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There was actually a point to how Gygax wrote insofar as he addressed the reader directly, and his "calling out voice" tended to explain why the rule worked the way it did, and that this reason why usually was for gameplay-based reasons, and finally that he'd throw in when and how and why you might want to exercise DM fiat over the rule. As much as I do agree that his writing was overwrought, that thing he did where he's giving you a window into the design decisions behind the rules is something that I find sorely lacking in some books (13th Age and Strike! pull it off fairly well) It's just that there's no way you could also consider it to be a badge of intellectualism that elevates you above the unwashed masses/those damned millenials.
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Jul 25, 2015 06:01
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gradenko_2000 posted:There was actually a point to how Gygax wrote insofar as he addressed the reader directly, and his "calling out voice" tended to explain why the rule worked the way it did, and that this reason why usually was for gameplay-based reasons, and finally that he'd throw in when and how and why you might want to exercise DM fiat over the rule. As much as I do agree that his writing was overwrought, that thing he did where he's giving you a window into the design decisions behind the rules is something that I find sorely lacking in some books (13th Age and Strike! pull it off fairly well) What gets me is all the people who think that "vidya games cause anyone younger than me to have short attention spans, thus explaining why they like games I don't" is some kind of unique, daring and dangerous opinion.
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Jul 25, 2015 06:05
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Nessus posted:I don't think there's any shame in enjoying prose that is not aggressively minimalist, but it's a loving taste thing, not some kind of sign of ignorance. Thanks to the magic of generation wars, any preference not held by people under thirty is now a sign of their objectively terrible education, discipline and values.
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Jul 25, 2015 09:47
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Plague of Hats posted:I don't begrudge someone just having fun with it, as I believe Gygax did. Acting like (one of) the first wargames nerds pounding out baroque rules for pretending to be one guy instead of five was a symbol of our glorious golden past, on the other hand… I didn't include this in my last post but the other, fundamental problem with the OSR is the people in it who basically just want to turn back time to about 1977 and redevelop from there. Someone here linked a blog whose author said (paraphrased) "To me, the OSR is about exploring the different directions roleplaying could have gone if freed from the personal and commercial interests of the early designers." That's an interesting exercise that can yield some good things. But I'm talking about guys who want to pretend that game design after the late 70s never developed, so that they can add a few house rules to D&D1/AD&D and pretend it's a stunning and original creation, when it's just not. Halloween Jack fucked around with this message at 15:43 on Jul 25, 2015 |
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Jul 25, 2015 15:40
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Halloween Jack posted:Well, to be honest, neither do I. I don't even mind that he was doing it in rulebooks designed to teach young people how to play--reading Marvel sci-fi comics as a child definitely expanded my vocabulary. But his imitation of Vance is clumsy at best, and when other people imitate Gygax imitating Vance, it's downright ugly. Even more so when they hold up this pastiche-of-pastiche like it's an esteemed mode, and they're following a noble tradition, like poets employing conceits to pay tribute to Donne, or some similar thing. Honestly, one of the reasons I liked OSRIC back when it was a new thing was that it cleaned up the 1E rules from all the unreadable confusing bullshit, including the High Gygaxian prose. Sometimes you just want to know how to roll to hit a guy, without having to wade through foot-long paragraphs about how the vicissitudes of fortuitousness pertains to the squalestic vitrifaux whence sprang the aforementioned quintasm.
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Jul 26, 2015 17:34
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ShannonA's nefarious quest to find out about the OSR meets a new challenger.quote:Shannon is being completely disingenuous with his questions and seeming lack of knowledge. Stuart Marshall has refused to engage with Shannon (the two had a big blowup over at therpgsite) after Shannon asked Stuart to discuss OSRIC and the OSR. Interested persons can easily go there and see the exchange.
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Jul 26, 2015 18:47
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Comrade Koba posted:Honestly, one of the reasons I liked OSRIC back when it was a new thing was that it cleaned up the 1E rules from all the unreadable confusing bullshit, including the High Gygaxian prose.
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Jul 26, 2015 18:53
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I'm a little put off by the lack of support for 5E, given the way D&D has always had lots of supplements and modules and campaign guides. What do you say to that, grog?quote:So if they don't flood the market with crap they're treating the line like poo poo and should get out of it. What self-important nonsense. They don't owe you jack, pal. Why the hell do you think that they should sell off a successful product line? Because you want to throw a tantrum over their release schedule. Grow up.
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Jul 26, 2015 19:32
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For ages humans viewed elves as beings both beautiful and refined, as a race seemingly molded out of better clay than men. While perceiving them thus, humans also asked themselves - do elves pee? Few wonder anymore, but if any still need tangible proof, it can be found in the sewers of Loc Muinne. This colossal system of corridors and canals arouses envy in human builders.
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Jul 26, 2015 20:02
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spectralent posted:Thanks to the magic of generation wars, any preference not held by people under thirty is now a sign of their objectively terrible education, discipline and values.
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Jul 26, 2015 20:21
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Nessus posted:Oh, sort of like how any preference held by people over thirty is a sign of their bestial education, reactionary ways and rapidly-advancing senility? Nobody said it was a one-way street. That doesn't make either of those opinions right.
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Jul 26, 2015 20:58
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Nessus posted:Oh, sort of like how any preference held by people over thirty is a sign of their bestial education, reactionary ways and rapidly-advancing senility? This was true until two or three years ago. Now those datblamed kids are all on their computery games and don't listen no how and it's the ones over forty who are too old and reactionary. Can't think what changed there...
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Jul 26, 2015 21:37
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Ronwayne posted:For ages humans viewed elves as beings both beautiful and refined, as a race seemingly molded out of better clay than men. While perceiving them thus, humans also asked themselves - do elves pee? Few wonder anymore, but if any still need tangible proof, it can be found in the sewers of Loc Muinne. This colossal system of corridors and canals arouses envy in human builders. whizzard.jpg
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Jul 26, 2015 21:51
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If you have a forest level you need a sewer level as well.
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Jul 26, 2015 21:54
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FMguru posted:I'm a little put off by the lack of support for 5E, given the way D&D has always had lots of supplements and modules and campaign guides. What do you say to that, grog? I simply do not get the idea that just because I don't need a lot of supplemental material then it must be an unequivocal good thing that a product is poorly supported. I only started to see it from 5e enthusiasts in response to the criticism of its release schedule. "I always hated how much was released for 1e, 2e, 3e and 4e, it was terrible and 5e's lack of releases is exactly what I want!" Run that by me again, please?
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Jul 27, 2015 02:21
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The tidal of wave of D20 poo poo was pretty awful.
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Jul 27, 2015 02:27
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Having a new monster book every year is pretty cool though.
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Jul 27, 2015 02:51
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Lemniscate Blue posted:I simply do not get the idea that just because I don't need a lot of supplemental material then it must be an unequivocal good thing that a product is poorly supported. I only started to see it from 5e enthusiasts in response to the criticism of its release schedule. "I always hated how much was released for 1e, 2e, 3e and 4e, it was terrible and 5e's lack of releases is exactly what I want!" In their minds, a low volume of published materials must naturally correspond to a high level of quality control.
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Jul 27, 2015 03:15
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Byers2142 posted:In their minds, a low volume of published materials must naturally correspond to a high level of quality control. Except when it's a game they don't like and the inverse is true.
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Jul 27, 2015 03:18
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It's basically "there was a lot of bad splat and/or hard-to-track splat for previous editions, and I don't want to track that, so if WOTC never publishes another splatbook again then good because I was just going to ban it anyway" Like, people are already declaring that they only run stuff from the PHB, nothing Unearthed Arcana (somewhat understandable since it's supposedly playtest material) and also nothing from the Elemental Evil supplement (i.e. Aaracokra) Personally I love people that dig out all sorts of crazy character concepts and ability combos like a Merfolk Marksman Psionic, and then I just stick the esoteric rules text in a Google Drive doc somewhere.
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Jul 27, 2015 04:09
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Terrible Opinions posted:Having a new monster book every year is pretty cool though. If a business plan that enable Howler Wasps to exist is wrong then I don't want to be right.
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Jul 27, 2015 05:35
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Part of the issue is that they're gating their released content to go along with their adventure paths. Which means we're probably never going to see a PHB2, and we won't see anything that isn't aggressively Forgotten Realms for a good long while. The other half of the issue is that their development team is so small and poorly managed that one guy getting jury duty is a substantial impairment to their ability to actually publish errata to the game. You know, the errata that they're actively encouraging DM's not to use.
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Jul 27, 2015 06:22
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With regards to the errata, there's a somewhat off-putting trend I'm observing that just because WOTC says it's only a clarification of what was allegedly already written into the game and not any sort of balance change, that people are willing to swallow that hook line and sinker. What would be the harm in admitting that the game isn't absolutely perfect at first pass and there's stuff that needs fixing?
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Jul 27, 2015 07:32
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gradenko_2000 posted:With regards to the errata, there's a somewhat off-putting trend I'm observing that just because WOTC says it's only a clarification of what was allegedly already written into the game and not any sort of balance change, that people are willing to swallow that hook line and sinker. What would be the harm in admitting that the game isn't absolutely perfect at first pass and there's stuff that needs fixing? Uncharitable answer: because 4e was pretty steadily erratad.
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Jul 27, 2015 07:39
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Shouldn't refinement and fixing of persistent problems be the whole goal of a new edition in the first place? For some reason WotC instead sees it as an excuse to use an existing brand on an entirely new game. With a bit of conversion work one can use crunch from AD&D 1st edition in 2nd edition, and each of them to a lesser degree in OD&D and OSRIC stuff. 3rd, 4th, and 5th editions though are wholly divorced from one another.
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Jul 27, 2015 07:51
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quote:I landed here as the result of a Google search and wished to reply once I had read both the interactions at therpgsite (where I'm not a memebr) and this site. So, I instantly signed up; easy enough to do. quote:Nice ban-bait, but I'm not going to discuss your linked thread. I don't know if Kellri is a person or a publisher. I can't wait to see what this amazing product will be.
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Jul 27, 2015 08:00
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You know if these folks were so keen on getting their side of the story published, the intuitive move would have been to start writing as much material as they could about the OSR so that there'd be something to draw upon, rather than hand-wringing about how there isn't.
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Jul 27, 2015 08:07
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Lemniscate Blue posted:Uncharitable answer: because 4e was pretty steadily erratad. 4e somehow convinced people that balancing a game in Just Not D&D, so I fully believe this.
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Jul 27, 2015 10:07
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I feel the need to point out that the new book isn't even WotC. It's made pretty much entirely by Green Ronin. WotC just plain isn't making books anymore.
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Jul 27, 2015 11:06
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ProfessorCirno posted:I feel the need to point out that the new book isn't even WotC. It's made pretty much entirely by Green Ronin. That means it's going to be a good book! 
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Jul 27, 2015 11:07
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gradenko_2000 posted:You know if these folks were so keen on getting their side of the story published, the intuitive move would have been to start writing as much material as they could about the OSR so that there'd be something to draw upon, rather than hand-wringing about how there isn't. That would be dependent on the OSR being concerned with history after 1984.
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Jul 27, 2015 12:12
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Alien Rope Burn posted:That would be dependent on the OSR being concerned with history after 1984. We have alway been gaming with OSRIC?
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Jul 27, 2015 12:35
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Angrymog posted:I don't know if Kellri is a person or a publisher. I can't wait to see what this amazing product will be. Google did turn up this quote from him Kellri posted:The Otus/Elmore rule: When adding something new to the campaign, try and imagine how Erol Otus would depict it. If you can, that's far enough...it's a good idea. If you can picture a Larry Elmore version...it's far too mundane and boring, excise immediately. - Kellri, K&K Alehouse
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Jul 27, 2015 17:16
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quote:When adding something new to the campaign, try and imagine how Erol Otus would depict it As a gelatinous mass with buck teeth, there, done.
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Jul 27, 2015 18:12
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FMguru posted:That name Kellri, I could have sworn I'd seen it in grognards.txt before, but Google says nay. What, does that even mean? Presumably an artist can depict whatever you ask them to. If you can't imagine either one turn in your imagination because it's broken. "Here, let me put in this groggy snipe about my favorite/hated artists to answer a question about GM advice."
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Jul 27, 2015 18:23
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Mendrian posted:What, does that even mean? Presumably an artist can depict whatever you ask them to. If you can't imagine either one turn in your imagination because it's broken. "Here, let me put in this groggy snipe about my favorite/hated artists to answer a question about GM advice." Erol Otus illustrated Tomb of Horrors and such.. Larry Elmore illustrated Dragonlance. Tomb of horrors good, Dragonlance bad.
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Jul 27, 2015 18:29
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I always imagine stuff the way Froud or DiTerlizzi would draw it, so my games tend to have a lot of goofy fat-butt goblins and imps in them.
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Jul 27, 2015 18:29
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Capfalcon posted:Erol Otus illustrated Tomb of Horrors and such.. Right but... The words he's actually typing are, "if you can imagine X artist depicting Y scene, then it's bad." It doesn't actually make any sense if you think about it.
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Jul 27, 2015 18:35
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theironjef posted:I always imagine stuff the way Froud or DiTerlizzi would draw it, so my games tend to have a lot of goofy fat-butt goblins and imps in them. All I get is Brom so everyone looks kind of like an angry corpse.
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Jul 27, 2015 19:04
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theironjef posted:I always imagine stuff the way Froud or DiTerlizzi would draw it, so my games tend to have a lot of goofy fat-butt goblins and imps in them. Off-topic but if you're a fan of DiTerlizzi his book 'Realms' is now out, which collects loads of his RPG and MtG art. I'm very pleased with my copy.
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Jul 27, 2015 19:29
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