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[Very Long] Combat as Sport vs. Combat as War: a Key Difference in D&D Play Styles...
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<blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 5812461" data-attributes="member: 82106"><p>I think in any practical sense too much is made of it really. Again consider the "Horn of Blasting" example. I seriously doubt that the guy who wrote up this item for 4e thought along the lines of "Hmmmm, I need to make up an item that has a daily close blast 5 power that pushes enemies" (or whatever exactly HoB does, not going to look it up but it isn't really too relevant). Concept always precedes implementation. Oddly enough for most items the actual 1e and 4e mechanics are virtually identical. So we can observe that the developers of 4e considered it adequate to provide a briefer and physically separate fluff it is kind of dubious to state that the two are really 'divided' in the sense that there is an intent to make the fluff irrelevant to the adjudication of the effect in a specific situation. Clearly it is a LOT easier to reflavor something in 4e as there are probably many ways to explain in-game the more abstract mechanics. I've never really understood the position that the in-game explanation of things has nothing to say about how it is resolved in a SPECIFIC situation.</p><p></p><p>I guess my question is, once you realize there is no line drawn there is the 4e approach REALLY less flexible for the players in a specific game? Obviously specific items might be more or less useful in different situations depending on the specifics of the item, but I don't see that anything prevents equally clever use of items as a general concept in say 4e vs 1e. The same observations apply to spells, etc.</p><p></p><p>One way you can approach this stuff in 4e is to couple it with page 42 and the skill system. For instance using spells in unusual ways can be perfectly well handled using Arcana checks, page 42, and perhaps skill challenges. Of course this puts a bunch of onus on the DM to decide exactly what the limits are and provide narrative explanations of those limits where needed. This CAN however allow for a pretty wide variety of possible styles of play under what are technically one set of rules. Whether that's good or bad is of course open for debate.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="AbdulAlhazred, post: 5812461, member: 82106"] I think in any practical sense too much is made of it really. Again consider the "Horn of Blasting" example. I seriously doubt that the guy who wrote up this item for 4e thought along the lines of "Hmmmm, I need to make up an item that has a daily close blast 5 power that pushes enemies" (or whatever exactly HoB does, not going to look it up but it isn't really too relevant). Concept always precedes implementation. Oddly enough for most items the actual 1e and 4e mechanics are virtually identical. So we can observe that the developers of 4e considered it adequate to provide a briefer and physically separate fluff it is kind of dubious to state that the two are really 'divided' in the sense that there is an intent to make the fluff irrelevant to the adjudication of the effect in a specific situation. Clearly it is a LOT easier to reflavor something in 4e as there are probably many ways to explain in-game the more abstract mechanics. I've never really understood the position that the in-game explanation of things has nothing to say about how it is resolved in a SPECIFIC situation. I guess my question is, once you realize there is no line drawn there is the 4e approach REALLY less flexible for the players in a specific game? Obviously specific items might be more or less useful in different situations depending on the specifics of the item, but I don't see that anything prevents equally clever use of items as a general concept in say 4e vs 1e. The same observations apply to spells, etc. One way you can approach this stuff in 4e is to couple it with page 42 and the skill system. For instance using spells in unusual ways can be perfectly well handled using Arcana checks, page 42, and perhaps skill challenges. Of course this puts a bunch of onus on the DM to decide exactly what the limits are and provide narrative explanations of those limits where needed. This CAN however allow for a pretty wide variety of possible styles of play under what are technically one set of rules. Whether that's good or bad is of course open for debate. [/QUOTE]
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