Originally posted by isurus I just cancelled my subscription. I played for a little over a month. Went slow, rerolled my character a few times, and eventually made it up to lv9 (cleric). As i was playing, i was thinking it's a pretty decent game. Hard to classify it as an MMO as it's not so much a persistent world but just a persistent non-combat zone. All the action is instanced (sigh) and linear (sigh again). But really, running the quests in a party is fun. The D&D character depth is awesome. The LFG/LFM interface and voice communication are excellent. There are a few glitches but it's bearable. And then Mod3 came out. Mod3 had been on the test server for how long? There were a ton of glitches that were reported by the players and that the devs were well aware of. Instead of taking the time to fix the bugs, they release it prematurely. And as of now, the current state of DDO is a glitch-ridden catastrophy. Just take a look at the known issues page on ddo.com. Inexplicable. And these are just the ones they're admiting to. It was hard to justify $15 a month when i first started, but now there's no doubt in my mind. Where the hell is all the money going? It's obviously not going to the dev team because they can't release a solid product. It's obviously not going to maintenance fees because DDO is a Guild Wars clone. The money is going into the fat wallets of Turbine management, who are completely inept and incapable of making sound decisions. Unless, of course, alienating everyone who isn't a hardcore fan of the franchise is considered a sound decision. Turbine is completely undeserving of pushing the D&D name. NWN2 ships on October 31st. The first NWN was a huge success and pretty much offers everything DDO does and more without a monthly fee. Except, it will be a quality product because Bioware has a clue. So NWN2 is going to steal the hardcore D&D fans, and Turbine is hard at work alienating everyone else. DDO is on its death bed.
I hope you know that Atari owns both DDO AND NWN2. So irregardless of your feelings if you purchase NWN2 your dollars are going to the very same company that owns DDO:)
DDO is most assuredly NOT a Guild Wars clone. Far from it in fact. Mod 3 is turning out quite fine as they tweek it. All MMO's suffer from content releasing in what some would call beta form. Turbine is doing a grand job.
Originally posted by Dyshade1 My gosh the negativity is overflowing. I have been playing MMO's for 6+ years and DDO is not ALL that bad.
But oh my Lord, it's not good either.
Repetition. Lack of dynamic storytelling. Lack of innovation. Broken skills. Technical issues. Lack of open terrain. Lack of climbing (real climbing, like up a tower wall), thieving skills (pickpocket, assassination, etc), PvP, solo play, spellcrafting, weapon crafting, armor crafting... lack of any other real locations besides the city.
I mean, it's not that it's horrible or anything. It's just not a good MMO and for those who have enjoyed PnP D&D, it's not even a good approximation. Heck, it's not even adequate.
The very least thing they could have done to improve it would have been to implement random spawning of traps and mobs in every new iteration of an instance so the player couldn't rote memorize trap and mob locations. It would have made repeating instances somewhat more interesting.
And to top all of that off, they charge a monthly fee. In my book, that is enough to create some extremely negative feedback. Especially when you consider that many of these things were brought up again and again during beta.
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Originally posted by Novaseeker Eh ... I'm not so sure that D&D is so appropriate for an MMO, to be honest. It's very, very rules intensive, turn-based and stat-heavy, whereas I think in MMOs many people prefer more streamlined, slightly less rules and stat intensive and more action-oriented design. The turn-based system really doesn't work in an MMO.
As much as I believe you're making a valid and strong argument here, I must propose in question format: Have you ever been a Dungeon Master, or do you DM to this day at a very high level of play? The reason I ask is not to poke fun at you or anyone for that matter, it's because - I have; for many years I have DM'ed AD&D PnP games (not so much PnP recently because of NWN1 but stil DM'ing).
It's become apparent to me that not many PnP players of AD&D have had the pleasure of participating in the alternate rule-set that is actualy die-less. Although it's more promanent among real life action role players.
This rule-set is fantastic for speeding up the game because it's based in a qualitative style of play - circumstance/decision/outcome cycle - where you perform an action given an initial encounter circumstance, then deal with the new circumstance based on the severity of the action you took from your choice of decisions. All the standard encounter rules apply, like initiative, actions you can perform, feats, saving throws, etc.
However, in this format you do not have to throw the die/dice. Everything is weighed qualitavily rather than the standard roll-of-the-die quantitative way. Meaning that there is no way to escape harm completely. You will at least be very tired, or become a little more irrational for the next few minutes when decision making - all depeding on the severity of the circumstance you were faced with.
Odds are more fluently calculated as undertones rather than being the holistic or deterministic nature of AD&D roll-of-the-die encounters. Because lowering the number of initial calculations that are required at each encounter, based on your avatar's stats, more time can be spent in a pervasive calculation of what happens next; much like in real life when face with intense circumstance which cause the "fight or flight" symptoms.
That couldnt be translated into a MMORPG though, could it Carrara? Removing the random function (the dice) from D&D just makes the game more complex (so harder for the programmers to code) and puts more stress on the creativity of a Dungeon Master.
I think the real problem with having a D&D video game is the lack of a DM. D&D Online attempts to create a sort of virtual DM, which is fairly effective, but it is obviously very time consuming to create dungeons this way, or they would have made more dungeons. There isnt that DM to constantly make new content for players to play, and that is the main problem with D&D Online, is it not? There isnt enough dungeons, and people are getting bored of doing the same instance runs over and over?
I do agree that NWN2 is competition for D&D, but I dont think it will 'destroy' D&D (although D&D is already pretty crippled as it is), and I certainly do not think NWN2 is better simply because it does not have a monthly fee, as the original poster falsely implied. NWN seems fun to me because it is made by real players, players who I can chat with, make suggestions to, and maybe even help create the world.
Does anyone know how many players will be able to be on a NWN2 server at a time?
A good fair-sized deticated NWN server with administrators who like to update the game world often is just as good as a MMORPG to me. In fact, I think it could be better, especially if you see the same people on every night, and you have a fun time grouping with them and fighting through the original dungeons and completing all the brand new player-created quests. It is much more intimate than a MMORPG.
Originally posted by wormywyrm Does anyone know how many players will be able to be on a NWN2 server at a time?
In the last interview I recall the person from Obsidian stated, that through the tools provided, a module can be expanded to host the same number of online players as NWN1. So that would mean 64 players as well.
Originally posted by wormywyrm That couldnt be translated into a MMORPG though, could it Carrara? Removing the random function (the dice) from D&D just makes the game more complex (so harder for the programmers to code) and puts more stress on the creativity of a Dungeon Master. I think the real problem with having a D&D video game is the lack of a DM. D&D Online attempts to create a sort of virtual DM, which is fairly effective, but it is obviously very time consuming to create dungeons this way, or they would have made more dungeons. There isnt that DM to constantly make new content for players to play, and that is the main problem with D&D Online, is it not? There isnt enough dungeons, and people are getting bored of doing the same instance runs over and over?
The problem with DnD being made into a video isn't just the content, but the fact that the game revolves around dice rolling. So if you remove the dice from the game, you could add more stuff. However, if you remove the dice then that DnD game will become just another RPG. Another thing that hurts the DnD transcending into a good game is the limit flexibility of classes and cross-classing. Gameplay shouldn't be restricted by the class you choose, but the feats and skill you picked. However, WotC refuses to change that and the game suffers as result of it.
That's a very good analysis of the ongoing ills to finding the happy medium translating into an Electronic Ruleset, CaptainRPG. I don't think there is much to add to your statement.
Originally posted by Carrara That's a very good analysis of the ongoing ills to finding the happy medium translating into an Electronic Ruleset, CaptainRPG. I don't think there is much to add to your statement.
True me when I say there is more wrong with DnD then just the ruleset. The Tabletop market has been ruined by Forgotten Realms as well.
After playing both NWN2 and DDO...I have to say that DDO is much more enjoyable then NWN2 and in lots of places DDO is better implemented then NWN2. Both game has limited landscape sadly and you are caged in a quite small environment, at least DDOs dungeons are more fun and a bit more challenging then NWN2s. For mw NWN2 was a bigger let down then DDO was, though both of em were a let down.
Turbine is the Uwe Boll of MMO's. Eberron is a weak crappy DnD world on paper and online. Forgotten Realms would have at least been fun and familiar to the majority. They probably were forced to do an Eberron setting but whats done is done. DDO is not a grind fest it's a bore fest. Do mission ABC over and over but wait as an added bonus they never change so you can expect no brain power to blitz through them. GW is far more advanced so comparing the 2 games is hilarious. What's even funnier is GW is free.
Turbine couldn't even get a free AC trial right just recently. What a sad company.
Originally posted by CaptainRPG The problem with DnD being made into a video isn't just the content, but the fact that the game revolves around dice rolling. So if you remove the dice from the game, you could add more stuff. However, if you remove the dice then that DnD game will become just another RPG. Another thing that hurts the DnD transcending into a good game is the limit flexibility of classes and cross-classing. Gameplay shouldn't be restricted by the class you choose, but the feats and skill you picked. However, WotC refuses to change that and the game suffers as result of it.
The thing is, D&D IS just another roleplaying game. It just happens to be one of the first (if not the first) and the one most heavily expanded on.
When you look at every other RPG, nearly every single one regardless of the game mechanics (six-sided dice, ten sided, etc) or their rulesets follow the same basic mechanics. For an electronic representation, it is actually less important that the actual dice exist than it is that the player can quantify the impact of their choices on their character's performance in a given area.
D&D PnP players can tell you down to the gnat's backside what effect dual-wielding, ambidexterity and two-weapon style would have on their combat effectiveness. If I, as the developer, only tell the player that taking a given skill will improve their chances to hit without quantifying the level of improvement numerically, the player still feels like every choice they make is a crap shoot. It is frustrating to the player to have to guess what skills will make them more effective, particuarly if they are unfamiliar with the system and even more so if they are familiar with the system and the effect of a given skill does not match expectations from PnP experience.
The crux of the issue with D&D has less to do with translating the PnP ruleset to a dynamic electronic medium (although accurately portraying that system is very important) than it does with the fact that the majority of PnP D&D players actually make some attempt to roleplay while the same cannot be said for a huge majority of MMO players; even those who play DDO, which should epitomize the hardcore roleplaying community.
Who can blame them? Jaegar the dwarf looks almost exactly like Prolly the dwarf. Who can tell the difference? What makes Jaegar special? If I'm not special, why bother roleplaying? What exists to motivate roleplay? What mechanics differentiate me from every other player of the same race/class? What dramatic elements exist to motivate me to roleplay?
So the challenge shifts from representing the PnP game mechanics in a realistic and dynamic manner to presenting the game in a way that allows the roleplayers to actually roleplay.
That means you have to include elements in the game that foster roleplay and you need to include all of the facets of the PnP game that add to that element. This begins with dynamic character customization, to include the ability to add a backstory with linked roots in the game. Those roots add to the drama of the game. If Jaegar comes from Hacker's Ridge, give him a home, a family (siblings, father, mother, etc. if they want one) and use that to motivate the player.
Just for example; one of the primary spells a wizard can expect to have available to them is Melf's Acid Arrow. No one who plays D&D can fail to recognize the spell. The issue is, the spell comes from a line of spells created by.... Melf.
In DDO (or any electronic D&D game, minus possibly NWN1/2) who is Melf? Can the player create a line of spells? Or armor? Or weapons?
What would Elric be without Stormbringer? Yrkoon without Mournblade?
So basic crafting abilities that are represented in the PnP game need to be in the electronic rendition to allow the player to express themselves. It becomes roleplaying-centric that a player becomes well-known by their creations. The blades of X have become legendary, passing from hand to hand, etc. It adds to the backstory and allows for player-created content.
That's just one example. There are many others that are not properly presented in electronic D&D games. Challenges that few can accomplish or even only ONE can accomplish, such as stealing a fabled gemstone from a heavily guarded tower keep. The rogue or group who accomplishes it becomes known for the feat. After they steal the fabled gemstone, that incredible feat isn't repeatable by five thousand other players who follow the "Guide to stealing the fabled gemstone" that the rogue posts to a fansite or the official boards. You have to have enough of these events so that everyone feels like at some point they may be able to accomplish it and it is something they become known for.
As an example; when every other server in Asheron's Call had unleashed Bael-Zharon by destroying the Shard of the Herald that imprisoned him, one server called Thistledown held out. Players protected the shard from every attacker and they did such a good job that the developers themselves had to step in and create specialty characters and gather help from other players to defeat them and destroy the shard. If they didn't, they could not update the servers with Bael-Zharon's release unless ALL the servers had destroyed the shard because of the way the servers were designed.
To represent the outstanding defense of the Shard, the developers erected a special monument on the Thistledown server with the names of the defenders.
They used the event to foster enormous drama. I myself was a defender on Solclaim when Khao and his vassals turned on us and destroyed the Shard on our server.
Incredible drama. Fantastic use of the game mechanics to foster roleplay. I haven't been involved in an event of this type in any MMO since.
And of course, there's the question of suitably representing character alignment. Without a solid and established social structure in the villages, towns, etc., that you enter, having an alignment is practically useless. Nothing you do has any real impact.
For example; you enter a lawful good city. The player is confronted with the legal system from the outset. Their actions have positive and negative results while in the environment. If the player is a thief and they pick a pocket and are discovered, they are pursued and perhaps even caught.
Every NPC in the game needs to be attackable; evil characters should be able to slay innocent bystanders at will until they are caught or defeated. If you cast Chained Lightning into a mixed crowd of innocents and bad guys and you hit a few innocents, there have to be consequences.
If Drizzt lived in the world of DDO (or just about any other electronic D&D game) there wouldn't be any conflict at all because regardless of the backstory the player envisions for themselves, they have no way to express it in the world. Drizzt would truly be a rebel without a cause in DDO.
Finally, the developers (or more appropriately, the support staff) need to be able to interact with the players in meaningful ways and add content and storyline elements on the fly, from global events all the way down to team events. Going back to the player roots concept, if the player elects to have a family of some kind, what if the game support team has the player's brother show up to tell him/her that their village is being attacked? Does the player ignore their "brother"? What kind of conflicting and interesting elements emerge in the player's group when s/he has to decide to return to their village?
The reason that cross-classing and the flexibility of classes is limited in D&D is intentional; it's supposed to represent that a character can become good at some things, great at other things and learn nearly nothing about specific skills in their lifetime. It mirrors the reality of being a living person.
While many people can be jacks-of-all-trades, it would be unique to find someone who had mastered them all. That's what the D&D system is meant to represent.
If I meet Jim and his friend tells me "Hey, I'd like you to meet Jim; he's a mechanic" is his friend saying that's all Jim is, a mechanic? Or is he telling me that Jim is professional mechanic and as I get to know Jim, I find out he's also a passable painter, a part-time welder, etc.?
The feats and skills that you select outside of your direct class represent the jack-of-all-trades aspect. It allows you to round out your character while giving you class bonuses for those skills and feats that are aligned with your chosen class. It is an attempt to reflect reality and now, more than ever, the system is much more robust than it has ever been in the past.
There are literally a thousand small touches that could be added to foster roleplaying and improve gameplay. The real issue is finding a development studio that cares more about the game than they do about the bottom line. Because in the end, a truly robust feature set that would be capable of supporting these features would take a great deal of time to develop properly and time in development is literally money. Everything is going out and nothing is coming in, minus investment capital.
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1. All Tabletop games use the same dice rules as DnD. I was saying as an electronic game, if you were to remove the dice then DnD would just be another rpg game. Every function in DnD revolves around dice rolling. If you do a flip, if you are trying to persuade someone to do something, etc. it all requires you to use the dice rule. In my game, I eliminate the constant need for dice. You only use one dice and that's the D20.
2. The problem with DnD isn't just the dice. The huge number of classes, clone class, requirements to transcend into another class and the class spefici level up bonus, which hinders my gameplay as both the player and the character. For example, if I'm a paladin, I have a limits my gameplay and the number of choice as to whom I can cross class with because of strict alignment, the class benefits on level up and types of I can acquire. In otherwords, it makes no sense to cross-class a paladin with a ranger because the Paladin abilities only favor himself rather than the Ranger abilities or the pet.
Although, the ranger gets favored enemy, the paladin gets a favored enemy (IN A SENSE) towards evil (any living creature with intelligence), demons and undead so the ranger's favored doesn't help my paladin out all that much since the paladin comes with feats that work similar to it.
Then they are the clone class like Ranger and Rogue. They are the same class in my opinion. Both can attack your eneimes weak points, go in stealth and can set/disable traps. The only thing that's them apart is the pet. However, some for dumb reason the ranger can hit an undead's enemy point, but a Rogue can't. To me that's a complete waste of time making clone classes.
Lastly, if I cross-class, my spells and certain feats get weaker. Most prestiges class favor non-law or non-good alignments. And the others have requirements like having such and such skill or such and such feat, which makes prestiges class all that more unfavorable. (Plus they can weaken your skill)
In my game, I based everything around skill and feats. You can say, my style of rpging is similar to Bruce Lee Intercepting Fist because there is no class system, you character is strength and weakened by their choice of skill. There is no personality alignment or a requirement for a God. (Though you can still choose to believei n a God)
3. The mechanics of tabletop and video-games are completely differen. Like cross-classing for example, when apply to a video games, it becomes an exploits. You see DnD tabletop games are made up by the DM. The DM put monsters in your path that were designed to be tackle speficially by your party so there is no reason to try to exploit the tabletop version of the game and even if you did the DM could see it and counter it. However, in most video game versions, the monsters set in dungeons by default and the game isn't design to revolve your character, but rather it is design for your character to go through it.
After realizing this, I understood how useless the class system was and that DnD rules (both video game and tabletop) needed to change to be in favor of the characters feats and skills rather than their class.
4. The Monster levels were another case. Instead of starting monster at certain levels, it would be best to start at default levels. As a DM, for me it was hard to understand the monsters levels, HP and how they worked. So I made up my own monster status starting from level 1 and then leveling the monster up to level they would be a must challenge. However, video game version of the monsters cannot be level up in this way and doing so could cause them to be overpowered.
5. Lack of items was another problems. In fact, DnD in general doesn't have a large inventory of items. Bastard of +1 is no different from a regular bastard sword. It's the same sword except now you can buy pass DR. In my game, I created two sets of items: simple and martial. Simple weapons can be wielding in one or dual-handed while martial weapons can be used in one or both hands. This allowed players 4 styles of combat without having to pick the feat to use weapons in such ways.
I could go on and on how DnD is messed up as both a tabletop game and video games, but it would take a long time to explain. Simply put, the game has to many restriction on it, which slows down gameplay and have long become obscelete.
Somnulus, you're in effect describing what the next gen MMORPGs need to contain to make the purchase and subscription worthwhile. I have tried getting into the flow of several recent MMOs, only to find myself unhappy at the sad state of communities having no respect for the other humans there, or endless torture of leet speak while a heavy RP session is in play. I don't know... there is just no happy medium anymore because everybody wants the "NEXT" MMO to contain what they want. I remember when people woudn't play EQ PvP because it was too hardcore. So EQ became niche in attraction and retention.
MMORPGs = meh, nowdays.
I want niche to come back, but not in a state like that of DDO, sorry. It's just not enough. Not at this point. DDO would have been fine if we were back in the day of AC, but we're not. DDO is too little too late. It's a 5 year old RPG that is barely MMO. That's just unforgivable.
Originally posted by CaptainRPG 1. All Tabletop games use the same dice rules as DnD. I was saying as an electronic game, if you were to remove the dice then DnD would just be another rpg game. Every function in DnD revolves around dice rolling. If you do a flip, if you are trying to persuade someone to do something, etc. it all requires you to use the dice rule. In my game, I eliminate the constant need for dice. You only use one dice and that's the D20.
And again, back to my point, D&D is just like every other RPG game. Or rather, every other RPG is just like D&D.
The extent that dice are used or not used is entirely up to the DM in a tabletop game. That's discretionary. There are many situations where, if the player's skill is sufficient, I have no requirement for them to roll any die at all. Why bother if their success rate is a given? On the off chance that they'll fumble? Every once in a while, it adds something to the storyline but you have to make sure that it's not blocking the play progression.
Using dice isn't a limitation of D&D. There has to be a statistical and quantifiable method for the player to gauge success or failure in any given action. How often you use the dice is a personal preference.
I haven't seen it stated anywhere in the ruleset that you must roll the dice in each and every situation for every action. What that means is that the ruleset provides the guidelines for the effects of every player action that they can by using dice to quantify that effect. It doesn't mean you have to do it that way.
2. The problem with DnD isn't just the dice. The huge number of classes, clone class, requirements to transcend into another class and the class spefici level up bonus, which hinders my gameplay as both the player and the character. For example, if I'm a paladin, I have a limits my gameplay and the number of choice as to whom I can cross class with because of strict alignment, the class benefits on level up and types of I can acquire. In otherwords, it makes no sense to cross-class a paladin with a ranger because the Paladin abilities only favor himself rather than the Ranger abilities or the pet.
The class bonuses are meant to represent the effect of specializing in a given field. Like my previous example, if you study engines and repair engines for a living, then you're probably a good mechanic. You do other things, but being a good mechanic is your primary bread and butter.
Since characters in D&D don't really have a "lifespan" to speak of, short of dying in-game, there has to be a way to represent this kind of specializing in the character's development. Again, it's simple logic and not a limitation.
Alignment rarely affects dual or multi-class, as nearly every class can meet the low end of another alignment, minus diametric opposites where the class requirement makes it so that they must maintain a strict ethos in order to be that class, per your example of the paladin. There really isn't another class that is quite that strict. The paladin's alignment restriction is meant to purposely hinder the player in their roleplaying choices. It's not a design flaw, it's a purposeful imposition of a standard of conduct expected of the paladin.
Since you as the paladin also gain feats and abilities similar to a fighter, if your alignment should change, either purposefully or through misadventure, you still have a plethora of options for your paladin in any of the fighter specialties. You just can't be a paladin anymore. This is a roleplaying opportunity for both the player and the DM. Has the player fallen out of favor with their god? Have they injured the "church"? Can they be redeemed and become a paladin again? Nothing in the rules says it is not possible.
On the other end of the spectrum, what if the fall from grace is so great that the paladin becomes an anti-paladin (death knight)?
Along the way, the player picks up new skills, feats and abilities, dual or multi-classes as they see fit. Perhaps they will never be a paladin again. But that was the choice they made. No one ever said it's easy being a Catholic priest or the member of any clergy. That's what it's supposed to represent.
Although, the ranger gets favored enemy, the paladin gets a favored enemy (IN A SENSE) towards evil (any living creature with intelligence), demons and undead so the ranger's favored doesn't help my paladin out all that much since the paladin comes with feats that work similar to it.
Not sure I really understand you here. Are you saying that because a paladin gets bonus abilities versus evil and undead that they have no use for animal husbandry, tracking, etc? I guess I don't see your point. It's really up to the player to decide what they need or don't need or what works for them.
Then they are the clone class like Ranger and Rogue. They are the same class in my opinion. Both can attack your eneimes weak points, go in stealth and can set/disable traps. The only thing that's them apart is the pet. However, some for dumb reason the ranger can hit an undead's enemy point, but a Rogue can't. To me that's a complete waste of time making clone classes.
They aren't clones at all. The two classes are distinctly different for many reasons.
Here, look at it in another way that might help; Rangers are basically failed druid/clerics. They were allowed priest spells 1-3rd up through second edition and the spell list for third edition basically follows that same general guide. They have animal empathy and their tracking is normally woodland-based, with a modifier applied for urban environments.
The ranger's druid/priest sub-class type also explains their ability with undead.
Thieves don't cast spells; if you're roleplaying it properly, their tracking is urban-based. They focus on trap detection/removal/setting. They have special allowances for "sneak attacks". They are allowed to use dexterity as an attack modifier. They don't have pets.
Though the two classes share some commonalities, they are quite distinct.
Lastly, if I cross-class, my spells and certain feats get weaker. Most prestiges class favor non-law or non-good alignments. And the others have requirements like having such and such skill or such and such feat, which makes prestiges class all that more unfavorable. (Plus they can weaken your skill)
Yes, of course spells and certain feats get weaker. By choosing a prestige class, you, the player, are electing to focus your area of specialization in one narrow place to get the most out of a relatively small number of skills and abilities.
It is akin to a martial arts master studying for his/her entire life until they can do the "death touch". Eventually, they can kill a person with one blow but how will that impact their overall speed, flexibility, accuracy or strength? If the "death touch" is based purely on will (as it is most often described) you're going to have to figure that those other areas will have atrophied a bit.
It still follows a logical flow.
Again, in the end, no one is forcing anyone to take on a prestige class.
In my game, I based everything around skill and feats. You can say, my style of rpging is similar to Bruce Lee Intercepting Fist because there is no class system, you character is strength and weakened by their choice of skill. There is no personality alignment or a requirement for a God. (Though you can still choose to believei n a God)
If that works for you, fantastic! Personally, I couldn't imagine playing D&D without character alignment; something needs to remind the player of who they are and if they decide they want to be something else, a change of alignment lets them know that their actions aren't in line with their character concept. That's fine, as long as they realize that if they're a lawful good character and they burn down an orphanage with all the orphans inside just for giggles, they aren't a lawful good character anymore. At that point, that's where the social structure kicks in and it's either time for the player to beat feet out of town, go to jail or get strung up by a mob.
The impact of that one act follows them. You may have done a huge amount of good in your life, but the moment you stood there with a torch in your hand and giggled while the orphanage burned down, you pretty much just wiped out a lot of good will.
Skills are great. They augment the character's main class selection, just like you, in your life, have some skills that are more finely honed than others and some skills that are completely absent. I haven't seen anything in any D&D PnP session that worked any differently.
3. The mechanics of tabletop and video-games are completely differen. Like cross-classing for example, when apply to a video games, it becomes an exploits. You see DnD tabletop games are made up by the DM. The DM put monsters in your path that were designed to be tackle speficially by your party so there is no reason to try to exploit the tabletop version of the game and even if you did the DM could see it and counter it. However, in most video game versions, the monsters set in dungeons by default and the game isn't design to revolve your character, but rather it is design for your character to go through it.
The concept of optimizing a character within a given ruleset being an "exploit" is entirely developer-driven and it's derived from the fact that the developer feels like since they make the rules, they can change the rules. It usually emerges from an electronic RPG or MMORPG game system that is not balanced properly to begin with. Once the developer realizes that players have discovered combinations of skills, etc., that allow them to perform better than their fellow players, they start to panic.
If you go to a DM and say "I found a combination of feats and skills that allow my character to add +10 to his attack roll" and they look at the rules and see that you're right, there's littel they can do to affect that since they didn't make the rules, unless they just start making up their own rules (which occasionally does happen).
Actually, most developers do try to design monsters to revolve around the player; to present them with a reasonable and interesting challenge, just like we, as DMs, would do for our players. The problem is that they feel as though they have failed if "Jaegar" comes in and wreaks havoc on their monsters. They start to wonder if they made it too easy. Then they look at Jaegar's build and start to see that perhaps their ruleset is flawed. Then the nerf bat swings. The developers also feel pressured to present the same game experience to every player regardless of the type of character they have designed. Often this means giving classes that are purely support ridiculous abilities to "balance" them with classes that are designed to do damage or to absorb damage. This even extends to utility-type abilities.
If the developer just stuck to their character classes and said "that's the way it was designed; you chose a healing class, you heal. You don't lay down massive damage" then while you may lose some discontented players, at least those remaining would know that they didn't have to fear constant nerfing and changes as a result of player complaints about support classes or comparative abilities. That kind of homogenizing ruins a lot of MMORPGs.
After realizing this, I understood how useless the class system was and that DnD rules (both video game and tabletop) needed to change to be in favor of the characters feats and skills rather than their class.
In theory I agree with you; in practice though, I have to say that defined classes with specific skills and abilities for them and augmenting abilities, feats and skills reflects reality.
The one thing that could really make a true classless system work would be if the choices made by the player reflected a serious time investment. This would reflect the point at which the player decides to stop being a fighter and start being a wizard. Which is pretty much the way multi-classing works in D&D now. It's akin to deciding to stop being a mechanic and start being a marine biologist. You don't just buy a boat and start snapping pictures of fish and submitting work to scientific journals. Not that you couldn't; but it's unlikely that your work would be published or taken seriously. You have to actually learn about marine biology first.
Meanwhile, they start producing hydrogen fuel based cars and while you spend three years studying marine biology, you decide it's not for you and return to being a mechanic only to find that you don't know squat about hydrogen fuel vehicles.
4. The Monster levels were another case. Instead of starting monster at certain levels, it would be best to start at default levels. As a DM, for me it was hard to understand the monsters levels, HP and how they worked. So I made up my own monster status starting from level 1 and then leveling the monster up to level they would be a must challenge. However, video game version of the monsters cannot be level up in this way and doing so could cause them to be overpowered.
I understand what you are saying here, but the final part of your statement is actually untrue. In Asheron's Call, as an opponent NPC (monster) killed more players, it gained levels, just like the player. You could actually see the little level animation around them while it happened. When we were assaulting Ithaenc Cathedral, I must have levelled up literally hundreds of sclavi.
Now, it did start at a static challenge level but that's for the player. It allows them to gauge their ability relative to what they're fighting.
5. Lack of items was another problems. In fact, DnD in general doesn't have a large inventory of items. Bastard of +1 is no different from a regular bastard sword. It's the same sword except now you can buy pass DR. In my game, I created two sets of items: simple and martial. Simple weapons can be wielding in one or dual-handed while martial weapons can be used in one or both hands. This allowed players 4 styles of combat without having to pick the feat to use weapons in such ways.
I'm not sure what you are basing a "lack of items" in D&D on; there are pages and pages of items in D&D.
Each feat represents a time investment on the player's part in learning the best way to wield that particular weapon or combinations of weapons. Without any feat representation, the player picks up a weapon and off s/he goes. That's just not very realistic or fair. It means that a level 1 player could basically wield a weapon just as well as a level 20 player. Unless I'm misinterpreting your comment from above "without having to pick the feat to use weapons in such ways".
I could go on and on how DnD is messed up as both a tabletop game and video games, but it would take a long time to explain. Simply put, the game has to many restriction on it, which slows down gameplay and have long become obscelete.
We'll just have to agree to disagree on that. What you have to keep in perspective is that D&D emerged from a tabletop wargame simulation. Its design intent has been to approximate how a human being learns and masters skills, how long it takes and how effective they can expect to become within a given time frame (level 1 thru 20, for example). It does a fine job of it.
The tabletop game is as slow as you make it. My experiences in PnP D&D have been exciting, even when they were moving slowly. That slowdown was a good thing; it allowed me to take some time, roleplay and make decisions about my actions. That's not necessarily a bad thing and it's not a reflection on the game mechanics, which far from being obsolete, are emulated by nearly every MMORPG and RPG on the market, without exception.
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Interestingly enough, we often speak of the PnP to electronic rules conversion problems, the environments seem to translate very well to electronic format. Which leads me to ask why, programmaticaly, is it so difficult to reproduce the rules in an easy to select what you want to force interactive rolls for, rather than always trying to make the die roll simpler?
I can envision a system where a USB adapter with a Pop-o-matic Trouble type of die casing, that would permit each of the six dice to be self contained with a magnetic register in the floor plate that would read the value of the die. Sure it would have its own set of design challenges, like how many sensors to add in each bubble to confirm a proper roll, cause lord knows there would be attemps at hacking these as well. And as well, there would be other adapters to hack the USB signal to improve number of the rolls. Anyhow, I'm straying off point.
This adapter would take out all of the automated dice rolling by the software and would only have to read the input, pass it along and the software would perfom according to the roll. I think this would bring back a level of interaction that I feel is missing in many of games today. Some might say it's only a novelty, but I think there is merit to this idea. The game would be playable with others online, and would as well bring true table top to the "desktop pc".
And it's funny how GURPS never enters these types of discussions. Would GURPS be easier to implement?
Originally posted by Carrara Interestingly enough, we often speak of the PnP to electronic rules conversion problems, the environments seem to translate very well to electronic format. Which leads me to ask why, programmaticaly, is it so difficult to reproduce the rules in an easy to select what you want to force interactive rolls for, rather than always trying to make the die roll simpler?I can envision a system where a USB adapter with a Pop-o-matic Trouble type of die casing, that would permit each of the six dice to be self contained with a magnetic register in the floor plate that would read the value of the die. Sure it would have its own set of design challenges, like how many sensors to add in each bubble to confirm a proper roll, cause lord knows there would be attemps at hacking these as well. And as well, there would be other adapters to hack the USB signal to improve number of the rolls. Anyhow, I'm straying off point.This adapter would take out all of the automated dice rolling by the software and would only have to read the input, pass it along and the software would perfom according to the roll. I think this would bring back a level of interaction that I feel is missing in many of games today. Some might say it's only a novelty, but I think there is merit to this idea. The game would be playable with others online, and would as well bring true table top to the "desktop pc".And it's funny how GURPS never enters these types of discussions. Would GURPS be easier to implement?
I don't really think it's a case of making the die roll easier, or even of visually seeing the dice themselves. The player wants to see a quantitative effect from the choices they make as they progress through the game. It's as simple as that.
When "Jaegar" selects Improved Parry, he wants to see it in action immediately after selecting it. He expects to be more effective in blocking blows and often, he wants to be able to break that effect down into a percentage representation of how much more effective he is compared to what he may have gained from another skill or feat selection because he is seeking to optimize his character within the given environment.
Too many electronic game developers working in an RPG or MMORPG environment try to mask the effect of skill selections from the player because they want to avoid min/maxing within the game environment. Not only is this frustrating to the player because they have to guess what the effect of each skill or feat selection really is in game terms, but it's not really the developer's business to stop that behavior. It's a natural human desire to want to do well and to meet and exceed challenges presented to them. It's the developer's job to present them with consistent challenge, not to handicap them when they succeed.
I think adaptations of GURPS never enter these discussions because the basic system of assigning point values to specific areas and adding or subtracting based on advantages or disadvantages is a standard game mechanic in most RPG/MMORPGs that aren't attempting to adhere strictly to D&D and it is easier to use because there is a direct and quantitative reflection of choices in player-character ability and effectiveness.
In the long and short of it, though, GURPS still represents the same statistical chance of effectiveness with modifiers (dice) that represent success or failure in any given situation, just like D&D. The main difference is that when you assign X number of points to Strength in the GURPS system, you know not only what that number represents in melee skill terms but you also know that your ability to take damage (basic hit points) is based on that number. You can use a calculator to estimate how effective you will be in a given area based entirely on point assignment.
The only real difference between D&D and GURPS is that D&D relies much more heavily on the random factor of dice rolls in character creation. Even there, the rules have been modified so that a player doesn't necessarily have to worry about crippling their character.
But in action, GURPS uses dice rolls just like D&D (although it uses six-sided dice).
Again, I would have to say that the actual rolling of dice isn't an absolute necessity as long as the player understands the direct effectiveness of their choices and all given modifiers within the game context. So if they understand that statistically, an action has a given percentile chance of being successful and that given the counters to that action (resistances, etc) they can expect a certain result, even if they aren't particuarly happy with the result they will at least know the reasons why that result occurred.
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Well all the reviews about NWN2 shows that its sucks as much as DDO. I personally don't think DDO is a bad game I just think they went a different direction than everyone expected.
In America I have bad teeth. If I lived in England my teeth would be perfect.
Originally posted by seabass2003 Well all the reviews about NWN2 shows that its sucks as much as DDO. I personally don't think DDO is a bad game I just think they went a different direction than everyone expected.
NWN2 is true to the D&D legacy. It is a decent game, an homage.
DDO is an action game that has very little to do with the legacy set prior. DDO is nice, in it ways.
But the games don't appeal to the same audience. NWN2 appeals to GAMERS, while DDO appeal to ACTION-fans. They both got flaws. But I buy NWN2 and I am happy with this purchase. I never buy DDO and I wouldn't, no matter what, simply because DDO isn't a rpg to start with, DDO is an action game with a rpg skin, not a rpg.
NWN2, despite all it flaws, is a rpg, and a decent one at it. It respect it legacy. I will replay NWN2 now that I complete it, it is not a pressing matter and I am not that motivated to do it, but I will in time, as I grew bored with some other stuff. NWN2 is far from perfect, but comparing it with...DDO? Come on, this ain't fair. DDO is a total RPG-disaster since it isn't a RPG to start with...
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
Originally posted by seabass2003 Well all the reviews about NWN2 shows that its sucks as much as DDO. I personally don't think DDO is a bad game I just think they went a different direction than everyone expected.
NWN2 is true to the D&D legacy. It is a decent game, an homage.
DDO is an action game that has very little to do with the legacy set prior. DDO is nice, in it ways.
But the games don't appeal to the same audience. NWN2 appeals to GAMERS, while DDO appeal to ACTION-fans. They both got flaws. But I buy NWN2 and I am happy with this purchase. I never buy DDO and I wouldn't, no matter what, simply because DDO isn't a rpg to start with, DDO is an action game with a rpg skin, not a rpg.
NWN2, despite all it flaws, is a rpg, and a decent one at it. It respect it legacy. I will replay NWN2 now that I complete it, it is not a pressing matter and I am not that motivated to do it, but I will in time, as I grew bored with some other stuff. NWN2 is far from perfect, but comparing it with...DDO? Come on, this ain't fair. DDO is a total RPG-disaster since it isn't a RPG to start with...
The only thing I was trying to point out was the fact that according to the OP "NWN2 is going to destroy this game."
Well it didn't, in fact its as much of a let down as DDO was to some people.
In America I have bad teeth. If I lived in England my teeth would be perfect.
I haven't found NWN2 disappointing in the least. It worked well right out of the box, the graphics are a huge upgrade compared to NWN and I haven't had a single bug or issue that has kept me from enjoying the game immensely.
I honestly think that many people raised their expectations just a wee bit too high. Many complaints talk about how this is the same, that is the same as NWN. Considering how much fun NWN was, is that a bad thing? Not in my opinion.
Just honestly having a blast playing the game. And I can seriously say that NWN2 beats the heck out of DDO, in just about every way you can conceive of.
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Yes, of course spells and certain feats get weaker. By choosing a prestige class, you, the player, are electing to focus your area of specialization in one narrow place to get the most out of a relatively small number of skills and abilities.
Its narrow minded to think because you specialize in something you cannot be just as good in something else. Thats not even logic. Benjamin Franklin was an inventory, philosopher and he was strong as an ox before he reach middle age. Bruce Lee was an actor, teacher and martial artist.
I know friends who were former highschool football players who were as smart as they were tough. However, I do believe depending at what point and time you try to versify will hurt you in terms of skills. But you shouldnt have to switch between both classes to just to specialize in them both nor should be half-way skilled in two or more fields.
My game focuses on letting players eliminate class and most class restrictions to build a character of their choice. It can work since Ive done it my last session, but tabletop games would lose money if everything were simplified.
I haven't seen it stated anywhere in the ruleset that you must roll the dice in each and every situation for every action.
I have the DM guide and you have to use roll for a lot of situations. And book doesnt give you any advice to do freestyle dice roll rules. They wouldnt make any money off of you if they did. I have a basic rule for dice in my game. You only rule a D20 and a D20 for magic attacks, traps, attacking and skill usage. There is no spell resistance for example and rolling a successful save reduces the damage (If not null it) against a magic all spell.
Since you as the paladin also gain feats and abilities similar to a fighter
No, you dont. The paladin gets its own class feats and class spell. The only thing the paladin gets thats similar to the Fighter is the equipment they can use. The Fighter doesnt get any class feats of its own the fighters get general feats and bonus feats. The Fighters is the second weakest character in the game and he only good for making a character to cross class with. They actually did a poll one time in NWN and the poll relieve fighters were the least played class. And we had a discussion about the Fighters because anything the Fighter can do, the Paladin can do, but better.
If you played WoW, the Warrior plays a significant roll because the class has its own skills, meaning he was more than a tank. Now why would the Warrior is more favorable to play in WoW, but not the Fighter in NWN. Simply because DnD players know that a Paladin offers more than a Fighter and can get the same generals feats.
They aren't clones at all. The two classes are distinctly different for many reasons.
They are the same class with small distinction dealing with HP, skills and feats. I could go into detail with that, but between the two, the Rogue is superior.
If that works for you, fantastic!
Oh the irony of this statement.
Personally, I couldn't imagine playing D&D without character alignment; something needs to remind the player of who they are and if they decide they want to be something else, a change of alignment lets them know that their actions aren't in line with their character concept.
Youre telling me you need an alignment to remind you that you should play a Blackguard as evil character? Alignment like classes are BS because your class controls your personality not alignment. We had a huge discussion on alignment and the Rogue in the Paper and Pencil forum on another board, a lot of DMs agreed, you cant be a Rogue and lawful good since being lawful means you uphold the law and you fight honorably. And if youre not going to use the Rogues skills then why be a Rogue?
Also I learned in NWN and tabletop, you do not have to RPG the exact personality alignment given to you. I was attacking from the back as a paladin in my NWN sessions and paladin talked a lot of trash in my tabletop sessions. As long as my trash talk didnt violate my code of conduct. As matter of fact, I late changed my code of conduct to fit my characters.
How your character acts is completely up to you.
The concept of optimizing a character within a given ruleset being an "exploit" is entirely developer-driven and it's derived from the fact that the developer feels like since they make the rules, they can change the rules. It usually emerges from an electronic RPG or MMORPG game system that is not balanced properly to begin with. Once the developer realizes that players have discovered combinations of skills, etc., that allow them to perform better than their fellow players, they start to panic.
Actually, no, I played NWN and tabletop session and the difference as I said earlier is that tabletop sessions are catered to your party. The DM throws monsters and dungeons your way that your characters can deal with better. A DM wouldnt throw a monster with a DR at you unless you had spellcasters that could help you by pass the monsters DR. Tailoring the gameplay to your party discourages cross-classing exploits.
Also in one NWN session, the DM went out of his way to put my character (a cleric) at a disadvantage. He made the monsters harder by giving them certain abilities, but it didnt work because my cleric was so versatile that he could tackle anything without the need for a party. I was kicked and ban from that server. By making the game harder, he only encouraged me to exploit the game more.
Yet, in another server, the DM had one simple program. No matter what your level was, the monsters would get stronger depending the level you reached. In other words, if you were level 10 then the monsters will have a CR level between level 7 to 10. This not only eliminated high level farming, but it stopped low level characters from party with high level characters.
This worked better than tailoring the monsters to take on my characters because the more advantages he gave the monsters only put other classes at a disadvantage.
Not sure I really understand you here. Are you saying that because a paladin gets bonus abilities versus evil and undead that they have no use for animal husbandry, tracking, etc? I guess I don't see your point. It's really up to the player to decide what they need or don't need or what works for them.
To put it simple for you, if you had a Ranger and a Paladin in the same party who would you rather use to eliminate the undead problem, the ranger or the Paladin? You would obviously use the paladin because he can take on the undead a lot better than the Ranger.
That and cross-classing the ranger class with my paladin class doesnt help to improve my paladin ability to tackle undead. Same with the Ranger abilities doesnt improve a Rogues ability to hit their weak point or go in stealth.
It still follows a logical flow.
Actually, no, its illogical because you can learn more than one skill and be just as good as the next person in them. Cross-classing in DnD, however, thins your character out, which encourages more pure-classing than cross classing. The only way to pure class without penalties is to cross class with class that benefits are not low when doing so. For example, in NWN, cross classing a Champion of Torm doesnt affect you Paladins ability to Smite Evil.
Again, in the end, no one is forcing anyone to take on a prestige class.
Nice way of ducking the analogy, Som. I think you see what I see, but you are trying to duck the issue. First off the most of the prestige class are clone of the core class with a small variation. A Shadowdancer is still a Rogue, but without the sneak attack, just an improved stealth skill.
The only true classes that exist in my game are racial classes.
It is clear now that NWN2 was a disapointment - from stellar expectations we had for it. Which could also be said for DDO.
But the diferences and adventages are clear.
DDO was disapointment , because it was supposed to be MMO D&D game - but instead they made limited, instanced, twitch based experimental Guild Wars clone, packed in kindof D&D skin - and they are charging 15$ monthly for it.
while
NWN2 was disapointment , because it was rushed out the door. Graphic and animations are not all that swell. There is a problem with controling NPCs (which is single player relevant only) , and there is issue with mandatory downloading files for multiplayer.
But you forget one thing. NWN2 is evolving game, and a tool. Everything is posible.
While DDO will never change.
Only good thing DDO has going for it is bit more imaginative dungeons, than other mmo's
You can recreate this in NWN2 easily. Hell, some old DDO player can go and recreate every inch of DDO in NWN2 and put it online... You can do anything...
Thats NWN2
So than...whats better ?
"Before this battle is over all the world will know that few...stood against many." - King Leonidas
Originally posted by CaptainRPG Its narrow minded to think because you specialize in something you cannot be just as good in something else. Thats not even logic. Benjamin Franklin was an inventory, philosopher and he was strong as an ox before he reach middle age. Bruce Lee was an actor, teacher and martial artist.
I know friends who were former highschool football players who were as smart as they were tough. However, I do believe depending at what point and time you try to versify will hurt you in terms of skills. But you shouldnt have to switch between both classes to just to specialize in them both nor should be half-way skilled in two or more fields.
Yes, it is narrow minded to believe that because you specialize in something you aren't capable in another skill. Good thing I never said that.
What I did say was that a person exhibits greater skill and expertise in a specialization as opposed to every skill they possess.
Being a high school football player is hardly the same as being a professional football player; that is a specialization. And while a professional football player may have many other talents. that one specialty outshines the others and places it above their other talents.
While you are a professional football player, practicing year round and playing professionally on a weekly basis, that is your specialization. Other interests or skills you have most likely take a backseat to being a professional football player. When you stop being a professional football player, you gain back the time investment you made in that specialization to concentrate in another area.
That's multiclassing. The time you used to used to apply one skill set for specialization is now devoted to the new skill set or one that is not as well developed.
Saying that Bruce Lee was an actor, teacher and a martial artist is actually misleading. He taught martial arts (although he also taught philosophy - again, connected to martial arts) and he acted in movies that were focused around the martial arts. This makes sense. He was specialized in the martial arts and the philosophies that guide the martial arts. He didn't teach astrophysics and he didn't play Hamlet. Those would be areas that would require specialized training to acquire excellence in.
This is not to say that he could NOT have taught astrophysics or played Hamlet; he simply did not expend the time in training and learning that would allow him to specialize in astrophysics or classical stage performances. If he had devoted considerable time to formal training in those two areas in addition to trying to maintain a specialized level of proficiency in the martial arts, one of those areas would have most likely suffered.
Whether you believe it or not, or even if you agree with it or not, does not make it any less a reality. There are very, very few individuals who could be said to have been masters (specialists) in multiple disciplines. This isn't necessarily because they weren't capable. People just tend to find the thing they are most skilled at and stick with it because they want to excel and it is easier to do so in something you already possess talent in.
My game focuses on letting players eliminate class and most class restrictions to build a character of their choice. It can work since Ive done it my last session, but tabletop games would lose money if everything were simplified.
Since the class concept has existed since D&D first edition (known as OD&D) and it is doubtful that anyone among those RPG pioneers (Gygax and Arneson) were making a significant amount of money (as a three volume OD&D set only cost $10.00) I don't see how you relate the class concept or class restrictions to a money-making machination.
That was the game design, plain and simple. All expansions and revisions remained true to the class concept because that was how people were introduced to the game and were used to playing it.
It's not a question of whether a classless system would work or not; D&D isn't a classless system, plain and simple, and hasn't been since its creation.
I have the DM guide and you have to use roll for a lot of situations. And book doesnt give you any advice to do freestyle dice roll rules. They wouldnt make any money off of you if they did. I have a basic rule for dice in my game. You only rule a D20 and a D20 for magic attacks, traps, attacking and skill usage. There is no spell resistance for example and rolling a successful save reduces the damage (If not null it) against a magic all spell.
I have to state again; nowhere in the Dungeon Master's Guide does it state that dice will be used to resolve each and every situation or that dice must be rolled for every single event.
They do, however, state on page 110 of the DM Guide (I am paraphrasing rather than quoting):
1. As the DM, you have the right to control the dice. 2. As DM, you can overrule dice results in order to cause a specific event to occur. 3. As DM, if a player rolls a particularly poor roll that could result in death through no fault of their own (poor decision making) you can make a decision that results in serious injury or loss of limb, etc, rather than death. 4. In any event that the rules do not specifically cover, you can use percentile dice and assign a reasonable probability for the success of the action, weighing it in favor of the player or the opponent/situation, however you see fit.
So, the DM Guide does give ample advice for freestyle rules in the use of dice and even suggests different areas where you, the DM, would apply those methods.
Again, this is not a money-making scheme; it's simply the system that was created and has been adhered to in subsequent expansions and revisions.
No, you dont. The paladin gets its own class feats and class spell. The only thing the paladin gets thats similar to the Fighter is the equipment they can use. The Fighter doesnt get any class feats of its own the fighters get general feats and bonus feats. The Fighters is the second weakest character in the game and he only good for making a character to cross class with. They actually did a poll one time in NWN and the poll relieve fighters were the least played class. And we had a discussion about the Fighters because anything the Fighter can do, the Paladin can do, but better.
Paladins and Fighters share no less than 118 feats that I know of. So I am not certain how you are coming to the conclusion that the only thing similar between them is the equipment they can use. I was certain that Fighters had five or six class-specific feats that paladins do not share, but I would have to do more research on that.
I personally consider the fighter the strongest character in the game at low levels, not only because they are walking tanks with the highest HP and the widest range of available armor and weapons, but also because they are not hampered by the Paladin's lawful good alignment.
I do not play a fighter in NWN (single-player campaign, mind you) for one reason only; I am guaranteed to have one in my party. I began NWN2 and started a warlock. Sure enough; the first potential party member I met was a dwarven fighter. Thank goodness for him too; I need him to absorb damage as much as possible while I throw spells. Sure, I can wear chainmail, but that does surprisingly little good against the mobs I've faced so far in the game. My little dwarven friend can wade into a mob and they will focus all of their hostility on him while I cast from afar. And he can take it.
Besides, my topic was not which character class was better but that a paladin can, through a change of alignment, become a fighter. It doesn't matter whether you believe me or not, the Player's Handbook states unequivocally:
"If a paladin should ever knowingly and willingly commit an evil act, he loses his status of paladinhood immediately and irrevocably. All benefits are then lost and no deed or magic can restore the character to paladinhood: He is ever after a fighter.
If the paladin commits an evil act while enchanted, s/he loses their paladinhood until they can atone for the act. They lose all abilities and function "essentially as a fighter".
If you played WoW, the Warrior plays a significant roll because the class has its own skills, meaning he was more than a tank. Now why would the Warrior is more favorable to play in WoW, but not the Fighter in NWN. Simply because DnD players know that a Paladin offers more than a Fighter and can get the same generals feats.
Completely untrue. I only have one character in WoW, a level 60 paladin. At level 53, I regularly crushed level 60 warriors in duels, for the same reasons you say that the D&D rules are flawed; I could heal myself being my primary advantage. Warriors in WoW are nothing more than tanks, period. They are no more or less special than a fighter in D&D.
I have never chosen to play a paladin in D&D and no one I have ever played with has played one, simply because being lawful good was too restrictive when the DM was applying the alignment rules correctly. I personally couldn't live up to being lawful good and apparently neither could anyone I've known in my 25 or so years of D&D play, regardless of the benefits the class has. That is the main reason for sticking to the alignment rules; because playing a paladin means you have to be willing to take actions within those restrictions, even actions that may bring you in conflict with your party members.
They are the same class with small distinction dealing with HP, skills and feats. I could go into detail with that, but between the two, the Rogue is superior.
I guess it depends entirely on how deeply you play the game. In the D&D I play, you drop a rogue in the woods and see how "superior" s/he is to a ranger. Inversely, the same applies to a ranger in the city.
I would really like you to go into detail, because every time I look at the skills and feats there are a great many differences immediately apparent to me.
Oh the irony of this statement.
Nothing ironic about it; no one is forcing you or your fellow players to adhere to every single rule in the book. The main point is that you have fun.
However, that doesn't mean everyone agrees with you and it certainly doesn't mean that your concept of fun or your modifications to the D&D rules are acceptable to everyone else.
Youre telling me you need an alignment to remind you that you should play a Blackguard as evil character? Alignment like classes are BS because your class controls your personality not alignment. We had a huge discussion on alignment and the Rogue in the Paper and Pencil forum on another board, a lot of DMs agreed, you cant be a Rogue and lawful good since being lawful means you uphold the law and you fight honorably. And if youre not going to use the Rogues skills then why be a Rogue?
No, I am not telling you that. What I am telling you is that the player needs to be reminded in the heat of the game that they are a specific alignment and that the actions they are considering taking may be antithetical to that alignment. As the DM, we should be reminding them of that fact and imposing repercussions to their actions that are in line with their changed behavior. There may also be party conflicts caused by a change in alignment. These situations add dramatic flavor to the game.
I would definitely agree that it is rather pointless to make a lawful good rogue. So why would you? Why even have a discussion over the topic, unless the lawful society the rogue supports has some sort of over-arching legal concept that allows them to exercise their abilities, say something along the lines of "national security" that supersedes the normal legal system? In that event, a rogue could be considered to be lawful good if they were stealing secret documents from another country or even assassinating someone. It rather depends on the legal system of the group the rogue is most closely connected to.
Even then it would be stretching to have a lawful good rogue. This does not mean you couldn't have a Chaotic Good rogue (by alignment definition "They believe in all the virtues of goodness and right, but they have little use for laws and regulations") and down the line to Neutral Evil.
Alignment isn't just for applying legal interpretations; the other players in the party can and should react to a change in alignment when they notice the odd behavior that their friend is exhibiting.
Also I learned in NWN and tabletop, you do not have to RPG the exact personality alignment given to you. I was attacking from the back as a paladin in my NWN sessions and paladin talked a lot of trash in my tabletop sessions. As long as my trash talk didnt violate my code of conduct. As matter of fact, I late changed my code of conduct to fit my characters.
How your character acts is completely up to you.
"you do not have to RPG the exact personality alignment given to you"
Huh? You choose your alignment, within certain exceptions. It isn't given to you, except if you are playing a character whose alignment is specifically dictated (i.e., a paladin).
Being Lawful Good doesn't mean that you don't trash talk and you don't backstab when the time comes. It does mean that you believe in an orderly and strong government, that laws must be respected and obeyed and that helping people benefits the entire society. It doesn't mean that when you are forced to fight someone who is outside of the law that you can't curse them or backstab them.
NWN is a poor example of the implementation of alignments, at any rate because it very rarely presented the player with a moral dilemma that caused them to make a decision that would affect their alignment in a way that was actually negative.
Now, if you're playing a tabletop D&D game and your paladin burns down an orphanage full of orphans just for the heck of it and nothing happens, then that is a complete departure from the ruleset. If that is the way you want to play, so be it; but that's not the D&D definition of a paladin.
Actually, no, I played NWN and tabletop session and the difference as I said earlier is that tabletop sessions are catered to your party. The DM throws monsters and dungeons your way that your characters can deal with better. A DM wouldnt throw a monster with a DR at you unless you had spellcasters that could help you by pass the monsters DR. Tailoring the gameplay to your party discourages cross-classing exploits.
Huh? I have no idea what you are talking about. What cross-classing exploits in a tabletop game could you possibly be referring to? There are none. They don't exist. You create a character, the character plays and as long as they aren't violating the rules or pulling something straight out of their backside, whatever feats and skills they have, they have. Whatever skills they may have picked up by dual or multi-classing, they have, within the limitations of the equipment they have and the armor they are wearing.
There's nothing to exploit; you can either do a specific action or you can't. The same goes for the other players sitting at the table.
In electronic games, however, specifically MMORPGs, the developers have a habit of deciding that even if you can do a specific action, you shouldn't be able to. After they decide that, it becomes an "exploit" if you continue to do it.
I've had plenty of D&D PnP sessions where the DM went strictly by the encounter tables based on terrain and rolled random encounters which resulted in low-level characters facing everything from Storm Giants to Nagas. The only thing to do is to roll a wisdom and/or lore check and get the party the heck out of there.
Also in one NWN session, the DM went out of his way to put my character (a cleric) at a disadvantage. He made the monsters harder by giving them certain abilities, but it didnt work because my cleric was so versatile that he could tackle anything without the need for a party. I was kicked and ban from that server. By making the game harder, he only encouraged me to exploit the game more.
First, I would like an itemized list of these exact exploits that you are referring to. Because referring to your cleric's versatility and then saying that you exploited the game are not the same thing when you are referring to an electronic game.
Normally, an exploit is doing something that you should not be able to do if you were playing the game within the rules as it was designed.
It's not just making an exceptionally good character. If you were only guilty of having a very well-designed and well-rounded cleric, that's not an exploit.
That's what I'm referring to when I say that electronic RPG and MMORPG developers have a habit of deciding something is an exploit when it doesn't work properly or the way they expected or the player combines things in a way that allows them to excel in a manner that is not consistent with the majority of their fellow players. If the developers would simply say "here it is, have fun" and didn't worry so much when players min/maxed, we wouldn't have this skewed definition of what can be considered an exploit.
Secondly, I can guarantee that I could make a module that would wreck your cleric if s/he didn't have a party with them, without making a single monster outside of your level range.
Finally, if the DM could not accomplish these things and felt like his/her only option was to ban you from their server, they simply did not try hard enough to allow for players and characters of widely different skillsets and experience.
Yet, in another server, the DM had one simple program. No matter what your level was, the monsters would get stronger depending the level you reached. In other words, if you were level 10 then the monsters will have a CR level between level 7 to 10. This not only eliminated high level farming, but it stopped low level characters from party with high level characters.
And that's the way it should work. It just sounds like the DM on the server you were banned from was hosting modules that were poorly designed or they didn't set the level restriction properly.
This worked better than tailoring the monsters to take on my characters because the more advantages he gave the monsters only put other classes at a disadvantage.
That's the way it should work. Most games do work that way. As I said, it sounds more like an inexperienced DM on the first server you discussed.
To put it simple for you, if you had a Ranger and a Paladin in the same party who would you rather use to eliminate the undead problem, the ranger or the Paladin? You would obviously use the paladin because he can take on the undead a lot better than the Ranger.
I'd use them both, because it would be a rare situation indeed where the paladin could handle all of the undead that would be thrown at my party (which normally implies plural player characters and thus, plural undead).
The ranger can still hit the undead; just because he can't turn them or at later levels destroy them with a single spell, doesn't mean he's ineffective.
In NWN2, I am playing a warlock, but my 17 year old son is playing a paladin. In the graveyard sequence, where he was fighting multiple undead mobs, his paladin wouldn't have been able to solo all of them. The party was a necessity, regardless of what classes they were. Even if the druid in the party only threw a single heal to the paladin, that still made him more effective than he would have been solo.
That and cross-classing the ranger class with my paladin class doesnt help to improve my paladin ability to tackle undead. Same with the Ranger abilities doesnt improve a Rogues ability to hit their weak point or go in stealth.
Which isn't the reason you would dual or multi-class to begin with. You're trying to pick up abilities that your class does not have, not augment abilities you already have.
Actually, no, its illogical because you can learn more than one skill and be just as good as the next person in them. Cross-classing in DnD, however, thins your character out, which encourages more pure-classing than cross classing. The only way to pure class without penalties is to cross class with class that benefits are not low when doing so. For example, in NWN, cross classing a Champion of Torm doesnt affect you Paladins ability to Smite Evil.
There's nothing illogical about learning more than one skill and being just as good as the next person in them. The reason you can is because you stopped improving your primary class just so you can learn those skills. Your statement above completely refutes your Bruce Lee / Benjamin Franklin example.
Like I said earlier, people go straight-class because it is the path of least resistance for them. Some of my best characters have been multi-class characters, far superior to their pure class but it wasn't easy to accomplish. I had to be willing to give up the possiblity of gaining certain benefits in order to accomplish it.
Nice way of ducking the analogy, Som. I think you see what I see, but you are trying to duck the issue. First off the most of the prestige class are clone of the core class with a small variation. A Shadowdancer is still a Rogue, but without the sneak attack, just an improved stealth skill.
No, I actually don't see what you see. A prestige class is an election to specialize in a small subset of your core classes' skills so that you can exceed the core class abilities in selected skills. As I said, it is perfectly logical
Of course they are derivative of the core class; they are just a further specialization of the core class, not an entirely different class all by their lonesome. They are based on extensions of the core classes.
As I said, you may personally want to have the specific feats and skills that the prestige classes provide, not only because you feel that they make your characte more efficient, but also because it fits the concept you have for your character. If you don't feel strongly one way or another, then don't take a prestige class. It's that simple.
In the end, I still do not see the D&D system as flawed or even in need of simplification. It is a very deep, rich and complex system and it is designed that way on purpose to cover as many of the situations that a character could be expected to encounter (combat, social, moral, religious, etc). The problem with most electronic RPGs and MMORPGs is that very few of these elements beyond combat are ever included in their game.
Abbatoir / Abbatoir Cinq Adnihilo Beorn Judge's Edge Somnulus Perfect Black ---------------------- Asheron's Call / Asheron's Call 2 Everquest / Everquest 2 Anarchy Online Shadowbane Dark Age of Camelot Star Wars Galaxies Matrix Online World of Warcraft Guild Wars City of Heroes
Being Lawful Good doesn't mean that you don't trash talk and you don't backstab when the time comes. It does mean that you believe in an orderly and strong government, that laws must be respected and obeyed and that helping people benefits the entire society. It doesn't mean that when you are forced to fight someone who is outside of the law that you can't curse them or backstab them.
- I cannot lie
- I cannot cheat or use poison
- I have to protect good people from evil
- (In some paladin rules, stealth is only used as a last restort)
- I can only my holy abilities to benefit others not myself.
You should have been at the discussions lawful good = lawful stupid and the purpose of alignment. If a person asks a paladin for some gold, can the paladin refuse? If he does hes not a truly good person. A paladin cannot use stealth so he has to charge in; therefore, he maybe riding into certain death. A Paladin can get themselves in same amount of trouble as a Rogue. In one DM session stories, the DM noted that a rogue (who was really a spy) was chased by the guards and the paladin of their session stop the rogue and handed him to the authorities. Later in that session, the guards came and arrested the Paladin for interfering government affairs. The player had to re-roll a new character because his paladin was later executed.
In the other topic, we came to two conclusions. You cant truly be neutral in DnD because taking a side automatically makes you a follower of a certain alignment and Chaotic Neutral = Nihilist. Your primary alignment cannot be neutral because your primary says you dont have a code of conduct nor do you take any type of action. However, since you are good, you have to have a code of conduct as to what is right and what is wrong.
During a tabletop, I had disarmed my opponent and would kill them after disarming them. The DM questioned the ability at first, but since my attacker used lethal force, I had the right to return the favor. The DM couldnt argue with that since two other lawful characters in my team did the same thing. So whatever applied to me had to be apply to them too. I could trash talk because it was neither lying since all I said was true or cheating since my opponent remained focus. Also I mentioned how powers were given to me by a God so its as form of cheat, which the DM and another player agreed so some changes had to be made.
Later on I change my code of conduct and presented it to my DM.
I could not be deceitful when talking. (I cannot lie or tell half-truths)
I could not use poison tactics, disease tactic, or magical weapons bestowed through spellcasting means. (I couldnt use a +1 weapon, but someone else couldnt put magical fire on my sword.)
I could use lethal force and necessary force, but only if Im attacked first.
I cannot torture or maim anyone nor can I arrest anyone unless given proper authority.
I may use my powers for myself or to benefit others. (An avatar is no good to his/her God, if they are unable to heal themselves to stay alive)
I can take action against evil that threaten a city or nation.
I cannot take part or execute the orders of someone I know is evil. (In other words, I cannot party with someone is evil or be commanded by them.)
Huh? I have no idea what you are talking about. What cross-classing exploits in a tabletop game could you possibly be referring to?
Dude, I didnt say there were any combinations to exploit. Im saying that BECAUSE DND TAILORS to you and your partys gameplay, there is no reason for players to try to create class combination in order to beat the game the DM has created.
The same cannot be said about NWN because the gameplay isnt tailored to your players. The monsters and dungeons are defaulted, meaning they are scripted to function that way against your character. Plus, the DM isnt on 24 hours a day so the players are free to play in ways they want.
That's what I'm referring to when I say that electronic RPG and MMORPG developers have a habit of deciding something is an exploit when it doesn't work properly or the way they expected or the player combines things in a way that allows them to excel in a manner that is not consistent with the majority of their fellow players.
Thats exactly why I got kicked out. My pure class cleric excelled at everything everyone else did.
Secondly, I can guarantee that I could make a module that would wreck your cleric if s/he didn't have a party with them, without making a single monster outside of your level range.
Thats exactly what the DM of that module said and I soloed his game by the way. He made the game hard enough for you to have to be dependent on other team members, but cleric are one man armies. The more difficult he made the game, the more I arranged my spells and feat to tackle the problem. Eventually, I playing less and less like a cleric.
For example; I would use darkness spells to blind my enemies so the DM gave the monsters either darkvision or true seeing. So I switch up my tactics and use Blades (forgot the name of the spell) and cast the spell right in front of me. This made the fights incredible short for the henchmen who came at me. For boss battles, I healed myself a lot and buffed before the fight began. You could say I played my cleric like Paladin/Wizard.
The only way you could put me at disadvantage is if you took away some the spells I have or if you gave the monster incredibly high status, but then you would be putting other players at a disadvantage as well. If you put the monster together that would still put other players at disadvantage because I can summon a pet to take damage while I prepare spell take out those enemies.
And thats what Im talking about with catering in both tabletop and NWN. NWN is a game; therefore, the player mentality changes to find ways to beat the game. Tabletop is a FUN SESSION; therefore, you do not have to exploit the game and EVEN if you did the DM would see it and counter it by killing your character off or presenting a challenge that would cripple you.
The ranger can still hit the undead; just because he can't turn them or at later levels destroy them with a single spell, doesn't mean he's ineffective.
Nice way to duck answering the question, but I wasnt saying the Ranger is ineffective. Rather Im saying the Paladin is more effective than the Ranger at battling undead and evil. And because the Paladin is able to fight both undead and evil there is no reason to cross class a Ranger with a Paladin. In cross classing a Paladin with a Ranger, I would weaken my Paladins ability rather than help them. This is why I said cross classing is flawed.
You're trying to pick up abilities that your class does not have, not augment abilities you already have.
You cross class to augment your abilities, period. A fighter/wizard only cross-class to benefit from both spellcasting and fighting. A wizard cross-classes with an Eldrith Knight so he can retain spellcasting while gaining fighter like attack bonus. You dont cross class a Rogue with a Ranger because you need more than 10 levels for your pet to be any good. You dont cross class for any other reason except to augment your abilities by giving yourself advantages to use certain feats or abilities. However, in tabletop games, they put restriction on the class to prevent you from continuing to benefit from class abilities or advancing in that class.
If you could ignore those rules and make up your own, what would be the point of having expanded books about different classes and restrictions? WotC makes money off people who take the rule literally.
The reason you can is because you stopped improving your primary class just so you can learn those skills. Your statement above completely refutes your Bruce Lee / Benjamin Franklin example.
Uh, no, my statement did no such thing. Bruce was still learning martial art when he was going to college so you can do both at the same time. Benjamin Franklin worked printing press company, kept himself in shape and invented the oven all while practice philosophies. My statement was saying thats illogical to think that you can have one primary goal.
Completely untrue. I only have one character in WoW, a level 60 paladin.
HOW ARE YOU GOING TO SAY SOMETHING IS UNTRUE IF YOU DONT KNOW WHAT I REFERRING TO. Youre so quick to say your right, but your slow to admit youre wrong.
Dude I was referring to the Warriors PvE prowess and not dueling prowess. Speaking of PvP, Paladins suck at it. They have a hard time killing anything and I use to play one. As a paladin you find yourself being a healing bot more than a Warrior/Priest blend. My point of saying that more people play the Warrior more in WoW than a Fighter in DnD has to do with the fact that the Warrior in WoW has own identity and its own class abilities, which is the something the DnD fighter lacks.
Paladins and Fighters share no less than 118 feats that I know of.
All the classes share the same damn abilities, your point? The fighter comes with no class feat as the paladin. The paladin gets smite evil and lay on hands for example, the fighter gets nothing except bonus feats. Excluding the general abilities, the only abilities the Paladin and Fighter share are equipment based feats.
I personally consider the fighter the strongest character in the game at low levels, not only because they are walking tanks with the highest HP and the widest range of available armor and weapons, but also because they are not hampered by the Paladin's lawful good alignment.
Actually, it depends on the game that fighter has advantage or disadvantage. Youre not guaranteed full-plated armor at the beginning of the game and both the paladin and warrior can use the same weapons. The paladin receives +1 or +2 less than Fighter in terms of HP (Dwarves have a +2 HP advantage) and the Fighter gets more general skills. Both are good tanks in the beginning since the fighter gets more HP and the paladin gets better save. The Fighter dominates for 3 levels and then Paladin surpasses him on the 4th level.
I would really like you to go into detail, because every time I look at the skills and feats there are a great many differences immediately apparent to me.
Rogue gets more skills and they arent thin out as much as Ranger in terms of status. Unless the Ranger a use simple weapon for dual-wielding and is expert marksman, the Ranger is going to put most of his points towards Str, Dex, Con, Wis, Int and a little in Cha. A Rogue only has to focus on Dex, Con, Int. I dont need to go pass 10 on Wis while both Str and Cha are a give or take. A rogue can use magic items and hes the most agile member of the group. Players are going to rely on a Rogue to be Mr. Fix than a Ranger. And why do the hell do we need assistance from your pet. Both Wizard/Sorcerer class and druid come with their own pets, plus instead of animal empathy, we can just kill the animal thats a threat to us. And its not like the pet is going to make a lick of difference and with the pet on our team you now have to worry about healing your pet when he starts dying meaning focusing less on the fight.
Rogues can also dual wielding, it may cost a few feats, but at least abilities wont be half-baked. As a Rogue, I can exploit the weakness of most enemies without having to pick a favor enemy. A Ranger can only 5 favor enemies to exploit and the extra damage they do is barely above a Fighter with weapon specialization. And the proof that the Ranger sucked was the fact that in 3.5, they had to blend the ranger more with a Fighter and Rogue. He went from an HP of D10 HP to D8 HP and was given Evasion. Everyone talked about how the Ranger sucked before 3.5. Now hes halfway decent.
The only thing the Ranger is better at than the Rogue is the HP really and you get a pet, which gives you an advantage in one on one fights.
What I am telling you is that the player needs to be reminded in the heat of the game that they are a specific alignment and that the actions they are considering taking may be antithetical to that alignment. As the DM, we should be reminding them of that fact and imposing repercussions to their actions that are in line with their changed behavior.
Thats not up to you to remind them. You have to play as if they understand their rules. You cannot do that you undermind your players gameplay and their roleplaying. Youre DM so be a DM and set the adventure. You shouldnt be telling them how they should be playing the game or how they should act. They can act out of alignment/character whenever they so please as long as it doesnt violate personality (Refer to my paladin example up above) OR if they are trying to change their alignment.
Huh? You choose your alignment, within certain exceptions. It isn't given to you, except if you are playing a character whose alignment is specifically dictated (i.e., a paladin).
Actually, no, a paladin code of conduct dictates their actions, not their alignment. A Rogue has more freedom than a paladin under the same alignment.
And that's the way it should work. It just sounds like the DM on the server you were banned from was hosting modules that were poorly designed or they didn't set the level restriction properly.
Actually, he did set the level restriction properly, but its hard to put a character capable of versatility without putting others at a disadvantage. While this mean have seemingly hurt the cleric, that DM who match CR levels with players level also had to go out of his way to edited the cleric spells to where they didnt work on themselves. They also had their non-holy spell were taken away. The Monk was also put at a disadvantage because monk cant fight anyone at their own level at the beginning of the game unless you give them the equipment to do so. He also had to heavily restrict cross-classing.
In the end, I still do not see the D&D system as flawed or even in need of simplification.
Thats because your conservative players. To you the DnD rules are a dogma. They HAVE to be followed. You claim the DnD ruleset doesnt prohibit you yet when I look player handbook and DM ruleset they say different.
Saying that Bruce Lee was an actor, teacher and a martial artist is actually misleading.
He had his own style and school of martials. He acted in movie and damn good fighter, not the best, but pretty good.
He taught martial arts (although he also taught philosophy - again, connected to martial arts)
Martial arts and philosophy are NOT the same. This coming from a martial artist himself. Martial artists are the ones who incorporate Buddhist and Confucius ideas into the martial arts, not the other way around.
and he acted in movies that were focused around the martial arts. This makes sense. He was specialized in the martial arts and the philosophies that guide the martial arts. He didn't teach astrophysics and he didn't play Hamlet. Those would be areas that would require specialized training to acquire excellence in.
He acted in movied prior to his martial arts action film. Hes been acting since he was kid.
Being a high school football player is hardly the same as being a professional football player; that is a specialization.
Actually, it is. This coming someone who has relative who use to play for the Green Bay Packers. They dont train a year around, they train for couple of months and they train every now and then to keep their muscle from weakening. Highschool players do the same thing.
Military is another perfect example. Youre to be soldier and learning civilian type jobs while in the military. You can still learn to survive as soldier using a God and learn to work an engine at the same time. You can specialize in more than one thing.
Since the class concept has existed since D&D first edition (known as OD&D) and it is doubtful that anyone among those RPG pioneers (Gygax and Arneson) were making a significant amount of money (as a three volume OD&D set only cost $10.00) I don't see how you relate the class concept or class restrictions to a money-making machination.
Most book publishing companies and certain board gaming companies only get a couple of cents to a dollar of your profits your book. So if I made a book that sold for $10 dollars, my publishers will only get 10 cents to 1 dollar while I get the rest of the 9 dollars. Now times that about a million and thats how much money youll have. DnD has sold worldwide. If Gygax didnt get his money then he squander his money away or forgot to copyright his ideas and thus bought out the rights from under him.
Also todays DnD books sell for 30 dollars. And this is the problem I was trying to get across to you from the get go is that DnD is the ONLY tabletop game ruling the market. To give you example, Marvel comic went bankruptcy and close their doors for good, DC comic would dominated the comic market and their comicbook prices would SHOOT through the roof because they would be the only source of comicbook entertainment. (I know they are other companies, but DC is one of the best comic companies)
Gygax copyrighted the D20 idea so it made it next to impossible to improve on it. It was until later that D20 ruleset was able to be used with other table top game, but it was too late. DnD had saturated the market with the product and other companies that try to come with their own games were overshadowed by DnD presents.
To make it simple, had Supermans creators (Superman being the first superhero) had copyright Superhero, you would not have Captain America or other Superheroes we have today.
Todays tabletop games that are non-Forgotten realms games have to sell their games for less than 20 dollars. If you try to go to a company with a new idea of how to do tabletops they reject the ideas because DnD games have the market tied up. DnD didnt evolve because the rules worked, DnD didnt evolved because they never had any competition!
They do, however, state on page 110 of the DM Guide (I am paraphrasing rather than quoting):
Those are variation of outcome the DM can look into. I said the book doesnt give you nor does the book give you ideas on varies way to use the Dice system.
A prestige class is an election to specialize in a small subset of your core classes' skills so that you can exceed the core class abilities in selected skills. As I said, it is perfectly logical
No, its actually not. I notice when reviewing the prestige classes, they are very restricted and very have a small number of abilities compare to core class. Prestige classes serve to give core classes more abilities and give the class a more identity. However, this ideas fails, at least with me because prestige lack in either improving abilities or making the class more define. Take the duelist for example, hes a thief without the sneak attack. Rather than making the duelist an extra class, his abilities should have been more expansion of what the Fighter, Rogue and Bard can do.
To put it simple, your core class are the dollars and your prestige classes are changes. Change by itself can't really buy anything useless which is how the prestige classes work, but you if pair your change up with dollars you can buy something.
Comments
DDO is most assuredly NOT a Guild Wars clone. Far from it in fact. Mod 3 is turning out quite fine as they tweek it. All MMO's suffer from content releasing in what some would call beta form. Turbine is doing a grand job.
But oh my Lord, it's not good either.
Repetition. Lack of dynamic storytelling. Lack of innovation. Broken skills. Technical issues. Lack of open terrain. Lack of climbing (real climbing, like up a tower wall), thieving skills (pickpocket, assassination, etc), PvP, solo play, spellcrafting, weapon crafting, armor crafting... lack of any other real locations besides the city.
I mean, it's not that it's horrible or anything. It's just not a good MMO and for those who have enjoyed PnP D&D, it's not even a good approximation. Heck, it's not even adequate.
The very least thing they could have done to improve it would have been to implement random spawning of traps and mobs in every new iteration of an instance so the player couldn't rote memorize trap and mob locations. It would have made repeating instances somewhat more interesting.
And to top all of that off, they charge a monthly fee. In my book, that is enough to create some extremely negative feedback. Especially when you consider that many of these things were brought up again and again during beta.
Abbatoir / Abbatoir Cinq
Adnihilo
Beorn Judge's Edge
Somnulus
Perfect Black
----------------------
Asheron's Call / Asheron's Call 2
Everquest / Everquest 2
Anarchy Online
Shadowbane
Dark Age of Camelot
Star Wars Galaxies
Matrix Online
World of Warcraft
Guild Wars
City of Heroes
As much as I believe you're making a valid and strong argument here, I must propose in question format: Have you ever been a Dungeon Master, or do you DM to this day at a very high level of play? The reason I ask is not to poke fun at you or anyone for that matter, it's because - I have; for many years I have DM'ed AD&D PnP games (not so much PnP recently because of NWN1 but stil DM'ing).
It's become apparent to me that not many PnP players of AD&D have had the pleasure of participating in the alternate rule-set that is actualy die-less. Although it's more promanent among real life action role players.
This rule-set is fantastic for speeding up the game because it's based in a qualitative style of play - circumstance/decision/outcome cycle - where you perform an action given an initial encounter circumstance, then deal with the new circumstance based on the severity of the action you took from your choice of decisions. All the standard encounter rules apply, like initiative, actions you can perform, feats, saving throws, etc.
However, in this format you do not have to throw the die/dice. Everything is weighed qualitavily rather than the standard roll-of-the-die quantitative way. Meaning that there is no way to escape harm completely. You will at least be very tired, or become a little more irrational for the next few minutes when decision making - all depeding on the severity of the circumstance you were faced with.
Odds are more fluently calculated as undertones rather than being the holistic or deterministic nature of AD&D roll-of-the-die encounters. Because lowering the number of initial calculations that are required at each encounter, based on your avatar's stats, more time can be spent in a pervasive calculation of what happens next; much like in real life when face with intense circumstance which cause the "fight or flight" symptoms.
I think the real problem with having a D&D video game is the lack of a DM. D&D Online attempts to create a sort of virtual DM, which is fairly effective, but it is obviously very time consuming to create dungeons this way, or they would have made more dungeons. There isnt that DM to constantly make new content for players to play, and that is the main problem with D&D Online, is it not? There isnt enough dungeons, and people are getting bored of doing the same instance runs over and over?
I do agree that NWN2 is competition for D&D, but I dont think it will 'destroy' D&D (although D&D is already pretty crippled as it is), and I certainly do not think NWN2 is better simply because it does not have a monthly fee, as the original poster falsely implied. NWN seems fun to me because it is made by real players, players who I can chat with, make suggestions to, and maybe even help create the world.
Does anyone know how many players will be able to be on a NWN2 server at a time?
A good fair-sized deticated NWN server with administrators who like to update the game world often is just as good as a MMORPG to me. In fact, I think it could be better, especially if you see the same people on every night, and you have a fun time grouping with them and fighting through the original dungeons and completing all the brand new player-created quests. It is much more intimate than a MMORPG.
Play as your fav retro characters: cnd-online.net. My site: www.lysle.net. Blog: creatingaworld.blogspot.com.
In the last interview I recall the person from Obsidian stated, that through the tools provided, a module can be expanded to host the same number of online players as NWN1. So that would mean 64 players as well.
but the fact that the game revolves around dice rolling. So if you
remove the dice from the game, you could add more stuff. However, if
you remove the dice then that DnD game will become just another RPG.
Another thing that hurts the DnD transcending into a good game is the
limit flexibility of classes and cross-classing. Gameplay shouldn't be
restricted by the class you choose, but the feats and skill you picked.
However, WotC refuses to change that and the game suffers as result of
it.
That's a very good analysis of the ongoing ills to finding the happy medium translating into an Electronic Ruleset, CaptainRPG. I don't think there is much to add to your statement.
when I say there is more wrong with DnD then just the ruleset. The
Tabletop market has been ruined by Forgotten Realms as well.
Turbine is the Uwe Boll of MMO's. Eberron is a weak crappy DnD world on paper and online. Forgotten Realms would have at least been fun and familiar to the majority. They probably were forced to do an Eberron setting but whats done is done. DDO is not a grind fest it's a bore fest. Do mission ABC over and over but wait as an added bonus they never change so you can expect no brain power to blitz through them. GW is far more advanced so comparing the 2 games is hilarious. What's even funnier is GW is free.
Turbine couldn't even get a free AC trial right just recently. What a sad company.
The thing is, D&D IS just another roleplaying game. It just happens to be one of the first (if not the first) and the one most heavily expanded on.
When you look at every other RPG, nearly every single one regardless of the game mechanics (six-sided dice, ten sided, etc) or their rulesets follow the same basic mechanics. For an electronic representation, it is actually less important that the actual dice exist than it is that the player can quantify the impact of their choices on their character's performance in a given area.
D&D PnP players can tell you down to the gnat's backside what effect dual-wielding, ambidexterity and two-weapon style would have on their combat effectiveness. If I, as the developer, only tell the player that taking a given skill will improve their chances to hit without quantifying the level of improvement numerically, the player still feels like every choice they make is a crap shoot. It is frustrating to the player to have to guess what skills will make them more effective, particuarly if they are unfamiliar with the system and even more so if they are familiar with the system and the effect of a given skill does not match expectations from PnP experience.
The crux of the issue with D&D has less to do with translating the PnP ruleset to a dynamic electronic medium (although accurately portraying that system is very important) than it does with the fact that the majority of PnP D&D players actually make some attempt to roleplay while the same cannot be said for a huge majority of MMO players; even those who play DDO, which should epitomize the hardcore roleplaying community.
Who can blame them? Jaegar the dwarf looks almost exactly like Prolly the dwarf. Who can tell the difference? What makes Jaegar special? If I'm not special, why bother roleplaying? What exists to motivate roleplay? What mechanics differentiate me from every other player of the same race/class? What dramatic elements exist to motivate me to roleplay?
So the challenge shifts from representing the PnP game mechanics in a realistic and dynamic manner to presenting the game in a way that allows the roleplayers to actually roleplay.
That means you have to include elements in the game that foster roleplay and you need to include all of the facets of the PnP game that add to that element. This begins with dynamic character customization, to include the ability to add a backstory with linked roots in the game. Those roots add to the drama of the game. If Jaegar comes from Hacker's Ridge, give him a home, a family (siblings, father, mother, etc. if they want one) and use that to motivate the player.
Just for example; one of the primary spells a wizard can expect to have available to them is Melf's Acid Arrow. No one who plays D&D can fail to recognize the spell. The issue is, the spell comes from a line of spells created by.... Melf.
In DDO (or any electronic D&D game, minus possibly NWN1/2) who is Melf? Can the player create a line of spells? Or armor? Or weapons?
What would Elric be without Stormbringer? Yrkoon without Mournblade?
So basic crafting abilities that are represented in the PnP game need to be in the electronic rendition to allow the player to express themselves. It becomes roleplaying-centric that a player becomes well-known by their creations. The blades of X have become legendary, passing from hand to hand, etc. It adds to the backstory and allows for player-created content.
That's just one example. There are many others that are not properly presented in electronic D&D games. Challenges that few can accomplish or even only ONE can accomplish, such as stealing a fabled gemstone from a heavily guarded tower keep. The rogue or group who accomplishes it becomes known for the feat. After they steal the fabled gemstone, that incredible feat isn't repeatable by five thousand other players who follow the "Guide to stealing the fabled gemstone" that the rogue posts to a fansite or the official boards. You have to have enough of these events so that everyone feels like at some point they may be able to accomplish it and it is something they become known for.
As an example; when every other server in Asheron's Call had unleashed Bael-Zharon by destroying the Shard of the Herald that imprisoned him, one server called Thistledown held out. Players protected the shard from every attacker and they did such a good job that the developers themselves had to step in and create specialty characters and gather help from other players to defeat them and destroy the shard. If they didn't, they could not update the servers with Bael-Zharon's release unless ALL the servers had destroyed the shard because of the way the servers were designed.
To represent the outstanding defense of the Shard, the developers erected a special monument on the Thistledown server with the names of the defenders.
They used the event to foster enormous drama. I myself was a defender on Solclaim when Khao and his vassals turned on us and destroyed the Shard on our server.
You can read more about the event here.
Incredible drama. Fantastic use of the game mechanics to foster roleplay. I haven't been involved in an event of this type in any MMO since.
And of course, there's the question of suitably representing character alignment. Without a solid and established social structure in the villages, towns, etc., that you enter, having an alignment is practically useless. Nothing you do has any real impact.
For example; you enter a lawful good city. The player is confronted with the legal system from the outset. Their actions have positive and negative results while in the environment. If the player is a thief and they pick a pocket and are discovered, they are pursued and perhaps even caught.
Every NPC in the game needs to be attackable; evil characters should be able to slay innocent bystanders at will until they are caught or defeated. If you cast Chained Lightning into a mixed crowd of innocents and bad guys and you hit a few innocents, there have to be consequences.
If Drizzt lived in the world of DDO (or just about any other electronic D&D game) there wouldn't be any conflict at all because regardless of the backstory the player envisions for themselves, they have no way to express it in the world. Drizzt would truly be a rebel without a cause in DDO.
Finally, the developers (or more appropriately, the support staff) need to be able to interact with the players in meaningful ways and add content and storyline elements on the fly, from global events all the way down to team events. Going back to the player roots concept, if the player elects to have a family of some kind, what if the game support team has the player's brother show up to tell him/her that their village is being attacked? Does the player ignore their "brother"? What kind of conflicting and interesting elements emerge in the player's group when s/he has to decide to return to their village?
The reason that cross-classing and the flexibility of classes is limited in D&D is intentional; it's supposed to represent that a character can become good at some things, great at other things and learn nearly nothing about specific skills in their lifetime. It mirrors the reality of being a living person.
While many people can be jacks-of-all-trades, it would be unique to find someone who had mastered them all. That's what the D&D system is meant to represent.
If I meet Jim and his friend tells me "Hey, I'd like you to meet Jim; he's a mechanic" is his friend saying that's all Jim is, a mechanic? Or is he telling me that Jim is professional mechanic and as I get to know Jim, I find out he's also a passable painter, a part-time welder, etc.?
The feats and skills that you select outside of your direct class represent the jack-of-all-trades aspect. It allows you to round out your character while giving you class bonuses for those skills and feats that are aligned with your chosen class. It is an attempt to reflect reality and now, more than ever, the system is much more robust than it has ever been in the past.
There are literally a thousand small touches that could be added to foster roleplaying and improve gameplay. The real issue is finding a development studio that cares more about the game than they do about the bottom line. Because in the end, a truly robust feature set that would be capable of supporting these features would take a great deal of time to develop properly and time in development is literally money. Everything is going out and nothing is coming in, minus investment capital.
Abbatoir / Abbatoir Cinq
Adnihilo
Beorn Judge's Edge
Somnulus
Perfect Black
----------------------
Asheron's Call / Asheron's Call 2
Everquest / Everquest 2
Anarchy Online
Shadowbane
Dark Age of Camelot
Star Wars Galaxies
Matrix Online
World of Warcraft
Guild Wars
City of Heroes
an electronic game, if you were to remove the dice then DnD would just
be another rpg game. Every function in DnD revolves around dice
rolling. If you do a flip, if you are trying to persuade someone to do
something, etc. it all requires you to use the dice rule. In my game, I
eliminate the constant need for dice. You only use one dice and that's
the D20.
2. The problem with DnD isn't just the dice. The huge number of
classes, clone class, requirements to transcend into another class and
the class spefici level up bonus, which hinders my gameplay as both the
player and the character. For example, if I'm a paladin, I have a
limits my gameplay and the number of choice as to whom I can cross
class with because of strict alignment, the class benefits on level up
and types of I can acquire. In otherwords, it makes no sense to
cross-class a paladin with a ranger because the Paladin abilities only
favor himself rather than the Ranger abilities or the pet.
Although, the ranger gets favored enemy, the paladin gets a favored
enemy (IN A SENSE) towards evil (any living creature with
intelligence), demons and undead so the ranger's favored doesn't help
my paladin out all that much since the paladin comes with feats that
work similar to it.
Then they are the clone class like Ranger and Rogue. They are the same
class in my opinion. Both can attack your eneimes weak points, go in
stealth and can set/disable traps. The only thing that's them apart is
the pet. However, some for dumb reason the ranger can hit an undead's
enemy point, but a Rogue can't. To me that's a complete waste of time
making clone classes.
Lastly, if I cross-class, my spells and certain feats get weaker. Most prestiges class favor non-law or
non-good alignments. And the others have requirements like having such
and such skill or such and such feat, which makes prestiges class all
that more unfavorable. (Plus they can weaken your skill)
In my game, I based everything around skill and feats. You can say, my
style of rpging is similar to Bruce Lee Intercepting Fist because there
is no class system, you character is strength and weakened by their
choice of skill. There is no personality alignment or a requirement for
a God. (Though you can still choose to believei n a God)
3. The mechanics of tabletop and video-games are completely differen.
Like cross-classing for example, when apply to a video games, it
becomes an exploits. You see DnD tabletop games are made up by the DM.
The DM put monsters in your path that were designed to be tackle
speficially by your party so there is no reason to try to exploit the
tabletop version of the game and even if you did the DM could see it
and counter it. However, in most video game versions, the monsters set
in dungeons by default and the game isn't design to revolve your
character, but rather it is design for your character to go through it.
After realizing this, I understood how useless the class system was and
that DnD rules (both video game and tabletop) needed to change to be in
favor of the characters feats and skills rather than their class.
4. The Monster levels were another case. Instead of starting monster at
certain levels, it would be best to start at default levels. As a DM,
for me it was hard to understand the monsters levels, HP and how they
worked. So I made up my own monster status starting from level 1 and
then leveling the monster up to level they would be a must challenge.
However, video game version of the monsters cannot be level up in this
way and doing so could cause them to be overpowered.
5. Lack of items was another problems. In fact, DnD in general doesn't
have a large inventory of items. Bastard of +1 is no different from a
regular bastard sword. It's the same sword except now you can buy pass
DR. In my game, I created two sets of items: simple and martial. Simple
weapons can be wielding in one or dual-handed while martial weapons can
be used in one or both hands. This allowed players 4 styles of combat
without having to pick the feat to use weapons in such ways.
I could go on and on how DnD is messed up as both a tabletop game and
video games, but it would take a long time to explain. Simply put, the
game has to many restriction on it, which slows down gameplay and have
long become obscelete.
Somnulus, you're in effect describing what the next gen MMORPGs need to contain to make the purchase and subscription worthwhile. I have tried getting into the flow of several recent MMOs, only to find myself unhappy at the sad state of communities having no respect for the other humans there, or endless torture of leet speak while a heavy RP session is in play. I don't know... there is just no happy medium anymore because everybody wants the "NEXT" MMO to contain what they want. I remember when people woudn't play EQ PvP because it was too hardcore. So EQ became niche in attraction and retention.
MMORPGs = meh, nowdays.
I want niche to come back, but not in a state like that of DDO, sorry. It's just not enough. Not at this point. DDO would have been fine if we were back in the day of AC, but we're not. DDO is too little too late. It's a 5 year old RPG that is barely MMO. That's just unforgivable.
And again, back to my point, D&D is just like every other RPG game. Or rather, every other RPG is just like D&D.
The extent that dice are used or not used is entirely up to the DM in a tabletop game. That's discretionary. There are many situations where, if the player's skill is sufficient, I have no requirement for them to roll any die at all. Why bother if their success rate is a given? On the off chance that they'll fumble? Every once in a while, it adds something to the storyline but you have to make sure that it's not blocking the play progression.
Using dice isn't a limitation of D&D. There has to be a statistical and quantifiable method for the player to gauge success or failure in any given action. How often you use the dice is a personal preference.
I haven't seen it stated anywhere in the ruleset that you must roll the dice in each and every situation for every action. What that means is that the ruleset provides the guidelines for the effects of every player action that they can by using dice to quantify that effect. It doesn't mean you have to do it that way.
The class bonuses are meant to represent the effect of specializing in a given field. Like my previous example, if you study engines and repair engines for a living, then you're probably a good mechanic. You do other things, but being a good mechanic is your primary bread and butter.
Since characters in D&D don't really have a "lifespan" to speak of, short of dying in-game, there has to be a way to represent this kind of specializing in the character's development. Again, it's simple logic and not a limitation.
Alignment rarely affects dual or multi-class, as nearly every class can meet the low end of another alignment, minus diametric opposites where the class requirement makes it so that they must maintain a strict ethos in order to be that class, per your example of the paladin. There really isn't another class that is quite that strict. The paladin's alignment restriction is meant to purposely hinder the player in their roleplaying choices. It's not a design flaw, it's a purposeful imposition of a standard of conduct expected of the paladin.
Since you as the paladin also gain feats and abilities similar to a fighter, if your alignment should change, either purposefully or through misadventure, you still have a plethora of options for your paladin in any of the fighter specialties. You just can't be a paladin anymore. This is a roleplaying opportunity for both the player and the DM. Has the player fallen out of favor with their god? Have they injured the "church"? Can they be redeemed and become a paladin again? Nothing in the rules says it is not possible.
On the other end of the spectrum, what if the fall from grace is so great that the paladin becomes an anti-paladin (death knight)?
Along the way, the player picks up new skills, feats and abilities, dual or multi-classes as they see fit. Perhaps they will never be a paladin again. But that was the choice they made. No one ever said it's easy being a Catholic priest or the member of any clergy. That's what it's supposed to represent.
Not sure I really understand you here. Are you saying that because a paladin gets bonus abilities versus evil and undead that they have no use for animal husbandry, tracking, etc? I guess I don't see your point. It's really up to the player to decide what they need or don't need or what works for them.
They aren't clones at all. The two classes are distinctly different for many reasons.
Here, look at it in another way that might help; Rangers are basically failed druid/clerics. They were allowed priest spells 1-3rd up through second edition and the spell list for third edition basically follows that same general guide. They have animal empathy and their tracking is normally woodland-based, with a modifier applied for urban environments.
The ranger's druid/priest sub-class type also explains their ability with undead.
Thieves don't cast spells; if you're roleplaying it properly, their tracking is urban-based. They focus on trap detection/removal/setting. They have special allowances for "sneak attacks". They are allowed to use dexterity as an attack modifier. They don't have pets.
Though the two classes share some commonalities, they are quite distinct.
Yes, of course spells and certain feats get weaker. By choosing a prestige class, you, the player, are electing to focus your area of specialization in one narrow place to get the most out of a relatively small number of skills and abilities.
It is akin to a martial arts master studying for his/her entire life until they can do the "death touch". Eventually, they can kill a person with one blow but how will that impact their overall speed, flexibility, accuracy or strength? If the "death touch" is based purely on will (as it is most often described) you're going to have to figure that those other areas will have atrophied a bit.
It still follows a logical flow.
Again, in the end, no one is forcing anyone to take on a prestige class.
If that works for you, fantastic! Personally, I couldn't imagine playing D&D without character alignment; something needs to remind the player of who they are and if they decide they want to be something else, a change of alignment lets them know that their actions aren't in line with their character concept. That's fine, as long as they realize that if they're a lawful good character and they burn down an orphanage with all the orphans inside just for giggles, they aren't a lawful good character anymore. At that point, that's where the social structure kicks in and it's either time for the player to beat feet out of town, go to jail or get strung up by a mob.
The impact of that one act follows them. You may have done a huge amount of good in your life, but the moment you stood there with a torch in your hand and giggled while the orphanage burned down, you pretty much just wiped out a lot of good will.
Skills are great. They augment the character's main class selection, just like you, in your life, have some skills that are more finely honed than others and some skills that are completely absent. I haven't seen anything in any D&D PnP session that worked any differently.
The concept of optimizing a character within a given ruleset being an "exploit" is entirely developer-driven and it's derived from the fact that the developer feels like since they make the rules, they can change the rules. It usually emerges from an electronic RPG or MMORPG game system that is not balanced properly to begin with. Once the developer realizes that players have discovered combinations of skills, etc., that allow them to perform better than their fellow players, they start to panic.
If you go to a DM and say "I found a combination of feats and skills that allow my character to add +10 to his attack roll" and they look at the rules and see that you're right, there's littel they can do to affect that since they didn't make the rules, unless they just start making up their own rules (which occasionally does happen).
Actually, most developers do try to design monsters to revolve around the player; to present them with a reasonable and interesting challenge, just like we, as DMs, would do for our players. The problem is that they feel as though they have failed if "Jaegar" comes in and wreaks havoc on their monsters. They start to wonder if they made it too easy. Then they look at Jaegar's build and start to see that perhaps their ruleset is flawed. Then the nerf bat swings. The developers also feel pressured to present the same game experience to every player regardless of the type of character they have designed. Often this means giving classes that are purely support ridiculous abilities to "balance" them with classes that are designed to do damage or to absorb damage. This even extends to utility-type abilities.
If the developer just stuck to their character classes and said "that's the way it was designed; you chose a healing class, you heal. You don't lay down massive damage" then while you may lose some discontented players, at least those remaining would know that they didn't have to fear constant nerfing and changes as a result of player complaints about support classes or comparative abilities. That kind of homogenizing ruins a lot of MMORPGs.
In theory I agree with you; in practice though, I have to say that defined classes with specific skills and abilities for them and augmenting abilities, feats and skills reflects reality.
The one thing that could really make a true classless system work would be if the choices made by the player reflected a serious time investment. This would reflect the point at which the player decides to stop being a fighter and start being a wizard. Which is pretty much the way multi-classing works in D&D now. It's akin to deciding to stop being a mechanic and start being a marine biologist. You don't just buy a boat and start snapping pictures of fish and submitting work to scientific journals. Not that you couldn't; but it's unlikely that your work would be published or taken seriously. You have to actually learn about marine biology first.
Meanwhile, they start producing hydrogen fuel based cars and while you spend three years studying marine biology, you decide it's not for you and return to being a mechanic only to find that you don't know squat about hydrogen fuel vehicles.
I understand what you are saying here, but the final part of your statement is actually untrue. In Asheron's Call, as an opponent NPC (monster) killed more players, it gained levels, just like the player. You could actually see the little level animation around them while it happened. When we were assaulting Ithaenc Cathedral, I must have levelled up literally hundreds of sclavi.
Now, it did start at a static challenge level but that's for the player. It allows them to gauge their ability relative to what they're fighting.
I'm not sure what you are basing a "lack of items" in D&D on; there are pages and pages of items in D&D.
Each feat represents a time investment on the player's part in learning the best way to wield that particular weapon or combinations of weapons. Without any feat representation, the player picks up a weapon and off s/he goes. That's just not very realistic or fair. It means that a level 1 player could basically wield a weapon just as well as a level 20 player. Unless I'm misinterpreting your comment from above "without having to pick the feat to use weapons in such ways".
We'll just have to agree to disagree on that. What you have to keep in perspective is that D&D emerged from a tabletop wargame simulation. Its design intent has been to approximate how a human being learns and masters skills, how long it takes and how effective they can expect to become within a given time frame (level 1 thru 20, for example). It does a fine job of it.
The tabletop game is as slow as you make it. My experiences in PnP D&D have been exciting, even when they were moving slowly. That slowdown was a good thing; it allowed me to take some time, roleplay and make decisions about my actions. That's not necessarily a bad thing and it's not a reflection on the game mechanics, which far from being obsolete, are emulated by nearly every MMORPG and RPG on the market, without exception.
Abbatoir / Abbatoir Cinq
Adnihilo
Beorn Judge's Edge
Somnulus
Perfect Black
----------------------
Asheron's Call / Asheron's Call 2
Everquest / Everquest 2
Anarchy Online
Shadowbane
Dark Age of Camelot
Star Wars Galaxies
Matrix Online
World of Warcraft
Guild Wars
City of Heroes
Interestingly enough, we often speak of the PnP to electronic rules conversion problems, the environments seem to translate very well to electronic format. Which leads me to ask why, programmaticaly, is it so difficult to reproduce the rules in an easy to select what you want to force interactive rolls for, rather than always trying to make the die roll simpler?
I can envision a system where a USB adapter with a Pop-o-matic Trouble type of die casing, that would permit each of the six dice to be self contained with a magnetic register in the floor plate that would read the value of the die. Sure it would have its own set of design challenges, like how many sensors to add in each bubble to confirm a proper roll, cause lord knows there would be attemps at hacking these as well.
And as well, there would be other adapters to hack the USB signal to improve number of the rolls. Anyhow, I'm straying off point.
This adapter would take out all of the automated dice rolling by the software and would only have to read the input, pass it along and the software would perfom according to the roll. I think this would bring back a level of interaction that I feel is missing in many of games today. Some might say it's only a novelty, but I think there is merit to this idea. The game would be playable with others online, and would as well bring true table top to the "desktop pc".
And it's funny how GURPS never enters these types of discussions. Would GURPS be easier to implement?
I don't really think it's a case of making the die roll easier, or even of visually seeing the dice themselves. The player wants to see a quantitative effect from the choices they make as they progress through the game. It's as simple as that.
When "Jaegar" selects Improved Parry, he wants to see it in action immediately after selecting it. He expects to be more effective in blocking blows and often, he wants to be able to break that effect down into a percentage representation of how much more effective he is compared to what he may have gained from another skill or feat selection because he is seeking to optimize his character within the given environment.
Too many electronic game developers working in an RPG or MMORPG environment try to mask the effect of skill selections from the player because they want to avoid min/maxing within the game environment. Not only is this frustrating to the player because they have to guess what the effect of each skill or feat selection really is in game terms, but it's not really the developer's business to stop that behavior. It's a natural human desire to want to do well and to meet and exceed challenges presented to them. It's the developer's job to present them with consistent challenge, not to handicap them when they succeed.
I think adaptations of GURPS never enter these discussions because the basic system of assigning point values to specific areas and adding or subtracting based on advantages or disadvantages is a standard game mechanic in most RPG/MMORPGs that aren't attempting to adhere strictly to D&D and it is easier to use because there is a direct and quantitative reflection of choices in player-character ability and effectiveness.
In the long and short of it, though, GURPS still represents the same statistical chance of effectiveness with modifiers (dice) that represent success or failure in any given situation, just like D&D. The main difference is that when you assign X number of points to Strength in the GURPS system, you know not only what that number represents in melee skill terms but you also know that your ability to take damage (basic hit points) is based on that number. You can use a calculator to estimate how effective you will be in a given area based entirely on point assignment.
The only real difference between D&D and GURPS is that D&D relies much more heavily on the random factor of dice rolls in character creation. Even there, the rules have been modified so that a player doesn't necessarily have to worry about crippling their character.
But in action, GURPS uses dice rolls just like D&D (although it uses six-sided dice).
Again, I would have to say that the actual rolling of dice isn't an absolute necessity as long as the player understands the direct effectiveness of their choices and all given modifiers within the game context. So if they understand that statistically, an action has a given percentile chance of being successful and that given the counters to that action (resistances, etc) they can expect a certain result, even if they aren't particuarly happy with the result they will at least know the reasons why that result occurred.
Abbatoir / Abbatoir Cinq
Adnihilo
Beorn Judge's Edge
Somnulus
Perfect Black
----------------------
Asheron's Call / Asheron's Call 2
Everquest / Everquest 2
Anarchy Online
Shadowbane
Dark Age of Camelot
Star Wars Galaxies
Matrix Online
World of Warcraft
Guild Wars
City of Heroes
In America I have bad teeth. If I lived in England my teeth would be perfect.
NWN2 is true to the D&D legacy. It is a decent game, an homage.
DDO is an action game that has very little to do with the legacy set prior. DDO is nice, in it ways.
But the games don't appeal to the same audience. NWN2 appeals to GAMERS, while DDO appeal to ACTION-fans. They both got flaws. But I buy NWN2 and I am happy with this purchase. I never buy DDO and I wouldn't, no matter what, simply because DDO isn't a rpg to start with, DDO is an action game with a rpg skin, not a rpg.
NWN2, despite all it flaws, is a rpg, and a decent one at it. It respect it legacy. I will replay NWN2 now that I complete it, it is not a pressing matter and I am not that motivated to do it, but I will in time, as I grew bored with some other stuff. NWN2 is far from perfect, but comparing it with...DDO? Come on, this ain't fair. DDO is a total RPG-disaster since it isn't a RPG to start with...
- "If I understand you well, you are telling me until next time. " - Ren
NWN2 is true to the D&D legacy. It is a decent game, an homage.
DDO is an action game that has very little to do with the legacy set prior. DDO is nice, in it ways.
But the games don't appeal to the same audience. NWN2 appeals to GAMERS, while DDO appeal to ACTION-fans. They both got flaws. But I buy NWN2 and I am happy with this purchase. I never buy DDO and I wouldn't, no matter what, simply because DDO isn't a rpg to start with, DDO is an action game with a rpg skin, not a rpg.
NWN2, despite all it flaws, is a rpg, and a decent one at it. It respect it legacy. I will replay NWN2 now that I complete it, it is not a pressing matter and I am not that motivated to do it, but I will in time, as I grew bored with some other stuff. NWN2 is far from perfect, but comparing it with...DDO? Come on, this ain't fair. DDO is a total RPG-disaster since it isn't a RPG to start with...
The only thing I was trying to point out was the fact that according to the OP "NWN2 is going to destroy this game."
Well it didn't, in fact its as much of a let down as DDO was to some people.
In America I have bad teeth. If I lived in England my teeth would be perfect.
I haven't found NWN2 disappointing in the least. It worked well right out of the box, the graphics are a huge upgrade compared to NWN and I haven't had a single bug or issue that has kept me from enjoying the game immensely.
I honestly think that many people raised their expectations just a wee bit too high. Many complaints talk about how this is the same, that is the same as NWN. Considering how much fun NWN was, is that a bad thing? Not in my opinion.
Just honestly having a blast playing the game. And I can seriously say that NWN2 beats the heck out of DDO, in just about every way you can conceive of.
Abbatoir / Abbatoir Cinq
Adnihilo
Beorn Judge's Edge
Somnulus
Perfect Black
----------------------
Asheron's Call / Asheron's Call 2
Everquest / Everquest 2
Anarchy Online
Shadowbane
Dark Age of Camelot
Star Wars Galaxies
Matrix Online
World of Warcraft
Guild Wars
City of Heroes
Yes, of course spells
and certain feats get weaker. By choosing a prestige class, you, the player,
are electing to focus your area of specialization in one narrow place to get
the most out of a relatively small number of skills and abilities.
Its narrow minded to think because you specialize in
something you cannot be just as good in something else. Thats not even logic.
Benjamin Franklin was an inventory, philosopher and he was strong as an ox
before he reach middle age. Bruce Lee was an actor, teacher and martial artist.
I know friends who were former highschool football players
who were as smart as they were tough. However, I do believe depending at what
point and time you try to versify will hurt you in terms of skills. But you
shouldnt have to switch between both classes to just to specialize in them
both nor should be half-way skilled in two or more fields.
My game focuses on letting players eliminate class and most
class restrictions to build a character of their choice. It can work since Ive
done it my last session, but tabletop games would lose money if everything were
simplified.
I haven't seen it
stated anywhere in the ruleset that you must roll the dice in each and every
situation for every action.
I have the DM guide and you have to use roll for a lot of
situations. And book doesnt give you any advice to do freestyle dice roll
rules. They wouldnt make any money off of you if they did. I have a basic rule
for dice in my game. You only rule a D20 and a D20 for magic attacks, traps,
attacking and skill usage. There is no spell resistance for example and rolling
a successful save reduces the damage (If not null it) against a magic all
spell.
Since you as the
paladin also gain feats and abilities similar to a fighter
No, you dont. The paladin gets its own class feats and class
spell. The only thing the paladin gets thats similar to the Fighter is the equipment
they can use. The Fighter doesnt get any class feats of its own the fighters
get general feats and bonus feats. The Fighters is the second weakest character
in the game and he only good for making a character to cross class with. They
actually did a poll one time in NWN and the poll relieve fighters were the
least played class. And we had a discussion about the Fighters because anything
the Fighter can do, the Paladin can do, but better.
If you played WoW, the Warrior plays a significant roll
because the class has its own skills, meaning he was more than a tank. Now why
would the Warrior is more favorable to play in WoW, but not the Fighter in NWN.
Simply because DnD players know that a Paladin offers more than a Fighter and
can get the same generals feats.
They aren't clones at
all. The two classes are distinctly different for many reasons.
They are the same class with small distinction dealing with
HP, skills and feats. I could go into detail with that, but between the two,
the Rogue is superior.
If that works for you,
fantastic!
Oh the irony of this statement.
Personally, I couldn't
imagine playing D&D without character alignment; something needs to remind
the player of who they are and if they decide they want to be something else, a
change of alignment lets them know that their actions aren't in line with their
character concept.
Youre telling me you need an alignment to remind you that
you should play a Blackguard as evil character? Alignment like classes are BS
because your class controls your personality not alignment. We had a huge
discussion on alignment and the Rogue in the Paper and Pencil forum on another
board, a lot of DMs agreed, you cant be a Rogue and lawful good since being
lawful means you uphold the law and you fight honorably. And if youre not
going to use the Rogues skills then why be a Rogue?
Also I learned in NWN and tabletop, you do not have to RPG
the exact personality alignment given to you. I was attacking from the back as
a paladin in my NWN sessions and paladin talked a lot of trash in my tabletop
sessions. As long as my trash talk didnt violate my code of conduct. As matter
of fact, I late changed my code of conduct to fit my characters.
How your character acts is completely up to you.
The concept of
optimizing a character within a given ruleset being an "exploit" is
entirely developer-driven and it's derived from the fact that the developer
feels like since they make the rules, they can change the rules. It usually
emerges from an electronic RPG or MMORPG game system that is not balanced
properly to begin with. Once the developer realizes that players have
discovered combinations of skills, etc., that allow them to perform better than
their fellow players, they start to panic.
Actually, no, I played NWN and tabletop session and the
difference as I said earlier is that tabletop sessions are catered to your
party. The DM throws monsters and dungeons your way that your characters can
deal with better. A DM wouldnt throw a monster with a DR at you unless you had
spellcasters that could help you by pass the monsters DR. Tailoring the
gameplay to your party discourages cross-classing exploits.
Also in one NWN session, the DM went out of his way to put
my character (a cleric) at a disadvantage. He made the monsters harder by
giving them certain abilities, but it didnt work because my cleric was so
versatile that he could tackle anything without the need for a party. I was
kicked and ban from that server. By making the game harder, he only encouraged
me to exploit the game more.
Yet, in another server, the DM had one simple program. No
matter what your level was, the monsters would get stronger depending the level
you reached. In other words, if you were level 10 then the monsters will have a
CR level between level 7 to 10. This not only eliminated high level farming,
but it stopped low level characters from party with high level characters.
This worked better than tailoring the monsters to take on my
characters because the more advantages he gave the monsters only put other
classes at a disadvantage.
Not sure I really
understand you here. Are you saying that because a paladin gets bonus abilities
versus evil and undead that they have no use for animal husbandry, tracking,
etc? I guess I don't see your point. It's really up to the player to decide what
they need or don't need or what works for them.
To put it simple for you, if you had a Ranger and a Paladin in
the same party who would you rather use to eliminate the undead problem, the
ranger or the Paladin? You would obviously use the paladin because he can take
on the undead a lot better than the Ranger.
That and cross-classing the ranger class with my paladin
class doesnt help to improve my paladin ability to tackle undead. Same with
the Ranger abilities doesnt improve a Rogues ability to hit their weak point or go in stealth.
It still follows a
logical flow.
Actually, no, its illogical because you can learn more than
one skill and be just as good as the next person in them. Cross-classing in DnD,
however, thins your character out, which encourages more pure-classing than
cross classing. The only way to pure class without penalties is to cross class
with class that benefits are not low when doing so. For example, in NWN, cross
classing a Champion of Torm doesnt affect you Paladins ability to Smite Evil.
Again, in the end, no
one is forcing anyone to take on a prestige class.
Nice way of ducking the analogy, Som. I think you see what I
see, but you are trying to duck the issue. First off the most of the prestige
class are clone of the core class with a small variation. A Shadowdancer is
still a Rogue, but without the sneak attack, just an improved stealth skill.
The only true classes that exist in my game are racial
classes.
Which could also be said for DDO.
But the diferences and adventages are clear.
DDO was disapointment , because it was supposed to be MMO D&D game - but instead they made limited, instanced, twitch based experimental Guild Wars clone, packed in kindof D&D skin - and they are charging 15$ monthly for it.
while
NWN2 was disapointment , because it was rushed out the door. Graphic and animations are not all that swell. There is a problem with controling NPCs (which is single player relevant only) , and there is issue with mandatory downloading files for multiplayer.
But you forget one thing. NWN2 is evolving game, and a tool. Everything is posible.
While DDO will never change.
Only good thing DDO has going for it is bit more imaginative dungeons, than other mmo's
You can recreate this in NWN2 easily. Hell, some old DDO player can go and recreate every inch of DDO in NWN2 and put it online... You can do anything...
Thats NWN2
So than...whats better ?
"Before this battle is over all the world will know that few...stood against many." - King Leonidas
Yes, it is narrow minded to believe that because you specialize in something you aren't capable in another skill. Good thing I never said that.
What I did say was that a person exhibits greater skill and expertise in a specialization as opposed to every skill they possess.
Being a high school football player is hardly the same as being a professional football player; that is a specialization. And while a professional football player may have many other talents. that one specialty outshines the others and places it above their other talents.
While you are a professional football player, practicing year round and playing professionally on a weekly basis, that is your specialization. Other interests or skills you have most likely take a backseat to being a professional football player. When you stop being a professional football player, you gain back the time investment you made in that specialization to concentrate in another area.
That's multiclassing. The time you used to used to apply one skill set for specialization is now devoted to the new skill set or one that is not as well developed.
Saying that Bruce Lee was an actor, teacher and a martial artist is actually misleading. He taught martial arts (although he also taught philosophy - again, connected to martial arts) and he acted in movies that were focused around the martial arts. This makes sense. He was specialized in the martial arts and the philosophies that guide the martial arts. He didn't teach astrophysics and he didn't play Hamlet. Those would be areas that would require specialized training to acquire excellence in.
This is not to say that he could NOT have taught astrophysics or played Hamlet; he simply did not expend the time in training and learning that would allow him to specialize in astrophysics or classical stage performances. If he had devoted considerable time to formal training in those two areas in addition to trying to maintain a specialized level of proficiency in the martial arts, one of those areas would have most likely suffered.
Whether you believe it or not, or even if you agree with it or not, does not make it any less a reality. There are very, very few individuals who could be said to have been masters (specialists) in multiple disciplines. This isn't necessarily because they weren't capable. People just tend to find the thing they are most skilled at and stick with it because they want to excel and it is easier to do so in something you already possess talent in.
Since the class concept has existed since D&D first edition (known as OD&D) and it is doubtful that anyone among those RPG pioneers (Gygax and Arneson) were making a significant amount of money (as a three volume OD&D set only cost $10.00) I don't see how you relate the class concept or class restrictions to a money-making machination.
That was the game design, plain and simple. All expansions and revisions remained true to the class concept because that was how people were introduced to the game and were used to playing it.
It's not a question of whether a classless system would work or not; D&D isn't a classless system, plain and simple, and hasn't been since its creation.
I have to state again; nowhere in the Dungeon Master's Guide does it state that dice will be used to resolve each and every situation or that dice must be rolled for every single event.
They do, however, state on page 110 of the DM Guide (I am paraphrasing rather than quoting):
1. As the DM, you have the right to control the dice.
2. As DM, you can overrule dice results in order to cause a specific event to occur.
3. As DM, if a player rolls a particularly poor roll that could result in death through no fault of their own (poor decision making) you can make a decision that results in serious injury or loss of limb, etc, rather than death.
4. In any event that the rules do not specifically cover, you can use percentile dice and assign a reasonable probability for the success of the action, weighing it in favor of the player or the opponent/situation, however you see fit.
So, the DM Guide does give ample advice for freestyle rules in the use of dice and even suggests different areas where you, the DM, would apply those methods.
Again, this is not a money-making scheme; it's simply the system that was created and has been adhered to in subsequent expansions and revisions.
Paladins and Fighters share no less than 118 feats that I know of. So I am not certain how you are coming to the conclusion that the only thing similar between them is the equipment they can use. I was certain that Fighters had five or six class-specific feats that paladins do not share, but I would have to do more research on that.
I personally consider the fighter the strongest character in the game at low levels, not only because they are walking tanks with the highest HP and the widest range of available armor and weapons, but also because they are not hampered by the Paladin's lawful good alignment.
I do not play a fighter in NWN (single-player campaign, mind you) for one reason only; I am guaranteed to have one in my party. I began NWN2 and started a warlock. Sure enough; the first potential party member I met was a dwarven fighter. Thank goodness for him too; I need him to absorb damage as much as possible while I throw spells. Sure, I can wear chainmail, but that does surprisingly little good against the mobs I've faced so far in the game. My little dwarven friend can wade into a mob and they will focus all of their hostility on him while I cast from afar. And he can take it.
Besides, my topic was not which character class was better but that a paladin can, through a change of alignment, become a fighter. It doesn't matter whether you believe me or not, the Player's Handbook states unequivocally:
"If a paladin should ever knowingly and willingly commit an evil act, he loses his status of paladinhood immediately and irrevocably. All benefits are then lost and no deed or magic can restore the character to paladinhood: He is ever after a fighter.
If the paladin commits an evil act while enchanted, s/he loses their paladinhood until they can atone for the act. They lose all abilities and function "essentially as a fighter".
Completely untrue. I only have one character in WoW, a level 60 paladin. At level 53, I regularly crushed level 60 warriors in duels, for the same reasons you say that the D&D rules are flawed; I could heal myself being my primary advantage. Warriors in WoW are nothing more than tanks, period. They are no more or less special than a fighter in D&D.
I have never chosen to play a paladin in D&D and no one I have ever played with has played one, simply because being lawful good was too restrictive when the DM was applying the alignment rules correctly. I personally couldn't live up to being lawful good and apparently neither could anyone I've known in my 25 or so years of D&D play, regardless of the benefits the class has. That is the main reason for sticking to the alignment rules; because playing a paladin means you have to be willing to take actions within those restrictions, even actions that may bring you in conflict with your party members.
I guess it depends entirely on how deeply you play the game. In the D&D I play, you drop a rogue in the woods and see how "superior" s/he is to a ranger. Inversely, the same applies to a ranger in the city.
I would really like you to go into detail, because every time I look at the skills and feats there are a great many differences immediately apparent to me.
Nothing ironic about it; no one is forcing you or your fellow players to adhere to every single rule in the book. The main point is that you have fun.
However, that doesn't mean everyone agrees with you and it certainly doesn't mean that your concept of fun or your modifications to the D&D rules are acceptable to everyone else.
No, I am not telling you that. What I am telling you is that the player needs to be reminded in the heat of the game that they are a specific alignment and that the actions they are considering taking may be antithetical to that alignment. As the DM, we should be reminding them of that fact and imposing repercussions to their actions that are in line with their changed behavior. There may also be party conflicts caused by a change in alignment. These situations add dramatic flavor to the game.
I would definitely agree that it is rather pointless to make a lawful good rogue. So why would you? Why even have a discussion over the topic, unless the lawful society the rogue supports has some sort of over-arching legal concept that allows them to exercise their abilities, say something along the lines of "national security" that supersedes the normal legal system? In that event, a rogue could be considered to be lawful good if they were stealing secret documents from another country or even assassinating someone. It rather depends on the legal system of the group the rogue is most closely connected to.
Even then it would be stretching to have a lawful good rogue. This does not mean you couldn't have a Chaotic Good rogue (by alignment definition "They believe in all the virtues of goodness and right, but they have little use for laws and regulations") and down the line to Neutral Evil.
Alignment isn't just for applying legal interpretations; the other players in the party can and should react to a change in alignment when they notice the odd behavior that their friend is exhibiting.
"you do not have to RPG the exact personality alignment given to you"
Huh? You choose your alignment, within certain exceptions. It isn't given to you, except if you are playing a character whose alignment is specifically dictated (i.e., a paladin).
Being Lawful Good doesn't mean that you don't trash talk and you don't backstab when the time comes. It does mean that you believe in an orderly and strong government, that laws must be respected and obeyed and that helping people benefits the entire society. It doesn't mean that when you are forced to fight someone who is outside of the law that you can't curse them or backstab them.
NWN is a poor example of the implementation of alignments, at any rate because it very rarely presented the player with a moral dilemma that caused them to make a decision that would affect their alignment in a way that was actually negative.
Now, if you're playing a tabletop D&D game and your paladin burns down an orphanage full of orphans just for the heck of it and nothing happens, then that is a complete departure from the ruleset. If that is the way you want to play, so be it; but that's not the D&D definition of a paladin.
Huh? I have no idea what you are talking about. What cross-classing exploits in a tabletop game could you possibly be referring to? There are none. They don't exist. You create a character, the character plays and as long as they aren't violating the rules or pulling something straight out of their backside, whatever feats and skills they have, they have. Whatever skills they may have picked up by dual or multi-classing, they have, within the limitations of the equipment they have and the armor they are wearing.
There's nothing to exploit; you can either do a specific action or you can't. The same goes for the other players sitting at the table.
In electronic games, however, specifically MMORPGs, the developers have a habit of deciding that even if you can do a specific action, you shouldn't be able to. After they decide that, it becomes an "exploit" if you continue to do it.
I've had plenty of D&D PnP sessions where the DM went strictly by the encounter tables based on terrain and rolled random encounters which resulted in low-level characters facing everything from Storm Giants to Nagas. The only thing to do is to roll a wisdom and/or lore check and get the party the heck out of there.
First, I would like an itemized list of these exact exploits that you are referring to. Because referring to your cleric's versatility and then saying that you exploited the game are not the same thing when you are referring to an electronic game.
Normally, an exploit is doing something that you should not be able to do if you were playing the game within the rules as it was designed.
It's not just making an exceptionally good character. If you were only guilty of having a very well-designed and well-rounded cleric, that's not an exploit.
That's what I'm referring to when I say that electronic RPG and MMORPG developers have a habit of deciding something is an exploit when it doesn't work properly or the way they expected or the player combines things in a way that allows them to excel in a manner that is not consistent with the majority of their fellow players. If the developers would simply say "here it is, have fun" and didn't worry so much when players min/maxed, we wouldn't have this skewed definition of what can be considered an exploit.
Secondly, I can guarantee that I could make a module that would wreck your cleric if s/he didn't have a party with them, without making a single monster outside of your level range.
Finally, if the DM could not accomplish these things and felt like his/her only option was to ban you from their server, they simply did not try hard enough to allow for players and characters of widely different skillsets and experience.
And that's the way it should work. It just sounds like the DM on the server you were banned from was hosting modules that were poorly designed or they didn't set the level restriction properly.
That's the way it should work. Most games do work that way. As I said, it sounds more like an inexperienced DM on the first server you discussed.
I'd use them both, because it would be a rare situation indeed where the paladin could handle all of the undead that would be thrown at my party (which normally implies plural player characters and thus, plural undead).
The ranger can still hit the undead; just because he can't turn them or at later levels destroy them with a single spell, doesn't mean he's ineffective.
In NWN2, I am playing a warlock, but my 17 year old son is playing a paladin. In the graveyard sequence, where he was fighting multiple undead mobs, his paladin wouldn't have been able to solo all of them. The party was a necessity, regardless of what classes they were. Even if the druid in the party only threw a single heal to the paladin, that still made him more effective than he would have been solo.
Which isn't the reason you would dual or multi-class to begin with. You're trying to pick up abilities that your class does not have, not augment abilities you already have.
There's nothing illogical about learning more than one skill and being just as good as the next person in them. The reason you can is because you stopped improving your primary class just so you can learn those skills. Your statement above completely refutes your Bruce Lee / Benjamin Franklin example.
Like I said earlier, people go straight-class because it is the path of least resistance for them. Some of my best characters have been multi-class characters, far superior to their pure class but it wasn't easy to accomplish. I had to be willing to give up the possiblity of gaining certain benefits in order to accomplish it.
No, I actually don't see what you see. A prestige class is an election to specialize in a small subset of your core classes' skills so that you can exceed the core class abilities in selected skills. As I said, it is perfectly logical
Of course they are derivative of the core class; they are just a further specialization of the core class, not an entirely different class all by their lonesome. They are based on extensions of the core classes.
As I said, you may personally want to have the specific feats and skills that the prestige classes provide, not only because you feel that they make your characte more efficient, but also because it fits the concept you have for your character. If you don't feel strongly one way or another, then don't take a prestige class. It's that simple.
In the end, I still do not see the D&D system as flawed or even in need of simplification. It is a very deep, rich and complex system and it is designed that way on purpose to cover as many of the situations that a character could be expected to encounter (combat, social, moral, religious, etc). The problem with most electronic RPGs and MMORPGs is that very few of these elements beyond combat are ever included in their game.
Abbatoir / Abbatoir Cinq
Adnihilo
Beorn Judge's Edge
Somnulus
Perfect Black
----------------------
Asheron's Call / Asheron's Call 2
Everquest / Everquest 2
Anarchy Online
Shadowbane
Dark Age of Camelot
Star Wars Galaxies
Matrix Online
World of Warcraft
Guild Wars
City of Heroes
Being Lawful Good doesn't mean that
you don't trash talk and you don't backstab when the time comes. It
does mean that you believe in an orderly and strong government, that
laws must be respected and obeyed and that helping people benefits the
entire society. It doesn't mean that when you are forced to fight
someone who is outside of the law that you can't curse them or backstab
them.
- I cannot lie
- I cannot cheat or use poison
- I have to protect good people from evil
- (In some paladin rules, stealth is only used as a last restort)
- I can only my holy abilities to benefit others not myself.
You
should have been at the discussions lawful good = lawful stupid and
the purpose of alignment. If a person asks a paladin for some gold,
can the paladin refuse? If he does hes not a truly good person. A
paladin cannot use stealth so he has to charge in; therefore, he maybe
riding into certain death. A Paladin can get themselves in same amount
of trouble as a Rogue. In one DM session stories, the DM noted that a
rogue (who was really a spy) was chased by the guards and the paladin
of their session stop the rogue and handed him to the authorities.
Later in that session, the guards came and arrested the Paladin for
interfering government affairs. The player had to re-roll a new
character because his paladin was later executed.
In
the other topic, we came to two conclusions. You cant truly be neutral
in DnD because taking a side automatically makes you a follower of a
certain alignment and Chaotic Neutral = Nihilist. Your primary
alignment cannot be neutral because your primary says you dont have a
code of conduct nor do you take any type of action. However, since you
are good, you have to have a code of conduct as to what is right and
what is wrong.
During
a tabletop, I had disarmed my opponent and would kill them after
disarming them. The DM questioned the ability at first, but since my
attacker used lethal force, I had the right to return the favor. The DM
couldnt argue with that since two other lawful characters in my team
did the same thing. So whatever applied to me had to be apply to them
too. I could trash talk because it was neither lying since all I said
was true or cheating since my opponent remained focus. Also I mentioned
how powers were given to me by a God so its as form of cheat, which
the DM and another player agreed so some changes had to be made.
Later on I change my code of conduct and presented it to my DM.
could not use poison tactics, disease tactic, or magical weapons
bestowed through spellcasting means. (I couldnt use a +1 weapon, but
someone else couldnt put magical fire on my sword.)
may use my powers for myself or to benefit others. (An avatar is no
good to his/her God, if they are unable to heal themselves to stay
alive)
cannot take part or execute the orders of someone I know is evil. (In
other words, I cannot party with someone is evil or be commanded by
them.)
Huh?
I have no idea what you are talking about. What cross-classing exploits
in a tabletop game could you possibly be referring to?
Dude,
I didnt say there were any combinations to exploit. Im saying that
BECAUSE DND TAILORS to you and your partys gameplay, there is no
reason for players to try to create class combination in order to beat
the game the DM has created.
The
same cannot be said about NWN because the gameplay isnt tailored to
your players. The monsters and dungeons are defaulted, meaning they are
scripted to function that way against your character. Plus, the DM
isnt on 24 hours a day so the players are free to play in ways they
want.
That's
what I'm referring to when I say that electronic RPG and MMORPG
developers have a habit of deciding something is an exploit when it
doesn't work properly or the way they expected or the player combines
things in a way that allows them to excel in a manner that is not
consistent with the majority of their fellow players.
Thats exactly why I got kicked out. My pure class cleric excelled at everything everyone else did.
Secondly,
I can guarantee that I could make a module that would wreck your cleric
if s/he didn't have a party with them, without making a single monster
outside of your level range.
Thats
exactly what the DM of that module said and I soloed his game by the
way. He made the game hard enough for you to have to be dependent on
other team members, but cleric are one man armies. The more difficult
he made the game, the more I arranged my spells and feat to tackle the
problem. Eventually, I playing less and less like a cleric.
For
example; I would use darkness spells to blind my enemies so the DM gave
the monsters either darkvision or true seeing. So I switch up my
tactics and use Blades (forgot the name of the spell) and cast the
spell right in front of me. This made the fights incredible short for
the henchmen who came at me. For boss battles, I healed myself a lot
and buffed before the fight began. You could say I played my cleric
like Paladin/Wizard.
The
only way you could put me at disadvantage is if you took away some the
spells I have or if you gave the monster incredibly high status, but
then you would be putting other players at a disadvantage as well. If
you put the monster together that would still put other players at
disadvantage because I can summon a pet to take damage while I prepare
spell take out those enemies.
And
thats what Im talking about with catering in both tabletop and NWN.
NWN is a game; therefore, the player mentality changes to find ways to
beat the game. Tabletop is a FUN SESSION; therefore, you do not have to
exploit the game and EVEN if you did the DM would see it and counter it
by killing your character off or presenting a challenge that would
cripple you.
The
ranger can still hit the undead; just because he can't turn them or at
later levels destroy them with a single spell, doesn't mean he's
ineffective.
Nice
way to duck answering the question, but I wasnt saying the Ranger is
ineffective. Rather Im saying the Paladin is more effective than the
Ranger at battling undead and evil. And because the Paladin is able to
fight both undead and evil there is no reason to cross class a Ranger
with a Paladin. In cross classing a Paladin with a Ranger, I would
weaken my Paladins ability rather than help them. This is why I said
cross classing is flawed.
You're trying to pick up abilities that your class does not have, not augment abilities you already have.
You
cross class to augment your abilities, period. A fighter/wizard only
cross-class to benefit from both spellcasting and fighting. A wizard
cross-classes with an Eldrith Knight so he can retain spellcasting
while gaining fighter like attack bonus. You dont cross class a Rogue
with a Ranger because you need more than 10 levels for your pet to be
any good. You dont cross class for any other reason except to augment
your abilities by giving yourself advantages to use certain feats or
abilities. However, in tabletop games, they put restriction on the
class to prevent you from continuing to benefit from class abilities or
advancing in that class.
If
you could ignore those rules and make up your own, what would be the
point of having expanded books about different classes and
restrictions? WotC makes money off people who take the rule literally.
The reason you can is because you stopped
improving your primary class just so you can learn those skills. Your
statement above completely refutes your Bruce Lee / Benjamin Franklin
example.
Uh,
no, my statement did no such thing. Bruce was still learning martial
art when he was going to college so you can do both at the same time.
Benjamin Franklin worked printing press company, kept himself in shape
and invented the oven all while practice philosophies. My statement was
saying thats illogical to think that you can have one primary goal.
Completely untrue. I only have one character in WoW, a level 60 paladin.
HOW
ARE YOU GOING TO SAY SOMETHING IS UNTRUE IF YOU DONT KNOW WHAT I
REFERRING TO. Youre so quick to say your right, but your slow to admit
youre wrong.
Dude
I was referring to the Warriors PvE prowess and not dueling prowess.
Speaking of PvP, Paladins suck at it. They have a hard time killing
anything and I use to play one. As a paladin you find yourself being a
healing bot more than a Warrior/Priest blend. My point of saying that
more people play the Warrior more in WoW than a Fighter in DnD has to
do with the fact that the Warrior in WoW has own identity and its own
class abilities, which is the something the DnD fighter lacks.
Paladins and Fighters share no less than 118 feats that I know of.
All
the classes share the same damn abilities, your point? The fighter
comes with no class feat as the paladin. The paladin gets smite evil
and lay on hands for example, the fighter gets nothing except bonus
feats. Excluding the general abilities, the only abilities the Paladin
and Fighter share are equipment based feats.
I
personally consider the fighter the strongest character in the game at
low levels, not only because they are walking tanks with the highest HP
and the widest range of available armor and weapons, but also because
they are not hampered by the Paladin's lawful good alignment.
Actually,
it depends on the game that fighter has advantage or disadvantage.
Youre not guaranteed full-plated armor at the beginning of the game
and both the paladin and warrior can use the same weapons. The paladin
receives +1 or +2 less than Fighter in terms of HP (Dwarves have a +2
HP advantage) and the Fighter gets more general skills. Both are good
tanks in the beginning since the fighter gets more HP and the paladin
gets better save. The Fighter dominates for 3 levels and then Paladin
surpasses him on the 4th level.
I
would really like you to go into detail, because every time I look at
the skills and feats there are a great many differences immediately
apparent to me.
Rogue
gets more skills and they arent thin out as much as Ranger in terms of
status. Unless the Ranger a use simple weapon for dual-wielding and is
expert marksman, the Ranger is going to put most of his points towards
Str, Dex, Con, Wis, Int and a little in Cha. A Rogue only has to focus
on Dex, Con, Int. I dont need to go pass 10 on Wis
while both Str and Cha are a give or take. A rogue can use magic items
and hes the most agile member of the group. Players are going to rely
on a Rogue to be Mr. Fix than a Ranger. And why do the hell do we need
assistance from your pet. Both Wizard/Sorcerer class and druid come
with their own pets, plus instead of animal empathy, we can just kill
the animal thats a threat to us. And its not like the pet is going to
make a lick of difference and with the pet on our team you now have to
worry about healing your pet when he starts dying meaning focusing less
on the fight.
Rogues
can also dual wielding, it may cost a few feats, but at least abilities
wont be half-baked. As a Rogue, I can exploit the weakness of most
enemies without having to pick a favor enemy. A Ranger can only 5 favor
enemies to exploit and the extra damage they do is barely above a
Fighter with weapon specialization. And the proof that the Ranger
sucked was the fact that in 3.5, they had to blend the ranger more with
a Fighter and Rogue. He went from an HP of D10 HP to D8 HP and was
given Evasion. Everyone talked about how the Ranger sucked before 3.5.
Now hes halfway decent.
The
only thing the Ranger is better at than the Rogue is the HP really and
you get a pet, which gives you an advantage in one on one fights.
What I am telling you is that the player
needs to be reminded in the heat of the game that they are a specific
alignment and that the actions they are considering taking may be
antithetical to that alignment. As the DM, we should be reminding them
of that fact and imposing repercussions to their actions that are in
line with their changed behavior.
Thats
not up to you to remind them. You have to play as if they understand
their rules. You cannot do that you undermind your players gameplay
and their roleplaying. Youre DM so be a DM and set the adventure. You
shouldnt be telling them how they should be playing the game or how
they should act. They can act out of alignment/character whenever they
so please as long as it doesnt violate personality (Refer to my
paladin example up above) OR if they are trying to change their
alignment.
Huh?
You choose your alignment, within certain exceptions. It isn't given to
you, except if you are playing a character whose alignment is
specifically dictated (i.e., a paladin).
Actually,
no, a paladin code of conduct dictates their actions, not their
alignment. A Rogue has more freedom than a paladin under the same
alignment.
And
that's the way it should work. It just sounds like the DM on the server
you were banned from was hosting modules that were poorly designed or
they didn't set the level restriction properly.
Actually,
he did set the level restriction properly, but its hard to put a
character capable of versatility without putting others at a
disadvantage. While this mean have seemingly hurt the cleric, that DM
who match CR levels with players level also had to go out of his way to
edited the cleric spells to where they didnt work on themselves. They
also had their non-holy spell were taken away. The Monk was also put at
a disadvantage because monk cant fight anyone at their own level at
the beginning of the game unless you give them the equipment to do so.
He also had to heavily restrict cross-classing.
In the end, I still do not see the D&D system as flawed or even in need of simplification.
Thats
because your conservative players. To you the DnD rules are a dogma.
They HAVE to be followed. You claim the DnD ruleset doesnt prohibit
you yet when I look player handbook and DM ruleset they say different.
Saying that Bruce Lee was an actor, teacher and a martial artist is actually misleading.
He had his own style and school of martials. He acted in movie and damn good fighter, not the best, but pretty good.
He taught martial arts (although he also taught philosophy - again, connected to martial arts)
Martial
arts and philosophy are NOT the same. This coming from a martial artist
himself. Martial artists are the ones who incorporate Buddhist and
Confucius ideas into the martial arts, not the other way around.
and
he acted in movies that were focused around the martial arts. This
makes sense. He was specialized in the martial arts and the
philosophies that guide the martial arts. He didn't teach astrophysics
and he didn't play Hamlet. Those would be areas that would require
specialized training to acquire excellence in.
He acted in movied prior to his martial arts action film. Hes been acting since he was kid.
Being a high school football player is hardly the same as being a professional football player; that is a specialization.
Actually,
it is. This coming someone who has relative who use to play for the
Green Bay Packers. They dont train a year around, they train for
couple of months and they train every now and then to keep their muscle
from weakening. Highschool players do the same thing.
Military
is another perfect example. Youre to be soldier and learning civilian
type jobs while in the military. You can still learn to survive as
soldier using a God and learn to work an engine at the same time. You
can specialize in more than one thing.
Since
the class concept has existed since D&D first edition (known as
OD&D) and it is doubtful that anyone among those RPG pioneers
(Gygax and Arneson) were making a significant amount of money (as a
three volume OD&D set only cost $10.00) I don't see how you relate
the class concept or class restrictions to a money-making machination.
Most
book publishing companies and certain board gaming companies only get a
couple of cents to a dollar of your profits your book. So if I made a
book that sold for $10 dollars, my publishers will only get 10 cents to
1 dollar while I get the rest of the 9 dollars. Now times that about a
million and thats how much money youll have. DnD has sold worldwide.
If Gygax didnt get his money then he squander his money away or forgot
to copyright his ideas and thus bought out the rights from under him.
Also
todays DnD books sell for 30 dollars. And this is the problem I was
trying to get across to you from the get go is that DnD is the ONLY
tabletop game ruling the market. To give you example, Marvel comic went
bankruptcy and close their doors for good, DC comic would dominated the
comic market and their comicbook prices would SHOOT through the roof
because they would be the only source of comicbook entertainment. (I
know they are other companies, but DC is one of the best comic
companies)
Gygax
copyrighted the D20 idea so it made it next to impossible to improve on
it. It was until later that D20 ruleset was able to be used with other
table top game, but it was too late. DnD had saturated the market with
the product and other companies that try to come with their own games
were overshadowed by DnD presents.
To
make it simple, had Supermans creators (Superman being the first
superhero) had copyright Superhero, you would not have Captain America or other Superheroes we have today.
Todays
tabletop games that are non-Forgotten realms games have to sell their
games for less than 20 dollars. If you try to go to a company with a
new idea of how to do tabletops they reject the ideas because DnD games
have the market tied up. DnD didnt evolve because the rules worked,
DnD didnt evolved because they never had any competition!
They do, however, state on page 110 of the DM Guide (I am paraphrasing rather than quoting):
Those
are variation of outcome the DM can look into. I said the book doesnt
give you nor does the book give you ideas on varies way to use the Dice
system.
A prestige class is an election
to specialize in a small subset of your core classes' skills so that
you can exceed the core class abilities in selected skills. As I said,
it is perfectly logical
No, its actually not. I notice
when reviewing the prestige classes, they are very restricted and very
have a small number of abilities compare to core class. Prestige
classes serve to give core classes more abilities and give the class a
more identity. However, this ideas fails, at least with me because
prestige lack in either improving abilities or making the class more
define. Take the duelist for example, hes a thief without the sneak
attack. Rather than making the duelist an extra class, his abilities
should have been more expansion of what the Fighter, Rogue and Bard can
do.
To put it simple, your core class are the dollars
and your prestige classes are changes. Change by itself can't really
buy anything useless which is how the prestige classes work, but you if
pair your change up with dollars you can buy something.