Chap 1 revision (7-04)

[geeman]

At 12:13 AM 7/26/2004 +0200, irdeggman wrote:



>>One could have a little text saying that paladins of Avani are lawful

>>good
or lawful evil, and a general comment that lawful neutral

>>paladins
smite/protect against chaos while lawful good ones smite evil.

>

>Sorry, again I refer to the poll that was conducted.Anything other is

>basically saying that the what the majority voted on was incorrect and is

>being ignored.If anyone wants to do something else in their campaign they

>most certainly can, it is a core principal of D&D that house rules rule.



I don`t recall, was it actually an option to have paladin`s choose from two

or three alignments that could be appropriate to their particular god with

the specifics of their alignment choice determining the emphasis of their

special abilities in that poll?



In any case, my point above was not what the polls results were, but that

the statement that there was no other way of doing it is incorrect. It

could really be done very easily.



Gary

[Ridder]

I'm wondering a little about the Paladin of Nesirie class. Access to the Sea domain, as a character ability, should probably go with the list of character abilities instead of up in the class summary. (Though the similarity of water affinity to the Sea domain power is enough to make me wonder whether that was meant to be replaced.) Smite evil 3/day was also left off the table at 10th level.

Mostly, though, I wonder why a character would take more than a few paladin levels when she can freely multiclass as a cleric. Clerics get better saves overall, and superior spellcasting seems to outweigh minor improvements in paladin abilities (smite evil, lay on hands, remove disease, water affinity, and eventually freedom of movement - the last three largely reproducing spell effects themselves).
The section on Nesirie in BRCS-playtest seemed to indicate that her paladins were more martial than her clerics. Even if people think it requires adjusting something else for balance between the paladin classes, I think it makes more sense for paladins of Nesirie to have the fighter BAB.

[RaspK_FOG]

The variants are meant to overrule the free-multiclassing options "standard" BRCS paladins have; in other words, a paladin of Cuiraécen can multiclass as a fighter or, if your DM prefers this, cannot cast spells or turn undead but gains bonus fighter feats at various levels, counting his paladin levels as fighter levels. To put it even simpler, it's either this or that. The same applies to all 4 "human" paladin classes.

[Ariadne]

Originally posted by irdeggman@Jul 25 2004, 07:22 PM
What specifically in the PS of Ariya would require the paladin-prince to be lawful good? I don't recall reading anything specific about the Ariyan Temple of Avani that leads to it having to be a lawful good one, in fact most of the descriptions apply to lawful neutral as equally as they do to lawful good.

If I recall it right, the prince of Ariya might be a cleric or paladin of Avani, but he/ she must be lawful good...

Edit: I still think, making the prince of Ariya lawful neutral violates this explicite setting. Rewriting Ariya as one of the Atlas member with lawful neutral rather than lawful good will cause more than a tear. I'm still of the opinion, for Ariya should be chreated an exception to not rewriting it this drastically...

Oh, and I can't recall that poll either... May you give the link?

[Ridder]

Originally posted by RaspK_FOG@Jul 26 2004, 12:58 AM
The variants are meant to overrule the free-multiclassing options "standard" BRCS paladins have; in other words, a paladin of Cuiraécen can multiclass as a fighter or, if your DM prefers this, cannot cast spells or turn undead but gains bonus fighter feats at various levels, counting his paladin levels as fighter levels. To put it even simpler, it's either this or that. The same applies to all 4 "human" paladin classes.

Ah, right. That does help some.

[irdeggman]

If I recall it right, the prince of Ariya might be a cleric or paladin of Avani, but he/ she must be lawful good...

Please, something more specific would be useful here. I think this is based on the 2nd ed BR requirement that paladins of Avani be LG and not on something specific to the domains in question. Looking through the PS (albeit quickly) I couldn't find any such reference. I think this may be a case of 'we've always done it that way' and hence the actual written requirement has been confused with what has been the norm for playing over the years.

Edit: I still think, making the prince of Ariya lawful neutral violates this explicite setting. Rewriting Ariya as one of the Atlas member with lawful neutral rather than lawful good will cause more than a tear. I'm still of the opinion, for Ariya should be chreated an exception to not rewriting it this drastically...

Unfortuneately that is not a reason or else I wouldn't have done the massive rewriting I've done with Chap 1 and Chap 2.

Oh, and I can't recall that poll either... May you give the link?

I included it in my post above.

[RaspK_FOG]

Err... I would like to address an issue here.

A rather sensitive matter, really.

It seems that many people (and I mean MANY) show up every day and point out that they do not like what they see coming up in the BRCS. It is common in such occassions to point these people to polls already run (for more than a couple of weeks at least if I am not mistaken) and tell them that it has already been decided.

It is also common for these protestants (no offence meant) to say that they have not noticed the poll, do not recall it, or disagree with the results, "especially since so few people out of all of us participated!"

In the end, this makes no sense.

I don't mean to offend anyone here, but this has started coming up more and more often. Additionally, I realised that members from as far back as 2002 have not made one single post!

What does this lead the community, and especially the BRCS team, to do? Can we and, above all, they satisfy the demands of us all?

I think not. And it's high time we realise this.

The BRCS revision team has a goal of producing (I have to use this word, however insulting may it seem to some, because it is the only one with such a meaning so deeply enamouring it :huh: ) a revision that will satisfy most of the community members with no or minimal house-ruling taking place afterwards and as little as possible for the rest of the community; if not, it would at least be best to manage and produce an end result that most nearly matches the mean of all these approaches to this one campaign setting.

In other words, they have one hell of work to do here!

Our quarelling over why these polls do not satisfy us can only result in one thing: the reduction of any speed we have managed to reach! It is only natural that not all of us will like EVERY SINGLE aspect of the revision; it is only natural that most of us will use at least one variant provided within the BRCS, or one of our own (house rules).

So, why disagree with something already decided, by however small a part of the community, in order to see if the community will say the same thing once again? It won't matter in the end, for I have been part of various commitees during various polls and stuff: they will either vote the same thing, since it is only logical that those who do care will vote again, or, if we are made to vote TOO MANY TIMES, we will answer dishonestly in order to finish this up!

I have seen this happen in the past. Please, do NOT cry over spilt milk!

[Athos69]

I agree RaspK, and at the very definate risk of sounding like an arrogant jerk...

We should listen to the masses, but should not be beholdent to try to satisfy them all. If they want us to change our minds about something, or make comments about how soemthing does not work, I welcome them to "put their money where their mouth is". Anyone can naysay or cut ideas to ribbons, but unitil they present a proposal that they have tapped up and presented to us, I don't feel that they really have a voice.

Please note, that until a few months ago, *I* was one of the unwashed masses, but I have made proposals and presentations....

[geeman]

I certainly agree that it is not enough to simply complain about some

aspect or other of the proposed text. A good critique includes one or more

alternates, and it`s worth noting that that is the most legitimate way to

present just about any criticism. On some occasions, however, I think

there is an implicit "this should be dropped" solution being suggested by

many such comments. That is especially the case when some of the

complaints are in regards to things that smack of house rules or that are,

essentially, tangentially related to the original setting material. It

would be silly, for instance, for me to present an alternative to paladins

of Moradin when I think the solution is that it should just be deleted from

the BRCS.



I`ve written a LOT of stuff for the BR community over the years and, on the

whole, I`ve found that it is met with a lot of very good commentary,

sometimes mediocre commentary, and occasionally really bad

commentary. However, in my experience even when I haven`t agreed with the

alternatives or the critiques themselves, I often derive something from

them that effects another aspect of the game, and there winds up being a

positive overall effect in the end--even from some of the really bad

criticisms. As such, I think it is reasonable to ask that those proposed

alternatives be given the same consideration that is being asked for

here. Sometimes proposals are discounted so quickly and forcefully that

it`s hard to see how they could possibly have been given much

consideration. In light of the fact that the nature of how they are

presented means they are almost by definition the very first draft of those

ideas, a little reflection is almost always warranted. In that respect

what is good for the goose is good for the gander. (Hmm. Maybe those

should be my next two awnsheghlien write ups....)



Gary

[Ariadne]

Originally posted by irdeggman@Jul 26 2004, 11:13 AM
Please, something more specific would be useful here. I think this is based on the 2nd ed BR requirement that paladins of Avani be LG and not on something specific to the domains in question. Looking through the PS (albeit quickly) I couldn't find any such reference. I think this may be a case of 'we've always done it that way' and hence the actual written requirement has been confused with what has been the norm for playing over the years.

I would, if I could, but my Ariya setting is borrowed away in the moment I'll look it up as soon as possible...

Unfortuneately that is not a reason or else I wouldn't have done the massive rewriting I've done with Chap 1 and Chap 2.

Yeah, I know, what you mean...

Oh, and I can't recall that poll either... May you give the link?

I included it in my post above.

Uhmmm... Should have read better, sorry...