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dwarf74 posted:Lol at Pathfinder 2e turning this thread back to 2008 again. At least nobody is edition warring over widespread use of WiFi this time.
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Mar 10, 2018 22:40
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Ultimately I think given infinite time most games will progress towards positive change, even with the regression we see. I don't buy the idea that everyone who rejected 4E in part because of the way it rejected LFQW did so because they were brainwashed idiots; I know plenty of people who did so but who also had a broad enough experience of other systems that you can't say that LFQW was the only idiom they knew. In general, I'm suspicious about any argument which relies on assuming that people are mistaken about their own tastes; if it turns out that some people find LFQW to be fun or a positive aspect of a game, actively disbelieving them is a good way to lose their patronage - and dogmatically assuming that LFQW is a bad thing which needs to go extinct needlessly tosses a game design tool into the bin which could be used for games which actually engage with it and make a virtue out of it (For instance, what about troupe style play? LFQW is absolutely not a problem if everyone has a F and a W of their own to use as the plot demands.)
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Mar 10, 2018 22:48
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Oh my god, we really are going to cover the entire 4e edition wars. You can LIKE things even though those things are objectively bad. People do it all the time. What people are unable to do is explain why LFQW is good within the context of D&D. Within the boundaries of a discussion of systemic quality, personal preference is unimportant.
counterspin fucked around with this message at 23:00 on Mar 10, 2018 |
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Mar 10, 2018 22:54
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also LFQW is just "I have fun when other people have less fun". Yeah, sure, people who like playing wizards probably love it but I imagine the pool of people who really want to have to sit on their hands for four hours and get told all their fun ideas are impossible while Dave conjours his eleventh platinum half-demon orca to trivially save everyone is probably much smaller.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:00
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spectralent posted:also LFQW is just "I have fun when other people have less fun". Yeah, sure, people who like playing wizards probably love it but I imagine the pool of people who really want to have to sit on their hands for four hours and get told all their fun ideas are impossible while Dave conjours his eleventh platinum half-demon orca to trivially save everyone is probably much smaller. It's not a coincidence that something like ninety percent of living city characters were primary casters.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:12
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counterspin posted:Oh my god, we really are going to cover the entire 4e edition wars. You can LIKE things even though those things are objectively bad. spectralent posted:also LFQW is just "I have fun when other people have less fun". Yeah, sure, people who like playing wizards probably love it but I imagine the pool of people who really want to have to sit on their hands for four hours and get told all their fun ideas are impossible while Dave conjours his eleventh platinum half-demon orca to trivially save everyone is probably much smaller. Perhaps if your experience of LFQW games are like that but mine differ then it really and genuinely is a matter of personal preference - in which case the question to settle is whether it's the preference of a majority of a game's audience and potential audience (and thus should be retained in a new edition) or the preference of a minority, which can be discarded for the benefit of the majority of a game's adherents.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:18
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ProfessorCirno posted:As far as perspectives on balance go, three things come up I've talked about in other threads in the past. This is a pretty enlightening and interesting comment; I hadn't really thought about the Wizard/Rogue and Cleric/Fighter comparison before.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:21
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Warthur posted:In the context of an entertainment product then if people like some aspect of a game, and have fun with it, and say they would find the game less fun if it were taken away, and in fact walk away from versions of the game that don't include it, it seems rich to call it "objectively bad". Subjectively bad? Sure. Bad for a large section of the audience? Sure. Objectively bad? No. Okay so you're not so tight on the words 'objective' and 'subjective' so let me clear this up - people can subjectively like a game, that's within their rights, but because they do like the game does not mean that the game cannot be also objectively a bad game because it presents itself deceptively to the people playing the game.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:24
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Warthur posted:Playing a pretty high-level 5E game right now (we're at about level 15) and this is not how my rogue is experiencing things at all - and this is with a wizard player who goes all in for the system mastery stuff. I mean there are people who enjoy getting poo poo on but I'm not going to suggest that a game is well designed if your reward for completing it is getting to watch 2girls1cup on loop. LFQW is bad game design given the stated goals of the game, and is unfun for most people who find out about it because, as a badly designed game, wizards don't have a clear role and are possible to play wrong and in such a way that the wizard player has the lovely time instead. It's worth noting that the levels wizards got spells of insane bullshit in earlier editions were when holding rules started coming into play for fighters; the answer to "fighter waters his crops, wizard casts Control Weather" was that the fighter started gaining the resources of a feudal state. The fighter lost that, and mages got more bullshit, earlier.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:26
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Darwinism posted:Okay so you're not so tight on the words 'objective' and 'subjective' so let me clear this up - people can subjectively like a game, that's within their rights, but because they do like the game does not mean that the game cannot be also objectively a bad game because it presents itself deceptively to the people playing the game. How can there be an objectively good or bad game?
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Mar 10, 2018 23:27
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Sampatrick posted:How can there be an objectively good or bad game? "This game is about personal ties and bonds, and cut-throat political manipulation that will bleed into a fantastical tragedy. Everyone has 5d10hp and moves 30 feet per round, and our rules for socialising consist of a four-tier opinion chart. You can tell we wanted it to be about personal entanglements, because we put a five-line box for backstory on the back of the character sheet, below your gear list and load limits." or hell "This game is about fast paced, action-adventure, with swashbuckling heroes. Come from the seventy five trillion guns and one-second-round that takes multiple turns to aim a weapon, and stay for our brutal and punishing critical hit table that might make any shot fatal." spectralent fucked around with this message at 23:32 on Mar 10, 2018 |
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Mar 10, 2018 23:29
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Sampatrick posted:How can there be an objectively good or bad game? Do we really have to go all the way down the bullshit lane of 'In this shadow reality, can we really claim anything exists?' Games are judged by a mix of their stated goals and reasonable expectations.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:31
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Darwinism posted:Okay so you're not so tight on the words 'objective' and 'subjective' so let me clear this up - people can subjectively like a game, that's within their rights, but because they do like the game does not mean that the game cannot be also objectively a bad game because it presents itself deceptively to the people playing the game.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:32
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Warthur posted:I'm not following "presents itself deceptively" here. I thought this whole tangent started because the PF2 design people were admitting that LFQW was a thing. Fighters appear in the book, acting like they're a proper class, when they're at best training wheels for the concept of dungeon crawler RPGs.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:33
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Yes, but they're not going to do anything about it because a big chunk of their audience is in it for exactly the issues they are discussing.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:33
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Warthur posted:I'm not following "presents itself deceptively" here. I thought this whole tangent started because the PF2 design people were admitting that LFQW was a thing. Will the rulebook explicitly tell you that some options are flat-out worse than others, and tell you which options those are and why they're worse?
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Mar 10, 2018 23:33
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spectralent posted:"This game is about personal ties and bonds, and cut-throat political manipulation that will bleed into a fantastical tragedy. Everyone has 5d10hp and moves 30 feet per round, and our rules for socialising consist of a four-tier opinion chart." Determining that a game is bad based on whether or not it is effective at it's designated design goal is a subjective method of determining if it's bad. Next you're going to tell me that your taste in music or film or w/e is the objectively correct one. Pointing out a disparity between damage per round for a fighter and a sorcerer would be objective. Saying that it's bad is subjective. Rule of thumb is that any time you need to do any analysis whatsoever, the conclusion you've come to is subjective. EDIT: I'm not saying poo poo about whether or not we can say anything is real, but you're literally using the word objective in a way that is not technically correct in the english language.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:35
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Warthur posted:Whilst I think iterative improvements and new innovations are all to the good, I don't think you can necessarily say that that inevitably means that Vancian spellcasting and LFQW will go extinct. Removing them only qualifies as "positive change" if they are flat-out negatives, and there's no circumstances under which it's ever sensible to use them as a design decision. I didn't exactly say they would. (I'm not a big fan, mind, but I didn't say that.) But games at the very least need to have mechanics that fulfill the intent of the designers. If a monk is supposed to be an acrobatic, hard-hitting class in a fight, maybe it'll finally be that in Pathfinder 2e, because it sure as hell wasn't that in 3e, 3.5, or Pathfinder. There's a problem with Pathfinder (and many games akin to it) is where sufficient system mastery causes players to start discarding well over 50% of the options printed on the page. Feats like Toughness, Dodge, or Rapid Reload quickly become prerequisite fodder and little else. And this isn't just an issue of the D&D legacy they saddled themselves with - recent classes like the Envoy or the Shifter can show how this is still an issue. Even within the rigid goalposts set for the d20 microcosm, there's always room to improve the player experience and mechanics. As for Vancian spellcasting and LFQW, they get blasted because the main intent they most often seem to fulfill is "make a game like D&D". And that's not to say they can't serve a design purpose - anything can if done within proper intent - but whether or not they properly serve the needs of conventional fantasy games has been in question for a long time now. I like to think we can do better than 1974's state of the art, ultimately.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:36
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Warthur posted:I'm not following "presents itself deceptively" here. I thought this whole tangent started because the PF2 design people were admitting that LFQW was a thing. No one seems to be denying LFQW exists or stating is a good thing. It seems to be a debate over whether the games that have that fault are terrible games by terrible people for terrible fans or whether it is a flaw in a still fun game.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:36
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Sampatrick posted:Determining that a game is bad based on whether or not it is effective at it's designated design goal is a subjective method of determining if it's bad. Next you're going to tell me that your taste in music or film or w/e is the objectively correct one. Pointing out a disparity between damage per round for a fighter and a sorcerer would be objective. Saying that it's bad is subjective. Rule of thumb is that any time you need to do any analysis whatsoever, the conclusion you've come to is subjective. By this logic, games can never get better, when in fact we live in an age where there's a ton of innovation and improvement in the world of games. Reality doesn't care that you don't believe in game design.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:37
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Sampatrick posted:Determining that a game is bad based on whether or not it is effective at it's designated design goal is a subjective method of determining if it's bad. Next you're going to tell me that your taste in music or film or w/e is the objectively correct one. Pointing out a disparity between damage per round for a fighter and a sorcerer would be objective. Saying that it's bad is subjective. Rule of thumb is that any time you need to do any analysis whatsoever, the conclusion you've come to is subjective. A game: I'm going to kick you in the genitals so hard that you throw up, pass out, and have to have surgery to walk again. You're not allowed to respond. Can we know if this is good or bad?
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Mar 10, 2018 23:37
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counterspin posted:Yes, but they're not going to do anything about it because a big chunk of their audience is in it for exactly the issues they are discussing. Yeah, but that's why they're lovely designers and pathfinder is bad. Sampatrick posted:Determining that a game is bad based on whether or not it is effective at it's designated design goal is a subjective method of determining if it's bad. Next you're going to tell me that your taste in music or film or w/e is the objectively correct one. Pointing out a disparity between damage per round for a fighter and a sorcerer would be objective. Saying that it's bad is subjective. Rule of thumb is that any time you need to do any analysis whatsoever, the conclusion you've come to is subjective. We can define opinions as being perspectives people hold. We share the qualia of holding a perspective. Since I can't be sure that my qualia is different from yours, despite the apparent differences, I'm forced to conclude you're agreeing with me, that Pathfinder is objectively bad, and that any distinction herein is part of the illusion of sense data.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:38
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AlphaDog posted:A game: I'm going to kick you in the genitals so hard that you throw up, pass out, and have to have surgery to walk again. You're not allowed to respond. Don't kink shame.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:38
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Liquid Communism posted:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pAzI1UvlQqw Though the major issue is people thinking someone in plate is nearly immobile and can't even get back on their feet if you knock them over, a lot of people swing way too far the other way when they find out it isn't like that. They act like plate isn't any worse than wearing a heavy jacket. Which is also bullshit - moving in armor is difficult and exhausting. That video really hammers home the right expectation level, and subtly makes the point as to why the trade off makes sense.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:38
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Comrade Gorbash posted:Though the major issue is people thinking someone in plate is nearly immobile and can't even get back on their feet if you knock them over, a lot of people swing way too far the other way when they find out it isn't like that. They act like plate isn't any worse than wearing a heavy jacket. Which is also bullshit - moving in armor is difficult and exhausting. That video really hammers home the right expectation level, and subtly makes the point as to why the trade off makes sense. That video is interesting, because whilst the soldier and firefighter's uniforms are probably easier to move in, I suspect they have worse weight distribution due to their back mounted gear?
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Mar 10, 2018 23:42
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Angrymog posted:That video is interesting, because whilst the soldier and firefighter's uniforms are probably easier to move in, I suspect they have worse weight distribution due to their back mounted gear? Yeah, that was my impression watching it. The knight was benefitting a lot from not having to deal with crap wobbling around on him. Also I did notice he was wearing trainers and not mail boots, but presumably that's just because perfectly smooth beams which are fine with combat boots aren't a fair comparison to running on actual earth like a knight would.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:45
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Pathfinder will only ever make the most basic steps towards becoming a better game without any major breakthroughs so long as it continues to be lashed to "simulationist" design. That is the core of so many of Pathfinder's problems - the refusal to look at game mechanics as a means to express the fluff. So long as Paizo attempts to use mechanics to illustrate the fluff, rather then express it, you're going to continue to get poo poo like the monk.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:46
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counterspin posted:By this logic, games can never get better, when in fact we live in an age where there's a ton of innovation and improvement in the world of games. Reality doesn't care that you don't believe in game design. That's a complete misrepresentation of what I'm saying. I want you to open your dictionary to the word objective and read what it says. Games can be subjectively better but by definition the word better implies an interpretation of something and that is a disagreement with the definition of the word objective and it is therefore not possible to have an objectively better game. If your criticism of a game is reduced down to you saying that your opinion is actually the objectively correct opinion and people who enjoy the game are just saying a game is subjectively good, then you have no idea how to actually criticize something. Games can get subjectively better. No game can ever get objectively better because that's not what the word means.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:47
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There is actually zero difference between good and bad things.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:49
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AlphaDog posted:There is actually zero difference between good and bad things. you imbecile. you loving moron
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Mar 10, 2018 23:51
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Sampatrick posted:That's a complete misrepresentation of what I'm saying. I want you to open your dictionary to the word objective and read what it says. Games can be subjectively better but by definition the word better implies an interpretation of something and that is a disagreement with the definition of the word objective and it is therefore not possible to have an objectively better game. If your criticism of a game is reduced down to you saying that your opinion is actually the objectively correct opinion and people who enjoy the game are just saying a game is subjectively good, then you have no idea how to actually criticize something. Games can get subjectively better. No game can ever get objectively better because that's not what the word means. Okay, I will. One of the definitions is 'based on facts.' The idea that games cannot get better in any factually way is wrong on it's face. 4th ed D&D was a better and more interesting tactics game than 3rd edition D&D. It was a better technically presented game than D&D. 3rd ed. These are facts. Some people didn't like it, and that's also a fact.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:55
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AlphaDog posted:There is actually zero difference between good and bad things. That's not at all what I'm saying. Any value judgement is by definition a subjective evaluation because it is based on your own personal interpretation of what makes something good or bad. An objective statement is something like a book being 364 pages long or 2+2=4. Casters being able to cast spells that solve problems whereas other classes have to pass skill checks in order to solve problems is an objective statement. Saying that this is good or bad is a value judgment. Saying that your opinion is the objectively correct one is a dumb way to answer somebody else saying that actually they don't have a problem with that. EDIT: counterspin posted:Okay, I will. One of the definitions is 'based on facts.' The idea that games cannot get better in any factually way is wrong on it's face. 4th ed D&D was a better and more interesting tactics game than 3rd edition D&D. It was a better technically presented game than D&D. 3rd ed. These are facts. Some people didn't like it, and that's also a fact. Value statements are inherently subjective. If you say better, you are not making an objective statement. Here is the meriam-webster definition of the word objective. The meaning of the word that we're using in this situation would be the third definition; please carefully read the definition and consider whether or not you are doing any interpretation whatsoever. shades of blue fucked around with this message at 23:58 on Mar 10, 2018 |
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Mar 10, 2018 23:56
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You're not engaging with the argument and it's crazy boring.
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Mar 10, 2018 23:58
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Sampatrick posted:That's a complete misrepresentation of what I'm saying. I want you to open your dictionary to the word objective and read what it says. Games can be subjectively better but by definition the word better implies an interpretation of something and that is a disagreement with the definition of the word objective and it is therefore not possible to have an objectively better game. If your criticism of a game is reduced down to you saying that your opinion is actually the objectively correct opinion and people who enjoy the game are just saying a game is subjectively good, then you have no idea how to actually criticize something. Games can get subjectively better. No game can ever get objectively better because that's not what the word means. Sampatrick posted:That's not at all what I'm saying. Any value judgement is by definition a subjective evaluation because it is based on your own personal interpretation of what makes something good or bad. An objective statement is something like a book being 364 pages long or 2+2=4. Casters being able to cast spells that solve problems whereas other classes have to pass skill checks in order to solve problems is an objective statement. Saying that this is good or bad is a value judgment. Saying that your opinion is the objectively correct one is a dumb way to answer somebody else saying that actually they don't have a problem with that. A game with many nonsensical broken rules that doesn't work if you play it as-written is objectively a worse game than one without nonsensical rules that does work if you play it as-written. A game with many nonsensical broken rules gets objectively better when those rules are re-written so that they make sense and work. Sampatrick posted:Value statements are inherently subjective. If you say better, you are not making an objective statement. Here is the meriam-webster definition of the word objective. The meaning of the word that we're using in this situation would be the third definition; please carefully read the definition and consider whether or not you are doing any interpretation whatsoever. No they're not. Here is the dictionary definition of the word better: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/better?utm_campaign=sd&utm_medium=serp&utm_source=jsonld The meaning of the word that we're using in this situation would be the fourth and fifth definition; please carefully read the definition and consider whether or not interpretation matters at all. Elector_Nerdlingen fucked around with this message at 00:02 on Mar 11, 2018 |
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Mar 10, 2018 23:58
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counterspin posted:Okay, I will. One of the definitions is 'based on facts.' The idea that games cannot get better in any factually way is wrong on it's face. 4th ed D&D was a better and more interesting tactics game than 3rd edition D&D. It was a better technically presented game than D&D. 3rd ed. These are facts. Some people didn't like it, and that's also a fact. Also 4e at least moderately achieved the objectives it set itself, whereas 3rd and pathfinder super don't. If something fails the objectives it's set itself, what else is it other than objectively bad? That's the crux of the issue; yeah, objectives can be decided by subjective factors, but once you know what you're doing you're either doing that or you're not. Pathfinder isn't. You can appeal that and say "Pathfinder is actually trying to be More D&D" but that's incredibly subjective and all you have to argue that with is your own dumb brainfarts about what does and doesn't constitute brand purity in the Memories Of Butter of roleplaying games, and you're also admitting that Pathfinder is a dishonest game that's primary achievements are in marketing and spin in the process.
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Mar 11, 2018 00:01
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Presenting two options that are vastly different in power as though they were equal options is objectively bad design. Full stop.
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Mar 11, 2018 00:06
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spectralent posted:Also 4e at least moderately achieved the objectives it set itself, whereas 3rd and pathfinder super don't. If something fails the objectives it's set itself, what else is it other than objectively bad? That's the crux of the issue; yeah, objectives can be decided by subjective factors, but once you know what you're doing you're either doing that or you're not. Pathfinder isn't. You can appeal that and say "Pathfinder is actually trying to be More D&D" but that's incredibly subjective and all you have to argue that with is your own dumb brainfarts about what does and doesn't constitute brand purity in the Memories Of Butter of roleplaying games, and you're also admitting that Pathfinder is a dishonest game that's primary achievements are in marketing and spin in the process. To bring this derail marginally back on topic, my issue is that your response to somebody saying, "Actually, I enjoy vancian spellcasting and think Pathfinder is a fun game." should not be to say that their opinions or feelings are subjective whereas your analysis that the game is inherently imbalanced is an objective critique. Putting more value into game balance than into verisimilitude or whatever you want to call it or vice versa leads to two different opinions on the game. I personally think that Pathfinder is a lovely game and love 4e. I'm just aware that my opinion is subjective because I put more importance in game balance than in simulation. I also think 4e is better than Dungeon World because I prefer tactical combat over narrative focused mechanics; I'm aware that this is, again, another subjective analytic. Like, c'mon, your criticism can be better than just saying that actually these other people are having fun wrong. shades of blue fucked around with this message at 00:14 on Mar 11, 2018 |
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Mar 11, 2018 00:11
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You made that poo poo up. No one has said that anyone is having fun wrong. They're just using standard critical language to discuss it. But yeah, this conversation is pointless because you're trying to convince the rest of us to adhere to your weird fetishes about how criticism should be phrased.
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Mar 11, 2018 00:14
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Sampatrick posted:To bring this derail marginally back on topic, my issue is that your response to somebody saying, "Actually, I enjoy vancian spellcasting and think Pathfinder is a fun game." should not be to say that their opinions or feelings are subjective whereas your analysis that the game is inherently imbalanced is an objective critique. Putting more value into game balance than into verisimilitude or whatever you want to call it or vice versa leads to two different opinions on the game. I personally think that Pathfinder is a lovely game and love 4e. I'm just aware that my opinion is subjective because I put more importance in game balance than in simulation. I also think 4e is better than Dungeon World because I prefer tactical combat over narrative focused mechanics; I'm aware that this is, again, another subjective analytic. Like, c'mon, your criticism can be better than just saying that actually these other people are having fun wrong. If your argument is "it's not nice to tell people they're having fun wrong", then I agree. But you've also made a bunch of wrong statements about how it's impossible for things to be objectively better or worse than other things, and that's what people are arguing with you about.
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Mar 11, 2018 00:17
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Wrong fun is posting on a dead comedy forum about whether or not failing to achieve an objective counts as having objectively failed imho
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Mar 11, 2018 00:20
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