Apparently, Larian Studios are working on Baldur's Gate 3. Loosely based on the D&D 5E ruleset, set directly subsequent to an official hell-focused adventure path/module ("Descent to Avernus"), and focused on mind flayers.
There's apparently one of those weird illithid spaceships in the trailer, so there might be a little Spelljammer in the new 5th Edition computer game.
D&D 5e has failed
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saithorthepyro
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They might be trying to downplay the fact that it’s likely turn-based by not mentioning specifics, as there is currently a split in the isometric CRPG fan base over wether or not the games should be turn-based or real time with pause. They might not be willing to state exactly which yet, although I’m pretty certain it will stick with turn-based
I'd be really impressed if they did what Obsidian did with Deadfire and released a game that can do both. There's merits either way, but turn-based vs. real time is a huge impact on the kind of abilities you can/should be putting in your game, and because a lot of CRPGs are translating turn based systems, but going real time with pause, they've often just kludged largely impossible to use abilities in.saithorthepyro wrote:They might be trying to downplay the fact that it’s likely turn-based by not mentioning specifics, as there is currently a split in the isometric CRPG fan base over wether or not the games should be turn-based or real time with pause. They might not be willing to state exactly which yet, although I’m pretty certain it will stick with turn-based
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saithorthepyro
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I did try Deadfire's turn-based system when they released it and quickly left because of how bad it was. I'll check it out again but initially it had a major bug where characters would push each other out of the way when moving, and this could result in characters pushing each other dozens of feet forward back and forth.
I think I'm in the minority that liked Deadfire much better than Divinity OS 2. For me. the story of DOS2 and the characters never really caught my interest as they did in PoE2.
IMHO The combat systems (both turn-based and RtwP) for Deadfire and turn-based for DOS2 are both OK, not great, but I feel both games have too many trash fights for a turn-based approach. Since turn-based takes longer, each combat should offer something unique or special, and both games fail at that.
IMHO The combat systems (both turn-based and RtwP) for Deadfire and turn-based for DOS2 are both OK, not great, but I feel both games have too many trash fights for a turn-based approach. Since turn-based takes longer, each combat should offer something unique or special, and both games fail at that.
Last edited by malak on Tue Jun 11, 2019 9:48 pm, edited 1 time in total.
I own D:OS 1 and 2 and the first POE as well of Torment:TON. I will say that D:OS 1 is a more fun game to play than than POE but the story feels a lot less serious. POE has the same problem as the late 90s games it is mimiking in that you don't actually feel like your playing any of the guys in the party. You can script up the whole party and then control them like a battle group in an RTS strategy game and clear most of the badguys on a screen by just clicking "move to here and fight."
Torment:TON uses the same engine and has a prefectly reasonable combat engine. The game uses a pretty faithful adaption of Cypher system so its not as complex as either D:OS or POE in terms of character building but the engine does just fine. I was waiting till I had cleared my back catalog of other stuff before I picked up POE:2 but with the turn based combat alternative I will probably pick it up next steam sale because it seems like it would have a good mix of story weight and combat.
As a side note I personally think that the best D&D game that didn't come in a gold box is "temple of elemental evil"
Torment:TON uses the same engine and has a prefectly reasonable combat engine. The game uses a pretty faithful adaption of Cypher system so its not as complex as either D:OS or POE in terms of character building but the engine does just fine. I was waiting till I had cleared my back catalog of other stuff before I picked up POE:2 but with the turn based combat alternative I will probably pick it up next steam sale because it seems like it would have a good mix of story weight and combat.
As a side note I personally think that the best D&D game that didn't come in a gold box is "temple of elemental evil"
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saithorthepyro
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Oh, I'll agree that Deadfire definitely has a better story, and I play both games around equally, I just put down Deadfire until they fixed the issue of shoving in the turn-based combat, and forgot to go back to it. I will say the other thing that I think DoS 2 has over Deadfire is the co-op aspect, which is a major reason for why I play DoS 2.
New 5E related topic:
The problem of money in 5e.
Money is useless in 5e D&D after about level 3 for most characters. Characters who want plate armor and then want to ride a creature wearing plate armor have to wait till level 4-5 but after that money is pointless.
There is just nothing relevant to the game to buy. At a lot of places where the 5e community meets people will say that players should be buying land and castles and crap. Except, there is no castle builders guidebook to provide anything like a baseline of building costs so its just hand over your fake play money back to the DM in arbitrary and shifting amounts.
However I think that this is a fundamental misunderstanding of the issue with not being able to buy magic items or other shit relevant to higher level PCs.
Lets assume that most of the NPCs in a rpg world are rational actors. They work their jobs so that they can meet their basic needs for food and shelter. Now, being an adventurer offers a lot of return, but also a unbelievable amount of risk. The fact that by level 5 or so you can accumulate enough wealth to buy a nice inn and settle down is not unreasonable. I think it is perfectly fair to assume that most NPC adventurers retire and move on to something less dangerous day to day the moment they can reasonably afford it.
However, Player Character adventurers are NOT rational actors. They are not looking for one more score before they retire. They are played by people whose motivation is to keep playing the game this means that the accumulation of wealth is meaningless unless it provides a tangible game benefit. If players cannot buy things that appear "on screen" and do something worthwhile they will quickly lose interest in wealth accumulation as a game goal.
5e finally decided to let players buy magic items. The system is cumbersome and requires the rolls by both the player and the DM so it takes table time. It is literally about as bad a system as you could come up with. Also, consumables are covered by this same system so you can't even load up on potions and scrolls.
I don't mind 5e as much as most people here, but for a game that has "get the treasure" as the motivating factor of about 75% of all adventurers, the fact that the whole economy works on underpants gnome logic is just infuriating.
The problem of money in 5e.
Money is useless in 5e D&D after about level 3 for most characters. Characters who want plate armor and then want to ride a creature wearing plate armor have to wait till level 4-5 but after that money is pointless.
There is just nothing relevant to the game to buy. At a lot of places where the 5e community meets people will say that players should be buying land and castles and crap. Except, there is no castle builders guidebook to provide anything like a baseline of building costs so its just hand over your fake play money back to the DM in arbitrary and shifting amounts.
However I think that this is a fundamental misunderstanding of the issue with not being able to buy magic items or other shit relevant to higher level PCs.
Lets assume that most of the NPCs in a rpg world are rational actors. They work their jobs so that they can meet their basic needs for food and shelter. Now, being an adventurer offers a lot of return, but also a unbelievable amount of risk. The fact that by level 5 or so you can accumulate enough wealth to buy a nice inn and settle down is not unreasonable. I think it is perfectly fair to assume that most NPC adventurers retire and move on to something less dangerous day to day the moment they can reasonably afford it.
However, Player Character adventurers are NOT rational actors. They are not looking for one more score before they retire. They are played by people whose motivation is to keep playing the game this means that the accumulation of wealth is meaningless unless it provides a tangible game benefit. If players cannot buy things that appear "on screen" and do something worthwhile they will quickly lose interest in wealth accumulation as a game goal.
5e finally decided to let players buy magic items. The system is cumbersome and requires the rolls by both the player and the DM so it takes table time. It is literally about as bad a system as you could come up with. Also, consumables are covered by this same system so you can't even load up on potions and scrolls.
I don't mind 5e as much as most people here, but for a game that has "get the treasure" as the motivating factor of about 75% of all adventurers, the fact that the whole economy works on underpants gnome logic is just infuriating.
Magic Marts are the worst. I am glad 5e discourages them. Not giving price tags to magic items is bad and also very obviously born from the same laziness that led to having an outline of a skill system with no actual rules attached, but the particular side effect that Magic-Mart has gone out of business is a good one. In fact, possibly the worst thing about 5e's approach to magic item pricing is that it has convinced an unknown but possibly very large portion of the playerbase that actually Magic-Marts aren't so bad. What a game should have is some random tables that can produce a random inventory appropriate to a magic item shop of level X, rather than every city having every magic item below X,000 gold in unlimited quantity.
And also I don't think magic items should be the presumed gold sink of the game. The whole murder-hobo thing where players are encouraged to sleep in a gutter because spending money on a nice bed at the inn is sapping character power? That's awful, and anyone who advocates for it should be flogged. The game just needs a better thought out economy with proper price tags on things like countryside estates and border march castles and so on. They don't even have to do anything. Just have steadily escalating price tags on steadily escalating fancy houses for players to buy. People are, in general, perfectly happy to save up a million gold pieces to buy a "glittering citadel" even if it is exactly as useless as the 40,000 gp "small keep" they got at level 8.
And also I don't think magic items should be the presumed gold sink of the game. The whole murder-hobo thing where players are encouraged to sleep in a gutter because spending money on a nice bed at the inn is sapping character power? That's awful, and anyone who advocates for it should be flogged. The game just needs a better thought out economy with proper price tags on things like countryside estates and border march castles and so on. They don't even have to do anything. Just have steadily escalating price tags on steadily escalating fancy houses for players to buy. People are, in general, perfectly happy to save up a million gold pieces to buy a "glittering citadel" even if it is exactly as useless as the 40,000 gp "small keep" they got at level 8.
Chamomile wrote:Magic Marts are the worst. I am glad 5e discourages them. Not giving price tags to magic items is bad and also very obviously born from the same laziness that led to having an outline of a skill system with no actual rules attached, but the particular side effect that Magic-Mart has gone out of business is a good one. In fact, possibly the worst thing about 5e's approach to magic item pricing is that it has convinced an unknown but possibly very large portion of the playerbase that actually Magic-Marts aren't so bad. What a game should have is some random tables that can produce a random inventory appropriate to a magic item shop of level X, rather than every city having every magic item below X,000 gold in unlimited quantity.
The game should make intelligent decisions about what should be in the magic mart. So, lots of consumables for sure. However, the magic mart was perfectly fine because I honestly don't want to have to adjudicate my players spending their money. I want to be able to send them home with their haul and they come back next time and I don't have to vet every line of of their inventory to make sure they don't own something game breaking.
This is dumb. Most people won't save up a million gold pieces for the citadel, they will simply stop giving a shit about gold.And also I don't think magic items should be the presumed gold sink of the game. The whole murder-hobo thing where players are encouraged to sleep in a gutter because spending money on a nice bed at the inn is sapping character power? That's awful, and anyone who advocates for it should be flogged. The game just needs a better thought out economy with proper price tags on things like countryside estates and border march castles and so on. They don't even have to do anything. Just have steadily escalating price tags on steadily escalating fancy houses for players to buy. People are, in general, perfectly happy to save up a million gold pieces to buy a "glittering citadel" even if it is exactly as useless as the 40,000 gp "small keep" they got at level 8.
Player characters are not rational actors. Players will always prioritize things that provide game effects over things that in world citizens will want. That is fine. There are not very many player characters. The game should assume that the money that they are being given represents their funds AFTER paying for at least basic accommodations.
If you want players to care about accommodations and standard of living you have to provide a game effect. If you don't want to worry about that shit just give them things that their money can do in game.
Even MMOs realize that the fake ass houses and horses have to do something, like EXIST in game. If the players house won't be central to the story then players will feel cheated.
If you don't want the game to actually have things for players to buy the game should have abstract money. However, abstract money doesn't make anybody want to go on an adventure.
Magic-Mart contains every item with a listed price in arbitrarily large quantities. That is what Magic-Mart means.souran wrote:
The game should make intelligent decisions about what should be in the magic mart.
Okay, cool for them. D&D is about mercenaries, so their character can go ahead and fuck off and maybe the next one will have an actual motivation to interact with the plot. "I don't want to break the law" means your character isn't in a Shadowrun story, "I'd rather die than pose an ongoing danger to innocent bystanders around me" means your character isn't a Vampire: the Masquerade story, and "I don't care about treasure for any reason" means your character isn't in a D&D story. RPGs need to provide a reason why the party gets together to go on an adventure. They do not need to provide an exhaustive list that applies to all possible characters.Most people won't save up a million gold pieces for the citadel, they will simply stop giving a shit about gold.
Also, citation needed. I run D&D for a lot of people, often in situations where magic items are of limited or no availability, and so far zero of them have stopped caring about amassing treasure. Indeed, many characters continue Greyhawking dungeons for minimally valuable fixtures no matter how useless the wealth becomes.
Well, that's a huge obstacle for TTRPGs, for sure. There's no way we'll be able to afford the graphic design budget to add players' castles to the game.Even MMOs realize that the fake ass houses and horses have to do something, like EXIST in game.
Yay! Nested quote discussion, this will start taking up whole pages really fast.
Players need this because the mundane equipment list stops being relevant to the game very fucking quickly. Especially with the amount of gold 5E hands out.
D&D is not about mercenaries, it is about Adventurers. Sometimes that is the same, usually the difference is that adventuers expect to be rewarded by what they find as opposed to being paid to go find something. Regardless, the sort of adventurers that most people play in dungeons and dragons are the type who go into dungeons and fight dragons . Therefore, they are going to want to be able to own shit that is good at fighting dragons.
Figuring out that a part of the game serves no purpose is not fun. I have had a 5e group stop me in the middle of telling them about their treasure haul and saying "we don't give a shit about anything that is not magic." Once they got to that point (they were level 7), there was a clear loss of enjoyment because any encounter that doesn't result in getting something magic feels pointless.
Turns out that after playing with a ton of people, both close friends, convention goers, and game store sign up groups, a bunch of varied groups in college, that I would say about 4/5 people actually don't want the game to change focus. They like being Big Damn Heroes and want to continue playing a game about fighting dragons in dungeons, or evil liches in tombs or trolls in tunnels or what have you. They do not want to get to level 10 and switch over to game of thrones. I have also found that this sentiment is probably closer to 9/10 female players. They don't want to switch from D&D to a wargame, they don't to own or run castles, they want to adventure.
The older I get the more reasonable that seems. Play the game you signed up for. That means that the game should offer you something to do with your currency that is relevant to the game at hand.
Finally, if a castle is relevant to the PLOT of an adventure it will be FREE because either the players will clear it of its current denizens, or the GM will give it to them. If a player BUYS a castle or a House, or an Inn there is a strong chance that it will never be relevant to the plot and therefore won't appear. Anything that doesn't appear might as well not exist. Also, nothing makes a person seem like a bigger jackass than them talking about their fortress/citadel/wizard's tower that doesn't show up in their trip to Avernus.
The buy status/property/building/hirelings is a canard. That is all shit that lets you discard large amounts of your fake money for things that won't matter and nobody will care about. You would be better to buy a wagon of healing potions because while they don't do much at level 12 at least they do something that actually matters at the table.
The players are going to want swap the magic shit they have but either can't use or don't want for magic shit they can use and do want. There needs to be a method for this. This exchange can be from a limited subset of the games magic items. If this means its not a magic mart then whatever. Additionally, they need to be able to swap gold for SOMETHING that helps play D&D advenures. That means a big fucking fat list of potions, scrolls, alchemical items, and expensive non-magic but fantastic tools. I also happen to think it should include a smattering of magic items.Chamomile wrote: Magic-Mart contains every item with a listed price in arbitrarily large quantities. That is what Magic-Mart means.
Players need this because the mundane equipment list stops being relevant to the game very fucking quickly. Especially with the amount of gold 5E hands out.
Okay, cool for them. D&D is about mercenaries, so their character can go ahead and fuck off and maybe the next one will have an actual motivation to interact with the plot. "I don't want to break the law" means your character isn't in a Shadowrun story, "I'd rather die than pose an ongoing danger to innocent bystanders around me" means your character isn't a Vampire: the Masquerade story, and "I don't care about treasure for any reason" means your character isn't in a D&D story. RPGs need to provide a reason why the party gets together to go on an adventure. They do not need to provide an exhaustive list that applies to all possible characters.
D&D is not about mercenaries, it is about Adventurers. Sometimes that is the same, usually the difference is that adventuers expect to be rewarded by what they find as opposed to being paid to go find something. Regardless, the sort of adventurers that most people play in dungeons and dragons are the type who go into dungeons and fight dragons . Therefore, they are going to want to be able to own shit that is good at fighting dragons.
Figuring out that a part of the game serves no purpose is not fun. I have had a 5e group stop me in the middle of telling them about their treasure haul and saying "we don't give a shit about anything that is not magic." Once they got to that point (they were level 7), there was a clear loss of enjoyment because any encounter that doesn't result in getting something magic feels pointless.
I too have run D&D for a lot of people over multiple editions. I took me a long time to really understand because I first learned with 2e and so my natural thought was that at some point the game is supposed to shift and be something else, a game about ruleship and having followers.Also, citation needed. I run D&D for a lot of people, often in situations where magic items are of limited or no availability, and so far zero of them have stopped caring about amassing treasure. Indeed, many characters continue Greyhawking dungeons for minimally valuable fixtures no matter how useless the wealth becomes.
Turns out that after playing with a ton of people, both close friends, convention goers, and game store sign up groups, a bunch of varied groups in college, that I would say about 4/5 people actually don't want the game to change focus. They like being Big Damn Heroes and want to continue playing a game about fighting dragons in dungeons, or evil liches in tombs or trolls in tunnels or what have you. They do not want to get to level 10 and switch over to game of thrones. I have also found that this sentiment is probably closer to 9/10 female players. They don't want to switch from D&D to a wargame, they don't to own or run castles, they want to adventure.
The older I get the more reasonable that seems. Play the game you signed up for. That means that the game should offer you something to do with your currency that is relevant to the game at hand.
Finally, if a castle is relevant to the PLOT of an adventure it will be FREE because either the players will clear it of its current denizens, or the GM will give it to them. If a player BUYS a castle or a House, or an Inn there is a strong chance that it will never be relevant to the plot and therefore won't appear. Anything that doesn't appear might as well not exist. Also, nothing makes a person seem like a bigger jackass than them talking about their fortress/citadel/wizard's tower that doesn't show up in their trip to Avernus.
The buy status/property/building/hirelings is a canard. That is all shit that lets you discard large amounts of your fake money for things that won't matter and nobody will care about. You would be better to buy a wagon of healing potions because while they don't do much at level 12 at least they do something that actually matters at the table.
No, don't worry, for nested quote discussion to continue happening, you have to be able to say things that are at all related to what I said. So far, we're safe.
You spend a lot of time talking about how players don't want to play logistics and dragons, because apparently you confused "players will buy a castle even if it doesn't do anything" for "players will buy a castle only if it plays a role in a completely separate mini-game." The point of the castle is that players will try to buy them (and boats - it's consistently those two, for some reason) whether or not they actually do anything. Players are 100% okay with owning castles whose only purpose is to be the place they're sitting around when quest hooks show up. Boats can not only serve that purpose, they're mobile on top of it, so the quest hook doesn't even have to be relevant to a specific region.
You spend a lot of time talking about how players don't want to play logistics and dragons, because apparently you confused "players will buy a castle even if it doesn't do anything" for "players will buy a castle only if it plays a role in a completely separate mini-game." The point of the castle is that players will try to buy them (and boats - it's consistently those two, for some reason) whether or not they actually do anything. Players are 100% okay with owning castles whose only purpose is to be the place they're sitting around when quest hooks show up. Boats can not only serve that purpose, they're mobile on top of it, so the quest hook doesn't even have to be relevant to a specific region.
Last edited by Chamomile on Thu Jun 20, 2019 2:15 am, edited 1 time in total.
I will admit that in my mind buying land/property is bound up in the logistic and dragons shift.
However, what you are proposing is the absolute worst most bullshit thing possible. Players should just spend their game earned currency on NOTHING bullshit they could have for free.
Again, telling the players to buy expensive bullshit that does nothing and costs random amounts of earned currency is bad. It is the very essence of indicating that the money the players get is pointless. It actively makes the game worse in concrete ways. Just get rid of tracked currency if that is the way the game is going to function.
Also, if boats are going to be particularly relevant to a game the players are going to end up with one without paying for it.
Finally, having stuff for the players to buy that is useful for playing mid and high level dungeons and dragons wouldn't mean couldn't buy pointless useless shit like castles or sailing ships that never appear in the adventure, do nothing, and make no impression on the other members of the table. It would just mean that the other players for whom buying that kind of pointless bullshit is not fun could also buy something.
However, what you are proposing is the absolute worst most bullshit thing possible. Players should just spend their game earned currency on NOTHING bullshit they could have for free.
Again, telling the players to buy expensive bullshit that does nothing and costs random amounts of earned currency is bad. It is the very essence of indicating that the money the players get is pointless. It actively makes the game worse in concrete ways. Just get rid of tracked currency if that is the way the game is going to function.
Also, if boats are going to be particularly relevant to a game the players are going to end up with one without paying for it.
Finally, having stuff for the players to buy that is useful for playing mid and high level dungeons and dragons wouldn't mean couldn't buy pointless useless shit like castles or sailing ships that never appear in the adventure, do nothing, and make no impression on the other members of the table. It would just mean that the other players for whom buying that kind of pointless bullshit is not fun could also buy something.
Last edited by souran on Thu Jun 20, 2019 2:43 am, edited 1 time in total.
Ok Chamomile; I read your posts again and I think that there is probably more we agree on than disagree. I will try and not be a jerk just because I am responding on the den.
Here are some things I don't see a disagreement with:
A. By level 3-4 most non plate armor wearing characters can/will own every piece of gear they can purchase and care about from the existing equipment lists.
a1: This increases a level or 2 for plate wearing characters.
B. The game had no rules for buying magic items or mid/higher level gear until Xanthar's was published. This situation was bad.
C. The rules in Xantahar's are also bad.
c1: I dislike them because they require to much DM attention.
c2: you dislike them because they make people want magic item marts
C2.1: I actually don't disagree with a randomizing what items are available in each magic item shop. I just hope for a way of doing this that also lets the DM not need to be present for the whole process.
Now it looks to me like our major area of contention is on weather money should be used to buy property/land and if this should be an major/desired gold sink for the game.
A. Having been burned in the past on the "buy land!" idea I have very strong feeling about this. I do not think that it is a good direction because without a lot of GM effort it feels like getting nothing.
B. One thing you originally noted was that the game would need to have "proper price tags" for all the estates/castles/catherdals etc. 5E is lacking anything like that and so buying land is a total ass pull that will be different at every table. So therefore would you agree that the "buy a castle" argument common on WOTC and Big Purple forums is a bad/disingenuous argument?
Here are some things I don't see a disagreement with:
A. By level 3-4 most non plate armor wearing characters can/will own every piece of gear they can purchase and care about from the existing equipment lists.
a1: This increases a level or 2 for plate wearing characters.
B. The game had no rules for buying magic items or mid/higher level gear until Xanthar's was published. This situation was bad.
C. The rules in Xantahar's are also bad.
c1: I dislike them because they require to much DM attention.
c2: you dislike them because they make people want magic item marts
C2.1: I actually don't disagree with a randomizing what items are available in each magic item shop. I just hope for a way of doing this that also lets the DM not need to be present for the whole process.
Now it looks to me like our major area of contention is on weather money should be used to buy property/land and if this should be an major/desired gold sink for the game.
A. Having been burned in the past on the "buy land!" idea I have very strong feeling about this. I do not think that it is a good direction because without a lot of GM effort it feels like getting nothing.
B. One thing you originally noted was that the game would need to have "proper price tags" for all the estates/castles/catherdals etc. 5E is lacking anything like that and so buying land is a total ass pull that will be different at every table. So therefore would you agree that the "buy a castle" argument common on WOTC and Big Purple forums is a bad/disingenuous argument?
Yes, the "buy a castle" argument is disingenuous when coming from the 5e devs (and probably the community, except in the case where someone has made actual house rules for it that they can refer you to) because it really means "ask your GM to fix the problem we gave you."
But also, yes, the primary source of disagreement here is that every time, in any group, that getting either a boat or a castle has been an option, it has immediately become a high priority. For the Kingmaker group, that's not surprising, the group is probably self selecting for the kind of person who sees an island on the world map and immediately resolves to build Barad-Dur on top of it, but it also happened with completely unrelated groups in three other games (four, if you add "a shop" to boats and castles, although that one was motivated by a desire to make even more money rather than a direct desire to own real estate).
Your assertion that people don't want castles unless they do something has been exactly the opposite of my experience: People always want castles unless they come packaged with an obligation to play a new mini-game.
But also, yes, the primary source of disagreement here is that every time, in any group, that getting either a boat or a castle has been an option, it has immediately become a high priority. For the Kingmaker group, that's not surprising, the group is probably self selecting for the kind of person who sees an island on the world map and immediately resolves to build Barad-Dur on top of it, but it also happened with completely unrelated groups in three other games (four, if you add "a shop" to boats and castles, although that one was motivated by a desire to make even more money rather than a direct desire to own real estate).
Your assertion that people don't want castles unless they do something has been exactly the opposite of my experience: People always want castles unless they come packaged with an obligation to play a new mini-game.
Hey souron. There's people have studied what players like, and modern PC games are heavily based on the psychology of it all to maximise profits.
Most people will spend real money, like actual "this is four hours of my life I took to earn this" kind of money, and buy things like a purple pair of boots that does nothing other than appear as purple boots on screen. That sort of thing is huge money in games now. Only thing beats it really is gambling on Skinner boxes, which should probably be illegal.
Anyway, your "it feels like getting nothing" complaint is essentially about a lack of screen time. Like buying purple boots on a console that didn't show on screen would suck and no one would do it. If you buy a castle, the DM needs to have an understanding of introducing the castle into the setting of the game. Have quest-givers visit you, have various non-combat scenes happen in the castle. Have owning a castle be a thing you can bring up to settle non-combat encounters, like maybe save the PC paying bridge trolls.
"Fuck off, troll, I'm Baron Chelmsworthy, I've a castle with a standing guard, let me by."
"Apologies, m'lord, didn't recognise you in those rags. Forgive my old grey eyes. Carry on."
And no bluff check, because you really do have a castle in Chelmsworthy. Maybe buy some nice travelling clothes next.
"That's a lovely dress m'lord, very fitting for Baron Chlemsworthy."
"Fuck off, troll."
And then it's on screen, so you can see it in game, and what you buy changes how NPCs interact with your character in relatively minor non-combat type ways. Baron Chelmsworthy can probably get an audience with the High Priestess a bit easier, but maybe she just takes the time to note the lack of a proper temple in the new castle.
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The main thing about proper price tags is people can feel better about taking the time to read them. Which is more important as the lists get longer. Also somewhat acts as gatekeeping on the most fantastic stuff only appearing at higher levels, which is appropriate for most campaigns.
Most people will spend real money, like actual "this is four hours of my life I took to earn this" kind of money, and buy things like a purple pair of boots that does nothing other than appear as purple boots on screen. That sort of thing is huge money in games now. Only thing beats it really is gambling on Skinner boxes, which should probably be illegal.
Anyway, your "it feels like getting nothing" complaint is essentially about a lack of screen time. Like buying purple boots on a console that didn't show on screen would suck and no one would do it. If you buy a castle, the DM needs to have an understanding of introducing the castle into the setting of the game. Have quest-givers visit you, have various non-combat scenes happen in the castle. Have owning a castle be a thing you can bring up to settle non-combat encounters, like maybe save the PC paying bridge trolls.
"Fuck off, troll, I'm Baron Chelmsworthy, I've a castle with a standing guard, let me by."
"Apologies, m'lord, didn't recognise you in those rags. Forgive my old grey eyes. Carry on."
And no bluff check, because you really do have a castle in Chelmsworthy. Maybe buy some nice travelling clothes next.
"That's a lovely dress m'lord, very fitting for Baron Chlemsworthy."
"Fuck off, troll."
And then it's on screen, so you can see it in game, and what you buy changes how NPCs interact with your character in relatively minor non-combat type ways. Baron Chelmsworthy can probably get an audience with the High Priestess a bit easier, but maybe she just takes the time to note the lack of a proper temple in the new castle.
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The main thing about proper price tags is people can feel better about taking the time to read them. Which is more important as the lists get longer. Also somewhat acts as gatekeeping on the most fantastic stuff only appearing at higher levels, which is appropriate for most campaigns.
PC, SJW, anti-fascist, not being a dick, or working on it, he/him.
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Thaluikhain
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Getting a bit off-topic, but is that really "most people" or merely "many people". A minority, but one worth catering to?tussock wrote:Most people will spend real money, like actual "this is four hours of my life I took to earn this" kind of money, and buy things like a purple pair of boots that does nothing other than appear as purple boots on screen. That sort of thing is huge money in games now. Only thing beats it really is gambling on Skinner boxes, which should probably be illegal.
Not sure that directly applies to TTRPG, surely that's more a thing in MMOs where you can show off your fancy purple boots to hundreds or thousands of people?
Tormenta (basically a brasilian D&D hack that actually got a series of books published) had a "cost of life" rule that represented how much your character spent on clohing/food/booze/housing each month, with spending more granting a bonus to social skills. Being a murderhobo and spending the bare minimum actually inflicted a -2 penalty, normal no bonus, rich lifestyle for +1 or luxurious lifestyle for +2.tussock wrote:Hey souron. There's people have studied what players like, and modern PC games are heavily based on the psychology of it all to maximise profits.
Most people will spend real money, like actual "this is four hours of my life I took to earn this" kind of money, and buy things like a purple pair of boots that does nothing other than appear as purple boots on screen. That sort of thing is huge money in games now. Only thing beats it really is gambling on Skinner boxes, which should probably be illegal.
Anyway, your "it feels like getting nothing" complaint is essentially about a lack of screen time. Like buying purple boots on a console that didn't show on screen would suck and no one would do it. If you buy a castle, the DM needs to have an understanding of introducing the castle into the setting of the game. Have quest-givers visit you, have various non-combat scenes happen in the castle. Have owning a castle be a thing you can bring up to settle non-combat encounters, like maybe save the PC paying bridge trolls.
"Fuck off, troll, I'm Baron Chelmsworthy, I've a castle with a standing guard, let me by."
"Apologies, m'lord, didn't recognise you in those rags. Forgive my old grey eyes. Carry on."
And no bluff check, because you really do have a castle in Chelmsworthy. Maybe buy some nice travelling clothes next.
"That's a lovely dress m'lord, very fitting for Baron Chlemsworthy."
"Fuck off, troll."
There are such people, they're called "whales", few in number but will spend a lot more on consumables. Most players won't spend a dime actually, but a few whales can still turn in a nice profit.Thaluikhain wrote: Getting a bit off-topic, but is that really "most people" or merely "many people". A minority, but one worth catering to?
Not sure that directly applies to TTRPG, surely that's more a thing in MMOs where you can show off your fancy purple boots to hundreds or thousands of people?
EDIT: Comic related.
Last edited by maglag on Thu Jun 20, 2019 6:08 am, edited 2 times in total.
FrankTrollman wrote: Actually, our blood banking system is set up exactly the way you'd want it to be if you were a secret vampire conspiracy.
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Username17
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The term you are looking for isn't that D&D players aren't rational actors. Indeed, the fact that D&D players generally have much more time to consider their actions during high stress situations makes them behave much more "rationally" than real people do in their own lives. The point is that they exist at a point in the hierarchy of needs where their security is completely assured. Nothing that happens in the game can seriously harm them, because they are playing a game. Even the death of their character is not necessarily the end of their game since they can and often do just make a new character.
This means that the player is free to pursue social needs and self actualization and shit through the game, and that purely mundane concerns like characters achieving retirement income or whatever only matter if the player wants them to. It's not "irrational" to place no value in your second hundred thousand gold pieces, because the second hundred thousand gold pieces only have what meaning and value they are ascribed by the social group. They are exactly as inherently likely to be worth pursuing as dick jokes or killing large numbers of gnolls or whatever.
The magic item economy is of course a very difficult question. If buying magic items is like buying things at the grocery store or even like buying a car at a dealership, it really undermines the coolness of the magic items you have. For there to be any significant amount of choice in purchaseable magic items, the magic items you end up with are necessarily "not special" in the sense that there are obviously a lot more magic items you didn't get sitting around in town laying on the shelf. It brings up questions like "Why don't we rob the magic shop instead of looting the dungeon?" or "Why doesn't the magic shop proprietor save the world instead of us?"
The goal of a magic item economy is then to make magic item purchasing be more like buying art at auction or commissioning works. Which leads to all kinds of problems in a table top game, because D&D posits too many different potential magic items for populating an auction house to be anything other than a giant pain in the ass involving rolling dice on lots of tables. This is a place where computer apps could save the day, but obviously 5e isn't remotely there yet. Also, take it or leave it magic items are very unlikely to fit with the "super hero outfits" that a lot of players expect out of their D&D characters.
You could do away with the magic item economy entirely (or almost entirely), but if you say "further gold goes to lands, armies, ships, and forts" that requires that you find a place in the story and the rules for all of those things. It's not simpler than figuring out how you want to balance the idea of people being able to buy venom lances without breaking the game or the world. It requires making some fairly extensive addons to the game.
Anyway, the core issue is of course that figuring out what players actually do with gold coins after they no longer have any particular need to buy more arrows or lamp oil is not an easy question and carries different potential answers with different plusses and minuses. Actually producing a reasonable answer to this problem would require bold design choices and extensive math hammering - and obviously the 5e designers were in no way up to the challenge. They didn't even really try.
-Username17
This means that the player is free to pursue social needs and self actualization and shit through the game, and that purely mundane concerns like characters achieving retirement income or whatever only matter if the player wants them to. It's not "irrational" to place no value in your second hundred thousand gold pieces, because the second hundred thousand gold pieces only have what meaning and value they are ascribed by the social group. They are exactly as inherently likely to be worth pursuing as dick jokes or killing large numbers of gnolls or whatever.
The magic item economy is of course a very difficult question. If buying magic items is like buying things at the grocery store or even like buying a car at a dealership, it really undermines the coolness of the magic items you have. For there to be any significant amount of choice in purchaseable magic items, the magic items you end up with are necessarily "not special" in the sense that there are obviously a lot more magic items you didn't get sitting around in town laying on the shelf. It brings up questions like "Why don't we rob the magic shop instead of looting the dungeon?" or "Why doesn't the magic shop proprietor save the world instead of us?"
The goal of a magic item economy is then to make magic item purchasing be more like buying art at auction or commissioning works. Which leads to all kinds of problems in a table top game, because D&D posits too many different potential magic items for populating an auction house to be anything other than a giant pain in the ass involving rolling dice on lots of tables. This is a place where computer apps could save the day, but obviously 5e isn't remotely there yet. Also, take it or leave it magic items are very unlikely to fit with the "super hero outfits" that a lot of players expect out of their D&D characters.
You could do away with the magic item economy entirely (or almost entirely), but if you say "further gold goes to lands, armies, ships, and forts" that requires that you find a place in the story and the rules for all of those things. It's not simpler than figuring out how you want to balance the idea of people being able to buy venom lances without breaking the game or the world. It requires making some fairly extensive addons to the game.
Anyway, the core issue is of course that figuring out what players actually do with gold coins after they no longer have any particular need to buy more arrows or lamp oil is not an easy question and carries different potential answers with different plusses and minuses. Actually producing a reasonable answer to this problem would require bold design choices and extensive math hammering - and obviously the 5e designers were in no way up to the challenge. They didn't even really try.
-Username17
The people who are spending that money are not taking four hours to earn it. The people who spend tons of money on cosmetic items almost universally have tons of disposable income. On the other hand, spending the haul of a dungeon dive represents a lot more than four hours of investment, as most adventures take multiple sessions and can easily go to 20+ hours. Thus, the cosmetic castle represents dozens of times as much investment as some purple boots. (Also, whales are <2% of players, so they hardly say anything about the average player.)tussock wrote:Most people will spend real money, like actual "this is four hours of my life I took to earn this" kind of money, and buy things like a purple pair of boots that does nothing other than appear as purple boots on screen. That sort of thing is huge money in games now. Only thing beats it really is gambling on Skinner boxes, which should probably be illegal.
virgil wrote:Lovecraft didn't later add a love triangle between Dagon, Chtulhu, & the Colour-Out-of-Space; only to have it broken up through cyber-bullying by the King in Yellow.
FrankTrollman wrote:If your enemy is fucking Gravity, are you helping or hindering it by putting things on high shelves? I don't fucking know! That's not even a thing. Your enemy can't be Gravity, because that's stupid.
Whales are <2% of players spending >50% of the money spent on the game, where most people spend basically nothing after net connection fees.
Because the world you live in is <2% of people having >50% of the money that is spent, with most people having basically nothing to spend after food and shelter.
It's a nice cartoon, but the reason lots of poor people are associated with very few rich people is that there is lots of poor people and very few rich people. Also, they are all just people, and they all work the same way.
And it turns out, if your character has 200kgp just lying around, you will totally just spend it like a super rich person spends $200k they have spare. The end.
Because the world you live in is <2% of people having >50% of the money that is spent, with most people having basically nothing to spend after food and shelter.
It's a nice cartoon, but the reason lots of poor people are associated with very few rich people is that there is lots of poor people and very few rich people. Also, they are all just people, and they all work the same way.
And it turns out, if your character has 200kgp just lying around, you will totally just spend it like a super rich person spends $200k they have spare. The end.
PC, SJW, anti-fascist, not being a dick, or working on it, he/him.
By the comic author's own words:tussock wrote:Whales are <2% of players spending >50% of the money spent on the game, where most people spend basically nothing after net connection fees.
Because the world you live in is <2% of people having >50% of the money that is spent, with most people having basically nothing to spend after food and shelter.
It's a nice cartoon, but the reason lots of poor people are associated with very few rich people is that there is lots of poor people and very few rich people. Also, they are all just people, and they all work the same way.
And it turns out, if your character has 200kgp just lying around, you will totally just spend it like a super rich person spends $200k they have spare.
"Some whales are so big they don't even notice Hearthstone feeding on them, like a flea sucking a bull.
Some whales however, spend what they don't have and end up on trouble."
Some whales are rich people just spending spare money yes, but others are poor smucks that end up addicted and in debt. There's a reason why many people have been comparing games where you can spend real-money for random rewards with actual gambling.
FrankTrollman wrote: Actually, our blood banking system is set up exactly the way you'd want it to be if you were a secret vampire conspiracy.