v0.10 Simplicity (With Poll)

Are the 2.0 rules a net gain or loss of Simplicity over the current 1.3 rules?

  • They are a net gain in Simplicity.

  • They are a net loss in Simplicity.

  • They are a wash, niether gaining or lossing Simplicity.


Results are only viewable after voting.

Tantarus

Knight
Pretty straight forward and direct question. This change is suppose to focus on Simplicity of the rules. Some things to consider:
  • New incants.
  • New abilities.
  • Functionality of the new rules vs the old.
  • Ease of understanding to a new player.
  • Functionality of new melee skills both offensive and defensive.
  • Magic item system.
  • Easy entry level class of "fighter" changes.
  • Scaling of monsters.
 
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I'm calling it a wash. There are some aspects of the new rules that streamline things very nicely -- standardization of defense and delivery types, adding damage/healing numbers to incants, etc. But as the rules have been revised, a number of non-standard things have been added back in (and some taken back out again) -- mettle and relics in this latest revision both work outside the normal defense/delivery paradigms, Meditate required for only some skills, basically everything that was in Paragon paths... I think the original impulse was good, but things are getting back to being complex and full of exceptions and edge cases.
 
I don't see how these rules as a whole are going be simpler for either side of the desk. I would have to agree with Avaran. I might learn a new rule set closer to home. I travel to play Alliance because I liked the rules and the dynamic the best out of the ones I looked at in genre at the time. To learn a new one that could easily be more complicated then the old ones, no thanks. I am sure there is something closer to home.
 
Calling it a net loss.

Evade is a terrible plan to add more complexity to the mental math required to play. New targeting for weapon blows on only disarm or shatter changes what counts as a legal blow, as well as introducing marshalling headaches when they interact with PTD skills.

Too many edge cases in this iteration of the playtest that are going to be real pains in the neck to iron out at the chapter level.
 
I agree that it loses simplicity as well.

To add on to what @Muir said:
Too many edge cases in this iteration of the playtest that are going to be real pains in the neck to iron out at the chapter level.

Right now, Alliance is pretty straightforward as a rules system. If I travel to a different chapter, although the playstyle might be a bit different, or they may have one or two LCO rules/calls, the overall game still feels the same. If 0.10 was to go live today, I think this falls apart... Especially at the beginning while everyone is learning how the rules work and different marshals might have different interpretations across chapters.

Although this would eventually iron itself out, I think it would certainly limit travelling players until some of the mechanics are ironed out.
 
I’m calling it a loss. Consider:

Evade’s changes mean more math on the fly.
Shatter/Disarm via Weapon will be the only weird skill that must hit the object and not the body (unless you’re hitting something like a wand, Ritual scroll or other weird thing, then you can call the object? I guess?)
The ritual rules certainly did not improve.
Stun Limb counts as a Rogue skill despite being able to be purchased via Fighter Build. Disarm counts as Fighter skills despite being able to be purchased via Rogue build. This is weird.
Some rituals require meditation to use again, some don’t. That’s weird.
Two skills now cost more the more you purchase them. That’s weird, and literally the only curvature cost in the system (because we don’t want to admit we need a build cap, but that’s another story).

Other things I’m sure I could find. This is just off the top of my head.
 
My other issue with 2.0 and "Simplicity"

You literally can't make a Melee character without the Build Spreadsheet, and spending build against "Fighter Skill" and "Rogue Skill" purchases isn't intuitive at all.

I literally can. I don't know if that just means I am better at math than you or that I just have a knack for building characters in this system.

-MS
 
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I literally can. I don't know if that just means I am better at math than you or that I just have a knack for building characters in this system.

-MS

So you are arguing that making a fighter in 2.0 is just as easy as 1.3? Otherwise what is the point of this reply?
 
Net gain... and I don't think it is even close.

Over two decades, one of the most common difficulties I have seen for new players is figuring out how much damage a spell did or cured. Now that number is stated out loud as part of the incantation. This should minimize confusion for new players significantly, and help older players (I still pause and count up through the damage spells when hit by lightning storm or ice storm).

The spell incantations are also the easiest they have ever been, by a far margin.

The complete nonsense of Nausea, Feeblemind, Laugh, and Vertigo being four separate, but similar effects is gone (Halleluah!).

Read & Write is gone as a skill that does nothing but make people screw up roleplay when they forget they don't have it.


These were all parts of the game that affected large swaths of players, which means that the simplification of these things has a massive effect.


Comparatively, the new corner case rules that exist affect a much smaller population of players. Evade is a skill that pretty much only rogues and part-rogues take, and those tend to be the least popular classes in the game. Stun Limb, Shatter, and Disarm are some of the rarer skills in the game, despite the plethora of fighters in the game. The arithmetic cost increase is an increase in complexity (though, this isn't the first time that this has been true for these two skills... really old people know what I am talking about), but that complexity isn't during game, making it much easier to deal with.

Overall, even if the total number of rules items that got simpler is lower than those that got more complex (and I'd say that seriously depends on how you count), the effect of the simplifications massively outweighs the effect of any increase in complexity.

-MS
 
Overall, even if the total number of rules items that got simpler is lower than those that got more complex (and I'd say that seriously depends on how you count), the effect of the simplifications massively outweighs the effect of any increase in complexity.

That is one opinion. In the minority. Stating it like it is a assumed fact does not make it so.
 
This is your weekly reminder to check your collective tones.
 
Off the top of your head, how many Disarms can you buy with 6 buys of Resolute already purchased?

How many buys of Waylay does a Fighter need to buy a Counteract?

And how many Parry's do I need to buy before I can buy 5 Stun Limbs as a Scout? Cause I want Parry, but I don't want Crit Attacks or Intercept. And no Disarms.

Also, I have a mid-level character (about 275 build), how many each skill can I get without focusing too much on Profs and no Crit attacks? Say, 2 Profs at-most?

These questions are kind of silly. All but the second are pretty much open-ended questions that don't have a definitive answer. For example, for the first one, not enough information is provided. If you have bought Resolute x6, you have spent at least 150 XP in fighter skills. But you might have spent 450 XP in fighter skills. So the answer is at least 10. Or, depending on how you interpret the question, the answer might be at least 11 (buying those 10 Disarms after having spent 150XP puts enough XP spent into fighter skills to also qualify for an 11th Disarm).

I could give equally complex answers for 3 and 4, but why bother? Overall, I just don't see how the 1 purchase per # XP is any harder to remember than 1 purchase per # profs we used to have.

-MS
 
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o while saying that Disarm, Shatter, and Stun Limb are uncommon and rarely purchased in 1.3 is useful for the 1.3 rules, it doesn't mean anything for 2.0 since the rules haven't been released and people aren't playing 2.0 outside of a few hours during a playtest.

Also shatter and disarm work very different now and are much easier to use against shields. To the point that I think shields will be very weak in 2.0.
 
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In 1.2 I don't take PTDs as my character is an Archer and activating PTD stops me from any attack other then that. With MIS it is currently easier to have that Disarm ect. as spells. With the drastic MI change I am sure you will see fighters take those skills.
 
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