Pen and paper feeling

Lord.Bachus · August 2015

will the multiplayer part of this game allow for some epic roleplaying and be the first game ever to capture that pen and paper feeling? With deep roleplaying?

or will it just like all those other games turn into a hack and slash experience?

Loke666 · August 2015

Well, Biowares Neverwinter night actually did a pretty good job capturing the feeling earlier as well. And even pen and paper D&D can turn into a huge hack and slash session at times.

The fact that the DM can possess any npc or monster clearly opens up a lot here and you can really with a good DM create player owned houses with furniture, families for the characters and plenty interesting intrigues as well. There is nothing that stops you from creating murder mysteries in the Cormyrean court or other fun campaigns but it will take some work.

As an off topic I introduce clear evidence that roleplaying is older than most people think:

Image: https://us.v-cdn.net/5022221/uploads/editor/xt/go8sc3x13dz6.jpg

This D20 is actually from 300 BC. honest to God. Now, the archeologists havn't found a rulebook scroll yet but it was probably D&D.

Archlyte · August 2015

I long to roll an 'E' on that ancient d20.

Loke666 · August 2015

After reading up a bit on the official forum: Yes, you can play it like a classic P&P with some exceptions (loot seems to be randomized) but it will take some work by the DM. Without the DM you will lose a lot of the P&P feeling.

Just like in P&P you need a good DM, it will be easy as the DM to make a TPW (total party wipe) but that isn't really fun unless the players really mess up. It isn't fun on the other hand to always succeed no matter how bad you play either so DMing will be the hardest role.

Lord.Bachus · August 2015

Loke666 said:

After reading up a bit on the official forum: Yes, you can play it like a classic P&P with some exceptions (loot seems to be randomized) but it will take some work by the DM. Without the DM you will lose a lot of the P&P feeling.

Just like in P&P you need a good DM, it will be easy as the DM to make a TPW (total party wipe) but that isn't really fun unless the players really mess up. It isn't fun on the other hand to always succeed no matter how bad you play either so DMing will be the hardest role.

With a good DM, players are allways living with the fear of dying and permadeath, tough they should almost never die.

But they can not allways succeed, there needs to be some failure...

waynejr2 · September 2015

Lord.Bachus said:

Loke666 said:

After reading up a bit on the official forum: Yes, you can play it like a classic P&P with some exceptions (loot seems to be randomized) but it will take some work by the DM. Without the DM you will lose a lot of the P&P feeling.

Just like in P&P you need a good DM, it will be easy as the DM to make a TPW (total party wipe) but that isn't really fun unless the players really mess up. It isn't fun on the other hand to always succeed no matter how bad you play either so DMing will be the hardest role.

With a good DM, players are allways living with the fear of dying and permadeath, tough they should almost never die.

But they can not allways succeed, there needs to be some failure...

I have been playing dnd since 1974. I hated this attitude that came into the hobby that suggests that good DMs don't kill players. That the good DM will create a clever bit to save them from themselves and then the players will pretend that "they have the fear of dying or permadeath".

Loke666 · September 2015

waynejr2 said:
I have been playing dnd since 1974. I hated this attitude that came into the hobby that suggests that good DMs don't kill players. That the good DM will create a clever bit to save them from themselves and then the players will pretend that "they have the fear of dying or permadeath".

If no player ever dies no matter how much they mess up the game don't have any risk and I don't see the fun in that.

A good DM wont kill a player for something that isn't the players fault though, killing a player just because you rolled something on a random table isn't fun either.

I killed plenty of players both in D&D and other games. Besides a few truly unlucky lvl 1 noobs and a guy in Warhammer that got a monster criting him with an extended role over 60 (if you rolla six on the damage die you rill a new skill check and if that one succeds you roll again and add the damege, and if you roll more sixes you continue, I rolled 10 sixes in a row), everyone else truly deserved what they had coming.

And I am not really keen on ressurection, I don't think that have happened even once in one of my campaigns. Death walks after the players and waiting for them to mess up, keeping them on thier toes.

Other DMs have their own tactics, some just kills off a few players now and then just for fun, others cheat secretly so the players never dies but neither works for me, I think a DM should be fair and be someone the players can trust but they should never relax too much and think everyone just will be a piece of cake. Let them work for it, they certainly have a better time when they know they completed something hard because they are good.

waynejr2 · September 2015

Players fault you say... Well, you are saying that something "smart" can't get you killed? What if the mistake was this choice, but the choice to travel to this section of the game.

How about that chest with the fatal instant poison trap. If they fail the st, will you save them? Don't cop out and say there is a different poison on it. If there are 10,000 chests in the world with poison and this is the only one with instant fatal poison are you going to save the player?

I think I am just of a different period in gaming. We didn't coddle people. When the RPGA came about, they stated that BS of a good DM never kills a player. They have your motto "A good DM wont kill a player for something that isn't the players fault though, killing a player just because you rolled something on a random table isn't fun either." Because anything else is being a killer DM.

Karnage69 · September 2015

The sign of a good DM/GM is answered in one question:

"Are your friends coming back, session after session, to keep playing?"

Slapshot1188 · September 2015

Karnage69 said:

The sign of a good DM/GM is answered in one question:

"Are your friends coming back, session after session, to keep playing?"

I'd have to agree. There is no single "right" type. The best DM would adapt to his players as long as they were compatible. If players and DM want very different things, then they should likely just move on.

Ridrith · September 2015

For anybody who's going to be playing this I'm generally more happy running 'beer and pretzel' games but of course heavy role-playing games are perfectly fine too. I've been DMing for 14 years and I'm not saying that makes me good or anything but I'd still be willing to run games for folks who'd like to play. I tend to use voice chat though.

Our guild is already getting pumped up for the game and we'll be doing a giveaway as well for two copies of SCL.

Loke666 · September 2015

waynejr2 said:

Players fault you say... Well, you are saying that something "smart" can't get you killed? What if the mistake was this choice, but the choice to travel to this section of the game.

How about that chest with the fatal instant poison trap. If they fail the st, will you save them? Don't cop out and say there is a different poison on it. If there are 10,000 chests in the world with poison and this is the only one with instant fatal poison are you going to save the player?

I think I am just of a different period in gaming. We didn't coddle people. When the RPGA came about, they stated that BS of a good DM never kills a player. They have your motto "A good DM wont kill a player for something that isn't the players fault though, killing a player just because you rolled something on a random table isn't fun either." Because anything else is being a killer DM.

Opening a chest without having a good theif is a stupid decision. I am just saying that you shouldn't kill of your player (or that I don't at least) on a single dice roll unless it is something that makes or breaks the campaign.

Botching your moral check when trying to throw the one ring in mount Doom is such a case, a random small trap isn't (particularly when you have a good thief that just rolls badly) unless you run a hard end dungeon campaign (preferably with floorplans and everything) and even then I rather kill my players for messing up a puzzle then a single bad roll for stuff that rarely affect the campaign.

Of course there are exceptions, in games like Paranoia and Call of Cthulhu have I killed groups for less than that.

Keeping the players on the edge is important, they should know that they don't have to succeed or even survive unless they are very careful but when you start killing them off for close to nothing it tends to stop being fun for them and RP are supposed to be fun for the entire group instead of just the DM.

As for belonging to an older generation do you have played for 10 years more than me (I were drooling and could hardly speak in '74) so it is kinda true and there are differences between European and North American RPing as well, you guys usually kill more players in dungeons while I get my players stuck on the wrong side of a civil war or something instead.

But if you call me a "daycare DM" my players would be pretty upset, they are still upset for me wiping their group a lot of times for them making some "tiny" misstake (pulling the red lever in the dungeon, getting the dukes daughter pregnant, suggesting to a certain inqusitor that not everything in the bible should be taken literary and so on).Slapshot1188 said:

Karnage69 said:

The sign of a good DM/GM is answered in one question:

"Are your friends coming back, session after session, to keep playing?"

I'd have to agree. There is no single "right" type. The best DM would adapt to his players as long as they were compatible. If players and DM want very different things, then they should likely just move on.

Well, usually you could find some kind of game that work for both types. If your DM love high tech while the group want fantasy you could run Shadowrun and so on.

I think it is more important that the DM is hard but fair and that he or she is good to describe stuff and have a nasty imagination for campaigns.

And there are aids that make things easier as well. We use miniatures and floorplains. I have pictures of all my important npcs. We sometimes use ambient sounds or music to set the mood and we actual physical metal coins instead of numbers (ok, the last part I mainly use because it is easier to trick my players into traps and problems but they still like them). No aids can make a bad DM good but they can improve the game and make things more fun.

Wizardry · September 2015

To me pen n paper is more about the statistical side of gaming.What is the first thing you think of when talking DnD?The six,7/8 sided die rolls.

Imo too many people look at Role playing in what i call an odd way.Role playing should be what you make of that adventure you are in,it can be as simple as enjoying the hunt with other comrades or out harvesting items to craft,that is all role playing.

When gaming becomes nothing more than level numbers and mechanics to gain level numbers,then it becomes superficial gaming,not role play gaming.

I always talk about depth in game play,that is what i look for and you accomplish that with lots of statistics, equations,systems and properties.Lore is a nice way to identify with your game world inhabitants but it is not really a role play mechanic.

Loke666 · September 2015

Wizardry said:

To me pen n paper is more about the statistical side of gaming.What is the first thing you think of when talking DnD?The six,7/8 sided die rolls.

Imo too many people look at Role playing in what i call an odd way.Role playing should be what you make of that adventure you are in,it can be as simple as enjoying the hunt with other comrades or out harvesting items to craft,that is all role playing.

When gaming becomes nothing more than level numbers and mechanics to gain level numbers,then it becomes superficial gaming,not role play gaming.

I always talk about depth in game play,that is what i look for and you accomplish that with lots of statistics, equations,systems and properties.Lore is a nice way to identify with your game world inhabitants but it is not really a role play mechanic.

You are of course right that RPers tend to discuss the mechanics a bit too much even though they usually matters less than telling a story together, which really is the point. But it could be worse, we could share character stories instead (imense fun to tell others, too bad that listening to others is like watching paint dry).

The thing is that mechanics are important if they don't work, when the game forbids you to do something logical and your rule nazi DM just forbids it since he doesn't have a rule for it.

And this is a far larger problem with computer games, usually with pen and paper gaes you can argue for your sake with an actual human, that might actually consider that you have a point when you say that beheading yourself every 1 sword swing in 100 is just plain moronic (runequest 1st ed).

A computer game is less forgiving that way and if they mess up the mechanics too much the game might become unplayable for many players.

When I make a pen and paper campaign I usually make the plot and NPCs first, then I choose a good system to use that fits it well. For my epic battles and intrigue game I used Iron heroes because it works very well here, I decided to leave the more intrigue skills to the players themselves and not roles while focusing on mass battles and skirmishes, and I added some battlelore (huge boardgame) for the more epic battles. If I instead would have started with a system and then made a campaign for it the whole thing would have been pretty different, and probably less fun as well.

Of course, SC:L can't do this since Wizards own the world (and D&D), so they pick the system.

waynejr2 · September 2015

Loke666 said:

waynejr2 said:

Players fault you say... Well, you are saying that something "smart" can't get you killed? What if the mistake was this choice, but the choice to travel to this section of the game.

How about that chest with the fatal instant poison trap. If they fail the st, will you save them? Don't cop out and say there is a different poison on it. If there are 10,000 chests in the world with poison and this is the only one with instant fatal poison are you going to save the player?

I think I am just of a different period in gaming. We didn't coddle people. When the RPGA came about, they stated that BS of a good DM never kills a player. They have your motto "A good DM wont kill a player for something that isn't the players fault though, killing a player just because you rolled something on a random table isn't fun either." Because anything else is being a killer DM.

Opening a chest without having a good theif is a stupid decision. I am just saying that you shouldn't kill of your player (or that I don't at least) on a single dice roll unless it is something that makes or breaks the campaign.

Botching your moral check when trying to throw the one ring in mount Doom is such a case, a random small trap isn't (particularly when you have a good thief that just rolls badly) unless you run a hard end dungeon campaign (preferably with floorplans and everything) and even then I rather kill my players for messing up a puzzle then a single bad roll for stuff that rarely affect the campaign.

Of course there are exceptions, in games like Paranoia and Call of Cthulhu have I killed groups for less than that.

Keeping the players on the edge is important, they should know that they don't have to succeed or even survive unless they are very careful but when you start killing them off for close to nothing it tends to stop being fun for them and RP are supposed to be fun for the entire group instead of just the DM.

As for belonging to an older generation do you have played for 10 years more than me (I were drooling and could hardly speak in '74) so it is kinda true and there are differences between European and North American RPing as well, you guys usually kill more players in dungeons while I get my players stuck on the wrong side of a civil war or something instead.

But if you call me a "daycare DM" my players would be pretty upset, they are still upset for me wiping their group a lot of times for them making some "tiny" misstake (pulling the red lever in the dungeon, getting the dukes daughter pregnant, suggesting to a certain inqusitor that not everything in the bible should be taken literary and so on).Slapshot1188 said:

Karnage69 said:

The sign of a good DM/GM is answered in one question:

"Are your friends coming back, session after session, to keep playing?"

I'd have to agree. There is no single "right" type. The best DM would adapt to his players as long as they were compatible. If players and DM want very different things, then they should likely just move on.

Well, usually you could find some kind of game that work for both types. If your DM love high tech while the group want fantasy you could run Shadowrun and so on.

I think it is more important that the DM is hard but fair and that he or she is good to describe stuff and have a nasty imagination for campaigns.

And there are aids that make things easier as well. We use miniatures and floorplains. I have pictures of all my important npcs. We sometimes use ambient sounds or music to set the mood and we actual physical metal coins instead of numbers (ok, the last part I mainly use because it is easier to trick my players into traps and problems but they still like them). No aids can make a bad DM good but they can improve the game and make things more fun.

Well, that is coddling the player IMO. You are taking risks going out to adventure. You aren't tending to your farm. We just have to disagree at this point.

Loke666 · September 2015

waynejr2 said:

Well, that is coddling the player IMO. You are taking risks going out to adventure. You aren't tending to your farm. We just have to disagree at this point.

As I see it the whole thing depends on your player group. I usually discuss with them after the first session what they thought of the difficulty. In my rather new campaign we all decided that the difficulty needed a ramp up. Nearly wiped them last session but they were really lucky (the Tymore clerics luck spell saved them from an Indiana Jones styled trap.... Ill get them next time though.

Others want it easier, there is a level I wont pass below since I need to enjoy it as well, if my minimum difficulty is too hard I kick them in the curve.

But difficulty must be enjoyable to everyone just like in computer games. Otherwise I would just be wasting peoples time.

Lord.Bachus · September 2015

Maybe this is the game that allows you both playing and DMing, as much as i love DMing i even love playing a character much more, making a steady group of players that DM one adventure/campaign and then turn over the wheel to another member sounds like a perfect opportunity for me...

as long as everyone suits as a DM and a player it sounds like fun

maybe we could set up a MMORPG community for this game, might start a european group myself...

Bluddwolf · September 2015

I'm actually getting that nostalgic, PnP feel, and it really begins at the Character Creation stage of the game.

* Character Modeling, customization of background, the character bio / history that you can write yourself, are all top notch.

* Character abilities give you a wide range of selections, and your character's abilities can help to create a pretty unique character (compared to others of the class).

The one aspect that I feel is much needed is that we have the ability to see our character up close, perhaps in the Character Sheet Window.

psiic · September 2015

waynejr2 said:

Lord.Bachus said:

Loke666 said:

After reading up a bit on the official forum: Yes, you can play it like a classic P&P with some exceptions (loot seems to be randomized) but it will take some work by the DM. Without the DM you will lose a lot of the P&P feeling.

Just like in P&P you need a good DM, it will be easy as the DM to make a TPW (total party wipe) but that isn't really fun unless the players really mess up. It isn't fun on the other hand to always succeed no matter how bad you play either so DMing will be the hardest role.

With a good DM, players are allways living with the fear of dying and permadeath, tough they should almost never die.

But they can not allways succeed, there needs to be some failure...

I have been playing dnd since 1974. I hated this attitude that came into the hobby that suggests that good DMs don't kill players. That the good DM will create a clever bit to save them from themselves and then the players will pretend that "they have the fear of dying or permadeath".

I killed players in my games all the time on occasion I had no problem with tossing out a perma-death now and again as a life lesson for real acts of stupidity. Had one joker who wanted to ice sheet across the crater of an active volcano, all the magic in the world aint got nothing on a force of nature.

Majestico · September 2015

After reading these comments, I wanted to hear your take on a situation that used to occur with me whilst DM'ing.

I used to run a fairly large group of players, and due to their work requirements, their pc's ended up branching off and forming two sub-groups. At the time I was a hard-up student, whilst my players were all holding down jobs. After a particularly brutal encounter one night, I received a 'note' from one of my pc's asking if he could get full health back and he would give me a full pack of cigs (in real life).

I was choking on a cigarette and so accepted.

Then rumour must have gotten around my players that I was susceptible to bribes. It started off as quite tame, with cigarettes being the standard currency to 'revive' a pc's hit points. Then when I would be out drinking with one of my players, they would start buying me drinks, with the promise that they would receive a certain magical item when the game resumed.

This started to escalate, and I started to receive money in exchange for 'boosting' a pc. The more cash they gave the more 'pimped' out their pc would become.

The funny thing was, that both factions were aware that this was going on, and through just minor tweaking, both sides became enemies. Which meant they would pay more, and more. I ended up not having to work to supplement my degree cause of this.

I mean it was quite mad, at one point I got a £200 leather jacket in exchange for resurrecting this guy's barbarian! (This is all true btw)

I always wondered what other DM's would think of this. The way I looked at it was that they enjoyed the game I offered them, and otherwise I would not have had time to run it.

Just curious if other DM's would do the same in that situation?

Bluddwolf · September 2015

When I played, our DM was very stingy when it came to resurrection. A player character could not learn the spell and they were never found as a scroll. If a character died we could expect it to be weeks, and usually involved a quest specific for that purpose, to find a way to get a character resurrected.

"Cheating Death is a step towards immortality, and that belongs to the Gods" was our DM's rationale.

Ridrith · September 2015

Majestico said:

After reading these comments, I wanted to hear your take on a situation that used to occur with me whilst DM'ing.
I used to run a fairly large group of players, and due to their work requirements, their pc's ended up branching off and forming two sub-groups. At the time I was a hard-up student, whilst my players were all holding down jobs. After a particularly brutal encounter one night, I received a 'note' from one of my pc's asking if he could get full health back and he would give me a full pack of cigs (in real life).
I was choking on a cigarette and so accepted.
Then rumour must have gotten around my players that I was susceptible to bribes. It started off as quite tame, with cigarettes being the standard currency to 'revive' a pc's hit points. Then when I would be out drinking with one of my players, they would start buying me drinks, with the promise that they would receive a certain magical item when the game resumed.
This started to escalate, and I started to receive money in exchange for 'boosting' a pc. The more cash they gave the more 'pimped' out their pc would become.
The funny thing was, that both factions were aware that this was going on, and through just minor tweaking, both sides became enemies. Which meant they would pay more, and more. I ended up not having to work to supplement my degree cause of this.
I mean it was quite mad, at one point I got a £200 leather jacket in exchange for resurrecting this guy's barbarian! (This is all true btw)
I always wondered what other DM's would think of this. The way I looked at it was that they enjoyed the game I offered them, and otherwise I would not have had time to run it.
Just curious if other DM's would do the same in that situation?

To me that seems pretty greasy, but I guess if people are stupid enough to spend their hard earned money bribing somebody who literally "gives" them something in return by simply saying it happens, sure. I guess whatever they want to blow their money on.

I feel like you were taking advantage to some degree and at some point you probably should have said: "Hey, how about we just play the game and you guys can stop treating me like I'm some cheap whore and instead like a guy who's trying to run a game of Dungeons and Dragons for you."

Make no mistake, I think it's perfectly fine if your players show some DM appreciation every now and again. Some of my players in my real life game often will pick me up a soda and a meal or something if they go out to grab some food during a break in our games. They've also contributed money (5-10 dollars a piece) so I could pick up a book to run for them. But we also use my house and I generally provide the snacks and drinks while they're here. I think that's fine. But if they started to offer me money, as in, large sums of money or leather coats to give them items in game or to "advance" their character... I'd let them know to just chill out.

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