Something that 4e's designers overlooked? -aka is KM correct?

[Mark]

bitch

Whadaya callin' me?

 

[JoeGKushner]

Whadaya callin' me?

But I'm talking about Shaft.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Now you're just ignoring my point completely and making fun of it. Fine by me.

You were saying earlier that you saw "a lot of people confusing that whole farmer brown thing with every possible starting character". What I am seeing, personally, is a lot of people who are taking things WAY too literally.

No reason to go on under these conditions, since I'm not willing to engage into hair-splitting matches. /out

If what you are saying is that starting characters are leaving a mundane existance behind then I am disagreeing you.

If you are saying starting characters in your campaign are doing so, no problem. Each campaign is unique onto itself.

1st level characters in almost every edition of the game I've played are not mundane and can start off doing things that normal people cannot. In addition, there is a lot of meta-information build into those things and in older editions, rely on community building and sharing the 'wealth' so to speak.

For example, if your running a long term campaign, generally in an older edition, and one of the players with a long lasting character has a fortress and attracts followers, and a new players picks to start off as one of those followers, is he coming from a mundane existance?

The background of the pre-game, in my experience, can support a massive variety of background starting themes and assuming that one is dominate in any edition can be seen as a narrow view of the game.

Farmers:
Can you run as farmer brown and his friends? Jed taught by the crazy mage at the tower, Heirnrich, the spoiled noble taught his weapons by a retired mercenary warrior? Silias whose lazy ways are never caught because no one can find him and Jerimah who spends more time tending church and preaching the ways as opposed to working the farm who are all brought together when the town is under attack and you must seek out those who've brought harm to you and yours? Or are bored and seek adventure outside the farm? Or are sent to look for that no-good McBurns when an earth quake unvaults a lost tomb?

The possibilities to me at least, are endless and if one wants to play the farm boy to represent the lack of actual power, one can. However, that farm boy is still not running around with 1 hit point and using a spade doing 1d6-1 points of damage.

But that's just me.

 

[Obryn]

Also, in AD&D, "everyone else" is usually a 0-level character; this even includes most mercenaries available for hire. Unless you're using an expansion like the Greyhawk Adventures hardback, PCs start at 1st level. While PCs can certainly come from humble origins, they're not completely unprepared; I don't know that the default assumption in the game world is that random acolytes and altar boys have the wherewithal to cast Cure Light Wounds.

Hardly anyone in AD&D has class levels, apart from the PCs and important NPCs. The PCs have class levels, making them exceptional.

-O

 

[Mark]

But I'm talking about Shaft.

Now I'm getting the what?

 

[Doug McCrae]

I believe Odhanan is coming at this from an OD&D perspective. In OD&D, clerics don't get spells until 2nd level, so I can see how one could view all the non-magic user classes (yeah, all two of them) as mundane.

Also in OD&D, PCs die at 0, whereas in 1e and 3e (and I think it was an optional rule in 2e), PCs die at -10. So they're more fragile in OD&D.

In the manuscript Dave Arneson first sent to Gary Gygax, what later became OD&D, PCs started at the equivalent of 4th level - heroes or wizards. So PCs that kick ass from the start are actually extremely old school. Even more old school than OD&D.

I think there's quite a strong tradition of not starting at 1st level in pre-4th ed D&D. Most modules are for mid level PCs, not low level, and pregens are provided. The Dragonlance PCs start at 3rd->6th level. Interestingly this is precisely the 'sweet spot' Lew Pulsipher cites in his Introduction to Dungeons & Dragons series in White Dwarf.

D&D is most fun for third to sixth level characters, who are strong enough to adventure without fear of immediate death, strong enough to have more combat options than flight, melee and sleep spells, but not so strong that they can laugh at monsters.

- White Dwarf 24, 1981

Playing 2e in the early 90s, we often started games around 5th-7th level.

 

[TerraDave]

Always. It's like the Bible. If you see an apparent inaccuracy or contradiction, it's really just your own lack of understanding of the proper way in which to understand it.

....wait, what am I supposed to have said?



Um.

I don't think 4e's combat roles mean any sort of inherent risk-taking or option-making is lost. I do think that 4e mostly focuses tightly on individual encounters, and that a lot can be gained from widening the focus out to include the context in which those encounters occur. Part of this means that encounters become subordinate to the flow of the adventure/dungeon, which means some encounters would probably be riskier than others, and deciding between options in play may affect which encounters you ultimately deal with, and which ones you avoid.

Its a good post...but I--still--disagree with this. In 4E RAW there are rewards and elements that are cross-encounter. And, again, my players really have these sorts of discussions (and rituals are not superflous).




As for the "hero" thing...1st level 4E charecters are closer to 3rd level charecters in earlier editions...but didn't fighting-men always start with enough gold to buy arms and armor? Certainly not commoners. I think the only pre 2E "0" charecter rules involved low status caveliers.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Now I'm getting the what?

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AAa5rP64YbQ]YouTube - Isaac Hayes - Theme from "Shaft"[/ame]

 

[pemerton]

In 4e, you start as a Hero. Boom. You're already there.

This is equally true of the Campbellian hero.

Campbell isn't offering a theory of how things happen in the world of the narrative. Like MerricB said, he's offering a theory of story analysis. In RPG terms, it's a theory of the metagame, not the ingame situation.

When I watch Star Wars, I know from the moment he appears on the screen that Luke Skywalker is the hero (even though the characters in the world don't know this). The same is true in 4e. The players all know the PCs are heros. What the situation is in the gameworld, however, is up for grabs.

If you play 4e in a simulationist fashion, it stands to reason you'll get a strange play experience. But it's not built to be played that way, as awesome apocalypse explained upthread.

 

[pemerton]

This pretty much gets it for me.

<snip>

Good post. The 4e designers didn't overlook it. They took it out, in order to change the play experience in the ways that you describe.