apparently not so badass as to risk a battle against anything that might stand a remote chance. :PThere is a difference between only engaging in combats with 'a reasonable chance of victory' and 'unwilling to risk a battle against anything that might stand a remote chance.'
I'd say personally speaking I don't want to get into a fight I have less than an 80% chance of winning. Fall below that and sooner or later someone will die. Not that there's anything wrong with death, but it's certainly something the vast majority of my characters actively seek to avoid (though it's not always avoidable for numerous reasons ranging from 'heroics' to 'greed' to a multitude of things.)
The bigger the risk, the bigger the win!
Seriously though, 20% chance of death and you don't want your hero to fight? 20% is not high. Not the most heroic stance.
apparently not so badass as to risk a battle against anything that might stand a remote chance. :PThere is a difference between only engaging in combats with 'a reasonable chance of victory' and 'unwilling to risk a battle against anything that might stand a remote chance.'
I'd say personally speaking I don't want to get into a fight I have less than an 80% chance of winning. Fall below that and sooner or later someone will die. Not that there's anything wrong with death, but it's certainly something the vast majority of my characters actively seek to avoid (though it's not always avoidable for numerous reasons ranging from 'heroics' to 'greed' to a multitude of things.)
The bigger the risk, the bigger the win!
Seriously though, 20% chance of death and you don't want your hero to fight? 20% is not high. Not the most heroic stance.
Because I like my characters lasting longer than 5 fights? Even 5 climactic fights?
20% is ridiculously high for making a career of adventuring.
Agreed. Heck, even with the nutty junk I throw at my players I've had no PC deaths in my current campaign. The Paladin would have been dead in one fight if he wasn't a Paladin (he got magic missile spammed). But he is, so everyone's still okay. :P
I've had plenty of characters die since 1982. Probably got upset once or twice, back in the day but now, it's a fantastic opportunity to try out a refreshing new concept.
I remember my favorite character Leaf the Druid finally got to 10th level when his naturally rolled psionic probability travel was viable. The other players went to sleep upon leveling late one night and I convinced the DM to let me take my awesome powarz for a spin. I wanted some crazy extra planar adventure in exotic locales, my fave being the Astral Plane. Instead I encountered the Astral Plane's random encounter table - to whit, a bone devil that ended poor Leaf. Definitely 1e.
But Leaf was also one of only two PCs left standing when we previously encountered the Bodak in Tsojcanth. All the other PCs were dead or dying, but Leaf and Rojoth (I think, an elven F/MU whose player used to fall asleep and when told about it termed this as merely a "long blink") were victorious!!!
I was more sad when Leaf's Mountain lion pet Mouf proved not indestructible. As if this cuddly war-machine based on my own tabby cat should ever be targetted. Good times.
I completely get bored in PF battles where no-one hits the ground prone/hurt or even dies. I prefer gritty and consequential to heroic and soap operatic. I also find in the PbPs I'm in the players are ultra conservative, fairly unimaginative and risk averse. It is frustrating...
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My favorite sort of game revolves around outmaneuvering the BBEG to try and tilt the odds -- if you charge right in, the chance of TPK is like 90%, but if you ruthlessly exploit every advantage, deny him resources, and keep him on the defensive at every turn, eventually you can tilt that to more like 80% in your favor.
PS: OR, maybe it could be that I have to DM PF and the group is all women besides me. With the AD&D group, I'm only a PC/Player and the entire group is a bunch of guys?You know women aren't uncommon in the hobby now-a-days, but the whole group besides the GM?
Was that just pure chance?
No, it's my wife is the main motivator in regards to it, and all the people she brings to RP are women. She enjoys me being a GM, but not as a player as much (ever since we had an incident where she wanted me to speak to a talking fish, but I burned down the innkeeper's roses instead...long story). Soooo...I always get to be the GM when playing with a family member in the group....
apparently not so badass as to risk a battle against anything that might stand a remote chance. :PThere is a difference between only engaging in combats with 'a reasonable chance of victory' and 'unwilling to risk a battle against anything that might stand a remote chance.'
I'd say personally speaking I don't want to get into a fight I have less than an 80% chance of winning. Fall below that and sooner or later someone will die. Not that there's anything wrong with death, but it's certainly something the vast majority of my characters actively seek to avoid (though it's not always avoidable for numerous reasons ranging from 'heroics' to 'greed' to a multitude of things.)
The bigger the risk, the bigger the win!
Seriously though, 20% chance of death and you don't want your hero to fight? 20% is not high. Not the most heroic stance.
Because I like my characters lasting longer than 5 fights? Even 5 climactic fights?
20% is ridiculously high for making a career of adventuring.
If you always want it easy, you won't find the joy of triumph when it is very hard. You play how you want to play, but its just a character, why shouldn't the hero risk death (and the dm challenge you with situations in which death is really possible)?
I dont think thejeff is saying he doesnt want a situation where death is really possible. He's just pointing out that 20% is a pretty high chance (pretty much no PCs are ever going to live to make second level if that's the average chance of survival).
EDIT: okay, 1 in 20 will, but hardly any are going to make it to third.
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You play how you want to play, but its just a character, why shouldn't the hero risk death
For what?
To clear a single dungeon room? No thanks, I choose life.
To save the kingdom from the lich's doomsday artifact? Hell yeah!
The reward should validate the risk accepted. To do otherwise is the height of foolishness.
"There is no cause to fly into a thunderstorm in peace time."
Yeah I think even with an adventurer's mindset, I'd want to know I had at least an 80% chance of surviving through the entire quest, not just a single fight.
I guess narrative chances mess things up a bit. With apologies to Terry Pratchett - the math odds might be 50/50, while the story odds say people with a 50/50 chance are almost certainly going to succeed ;)
Also, a 20% chance of *losing* a fight may be pretty good odds, but an 20% chance of *dying* in that fight is pretty bad. Once you start equating defeat with death, anything in double figures tends to be nasty.
Well, what about raising? What happened to some combats being harder than others? I did not say 20% every time, what is more of interest is the question of is a 20% chance of death fight too insurmountable a problem for characters that you play? Is once in a while okay? Once in a campaign?
If there isn't a challenge, what is the point?
I say all this because part of the old essence of AD&D was that death was really possible in game, it could and indeed did happen. Traps often caused it (don't bring a thief, you'll be fine), tough enemies or waves of them could also cause it to happen. Rejecting the old sense of walking the tight-rope challenge in favour of safety is what I consider the biggest departure from the old way of playing D&D.
That and better craft all my items, so there is even less of a challenge for my uber character.
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Back in AD&D there was more threat of death and yes; more consequence when your character died. I wasn't necessarily a killer DM but I ran Tomb of Horrors for my PCs a couple times. Another DM I played under routinely ran a dark world. You couldn't grab a drink from a stream while dying of thirst because as you drank you were grappled and drowned by xvarts.
But one threat I DON'T miss from those days is hazards and traps. They were diabolical, quick, and deadly. In one module my buddy always tells me about there's a pair of boots in the first room.
DM: you see a pair of boots
Player: I try em on
DM: Give me a save
Player: umm (rolls)... seven?
DM you die.
See, there's yellow mold in the boots. Even if you look in supposedly the module just says "a yellowish substance coats the inside of the boots" but if the PCs try any other inspection of the footgear they risk dying. In the first room. Of a 1st level appropriate adventure.
Now yellow mold hasn't gotten any less lethal for novice 1st level players but experienced Pathfinders can use Knowledge: Dungeoneering to identify it, try a cantrip or orison to test it from a distance or sacrifice an animal companion or summoned creature for the effort. Bottom line, hazards are still hazardous, its just that now you have ways of dealing with them.
Now, there were ways of dealing with them in older editions, but either your chances were low OR they were esoteric, undefined by the system. There was thus a lot more interaction between DM and player, but since things like "knowledge" rolls were up to the DM to decide and adjudicate, there was even more of an attitude that the DM was a separate entity like there were the players and then this impartial/cruel/tyrannical/fair/fun/godlike entity off to the side called the DM.
This might be another part of the "essence" folks want to recapture.
Technically, isn't a cr = level 50/50 in a one on one fight? Cr equivalent foes are 20-25 percent of a party s resources or a possible death. So you 20 per centers actively avoid apl +1 encounter s or Cr equivalent 1v1? How heroic.
Not against running away. Criteria for when to is different per situation and player.
(Think on how unpopular the offhand demise of Tasha Yar was on TNG.)
So, given the popularity of Game of Thrones, I can assume that GRRM would never kill off major characters...
In addition, it's relatively easy to kill off 57 major characters when you have 845 of them.
LOL!
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In 1E there was an adventure module where players started out without a class, and the actions they took throughout the adventure determined what their class was. If I remember there was a checklist, the the DM kept track of actions for each PC. I may work on something like that for PF this summer, it recapture a lot of what I think of as essential to the AD&D experience- focus on roleplaying and character personality rather than build, hopefully some of the sense of wonder at...
All good points until here.
Boy did that suck. I ended up with a cleric who had a Wis of 9, and unable to cast spells. Of course, I just never played him again.
Considering how attached we get to literary characters whose creation with which we had nothing to do, is it really so surprising that one of our own devising becomes, for some, too near and dear to see killed arbitrarily or casually? Some players are not invested in their creations so emotionally, but others are, and don't enjoy the random brutality of sudden death, at least not without what they consider good reason. (Think on how unpopular the offhand demise of Tasha Yar was on TNG.) A play style in which the PCs have, to some extent, plot immunity, would not be valid—except that this is a role-playing game.
The key for any DM is to discern the risk level each player wants for his characters and employ it. It may vary from group to group, person to person ... or even week to week. Ain't the easiest job, but that's why DM's are paid ungodly amounts of ...
... well, that's why we're showered with praise and ...
... well, it's our job.
Not to go too far OT but think of what 'Tasha Yar' could have been. Denise Crosby was supposed to get the 'Deanna Troi' role. Roddenberry switched them before filming started. He always had a weakness for large chested women (other than his wife).
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(Think on how unpopular the offhand demise of Tasha Yar was on TNG.)So, given the popularity of Game of Thrones, I can assume that GRRM would never kill off major characters...
GRRM needs a serious editor. He's a good writer but quickly comes to hate his heroes. He actively kills everyone with a soupcon of decency and heroism as quickly as he can unless they're victims. He sure loves victims and villains. Heroes? Not so much.
On topic, the mechanics of AD&D are completely different than d20. The sheer number of mechanical options in d20 opens alot of in play options for roleplay that are backed up by those mechanical options.
I dunno that one can get the feel of AD&D which was very limited in player options.
I don't think either has more merit than the other, either. Depends on what kind of a game you like.
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If there isn't a challenge, what is the point?
To have fun.
Of course, not having a 20% chance of failure every battle does NOT mean there isn't a challenge, but nice try.
If you can't have fun without a 1 in 5 chance of failing, you should let your group know in case your playstyles don't match.
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I think it's more about style and pacing honestly. The mechanics facilitate a nice stable play, but everything else in the game is set in tone and flow by the GM and the players.
A few things that would make PF look a bit more like OD&D...
1. Lots of randomness.
2. Way bigger encounters.
For example, my copy of OSRIC says the number of bandits encountered is 20d10 (average 110 bandits) plus 1 9th level fighter, 2 6th level fighters, 2 5th level fighters, 3 4th level fighters, 5 3rd level fighters. Each bandit has 2d4 gp. The fighters in the group have a 5% per level of having a magic armor, shield, sword, miscellaneous weapon, and potion (so 45%, 30%, 25%, 20%, and 15% for those fighters). Said magic items would be rolled randomly.
For magic armors and shields, there was a 50% chance it would be a +1. A 25% chance for it to be +2. A 5% chance to be +3. A 5% chance for it to be +4 or +5 (+4 65% / +5 35%). A 5% chance to be cursed. A 10% chance that it was a special specific armor.
Same with magic swords and miscellaneous weapons.
Potions you have to select yourself, but they were nice enough to include which classes use what potions. So since these are Fighters the kind of potions that they carry on things like...
Potion of Invulnerability (immune to normal attacks, attacks from nonmagical creatures, attacks from creatures with less than 4 HD, +2 to all saving throws, provides 2 points better AC, lasts 3d6+2 rounds).
Potion of Heroism (grants +3 levels for fighters 3rd level or less, +2 levels for 6th level or less, +1 level for 9th level or less, lasts for 10-40 minutes).
Potion of Super Heroism (grants +5 levels for 3rd level or less, +4 for 6th level or less, +3 for 9th level or less, and +2 levels for 12th or less, lasts 5d5 rounds).
Potion of Giant Strength (grants rock throwing ability and other benefits as shown below, lasts 10-40 minutes).
Roll 1d20 to determine potion type : Giant Type : Melee Damage : Carrying Capacity : Rock Throw Range : Rock Damage : Bend Bars/Lift Gates
1-6: Hill : +1d8 : +4,500 : +780 ft. : 1d6 : 50%
7-10: Stone: +1d10 : +5,000 : +8,160 ft. : 1d12 : 60%
11-14: Frost : +1d12 : +6,000 : +9,100 ft. : 1d8 : 70%
15-17: Fire : +2d6 : +7,500 : +10,129 ft. : 1d8 : 80%
18-19: Cloud : +2d8 : +9,000 : +11,140 ft. : 1d10 : 90%
20: Storm : +2d10 : +12,000 : +12,160 ft. : 1d12 : 99%
That said, I think I'll probably just stick to Pathfinder. :o
But Ashiel: all these rules, so much math...it's too cumbersome. Go back to old D&D... :)
In all seriousness though, I agree with what Kryzbyn is saying. A lot of the difference is just in number of player options. AD&D had no real "build" options except for minor decisions along the way and a lot of decisions were made by DM fiat. PF has a lot more of the options, rules and even some of the campaign creativity rooted in the players. It really depends on which system you enjoy as both have pros and cons.
My favorite sort of game revolves around outmaneuvering the BBEG to try and tilt the odds -- if you charge right in, the chance of TPK is like 90%, but if you ruthlessly exploit every advantage, deny him resources, and keep him on the defensive at every turn, eventually you can tilt that to more like 80% in your favor.
Are any of the AP's written that way? Or is it something you have to add in as GM?
Are any of the AP's written that way? Or is it something you have to add in as GM?
I ususally write my own adventures. Sometimes I'll crib pieces from APs, but past very low level, I almost never run them as-is.
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My favorite sort of game revolves around outmaneuvering the BBEG to try and tilt the odds -- if you charge right in, the chance of TPK is like 90%, but if you ruthlessly exploit every advantage, deny him resources, and keep him on the defensive at every turn, eventually you can tilt that to more like 80% in your favor.Are any of the AP's written that way? Or is it something you have to add in as GM?
The APs are written to give a 15 point buy party a moderately "challenging" experience. Or something. A 20 point buy party of guys that can optimize halfway decently will probably never be truly challenged in an unmodified AP.
Back in AD&D there was more threat of death and yes; more consequence when your character died. I wasn't necessarily a killer DM but I ran Tomb of Horrors for my PCs a couple times. Another DM I played under routinely ran a dark world. You couldn't grab a drink from a stream while dying of thirst because as you drank you were grappled and drowned by xvarts.
But one threat I DON'T miss from those days is hazards and traps. They were diabolical, quick, and deadly. In one module my buddy always tells me about there's a pair of boots in the first room.
DM: you see a pair of boots
Player: I try em on
DM: Give me a save
Player: umm (rolls)... seven?
DM you die.See, there's yellow mold in the boots. Even if you look in supposedly the module just says "a yellowish substance coats the inside of the boots" but if the PCs try any other inspection of the footgear they risk dying. In the first room. Of a 1st level appropriate adventure.
Now yellow mold hasn't gotten any less lethal for novice 1st level players but experienced Pathfinders can use Knowledge: Dungeoneering to identify it, try a cantrip or orison to test it from a distance or sacrifice an animal companion or summoned creature for the effort. Bottom line, hazards are still hazardous, its just that now you have ways of dealing with them.
Now, there were ways of dealing with them in older editions, but either your chances were low OR they were esoteric, undefined by the system. There was thus a lot more interaction between DM and player, but since things like "knowledge" rolls were up to the DM to decide and adjudicate, there was even more of an attitude that the DM was a separate entity like there were the players and then this impartial/cruel/tyrannical/fair/fun/godlike entity off to the side called the DM.
This might be another part of the "essence" folks want to recapture.
Stealing the boot trap. That will sure shake up the low level players!
That is a good point, the novelty and creation phase shifting to the rules and if no rules it is forbidden phase of dice rpgs.
Only an anecdote but I did start with AD&D (red box old friend) and house rules and creating/adapting was taught to me by my first dm (my older brother). It was encouraged. I've made my own systems, had a lot of fun, played around with the rules. I find myself arguing with a lot of mechanics obsessives (and I don't meant that in an entirely negative way either, good builds are good for the party) that don't seem to want to make their own rules, try something out of the ordinary or what is stated as do-able, or feel confident doing so. Raised into a game with more structure, the structure is King.
This relates back to the point on thieves that their skills are too low to succeed at low level. Well there was a lot of creativity and chicanery that went into playing a thief, sometimes you had to lie and use charisma checks to cover your failures, "oh your purse has a hole in it, yeaaaaah", you didn't always pass the checks, and sometimes you just had to knife everyone to complete the job. Rarely did a job go off without a hitch before level 9, which when you think about it, was probably a deliberate choice in design. Gygax you trickster, you weren't making this easy. You made me use all those backstabs!
This moves us to backstabs, and some more recent players trying AD&D and saying it is impossible to set up. Well you use your creativity and try to make the scene one in which you can pull off a backstab. You are talking the dm through how you are setting it up. Early dnd had a lot of bluff, persuade and con the dm into making this work, but mechanically some people say it cannot, simply, be, done. Yet players set those wonderful multipliers up for years. My AD&D friends never reported a problem getting off the backstab.
I think it is a very good point you make Eirik.
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I really don't understand the reaction to my post here, especially since I ended it with:On topic, the mechanics of AD&D are completely different than d20. The sheer number of mechanical options in d20 opens alot of in play options for roleplay that are backed up by those mechanical options.
I dunno that one can get the feel of AD&D which was very limited in player options.
I don't think either has more merit than the other, either. Depends on what kind of a game you like.
What??? This is the thing I don't get. I think this is the perfect example of the cultural difference in today's players (as opposed to the players of yesteryear). How do mechanical options open roleplay options? In my experience, every rule closes many more opportunities than it opens. Things you might have tried based on the narrative, you won't try because the mechanics makes them unlikely to succeed. Having a rule limits you to only the interactions that are mechanically optimal.
I think this has something to do with the relative newness of RPGs back in the AD&D days. We were creating as we went, because nothing told us what couldn't be done. Heck, I don't know anyone who played back then who didn't try to write their own game. So lack of mechanics was an opportunity, not a drawback. We imagined the scene, then reacted accordingly, and invented the mechanics to do what we wanted to. Today, with computer games as a major influence on gaming culture (the circle is now complete </Vader>), gamers seem to be waiting to choose between options provided to them. If the mechanics don't expressly say it, it is forbidden. Whereas, I think the older attitude was more that if it wasn't expressly forbidden, then it was allowed (you just have to make it up).
I'm not trying to be dismissive of one style or the other, but there is one that I prefer, and I don't think I should have to pretend otherwise. I always found the limited mechanics freeing. Combined with the focus on building (pre-gaming work) characters to pre-plan your abilities, as opposed to a focus on...
I don't think either has more merit than the other, either. Depends on what kind of a game you like.
But to clarify my point:
In AD&D I could write into my character's backstory that he was known as being heartier than others. If I wasn't a fighter class that rolled really well for CON, it wasn't backed up with mechanics. My character could easily drop as fast as any other of his class. But, in Pathfinder, we have Toughness, Endurance, Die Hard, etc. So, the character in different ways is actually more hardy/harder to take down than those that do not take those feats.Mechanics back up character concept, and also role play.
In Pathfinder, traits and feats work together to back up your concept and actually allow your character to do what he claims/actually back up your character concept/role play.
I understand how some folks are intimidated by more choices, I guess.
But again, if your play style doesn't like it, that's fine. There is no badwrongfun.
EDIT: I find this interesting:
Combined with the focus on building (pre-gaming work) characters to pre-plan your abilities, as opposed to a focus on in-game decisions...
There is absolutely no reason you can't do both...the folks I play with are fully capable of building/planning out a characters initial concept (initial because things can change in game) and also focus/work on in-game problems/story...am I missing something?
I'd say a good acrobatics roll (DC 15) would easily allow a person to swing on a chandelier...
Isn't this the "DM fiat" people say made AD&D more to their liking?
I got it. Seems to me a lot of feats should actually be built in class features personally.
That would be an interesting "solution".
It'd be similar to what MMOs do when they see people all using the same AA builds...they make them part of the base class and then invent new options...
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It especially screws over the fighter. The game pretends to give him a bunch of bonus feats, but locks most of the cool feats he might actually want behind feat chains and undsrwhelming fear taxes. He ends up with LESS feats he actually gave a damn about than classes with no bonus feats.