work day until I came to the forums. It is just not how we play. The casters don't go nova on every encounter they are holding back spells for later in the day. And if by chance they had to go nova well they spend the rest of the day firing crossbows.

Pretty much this...not just when I DM, but every DM I've played under since 1977.

 

[Number48]

I once had a car that drifted to the left. It was perfectly drivable, you just had to compensate for it wanting to drift left. That alone didn't make it a bad car, but there's eventually a time when you have to replace a car. I wouldn't go and buy a new car that drifted to the left.

DMs can and do compensate for what things the game might allow, or in some cases that the game doesn't really provide for. But just because you can compensate for it, even if it is easy to compensate for, I would expect to see it addressed in a new full-price system.

 

[Tony Vargas]

But the difference in the two editions is that 4e does have some mechanical benefit for pressing on. In 3.x there is no gamist reason to keep fighting, but rather a narrative one. It doesn't make sense to fight one encounter and then rest

The 'narrative reason' has always been true, and remains true. The added mechanical incentive is nice, but minor.

What would really be nice would be if it didn't matter - if the DM could pace the game according to the needs of the campaign, rather than in a vain attempt to maintain some semblance of class balance (3e and earlier), or keep encounter balance pegged (4e). That'd mean getting rid of dailies for all classes, though, and that's one sacred cow even 4e didn't lead to the abattoir.

But I just don't see how it can be classified as a older edition only problem, its a pacing problem that effects all editions

Nod. It just hits each ed differently. In AD&D, the frequent-resting 'problem' wasn't a problem at all at very low level - the party simply wouldn't have the healing resources to go very long - at higher levels it was an added source of balance problems, but magic items and rules problems made balance so quixotic that it hardly mattered. In 3e it was a major source of challenge-balancing problems for the DM, and hurt class balance severely. In 4e, it's still an encounter-balance problem, but a less severe one, because daily resources aren't so extreme in their power or numbers, and it's not a class balance issue at all, since all classes have such powers in aproximately equivalent portions.

In the case of the big fat jerk. I don't really want to game with jerks, regardless of edition. I want to game with people that I would want to be around even if I were not gaming. As far as the concept getting out of hand I would just talk to the player, or let the other players in the group moderate it for me.

I don't know if you've ever gamed with people who were good friends away from the table, but were Mr Hyde as soon as they started power gaming; or with players who were so enthused to get the most out of the system that they ended up breaking it; or in situations where expelling or 'talking to' a problem player could be a big problem, in itself. Maybe you've led a charmed life or maybe I did something terrible in a past one, but I've certainly seen all of those, and more, and in no small quantities over the last 32 years.

You and I seem to share a common wishlist for a good game. I would love to play a game with the bolded concepts in effect.

If you'd tried 4e before they came out with the Expertise 'fix' and Essentials...

I will be eagerly watching the horizon in hopes that 5e can achieve that

Given the big retro-push, that seems unlikely. But you never know what an inspired designer might come up with. I was shocked that 4e solved D&Ds problem with class balance, for instance.

I will tell you honestly I really enjoyed MAKING the toon and trying to make her as good as possible. But in practice it wasn't that fun to actually play for me or for anyone else. My baddass psychic warrior didn't even last a session before she retired, because while she was great on paper, its not that fun to trivialize the encounters in play. I mean, it was fun the first couple of times, but it got old real quick.

My feelings, exactly. The CharOp exercise is a fun one, but of minimal use in a serious (and friendly) campaign. In competative tournament play, PvP, or challenges like Lair Assault, OTOH, it has some use.