D&D 3E/3.5 Thoughts of a 3E/4E powergamer on starting to play 5E

[thecasualoblivion]

As in your character will try to pick a fight in-game? Or that you personally will get violent in the games shop?

What is likely to happen? How do you go about disrupting the game?

Have you stated this to the group? Is this the only group running in the shop with the right timing? There aren't any other games like wargames available at the shop?

"Go play something else besides D&D"

I mean I know people who feel the same way when someone wastes their precious time resolving a combat round-by-round that might have been able to have been talked through. They seem to be able to put up with the delay in the game until people have finished rolling attack and damage rolls without taking a swing at the girl next to them.

If resolving combat is a bad thing, why is the person in your example playing D&D? If you want to minimize combat, D&D is just about the worst RPG you could possibly play.

 

[thecasualoblivion]

One thing that I can't help but wondering about when the 'style' complaint comes out is what people really want for their style. Is a system that allows their style enough, or does it have to actively 'support' that style, does support really mean reward, can it 'support' other styles, or does it have to be style-exclusive, etc?

For me, if a system merely allows my style - doesn't actively discourage/punish it, doesn't radically over-reward others, doesn't force a given style - I'm not seeing a lot to complain about.

Yes, 5e does that for me as a DM more than it does as a player, I'll grant that it's very DM-oriented, 'DM Empowering.'

I don't think a game has to dis-empower players to empower the DM, though. 5e may arguably do so, but it doesn't have to, and the DM doesn't have to let it.

I get the real sense, in this thread and on the whole that there are a significant group of people for whom D&D supporting their style means D&D excluding somebody else's style that doesn't meet their definition of D&D. During the playtest discussions for 5E, there were a lot of people who were saying that they wouldn't be switching to 5E unless things they disliked were removed from the new D&D.

Sure is, feel free. A solid base of clear, well-defined, consistent, playable, balanced rules is certainly a good thing to aim for and very nice to have. It's a valid game-design philosophy, and in any game other than an RPG, you probably wouldn't get a lot of push-back for expecting such qualities in a game. RPGs though, seem to really /need/ a DM, no matter how much effort goes into the system design. At some point, a designer has to ask, 'what - who - am I doing this for?' If you can assume a good-enough DM using the system, you have less need to build difficult-to-achieve qualities into that system, you can focus on other aspects of the design than the details and interactions and functionalities of the system - like the Story, 5e's stated emphasis. Easier or even possible, with a given skill set. Given a system you know won't be modded much - whether it's a 'solid' system or an easily 'broken' one - you can develop and apply system mastery to get a better character. That's a certain kind of skill. OTOH, given a system you know will be heavily DM-moderated, you can cultivate the relationship with the DM to achieve much the same result. A different skillset. Depending on your relative talents, one may well be much easier than the other. But which way you go is as much about the 'table-culture' you're playing in as the system. A DM could run 4e or 3.x with flagrant disregard for RaW and just rule as he likes, or run 5e or 1e (madness!) strictly 'by the book' (even if the book strictly tells him not to run strictly by the book). As a player, I understand the concern, but as a DM, I feel that is the kind of concern it's the DM's responsibility to address, especially in a game like 5e. A good DM will work with a player to provide them what they need to play the character they want. If that's guidance as to how some things that are vague in the rules are likely to work, so be it. It's no guarantee (even in the most tightly-defined RPG, the DM could whip the RAW right out from under you at any time), but it's better to have it out there.

This is where the part about player empowerment that involves the system giving players tools to affect the game world directly fits in. You're right about all that stuff about the DM, but the system can also give players their own power independent of the DM.

 

[ChrisCarlson]

If resolving combat is a bad thing, why is the person in your example playing D&D? If you want to minimize combat, D&D is just about the worst RPG you could possibly play.

Uh oh. That might sound to some an awful lot like you are imposing a playstyle on others. I'd caution you that such a direction could be seen as getting into hypocritical territory here. N'est–ce pas?

 

[ChrisCarlson]

This is where the part about player empowerment that involves the system giving players tools to affect the game world directly fits in. You're right about all that stuff about the DM, but the system can also give players their own power independent of the DM.

I could argue that 5e has given more empowerment to players than 3.x or 4e ever did.

 

[thecasualoblivion]

Uh oh. That might sound to some an awful lot like you are imposing a playstyle on others. I'd caution you that such a direction could be seen as getting into hypocritical territory here. N'est–ce pas?

If you want to make the argument that D&D isn't about fighting monsters, make that argument. Otherwise your just playing stupid Internet word games.

I could argue that 5e has given more empowerment to players than 3.x or 4e ever did.

Then make that argument. I'm curious to hear it.

 

[ChrisCarlson]

"Go play something else besides D&D"

Also, this avoided answering Cap'n Kobold's direct question (one I am also curious about):

When you said the boredom had you bordering on violence, did you mean you wanted to pick a fight in-character, or that you wanted to actually lash out physically at the table?

 

[thecasualoblivion]

Also, this avoided answering Cap'n Kobold's direct question (one I am also curious about):

When you said the boredom had you bordering on violence, did you mean you wanted to pick a fight in-character, or that you wanted to actually lash out physically at the table?

Colorful metaphors seem a bit over your head. If all you want to do is trade passive aggressive personal attacks and 4chan rhetoric, we should do that in private and not hassle the rest of this thread.

 

[ChrisCarlson]

If you want to make the argument that D&D isn't about fighting monsters, make that argument. Otherwise your just playing Internet word games.

Wait. Are you actually claiming there is no such thing as entire tables of D&D players who's playstyle involves things other than focusing on combat? Fascinating position to take. I challenge your theory. My evidence? I've seen it with my own eyes. Heck, I've been it.

Again, for someone hellbent on standing firm in their playstyle and railing against anyone who would dare tell you it may not be ideal for 5e, this new stance of yours screams double-standard to me. I mean, seriously.

Then make that argument. I'm curious to hear it.

Gladly.

In two (related) ways:
1) I don’t have to look on my character sheet to see if I have the “win-button”. With less fiddly-bits and fewer rigidly structured mechanical doodads, I have a world of options rather than a few dozen feats/powers/items to fall back on.
2) And because of bounded accuracy, that broader breadth of choices, in resolving any situation, becomes more viable. I am not forced to select from only those handful of things I chose to focus on during character creation/advancement.

[I will warn you in advance that attempts to discredit my opinion with claims that I have not played every edition of D&D since 1978 would be foolish of you. I have extensively played and enjoyed them all.]

 

[ChrisCarlson]

Colorful metaphors seem a bit over your head. If all you want to do is trade passive aggressive personal attacks and 4chan rhetoric, we should do that in private and not hassle the rest of this thread.

Is this your way of backpedaling on your original claim that the sheer boredom of watching your fellow players, playing in a way that frustrates you deeply, had you bordering on violent outbursts?

Are you sure you're old enough to have an 18 year old stepson? Is this one of those robbing-the-cradle situations?

 

[RandallS]

Well it's a trade off. I am bored to the point of violence when it comes to spending 15 minutes to search an empty room. Either I spend those 15 minutes on my phone and disrupt the game in a minor way coming back, or my boredom and unhappiness spills over. I can almost guarantee the latter will be more disruptive to the game. Think of it this way, I am being nice enough to allow everyone else to waste large portions of my precious table time doing things I have no interest in whatsoever.

I'm bored to the point of not returning to the game by D&D combats that take more than 15-20 minutes from start to finish (including setup and tear-down time if minis and battlemats/terrain are used). I solve this issue by not playing at tables where long combats are a regular thing. This also means I usually avoid playing at tables where 3.x or 4e is the rules set in use as these versions of D&D seem designed around long combats.