The Knock On effect and Complexity Complaints

[Ridley's Cohort]

Removing AoOs would be pretty darn simple.

Removing Feats entirely would require some work, but I do not think that would be hard either.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

I pretty much agree with James and Lanefan. The thing I dislike most about D&D3.x are the skills and feats. From what I can see it would be pretty difficult to just rip those out of the game and not have it be unaffected, playability wise. It is sooo much easier to just play a different game that does what I want it to do.

If I want a game with skills and feats, however, there are also plenty of other games that handle these much better than D&D does, IMO.

Sure. If two of the major mechanics of a game does not meet the demands of your personal taste, it is highly likely you are better off grabbing another RPG from the shelf of your FLGS than go through all that work.

But this is non-evidence regarding whether the game itself is too complicated or too difficult to houserule.

 

[Voadam]

Heh, and I'd think 3e would work fine without feats except for the big exception of the fighter class, they'd then be just a d10 hd warrior. Feats are extra powers. It'd be like playing GURPS without advantages. It would still play fine.

Feats are fun and provide for character customization and special powers, but I hardly think they would muck up the game if they were not used. It would just be more like Red box Basic D&D or original 1e AD&D with the change that anybody could play any class/race or multiclass combo.

 

[cildarith]

Sure. If two of the major mechanics of a game does not meet the demands of your personal taste, it is highly likely you are better off grabbing another RPG from the shelf of your FLGS than go through all that work.

But this is non-evidence regarding whether the game itself is too complicated or too difficult to houserule.

Ah, but to me (and probably a few others), this is the very essence of house ruling. If I can't knock large chunks out of the core and replace them with something else (or not replace them at all), without the system unravelling on me, it is, as others have said in the past, too tightly wound, too well-integrated, etc. for extensive modification.

To me, tacking bits onto the outside of the core is not houseruling, and is, whatever you chose to call it, something D&D3.x seems to handle quite well.

All in MVHO.

I guess you could say I like complete modularity in my game systems.

 

[Crothian]

I guess you could say I like complete modularity in my game systems.

Well, that's not D&D. THat more like HERO or GURPs or some other game.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

An example of a change that would have serious knock-on would be, say, ditching the entire feats system. This would force a near-complete re-build of the Fighter class to make it playable, and a decision on whether the idea of metamagic is worth keeping and if so how to implement it, and a question of how to handle things like blind-fighting, and..., and... And that is the level of changes and tweaks that are being looked at, and where the knock-on effect becomes a serious issue.

Lanefan

And how is this different from the ripple effect that, say, removing priest spells from the cleric or thief skills from thieves in 1st edition?

 

[blargney the second]

Removing AoOs would be pretty darn simple.

I agree with that statement - they are easy enough to take out.

However, it's significantly more difficult to understand the full ramifications of removing the primary balancing mechanism for many of the actions in the game.
-blarg

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

Ah, but to me (and probably a few others), this is the very essence of house ruling. If I can't knock large chunks out of the core and replace them with something else (or not replace them at all), without the system unravelling on me, it is, as others have said in the past, too tightly wound, too well-integrated, etc. for extensive modification.

As far as I can tell if "too tightly wound" and "too well-integrated" means exactly nothing. You are welcome to try and come up with an example if you disagree.

If you knock large chunks out of the the core of 1e or 2e or OD&D or BRP or GURPS or Hero or Shadowrun or Amber or Vampire, you are going to have similar or greater problems to those you have with 3e.

Integrated rules are more likely to save your bacon than hurt you, as the effects of changes are more predictable and therefore give you a palette of options to prescribe to the ailment.

It is, in fact, possible to rip feats completely out of 3e. So this "too tightly wound" and "too well-integrated" assertion looks dead wrong from where I stand.

I agree that you are probably better off just playing some other game than go through such effort. But that is non-evidence to either side of the argument.

 

[Crothian]

However, it's significantly more difficult to understand the full ramifications of removing the primary balancing mechanism for many of the actions in the game.

Yes, someone needs to understand and be pretty experienced with the system to make these changes. It is not something a novice should expect to be able to do.

 

[Ridley's Cohort]

However, it's significantly more difficult to understand the full ramifications of removing the primary balancing mechanism for many of the actions in the game.

In this case we know there are plenty of combat heavy games that do not use the concept of AoOs at all, and it is not missed.

All that is left is to tweak a few specific actions and add flat modifiers against their success chance. Go down the list of AoO provoking actions in the PHB. Most require no modifications.

Honestly if you yanked AoOs and did absolutely nothing to "correct" the situation most campaigns would see no significant problems. Is it really a big deal if you see a few more grapples and trips? Most characters who want to specialize in those in those tactics get the special feats, not just to avoid the AoO, but in order to gain the bonus on the check.