The Latest Edition War

shadzar · Post by **shadzar** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 3:17 am

you forget that when you begin playing it, even Forgotten Realms becomes a homebrew, even the Living series dont follow the same paths no matter how formal WotC tried to make them.

I am still wanting to see AD&D in print and fixed some of the problem form it, rather than just adding crap like PO to it and causing bloat.

AD&D never ened to leave the shelves because they used it to screw up stuff, remove the A and call it D&D.....and create so many people that have no idea what int he hell D&D was but make stuff up without any knowledge of the past.

while it may be D&D focused, it is a problem of the human race at current being so damn lazy and naive to think everything said now is true, and NOT do their own research.

i myself cannot put out something with AD&D logo on it...

Winnah · Post by **Winnah** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 6:23 am

shadzar wrote:
Winnah wrote:
shadzar wrote: the game doesnt need these things, YOU need them. odds are that each group will feel differently about them, so each group must set up their own "formalities" on this.
Having to make up houserules to arbitrate common situations is why I stopped playing 4e.
and we come all back to the Kuntz interview, and why we have the newer editions because D&D has already failed, and why there are edition wars.

the game was made to be a simple system, add what you want.

people want to have a babysitter do the work for them to make their group work.

lazy as people not grasping the concept of D&D to begin with. it isnt an MRE just add water. its kitchen stadium, and you have to do ALL the work for your group.

i want D&D to have X, but i dont want to make X, i want it to be in the game when i buy it, so everyone else has to have X to, and to pay for it even if they dont want it.

a game for the imagination turned into a game for lazy retards.

And here we go. Houserules are fine for gaming with a small, close-knit group. I can and have typed up a living document and made it available to players as required. When I am DMing at clubs and conventions, I do not have that luxury. Disseminating changes to the base system and explaining them takes time, time that could otherwise be spent actually playing the game.

The 4e game I was running was 4 hours once a week, with 3 regular players and another 3 players that could only make it occasionally. Bringing everyone up to speed on changes, allowing for people to provide input into those changes in addition to the other time requirements of hosting a game ate into available play time.

Not a problem if I were still running 14 hour weekly games of AD&D. These days, I simply don't have the time to fix a game system to my liking. The guys I regularly play with barely have the time to read the rule-books properly, let alone provide insightful feedback on houserules.

We get together to play rpg's, not design them.

you want a complete game, sit down and play monopoly. D&D was and will always be an unfinished game, as that is what an RPG is.

what situations are common to you, are not common to all, and having them part of the rules is where the biggest arguments come from.

always the same bullshit excuses. "i dont like Thing X, so Thing X needs to be made for me"

make it your fucking self.

Are you taking your meds? I buy something and it does not work as advertised. I have a right to be pissed off.

turning the novels into exacts in settings, and hand holding players through every last little thing has pampered them for the sake of turning a quick buck.

Lorraine Williams thrived on little shits like you, cause you follow her line of thinking "these dumb gamers will spend money on anything"

I don't even know what you are talking about here. I have no idea who Loren Williams is. I read one of the Drizzt books once. It was stupid.

this is why Gary put that comment in the books "we mustnt let players know they dont evne need to buy books form us to play"

it is why "Zeb" cook put the comment in also

2e DMG wrote:At conventions, in letters, and over the phone I'm often asked for the instant answer to a fine point of the game rules. More often than not, I come back with a question--what do you feel is right? And the people asking the questions discover that not only can they create an answer, but that their answer is as good as anyone else's. The rules are only guidelines.

Copyright 1999 TSR Inc.

Gary. I assume you mean Gary Gygax. Even he felt the need for a uniform set of rules. Otherwise conventions would have been (more of) a fucking mess.

NetBooks existed LONG before the Tomes found on TGD. like the Tomes, not everybody used them. Steve Winter was wrong trying to collect everyone's houserules and then so to was WotC.

the fact that everyone doesnt play the same way still with 4th, means the truth shall prevail. Everyone will make the game what they want within the group.

No, it does not. It means people will be playing Smash Brothers instead. Or going out to get drunk and chase tail. Those that actually put a game system together are in the minority.

YOU dont need the "official" product to include things, you jsut need something like the Tomes and NetBooks, to provide something for you because you cant pull your head out of your ass long enough to think out how to do something yourself.

I'm perfectly capable of doing so. Finding players that actually want to play that system is another issue entirely. If it was an 'official' hardcover publication, I would have more players than needed.

if it werent for that lazy attitude and the greed and such of the Blumes and Williams, there would have been something like the OGL since the 80's i am sure. Hell people were allowed to make their own, and could even get them printed (which means they got paid for), software to run D&D games with back then.

Bullshit. My first foray into the internet gaming community was during the late 80's and early 90's. Nothing approaching an OGL was on the old .alt forums. All fanfics, game reports, recruitment and encounter advice. Optimization started flame wars and homebrew was treated with scorn.

so if you dont have the social skills required to play a social game, then stop, and find a game requiring les. you dont need rules for everything printed from an "official" source.

you want a game like Monopoly form D&D, but it will NEVER offer a compelte set of rules to handle all situations, because after nearly 40 years, they still dont know everything that someone might do in the game to need to cover it, NOR can they print all this and expect people to buy it. when they do so, the first thing people bitch about is the bloat.

it is a never ending cycle, so when the petty people stop trying to make them make everything for them, then they will be able to stop bitching about bloat. then will the game be able to be played.

thankfully some people have grown up and learned. they have started making their own "fantasy heartbreaker" because they realized what Gary said back in the 70s. You dont need to buy their books. you didnt need anything from TSR or WotC to play an RPG. those hangers-on that cant go beyond those limits and dont like D&D for what it is trying to change it still is just sad and pathetic. you have my pity Winnah.

The more I look at this wall of text, the less convinced I am that you actually play rpg's any more. No doubt you used to play, but I honestly can't imagine the type of masochist that would spend hours at a time listening to your inane drivel.

shadzar · Post by **shadzar** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 7:01 am

Winnah wrote: http://www.tgdmb.com/viewtopic.php?p=227336#227336

just going to number stuff sicne forum errors are giving problems, to help lower the database size as we are saying much that doesnt need be repeated in 4000 deep nested quotes.

1. if the clubs and conventions agree with your houserules, then you shouldnt need to spread them around. odds are, not everyone will. why i in part despise "con games", because they are just that con games. you should be palying something at a con that is very low key to give the idea of the game in order to attract new players. otherwise dont run a con game for YO system, but go back to your hotel room and gather people that want to play YOUR system and run it for them.

Mentzer did what he had to do, but doesnt mean the RPGA ever worked correctly or that D&D was made to fit within the tournament mold.

if you have that many houserules that must be gone over, then it seems you DO prefer to design games rather than play them, otherwise you would be playing them as-is. that or publish your game and once designed let others buy it form Lulu or whatever and jsut play from then on.

2. when did D&D ever advertise itself as a complete game, no assembly required?

3. and here we have again, someone with no idea what D&D is, only what they are told it is by others and probably regurgitate hearsay about earlier editions because they have never once looked at them but want to jump on the bandwagon to be a popular kid and make comments about them.

do some research on Lorraine, myself and Tzor has explained her about to FBMF, but do a google search and you will find that the bitch troll she was uneffected by acid or fire, and even at -30 HP and a wish cast, she still didnt die.

if you do research older editions, you might understand some of the edition wars better as it were. where people from the old school crowd are coming from with what was done. maybe you are to young and only know the world of buying brand names since Nike and British Knights fought over the shoe industry along with Adidas and Converse. People used to buy a product based on its merits, and the longest standing products because they delivered a quality product that stood the test of time. D&D has had @40 years and hasnt stabilized yet.

FR is fraught with people against it because the Drizzt novels of Salvatore, and Greenwoods novels got forced into the setting as canon along with just about anything else.

4. Yes Gygax. No he felt a colelction of the clusterfuck of people trying to do different things without talking to each other needed to be undone, while getting away from Dave to prevent paying him royalties...or something like that; was why AD&D came about. BD&D on the other hand was written by so many people it is laughable it ever got finished.

Holmes/Mentzer/Moldvay each had an edition of D&D. that is where B/x and BECMI come from. and the people writing later parts of the BECMI further deviated from a single person writing it so that it was understood by all...of course Gary needed a professional copy-editor BAD!

Mentzer was TOLD to set up the RPGA by the people who had money, but knew nothing about games... the Blumes.

Mike Carr of TSR had been contemplating starting a TSR-sponsored D&D fan club. Shortly after Mentzer won the DM Invitational, Carr approached him about taking on that task. Mentzer agreed to form some sort of group, but rather than a simple "fan club", he was interested in promoting better quality roleplaying, especially during scored D&D events at conventions. Mentzer felt that the system as it stood rewarded those players that stayed quiet at the table, in effect punishing good roleplayers. He came up with a scoring system where the dungeon master and the players all voted on who had been the best roleplayer at the table. With this in place, Mentzer formed the RPGA, an organization that would promote quality roleplaying and allow fans of roleplaying games to meet and play games with each other.

the tournament format set forth by the RPGA was a scoring system to pick an MVP at each table. that is it, not some special set of perfectly designed rules. not even that people used the same house rules.

EACH table picked their on MVP. get your hands on the RPGA handbook and look at it if you can find a copy somewhere.

again the thoughts you have are based on wrong assumptions rather than facts.

5. no dumbass. not people that dont play RPGs at all and want to do stupid crap. every group DOES "make the game what they want within the group." just like everytime people sit downt o play Monopoly they decide will they auction off the deeds, and will free parking give anything for landing on it.

6. you realize the thing is, the game isnt made so you can find player right? that is and always will be your problem. there are MANY places to find people that game, the fact that finding players to play the right game with you is a problem is either your preferences are so narrow, or you live in the sticks where not much gaming is. neither problems the game itelf can help you with. Look at Cham's thread about wanting to convert people he just met and has never gamed with to a Tome game.... might explain why Cham doesnt have a steady group with that sort of behavior, huh? (not the only reason for lack of a steady group, jsut all we know and helps my example.)

7. how the fuck were you on newsgroups in the 80's and have no fucking clue who Lorraine Williams is? that explains why you dont know what the fuck i am talking about, you dont pay attention. read it again and take some time to think what you quote in regards to an 80's OGL.

f it werent for that lazy attitude and the greed and such of the Blumes and Williams, there would have been something like the OGL since the 80's i am sure. Hell people were allowed to make their own, and could even get them printed (which means they got paid for), software to run D&D games with back then.

8. CCGs have mostly wiped out RPG play around here, and not having a place to play with enough room for people outside of the LGS means not MANY people play unless they are mid-tens living at mom and dad's house still. really, you bring out economic prejudice as an excuse for you attack? let me guess, you want to burn down Harlem to get rid of all them "coloreds" that keep bringing the property value down too huh?

always funny when someone attributes not being able to play for some dumb reason, and many times it is their bigotry and prejudice that is the reason they try to bring it up....

FYI, i am most wanted to run games for people, but they dont get i will not run 3.x, nor play it.

Desdan_Mervolam · Post by **Desdan_Mervolam** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 7:12 am

I know this is a running theme, and I am honestly and sincerely not trying to be mean here, but Shadzar, your posts are hard to read. Please, slow down a little, employ a spell-checker and proofread before you hit 'submit'. Your posting style is stream-of-consciousness which makes your posts chaotic and disorganized to begin with, so as it stands trying to read your posts are like trying to pick apart a knot in a piece of rope.

There's definitely a measure of nobility in trying to champion unpopular viewpoints, but to do that you need to make sure you convey those viewpoints as clearly as possible. Frankly, your posts haven't been very clear at all.

I'm saying this because I honestly want to know what your views are, but haven't been able to figure them out between readability issues and what I perceive to be shifting positions.

Chamomile · Post by **Chamomile** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 7:21 am

I'm going to mention that I have Shadzar on ignore, but it's not because I find him too infuriating to deal with. It's because his posts are unintelligible to the point where it takes several read-throughs to even begin to understand what he's saying, with the end result that his posts are effectively 100% noise. Since I automatically skip over them anyway, I decided I may as well put him on ignore to make things more convenient.

So, yeah, fix those readability issues and I'll start reading your posts again.

shadzar · Post by **shadzar** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 7:58 am

Desdan_Mervolam wrote:Your posting style is stream-of-consciousness

yes, yes it is, often with frequent trips to the bathroom inbetween them with lost thoughts coming back to post.

FUCK YOU DEHYDRATION!

the simple matter is ask and question and get an answer then.

what do you not understand?

the spellchecker works, but the problem is visibility in phpBB v2.18 used here... the post area is so damn small, and hasnt be expanded by Z.

i cannot read what i write until after i hit sumbit or preview, then it is still hard to go back and edit it because it is the same size textarea in the form.

Winnah · Post by **Winnah** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 8:47 am

shadzar wrote:
Desdan_Mervolam wrote:Your posting style is stream-of-consciousness
yes, yes it is, often with frequent trips to the bathroom inbetween them with lost thoughts coming back to post.

Over-excitable? I had a dog like that.

Seriously though, If you do have mental health issues, I apologise for the 'taking your meds' remark.

I won't be continuing any discussion with you until I can see a marked improvement in the coherence of your posts.

Korwin · Post by **Korwin** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 8:54 am

@shadzar
Write in an Text Editor/Word/Open Office/whatever.
Ctrl + a
Ctrl + c
Switch to the forum.
Ctrl + v
Hit preview.
Read your post.
Switch back to Word.
Make your Text readable.
Ctrl + a
etc.

shadzar · Post by **shadzar** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 9:05 am

oh yes im a retard and dont know how to use another program.. sadly after the HDD crash NO other program has a spellchecker, so it really means nothing again.

fucking morons and shits like you again that think they know everything about everything.

you're about as useful and in the same category of retard as the person trying to claim i had a virus, when it was the disc had jsut seen to many damn write-passes.

remember Korwin, free advice is worth its price.

and odds are i have been programming computers since before your dad nearly shot you onto your mothers face.

Guyr Adamantine · Post by **Guyr Adamantine** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 9:12 am

Well, he *is* starting to sound like a denner here, but the whole signal-to-noise ratio is still shit.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 3:02 pm

Okay, a lot of my original post was scattershot, but if I had to pick five things that I think would make a 5E Edition successful, warts and all:

Make treasure accumulation rapid and exciting. In my opinion, 3E and 4E D&D's schedule for treasure is too slow. The game should stimulate the 'gambling addict' center of the brain by having a frequent but unpredictable payout schedule. So you have two basic ways to do this.
A) Make payout effects big but temporary. I don't blame you for not liking that idea because it seems cynical and manipulative, but it's either this or:
B) Make payout effects small, permanent, but continually scaling. Like Diablo. A lot of people complain about how videogamey it feels, but let's face it people like getting new shit.
A brand spank-my-ass new campaign setting that doesn't feel like a rehash of LotR. There are plenty of other genres or even source material that you can emulate or straight-out rip off (the Heroic Fantasy Final Fantasies, Dragon Age, A:TLA, Dragon Quest 7, Exalted even) but for the love of fuck get a new one. People, even people who came to the fantasy train after the LotR trilogy, are tired of that shit.
A class and level system with a huge number of abilities. You don't necessarily have to have a multiclass system, a classplosion with 25 classes at the outset works just fine. I think classplosions are wasteful for source material however and reach a saturation point quickly. The multiclass system doesn't need to be very granular; only CharOp people desire something more specific than 'Mostly Druid, a little Rogue and Psion'.
A combat system that can be played without a battlemat. When D&D gets to the point where it can be played on an iPad with WiFi connection or at a library over Facebook, that will be enormously helpful to the product. In fact I'll go as far as to say that if the next edition or any challengers to the throne can't meet this standard then they're not going to be very successful.
The combat system should strive as hard as it can to have player engagement at all times. Meaning that it should have as many of the criteria as possible:
A) Make player turns as short as possible. Long player turns are fine in games like Chess when there are only two people in it, but D&D has like five people in it. People waiting 10 minutes before it's their turn again get pissed off and disengaged.
B) Have more player-side rolls. I put this in another thread but I strongly think that opposed rolls should be done by the player, since it encourages people to pay attention to what's happening when it's not their turn.
C) A mechanic that dumps a lot of chaff mobs onto the battlefield. Minions are really popular with the 4E games that I run. It makes people feel badass to take out 5 of them at once. Unfortunately even though the rules suck it's a very sound idea. While people love a good boss fight every now and then seriously if it takes a non-named enemy more than 3 player attacks to take out you should be seriously re-evaluating your system. A 7-round boss fight is the same amount of action as a 7-round 200 minion fight, but the latter tends to be more exciting than the former.
D) A few calculations as possible. I'd like to get rid of the damage roll and fold it into the attack roll like for Shadowrun, but people might feel like they're being cheated. And let's face it, 1d6+20 is just lame compared to 5d6+8. Even people who are good at math tend to stumble on repeated small operations. If a calculation can be done before combat or on someone else's turn, that's awesome.
E) The status effects that the game pushes out should not unduly decrease your offense. People get frustrated when they get told at the start of their turn that they're going to be sitting it out because they're immobilized or stunned or dominated or whatever the fuck. People also get frustrated when combat takes longer because everyone is at a -4 to attack. A condition that makes 50% of the attacks that come after you potential critical hits is exciting a condition that limits you to taking only move actions for a turn is not even though the former screws you over more.
F) A resource management system that engages players. If you don't like Winds of Fate then Rage Meter works just fine--though one potential problem with Rage Meter is that it can hotswap someone's powers right before they take their turn which takes extra time and breaks strategies. I think that people feel that Rage Meter is more intuitive so I won't feel offended if it's used. An At-Will System with a reasonably small-but-versatile number of powers in it is pathetic but acceptable.

You know what DOESN'T engage players, though? Spell charges, unrandomized spell warmups/cooldown, or mana points.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Sat Sep 17, 2011 5:26 pm

Re: 3e's multiclassing, I noticed the other day that the 3e previews in early y2k dragon wrote that frontloading and dipping was exactly how it was supposed to work.

Elven Ftr/Wiz was supposed to be Ftr1/WizX. That was the design. A Rogue who wanted TWFing was supposed to grab 1 level of Ranger. If you wanted +10 speed for your grunt you were supposed to grab 1 level of Barbarian. Apparently playtesters choked on that and made them put in talk about keeping the levels even, but it wasn't the intention.

Frontloading was to help your class dips be useful. They just wimped out on it as the Prestige classes started stacking up, rather than suggest a flat cap of 3 classes or something.

Desdan_Mervolam · Post by **Desdan_Mervolam** » Sun Sep 18, 2011 12:21 am

If Dipping was supposed to be de regeur, then why have the multiclass system set up to punish people who don't have the same number of levels in each class?

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Sun Sep 18, 2011 12:22 am

Desdan_Mervolam wrote:If Dipping was supposed to be de regeur, then why have the multiclass system set up to punish people who don't have the same number of levels in each class?

because

tussock wrote:Apparently playtesters choked on that and made them put in talk about keeping the levels even, but it wasn't the intention.

shadzar · Post by **shadzar** » Sun Sep 18, 2011 4:36 am

random is often more enjoyable to the DM to add that surprise element to the game that i lost, since the DM usually knows most everything going on within the world, so get to let him challenge himself to figure out how to deal with it...if using a random table he did not design.

randomaly rolling Deck of Many Things for a treasure....

fun for all!

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Sun Sep 18, 2011 6:30 am

Desdan_Mervolam wrote:If Dipping was supposed to be de regeur, then why have the multiclass system set up to punish people who don't have the same number of levels in each class?

In addition to fectin's note, which is partly speculation on my point, as I only know it's true for some of the anti-multiclass rules: it was also set up to make you stick to the traditional multiclass combos while dipping. One or two levels in a class gave you everything you wanted from it.

So Elves could dip Wizard (for wand and staff use, and toad familiar) on any other class, or run with Wizard and dip anything else (though it didn't work as well for them, already having longsword and longbow and being unable to use armour).

But dipping works well in 3.0, it's recommended in the previews, it's not penalised mechanically if you use the "right" dip or levelling class for your race, or stick with levelling any one class as human. Lose one or two main levels, gain a stack of stuff that is fairly useful forever (save boost, proficiencies and feats, access to better magic items, and usually some sort of skill that works with only a few ranks (like ride or search)).

Then everyone kept asking how to make a Rog7/Wiz7 not suck so much, and begged them to stop the dipping, so they sold books which gave the fans what they wanted: 3.5, with its anti-dipping base classes, and Prestige classes for all the possible combinations.

CCarter · Post by **CCarter** » Sun Sep 18, 2011 7:39 am

IMHO the problem with the 1-level dips that drove 3.5 design was that for some classes (Ranger, Monk) there was no reason for anyone to take more than one level of them. e.g. 3.0 ranger was 3 free feats at first level, then dead levels for the most part.

shadzar · Post by **shadzar** » Sun Sep 18, 2011 7:47 am

maybe it isnt classes that is the problem but levels then?

which would be better?
A. a class for any ideal concept
B. simple classes that can be combined in a way to get any concept form them
C. no classes, just options from what used to be in classes. BYOC.

Lago PARANOIA · Post by **Lago PARANOIA** » Sun Sep 18, 2011 7:20 pm

Hieronymous Rex wrote:That isn't to say that random generation has to give people huge payouts every time: the numbers can be calibrated to give any given average value. Having artifacts isn't really "unbalanced" as the knee-jerk reaction might be: a party with a powerful item will simply go on adventures appropriate to a higher level party.

The problem is that when someone gets a Hackmaster +12 and the MC has to increase the difficulty of encounters to compensate, it creates intraparty imbalances because Dave is now getting a greater share of the spotlight than before. The challenge to the party is still the same but Dave's reward makes everything harder for everyone else.

If you're going to have treasure that gives huge payouts without causing group resentment, you need to:

A) Not screw over the people who didn't get treasure. You can't increase the difficulty if someone rolls a Hackmaster +12, because it encourages people to steal Dave's sword and throw it down the ditch so they personally aren't fucked over as much. Yes, this means that if someone rolls The One Ring at level 2 it means that they'll curbstomp the next few encounters.

B) Make the bonus temporary. If you really want a system where people can roll Hackmaster +12s at first level you'll need to take it away from them at some point. You can either do this by engaging in a treasure arms race or by making the Hackmaster crumble at some point. You do this for three reasons:

You don't bore Dave when he rolls up future treasure. 'Oh, joy, a Hackmaster +4? Meh.'
Curbstomping encounters because you have the One Ring is fun, but assured victory becomes boring after awhile. People love Super Stars, but if it lasted the whole game people would stop playing Super Mario.
You don't irritate and frustrate other players at Dave's good fortune. People can put up with someone being the MVP for four encounters in a row, they're not going to tolerate it for ten.

fectin · Post by **fectin** » Sun Sep 18, 2011 11:37 pm

Lago PARANOIA wrote:The problem is that when someone gets a Hackmaster +12 and the MC has to increase the difficulty of encounters to compensate, it creates intraparty imbalances because Dave is now getting a greater share of the spotlight than before. The challenge to the party is still the same but Dave's reward makes everything harder for everyone else.

The best description of that problem I've seen was here:
http://www.diepointyhat.com/?p=142

Post by **fbmf** » Sun Sep 18, 2011 11:53 pm

My guess is 5, excluding the ones asking about this one.

Game On,
fbmf

shadzar · Post by **shadzar** » Mon Sep 19, 2011 3:23 am

Lago PARANOIA wrote:The problem is that when someone gets a Hackmaster +12 and the MC has to increase the difficulty of encounters to compensate, it creates intraparty imbalances because Dave is now getting a greater share of the spotlight than before. The challenge to the party is still the same but Dave's reward makes everything harder for everyone else.

no game rules will prevent a ball-hog from being a ball-hog. just dont play with the ball-hogs.

Chamomile · Post by **Chamomile** » Mon Sep 19, 2011 3:56 am

You could make magic items prone to crumbling when wielded by someone too low level to use them properly. So if Dave gets a Hackmaster +12 he can either stow it until he's level 12 or accept a 25% chance of losing it every time he curbstomps a troll.

Whipstitch · Post by **Whipstitch** » Mon Sep 19, 2011 4:27 am

shadzar wrote:
no game rules will prevent a ball-hog from being a ball-hog. just dont play with the ball-hogs.

Yes, yes, we get it: disruptive players are disruptive. But some events are mission-critical and some groups will naturally gravitate towards having whoever is best suited for the job do the job since that's just the logical thing to do. Problem is, if that answer is "Have Jimbo shake the Hackmaster at it" as often as not than frankly I'd rather you not give the group the Hackmaster so we can go back to having a varied game environment instead.

shadzar · Post by **shadzar** » Mon Sep 19, 2011 6:28 am

Whipstitch wrote:
shadzar wrote:
no game rules will prevent a ball-hog from being a ball-hog. just dont play with the ball-hogs.
Yes, yes, we get it: disruptive players are disruptive. But some events are mission-critical and some groups will naturally gravitate towards having whoever is best suited for the job do the job since that's just the logical thing to do. Problem is, if that answer is "Have Jimbo shake the Hackmaster at it" as often as not than frankly I'd rather you not give the group the Hackmaster so we can go back to having a varied game environment instead.

if you dont have the Hackmaster, then how is that any different than having it?

it doesnt have to be used all the time, and he can stow it as treasure or something to figure out what to do with later. sell it and divide it up form the group loot pool later.

IF you choose to have Jimbo shake the Hackmaster at it all the time, then you have NO right to complain because YOU gave him your ball-time/spotlight/whatever.

make Jimbo always go last in the round since he has the Hackmaster, to give everyone else a chance to do something.

i am guessing everyone bitching about this plays with individual initiative, rather than group initiative?

by that i mean every piece on the playing field goes in its own order, rather than DM rolling initiative for the encounters pieces, and the players pick someone to roll for them, and when the player group turn comes around the PLAYERS decide who goes first...and it can change each turn/round if the players want to do so.

this means that Jimbo still sues the Hackmaster, because you all WANT him to use it, but gives everyone else a chance to do something since Jimbo has to wait in line to use it.

2e PHB wrote:Standard Initiative Procedure
To determine the initiative order for a round of combat, roll 1d10 for each side in the battle. Normally, this means the DM rolls for the monsters (or NPCs), while one of the players rolls for the PC party. Low roll wins initiative.

Copyright 1999 TSR Inc.

Individual Initiative (Optional Rule)
This method of determining initiative is the same as that just given earlier, except that each PC, NPC, and monster involved in the fight rolls and then modifies his own initiative roll. This gives combat a more realistic feel, but at the expense of quick play.

Copyright 1999 TSR Inc.

always so funny how that optional shit like NWP, and individual initiative got dragged in as default, but wasnt ever thought ou about the consequences, and by doing so, people use that optional and then bitch when they use the option.

blame whoever added it as default for 3.x and 4th if you want to, but bitching about an optional rule not working for you makes no sense when you CHOOSE to use the optional rule.

and EVERYONE i see play these days uses individual initiative rather than group initiative, and wonders why they have so many problems.