grognards.txt

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opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Yes, my random number generator only produces half of its range. Problem? What problem?

# ¿ Apr 17, 2009 20:28

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# ¿ May 4, 2024 21:04

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

H.P. Grenade posted:

i'm not digging through that to find the point.

"Wizards are so powerful in 3.5 that the DM is forced to suppress them to prevent them from instantly winning, why do people have anything against 3.5 wizards."

"Marking is a great improvement to the battle system, unfortunately it bears a slight resemblance to a mechanic used in MMOs and thus is only for preteen boys."

"Limitations on a wizard's ability to control reality shouldn't be written into the rules, players should be allowed to make them up as they go along. Only preteen boys think balance is a good thing."

"Preteen boys. Oral sex."

# ¿ May 21, 2009 21:09

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Seftir posted:

Also IM A GIRL

I actually missed that in the word salad about being a figurative "geeking / gelding / worse than a gelding / a female / in the middle / spit or swallow"

"We already knew the obvious without it being forced on us like some Computer aided Character Builder, MMO, video game via Nintendo 360 or WotC if you subscribe to the service. But why force it?"

Please tell me there's a name for this mental illness.

# ¿ May 21, 2009 21:47

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Poopy Palpy posted:

Schizophasia?

Oo, new to me. Something like that, only for arguments instead of words. Throw a little Logorrhoea in there, too.

# ¿ May 22, 2009 00:06

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Zarick posted:

maybe as far as ability fluff goes stuff is not spelled out, but i'm not sure what system requires less preparation than 4e as a DM and if you can find it i would honestly like to know

Yeah. The first time I played 4e, it was done with about an hour of prep time, me reading up on the finer points of balancing combat and picking some interesting encounters out of Dungeon Delve, while one guy (who already had his character ready) helped the other two (who knew nothing about D&D) use the character creator to make characters. It went incredibly well. I was able to put together encounters on the fly and invent skill challenges for anything the players suggested.

I'm only even vaguely familiar with a few systems, but there's no way I could've put together engaging encounters without even needing to glance at the players' character sheets.

# ¿ Jun 3, 2009 23:26

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Kemper Boyd posted:

See now there is the problem started by LW and the Blumes, and continued with WotC to bastardize what it is for a quick buck.

I don't play franchise. I cannot go and play McDonald's can I? No because it is not a game. Likewise D&D is not longer a game nor has any meaning. It is Jello and Bandaids now. Only one company is allowed to use the name and logo for a product, but that name is used as a generic term by others and the name has no meaning.

Every time I ask for a bandaid I don't need a product made by Johnson & Johnson. Every time I eat jello it doesn't have the logo on it.

Wherein Jello doesn't have such a following to where eating it means something other than eating generic gelatin, and only the company has anything to really get upset about, likewise bandaid is the same way. When you have a product that is user configurable and the name carries weight to really identify what the product is, like D&D, when you turn it into something other than it is then the users like the product no longer have a purpose to using that name.

When they tried to turn D&D into a brand, a label just to stick on things, they diluted any weight that name carried. Like Jello is a product line, as well Bandaid, now so is D&D.

I didn't play D&D for many years because it was D&D. I played D&D for many years because everything else out there to me sucked. It didn't offer what I wanted form a game. Other games had some interesting things, but as a whole they were not something worthy of my playing. Now with 4th edition D&D has become something not worthy of me playing because it is so far from anything I would play.

No longer can you casually discuss D&D, especially after 3rd; and have decent talks about it, because the way the name/brand has been diluted to just mean (and many people use it this way) a generic term for fantasy RPGs.

Any other company that makes a product that its buying public doesn't acknowledge as worthy of carrying the name quickly hides that product and terminates its production in hopes that the buying public will forget it and forgive them. This buying public is often the supporters of that company and fans of its products, rather than random people that did not buy its products before if it carries a name well know to be a specific thing.

How many ET video games do you see today, and what happened to those made for the Atari?

"4th edition D&D" is the "Atari 2600 ET" of the RPG world.

What the hell IS this? At first I thought it was your standard, "WotC cares about making money, ergo 4e sucks", but actually it looks like his argument is, "A word can't refer to two different things -- thus, now that 'D&D' refers to a franchise, it can no longer refer to a game." Is he really claiming you can't discuss D&D anymore? What?

# ¿ Jun 9, 2009 00:24

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Yeah, even the halflings. They used to be those lovable, larcenous crossbreeds of hobbits and kender, but in the new edition, they�re a race of riverboat-gypsies, and a full foot taller than previously, because apparently a little guy can�t be a hero. Sorry, Frodo.

# ¿ Jun 11, 2009 22:43

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Fuego Fish posted:

Holy. Christ. This literally reads like an MMO guide.

"DUDE YOU'RE A TANK SO TAKE THE HITS"

"DEFEND YOUR TEAMMATES BECAUSE THAT'S YOUR ROLE"

"TIEFLINGS MAKE BAD FIGHTERS BECAUSE THEY'RE SMART. ROLL DWARF OR DRAENEI FOR THE BEST STATS"

"YOU'RE A loving GUARDIAN, DO YOU HEAR ME? PLAY YOUR ROLE OR GET THE gently caress OUT"

"CARRY A JAVELIN BECAUSE YOU CAN'T USE A BOW LOL"

"MARK YOUR ENEMIES AND THEN HIT 'TAUNT'"

What the hell. Working as a team? Taking advantage of your stats and abilities? Next you'll tell me that 4e has "hit points" and that you get gold and "loot" from beating monsters.

WHAT??

# ¿ Jun 15, 2009 16:40

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Seftir posted:

I have a couple questions about what WOTC means by "core".

I have the PHB, DMG, and MM. I'll call these Core1.

Does the Ebberon Player's guide rely on material outside Core1? Does it use races from PHB2, monsters from MM2 etc...?

To get 100% out of Ebberon do I need five "core" books?

To get 100% out of next years setting will I need eight or nine "core" books?

Eleven or Twelve the year after?

Piestrio

He'd almost have the beginning of a point if the Character Builder didn't exist.

I'd love to see the amount of crossover between the "I hate min/maxing, so I hate 4e" crowd and the "oh man there's a new feat in the new book? Ugh, now I guess I have to buy that one too" crowd.

# ¿ Jun 24, 2009 22:21

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

RagnarokAngel posted:

Does no one share books? I mean in my group its not mandatory but highly advised everyone own the PHB1. After that usually theres at least one copy of any book among our group and we just pass it around during the pre game warm up.

Oh, sure, but for less than the price of one book, you and four friends can have access to all the currently-printed character options. It doesn't even scale with the number of books released.

Actually, never mind, the real stupidity comes from him insisting that you need to get "100%" out of a source book, or assuming Wizards isn't going to reprint the relevant stat blocks / descriptions where needed to make a setting make sense.

# ¿ Jun 24, 2009 23:38

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Cyrai posted:

They have a point in that the novels are based off the official changes. That being said, their point is worthless because they care about D&D novels

That is completely not true. He also threw away thousands of years of back story, such as
and

What the heck are you doing?? Don't you know that WotC has banned all knowledge of pre-4e sourcebooks? You'll get us all killed!

# ¿ Jul 3, 2009 08:53

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

"I tried to roleplay a wyrmling disguised as a beautiful human female, and after that all my players stopped wanting to roleplay."

opaopa13 fucked around with this message at 22:24 on Jul 14, 2009

# ¿ Jul 14, 2009 22:20

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Evil Mastermind posted:

No, they didn't roleplay because 4th Edition actually prevents you from role-playing. Haven't you been paying attention?

Uh, yeah, that's what I said. My players were visibly uncomfortable with how clumsy and awkward 4e's roleplaying is.

Ugh, my players are trying to use their skills and abilities to resolve a non-combat encounter. Because there are no formal rules for how they work, I am forced to rule that they succeed.

# ¿ Jul 14, 2009 23:44

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

plarp posted:

This is just unbelievable. Clerics can heal fighters now, who would have thought?

To be fair, simply choosing a Cleric is powergaming in 3.5.

(maybe he meant "power inflation"? that'd be just idiotic, instead of absurd)

# ¿ Jul 15, 2009 03:07

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Eggplant Ronin posted:

Maybe I'm missing it, but why is that people keep saying it's impossible to roleplay in 4e?

It seems like it all comes back to the fact that 4e's approach to roleplaying is to provide only some basic rules. The fact that there are rules at all makes (bad) DMs feel like they have to obey them, but there aren't the really detailed rules necessary to mechanically define how to roleplay a character. DMs feel unempowered because it's not 100% DM fiat, while players feel unempowered because there's very little they can do during character creation to influence their non-combat rolling.

Of course, it's a silly complaint -- the DM can still interpret the dice rolls however he needs to, and players can still do implicitly whatever they would have done explicitly if there mechanics to guide their roleplaying.

# ¿ Jul 15, 2009 05:38

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Fenarisk posted:

BEHOLD

GROGNARD IN STEREO

PART 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qp6EbvJ0ssM

PART 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuAaL7W6SSw&feature=related

This guy has mastered the art of suggesting he's about to say something damning and then rambling on about nothing.

"This is supposed to be Dungeon and Dragons?! Let's take a look at the races. There are humans! And elves, two kinds! Two kinds?! That's in keeping with D&D's Tolkien roots. And dwarves! So that's about what you'd expect. But they've added tieflings, and oh man -- they're okay. I guess the good version of them is coming later. Oh, but then you get to dragonoids, and get this -- they've appeared in other games too. I've never really liked the concept."

Devastating!

# ¿ Jul 15, 2009 20:06

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Countblanc posted:

I really don't care if someone doesn't like the mechanics of 4e, but I really don't get the "this isn't D&D!" complaint.

But now we have Warlocks... and Wizards. (sounds like its own game, doesn't it?) Warlocks and Wizards, Warlocks deriving their power from another source than Wizards do, which brings me to one of the key features that makes fourth edition different: the different classes draw their "powers", if you will, their "shticks", their... um, "class abilities" from different sources. For example, there's Arcane, which powers the Warlocks and the Wizards...

# ¿ Jul 15, 2009 20:26

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Dinictus posted:

I honestly, honestly do not want to see what he has to say about 4E.

_{_{Yes I do.}}

Enjoy!

John Wick posted:

I bought Octane and Inspectres (both available over at Memento-Mori.com) for twenty bucks each. Forty dollars. What I got out of those games was absolutely invaluable.

Jared's keen insight into roleplaying games changed the way I wrote games. He didn't change the way I played or ran games, but he made me realize I could write games the way I ran them.

See, if truth be told, first edition L5R looked absolutely nothing like the way I ran it. My style of Game Mastering has always been very loose. I encouraged player feedback. I seldom, if ever, used dice. In fact, I only ever used dice if I didn't know what should happen next. I gave players NPCs to run on their own, encouraged them to contribute to the world with suggestions and used narrative techniques that would make most roleplayers wig out. In fact, most did wig out until they figured out what was going on, and then, they jumped on board the train and never looked back.

Reading Jared's work taught me that I could write a game with the same philosophies I was using to run them. I could not have done this at AEG. In fact, the staff at AEG was moving closer to a more traditional RPG approach while I was moving in a far less conventional one. I was tired of making compromises in the games, tired of putting in rules that would discourage cheating or wankery, tired of forcing cliches into the world to satisfy D&D tropes.

(Yes, like guys in armor walking around a swashbuckling RPG.)

I met Jared at exactly the right time. I'd just finished Orkworld--my transition game from "big games" to "little games." We had a long talk at a convention about game design and I found him to be insightful, funny and drat scary. Scary because what he was saying made perfect sense, but I didn't understand what he was saying at all. Yes, that's a contradiction. If you've never met Jared, you don't get it. If you have, you understand exactly what I mean.

I listened to him talk, but it wasn't until I actually read what he designed that everything clicked. I really could make games the way I ran them. I really could. And then came the daunting task of trying it.

All of this is leading to a very important topic I've been waiting to discuss for some time. Something I've been holding off until I had exactly the right words. And, strangely enough, a gmail chat with Jared finally gave me the words to say exactly what I mean.

You see, I've had the D&D 4E box set on my shelf for a long time. I read through it. I liked a lot of advice I found in the DM's Guide, but reading it was like walking through a maze of mirrors: it's all things I've seen before. A lot of it read like Robin's Laws of Good Game Mastering and the dozens of indie games I have on my shelf. Stuff about narrative control, stuff about player empowerment, stuff about spotlight... I mean, yeah. I've seen this before. In fact, I wrote a lot of it for the L5R and 7th Sea GM sections. And I wrote those books a decade ago. I'm glad they put it in the DMG: this may be the first time D&D players ever see it... but I don't think it will affect the way people play D&D at all. I mean, you can give all the narrative advice in the world, but if your game is still about kicking down the door, killing the ork and taking his stuff, that's exactly what players are going to do.

Which brings me to the Player's Handbook.

Reading this book and reading the DMG is a lot like reading two different roleplaying games. One of them rewards killin' poo poo and the other encourages roleplaying. Now, granted, those two goals are not mutually exclusive, but pay close attention to my wording here. One of them rewards killin' poo poo and the other encourages roleplaying. The mechanics do not reward slowing down the game to have talking time.

But that isn't what I really want to say about 4E is something a bit different. 4E feels a lot like a summer movie blockbuster to me. A whole lot of flash and not a lot of substance. More than that, though, D&D 4E doesn't move game design forward at all. There isn't anything innovative or new or daring. In fact, the game itself is... what's the right word?

Oh, yeah. Bland.

When 3E first came out, I said it felt like the design team had been playing Diablo. I'm not the first to say this, but I'll confirm the reports: this version feels like the design team has been playing World of Warcraft. That isn't insight on my part: I'm just confirming it. And that's a symptom of my chief problem with it. The game doesn't feel at all inspired. It feels... adequate.

Adequate. Sufficient. Satisfactory. What's more, it doesn't feel like any fun. Quite simply, there are no risks in the game design. Everything is perfectly safe.

You would think with a ton of money, time and manpower, the most powerful roleplaying game company in the world could design something that was at least a bit more spicy than oatmeal. Now, there's nothing wrong with oatmeal, but nobody eats just oatmeal. You eat what an ex-girlfriend of mine called "oatmeal with..." Oatmeal with honey, oatmeal with sugar, oatmeal with fruit. But this feels like the oatmeal except someone forgot to add the "with."

The real question--the real test--I think, is asking this: "Will this change how gamers play D&D?" The answer, I feel, is "No." They will continue to play the same game, except with different dice tricks. They may as well be playing GURPS or Hero. It's just another generic system designed to produce generic results from a generic fantasy world using the most safe choices possible so they will offend the least number of players.

And that's the part that really disappoints me. I like comparing the Watchmen novel to the Watchmen movie in terms of manpower and money. One of them cost a far less amount of cash, a far less amount of time and a far less amount of resources. The authors had near complete control over the content and the result was a book that's regarded as a classic of human creative endeavor. The other spent a fortune that's the equivalent of the GNP of some countries and produced something... adequate.

D&D 4E feels like that. Given the same amount of time, money and manpower, I think of what Greg Stafford would have made. Or Robin Laws. Or that punk Jared Sorensen. And, frankly, I get kind of weepy. A game that probably cost more than a million dollars to make and it's just oatmeal. It doesn't suck. It isn't a bad game. It's a good game, in fact. It does exactly what it says it does.

But that's all it does. And, to me, that's just a little sad.

He's an A-rank grognard, no doubt, but I'd rather skip an entire paragraph about oatmeal than listen to one second of Mr. "They added new monsters in 4e, and, okay, that doesn't bother me that much".

# ¿ Jul 16, 2009 16:18

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

"I can't play my Sorcerer turned Monk/Warlord concept in 4e, roleplaying is dead."

There, I just saved you from having to read:

Felonius posted:

I'll admit up front that I was initially very excited to see what 4th Edition would bring. I purchased a 4th Edition Player's Handbook within 24 hours of its public release.

Unfortunately, I read it and returned it the next day.

And yes, I will admit that playing 4th Edition can be fun. I've played a handful (read: three) sessions with it, and on some levels its fun on a tactical battle scale.

But here's my real beef with it--

The core rule set does not allow me to play a true character of my choice. The 4th Edition rule set simply doesn't account for the fact that a character in the game may have an entirely valid, real set of reasons and motivations for no longer wishing to be a sorcerer, and instead wanting to focus completely on a 2nd class . . . and a 3rd class on top of that.

Let me explain further:

Let's say in a campaign, Billy the Sorcerer discovers some things he's not comfortable with in terms of who he's receiving his Sorcerer-ite training from. In fact, his character meets a monk that he respects highly, and Billy (being played true to character by a good role-player) decides he'd rather commit his time to the path of monk-like enlightenment. But along the way he also discovers that he is very much interested in studying battle tactics, and so takes up with a warlord for a while to study battle strategies.

Again, for the types of campaigns I usually play, these are not at all unusual types of choices for characters to make--who do we associate with? Who do we train with? What are the motivations of Organization X? What if, as a sorcerer, for philosophical and moral reasons I decide I want to discontinue studying sorcerer, but don't want to give up the lessons I've already learned? These are valid, character-driven decisions that will also directly affect the TYPE of character that they ultimately become.

This is not unlike my own "real life"--I have backgrounds in several academic and vocational subjects, and enjoy pursuing knowledge in all of them.

What's 4th Edition's answer on how to play this type of a not-altogether-uncommon real life human being?

"Too bad. You're one type of character, who maybe, kinda, sorta can mix with a second. But otherwise, you're out of luck."

And to stave off the inevitable rebuttals:

"Well, no DM would allow you to mix and match classes like that because it's not lifelike." Bullcrap. Since when did a "roleplaying game" hamstring a player to actually play a true-to-life character concept? Well, in D&D's case, since about June 2008, because it's simply not allowed in the CORE 4TH EDITION RULEBOOKS.

"Well, play what the books give you, and just have fun!" Ummm....okay. Since the TYPE of character concept I want to play just doesn't fit within your spectrum of rules . . . Oh but wait, surely the DM can just "Make it up as he goes," since that's one of the biggest selling points of 4th ed?

"Why do you care anyway? Just play Class X with powers A, B, J, and Q, and go beat the crap out of stuff." Right. Because roleplaying is about min/maxing. Because determining how much damage I do with Weapon X or Spell Z has anything to do with these types of character-driven actions.

Now, I recognize for some of you, this is irrelevant. You couldn't care less that you're not allowed to develop a "real life" sense of a true character motivation arc. You're happily banging away with your "At Wills" at whatever encounter your DM throws at you, and you're fine with that. Character motivations? Pffft, who gives a crap? When's my next encounter, and how many healing surges to I have left?

Well I'm not fine with that. And frankly, I dislike playing roleplaying games with people who ARE "fine with that." People say that 4th Edition frees up the DM to be more flexible. Hmmm, guess so, as long as "being flexible" doesn't involve a character actually moving beyond the rigid structures of their "role." What Wizards apparently lost sight of was that the idea of "What my character wants to do" goes far, FAR beyond simply "Well, I want to grapple the orc on the roof across the way while swinging on my magic spider rope I shot from my butt."

In 4th Edition, you're not a once-upon-a-time sorcerer who's disenchanted with magic and seeking for truth through other means (and your character progression now reflects that motivation). Your entire existence is summed up in one word--"You're a controller," because the exigencies of combat (which is where the real "fun" is, or so Wizards claims now) is more important than true character development.

So by all means, Wizards of the Coast / Hasbro, pump up your minis-based D&D so people can play a dumbed-down roleplaying game. Because heaven forbid a character actually make farther-reaching decisions, and have the rules to make those decisions possible and playable.

And just for the record--I own over a dozen 3.5 edition books, bought ALL FOUR SETS of the original D&D colored rulebooks (Red, Blue, Green, Black), and STILL have my D&D Classic Rules Cyclopedia sitting on my shelf as we speak. I have every Baldur's Gate PC game titles, Planescape: Torment, and own both Neverwinter Nights PC games. What I mean to say is, I'm not writing this just to bash 4th Edition. I'm writing this because I'm invested in the success of D&D as a viable gaming product, and because I hope that Wizards at least considers some of these types of player choices in their inevitable 5th edition.

# ¿ Jul 17, 2009 02:02

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

My "blog" and my "site" are two of the most popular RPG media in their respective forms on the entire internet.

[242 views, 8 comments from visitors, 7 of which are mocking him]

# ¿ Jul 19, 2009 22:29

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Combat should be simple and fast and lethal. A combat in an old-school game takes a few die rolls back and forth. Special cases, acrobatic maneuvers, tricks and tactics, are handled by role-play and the Judge calling for task rolls, NOT by a gigantic set of rules defining every edge case (Champions and GURPS were the original offenders here, but Dungeons & Dragons 3E and 4E carried the idea to absurdity). A fight should take 10-15 minutes to play out before everyone is dead, escaped, or surrendered.

The consequences of a fight should take a while to recover from: recovering HP, magic power, repairing armor, and reloading ammo. Old-school combat is about expending resources that take a lot of time to recover, if ever.

Death should be a constant possibility. Without death, there is no heroism. D&D 4E can't have heroes, because they can just fart and get a healing surge, inflict 1 HP damage and a minion explodes into gibbets. It's GOD MODE, just like in Doom! 10 years ago, the makers of SenZar were mocked for having a game where you couldn't lose, but now Wizards of the Hasbro does it, it's okay?

I find that killing 1 player character every 2-4 sessions, and maybe 1-2 NPC henchmen every session, keeps the players nervous and watching their backs. Resurrection should be rare or unavailable. Making a new character is easy.

# ¿ Jul 22, 2009 07:19

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Megaman's Jockstrap posted:

Where is this from?

A goldmine of grognardium.

So for our first session, we just finished up characters, talked about setting, and then did a quick one-shot rear end-kicking in a graveyard to playtest our abilities; everything that happens is discarded, but we get experience.

My friends well know by now my feelings about Z-grade "people who appear on film" (I refuse to call them "actors", because that would imply acting ability) Sarah Michelle Geller and David Boreanaz: I would have liked both Buffy and Angel so much better without Buffy or Angel, just the supporting cast, who were all fun and well-acted. So the antagonists chosen for us: Angel, Buffy, and about 10 normal vampires. We don't know who they are, we just act on our knowledge that all vampires are evil, and since the blonde chick is associating with a vampire, she must be his Renfield.

The other two players are hack-and-slashing and telekinetically throwing stakes through vampires, doing fine. I take on the "master vampire". Round one: I bite Angel just barely, and dodge his punch. Round two: I bite Angel in half, he explodes, the streetlights blow out, and he settles into dust. YEAH! Take that, David Boringanus!

Round three: Now this vampire-loving blonde bitch comes charging at me with her big loving sword, screaming about me killing her boyfriend (filthy necrophiliac), easily hits me despite my insanely high dodge skill, but luckily rolls pathetic damage and it bounces off my equally pathetic Shielding spell. She turns and runs, probably to go get Willow to nuke my rear end. I whip the shotgun off my back and fire (yes, from behind: rats don't do honor or dignity, they're survivors). Cha-Chick. BOOM. Headless Buffy falls to the ground. I walk over and make sure she's dead. Cha-Chick. BOOM.

Whole table applauds me. I have single-handedly eliminated my two least favorite "people who appear on film". Sunnydale is saved. Justice is served.

# ¿ Jul 22, 2009 08:07

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Amish Ninja posted:

Verisimilitude, internal consistency, immersive setting!

farmer vs orc minion intricacies are vital to these things!

Common sense? What feat do I have to take for that? Is there a table I could roll on?

# ¿ Jul 22, 2009 22:20

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Bob Smith posted:

I really don't get why people would want to play a purely non-combat character in a game where combat will be a part of it. There are systems for running intrigue-styled or low-combat games in a fantasy setting (WHFRP comes to mind) and D&D never has been one of them.

It's the inverse of the "rules as written, my level 11 warlord/bard could make a DC 60 Diplomacy check, which is enough to make Orcus work for me, QED 4e is UNPLAYABLE" effect. If I can make a cleric with 5 wisdom, then my group should accommodate me! If they don't want me to, it's because 4e doesn't allow for roleplaying! Why, I remember this 3e campaign where I repeatedly saved the day with my, scoff, "unoptimized" gnome bard by blah blah blah blah blah blah

You'd think these amazing players would be willing to make the slightest effort to compromise, but I guess not while there are ridiculous edge cases to pretend to care about!

# ¿ Jul 23, 2009 17:58

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Bob Smith posted:

Any good DM should discuss with their players any "odd" characters they want to try and find a compromise that thematically fits their idea and comes as mechanically close as possible without ruining everyone else's fun. The role the player I spoke of ended up with would have been an NPC interacted with by the PCs otherwise, but now the situation allows everyone to have what they want.

Yes, exactly. If the 5 wisdom cleric guy had a decent reason for wanting to play that character, he and his group could've surely worked something out. I thought of a character who feels no connection to the divine but nonetheless has divine powers. He sees nothing glorious in the glowing auras and golden cleansing fires that seem to follow him around. He is incapable of making the connection between an angel shielding him from a monster and his having just shouted, "Oh god, it's going to kill me!" It could be a fun character to play, especially if you insist on trying to explain away your own powers as you use them.

Of course, in that case you'd just take your 16-18 in Wisdom and roleplay as if it was much lower. Either that, or your DM/group tells you that there's no reason the other characters would agree to work with someone who's thoroughly incapable at his job, and you try again.

# ¿ Jul 24, 2009 00:49

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Duke5150 posted:

I agree that things should stay true to their original representation (artwork) but hey, its wotc after all and I think we all know what that means.::winkyface::

(Example - Arstor the Pentifex Monolith from the magic of incarnum is now an Avatar of Hope in Divine Power.)::rollseyes::

# ¿ Jul 27, 2009 03:04

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Seriously? What the hell. Why do people keeping saying the same bullcrap just to defend 4th Edition:

�D&D is what YOU make it.�
�D&D is about roleplaying.�
�D&D is different to everyone.�

Ilikegreen is among these people and, sorry, you make no sense. That�s not what D&D is. That�s what EVERY Tabletop RPG game. Again, what separates D&D from the others?

To me, it�s been two things: The Story and The Sacred Cows.

D&D had a Law vs Chaos, Good vs Evil thing going, with Neutral also as a force. D&D has Paladins that must be LG, Monks that must be Lawful, Chaotic Barbarians, etc.

D&D has elves that live for centuries. (not 200 years!)

D&D has demons in the Abyss, not Elementals in the bottom of Elemental Chaos.

D&D has Elemental Planes, not Elemental Chaos.

D&D has 17 Outer Planes, Ethereal, Shadow, Astral, demiplanes, and other miscellaneous planes the the Plane of Faerie, Mirrors, and more. Not just 5 planes all mangled together (Shadowfell, Astral, Feywild, Elemental Chaos, Abyss?)

D&D has 5 iconic metallic dragons which are Brass, Bronze, Copper, Gold, and Silver�not REPLACING Brass and Bronze with Adamantine and Iron!

D&D had REAL MAGIC. One spell was capable of having multiple uses depending on creativity, even the combat spells, and didn�t take an 10 minutes to an hour to perform.

D&D had REAL MAGIC ITEMS. Not items that work once or give some piddly crap modifier for an encounter.

D&D treated monsters as characters in 3rd Edition. BRILLIANT! I was able to get a baseline for a creature and tailor it to my own way! Instead, I have 4th Edition giving me 50 versions of the same creature, with various distinctions between them that gives me no room to tailor other than throwing a template or two on them. I just want ONE or two version and let ME fix them the way I want them. Why do I need 50 versions of goblins with 20 dozen different abilities? What makes a goblin a goblin? I can�t tell, since a Goblin Lurker has the same abilities as a Bugbear Lurker of the same level.

D&D had better customization and options (3rd Edition D&D anyway) than 4E ever will.

I can go on and on, you get the point. They destroyed 35+ years of lore and history, slaughtered almost every sacred cow, and made the game into �World of Warcraft on Paper�. They alienated their loyal fanbase to attract a new generation of instant-gratification and simple-minded youngins to play their game, but any kid, teen, or college student worth a brain cell can easily see they�re better off jumping onto something less tedious and more visually stunning and faster like an MMO.

D&D 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Edition was what made it D&D to me. It was entirely different and unique from any other game. Now that it�s similar to every other game on the PC, I see no D&D in it at all.

# ¿ Jul 28, 2009 00:18

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Here you go, in the comments: http://blog.red-bean.com/sussman/?p=100

Here's another from the same comments sections, bolded for emphasis/clarity:

Darkmessiah posted:

ok now dm for 30 years played 200+P&p Sessions 1st edtion played loved it 2nd edtion loved it even more looked into 3rd edtion starting to accept it ,4th edtion burn it burn it burn it .anything that gets to close to a video game should be banned theres enough games on there to keep you entertained till you dead.pen and paper games as well have a varity but the orginailty of D&D was it�s complexity sure there where thousands and rules and things to keep in mind but i read them manuals over and over again and i would only adopt what worked and kept the game flow but having so many options gave me alot inspiration to try out and revamp my own games and sure you can do that with the new editions but only buy praticing and learning them rules till they where embded in your head could a dm be a true god so really it just seems like people out there have become lazy in challanging there minds ok so you might lose a little life over it and you might even think there is no room for more roleplaying just sitting around rolling dice in every situation true however if you kept the dice roll to a minimum and concentrating on winging it you be surprised how you can keep the game flowing oh and as far as magic user go sure weak in the beggining one magic missle spell not the case if you play the game like me alway give them starting off with a few magical items that there mentor or they created themselves i usally gave a staff with magic missle of some other spells so many things you could do some dm really if you just let tem go into a dungeon with 2 fighters one cleric and a Mu aremed with a dagger and ac 11 com on !!!! no sense of fun and balance there but give them something in par with the fighters then problem solved and there low hit points and ac sure was tough but thats what makes them ever so challanging as well as usally intended for more advance players.i loved 2.0 it was complex thac0 is not that hard to understand but changing it in 3.0 it seems worthy but a minor change i agree with if your going to change something do it for the better but dont fix something taht is�ent broken and it sounds like that in 4.0 actually i if your a gary gygax fan then you whould be shocked to see your beloved creation get rammed up a cows rear end and spat out as the new improved Bah! if you a true fan you would have had a problem with them even droping the advance they should have kept it this way 2nd edtion is Advance d&d so it makes sense to me more complex good think they took that title away in the later edtions because its exatcly right its Dungeons and dragons and if you are an old player you would remeber the D&d back in the 70s and 80s it was basic just like todays revised edtion for 9 year olds i mean they should have kept them seperate Advance for the more adult players and D&d for the youth my point is this Gary GyGax has been booted from the creation his idea has truned to a pre maddona sell out and the orginal seems nothing but a memory if you love D&D then go to the roots.if you love all this poo poo they now bring on then go play computer games you dont belong to the realm of the educated challanged roleplaying tabletop player where you whould to actually take the time to study them rules so much that you could rewrite the book yourself only then can you really say to yourself that drat i love this game until then your just another noob so get with it sell your soul to the wizards of the coast or repent to the true meaning of D&D and start from the orginal and become a true Master.

Not willing to lose a little life to learn thousands of rules so you know which ones to discard? Sorry, you don't belong at the table with the educated-challenged players. ::downssmug::

# ¿ Jul 28, 2009 02:03

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Lugubrious posted:

In case anyone is wondering what Ed Greenwood looks like:

And no one was surprised.

I don't know what it is exactly, but I have an easier time reading the punctuation-free garble I posted a few pages back than any of these Ed Greenwood posts. He's managed to capture the essence of labored ramblings in text form.

# ¿ Jul 31, 2009 21:00

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Countblanc posted:

I don't like 4e's per encounter or dailies simply because it feels very mechanical and weird, especially for fighting characters,

This person has never physically exerted himself.

# ¿ Aug 3, 2009 05:01

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

sigma999 posted:

Stopped reading at "ork".

sigma999 posted:

Orcs are a trope unto itself, but "ork" takes all better aspects of that away and adds guns, pubescent notions of biology, and "WAAAGH" in a mangled cockney accent.

That's not funny. That's stupid. That's the same grade as Tolkein, really.

# ¿ Aug 3, 2009 07:19

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Mikan posted:

Do what's good for the story, and give the players what they want so they come back next week.

Oh no, anything but that.

# ¿ Aug 4, 2009 16:36

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

mandrake776 posted:

http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?p=89650#89650

The whole thread is a clusterfuck of people attacking one or two people who have the audacity to suggest that maybe 4E is not the worst game.

That thread actually looks like one of the more civil and readable threads on the forums. A majority of the posts manage to do without 4chan phrases, image macros and personal attacks!

# ¿ Aug 5, 2009 20:07

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Red_Mage posted:

So as a Hypothetical exercise, lets pretend we are the ones who are objectively wrong, using nothing but fallacies and shoddy house rules to support 4e. What exactly would they do to fix 4e. So far the only complaint I've seen that can be "fixed" is "I can't play my horrible combination of 17 classes." And WotC seems to be trying to help with that, what with the new Paragon Paths, Dual Classing, and Multiclass feat classes.

What more do they want that 4e can't give them?

A lot of the complaints seem to stem (whether they realize it or not) from the fact that 4e puts the game before the simulation. When it comes to monster creation, 4e gives you guidelines for piecing together its stats from nothing, while 3e expects you to treat it like a PC and give it feats/spend its skill points. 4e just says, "Here are low/medium/high damage ranges for at-will/limited use powers", while 3e says, "Here's a list of feats and spells, and here's how you'd calculate their damage based on the user's ability scores, equipment and skills".

So you get people complaining that a Hobgoblin Guard is literally unable to pick up a longbow, because the Hobgoblin's attacks come from arbitrary powers instead of calculations. Or that because the DMG says players can't sell mundane equipment, every single monster's equipment logically must crumble to dust the second it dies. Or how a level 1 wizard can kill a level 27 minion with Cloud of Daggers, because clearly "HP" is an exact statistic and not an abstraction of one's ability to shrug off damage. If you try to point out that these problems have common sense solutions, they call it "Oberoni" or "Magical Tea Party".

# ¿ Aug 5, 2009 21:59

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

RagnarokAngel posted:

Basically the idea that in 4th edition theres no threats and no danger, everyone can just sit around with happy smiles sipping tea and eating crumpets.

They need hardcore power. Blood spilt on a weekly basis, character sheets cast into the fireplace every hour, the lament of players who just got unlucky but failed due to no fault of their own.

This...this is true roleplaying.

I think it's that, but also "If there are no explicit rules for something, the game is reduced to whatever the DM and players all agree on."

So because there are no rules for searching a medium sized city (with port access) for skilled laborers (d100 to determine proficiency bonus) and hiring them (see page 276 for wages) to build a tavern (estimated materials on page 294, a wizard can reduce these costs with the Fabricate spell) to staff with the rogue's posse (each gaining a benefit to their Perform skill based on the rogue's skill level) and make a weekly income from (see the appendix), then there's absolutely no way to include that in your game without just giving the player whatever they want.

I wish I could say I was just making this up, but this example was actually in that monster of a thread. Someone pointed out 3e doesn't really have rules for all this, just estimations and the response was that bad rules are better than no rules. Because really, the importance of owning a tavern in a D&D campaign is not how it ties into the story, but making sure that the amount your waitress made this week is FAIR and BY THE RULES AS WRITTEN.

# ¿ Aug 6, 2009 05:58

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

RagnarokAngel posted:

*In high pitched, conceited voice*
PATHFINDER SUCKS, 4TH EDITION IS GOD

Why are you mocking this man, did you even hear how aesthetic the Pathfinder book is? It's got an INDEX. And ART.

What does 4e have? Does it have the same races in PHB1 as 3.5?? I thought not :smug:

# ¿ Aug 7, 2009 04:56

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Those of you with a copy, lets turn to page 34 and look at the drawing accompanying the Dragonborn race. Does anything jump out at you? The female Dragonborn has boobs. Boobs. WHY THE gently caress DOES A REPTILE HAVE loving MAMMARY GLANDS?? Can you explain this for me? Purely within the context of this fantasy realm, do female dragons wear giant brassieres to keep their massive, scaly, dragon-titties from flopping around while they�re devouring entire villages??

# ¿ Aug 7, 2009 19:26

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Seftir posted:

But consider that though there is a good chance it'll come back every round, there's also a good chance it won't.

Solution 1:
Recharge 6+ --> Can be used once every six turns.
Recharge 5+ --> Can be used once every three turns.
And so on.

Solution 2:
Make your recharge rolls pre-emptively, so you know how many turns it will take for the power to recharge.

Solution 3:
I CAN'T ROLEPLAY MY DRAGON YOU GUYS
YOU GUYS
MY DRAGON

Anyway, courtesy of Mikan's links (he rules (but not as much as 4e)):

quote:

Tomb of Horrors midnight game: 14 players (!)
...
A few of the people I think got a bit fed up, and then once play started, since it's not an action-adventure module, it became easy for certain people to be the ones actually playing more. There were I think 7 left by the time 5:30am rolled around.

Funniest thing was the one real survivor who came out far ahead... he just sat next to me and listened for 6 friggin hours, not really actually doing anything. Near the beginning of the game he passes me a note, "I'm going to cast invisibility and follow everyone else about 20' back." Near the end when the party was splitting into groups of 2-3 and dying alone in pits, here's this guy following along, invisible, looting their bodies and then leaving. heh.

# ¿ Aug 9, 2009 05:20

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

Red_Mage posted:

As an example, in the DMG on page 124 under monetary treasure the portion reads, "By the time characters reach epic level, they rarely see gold anymore." Hmmm, so do they shop at Epic Level merchants and eat at Epic Level taverns?

This is perfect grognard. A thousand words leading up to a single actual complaint, which is "What if my immortal, world-changing, god-slaying avatar of justice wants to buy a rope? What THEN?"

# ¿ Aug 10, 2009 23:42

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# ¿ May 4, 2024 21:04

opaopa13: Jul 25, 2007; EB: i'm in a rocket pack and i am about to blast off into space. it should be sweet.

RagnarokAngel posted:

something he dwells on for like 10 minutes is how all classes are identical.
I'm loving sorry but just because clerics and wizards lost a little diversity to make everyone irrelevant doesnt mean theyre identical.
Fighters and rogues can now do more than they ever could. during 3rd edition people convinced themselves feat choices made fighters "unique". But now they have that AND the power selection and yet now theyre all too samey?

I think the mistake some of them are making is just glancing at the powers and seeing a lot of "Do x damage and get an additional bonus". For melee classes, they skip the features and feats that make them unique, as well as missing the larger themes. For spellcasters, they see simple damage spells where they used to have every possible type of effect. They might also look at one level's power choice and translate "All of these powers are worthwhile" into "My choice is irrelevant".

On the other hand, that guy specifically calls out Rangers in 4e, as if picking from at least four powers most levels is not going to produce any kind of variation at all. What does 3.5e do instead? Perhaps 4e is worse because you can sum up your character as "Two-Weapon Ranger" instead of having to recite "Scout 4 / Ranger 12 / etc. 7 / and so on 5"?

Meanwhile, one of my players took a funky stat array with his Warlord so that he can someday take up a spear and start making OAs and tripping everything with reach 2. Another multiclassed into Rogue with her Sorcerer so she can occasionally Sneak Attack with her spells, using a dagger as an implement. I have no idea how effective they'll be, but so much for being identical.

opaopa13 fucked around with this message at 00:09 on Aug 12, 2009

# ¿ Aug 12, 2009 00:03

The Something Awful Forums > Archives > Comedy Goldmine > grognards.txt

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