In mechanics terms, that is true, but when talking about characters they were referred to by their former careers: "ex marine", "former scout", "retired navy" and so on. And back then, that's what was most important to us nerds.
Sure, but that still doesn't make it a class. It's background. It is in fact more comparable to D&D5's Backgrounds than Classes, because it gives you history, skills and equipment. In GURPS I can also use a template to create a character and identify my character by that template, but that doesn't make GURPS a class-based system. Both GURPS and Traveller are skill-based systems.
If speed is absolutely critical, you're going to go with C/C++/ASM/whatever native-compiled-language works well for your problem.
If speed is not absolutely critical, there's plenty of "scripting" languages that get the job done more easily with less code. And if you're talking about something cloud-based, you can probably handle the lower speed of these options by adding another server node.
Java seems to be in the middle ground where it's more cumbersome than the "scripting" options, yet slower than the "native" options
It's a pretty good middle ground, though. Java is almost as fast as C++ (10% slower back in the days of Java 5, I seem to recall). If you want speed in a managed environment, Java is a pretty good choice.
In his opinion, Java the programming language was on its way out whereas Java the runtime environment was here to stay.
Absolutely. Java the language is a chore, leading to very verbose code. The JVM however is one of the best things since sliced bread. A managed environment like that is extremely useful.
If you find that you resemble that description, then check out Clojure which is a version of lisp that compiles to Java byte code running in the JVM. It can, but doesn't have to, be pre-compiled and it is dynamically typed. You can provide type hints but you don't have to. For this reason, Clojure programs are much more dense than Java programs. Less typing in order to get the job done.
Another good option is Groovy, which very easy to get into for Java programmers, since 99% of legal Java syntax is also legal Groovy syntax. But for everything, there's also a better, more readable way to do it. Best interaction with Java of any JVM language. It's basically what Java should have been.
Be careful what you ask for. All that typing means that you can find and fix a lot of bugs in the compile step. With dynamically typed languages, you get to find those bugs at runtime. Maybe that is why other posters here believe that Java is for the B programmers.
No, if you're a competent programmer, you don't rely on the compiler to find all your bugs, because it won't. You rely on unit tests, which means your basic bugs will be found at build time. The percentage of bugs that a statically typed compiler will find for you is small. You still need extra tests to find all your other bugs, and those tests will also find your basic type errors.
I wouldn't state that C# is superior to Java from a language perspective, both are essentially derived from Ada and C with influences from C++.
But C# is far quicker to incorporate modern language features (like closures and other dynamic programming features), while Java is constantly dragging its feet.
I'd never lock myself into a Microsoft ecosystem by specializing in C#, but as a language, it's more up to date than Java. There's a good reason for the proliferation of other JVM languages like Groovy, Scala and Clojure.
But how do you explain that the fighter can do that only once per day? With magic, the "it's magic" explanation always works. With mundane stuff, sure, you might be too tired to try it every round, but surely after some rest, you're ready again?
And don't fighters get plenty of cool with their special dice that get increasingly better and can be used on an increasing number of abilities?
And one of the big complaints about 4e was that by giving every character exactly the same amount of similar abilities, they all start to feel the same. Have magic and non-magic feel different. Give each class different kinds of cool stuff to do.
Closest thing doesn't mean it's the same thing, though. In GURPS, templates are the closest thing to classes. That doesn't make it class-based. Traveller is every bit as skill-based as that, even if character creation is through random tables rather than point buy.
I've been getting into Shadowrun 5th edition lately and liking it more and more.
Shadowrun 5 does a very good job of taking the best parts of previous editions (mainly the smoother system from 4 and the tons of flavour from 3 and earlier).
Man, that sounds very similar to the D&D situation, actually. But Shadowrun doesn't have the crazy jumps in complexity and focus that D&D has had.
Indie games are big, and publishing something is easier than ever. However, RPGs aren't exactly a lucrative market. Most people do it for the love of the hobby, and unless your name is Monte Cook, it's not going to pay your bills.
Getting paid as a GM is an old idea, but I don't think anyone ever got it working. You'd have to be a legendary GM with everybody raving about how great you are, before you might convince anyone to pay you for playing a game with them.
Pathfinder sales recently surpassed D&D sales, though that was also because everybody was waiting for the release of 5th edition.
Paizo (makers of Pathfinder) are doing very well, and many groups play nothing else. I'm currently playing in three different Pathfinder campaigns. But I'm afraid I'm getting a bit tired of it, and I'm looking for something else. I'm currently looking more at Star Wars: Edge of the Empire, Dungeon World, and Shadowrun 5, but D&D5 definitely looks interesting.
Yeah, if you want a skirmish system that focuses entirely on interesting yet balanced combat, then 4e is definitely the game for you. But if you want time for something other than combat, then 5e is probably the better choice.
Skills have been toned down a lot. They don't go through the roof like the used to. Instead, you have a few skills, which means you get a moderate bonus to those rolls. And that bonus goes up slowly (no extra +1 every level), and DCs are much more moderate, which means you can still fail even if you have the skill, and even without it, you can still succeed. It's just less likely than if you have the skill.
I've yet to see a system which included mechanically relevant flaws that didn't end up with everyone being ugly squinting one eyed outlaws from a bad family who owe favours to someone three countries over.
Then you should look around a bit; there are plenty. Cortex+ systems (like Marvel Heroic Roleplay, or Firefly) have an interesting way to make flaws relevant without going overboard. FATE based systems do something similar with aspects that can be positive, negative, or even both.
Aren't those optional? I believe there's loads of optional stuff in 5th edition, so players can easily tweak it to be more old-school, story-based or skirmishy, depending on their taste.
Opinions vary of course, but I don't think "I wack it really hard with my sword, but only once per day" makes all that much sense, really. Mind you, I've never been much of a fan of the "Vancian" magic system of D&D (that allows you to cast each spell only once). Pathfinder let go of that principle a bit by allowing cantrips (0 level spells) to be recast as often as you like. 5th edition continues along that path, both with more powerful cantrips, but also spells don't scale as hard with your level anymore: if you want your Magic Missile to become more powerful as you reach higher levels, you'll have to use a higher level spell slot to cast it. Meanwhile, fighters get more fancy stuff to do on top of wacking stuff with their sword. Hopefully this will balance classes a bit more without making them all feel the same.
5th edition is not a step backward; it does take elements from 4th edition, but only the best parts, and it also takes the best parts of previous editions, molding it all into a surprisingly coherent whole.
Yes, but that might make the initial comment valid for the previous edition, not this one. This one is as old-school as D&D has been in a long time. It combines the simple character creation of early editions with more streamlined customization options than the 3rd edition and Pathfinder have. It doesn't try to cover every possible case with an overdose of mechanics anymore. It's less MMO-like than 3rd edition and Pathfinder.
Appropriating mythological characters is fine and dandy, but making fundamental changes to them that don't serve a greater purpose to the audience is not.
Simply moving them from mythology to a superhero universe is already a fundamental change. Marvel has made many, many, many other changes to Thor. In fact, when he was first introduced, it was as a normal human finding Thor's hammer in a cave and turning into Thor. There already have been "what if?" stories exploring the scenario where his wife/girlfriend found the hammer instead. Storm has wielded Mjolnier on several occasions and turned into Thor. An alien has turned into Thor.
Fundamental differences compared to the mythological Thor are central to Marvel's Thor.
To take a non-mythological example, I've enjoyed the change from "John Watson" to "Joan Watson" in Elementary (the John Watson associated with Sherlock Holmes, in case you aren't familiar with it). Why? Because in the original Sherlock stories there has always been a kind of weird relationship between Sherlock and John. Changing John to a female character presents those relationships in a different light, just as it would if the characters were gay. So that's interesting.
And so is this. This is also an interesting new twist to the character. It's not as if they're turning Thor into Spiderman or something. It's just that now, a woman is Thor.
To take another example, in the Thor movie, making Heimdall black was stupid. That added nothing.. though since he was a minor character it wasn't a big deal.
Did it take anything away? To a lot of people, it most certainly did add something. There was nothing stupid about making him black.
Hypothetically, if they had made Loki black to make his "otherness" more obvious, that could have been interesting on many levels so it would be a worthwhile change to explore.
I feel like we're getting to the heart of the matter here. You associate black with "otherness". Let me guess: you are white? And male? Do you associate female also with "otherness"?
Do you realize that there are people like you who are black and/or female? That to them, there's nothing "other" about black or female? And if culture continues insisting that black and female are "other", then they will be forced to see themselves as "other", or all of culture will become "other". Wouldn't it be better to accept blacks and women as people just like yourself?
So what does changing Thor into a woman bring to the table?
Well, apparently it exposes these kind of preconceptions. That's something.
For now, I can't think of anything interesting that comes up as a result of Thor being a woman. So to me this was a stupid change.
To you maybe, but to many others, it's a wonderful change. And even you may eventually see something interesting coming from this. I hope you will.
Also the god of protection, strength, thunder/lightning/storms, etc. Those are masculine traits. If marvel wants a female character based on norse mythos, pick a female deity to base it on or make one up. Hell, they already have Storm, right?
Yeah, so thunder, lightning and storms are not the sole domain of men. Also, Storm has been Thor at some point in the past.
Slashdot Mirror
Nobody is directly profiting from these actions.
Not directly, but it's done to reduce competition. Isn't that supposed to be illegal all by itself?
In mechanics terms, that is true, but when talking about characters they were referred to by their former careers: "ex marine", "former scout", "retired navy" and so on. And back then, that's what was most important to us nerds.
Sure, but that still doesn't make it a class. It's background. It is in fact more comparable to D&D5's Backgrounds than Classes, because it gives you history, skills and equipment. In GURPS I can also use a template to create a character and identify my character by that template, but that doesn't make GURPS a class-based system. Both GURPS and Traveller are skill-based systems.
The problem is what's the point of Java?
If speed is absolutely critical, you're going to go with C/C++/ASM/whatever native-compiled-language works well for your problem.
If speed is not absolutely critical, there's plenty of "scripting" languages that get the job done more easily with less code. And if you're talking about something cloud-based, you can probably handle the lower speed of these options by adding another server node.
Java seems to be in the middle ground where it's more cumbersome than the "scripting" options, yet slower than the "native" options
It's a pretty good middle ground, though. Java is almost as fast as C++ (10% slower back in the days of Java 5, I seem to recall). If you want speed in a managed environment, Java is a pretty good choice.
In his opinion, Java the programming language was on its way out whereas Java the runtime environment was here to stay.
Absolutely. Java the language is a chore, leading to very verbose code. The JVM however is one of the best things since sliced bread. A managed environment like that is extremely useful.
If you find that you resemble that description, then check out Clojure which is a version of lisp that compiles to Java byte code running in the JVM. It can, but doesn't have to, be pre-compiled and it is dynamically typed. You can provide type hints but you don't have to. For this reason, Clojure programs are much more dense than Java programs. Less typing in order to get the job done.
Another good option is Groovy, which very easy to get into for Java programmers, since 99% of legal Java syntax is also legal Groovy syntax. But for everything, there's also a better, more readable way to do it. Best interaction with Java of any JVM language. It's basically what Java should have been.
Be careful what you ask for. All that typing means that you can find and fix a lot of bugs in the compile step. With dynamically typed languages, you get to find those bugs at runtime. Maybe that is why other posters here believe that Java is for the B programmers.
No, if you're a competent programmer, you don't rely on the compiler to find all your bugs, because it won't. You rely on unit tests, which means your basic bugs will be found at build time. The percentage of bugs that a statically typed compiler will find for you is small. You still need extra tests to find all your other bugs, and those tests will also find your basic type errors.
I wouldn't state that C# is superior to Java from a language perspective, both are essentially derived from Ada and C with influences from C++.
But C# is far quicker to incorporate modern language features (like closures and other dynamic programming features), while Java is constantly dragging its feet.
I'd never lock myself into a Microsoft ecosystem by specializing in C#, but as a language, it's more up to date than Java. There's a good reason for the proliferation of other JVM languages like Groovy, Scala and Clojure.
But how do you explain that the fighter can do that only once per day? With magic, the "it's magic" explanation always works. With mundane stuff, sure, you might be too tired to try it every round, but surely after some rest, you're ready again?
And don't fighters get plenty of cool with their special dice that get increasingly better and can be used on an increasing number of abilities?
And one of the big complaints about 4e was that by giving every character exactly the same amount of similar abilities, they all start to feel the same. Have magic and non-magic feel different. Give each class different kinds of cool stuff to do.
Closest thing doesn't mean it's the same thing, though. In GURPS, templates are the closest thing to classes. That doesn't make it class-based. Traveller is every bit as skill-based as that, even if character creation is through random tables rather than point buy.
Off your lawn? But you got exactly what you want! Basic is back, and it's free! Only Advanced costs money.
But it might be great for other people.
I've been getting into Shadowrun 5th edition lately and liking it more and more.
Shadowrun 5 does a very good job of taking the best parts of previous editions (mainly the smoother system from 4 and the tons of flavour from 3 and earlier).
Man, that sounds very similar to the D&D situation, actually. But Shadowrun doesn't have the crazy jumps in complexity and focus that D&D has had.
Indie games are big, and publishing something is easier than ever. However, RPGs aren't exactly a lucrative market. Most people do it for the love of the hobby, and unless your name is Monte Cook, it's not going to pay your bills.
Getting paid as a GM is an old idea, but I don't think anyone ever got it working. You'd have to be a legendary GM with everybody raving about how great you are, before you might convince anyone to pay you for playing a game with them.
Pathfinder sales recently surpassed D&D sales, though that was also because everybody was waiting for the release of 5th edition.
Paizo (makers of Pathfinder) are doing very well, and many groups play nothing else. I'm currently playing in three different Pathfinder campaigns. But I'm afraid I'm getting a bit tired of it, and I'm looking for something else. I'm currently looking more at Star Wars: Edge of the Empire, Dungeon World, and Shadowrun 5, but D&D5 definitely looks interesting.
But it's still an extra translation step, and it doesn't really add anything to the system.
Yeah, if you want a skirmish system that focuses entirely on interesting yet balanced combat, then 4e is definitely the game for you. But if you want time for something other than combat, then 5e is probably the better choice.
Traveller's careers don't really count as classes. I don't think they're anything more than a skill and gear distribution system, are they?
Skills have been toned down a lot. They don't go through the roof like the used to. Instead, you have a few skills, which means you get a moderate bonus to those rolls. And that bonus goes up slowly (no extra +1 every level), and DCs are much more moderate, which means you can still fail even if you have the skill, and even without it, you can still succeed. It's just less likely than if you have the skill.
I've yet to see a system which included mechanically relevant flaws that didn't end up with everyone being ugly squinting one eyed outlaws from a bad family who owe favours to someone three countries over.
Then you should look around a bit; there are plenty. Cortex+ systems (like Marvel Heroic Roleplay, or Firefly) have an interesting way to make flaws relevant without going overboard. FATE based systems do something similar with aspects that can be positive, negative, or even both.
Characters have to have Flaws?
Aren't those optional? I believe there's loads of optional stuff in 5th edition, so players can easily tweak it to be more old-school, story-based or skirmishy, depending on their taste.
Opinions vary of course, but I don't think "I wack it really hard with my sword, but only once per day" makes all that much sense, really. Mind you, I've never been much of a fan of the "Vancian" magic system of D&D (that allows you to cast each spell only once). Pathfinder let go of that principle a bit by allowing cantrips (0 level spells) to be recast as often as you like. 5th edition continues along that path, both with more powerful cantrips, but also spells don't scale as hard with your level anymore: if you want your Magic Missile to become more powerful as you reach higher levels, you'll have to use a higher level spell slot to cast it. Meanwhile, fighters get more fancy stuff to do on top of wacking stuff with their sword. Hopefully this will balance classes a bit more without making them all feel the same.
5th edition is not a step backward; it does take elements from 4th edition, but only the best parts, and it also takes the best parts of previous editions, molding it all into a surprisingly coherent whole.
Yes, but that might make the initial comment valid for the previous edition, not this one. This one is as old-school as D&D has been in a long time. It combines the simple character creation of early editions with more streamlined customization options than the 3rd edition and Pathfinder have. It doesn't try to cover every possible case with an overdose of mechanics anymore. It's less MMO-like than 3rd edition and Pathfinder.
Didn't he retire to a life of sex and drugs, preferably of the illegal kind?
I'm all for privacy, but I'm not sure if that argument gets more weight if it's John McAfee who says it.
There was a proposal once to replace the airbag in the steering wheel with a steel spike.
Appropriating mythological characters is fine and dandy, but making fundamental changes to them that don't serve a greater purpose to the audience is not.
Simply moving them from mythology to a superhero universe is already a fundamental change. Marvel has made many, many, many other changes to Thor. In fact, when he was first introduced, it was as a normal human finding Thor's hammer in a cave and turning into Thor. There already have been "what if?" stories exploring the scenario where his wife/girlfriend found the hammer instead. Storm has wielded Mjolnier on several occasions and turned into Thor. An alien has turned into Thor.
Fundamental differences compared to the mythological Thor are central to Marvel's Thor.
To take a non-mythological example, I've enjoyed the change from "John Watson" to "Joan Watson" in Elementary (the John Watson associated with Sherlock Holmes, in case you aren't familiar with it). Why? Because in the original Sherlock stories there has always been a kind of weird relationship between Sherlock and John. Changing John to a female character presents those relationships in a different light, just as it would if the characters were gay. So that's interesting.
And so is this. This is also an interesting new twist to the character. It's not as if they're turning Thor into Spiderman or something. It's just that now, a woman is Thor.
To take another example, in the Thor movie, making Heimdall black was stupid. That added nothing.. though since he was a minor character it wasn't a big deal.
Did it take anything away? To a lot of people, it most certainly did add something. There was nothing stupid about making him black.
Hypothetically, if they had made Loki black to make his "otherness" more obvious, that could have been interesting on many levels so it would be a worthwhile change to explore.
I feel like we're getting to the heart of the matter here. You associate black with "otherness". Let me guess: you are white? And male? Do you associate female also with "otherness"?
Do you realize that there are people like you who are black and/or female? That to them, there's nothing "other" about black or female? And if culture continues insisting that black and female are "other", then they will be forced to see themselves as "other", or all of culture will become "other". Wouldn't it be better to accept blacks and women as people just like yourself?
So what does changing Thor into a woman bring to the table?
Well, apparently it exposes these kind of preconceptions. That's something.
For now, I can't think of anything interesting that comes up as a result of Thor being a woman. So to me this was a stupid change.
To you maybe, but to many others, it's a wonderful change. And even you may eventually see something interesting coming from this. I hope you will.
Also the god of protection, strength, thunder/lightning/storms, etc. Those are masculine traits. If marvel wants a female character based on norse mythos, pick a female deity to base it on or make one up. Hell, they already have Storm, right?
Yeah, so thunder, lightning and storms are not the sole domain of men. Also, Storm has been Thor at some point in the past.
thor is the person wielding mjolnir and busting asses.
Okay. So what's the name of the guy who will shortly have used to wield mjolnir and bust asses?
Donald Blake.