| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Why play as a big strong Fighter when you can play as a Commoner and pretend that you're a big strong fighter.Because Commoners have better class skills, and if you could get the 2:1 level:CR deal for playing a commoner that NPCs do, it would easily overshadow fighters as big strong warriors.
2 NPC levels vs 1 Fighter level? 2 NPC levels 24/7. It's not even a contest. You'd end up getting +1 feat / level which wouldn't be restricted, better saves after a few CR levels, +1 to +2 BAB, higher max-ranks, way more skill points, and comparable or better HP.
2 levels of Commoner = +1 BAB, +2/3 Fort/Ref/Will, 4 + (IntMod*2) skill points, +2 HD (more resistant to certain effects), 7 + (ConMod*2) HP, +1 feat, and you even have better skills.
No contest. :P
EDIT: Or you could be a barbarian. That works too.
Yeah, I'm not seeing it with commoner. 10th level fighter: +10 BAB, +7/+3/+3 saves, 20+10*int mod skill points, 10HD, 59.5+10XCon hp, 11 feats, weapon training +2, armor training, actually proficient in weapons and armor. Fighter class skill list eclipses commoner with the exception of Perception, which I don't accept as a "god skill."
20th level commoner has: +10 BAB, +6/+6/+6 saves, 40+20*Int skill points, 20 HD, 70+20XCon hp, 11 feats, and one simple weapon. So the commoner ends up with slightly better saves, hp, decent skill points but a smaller skill list, and worse attack rolls, damage, armor and weapon choices. Seems to me that if I'm looking at playing a fighter I might prioritize armor, weapons, attack rolls and such more than skill ranks. Also don't forget that your CR 2 for 1 calculation presumes the NPC is built on 3 point buy, while the PC class gets 15.
You seemed to miss the part where I mentioned getting 2:1 levels for commoner levels being considered disassociated when leveling a creature. The bestiary outlines the mechanics for advancing creatures in the game by CR. Since Fighter is supposedly a heroic class (it's actually more like NPC-class * 1.25) it advances your CR at +1/level, whereas the Commoner would advance your CR at +0.5/level, which means 2 NPC levels / 1 Fighter level.
And at that point the Commoner is just better (the warrior NPC class is so much better that it's disgusting to compare the two). Yes, at 1:1, the commoner is only better in that it has better skills than the Fighter (poor fighters T_T), but at 2:1, Commoner all the way.
|
Well, for those who said they would throw up their arms, and quit, if they allowed larger weapons to be wielded, the Giant Hunter's Handbook is out.
I give you, the Titan Fighter:
Sorry to see you go...Titan fighters make use of enormous weapons others can
barely lift. Titan fighters have the following class features.
Giant Weapon Wielder (Ex): At 1st level, a titan fighter can wield two-handed melee weapons intended for creatures one size category larger than himself, treating them as two-handed weapons. He takes an additional –2 penalty on attack rolls when using an oversized two-handed weapon. This ability replaces the fighter’s 1st level bonus feat.
Lol, I hope Umbranus is not that pissed. Anyway this makes titan fighter and titan mauler a really good combination, actually it repairs the archettype
i knew somebody named Andy who played a katana wielding Lizardfolk Samurai named Bruce, who was built using the barbarian chassis. he hit like a truck with a 2hand katana he wielded with martial proficiency, but wasn't very well optimized, having forgotten to take the obvious superstition rage power and it's counterparts spell sunder and ghost rager, his characters themselves weren't the hindrance, the hindrance would often be the dependent NPCs he brought
I think it depends on your playstyle.
On these boards, there is a great number that pay no attention to the fluff (why the heck they think it's even written is beyond me...apparently it's so they can ignore it as they obviously don't feel it's part of the rules).
Others feel it is an integral part of the rules (aka...fluff is PART of the rules and crunch and fluff are complementary).
So in essence, it depends on the playstyle of the group.
I find that most are somewhere in between the two extremes...where fluff DOES matter, but it's not so set that it can't be refluffed.
Only on these boards do I find this (ignore everything but the numbers) type playstyle.
Best way...ask your GM about it and what they will or won't allow. You may get advice here that is NOT allowed in your group...it's best to go straight to the group and source on this one and see how they would handle it instead of trying to get an idea from these boards and then being disappointed because they don't allow it.
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
I think it depends on your playstyle.
On these boards, there is a great number that pay no attention to the fluff (why the heck they think it's even written is beyond me...apparently it's so they can ignore it as they obviously don't feel it's part of the rules).
I think it is because they think that restricting yourself to the book's flavor is not needed. If you want to be someone who taps into his anger or "lose yourself in combat" in order to fighter better then go barbarian since it does not have to mean you are some guy from the wilderness. The book's flavor is just a suggestion* most of the time, unless it is directly attached to the mechanics, such as with the paladin.
*I think they are aware that the flavor in the book is the base assumption, but the idea is that you should not "have" to choose class X to portray a concept, if you can do it better with class Y.
I think it depends on your playstyle.
On these boards, there is a great number that pay no attention to the fluff (why the heck they think it's even written is beyond me...apparently it's so they can ignore it as they obviously don't feel it's part of the rules).
I think it is because they think that restricting yourself to the book's flavor is not needed. If you want to be someone who taps into his anger or "lose yourself in combat" in order to fighter better then go barbarian since it does not have to mean you are some guy from the wilderness. The book's flavor is just a suggestion* most of the time, unless it is directly attached to the mechanics, such as with the paladin.
*I think they are aware that the flavor in the book is the base assumption, but the idea is that you should not "have" to choose class X to portray a concept, if you can do it better with class Y.
Andy's Zen Samurai Swordsman was essentially done as a barbarian, his 'rage' was used to represent a trance of extreme serenity with the same mechanics as rage and same stat changes, and his "rage powers" were basically different fantasy samurai techniques
another example is Rin the street magician, a timid sylph slayer with a knife, well, several knives, a deck of razor sharp throwing cards, an internally brigandine/kikko reinforced raincoat, an inferiority complex, all the classic rogue tools, and lots of bad reskinned Las Vegas puns pertaining to a small city called Lost Wages. she was also a gambler, a part time casino dealer and had a general knack for getting in trouble, the only thing she lacked to be a petite genderswapped gambit was the Cajun accent
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
i knew somebody named Andy who played a katana wielding Lizardfolk Samurai named Bruce, who was built using the barbarian chassis.
I'm probably losing what little mind I have left but, I read this and immediately imagined an adventuring duo consisting of a Kua-Toa named Ribbit the Bruce and his partner Willhowl Wallace the werewolf. I need to lay off the Mt. Dew. :|
i knew somebody named Andy who played a katana wielding Lizardfolk Samurai named Bruce, who was built using the barbarian chassis.I'm probably losing what little mind I have left but, I read this and immediately imagined an adventuring duo consisting of a Kua-Toa named Ribbit the Bruce and his partner Willhowl Wallace the werewolf. I need to lay off the Mt. Dew. :|
you don't need to lay off the mountain dew, you need to drink more of it. Bruce was a fun reskinned barbarian to play with, even if his build wasn't quite optimal.
I'm in the mood for Mt. Dew now. Thanks...
don't forget to drink the orange soda too. it triggers similar parts of the imagination in a similar manner to mountian dew.
|
I think it depends on your playstyle.
On these boards, there is a great number that pay no attention to the fluff (why the heck they think it's even written is beyond me...apparently it's so they can ignore it as they obviously don't feel it's part of the rules).
I expect the crunch to match the fluff. With Craft Ooze I was not expecting a ooze companion with no restrictions. Neither was I expecting a ooze that was both unintelligent and non-loyal. What the point of taking such a feat when in the end my own creation could attack my character and my companions.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
On these boards, there is a great number that pay no attention to the fluff (why the heck they think it's even written is beyond me...apparently it's so they can ignore it as they obviously don't feel it's part of the rules).
I'm one of those refluffers you're talking about so let me give some insight from this angle. Fluff serves its purpose. It's a sprigboard for inspiration and makes it easier to jump into a game as both a player and a GM without having to completely imagine everything about the world from scratch. Fluff can be used to set mood, act as a lure for the uninitiated, and even simply to provide some entertaining reading.
However, fluff has nothing to do with the actual game. It's almost required to be retuned for each campaign setting. If hobgoblins in your world are perfectly fine with arcane magic, it's not a house rule, it's just the sample narrative junk isn't the same. Nothing in the rules is actually changed, it's not even a house rule, just a theme difference.
It actually gets under our skin (or at least it gets under mine) when the default fluff doesn't fit with what the mechanics actually provide. The monk class is notorious for fluff that does not describe the mechanics of the class but actively describes things the class is poor at providing.
Example 2: Someone wants to play a strong dual wielding Samurai. How important is it that this pc really has the samurai class written on his sheet? From a rules perspective he could well play a slayer, getting TWF from a ranger combat style. If he behaves and dresses like a samurai why would it be any worse, fluff wise, than a pc with samurai written on the sheet? Again, why look at the rules when you are aiming for a certain fluff?
I am literally playing a viking that is a ranger(gave up spell casting for something that I thought synergized better for the role i wanted him to play in group). he was originally a barbarian, but he turned out in effective in the fighting style I wanted, due to lack of feats. If anyone asks me what class I am, I will get confused, and if they ask me my profession I say viking.
I am literally playing a viking that is a ranger(gave up spell casting for something that I thought synergized better for the role i wanted him to play in group). he was originally a barbarian, but he turned out in effective in the fighting style I wanted, due to lack of feats. If anyone asks me what class I am, I will get confused, and if they ask me my profession I say viking.
Example 2: Someone wants to play a strong dual wielding Samurai. How important is it that this pc really has the samurai class written on his sheet? From a rules perspective he could well play a slayer, getting TWF from a ranger combat style. If he behaves and dresses like a samurai why would it be any worse, fluff wise, than a pc with samurai written on the sheet? Again, why look at the rules when you are aiming for a certain fluff?
Would it be wrong of me, in light of the conversation, to point out that the Viking Fighter has rage and a ton of feats?
I know it matches the actual flavor of the archetype, and that's frowned upon, but, you know...Thought I'd point it out.
In regards to Example 2, when I dreamed up and developed Way of the Samurai (PFRPG), since Paizo actually created a samurai class and I did want to support it, 4 different samurai archetypes were included (even a Musashi-based 2 weapon variety), and 3 new samurai orders.
However, I also wanted to emphasize in that product that samurai was really a social caste and not something that could necessarily fit in a container called "samurai class", I even offered the alternate name "buke" which was the official name of the samurai caste in feudal Japan. I did that by including samurai-flavored archetypes: teppo bushi (gunslinger), onmyoji (wizard), yamabushi (paladin), yojimbo (ranger), thus you could fit various concepts of "samurai" that didn't inherently fit the PF class "samurai", yet all belonged in the buke social caste.
I even included 2 prestige classes: bugyo (government official) and mosa (samurai tank) that get some samurai abilities, yet have no prerequisites with levels of samurai class, so any class with enough BAB and appropriate feats can take a prestige class to emphasize the "samurai" as a mechanical option, yet not play the actual samurai class.
This way an entire party can play the role of samurai, yet consist entirely of different classes to achieve that concept in a balanced and sensible way. You don't have to play the samurai class to be a samurai, so I created mechanical options to do that, because often fluff is not enough.
|
|
| 3 people marked this as a favorite. |
IMO often they want BOTH. They want their mental vision AND they want it to work in the game the way they expect.
Agreed and seconded.
We want both. It's all good to give me a feat similar to Minkey Grip. Yet if the perquisites and/ or negatives are too high I'm simply not going to take it. If a DM removed the Improved version of say Sunder. Then multiplies the hit points of items by five or more. Again like above not worth taking. A good balance of fluff and crunch is something some dms and Paizo devs simply can't seems to do.
However, fluff has nothing to do with the actual game. It's almost required to be retuned for each campaign setting. If hobgoblins in your world are perfectly fine with arcane magic, it's not a house rule, it's just the sample narrative junk isn't the same. Nothing in the rules is actually changed, it's not even a house rule, just a theme difference.It actually gets under our skin (or at least it gets under mine) when the default fluff doesn't fit with what the mechanics actually provide. The monk class is notorious for fluff that does not describe the mechanics of the class but actively describes things the class is poor at providing.
Seconded when it doesn't match.
I refluff all the time. Part of that is training from having played the HERO system for nearly 30 years - in that game you don't get a "lightning bolt" you get Xd6 of damage and define it as fire, lightning, bio-energy etc. (there aren't elemental resistances so this remains balanced).Of the big uses of refluffing is if you have a character concept that the designers have never done, but you and your GM like the idea, you just yank the mechanics from another class. It gives a lot more options without increasing the amount of crunch - you aren't "held hostage" by what the game designers have come up with so far.
I am literally playing a viking that is a ranger(gave up spell casting for something that I thought synergized better for the role i wanted him to play in group). he was originally a barbarian, but he turned out in effective in the fighting style I wanted, due to lack of feats. If anyone asks me what class I am, I will get confused, and if they ask me my profession I say viking.
Example 2: Someone wants to play a strong dual wielding Samurai. How important is it that this pc really has the samurai class written on his sheet? From a rules perspective he could well play a slayer, getting TWF from a ranger combat style. If he behaves and dresses like a samurai why would it be any worse, fluff wise, than a pc with samurai written on the sheet? Again, why look at the rules when you are aiming for a certain fluff?
Would it be wrong of me, in light of the conversation, to point out that the Viking Fighter has rage and a ton of feats?
I know it matches the actual flavor of the archetype, and that's frowned upon, but, you know...Thought I'd point it out.
I wasn't playing sword and board, and i would have to choose between rage powers and bonus feats. *shrug* i like this better than raging really, even if it is very powerful.
|
|
Again, why look at the rules when you are aiming for a certain fluff?I wish I knew. I have had discussions with this guy in my group about stuff like this all the time. His answer is, "I just don't think Pathfinder is a 'refluff it' kind of game." WTF does that mean?
What it means is that, the way it is set up, Pathfinder does your imagining for you. Given enough time, they will have a base case for most concepts, eliminating the need for the player to imagine anything, and just pick off the menu of feats and skills.
Again, why look at the rules when you are aiming for a certain fluff?I wish I knew. I have had discussions with this guy in my group about stuff like this all the time. His answer is, "I just don't think Pathfinder is a 'refluff it' kind of game." WTF does that mean?What it means is that, the way it is set up, Pathfinder does your imagining for you. Given enough time, they will have a base case for most concepts, eliminating the need for the player to imagine anything, and just pick off the menu of feats and skills.
So you say pathfinder kills roleplaying? Because that's what it sounds like.
So you say pathfinder kills roleplaying? Because that's what it sounds like.Again, why look at the rules when you are aiming for a certain fluff?I wish I knew. I have had discussions with this guy in my group about stuff like this all the time. His answer is, "I just don't think Pathfinder is a 'refluff it' kind of game." WTF does that mean?What it means is that, the way it is set up, Pathfinder does your imagining for you. Given enough time, they will have a base case for most concepts, eliminating the need for the player to imagine anything, and just pick off the menu of feats and skills.
Character generation isn't roleplaying. It's what happens before roleplaying.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
So you say pathfinder kills roleplaying? Because that's what it sounds like.Again, why look at the rules when you are aiming for a certain fluff?I wish I knew. I have had discussions with this guy in my group about stuff like this all the time. His answer is, "I just don't think Pathfinder is a 'refluff it' kind of game." WTF does that mean?What it means is that, the way it is set up, Pathfinder does your imagining for you. Given enough time, they will have a base case for most concepts, eliminating the need for the player to imagine anything, and just pick off the menu of feats and skills.
For some it does. It depends on the level of holiness(thou shall not modify) applied to Paizo's flavor text, and how much everyone agrees on it. As I said before some posters/gamers will call you a powergamer or munchkin if you use a different class to perform whose flavor is written up in a different class. Some GM's will ban the ninja class strictly based on the name, and won't allow you to change the flavor around it.
Actually, it can work both ways. It kills roleplaying to simply play the crunch game in many aspects. Fluff is an RPG part, crunch is simply numbers.
So, if you simply optimize and see how fast you can kill things or how effectively you can beat the numbers...that kills roleplaying FAR more than using fluff.
Afterall, everything with golarion, that world, and the rpg aspects of the game are fluff.
One could say, by adhering to fluff, you actually are paying closer heed to the roleplaying aspects than simply tossing them out and using the crunch.
of course, you can also roleplay if you reflavor the fluff, but it's far easier to kill roleplaying and imagination by focusing on crunch rather than fluff.
Neither kills roleplaying, but they can. However, anyone who thinks that following pre-written fluff as rules Kills the roleplaying aspect, shows someone who really doesn't understand WHAT roleplaying is from it's inception from Gygax (with the fluff of Greyhawk) to the AD&D highpoints (of Forgotten Realms and Krynn) to Pathfinder (Golarion).
Sure, you can toss out fluff and refluff and roleplay fine, but roleplaying games have ALWAYS had fluff which was important to the flavor of that particular form of RPG.
The biggest difference between fluff and refluff is how imaginative the house GM is in creating their own world, how much the players actually TRUST that GM for that world creation, and if they even want to play in that GM's creation, or another world. Each can be equally roleplaying and imaginative.
Only someone who plays more towards a crunch world and kills roleplaying that way, IN MY OPINION, would think that fluff kills roleplaying.
That's about the most ridiculous idea I've ever heard, since roleplaying itself revolves around fluff, either the GM's, or one already created...or both.
Only someone who plays more towards a crunch world and kills roleplaying that way, IN MY OPINION, would think that fluff kills roleplaying.There are two sides to that coin GreyWolfLord. One could also interpret the term 'roleplaying' as a creative endeavor which is indeed stifled by excessive established fluff.
Some of the best roleplaying I've experienced were in games where the established fluff was thrown out the window and players were encouraged to do their own thing with the game rules.
Irregardless of whether it's GM made, or player made, fluff is still what differentiates Roleplaying, from a math game or exercise.
Players are always encouraged to do their own thing, the question is whether they can use their imagination, or are limited by needing to use numbers. It has NOTHING to do whether they are using established fluff, or GM made fluff.
If you really want to go down that road, and say it's Only player created fluff that counts, why even use the classes created by Paizo?
Afterall, if one is so anti-fluff that's been established, perhaps they should create their own classes...afterall, then there is no debate on whether to use established fluff or not.
Some of the MOST UNINSPIRED games have been from people who disregards established fluff, basically because they play a numbers game with crunch and really have no idea what they REALLY want to play. They make up something to fit in, NOT BECAUSE it really MAKES SENSE...but so they can justify some incredible build of theirs.
Looking at the advice forums on this site, a majority of the builds have NO REAL roleplaying backstory. Is this what you mean by creativity or roleplaying, something simply built for numbers and a vague one sentence idea?
Games without any fluff are NOT roleplaying games in my opinion, but a number crunching game which has less actual roleplaying than videogames in many instances. That's not a bad thing necessarily, but it's not the style of roleplaying I want to play.
Established fluff is there to create a world when the GM doesn't have time to. It's equally as valid as any other, and in many instances where a GM tries to create their own but it's an five minute or hour thing...that's incredibly less complex and may have less room for roleplaying (depends on how fast on their feet a GM is) then any established fluff.
I don't have a problem with people creating their own fluff and playing with it, but calling established fluff as killing roleplaying, is basically the same as calling any fluff as killing roleplaying, which is absolutely ridiculous as the only thing that differentiates roleplaying from a crunchy math game is the actual fluff.
Fluff is the descriptions not only of the classes, but of the world, and anything that isn't really the numbers and names of numeric rules of the game.
Basically, if you want to game in a world, someone has to create the fluff, whether it's the GM or an established campaign.
Now you may find that the fluff in the PF rulebooks are not your style and more constricting in choices than you like, and that's FINE, but that has nothing to do with roleplaying and the ability to do so and more of what your preferred style of roleplaying is.
I don't suspect anybody is saying that the existence of fluff is killing roleplaying, but rather the way a group chooses to implement it.
+1
being forced to make up your own fluff encourages the player to invest more attachment onto their character because the fluff isn't premade, i played a nanoha style martially inclined magical girl who was built using the Psionic Warrior from psionics expanded, other than fudging power lists to get general time space bureau powers, her device was a Naginata or a modified glaive that dealt 1d8 damage with an 18-20x2 crit range as a martial weapon with the reach, trip and disarm properties, and it didn't really matter that she used the stats of a half drow to represent her race, i referred to her as a Nyxad or Shadow Nymph and she had traded a few path powers for the ability to flurry with polearms, as well as a few unarmed oriented powers and she even had a tweaked prestige class made to modify her psionic progression instead of modifiying a divine casting progression
she was a dirty fighting but honorable C rank mage with A Rank Martial Ability who tanked through absorption spells and even used the inertial armor and psionic weapon powers. she really didn't have a lot of charisma unlike most nyxads because she followed orders, she didn't lead, she was cute, but driven by duty and common sense over simply acting on her priveledges. she was lawful neutral to the core and generally did good things because she was ordered to, and if she were told to do something bad, she would have, if her commander told her, the only exceptions being suicidal things like jumping off a bridge. she did both reach attacks and butt attacks and rarely fired her force danmaku.
|
|
Try rolling up a character in TravellerCharacter generation isn't roleplaying. It's what happens before roleplaying.So you say pathfinder kills roleplaying? Because that's what it sounds like.Again, why look at the rules when you are aiming for a certain fluff?I wish I knew. I have had discussions with this guy in my group about stuff like this all the time. His answer is, "I just don't think Pathfinder is a 'refluff it' kind of game." WTF does that mean?What it means is that, the way it is set up, Pathfinder does your imagining for you. Given enough time, they will have a base case for most concepts, eliminating the need for the player to imagine anything, and just pick off the menu of feats and skills.
Well, that's T&T style solo roleplaying. Rolling until you're seventy and dead? Classic.
|
|
+1I don't suspect anybody is saying that the existence of fluff is killing roleplaying, but rather the way a group chooses to implement it.
Not even that, what I meant was, by having so many base classes, you don't have to really think about how to develop a concept or how to portray an archetype. Once the game actually starts, all RPGs depend on the group's preferences as to how immersive the RP will be, but I preferred having to do some mental gymnastics to get a concept across, pre-3x. Now, if you allow 3.5 splats, you basically have a base class for every concept, no mental gymnastics required.
Fluff is fluff, and it is mutable with most gamers. It really can't get in the way of RP unless you let it.
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
I don't need official fluff, but I do need mechanics that can reflect my character concept in a satisfying way.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
I think it depends on your playstyle.
On these boards, there is a great number that pay no attention to the fluff (why the heck they think it's even written is beyond me...apparently it's so they can ignore it as they obviously don't feel it's part of the rules).
Why does a marathon have a start line? Why do various gymnastics use a springboard?
To get things started. It's the basis from which players create the ideas and characters and concepts that all those numbers are in reference to. That doesn't mean you have to stay there any more than a gymnast can never leave the springboard.
I think fluff is certainly important. If you don't have a fleshed-out enough concept of your character or if you like the pre-made fluff, then use that. If you have your character in mind, though, you shouldn't be limited by the fact that the game's designers have a finite amount of room in the books or that their job is to provide that starting point.
You should have a fluffed-out character, and if it's not the pre-made fluff, then it should be some kind of fluff. But if you have that some kind of fluff, then you should be set. As long as you've got some kind of explanation for how your character learned how to do what he does, the fact that he's never seen the inside of a monastery in his life should not prevent him from being a Monk (the class).
If you use the fluff of class description, it gives you some directions, but it doesn't define the personality of the PC or the real essence of makes good roleplaying content. It would be like saying that being a graphic designer (me) somehow defines who I am. Its a job that might imply some things like education, but being a graphic designer in no way tells you what kind of person I am, what are my motivations are and what bothers me. In the same way class doesn't replace roleplaying value of a given class.
On the other hand, I've run what was essentially a bounty hunter, but I used paladin to play that role. The class description/fluff for paladin in no way suggests "bounty hunter". So what, I chucked the existing fluff out the door. This guy didn't take every bounty, he'd do some investigation first and try to decide whether the target was evil or not and only pursue those that qualified under his tight scrutiny, then he'd hunt them down attempting capture if possible, or slay them if he has to.
What a given player wants to roleplay can use the fluff as a guide, if it fits his concept. However, if you can twist the concept around, and class with a particular set of mechanics you want to use, and make up your own justification for using to your own completely different concept. Some classes probably can't reflavor easily to every concept, but creative players may come up with something reasonable.
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Actually, it can work both ways. It kills roleplaying to simply play the crunch game in many aspects. Fluff is an RPG part, crunch is simply numbers.
Irregardless of whether it's GM made, or player made, fluff is still what differentiates Roleplaying, from a math game or exercise.
Both of these are factually false. Fluff adds nothing to roleplaying beyond a sample for which to get a deeper idea of a character from. If you require a specific class to have a specific fluff then you are are actively making the game MORE about the crunch and a math exercise because you are anchoring a specific set of imagination to mechanics and barring all imagination and innovation that isn't baked in.
As a result you are actively murdering many, many character concepts, especially if there is no pre-established fluff for the concept whether there are mechanics that would allow it to begin with, or you are forcing everyone to look like everyone else in the world.
In a good friend of mine's Reign of Winter game a while back, I had a character named Agatha. She was a "witch" but she was closer to a druid in my concept of her as a major theme of hers was shapeshifting and using spooky spirit magics and such. My concept for her did not include a familiar, animal companion, or oracle curse (I ****ing hate the forced flavor of oracle curses btw, just as an aside, its rare I have a character concept that calls for one), but I did want her to have a fetish with her mentor's spirit in it that was like a piece of bone jewelry.
The class I ultimately ended up going with was a PSION (dual disciple version, specializing in Egoist and Shaper) which allowed her to do things like take the shape of animals and/or people and call strange spirit-wolves and phantoms. She dressed in robes and furs, carried an athame (ritual dagger), was semi-religious, wore lots of little trinket fetishes that included things like feathers and animal bones and teeth. Her psicrystal was the polished bone eyesocket of her mentor (whom she ate in a ritual to bind their souls together) with an opal for the eye, and it spoke to her and would become possessed and animated frequently as her mentor acted through it.
She was a favorite character of the campaign (I got a lot of compliments on her from the other PCs and the GM).
In a good friend of mine's Reign of Winter game a while back, I had a character named Agatha. She was a "witch" but she was closer to a druid in my concept of her as a major theme of hers was shapeshifting and using spooky spirit magics and such. My concept for her did not include a familiar, animal companion, or oracle curse (I ****ing hate the forced flavor of oracle curses btw, just as an aside, its rare I have a character concept that calls for one), but I did want her to have a fetish with her mentor's spirit in it that was like a piece of bone jewelry.
The class I ultimately ended up going with was a PSION (dual disciple version, specializing in Egoist and Shaper) which allowed her to do things like take the shape of animals and/or people and call strange spirit-wolves and phantoms. She dressed in robes and furs, carried an athame (ritual dagger), was semi-religious, wore lots of little trinket fetishes that included things like feathers and animal bones and teeth. Her psicrystal was the polished bone eyesocket of her...
Cool character, inspired by Morrigan from the Dragon Age games?
I would probably make the same character with a domain Druid or a Bonded Item Witch.
There are players who will decide descriptive doesn't matter if it isn't backed up by rules.
There are players who disregard descriptive altogether and say that descriptive and rules are completely separate.
It depends on who you're playing with.
I would tend to have descriptive and rules match, but do so in an overall way with broad strokes. Not everything needs rules added to it, because that gets insane.
|
|
Depends on the kind of flavor. If your flavor is something purely thematic, like "I'm 5' tall and weigh 100 lbs soaking wet." or "My character likes to drink and dance." then you don't really need specific mechanics to back that up 99% of the time.
On the other hand, if your flavor is something with mechanical impact like "I'm a deadly warrior with bow or blade, and fear nothing in this world." or "I'm a silver tongued devil who can talk almost anyone into almost anything." you're really gonna need some stats to back those up.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
For me it is simple as this. If you say your character can do something please for the love of god stat it so it can, or be the fop that fails. Back story and fluff that does not impact actions is totally up to the players in my games, but the fighter that studied in a wizard tower hurts my head with 2 skill points and no studious aspects.
I have ran many games in many states, and to me there is no badwrongfun if people are having fun. But it is a group play and having fluff that others can relate to and understand really keeps the shenanigans out of the game.
YMMV
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
In a good friend of mine's Reign of Winter game a while back, I had a character named Agatha. She was a "witch" but she was closer to a druid in my concept of her as a major theme of hers was shapeshifting and using spooky spirit magics and such. My concept for her did not include a familiar, animal companion, or oracle curse (I ****ing hate the forced flavor of oracle curses btw, just as an aside, its rare I have a character concept that calls for one), but I did want her to have a fetish with her mentor's spirit in it that was like a piece of bone jewelry.
The class I ultimately ended up going with was a PSION (dual disciple version, specializing in Egoist and Shaper) which allowed her to do things like take the shape of animals and/or people and call strange spirit-wolves and phantoms. She dressed in robes and furs, carried an athame (ritual dagger), was semi-religious, wore lots of little trinket fetishes that included things like feathers and animal bones and teeth. Her psicrystal was the polished bone eyesocket of her...
Cool character, inspired by Morrigan from the Dragon Age games?
I would probably make the same character with a domain Druid or a Bonded Item Witch.
Thank you, and actually no she wasn't but she definitely had a lot of similarities with Morrigan what with the shapeshifting thing. I was thinking "hedge witch" when I was thinking her up.
I had considered druid initially. Witch just didn't seem to have anything suitable for the flavor and druids have very powerful shapeshifting and some cool options for a hedgewitch or something, but I didn't want to wait until 5th level to actually start doing shapeshifting things (lesser metamorphosis is a 1st level power, and while no where near as strong a druidic shapeshifting, it let her turn into interesting things right out of the gate), and astral construct was very ideal for phantom-spirits and stuff. :)
Both of these are factually false. Fluff adds nothing to roleplaying beyond a sample for which to get a deeper idea of a character from. If you require a specific class to have a specific fluff then you are are actively making the game MORE about the crunch and a math exercise because you are anchoring a specific set of imagination to mechanics and barring all imagination and innovation that isn't baked in.
As a result you are actively murdering many, many character concepts, especially if there is no pre-established fluff for the concept whether there are mechanics that would allow it to begin with, or you are forcing everyone to look like everyone else in the world.
In a good friend of mine's Reign of Winter game a while back, I had a character named Agatha. She was a "witch"
The class I ultimately ended up going with was a PSION (dual disciple version, specializing in Egoist and Shaper) which allowed her to do things like take the shape of animals and/or people and call strange spirit-wolves and phantoms.
I remedied that for you. You included FLUFF in your description. Actually, I left a little fluff in there still, so people could know what you had and so your sentences would make a little sense.
FLUFF is all the stuff that is not the rules. It's the FLUFF which makes an RPG...it is the FLUFF that differentiates it from many boardgames or even some computer games.
Without fluff, we know your class, but you have NO INTENT, and NO design of the class...there's no backstory, no concept, no major theme, not anything that is fluff. Everything dealing with your concept, or background, or activity...
That's all fluff.
I think people don't understand fluff, and so they don't understand that without the fluff, there is no RPG...not really.
I suppose you could have the roll playing game type RPG...but not really a ROLE playing game type RPG.
FACTUALLY, you have NUMBERS and or rules, and you have what is extra beyond that. The extra is the fluff...it's the descriptive text. It's what states what a character or being really is beyond the numbers. It's how you know a dwarf is a dwarf, and elf is an elf or a fighter is a fighter, or any other descriptions we call fluff. It's how you know what world you are in. Fluff is the stuff that is outside the numbers and absolute rules themselves...but without fluff, there IS NO GAME like most of us understand it.
Whether it is pre-existing or pre-made fluff, or something you make on your own to fill out the rules of the game...fluff is a necessary item for an ROLE playing game (though I admit, a ROLL playing game, just of crunch is possible. They can even be fun occasionally).
What's interesting in much of this, are people are readily able to discard the fluff that describes what a class is, but with the races which have the exact same thing going on, those same people will insist a dwarf is a dwarf and an elf is an elf...but a fighter isn't necessarily a fighter.
It's because many who Role play PF have other ideas for what fluff they want in their classes, but can use their imaginations just as creatively with premade fluff for their races.
It IS interesting to observe though...that where as many are adamant that utilizing fluff as written for classes restricts them, they hold a double standard in regards to other fluff that is in PF (such as races).
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Races aren't really any different. It's not like countless versions of fantasy games or settings don't have their own versions of orcs, elves, dwarfs, etc; but they might look different and/or have subtle cultural differences, but the "stocky tough", "agile graceful", "small and sneaky" are pretty universal. I mean even in Star Wars, Gammoreans are basically space-orcs. :P
You can present an entirely new world with new and exotic races without ever even changing the mechanics of the core races if you want.
Also, something you said I'd like to comment on...
" fluff that describes what a class is"
Fluff describes what the class is expected to be able to emulate. It's more like it describes what the class does, rather than is. As you yourself point out, a class is nothing but numbers and mechanical bits and how it actually plays out in a story is irrelevant to that. Which is why a lot of us refluffers are extremely put off by things like forced-fluff or meta-gaming names.
Because metagaming and immersion breaking is bad to us. Sorting people in the world based on what their class is called leads to a goofy sort of play environment like that of Order of the Stick, except while OoTS is all very tongue-in-cheek, a lot of people seem very serious in trying to define everyone in the world based on their classes, which is just ludicrous.
"Hi, I'm a multiclassed wizard/ranger/eldritch knight" is dumb.
What's interesting in much of this, are people are readily able to discard the fluff that describes what a class is, but with the races which have the exact same thing going on, those same people will insist a dwarf is a dwarf and an elf is an elf...but a fighter isn't necessarily a fighter.
What many people do is ignore the stereotype applied to a race, and a race and class are different engines so that is not really a good comparison. A better comparison is ignoring the flavor text for a class ability or feat.
Also almost nobody ever says the fighter is not a fighter. The fighter is pretty much a blank slate. He can a large number of professions such as gladiator or bodyguard. Neither of those stop him from being a fighter.
What is often said with classes is that you don't have to follow the flavor text for that class, and that still applies with my race example. You can actually be a dwarf with no beard that does not drink alcohol, and is very polite. That is different than saying the dwarf is a half-orc who is just very short.
For some classes their name, such as the paladin is who the class is to a large extent, but mostly only if the flavor is very tied into the class.
The thing with the race is that it they have certain build in mechanics that only that race can have, and it also ties into how they interact with certain rules such as bane weapons so while you can RP being a different race it is not as easy to pull off.
Can it be done?
Sure it can. Maybe you have elven ancestry so you inherited low light vision, and immunity to sleep making you an unusual "human". That ancestry could also explain your vulnerability to things that can only affect elves. However in the game if you are recognized as a human when you are an elf then you could get unintended benefits, and yes I realize that is a corner case but if so the GM now has to think of a logical reason to not let a purely cosmetic thing have a mechanical affect.
For some classes their name, such as the paladin is who the class is to a large extent,
I'd dare say that even Paladins aren't exempt from name/fluff/crunch disconnection. I mean, I don't think the D&D/PF Paladin has much to do with being a Christian Knight fighting Muslims. At least...I didn't see a smite Muslim in their class features and I'd really like to think smite evil isn't intended to represent the same.
o_o