Unpopular opinions go here

[Thomas Shey]

Huh. Constitution is the only one of the six that can actually sort of be mapped to something that exists in the real world, IMO. People do in fact have different degrees of physical resilience to disease, etc.

The problem is, just like the others, its too broad, since it covers endurance, resistance to disease, and to some extent durability all in one. While these aren't completely unrelated, I can assure you personally that its possible to have a high resistance to drugs and disease, and have cruddy endurance.

 

[Fifth Element]

Too many people underseason and undersalt their food when cooking and then complain that their cooking doesn't taste as good as it does in restaurants.

They don't undersalt their food. Restaurants OVERsalt their food. They cheat with more salt, fat and sugar than you need. Tastes good but is very bad for you.

 

[Micah Sweet]

The problem is, just like the others, its too broad, since it covers endurance, resistance to disease, and to some extent durability all in one. While these aren't completely unrelated, I can assure you personally that its possible to have a high resistance to drugs and disease, and have cruddy endurance.

By the same token, one's physical senses probably shouldn't be rolled into willpower under the wisdom stat either.

 

[Aldarc]

They don't undersalt their food. Restaurants OVERsalt their food. They cheat with more salt, fat and sugar than you need. Tastes good but is very bad for you.

That may be a more unpopular opinion than mine. I disagree with you on this issue, but that's fine.

 

[Thomas Shey]

By the same token, one's physical senses probably shouldn't be rolled into willpower under the wisdom stat either.

Well, you've got two different things going on there: receptors and processing. I can see rolling processing into one (if you really start down the road of splitting out attributes that finely there's no end to it) but there's enough difference in receptors to probably want to at least pay some attention to it (though I'm not sure that's true with D&D being as big a blunt object as it is).

 

[Micah Sweet]

Well, you've got two different things going on there: receptors and processing. I can see rolling processing into one (if you really start down the road of splitting out attributes that finely there's no end to it) but there's enough difference in receptors to probably want to at least pay some attention to it (though I'm not sure that's true with D&D being as big a blunt object as it is).

Yeah, that's my problem. I want to sharpen it.

 

[MGibster]

They don't undersalt their food. Restaurants OVERsalt their food. They cheat with more salt, fat and sugar than you need. Tastes good but is very bad for you.

I don't remember what I was watching, but they were interviewing a restaurant chef and asked him why everything seemed to taste better when you're out than what you make at home. He said it was butter. They use butter on everything.

 

[Emberashh]

I think you could write a pretty decent set of stories about first contact that included trying to figure out how to effectively communicate with one another. I'm sure you could make a decent game about it too. But I'm not sure it's a game I'd be interested in playing very often.

Well thats something very specific. And in fact, there already is such a game. Xenolanguage.

What Im speaking to is how language is used in RPG settings like your typical DND setting. Making broad languages a given while focusing on dialects makes for a more repeatedly interesting experience than trying to abstract languages too hard and having nothing to base mechanics around. Dialects open up a lot of design space.

And, as said in another post, if you're going that indepth with languages you need to also be presenting a world that can actually support those languages, and thus naturally wedges in a lot of gameplay inbetween them.

 

[CreamCloud0]

no they were written in latin because the scholar's communicated in latin and it was the language of the developing world.

Just like most scholarly articles now are written in English because it's the language of the developed world for the most part. At least the language of the richest parts of the world.

No high arcane just jumped out at me as the most overcomplicated. In general I think a language should have a reason to exist beyond the fact that what is talked about is complicated. Once a language is in play the cost to change to another language is HUUUGe. I like things to make sense and barring some secret society trying to control all the magic I can't come up with a single reason a group would create an entire language just for their profession. merchant trading language is what common was originally in 1e. in 1e common was supposed to be a simplified means of communication that was used by people from various cultures in trade.
While I still feel the same way about it that i do about adding languages simply for complexity It does have precident now that common has somehow morphed into fantasy English.

maybe then, with magic being, y'know, magic, it was decided it would be worth it to create a bit of a bar to entry for some of the knowledge, writing your magic book in a specifically designed language would be a good way to prevent anyone who happens across it from learning how to blast fire from their hands or accidentally summoning a demon, sure some people might still learn how to do that but it's probably a good sight less than it would be otherwise, and i can totally see some stuffy old elitist wizards making up thier own language to lord over everyone else who isn't in their super exclusive magic club and who doesn't understand what's being said.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Yeah, that's my problem. I want to sharpen it.

It wasn't sharp enough to do that at any point in its publication history, so good luck there.