Quote from: Sacrificial Lamb;690015I haven't read those threads, so I can't comment on that. However, I'm talking about people on other forums doing min-maxing discussions using the rules of 3.5, Pathfinder, or 4.x....and people here are whining about that.

I say...let people min-max the shit out of these games, because it lets us find any glaring holes in the rules.

When I first started playing 3e, I didn't know that Toughness was such a shitty feat. I didn't know how horribly weak a 3.x Fighter was compared to a competent 3.x Cleric, Druid, or Wizard. It's good to know these things.

Some people will bleat that these theoretical min-max exercises are missing the entire point of the game. I disagree. The truth is....these types of mathematical exercises can help make it easier for a game setting to make sense, and prevent some classes from being rendered useless. So while I'm not particularly excited by the min-max discussions myself, I do believe they have their place in D&D.

A D&D thread anywhere becomes a shitstorm the instant invisible edition warrior lines get crossed. Bitter tears of nerdrage are shed, weighty tomes clasped to breasts, all sorts of nonsense better suited to a child's tantrum is not ignored but held as the standard.

Big difference between that and this place being against mechanical or theoretical discussion. It really isn't.

Quote from: Sacrificial Lamb;690003This is a reactionary forum. It was initially created as a reaction against rpgnet.

That is not what 'Reactionary' means.

Quote from: Mistwell;689952While we are a hive of scum and villainy, I'd say you happened to walk in on the day when an unexpected shoot-out occurred that was bad enough to make the band stop playing and duck.

Or a punk rock band continuing to play, with the lead vocalist adding more fuel to the fire by egging on the crowd.  :rolleyes:

Quote from: jadrax;690017That is not what 'Reactionary' means.

Then please enlighten me. I'm not being sarcastic here, but would like to know what detail I'm missing.

Quote from: Sacrificial Lamb;690043Then please enlighten me. I'm not being sarcastic here, but would like to know what detail I'm missing.

The point.

Quote from: Sacrificial Lamb;690043Then please enlighten me. I'm not being sarcastic here, but would like to know what detail I'm missing.

The Wikipedia  page should give you a basic grounding.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reactionary

Quote from: Sacrificial Lamb;689996But I'm asking you, not them.

Again, asked and answered.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;689816I think stupid dice tricks become an end in themselves, 'a solution in search of a problem.' That said, there is an undeniable market of gamers who love stupid dice tricks.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;689853I commented on an attitude toward game design that I think leads to crap games. Stab City may or may not be one of those games, but whether it is or not is, to me, irrelevant to the larger point, that, in my experience, so-called game designers who are more interested in "cute math tricks" tend to produce boring games.

Quote from: Black Vulmea;689955What it's about is games like MHR, which comes across to me as playing a hand of Yahtzee then telling a story about Spiderman.

As I noted in the linked post upthread, I understand the impulse, but I try to resist that impulse.

Pay attention.

In the interest of being more constructive Black Vumea is totally right. Making you dice system more complicated is bad design. If you can't understand why that is you have no business designing games, end of story -_-

Stupid dice tricks is one of the things that tick me off.

I can see the point of trying to pack more information into a dice roll; I've tried that, myself. And I understand the origins of the practice: back when the first competitors to D&D came out, some designers thought that, to avoid infringing on D&D or other games, they had to be as different as possible, and they usually focused their efforts on doing the dice differently. It just became a bad habit. Now, every time someone comes up with a new game idea, the first thing they think about is "what kind of dice mechanic can I come up with?"

But honestly, almost all the good dice mechanics were invented before RPGs even existed. There's really no point in coming up with a new mechanic; dice mechanics are the least important part of the game. The important part is the rules structure around the dice mechanic (and also around the scoring mechanic and the character generation rules, which are also trivial.)

Not "what do I roll?" or "what can I do with my dice after I roll?" but "when do I roll?" and "what are the effects of my action?"

Quote from: gamerGoyf;690074In the interest of being more constructive Black Vumea is totally right. Making you dice system more complicated is bad design. If you can't understand why that is you have no business designing games, end of story -_-

No, not end of story.  Once again, it comes down to the scope of your game you're designing.

Quote from: gamerGoyf;690074In the interest of being more constructive Black Vumea is totally right. Making you dice system more complicated[Than it needs to be] is bad design. If you can't understand why that is you have no business designing games, end of story -_-

Bolded part added for emphasis.

An unusual die mechanic usually means a shitty game when the mechanic is developed first and the rest of the game packed around that mechanic to support it.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;690079Bolded part added for emphasis.

An unusual die mechanic usually means a shitty game when the mechanic is developed first and the rest of the game packed around that mechanic to support it.

In principle, I think that design processes can and should go back and forth - with the setting sometimes informing the mechanics, and sometimes the mechanics informing the setting.  In the end, they both should support each other.  

That said, I definitely agree there are gimmicky mechanics.  This is how I feel about the One Roll Engine, for example.  

Quote from: Cheneybeast;689932Oh wow, so I can be a shill, but on the DL? That's convenient.

Oh look I'm just posting casually don't bother looking down here or nuthin'
VVVVVV

OK, so I briefly checked it out - but it seems to me like there is a disconnect between the mechanics and the fiction.  What is the grid of zones with no diagonal connections supposed to represent, even in the abstract sense?  Is there anything you're trying to convey?

Quote from: Ravenswing;689987...As a staunch GURPS fan and D&D-hater...

I am a big GURPS 4e fan. :-) I also don't like D&D in it's classic or even new presentations. I've tried everything but D&D as designed is not fun for me. We're currently playing Novus for a lighter, D&D-esque game that's NOT D&D and it ticks all the right D&D buttons for me without being annoying.

[On Topic] I agree with the general assessment; stupid dice tricks generally detract from the games I like to play/run. I've heard some good things about Star Wars but my close friends who tried it out at Gen Con found it overly complicated. Personally I like things more "traditional" with things like levels-of-success, critical hits/fumbles and the like.

I think SDTs (don't switch letters around!!) and many of the story-game mechanics introduced these days are trying to address the front-loaded work of traditional GMing AND the in-play work of traditional GMing. So we don't need lots of mechanics so prep is fast. We don't need to prepare "reactions" or "random" adventures because the dice roll results give us more information to drive creativity without having to predetermine possibilities. For some gamers, these kinds of mechanics are welcome and exciting. They enjoy leaning on the improv side of GMing and see what falls out of the game engine.

I believe calling more complex dice mechanics SDTs is somewhat insulting to people who like these sorts of mechanics. I appreciate the appeal of bullying the other kids on the playground, but calling something "stupid" is fighting words. It's meant to invoke a fighting response from someone. This has not changed since the days we all grew up on the playground.

The challenge with theRPGsite is not any adherence to "onetruewaysim" or the Tyranny of Fun or grognardism extremis but a lack of genuine desire to on the part of some to engage in a meaningful conversation. Which is what forums are for. There are posters here who attempt to spark conversation. There is no reason that Black Vulmea couldn't have started this thread with a stance that sparked CONVERSATION versus defensive snarky controversy. However, if you look at what turns us on via post count, it's the gladiatorial snark-fests that garner the most attention.

I wish people would start threads with a more subjective tone. Reach "across the aisle" and ask what others think. Maybe word things in a way that is not directly offensive but instead speaks to how YOU see something and ask for other views. That's a conversation. However, you WILL probably get fewer responses and post count in your thread. Watching mortal combat in any form has always held us in thrall since the begging of time, and as it turns out, the InterTubes are no different.

Just my two cents...

Quote from: trechriron;690083I believe calling more complex dice mechanics SDTs is somewhat insulting to people who like these sorts of mechanics.

As the original coiner of the phrase 'stupid dice tricks,' I'm in a unique position to tell you the precise origin of the usage.

I took the name from a David Letterman skit called Stupid Pet Tricks, and swapped out the word 'pet' for the word 'dice.'

I then applied it to my own attempts at novelty dice mechanics, using a LEGO die frame.

Quote from: trechriron;690083I appreciate the appeal of bullying the other kids on the playground, but calling something "stupid" is fighting words. It's meant to invoke a fighting response from someone. This has not changed since the days we all grew up on the playground.

Well, I was going to suggest if you want to be safe from trigger words like stupid, perhaps you'd be better off over at Big Purple instead.

Except this very morning I was told something I wrote was "objectively stupid" over there, so I don't think it's quite the safe space you're looking for, either.

By the way, my response to the poster who called me "stupid?" Nothing, because I'm an adult, not a child in a schoolyard, and silly taunts don't phase me.

Quote from: trechriron;690083The challenge with theRPGsite is not any adherence to "onetruewaysim" or the Tyranny of Fun or grognardism extremis but a lack of genuine desire to on the part of some to engage in a meaningful conversation. Which is what forums are for. There are posters here who attempt to spark conversation. There is no reason that Black Vulmea couldn't have started this thread with a stance that sparked CONVERSATION versus defensive snarky controversy. However, if you look at what turns us on via post count, it's the gladiatorial snark-fests that garner the most attention.

I wish people would start threads with a more subjective tone. Reach "across the aisle" and ask what others think. Maybe word things in a way that is not directly offensive but instead speaks to how YOU see something and ask for other views. That's a conversation. However, you WILL probably get fewer responses and post count in your thread. Watching mortal combat in any form has always held us in thrall since the begging of time, and as it turns out, the InterTubes are no different.

:enworld:

Some of us have been having a conversation about gaming. Others expressing their outrage at the form that conversation takes. Guess which ones are actually contributing to the thread?

Quote from: Sacrificial Lamb;690003This is a reactionary forum. It was initially created as a reaction against rpgnet. Now....therpgsite may have partially evolved beyond that, but we cannot escape that simple truth.....especially since we still bitch about rpgnet every chance we can get.

Furthermore, this place has become increasingly reactive against the very idea of game design. Or to be more precise, people here have been freaking out when other people do a breakdown on how various game mechanics actually fucking work. That's insane.

Seriously...think about it. Many of you have been having a shitfit over other people doing mathematical exercises using rules for D&D. But you can't have a functional D&D game without math, just like you can't have a functional car without an engine.

And with all the bitching lately about both 3e and 4e, it seems like this place is damning itself with a staggering lack of understanding about how or why so many other people play roleplaying games. It's becoming like fucking Dragonsfoot Part 2. I see much more "onetruewayism" here now than I did a couple years ago, and I don't like it one bit.

Yep. I pointed out a while ago that this site has become little more than a bitchy Dragonsfoot.