Do "roleplaying heavy" 3.5/PF/5e campaigns that are "more about intrigue, investigation, exploration, and politics than combat" exacerbate the martial/caster disparity even further?
>intrigue, investigation, exploration, and politics
>D&D
>>45772875
This is, sadly, what too many Roll20 campaigns try to do to count.
>>45772862
Yes, since martial characters usually don't have enough skills they can use out of combat while casters do, or can get by with spells that replicate those skills.
It's pretty dumb how people try to use DnD as an all-purpose system instead of the things it's actually good at.
First,
>>45772875
>>45773164
This
Second,
>3.5/PF/5e
>Yes, since martial characters usually don't have enough skills they can use out of combat while casters do, or can get by with spells that replicate those skills.
Use 4e, where casters and martials are equal
>>45773964
To be fair, D&D more or less advertised itself as an all-purpose system. And the creators themselves don't know what the system is good at, so how are its users supposed to know?
>>45773999
>Use 4e, where casters and martials are equal
Except martials still tend to suck in terms of skills.
The heavy combat focus doesn't do the system any favors in this context, either.
>>45774051
>The heavy combat focus doesn't do the system any favors in this context, either.
He is using D&D, the "heavy combat focus" argument apply to all D&D editions
>>45774051
>Except martials still tend to suck in terms of skills.
Only fighters.
And fighters are fucking god-tier at fighting.
>>45774080
Except 4e carries the distinction of being the pinnacle of the combat focused-ness of all editions.
A defective, overly complicated non-combat skill system was replaced by a rudimentary, defective non-combat skill system.
>>45772862
Just play Fantasy craft.
>>45772862
you can really just answer "yes" to any question that about casters beating martials at something in 3.5/PF. Like you could have a campaign of competitive napkin folding and wizards will still destroy at it.
>>45774342
I dunno, 4e's skills work a good sight better than 3.5s on that front.
Passive Perception/Insight was a godsend for investigation games and it's a lot easier for everyone to be useful due to less skill bloat.
I had a lot of fun with a few minisessions with my current monk who went on a full scooby-doo adventure with some of her non-adventurer friends.
It reay depends, I have had games that where fun as he'll and we played for like 4-5 sessions without fighting a single thing and in that game I think the only rolls we ever did were for diplomacy and perception to notice things. Not once did it come up however if you had a full caster with levels who used their spells even the attribute buffs would have made everything a cake walk. It depends on the DM and how many rolls they require.I really hate games with social "combat" and abilities. The whole "I know a guy in this town because it says I do." always seems a bit contrived.
>>45772875
What systems are good for that kind of thing then?
What mechanics equipt a system to do intrigue, investigation, and politics?
>>45774342
>Except 4e carries the distinction of being the pinnacle of the combat focused-ness of all editions.
Says the guy who is baiting.
Look, man, the people who have played the game know better, and the people who haven't have been heard so much shit, they don't even care.
>>45774715
The only difference is that some systems have rules for "investigation" (that come down to "roll these dice", such as DH or WoD), and other systems expect the GM to adjudicate the situation as they see fit (4e expects the DM to tell the players to "roll that dice").
Anything others tell you is fucking lies and game system favoritism with a dose of grognard oneupmanship.
>>45774862
Bait?
Would you like to dispute that Skill Challenges, Rituals and Martial Practices are non-functioning afterthoughts to the combat system?
>>45774873
Skill challenges worked after they got the math right.
Rituals were the solution to the game breaking potential of spells, and if you played other games, you'd notice that similar spells carried a high opportunity cost to balance them out. Unless you were one of those people always hunting for your next + weapon/armor, you would always have enough money to use them when you needed them.
Martial practices had the luck of coming out towards the end, and weren't expanded on.
See, here's how you know you are bait: Only 3.x tried to place rules on the number of situations as it did in the franchise. All other editions covered combat heavily, skill and highlight situations moderately, and left other situations up to the DM to rule how he sought fit.
Only if you compare 4e to 3.x, which itself is the anomaly of the franchise, does 4e seem any way out of place. Logical fallacies that require the reader to be a 3.x fan and have no experience with the rest of D&D as a whole in order to swallow.
Y'know, bait.
>but please, continue, I have little to do until my game starts in an hour
>>45774873
4e fans don't bait. They grognard harder than any other kind of fan boy.
Leave him alone it'll just be an endless cascade of replies.
>>45774715
Any game that has a high death rate. Because success in confronting the opposition will hinge on preparation and planning. Which requires a lot of investigation.
>D&D
It also helps when you use a system that encourages the player to get a wide a aŕray of good skills instead of focusing on a "build". You know so they actually CAN investigate and get involved in your politics.
So I'd say something like WoD or BRP.
>>45772875
/thread
>>45772862
Yes, because divination/mind magics are EVEN WORSE about walking all over everyone else's schtick.Simple hotfix: Allow EITHER Rangers and Rogues OR Wizards, not both.
>>45772862
Those ghosts are cute.
>>45774715
Have a look at Exalted 3rd Ed for a system built to support those things.
>>45774872
Thats basically ehat i thought, and have observed. I was hopeing to hear something different though because i do think it is kinda unfortunate that no good system exists for it (that isnt highly specialized for a particular social setting, like maid or whatever) for non-combat stuff when it normally comprises more than half of the session.
On one hand maybe its better this way; there is nothing inherently wrong with freeform aside from that physical conflict resolution sucks, so it makes sense that mechanical systems would focus almost entirely on fixing just that.
On the other hand, it is nearly impossible to design interesting non-combat magic/abilities/merits/etc for a game with thin non-combat rules. Combat generally has a robust system of action economy, damage type, damage resolution, defense, health effects, damage mitigation, positioning, and so on for magic/abilities/whatever to modify in interesting ways. Social abilities/modifiers can do what? +1 diplomacy?
>>45774873
Rituals worked fine.
Martial Practices are fine in how they work, they just turned up at the tail end of the system.
Skill challenges are pretty good as long as you don't just flat tell the players 'This is a skill challenge'.
>>45775033
>On the other hand, it is nearly impossible to design interesting non-combat magic/abilities/merits/etc for a game with thin non-combat rules
That literally comes down to the gm, and realizing that investigation is not about dice rolls.
If you have to distill your investigation to a +2 on a diplomacy dice roll, you fucked up a long time ago. If anything, dice rolls help the investigation along, or open doors, they should not settle it. The players and their own beat work should come to the end of it.
The reason it doesn't work in 3.x D&D is the spells that force npcs to do what you want are basic and very available.
>>45775033
That anon is full of shit though. There is much more to Exalted 3's social influence or investigation system, for example.
>>45775061
I agree with you. I think I didnt express my point right.
My issue isnt with how the lack of non-combat rules effects how you resolve non-combat situations, but with how it effects the non-combat identity of characters.
Combat abilities tend to give characters tons of rich identity. There is a huge list of combat magic/abilities/skills/feats/whatever in most games and the ones you choose and combine make your character who he or she is, independent of roleplay.
There is almost no equivalent for non-combat identity though, it is almost entirely represented by roleplay, which results in a lot of unsatisfying experiences such as
>"low cha" players being unable to play noble or "high cha" characters
>vice versa (high cha players will usually "turn up" when the party is actually in a pinch, regardless of who they are rping
>general metaness
>character inconsistency
And so on. Sure, if you have a room of great rpers you may never have a problem with this, but such a group is hardly the best measure of a system as they could likely have fun without a system at all.
I think exploration could work since most of that is in the DM's court.
>>45774357
Best answer in the thread.
>>45772875
>>45773964
>this meme
God, you guys are STILL butthurt?
People prefer D&D over your shit system. Constantly bitching about that on the internet isn't going to change that, no matter how self-deluded you wind up making yourself.
All it takes is a single session of D&D to completely unravel all the myths you try to spin about it, like it being bad for roleplaying or not versatile enough for space campaigns.
>>45775656
>like it being bad for roleplaying
I regularly GM pathfinder. Roleplaying works best when it's not hampered by the damn skill system and vague spell effects.
>or not versatile enough for space campaigns
Please say you don't do this. Please say you don't actually try to run space campaigns in fucking D&D when there are so many other systems that actually work for space campaigns.
>>45774715
REIGN
>>45775656
Im neither of those anons but god damn. You cant read for shit.
What they're saying is that maybe OP should look into a system that is more suited to what he wants to run and I'd have to agree with that. D20 is not the only system around but people use it for EVERYTHING when it should be reserved for dungeon delving and combat heavy games.
>TL;DR Dont ask an electrician to fix your plumbing
>>45775818
That's cool. I'm a 5e DM. I have no problems with roleplaying, and Spelljammer.
Guess that eliminates the whole "you can't" or "it's automatically bad" arguments you might have.
>>45775900
No, they're bitching because OP DARED to mention D&D.
Stop trying to defend them/yourself.
It's like you think that anytime someone mentions Exalted or 40k or whatever, someone should pop in and ask "Have you tried playing D&D?"
>>45775922
The day someone will ask me how to turn his medieval BRP game into something more action oriented, I will GLADLY tell him "Have you considered D&D or one of its many clones."
Now chill nigga. Dont act like D&D is beign held down by some kind of boogeyman conspiracy to ruin your fun. Its the most played system by a landslide. Its so widespread whenever some one says tabletop i automatically think d20.
Its healthy to remind people of the alternatives to pathfinder and co.
>>45775900
You need to read a little further, anon, because it was already brought up that the only thing other systems have is X dice rolls to solve mystery rules, that you shouldn't be using dice rolls to settle mysteries to begin with, and that the only edition of D&D that makes mysteries a problem is 3.x due to the outlier nature of it's magic.
You could literally do the same in any other version of D&D, with 5th causing the second most issues, without a fucking care, but you are too quick to drink the koolaid and drop critical thinking or any actual knowledge of what you are talking about.
>intrigue, investigation, exploration, and politics
>D&D
>>45772862
Only good social rpg with decent fighting and social shit that has great weight to it is L5R.
>>45775997
I was just pointing out that anon was acting like a fucking retard.
>>45776093
Says the guy defending people who have a crippling need to bitch about D&D whenever it's mentioned.
>>45775976
How about you stop pretending this is about reminding people about other systems when there's plenty of threads about those other systems.
If someone is specifically asking about D&D, that's not them asking you to try and proselytize your shit. So, get your shit together, get it all together, get it all wrapped up in a little backpack, get all your shit together, and go try and "remind" people in threads not specifically telling you that they want to play D&D.
>>45776174
Look, maybe you're the kind of person who'd stand back and watch a cripple try to walk up the down escalator, but that doesn't mean other people won't pat the fellow on the back and be like, "dude, look, if you take THIS escalator you can make it!"
>>45776117
>>45775997
>>45775922
Actually you know what? I was beign retarded. Today, the faggot is I. I sincerely apologise for my knee-jerk post.
You guys are cool.
>>45776192
Your analogy is hyperbolic and lacks anything real mettle, rendering it as mere bitching.
I'm sorry your mother remarried and you aren't ready to acknowledge D&D as your new father, but we're not asking you to call him "dad", we're asking you to not try and start a scene everytime we sit down together for dinner.
>>45774157
If by god-tier you mean sometimes as good as what the Cleric or Wizard can summon, sure...
>>45774715
Fantasy craft has rules on Disposition, Attitudes, Renown, Contacts and Holdings, investigating people, and actual non-combat social focus classes that can dominate social situations, while still being useful in combat (likewise, a well built Soldier, the fightiest fight character) can be useful at social if you want them to be.
>>45775656
>or not versatile enough for space campaigns.
>>45772862
give obstacles that require strength and dex checks, like swiping a key or a letter off someone, or moving the statue blocking the secret passage out of the way
>>45777549
Eh, I'd totally run a space fairing PF game. PF was made for high fantasy galactic conquest style adventures. It'd work pretty great to emulate the space operas
