Fuck Dragon Age 3, this thread is now about RPG stat systems

[mediocrepoet]

Monte Cook is a moron. Only a moron would put bad choices in a system on purpose.

I haven't liked anything I've ever seen him publish.

 

[Grunker]

Only a moron would put bad choices in a system on purpose

Basic fucking truths of system design shot down by yours truly - Roguey.

I see you still have a teenager's of average nerds concept of what 'game balance' means. Read some stuff, and come back when you realize what a floating concept it is, and how building your game around "useful mechanics" or "perfect balance" is the surest way to fuck up your game. Every great system out there has tons of willfully "bad" (using heavy quotation makrs here) choices implemented.

I haven't liked anything I've ever seen him publish.

3rd edition is a great game. Fantastic even. Extremely unpolished of course, but a gem of system design. Making a focused 3rd was the tricky part. 3.5 and Pathfinder were constructed on the foundation of an unpolished, great design.

The Banewarrens is an excellent adventure.

 

[bminorkey]

I don't really see where this complete and precise vision is supposed to come from, if not by matching together lots of little puzzle pieces and seeing what fits. The idea that good design is a hierarchical and systematic process is a myth. Inspiration isn't some all-encompassing epiphany that hits you and then you see everything clear. What you're doing de facto is thinking "this idea is really cool", "this idea works well with that idea" or "this [irrelevant] idea is interesting" and bridging together the gaps. Does it work? Great. Does it suck? Refine, revamp, or trash and look for a better idea.

 

[mediocrepoet]

3rd edition is a great game. Fantastic even. Extremely unpolished of course, but a gem of system design. Making a focused 3rd was the tricky part. 3.5 and Pathfinder were constructed on the foundation of an unpolished, great design.

I suppose I tend to view 3E as a collaboration involving Monte Cook as opposed to something he did on his own. I was mainly referring to his unofficial splatbooks and the like which tended to be filled to the gills with garbage, imo. I quite like 3E as well.

EDIT: quote tags fixed. I suck.

 

[Grunker]

I don't really see where this "big picture" is supposed to come from, if not by matching together lots of little puzzle pieces and seeing what fits. The idea that good design is a hierarchical and systematic process is a myth. Inspiration isn't some all-encompassing epiphany that hits you and then you see everything clear. What you're doing de facto is thinking "this (low-level) idea is really cool", "this idea works well with that idea" or "this (high-level) idea is interesting" and bridging together the gaps. Does it work? Great. Does it suck? Refine, revamp, or trash and look for a better idea.

GURPS utterly destroys this half-baked argument pulled out of your ass. This is the basic vision of GURPS, all other design choices spring from this short text (this is from fourth, but the intro text has changed very little from edition to edition):

GURPS stands for “Generic Universal RolePlaying System.” It was originally a joke . . . a code word to describe the game while we looked for a “real” name. Years went by – literally! – as the game developed. We never found a better name, and now that the Fourth Edition is in your hands, the name is more appropriate than ever.
“Generic.” Some people like quick, fast-moving games, where the referee makes lots of decisions to keep things moving. Others want ultimate detail, with rules for every contingency. Most of us fall somewhere in between. GURPS starts with simple rules, and – especially in the combat system – builds up to as much optional detail as you like. But it’s still the same game. You may all use it differently, but your campaigns will all be compatible.
“Universal.” I’ve always thought it was silly for game companies to publish one set of rules for fantasy, another one for Old West, another one for science fiction, and another one for super powers. GURPS is one set of rules that’s comprehensive enough to let you use any background. There are worldbooks and supplements that “fine-tune” the generic system for any game world you want. But they are still compatible. If you want to take your Wild West gun-slinger and your WWII commando fortune hunting in Renaissance Italy . . . go for it! And because that’s exactly the kind of game that so many of our fans play, the Fourth Edition adds an over-arching background created to support just such campaigns.
“RolePlaying.” This is not just a hack-and-slash game. The rules are written to make true roleplaying possible – and, in fact, to encourage it. GURPS is a game in which you take on the persona of another character – and pretend, for a little while, to bethat character.
“System.” It really is. Most other RPGs started out as a simple set of rules, and then were patched and modified, ad infinitum. That makes them hard to play. GURPS, more than ever in the Fourth Edition, is a unified whole. We’ve gone to a great deal of effort to make sure that it all works together, and it all works. GURPS will let you create any character you can imagine, and do anything you can think of . . . and it all makes sense. GURPS has been in print now for nearly 20 years. It was not designed in a vacuum; every game builds on the ones that came before.

Pay special attention to the "System." part. Whenever a rules is discussed, implemented or changed in GURPS, these four pillars are in the back of the skull of the designers.

Most, if not all, great system designers work this way. With a clear, short vision from which every element is constructed. When the basic system is done from this one, fundamental idea, the system becomes a unified whole; everything fits, and everything works together. It's why D&D 3rd edition - even if it falls short of point four in some cases - still feels like an overall, unified system. Because every single part of the basic rules was made from a clear vision, which is implicit in the very design, and hard to stray from. 3rd edition is a clusterfuck of a million different designers' ideas of how to structure the system, yet the basis on which it was build still somehow manage to hold together this clusterfuck.

The truely great systems like GURPS contain even more streamlined (in the good way) system capabilities. All because they are constructed on a solid basis: the idea of the system.

Half-assed systems are made by ignoring vision and focusing solely on mechanics.

 

[bminorkey]

You're identifying a system that happens to be a unified whole with the design process that went behind it. Upon thinking of these four generic, almost buzzword-level heuristics one does not spontaneously generate a great system. Indeed, these four rules don't give you much of anything - the fact the guys (or would it be guy) designing GURPS seemingly started with them was not the Rosetta stone that unlocked their inherent game design genius. Really, I wish I could apply Descartes' Method to problems in analysis and expect the solution to poof itself into existence. Doesn't work like that.

Unless GURPS is truly exceptional, the real story was probably a bit different. There are a few reasons we sometimes see system designers explain their work in terms of first principles. One of these is simply the organisational effectiveness of telling your narrative hierarchically. When you come up with a pitch to sell your game, you want to make it seem as if everything in it follows a precise, foolproof recipe for success (this saves you the need for credentials, for example). Convoluted narratives are boring, tedious to explain, and people don't get them. Another, related reason is the simple psychological observation that very often, people don't go meta on their thought process. They don't consider the order they came up with things, how they arrived at X which led to Y which turned out to be stupid so instead we got Z. When they eventually find it necessary to articulate their thought process, the picture is often far more idealistic and 'pretty' than the reality of the thing. This doesn't just apply to game systems: pick up just about any book about the history of a certain topic in mathematics, physics, or anything, really, and compare it with the "unified vision" you'll find in your standard textbook. You'd be surprised. (Alternatively, one need only hang around MathExchange or similar sites for a short while to see how professional mathematicians trivialize their better grasp of concepts that stems from talent and years of hard work with bland, obvious heuristics that they preach with religious fervor).

The more accurate picture behind GURPS is probably this: drawing on years of gaming experience, inspiration, and a knack for game design, this one Steve Jackson slowly nurtured in his mind some concrete ideas and some heuristicsfor a game system which turned out to be pretty cool. When he finally came to the realization he wants to design a whole game system (and we can rest assured this realization came much later), our protagonist Steve went through a long and arduous (or short and trivial) process of screening the good from the bad, tying it neatly in a package of first principles that proved both an excellent pitch and a great "excuse" for why his system happens to be better than others.

Now it's 5 am and I'm going to sleep.

e- ok, now it's 5 am and now I'm going to sleep

 

[Grunker]

Have you actually designed a system? Organized a project?

You always go back to your original vision. It's pretty basic stuff. I guarantee you Sawyer and his team have a vision document they refer with constantly (my complaint is that they only have one for the game as a whole, not for the RPG system they intend to make). When you design, of course you have basic discussions like "does this work?", but you always return to your core to say "does this fit? Is this the direction we wanted to go in?"

You're accusing me of using empty buzzwords and buying hyperboled narratives, yet it is very, very clear to me that you have never, ever read GURPS and that you are pulling your arguments out of thin air. I have rarely read interviews or hear Steve talk about his system; the truth that GURPS designs its subsystems based on those four pillars comes from the fact that every. single. subsystem functions in accordance with those pillars. I'm not buying some made-up narrative, I'm reading the system and finding that it all functions according to the vision, as a unified whole.

So you see, unlike you, I'm not just pulling these arguments out of my ass. GURPS' subsystems are all generic and modular, they can all function with every single other element of the system (i.e. no system paradoxes), and it functions as a unified whole; there are no patches, it is all streamlined, and new books follow in the footsteps of old.

What you're basically saying is: WELL I GUESS THAT WAS JUST ALL RANDOM BLIND LUCK LOL.

Of course it wasn't. It was good design.

 

[Roguey]

I see you still have a teenager's of average nerds concept of what 'game balance' means.

No, I believe they think it means "everything is equal" and that's false. Balance should mean everything is useful and has trade-offs. There should never be anything in a game that you look at and decide "I would never choose that in a million years unless I was making a gimmick build to show off my skillz" or "That's so awesome I can't justify not taking it over all those inferior choices unless I'm making a gimmick build to show off my skillz."

3rd edition is a great game. Fantastic even. Extremely unpolished of course, but a gem of system design.

Nope, still siding with http://www.choiceofweapon.net/index.php/intelligent-design-is-sometimes-good-for-you/ and http://www.choiceofweapon.net/index.php/dd-emergent-gameplay-third-edition-style-omnificer/
Good game systems are easy to learn and difficult to master as opposed to D&D which is difficult to learn (on purpose) and absurdly easy to master. Awful, awful game that's only worthwhile because of its many cool spellz and monsterz. Fortunately spellz and monsterz can be transferred to another, superior system.

 

[Grunker]

D&D which is difficult to learn

My student-job is teaching and playing this game with kids from 10-15 years of age. Some with reading and learning difficulties.They learn it within an hour. Fuck off.

The only ones who think D&D is a hard to game to learn is people in the video game industry who has swallowed the paradigm that addition is hard.

 

[bminorkey]

You always go back to your original vision. It's pretty basic stuff. I guarantee you Sawyer and his team have a vision document they refer with constantly (my complaint is that they only have one for the game as a whole, not for the RPG system they intend to make). When you design, of course you have basic discussions like "does this work?", but you always return to your core to say "does this fit? Is this the direction we wanted to go in?"

I never said there's no vision at all: just that this vision is not something that hits you at once, like some sort of divine inspiration. It's something that becomes clearer as you flesh out all aspects of the game, and something that inevitably changes as you flesh out your game.

You're accusing me of using empty buzzwords and buying hyperboled narratives, yet it is very, very clear to me that you have never, ever read GURPS and that you are pulling your arguments out of thin air. I have rarely read interviews or hear Steve talk about his system; the truth that GURPS designs its subsystems based on those four pillars comes from the fact that every. single. subsystem functions in accordance with those pillars. I'm not buying some made-up narrative, I'm reading the system and finding that it all functions according to the vision, as a unified whole.

I did not accuse you of using empty buzzwords.

So you see, unlike you, I'm not just pulling these arguments out of my ass. GURPS' subsystems are all generic and modular, they can all function with every single other element of the system (i.e. no system paradoxes), and it functions as a unified whole; there are no patches, it is all streamlined, and new books follow in the footsteps of old.

I don't see why you insist I'm pulling these arguments out of my ass after I gave you much more empirical evidence than you gave me (oh, I dunno, almost the whole of fucking mathematics).

What you're basically saying is: WELL I GUESS THAT WAS JUST ALL RANDOM BLIND LUCK LOL.

But that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying design isn't the idealized process you're making it to be: people can't just poof the higher-level vision out of nowhere and expect the pieces to fit themselves into place. Yes, by all means, come up with general heuristics that guide you: but these heuristics will be just that, heuristics. There's no replacement for constant experimentation and small bits of inspiration or "wouldn't it be cool if" thoughts. (Hell, it's very likely the reason you came up with these higher-level principles in the first place is that they fit with your idea of what mechanics or concrete 'things' you want the game / system to have).

 

[Grunker]

that hits you at once, like some sort of divine inspiration.

Nice strawman. A vision is something you outline before you start your project. I never said anything it was some kind of magical muse guiding your artistic hand. This:

It's something that becomes clearer as you flesh out all aspects of the game, and something that inevitably changes as you flesh out your game.

truth is not an argument that invalidates mine, it is an extension of it. I'm arguing you should start with a vision and stick to it. You're saying; "well, changes happen the other way too." Yeah. You're right. So?

people can't just poof the higher-level vision out of nowhere and expect the pieces to magically fit themselves in place.

I've never said anything like this. You're using another strawman to reduce my argument (good design starts with a vision) to an abomination (good design magically transforms out of a vision). That's bullshit, and since you seem eager to have a honest debate I'm quite surprised you fall back to such a cliché.

There's no replacement for constant experimentation and small bits of inspiration or "wouldn't it be cool if" thoughts. (Hell, it's very likely the reason you came up with these higher-level principles in the first place is that they fit with your idea of what mechanics or concrete 'things' you want the game / system to have).

Of course you constantly wheigh the choices you make and test whether they work. I've never said anything but, and I'm surprised you seem to actually believe I have. Let's go back to my original statement:

You start with a vision. You design mechanics and subsystems in accordance with that vision. You get a unified system with a clear goal, where everything fits to gether.

Of course you wheigh mechanics against one another in step 2. Of course you test the mechanics you develop in step two. Of course experiment and play around with stuff in Step 2. Step two is the bulk of the entire process. But that is not the same as throwing random game mechanic ideas that you think would be cool into a bucket, shaking them and then producing a system out of that. Which was what I was arguing seemed to be the process behind Sawyer's system design.


Then you get these systems where the subsystems are completely disconnected from one another. Magic is an entirely different system than hand-to-hand fighting, and you have to invent "bridge-rules" that connect the two so they can interact.

So please, take a step back. I think either you and I agree, or I am not understanding your point correctly. The fundamental reasion we're having this discussion is whether video game developers of cRPGs should proceed constructing RPG systems for their games as in recent years (develop sub-systems through cool ideas and then smash them all together hoping the system will make sense).

 

[Roguey]

My student-job is teaching and playing this game with kids from 10-15 years of age. Some with reading and learning difficulties.They learn it within an hour. Fuck off.

Those kids definitely don't know how to make good characters that can avoid falling into the many noob traps unless you're actually telling them how (and telling isn't learning) or making content for their bad characters by easing up on them (which is what a good DM should do but once again isn't learning).

 

[Grunker]

My student-job is teaching and playing this game with kids from 10-15 years of age. Some with reading and learning difficulties.They learn it within an hour. Fuck off.

Those kids definitely don't know how to make good characters that can avoid falling into the many noob traps unless you're actually telling them how (and telling isn't learning) or making content for their bad characters by easing up on them (which is what a good DM should do but once again isn't learning).

That is not learning a system. That is mastering a system.

Learning a system = Knowing how stuff works, knowing the basics of making a character and playing out combat. Being able to use the system to play.

Mastering a system = Knowing how to make a good character, knowing how to fight properly. Being able to use the system to play well.

You yourself stated that the goal should be for the first to be easy, and the second to be difficult. Now you're saying "yeah, your kids might learn D&D fast - but I bet they master it slowly!" Make up your mind.

And that's without mentioning the fact that there are plenty of GREAT systems that reverse this paradigm (Blood Bowl, for example), and work as systems that create fantastic gameplay even though they have completely skewered the traditional concepts of balance and mastery.

 

[bminorkey]

What you're basically saying is: WELL I GUESS THAT WAS JUST ALL RANDOM BLIND LUCK LOL.

But that is not the same as throwing random game mechanic ideas that you think would be cool into a bucket, shaking them and then producing a system out of that. Which was what I was arguing seemed to be the process behind Sawyer's system design.

I like how I'm the one who ends up getting the backlash for using a strawman (okay that second one isn't strictly a strawman but it's still a very superficial way to represent Sawyer). M:

So please, take a step back.

'kay. If you want me to.

 

[Roguey]

That is not learning a system. That is mastering a system.

Mastering the system is playing well with the character you're created, which is different than knowing how to make a good character. A person who has mastered D&D can do a lot more with a gimped character than a new one who's given a great character. The purposely-bad character build options are a pointless barrier to entry that make learning the system more difficult and only serve to fuel the egos of sad sadomasochists.

Oh and I don't want to get too involved in that other debate you have going on there but

There are many pitfalls to system design and I believe most designers trip those pitfalls by moving into implementation details too quickly. I believe some keys to success in system design (and for design in general) are to establish clear goals, to frame what those goals will accomplish in terms of player experience, and to continually return to those goals and player experiences to ensure that nothing was lost in the details of implementation.
...
When I look at any system, I examine both the system's design as well as the content that uses the system. I believe this is something that system designers should always do. A system is only as good as the content that makes use of it; content that fails to make use of a system (or vice versa) will always create a disappointing experience.

don't strike me as the words of someone who's "throwing random game mechanics ideas (he thinks) would be cool into a bucket, shaking them and then producing a system out of that."

 

[Grunker]

Stuff

An out-stretched hand isn't what it used to be, I guess.

don't strike me as the words of someone who's "throwing random game mechanics ideas (he thinks) would be cool into a bucket, shaking them and then producing a system out of that."

I can only speak of what I've seen him say concerning PE's system. All he has talked about has been random sub-systems. You present me with a text or vid where he actually puts your quote into practice in PE; a place where he actually talks about his vision for the system, then we'll talk.

And again, that's without delving into the primary discussion of: Why the fuck are they wasting their dwindling resources on developing a hobby-system instead of using a free, professionally developed one?

The purposely-bad character build options are a pointless barrier to entry that make learning the system more difficult and only serve to fuel the egos of sad sadomasochists.

I never said D&D was flawless. In fact, I called 3rd edition a incredibly flawed gem, which took nearly 10 years to craft into the fantastic system (for what it wants to achieve) that is Pathfinder.

The blatantly overpowered bullshit in D&D was not intended as such, like the purposely "bad" stuff (bad in combat maybe, but D&D is not just a combat game). Your "purposely bad" feat is another one's goldmine because he isn't playing the system like you are.

That's why the traditional concept of balance is so idiotic. It doesn't work without viewing assets of the system entirely as though they only worked in a space of conflict with other assets (practical examples are combat or other situations of opposed rolls or stats).

 

[bminorkey]

An out-stretched hand isn't what it used to be, I guess.

No bro, I'm not passing the bait. You don't get to pretend you successfully convinced anyone that your banal, bad-engineering-book-level idea of system design is in any way based in reality. Either you stop at your request that we finish arguing and suffer the inevitable snappy backlash (such is the internet) or we go all the way down. Beggars can't be internet_tough_guys.jpg.

inb4 you can't suck it up and end up having another argument though it's clear you don't want to have an argument with three different people in this thread. this is how you repay me huh, huh?

 

[Roguey]

And again, that's without delving into the primary discussion of: Why the fuck are they wasting their dwindling resources on developing a hobby-system instead of using a free, professionally developed one?

Ah, once again claiming that someone who's getting paid to make a system is doing it as a "hobby."

And it's because "Generally speaking, I think most tabletop RPG systems are crummy...When I play in a tabletop game, it's usually because I like the setting/GM/players. When I GM, I adapt or modify the existing rule set or create my own." And because they want to make a system that supports the content they want to make rather than having to make content based on which system they're licensing, as referred to in the previous quote.

The blatantly overpowered bullshit in D&D was not intended as such, like the purposely "bad" stuff (bad in combat maybe, but D&D is not just a combat game). Your "purposely bad" feat is another one's goldmine because he isn't playing the system like you are.

Monte Cook said otherwise and computer role playing games are far less flexible when it comes to supporting suboptimal choices than a human being.

 

[Grunker]

An out-stretched hand isn't what it used to be, I guess.

No bro, I'm not passing the bait. You don't get to pretend you successfully convinced anyone that your banal, bad-engineering-book-level idea of system design is in any way based in reality. Either you stop at your request that we finish arguing and suffer the inevitable snappy backlash (such is the internet) or we go all the way down. Beggars can't be internet_tough_guys.jpg.

Points for drama I guess, lol.

"all the way down", haha. Get the fuck out of here son

once again claiming that someone who's getting paid to make a system is doing it as a "hobby."

If I convince someone to pay me for giving him medicine, does that make me a doctor?

Generally speaking, I think most tabletop RPG systems are crummy...When I play in a tabletop game, it's usually because I like the setting/GM/players. When I GM, I adapt or modify the existing rule set or create my own.

"I think other systems are bad and I want to make my own" Is not a design vision. It is, however, exactly what every 16-19-year-old Dungeons & Dragons player state right before they create a horrendous home-brew system-abomination of their very own.

 

[bminorkey]

Points for drama I guess, lol.

"all the way down", haha. Get the fuck out of here son

Nuh-uh. I can suffer impotent attempts at critical thinking, an inability to clearly present coherent cases and a tendency to ground your arguments in facile, pearls-of-wisdom style folkore but, you know, there's nothing quite so obtuse as spitting good-natured humor in the face.

hovertext: except maybe calling someone out on that obtuseness. not classy enough for the internet.

 

[Grunker]

Points for drama I guess, lol.

"all the way down", haha. Get the fuck out of here son

Nuh-uh. I can suffer impotent attempts at critical thinking, an inability to clearly present coherent cases and a tendency to ground your arguments in facile, pearls-of-wisdom style folkore but, you know, there's nothing quite so obtuse as spitting good-natured humor in the face.

hovertext: except maybe calling someone out on that obtuseness. not classy enough for the internet.

 

[MetalCraze]

Look. It is quite simple: Video game developers are basically fan-amateurs in RPG system-development. And I have never, ever played a fan-made system that wasn't complete crap.

It's great that you are just a silly newfag otherwise you would've been unlucky enough to play games like Wiz8 and JA2

 

[Grunker]

Look. It is quite simple: Video game developers are basically fan-amateurs in RPG system-development. And I have never, ever played a fan-made system that wasn't complete crap.

It's great that you are just a silly newfag otherwise you would've been unlucky enough to play games like Wiz8 and JA2

Wiz8 was built on the foundations of AD&D and based on 8 games worth of experience. JA2 is not constructed like a traditional RPG system, and the character system certainly wasn't as good as tactical P&P that existed at the time. I have played both games quite extensively, what's your point?

 

[Roguey]

If I convince someone to pay me for giving him medicine, does that make me a doctor?

It'd make you a con artist. Sawyer's been in the game industry for over a decade, has adapted D&D and SPECIAL, and worked on creating systems for multiple unreleased games (Seven Dwarves, Aliens, North Carolina). Urquhart really seems to like him (enough to quickly promote him from web designer to junior designer on IWD to lead designer on The Black Hound/Icewind Dale 2/Van Buren-after-Avellone-left and constantly giving him leadership positions since then) and he also comes highly recommended from Annie:
http://www.rpgcodex.net/content.php?id=207

Josh Sawyer was a lot of fun to work with in NWN2, and his matter-of-fact nature for keeping an overall design up to its proper pace is absolutely impressive (plus, the man knows him some system design).

http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/inde...ure-the-26-best-rpgs.27585/page-5#post-630494

IWD2 I know for sure was Sawyer's game, as well as the upcoming Aliens RPG, and trust me when I say that what he did to save NWN2 and get it out the door was nothing short of amazing (I have mad respect for Josh, and I think he's underappreciated as a designer. In my time working with the man every chat with him has been a reminder that the dude is badass and knows his shit).

http://www.rpgcodex.net/forums/index.php?threads/gaider.28722/page-3#post-663014

The characters are fucking RAD, and I did regret that I only got a little time to work with them. But it's awesome, the systems are solid as hell, everything I've seen of it I was impressed with, and as always Josh Sawyer knows what the fuck he is doing.

Of course now I've risked setting you off about how Dead State needs to get a licensed system made by profeshunal hacks like Monte Cook instead of coming up with their own.

"I think other systems are bad and I want to make my own" Is not a design vision. It is, however, exactly what every 16-19-year-old Dungeons & Dragons player state right before they create a horrendous home-brew system-abomination of their very own.

Good thing Josh isn't an amateur 16-19 year old D&D player with no critical thinking skills then, see above.

 

[Captain Shrek]

snip

let's walk through this piece by piece.

IWD2 was an amzingly designed game in terms of combat. I give you that. This is of course considering the limitations of the engine and AI at that time. But to say that NWN2 has good design is nothing short of revealing that one is completely incapable of applying sensory perception when confronted with favorite developer. I have nothing to say about Aliens RPG since I never played it (neither did you I am guessing).

Which makes exactly ONE game that he designed and had good mechanics. And tell you what, that mechanics comes from BG games. It is just the encounter design that is good for IWD2.