Das stimmt so nicht. Ausser Mike Mearls lügt. Für die Skillchallenges-Artikel benutzt er nach seinen eigenen Angaben Beispiele, die er so spielen wird oder gespielt hat.
Wir halten fest.
1. Das System im 4E DMG entspricht nichts, dass Mearls jemals gespielt hat noch jemals spielen wollen würde.
2. Im DDI schreibt er jetzt Aufsätze über Beispiele, die er ebenfalls noch nicht gespielt hat, aber die er zumindest
vorhat, zu spielen.
Aha. Bei DSA Zeter und Mordi schreien, wenn die Redaktion dort
ungetestes Material raushaut und Euch zur Kasse bittet. Aber bei einem teuren Hardcover von WotC oder deren PayTV gilt das natürlich nicht. Also: wo ist ein Beispiel von einer SKill Challenge, mitsamt DC Angaben, die Mearls laut eigenen Aussagen am Spieltisch bereits benutzt hat?
Er ist ja übrigens auch nicht der einzige. Es gibt Leute, die schreiben für den Insider digitale Kaufabenteuer mitsamt Skill Challenges und prahlen auf EnWorld damit rum, das System am eigenen Tisch noch kein einziges mal benutzt zu haben. So sieht die "tollste Neuerung der 4E" aus.
As to Mearls' specific complaint that it is somehow unfair to take him to task for having presented multiple systems for skill challenges that are untested and nonfunctional... No. It's not unfair at all. When you present a system as being finished enough for publication and sale you are saying that your material is finished enough that other people should pay you actual money for it. This comes with the implied statement that you've tested it in play and subjected it to the math hammer.
The original material in the DMG was not. We know it wasn't because it fails basic probability analysis. Players can't win the original system that they were so excited about and released with much fanfare. The errataed version came out in response to player feedback that demonstrated that winning the skill challenge was something that did not happen. And all that did was swing the pendulum of success into "automagically succeed" territory. In short: it still didn't fulfill even the simplest of design goals that they supposedly had for the subsystem. Which in turn means that too was released without a single play through or serious attempt at analysis.
Mearls flat admits that the system he presented in Skill Challenges #4 has not been played even once at the time of printing. In short, it is more word salad from what is already an extensive and costly litany of untested and unmitigated failure. There is no reason to believe that this will ultimately lead to anything that meets even the basest of their design goals in the most cursory fashion because none of it is played or tested or even considered from a mathematical standpoint before it reaches the reading eyes of the paying public.
My statement that whatever system is used should be the one they are actually playing with is something I stand by one hundred percent. If you don't have the confidence in your system to use it at your own table you shouldn't have the confidence to charge real people real money for it. If the system you have written down is so non-functional that you feel the need to extensively house rule it so that it works at home, you need to hold up production until you have something written down that you actually believe will actually work.
It's pretty easy to argue with someone when you make up their statements for them.
In that vein, as to Frank Trollman's specific observation that skill challenges are the Ghandi of game mechanics, I can only agree.
There, we agree now! Case closed, comrade.
This is why I never bother to discuss things on rpg.net. People like mearls simply don't like the maturity to engage in genuine conversation and debate. It really brings down the forum as a whole and makes it a pointless venue for discussion.
As has been demonstrated, we are now on our third iteration that of the Skill Challenge System. All untested. All untried. All unsuccessful. And Mike Mearls lacks the maturity to even address the very real issues the system. Instead he jumps around, accusing people of various stuff. He has no intention of "fixing" the problems because isn't even discussing the problems.
Honestly, this is a sham, and quite a pathetic one. Ask yourself: what besides his platitudes has Mike offered to show that anything is being done? The fact so many people are willing to take him merely on his word that everything will eventually work out is simultaneously perplexing and inane. Yes, he's talking on this thread, but he isn't even addressing any of the points.
...
And to have him say that he is going to address those issues without confronting the angle of his own personal responsibility is if anything an admission that nothing is going to change. The same team that brought you version 1, 2, and 3 of Skill Challenges that met no design goals whatsoever will be handing you versions 4, 5, and 6. And they will admit that each previous version didn't work but they will never admit that they have no actual reason to believe that the next offering will.
Und, für mich persönlich der Höhepunkt:
That's what they promised ["Fluid, intuitive and fun"]. What did they deliver? They delivered a system that not only is a binary pass/fail, but also didn't even work. Like mathematically, it was unplayable. Despite the fact that they guaranteed us repeatedly and in so many words that "everything just works" in 4e, this was not true. And more importantly, it was obviously not true. Anyone who played through a skill challenge even once would have seen that immediately.
So either they sincerely believed that rules that they had never tested or played with would magically work perfectly or they rushed something to print that they knew full well was completely nonfunctional expecting to patch it later with something that worked at all. I don't even know which option is worse, but I do know that neither really fills me with confidence when they say that they are tinkering with it and they'll have something that works properly "real soon."
So yeah: when mearls tries to play it off as hypocrisy on my part that I simultaneously lambaste him for both his product and his methodology, I remain unmoved. The methodology created the product. Frankly, I'm being generous by chalking it up to the effects of an insular design bubble on a complete lack of proofreading or meaningful playtesting. The alternative is deliberate deception coupled with a callous disregard for their consumers.
Nachdem ich mir den PodCast zu den Skill Challenges vor kurzem angehört habe (der ist doch vom Juni 2009, oder?) bin ich von dieser "Alternative" überzeugt. Ein Jahr ist vergangen, und es kratzt Mearls&Co. nicht, neben Platitüden und Verharmlosung der Situation ("das
soll doch jeder SL selber beheben") endlich mal ein funktionierendes System zu entwickeln.
