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Markustay
Realms Explorer extraordinaire
USA
15724 Posts |
 Posted - 26 May 2011 : 14:45:37
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And yet, conversely, magic and wizards are extremely rare in those 'pulpy' types of works, and are usually associated with evil. Almost universally (within that genre), Sorcerers are looked upon with suspicion, and are fairly rare.
I believe Gary was trying to capture the 'bumbling novice' aspect of wizardry with D&D PCs, rather then the all-powerful, uber-archmages they evolved into. I doubt they were ever supposed to dominate the game as they eventually did.
My settings - even when I ran FR - were humanocentric. City-folk may have become used to the sight of an occasional non-human, but most rural folks would stare at such 'mythical' creatures (like in Middle Earth, or Mithgar). A setting can be high-fantasy and still be humanocentric.
I played on this heavily back when I ran GH, but not so much when I ran FR. People in small villagers would make hex-signs and what-not when seeing an elf for the first time. This is how I countered the human 'limitation' in early D&D - with prejudice. Most Inns wouldn't even rent a room to such 'magical' (evil) folk.
I also ran my non-human cultures the same way (like in LotR), so the dislike was a two-way street. Only halflings were generally accepted by all, and even they were still stared at in rural human areas. I didn't use gnomes.... kinda redundant with both halflings and dwarves (if someone wanted to run one, I would say it was a crossbreed of those two groups).
In my HB setting, the theocratic empire persecutes non-humans, which is going back to my humanocentric roots. I try to keep some of the wonder in fantasy - I think people have become too jaded these days. |
"I have never in my life learned anything from any man who agreed with me" --- Dudley Field Malone
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Edited by - Markustay on 26 May 2011 14:46:45 |
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ChieftainTwilight
Learned Scribe
171 Posts |
Posted - 26 May 2011 : 22:24:33
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quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
I never said it was bad. I cited both the SW minis and Zombies games as examples of fun romps with no RPing involved. The 4e rules are somewhere between, me thinks. The RP elements are added by the group, rather then by the rules, and there is nothing wrong with that.
I just think that the less rules you have, the more you have to rely on the story-teller mode for gaming. PURE Story-teller is NOT my cup of tea, so equal amounts of crunch and fluff work for me... but everyone is different.
I never used level caps - I had other ways of controlling demi-human dominance in my early D&D games (prejudice being one of them). I also insisted upon patrons, trainers, Sages, and apprenticeships after a certain point in ALL classes; you can only learn so much on your own. Later, I stopped doing this, but no campaign I ran in 3e ever advanced enough for it to become an issue.
I still like Kits from 2e, but some of them were over-powered. I like it when they simply add some sort of starter benefit, and not something that helps a character throughout their careers. In 3e I boiled-down a few kits into background feats, which worked well (everyone got a FREE background Feat, along with the usual feat AND a racial Feat). Personally, I think a 3-tiered feat system could have easily replaced PrCs altogether. If I ever run another game, I may borrow from 4e's model (the 3 tiers of play) and have organization-Feats available at higher levels (stuff like Red Wizard, or Purple Dragon) - I've always been a big fan of path-based systems, and using 3e's feats (with prerequisites) could form a good base for a very dynamic system of skill-trees. Of course, as it is with CCG's, the more you layer a system with 'exceptions', the more errata you need because of unforeseen combinations (which 3e suffered from toward the end of its run).
In 2e I simply started people out at lev3 (I hate those low-powered early sessions - they are no fun for anyone) to give that same boost.
actually, I have called it bad since it first hit teh shelves. hell, I've hated it before then! XD
so, what I wa strying to say is that I have given up hating 4th edition. |
and a heart can only break so many times
and I've been to hell and back so many times
and I've seen folks walk away so many times
but just like anyone else I gotta stand up by myself
and a heart can only break so many times
a heart can only break so many times
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Faraer
Great Reader
3308 Posts |
Posted - 27 May 2011 : 02:38:07
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quote:
Originally posted by Markustay
And yet, conversely, magic and wizards are extremely rare in those 'pulpy' types of works, and are usually associated with evil. Almost universally (within that genre), Sorcerers are looked upon with suspicion, and are fairly rare.
In sword and sorcery, yes. Gary's main magical models, though, were the Dying Earth and the Harold Shea stories, whose protagonists are indeed more struggling journeyman than all-seeing archmage. On the other hand, his main PCs included Mordenkainen and Bigby.quote:
My settings - even when I ran FR - were humanocentric.
So is the baseline Realms, of course, with ten times as many named human characters as any other race.quote:
I try to keep some of the wonder in fantasy - I think people have become too jaded these days.
There's no question that blasé normalization of the Player's Handbook races was part of a progressive flattening disenchantment involving that grim, unsustainable race to ever more novel PC types. |
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realization
