Some lessons D&D should learn from the Teen Titans

[Catharz_Godsfoot]

1097043856[/unixtime]]
Like five or so, unless you count all the damn TAs I've had who have also at some point worked in one or more of the yeast labs. I go to UCSC, we do the genome project, and my intro to neuroscience class is held right underneath the computer banks which hold the entire sequence information for... the mouse I think. The human genome is held kind of down the hall a bit.

You can't swing a cat without hitting some kind of genetics researcher. It's what we do.

-Username17

Nice campus

Anyway, sounds like fun. I worked in a biochemical/medical lab for a while, but all people messed with there were E. Coli, bunnies, rats, and ... oysters!?!?! Maybe it was mussels. That would make sense, at least in a stupid way: We were studying actin/myosin interactions. *buh da bum bum PSSH*:disgusted:

And ya, I don't think I could deal with the yeast smell
But swinging cats at UCSC? Isn't it still hippy enough that the PETA-types would massacre you?

[Username17]

But swinging cats at UCSC? Isn't it still hippy enough that the PETA-types would massacre you?

Not exactly. The PETA types and the biologists have come to an understanding around here after we pointed out that without the research we do it wouldn't even be possible to know what being "kind to animals" even meant - what with the whole thing of every species having fundamentally different needs.

So we stopped all that old research about whether or not you could make dogs and lobsters sad by repeatedly torturing them (seemingly yes, although why anyone had to torture labradors to get that information is beyond understanding - it seems pretty obvious), and the hippies shut the fvck up when we want to do destructive testing to find out how genetic diseases work. It's a fragile compromise, but I actually think it's better for everyone.

Constant kvetching by hippies keeps us honest, and just plain going ahead with research keeps hippies from delaying medical breakthroughs.

-Username17

[MrWaeseL]

I also think that as long as Starfire is Robin's girl, he gets to be as homoerotic with Slade as he wants. As a Paladin, she has "Cure Sex-role Confusion 3/day" in place of Cure Disease.

Ok, this is now the weirdest thread evar.

[fbmf]

[action]ahems[/action]

Enough about yeast and swinging cats and PETA and anything else not related to the party dynamics of the Teen Titans.

Back. To. Topic.

[/TGFBS]

[Username17]

Starfire's ability to survive in space and fly faster than light while outside a gravity well means nothing. It's the opposite problem of the Mr. T/Forsaker problem, but it's just as damning.

Mr. T problem: If you refuse to use the transportation that the rest of the party wants to use, the rest of the party might as well not have it.

Starfire problem: If the rest of the party can't use your non-combat method of transportation, you might as well not have it.

It's a big problem. Since the rest of the party can't get to distant stars just by flying there, they have to take a spaceship (which fortunately, Cyborg can build). And since Starfire could jolly well ride in the same spaceship, she derives no actual advantage from being able to fly on her own.

Personal non-combat transportation powers are crap unless the entire party has them.

-Username17

[RandomCasualty]

Well the whole transportation power thing only occurs if you run a game where the party isnt' allowed to split up. Otherwise personal transportation powers become of minor use, though certainly nothing spectacular.

In a lot of comic books and stuff the team sometimes split up to do different things, in which case those personal powers become pretty important.

[Draco_Argentum]

Space flight could be nice if the game had the party in their spaceship. If the party never goes into space being able to fly in space is totally irrelevent.

[RandomCasualty]

1097482556[/unixtime]]Space flight could be nice if the game had the party in their spaceship. If the party never goes into space being able to fly in space is totally irrelevent.

Well, again assuming that you can't split up. I mean there might be something cool in space you can actually acquire that doesnt' require the rest of the party to get it, like chunks of the planet Krypton or something.

In essence, your travel power might be less a travel power and more a contacts or resources power because it lets you get access to areas other people can't visit which may or may not have other cool stuff you can get.

[Draco_Argentum]

Yah, but in general splitting the party is less appropriate in an rpg than a comic/TV show. The audience stops getting what they signed on for when the party splits in D&D but that isn't true in most other media.

[RandomCasualty]

1097490368[/unixtime]]Yah, but in general splitting the party is less appropriate in an rpg than a comic/TV show. The audience stops getting what they signed on for when the party splits in D&D but that isn't true in most other media.

Right in D&D, splitting the party is pretty uncommon. In most of the white wolf games however, I find it happens quite a lot. You tend to have scenes where only half the group might be in it, or sometimes just a single character.

Which is why I say that it's dependent on the type of game you play.

[Desdan_Mervolam]

Or Amber, where the party splits as soon as the opening adventure is over, and never get back together again. Seriously, keeping the party together is like trying to keep magnets with identical polarity together.

-Desdan

[Lago_AM3P]

Having a power that will split you off from the rest of the party and get some more screen time (and maybe come back with a cool power, as everyone but Beast Boy has) is a feature everyone in that show has.

Beast Boy's ability to team up with Aqualad in the seas is actually worth something, since he can go a lot of places where the rest of the party cannot, even with their ship; he's like the rogue who has to sneak into the mansion to rescue a statue because everyone else is too damn loud. But since Starfire can't go anywhere her team can't and her ability doesn't synergize with the rest of the party's (unlike Beast Boy's), her ability is worthless.

In most of the white wolf games however, I find it happens quite a lot. You tend to have scenes where only half the group might be in it, or sometimes just a single character.

And when you reach a point in the game when the DM is deliberately limiting input from your character to focus on Teh Story...

Don't get me wrong, sometimes it was good, or even fun for me to just chill out and get up to mischief with my character sheet while the DM made the story shift to a teammate's DARK PAST WHERE SHE WAS THE WHORE OF THE DEMON LORD URIEN OMG. I think it's bad for a character to have a power that's only good for splitting them off from the party.

[RandomCasualty]

1097524974[/unixtime]]Having a power that will split you off from the rest of the party and get some more screen time (and maybe come back with a cool power, as everyone but Beast Boy has) is a feature everyone in that show has.

Beast Boy's ability to team up with Aqualad in the seas is actually worth something, since he can go a lot of places where the rest of the party cannot, even with their ship; he's like the rogue who has to sneak into the mansion to rescue a statue because everyone else is too damn loud. But since Starfire can't go anywhere her team can't and her ability doesn't synergize with the rest of the party's (unlike Beast Boy's), her ability is worthless.

Well, not totally worthless. I mean consider that space is a really nice place to hide something if you wanted to. I mean whenever you get a quest to hide or destroy something, throwing it into the nearest sun is going to go a long way, and you can basically do that on a whim, instead of requiring a space ship. That's worth something, how much depends on how often you have a "destroy the One Ring" quest. Ditching something in space takes no actual playing time, so you can use that one a lot.

And in an RPG there might actually be a reason why you wouldn't want to travel on the same spaceship as the rest of the party. Perhaps you get attacked by some big ship and you can sneak aboard being just some random flying person and not another ship or whatever. Then maybe you sabotage the ship so your party can board it or something similar... or maybe just save their ass by jamming all the laser cannons externally. So you might perform a more stealthy role in space combat. This depends of course on what space combat system you're using if it were an RPG.

Also depending on how fast you can do it, grabbing someone and pulling them into space could actually be a fun secret attack.

[Desdan_Mervolam]

That, and Starfire can fly Escort for whatever ship Cyborg made, so if they get attacked she's not waiting to be killed by shrapnel, fire and explosive decompression*

-Desdan

*Note: I do not actually know if these things would, in fact, kill her.

[fbmf]

[The Great Fence Builder Speaks]
Amber Diceless discussion spun off to own thread. Back to Teen Titans, folks.
[/The Great Fence Builder Speaks]

[User3]

In your opinion, how much should the maximum difference in power between someone who spend all of their chargen points in the worst possible way (Starfire) and optimized it (Robin, Cyborg)?

All of the Titans seem to have the same amount of CharGen points, but their efficiency varies wildly.

[Lago_AM3P]

(The guest was me.)

Also:

...I can remember what a shock it was when Terra turned out to be a traitor in the comics in oh 1983 or so.

I just read that comic.

It pained me physically to see sweet Terra curled up on Slade's bed in a bathrobe and makeup, and I knew what was going to happen ahead of time.

I can only imagine what sort of trauma that scene caused to people reading the comic at the time.


Also, Jericho and Kid Flash sucks. I'm glad they didn't put them into the show.

[MrWaeseL]

In your opinion, how much should the maximum difference in power between someone who spend all of their chargen points in the worst possible way (Starfire) and optimized it (Robin, Cyborg)?

In an ideal game? 0.

[Lago_AM3P]

I mean, no matter how balanced your system is, there's always going to be people who pick optimized choices and people who don't.

Even if the fighter, rogue, cleric, and wizard classes were perfectly balanced, we're still going to have people who pick up weapon finesse for their rogue and medium armor proficiency for wizards. Or 3.0E whirlwind + snatch weapon + improved disarm + TWF fighters compared to fighters who take 2 kinds of weapon focuses and two kinds of exotic proficiencies.

This system will remain even if the feats were perfectly balanced; I have no shit seen people take combat reflexes for their Dex 13 fighter, of all classes.

[User3]

I can only imagine what sort of trauma that scene caused to people reading the comic at the time.

It was shattering. I count myself among the wrecked. Freakin' Marv. Jeez. Ew.

Just ew.

[Username17]

In your opinion, how much should the maximum difference in power between someone who spend all of their chargen points in the worst possible way (Starfire) and optimized it (Robin, Cyborg)?

Numerically: less than a d20.

Functionally: infinity.

That is, no amount of taking multiple weapon focuses, or taking cross classed skills, or whatever the hell it is that you do, should cause you to fall so far behind numerically that you are unable to succeed where your teammates could fail. No amount of diversification and focus should cause you to diverge so much that your friends are unable to fail against a challenge that you might possibly beat. That's a minimum, though.

Ideally, you'd want the numeric bonuses/penalties to be such that you did not especially come close to that absolute piece of puntang, because the guys like Beast Boy who design their characters better are usually also better at picking up flanking and situational synergies in game. So if you step too close to the absolute line you'll end up walking over it repeatedly in actual play.

---

But that's not going to stop the actual ratio between the best and the worst from being unbounded. Some people are unable to remember when they can use the powers and abilities that they have. Some people are going to wander off mumbling when combat isn't happening - even though their character has X-ray vision and could solve like half the mystery yesterday.

-Username17

[Lago_AM3P]

I used this example elsewhere, so I'm going to use it again.

---

It's not just here, but a lot of people not only think that casters and non-casters should be held to a totally different standard but they simply CAN'T imagine a game where reality-based powers are equivalent to magic-based powers.

So I'll use two examples of characters, both from the World's Finest cartoon shows. Robin, from Teen Titans, and Batman from the Justice League Unlimited.

First of all, everyone agrees that in source material, if Batman and Robin had to throw down, Batman would completely cream Robin. There isn't any argument to this. Batman just has more skillz.

Unfortunately, that's just not reflected in their respective shows. Robin is hardcore enough that if he fights a gigantic stone golem in his show, he can actually make it lurch in pain from hitting it over the head with a stick. He's done this a lot. Batman CANNOT do that in his show; if he wants to take down the stone golem he either has to pull out some elaborate Scooby Doo plan or some contingency artifact.

Robin's cape is sufficient to protect him from a huge blast of flame from someone with awesome fireball powers and he isn't even hurt. Batman would get wasted by a similar attack using the same trick. Robin can stagger a gigantic dragon by kicking it in the FACE. Batman has to coat a Batarang with special dragon poison and then stick it in his mouth, since his rangs won't be piercing dragon flesh.

So. Two equal characters, one is hosed in the confines of his engine without superpowers, the other one doesn't even notice. Hell, not having his schtick sourced as a superpower is an ADVANTAGE for Robin, since he doesn't risk losing control of it or drain his energy (unlike Beast Boy and Raven--compare the Shadowrun drain system) and it doesn't open some weird backalley auto-takedown exploitive trick (unlike Cyborg and Raven--compare the D&D wizard who automatically loses if the fight comes at some weird hour of the night).

Does anyone still have trouble seeing how unfair the engine is for Batman? I think I about cried when he and the JL were fighting Hades and all he could do was throw a Batarang.

[Username17]

JLU has a very different engine from Teen Titans, and it's designed to do different things entirely. In Teen Titans, there are about six people at the table. One of them is the GM. One of them is playing Robin. One of them is playing Starfire and spends a lot of time flirting with the player playing Robin instead of thinking about her next actions. But how many people are at the table playing Justice League?

Probably about four or five. But there's about a hundred gajillion superheroes in that show. And only a few people at the table. And the way this works is that one player plays several heroes. Batman isn't really useful in all situations in that game system - but he doesn't have to be, because the same person is also controlling Supergirl.

That's a game system where any particular action is only supposed to have a few people who can do it, and any problem can only be solved by a small chunk of the characters. And this is mostly made up by the fact that each player has several characters moving around.

When Galatea runs amok, The Question really can't do dick about it. But that's OK, because his player can also move around other super characters who can. When Galatea is in hiding, there is literally no possibility that John Stuart could ever ever find her in a million years. But again, that's OK.

If you want the one character to one player idea to hold, you have to do things like Teen Titans. But if you think of each player as a range of PCs - then it's OK for most of each player's group to be useless in any particular situation.

-Username17

[Oberoni]

1108358083[/unixtime]]
Does anyone still have trouble seeing how unfair the engine is for Batman? I think I about cried when he and the JL were fighting Hades and all he could do was throw a Batarang.

I know what idea you're going for, but you're not using the best examples.

Whenever Batman's around other supers, he stops using regular Batarangs--he starts using the exploding ones that seem to hurt quite a bit. They seem to be at least somewhat effective, even against guys with some degree of superhuman toughness.

Speaking of superhuman toughness...Batman's got that, too. There's an episode where he takes a bodyslam from Mongol. Seriously, remember that one episode where Bats and Wonder Woman get together to help Superman celebrate his birthday? Part of that episode is the big brawl where Batman and Wonder Woman try to take down Mongol.

At one point, Batman stupidly jumps on Mongol's back and wraps his arms around Mongol's neck. Mongol responds by throwing him down.

And that means a lot. Mongol's a guy that can lift several tons, and I imagine that he would not have really pulled any punches for Bats. That's not the kind of guy Mongol is. Even if he would do that sort of thing, I don't see why he'd know enough about Batman to conclude that Batman, unlike his two old chums, doesn't have any degree of invulnerability.

So, really, Batman should have become a stain on the floor of the Fortress of Solitude, if the show was using the exact same sort of engine that you're describing; however, he did not.

I'd say that, overall, JLU and its animated kin let Batman get away with a lot more than a regular human could, just because he's Batman.

However, when you compare him to the Teen Titans Robin, well...of course he's going to come off looking worse.

[Lago_AM3P]

I guess what I meant to say instead of Justice League unlimited was the regular Justice League, where situations where Batman was useless came up quite often. In fact, the Hades example comes from that iteration of the show.

---

Also, I think that we need to completely scrap the idea of knowledge skills for PCs in high level fantasy and modern games.

Robin doesn't have many intellectual skills in his show, despite the fact that he often needs to make checks. But it doesn't freakin' matter. When he needs to make a gather information check (which should really be a knowledge check) to grab materials from Chang or to find out about Slade's history, he doesn't pull it from his own ass--he has awesome contacts or a really sweet supercomputer. If for some reason he needs to make a knowledge check during a battle, he can damn well ask Cyborg to hook himself up to the computer and make it for him.

Cyborg's intellectual skills are actually useful, as it allows him to construct unique things really, really fast. Raven's intellectual skills are useful because it is almost impossible for anyone on the team to get them.

But no one does the D&D crap of sinking 5 ranks into knowledge:dungeoneering because it might be useful. That's dumb. Even if a wizard needs to know that, he can just contact the Wizard Academy and get a higher result. If there's something that Peter Parker doesn't know too well, he doesn't just live with a poor knowledge roll; he just takes 2 minutes out of his day to call up Dr. Conners or the LIBRARY. If Yusuke Urameshi needs to find out information on the spirit world, he can just ask Botan who can ask Genma if she doesn't know who can ask his demon hordes if HE doesn't know.


In conclusion, you should only have intellectual skills if no one else in the game has them or you have such a goddamn huge check that you get some sort of a personal bonus out of them. For example, even though you could get instructions how to emergency land a plane from the air station, you'll do a much better job if you have significant amounts of ranks in the skill.

Argh.