[a / b / c / d / e / f / g / gif / h / hr / k / m / o / p / s / t / u / v / vg / vm / vmg / vr / vrpg / vst / w / wg] [i / ic] [r9k / s4s / vip] [cm / hm / lgbt / y] [3 / aco / adv / an / bant / biz / cgl / ck / co / diy / fa / fit / gd / hc / his / int / jp / lit / mlp / mu / n / news / out / po / pol / pw / qst / sci / soc / sp / tg / toy / trv / tv / vp / vt / wsg / wsr / x / xs] [Settings] [Search] [Mobile] [Home]
Board
Settings Mobile Home
/tg/ - Traditional Games

Name
Spoiler?[]
Options
Comment
Verification
4chan Pass users can bypass this verification. [Learn More] [Login]
File[]
  • Please read the Rules and FAQ before posting.
  • Roll dice with "dice+numberdfaces" in the options field (without quotes).

08/21/20New boards added: /vrpg/, /vmg/, /vst/ and /vm/
05/04/17New trial board added: /bant/ - International/Random
10/04/16New board for 4chan Pass users: /vip/ - Very Important Posts
[Hide] [Show All]


Janitor acceptance emails will be sent out over the coming weeks. Make sure to check your spam folder!


[Advertise on 4chan]


File: dnd editions.png (75 KB, 941x1869)
75 KB PNG
D&D makes a lot more sense when you realize it's a superhero and narrative system wearing the corpse of a wargaming and wilderness exploration system.
>>
>DnDogshit
>Narrative
I kek'd
>>
>>98360930
I think it would be really funny if you wore a trip so people could track how much you shitpost.
>>
>>98360930
Yeah, that's why there's big "fantasy adventures" like Out of the Abyss
>>
How do ADND, ADND2e & B/X differ from each other?
>>
>>98361091
B/X uses 10 second combat rounds and 9 is the worst AC. AD&D and AD&D2e both use 1 minute combat rounds and 10 is the worst AC. These are the ones you will notice right off the bat.

Going deeper
>B/X has far less that AD&D in the way of rules detail for more obscure situations and effects
>AD&D 1e uses a movement rate that is 1/3 the speed of AD&D2e (iirc; it might be a different fraction, but movement speed in AD&D2e is far faster)
>AD&D2e doesn't strictly use xp for gold, which both B/X and AD&D do. 2e says you CAN do xp for gold, but advises against it. This is the single biggest departure from the ethos of Gygaxian D&D
>AD&D2e changed dragons and giants to be vastly more powerful than they were in AD&D
>In AD&D2e, non-weapon proficiencies are in the PHB, though they are still optional rules
>In AD&D, all of the combat rules and every other rule in the game are in the DMG. In the AD&D2e, they got ported to the PHB. This is also a significant departure from Gygaxian D&D depending on who you ask.

There are several dozen other small differences between the systems, but those are the ones that really stand out because of how much they change either a core mechanic of the game or the feel of the game.

Also, as a friendly suggestion, never look into the 2e Player's Option or Dm's Option books. They are an utter pile of festering smegma.
>>
>>98361044
dndogshit has 0 tools for creating narratives
>>
>>98360930
Yes, narrative.
If it wasn't, it would have clear rules established, and its users wouldn't profess statements pertaining to some story they want to tell.
If it was a game, it would be written like a game.
>>
>>98361471
And anyone creating a narrative doesn't "need a book to hold their hand".
>>
>>98361471
>Shiteater doesnt understand how stories work
>>
>>98361222
>AD&D2e doesn't strictly use xp for gold, which both B/X and AD&D do
Roleplay and Quest XP started in AD&D1.
>>
>>98361496
there are systems with tools for creating narratives, dndogshit just doesnt have any. the premise of the OP is false from the start
>>
>>98361669
<citation needed>
>>
>>98361902
Dragonlance
>>
>>98361928
Anon asked about editions of the game, not modules for them. Dragonlance is an module series, and as such not actually relevant to the question asked.
>>
>>98361222
>departure from the ethos of Gygaxian D&D
XP for gold was more of a Blume thing, really. Gary included it in 1E because he didn't want to tell anyone that he gave out levels as he saw fit. Please actually read what the man wrote himself on Dragonsfoot and in his Soapbox articles in Dragon Magazine.
>>
>>98361948
The short-lived by extreme popularity of Dragonlance saw a huge shift in how AD&D1E was presented moving forward, so much so that post 1E was in effect a 1.5E. It is relevant to any discussion about the differences between editions of D&D.
>>
>>98361977
I spoke to the man in person at a con on this very topic. What one DM does in his own games, even if it is Gary Gygax himself, does not make that the rule in AD&D. If you read the DMG, it will tell you that very explicitly.
>>
>>98361988
>I spoke to Gary about XP
Sure you did, Jan.
Gary included it in the rules because people expected it to be there, not because it was something he was running in his home games. Hell, he didn't even have a home game at the time he was writing AD&D1E. He was too busy doing cocaine and trying to get a D&D movie sold.
>>
File: Fishfag003.jpg (179 KB, 932x700)
179 KB JPG
>>98361983
By the time the Dragonlance modules started coming out, Gygax was no longer with the company. That later, lesser minds started faffing about with stupidities like a pre-scripted set of modules where character death meant nothing because they were simply alive again in later installments in the series doesn't shift what the AD&D game contained.

>1.5e
Ah, now we see your true colors. Pic related.
>>
>>98362014
He was at a con in Knoxville a couple years before his death. It was very easy for me to make it, since I live in Knoxville.
>>
>>98362015
>Fishfag schizoing
Dude, what the fuck is your problem? If you're a modulefag, post-Dragonlance 1E is in effect a different game from the initial release. This is just a simple fact. I don't even fuck with AD&D beyond liking the history of D&D.
>>
>>98362038
>If you're a modulefag, post-Dragonlance 1E is in effect a different game from the initial release.
So it's not the game anon was asking about, and is therefore irrelevant for his question. QED
>>
>>98362058
That's retarded and you used QED wrong.
>>
>>98362150
It's perfectly accurate and I used QED perfectly, since my position was that stupidities in adventure modules which came after the fact and created some imaginary "1.5e" do nothing to change what AD&D first edition was. The thing has been demonstrated even in the protestations against my position.
>>
>>98362038
You're talking to some psychotic troll shitposter.
>By the time the Dragonlance modules started coming out, Gygax was no longer with the company.
This is factually wrong and he knows it, it just upsets his insane worldview so he can't tolerate anything that contradicts him.
>>
>>98362166
Ironic.
>>
>>98362192
Is that your way of saying "i lose"? Good, now sod off, you retard.
Also remember that Gygax lost control of the company in 1985, and didn't leave until 1986.
>>
>>98362015
>By the time the Dragonlance modules started coming out, Gygax was no longer with the company.

Gygax was with the company from founding till October 1985 when he offered his resignation to the board and they accepted. He might have gone off to be movie and tv guy but Dragonlance started under his approval before the first company split into divisions. He was still the Chairman of the Board of Directors of TSR, Inc., the games division, all the way through the Blumes' disastrous presidencies 1984, when the first Dragonlance modules were released, and was recalled in 1985. DL 5 through 10 were released while he was again president but he was back in Lake Geneva at TSR for DL4 which you can be sure he would have said something if he had objected, not to mentioning cancelling the as yet unfinished works published in 1985.

>>98361983
Gygax was writing story modules well before Dragonlance came out, not saying DL isn't relevant, am saying DL didn't start that shift, only maintained it, not that it was in any danger of going away, it had been around for years before '84.
>>
>>98360819
D&D is too mainstream. I prefer BRP and GURPS.
>>98360930
fpbp
>>
>>98362166
>>98362202
>>98362844
I think you killed him.
>>
>>98360819
It's not quite "superhero" because it refuses the "hat" enforcement (hence the breadth problem) or any of the MANY flavors of raw physicality inflated to "matter", but instead its own weird distortion of people's (mis)use of its higher-level conceits. And the Alignment, political advancement, and travel sides of its narrative-structuring mechanics actually got pruned, leaving basically just scheduling that's been softened by standardizing rests instead of retaining the Cleric's strict daily allotment of healing available.

It's more the husk of a wargaming and wilderness exploration system refilled with the want for narrative and its own unique incestuous distortion of "Great Men" but never actually committing to introducing new structures for it. Still vaguely functional on the dungeon-crawling side, though.
>>
>>98362202
>>98363191
lmao you're still at it
>>
>>98361738
Once again, that doesn't matter because narrative fags don't need books to hold their hand. Any "tools" are just filler text.
>>
>>98360819
>and narrative system
It specifically isn't because of the sacred cows. It has players who want it to be a superhero epic lotr/got thing and players who want quirky fantastical drama, but no actual narrative game mechanics to facilitate this.
>>
>>98363547
>that doesn't matter
Then next time surely op can refrain from lying
>>
>>98363547
This is a retarded take, and you're an idiot.
>>
>>98364132
Someone should have told that to the retards saying ">he needs a book to hold his hand" whenever anyone brought up flaws about D&D 5e then.
>>
>>98363881
It specifically is because of the rulings as written are vague and intentionally require interpretation or modification. It specifically is because a vast majority of its users will cite "rulings not rules" and "rule 0" to defend its contents and steelman those who have done good while claiming to use it, while ignoring every constructive flaw and denying every individual misuse of it.
It isn't written like a game, and it isn't used like a game, and any "game-like" parts are constantly handwaved for being "bookkeepy slogs".
>>
>>98365671
is there a ttrpg that has no rulings at all?
>>
>>98365935
VTNL
>>
>>98360930
>>98361471
>>98361738
You don't need dogshit like a social combat system to create a narrative with a TTRPG. The narrative emerges from the gameplay and the choices the players have their characters make. If you can't understand that, you don't know what a narrative is within the context of a TTRPG.

If you're complaining that D&D doesn't have any social mechanics (which is an entirely different argument by the way), you're just lying or ignorant. Both 2014 and 2024 have a system for the disposition of NPCs and a dedicated action for social encounters, as well as multiple spells that influence social encounters in some way.

If you're complaining that it doesn't have dogshit mechanics like the ability for players to just go "ERM NO GM THAT DOESNT 'HAPPEN?!" (embelishment type mechanics), fuck off, you don't need those to have a narrative in a TTRPG.
>>
>>98363881
And yet every single D&D game where things happen because of the actions of the player characters (or their inaction) still results in a narrative forming through play. It's almost like you don't need shit like embelishments or fate dice or what have you to have a narrative emerge from a TTRPG's gameplay organically! And I say this as someone who's currently in a game of Perfect Draw, a PBTA game. That system's advancement is tied to your character getting Baggage through experiencing trauma or whiffing rolls, which IMO is very counterintuitive and, for some characters, hinders their advancement.

For example, my character in said game is currently sitting on 3 pieces of baggage, while some others have 6-8 baggage. Of my baggage, at least one of the baggages I have is going to be cleared in the next 2 sessions, and the other two will likely be sorted out over the course of the next "arc" of the game, and short of really, really bad rolls I'm probably not gaining any more baggage anytime soon which means I won't be getting much in the way of advancement anytime soon short of winning duels to get EXP. I'll get maybe one more, then be stuck at 1-2 XP out of 3 needed to advance for a very long time.
>>
>>98366111
if DnDogshit doesn't have narrative systems don't call it one
>>
>>98366168
>Shiteater can't comprehend what narrative means.
>>
>>98366168
Don't be a retard. All TTRPGs have a narrative. Just because a system isn't bending over backwards to go down storyshit railroad (I exaggerate using those buzzwords mind you, I understand there's fun to be had in a system built around character arcs and what have you through communicating with the GM and other players) doesn't mean it isn't capable of producing a narrative.

However, OP has a point. D&D has moved away from the idea of being a loot and stab dungeon crawler in favor of adventures with more social interactions - and the system does have mechanics for that in the form of disposition mechanics for each NPC, spells that let you alter that disposition or influence the actions of NPCs, it even has a re-roll mechanic as a reward for good roleplaying in the form of Heroic Inspiration as of 2024. It's not something as heavily narrative focused as PBTA or FATE and certainly not something completely built around social interaction like, say, Dogs in the Vineyard, but it can in fact do things other than dungeon crawling well enough.Hell, I'd argue one of the best class-subclass combinations in the game is Eloquence Bard. It gets some solid spells, magical secrets lets it dip into other classes' spell lists, and being unable to roll anything under a 10 on social checks makes it amazing for those sorts of campaigns.
>>
>>98360930
Narrative doesn't require metacurrency and sharing the GM role of describing the world.

>>98361091
In the grand scheme of things, very little. You can more or less run KotB with minimal modifications in any of these systems.

Late 2e, with the Players Option books is different enough it might be better thought of as 2.75e, but those are optional and weren't widely used.
>>
>>98362844
Who put the Blumes in charge lol? Gygax doesn't get blamed enough for TSR's problems; and Lorraine Williams is overhated, and had a much better eye for talent than Gygax ever did.
>>
>>98366197
dndogshit doesn't have narrative systems.
therefore is not a narrative game.
>>
>>98365671
Being vague isn't a narrative mechanic. You have no idea what the terms even mean.
>>
>>98366136
You don't know the difference between emergent and genre driven narrative, and how mechanics can be designed for either.
>>
>>98366197
aaaannnnd you don't know the difference between railroad and narrative or what a storygame actually is.

All of you, go do some reading, play some different games outside of dnd heart breakers and finish your report over the weekend.
>>
>>98366292
I do, but that doesn't matter, the claim that D&D doesn't have any means to create a narrative is objectively false.

>>98366301
I know for a fact you don't know any of those things, because you don't run or play any games. You just shitpost on /tg/ to whine about popular thing because it's popular, without even knowing anything about what you're whining about.
>>
>>98366168
The people seething about narrative games have no idea what they actually are because they've never played one. Narrative game means "not enough rules about how long a torch lasts" and not a game with actual rules for how the narrative works.
>>
>>98366379
The problem is that about 25 years ago, a bunch of indie rpg designers with some very specific and idiosyncratic ideas about game design, specifically around meta mechanics and shared authorial control of a scene laundering those ideas into more prominence by calling them narrativist to use a term similar enough to that used to promote other games like Vampire (a game they loved to shit on because of said idiosyncratic philosophy, amusingly enough).
>>
>>98361222
You really glossed right over the main difference between AD&D and B/X being the division of race and class.
>>
>>98366330
>everyone who realizes I'm full of shit is nogmes
cope
>>
>>98360819
Kinda crazy that they're going to kill D&D trying to turn it into a video game with a season pass. Kinda crazy they ALREADY tried to do that and failed badly with 4e.
>>
>>98360819
Oriental Adventures was the last, true D&D game, as they were honestly trying to bring Race-As-Class back through the comeliness stat.
>>
>>98361983
That's not what "saw" means. Caused or resulted in or lead to. Take an English class ffs
>>
>>98377279
Argue with Cambridge about it.
>>
>>98376953
It's not 2008 anymore. I suspect it will succeed.
>>
>>98361222
>This is the single biggest departure from the ethos of Gygaxian D&D
No, it isn't. There's no ethos behind gold-for-XP, just multiple implementations that are all broken in different ways.
>>
>>98360819
It makes more sense when you realize the people in charge of the company are verifiably fucking retarded and the designers they hired are shackled to a "lifestyle brand" identity that they have been told is all about not changing anything and just letting customers do whatever they want.
>>
>>98366111
>The narrative emerges from the gameplay and the choices the players have their characters make
This is incredibly disingenuous argumentation, which shows you either don't understand what "narrative" means in relation to RPG systems, or you are just retarded.
>>
>>98360819
WoTC D&D has always been a skinsuit.
>>
>>98379936
I just looked up the definition of the narrativist structure and I'm not entirely sure how d&d doesn't fit into it.

Honestly, dnd kind of fits into all the criteria and different types of gamers would focus on different parts, hence why we've got critrole and turbo optimizers playing the same game
>>
>>98380013
I don't know if I have another deep dive on the forge articles in me right now but basically it would be that critrole and the turbo optimzers are in fact not playing the same game. They're calling it the same thing but its wildly different in terms of the rules they're using such as to be a totally different game and largely incompatible game, and this overlap of naming and the misalignment of interest is what causes significant amounts of confusion and asspain.
>>
>>98380312
that's understandable, but i feel like that's due to DM interpretation of the rules and how the dm design adventures, and how the players adapt to the game.
>>
>>98380013
>>98380483
D&D is, first and foremost, a combat game. It's mechanics are about combat, things you can do in combat, getting stronger to fight bigger things, seeking money or equipment to get better at combat, etc etc etc. When you look at the kind of gameplay conveyed by the rules, D&D is a rigidly structured, mechanically-focused game that attempts to prioritize fair and balanced combat. Rules and procedures and carefully calculated damage-to-hp, measured against CR, and so on.

It can have a narrative and it can be played with more roleplay and less combat, but out of the box, judged by the contents of its books, D&D is about mechanics and combat. Saying that it CAN be a narrative game does not mean it IS a narrative game.

When you compare it to something like Fiasco, or many PbtA games which prioritize telling a story far above optimized combat strategy, and it's not even remotely the same. You can try and play them optimally with reduced risk and highest fictional reward in mind, but they will never have the same level of mechanical and combat focus as D&D.
>>
>>98380851
i dont think GNS specifically calls out combat = not narrativist but if you say so
>>
>>98380909
GNS theory is bullshit anyways, but in the general sense, D&D is not more of a narrative game than any other RPG, just because when you play it you create a "narrative" since that's not what's being discussed or referenced here. All games have stories and narratives as you play them. It comes with the fucking territory. Arguing otherwise may as well just be an argument that you can use any system for whatever you want, so D&D is a cooking-focused RPG that has nothing to do with combat, because that's a way you could run it if you wanted. Which is retarded and is not a legitimate point to make when discussing the content of RPG systems and their purposes.

Not every game is narrative focused by design and D&D, in this specific example is a system by its own rules as written, prioritizes crunchy mechanical engagement rather than fiction-first, rule of cool, cinematic storytelling.
>>
>>98380931
>GNS theory is bullshit anyways
sure sure

>prioritizes crunchy mechanical engagement rather than fiction-first, rule of cool, cinematic storytelling
if you say so
>>
>>98380943
Too much of a faggot to admit that you were wrong, huh?
>>
>>98380987
>fiction-first, rule of cool, cinematic storytelling
dnd has published prewritten adventures since the game came out that focused on this shit, so ... fuck off retard?
>>
>>98380943
GNS was set up as a hierarchy that basically said narrative is the best
>>
>>98381081
>prewritten adventures
Cool game design, faggot.
>>
>>98381361
modules are a cornerstone of any system, moron
>>
>>98381361
mechanics and story go together to make a game, yes?
>>
>>98381392
>>98381396
Adventure writing is fundamentally different from game design and does not change the nature of the game's actual rules. You judge the game as it is out of the box, not based on what it could be under a GM doing something explicitly differently than how the rules are written, or what one adventure might say. And in the context of 5e and modern D&D specifically, those old adventures don't mean shit to the topic at hand.
>>
>>98381544
are you under the assumption that modules and adventures are not playable using RAW and require?
>>
>>98381686
Do you thinking using a ruleset for a module means something dictates the contents of the ruleset? Genuinely, I don't understand how the point has gone over your head repeatedly.
>>
>>98381216
And their N mechanics very clearly have G concerns of feedback loops and rising tension. It was just pseudointellectual wankery to justify why they didn't like D&D and Vampire. There's a reason nobody used it in the broader world of game design: it's not very descriptive or prescriptive, doesn't help you find the fun, and doesn't really help you analyze your game to refine it. There's a reason MDA is taught everywhere, and GNS is not.



[Advertise on 4chan]

Delete Post: [File Only] Style:
[Disable Mobile View / Use Desktop Site]

[Enable Mobile View / Use Mobile Site]

All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective parties. Images uploaded are the responsibility of the Poster. Comments are owned by the Poster.