What people want and what makes them happy rarely coincide.

[Swordslinger]

I keep stating that inorder for random loot to work, you need to ban too much.

Okay, what exactly do you need to ban?

Thus far, all I've seen is item transference magic.

Item crafting is still in, and as far as I can tell, so is item purchasing.

[A Man In Black]

This thread is about people "wanting" things that will in fact make them less happy.

Oh. Fuck me, now I get it.

These are just intractable ways of implementing the goals of "Give people shinies to keep them involved in the game". Wishlists suck the fun and excitement out of loot; slot machine loot derails games and leads to big stupid fights that chase people out of campaigns. They both make people less happy. Neither is objectively better.

Is 3d6 or d20 better? I bet if we have 20 more pages of posts, we'll come up with an answer.

[Winnah]

Incidentally, TGD in general has a hate-on for asking a fellow party member to do anything, even if it can be accomplished in literally five seconds of real time. Apparently, having to ask another player who has the relevant feat to enchant a war maul for you is utterly terrible, and phrases like "break out the kneepads and mouthwash" start getting mentioned. But in actual games, I have seen this effect ... never, 0% of the time.

It's a bit more complicated than you are making it out to be, at least in D&D 3rd edition.

Feat. Caster Level. Relevant spells. Time. XP.

Possibly easy to manage in your game. Don't pretend that my game, or anyone elses has similar circumstances. Personally, the only times I have played a character that enchanted items, I was making damn sure my own needs were subsidised and that those needs were met before catering to another player.

Crafting a scroll for another player. 1 day (that the crafter could be using on himself.)

Crafting a basic, vanilla +1 weapon. 2 days.

Crafting a weapon with an effective +4 enchantment. More than a month.

Crafting a weapon with an effective +10 enchantment. More than 6 months.

Granted, costs are not cumulative, so long as you are enchanting the same piece of equipment. However, the amount of time you expect another player to effectively bench his character so your character gets his magical item makes this option impractical and selfish, even if you are playing the kind of game where this option is a possibility.

[Username17]

TL;DR - I can understand "no wishlists, random drops only, final destination" as a valid style of play. But I see no good reason why it precludes having a favorite weapon.

It doesn't. You can have a favorite weapon. You just can't guarantee that you will have or use your favorite weapon at any particular point in the game. You might find a really good hammer and use that for a while before you schedule some time to quest for a better dagger or trade for one someone already found. And campaigns are inherently finite, that "a while" could in fact be for the rest of the campaign - especially in table top where you have to balance your quest goals with those of several other people.

You having a "favorite" weapon does not necessarily mean that you will get one now, which in the larger sense means that you won't necessarily get one ever, because every "now" could be the last game. People have fickle life schedules sometimes.

-Username17

[MGuy]

This conversation seriously could've been over many pages ago. Frank only barely disagrees with the rest of us. I pointed out how his defense for his position required concentrating on either an argument no one was making or an argument over taste. That's it. That's the big show stopper.

[Yep]

The idea that it's somehow bad to expect to get items key to your character is pretty bizarre. Especially when it comes down to magical weapons. If you're playing a high-magic campaign, people are going to expect the type of high fantasy where the heroes actually find weapons they can use, not purely random trash that they have to make do with until they get a good roll on the loot table. Jesus, just saying that makes me flashback to farming drops in shitty MMOs and MUDs.

[Prak]

Incidentally, TGD in general has a hate-on for asking a fellow party member to do anything, even if it can be accomplished in literally five seconds of real time. Apparently, having to ask another player who has the relevant feat to enchant a war maul for you is utterly terrible, and phrases like "break out the kneepads and mouthwash" start getting mentioned. But in actual games, I have seen this effect ... never, 0% of the time.

It's a bit more complicated than you are making it out to be, at least in D&D 3rd edition.

Feat. Caster Level. Relevant spells. Time. XP.

Possibly easy to manage in your game. Don't pretend that my game, or anyone elses has similar circumstances. Personally, the only times I have played a character that enchanted items, I was making damn sure my own needs were subsidised and that those needs were met before catering to another player.

Crafting a scroll for another player. 1 day (that the crafter could be using on himself.)

Crafting a basic, vanilla +1 weapon. 2 days.

Crafting a weapon with an effective +4 enchantment. More than a month.

Crafting a weapon with an effective +10 enchantment. More than 6 months.

Granted, costs are not cumulative, so long as you are enchanting the same piece of equipment. However, the amount of time you expect another player to effectively bench his character so your character gets his magical item makes this option impractical and selfish, even if you are playing the kind of game where this option is a possibility.

Really? When I played an enchanter, I actually offered to make items for the other players voluntarily, stating only that I'd sell them at cost (since my character actually made a living selling enchanted items), and requesting that they put forth some of the non-monetary components (POW in that system, basically "I'm not spending all my exp on you guys" if it'd been D&D)

[Winnah]

Really? When I played an enchanter, I actually offered to make items for the other players voluntarily, stating only that I'd sell them at cost (since my character actually made a living selling enchanted items), and requesting that they put forth some of the non-monetary components (POW in that system, basically "I'm not spending all my exp on you guys" if it'd been D&D)

If I had said IC "I want to take a week off adventuring in order to make some stuff" The response was always. "No" or "We are going on the adventure without you."

Simultaneously I was expected to have my character take a week off in order to craft the items other players wanted.

So In order to get what I wanted, everyone elses needs had to take secondary priority. Otherwise I would have got the stay at home speech, but after giving another player what they wanted. This actually happened.

I had my character forge items for other characters, mainly attribute and skill boosters, cheaper than market price. But, my character always got paid and always looked after his own needs first, but only after I had been burned once by a self entitled player in game.

[Chamomile]

What's wrong with your group, Winnah?

[Seerow]

What's wrong with your group, Winnah?

[Kaelik]

This conversation seriously could've been over many pages ago. Frank only barely disagrees with the rest of us. I pointed out how his defense for his position required concentrating on either an argument no one was making or an argument over taste. That's it. That's the big show stopper.

Well, except for the argument people actually were making. Just because you aren't making it doesn't mean no one is.

[MGuy]

He claims Fuchs was making that argument. And I don't believe Fuchs wants wish lists in the way Frank is framing them.

[Seerow]

He claims Fuchs was making that argument. And I don't believe Fuchs wants wish lists in the way Frank is framing them.

According to Frank, wanting "A sword that is level appropriate" is a wish list.



Where really, it's not hard at all to make that happen, even with random treasure. You roll your treasure 100% randomly, then rather than rolling the actual shape of the weapon, you choose it. The fact that you got a +4 Flaming Icy Burst weapon by random rolling isn't changed, the only thing that changed is now it is a rapier instead of the dire flail you would have rolled randomly.


The counter argument to this is "What sense does it make for the orc to be wielding a magical rapier?" to which you say "The orc could have been wielding a magical rapier from randomized loot anyway so who cares?". Then it gets argued "But dropping a rapier every adventure strains verisimilitude because they're not really common weapons in this world!" to which you say it doesn't actually need to be dropped every adventure, or even every level. Running into one magical weapon of a given type every 3-4 levels isn't a large enough quantity of them to defy rational explanation, or blow away suspension of disbelief.

[hogarth]

According to Frank, wanting "A sword that is level appropriate" is a wish list.

No. According to Frank, insisting on "a sword that is level appropriate" is a wish list. It took him suprisingly long to make that clarification, but he eventually did.

[Seerow]

According to Frank, wanting "A sword that is level appropriate" is a wish list.

No. According to Frank, insisting on "a sword that is level appropriate" is a wish list. It took him suprisingly long to make that clarification, but he eventually did.

Okay so insisting that your character get a level appropriate weapon of a type he wants to use is a wishlist. The rest of my post pretty much remains the same.


Right from the very beginning pretty much everyone agreed that what type of weapon you use actually matters very little mechanically. So asking that a specific type of weapon shows up isn't something that has any sort of major effect, it's just taking a weapon that would have shown up anyway, and making it into a different shape to make the player happy.

I don't see how this is a wishlist, since mechanically it's the same things dropping, it's just the fluff of the things that drop that changed. The closest thing to an actual argument I've seen is that then the sword user feels it is his right to claim -every- sword drop that comes, rather than saying "Okay the sword that just dropped I got, so someone else can take the next weapon even if it is another sword"

[MGuy]

This thread is about people "wanting" things that will in fact make them less happy. The thread is about the fact that wishlists are bad. That people requesting "what they want" to the point that it tramples on the story, the world, and their relationship with other players is in fact self-defeating.

This is what Frank claims this thread is about. As far as I can tell this is, for Frank, more about the first thing than anything else (but mentioning it makes him ignore you). The reason I think this is the case is because the second thing (wishlists) isn't something anyone is saying is "the" solution, just that its better than Frank/Lago's suggestion that having it be Random is better.The last thing stipulates that something be done until it becomes a problem for it to be bad and that point is stupid and not worth acknowledging.

[Prak]

Really? When I played an enchanter, I actually offered to make items for the other players voluntarily, stating only that I'd sell them at cost (since my character actually made a living selling enchanted items), and requesting that they put forth some of the non-monetary components (POW in that system, basically "I'm not spending all my exp on you guys" if it'd been D&D)

If I had said IC "I want to take a week off adventuring in order to make some stuff" The response was always. "No" or "We are going on the adventure without you."

Simultaneously I was expected to have my character take a week off in order to craft the items other players wanted.

So In order to get what I wanted, everyone elses needs had to take secondary priority. Otherwise I would have got the stay at home speech, but after giving another player what they wanted. This actually happened.

I had my character forge items for other characters, mainly attribute and skill boosters, cheaper than market price. But, my character always got paid and always looked after his own needs first, but only after I had been burned once by a self entitled player in game.

Yeah, I got the "well we're continuing on without you" thing a couple of times, but mostly I just tried to work within the confines of the circumstances (this was a skill based system, so it was possible to speed up construction), never thinking to ask for down time.

[Swordslinger]

If I had said IC "I want to take a week off adventuring in order to make some stuff" The response was always. "No" or "We are going on the adventure without you."

Simultaneously I was expected to have my character take a week off in order to craft the items other players wanted.

Huh? I don't really understand this. Did your DM force you to play in real time where if you wanted to craft an item for an ingame week, you couldn't play that week in real life or what?

Otherwise, why does the group care about in-game downtime so much?

[CatharzGodfoot]

The reason I think this is the case is because the second thing (wishlists) isn't something anyone is saying is "the" solution, just that its better than Frank/Lago's suggestion that having it be Random is better.

I think that Frank & Lago's suggestion is that the items an enemy drops should be the items an enemy has. An enemy wizard will have a spell book and a headband of intellect, even if the PCs are a sorcerer, a cleric, and a barbarian. When you defeat the kobold queen, you probably won't find that she was using a magic human-scale greatsword. Saughins probably won't be running around with bows and axes.

None of that is random. What it allows you to do, as a player, is raid the elves if you want a magic sword, the dwarves if you want a magic hammer, or the orcs if you want a magic axe. You can try to defeat a rival spiked chain master, knowing that her weapon is going to be great for you. You can capture a rival wizard's spellbook. You can decide to quest after Grummsh's spear rather than the Sword of Kas, because you're a spear user.

Then there's the gelatinous cube. Totally arbitrary treasure gives the DM a chance to try to give the players items that they'll really appreciate -- and they'll appreciate it more if they weren't expecting it in the first place. Sometimes you'll get things wrong, and the player will try to pawn your gift. Don't take it the wrong way; just try to do better next Christmas.

[Fuchs]

I think that Frank & Lago's suggestion is that the items an enemy drops should be the items an enemy has. An enemy wizard will have a spell book and a headband of intellect, even if the PCs are a sorcerer, a cleric, and a barbarian. When you defeat the kobold queen, you probably won't find that she was using a magic human-scale greatsword. Saughins probably won't be running around with bows and axes.

None of that is random. What it allows you to do, as a player, is raid the elves if you want a magic sword, the dwarves if you want a magic hammer, or the orcs if you want a magic axe. You can try to defeat a rival spiked chain master, knowing that her weapon is going to be great for you. You can capture a rival wizard's spellbook. You can decide to quest after Grummsh's spear rather than the Sword of Kas, because you're a spear user.

That makes no sense. If the treasure is random NPCs should have random treasure too. Why would dwarves get hammers and elves get swords while PCs can't pick their theme?

[PhoneLobster]

None of that is random.

A point I have been making on and off for about half the damn thread.

It got me ignored.

Frank HAS pulled out these goals that demand essentially non-random item drops. In order to attack wishlists and "katana fetishists"... and to support random item drops.

When ASKED what the fuck that was about his RESPONSE was "Fuck you all I'm ignoring everyone and continuing to talk about how much I hate katanas because that is all that matters". I don't think you even have to go back ONE PAGE right now to find Frank yelling at everyone and demanding that the conversation NOT be about explaining what the fuck is going on there with the random methodology to meet non-random goals thing.

So if the thing where SOME of what they say seems to indicate a desire for some sort of relatively sane, and not-coincidentally non-random loot drop system happens to be getting either ignored or confused it's hardly anyone's fault but their own.

[Blicero]

That makes no sense. If the treasure is random NPCs should have random treasure too. Why would dwarves get hammers and elves get swords while PCs can't pick their theme?

Crafting?

[Fuchs]

That makes no sense. If the treasure is random NPCs should have random treasure too. Why would dwarves get hammers and elves get swords while PCs can't pick their theme?

Crafting?

If you can craft the loot you want no one cares about random loot at all other than to finance your crafting.

[Seerow]

That makes no sense. If the treasure is random NPCs should have random treasure too. Why would dwarves get hammers and elves get swords while PCs can't pick their theme?

Crafting?

So do all elves have the crafting feat? Or at least all of the ones with magic weapons? If not, why are they able to buy weapons of the type they want while PCs are told that trying to buy something is selfish and bad, or just outright can't be done, depending on who's talking and which point they're trying to make?

[CatharzGodfoot]

Damn', motha fuckas be trippin'.