Scythia wrote:
Personally I always thought that Paladins and Clerics ping alignment so easily because they are "anchored" into a plane/power that radiates that alignment so strongly. The person may not have to match the alignment they ping in such cases, but if the devotee's alignment gets too off the mark they can't sync up with that anchor and thus lose their benefits. Paladins have a much narrower band to sync up whereas Clerics only need to be within 1 step. I do take as supporting evidence that some spells will cause you to temporarily appear as a specific alignment regardless of usage/intent or personal alignment. The taint of connecting to that other plane/power covers over your natural alignment.
@thejeff : I agree with you in the idea that telling a character story that traits of the character to give a reference point do have to be used. I do prefer my fantasy to use more blank slate characters so I can mentally fill in parts I would prefer. To me characters are just people, straight, bi, gay, other all just people, I don't really care about the labels. Maybe that is a privilege thing that I am getting to enjoy "just because" I happen to identify somewhat closely with a well represented set of characteristics. Using Dumbledore again as an example, in his author's mind he was gay, but realistically no real "come out and say it" was done, as his intimate life wasn't intended as part of the story. His gender and how he gender identified admittedly was known (or was it...). I do cringe when I read stories written where it feels a character was made just to fill in a set of check boxes rather than the character and story fitting together like a .. well.. 'like a well told story'. I think Paizo works hard to not make bad stories both for business and because they have a vested love of stories as well. I suppose the reason I'm even chiming in at all is I've had discussions about sexuality fairly often in my personal life, and have basically come up with the conclusion of "what get's your motor humming is no business of anyone else's unless you make it so". Don't identify yourself as a single bullet point as that shouldn't be all you are.
I still want to see the characters that other players have in their own "mind's theater" because there really won't be enough official characters to even do minimal service to all the races/countries/classes/genders/self-identifiers we have, from a game standpoint the classes races and countries have a very important mechanical component in giving ideas how to play said adventurer types with your own twist on a character.
So if someone dies by Shadow Str drain, is brought back to life via resurrection or something. Goes on their merry way to a long life of living, is str drained by poison years later, instead of falling uselessly weak they die because once in the past a Shadow molested them. I don't assume the above is the way anyone would play it. Once you die the shadows ability drain *special* is expended and doesn't linger on past being brought back to life. So once alive again it is just 0 str penalty not penalty + shadow *special* .
Personally I adhere to the idea that elves are able at an earlier age, but they aren't yet seasoned to the point where the Elvish Society deems them worthy of speaking in public. A parallel I draw from this is human history. Humans in less than desirable situations/cultures could do all the adult things in their early teens normally, up to starting families, taking over the family business and so forth. But more recently with a higher desire for culture and education, and also more favorable circumstances to allow a longer childhood I would say that some people aren't quite ready to start their long career lives until late 20's to early 30's (like Doctors they have a long seasoning period). Another example is the Lord of the Rings mythology, look at the Hobbits, there were many references to how old the hobbits were before their society deemed them worthy of being "adults" that had little to do with their physical development. I am sad that the referenced story about the lost Elf having a physical maturing that took decades in that city, it kinda set, a distasteful, idea in stone. The trope that I've often seen in the Fantasy series is that elves are wise, and patient. Never prone to hasty choices and ultimately being very conservative. Humans dominate because of passion, that passionate zest for life feeds the human psyche allowing them to make leaps of progress that allowed them to spread over the world. Learning-wise that passion would likely translate into being very fast learners, making intuitive connections that speed their learning. Elves are smarter (capacity) but humans being more clever allow them to "fill" their learning capacity much faster. -- Now the question from me is, if Elven maturation rate is more a cultural than a biological thing, what would happen if a human baby foundling was raised in an Elvish society? A geriatric just getting ready to start their career, or would exceptions be made? Or conversely if the maturation is all biology, how would the Elvish parents react to this human maturing like a weed?
I cut my RP teeth on 2nd Ed, and I loved every moment of it.
Pros:
Cons:
Later games mechanically do run smoother and consistently, but I do feel a little of imagination and uniqueness may have been lost with the smoothing over the edges. Of course maybe it is just a heavy nostalgia of younger days with more free time and a better tolerance for inefficiency than I'm allowed nowadays. |