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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 6338940" data-attributes="member: 4937">But you will anyway.I mean seriously people, whenever you hear yourself saying that you don't want to do something, what's really going on here is that you know you are being disrespectful and confrontational but you don't want to admit to yourself that that is what you are doing.   I think maybe you are thinking to yourself that by saying, "I don't want to.... whatever" that you are softening the harsh, but you are actually heightening it.   Better would be, "I know this will sound disrespectful and confrontational, but please don't take it that way."   Better yet would be, "I beg your pardon for being disrespectful and confrontational, but..."It's pretty pathetic that 1500 or 1800 pages of character generation rules aren't enough isn't it?  When I say to you that I honestly think that I cover core fantasy archetypes better than 3.X as a whole with fewer pages, I mean it quite sincerely.  There are only two archetypes I can't quite yet cover under my rules, and its solely because nothing in 3.X covers them to my satisfaction either.   One is the 'Sherlock Holmes' character with mundane powers of divination, and the other is the 'Saka' type character who lacks easily definable skills and yet manages to always make himself useful to characters that are in theory far more powerful than him.  But seriously, everything else you can think of that doesn't fall into the 'Stone Giant Lycanthrope Monk' category is covered.So much of the chargen space in 3.X is just absolutely wasted and so many of the solutions that they adopt like PrC's are so inefficient in terms of space.  Each PrC for example provides a fixed series of progression in class abilities tied to single highly narrow concept.  That means that you basically need one PrC for each possible character concept.  So of course they needed a massive amount of rules and of course it was never enough.  They didn't really care.  Page bloat was to a certain extent a feature in the WotC 3.X business model rather than a bug.  They didn't print tons of rules for chargen because they needed tons of rules.  They printed rules to sell books.Look, honestly, systems like HERO far more space efficiently cover far more concepts even than I intend to cover, but there is nothing inherently unreasonable in suggesting, "Even though I've got fewer pages than 3.X, I actually cover nearly as much conceptual space."   Where 3.X has me beat hands down I'll admit is in, "There is more than one way to do things."   They've got 3-6 overlapping classes for every concept, each defined by very minor mechanical variations in the theme.   Where I typically would get a disappointed player compared to 3.X is in the guy that optimizes by splashing a few levels of 3-6 overlapping classes to get overlapping stacking front loaded abilities.   But you know what?  That's intentional as well.   The possibilities of mechanical synergy compared to 3.X aren't there by design.   But in terms of the actual concepts, it's every bit as broad you just might have to accept using a different mechanic to represent the same thing compared to what you are used to.  Ultimately though, I cover more things by default that 3.X should have covered - paladins of every alignment for every diety, for example - than 3.X did using less space and ultimately I think that there are more truly viable concepts.  To some extent in core 3.X, if you weren't playing one of the tier 1 classes or equivalent 'tier 1' builds, you were intentionally hampering yourself.   With what I think is superior balance compared to unmodified 3.X, you are freer to just play the concept rather than worry about the mechanics.I can't be responsible for your past experiences or what they've done to your trust. If on day one you tell me I got to change, then yeah, you are likely to find me pretty darn rigid and intolerant.  If on the other hand you outline a character concept, and ask what you could do by the rules to implement it, if the concept is reasonable at all either I'm going to find you a way to do it or create you one.  Again, I can't be reasonable for your past experiences and insecurities or how that prompts you to respond to people.  I think I'm pretty firmly hands off micromanaging PC's if I understand your meaning rightly.   As much as I demand you respect my setting, I reciprocate by respecting your right to play your PC however the heck you like.You know, I have no idea what you are talking about.  I hate generalities.  It is more than possible that what you think is a fringe concept is so mainstream that its mechanically supported in my rules.  Most things I think are 'fringe' I think so either because they inherently can't be balanced, can't pull enough weight, or are inherently anti-social - not because they are weird.  You are unlikely to want anything that I find too weird to be a character.  If you can exhaust the options, then I'll make new ones, but I bet you can't.</blockquote>

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