Why does 4th Edition have classes anyway?

[JonSetanta]

Frank, your most recent claim is almost exactly the same argument a friend of mine held against some classless concepts 4 years ago.

Same reasons; lost structure means no landmarks, no recognition of another's capability, no relation between archetypes.

Here's the catch though: the example vampire and werewolf can be defined by acquired traits and powers.
If a character has this trait and that feat plus A, B, and C powers at least , they count as a vampire.
If a character has another trait and some other feat plus X, Y, and Z powers at least , they count as a werewolf.
The defining selections would be universal between each of their own type. If you don't have them (as defined by setting or subrace, since that varies) you aren't a member.

Slap a subtype on them or not, they would exhibit physical features by
nature of their selections alone.

Fuck. One could even hardcode the descriptive fluff in to the powers and traits themselves; pick up certain "racial" tagged ones, even just possessing them, and the character displays obvious and recognizable appearances. Players witness those appearances and default forms, and react accordingly.
See K's bit on oozes with runes in them.
I don't see the problem there.

[K]

Actually, since World of Darkness does exactly that, I actually think your argument seems quite silly and nonsensical .

Seriously. World of Darkness has vampires with wildly different lists as well as crossover potential with those lists, and it works just fine. In fact, despite all its deep mechanical flaws it is still one of the more playable games ever (like DnD, some of the classes/races are wildly more powerful than others, but once you overcome that no one ever complained if the party was two vampires, a werewolf, and a mage).

[PhoneLobster]

Actually, since World of Darkness does exactly that, I actually think your argument seems quite silly and nonsensical .

K beat me to it.

Basically as long as class isn't the end of the choice/definition structure your claims of role purity will be diluted to some degree, pretty much equal to the amount of real choice available. Just slapping a Class choice at the head of the choice tree doesn't significantly impact that on any tree of anything short of a laughable small size.

And then there is WoD.

[Username17]

There are games which benefit from being classless. I would say that RIFTS is severely harmed by having classes, and certainly TFOS and GURPS: Infnite Worlds are better off without classes. In any game where the expectation is that every single thing be a one-off that is unique to itself, classes of any kind are a pointless waste of time. If my character is upon entrance into the story supposed to have to give the exposition that he's from an alternate world where dressing up in animal skins gives you powers and the world was divided up between powerful Aztec and Malian factions in what you would call 1000 CE; or that she's a penagalon from a Weeaboo universe which is why she divides herself up Voltron style in the middle of combat in order to cause maximum havoc - then sure, a class system of any kind is meaningless and trite.

But if you're playing in a world that does have an internal consistency and logic to it - then you're damn right that there's an advantage to hard coding the differences between things.

Seriously. World of Darkness has vampires with wildly different lists as well as crossover potential with those lists, and it works just fine.

Yes it does. Which is actually my central thesis. The "class" in WoD is not "Ventrue" or "Malkavian" (or Ventrue/Mekhet if you happen to be playing nWoD for some reason). The class is Vampire or Werewolf. And those power lists don't overlap or allow crossover potential in anything other than a single broken sourcebook that actually got retconned out of existence anyway.

The fact that a Vampire is not a werewolf, cannot learn or use Rage powers, and will never obtain a "Gift" does not harm the game. It enhances the game. It makes a vampire and a werewolf player feel special. It makes the game feel like there is more variety. It is, for WoD, a good thing.

-Username17

[CatharzGodfoot]

The class is Vampire or Werewolf. And those power lists don't overlap or allow crossover potential in anything other than a single broken sourcebook that actually got retconned out of existence anyway.

The fact that a Vampire is not a werewolf, cannot learn or use Rage powers, and will never obtain a "Gift" does not harm the game. It enhances the game. It makes a vampire and a werewolf player feel special. It makes the game feel like there is more variety. It is, for WoD, a good thing.

-Username17

I'm getting flashbacks to Underworld, with the horse-demon lichens and the requisite half-lichen/half-vampire.

[K]

In DnD, the class is "Adventurer", and like the classes of Vampire you have roles where being good at certain things is hard coded, and you have a unique weakness.

I mean, in Vampire you are vampire who probably plays with same clan disciplines he started with considering the out of clan costs, but with a little work you can do anything any other clan can do. You weakness is hardcoded and ranges from being crazy and in important situations losing Willpower to RP problems like having to eat only certain people.

In DnD, you are an adventurer who picks up powers from a class and you probably never pick up other classes roles(though you can, from Wizards with Tenser's Transformation to UMDing Fighters). Your weakness is hardcoded into the game in that some characters can't use their class features without magic weapons to the RP consequence that some people can't use their class features unless arbitrary things are in a sack at your belt.

Vampires have a slider between all the kinds of the vampire and adventurers have a slider between all the kinds of the adventurer.

The fact that vampires can't learn werewolf powers is merely story. The same roles can be done by any of the supernatural races with a proper build, so the fact that a Werewolf burns Rage for more actions in combat and Vampire burns Blood and a Mage probably burns Quintessence is just a flavor consideration.

In fact, fixing WoD's massive mechanic's problems could have been done with a class system that unified the races so that weirdness like "why were the Tremere mages and then vampires who instantly had vast magic power" made any sense at all.

(PS. There were lots of ways to get cross-over powers. They ranged from rituals that made you a werewolf for a night, Ghoul Merits for Mages, Black Spiral Dancer rules for Vampire/Werewolves, and various other shennanigans too numerous to continue listing. They were littered in the books.)

I think Rifts would have benefited from the same thing. I mean, if you just said "at this level, this is the range of things you should be able to do," they could have stayed a viable system.

Fantasy novels multiclass all the time, and it is a core conceit of the genre, so any system that doesn't do it is going to be put down very quickly. Once someone says "How can I make Rand Al Thor? or "how can I make Vlad from the Jhereg novels", a system's lack of the abilities to make fighter mages who take some from list A and some from list B is a fatal flaw.

I don't see the the need for that flaw.if Player A picks a Black Mage and picks ten out of forty Black abilities, and Player B picks White Mage and gets his 10/40 from White and Player C gets his 5 from 40 of the Black list and 5 from 40 from the White list, the chances of them having any overlapping abilities is actually super small.

The vast majority of character creation arguments I've seen have been:

1. People convincing others to play roles they think the party needs. For example, Cleric was the bitch class for all of DnD and the weakest-willed or least involved player always got it; in Shadowrun, it was always the role that wasn't covered in the Sammie or PhysAd/Decker/Mage/Rigger matrix.

2. People min-maxing. This takes a whole session and a mountain of books.

3. People convincing other to not play nearly useless character types. See the Monk, True Necromancer, or things like two-weapon Fighters.

The only times I was offended that someone was stepping on my character's thing was when:

1. Someone had taken a ratling cohort who because of the cohort rules and the fact that I has taken a one level dip(and missed a few sessions), it meant that their cohort was the same level as me and as powerful and as interesting as me.....as a cohort.

2. I made it my unique thing that I was a Wizard who used Black Slaad trapped in gems in a belt called the Ten Demon Belt. Then a Pokemaster decided to take my released Slaad and proceed to use it in every battle.


Now, in both of the circumstances the thing I cared most about was:
A. Someone had taken something unique about my character that separated it from the other Wizard characters in the group. It's just like someone had said "wow, my parents were also killed by orcs and I've sworn to avenge them." I didn't care that the other Wizards had overlapping spell lists with me; I hated that someone had taken my custom detail away from me.

and...

B. Someone had a spent a single feat to get my whole character.


The solution is to make feat-like things deeply unique to characters. If someone says: "I learned Robliar's Gambit after I returned Robliar's daughter to him" then that is a unique detail that you should feel protective about.

You should not feel protective about also knowing how to disarm people, or using fire, or any other things that are basic to fantasy gaming.

[Manxome]

Fantasy novels multiclass all the time, and it is a core conceit of the genre, so any system that doesn't do it is going to be put down very quickly. Once someone says "How can I make Rand Al Thor? or "how can I make Vlad from the Jhereg novels", a system's lack of the abilities to make fighter mages who take some from list A and some from list B is a fatal flaw.

So, if these are likely candidates for archetypes players will want to emulate, why exactly can't we write classes such that each of them is covered by one class, instead of two?

I mean, Frank is entirely correct that a "2 classes maximum" system can be emulated by a "single-class only" system with more classes. There are meaningful drawbacks to that approach (more ink and so forth), and I'm not exactly heart-set on a one-class system, but it would be really interesting to hear the thought process that lead you to the conclusion that every reasonable character concept can be built using 2 classes but not necessarily with 1.

I don't see the the need for that flaw.if Player A picks a Black Mage and picks ten out of forty Black abilities, and Player B picks White Mage and gets his 10/40 from White and Player C gets his 5 from 40 of the Black list and 5 from 40 from the White list, the chances of them having any overlapping abilities is actually super small.

If by "any overlapping abilities," you mean "at least 2 of them have at least 1 ability in common," then by "actually super small" you must mean "around 93%, assuming their choices are totally uncorrelated". Birthday theorem's a bitch.

Here's the catch though: the example vampire and werewolf can be defined by acquired traits and powers.
If a character has this trait and that feat plus A, B, and C powers at least , they count as a vampire.
If a character has another trait and some other feat plus X, Y, and Z powers at least , they count as a werewolf.
The defining selections would be universal between each of their own type. If you don't have them (as defined by setting or subrace, since that varies) you aren't a member.

Slap a subtype on them or not, they would exhibit physical features by
nature of their selections alone.

I don't get what you think that accomplishes.

Sure, you can take any arbitrary subset of abilities and assign a label to them. That doesn't magically cause those abilities to be correlated; anyone can still take one of them without the rest, or all but one, or whatever. The fact that your label exists gives precisely zero predictive power, because you don't know whether the label applies to anyone until you already know everything about them that the label would imply.

Adding visual cues doesn't change this, unless the cue appears only for people who have every single power in the set. If power A has cue X and power B has cue Y and you have an "A+B" power label, each cue still only tells you about the power that actually generates that cue. If you see X, you know the creature has A, but you don't know whether they're an "A+B" unless you also check for Y.

So what precisely is your point?

HELLO 4th edition design methodology. You think it might be too hard, you don't have numbers or reasoning to back it up, you don't even TRY it you just wholesale remove a massive and desirable part of the game.

What posts have you been reading? I seem to recall making several detailed arguments citing actual math and numbers and real-world empirical examples. Contrariwise, I don't see you doing anything other than flinging ad hominem attacks and vague platitudes. I've also explicitly challenged you twice to articulate your own philosophy regarding what constitutes acceptable limits on player choice, and you've completely ignored that challenge.

You have no usable position of your own, and you have no counters to others' arguments but to ignore them. Even your claimed understanding of my position is contradictory with nearly everything I've said by your own analysis--gosh, that couldn't possibly be because you're burning a straw man. WTF do you think you're doing?

[Username17]

If by "any overlapping abilities," you mean "at least 2 of them have at least 1 ability in common," then by "actually super small" you must mean "around 40%, assuming their choices are totally uncorrelated". Birthday theorem's a bitch.

Try 95.3%. If you have 10 abilities off list A, and there are forty abilities on list A, and a second person takes 5 abilities off list A, then his chances of taking none of the same abilities are exactly 30*29*28*27*26/40/39/38/37/36. That works out to slightly better than a 1 in 5 chance that he won't pull a copy of one of your powers.

However in the example the same character was also pulling 5 abilities off List B, which he was trying to not pull an ability from the third guy. So really in order to not have abilities in common, he has to make that chance twice in a row - and multiplicative probability being what it is, that works out to 4.7%. So having that mixed character in the example randomly not have any overlap with the single classed characters in the example is slightly better than rolling a natural 20 on your first attempt.

Not impossible certainly, but definitely not something you want to rely upon or use as the focus of an argument.

-Username17

[MartinHarper]

One way of encouraging uniqueness in power selection would be to build it into the mechanics. For example, for an encounter-level spell, when a wizard casts a spell, nobody can cast the same spell for five minutes in the local area, whether friend or foe. If two players join with the same spell, one of them can freely retrain it, or they can both persist and be suboptimal.

[ckafrica]

One way of encouraging uniqueness in power selection would be to build it into the mechanics. For example, for an encounter-level spell, when a wizard casts a spell, nobody can cast the same spell for five minutes in the local area, whether friend or foe. If two players join with the same spell, one of them can freely retrain it, or they can both persist and be suboptimal.

I don't like that idea. If I cast fireball first, no one else can for the rest of the encounter? Sounds like metagaming waiting to happen. Prepare desecration so when you encounter the demon at the end you cast it first thereby preempting his most devestating attack. I don't even have to aim it just cast it in the area.

[PhoneLobster]

What posts have you been reading? I seem to recall making several detailed arguments citing actual math and numbers and real-world empirical examples.

You can multiply a subjective fear of the synergy monster by any amount.

It still has no measurable value.

Your math is utterly baseless because of the countless assumptions and subjective values it incorporates.

It's utter intellectual slight of hand and would be laughed out of town by any kind of skilled statistician.

[Username17]

PL: Put up or shut up.

What would you consider to be a valid limiter on player choice?

Full stop, I refuse to respond to any more of your tirades until you answer that point.

-Username17

[K]

If by "any overlapping abilities," you mean "at least 2 of them have at least 1 ability in common," then by "actually super small" you must mean "around 40%, assuming their choices are totally uncorrelated". Birthday theorem's a bitch.

Try 95.3%. If you have 10 abilities off list A, and there are forty abilities on list A, and a second person takes 5 abilities off list A, then his chances of taking none of the same abilities are exactly 30*29*28*27*26/40/39/38/37/36. That works out to slightly better than a 1 in 5 chance that he won't pull a copy of one of your powers.

However in the example the same character was also pulling 5 abilities off List B, which he was trying to not pull an ability from the third guy. So really in order to not have abilities in common, he has to make that chance twice in a row - and multiplicative probability being what it is, that works out to 4.7%. So having that mixed character in the example randomly not have any overlap with the single classed characters in the example is slightly better than rolling a natural 20 on your first attempt.

Not impossible certainly, but definitely not something you want to rely upon or use as the focus of an argument.

-Username17

The math only holds water on the assumption that people are picking powers at random, which they won't be doing.

Not only will they be compelled to pick powers that others don't have, they will also are more likely to pick powers that are described well or for some reason are though of as more powerful.

The only thing that can be proved with any certainty is that it isn't hard for people to not have the same powers if they don't want to in this model

Way to get lost in the details and miss the point(s). Good job.

-----------------

And to the question: why not just make a fighter mage single class and be done with it.

Simply put, it doesn't work. Some people will want swording and fireballs, and others will want swording and illusions, and some will want archery and lifedrain. 3e had over six examples of the archtype and if if they continued to make books there would have been more.

The key that 3e never got is that people don't want magery and BAB, or magery that shoots out of a sword, or ASf reductions and magery, or shortened spells lists and fighting stuff, or hexblade-like schtick and sword....people usually want some of the actual mage powers and some of the actual fighter powers. The only way to do that is to... do that.

Letting people customize characters means that they have to have meaningful choices in character creation. There are benefits and dangers to that:

The benefits are: happier and more involved players. They get the character they want to play, and so are less likely to play Smash Bros.

The dangers are: bigger chance of harmful synergies.

Considering that the chances of harmful synergies can be mostly mitigated by removing meta-abilities, there is no reason to not let people multi-class.

[fliprushman]

B. Someone had a spent a single feat to get my whole character.

This is the factor that needs to be limited. Feats are, in D20, the tools players use to make there characters, not classes and race as it once was. If we shift the importance of feats to class and race, then you will not need to worry about the problem you are describing.

[Manxome]

Try 95.3%

Yeah, I realized a little bit after posting that I inverted the probability before squaring it, or failed to do so, or something along those lines. Edited a fix into the post before your reply, but apparently not before you read it. Sorry.

The math only holds water on the assumption that people are picking powers at random, which they won't be doing.

Not only will they be compelled to pick powers that others don't have, they will also are more likely to pick powers that are described well or for some reason are though of as more powerful.

The only thing that can be proved with any certainty is that it isn't hard for people to not have the same powers if they don't want to in this model

Way to get lost in the details and miss the point(s). Good job.

Um...you tell us that odds are amazingly small, and when we point out that they're actually quite big, you say that your point wasn't anything to do with odds, but that players who are cooperating can arrange to choose different powers. Which is true under every system discussed so far, and doesn't actually seem to include any response to Frank's allegation that it takes a lot more discussion and compromise for people choosing powers off the same list to avoid collisions than it takes for them to select different lists.

So I no longer believe I have the slightest clue what your point is supposed to be.

And to the question: why not just make a fighter mage single class and be done with it.

Simply put, it doesn't work. Some people will want swording and fireballs, and others will want swording and illusions, and some will want archery and lifedrain. 3e had over six examples of the archtype and if if they continued to make books there would have been more.

OK, I've got no problem believing in the plausibility of that. But what makes the people who want swording and illusions or who want archery and lifedrain more legitimate than the people who want swording and archery and lifedrain, or any other combination of 3? Or 4?

The key that 3e never got is that people don't want magery and BAB, or magery that shoots out of a sword, or ASf reductions and magery, or shortened spells lists and fighting stuff, or hexblade-like schtick and sword....people usually want some of the actual mage powers and some of the actual fighter powers. The only way to do that is to... do that.

I don't know about other people, but when I play a hybridized martial/magical character, I definitely do want his powers to be integrated in some way, not to have arbitrary powers from different categories that have nothing to do with each other. I want to feel like my character has a sensible, cohesive fighting style involving all (or at least most) of his abilities, not that he's alternating between emulating one style and emulating a completely different, unrelated style.

[Username17]

The math only holds water on the assumption that people are picking powers at random, which they won't be doing.

Not only will they be compelled to pick powers that others don't have, they will also are more likely to pick powers that are described well or for some reason are though of as more powerful.

What are you talking about here? Let's break that down:

Not only will they be compelled to pick powers that others don't have

So people will be non-randomly taking different powers...?

they will also are more likely to pick powers that are described well or for some reason are though of as more powerful.

So people will be non-randomly picking the exact same powers?

What is your point? You just contradicted yourself within the sentence, and I have no idea what your point was supposed to be anyway. You just pulled some numbers out of the air and said that people would be unlikely to end up with overlapping power sets. After it was shown mathematically that people picking powers at random would cause people in your example to pick the same powers almost every time, you then counter that people pick non-randomly. Sure, but in your own example the non-random selection made in the absence of long and annoying player negotiations actually makes overlap even more likely.

Are you trying to refute my assertion that people choosing off the same list leads to people feeling other people are encroaching on their conceptual space? Because if that's what you're doing, you're not doing it well.

-Username17

[CatharzGodfoot]

There's still the issue of an 'organically growing' character. What if the warrior decides that he wants to study magic?

• Do you say, 'Sorry, you didn't start with the gish class'?
• Do you say 'OK, rebuild your entire character as a gish'?
• Do you say, 'Sorry, role protection. There are no gish and the party magus would be pissed if you took her role'?
• Do you say, 'Sorry, role protection. You can't do that even though there's no magus in the party (or the party magus wants to train you)'?
• Do you say, 'Alright, start taking skills off the "magus" list'?
• Something else entirely?

[Edit] Character development can be one of the most rewarding parts of an RPG game, and IMO isn't sad if (1) a character is totally 'locked in' or (2) has nothing to show for what she's been through.
[/Edit]

[K]

The math only holds water on the assumption that people are picking powers at random, which they won't be doing.

Not only will they be compelled to pick powers that others don't have, they will also are more likely to pick powers that are described well or for some reason are though of as more powerful.

What are you talking about here? Let's break that down:

Not only will they be compelled to pick powers that others don't have

So people will be non-randomly taking different powers...?

they will also are more likely to pick powers that are described well or for some reason are though of as more powerful.

So people will be non-randomly picking the exact same powers?

What is your point? You just contradicted yourself within the sentence, and I have no idea what your point was supposed to be anyway. You just pulled some numbers out of the air and said that people would be unlikely to end up with overlapping power sets. After it was shown mathematically that people picking powers at random would cause people in your example to pick the same powers almost every time, you then counter that people pick non-randomly. Sure, but in your own example the non-random selection made in the absence of long and annoying player negotiations actually makes overlap even more likely.

Are you trying to refute my assertion that people choosing off the same list leads to people feeling other people are encroaching on their conceptual space? Because if that's what you're doing, you're not doing it well.

-Username17

Right. I'm in fact not reducing it to a statistical argument because there are several factors at play which make that impossible. Some of those factors favor me and some favor you. It's called "being reasonable."

I'm not as good with math as you. That's clear, and I can't and won't debate it.

That being said, in the example we had a dual class character that had to pick five powers out of a list of forty, and not overlap with them the ten out of forty being picked by the other character. Considering that at least 25 powers can't be picked by both, it doesn't seem hard.

Five powers doesn't take a lot of discussion, even if you have one player who absolutely cannot have any overlap (an assertion I don't believe). Even if only one power overlaps, there is still no evidence that that would be enough to make someone unhappy.

But, since you won't to address the other points in my assertion, I'll consider this a win for me and move on.

------------------------

As for fighter mages integrating: I don't believe that anyone really wants integration.

I'm serious. None of the archetypes from fantasy fiction do that. Rand al' Thor has magic powers and swording and on a few occasions used magic to make a fire sword, but he didn't do that in occasions when he actually had a sword handy. Vlad fights, and sometimes uses magic. He never mixes them in any way.

Heck, the iconic Melf as he appeared in fiction never mixed.

And that's the test. I think all the "sword magic" PrCs are just a function of magic swords not being any good and people trying to find way for that to be true. Lots of people actually want to play Inuyasha and have a sword that shoot fireballs and they don't want to shoot them themselves.

Considering that I already have that problem solved, compounding it with being forced to write a dozen swording mage or maging swordsman classes is pointless.

[Manxome]

As for fighter mages integrating: I don't believe that anyone really wants integration.

I'm serious. None of the archetypes from fantasy fiction do that. Rand al' Thor has magic powers and swording and on a few occasions used magic to make a fire sword, but he didn't do that in occasions when he actually had a sword handy. Vlad fights, and sometimes uses magic. He never mixes them in any way.

Heck, the iconic Melf as he appeared in fiction never mixed.

Jedi, the Matrix, Gandalf (sometimes), telekinetics with weapons, flying martial artists, smite evil, the girl on Angel who electrocutes people she touches (Gwen?)...I don't think the incorporation of supernatural abilities into martial fighting is exactly a rare trope.

I'm not familiar with your particular examples. And perhaps I was unclear; I don't necessarily mean that I want individual moves to be inherently both martial and magical (though I certainly don't object to that): I mean that I want to feel like the lowest-level tactics I am using wouldn't work without both abilities. Using super strength to hurl someone into the air and then using telekinesis to pull them back down so I can hit them again: good. Shooting a grenade launcher and then shooting a fireball: unsatisfying (at least to me).

Maybe I'm unrepresentative, but the fact that you know of 6 hybrid D&D classes (and believe there would have been more) suggests otherwise.

Considering that the chances of harmful synergies can be mostly mitigated by removing meta-abilities...

To your argument (by which I mean footnote) that removing meta-abilities will mostly remove synergies: I very much doubt it. I don't think any examples of synergies that have been tossed around this forum any time recently have even involved meta-abilities. And weren't you the one who was talking about the archer with a fog cloud and the ability to see through fog, or something like that?

[PhoneLobster]

PL: Put up or shut up.

What would you consider to be a valid limiter on player choice?

What? I've already told you I was more than satisfied with K's suggested compromise.

Or isn't it good enough for you until I declare that I agree 100% with YOUR idea?

But anyway. I think K's system is pretty good. You have structure and limits but some freedom to either multi class or use a minority of unrestricted power selections in order to customise your character. It is effectively a nice soft class system with levels of choice similar or superior to what 3.x has now rather than a step backwards.

Ideally I'd rather some more flexible system that could answer the organically growing character issue as presented by Catharz in a way that was, well, in any way good. But that's a pretty big ask and requires some sort of rather non traditional solution.

I think that ultimately in a well designed system shouldn't significantly matter how many abilities you choose from so I don't think there is an upward limit in the list of available options for a single character to select from beyond which we dare not go.

I mean after all if selecting from 5 separate class lists of 10 abilities each is a problem we can't offer players the ability to select from 1 class list of 50 either.

If you design relying on a hard upper limit in option list size then you can never produce splat material, GMs can never add home made additional abilities. You hard code (or assume as a law of game design) total non extensibility.

Now your turn to put up.

How much choice is TOO much? How many choices within each of your protected roles before they lose their meaning or magically summon the synergy monster? What is the magical hard cap beyond which the system fails and cannot be extended for each and every class/role?

10 selections from a list of 100? 50? 20? 10? How many selections from how many choices are too many?

In my opinion you need to make very few choices from very small lists before you get supposed role protection benefits.

So your character design choices really would basically be something like.

Select one of 5 Races. Select one of 10 Classes. Select one of 2 sub classes. End of character design.

THEN everyone knows what everyone does, character design was easy, and it can all be unique and stuff. As long as no one else makes the same three choices.

Do you agree or do you think you can make still make 10 or 20 or 40 or more choices from a class list of who knows how large a size and still be "role protected" and "uniquely identifiable"?

Your WoD defense seems to suggest you think you can.

Should customizable base attributes be thrown out the window? I wouldn't mind. It certainly sounds like you can't tolerate the countless permutations of different attributes that might end up behind a rogue character, especially if one decides to be high Strength when the "role" demands he be high Dex or something.

So yeah, put up or shut up. K actually proposed a layout for how to select options and from where. You have what? Declared cross class selections to be evil role dilution and then of all things held up WoD as a paragon of simplicity and clean game design.

[JonSetanta]

[*] Do you say, 'Sorry, you didn't start with the gish class'?
[*] Do you say 'OK, rebuild your entire character as a gish'?
[*] Do you say, 'Sorry, role protection. There are no gish and the party magus would be pissed if you took her role'?
[*] Do you say, 'Sorry, role protection. You can't do that even though there's no magus in the party (or the party magus wants to train you)'?
[*] Do you say, 'Alright, start taking skills off the "magus" list'?[/b]
[*] Something else entirely?

Second to last one. "Alright, start taking skills off the "magus" list"
The problem then is;
• will they be starting over again at the bottom
• or 'cutting in line' by sampling the high-level mage bits without any of the basics?

I believe there should be some prerequisites, like a very small chain or tree, before grabbing the next step. Nothing major, but just enough so that a "warrior" snagging a "mage" power isn't taking just that lone spell, in most cases. They get in line like everyone else.
Some powers would be cross-type or universal, such as teleporting or flight, but powers like 'ranged AOE' really should remain "mage".

Also; Underworld and Underworld 2. Breaking archetypes? You fucking bet.

And shit, it's getting lengthy in here. We'll rip through a 20-page thread in less than a week at this pace.

[K]

There's still the issue of an 'organically growing' character. What if the warrior decides that he wants to study magic?

• Do you say, 'Sorry, you didn't start with the gish class'?
• Do you say 'OK, rebuild your entire character as a gish'?
• Do you say, 'Sorry, role protection. There are no gish and the party magus would be pissed if you took her role'?
• Do you say, 'Sorry, role protection. You can't do that even though there's no magus in the party (or the party magus wants to train you)'?
• Do you say, 'Alright, start taking skills off the "magus" list'?
• Something else entirely?

[Edit] Character development can be one of the most rewarding parts of an RPG game, and IMO isn't sad if (1) a character is totally 'locked in' or (2) has nothing to show for what she's been through.
[/Edit]

Aaaa, a good question.

The plan right now is that the feat-like things that you get are used for character customization.

As of yesterday, I've been bouncing around the idea that the organic character can use feat-like things to take abilities off of other classes if there is an in-story reason for that. So, if in the month off between adventures you hire a tutor and study a bunch of magical texts, you'd retrain a feat-like thing and enter the next adventure with a spell. (Other people might acquire a mage spell by mastering an Item of Power, undergoing some mystical process, or some other plot point. By the same token, a mage might learn a fighting technique from the adventure where you all get forced to fight in a pit arena, or you might be possessed by a powerful warrior and learn a few tricks.)

At some point, you'll switch over to a multi- or a single class. You won't have to "rebuild" your character in any other way because I am not tying stats to attack values in any way. I personally see no problem with physically strong and weak-willed mages and the opposite kind of fighter.

Also, since feat-like things will be character customization that comes from story, you won't even have to change these out either (though that remain an option).

I also think that over time one should be able to switch out class abilities for other class abilities using some class-specific mechanic. Mages should always be happy to acquire enemy spellbooks and fighters should always want to mix it up and learn new tricks from enemy fighters.

[Manxome]

PL: Put up or shut up.

What would you consider to be a valid limiter on player choice?

What? I've already told you I was more than satisfied with K's suggested compromise.

Or isn't it good enough for you until I declare that I agree 100% with YOUR idea?

I don't actually recall you expressing that level of satisfaction before, and that's a very interesting position for you to take, but it doesn't actually answer the challenge. The challenge was not "pick something that you personally consider acceptable and tell us what to do," the challenge was "articulate a reasonable method for choosing an option that results in choosing the option that you actually want." Cause, see, the rest of us have been discussing pros and cons of various trade-offs and you've been saying that we should let the players do anything and that if there are any problems with that approach we should just cope, no matter what they are...and actually adopting your stated thought process results in magical tea party, not TNE. Your reasoning (such as it is) doesn't match your conclusion.

Though your satisfaction with K's idea is very interesting because K's proposal can be simulated with a strict single-class sytem that has more classes. Which means either that you're actually perfectly OK with Frank's plan if it happens to have enough classes (or maybe "the right classes")...or that your objection to Frank's single-class proposal actually has nothing to do with the amount of flexibility it permits.

So unless I've completely missed something, I think you just slew your own argument. When you get down to it, K's plan is Frank's plan, but with a new trick that's basically supposed to cut production costs. We're debating whether or not it actually does that and what side-effects it would have. I actually think it would cut costs, just not as much as K seems to think.

Now your turn to put up.

How much choice is TOO much?

It's too much choice when the quality of the game goes down for a given amount of development time and effort invested.

See, after we figure on writing and balancing the first X options, we can either spend our time trying out various permutations of some same X options and tweaking them to make sure that all the wild mix-and-match possibilities work OK, or we could enforce limits on the amount of mixing you can do and instead spend that same development effort, say, writing more new options.

Quality is complicated to evaluate, of course, and we also have to consider things like: how easy the game is to learn and play, how much internal sense it makes, how good a job it does of meeting various' players expectations and desires, etc., etc. That's what the adults in the thread are discussing.

But the criteria for including any particular feature is not "is the game better or worse without this feature?", it's "is this the best feature we could possibly include for the amount of effort it would take?"

At least, that's the question if we're trying to design an actual game, rather than trying to describe the platonic ideal.

[K]

As for fighter mages integrating: I don't believe that anyone really wants integration.

I'm serious. None of the archetypes from fantasy fiction do that. Rand al' Thor has magic powers and swording and on a few occasions used magic to make a fire sword, but he didn't do that in occasions when he actually had a sword handy. Vlad fights, and sometimes uses magic. He never mixes them in any way.

Heck, the iconic Melf as he appeared in fiction never mixed.

Jedi, the Matrix, Gandalf (sometimes), telekinetics with weapons, flying martial artists, smite evil, the girl on Angel who electrocutes people she touches (Gwen?)...I don't think the incorporation of supernatural abilities into martial fighting is exactly a rare trope.

I'm not familiar with your particular examples. And perhaps I was unclear; I don't necessarily mean that I want individual moves to be inherently both martial and magical (though I certainly don't object to that): I mean that I want to feel like the lowest-level tactics I am using wouldn't work without both abilities. Using super strength to hurl someone into the air and then using telekinesis to pull them back down so I can hit them again: good. Shooting a grenade launcher and then shooting a fireball: unsatisfying (at least to me).

Maybe I'm unrepresentative, but the fact that you know of 6 hybrid D&D classes (and believe there would have been more) suggests otherwise.

I don't think your examples mix anything at all. The lady from Angel touches anything and it flies back(no different from a spellcaster), the Matrix guys don't use any magic at all and just jump high, and smite evil is an example from a game that is metagame so it isn't even valid.

You do have part of a point with the Jedi. The newest Jedi game mixes heavily. You put force lightning on your lightsaber (cuz it's not damaging enough....yeh, OK), telekinetically toss lightsabers, and do all kinds of mixed things like pulling enemies toward you so you can stabinate them.

Now, that's one game. The movies all have people doing things like "fight, fight, fight, force effect, fight, fight." At one point I think someone blocks force lightning with a lightsaber, but the vast majoriity of Jedi don't mix their effects at all.

I know that some people want mixing. They want to use a third level effect with third level power that synergizes with their fighting skill and it is just like level appropriate damage from fighting plus the level appropriate damage from the spellcasting.

That's bad synergy, which we define as "taking level-appropriate things and doing things well beyond your level."

Since thematically there is no way to do it to make people happy in a single concept, and I can't really figure out a way to make it mechanically balanced, I am taking a pass for now in its class form(though I may take it up later).

Considering that the chances of harmful synergies can be mostly mitigated by removing meta-abilities...

To your argument (by which I mean footnote) that removing meta-abilities will mostly remove synergies: I very much doubt it. I don't think any examples of synergies that have been tossed around this forum any time recently have even involved meta-abilities. And weren't you the one who was talking about the archer with a fog cloud and the ability to see through fog, or something like that?

We did have a long conversation about meta-abilities in some thread.

We also talked about straight synergy. I think the best way to handle that is to make abilities very mechanistic and less magic-logic. I mean, if you truly did want a blind archer who used echolocation to see, then I could bring in evidence that fog actually distorts sound because of differing densities of water vapor(and yes, I did fair amount of research on the issue as it relates to bats), so breaking the ranged game for everyone includes you.

I mean, one of DnD's great flaws is things like the fact that when you fail a save to an entangle/i, you are boned. Why? If you are stuck in some vines, you'd think you should be able to cut yourself free, but the magic logic of 3e won't allow that.

I mean, video game logic works really well for video games, but in a tabletop rpg you really can have that level of granularity at almost no cost. I really don't mind a chart at the back of the book with the numbers you need tp cut through vines next to things like the numbers you need to cut through things like stone walls and wooden walls.

[K]

See, after we figure on writing and balancing the first X options, we can either spend our time trying out various permutations of some same X options and tweaking them to make sure that all the wild mix-and-match possibilities work OK, or we could enforce limits on the amount of mixing you can do and instead spend that same development effort, say, writing more new options.

The thing I'm not sure that people get is that any synergy that might break the game from multiclassing is the same synergy you'd get if two characters in the same game have those abilities. I mean, you can cry foul if a melee-focused character has a way to break the ranged game like using a fog cloud, but if the melee character can't and the party mage can, then it is the same synergy.

I'm 100% against- meta-abilities, so that only leaves synergies between different class lists or the same class lists. Since those same problems come up when two characters are using those abilities and not one, it clearly has no bearing on a multi-class discussion.