Yeah, right.
How 'bout this: D&D Insider is going to cost more than a Dungeon subscription, despite that fact that WotC has eliminated much of the overhead of hardcopy-publishing. And so far, dosn't seem to be spending much on artwork either (though the Drelzna pic looks cool).
And this: why is the most successful Living Campaign to date (i.e. Living Greyhawk) being terminated?
And this: what is the.... aaahh, forget it >=(
Check out Dungeon 151 if you don't know what the thread title means :/
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The entire piece has also been posted on this thread for those who don't want to soil themselves by going to the WotC website.
The entire piece has also been posted on this thread for those who don't want to soil themselves by going to the WotC website.
They'll soil themselves no matter where they read it.
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They'll soil themselves no matter where they read it.
Well said. I was so disgusted by the "roll vs buy" portion, I posted about it in the Insults thread.
Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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I wanted to post a complaint on the WotC boards about both the Save My Game article and the Confessions article, but they've changed their login procedure for the messageboards and my old info doesn't work. Maybe they don't want us complaining.
When you try to log in, you should see a link that says something like "migrate my account.". Click that. They are moving everything to *shudder* gleemax.
They are moving everything to *shudder* gleemax.
ugg
it is convoluted toothey don't like making things simple or obvious either
I dont have high hopes for things to come
I'm Stephen. I write adventures :)
I am a fool and I laugh at your misfortune. Tea anyone?
Thanks. The Pity Tank was a little low this morning.
I'm Stephen. I write adventures :)
A much better tagline, O Slimey One. :)
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I wanted to post a complaint on the WotC boards about both the Save My Game article and the Confessions article, but they've changed their login procedure for the messageboards and my old info doesn't work. Maybe they don't want us complaining.When you try to log in, you should see a link that says something like "migrate my account.". Click that. They are moving everything to *shudder* gleemax.
Thanks for the info. Although now I'm debating whether I really want access to those messageboards.
Although now I'm debating whether I really want access to those messageboards.
Do it. Come on. All your friends are doing it.
Thanks for the info. Although now I'm debating whether I really want access to those messageboards.I wanted to post a complaint on the WotC boards about both the Save My Game article and the Confessions article, but they've changed their login procedure for the messageboards and my old info doesn't work. Maybe they don't want us complaining.When you try to log in, you should see a link that says something like "migrate my account.". Click that. They are moving everything to *shudder* gleemax.
Don't do it man. You'll only make yourself upset for nothing. Let it go. I'm as fed up as you are. But it's best to just let it go.
I had a good chuckle at the suggestion of point buy stats. I think this guy just got back from a good ol' flaming Roll v. Point Buy thread and decided to vent while writing this article.
Let it go. I'm as fed up as you are. But it's best to just let it go.
That is exactly the kind of 'rational thinking' that will lead to purchasing 4.5 when it comes out.
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So... I've avoided going over there (you know where I mean). I kept hearing about how horrible it was, and didn't want the drama.
Then, I thought to myself "Self," that's what I call myself, "maybe it's not that bad."
So I went.
He's Steven, and he solves my need to look any further at Dungeon or Dragon online.
Condescending git.
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I had a good chuckle at the suggestion of point buy stats. I think this guy just got back from a good ol' flaming Roll v. Point Buy thread and decided to vent while writing this article.
In the author's defense, the use of point buy most certainly would solve the problem he was addressing. I have a similar situation in my games, and may just take that piece of advice when we start a new campaign.
I think the tone of the article translated badly because we're all very sensitive about the changes to our game and the magazines right now. He was trying to establish his credentials to handle a column like this, but to many it probably sounded like bragging.
Anyway, it may not be the meatiest column, but it is not without merit. Since the magazine no longer has to worry about page counts, a DM advice column seems like a nice addition.
What are the advantages of random roll over point buy?
What are the advantages of random roll over point buy?
Rolling dice is fun!
Although now I'm debating whether I really want access to those messageboards.Do it. Come on. All your friends are doing it.
Yeah common, I hear all the cool kids at WotC are doing it. Common you wanna cool don't yah?
When my group has to roll up a new character, we get another player or the DM to witness our rolls. 4d6, pick the best 3. If it sucks, do it again. If it's Harnmaster or Hackmaster it's 3d6 and suck it up, princess!
I prefer characters that are slightly higher on the attribute scale in the game I run. As a result, I use the following method - Two numbers are generated with a straight 3d6 roll, two numbers are generated on 2d6+6, and two numbers are generated by rolling 1d6+12. The attributes are then placed as the player wants.
What are the advantages of random roll over point buy?
Rolling avoids the "cookie cutter syndrome" that some people think point buy creates: all evens stats, roughly the same stats for every character, no low stats to add "roleplayability" to your character, etc.
I'm Stephen. I write adventures :)
A much better tagline, O Slimey One. :)
At least that Stephen (SG) is telling the truth :/
What are the advantages of random roll over point buy?
Dice (4d6, drop 1) roll higher on average than standard point buy (of 25), at about 30, or actually close to 31 if you include the automatic reroll if total stat mods are under +2. However they don't roll "even" stats, so Point-buy has a nice advantage there.
I think standard 25, or challenging 28 (I think?) is about equivalent, depending on how much you value not having a chance of rolling rather low.
(E.g. 25 point buy:
9, 10, 12, 14, 14, 14 = +6 total
vs. 31 "point-buy" equivalent that could be rolled:
9, 9, 13, 15, 15, 15 = +5 total)
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What are the advantages of random roll over point buy?Rolling avoids the "cookie cutter syndrome" that some people think point buy creates: all evens stats, roughly the same stats for every character, no low stats to add "roleplayability" to your character, etc.
I don't know if I would call that an 'advantage'.
This has been dealt with MANY times on other threads. We do 'point buy' all the time and I have never seen two of any one class with the same stats. (And mathematically speaking -- it's better to have at least one if not two stats with odd stats that you would intend to increase at the 4th levels.) What I have seen with rolling stats is that with everyone's different rules on rolling (roll 4d6 reroll 1s seems to be fairly common), people tend to get more powerful characters than they would get with a point buy -- but that isn't even a guarantee.
Truthfully, I don't think that there is or ever will be truly an 'advantage' of one over the other. It usually ends up being the difference of whether you want to be surprised with what your character can do or if you want to determine what your character can do.
Random rolls can produce characters with interesting quirks. One of my favorite characters was a 1st Edition paladin who had the bizarre good fortune to have an 18 Intelligence (Rolled on three dice, each assigned to one ability score, with a +2 bonus given to two primary stats). If I were assigning the characteristics, there's no way that I would have come up with a supergenius paladin, the points just aren't there.
Even a character with surprisingly low scores can be amusing. One of my favorite PCs ("Gek the Incompetent") had an Intelligence of 14: The rest of his ability scores were below average. He was still a blast to play.
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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Court Fool, you asked, "What are the advantages of random roll over point buy?"
It depends on the point-buy scale. I've seen a lot of variations off the "one stat-point costs one buy-point" model, usually with very high stat modifiers being very costly.
To me, there's a certain excitement in playing a character with some aspects I didn't personally choose. That, from beginning to end, is why I like rolling up characters.
(I'm still a fan of the 27-dice assignment I described once on these boards: assign 27 dice to your stats, at least three dice per stat, roll however many dice you've assigned to each stat, and take the best three.
So, if you wanted to play a wizard, and assigned:
STRENGTH 3d6
DEXTERITY 5d6
CONSTITUTION 5d6
INTELLIGENCE 8d6
WISDOM 3d6
CHARISMA 3d6
You're virtually guaranteed a great Intelligence score (median of 16, 5th percentile of 14) but you might have a great Strength and a stinky Charisma, or vice versa.)
You can 'roleplay' just as well with point buy. In fact, you get to decide (choice is always good) what you are going to 'roleplay'. Rolling crappy characters was never 'fun' for me.
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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You can 'roleplay' just as well with point buy. In fact, you get to decide (choice is always good) what you are going to 'roleplay'. Rolling crappy characters was never 'fun' for me.
You must love Warhammer's character generation system. ;-)
Random rolls in character generation are like random encounter tables. Do you really need a random encounter? Wouldn't it be better if you just planned the encounter and tailored it rather than rolling dice and coming up with something on the spot? Possibly, but there is something fun about throwing down the dice, seeing that there are displacer beasts wandering the plains, and then piecing together an explanation of why they are there and what they are doing.
Similarly, randomly rolled statistics create a set of facts around which you must build your character. Why does he have a 3 Str but a 14 Con? Is he cursed? Small? What happened? They also can help you decide between the many options available in D&D. If you don't have at least a 16, you probably won't be an effective straght caster, but if you have three 15's, you probably have a decent monk or paladin.
That's what I see as the appeal of random rolls - they fix some of the parameters of character generation. Some people find that limits inspires their creativity, while others just feel constrained by the arbitrariness. At the end of the day, I favor point buy myself, but I can understand the appeal of random rolls.
Some people find that limits inspires their creativity, while others just feel constrained by the arbitrariness.
Aha! Thank you for the insight, Sebastian. I always have a concept so it never occured to me that others might need some proding.
BLAAAARRRGGGHHHHH!!!!!
While I'm fond of point-buy, myself--I had the irresistible urge to punch this Stephen guy in the face while reading that.
Get in line. He evidently has quite a history as head of RPGA :/
Heh. Funny. After reading that last comment, I immediately envisioned the scene from Airplane! where everyone's lined up to beat down that hysterical passenger starting off with a simple slap across the face, to a slap-shake-slap combo, and panning down the line to people with brass knuckles, an iron bar, and other assorted weaponry. (Even the nuns were lined up to give her a beat down.)
Hmmm. That was a really long explanation of a thought that took all of .06 seconds to think. Weird.
I swear I think most of You are all just looking for things to find fault with at this point. Nothing that the author of that article wrote was necessarily ground-breaking but there was some worthwhile advice in there. I myself thought the notion of scripting a campaign in terms of seasons (rather than an endless soap opera) was actually a rather good idea as I've run into that problem before too.
Also, what's wrong with the guy stating his credentials and letting You know his background and how he intends to approach the column? I can see it now, if he'd just written an article with no preface then people would still be complaining wondering who-the-hell this guy thinks he is to go telling people what to do.
Get a grip [on an ale]!
I swear I think most of You are all just looking for things to find fault with at this point. Nothing that the author of that article wrote was necessarily ground-breaking but there was some worthwhile advice in there. I myself thought the notion of scripting a campaign in terms of seasons (rather than an endless soap opera) was actually a rather good idea as I've run into that problem before too.
Also, what's wrong with the guy stating his credentials and letting You know his background and how he intends to approach the column? I can see it now, if he'd just written an article with no preface then people would still be complaining wondering who-the-hell this guy thinks he is to go telling people what to do.
Get a grip [on an ale]!
QFT
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Wayfinder, PaizoCon Founder
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I swear I think most of You are all just looking for things to find fault with at this point. Nothing that the author of that article wrote was necessarily ground-breaking but there was some worthwhile advice in there. I myself thought the notion of scripting a campaign in terms of seasons (rather than an endless soap opera) was actually a rather good idea as I've run into that problem before too.
Also, what's wrong with the guy stating his credentials and letting You know his background and how he intends to approach the column? I can see it now, if he'd just written an article with no preface then people would still be complaining wondering who-the-hell this guy thinks he is to go telling people what to do.
Get a grip [on an ale]!
You know, this is almost precisely what I wrote last week for this thread...but then I deleted it. I had to take a step back, because it was sort of personal to me. I have gamed with Stephen in Jason Bulmahn's game for over 2 years. Before that, I met him at Norwescon, running the RPGA tables. To read all the comments about how he was bragging, how his "tone" was condescending...all these perceived slights, well, I realized that folks are so uptight about 4th ed. that any WotC staffer who puts themselves out there might as well have a great big bullseye on them!
It is equally apparent that many of you don't know, haven't met these WotC people. Therefore, you have no idea of their tone or intent when they write this stuff. There are comments that people think Mearls sounds "stuck up and full of himself" on the podcasts, and can't stand him. Judging a person on the sound of his voice??? We are better than that. Calm down, wait for the 4E stuff to come out, check it out, and make your decisions then.
Hear, hear!
It is equally apparent that many of you don't know, haven't met these WotC people. Therefore, you have no idea of their tone or intent when they write this stuff. There are comments that people think Mearls sounds "stuck up and full of himself" on the podcasts, and can't stand him. Judging a person on the sound of his voice??? We are better than that. Calm down, wait for the 4E stuff to come out, check it out, and make your decisions then.
You're right - we (naysayers) don't know them. All we can go by is what they tell us - since they don't interract with us.
All we can go by is the fact that they are rolling out a product line previously that only needed 3 core books that is now a rules subscription model.
All we can go by is the fact that they told us that if we don't like the change, too bad - it's coming anyway.
All we can go by is the fact that at the D&D experience, they knowingly allowed a misquote to circulate to give the idea that there would be no 4E D&D through 2008.
All we can go by is that they canceled print editions of Dragon and Dungeon magazine for reasons they won't completely provide (or that we agree with).
All we can go by is what they tell us and how they behave. You may like them and know them personally. We don't.
You may like many of the 4E changes that have been presented. We don't.
Personally, I think they're probably good people, but they are not taking my favorite game in a direction I like. And that pisses me off.
It is equally apparent that many of you don't know, haven't met these WotC people. Therefore, you have no idea of their tone or intent when they write this stuff. There are comments that people think Mearls sounds "stuck up and full of himself" on the podcasts, and can't stand him. Judging a person on the sound of his voice??? We are better than that. Calm down, wait for the 4E stuff to come out, check it out, and make your decisions then.
And its obvious that they haven't met us either or are in tune with anyone outside their home and work campaigns. Sorry dude, but you wayyyyyy off base here. Tone is apparent in both writing and voice.
I don't need to meet these people to know what they are up to or how they perceive themselves and I will not bow at their altar.
The following are examples of the professionalism of the WoTC staff so far:
4.0 release ad and presentation take on mocking tone toward established gamers and anyone with a brain
Living Greyhawk retired
Dragon and Dungeon magazine are cancelled
PHB release is pushed back (shocker!)
Content on the DnDInsider is sub par
Article after article insults long time gamers and insuates that they were too dumb to realize that the rules set they were using was garbage and that they've been playing with the "real" rules set all along in their uber home campaigns
Why would anyone be insulted? Need I say more.
4.DOH!