D&D General Reification versus ludification in 5E/6E

[Guest 7037866]

Heh, though you could use a 1E PC in a 2E game, so 2014/2024 is closer to the changes in 1E -> 2E than 2E -> 3E.

Yep, a number of people (myself included) have commented as such.

 

[Sepulchrave II]

Not for me; as that's exactly how I see them. Your class is your (current) profession - she's a plumber, he's a baker, I'm a cleric, she's a fighter. A feat or ability or spell represents some specialist training you've had along the way.

I think this approach can only be cogent within a certain - campaign specific - context, where the milieu is tailored to reflect the classes and they are purposefully and mindfully grounded in the campaign world. And I don't think it can work - i.e. it is not logically tenable - with broad-remit classes such as rogues and fighters.

If the only deity who has paladins is Heironeous, then having an elect order of holy knights who are granted certain supernatural boons by their devotion is not unreasonable: this is not dissimilar to the way that certain prestige classes in 3.X are assumed to work. But when you extend the ambit of "paladin" and make it a class which exists independently from a particular context (e.g. of Pelor, of Tritherion - whatever), and insist that that particular mechanical expression - "paladin" - is a sensible "thing", regardless of their religious persuasion, then you've created a logical inconsistency; you've interpolated an element - "paladin" - between the ruleset and the imagined world, and afforded it a substantiality which is unwarranted.

Wizards are another class which can be purposefully baked into the campaign setting - it does not strain credulity to have an order or clique of academically-minded, rigorously systematic magic-users who share a common methodology. But this - the "wizard as a thing" - will logically stumble the further removed it is is from the particular context in which it was established in-world. That said, I think "wizard" is the most durable and logically tenable "class is real" candidate.

 

[Remathilis]

Heh, though you could use a 1E PC in a 2E game, so 2014/2024 is closer to the changes in 1E -> 2E than 2E -> 3E.

Mostly, again assuming you pick one set of rules as the default and incorporate the others, converting as needed. You could not have a 1e fighter using d6 initiative and a 2e thief using d10 initiative at the same time. Magic would need either casting time OR segments. Things like that.

 

[Lanefan]

Like it used to be for humanoids wher the only difference between stat blocks was 1 hp? Goblins had 1 more hp than kobolds, orcs had one more hp than goblins. Hobgoblins had one more hp.

Everything else was identical.

Well, not quite; while Orcs and Hobgoblins were similar (other than their base alignments, which made a big difference in how they were played), Goblins were lower HD and couldn't use large weapons...there's other differences but I can't be arsed to look them up right now.

Those kinds of differences you mean?

In the WotC editions where they list the 6 base stats in the statblocks, I'd expect to see differences in those stats between different species of creatures. Also there'll be differences in the specific abilities and suggested tactics of different creatures - Goblins might go more in for missile weapons and stealth* while Hobgoblins plan it all out meanwhile Orcs just face-charge everything: the WotC stat blocks and write-ups have room for all of this.

* - and if NPC Goblins get mechanical benefits to back this up then so should PC Goblins, unless being a PC somehow disallows a Goblin from being a member of its own species.

 

[Lanefan]

Yes.

Because, and I know this seems to be hard to get across so I’ll repeat it again:

PCs and npcs are not built using the same rules.

You can yell this all you like but there's some - maybe even quite a few - of us who don't and won't subscribe to this theory even if the rules say we're supposed to.

 

[Lanefan]

So all fighters belong to the same profession?

Yes. It's called "fighter".

 

[Lanefan]

I think most people will treat it that way, but how they treat the books doesn't alter what WotC claimed about the 5e rules still being valid. That means when discussing the rules as written, I can still quote the 5e books.

You can; but for the sake of clarity you still might want to note which one you're referring to each time, if only for the benefit of those who don't have both versions to refer to.

 

[Emerikol]

My eyes were really opened when I found out that many people do not think of the mechanics as representations of real things. I've never played that way and until I came here I never even heard of the idea.

Spells had to be memorized or "prepared"
Spell levels were real. You might flavor up the name but the idea was there.
Hit points were an abstraction for how you were physically doing but still real.
And while I could imagine other ways to get an attack bonus, classes were by no means limited to PCs. People would say in game "I'm a wizard or I'm a fighter". It was reality for the game world.

I think so many thinking differently is why they were so baffled when I brought up issues with 4e and later 5e. They thought I was already thinking that way with all those things. I was not. They were real things in game for me and my players.

 

[Lanefan]

In both cases, that was not an invitation to pick and choose, only that your old PC would function in the new ruleset (something you could not do moving from 2e to 3e, for example).

Well, they did put out a free 2e-to-3e conversion guide to make forward-porting easier; which is more than I can say for the 3e-to-4e or 4e-to-5e jumps.

 

[Lanefan]

I think this approach can only be cogent within a certain - campaign specific - context, where the milieu is tailored to reflect the classes and they are purposefully and mindfully grounded in the campaign world. And I don't think it can work - i.e. it is not logically tenable - with broad-remit classes such as rogues and fighters.

If the only deity who has paladins is Heironeous, then having an elect order of holy knights who are granted certain supernatural boons by their devotion is not unreasonable: this is not dissimilar to the way that certain prestige classes in 3.X are assumed to work. But when you extend the ambit of "paladin" and make it a class which exists independently from a particular context (e.g. of Pelor, of Tritherion - whatever), and insist that that particular mechanical expression - "paladin" - is a sensible "thing", regardless of their religious persuasion, then you've created a logical inconsistency; you've interpolated an element - "paladin" - between the ruleset and the imagined world, and afforded it a substantiality which is unwarranted.

Paladin might not be the best example here, in that as they are bound to deities those deities might have set some overarching ground rules on what "paladins" can and cannot do.

Thieves or rogues might be a better example; for game purposes we treat them all as being the same in terms of skills at any given level, but in the fiction one could well have received more/better training in one aspect (say, hiding and stealth) than another. Assignable skill points covers this well, but they're also a bloody nuisance in practice in a game like mine that has level loss as a possibility.

Wizards are another class which can be purposefully baked into the campaign setting - it does not strain credulity to have an order or clique of academically-minded, rigorously systematic magic-users who share a common methodology. But this - the "wizard as a thing" - will logically stumble the further removed it is is from the particular context in which it was established in-world. That said, I think "wizard" is the most durable and logically tenable "class is real" candidate.

Clerics even more so, as one could argue some sort of investiture or ceremony (even if self-applied) is used to "welcome" a cleric into a new level or further-in circle.