Pathfinder 1E WotC desperately needs to learn from Paizo and Privateer Press

[SSquirrel]

Why do we have to know what causes a Ghoul's claw attack to paralyze people? It's magic. Or poison. Or necrotic flesh that enters the cuts and starts worming its way toward your heart. Or the DM may decide he has a great idea for what causes it. This just goes back to allowing us to flavor things to our own tastes.

I'm sure the text of the 4E MM isn't ONLY text from 1E and basic completely rehashed, but the idea of KISS clearly runs thru the 4E books. BTW, I just cruised thru the 4E MM1 up thru Manticore. People are saying everything doesn't have a picture. Uhm...could you cite some examples? I couldn't find anything. If it's a category (Demon for example) there is a picture of every type. If it's just slight variations of one creature type, not everything has a picture as it is just examples of higher level stuff usually.

 

[Windjammer]

I wonder how well a book that was nothing but fluff would do? Something that collected alot of really cool artwork and no game stats, but was all D&D? Some kind of encyclopedia of monsters?

I'd buy that in a heart beat. But it's obvious to me that all companies in the business of making books on monster backgrounds are set on the idea of getting every last penny out of their customers.

Let's see... You'd have to get 7 instalments of Paizo's Monsters Revisited series to get you somewhere near the revised 2e MM's page count (the book I was talking about).

In other words, you'd have to pay Paizo $126.

 

[Snoweel]

And that, gentlemen, is why some BECMI lovers drool all over 4E. It's the same game all over, except with 21st century layout. In short, peanut butter + sex.

Wow.

I do love BECMI (and 4e). I just said so in another thread.

Is there really a correlation between fans of BECMI and 4e fans? Is there a similar correlation between haters of the two?

 

[Drkfathr1]

I'd buy that in a heart beat. But it's obvious to me that all companies in the business of making books on monster backgrounds are set on the idea of getting every last penny out of their customers.

Let's see... You'd have to get 7 instalments of Paizo's Monsters Revisited series to get you somewhere near the revised 2e MM's page count (the book I was talking about).

In other words, you'd have to pay Paizo $126.

Which I would gladly do. That's more my cup of tea than what the 4E MM1 and 2 were.

But certainly not everyone's!

 

[Drkfathr1]

Why do we have to know what causes a Ghoul's claw attack to paralyze people? It's magic. Or poison. Or necrotic flesh that enters the cuts and starts worming its way toward your heart. Or the DM may decide he has a great idea for what causes it. This just goes back to allowing us to flavor things to our own tastes.

I'm sure the text of the 4E MM isn't ONLY text from 1E and basic completely rehashed, but the idea of KISS clearly runs thru the 4E books. BTW, I just cruised thru the 4E MM1 up thru Manticore. People are saying everything doesn't have a picture. Uhm...could you cite some examples? I couldn't find anything. If it's a category (Demon for example) there is a picture of every type. If it's just slight variations of one creature type, not everything has a picture as it is just examples of higher level stuff usually.

Well, you don't have to know.

But surely you can understand that some DO want to know?

 

[Shemeska]

Is there really a correlation between fans of BECMI and 4e fans? Is there a similar correlation between haters of the two?

I'm not a 4e fan, and to be honest, I've never read any BECMI stuff; actually I've never so much as even seen a single BECMI book in real life or in pdf or pirate scanned or anything. I started in 3e, and never even seen them for sale used anywhere.

 

[Snoweel]

I'm not a 4e fan, and to be honest, I've never read any BECMI stuff; actually I've never so much as even seen a single BECMI book in real life or in pdf or pirate scanned or anything. I started in 3e, and never even seen them for sale used anywhere.

I don't have mine any more. Though I do have a pdf of Keep on the Borderlands, amongst others.

 

[Dire Bare]

If you look back to what the developers at wizards were posting around the time, one of the columns dealt with the fact that "box text" tended to make players eyes glaze over. IIRC, the column recounted how a developer had walked around the areas at GenCon where people were playing D&D and observed the players reaction to the DM. The observation was that when the DM was reading off the page, the players were listless and inattentive. When the DM was narrating on the fly, the players were much more attentive.

The revelation there was that text meant to be read aloud is wasted on the majority of players. A good DM is telling the story, not reading it aloud. So essentially, I think that the 4e manuals intentionally stripped out things, like monster descriptions, that were meant to be read aloud as sort of a way of forcing the DM to improvise.

It's a change in philosophy that may not suit everyone. I suspect that while the old way of description-heavy modules may have bored everyone but the 1 in 5 players that enjoys being read to, the new way of sparse modules may provide a worse experience for players that don't have the sort of improvisational DM it takes to liven the the experience up.

I reread my post, and now I feel I was kinda contradicting myself. I do want a bit more fluff in the MMs (all the D&D books really), but I'm fine with the current format of fluff presented as knowledge checks rather than a "box". Back in the day I learned quickly that reading the boxed text put my player's to sleep, but I appreciated it still to give me the info I wanted as a DM. But I'm cool with the loss of "boxed text".

I do want a brief physical description of each monster, however. A lot like some of the later 3e monster books where you'd get a sentence or small paragraph in italics describing the monster (or magic item, or other crunchy bit). Not to read to the players, but to help me visualize and understand the critter better. That wouldn't be hard to add back in.

 

[Twowolves]

I thought that was mainly the loud rhetoric of a few (one I could name...)

Glad to see I'm not the only fossil around that remembers the days of rec.games.frp.dnd

 

[Barastrondo]

One of my biggest pet peeves is the Ghoul entry. The claw attack still causes Paralysis of a sort (Immobilization), but nothing in the Ghoul's entry actually describes what causes it. You need knowledge from prior editions to fill in the blanks, and that totally goes against the newbie friendly philosophy.

To be totally fair, the B/E description of the ghoul doesn't explain what causes it, either.

"Ghouls are undead creatures. They are hideous, beast-like humans who will attack anything living. Any attack from a ghoul will paralyze any creature of ogre-size or smaller that they hit successfully (except elves) unless the victim saves vs. Paralysis. Once an opponent is paralyzed, the ghoul will turn and attack another opponent, until either the ghoul or all the opponents are paralyzed or dead. This paralysis is the normal type (lasting 2-8 turns unless removed by a cure light wounds spell).

Not only is there no explanation for the ghoul's paralytic ability, there's no explanation for why elves are immune. We had no knowledge from prior editions to fill in the blanks. Similarly, none of the NPCs at the Keep on the Borderlands had actual names; they were just "the Castellan," "the innkeeper," etc.

Certainly the game was newbie-friendly, as it managed to sustain that craze among 10-12-year-olds and up. I think it just intended to get people started playing first, and maybe immersion would come later. Or maybe it wouldn't. It didn't make people into deeply skilled roleplayers overnight, but I don't think that was ever its goal.