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[Criptfeind]

I am saying that if a situation exists then a good DM makes it possible to solve through ingenuity

I'm saying this is the opposite of what you said before, or possibly that you just didn't understand before? You're saying that a GM makes a encounter solvable. But before you said

custom tailoring makes the game worse

These are pretty contradictory.

[NullForceOmega]

It is not the opposite, you are not reading it in the context that it is intended.  From my perspective custom tailoring to the party mean excluding things such as deathtraps, or only including those that the current party can deal with, i.e. playing to the 'roll'.  Making the situation solvable by application of intelligence is not 'custom tailoring' any more than basic worldbuilding is.  Using environmental variables to your advantage is simple logic, and should be encouraged at every single opportunity in order to increase player involvement, and is therefore playing to 'role'.

[Rolan7]

(oop, several replies have been posted.  I'm not addressing anyone directly with this)
Is having a single level of rogue within the entire party really so much to ask?  Or investing in a hireling?

Our party was kinda twisted in that we (the players) all thought like cunning rogues, regardless of INT.  And our hulking sea-ogre barbarian talked like a bard, which was particularly ironic when he was the party face for a sorcerer and favored soul (both CHA classes).  We put our points in things we actually had to roll.  We mostly took care of traps with Detect Magic, Dispel Magic, and sometimes Break Enchantment when things went wrong.  But I don't think we were playing that right. 

A rogue should be more than sneak attack, it's a clever problem solver class.  Often a pseudo-spellcaster via UMD.  But that just wasn't optimal to play, because we were all doing that anyway.  (Also most of our enemies were undead, and we didn't have truedeath enhancement crystals until near the end.  In 3.5e that meant no sneak attack damage).

[Criptfeind]

only including those that the current party can deal with

Making the situation solvable by application of intelligence

These are one and the same generally. Well, not everything solvable by intelligence is is something a party can deal with, I'd say probably the hardest part of gming for me is trying to figure out if the players are going to be able to read my intentions and such with puzzles, but... Yeah. Generally that's the same thing.

Like honestly you could say "Only including things that the current party can deal with purely with their mechanical abilities with no thought" and then what you're talking about would make sense, but at the same time no one ever claimed that was how good gms act anyway.

[Neonivek]

We mostly took care of traps with Detect Magic, Dispel Magic, and sometimes Break Enchantment when things went wrong.  But I don't think we were playing that right.

Technically Detect Magic doesn't break stealth so you still need to defeat the trap. That is really the only issue except well "Dispel magic only shuts down a magic trap for 1d4 turns if successful")

That is really it as far as "not doing it right". Unless we are talking about 3.5 in which case...

[Rolan7]

Sorry yeah, we were playing 3.5e.
Though I don't know if it's any different, really.

[NullForceOmega]

only including those that the current party can deal with

Making the situation solvable by application of intelligence

These are one and the same generally. Well, not everything solvable by intelligence is is something a party can deal with, I'd say probably the hardest part of gming for me is trying to figure out if the players are going to be able to read my intentions and such with puzzles, but... Yeah. Generally that's the same thing.

Like honestly you could say "Only including things that the current party can deal with purely with their mechanical abilities with no thought" and then what you're talking about would make sense, but at the same time no one ever claimed that was how good gms act anyway.

Last time I'm commenting on this.

Your second statement is EXACTLY what I am saying.

Your first is straight up incorrect, from a mechanical standpoint there is no comparison whatsoever, one is solvable via thought and use of the tools available (application of intelligence), and the other is all about numbers (current party) and thus is flat-out bad practice for a DM.

It appears that I miscommunicated this point however, so one last time:  If you are creating challenges based only on numeric and game rules, instead of based on intelligence and interactivity, you are engaging in bad GM practices.

[Criptfeind]

It appears that I miscommunicated this point however, so one last time:  If you are creating challenges based only on numeric and game rules, instead of based on intelligence and interactivity, you are engaging in bad GM practices.

This is a fair enough thing to say (I mean, I wouldn't go as far to say as it's strictly a bad thing, but yeah I get what you mean).

[NullForceOmega]

It isn't 'strictly' a bad thing, sometimes you just want a simple thing that can be rolled away.  However using such challenges exclusively (or even regularly) is very bad practice because it is lazy design, and doesn't engage the players.

[Kadzar]

Thinking about why we're having more fun in WoD than DND (and even that's not entirely true, we had a *lot* of fun in 3.5e)...
When we started the DND campaign, which was essentially 1 single campaign for 3 real-life years, we were noobs.  As a child I had run a few games with my brother and a friend which I think were...  first edition?  Possibly advanced?  Honestly we were very young and we ignored most of the rules, it was practically Roll To Die without the dying.  Very free-form.

Later on me and my best friend had separately tried a few systems like GURPS and CoC, but via text.  Not voice, at least for me and I think him.  Short affairs.  Whereas our DM had played DND 3.5e before and was teaching us...  But it was his first time DMing.

My point is that the three of us (the fourth player dropped fast) were basically new to 3.5e and were trying desperately to learn the system.  And that made us focus on the rules, and optimizing.  A lot.  We didn't actually need to, it was just that we were all worried about pulling our weight and demonstrating competence.  It was...  not Ravenloft-grimdark, but a pretty harsh setting.  I think maybe we (particularly I) panicked and rushed things.

Anyway.  With this new system, we had a fresh start.  It's kinda relaxed, because we know what became tiresome in the last campaign (again, 3 years!).  I spent two sessions worth of XP on Auspex 2 so I could read auras...  So I could tell that the evil renegade gangrel who tells us to murder people is, in fact, a dangerous dude.  And my only regret was that I failed to save up the 4 session's worth for Obfuscate 4 that'll help me atone for a past sin (and also be useful, of course.  It's a level 4 discipline).  Keeping in mind that mechanically, this atonement will do nothing for my struggle with Jake's beast.  It just makes for a good story.

I can "waste" XP on that because I no longer feel like we're in a race.  We're all pretty good in combat without any specialization, and we can shore up our weak spots relatively cheaply due to the quadratic XP costs.  But infiltration is just as important, and social situations are... well, significant.

So actually I don't know whether we're just more comfortable starting fresh, or that the new system mechanically emphasizes something other than combat.  Either way, this is great.

Yeah, one of the big advantages of non-class-based systems is that you can just pick up cool new things without worrying about it slowing down your progression too much. Though it's possibly to incorporate this sort of thing in a class-based system, too, as I've seen in Talislanta, where you have something of a class in pretty much all editions, but you can spend xp to learn various skills and techniques.

[BlackHeartKabal]

If not for the game actually being on the forum, i'd ask for advice related to a Pathfinder character.

[BlackFlyme]

I don't see what would be wrong about asking for advice for a character, so long as you aren't meta-gaming.

[BlackHeartKabal]

I mean, related to my character.

[Neonivek]

If not for the game actually being on the forum, i'd ask for advice related to a Pathfinder character.

Yep, been there. Yet I can't ask for advice on my games without giving things away.

[Jimmy]

Feel free to PM me if you want input, I'm fairly familiar with Pathfinder's system and I'm happy to make suggestions.