D&D General Requesting permission to have something cool

[Remathilis]

In many aspects of life (including music!) I've really come to dislike the bolded phrase and what it stands for.

The journey - the low-level play, the long intro to the song, the slow-build of tension in a novel - is often as or even more interesting than is the end destination or "payoff".

It's one thing to enjoy the ride it's another to suffer through hours of tedium before the fun begins.

Old school MMOs used to pride themselves on the time sinks needed to reach the best parts of the game, typically the endgame content. RuneScape players used to say "the game gets good after the first 100 hours!" As if to say the fun begins after you've wasted weeks of time grinding to get to a point where play isn't a chore. I'm too old for that, get me to the fun point OR make the fun part start at the beginning.

In D&D, the fun for me is creating a character I want to play. Why do I want to spend hours grinding through toons to get a level 1 PC when I could just create a level 1PC?

 

[Minigiant]

That never happened in any campaign I was in, and I still DM 3.5e now.

Not every player’s prime concern is trying to outdo the other players on DPS.

Also, not every DM runs a 15 minute workday or high-level campaign. At levels I actually play (1-12), with adventures that are sometimes on a deadline, wandering monsters, foes that won’t let you rest in the dungeon, and foes who may organize a counterattack, “nova and rest for the night” classes aren’t clearly better than “I can do this all day” classes.

I didn't say DMs were trying to outdo the players.

That I said was everyone was a caster. Which I exaggerated. Some people played TOB classes.

The issue with DMing it was that if you weren't all new, the game devolved to rocket tag and countering. There were so many spells and feats officially. That's before you got to third parties. It was a lot to keep track of.

Snagging items from one book and spells from another a prcs from a 3rd is how the some crazy combos turned infamous.

It was a lot. The DM had to swing a banhammer, the players shake hands to a power tier or it could get insane

 

[Micah Sweet]

It's one thing to enjoy the ride it's another to suffer through hours of tedium before the fun begins.

Old school MMOs used to pride themselves on the time sinks needed to reach the best parts of the game, typically the endgame content. RuneScape players used to say "the game gets good after the first 100 hours!" As if to say the fun begins after you've wasted weeks of time grinding to get to a point where play isn't a chore. I'm too old for that, get me to the fun point OR make the fun part start at the beginning.

In D&D, the fun for me is creating a character I want to play. Why do I want to spend hours grinding through toons to get a level 1 PC when I could just create a level 1PC?

It all depends on what people find fun. One person's grind is someone else's enjoyable ride. Assuming one way is always better for everyone is the wrong path IMO.

 

[haakon1]

That I said was everyone was a caster. Which I exaggerated. Some people played TOB classes.
…
Snagging items from one book and spells from another a prcs from a 3rd is how the some crazy combos turned infamous.
…
It was a lot. The DM had to swing a banhammer …

Your experience - with an edition I’m guessing you last played in 2007? - is very different than mine, with the edition I love best and still run.

I have never seen, with me as DM or player:

• an all caster campaign
• a Tome of Battle/Book of the Seven Swords character. This book came out in August 2006. 4e came out in August 2007. It’s a book from “publish anything just to carryover sales until the new edition is published lameduck part” of this edition. Other editions had this regretable period too. So much of the vitriol at 3x from haters focuses on this book.
• a player character with more than 3 classes
• a player character with classes from more than 2 books

About the banhammer, I think I agree. But I have always taken the same approach with 3x that I took with AD&D:
Core Rules only (PHB, DMG, MM’s/FF, Legends & Lore, setting books)

Plus whatever the DM wants to add. I take stuff from AD&D, 5e, Harn, PF1, all over.

Plus whatever a player wants to add that’s requested and approved. Whether that’s from an official splatbook or 3PP or homebrew, it’s all OK if it’s good. And the word-for-word details need to be typed out on the character sheet, with the source cited, so it can be verified and used in game. Usually this has been feats, but also a custom class. In debating if something is “good”, it’s less the rule of cool than “does it make sense”. The player who wanted hoplite feats called “Shield and Spear” to use a longspear and a shield and “Near and Far” to use a longspear from the second rank referred me to a history book with illustrations from Greek pottery. His sales pitch was approved!

 

[ReshiIRE]

I didn't say Pathfinder has a Martial Caster trouble nor a lack of Martial options.

Just that like WOTC, Paizo puts more focus on the magic than the not magic.

Because designing casters, magic characters, and spells is easier and flashier

That is not really true.

Here's the classes that have been released since the Advanced Player's Guide (which I will consider part of the base game, especially since in some ways they will be after the Remaster books moving some about). I will put in Italics classes that are not primarily magical.

Gunslinger
Inventor
Magus
Summoner
Thaumaturge
Psychic
Kineticist

That is three Martial classes, two of which have no supernatural stuff built in, out of 7 classes. Thaumaturge you COULD argue is supernatural; but it's based entirely on the character's knowledge as a base line.

Sure, they do keep adding spells, but Paizo has absolutely made a game where there are a lot of non-magical characters be possible, and able to do grand, awesome things.

 

[ReshiIRE]

The problem there is that it sounds way too much like a solution, and we can't have solutions and continue to complain.

That's not really fair if you want to play in person and can't find a Pathfinder 2e game though.

I'm not sure I could find a Pathfinder 2e game in person - and I would be the person running it!

That is why I specified online games - which may not be everyone's cup of teas.

Granted, I think it's still better than talking about this problem here, which has lead to nothing productive for a wide variety of reasons.

Or at-least, without it being a (+) thread to actually get to the meat of this.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

That's not really fair if you want to play in person and can't find a Pathfinder 2e game though.

I'm not sure I could find a Pathfinder 2e game in person - and I would be the person running it!

That is why I specified online games - which may not be everyone's cup of teas.

Granted, I think it's still better than talking about this problem here, which has lead to nothing productive for a wide variety of reasons.

Or at-least, without it being a (+) thread to actually get to the meat of this.

I'd suspect that it is somewhat easier to convince couple of people to play Pathfinder 2e than to convince WotC to completely rewrite D&D to one's liking.

 

[Vaalingrade]

I'd suspect that it is somewhat easier to convince couple of people to play Pathfinder 2e than to convince WotC to completely rewrite D&D to one's liking.

Your honor, I would like to present Exhibit A to the contrary: 5e itself.

 

[Minigiant]

That is not really true.

Here's the classes that have been released since the Advanced Player's Guide (which I will consider part of the base game, especially since in some ways they will be after the Remaster books moving some about). I will put in Italics classes that are not primarily magical.

Gunslinger
Inventor
Magus
Summoner
Thaumaturge
Psychic
Kineticist

That is three Martial classes, two of which have no supernatural stuff built in, out of 7 classes. Thaumaturge you COULD argue is supernatural; but it's based entirely on the character's knowledge as a base line.

Sure, they do keep adding spells, but Paizo has absolutely made a game where there are a lot of non-magical characters be possible, and able to do grand, awesome things.

blink blink blink

Now count the number of caster classess and blatantly magical class.

Jeez louise. You can't even say a game with a ton of spellcaster classes has a ton of magical classes anymore. PF2e is adding 2 more class. Both are magical.
What's next someone's gonna say 5e doesn't have over 3 casters and more than 3 types of elf.

This is why RPG development moves at a crawling pace. Fans are so defensive about nonattacks. I didn't say Paizo doesn't make martial classes and martial options. I said that like every other fantasy publisher, they make more magical stuff as time marches. That's should be obvious. It's fantasy.

Going nonmagical is the hard route. There's nothing wrong with saying a company takes the easy route over the hard one.

 

[Lanefan]

It's one thing to enjoy the ride it's another to suffer through hours of tedium before the fun begins.

Old school MMOs used to pride themselves on the time sinks needed to reach the best parts of the game, typically the endgame content. RuneScape players used to say "the game gets good after the first 100 hours!" As if to say the fun begins after you've wasted weeks of time grinding to get to a point where play isn't a chore. I'm too old for that, get me to the fun point OR make the fun part start at the beginning.

In D&D, the fun for me is creating a character I want to play. Why do I want to spend hours grinding through toons to get a level 1 PC when I could just create a level 1PC?

Because in WotC-D&D that level 1 PC left the station ages ago and is already a fair way along its journey.

If you want to play a fully-developed powerful character right out the gate (and can convince your group and-or DM) then start play at level 10.