Heartbreaker?

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Charlie Dunwoody at 2005-04-14 04:31:36
Converted from Phorums BB System

I wrote last month's column as a one shot and received many positive comments. Many readers were surprised that I didn't suggest more change for 4th edition.

I want to thank everyone who wrote responses agreeing or disagreeing with my ideas and presenting their own takes on D&D 4th edition. Discussion with other gamers is why I write this column.

Rant on:

So I wrote this follow up column. I tossed some ideas out and have received both positive agreement as well as constructive criticism. I have also received some negative, in your face criticism.

For the record, I am familiar with a lot of what is going on with D20 variants out there, especially Mutants and Masterminds' brilliant save mechanic in place of hit points and Blue Rose's condensing and refining of traditional D&D mechanics. I do not own all D20 game books but I read the designer's websites and check their products out in stores.

I do not visit the Forge currently, although talk about the site intrigues me. I do not know what a Heartbreaker game is or why a few posters here tell me I'm trying to make a Heartbreaker game. I can hardly have that as design goal when I don't know what it is.

These last two columns were written for fun and to stimulate creative thinking about 4th edition. Taking jabs at me personally, calling my column redundant or ignorant or like taking the wall out to fix the plumbing won't accomplish anthing.

Here's a secret. As noted in both my columns I have about as much control over what happens to 4th edition as I have over the weather. Basically, if I don't like it I can stay inside and avoid it. That's about it.

If you don't want to discuss 4th edition in a nice way, you are welcome to stay inside and avoid my column. I don't mind criticism of my work, in fact I welcome it so I can hone my writing talents. But I don't consider name calling and taunts to be criticism.

Rant off

Charlie

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Gaming Nut at 2005-04-14 06:44:45
Converted from Phorums BB System

You responded like an ass.

We responded in kind.

Loser.

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Charlie Dunwoody at 2005-04-14 07:32:17
Converted from Phorums BB System

Actually, you are the only poster with a real attitude problem. I usually get well thought criticism as well as agreement or expansion on some of my ideas.

You make assumptions and accusations without understanding where I'm coming from or asking for clarification and then resort to insults when I call you on it. At work, I have to put up with people like you. Here I don't.

I have no desire to argue with you. In fact, I'm willing to start over and try to have a constructive dialogue with you. Maybe we misunderstood each other because it is hard to read emotion in a post.

Charlie

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Tom Davidson at 2005-04-14 11:18:27
Converted from Phorums BB System

I'll be frank: I just don't get what you're trying to accomplish with your column. Nothing you're proposing is particularly innovative, and you don't go into enough depth about any one change to suggest why you feel it's an improvement, or even what gameplay changes will result as a consequence of your rules change.

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Charlie Dunwoody at 2005-04-14 11:42:33
Converted from Phorums BB System

Tom,

Last month I did a one shot about D&D 4th edition which generated a lot of positive responses. One request was for more changes so I threw out some more ideas this month. It didn't go over as well.

Normally, my column is about building a campaign and setting. I'm going back to that format next month.

Charlie

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Darrin Bright at 2005-04-14 11:50:58
Converted from Phorums BB System

Hmm. Seems like a lot of your points seem directed at me, since I brought up the Heartbreaker, The Forge, Drama/Fortune/Karma mechanics, etc...

...so let me apologize if I was overly pedantic. I really should mind my manners.

"Fantasy Heartbreaker" is a term coined by Ron Edwards. You can read his original article and the follow-up over at The Forge:

http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/9/
http://www.indie-rpgs.com/articles/10/

Basically, it's a labor-of-love reworking of D&D where the author sets out to write "the next big revolutionary step in RPGs". The "heartbreaker" comes form the fact that there may be some really cool stuff in there, but it's burried under a horribly designed system that's hopelessly derivative of what the industry got bored of 20 years ago. However, he does say any would-be game designer *MUST* design (but not actually produce/market/sell) a Heartbreaker at least once, to at least get it out of his system or at most examine what issues are driving the interests of the designer.

Now, it was a little unfair of me to invoke this epithet because your first post dealt almost purely with marketing strategy rather than setting or system issues, which is such a "Cart-Before-The-Horse" Zen-counter-thinking approach when it comes to GNS Theory that I was incapable of insulting narrow-minded denigration masquerading as criticism only up until you took my single d20 away and replaced it with 2d10.

So, just to make absolutely sure I've beaten all possible XPs out of a thoroughly thanotopic equine, let's take a closer look at the economic model.

First, TSR developed the "standard" AD&D model: one person, generally the DM, buys the majority of the hardback books. In a staggering leap of incisiveness, the DM is also expected to buy the less expensive softbacks, the "modules".

2nd Edition brought a second economic model. Similar to the first, the DM is expected to get all the major hardbacks. However, a new line of softback "Complete Left-Handed Half-Ogre Nosepicker's Handbook" is introduced that is marketed directly to the players. This is the "splatbook" strategy, and you could say White Wolf pioneered this, but you could also say absolutely anybody who wanted any hope of making any money in the 80's/90's used this model.

3rd Edition started off with the splatbook model, but ever since the Expanded Psionicist Handbook came out, WotC has been trotting out a new market strategy: Every single person must buy hardback books. Absolutely no exceptions, unless you're a peon company doing D20 License dreck that no store will stock.

Now, somewhere between 1st and 2nd, TSR experimented with a similar "tiered" model: Basic/Expert/Companion/Immortal box sets. This model didn't work very well for two important reasons:

1) Customers were turned off by the terms "Basic" and "Advanced". Hardcore fans turned up their noses at "baby stuff" that they considered beneath them, and more casual customers were turned off by what they thought was too much complexity. Also, this over-segments your target market into two separate product lines, which tends to waste resources, confuses customers, and can turn your own company into it's biggest competitor (Teddy Ruxpin Syndrome).

2) The Piano Book Syndrome. Ever tried to teach yourself how to play an instrument? You start with a "Basic Piano" book. In order to sell ONE "Intermediate Piano" book (the next step up), a publisher usually has to sell at least a 100 basic books. By segmenting your product line into different levels of competency, you're guaranteeing that anything beyond "Basic" will be a huge, horrible gaping hole of unsold product eating up warehouse space and inventory taxes.

Now, admittedly, maybe the market has changed and a strategy like this might work with the current D&D customers. Before I buy that, though, I'd like to see a few more ideas on how you think you'll work around or solve these problems.

Where the heck was I? Dead horse. Oh, ok... let me go back to what inspired me to mouth off in the first place... you took away my 20-sider (which I'm not all that attached to, truth be told... my favorite system is Feng Shui, 2d6 plus/minus).

> D20 now stands for Dramatic 20 ...

What's implied here is you, as a designer, don't consider "vanilla D&D" to be dramatic enough, and you'd like to fix that. Instead of immediately insinuating what you were trying to do was pointless, I should have asked something along the lines of "Why do you think that way? What in the current system is bothering you? What specific needs do you want out of this game that you're just not getting right now?"

Which gets us into GNS Theory, which I keep referencing like I know what the heck I'm talking about, but if you actually backed me into a corner and came at me, you might find I know even less about it than you do. I'm kinda ok with Gamist and Simulationist, but every time Narrativism gets brought up, my brain goes all right angles and I get confused... probably because I keep confusing it with what I think is Dramatism, which is apparently something else entirely when discussing GNS.

Actually at this point it might be better to just avoid talking about GNS Theory completely... it's terribly useful for generating a monstrously huge amount of theoretical analysis, but despite all claims to the contrary the primary purpose for all theoretical analysis is to generate even more theoretical analysis. An inexhaustible source of endlessly recursive thanotopic equines, if you will.

Anyway, that being said, perhaps I should cut down to the bone, so to speak...

You said you want a more Dramatic game. What exactly do you mean by that?

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Charlie Dunwoody at 2005-04-15 04:32:02
Converted from Phorums BB System

Darrin,

Sorry if I got a little mouthy. I had a rough day at work when I responded to both you and Gamer Nut and wasn't in a diplomatic mood.

Actually, I simply wrote the column to stimulate conversation and ideas (read RagingDragon's post, he seemed to get what I was after pretty well). I love D&D and have played every edition since AD&D 1st edition. I don't really need to change it drastically.

My last column kept D&D close to current rules but with a different marketing strategy, which as you pointed out, might not work real well. A lot of posters asked for more change in the rules themselves, however.

So I wrote this column and threw out some ideas. For both columns I put myself in the fictional shoes of a new owner of D&D looking to brainstorm ideas about 4th edition. Somehow I gave everyone the impression that I wanted all these changes now, with no input from anybody else.

Which confused me, because I went out of my way to put this theoretical exercise in the future of 2014 and ask the reader to put him or herself in the shoes of a game designers or playtester when they responded. Perhaps my attempt was overly complicated.

Anyway, I have learned two things. One, I can finally learn about the Heartbreaker syndrome (and perhaps these two columns are my Heartbreaker, in their own way). Two, I realize how scared the designers of 3rd edition must have been when they considered making any changes to D&D. People take the game seriously!

I have no plans to take away your D20.:) Crit on!

Thanks for clearing up the Heartbreaker stuff for me, Darrin. I'll check out the articles.

Next month I'm going back to my roots and less controversy. I'll be covering campaign creation and setting building. Hope you have time to read the column and chime in.

Charlie

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Tom Davidson at 2005-04-15 05:59:26
Converted from Phorums BB System

"So I wrote this column and threw out some ideas. For both columns I put myself in the fictional shoes of a new owner of D&D looking to brainstorm ideas about 4th edition. Somehow I gave everyone the impression that I wanted all these changes now, with no input from anybody else."

Well, as I've said, that's not my complaint. My complaint is that you submit these hypothetical changes without spending any time discussing why you think they're improvements to the game -- which, IMO, makes the column not particularly interesting.

I mean, I could write a column describing a hypothetical revision of Call of Cthulhu that used playing cards and pick-up-sticks as randomizers, but unless I explained WHY CoC should start using those mechanisms, the readers would just be left with a strange mental image and no understanding of what I was trying to accomplish.

The changes you've proposed are presumably changes for the better. You need to explain why.

[RPGnet Columns]

Post originally by Charlie Dunwoody at 2005-04-15 06:52:10
Converted from Phorums BB System

Tom,

I pulled out some info from the column that include reasons for changes. In addition, the posts from the last column, as noted, include reasons for change. Hope it helps.


I propose radical changes to D&D based partially on received feedback.

Each DM decides on certain actions that a character can attempt that fit within the theme and style of the DM's game world. Once a session, a PC can declare one d10 result to be a 10 if they are attempting one of these actions.

For instance, the default action for D&D is good heroics. PCs who rescue the princess and save the village from the dragon may be granted a few rerolls as they risk their lives to protect the weak and helpless.

Another DM may want a dark and gritty world. PCs who act selfishly or with anger or other dark emotion may receive a reroll. At the same time, however, they may gain Corruption points, taking them down a path leading to physical deformities and possibly the loss of their soul.

This change also impacts alignment. Although the standard alignments (selflessness versus selfishness and individual versus community) fit the good heroic default action, other world styles may need different alignments to fit their unique flavor.

I have two basic design goals for 4th edition. Keep it D&D but streamline it and update it with the latest designs for roleplaying games. And make it easy to both DM and play a character while encouraging good roleplaying and joint storytelling.

Anything that will add to the complexity of D&D needs to be included only if it adds to the enjoyment of the game and adds in facilitating better play. Otherwise, the game design goal is to streamline where possible.

Saving throws are based on all six ability scores, which isn't streamlining but will make characters with a variety of ability scores more fun to play.

Some things in D&D could use an overhaul. The following is a partial list of things we'd rework.

Charlie