Tuesdays.
Lets talk about games.
It is quarter after seven, ante meridian, and my space brain has already decided to leave my body behind and go somewhere more interesting. I'm going to talk about 4th edition. All two people that may actually read this, stick with it, I will post something of greater content later, but the creative juices are long since dried up in the desolate grey wasteland that is morning.
Just recently, the Monday Night Hate Crimes Unit has expanded, taken-over, and asked the government nicely to subsidize Sunday mornings at around 9 for a weekly game of Dungeons and Dragons(a noticeable downturn in hate crimes in the wee hours before church)(Sub-note for new readers - Yes, I play DnD. Wanna fight about it?). I have not seen that side of noon on Sunday for over 4 years. Knob Creek made a good argument reminding me why precisely I had not seen that side of noon for over 4 years. I had made my character well in advance and me and Dredd Eckhart sat around trying to get my eyes to focus after playing the Left 4 Dead Drinking Game (Take a shot everytime Josh's roomate causes us to get devoured by a mob of zombies). This gave me time to reflect on the task at hand.
4th edition annoys me. There are certain aspects to it that just seem... out of place in a pen and paper role-playing game. To many elements of the powers and abilities as written in 4th edition force the feel of the game to be much more of a tactical exercise instead of a role playing activity. I have, in Dredd, what equates to a tank. Tank is most decidedly a term coined from online role playing. I remember when we were acne ridden junior high-schoolers with to much time on our hands and decidedly to good in school to be well liked describing one of our characters as "like a tank," but always in reference to the fact that he was about to lay down fire like sort of Tiger I in Poland. He was the pinnacle of bad-ass-itude, no one would stand up to his furious onslaught of blows, a true engine of destruction. Not so anymore. Now, this reference takes on the sense in that you are a holding tank. A vessel for containing beatings. The purpose of a fighter now is no longer to dole out pain at a rate that is at least thrice what he absorbs, but to take the brunt of damage off of the rest of the party. I have never really ever seen this phenomenon in pen and pencil games, this idea of diverting damage onto one target in my experience has only ever been while playing World of Warcraft.
Now with a series of taunts and abilities to shunt damage, DnD plays a little closer to a video game. With a host of abilities that allow for tactical advantages without any real world justification (when I hit that guy, I can teleport three spaces. Why?) it plays like a miniatures game. The powers are all pretty set from class to class, and truthfully you only take one path up the class and to continue the wow analogy you can pick a spec for tanking or for DPS. Its hard to do both (well), and even the dps choice makes use of the taunts and splashing damage meaning you are still fulfilling your party roll while trying to pick up slack for a missing one, and thus end up being punished because you suck at both.
I don't think this is necessarily bad. Its just not the DnD I remember. They are catering to the young, ADD kids that don't know anything different from automated sytems from WoW or Morrowind, games where the mathematics and dramatic systems are discreet and their class defines their roll in the world society. There is no multiclassing or customization through feats. Theoretically, I guess it should not impact role playing, Dredd is still the optimistic nihilist road warden who doesn't much care for books that he always will be and has been, but the mood is different, the world not as dire when you can use an At-Will power to crush a kobold with your shield, but only if it doesn't shift away before you get "combat advantage" (which is not flanking, though flanking will grant "combat advantage.") I do not know. I don't have any real doubts that it will at some point stop being fun, I am just not sure yet if its what I'm looking for anymore.
I don't miss Vampire. V:tM is clunky and the stereotype and subsequent stigma that is attached to it, normally, completely legitimate, but I miss Strasbourg. Playing electronically I found I preferred as it gave me a few seconds to formulate better constructed character reactions then I typically can in person. Party type games make that hard, especially with the players I have around me.
Other news, Slasher: The Slashening just came out! Shame now that the serial-murder-mystery-call-of-cthulhu-silent-hill game is rather dead, or I would have taken great pleasure in having a source book to take some of the guess work out of running a serial killer. Living in that persons head less is always a good thing.
Posts coming soon: Left 4 Dead/Eternal Silence, writing a serial killer, sample blurbs.
Now back to dealing with people asking me for things that I don't have to give them. Edit later for being poorly written. (Oh wait...)
It is quarter after seven, ante meridian, and my space brain has already decided to leave my body behind and go somewhere more interesting. I'm going to talk about 4th edition. All two people that may actually read this, stick with it, I will post something of greater content later, but the creative juices are long since dried up in the desolate grey wasteland that is morning.
Just recently, the Monday Night Hate Crimes Unit has expanded, taken-over, and asked the government nicely to subsidize Sunday mornings at around 9 for a weekly game of Dungeons and Dragons(a noticeable downturn in hate crimes in the wee hours before church)(Sub-note for new readers - Yes, I play DnD. Wanna fight about it?). I have not seen that side of noon on Sunday for over 4 years. Knob Creek made a good argument reminding me why precisely I had not seen that side of noon for over 4 years. I had made my character well in advance and me and Dredd Eckhart sat around trying to get my eyes to focus after playing the Left 4 Dead Drinking Game (Take a shot everytime Josh's roomate causes us to get devoured by a mob of zombies). This gave me time to reflect on the task at hand.
4th edition annoys me. There are certain aspects to it that just seem... out of place in a pen and paper role-playing game. To many elements of the powers and abilities as written in 4th edition force the feel of the game to be much more of a tactical exercise instead of a role playing activity. I have, in Dredd, what equates to a tank. Tank is most decidedly a term coined from online role playing. I remember when we were acne ridden junior high-schoolers with to much time on our hands and decidedly to good in school to be well liked describing one of our characters as "like a tank," but always in reference to the fact that he was about to lay down fire like sort of Tiger I in Poland. He was the pinnacle of bad-ass-itude, no one would stand up to his furious onslaught of blows, a true engine of destruction. Not so anymore. Now, this reference takes on the sense in that you are a holding tank. A vessel for containing beatings. The purpose of a fighter now is no longer to dole out pain at a rate that is at least thrice what he absorbs, but to take the brunt of damage off of the rest of the party. I have never really ever seen this phenomenon in pen and pencil games, this idea of diverting damage onto one target in my experience has only ever been while playing World of Warcraft.
Now with a series of taunts and abilities to shunt damage, DnD plays a little closer to a video game. With a host of abilities that allow for tactical advantages without any real world justification (when I hit that guy, I can teleport three spaces. Why?) it plays like a miniatures game. The powers are all pretty set from class to class, and truthfully you only take one path up the class and to continue the wow analogy you can pick a spec for tanking or for DPS. Its hard to do both (well), and even the dps choice makes use of the taunts and splashing damage meaning you are still fulfilling your party roll while trying to pick up slack for a missing one, and thus end up being punished because you suck at both.
I don't think this is necessarily bad. Its just not the DnD I remember. They are catering to the young, ADD kids that don't know anything different from automated sytems from WoW or Morrowind, games where the mathematics and dramatic systems are discreet and their class defines their roll in the world society. There is no multiclassing or customization through feats. Theoretically, I guess it should not impact role playing, Dredd is still the optimistic nihilist road warden who doesn't much care for books that he always will be and has been, but the mood is different, the world not as dire when you can use an At-Will power to crush a kobold with your shield, but only if it doesn't shift away before you get "combat advantage" (which is not flanking, though flanking will grant "combat advantage.") I do not know. I don't have any real doubts that it will at some point stop being fun, I am just not sure yet if its what I'm looking for anymore.
I don't miss Vampire. V:tM is clunky and the stereotype and subsequent stigma that is attached to it, normally, completely legitimate, but I miss Strasbourg. Playing electronically I found I preferred as it gave me a few seconds to formulate better constructed character reactions then I typically can in person. Party type games make that hard, especially with the players I have around me.
Other news, Slasher: The Slashening just came out! Shame now that the serial-murder-mystery-call-of-cthulhu-silent-hill game is rather dead, or I would have taken great pleasure in having a source book to take some of the guess work out of running a serial killer. Living in that persons head less is always a good thing.
Posts coming soon: Left 4 Dead/Eternal Silence, writing a serial killer, sample blurbs.
Now back to dealing with people asking me for things that I don't have to give them. Edit later for being poorly written. (Oh wait...)