D&D General Reification versus ludification in 5E/6E

[GobHag]

If Dispel Magic can do that, why can't they make a Dragon's stop breathing rocks/acid/etc? Or make a Beholder blind with it

 

[Hussar]

One of the points I'm advocating for is that it is substance. Not just presentation and preference.

When a game abandons that, it's not just a stylistic choice about presentation. It's doing a worse job at helping you play you pc.

But only the dm is seeing any of this. The player should never know how a monster is doing its exact damage. That a monster does X or Y damage is irrelevant to getting into the head of your character because you, the player, have no idea how the sausage is made.

 

[Pedantic]

But only the dm is seeing any of this. The player should never know how a monster is doing its exact damage. That a monster does X or Y damage is irrelevant to getting into the head of your character because you, the player, have no idea how the sausage is made.

That's simply not the case. If there are general systems, players are perfectly capable and interested in extrapolating from them. Not knowing the precise details of any specific NPC does not preclude them from making inferences from what they do know. If nothing else, a player should be able to judge that an enemy wielding a greatsword in two hands will likely do more damage per hit than an enemy wielding a longsword and a shield.

You could go even further in the 3e days. Two-handed manufactured weaponry on an enemy that is supposed to be a skilled combatant means Power Attack, which means avoiding letting the enemy do full attacks, debuffing the enemy's accuracy, or buffing your AC are all probably more effective than usual. You can imagine a step further still, with specific DCs to make knowledge checks to determine what other abilities might modify the opponent's damage, and combat actions that aren't as miserable to use as Power Attack and Combat Expertise.

There's obviously a loss of information if you render the relationship between the enemy's fictional description and mechanical output into a black box, or a CR calculation.

 

[Micah Sweet]

If Dispel Magic can do that, why can't they make a Dragon's stop breathing rocks/acid/etc? Or make a Beholder blind with it

Why indeed? My answer is that it should actually be called Dispel Spell.

 

[Hussar]

I highly disagree with the last. If a Hobgoblin walks up to me and clobbers me for 25 points damage using what looks like a mundane longsword, I think I-as-player (in or out of character, either way) have a right to ask "How the hell did it do that?" and expect to get some narration back that points to the cause e.g. "Even his muscles have muscles" or "She looks to have gone berserk" or something that I can use to inform my next move, assuming the 25 I just took didn't drop me.

Put another way: a player might not know how much damage a monster can do but should in theory know (or, from experience, be able to learn) what damage a longsword can do, and a longsword is a longsword no matter who or what happens to be wielding it at the time.

You don't. Full stop. Do the monsters know exactly how your PC's are dealing damage? After all, a fighter could easily be dealing 25 points of damage with a longsword without any magic. Welcome to 5th edition.

I know how much damage a longsword can do. It can kill people. One hit and most people fall down dead. So, unless little glowing numbers pop out of people's head when you hit them with swords, the notion of HP's existing in the game world is an old, old argument.

Put it another way, @Lanefan. How much damage can a longsword do to a person in the real world? That's EXACTLY how much damage a longsword can do to a person in D&D land.

 

[Hussar]

That's simply not the case. If there are general systems, players are perfectly capable and interested in extrapolating from them. Not knowing the precise details of any specific NPC does not preclude them from making inferences from what they do know. If nothing else, a player should be able to judge that an enemy wielding a greatsword in two hands will likely do more damage per hit than an enemy wielding a longsword and a shield.

You could go even further in the 3e days. Two-handed manufactured weaponry on an enemy that is supposed to be a skilled combatant means Power Attack, which means avoiding letting the enemy do full attacks, debuffing the enemy's accuracy, or buffing your AC are all probably more effective than usual. You can imagine a step further still, with specific DCs to make knowledge checks to determine what other abilities might modify the opponent's damage, and combat actions that aren't as miserable to use as Power Attack and Combat Expertise.

There's obviously a loss of information if you render the relationship between the enemy's fictional description and mechanical output into a black box, or a CR calculation.

Oh, I see. We need to reify the damage so that the players can make entirely game related changes which engage exactly nothing in the game world in order to react to the events in the game world. And this is more believable? That I can say, "Thugdar my fighter, has determined that the bad guy has dropped two points from his attack bonus in order to increase his damage by four, therefore, I will use expertise to increase my AC and take advantage of this."

And this is getting more into the character's head?

 

[mamba]

Saw this in another thread a minute ago, but it fits here too

“Also from the 2024 MM: Higher CR pirate officers get a very significant base weapon damage multiplier on each attack...for no in-game rational, explicable reason. Which incidentally means that the pistol attacks of a CR 12 Pirate Admiral NPC deal exactly as much damage on average as the enormous claw attacks of a gargantuan sized CR 24 Ancient Gold Dragon....(though admittedly with a much smaller attack bonus). Don't worry, though, any of the CR 12 Questing Knight NPC's three weapon attacks outdamage both of those previous fools; as well as the claws of any other enormous, centuries-old, 20+ CR ancient dragon. Largely because the questing knight's weapons are secretly lasers.”

 

[Hussar]

Again, how much damage does a bullet do?

 

[Maxperson]

If Dispel Magic can do that, why can't they make a Dragon's stop breathing rocks/acid/etc? Or make a Beholder blind with it

Well, according to 5e dragon breath is "magic," but not magic.

 

[Maxperson]

Again, how much damage does a bullet do?

Per the 1e DMG

Weapon

Derringer - 1-4
Other Hand Gun - 1-8
Shotgun - 1-10
Scatter gun - 1-8
Other Shoulder Arms - 2-8
Gatling Gun - 1-8
Cannon (canister) - 3-12
Dynamite (per stick)* - 4-24

Edit: In 5e

Pistol, automatic - 2d6
Revolver - 2d8
Rifle, hunting - 2d10
Rifle, automatic - 2d8
Shotgun - 2d8