Recent content by Micah Sweet

Like I said, totally understand that point of view. I would feel the same if I was in a fantasy game that operated that way. Not sure why I can handle it in supers games and stuff like Star Trek Adventures. Must be because I love the source material for those games so much.

I agree. Gygax's Simulationist sensibilities (compared to a lot of modern games, and no matter what he said when trying to sell his game) very much informed my own preferences, and still inspire me. The 1e DMG was the first RPG book I ever read cover to cover!

I get that. My solution is just to avoid any mechanics that try to enforce genre altogether, except in specific situations where I feel the game can't be played properly without them, like supers games. IMO, no version of D&D or its relatives require such mechanics.

What if they just say, "I try to pick the lock" without any mention of noise? Do they know they're not actually rolling to pick the lock (because that's a guaranteed success in your game)? That's what I mean by "affect the narrative". I mean outside of straight task resolution (what the rules...

I have to ask: when you have your players roll for stuff like this, do they know that success for the actual action they're taking is guaranteed regardless of the result, and the roll is for how their action affects the narrative?

My take is that the player decides what they want done, but the character has to carry it out to the best of their in-setting ability. So the socially awkward player can tell the GM they want their PC to take an action requiring high social acuity, and if the PC has good social skills it'll...

That's true. The 5e adaptation of Middle-Earth (both versions) are hardly at the same power level as WotC 5e.

For my part, I use 5e rules for science fiction games extensively, and from several sources combined with my own homebrew, so 5e Traveller would for me be a welcome source of new mechanical ideas and inspiration, especially since I have regularly had difficulty with getting my 5e players...

Quite a bit. Unless I am running a game in the supers genre (or another game in which mechanical enforcement of genre tropes is IMO needed), believability, verisimilitude, and yes realism in setting and character are very important to me. Without at least the attempt for such I rapidly lose...

I believe they are referring to the Monster Overhaul by Skerples. Many entries have a menu section describing the effects of consumption.

Yeah. I'm in the US and haven't seen it yet. Thought it would still be a bit.

Let me just say I disagree, and feel realism in gaming has been successfully done in many areas in different games, even versions of D&D to some degree. I don't think I misunderstood you. I think you are stating your personal opinion about simulation in an RPG context and claiming it is...

1. Fantasy does not automatically mean all sense of verisimilitude is meaningless and literally anything goes. It certainly doesn't mean that anyone who disagrees with you on the subject is pursuing a "fool's folly", and suggesting otherwise is dangerously close to declaring other people's fun...

Just heard about this recently. Looking forward to watching it myself.

HTML might be better for some people in actual play at the table, but PDF works great for reading and reference, which are the main reasons I use books. And it is just as good for electronic storage and transport as HTML, while not requiring an internet connection or subscription (which HTML...