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Presentaion of Spells: To Prose or Not To Prose?
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<blockquote data-quote="Daztur" data-source="post: 5904073" data-attributes="member: 55680"><p>Forgive me if I misinterpret anything about 4ed, my 4ed-fu is weak but from what I've seen they're not as similar as you're saying. But my impression is thus:</p><p></p><p>0ed:</p><p>A. The rules provide you with a specific effect.</p><p>B. For figuring out what effects that effect has on the environment the DM makes <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /><img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile :)" data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> up. For example does getting hit by a fireball light you on fire and cause ongoing damage? Does casting shocking grasp and then sticking your hands in some water zap all of the nearby fish with electricity? Up to the DM.</p><p></p><p>4ed:</p><p>A. The rules provide you with a specific result that you can get by using a specific power.</p><p>B. If the crunch of what the power does and the fluff of what the power does contradict, you refluff the fluff.</p><p></p><p>For example let's look at Crack the Shell "you break through your enemy’s armor and deal a painful bleeding wound." What happens if you're fighting an enemy (say a golem) that has no blood. Can there still be a bleeding wound? What happens if you're fighting an enemy with no discernable armor like a gelatinous cube? How can you break through the armor? In 4ed the DM uses some creativity and changes the fluff a bit and says that instead of breaking through the gelatinous cube's armor (since it has none) the fighter drives his sword extra deep or whatever.</p><p></p><p>Looking at 0ed on the other hand: "Polymorph Self: A spell allowing the user to take the shape of anything he desires, but he will not thereby acquire the combat abilities of the thing he has polymorphed himself to resemble. That is, while the user may turn himself into a dragon of some type, he will not gain the ability to fight and breathe, but he will be able to fly. Duration: 6 turns + the level of the Magic-User employing it."</p><p>That gives you a pretty vague effect that can be used for all kinds of things and requires DM adjudication to say what kinds of mechanical effects it has.</p><p></p><p>Basically while 0ed and 4ed both are pretty scant on the prose, 0ed effects are far more situational than 4ed ones. In my experience more situational effects are harder to balance (since the situation matters so much it could be very weak one day and very powerful the next) but encourage more creativity.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Daztur, post: 5904073, member: 55680"] Forgive me if I misinterpret anything about 4ed, my 4ed-fu is weak but from what I've seen they're not as similar as you're saying. But my impression is thus: 0ed: A. The rules provide you with a specific effect. B. For figuring out what effects that effect has on the environment the DM makes :):):):) up. For example does getting hit by a fireball light you on fire and cause ongoing damage? Does casting shocking grasp and then sticking your hands in some water zap all of the nearby fish with electricity? Up to the DM. 4ed: A. The rules provide you with a specific result that you can get by using a specific power. B. If the crunch of what the power does and the fluff of what the power does contradict, you refluff the fluff. For example let's look at Crack the Shell "you break through your enemy’s armor and deal a painful bleeding wound." What happens if you're fighting an enemy (say a golem) that has no blood. Can there still be a bleeding wound? What happens if you're fighting an enemy with no discernable armor like a gelatinous cube? How can you break through the armor? In 4ed the DM uses some creativity and changes the fluff a bit and says that instead of breaking through the gelatinous cube's armor (since it has none) the fighter drives his sword extra deep or whatever. Looking at 0ed on the other hand: "Polymorph Self: A spell allowing the user to take the shape of anything he desires, but he will not thereby acquire the combat abilities of the thing he has polymorphed himself to resemble. That is, while the user may turn himself into a dragon of some type, he will not gain the ability to fight and breathe, but he will be able to fly. Duration: 6 turns + the level of the Magic-User employing it." That gives you a pretty vague effect that can be used for all kinds of things and requires DM adjudication to say what kinds of mechanical effects it has. Basically while 0ed and 4ed both are pretty scant on the prose, 0ed effects are far more situational than 4ed ones. In my experience more situational effects are harder to balance (since the situation matters so much it could be very weak one day and very powerful the next) but encourage more creativity. [/QUOTE]
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Presentaion of Spells: To Prose or Not To Prose?
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