Pathfinder 1E Opinions on Pathfinder

[Vyvyan Basterd]

if it was available for the BBEG NPC or the Monster, then the feat/spell/thingy was available to the players, or should be able to be replicated by the PCs.

[Emphasis mine.] The if I am referring to is classes/feats/spells.

That seems more like a play-style issue than a game-design issue. I've never run or played any RPG with such an assumption in place. So, while I can certainly see why some players might have developed such a sense of entitlement, it isn't a part of Pathfinder as far I can see.

Could you give an example in 3.5 or Pathfinder RAW where a given class, feat or spell is available to the NPC or Monster and not available to a PC. I'm not talking about feats that require a physical attribute like wings or Large size, just a feat/class/spell that explicitly says DM Only.

since 3E didn't explicitly say that DMs have to play by the rules,

AD&D opponents (mainly monsters) and 4E opponents are explicitly built using different rules than 3E equivalents. This set up an expectation in many players' eyes that the DM would now have to follow the same rules they did. Sure, you can always point to Rule Zero, but disappointing your players by using it as a crutch for every time you want to buck the paradigm isn't exactly a good idea, IMO. Everyone at the table needs to be satisfied with the game, not just the DM.

Warning, some may find the following maudlin ramblings not to their personal taste. So I will hide them away in a spoiler block so as not to offend:
[sblock]I wasn't satisfied with the 3E paradigm and that led to my abandonment of it. Luckily, my players are just as satisfied overall with the shift to 4E that we are able to reach concensus of play. It could have also gone the direction of one of them stepping up to run 3E or PF and me being satisfied participating as a player.[/sblock]

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

Last night after readin a few of these posts I actually sat down with my PF Bestiary and Core Rulebook and hand copied (from the book) an adult blue dragon. It took me about 15 min to copy what I'd need for a combat including special abilities, spell ranges, saves and damage.

Unless I misunderstand ShinHakkaider, this was 15 minutes to copy down what he needed for combat. This isn't modifying the creature at all. And this matches my experience. Either spend 15-30 minutes (some of us don't write or type as fast as SH) referencing the details to run a complex monster as is or spend equivalent time in-game to flip through books for the same info.

That's versus about 1 min total to open the 4E MM and scan the statblock and go.

5-ish minutes was to modify an existing creature using MB.

 

[Hunter In Darkness]

No, it's not.

He said that he could alter a monster to his liking in 15 minutes. I said that a 4e monster can be modified using the official program in 5.

Yes, he could use any number of 3rd party, feature-poor applications to mess around with the monster in 3.5, but they aren't official, they don't automatically contain every monster published, and they don't support the totally integrated power-swapping that makes using the Monster Builder so fantastic.

His point was that he could take 15 minutes to take that tremendous stat block and modify it to something he wants to use. My counterpoint was that I can take five minutes to do the same thing, but better polished.

Still not even close to the same thing. You can do it in five with 90% of the work done for you with a program. He can do it in 15 with no outside help. That is no where near the same thing.

 

[Mark Chance]

Could you give an example in 3.5 or Pathfinder RAW where a given class, feat or spell is available to the NPC or Monster and not available to a PC. I'm not talking about feats that require a physical attribute like wings or Large size, just a feat/class/spell that explicitly says DM Only.

I'll get on that right after you reference where in the 3.5 and/or PF canon the "players were told that they were on a level playing field with the DM."

 

[Dannager]

Still not even close to the same thing. You can do it in five with 90% of the work done for you with a program. He can do it in 15 with no outside help. That is no where near the same thing.

I think the fact that I have access to an officially supported, full-featured program that does 90% of the work for me with 4e, while those interested in messing with the Pathfinder stat block resort to copying it down by hand and browsing through sourcebooks (while still requiring those sourcebooks during play to properly run the monster) is perfectly germane to the discussion.

 

[BryonD]

AD&D opponents (mainly monsters) and 4E opponents are explicitly built using different rules than 3E equivalents. This set up an expectation in many players' eyes that the DM would now have to follow the same rules they did. Sure, you can always point to Rule Zero, but disappointing your players by using it as a crutch for every time you want to buck the paradigm isn't exactly a good idea, IMO. Everyone at the table needs to be satisfied with the game, not just the DM.

The transition from player entitlement to having to follow the same rules is a non sequitur.

Again, I'd ask for a specific example where the monsters following the same rules created a player entitlement.

I don't recall ever using rule zero to disallow something. And yet I simultaneously can not recall a single time that a player expressed an entitlement to something that I needed to deny them.

Rule zero is about changing the rules when the circumstances trump the general logic that the rule in question assumes. The fact that you are basing your argument on applying rule zero to deny things to players is quite informative to me. If you are hosing players, then not everyone is going to be satisfied.

I didn't warp rule zero into this kind of anti-fun attack and, not surprisingly, satisfaction all around was the consistent result.
Please don't blame the system for failures you are inserting into it.

 

[Chrono22]

Um this thread is supposed to be about pathfinder right?

How about those adventures? Is the pathfinder srd as good as the 3.5 hypertext srd?

 

[Hunter In Darkness]

I think the fact that I have access to an officially supported, full-featured program that does 90% of the work for me with 4e, while those interested in messing with the Pathfinder stat block resort to copying it down by hand and browsing through sourcebooks (while still requiring those sourcebooks during play to properly run the monster) is perfectly germane to the discussion.

Yep it means without that program your in the same boat as him. So your 5 mins time frame is pointless. He knows how long it takes him you do not, you have no base time of comparison at all. The question had nothing to do with programs but how much time it took. Simply put you have no ideal how long it would take. The DDI is not a part of the core books it's a useful program but has zero to do with how long it takes you to prep without a computer.

 

[Mark Chance]

Um this thread is supposed to be about pathfinder right?

Path-what-er?

How about those adventures? Is the pathfinder srd as good as the 3.5 hypertext srd?

I don't really know about the adventures as I've not read any of them. I have DLed and read more than one free Player's Guide for this or that adventure path. Those were interesting. I'm also familiar with a few of Paizo's non-PF adventures, and those I've seen have been consistently impressive. Now, all of that said, I don't really like Adventure Paths. I'm kind of sick of epic, go from level 1 to whatever quests. I want something sandboxey, like B2.

As far as SRDs go, I prefer d20pfsrd.org over the official Paizo SRD. I find the former to be more user-friendly in terms of layout, functionality, et cetera. Maybe it's just me (it usually is) but I can't even get the Paizo SRD site to let me cut-and-paste or use CTRL-F to locate key text.

 

[ShinHakkaider]

Unless I misunderstand ShinHakkaider, this was 15 minutes to copy down what he needed for combat. This isn't modifying the creature at all. And this matches my experience. Either spend 15-30 minutes (some of us don't write or type as fast as SH) referencing the details to run a complex monster as is or spend equivalent time in-game to flip through books for the same info.

That's versus about 1 min total to open the 4E MM and scan the statblock and go.

5-ish minutes was to modify an existing creature using MB.

Nope you didnt misunderstand at all, 15 minutes to copy down what I needed for combat on a 8.5 x 11 college ruled sheet of loose leaf paper. I didnt add a template or change the monster in any way. I just made sure I had the special abilities and spells DC saves, damages and ranges. I didn't write everything out word for word, but in enough shorthand so that I'd know what they do.

I also wanted to point out that this method is the most INCONVENIENT way for me to do this. Which is why I did it this way just to see how long it would take using the least optimal method and it was still only 15 min.

Usually, I open the PDF's that I want to use and copy and paste what I need from there into a word document. From there I usually edit things down, then when I'm done I print and I'm done. Needless to say doing it this way usually goes a lot quicker.