Real tale of Old School feel?

[gizmo33]

i'm sure my players would love it, despite all the absurdities in it)

What absurdities?

 

[Spell]

Original D&D brown/white box vs 3.x D&D

[...]

But is it more fun? That's an entirely different question, and far more subjective.

you rule.

So what does matter in good design? What examples can someone present of good or bad design? Maybe if we can better define this, we'll be able to get past the comments about agendas and motives.

de·sign
[...]
v.tr.
1. a. To conceive or fashion in the mind; invent: design a good excuse for not attending the conference.
1. b. To formulate a plan for; devise: designed a marketing strategy for the new product.
2. To plan out in systematic, usually graphic form: design a building; design a computer program.
3. To create or contrive for a particular purpose or effect: a game designed to appeal to all ages.
4. To have as a goal or purpose; intend.
5. To create or execute in an artistic or highly skilled manner.

by definition, as you can see, there is no such thing as an objectively good design. or, better, there *could* be, if you knew what the designer was aiming at.
if castle amber was intended to be a "realistic" module in a far away land, it was designed by a monkey. if it was intended to be a horror module with fantasy elements, it was quite good, despite a number of things that for my tastes just don't hold water. that doesn't mean that joe gamer, looking for hack and slash fun, or eddie gamer, looking for intricate political plot, would have the same opinion on the module.

the only way you could tell if a module is well designed or not, objectively, is by looking at how the crunchy part is done. but even then, if a good reason is given for breaking the rule, then what's the problem? does it really make a big difference if the orcs have one more HD?

poor spelling, messy maps, lack of imagination, sloppy plots, those are the bad, unforgivable (well, sometimes! i can live with messy maps!) flaws in an adventure.

 

[Spell]

What absurdities?

i found absurd that you could die at the ghost banquet, without having a clue of what was going to happen.
i thought that the whole start of the adventure (in the fog, with the escaped mule dying, to show the players that they were forced to go in) was absurd (that was loooooong before the mists of ravenloft seduced me...)
i can't remember exactly what i didn't like in the finale (i seem to recall an ubermonster watching over the tomb of the dormient amber guy, or the fact that, as far as i can remember, the whole module had a happy ending after the PCs awoke the sleeping guy... it was 1992 when i last read the module, so, please, forgive me for any inaccuracy).

those of course, are absurd things in my book, for my tastes and at my gaming table. and, besides, they are not big things. i could easily change them or explain them away, if i had to run the module. other people might have no problem with them... but, of course, since i am talking, i think it's assumed i am stating my opinion... i don't believe in universal truths, you know, especially in gaming...

 

[ThirdWizard]

Re: Objectivity and "Taste" (from an Academic Standpoint)

Stating that you can't determine whether something is good or not because of different tastes is not valid. That sounds an awful like middle school poetry writing where the teacher will say something along the lines of "be creative, there is no wrong way to write." Which is completely and utterly false. There are many wrong ways to write, and many correct ways to write. Whether something is liked or hated has little to do with this, as any literary scholar will attest.

The same goes for film, and other forms of entertainment. In the area of music, for example, there are many songs that arn't objectively good but very popular, and when discussing the merits of such things it is important to realize the difference beween likeing something and considering something a good piece of work.

In the area of module design, I think we can also take a step back and look at aspects which make a module "good." This doesn't mean a good module in this sense are the ones that we find fun to play, it might be the exact opposite for many people. Such things as the module being coherant, written to be understood, flowing from situation to situation, allowing choices, and ease of use by the DM are examples of what would make a module good that go beyond thngs like is the monster's AC calculated correctly.

In summary, like all forms of entertainment, a module can be approached from an objective viewpoint and be assessed on those grounds without regard who how much an individual will find the module fun. Whether any modules in question are good or bad, I'm not going into; I havn't read them and I'm probably not qualified to give an accurate assessment of them anyway.

 

[gizmo33]

i found absurd that you could die at the ghost banquet, without having a clue of what was going to happen.

I guess by the rules of the language that you're using, I find the idea that all traps and events in a module must be foreshadowed to be far more absurd then the ghost banquet.

Perhaps here what we're talking about is preferences, and so why use such inflamatory (and wasted, really) language that assumes a certain adventure design philosophy that I can barely believe you would think was universal?

It's like as if I were to read a module where bugbears and kobolds are working together and say "that's absurd". Don't you think such a statement would require an explanation?

 

[Spell]

Such things as the module being coherant, written to be understood, flowing from situation to situation, allowing choices, and ease of use by the DM are examples of what would make a module good that go beyond thngs like is the monster's AC calculated correctly.

being coherent and capable or writing in english (or whatever language one chooses to write in) has nothing to do with module design, in my opinion, but with... well, the ability of writing something that could be sold, be it a module for an RPG, a short story, or a physics book.

allowing choices and ease of use are much more tied to personal perspective. as this tread has shown. quasqueton thought (or so it seemed to me) I3-5 was difficult to use because it had random wizards around, magical items left alone in a corridor and such. gizmo thought the opposite. for this reason, and because i can't honestly think that my view on the subject would really universally invalidate either views, i think that these are not objective values.

 

[Andre]

Such things as
...the module being coherant,
...written to be understood,
...flowing from situation to situation,
...allowing choices,
...and ease of use by the DM
are examples of what would make a module good that go beyond thngs like is the monster's AC calculated correctly.

I like this list. It allows for a wide range of preferences, while making explicit some the unspoken expectations the average consumer has when purchasing a module.

 

[Andre]

allowing choices and ease of use are much more tied to personal perspective. as this tread has shown.

I'll disagree to the extent of saying that some modules are well-organized, allowing the GM to find the relevant info when needed. Others are incredibly disorganized, requiring a considerable amount of pre-game work from the GM to make it easily usable. Organization falls under the goal of ease-of-use, and can be evaluated relatively objectively.

Allowing choice (I assume) refers to allowing the characters to make meaningful choices in the module. Unless someone is playing a complete railroad (*cough*Dragonlance*cough*), character/player choice is critical to a good adventure. Hence it's necessary in a good module.

quasqueton thought (or so it seemed to me) I3-5 was difficult to use because it had random wizards around, magical items left alone in a corridor and such. gizmo thought the opposite.

Interestingly enough, I don't see those criticisms as part of TW's list. Quas seemed (if I understood correctly) to object most to the lack of background and detail, illogical or unreasonable (to him) situations, and the like. Since many other posters have said that's not a critical issue for them, should that be a sign of good design, or just a consumer preference, like chocolate vs. vanilla?

 

[Spell]

Perhaps here what we're talking about is preferences

it is indeed. i never doubted it.

and so why use such inflamatory (and wasted, really) language that assumes a certain adventure design philosophy that I can barely believe you would think was universal?

well, maybe it's because i'm not a native english speaker, but "absurd" is not inflamatory, to me. if i would have said "stupid", for example, i would have been more offensive.
more over, i thought it was clear by the general tone of my message that i wasn't trying to enforce any kind of dogmatic point.
in fact, i used "absurd" just because it's what i thought when reading it (well, let's say it's the polite form! ). that doesn't mean that what is absurd to me must be absurd for the majority, or the whole world.

if you took that as any kind of attack, i'm sorry, but that's not what i was meaning.

It's like as if I were to read a module where bugbears and kobolds are working together and say "that's absurd". Don't you think such a statement would require an explanation?

well, my explanation on the subject is that those things were absurd to me, for the way i run the game.

in your example of kobolds and bugbears, you could say that it's absurd because in your campaign the two races can't stand each other. it's a perfect logic to me. as long as you are not trying to bully anybody for having the cohoperation idea, i have no problem whatsoever with it.

 

[Spell]

Allowing choice (I assume) refers to allowing the characters to make meaningful choices in the module. Unless someone is playing a complete railroad (*cough*Dragonlance*cough*), character/player choice is critical to a good adventure.

my bad. you are right. the problem is that i take it so much for granted that i would throw a railroad adventure in the garbage bin without even finishing to read it.
no surprise i never liked dragonlance...

Interestingly enough, I don't see those criticisms as part of TW's list. Quas seemed (if I understood correctly) to object most to the lack of background and detail, illogical or unreasonable (to him) situations, and the like. Since many other posters have said that's not a critical issue for them, should that be a sign of good design, or just a consumer preference, like chocolate vs. vanilla?

well, i suppose that, for quasqueton thatlack of background made the module difficult to DM.
i don't agree with him, but maybe he doesn't have ANY time to do some preparation work, and his improvisation skills are not good enough to wig it.
but maybe i'm reading in his posts something that wasn't there.

my point is that, if one start talking about "ease of use" and "lack of background" in a review, and gives examples that would make the reader know where he's coming from, it's all nice and well done.
on the other hand, if we sit down and try to codify what is good design and what is not generally and universally, we couldn't go much far, in my opinion. i could be wrong, but i as i said, as long as i'm concerned, good design is:
1. good english usage.
2. imaginative plot.
3. nice presentation of the crunchy bits (even if they are somewhat "wrong", like monsters with the "wrong" skills, or the "wrong hit die")
4. an overal good balance of the adventure (if one puts a 44 HD half-demon orc, 3 mundane kobolds, 1 fire elemental, 2 liches and 6 rust moster as fighting opponents in a first level adventure, even if the gaming math is good, the adventure will be difficult to run as is)