A geeky D&D rant
Apr. 12th, 2006 08:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
felis_ultharusJus' since I'm taking it easy tonight, when I should be started my essay...
Okay. So in Dungeons & Dragons circles -- and yes, there are such places on the internet where DMs and players converse -- there are discussions about these things called "broken rules," which are essentially loopholes exploited by mathematically adept players with way too much time on their hands.
I'm always astonished reading these broken rules. What kind of milquetoast DMs let their players get away with these things? There is no loophole in Dungeons and Dragons which cannot be resolved if the DM has three things:
Take the Druid/Awaken loophole. For those of you not geeky enough to know these things, those delightful nature-priests have the power to transform themselves into an animal. Some few can cast spells in that form, and one of those spells is called awaken, which boosts an animal's Wisdom and Charisma scores, and grants it sentience, and makes it a magical beast.
Since the druid already is sentient, he or she gets smarter, more wise, and more charismatic, and this can repeated indefinitely.
An alternate version of this has you transforming and awakening your buddy, instead of yourself. And people who think awhile about it and realize awaken eats up experience points throw in a dungeon of infinite monsters for the Druid to keep building his or her experience back up.
First of all, any DM who throws in a "dungeon of infinite monster" needs a lesson in basic ecology. The Druid, at least, ought to know his or her basic ecology. Pretty soon, that Druid is going to clear things out. I guess you could say that the dungeon has a portal to one of those infinite planes of nasty monsters -- like the Abyss -- but who's to say that something big and nasty won't wander through that portal that the Druid can't handle.
Secondly, the Druid who casts this on him/herselfin my game would have a very rude awakening when they discovered that their transformation into a magical beast made their animal form permanent. After all, they can turn back from "animal" not from "magical beast." And Awaken cannot be dispelled. If they tried to rid themselves of it with a wish, they would turn to a human with the intelligence of an animal.
But I'd save my greatest wrath for the one who visited this loophole on a friend.
After five transformations, the friend would plead for it to stop.
After 10, his brain would turn to mush, instead of getting smarter -- Intelligence 2, Wisdom 0.
After 15, he would transform into a bizarre, ever-shifting chaos of random animal parts (yes, I've read way too much Lovecraft and seen Akira too many times).
After 20, he would transcend form itself, become an insane animal-god, and whisk the now-hated druid off to his newly-constructed afterlife which was designed entirely as one giant torture chamber for said Druid, who could never escape.
Player (who makes a new character) thinks twice about using a broken rule in the future.
And don't get me started about the Hulking Hurler Loophole. This one allows a player playing a half-ogre to throw a lead ball and do 4697 points of damage in a single attack -- most players will rarely do more than 12 in a single attack.
Problem is, this plan requires the half-ogre to purchase a 9-foot-diameter sphere of lead, at a cost of 5315 gold.
Question: where do you go to buy a 9-foot-diameter sphere of lead? Where in a quasi-Medieval town do giant lead balls get sold? The blacksmith? The dry goods store? I picture this huge half-ogre wandering into the local dry goods store and saying, "Hey, got any giant lead balls for sale?" And the shopkeeper says, "Phew! I didn't think anybody would ever buy this thing."
Where do you get that much lead? Who manufactures it? What kind of market can there be for 9-foot-diameter spheres of lead? Is there that much demand? Are traders rolling these things along the major trade routes, trying not to get squashed?
And why aren't other DMs actually thinking about these things, when one of their players come to them with something crazy like this?
Okay. So in Dungeons & Dragons circles -- and yes, there are such places on the internet where DMs and players converse -- there are discussions about these things called "broken rules," which are essentially loopholes exploited by mathematically adept players with way too much time on their hands.
I'm always astonished reading these broken rules. What kind of milquetoast DMs let their players get away with these things? There is no loophole in Dungeons and Dragons which cannot be resolved if the DM has three things:
- Lateral Thinking
- Common Sense
- A Cruel Streak
Take the Druid/Awaken loophole. For those of you not geeky enough to know these things, those delightful nature-priests have the power to transform themselves into an animal. Some few can cast spells in that form, and one of those spells is called awaken, which boosts an animal's Wisdom and Charisma scores, and grants it sentience, and makes it a magical beast.
Since the druid already is sentient, he or she gets smarter, more wise, and more charismatic, and this can repeated indefinitely.
An alternate version of this has you transforming and awakening your buddy, instead of yourself. And people who think awhile about it and realize awaken eats up experience points throw in a dungeon of infinite monsters for the Druid to keep building his or her experience back up.
First of all, any DM who throws in a "dungeon of infinite monster" needs a lesson in basic ecology. The Druid, at least, ought to know his or her basic ecology. Pretty soon, that Druid is going to clear things out. I guess you could say that the dungeon has a portal to one of those infinite planes of nasty monsters -- like the Abyss -- but who's to say that something big and nasty won't wander through that portal that the Druid can't handle.
Secondly, the Druid who casts this on him/herselfin my game would have a very rude awakening when they discovered that their transformation into a magical beast made their animal form permanent. After all, they can turn back from "animal" not from "magical beast." And Awaken cannot be dispelled. If they tried to rid themselves of it with a wish, they would turn to a human with the intelligence of an animal.
But I'd save my greatest wrath for the one who visited this loophole on a friend.
After five transformations, the friend would plead for it to stop.
After 10, his brain would turn to mush, instead of getting smarter -- Intelligence 2, Wisdom 0.
After 15, he would transform into a bizarre, ever-shifting chaos of random animal parts (yes, I've read way too much Lovecraft and seen Akira too many times).
After 20, he would transcend form itself, become an insane animal-god, and whisk the now-hated druid off to his newly-constructed afterlife which was designed entirely as one giant torture chamber for said Druid, who could never escape.
Player (who makes a new character) thinks twice about using a broken rule in the future.
And don't get me started about the Hulking Hurler Loophole. This one allows a player playing a half-ogre to throw a lead ball and do 4697 points of damage in a single attack -- most players will rarely do more than 12 in a single attack.
Problem is, this plan requires the half-ogre to purchase a 9-foot-diameter sphere of lead, at a cost of 5315 gold.
Question: where do you go to buy a 9-foot-diameter sphere of lead? Where in a quasi-Medieval town do giant lead balls get sold? The blacksmith? The dry goods store? I picture this huge half-ogre wandering into the local dry goods store and saying, "Hey, got any giant lead balls for sale?" And the shopkeeper says, "Phew! I didn't think anybody would ever buy this thing."
Where do you get that much lead? Who manufactures it? What kind of market can there be for 9-foot-diameter spheres of lead? Is there that much demand? Are traders rolling these things along the major trade routes, trying not to get squashed?
And why aren't other DMs actually thinking about these things, when one of their players come to them with something crazy like this?
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-12 06:25 pm (UTC)DM: "OK, you can be a Hulking Hurler, but FIRST you must mine enough lead. Have fun (and possibly cancer)!"
.....But seriously, I like your Cruel Streak.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-18 03:04 pm (UTC)I'm not that cruwel. My cruelty is in direct proportion to a player's power-gamer tendencies.
(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-12 07:59 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2006-04-18 03:14 pm (UTC)