Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;537661Yeah, because expressing your disdain for a player who shows up with a MU who memorizes all their spells to replace the thief another player is currently playing is highly unusual...


Whatever.  Good thing you're here to keep everything "realz" and keep everyone in line...

You're right. It is unusual. You're also right, it is good I'm here. Grow a sense of humor and some perspective and we'll all be much happier.

Quote from: Sigmund;537662You're right. It is unusual. .

Not it's not.  If you're at a game table, and the MU decides to memorize all his spells to replicate what the player who is playing the thief does and nothing else, the other players are going to give him grief about it.  A huge part of early D&D was having everyone play their role.  A MU who can't inflict damage, identify magic, or do crowd control in a dungeon romp when the other players are expecting it is going to cause friction.  Especially when there's already a player who does the things the MU just spent all their spell slots on.

And it would also be highly unusual for a MU to charm one of the other PCs against their will, putting them at risk, and that player not having a problem with it.

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;537664Not it's not.  If you're at a game table, and the MU decides to memorize all his spells to replicate what the player who is playing the thief does and nothing else, the other players are going to give him grief about it.  A huge part of early D&D was having everyone play their role.  A MU who can't inflict damage, identify magic, or do crowd control in a dungeon romp when the other players are expecting it is going to cause friction.  Especially when there's already a player who does the things the MU just spent all their spell slots on.

And it would also be highly unusual for a MU to charm one of the other PCs against their will, putting them at risk, and that player not having a problem with it.

But that is not how games play. Chances are the MU has a limited set of spells say at 5th level the MU can cast what 3/2/1 and chances are he has in his book 5/3/1 so the stuff he memorises is goign to be hugely limited to the spells he actualy has access to .

If the choice is between Knock, Read Magic, Find Familar, Spider Climb and Burning Hands I can suggest the 3 that are best for a dungeon adventure.....

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;537664Not it's not.  If you're at a game table, and the MU decides to memorize all his spells to replicate what the player who is playing the thief does and nothing else, the other players are going to give him grief about it.  A huge part of early D&D was having everyone play their role.  A MU who can't inflict damage, identify magic, or do crowd control in a dungeon romp when the other players are expecting it is going to cause friction.  Especially when there's already a player who does the things the MU just spent all their spell slots on.

And it would also be highly unusual for a MU to charm one of the other PCs against their will, putting them at risk, and that player not having a problem with it.

Couple things. First, a PLAYER deciding to have his character try to horn-in on  the "niche" of another PLAYER'S character is not a GAME problem. It's a PLAYER problem. Also, as you pointed out, it's not a problem that can be successfully accomplished in D&D between the wizard and the thief. Also, this player problem can be much more easily and thoroughly solved by the other players, and the game designer does not need to get involved. Lastly, despite my post about the wizards charming a thief being a joke, nowhere in the post did I specify that the thief the wizard charmed was another player's character. On top of all that, if the players can't handle the occasional inter-character strife, they need to lighten up as well. The fist-fight between my halfling ranger and our human fighter in-character is still one of my favorite D&D game events/memories. It isn't joked about in OotS for no reason, it's part of what makes RPGing fun. So as I said before, lighten up.

Quote from: Benoist;537525Given than a OD&D Fighting Man is a Veteran at 1st level, a Hero and as such, acquires the fighting capability of four men at 4th level, and becomes a Superhero (not to mix up with the spandex supers) at 8th level with a fighting capability of eight men, I tend to disagree. The logic is the same in AD&D, where the 1st level Fighter in AD&D is a Veteran already, becomes a Hero at 4th, Superhero at 8th, compared to a world of 0-level combatants as the baseline of normality in the campaign. That's the problem with you people throwing around this kind of stuff: you're spewing total bullshit without relating it to any particular context, and when you do, you in fact have no fucking idea what it is you are talking about.

I asked you what you were thinking of in terms of "actual myth and legends" and you reference decades-old D&D mechanics. I wish that was a surprise.

Heroes from actual myth and legend are much stronger than 8 soldiers even at the "journeyman" stage of their character arc. So I repeat my question, what (and what characters) are you thinking of when you think of "actual myths and legends?"

Quote from: Sigmund;537669Couple things. First, a PLAYER deciding to have his character try to horn-in on  the "niche" of another PLAYER'S character is not a GAME problem. It's a PLAYER problem. .

Who said it was a game problem?  In fact, it seems like my original post was one of a player disagreement, not a game disagreement, so I'm not sure what you're disagreeing with.

Quote from: Halloween Jack;537671Heroes from actual myth and legend are much stronger than 8 soldiers even at the "journeyman" stage of their character arc. "

Not necessarily.  Davy Crockett, King Arthur, Alexander, Ghangis Khan, Leonidas, etc.  The list goes on about legendary figures that aren't superheroes.

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;537678Not necessarily. Davy Crockett, King Arthur, Alexander, Ghangis Khan, Leonidas, etc.  The list goes on about legendary figures that aren't superheroes.

With the exception of Arthur, those are real people sometimes cast into a legendary narrative. I'm talking about heroes from "myth and legends."

There's also a funny bit of circular logic going on here where a Fighter 8 is a "superhero" and is as strong as 8 soldiers, therefore "as strong as 8 soldiers" is the standard for a superheroic fighter. The original, actually relevant question is what Benoist thinks of as heroes from "actual myth and legend," since he disagrees with my assertion that D&D martial characters are weaker than heroes of myth and legend, and said that modeling D&D characters on "actual myth and legend" precludes what he terms "kewl supernatural abilities." Western mythic and legendary heroes perform often grotesquely superhuman feats. It's the standard.

That's also setting aside the fact that if D&D dragons existed, the idea of a "realistic" swordsman in plate armor killing one is preposterous.

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;537661Yeah, because expressing your disdain for a player who shows up with a MU who memorizes all their spells to replace the thief another player is currently playing is highly unusual...

Since when did having more than one thief (or cheap thief substitute in this case) become a bad thing? :confused:

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;537678Not necessarily.  Davy Crockett, King Arthur, Alexander, Ghangis Khan, Leonidas, etc.  The list goes on about legendary figures that aren't superheroes.

I would say that the fact that King Arthur caries a sword that can cut through anything and a sheath that prevents him from ever being cut or suffering a killing blow. The fact that when he dies he will be born away by the Faey to return at the time of Britian's greatest need and his life force is somewhow mythically linked to the land of which he is king possibly sets him above the average 4th level fighter.....

If you are taling about historical real people like Alexander, Davy Crocket etc then I would agree they aren't super heroes but neither are they mythic figures. Everyone knows Frank Lampard is a legend but he can't like fly or nothing.

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;537664Not it's not.  If you're at a game table, and the MU decides to memorize all his spells to replicate what the player who is playing the thief does and nothing else, the other players are going to give him grief about it.  A huge part of early D&D was having everyone play their role.  A MU who can't inflict damage, identify magic, or do crowd control in a dungeon romp when the other players are expecting it is going to cause friction.  Especially when there's already a player who does the things the MU just spent all their spell slots on.

My bad, I guess I should have read the whole thread before responding to your previous post.  LOL!

This is counter to my experience with D&D, especially AD&D.  We routinely had multiple thieves, or a monk and a thief; especially at low levels of play.  Also, usually, there weren't just 4 PCs in the group which covered the four basic class concepts only; we usually had 5-8 PCs in the group.

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;537664And it would also be highly unusual for a MU to charm one of the other PCs against their will, putting them at risk, and that player not having a problem with it.

This is a topic better suited for its own thread, which I am going to create in a moment.

Quote from: Halloween Jack;537679With the exception of Arthur, those are real people sometimes cast into a legendary narrative. I'm talking about heroes from "myth and legends.".

Yeah, and all of those are legends.  Or are we only using your own personal definition of legends?  Are we shifting the goalposts now?

Quote from: jibbajibba;537684I would say that the fact that King Arthur caries a sword that can cut through anything and a sheath that prevents him from ever being cut or suffering a killing blow. .

I'm not just talking about Arthur from the D&D description of him.  Most of the stories about Arthur were that he was just a great warrior without any godlike abilities.

Quote from: Drohem;537686My bad, I guess I should have read the whole thread before responding to your previous post.  LOL!

This is counter to my experience with D&D, especially AD&D.  We routinely had multiple thieves, or a monk and a thief; especially at low levels of play.  Also, usually, there weren't just 4 PCs in the group which covered the four basic class concepts only; we usually had 5-8 PCs in the group.

I don't have a problem with multiple thieves, because that's the role of the class.  I don't even have a problem with a MU memorizing thief like spells if there is no thief in the group.  I have a problem with a player who chooses to bring a MU into the group that may already have a thief, and ignore 80% of his spell repertoire because he insists on memorizing spells that replicate the thief's skills.

Quote from: Acta Est Fabula;537687Yeah, and all of those are legends.  Or are we only using your own personal definition of legends?  Are we shifting the goalposts now?

We're not shifting the goalposts, we're using the original goalposts of "actual myth and legend." Which includes both myth and legend. You cherry-picked mostly historical figures who are referred to as "legends."

Quote from: Benoist;537221I am mildly annoyed by the use of "myth" and "legend" to mean "kewl supernatural abilities".

Quote from: Benoist;537365Actual myth and legends.

Quote from: Halloween Jack;537400What do you think of when you think of myth and legend?

Quote from: Halloween Jack;537671Heroes from actual myth and legend

Don't accuse me of "shifting goalposts," you have no idea what you're talking about.

Quote from: Halloween Jack;537692We're not shifting the goalposts, we're using the original goalposts of "actual myth and legend." Which includes both myth and legend. You cherry-picked mostly historical figures who are referred to as "legends."




Don't accuse me of "shifting goalposts," you have no idea what you're talking about.

WFT?  Dude, you said give some examples of myths and legends.  I gave you a half dozen legends off the top of my head.  I didn't cherry pick anything.  You want more?