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Rules & setting fluff should be strictly separate. Just because it's the standard fighting technique of one faction to use a set of feats in no way means another cannot learn the same, especially as the rules are (or should be) an abstraction.
Absolutely not. One of the worst things to come down from the publishers of D&D was the sense that "fluff" and "crunch" were some kind of separate entities. These are RPGs, not board games. The "fluff" is as important as the "crunch".
That said, the setting-specific stuff is as reskinable as it has always been, which is to say, infinitely reskinable.
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Well, not all religious characters have to belong to a religious class. I think it's a cool thing to have options that mechanically reflect that you wizard/fighter/rogue/etc. is devoted to a specific deity.
Actually my ninja is sort of a religious fanatic.
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Well, they can be separable. The problem with the D&D approach is that they've got them tied together, but theoretically separable.
Compare to something like Hero System, where the fluff is completely separate. You buy mechanical powers and you make up the special effects that go with them. And all the background about how you got them and everything else that goes with it.
D&D's some kind of weird hybrid when it comes to crunch and fluff.
Hero and Mutants and Masterminds are modeling the superhero genre and that fairly requires a lot of customizability (as well as undefined adjudication by the GM). But they're not really the standard when it comes to RPGs. They're the outliers. Other RPGs, from Traveller and Warhammer to Cyberpunk and Shadowrun, tend to follow a more D&D/PF-ish model of meeting fluff with crunch. Abilities are available through professions or archetypes and not necessarily available to everyone. Nomads and physical adepts don't get great netrunner or decker abilities. If you want to tote around a powerful gun (like a Plasma Gun Man-Portable or PGMP) in Traveller but aren't at the highest tech level, you're going to have to be in battledress powered armor - no exceptions. And retirees from the Marines don't get Scout-class ships when mustering out.
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I don't like flavor restrictions on mechanics, and while I'm sympathetic to people defending it, I don't like the argument that it stops power gaming. Like, when I hear about DEX-based glaive users, my first thought is "that's awesome", same with DEX-based scimitar dancers, and I hate the idea that it's restricted to a random religion that quite frankly I don't care about. As an aside, DEX based builds are COOL, and that's part of the problem, because they're also considered strong and you often need to jump through hoops to get them working, but for me at least it's not so much a powergaming impulse as just wanting to play DEX-based characters.
And I mean, this is what I do when I have a great idea that has a RP cost tagged on- I call myself a worshiper of X, go through the motions, yadda yadda sun god whatever, because I want that feat, but I'm not going to mention it in my RPing unless I absolutely have to.
So to the people who say this is good because it makes you think about your RP, stop power gaming, etc, I ask:
What is worse, someone who "powergames" (or just wants to play a cool idea) and is able to RP whatever they want with a fairly easy conscience, or someone who "powergames" and is forced into having specific traits which they will then ignore? I personally think the former is less stressful for everyone involved.
(And for the record I'm a fan of Chaotic Monks, Lawful Barbarians, Neutral Assassins, and Paladins of all flavors.
To be clear, I understand why some people like flavor requirements like this. I don't though, especially as I don't play in Golarion if I can help it. )
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Other RPGs, from Traveller and Warhammer to Cyberpunk and Shadowrun, tend to follow a more D&D/PF-ish model of meeting fluff with crunch. Abilities are available through professions or archetypes and not necessarily available to everyone. Nomads and physical adepts don't get great netrunner or decker abilities.
I feel compelled to point out that in Shadowrun there's no reason a physical adept couldn't get all the decker abilities, since it's not a class-based system.
Granted, someone who tries to be an adept/decker is almost certainly going to end up being mediocre at both roles since characters rarely have the resources to manage two completely different skillsets, but nothing in the rules prevents someone from trying.
I think it's helpful to remember that religion isn't the only thing that gets restrictions. Thanks to stuff like the Player Companion line, many different groups and organizations have options exclusive to its members. Some people want anyone to be able to take anything, other people see these choices as thematic extras, and options to help create certain kinds of characters. ...Both views probably have something to them.
But it's always easier to remove restrictions to something you want to use than creating new flavor and story for something that doesn't have it.
So I think it's cool they bring to play some flavorful stuff with the mechanics because it adds a lot of color to the game. If you don't like the flavor or you can just remove them effortlessly from your game.
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What is worse, someone who "powergames" (or just wants to play a cool idea) and is able to RP whatever they want with a fairly easy conscience, or someone who "powergames" and is forced into having specific traits which they will then ignore? I personally think the former is less stressful for everyone involved.
Nothing is "forcing" people to arbitrarily write down a deity they want nothing to do with in order to get a cool feat.
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Nothing is "forcing" people to arbitrarily write down a deity they want nothing to do with in order to get a cool feat.
The rules are, though.
It's all well and good to say you can change them if you want, but that's only if you're the GM, and this is more of a player problem.
EDIT: Unless you mean they should just give up and not take the feat. Which isn't going to happen. If someone really wants a feat, they're going to take it, and justify it however they want, but they're going to drop those justifications as soon as they can if it runs counter to the character they imagined.
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Nothing is "forcing" people to arbitrarily write down a deity they want nothing to do with in order to get a cool feat.The rules are, though.
It's all well and good to say you can change them if you want, but that's only if you're the GM, and this is more of a player problem.
Again, nothing is forcing people to take the feat, which is different than people wanting the feat.
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See my edit. Just because nothings forcing people doesn't make it not a problem.
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EDIT: Unless you mean they should just give up and not take the feat. Which isn't going to happen. If someone really wants a feat, they're going to take it, and justify it however they want, but they're going to drop those justifications as soon as they can if it runs counter to the character they imagined.
Which is what a Powergamer with no regard for settings and flavour does, and is a player problem, not a setting problem.
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Look, I'm all for system fluff, but I would rather DM's have the power to just lift some restrictions for a mechanical bonus for their players. Even if it is meeting the feat prerequisite halfway, and incorporating the god in question somewhere in a character's backstory. Whatever. I just don't see the problem with that, but I don't see the problem with stripping away fluff either. It's not like the player is going to just play Joe Hitsaguy whose parents, wife, children and entire family is dead and he's just here to hit things and get loot. He just wants to drink potions faster.
And I see a bigger problem with tying non-magical feats into the worship of a deity, because then you have the can of worms that is 'what happens when you lose faith? Do you just...forget to do something you could before?'
I just think flavoring a feat as divinely inspired rather than only practiced by the faithful, and they alone, to be more appropriate than putting a god's worship in the prerequisites. Particularly since ex-members of a faith wouldn't give up combat training just because they learnt it from a god's clergy. It was strictly beneficial to them for that member to take the feat, and they could still put it to good use. If it isn't, you know, morally dubious.
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Yeah except its Ravingdork...a lot of his posts are more for principle then application. I could be wrong but that is how I read it.
Seems like a fair statement.
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There is a huge difference between "want", "need, and "force".
No one is "forced" to do anything in Pathfinder. Well, you are expected to be a team player, work for the best gaming experience for all players (not just yourself), have a basic understanding of, and follow the rules. But no one is forced to select any options for their character.
People want to have certain things, but don't want the baggage thats associated with them either.
You can make a dex based polearm wielder with bladed brush. There is the elven branched spear. Sure, you wont get dex to damage. But that's not a concept for a character, that's a mechanical aspect. One that isn't important to the idea.
The ultimate problem being that "Oh, I'm not as powerful as I could be".
Indeed. This is the story of Pathfinder, and of D&D. If I wanted the most powerful character, I wouldn't play anything other than a 9th level spell caster. You have to deal with the fact that not all options are equal.
I honestly wonder how much of a solution it would be to publish a new feat that gives dex to damage with a different polearm, without invoking any deities in particular?
Like if you could get dex-to damage with a Ranseur or a Guisarme or a Tepoztopilli without worshipping anybody in particular, nobody would care about bladed brush right?
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Other RPGs, from Traveller and Warhammer to Cyberpunk and Shadowrun, tend to follow a more D&D/PF-ish model of meeting fluff with crunch. Abilities are available through professions or archetypes and not necessarily available to everyone. Nomads and physical adepts don't get great netrunner or decker abilities.I feel compelled to point out that in Shadowrun there's no reason a physical adept couldn't get all the decker abilities, since it's not a class-based system.
Granted, someone who tries to be an adept/decker is almost certainly going to end up being mediocre at both roles since characters rarely have the resources to manage two completely different skillsets, but nothing in the rules prevents someone from trying.
Makes it easier for the GM to use one for a NPC or villain, which is kind of cool.
There's a minor drawback, IIRC, in that the essence cost for implants cuts into your magic, but then again Deckers don't actually need much in the way of cyberware.
Yeah, all you need to be a decker is a datajack, which has a near-zero essence cost. Not the mention the Burnout Adept builds who try to get the best of both tech and magic.
I much prefer systems where the only restriction on character creation concepts is "Would this person be someone the rest of the party wants around?"
Which is kinda the antithesis of Pathfinder stuff like "Only Gnomes know how to ask their captor to loosen their bonds" and "only Dwarves know how to headbutt while wearing a helmet."
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Indeed. This is the story of Pathfinder, and of D&D. If I wanted the most powerful character, I wouldn't play anything other than a 9th level spell caster. You have to deal with the fact that not all options are equal.
I mean, giving lip-service to the best god is not a bad thing, all things considered. Everyone loves Shelyn!
Except everyone who is evil. But only a little. They can't help like her either.
And I suppose her brother hates her eternally. But he's a jerk anyway.
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I honestly wonder how much of a solution it would be to publish a new feat that gives dex to damage with a different polearm, without invoking any deities in particular?
Like if you could get dex-to damage with a Ranseur or a Guisarme or a Tepoztopilli without worshipping anybody in particular, nobody would care about bladed brush right?
I'd probably care, because Glaives are awesome. It's not a power gaming impulse in my case, it's just wanting to build the character I want to build.
I'm a little miffed because I was trying to be nice and explain that it's not always a power gaming impulse here, but essentially got called a powergamer- which is a tad over simplistic. My entire point was to suggest that there's more to it than power gaming.
If you're in a game with GM who doesn't like such flavor restrictions, they'll probably be happy to handwave them away.
If your GM does like such restrictions and you don't, you probably have a deeper problem.
The latter is entirely the situation I'm talking about though. Not everyone has access to the perfect GM that matches their playing style.
Again, I'm not trying to argue that flavor restrictions should be scoured from the PF books. I'm fine with paizo doing it how they're doing it. I'm just trying to argue against some oversimplifications, and maybe allow people to understand each other better?
I honestly wonder how much of a solution it would be to publish a new feat that gives dex to damage with a different polearm, without invoking any deities in particular?
Like if you could get dex-to damage with a Ranseur or a Guisarme or a Tepoztopilli without worshipping anybody in particular, nobody would care about bladed brush right?
Dex-to-damage with Falchions when? I need all the damage.
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I imagine the power gamers would be sated by a feat that gave dex to damage with fauchards. It's clearly the superior option for reach swashbucklers anyway. Glaives don't have the crit range to let you parry and riposte incessantly, after all.
One of the things I come back to is that I don't run D&D and its kin in official settings; haven't done it since the 80s. But if there's a cool idea or rule something I see in a book, I'm happy to appropriate it. So when it comes to feats or options that are gated behind membership in a certain group in official material, how much is that actually considered to be a real prerequisite that I should try to replicate somehow, and how much of it is purely fluff?
Like the only mechanical effect of the deity-related feats in Pathfinder is that you can't get them from multiple deities,, right? I'm curious how much that's considered a downside when the feats are being crafted, and if they're buffed to make up for that.
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That's really the crux of the matter, isn't it? Finding a way to maintain the flavor of various campaign elements without unnecessarily restricting a player's creative options.
I think this is definitely something that game developers should pay more attention to moving forward.
It's okay to have restrictions, but they should probably be mechanical in nature, not tied to flavor elements such as campaign organizations. For one, it limits players' concepts, which is the opposite of what flavor is supposed to do. For two, a GM running a homebrew game with the ability to house rule such a restriction away, is just as likely to say "no" to that character option altogether, rather than have to go through the hassle of making and tracking another house rule.
Look, I'm all for system fluff, but I would rather DM's have the power to just lift some restrictions for a mechanical bonus for their players. Even if it is meeting the feat prerequisite halfway, and incorporating the god in question somewhere in a character's backstory. Whatever. I just don't see the problem with that, but I don't see the problem with stripping away fluff either. It's not like the player is going to just play Joe Hitsaguy whose parents, wife, children and entire family is dead and he's just here to hit things and get loot. He just wants to drink potions faster.
And I see a bigger problem with tying non-magical feats into the worship of a deity, because then you have the can of worms that is 'what happens when you lose faith? Do you just...forget to do something you could before?'
I just think flavoring a feat as divinely inspired rather than only practiced by the faithful, and they alone, to be more appropriate than putting a god's worship in the prerequisites. Particularly since ex-members of a faith wouldn't give up combat training just because they learnt it from a god's clergy. It was strictly beneficial to them for that member to take the feat, and they could still put it to good use. If it isn't, you know, morally dubious.
Well you are in luck then: GMs already have that kind of power.
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I'd probably care, because Glaives are awesome. It's not a power gaming impulse in my case, it's just wanting to build the character I want to build.And you do not need this feat in order to build a character that uses a glaive
But a DEX based glaive user could really, really use it, in order to, if nothing else, do the minimum damage required to overcome DR and not look totally lame every time a DR 10 creature shows up.
I don't need my characters to be super competent. But I don't want the mechanics to paint my character as incompetent either (which failing to pierce DR tends to do). DEX to damage is helpful in portraying my character as good at their job.
Honestly, powergamers don't care about this stuff. They'll just take the god and move on. The only people that care are people who enjoy roleplaying, have strong character concepts, but realize they're going to have trouble not being embarrassed by the game unless they put in some basic effort into making sure they're ok at combat.
I mean, it happens. Whenever you don't do damage, someone cracks a joke. Before long, you're the joke of the party. Having consistent damage avoids that.
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I get that, but my point was that this kind of thing is likely to be a fairly small symptom of a larger clash.
The latter is entirely the situation I'm talking about though. Not everyone has access to the perfect GM that matches their playing style.
If you're in a game with GM who doesn't like such flavor restrictions, they'll probably be happy to handwave them away.
If your GM does like such restrictions and you don't, you probably have a deeper problem.
This is true, I'll agree with this. Anything to lessen the impact of these clashes is nice though, IMO.
I also don't think this is a super big deal, tbqh. I'm just arguing about it because it's the subject of the topic, lol.
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I mean, conceptually "lightly armored, agile, mobile long weapon user" is a concept whose fiction is sufficiently strong (and common) that there ought to be a number of ways to accomplish it anyway.
All of this is resolved by Rule 0.
But a DEX based glaive user could really, really use it, in order to, if nothing else, do the minimum damage required to overcome DR and not look totally lame every time a DR 10 creature shows up.I don't need my characters to be super competent. But I don't want the mechanics to paint my character as incompetent either (which failing to pierce DR tends to do). DEX to damage is helpful in portraying my character as good at their job.
There are other solutions to this too.
1) Put good scores in both Dexterity and Strength.
2) Get a Strength booster to supplement a high Dex
3) Get a Dexterity booster to supplement a high Str
4) Get a high strength but portray it with the flair of a high Dex and invest in good AC items to compensate for not actually boosting Dex
5) Don't base a concept on stuff not supported by rules
6) Find other ways around DRs you're likely to encounter - including boosting your weapon's enhancement bonus
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I'd probably care, because Glaives are awesome. It's not a power gaming impulse in my case, it's just wanting to build the character I want to build.And you do not need this feat in order to build a character that uses a glaiveBut you do need this feat to be an effective Glaive-dancer.
Then you need to worship Sheylin to use this feat, whilst your character worships Asmodeus. Or Cayden Calean. Or Erastil.
Kindly take these chains off my story.
I'm confused: according to the setting some Sheylinites are USUALLY better at fighting with glaive than worshippers of Asmodeus or Erastil fighting with glaive because they have developed secret techniques to fight with that kind of weapon (or their goddess gifts them with divine insight when fighting with her chosen weapon, it' not really clear which of these 2 options is correct).
Despite this you want Asmodites and followers of Erastil to have the same kind of ability and the same access to tecniques unique to the church of Sheylin and call the inability to do so "chains on your story".As Rysky pointed out there are no "chains" whatsoever: you can very well make a character who fights with a glaive and worships Asmodeus. It can be effective, it just can't be as effective as a Shelyinte doing the same because the Shelynite has an advantage there.
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But a DEX based glaive user could really, really use it, in order to, if nothing else, do the minimum damage required to overcome DR and not look totally lame every time a DR 10 creature shows up.They would benefit from it, yes, but it's not required, moreso when other factors enter the mix.
I don't need my characters to be super competent. But I don't want the mechanics to paint my character as incompetent either (which failing to pierce DR tends to do). DEX to damage is helpful in portraying my character as good at their job.DR slows most martials down if they don't have something to bypass it, it doesn't make you incompetent.
Honestly, powergamers don't care about this stuff. They'll just take the god and move on. The only people that care are people who enjoy roleplaying, have strong character concepts, but realize they're going to have trouble not being embarrassed by the game unless they put in some basic effort into making sure they're ok at combat.SO in order to preserve flavour we should remove flavour? Again, this feat goes beyond "basic effort", you do not need it to be competent, just look at every glaive wielding character before this feat.
I mean, it happens. Whenever you don't do damage, someone cracks a joke. Before long, you're the joke of the party. Having consistent damage avoids that.
Um, what? Okay, whoa, hold up.
This is no longer a build or competency issue, this is a "you're playing with a*&%@$!s" issue. And I know you don't like us using that term but this reads as a very toxic powergaming mindset. You have to be super-competent and effective in order to be competent? That does not sound like a pleasant group.
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Actually, a much more interesting question is: if a follower of Sheylyn learns this feat and then converts to another faith, why does she become incapable of using the feat? (Since we know that if you cease to meet a feat's prerequisites, the feat shuts off until you meet the prerequisites again.)
It could be a character that's used the feat for 50 years, but the moment they stop worshiping Sheylyn - RAW - they forget how to use it.