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Cheese is like Pornography, hard to define but I know it when I see it.
Examples from recent history...
Wielding a lance in each hand on horseback
Taking a readied attack to 5' step back to negate a charge
Using a quick draw, throwing shield to get an attack as a free action
Magic jarring a giant whale to get free wishes.There is a more fundamental rule to combat these than rule zero. The 'Rule of Stupid' should be enshrined in gamer law.
I feel so proud of being included in this list. You're also forgetting that you have to MAGICALLY GRAFT ARMS AND MAKE IT ENTIRELY IMMOBILE to make this work. Really, if you're not going to include everything, you just make it sound silly.
Cheese to one person is fair game to another, although it seems the old guard has a much harder time dealing with change than the newer players. I mean when something is called 'anime' as a means to say it's cheesy, that says a lot about the person making that claim. I mean it's not like we have an iconic that wields a giant's greatsword, because oversized weapons are silly.
And it's totally not anime to move your hands and have a fireball come out, just look at european fantasy shows like Naruto.
Internal logic took a holiday the moment I could grow a familiar out of my back fat, so I'm fine with martials doing 'cheesy' things.
PS: For the record, dual lancing looks cool, and I totally support it.
Much like on the other thread, I'm not a big proponent of "if it looks cool then it's OK!" Also, I don't tend to think of it as cheesy either, but more of something I may not like.
Like tumor familiars. Not a fan. Cheesy is often just a word that gets used for "something someone doesn't like." It sounds better, I guess, to say that it is cheesy rather than "That's stupid, Tim. Don't do that." Or "What?" or "That seems broken."
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Cheese is like Pornography, hard to define but I know it when I see it.
Examples from recent history...
Wielding a lance in each hand on horseback
Taking a readied attack to 5' step back to negate a charge
Using a quick draw, throwing shield to get an attack as a free action
Magic jarring a giant whale to get free wishes.There is a more fundamental rule to combat these than rule zero. The 'Rule of Stupid' should be enshrined in gamer law.
I feel so proud of being included in this list. You're also forgetting that you have to MAGICALLY GRAFT ARMS AND MAKE IT ENTIRELY IMMOBILE to make this work. Really, if you're not going to include everything, you just make it sound silly.
Cheese to one person is fair game to another, although it seems the old guard has a much harder time dealing with change than the newer players. I mean when something is called 'anime' as a means to say it's cheesy, that says a lot about the person making that claim. I mean it's not like we have an iconic that wields a giant's greatsword, because oversized weapons are silly.
And it's totally not anime to move your hands and have a fireball come out, just look at european fantasy shows like Naruto.
Internal logic took a holiday the moment I could grow a familiar out of my back fat, so I'm fine with martials doing 'cheesy' things.
PS: For the record, dual lancing looks cool, and I totally support it.
Does make you wonder why some folks are so insistent on maintaining the European fantasy, and get so pissed off when anything from non-white cultures is included that they consider "This reminds me of an artistic style made by non-whites" to be the ultimate insult.
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Does make you wonder why some folks are so insistent on maintaining the European fantasy, and get so pissed off when anything from non-white cultures is included that they consider "This reminds me of an artistic style made by non-whites" to be the ultimate insult.
I don't favorite a post often, but you have certainly earned it.
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Does make you wonder why some folks are so insistent on maintaining the European fantasy, and get so pissed off when anything from non-white cultures is included that they consider "This reminds me of an artistic style made by non-whites" to be the ultimate insult.I don't favorite a post often, but you have certainly earned it.
Oh cool, the race card. We don't see that enough these days.
Maybe they refer to it as "anime" so that people have a common point of reference about what they are describing and what they mean -- not that we've cobbled out on this thread, mind you, but to whichever people that believe that "anime" means X. Sort of like how 4E was called "too much like a video game" as a short hand to describe what they meant. Not that it was ever defined well.
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I'm sorry if you felt 4e was a good game. Sales and common opinion differ with you though.
Huh, turns out HWalsh actually thinks Pathfinder is actually a bad game! I never would have guessed. Don't worry, it's okay to like a bad game.
Does make you wonder why some folks are so insistent on maintaining the European fantasy, and get so pissed off when anything from non-white cultures is included that they consider "This reminds me of an artistic style made by non-whites" to be the ultimate insult.
I'm not sure how any of the examples I gave, draw inspiration from any culture let alone western world.
For the record, anime is a particular style of Asian art, it isn't the only one. Having ran a very enjoyable legend of the 5 rings campaign, a steampunk African campaign and a middle eastern inspired legacy of fire campaign it is clear that there is far more to draw on from non western cultures than anime.
The anime that people pbject to is the equivalent of western superhero comics. There is a place for it, in the same way that there is a place for superheroes, but can you at least understand that some people see superheroics as cheese.
Calling monks cheese is simply retconning a prejudice and blaming it on realism. Sadly, oriental monks may have journeyed all over the world before the time of king Arthur and his real life inspirations.
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Does make you wonder why some folks are so insistent on maintaining the European fantasy, and get so pissed off when anything from non-white cultures is included that they consider "This reminds me of an artistic style made by non-whites" to be the ultimate insult.I don't favorite a post often, but you have certainly earned it.Oh cool, the race card. We don't see that enough these days.
Maybe they refer to it as "anime" so that people have a common point of reference about what they are describing and what they mean -- not that we've cobbled out on this thread, mind you, but to whichever people that believe that "anime" means X. Sort of like how 4E was called "too much like a video game" as a short hand to describe what they meant. Not that it was ever defined well.
I've always objected to that, as Anime isn't actually a genre. It's a medium.
There are anime about guys using reality marbles to create a world with infinite blades to fight the immortal spirit of Gilgamesh and supernatural stuff and all that, and there are also anime about a group of friends coming to the end of their time at art school and adjusting to the adult world in various ways.
It's not at all an accurate way to describe some of the objections people make. Berserk is an anime and it bears far greater resemblance to what you can do in a Pathfinder game than a western cartoon like Avatar does.
It may not be a fair description, but keep in mind that a large number of people using it have seen less than a handful of anime, likely. They're going off of "This show, this one right here? This is the sort of thing I don't like. What do you call this? Anime? I don't like anime!"
That is usually what happens when you use a sweeping generalization "I don't like country music" or "I hate vegetables". Usually a fan of those things will say, "But have you listened to X artist? Tried Y veggie?" Anime fans can point to 50 shows that aren't all about tentacle sex, panty shots, and overpowered world destroyers. But the examples that seem to get through to those outside of the fans are ones with the tropes that seem to ignite the dislike.
Aza Manga Dio was mostly too realistic for me, but the comedy and dream sequences won me back.
Sweet potatoes are a vegetable. So is ketchup.
I don't necessarily think new things are cheese but it is safe to say that games companies need to have a power creep to keep the interest going. Just look at Magic the Gathering. Pathfinder doesn't tend to have it that bad but some of what comes out (ACG onwards for me) has started to make the basic game classes, feats and spells a lot less interesting and feel redundant.
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Oh cool, the race card. We don't see that enough these days.
Maybe they refer to it as "anime" so that people have a common point of reference about what they are describing and what they mean -- not that we've cobbled out on this thread, mind you, but to whichever people that believe that "anime" means X. Sort of like how 4E was called "too much like a video game" as a short hand to describe what they meant. Not that it was ever defined well.
This isn't playing the race card, although let me explain why I favorited that post. I didn't see it as "look at this sweeping argument that proves everyone who dislikes different playstyles is a racist!" I saw it as "Perhaps there is a reason that you don't like the following things that you weren't aware of?"
The two are largely different in tone, and really it made me look at the conversation in a different way that I hadn't thought of before, as I'm sure it did with others.
Also really you didn't dispute their point, you just clarified what people think of 'anime' as. Anime in these discussions is primarily 'shonen' in tone, which is what most of these abilities that people call 'cheesy' stem from.
Really, there's no reason to get defensive and say someone's pulling the race card (whatever that even means in this context), more just take the chance to think about the point brought up and think if it's relevant to you or anyone you know.
I mean the whole european fantasy ignores a lot of other world cultures too, and many of them are incredibly interesting, and yet they always seem to be pushed aside for the classic 'sword and sorcery' theme of a very exclusionary story telling style. The fantasy of other cultures have plenty of things that would presumably be seen as too 'anime' as well, at least without explanation as to their culture.
The comment gave me a lot of food for thought, and it's something I plan on dwelling on more later.
I don't necessarily think new things are cheese but it is safe to say that games companies need to have a power creep to keep the interest going. Just look at Magic the Gathering. Pathfinder doesn't tend to have it that bad but some of what comes out (ACG onwards for me) has started to make the basic game classes, feats and spells a lot less interesting and feel redundant.
Talking like this, it makes me amused to think of PFS having a 'block' format.
"Sorry kids, you all knew that Ultimate Combat was rotating out, but if you're lucky, you'll get the ninja archetype reprinted in the Paizo's legends collection!"
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Not everybody wants a mush of everything. Wanting everything thrown in isn't somehow morally superior to wanting generic medieval western fantasy. People like things that they can immerse themselves in easily, and if you have to study a whole culture and its mores to fully immerse yourself in the game, its going to cease to fit the definition of "Having some fun with the guys(and gals) on saturday night".
As I stated, I didn't say that this was a large sweeping statement, or that it was the end all be all of the conversation, I said that it was an interesting point, and one that I think is important to consider personally.
There's no accusation being made to anyone direction, instead just an idea that deserves attention, at least in my opinion. No one's saying a combination of everything is better either. It's more about the aversion to even small things being included in a game (we have people calling oversized weapons 'anime' while we have an iconic that wields one as well as the kineticist having heavy influence on Avatar: The Last Airbender/Legend of Korra, which in itself is a largely eastern influenced show) due to the influence of other cultures.
No one's saying this is an absolute reason, but even if this isn't the reason you don't like 'anime' as it were in your games, can you deny that it isn't for everyone? It's worth considering if that's your rationale if even for a minute to be able to say to yourself "No, that's not it, I dislike it for X other reason."
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I'm just going to point out as an anime fan...
Pathfinder isn't really Anime based. Pathfinder is the successor to D&D which is mostly western euro-based. While there have been Asian-themed books (Oriental Adventures, Jade Regent) and Asian-themed classed (Samurai and Ninja) they are treated more real-world based than Anime based.
I'd say it's more L5R than Anime for certain.
If you want Anime-Based may I recommend BESM and its D20 variant?
That might be more welcoming to you.
Pathfinder is REALLY weird with how it treats mundanes.
Fighter's tied to reality, Barbarian can EAT MAGIC if it gets angry enough.
Samurai is rooted firmly in reality, Ninja turns invisible through KI POWERS.
I think a lot of it stems from people wanting more versatile martials, and a lot of the ideas are coming from anime since it's popular and it has some very visually appealing motifs for its attacks, making it more easy to draw from than other things.
Again, it's less about actually including anime, and more people comparing anything that's different to anime, which seems to happen more often than not.
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Oh cool, the race card. We don't see that enough these days.
Maybe they refer to it as "anime" so that people have a common point of reference about what they are describing and what they mean -- not that we've cobbled out on this thread, mind you, but to whichever people that believe that "anime" means X. Sort of like how 4E was called "too much like a video game" as a short hand to describe what they meant. Not that it was ever defined well.
This isn't playing the race card, although let me explain why I favorited that post. I didn't see it as "look at this sweeping argument that proves everyone who dislikes different playstyles is a racist!" I saw it as "Perhaps there is a reason that you don't like the following things that you weren't aware of?"
The two are largely different in tone, and really it made me look at the conversation in a different way that I hadn't thought of before, as I'm sure it did with others.
Also really you didn't dispute their point, you just clarified what people think of 'anime' as. Anime in these discussions is primarily 'shonen' in tone, which is what most of these abilities that people call 'cheesy' stem from.
Really, there's no reason to get defensive and say someone's pulling the race card (whatever that even means in this context), more just take the chance to think about the point brought up and think if it's relevant to you or anyone you know.
I mean the whole european fantasy ignores a lot of other world cultures too, and many of them are incredibly interesting, and yet they always seem to be pushed aside for the classic 'sword and sorcery' theme of a very exclusionary story telling style. The fantasy of other cultures have plenty of things that would presumably be seen as too 'anime' as well, at least without explanation as to their culture.
That is certainly one way to take it. It came across, perhaps due to the nature of text, as "You are a bigot because you don't like this non-white thing." And for some people, maybe that is the case. For others it is completely possible to not like it because they don't like it. Maybe they dislike common tropes, the story lines, poor animation, poor plots, or it is just outside of their comfort zone.
It may not be playing a race card, but it certainly comes across in poor light when the conversation drops to accusations of not liking something because of the race of the people creating it.
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That is certainly one way to take it. It came across, perhaps due to the nature of text, as "You are a bigot because you don't like this non-white thing." And for some people, maybe that is the case. For others it is completely possible to not like it because they don't like it. Maybe they dislike common tropes, the story lines, poor animation, poor plots, or it is just outside of their comfort zone.
It may not be playing a race card, but it certainly comes across in poor light when the conversation drops to accusations of not liking something because of the race of the people creating it.
Text isn't the best medium for this sort of discourse agreed. That's why I wanted to take the time to explain why I favorited it instead of just letting that statement hang.
There's plenty of reasons to dislike anything that are entirely subjective, and that's fine. But acting like no one dislikes things due to racial prejudice is purposefully ignoring an actual issue that is very real in society.
In my view, it's important to have that introspection to really figure out if that's an issue, or if it's something else. Hell, most everyone does racist things without thinking about it, it's a process to unlearn negative behaviors, and realizing them is helpful even if they're unintentional.
At the end of the day, it's worth considering just for that reason, if only so that you can look at yourself and give a firm 'no' in that respect.
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I'm just saying, people don't want low key Asian-themed things when they go Anime. They want Martials that can leap 900 feet in the air, run at speeds that can break the sound barrier, and cut through trees in a single blow... All without using a hint of magic or magical items.
That just doesn't fit in the world of Pathfinder.
You want super mundanes look in games that cater to it.
Some people want that, that's not fair to say that everyone wants things of that nature. Some people just want mundanes to be able to full attack while moving without jumping through hoops for pounce.
Again, Barbarians are decently close to what you're talking about with a lot of things, again without a hint of magic. Barbarians are also regarded by many as the best entirely 'mundane' class for a reason.
Not everyone wants to cut skyscrapers with one swing at first level, but once you're 20th level and you have problems cutting a tree due to hardness, we're not in a great place.
... I thought you said this WASN'T about race, and then you drag it right into race?
That was just more of a general thought, not really related to the conversation, sorry if it was off topic for what I was trying to say, that wasn't my intention. I've said what I'm going to on that topic, I don't plan to address it again.
The question isn't about east or west... That much is clear.
It is about superhero and non-superhero roots.
it really has nothing to do with race. The same stories are told across cultures anyway.
Unless they work for WotC. Remember how evil terrible Hitler-y 4e is? You can't house rule anything in 4e, so everything in it is the "Devs'" fault.You can NEVER blame the devsEvery single HWalsh post on the forum condensed into a single phrase.I'm sorry if you felt 4e was a good game. Sales and common opinion differ with you though.
It's OK to like a bad game.
I love bad movies.
I still admit they are bad though.
It's only bad if you run it wrong.....
Just sayin'
It happened to el-emmenthals too. And briedges. Everything new is called cheese.
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I mean the whole european fantasy ignores a lot of other world cultures too, and many of them are incredibly interesting, and yet they always seem to be pushed aside for the classic 'sword and sorcery' theme of a very exclusionary story telling style.
I think the question is if we need to have all these influences in one game or if maybe we are allowed to enjoy the one thing in format A and the other in format B. I generally love anime as books, tv series and movie flicks, but I had never any interest to play any rpg in this style. I also love ancient history but don't feel attracted the least by any rpg playing in ancient rome or greece. On the other hand, any celtic rpg is fine with me, as are LotFR or Oriental adventures style rpg.
Now I'm a big proponent of D&D being as inclusive as possible, so I don't mind these influences too much, as long as I can simply ignore them in my games. Because the reason I play D&D is still Appendix N.
But I agree that the race card is drawn too often. It's like with Marvel these days. I'm all for diversity and inclusiveness, and most of my most favorite super-heroes are female, stem from other cultures and/or have other sexual orientations than myself. Still, I don't get the least, why we need a new Hulk (though I love Amadeus Cho characterwise), a female Thor (though there's no denying that the story is awesome, but we already have Angela), or Miles Morales as Spider-Man (because the interesting thing about Spider-Man never was the Spider-Man but the Peter Parker part, which is not saying that Miles morales is uninteresting, becasue he isn't). Those are all no dealbreakers to me, but obviously you cannot prefer the original version without being called a racist for denying other people their own version of already established heroes.
Hm, hum, ok, back to topic. Though I can't say to much about the cheese in D&D, because Appendix N is already cheesy as hell.
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Because new things take time to fully integrate into peoples inner view of what a game or setting is. Many times unfamiliarity leads to them being played incorrectly or missing the weaknesses in whatever the new thing is. If you're in that mindset already it becomes pretty easy for a series of good dice rolls or luck on the part of the person using the new thing to come across as overpowered.
The question isn't about east or west... That much is clear.
It is about superhero and non-superhero roots.
it really has nothing to do with race. The same stories are told across cultures anyway.
D&D, as the mechanics go, is HEAVILY based on super heroes if we're comparing what sort of things they can do and the sort of punishment they can take. At least, D&D that's been published in the past 15 years. Gandalf and Merlin didn't lob fireballs or Mirror Images or Fly around shooting beams of fire at enemies. Conan dealt mostly with human goons and the occasional large monster or predator.
Hit points, armor class, action economy, the style and potency of the magic system ALL lead to a game that is better to simulate a fast paced, high-action Superhero game to anything resembling what we've read from non-TSR/WotC fantasy. Not that it's bad, just that trying to peg D&D as something that it's not is why things often get called "cheese".
i should be clear that I refer to comic book superheroes, marvel et al.
I wouldn't count Conan as a superhero, nor most of the basic characters. Magic is magic not superheoism and magic users in many works of fantasy fiction can throw to fireballs.
I don't see any classes as being based on a superhero or on superhero poses, certainly not in core. Though I am open to be corrected.
What we seem to accomplish in many of these threads is finding new and interesting ways to talk about the problem, but much less in describing what people want and how to get there.
There are fixes, don't get me wrong, spoken about in some of the threads. But for the most part it is grumbling about spell casters and how the game doesn't fix it but the one just down the street does, or speaking in nebulous terms about what people may or may not want from their martials. It is less clear what they want from their spell casters -- there seem to be equal voices calling to limit them and others saying let them stay at the same level but raise the martials to that level. How? No one is sure, but we'll bring up One Punch Man and Cú Chulainn and Pecos Bill and nod sagely as if that actually says how to build it in the game.
Whether Pathfinder is or isn't influenced by anime is not significant except for getting a point in an argument that doesn't matter. Who cares? How do we get from "martials suck" to "My martial jump kicked Chtulhu!"
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Ultimately, it all boils down to the fact that Pathfinder goes for "realism" with martials and super-powered magic users. As always comes up in these kinds of threads, there's no shortage of Western examples of ordinary "mundane" characters performing superhuman feats. It's not an exclusively anime thing by any means. The only reason I can see for labeling concepts and ideas that feature in plenty of Western folklore and mythology as "anime" is to try and exclude them from the having a place in Traditional Western Fantasy.
The anime that people pbject to is the equivalent of western superhero comics. There is a place for it, in the same way that there is a place for superheroes, but can you at least understand that some people see superheroics as cheese.I don't think that's fair at all. Blatant superheroic behavior is often unmentioned in most of these discussions.
After all, this is a thread with a first page full of people ridiculing the idea of a man with superhuman strength and endurance wielding a slightly larger sword than normal while raising no objecting to someone flying around and shooting lasers out of their eyes.
And I see a lot more superheroes doing the latter than the former.
What we seem to accomplish in many of these threads is finding new and interesting ways to talk about the problem, but much less in describing what people want and how to get there.People have talked about what they want, but it's actually the less important issue here, because there's really irreconcilable differences between the two sides.
Yes, there are irreconcilable differences -- so why are we arguing about them instead of moving on with making things better for martials? Those who don't think they need them will not think they need them, and no amount of posts will change that fact. So why is it the more important issue to try to persuade people to "see the light?"
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Aside from the Wicked Witch of the West, what fictional wizards (pre-D&D, preferrably), threw fireballs?I wouldn't count Conan as a superhero, nor most of the basic characters. Magic is magic not superheoism and magic users in many works of fantasy fiction can throw to fireballs.
Not pre-D&D but Tim the Enchanter is all about that delayed blast fireball.
The wheel of time casters - throw fireballs, call lightening and do much more powerful things.
Just because Gandalf doesn't throw fireballs doesn't mean he can't throw them.
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Frankly I think martials need more save or die abilities. There are FEW things more final than a sword through the heart, and the fact that the greatest swordsman in the world hasn't got much of a chance of ending a fight with a swift decapitation or thrust through the chest without abstracting the back and forth or fighting far weaker targets kind of stinks.
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So after reading a thread in which monkey grip was called cheese, it occurred to me that people seem to have lost the idea of what that word means. For those unfamiliar, monkey grip is a 3.x feat that allows you to use two handed weapons one handed, at a -2 penalty to accuracy. This reults in almost all cases in a dps loss, even before figuring in the feat opportunity cost, and is pretty much solely for flavor. Even in the face of that, it was called cheese.
It seems like any time there is an option that lets you do something you couldn't before, it's called cheesy. Guns, for example, hit touch ac, but a well built gunslinger is no match for a well built archer in terms of dpr, yet they're constantly banned and called cheese. Why is a new ability always cheese? Doesn't cheese mean game breaking, not game expanding?
Well, you've a couple minor errors here.
One, dual wielding greatswords is looked as cheesy, not because it's impossible, but because its anime-ish, and not something even a hugely strong person would attempt in reality. The fact you could lift such a thing doesn't mean you could wield them well, as any weapons practitioner will tell you. You don't have leverage, you don't have range of movement, and you don't have momentum. To somehow do this effectively, you'd probably have to be standing at least three feet above the floor to get the full range of effective motion.
And lest you think it's cheesy much, there was an Epic feat that allowed you to wield weapons up to 3x above your size. The depiction was a Halfling wielding a Huge Greataxe.
Lastly, a well built gunfighter will trample the DPR of anything into the Dust, because they can target Touch AC. The resulting auto-hits will nicely trounce any archer in a DPR contest.
==Aelryinth
Arguing cause for "realism" in a game where a 17 year old can have the ability to sprout claws and throw up magical "force bullets" becuase eight generations ago a dragon got busy with his great-times-eight grandma isn't especially compelling. Especially when he was born in revolutionary france and is currently exploring an ice planet because an old lady gave him a house on chicken legs.
"no one wields two great swords because it's dumb!" yeah, same reason no one covered themsleves in belts and straps. same reason swords never had spikes on the blades. same reason that armor was not created to hold to a flattering shape on the wearer's body. Now open your pathfinder books, and flip through some of the art.
"becuse realism" just isn't a valid argument for this game. It's not a game that even tries for realism. it's a stylized gme about often (usually) magical heroes who run out from their assorted trope-and-pastiche-flavored homelands to have heroic adventure against crazy things like pyromaniac midgets with shark-faced melons for heads and inexplicably sexualized snake-ladies in forgotten temples.
It's like complaining that Conan isn't doing the sensible thing and putting on some of that armor that his enemies always wear and is instead running around with his Austrian man-boobs hanging out and never once getting a scratch on them.
No, it's not at all realistic. But it's not supposed to be. it's heroic high fantasy. The characters are supposed to be able to achieve pretty ludicrous things, and I think being able to use a voulge like a double-weapon is, if anything, more realistic than having magical powers because gran-gran got busy with a flying monitor lizard.
That may be the case in your campaigns. In others more realism is the order of the day. The core pathfinder rules are a modelling system for a world where magic and monsters exist. How much magic, what it looks like, how many monsters and which you chose are down to individual groups.
As has been said in other threads, reality is the base line that other elements of the game that defy our reality are based on. Magic doesn't mean anything if there aren't underlying principals for it to alter.
As long as the rules are consistent so players are able to use internal logic to solve problems I don't have a problem with dragons and fireballs etc.