Roles in Roleplaying Games

[Vyvyan Basterd]

Well I find it off-putting that you can't understand why the way you approach concepts would be unsatisfactory for many players because of a lack of actual mechnical support for the concept and/or the amount of cost inherent in fulfilling the mechanical weight they want for the concept.

I haven't been clear enough. I do understand why my approach won't satisfy other players. As the DM of those players I would work with them to best realize the concept and mechanics they wish to achieve. I only have a problem when I'm completely satisfied with my concept and the approach I've taken to achieve it but others are unwilling to budge on basic class fluff. I can understand it in a case like the "Intersect Fighter" because that really pushes boundaries. But having a character that "fires up his blood" that isn't from a backwoods tribe seems more than reasonable IMO. I remember the discussion board complaints well regarding the induced illiteracy of the class, deriding the idea that only uneducated wilderness folk can "get mad," so I'm surely not the only one who believes that the class shouldn't be pigeonholed into the narrow background that many put it in, even if the standard fluff says so.

 

[Guest 85555]

Everyone has a different reaction to these things.

Honestly I am not sure why roles were such a turn-off for me in 4E. It was one of a number of changes I reacted pretty negatively to. It could be any number of things. I suspect it isn't just one reason but many. Part of it is it seems to really place the emphasis on combat and dungeon crawl. I know people have designed parties around combat functions for a while, but even back in 2E or 3E I never liked designing a party like that. It was just not organic enough for me. To me having three spell casters in a party was fine, not having a cleric wasn't a problem, a group of all fighters could be a blast. But for me combat was rarely the focus of the game (it had its place but how well a character performed in battle was only a part of his value to the party).

I think another reason I didn't like the role concept was it felt like the designers were holding my hand, but at the same time limiting my options. It also seemed kind of muddled having both classes and roles. In my opinion one of the things 3e got right was the multiclassing system. I really liked the flexibility of it and it was way more streamlined than previous editions. It was the one aspect of the game I felt really should be preserved in the next edition. But roles and open multiclassing are somewhat opposed notions.

At the end of the day though, I just found the concept very distasteful for some reason.

 

[Jhaelen]

The names inspire vague archetypes, and I was wondering what the class rules are like. Also, are they pigeon-holing -- can't you have a scholarly treasure-hunter or a wandering scholar?

In TOR you pick a Calling to define your main motiviation for going adventuring. It doesn't have a lot of mechanical impact, the most important aspect is that it will also define your 'Dark Flaw', e.g. 'Dragon Disease' (basically 'Greed') for the Treasure Hunter.

In TOR the most important decision is picking your cultural group (Beorninger, Dwarf, etc.) since it defines your starting skills. Within the culture you also get to pick something like a profession/role that defines your starting attributes and skill specialization.

Every character also gets 10 'experience points' to freely advance skills and a 1/2/3 bonus to assign to attributes.

 

[Bluenose]

In TOR the most important decision is picking your cultural group (Beorninger, Dwarf, etc.) since it defines your starting skills. Within the culture you also get to pick something like a profession/role that defines your starting attributes and skill specialization.

Wait. Aren't you supposed to roll that profession randomly? Or were we misunderstanding the rule?

 

[Vyvyan Basterd]

I'm guessing for Vyvyan Basterd and others, that suburban Barbarian and barbarian Suburbanite are interchangeable?

I geuss, but it wasn't really the point I was trying to make. I didn't see my character as an "Urban Barbarian/Sorcer." Rules-wise my character was a barbarian/sorcerer but I envisioned that combination as "Noble Urbanite with Draconic Heritage." The class names do not factor into my concept.

 

[Jhaelen]

Wait. Aren't you supposed to roll that profession randomly? Or were we misunderstanding the rule?

I don't recall anything like that.

Note, though that I have the German version which suffers from some translation issues:
According to the German publisher, some of the files they received for translation were out of
date.

 

[Bluenose]

I don't recall anything like that.

Note, though that I have the German version which suffers from some translation issues:
According to the German publisher, some of the files they received for translation were out of
date.

In the Adventurer's Book, page 31, Hero Creation Summary, it says "Roll (or choose) Background". So I think we're both 'doing it right'. Though as you pointed out, culture is much more important.

 

[pemerton]

Now is this the part where you tell us that even the designers and developers of the game are confused about their thoughts and 4e because of presentation or something like that?

Don't see the point of snark.

Are you sure?

there are posters like pemerton, who claim that this narrative fiction is important and what makes D&D 4e such a great narrative game

My view is that 4e works well for narrativist play because of the way it supports situation-oriented, player driven play.

My view is that the lists of fictional elements - races, classes, Paragon Paths, Epic Destinies, etc - gives the players material to choose from in building their PCs and setting up the parameters around which the GM builds situations. (It's a more commercially-oriented alternative to the HeroQuest approach of player-chosen descriptors!)

The question is... from the description of a warlock or wizard, why should one be confined to the striker role and the other be confined to the controller role?

I don't think there's any inherent reason for this. There's no in-principle reason why you couldn't have a pact-based arcane controller (and Heroes of Shadow offers a poor version of such a thing). But there is a reason to focus PC builds in various ways. As I posted upthread, this produces a particular play experience.

What's the problem, exactly, with divorcing combat role from being encoded into classes?

<snip>

When I play a Fighter, why is "Defender" already encoded? When I play a Wizard, why is "controller" already encoded?

<snip>

What I guess I'm missing is what exactly is objectionable about having pools of "Defender Powers" and "Controller Powers" separate to choose from. Just like pools of "Arcane Powers" and "Martial Exploits" or the like. You could have the Combat Role pools be inside the Power Source pools.

There's nothing objectionable about it. But it would produce a different game from 4e. It would have implications for the design of Paragon Paths. It would - I suspect - tend to produce less focused PCs (less focused both mechanically and fictionally).

 

[JamesonCourage]

It would - I suspect - tend to produce less focused PCs (less focused both mechanically and fictionally).

If that's the case, then the players would be voluntarily choosing watered down roles. That is, they could choose all Defender powers if they wanted to be paramount at Defending. If making powers optional as indicated above would tend to produce less focused PCs, isn't that a sign that players tend to want more diversity than roles give them?

 

[Imaro]

Are you sure?

Touche... there might have been a little snark in that comment... but I would also argue that there's is also more then a little truth to how you often dismiss what the very designers and developers of 4e claim about the intentions, designs and flaws of their own game by asserting your own anecdotal evidence and experiences over their expertise or hand-waving it as the fault of 4e's presentation.

My view is that 4e works well for narrativist play because of the way it supports situation-oriented, player driven play.

My view is that the lists of fictional elements - races, classes, Paragon Paths, Epic Destinies, etc - gives the players material to choose from in building their PCs and setting up the parameters around which the GM builds situations. (It's a more commercially-oriented alternative to the HeroQuest approach of player-chosen descriptors!)

So it seems like we are in agreement then (except I believe this has been true as far back as AD&D 2e.), you feel that the narrative or fictional elements have actual weight as opposeed to being irrelevant and that the mechanics back up those fictional elements... or am I mis-understanding you?

I don't think there's any inherent reason for this. There's no in-principle reason why you couldn't have a pact-based arcane controller (and Heroes of Shadow offers a poor version of such a thing). But there is a reason to focus PC builds in various ways. As I posted upthread, this produces a particular play experience.

Well, I have much less of a problem with them instilling combat role in builds (though I still very much prefer the freedom of players deciding their own role by their own choices within a concept), since they are more specific concepts and thus by their very nature more narrowly defined.

That said, I think sticking combat role in the overarching archetype of a class, where any concept for a fighter must be a defender... or any concept for the wizard archetype must be a controller and so on, was a big mistake. It's unnecessarily and extremely limiting and, going by the Rule-of-Three article, I think even the designers and developers realize this.