Quote from: J ArcaneI don't actually like prestige classes that much, and I find the vast majority of them wind up penalizing you more than they help by depriving you of core class levels.  

I seldom, if ever, use them, and prefer to stick with base classes.

Same here.  I heard a good explanation for them, which was that they're super-specializations.  You end up sucking a whole lot at almost everything, but you're really really good at one particular sub-niche.  You're an awesome scholar, or you can control shadows, or whatever.

It didn't make me want to play them more, but at least it explained to me why I think they generally suck so bad.

Quote from: RedFoxIn what way?

• Prestige classes are optional.  I know, I know...  this goes against the common wisdom, but it's true.
• There are prestige classes in the DMG, as well as some advice on making your own.

1. It's true but unreal, i.e. contradicted by actual playing practice. Try finding players for a non-PrCl game. Not impossible, but hard. This fact (network externalities) also puts paid to Thanatos' point.

2. If I'm supposed to do work myself in order to complete the game, the game is not complete as is.

I would probably still like 3.x if they had published one volume each exclusively on feats and Prestige Classes, and I mean three columns of 7-point text or so. That would have been a complete game. Instead they resurrected the 2E kits book paradigm and used feats and PrCls as OGL start-up seeds, thus turning 3.x into 2E OGL.

J A, I actually agree--I remember checking out every single PrCl that was Ranger-themed, and they were all dull as dishwater. But that's just it... some PrCls are better than others, how do you find the good ones? By buying more books.

You're selectively ignoring two important and basic facts:

• You don't need prestige classes to play or complete the game.  They're optional.
• The core books not only include prestige classes, they also include guidelines to build more.

You don't need anything more to play and run a complete game.

Fox, I'm not ignoring your two points. I addressed them head-on.

what d&d has isn't rules bloat, it's option bloat.  the problem is running a game with core or core + a few and having a player who gets most of the books and want to use them, thinking if it's published then it's okay.  then you as ref have to put your foot down and deny them the options.

not a "required" bloat, but over-sizing nonetheless.  but i'm a fan of setting sourcebooks over rules-splats, so YMMV etc.

Quote from: Pierce Inverarity1. It's true but unreal, i.e. contradicted by actual playing practice. Try finding players for a non-PrCl game. Not impossible, but hard. This fact (network externalities) also puts paid to Thanatos' point.

I feel I can address these issues.
I don't know how much PrC's are needed. I know I didn't have much cause to use many of them in the games I ran, and I didn't weigh it one way or the other. (As in, they were allowed if they found a trainer and it made sense.) Their optionality is a facet. Just because it's a popular option doesn't mean you need them to play.

Quote2. If I'm supposed to do work myself in order to complete the game, the game is not complete as is.

Just because you can make prestige classes doesn't mean the game is complete without them. If you can make more, that doesn't mean the game is not complete.

QuoteI would probably still like 3.x if they had published one volume each exclusively on feats and Prestige Classes, and I mean three columns of 7-point text or so. That would have been a complete game. Instead they resurrected the 2E kits book paradigm and used feats and PrCls as OGL start-up seeds, thus turning 3.x into 2E OGL.

And I already addressed this point. In fact, my whole OP was addressed pretty much directly at you.

Quote from: Thanatos02You'll have to explain your concept of canon further. I think I get it, but I'm a little unclear.

"Canon" was too formal a word.  "House rules" or "groundrules" would be more accurate -- the rules that everyone sitting down to the table understand and expect to be in play when the game begins, or that are introduced as game proceeds.  In other words, starting from the core rules as a foundation, and adding (or not) supplemental rules upon mutual agreement.  In still other words, the way just about every game is played anyway.

QuoteI don't think anyone's every actually said that not using optional material makes you a 'bad' player, or that you're playing the game incorrectly.

Well, yes, in fact someone once (or twice) did so.

QuoteAnd in addition, you do yourself no favors by starting the name calling again. I hope you'll agree that's kind of juvinile.

Only if he doesn't take the bait and leave me high and dry.  Besides, I meant to write "cupcake" and not "dingleshit".

Long and short, though, "bloat", whether it be feats, or PrCs, or charms, or spell lists, is only a problem if you pay any attention to that sort of thing.  It's a problem only in so much as you or one of your fellow players believes that every published resource is available for play by simple virtue of seeing print.

I've run into that with other games before (oWoD clan and tribe books most notably, but also with Exalted), and it tends to disrupt campaigns in that the supplemental rules tend to elevate the power level of the PCs in spite of the GM's (and often other players') plans and wishes.  Set your groundrules firmly in advance, though, and this is not a problem.

!i!

Quote from: Thanatos02I don't understand the compulsion to buy new material and then complain about it. I don't understand the compulsion to stop running a game because there are more books published then Core.

I think the issue is the same as many others - different wishes within the game group. If the GM wants to run the game with Book A and Book B, but the players come up with Books C and D and wave them at the GM oudly demanding to use them, or worse, sitting around sulking about it, then that's a problem. Likewise, if the players just want to play with this or that book, but the GM is a real collector and has a heap of them, and is always suggesting new classes or settings or whatever, and telling the players they should buy this book, that's a problem. Or if the whole group is into heaps of books except one player, that player will feel left behind, and won't have all these optimal traits for their character.

So the real issue is different wishes within the game group.

Add in to this a bit of the old, "guy who's never used Book X in play complains about how it reads," the theory vs practice.

Quote from: Thanatos02And I already addressed this point. In fact, my whole OP was addressed pretty much directly at you.

Jesus Christ, young man. Your whole post is mental bubblegum.

Ian: The problem comes in when someone purchases an optional book, and the GM says "not in my game."  That purchase then becomes rather worthless.

I'm still itching to play character options that almost no GM will allow, but that I think are really cool.

Of course, the reverse is also true but far less likely.  The GM institutes options that impact play rather broadly yet the player(s) do(es) not like.

I see no solution to this, as it's a simple matter of different interests.  The most you can hope for is some sort of compromise.

Quote from: RedFoxIan: The problem comes in when someone purchases an optional book, and the GM says "not in my game."  That purchase then becomes rather worthless.

Precisely, and, as you suggest, it's conceivable that a GM may introduce options that the players don't want.  The conflict lies in differing expectations based on the perceived importance of official, but optional, publications.

Wait.  I think I just paraphrased what you wrote.  So, yeah, laying down the common frame of reference at the outset is important.

!i!

Quote from: Pierce InverarityJesus Christ, young man. Your whole post is mental bubblegum.

Funny thing is, I'm sensitive to the issues you raise. While they're fairly true, I don't think they constitute rules-bloat.

D&D is a funny beast because of its modular nature. For better or for worse, I feel it's becoming kind of like GURPS in that the material released for it is difficult to work in whole-cloth. Generally, there's too much of it, and it's fairly obvious that they're modular systems or units that are designed to be integrated at will. Like Feats, for example. Feats are like macros, infinite in nature but designed to be swapped in and out like different colored Legos. You can remove almost every Feat that's ever been published from your house game (leaving, perhaps, just Core or what-have-you) and you haven't really altered the nature of the game.

The closest I think D&D's come is the Book of 9 Swords combat subsystem, I think. Of course, I've been thinking about it some more and started to wonder what other people constitute as rules-bloat.

EDIT: By the way, what exactly did you mean by that quote. I can't quite put my finger on it, but it seems like a great metaphor.

Well I posted my definition above.

The Book of 9 Swords is a good choice, btw.  So would be the new "swift" and "immediate" action types that have wormed their way into D&D books latley.  Those actually constitute real "rules bloat."  Thankfully, they're actually useful and not all that intrusive (feather fall works a lot better as an immediate action, for example).

So, I guess I was wrong. There does seem to be some identifiable rules bloat in D&D. You don't need any of the new stuff to play the Core game, but I have to admit now that some of these new subsytems could be construed as an issue.

I think Swift and Immediate actions kind of already existed, but without keywords. See: Feather Fall. But by attributing key words to them, it does kind of create a 'new rule' that works outside the previously closed rules system.

Green Ronin, I've heard, may have done the same thing. So, hm. Does anyone want to weigh in on those particular issues?

I don't think that they're strictly necessary.  Your game won't suffer if you fail to include anything beyond core, even immediate or swift actions, and especially the Bo9S stuff.

And most especially the polymorph errata.  :mad:

However, they do constitute bloat, and indicate that the game is definitely creeping toward a new printing if not a new edition.