The problem with D&D

[rgard]

Have you ever seen a Jackie Chan movie?

I was thinking of the Governor of California's work.

 

[T. Foster]

Not sure why this thread is labeled with the "1E/2E/OD&D" tag since the complaints and examples seem to apply mostly to the current edition, but since the tag lured me into reading the thread and I'm here anyway, I might as well respond:

#1 Power disparity
This is kind of the primary flaw in the whole system. A 3rd level fighter can probably take down two 1st level fighters. A 10th level fighter could quite conceivably take down a company of 1st level characters. Generally unless the lower level combatants start to use advanced tactics to ensure flanking bonuses and stacking aid anothers then they are like so much cream cheese in front of the death dealing monster.

This is a matter of perspective, and is helped by thinking of a narrower spread of levels than what the current edition assumes. Most folks are and always will be 0-level, and even a 'lowly' 1st level character is exceptional (or at least shows the potential to become exceptional); by 4th level a character is a 'hero' -- able to do things normal men could barely dream of, instantly recognized in his home-base town, and probably at least known of by the rulers of the land; by 8th level a character is a 'superhero,' a legendary figure of the sort who comes along once in a generation (or perhaps a 'patriarch' -- the head of his church for an entire nation or region); higher levels, while theoretically possible, are even more rare and legendary -- yeah the rulebooks include 9th level spells that require an 18th level magic-user to cast, but that doesn't mean the world is full of 18th+ level magic-users -- perhaps one of these comes along once a century, or even once a millennium, and are remembered long after their passing (or ascendancy to godhead). So yeah, the power disparity is real, but it's only a problem if you view it from the perspective of a more-or-less even distribution of all 20 levels running around an interacting together -- only characters of 1st-4th level should be roaming around town interacting with 0-level city guards and saving the village; characters of 5th-8th level should be roaming around the wilderness interacting with barons and generals and saving the nation, characters of 9th-12th level should be roaming around the halls of power interacting with kings and emperors and saving the world, and characters of 13th+ levels should be roaming the planes of existence, interacting with the gods themselves, and saving the universe.

#2 Class System
Right well your a wizard, you adventure for six months in the wilderness and come back with more knowledge of architecture??? Survival still remains cross class no matter what you do. Oh and wizards are just refused armour completely. Basically the whole concept of classes is restrictive and seems more like a good excuse to release reams of books than out of any intrinsic value to the idea. Oh and this also leads to the temptation to make the classes in the next book slightly more powerful or attractive than the last to try to tempt more people to buy the book.

The purpose of the class system isn't to be restrictive, it's to provide an easily accessible hook in the form of an archetype to enable the player to begin playing the game immediately without having to invent a bunch of pre-game backstory. For higher level characters or more experienced or dedicated players the class system doesn't need to serve as a straitjacket to creativity -- the player and ref are free to work together to customize the character and make it more well-rounded, and can deviate from the examples in the book as they please. As for making the classes in new books better or more attractive than previous classes to tempt people into buying the new books, yeah you may have a point there (thinks about the 1E UA barbarian and cavalier who could both be fairly described as "like a fighter, only better"), but that only matters if you let yourself be a slave to the official. The official material is always going to add new complications and power-ups to the game, because that's how they keep people buying books, but no one says you have to use them -- the game remains perfectly viable and playable with only the core books (heck, it's perfectly viable and playable using only the original boxed set from 1974!).

The XP system is an abstraction, a metonymy or synecdoche in which one type of activity (monster-slaying and treasure-gathering) serves for the whole of the character's training, practice, education, and other means of self-improvement. The reason for this is obvious -- monster-slaying and treasure-gathering are what the game is about, and are at least ostensibly the most fun, whereas all that other stuff is less fun, so it's shunted off to the background and abstracted away. Of course the character is assumed to be doing all those things too -- that's what all the enforced downtime built into the rules is there for -- and it's only a lack of understanding that assumes that because we only see the character doing one type of activity ("adventuring" -- killing monsters and gathering treasures) that that's all he's doing.

#3 The whole d20 thing
Basically the d20 idea is not a good one from a statistics point of view and neither is it any good for representing what a person can reliably do as compared to what they could potentially do (ok that's like a reiteration of the statistics point). D&D has a flat probability curve. You are as likely to roll a 20 as a 1. That alone doesn't sound too bad but when you consider that 10 is basically a reliable result to reflect normal responses but rolling a 9 means failure then it's getting too twitchy and isn't a reliable result at all. There are ways around this but whilst still using the D20 system it tends to lead to more capability than you wanted and more cost than you can afford.

I agree with this completely. Gygax went with a d20-based system (rather than the previous 2d6 based system) for combat and saving throws in D&D because he wanted a flat probability distribution and (I suspect, though he's never confirmed this) heavy random element, but retained d6 and d% based rolls in most other areas. The move towards using d20 for everything for the sake of consistency is, IMO, a mistake. (And, FWIW, one of my long-standing house-rule projects is an attempt to move D&D back to 2d6-based rolls for combat and saving throws -- but that's a tough battle against a very ingrained tradition.)

#4 Break points
Right well let's assume that your playing the game and your happy with the rules structure. At first level everything is deadly. Stubbing your toe can force you to return to a safe haven and rest up for 3 weeks whilst you regain your confidence. Now through your career your progressing (usually at an alarming rate or one so dull as to be torturous) and you hit some "break" points. The first is around level 6 and the others are usually about level 12 and leel 16, roughly in line with when a full BAB character gains an additional attack. At these points it seems your abilities suddenly shift up a gear and you become more than a mere level above your previous point. This is quite odd but it's all to do with how the level system works out and the way all those charts sum together.
Quite often what was a challenge the day before is now a walk over and you feel much more powerful. This would represent real life only in terms of psychology but here it's made real. Of course in about 2 levels your back to your normal state of pride ready for the next break but that's an aside.

I already covered most of my response to this in my response to #1 above -- yeah, the breakpoints are real, so understand them and embrace them. A 7th level character shouldn't be having the same types of adventures as a 2nd level character only having an easier time of it, he should be facing completely different kinds of challenges. That said, I personally feel that after the 2nd breakpoint (at or around 12th level) the game generally ceases to be interesting and characters should be retired to NPC status, perhaps brought out of retirement on rare occasions for world-saving epic adventures, but not played week-to-week. So it's kind of a Catch-22 -- you win the game by gaining experience for your character and going up in levels, but the reward for winning is that the character is no fun to play anymore so you have to retire him and start over with a new character rather than keeping the one you liked. This is a real issue, and one I haven't quite worked out to my personal satisfaction yet (the obvious answer is to drastically slow down the leveling rate, or even remove leveling entirely and have characters stay at 7th level (or whatever other 'sweet spot' point) forever, but neither of those are satisfying to me -- a completely stagnant game is no more appealing to me than a superhero game).

#5 Magic
Okay so fantasy needs magic like Star Trek needs to be able to beam people or create food from nothing but the present philosophy regarding magic is terrible. Any time something happens which is not explained by what we regard as reality, it's labelled as magic. Strangely however it seems that magic is actually about a dozen different elements working in concert. No regard is paid to making any kind of sense with magic, it is just left completely open as some kind of weird thing which just does what it wants and yet conforms to the petty rules laid out in the books. Why oh why is there such restricted and tightly defined spells with almost no allowance for customisation and yet virtually anything can and will be explained away with a singular mention of the word magic. Personally I'd like to see some kind of overall general capabilities of magic which are guidelines for what magic can and cannot do whilst simultaneously relaxing the borders on spells so that a fireball (for instance) is not it's own spell but rather something you can do with a certain level of skill in a fire based spell. It'd be quite simple to break down most spells into various categories so that skills could be used and then each casters personal choice on where they place their skill points would be reflected in their capability with their spell selection.

This, frankly, just isn't the way magic works in the assumed D&D cosmology. It's not necessarily inferior or superior to what you're suggesting, just different. Magic in D&D follows certain laws (which I think might be spelled out a bit in the AD&D PH or DMG; they're spelled out in much more detailed manner in Mythus Magick for the Dangerous Journeys game) that are formulated for use and exploitation by mortals into discrete "spells" with specific effects. The way to create a new magical effect isn't to customize or modify the existing spells, but to use the magical principles to formulate entirely new spells (which may have elements in common with the previously extant spells). D&D allows this (or at least the old versions did, and I assume the current one still does) through its rules for magical research -- by investing time and money characters can create new spells and magical effects. If this flavor doesn't work for you (and it seems it doesn't) all I can suggest is to cut out the D&D magic system and replace it with something else, either from another rpg or with something of your own devising.

 

[Greg K]

Have you ever seen a Jackie Chan movie?

I have. And there are several in which he has problems dealing with three or four individual. Usually, he comes out on top, but he takes several hits in the process unless he is dodging to avoid attacks.

However, he is not invincible.

In one movie, he was left beaten in an alley after being hit with thrown bottles. And, another occassion, he wound up butt naked on the street, because the bad guys stole his clothes.

 

[Greg K]

I was thinking of the Governor of California's work.

And, that he is practically invincible might be why some of have a hard time watching his movies.

 

[Jdvn1]

I have. And there are several in which he has problems dealing with three or four individual. Usually, he comes out on top, but he takes several hits in the process unless he is dodging to avoid attacks.

However, he is not invincible.

In one movie, he was left beaten in an alley after being hit with thrown bottles. And, another occassion, he wound up butt naked on the street, because the bad guys stole his clothes.

Oh sure, not everyone Jackie Chan comes up to is a level 1 mook. But I also remember scenes where he takes on well more than three or four individuals.

Or, look at Indiana Jones. Or Zorro. Or Batman. Or some of the LotR characters. Or the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Or Bruce Lee. Or the Three Musketeers. Or Achilles. Or V.

I mean, seriously, the list of examples goes on and on. We could argue Jackie Chan as a specific example, but then we'd be missing the point.

And, I think rgard would be referring to Conan, not the Terminator.

 

[painandgreed]

And shame on the pair of level 1 fighters who attack the level 3 fighter head on. That's tantamount to a rigged fight, in my book.

Depends on who is the PC and who is the NPC IMHO. Two fresh 1st level PC fighters versus a 3rd level NPC fighter is probably a hard but winnable fight. A 3rd level PC versus two 1st level NPCs is a speedbump.

 

[Umbran]

I did in fact read the "rules" but they did not state anything like what you suggest with any clarity.

*nod* That's why I added the extra observations.

I apologise if I sound irritated but, as this is my first thread, perhaps you could leave the chiding for repeat offenders or make more comprehensive rules.

It wasn't chiding - it was advice.

If you'd like to discuss The Rules, and how they apply, any of the moderators will be happy to speak about them with you in e-mail. Our addresses are available in a thread stickied to the top of the Meta forum. We shouldn't clutter up your thread with any more such sidetracks.

 

[Technomancer]

Have you ever seen a Jackie Chan movie?

And that's my point. Some people like that kind of over the top action with all kinds of kewl powers. Apparently a lot of people like that actually, since D&D is the most popular rpg out there by far. And that's ok.

Others, like the OP and myself, prefer something a little more scaled back or toned down, and that's ok too.

And like many have said, the best solution in my opinion is to play another game.

Or some of the LotR characters.

The fight at the end of FotR is a perfect example of a mid-level d&d party going up against a crowd of mooks.

 

[shilsen]

I think his point, one I agree with, is that no one individual being should be that much more powerful than anyone else. The disparity in power between even 10th level and 1st level is too great, at least in my opinion.

Think of the most elite special forces guy on the planet, or alternately the greatest competitive boxer or martial artist. Put them up against a dozen guys armed and equipped similarly. Would they be able to mow through the mooks without a second thought?

A 10th lvl character is far more akin to a superhero or a mythic hero than any of the examplees you mentioned. Could the Hulk or Hercules mow down a mob of similarly armed mooks without a second thought? Yes.

 

[Greg K]

Oh sure, not everyone Jackie Chan comes up to is a level 1 mook. But I also remember scenes where he takes on well more than three or four individuals.

Or, look at Indiana Jones. Or Zorro. Or Batman. Or some of the LotR characters. Or the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Or Bruce Lee. Or the Three Musketeers. Or Achilles. Or V.

I mean, seriously, the list of examples goes on and on. We could argue Jackie Chan as a specific example, but then we'd be missing the point.

And, I think rgard would be referring to Conan, not the Terminator.

Of course. Howerver, the whole things depends on the individual source one uses as a guideline, at what level an individual pegs a specific hero, and at what point a given's suspension of disbelief is exceeded. Just because a given hero without some super humanpower withstands a few sword blows or gunshots doesn't mean that a bullet or sword blow scoring a critical hit cannot kill them (theoretically). However, some people will place the hero at a specific level where a maxed damaged crit from a sword or bullet has no chance of killing the character simply the character is a hero.