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Message: <blockquote data-quote="evildmguy" data-source="post: 5037068" data-attributes="member: 6092">Wow.Just wow.There are some really good ideas here.  I almost wish I could go back to 1980 with my ideas to run 1E with 30 years of understanding based on this thread.  It's too bad I can't.  What I am seeing is probably what Gary intended, which is that each group tailors the rules to what they want to see.  As others have pointed out many times, there is agreement that mages at low levels aren't mechanically balanced but no agreement on what the issue is because of how each person approaches the game.  Their own ideas of magic come into play, not the base rules.  And that's fine!  But it also makes finding a common solution problematic, if not impossible.It's all about the group's style of play.  And that's important even today.  I had several players join and leave within a few sessions because it's obvious our styles of play were not the same.  It's taken me a long time to figure that out.  I don't know if I could declare my style 100% but I at least know it better now.  It's also interesting to see how style is affected by simple things.  If I had a group that played three times a week for five hours, my goals would be different.  If I have players that do character write ups or track spell components down to the grain of sand, then it's also a different style and what I would do with those players would be different.  (What I currently have is a weekly gaming group made up of older professional people who have kids, jobs and lives outside of the game table, and want to do something fun together.  That also influences style and the games that fit.)  I still think it is too bad that 1E/2E/3E play differently at different levels.  For me and my group, I want a heroic game where the players aren't afraid to jump into the action with their characters, with some strategy, compared to the mage that almost wants to hide as well as the thief because as soon as he casts a spell he knows he will be a target and can't take more than a hit or two.  Again, though, these are all style choices.  But, I do think I would do a much better job DMing 1E now that I did back then.  Sure, that's obvious but I am more lamenting that I won't get a chance to try it and see how much better it could be.  I do have a comment on one thing said.  One of the things that I never learned back in the day about 1E, or any RPG, is that there IS a difference between the player and the character.  I firmly believe that the game mechanics should be there to show the player and DM that difference.  Now, you might not have meant this quote they way I took it but I glommed onto "player centric challenges" that you wrote above instead of "character centric challenges" (emphasis mine) as a very big difference and something that should be addressed by the game.  I had way way way way way too many arguments because the game didn't help us understand that it's not the job of the player to convince the DM that his character could have haggled down the price but for the character to convince the NPC.  (Some of you may have known this.  As an eight year old player and a twelve year old DM, I didn't.  And it influenced my groups and style of play for decades.)  To that end, there needs to be some way for the mechanics of the game, whatever game, to help a player define his character in a way the player and DM can agree.  Whether it's skills or adjectives, there needs to be a mechanical way to resolve most tasks, with role playing giving a bonus but not needed.  That took me a long time to figure out and I personally think it's important.  Unfortunately, 1E and 2E never address this and even 3E doesn't state it in clear terms.  And maybe this is part of the evolution of RPGs.  I don't know.  But I do think there needs to be a way for a player and DM to be clear on what a character can and cannot do in the mechanics.  It's not as simple as having role playing rules for Monopoly, for example, but that's the direction I am thinking.  What this does, imo, is let role playing be as important or not as the group wants it to be.   Thanks!edg</blockquote>

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