It was your example, no question, and I did toss in a tease, but by and large I was highlighting the way the difference in play style leads into that import of the weapons from a play perspective, not so much a mechanical perspective, because in 5e a fighter can often do that using some special ability they have.
THe mechanism is different, but the outcome is the same, in terms of practical damage done, blah blah (and why I didn't include your specifics about level and the fact you were referencing B/X at the time0).
The big difference, which we were trying to get across before we sidetracked, was that there really is a big difference in feel between the two games. While "leveling up" is a big deal in both, for the most part, neither version (none of them, really, in practical play) use or treat leveling up as a major role playing aspect, soa lot of that feel of "fighting your way to get to that magical weapon" was lost when they shifted to the special ability model in use at present.
In that respect, I am also referencing the OP (before folks like you and I ran away with the thread, lol) and that whole concept of feeling like you don't really earn that special ability in a single fight or a hard fought sequence because the special abilities are handwaved away into the idea of "downtime". Late stage 2, 3/3.5 had some chapbooks that sorta gave that period a little more depth and made it interesting, but 1e, 2e, and 5e don't and neither did B/X or BECMI.
So it was a lot more fun to go out and get that +3 flametongue than iit is to go "oh, hey, I went up a level, and now I can do this whole turn my sword into a fiery death thing, which is totally cool".
And, to your point and the general complaint, in B/X, BECMI, 1e, and 2e, you needed that sword to do some things you couldn't do any other way, so, as I noted, having it changed the way that a player approached the game. in 5e, that's baked into the subclass, so you already know how it is going to set your approach to the game, instead of having something appear that can really shift it.
But, give a Bladelock a flaming sword and it might change the way they are going to play the game in 5e. And it will have a much more significant impact than it ever did for previous editions. Look up and you'll see someone gloss over the absence of special weapon immunities and weapon requirements in the default 5e monster assortment.
Which makes my explanation of the particular complaint even more interesting, because while they got gargoyles, they ain't got any "cold iron" monsters or "magic draining but weak against normal" monsters because we had at least three books to their one and a half (since they used half the additionals for class, race, and similar updates).
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Your claim is that the possession of powerful magic weapons in older editions at level 1 makes the game more fun. While simultaneously claiming that the possession of powerful magic weapons in older editions at level 1 doesn’t really change the outcome of the fight. If having powerful magic weapons doesn’t change the outcome of the fight, how is the game made more or less fun by their inclusion or exclusion? Because you are excited by the idea of having powerful magic weapons but fail to understand that if they don’t do anything, they are not powerful at all, they just have cool names?? This is not a design flaw of 5e nor a perk older editions, it’s something you have to reconcile within yourself by examining your relationship with the English language, first, and the purpose of things as a philosophical notion, second.
I don't know if I actually claimed it was "more fun" at any point yet, I simply claimed that in 1e you didn't have to worry about the introduction of magic items into the game as a balancing factor, though I will now since Im already accused of it, I do in fact believe that finding magic items is in fact fun for players and its not because it makes you more powerful, but because finding treasure is a fun part of the game. It's a part of Dungeons & Dragons to find treasure and magic items. This is not some sort of bizarre new thing I have invented.
My claim if there is such a thing is that finding magic items is a core part of the game of D&D, it always has been. Case in point, even in the 5e DMG there are 94 pages of the book dedicated to treasure and magical items, that is 1/3rd of the whole bloody book. If finding treasure and magic items is an unimportant part of the game, why dedicate this many pages of the DMG to it?
What you are suggesting is that something that doesn't make you more powerful, is useless and not fun with which I disagree. Not everything is about character builds and power creep. Finding a cool magical sword that doesn't do any major damage to balance adds to the mythos of the story, adventure and character. Its a memory, a part of the games feel. It doesn't need to break the game balance to be fun.
Going back to the OPs depiction of the events in his gaming group.
So, an interesting thing happened with my group. I run games at a local hobby store, which i have been doing for about 6 years now. Recently, my group wanted to run a Dark Sun game, so I dusted off my old ADnD 2e books and ran the starting adventure for them. Then i decided to run the Audio adventure, Light in the Belfry for Ravenloft (they seriously need to bring back audio adventures), also using 2e rules.
So now I plan to return to some old Ravenloft modules and I asked my group if they wanted to use 5e characters ll 5 of them said, no. I believe the reason why is because they are truly invested in their 2e characters like they have never been in 5e and I feel a lot of satisfaction being there with them in their journey.
This, doesn't surprise me even a little bit.
5e characters are basically Avengers. Every level comes with new super powers, no one really earns anything. Very little comes with questing. The result is that my players in 5e are constantly switching characters when they get bored. In my 2e game, they earn every power, every ability and every level. When a character dies in 1e or 2e, it usually takes few hours of counselling to get over it. I have had 5e players go out of their way to kill their character just to play something else. In 2e, when they level, they get better at what they do. Fighters are hitting more, rogues get better at thief skills, and Wizards and Priests get better at casting their spells. In 5e the skills are all shared, including thief skills, all classes have the same combat bonuses, spells are locked in at their level, unless you spend a higher spell slot, and they are limited to 3 magic items, which means getting loot is typically meaningless by level 6.
This is the result I would expect.
I think the hardest thing for 5e DM's to understand is the distinction between what players want and say they want and what they need for the game to be good. If there is a difference between old school and modern D&D as a culture and as a system, this is the difference. It's why the entire concept of the current playtest and development of the game is so broken. You have players who are certain about what they want, upvoting and downvoting developments. Its like asking a drug addict what they want.. yeah you guessed right, its more drugs!
When someone actually takes these players and puts them in an actual good game, it doesn't take long for the lights to come on and make the distinction between a great game in which you don't get what you want and a mediocre game where you always get everything you want. This OP's experience, its... predictable.
Going back to the OPs depiction of the events in his gaming group.
So, an interesting thing happened with my group. I run games at a local hobby store, which i have been doing for about 6 years now. Recently, my group wanted to run a Dark Sun game, so I dusted off my old ADnD 2e books and ran the starting adventure for them. Then i decided to run the Audio adventure, Light in the Belfry for Ravenloft (they seriously need to bring back audio adventures), also using 2e rules.
So now I plan to return to some old Ravenloft modules and I asked my group if they wanted to use 5e characters ll 5 of them said, no. I believe the reason why is because they are truly invested in their 2e characters like they have never been in 5e and I feel a lot of satisfaction being there with them in their journey.
This, doesn't surprise me even a little bit.
5e characters are basically Avengers. Every level comes with new super powers, no one really earns anything. Very little comes with questing. The result is that my players in 5e are constantly switching characters when they get bored. In my 2e game, they earn every power, every ability and every level. When a character dies in 1e or 2e, it usually takes few hours of counselling to get over it. I have had 5e players go out of their way to kill their character just to play something else. In 2e, when they level, they get better at what they do. Fighters are hitting more, rogues get better at thief skills, and Wizards and Priests get better at casting their spells. In 5e the skills are all shared, including thief skills, all classes have the same combat bonuses, spells are locked in at their level, unless you spend a higher spell slot, and they are limited to 3 magic items, which means getting loot is typically meaningless by level 6.
This is the result I would expect.
I think the hardest thing for 5e DM's to understand is the distinction between what players want and say they want and what they need for the game to be good. If there is a difference between old school and modern D&D as a culture and as a system, this is the difference. It's why the entire concept of the current playtest and development of the game is so broken. You have players who are certain about what they want, upvoting and downvoting developments. Its like asking a drug addict what they want.. yeah you guessed right, its more drugs!
When someone actually takes these players and puts them in an actual good game, it doesn't take long for the lights to come on and make the distinction between a great game in which you don't get what you want and a mediocre game where you always get everything you want. This OP's experience, its... predictable.
Further, crowd-sourcing game design, which is precisely what wotc is doing, is a disastrous manner to build a game.
Going back to the OPs depiction of the events in his gaming group.
So, an interesting thing happened with my group. I run games at a local hobby store, which i have been doing for about 6 years now. Recently, my group wanted to run a Dark Sun game, so I dusted off my old ADnD 2e books and ran the starting adventure for them. Then i decided to run the Audio adventure, Light in the Belfry for Ravenloft (they seriously need to bring back audio adventures), also using 2e rules.
So now I plan to return to some old Ravenloft modules and I asked my group if they wanted to use 5e characters ll 5 of them said, no. I believe the reason why is because they are truly invested in their 2e characters like they have never been in 5e and I feel a lot of satisfaction being there with them in their journey.
This, doesn't surprise me even a little bit.
5e characters are basically Avengers. Every level comes with new super powers, no one really earns anything. Very little comes with questing. The result is that my players in 5e are constantly switching characters when they get bored. In my 2e game, they earn every power, every ability and every level. When a character dies in 1e or 2e, it usually takes few hours of counselling to get over it. I have had 5e players go out of their way to kill their character just to play something else. In 2e, when they level, they get better at what they do. Fighters are hitting more, rogues get better at thief skills, and Wizards and Priests get better at casting their spells. In 5e the skills are all shared, including thief skills, all classes have the same combat bonuses, spells are locked in at their level, unless you spend a higher spell slot, and they are limited to 3 magic items, which means getting loot is typically meaningless by level 6.
This is the result I would expect.
I think the hardest thing for 5e DM's to understand is the distinction between what players want and say they want and what they need for the game to be good. If there is a difference between old school and modern D&D as a culture and as a system, this is the difference. It's why the entire concept of the current playtest and development of the game is so broken. You have players who are certain about what they want, upvoting and downvoting developments. Its like asking a drug addict what they want.. yeah you guessed right, its more drugs!
When someone actually takes these players and puts them in an actual good game, it doesn't take long for the lights to come on and make the distinction between a great game in which you don't get what you want and a mediocre game where you always get everything you want. This OP's experience, its... predictable.
Further, crowd-sourcing game design, which is precisely what wotc is doing, is a disastrous manner to build a game.
that...
... depends on how you crowd source it.
I do mechanics and development for my games. The other DMs do the same for theirs, and we steal from each other the time, because we also playtest for each other, but not ourselves. An example of some quirks: I don't read litRPG stuff even a little,. Another DM does, and as voraciously as I take bites out of urban fantasy. I dislike anything having to do with werewolves or vampires being "good guys" in books, and others often want nothing but. But we all play with each other and have for years. I know their tastes, their styles, their approaches. THey know mine.
I showed them my basic rules but not my design goals for what I wanted to do with a new world, asked for game system, and got a list of about 100 items to put into it. I asked about magic, about combat, about elements. I always showed what I had, very much like the UAs. Removal of the subclasses was a collective decision, the way we removed them fell to development (which is me). Magic to spell points (and all the complaints about the 5e system because we had tried it) was my development, their calls. I did this over several years, not the abbreviated timetable here, and the part that excited the players most was the new approach to classes. It is still going on, and they love these "final form" versions after probably 25 iterations.Then I have come here and snagged ideas more than a few times, lol. That is a form of crowd sourcing as well -- but it has to fit in with the goals I have as a designer.
Now, to be fair, much smaller crowd, much less trained to be big on subclasses, and much more trained to like magic items. if TSR had done this with magic items in the old days, it would have been just as bad.
WotC's design goals are not the same. Aside from building mostly for one world but including a handful of others, they have also been doing some other things that they aren't sharing that are absolutely structural in nature that they aren't showing. THey thought about the universal list and different kinds of magic thing, scrapped it. They have been toying with a few combat mechanics and conditions, and they are totally doing a major rewrite of spells that's only being given a peek at and not even really discussed.
What are they really hyping and, to use the traditional phrase, giving players Bread and Circus about? Subclasses and classes. VTT. That's our bread and our circus, and when you stop and analyze what they are presenting, a lot of folks will probably go "oh, that's all they are doing" and odds are really, really good that's not the case. They haven't even gotten into the new DMG stuff yet. And they have these forums to use just like I do.
And all of that? That's only different in terms of scale and the fact that yeah, this stie is way too full of die hard by the book, written rules only minmaxers who love every influencer out there with a bone to pick with wotc, lol. Now, sure, they are drawing limited input from outside it, but it isnt the crowd sourcing that's bad, its that they aren't using an effective crowd and have a built in model bias that *matches the one wotc already has*.
The 1e DMG was at least partially crowd sourced -- if you ever read it, he spent paragraphs on explaining to people how they were wrong in their decisions between the release of the PHB and the DMG. So he heard from outside and used it. Hell, D&D itself is crowd sourced, lol. Arneson developed his basic stuff through a lot of sessions, and when Gygax grabbed the few rules, he ran with it while still building on it with his players and Arneson's and new people.
So it depends on how you do it. Crowd sourcing is opinion polling in the end -- if you don't control the input, you get what you put into it. In science, we call it GIGO, lol. I would *never* say that they are doing bad crowd sourcing, though, because of what GIGO means, and what it would say about the majority of players.
I don't think that's the case, because I ain't playing in their games and don't care how they do -- and given what I have seen, they wouldn't enjoy my games.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
I have noticed that the edition affects the kinds of stories one can tell. Early published adventures often focused on episodic tales of dungeon delving and treasure seeking. While things were already changing even in that edition, over the decades, the focus has shifted more to pulp action. I think if you're trying to tell stories that are more focused on the former in 5E than the latter, you're going to find the experience is not as fulfilling.
That would be extremely early years of D&D like an original box set early. D&D adventures by the time 1st edition was middle-aged varied wildly from classic dungeon crawls, hex crawls, campaign adventures, dominion management adventures, even crazy stuff like linear railroads stuff where you would literally play through the Dragonlance novels using the Dragonlance novel characters and essentially following alone a pre-determined story. I don't think I could think of anything that wasn't tried during the 1e era, they did everything twice over.
It wasn't all good mind you, I would say in the 1e days for every 1 good published adventure you would have half a dozen that were... let's just say, poorly executed and leave it at that.
The thing that was true about 1e, mainly because it was a very light system and very modular, was that you could pretty easily add modular rules to focus on whatever aspect of the game you wanted the adventure to focus on. So like, you could do fast travel to avoid wilderness stuff, but if you wanted to make an adventure out of it, you had detailed wilderness adventure rules that you could deploy. If you wanted to do stronghold building and dominion running a narrative story thing, no problem, or you had a system you could add to turn it into a mini game.
Well, if you exclude the Greyhawk modules, ignore the Mystara modules, and focus solely on adventures and campaign settings written by Tracy and Laura Hickman, then yeah. You're absolutely right. Classic dungeon crawls were no longer a thing by the time 2E came out. 🙄
Regardless of how you want to look at it, though, the further you move from 1E, the more the storytelling style moves away from collecting treasure and more towards pulp action. 5E went even further than earlier editions, deciding to make it unnecessary for players to have an arsenal of magic items to take on high level creatures. As a result, the class means more than the items.
I'm not saying that's good or bad. In fact, my players have wondered aloud what would motivate someone to become an adventurer if fortune isn't a factor. I'm just saying that it has changed how people play the game and storytelling devices that worked in previous editions are not as satisfying in the current edition.
Regardless of how you want to look at it, though, the further you move from 1E, the more the storytelling style moves away from collecting treasure and more towards pulp action. 5E went even further than earlier editions, deciding to make it unnecessary for players to have an arsenal of magic items to take on high level creatures.
That kind of started in 4e, though they did it in the reverse way -- rather than reducing the effect of magic items, they had optional rules where you just got level-based bonuses that matched expected itemization for that level. This meant that low-end magic items were totally irrelevant as they had less effect than your inherent bonuses and those bonuses didn't stack.
I have noticed that the edition affects the kinds of stories one can tell. Early published adventures often focused on episodic tales of dungeon delving and treasure seeking. While things were already changing even in that edition, over the decades, the focus has shifted more to pulp action. I think if you're trying to tell stories that are more focused on the former in 5E than the latter, you're going to find the experience is not as fulfilling.
That would be extremely early years of D&D like an original box set early. D&D adventures by the time 1st edition was middle-aged varied wildly from classic dungeon crawls, hex crawls, campaign adventures, dominion management adventures, even crazy stuff like linear railroads stuff where you would literally play through the Dragonlance novels using the Dragonlance novel characters and essentially following alone a pre-determined story. I don't think I could think of anything that wasn't tried during the 1e era, they did everything twice over.
It wasn't all good mind you, I would say in the 1e days for every 1 good published adventure you would have half a dozen that were... let's just say, poorly executed and leave it at that.
The thing that was true about 1e, mainly because it was a very light system and very modular, was that you could pretty easily add modular rules to focus on whatever aspect of the game you wanted the adventure to focus on. So like, you could do fast travel to avoid wilderness stuff, but if you wanted to make an adventure out of it, you had detailed wilderness adventure rules that you could deploy. If you wanted to do stronghold building and dominion running a narrative story thing, no problem, or you had a system you could add to turn it into a mini game.
Well, if you exclude the Greyhawk modules, ignore the Mystara modules, and focus solely on adventures and campaign settings written by Tracy and Laura Hickman, then yeah. You're absolutely right. Classic dungeon crawls were no longer a thing by the time 2E came out. 🙄
Regardless of how you want to look at it, though, the further you move from 1E, the more the storytelling style moves away from collecting treasure and more towards pulp action. 5E went even further than earlier editions, deciding to make it unnecessary for players to have an arsenal of magic items to take on high level creatures. As a result, the class means more than the items.
I'm not saying that's good or bad. In fact, my players have wondered aloud what would motivate someone to become an adventurer if fortune isn't a factor. I'm just saying that it has changed how people play the game and storytelling devices that worked in previous editions are not as satisfying in the current edition.
I think there's plenty of story hooks, it's just with a safer world, (because people are less able to handle offensive or controversial material in an adult manner, both from a DM and a player perspective.), The focus of the rules being on combat, and thus, combat dominates over role playing means a less and less of a drive for narrative, whether overtly or subconsciously, I'd argue players are more motivated than ever to find the biggest treasure hoard, be the strongest just cause, etc.
I see more PVP death match style play than I do quests to save the realm, rescue a long lost love, etc. Irreverent fun storytelling is nice from time to time, but when it's the norm it gets... tiring.
EDIT: I guess my point is, old actual dungeon crawls and hex crawls are gone, but in their place are thinly veiled narratives for what players are basically treating as dungeon crawls and hex crawls and...
I have noticed that the edition affects the kinds of stories one can tell. Early published adventures often focused on episodic tales of dungeon delving and treasure seeking. While things were already changing even in that edition, over the decades, the focus has shifted more to pulp action. I think if you're trying to tell stories that are more focused on the former in 5E than the latter, you're going to find the experience is not as fulfilling.
That would be extremely early years of D&D like an original box set early. D&D adventures by the time 1st edition was middle-aged varied wildly from classic dungeon crawls, hex crawls, campaign adventures, dominion management adventures, even crazy stuff like linear railroads stuff where you would literally play through the Dragonlance novels using the Dragonlance novel characters and essentially following alone a pre-determined story. I don't think I could think of anything that wasn't tried during the 1e era, they did everything twice over.
It wasn't all good mind you, I would say in the 1e days for every 1 good published adventure you would have half a dozen that were... let's just say, poorly executed and leave it at that.
The thing that was true about 1e, mainly because it was a very light system and very modular, was that you could pretty easily add modular rules to focus on whatever aspect of the game you wanted the adventure to focus on. So like, you could do fast travel to avoid wilderness stuff, but if you wanted to make an adventure out of it, you had detailed wilderness adventure rules that you could deploy. If you wanted to do stronghold building and dominion running a narrative story thing, no problem, or you had a system you could add to turn it into a mini game.
Well, if you exclude the Greyhawk modules, ignore the Mystara modules, and focus solely on adventures and campaign settings written by Tracy and Laura Hickman, then yeah. You're absolutely right. Classic dungeon crawls were no longer a thing by the time 2E came out. 🙄
Regardless of how you want to look at it, though, the further you move from 1E, the more the storytelling style moves away from collecting treasure and more towards pulp action. 5E went even further than earlier editions, deciding to make it unnecessary for players to have an arsenal of magic items to take on high level creatures. As a result, the class means more than the items.
I'm not saying that's good or bad. In fact, my players have wondered aloud what would motivate someone to become an adventurer if fortune isn't a factor. I'm just saying that it has changed how people play the game and storytelling devices that worked in previous editions are not as satisfying in the current edition.
I think there's plenty of story hooks, it's just with a safer world, (because people are less able to handle offensive or controversial material in an adult manner, both from a DM and a player perspective.), The focus of the rules being on combat, and thus, combat dominates over role playing means a less and less of a drive for narrative, whether overtly or subconsciously, I'd argue players are more motivated than ever to find the biggest treasure hoard, be the strongest just cause, etc.
I see more PVP death match style play than I do quests to save the realm, rescue a long lost love, etc. Irreverent fun storytelling is nice from time to time, but when it's the norm it gets... tiring.
EDIT: I guess my point is, old actual dungeon crawls and hex crawls are gone, but in their place are thinly veiled narratives for what players are basically treating as dungeon crawls and hex crawls and...
People can handle controversial stuff fine. That’s why Wizards still leaves in questions about slavery in Out of the Abyss, mind control magic, and… literally a week ago… talking about how the Gith might use biological weapons “for the greater good,” collateral damage and innocent deaths be darned.
It just isn’t as in your face as prior editions, because 5e isn’t led by notorious bigot Gary Gygax, who seemed insistent on forcing his pro-genocide views into the game. Rather than a man who had all the subtlety of a Commander ordering his men to kill women and children (whom Gygax quoted to justify why good characters should be allowed to murder innocents), 5e has competent writers who know how to deal with controversial topics without also being offensive asses who hammer you over the face with their opinions.
People can handle controversial stuff fine. That’s why Wizards still leaves in questions about slavery in Out of the Abyss, mind control magic, and… literally a week ago… talking about how the Gith might use biological weapons “for the greater good,” collateral damage and innocent deaths be darned.
It just isn’t as in your face as prior editions, because 5e isn’t led by notorious bigot Gary Gygax, who seemed insistent on forcing his pro-genocide views into the game.
5e isn’t any less controversial - it just has competent writers who know how to deal with controversial topics without also being offensive asses who hammer you over the face with their opinions.
I disagree. It's there, but it's as you say, "not in your face". the lore may have it, and the slavery happens off screen, and so on. Players tend to be very....
Look, people in general are fairly politically charged and it turns into where unless you are SUPER comfortable with your own group, and generally even then you will know what you can and cannot portray within your games.
Personally, I like morally grey stories. Where sometimes you have to help out some not so great people as a matter of choosing the lesser of evils. Or having choices of "for the greater good". I am very aware of comfort levels and I'm not going to violate them, but I can only touch the surfaces of things.
In fact, my players have wondered aloud what would motivate someone to become an adventurer if fortune isn't a factor.
I dunno. Of the five characters in the party I DM for, exactly zero have backstories that made them motivated to find riches. Not even the pirate
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
For a potentially better way of phrasing "because people are less able to handle offensive or controversial material in an adult manner, both from a DM and a player perspective" try this:
"because people will stand up and speak out when old harms that were accepted just a generation ago are seen as harmful today".
Spitting on the sidewalk is offensive to some people. It is not in the same category as the racism that was addressed in the game -- that isn't a question of offensiveness or controversiality, it is a question of active harm.
I don't suggest this because I am offended or because it might be controversial, even though some folks may see it as both or neither. I suggest it because it is common human decency.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
For a potentially better way of phrasing "because people are less able to handle offensive or controversial material in an adult manner, both from a DM and a player perspective" try this:
"because people will stand up and speak out when old harms that were accepted just a generation ago are seen as harmful today".
Spitting on the sidewalk is offensive to some people. It is not in the same category as the racism that was addressed in the game -- that isn't a question of offensiveness or controversiality, it is a question of active harm.
I don't suggest this because I am offended or because it might be controversial, even though some folks may see it as both or neither. I suggest it because it is common human decency.
No, I get that that's the case for many, but what I very pointedly mean is that people cannot handle negative situations. And I'm not talking racism or slavery.
People are hair triggered about a LOT of subjects. many that border upon political. The Saltmarsh module has some very.... political messaging, (at least as presented to me in my own experience as a player). I'm also not a fan of having to linguistically dance through a minefield because some people may be more conservative than I am and thus I get into a thanksgiving style debate at what's supposed to be just a fun time.
I have noticed that the edition affects the kinds of stories one can tell. Early published adventures often focused on episodic tales of dungeon delving and treasure seeking. While things were already changing even in that edition, over the decades, the focus has shifted more to pulp action. I think if you're trying to tell stories that are more focused on the former in 5E than the latter, you're going to find the experience is not as fulfilling.
That would be extremely early years of D&D like an original box set early. D&D adventures by the time 1st edition was middle-aged varied wildly from classic dungeon crawls, hex crawls, campaign adventures, dominion management adventures, even crazy stuff like linear railroads stuff where you would literally play through the Dragonlance novels using the Dragonlance novel characters and essentially following alone a pre-determined story. I don't think I could think of anything that wasn't tried during the 1e era, they did everything twice over.
It wasn't all good mind you, I would say in the 1e days for every 1 good published adventure you would have half a dozen that were... let's just say, poorly executed and leave it at that.
The thing that was true about 1e, mainly because it was a very light system and very modular, was that you could pretty easily add modular rules to focus on whatever aspect of the game you wanted the adventure to focus on. So like, you could do fast travel to avoid wilderness stuff, but if you wanted to make an adventure out of it, you had detailed wilderness adventure rules that you could deploy. If you wanted to do stronghold building and dominion running a narrative story thing, no problem, or you had a system you could add to turn it into a mini game.
Well, if you exclude the Greyhawk modules, ignore the Mystara modules, and focus solely on adventures and campaign settings written by Tracy and Laura Hickman, then yeah. You're absolutely right. Classic dungeon crawls were no longer a thing by the time 2E came out. 🙄
Regardless of how you want to look at it, though, the further you move from 1E, the more the storytelling style moves away from collecting treasure and more towards pulp action. 5E went even further than earlier editions, deciding to make it unnecessary for players to have an arsenal of magic items to take on high level creatures. As a result, the class means more than the items.
I'm not saying that's good or bad. In fact, my players have wondered aloud what would motivate someone to become an adventurer if fortune isn't a factor. I'm just saying that it has changed how people play the game and storytelling devices that worked in previous editions are not as satisfying in the current edition.
I think there's plenty of story hooks, it's just with a safer world, (because people are less able to handle offensive or controversial material in an adult manner, both from a DM and a player perspective.), The focus of the rules being on combat, and thus, combat dominates over role playing means a less and less of a drive for narrative, whether overtly or subconsciously, I'd argue players are more motivated than ever to find the biggest treasure hoard, be the strongest just cause, etc.
I see more PVP death match style play than I do quests to save the realm, rescue a long lost love, etc. Irreverent fun storytelling is nice from time to time, but when it's the norm it gets... tiring.
EDIT: I guess my point is, old actual dungeon crawls and hex crawls are gone, but in their place are thinly veiled narratives for what players are basically treating as dungeon crawls and hex crawls and...
Please don't use my comments to derail the thread into a lament about the game not being offensive enough. My comments were about treasure seeking and pulp action. There is nothing in them that would suggest I think offensive materials have any place in the game and I don't appreciate my comments getting used as a jumping off point for that discussion. Please leave me out of your conversation.
I have noticed that the edition affects the kinds of stories one can tell. Early published adventures often focused on episodic tales of dungeon delving and treasure seeking. While things were already changing even in that edition, over the decades, the focus has shifted more to pulp action. I think if you're trying to tell stories that are more focused on the former in 5E than the latter, you're going to find the experience is not as fulfilling.
That would be extremely early years of D&D like an original box set early. D&D adventures by the time 1st edition was middle-aged varied wildly from classic dungeon crawls, hex crawls, campaign adventures, dominion management adventures, even crazy stuff like linear railroads stuff where you would literally play through the Dragonlance novels using the Dragonlance novel characters and essentially following alone a pre-determined story. I don't think I could think of anything that wasn't tried during the 1e era, they did everything twice over.
It wasn't all good mind you, I would say in the 1e days for every 1 good published adventure you would have half a dozen that were... let's just say, poorly executed and leave it at that.
The thing that was true about 1e, mainly because it was a very light system and very modular, was that you could pretty easily add modular rules to focus on whatever aspect of the game you wanted the adventure to focus on. So like, you could do fast travel to avoid wilderness stuff, but if you wanted to make an adventure out of it, you had detailed wilderness adventure rules that you could deploy. If you wanted to do stronghold building and dominion running a narrative story thing, no problem, or you had a system you could add to turn it into a mini game.
Well, if you exclude the Greyhawk modules, ignore the Mystara modules, and focus solely on adventures and campaign settings written by Tracy and Laura Hickman, then yeah. You're absolutely right. Classic dungeon crawls were no longer a thing by the time 2E came out. 🙄
Regardless of how you want to look at it, though, the further you move from 1E, the more the storytelling style moves away from collecting treasure and more towards pulp action. 5E went even further than earlier editions, deciding to make it unnecessary for players to have an arsenal of magic items to take on high level creatures. As a result, the class means more than the items.
I'm not saying that's good or bad. In fact, my players have wondered aloud what would motivate someone to become an adventurer if fortune isn't a factor. I'm just saying that it has changed how people play the game and storytelling devices that worked in previous editions are not as satisfying in the current edition.
I think there's plenty of story hooks, it's just with a safer world, (because people are less able to handle offensive or controversial material in an adult manner, both from a DM and a player perspective.), The focus of the rules being on combat, and thus, combat dominates over role playing means a less and less of a drive for narrative, whether overtly or subconsciously, I'd argue players are more motivated than ever to find the biggest treasure hoard, be the strongest just cause, etc.
I see more PVP death match style play than I do quests to save the realm, rescue a long lost love, etc. Irreverent fun storytelling is nice from time to time, but when it's the norm it gets... tiring.
EDIT: I guess my point is, old actual dungeon crawls and hex crawls are gone, but in their place are thinly veiled narratives for what players are basically treating as dungeon crawls and hex crawls and...
Please don't use my comments to derail the thread into a lament about the game not being offensive enough. My comments were about treasure seeking and pulp action. There is nothing in them that would suggest I think offensive materials have any place in the game and I don't appreciate my comments getting used as a jumping off point for that discussion. Please leave me out of your conversation.
not my intention. But this demonstrates the point I am making.
The zero tolerance means less stories and more dungeon crawling.
One should even ask if it's morally right to attack tribes of goblins, or just waltz in and attack a thieves guild because some random guy in a bar told you to... It would make for an excellent story, but tables would shy away.
The problem with the classic dungeon crawl is that, well, going into someone else's house, killing them, and stealing their stuff is normally described as... evil. Assuming your players don't want to be evil, that means you need to rethink the fundamental motivation of PCs: rather than dungeon crawling for loot, they're dungeon crawling to foil someone's evil plot. And this in turn means that the game is just going to be less treasure focused, because your measure of success is no longer gaining treasure, it's foiling evil. This doesn't mean there can't be magic items and loot, but it does mean they are incidental, rather than primary -- first write the adventure, then go in at the end and sprinkle an appropriate amount of treasure around.
Hey now, Acererak wasn’t plotting jack. He was just sitting there in his trap filled mausoleum like some b grade pharaoh. grave robbing isn’t grave robbing if you give the jewels to a museum. That’s how Indy did it, that’s how Bigby does it, and it’s worked okay so far…
Come to think of it, the idea of most early dungeons being someone’s home is a bit out there — prison seems more likely given they weren’t always able to leave, lol.
but then, wandering into a prison and killing all the criminals also isn’t looked on fondly…
Context.
The “thwarting evil” is one. Opposing malice, defying despair, rescue, finding the lost Shiri shama tribe, seeking a rare flower — all others.
But recovering a dead pirate’s loot, clearing out one of those damnable pits, snatching loot from the evil king (but not fixing the problem of an evil king), or exploring that big ole hole in the side of that hill are also all valid contexts.
That’s not counting the basic underlying deal of “there is a weird magical place over there, and you can earn a living by finding the magical chests in it. Monsters appear to kill or eat you.” Survival is also a context.
I wonder if “the kids these days” could handle a dungeon without a clear context…
… and if the old farts could tackle a moral and ethical hex crawl that requires overcoming foes instead of killing them.
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Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Whether the premise of the Dungeon Crawl is "appropriate" or "ethical" is a question of what you consider a monster to be. In modern-day D&D we have redefined the word monster to exclude most "humanoid" monsters that have societies and cultures, so like Orcs and Goblins are not in the same category as Rust Monsters and Gelatinous Cubes. In old-school Dungeon Crawls, there was no distinction between an Orc and a Zombie, they were both evil monsters that you didn't have to feel bad about ruthlessly murdering.
Dungeon Crawls however can be done in a way that doesn't really pose this ethical question or offend modern players today. It's all about what you put in a Dungeon. If it's filled with Zombies and Skeletons, does anyone have a moral objection to killing the undead? I doubt it, hell you have entire classes dedicated to murdering undead without remorse as a virtue of gods work.
The question here I think is more about whether Dungeon Crawls can or should be part of a D&D story and some would argue that the premise is opposed to a story-driven game. With that I disagree. The emergent story of exploring an old ruin or some long-forgotten crypt can be every bit as fun, interesting and narrative as whatever a DM can scribble as a plot and it has the added advantage of being emergent and dynamic where most DM-written plots are linear railroads.
Someone mentioned how in 2e AD&D we started to see more and more "plot-based adventures", what wasn't mentioned is how harshly these were rejected by the community and universally hated they were to such an extent that when WotC took over the franchise and remade D&D they didn't dare try any plot based adventures, instead the core focus of adventure writing went back to dungeon crawls for the first 2 years before anyone even considered it again. It was later proven with stuff like Red Hand of Doom that this type of adventure can be really great if done right and we have since seen a lot of great stuff in that area. That said, even these plot-driven adventures always have dungeons for players to crawl around in, I can't think of an adventure written in the last 20 years that doesn't have a dungeon. I'm sure there are some just saying it's kind of a rare thing and I think there is good reason for that.
Dungeon Crawls are an inherent part of D&D so this conversation about whether or not it "should" be a thing is silly, it has to be a thing, without support for Dungeon Crawls I proclaim here and now, you are not D&D, objectively. D&D will always have dungeon crawling. Exploration is one of the tiers of the game which heavily supports the combat tier. Two of the three tiers essentially exist to support Dungeon Crawls almost exclusively.
Modern players have tried very hard to get away from Dungeon Crawls and to that I can only say.. meh.. to reach their own I guess. I mean I honestly don't care what people do in their games, but I personally don't see the point of having so many game mechanics in an RPG if the whole thing is going to boil down to free-form role-playing and storytelling. I mean, the more role-playing you have in a game where there are few fights and the focus is on the narrative the less mechanics you need, so if you're going to run political drama's or games about Wizardry School Students ala Harry Potter for example... less mechanics is better, it begs the question, why use D&D as a platform for games like that. It's a lot of unnecessary fiddly bits that get under your feet.
D&D is built under the assumption that the characters are going to go out and adventure, explore, fight monsters, find treasure, and become famous heroes known for their great deeds. All of the mechanics and architecture of the game are built around this premise and now we are meant to believe that modern D&D is not about these things? I don't buy it.
Hey now, it wasn't *just* about you.
It was your example, no question, and I did toss in a tease, but by and large I was highlighting the way the difference in play style leads into that import of the weapons from a play perspective, not so much a mechanical perspective, because in 5e a fighter can often do that using some special ability they have.
THe mechanism is different, but the outcome is the same, in terms of practical damage done, blah blah (and why I didn't include your specifics about level and the fact you were referencing B/X at the time0).
The big difference, which we were trying to get across before we sidetracked, was that there really is a big difference in feel between the two games. While "leveling up" is a big deal in both, for the most part, neither version (none of them, really, in practical play) use or treat leveling up as a major role playing aspect, soa lot of that feel of "fighting your way to get to that magical weapon" was lost when they shifted to the special ability model in use at present.
In that respect, I am also referencing the OP (before folks like you and I ran away with the thread, lol) and that whole concept of feeling like you don't really earn that special ability in a single fight or a hard fought sequence because the special abilities are handwaved away into the idea of "downtime". Late stage 2, 3/3.5 had some chapbooks that sorta gave that period a little more depth and made it interesting, but 1e, 2e, and 5e don't and neither did B/X or BECMI.
So it was a lot more fun to go out and get that +3 flametongue than iit is to go "oh, hey, I went up a level, and now I can do this whole turn my sword into a fiery death thing, which is totally cool".
And, to your point and the general complaint, in B/X, BECMI, 1e, and 2e, you needed that sword to do some things you couldn't do any other way, so, as I noted, having it changed the way that a player approached the game. in 5e, that's baked into the subclass, so you already know how it is going to set your approach to the game, instead of having something appear that can really shift it.
But, give a Bladelock a flaming sword and it might change the way they are going to play the game in 5e. And it will have a much more significant impact than it ever did for previous editions. Look up and you'll see someone gloss over the absence of special weapon immunities and weapon requirements in the default 5e monster assortment.
Which makes my explanation of the particular complaint even more interesting, because while they got gargoyles, they ain't got any "cold iron" monsters or "magic draining but weak against normal" monsters because we had at least three books to their one and a half (since they used half the additionals for class, race, and similar updates).
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
I don't know if I actually claimed it was "more fun" at any point yet, I simply claimed that in 1e you didn't have to worry about the introduction of magic items into the game as a balancing factor, though I will now since Im already accused of it, I do in fact believe that finding magic items is in fact fun for players and its not because it makes you more powerful, but because finding treasure is a fun part of the game. It's a part of Dungeons & Dragons to find treasure and magic items. This is not some sort of bizarre new thing I have invented.
My claim if there is such a thing is that finding magic items is a core part of the game of D&D, it always has been. Case in point, even in the 5e DMG there are 94 pages of the book dedicated to treasure and magical items, that is 1/3rd of the whole bloody book. If finding treasure and magic items is an unimportant part of the game, why dedicate this many pages of the DMG to it?
What you are suggesting is that something that doesn't make you more powerful, is useless and not fun with which I disagree. Not everything is about character builds and power creep. Finding a cool magical sword that doesn't do any major damage to balance adds to the mythos of the story, adventure and character. Its a memory, a part of the games feel. It doesn't need to break the game balance to be fun.
I liked the old special monsters. you needed something special to take them on.
Going back to the OPs depiction of the events in his gaming group.
This, doesn't surprise me even a little bit.
This is the result I would expect.
I think the hardest thing for 5e DM's to understand is the distinction between what players want and say they want and what they need for the game to be good. If there is a difference between old school and modern D&D as a culture and as a system, this is the difference. It's why the entire concept of the current playtest and development of the game is so broken. You have players who are certain about what they want, upvoting and downvoting developments. Its like asking a drug addict what they want.. yeah you guessed right, its more drugs!
When someone actually takes these players and puts them in an actual good game, it doesn't take long for the lights to come on and make the distinction between a great game in which you don't get what you want and a mediocre game where you always get everything you want. This OP's experience, its... predictable.
Further, crowd-sourcing game design, which is precisely what wotc is doing, is a disastrous manner to build a game.
No, it's not if you understand how to set expectations and give and take feedback correctly.
What I mean is that it's just another tool in one's toolbox
that...
... depends on how you crowd source it.
I do mechanics and development for my games. The other DMs do the same for theirs, and we steal from each other the time, because we also playtest for each other, but not ourselves. An example of some quirks: I don't read litRPG stuff even a little,. Another DM does, and as voraciously as I take bites out of urban fantasy. I dislike anything having to do with werewolves or vampires being "good guys" in books, and others often want nothing but. But we all play with each other and have for years. I know their tastes, their styles, their approaches. THey know mine.
I showed them my basic rules but not my design goals for what I wanted to do with a new world, asked for game system, and got a list of about 100 items to put into it. I asked about magic, about combat, about elements. I always showed what I had, very much like the UAs. Removal of the subclasses was a collective decision, the way we removed them fell to development (which is me). Magic to spell points (and all the complaints about the 5e system because we had tried it) was my development, their calls. I did this over several years, not the abbreviated timetable here, and the part that excited the players most was the new approach to classes. It is still going on, and they love these "final form" versions after probably 25 iterations.Then I have come here and snagged ideas more than a few times, lol. That is a form of crowd sourcing as well -- but it has to fit in with the goals I have as a designer.
Now, to be fair, much smaller crowd, much less trained to be big on subclasses, and much more trained to like magic items. if TSR had done this with magic items in the old days, it would have been just as bad.
WotC's design goals are not the same. Aside from building mostly for one world but including a handful of others, they have also been doing some other things that they aren't sharing that are absolutely structural in nature that they aren't showing. THey thought about the universal list and different kinds of magic thing, scrapped it. They have been toying with a few combat mechanics and conditions, and they are totally doing a major rewrite of spells that's only being given a peek at and not even really discussed.
What are they really hyping and, to use the traditional phrase, giving players Bread and Circus about? Subclasses and classes. VTT. That's our bread and our circus, and when you stop and analyze what they are presenting, a lot of folks will probably go "oh, that's all they are doing" and odds are really, really good that's not the case. They haven't even gotten into the new DMG stuff yet. And they have these forums to use just like I do.
And all of that? That's only different in terms of scale and the fact that yeah, this stie is way too full of die hard by the book, written rules only minmaxers who love every influencer out there with a bone to pick with wotc, lol. Now, sure, they are drawing limited input from outside it, but it isnt the crowd sourcing that's bad, its that they aren't using an effective crowd and have a built in model bias that *matches the one wotc already has*.
The 1e DMG was at least partially crowd sourced -- if you ever read it, he spent paragraphs on explaining to people how they were wrong in their decisions between the release of the PHB and the DMG. So he heard from outside and used it. Hell, D&D itself is crowd sourced, lol. Arneson developed his basic stuff through a lot of sessions, and when Gygax grabbed the few rules, he ran with it while still building on it with his players and Arneson's and new people.
So it depends on how you do it. Crowd sourcing is opinion polling in the end -- if you don't control the input, you get what you put into it. In science, we call it GIGO, lol. I would *never* say that they are doing bad crowd sourcing, though, because of what GIGO means, and what it would say about the majority of players.
I don't think that's the case, because I ain't playing in their games and don't care how they do -- and given what I have seen, they wouldn't enjoy my games.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Well, if you exclude the Greyhawk modules, ignore the Mystara modules, and focus solely on adventures and campaign settings written by Tracy and Laura Hickman, then yeah. You're absolutely right. Classic dungeon crawls were no longer a thing by the time 2E came out. 🙄
Regardless of how you want to look at it, though, the further you move from 1E, the more the storytelling style moves away from collecting treasure and more towards pulp action. 5E went even further than earlier editions, deciding to make it unnecessary for players to have an arsenal of magic items to take on high level creatures. As a result, the class means more than the items.
I'm not saying that's good or bad. In fact, my players have wondered aloud what would motivate someone to become an adventurer if fortune isn't a factor. I'm just saying that it has changed how people play the game and storytelling devices that worked in previous editions are not as satisfying in the current edition.
That kind of started in 4e, though they did it in the reverse way -- rather than reducing the effect of magic items, they had optional rules where you just got level-based bonuses that matched expected itemization for that level. This meant that low-end magic items were totally irrelevant as they had less effect than your inherent bonuses and those bonuses didn't stack.
I think there's plenty of story hooks, it's just with a safer world, (because people are less able to handle offensive or controversial material in an adult manner, both from a DM and a player perspective.), The focus of the rules being on combat, and thus, combat dominates over role playing means a less and less of a drive for narrative, whether overtly or subconsciously, I'd argue players are more motivated than ever to find the biggest treasure hoard, be the strongest just cause, etc.
I see more PVP death match style play than I do quests to save the realm, rescue a long lost love, etc. Irreverent fun storytelling is nice from time to time, but when it's the norm it gets... tiring.
EDIT: I guess my point is, old actual dungeon crawls and hex crawls are gone, but in their place are thinly veiled narratives for what players are basically treating as dungeon crawls and hex crawls and...
People can handle controversial stuff fine. That’s why Wizards still leaves in questions about slavery in Out of the Abyss, mind control magic, and… literally a week ago… talking about how the Gith might use biological weapons “for the greater good,” collateral damage and innocent deaths be darned.
It just isn’t as in your face as prior editions, because 5e isn’t led by notorious bigot Gary Gygax, who seemed insistent on forcing his pro-genocide views into the game. Rather than a man who had all the subtlety of a Commander ordering his men to kill women and children (whom Gygax quoted to justify why good characters should be allowed to murder innocents), 5e has competent writers who know how to deal with controversial topics without also being offensive asses who hammer you over the face with their opinions.
I disagree. It's there, but it's as you say, "not in your face". the lore may have it, and the slavery happens off screen, and so on. Players tend to be very....
Look, people in general are fairly politically charged and it turns into where unless you are SUPER comfortable with your own group, and generally even then you will know what you can and cannot portray within your games.
Personally, I like morally grey stories. Where sometimes you have to help out some not so great people as a matter of choosing the lesser of evils. Or having choices of "for the greater good". I am very aware of comfort levels and I'm not going to violate them, but I can only touch the surfaces of things.
I dunno. Of the five characters in the party I DM for, exactly zero have backstories that made them motivated to find riches. Not even the pirate
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
For a potentially better way of phrasing "because people are less able to handle offensive or controversial material in an adult manner, both from a DM and a player perspective" try this:
"because people will stand up and speak out when old harms that were accepted just a generation ago are seen as harmful today".
Spitting on the sidewalk is offensive to some people. It is not in the same category as the racism that was addressed in the game -- that isn't a question of offensiveness or controversiality, it is a question of active harm.
I don't suggest this because I am offended or because it might be controversial, even though some folks may see it as both or neither. I suggest it because it is common human decency.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
No, I get that that's the case for many, but what I very pointedly mean is that people cannot handle negative situations. And I'm not talking racism or slavery.
People are hair triggered about a LOT of subjects. many that border upon political. The Saltmarsh module has some very.... political messaging, (at least as presented to me in my own experience as a player). I'm also not a fan of having to linguistically dance through a minefield because some people may be more conservative than I am and thus I get into a thanksgiving style debate at what's supposed to be just a fun time.
Please don't use my comments to derail the thread into a lament about the game not being offensive enough. My comments were about treasure seeking and pulp action. There is nothing in them that would suggest I think offensive materials have any place in the game and I don't appreciate my comments getting used as a jumping off point for that discussion. Please leave me out of your conversation.
not my intention. But this demonstrates the point I am making.
The zero tolerance means less stories and more dungeon crawling.
One should even ask if it's morally right to attack tribes of goblins, or just waltz in and attack a thieves guild because some random guy in a bar told you to... It would make for an excellent story, but tables would shy away.
Long live the dungeon crawl.
The problem with the classic dungeon crawl is that, well, going into someone else's house, killing them, and stealing their stuff is normally described as... evil. Assuming your players don't want to be evil, that means you need to rethink the fundamental motivation of PCs: rather than dungeon crawling for loot, they're dungeon crawling to foil someone's evil plot. And this in turn means that the game is just going to be less treasure focused, because your measure of success is no longer gaining treasure, it's foiling evil. This doesn't mean there can't be magic items and loot, but it does mean they are incidental, rather than primary -- first write the adventure, then go in at the end and sprinkle an appropriate amount of treasure around.
Hey now, Acererak wasn’t plotting jack. He was just sitting there in his trap filled mausoleum like some b grade pharaoh. grave robbing isn’t grave robbing if you give the jewels to a museum. That’s how Indy did it, that’s how Bigby does it, and it’s worked okay so far…
Come to think of it, the idea of most early dungeons being someone’s home is a bit out there — prison seems more likely given they weren’t always able to leave, lol.
but then, wandering into a prison and killing all the criminals also isn’t looked on fondly…
Context.
The “thwarting evil” is one. Opposing malice, defying despair, rescue, finding the lost Shiri shama tribe, seeking a rare flower — all others.
But recovering a dead pirate’s loot, clearing out one of those damnable pits, snatching loot from the evil king (but not fixing the problem of an evil king), or exploring that big ole hole in the side of that hill are also all valid contexts.
That’s not counting the basic underlying deal of “there is a weird magical place over there, and you can earn a living by finding the magical chests in it. Monsters appear to kill or eat you.” Survival is also a context.
I wonder if “the kids these days” could handle a dungeon without a clear context…
… and if the old farts could tackle a moral and ethical hex crawl that requires overcoming foes instead of killing them.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Whether the premise of the Dungeon Crawl is "appropriate" or "ethical" is a question of what you consider a monster to be. In modern-day D&D we have redefined the word monster to exclude most "humanoid" monsters that have societies and cultures, so like Orcs and Goblins are not in the same category as Rust Monsters and Gelatinous Cubes. In old-school Dungeon Crawls, there was no distinction between an Orc and a Zombie, they were both evil monsters that you didn't have to feel bad about ruthlessly murdering.
Dungeon Crawls however can be done in a way that doesn't really pose this ethical question or offend modern players today. It's all about what you put in a Dungeon. If it's filled with Zombies and Skeletons, does anyone have a moral objection to killing the undead? I doubt it, hell you have entire classes dedicated to murdering undead without remorse as a virtue of gods work.
The question here I think is more about whether Dungeon Crawls can or should be part of a D&D story and some would argue that the premise is opposed to a story-driven game. With that I disagree. The emergent story of exploring an old ruin or some long-forgotten crypt can be every bit as fun, interesting and narrative as whatever a DM can scribble as a plot and it has the added advantage of being emergent and dynamic where most DM-written plots are linear railroads.
Someone mentioned how in 2e AD&D we started to see more and more "plot-based adventures", what wasn't mentioned is how harshly these were rejected by the community and universally hated they were to such an extent that when WotC took over the franchise and remade D&D they didn't dare try any plot based adventures, instead the core focus of adventure writing went back to dungeon crawls for the first 2 years before anyone even considered it again. It was later proven with stuff like Red Hand of Doom that this type of adventure can be really great if done right and we have since seen a lot of great stuff in that area. That said, even these plot-driven adventures always have dungeons for players to crawl around in, I can't think of an adventure written in the last 20 years that doesn't have a dungeon. I'm sure there are some just saying it's kind of a rare thing and I think there is good reason for that.
Dungeon Crawls are an inherent part of D&D so this conversation about whether or not it "should" be a thing is silly, it has to be a thing, without support for Dungeon Crawls I proclaim here and now, you are not D&D, objectively. D&D will always have dungeon crawling. Exploration is one of the tiers of the game which heavily supports the combat tier. Two of the three tiers essentially exist to support Dungeon Crawls almost exclusively.
Modern players have tried very hard to get away from Dungeon Crawls and to that I can only say.. meh.. to reach their own I guess. I mean I honestly don't care what people do in their games, but I personally don't see the point of having so many game mechanics in an RPG if the whole thing is going to boil down to free-form role-playing and storytelling. I mean, the more role-playing you have in a game where there are few fights and the focus is on the narrative the less mechanics you need, so if you're going to run political drama's or games about Wizardry School Students ala Harry Potter for example... less mechanics is better, it begs the question, why use D&D as a platform for games like that. It's a lot of unnecessary fiddly bits that get under your feet.
D&D is built under the assumption that the characters are going to go out and adventure, explore, fight monsters, find treasure, and become famous heroes known for their great deeds. All of the mechanics and architecture of the game are built around this premise and now we are meant to believe that modern D&D is not about these things? I don't buy it.