Things that Irk Me about DnD (Somewhat long, kinda ranty)

[schnee]

As far as magic preparation vs. divine gift, all the 'magic' in western cultures (i.e. Golden Dawn, Crowley, Alchemy, etc.) come from ritual, study, and secret knowledge scribed in musty tomes of ancient origin. For a good primer, check out this excellent article on RPG.net: http://www.rpg.net/news+reviews/columns/archetypology27nov01.html .

As far as the archetypes we play with, D&D is cobbled together from dozens of sources both historical and fictional, so there are some odd combinations.

Clerics don't bother me - they're holy crusaders, prepared for war. It's not like you're forced to wear heavy armor... you can make it that way if you want, but you can also go the dex+bracers+whatever route too. They may be 'unbalanced', but in the ones I've seen that extra power gets spent on making other players do great things... supporting role, blah blah. If it weren't for their extra power, letting them shine occasionally on their own, nobody would ever play 'em. In my games in earlier editions they were almost always NPCs.

As far as specific game mechanics, just remember AD&D is the descendent of Chainmail, a turn-based combat board game. Most of the 'flavor' text regarding game mechanics are either outgrowths of, or rationalizations for, that origin (depending if you like 'em or not. ). There are other magical systems that are far more flexible and thematically consistent you can choose from (older Chaosium games and Shadowrun for example) but they aren't from the same lineage.

We're stuck with it for D&D. I personally don't mind, as I've played a lot of systems and after a while they just become a different palette to paint with. I enjoy a very tactical game, and for all it's limitations and problems, D&D delivers.

 

[dead]

Yeah, the divide in magic is quite funny. I still use it, though.

I tell you what's even funnier, though; when you find gods of "magic". Or gods of "arcane magic".

What do with the clerics of these gods? Do you have to go to the extreme of making them cleric/wizards or give them a prestidge class like the Hollowed Mage (BoHM) or Dweomercrafter (Complete Divine web enhancement)?

Should these clerics be getting the entire arcane list as divine spells?

I'm starting to go cross-eyed.

 

[teitan]

Well, as a practicing Occultist and follower of Crowley I can tell you that magick is a heck of a lot more than studying ancient tomes and performance of ritual. Western Magick is just as much about being a Priest and Prophet, not just for yourself but for those around you as Christianity etc. Sure, the secrets of western occultism are contained in musty tomes and hidden in Da Vinci's paintings, but heck, they are also plainly stated in various books from Donald Michael Kraig to Dan Brown. There is no divide between arcane magick and divine magick to us, there is only MAGICK.

At any rate, what bothers me about D&D is the move away from a rules lite system. I mean 3E could have still been very similar to 1 or 2e without skills and feats etc. Don't get me wrong, I think 3E is a superior system in terms of playability etc. I am just feeling nostalgic for my 1E days.

I get irked by the magic divide when I want to run a specific style, I love AU's magic system BUT not all of those classes represent an archetype as easily or smoothly as some of the D&D classes like the Rogue or Ranger. They get close at times. I will sometimes start developing ideas for a new campaign and I feel torn between AU because of the magic system and D&D for its pure classical feel.

Clerics... I understand the issues with them. I don't think they are overpowered personally but I see why many do. As far as their abilities, I don't necessarily see their powers as granted by their god per se, sure FR says that and GH implies it a little less than FR, but what I see clerics as are the warrior arm of the church. Not always the wisest or most learned but they travel to spread the word of their faith and their magic comes from their ability to channel the energies of life and death and their domains reflect their temperament and what aspect of their deity they most identify with on a very personal and intangible level, almost indefinable by the cleric because it is a matter of FAITH and FAITH can not be defined easily. The god doesn't grant them their spells, but their faith in their god grants them their spells. I love the Realms but on of my few nitpicks is that the gods are so hands on and really fs this idea of divine magic up. As far as the Cleric as priest thing, the 1e clerics were very much Crusader Knights like Templars and Hospitalers and when 2E brought us Priests, Clerics went almost totally away as an optional rule in the PHB. Divine Spellcasters became priests as opposed to the adventuring arm of their church. In 3e, Adkison seemed to have wanted a more 1e feel to the products, y'know, when people bought and played D&D en masse as opposed to 2e which never outsold 1e... anyway, Clerics returned and in order to retain some of the old specialist priest flavour (introduced in Greyhawk Adventures!) we got the domains and a rather confused picture of what Clerics are as opposed to priest. What we need in the DMG is a NPC class that represents the nonadventuring priest and not just the Aristocrat or Adept, maybe something inbetween? Anyway, the Clerics material components represent a focus for his will.

Mages... Again, I understand but how I view Arcane magic is this... Wizards are working with the air that surrounds them and weaving the five elements together to create their desired effect. Arcane magic does not come from within so much as from an understanding of the mutable laws of nature and how to manipulate them to your purposes. This even includes the ambient positive and negative energy inherent in the air. A mage draws the energy for his spells out of his components like a vampire leeches the life out of his victims.

At least, that is my understanding of what Clerics, Priests and Mages are...

Jason

 

[Heretic Apostate]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Merlion
Especially now since its grown so far beyond a combat-simulation system for 2 people to use in their basement.


Has it ever been like this?

I know the old boxed set edition of D&D (not the very original, tho), AD&D 1st and 2nd and now D&D 3rd, but none seem to fit that description.

(let's hope this copy/paste works...)

Yes, the game of D&D evolved from a wargame. I think it was called Chainmail or something like that.

I dunno... Someone will be along to provide fuller answers soon, I bet.

 

[Chris Parker]

Well, as a practicing Occultist and follower of Crowley I can tell you that magick is (...)
Jason

Sigh. Lets leave whatever our personal real world religious beliefs might be totally out of this. Way to easy to offend someone - plus, when you sound intelligeable on the net, your far more likely to be listened to if you do not include your religious inclinations.

Additionally, this is Fantasy. When your thinking of how magic should work in your campaign, think of your campaign like a fantasy book. Do teleporting mages make cross continental travel an every day thing? That certainly robs the campaign of lots of interesting elements... force em to walk Also, maybe there is no divine magic. Maybe all magic is divine.

Maybe there are no Gods, they are merely parasitic creatures that rob humans(elves/dwarves/all other races) of thier greatness, and when you kill one they cant feed off of humans quick enough to make up the difference, so for a while everyone becomes a quasidiety.

In short, the base rules should allow a large degree of flexibility for ad hoc changes and house rules.

~Chris.

 

[kiznit]

believable clerics?

I've had issues off and on with the whole "concept" of clerics, but I've certainly seen them played successfully and believably. The closest I've really considered a fantasy cleric archetype has been, get this, Friar Tuck from the old Errol Flynn Robin Hood movie. There was something so wonderful about this character sleeping on the side of a riverbank with a leg of mutton, with his brown robes, his little metal skullcap and his mace. He was probably totally wearing chainmail underneath those robes.

Still he had kind of a pugnacious spirituality to him, you know, the "holy man" of a gang of robbers and thieves, who all love him and love to make fun of him.

I truly think of playing D&D as being the crack commandos of the tolkien based fantasy world. Special Ops teams never really existed in medieval times, but what if they did? I think D&D represents that perfectly.. It's not totally culturally believable, but you got your thug, your explosives specialists, your medic, you know, it does work. And it's a lot of fun. We're all having fun, right?

 

[LostSoul]

The god doesn't grant them their spells, but their faith in their god grants them their spells.

Yeah, but why does one advance in Cleric levels by bashing in the skulls of goblins and ogres? If it's just a matter of faith, wouldn't it be better to sit in a monestary and contemplate the nature of god?

 

[Brother MacLaren]

"Wizards" in some myth and legend do get their power from various gods, correct? The Wizard in the movie "Conan the Barbarian" casts exactly one spell, by performing a long ritual calling upon either gods or demons. Thulsa Doom, on the other hand, seems to have his magic inherent in him, and can "cast" much more quickly.

Could you call the first a cleric and the second a wizard?

I definitely agree with those who note that a "cleric" is not a "priest," despite what the English language might say. Creating an NPC Priest class that is unsuitable for use as a PC (miracles awarded by godly whim, taking long time to invoke) might be a useful idea.
If you don't like the idea of all clerics having access to the common spell list, such as a God of Knowledge giving Flame Strike, you could adapt the 2E system; add some more domains, classify every spell as "universal" or belonging to one of the domains, and give each cleric access to three or four (more if they have limited combat ability).
Clerics could be toned down a bit and still be fun; I played a cleric in Basic/Expert, and back in the day clerics had *no* offensive damaging spells except for the "reversed" versions, which Lawful clerics generally wouldn't use. I just went back and looked that up. No offensive damaging spells. On the other hand, you don't want the cleric to be the combat medic and nothing else - items like the BD&D Staff of Healing (no charges, once per day per person) allowed a cleric to occasionally memorize utility, enhancement, or defensive spells. They also had HD one size lower than fighters and one size above thieves, and BAB equal to thieves (similar to how it is now).

 

[Li Shenron]

The Arcane/Divine divide...
I personally feel that wizards/sorcerers should be the masters of magic, as a whole...
The Cleric class...
Magical Sterotyping...
Magic Item Dependency...

Well, there are other things, but this post is plenty long enough as is so I’m just gonna go with this for now

Basically I had at some point of my gaming experience all your doubts mentioned here. "Magical stereotyping" is the only one which is very easy to get rid of, just let your players choose where do their powers come and the explanation, but the other 4 points have a much deeper root into game mechanics.

I have always claimed the right as a DM to play in my own setting, and I would definitely change what I dislike (although I have mostly played D&D as it is, and didn't suffer much). What really has bugged me a few times is not the points above, but how much some lawful players pretend that those (or others) should never be changed, otherwise "it's not D&D anymore". So what?
This accident has happened to me only with occasional gamers, I think that if you have been playing with the same friends for a long time, they would be curious to play something different over time, to have something new to discover how it works. Don't be afraid to propose them something new, even if it may be hard to accept at first! You can always change back if you don't like it...

As an example, this morning I woke up thinking about a variant rule from UA ("Recharge Magic"), something that at first sight I thought it would never made into our games. Later during the day I was planning something about the continuation of our campaign, which early or late should bring the PCs to the abyss for an adventure (see Zappo's signature ) which will be as deadly as ever, and I was concerned about their chances of survival. The Recharge Magic came back into my mind, and now I am evaluating the idea of having the variant come into play gradually during the campaign, perhaps as the players approach the central location. This can be a trial of the variant, which can potentially change D&D magic into something very different; were the players find that they don't like it, at the end of the adventure it will be left behind as a feature of that abyssal plane for example, which they may never visit again.

 

[Psion]

Gamers, being people, all have their own preferences. My problems with it lean more towards distaste at it trending back towards the dungeon alone and bigger empasis on the minis as have a role bigger than facilitating the roleplay.

The joy of d20 is that there is a load of support for most unique tastes you care to name.

The Arcane/Divine divide:

Elements of magic

Magical Sterotyping:

Ditto.

Magic Item Dependency:

Grim tales.