[D&D 3.5] The Unconventional Wisdom of the Den

[Username17]

Did they literally do that, or is it just obvious from their actions?

Mike Mearls literally did that. Rob Heinsoo has basically never come clean as to what the hell he was thinking.

-Username17

[Gx1080]

Well, there's a valid point on "there's a limit on character optimization and is how much bullshit will the DM let you pull" but it goes to the usual question: Who is the better bullshitter, the players or the DM? It varies from group to group. Though is obvious that the kind of people who go to CharOp vastly overestimate their skill on the latter.

About GNS, is the same as Richard Bartle's 4 gamer types:

http://www.nickyee.com/facets/bartle.html

A valid way to gather players in obvious categories that a game designer can understand, but not designed for actually being the basis of a game on the first place.

[Koumei]

If you'd played Vampire and Teenagers from Outerspace those statements would make complete sense.

Hahaha no. See, you fell into the trap of projecting your own definitions onto these terms and thinking everyone else thinks the same way.

TFOS is a game all about silly cartoon fun with a loose set of rules so you can go wild with the setting. Tell me how that is particularly game-heavy, and makes it more of a *game* than Vampire or whatever. And how it involves less simulation or narrative.

Though if you make the argument "Games are a form of entertainment, so a game has to be fun" then I could see it rating higher on a Game scale than Vampire.

[Josh_Kablack]

The First Thing an experienced rolepayer will notice is that Teenagers is relatively simplistic. Most "RPG's" (Role Playing Games) have very complex rules to simulate the effects of "realism" in the game. In Teenagers, you have people trying to hit outher people with hyperspace hammers while they're flying upside down around the Homeroom. Anyone who wants realism in this context should have his head examined

Here's the catch, In most Roleplaying Games, the higher your stats and knacks (also sometimes called skills), the better your character does. But it Teenagers (just like in Real Life), we reward mediocrity by grading on the curve

There you have it. The system both isn't appropriate for realism, and has mechanics to emulate Real Life.

[CapnTthePirateG]

On the topic of rules interpretations, what's the Den's opinion on persisting a touch spell?

[Kaelik]

Not sure about the Den, but to me, it's pretty obviously allowed.

The claim that touch is variable based on your reach is almost but not quite as valid as the claim that personal is variable based on the fact that you could be a different person than you are.

[Grek]

I consider touch spells to have a fixed range, that range being "0 ft". I'm also generally willing to allow "independant research" to produce a custom version of the spell with a fixed range of 25 for close range spells, 100' for medium and 400' for long.

[Username17]

I don't generally care about Persistent Spell, because especially with the +6 levels cost it exists only to cheese out by not paying that cost by one of half a dozen methods.

However, it's fairly obvious that Persistent is not supposed to work on Touch spells. It lists a "fixed range" (which is not a game term) and "personal" as separate things, even though "self" would normally be expected to be about the most fixedly fixed of all possibly ranges. So it is supposed to mean "has a non-variable number or the word personal written in the range descriptor".

Of course, that's not less broken than any other interpretation. It's still fucking useless unless you're snorting nightsticks to power DMM. At least the 3e version was kinda sorta justifiable as something you'd use without cheese, as far as I can tell Persistence is just theoretical optimization all the way down.

-Username17

[Josh_Kablack]

My opinion is that Persist doesn't make much sense as written.

Firstly, because (like most metamagic) it requires you to either be playing in a higher level game than actually happen or to be able to abuse item rules in various ways to get it.

But even with that aside:

Part of balancing a spell to the correct spell level included the duration (this obviously was not done perfectly, but it was a design consideration )
Persist Spell increases a spell's duration to a large constant
Persist Spell has a constant increase to spell level
Persist Spell has restrictions based on spell range.

At least to me, it's obvious that the best way to put meaningful limits on Persist Spell would be to have restrictions based on *duration* and not give a shit about the range, or alternately to merely increase the standard duration by a fixed multiple - both of these would at least acknowledge that the original duration is supposed to mean something, which the RAW Persist doesn't.

[erik]

I think not caring about Persist Spell may be something falling under "Unconventional Wisdom of the Den".

I used to fap to it for making perma-buffed characters or in builds, but I was straightened out on that here, as it is either an inferior option or you are collecting dildos.

I kind of liked the notion of Persistent Acid Arrow just as a mean way to slowly kill an enemy, but it certainly is not a good use of a spell slot.

[CapnTthePirateG]

Collecting dildos? I assume that means you have more power than you actually need?

[Prak]

Collecting dildos? I assume that means you have more power than you actually need?

It means it's just self indulgent and masturbatory to buff your character to that extent.

[Maxus]

I kind of liked the notion of Persistent Acid Arrow just as a mean way to slowly kill an enemy, but it certainly is not a good use of a spell slot.

I dunno. I never thought of that one...I like it!

[Koumei]

Collecting dildos? I assume that means you have more power than you actually need?

Nightsticks. Collecting Nightsticks, and they may as well be dildos for when people find your huge collection of them.

"No, they're just there to power up my undead-turning, yes I know you've never seen me turn undead in my life, but I use that power to make my spells last longer! No, honest! Why are you looking at me like that?"

[Archmage Joda]

Does that same "meh" apply when non-clerics find ways to mitigate persist? Like the Anima Mage? Or the Incantatrix? I don't really play clerics, arcane casters are just more my style.

On a side note, I find myself very fond of the Thaumaturge base class presented in the version of the tome compilation I have. Probably because I just like having access to all sorts of spell lists.

[erik]

Nightsticks.

Winner winner, chicken dinner!

[K]

Does that same "meh" apply when non-clerics find ways to mitigate persist? Like the Anima Mage? Or the Incantatrix? I don't really play clerics, arcane casters are just more my style.

On a side note, I find myself very fond of the Thaumaturge base class presented in the version of the tome compilation I have. Probably because I just like having access to all sorts of spell lists.

I think we all understand the ramifications of various bad rules and sometimes we point them out to illustrate a point, but we don't feel obliged to play the game by them. TGD tend to look at the game like designers would, and not like players or even DMs. Things that are obviously designer oversight don't impress most of us, especially rules that are obviously DM-fiat and not proper rules.

We want to fix things that are broken and play the game and not live in some fantasy world where we "make the DM cry with our build!"

I find that most gaming forums tend to live in some fantasy world of some theoretical game that will never be played. It's like the idea of playing that game is more real and enjoyable to them than actually sitting at a table and playing.

I mean, the same type of people are in MMO forums too. They are the people obsessively min-maxing for a potential extra 1% damage you might get with theoretical "top-notch gear build" and tell people that they'll never be the best with second-rate gear that does 1% less damage, looking down at people discussing the tactics needed to actually defeat challenges.

[Koumei]

For what it's worth, I actually enjoy making characters - making the choices there, tallying the numbers, going through a list of ways they would contribute in the game and then probably drawing a picture of them as well.

I'm sure there are plenty of others who do that too. But there is always this assumption that the character is being made for a game, or could soon be used in one if I were to ask around.

[Kaelik]

Does that same "meh" apply when non-clerics find ways to mitigate persist? Like the Anima Mage? Or the Incantatrix? I don't really play clerics, arcane casters are just more my style.

All methods of Persist cheating fall into the previous Den classification of "We already know how to break the game super easy, so we don't give a shit about making broken characters, and just want to make characters that are actually playable."

Frank made the 3.0 Cleric Archer. I made the most powerful Incantatrix, and 3.5 Cleric Archer using DMM Persist. These things exist, and are so broken that you can't actually play a game with them. But they are just as RAW as using a Candle of Invocation to get yourself 2 scrolls of Gate, and a +10000000000 Belt of Magnificence, and from there just getting whatever the fuck you want, because you have half that to all UMD checks, attack rolls, AC, HP, ect.

We know how to break the game, so the fact that an Incantatrix or Cleric Archer breaks the game isn't worth anything, because you can't play it in a game any more than you can a Gate abuser.

[Bill Bisco: Isometric Imp]

Does that same "meh" apply when non-clerics find ways to mitigate persist? Like the Anima Mage? Or the Incantatrix? I don't really play clerics, arcane casters are just more my style.

On a side note, I find myself very fond of the Thaumaturge base class presented in the version of the tome compilation I have. Probably because I just like having access to all sorts of spell lists.

I think we all understand the ramifications of various bad rules and sometimes we point them out to illustrate a point, but we don't feel obliged to play the game by them. TGD tend to look at the game like designers would, and not like players or even DMs. Things that are obviously designer oversight don't impress most of us, especially rules that are obviously DM-fiat and not proper rules.
We want to fix things that are broken and play the game and not live in some fantasy world where we "make the DM cry with our build!"

I find that most gaming forums tend to live in some fantasy world of some theoretical game that will never be played. It's like the idea of playing that game is more real and enjoyable to them than actually sitting at a table and playing.

I mean, the same type of people are in MMO forums too. They are the people obsessively min-maxing for a potential extra 1% damage you might get with theoretical "top-notch gear build" and tell people that they'll never be the best with second-rate gear that does 1% less damage, looking down at people discussing the tactics needed to actually defeat challenges.

I'd have to disagree with you to an extent. Persistent spell and divine metamagic are used in a great many games that actually see play with nightsticks too so that's really not an example of something omg broken. In fact the application of most persistable spells isn't anywhere close to the range of infinite Titan, solar, ect. Spam. In fact I'm making my own handbook and threads for the best persistable spells and fun combos out of their uses. To say persistent tricks are broken is like saying magic items are broken because there is candle of invocation. I think the better answer would be that some magic items and some spells eligible for persistent tricks "can" be broken and broken is a relative term

[virgil]

I think we all understand the ramifications of various bad rules and sometimes we point them out to illustrate a point, but we don't feel obliged to play the game by them. TGD tend to look at the game like designers would, and not like players or even DMs. Things that are obviously designer oversight don't impress most of us, especially rules that are obviously DM-fiat and not proper rules.

In addition, we also admit that said rules are flawed. This is possibly the only place I've seen on the internet that actually tries to avoid the Oberoni Fallacy.

[Kaelik]

I'd have to disagree with you to an extent. Persistent spell and divine metamagic are used in a great many games that actually see play with nightsticks too so that's really not an example of something omg broken. In fact the application of most persistable spells isn't anywhere close to the range of infinite Titan, solar, ect. Spam. In fact I'm making my own handbook and threads for the best persistable spells and fun combos out of their uses. To say persistent tricks are broken is like saying magic items are broken because there is candle of invocation. I think the better answer would be that some magic items and some spells eligible for persistent tricks "can" be broken and broken is a relative term

The fact that people intentionally low ball does not make it not broken. I could "Just" wish for a +100000 resistance bonus to saves, and +10000000 insight bonus to AC, and then I wouldn't have better offense and 1/20 attacks/spells will still hit me, but that doesn't make wishing for items not an offensive boost just because you didn't use i for that.

You could play the Wish and the Word by having the Word voluntarily cast at a reasonable Caster level, while the Wish only uses Wish to emulate low level effects. It's still broken.

The fact that people use Persist for things besides being a Cleric Archer of Doom or untouchable Incantatrix doesn't mean that it's not broken.

[Bill Bisco: Isometric Imp]

True but it doesn't make the inclusion of persistent spell TO by default because it isn't always used in that way. The same thing with magic items or wealth by level. Just cause I have excess gold to spend doesn't make it such that I buy a candle of invocation and thus gold and magic items become TO

[DSMatticus]

True but it doesn't make the inclusion of persistent spell TO by default because it isn't always used in that way. The same thing with magic items or wealth by level. Just cause I have excess gold to spend doesn't make it such that I buy a candle of invocation and thus gold and magic items become TO

This is a dumb argument.

Firstly, persistent spell is a character feature. Buying magic items is a game subsystem. Comparing a character feature to a game subsystem is a bad analogy right from the get go, especially for the way you're using it.

Secondly, buying magic items is a broken game subsystem, if by broken we mean 'does not work without player ignorance, player restraint, or DM restriction,' and you have already explained why: candles of invocation exist, and have a price in gold. So even if we allow that your analogy works, what it actually tells us is "buying magic items is broken, persistent spell is like buying magic items, so persistent spell is broken too."

[Whatever]

There are three possible uses for the Persistent Spell Metamagic:

1) Fair use. This assumes that you have access to level 7-9 spells, AND that you care how long your level 1-3 spells last. Except you don't.

2) Uber Hax. You make a little pile of nightsticks or feats or whatever, and set them on fire for real ultimate power. Not going to happen in a real game.

3) Self-Restrained Hax. You jump through a bunch of hoops, but instead of real ultimate power, you settle for something on par with the other players. Who didn't have to jump through tons of hoops. So you basically just confuse your DM for no reason. I mean, I get that it's a nice feeling to have extra power in your back pocket that you're not using right now. But if you're a spellcaster (and you are, you're Persisting Spells), then that is always true anyway. If you want to feel like a bad ass, just put Shivering Touch in your spell book and never memorize it. Easier on everyone involved.