[Poll] As A *Player*, Do You Enjoy Low-Magic/Grim&Gritty Campaigns?

[Bendris Noulg]

And as for herding gorgons, I'd say it would be better if gorgons were incapable of domestication, to keep the blood nice and rare.

Anyone else think it's funny how arbitrary decisions are sneered down on when used to generate a low magic setting but it's perfectly fine to be arbitrary to keep high magic environments in check...

At any rate, they don't have to be domesticated... In a high magic world, confining them to a specific area for easy retrieval is relatively simple to occomplish. Once a few have been gathered and they start having baby gorgons, harvesting the blood is even easier. Get enough gorgons in the herd, and it now becomes possible to draw some blood from many, giving you a steady supply of gorgon's blood without depletion of your source.

 

[Bendris Noulg]

This seems like a pretty unambigous asault on being creative with magic.

Y'know, I'm about two posts away from deciding that you either don't comprehend what I'm writing or simply refuse to.

To put it as simple as possible without getting my crayons to write with: It's not an "unambigous assault on being creative with magic", it's a statement about the inability to be creative without it.

Sounds like the players were being a bit too creative. Sounds like they were coming up with things that broke your plots and stories.

Again, you fail or refuse to read what is being written: I was tired of constantly flipping through books like they were a deck of Magic: The Gathering cards looking to trump and trump and trump again. This act was taking away time away from the development of plots and stories.

In addition, in order to use these trumps, it was becoming necessary to introduce villainous spellcasters in order to apply them. This, obviously, has an effect contrary to the application of rare magic themes (in other words, it required too many spellcasters to retain versimilitude).

Then you call me a troll for pointing out that this is a GM problem not a player problem.

I indicated that refusing to understand plain and simple messages by bringing up the same irrelevant and meaningless point, and indicating that I've stated something that I didn't state as your reasoning, is trollish behavior.

If you're not a troll, then I would hope your misunderstanding of my posts will come to an end.

mmmm I guess your right. I guess the real problem isn't that you don't want to deal with affects of high level spells, but refuse to admit that you'd rather play low level. I guess it's that the players are both to creative and to derivative at the same time to be allowed to play magic users.

Again, more of this "low magic = low level" nonesense.

Please, stop it. It's crap like this that leave me wondering if you're an idiot or a troll to begin with.

The point isn't to troll you, but to get you to admit that you don't restrict spells because they destroy creativity. You don't take them away because you it makes for better characters and better players. You take them away because it makes your life easier as a GM. Every thing else is just easily stripped away bluster and pride.

No, what you want is for me to admit to the only thing that will make you feel comfortable with others having preferences other than your own and to insult GMs that run games you don't like.

See, you're looking more and more like a troll.

My orginal post stated that IME GM's take away spells because they fear the power it gives the players. I think you've helped me to expose this point.
Thanks

Sigh...

Yep, you're a troll... Welcome to the ignore list. Say hello to Hong while you're there.

 

[Stormborn]

i can't really answer the poll because while i enjoy and prefer low-magic games, i hate grim & gritty games. heck, i think core D&D is too grim & gritty.

i prefer low-magic, cinematic, high-action games.

i think a better poll would be to ask about the two characteristics separately, since they by no means always go hand-in-hand.

I had the same responce when I saw the poll. Low-magic and Grim n Gritty are not mutually inclusive. Although, I will agree that Grim n Gritty tend to be low magic, Low Magic is not neccesarily more Grim n Gritty.

While I tend to play arcane spell casters, I like Low Magic for its feel, but want to play in more "cinematic" style campaigns. Although, if as was stated previously, Grim can equal dark and moody games like Call of Cthullu or Unknown Armies (the later, although built around magic, would def. be considered 'low magic' in comparision to DnD Core Rules) then I am all in favor of Grim.

 

[tonym]

Y'know, I read this accusation a lot, and I have to ask: Is this really the GM forcing players to be predictable?

It seems to me that it's more related to the player; without all the magic options, they can't come up with anything imaginative, and thus try to blame to GM for their own lacking of creativity. This only adds weight to the assertion that magic is a crutch for many players; remove the crutch and they can't walk.

In my experience, most players are extremely creative, not lacking in creativity, so I can't agree with your theory.

This is the way I see it: a Low-Magic campaign may be the means a frustrated DM uses to reign in his Players' creativity. Creative players require a super-creative DM, and some DMs can't handle the combined creative might of several imaginative Players working together on every problem.

If a DM is running a Low Magic campaign for positive reasons--not merely to reign-in their Players' creativity--then that's GREAT! Woohoo! However, I bet many Low Magic DMs choose Low Magic only because they are frustrated with their overly-creative Players coming up with clever ways to use spells and magic items. Those DMs want to control the 'story' overly much, and resent their creative Players using magic to resist being RAILROADED.

Tony M

 

[kamosa]

Y'know, I'm about two posts away from deciding that you either don't comprehend what I'm writing or simply refuse to.

To put it as simple as possible without getting my crayons to write with: It's not an "unambigous assault on being creative with magic", it's a statement about the inability to be creative without it.

Again, you fail or refuse to read what is being written: I was tired of constantly flipping through books like they were a deck of Magic: The Gathering cards looking to trump and trump and trump again. This act was taking away time away from the development of plots and stories.

In addition, in order to use these trumps, it was becoming necessary to introduce villainous spellcasters in order to apply them. This, obviously, has an effect contrary to the application of rare magic themes (in other words, it required too many spellcasters to retain versimilitude).

I indicated that refusing to understand plain and simple messages by bringing up the same irrelevant and meaningless point, and indicating that I've stated something that I didn't state as your reasoning, is trollish behavior.

If you're not a troll, then I would hope your misunderstanding of my posts will come to an end.

Again, more of this "low magic = low level" nonesense.

Please, stop it. It's crap like this that leave me wondering if you're an idiot or a troll to begin with.

No, what you want is for me to admit to the only thing that will make you feel comfortable with others having preferences other than your own and to insult GMs that run games you don't like.

See, you're looking more and more like a troll.

Sigh...

Yep, you're a troll... Welcome to the ignore list. Say hello to Hong while you're there.

And yet through all my "ignorance" I've never had to resort to name calling to get my point across.

 

[Bendris Noulg]

Again, more "the GM is incompetant" statements...

Check it out folks... There are currently two threads on this topic with a combined total of 12 pages worth of posts. Search the back pages and you'll find hundreds more. If you all have these same complaints and lame accusations as you did when the first thread was only 1 page long, than it's because you don't want to change your views.

That said, there is no longer anything to occomplish attempting to communicate with you folks anymore. You've obviously become set in your close-minded, bigotted, and simplistic view of LM, and no more effort on my part or anyone else's is going to provide any benefit aside from feeding the machine of ignorance.

 

[devita]

It depends...

It really depends on the campaign that is being played.

Generally speaking, when playing a straight D&D game, I love high magic. I seem to draw toward clerics and sorcerers.

When playing in something like Iron Kingdoms (from Privateer Press), low magic and grim / gritty is great. That is not a setting that should be hogh magic, in my opinion.

- Nash J. DeVita
- Silven Crossroads Non- d20 Section Admin

 

[Bendris Noulg]

And yet through all my "ignorance" I've never had to resort to name calling to get my point across.

Yes, you did... You called me (and every other low magic GM) fearful, prideful, lazy, and a dozen other things. Just because you don't flat out call us that doesn't disguise what you mean (it's done for laziness = person doing it is lazy)... Unlike you, I don't pretend to not understand in order to prove an invalid point; I'm reading clearly what you are posting (over and over and over again), I've just tried to be civil for the sake of civility.

For instance, you indicate that GMs take away spells because they fear the power it gives players and that I prove that to be the case. Well, guess what, Mr. I-don't-know-jack-but-will-blow-hot-air-out-my-backside-anyway, I haven't taken away any spells. None. Nadda. Zip. So how my posts prove your point is completely beyond me unless, of course, you're adding stuff to my posts within your own mind or combining my reasons for running low magic with someone else's reason for being low magic. I mean, if that's a valid way to prove a point, than it should be a simple thing to combine a few "I like high magic" posts to prove that all high magic players are pathetic munchkins that can't role-play their way out of a paper bag. However, it's not a valid means of proving a point, and unlike you, I'm not going to stoop to such lows.

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Just saying "npc wizards are rare and magic items are almost unheard of" doesn't make a campaign low magic to me, if you can still play a 6th level sorcerer in the 6th level party... YMMV

Kahuna burger

See, that's exactly what I want in a low-magic game. Basically because I think a world in which every single village has a wizard, a sorcerer, a cleric, a druid, and a bard is one that's a little too silly and un-genre-like, and it would be extremely difficult to *accurately* capture the effect of all that magic. But that's what the "default" DMG demographics state.
I want far fewer NPC casters than the default. Ergo, I want a low(er)-magic game. I've never suggested nerfing PC capabilities. (and I don't like gritty, no problem with grim)
It does seem that a lot of people are debating very different definitions of the terms, does it not?

 

[Brother MacLaren]

Well, also take into account how much money such defenses cost, and how rare the necessary components are. Yes, I know 3.x does gloss over this for the sake of ease, but stuff like gorgon's blood should damn well be rare and expensive. And as for herding gorgons, I'd say it would be better if gorgons were incapable of domestication, to keep the blood nice and rare. Besides, even if you could domesticate them, do you really think they'd let you cut open their necks for the blood without breathing on you? Survival instinct has to count for something.

Some defenses are relatively cheap. Flour, tripwires, guard dogs, sentries holding 40' ropes attached to bells (for defeating Silence). And, logically, everybody aware of magic would be using them, which would hurt the effectiveness of existing spells.
For gorgon's blood, if you say it's very expensive, then there's profit to be made. A merchant *will* - not "might" - hire adventurers to capture a gorgon, cripple and muzzle it, bleed it regularly, and keep it alive via magic. He's getting rich. And then another merchant tries the same trick. So the price of gorgon blood drops, and it becomes more commonplace. In any world, you have to account for economics - prices are not fixed for all time.