Beating a dead Arcadian Pony

*sigh* Now that the topic's purpose has been served, it looks like the pony can finally have its burial. More discussion of Template vs Feat vs Trait should probably wait for another day.

Mods, you can go ahead and lock this topic ;D

I did answer your question. I said very clearly that I'm not trying to prove anything. It's YOUR challenge, not mine. If you are not conceding, then please indicate why the feat I presented does not meet the previously stated and agreed-upon requirements for your challenge.

I never said anything about concessions or the feat in question. I asked what do you gain out of proving my suppositions wrong.

The requirements:

The feat I presented:

Mage Slayer
Prerequisite: Spellcraft 2 ranks, base attack bonus +3.
Benefit: You gain a +1 bonus on Will saving throws. Spellcasters you threaten may not cast defensively (they automatically fail their Concentration checks to do so), but they are aware that they cannot cast defensively while being threatened by a character with this feat.
Special: Taking this feat reduces your caster level for all your spells and spell-like abilities by 4.

A? True.
B? True.
C? True.
E? Xan has yet to prove that I haven't met this 4th and final requirement.

That's very presumptuous of you to assume the feat will be fixed in your favour. What evidence do you have to support this assumption?

Xan, it's your challenge. Why do you have so much trouble understanding that? It's YOUR challenge. You posted the challenge. This whole thread was started by YOU. IT'S YOUR CHALLENGE. How many times to I have to say this? It's important for you to meet the challenge because it's YOUR challenge.

Where will it end? Why, is there a time limit on your challenge, Xan? I tell you what... It will end when you can be man enough to admit that somebody's met YOUR challenge or when the errata that you say is forthcoming 'fixes' Mage Slayer, such that it no longer meets the requirements of this challenge. I will stand or fall on this feat; I will not go looking for another. And if I lose the challenge, I'll take it like a gentleman. Hopefully you can do the same.

Don't try to make this personal, Xan. It isn't, and I resent the implication. I'm not interested in proving anyone wrong or discrediting anybody. I'm in this for the simple pleasure of taking on a challenge. Like any game of skill, debating can be a lot of fun provided the people engaged in it are mature and not vengeful. Losing a debate in this way is fine and nobody should feel injured.

I've said before I'm not interested in the argument that spawned this challenge. You and others can beat that back and forth till the cows come home. I'm in this for the challenge only. The only one discrediting anybody is you; you're discrediting yourself by not playing by the rules you agreed to.

Let me say this one... last... time...

I'm only in this for the pleasure of taking on a challenge.

So what would be the best forum to start a 'random chatter/free association' thread whose only purpose is to acquire enough posts to outstrip this thread?

Only when you admit your reason for entering the fray, Enzo.

Oh, that poor Arcadian pony... someone please have mercy!!

-Ken :roll:

That is an appeal to inappropriate authority (reason to lie).

Better go back to your Logic textbooks, Xan. An appeal to inappropriate authority is a fallacy committed when a conclusion in one area of inquiry is supported by appealing to the authority of someone whose authority or expertise lies in an independent and unrelated area of inquiry. You are mistaken, both in your understanding of this concept and in your application of it here.

No matter. Neither my motives, nor your understanding of the principles of logic, are relevant to the challenge. The feat I put forward, and how it meets the rules of the challenge should be the only things being argued.

But you're clearly not interested in discussing the feat in an intelligent and mature manner, are you? So, I won't ask you again to admit that I've met your challenge. It's not necessary. I know I've met it, and so does everyone else, including you. So, as far as I'm concerned, this is finished.

Instead, I'll just ask Clueless if she will kindly put this Arcadian pony out of its misery now. No point waiting two weeks. Hope you've all had as much fun as I've had.

Cheers,

Rush? I posted mage Slayer 8 weeks ago. The errata for Complete Arcane was released a month ago.

As for your argument for appeal to inappropriate authority based on bias, it was misapplied. I have no involvement with the 3e PS Campaign Setting team and have no stake in the outcome of this challenge. Nor have I, implicitly or explicitly, appealed to any supposed authority as a member of PW staff. I presented a simple, published fact for your consideration.

I will not respond to any further comments by you on this thread. This conversation is over. Time to bury the pony.

1.

In addition to what Enzo said before, the implication here is also totally--that Enzo is debating this in order to justify the PSCS in spite of the indictments that Xan makes against its faction feats (a small amount of which include both benefits and drawbacks).
The manager staff at planewalker.com is completely separate from the writing staff of the PSCS, with the one exception of Sarah (Clueless), who is the manager of two sections that would be otherwise managerless, and, incidentally are both completely "fluff" (being repositories for fiction and art, respectively). And I assume you don't intend to impune her honor. Therefore, no one is going to pay attention to any accusations you make that Enzo is trying to defend his own work.

2.

There are two products that are relevant here: the PSCS Chapter 4 (Skills and Feats) and Complete Arcane (which presents Mage-Killer, the proposed answer to the challenge). The errata for Complete Arcane is fully compiled and available at wizards.com; it is less than one page and makes absolutely no mention of this feat. Therefore this remark is also irrelevant.
If, instead, the remark were directed toward the PSCS, it would also be irrelevant, since any errata to this product which removed the faction feats in question that provide benefits and drawbacks would not nullify anyone's positions, but merely the basis for the entire argument against its faction feat system.

As far as I can see, after talking to a few people, the question has changed here into the following two:

1) Is it reasonable to believe that there is more forthcoming errata on Complete Arcane, and if so, how long should we wait for it?

2) Are the PW staff in general linked closely enough to the PSCS Writing Team to establish a "conflict of interest" as Xan puts it?

#1 is integral to the debate; errata can change the result. #2 is tangential but important to the context of the debate, and should probably be addressed sooner or later

Personally, I see no reason to doubt that Enzo's only purpose here is an intellectual challenge; even if there is a strong link (#2) there's no proof that he's acting in cahoots on purpose. Besides, if he was affiliated with the PSCS Writers, what reason could he possibly have to hide the fact?

As for whether pressure for a resolution is being applied to out-race new errata, let me simply remind everyone that should the information change in the future, the "winner" can change as well without any difficulty. If pressure is being applied and Xan were to concede, there's nothing stopping him from returning to the issue should a new erratum vindicate him. Indeed, such a fix would prove his point immutably; Wizards would only change it if feats aren't supposed to work that way!

However, for a temporary soluton, could we please agree on some kind of period for #1, or at least a method of determining whether more errata are forthcoming? I'd really like to see this mess drawn to a civil conclusion.

EDIT: And a number we have.

I suggest that we let this issue rest, for now. At least one side won't consider the issue at rest for another four months (it's already been two since the publishing date). Besides, everyone's pretty riled up; it's unlikely that there will be a resolution in the current frame of consciousness.

Why don't we let this thread sink into the Ether, and come back to it in, say, four months or so? ;D

I already asked. The reply I got was that they were unaware of what the designers were doing or why and did not address the issue beyond that when I asked why the feat was designed the way it was compared to other feats.

Wait for the errata to be compiled more? Wizards will never publish a "final errata" and tell us all that, "Yes, this is the definitive version of Complete Arcane. All your questions are officially put to rest now." This debate could be waiting forever for Xan to decide that, indeed, the published errata that makes no mention of his complaints may actually not support his complaints. Nor was the errata edition or supposed "completeness" ever a condition of the debate. Xan claims to have too busy a schedule to actively continue the debate itself and bring points about the feats in question, yet since he suggested this new line about "inappropriate authority," he has posted four times in three days, but only to derail the debate into a mire of misquoted technical fallacies and conflicts of interest which miraculously become significant only when the debate has been conclusively decided in Enzo's favor.

Secondly, Complete Arcane was released in November of last year, five months ago. That should be long enough to address something like a feat which horrendously betrays a basic principle of feat-building (including a drawback), unless, of course, there were no such principle and Enzo were right...

Thanks for twisting my words, Eco. I said that it takes them 6 months to errata everything when they start the process.

Hell, even if I am wrong on this one feat, that's only .001% of published feats in your favor.

Oh for - you know. It would have been nice if you'd told us before you even tossed out the challenge that you weren't going to acknowledge the results. Would have saved a lot of people a lot of stress.

It was, but Xan lost so he changed the rules. So at this point the arguement is largly academic with Xan's actually coming out and saying it is being a small bonus prize. A good deal of the amusement for me is watching for what Xan will do next.

I didn't change the rules. You're just impatient.

In a nutshell. The demonstration that one feat meets these requirments means that other feats with drawbacks built in are fine because it demonstrates that there is a standard that does allow feats to have draw-backs and penalties associated with them. The rariety of this standard does not matter or make it any less valid and many such standards are used. Metamagic feats have different standards than non-metamagic feats.

Just to stave off any controversy over what exactly this challenge is I am going to point to the original challenge as put forth by Xan in Representing the Factions and Sects (Part Two) page 6:

I'd prefer to redirect Xan's complaint to Guy Macon. Probably about as informative and a lot more fun to watch. :roll:

Which is why I asked to wait for the errata to build up. If you look at the errata page for D&D stuff, it tells you when a file has been updated because it's in red.