killjoy32 wrote:i will guarantee you one thing tho, you will look at a 3E rule book far more than you will a 1E one...Al
killjoy32 wrote:Lewisexi wrote:This isn't a "my character is mighty post" but the fact that with a average crit on a power attack with a a +1 2h Axe my character (ftr 9 / cleric 2) can kill any member of the party of the same level in one hit seems a little overpowered. That could never happen to any fighter in pervious versions of the game and I cringe slightly anytime I hit an npc for 70+ damage at that level. Luckily I very rarely hit anything let alone a crit someone! I once missed an entire combat trying to climb a wall needing a 2 to succeed! Rolling four ones in a row had our group rolling around with laughter at my character. I guess I need flashes of brilliance to balance out my luck with the dice! sorry lew, this isnt a dig at you in this regard.for you guys who play and enjoy 3E, respect to y'all, but cooooooooooooome on ! where is the fun in a melee that you take something out with one hit doing 70+ damage??!!! AND with a +1 2H axe for jeez sake! i would expect that from something a LOT more powerful or maybe if it was a super-fluke one-off under a particular circumstance, but as a common occurance??!! sorry but that just doesnt fit in my method of thinking. the group i DM always enjoy the combats. thats one of the fun things in the games cos i like it to be that way - they had a fight in B4 with a group of grimlocks i think they were called (fiend folio) (cant remember now it was agesago)....in the big hall and the combat lasted about 1hr 20 mins in real time. it was an absolute blast and everyone was knackered when it finished but it was great.dont you think with that much power, that it kinda takes all the fun out of it like that?if you think thats cool, then thats fair enough, but i somehow feel that it takes something out of the game imo.oh well back to work Al
Lewisexi wrote:This isn't a "my character is mighty post" but the fact that with a average crit on a power attack with a a +1 2h Axe my character (ftr 9 / cleric 2) can kill any member of the party of the same level in one hit seems a little overpowered. That could never happen to any fighter in pervious versions of the game and I cringe slightly anytime I hit an npc for 70+ damage at that level. Luckily I very rarely hit anything let alone a crit someone! I once missed an entire combat trying to climb a wall needing a 2 to succeed! Rolling four ones in a row had our group rolling around with laughter at my character. I guess I need flashes of brilliance to balance out my luck with the dice!
Lewisexi wrote:Just to give you an idea Al in two years of playing the same character I've made four crits that's all. In the hands of someone for whom dice generate random numbers instead of consistently poor ones she'd be a killing machine. In my hands she's merely a bad fighter that gets in the way more often than not
Lewisexi wrote: Even stranger the two lawful good characters (and group leaders) have all the luck whilst Laurie and I playing the chaotic types (and unreliable pair of taggers-along) get none at all! Perhaps there is some justice in the world!
killjoy32 wrote:Lewisexi wrote: Even stranger the two lawful good characters (and group leaders) have all the luck whilst Laurie and I playing the chaotic types (and unreliable pair of taggers-along) get none at all! Perhaps there is some justice in the world! actually thats another thing. in all the years i have played and DM'd, i have still yet to come across a player who TRULY plays the lawful good alignment.Al
The point about the "mystery" of the drow above is a case in point. What mystery is there to the drow if they're all evil. Besides what combat options they have, there's very little mystery. They're just all evil and therefore meant to be killed by good parties, and then have all their cool Drow magic items taken. It is a much more interesting gaming experience to expand the possible motivations of the drow, rather than making them all the same cookie-cutter alignment. This is especially true of the Drow with all their different houses. If every house just wants to usurp the power of the others and take over the surface and under world, then what's the point of the houses? They all have the same motivation so why bother with them? They're just cookie-cutter evil, which makes for a bland, stale and hackneyed narrative.
bbarsh wrote:This is exactly my point. By making the drow a force of undeniable evil is what makes them great.
bbarsh wrote:When you start throwing in good ranger drow and the weak-kneeed "the surface elves made us what we are today" crap the greatness of these villains is lost.
bbarsh wrote:By changing who and what the drow are - making them "interesting" - you are doing the exact opposite - they become generic cookie-cutter, bland and stale.
bbarsh wrote:How many times have you seen the "misunderstood" bad guy routine.
bbarsh wrote: Leave the darn bad guys as bad guys. Make them evil and nasty. Make them a pestilence to the PCs.
bbarsh wrote:As far as alignments go. They are only as important as you make them. If you are playing hardcore role-playing, then you will have problems with how they are presented in the 1e books. If you just want too play AD&D, they are just fine.
MShipley88 wrote:I think that the idea of goody two-shoes Drow is OK. I don't mind a man of conscience or two among the psychotics...like Alternative Evil Bones in the Star Trek episode, Mirror Mirror. In my experience, most players tend to have their characters act upon the very simple formula of if he has something I want or is not doing what I want at this moment then he must be evil. The question I am interested in is not who is evil but why they are evil. What I think is more interesting is badguys (Drow, for instance) who ARE evil, but whose current goals coincide with those of the PC party. I like to make my players choose which evil they want to fight more. I also like to present them with extremely aggravating and evil NPC's who turn out to be slightly less evil than the true bad guys...and who (of course) hold the key to getting at the really-really-horrible-truth-of-everything. 8) MRS
Badmike wrote:The alignment system was broken the minute it was written. No one could play Lawful Good, everyone wanted their character to be Chaotic Neutral so as not to face alignment penalties yet do whatever they pleased, no one really could apply situational ethics, etc. So we chucked it about 20 years ago.
radagast wrote:Badmike wrote:The alignment system was broken the minute it was written. No one could play Lawful Good, everyone wanted their character to be Chaotic Neutral so as not to face alignment penalties yet do whatever they pleased, no one really could apply situational ethics, etc. So we chucked it about 20 years ago.I agree with Mike. And I prefer the simple tripartition of Basic D&D (Legal, Chaotic and Neutral) without any ethic connotation (Good or Evil).Alignment in Basic D&D is useless too but, at least, is far more close to my own opinion about what a roleplay is: a mean to play ourselves without many of the strings we have in real life. So my players (when I DMed) hadn't to choose an alignment: they simply recognized their own way to act, Legal, Neutral or Chaotic. BTW when I was young I thought that Legal=Good, Chaotic=Evil, Neutral ... so and so. Now I know this is not true (or so I think).The tripartition is an attitude towards "Order" while Good/Evil describe the means we use to act this attitude.For example, in the Lord of the Rings (the best book ever written), I cannot say that Sauron is truly chaotic: he uses caos, fear, violence but he wants to create an order, ruled by himself. Tom Bombadil is far more chaotic, in this sense.When I was at university, while I was attending the course of Moral Philosophy, our teacher told us this little story."Your wife/husband (or a person you love) is ill. A particular illness with only one possible medicine. The chemistry in your home town has this medicine but it is too expensive. What will you do? Keep in mind: without that medicine, that person will die.You'll respect the Law even if it costs the death of a person you love?You'll try to get the medecine at all costs? (Even stealing, killing or ...)You'll be in doubt??What would it be your decision? Your attitude towards Law?? Note that ethical or moral decisions do not enter: what is good and what is evil??This is to say (sorry for the time I've stolen from you) that Alignment would be a too difficult thing to manage.That's why Mike is perfecly right.In my opinion.Have a nice day.Giorgio