Unpopular opinions go here

[overgeeked]

There's also the issue that not everything is written down.

Right. Which is where this tangent began. I mentioned the few gaps in Peterson's history of RPGs works that were filled in by the documentary Secrets of Blackmoor. Specifically because not everything is written down, not everything that is written down is free of bias, not everything that is written down survives long enough for others to think it important enough to reference, and not everything that survives is findable later on.

Not everything is communicated in the first place, either. A primary documentation only standard is going to have more gaps in the evidentiary trail of things.

As mentioned in the thread, eye witness accounts are primary sources.

History is messy, and you have to take all look at all contributing evidence and recognize not just how it might be biased, but why what it is and isn't/could or could not show/etc.

Experts can be wrong. People who think they are experts can be wrong. People who think the other person in a discussion must merely have access to the internet as their supposed expertise regarding a situation can be wrong (about that, or the topic being discussed). People can take knowledge from experts and interpret it (either the expertise in total or the individual knowledge communicated) and apply it to situations it doesn't actually apply. This is why, in general, I look for people providing both the (checkable) references in question, as well as the actual functional argument for what said evidence is, how it applies, and what they believe it implies about the topic being discussed. There's no shortcut to bringing one's receipts.

Exactly.

 

[Gradine]

People can get used to a lot of things, usually pretty quickly. It's certainly something that could be done within a generation, but likely much faster than that.

And I'm not at all advocating that we don't do exactly that. Only that looking down on people who find comfort and ease in the imperial system is pretty crappy.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

There is still some conversion required to switch within non-temperature metric units. I've never seen anyone measure anything in hectounits - and don't get me started on deci vs deca. It's like you need to know which steps to avoid!

In honesty, I think it's easier to use the imperial system for dividing things in half for purposes of volume and weight. Once you get down to 0.125 there are a lot of opportunities for mistakes.

Yeah, getting cooking (and cocktail!) recipes written in the units that make sense, whatever the system, is a whole separate problem to solve. Too many writers, IMO, don't understand why things are the ratios they are, and so the numbers are written in formats that aren't particularly helpful.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

Unpopular opinion II: You should have your next D&D character be a teenager.

Part of the point of D&D, to me, is emulating fantasy fiction. In this genre, young and inexperienced protagonists are the rule, not the exception. Conan the Cimmerian; Eragon; Harry Potter; Lessa from Dragonriders of Pern; the Pevensie children from The Chronicle of Narnia; and Arya Stark, Danerys Targaryen, and Jon Snow from A Song of Ice and Fire are just the first few examples off the top of my head of fantasy heroes who begin their first adventures before age 18.

What's more, I would think that younger people are more likely to go out adventuring than older ones, realistically. Teenagers aren't yet tied down to careers, spouses, and children of their own. They have the freedom to leave home and throw themselves into danger- and lack the wisdom to know that they probably shouldn't!

I also feel that D&D (and its near derivatives) is uniquely suited to playing out coming-of-age stories. Even when PC's aren't literal teenagers, they often feel like they are. I've never seen a PC begin a campaign with a spouse or kids; oftentimes they don't have a job yet, until they begin the first adventure. If your character is level 1, that implies they lack experience (they literally have 0 experience! The game measures that!). As you play, the character learns about the world they inhabit, meets and forms relationships with new people, earns a reputation, and begins to advance their skills and abilities (by leveling up.) That's what being a teen and growing up is all about!

Beyond the Wall & Other Stories, an OSR game, is even better at this. It's shockingly good at delivering the young adult fantasy, in fact. If you haven't played it, this is a run-don't-walk endorsement.

 

[overgeeked]

In a white room, certainly the metric system is superior to the imperial system in pretty much* every way. And yet...

As a product on an American society for nearly four decades, I don't know that I would ever get used to using kilograms over pounds when describing weights, kilometers over miles when describing distances, etc... That has nothing to do with objective superiority/inferiority and everything to do with comfort and familiarity.

And, when discussing measures of temperature, you hit the nail on the head on the one pro* that the imperial system has, generally speaking: granularity.

**Someone else did point out how the whole conversion of teaspoon/tablespoon ratios is stupid and I can't say I disagree with that

Two things.

First, does that granularity actually matter? Is it important enough to keep?

Second, the USA is almost using the metric system. There's only a few holdouts like distance. Here's a video from Neil deGrasse Tyson talking about it.

 

[Whizbang Dustyboots]

First, does that granularity actually matter? Is it important enough to keep?

For Celsius vs. Fahrenheit, I'd say it does. I can feel and appreciate the difference between two temperatures expressed in Fahrenheit that are the same temperature, officially, in Celsius.

 

[overgeeked]

And I'm not at all advocating that we don't do exactly that. Only that looking down on people who find comfort and ease in the imperial system is pretty crappy.

That's the trick...it's not easy. It's familiar. There's a difference.

How many teaspoons make a tablespoon? How many tablespoons make a cup? How many cups make a gallon? How many ounces make a pound? How many pounds make a ton? How many inches make a foot? How many feet make a mile?

ETA: And how many of those did you know off the top of your head without having to look them up?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Have you read DnD: 00s? Because it literally says the opposite of what you are claiming.

Remember that most of what was produced for d20 did not take away from other designs. it was stuff that would never have existed by people that would never have published in the first place. The appearance of the market created the majority of the product. And for those that would have created anyway, many of them got their start with d20 or as a rejection of it.

Yeah the claim that the OGL restricted innovation is pretty wild.

The big tent allows individuals to publish some stuff as a hobby, get feedback, then discuss design with other creators and understand those discussions more fully, and then make weirder and weirder stuff.

The OGL boom was also an indie zine TTRPG read by 12 people in Nebraska boom.

 

[Pedantic]

In a white room, certainly the metric system is superior to the imperial system in pretty much* every way. And yet...

As a product on an American society for nearly four decades, I don't know that I would ever get used to using kilograms over pounds when describing weights, kilometers over miles when describing distances, etc... That has nothing to do with objective superiority/inferiority and everything to do with comfort and familiarity.

Okay, but can we all agree that the uniquely English measurement in "stone" is bonkers? I have never wanted to know the weight of something relative to 14 pounds. No one has ever needed to know the weight of anything relative to 14 pounds.

 

[billd91]

Okay, but can we all agree that the uniquely English measurement in "stone" is bonkers? I have never wanted to know the weight of something relative to 14 pounds. No one has ever needed to know the weight of anything relative to 14 pounds.

"Whole Lotta Rosie" sounds a lot more poetic at 19 stone than at 120.6 kilograms.