My first actual D&D session today. Here is what I learned:
Stormvessel
Member Posts: 654
in Off-Topic
For the first time I actually took part in a real D&D session. And it was a disaster - at least the first two hours. We started a new campaign and we will be doing it every Saturday. I have had some experience with D&D before but it was mainly just creating characters and messing about. Nothing like this. Here are some things I learned:
1. Baldur's Gate is part of D&D - not D&D. D&D is a massive universe. Baldur's Gate is a CAMPAIGN. It uses from D&D the same way a real campaign session might use from D&D. But it doesn't encompass all of D&D, not even close. For instance, on this campaign, we are doing quests and have a setting. It's part of the D&D universe. But the universe is vast. There are so many weapons, items, magics, settings, and other things that aren't in these PC games. The PC games are just single campaigns that draw from the universe, nothing more. I didn't realize that. I do now.
2. The thing that makes D&D "D&D" isn't the ruleset. What makes D&D "D&D" is the interaction. The human element. We can deviate from the ruleset entirely but it will still be D&D. Interacting with each other is really unlike anything I've ever experienced before.
3. The GM is GOD.
4. The mental element. It was very rocky the first two hours but the last two hours went well. Here is the thing - by the end of the session I had a mental understanding, a mental picture, of this alternate reality. Everything was happening in my mind. Kind of freaky. The human interaction in this game is what gives the game it's power. Totally unlike anything I've ever experienced.
5. It's hard to roleplay at first. It was embarrassing. The first two hours were extremely hard and I had a real tough go of it. I was making jokes that were just awful because I was nervous and I really embarrassed myself pretty badly. Pretending to be someone else for me, a 33 year old man, was something very hard to do. But the final two hours went great and it was worth it. Still wish I had the first half of the session to do over again.
1. Baldur's Gate is part of D&D - not D&D. D&D is a massive universe. Baldur's Gate is a CAMPAIGN. It uses from D&D the same way a real campaign session might use from D&D. But it doesn't encompass all of D&D, not even close. For instance, on this campaign, we are doing quests and have a setting. It's part of the D&D universe. But the universe is vast. There are so many weapons, items, magics, settings, and other things that aren't in these PC games. The PC games are just single campaigns that draw from the universe, nothing more. I didn't realize that. I do now.
2. The thing that makes D&D "D&D" isn't the ruleset. What makes D&D "D&D" is the interaction. The human element. We can deviate from the ruleset entirely but it will still be D&D. Interacting with each other is really unlike anything I've ever experienced before.
3. The GM is GOD.
4. The mental element. It was very rocky the first two hours but the last two hours went well. Here is the thing - by the end of the session I had a mental understanding, a mental picture, of this alternate reality. Everything was happening in my mind. Kind of freaky. The human interaction in this game is what gives the game it's power. Totally unlike anything I've ever experienced.
5. It's hard to roleplay at first. It was embarrassing. The first two hours were extremely hard and I had a real tough go of it. I was making jokes that were just awful because I was nervous and I really embarrassed myself pretty badly. Pretending to be someone else for me, a 33 year old man, was something very hard to do. But the final two hours went great and it was worth it. Still wish I had the first half of the session to do over again.
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Anyway, after a few sessions, you'll soon learn the following truths of tabletop RPGs:
1) No matter how hard the GM tries to make the campaign a serious and gripping story, with dramatic tension and shocking moments, the players will always find a way to turn it into Monty Python and the World's Silliest Adventurers.
2) "He needs a 20 to hit me so I'll be fine!" is one of the most famous last words. (well, statements, but...you know!)
3) The plot must always be derailed wherever possible.
Player 1: "Oh, I see such and such over there, maybe I will do such and such".
GM: "No, that's actually such and such. You can do no such and such thing."
One good example was when we killed the leader of a bandit camp. He was wearing fullplate and it took us a very long time to bring him down. One of our guys went down in that battle. After the battle, one player was adamant that he was going to have the armor. The GM tried to get it through to the player that the armor was useless, as the bandit had been run through. But he kept insisting that he would "repair it" or "get it repaired" when he had no such NWP. The GM had to eventually break the immersion by telling the guy to give it a rest already. And this wasn't a new player.
The idea is that a GM can add these rules in, depending on how hardcore he wants the game to be, and even make house-rules for certain situations, but if a player tries to contest it, you end up with hour-long discussions of why this or that should or shouldn't be possible, and it holds the game up. It's actually quite inconsiderate to the other players when people do that.
Besides, is it actually possible to repair a steel breastplate once it's finished? At the very most, I'd have ruled that he can take the parts that aren't wrecked and would have to get somebody to make him a new breastplate or whatever, and then he'd have the joy of figuring out how he's going to carry steel pauldrons, arm and leg guards, greaves, and a helmet.
Think about it this way: What D&D (or AD&D) calls "Plate Mail" is "Plates over chain". It's a base of chain mail with armor plates over the top to reinforce specific body parts. Field Plate and Full Plate are articulated, interlocking plates that basically cover *everything*. Full Plate has more plates, and covers better in places like the back of the neck, etc.
Now magical armor (at least in early editions of D&D, I don't know if they changed this later), have part of the magic being that they "Magically" adjust to fit *any* body type. So it's a "one size fits all" type thing.
Not everyone can harmoniously game together, and some people do not enjoy PnP much. I enjoy learning the ins and outs of the systems though.
Computerized D&D like Baldur's Gate came years later, when I was beyond school and working.
A couple of years ago, I tried to join an adult tabletop roleplaying group. The host had a huge table covered with hex board, and maps all over the walls, in his living room of all places. That seemed a little overboard and weird to me. I wound up not enjoying the experience, and I only went for two sessions.
What impressed me the most about how my perpective had changed from my years of playing on the computer, was the glacially slow pace of everything in the live version. We spent an entire three hour evening figuring out how to cross a river (I finally asked the mage if he could freeze it or something, and he said "Oh yeah, I have a water walk spell memorized.") The next three hour evening I spent there, we explored a house (nothing interesting was in it), and then *finally* found a secret passage to the basement through a detect evil spell.)
The next week there was to be combat with whatever was down there. But I didn't go back for it. I thought, "I've spent six hours so far cramping my butt in this uncomfortable folding chair, and we're just now gearing up for one combat? No thanks, I'm tired from work, and I want to sit in my recliner at home and do as many combats as I want (certainly more than one every three play sessoins) on my computer, which will do all the figuring and dice-rolling for me, behind the scenes at light speed. "
My high school group was more of a hack-n-slash group, while this adult group was way more into the roleplaying. Perhaps I would have enjoyed it more if they had been at least a little more action oriented. But with computer games, I can play any way I want, and if I don't like the setting, I can just change games, whenever I feel like it.
I think roleplaying in person requires that you really like the people you're spending time with. The game isn't really the main thing - the game is just something to do while socializing. The main thing is spending time with friends who you'd be spending time with any way, regardless of the activity. It's not a great way to meet new people, for me, because it doesn't let me get to know the new people - I'm only getting to know their characters, or how they act as GM's, instead of hearing them share about their real lives.
@LadyRhian I've actually been thinking about this, and from what I've seen, it seems to be: half plate is a 15th century gothic harness (which was sometimes worn with mail but not always), and full plate is a renaissance harness, while a breastplate is most likely cuirassier/demilancer armour. I've been struggling to pin down the exact period that Forgotten Realms is supposed to be parallel to, but I think I've gotten it down to late renaissance/early 17th century (only with a wider disparity in technology and with a bit of steampunk thrown in because why the hell not?!).
And yes, putting plate armour on takes ages - 10 combat rounds is incredibly generous. A squire who knows what he's doing generally takes 30-40 minutes to get a knight into his harness, it's not a suit that you can slip into. Each piece has to be buckled on and tied to arming points on the jack. Think of it as protective sports gear...you don't slip into a "suit of skater gear", or a "suit of Ice Hockey Padding", you have a bag full of components that you put on individually when you get ready to do sport.
As for carrying it...D&D only measures encumberance in terms of weight, but doesn't factor volume into the equation, simply ruling that "I can carry 200 pounds of kit, and a harness weighs less than 200 pounds, so I can just shove the whole thing into my backpack!"
Yeah. I suppose you *could* roughly tie it together, some parts, and wear it tied to your back, but it would be incredibly unwieldy and probably make the character fall over and squirm like an overturned turtle very often. If I was DMing that session, I probably wouldn't say it was impossible, I'd just make it more trouble than it's worth. It keeps getting caught on things, you overbalance going up inclines, it makes you slower, you get penalties to your Dex bonus while you are carrying it… and so on, and so on. There are ways to make a player go, "Ugh, Scroo this!" rather than flat out saying, "No, you CANNOT do this."
@BelgarathMTH You may have had a not very good GM. GM's do try to move stuff along. But it also might be the fault of the other players, like the mage who had the water-walking spell. He should know that and proffer it as a solution rather than sitting around like a bump on a log. There are plenty of people who roll-play rather than role-play. You also need one person in a party or group to be the actual leader, because if it's just six characters heading in the same direction, someone is going to do something stupid and get everyone else killed. (See some of the RP Games in the RP forum for examples!) Not that there isn't a good chance of that *anyhow*, but with a good leader, the chance of it is much less.
If you're into it, you can join my RP game on the forum right now. I have a spot opening up (since @scriver has been a no-show for 99.8% of the adventure). I can offer you the part of Khalid, or any other of the BG NPCs. See if you like it, and if not, you can drop out if you wish.
Wherever possible, if a DM uses any house rules, they should have that written down and clearly communicated. Rules that are changed 'on the fly' should get voted on. That said, I like DM screens for rolling, and letting the DM fudge results; TPK due to bad luck is bad DMing, though TPK due to atrocious stupidity probably needs to be allowed sometimes.
10 combat rounds is 10 minutes remember in PnP, and that requires heavy armour proficiency. Iirc, you NEED assistance for donning full plate, and can't properly don it without. Period-wise, full plate is post medieval for sure. Half-plate in 3rd ed represents about the best 'medieval' style armour, and its substantially clumsier to wear. Like chainmail, its not designed to distribute the weight, so it tends to hang off you, like chainmail. Full plate uses tight tolerances and straps to cling to the wearer. 3rd ed had a nifty idea with balancing armours by having them limit dexterity bonus.
In 2nd ed, iirc Fieldplate is the combination heavy armour... ie plates with chainmail. I could be wrong though. I thought platemail was more akin to a breastplate with greaves, gauntlets or bracers, probably a helm, etc. Its a pretty old style of armour, used during the late bronze age.
http://www.dandwiki.com/wiki/SRD:How_Combat_Works
Does that mean a round for your player (an action) or a round for everyone (everyone having acted)?
https://web.duke.edu/DRAGO/humor/GMList.html
FYI mine was usually 9.Die Modifier.
Though don't dare playing it without the Circle of Eight mod. It's not optional, it's mandatory if you don't want to be drown in gamebreaking bugs.
There are also NwN servers that use other settings. Planescape in NwN2, Ravenloft in NwN1.
By the way, there are spells to repair items like Mending I think and others.
Also you can pay a smith to resize a Full Plate for a fee which is another solution.
But yes, this is why I play Rogues/Druids/Mages in DnD. Screw your expensive armor, I have my stealth, magic and animal forms to protect me.
It's a shame. Because 3.5 sucks a big one. I can't stand that ability score system and the game is way too flexible. It should be way more restrictive IMO. I'm serious.
Of course, I believe the way 3.5 is intended is to have crafted and implemented these rules that promote a balanced game but ultimately function as guidelines rather than laws. You have the freedom to homebrew house rules, reinterpret written rules, and even ignore some of them. The rules, though meticulous and sometimes seemingly oppressive, were created to promote fun and that needs to be remembered as the supreme rule ("have fun").
FWIW, The Only Sheet makes 3.5 soooooo much more enjoyable when it comes to character creation, leveling, keeping track of feats, knowing what feats do, etc. It takes some of the need to memorize or refer to rules and formulae out of the game, allowing it to flow better.
The stat system aside, yeah its true some folks like the simple but brutally restrictive. The standout to me of not clear in 3.5 is definately Improved Buckler Defense feat... which apparently according to some borderline illiterste people allows you to use a buckler with a two-handed weapon. Which it clearly does not.
Improved Buckler Proficiency [General Feat]
[[3e Summary::You are extremely skilled in using a buckler.]]
Prerequisite: Shield Proficiency and a Dexterity score of 13 or higher
Benefit: You retain a buckler's AC bonus when attacking with a weapon in the same hand.
Normal: When using a weapon in the same hand as a buckler, you lose the buckler's AC bonus for that round if you attack.
Special: A fighter may select this feat as one of his fighter bonus feats.
Personally, I think 5th ed sounds pretty interesting, but 3.5 is my go-to for versatility. Character design became an art in that edition.
The reason I bring it up here is that my interest in it online has gotten me interested in trying it in real life with friends. I guess it would be Magic: The Gathering that I think I would enjoy. The trouble is that we don't have any gaming shops in my area that sponsor it. We used to have one, but it closed. There are some private groups around that can be contacted online, but I'm not too comfortable with that, so I guess I won't get to try it any time soon.
Have any of you tabletop players ever tried any of the card games?
@LadyRhian , thank you kindly for the invite, but I don't think I could be around enough to be a good member of the forum roleplaying group.
My ideal version would be 2nd edition, with some of 3rd edition's feats (because I like the ones like weapon finesse, power attack, expertise, rapid shot, etc), a reduced HP progression, and an armour DR system, where lightly armoured characters are harder to hit but easier to damage, and heavily armoured characters vice versa.
The really old sets were pretty wildly unbalanced, but this has improved constantly. Unfortunately, imho the art has gone downhill, becoming pretty awful in the 'cartoony' nature. I still dig the really old cards, even though many are kinda duds. I even like the really, really old lands, and anything with the oldschool T symbol for tapping is automatically better.
There is lots of errata/banned cards. I mostly preferred casual rules, since I never knew anyone rocking many uber-cards. I have a lotus petal, but mostly I collect archaic rares. Baron Sengir ftw! Well, technically he's like 8 mana to drop, so he's nearly unplayable... But he's mega-cool! The rest of his family are inbred hillbilly level garbage though, the son is one of the words cards in magic.
General guidelines:
Stick to one colour until you get pretty comfortable with the mechanics. Build decks around a win condition, and keep them small, unless you're doing a weird blue cycling based deck. The colours have their own specialties, but for sheer versatility and ease of use, I'd recommend starting out with Green or Red. Green can gain life, and is usually built around the summoning early on a big, scary monster. Green is potentially pretty fast, but tends to run out of cards to use, so anything that helps draw is a huge plus. White usually needs lots of rares to be dominant, but is pretty good at not losing. Lots of cards to delay, especially life gain. Black and Red specialize in damage spells, but black uses your health as a commodity. Black has spells that cost you life, but also is good at gaining life. Black is potentially decent at everything, and is probably the most well rounded. Black has probanly the most cheap summons that come with a drawback... ie it has big powerful creatures that requiring sacrificing creatures or life. It can also raise the dead! Blue is by far the hardest to use effectively; Blue casts various counterspells, but is very limited in terms of creatures. Blue traditionally had the absolute biggest creatures, but they were saddled with very high summoning costs or crummy abilities like island home.
As a rule of thumb, if a deck can expect a decent chance to win within 5 turns, you're pretty fast. If your deck will take longer than 10 turns, you need to have some serious defences to keep alive. Speed is usually the best strategy, and beware the noob traps of slow cards; some can work, but for every Bottomless Vault, there are several duds.
My ideal version would be 2nd edition, with some of 3rd edition's feats (because I like the ones like weapon finesse, power attack, expertise, rapid shot, etc), a reduced HP progression, and an armour DR system, where lightly armoured characters are harder to hit but easier to damage, and heavily armoured characters vice versa.
No, you just THINK you like 2nd ed ability scores, or are pulling my leg. A combination of completely irrelevant mid-ranges to huge bonuses at the extreme end of things. Also, they are utterly arbitraty, and require memorization. 3rd Ed uses an easy pattern.
Also, the stat check rules in 2nd ed?? **** that with a standard issue 10ft pole. I feel slightly dumber for having read those rules, though I accept someone might actually like them.
Feats are nice, but the d20 Skill system! So wonderfully overly confusing! Loved it, but I'm the only one.
I've played with DMs who have 'Fudged' rolls (both for good and for ill) to make certain things happen. I've had one who would play it fast and loose with the 'house rules' provided that you had a good reason for doing what you were trying to do. Come up with a good way around them? You got a fair chance to succeed. Come up with something lame like 'But the rules say', and that ALWAYS ended badly. DM is more than a referee. And the guidelines that he/she plays by don't have to be iron clad, but they DO have to be in pursuit of the story.
My experiences in PnP were significantly less focused on combat and more on adventuring (for the most part). We would have whole sessions (sometimes 2 or 3 in a row) with no combat. However sometimes it was a hack-slash fest. I had one DM who gifted every 1st level with +100 Hit points at the beginning. Sounds dumb, I know, but his games were absolutely hackmaster games. They were fun, but they were bloody and just total meat grinders. The DM made it fun to play, and that is the key.
If you want to compare CRPG games with a D&D tabletop session they have almost nothing in common other than the rules set and the setting. A game like BG has to be combat heavy because there just wasn't the capacity for real Role playing in the branching conversation trees back then (still it is tough). It's just not the same animal. Table top is a bunch of friends sitting around a table and making an interactive story. Baldur's Gate, as fun and awesome as it is, is simply a mechanical vehicle.
Anyway, there are a lot of reasons why I prefer 2nd edition. Actually there are a lot of reasons why I don't really like D&D anymore, but I won't go into them all here.
In my experience, 3E took a lot of the creativity and variability out of the system. In 3E, you could never have a character like Wulfgar, who was supposed to be superhumanly strong. There is no situation where a level 1 character can have freakishly high anything. You can have high "For your level", but you compare a 1st level to a 15th level, both Focused (and this is the main point) on STR having an arm wrestling contest and the 15th level will win EVERY TIME. Problem.
In 2E, I played a wizard (big surprise if you know me) with a 17 INT. He was Wizard supreme and hands down the most intelligent in the campaign (even if I wasn't). In 3E, that isn't even 'Decent' for a level 5 wizard.
And yes, I think the point buy system encouraged Min/Maxing far more than the more random system of 2E. Everything was balanced against the player's desire to make the most of whatever they were trying to achieve instead of making the most of what they got.
I'd go 2E any day over 3E. Personal opinion.
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I have to use feats to get my will and reflex saves up. I also have to sacrifice good feats (such as improved knockdown). But I don't have a choice. I want to start the game with maximum strength so it is what it is. I never had this retarded problem with Baldur's Gate.