The Gaming Den

K wrote: Stat + skill systems just flatly discourage secondary schticks even when you have enough points to spread around because stats are always fully or mostly static and skill is assumed to rise with levels/XP/etc (and games like DnD or Shadowrun never have enough points to spread around because your character is a resource allocation mini-game).

If you buy stat increases and skill increases using the same pool of points (a la Mutants & Masterminds), it works fine.

hogarth wrote:

K wrote: Stat + skill systems just flatly discourage secondary schticks even when you have enough points to spread around because stats are always fully or mostly static and skill is assumed to rise with levels/XP/etc (and games like DnD or Shadowrun never have enough points to spread around because your character is a resource allocation mini-game).

If you buy stat increases and skill increases using the same pool of points (a la Mutants & Masterminds), it works fine.

That's completely wrong. For example: in shadowrun, you buy stat and skill increases with the same points. Secondary shticks are still disincentivized. The thing that makes secondary shticks worth considering at all in Mutants and Masterminds is the fact that the total bonus is capped so severely that having a high stat and a high skill isn't compatible - which means that it isn't much like a stat + skill system in the first place.

-Username17

FrankTrollman wrote:The thing that makes secondary shticks worth considering at all in Mutants and Masterminds is the fact that the total bonus is capped so severely that having a high stat and a high skill isn't compatible - which means that it isn't much like a stat + skill system in the first place.

There's nothing about the words "stat + skill system" that seems to exclude the system used in Mutants & Materminds (and HERO, etc.). And it seems ridiculously tautological to say "stat + skill systems don't work because anything that does work isn't a stat + skill system".

hogarth wrote:

FrankTrollman wrote:The thing that makes secondary shticks worth considering at all in Mutants and Masterminds is the fact that the total bonus is capped so severely that having a high stat and a high skill isn't compatible - which means that it isn't much like a stat + skill system in the first place.

There's nothing about the words "stat + skill system" that seems to exclude the system used in Mutants & Materminds (and HERO, etc.). And it seems ridiculously tautological to say "stat + skill systems don't work because anything that does work isn't a stat + skill system".

You haven't explained why M&M/HERO's stat + skill system actually works, though. Even if Frank is being tautological, you still have to refute the point with something other than "nuh uh, ur dum".

I remember both raw stats and skills being relatively useless in M&M as opposed to what you can do with powers, and having secondary shticks was a function of clever allocation of Alternate Power choices/Devices and Gadgets.

HERO doesn't have a hard cap to the same extent that M&M does. The reason you can have secondary skills in HERO is that the points for a few skills (at a moderate level) is extremely cheap compared to your total points budget.

There's still the factor that how much you can support secondary ability sets it dependent on how you total points compare to the amount you can spend in one category, but skills are generally not a big part of that.

Shadzar, you're seeming to be stuffing your "rev-erend" one way truisms, head up the rump much? Anyway, D&D is a game, this game has rules, now, within the game world, ye use these rules to interact with it. Like a world, ye know of consistency, when people say "realism" when it comes to D&D, they moreso mean consistency in the world. If a wooden door has DC 11 to break, then it doesn't become DC 22, for no game world explained reason which happens when its the "DM felt like" excuse, similar when a DM decides 10th level sorcerer boss should have "fiat HP". Which is basically infinite amount of HP a bad DM decides is needed for a low level party to chunk through till they lose the fight.

Regardless of that example, we don't mistrust the DM by default, we're not playing D&D to be "MLG" or some nonsense. Such mistrust happens when there's reasoning for that to be the case (past Bad DMing,tales of woe,current evidence showing such), when a DM isn't being a fair arbiter to what was agreed beforehand, or otherwise clearly being detrimental to the experience. Now, there can be certain assumptions to be found, like if someone has never DM'd before, believes in caster v. non-caster imbalance to be a "good" thing, bias of one backstory over another.

So, if you're telling people they should ignore any/all rules that are in the book of D&D to begin with, why would I need paper/pencil, why would I even require the old edition books you worship so hard over? People here are more than well aware, they could just play a game without any rules at all, could just go roll a D20, and judge what happens based on the result, or not even that.

Unlike TheRPGsite, this is a game design forum, so rules, pros/cons, new solutions/fixes are what is discussed, merit of whether we're having "Fun" or not, is regardless (we obviously do in our respective games we play D&D,Monopoly,Borderlands 2, or whatever) in the conversation of design. If you have little/no desire to actually discuss such matters then I'd suggest ye leave these parts of the Den. Relegated to the misc forum, or simply go to TheRPGsite to be worshipped as a god no doubt.

ah, the onetrueway to play D&D is 3rd, cause you are doing it wrong if you played before.. oh wait, no. that is 4th edition, so wanker to 3rd are all doing it wrong. sorry, you have been outmoded, go play pathfinder.

oh you like 4th? sorry, you are more of an oddball around here than myself, cause board concensus seems to think 4th just doesnt work.

not sure what rpgsite is. is it like Something Awdul, where some of the recent new posters seem to have come from? those people that seem to think old-school was so wrong and they shouldnt have a game now because old-school should have never happened that would give them a game to play? guess you only play warhammer and buy new miniatures for about $100 every month to keep up right?

as for the game design forum bit...that section here is called "My Own Invention", the general gaming discussion area is the one this thread is in, and in the context of this thread...you dont need stats, aka ability scores, for an RPG to function.

Gary tried to prevent a case where you were required to let the company think for your game, but LW saw fit to milk every dime from the players, because she hated gamers, and figured it best to declare everything. you msut love using all those rules in the splatbooks because you think the game is incomplete. as long as you try to use the books and ONLY what is in the books, YOUR game will be incomplete, because it was always a game of YOUR IMAGINATION, not that of the designers. they just gave you the basics to be able to play a game with.

people that think like you about "da rules" include:
Bill S, co-creator of Alternity, fired from WotC
Monte Cook, co-cretor of Alternity, fired from WotC
Tweet, fired from WotC
Mearls, a simpering idiot

obviously the game company disagrees with you, or they wouldnt be throwing out all the people that think like you. WotC lost, your way lost, it isnt the way of D&D.

i would tell you to go suck a barrel of cocks, but you would have to have your lips surgically removed from the base of Mike Mearls penis before you could even do that. so i suggest you just shut the fuck up mumbling with the cock that is already in your mouth.

mind saying something on topic of the thread stats that you are posting in? the one that questions if ANY of the stats are needed aside from STR?

I saw a game that was in development which built your stats bottom up. Basically you picked a Feat each level-up which gave you +s to several stats which corresponded to that thing. So a trick shot with a pistol that gave you a bonus on disarm checks would give you +1 Marksmanship, +1 Tactics, and +3 HP or whatever. It's the opposite of a prerequisite; you choose the abilities you want and the stats come with it, instead of building up the stats just to qualify for your desired toy.

An attractive idea, but it seemed prone to abuse. Also, I don't think it avoids any of the issues mentioned here. It's just different.

But what do the stats actually do?

shadzar wrote: mind saying something on topic of the thread stats that you are posting in? the one that questions if ANY of the stats are needed aside from STR?

Guess what dingus, you've been going off topic with your rants too, sure they contain some stuff about stats, but then ye prattle on about your "one way truism, grognard religion" spiel again. In regards to me, I already have on topic, I'm still waiting for Tussock to give an actual answer on my query of defining D&D.

Anyway, not entirely sure why I'm responding to you, especially when its implied ye hardly actually read all what I said, or otherwise ignoring bits in petty attempt to insult me. It's rather rude to respond to someone's post and then ignore most of it, especially making false assumptions without prior knowledge to back it up on. Such as, when did I mention in this thread, I liked 4th edition in the way you're insinuating?

therpgsite is a place where people like you recount of the "glory days" stuck on false nostalgia, pseudo design philosophies fulled of Fiat than any actual game, and like you, are rather stuck up with a broom up their @$$, an example, here, enjoy.

Not sure if you're referring to me, but no, I don't play Warhammer, Magic, or WoW, games where you have to keep paying to play, but as you brag, that's rather off topic has little to do with anything.

Seems you don't realize, in these "general discussion/debates/rants about RPGs" the culture here seems to focus on actual design, ones that'll be actually conductive to good time. Your Fiat spiels are irregardless, if we wanted to "have fun" without using any rules at all, and just fiat-ing it up, then we already KNOW we can do that, likely know it better than you do even Shadzar.

Shadzar[ wrote:as long as you try to use the books and ONLY what is in the books, YOUR game will be incomplete, because it was always a game of YOUR IMAGINATION, not that of the designers.

Again, old news, something all of us here, already KNOW, and I'm more than aware of. It's pretty much stating common knowledge that makes your "preaching" only make you look more like an idiot. Because when you state things people already know, and practice to some degree, then yeah, you're just spewing redundant information.

I find it odd you think to say its "my way" personally, when it's easily a large subset of people, including the new, would easily be far more than your niche AD&D cult. So again, I'd suggest you go back and read my post again (particularly the first paragraph), ideally when you're not under the influence of whatever is you're taking sir (you've even made excuse of having taking prescribed drugs to avoid arguments before).

I don't like Mike Mearls, him and his staff are incompetent louts that will drive this game down into the ground, and ironically, folks like him would LOVE for a game of no stats, no rules, FINAL DESTINATION. So yes, if you're going to use petty insults, have an actual basis for their usage, or simply don't use them at all, less you look like a petulant child.

Speaking of Strength, if you do use attributes, sounds simple enough idea that narrow skills like Athletics (climb/swim/jump/run?) could just be folded into the stat. Though I suppose this would be easier said for a Dice Pool game (Shadowrun = str +str), where calculations might be more difficult in a D&D game, or otherwise depends on the skill system being used?

Aryxbez wrote:Speaking of Strength, if you do use attributes, sounds simple enough idea that narrow skills like Athletics (climb/swim/jump/run?) could just be folded into the stat. Though I suppose this would be easier said for a Dice Pool game (Shadowrun = str +str), where calculations might be more difficult in a D&D game, or otherwise depends on the skill system being used?

Actually before UA for 1st edition, there was no such skills or proficiencies. weapon proficiencies were optional to allow some diversity to fighters. AD&D and D&D began with the simple stat/ability check. STRENGTH already had things folded into it, as well did the others. It worked fine since 1979, and still for many work that same way today. That is why 4th took the approach to reduce the number of skills created by WotC with 3rd as they expounded on the DM/Player's Options series released the year before T$R collapsed to be sold.

No idea about shadowrun, only played the old Sega game for it, as it was too modern for what i would want from an RPG. the emulation of skills requires a basis such as stat in order to build from so that, to use 3rd vernacular, the trained and untrained both have a chance to do something, .like Profession (underwater basket-weaving). the problem with "skills" has always been, how many is right? the only way to define this would be to simulate further where a character came from, like "secondary skills" tried to do in the past and use player knowledge and DM knowledge, or group knowledge of such things to provide the skills that a character would have. something else lost in the game is the ideas of the mapper and caller. caller being the one who talks to the DM, the leader of the party that takes everyone's ideas and formulates a plan. this allowed the new player to add things, and also not let down the group, when they could not come up with an idea. so someone that was a blacksmith, but knows nothing of smiting, could leave his task at a time to the leader to decide what he does and the DM handle it. the need for more independent player power was not a total wrong thing, but did loss something in the translate of newer editions for a chance for greater player individuality. thus too were the groups total skillset, and in turn the stats became of less use.

but again, stats werent needed to begin with depending on what was modeled should the game not have been built too closely to a miniature game.

could you see the removal of both stats and skill as a lsit of abilities and the game be playable? would it no longer be D&D without them?

I'm still waiting for Tussock to give an actual answer on my query of defining D&D.

The 3rd edition team did some surveys about that in about '96-'97, which is where they got their "sacred cows" list of things that they had to keep in 3rd edition for it to be D&D.

It was apparently quite a large list, I got the impression of a few hundred points, though it's never been made public to my knowledge. It's the way hit points and AC work against attacks and damage. It's the "automatic" fire-and-forget spell slots with only situational failure chances with a save for the defender, but no default active defence roll for non-magic attacks. The six stats, no matter what they do. The races, including 1st edition ones. Backstabbing thieves. Lawful-Good Paladins with their anti-magic sword and horse. "+1" gear. The Vorpal sword that just fucking kills people. All sorts.

But it's also the d6/level fireball and 1d for cure light wounds, fiddly crap like that. The actual number of dice you roll for specific spell resolutions totally gets people, because things like picking up 10d6, rolling them, and learning to count them fast, is part of the experience.

You'll note 4e basically ignored all of that. Built a new game around the math for mid-level D&D as played by vocal WotC board users, using some of the same names for different things more often than not. Rob's Fantasy Heartbreaker. Healing Surges were a last-minute thing to try and make it feel a "little" closer to D&D, some sort of hit point and healing limit, only per-character so not as good.