Did I mention that I really miss chain shirts?
How can they leave those out?
If it's good enough for frodo, it's good enough for me. And with those fabulous magical keebler diamonds they have now, you could buy one that's "worth more than the whole shire and everything in it".
Someone who is highly intelligent can analyze an opponent, his environment, and properly calculate when an attack will come, at what angle, and where to move to dodge it or most of it.No, that doesn't work for me. Because if you go that route, a highly intelligent person can end up over thinking it and making matters worse.
Yes, a similar argument could be made about reflexes (Dexterity), but reflexes tend to be much more accurate. I know my reflexes vastly improve when my mind can't interfere - either through sleep deprivation or alcohol. (And I am not even classifying myself as highly intelligent.)
Hence, why, by the default a character uses Dex. for his AC. Not Intelligence. The ones that use Intelligence are, I believe, the ones who specifically spent years training themselves to battle in that type of method (aka Duelists, for example).
An intelligent person can train themselves to not overthink things. Then again, you can always rule that the enemy "successfully hit" the character because they were overthinking a particular part of the situation they were in.
It's all abstract. That's the fun of D&D (or, was the fun, 4E is making it all numbers now). DMs need to learn to creatively express it somehow without resorting to sliding it over into the realm of ignorance.
Ah 4E the game where you are smart enough to outsmart a bullet.
Again, abstract really. Prime example, Vamp from Metal Gear 2: Sons of Liberty. He was somehow dodging bullets, not just with speed, but Intelligence.
How?
He specifically states he was able to read Raiden's movements in his muscles, form, and other physical mannerisms. Thus, he was able to tell when Raiden would shoot, where he would shoot, and so on.
Assuming non-PCs actually get gear now.
[sarcasm]
Who cares if monsters/NPCs actually use gear? It's not important to the encounter stats. It only matters what their "drop list" consists of.[/sarcasm]
I'm hoping it's not that bad, but 4e keeps sounding more like Final Fantasy than D&D.
Without thinking about it for more than 10 seconds, I could come up with 10 solutions that would have been better. And most of those 10 solutions really stink, I freely admit that.I'd like to see your list of ten things that would be better than astral diamonds.
I'll give you that it's not the most amazing name in the world, but the idea of a portable, highly valuable monetary unit certainly does away with one of D&D's longtime absurdities.
There already was a way.
Bag of Holding.
Nothing wrong with that. The problem is, does every D&D game have to involve treasure hoards? No. It's been specifically stated many times that rewards don't have to come in gold pieces. Magic items, art objects, gems, literary art, statues, a castle, a town, a building, a rare type of stone mined from a dangerous region, title, whatever.
But most D&D games do involve treasure hoards. Fine. But, what is more important to a D&D experience?
It boils down to two types of people. Those that Roll Play and those that Role Play.
Roll Player people don't want to worry about how that treasure is transported and would rather have it put into some kind of faux "credit" system like video games. Final Fantasy games, for example. You have 50 million gil, but not very many people think how the hell am I even carrying that much gil? If a person does ask that, then they have the potential to be a great roleplayer.
Role Players do ask. How do we haul the ancient treasure hoard of Smaug the Mighty Red Dragon? Do we pay for hirelings and bodyguards, hitch wagons and do it ourselves, or is there a magical way to do it? (Wizard, help us with a magical way...oh, you can enchant a bag to store massive amounts of items in an extradimensional space, cool!).
What WotC should've done was give monetary values of those abstract things to grant players. Or guidelines, at least. They didn't of course. We now get MMORPG styled currencies, unfortunately.
WotC wants to attract more "MMORPG gamers" because there's over 9 million of them out there (much more if you go beyond WoW) to play D&D. Because many MMORPG players don't concern themselves with those "trivial" questions and care about the "phat lewt", here comes the introduction of Astral Diamonds.
It's a sad state of affairs what this great pastime is becoming. A slave to corporate greed.
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For those having problems with Intelligence helping with the increase to AC, I have to agree with it. Someone who is highly intelligent can analyze an opponent, his environment, and properly calculate when an attack will come, at what angle, and where to move to dodge it or most of it. If you're standing by a wooden beam inside a tavern brawl and an enemy swings wide at you. Your Intelligence would indicate that at the angle the enemy is swinging towards you, if you leaned your upper body towards and behind the beam, it will hit the beam and miss you mostly or entirely.
Whereas your Dexterity alone would simply react physically by dropping low to the floor without dropping on the ground to avoid the attack and beating the attack with pure speed and not any reason at all.
End result, Intelligence bonus to AC is perfectly ok for AC if you can describe how it happens in the first place.
Yo, Razz!
You just defended 4E!
You know, it's only a matter of time before you convert...?
;P
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Are you going to argue, with a straight face, that the bag of holding was a good idea?
It's a great idea!
Now whether it is realistic or desirable for every campaign to feature extra dimensional spaces packed into every character's back-pack and sack is another question.
But if a magical society could create bags of holding at a reasonable rate, I bet you that they would sell like hotcakes.
The bag of holding has always been something to reduce the overall "work" of the game.
Like having create food/water spells and magic light sources that never run out, the bag of holding helps people ignore the little things and continue playing the game.
Generally it starts with starting to ignore light sources, as its the cheapest thing, and then moves on to encumbrance.
Stuff.
Or more accurately, people who play the game how you think it should, and people who have fun in a different (yet still legitimate) way.
I get bags of holding because I dont want to deal with the trivial issues of where/how I am carrying whatever it is I am carrying. I tend not to laden my character down with lots of gear, but when I play arcane casters its nice to have a handy place to store an alchemist's lab, tons of books for reference, or in the case of a dread necromancer an umber hulk zombie.
As soon as my group can, everyone tends to pool resources to get that box thing in Miniatures Handbook that creates a crapload of food so that we can ignore the whole food-resource bit (if necessary, the cleric can fill in the rest).
It helps reduce the book keeping on food, water, weight, and lighting so that we can move on to the funner aspects of the game.
The game is now being reimagined by people who haven't played it as long as I have, and they *insist* that 3E is unplayable, boring and / or slow, despite having, in some cases, gotten their start in the industry working under the people who designed it, and then got laid off and replaced by this new generation.
I have to agree. I find it paradoxical to say that 3E is so bad that 4E is a must-buy. If 3rd edition had been so terrible, I'd still be playing 2nd edition AD&D. Personally, most of the "bad" things they're changing, I've never really had a problem with. Then again, I'm absolutely against the one game-killer that a vast majority of people on the WotC boards tout as their sacred cow: game balance.
When taken to its ultimate conclusion, all "game balance" does is institute stupid rules to ensure an artificial equality between characters and races that I don't think makes for a good game.
Game Balance is up more to the DM than the rules. I have banned several classes (frenzied berserker) in the name of game balance. And an "astral diamond' sounds like a quest item from a 3rd rate RPG.
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He specifically states he was able to read Raiden's movements in his muscles, form, and other physical mannerisms. Thus, he was able to tell when Raiden would shoot, where he would shoot, and so on.
Right. You seem to be indicating that using Int for AC should be specialized (ie- duelist).
I know I agree with that statement and I imagine most people wouldn't have a problem with what you are saying.
I truly don't like the idea of the uber-smart wizard with his +5 bonus having a greater benefit than the rogue with his +4 bonus when the wizard remains untrained in most of the arts of war, as far we can tell. The rogue might still have the greater AC because of armor usage. I just can't see why the wizard should be more adept at getting out the way than the highly trained rogue.
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Without thinking about it for more than 10 seconds, I could come up with 10 solutions that would have been better. And most of those 10 solutions really stink, I freely admit that.I'd like to see your list of ten things that would be better than astral diamonds. In my home campaign, I started to introduce higher values of currency as my players got to higher levels and started needing more treasure, so if you've got some ideas I would love to hear them.
I'll give you that it's not the most amazing name in the world, but the idea of a portable, highly valuable monetary unit certainly does away with one of D&D's longtime absurdities.
I guess it really matters on where the treasure comes from. I often use Notes of Credit (checks) issued by guilds or nobles as rewards to replace hard coinage. But then I tend to assume my campaigns have organizations who utilize a primitive form of banking and that such "paper money" has some form of formal backing. Usually the characters will cash them in if they can (ie- currently in a large city) but many merchants will accept them knowing once the characters sign them over they will get their cash.Often these notes have all sorts of minor magic on them to prevent forging and the like.
Its easy and it isn't too much of a stretch for a high medieval-esque setting with sophisticated magic. Heck, it wasn't too much of stretch historically so you have a lot more leeway with a fantasy setting. But I can understand if it might not work for you.
By the way, this site has some interesting info on Medieval banking.
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Assuming non-PCs actually get gear now.[sarcasm] Who cares if monsters/NPCs actually use gear? It's not important to the encounter stats. It only matters what their "drop list" consists of. [/sarcasm]
Monsters don't have to have any 'loot' or gear at all. They've already said that PCs get gear and money by level. Ding. Level 5, and no matter what you've found, you have the same equipment value as every other level 5 character.
Hopefully the level-up animation is cool. A 'ding' noise is so old-school.
Then again, I'm absolutely against the one game-killer that a vast majority of people on the WotC boards tout as their sacred cow: game balance.
When taken to its ultimate conclusion, all "game balance" does is institute stupid rules to ensure an artificial equality between characters and races that I don't think makes for a good game.
I prefer a kind of balance, but I definitely prefer for different classes to appeal to different sorts of players. If I want to play the resource management game and have strategic and tactical choices to make in each session, I can play a 3.5 Wizard, but if I want steady damage, I can play the 3.5 Warlock or a Fighter, and if I want situational 'spike' damage, I can go with a Rogue. Every single class doesn't need to be tuned to work the same as every other class, just with variant power sources. The game, IMO, should appeal to a wider selection of players than that.
I'd like to see your list of ten things that would be better than astral diamonds. In my home campaign, I started to introduce higher values of currency as my players got to higher levels and started needing more treasure, so if you've got some ideas I would love to hear them.
- Gems. Regular ones. Not "magical keebler diamonds from the astral plane". In fact, that's one I often use: Gems are used as currency by adventurers and rich people.
I went as far as keeping the exact nature of the gems off screen (mainly because the players weren't that much interested in such details). There were simply divided into fixed values. 10gp, 50gp, 100gp, 500gp, 1000gp.
As I said, I kept it mostly off-screen, but you could easily say that the gemcutters had their guidelines for cutting gems of different sorts in different ways to create a sort of currency that was generally accepted to have a certain value.
If you want a list of what types of gems would have what value, you're actually going to find it in the SRC!
Just ignore the dice and use average.
(Okay, that wasn't really part of the 10-second-lousy-but-still-better-than-astral-diamonds-list)
- Mithral (bad idea because more useful in weapons and armour)
- Adamantine (bad idea because see mithral)
- Magic Weapons (come one, people are always joking that they're so very common, can as well use them as currency. As someone has said before: even a +2 weapon is worth a human's weight in gold)
- Scrolls. (Now that's paper money. Quite forgery-proof as well. And comes in several levels, uh, I mean, denominations, of course. And talk about casting away all your money!)
- Dungeon Shares. Tradeable at the stock exchange, and the more shares you have, the more influence you have at what sort of monster they put in there
- Spice. Either spices or actual Spice, like in Dune.
- Blood. Not necessarily human blood. Blood of outsiders. Deva Blood is 10gp the ounce, Planetar Blood 100, Solar Blood 1000. Similar stuff exists for all manner of outsiders (Slaadi Blood has variable value, of course, mainly because an ounce today will be a quart tomorrow. Chaos!)
- Favours. A bit like IOUs or shares.
- Rupees. Like in Zelda. Green is 1, Blue is 5, Red is 10, and so on. Colour-coded for your convenience. If we catch you with paint, you're going to drink it!
- Metals! Why stop with Copper, Silver, Gold, Platinum? There's so many precious metals out there: Palladium, Iridium, Rhodium, Rhuthenium...
I'll give you that it's not the most amazing name in the world, but the idea of a portable, highly valuable monetary unit certainly does away with one of D&D's longtime absurdities.
Don't get me wrong: The idea of "bigger coins" isn't bad at all. And not really that new to D&D. Just look at "my" gem idea above. That's in the SRD. And has been used in D&D for as long as I know the game. I guess that's why they didn't use it. It was part of D&D's history, and hence not cool enough.
The thing I have a problem with is "astral diamonds" which sound paragon-level corny.
He specifically states he was able to read Raiden's movements in his muscles, form, and other physical mannerisms. Thus, he was able to tell when Raiden would shoot, where he would shoot, and so on.
That sounds as much like wisdom (which is the D&D notice attribute) as it sounds like intelligence.
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Don't get me wrong: The idea of "bigger coins" isn't bad at all. And not really that new to D&D.
I'll give you that it's not the most amazing name in the world, but the idea of a portable, highly valuable monetary unit certainly does away with one of D&D's longtime absurdities.
Trade bars, introduced back in 1st edition, along with the Drow. Both mithril and adamatine trade bars existed. The only 'longtime absurdity' is that the younger game designers don't seem to know that it hasn't been an issue for a couple of decades.
Gary Gygax fixed that issue long before they decided to come up with astral diamonds.
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Don't get me wrong: The idea of "bigger coins" isn't bad at all. And not really that new to D&D.
I'll give you that it's not the most amazing name in the world, but the idea of a portable, highly valuable monetary unit certainly does away with one of D&D's longtime absurdities.Trade bars, introduced back in 1st edition, along with the Drow. Both mithril and adamatine trade bars existed. The only 'longtime absurdity' is that the younger game designers don't seem to know that it hasn't been an issue for a couple of decades.
Gary Gygax fixed that issue long before they decided to come up with astral diamonds.
Ah yes....I love trade bars as well. I use them often in hoards or the like. Yet another reasonable way of handling big currency.
That sounds as much like wisdom (which is the D&D notice attribute) as it sounds like intelligence.
Exactly, like Monks.
Hence, why, by the default a character uses Dex. for his AC. Not Intelligence. The ones that use Intelligence are, I believe, the ones who specifically spent years training themselves to battle in that type of method (aka Duelists, for example).
That explanation would work for me, if it was what the rules say, but this is not the case. The rules (as scanned from a page of the PHB) indicate that they add either their Dexterity modifier or their Intelligence modifier, whichever is higher. There's no condition about having some kind of extensive training, it's just a matter of comparing two values and taking the highest one.
I can see that duellists use Intelligence to increase their AC but then again - if I remember well - if they are level 1 duellists, they can only add +1 from their Intelligence; +2 if they are level 2 duellists, and so on. That rules clearly shows that they have to practice using Intelligence to avoid blows (by reading the enemies' movements, by studying the exact trajectories of projectiles and weapons, whatever).
The same thing holds for Wisdom and monks: they too are limited in how much of their Wisdom modifier they can add to AC, and this is capped by their training/level.
But this 4E rule has no restriction of the kind, which means that high-Intelligence wizards get a good AC for free? That does not really fit well with the image of wizards spending most of their time studying dusty tomes and practicing their arcane trade. Worse, it means that the 14-Dex 18-Int wizard is much better at avoiding incoming blows than the 14-Dex 10-Int fighter who has spent most of his life training to hit people while at the same avoiding to be hit by them?
Sure, from a mechanical point of view, it works well to give wizards a good AC and thus "make the math work". But I expect more from a roleplaying game than just having "the math work".
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I'd like to see your list of ten things that would be better than astral diamonds.
Sure. The problem is that higher end magical items have costs which are so massive in terms of weights of gold that no one can possibly afford the higher level equipment that they are actually supposed to purchase. Here are, off the top of my head, ten potential solutions to this:
- Portable Holes. By giving everyone near instantaneous access to what is essentially a treasure room, people can actually claim giant gold statues and ivory herons and such. And then they can trade those back and forth in a reasonable amount of time.
- Remove the Magic Mart. If we go back to the AD&D standard where you couldn't purchase magic items, and you were therefore not expected to do so, the problem is gone. You can have dragon hordes of millions of gold pieces, piles of copper and fountains of rubies. And it can be used to hire goblins to stand on the towers of your castle and put fancy rugs on the walls of said castle, and it can't be used to get an additional +1 to your to-hit score. So the problem is solved. If people just want to stab demons they don't have to pick up the treasure at all, and people who want to swim in their money bin can do so.
- Non Convertible Currency We throw in something like an Astral Diamond but with a cooler name. Maybe we use Dragon Shards. Point is, the exchange rate of Gold to Dragon Shard is set at "not a chance in hell." Then you have the magic economy set in that currency so that the piles of gold don't have to be intractably large and yet they still can be without breaking the game.
- Bank Notes We just accept that a +2 Sword costs 167 pounds of gold. And then... we keep the gold in big keeps and we conduct our actual trade with checks. We trade the ownership of giant piles of gold which are kept in vaults back and forth. And then the currency of the powerful is measured in little pieces of velum and we still get to loot orcish treasuries with Santa Sacks and fill wagons with the hoards of mighty dragons.
- Barter Give magic items no fixed value and just trade them like baseball cards. Make people think about how much an Amulet of Turning is worth to them.
- A Rainbow of Flavors Bring back the old gem/jewelry system. Heck, it was never actually gone because it still appeared in the 3rd edition DMG. But actually use it. Don't hand out thousands of gold pieces. Hand out various gems worth thousands of gold pieces. As long as people are throwing around amethysts and sapphires and tourmaline earrings, the thrill of treasure discovery will still be there.
- Approved by the Sultan Bring in the Wish Economy as official serious business. Have the City of Brass issue letters of credit redeemable for assistance from the Lords of Fire. These have real value to powerful people and they can trade them back and forth. Kind of like the Stone of Jordan economy from Diablo II.
- Raw Power Liquid Pain, Human Souls, Raw Chaos, Larvae... the D&D world has a lot of crap in it that you can use to fashion magic items for cheap or free. If you just use these power sources directly as currency you can imagine people trading them back and forth for powerful magic items. Like, you give a Wizard power components sufficient to make a Staff of Power with some left over and he gives you a Staff of Power. He trades his time and expertise for your power components. Alternately, you trade someone a pile of power components for a magic item that he doesn't necessarily want. You get something you can use, and he gets something which is fungible into something he wants.
- Miniaturize Currency D&D coins are Heug Like XBox! Drop them in size. A lot. A .01 Euro coin is a quarter the mass of a copper piece. You could seriously ramp down mass inflation severely by just making coins lighter. We don't deal with the crappy old AD&D coins that are 1/10th of a pound, why don't we have coins that are 400 to the kilogram?
- Deflate Currency The D&D Copper Piece is pretty much worthless to an average adventurer. Why? It's the standard of exchange in the campaign world, why not make it valuable? If people were seriously given their basic equipment in Copper Pieces and a piece of Silver was a big deal, and a piece of Gold was an even bigger deal, then you could purchase stuff with actually portable amounts of currency. Imagine for the moment that currency was pretty much the same only the masterwork/magic item costs were written in copper instead of gold. Suddenly you could plausibly purchase a +2 sword for less than two pounds of gold. That's actually plausible. And when you eventually get to the Epic levels where you are paying with hundreds of pounds of gold anyway you already have a celestial rhinoceros mount to carry it for you and that's OK.
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Boom. Top of my head. Ten answers. Any one of them would be more satisfying than what they did.
-Frank
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For those having problems with Intelligence helping with the increase to AC, I have to agree with it. Someone who is highly intelligent can analyze an opponent, his environment, and properly calculate when an attack will come, at what angle, and where to move to dodge it or most of it. If you're standing by a wooden beam inside a tavern brawl and an enemy swings wide at you. Your Intelligence would indicate that at the angle the enemy is swinging towards you, if you leaned your upper body towards and behind the beam, it will hit the beam and miss you mostly or entirely.
Whereas your Dexterity alone would simply react physically by dropping low to the floor without dropping on the ground to avoid the attack and beating the attack with pure speed and not any reason at all.
End result, Intelligence bonus to AC is perfectly ok for AC if you can describe how it happens in the first place.
Intelligence_can_help.
But in fact what enables a fighter to avoid blows through dodging, blocking, and parrying is mostly training. Through repetitive drills and non-lethal practice one gradually gains the ability to react to threats, and in a skillful fighter the reactions occur WITHOUT THINKING.
A well trained fighter, during combat, thinks very little. They should be 'in the zone' as some athletes say. At times your mind is absolutely and totally empty and you are acting on years, or even decades of practice that is burned into your nerves. When you pause, for moments, you may get flashes of insight that allow you to gain an advantage, and the smarter you are, the more likely these flashes are.
This is simply not the same as substituting intelligence for dexterity. Dexterity and training remain far more important, and training is the most important by considerable margin.
Where do I get this? I am 36 and I began learning karate when I was 14 years old at the University of Alberta dojo of the Amateur Karate Foundation in Canada and have trained for more than 20 years. I currently live in China and have logged training under several accomplished Kung Fu instructors and practice Tai Qi Quan with old people in the park.
This rule is bullshit as far as reality is concerned. The dynamics of 3.5 are only marginally better. Justifying this rule because it mimics reality is a joke.
To add to this, in particular to the beam in the tavern argument. Your brain does the math when a projectile is launched, and it is not your conscious mind, not your rational mind, it is your animal hunter mind that does this. There are many people with a low IQ who are very talented at sports and that's because the cognitive processes that involve throwing and catching stuff are NOT the same as those involving intelligence.
Again, I'm not saying intelligence does not have it's role. But this rule in no ways simulates what happens in real man to man combat.
Strategy? Tactics? That's where intelligence comes into play.
BTW, I'm not trying to beat on you Razz. As you correctly said, it's all abstract. The rule doesn't bother me because it does not simulate reality. It bothers me because it represents this 'everybody should have the same bonus' thinking that seems to be seeping from the cracks of 4E.
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Oddly enough, large currency issues actually apply in the real world.. How do they solve them?
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The real answer was paper notes.
And you are completely correct. Paper notes, in our world, work well to a point. They unfortunately break apart over time, and break due to water. Luckily, other countries has started using plastic currency that is stronger. Thus the same problem I have with using paper currency in DnD.
The average adventurer goes through acid, cold, fire and water on a daily basis. On a roll of 1 (at the moment) or however (or if) 4e will make damaging goods on your person occurs, this means it goes from your coins being in some trouble from acid to your money being lost due to going for a swim, fire breath, ripped up by troll claws, etc.
Now if it was magically treated paper (someone mention scrolls above as an option), then I'd be all for that.
EDIT: Oh! I also thought of the idea of an arcane monetary mark, that'd be sweet too. Did someone already say that?
The same thing holds for Wisdom and monks: they too are limited in how much of their Wisdom modifier they can add to AC, and this is capped by their training/level.
A Monk's Wis modifier to AC isn't capped. That doesn't change the correctness of your point though: Adding mental attributes to your AC takes specialized training, as evidenced by membership in certain classes.
Feyleather armour is what you get if you have Tailoring to 375, and use
(10) Felweave Cloth
(4) Runic Spell Thread
(12) Cured Heavy Hide
(3) Astral Diamondsand requires an arcanite rod (available from an enchanter)
I thought everyone knew that. Right?
Oooh Oooh, can I have mongoose put on that?
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EDIT: Oh! I also thought of the idea of an arcane monetary mark, that'd be sweet too. Did someone already say that?
Yes. :) Sort of. I use them in my game but only as rewards from nobles, merchants, and the like. When they are found they got where they in fairly recent history. They are usually enchanted to prevent forgery but some have spells of protection on them.
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Yes. :) Sort of. I use them in my game but only as rewards from nobles, merchants, and the like. When they are found they got where they in fairly recent history. They are usually enchanted to prevent forgery but some have spells of protection on them.
I wish I could edit a post to fix grammatical errors.
"When they are found they got where they are in fairly recent memory."
I think that bags of holding are at least as much of a "cop out" as high-value currency, if not moreso. They're kind of silly, in my opinion.
Perhaps. But similar items do appear in myth and legend, not to mention fiction (and not just fiction based on RPGs). They're hardly something that only exists to make it easier to carry large sums of money.
Perhaps. But similar items do appear in myth and legend, not to mention fiction (and not just fiction based on RPGs). They're hardly something that only exists to make it easier to carry large sums of money.
Most definetly. To quote the Portable Hole Full Of Beer
With a radius of 3 ft and a depth of 10 feet, the portable hole has a volume of slightly more than 282.743 cubic feet or 270,729 US Fluid Ounces (or 8006.4 Liters for the rest of the world).
A typical bottle of commercial beer in this day and age is 12 ounces. In other words, there is the equivalent volume of 22560.75 bottles of beer (or over 940 cases of beer) in a full portable hole.
Which brings me to the idea of introducing booze as a currency. Might be a lot to carry around, but it's a great investment.
I invest heavily in straw rum - where else will you get 80% on your investment?
Without thinking about it for more than 10 seconds, I could come up with 10 solutions that would have been better. And most of those 10 solutions really stink, I freely admit that.I'd like to see your list of ten things that would be better than astral diamonds.
I'll give you that it's not the most amazing name in the world, but the idea of a portable, highly valuable monetary unit certainly does away with one of D&D's longtime absurdities.
There already was a way.
Bag of Holding.
Nothing wrong with that. The problem is, does every D&D game have to involve treasure hoards? No. It's been specifically stated many times that rewards don't have to come in gold pieces. Magic items, art objects, gems, literary art, statues, a castle, a town, a building, a rare type of stone mined from a dangerous region, title, whatever.
But most D&D games do involve treasure hoards. Fine. But, what is more important to a D&D experience?
It boils down to two types of people. Those that Roll Play and those that Role Play.
Roll Player people don't want to worry about how that treasure is transported and would rather have it put into some kind of faux "credit" system like video games. Final Fantasy games, for example. You have 50 million gil, but not very many people think how the hell am I even carrying that much gil? If a person does ask that, then they have the potential to be a great roleplayer.
Role Players do ask. How do we haul the ancient treasure hoard of Smaug the Mighty Red Dragon? Do we pay for hirelings and bodyguards, hitch wagons and do it ourselves, or is there a magical way to do it? (Wizard, help us with a magical way...oh, you can enchant a bag to store massive amounts of items in an extradimensional space, cool!).
What WotC should've done was give monetary values of those abstract things to grant players. Or guidelines, at least. They didn't of course. We now get MMORPG styled currencies, unfortunately.
WotC wants to attract...
As far as I'm concerned, one of the best things you can do to mess with your players is LET THEM have the money. Let them hang themselves with it. They want to buy magic items? Sure! Let them do it! They want to get more powerful, sure!
First thing that happens! Your threat level for encounters increases, because those who hire you assume you can handle stupidly dangerous jobs.
Second thing that happens:
Local Lord: "Fraxno Buntleby, You are now Sir Fraxno Buntleby, Third Warden of the Lower Quarter of the Suretmarsh!"
PC: But I don't want to be Third Warden of the Lower Quarter of the Suretmarsh!
Local Lord: Sir Buntleby, you have two choices. You can accept the honor, and the accolades that go with it, and build yourself a castle and put all that money back into my Lordship, or, you can leave the Suretmarsh, never to return. And you will have to pay the quitrent tax, which weighs in at fifty percent of all your worldly goods.
PC: The quitrent tax? What's that? You can't be serious! I fought for that money, it's mine.
Local Lord: Do you even understand how feudalism works? Even if you fight for every single gold piece, technically, everything in my realm belongs to me.
PC: !@#$%^&*!!!!!!!!
Local Lord: Sir Buntleby, I hereby dub you Sir Fraxno Buntleby, Third Warden of the Lower Quarter of the Suretmarsh.
PC: Sob....
PC's Allies: What's happened? Why are you crying?
PC: I'm the third warden of the lower quarter of the Suretmarsh, and a Knight.
Allies: Congratulations! That's great! So what now?
PC: We have to build a castle in the Suretmarsh, and live in it, and protect it.
Allies: !!@#$%^&*(!!!!!!!
Monsters don't have to have any 'loot' or gear at all. They've already said that PCs get gear and money by level. Ding. Level 5, and no matter what you've found, you have the same equipment value as every other level 5 character.
I'm not sure I see how this differs from the 3E wealth-by-level system exactly? I mean, snarkiness aside, the 3E CR system is entirely hung upon the characters possessing the appropriate amount of loot. Denial of the expected wealth really wrecks a lot of the CRs.
Ah 4E the game where you are smart enough to outsmart a bullet.
You don't have to outsmart the bullet, just the guy pulling the trigger! ;)
Yes, it is. As you say: generally. It may be implied. But it doesn't explicitly say "you can't get this before level 16". It screams, shouts, shrieks DIABLO. "Requirements: Level 21, Strength 40".
D&D isn't supposed to be Diablo. When such "soft limitation" kinda exist in the game, it's okay. But when the rules dictate or even imply that you cannot use this until level X, I feel like I'm hunting for magic items, doing Mephi Runs or Raids, instead of roleplaying a character in a fantasy world.
I'm not sure where you're getting this from at all. I haven't seen anything that implied that any items had hard level/stat requirements for use (with the possible exception of magical rings). Where do you get this info from?
For what it's worth, I wouldn't mind some stat/level requirements on SOME items, but having them on every item would make me a sad David Marks. :(
Look at the Realms. What kind of coins does it use? Copper, Silver, Gold, Platinum. Eberron? I'm not quite sure, but from what I've heard, it's CSGP.
In fact, whenever something like currency is changed, they usually make a big deal out of it. Dragonlance and their Steel Pieces (which never made sense.
And you can be sure that the new Realms and Eberron will suddenly be flooded with Astral Diamonds.
As someone else said, the page pretty specifically indicates Astral Diamonds are used as currency in some of the universe's bigger planar metropoli. So I guess they might be referred to in FR or Eberron, but I'd be suprised if they really showed up that commonly. If I had to bet on it, I'd say FR is more likely to see them than Eberron, but I can't really back that up with more than a gut feeling.
Edit: Forgot to wish everyone cheers! :)
As far as I'm concerned, one of the best things you can do to mess with your players is LET THEM have the money. Let them hang themselves with it. They want to buy magic items? Sure! Let them do it! They want to get more powerful, sure!
First thing that happens! Your threat level for encounters increases, because those who hire you assume you can handle stupidly dangerous jobs.
Second thing that happens: [Local Lord makes PCs vassals]
Don't forget that in 3E, the characters are expected to have those oodles of wealth. It's a bit unfair to unduly penalize them for amassing the fortunes the game expects them to as they advance. Higher CRs assume vast amounts of magical gear, especially as you get into the higher levels.
As for the second thing, some players might really enjoy becoming a lord of a province, but I'd be pretty hesitant to force such a duty onto a character without that player's permission. Politics/Lordship leave little time in the day for adventuring (at least IMO).
Cheers! :)
Yes, it is. As you say: generally. It may be implied. But it doesn't explicitly say "you can't get this before level 16". It screams, shouts, shrieks DIABLO. "Requirements: Level 21, Strength 40".
D&D isn't supposed to be Diablo. When such "soft limitation" kinda exist in the game, it's okay. But when the rules dictate or even imply that you cannot use this until level X, I feel like I'm hunting for magic items, doing Mephi Runs or Raids, instead of roleplaying a character in a fantasy world.
I'm not sure where you're getting this from at all. I haven't seen anything that implied that any items had hard level/stat requirements for use (with the possible exception of magical rings). Where do you get this info from?
Well, the sentence in the excerpt this whole thread is about is "These masterwork armors never appear except as magic items and even then only at the highest levels (16th and above)." While we don´t know exactly what is meant by that, you can surely come to the conclusion that there is some mechanic preventing certain items from appearing until a certain level is reached. If this conclusion is right remains to be seen. If it is indeed right, it is like Diablo or something similar, and would not be to my liking.
Stefan
As far as I'm concerned, one of the best things you can do to mess with your players is LET THEM have the money. Let them hang themselves with it. They want to buy magic items? Sure! Let them do it! They want to get more powerful, sure!
First thing that happens! Your threat level for encounters increases, because those who hire you assume you can handle stupidly dangerous jobs.
Second thing that happens: [Local Lord makes PCs vassals]
Don't forget that in 3E, the characters are expected to have those oodles of wealth. It's a bit unfair to unduly penalize them for amassing the fortunes the game expects them to as they advance. Higher CRs assume vast amounts of magical gear, especially as you get into the higher levels.
As for the second thing, some players might really enjoy becoming a lord of a province, but I'd be pretty hesitant to force such a duty onto a character without that player's permission. Politics/Lordship leave little time in the day for adventuring (at least IMO).
Cheers! :)
Well, that's the point. The adventuring career slows down. Instead of adventuring once a month, the character might get 1-2 adventures a year.
It reinforces the ideas of lordship, and unless you're running intrigue plots, there's not a lot of XP, it's just roleplay for the sake of roleplay.
Well, the sentence in the excerpt this whole thread is about is "These masterwork armors never appear except as magic items and even then only at the highest levels (16th and above)." While we don´t know exactly what is meant by that, you can surely come to the conclusion that there is some mechanic preventing certain items from appearing until a certain level is reached. If this conclusion is right remains to be seen. If it is indeed right, it is like Diablo or something similar, and would not be to my liking.
Stefan
Re-reading that part of the passage, I can see where you could get the idea from, but I'd still call the claim that magic items have a general level requirement pure speculation. To read my own interpretation into that passage, I'd say the three flavors of armor now (Cloth/Feyweave/Starweave) is a replacement of the old Masterwork rules, and they mostly break down along the lines of the three tiers. But again, pure speculation on my part.
Thanks for the quote though, at least I know what has some people so concerned!
Cheers! :)
Well, that's the point. The adventuring career slows down. Instead of adventuring once a month, the character might get 1-2 adventures a year.
It reinforces the ideas of lordship, and unless you're running intrigue plots, there's not a lot of XP, it's just roleplay for the sake of roleplay.
Hrms. Boards ate my post. :(
Let's try again ...
I agree, which is why I said I'd be reluctant to pop this on an unsuspecting player. Roleplaying for the sake of roleplaying is certainly fun, but I would want my players to expect it before hand.
But overall, it sounds like we agree here, so cheers! :)
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Well, the sentence in the excerpt this whole thread is about is "These masterwork armors never appear except as magic items and even then only at the highest levels (16th and above)." While we don´t know exactly what is meant by that, you can surely come to the conclusion that there is some mechanic preventing certain items from appearing until a certain level is reached. If this conclusion is right remains to be seen. If it is indeed right, it is like Diablo or something similar, and would not be to my liking.
Stefan
Re-reading that part of the passage, I can see where you could get the idea from, but I'd still call the claim that magic items have a general level requirement pure speculation. To read my own interpretation into that passage, I'd say the three flavors of armor now (Cloth/Feyweave/Starweave) is a replacement of the old Masterwork rules, and they mostly break down along the lines of the three tiers. But again, pure speculation on my part.
Thanks for the quote though, at least I know what has some people so concerned!
Cheers! :)
From the Magic Item Compendium (pg 226):
Coincidentally, the item's level also provides a useful guideline to the DM as to when such an item becomes appropriate for PCs. In general, PC's should own items of their own character level or lower. Small exceptions to this general rule exist - a 12th-level magic item is OK in the hands of a 10th level PC - but straying too far can cause trouble.
Now I am not holding the MIC up as a paragon of game design, but this fairly recent book, with its per-day item recharging, feels very 4e to me. I don't think we will know if 4e item levels will be restrictions or just guidelines, but the inability for characters to wear rings until paragon levels (mentioned more than once in 4e design threads though I can't find them atm) and all this talk of 4e item levels at the very least provides footing for those of us concerned about this aspect of the new version.
Well, the sentence in the excerpt this whole thread is about is "These masterwork armors never appear except as magic items and even then only at the highest levels (16th and above)." While we don´t know exactly what is meant by that, you can surely come to the conclusion that there is some mechanic preventing certain items from appearing until a certain level is reached. If this conclusion is right remains to be seen. If it is indeed right, it is like Diablo or something similar, and would not be to my liking.
Stefan
Re-reading that part of the passage, I can see where you could get the idea from, but I'd still call the claim that magic items have a general level requirement pure speculation. To read my own interpretation into that passage, I'd say the three flavors of armor now (Cloth/Feyweave/Starweave) is a replacement of the old Masterwork rules, and they mostly break down along the lines of the three tiers. But again, pure speculation on my part.
Thanks for the quote though, at least I know what has some people so concerned!
To put things in perspective: they have already confirmed that characters who are 11th level and above can use Rings, and that characters who are not, can't. Given that the 4e magic item preview stated explicitly that Rings have level limits, it doesn't seem like much of a stretch at all to read that passage as stating that the Nightmare and Hell grade armors will have level limits as well.
Rings: This slot has changed quite a bit. A starting character isn’t powerful enough to unleash the power of a ring. You can use one ring when you reach paragon tier (11th level) and two when you’re epic (21st level). And before you get started about how Frodo sure as hell wasn’t epic, let's be clear: the One Ring was an artifact, not a magic item any old spellcaster could make. Artifacts follow their own rules.
So want to take bets that the level limit on Rings is 11, the level limit on Feyweave is 16, the level limit on a second ring is 21, and the level limit on Godplate is 26? I'll bet you a Euro.
-Frank
From the Magic Item Compendium (pg 226):Coincidentally, the item's level also provides a useful guideline to the DM as to when such an item becomes appropriate for PCs. In general, PC's should own items of their own character level or lower. Small exceptions to this general rule exist - a 12th-level magic item is OK in the hands of a 10th level PC - but straying too far can cause trouble.Now I am not holding the MIC up as a paragon of game design, but this fairly recent book, with its per-day item recharging, feels very 4e to me. I don't think we will know if 4e item levels will be restrictions or just guidelines, but the inability for characters to wear rings until paragon levels (mentioned more than once in 4e design threads though I can't find them atm) and all this talk of 4e item levels at the very least provides footing for those of us concerned about this aspect of the new version.
It seems to me that the quote you listed seems the most logical assumption to make in regards to 4E item levels (ie, the idea that they are suggested guidelines for when they should be acquired and not some "you're too low to use this item" requirement). And indeed, this article (findable here) seems to pretty explicitly indicate that the quote you provided from the MiC still applies.
Re: the magical rings thing, I first read about them being off limits in a different preview article on the WotC site here. I hope that has changed by now, but I guess we'll both have to wait 'till release to see!
Cheers! :)
To put things in perspective: they have already confirmed that characters who are 11th level and above can use Rings, and that characters who are not, can't. Given that the 4e magic item preview stated explicitly that Rings have level limits, it doesn't seem like much of a stretch at all to read that passage as stating that the Nightmare and Hell grade armors will have level limits as well.
So want to take bets that the level limit on Rings is 11, the level limit on Feyweave is 16, the level limit on a second ring is 21, and the level limit on Godplate is 26? I'll bet you a Euro.
Rings: This slot has changed quite a bit. A starting character isn’t powerful enough to unleash the power of a ring. You can use one ring when you reach paragon tier (11th level) and two when you’re epic (21st level). And before you get started about how Frodo sure as hell wasn’t epic, let's be clear: the One Ring was an artifact, not a magic item any old spellcaster could make. Artifacts follow their own rules.
Indeed, they have said rings only work from Paragon tier on (I even linked to the article in my last post.) But in another preview article, they pretty explicitly talk about giving high level items to characters, with no mention of those items failing to work because of level requirements (also linked in my last post.)
So, while it is possible they've added level requirements in since then, I just don't see it. If the armor is 16th level armor, then all that means (IMO, based on what I've seen) is that the armor is balanced for about 16th level. Of course it's all speculation at this point! :)
As for your offer of a bet ... at the rate dollars are exchanging to euros right now, I'm not sure I could afford it! :P
Cheers! :)
Yo, Razz!You just defended 4E!
You know, it's only a matter of time before you convert...?
;P
** spoiler omitted **
I wouldn't say that LOL Intelligence bonus to AC is also 3E thing.