Response to recent article by James Wyatt on DMG

[AtomicPope]

I think you've misread the numbers on the page to which you linked. Men of a given weight class are lifting ~50% more than the women at the same weight class.

Clean & Jerk: 60 kg weight class

Men: 190.0 kg Women: 125.0 kg

Clean & Jerk: 82.5 kg weight class

Men: 225.0 kg Women: 142.5 kg

Snatch: 60 kg weight class

Men: 152.5 kg Women: 97.5 kg

Snatch: 82.5 kg weight class

Men: 183.0 kg Women: 110.0 kg

Don't bring the facts into a gender discussion. It instantly labels you as a sexist!

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

Don't bring the facts into a gender discussion. It instantly labels you as a sexist!

Thank you! *blushes prettily*

Oh... you said sexist, not sexy...

 

[SDOgre]

Well first off how did you give your players the stats on the summoned monsters or things like the effects of spells that are only described in the DMG? These things are way too complicated to be simply descibed. Did you actually print out the 20+ pages of monster stats that would be necesary for even a lower level caster to have access to all of his summons?

Players don't need to know all the stats of a monster to summon them. I had a player who ran a summoner sorcerer at 9th level. We always joked about the zoo he created in combat. When he was able to summon new monsters he chose one, it showed up, and I described what it did as combat progressed. He was surprised and came to learn what each monster did as the game progressed. It was like unwrapping a new present each session. He loved it. And I don't think I ever showed him the MM.

As for magic items, well you did learn exactly what they did with an identify spell, so there is no reason not to let them look them up. Again unless all your magic items are simple +1 swords, they probably aren't going to always remember exactly what they do. Though I guess you could solve this problem by printing out several pages of the DMG for them to look through, or just typing out the text of the items.

I told them, "It does this..." and they wrote it down...

 

[Arbitrary]

That's great and all but it's a gigantic amount of work. I've played a summoner druid and seen someone else play a summoner druid and limiting information for the player just gives the DM a ton more work to do.

You want to summon a squad of 5 badgers and another of 4 bears, you run them. I'm not running them.

 

[Tellerve]

I will say that one the "must-have magic item" list I'm quickly beginning to put Cloak of Survival right up there. +Enhancement bonus to Endurance checks and Resist Fire/Cold:5 is nice. Throw in some Black Iron Armor for Resist Fire/Necrotic:5, Amulet of Health for Resist Poison:5 and this is all on a Tiefling for another 5 Fire Resistance. You would yawn at Fireball The armor and cloak are both L9 and the necklace is L8 so this should be quite doable by level 9 or 10.

I'm looking for it again currently, but I know I've read that like resistances don't stack, pretty much as everything "like" doesn't stack. So no adding up resistance 5 fires to get some huge fire resistance.

Tellerve

 

[jelmore]

I think I've come to understand a fundamental difference between myself and others that have posted to this thread.

My players never had DMGs. We established it early on that only the DM needed a DMG and MM. Since there was only one other DM that I played with (all through 3E) then this wasn't difficult.

The players never wanted to ruin the surprise, mystery, and excitement by knowing what magic items did and what monsters could do.

I think what I'm coming to understand is that most people who have posted to this thread play in groups where half or more of the players have access to the DM's books.

That's too bad. I think you would have found the game more enjoyable with a lot more "Ah, ha!" moments if the only the DM got the DM books.

It's kinda presumptuous to assume that your gaming experience is richer than ours, especially when you are basing your opinion on an imperfect assessment of our gaming experiences.

Your group is fortunate in that it has one or two people who are always the DM and apparently never miss a session. Many RP groups are pick-up or casual groups, so whoever DMs may change frequently as people come and go from the group, or DMs will change as one person wants to try running a different type of campaign.

There is something to be said about not having all of the answers and not knowing all of the stats, but at the same time I've been in a game where a DM just kinda smirked and smiled knowingly instead of answering questions about his campaign world for the players. He also tried to make everything sound "ooo, mysterious" and the NPCs tended to talk in overly vague terms, so he actually made it harder for the players to figure out their next course of action as a result.

I want to figure out the mystery, solve the puzzle, defeat the monster, or discover the secret; I don't want to play twenty questions about every facet of the campaign world, and I've played 3.5e for so long that I've made it a habit to try to not let my out-of-game knowledge affect how my PC would behave because it's more fun for me that way.

 

[Benly]

I think everyone is being a little too literal about what a wish list constitutes. I've used something similar to a wish list and it works out well enough: I ask the players things like "Is it more important to your character to have a strong weapon or strong armor? Are you wearing scalemail because you want to or because you can't afford plate?" and set up the basic items along those lines, with specifics defined by personality.

As for preserving mystery: for mysterious items, design your own.

 

[Spatula]

That's too bad. I think you would have found the game more enjoyable with a lot more "Ah, ha!" moments if the only the DM got the DM books.

And what do you do if everyone in the group takes turns DMing?

And what do you do if you play more than one campaign ever, so that the players already know that X does Y when they see it again? The whole "mystery" thing only works the first time around.

 

[Skyscraper]

For the record, i'm not too fond of high-magic campaigns, whether i'm the DM or a player in them. It has a lot do to with flavor, but also with what type of game you want to play. I don't really like the time when players shop around to sell/buy stuff, i have to do the grocery every week for my family as it is, i'd rather skip that in my D&D games

So, to answer the OP's question:

So whats kind of houserule fix would work for this?

What i did in my 3E campaign and possibly plan on doing in my upcoming 4E adenture where i DM is that weapons and armor (and implements) that have a bonus without any other ability are simply superior equipment. They are not magic. Their gold piece value is also decreased. This addresses the flavor issue (no magic items running around every corner) and also slightly the buying issue (though this might not work as well in 4E, so i'm considering providing +1 def/att at level 2 and then at every 5 levels to each character).

Sky