Why is it so important?

[Merlion]

If this were Wyatt's design goal then that would be fine but it's not AFAICT. The current resource model is not inextricably linked to Vancian magic. The "9:00-9:15" problem could just as easily occur within a spell point system.
.

See what I said about how in the end, people are going to play how they want to play. If a given group insists on being at 100% for every encounter, then they are going to rest/reset whatever after every encounter, regardless.

Furthermore, other than in super-hero type stories the workings of magic are left relatively vague

Hmm....I guess you've never read Zelazny's Changling/Madwand books, or Maggie Furie's Aurian series, or the Edding's Belgariad/Malloreaon or Elenium/Tamuli stories, or any of various others in which the workings of magic are made at least reasonbly clear.

RPGs have to stand a level of logical scrutiny that novels don't because the players can actually play around with the elements of the world - and find loop holes, problem areas,

You really think characters in a novel cant do that?

Some of the problems that you seem to have with Vancian magic could be solved within a system that's still basically Vancian, or other systems that still don't use a "per-encounter" resource model. You appear to be asking for far more than what you need to solve the problems described.

I've already said that that what we know so far of what they are doing with 4e DOES solve most of my conceptual problems, just as virtually any system that isn't "fire and forget" memorization and nothing else would. I've also stated that, from what little we know, it will solve my issue of wizards quickly being rendered non-magical, especially at low levels.

 

[gizmo33]

No...it isnt. The issue under discussion here is the inclusion of some degree of per day, per encounter and at will abilities to the classes in general...and to Wizards in particular.

Any significant degree of "per-day" abilities in the game does not significantly change the fundemental "problem" that Wyatt identified in the quote.

What difference does it make? The point is, even experienced individuals are still quite capable of making decisions based on factors other than whats most tactical sound, for reasons personal or circumstantial.

Then let your players continue on in the dungeon when they're down to 2 hitpoints! Why change a fundemental tactical aspect of the game if your players are accustomed to ignoring those anyway? People may act irrationally, but the world probably continues to be rational. What you want to do is reward the behavior - change the rational fundementals of the world - essentially make being irrational a rational act (or an act of no consequence).

So, either everyone stops, or everyone continues and the wizard is basically relagated to the sidelines.

So fix this! I am totally for this, but the rationale behind the "per-encounter" design goes far beyond just balancing out the wizard character class. The justification suggests that *no* character, under any circumstances should ever suffer any consequences for prolonged exertion - no resource loss, no fatigue, no nothing. 20 Armageddon-level battles per day, as long as you rest a minute between each one.

None of this, to me, has much affect on other aspects of the game besides combat itself, and the choice of how frequently to rest.

The development of the game world and the logical consequences of the dealing with the "operational" aspects of the game (as Celebrim calls them) go beyond combat and potentially extend to every other aspect of the game (if you're handling these things in the ways that have been suggested). If a continual light spell were a "per-encounter" ability with no permanent resource cost, the whole town would be lit up all of the time - that's not a "combat only" or "resting only" situation.

My point however was that you seem to feel that these changes are going to essentially eliminate all aspects of versimilitude, realism, and possibly anything other than continious combat from the game,

No. I'll try to be clear: it's not this particular change only. It's the justification for the change. The expressed set of priorities that 4E seems like it has. *Those* things are what will change all aspects of the game - if taken to their logical and sensible conclusion ("sensible" from the perspective of the pro-"per-encounter resource" opinion). They'll get around to every aspect of the game and make sure it has all the same properties as combat. Why not? Why would the definition of what's fun and what isn't change between subsystems?

I am assuming that even if they wish to put forth a certain design philosophy, the execution of the mechanics will allow for the accomadation of more than one play style.

That's a very bold assumption IMO. First of all, why have a design philosophy and then choose not to apply to one or more aspects of the game? Perhaps for "backwards compatibility" reasons, but I see 1E DnD as having less and less bearing on future designs. Secondly, I really don't think you can have more than one play style in terms of resource expenditure because it goes too much to the core of game balance. If you don't believe me, just let wizards cast whatever spells they want when they want right now in 3E. You won't do that because the balance aspect of your game will go haywire, because the current spells were designed at a power level appropriate for a resource management style of game.

 

[Merlion]

The justification suggests that *no* character, under any circumstances should ever suffer any consequences for prolonged exertion - no resource loss, no fatigue, no nothing. 20 Armageddon-level battles per day, as long as you rest a minute between each one

And yet you wonder why people keep telling you that you exaggerate, overstate, and use absurdly extreme examples, and come to incredibly extreme conclusions?

That's a very bold assumption IMO

And your assumption that the designers intend to take the exact same philosophy that they are using in the "per encounter" issue and apply it totally to each and every aspect of the game is at least as bold, and has a lot less foundation.

I think the designers fully realize that people want a sense of "realism" or whatever you want to call it, in their games. I think they will be conciously aproaching each aspect of the game with that in mind. Because they have always done so. The results have not always lived up to everyones desires in that regard, but I personally feel that they have and will always take this into account.

And they have always stated, especially from 3.0 onward, that they wish to accomadate multiple play styles, so I see no reason to believe that will change all of a sudden.

 

[gizmo33]

Hmm....I guess you've never read Zelazny's Changling/Madwand books, or Maggie Furie's Aurian series, or the Edding's Belgariad/Malloreaon or Elenium/Tamuli stories, or any of various others in which the workings of magic are made at least reasonbly clear.

I read Zelazny's Amber series, and that certainly has a lot of magic without a lot of a sense of mechanics. Then again I didn't get my PhD in it. I read the first couple of the Belgariad books but I don't really remember them, or recall anything notable about the magic system.

You really think characters in a novel cant do that?

Yes, I do - character's in books aren't real. I must be missing something.

 

[med stud]

This all depends on how you look at the game of chess and an encounter. In an actual game you are steadily dealing with depleting resources over extended time(IMHO this is way different from the avg fight that lasts 3-5 rnds, though I might be mistaken). It all depends on how you view the game, but unless you gain a piece by moving a pawn to the last square, or are playing against someone way below your skill level, you will never have the resources you had in the opening move. IMHO each move is an "encounter" as it sets up a different dynamic that isn't the same as before that move. The game can still be won by a clever, or more skilled opponent even with less resources, and I enjoy this aspect of chess as well. You look at the entire game as one encounter, I look at the entire game as the same as an entire game session of D&D. My analogy of chess and per-encounter abilities is more similar to every time you take a piece...you get most of yours back, YMMV.

The difference is how long a game isn't really important for the tactical side of things; the importance is the decisions you make while it lasts. So a combat is 3-5 rounds, then you have to make those rounds count, just like in chess or a poker tour (to use the extreme example of number of rounds).

Your are right about ending a chess game with fewer resources that you started out with, that's the nature of chess. This goes for D&D as well if you view each game of chess like one combat in D&D. After a combat of appropriate level you will have less resources than you started out with, even if you win. Your last part (as I understand it) seems to be that you think that you will be reckless with your resources if you get them back each encounter. Well as I see it you can use them more but you have to consider what resource is best when instead of if you should use it at all in the combat.

I'm not saying tactics won't exsist...but I can easily see players falling into a sort of routine with their per-encounter & at-will abilities, while saving the per-day for the big or last encounter that night. All the time? No, but I could see it happening alot, even with varied scenery etc. I find it hard to believe that after a few sessions PC's won't find optimized combo's either within their own abilities or working in tangent and while they may not be practical in every situation, winning a combat in D&D boils down to two main factors; deal more propotional damage to opponents and take less proportional damage from opponents.

The designer's could totally surprise me and make every ability either so original it can be used in only a few singular situations(thus promoting outside the box thinking) or so applicable all can be used in any situation(they're really all equal so it's now a style thing, which doesn't really promote tactics). But my first instinct is there will be abilities that are just better than others...only time will tell.

I would like to see a game without optimization. They exist in D&D, Starcraft, DOTA, soccer, you name it. What a game should do to be interesting is to make the game so that the answer to "what is best?" is "it depends." This hasn't anything to do if you get abilities per encounter or if you get them to use over a day. If they make the game so that it always makes sense to use one or two abilities, or even worse, if they make the game so that a certain order of using abilities is always optimal then they have failed utterly. So, with varied "scenery" (if that's what you call different enemies) comes different optimal combos, enough so that it hopefully won't get boring.

Note: This is if you are playing the game as a war game, usually, at least IME, battles get interesting because of context etc as well.

PS: Dealing more damage than you take is a good summary of how to win conflicts in the real world as well . What all strategists and leaders have been going after in history is how to do this as good as possible with the tools available.

IMHO the per-day depletion forces you to consider more variables when taking an action and I like that, it's long-term strategy and thought. I mean in the end it really is a style thing.

I agree with the last sentence .

 

[Merlion]

I read Zelazny's Amber series, and that certainly has a lot of magic without a lot of a sense of mechanics. Then again I didn't get my PhD in it. I read the first couple of the Belgariad books but I don't really remember them, or recall anything notable about the magic system.

In Changling/Madwand a good deal of time is spent on the nature of magic. Mostly how mages percieve and use it, but also a good bit is implied about its limitations and "rules."

In the Belgariad, theres a couple different forms of magic, although they are all spoken of as being aspects of the same thing. The main one is "sorcerery" or "The Will and the Word." Basically you think what you want, speak a word and it happens. However, it has a number of rules and limitations which are spelled out. It creates "noise" that other magic users can "hear." It is mentally and physically tiring, and overextending oneself that way will lead to death. And there are certain things that can't be done, or dont work well...you can't "uncreate" anything, and teleportation is usually not viable.

I could go into the Elenium/Tamuli as well, but I think you get the idea. There are certainly examples of literature were the workings of magic are not "vague."

Yes, I do - character's in books aren't real. I must be missing something

Being a writer/storyteller myself....yea, you are. Characters in books are quite real, and I often find them, and the story itself, telling me what to do.

But philosophical points aside, a character in a story with magic that does have known rules/limitations etc can most certainly find loopholes, weakness and the like as you spoke of.

 

[Raven Crowking]

So, why is it not adversarial if the DM decides an encounter that must be met in a specific time frame and thus resource depletion is important and leading to the final encounters being more difficult, but it is adversarial if the DM just creates a difficult encounter?

I don't have time right now to write the essay required to adequately answer this question. Perhaps I will be able to do so later. I added the "YMMV, and probably does" bit because I knew I was unlikely to expand on this, and I knew that what seems largely self-evident to me would not seem largely self-evident to others.

(Although, I note, that a resource depletion scenario doesn't necessarily require a specific time frame, whereas the changes to 3.X that made a time frame "mandatory" in the hands of some DMs to run such a scenario has certainly led to claims of adversarial play.)

RC

 

[Celebrim]

But what if the player of the wizard actually wants to contribute most of the time, rather than every once in a while?

First, a good wizard contributes something all the time. Even in 1st edition, a low level wizard was standing back there behind the front line hurling darts or daggers waiting for the right oppurtunity to drop his 'bomb' spells like sleep or web. At higher levels, he'd have plenty of useful low level spells to throw around while he was hording his big guns, plus likely a wand or stave to use in a pinch, and he could still always throw things or occassionally swing a staff (since his main combat limitation of bad AC would likely be overcome at some point).

Secondly, as I said, when a Wizard does choose to contribute, he really contributes. In 1st edition, a fireball was practically a nuclear bomb. No one denies how powerful a Wizard is in 3rd. So in exchange for in theory not shining quite so often (not as durable), the Wizard in theory is balanced by shining more brightly (more powerful). If D&D was a wargame, the Wizards would be artillery. BOOM!

Don't want to be the artillery? Don't play a wizard.

Of course, this model doesn't work at all if you only do one encounter per day.

That said, if Mearl's past work is any guide, the direction D&D is moving in is 'everyone is a spell caster' (in practice if not necessarily by flavor).

 

[med stud]

So you are saying that chess makes a good analogy for RPGs? Do you think RPGs are competitive games like chess? Do you think chess is as popular as RPGs (for example, do you think that as many people play chess for as long of a period as play WoW)? The tenth time you played chess, did your queen acquire the power to jump peices, and your king get an armor upgrade?

Is chess a good analogy for RPGs as a whole?
-No. I used chess as an example of a tactical game.

Do I think that RPGs are competitive games?
-Defenitly not.

Do I think that chess is as popular as RPGs?
-What has that to do with my chess analogy?

The tenth time etc, did my queen get an upgrade?
-Again, why do you ask that? I used chess as an example of a tactical game where your resources renew everytime you play it.
[/quote]

I have never claimed that per-encounter powers will be a detriment to tactics. If you are talking tactics, then you've missed my point.

My answer to your post hadn't anything to do with tactics so I can't see how I missed any of your points.

 

[gizmo33]

And yet you wonder why people keep telling you that you exaggerate, overstate, and use absurdly extreme examples, and come to incredibly extreme conclusions?

I don't wonder about that! I exaggerate because it helps to clarify what I'm talking about. As I said to Hong, often times without "exaggeration" people can stonewall over irrelevant issues. For example, I'll say "what if there's a 1000 lb weight that you can't lift, then..." and folks respond "well I *can* lift 1,000 lb weight, so everything you're saying is wrong" when the actual weight wasn't the issue, the relevant characteristic was that you couldn't lift it! So the exaggeration IMO establishes the conditions in the IF part of my reasoning. If you find there is some fundemental different between 2 Armageddon and 20 Armageddon battles that changes the nature of the argument, then identify those things (or not).

In any case this is getting too personal if you're having trouble discussing this because of perceived personality issues. I don't care that to that extent, I'll let the situation take care of it's self like it did in the 2E days. (Or at least try to give this a rest for a few days and let some other folks have the floor).