The Death of Story Telling?

[MichaelStockin]

I was wondering what about 3rd edition leant it to more narrative/story RPG based games compared to 4th onward.
I mean other than the obvious inclusion of a GM.

I think when 4th made the default d6 roll to hit a 4+ rather than a 5+, it was clear they were trying to speed the gameplay up.
Have a battle, charge so you hit first, hit easily, rout them and win.
Long gone were reserves and defensive play, no longer did combat take turn after turn of slogging it out, sending in reserves to bolster beleaguered units.
It was wham bam thank you maam.

But what I think also made a large difference was the distillation of a races mental characteristics from 4 stats into 1.
LD became all, it became only about the races ability to follow orders, which is what soldering is all about right?

But where was the thing about a race that made it not generic and average like humans?

We all know Orcs are dim, so they have a lower INT than humans.
We all know Halflings are not soldiers, hence a lower LD, but we also know they are more resilient to magic, hence the higher WP.
Humans may have the same INT as Dwarves, but they scare more easily hence Dwarves having a higher CL.
I think this dropping of the stats shows how GW shifted from caring about what races were other than in terms of killing machines, they became less like people with different racial mental traits, no strengths and weakness, just LD, just bland?

EDIT: Apologies to those that use other editions, you are free to disagree of course, YMMV and all that.

 

[Dreadaxe]

My advice is to look at WFB3 for existing profiles or when the profile doesn't exist to look at WFRP1/2/4 and then make a simple rule of proportionality

Envoyé de mon SM-G970F en utilisant Tapatalk

 

[ManicMan]

I've been thinking about this..

I think after 2ed, with the large number of narrative campaigns, they started to slim down on that. 3ed reused alot of 2ed but 4ed reused alot of 3ed.. that's how updates happen ^_^

When you think, in the 4ed rule book, the main option (it does give another) is to role a D6 to see how long the game lasts as it appears... you can only fight during daylight (4,5 or 6 turns) where as 3ed suggests more options for game length but that picking a number of turns is most common. (I don't think the 2ed rule books say a turn limit at all.. I'm not really sure (though I do know it features some... nice rubbish which was early retroactive history for them)).

That said, 2ed does do a bit of a focus on pointing out that WFRP is out and people should use it to 'supplement' there WFB games. I would say that by the time 4ed came out, WFRP had fully spun out in it's own so they was probably a degree more of separation between the games which they felt, unless campaign playing, WFB was more just the battle side.

 

[Fimm McCool]

I think presentation has a lot to it as well. 1st-3rd you buy a rulebook which gives you, well rules, and stats, and some background. Then it's over to you. You may have a few models, you may buy a few to get going. Not gonna be huge forces so you get to know every figure you buy and they acquire a story and reason for being all together in the same place.

4th edition you buy a boxed game complete with two armies ready to go and an example battle. Even if you choose to collect a different army there's an example size of force aim for in order to play. Even if it's not true it's what the presentation suggests. Therefore you lose the rough collection of whatever you can afford/get hold of and jump straight in at pitched battle.

 

[MichaelStockin]

I think presentation has a lot to it as well. 1st-3rd you buy a rulebook which gives you, well rules, and stats, and some background. Then it's over to you.

That's a good point. I think it applies to so many games where it is either self sourced vs boxed to go.

When I started selling 6mm sci-fi skirmish rules and models years ago, so many people did not know what to do as individually based 6mm sci-fi models with skirmish and scenario based encounters was new to them, they wanted help with what to buy and how to play.
I suspect that had I sold boxed to go products rather than pluck and play there would have been less confusion, but also less range/scope.

I have certainly seen a lot more hand holding when it comes to new products and games over the last 10 or 15 years compared to say 30 or 40 years ago.

 

[AranaszarSzuur]

I was wondering what about 3rd edition leant it to more narrative/story RPG based games compared to 4th onward.
I mean other than the obvious inclusion of a GM.

I think when 4th made the default d6 roll to hit a 4+ rather than a 5+, it was clear they were trying to speed the gameplay up.
Have a battle, charge so you hit first, hit easily, rout them and win.
Long gone were reserves and defensive play, no longer did combat take turn after turn of slogging it out, sending in reserves to bolster beleaguered units.
It was wham bam thank you maam.

But what I think also made a large difference was the distillation of a races mental characteristics from 4 stats into 1.
LD became all, it became only about the races ability to follow orders, which is what soldering is all about right?

But where was the thing about a race that made it not generic and average like humans?

We all know Orcs are dim, so they have a lower INT than humans.
We all know Halflings are not soldiers, hence a lower LD, but we also know they are more resilient to magic, hence the higher WP.
Humans may have the same INT as Dwarves, but they scare more easily hence Dwarves having a higher CL.
I think this dropping of the stats shows how GW shifted from caring about what races were other than in terms of killing machines, they became less like people with different racial mental traits, no strengths and weakness, just LD, just bland?

EDIT: Apologies to those that use other editions, you are free to disagree of course, YMMV and all that.

That's basically the shift from Oldhammer to Newhammer. It's easier to sell tons of miniatures and get people playing when it's just competitive play with army lists.

 

[Fimm McCool]

That's a good point. I think it applies to so many games where it is either self sourced vs boxed to go.

When I started selling 6mm sci-fi skirmish rules and models years ago, so many people did not know what to do as individually based 6mm sci-fi models with skirmish and scenario based encounters was new to them, they wanted help with what to buy and how to play.
I suspect that had I sold boxed to go products rather than pluck and play there would have been less confusion, but also less range/scope.

I have certainly seen a lot more hand holding when it comes to new products and games over the last 10 or 15 years compared to say 30 or 40 years ago.

Indeed. I'm currently reordering my Oakbound stand I take to shows so people can clearly see where to start collecting, good miniatures to complement a starter set and purchases for later warband development. My own preference for just buying whatever figures I like the look of and proxying or making them fit within the rules is clearly not the way most people buy toys. Especially for a game system which is unfamiliar. They want to know they can use what they buy.

 

[MichaelStockin]

They want to know they can use what they buy.

I suspect, and understandably, they also want to know what is 'good'.

 

[ManicMan]

I do know that sometimes, a 'starter set' offer of say, a rule book with a few figures for play does help some people get into things these days. Of course, GW did used to offer the odd thing like that before boxed sets but took more of a focus when box sets came around more. But also remember, scenario packs were 2nd and they had basically everything for that part (not a starter though). While the figures were a set secondary to the main pack, proxies were given so you had rules, buildings, figures, etc as a single pack.

 

[Eric]

I think as has been said a few times it is worth remembering that Citadel/GW created the games to sell the models, the fact those games were created by people who loved playing games is somewhat by the by almost.

I guess it's interesting to speculate how much of the change was intentional business direction and how much came about simply from "cleaning up" the rules, which given they'd already done multiple versions of WFB at that point probably felt very natural. Certainly 4th WFB and 2nd 40k seemed to concentrate on being cleaner and consolidated.

Although at the time of WFB4th I think because the new army books were being published along with new models it still felt a bit fresh and full of change so maybe what was lost (narrative and depth) wasn't apparent to me as I was caught up in the momentum at the time. We were still doing a lot of narrative games in 40k1st but more with the models we had which I supposed balanced it out for us (never really did 40k 2nd at home at least).

 

[Fimm McCool]

A related factor is the rise in plastic technologies. GW would have done the first three editions with plastic armies if they could, but they didn't have the experience, technology or budget to do so. As Eric says, not necessarily a change in direction but in capability.

 

[MichaelStockin]

I wonder if the shift from single unique named models which dominated in 1st to 3rd edition to the abundance of monopose plastics in 4th onwards was also factor for why the story telling element felt neglected for me.

From models like this:

Which have personality, and of course the people that your armies are defending, the local village folk:

To what became the norm thereafter:



Unnamed models that gave you units of identical troops, not just the same pose, the same build, the same expression, the same faces. Nothing unique about them. More playing pieces in a game than characters in stories.

If the will is there any rules can be made to tell stories with, to create your own worlds and dive in.
But I still feel that from 4th edition onwards, GW dropped this notion.
No longer did you have a level of hero that you were encouraged to name and give a rank and title to, you were told who your hero models were.
There were special rules and special models for just that purpose, you were told what to do, not encouraged to make it up as you went.
Less creative licence* with the world and more legal licence to follow.

Not that you could not tell your own stories with later editions of WFB, just that GW wanted you to play their mass battles instead.


*an example that springs to mind is in the 3rd edition army book the suggest changing things to better suit how you want to play.
I could not find anything in the few 4th edition army books saying to ignore what they said.

 

[ManicMan]

of course, up to 3ed, they kinda wanted a 2 player battle to have 3 players, as while not needed, they were very big on having a Game Master to act as a judge, where in the 4ed, they was removed to have 2 players dealing with it themselves.

I would also point out that by 4ed, they were very much of the mind set that there was a strong player base and claiming it was easy to find new people to play with etc, this is the kinda thing which often required stronger rule sets because people get too focused on 'winning' and stuff and would fight over some silly ruling.

 

[Eric]

... claiming it was easy to find new people to play with etc, this is the kinda thing which often required stronger rule sets because people get too focused on 'winning' and stuff and would fight over some silly ruling.

I think this is quite a key point, as soon as it goes beyond the small trusted group you either really need that third tested impartial person to adjudicate or you need an attempt at handling that via the rules. You see it everywhere, Laws in countries, or even take this forum - we muddle by with a gentlemanly agreement not to be arses to each other, and that works as it's a smallish place, look at say https://leadadventureforum.com or somewhere and they have a massive long list of rules and so forth in an attempt to manage things.

Unnamed models that gave you units of identical troops, not just the same pose, the same build, the same expression, the same faces. Nothing unique about them. More playing pieces in a game than characters in stories.

I was thinking about this and our games - I think our narratives shifted more to the campaign side of things (in WFB) - so to some extent the narrative sat outside the actual game, granted that game may have had some kind of light theme to it - protect the village, stop the undead crossing the river - whatever, but certainly not anything at the individual model level like they would have had.

One aspect I've always thought might be worth further exploration and might be related was simply age. So these days I pick up a game and due to age, free time, life, etc, etc I do wince at complicated mechanics and effort I might have to put into learning it. Comparing that to young me and I revelled in the depth of the Rogue Trader rulebook, knowing all the little bits and pieces of rules (and winging it anyway), all that "secret knowledge". Of course all our favourite games designers were also growing older along with their games. You only have to look at how much cleaner (for want of a better word) one of Rick's newer games is compared to old WFB/40k for instance. It's something I've not really given much thought to other than thinking - I should give some thought to! So I've not really quite organised it in my mind yet, still dumping here lest someone more eloquently articulate what I'm thinking.

 

[AranaszarSzuur]

Unnamed models that gave you units of identical troops, not just the same pose, the same build, the same expression, the same faces. Nothing unique about them. More playing pieces in a game than characters in stories.

When GW did 4th ed WHFB and 2nd ed 40k, they were broke after management buyout and desperate for money. That's why they shifted towards making tournament-style army list-based game for kids with the cringe kitchhammer aesthetics.
This also included limited budget and time for miniatures and art.
Like there was a shift occurring during 3rd ed/1st ed 40k and they doubled down on it with next edition.

 

[Eric]

... shifted towards making tournament-style army list-based game for kids ...

Although to be fair both myself and my friends were all very much what you'd call kids when we started with Rogue Trader, so evidently even the original versions appealed to us babies back then! Although looking at the back of the RT book I see it says 16 to adult. The current 40k starter set says 12+ on the website. So at least formally the target age range has indeed dropped a bit.

 

[AranaszarSzuur]

Although to be fair both myself and my friends were all very much what you'd call kids when we started with Rogue Trader, so evidently even the original versions appealed to us babies back then! Although looking at the back of the RT book I see it says 16 to adult. The current 40k starter set says 12+ on the website. So at least formally the target age range has indeed dropped a bit.

AFAIK 2nd ed 40k had no age rating at all, while 3rd ed 40k had rating of 8+ on the box. 3rd ed ended up with Juan Diaz deamonettes XD .