The Gaming Den

This is hilarious.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/cwc/20041014a

I do respect Skip, to an extent, but...what was the point of that article?

I... don't know what to say. It seems like the entire article was "Fighters function properly if you play them stereotypically". This is a sentiment which is totally lost on me.

-Username17

Um, Skip is not playing in any of the same games or types of I am.

That's awesome.

But they forgot to add "being fucking unable to contribute anything to a party with a spellcaster in it" to weaknesses.

I am continually surprised by the way that they make "easy" characters like fighters and half-orcs that are also not good.

Easy characters can be made by just handing out stats and skills to things.

I mean, just give the Fighter auto-ranks in some skills like Intimidate and he can't make a terrible character, and hand him a bunch of Str or Dex and he won't be confused by a lot of ability-based feats to remember. I mean, look at the Hulk. He makes being really strong into a bunch of abilities, and a player wanting a simple character can use "being strong" or "inhumanly graceful" in a lot of ways(just look at Legolas in LOTR: the dude climbs up an elephant, which was definately a "and make a Climb check and add your super high Dex" rather than a "Climb Elephant" feat).

My favorite strength is the "best fortitude save". Which also happens to correspond to having one good save. Which is coincidentally the worst save progression in the entire game. So one of the listed Fighter "Strengths" is having every single other character or monster have something which is just like yours or better.

It's like listing the fact that you gain a d4 hit points every level as one of the strengths of the Wizard.

-Username17

Josh_Kablack at [unixtime wrote:1098079277[/unixtime]]
Um, Skip is not playing in any of the same games or types of I am.

That pretty much sums it up... Most of the designers have some weird envisioning of what types of games are played.

First, they seem to think that people who play spellcasters are morons, and will never try to optimize their characters in the least beyond being fireball machines. Apparently druids will never use wild shape to full effect either.

And there are plenty of spells on the spell list which I think these games just outiright ignore like polymorph and astral projection. But none of the designers actually have the balls to roast the sacred cows.

My best guess about that sort of thing is that the designers are envisioning relatively straightforward, largely core-rules campaigns with items the wealth by level guidelines and consisting mainly of characters ranging from 1st to 6th level.

Conversely, most of us on this board seem to be focused, and perhaps overly so, on the balance issues, inifinite loops and other assorted rules failures that happen around 10th level and upwards as well as the integration of large amounts of non-core material and oddball highly creative players.

I think the designers are confused about what an actual high level party really looks like or does. They've set rules for it, but I don't think any of them have likely ever actually tried out most of the rules set for high level or any of the spells.

Case in point: Hecantoncheires CR, which can be cut in half.

Oh, I think they know, but are not creative enough to do anything about it.

I was posting on the Dungeon board, and I offered my opinion that the last three or four Adventure Path installments were basically just slugfests without much character, but that it was hard to write an adventure to truly challenge a high level party.

I got a reply from an Assistant Editor at Dungeon (and fellow player of Skip and the boys) who said that he agreed that it was hard to make adventures that took into account PC abilities. His example was "you can't really write for the possiblity that the PCs will make an army of Simulacrums of [party's last BBEG] and level the enemy's castle without ever fighting him."

Basically, they know that high-level is broken with a little creativity or a basic understanding of math. They just can't do anything about it. Reconcepting the whole game is beyond the abilities of the current facilty working in the industry.

I think that we should consider oursleves lucky that we got 3.X.

The sad thing is that a lot of it doesn't even require reconstructing the game or anything, it just entails putting Xs through existing spells. I just don't see any excuse for leaving in broken spells just because they're sacred cows.

I mean I can see polymorph being a bitch of a spell to balance, but if you can't balance it, then X it out. If you can't balance simulacrum, then X it out. If they can't make a particular tactic balanced in the first place, then it just shouldn't exist until they can make it balanced.

I don't blame the designers for being unable to come up with a balanced version of polymorph, I blame them for not just chucking the spell as unworkable. And there are lots of spells like that, the polymorph/shapechange line, astral projection, simulacrum, fabricate. Those spells just have to go if they can't fall into line.

I agree with that approach, but

I have to disagree on Polymorph.

I mean, I'd really really like to cut that whole line of nigh-impossible to balance spells entirely out of the game.

But, the thing is that form-changing magic plays a role in the works of Homer, Virgil, Tolkien, Vance, Lieber, Dunsany, Hans Christian Andersen, Robert E. Howard, The Brother's Grimm, L. Frank Baum, Norse Myth, Biblical Myth, Hindu Myth, Arthurian Myth and just about any other source material for D&D you can find.

It is a sacred cow, but it's attached to the entire genre the game attempts to emulate and not merely to the game. Getting rid of form-changing magic would be something like getting rid of swords - you could do it, but you'd no longer have a sword and sorcery game if you did.

Polymorph can be balanced, but only if monsters adhere to a level system and Polymorph is based off of that system.

As long we avoid stuff like giving 8th level spells to CR 5 characters(one of the faeries) or CR 10 monsters with 6 HD and other stupid powers(most of the angels), you can't have a balanced Polymorph.

I mean, if gaining minor abilties from a appropriately CRed enemy-type was what the spell did, we'd be fine with it.

Instead, it grants huge bonuses that synergize with normal levels(like a monstously high Con, a huge natural AC to stack with armor, etc) that are at no cost (no lost abilities or tactics).

It also has an "infinite" component where you can use to solve any problem by changing into a monster with the needed ability. Thats got to go.

I honestly believe that it all can be balanced.

Just not by WotC. Those guys are the product of the city college system.

Josh_Kablack at [unixtime wrote:1098210010[/unixtime]]
It is a sacred cow, but it's attached to the entire genre the game attempts to emulate and not merely to the game. Getting rid of form-changing magic would be something like getting rid of swords - you could do it, but you'd no longer have a sword and sorcery game if you did.

Well, basically how it'd have to work is you'd have individual polymorphs and not a general polymorph.

You could have a polymorph to turn you into a giant snake or one to turn your foes into pigs, and those can be reasonably balanced, but you can't have the sort of general "turn into anything you want" polymorph unless it simply acts as a disguise and nothing more.

It can be a disguise plus abilities off a list and work fine. What it can't be is "go through the monster manual and find something unbalanced for your level/situation." That can't work.

But you know, disguise plus abilities off a list was what it used to be, that really worked fine.

-Username17

I've played OD&D, and 2E, and I never found a problem with polymorph at all until now.

However, I don't think I've ever seen many people use polymorph before 3E either, but I can see if I wasn't in perhaps the worst group of munchkin powergamers in existance back then, then it would have use.

(To give an example, if my wizard tried to cast a spell that did something other than do damage, the DM wouldn't let me, and would pre-empt my decision. "Polymorph the hill giant into a newt? That's stupid, you're casting fireball at him. No, it doesn't hurt the fighter in melee with it." Ass.)

Polymorph as a save or die really isn't that broken, it's the buff variant that causes the real trouble. You could leave in baleful polymorph, you'd just have to get rid of all the buff polymorphs, or have specialty buff polymorphs that make you into a fixed shape.

But that's not even the point really, the point I was trying to make was that if the designers can't balance it, then it shouldnt' be in the game. I really don't care how much of a sacred cow it is, if they can't make it work mechanically they don't use it at all and let individual groups worry about it if they want.

Creating broken spell mechanics is bad, but it's even worse to create an entire class (the druid) based on those bad mechanics, that's just inexcuseable really.

Since it's such a successful format, Skip decided to continue his bout of tourette's with this little gem:

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dn ... r]Remember, having a good initiative score is an advantage of playing the Rogue class because your abilities don't work if your initiative score isn't good. Also, remember that having the worst save progression in the game is a class advantage that you should exploit.

But the absolute top of the shit list: Skip lists key equipment for a rogue and Masterwork Thieve's Tools don't make the list. Good times!

-Username17

Did I miss it, or does he skip thieve's tools altogether?

It's abundantly clear that WotC is aimed only at the 1-10 levels. Among other things, I've never played a rogue who actually needed the divine caster for healing or antyhing else. Even a 6th level rogue can pick up a CLW wand for squat.

Why do they even have higher levels in the book? It's obvious the rules aren't intended to even cover those levels.

He skips thieve's tools altogether. He also skips all mention of magic items, even the extremely cheap and good magic items that Rogues are in a unique position to care about such as cross-class spell trigger items.

I don't see the guide as even making any sense when being read as a how-to guide past first or second level, but it also doesn't cover all the things that a first level Rogue needs - Thieve's Tools, Pitons, Rope; and it does cover some stuff that a low-level Rogue is literally never ever going to give a damn about - cutting your way out of a monster's belly? WTF? How is a Rogue supposed to survive that kind of beating before he can afford a Ring of Blinking and just leave?

It seems like it was written as a guide to use to reverse engineer Chainmail characters out of PC classes, rather than as a serious introspection on how you should play an actual character in a D&D game.

-Username17

Just be glad he didn't recommend Full plate to offset their fairly low armour class.

I bet he's saving that for the monk

No, they're going to go on about how an amulet of mighty fists is better than a +5 vorpal kama because the +5 amulet of mighty fists is cheaper.