D&D (2024) Do you plan to adopt D&D5.5One2024Redux?

[UngeheuerLich]

But that doesn’t actually apply. Almost no powers were always expected to work. There were reliable powers that didn’t expend unless they worked but that’s different. They still could fail to work.

You misunderstood me. Work in the sense of: you are always allowed to try to apply effects.
Making an ooze or snake prone? No problem. Of course you could narrate that the ooze is split and the snake lies on the back. But that was the extra work we did not always want to do. If the power used was called: "pull a leg" (probably not an actual power but matching the naming policy) it made everything harder to imagine.

TLDR: my point was not in any way related to the reliable tag.

 

[Oofta]

When it comes to game design you can take multiple approaches. In one, you simplify what happens in the real world and then add in features like magic and dragons. In another you start with abilities you think will be fun and fit into a game with features like magic and dragons.

With most editions, to me it seemed like they started with the first approach. Yes, AC, HP, etc. are terrible but they are simple representations of real world things albeit probably overly simplified for some people. With 4E it seems like they took the latter approach and designed powers they thought would be fun and, to a large degree, based on what they saw as popular in video games. There's nothing wrong with that approach at all even if, as I've stated before, the release was rushed out the door. It's just not my personal preference.

So an ability that reliably terrifies enemies so much they run away is not my preference because I don't view it as based on anything at all realistic. Causing enemies to flee is far too situational and based on too many factors to be boiled down to a single save for me unless it's magic. Sometimes you can cause enemies to flee by intimidating them, sometimes you can't. If it works for other people, that's fine too. We're just talking preference and opinion here.

So all I ask is that you don't tell me that my preference is wrong, because I'm not telling anyone else that their opinion is wrong. We all want different things out of games and it shouldn't be a bad thing to say what you like or dislike. If my responses seem dismissive well, to be honest, I'm just replying in the same style people have responded to my preferences.

P.S. I did some searching and the whole 4E tangent came along because of this post, a statement that WotC did surveys because 4E was not as successful as they had hoped. Which then of course was taken as something along the lines of 4E being terrible and the cycle started all over again. Maybe the post could have been worded differently, but any time 4E is even mentioned (and as the post stated, it was not a successful release) the accusations start flying because people make observations or state their opinion.

 

[Hussar]

yes, when it comes to affecting character behaviour player attitude has been 'one rule for me, another for thee' for quite a while now when PCs are involved...

'you can't tell me my character HAS to do something, that's denying my agency and ability to roleplay my character'

If by “quite a while” you mean since day 1 then yup. Morale and charisma have never affected pc’s.

 

[Hriston]

we disagree on this... so you are saying no level of explicitness is enough for you to not ignore it and find a way around in violation of the description

I think the design intent of Criminal Contact is fairly explicit and that reading “you know the local messengers” as some kind of prerequisite that needs to have been established in the fiction independently of the feature before the player can use it is a bizarre interpretation of a game rule.

 

[mamba]

I think the design intent of Criminal Contact is fairly explicit and that reading “you know the local messengers” as some kind of prerequisite that needs to have been established in the fiction independently of the feature before the player can use it is a bizarre interpretation of a game rule.

well, your interpretation defies reality, logic and the English language… if that does not stop you, then I doubt anything I say will either…

The more I read that feature, the more I believe it is intended to be local, not universal (you know the local messengers…). In any case, nothing will convince you and I feel I said everything more than once already, so I won’t continue this topic with you

 

[MuhVerisimilitude]

I think the design intent of Criminal Contact is fairly explicit and that reading “you know the local messengers” as some kind of prerequisite that needs to have been established in the fiction independently of the feature before the player can use it is a bizarre interpretation of a game rule.

Assuming this is the correct version of the feature

"You have a reliable and trustworthy contact who acts as your liaison to a network of other criminals. You know how to get messages to and from your contact, even over great distances; specifically, you know the local messengers, corrupt caravan masters, and seedy sailors who can deliver messages for you."

How else would you even interpret this?

It says explicitly that "you know the local messengers". There's nothing conditional about this.

It would have been conditional if (haha) it say "IF you know the local messengers" but no it is explicit. You do know them. Otherwise the feature is null and void. What point is there in a feature that says "If you know the local messengers you can use them to send messages"?

That's like having a ability that read something like "If you know the local blacksmiths you can purchase their services"

 

[Cadence]

Assuming this is the correct version of the feature

"You have a reliable and trustworthy contact who acts as your liaison to a network of other criminals. You know how to get messages to and from your contact, even over great distances; specifically, you know the local messengers, corrupt caravan masters, and seedy sailors who can deliver messages for you."

How else would you even interpret this?

It says explicitly that "you know the local messengers". There's nothing conditional about this.

It would have been conditional if (haha) it say "IF you know the local messengers" but no it is explicit. You do know them. Otherwise the feature is null and void. What point is there in a feature that says "If you know the local messengers you can use them to send messages"?

That's like having a ability that read something like "If you know the local blacksmiths you can purchase their services"

I think the problem is that knowing local messengers everywhere that can get through to your contact from literally anywhere seems implausible to many in here, and seems to go against what such a background would enable in many stories or IRL. ("The vortex drops you down on a beach outside a city at night, it looks like there is an extra moon in the sky." "Ok, I go into the city and find a messenger to get word back to my contact back home").

As such, I post that they are reading it so that it doesn't lead to situations like that. I do like what someone else posted above about allowing players to try and justify something instead of flat out vetoing it. But I wouldn't take any and all justification.

 

[tetrasodium]

I think the problem is that knowing local messengers everywhere that can get through to your contact from literally anywhere seems implausible to many in here, and seems to go against what such a background would enable in many stories or IRL. ("The vortex drops you down on a beach outside a city at night, it looks like there is an extra moon in the sky." "Ok, I go into the city and find a messenger to get word back to my contact back home").

As such, I post that they are reading it so that it doesn't lead to situations like that. I do like what someone else posted above about allowing players to try and justify something instead of flat out vetoing it. But I wouldn't take any and all justification.

I think that the problem with your effort at interpretation lies in that bolded bit. Many of the background features have a RAW wording where the player doesn't need to do the try part & they are encouraged to skip right past justify(to the gm who decides) straight to simply deciding or declaring right from the initial "I do [background feature]"

 

[Cadence]

I think that the problem with your effort at interpretation lies in that bolded bit. Many of the background features have a RAW wording where the player doesn't need to do the try part & they are encouraged to skip right past justify(to the gm who decides) straight to simply deciding or declaring right from the initial "I do [background feature]"

The RAW wording seems bizarre to me if it is taken to mean literally anywhere: trudging through Mordor in a LotR set-up, being a party member in one of the lower planes adventures, being crashed on another planet in Spelljammer, storm wrecks you on Kara-Tur as the first person from the west to be there - "I find a messenger to get word back to my contact to see if they can send help in exchange for a favor". *

If it was any place the contact's criminal organization seems vaguely likely to have reach or where the underworld structure is kind of like what you have back home and there is some route that could work - then I wouldn't particularly expect them to try and justify why they could do it if they went to the part of town a messenger would be at.

On the other hand, I am also fine if they want to draw on their background to try something RAW doesn't seem to give them: knowledge of how the criminal justice system works, where one might find a fence, recognizing when someone in a bar (less skilled than you) might be a criminal too...


* On the other hand, Sending is only a 3rd level spell and works across planes even 95% of the time.

 

[MuhVerisimilitude]

I think the problem is that knowing local messengers everywhere that can get through to your contact from literally anywhere seems implausible to many in here, and seems to go against what such a background would enable in many stories or IRL. ("The vortex drops you down on a beach outside a city at night, it looks like there is an extra moon in the sky." "Ok, I go into the city and find a messenger to get word back to my contact back home").

As such, I post that they are reading it so that it doesn't lead to situations like that. I do like what someone else posted above about allowing players to try and justify something instead of flat out vetoing it. But I wouldn't take any and all justification.

I think it is pretty valid to say that sometimes this feature doesn't work.

On the other hand, I also think it's worth thinking about rule of cool here. Suppose the players end up warped into some other plane it would be really nifty, don't you think, if it turns out that this character with criminal background actually HAS connections here, even if they don't even know they actually had?

Since D&D already suffers from non-magical abilities being trash in general I think a favourable interpretation in cases like these can only be beneficial to the gameplay experience.