D&D 5E sharpshooter math meaning

[FormerlyHemlock]

Or it has standard gravitational effects, but modeling it as binary is close enough for practical purposes.

Negative on that. D&D gravity in no way corresponds to standard gravity. If they were trying to model standard gravity they'd do something sane and normal, like making gravity by the same everywhere. Instead you've got a bubble of normal gravity in the shape of a bidirectional plane, IIRC about twice the linear size of your ship in every dimension; if your ship (or planet) is large enough then at some point it arbitrarily flips from being a plane to a point source, but again with an arbitrary cut-off point at a certain distance from the point. Within that distance gravity is always exactly 1 g. It is only in this latter respect that it even begins to resemble a sloppy approximation of Earth physics. In all other respects, gravity in D&D is totally bizarre.

Don't get me started on biology. That's even worse. It's questionable whether D&D humans even have cell differentiation...

 

[The Crimson Binome]

Negative on that. D&D gravity in no way corresponds to standard gravity. If they were trying to model standard gravity they'd do something sane and normal, like making gravity by the same everywhere. Instead you've got a bubble of normal gravity in the shape of a bidirectional plane, IIRC about twice the linear size of your ship in every dimension; if your ship (or planet) is large enough then at some point it arbitrarily flips from being a plane to a point source, but again with an arbitrary cut-off point at a certain distance from the point. Within that distance gravity is always exactly 1 g. It is only in this latter respect that it even begins to resemble a sloppy approximation of Earth physics. In all other respects, gravity in D&D is totally bizarre.

Whatever you are talking about is something unrelated to any of the rules in any of my last four PHBs. Obscure supplements are not a reflection on D&D as a whole; they only reflect that particular supplement.

 

[snickersnax]

Or D&D is a really wonky reality. Don't forget it has binary gravity, not mass-proportionate gravity.[/URL]

I'm not sure I know what binary gravity is. I tried to do a search for it, but you seemed to be the only one using that phrase. The only physics reference I could find seemed to suggest that binary gravity and mass proportional gravity were the same thing.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Whatever you are talking about is something unrelated to any of the rules in any of my last four PHBs. Obscure supplements are not a reflection on D&D as a whole; they only reflect that particular supplement.

Well, in 2nd edition that is explicitly how gravity worked on Toril, Krynn, and Oerth. Athas, who knows?

Sent from my Moto G (4) using EN World mobile app

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

I'm not sure I know what binary gravity is. I tried to do a search for it, but you seemed to be the only one using that phrase. The only physics reference I could find seemed to suggest that binary gravity and mass proportional gravity were the same thing.

In AD&D 2nd edition, there was a setting called Spelljammer which tied together most of the other main settings. It gave rules for space travel and travel to other planets/solar systems, and included a wildly variant physics loosely based (as I understand it) on various Renaissance, medieval and ancient Greek ideas of cosmology and physics. In particular, gravity is always either on or it's off in a particular place. It's never in between. Hence "binary."

The product is available on DriveThruRPG, and an excerpt from the preview will serve to illustrate its themes:

Everything you know about space is wrong.

Infinite space; stars as flaming spheres of super-heated
plasma; movement through space as a balance of scientific
forces, thrust providing acceleration and maneuverability;
scientific fact backing up natural phenomena; life on other
planets built along blocks of carbon or silicon elements.

Forget all that. It's wrong.

You can get out of the atmosphere on the back of a
roc; fly between the planets through a breathable ocean of
air; sail between the crystal spheres that surround the in-
habited worlds on a river of magical energy; encounter
roving mind flayers and beholders. The stars are living
things in some areas, great bowls of fire in others, and pin-
points of light painted inside a sphere in others.

Welcome to the SPELLJAMMER™ universe. It is a magical universe.

The SPELLJAMMER supplement treats the AD&D®
game world, with its magic, myriad races, and dimen-
sional gates as the "real" world, and builds outward
from there. This is a universe postulated on magical, not sci-
entific, laws. There are universal laws and they must be
obeyed, but they are the laws of magic, not physics—the
laws of Mordenkainen, Elminster, and Fistandantilus rather
than Galileo, Newton, and Einstein. They sometimes appear
strange and random to us, who are accustomed to the work-
ings of science. But to the characters who have lived
their entire lives in this environment, nothing could be
more familiar and logical.

This SPELLJAMMER supplement extends the AD&D®
2nd Edition game into space, and does so without violating
existing campaign material. This includes Greyhawk, the
original AD&D game setting; Krynn, land of the Dragon-
lances; Toril, home of the Forgotten Realms; and every
individual campaign in existence.

Play Spelljammer. It will change the way you think about (A)D&D forever.

 

[The Crimson Binome]

In AD&D 2nd edition, there was a setting called Spelljammer which tied together most of the other main settings. It gave rules for space travel and travel to other planets/solar systems, and included a wildly variant physics loosely based (as I understand it) on various Renaissance, medieval and ancient Greek ideas of cosmology and physics. In particular, gravity is always either on or it's off in a particular place. It's never in between. Hence "binary."

Spelljammer was intentionally created to be as absurd of a setting as they could get away with. It does not reflect upon the rest of AD&D, unless you decide to make it so. If you don't own the Spelljammer setting, or if you decide that its rules do not apply to your setting, then it's safe to assume that normal physics are still in effect (except where noted).

 

[snickersnax]

@Hemlock...

So what you're suggesting is that I should think of sharpshooter in a binary way like D&D Spelljammer gravity. For example a 10 dexterity sharpshooter takes a wild shot simulating that he only has a 1 dexterity (-5 to hit). If he still hits then he gets to add damage as if he had a 30 dexterity (+10) damage. Extrapolating the ability score chart for all starting dexterities: basically subtract 10 dexterity to hit and add 20 dexterity to damage (ie a 20 dexterity sharpshooter would be 10 dex to hit and 40 dex to damage)

This wasn't exactly what I was looking for, but it is an interesting thought.

And here I was worried that you were derailing my thread

 

[Ovinomancer]

What's the goal here? Is it to have D&D combat make sense, and then have sharpshooter make sense inside that framework? Or is it that numbers look like other numbers and we want to know exactly what these numbers are supposed to be?

 

[snickersnax]

What's the goal here? Is it to have D&D combat make sense, and then have sharpshooter make sense inside that framework? Or is it that numbers look like other numbers and we want to know exactly what these numbers are supposed to be?

I was mostly hoping to try to get a better understanding of what the sharpshooter numbers represent, and wondering if someone had a cool way of thinking about it that I hadn't considered. I would certainly like D&D combat and all aspects of the game to make more sense.

The introduction of the sharpshooter feat says this: You have mastered ranged weapons and can make shots that others find impossible.

None of the sharpshooter benefits represent the underlined portion very well. Least of all the -5/+10 benefit. Sharpshooter feat isn't the only place that the description doesn't match the math modelling very well, it was just the one I was looking at when my overly-sensitive fantasy immersion had an inconsistency spasm

 

[Ovinomancer]

I was mostly hoping to try to get a better understanding of what the sharpshooter numbers represent, and wondering if someone had a cool way of thinking about it that I hadn't considered. I would certainly like D&D combat and all aspects of the game to make more sense.

The introduction of the sharpshooter feat says this: You have mastered ranged weapons and can make shots that others find impossible.

None of the sharpshooter benefits represent the underlined portion very well. Least of all the -5/+10 benefit. Sharpshooter feat isn't the only place that the description doesn't match the math modelling very well, it was just the one I was looking at when my overly-sensitive fantasy immersion had an inconsistency spasm

Hitting a target with 3/4 cover at the limit of long range doesn't qualify for you?