Rather than stringing a bunch of comments at the end of the blog, it's directing people here for that discussion.
Steve
What I want to see in Dragon:
- Articles fleshing out areas of published campaign settings that don't fit into sourcebooks (and updates to keep those settings "alive" in the way the Poor Wizards Almanac used to do for the Mystara setting) - although the old-school DM in me still thinks campaign settings need to be hidden from the players so they can't dispute the things you've changed, so personally I'd be more likely to throw that stuff into Dungeon ;)
- Advice and tutorials on how to play the game.
- Rules Q+As. clarifications and detailed examples of tactics that could be used.
- Open-box reviews and previews of new products, including licenced products such as Neverwinter.
- "Blog"-style articles by the D&D staff.
- Something like the "Insider Exclusive" Assassin class is perfect - it stands out as rulebook-quality content and in a managable quantity (a class a year, maybe) so it doesn't get lost in the morass.
- Self-contained rules additions such as "mass combat", "building a castle", and things like that. If I know the entire text of a rules addition is in a single issue of Dragon, it's a lot better than searching for power descriptions scattered through the lot of them.
- And this one might cause problems, but I'm saying it anyway: How to use third-party products to enhance the D&D experience. Lets see a return to the days of reviews of third-party unpainted miniatures, for example!
What I don't want to see in Dragon
- New Powers. Honestly - these should be on the table in Rulebooks, or at least downloaded via the Compendium and the Character Builder rather than taking up space in the mag (yes, there are content quantity issues even in electronic format). I know theres a lot of noise on the forums that various classes are missing certain types of powers, but these need to either be in new rulebooks or errata-ed into the existing ones. I'm not saying we shouldn't get these - just that they just get lost too easily in Dragon so thats not the place for them.
- Cheesy, poorly thought-out new races and classes and variants on existing classes that overpowered and only got written by someone that thought it sounded "like something cool to have".
Like you, I've never liked the word "fluff" because it sounds to me as a somewhat derogatory term used to mean "worthless filler that gets in the way of the real content", and has caused me a great deal of consternation in miniatures gaming arguments through the years. When I buy a game, I tend to buy it specifically for the setting above everything else (which explains the amount of licenced settings sitting on my shelves) - In fact most of the campaign settings I've bought for various RPGs never actually get used with the rules they were designed for. I can quite happily disappear off with a campaign setting book for hours and just read it cover to cover in the same way other people read novels - I guess to my mind having fiction material ordered geographically makes more sense than in a story format!
As long as the material is actually applicable to use in the game (for example, supporting a campaign setting or adventure), "flavor" text is great. In fact, for an article on, for example, a new fighting style I'd want to see plenty of it to make sure I knew the author had researched the topic probably and wasn't just throwing a bunch of numbers and dice rolls together and calling it an article fit for publication.
However, I'm thinking theres a fourth type of content you haven't mentioned, which probably ought to make up a good part of the magazine
- Crunch: New rules and other text you'd expect to see in the game rulebooks.
- Flavor: Background text, campaign settings, etc.
- Fluff: Unneeded "story" text used to bump up word counts
The fourth category is "game support" (apologies for not coming up with a catchy term, its getting late here) - tutorials, people relating their gaming experiences, reviews, etc, and it's probably this which I expect to see as much of in Dragon as Flavor. It isn't for direct application in the game, rather to give players something to think about, and probably isn't what the majority of readers think of as "crunch", "flavor", or "fluff", so I think its deserving of its own categorisation.
I guess I can summarise this all up as: I expect Dragon magazine to support playing D&D, rather than extend it.
I don't want a magazine full of fan-fic and product advertisements.
Mr Winter, I've emailed you before on the subject, and like Dielzen, received a timely reply, to at least the first email, so I really have nothing more to say, other than to second his comment, that I do not want to see pages and pages of fiction and advertising.
What I can tell you is that I found exactly *three* articles useful last month: The Essential Assassins playtest, the Pyromancer article, and Grifnar's Magic Shop. I found the last useful not because I found the magic items interesting or useful, but simply because there are so few common items available for characters.
I've found this month even worse, as I haven't found a single interesting or appealing article so far.
I absolutely think there is a role for rules in Dragon, and rules for new powers. They shouldn't be poorly thought out, but rather, be there to support previously weak or poorly-designed character classes and character concepts. What I instead keep seeing are weak, poorly designed powers which are too complicated or too situational to be useful in regular play.
I absolutely think there is a role for rules in Dragon, and rules for new powers. They shouldn't be poorly thought out, but rather, be there to support previously weak or poorly-designed character classes and character concepts. What I instead keep seeing are weak, poorly designed powers which are too complicated or too situational to be useful in regular play.
Actually I don't think we disagree as much as you think we do here - it's just that the reason Dragon will be full of poorly-designed powers is because it's people like us writing them, and not the people that actually designed the game. The R&D team are more likely going to spend their time working on new powers for publication in books, generating visible revenue to pay their wages, than putting it in Dragon where its harder to tie the subscription revenue to an individual's salary other than those people employed specifically for D&DI.
From a business standpoint, the amount spent per word on a Dragon article is unlikely ever going to be the same as that paid for material destined for a rulebook. So the way I see it, theres three options when it comes to new rules:
a) Rules written by WotC Staff and Freelancers, on the shelf in books
b) Rules written by WotC Staff when they're "between jobs" and have time to throw something into the Dragon inbox. You will probably not see too much of this, as a staff writer with free time on their hands obviously needs to be given a new book assignment.
c) Rules written by Fans and published in Dragon. As you've said, these tend to be weak and poorly designed. I'm sure we'll agree these are best not published at all.
What I'm also finding hard to understand, and hopefully someone can help me out here, is why you'd rather see rules in Dragon than in a new "[insert source name] power" book where it's more easily referenced. From the electronic point of view, it's going to end up in the Compendium anyway for D&DI subscribers who didn't buy the book.
The other problem I have is wondering why an RPG magazine is any different to a magazine about any other hobby. Apologies in advance for the analogies here: Photography magazines don't usually give away cameras and film, Car magazines don't tend to come with a hubcap taped to the cover, so I'm not sure why people expect an RPG magazine to contain rulebook-quality rules when the business case is usually to have them printed in a rulebook for sale. Finally, as I said earlier, I'd much rather see those rules printed in a nice hardback book on my shelves than sitting on the PC. Adventures in Dungeon on the other hand, are much better in magazine format as you tend to only want them once as a "disposable" article, rather than wanting them constantly on the table to refer to. Personally - and I'm well aware I'm in the minority here - I'm more than happy knowing my D&DI subscription is saving me from the days of countless adventure modules piling up, and that I still need to buy the physical rulebooks to tell me what dice to roll and when.
Anyways, I have my option, others have theirs, and at the end of the day I'm not expecting to change anyones mind as this seems such a fundamental issue - rather I'd just like to understand the thinking better.
The other problem I have is wondering why an RPG magazine is any different to a magazine about any other hobby. Apologies in advance for the analogies here: Photography magazines don't usually give away cameras and film, Car magazines don't tend to come with a hubcap taped to the cover, so I'm not sure why people expect an RPG magazine to contain rulebook-quality rules when the business case is usually to have them printed in a rulebook for sale.
The big difference that I see with those hobbies is that they have to do with physical things. With the exception of things like dice, miniatures, and battlemaps, role-playing games are based on ideas. Sure, you can have advice on how to run a better game without getting into new rules, and that's a lot of what you see in Dungeon. But writing "how to play a better game" is going to be hard to do without new content, and more of it than can be provided through book publishing (which is a lot more expensive than a subscription-based digital magazine).
Both of those magazines also have a fair amount of space devoted to reviews of new product, such as new cameras or new cars. Those magazines aren't producing the new things. Wizards isn't going to start rating third-party content, and it's hardly about to start doing things like saying "The book we wrote was only okay; two and a half stars out of five".
The big difference that I see with those hobbies is that they have to do with physical things. With the exception of things like dice, miniatures, and battlemaps, role-playing games are based on ideas. Sure, you can have advice on how to run a better game without getting into new rules, and that's a lot of what you see in Dungeon. But writing "how to play a better game" is going to be hard to do without new content, and more of it than can be provided through book publishing (which is a lot more expensive than a subscription-based digital magazine).
Both of those magazines also have a fair amount of space devoted to reviews of new product, such as new cameras or new cars. Those magazines aren't producing the new things. Wizards isn't going to start rating third-party content, and it's hardly about to start doing things like saying "The book we wrote was only okay; two and a half stars out of five".
Okay, thats a good argument
I'd probably disagree with you that "How to play a better game" is all about explaining how to use the existing rules rather than adding new ones, but otherwise I can't argue with the rest.Taking it to the next logical step: Where is the dividing line between rulebook content and rules published in Dragon?
As I mentioned earlier, I do believe theres space for rules in Dragon, but I think it needs to be the sort of rules that don't "fit" into a rulebook easily - concepts that can be covered in, say, a dozen pages for example, such as mass combat, naval fleet rules, oh or spelljamming vessels!
If a class is truly broken and needs powers to fix it, I'd see that as needing to be free errata to the book in question (although mentioning the fact that it has been errata-ed is a good thing to put in Dragon, along with a link to the errata PDF and some chatter by the R&D people on just why it was broken and how they've fixed it)
If it's a case of extending a class, Wizards makes money by selling that sort of thing in that pile of rulebooks that is threatening to break your gaming table in two.
Another option, of course, could to put the *playtest* version of new rules in Dragon for feedback from us (something I hadn't thought about earlier but wish now I'd added to the list of things I'd like to see in there)
Historically Dragon did rate third-party content, although I'll agree its unlikely to change back to that nowadays (I'd really love to be proven wrong here). Unfortunately one of the things that tends to make people see a company as "customer friendly" is their ability to publically recognise third-party products working alongside their own. Nowadays though we tend to see the "Microsoft Model" of "Only our products exist, don't even bother thinking about anything else". I would guess that any such directives for Dragon would be handed down from on high, and not open to change no matter how much we may wish otherwise, but I think it would really make a huge impact with D&D players and bring a great deal of respect for WotC if we did see things such as third party adventure module reviews and which miniature by which company would be good for a new L1 Cleric - personally I pretty much gave up on ever finding suitable miniatures in the random D&D packs, and if I pay the "ebay premium" for the rare models I want I may as well buy unpainted metal minis. Uhm, I think I'm probably digressing way too much here, sorry!
c) Rules written by Fans and published in Dragon. As you've said, these tend to be weak and poorly designed. I'm sure we'll agree these are best not published at all.
What I'm also finding hard to understand, and hopefully someone can help me out here, is why you'd rather see rules in Dragon than in a new "[insert source name] power" book where it's more easily referenced. From the electronic point of view, it's going to end up in the Compendium anyway for D&DI subscribers who didn't buy the book.
No, I disagree with you. Fan written rules can be well worth publishing, such as the article about Half-Orc Swordmages, Paladins and Avengers. Yes, there are weak examples, but there are also weak articles from in-house or regular writers as well, which are also not worth publishing. The poster you quoted did not specify that he meant fan-written powers were weak, merely that the current offerings in general are.
And why do I want to see such things in dragon as opposed to in a Power book? Because power books tend to be about adding a new build, and support for it, where dragon articles can be more options for existing builds, and niche, thinking-outside-the-box options, such as the aforementioned Half-Orc Swordmage, or the Dagger Sorceror article a little while ago.
And because dragon can be both more and less specific than a Power book - the Epic Destinies presented in the excellent Heroes Reborn article, would either be in 3 different Power books, or more likely none at all, given that one required an Arcane class, one required skill trainings, and one required the Defender role. The first two fit to some extent, the first in Arcane Power, the second in perhaps Martial Power due to its leanings towards the Rogue class, but the third? Where would that go in a Power book?
No, I disagree with you. Fan written rules can be well worth publishing, such as the article about Half-Orc Swordmages, Paladins and Avengers. Yes, there are weak examples, but there are also weak articles from in-house or regular writers as well, which are also not worth publishing. The poster you quoted did not specify that he meant fan-written powers were weak, merely that the current offerings in general are.
Heh, I hope you didn't mind me playing Devils Advocate on that one - my main interest there was trying to keep the conversation moving and digging details out of people so I can satisfy my insomnia-induced curiosity ;)
So - you're saying you'd like to see better vetting of the rules articles in general?
Wouldn't that result in better quality rules articles, but less of them?
Is it possible the root issue then is that theres just a lack of decent rules submissions to publish?
And why do I want to see such things in dragon as opposed to in a Power book? Because power books tend to be about adding a new build, and support for it, where dragon articles can be more options for existing builds, and niche, thinking-outside-the-box options, such as the aforementioned Half-Orc Swordmage, or the Dagger Sorceror article a little while ago.
And because dragon can be both more and less specific than a Power book - the Epic Destinies presented in the excellent Heroes Reborn article, would either be in 3 different Power books, or more likely none at all, given that one required an Arcane class, one required skill trainings, and one required the Defender role. The first two fit to some extent, the first in Arcane Power, the second in perhaps Martial Power due to its leanings towards the Rogue class, but the third? Where would that go in a Power book?
I can go with that
My personal preference would still be to roll all of that into a "character options" book of some kind, just because its so easy to lose track of it all in magazine format, but I'm more than happy to accept that we feel differently about that kind of thing. Maybe I'm just getting too long in the tooth and need all my information neatly organised to stop me forgetting where I left it ;)I also have to admit the whole 4E powers system is an approach I'm not used to dealing with - in the past, it was just a matter of throwing spell lists together for the caster classes, neatly organised into supplements, while the others took care of themselves in their main writeups with very little work needed. It's interesting seeing how the approach taken with 4E has created this demand for a whole new area of character option support.
So - you're saying you'd like to see better vetting of the rules articles in general?
Wouldn't that result in better quality rules articles, but less of them?
Is it possible the root issue then is that theres just a lack of decent rules submissions to publish?
1) Yes, but at the same time I'd like better editing and selection of the 'flavour' articles too.
2) Maybe, but at this point I'd actually prefer it to the current direction of Dragon.
3) No, I doubt this very much, considering the number of people I've talked to who have submitted to dragon (I even have done so myself), and if articles like that, frankly, awful, Enraged Halflings one are what's getting through, then the problem lies with what's being selected.
In contrast, crunch creates options for players. If the crunch is any good, every time a character is created, every time a character levels, and every time a new player says, "I want to play this type of character", the crunch will be considered and potentially used. That is the big advantage crunch has over flavor. Crunch creates choice for all people, DMs and players alike and can become a springboard for anyone; flavor can only be used on a less frequent basis and mostly only by DMs.
Yes, much of the crunch out there is poorly thought out. Blaming it on the fact that WotC was not the originator discount all the bad crunch WotC produces (see the update/errata page for just the stuff that has been change!). The type of crunch most players, imho, want is crunch that creates new balanced options. A good piece of crunch is something that a player looks at and goes, "I could build a character concept around that crunch" or "I could see that power as a viable alternative to the stuff already out there" Crunch is valuable because it can create concepts, fill concept gaps (Badly needed), and fix problems with the system. Most players do not want, again imho, crunch that supercedes all other options or crunch that is so bad that it would only be taken if a character is willing to abandon mechanical enhancements to their character to fluff, yes fluff as defined by the OP as filler.
In conclusion, flavor must be produced in a quantity that does not overwhelm the readers. At this point I am overwhelmed by flavor, just from the printed books. I might not be typical, but I suspect I am. All that leaves is fluff and crunch. The former, as the OP pointed out, is mostly useless to everyone. The, latter on the other hand, can provide massive assistance to the game, create opportunities, and attract new players. Crunch should be doles out with care, but not sparingly!
Personally, I consider the last several months of Dragon to have been a waste of time with few exception. I do not need a whole bunch of feats that could only be used once every 10 encouinters, or even once per encounter with a virtually non-existant effect. I do not need fanfiction. I do not need one-thousand and one new ideas on setting elements. What I need are elements of the game that will fill in gaps in balance, create new opportunity for the players, and create a wow factor. For the most part, that is going to be crunch.
I've always been a big big fan of mounted combat. I'll eventually post other stuff I'd like to see if the way of Crunchy Flavortastic things but I think with the Cavalier and mount coming out soon this would be a great time to throw something like this thread into an article.
Thank you for the plug, and the support. I do need to update that thread with the information from the Rules Compendium (Which, after reading, I'm pretty sure a couple of the passages in there are because of my nit-picking), but I have not had the time of late. I will get on to that.-edit- I'd like to second ScruLooses comments.
With the upcoming Cavalier and mount I'd like to see RuinsFate's compiled information of mounted combat with fluff. community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/758....
Seconded on that
Thats exactly the sort of article I'd love to see, personally - something thats both directly applicable to game rules but also gives me something to read beyond power card text ;) It also has one of my favorite topics, how to throw RAW out of the window and apply common sense (Thank you, RuinsFate!)
With the addition of maybe some historical context on mounted combat, perhaps covering topics such as the history of cavalry and tactics for infantry to defend against mounted opponents, and maybe even some jousting rules this would be pretty much the perfect Dragon article.
I'm tired, so I'll keep this short: I can write a 50,000 word draft of a novel with several complete character arcs and a world to match in a month. (And have been every November for the past three years.) What I can't do is take the time to design mechanical elements that fit cohesively into the system, then program them manually into the various Insider toolsets.
Guess which of those I'm giving you my money to do for me.
When I first read this, it didn't feel right. I waited a bit to collect my thoughts on the subject though, and I think I'm ready to respond to some degree now.
I have to begin by saying that the desire to change "fluff" to "flavor" misses the point. The crunch versus fluff was, to the best of my understanding, always meant within the limited realm of candy (bars). It was suposed to be referring to the range which such candy exists where you have the really crunchy bars and the really fluffy ones as well with each person having a preference on that scale for the proper amount of each attribute. Changing "fluff" to "flavor" completely removes the usefulness of the analogy. It removes the notion of mixing of the two in a sliding scale of preference and biases towards "flavor" being always neccesary and crunch being optional. I mean really who wants a crunchy steak? While this certainly fits with the current direction of Dragon, it is not a good direction to make fluff the primary concern and have crunch be a secondary consideration. Especially nto with the quality of the majority of the fluff that has been appearing in recent Dragon articles. If we were to use flavor and crunch as the standards, we've been mostly getting watery mashed potatoes that have been sitting out for over a month.
To echo the other voices in this thread, I don't need the background being provided in Dragon(campaign setting articles as an exception because those an entirely different beast) as I can come up with interesting worlds, characters, story arcs easily. I've been exposed to enough fiction to be able to create interesting characters that fit into pretty much any world without too much effort. What I want from the magazines is crunch that helps me express those ideas into game mechanics. Provide soem fluff to give context to the items, but don't make the fluff the focus because I'll just be tossing out all but the most basic aspects of it(occasioanlly I'll even toss out the basic aspects of it). The greater the concentration of fluff, the less this subscription is worth to me.
Allow me to redirect the discussion slightly.
How many powers are "enough" for a class?
Here are a few numbers to consider. They're not a challenge to anyone's viewpoint; they're a basis for discussion:
At 30th level, a character has 17 powers. With the standard amount of replacing, he's had 25 different powers over his career. That number could be higher with retraining.
When a class is newly published (has material in just one sourcebook), it gets about 80 powers. That means, including level-based replacing but not retraining, you could play that character from level 1 to level 30 three times without seeing the same power twice.
At what point can you comfortably say, "this class has enough powers to choose from" -- 100? 300? 500? 1,000? If you had to put a number on it, what would that number be?
Steve
And, as I mentioned in my email to you, I don't want to sit down at a table with another person of the same class and feel like we're playing the same character. The job of power/phb/etc books is to make each class build viable. Dragon takes each viable build and adds elements to make it unique. Sneak Attack with a staff, now that's unique, but until recently it was also impossible. Dragon should add these sorts of elements to the classes.
Allow me to redirect the discussion slightly.
How many powers are "enough" for a class?
Here are a few numbers to consider. They're not a challenge to anyone's viewpoint; they're a basis for discussion:
At 30th level, a character has 17 powers. With the standard amount of replacing, he's had 25 different powers over his career. That number could be higher with retraining.
When a class is newly published (has material in just one sourcebook), it gets about 80 powers. That means, including level-based replacing but not retraining, you could play that character from level 1 to level 30 three times without seeing the same power twice.
At what point can you comfortably say, "this class has enough powers to choose from" -- 100? 300? 500? 1,000? If you had to put a number on it, what would that number be?
Steve
Here is what I can say. Since you are the editor of Dragon, and we are all in agreement, yourself included, I hope, that Changeling, Seeker, Assassin and Runepriest are lacking in options, specifically good options and builds, not to mention viable PP's why don't you specifically solicit articles to add crunch to the undernourished Races and Classes that desperately need them?
We can all agree fighters do not need another article with 12 more feats and 20 powers. Changelings, on the other hand, could desperately use something so that the entire race is not obsoleted by a Hat of Disguise, and Seekers desperately need help to be a viable class. Assassins have been ignored for ages, and Essentials Assassin desperately needs feats to augment the new playtest class.
Allow me to redirect the discussion slightly.
How many powers are "enough" for a class?
Here are a few numbers to consider. They're not a challenge to anyone's viewpoint; they're a basis for discussion:
At 30th level, a character has 17 powers. With the standard amount of replacing, he's had 25 different powers over his career. That number could be higher with retraining.
When a class is newly published (has material in just one sourcebook), it gets about 80 powers. That means, including level-based replacing but not retraining, you could play that character from level 1 to level 30 three times without seeing the same power twice.
At what point can you comfortably say, "this class has enough powers to choose from" -- 100? 300? 500? 1,000? If you had to put a number on it, what would that number be?
You're asking this question from the wrong direction, because it's a floating number. It depends on how many builds you want to support, and how whether all of the existing powers for the class are sufficient. You might also want to ask yourself, "Are there enough options at a given level?" It also depends on how many of the powers just end up being terrible, which is not always obvious to designers.
As an example, fighters absolutely don't need any more powers at level 7, because Come And Get It is such a useful and effective signature power that I very rarely see fighters equipped with a different power. Printing more level 7 fighter powers is probably a total waste of space. This was arguably true before Fighters got all of their additional support.
In contrast, Beastmaster Rangers need a lot more powers, because all of the ones they currently have are terrible and the Beastmaster Ranger doesn't do anywhere near enough damage compared to a similar archer to two-weapon ranger. Generally speaking, Beastmaster Rangers are underpowered, and need a lot of help. It's not a question of how many powers they have... arguably 17 solid and effective powers would be more than enough to make sure that they remain viable.
Knights and Slayers clearly need more options. There are going to be people who want to be axe-wielding knights, or polearm-wielding slayers. The staff article is in contrast, a total joke, because I doubt many people would be excited about playing a staff-wielding knight or slayer, especially when they are so much weaker than a default sword or hammer knight, or axe or sword slayer.
The question you're asking is meaningless. I'd say 80 good powers would be more than enough, but the fact is, the vast majority of powers are not good, and don't hit that sweet spot between flavor, and in-game effectiveness to matter. They end up, in the Magic the Gathering parlance, as the equivalent of wallpaper cards.
How many powers are "enough" for a class?
I'm a bit old-school and tend to think it depends on the class. There's only so many ways someone can smack someone upside the head, but theres near infinite variety in spells and spell-like effects. (Yeah, I know, its an attitude that doesn't mesh well with 4E, but like any good player if it isn't working for me I find ways of dealing with it).
I'm more a build person when it comes to martial classes. Switching in powers willy-nilly for me makes it feel like a pen and paper version of an MMORPG, with little icon buttons waiting to have powers slotted into them. However, I can see why that isn't actually a bad thing for the game in terms of attracting a new audience ;) Still, I'll be okay with it until the day D&D adventures start giving out tokens to collect and trade for a magic item card of your choice with a purple border...
However, to answer the question:
"Enough" is as many as are needed to perform the role the character needs to perform, while allowing sufficient variety to fit the player's concept of the character in their mind. This really does vary by character class, though.
Caster-types, for example need a full selection of powers for each feasible "school of magic", plus a bunch of generics (such as magic missile). If anyone can think of a new school, theres a whole new selection of powers to fit in.
For martial-types, you need enough powers to fill each build, and again a handful of generics that can be switched in for variety and customisation. Given that a good number of powers from other builds are viable, that really ought to be it. If you have, say, a martial class that is recognised as lacking in defensive capability *and* needing it, theres a case for making a whole defensive build for that class (and thus making the powers available to the other builds to "borrow").
I'm also a big supporter of making classes actually do what they're meant to do as the first priority, and worrying about balance second (again, I know, I'm going against the grain of 4E here, but forums are for opinions so I'm giving mine). I sometimes think newer players need a reminder of the days when rolling a certain sickly-looking mage with a near-unplayable CON score was at the core of D&D, rather than todays optimized-for-max-DPR characters (we'd never have even dreamed of the term DPR in the 80s, except as a geeky mathematical exercise never to be actually practiced in-game). If building the best possible character is what you find fun, then sure, I'm all for having the option, after all I don't want anyone to feel excluded from the game - however there's just as much (if not more) fun to be had in RPing your characters weaknesses and dealing with them in-game. Sometimes I wonder if plugging "power gaps" really is the right thing to do.
Some of the "power bloat" problems in certain classes has come around due to them trying to do things they just were not meant to do, while in other cases some rather specialised classes should perhaps just have been builds of existing ones to give them more variety. I think perhaps 4E may have gone a bit astray here, trying to pull in both directions (builds and classes) at once. On the other hand, some "missing power" issues can be also be solved by players themseives by using multiclassing or hybrids - I'm pretty certain however that many players feel this is "diluting" their character, so perhaps making multiclassing/hybriding more acceptable is an area for R&D to consider for the next edition.
Another option which occurs to me is making available a number of Power Source-specific powers, generic abilities which can be used by *any* class which uses that power source. That would relieve somewhat the issues caused by new classes that arrive late to the dance being lacking in options. Maybe something else to consider for 5E (don't kill me for mentioning it people, we all know it'll hit sooner or later, just preferably later!), or possibly an idea for a new 4E power book?
A little about me. I'm 38 years old. I started gaming in 1977, before the Red Box came out, at the early age of 5. My friends and I got together with his Dad and rolled dice. It was fun.
When 2nd Edition rolled around, and all Fighters and Rogues became mechanically identical, I left the game for Palladium, then Rolemaster, then Vampire, and then I left roleplaying games completely for 10+ years.
It wasn't until a friend of mine begged me to play 3.5 and promised me the game wasn't as poorly put together as it was "in the old days" that I came back.
I dunno who you played with, but my friends and I made an effort to optimize our characters. Optimizing isnt a dirty word, you can have roleplaying and optimizing together in the same character, even.
So I guess, if you are trying to lose me, and people like me as customers, lets do it like we did 1e and 2e again.
"The good old days" were only good because people didn't know any better, and even then, I stopped roleplaying for 10 years because the balance was so bad, and the options were so poor, I'd rather not play at all than play as it was.
A lot of good points have already been made.
- The magazines cannot vet mechanics as rigorously as they do books (and people cmplain about the vetting process for books!), so most of the mechanics I've seen in the magazines have been useless and that's simply very very unlikely to ever change. To me this means, it's more likely to get useful flavor articles (which don't require playtesting to be useful) than useful crunchy articles (which are only useful if the mechanics work).
- Mechanics are useful to a small subset of people -- those for whom that specific power, feat, etc. can be used. Not every player needs viable Paragon Paths for Seekers -- only people who are going to play Seekers over the eight of so years (probably five at this point) that the edition will remain supported. Does that mean that no Seeker articles should be published? Absolutely not. But it does mean we need to put the demand for each crunchy article into context.
- I think flavor is useful to me as a DM. Can I make up my own flavor? Of course. But would my flavor be as good if I didn't have a myriad of inspiratins to draw from? Absolutely not. And while generic fantasy literature, and other forms of literature, can provide inspiration, the best inspiration is invariably that which is created specifically for the game. Good flavor will give me nuggets I can steal from as a DM. If there are mechanics to use to enhance that, all the better, but it's by no mean necessary.
Again, that's not to say we shouldn't continue to have crunchy articles. But I think it's a mistake to think that flavorful articles are more useless to the intended audience than crunchy articles. I think it's easier to come up with flavor that is useful to DMs than it is to find crunch useful to an equal number of players because flavor requires little or no playtesting and can be an inspiration (and thus useful) to pretty much any DM.
As an example, fighters absolutely don't need any more powers at level 7, because Come And Get It is such a useful and effective signature power that I very rarely see fighters equipped with a different power. Printing more level 7 fighter powers is probably a total waste of space. This was arguably true before Fighters got all of their additional support.
This is a curious viewpoint. I would look at that situation (assuming it's truly the case) and reach the opposite conclusion -- that more viable level 7 fighter powers are exactly what's needed, because if everyone is taking the same one, then effectively there's only one choice at that level.
Steve
As an example, fighters absolutely don't need any more powers at level 7, because Come And Get It is such a useful and effective signature power that I very rarely see fighters equipped with a different power. Printing more level 7 fighter powers is probably a total waste of space. This was arguably true before Fighters got all of their additional support.
This is a curious viewpoint. I would look at that situation (assuming it's truly the case) and reach the opposite conclusion -- that more viable level 7 fighter powers are exactly what's needed, because if everyone is taking the same one, then effectively there's only one choice at that level.
Steve
You'd have to be willing to do powers worthy of replacing come and get it with then, those are the types of powers, feats and abilities that the last several issues of Dragon has deleted out in compilation, ie, the ones worth using.
Allow me to redirect the discussion slightly.
How many powers are "enough" for a class?
Seems more than a slight redirection. :P
I'd say at least two competitive powers per level per class build with at least two competitive powers that are build independent.
All DMs should find good flavor useful and DMs make up about 20% of the market. Only a subset of players will find any given article of race or class-specific crunch useful, and I think a lot less than 20% of the market is ever going to play any given race or class. There are currently about 28 classes (not including hybrids). In order for 20% of the market to play a class, each player on average needs to play six different classes over the life of an edition. I find this unlikely.
Again, that's not to say we shouldn't continue to have crunchy articles. But I think it's a mistake to think that flavorful articles are more useless to the intended audience than crunchy articles. I think it's easier to come up with flavor that is useful to DMs than it is to find crunch useful to an equal number of players because flavor requires little or no playtesting and can be an inspiration (and thus useful) to pretty much any DM.
I have friends who have played at least four different classes since the start of the edition, assuming the edition lasts for 10 years we aren't even at the half way point yet. I think that it is quite likely that most players who aren't tied to single class will play more than 6 classses during the edition. Ignoring that fact, crunch articles don't even have to tied to a single class. They can instead cover multiple classes or touch upon game mechanics that aren't tied to class like epic destinies or themes. Heck my favorite article from Dragon this year was the one with legendary epic destinies(the one with thief of legend). As I recall it was a fairly short article that had short but had amazing fluff and had crunch that backed up the fluff which was just as awesome. That is what short Dragon articles should be like. Longer articles(which we sadly don't get anymore unless it is fiction that I don't care to read) should be like the gladiator articles of yesteryear.
This is a curious viewpoint. I would look at that situation (assuming it's truly the case) and reach the opposite conclusion -- that more viable level 7 fighter powers are exactly what's needed, because if everyone is taking the same one, then effectively there's only one choice at that level.
The issue in this particular case is that Come and Get It is .. really good. I don't think it's broken, but I do think it is at the upper reaches of balance, and it would be really tricky to get anything else that competed with it that didn't go too far. There are very few powers with that degree of forced movement that don't require an attack. (Mass Charm now exists, as an example. A higher level controller example.)
I'll go back to my initial reply to your editorial....
What do I want from Dragon?
I want stuff that supports the characters I play, or might play.
Let me repeat that again for emphasis:
I want stuff that supports the characters I play, or might play.
Sometimes Flavor will fall into this category. The Deva article that wasn't even in Dragon would count. It gives me some ideas and hooks for a character I might play. And that had no crunch content at all.
But for the most part, this means: "I mostly want crunch". I'm pretty good at creating character concepts. I do not need any official blessing for my character personality. I do need official blessing for his crunch.
And yes, there are a ton of feats and other options... yet there are still things that can't be done, or things that can't be affordably done. For example, the striker-gish archtype: the first translation guide said "oh, that's hard" (converting the Duskblade) ... and it's STILL pretty hard to get what I want. (Theme support will go a long way, if you want to fix that). So there is plenty of ground for archetype support.
For example: Str/Wis rangers have AC problems, Shamans have AC problems. Avengers have a host of powers they shouldn't bother using currently (implement powers basically require them to give up their striker-class feature). So there is, IMHO, plenty of ground still for "patch articles"
There is plenty of space for support. Shamans, Runepriests, Seekers, and Assassins could all use more tools. (Notice, those are also classes that can be underpowered).
Those will support the characters I play, or might play.
Fluff articles about someone's personal PC won't, unless they come with crunch that will.
How many powers are "enough" for a class?
At what point can you comfortably say, "this class has enough powers to choose from" -- 100? 300? 500? 1,000? If you had to put a number on it, what would that number be?
I would reiterate others' caveats: the quality of said powers and the archetypes that fall under the auspices of the themes that comprise the class are going to mean that "enough" is a fluctuating value to be assigned independantly for each class. For example, look at the Seeker and Runepriest. The Seeker has some obvious ways it could be expanded; there are probably interesting options to explore the ranged/melee combo powers and its unique conjuration style powers could be pushed in new directions. After that though, there isn't anything obvious. More is certainly welcome, but there isn't anything that the class clearly cries out for. The Runepriest on the other hand used word-derived magic. There are countless numbers of words that one could use to derive entirely new builds around. The class is practically screaming to have new content developed for it. As long as there is fertile ground within which the underlying mechanics can be differentiated so that each new build felt as though it opperated differently, you could present me with 1,000 Runepriest powers and I would still welcome new ones.
That doesn't mean I would not be content with the current selection of powers. There are an astounding number and variety of them. More than I'm likely to ever actually use in a lifetime.
Perhaps a better question is to ask is if there can be such a thing as "too many" powers?
This is a curious viewpoint. I would look at that situation (assuming it's truly the case) and reach the opposite conclusion -- that more viable level 7 fighter powers are exactly what's needed, because if everyone is taking the same one, then effectively there's only one choice at that level.
Well, I think Trip Up is at the same level, and quite viable for certain builds. I think though, that in some cases, you have signature powers that perfectly define what a class is all about. At that point, you can wrack your brain for alternatives, or pat yourself on the back and move on.
I have friends who have played at least four different classes since the start of the edition, assuming the edition lasts for 10 years we aren't even at the half way point yet. I think that it is quite likely that most players who aren't tied to single class will play more than 6 classses during the edition.
And I have friends who have been playing 1 class since the edition began and always will. That's why the "average" shoudl be used.
If the average gaming group meets every other week, and the edition lasts eight years, you have 208 sessions/edition. If each session has an average of 5 encounters/session, you have 1,040 encounters for a session. So each player might advance through 104 levels in an edition, or 4 campaigns.
That's four characters. I'll even add a +50% to that and make it six characters, by including hybrids, new characters to replace killed ones, and short campaigns that don't go from level 1 to 30. If players play different classes each time, that's 6 of 28 of the classes tried (21%). But in my experience, people don't play different classes each time. I think the number probably is well less than 20%.
Now, there are exceptions. People might be playing in several campaign simultaneously, or playing in a bunch of on-line games. but I think those are exceptions. Similarly, people might play one character over and over again in every campaign. That, too, would be an exception.
But I think 20% is about the maximum as to how many classes the median player will try out over the course of an edition.
And of course, this 20% number is only relevant if the article is applicable to everyone who plays a class. As good as the rogue duelist article was (to choose an article generally praised), not every rogue is going to take the duelist powers and feats. I doubt even half will. So the best crunchy articles are still only going to be useful to about 10% of your audience, whereas the best flavorful articles can be useful to a good 20% of your audience (DMs).
Which, again, is not to say, there's no place for crunchy articles. But given how hard it is, logistically, for Dragon to make properly balanced powers for races and classes, I think they should be cautious about it.
crunch articles don't even have to tied to a single class. They can instead cover multiple classes or touch upon game mechanics that aren't tied to class like epic destinies or themes.
Those are going to be less useful than a class (except for themese because they're new and there aren't a lot to choose fom yet). There a ton more epic destinies than classes.
it was a fairly short article that had short but had amazing fluff and had crunch that backed up the fluff which was just as awesome. That is what short Dragon articles should be like.
I enjoyed that article too. But I don't know how useful it is. I agree that the best articles have the right mix of crunch and fluff. But that doesn't mean that flavor-only or crunch-only articles are a bad idea either. Personally, I'll take an enjoyable less useful article over a dry but usable article any day.
I dunno who you played with, but my friends and I made an effort to optimize our characters. Optimizing isnt a dirty word, you can have roleplaying and optimizing together in the same character, even.
Absolutely - I find the difference is that there tend to be people who play "systems" (who tend to be the majority), and people like me who tend to play "settings".
I'll agree I'm in the minority, and have absolutely no illusions that D&D should be changed to aim at me as an audience - it'd be a terrible commercial decision
Back in my younger days, our group tended to use rules as something that was purely incidental and you just played with in a pick+mix type of affair, writing in the half of it ourselves. In fact, I actually enjoy it more when a ruleset isn't perfect for me, otherwise theres nothing left for me to do to it! I think its worth me emphasising that all a third time - I would not want to see D&D changed to fit the way I want to play it. I do not want a game thats got such a small audience that it fails. I think 4E is the best move for the game so far for getting more players playing, and putting my freelancer hat on for a second here I would love to churn out some of those new powers people keep wanting ;)
Would I like to see a return to older editions? Absolutely, for me personally. Do I think it would be a good business idea? Absolutely not. I find the best way to deal with it is to seperate what I want personally from what I want for the game - the fact that the two do not mesh very well is something I actually enjoy. Hey, at the end of the day I have a Rules Cyclopedia on my bookshelf that I still bring down occasionally, I can play that when I want to, I don't need another copy :D
It really comes down to how you play. Most players tend to think about the options the rules give them, and work out which will be the most effective. I tend to think of what I want to do in a situation first, and *then* see how the rules apply to seeing if I succeed or not. Its the old "playing a game vs writing a story" thing - which comes first? Just like the Chicken and the Egg though, there's no right or wrong answer, just opinions
My first question in creating a character is "what character concept would work well in a story?", as opposed to "how much damage can I do?" Most of my characters come out as average Joes who get dragged into doing things they really don't want to (or are equipped/trained to) do. Their abilities improve with experience, which I put down to necessity from their situation rather than as rewards.That's a lot easier to describe from a wargaming aspect (going OT a little, but related enough that I'm sure most people here will have experience in that area). I was involved in the development of a set of wargaming rules a few years back, and I ended up of the opinion that the rules came out near-perfect, for one reason: those rules let me think and play "visually", using what I can see on the tabletop as reference, and make decisions based on what I could see. They didn't force me into thinking about numbers and probabilities and rules in order to make decisions, all of that came in *after* I made the decision. I play RPGs the exact same way. I don't expect everyone else to, obviously
For that reason though, what many people think of as "flavor/fluff", I see as necessary to explain to me what this power/item/spell/monster does (the 4E monster manual for me was very disappointing, I want my lengthy descriptions of habitat and social organisation!) I much prefer to read a narrative of how something works than see the game mechanics - I refer to those *after* I've decided if thats what I'm going to do or it. I guess you could call it "playing narratively" as opposed to "playing mechanically".
As an example, fighters absolutely don't need any more powers at level 7, because Come And Get It is such a useful and effective signature power that I very rarely see fighters equipped with a different power. Printing more level 7 fighter powers is probably a total waste of space. This was arguably true before Fighters got all of their additional support.
This is a curious viewpoint. I would look at that situation (assuming it's truly the case) and reach the opposite conclusion -- that more viable level 7 fighter powers are exactly what's needed, because if everyone is taking the same one, then effectively there's only one choice at that level.
Steve
Having a single power far outshining most alternatives can usually mean two things: either the alternatives for the slot are too few and too weak, or the power is so good that it's hurting the class. I think Come and Get It belongs to the second category - if a fighter is remotely interested in the defender role, the power is a must, and it's negating a lot of options (the fighter has 20 powers for that slot, and many of them are pretty good!).
Back to the (second) original topic, I think that raw numbers of powers are not too useful for these discussions, in that they are too often inflated with terrible options. In theory, it is safe to release virtually unplayable crunch, because it can be safely ignored... up to a point. Until a reliable filter feature is implemented for Character Builder and Compendium, each blank power or feat is mere noise when building a character... and we currently have way too much noise.
Yes, the game has many powers already. And, as much as I love crunch in general, I do see that as a reason to reduce the amount of new powers and feats in the magazines. But not just to replace them with flavor! What I'd really like to see is a severe reduction in useless powers. I'm fine if the day's article only has two powers, but make them count. There is a lot of room to cut filler crunch - but we still want to see good stuff. And it doesn't have to be overpowered, but it needs to be playable, and it would better be different.
And, back again to the original original topic, I don't usually mind flavor in the magazines, but enjoy it the most when it comes in a neat package, improving the crunchy bits. The best example that comes to my mind is the recent magic item article that depicted a dwarven shop - it had few, but useful weapons, many of which featuring more or less new mechanics. And the flavor was not something tacked on, but something fun that made for a good reading and could even be used in a game without much effort. Give us more of that!
Thinking about the dwarven shop, I think there is a reason why I enjoyed it so much but tend to skip most other flavor. Humor! Make us laugh, or at least smile! Most of the games I play feature quite a bit of jokes and silliness, and I don't see enough of that in the magazines. That is something I could use
The best example that comes to my mind is the recent magic item article that depicted a dwarven shop - it had few, but useful weapons, many of which featuring more or less new mechanics. And the flavor was not something tacked on, but something fun that made for a good reading and could even be used in a game without much effort. Give us more of that!
I liked that one too - it was "contextual flavor", as opposed to fluff fanfic someone had just decided to write with zero in-game applicability (which I would want excluded as much as the next guy).
Other examples I can think of would be:
- Artifacts along with extensive in-game history (who made it, why, what was it used for in the past, how did it get lost - this is usually usable in any campaign with just minor modifications)
- Fighting styles along with their real world historical use. If you can't get a mental image of your character actually performing the maneuver, along with whats going on in their head at the time and why they chose to fight that way, then you don't have enough background information.
- Articles like the recent Deva one that help you get into character for a particular race. Completely crunch-free, but 100% aimed at helping you play the game.
- Siege rules, along with a look at some historical sieges, and the real reasons for them as opposed to just how much damage weapon X does to wall Y.
Things need to feel real in the story, and not every player is able to simply make up plausible reasons for things that stand up under scrutiny (and some groups will have that player that questions *everything*). The classic example is monster ecologies - you can't simply have a tunnel in a hillside thats full of things to fight, the DM needs to know *why* they chose to live in that tunnel, and they need viable support systems. What is the structure of their society (if indeed they have one) - you need to know that in order to figure out if they are, for example, loyal to a leader figure. If they do have a leader, how is succession figured out? If its a matter of "the strongest leads", theres already an option to possibly negotiate with another member to help them bump off the man, woman, or thing in charge. Thats the sort of things you need flavor text for - to make things feel like part of a living game world, and not just a boardgame where the aim is to kill the monster-shaped miniatures. Some people can happily take rules and invent the flavor themselves, some cannot, some can do the exact opposite, and I think its necessary to ensure all groups go away satisified.
I think we can all pretty much agree that seeing articles that contain useful crunch and the contextual flavor to go with it would keep us all happy, with a room to bend in either direction on an article-by-article basis. In fact if that were the case, we would all probably accept an article or two of completely unrelated fluff (especially if, as the poster before me mentioned, there were some humor involved!)
Hmm. I think we've now managed to successfully redirect the conversation back from where Steve was trying to direct it... sorry about that!
How many powers are "enough" for a class?
I'd say that there should be 2 reasonable choices per power for a build, whether those are tailored to a certain build (such as Rain of Blood for Invokers) or whether it's just generally useful for the class (Come and Get It for Fighters). As a general rule, I think that this should make most people feel satisfied with the selection.
But let's take a look at some of the specific problems that need to be addressed in relation to this rule of thumb. I'm going to use the Artificer primarily as my example of what not to do, because it's the class I know the best.
Not only does there need to be 2 reasonable choices for the build, but if the build features two different approaches, it needs to cover both approaches. The Battlesmith has melee and ranged at-will and encounter weapon powers, but essentially only ranged weapon daily powers. So there needs to be support for each side of the build.
The two powers also need to be unique and fun. They need to do different things without compromising the differences between the builds within the class. Magic Weapon and Aggravating Force both do similar things (and Magic Weapon in the hands of an intelligent player/party does it better). Thus, there are rarely any artificers that pick up both; even though it is theoritically an option. To compound this issue, Magic Weapon seems to have many "iterations". Flaming Weapons, Icy Weapons, and Greater Magic Weapon are really just Magic Weapon with some food coloring and added effects.
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Since this is a discussion about what WoTC editors look for in submissions, let me say a few things that relate a bit closer to that overall topic.
I'd be rather disappointed if WoTC made a semi-official policy that says, "We don't want X.", which appears to be what is happening. (See the final 3 paragraphs of the blog and "Dragon Magazine will have more fluff and less crunch"-like topics; while it is not explicitly stated, there is a feeling that this is indeed the case.) This will only serve to drive away people who may have legitimate ideas.
Second is that it is amazingly hard to make an article with wide appeal, good flavor, and usuable game mechanics. It's even more difficult to pitch it. I'm curious how many articles that have failed to launch that would have fit that criteria while other articles that don't have that criteria have slipped through.
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To the editor: What I want from Dragon/Dungeon is the same stuff I want from the books. I really want each month of Dragon/Dungeon to be a mix of what I see in Players Guides, Campaign Guides, Monster Manuals, Dungeon Master Guides, and Adventures. If that's what I can dependably get at a reasonable quality, then it's worth the $$$ to get Insider because it's essentially just a book. Everything else in Insider has no appeal for me (I've tried the Character Builder and I get really irked trying to make a character. I've got the books pretty much memorized, but I couldn't find the right stuff in the character builder to save my life.)
I'd be rather disappointed if WoTC made a semi-official policy that says, "We don't want X.", which appears to be what is happening. (See the final 3 paragraphs of the blog and "Dragon Magazine will have more fluff and less crunch"-like topics; while it is not explicitly stated, there is a feeling that this is indeed the case.) This will only serve to drive away people who may have legitimate ideas.
I can't imagine a good article being turned down because it was on the "we dont want" list. If the "wow" factor mentioned on the Dungeon version of this conversation is met, I would guess it will get through. I usually read "We don't want X" as "We don't want piles of bland uninteresting X that is just more of the same we already have".
Alternatively, it may be that they really don't want any more of X, because they either have enough from the slush pile to go through all of 2011, or have decided to write X internally and not take external submissions, or indeed will not be publishing X.
A good writer will look at "We don't want X", look at the X idea they believe really would be a good contribution, and say to themselves "well, how can I turn my article on X into something *more* than just simply X so they take a look at it".
Hypothetical example: I have this great idea for a new magic item, along with an extensive history of its use, bio of its creator, etc. I get told "we dont want any more magic items." I go away and rework that idea into an adventure article where the item is stolen, and the aforementioned creator wants it back.
Ranger
Fighter
Wizard
Warlord
Rogue
Classes that probably have enough support:
Charisma-based Warlock
Wisdom-based Cleric
Paladin
Avenger
Barbarian
Invoker
Bard
Warden
Classes that could use more support:
Constitution-based Warlock
Druid
Shaman
Ardent
Battlemind
Monk
Psion
Artificer
Swordmage
Classes that desperately need more support:
Strength-based clerics
Seeker
Assassin
Runepriest
I would be happy to see articles focusing on the classes in the last two categories. Classes from the first two categories are pretty much fine as is.
A few more things to also think about: I think that Primal as a power source needs a few more viable feats.
However, I understand some people's desire for more flavor, and I will admit that there is a lot of crap in the magazine that no one will ever use (like that Changeling Becomer feat, and the one Rogue at-will that's useless unless you fight a lot of Aberrations, and keys off Wis for some reason).
Personally, I would be hapy with a 60/40 split. Give us like three pages of flavor, and a page of GOOD crunch, and that would satisfy me, and most other people here IMO. As long as it's got like one or two GOOD feats or two or three GOOD powers or items, then I don't mind the quantity. Notice the emphasis on GOOD. >_> Like not the standard, "you get +x to y skill when you do z highly-situational thing".
I will just agree with the dozens of other posters -- we make our OWN flavor. You can't tell me what my character's backstory is, because you don't know. You can tell me how my character acts in battle, because you can write interesting powers that are competitive with already-published powers, such that I actually want to use the new powers.
Who really cares how many powers I have per level? I have a nice character builder to help me sort through them all. Feats might be another story, especially because you publish so many worthless ones, and have outright obsoleted some feats, and there's no good grouping for them in the builder (yet?). But I can always use new powers and maybe new feats.
I can even get behind new races and classes occasionally (one a month or so)... as long as they're FULLY DEVELOPED, not half-hearted "oh these are, um, Fire Dwarves! Yeah, that's it... they're just like Dwarves, except, um... Fire! They can take a feat so that when they use their second wind [because we all know that's what makes you a dwarf, is using your second wind], they gain resist 5 fire." I don't need any more of that.
I dunno who you played with, but my friends and I made an effort to optimize our characters. Optimizing isnt a dirty word, you can have roleplaying and optimizing together in the same character, even.
Absolutely - I find the difference is that there tend to be people who play "systems" (who tend to be the majority), and people like me who tend to play "settings".
In this long post (I haven't quoted it all - go read it!) MThomason explains beautifully a style and method of roleplaying that I love - but that is not D&D. I realise that this statement begs some explanation, and I'm going to try, but the arguments are quite nuanced and difficult to get accross in the "soundbyte" environment of a Forum - maybe I'll get around the blog I have been planning on the subject...
The issue, to me, is that (a) there are at least two modes of play possible in roleplaying games - those MThomason describes plus, I believe, more - but (b) a roleplaying game system can only support one of them well. For example, firm, mechanical rules are only really required when players (not characters) are in conflict. D&D has always, since its inception, encouraged a specific type of player conflict (or perhaps 'tension', since 'conflict' has negative connotations) because of the "advancement" mechanism involving getting xp for beating challenges to go up levels and get loot. At its best, this is "constructive tension", leading to excitement and fun.
The "setting-based" type of roleplaying MThomason describes barely needs rules. The player is engaged, perhaps, but the conflicts are, at core, those of the character, not the player. Hence why, in such play, houserules, rules changes "on the fly" to better model the setting and player discussion and agreement are (in my experience) more common. In fact, I think there are several rulesets out there that suit this style of play far better than D&D ever has - and the first things they jettison are xp and levels!
So, to return to D&D, I would go further than "D&D should not aim at the 'simulationist' market" - I would say that I do not want to see any changes to D&D or D&D articles for or about such things. Attempting to support both types of play will, I am convinced, both fail to support the "simulationist/setting modelling" style and fatally compromise the support that has been painstakingly built up for the "gamist" style.
What does this mean for Dragon articles? "Flavour" to describe the workings of extant rules mechanisms or features I think would be a mistake. For successful gamist play the rules are as they are - making them malleable based on (supposed) "truth" about how things like combat and horseriding work will break down the game at the core of the "challenge" mechanism that moderates the conflict between "level and enrich my character now" and "your character getz stuff when I say so".
But there are a few areas that do desperately need enrichment, in my view.
1) Other Challenges. Someone above mentioned the Dragon being a place for test-bed rules and new ideas that "stretch the envelope". I think this is an excellent notion. Things that expand upon Skill Challenges and, maybe, other types of challenge would be especially welcome. The aim would be to make such challenges just as exciting, just as tactically rich and just as balanced as combat - or better!
2) Picking Challenges. The challenges in D&D are core to the basic mechanic of xp/level/loot and are where the "constructive tension" that generates much of the "D&D brand of fun" comes from. But part of the "challenge" paradigm involves "stepping up" to meet the challenge presented. Giving players the means to make such choices has been touched upon very little, it seems to me, and expansion here could be beneficial. "Ecology of the..." articles might come in, here - giving ways for the players to gauge an array of "challenge hooks" to discern what each will involve - what "difficulty" level and type of opponent will they have? Of the old computer games of D&D, "Pool of Radiance" stood out as a classic precisely because, past the first 'level' or so, there were several possible "scenarios" that the player could choose to tackle - with rumours and hints as to what each contained. So - "Ecology of..." articles with tell-tales and habits of monsters, rather than "little known" extra powers or "special" loot, would be helpful. Articles about rumours - how to build and distribute them - would be good. Maybe in time such things will go in a DMG, but as a place to experiment - 'push the envelope' - Dragon would be fine.
3) Handling "Downtime". Character "downtime" - time spent not adventuring or shopping - is a potential area to be used in D&D, but faces two problems. (i) How to make it relevant to the core of game play (i.e. challenges) and (ii) how to balance it with the character/challenge equation. What I mean by the last point is illustrated by 'strongholds'. If strongholds/homes for the characters cost money, that has to be balanced with the (assumed) wealth=magic-item level of the characters. Making it so that you can have a stronghold only by nerfing your character in the items department would suck; so would making it so that power-hungry players could eschew the stronghold for extra items. If the stronghold costs money it has to contribute to the challenge-effectiveness of the characters; if it doesn't cost money, how should it be described/limited?
So, I see some scope for 'non-crunch' (i.e. non-feat/power) articles - but plead for no "this is how real _____ work" or "here are some poorly-tested little bonus abilities for your _____" items.
I haven't looked at the stats or tried them out enough to comment on the actual playability, but if we make the assumption this is a well-thought-out creation gameplay-wise, I think this article embodies the precise sort of thing I personally like in a "rules-orientated" article. Rather than simply being a bunch of stat blocks, it explains what the creature is, how to use it, and its history to use/modify/replace/ignore as individuals prefer.
Assume an article on a selection of new powers for [insert random class here] had a similar layout to it - would that work for you - and if not, why?
Anyway firstly I don't think the crunch vs fluff thing is an issue. Fluff is fluff. It is distinctly optional and should be able to be freely re-worked by the players and DM to suit their character an campaign, and is only binding to that campaign once they have done so.
The issue with Crunch is we seem to keep getting the same stuff. More fighter options, more of the same Ranger options and so on.
Now by and large I find crunch more useful than fluff, and I read crunch first fluff second. In fact I only read the fluff if the crunch is appealing to me in the first place. In this regard I find the Essentials power presentation incredibly annoying as I need to wade through fluff to reach the crunch that will tell me if I care about the fluff.
That might seem backwards, but it is born out of the simple desire not to totally gimp my character in the pursuit of having the right powers to support the fluff.
Consider my primary Dwarf fighter's power list:
POWERS
Fighter at-will 1: Reaping Strike
Fighter at-will 1: Wicked Strike
Fighter encounter 1: Steel Serpent Strike
Fighter daily 1: Driving Attack
Fighter utility 2: Who's Next?
Fighter encounter 3: Bull Charge
Fighter daily 5: Brutal Advance
Fighter utility 6: Unbreakable
Fighter encounter 7: Inertia Strike
Fighter daily 9: Victorious Surge
Fighter utility 10: Endure Pain
(Note that he doesn't have the all consuming Come and Get It !)
Nearly every power in some way supports the character's "charge in" approach to fighting.
I didn't need the fluff of any articles to get those ideas, and if I had been reading an article and thinking "these are lame" I wouldn't have considered the build - this is why I'd never make him a Slayer despite that class nearly exactly matching his concept in theory. The Slayer is as mechanically dull as cream paint to me. I like him as above because he is charging about and knocking people over and still doing pretty good damage, far better than "I charge" or "I hit" as his options from the Slayer. So as a result of the mechanical boredom a Slaryer offers me I've not read any of the intervening fluff in the class. Why would I, they don't look intersting to play mechanically, why would I bother with the fluff?
So yes good crunch supported by an equal amount of fluff is fine. But first the crunch actually has to be good, not obscure corner case or significantly under powered.
MThomason wouldn't the Earth Domain be a better comparator then?
I hadn't gotten around to reading that at the time
I just picked on the Scarecrow article because I'd just that minute finished reading it and felt it had the perfect balance.Looking at the Earth Domain, its a bit crunch-heavy for my personal tastes. I'd have liked a couple of full pages on the Earth Domain before hitting mechanics. I wouldn't have reduced the mechanics at all, just spent longer building up to it and making it feel interesting.
That said, it looks like it would suit the majority in this thread, so I have zero complaints on a professional level for "suitability for the intended audience" - I agree with the poster above that the core of 4E is what makes it successful, and it probably shouldn't change. However, I do feel that Dragon is a good place to explore other ways of playing, especially as D&D hasn't always been a pure "dungeon delve" game. The Birthright campaign, especially, is a good example of "political play", and I always felt Mystara's rich background of myriad nations provided similar opportunities - my own Mystara campaign spent an inordinate amount of time with running dominions in Norwold during and after CM1, and dealing with Thyatian/Alphatian politics.
However, I do feel that Dragon is a good place to explore other ways of playing, especially as D&D hasn't always been a pure "dungeon delve" game. The Birthright campaign, especially, is a good example of "political play", and I always felt Mystara's rich background of myriad nations provided similar opportunities - my own Mystara campaign spent an inordinate amount of time with running dominions in Norwold during and after CM1, and dealing with Thyatian/Alphatian politics.
Birthright (which was one of my favourite D&D worlds - it actually got me into playing some D&D after abandoning it as a hopeless mish-mash for several years) is a very fine example of the potential for "other challenge possibilities", I think. Add in a conflict game built around "Domain Actions" that can stand as "Encounters" and then fill out (maybe in Dragon) how to construct a political "scenario" from this and you add another dimension to the game. A political backdrop also gives excellent scope for offering a range of challenges to the players and allowing them to select which they will "step up" to (thus giving players both another dimension along which to apply thought/skill and an input into the 'shape' of the game's direction).
I've dropped another round of thoughts in the blog: community.wizards.com/wotc_huscarl/blog/...
In the future, blogs about the magazines probably will go into the D&D Insider group rather than my personal area.
Steve
A worst case scenario with the above is that some players are aware of the chaff, while others are actively trying to take advantage of it. Then you run into issues where it can cause arguments. Hopefully most groups are mature enough for this not to be an issue, but I think we've probably all experienced the problem player who will constantly attempt to rules-lawyer things their way just because "the rulebook says so". (My #2 reason for wishing for an electronic-format rulebook is so that I, as DM, can edit in my own rules amendments before distributing it to the players. Obviously my #1 reason is to make it easier to search )
(Steve) "But as the number of feats and powers in the game increases, the development process becomes ever more time intensive because there are more data points to cross-check."
That is somewhat of a worry in itself. Looking at certain "bloated" classes at the moment, I know how hard it is for me to try and fit it all into my head, so I can only imagine how that affects the dev guys who need to get it 100% right.
In the "systems" world a growing, complicated system can eventually lead to thoughts of how much easier it would be to implement a "refresh" and rebuild from scratch to get back to a simple base again. Lets face it, thats one of the reasons we have 4e ;) The faster and more complicated a system grows, the more likely a flaw will creep in and become a dependancy for other parts before it can be cut out (and I'm sure from that pretty much anyone can guess what I used to do for a living in a previous life).
Therefore, we at the receiving end of the product need to start thinking how much of an effect rolling more and more rules in will have on how soon we get a 5e. I think for most of us, we'd rather that was later than sooner, so I'm sorely tempted to advocate a "slow down and get it right" approach, especially as the release of Essentials has stablised things a bit (or complicated it, depending on who you talk to!)
As we've been discussing above, that could be another good reason for putting unapproved rules in Dragon for open playtest and feedback. Rather than give us previews of a product out next month, throw us some of the more important rules still in development so we can help point out the problems before they go to print (not to mention it'll make the term "D&D Insider" a lot more appropriate!)
Another sticking point here, as someone else mentioned earlier, is that getting material into Dragon is pretty much the only way to get it into the Character Builder, something I feel which is turning house rules into a lost art. Taking a holistic look at this, I'm starting to question whether this is a major contributor towards the push for more rules material. I'm also tempted to go off at a tangent here and talk about how the 'builder really needs a scripting engine so we can make the most of it, but I'll hold that back for another day for fear of turning my wall of text here into a skyscraper ;)
Note the lack of a red icon by my name. The primary reason for that is the current sorry state of Dragon. (Dungeon actually seems pretty decent to me right now). I don't know how I'll find out if Dragon gets any better...
I do not believe what you're doing right now is working.
Good luck. You need it.
"We intend to eliminate both varieties of waste, but of the two, bad crunch is what harms the game. Publishing an article containing twelve feats, of which five are balanced and useful but seven are either unbalanced or unlikely to be used, is worse than publishing that same article with just three good feats. Yes, you got only three usable feats instead of five, but the system wasn't degraded by seven overpowered, underpowered, or unneeded feats in the process. Some might argue that weak feats don't matter because players will find the wheat among the chaff, but we disagree and we're pretty inflexible on that point. "
"The result should be a slower stream of high-quality material. That's the philosophy in a nutshell."
However, this is not the result. What the last few months of Dragon have, for the most part, been a steady stream of worthless drivel. Like that halfling article. You said to me that page downloads are a good sign of popularity - did it not occur to you that those downloads may have been caused by people wanting to see what the controversy over it's abyssmal quality were about? That article was nothing but chaff, with no wheat whatsoever.
Although I do have to say that yes, I did like Mearls' Earth Domain, and my compliments to him on it. Overall I am severely unimpressed with the current quality of Dragon and it's design direction, which seems to contradict itself on a regular basis. If your aim is more flavour and decent, if small amounts of crunch, then the last few issues are not following it. Subpar crunch and articles of wildly differing levels of flavour/crunch balance with uninteresting flavour interspersed with average fiction and advertising levels I would expect from an actual printed magazine.
I have turned off auto-renew on my DDI sub and am waiting for my red forum icon to dissappear as well, and if this quality continues, I will not be turning it back on.
Allow me to redirect the discussion slightly.
How many powers are "enough" for a class?
Here are a few numbers to consider. They're not a challenge to anyone's viewpoint; they're a basis for discussion:
At 30th level, a character has 17 powers. With the standard amount of replacing, he's had 25 different powers over his career. That number could be higher with retraining.
When a class is newly published (has material in just one sourcebook), it gets about 80 powers. That means, including level-based replacing but not retraining, you could play that character from level 1 to level 30 three times without seeing the same power twice.
At what point can you comfortably say, "this class has enough powers to choose from" -- 100? 300? 500? 1,000? If you had to put a number on it, what would that number be?
Steve
Depends on the class. I'd like to see many of the 3.5 spells make a return. I know alot have, but would like to see as close to complete as is possible.
Sure, it is picked up in the backgrounds section, but it doesn't cover the automatic skill selection that a class has to have, which may make no sense.
The result should be a slower stream of high-quality material. That's the philosophy in a nutshell.
I agree with this philosophy, and think it would be a good direction for the magazine (in fact, it's pretty much what I asked for earlier in this thread). However, as other posters have noted, the latest Dragon issues do not really reflect these ideas: the decline in mechanical content hasn't been followed by an appreciable increase in crunch quality. The summer issues were particularly bad, and even though the more recent ones have recovered the average level we have come to expect from DDI (with a few gems, like the Earth Domain one, the one about Grifnar's Arms, or the Class Acts: monk), the fact remains that we are getting less playable material, and there is still plenty of filler.
I think part of the reasons for dissatisfaction lies in players not expecting Dragon to merely add new options that are very much like what they already have, but stuff that fundamentally changes their characters or, dare I say it, fixes them. This was easier in the earlier days when classes were sorely lacking in options, and any class acts article would add some much-needed alternatives. Yet there are still some abandoned classes and races (such as Runepriests or Changelings) in dire need of additional material.
What Dragon could provide nowadays, and players like me expect from it, are surgical solutions to known game problems. There is precedent in this: Avengers suffered from lack of damage at higher levels, and got Painful Oath. Warlocks had a similar problem, and got Cursed Spells, plus a dozen other options for boosting attacks in the same article. Lately most of these fixes have come via errata, but that only goes so far. I would gladly pay for a magazine that brought patches for the following items, in no particular order:
Show
- Beastmaster rangers suffering from pitiful beast damage, dooming all beast powers to unplayability.
- Seekers being way too weak, on account on a terrible power selection and a lack of features/feats to compensate
- Avengers requiring a Skill domain god in order to charge.
- Battleminds lacking a decent alternative to Melee Training for their opportunity attacks.
- Ensnaring Swordmages having terrible defender punishment, particularly at heroic tier.
- Strength clerics lacking powers (give them a way to use Wis-based powers with strength!)- Druids lacking non-beast form options.
- Star pact Warlocks wanting three good ability scores. Let them have a Cha-based at-will, or use something other than Int for defense, or use Cha or Con for all their attacks.
- Constitution-based Shamans having lousy AC.
- Beastmaster rangers suffering from pitiful beast damage, dooming all beast powers to unplayability.
- Seekers being way too weak, on account on a terrible power selection and a lack of features/feats to compensate
- Avengers requiring a Skill domain god in order to charge.
- Battleminds lacking a decent alternative to Melee Training for their opportunity attacks.
- Ensnaring Swordmages having terrible defender punishment, particularly at heroic tier.
- Strength clerics lacking powers (give them a way to use Wis-based powers with strength!)- Druids lacking non-beast form options.
- Star pact Warlocks wanting three good ability scores. Let them have a Cha-based at-will, or use something other than Int for defense, or use Cha or Con for all their attacks.
- Constitution-based Shamans having lousy AC.
Show
- Beastmaster rangers suffering from pitiful beast damage, dooming all beast powers to unplayability.
- Seekers being way too weak, on account on a terrible power selection and a lack of features/feats to compensate
- Avengers requiring a Skill domain god in order to charge.
- Battleminds lacking a decent alternative to Melee Training for their opportunity attacks.
- Ensnaring Swordmages having terrible defender punishment, particularly at heroic tier.
- Strength clerics lacking powers (give them a way to use Wis-based powers with strength!)- Druids lacking non-beast form options.
- Star pact Warlocks wanting three good ability scores. Let them have a Cha-based at-will, or use something other than Int for defense, or use Cha or Con for all their attacks.
- Constitution-based Shamans having lousy AC.
I think Dragon is at its best when it has crunch heavy articles in the same issue as the fluff. I love fluff. I love reading other peoples ideas about the D&D multiverse. I love reading fiction. But I also think there's a place for those crunch heavy articles that serve a very specific purpose; to support parts of the game that are in serious need of help and that help won't come from a book.
For example, artificers are now seen as a broken class. Some of their options and paragon paths have been made obsolete by the new magic item rules. Here's where Dragon can step in and save the day. A crunch heavy article that retools the artificer would be applauded by everyone.
Another thing that everyone approves of is support for new races and classes. Yes, essentials should be supported too, but not at the expense of classes like the Seeker and the Runepriest who feel like they were abandoned. One of my players asked me to kill off his runepriest because he felt like there weren't enough powers to define his character.
I'm not so keen on new general feats, but I'm desperate for new feats that define the newer races. Shardminds, Gith, Wilden come to mind.
I think the new system of themes will be a godsend for new Dragon crunch. Themes really open up design space because they allow a player to steer their character towards some diverse flavour without multi-classing or hybridizing. Once again, Dragon can take the lead here and put out monthly theme articles. Then after a year, you put them all in a book and it would be one of D&D's new best sellers.
If you put these crunch heavy articles with the "fluff" articles, but don't try to hybridize them, you'd make a lot of people happy.
Now this is going somewhere constructive.
Psikus and kilpatds pointed at specific class and race problems that they'd like to see addressed. Here's their list, compiled:
- Beastmaster rangers suffering from pitiful beast damage, dooming all beast powers to unplayability.
- Seekers being way too weak, on account of a terrible power selection and a lack of features/feats to compensate
- Avengers requiring a Skill domain god in order to charge.
- Battleminds lacking a decent alternative to Melee Training for their opportunity attacks.
- Ensnaring Swordmages having terrible defender punishment, particularly at heroic tier.
- Strength clerics lacking powers (give them a way to use Wis-based powers with strength!)
- Druids lacking non-beast form options.
- Star pact Warlocks wanting three good ability scores. Let them have a Cha-based at-will, or use something other than Int for defense, or use Cha or Con for all their attacks.
- Constitution-based Shamans having lousy AC.
- Too many feats to decent armor for Con/non-int-or-dex Warlocks and Str/Wis rangers. (patch feat for scale for both)
- Bards, Ardents, Avengers, Monks, Rogues could all use basic attack options other than melee training
- Assassins (not the essential version, the original one) need spike damage badly
I'm not saying we agree that every one of these is a legitimate problem deserving an article, but there are some interesting suggestions in that list which step outside the bounds of what we typically see in the inbox. (Despite the fact that most PH1 classes and races already have tons of support, we still get endless article proposals for more.)
Let's hear more suggestions along these lines -- what class and race deficiencies would you like to see addressed in the pages of Dragon magazine?
Steve
Let's hear more suggestions along these lines -- what class and race deficiencies would you like to see addressed in the pages of Dragon magazine?
Steve
Let's hear more suggestions along these lines -- what class and race deficiencies would you like to see addressed in the pages of Dragon magazine?
I'll bite.
Runepriests, having come on the scene after Divine Power and having never had an article devoted to them just don't have nearly as many options as other classes.
The Thri-Kreen racial power is great for a melee type, but some alternative for Thri-Kreen who use ranged attacks would be nice.
I think Seekers need not just more powers generally, but more powers that can be used as Melee or Ranged, specifically. The Spiritbond build is very definitely the weaker of the two.
As more of a cross-class deficiency, the number of alternatives for superior implements feels very limited within each category. More superior implements, please; even if it's just a crunch-only (or almost crunch-only) Bazaar of the Bizarre article that just dumps a lot of new superior implements into the game.
I'd love a deep dive into monster design, in Dungeon. Start with the updated DMG baselines, and explain why. How to design powers. How many good powers a monster should have. Some way of getting a good starting point for how much damage a given control effect is worth, and a ton of powers of different generic themes. Please walk through at least two monster designs, with missteps and adjustments included.
In dungeon, more articles about puzzles. How to use em. Examples. Debugging them going badly at the table.
More Eberron stuff. NPCs, terrorist cells, adventures. I personally like my Eberron with a serious shadowrun feel, but that may just be me. (Oh, I can write those adventures if you want them)
Dragon: keeping the description short (can write any of these)
- Weaplements. It's too expensive to keep feats/items for two different attack items.
- Unarmed Monks. (rules issue, "Unarmed" monks don't actually, in the rules sense, use their unarmed attack for anything, so the feats to support it don't work.)
- Ranged Avengers: half their powers basically say "give up your striker class feature"
- Weapon Artificiers: high levels, your power selection dries up.
- Weapon Bards. The PP is great, the power selection ... less so. (Take some arti&bard weapon powers, merge into a theme?)
- Epic skill powers. Let's throw some "fly" into athletics, and "phasing" into stealth. Make them epic, and then let them be EPIC.
Also concerning weaplements, thanks to the changes with Essentials, the Swordmage loses out vastly on Expertise/Focus feats - a lot of their good powers are implement based, but can not benefit from Weapon Focus, Heavy/Light Blade Expertise and the like. When a class with 'Sword' in it's name can not benefit from what are basically 'Sword Expertise' feats, and good feats at that, there is a problem.
And I'd also like to see more racial feat support along the lines of what Tieflings get, for example, Eladrin support that's NOT about fey step, Drow support that's NOT about using the Cloud/Darkfire powers, Minotaur support that's NOT about charging...
Epic skill powers. Let's throw some "fly" into athletics, and "phasing" into stealth. Make them epic, and then let them be EPIC.
Agreed - and "Balancing on rainbows" type stuff, too.
Lots of ideas already, but a few extras:
- Interesting Rituals. Exempli gratia, a ritual for a Wizard's Duel (defines a space for the duel and makes any "death" a KO, maybe). Rituals that build (i.e. each is a component of a larger effect).
- Systems (as Skill Challenges?) for character "projects" or "competitions"; for example, challenges for tracking down difficult-to-find purchases or ingredients, challenges for building bases, information networks, political support bases, congregations, boats, ships or airships. Tasks that can run over months or so as "background" to ongoing adventures; "hobbies" that players can develop for their characters that give some in-game benefits that fit with the established advancement schema.
- Monster lore for players (that DMs should read, too!); 'flavour' that gives clues and indications that let playres spot what sort of monster they are about to face before the Init dice are rolled. Not extra powers for the monsters - but maybe some ideas concerning what the monsters' glands are useful for...
- Alternatives to the "Spellscarred" and "Dragonmarked" concepts - options for game specific worlds. Bloodlines and heritages, not as "more ingredients into the same soup", but as alternative schemata that can be slotted in as an option for a game world.
- Monster lore for players (that DMs should read, too!); 'flavour' that gives clues and indications that let playres spot what sort of monster they are about to face before the Init dice are rolled.
That more than anything is what I feel is the most important type of flavor that is sadly missing in the majority of monster creations. Or to put it another way: five monsters with pretty much identical stats and powers but vastly differing flavor text are most certainly five very different monsters and will feel so when the DM plays them appropriately following their descriptions. If they just treat them as game pieces on a board, then they will indeed feel repetitive and stale.
Similarly, since 4e brought in so much in the way of character customisation, it appears to have introduced the idea of players letting their character's powers define their character far more than the personality they invent for them. One thing I miss from older editions is that they forced two fighters to differentiate themselves through roleplaying precisely because of the rules being pretty much identical for the two.
One way to test this is to ask a player what their character's preferred weapon is, and then give them the opportunity to replace it with something completely different that does an extra point of damage. See if they stay in character and keep the preferred one over the one that has an in-game effect
It may sound a little silly at first, until you get to thinking and realise the character wouldn't really know the difference between, say, 9 and 10 points of damage, and would be more likely to use the weapon they feel more comfortable with. I also remember in the distant past, running RPGs where I kept all the paperwork to myself, never told the players what the rules actually were, and simply described damage such as "that hit really took it out of you", "you're almost dead on your feet", and "your left arm is flapping around, only held on by a tendon". Once players become aware of the rules, theres a temptation to start letting the rulebook make decisions for you, rather than trying to "act the scene out" and letting the rules just define your success rate. Its the old (overused, but all too appropriate) roleplaying vs rollplaying argument again. If people prefer the latter, then more power to them, but there needs to be enough support in a roleplaying game to actually do the roleplaying. If someone gave me a new character class that consisted entirely of rules with zero flavor text, I'd throw it back in their face and tell them to bring it back when it was more than half-written.Another example, which probably makes more sense, would be playing something like Neverwinter Nights with all the numeric game stats hidden (you can keep a health bar so you have an approximate idea of how much health you have), and making decisions based on the facts you have discovered in-character. If you've heard that monster X is particularly weak against holy water, you know to throw a flask of it at them, without needing to bother looking up how much damage that would do vs your equipped weapon.
Not extra powers for the monsters - but maybe some ideas concerning what the monsters' glands are useful for...
Heh, funny you should mention that... (although what I have in mind probably isn't exactly what you intended in that sentence
)five monsters with pretty much identical stats and powers but vastly differing flavor text are most certainly five very different monsters and will feel so when the DM plays them
One thing I miss from older editions is that they forced two fighters to differentiate themselves through roleplaying precisely because of the rules being pretty much identical for the two.
Don't you find these two statements contradictory? If identical stats forces players to differentiate the fighters through roleplaying, don't identical stats force DMs to differentiate monsters through roleplay as well?
I actually found the opposite to be true. In prior editions, when fighters just hit things with their weapon, fighters tended to be the same personality-wise. People had to make an effort to come up with different characters.
ask a player what their character's preferred weapon is, and then give them the opportunity to replace it with something completely different that does an extra point of damage.
That's a loaded question. in prior editions, most players don't define character personality based on what weapon the PC carries. So it's no big deal to drop a mundane axe for a +1 two-handed sword. In 4e, you invest your character's expertise with feats and powers that depend on a specific weapon or implement, so it takes a lot more to convince someone to drop one weapon type for another. But that doesn't have anything to do with roleplaying.
there needs to be enough support in a roleplaying game to actually do the roleplaying. If someone gave me a new character class that consisted entirely of rules with zero flavor text, I'd throw it back in their face and tell them to bring it back when it was more than half-written.
Wait, I thought you just said that characters were more differentiated int he past when the rulebooks didn't tell you how to play a character. Now you want flavor text?
In the end, I don't think your idea of hiding the rules form players to make them play the story, rather than the rules is workable. The whole point of rules is to prevent the DM from being arbitrary. When the players don't know the rules, it's not a game -- it's just improvisational theater, which is fun, but I don't think you need any rules for it.
In the end, I don't think your idea of hiding the rules form players to make them play the story, rather than the rules is workable. The whole point of rules is to prevent the DM from being arbitrary. When the players don't know the rules, it's not a game -- it's just improvisational theater, which is fun, but I don't think you need any rules for it.
Thanks for saying this more succinctly than I would have
What I had in mind with "monster ecologies" was more along the lines of stuff to add flavour to the sub-game where players try to get an idea (a) how tough the challenges on offer are, and (b) what type of foe each involves. I actually want a situation where players discuss whether to go for the Hard Troll encounter or the Easy Hobgoblin encounter right now, given their current resources and what they might hope to gain from each in terms of treasure or "quest progress". Maybe they'll judge one (or both) possible challenges poorly - that's all part of the game - but they get some feeling of control over what they "step on up" to.
Don't you find these two statements contradictory? If identical stats forces players to differentiate the fighters through roleplaying, don't identical stats force DMs to differentiate monsters through roleplay as well?
Let me put it another way:
Its all in the flavor text. For the DM, the flavor text is racial and so would be in the monster description. For the players, the "flavor text" in this case is their character's personality, and would be their own creation.
I actually found the opposite to be true. In prior editions, when fighters just hit things with their weapon, fighters tended to be the same personality-wise. People had to make an effort to come up with different characters.
Actually thats precisely what I meant. People had to make an effort
When two fighters are the same personality-wise, I put it down to the player not making enough effort.
That's a loaded question. in prior editions, most players don't define character personality based on what weapon the PC carries. So it's no big deal to drop a mundane axe for a +1 two-handed sword. In 4e, you invest your character's expertise with feats and powers that depend on a specific weapon or implement, so it takes a lot more to convince someone to drop one weapon type for another. But that doesn't have anything to do with roleplaying.
Really? My character's preference in their own mind for a particular weapon has everything to do with roleplaying, it has to do with the type of weapon I envisage them liking to use (usually down to affecting my choice of miniature for them, when playing with miniatures).
It'd be like Gimli from LotR using a sword. The axe is just too much a part of his character. I'm sure he *could* use a sword if he needed to, it just wouldn't feel right to him, and he'd be likely to complain constantly until he got his hands on an axe again. He certainly wouldn't care about +1 to damage.
Wait, I thought you just said that characters were more differentiated int he past when the rulebooks didn't tell you how to play a character. Now you want flavor text?
Exactly. I want flavor text telling me about the class, more than I need 20 different options to help "define my personality". Making my character feel like an individual is my role as a player, in the mannerisms I develop for them, who they like and dislike within the party, how they choose to react in various situations, etc. It isn't the game's role to tell me how to play my character, but it is the game's role to describe to me in plain english what makes this Class different. Knowing that, I can think when designing my character and fit the class description into my own description of the character. Sometimes I design the character before choosing a class, in which case the description means I can get into character and think about what decision they would take when choosing "what to be when they grow up". Sometimes I choose the class first and build the character personality into that. In fact, all I need for that is the flavor text, the rules I can happily read after I've made my decision.
In the end, I don't think your idea of hiding the rules form players to make them play the story, rather than the rules is workable. The whole point of rules is to prevent the DM from being arbitrary. When the players don't know the rules, it's not a game -- it's just improvisational theater, which is fun, but I don't think you need any rules for it.
Well, it isn't my idea exactly. It's the way a lot of roleplayers have tried in the past. Its far too much work to do, to be honest, on the part of the poor DM who has to make every single roll and every single rules check. You'll also find many computer games are based on RPG rules internally, even if they hide this from the player. What we tried all those years ago was basically the DM "being the computer", and providing a "presentation layer" to the players. I wouldn't want to play like that either, but I wanted to illustrate the point that to play "in character" you need to learn to divorce yourself from your own knowledge of the rules and instead choose to do what your character would do in that situation. You might know that your character has exactly 5 hps left and that Kobold can do d4+1 damage with that dagger, but they themselves have a far vaguer idea of whether one stab will be enough to kill them, KO them, or just add a bit more to the pain.
It might help if I illustrate the way I tend to play (using rules)
1) Player decides what they want to do. They can quote a precise power or other rules-based option to be used, or just describe it narratively if they can't think of a rule on the spot (or if none exists to cover the situation).
2) If it was described narratively, Player and DM find an appropriate rule to judge success of the maneuver. If none exists, DM makes up a rule.
3) Roll is made to see if it succeeds.
The important thing (to me and the players I tend to play with) is that the narrative and story drives the game, and we use the rules as tools to be wielded the way we want them, rather than picking up a rulebook and letting it tell us how to play (something which many of us feel belongs in the realms of Magic: The Gathering and Warhammer 40k - both of which are good games but also different types of game - and not in roleplaying). Or, as Steve put it when he kicked off this discussion:
D&D is about making choices and telling stories. It's not about rules. You need rules to give structure to the stories you tell and the choices you make, and that's it. The numbers underlying the game are tools which serve the decision-making, puzzles, exploration, fighting, and story-telling, but the rules are not D&D, and D&D is not its rules.
Now I personally wouldn't go quite that far. I feel D&D is whatever you make of it.
I've played in pretty much every style of game imaginable, from not even bothering with a rulebook to playing strict RAW. I have to say I prefer the middle ground, rather than either extreme.
If you get a good mix of crunch and flavor, everyone should be happy. I do know, unfortunately, a lot of people that avoided 4e completely due to feeling it was "devoid of flavor and aimed at power gamers". After looking at it, I'm happy to say I think they were wrong, and I feel 4e can form the basis for pretty much any group as long as they're willing to put in some effort too, and any good RPG will force players to make an effort. In the event of anyone quoting what I said earlier here, the difference for me is that earlier editions *forced* players to make an effort in roleplaying. 4e doesn't force people to, and therefore brings in an audience of people that would rather play a Diabloesque game. The bigger audience the game has, the better it is for us all.
My only criticism of 4e is that if you haven't played any other way before, it naturally leans towards the "power gamer" model. That's one of the reasons I feel I have to inject myself into conversations as I have here just to try and stimulate the discussion (the other being that I want to see what you guys want written so I can bear it in mind when I'm writing pitches), so newer players that are reading these forums can see there is another way to play.
For those who really do want to play a stricter RAW game, great - and welcome to D&D!. If I've managed to persuade one person to play more narratively, even better
I know personally I can play 4e in the narrative style I want to play it, because if I can't its not a failure in the game's design, but a failure in my own use of the tools provided to me, so at the end of the day I'm more than happy with my 4e rulebooks. The only reason my 3e rulebooks haven't headed the way of my 2e ones a few years ago (to ebay, to my eternal regret) is that like the 1980s boxed sets (which thankfully I did hold onto), I may actually want to play them for nostalgia's sake some day.For the DM, the flavor text is racial and so would be in the monster description.
Why should it be racial and not individual? Should all orcs play the same? Or shouldn't the DM infuse each orc with a personality just as each player infuses each character with a personality.
One of the things I like about 4e is it treats all characters as individuals. There's no distinction between NPC and monster. All monsters are NPCs and therefore each monster should have an individuated personality.
I don't have a problem with flavorful monster text. I just don't see its lack as inhibiting roleplay. If anything you should be lauding it because now DMs have to work at giving monsters some personality, and "work" for work's sake sees to be a virtue for you.
People had to make an effort
So do you want the rules to make things easier for peoplpe or not? With DMs, you seem to want the game to supply fluff so the DMs don't have to. With players, you seem to want the game to give them no fluff so they have to work at it. Which is it?
Really? My character's preference in their own mind for a particular weapon has everything to do with roleplaying, it has to do with the type of weapon I envisage them liking to use (usually down to affecting my choice of miniature for them, when playing with miniatures).
That's not roleplaying. Whether Hamlet is weilding a dirk or a rapier doesn't change that Hamlet is the Melancholy Dane. Equipment can sometimes reflect a personality, but it is a tangential connection at best.
It'd be like Gimli from LotR using a sword. The axe is just too much a part of his character. I'm sure he *could* use a sword if he needed to, it just wouldn't feel right to him, and he'd be likely to complain constantly until he got his hands on an axe again. He certainly wouldn't care about +1 to damage.
Actually, given Gimli's competitive nature, I suspect he actually would care about that +1 to damage. There's nothing inherent to Gimli's nature about weilding an axe. He never complained about swords being weak or inferior. In fact, his axe probably was a powerful item (in a world with few magic items). It was a family heirloom with a lot of history and merit to it. I daresay Gimli never had ocassion to be tempted by anything else.
Making my character feel like an individual is my role as a player, in the mannerisms I develop for them, who they like and dislike within the party, how they choose to react in various situations, etc.
I have no idea why you think the current system inhibits this.
It's the way a lot of roleplayers have tried in the past.
Yeah. It's calle dimporvisational theater and you don't need rules for it. I'm not exactly sure what you think WotC (or any gaming company) can do to facilitate the only-the-Dm-knows-the-rules concept you want to employ.
You'll also find many computer games are based on RPG rules internally, even if they hide this from the player.
Because computers are inherently impartial. DMs are, theoretically, human and therefore fallible.
Look, I've probably been playing as long as you. I've played games where the DM didn't let us have any character sheets. They were fine. And if you want to play that in 4e, just reduce everything to Skills. In fact, I think pluisjen had a blog about how you can do just that.
I just don't think what you're proposing is something for which a company that makes its money by publishing rules can do profitably. What you're asking for is a pamphlet.
Why should it be racial and not individual? Should all orcs play the same? Or shouldn't the DM infuse each orc with a personality just as each player infuses each character with a personality.
Absolutely, but the situation I was describing was five identical monster entries with zero flavor text being "unusable". Monsters need flavor text. They need mini-essays on their organisation, the terrain they tend to inhabit, what their natural impulses are, what level of intelligence the average member will have, and generally "how this race fits in". Otherwise they're just a bunch of stats for playing pieces. They need to feel "alive", they need to fit into the ecology of the world somehow. What do they eat? What do they (usually) make their homes out of? That to me is what makes a race, far more than the damage it does in a specific instance. As DM, I'll rate it up or down as necessary for the story - theres no reason Monsters cant have heroes, too, so if I need a L30 Orc Warchief as the protaganist in an Epic adventure, I'll make one.
If its an intelligent race, then as you say, each member needs to be treated as an individual too, but the DM needs something to explain what makes Monster Race X different to Monster Race Y other than their combat stats. What makes that Orc Warchief different to the chief of the Orc tribe in the neighbouring mountain/valley/whatever, or different to the tribal Shaman, or different to the deformed Orc that gets treated as a slave and beaten by the other members, and may be of help to the party, is where the DM's job comes in.
I don't have a problem with flavorful monster text. I just don't see its lack as inhibiting roleplay.
So if I give you a bunch of stats in an adventure and say "this is the monster for the next encounter", you're happy? You don't want to know anything about their racial habits and motivations, just the name of the race and a bunch of numbers? That sounds more like a miniatures game than a roleplaying game to me (and admittedly, 4e is probably closer to that grey area between the two than any other edition)
If anything you should be lauding it because now DMs have to work at giving monsters some personality, and "work" for work's sake sees to be a virtue for you.
LOL. Actually you have a point there, if it forces DMs to think creatively
The thing is though, I don't want anyone to feel "forced" into anything. I want the game to give everyone everything they need and the option to ignore the bits they don't want, rather than telling people "heres some rules, now go away and make up the rest".
So do you want the rules to make things easier for peoplpe or not? With DMs, you seem to want the game to supply fluff so the DMs don't have to. With players, you seem to want the game to give them no fluff so they have to work at it. Which is it?
I want everyone to be given all the general flavor text (covering classes, races, possibly organisations, but not individuals) they need, alongside the associated crunch ;)
I absolutely do not want a bunch of stats that don't tell me how the thing they represent fits into the world. I likewise do not want flavor text that tells me everything except how to apply it using ingame rules. I want a balance, because that is the only way to ensure it can be used for the majority of play styles.
What do you want?
That's not roleplaying. Whether Hamlet is weilding a dirk or a rapier doesn't change that Hamlet is the Melancholy Dane. Equipment can sometimes reflect a personality, but it is a tangential connection at best.
Okay, my apologies for using that precise example.
The point I'm really trying to make is that a character needs to exist in my head as something other than stats. I need to know their personality, and that is what makes them an individual. Whether they use the exact same rules as someone elses character doesn't make a difference to the way I play the role. I can come up with a personality for a character just fine whether I'm using rules that give me a choice of 80 powers, or where every member of a class has exactly the same maneuvers. I also accept, however, that for some players they need the flexibility to choose powers because in their game narrative doesn't mean that much and the games are combat-heavy with very little time spent on dialogue, as is evident from many replies earlier in this thread.
What I want is to ensure that people realise there is another option for defining their character beyond those given in the rules. That is why we need the crunch/flavor balance. If a new player comes into the game seeing nothing but rules and stats, they could be led to believe that there really is nothing beyond that. I feel that would be a very sad day indeed for roleplaying, and would result in roleplaying being absorbed back into miniatures gaming rather than standing as something seperate and creative.
Actually, given Gimli's competitive nature, I suspect he actually would care about that +1 to damage. There's nothing inherent to Gimli's nature about weilding an axe. He never complained about swords being weak or inferior. In fact, his axe probably was a powerful item (in a world with few magic items). It was a family heirloom with a lot of history and merit to it. I daresay Gimli never had ocassion to be tempted by anything else.
Your Gimli does what it takes to win. My Gimli is very proud of his heritage, and frowns on swords almost as much as he does bows
We've both defined a character in our heads. The main difference between us though, is that I'm quite happy accepting that my Gimli doesn't even realise theres an extra +1 point of damage there, because he doesn't know he's part of a game with rules and statistics.
Making my character feel like an individual is my role as a player, in the mannerisms I develop for them, who they like and dislike within the party, how they choose to react in various situations, etc.
I have no idea why you think the current system inhibits this.
Actually I never say that I thought that. I know of others that think that, and will not play 4e for that reason because they see it as a "glorified boardgame", or "roleplaying for power gamers". That to me is their failure to apply what they already know to the tools 4e gives us. What I do think though, is that many newer players come into the game and do not receive enough information to think about characterisation, narrative, and improvisation. For old hands like you and me, we don't need it written in the books, or in Dragon articles. For the newer players, many will or they'll just see 4e as "move the pieces around, kill the monsters, pick up the loot, next!" As I also said, I have no problem with players that *want* to play that way, my problem is with not introducing the option to them.
Look, I've probably been playing as long as you. I've played games where the DM didn't let us have any character sheets. They were fine. And if you want to play that in 4e, just reduce everything to Skills. In fact, I think pluisjen had a blog about how you can do just that.
I don't want to play like that
I was just using the "rules-less" example to prove a point, that how your character reacts in any given situation doesn't have to have anything to do with what the rules say the options are.Also, I don't want you to think I'm attempting to lecture you or any other veteran players. I'm trying to ensure the newer players reading these forums know there *is* something beyond dungeon delving (I have nothing against dungeon delving, I love it as an interlude between adventures that have taxed my mind too much with politics and puzzles), as well as presenting the argument for needing associated flavor text alongside the crunch in Dragon (mainly because nobody else seems to want to).
I do apologise, however, for using extremes to attempt to illustrate a point, or if I came off condescending in any way. I think I probably came out sounding like I'm looking for change. I'm not, I'm just arguing that we need flavor and crunch balanced in our game, and also need to teach our newer players (those that want to learn) how to roleplay and play the game "beyond the rules".
I just don't think what you're proposing is something for which a company that makes its money by publishing rules can do profitably. What you're asking for is a pamphlet.
I feel what I'm asking for is what Steve has described as the current way of thinking for future issues of Dragon. I come away from his blog and his replies in this forum thinking what we're going to see in the future is articles that present a mix of crunch alongside the associated flavor, more dilligence on playtesting new rules (which does unfortunately mean less new rules), as well as more essay-type articles on topics such as "how to roleplay", as opposed to being a "monthly rules update journal". If "D&D is more than just the rules", then Dragon needs to be, as well. Of course, it also has to be "more than just the flavor"!
And you know... maybe I'm being idealistic and seeing the world through rose-tinted spectacles. Maybe what we'll end up with really is a magazine full of fanfiction that nobody wants to read.
You and I don't have the answer to that, but I'm optimistic at this point that Wizards are not intentionally trying to sabotage their own magazine
To be honest though, we can only wait and see. Okay, no, we can also make it known here what we want to see, and continue with constructive conversation.
By the way, as alien as the idea of an RPG being played as "Improvisational Theater" is to you, its just as alien to me *not* to play it that way
The idea of playing RPGs as improvisational theatre (and as many other things besides) is not alien to me in the slightest. The idea of playing D&D as improvisational theatre (and many other things besides) is alien. The confusion of D&D with roleplaying in general is one I come accross quite a lot, as I see in this:
D&D is about making choices and telling stories. It's not about rules. You need rules to give structure to the stories you tell and the choices you make, and that's it. The numbers underlying the game are tools which serve the decision-making, puzzles, exploration, fighting, and story-telling, but the rules are not D&D, and D&D is not its rules.
Hooey. Either this statement was made with the intention of promoting D&D as "the only RPG" (which is understandable in a representative of the company that makes D&D), or Steve really doesn't understand what he's saying. Replace 'D&D' with 'RPGs' throughout and you have something that almost makes sense. But D&D itself is incredibly poorly set up for focussed storytelling or character, setting or situation exploration. Sure, D&D is more than its rules - that's true for any RPG. And you can tell stories about what happens in D&D - but you can about a shopping trip, and that's hardly "about telling stories" (although it is about making choices - and so is D&D ;) ). But, in the case of D&D specifically, the rules are the core foundation that the game is built upon. They are what make the core of the game "tick". The layers of description and 'colour' all add to the experience - but they are not essential to it. Now is the time of D&D Essentials - maybe it's time to take a long, hard look at what those 'essentials' are, exactly.
D&D is a functional game with some fantasy flavour wrapped around it. It does that really well. If it tries to be something else it starts to compromise that game - which is a shame, as (with 4E at least) it's a very good game.
So if I give you a bunch of stats in an adventure and say "this is the monster for the next encounter", you're happy?
You've changed the scenario. We were discussing five identical monster entries in a monster supplement.
Monsters in an adventure exist in a very specific context. That specific encunter, so of course the adventure should explain why the players are encountering them and what the creatures will do once encountered.
But creatures in a book like the Monster Manual or Monster Vault don't have a context. They exist solely for the DM to use in an encounter of the DMs own design. And for that, I don't think a lot of fluff is needed at all, because the fluff is necessarily going to be supplied by the DM when the Dm designs the adventure.
You don't want to know anything about their racial habits and motivations, just the name of the race and a bunch of numbers? That sounds more like a miniatures game than a roleplaying game to me (and admittedly, 4e is probably closer to that grey area between the two than any other edition)
Except, of course, I can add in any behaviors, habits, and motivations I like. Since I write the story, I don't need Wizards to do it for me. Now, if I'm using a Dungeon Magazine adventure then, yes, the monster entries shoudl be accompanied by flavorful text. Also, in a campaign setting book, it makes sense. But in a Monster Manual entry? No, I don't want that.
I want the game to give everyone everything they need and the option to ignore the bits they don't want, rather than telling people "heres some rules, now go away and make up the rest".
Then why were you complaining about all the flavor given to player character powers?!
What do you want?
I've written extensively on what I want. You can go to my blog (linked to in my sig) and read all about my game design philosophies.
I'm quite happy accepting that my Gimli doesn't even realise theres an extra +1 point of damage there, because he doesn't know he's part of a game with rules and statistics.
I don't think that makes sense. A +1 bonus makes you 5% more effective. In real world terms, that's a pretty high number. If any professional athlete increases his effectiveness by 5% he can go from being a wannabe to a Hall-of-Famer. A +1 to hit should be noticeable. Now, he may not understand that this is a "+2 longsword" vs. a "+3 longsword", but he should realize that his current magic sword is easily being outshined by this spiffy new longsword he picked up.
I don't have a problem with PCs not using the game terms. My players never claim -- in character -- that they own a "+3 sword". But I think they'd find it a bit unbelievable that they couldn't practice spar with a +1 weapon and then a +2 weapon and not notice a difference between the two.
many newer players come into the game and do not receive enough information to think about characterisation, narrative, and improvisation.
I don't know what ele you think needs to be done. The PHB has whole chapters on it. The DMG does too. The DMG 2 had even more. Mearls wrote a great series of articles on Skill Challenges. The Save My Game and Dungeoncraft articles were altogether mechanics-free. Essentials has whole chapters devoted to roleplaying. And yet people still complain that D&D is all about combat. The complainers don't read the roleplaying advice. They just don't. They never did. They never will. Giving them more stuff to ignore won't change anything.
For old hands like you and me, we don't need it written in the books, or in Dragon articles. For the newer players, many will or they'll just see 4e as "move the pieces around, kill the monsters, pick up the loot, next!" As I also said, I have no problem with players that *want* to play that way, my problem is with not introducing the option to them.
But it's in the books! What exactly are you lacking? Should Dragon Magazine reprint the PHB chapters on roleplaying once a year just to be on the safe side?
I'm ... presenting the argument for needing associated flavor text alongside the crunch in Dragon (mainly because nobody else seems to want to).
I think I already did that earlier in the thread too.
D&D itself is incredibly poorly set up for focussed storytelling or character, setting or situation exploration.
Thats quite possibly one of the things I enjoy most, being able to put all of that in and "let the rules handle the combat bits inbetween".
But, in the case of D&D specifically, the rules are the core foundation that the game is built upon. They are what make the core of the game "tick". The layers of description and 'colour' all add to the experience - but they are not essential to it.
With 4e I'd agree with you there. With the five colored boxed sets, I felt the Mystara setting was the reason I played, the rules just "sorta came with it". Those rules felt a bit unwieldy at times, especially when you reached higher levels and found more things "getting in the way" when you tried to do something. On the other hand, monster entries despite being somewhat smaller than todays still gave enough good usable information for me to work out what to do with that monster storyline-wise.
I think it'd be interesting to see how a 4e Forgotten Realms player feels here. You can probably guess I was incredibly happy with the immense piles of FR sourcebooks in 3e ;) So much so that I never actually ran an FR game, I just bought the books because I love reading other peoples world creations.
D&D is a functional game with some fantasy flavour wrapped around it. It does that really well. If it tries to be something else it starts to compromise that game - which is a shame, as (with 4E at least) it's a very good game.
I absolutely agree on 4e being a good game. Ignoring everything else for a moment, I love the fact it doesn't "get in the way of playing". I think I'm just going to have to agree to disagree with you on what else it can do - I feel it fits in well as a set of combat rules sitting behind an epic story. I feel the heroes in my story can quite happily hit L30 and be renowned around my game world for rebuilding an empire, and not just killing the latest mega-threat
I've also played Games Workshop's Advanced Heroquest game (later reworked into Warhammer Quest), which for anyone unfamiliar with it was a tiles-and-miniatures-based dungeon delve game. I liked that game too, but it just didn't have the feel to me of being usable for anything more than moving pieces around and killing things. D&D in the past *has* meant more than that to me, and while 4e has moved further away, it still feels to me more of an RPG than a miniatures-and-tiles game.
You've changed the scenario. We were discussing five identical monster entries in a monster supplement.
Yeah you're right. Roll back a bit (I've been up for hours and am a bit tired, sorry!) and take it as five entries in a Monster Manual. Which leads nicely into:
But creatures in a book like the Monster Manual or Monster Vault don't have a context. They exist solely for the DM to use in an encounter of the DMs own design. And for that, I don't think a lot of fluff is needed at all, because the fluff is necessarily going to be supplied by the DM when the Dm designs the adventure.
I've just pulled up Dragon #238, page 72, a nice monster entry for the "Water Cat".
It includes Habitat, Society, and Ecology entries, which I feel are pretty much essential if you're writing up a monster entry. Otherwise all you need is to program a computer with a bunch of points values and use it to build stats. That text right there tells me a human being has sat and thought about this creature, and I feel it has a place in the world. I don't particularly want to spend my time worrying about writing my own ecology info, especially if I'm pushed for time and need to bring something out instantly in the middle of a game. When I do write all of that, I'll make up my own monster from scratch, not use something provided in-game which I feel ought to be provided "complete". Even if you don't want to use the provided flavor text, I can't see that having it in there can actually harm anything.
So going back to our five monster entries, if I'm picking up a magazine and reading about a new monster, I absolutely do want all of that flavor text. I want to know someone actually sat down and thought about what this thing is and what it does, rather than simply coming up with something that'll be a challenging fight. As long as they haven't woven it in too deeply with any particular game world's history, it should be easily pluggable into anything. Individuals can choose to take or ignore or modify the flavor text as they see fit, just as we can also change the stats and powers if we don't like that exact version.
I don't think that makes sense. A +1 bonus makes you 5% more effective. In real world terms, that's a pretty high number. If any professional athlete increases his effectiveness by 5% he can go from being a wannabe to a Hall-of-Famer. A +1 to hit should be noticeable. Now, he may not understand that this is a "+2 longsword" vs. a "+3 longsword", but he should realize that his current magic sword is easily being outshined by this spiffy new longsword he picked up.
I don't have a problem with PCs not using the game terms. My players never claim -- in character -- that they own a "+3 sword". But I think they'd find it a bit unbelievable that they couldn't practice spar with a +1 weapon and then a +2 weapon and not notice a difference between the two.
Ah, but now you've used the magic words - they've practiced with it
And as such I'm then happy they know the difference. If you take however a character who is based on a classic fantasy Knight, they are unlikely to put aside their sword for some weird-looking club just because its a +5. Chances are they wouldn't even lower themselves to practice with it. Being known around town as "the guy wearing the shiny plate armor and waving a piece of wood" really isn't going to do anything for their ego. If they did discover it was somehow magical, I can imagine them using it in a fight where they were hard-pressed to win, but they're not going to discard their sword for it routinely. I accept this is an extreme example, though Going back to the point I was trying to make with it originally though (which I've let myself get far too sidetracked from) - your character is ultimately defined by you, not by the rulebook, and I'll always have trouble completely understanding "The rules do not make me feel individual enough." Thats probably more down to my being used to fighters mostly just hitting things and not having a huge array of extra maneuvers, though ;) What I can accept far more easily is the argument "The rules do not allow me to have certain abilities I have in my character concept" - assuming of course its a relatively sensible concept (if it isn't, then hey theres always Gamma World )One thing I will happily hand to 4e is that it has made combat more exciting, and that you can almost feel the narrative flowing from the combat with the use of the new powers system. Thats absolutely not something I'd want to lose after experiencing it.
Then why were you complaining about all the flavor given to player character powers?!
Er. I wasn't
If anything I'm complaining that a new power needs a lot more flavor text. Ideally, I feel everything in the game needs flavor text, of the type that helps narration while not mentioning game world details and the like. I did however mention the sheer variety of powers in 4e makes it easy to build a character concept using just those powers rather than your imagination, and that I feel perhaps sometimes players need to be reminded that its okay to use your imagination too ;)While its impossible to get that much flavor text into the PHB/DMG (at least, not without having to lose a lot of gameplay information to fit it in and ending up having to spend ten times as long to find the rule you need), it's not so impossible in Dragon or the Monster Manual. I'd probably pick on the Monster Manual as being the main culprit here. Although its the most encyclopediac in format, theres no reason it needs to be so... bland. The 3E Monster Manual was far more interesting, and 2E better still. Luckily, everything else in 4E more than makes up for that - and I'm lucky in that I still have my 2E Rules CD if I want to drag up the old text, even though I sold the books, so I can enjoy the best of both worlds - 4E stats with 2E descriptions
Okies. BIG rollback here and tl;dr for what I've been trying to say (in general, not to any one person in particular) - having had all this time to think, its a lot easier to sum it up:
1) Crunch articles need their flavor. Discard it if you like on an individual basis, but leave it in for those of us that want it. It does need to be good flavor, obviously, just as it needs to be good crunch.
2) If you feel the rules are restricting your playstyle, it's quite likely because you are letting them. To the people that left D&D because 4E felt too power-gamey - its your game, if you let it get that way its more down to you than the rules. DM's rule #1 will always be "the rules are only guidelines, if something isn't fun for your group, change it".
Bowing out now until the next question from Steve, unless anyone aims a specific question at me, as I really have managed to derail the discussion from where it's supposed to be
1) Crunch articles need their flavor. Discard it if you like on an individual basis, but leave it in for those of us that want it. It does need to be good flavor, obviously, just as it needs to be good crunch.
There's really one major problem I have with this. In theory, I agree with you 100%. But in practice... I honestly don't want to wait until some good writer to make up some flavor to go with my game fixes. I mean, I'm a crappy writer. But I know how to work with game mechanics.
If you told me that over the next 6 months, the only thing I would see out of Dragon Magazine is Kilpatds (or some other person who I feel is generally competent) fixing all those issues on his list, I would buy a subscription. If some (competent) writer stepped in and flavored all his articles, that would be even better. But the policy of flavor+crunch is going to be amazingly hard to meet the requirements of and still fix issues. There's just not going to be too many people who can write near-professional quality flavor and great crunch.
There's another thing that is linked to submissions that I want to ask though. Can we submit proposed errata to content in the books? Of all the things that I would like to submit, this would be the easiest for me to do, because I don't have to grind my brain for whatever creativity I have that is able to make ~even minimally acceptable flavor~.
If you told me that over the next 6 months, the only thing I would see out of Dragon Magazine is Kilpatds (or some other person who I feel is generally competent) fixing all those issues on his list, I would buy a subscription. If some (competent) writer stepped in and flavored all his articles, that would be even better. But the policy of flavor+crunch is going to be amazingly hard to meet the requirements of and still fix issues. There's just not going to be too many people who can write near-professional quality flavor and great crunch.
I think thats a really good point. I don't know the official Wizards stance on accepting joint submissions, but I can't think of a reason why two writers couldn't get together and collaborate on an article. That's what I'd suggest anyone who feels they are strong in one area and weak in another try. Sometimes the two sides (crunch and flavor) "feed" one another during the writing process, too, especially with two people together coming up with ideas neither would have had individually.
If you can't find that writing partner, I'd still submit anyway. Maybe it can all be worked out at the editorial level, or maybe it's so awesome an article it can stand alone without the flavor. If you don't try, you'll never know.
D&D itself is incredibly poorly set up for focussed storytelling or character, setting or situation exploration.
Thats quite possibly one of the things I enjoy most, being able to put all of that in and "let the rules handle the combat bits inbetween".
...
With 4e I'd agree with you there. With the five colored boxed sets, I felt the Mystara setting was the reason I played, the rules just "sorta came with it". Those rules felt a bit unwieldy at times, especially when you reached higher levels and found more things "getting in the way" when you tried to do something. On the other hand, monster entries despite being somewhat smaller than todays still gave enough good usable information for me to work out what to do with that monster storyline-wise.
I really enjoy that type of gaming, too, but these days I use a different system when I want to play in that style. It's not that D&D absolutely can't do that style - it's just sort of "if I want to play football why would I use a softball ball when I have an actual football handy?" If I want to just cut back and dream of a different world I'll usually pick Hârn - or maybe Gloranthan Runequest. Or Traveller. With any of those, the system doesn't fight me, or try to tempt me into some action-adventure high jinks - unless those crop up 'naturally'.
I absolutely agree on 4e being a good game. Ignoring everything else for a moment, I love the fact it doesn't "get in the way of playing". I think I'm just going to have to agree to disagree with you on what else it can do - I feel it fits in well as a set of combat rules sitting behind an epic story. I feel the heroes in my story can quite happily hit L30 and be renowned around my game world for rebuilding an empire, and not just killing the latest mega-threat
I don't doubt D&D can be used for that - with some house rules or copious DM judgement. I just think (a) why bother, when other systems do it better, and (b) with players that have any prediliction to competitive endeavour (that would include my usual bunch!) the challenges will take over as the main focus of play. And there's nothing wrong with that - it's what the game is good at, after all.
As an aside, 'Challenge' =/= 'Combat'. The specific "game" I'm referring to here is "players (not characters) using their skills and luck to overcome challenges". Note it's the player skill and luck that is being engaged. That is where the players' focus is - on formulating tactics and strategies and taking up 'risks' with their character. If it's only the character's skills and luck that are being tested, the question arises "what are the players focussing on?" - and it's a question very much worth asking (and answering).
You've changed the scenario. We were discussing five identical monster entries in a monster supplement.
Actually, this and the remaining quotes you post were wrecan, not me. I think you got paste-happy with the quote blocks ;)
Actually, this and the remaining quotes you post were wrecan, not me. I think you got paste-happy with the quote blocks ;)
Ugh, apologies to you both. Its 1am here now
If you told me that over the next 6 months, the only thing I would see out of Dragon Magazine is Kilpatds (or some other person who I feel is generally competent) fixing all those issues on his list, I would buy a subscription. If some (competent) writer stepped in and flavored all his articles, that would be even better.
As it happens, I live within spitting distance of Matt James. And Matt James is pretty darn awesome at the flavor parts.
But ... The ones that are trivial and no-brainers to fix are sort of scattershot. You can't make a coherent article out of them.
To make an article, you have to include other things.
So, for example, a very well known poster around these parts submitted an pitch to address some of the ranger related issues (would have had a beastmaster fix, a Str/Wis ranger fix, and a couple others). And he had some pretty nice flavor, I thought (an article about a Wilderness Scout organization).
But it wasn't accepted.
Would it have been if the pitch had been "Fixes for Beastmaster Rangers, and a few other feat for other ranger types." Um ... unlikely. Very very unlikely.
Mr Winter, you would be well served to listen to him.
Now this is going somewhere constructive.
Psikus and kilpatds pointed at specific class and race problems that they'd like to see addressed. Here's their list, compiled:
- Beastmaster rangers suffering from pitiful beast damage, dooming all beast powers to unplayability.
- Seekers being way too weak, on account of a terrible power selection and a lack of features/feats to compensate
- Avengers requiring a Skill domain god in order to charge.
- Battleminds lacking a decent alternative to Melee Training for their opportunity attacks.
- Ensnaring Swordmages having terrible defender punishment, particularly at heroic tier.
- Strength clerics lacking powers (give them a way to use Wis-based powers with strength!)
- Druids lacking non-beast form options.
- Star pact Warlocks wanting three good ability scores. Let them have a Cha-based at-will, or use something other than Int for defense, or use Cha or Con for all their attacks.
- Constitution-based Shamans having lousy AC.
- Too many feats to decent armor for Con/non-int-or-dex Warlocks and Str/Wis rangers. (patch feat for scale for both)
- Bards, Ardents, Avengers, Monks, Rogues could all use basic attack options other than melee training
- Assassins (not the essential version, the original one) need spike damage badly
I'm not saying we agree that every one of these is a legitimate problem deserving an article, but there are some interesting suggestions in that list which step outside the bounds of what we typically see in the inbox. (Despite the fact that most PH1 classes and races already have tons of support, we still get endless article proposals for more.)
Let's hear more suggestions along these lines -- what class and race deficiencies would you like to see addressed in the pages of Dragon magazine?
Steve
I haven't received any response for these pitches, and I have no way of knowing whether that's because my flavor wasn't sufficiently grabbing, or someone else already has a similar article in the queue, or because the problem that I perceive isn't perceived as a problem by someone else within Wizards of the Coast.
I believe in this case getting no response means "they still haven't decided" (unless you've been waiting more than 60 days, which the guidelines say you should assume a rejection after). Most likely I would guess it's still being considered. Quite possibly they *did* get multiple submissions for it and are trying to decide which to use, possibly theres a book in the works that might cover it and they're waiting to see if it is going to publication or not. Could be any one of a number of things, most of which would violate NDAs if they told you exactly why.
From my own editorial experience, I know its tricky to give people precise reasons why you don't want their submission. Sometimes, you just want to know a writer can work out for themselves what sort of material you're interested in, it's almost a part of the "test". Some people have said that Steve's "wow factor" doesn't help them much, but unfortunately thats pretty much exactly what you need to understand - you need the ability to know what makes an article exciting, without being prompted.
What Kilpatds says above is *very* sensible. If you can write an article that introduces new ranger powers without just looking like "an article that introduces new ranger powers", my guess is that it'll be far more likely to be accepted.
It needs to be something that grabs readers and makes them read it, whether they're actually interested in using it in-game or not. When writing the pitch, aim for making the editor want to actually read this article in full as the #1 priority. Also, always bear in mind that even the best-written pitch could get rejected simply because its not material they want to publish (perhaps because they've already got it covered, maybe because the devs just dont see it as broken), however exciting your idea may be. Don't give up, and always try something else. When you see the sort of ideas that you do get accepted, you can start working out in your head what sort of approach to take next time.
Hard Truth: If writing an article to that fixes something thats broken, for crying out loud make sure you don't make it sound like it was broken in the first place. Marketing departments do not want new readers looking through their magazines to think their game is broken, was broken, or ever will be broken. Remember who is paying you for writing the article. It may sound obvious to many, but for some it isn't - using the word "fixes" anywhere near the article is likely to end up with it heading toilet-wards. Try alternatives such as "builds upon", "expands", and "fleshes out" ;)
- Beastmaster rangers suffering from pitiful beast damage, dooming all beast powers to unplayability.
- Seekers being way too weak, on account of a terrible power selection and a lack of features/feats to compensate
- Avengers requiring a Skill domain god in order to charge.
- Battleminds lacking a decent alternative to Melee Training for their opportunity attacks.
- Ensnaring Swordmages having terrible defender punishment, particularly at heroic tier.
- Strength clerics lacking powers (give them a way to use Wis-based powers with strength!)
- Druids lacking non-beast form options.
- Star pact Warlocks wanting three good ability scores. Let them have a Cha-based at-will, or use something other than Int for defense, or use Cha or Con for all their attacks.
- Constitution-based Shamans having lousy AC.
- Too many feats to decent armor for Con/non-int-or-dex Warlocks and Str/Wis rangers. (patch feat for scale for both)
- Bards, Ardents, Avengers, Monks, Rogues could all use basic attack options other than melee training
- Assassins (not the essential version, the original one) need spike damage badly
- Weaplements. It's too expensive to keep feats/items for two different attack items.
- Unarmed Monks. (rules issue, "Unarmed" monks don't actually, in the rules sense, use their unarmed attack for anything, so the feats to support it don't work.)
- Ranged Avengers: half their powers basically say "give up your striker class feature"
- Weapon Artificers: high levels, your power selection dries up. * Specifically, there is only 1 Artificer Daily that uses a melee weapon (at level 29), and the majority of the artificer powers do a variant of Magic Weapon or have effects that could be given to any class and look like a power that fits. Also, recent errata has made it so the Artificer can't use items to boost the Curative Admixture part of Healing Infusion. This can simple be fixed by a Special: Consider this power as letting the target to spend a healing surge for the purposes of extra healing from items and abilities. There's also very little choice for Weapon At-will powers.*
- Weapon Bards. The PP is great, the power selection ... less so. (Take some arti&bard weapon powers, merge into a theme?) * Themes aren't always an option though. The solution should be made inside the class, not outside. *
- Epic skill powers. Let's throw some "fly" into athletics, and "phasing" into stealth. Make them epic, and then let them be EPIC * I believe I've read that the developers didn't want to do Epic skill powers. If they do accept one, it'd have to be really really flavorful.*
I haven't received any response for these pitches, and I have no way of knowing whether that's because my flavor wasn't sufficiently grabbing, or someone else already has a similar article in the queue, or because the problem that I perceive isn't perceived as a problem by someone else within Wizards of the Coast.
I believe in this case getting no response means "they still haven't decided" (unless you've been waiting more than 60 days, which the guidelines say you should assume a rejection after). Most likely I would guess it's still being considered.
You do realize you're replying to someone who's already had at least 2 articles published, right? (I've gotten nothing published, and only one rejection note)
You do realize you're replying to someone who's already had at least 2 articles published, right? (I've gotten nothing published, and only one rejection note)
Actually no. All I know is I'm replying to someone that said they hadn't received a response to their pitches, wasn't sure why, and was trying to give them some advice why that may be the case.
Themes aren't always an option though. The solution should be made inside the class, not outside.
I understand that. However ... themes are a great fix to many of their problems.
I believe in one of the blog posts that links to this thread, Steve Winter was complaining about the number of duplicate powers they get/have to make. "I want to be a bard that hits things with a sword". "I want to be an artificer that hits things with a sword". "I want to be a Warlock that hits things with a sword". "I want to be a swordmage that hits things with a sword". "I want to be a sorcerer that hits things with a dagger"
In that example, two of the classes even have the same role (twice) .. and that's not even considering secondary roles, or the implicit secondary role everything Arcane.
Themes are a solution to this. You get powers out to a wider set of classes, with less duplication, less builder cruft. You have to come up with fewer different powers, fewer unique kickers, fewer lines of fluff for the same coverage.
Expanding themes, so that it's obvious to most DMs to allow them, would seem to solve many of their problems.
Let's consider the rare items we've seen to date, whether in Dragon or a printed book. These are supposed to be awesome right? We're supposed to get all of 3 of these in our entire career, so they should be truly outstanding, right? Yeah, about that... I think the Character Optimization forum would laugh at that (if you could actually get them to agree to use the rarity rules...).
Let's take the recent Beastmaster article, for example. Flip to page 3 where we find 10 powers. Can we find 3 good ones? I bet I can actually, but more importantly then, is can you (and/or the other editors)? Let's assume for a minute (it's a big assumption) that your choice of beast companion is purely decided by flavor and that there is enough mechanical support to make any beast companion a reasonable choice (not necessarily "I do as much damage as an optimized twinstriking melee ranger," but "I contribute meaningfully to the party's damage in my role as a striker.") Actually under those assumptions, about half of the powers are good. But then why print the other 5? According to your own philosophy, you shouldn't be printing them. And if you happen to think one of the 5 powers that is mechanically weak has really awesome flavor, are you going to print that instead of one of the 5 that are good?
Look at the Kord article... ignoring that none of these powers require me to actually worship Kord (which I can see some argument for not making that a requirement), most of them are bad. Exemplar of Valor is OK, but it's a daily and it has a requirement that could easily not come up in any given day, wasting the power slot.
So I guess you have until mid-November when my subscription lapses to convince me that you know how to select a handful of good crunch items to publish. It doesn't help you that you're also dealing with other issues in D&Di, so picking this time to try to shake things up is not necessarily very smart, but if you had a few really brilliant Dragon articles in early November, you might just win back some loyalty from those who feel dissatisfied with the way D&Di has been going lately.
To those who wonder why they've heard nothing after submitting an article proposal -- In the past, it was magazine policy to not reply in any way unless we were interested in picking up your article, or at least in seeing more details. Since taking over, I've tried to be far more proactive and send a response to every proposal. That policy goes back about a month, maybe five weeks. For just the two months before then, however, there were several hundred email proposals, and I don't have the time to work back through all of those and send notes to everyone. They all got read (by someone, not necessarily me); they didn't get answered unless we wanted to see more.
To those who wonder why an article didn't get picked up -- Sometimes I include a few notes, but limited time precludes me from doing that in most cases. (If you've gotten a rejection note from me time-stamped 10 p.m. on a Saturday, you'll understand.) There's just no way around the number of hours in a week, so that situation isn't going to change.
I'd never imply that the bulk of proposals are rejected for basic reasons, but anyone who wants to maximize their chances MUST follow these rules:
- Include your real first and last names.
- Say hello.
- Check your spelling and grammar.
- Use paragraphs.
- Use the correct D&D rules, and use them correctly.
Here's the hard, cruel, bottom-line fact: most of the email proposals we receive get rejected within 30 seconds of opening. That's how much time you have to grab our attention and make us think your idea is worth pursuing. Once you've got us thinking about it, there's a good chance that you'll get more than a "thanks, but no" response. The next level up from that is, "this is interesting but we don't need it right now; we're putting it in the 'Has Potential' folder to look at again in a few months." The top step for an over-the-transom submission is, "I want to read more about this; send more details."
Here's one pointer which is key to this discussion -- If your proposal is intended to fix a problem or address a deficiency in a particular class or race, indicate specifically what that problem or deficiency is and how your proposed solution resolves it. We see reams of letters that might, or might not, be pointing in that direction; it's impossible to tell because the proposal is too vague, and vague doesn't sell.
Finally, if something got rejected or drew no response, there's nothing wrong with re-thinking or re-framing it and then trying again.
Steve
Here's one pointer which is key to this discussion -- If your proposal is intended to fix a problem or address a deficiency in a particular class or race, indicate specifically what that problem or deficiency is and how your proposed solution resolves it. We see reams of letters that might, or might not, be pointing in that direction; it's impossible to tell because the proposal is too vague, and vague doesn't sell.
Finally, if something got rejected or drew no response, there's nothing wrong with re-thinking or re-framing it and then trying again.
Steve
Since taking over, I've tried to be far more proactive and send a response to every proposal.
I'd just like to take this opportunity to say "Thanks". I appreciated getting a response, even if that respose was "no thanks."
Here's one pointer which is key to this discussion -- If your proposal is intended to fix a problem or address a deficiency in a particular class or race, indicate specifically what that problem or deficiency is and how your proposed solution resolves it.
Mind exploring this a bit more?
Lets say I want to fix the issue of Ranged Avengers giving up their striker feature for half their powers. I think the fix is the following feat
The Long Reach of Justice
Prequisite: Avenger, Oath of Enmity power
Benefit: As long as no enemies are adjacent to you and your Oath of Enmity target is within 5 squares, you gain the benefit of your Oath of Enmity on ranged Avenger and Avenger Paragon Path attack powers.
Ok. That's a feat down.
But there's still an article. And to be honest, the rest of the article is more important than the one feat I've got in there that's an important crunch fix.
So ... I can add an article about Erathis, or a specific justice oriented sect of the same... But if all I've got is a single feat, you're going to reject my pitch. And you SHOULD reject that pitch.
But that leaves unresolved the issue of how to patch up some of these issues that could use the attention.
Should I send in the following?
Hello.
I propose a crunch heavy avenger article. It will include some support I feel Avengers still need.
I'll include a feat to allow avengers to use their ranged powers without giving up their striker class feature, a paragon path for Retribution Avengers that clearly manages to be striker focused by leveraging their censure bonus, a couple of at-will powers that count as basic attacks; one for censure of pursuit, and one for censure of retribution, and a couple of higher level encounter powers that have the phasing keyword to replace Inexorable Pursuit for avengers that wish to keep an encounter phasing ability.
The article can be up to 3000 words, depending on which proposed game elements are included.
Thanks for your attention
Douglas Kilpatrick
Cause if I should send that in, consider this a pitch submission. It's already written and sitting on my harddrive.
If you were to send that, it would be the first time we've seen an article proposal put forward in such clear, direct, and useful terms. That's exactly the type of proposal format we'd like to see.
A different way to look at that article, if there's really only one feat you want to propose for avengers, would be to consider whether other strikers could benefit from a similar treatment. A class article doesn't need to be about just a single class; it can treat an entire role, for example, with the right angle.
A further point to consider is that I would have no qualms about running an article of that type with little or no accompanying flavor. That's a case where such material would clearly be superfluous.
Of course, we don't accept submissions through the forum, so I'm afraid I must reject it on that technicality.*
Steve
* I've been warned that my sense of humor is sometimes opaque, so at the risk of killing the funny, I'll go ahead and make it clear that that statement is a joke. Except for the not accepting submissions through the forum part; that's totally true. So send that idea or a development of it to submissions@wizards.com, and I guarantee that it will get seen by the editorial board.
** One other thing about responses to proposals -- The submissions mailbox is supposed to send an autoresponse to every incoming message indicating that the message has been received. Not long ago, all of those autoreplies started bouncing, and that problem has yet to be resolved. If you sent something recently, there's a good chance you didn't get a confirmation. The problem is outgoing, not incoming; odds are we got your note and you didn't get ours.
And as a former editor, I know this guy is BUSY so I doubly appreciate the time he's spending to communicate with us. Thanks!
Okay, to catch up. Let me start at the beginning.
I have submitted at least one article per week for roughly the past 30 weeks. In the initial time of this period, I received the obvious auto-reply and nothing else. Since Steve took over, I have frequently gotten a response from him. I just wanted to take a moment to say Thank You to Steve for this. Even if the response is short and quick, I know he is working very hard to do this (I have received a 10pm, Saturday stamped response).
Now, onto the topics at hand.
1) Crunch vs. Fluff. As I have previously stated, this is a false dichotomy. The beliefe that these are mutually exclusive and must in some way be traded is like believing there is a limited amount of money in the economy, its simply not the case. Crunch and Fluff, when they work correctly, work in tandem and increase the impact and effect of each other. The Fluff behooves Crunch and the Crunch drips fluff.
Some examples, from the history of Dragon (IMHO of course):
DRG 368: Gladiators - The crunch of this article became a banner staple for a long time of many of my character and spawned great ideas. Though if we were doing this today, it would be theme based, it was great given the tech of the time.
DRG 370: Mercykillers - Perhaps its my penchant for all things Planescape, perhaps I am a sucker for a term like "mercy killing", either way this article worked. If made now, it would (and should) be split into compliemntary articles, one for Dungeon with the monster stuff and one for Dragon with the player stuff.
DRG 380: Abyssal Genasi - Holy smoke, this may be in my top five favorite articles of any D&D edition. THIS is exactly what a Dragon article should be. The crunch and the fluff were in perfect harmony and you WANTED to play these guys. It took an accepted race and stood them on their head, opening a host of new, flavorful and exciting options. These had everything fluff wise to inspire you and everything crunch wise to support that build concept (Base race, feats, PP). I can not speak high enough of this article.
DRG 381: Duelist Rogue - Again, this was a fantastic article and what Dragon should be. This created a new way to play a rogue, made you WANT to play that way because of the flavor and then gave you the tools to bring that character to life. Perfection.
There are more, but that is a nice sample. In each of these cases, the mechanical elements had great fluff baked right in. There was no seperation. When you read stand alone fluff, you wanted the rules to back up that fluff and BOOM it did! In the words of Strongbad - "I have been synnergizing all day."
2) Correct number of powers
This again is the wrong question. The answer is - there is no spoon...errr correct number of powers. As other have eluded to, the correct number is enough that there are multiple iterations (i.e. builds, concepts, etc.) of the class that are flavorful, compelling and supported. These do not have to be real "builds" in that they appear in a book, and have a title such as "Sly Rogue" it is a about a COHERENT mix of flavor and crunch from which the CHARACTER is an emergent property. The Duelist Rogue is a great example of this. The Duelist is a more coherent concept than the Sly Rogue (in fact, he is a subset of the Sly Rogue), he is more interesting, because there are a synnergistic set of flavor intense, quality powers, feats and options that allow that concept to come to life on the page and in your imagination. So an article that introduces only 4 or 5 new powers and that is it, automatically fails (unless those were the last 4 or 5 necessary to complete a concept, such as a fear invoker who has some levels he is out of luck, or a weapon bard) because it does not provide a total concept, only the potential to get an idea, and then have it fall on its face.
I can not bang this drum loud enough - complete concepts, (or the completion of concepts already half introduced, as mentioned by several people) should be the core focus of this magazine though an intense mix of solid crunch synnergizing with support fluff.
3.) Potential Fixes for existing classes. In this, I may be in the minority, but for some stuff, I would be as content to let it rot. Some things were simply a poor idea that probably shouldn't have been done in the way they were done (I'm looking at you Seeker). The reality is, some part of the creation of this game is experimentation, and some experiements fail. Sometimes, we must let that experiment go, and try a new approach (Seeker, meet Essentials Hunter Ranger). By trying to fix what may be too badly broken, we are only wasting space on something that is doomed to fail anyway. Please understand, I don't think everything on the list is in this camp (Ranged Avenger options I definetly support, Seeker and Runepriest, not so much), but that is an arbitrary line and even more IMHO than the rest of this post.
This concludes my thoughts on this thread so far. We now return you to your regularly scheduled thread.
If you were to send that, it would be the first time we've seen an article proposal put forward in such clear, direct, and useful terms. That's exactly the type of proposal format we'd like to see.
Between this and your earlier comment about joint authorship (I think that was yours), I've got a pitch or two to reframe and a PM or two to send. I really appreciate your starting (and continuing) this discussion.
In the future, blogs about the magazines probably will go into the D&D Insider group rather than my personal area.
I'd be disappointed to see that since your editorial, blog posts (and this thread) are some of the best advertising that I've seen for DDI in some time.
It makes me think 'Hrm, if WotC actually implements this type of crunch/fluff balance, I'd want to subscribe.'
If you were to send that, it would be the first time we've seen an article proposal put forward in such clear, direct, and useful terms. That's exactly the type of proposal format we'd like to see.
That's also the first time that I've seen any indication that WotC wanted crunch-centric proposals submitted for DDi. Usually I see things about 'great idea' in a way that makes me think 'great fluff' more than it makes me think 'a great fix for the avenger' or 'a duelist rogue'.
It also sounds like there is a disconnect between what I expect the average submission to be, and what is actually being submitted. It might be helpful to share examples about what is being submitted and rejected, or perhaps some examples of what is being accepted. I'm shocked nothing like kilpatds's avenger proposal has been submitted, and I'm also pleasantly surprised that it's a viable submission.
A further point to consider is that I would have no qualms about running an article of that type with little or no accompanying flavor. That's a case where such material would clearly be superfluous.
I really appreciate seeing the continued discussion from you, Steve, about what you'd like to see. At the risk of putting words in your mouth, it sounds like there is room for crunch-centric articles (albeit with caveats about fixing existing problems or adding a new aspect to a class or group of classes). I'd enjoy seeing a blog or editorial about guidelines for those types of articles.
We have yet to see a suitable proposal exploring what hybrid characters of any type can do. I'd like to run articles showcasing what can be accomplished with the existing multi- and hybrid-classing rules; there seems to be a lack of appreciation among many players of how potent and flexible some of those options are.
Having recently seen the blog post in which Steve mentions a desire to see more material that can make multi-class and hybrid options more attractive, I'm very excited. I've already got a stack of characters built at various levels using multi-class and hybrid options.
To players,
I'm interested in writing feats that could help bridge divides across hybrid classes as well as assist in recovering class features lost.
What hybrid classes and multi-classes should I approach first?
I can't promise that any of it will be accepted, but I'll write it and propose it through the appropriate submission process.
Personally, I really like the multi-class options and hybrid options for forming character concept, but find that the difficulty of combining separate classes lowers the attractiveness of the choices. With feats that have pre-requisites applicableto hybrid classes, these character building choices could be much more attractive in the future.
It is my belief that mechanics should be firmly grounded in flavour. Flavour should support the mechanics of the game, and the mechanics should support the flavour of the game. The two are interconnected, and when there's too much of a focus on one, the game loses it's meaning.
This is a Role-Playing Game. The point of it is to provide framing (rules or crunch or mechanics) so that the story, or role-play (the flavour) has meaning: Without rules, the game becomes an imaginative excelleration into a Yes vs No fight. "I cast a spell! It kills the Dragon!" "But no, the Dragon is tougher, so you didn't kill it!" "But I use more power! I kill it!" "No you don't!" "Yes I do!" The rules provide a semi-random structure to allow us to know if our imaginative ideas work. Furthermore, they reward our imaginations by providing structure to what we imagine our characters doing. This cannot work if the mechanics have little to no fluff tied to them: if the mechanics are just numbers, then they're meaningless, because they could mean this thing or that. Having really meaningful powers and class features are essential.
This is why I'm a HUGE fan of Essentials. The way each power, feat, skill, and class feature, as well as other elements of choice or gains, are detailed with flavour is extremely potent for the game.
So, coming now to the issue of Magazine content and the ratio of crunch to flavour: They ratio must be balanced almost completely. Just pages and pages of powers that don't have a reason for existing but to increase options for a class are pointless. Keep giving us Class Acts and such articles that have strong flavourful ties. But the mechanics must be strong and balanced enough to carry the weight of the game, and allow each player to play relatively fairly. Otherwise, why use mechanics at all?
Fiction and columns like Shelly's are absolved from this balance. These are things that should remain in Dragon, but because they're there, we need more articles, supporting more classes, with more mechanical value, but not meaningless mechanics.
If you were to send that, it would be the first time we've seen an article proposal put forward in such clear, direct, and useful terms. That's exactly the type of proposal format we'd like to see.
...
* I've been warned that my sense of humor is sometimes opaque, so at the risk of killing the funny, I'll go ahead and make it clear that that statement is a joke. Except for the not accepting submissions through the forum part; that's totally true. So send that idea or a development of it to submissions@wizards.com, and I guarantee that it will get seen by the editorial board.
Question: What is the status of this? Kilpatds told me that he submitted his pitch and has not received a reply. How much of a delay is there between submission and response/acceptance usually?
I don't want a magazine full of fan-fic and product advertisements.
But...but... my Drizzt/Elminster slash fiction was almost finished!
But you're right. Advertorial needs to stay out of Dragon. Anyone remember this one:
www.wizards.com/dnd/Article.aspx?x=dnd/d...
Got to go. I also think a great feature that they could do better with in Dragon is developer commentary. E.g. why certain things (especially controversial things) were done the way they were. It'd be great to have that kind of insight into the process.
If you were to send that, it would be the first time we've seen an article proposal put forward in such clear, direct, and useful terms. That's exactly the type of proposal format we'd like to see.
...
* I've been warned that my sense of humor is sometimes opaque, so at the risk of killing the funny, I'll go ahead and make it clear that that statement is a joke. Except for the not accepting submissions through the forum part; that's totally true. So send that idea or a development of it to submissions@wizards.com, and I guarantee that it will get seen by the editorial board.
Question: What is the status of this? Kilpatds told me that he submitted his pitch and has not received a reply. How much of a delay is there between submission and response/acceptance usually?
I don't know about that Kilpatds's response, but I sent a pitch for a Dark Pact hexblade on Sunday, 11/14, and had a reply on 11/22. Herid_Fel sent a joint proposal from him and myself earlier this week, though if he's gotten a reply, I haven't heard from him about it yet.
My prior responses ("thx but no thx" to 3-4 versions of "I want more melee warlock powers"
) generally came faster.
I don't know about that Kilpatds's response, but I sent a pitch for a Dark Pact hexblade on Sunday, 11/14, and had a reply on 11/22. Herid_Fel sent a joint proposal from him and myself earlier this week, though if he's gotten a reply, I haven't heard from him about it yet.
I'd let you know if I heard something. Nothing but the auto-reply thus far.
It was intended as a way of acknowledging that there was a possibility something was sitting in your box that you hadn't read at the time I wrote my previous post in this thread.