Overlapping concepts

[Andor]

There are often many ways to achieve the same end in D&D.

Suppose for example you want a character who can pull a weapon out of thin air. You could do this by:

A) Taking Levels in Soul Knife.
B) Taking Levels in Psychic Warrior and learning the Call Weapon power.
C) Take Levels in Incarnate and use the Incarnate Weapon Soulmeld.
D) Take the Shape Soulmeld (Incarnate Weapon) feat.
E) Take Levels in the Shadowsmith PRC.
F) Use any of a number of spells from Flame Blade to Fabricate.
G) Use any of a variety of Magic Items from Gloves of Storing to a Robe of Many Items.

Clearly nobody has a monopoly on this. But there are even some things that seem pretty narrowly focused that can be done in several ways.

Suppose you want a character who uses darkness itself as a weapon. Seems like a pretty narrow shtick right? Off the top of my head:

A) Shadowsmith PRC
B) Shadowblade PRC
C) Umbral Disciple PRC

and arguments could be made for

D) Warlock
E) Shadowcaster
F) Shadow Dancer PRC

Now in general I'm in the 'choices are good' camp. But I do wonder if there comes a point where a concept is diluted by too many options. Opinions?

 

[BullMarkOne]

Personally I think that the more ways a concept is developed the better. I like to have very detailed campaign settings, but I'm lazy. If I can use, or quickly adapt someone elses work, all the better. I don't however feel the need to use every option in every game. It is the duty of the players and dungeonmaster to whittle the options down to those in any campaign. This can be used to good effect to allow players to have a good hand in defining the specifics of a setting. Just loosely identify various groups or races, or locales by schtick. Then when a player picks a schtick, work his characters background into the flavor of the group. Less work for the DM and lets the player have an effect on defining the game world.

 

[Nebulous]

There are often many ways to achieve the same end in D&D.

Now in general I'm in the 'choices are good' camp. But I do wonder if there comes a point where a concept is diluted by too many options. Opinions?

Well, in general this IS a slight problem i have with current Dnd, and the more sourcebooks they pump out every month the more the problem stacks. And to say it's a "problem" is somewhat of a misnomer. It's easy avoided by "I use this in my campaign, and not this." Problem solved. But I agree, so many classes and spells and feats have overlap that they all blur together. I really wanted to love Tome of Magic, but aside from flavor, the actual MECHANICAL results of spells were nearly identical to many in the core rules. A bonus here. A bonus there. Bleh.