Egads! Don't even get me started on the GSL. :P
And I agree: Different games sytems do, in fact, have an effect on story-telling. I just take exception to claims that 4E is bad because "you can't tell the same stories as you can in 3.5." Which it appears you weren't making. ;-)
No worries. Such are the perils of bulletin board communications. :D
I think overall, you can tell the same overarching stories with the same themes and general plots...
A troupe of heroes battle a corrupt, vain queen for the soul and life of a city; An evil Efreet tries to wake the Son of Destruction and the heroes must stop him before the final wish is woven; A tribe of goblins, a horde of ogres, an army of giants... what do these have in common? They stand in the way of the heroes who must stop an evil wizard from resurrecting his ancient empire.
All fine for 1st, 2nd, 3rd or 4th Ed.
It's when you get granular, things look different. The devil, they say, is in the details. Individual scenes may change if you need to multiply the numbers by x to give the players the requisite challenge; when x, x, or x creature is not available for 3rd party use that was in the d20; when by principle the designer is strongly encouraged to add effects to an originally austere environment (firespouts, grasping vines, those spikey sliding block traps from Zelda,) to make matters more action packed and exciting; and it alters the flow of what the author sees in his/her head. Depending on the author, possibly for the better. Paizo doesn't seem to think so. Their perogative.
Heck, I don't know what core assumptions one is required to make if one is a 4E publisher. I admit I stopped paying attention to the GSL when I learned Paizo wasn't going to use it. Are publishers required to use the 4E planar cosmology? The Pantheon? Are goblins, drow, gnomes, demons supposed to be run and act in a certain way? I don't know the answer to these questions.
I'm in a 4E game. I'm having fun. I'm also in a 3.P game and having fun, and I'm pretty glad they feel different.
i think that we are all forgetting the imortal words of the founder of our hobbie: "As with any other set of miniatures rules they are guidlines to follow in designing your own fatastic-medieveal campaign. The provide the framework around which you will build a game of somplicity or tremendous complexity..."
page 4, Dungeons and Dragons, Men and Magic, volume 1 of three booklets, 1974.
something like this has been written in every incarnation of the game since. we are in charge of our own enjoyment, our own campaign. just because a story item is written in a modual some where doesnt mean that is the way it must be done. to many people get to wadded up in what they think dnd is. i know what it isnt....it isnt the same from one table to the next. it isnt a simulation of life and love by any stretch of the imagination. if it were it would be more like the sca (which isnt perfect, there is no magic in the sca)
by the way, i like the idea of 32 page racial books. i wish they did the same thing with the character classes.
i love dungeons and dragons. i have since the summer of 1979. i just wish people on these message boards and other boards would stop telling me that i am wrong for perfreing 4e to older editions, and even knock offs of older editions.
i dont tell them they are dumb for not switching to 4e.
hey, lets all just sit back, drink a really good beer, role some dice, listen to our buddie tell us about this fantastic world, with broken economy, broken ecology, and hell, even geology is broken in dungeons and dragons.
i like that i can get the snot pounded out of me, and heal with a word or two. to continue playing. if i didnt i would play something like boot hill. with a ream of new pcs standing by.
i dont even remember why i was ranting. it will just be ignored anyway i guess.
get together, drink beer, role dice.
A troupe of heroes battle a corrupt, vain queen for the soul and life of a city; An evil Efreet tries to wake the Son of Destruction and the heroes must stop him before the final wish is woven; A tribe of goblins, a horde of ogres, an army of giants... what do these have in common? They stand in the way of the heroes who must stop an evil wizard from resurrecting his ancient empire.All fine for 1st, 2nd, 3rd or 4th Ed.
It's when you get granular, things look different. The devil, they say, is in the details. Individual scenes may change if you need to multiply the numbers by x to give the players the requisite challenge; when x, x, or x creature is not available for 3rd party use that was in the d20; when by principle the designer is strongly encouraged to add effects to an originally austere environment (firespouts, grasping vines, those spikey sliding block traps from Zelda,) to make matters more action packed and exciting; and it alters the flow of what the author sees in his/her head. Depending on the author, possibly for the better. Paizo doesn't seem to think so. Their perogative.
I agree with you here and there are definitely some details that are going to come into play more in one edition then in another. The thing is its possible to simulate a 4E adventure in 3.P and vice versa. Nothing in Pathfinder forces there to be only one singular bad guy - it may be more of a default mode then in 4E but its not by any means a requirement. If one was to translate a 4E adventure into Pathfinder they could increase the number of enemies in the room if that happened to be critical to the story being told. Similarly in 4E usually you work with groups of enemies but if its important enough you can go down to one. Most of the time its really not going to impact the story one way or another and a conversion likely aims for the default mode of the edition because encounters play better in that default mode.
Furthermore even where there are changes its often not going to hurt the adventure one whit to add the strengths of one edition to the story in another. This is mainly because a good converter takes pains to limit the damage an edition change forces on an adventure while working to enhance the strengths. Its in some ways simply a matter of 'more prep time usually leads to better adventures',
For example in 3.5's Whispering Cairn we have the stats for Kullen and the gang and a map of the bar where the fight probably occurs. Because combat is usually static in 3.5 thats probably all that is needed. In my 4E conversion of Whispering Cairn I realized that the fight would likely be very mobile - that means someones going to end up in that dog pit - I can nearly guarantee it and its obviously more exciting to have a violent dog in there then to have it empty - so for my conversion I needed to add the stats for the dog. It also made sense include many of the modifications for jumping on tables or leaping over counters on the battle map because otherwise we'd have to look that sort of thing up - a bad plan when your near certain this will take place.
So sure - in the specific details the bar fight with Kullen will play out differently in 3.5 (or 3.P) and 4E - in terms of the overall story though you'll still end up at the same place in the end.
Well except the bar will be trashed in 4E and there is a much greater chance that some of the patrons will end up dead. Even here though thats essentially in the hands of the DM. 4E is an excellent 'summer blockbuster action flick simulator' but if the DM does not include the rules for jumping on tables the players probably won't think to jump on them, if the DM waves his hands and says vaguely 'all the patrons run off when you guys start fighting' then they are not in the action. I'd rather include them myself as I think it adds to the game but its not actually required.
i think that we are all forgetting the imortal words of the founder of our hobbie: "As with any other set of miniatures rules they are guidlines to follow in designing your own fatastic-medieveal campaign. The provide the framework around which you will build a game of somplicity or tremendous complexity..."
page 4, Dungeons and Dragons, Men and Magic, volume 1 of three booklets, 1974.
something like this has been written in every incarnation of the game since. we are in charge of our own enjoyment, our own campaign. just because a story item is written in a modual some where doesnt mean that is the way it must be done. to many people get to wadded up in what they think dnd is. i know what it isnt....it isnt the same from one table to the next. it isnt a simulation of life and love by any stretch of the imagination. if it were it would be more like the sca (which isnt perfect, there is no magic in the sca)
by the way, i like the idea of 32 page racial books. i wish they did the same thing with the character classes.
i love dungeons and dragons. i have since the summer of 1979. i just wish people on these message boards and other boards would stop telling me that i am wrong for perfreing 4e to older editions, and even knock offs of older editions.
i dont tell them they are dumb for not switching to 4e.
hey, lets all just sit back, drink a really good beer, role some dice, listen to our buddie tell us about this fantastic world, with broken economy, broken ecology, and hell, even geology is broken in dungeons and dragons.
i like that i can get the snot pounded out of me, and heal with a word or two. to continue playing. if i didnt i would play something like boot hill. with a ream of new pcs standing by.
i dont even remember why i was ranting. it will just be ignored anyway i guess.
get together, drink beer, role dice.
You sir, are a scholar and a gentleman and a fine judge of whiskey (or beer!). I couldn't have said this better myself.
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Not sure I'm seeing what he problem is. So they release more books. No one is forced to buy all that is coming out. Given enough time even Pathfinder will have a lot of books. I rather they publish stuff then not. I'm also a completist for the most part so the more the better. As for the smaller size race books I still do not see the problem. Paizo has some for Pathfinder and I rather have a samll book then a large one sometimes. Makes it easuer to read and cheaper. I wonder if the same criticism would be leveled at Paizo if they had a similiar release schedule probably not. Wotc just can't get any sort of break on this board.
I wonder if the same criticism would be leveled at Paizo if they had a similiar release schedule probably not. Wotc just can't get any sort of break on this board.
I would be likely as criticism has been leveled at Paizo for having their current release schedule, while I think that criticism often is displayed too harshly, it isn't just WotC that receives it.
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Playing an RPG is about being the Hero, good or bad. And so to be a hero we need rule sets that reflect that.
I see playing an RPG is about becoming a hero.
And that is a big difference to playing a hero. But YMMVWhy play Nug the Cobbler when you could step into the role of Lancelot, or Hurcules?
Because it is cool to start out as a cobbler advance against all odds to become a hero. Neither lancelot nor Hercules have any personality that I find remotely interesting. They are strong, brave intelligent etc. the only flaw I know of is that Lance has the hots for his King's wife. I find this boring. On the other Hand, plying a young cobbler who takes up hi grandfathers sword with dreams of becoming a knight one day. Now, that is something I can relate to.
If you want to play a character as Mundane as Nug, than so be it just dont cry to me when Smuag eats your shoe cobbling arse.
And who was the one who got in and out of this Dragon's lair? A Superhero? Nope, a fat, middleaged Hobbit.
Also if you take a look at the Warhammer FRPG, you will see that it is indeed mostly cobblers, ratcatchers and roadwardens who adventure and save the day. Not Knights in shining armor.
So there are RPGs out there who still do the "normal guy becomes a hero" approach.
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Didn't he say earlier that they were going to be about 32 pages? I mean, 16 pages of crunch only seems a bit too much, and 50% crunch is probably a high estimate.32 pages, paperback, US$9.95, Jan. 2010.
While I'm here, here is the link to the Tiefling book page for June. Disregard the title.
What bothers me about those links is that they're talking up powers and stats and only mention background and personality as an afterthought. If you read carefully, you'll see that the description almost blatantly says this:
... and... oh yeah, background and personality stuff, too.
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I would be likely as criticism has been leveled at Paizo for having their current release schedule, while I think that criticism often is displayed too harshly, it isn't just WotC that receives it.
I have not seen as it myself personally. They do not have the same level of releases as Wotc which is fine by me as they not everyone has to follow that model. What exactly is Paizo doing wrong with the releases? Not enough? Too much? With Wotc imo it seems like anything and everything they do is wrong. After awhile it kind of becomes annoyingto me at least.
I have not seen as it myself personally. They do not have the same level of releases as Wotc which is fine by me as they not everyone has to follow that model. What exactly is Paizo doing wrong with the releases? Not enough? Too much? With Wotc imo it seems like anything and everything they do is wrong. After awhile it kind of becomes annoyingto me at least.
I would be likely as criticism has been leveled at Paizo for having their current release schedule, while I think that criticism often is displayed too harshly, it isn't just WotC that receives it.
I don't have an issue with the rate of Paizo's releases or WotC's even, they both seem to be doing well enough with their releases to me. There have been a few complaints that the release of RPG books has been too quick and that their focus on the RPG line should be range from little to nothing. There have been also a few posts I've seen that seem to be disappointed the the release schedule is so slow and that as result of that, it would be impossible to for it to be published in 2010, somewhat unlikely in 2011, and getting to only pretty good in 2012 and beyond.
Aside from posters that have a special interest in complaining no matter what happens, that is what I would say that happens with WotC criticism often. In many cases their customers (current and lapsed) will want two different and opposing things from WotC. If they do one thing, group A complains, if they do another thing, group B complains, and compromise would likely result in portions of both groups to complain.
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Seriously, if I'm the GM and the players want another +3 to whatever, they can just pay me $25 and cut out the middleman.
Now that is funny and yet strangely well thought out!
Your point was my original point also. Splat books filled with little power cards with badly worded descriptions adding nothing but ad nauseum to the game.
The common reply is of course, don't buy it. That is fine until a player turns up to your game and says I'm a X or Y. As DM you say WTF and that really doesn't fit in my carefully crafted world. But it's in the rules the player says AND everything is core... Awkward moment time...
If they want to do "standard" races, do them ALL at the same time and stuff them in ONE book - for balance reasons. The "campaign specific" races SHOULD be in the campaign players guides. I guess I'm jaded from Games Workshop Warhammer Fantasy Battle Army books. He who was the latest book wins. Time will tell but if it ain't hardbound I'm not buying it would some up my stance.
S.
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That is fine until a player turns up to your game and says I'm a X or Y. As DM you say WTF and that really doesn't fit in my carefully crafted world. But it's in the rules the player says AND everything is core... Awkward moment time...
I sympathize and have had to deal with a similar siutation. Yet that is when a DM has to say no. It sucks to do it sometimes but imo has to be done. While everything may be core you can allow and disallow what you allow into a game. If the player complains that you refused to allow what he wants or because he spent money on book too bad for him. Sometimes being a DM means having to be the bad guy so to speak.
The common reply is of course, don't buy it. That is fine until a player turns up to your game and says I'm a X or Y. As DM you say WTF and that really doesn't fit in my carefully crafted world. But it's in the rules the player says AND everything is core... Awkward moment time...
Just because it is "core" to the system does not mean it is automatically core to your game. Let the player bring his idea and if you feel it has merit then let him play it. If you feel it may not be a fit for the game, then explain why it isn't a good fit. The DM, being the one who does a lot of the work, needs to be the final arbiter as he is the one that will have to integrate the character with what ever it brings to the table.
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The common reply is of course, don't buy it. That is fine until a player turns up to your game and says I'm a X or Y. As DM you say WTF and that really doesn't fit in my carefully crafted world. But it's in the rules the player says AND everything is core... Awkward moment time...D&D has a long and proud tradition of having some exceptionally dumb stuff in core, a quality not unique to 4e.
But before you smack down a character because it's X race or Y class and it doesn't fit into your carefully crafted world, keep in mind that most D&D settings involve interplanar travel, at least a half-dozen races all keeping secrets from each other, and various forms of intended and accidental magic making new things all the time.
This is not meant to be taken badly.
Planar travel can bite me. In 24 years of DMing I have never inflicted planar travel on PC's. Sigil can take itself off and have itself shot IMHO. Planar travel for me is right up there with the "Holodeck" in that shockingly appalling of a show they called Star Trek - The Next Generation. "Right, the story's buggered. What we need is an out for this dumb-arsed plot." Enter the Holodeck... And Riker, what the hell is up with that guy? The producers thought that a fat dude with a stupid beard was a good model for a space hero (apologies to fat dudes with stupid beards btw). But I digress (again).
Anyway I think I made my point even if not elegantly.
S.
The common reply is of course, don't buy it. That is fine until a player turns up to your game and says I'm a X or Y. As DM you say WTF and that really doesn't fit in my carefully crafted world. But it's in the rules the player says AND everything is core... Awkward moment time...
The solution is to make it work. You want your carefully crafted world's integrity to remain intact, and feel adding element X threatens that. Your player is excited about the prospect of using element X.
"No, you can't do this because it doesn't fit in my world," is almost always a poor solution. Make it fit. This may come as a shock to a number of career DMs, but your players don't care nearly as much for the integrity of your game world as you might think they do - especially when that desire for perfect integrity gets in the way of their fun. When this happens, it is incumbent upon you to compromise. You agree to figure out a way to include element X in your world, and he agrees to abide by the implications that might have for his character.
And, on a related note, if you created your world in such a way as to prevent it from being expanded to include element X to begin with, it is not "carefully crafted."
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Enter the Holodeck... And Riker, what the hell is up with that guy? The producers thought that a fat dude with a stupid beard was a good model for a space hero (apologies to fat dudes with stupid beards btw). But I digress (again).
Heck, I'm just a pair of rocket boots away... as are what, probably 50% of the rest of us gamers nowadays?
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And, on a related note, if you created your world in such a way as to prevent it from being expanded to include element X to begin with, it is not "carefully crafted."
Er, so I need to predict what WotC will bring out Class/Race wise? You got one of those crystal balls spare? I seem to have misplaced mine.
You are partially right, for example my new Warforged Warden, is being played not in Eberron and in a setting that doesn't suit that sort of race at all. But I worked with my DM and we decided he was an ancient "defense" that was built centuries before but only now has reactivated (cheesy I know). Hence his name is "Relic", because when he "awoke" it's what they referred to him as. But, if I couldn't come up with a unique solution (and other Warforged would be tricky to include) and the DM said no I would respect he does a lot of the work to make the game happen and move on. Players who did otherwise when the DM explained why the race/class doesn't fit are being selfish. We aren't talking about no for the sake of saying no - that I agree is wrong.
S.
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Heck, I'm just a pair of rocket boots away... as are what, probably 50% of the rest of us gamers nowadays?Enter the Holodeck... And Riker, what the hell is up with that guy? The producers thought that a fat dude with a stupid beard was a good model for a space hero (apologies to fat dudes with stupid beards btw). But I digress (again).
Actually I'm doing the Movember thing to rise money for "male" cancer - so hell I'm there. Doesn't mean I want me in an episode of Star Trek :)
We should check gamer demographics - be interesting to see if your figure means we need some bearded women ;)
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Even if you don't like Sigil (and I completely understand that), there's the City of Brass and Dis and a hundred other interesting places you can make once you worlds which are ideas into your setting.
Actually Sigil is what made planar travel uninteresting to me as a DM. It came, common for what of a better term. The H1-H4 (Bloodstone) series was the closest I got to planar travel (under 1e). That was sort of fun on a stupid way - city of 100 Liches (or was it 1,000?). Actually that was one of the funniest moments. The mighty (and decked out heroes) get hit by "more than one" Mordinkinen's Disjuction - now not so decked out heroes. Still live and learn they say, actually happened in response to a magic item someone had that did auto-damage to undead. Great when facing Orcus's hoards, not so great when negotiating with Liches...
S.
Er, so I need to predict what WotC will bring out Class/Race wise? You got one of those crystal balls spare? I seem to have misplaced mine.
No. You just need to create a flexible world. Don't fill in everything, for example. Leave some "dark spots" that can be filled in as the wishes of your players dictate. I mean, it's not like you need to worry about something like a class of mecha pilots being added to the game. Pretty much everything that gets released is going to fall into the realm of fantasy. If your world already incorporates dragons, magical elves and fireballs, adding element X to the mix should be something that is doable.
The solution is to make it work. You want your carefully crafted world's integrity to remain intact, and feel adding element X threatens that. Your player is excited about the prospect of using element X."No, you can't do this because it doesn't fit in my world," is almost always a poor solution. Make it fit. This may come as a shock to a number of career DMs, but your players don't care nearly as much for the integrity of your game world as you might think they do - especially when that desire for perfect integrity gets in the way of their fun. When this happens, it is incumbent upon you to compromise. You agree to figure out a way to include element X in your world, and he agrees to abide by the implications that might have for his character.
And, on a related note, if you created your world in such a way as to prevent it from being expanded to include element X to begin with, it is not "carefully crafted."
For the most part I agree but you do have to keep what the race does in mind in this regards. Lots of sea elves in my homebrew but I rarely let the players play them since undersea campaigns are not what I'm running. A campaign about court intrigue may preclude some races as well and sometimes a good race is maybe best left to its original campaign setting. Not sure I want to have psychopathic cannibalistic halflings running around my game - especially if what I really want to do is murder mysteries. Furthermore you do have to be able to guess why the players want access to race X sometimes its more mechanics then flavour. I had to disallow Centaurs in 3.5 - even after you factored in the level adjustment they were just to sick as Frenzied Berserkers.
Then there are Kender - the whole race exists so that a character can be stunningly annoying (usually to the other players - not so much the DM) and the player can always say 'well I'm just playing my character'.
Still there is a reflex tendency for the DM to shoot the PCs desires down and that is usually a mistake - most things, most of the time, can be worked in and it'll likely do little more then expand on the DMs campaign world.
The solution is to make it work. You want your carefully crafted world's integrity to remain intact, and feel adding element X threatens that. Your player is excited about the prospect of using element X."No, you can't do this because it doesn't fit in my world," is almost always a poor solution. Make it fit. This may come as a shock to a number of career DMs, but your players don't care nearly as much for the integrity of your game world as you might think they do - especially when that desire for perfect integrity gets in the way of their fun. When this happens, it is incumbent upon you to compromise. You agree to figure out a way to include element X in your world, and he agrees to abide by the implications that might have for his character.
And, on a related note, if you created your world in such a way as to prevent it from being expanded to include element X to begin with, it is not "carefully crafted."
For the most part I agree but you do have to keep what the race does in mind in this regards. Lots of sea elves in my homebrew but I rarely let the players play them since undersea campaigns are not what I'm running. A campaign about court intrigue may preclude some races as well and sometimes a good race is maybe best left to its original campaign setting. Not sure I want to have psychopathic cannibalistic halflings running around my game - especially if what I really want to do is murder mysteries. Furthermore you do have to be able to guess why the players want access to race X sometimes its more mechanics then flavour. I had to disallow Centaurs in 3.5 - even after you factored in the level adjustment they were just to sick as Frenzied Berserkers.
Then there are Kender - the whole race exists so that a character can be stunningly annoying (usually to the other players - not so much the DM) and the player can always say 'well I'm just playing my character'.
Still there is a reflex tendency for the DM...
If your player wants the mechanics of element X, figuring out a way to make those mechanics work in your game isn't something that is difficult. If those mechanics are unbalanced, they shouldn't be allowed, but that has nothing to do with the setting of the game and everything to do with its behind-the-scenes rules.
No, not at all. There are somewhere between two and five dozen interesting and awesome places to go and adventure even in WotC core cosmology. I don't see the problem with planar travel because it's full of things to do which are awesome. MOTP is one great story idea after another regardless of if you mean 1e, 3e, or 4e.Even if you don't like Sigil (and I completely understand that), there's the City of Brass and Dis and a hundred other interesting places you can make once you worlds which are ideas into your setting.
I'm actually with Stefin Hill here for the most part. Generally speaking I'd rather the planar hoping and most cool places that one has in the planes could actually fit somewhere in the campaign world. There are exceptions but one of my big problems with the planes is that they usually feel rather mundane - and when they don't it usually makes the game hard to play.
Truth is if I want a tree that reaches the clouds with a whole ecology in the branches I'll just plant it somewhere in the campaign world itself - it'll probably have an interesting effect on the peoples that live nearby as well. You don't need to go to another place to have Ravenloft, haunted places are a dime a dozen in fantasy literature. Plus if you stick it somewhere on your map then it can play a part in subsequent adventures and if the PCs effect it somehow that carries over to the next campaign...which is the surest way of getting players interested in your campaign setting - make what they do in one campaign be evident in later ones.
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None of those RPGs are D&D.
I know that WFRPG and D&D a very different. But the poster claimed that RPGs in general were about playing heroes. Or at least I understood it so. And there I disagreed with him.
It's worth noticing that in a WFRP group that includes both a ratcatcher and a squire (knight is an advanced career unless you're Brettonian) the ratcatcher is certain to be contributing to the group in a different way to the warrior-types; in practice, given the wide range of careers, any career will be contributing in a way that's different to everyone else in the group. But the game is written to support play in that style where D&D isn't.
Sure, both games are different from the feel and the rules support this. BUT you can do Kill-things-and-take-the-stuff-level-up in Warhammer. D&D is simply better suited to support this style of play.
The D&D Fighter-class does not model and does not attempt to model the novice who's just learning to fight. It's a trained, skilled warrior with quite a lot of training behind them even if they've less actual field experience. Consider the proficiences they have, and their combat skills compared to those of the 1st level warriors who make up the bulk of town guard forces and armies. Fighters have had just as much training in using their skills as a Wizard has to cast their spells or a cleric to do their thing. This is, incidentally, historically accurate considering the amount of training given to elite warriors such as knights, samurai, jannisaries, maryannu, and others.
This goes for 1st-3rd edition, much less for 4th edition:
But there is a difference between playing a Man at Arms who is a cut above most of the other men at arms, because his mentor was a good coach (warrior vs. fighter). Or because he was picked up by a travelling mage to be an apprentice instead of having to learn from the old village withc (wizard vs. adept). But these characters are can still get their butts whipped by the old tavern brawler (warrior 2nd) or get outmagiced by the village withc (adept 3rd). They are good, but they are not exceptional.
Hopefully, in general, it will be easier to weed out or judge appropriately any race or class a player wishes to bring into a campaign (from another source book) by the very nature of 4E and a consolidated rule set. I actually see balance issues coming in with DDI hybrid classes, or with any material that expands non-encounter items like rituals, etc. But as a DM it would be best to incorporate these items into your campaign as long as it can be discussed. A motivated player, that isn't tying to use a loophole, is an excellent tool to help support your world.
As to planar travel, or other realms, I have always used them as a backdrop to support the physical world. A common theme it to use certain areas that are tuned to or has a portal to another realm.
In an oriental 4E campaign I run, where there is a definitive spirit world or plane, I focus certain areas in the physical world that provide glimpses to the past where a powerful mortal may have died. When charaters enter these areas, their physical environment may change from a set of ruins in an autumn forest, to a winter fortress some time in the past. Once they come back to the physical realm they are back in their original setting, but have more history at hand to make future decisions. I guess this could be an equivalent to a ravenloft setting in some respects.
Another concept I used was merging the ethereal plane, with an underground dwarven kingdom, where an ancient force was tampered with. The characters explored pocket communities of dwarves that may be trapped by ethereal rivers running accross hallways, intermixed with ethereal races and related creatures.
And finally, I would like to make a comment on playing a commoner, versus a hero, and rising up through the ranks. It is true this is partially based on the character progression, but it is also a componemt of the characters environment or world. By adjusting the environment, creatures and NPCs the character interacts with you can support a "dog eats dog" world to one of high fantasy.
This goes for 1st-3rd edition, much less for 4th edition:
But there is a difference between playing a Man at Arms who is a cut above most of the other men at arms, because his mentor was a good coach (warrior vs. fighter). Or because he was picked up by a travelling mage to be an apprentice instead of having to learn from the old village withc (wizard vs. adept). But these characters are can still get their butts whipped by the old tavern brawler (warrior 2nd) or get outmagiced by the village withc (adept 3rd). They are good, but they are not exceptional.
I'm not following this argument - in 3rd a 1st level fighter is in danger from a 2nd level warrior, sure. That is true in 4th as well, Town Guard from the monster manual rates as a 3rd level soldier - very, very tough fight for a 1st level fighter. If the DM gives the towns guardsman the Grizzled Veteran template then the 1st level fighter has nearly no chance.
In fact one of the big differences between the editions in this regards is that 4E characters are basically weaker then their 3.5 counterpart - that town guardsmen is someone I'd fear in numbers even at 5th or 6th level mainly because there is not much one can do about their AC - those guardsmen will hit a 6th level character about 40% of the time and a d10+7 damage is notable to a character with 55-60 hps.
You can't get a story out of going through a portal at the bottom of a volcano to infiltrate a salamander fortress made of fire on the elemental plane of fire?
Why not just stick the slamander fortress at the bottom of the volcano itself instead of putting a door there?
The great thing about other worlds is that it gives you a place to put things that you can't reasonably cram into your world without being disruptive. It gives you invaders from another world without needing science fiction trappings, it gives you paladin in Hell adventures, it gives you a place to keep Lovecraftian horrors without needing to put them at the bottom of the ocean, and it gives you a good place for cities of jade peopled by genies.
Things still come from, elsewhere to the main world its just usually a one way street - demons are summoned to the campaign world and they try and corrupt mortals but not normally the reverse. Evil nightmare things might invade but they invade the campaign world not some other plane no one cares about. They are evil probably because they threaten Amanda's palace - well the one one of her characters built three campaigns ago...so Amanda the player suddenly really cares about what is going on.
Which is really my difficulty with the Planes - its easy to make the fantastic but nothing really endures - every story is about some other place the player don't usually impact the planes and if they do they'll not be back this way again in all likelihood. The real problem with the planes is that they don't really have either a history or a future that the players can interact with. They are more like timeless boxes in which the DM sticks 'adventure places' for the PCs to interact with before they go home. The fact that the PCs did something heroic here is meaningless to the next set of characters that the players create. It might well be a good story but the story itself does not endure within the campaign itself - usually I'd rather stick the fantastic object in the campaign itself so that it plays a part in later campaigns - even if that part is just to be seen by the players as they travel past this location. Even this still reminds them of former glories and helps to make the campaign world seem alive.
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I think the utility of single serving planar jaunting is this:
Dungeonmaster gets a module/adventure idea/whatever that involves viking stuff in a frigid northland.
Problem: Party is in the Sighing Desert 1,500 miles away
Solution: there's a gate to Gladsheim in the Pharoah's crypt.
I know, I know, the gate could be to Scandavazia, but I don't want Scandavazia; I WANT something totally unrelated to the actual campaign world. I don't think everything HAS to fit into "teh relmz" succinctly, and neither did Michael Moorcock, or Fritz Leiber.
As a matter of fact, maybe I PURPOSELY DON'T WANT reality to be all that reliable of a notion. Because it's a big rug and it's unravelling.
Or, in a nutshell, I think the whole thing is just too damn subjective.
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If your player wants the mechanics of element X, figuring out a way to make those mechanics work in your game isn't something that is difficult. If those mechanics are unbalanced, they shouldn't be allowed, but that has nothing to do with the setting of the game and everything to do with its behind-the-scenes rules.
No, it isn't necessarily difficult... however the DM/GM is the arbitrator of the world in question and can make the decision to say No to something in particular. For example, if a player wants to buy a book... good on them, but my answer to them when they ask if they can use something is typically wait until the next campaign and we'll see. Then I can answer yes or no more appropriately without having to leave big blank areas in my campaign, especially on ones that have been established for years.
No, it isn't necessarily difficult... however the DM/GM is the arbitrator of the world in question and can make the decision to say No to something in particular.
Yes, they absolutely can just say "No."
Whether they should, on the other hand, in an entirely different question.
Any time you say "No," to one of your players, you are preventing them from enjoying the game on their own terms. Any time this happens, you had better be absolutely sure that denying them the ability to play the character they want is worth the little bit of campaign world integrity that might have to be adjusted to allow their request.
WotC has published a number of short articles and other bits of advice on why just saying "Yes," is a great personal policy, even if that occasionally becomes "Yes, but..."
Really, the effort of leaving open spaces in your world design (which is to say, the zero effort required to not describe something in detail) in order to allow for player requests down the line is rarely - if ever! - something that should be a hang-up for a DM. If your world is designed so tightly and in such exhaustive detail that you find yourself completely unable to incorporate a player's request to include fantasy element X (even if just mechanically!), you might have too tight a rein on the game you play.
Any time you say "No," to one of your players, you are preventing them from enjoying the game on their own terms.
But the game's not on their own terms. The game is on the shared terms of the DM and all of the other players. The player has to make compromises too. If their concept doesn't fit the setting, but they're otherwise content with the setting, it's time to make compromises on their character concept to find something that does fit.
But the game's not on their own terms. The game is on the shared terms of the DM and all of the other players. The player has to make compromises too. If their concept doesn't fit the setting, but they're otherwise content with the setting, it's time to make compromises on their character concept to find something that does fit.
Any time you say "No," to one of your players, you are preventing them from enjoying the game on their own terms.
Absolutely. But when you can allow them to play the game on their own terms without compromising the enjoyment of the game for everyone else, you ought to. If you can't do that, work to find a compromise.
I'm starting to get a little utilitarian here, but I think it's a decent way of approaching the social environment of a D&D game.
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But the game's not on their own terms. The game is on the shared terms of the DM and all of the other players. The player has to make compromises too. If their concept doesn't fit the setting, but they're otherwise content with the setting, it's time to make compromises on their character concept to find something that does fit.
Any time you say "No," to one of your players, you are preventing them from enjoying the game on their own terms.
Comprimise is a two-way street. I think all Scott is saying is that DM's need to be able to comprimise as well, as opposed to shooting down anything they haven't already planned for.
If you are able to work out an agreement with your players, even when testing new concepts, your world becomes that much richer. However, I have made decisions before, or have been a victim of a decision, where a concept was denied and for the rest of the campaign the player showed their displeasure by not participating fully.
I know there are times when something should not be allowed, and a player may decide not to continue in your campaign, but I believe this typically happens at open games, wherer someone off the street can join. In those same instances, DMs tend to be stricter, just to keep their sanity.
Adapt. A non-courtly race is perfect for a game about courtly intrigue because a half-orc at court is invisible. He puts on shabby clothing and he's suddenly the laborer servant that nobody wants to bother at all, especially if he's got the intimidate to play himself off as not worth bothering. A psycopathic cannibal halfling presumably has some sort of core competancy; if he's a barbarian (not the class, the origin) then he may be completely nonplussed by things that bother the rest of the party. Except for some of the Dragon Magazine goofiness (revenants are a NO), it's hard to disrupt the game with a race. (Now, in 3e, it is easy to gimp your character with something like a centaur, yeah.)
In most cases for me the problem would either be play balance or what the class does in inappropriate for the style of game being played. One of the things I have that the players usually don't is an idea of what kind of adventures I'm going to be running. So if I know that its going to be low combat murder mysteries I'll be steering the players away from builds that are designed to deal damage (admittedly this is more a 3.x problem where there was a clear line between combat builds and non-combat builds) while steering them away from heavily social builds in dungeon orientated settings.
There can be other reasons to steer a player away from a class or race. For example I steered a player away from a from a really cool class that would was basically a conduit for Far Realm. My reasoning was that we are heading into the final leg of the campaign and there really was not going to be any point where I could do anything cool with the Far Realm in this campaign - ask me next campaign, preferably early on, and the answer will be yes and I'll make sure that the Far Realm has at least an interesting sub plot in the campaign that will allow us to really explore this characters concept.
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Don't take what I'm saying as "Say NO all the time". It isn't what I said. All my point is: that a DM should feel as free to say no as yes and vice versa.
The player can ask, but should also make sure that the other players and the GM are also ready to play with whatever new material is provided. At most, that means they can ask. If they for some reason don't want to play now because someone says no, then that is too bad.
I would seriously question playing with someone who wants to force new material, gameplay, or rules on anyone else either (GM or player) without regard for their level of fun either. I've played with guys like this in the past. We no longer play with them. Of the two groups that emerged, I'm the Yes-man to his No-man for gameplay. His group hates on both 4e and Pathfinder and have few splat books. I allow almost all books (except BoED and BoVD, some 3rd party sources too) and have the policy of "Ask, and we shall try to find a way to make it work," so I feel ya on this one Scott.
Ultimately, finding the right way to say yes or no is more important than just making a decision. If you've got a good reason, go ahead and give it as GM. If you're unsure and would like to avoid it as a result, I find that every bit as valid a reason.
Don't take what I'm saying as "Say NO all the time". It isn't what I said. All my point is: that a DM should feel as free to say no as yes and vice versa.
I don't know that I agree with this either. Saying "No," is easy. It's tempting to say "No," as a DM. It keeps you in control, it means you don't have to do any work to accommodate, and the game remains as predictable as it was a few minutes before. Saying "Yes," is more difficult for the DM, but more rewarding for the player. In my view, "Yes," should be the default answer. The only time "No," should come up is when saying "Yes," would be either extremely difficult to follow through on, or simply would not make sense in any incarnation. Most of the time the worst I'd expect is, "Yes, but we'll have to change it around a bit to help the concept fit into the world."
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Don't take what I'm saying as "Say NO all the time". It isn't what I said. All my point is: that a DM should feel as free to say no as yes and vice versa.I don't know that I agree with this either. Saying "No," is easy. It's tempting to say "No," as a DM. It keeps you in control, it means you don't have to do any work to accommodate, and the game remains as predictable as it was a few minutes before. Saying "Yes," is more difficult for the DM, but more rewarding for the player. In my view, "Yes," should be the default answer. The only time "No," should come up is when saying "Yes," would be either extremely difficult to follow through on, or simply would not make sense in any incarnation. Most of the time the worst I'd expect is, "Yes, but we'll have to change it around a bit to help the concept fit into the world."
I don't see that saying no is any easier than saying yes. It seems that the rest of your argument agrees with me, save for the default answer part. In no way, shape, or form can there be a default answer for such a situational event as new material. Every new rule, mechanic, or glob of fluff is situational and should be judged in according fashion. A player should feel free to ask, which sort of implies that a GM should say yes to things but all I say is that the DM shouldn't feel beholden to say yes all the time either. We're agreeing here.
I don't know if I'd call it work for a GM either, because it can be very fun to sit down with a book in your lap and go through the process of crunching numbers for mechanics and envisioning how it could interact with the world created. If you've got a problem that arises and you cannot reconcile it, then you should feel free to say no until you can come up with a way to alleviate the problem. I, for instance, don't particularly care for the Monk class in my homebrew campaign settings... but if a player really wants to play one then I will allow it as long as they come up with an interesting backstory for how it is they became that class. Wowing me is the best way to assure a yes answer, and it can be a whole lot of fun working with them to come up with the solution (in this case the resulting backstory).
Saying "Yes, but we'll have to change it around a bit to help the concept fit into the world," is the same as saying no. For example, if this player wants whatever class because of whatever reason, and you want to change that as the GM, can that player have the same amount of fun? You're quite possibly changing the very thing that attracted the player to the class in the first place, and now either the player will say no or it means he must play something different. Now the player is the one saying no, so I don't see the GM saying no is any different. You can hope the compromise comes out, but it might very well not. Therefore a No answer is every bit as valid.