The insidious political correctness of message boards these days astounds me, to be honest.

Quote from: Fifth Element;543584It's not "can't do anything." It's "may as well be a commoner."

I guess this is another example is the gulfs between paradigms of the sundry stakeholders in D&D, but one of the things I quite enjoy about low-level D&D (and 3d6 in order) is the feeling that, aside from a couple of fantasy things, your character is pretty much just an ordinary dude like yourself trying to get by in this crazy fantasy world.

...and that's a serious fucking motivation to get the XP so that you progress past that awkward stage, and I enjoy that pressure, "we need to get some fucking treasure pronto guys!"

And if a people want to play under a more powerful paradigm such as that expressed in media such as anime, videgames or Harry Potter than they can easily just start at level "X" instead of overclocking the game system at its root.

Quote from: jadrax;543587Bunch of stuff!

Thanks. There is some good information in there.

Quote from: Sigmund;543503It's magic. It's not now nor will it ever be "real" It works any way you want it to. It can't possibly model "physics". There's an entire dimension of imagination to explain why it can target "creatures" and not inanimate objects. it can be made disassociated by refusing to explain it at all, or as associated as magic in a fantasy game is ever going to get. Now explaining how often a skilled warrior can trip opponents per day (for example)... you know, something that actually has a precedent in real life around which a game model can be constructed... that's what ends up actually being truly dissociated or not (to me anyway).

I've never understood why magic working any which way at all would be so confusing. Any mechanical descriptions of magic in an RPG are going to be for game purposes. Now I'll grant you that consistency in the mechanical approach to magic can possibly add the illusion of association to magic rules (although even that's not inherent). However, I've seen more than one magic system that is more or less "make it up as you go" that still "feels" associated in the context of the overall game (such as Ars Magica, Iron Gauntlets, or even Elements of Magic). Why all this confusion over how Magic Missile works? It unerringly hits "living" targets, or targets with "auras" or "spirits" or the capacity to move independently of another's influence or control". Or, it hits anything you want. Play it however you want to. Maybe it is useless against rocks, but works against fire because the fire is "animated"... works for me. of course the game limits it since it's a low power spell, available to even the greenest of casters. What draws it into the game world for the players is how it's explained, or not explained, and that's pure fluff. Hell, maybe nobody knows why it works the way it does. Magic is mysterious.

See I want magic to be internally consistentand the its magic don't worry about it is a pet peeve.
If the spell said will only target living creatures and then explained that it didn't work on constructs and undead then fine, but we kknow that won;t be the case it will work on anything that is vaguely defined as a creature ie a mob/enemy etc.

Again this isn;t a big deal I have already ruled that you need to roll to hit so ...done.

Quote from: Marleycat;543593Thanks. There is some good information in there.

Did you need to repost everything in that quote? It's a bit of a PITA to scroll past it twice.

Fixed!

In re wizards shooting magic bolts, there's a whole lot of space to explore between "at-will" and "Vancian" so that particular fight seems pretty dumb to me, though apparently it's inevitable at this point since none of the designers seem willing to entertain alternate mechanisms.

I kind of like the apprentice-wizard-with-a-bunch-of-kit-to-make-himself-useful-until-he-gets-powers things myself, but it's not a common thing in other fantasy.

Quote from: Imp;543603In re wizards shooting magic bolts, there's a whole lot of space to explore between "at-will" and "Vancian" so that particular fight seems pretty dumb to me, though apparently it's inevitable at this point since none of the designers seem willing to entertain alternate mechanisms.

I kind of like the apprentice-wizard-with-a-bunch-of-kit-to-make-himself-useful-until-he-gets-powers things myself, but it's not a common thing in other fantasy.

They are though. This whole thing can and will be a non-issue because of "campaign traits" basically it's a community/developer accepted set of houserules that affect the game at the baseline that you mix and match to fit your particular game until it matches your vision. The link is on page 59 it's pretty much a replica of what Fantasy Craft does.

As for your DYI mage I think a Bard better fits what you want. From there I would just start mixing and matching themes or pick the ala carte theme they will have.

Quote from: Marleycat;543606They are though. This whole thing can and will be a non-issue because of "campaign traits" basically it's a community/developer accepted set of houserules at affect the baseline of the game that you mix and match to fit your particular game.

Yes Campaign traits is a very nice little idea.
Tidy, clean and gives plenty of flexibility.
Also gives you the ability to port PCs between campaigns to a degree as the PC remains the PC its the setting rules that are tweaked.

Maybe they will give Ben one that turns off healing

Quote from: jibbajibba;543608Yes Campaign traits is a very nice little idea.
Tidy, clean and gives plenty of flexibility.
Also gives you the ability to port PCs between campaigns to a degree as the PC remains the PC its the setting rules that are tweaked.

Maybe they will give Ben one that turns off healing

That's easy just make a trait that says "No Medics Are Around" and do something 1eish mechanically. My inner tinkerer is giggling at the possibilities.

Oh and I think Mage hand might actually be more abusable than Magic Missile.

One of my Wizards once created a Spell called Aberlard's Maddening Massage.
working on the Bigby theme it causes a pair of hands to appear for every 3 levelas of the cater and these hands plague an opponent. Causing them to break spell concentration by tweaking noses and pulling ears, emptying their pockets, undoing their belts, tying shoe laces together, pouring out the contents of potion bottles etc etc .
It looked silly so the DM agreed to it but in play it was totally devastating becuase there was no Save. You could destroy each pair of hands with 10 damage and they were AC 0, being small, mostly transparent and quick.

Of course the alternate version Aberlards Erotic Massage was very popular with your typical 'loney wizard nerd' .

Anyway I can see a lot of the same tricks can be accomplished with Mage hand  so potentially devasting unless you are a lonely teenage wizard of course ......

Quote from: jibbajibba;543614Oh and I think Mage hand might actually be more abusable than Magic Missile.

One of my Wizards once created a Spell called Aberlard's Maddening Massage.
working on the Bigby theme it causes a pair of hands to appear for every 3 levelas of the cater and these hands plague an opponent. Causing them to break spell concentration by tweaking noses and pulling ears, emptying their pockets, undoing their belts, tying shoe laces together, pouring out the contents of potion bottles etc etc .
It looked silly so the DM agreed to it but in play it was totally devastating becuase there was no Save. You could destroy each pair of hands with 10 damage and they were AC 0, being small, mostly transparent and quick.

Of course the alternate version Aberlards Erotic Massage was very popular with your typical 'loney wizard nerd' .

Anyway I can see a lot of the same tricks can be accomplished with Mage hand  so potentially devasting unless you are a lonely teenage wizard of course ......

I will let you have my at-will Magic Missle but no way can you have my Mage Hand! Other than summoning things why do you think it's so fun to be a mage? Seriously, I go by the adage "inventive yes, spammy no". It's fairly easy to tell the difference imo.

Quote from: Planet Algol;543589Meh, I'm just of the opinion that Harry Potter is garbage. People say that they think things are crap all the time.

If someone say to me that they think that Dungeons & Dragons or Judas Priest or Jack Vance is a bunch of horseshit, well than I know that we're not going to be playing D&D/listening to Judas Priest/lending each other Jack Vance books, and I get on with my day.

Fair enough.

Quote from: Planet Algol;543592I guess this is another example is the gulfs between paradigms of the sundry stakeholders in D&D, but one of the things I quite enjoy about low-level D&D (and 3d6 in order) is the feeling that, aside from a couple of fantasy things, your character is pretty much just an ordinary dude like yourself trying to get by in this crazy fantasy world.

...and that's a serious fucking motivation to get the XP so that you progress past that awkward stage, and I enjoy that pressure, "we need to get some fucking treasure pronto guys!"

And if a people want to play under a more powerful paradigm such as that expressed in media such as anime, videgames or Harry Potter than they can easily just start at level "X" instead of overclocking the game system at its root.

The difference between you and I it seems is that I do not find this and the ability to do minor magical tricks incompatible ideas.

Quote from: jibbajibba;543597See I want magic to be internally consistentand the its magic don't worry about it is a pet peeve.
If the spell said will only target living creatures and then explained that it didn't work on constructs and undead then fine, but we kknow that won;t be the case it will work on anything that is vaguely defined as a creature ie a mob/enemy etc.

Again this isn;t a big deal I have already ruled that you need to roll to hit so ...done.

How can magic be "internally consistent"? It has no existence outside your head. What you find "internally consistent" is not by default what I find "internally consistent" without some real world baseline to compare to. In the end we are in fact talking about games here. While I want some effort made to provide some sort of system for magic in my fantasy RPGs, I still realize it's all make-believe. Magic does what I say it does in my games. It does it how I say it does it. Same goes for your games. Given that, why is it so hard to pretend that magic missiles can only damage certain things? We seem to have no trouble pretending dragons could fly or that ghosts could see, why is magic missile such a stumbling block all of a sudden?