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I'm not the world's biggest fan of d100 systems but Unknown Armies uses one and Tynes and Stolze at least had the good sense to explicitly spell out the conditions and circumstances in which characters should be called upon to actually roll dice.
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Oct 9, 2015 19:28
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fool_of_sound posted:It's usually because the GM is supposed to apply massive bonuses to easy tasks/a massive penalty to hard tasks, and most systems don't have a good example chart of what these modifiers should be. It also doesn't help that because d100 systems tend to list things like 'trivial' and 'very easy' that GMs end up calling for rolls on things that they probably should just give an autosuccess. Another pet peeve of mine is rulesets with a difficulty chart that goes like this: Routine +15 Easy +10 A synonym for "easy" +5 Normal +0 Difficult -5 Hard -10 Really Hard -15 Amazing -20 Incredible -25 Impossible -30 Synonym for "hard" -35 Another synonym for "hard" -40 I hate my players and I own a thesaurus -45 without explaining what any of this means.
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Oct 9, 2015 19:28
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Halloween Jack posted:Another pet peeve of mine is rulesets with a difficulty chart that goes like this: Yes. These are the devil. The general rule of thumb I use for out of combat checks in stuff like DH and WHFRP is that most of them should be rolling to get more than the bare minimum. If you're rolling at a -10 or -20 penalty, the check should be a positive thing to see if you're getting some kind of bonus rather than a required thing to advance in the adventure (gently caress you, published scenarios, Pinning, and Fear tests in DH). '10-30% to play game' is really awful. Similar, if you're just hitting the street to ask around and get a basic profile of something, having the skill alone should get you enough information to proceed and if a check is used, the check should be to get additional info or a warning of a possible pitfall or trap.
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Oct 9, 2015 19:40
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Halloween Jack posted:Another pet peeve of mine is rulesets with a difficulty chart that goes like this: One of the examples I think illustrates this the best are skills names "Mathematics". Some things would be just flat-out impossible to do who don't have the required knowledge, like doing vector calculus with only a high school education in mathematics. But to someone with a master's degree in mathematics, vector calculus is probably not all that difficult. Is vector calculus then an Impossible Mathematics test, or an Easy Mathematics test? Or is it an Easy test for the university-graduate and an Impossible test for the high-school graduate, just to make things extra difficult?
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Oct 9, 2015 20:42
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Nessus posted:I am gonna be fair to Exalted 2E that the section on social combat said, first, that outside of super top-tier Solar/evil Solar brain-gently caress magic (which of course inevitably everyone, ever, will have, because Exalted loves power escalation more than Doc Smith did), the absolute most you would have to do is spend 2 WP and your brain and precious bodily fluids are safe for that scene. It also said that people who are using social combat to get their friends to cover this round of beers are going to come off as relentless bullies and it was meant for high stakes persuasion rather than "literally every time you argue, ever." Haggling over a ship vs. haggling over lunch. This is Richard Rahl we're talking about, he wouldn't have anything less.
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Oct 9, 2015 21:00
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LatwPIAT posted:One of the examples I think illustrates this the best are skills names "Mathematics". Some things would be just flat-out impossible to do who don't have the required knowledge, like doing vector calculus with only a high school education in mathematics. But to someone with a master's degree in mathematics, vector calculus is probably not all that difficult. Is vector calculus then an Impossible Mathematics test, or an Easy Mathematics test? Or is it an Easy test for the university-graduate and an Impossible test for the high-school graduate, just to make things extra difficult?
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Oct 9, 2015 21:14
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Halloween Jack posted:As a follow-up to this, what is a professional-level difficulty situation for Mathematics as opposed to a professional-level difficulty situation for Firearms? A mathematician does lots of complex math stuff all the time, but few police officers, for example, get into gunfights day after day. Well, RPG ones do.
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Oct 9, 2015 21:20
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I'd say that mathematics, as a skill, would probably involve a lot of being able to do the local equivalent of "taking 20," if you know the requisite mechanics for what you're doing(algebra or whatever), usually the main question is how fast you can complete it, not whether you can complete it at all, especially if you've got something to reference formulas in.
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Oct 9, 2015 22:58
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Doresh posted:This get's even better if your Eidolon/Companion has access to Pounce. gradenko_2000 posted:Natural Aspect [Form] - the Companion gains one of the following special monster qualities: pounce, leaping attack, rend, trample, rock catching, rock throwing, Fast Healing 1. This talent can be taken multiple times. Yep.
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Oct 9, 2015 23:04
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Imagining a 100-armed creature summoned only for the purpose of throwing rocks.
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Oct 10, 2015 14:51
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Crasical posted:Yep. I should learn to read XD Green Intern posted:Imagining a 100-armed creature summoned only for the purpose of throwing rocks. Man, just imagine if you had enough vorpal weapons for all those arms. "Well, he'll pretty much insta-kill just about anyone 5 times per Full Attack (okay a bit less than that because you have to confirm, but you get the idea), so let's make this quick and say he'll just win against anyone within pouncing distance." But since this is Pathfinder, you can just overspecialize your buddy into using falcatas to rain down crits upon crits on your foes. Doresh fucked around with this message at 16:23 on Oct 10, 2015 |
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Oct 10, 2015 16:10
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They had one of those in the 3.x Epic handbook, didn't they? I think that was when my GM realized just how completely worthless CR was as a measurement.
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Oct 10, 2015 17:18
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I think if you're making this blenderman(tm), you probably are high enough level to be able to afford vorpal scimitars or whatever.
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Oct 10, 2015 17:25
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Bieeardo posted:They had one of those in the 3.x Epic handbook, didn't they? Here it is. Yes, the designer expected GMs to toss down 100 attack rolls every round. But they can only rend once per round, because rending would be broken otherwise. 
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Oct 10, 2015 17:37
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Here it is. Hey, only a max of 15 against any given medium creature!
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Oct 10, 2015 17:48
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Here it is. Of loving course it can summon another one if you're actually winning.
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Oct 10, 2015 17:58
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That epic level monster page also has the Chichimec, which is my favorite "looks like the aftermath of a flock of geese hitting a plane" monster.
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Oct 10, 2015 18:13
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And the Atropal. Paraphrasing earlier from the book: "Nodoz the wizard encounters an atropal while outside alone. Instead of just staring at his DM and saying, 'An undead, godly fetus? Seriously, dude?' he casts a Hellball which, due to the creature's SR and innate resistance to the elements conjured by the spell, will probably dela more damage to the wizard than the monster."
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Oct 10, 2015 18:30
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Epic Level Handbook is widely acknowledged as broken even among the staunchest defenders of 3.X mechanics. It had a neat premise, but the designers took the "inflate the numbers" approach to god-tier D&D games with the exception of Epic-Level Spells, which were even more powerful and customizable than the Epic options for the other classes.
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Oct 10, 2015 18:31
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Here it is. It's cute that there's never any middle ground between an attack and a full attack
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Oct 10, 2015 19:27
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ELH is even worse in that it's just boring. There's so much "okay, fight this thing, but with bigger numbers and extra immunities, don't mind the grind". The most hilarious part is Union, which is apparently populated by epic-level characters who decided to just settle down and be epic-level bakers or whatever, so you can go eat level-appropriate pies with a properly scaled savoriness DC, but is otherwise near-indistinguishable from every other high-fantasy D&D metropolis.
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Oct 10, 2015 20:00
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Alien Rope Burn posted:ELH is even worse in that it's just boring. There's so much "okay, fight this thing, but with bigger numbers and extra immunities, don't mind the grind". The most hilarious part is Union, which is apparently populated by epic-level characters who decided to just settle down and be epic-level bakers or whatever, so you can go eat level-appropriate pies with a properly scaled savoriness DC, but is otherwise near-indistinguishable from every other high-fantasy D&D metropolis. You could probably spin an interesting story from the Epic Butcher, Epic Baker and Epic Candlestick maker getting fed up with some god's bullshit and putting their adventuring gear on for one last romp.
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Oct 10, 2015 20:10
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Alien Rope Burn posted:Here it is. I really like the Pathfinder version more. Dude just has a max of 4 attacks, but tries to hit anyone within range with them. Then again he was scaled down to a power level were the system wouldn't break down completely. Green Intern posted:That epic level monster page also has the Chichimec, which is my favorite "looks like the aftermath of a flock of geese hitting a plane" monster. This is what happens if you go the opposite route Sephiroth took. Alien Rope Burn posted:ELH is even worse in that it's just boring. There's so much "okay, fight this thing, but with bigger numbers and extra immunities, don't mind the grind". The most hilarious part is Union, which is apparently populated by epic-level characters who decided to just settle down and be epic-level bakers or whatever, so you can go eat level-appropriate pies with a properly scaled savoriness DC, but is otherwise near-indistinguishable from every other high-fantasy D&D metropolis. With town guards that are like any normal guards, but just so happen to have more Hit Dice than an entire army combined. Doresh fucked around with this message at 23:08 on Oct 10, 2015 |
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Oct 10, 2015 20:38
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Remember that homebrewed monster from a while back that was larger than the observable universe and could spawn an infinite number of offspring from his arbitrarily large hit point pool.
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Oct 11, 2015 00:41
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Kurieg posted:Remember that homebrewed monster from a while back that was larger than the observable universe and could spawn an infinite number of offspring from his arbitrarily large hit point pool. That's literally Azothoth though. Perfect translation.
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Oct 11, 2015 03:52
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Kurieg posted:Remember that homebrewed monster from a while back that was larger than the observable universe and could spawn an infinite number of offspring from his arbitrarily large hit point pool. Would be funny if he wasn't immune against Save-or-Die effects. Unless this is Pathfinder, where it's just Save-or-Take-Lotsa-Damage. The Dark Eye  Now to cover other critters aside from demons (because those are numerous enough to be their own post or two). Animals TDE features all your typical wild beasts, their pre-historic counterparts and of course dinosaurs. Some are bit more creative because they have unique Aventurian names: A T-Rex is known as a Gorger (sometimes also called Sultan Lizard or Tyrant Lizard), hyenas are known as Khoram Beasts after the desert they like to hang out in, and they have a unique baboon variant that likes to hang out in swamps and is called a Redeye or Swamp-[I have no idea how to translate "Ranze", if that even is an actual word to begin with] Oversized insects do also exist of course, with dog-sized stag beetles sometimes being used as novelty pets who make for surprisingly good watchdogs. The most original animals featured in TDE include the Snow Lurker (a very aggressive rage badger and the only creature in the entire game that somehow becomes faster and stronger as it takes damage), the Morfu (a giant snail that can shoot poisonous darts from the warts covering its body, though all the poison does is just add more damage), and the Kalekks. Kalekks are flesh-eating hominids standing 6 feet tall (with the females being 1.5x to 2x as big depending on the edition) who somehow lay eggs that the females carry around in pouches like some kind of marsupial. As yet another proof that Maraskan isn't actually Not-Japan aside from samurai weapons and armor, there isn't anything along a kappa or other kind of Yokai. Instead, Maraskan is home of the Maraskan Tarantula, a spider-like creature with jaguar camo, a very flat triangular body and a very long stinger. Chimeras As mentioned last time, your general term for magically-created hybrid creatures. Generally considered the work of black magic or demon worship (seeing how chimeras fall into the domain of the archdemon Asfaloth). Modifiers to creating a chimera are based on how powerful you want it to be (like taking the worst or best stats of every base creature), whether you want it to be fertile and how different the base creatures are. An owlbear (who don't exist in TDE) are certainly way easier to do than scorpion whale grass. Aside from harpyies, most other chimeras are pretty rare or one-of-a-kind, though manticores (without wings or ranged attacks) are somewhat common, especially since their are the patron animal of the demigod Kor (not sure how that works with the whole demon angle). For some reason, overpowered NPC mages really like fusing dragons with other critters. And not just the lame lesser dragons, the big "Is a much better spellcaster than you can ever hope to be" ones. (it should be noted that the general rules for summoning/creating give the caster some points to beef up their creation. These points are either gained by taking a penalty to the spellcasting roll or by using the margin of success, though the latter gives you only half as many points to play with.) Daemonites These are like chimeras, but include at least one demon as the base creature. The notable daemonites are the White Chasers, a cross between a white-fured wolf and a Karmanath (a demon that doesn't really look too different from a normal wolf). The result is somehow way more demonic and scarier than the parent demon, because White Chasers are badass monstrosities with two heads and eight legs. There is also a very confusing list of creatures that are (or might be) technically Daemonites, including Lobsterians (could explain why they only appeared in Aventuria in the last couple decades), Night Elves (not sure why they have random iron allergies if they're partially demons) and those White Lurkers (this actually makes kinda sense, with them raging and all). Demon Ark Nobody quite knows whether these things are a form of daemonite, an actual demon or something else entirely. They look like misshapen tree trunks with (usually) four big branches serving as legs, with which they can walk on water like some kind of oversized, wooden water strider. They also eat ships and reproduce through some kind of mitosis. They can become as big as a warship (sometimes even larger) and have plenty of hollow space for weaponry and a crew composed of pirates, demons, Krakonians and our beloved Lobsterians. Why isn't there a game about pirate lobsters riding giant demon trees? Suffice to say, these things really spice up ship combat in a setting where ships can only ploink ballista bolts at each other. Unfortunately, I'm not sure if these things actually have stats. Elementals Elementals in TDE come in four levels of power: Elemental Ghosts who are barely sentient, Genies who are much smarter and always look humanoid, Elemental Masters who are essentially sentient natural disasters and finally the Elemental Lords who rule over their respective element like gods and hang around in the Elemental Citadeles that span from the First Sphere all the way to the Third (usually at the top of a high mountain range). The strongest elementals that can actually be summoned are the masters, though most spellcasters prefer genies as they're easier to deal with. Elementals don't blindly follow orders, but have to be haggled with based on what the caster wants them to do and how good his summoning and diplomacy rolls are. Unless it's a ghost, they just do stuff as best as they can. The various things elementals can do and the modifiers associated with it are somehow more complicated than controlling a demon - who unlike elementls can also be summoned permanently. (Elementals also aren't as customizable as other summoned creatures. Their stats are just boosted based on your margin of success) Ghosts These all come in your usual variety: The classic ghost who haunts a place till the PCs figure out what he wants, the Poltergeist who wrecks stuff Golem Another crime against nature courtesy of Asfaloth. They are made out of either clay, wood, stone or metal, and their size can be anything from a child to a troll. (Fun fact: Prior to 4th edition, golem and undead creation was all done with the same spell) Golemite The elemental counterpart to a golem. Unlike their evil demon cousin, they can't be made permanently. They are also so rare that the only officla Golemite-creating spell is for the creation of quicksand golemites, but even that spell is hard to get because it was developed exclusively by and for one Tulamidian sultan. Because we can't have the heroes summon a sand-based T-1000 buddy. Gryhpons Not really an actual enemy seeing how they are servants of Praios. The are naturally suped-up lions with wings and a beak. Sea Serpents These almost-Godzilla-sized sea monsters (though there are rumors of specimens that actually are Godzilla-sized) are clearly not meant to be fought by PCs and are merely plot devices and adventure hooks (though that didn't stop the developers from giving them stats anyways, with very swingy d20-based damage rolls and hundreds of Life Points that makes it more durable than a warship). The writers also fully endorse antagonistic GM behavior when using sea serpents - because having the players find lots of treasure only to have it lost through a surprise sea serpent they have no chance of defeating will surely do wonders to a good roleplaying atmosphere. Kraken Of course TDE has this other kind of sea serpent, in case the antagonistic GM wants to spice things up a little. Fortunately, there exist a couple smaller kraken variants the PCs can actually fight. These can also hunt on land, which makes me imagine them walking around like a cartoon squid. Lycranthrope No real surprises here. Can turn into an animal or animal hybrid, and hard to kill without silver. The only strange part is that they can raise their physical stats as much as they want, so your Barbarian-Battleaxe-wielding powergamer probably really wants to become a were-critter. Undead Undead are annoying. Not only can they easily cause wound infections (plus a handful of diseases based on the type of undead), but seeing a type of undead for the first time requires a penalized Courage check to not turn around and run away, screaming like a little girl. Fun. Aside from your standard zombie and skeleton, there's the Living Corpse, a zombie that is just fresh enough to kinda sorta pass off as living and can still use weapons and other tools. The most powerful undead is the mummy, who may be weak to fire attacks, but makes up for it by hitting like a truck. There are also stats for skeleton dogs and horses, but TDE sadly doesn't have generel zombie/skeleton templates. As skillful casters can beef up their undead, the basic human undead stay competitive quite longer than their D&D counterparts. Though they are still pretty dumb and lack finesse. There do exist some undead that are sentient, but those are just another case of overpowered NPC syndrome. Almost all undead fall under the domain of Targunitoth, but other archdemons can have undead of their own, usually reflavored after their sthick. The most common are the bloated Water Corpses of Charyptoroth, and the Ice Corpses of Nagrach. I also seem to recall that Blakharaz has a thing for Ghost Rider skeletons. (There also used to be a good kind of undead called Revenant, who is so dedicated to fulfill his last mission that he'd resurrect himself over and over again. 4th edition seems to have retconned them away, though) Vampires Now these guys are much more creative than the lycanthropes. The first vampires were loyal servants of the Nameless who were granted demonic power by him, only to be cursed by the Twelvegods in return. To this day, every vampire is considered to have been cursed by one of the Twelvegods (either their patron deity from their time as a human, or the god of their birth month if they weren't particularly religious), which determines what kind of weakness he has: Praios-cursed vampires are weak to sunlight, Rondra-cursed can be killed easily in a honorful duel (which Sanctified of Rondra can actually force you to do), and Boron-cursed have the whole "Must sleep in homeland soil"-shtick while Travia-cursed have the "Can't enter a building without being invited in"-shtick. Vampires also go through a radical personality change, so a noble warrior in service of Rondra eventually turns into a cowardly scoundrel, and a Praios-cursed can't help to lie constantly. The exact frequency and severity of a weakness is randomly determined. A Praios-cursed might only be mildly irritated by sunlight, while water might be literal acid to an Efferd-cursed (think Legacy of Kain) and a Travia-cursed might instantly turn to ashes if a blood relative gives him a hug. Outside of their weakness, vampires are more than pushovers. They have greatly boosted physical attributes, gain random vampire-related powers and regenerate any kind of damage pretty darn fast. On top of that, they are also resistant to physical damage. As this is the only kind of resistance that reduces the Hit Points (aka damage before armor) instead of the Damage Points (aka damage after armor), a vmapire in full knight getup can shrug off siege engine attacks. In any case, it's much better for the PCs to just do research on the vampire in question so they know what to try out against him. TDE vampires are also a bit new-agey because they don't drink blood for the blood itself, but the life essence inside the blood. Pardona - being the crazy mad scientist of this setting - also created her own brand of elven vampires called Feylamia. They aren't too different from normal vampires except that they are always cursed by demigoddes Mada, giving them weaknesses to moonlight and silver. Next Time: Metaplot! Let's see how things have changed since Realms of Arkania.
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Oct 11, 2015 20:51
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I like the vampire varieties, that's actually pretty cool, and also encourages the players doing some research. Though, is there any reasonable way that the PC's could identify which deity a given vampire is cursed by? Do they look notably different or anything? Are they rare enough that any given vampire is probably a local legend whose background they could investigate? Or is it just a matter of hauling along all the various anti-vampire remedies and giving them a try?
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Oct 11, 2015 22:51
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I imagine the easiest way is to start researching that vampire's history in life. Dig up old records, check church rolls...
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Oct 11, 2015 22:55
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Mors Rattus posted:I imagine the easiest way is to start researching that vampire's history in life. Dig up old records, check church rolls... Yeah, but that'd require the vampires to be relatively rare. If there's, like, fifty vampires inside every old crypt, being able to do actual research goes out the window and it turns into more of a "lol the anti-vampire weapon you thought was the right one doesn't work! try again!" If they're legitimately pretty rare, though, any given vampire will probably be a local legend that can be researched if the players give a gently caress. Though that can also lead to an entertaining situation where the vampire, not being loving dense, realizes that information about it is a weakness, and it's gone to great pains to destroy any mentions of its life, kill people it used to know, etc. and the players have to do their research from incomplete and intentionally damaged sources.
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Oct 12, 2015 00:14
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PurpleXVI posted:Yeah, but that'd require the vampires to be relatively rare. If there's, like, fifty vampires inside every old crypt, being able to do actual research goes out the window and it turns into more of a "lol the anti-vampire weapon you thought was the right one doesn't work! try again!" Which is a plot hook in and of itself. "So you hear about this strange rash of disappearances and seemingly random acts of vandalism in this nearby village..."
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Oct 12, 2015 01:06
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Doresh posted:
Does this mean there are a bunch of Firun cursed vampires that dedicate themselves to helping the weak and needy?
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Oct 12, 2015 08:25
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PurpleXVI posted:I like the vampire varieties, that's actually pretty cool, and also encourages the players doing some research. Though, is there any reasonable way that the PC's could identify which deity a given vampire is cursed by? Do they look notably different or anything? Are they rare enough that any given vampire is probably a local legend whose background they could investigate? Or is it just a matter of hauling along all the various anti-vampire remedies and giving them a try? There's really no sure-fire way to know the curse of a vampire aside from maybe carrying around holy symbols of each Twelvegod and checking which he is afraid of. Though having those symbols be too close together could result in a bit of confusion. The vampire will certainly not sit idle in the meantime, and he'll probably just freak out anyways to hide is true weakness. Some weaknesses are also hard to actually carry around. A Firun-cursed might be weak to ice (though that's actually easy to pull off if the party's caster has either an ice or elemental summon spell), and a Rondra-cursed might be weak to thunder instead of honorful duels because Rondra is also the thunder goddess. And lightning-based spells are surprisingly rare because that's not an actual element in TDE. As for the classic stake through the heart, I think that one only works if the wood or other material the stake is made out of is related to the god the vampire was cursed by. As with all supernatural creatures in TDE, they are rare enough that most people aside from scholars, spellcasters and Sanctified only know them from legend and have build lots of superstition around them that makes it hard to know what actually works on a vampire. Many people most likely don't even realize that not all weaknesses work on all vampires. Mors Rattus posted:I imagine the easiest way is to start researching that vampire's history in life. Dig up old records, check church rolls... Yeah, they're pretty much an investigative puzzle. (Though I guess if you could lock one up in a cell or something, you just have to wait till he runs out of life essence, at which point he loses most of his powers and can be killed much easier. Still, locking one up in the first place is not easy, as their are very strong and can have a random collection of vampire powers ranging form turning into mist to mind control. Still, I think you could do some fun stuff with an ore elemental... ) PurpleXVI posted:Yeah, but that'd require the vampires to be relatively rare. If there's, like, fifty vampires inside every old crypt, being able to do actual research goes out the window and it turns into more of a "lol the anti-vampire weapon you thought was the right one doesn't work! try again!" Excatly. Using vampires as cannon fodder is missing the point. And doing research becomes especially tricky if the vampire has already been around for a couple centuries. Hel posted:Does this mean there are a bunch of Firun cursed vampires that dedicate themselves to helping the weak and needy? I fear the offical answer is just "They start hating nature and just hang out in cities", but I like the image of Firun-curse vampires tending to beggars and cripples in exchange for a bit of life essence - or not even that if the vampire in question is fine without super powers. Then again running out of juice is irreversible and causes you to lose your soul, so they probably want life essence. As a precedent, there is a group of good vampires called the Children of the Night who have dedicated their life in service of Boron and aren't quite as cursed as other vampires in return. Some of the Twelvegods even went so far as to give them buffs. In return, they have to contempt with the fact that part of the life essence they gobble up goes straight to the Nameless like with every vampire. Doresh fucked around with this message at 18:23 on Oct 12, 2015 |
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Oct 12, 2015 18:10
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Reaching way back, butHalloween Jack posted:The 90s and 00s produced many games that follow this basic model: Characters have Attributes and Skills, usually rated 1-5 or 1-6. There's a dice-based resolution system that combines an Attribute and a Skill for a total which is somehow compared to a difficulty number. The resolution mechanics can be wildly different between games, but they all tend to work with an Attribute/Skill divide and a low numerical cap. (Often it seems like the designers just wanted to have a unique resolution mechanic to make their game stand out, without playtesting or even thinking very hard about how the probabilities worked out. One of the few merits of these systems is that it's fairly easy to convert between them.) Bolted onto this uninspired but functional system, there's often poorly-considered Advantages/Disadvantages rules, a magic system, and a combat subsystem. If the designer isn't a lazy dolt, there might actually be a subsystem for other genre-appropriate things like car chases. Asimo posted:Honestly I'd just call this "90's game design"? I suppose that we can define 70s Design as just...whatever people were doing in the 70s, since the hobby was evolving out of wargaming, and pretty much everything that was created was a reaction to D&D. Was 80s design defined by the successful "universal" systems? Rolemaster, BRP, GURPS, and Palladium's Megaversal system all started as somebody's attempt to improve on D&D, but grew into successful franchises. You can see some pretty clear parallels across all of these games, just as you can between the designers of all those obscure Fantasy Heartbreakers...the difference being that the latter group were too ignorant and too late to the party to have any relevance. I'm also interested in the history of perspectives on how to run a game. theironjef mentioned 80s games as setting up a distinctly adversarial and punitive relationship between the GM and the players. People tend to assume that White Wolf defined innovation in design in the 90s, and that the way of the 90s was all about "story," the other side of the coin being that supplements in the 90s were often rife with metaplot and extremely railroady adventures. I find that all the negative things that White Wolf is accused of are, as a rule, even worse in the games that were ripping them off. For example, Everlasting professes "story" at every turn, but in practice, all of the rules that are supposed to support storytelling (such as Destiny Points) are paddles for the GM to spank you with if he thinks you're not roleplaying correctly. The more I look at it, the less difference I see between the old-fashioned "DM as jealous Old Testament God" and the 90s "GM as Auteur Director" styles. It's not hard to see the similarity when I put it that way, is it?
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Oct 12, 2015 20:51
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I mean there were a lot of dumb and pervasive trends that took years to finally start going away, and Cthulhutech unfortunately stands out by just doing design like that straight with little insight or innovation.
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I honestly don't think there was ever really a "decade" for adversarial GM'ing. I think it's more that games started out a bit more like GAMES, i.e., the players were supposed to be able to lose and have to start over, and hence the GM was meant to challenge them more aggressively and more mercilessly. But I don't think the ratio of "jackass GM who will TPK you with surprise medusas/cockatrices/rockfalls" to "normal, sane GM" has really shifted all that much. Except that the methods have changed from "TPK everyone" to "railroad everyone with my Mary Sue GMPC elf vampire wizard."
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Oct 12, 2015 20:55
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I think actually the evolution is toward more game-ified agency within roleplaying games. What we're progressing toward with things like apoc world or D&D4e is the treatment of narrative agency as an integrated part of more traditional game elements, like wargame-inspired combat and level-ups. Fiasco is a good example of the far end of this, but earlier games like Dogs in the Vineyard and My Life with Master all make passing the baton easier. *World games are another expression of this idea, with Gnome7's Fellowship being the next logical progression - giving each player a part of the world that they have more-or-less complete authorial control, and giving the GM a character sheet they have to play by like everyone else.
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Oct 12, 2015 21:18
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1980s design, to me, means efforts at making systems more unified, more universal, more “realistic”. Moving away from the D&D/AD&D model of independent subsystems that weren’t terribly well integrated. Comprehensive skill systems. Universal result tables (like in Marvel Super Heroes). Things like Champions/Hero, GURPS, BRP, Rolemaster, and the first D6 games. It wasn’t all detailed weapons tables - there were a lot of proto-narative games with explicit genre elements from that era. Toon, Paranoia, and James Bond 007 are three that I can name off the top of my head.
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Oct 12, 2015 21:45
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Bear in mind a lot of hyper-crunchy games like Pathfinder or Exalted can inadvertently give the players a fair deal of narrative control just because so much of the system revolves around the player's toys, and the likelihood that more and more of those toys will provide avenues to dominate or derail the game.
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Oct 12, 2015 22:22
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FMguru posted:1980s design, to me, means efforts at making systems more unified, more universal, more “realistic”. Moving away from the D&D/AD&D model of independent subsystems that weren’t terribly well integrated. Comprehensive skill systems. Universal result tables (like in Marvel Super Heroes). Things like Champions/Hero, GURPS, BRP, Rolemaster, and the first D6 games. It strikes me as a transition from common law (Collections of rulings and systems established on a case-by-case basis) to civil law (Something designed and written from the bottom-up to work together as a coherent whole).
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Oct 13, 2015 00:07
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Halloween Jack posted:The more I look at it, the less difference I see between the old-fashioned "DM as jealous Old Testament God" and the 90s "GM as Auteur Director" styles. It's not hard to see the similarity when I put it that way, is it? I think the split is definitely similar but different enough in the way it is approached to be distinct. You can have controlling DMs in any game but the quintessential "adversarial DM" is more aligned with the 80s simply because of the way the games were set up. It was designed much more as an evolution of the war game where there were clear sides and a winner and a loser. A DM that killed someone's character was seen less as killing off a fully realized person with a backstory and more like knocking someone out in a boardgame. It sucks but you'll just jump back in next time with a new Elf Wizard to replace the one that died. With the 90s trying to focus on story and character instead of fighting and looting, it became more of a dick move to kill off someone's character that they had poured so much into. So rather than trying to beat the players at the game, we get the problem of the DM trying to tell a story but the players won't go along with it so he has to railroad them onto it. I think the key differences are 80s is more premeditated dickery with planning a session and 90s is more unplanned reactions to players being "unruly". Also one is a direct confrontation where you put the players in a room with multiple save or die monsters and the other is more indirect with threats and coercion to try to get the players to do what you want. While both design perspectives can lead to a powertripping DM, it's the expression of that power that separates the two.
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Oct 13, 2015 00:54
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| # ? Apr 24, 2024 05:44 |
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Hey, System Mastery chums, your continued pestilence and woe fills me with sadness as I await your dulcet words. My week has been nothing but burning servers and capitalists angry about all the burning servers. So, when you can, an episode would be quite a relief.
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Oct 14, 2015 20:42
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