auticus's page

Roleplaying at its most extreme - a person who talks in character at all times and describes in narrative what is happening with everything the character does. If the character attacks, he explains it in vivid detail. If the character casts a spell, he explains it in vivid detail. If the character makes a spellcraft roll, he explains it in vivid detail. If the character makes a diplomacy roll, he explains it in vivid detail. The dice results are incorporated into the details.

Rollplaying at its most extreme - a person who pushes his miniature forward on the battle map. Rolls a D20. Says he hit AC 16. Rolls damage. The character sheet is a collection of numbers and mechanics. When a player must attack, he rolls a dice and gives you the math. When a character casts a spell, he rolls some dice and gives you the math and explains the rules mechanics. When the character must make a spellcraft roll, he rolls the dice and gives you the math. When the character makes a diplomacy roll, he rolls the dice and gives you the math. The details are all in the number rolled.

Which one is the best and which one is "doing it wrong"?

=)

I'm sure you can tell what the correct answer is to that question. For those of you that do not, or insinuate I'm taking up for one side or the other, the correct answer is: "neither".

auticus wrote:

I was going off of the charts that explained the stat scores and how they relate from the manuals in 1st and 2nd ed.

They actually explained that an 18/00 strength character was super human beyond conan in 2nd edition PHB.

They also had an IQ range for INT and 18 INT was around a 180 IQ.

The bonuses in 2nd ed to 3rd ed are the same, so to me the comparisons can still be valid, though of course the whole thing is abstract, so you may consider an 18 to be a shlep.

Right, and I put a 18 IQ arround 160, as that is 4 standard deviations. A 180 would be 20-21. I never said an 18 was a shlep, only that it wasn't so rare that they should be prohibitted from players.

Part of the reason this discussion gets so heated is because people come into it with different ideas of what stats mean. If you think an 18 correlates to 180 and I think its a 160 IQ, I think 1 out of every 30K people are that smart and you think 1 of every ~3,500K is that smart. Over 2 orders of magnitude difference. To me, an 18 isn't superhuman, just exceptional. A 20 is competing for best in the field, but can still be exceeded by someone who is exceptional and has enough training (stat increases for level).

In the end, how exceptional your characters are depends greatly on how exceptional everyone else in the world is. If most of the NPCs are toting max of 15s, having an 18 is a lot different than if your average NPCs have a 17-20. That depends a lot on GM style, and how they see people in their world. I know GMs who give 20s to cannon fodder, so in these games have 20s is fairly normal for PCs and not considered exceptional. I also know GMs who give most NPCs 13s, and exceptional ones 15s. Here 16s start to feel exceptional. The only time I really find problems are when the GM has different expectations for their players than they do for the NPCs, unless they want the PCs to feel exceptional (or underpowered) intentionally.

You are correct, it boils down to your own perceptions. There is no hard and fast "18 means this" so what it means to me may be different to you.

Ultimately the campaign itself will dictate what the players should be. If a player is looking to be an x-man and beyond normal, higher stats fit that.

In my world, my NPCs fit the mould for what I feel a stat for normal people are.

A typical laborer in my world would be S10-12, D10, C10, I10, W10, Ch10. That represents a baseline normal person who relies on physicality to make a living.

A gladiator NPC may be S14, D12, C12, I10, W10, Ch12 to denote superior physical traits and an ability for showmanship above and beyond "the norm".

A scholar would be 10s across the board except he may have an Int of 14 to denote a very sharp individual.

My PCs typically have a primary stat of 16 so they are already a cut above normal people by a lot (considering that they will have three or four stats above 10) so it fits in my world.

If my PCs used 20 point or higher buys they would be toting 18s or higher which would put them in a whole different realm (to me, rather than being exceptional, they would be borderline super human at that point)

But again that is perception and how I stat out my NPCs.

TOZ wrote:

master arminas wrote:

You see, this is what I utterly hate about some DMs views on gaming. I AM NOT AN AVERAGE COMMONER.

At those DMs tables, yes, you are. You want to be a hero, find a DM that matches your playstyle. Calling them idiotic pissants because you don't like the game they run is idiotic.

It's funny because it was my PLAYERS that were the ones who suggested we switch from epic-super-awesome stats to a 15 pt buy. Personally, I think you can still be an effective player with 15 pts maybe not a one man killing machine but an effective player all the same.

Out of curiosity. What is the point buy that paizo designs their APs around? Isn't it 15.

Supposedly yes the monsters are designed for four characters using the 15 point buy. That is "standard" mode. 20 point buy is "easy mode". 10 point buy is "hard mode".

I have yet to see how the 10 point buy has screwed people over either. I think people take things way too seriously and, it being the internet, exaggerate and blow things way out of proportion.

The difference between a 10 point and a 15 point buy character is two or so stats with a +1 mod difference. Same with 15 point compared to 20 point.

Catastrophic epic screwing of PCs over there lol.

If you need 20 point buy, then play in a group that does 20 point buy. If you like 50 point buy, play in a group that does 50 point buy (note this is not directed at anyone in particular, this is just general)

People who launch themselves on others for not playing like they do and go nerd-rage on them are their own special breed.

Just because your group is fine with it doesn't make it right for everyone, auticus. Sorry, but them's the facts.

That doesn't warrant attacking someone verbally for it does it? I'm not trying to push it on anyone else. I was sharing what we use.

Thalin wrote:

I can understand that; you're a GM trying to create a fantastic world and spending a LOT of time putting it together. You want to know the players so they feel more connected. I always request bios; but sometimes players are lazy, and it makes me feel cheated after all of my hard work that they won't even write a basic background. So I think it's the perfect encouragement; really you can look at it as a 15-point buy world where if you're too lazy to even do a little background setup for your character you are penalized 5 points.

Sorry, reading stuff like this always makes me angry. Some players may have a time-consuming job and a family - they may have a hard time keeping that one evening free every other week.

I think if something like this makes you "angry" you need to look into some assistance at getting some of that negative energy off your chset.

A particular group's playstyle or house rules should never make someone "angry".

I have a group that is perfectly fine with this.

If you don't like this particular set of house-rules, keep on doing what you're doing and play with a group that doesn't use them.

Getting "angry" over what my group uses is silly. I was sharing what my group does in a group setting, not trying to force you to use my rules nor was I even inferring that my way is superior to your way or belittling you for how you play.

auticus wrote:

Yeah. Really. I prefer low-heroic games.

I did not mean that, but the fact that you penalize players who do not put a character bio with at least 1000 words on paper (do you actually count the words?).

It's not a penalty. Everyone starts at 10-point buy. You get rewarded for putting in extra effort. Just like you get bonus xp for putting in extra effort. Don't put the effort in, you don't get the extra stuff. It's a choice.

Counting words in a document is as easy as copy/paste and having word tell you how many words it is. I'm a professional writer... 1000 words is a handful of paragraphs.

I don't buy in to th e"you're penalizing me" mantra. That's like me telling my boss I feel I am being penalized because a coworker got a raise for putting in extra effort and I feel entitled to a raise too even though I didn't do anything extra to warrant it.

Ah. This debate has raged forever.

* Min/Maxing, Powergaming, Twinking, Munchkining... these all basically revolve around a player making their character really really really good at one thing (usually combat). It is of itself not bad nor does it make someone "not a roleplayer".

You can, and in fact many do, be an excellent roleplayer, and still twink your character to the nth degree.

* Sitting in a group and looking down your nose at another player for not optimizing their character, or not choosing what you think they should choose, and detracting from the group overall with negative comments is asshattery of the highest calibre. I've dealt with a couple of players that did this, and they were eventually phased out of the group.

* RPG groups take many forms. Some are highly optimized. Some are lower fantasy. Others are a mixed bag.

In my experience, the best groups are predominantly one style or the other. Mixing makes things difficult.

If a group has four players who love RP, and two players who get bored whenever they aren't beating things down and fall asleep at the table, we have a disconnect in party dynamics.

If a group has four players, and two twink their characters out, and the other two only make normal characters, there are going to be issues with the encounters. Either the encounters are going to be too easy because the twink characters can deal with them without effort, OR the encounters will be too hard because the normal characters cannot deal with the monsters that had to be upgraded to deal with the twink characters.

As such, I strive to make sure that the same overall theme is adhered to at my group. My games are low-magic and discourage super optimized characters.

My players take some good things, but don't go overboard with it, because ahead of time I have asked them not to, and they know that I can min/max monsters with the best of them which hurts the party that has players that don't min/max.

It's a team effort.

However, RPGing is not professional sports.

The problem arises when you mix people of different mentalities who will not budge on their stance one way or the other. This causes negative emotions and bitterness overall.

My suggestion is to make sure your group fits each other.

To the OP, you can roleplay just as well if you are a power gamer or a person who just makes normal characters with weaknesses.

I think this group needs to disband. There seem to be a lot of issues. I think I've read something similar in Knights of the Dinner Table, though that is supposed to be satire.

If I was the DM of this group, said weapon would implode. Arguing over items is silly. Period. It's supposed to be a game. A time to relax, hang out with friends, and tell stories and roll some dice.

Sometimes it's about being the bigger person. There seems to be a lot of negative pent up energy over something that could have been resolved a while ago. Instead... both parties dig their heels in and fight and won't give in.

A trend I've noticed over the past few years is how soft games have gotten. By soft I mean that many players come in with the expectation that their characters aren't really going to die, no matter what inane or stupid things that they pull, because any "good GM" is going to pull strings to keep them up. If their characters do die, they see that as the fault of the GM and that it's "bad GMing" because after all, they were only roleplaying their character.

I've noticed a lot of GMs supporting this style of play (I'm officially saying right here that I'm not saying that this style of play is bad or wrong, only that it's a newish trend in games and one that I don't particularly enjoy, but that doesn't make it bad), and in the last game I participated in as a player, I noticed that when my character would get close to death, the GM would start fudging rolls and having monsters ignore me.

I literally had to actively *try* to get killed for it to happen. In reading message boards on the webz, I've seen this particular style of play has grown very much in popularity, to mirror how many video games are now crafted (where character death is discouraged).

I have had a couple negative experiences with players dying and freaking out at the table about it in the past couple years, mainly with 4e. I had a guy playing a paladin who instructed his party members to attack the creatures that were really good at hitting AC (they had low AC) and he was hitting a creature really good at hitting REFLEX (he had a low REF). The end result was a party-wipe due to bad tactics, to which he slammed his fists into the table and went into a tirade about bad DMs.

I had a guy playing a barbarian who raged and then sprinted a good 100 feet away from the party, kicking a door down, rushing blindly into a room swinging away and then as he was the only one in the room, the monsters in the room converged on him and killed him (the party was still far down the hall), to which he raged in real life about what a poor DM that was to have punished him for roleplaying his character.

Recently I had another barbarian player (3.5/PF) rage and go running off into the woods alone and away from the party, setting off traps and injuring himself and then ending up dead smack in the middle of a bandit camp, far away from support or healing, where he was hacked down as he was the only target at that point as the rest of the party was gathered across the map still (they have since bought a collar and leash for that character). He did not rage or go into a frothing rant about bad DMs, but he was annoyed that he was allowed to be attacked by so many bandits and had to spend the fight lying in a pool of his own blood, when he was simply "roleplaying his character".

So this brings me to the point of the thread, which is my opinion followed up by what do you think...

"Roleplaying my character" it seems has become synonomous with "I want to do stupid things and because my character is prone to stupid things, you should let me do them without being subject to death for my stupid actions".

I play my monsters as I feel they would operate tactically. Stupid things, dumb undead, animals,... they have no tactics. They either fight whatever is closest, or flee.

Smarter enemies are going to employ some tactics, and when a berzerking barbarian lands in their midst alone and outnumbered 9:1, it seems unlikely that they are just going to stroll away and ignore him so that he can use his beat stick on their skulls at leisure.

Granted if a berzerking half orc barbarian came sprinting into a kobold lair or a goblin lair and there were only a handful of them in the room, I'd allow an intimidate check to set them fleeing, but then none of the players above thought to do that anyway.

This is kind of similar to how certain min/max players get angry when they make a min/max character, and then their min traits are exploited, using the "bad DM" button to describe anyone who attacks where they are weakest as if their max traits should be the only things that matter in the game.

So then, how do you handle this scenario, both as a player or as a GM? Interested to see others' take.