D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[Micah Sweet]

I could not disagree more with this take. I want to run the game that fits exactly what my players want to play. I want my adventures to feature what they want to explore. I want the story to come from their desires.

I could care less during character creation of players mix and match pretty much anything to fit their character concept. Want your druid to have magic missile, why not? Want your fighter to have the stealth skill, go for it!

I literally control the entire rest of the world..and can temper it to match shape to the puzzle pieces the layers have given me to interact with.

I LOVE my narrative style of campaign...and my players l9ve to show up every week digging more and more into the cooperative storytelling project we are embarked upon as a team.

I'm not in charge of anything. I'm not a voice of authority. I have a vote and it's one of many at the table.

From this comes a story remembered so much deeper and more intimately than back in the day if mapping dungeons, counting arrows, and clearing rats from basements.

That's why I'm on this thread....I've been playing a LONG time but I don't really have any rose colored glasses for "old school". It's hard for me to understand the mindset of those who still find joy at that +1 sword after 40 years of finding them.

Well, everybody likes different things, and your game would not be any more fun for me than my game would likely be for you. Your mindset is is hard for me to understand, but I'm not going to go around giving you a hard time about it.

 

[kermit4karate]

That's why I'm on this thread....I've been playing a LONG time but I don't really have any rose colored glasses for "old school". It's hard for me to understand the mindset of those who still find joy at that +1 sword after 40 years of finding them.

I want to keep this discussion civil because I really do enjoy it. That said, I have to inquire about that last comment. Hard to still find joy at that +1 sword after 40 years of finding them?

The joy comes down to the game, right? Haven't you run campaigns where magic was rare and the entire story would turn on the littlest of things (like that +1 sword)? When a werebear terrorizes the woods around the village and one of the players finds Emberfang or Dawnbreaker (the simple +1 sword) and can now face the werebear without needing silver...you can't tell me that doesn't still feel a little awesome even after 40 years.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Like what? What "workaround" can you do that isn't a houserule? Like I said I really don't understand what you're asking for.

You have a problem with mechanical element X that you theoretically need to engage with to make your character work, and the character design twiddles associated with it don't help. A knowledgable player or GM can suggest ways to approximate the effect in another way that may not be obvious. Barring a GM who is actively hostile to the workaround, it may be the best option a player has available.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

I want to keep this discussion civil because I really do enjoy it. That said, I have to inquire about that last comment. Hard to still find joy at that +1 sword after 40 years of finding them?

The joy comes down to the game, right? Haven't you run campaigns where magic was rare and the entire story would turn on the littlest of things (like that +1 sword)? When a werebear terrorizes the woods around the village and one of the players finds Emberfang or Dawnbreaker (the simple +1 sword) and can now face the werebear without needing silver...you can't tell me that doesn't still feel a little awesome even after 40 years.

Your post is exactly the energy I'm talking about. In 1989 we killed a pile of kobolds and then when searching in their haybale beds we would find "a +1 dagger, a potion of invisibility, 3sp". There was no fanfare....the excitement about the dagger was that number went up.

Now, in my games, if a kobold had an awesome magical dagger it's going to be wielding it, and I'm going to customize its power to somehow be appropriate to the kobold. It's gonna be +1 to hit and damage but maybe this one has a unique ability to slightly shrink the user allowing them to squeeze through tight corridors without a penalty...or whatever unique idea I want to attach to it. During the combat the power is going to be used to show off what it does. Then, as treasure, the item will remain unique and not just a commodity to be tossed at a vendor when a +2 dagger becomes available.

 

[Eric V]

It may not feel democratic to ever silence debate, may leave a bad taste in one's mouth, but it's necessary. We can try to imagine it otherwise, try to manifest something better and more evolved, but we're only fooling ourselves when we do.

Absolutely no reason to think this is true, assuming everyone is operating in good faith.

 

[kermit4karate]

Absolutely no reason to think this is true, assuming everyone is operating in good faith.

I do not think everyone is normally operating in good faith. But that's not really a big deal. Maybe I have a slightly lower opinion of humanity, myself included, than you do.

Again, not a big deal, but I think all of us are influenced by our insecurities, ego and weaknesses. We aren't all operating in good faith all the time. That's just a fact, so plan accordingly.

 

[Micah Sweet]

You have a problem with mechanical element X that you theoretically need to engage with to make your character work, and the character design twiddles associated with it don't help. A knowledgable player or GM can suggest ways to approximate the effect in another way that may not be obvious. Barring a GM who is actively hostile to the workaround, it may be the best option a player has available.

So use a different rule? Ok, but I don't really see how that's a better solution to the problem than changing the existing rule to better suit both player and GM, or your obvious reluctance to consider such.

 

[Micah Sweet]

Your post is exactly the energy I'm talking about. In 1989 we killed a pile of kobolds and then when searching in their haybale beds we would find "a +1 dagger, a potion of invisibility, 3sp". There was no fanfare....the excitement about the dagger was that number went up.

Now, in my games, if a kobold had an awesome magical dagger it's going to be wielding it, and I'm going to customize its power to somehow be appropriate to the kobold. It's gonna be +1 to hit and damage but maybe this one has a unique ability to slightly shrink the user allowing them to squeeze through tight corridors without a penalty...or whatever unique idea I want to attach to it. During the combat the power is going to be used to show off what it does. Then, as treasure, the item will remain unique and not just a commodity to be tossed at a vendor when a +2 dagger becomes available.

Why would the kobold necessarily have a magic dagger customized to their needs? To me it makes more sense for them to just use the best tool they have available, especially as the dort of item you're describing would IMO require a significant magical forging infrastructure to create. How important is this kobold that he gets such a thing, and how would he have come by it? I would want those questions answered.

Our priorities are, I suspect, very far away from each other.

 

[JiffyPopTart]

Why would the kobold necessarily have a magic dagger customized to their needs? To me it makes more sense for them to just use the best tool they have available, especially as the dort of item you're describing would IMO require a significant magical forging infrastructure to create. How important is this kobold that he gets such a thing, and how would he have come by it? I would want those questions answered.

Our priorities are, I suspect, very far away from each other.

Indeed we likely have very different ideas of the general framework of a game. In my world "bog standard" enchanted items exist but mostly in the form of potions and scrolls. More permanent magical items are almost always one of a kind and uniquely useful in niche situations.

In my mind the kobold has the weapon exactly attuned to their needs because the very act of having that makes them ultra successful at doing what kobolds do only better. In my games kobold lairs are a nightmare of confusing tight twisty tunnels in all three dimensions. Any kobold able to navigate this mess better than the others is going to rise to be the mightiest among them, thus in mechanics the leader with the good magic item.l and most treasure.

The kobolds aren't there because I need X number of combats per session, they are there beside encountering their unique layer structure, learning about how kobolds live, and interacting with them is interesting in and of itself. For all I know the PCs might as likely end up making friends rather than slaughtering them and collecting the loot.

I will put ties from the different plots leading the party to encountering the kobolds but how they deal with them is up to them.