"Sticks and stones may break my bones, but nothing will ever kill me. Well, let's see now. First, they tried burning me. Then they tried burying me. But this... this is my favorite. They even tried holy water! But I just keep on tickin'... because they promised me that."
"They?"
"The dream people. The ones that gave me this job. In dreams... I am forever! Too bad you're not."
Hands up, who saw this one coming? I didn't feel it was fair to bring up alignments without breaking down what the "problem" with them was. Now that we all know how easy the axis is to understand and how much baggage it brings along with it, let's talk about a particular style of play that causes no end of problems.
Necromancers. Sith. Black Spiral Dancers. Anarchs and Sabbat. Assassins and hitmen. Anarchists and Toxic Shamans. They're all so fucking cool it's inevitable that we all get the desire to play them. Maybe some people try to mix them in with other characters, and sometimes that just doesn't work. Maybe the conflict comes to combat too easily, or maybe someone's just really adverse to moral conflict in his PNP games. So, it follows naturally that if we don't like the conflict and we want to play these amoral concepts...let's just all do it at once.
This line break is here to give everyone time to reflect back on all the times they've tried this. Sorry I'm bringing back bad memories for some of you.
For every "Evil Game" that runs really well, there's probably a dozen that fail. We're going to go into the two major reasons for that today, but...I gotta put a word of caution here. Amoral campaigns may not be for your group. This isn't something where I'm trying to pull back the veil and show that it's not really that bad, and declare this is something nobody should be afraid of. While I AM trying to do that first part...amoral campaigns require both a certain mindset and a level of maturity. In this above all other things, you've got to know your group. Bad things might happen. Players may try to manipulate other players, depending on the "style" of their evil. Graphic scenes and awful things will absolutely be described.
Anyway. I said there are two major problems with these types of games, aside from my phantom third problem of the amoral campaign potentially having a lot of in-group conflict. It doesn't always happen, and an amoral game can easily be arranged without it, but some people just don't like that sort of thing. Not much advice I can give for this: Evil can lend itself to manipulating the people around it, and all you can really do is tell people not to play these "master manipulator" asshole types if most of the group isn't okay with it. With that out of the way, here's our two cuplrits:
A. Amoral campaigns are often seen as a way to blow off steam or act out personal fantasy and quickly get out of hand due to player's over-the-top actions.
B. Evil is proactive in nature.
So yeah, that first one is probably the one everyone remembers. We all love pen and paper gaming, but role playing good guys all the time can wear you down. Really. GMs will often place (deliberately or on accident) wildly irritating NPCs or situations that the players are locked into dealing with due to playing a good guy. An overly bureaucratic clerk who can't be made to care about the PCs plight can't just be beaten mercilessly by a good person. Neither can you just murder someone repeatedly demanding favors(read: adventure hooks) for necessary items or assistance. The "evil" game rolls around and the first thing a lot of people think is...I can do whatever I want now. I don't have to sit here and deal with this. Talking didn't work, and now I don't have to just walk away like my good character did. I don't have to let anyone push me around. Fuck turning the other cheek.
So you can see where that goes. Other times, players feel like this game is finally their shot to do whatever they want. To be Really Evil, to do all the villain stuff they always wanted to act out in these games. So the players end up doing a lot of really bombastic stuff, from complex plots all the way to simple wanton violence. The GM feels boxed-in or threatened and ends up working double-time to cause all of the proper reactions and consequences to happen. He feels actions should have consequences, and he's pushed to the point where either he's throwing a holy light tactical nuke at the party...or just giving up and letting them run roughshod over the game, providing no resistance.
There's unfortunately not a whole lot of advice I can give you with this one. I wrote a post on problem players, and I invite you to go read that. There are a lot of people out there who think "My guy is Evil" is all the justification they need to act like a dickhead. During my time playing MUDs online, I met very, very many of these people. An evil alignment does not preclude character motivation, and be sure all the members of your group understands this. If you're a player, try to follow a personality naturally instead of just doing whatever sounds funny or sickening. Build a character more three dimensional than "My dude's a sadist" or "He just likes killing people". Presumably you're not that thin when building a neutral or good character. The GM will also want to make sure that everyone's on the same page with what kind of game it's going to be. It's perfectly fine to run a game where the players are monstrously and cartoonishly evil so long as everyone's on board for that. Inter-group conflict frequently happens when two people have wildly different expectations for a game. Try to nip that in the bud by being clear about the game's tone when you begin. In addition, if there's group conflict and everyone's enjoying it...just let it happen. Check in maybe at the end of the session to make sure nobody's upset. If someone needs to change characters or something, be smooth about it and don't force them to continue playing a character far after they'd logically just split. Often, people are way more okay with their character leaving than dying...even though in the scope of the game, it may as well be the same thing.
I want to put a minor note here. A lot of people seem to think "Evil" is synonymous with being severely vengeful or having a huge chip on your shoulder. While it may seem weird to play someone who's easygoing but evil, remember people are complex creatures. You don't have to punish every slight or track down and murder everyone who ever annoyed you. Some villains do that, sure. However, keep in mind that evil can mean many, many things. You're not under an obligation.
Otherwise, if you're the GM, remember that you're running an Evil game. Actions should have consequences sometimes, but don't get upset if a character gets away clean with something. This is an EVIL game, after all, and your job as GM is to present interesting challenges and a compelling plot. Use their actions to create plot hooks and interesting challenges, but remember your job is NOT to constantly apply the rules of Karma to the group. Good doesn't rule the universe. Neither does Evil. The idea that sometimes, the bad guy wins, can be a hard pill to swallow. This is because that isn't an acceptable thing in a traditional good-focused game. The main characters losing in the end is okay in a book or movie, but it's not okay in a pen and paper game. Thus...an amoral campaign requires a shift in perspective that many people miss. The characters should, at some point, overcome their challenge at the climax of the game.
(Fun drinking game: Take a shot every time I say there's not a lot of advice I can give for a topic then talk for like two or three paragraphs.)
This dovetails nicely into our discussion of the second main issue. Good is inherently reactive, even in other media. In fact, in comic books is a big deal to see a proactive good guy like The Outsiders or The Punisher. They're even usually seen as walking a thin line, or being in a moral grey area for this. Evil is the one that gets to be proactive, having big plans and goals of their own. It doesn't SOUND like it's a bad thing, does it? No, any GM who's ever planned anything knows that the players throwing you a curve ball can be stressful. Avoiding this stress is how the bad habit of railroading starts. To run an amoral game, in many ways, is to prepare yourself to run a sandbox game. It's to think on your feet, throw out plot hooks, tie things together on the fly, and to quote Perry Farrell, Fly by your Butt.
It's not easy, and we'll give sandbox games a biiiig, long talk later. The point is, evil characters inherently have their own plans, and you either have to roll with that, or expect your game to face constant derailing. A super-quick rundown of how you should enter into this sort of game is to come up with plots you can run independent of or in between plots centric to their own motivations. Show up with some stories and a world, and be ready to roll. In fact, if you need a leg-up you can always get them together a week before the first session to discuss motivations and characters. This is fun to do with traditional games as well but more crucial with an amoral game. You can also easily create a grace period by providing some simple "milk run" style adventures in the beginning of the game. Shadowrunners will always be happy doing a few runs or robbing a few banks. Even evil bastards like raiding dungeons...especially if you theme it a bit toward them. An abandoned castle full of monsters and hidden treasure can easily be an OCCUPIED castle full of guards and a treasure vault. It'll play almost exactly the same and players chomping at the bit to be evil will appreciate being given a chance to do that right out of the gate.
The take-away this week is that the amoral game often goes sour, but it's not always for the reasons you think. Evil people acting evil can be distasteful, but it gives the GM much more freedom than a more traditional game. While Karma, as a rule, doesn't exist...a typical evil player is constantly creating his own plot hooks. With time and experience, an amoral game can even feel way easier to run. After all, when you can't plan...that also means you don't HAVE to plan. In addition to that, I'm not going to lie...they really are a nice way to do something fresh and blow off steam.
Sunday, January 29, 2017
Sunday, January 22, 2017
Dumb and Wrong: D20, I
Welcome back to the Island of Misfit Game Development Decisions. I put D20 into one big category since it's likely to span editions: After all, it's arguable that Pathfinder is Dungeons and Dragons 3.75. Today we are talking about Pathfinder, though.
Monstrous Physique
So this spell line is part of the replacement for the overpowered blanket spell Polymorph Self in 3.X. It got partially split into many different spells based on types: elemental, beast, dragon, giant, monstrous humanoid. That sort of thing.
Here's the fucking problem. Monstrous Physique III and IV, 5th and 6th level spells respectively, lets you assume a laundry list of special abilities, as well as size huge or diminutive. This is important because assuming size huge over size large gives you an extra +2 strength as well as obviously granting more powerful natural attacks. Awesome. Here's the list of size huge monstrous humanoids in the first two monster manuals.
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5.
And no, that's not an Invisible Stalker joke. I struggled to even find a huge monstrous humanoid in the 3rd and 4th monster manuals. In fact, if I did some research I'm betting a lot of these special abilities it grants don't ever appear on a monstrous humanoid. Since you have to pick a pre-existing monster instead of just taking your stat bonuses and choosing, I dunno, two or three special abilities, the entire Monstrous Physique line is fairly useless and only serves to give a weapon user a few extra points of damage by turning him into any old large thing with two hands. You might as well make it one spell called Turn Into Gargoyle, because that's one of the few decent and viable choices.
Brute
Alright, so Ultimate Intrigue has a "Vigilante" class. It basically turns you into Batman, complete with a bunch of social-focused Bruce Wayne abilities, and a bunch of combative and skill utility Batman abilities. You even have to switch identities to use them. It even goes so far as to allow your two identities to have different alignments as well. I personally think this class is kind of dumb, but people seem to like it and it doesn't wreck tone that badly.
It has an archetype where instead of being a costumed vigilante, you turn into a big strong brutish creature.
DID PATHFINDER REALLY FUCKING NEED AN INCREDIBLE HULK ARCHETYPE?
Everything about this hurts my brain. The brute character even has to worry about transforming after being struck or getting too angry. The one saving fucking grace for this stupid thing is that the example picture isn't fucking green.
Edit: While this was sitting around waiting to post, I found a Brawler archetype that's all about throwing your shield at people. Paizo. I swear to God.
Tome Eater
So Occult Adventures is a pretty cool book. Really. It has a bunch of cool tone-setting stuff like spiritualists, mediums(both real ones AND con artists!) and occultist hedge-mages. It also has a bunch of the exact kind of cheesy shit I love, like phrenology and cranial binding. It's a really enjoyable book full of fun classes and abilities, and like Ultimate Intrigue I really recommend the book, overall.
Tome Eater is an Occultist archetype. I thought it was kind of interesting, because it focuses around destroying magical books and scrolls to gain their power, but it didn't come with the stupid anti-magic hangups that awful god damn barbarian prestige class did in 3.0 did. I hated that thing but I always kinda liked the idea of destroying potions, wands or scrolls for a different effect than they were made for, so this really appealed to me. Then, I turned my head and saw its associated artwork.
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Turns out the name of the Archetype wasn't as metaphorical as I thought. God Bless Ivan Troitsky, because that's actually a really great picture of the stupidest thing I've ever seen. I can only imagine his thought process on being told to create this. There's no way he had this on hand. I can see in my head: some Paizo executive demanding that the picture associated with Tome Eater has to clearly convey the class and turning down Ivan's first five drafts. Frustrated, Mr. Troitsky pulls a George "The Animal" Steele and goes "You want it? You fucking got it." and just like Vince McMahon, Paizo says "Perfect!"
Monstrous Physique
So this spell line is part of the replacement for the overpowered blanket spell Polymorph Self in 3.X. It got partially split into many different spells based on types: elemental, beast, dragon, giant, monstrous humanoid. That sort of thing.
Here's the fucking problem. Monstrous Physique III and IV, 5th and 6th level spells respectively, lets you assume a laundry list of special abilities, as well as size huge or diminutive. This is important because assuming size huge over size large gives you an extra +2 strength as well as obviously granting more powerful natural attacks. Awesome. Here's the list of size huge monstrous humanoids in the first two monster manuals.
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
And no, that's not an Invisible Stalker joke. I struggled to even find a huge monstrous humanoid in the 3rd and 4th monster manuals. In fact, if I did some research I'm betting a lot of these special abilities it grants don't ever appear on a monstrous humanoid. Since you have to pick a pre-existing monster instead of just taking your stat bonuses and choosing, I dunno, two or three special abilities, the entire Monstrous Physique line is fairly useless and only serves to give a weapon user a few extra points of damage by turning him into any old large thing with two hands. You might as well make it one spell called Turn Into Gargoyle, because that's one of the few decent and viable choices.
Brute
Alright, so Ultimate Intrigue has a "Vigilante" class. It basically turns you into Batman, complete with a bunch of social-focused Bruce Wayne abilities, and a bunch of combative and skill utility Batman abilities. You even have to switch identities to use them. It even goes so far as to allow your two identities to have different alignments as well. I personally think this class is kind of dumb, but people seem to like it and it doesn't wreck tone that badly.
It has an archetype where instead of being a costumed vigilante, you turn into a big strong brutish creature.
DID PATHFINDER REALLY FUCKING NEED AN INCREDIBLE HULK ARCHETYPE?
Everything about this hurts my brain. The brute character even has to worry about transforming after being struck or getting too angry. The one saving fucking grace for this stupid thing is that the example picture isn't fucking green.
Edit: While this was sitting around waiting to post, I found a Brawler archetype that's all about throwing your shield at people. Paizo. I swear to God.
Tome Eater
So Occult Adventures is a pretty cool book. Really. It has a bunch of cool tone-setting stuff like spiritualists, mediums(both real ones AND con artists!) and occultist hedge-mages. It also has a bunch of the exact kind of cheesy shit I love, like phrenology and cranial binding. It's a really enjoyable book full of fun classes and abilities, and like Ultimate Intrigue I really recommend the book, overall.
Tome Eater is an Occultist archetype. I thought it was kind of interesting, because it focuses around destroying magical books and scrolls to gain their power, but it didn't come with the stupid anti-magic hangups that awful god damn barbarian prestige class did in 3.0 did. I hated that thing but I always kinda liked the idea of destroying potions, wands or scrolls for a different effect than they were made for, so this really appealed to me. Then, I turned my head and saw its associated artwork.
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Turns out the name of the Archetype wasn't as metaphorical as I thought. God Bless Ivan Troitsky, because that's actually a really great picture of the stupidest thing I've ever seen. I can only imagine his thought process on being told to create this. There's no way he had this on hand. I can see in my head: some Paizo executive demanding that the picture associated with Tome Eater has to clearly convey the class and turning down Ivan's first five drafts. Frustrated, Mr. Troitsky pulls a George "The Animal" Steele and goes "You want it? You fucking got it." and just like Vince McMahon, Paizo says "Perfect!"
Sunday, January 15, 2017
Character Building: The Alignment Axis
"When the Devil is too busy / And death's a bit too much / They call on me / By name you see / For my special touch."
I should probably just come out and say it. I prefer Pen and Paper games that don't use alignment. In even the best games, it can feel a lot like a parent constantly looking over your shoulder. Most of us will, at least a few times a game, step back and contemplate whether or not our character would do something, and the declaration of an alignment(Or even a Nature in World of Darkness) is what causes this, in my experience. Games that lack alignment end up having richer characters with more complex motivations. Alignment can even lead to arguments. I'm sure everyone's been around for one of THOSE: a game dragged to a halt by a GM or a fellow player questioning a character's actions based solely on their alignment.
"Lorian wouldn't do THAT, he's CHAOTIC GOOD!"
"That's an EVIL ACT, Jason. Your character ISN'T EVIL."
Or my personal favorite, Star Wars and its Dark Side Points, the literal Evil Scoreboard.
However, I begrudgingly admit that a high fantasy game needs to have these lines drawn: These are the same black and white morals as a classic superhero game, but without many of the trappings that make the morality there obvious. Fantasy heroes don't wear costumes, and fantasy villains frequently have far more reasonable goals than a supervillain does. In addition to all of that, the machinations and favor of gods are very important to the genre...and thus clear lines need to be drawn. So, I'm going to discuss alignment so as to minimize some of the ridiculousness floating around about how this all works.
Anyway, there's a TLDR at the end of this. If you feel the irony of me discussing a really simple concept at length is getting to you, or if you're confused, feel free to skip to the bottom.
First off I want to address the elephant in the room. Alignment is where a lot of books go really badly wrong with descriptions. Some 1e and 2e sources said absurd things like a true neutral person would switch sides in a battle to keep it even, or a chaotic neutral person would flip a coin in the same situation. They describe Chaotic Evil as sand-bagging in a fight so he'd have enough spell slots to force his friends to give him all the treasure, and Chaotic Neutral as foolishly charging a Gorgon for no reason. Really, someone at TSR had a serious grudge for Chaotic Neutral and it ended up so maligned that its reputation of being "the insane alignment" has stuck to this day. This kind of thing completely moronic, and there's an easy way to keep yourself on track while reading this stupidity: Remember that these are normal people. There's no difference(in terms of morals and ethics) between a character made in Dungeons and Dragons and one made in Shadowrun. So if a game starts telling you something absurd, hopefully you'll notice.
Anyway. Alignment is super-simple and elegant. Even though I dislike alignments in general, I have to admit efforts to simplify it such as in 4e are insulting. Alignment is a pair of Axis: One Ethical and one Moral. I am aware that the word Ethics has a lot of meanings and is sometimes used interchangeably with morals. Please bear with me and I'll explain which type I mean soon. Essentially, the Alignment Axis puts you into one of nine categories by asking you to choose where you lie on these two axis: Basically Yes, Don't Care, or No.
The Ethical Axis. We're going into this one first because it's listed first when you give your alignment. This is defined as your opinion on the artificial conventions of man. Basically, on one end of this axis is honor, reliability, respect of authority, and structure. On the other end of this axis is the logical opposite: Freedom, adaptability, mistrust of authority and a focus on the individual, whether that means yourself or others. Chaos is not selfishness(No, that's later) but instead an insistence that the individual is important over the whole of society. Law is the opposite.
In fact...this really is the axis of politics. Law can be defined fairly easily as "the system is important", in that the person in question feels rigid systems such as honor or written laws are most important. Chaos believes the individual and his freedom are more important. He may even think that Law's vaunted systems ultimately take away the individual's freedom. I'm sure there's a comparison between Liberal and Conservative in here somewhere, but I can't find it at the moment.
This means he may have an important personal system like a code of honor or rigid set of structures to his life. However, it also means that he feels the CONCEPT of structure is important. He's the type of person to uphold laws because the structures they provide is important. If the law is wrong(like the classic conflict of legal slavery) then two things he believes are in conflict: Helping the helpless and innocent is important, but so is structure and law.
But that's it. Honestly. I understand there's some wiggle room in each category and we do have to live with that. Two men can still be defined as Lawful and still disagree heavily about a certain situation. Putting personalities into categories is always going to be like this, and one of our biggest mistakes is trying to narrowly define something that's such a big, wide category.
The Moral Axis. Moving on, the other axis is Good and Evil, with another obvious "Don't care" in the middle. This one confuses people a lot less, thank God. I don't really even need to go into it, since most of us know what I mean when I say "Good" and "Evil". However, I'm trying to prove a point, so here we go anyway. Good is obviously the notion that the innocent should be protected and the needy should be helped. Evil is the notion that the self is most important, and that the innocent and needy should be used and exploited. An Evil person believes (in general) that it's up to the individual to help themselves.
And thus we arrive to our boil-down. Good believes in Altruism, and Evil believes in the Self. Cruelty happens because a man is more concerned with his own property, with his own reputation, or even his own amusement, than the pain his actions cause to another person. Simple. Good believes others should be helped and protected, and that the 'self' is not as important as someone less fortunate.
Obviously, someone who's selfish can still have friends. Sincere ones that he actually cares about. Dunbar's Number, or more famously referred to as the Monkeysphere, tells us there's a cognitive limit to the number of people we're able to care about. It's easy to think of an Evil character's as simply a much smaller number. Selfishness doesn't always mean personal, but it often does. Everyone has a concept of "Others". They may be people outside a group we belong to, people we don't know personally, or, in some cases, even everyone but ourselves. The way the character feels about those "others" are where his moral alignment lies.
What the Fuck I'm Talking About. What I'm saying is that the alignment axis is really simple at the end of the day, and conflicts and annoyances happen when someone tries to more narrowly define one of its six categories. We argue because we get it into our heads that someone's not "evil" enough, not "good" enough, or even sometimes, "Not Chaotic Good Enough". I went into how our predefined notions and baggage affect the Paladin, so I hope you can see what I'm getting at. Our opinion of what alignment represents is far, far larger than what it actually is.
To prove that yes, it really is this simple, I'm going to go into some of the alignments and show you how my simple definitions still end up pointing out the alignment's classic and "typical" personal outlook. We all know the "Stereotypes" of the alignments, but if you're confused please feel free to contact me personally. In the spirit of brevity, I won't be pointing out every single classic stereotype before I discuss them.
Lawful Good. "I believe in Structure and Altruism.". The lawful good character believes that the system works. That it's necessary. He feels rigid structure is necessary to keep the helpless safe and to help the needy. He feels that helping others is important, but without structure it can be harder, or even impossible. Honor and Laws, to him, exist as a tool or method to help others.
Lawful Evil. "I believe in Structure and myself." Obviously few would ever SAY they believe in "myself first", but the Lawful Evil character is selfish nonetheless. He, like the LG person, believes that "the system" is important. He believes in structure. However, since he is only concerned with himself, he sees the system as a tool. He sees it as something to get "good" at, to manipulate to shackle other people. He sees things like honor and laws as a way to garner himself more power.
Chaotic Good. "I believe in Freedom and Altruism." The classic Chaotic Good character believes a person's own freedom is vitally important, but he also believes in protecting and helping those in need. He feels letting people do what they want is important, but has no problem drawing the line when he sees something wrong. Wrong is Wrong, and a law telling him that it's not is simply idiotic at best. His reputation for unreliability or randomness may come from his love of freedom, since it includes his freedom to follow his desires.
Chaotic Evil. "I believe in Freedom and Myself." The archetype of villains, Chaotic Evil, feels that freedom is important. To put a finer point on it, he feels that HIS freedom to do what HE wants is important. He doesn't care about other people. He doesn't care about absurd things like written laws or "fake" structures like honor. People should take what they want. The world is Kill or Be Killed, and anything else is a weak person trying to convince themselves otherwise.
This works for all nine alignments, but since the partially neutral alignments are less complex, I'm going to gloss over them a bit. When someone has no strong opinion for one axis, it means they believe solely in their other axis. Obviously. A lawful neutral person doesn't believe systems of honor and law are "for" anything. He believes they're necessary by themselves. They are not a tool to him, they are simply something important. A Chaotic Neutral character isn't insane or wacky, they simply believe in freedom for freedom's sake. To him, personal freedom is the only important thing, with questions of morality being met with ambivalence at best. Neutral Evil is consummate selfishness, Neutral Good is consummate Altruism. The True Neutral (Neutral Neutral) character is unique in that he may believe there is balance in everything...or he simply may have no strong stance.
A small note on conflict. As I mentioned earlier, the Lawful Good person may have conflicting emotions about something such as an evil being legal in an area. This will happen somewhat often to all four alignments with no neutral components...however, admittedly less so with evil ones. I will go into the nature of evil soon, but suffice to say when you feel the self is more important, you tend to have less compunctions about other things. Anyway, when the two concepts a character feels important are in conflict, it means he's making a hard decision. It doesn't necessarily mean he's being forced to choose one alignment axis over the other, even though it can often feel that way. A person's actions are always going to be tempered by the specifics of the situation, and a compromise with themselves doesn't need their alignment "took a hit" or "needs to change".
In fact, even though this is getting a little long, I want to put this here especially. Alignment isn't a set of shackles. It's a category. There's no need to argue or bitch. Be nice. If someone has an alignment component to their class and you're the GM, warn them if you feel they're stepping out of line. Give them time to step back in so nobody loses their class abilities. Poke people whose alignment seems to be changing over the course of the game, and if they like that idea, chill. People change, and sometimes this is the most fun you can have in a game. There's no reason to shackle people to one alignment and punish them for changing. Look at Vegeta during the Saiyan arc when he was introduced. Then, look at the Frieza saga, and then finally the end of the show after the Buu arc. Ask yourself if he's the same alignment in all of these eras.
Overall, to give you guys the TLDR of all this, alignment is just a lot simpler than you think. It's a question of how your character feels about four base concepts. That's what you need to take away from this. There is no "I'm more Good than Lawful." except where a person comes into conflict with themselves and makes a decision about a situation. Alignment isn't a 1-10 grade of where you stand or what's more important than what. It's not nine different specific little outlooks. It's not a narrow little box your character is shackled into, and it's not four concepts each weighed against the other three.
It's two simple questions with three answers each, because saying "Neither" is a valid answer.
"What's more important, Structure or Freedom?"
"What's more important, helping Others or helping Yourself?"
That's it.
I should probably just come out and say it. I prefer Pen and Paper games that don't use alignment. In even the best games, it can feel a lot like a parent constantly looking over your shoulder. Most of us will, at least a few times a game, step back and contemplate whether or not our character would do something, and the declaration of an alignment(Or even a Nature in World of Darkness) is what causes this, in my experience. Games that lack alignment end up having richer characters with more complex motivations. Alignment can even lead to arguments. I'm sure everyone's been around for one of THOSE: a game dragged to a halt by a GM or a fellow player questioning a character's actions based solely on their alignment.
"Lorian wouldn't do THAT, he's CHAOTIC GOOD!"
"That's an EVIL ACT, Jason. Your character ISN'T EVIL."
Or my personal favorite, Star Wars and its Dark Side Points, the literal Evil Scoreboard.
However, I begrudgingly admit that a high fantasy game needs to have these lines drawn: These are the same black and white morals as a classic superhero game, but without many of the trappings that make the morality there obvious. Fantasy heroes don't wear costumes, and fantasy villains frequently have far more reasonable goals than a supervillain does. In addition to all of that, the machinations and favor of gods are very important to the genre...and thus clear lines need to be drawn. So, I'm going to discuss alignment so as to minimize some of the ridiculousness floating around about how this all works.
Anyway, there's a TLDR at the end of this. If you feel the irony of me discussing a really simple concept at length is getting to you, or if you're confused, feel free to skip to the bottom.
First off I want to address the elephant in the room. Alignment is where a lot of books go really badly wrong with descriptions. Some 1e and 2e sources said absurd things like a true neutral person would switch sides in a battle to keep it even, or a chaotic neutral person would flip a coin in the same situation. They describe Chaotic Evil as sand-bagging in a fight so he'd have enough spell slots to force his friends to give him all the treasure, and Chaotic Neutral as foolishly charging a Gorgon for no reason. Really, someone at TSR had a serious grudge for Chaotic Neutral and it ended up so maligned that its reputation of being "the insane alignment" has stuck to this day. This kind of thing completely moronic, and there's an easy way to keep yourself on track while reading this stupidity: Remember that these are normal people. There's no difference(in terms of morals and ethics) between a character made in Dungeons and Dragons and one made in Shadowrun. So if a game starts telling you something absurd, hopefully you'll notice.
Anyway. Alignment is super-simple and elegant. Even though I dislike alignments in general, I have to admit efforts to simplify it such as in 4e are insulting. Alignment is a pair of Axis: One Ethical and one Moral. I am aware that the word Ethics has a lot of meanings and is sometimes used interchangeably with morals. Please bear with me and I'll explain which type I mean soon. Essentially, the Alignment Axis puts you into one of nine categories by asking you to choose where you lie on these two axis: Basically Yes, Don't Care, or No.
The Ethical Axis. We're going into this one first because it's listed first when you give your alignment. This is defined as your opinion on the artificial conventions of man. Basically, on one end of this axis is honor, reliability, respect of authority, and structure. On the other end of this axis is the logical opposite: Freedom, adaptability, mistrust of authority and a focus on the individual, whether that means yourself or others. Chaos is not selfishness(No, that's later) but instead an insistence that the individual is important over the whole of society. Law is the opposite.
In fact...this really is the axis of politics. Law can be defined fairly easily as "the system is important", in that the person in question feels rigid systems such as honor or written laws are most important. Chaos believes the individual and his freedom are more important. He may even think that Law's vaunted systems ultimately take away the individual's freedom. I'm sure there's a comparison between Liberal and Conservative in here somewhere, but I can't find it at the moment.
This means he may have an important personal system like a code of honor or rigid set of structures to his life. However, it also means that he feels the CONCEPT of structure is important. He's the type of person to uphold laws because the structures they provide is important. If the law is wrong(like the classic conflict of legal slavery) then two things he believes are in conflict: Helping the helpless and innocent is important, but so is structure and law.
But that's it. Honestly. I understand there's some wiggle room in each category and we do have to live with that. Two men can still be defined as Lawful and still disagree heavily about a certain situation. Putting personalities into categories is always going to be like this, and one of our biggest mistakes is trying to narrowly define something that's such a big, wide category.
The Moral Axis. Moving on, the other axis is Good and Evil, with another obvious "Don't care" in the middle. This one confuses people a lot less, thank God. I don't really even need to go into it, since most of us know what I mean when I say "Good" and "Evil". However, I'm trying to prove a point, so here we go anyway. Good is obviously the notion that the innocent should be protected and the needy should be helped. Evil is the notion that the self is most important, and that the innocent and needy should be used and exploited. An Evil person believes (in general) that it's up to the individual to help themselves.
And thus we arrive to our boil-down. Good believes in Altruism, and Evil believes in the Self. Cruelty happens because a man is more concerned with his own property, with his own reputation, or even his own amusement, than the pain his actions cause to another person. Simple. Good believes others should be helped and protected, and that the 'self' is not as important as someone less fortunate.
Obviously, someone who's selfish can still have friends. Sincere ones that he actually cares about. Dunbar's Number, or more famously referred to as the Monkeysphere, tells us there's a cognitive limit to the number of people we're able to care about. It's easy to think of an Evil character's as simply a much smaller number. Selfishness doesn't always mean personal, but it often does. Everyone has a concept of "Others". They may be people outside a group we belong to, people we don't know personally, or, in some cases, even everyone but ourselves. The way the character feels about those "others" are where his moral alignment lies.
What the Fuck I'm Talking About. What I'm saying is that the alignment axis is really simple at the end of the day, and conflicts and annoyances happen when someone tries to more narrowly define one of its six categories. We argue because we get it into our heads that someone's not "evil" enough, not "good" enough, or even sometimes, "Not Chaotic Good Enough". I went into how our predefined notions and baggage affect the Paladin, so I hope you can see what I'm getting at. Our opinion of what alignment represents is far, far larger than what it actually is.
To prove that yes, it really is this simple, I'm going to go into some of the alignments and show you how my simple definitions still end up pointing out the alignment's classic and "typical" personal outlook. We all know the "Stereotypes" of the alignments, but if you're confused please feel free to contact me personally. In the spirit of brevity, I won't be pointing out every single classic stereotype before I discuss them.
Lawful Good. "I believe in Structure and Altruism.". The lawful good character believes that the system works. That it's necessary. He feels rigid structure is necessary to keep the helpless safe and to help the needy. He feels that helping others is important, but without structure it can be harder, or even impossible. Honor and Laws, to him, exist as a tool or method to help others.
Lawful Evil. "I believe in Structure and myself." Obviously few would ever SAY they believe in "myself first", but the Lawful Evil character is selfish nonetheless. He, like the LG person, believes that "the system" is important. He believes in structure. However, since he is only concerned with himself, he sees the system as a tool. He sees it as something to get "good" at, to manipulate to shackle other people. He sees things like honor and laws as a way to garner himself more power.
Chaotic Good. "I believe in Freedom and Altruism." The classic Chaotic Good character believes a person's own freedom is vitally important, but he also believes in protecting and helping those in need. He feels letting people do what they want is important, but has no problem drawing the line when he sees something wrong. Wrong is Wrong, and a law telling him that it's not is simply idiotic at best. His reputation for unreliability or randomness may come from his love of freedom, since it includes his freedom to follow his desires.
Chaotic Evil. "I believe in Freedom and Myself." The archetype of villains, Chaotic Evil, feels that freedom is important. To put a finer point on it, he feels that HIS freedom to do what HE wants is important. He doesn't care about other people. He doesn't care about absurd things like written laws or "fake" structures like honor. People should take what they want. The world is Kill or Be Killed, and anything else is a weak person trying to convince themselves otherwise.
This works for all nine alignments, but since the partially neutral alignments are less complex, I'm going to gloss over them a bit. When someone has no strong opinion for one axis, it means they believe solely in their other axis. Obviously. A lawful neutral person doesn't believe systems of honor and law are "for" anything. He believes they're necessary by themselves. They are not a tool to him, they are simply something important. A Chaotic Neutral character isn't insane or wacky, they simply believe in freedom for freedom's sake. To him, personal freedom is the only important thing, with questions of morality being met with ambivalence at best. Neutral Evil is consummate selfishness, Neutral Good is consummate Altruism. The True Neutral (Neutral Neutral) character is unique in that he may believe there is balance in everything...or he simply may have no strong stance.
A small note on conflict. As I mentioned earlier, the Lawful Good person may have conflicting emotions about something such as an evil being legal in an area. This will happen somewhat often to all four alignments with no neutral components...however, admittedly less so with evil ones. I will go into the nature of evil soon, but suffice to say when you feel the self is more important, you tend to have less compunctions about other things. Anyway, when the two concepts a character feels important are in conflict, it means he's making a hard decision. It doesn't necessarily mean he's being forced to choose one alignment axis over the other, even though it can often feel that way. A person's actions are always going to be tempered by the specifics of the situation, and a compromise with themselves doesn't need their alignment "took a hit" or "needs to change".
In fact, even though this is getting a little long, I want to put this here especially. Alignment isn't a set of shackles. It's a category. There's no need to argue or bitch. Be nice. If someone has an alignment component to their class and you're the GM, warn them if you feel they're stepping out of line. Give them time to step back in so nobody loses their class abilities. Poke people whose alignment seems to be changing over the course of the game, and if they like that idea, chill. People change, and sometimes this is the most fun you can have in a game. There's no reason to shackle people to one alignment and punish them for changing. Look at Vegeta during the Saiyan arc when he was introduced. Then, look at the Frieza saga, and then finally the end of the show after the Buu arc. Ask yourself if he's the same alignment in all of these eras.
Overall, to give you guys the TLDR of all this, alignment is just a lot simpler than you think. It's a question of how your character feels about four base concepts. That's what you need to take away from this. There is no "I'm more Good than Lawful." except where a person comes into conflict with themselves and makes a decision about a situation. Alignment isn't a 1-10 grade of where you stand or what's more important than what. It's not nine different specific little outlooks. It's not a narrow little box your character is shackled into, and it's not four concepts each weighed against the other three.
It's two simple questions with three answers each, because saying "Neither" is a valid answer.
"What's more important, Structure or Freedom?"
"What's more important, helping Others or helping Yourself?"
That's it.
Sunday, January 8, 2017
Dumb and Wrong: World of Darkness, I
"Oh yeah? Well, as the Esperanto would say, “Bonvoro alsendi la pordiston, lausajne estas rano en mia bideo!” And I think we all know what that means."
I've been brushing up on the new World of Darkness in general, and Werewolf: The Forsaken in specific. I really like it, honestly. I like that the genres are standardized, I like that Werewolf has kicked a lot of its stupider concepts to the curb, and I like that the douchebag who ruined Werewolf: The Apocalypse has apparently been fired. If I had to give a major complaint, it's that the game seems to assume you're going to grant the PCs some experience to build with, because otherwise it doesn't feel like you've made very much of a mark on your character. Freebie points are gone, and so are flaws(kind of.) so even a newbie can use at least the basic suggested 35 EXP. The other big thing is that they've included really pointless "twink breaking" measures, where the fifth(and final) point of anything costs double points during character generation. They've "doubled up" on fixing the twink "problem" by also giving fewer build points in every category, so it feels particularly pointless, simply lowering the "efficiency bar" from Five dots to Four.
But this segment isn't about major complaints. Not really.
Languages in PNP Games
Yeah so, I've said before that the "language barrier" challenge in PNP games is never as fun as you think it is. Regardless of that, I still wouldn't want languages removed or anything. I like it when they're simple to get, like in 3.5 and Pathfinder, where a single rank in a skill is a language, and that skill ALSO still does stuff. Fantasy games in particular have a ton of different languages in them, so a PC should probably have access to an easy way to get them. Even the real world has a ton of languages, so I like Shadowrun's method too: Languages have their own amount of freebie points to spend on them, and it's easy to get more. This ensures that the language barrier doesn't come up very much, and everyone can easily fit language into their background. I mean, a lot of us really like to play characters of different ethnicity...but you still need to know English so you're not a burden on the party. So that means modern style games end up with a lot of bilingual characters.
In case it wasn't obvious, I fucking hate it when systems make languages tough or significant to get. in WoD you get seven merit points, and languages are one to three dots: One dot is minimal fluency. Two dots is conversational fluency, and three dots is being a native speaker. As I already told you, you only get seven merit points, and since they lumped the old system's backgrounds and merits into the same category, there's a FUCKING TON of merits to take. This also means something like "Being from Miami" is a two point merit. Oh, sorry guys, I know we really needed someone who had a Grand Klaive of Epic Power to easily destroy the evil Pure tribes with, but I wanted to play a Latino so I didn't have the points. Y'know what? I'm gonna be really petty and make a list of things that World of Darkness thinks are as powerful or less than being a native speaker of two languages. Let's pick Welsh since Wales has a fair amount of bilingual denizens. Here is a list of things that are just as powerful or important as being from Wales.
Having a sixth sense for danger.
Having an eidetic memory.
Being able to use Dexterity to attack with a weapon.
Being able to attack twice in a round.
Being able to use two weapons or guns at once.
Being able to drive and still perform an action.
Being world famous.
Free disposable income of $2k a month and $10k in assets.
Being an official Police detective or high ranking officer.
A magic timepiece that records up to three minutes of the user's experiences.
An enchanted dagger that can pierce armor.
I'm not done. Raising a merit is two experience times the number of new dots, meaning native fluency costs 2+4+6, or 12 experience. Buying a second tier Gift is three experience(for skipping the first dot) plus 5 times the number of new dots, or 13 total. We'll be nice and assume that three XP for ignoring the first dot was spent, even though hardly anyone is going to do that. So, here's a short list of supernatural capabilities just as nice as knowing Welsh.
Brief, single-command mind control.
Earth Shaping.
Doubling your speed for a scene.
Immunity to pain.
Automatically slipping free of any bonds.
Six bonus dice in any leaping attempt.
I mean, if you wanted to play Pitbull as a WoD character...First off, may God have mercy on your soul...but second, even a simple, basic concept such as this costs too many points. He's famous, which is two or three dots. He's rich, which is at least four. Finally, he's from Miami, which we all know is Cuba II, so he has to blow three dots on Spanish. If your defense to this is that a starting PC shouldn't be a world famous rapper, well...if he wasn't Latino, it would be a completely valid character concept. I'm tempted to call that racist.
I could totally go on but I won't. If you read this and think I'm being really unfair...lemme let you in on a little secret: That's the point.
Call Human, the Dumbest Spell Ever.
Okay so they're called rites, I know. Rituals in Werewolf: The Forsaken is a catch-all power of mysticism and various useful things. It's a pretty common thing to include in these types of games, and it basically means someone can feel like a mystic, shaman or wizard without breaking the bank or having to take a specific tribe or clan. I like'em, in other words.
But. Every so often...
Anyway, when I first read this power I was reminded of classic Vampire's Presence discipline, which could compel someone(even a supernatural being) to do everything they could to make their way right to the vampire. It's highly powerful and highly abusable, so I was surprised to see Call Human being only two dots. Then I read it.
So what this ritual does is summons the nearest mortal human in five miles. You can not choose a specific mortal. You put an "offering" of "objects considered to be alluring to the local mortal population" in the middle of the room and then the ritualist performs a howl of summons while moving counterclockwise around the offering. The book even mentions beer and pornography as viable options.
Y'know, the book says this was used in prehistory "over a period of weeks" for a Werewolf to "spread his seed".(The quick TLDR behind this concept is that makin' a werewolf baby ain't easy.) Quick sidenote here: Ew. Only, what the fuck are you going to do, exactly? First off, there's a fifty/fifty shot of this not even bringing a human of the womb-bearing variety to spread your stupid lazy seed into. In fact, it's LESS than fifty percent because we have to allow for the elderly or the already pregnant. Second, if it doesn't, what the hell are you going to do, perform the ritual again? Well Cletus showed up the last time, so he's the closest mortal within five miles now! Third, if you have some sort of gift to compel them to do what you want when they get there, why not just go find someone yourself and use it there? If you DON'T, what the fuck use is this ritual?
In fact, I can't figure out a use for this dumb dumbass spell. The closest I can get is that your territory is mostly wilderness and you use this ritual to root out mortal tresspassers, but a werewolf, with werewolf sense of smell, can easily track someone through their own ding-dang territory, so I can't even tell you it's good for that in good conscience. I'm normally really easy on this stuff, like....oh, it's fluff, it's okay, but there are only nine two-dot rituals in the book. Even rites that give no direct tangible benefit like the Funeral Rites still give an important social benefit and can endear you to the NPCs around you. Call Human is taking up valuable space in the book that could have been given to a rite that's not pants-on-head retarded.
The fact that you can't specify anything and it just calls the closest mortal in five miles blows my fucking mind.
I've been brushing up on the new World of Darkness in general, and Werewolf: The Forsaken in specific. I really like it, honestly. I like that the genres are standardized, I like that Werewolf has kicked a lot of its stupider concepts to the curb, and I like that the douchebag who ruined Werewolf: The Apocalypse has apparently been fired. If I had to give a major complaint, it's that the game seems to assume you're going to grant the PCs some experience to build with, because otherwise it doesn't feel like you've made very much of a mark on your character. Freebie points are gone, and so are flaws(kind of.) so even a newbie can use at least the basic suggested 35 EXP. The other big thing is that they've included really pointless "twink breaking" measures, where the fifth(and final) point of anything costs double points during character generation. They've "doubled up" on fixing the twink "problem" by also giving fewer build points in every category, so it feels particularly pointless, simply lowering the "efficiency bar" from Five dots to Four.
But this segment isn't about major complaints. Not really.
Languages in PNP Games
Yeah so, I've said before that the "language barrier" challenge in PNP games is never as fun as you think it is. Regardless of that, I still wouldn't want languages removed or anything. I like it when they're simple to get, like in 3.5 and Pathfinder, where a single rank in a skill is a language, and that skill ALSO still does stuff. Fantasy games in particular have a ton of different languages in them, so a PC should probably have access to an easy way to get them. Even the real world has a ton of languages, so I like Shadowrun's method too: Languages have their own amount of freebie points to spend on them, and it's easy to get more. This ensures that the language barrier doesn't come up very much, and everyone can easily fit language into their background. I mean, a lot of us really like to play characters of different ethnicity...but you still need to know English so you're not a burden on the party. So that means modern style games end up with a lot of bilingual characters.
In case it wasn't obvious, I fucking hate it when systems make languages tough or significant to get. in WoD you get seven merit points, and languages are one to three dots: One dot is minimal fluency. Two dots is conversational fluency, and three dots is being a native speaker. As I already told you, you only get seven merit points, and since they lumped the old system's backgrounds and merits into the same category, there's a FUCKING TON of merits to take. This also means something like "Being from Miami" is a two point merit. Oh, sorry guys, I know we really needed someone who had a Grand Klaive of Epic Power to easily destroy the evil Pure tribes with, but I wanted to play a Latino so I didn't have the points. Y'know what? I'm gonna be really petty and make a list of things that World of Darkness thinks are as powerful or less than being a native speaker of two languages. Let's pick Welsh since Wales has a fair amount of bilingual denizens. Here is a list of things that are just as powerful or important as being from Wales.
Having a sixth sense for danger.
Having an eidetic memory.
Being able to use Dexterity to attack with a weapon.
Being able to attack twice in a round.
Being able to use two weapons or guns at once.
Being able to drive and still perform an action.
Being world famous.
Free disposable income of $2k a month and $10k in assets.
Being an official Police detective or high ranking officer.
A magic timepiece that records up to three minutes of the user's experiences.
An enchanted dagger that can pierce armor.
I'm not done. Raising a merit is two experience times the number of new dots, meaning native fluency costs 2+4+6, or 12 experience. Buying a second tier Gift is three experience(for skipping the first dot) plus 5 times the number of new dots, or 13 total. We'll be nice and assume that three XP for ignoring the first dot was spent, even though hardly anyone is going to do that. So, here's a short list of supernatural capabilities just as nice as knowing Welsh.
Brief, single-command mind control.
Earth Shaping.
Doubling your speed for a scene.
Immunity to pain.
Automatically slipping free of any bonds.
Six bonus dice in any leaping attempt.
I mean, if you wanted to play Pitbull as a WoD character...First off, may God have mercy on your soul...but second, even a simple, basic concept such as this costs too many points. He's famous, which is two or three dots. He's rich, which is at least four. Finally, he's from Miami, which we all know is Cuba II, so he has to blow three dots on Spanish. If your defense to this is that a starting PC shouldn't be a world famous rapper, well...if he wasn't Latino, it would be a completely valid character concept. I'm tempted to call that racist.
I could totally go on but I won't. If you read this and think I'm being really unfair...lemme let you in on a little secret: That's the point.
Call Human, the Dumbest Spell Ever.
Okay so they're called rites, I know. Rituals in Werewolf: The Forsaken is a catch-all power of mysticism and various useful things. It's a pretty common thing to include in these types of games, and it basically means someone can feel like a mystic, shaman or wizard without breaking the bank or having to take a specific tribe or clan. I like'em, in other words.
But. Every so often...
Anyway, when I first read this power I was reminded of classic Vampire's Presence discipline, which could compel someone(even a supernatural being) to do everything they could to make their way right to the vampire. It's highly powerful and highly abusable, so I was surprised to see Call Human being only two dots. Then I read it.
So what this ritual does is summons the nearest mortal human in five miles. You can not choose a specific mortal. You put an "offering" of "objects considered to be alluring to the local mortal population" in the middle of the room and then the ritualist performs a howl of summons while moving counterclockwise around the offering. The book even mentions beer and pornography as viable options.
Y'know, the book says this was used in prehistory "over a period of weeks" for a Werewolf to "spread his seed".(The quick TLDR behind this concept is that makin' a werewolf baby ain't easy.) Quick sidenote here: Ew. Only, what the fuck are you going to do, exactly? First off, there's a fifty/fifty shot of this not even bringing a human of the womb-bearing variety to spread your stupid lazy seed into. In fact, it's LESS than fifty percent because we have to allow for the elderly or the already pregnant. Second, if it doesn't, what the hell are you going to do, perform the ritual again? Well Cletus showed up the last time, so he's the closest mortal within five miles now! Third, if you have some sort of gift to compel them to do what you want when they get there, why not just go find someone yourself and use it there? If you DON'T, what the fuck use is this ritual?
In fact, I can't figure out a use for this dumb dumbass spell. The closest I can get is that your territory is mostly wilderness and you use this ritual to root out mortal tresspassers, but a werewolf, with werewolf sense of smell, can easily track someone through their own ding-dang territory, so I can't even tell you it's good for that in good conscience. I'm normally really easy on this stuff, like....oh, it's fluff, it's okay, but there are only nine two-dot rituals in the book. Even rites that give no direct tangible benefit like the Funeral Rites still give an important social benefit and can endear you to the NPCs around you. Call Human is taking up valuable space in the book that could have been given to a rite that's not pants-on-head retarded.
The fact that you can't specify anything and it just calls the closest mortal in five miles blows my fucking mind.
Sunday, January 1, 2017
Character Building: The Dip
"Remember how we always thought there wasn't a way to kill a toon? Well, Doom found a way: Turpentine, Acetone, Benzine. He calls it The Dip."
Multiclassing gets a bad rap. Lots of people see it as the source of design problems or bad balance. Some games like 4e sought to remove its teeth by giving several standardized methods of multiclassing. After all, you only get so many powers despite how many classes you want to take, so it's not likely to cause issues. Pathfinder used the carrot instead of the stick and provided a bunch of single classes that FEEL like a two-in-one multiclass, like Slayer, Investigator, Warpriest(which is really just an alt paladin but I digress), Shaman or Hunter. They want you to feel like you don't HAVE to mutliclass to achieve the feel you want. Star Wars D20 even limits what you get for "free" when multiclassing, as opposed to taking the class from level one. However, it's a really fun way to build a character and a staple of PNP gaming, in my opinion. Unfortunately, it really is where a lot of things can go wrong in game design. Mostly this reputation is undeserved, but every so often it does cause a legitimate problem. Sometimes class abilities have some insane interaction with another ability that isn't intended. Other times important abilities are "front loaded" into a class to help people achieve class identity at low levels. Today among other more basic concepts, we're discussing those front-loaded classes.
The Dip is arguably a problem in game design. I can kind of see it. Basically, it's when it's enticing to take just a few levels of a class because of either how dense those levels are, or how important those low level abilities are. I'm not gonna judge on the concept until later, I'm just going to talk a little bit about the two most popular dips, and also how to identify classes that have this kind of thing. Dippable classes, as it were. Man, remember dipped ice cream cones? I haven't had one in at least fifteen years. There used to be a little ice cream stand in the shopping center near my house. It got turned into a Kodak store, then it closed down. The little building's not even there anymore, because nothing good lasts and everything eventually turns to shit.
...Anyway... the trope namer, the big daddy, and the reason we're having this discussion at all is fighter. 3.0's designers wanted to make sure the fighter is a tough guy from day one, because he's got to protect the rogues, the wizards, and the bards until they can stand on their own. This is as old as first edition. Hell, it's probably as old as the miniatures game Chainmail. Because of this, though, taking just two levels of fighter in a twenty level build is insanely lucrative, and it's true even in Pathfinder. The list of important benefits you get is:
Two combat feats.
Simple and Martial Weapon Proficiencies.
All three Armor Proficiencies.
Shield proficiency. Some archetypes or games even get tower shields.
2D10 HP
and a bump in both Attack Bonus and Fort Save.
It's a lot of shit, and it's for two reasons: One is the 'rules' of proficiencies in D20: even one level gets you all of them. It's also because the fighter gets an extra "bonus" feat at level one to help him fill out and be tough. Proficiencies and the AB bump can be very helpful to a "sort of combative" class like rogue or bard to push them further into the spotlight. Note that even though these are combat only feats you must take, you can still take some purely defensive stuff like toughness or dodge and come out ahead.
Our next culprit is Unchained Rogue from Pathfinder. Yes, Rogue is the new Fighter. Basically, Pathfinder saw that Rogue, Barbarian and Monk were lacking. It also saw that Summoner was likely too powerful, due to superior action economy in a single character. So, its version of Unearthed Arcana, a book called Pathfinder Unchained, contained updated versions of the classes. In the case of Barbarian, Rogue and Monk, you can even play the old ones if you want, it's just with Barbarian and Rogue I don't know why you would. This needed buff caused Rogue to turn into a hellaciously good 3 or 4 level dip class for a mainline bruiser type in particular.
Unchained Rogue is a great example of importance of abilities dipped into as opposed to density. We're taking four levels in this example as well, not two. Our relevant bonuses are as follows.
Four levels of superior 8+INT skill points
Two rogue talents
2D6 Sneak Attack
Evasion, Uncanny Dodge, and Trapfinding
Debilitating Injury
Finesse Training 2
Debilitating Injury is a list of free, low powered but no-save penalties applied to anyone taking damage from your sneak attack. So what's Finesse Training, I hear you not asking me at all? It's Weapon Finesse for free at level one, and then at level three it's the ability to add dexterity to damage for a single weapon in the weapon finesse list. Our second rogue talent at level four can extend that ability to any weapon in the book, even the silly ones. So yeah, remember when I talked about Stat Dependencies? If you do, you already know why this is nuts. It lets someone playing a melee character "double down" on dexterity, pumping one ability score instead of two, choosing a dex bonus race instead of an "all things considered" race and being able to dump-stat strength. You may end up without that particular weapon in hand, but even then, weapon finesse still applies to everything in its short list. You're not screwed, just kind of.
So when should you dip? Well, first off if you're a pure(as in 1:1 caster level and up to 9th level spells) caster class, you can generally forget it. Those spell levels are hyper-important to you and you're better off trying to find a prestige class that gives spell caster levels, or, in the case of Pathfinder, playing a "half-caster" like magus, mesmerist or alchemist. With that out of the way, you want to first look at what you're losing. In 3.X this probably isn't a hell of a lot considering lack of high level abilities in most classes, but in PF it means losing access to those. It also means getting your core class abilities a little late, which might just be something you've got to live with.
A special note on missing out on things, before we continue. This is kind of scummy of me to even mention, but a lot of your multiclassing decisions are gonna be driven by how long you expect the game to run. If you were never going to hit 20 anyway, you're not missing out on that level 20 weapon mastery, or quivering palm, or grand discovery, or whatever the shit else there is. In general, games ending lower lend themselves more to funky multiclassing or dipping, because nobody's going to see any higher level abilities anyway.
With that out of the way, I suggest making two real quick outlines of your character and seeing what the impact of taking a couple levels of something else is. If you've got the time and inclination, even try one that's a more mixed build, like 10/10 or 12/8 instead of 16/4 or 18/2. Ask yourself what you're gonna use those two feats for, or ask yourself how useful(or fun) pumping DEX instead of STR will be. I can't give you a hard answer without getting more specific about what you're stacking the dip class with. In the case of casters, be very careful, and ask yourself if putting your character behind on spells is worth whatever you're dipping for.
So how do you identify other dip classes? That can't be the only two, right? Right. First off, look for anything in the first six levels that's not reliant on a class level. Yes, this means most caster classes are 'out' for dips. A few lower level spells can be nice utility early on, but later you can easily buy magic items to emulate it, and you'll be wishing you hadn't taken those levels. Basically, if you're only going to have a few levels it means things intended to scale like a fighter's Bravery ability are useless to you. However, there's a lot of abilities scattered around that act independently of class level, like a paladin's Divine Grace or a monk's AC bonus. Look for things like that, maybe things which are intended to scale with ability scores and not levels. You also want to look for anything that's going to give you a bump in an area you're lacking at, like extra skill points, better class skills, save bonuses or proficiencies. A fighter who takes four levels of rogue is adding a TON of skill utility to his character, for example.
A final note goes to attack bonus. You need to be aware of how far back, or forward your dip is putting you. You also need to be aware of how a 3/4ths class scales: 0,1,2,3,3,4,5. This means that you should have some serious thought before taking more than 4 levels, since level five is where you lose your second point of AB. Also be aware of iterative attacks: You want to get them as fast as possible, and you definitely don't want to rob yourself of an attack by taking too many levels in another class. 6, 11, and 16 are your "break points".
So the final question remains. Is this right? Is this bad design? Maybe. If a class has a million reasons to take two or four levels and none to take any more, it absolutely is bad design. Like Fighter in 3.X. Otherwise though, it's a consequence of assisting low level play, and the only fixes I find acceptable are ones like Star Wars D20 where multiclassing into something doesn't give you everything starting as it does. Even then, it makes for a weird problem where your first level ever is a really important choice. You have no idea how much of a problem it was trying to explain level one skill points to people in 3.X D&D was. Is it a scummy thing to do? Well, I advocate building the absolute best character you can, but there's a point at which this attitude can be taken to an extreme. If all you're trying to do is better define the character you have in your head or reach a capability you want to play, I really don't see a problem. Still, this is one of those things where you shouldn't be surprised if someone gets annoyed with you.
Multiclassing gets a bad rap. Lots of people see it as the source of design problems or bad balance. Some games like 4e sought to remove its teeth by giving several standardized methods of multiclassing. After all, you only get so many powers despite how many classes you want to take, so it's not likely to cause issues. Pathfinder used the carrot instead of the stick and provided a bunch of single classes that FEEL like a two-in-one multiclass, like Slayer, Investigator, Warpriest(which is really just an alt paladin but I digress), Shaman or Hunter. They want you to feel like you don't HAVE to mutliclass to achieve the feel you want. Star Wars D20 even limits what you get for "free" when multiclassing, as opposed to taking the class from level one. However, it's a really fun way to build a character and a staple of PNP gaming, in my opinion. Unfortunately, it really is where a lot of things can go wrong in game design. Mostly this reputation is undeserved, but every so often it does cause a legitimate problem. Sometimes class abilities have some insane interaction with another ability that isn't intended. Other times important abilities are "front loaded" into a class to help people achieve class identity at low levels. Today among other more basic concepts, we're discussing those front-loaded classes.
The Dip is arguably a problem in game design. I can kind of see it. Basically, it's when it's enticing to take just a few levels of a class because of either how dense those levels are, or how important those low level abilities are. I'm not gonna judge on the concept until later, I'm just going to talk a little bit about the two most popular dips, and also how to identify classes that have this kind of thing. Dippable classes, as it were. Man, remember dipped ice cream cones? I haven't had one in at least fifteen years. There used to be a little ice cream stand in the shopping center near my house. It got turned into a Kodak store, then it closed down. The little building's not even there anymore, because nothing good lasts and everything eventually turns to shit.
...Anyway... the trope namer, the big daddy, and the reason we're having this discussion at all is fighter. 3.0's designers wanted to make sure the fighter is a tough guy from day one, because he's got to protect the rogues, the wizards, and the bards until they can stand on their own. This is as old as first edition. Hell, it's probably as old as the miniatures game Chainmail. Because of this, though, taking just two levels of fighter in a twenty level build is insanely lucrative, and it's true even in Pathfinder. The list of important benefits you get is:
Two combat feats.
Simple and Martial Weapon Proficiencies.
All three Armor Proficiencies.
Shield proficiency. Some archetypes or games even get tower shields.
2D10 HP
and a bump in both Attack Bonus and Fort Save.
It's a lot of shit, and it's for two reasons: One is the 'rules' of proficiencies in D20: even one level gets you all of them. It's also because the fighter gets an extra "bonus" feat at level one to help him fill out and be tough. Proficiencies and the AB bump can be very helpful to a "sort of combative" class like rogue or bard to push them further into the spotlight. Note that even though these are combat only feats you must take, you can still take some purely defensive stuff like toughness or dodge and come out ahead.
Our next culprit is Unchained Rogue from Pathfinder. Yes, Rogue is the new Fighter. Basically, Pathfinder saw that Rogue, Barbarian and Monk were lacking. It also saw that Summoner was likely too powerful, due to superior action economy in a single character. So, its version of Unearthed Arcana, a book called Pathfinder Unchained, contained updated versions of the classes. In the case of Barbarian, Rogue and Monk, you can even play the old ones if you want, it's just with Barbarian and Rogue I don't know why you would. This needed buff caused Rogue to turn into a hellaciously good 3 or 4 level dip class for a mainline bruiser type in particular.
Unchained Rogue is a great example of importance of abilities dipped into as opposed to density. We're taking four levels in this example as well, not two. Our relevant bonuses are as follows.
Four levels of superior 8+INT skill points
Two rogue talents
2D6 Sneak Attack
Evasion, Uncanny Dodge, and Trapfinding
Debilitating Injury
Finesse Training 2
Debilitating Injury is a list of free, low powered but no-save penalties applied to anyone taking damage from your sneak attack. So what's Finesse Training, I hear you not asking me at all? It's Weapon Finesse for free at level one, and then at level three it's the ability to add dexterity to damage for a single weapon in the weapon finesse list. Our second rogue talent at level four can extend that ability to any weapon in the book, even the silly ones. So yeah, remember when I talked about Stat Dependencies? If you do, you already know why this is nuts. It lets someone playing a melee character "double down" on dexterity, pumping one ability score instead of two, choosing a dex bonus race instead of an "all things considered" race and being able to dump-stat strength. You may end up without that particular weapon in hand, but even then, weapon finesse still applies to everything in its short list. You're not screwed, just kind of.
So when should you dip? Well, first off if you're a pure(as in 1:1 caster level and up to 9th level spells) caster class, you can generally forget it. Those spell levels are hyper-important to you and you're better off trying to find a prestige class that gives spell caster levels, or, in the case of Pathfinder, playing a "half-caster" like magus, mesmerist or alchemist. With that out of the way, you want to first look at what you're losing. In 3.X this probably isn't a hell of a lot considering lack of high level abilities in most classes, but in PF it means losing access to those. It also means getting your core class abilities a little late, which might just be something you've got to live with.
A special note on missing out on things, before we continue. This is kind of scummy of me to even mention, but a lot of your multiclassing decisions are gonna be driven by how long you expect the game to run. If you were never going to hit 20 anyway, you're not missing out on that level 20 weapon mastery, or quivering palm, or grand discovery, or whatever the shit else there is. In general, games ending lower lend themselves more to funky multiclassing or dipping, because nobody's going to see any higher level abilities anyway.
With that out of the way, I suggest making two real quick outlines of your character and seeing what the impact of taking a couple levels of something else is. If you've got the time and inclination, even try one that's a more mixed build, like 10/10 or 12/8 instead of 16/4 or 18/2. Ask yourself what you're gonna use those two feats for, or ask yourself how useful(or fun) pumping DEX instead of STR will be. I can't give you a hard answer without getting more specific about what you're stacking the dip class with. In the case of casters, be very careful, and ask yourself if putting your character behind on spells is worth whatever you're dipping for.
So how do you identify other dip classes? That can't be the only two, right? Right. First off, look for anything in the first six levels that's not reliant on a class level. Yes, this means most caster classes are 'out' for dips. A few lower level spells can be nice utility early on, but later you can easily buy magic items to emulate it, and you'll be wishing you hadn't taken those levels. Basically, if you're only going to have a few levels it means things intended to scale like a fighter's Bravery ability are useless to you. However, there's a lot of abilities scattered around that act independently of class level, like a paladin's Divine Grace or a monk's AC bonus. Look for things like that, maybe things which are intended to scale with ability scores and not levels. You also want to look for anything that's going to give you a bump in an area you're lacking at, like extra skill points, better class skills, save bonuses or proficiencies. A fighter who takes four levels of rogue is adding a TON of skill utility to his character, for example.
A final note goes to attack bonus. You need to be aware of how far back, or forward your dip is putting you. You also need to be aware of how a 3/4ths class scales: 0,1,2,3,3,4,5. This means that you should have some serious thought before taking more than 4 levels, since level five is where you lose your second point of AB. Also be aware of iterative attacks: You want to get them as fast as possible, and you definitely don't want to rob yourself of an attack by taking too many levels in another class. 6, 11, and 16 are your "break points".
So the final question remains. Is this right? Is this bad design? Maybe. If a class has a million reasons to take two or four levels and none to take any more, it absolutely is bad design. Like Fighter in 3.X. Otherwise though, it's a consequence of assisting low level play, and the only fixes I find acceptable are ones like Star Wars D20 where multiclassing into something doesn't give you everything starting as it does. Even then, it makes for a weird problem where your first level ever is a really important choice. You have no idea how much of a problem it was trying to explain level one skill points to people in 3.X D&D was. Is it a scummy thing to do? Well, I advocate building the absolute best character you can, but there's a point at which this attitude can be taken to an extreme. If all you're trying to do is better define the character you have in your head or reach a capability you want to play, I really don't see a problem. Still, this is one of those things where you shouldn't be surprised if someone gets annoyed with you.
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