Does Anyone Find the Encumbrance Amounts Unrealistic?

[Oni]

Bring back light, medium, and heavy loads.

The more they can get away from fiddly stuff like that the better IMHO, personally I prefer a nice binary unencumbered/encumbered. D&D at its heart is a pretty abstract game, why get bogged down in minutia?

 

[Szatany]

As a skinny 16-19 year old with next to no muscle back in the day, I used to hike with 80-100 pounds for up to six hours a day. I don't think its too unrealistically high for carrying packs at least, based on my own experience.

Don't forget about weight distribution. An item you put on yourself feels less heavy than the same item you hold in your hand. Maybe the rules should assume that carrying capacity is for the total weight of items you wear, while everything you hold temporarily gets its weight doubled. (Or the other way around, but then carrying capacity should be seriously reduced).
The trade off is, of course, that the rules get more complex for little gain. I would make it a module.

 

[Arlough]

The US Marine Corps individual equipment ranges between 95 and 135 pounds, with some missions requiring each soldier to carry up to 150 pounds and not be noticeably slowed down.

This actually is a very good demonstration of Encumberance Units or Points vs. mass.
A Marine or Ranger is expected to not be slowed down by 150 lbs of gear, but that gear is arranged on their body in such a way to reduce the amount it encumbers them as they march/run/crawl/etc.
If those same soldiers were carrying a 150 lb. Harley Davidson Engine without any sort of straps, and most will tire rather rapidly.

Or, to put it in terms that many of us have probably run into.
I have picked up from Ikea and moved, without help, the Malm queen size bed frame and center rail, as well as a mattress and slatted bed base. They came in flat-packs that fit into my car and weigh a total of 245 lbs. I do not think I could have done this with a fully assembled bed even without the slatted base or mattress (therefore only weighing only about 116 lbs.) This does not mean that my car is weaker than it was prior, but that the bed is more encumbering even with less weight.

 

[Crazy Jerome]

My group has been using Encumbrance Units since 3e was released. Two of us have quite a bit of knowledge of medieval weaponry, and the weight of things like swords and bows irked us. Then we decided that looking at the number as an abstract of how difficult the item was to deal with not only made more sense, but was more useful in over 95% of the situations the characters found themselves in.
I like rules that cover most situations, and then making exceptions for the remaining situations, not the reverse.

It is not surprising that this works, since those 3E weights were copied from earlier versions that used exactly that rationale, but dropped the explantation in the process. In "encumbrance" terms, a "pound" of feathers in a sack does not weigh the same (in real-world pounds) as a "pound" of coins in that same sack. The feathers weigh less, but take up more space, and thus count as a pound of encumbrance nevertheless.

So it is not much use to try to derive semi-realistic carry capacity from Str scores until it is first decided whether the "weights" listed are actual weight or are encumbrance. I'm with you, in that the encumbrance option is generally a better one. That leads to things like x10 Str not being too far out of line, except for those oddball cases where a character is carrying nothing but armor and sacks of coins. (Ok, not that oddball, but still ...)

I've also always generally treated Str scores as partially "knowing practically how to carry things." Having learned to carry hay and sacks of fertilizer when I was a teenaged skinny 5' 4" and 125 pounds soaking wet, I can generally carry above my raw lifting strength, and for some distance.

 

[Jeff Carlsen]

I'm okay with the rules as written, but wouldn't mind something better. I also like the idea of factoring in Con.

What I would really like to see is some mechanic that spreads out the crossover point from encumbered to unencumbered. It's always kind of bothered me when a character is just above their weight limit, and then by shedding a one or two pound item is suddenly fully mobile. It's not a huge problem, but it would be cool problem to have solved.

 

[ExploderWizard]

100 pounds for an average STR person is believable if the weight is well distributed but the individual would not be unencumbered by a long shot.

Get two runners of equal size, strength, and conditioning and have them run a 5 mile race. Strap a 100 pound backpack to one of them and try to convince them that he/she is unencumbered.

 

[filthgrinder]

I think this is another excellent use case for optional rules modules. The simple multiple by 10 rule is a good "core". It's a little wonky around the edges, it's over simplification, but it is a decent rule of thumb, and easy to follow.

Additional systems that are more exacting and more complex should be offered as well. That way, tables like mine, which are more gamist than simulationist, can just go ahead and use the simple core rule. While other tables which prefer a more exact rule can run that way.

I would love to start seeing some of these optional rules begin to start popping up.

Also, this is great feedback that should be sent in to the playtest team.

 

[IronWolf]

I think this is another excellent use case for optional rules modules. The simple multiple by 10 rule is a good "core". It's a little wonky around the edges, it's over simplification, but it is a decent rule of thumb, and easy to follow.

You know, wonky at the edges is a good way of putting it. And overall it really doesn't bother me much as I do understand not needing to break out a chart to look up encumbrance that comes with its pros that for the most part out weigh the cons of some of this wonkiness at the edges.

 

[howandwhy99]

This is pretty weird, but it's easy to change. The average person dead lifting 500 lbs. isn't realistic. I'd probably x2 for that. Plus the speed changes could be a little less binary. Overall, it's easy to remember. I expect most people will ignore it though, so options here are the real deal for those who do want this.

The jump rules are what really look peculiar to me.

 

[howandwhy99]

double post