D&D General Explain Bounded Accuracy to Me (As if I Was Five)

[Maxperson]

And that's awesome that it works for you and the rest of the players don't become frustrated with his disregard for those aspects of the game. Over 10 levels late he discovered a key feature to a class, that no one noticed beforehand and pointed out to him, despite periodically checking his character sheet? Seems a bit odd, but if no one ever felt the impact, affected their fun, or whatever, then there would be no reason to take resolve it---because there was nothing to resolve.

We look more for skill point(when playing 3e) infractions, hit points being rolled, bonuses calculated, etc. It didn't occur to us that he would miss something he had since level 2.

If you don't mind my asking some (genuine) question?

• How often do you play in the game that includes him?

It was weekly.

• You help him with his character sheet, but what else do you do to help him be better prepared?

Nothing anymore. He is what he is. We have even, in good humor and in front of him because it is friendly, taken to calling times when we mess up something on our characters, <his name>izing it.

• Does he miss sessions regularly or is he often late due to his busy life? If so, how do you handle his character or does everyone wait?

He was pretty regular. I mean we all miss days now and then. When it happens someone else at the table runs the character to the best of their ability.

• Does he pay attention when it is other players' turns or do you regularly have to remind him what is going on when his turn comes up?

That was a big issue, so we banned cell phone use during the game. That one helped with a few players. Now, it wasn't lack of interest on his part, but rather he was really into a few real time games and tried to do both.

 

[Maxperson]

Though it would be really nice if
(a) more than one class were assigned this function,
(b) the one-and-only class meant to bear the entire load of "non-magical everyman" were not automatically assigned to this function, given there are plenty of people who want a non-magical everyman that isn't that simple, and
(c) at least one of the classes assigned this function were a spellcaster, something either no edition of D&D has done, or only one has (4e, with its Elementalist subclass for Sorcerer)

Because it gets more than a little tedious, the assertion that 100% of people who want simple classes obviously only want martial classes, and 100% of people who want martial classes obviously only want simple classes.

Where are the simple casters and the complex martials? The most maximally complex martial in 5e is simpler than the simplest caster.

And don't tell me there's no appetite for it. Folks across the web, not just on this forum, have asked for such things--including inquiring about why the Warlord wasn't carried forward to 5e, even when the poster did not play 4e themselves. Further, considering the absolutely ridiculous popularity of Harry Potter, you can't tell me there isn't appetite out there for a spellcaster who has a basic reliable bag of tricks with no conception of "slots" or needing to rest in order to perform their magic again. Just point a wand and shout "winGARdium levioSAH!"

The 3e warlock was pretty simple. Blasty, blasty!

 

[billd91]

People should play with people with similar mindsets. Personally to me a player who is angry at others because they do not play the elfgame optimally enough is a bigger red flag than someone who is forgetting rules occasionally.

Unless they take forever rolling dice with some bizarre or fussy ritual. Then everyone angry with them is righteous in their ire.

I mean, really, just roll the damn dice already!

 

[ezo]

We look more for skill point(when playing 3e) infractions, hit points being rolled, bonuses calculated, etc. It didn't occur to us that he would miss something he had since level 2.

It was weekly.

Nothing anymore. He is what he is. We have even, in good humor and in front of him because it is friendly, taken to calling times when we mess up something on our characters, <his name>izing it.

He was pretty regular. I mean we all miss days now and then. When it happens someone else at the table runs the character to the best of their ability.

That was a big issue, so we banned cell phone use during the game. That one helped with a few players. Now, it wasn't lack of interest on his part, but rather he was really into a few real time games and tried to do both.

Yes, the biggest issue is cell phones at the game. Unless you are using them for your character, put them away.

 

[FrozenNorth]

Honestly, you could just about port the Champion over whole cloth, and change some ability names. All you need is a replacement for fighting style, and to choose a basic, repeatable, or adequately scaling spell attack.

It may not be good, but it would be simple, and a caster.

Yup. Have a basic melee and a basic ranged attack. Have the character choose at 1st level if they want to do fire, cold, acid damage and csll the class the Elementalist.

 

[Willie the Duck]

It depends on what you translate as "worse experience". I found OD&D fighters dull as dishwater, but some people seemed to like them. "Simple" and "interesting choices" are always going to be to some extent at odds, but not everyone apparently needs the latter to find the experience good.

I found (BX and BECMI) fighters to be interesting enough to play. Mostly in that, in the absence of any skill system or grand world-interfacing rules, playgroups and playstyles tended to let you do many things ad hoc, and a lot more of the challenges were anyone-can-try ). I know the old 'makes you not look to your character sheet for answers' adage has become something of a rhetorical bludgeon, but I do remember a whole lot of rube goldberg esque solutions** to getting through dungeons. Whether that's making do with what you had, or some emergent value in simplicity, I'm not sure.
*(and the fighters will because they have AC, HP, and saves for when it blows up on them
**'Kim you stand on the pressure plate while I turn the statue widdershins to lower the ramp while Shannon opens the hellhound cage door, and they'll come streaming out into the bugbear den and we won't have to fight either of them.'

Obviously the example isn't a pure one, because the party at that time had absolutely-not-simple vancian magic users. And of course magic items -- which disproportionately benefited fighters, but again not as much as is sometimes inferred in rhetoric.

Honestly, I get personal preference on the subject, but the strong opinions so often levied in D&D discussions I do not get.

Does that bold bit matter? It's hard to see how when the discussion immediately crashed into & never moved past if it's even reasonable to ever criticize someone who is negatively impacting the fun of others at the table with their behavior or not because it could possibly be a case where there could possibly be a good reason or that it could possibly have been a momentary lapse? When there is a strong effort to ensure that the answer is always "no never reasonable until proven 110% otherwise" it becomes an unreasonable burden to even discuss it with that underlined group without getting sandbagged by the defense of something else that drags that criticism into the weeds to be strangled.

Look, I won't even pretend to have been able to follow the entirety of this thread, so I don't know if you are correct in this. If you think someone else in the conversation is behaving in a fashion that shuts down communication instead of moves the discussion forward, I would suggest ignoring them*. We're not here to 'win' these threads and the only influence we have here is to change minds. Just state that you do think there is a reasonable situation where you might want to call out someone for said behavior, and then move on to discuss the scenario. You will be talking to the people who had any interest in being persuaded in the first place. *manually; or with the function provided for us, which the mods repeatedly stress is neither mean nor cowardly

Myself, I think that yes this situation exists, and we've all likely seen it (outside of this forum and maybe outside of gaming, perhaps adult-league sports). Someone has joined in a collective entertainment effort but been uninvolved enough that the rest of the participants suffer for them being there (or not being there, as the case may be). And yes, without a good excuse, they just thought they were more interested than they are, but don't quit until they are in a better place to participate. I think when it happens, everyone else darn well knows it, and no 110% proof need be obtained. I also think it is pretty rare. Rare enough that the specifics of the individual group probably trump any broad-strokes points we can make on the issue.

Well, I'm not certain what dozen (or so) type of players who frustrate a game you mean? Could you please elaborate? Thanks.

I don't have a specified list. Perhaps gamers who cheat, those who throw fits, those that pick fights, those who cannot accept rulings that come down against them, those that can't leave the game at the game table or real world disagreements off the game table, and so on. The specific list isn't important, so much as the point that this non-participating participant doesn't rise to the level (in frequency or frustration) to be on my top-10 problematic player's list*.*outside of whether my games have all that many problematic players.

 

[ezo]

I don't have a specified list. Perhaps gamers who cheat, those who throw fits, those that pick fights, those who cannot accept rulings that come down against them, those that can't leave the game at the game table or real world disagreements off the game table, and so on. The specific list isn't important, so much as the point that this non-participating participant doesn't rise to the level (in frequency or frustration) to be on my top-10 problematic player's list*.*outside of whether my games have all that many problematic players.

Thanks. I figured that was your intentions, but I appreciate the clarification.

Such problematic players (cheater, throwing tantrums, fighting, whining, etc.) never last long enough to see if they learned the basics of the game or not. But honestly, such players are also never friends before hand. They are newcomers, friends of a friend, etc. with interest in the game. We address any issues, and they get three chances to change (which ultimately never happens) before they get booted.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Yes, the biggest issue is cell phones at the game. Unless you are using them for your character, put them away.

Or ordering food, keeping tabs on your kids, staying on call for work, or any of the billions of uses for a handheld computer connected to the collective intelligence of humanity and also D&D forums.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I found (BX and BECMI) fighters to be interesting enough to play. Mostly in that, in the absence of any skill system or grand world-interfacing rules, playgroups and playstyles tended to let you do many things ad hoc, and a lot more of the challenges were anyone-can-try ). I know the old 'makes you not look to your character sheet for answers' adage has become something of a rhetorical bludgeon, but I do remember a whole lot of rube goldberg esque solutions** to getting through dungeons. Whether that's making do with what you had, or some emergent value in simplicity, I'm not sure.

The problem I had was I don't really want to have to be dependent on the GM's assessment to make playing a fighting specialist interesting. I really do want most of my options to be spelled out (some of them broadly enough to serve multiple purposes). Among other things I can figure out whether doing something is a terrible idea without having to constantly find out if the GM thinks so in an ad-hoc way.

I also have to note that people who can't be bothered to engage with the mechanics are not necessarily be the people who are going to be super-engaged with things on a non-mechanical level in those areas the mechanics covers (there are obviously exceptions, but if someone is taking a casual approach, expecting maximal creativity out of them doesn't seem a good bet).

 

[DEFCON 1]

The funny thing I find right now about this continuing thread is that if the original poster really was 5... they would have stopped paying attention to everything that was being said about 75 pages ago.