What people want and what makes them happy rarely coincide.

[Chamomile]

No one rolled dice to see whether Batman was going to have batarangs, web shooters, or powered armor, because two out of those three things are stupid ideas. If you want to prove that the narrative benefits from players being forced to change aesthetic at random then you need to find in-genre examples of artists choosing their characters upgrades at random.

[souran]

That is, by definition, the fifth session. In the fifth session he gets some Batarangs, and just three years into the campaign he stops using a gun.

-Username17

Frank that whole example works against you.

Batman gets his batarangs but he doesn't stop being a detctive or a martial artist.

He does, however, slowly phase out carrying a gun at all.

The boomering weapon was a better fit for his idiom anyway as supposedly batman doesn't kill people.

If batman had become the aboriginal terror who throws a storm of boomerangs you would have something. However, he remained primarily a martial artist.

nobody is saying that the perihperal items can't or shouldn't change. If you are a sword and shield guy and you find a cloak that you can use in place of your shield there is something to that.

However telling swordman that he is now axeman because orcs in the monster manual have axes and not swords is dumb. Especially when its inconsequential to the DM but important to swordman's player.

This is espeically true in rpgs because in many rpgs swordman has had to spend character resources on getting to his current level of swording and its likely that not all of his levels of swording will transfer over to axing.

Some of this also has to do with when the changes occur.

Batman change occurs earily. So does Zorros. Robert E. Howard conan stories are less involved with conans weaponry and attachments (except his horned helmet) than la sprage decamp versions.

A character change made early will not create a lot of issues, but a character change made to a will established character will. This is true in rpgs as well. Asking swordman to reconsider his investment in swording at level 3 is much easier than telling swordman at level 18 that unless he taxes up axing he is fucked.

[angelfromanotherpin]

Virtually all collaboratively-created characters get their actual upgrades at random. One writer puts something in, and then it sticks or not by popularity contest - if the next writer doesn't like it, or if the fanbase objects strongly enough, that upgrade goes down the memory hole never to be spoken of again. Spider-Man does not have a Spider-Car or bone spikes anymore, and most people will deny that he ever did. Batman does not have an autistic hunchback who makes his gear living in the Batcave. I'm pretty sure Superman has long-since lost his Super-hypnotism and Super-ventriloquism.

[Chamomile]

Batman does not have an autistic hunchback who makes his gear living in the Batcave.

Wait, what?

Anyways, while some upgrades might get vetoed by a rebelling fanbase, the fact is that certain upgrades might be appropriate for characters in the same universe or even the same story that would be absurd for another character. There are a lot of upgrades that work for Spider-Man but not Punisher and vice-versa, so the two of them shouldn't be rolling on the same upgrade table even if they are having the exact same adventure. Any campaign that tells Speedball "be a gimp or be Penance" is a really bad campaign.

[angelfromanotherpin]

Wait, what?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Allnut

[Gx1080]

Protip: All the superhero comic examples are retarded because we are still talking about D&D. At least I hope so.

@Chamomile

Dude, play M&M instead.

EDIT: WTF is with the page?

[PhoneLobster]

One writer puts something in, and then it sticks or not by popularity contest - if the next writer doesn't like it, or if the fanbase objects strongly enough, that upgrade goes down the memory hole never to be spoken of again.

But. That isn't actually random.

Nor is it emulated or promoted by a random mechanic.

Especially a random mechanic combined with very strong motivation to keep the randomly generated item even if it proves massively unpopular with "the fan base".

If you REALLY want to emulate that, and there are strong reasons not to try and emulate EVERYTHING you see in a batman comic , then you actually want a system where characters have motivations to change or pick up different options in missions but then have the ability to walk into the beginning of the next mission with pretty much whatever level appropriate stuff they want, including any prior in mission pick ups that rated well with the "fan base" during their brief appearance.

Basically, among other things, the Frank and Lago mechanical suggestions here lack a mechanic to represent the items unpopular with the "fan base" being removed. (and any means of selecting items more likely to be popular with the "fan base" and less likely to need removing).

[Username17]

Frank that whole example works against you.

Batman gets his batarangs but he doesn't stop being a detctive or a martial artist.

He does, however, slowly phase out carrying a gun at all.

The boomering weapon was a better fit for his idiom anyway as supposedly batman doesn't kill people.

Uh... you know giving up the gun and refusing to kill people happened at the same time and was a major shift of the character's idiom, right? Like, you just conceded the entire argument, because the character changed his idiom and everyone liked it better.

-Username17

[A Man In Black]

But the thing is that the actual Frank Castle, just like the actual Conan, the actual Zorro, the actual Darth Vader, and the actual every single fucking character brought up by the weapon fetishists since this fucking multi-thread argument started does not work that way.

Well, no, even when the Punisher gets turned into an angel or Frankenstein's monster or when he's getting really fucking weird comedy guns invented for him or when he can't even kill people because of the Comic Code or when he's in Archie motherfucking Comics, he's still the gun guy. Sometimes it's angel guns and sometimes it's "mercy bullets" that don't kill anyone and sometimes he's not actually allowed to hit anyone and sometimes it's two gatling guns and sometimes he's not even allowed to draw a gun where the reader can see it and sometimes it's a gun that shoots swords, but he's always a guy with a gun and a desire to shoot it at criminals.

Again, not really sure what the argument is here, but he shoots criminals, that's as consistent as consistent can be.

Uh... you know giving up the gun and refusing to kill people happened at the same time and was a major shift of the character's idiom, right? Like, you just conceded the entire argument, because the character changed his idiom and everyone liked it better.

Citation fucking needed? Because if you could actually prove this, you'd be the first. Near as anyone can tell, there may have been an editorial edict somewhere between Detective Comics #35 and Batman #1 that Batman was no longer willing to use guns (or between DC #39 and Batman #1 that he was no longer willing to kill criminals), but since Bill Finger and Whitney Ellsworth have both been dead for 30+ years, there's nobody to ask. Les Daniels (in DC Comics: A Longass Subtitle I Can't Be Arsed To Remember But It's In My Closet) claims that Ellsworth decreed both, but IIRC he's just basing that on the editor's note in Batman #4 and some contextual clues from Batman #1 (which could have been Finger just as likely as Ellsworth).

[Fuchs]

Virtually all collaboratively-created characters get their actual upgrades at random. One writer puts something in, and then it sticks or not by popularity contest - if the next writer doesn't like it, or if the fanbase objects strongly enough, that upgrade goes down the memory hole never to be spoken of again. Spider-Man does not have a Spider-Car or bone spikes anymore, and most people will deny that he ever did. Batman does not have an autistic hunchback who makes his gear living in the Batcave. I'm pretty sure Superman has long-since lost his Super-hypnotism and Super-ventriloquism.

I would say the "fanbase" who decides what upgrades stick is the player in the case of an RPG character. No one else.

[Josh_Kablack]

I would say the "fanbase" who decides what upgrades stick is the player in the case of an RPG character. No one else.

Nah, the other people at the table have to have some input too.

I mean, in response some of the crazy extreme positions in this thread, I would really like to base my next RPG character off of Gunhaver - someone who not only has a signature weapon as one of exactly four defining traits, but is named for it, and considers possession of said weapon to be not merely a protected role, but also a crucial task for team missions. ( "But then who will have gun? ) but I suspect that the MC and any other players would find that more annoying than entertaining by a large margin.

[Stubbazubba]

Uh... you know giving up the gun and refusing to kill people happened at the same time and was a major shift of the character's idiom, right? Like, you just conceded the entire argument, because the character changed his idiom and everyone liked it better.

-Username17

Are you saying that being a ninja-detective who uses the image of a bat to intimidate criminals and then kills them and then moving to a ninja-detective who uses the image of a bat to intimidate criminals but not kill them is a changed idiom? Besides which, Batman virtually never used a gun to kill anyone early on anyway. True, he carried one on his belt, but pretty early that was retconned out. Batman has since only picked up guns for temporary use (never involving shooting anyone after Batman #1, and that was the Batplane, not a sidearm). Gun use was never part of Batman's idiom, it was a secondary piece of equipment he used only a handful of times ever, so it doesn't count as central to his character. If Batman had a costume change and went from cape and cowl to Batman Beyond, that would be a good example, but the gun thing is too tangential to be applicable to this situation.

Source

[Red_Rob]

The signature weapon is a well established trope, but more than that it often is a major indicator of personality, and changing it too radically messes with the characters aesthetic.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/M ... onOfChoice

Take your average Berserker barbarian. He's going to use an Axe. Probably a Great Axe. This is because an axe is a purely offensive weapon, unsubtle and unbalanced, which adds to the image of the wild warrior who cares only for slaughter. There's a reason for the term Axe Crazy... after all.

Now, certain other weapons can also fit this aesthetic, but if you find a powerful magic rapier or dagger then you are diluting your characters schtick by using it - he's supposed to be a crazed attacker, frenzied and uncouth, weilding a weapon so large that other men would struggle to lift it, not a thin elegant blade or a tiny dagger. This is what people are saying when they complain about random treasure, and its a big reason that Weapon Specialization has been so popular over the editions.

[Chamomile]

Has Frank seriously not yet figured out that skimming a few results on Google for whatever point he's trying to make and then ignoring its context is a bad idea, particularly with reference to things like Star Wars and Batman? Even if someone who knows the details inside and out doesn't visit this forum specifically, there's definitely someone who's put it the information on the internet. Do your research.

[hyzmarca]

It's also worth noting that Batman generally uses batarangs. He doesn't loot Captain Boomerang's gear, even if Captain Boomerang has objectively better boomerangs.

Characters with an iconic weapon have just that, an iconic weapon.

[Prak]

At the same time, batman does loot his enemies, and pull the weapons out when they're objectively better than what he has, along with making use of his intellect and wealth to have a veritable golfbag full of gear for different things, that's *part* of his "crazy prepared" shtick. When a red dragon comes to town, Batman pulls out Freeze's Freeze Ray. When Mr Freeze breaks out of Arkham again, he puts on his cold weather, ice-camo bat suit, and when he needs to beat the shit out of a superman gone mad with power/red kryptonite, he has a bat mech/power armour.

Batman's aesthetic is "crazy vigilante who refuses to kill but is quite possibly a sadist, who dresses like a bat for psychological warfare."

His iconic weapon is "bat-whatever, usually batarang."

He still totally has lots of other crazy crap, that gets pulled out depending on the adventure.

The foaming barbarian probably usually uses his giant, "strength of ten men needed to lift it" ax most of the time. But he may also have some looted items secreted away so he can deal with problems not solvable by Giant FrogAx

[Chamomile]

-snip-

Yeah, and having niche weapons for niche uses is totally fine, so long as the weapon of choice is usable in most cases. If I'm playing someone who generally has a sword-based aesthetic but we're facing one, specific villain who, for whatever reason, can only be killed by the Frost Axe of Being Very Cold, then I don't have any problems with dropping the sword in favor of an axe for one fight. It's being asked to permanently leave behind my character's aesthetic because the dice say wielding the lightning dagger is now the only way to remain competitive that irks me.

[Prak]

Well, I'm personally in favour of Ye Olde Magic Shoppe where you can sell the lightning dagger and get something you like better.

I'm also in favour of enchantment transferral, weapon transmuting, etc.

[Fuchs]

The ease of choosing the exact look of your character is also one of the (remaining) advantages of pen and paper RPGs compared to the limits imposed by CRPGs. That's not something one should give up lightly.

[Lago PARANOIA]

I was saying that just because a trope has a long narrative history does not mean that it should go away just because it has a long narrative history.

What? Do you think that's why I advocate a lot of the design paradigms I do? 'cause that's not why I'm against this.

I don't consider anything sacred in game design. There are some things that I wouldn't touch (such as not letting NPCs diplomatize PCs) but that's just because of marketing issues, not because I don't think that it would advance the design goals of the game more. But that's the whole point of this thread anyway, that peoples' desires are often so contradictory and poorly thought-out that it's easy to construct or observe situations where giving people what they want makes them less satisfied.

I'm against the obsession with weapons and weapon aesthetic because in my experience it hurts the game more than it helps. In addition to the versimilitude and lack of satisfaction being able to insist that every weapon drop will be or end up a katana causes, it also has a negative impact on how people roleplay.

It has nothing to do with me wanting to throw something out just because it's old. I want to throw it out because I think that it's bad for the game.

it makes a ubiquitous type of character that people actually want to play possible. Now you're left with the task of making some argument beyond "appeal to anti-tradition," because all I have actually heard from you is "just because it's tradition doesn't mean we have to have it," which is great for setting up the possibility that it might be removed, but does not demonstrate the necessity for its removal.

Dude, if the only reason why you should advocate something to be in the game is 'because it made players happy when we had it before', you are making an appeal to tradition if you leave it at that. You need to give a reason why that makes people happy. It speeds up gameplay and lets people get in more game is a defensible reason. It increases tactical complexity and the meaningfulness of choices is a defensible reason. It increases immersion is a defensible reason. 'it makes a ubiquitous type of character that people actually want to play possible' is such a vague and empty statement that it can only be defended by appeal to tradition. That could apply to anything; big-breasted misandrist elves, Killfuck Soulshitter, the designated party backstabber, whatever.

Second of all, even if you do get a better reason than 'that's what people want to play', you haven't actually argued against why I think that an immutable weapon aesthetic is bad. Seriously, which part of this analysis do you disagree with and why? And even if you fully agree or fully disagree with everything I said, what is your gameplay/story/marketing reason for having things be the way that they are?

[*] "Has a katana" is not a high level character concept or even a medium level concept. Including that as part of the character profoundly limits the potential progression of the character.

[*] While having the ability to forge katanas exists, that isn't intrinsically part of the katana fetishist character concept and without katana forging, a katana fetishist pretty much requires item wishlisting and item wishlisting is incredibly bad for the game.

[*] If you don't have your weapons auto-upgrade, you're spending quests or resources or both in order to... stay exactly the same. But with bigger numbers. So you're going to the other players asking them to chip in party resources or vote for your favorite sidequest with the result being no change at all from a story or descriptive standpoint.

[*] Claiming katana fetishism as a character trait (as opposed to simply having a katana as starting equipment) is characterization that does absolutely nothing for the character's storytelling impetus now, adds no additional storytelling options in the future, and eliminates potential future story paths.

[*] The katana fetishist will be disappointed if they acquire the Sword of Kas or the Ax of the Dwarven Lords, making them a petulant brat.

Here are a couple more things.

[*] The amount of mental space people can devote to a roleplaying exercise is limited. The amount of time that someone has to advance a certain roleplaying concept is also limited. Despite what Wolverine has told us, there's only so much you can add or pontificate to a character and thus a story. Past a certain point, you just have to select on a certain number of character aspects and abandon everything else.

[*] Weapon aesthetics are unique as opposed to that of a family, clothing, vehicles, etc.. in that it captures players' attention a lot more. For god's sake there's a trope on this. Having a weapon aesthetic as a character trait pushes out other traits.

[*] Weapon fetishism is a selfish character trait because it takes up screentime without giving other players the hook. Unlike being, say, a freer of slaves or a war profiteer or an ace detective it's much harder to generically get other people involved. This hurts the cooperative nature of roleplay.

[*] Having a character defined by their weapon or visuals is a shallow and stereotyped way to do things. While stereotypes and memetic shortcuts are a way for someone completely alien to the concept of roleplaying to get started, it eventually becomes a crutch.

The signature weapon is a well established trope, but more than that it often is a major indicator of personality, and changing it too radically messes with the characters aesthetic.

No shit, that's why I didn't get involved in the Batman evolution argument.

But here's the thing: just because it has memetic power does not mean that it should be something you should encourage!

Yes, a barbarian with a huge axe will 'feel' different than one with a musket. Right away, even. The Weapon of Choice trope does exist for a reason. But here's the thing: all-too-often these kind of visual cues becomes a shorthand for actual roleplaying. Sure, you see a barbarian with a gigantic battleaxe you think 'ah, must be savage, powerful, and wild' but the axe is not what makes him savage, powerful, and wild! The barbarian's brutality, super strength, and lack of manners is what makes him those things. If the axe-wielding barbarian was revealed to be chicken-hearted, getting muscles only from the side effect of the axe, and his wildness was more neurotic antisocial behavior than how stereotyped nomads behave, they would deviate hugely from how the two characters would play despite having similar visual images. Similarly, if the epee-wielding barbarian is revealed to be a classic barbarian, that reinforces the whole concept.

When people say stupid shit like 'The Punisher's wicked-sweet guns and his skull shirt are just as important to his idiom as his amorality, total lack of mercy, and his bloodthirstiness' it is to me a clear confusion of the imagery for the actual effect. And that shit leads to shallow stories. And since humans have a very hard time seeing past symbols, let alone exploring and/or subverting them, minimizing their relevance encourages creativity and depth.

And that's exactly why I am against weapon fetishism. It's the worst form of cargo cult roleplaying; like all cargo cults it encourages people to look at and imitate the symbols rather than analyzing the structure. And also like all cargo cults one it is established it is very hard to break people out of it.

[Stubbazubba]

When people say stupid shit like 'The Punisher's wicked-sweet guns and his skull shirt are just as important to his idiom as his amorality, total lack of mercy, and his bloodthirstiness' it is to me a clear confusion of the imagery for the actual effect. And that shit leads to shallow stories. And since humans have a very hard time seeing past symbols, let alone exploring and/or subverting them, minimizing their relevance encourages creativity and depth.

No, it doesn't. I see where you're coming from, but the treatment is all wrong, and will not work the way you imagine it will. That's why I am for weapon fetishism; even though I don't really get attached to weapons myself, I'm not gonna try and institutionalize my standards of role-playing on others by forcing them to abandon what they consider to be fun.

[Username17]

That's why I am for weapon fetishism; even though I don't really get attached to weapons myself, I'm not gonna try and institutionalize my standards of role-playing on others by forcing them to abandon what they consider to be fun.

How do you feel about players interrupting the MC describing a scene by declaring attacks? How do you feel about players interrupting other players with fart jokes? They apparently consider that to be fun. Are you going to institutionalize your standards on them?

-Username17

[PhoneLobster]

You know... I think it might once again be time for Frank and Lago to actually put together a sample system for yet another one of their ludicrously unpopular theory wanks.

Reading their discussion here closely they have given out some deeply contradictory suggestions on what they want to do.

They have discussed NPCs and missions with fixed weapons, available nowhere else... in the context of a randomized loot mechanic.

Also they told us special missions to get weapons were impossible and bad for game play. Except when they were telling us that they would "fucking walk" if people received "dire flails" by any other means. Including, again, those random tables Frank and Lago have been demanding.

They have suggested weighted regional randomized loot mechanics. Which is an interesting detail, but doesn't actually contribute positively to resolving any of their many contradictory dilemmas, or indeed, doing anything in particular, including actually reliably generating regionally themed material. What with it being, you know, random.

They have suggested creating weapon types that are NOT ACTUALLY AVAILABLE to player characters, except through special missions OR rare randomized table results, and yet which will make Frank throw a tantrum and walk... when they come up as a rare randomized table result.

There have been vague suggestions from them that the randomized table results... should be "modifiable" by "some sort of" choice based element for context purposes... in direct contradiction to well nigh everything else they have said.

They have in short provided the same vast morass of contradictory and essentially random statements about what they want that they have in the LAST three arguments where they decided inexplicably to put themselves in the position of arguing for what is basically insanity.

So again. For the purposes of clarification, it's YET A-FUCKING-GAIN time to say "Well OK, so how the fuck DO you want this to work exactly?".

Because at the moment you guys have shifted your goal posts around so much that they have formed a Gordian knot of raw insanity.

[Josh_Kablack]

When people say stupid shit like 'The Punisher's wicked-sweet guns and his skull shirt are just as important to his idiom as his amorality, total lack of mercy, and his bloodthirstiness' it is to me a clear confusion of the imagery for the actual effect. And that shit leads to shallow stories. And since humans have a very hard time seeing past symbols, let alone exploring and/or subverting them, minimizing their relevance encourages creativity and depth.

Isn't all of roleplaying the substitution of symbolic gestures, symbolic words and symbolic random numbers in place of actual actions undertaken in reality? Isn't a large part of the point that it allows players to symbolicly explore actions and situations which they cannot or will not undertake in real life? I happen to think so, and consequentially, I am more than willing to admit that you're right. As a human, I have a downright impossible time seeing past such symbols in the context of a TTRPG. And while you certainly have a point that unexamined repetition of such symbols enshrines cultural problems, I personally do not believe it to be within human capacity to shed them entirely. Culturally speaking, we have been despairing of the lack of innovation since at least the Book of Ecclesiates.

[Stubbazubba]

How do you feel about players interrupting the MC describing a scene by declaring attacks? How do you feel about players interrupting other players with fart jokes? They apparently consider that to be fun. Are you going to institutionalize your standards on them?

-Username17

1) Don't be an idiot, Frank, those aren't role-playing problems, those are problems with giving the other people at the table the basic respect they deserve as human beings, it's being a douche, it's being immature, kind of like what you're doing now.

2) No, I would not institutionalize standards on them in the form of game rules. That kind of problem should be taken care of by the gaming group on a very OOC level that no rulebook should be regulating.

Was this your best shot at counterpoint?