>Magic in a setting is 'hard to use and learn' to

>Rules don't reflect that, it's very easy to learn and use magic as a player

You assume that Player Characters are just ordinary people, and that anyone can be one.

That's not very imaginative.

>>48469623
that's the thing though
what stops anyone from learning the same way a player does besides "i say so"?

>>48469583
>Setting doesn't have any kind of regulation or standard indoctrination

This implies a strong central authority to enforce the regulation, which isn't always the case

>>48469638
The players just have a knack for magic
Either that or the spark of magic isn't found in everyone

>>48469678
regulation doesn't have to come from a central entity created solely for magic things, any kind of government could have laws regarding the usage of magic so magic users don't fuck shit up (if it's unique enough to be adressed separately and not bagged along other laws)

>>48469623
characters are ordinary people or characters are exceptional people.
I don't see how one assumption is more imaginative than the other.

>>48469583
>"to explain why magic hasn't completely wiped out all other means of military advancement"
DESU if you have a shitload of Heracles' running around with magic deflecting armour it's no wonder that mages cannot simply steamroll.

>>48469583

Unknown Armies. If you don't start the game as an adept or an avatar, becoming one is pretty difficult. Becoming an adept requires that your character go insane on one of the game's sanity tracks. Becoming an avatar requires that your character behave in very specific ways for a long stretch of game time, and keep behaving that way forever in order to get the skill higher than 10%. Learning either provides cool abilities that are useful, but may not always be worth the tradeoff of a normal life.

>>48469638
Because PCs or Adventurers in general are born special or become special.
Your ordinary townsfolk starts at either lvl 0 Fighter or have their own Peasant class, both of which has terrible stats which makes fighting a lot harder compared to any PC class at lvl 1. And there are no rules for them to level up, meaning even if they win a fight they do not advance.

And PCs get experience for stuff no "real" person would get experience for, that shows just how special PCs are in the world.

>There's a shitload of mages around
That's not true at all, you just don't meet all the millions of farmers but you will meet almost every wizard that exists near your party, making them seem unproportional common.

>>48469583
Well, I don't think the rules have to reflect that. It'd be more of a flavor text thing that whoever is running the game would explain or have written down in their setting overview.

>>48469623
>Player Characters are exceptional
>Player Characters
I just puked a bit.

>>48469787

Blah blah blah hit with stick hard blah blah blah bend reality

>>48469927
Why, should settings only have NPCs?

>>48469981
>not bending reality with your stick

>>48470096

CoC, where the "PC's" are average joes who accidentally disturb some freaky shit that causes them to slowly go insane.

>>48469836
>And PCs get experience for stuff no "real" person would get experience for, that shows just how special PCs are in the world.
>And there are no rules for them to level up, meaning even if they win a fight they do not advance.
>Your ordinary townsfolk starts at either lvl 0 Fighter or have their own Peasant class, both of which has terrible stats which makes fighting a lot harder compared to any PC class at lvl 1.

That really just sounds like the game has poorly written rules in general.

I mean, why should one guy get EXP for disabling traps and killing monsters, but the militia of farmers who drive away a small horde of goblins get nothing, in spite of them beating away the goblins successfully?

>>48470096
There should be no clear distinction between NPCs and PCs.

A characters actions should speak, while being a players character should say nothing.

If you want to run or play in games where you're a special person who has had life handed to them on a golden platter, feel free. I won't be running those games because they're boring and pointless.

>>48470230
This is true.

PCs in CoC are also not wizards with control of elemental forces. The best you have is a professor who can read a bit of the evil book which drives him insane for reading it.

OP and >>48469623 are obviously talking about D&D and D&D-esque heroic fantasy games, which don't have the player characters as random schmucks. Fantasy games where you are supposed to be random schmucks, like WFRP, have a very low chance of you or anyone else you run into being a wizard.

>>48469638
Because players have control over the abilities of their characters(at least, up to a point). A player wants his character to be a wizard? The character always had the knack for it he just didn't practice or even realize he had it before. He wants the character to become barbarian? Same deal. Doesn't matter if in-setting only one in thousand or one in ten thousand has ability to become a wizard, the player character has it if the player wants him to have it. It sacrifices a degree of verisimilitude to grant the players a greater control over their characters.

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>>48470284
Because the others haven't been possessed by one of Those who Play Games.

>>48470403
I've been planning on using this idea forever. Someday. . . Someday

>>48470284
>That really just sounds like the game has poorly written rules in general.

Not really. It's just game first, a platform for doing cool stuff second and a simulation distant third.

Although usually, the town militia driving away the goblins should receive XP, it just isn't tracked in detail because it's pretty much irrelevant whether they're first or second level and the GM has better things to do than worry about that. If a border town repeatedly getting attacked by goblins/orcs/whatever has militia consisting of first level warriors, that's an oversight from the GM, not a flaw in the system.

>>48470230
CoC basically has no magic and is irrelevant to the discussion because it will kill or maim or destroy your character 99% of the time you try to use it.

>>48470303
Special snowflake and "has the very rare gift of magic/the shining/etc" are not the same.

>>48470307

So if wizards and clerics and druids are that powerful and dangerous, why are they even playable classes in the first place?

Gandalf was powerful sure but he didn't go around blasting everything the party came across or solving every tense moment by wiggling his fingers and forcing the equivalent of a SoL/SoD until the threat was either dead or incapacitated.

Also, compared to most shit in the grand scheme, martials are the de facto random schmucks, if only because they cannot just cast spells and watch their problems go away.

Granted, playing martials in D&D, in any edition besides maybe OD&D and 4e, probably the most boring shit you could ever subject yourself to but that's besides the point.

>>48470493
>Special snowflake and "has the very rare gift of magic/the shining/etc" are not the same.

Never said they were. I just said I don't enjoy games where player characters are either one.

I prefer for magic to be proportionally weak and common if it's an option characters can take. If it's rare and powerful then it becomes a plot device.

>>48470230
Yes, but even in CoC the players are exceptional. They are part of a small group of people that actually stumbles onto these eldritch secrets and are driven insane, rather than just playing as one of the vast majority of people in the world who has nothing supernatural happen to them.

PCs are kind of special by nature. That isn't always a good thing, but it is mostly true.

>>48470558
>So if wizards and clerics and druids are that powerful and dangerous, why are they even playable classes in the first place?

That's a trick question. There's nothing wrong with PCs being essentially demi-gods. The problems arise when in the same game one character is a wizard who can do essentially anything, and another is a fighter who can hit things with sword really hard and the rules text implies that the two should be played in the same party.

>>48470587
>read as "I like low-magic games and hate high-magic games"
Why do you cunts always come into magic threads? You don't like magic.

>>48470493

>Special snowflake and "has the very rare gift of magic/the shining/etc" are not the same.

Yes they are.

It's a special snowflake story if the main character was blessed with a rare gift that not many people have access to that allows him to be the sole reason for why anything within the story gets done.

See: Attack on Titan or Naruto.

Granted, special snowflake and mary sue are terms that get thrown around a lot but overall, the story is much more compelling when the protagonist is someone who doesn't have fortune and power on their side yet still overcomes obstacles based on their wits and talents that allow them to pull off impossible bullshit in spite of the handicap.

See: Boku no Hero Academia or Assassination Classroom

>>48470689
>>It's a special snowflake story if the main character
There are no main characters in a tabletop roleplaying game. Playing a character that isn't Joe Average and sucks at everything is not the same as playing a donut steel Mary Sue. Saying your character was born with the gift of magic does not inherently make that character a Mary Sue.

>>48470683
I love magic mate. I just don't like games where the party are gods walking among meek mortals. If I hated magic I wouldn't run 5e where every class has the option to access some level of magic.

>>48470689
>any unique qualities that help the character in any way makes them a special snowflake
This thread gets more retarded by the second.

>>48470742
>I love magic mate. I just don't like games where the party are gods walking among meek mortals.
No, you love cantrips and other weak excuses for "magic." Low magic = you don't like magic is just how I choose to describe you people because it might as well be nonmagical. Afterall there's no real difference between everyone being able to use cantrips/weak magic and a scifi game where room temperature superconductors have been discovered and thus "telekinesis" and/or nano/femtobots exist that can do everything in a low magic setting and more.

Hardly anyone really wants to play some boring as shit mundane character even in games ABOUT boring as shit mundane characters.

>>48470689
well, now special snowflake has degraded to the point where it is a useless term.
Good work anon, you killed another piece of internet lingo.

>>48470683

Different anon.

If magic exists in the world as an option that the character can take, it should be weak and/or common for people to take due to it being about as mundane and dangerous to use as something like a stove or an electrical socket IRL.

If magic is supposed to be game-breakingly powerful and renders every encounter into a trivial pursuit of who can get their SoL/SoD spells to stick first, then said magic should be similarly rare, to where anyone who does know magic is either hidden away or feared by the general populace.

When you allow magic to be vastly more powerful than any option that does not have access to it, it just creates a situation where those who don't have magic are at a disadvantage while those who do have magic can easily overcome any situation you throw at them simply because "there's a spell for that."

>>48470833
>cantrip and low level spells aren't magic
It's obvious you've been spoiled as a player. A shame really.

>>48470739

>Saying your character was born with the gift of magic does not inherently make that character a Mary Sue.

It does when they're able to win the hearts of anyone they come across with charm spells, lay waste with destructive spells like fireball with the flick of a wrist and generally overcome any obstacle they come across without a lick of struggle when compared to their martial counterpart.

Which is exactly what mages generally can do, as per the game's rules.

>>48470877
That's a false dilemma, anon. Magic can be rare and powerful without making it a game-breaking option.

>>48470877
Your entire post is basically a complaint about D&D 3.5. There are many, many systems where magic is not "game-breakingly powerful and renders every encounter into a trivial pursuit of who can get their SoL/SoD spells to stick first" or "vastly more powerful than any option that does not have access to it."

The OP is asking for magic systems that are hard to learn, thus making it extremely unlikely to be anything common, as well as rewarding without being OP, like you have just described by saying 3.5 without saying 3.5.

>>48470921
>wah 3.5 and D&D and PF
see >>48470941

>>48470141

blah blah that's just magic blah blah blah

>>48469583
oh its this thread again

>>48469583
>why magic hasn't completely wiped out all other means of military advancement

The law of comparative advantage explains this more than adequately.

If more gamers knew basic microeconomics, we wouldn't keep falling into world building blunders like this.

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>>48470961
blah in-universe laws blah blah supernatural bloo.

>>48470934

Name three settings/systems where that's actually the case.

>>48471031
Any superhero system, for starters.

>>48471031
>>48470934
First lets define 'game breaking' in the context of a cooperative multiplayer story telling game.

>>48470985
care to elaborate your point? you might have something in mind that interests me greatly

>>48471049 clearly conflicts with >>48470833
Which is true I wonder?

>>48471031
Eclipse Phase if you consider Psi powers "magic."
All superhero games.
Exalted with regards to Solar powers vs. Dragonblooded powers.

>>48471085
The two posts are by different posters and wholly unrelated, so I don't see how they can conflict.

>>48471111
If everyone has superpowers, is magic really magic?
>Afterall there's no real difference between everyone being able to use cantrips/weak magic and a scifi game where room temperature superconductors have been discovered and thus "telekinesis" and/or nano/femtobots exist that can do everything in a low magic setting and more.

Power is relative after all. If everyone is a superhero, is magic really magic? Or is it just a separate power pool or part of a rock paper scissors style system where some supers are vulnerable to only 'magic' powers just to give the appearance of balance?

>>48471031
Not who you responded to, but alphabetically from my folder:
>Godbound, but "muh low power dirt-farming fantasy"
>Ironclaw
>Legends of the Wulin, but see above
>Reign
>Stars Without Number, but it's sci-fi so it's called psychics
>Unknown Armies

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>>48471170
i wonder who could be behind this post

>>48471099
Exalted also has sorcery, which is powerful and versatile, but by no means game-breaking.

>>48470689

>See: weebshit

You're not helping your case.

>>48471031
>>48471179
Misread your post, so strike out spoilers and Reign. That's still more than you asked for.

>>48471064
>First lets define 'game breaking' in the context of a cooperative multiplayer story telling game.
Able to singlehandedly solve any and all problems better than characters specialized in solving a given set of problems. Basically an unrestricted wizard in 3.5 D&D.

Or at least that's what I seem to be getting from reading these posts.

>>48471170
>If everyone has superpowers, is magic really magic?
>Power is relative after all. If everyone is a superhero, is magic really magic?
Are we talking about "everyone" in the context of the players at the table, or everyone in the context of everyone in the game world. I thought we were referring to the latter.

>>48471064

Any option in the game that opens up vastly more powerful/effective options than another option that has vastly less options in how they choose to overcome an obstacle.

To put it another way,

Fighter

>Hit with sword
>Hit harder with sword

Due to the fact that most options granted by feats are weak, too situational for them to really offer much versatility, or become weaker by design due to enemies gaining more and more strengths that render them immune to it.

Wizard

>Damage
>Debuff
>Buff
>Teleport
>Summon
>SoL/SoD

Among other options, that only become stronger and stronger as they gain levels and opportunities to improve the DC of their spells.

And when you're a martial that's supposed to be powerful yet all you see is the mage slowly gaining more and more power and overcoming obstacles without any help from you, then that's when shit gets stupid and the concept of a "co-op MP ST game" becomes eroded.

To put it another way, nobody wants to go through an hour of character creation only to see that their badass swordsman contributes nothing or worth to the party beyond swinging a hunk of metal while the wizard is able to effortlessly break the CRB over their knee and do almost anything they fucking want.

>>48471212

You can't really snark about weebshit when there exists a long running thread based on Jojo that's running right this second.

Face it, tabletop games overlap with many other forms of media, it's generally what happens.

>>48471245

I hate to say this, but have you tried not playing 3.pf? Earlier editions of D&D don't have this problem to this extent (Wizards do become pretty powerful by the late game, but they're lucky if they live that long, and there's not a lot of ways to enhance the power of their magic).

Later editions also don't really have this problem either. Either by making everyone capable of using some magic, or just making everyone a wizard.

And then there are other systems for fantasy games that don't require this.

Also: This is a bait thread. It's the third one I've seen since yesterday. Why are we all bothering?

>>48469583
this is the third fucking time we've had a thread like this in 2 days.

>depends on the setting

>>48471334
>Why are we all bothering?
Because this is Hell. Eventually, if we shitpost hard enough, the site will crash forever and we can finally be free.

>>48471284
But anon, your weebshit is bad weebshit.

Assassination classroom, really?

>>48471370

What's wrong with Assasination Classrom and Boku No Hero Academia?

Keep in mind, I listed Naruto and Attack on Titan as examples of how special snowflake bullshit can ruin the story.
.

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>>48471201
kek

I'm just trying to establish a community consensus on the definition of magic for both the narrative and mechanical sides of the roleplaying die. Hopefully so the thread doesn't devolve into people arguing semantics without realizing what they're doing.

>>48471245
>>48471222
So an ideally balanced game would naturally, though its mechanics, enable each and every player to be of near equal value, with each contributing to different scenarios in unique and meaningful ways.

>Are we talking about "everyone"
And here we have another thing we need to define and agree on.
>Rules don't reflect that, it's very easy to learn and use magic as a player.
OP seems to believe that magic being easily available to the players as an option means that magic is also common and easy to learn for everyone. That if magic is hard to learn and acquire in the setting, the same should apply to the players and their characters.

What are your thoughts, gentlemen?

Thoughts?

>>48471031

Mage. Sure, it offers reality-warping power. But your enemies have it too and reality itself rejects you.

>>48471366

Can you imagine if that happens? Like, where would you idly waste time if 4chan went down? Like, no warning, the site is just gone.

What would we do?

>>48471537
go to infinity chan or something?

Why are you replying to the THIRD active bait thread on the exact same topic? You know they are all probably virtualoptim, right?

>>48471437
>OP seems to believe that magic being easily available to the players as an option means that magic is also common and easy to learn for everyone. That if magic is hard to learn and acquire in the setting, the same should apply to the players and their characters.
>What are your thoughts, gentlemen?
Retarded.

>>48471553
>>48471537
I went to twicechan once. The only board I would go on is /tg/, and it was pretty much dead.

I'd probably get banned from any of the normal RPG sites, and be cucked at on the rest.

I'd probably sit around playing Dwarf Fortress.

>>48471609
It's a slow board. I prefer it honestly, give me more time to generate thoughtful responses and read/digest what other people are saying.

>>48471609
>I went to twicechan once. The only board I would go on is /tg/, and it was pretty much dead.

If 4chan went dead, it would probably get a lot of extra traffic, because it's the most obvious alternative.

>>48471031
GURPS

>>48471437

I'm going to humor you, despite this being a bait thread.

Before I go putting my thoughts out there, you need to know they're coming from a specific place. OSR, and the original framework for D&D. Within this framework of rules is an implied setting where the world is filled with ruins, monsters, and treasure, and the adventurers (PCs) are the only ones crazy enough to go out and loot them. As a result, they get XP for looting treasure. Monsters don't give much XP, and the resources lost fighting them and the potential for death due to the lower number of hit points makes doing this unattractive. They don't get XP for killing NPCs, or disarming traps. They only get XP for recovered treasure.

There are no bonus spells in OSR. There are no "DCs" in OSR. When a character is affected by a spell, they roll against the appropriate saving throw, and whether they succeed or fail is based on luck and rolling over the target number for the appropriate save - meaning, that as saves improve, one is less and less likely to be affected by magic.

There are (generally) a lack of cantrips in OSR. Cantrip actually used to be a first level spell that could do all of the 3.5 core cantrip spells. Incidentally, this means that a person has to be a 1st level Magic-User in order to cast it.

However, there are some options for cantrips in modern OSR games, and my example will draw from the Basic Fantasy RPG system.

Detailed therein, there is an option for non-spellcasters to learn and cast orisons and cantrips, but they're restricted to 1+Int or Wis modifier per day (or 0+Int of Wis modifier, depending on how rare the DM wishes them to be).

So, at most, you'll have someone who is has the maximum ability score of 18 getting 3-4 spells a day, most of which do incredibly minor things.

Summon/Exterminate Vermin summons or kills one insect.

Mage-Hand can move one pound of material at a speed of 10 feet, or give an object a push of approximately the caster's own strength.

>>48471917

Knot/Unknot can make or unmake knots.

Irritate forces the target to involuntarily blink, nod, itch, giggle, or some other small body movement.

Flavor/Putrefy makes food taste however you want it to, up to and including making it taste like it has gone bad.

Clean/Dirty makes a square foot area clean or dirty.

Transfigure is a minor transformation. You could change hair color with it, but the change isn't permanent. Living things created with the spell don't last more than 10 minutes.

Flare is a flash of fire or a puff of colored smoke.

Animate Tool causes a small tool (up to a small hammer) to do a repetitive task for 10 minutes. It cannot animate weapons.

Inscribe can engrave a square foot of almost any material with writings or drawings.

Open/Close opens or closes a normal unlocked window, door or similar entrance.

Orisons

Guidance/Misguidance gives a +1 or -1 to the subject's next attack roll.

Ward/Curse grants a +1 to the subject's next saving throw.

Cure Minor Wounds heals 1 hp.

Mend fixes dents, minor holes, wear, etc. in small objects.

Predict Weather lets you know what the weather will be like for 24 hours.

Virtue grants a single temporary hit point.

Water to Wine does what it says on the tin. A jug of water becomes wine.

Call to Worship allows the caster to let everyone within a mile know that it's time to pray to the gods. Doesn't compel anyone to show up. Bells might be more useful.

Meal Blessing basically grants 1 hp for the meal that was blessed.

Now, a world with such an implied setting is going to have:

a.) 0 level people, and

b.) some of those people will be capable of casting at least 1 cantrip or orison per day.

c.) 1st level magic is beyond them unless they become a Magic-User or Cleric.

>>48470303
You're right. We should let the statistics do the talking. Each player rolls 1d100 ten times, if all of them come out as 100 they're adventurers. If not, they spend their entire lives inside the same hut, only leaving each morning to tend to their cabbage patch. Nothing exceptional happens their entire lives. There's a 5% that at one point in their lives they hear secondhand stories about an adventure that happened in another country. At age 29 they die from the plague.

I'm sure everyone would have a blast

>>48472148

In such a setting, I would say that "everyone" can have access to these minor magics, and that "everyone" could potentially be a Cleric or Magic-User, but Clerics require uncommon faith and dedication to the deity in question, and Magic-Users likely do in fact require real effort and training to become one.

Elves, in the implied setting of Basic Fantasy RPG are the only race that can be a Fighter/Magic-User multiclass, so I'd assume that Magic-Users are more common among elves, and thus they are more likely to produce them.

But would everyone choose to be a Cleric or Wizard in Basic Fantasy RPG's implied setting? I rather doubt it. For one, Clerics and Magic-User have a d6 and a d4 health (respectively) while 0 level persons enjoy a d8, except for elves, whose maximum HD is a d6.

Moreover, 1st level Clerics have no spells. They don't get them until 2nd level, so you have to survive that long in order to get any payoff beyond the orisons you might already know.

Magic-Users don't have it quite as tough, but they can only cast a single 1st level spell per day at 1st level, meaning that you could charm a single person, once. You don't get a 2nd level spell until 3rd level, so you have to survive that long to begin cashing in your ultimate cosmic power investment.

And, reminder: You only get XP for recovered treasure, so you're playing a dangerous game of chance every time you enter a ruin in pursuit of your aforementioned ultimate cosmic power.

The more time I spend here, the more I question how much anyone has ever even played a table top RPG with other human beings.

>>48472357
Most of the problems discussed on this bored are solved by playing with irl friends and actually reading the material.

>>48472258

Mr. Strawman, if you put that amount of work into actual answers then we might have been able to get somewhere.

There's nothing saying that all NPCs have to lead dreary existences until they die, in fact, there are plenty of stories of ordinary sods being thrust into extraordinary situations.

Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, The Hobbit, Star Wars: Episode IV, etc. all dealt with protagonists who started off as relatively ordinary people who, for one reason or another, decided to go out and explore the world around them while leaving their ordinary lives behind.

Hell, "the hero's journey" is built around this premise.

If you have to make everyone involved in the story a superhero just to have interesting stuff happen to them, rather than throwing them into situations and seeing how they make it out in one piece, then you're just a lazy Storyteller.

Why is it that the guys who want to play lower power games are always the biggest elitist faggots around? They can't just say "I don't enjoy high power games" it's always
>*pukes smugly with self-sactisfacion* if you want to play as a special person, feel free I won't be running those games
as if people are dying to play with them and therefore everyone should give a fuck about what they personally won't run

Meanwhile everyone else in the thread can talk about the topic without spewing "your fun is badwrongfun" bullshit

>>48472412
>Star Wars: Episode IV
>protagonists who started off as relatively ordinary people

The second-to-last living Jedi master, a princess and the literal Chosen One are not good examples of "relatively ordinary people."

>>48472488

Luke started off as a water farmer who wanted to join the rebellion but ended up learning about his birthright as he went on to discover the force.

For the record, that's who I was referring to, specifically.

>>48472412

I'm not the guy you were replying to, but Star Wars might be a bad example. The protagonists of such stories are not in fact, "regular people". They are people with a Hidden Destiny who have been thrust into that destiny after being deliberately shielded from it (in the case of Luke and whatshername) or had their Destiny present itself (in the case of Anakin).

>>48471437
>That if magic is hard to learn and acquire in the setting, the same should apply to the players and their characters.
I would like to ask "why would you do that"?

>>48472412
>Star Wars

I'm glad you mentioned that, because it's the perfect example.

Yes, Luke starts out as an average farmboy, but he also starts off with a hidden talent for a rare form of magical power. They've also got a full-fledged wizard tagging along with them, a princess, and an alien of a rather strong and rare race.

The most normal ones in the group are Han Solo and the Droids, but even they're special by virtue of the fact that out of all the R2 units, protocal droids, and smugglers in the galaxy, they got swept up in this.

Not everyone involved needs to be a superhero, but that doesn't mean that nobody involved can be special. Luke from Star Wars goes against your entire point, as he's the main character with a special power that maybe a dozen people living in the entire galaxy still have.

Insisting that the PCs can't be better than the average NPC throws that out the window, because even with the occasional nobody having some excitement in their lives and going on an adventure, the vast majority really won't.

By being that average Joe who gets caught up in an adventure in the first place, you've made that person special just by having the story focus on them.

>>48470303
>If you want to run or play in games where you're a special person who has had life handed to them on a golden platter, feel free. I won't be running those games because they're boring and pointless.
You forget to tell us that you're leaving the board and never coming back.

>>48472575
Sorry kid, I've been here and will be here for a bit longer.

>>48472631
But you haven't been here long enough to understand that reference?

>>48472413

There is no way to run a high power/magic campaign and still have a threat level maintain a semblance of danger throughout without resorting to power creep.

It's the same reason why you can't have a story featuring Superman or The Flash without anyone with even a semblance of insight into the character's power thinking to themselves "hey, shouldn't this fucker be capable of dealing with this problem due to X?"

How do you create a threat that Superman cannot handle when he has lifted the personification of time itself and a book of infinite pages?

How do you create a threat for The Flash when he can witness events that take place in less than a fraction of a second and can run fast enough to outrun a death being whose whole purpose was catching speedsters?

You really can't, not without either inventing contrived reasons for why they cannot use those abilities anymore (such as using AMF's against mages) or by succumbing to power creep and making progressively stronger enemies that will inevitably leave weaker members of the cast behind yet still only being defeated by the person they were designed to counter (such as using creatures like golems or basilisks).

>>48472647
I don't much care for memes.

>>48472651
So your complaint is that high power characters require high power enemies to challenge them, and this will leave low-power characters behind?

Well, aside from the fact that a high power campaign ideally wouldn't have low-power characters, then I don't see the problem with having the high power characters fighting high-power threats.

Nothing says your high-power characters need to be as strong as superman either, and yet superman has had times where he's died or lost fights or been unable to solve problems. Thus, a high magic party can clearly be put in situations that have a semblance of danger.

Arguing from comic books also isn't very helpful, as power scales there fluctuate massively from writer to writer and even story to story.

A High magic campaign doesn't automatically make everyone demigods that can solve every problem with a flick of the wrist.

>>48472572

>Yes, Luke starts out as an average farmboy, but he also starts off with a hidden talent for a rare form of magical power.

Which he wouldn't have discovered in the first place if he didn't run into R2-DR or C3-PO who played the message that led them to meeting with Obi-Wan in the first place.

Hell, even in the original trilogy, it took Luke one-and-a-half movies to truly master the force and even then, it took training from Obi-Wan and Yoda together.

Even then, I wouldn't really call him a Jedi until Episode 6, primarily due to the fact that throughout most of the movies, he's participating as a rebel pilot until the climax of episode 5 onwards where he finally gets to confront Vader for the first time.

>>48472651
>There is no way to run a high power/magic campaign and still have a threat level maintain a semblance of danger throughout without resorting to power creep.

Unless you think "high power/magic" means epic level D&D 3.x specifically, you're crazy.
Yeah, a wizard is powerful... But so is a dragon, or a beholder.

>>48472742
>it took Luke one-and-a-half movies to truly master the force and even then, it took training from Obi-Wan and Yoda together.

so troughout the course of a campaign he went from level 1 to max level? And he trained with obi-wan and yoda off-screen just like how we assume every player character is training off-screen to justify the power gains of levelling up?

Remember, it didn't even take 10 years for luke to go from loser to jedi master.

>>48472679
You can just say that you don't understand the reference. We're both anonymous, so you won't lose any face.

>>48472651
>WAH 3.PF WIZARDS VS MARTIALS
it never gets old

>>48472813
How would not recognizing or caring for a reference cause someone to lose face even if they weren't anonymous?

>>48471073
The point is, having the power to make all military advancements obsolete also means having the power to do other things which are vastly more beneficial/productive and since there are only so many mages/wizards to go around (i.e they are a scarce resource with alternative uses), they would be doing those things which are most useful/productive

A basic understanding of economics goes a long way toward making realistic worlds (if that's your thing). I recommend the book 'Basic Economics' by Thomas "The Realest Nigga" Sowell for a start.

>>48472737

>Well, aside from the fact that a high power campaign ideally wouldn't have low-power characters, then I don't see the problem with having the high power characters fighting high-power threats.

Look at shit like DBZ, where the only ones who remain relevant throughout once power levels and super saiyan forms come into play are Goku, Vegeta, and Gohan for a time before he takes on a support roll.

Each member of the group is vastly more powerful than an ordinary human, yet they still cannot take on any of the major threats that threaten the world, such as Frieza, Cell, or Majin Buu.

>Nothing says your high-power characters need to be as strong as superman either, and yet superman has had times where he's died or lost fights or been unable to solve problems. Thus, a high magic party can clearly be put in situations that have a semblance of danger.

Yet after a few months, Superman is back in action and looking no worse for wear because of some contrived bullshit like "healing comas" and "secret Kryptonian physiology."

>A High magic campaign doesn't automatically make everyone demigods that can solve every problem with a flick of the wrist.

Yet because of how powerful they are, it's hard to justify anything short of class 1 apocalypse l to make them even flinch for an instance.

And at that point, shit's no longer all that scary since in a high magic campaign, the characters have probably already dealt with threats that were around the same weight class at some point in their journey.

>>48472803

>so troughout the course of a campaign he went from level 1 to max level? And he trained with obi-wan and yoda off-screen just like how we assume every player character is training off-screen to justify the power gains of levelling up?

You don't get EXP for training unless the GM gives you like, RP EXP or something.

>>48472742
I don't get what point you're trying to make here. That Luke could have easily just been an average pilot if the Hero's Journey plot didn't find him? That if Luke was an NPC, he wouldn't have gone on an interesting adventure? Because that runs counter to what you were saying >>48472412

Luke doesn't start off as an ordinary person. He starts with an ordinary life, but just by being a latent force user he's anything but ordinary.

>>48472932
thing is, why do you suppose the players start there? And why do you think the progression is exponential?

>>48472946
No, you don't get it
you get xp from adventuring and level up
but the assumption is that your character is training/meditating/whatever off-screen which is why you only get the benefits of the level up at the end of the adventure.

>>48472932
>Yet because of how powerful they are, it's hard to justify anything short of class 1 apocalypse l to make them even flinch for an instance.
>And at that point, shit's no longer all that scary since in a high magic campaign, the characters have probably already dealt with threats that were around the same weight class at some point in their journey.

You have some really fucking crazy assumptions about roleplaying games. I'm actually getting confused by what you say about high magic campaigns
Please give an example of a game othat is high magic according to you.

Cause it sure as shit ain't D&D. No D&D party has faced multiple apocalypse-level threat in the same campaign. You also keep making comparisons to other media but you gotta realize that RPGs are games, and thus interactive media. They don't follow exactly the same rules as non-interactive media like anime and comics.

>>48472975

No, you gain XP by killing monsters or completing important quest lines.

Don't inject your head canon into the argument and pretend that it's actually relevant.

>>48472932
>Yet after a few months, Superman is back in action and looking no worse for wear because of some contrived bullshit like "healing comas" and "secret Kryptonian physiology."

Because it's a comic book, and they can't sell superman comics if superman is dead.

In a tabletop RPG, the player will just shrug and re-roll as mightyman or whatever instead, just the same as a low power game. You can have high-magic and high-power settings without cheap and easy resurrection being a given as well.

>Yet because of how powerful they are,

There isn't a 'how powerful they are'. A high magic or high power campaign doesn't have a set level of how powerful something is before it qualifies. It's largely in contrast to a low power setting.

I would classify 4e as a High power setting, because they start with plenty of hitpoints, are unlikely to go down in a single attack, and are firmly established as being heroic from square 1. That doesn't mean they can solve every problem though, as a sufficiently sized horde of goblins can still cause them trouble.

>And at that point, shit's no longer all that scary since in a high magic campaign, the characters have probably already dealt with threats that were around the same weight class at some point in their journey.

Except that's not what that means. If you've already encountered an apocalyptic threat before, that means there was a time when you first encountered an apocalyptic threat, when it was actually dangerous. And since you've obviously dealt with things less threatening than the apocalypse before on your journey, that also means you've dealt with natural-disaster level threats. Which means there was a first time you dealt with that where it was scary. And so on and so forth until there was a time where you just started out and managed to slay a threat to a town.

Progression is part of the game.

>>48473073
Not that anon, but you're literally retarded and need to kill yourself.

>>48469583
Jesus, you AGAIN?
Don't you have like a goddamn job to go do or something?

>>48469583
After reading the thread I wish you to either try out a dnd game or just proceed to some other board. An alternative is to just end your life since if you don't want to do either of those I'm convinced you're unable to have an enjoyable life in any way not counter-productive.

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Well so much for productive discussion.

>>48469583
>Mages are like 0.000000000001% of the population.
>Highly regulated
>Most are weak
>Party has 2 world class uber mages in it by the system's definition.

Thanks shadowrun.

>>48471917
>despite this being a bait thread.
OP here
this isn't bait

shit like >>48473472 happens a lot and it bothers me

>>48473472
>>48473619
Shadowrun
is a game about, obviously, shadowrunners. A group of people who by the very nature of their jobs, are exceptional compared to the average person. I really don't see the issue here.
It's not like the NPC shadowrunners aren't also mages and shit.

I'm pretty sure the number of special forces in the world doesn't even come close to 1% of people in the world. And yet if there was an RPG focused on being a member of some army special forces, no one would complain.

>>48473761
But you don't understand, anon, every game must cater to my very low-magic, poor as fuck commoner campaign desires OR IT'S MARY SUE TIER BULLSHIT.

>>48473761
>RPG focused on being a member of some army special forces, no one would complain.
That's because no matter how special you are in this world, a lucky shot, grenade, hail of bullets, or a moving vehicle can still kill you.

You're not a superhero just because you're a Ranger. And not being superpowered is part of what makes being a Ranger so admirable.

>>48473788
that's not the point of the thread anon, are you literally retarded?

where did i say it's mary sue bullshit?

all i'm saying is that if a setting's magic is supposedly HARD TO LEARN, i'm expecting something other than a level slide where my character grows at the same rate as the brawler learns new punches

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>>48469583
Depends on setting obvi.
I've run settings where major cities are lucky to have more than 20~ people can cast above 5th level spells (We are talking residents, not travelers) It's supposed to be rare as shit

>>48473828
>a lucky shot, grenade, hail of bullets, or a moving vehicle can still kill you
in SR that also applies to mages
it ESPECIALLY applies to mages since once they are recognized they usually try to occupy the same space as a dozen bullets or so
Geek the mage first is one of the important rules there

>>48473828
>That's because no matter how special you are in this world, a lucky shot, grenade, hail of bullets, or a moving vehicle can still kill you.

same thing in shadowrun though.
The point of this thread is

>magic is rare and takes a lot of effort therefore players shouldn't be able to be wizards

well then being an army ranger or a gru sniper or a bope whatever takes a lot of effort and is super rare therefore players shouldn't be able to be spec-ops.

That is how dumb OP sounds.

>>48473864
that's why AD&D and D&D basic have wizard classes taking more XP to level up then other classes. Later editions of D&D dumped that system because it added nothing to the game.
remember m8, it's a game. The rules aren't necessarily meant to be some sort of simulation of the world.

>>48474038
so basically you're a simulationist autist who can't understant gamist systems.
Ok. Please stop making these threads.

>>48474088
His argument seems to be that they should progress slowly compared to others, not that players shouldn't have the option to play them.

He's made that clear.

>>48474111
>implying I'm OP
>implying there is only one person that supports this
>implying implicative implications

>>48474127
>He's made that clear

He's made nothing clear. His argument is all over the place.

>>48474169
There are multiple people in this thread. You might be getting OP confused with others.

>>48469583
I dunno, why havent combat engineers or weapon scientists taken complete controll over the military standard forces yet?

>>48474127
>His argument seems to be that they should progress slowly compared to others

Well, AD&D and D&D basic does just that. Wizards take more xp to level up there.
It was a bad idea then, and it's still a bad idea now.

>>48470961
Blah blah sufficient advanced technology is magic blah blah

I dont trust someone whos only tooös are a bathrobe and a stick to not be from the rock age.

>>48469583
It takes years of training and experience to be an expert swordsman.

Yet any player can just up and become a 30th level Paladin.

...You want the game to reflect the difficulty experienced by the character? People have jobs and school, ya know.

>>48469583
>Magic in a setting is 'hard to use and learn' to explain why magic hasn't completely wiped out all other means of military advancement
Of what game you are referring, specifically?

I mean, in most settings, mages are rare as fuck, usually acquiring their powers through lineage or some infernal contract.

In systems where they aren't, magic is so prevalent that either everyone is using it, thus magic cancels magic, or the mundanes have enough magic items to counter most magical effects, simply because there's so many magic users producing them.

>>48471370
Assassination classroom is one of the more solid flavor of the month series, recently. (Or at least, from where I'm at. If be willing to bet that there's gonna a be a shitty overdramatic twist about sensei, that's gonna ruin everything, and be a total copout.)

Has fun characters, funny moments, and good "fights", all without taking itself too seriously.

>>48474169
>He's made nothing clear. His argument is all over the place.
The strawman arguments of the people who hate him are all over the place, which isn't surprising, since they actively avoid making sense. The OP's actual complaint is quite clearly that there are things said to be rare due to the incredible difficulty inherent in learning them, yet are easy to actually acquire if one goes by the rules.

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>>48469583
As far as I am aware, there are plenty of homebrews LotR style, where margic is scarcer than your sexlife, or mages are hunted down like your loli collection on japanese ebay. That being said, it is obviously because the games you are talking about, yet failing to mention, give the players the opportunity to be extraordinary individuals, and not your average shit-eating dirt far- i mean like you. Quite frankly, your complaint about regulation reminds me of GRRM complaining about Tolkien not disclosing Aragorn's tax policies during his reign: misguided, butthurt, and completely irrelevant.

>>48474497
>The OP's actual complaint is quite clearly that there are things said to be rare due to the incredible difficulty inherent in learning them, yet are easy to actually acquire if one goes by the rules.
Yeah, but the skills for nearly EVERY class in nearly every game are incredibly difficult to acquire for the character, yet only require a few dice rolls and some pencil strokes for the player, regardless of how over or under powered they are.

>>48472927
You ignorant slut. That's a production possibilities frontier, not comparative advantage.

If you knew basic microeconomics, you wouldn't keep falling into word choice blunders like this.

Comparative advantage would be "Nation A is built on Ley Lines and is fuckgood at magic, while Nation B has beast blood in its soldiers and a surplus of iron. Nation A should trade some mages to Nation B in exchange for elite soldiers, and they can both be magically and martially stronger than they could be on their own"

>>48474497
They're easy to acquire for PCs, because PCs are rare. They're difficult and rare to get for NPCs, because NPCs are basically limitless.

>>48469583
who is this semen demon?

>>48474533
>GRRM complaining about Tolkien not disclosing Aragorn's tax policies
I think that was a weee bit out of context - he was complaining that Tolkien just described Aragorn as a "goodly king" who reigned for a century, but never mentioned what he did to make him "goodly", and that was true, for the most part, of most of the good and evil characters in the stories - most were good or evil by decree or sometimes merely appearance, rather than due to any set of actions. This was part of his rant of complaining about the instigation of a trend of simplistic "good guys vs. bad guys" in fantasy in general, and his desire for such worlds to be more nuanced.

Though, other than that, agreed.

I don't get it. Why should player characters be, without explanation, extraordinary in any physical way other than their willingness to do dangerous things?

>>48474666
Well, they are easy to acquire for PLAYERS - not necessarily for their characters - who went through however many years of torture, training, mind bending meditations and studies, spending years building muscles and breaking their backs, experiencing near fatal wounds, and/or spending hours every day memorizing some spells, only to have half their mind ripped from their heads at the end of the day, and so on and so forth. The bulk of NPCs have a much easier time of it than most PCs.

I mean, most of our characters would kill us if they knew we were responsible for putting them through so much suffering, rather than having them simply settle on a farm somewhere safe... Though they'd probably kill our game masters first.

>>48474666
>They're easy to acquire for PCs, because PCs are rare.
There's a difference between "the PCs are extraordinary individuals who gain more skill points by default than normal people" and "the fluff says that this is incredibly rare and hard to master but the rules say that it's not much harder than common combat skills".

>>48474875
That anon, is a pretty big distinction, which may decide what types of games you play

Most modern games follow the "PCs are exceptional and thus have extraordinary abilities which NPCs usually don't have." philosophy

Old school games like OD&D, OSR and such follow "The PCs are mostly normal and thus can do what normal people can do".

It also determines how they see Character death: camp one says "character death is very bad and should be avoided at all costs". This is often also because in these systems CharGen can take a while.
camp two OTOH says "character death? Who cares, there's another guy to fill his spot" In these systems CharGen is usually fast so you can quickly have another PC at hand

>>48474875
If they weren't extraordinary, you'd be playing someone else instead.

>>48474946
>common combat skills
>PCs
>ever
The sort of combat skills PCs acquire tend to be on the verge of super human (if not straight up super human). Killing dragons in martial combat is hardly "common". So yeah, it makes sense it takes about as much time and effort to acquire those as it does to acquire the same magical skills, being among the reasons you usually can't do both.

But generally, in these games, magic also requires some sort of birth trait, demon contract, divine blessing, or what not, so even basic magic is a lot less common than "common combat skills", and epically powerful mages are even rarer than epically powerful combatants.

Though it doesn't help that OP doesn't mention ANY SPECIFIC GAME - cuz this all varies quite a bit from setting to setting.

>>48474993
Those two things aren't necessarily related except in the specific case of old school games that you mention. Consider Unknown Armies: Characters are shit. But they still take a long time to roll up, and aren't expected to die often. Then consider Magical Burst: Characters are more special than any edition of D&D, but they don't take long to make at all, and although death isn't common, character generation is incredibly fast.

>>48474875

I don't believe they should. I like the farmer boy picks up a sword to become an adventurer thing.

But what I don't get is this entire thread; why the shit fit? Can somebody summarize?

>>48474993
Not sure what "OD&D" you are referring to, but in several ancient versions of D&D and AD&D your average civilian was considered a level 0 character with 1hp. AD&D/D&D Redbook/bluebook player characters were super-hero as fuck, once they had some levels under their belts. (Granted, getting those first few levels was often one hell of a gamble.)

>>48475100
I don't think OP has posted once since he started this bait thread, as not one question directed at him has been answered, so I've no idea.

>>48474875
The same reason why you start at an adventuring age instead of playing through all of a character's formative years to find out if they become a fighter, a baker, or die of cholera.

It's not very interesting to have a character start in a place where they're bringing nothing to the table. It's more fun to start as someone with skill rather than a nobody.

I mean, say the PCs aren't any more special than NPCs. That means your average party is going to be the town pickpocket, a new recruit in the town guard, and maybe a hunter. While that could be an interesting premise, it also means that there's little that the party can do that other people in the town can't. If Goblins are attacking the village, the party could go on a mission to root them out, or the town guard can just send a few recruits, since they're just as strong as the PCs

If instead, the players are the best thief in town, the captain of the town guard, and a skilled hunter who lives in the town, then there's a much better reason as to why they were chosen.

>>48475150
Well, 1st level characters aren't too far beyond normal folks in most D&D games. I mean, yeah, your mage can put a couple of people to sleep once per day, but then he's done, and doesn't even have the hitpoints to take a single solid hit from a goblin, let alone the skill to hit one with his puny knife. (Well, until you start min/max'ing with splatbooks.)

But after a few adventures, you're basically superheroes who could wipe out your whole village before lunch time.

>>48475100
People tried to justify magic being rare while PCs could have multiple magic users by pointing out that PCs are usually more special and rare as a general rule.

Others went against that with their belief that PCs shouldn't be given special things above NPCs and the two should behave the same.

Then it was a matter of jumping to extremes about low power vs. high power that ultimately comes down to a lot of stuff about system and setting.

Ultimately, you can use both to justify things in a setting.

>>48469583
>>There's a shitload of mages around
How much is a shitload?

>>48471031
>Name three settings/systems where that's actually the case.

WFRP, I mostly played 2ed.
Magic is rare among humans and not so powerful most of times.
Apprentice wizard have smaller firepower than combat oriented character.
Archmage will loose to master of weapon, unless he is archmage of fire order. Then he is a living artillery that can't do much else.
Also each spell could result(rarely) in mage's death or insanity, so use on your own risk.

To this there are relay powerful ritual (also available to players).
But the are balanced by:
a)requiring rare ingredients
b)they can backfire and kill the caster
c)they need hours of time
So while mage can destroy city by using one ritual, it would be easier to just get an army and bombard the shit of it.

Plus there is strong social stigma on magic users. Ability to shoot fire bolts could let you kill d10 peasants, but rest will pin you down and burn on stake.

>>48475219
about tree-fiddy

>>48475200
Depends a lot on the edition. Fighters are certainly a strict upgrade to the typical basic town guard or bandit. While a mage can't take a hit from a goblin, the same is probably true of most townsfolk aside from the guards themselves.

While the rampant leveling of D&D is a bit odd, there are often ways to mitigate it somewhat. Even then, is it really that unusual to think that professionals going through these situations and practicing and honing new skills to wipe out entire caves of goblins are going to struggle if they somehow turn evil and decide to wipe out their village?

It is how D&D was designed, and while it is a bit gamey, I don't really see much wrong with that. If you want a grittier game while still using D&D, it's easy to change the XP values so players will have to do more stuff to level, spending more time at those low levels. You can require that the players take downtime between adventures in order to 'spend' their experience and level up, explaining where they get new spells and combat tricks.

PCs tend to hit superhero levels at around level 5 or so, but at that point they're also ready to start going toe to toe with dragons. It's just the way the game is designed, and that part of it is more a matter of preference.

Are there settings with present magic where it's basically useless in combat and more of a skill?

>>48471031
Well, there's OWoD Mage, where the power of magic is practically limitless, and mages are rare as fuck, but your primary enemy tends to be other mages, and the collective sense of reality is your greatest foe, ready to kick you straight the fuck out of it, if you fuck with it too much. (Does go a little nuts if not handled right though, or if you happen to be outside of reality already anyways.)

There's old Shadowrun, where mages are rare as fuck, and OP'd as fuck, but mages are so good at countering other mages that it basically turns into a stalemate if you have one on your team, even if you're jumped by multiple mages. This is slightly countered by the fact that mages can't have much cyberware, and thus the mundanes can fill them full of lead before they can move, if they can get the jump on them, or have magical backup to foil their attacks. (Hence the credo, "Always geek the mage first.")

And then there's Ars Magica, where you play a mage, and mages are rare as fuck, but you also have about a 10% chance of utterly fucking yourself in the ass every time you use your magic, and the training is so knowledge intensive and leaves you so specialized that you basically have to play a second mundane character, just so he can wipe your ass (or anything else that doesn't involve magic, really).

>>48475025
There's still a difference between things like, say, high weapon skills, which any highly-trained guard or soldier you encounter is likely to have, and magic, which is supposed to be much less common even though the rules let you get it with about the same amount of training.

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Why is it only magic users that need to learn magic the hard way? Or rather, why is all magic the hard kind to learn?

When a young fighter starts his journey, he knows some techniques and has the strength in his arms. Later on down the line, he may find a special sword of great strength, or learn secret techniques from a wise monk to improve his power and cool his temper.

When the thief starts his journey, he is alright at stealing and sneaking. But later down the line he might find a master skeleton key, or a cloak of invisibility!

So why not the same for the magic user? Don't give your players the 'good' spells for free, make them plot points and work for them. Wizards start with a few basic, common spells. But if they want to learn how to fly or control the minds of many people, they need to go find a magic carpet or construct a hand of glory from the hand of a truly bad man stuck with 5 candles, one from each temple on opposite parts of the globe, and so on.

>>48475522
I've not played D&D in a long time, but in my day, high level guards were rare as fuck, the scariest ones I could remember being the Waterdeep Redplum guards, who were all 8th level fighters, but that was in a cray cray city of millions, and they were the elite of the elite.

But in most D&D worlds, to use magic, you had to be born with the talent. PCs are just more likely to be born with said talent, as they are more apt to select Wizard in their creation, while NPCs are more likely to select Peasant. If you have the talent, it takes the same dedication to hone it, yes, but as said talent is rare, and the dedication to hone any skill was also rare, it made elite mages rarer than elite fighters.

>>48475528
I always liked the idea of mages being more restricted in terms of effects they could get, though I usually prefer it to be more thematic than power based.

Still, it wouldn't be that difficult to do, even in D&D. Just make it so that casters only get cantrips and maybe a single level 1 spell, and to get any more they have to find scrolls by questing.

>>48475522
>which any highly-trained guard or soldier you encounter is likely to have
this "magic is high power but non-magical characters are weak" bullshit is only for a single edition of a single fucking game.
This entire fucking thread is

>D&D be like this lets discuss D&D but without ever saying D&D so we can pretend the thread is generic, also I have never played an RPG besides D&D but I still assume that's how every other game is like

A regular ass guard no matter how well trained cannot do what a high level D&D 4e and 5e fighter can, and in 3e that regular ass guard captain is probably a fighter anyway, and they probably have a mage somewhere in town because magic is extremely common in 3e according to the random population rolls of the DM handbook, and in 2e and 1e there's no distinction between npcs and pcs so anyone who rolled enough intelligence can be a wizard, and wizards DO take more xp to level up anyway.

>>48475669
>this "magic is high power but non-magical characters are weak" bullshit
Feel free to read my actual point at any time.

>>48475669
So basically

1e & 2e have magic being actually 'difficult' to learn

3e has magic being easy, strong, but also common due to tables

4e and 5e has characters built differently from npcs, and get tricks npcs never get

So in short, basically no edition has the problem of calling magic rare and then making it easy and common?

You don't often see a PC D&D party made up of all mages, outside of a comedy campaign, for good reason. They're basically fucked if something gets in close or they run outta spells.

You usually have one mage per party as artillery, a cleric for healing, and then a few fighters - and possibly some other classes such as rogues or bards for face and incidentals. So, for all the butthurt talk of how OP mages are, it is strange that they generally make up the minority of any given D&D party.

>>48475737
Yup
I'm willing to be no game has that problem either
it's just some bullshit made up by OP.

>>48475482
>you also have about a 10% chance of utterly fucking yourself in the ass every time you use your magi
Explain more?

>>48475773
It's only really 3.5, and for 3.5, it's specifically all casters, not just wizards. A party of a Druid, Cleric, and two Wizards is much better off than a party of a Fighter, Cleric, Rogue, Wizard. Wizards get enough Int and skills combined with spell utility to match a Rogue for long enough to get a wWnd of knock. Druids get a free fighter at level 1. Clerics and Druids can both front-line almost as well as a Fighter.

It might have been true in AD&D, but 3.5, 4e, and 5e can have all-caster parties that all function quite well, some for different reasons than others.

While an all caster party has to play smart in 3.5, that's basically the only place where the OP mage complaints crop up, and they do have a lot of merit. It's just more complicated than a party of 4 wizards dying because they all prepped nothing but magic missile.

>>48475361
It's strange that I canna think of one... Closest I can think of is maybe the ritual magic in Shadowrun or Mage, where it was something that could take days to complete, and thus was done out of combat. There were even some rules where these rituals could be performed by mundanes (or a group of mostly mundanes), but, of course, in both those games the in-combat magic was much more common.

I suppose, the exception, is that some Adepts in Shadowrun could ONLY do enchanting, or summoning (the latter of which had to be done out of combat, but certainly wasn't useless in it, once you had your elemental/spirit), but rarely did anyone build such characters as PCs.

I know there's some game I'm forgetting about... Other than, you know, Call of Cthulhu and the like.

>>48475842
Not him. The 10% is a bit of an exaggeration, but whenever you cast a spell, on a roll of 0 on the die (AM uses a d10, 0-9 for most challenging tasks), you have to check for a botch. If any of the "botch dice" rolled also show a 0, the spell goes haywire. If you roll 2 0s on the botch dice, you have to see if you enter Wizard's Twilight, which makes you temporarily disappear and come back with some supernatural mark. The reason magi have to deal with it so much is that casting a spell always starts as a task with 3 botch dice, and there are plenty of ways for the number to increase with few ways to reduce it.

At least, that's how it is for 5th. 4th might be dumber on this point just like how it is in combat, and I'd believe this was the case in the mess that was 3rd.

>>48469583
Get a better world builder retard.

>>48475891
>>48475361
Participated this funny little homebrew, that I think was actually based on a chart I've seen on /tg/ but don't have at the moment, where you had to draw these little inter-locking rune patterns to do magic. You were allowed to have three prepared at any time, so magic wasn't useless in combat, but once you used those up, you had to draw anymore you needed in real time (which, against martials, meant faster than the GM could roll dice), and for them to have any real power, they had to be pretty complicated. I suppose you could be quite the spell flinger, if you got real good at drawing them fast, but none of us could. Often we had one beefy guy holding off the enemy while one or two others drew circles as fast as they could, getting in one good spell every three rounds or so. Beefcake really won the day in extended combat.

Outside of combat, the magic was much more powerful, as you could make the runes about as elaborate as you wanted. If we had some material component of our enemy, or knew where he was, and he wasn't around to beat on us, he was basically fucked, as we could generally nuke him as well as counter any protection runes he had at our leisure.

Was interesting, though the campaign only lasted a few months.

>>48476242
That's a really dumb mechanic. That's like making someone playing a fighter do a certain amount of dumbbell lifts before the GM can roll dice to attack.

>>48474805
>ut never mentioned what he did to make him "goodly
He was the chieftain of the rangers of the north. It was only because of his rule that the few organized settlements on middle earth didn't collapse. The hobbits at the Shire and the people at Bree have no idea there's a war going on because the Rangers protect them that much. The moment Aragorn is busy elsewhere is the moment Saruman takes over the Shire.
>of most of the good and evil characters in the stories - most were good or evil by decree or sometimes merely appearance, rather than due to any set of actions
This is false. This is the kind of criticism people who haven't read Tolkien make about him.

>>48475773
In 3.5 full caster parties are objectively better than mixed. In 4e everyone is a re-flavored caster. In 5e every single class has the option to gain access to magic at some point; again a full caster party is fully viable.

>>48476724
Oh, yes, there's also that by birthright Aragorn is technically the king of not only Gondor but ALL HUMANITY as the last descendant of the kings of Numenor. He's still happy to allow people to treat him as a vagabond or wild man in Bree, and he refuses to take reign over Gondor until the war is over, camping outside the city instead.

File: 1f0.gif (3MB, 287x191px) Image search: [Google]

3MB, 287x191px

>>48471512
>reality itself rejects you.
Reality itself already rejects me in real life.

>>48475635
>even in D&D
D&D already does this though, it's just the scaling that's fucked.

>>48477201
D&D doesn't do that at all, except in very early editions. You already know a good handful of spells automatically at level 1, and usually learn a couple each time you go up a level.

This would change it instead so that either you're relying on the DM to hand out spells to you, or having to ask around and actually research where to find the spell you really want.

>>48477365
>You already know a good handful of spells automatically at level 1, and usually learn a couple each time you go up a level.
Right, there's some basic spells you get, and then the others are found by the DM. The only thing missing is differentiating the two. I'm not saying D&D is a good system, but the intent is clearly there.

>>48477427
Right, which isn't what I said at all. Instead you'd get no spells on leveling up, just starting with basic cantrips, and relying entirely on the DM to give you chances to acquire more.

>>48477528
Well, yeah. That was your solution to the issue we were talking about. If you refer back to your previous post, you'll note that I called out a specific phrase, I wasn't addressing your proposed solution at all. For what it's worth, I think that solution would be an awkward modification to an already awkward system.

>>48469638
They are the protagonists in the story.

>>48476695
Well, it was sorta an "old english magic" detective game where we were all practicing magicians running around Victorian London hunting down and offing groups of evil occultists, just some of us were better beefcake than others. Worked alright that way... I wouldn't recommend it for a D&D style world, lest you were all similarly wizards with some combat and social skills on the side. Wasn't intended to nerf magic, so much as be the central mechanic.

Wish I could find the damned rune charts though - I know I've seen them here.

>>48470230
CoC pc's are anything but ordinary by the fact they have players driving them.

Not only do they go places no one in the setting would go outside of story protagonist, they also grow from the experiences and can sometimes overcome mind numbing insanity.

>>48470303
And we will not be playing in your game because they are terrible and non satisfying.

>>48478092
Said none of my nine players across two separate games.

>>48478152
you seem like Virt

>>48478458
Nice ad hominem.

>>48478517
does that mean you are Virt?

>>48478732
If I was would I consider being confused for him to be an attack on my character?

>>48474761
Seriously? You'd probably masturbate to a plank of wood if I said it was a girl. Uh, it looks like a shy guy/gal but with the evil fuck-you mask from Mario Bros 2. /tg/ perverts are worthless.

>>48478773
>You'd probably masturbate to a plank of wood if I said it was a girl.
Yes, and?

>>48472412

The only thing that really separates the "specials" from the "nots" is drive. The gumption to get out there and make something of themselves, solve a problem, amass wealth, whatever.

The fact that magic could just as easily be related to money--it allows you to do most anything. It is completely achievable by pretty much anyone willing to do whats necessary to get it, and yet very few people make it to 60k status, let alone millionaire.

>>48472651
Look at the Mahabharata for a moment.

This is a story where most characters are carrying at least one weapon with the destructive capabilities of a nuclear bomb. Some of the main characters are on par with gods. Arjuna kills a demon even gods could not kill. There are weapons capable of destroying three worlds at once.

And yet, the 'good guys' barely win by the skin of their teeth, having lost all of their friends and children, and to get this much they had to cheat in battle several times.

Or for a more modern example, look at Exalted. The whole point of that game is to play as supernatural powerhouses expected to challenge gods and demon lords for supremacy.

Seriously, try thinking outside of the Western DnD fantasy box.

>>48479040
He needs to read him some Dying Earth or Elric, seriously. Some Night's Master or something. Read some real fantasy, you damn kids!

>it's a "is magic really magic" discussion thread
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VHrTTgmB_3w
Especially the second half.

>>48482533
Can a player even be given and trusted with the level of flexibility and power talked about in the second half?

Lets say instead of the spells in D&D the character simply has a very limited resource pool that allows them to, at any time, spend a point and tell the GM and the rest of the group: 'Actually, Y happens instead of X' or 'I do thing B' and it happens, the GM has to roll with it. But the catch is that the only way the caster can refill that pool of power is if the GM gives them points back.

How does that sound? Ripe for abuse, I'd argue, but it would be fun to test.

>>48470403
This is cool

>>48484077
Anon, you just described FATE points

>>48484204
Doesn't everyone get fate points though?

>>48478749

It would be extremely painful

>>48484204
that's not FATE points at all though.
FATE points have to be used through an aspect or a stunt, which severely limits what can happen.
You either invoke aspects with the points by paying them to someone or something, which can only bring forth aspects of characters or the environment that were already there, or you feed them into a stunt as the cost for "declaring" something, in which case you can only declare things in one specific way.