I don't always establish a privileged class. But when I establish it, I expect the players to use sabres and wear komtuszes.

QuoteA big bit of D&D wonkery that I don’t like is all the hullabaloo about clerics and their role. I’m referring to the role of healing and the weird social pressures that are unintentionally created.

Good God Monte, never play Game of Thrones board game.

In the Army, they say always be nice to the medic.

I never, EVER got that "hard to persuade people to be a cleric."

They don't get spell penalties for a low WIS, they fight almost as good as fighters, they can wear plate armor, they get healing spells, AND they can turn away undead.

PLUS they have the fastest advancement to Name Level, and get huge bonuses when they build their stronghold.

I'm playing Brother Odo in Ernie's game and I'm having a blast with him. And yeah, to me it actually is part of the pleasure to have to make tactical choices between going into melee or hanging back, who to heal and when, what to memorize in order to provide the most support for the day, etc. So when you nuke CLW in order to put in "healing bursts per day" because "choosing between who to heal and when is hard", I'm like "WTF! That's the point! That's what's fun about it for someone like me!"

Having to play a cleric is Problematic.  I'm literally shaking.

And people wonder why I started a thread about how much I hate gamers.

BTW, looks like Dogbert's webcomic currently has links or ads that go to flagged bad websites.  It didn't a few days ago, so watch the link.

Told ya.

Quote from: Benoist;730161I'm playing Brother Odo in Ernie's game and I'm having a blast with him. And yeah, to me it actually is part of the pleasure to have to make tactical choices between going into melee or hanging back, who to heal and when, what to memorize in order to provide the most support for the day, etc. So when you nuke CLW in order to put in "healing bursts per day" because "choosing between who to heal and when is hard", I'm like "WTF! That's the point! That's what's fun about it for someone like me!"

The only hard decision should be like in DnD 4e: Whether we play out this encounter, or scratch off 20 hp and continue.

Quote from: Benoist;730110What is it with everything being pseudo-political bullshit these days? That's like Monte Cook playing OD&D with Tweet, Heinsoo, Reynolds, Cordell and crew and starting the game by modifying the baseline of HP per hit dice because "drawbacks in races are bad," everybody gets a trophy, switching to ascending armor class and nuking Cure Light Wounds because "choices are hard" to switch to healing bursts instead, or my personal favorite, "fighting men are needlessly genderized and 'quaint' in OD&D but that's problematic".

What the fuck is up with people these days?

Oh, that.

Paraphrasing the great Joesky, when I read a blog entry and it makes a blah blah blah sound in my head, I tend to skip these parts and look for actual gaming content. That's why I skipped over the "fighting man OMG sexist" bit.

Other than that, well, I am super OK with everyone modding older versions of D&D because it's a testament to the system. That said, at my game table, "healing burst" would be a dumb houserule that glosses over a big resources management question, and I enjoy players confronting resources management issues (I think they do too; they keep coming back). But what to expect of the man who came up with 3.0e's "spontaneous healing" (trade in a memorized spell for 1d8/spell level healing)?

Monte is not and hasn't been an old school guy for a long time now. His idea of a fun D&D session won't always jive with mine, despite my enjoyment of quite a bit of his gaming material. It's nice that he wants to give OD&D a spin, even if it's a pity that he (unlike myself) wasn't willing to give the RAW a fair shake; it feels like the act of plopping down a copy of OD&D at the rules table was mostly symbolic, and the game he wanted to run on that occasion might be better served by the version of D&D he co-designer with one of his players at that session.

Part of the draw of OD&D for us is that we, as a group, explicitly wanted to try "hard mode D&D". Much like an old school enthusiast playing C&C and hand-inserting rules and subsystems from AD&D 1e, until he or she realizes "why am I not playing AD&D 1e?", I feel Monte would probably eventually switch over to his preferred version of D&D (we all know which one that is), if this wasn't a one-off thing.

Quote from: Old Geezer;730160I never, EVER got that "hard to persuade people to be a cleric."

They don't get spell penalties for a low WIS, they fight almost as good as fighters, they can wear plate armor, they get healing spells, AND they can turn away undead.

PLUS they have the fastest advancement to Name Level, and get huge bonuses when they build their stronghold.

Me neither. Clerics are badass in just about every edition of D&D.

But in any case, I always keep a pregenerated cleric NPC at hand, for PCs to hire as a henchman.

Quote from: Dogbert;729986Rewarding some people while leaving others hanging gives you the same result as punishing everyone but his favorites. You establish a privileged class.

You say that like it's a bad -- or at least, a suspect -- thing.

Don't we want players who'll buy into the styles we prefer, and prefer to discourage the players who won't buy into those styles?  (Okay, granted, this is something better done with a comprehensive "This is what my campaign is about, can you handle this?" speech at character creation, but.)

Quote from: The Butcher;730200Me neither. Clerics are badass in just about every edition of D&D.

But in any case, I always keep a pregenerated cleric NPC at hand, for PCs to hire as a henchman.

Exactly.  Plus Flame Strike.

I <3 Clerics.

Quote from: Dogbert;729986Show me a GM who says he has never had six players of different styles each and rewarded better the one(s) with style(s) more appealing to him and I'll show you a liar. Once all is said and done, all GMs are meritocrats.

Rewarding some people while leaving others hanging gives you the same result as punishing everyone but his favorites. You establish a privileged class.



It's okay, you're still young, you'll have your chance as you get around more tables.

Agreed, but I do think some gm's genuinely do not realize their bias.

Quote from: Dogbert;729986Show me a GM who says he has never had six players of different styles each and rewarded better the one(s) with style(s) more appealing to him and I'll show you a liar. Once all is said and done, all GMs are meritocrats.

Rewarding some people while leaving others hanging gives you the same result as punishing everyone but his favorites. You establish a privileged class.



It's okay, you're still young, you'll have your chance as you get around more tables.

This is an extreme over simplification. In between the poles of perfect objectivity and unfair GM who rewards based on the players and style he likes most, you will find the majority of GMs who work toward fairness but understand they are human and make mistakes. It is like being a referee in any activity, it requires human judgement, and that is subjective. But good refs make fair calls most of the time.

If you expect perfect objectivity every time, you will be dissapointed.