Roles - do they work?

[AngeltheTechrat]

Why? Not all classes got the spell Light in 3.5. Classes do different things.

No, but any character that wanted to could just buy an Everburning Torch from the PHB equipment list. More characters could see in the dark anyway. Good lighting wasn't as important. And you couldn't rely on cantrips to light the dungeon for you anyway, you'd run out.

I do like cantrips being useable at will now. (I see they are in Pathfinder Beta as well..)

 

[AngeltheTechrat]

I agree. I find the way things are done in 4e to be a lot more flexible, and organic.

The 3e concept was great when it came out. It added a multiclassing ability the game just didn't have before that point, but I feel 4e improves upon what the goal of multiclassing was.

I... think we've already proved that different people had very different multi-classing goals.

 

[Spatula]

I'm not saying 3e was flawless, but it's my point of reference to make my arguments. That said you could make a duelist in 3.0 with just the PHB. It might not be the best in the world, but you could play the concept. Same with swashbuckler.

ProfessorPain was asking for a build that was doing the most damage. Realizing a concept via suboptimal mechanics is hardly difficult. 2e monk - thief class using unarmed strikes and not wearing armor! The trick is making the concept effective within the game.

I have to assume you are just being silly. Yes, 4e fighters are proficient with bows. But because of the nature of powers, they're all but pointless to use. You /have/ to realize this. The same is true of a warlord. Sure he's proficient with a bow, but 4e tells us that warlords only fight melee style. Thinking about it, I'm not sure why these classes even get bow proficiency in 4e at all in the first place.

Warlords aren't proficient with bows. Fighters and rangers are (so far) the only classes with martial ranged proficienies. And it's not silly if you want to attack something further than 100 feet away.

Now if you want to make an archer that's different. Then you play a ranger.

I think I'll disagree with you on this. 3e has a Thievery domain at the least. That's much more support for a deception cleric than 4e provides.

Now compare that to a 2e specialty priest. In any case, domains are supposedly going to be in the 4e divine book.

Not what I meant, but I think my example may have been a bit vague. Brutal Rogue lets you apply your Str bonus as a modifier to damage. I can't use it on my attack rolls, however. In 3e, a rogue/fighter works well. In 4e, it works well /if/ you have a good Str and a good Dex because by RAW rogues only know how to attack with cunning strikes and fighters only know how to smack people with brute force. These feel like arbitrary limitations to me that go against the grain of providing flexibility.

How is manual dexterity "cunning"?

Flexibility is achieved via options. 3e started out proving concept options via a couple of generic classes and the multiclassing rules, but that broke down with time as it became apparent that certain concepts (the duelist/swashbuckler being a popular example) still couldn't be effectively realized. 4e provides concept options primarily via class & power selection, which right now is limited.

 

[yesnomu]

You're not serious... ? ... are you?

Absolutely! Again, only if you don't want to ask your GM for Light or buy a magic lantern or something.

Dude, it's an imagination game. What's it hurt to say "I'm making that torch shine brightly"?

No.. No I don't get the idea, actually. I mean.. If you have to completely rewrite an entire class (by that I mean redescribing all the powers.. and everything..) then... what's the point? If you wind up playing something that doesn't exist wholesale, then.. what the heck are you playing?

Enjoying yourself? Playing a character concept you came up with? Not letting yourself be dragged down by The Man's character classes?

I'm not sure that's fair to all the other players, though. And I would assume most DMs wouldn't want you rewritting all the powers for a character. Even trying to play it, there would always be all that doubt.

All what doubt? I'm not talking about changing mechanical aspects (though you can, just ask the GM), just the fluff. What exactly isn't fair about it? They can do the exact same thing! Hell, they ought to!

If I were your DM, I'd be thrilled that you were so invested in your character that you wanted to make the game suit them. As long as there wasn't a power disparity, I would absolutely allow changes like that.

Real-life example: The paladin in our party is a bit of a WoW fanatic, so he renamed and flavored his powers to be more like a Death Knight's. So he's always coming around and using powers like "Dark Mending!" (Lay on Hands) and "Life-Sapping Strike!" (Invig. Smite) We roll our eyes at the cliche, but we don't have a problem with it and neither does the GM. Is he being selfish because he's playing the character he wants with the tools at his disposal? I personally don't think so.

 

[Scribble]

I... think we've already proved that different people had very different multi-classing goals.

Cool? I was pointing out my prefference.

 

[yesnomu]

No, but any character that wanted to could just buy an Everburning Torch from the PHB equipment list. More characters could see in the dark anyway. Good lighting wasn't as important. And you couldn't rely on cantrips to light the dungeon for you anyway, you'd run out.

I do like cantrips being useable at will now. (I see they are in Pathfinder Beta as well..)

Oh, I didn't realize you just wanted a magic lamp! Check out the Floating Lantern (AV pg 171). Sunrods are only 2 gp, so those work well enough at low levels.

 

[AngeltheTechrat]

Oh, I didn't realize you just wanted a magic lamp! Check out the Floating Lantern (AV pg 171). Sunrods are only 2 gp, so those work well enough at low levels.

No I.. I don't want a magic lamp.. That was just the answer before, since cantrips weren't something you could do at will. Since they can, and I like that better, I want to use my light. Not... a torch...

 

[AngeltheTechrat]

Absolutely! Again, only if you don't want to ask your GM for Light or buy a magic lantern or something.

Dude, it's an imagination game. What's it hurt to say "I'm making that torch shine brightly"?


Enjoying yourself? Playing a character concept you came up with? Not letting yourself be dragged down by The Man's character classes?


All what doubt? I'm not talking about changing mechanical aspects (though you can, just ask the GM), just the fluff. What exactly isn't fair about it? They can do the exact same thing! Hell, they ought to!

If I were your DM, I'd be thrilled that you were so invested in your character that you wanted to make the game suit them. As long as there wasn't a power disparity, I would absolutely allow changes like that.

Real-life example: The paladin in our party is a bit of a WoW fanatic, so he renamed and flavored his powers to be more like a Death Knight's. So he's always coming around and using powers like "Dark Mending!" (Lay on Hands) and "Life-Sapping Strike!" (Invig. Smite) We roll our eyes at the cliche, but we don't have a problem with it and neither does the GM. Is he being selfish because he's playing the character he wants with the tools at his disposal? I personally don't think so.

You just said you all (including your DM) roll your eyes at him, and just humor him. That.. sounds horrible, actually. (Also I don't understand the "cliché"..? Life-Sapping Strike sounds..um.. odd.. but Dark Mending at least sounds like an interesting name for ..what..? "Evil healing"?)

Aside from him barreling forward when the rest of the party thinks ill, doesn't all this renaming and rule-rewriting and everything, um... make it AWFUL hard to look the powers up in the books again when referencing them, and how DO you handle questoins about it when they don't work like they're supposed to anyway?

 

[resistor]

I'm going to harp on the torch-as-magical-light issue for a moment.

While it's certainly a valid means to achieve an effect, it makes me wonder: if we're coming to the point where the simulative mechanics have absolutely nothing to do with what we're using them to simulate, why bother with them at all?

To be a little clearer, if the answer to everything if "Well, you can take this mechanic for achieve X, and refluff/retool/warp it to fit Y," then could it be that we have the wrong mechanical divisions to start with?

I can think of at least two other ways to approach the problem: effects-based simulation mechanics, and narrative mechanics, neither of which have this problem.

Effects-based mechanics, like seen in M&M (and, I would say, creeping in d20 Modern with the attribute-based classes), use mechanics to model end results, not means. An M&M character might have a power to let him fly, without saying anything about how or why he can fly. Personally, I think d20 Modern channels some of the same philosophy (if not the implementation details) with the generic classes: a character is strong/fast independent of whether he's a martial artist or a swashbuckler.

The other option is fully narrative systems. To go to the extreme, you have something like Amber Diceless or The Pool, in which the mechanics don't try to model the game world at all, but just serve as an arbitration mechanism to decide which player gets to decide what happens next (at least when they disagree).

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At any rate, where I'm going with this is that I think we need to accept that different people have different creative agendas in the game.

For some, it's just an arbitration mechanism to tell a cool story, and for them refluffing/reworking/warping the mechanics to reflect what they want may be fine.

For others, it's a mechanism for simulating a fantasy world, and for them having mechanics that aren't rooted in the simulation may break their sense of immersion.

And for yet others, it's a tactical combat game, and none of it really matters as long as the combat system is fun and (relatively) balanced.

 

[yesnomu]

You just said you all (including your DM) roll your eyes at him, and just humor him. That.. sounds horrible, actually. (Also I don't understand the "cliché"..? Life-Sapping Strike sounds..um.. odd.. but Dark Mending at least sounds like an interesting name for ..what..? "Evil healing"?)

Aside from him barreling forward when the rest of the party thinks ill, doesn't all this renaming and rule-rewriting and everything, um... make it AWFUL hard to look the powers up in the books again when referencing them, and how DO you handle questoins about it when they don't work like they're supposed to anyway?

Really? Horrible? He's playing the character he wants to play, and he's very effective at it. A couple of people (didn't mean a universal "we" there) ragged on him about the idea, but the DM went along with it and now he has a character he's satisfied with. I, personally, find the "dark and brooding hero that channels the powers of Darkness to fight evil!" thing kinda cliche. But he wants to do it, and came up with a not-entirely-terrible backstory for the character, so I say more power to him.

Nah, it works seamlessly. He includes the "real" name of the power on the bottom of the card (he uses power cards), and the mechanics are right there anyway. Remember, this is just a name and SFX change, no actual mechanics (even damage type) are changed. But now he's effectively a Death Knight, using the same mechanics as the Paladin.

Fluff change is awesome like that. I'd definitely use it whenever I had a concept the rules didn't provide, and I'm happy that my DM is amenable to it.