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Message: <blockquote data-quote="jbear" data-source="post: 5575360" data-attributes="member: 75065">Anecdotal contribution that is neither here nor there, which I realise will be largely ignored, having chimed into this conversation on pg 22.I have experienced a change in the way I DM with a change from 3.5 to 4e. Fundamentally it involves me previously judging player 'desired actions' with a 'there is probably no way you can pull that off, stop let me check the rules...' which switched to a 'that sounds like fun, okay, in that case, this is what happens...' type attitde. For me, personally, as a DM this change has been massively positive, both for myself, my players and the game I run. And certainly no amount of arguing can challenge the fact that this change (in me) occured when I read the 4e DMG.Nevertheless, it has not affected my attitude towards RP within my game, and my attitude is that it is a fundamental, wonderful, and necessary part of RPG. Yep, 4e cpmbat system, solid, slick, simple, awesome. but has that changed the way I run my game? Well ... yes ... the combat side of things. Fair enough. But there you go, see how I said 'the combat SIDE'. Because there is another side. A 50/50, just as imprtant as the combat side side. D&D is a RPG where combat is a fundamental part of things. You expect it, you want it, you love it. That doesn't mean it has to becpme the be all and end all of the game. Not at all.Then again, I take the attitude that the rules simply provide me the base I springboard my games from. If, as ocurred in last night's session, the paladin uses a Push encounter power to by pass a haunted door, and I decide on the spur of the moment that I don't think the challenge can be by passed so easily, then I will make my own ruling.  Once that ruling is made i will be consistent, which I think is the most important factor. In this case i had the Push effect rebound and hurl the paladin the same distance. When he protested, underlining how athletic his character was I allowed him to make an acrobatics check and remove the damage from the fall (10 ft) equal to half his acro check. He was cool with it as he nimbly landed back on his feet with no damage (orignally having rolled a 10 on a 1d10), having learnt the door was invulnerable to Push and the game moved on. I allow heaps of stuff. And i constantly make judgement calls that don't favour the PCs. I try and remain constant and fair as possible. Some nights I'm better than others. But what I always have to rely on that the system I have to rely my judgement calls on is solid as a rock... and I hve the fundamentals of it grasped well enough that i never ever crack open a book to check if I'm exactly right or not. And the game moves on.RP ... never the less ... same as it ever was. Maybe this also stems from the fact that I explicitly don't allow my players to EVER get away with I roll diplomacy to covince ... Whao!!!! Hold up right there! I will tell you what you have to roll if I consider it necessary. If you are a player with a PC with 8 charisma why are you making a speech as if you were a shalespearean actor? And anyway ... what is it your PC says to convice the person in question ...?I think DM's have a big part in setting expectations and norms within a game. I can see how the system influences that, but I think it's pretty slight. Or in other words I don't really buy it either. I play 4e online. I RP my PC ... I play Pathfinder in 2 different PbP games. I RP both characters ...I can see certain small detail ... like character generation in PF being slightly more involved, especially as mundane equipment seems like a far more important factor, and being a bit useless at the start part and parcel of developing your character (well, the characters I play at least, both multiclassed casters, which I'm sure is a factor). Again this may be largely due to my now fairly in depth knowledge and comfort level with the CBuilder. All that aside, I don't have trouble Rping my PC when playing 4e (my DM runs things so this is what happens naturally), and neither do my players playing at my table. I do engineer the way I run things so that this is not only explicit but rewarded.So there you guy ... that's me and my experience, for what little it counts for. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> Carry on!</blockquote>

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