Roman's page

Cross-posted from a similar thread:

To be honest, although I am not a proponent of immortality (or resurrection) possibilities at low and medium levels, these concepts do have their place in high-powered play, so including them as mythic abilities does make some sense. Immortality, even in Mythic play, however, should be (much) more circumscribed than it is in the current playtest document.

1) There need to be ways for signature/powerful non-mythic creatures to kill mythic characters. Legendary dragons and outsiders (and indeed heroes - say X levels higher than the character concerned), for example, could be allowed to deal mythic damage, even if they are not strictly-speaking mythic.

2) Like legendary creatures, legendary weapons should also be capable of killing mythic characters (e.g. by also dealing mythic damage), even when wielded by non-legendary hands. This should include all artifacts and some other major magic items.

3) Each character should have a weakness that allows even weak creatures to kill the character (in theory - they might find it hard to accomplish in practice) if they exploit it properly. The 'mortal weakness' could be based on the mythic fault or be an entirely separate concept.

Gunslinger is banned in my games, but the reasons are not so much balance, as the very idea of a class that uses guns. No thanks, in my fantasy games that are without guns.

Tacticslion, I agree. An attempt by WotC at higher world consistency in the rules is absolutely essential if I am to have any real interest in a new edition of D&D. Indeed, judging from your post, I think what we look for in a new D&D game is virtually identical.

Anyway, to add something extra, many of the departures from the 'immersion function' (it is not a perfect term, but I have to call it something short...) to an 'unveiled game function' in 3.XE/Pathfinder are based on D&D traditions (e.g. hit points). For this reason, I find them more acceptable than I would have found them were they newly introduced. In other words, I accept some mechanical conceits as part of the heritage of the game. Of course, that's not to say that I would object to them changing to provide enhanced support for immersion, but I am not as bothered by them as by newly introduced immersion-hampering rules elements.

Honestly, the only people who should care about 5E are the people still buying WotC products.

Why? I currently don't buy WotC products, but that doesn't mean I will never do so again. Hence, I am still interested with what they might come up with.

Rather long aside about the difference between 4E mentality and a 3.X/Pathfinder one

** spoiler omitted **...

I agree with what you wrote in the spoiler. Verisimilitude and or simulationism may or may not be the right terms to summarize them, but yes, the factors you describe are some of the major reasons why I do not play 4E. They are not the only reasons - things like lack of class progression diversity, more metagame references (encounter is NOT a defined a unit of time) and others also matter a great deal to me, but the foregoing are definitely extremely important.

If WotC wanted to get me to buy into the 5th edition, they would have to change their design philosophy and at the very least return to the 3.X/Pathfinder philosophy or even go further in that direction. Fluff is important to me too, but, as far as I am concerned, rules design philosophy is absolutely vital.

Roman wrote:

I strongly disagree with the opinion that 3.5e/Pathfinder is a worse ruleset than 4e. There are no objective criteria to judge how good a ruleset is, since we assign different value to different ruleset features. For example, I assign a rather large value to mechanical diversity between classes, so that's one reason (though by no means the only reason) why I find the 3.5e/Pathfinder ruleset far superior to the 4e one. You might not be too bothered by that and might instead value balance between classes (which I also value, but often less than inter-class diversity) more, in which case your preferences would be the reverse of mine.

I dunno. You just listed a number of objective criteria right there. Rules complexity. Number choices. Balance. Ease of learning.

Right, but the value of each of those criteria is subjectively determined by the individual. Hence, the resulting ranking of RPG systems in how 'good' they are would be subjective.

Roman wrote:

Regarding your setting assessment, I also disagree. I think WotC has some very good campaign settings. Dark Sun was awesome, as were others. Golarion may or may not be good - I am not familiar enough with it to be able to judge, but I am familiar enough with the WotC settings to say that they have some real gems there.

I will rephrase that. WotC does have a number of great settings. I mentioned earlier that Eberron is still one of my favorites. However, WotC simply doesn't support their settings was well as Paizo does. I feel that's an objective fact based on the amount of material Paizo has produced for their setting.

That may well be. I am unfamiliar with the extent of support WotC currently provides for its settings. From what I have heard, it seems that the flavor conversion of those settings to 4E has been a mixed bag, with Forgotten Realms violated, Eberron done OK and Dark Sun done very well. As to post-conversion support the settings have received, however, I lack the knowledge to comment.

I certainly didn't want to give the impression that Wizards of the Coast will have it easy. It is tough to design a game that will reunite the fan-base, given how disparate the wants of various gamers can be. One cannot rule out that the game will try to be good at everything and end up being good at nothing. Still, Wizards of the Coast does have some excellent designer talent - they may be able to pull off a game that can reunite the player-base to a significant extent.

The signs on the RPG scene these days are pointing to the rather likely possibility that design of the 5th edition of Dungeons & Dragons is already under way and possibly has been for some time. It is not the purpose of this post to delve into the details or discuss the likelihood in any great detail, so suffice it to say that the Legends & Lore series of articles seem to point that way, as does the rehiring of Monte Cook by Wizards of the Coast. Further evidence attesting to this comes from sales and the release schedule for 4e – the sales of the Pathfinder RPG are of the same magnitude as those of 4e and may even be outselling it, which is a major achievement, though it probably also owes a great deal to the weak release schedule for 4e that is somewhat reminiscent of the end of official support for 3.5E. In any case, even if you still don’t believe 5e is coming, just assume that it is anyway for the purposes of this thread.

I would enjoy seeing a discussion of what Paizo will and/or can do to position itself, as well as the Pathfinder RPG, to prepare for and withstand the challenge that 5E will pose. It appears from the Legends & Lore series of articles that Wizards of the Coast is keen on designing a game that will reunite the splintered D&D fan-base. That may be beneficial for the players, but it could hurt PFRPG and Paizo.

I must say that I really like what is being presented in the aforementioned articles, which is in complete contrast to the run up to 4e, where I was more and more repelled by each successive reveal. If this is the case for a substantial section of the Pathfinder RPG player base, than the game can be significantly undercut. I know that PFRPG has been going from strength to strength recently, but it could well be fatal for Paizo to underestimate WotC if the latter comes to the market with a new edition. As high quality as PFRPG products may be, business as usual may not be enough, and there might need to be a more specific response.

That said, Paizo has managed to build up a lot of loyalty. It has done a lot of things right to ensure that. Apart from updating a popular edition of D&D with a fresh and flavorful twist, the company has managed to grow it in new directions, while maintaining a high level of quality and excellent production values. On top of that, it has embraced the Open Gaming License, which has further endeared it to the community; a fact further enhanced by the regular interaction of Paizo staff with the community. So, clearly, there will be a large number of players who trust Paizo and will stay with the Pathfinder RPG no matter what lures WotC may throw at them. Others will play both games. Still, not all players are like that and a significant portion of the Pathfinder RPG player base may be susceptible to switching to 5E if WotC does a good job with the game.

So what should/will Paizo do to respond to and how will Pathfinder be impacted by 5e D&D?

Should Paizo simply attempt to continue its plan for the PFRPG without change and stress stability and/or backward compatibility?
Should Paizo release a 2nd edition of the PFRPG to compete for novelty value?
Should Paizo try to sell itself (perhaps even to WotC/Hasbro) along with the PFRPG?
Should Paizo do an update/refresh of the PFRPG – i.e. PFRPG revised/1.5e akin to what D&D 3.5E did with respect to 3E?
Should Paizo expand the PFRPG system in new directions, such as science fiction, wild west, modern, etcetera?
Should Paizo revert to 3PP status, abandon PFRPG and throw itself behind supporting 5e (depending on the terms offered by a licensing agreement – if any)? (This is the least likely scenario, I think.)

Obviously, this is by no means an exhaustive list of Paizo’s choices and PFRPG’s futures and each of the above can contain many sub-scenarios, but I hope the should be enough to get the discussion going!

We have past the limit. The gunslinger was totally uneeded as were the two alt classes. There is nothing left to do that can not and should not be archetypes of other classes.

If you want to be blunt, a number of classes could be folded into archtypes of other classes.

I agree. We are at or perhaps even past the limit. Perhaps when new major game systems are added, such as psionics, it could justify new base classes, but otherwise they would be superfluous.

Paizo has not been shy about introducing new mechanics for new classes. Apart from the aforementioned quinggong monk, I can also cite the summoner, the oracle and others to a lesser or greater extent. Hence, I find the James' insistence on slot-based psionics rather puzzling. The notion that the new systems do not involve casting merely creates a false dichotomy - the line that separates special abilities from spells is blurry and artificial.

Don't get me wrong, I like slot-based magic, but I enjoy having mechanical variety and divergence among the classes. Indeed, one of the reasons I did not switch to 4E was the mechanical uniformity of the classes. Ideally, I would like to see every type of magic having its own system - arcane, divine, nature, psionics and possibly others. In practice, faithfulness to D&D legacy means that I am willing to acquiesce to divine and nature magic being rolled into one and using essentially the same mechanics as arcane magic. Psionics, however, does not share that slot-based legacy and thus provides a perfect opportunity to branch out to a different system.

One such possibility is power points, of course, but I am not wedded to the system. Any system that jives well with the flavor of psionics would probably make me happy. It could indeed be a ki-based psionics system that has been suggested as soon as the ki-pool was added to the monk and which, as Epic Meepo has so skillfully demonstrated, does not need a wordy explanation in an adventure path (this also incidently illustrates that a power point system would also not need lengthy explanations to get across the basics in an adventure path). Alternatively, it could be a skills & feats based psionic system (or even a word of power like system) or something entirely novel.

I am not saying I would outright reject a slot-based psionics system - just that I prefer mechanical diversity. If you do go the slot-based route, though, at least make a serious effort to mechanically differentiate psionic casters from existing casters. An idea I have been harboring for some time, for example, is that you could have a spontaneous slot-based system, but use ki points or power points to add metamagic feats and additional effects to spells [there would be fewer spell slots to compensate]. These additional effects would serve to enhance flexibility and add psionic flavor. Perhaps having a sufficient ki point or power point reserve could even enable the manifestation of select powers at will. You get the picture - basically, even if one sticks with the slot-based system, it is possible to differentiate it somewhat.

I must also say that it is unfortunate that the existing magic system already covers practically all bases. I would have liked to see a greater separation between arcane, nature, divine and psionic systems also in terms of what they can accomplish, but alas, that boat has mostly sailed in the Pathfinder RPG.

The edit window we provide means enough opportunity to fix typos, or realize a post does not read the way you've intended, but prevents people from "going back in time" to move the goalposts or making those who've replied to them look foolish or deceptive.

Hmm, I can see what you mean. In theory, it sounds like it could be useful for what you say, but on all the other boards I have been on (including some small ones and some very large ones), what you describe has simply not been a problem in practice, even though they allowed unrestricted editting. I think the restriction deals with a theoretical problem that does not really occur in practice with any great frequency and its only real effect is thus to inconvenience users.

seekerofshadowlight wrote:

You have an hour. After an Hour you can no longer edit. It has been that way as long as I have been here.

Aha! That makes sense. Thank you!

Although it does make sense and has indeed been the case on these boards as long as I have been here, it is also pretty annoying. There have certainly been cases when I wanted to go back and edit posts that were days old. Often it was a desire to update them with new information that stemmed from the discussion that came later.

Although I have never walked from a game due to bad GMing or playing (I did have times whan I had to leave, because of RL issues, such as moving to another location) and have never had players/GMs walk out on any of the groups I was playing in for this reason either, even ignoring the teenage years, I do have my own share of GMing mistakes that some might consider horror stories.

A relatively recent DMing mistake of mine occured during a campaign I was running in my own world featuring my friends and my sister as players. They were taking a break from the main plot and accepted a quest to retrieve the symbols of rulership from an ancient tomb burried under a remote part of the desert. The tomb was hidden, but the group eventually overcame environmental and other hazards and found it. Forcing their way in, the PCs discovered undead in the tomb, whom they proceeded to swiftly dispatch (Channel Energy...). Unfortunately, when designing the adventure, I thought I would make things more interesting by making the undead a bit different from the standard lot. You see, I had decided that undeath was actually considered the afterlife for the culture that built the tomb, so instead of haunting the living, the undead merely (un-)lived their (un-)lives in the tomb, which was designed to guard them, but also to provide them with comforts resembling the ones they enjoyed during their mortal existence.

The players eventually discovered this and it split the party. Most of the PCs were intent on plundering the tomb anyway and destroying the undead, arguing that the undead simply don't know any better and it will actually liberate their souls. One PC, however, wanted to respect the afterlife of the given culture. This turned into a major intra-party conflict (though it didn't come to blows), which in itself would not be such a huge issue. As a DM I did nothing about this and just let the party work it out among themselves, thus allowing it to spill into real life.

That particular session ended without a resolution and we all went home. The player who disagreed with purging the rest of the undead, however, was the girlfriend of one of the other players and it seems that she let him 'feel the heat' (or maybe, ehm, 'feel the cold', ehm) so to speak in a major way. The things became apparently so bad, that he called me to ask me to reschedule the session for earlier the following week, swapping it with the game his girlfriend was running (same group of players, but she was the DM and I was a player in that game), so that the situation could be resolved earlier. I agreed and the next session the conflict continued for a while. By this time (well since that phone call), however, I had realized what I was causing by letting it fester, so when the conflict continued (well, by this time it was not so much conflict, as the rest of the group pleading with her to come out of her 'secure shelter' and appologizing to her), I interrupted the game and had a chat with them out of game, particularly with that one player. I also decided to tilt the issue to one side by making the situation less morally ambiguous and to present some 'additional evidence' that killing the undead would actually liberate their souls, despite the fact that they believe they are in their afterlife. The out of game chat and the extra evidence did help to resolve the issue and the party then recomposed and cleared out the tomb before proceeding with the main quest.

Lesson 1 for me: Be very careful when introducing morally ambiguous situations - at least with this particular group. I made a mistake of introducing a morally ambiguous situation without knowing the group sufficiently well to be sure that it wouldn't tear the group apart.

Lesson 2 for me: Intervene early when an in-game conflict spreads into real life. I let had allowed the situation to fester and even continue past the end of the game session of where it began.

I also like what Paizo has done with Channel Energy and I do like your idea on how to take it further. In fact, I would take it even further than you would. This could be reworked into a really major cleric and paladin mechanic - in effect a 'power source' to use 4E terminology to the extent that paladins could then lose their spellcasting and clerics could, at the very least, have it curtailed. That kind of radical change, however, is not for the Pathfinder RPG and even your less radical idea, although good, might be going too far at this time. Maybe in the eventual Patfinder RPG 2nd edition or some later edition, where backward compatibility is less of a concern, this could be implemented.