215 réponses à ce sujet

[Deathwurm]

I won't post a Quote, but to speak to something MerinTB said:

Monopoly should ALWAY be played with money on Free Parking!

[mousestalker]

I'm not going to discuss just how long I've been roleplaying (because every time I think about it, I get depressed) but I've played and ran many different games with different systems. We do it because we enjoy it. Some groups go all homebrewed, others have a nominal gaming system, other demand rigid adherence to the rules.

At the end of the session what matters is if you enjoyed it. Barring spectacularly broken gaming systems (Palladium's Rifts I'm looking at you), most modern rules work pretty well. So what really matters is the GM, the other players and the genre you prefer.

If you doubt me, try playing either Paranoia or Call of Cthulhu. You may not enjoy the experience (there is no winning in a CoC game (Big hint: Burn the books. Don't read them, just burn them. For that matter burn anything and everything before you enter or open it)) but it will open your eyes about what really matters.

[MerinTB]

Deathwurm wrote...

I won't post a Quote, but to speak to something MerinTB said:

Monopoly should ALWAY be played with money on Free Parking!

and many would agree with you.  And agree that D&D shouldn't be played with mini's.

And the D&D (and Monopoly rules) tell you to play the game how the lot of you playing it agree that it'll be fun.   All the D&D books (well, post 1st ed, where Cook in the preface makes a STRONG argument for adhering to the rules when at all possible) tell the players and DM to use the rules to have fun, not sacrifice fun at the expense of rules.  Treat the rules as a guide.

I think there's something said for all players agreeing to what rules will be followed and what won't, so seemingly arbitrary things don't pop up (what?  what do you mean my gun jammed?  what are the mechanics for my gun jamming?  did you even roll?  you mean that you can jam my gun whenever you feel it's story appropriate?  oh, just in emergencies, huh?  whatever...) - but if all players agree to something (say, a house rule I've been toying with for Saga that everyone who wants to be a player in my game likes - that is that you get a Feat and a Talent EVERY LEVEL) then the rule book should not stand in the way.

Free parking.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Maria Caliban wrote...

4e DnD > 3.x DnD

Evidence:
You don't have to play a lawful good paladin, which means you don't
have to spend hours arguing with the DM as to what 'lawful' and 'good'
mean.

But the simpler 4E system tends to invite complaints when I employ what would previously have been called Lawful Evil.

They would have been better off just scrapping the whole thing.

Vaeliorin wrote...

I'm still half-convinced that everyone who hates 4E was strictly a caster player in previous editions.

Guilty as charged.

I'm still annoyed at how much 3E nerfed wizards.

[MerinTB]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
I'm still annoyed at how much 3E nerfed wizards.

3E or 4E?  I've not heard complaints about 3E Wizards.
3E Fighters being useless, yes.  3E Clerics being OP, yes.  But Wizards nerfed from 2E to 3E?
I'm not arguing against it - just never heard it before.

Unless you made a typo.  Then yeah, Wizards are suddenly balanced with the other classes.

[Vaeliorin]

MerinTB wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
I'm still annoyed at how much 3E nerfed wizards.

3E or 4E?  I've not heard complaints about 3E Wizards.
3E Fighters being useless, yes.  3E Clerics being OP, yes.  But Wizards nerfed from 2E to 3E?
I'm not arguing against it - just never heard it before.

Unless you made a typo.  Then yeah, Wizards are suddenly balanced with the other classes.

I've heard the complaint before.  And it's true, wizards did lose some power in 3.X when they did away with some of the ridiculous spells from 2E (Stoneskin, various Immunity spells, etc) but they were still ridiculously strong in 3.X.  Clerics or Druids might be a match for a wizard, particularly if you go for some real cheese, but that's about it.

[Sylvius the Mad]

MerinTB wrote...

Sylvius the Mad wrote...
I'm still annoyed at how much 3E nerfed wizards.

3E or 4E?  I've not heard complaints about 3E Wizards.
3E Fighters being useless, yes.  3E Clerics being OP, yes.  But Wizards nerfed from 2E to 3E?
I'm not arguing against it - just never heard it before.

Unless you made a typo.  Then yeah, Wizards are suddenly balanced with the other classes.

3E made wizards less fragile and useless at low levels, but a high level wizard in 3E isn't nearly the world-destroying abomination it was in 2nd edition.

I think people complained more about the lack of balance between mages and non-mages in 3E because mages suddenly were able to live to see level 3 (which very rarely happened in 1st and 2nd edition).  That was how mages were balanced in the earlier editions - Mages, as a group, were about as powerful as Fighters, as a group, because by the time everyone was level 7 Fighters outnumbered Mages 30 to 1.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Vaeliorin wrote...

Clerics or Druids might be a match for a wizard, particularly if you go for some real cheese, but that's about it.

2nd edition did overpower Clerics quite a bit, and right from low levels.  Command had no save.

[Beerfish]

1st edition baby, all else pales.

[Zanallen]

I like playing DnD with miniatures and grid maps. I like knowing at a glance if I am in range of getting stomped.

[UrkOfGreyhawk]

Beerfish wrote...

1st edition baby, all else pales.

QFT Brother!

[Seagloom]

3e nerfed wizards? Wow. No way. Wizards are right up there with druids for the honor of most overpowered core class. Actually, very few splat book classes measure up to them either. The only class that is arguably more powerful is the druid since they come with a free fighter buddy (animal companion), and can turn themselves into another animal while retaining spellcasting with the natural spell feat.

The only area where wizards were nerfed in 3e was direct damage, and that has nothing to do with the absence of a few 2e spells. 3e increased hit points across the board while retaining spell dice pools from past editions. A 10d6 fireball was fearsome in 2e because enemies rarely had much higher than a 100HP even at very high levels. In 3e, a similarly leveled NPC or a high hit dice monster with massive constitution can have several hundred hit points easily. Throw in damage resistance and the possibility of evasion, and direct damage can really suck.

However, wizards can utilize effects few other classes can. Summoning monsters, debuffing, buffing, dominating enemies, shaping the battlefield, teleporting, divination, and so on all while having a top notch defense through magic. They are also not item dependent like say, fighters or rogues are. A wizard with the right mix of spells and feats walking around naked can still easily break the game if a player puts her mind to it. Not just win encounters, but make the whole game so utterly pointless any noncaster loses their relevance. It actually takes restraint to play a wizard without causing your DM to upend the table in frustration.

One reason I prefer sorcerers is they are limited in spell selection. Thus, they cannot change their entire repertoire on a daily basis and be jacks of all trades, masters of all. The R&D guys behind 3e balanced mages with the expectation most players would stick to blasting. Their mistake was leaving all those game breaking effects from past editions in; and throwing in more for flavor. Once players figured this out, it was all over. Google the "Batman Wizard" or any of Treantmonk's spell school guides if you want to read the minutia of just how overpowered the class is.

4e went a long way toward bringing them to heel.

Modifié par Seagloom, 25 septembre 2011 - 01:23 .

[Mystic dream]

Natural spell came with 3.0? I wish they would have included that in the first nwn then. It's the only reason i bother with nwn 2 at the moment really >.<....

Edit. Also I'd like to argue that Clerics are right there competing with wizards as the most overpowered class. With every new d&d edition they seemed to get more and more ridicilous. I remember back when Newerwinter Nights 2 was in development, they promised to look into the balance issues. As far as I've seen the biggest nerf was the removal of darkfire. The rest have been massive buffs.
It feels like they just stopped trying, and later just cluttered the expansions with divine prestige classes.

This is my experience with only the pc games though, as much as I hate to admit my exposure to all things FR comes from them. Haven't touched the pen and paper version ever, though I'd much like to.

Modifié par Mystic dream, 25 septembre 2011 - 02:39 .

[MerinTB]

I'd definitely played 2nd over 3rd. It has been SO long since I played first that I don't know about going back to it (I have no problem with THAC0 - see my love for 2nd - but the grappling rules in 1st are almost as bad as the ones in 3rd.) I think going back to 1st would be like me trying to play Rifts again... love the concept, spoiled by the newer games that make things easier to remember and run.

---

Sylvius, have you ever played the SNES Shadowrun? I know you are a PC guy, but maybe you could find and emulator and a ROM. That was a pretty awesome game.

[Seagloom]

@Mystic dream

Natural Spell was introduced in 3e in the Masters of the Wild splat and reprinted in Ghostwalk. 3.5e included it in the Player's Handbook; making it less obscure. I wish they included it in NWN too. NWN druids are nowhere near as powerful as their tabletop brethren. They could use the help.

I agree clerics are powerful. No question that they make the top three; especially with divine metamagic cheese. Some argue clerics are comparable to druids and wizards, but I feel they are slightly less versatile, and thus rate lower. That said, they are still head and shoulders above every other class.

As far as 3x is concerned, I think rogue and bard are the only truly balanced classes. Everything else is above or below the curve to some degree. Computer games are whole other story. Wizards were great in NWN, but are inferior to clerics in NWN2. They got nerfed pretty hard when epic quicken spell became 3.5 compliant, and haste no longer granted extra actions. That seriously cut into their damage output. Plus they lost time stop. Druids are fiddly and lacking some of their best spells in both NWN titles. Bards were buffed to the point of lunacy, and yet I still run across NWN2 players claiming it is a weak class.

In P&P though? Wizzies are definitely in the top three. Makes sense. The company is called Wizards of the Coast.

Modifié par Seagloom, 25 septembre 2011 - 03:52 .

[HoonDing]

This discussion about wizards brings back (painful) memories of Gorion getting skewered by Sarevok. Or Helm skewering Mystra.

Modifié par virumor, 25 septembre 2011 - 07:18 .

[naughty99]

MerinTB wrote...

Deathwurm wrote...

I won't post a Quote, but to speak to something MerinTB said:

Monopoly should ALWAY be played with money on Free Parking!

and many would agree with you.  And agree that D&D shouldn't be played with mini's.

I would agree with this. Miniatures and battle maps slow down the game tremendously and turn combat into more of a strategy simulation. I think they are only helpful as a visual aid to demonstrate really complex encounter scenarios.

I've never had a chance to play 3e or 4e, but I've been playing AD&D 1e and 2e for decades and never use battle maps or miniatures. The only time I share a map with players is if they encounter some sort of map in-game.

I played an OSRIC game over Skype and Map Tools and when the GM was using the battlemap it seemed to turn things into a video game, as everyone was more focused on how many squares they could move and who could flank whom, etc., rather than role-playing their characters.

Modifié par naughty99, 25 septembre 2011 - 07:42 .

[Sylvius the Mad]

MerinTB wrote...

Sylvius, have you ever played the SNES Shadowrun? I know you are a PC guy, but maybe you could find and emulator and a ROM. That was a pretty awesome game.

I have never owned a Nintendo product.  Though I will admit to having enjoyed some N64 games I played on other people's systems, and I think the N64 had the best controller of any console I've tried.

I'll keep SNES Shadowrun in mind.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Seagloom wrote...

It actually takes restraint to play a wizard without causing your DM to upend the table in frustration.

I generally prefer lower-level campaigns, myself.  I think a party of level 5-8 characters is more interesting than a party of level 15-18 characters.

I think 2nd edition AD&D would have been just as good a game system if there weren't spells past level 4.  Just give us Enervation (that's one of the big nerfs in 3E, by the way - level drains weren't permanent) and Evard's Black Tentacles and then stop.

That's one reason I keep asking game developers to make a CPRG with a shallower power curve.

On the nerf issue, 3E also removed the Spectral Hand spell, and Spectral Hand (level 2) was massively useful.  It allowed the mage to cast Touch spells from a safe distance.

Modifié par Sylvius the Mad, 25 septembre 2011 - 11:25 .

[Seagloom]

Spectral Hand still exists in 3e. It is a second level necromancy spell that functions as you describe. A wizard or sorcerer can also use their familiar for that purpose; though I suppose that is much riskier. I consider enervation significantly more powerful in 3e than 2e.

Neither edition's enervation came with a permanent level drain. 2e's enervation inflicted one negative level for ever four caster levels. In 3e it inflicts 1d4 negative levels from the start, but never increases in power. 2e's has superior range increment increases per level, but is subject to a saving throw versus spell modified by the victim's dexterity. 3e enervation does not allow a save, but requires a ranged touch attack.

Taken at face value, the spells are comparable. However, 3e's version has a significant advantage its 2e counterpart lacks: metamagic. Enervation with empower spell and split ray applied starts to get cheap. Throw in other metamagic such as twin spell, and it can get out hand. You can reduce living opponents to rotted husks in two or three rounds; since 3e's version results in instant death if a creature loses as many levels as it has hit dice. 2e's enervation only kills if a system shock save is failed. Otherwise the victim is merely immobilized until it wears off in a few hours. There are 3e wizard builds floating around online centered around that one spell. Most wizard guides and discussions I read suggest it as a must have for any wizard.

As far as campaigns go, I prefer the 9-13 sweet spot. classes start to feel powerful and competent without being unstoppable. Few campaigns make it that high in my experience, though. I have never been in a game that made it to double digits.

Modifié par Seagloom, 26 septembre 2011 - 02:28 .

[naughty99]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

Seagloom wrote...

It actually takes restraint to play a wizard without causing your DM to upend the table in frustration.

I generally prefer lower-level campaigns, myself.  I think a party of level 5-8 characters is more interesting than a party of level 15-18 characters.

I think 2nd edition AD&D would have been just as good a game system if there weren't spells past level 4.  Just give us Enervation (that's one of the big nerfs in 3E, by the way - level drains weren't permanent) and Evard's Black Tentacles and then stop.

That's one reason I keep asking game developers to make a CPRG with a shallower power curve.

On the nerf issue, 3E also removed the Spectral Hand spell, and Spectral Hand (level 2) was massively useful.  It allowed the mage to cast Touch spells from a safe distance.

It becomes more and more challenging to GM higher level parties, because you have to come up with more and more epic stuff going on in the world.

However, I don't understand your comment about removing spells above level 4. You are saying you wouldn't want magic users to progress further?

Learning and even creating powerful spells is a lot of fun for players, especially after being relatively weak at the lower levels. A good GM can keep the game balanced regardless of whether the players are high level or not.

Also it's fun to let magic users research and create their own spells, incorporating quests for materials and ancient tomes and things. 

[MerinTB]

Sylvius the Mad wrote...

Seagloom wrote...

It actually takes restraint to play a wizard without causing your DM to upend the table in frustration.

I generally prefer lower-level campaigns, myself.  I think a party of level 5-8 characters is more interesting than a party of level 15-18 characters.

The highest level I ever personally saw a campaign reach was 9th, I believe.  The first major D&D one I ever ran.  Other than that I don't think I've run nor played in a game where characters got past 6th.

So, to be fair, despite having played D&D for a couple decades or so, I've not experienced most of the game system for any of them.  I did play one session of an Epic Level Basic D&D game - bored out of my mind with how powerful the characters and the monsters were.

I want to progress the characters.  Most games I'm in (yes, yes, even 4E) are so focused on story and world that we never really gain enough XP to get anywhere, even when we force social RP XP.

I think next 4E game I run I'm going to take a hint from Gamma World and Pathfinder - adjust the XP tables for "fast advancement."

[Sylvius the Mad]

Seagloom wrote...

Spectral Hand still exists in 3e. It is a second level necromancy spell that functions as you describe.

I don't know why I thought that.

Though, 3E mages need to make to-hit rolls to land ranged magic, and 2nd edition ranged spells hit automatically.

naughty99 wrote...

However, I don't understand your comment about removing spells above level 4. You are saying you wouldn't want magic users to progress further?

I think the setting would be more interesting without all the high-powered magic.

I suppose I just prefer a low-magic setting.  And yet, I'd probably still play a mage.

[Deviija]

I did not enjoy the first Drakensang due to the lack of customization for the protagonist and the rather lacking companions (and companion dialogue). Drakensang: River of Time is definitely a lot better and prettier in all these regards. I am enjoying it more.

Dead State, for sure. I have been tracking that since it was announced (even made a post about it on the old OC forums).

I'd recommend Divine Divinity's sequel, Divinity II: Ego Draconis, more than I would recommend DD or Beyond Divinity. The scope and quests and roleplaying opportunities, imo, are much more fleshed out.

I'd also highly recommend the Spiderweb Software indie games. I love them dearly. The Avadon series is more party-centric with interesting companions. The Avernum series is more create-your-own-party adventure. And the Geneforge games are more summon-minion solo adventures. I think you'd really enjoy the theme and magery of the Geneforge series. Also has some great various endings and alliances/sides/factions to choose or betray in it as well.

[Sylvius the Mad]

Thanks, Deviija. I'm definitely looking at Spiderweb.

Modifié par Sylvius the Mad, 26 septembre 2011 - 08:25 .