Quote from: jrientsI dunno.  I've met plenty of people who love D&D.  Not a one of them were without some complaint about this rule or that.

Come on man, we've got the "D&D is a video game" shite, the grognards babbling about how "CR is for wussies", the "3.5 is too complicated", it's all here.  It's really kind of snore worthy honestly.  and yet it's all being treated seriously, as if it's anything other than trumped up bullshit used to trash a game they don't like.  

It's the kind of shit I expect on RPGnet, not a site that claims to speak for "the mainstream".  

The bottom line is that the friendly adversarial relationship between DM and players requires some level of trust between players, and yes, that means the players need to feel their being given a fair shake at things.  The spirit of competition breaks down when one side is clearly superior in power to the other.  This is why save-or-die is such a cheap dick move, it's basically one die roll away from death-by-GM-fiat.  And whether it's CR, Hit Dice, monster levels, or whatever the hell, it's just a tool to give the DM a rubric by which to judge potential challenge.  That's it.

It has fucking nothing whatsoever to do with video games, or the players being wusses, or the GM being a wuss, or the game being too complicated, and it's completely asinine to suggest such things, and says a hell of a lot more about the bitter jackasses making such claims than it does about the game.  

It sounds like a bunch of ex-killer-DMs and railroaders bitching because their players stopped taking their shit.

Quote from: J ArcaneSee, threads like this are why I question whether this site is really as "mainstream" as is often claimed.

I don't claim to be mainstream.  As Popeye says, "I am what I am."  

Quote from: J ArcaneThis is like a cornucopia of stock D&D bashing, all concentrated in one place.

My main complaint with D&D 3.5 was that it was too much work to GM (because I didn't feel comfortable judge fudging).  My only other complaint was that the quality of the Feats, Classes, and Spells in the supplement books were uneven and, if I had to do it again, I might stick with the vanilla SRD stuff.  Other than that, I was pretty happy with it and enjoy being a player.

Nobody said that D&D3.5 is a video game. I said that some elements in it look like they were put there to appeal to the same sort of people who like computer games. I said that some players cry when their character dies or is faced with an encounter beyond their character's ability to overcome by sword or blast or skill, but that GMs are probably more scared of killing PCs than players are scared of their PCs being killed.

I'm not sure, J Arcane, why you think nobody should be able to criticise or characterise others' play styles. What do you want, a group hug? To say, "if people play this way, I don't know why they don't just play a computer game" is not some enormously bigoted statement like "all niggers must hang" or something.

Quote from: J ArcaneThe spirit of competition breaks down when one side is clearly superior in power to the other.

The GM is always superior in power to the players and PCs. Always. For a particular encounter, the GM should give players and their characters a tactical challenge.

Part of tactics is knowing when to run or surrender. Choosing how to fight is not the only kind of choice the players and their characters should have, but also choosing whether to fight. Old Gygax laid this down almost thirty years ago in AD&D1e, and it's a good principle. Players may not enjoy having their characters run away at that particular moment, but they very often enjoy the sense, "there are greater challenges out there, and one day we'll take them on... I'll be back, you bastard!" :cool:  

And honestly, lots of people do play that way. We've been talking about what's in the D&D rules. The way people play it may or may not look the same. I think it's often quite different, whatever rpg we're talking about.

It is true that the D&D RAW have elements which look like elements from computer games, as if they're trying to appeal to the same sort of person. How that comes out in play is a different thing.

I thought we were talking about D&D4...

QuoteThe GM is always superior in power to the players and PCs. Always. For a particular encounter, the GM should give players and their characters a tactical challenge.

Yes, the GM holds all the cards in the end.  But it is important for him to use that power gracefully.  Just because I have the power to drop rocks on everyone's head and kill thme instantly doesn't mean I should.

You're telling me that you, Mr. Cheetoist, can't understand the importance of give and take in human relationships?  A game group is fundamentally a relationship between the players and the GM, and like all relationships, there must be a balance.

You love to lecture on the importance of the social dynamic, so where's the lecture on the importance of one side or the other not throwing their weight around and acting like a jerk just because they can?

Of course the GM is supposed to provide a challenge, but so too are the players supposed to provide a challenge to the GM, but they can't do that if the GM goes out of his way to weight everything against them all the time.  

It's a two-way street.  That's what's meant by the concept of "fairness".  I don't get why that's some massively awful idea.

Quote from: John MorrowI don't think that Fox in unbiased.  I simply think that it's not nearly as biased as many people assume, especially once you go outside of Bill O'Reilly and Hannity.  I was curious whether your opinion was from personal experience or came from someone else.  You answered my question.  Thanks.

This is just a request - but could you guys  split the Fox News debate (is it? isn't it?) down to off topic?
 Please?

 Maybe this is one of those times when politics and gaming don't mix well in a conversation.

Thanks

 Sorry for the interruption folks....now back to the thread....


- Ed C.

J Arcane: being mainstream means recognizing the validity and worth of D&D, in all its editions.

It doesn't mean that you cannot criticize anything at all about the game in any of its editions! Now, certainly, some of the people here are just D&D-haters posting in bad faith, but you can also have a lot of D&D fans who still have issues with some rule or another, or some aspect of the game or another.

This kind of absolute "I cannot acknowledge any flaws in my game" mentality is the sort of things Forgies do with their games, and its unbecoming of us.

Do try to save your righteous indignation for those who AREN'T here in good faith and ARE really just out to smear D&D's good name.


RPGPundit

snarkiness deleted

Quote from: RPGPunditJ Arcane: being mainstream means recognizing the validity and worth of D&D, in all its editions.

It doesn't mean that you cannot criticize anything at all about the game in any of its editions! Now, certainly, some of the people here are just D&D-haters posting in bad faith, but you can also have a lot of D&D fans who still have issues with some rule or another, or some aspect of the game or another.

This kind of absolute "I cannot acknowledge any flaws in my game" mentality is the sort of things Forgies do with their games, and its unbecoming of us.

Do try to save your righteous indignation for those who AREN'T here in good faith and ARE really just out to smear D&D's good name.


RPGPundit

Says the Grand High Hypocrite himself.  Everytime you open your damn mouth it's in bad faith, especialyl when it comes to to 3.5.  You've openly admitted to hating the game, have attacked it in the past, and love to shill your pet set of houserules whenever humanly possible, whether it was True20 in the old days, or now, FtA.  

Nice speech, but rings pretty hollow to anyone who's actually paid attention to your posting history.

Quote from: J ArcaneYou're telling me that you, Mr. Cheetoist, can't understand the importance of give and take in human relationships?  [...]

You love to lecture on the importance of the social dynamic, so where's the lecture on the importance of one side or the other not throwing their weight around and acting like a jerk just because they can?

I don't think we need to state the obvious. I mean, for the Cheetoism wiki or some GM/player advice section in a game I might begin by saying, "don't be a jerk", but I'd go on to say, "and these are the many ways in which you can be a jerk without really realising it's jerky until whoops too late." But I'm not writing that here, it's just a forum thread. So I think we can take it as read that GMs and players shouldn't be jerks to each-other.

The point of saying that the GM always has more power than the players and PCs isn't to say, "woohoo, let's fuck the players!" It's simply to say that we talk about "each side must be equal" - it's not possible, because in fact they're not, and so you start wanting to make them equal, and if you carry on with that idea you start talking about restricting the power of the GM, players spending cookies to overrule the GM, players being able to point to the bit in the rules where it says that characters of Level X should only get encounters of Level X-1, or whatever. And that way madness lies, GMless games.

Quote from: J ArcaneOf course the GM is supposed to provide a challenge, but so too are the players supposed to provide a challenge to the GM, but they can't do that if the GM goes out of his way to weight everything against them all the time.  

It's impossible for the players to provide a tactical challenge to the GM in any game with GM freedom. The GM can always defeat the players. What the GM says happens is what happens in the game world. "Rocks fall, you die" is simply the ultimate expression of it, but it's easy to be more subtle than that, to give some foe another k3w1 pw0rz if the PCs deal with him too quickly, or whatever.

The paradox of the GM running the game is that while the GM is there to provide a challenge for the players and characters, the GM doesn't actually feel themselves the players' adversary. The GM is offering a challenge not because the GM wants to beat the players, but because they want to offer the players the chance to figure their way through the challenge. So the GM is acting as an adversary while not being adversarial.

The players can never challenge the GM tactically. But they can challenge the GM in other ways. "Ah, I never thought you guys would take that way, but... yeah, it makes sense. Okay, give me a few minutes' break to think of what should happen now."

The GM's tactical challenge to the players, again I say that part of tactics is knowing not just how to fight, but whether to fight at all. So it's okay for the GM to bust out a red dragon on those 1st level characters. But either the GM should let them see the thing and decide whether to fight it, or else have the thing appear but not attack them. They get the choice, the tactical choice of whether to fight or not.

The way I have always approached it is that a superior force will almost never ambush the PCs, they get to choose whether or not to fight them - and if it does ambush them, then it won't kill them, it wants them as prisoners or whatever. But if the PCs had a chance to talk or run away and decided to fight anyway, then let the dice fall where they may.

Quote from: J ArcaneIt's a two-way street.  That's what's meant by the concept of "fairness".  I don't get why that's some massively awful idea.

Fairness is a fine idea. But I don't see why it needs to be hard-wired into the rules. As Calithena said in his OP, shouldn't GMs have to exercise judgment? If the rules tell you exactly what challenges to offer when, what do the players need a GM for? They can have GMless gaming, just sit there rolling dice against all the monsters and traps in order of challenge. Woohoo, we're back to computer games, only with no machine to take care of the details and less purty pictures.

This isn't roleplay vs rollplay. This is GM rulings vs game rules. As a Cheetoist, I say, fuck the rules, people come first - I know what's good for my group better than four hundred pages of sloppily-written, badly-edited, saucily-illustrated book.

I master the game, the game does not master me.

Quote from: J ArcaneCome on man, we've got the "D&D is a video game" shite, the grognards babbling about how "CR is for wussies", the "3.5 is too complicated", it's all here.  It's really kind of snore worthy honestly.  and yet it's all being treated seriously, as if it's anything other than trumped up bullshit used to trash a game they don't like.

Look...I play 3.5.  I just played two Living Greyhawk mods on Saturday - 9 Hours of gaming goodness; we had a blast!

But two things happened in the game that struck me upon reading both the original post and the link to the Bodak discussion.

• My character died in the last encounter of the first game.  Jerric was 350 XP from 5th Level - new feat, 3rd level spells.  I can't say it wasn't a bit of a bummer (and it was a bit of silly bravado that got him killed - and something we used to riff off of for jokes in the second session). But the DM apologized! I know this guy from conventions.  He's DM'd me before.  He's good. Bu tI was the first character he killed! And everyone seemed more sad about it then me - so I had to, for the first few minutes after the game wrapped up, kind of let everyone know I was cool with it. It was..weird.
• One of the GM's, I can't remember which, had kind of mentioned it was agood thing we turned away from one possible path because it was an "untiered" encounter.  You should have heard the intake of breath and the seen the heads come up.  It was like, "The author put an untiered encounter in?   Holy shit..." Untiered is synonomous with unbalanced.

Then I see the OP.  But what really threw me was the Bodak link. The guy is talking about Save-or-die and people get into a rules argument about whether or not the encounter was "fair" or "balanced." WTF?

That's something I never would have considered; not to mention that fact that once I read "didn't set a watch" I wrote it off to the stupidity of the players. The players were careless - my conjecture is because they expect fair and balanced; I would never have thought to get into a question of the EL or CR of the Bodak.

It's just a different way of looking at the game from mine.  It's not wrong;  it's different...from me.

Quote from: J ArcaneThe bottom line is that the friendly adversarial relationship between DM and players requires some level of trust between players, and yes, that means the players need to feel their being given a fair shake at things.  The spirit of competition breaks down when one side is clearly superior in power to the other.

:forge:

Quote from: J ArcaneIt has fucking nothing whatsoever to do with video games, or the players being wusses, or the GM being a wuss, or the game being too complicated, and it's completely asinine to suggest such things, and says a hell of a lot more about the bitter jackasses making such claims than it does about the game.

Saying these things are possible reasons is no more assinine than you stating  objectively they are not. It's guesswork and conjecture - that's all.  If we're not allowed to do that, all Internet forums will be destroyed and the force will echo for years from the disturbance.

Quote from: J ArcaneIt sounds like a bunch of ex-killer-DMs and railroaders bitching because their players stopped taking their shit.

There's a band name - the Killer DM's. I'll simply just note that I was the one with the dead character making sure the DM knew I was OK with it; I don't know how that fits into your model.

Quote from: J ArcaneThis is why save-or-die is such a cheap dick move, it's basically one die roll away from death-by-GM-fiat.

It's a dick move if the players aren't given a way to avoid it.  That all comes down to play style, it has nothing to do with the edition in question.  Looking at "save-or-die" in isolation ignores the greater context, what led the PCs to get to that point.  

I've never set up a save-or-die situation that didn't offer the PCs a way to avoid or overcome it somehow; I try to use explicit clues, rumors, carefully placed magic items, etc. to let them know this.  At any rate, going in they'd know the potential for death existed.  If they weren't careful enough to notice the warning signs and avoid the situation, then they could find themselves at the mercy of the dice.  By the time they get to that point, hopefully the player realizes they've made a few bad choices along the way.

But again, that's how I try to approach it (I haven't always been successful).  It's my style, and it's certainly open to criticism by others, but I try to make the whole scenario as fair as possible.  The better DMs I've had do the same thing, and I've never thrown a fit because I lost a character.

EDIT: Kyle and James said it way better than I just did.

Quote from: Kyle AaronThe players can never challenge the GM tactically.

Um - yeah, they can.  In the last D&D campaign I ran that happened all the time.  We'd get into a fight, lay down the minis, and there would be lots of challenge thrown around.  

I was trying to kill their characters.  They were trying to kill the NPCs.  I don't see how that's not a tactical challenge just because I can say that a cow falls on their head and they die.

Quote from: J ArcaneSee, threads like this are why I question whether this site is really as "mainstream" as is often claimed.  

This is like a cornucopia of stock D&D bashing, all concentrated in one place.

Fuck the mainstream. Meanwhile, no one's bashing D&D in this thread, silly.

Quote from: LostSoulUm - yeah, they can.  In the last D&D campaign I ran that happened all the time.  We'd get into a fight, lay down the minis, and there would be lots of challenge thrown around.

You chose to let them challenge you. Really you didn't have to. It'd be like the USMC choosing to have a firefight when they could just call in an airstrike.

The GM can only be tactically challenged if they choose to fight with one of their GM hands behind their back, the Hand of GM Fiat.

That kind of challenge is not really a challenge for the GM. They couldbring their hand out from behind their back at any time. Nothing's at stake for the GM, while the players are risking everything. It's not a challenge when there's nothing at stake for you.