D&D 4E Should 4e convert to metric?

[Derren]

From what I heard there was a plan in the government to convert, but it turns out that the expenses of replacing all the speed limit signs with km/h instead of miles/h was simply too high to be worth it...

The US was one of the driving factors behind unifing the worlds measurments (converting them into metrics)and officially the uses the metric measurment. For example all government agencies use metric measurements in their documents (like the CIA World Factbook).

But to my knowledge the actual decision of when to convert was left to the individual states and they apparently have no interest in converting as it costs money to do so.

Even countries that did go metric, didn't go completely metric. No one uses metric time, for instance. Instead of using kiloseconds or whatever, they still use hours and days.

I don't think time is part of the metric, or SI standard (although the time measurments for times <1 second is metric). Or do you think we currently use imperial time?

 

[WhatGravitas]

Because it was largely designed from everyday life. When people needed a unit of measure, they used whatever was handy, or (like Farhenheit) they tried to base it on the range of human experience. OTOH, the metric system was designed for science. Even though 99% of the people in the world aren't scientists.

Well, for that: Look here and here. As well as my post above. And for Fahrenheit - I have an easier time imagining 0°C as freezing point of water (because by a look out of my window I can instantly determine whether it's above or below zero) than by using the Fahrenheit 0°F. Scientists use Kelvin!

Even countries that did go metric, didn't go completely metric. No one uses metric time, for instance. Instead of using kiloseconds or whatever, they still use hours and days.

Well, I would want a decimal time measurement... because I'm a decimal being (as most of us are, because we are taught that... and we have ten fingers). But well...

Cheers, LT.

 

[AidyBaby]

As a Brit and an engineer I'm definitely SI biased, although my age (nearly forty) means I'm imperial when it comes to distance and weight, go figure. I still voted imperial however, after all who wants to check for pits with a 3.048m pole?

 

[KenSeg]

Metric is the devil's plaything and must have been created in France!

 

[Baumi]

I never understood why yard isn't used as a base instead of feet, since 1 Yard is approximately 1 meter ... so you would still have the imperial system (for the feeling) but it is much easier to use for countries where the metric system is the norm.

Savage Worlds did a good mixture of 4e counting and yard/meter System. While they count movement and ranges in squares (inches), one square is simply two yards or two meter.

 

[Jan van Leyden]

Well, you completely missed my point - a foot is roughly the length of a human foot. Most people have feet and should be able to relate to the length of a foot as a unit of length. If you have trouble visualizing a foot, just look down.

And like I said, obviously not everyone's foot is a foot, but most are close, so it's a handy frame of reference. There is no handy frame of reference for the meter. Unless you want to try to visualize a little more than 3 feet.

But me, having only two feet, has seriuos trouble visualising 10, 20 or 60 feet.

The main reason for the metric system is, imho, the weird relationship between the imperial units. Twelve inches make a foot, three feet make a yard, how many yard make a furlong, a mile, a statute mile, a nautical mile?

How do you convert square feet to square miles?

In the metric system, the name of a unit makes clear its relationship to related units. And I'm very much for systems I don't have to learn by heart.

But hey, I guess there are bigger problems than [removed fo civility]!

---
Huldvoll

Jan van Leyden

 

[Xanaqui]

I dislike both. My preference would be Le Système International d'Unités (SI).

If it stays Imperial, it should use a lot more of Imperial, not just the fraction of corrupted Imperial that's in common use in the U.S.A. - let's use nautical miles, rods, cables, links, poles, cables, thous, chains, furlongs, and leagues for distance - roods for area - gills for volume - grains, drachm, stones, quarters, and hundredweights for weight/mass. This will obviously simplify the text greatly, since with the use of proper Imperial units, the text can use fewer digits

I'll note that while the United States of America has had high-level proponents of converting to metric, or SI, since at least 1866 (when the metric system was authorized by Congress), the U.S.A. is one of only three countries in the world which isn't officially SI. The closest it has come to converting to metric is the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act of 1988, which encourages voluntary conversion to metric, and requires federal agencies to use metric (with lots of exceptions). Note that this act has not been continuously valid (which presumably makes things worse).

There were other attempts, like the Metric Conversion act of 1975, whose board was disbanded in 1982, and there have been backlashes, like the 1992 National Highway System Designation Act (which prohibits the use of federal funds to convert or buy metric highway signs).

Personally, having been schooled in the U.S.A. while the Metric Conversion act's board was still active, I use the U.S.A.'s traditional units for certain things, SI for others, and the twain rarely meet. Conversions are so much more painful in the U.S.A.'s traditional that I prefer SI (or at least metric) in the rare cases that I get a choice.

 

[Cirex]

I don't mind English version of D&D using Imperial system, but why oh why, didn't translators use the SI for the Spanish version.

At the beginning it was kinda confusing. Feet? Pounds? Inches? A matter of getting used to it I guess.

 

[Dausuul]

Maybe for the older generations but hasn't metric been taught in American schools for some years now?

Sorta kinda. Science classes use metric, but a few science classes don't go very far when you put them up against an entire society committed to the Imperial system. Road signs use miles, grocery stores and gas stations use gallons, scales use pounds and ounces, apartment sizes are in square feet, thermometers use Fahrenheit, and on and on and on. I know the metric units, and I know how to convert between metric and Imperial for most things (which most Americans don't, I suspect), but I don't intuitively think in them.

I'm not going to try to argue that Imperial is better. It has a certain antique charm, and it does give one's math skills more of a workout, but I think metric is a superior system.

So does that mean I want D&D to be in metric? Well... no. Unless I can get all of the United States to convert along with D&D. Clunky though Imperial is, I still prefer to have D&D use the system of measurements I think in every day. I prefer the solution Deep_Blue put forward; D&D books published in the U.S. should use Imperial, D&D books published in the rest of the world should use metric.

(I'm curious--for those who play non-English versions of D&D, do your rulebooks still use Imperial measurements? Or do they convert to metric in the process of translation? Edit: I guess Cirex just answered this question.)

 

[eleran]

There is - make one step forward. Since the distance between the feet by making a step is roughly another foot, it's about three foot, i.e. a metre. Which makes metres great for measuring distances - count your steps. My father, as architect, does it all the time to estimate distances.

Sure, it doesn't hold true for smaller or taller people - but neither does the foot.

Cheers, LT.

Handily enough that same length is roughly a yard. I would be in favor of using an old fashioned term in game and calling it a stride.