Nikmal Posted July 17, 2005 Share Posted July 17, 2005 The game of D&D is based on the medevil times very loosely.. not historically nor should it be.. it is a FANTASY setting and always will be.. Now with Matt wanting to play the game the way he is, is a good thing. I love how he explained it to me. It is a D&D setting based on the roman empire. (notice I set D&D!!) It still is fantasy in the silly greek movie genre type setting and cool IMHO.. so please do not criticize someones play style so to speak.. butgive the DM suggestions on how to deal with said play styles folks!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arvok Posted July 17, 2005 Share Posted July 17, 2005 I have no problem with expanding the D&D world to include ancient or prehistoric campaigns (has anybody else checked out the TestamentTM supplement?), I just hate it when people are unwilling/unable to get into the mindset of an alien culture--and that what any pre-modern society is. Your D&D world doesn't have to try and be as close to Medieval Europe as possible, but it should not look like the modern world with magic and monsters inserted--that's what d20 modern is for. Part of the fun of Role-Playing is to assume a different personality with different outlooks on life. P.S. Did anybody else hate the Spelljammer campaign setting? P.P.S. Oh, and shouldn't this string be in General Fantasy? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dragon Snack Posted July 17, 2005 Share Posted July 17, 2005 It could go there, but it is "Off Topic" since it's not about miniatures... It seems the whole idea behind 3rd edition was to dumb it down so as to attract more players. You say dumb it down, I say got rid of wonky, counterintuitive mechanics... 3 things for me sum up the problem with 3rd edition: 1. The illustration for chapter 1 of the PHB: the guy has breast implants! Muscles have points of attachment. 2. The illustration for armor in the PHB: most of them don't resemble anything historically accurate or practical. 3. A (near) quote from Unearthed Arcana: Adding fraction can be tricky... 1. Umm, it's a drawing, how is this a problem with the game? 2. You know, some Reaper minis have armor that isn't historically accurate or practical (and in some cases wouldn't even work). I'm just sayin'... 3. Unearthed Arcana, IIRC since it's been a while since I looked at it (didn't buy it), is a book of optional rules (specifically optional, rather than everything is optional), at least stick to the core supplements. And if it's not an exact quote, it's (near) useless for discussion, not to mention taken out of context. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nikmal Posted July 17, 2005 Share Posted July 17, 2005 I always thought that 2nd edition and 1rst Edition were so easy it was just a blast to play.. of them both I liked to play 1rst the best.. then 2nd... With Third Edition and 3.5 though.. it seems that yes it is sort of a lead by the teeth rules.. made and geared towards power gamers. I call it the video game mind set. for the most part it is true.. what dragon magazine have you picked up that does not talk about tweaking your character to make it more powerful.. instead of truely talking about making it better for role playing? I feel that the heart of the game, that being Role Playing, is gone. It is all about the rolls and the numbers now. Unless you are lucky enough to get a group of players with that hate the numbers game and are into role playing all you will have is a bunch of power gamers and rules lawyers. To me that is the ruination of it all. Yes a good DM can be a curtail to powergamers and such.. but should they have to? There are times when I just want to give the game up and I have played it for 31 years now. I will promote 2nd edition over third any day of the week and would highly recommend playing those rules over 3rd any where, any time! NOw for the historical aspect... Matt.. I love that you are doing a semi historical campaign.. let me know how it goes.. I might do one myself for the group of ten year olds I am trying to teach :) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arvok Posted July 17, 2005 Share Posted July 17, 2005 In response: 1. The illustrations in the PHB are apparently designed to be anatomically accurate. Whoever approved the artwork has no idea what the human body looks like, so I'm dubious of his knowledge concerning more esoteric subjects. 2. If the occasional mini has armor that's unrealistic that's fine, you don't have to buy that mini. But when the core rulebook has armor that's completely unworkable, that means the vast majority of characters have armor that's impractical. I understand that the rules of physics can be suspended with magic from time to time in a fantasy game, but they shouldn't be completely abrogated. 3. While Unearthed Arcana is an optional rulebook, it is still designed for 3e players. My point is that the game is now designed for people of mental capacities insufficient to add fractions. If you can't wrap your brain around common denominators how are you supposed to realistically (again, I know the use of this word is paradoxical when discussing fantasy) role-play and alien race (say like a Dwarf), in an alien world (where magic and monsters are real, and the gods routinely intervene--either directly or indirectly--in the affairs of mortals), in which all the inhabitants have alien outlooks. If you would like to check the quote you should see that I captured the meaning of it pretty closely. Just because I may not have quoted it exactly does not mean I misrepresented the author's sentiments. In summary, 3rd edition stinks! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dragon Snack Posted July 17, 2005 Share Posted July 17, 2005 Hey, I don't think either one of us is going to change the others minds, but I still think you are painting 3.x (or, it seems, more correctly WotC) with too broad a hate brush. You see, I remember playing First Edition (and even OD&D for a while). I also remember the power gamers (and worse, the power gamer/Monty Haul DM). It wasn't just individuals though, I had a book from back then that detailed characters from the designers games (I wish I still had it, but it was lost when all my First Edition books were stolen). You think monstrous characters are something new? I'll bet half of the characters presented in the book were either "monsters" (there was at least one Centaur) or "broken" (characters with at least 16s in all their stats or possessing multiple Artifacts). In fact, not only did this book present them as from the designers game (thus showing "how the game was meant to be played"), it gave you the "rules" to do your own breaking. It's not new, it's just in front of your face now vs. an idealized notion of how the game was "back in the day". That's why retro is so popular... My group played plenty of game systems for years before 3.0 came out. We had players breaking whatever system we happened to be playing (in fact, sometimes it was so bad we would quit the system after only a couple of sessions). I think Fault/Favor systems are WAY MORE broken than the Prestige Class system or the Feat system, all you have to do in them is take a Fault that really isn't a Fault (or as RB pointed out, one that has unintended consequences) and you get the cheese from day one (as opposed to working towards more power). To each his own, but I'll still defend the game I play. I find it funny that I rarely post on the WotC message boards because I don't like a lot of what they've done (rules changes, poor editing, etc), but I always seem to defend them on other message boards... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Qwyksilver Posted July 17, 2005 Share Posted July 17, 2005 When my elven wizard can cast a spell summoning a celestial badger and shoot fireballs from his fingers, I don't begrudge the warriors in the party some weapons and armor that might bend the laws of physics and biomechanics in this fantasy world. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arvok Posted July 18, 2005 Share Posted July 18, 2005 When my elven wizard can cast a spell summoning a celestial badger and shoot fireballs from his fingers, I don't begrudge the warriors in the party some weapons and armor that might bend the laws of physics and biomechanics in this fantasy world. Your Elven wizard spent decades studying obscure formulae that allow him to harness energies from another plane of existance that allow him to do those things. Although such stuff doesn't follow the laws of physics of the real world it certainly can be argued that said stuff does follow the laws of physics of a fantasy world. A normal person with no training in the supernatural shouldn't be able to don a suit of armor that is anatomically incorrect or weighted down with spikes on his weapon arm and fight effectively. Once you start bending the basic laws of physics for everybody players can start arguing (rightly so) that it is arbitrary that they take damage from a fall, or that they even fall in the first place. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arvok Posted July 18, 2005 Share Posted July 18, 2005 Yes a good DM can be a curtail to powergamers and such.. but should they have to? There are times when I just want to give the game up and I have played it for 31 years now. I will promote 2nd edition over third any day of the week and would highly recommend playing those rules over 3rd any where, any time! The d20 mechanics are pretty handy. They're flexible enough that if you take the time you can create a great system. I know, I know. You're probably going to say that you want a system you can use "as is," but does anybody out there not use house rules? I know in my group each DM has a different set of rules. Sometimes the same DM has different rules in different campaigns. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ched-dar Posted July 18, 2005 Share Posted July 18, 2005 The min/maxing is frustrating, but I do not know of any way to stop that. What I have problems with is that 3rd edition tried to make everyone "equal". Does it make any sense at all that the average adventuring party of 1 Cleric, 1 Fighter, 1 Rogue, 1 Wizard earns most of their experience through combat, yet the wizard and cleric advance as fast as the fighter? Clerics are all basically the same. What is really the mechanical difference between a cleric of Heironeous and a cleric of Kord? Rogues' sneak attack is horribly unbalanced. I could see a sneak attack being made on a totally unsuspecting character, but in the middle of combat? Alignment also seems to be increasingly irrelevant. What are the consequences for acting outside of one's alignment? And the class/alignment restrictions are odd to me. Barbarians may live in the wilds, but they must depend upon their tribes and fitting in to survive. Bards also cannot be lawful? I could see Mozart or Bach as lawful. Why were halflings changed so much in 3e? Nomadic and neutral? Their primary god is Lawfull Good! AAACCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCCHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ched-dar Posted July 18, 2005 Share Posted July 18, 2005 Has anyone ever used a Bard as the main foe in a campaign? I am toying with that concept and would welcome any suggestions. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lars Porsenna Posted July 18, 2005 Share Posted July 18, 2005 Clerics are all basically the same. What is really the mechanical difference between a cleric of Heironeous and a cleric of Kord? Well Hieroneous gets the domains Good, Law, and War, while Kord gets Chaos, Good, Luck and strength. The penultimate (IMHO) cleric of Hieroneous would therefore have the domains of Good and War (good spells at +1 level, and free martial weapon feat PLUS weapon focus in it), while Kord (IMHO) would have Chaos and Strenght (chaos spells at +1 caster level and can get a strength bonus EQUAL to your Cleric level, usable once a day). Both of these do very well in differentiating the clerics of a god of Noble and Righteous battle, and clerics of personal strenght and resiliance. As others have mentioned, actual RPing goes a long way too. We have a cleric of Kord in our group, a hard drinking but ultimately good character that hits the bad guys really, really hard. I play a Paladin of Hieroneous whose greatest goal is to push back the Humanoid hordes and reclaim the land. The RPing really differentiates these characters, but the cleric domains help too... IMHO, the "specialty priests" of 2e really sucked, and I have NO desire to go back to that format, especially since on campaign more often than not the specialty priest features were a hinderance rather than added to the character. Damon. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
spiritual_exorcist Posted July 18, 2005 Share Posted July 18, 2005 Some people just don't like change... Two thumbs up to that, if you like the old systems play them. The new rules (3+) are 100% better in my opinion, they are so versatile that they allow nearly any type of character to be played. Perhaps the characters that got the biggest boost in the game are those that take a diplomatic or investagative perspective, just my opinion. I love making characters that revolve around an interesting concept. I'll always give bonus' to diplomacy rolls for good roleplaying, but its nice that the new system has rules in place to that allow even those who are mediocre characters to explore diplomatic character type options. I know I've seen a far wider variety of unique player characters since the adoption of the new rules system. From my perspective the game has progressed for the better. A game is always what you and your players make of it. New combat options are always fun, but combat isn't even close to the whole of the games I've played in. Just my perspective. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arvok Posted July 18, 2005 Share Posted July 18, 2005 If a character can bluff his way past intelligent opponents, make them fight a frickin' ooze! Yeah, have the players fight and endless series of mindless opponents...why not just play Diablo? The problem I've seen with the newer players who grew up on a steady diet of Diablo, Halo, and M:TG is that their idea of a campaign is a quest to kill some big, bad villian with smaller, less important encounters along the way. There is no plot or character development either by the players or the DM. I blame the mentality of the new rules and the attitudes the new authors brought in. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Arvok Posted July 18, 2005 Share Posted July 18, 2005 Has anyone ever used a Bard as the main foe in a campaign? I am toying with that concept and would welcome any suggestions. That has inspired me Ched-dar. I'm going to make up an adventure with a Bard as the main villian just for the challenge of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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