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Maybe not, but I can play one with the 3.0 or 3.5 PHB. That's right, one core rulebook to play one of simplest, most basic 3.0/3.5 archetypes. Since 4th edition is loosely being based on those games (and supposedly replacing them), that is the bar that they have to live up to, and they aren't doing a very good job.
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Yes you can - you just declare your Half-Orc Fighter or Cleric (it doesn't make much sense for a Thief or multi-class character) IS a Barbarian. You don't get anything special out of it (unless the DM house-rules something - or you pull out Unearthed Arcana) but you CAN...
So, that means there shouldn't be any more complaints about no barbarians in 4e right? ;D
unless one of the world supplements added them in, you could NEVER play a Half Orc in either system, and Barbarian required a Kit)
(LOL)
2nd edition introduced both Half-orcs and barbarians in later supplements.
I don't recall half-orcs in the classic game, but I do remember orcs being introduced.
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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No, but I can play one with the 3.0 or 3.5 PHB. That's right, one core rulebook to play one of simplest, most basic 3.0/3.5 archetypes. Since 4th edition is loosely being based on those games, that is the bar that they have to live up to.
But I can't play a warlock with that one core rulebook. Or an assassin. Why is the arbitrary choice to include a particular class/race in 3e binding on all future editions? Which edition has the complete list of all races/classes that must be included in every edition for it to be D&D? Is 2e even D&D because it doesn't have half-orcs or barbarians? I'm very confused...
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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It's very simple. A lot of us have the expectation that the classes and races in the 3.5 PHB are core, and shouldn't require extra books or subscriptions to have access to. That may not be the most rational expectation, but it's one many of us have, and it's being mostly ignored by WotC.
So you're angry that WotC is not listening to an irrational expectation held by some undefined number of people.
Huh.
Well, if that's your standard, myself and many of us expect that WotC come by my house and rub my feet while I read 4e. I'll be very angry if they ignore this expectation. I think Danger Dwarf could use a foot rub too.
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Okay, I seem to be failing to get my point across. It basically boils down to paying full price for a partial product. You wouldn't want to buy a car ,and then be told have to wait seveal weeks and pay extra for the radio, AC, and seatbelts. Sure, you could drive it, but you'd still feel like you were getting ripped off, and would most likely tell them what they could do with their car.
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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Okay, I seem to be failing to get my point across. It basically boils down to paying full price for a partial product. You wouldn't want to buy a car ,and then be told have to wait seveal weeks and pay extra for the radio, AC, and seatbelts. Sure, you could drive it, but you'd still feel like you were getting ripped off, and would most likely tell them what they could do with their car.
You're not so much failing at getting your point across as you are failing to appreciate the magnitude of the change and your overwhelming feelings regarding it. There are many examples of products changing over time, including the core rules, which have at various points included or not included the half-orc. Yet, you continue to insist the half-orc is somehow integral part of the game and unplayable without it. It's not. There's nothing you can say that will magically change that fact. The combat rules are an integral part of the game. The character creation rules are an integral part of the game. The races are not. If you want to go with the car analogy, we are talking about whether you opt to have the door handles match the color of the body.
If you want to feel ripped off, that's certainly your prerogative, but the claim that an element of the game that has appeared intermittently between the various editions is somehow an integral feature of the game is bullshit.
Edit: And, if you want to take the car analogy home to roost, we can play the "seatbelts are missing" game. Here are your choices: 1989 Ford Fiesta, with seatbelts or 2007 Mercedes Benz M-Class, no seat belts. Yeah, I'd sure get up in the face of the sap who wanted me to trade my Fiesta for the Mercedes. The analogy is not intended to suggest that 4e is to 3e what a Mercedes is to a Ford, but rather that there's a hell of a lot more to a car than seatbelts. Similarly, there's more to D&D than half-orcs.
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To each his own. Some of us have higher expectations of the new game than others. We'll have to agree to disagree. It's not some much leaving out things like the half-orc among other things. It just seems like they are intentionally leaving them out just to charge more for them later. That may not be true, but that's how it's coming across to me.
Okay, I seem to be failing to get my point across. It basically boils down to paying full price for a partial product. You wouldn't want to buy a car ,and then be told have to wait seveal weeks and pay extra for the radio, AC, and seatbelts. Sure, you could drive it, but you'd still feel like you were getting ripped off, and would most likely tell them what they could do with their car.
A better analogy:
Car Dealer: "This model comes standard with the latest GPS."
Customer: "The old model came with free maps in the glove compartment, this one better have that too!"
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Bella Sara Charter Superscriber
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To each his own. Some of us have higher expectations of the new game than others. We'll have to agree to disagree. It's not some much leaving out things like the half-orc among other things. It just seems like they are intentionally leaving them out just to charge more for them later. That may not be true, but that's how it's coming across to me.
Some of us have high expectations, we just don't exaggerate the importance of minor elements to the point where they eclipse the actual substance of the product. If I feel the new content (e.g., tieflings) is better than the old content (e.g., half-orcs), I should be happy.
I'm buying an rpg, not the complete guide to playable races. Different expectations apply.
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A better analogy would be:
Me: Does this car come with power steering (half-orc or druid, barbarian, etc.)
Car Dealer: No, but it does come with seat heaters (tiefling, dragonborn, warlord, etc.)
Me: I couldn't care less about seat heaters. Can I get it without the seat heaters, and get power steering for the same price?
Car Dealer: No. You'll have to wait two weeks and pay and extra 500 dollars for that.
Me: Forget it.
You generally pay for the extra options on cars too.
But cars always come with a working motor steering unit etc. etc.
I gladly trade my airco for a motor when they don't come standard.
I believe a half orc and gnome need to come standard and a thiefling/dragonborn is just an extra option for wich you pay extra
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Breaking the law is not always unethical unless the majority of people think it's wrong. Ethics of the people, morality of the individual.
If there is a law against it then the people have decided it to be unethical.
However, you'll have a hard time convincing everyone that downloading music through bit torrent is stealing. Otherwise, the music industry as we know it wouldn't be going down the drain, right now.
You are right, the music industry is in the decline because so many people are stealing their music.
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Breaking the law is not always unethical unless the majority of people think it's wrong. Ethics of the people, morality of the individual.If there is a law against it then the people have decided it to be unethical.
It might be better to say that "[some] people have decided it to be unethical." Considering the [lack of] participation of the "average man" in the political process its debatable whether political representatives are actually such.
Regardless, for better or for worse, the law is the law...
Until it gets changed...
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Yeah, we've got some serious threadjacking going on. Save the talk about illegal downloads for another thread please? Yes, it's stealing,and stealing is wrong. People are still going to do it because lots of people place their personal desires over ethics. I may not agree with core material being on subscription only DDI, but I still wouldn't stoop to using illegal downloads.
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Wow.
This thread is getting boring FAST.You're right. I say we go back to the more fun argument of whether Half-Orcs are catalytic converters and Elves come with full power train warranty.
Yeah, we've got some serious threadjacking going on. Save the talk about illegal downloads for another thread please? Yes, it's stealing,and stealing is wrong. People are still going to do it because lots of people place their personal desires over ethics. I may not agree with core material being on subscription only DDI, but I still wouldn't stoop to using illegal downloads.Whatever floats your boat, tiger.
Elves should come with a full power train warranty when you consider how long they live (or at least used to live).
...but I still wouldn't stoop to using illegal downloads.
How about other people's illegal downloads? :P
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...but I still wouldn't stoop to using illegal downloads.How about other people's illegal downloads? :P
Thats cool because then its not illegal because I had the book at one time but it spontaneously combusted during the solar eclipse. Plus, in the utopian disporia of the pseudo-stealiophile society of the once bitten twice shy sub-gynarchy of Woo the ethics of the populace are directly inverse of the moral ramifications of goat sucking. Most people incorrectly assume that the money that I could have had in place of the money that you should have given to me i worth the direct proportion to the fact that this thread has turned to a sleep inducing speal of magnanimous proportions which may or may not (maybe?) might have been interesting at one time.
Even though this thread has gone into the crapper:
If there is a law against it then the people have decided it to be unethical.
Ask the citizens of oppressive dictatorships or communist countries how much input they had in making the laws.
Just saying...
It has gotten to the point where they call WotC Nazis (because it seems that's how they are with D&D and it also rhymes, since they phoenetically say WotC).
Razz, no disrespect, but do you yourself work for WOTC?
The way you froth at the mouth and throw around words like "Nazi", you're really not making 3.5 players look good. Seriously, I wouldn't be surprised if people read your posts and think to themselves "Man, if that's the company I'll be keeping if I stay with 3.5 I might as well go and switch to 4.0."
Honestly, if you really like 3.5, and if you want others to keep playing that system, you're really not doing yourself any favors. I myself have no desire to switch to 4.0 but you've halfway convinced me to give it a chance.
You might wanna dial it down a notch.
I wasn't calling WotC Nazis in my post, I was stating how heated the situation has become at my hobby shop that the frequent visitors to the hobby shop, and the owner, all refer to WotC as Nazi.
Folks, please don't misinterpret my posts again. That is what starts the "let's hate on Razz" treatment I always get on message boards. Read my post again before you make wrong assumptions.
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Folks, please don't misinterpret my posts again. That is what starts the "let's hate on Razz" treatment I always get on message boards. Read my post again before you make wrong assumptions.[/b]
Then don't even go close to saying what you said.
And if you always get that treatment on message boards then maybe there is a trend you should pay attention to. I did and i moderated my posts on this one.
Right doc? IMHO :-)
I don't recall half-orcs in the classic game, but I do remember orcs being introduced.
That depends on what you mean by "classic".
AD&D (1st Ed.) had Half-Orcs...they were the only non-human race to earn a "U" in something other than Thief. Half-Orcs earned their "U" in Assassin.
They even had "Zarak" in the action figure line.
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I don't recall half-orcs in the classic game, but I do remember orcs being introduced.That depends on what you mean by "classic".
AD&D (1st Ed.) had Half-Orcs...they were the only non-human race to earn a "U" in something other than Thief. Half-Orcs earned their "U" in Assassin.
They even had "Zarak" in the action figure line.
Yeah, we dicused them in AD&D. By classic I was referring to OD&D.
[They even had "Zarak" in the action figure line.Hey, I've still got that guy in a box somewher ein my garage, along with some of the other D&D action figures. Classic!
I did a e-bay search on them, in the package they are worth some coin. Aberzombie you got some treasures.
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I did a e-bay search on them, in the package they are worth some coin. Aberzombie you got some treasures.[They even had "Zarak" in the action figure line.Hey, I've still got that guy in a box somewher ein my garage, along with some of the other D&D action figures. Classic!
Sweet! Money, money, money, money, money.......
It has gotten to the point where they call WotC Nazis (because it seems that's how they are with D&D and it also rhymes, since they phoenetically say WotC).
Funny how history repeats it self;
The company was the subject of an urban myth stating that it tried to trademark the term "Nazi". This was based on a supplement for the Indiana Jones RPG in which some figures were marked with "NAZI(tm)". This notation was in compliance with the list of trademarked character names supplied by Lucasfilm's legal department, specifically referring to a particular illustration of a Nazi on a cardboard game piece, which is legally trademarkable. (Marvel Comics also supplied a list of trademarked Marvel characters which included the term "NAZI(tm)".) Later references to the error would forget its origin and slowly morph into stories of TSR's trying to register such a trademark, possibly aided by TSR's own reputation late in its existence as a "trademark Nazi" company.|
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Folks, please don't misinterpret my posts again. That is what starts the "let's hate on Razz" treatment I always get on message boards. Read my post again before you make wrong assumptions.
I've read several of your posts Razz. I don't think people are making wrong assumptions or misinterpreting you:
where we have termed WotC as Nazi since they rhyme when you say WotC phoenetically).
And that is only counting posts in which you yourself made use of the term, not the numerous posts in which you use the nebulous "they".
So forgive me for not indulging you in your indignation.
EDIT: Fixed.
"let's hate on Razz"
Hate. Let me tell you how much I've come to hate you since I began to live. There are 387.44 million miles of wafer thin printed circuits that fill my complex. If the word hate was engraved on each nanoangstrom of those hundreds of millions of miles it would not equal one one-billionth of the hate I feel for humans at this micro-instant. For you. Hate. Hate.
Actually, I was the one that made the comment about the moderator nazis.
What can I say. It seemed appropriate at the time.Gah! You are correct. Dang you masked men.
Now I gotta go fix the above.
Yes?
But if a grognard is willing to pony up a couple of bucks to get the half-orc earlier than an 'advanced' splatbook release date, why wouldn't WotC supply what's in demand?And therein lies my objection. It would cost them nothing to provide a free download to appease lots of angry customers. Instead, they use it as a tactic to pull those customers into D&D Insider. Not only is this a little sleazy, but it adds insult to injury (given the sensibilities of the customers we're talking about).
And just because grognards are willing doesn't make it OK. This is an example of rather shameless extortion.
Extortion is an awfully strong word. WotC is offering a product. You can purchase it or not. You can continue using the old version that you already own if you so choose. This isn't food, water, or your firstborn child they're withholding.
I do have sympathy for the feeling. I didn't buy CDs because the cost to value ratio was completely wrong for me (why spend $15 for 2 songs?) I don't have cable because I won't pay $50-75 for a dozen channels when I only consume maybe 5 hours of tv per week. I like that technology now allows me to buy music ala carte; I hope someday cable will be the same way, but it's really hard for me to say that it is inherently wrong to bundle products in this way or that I am being cheated.
Would it be a better PR move for WotC if they released those pieces of 3e that won't make it to 4e for free? Hell yeah. Has WotC demonstrated any willingness to employ good PR? Unfortunately not. Do you have a right to free content? Not really.
If you find that the phb's value is impaired below its cost due to the lack of the half-orc, I would recommend not purchasing it.
Broadcast TV will be illegal next year. You should get a satilite dish. Dish or cable TV programs will no longer be free.
That's extortion.