D&D General A Rant: DMing is not hard.

[Maxperson]

Increased awareness of roadway threats in general, increased knowledge of traffic flow, and specific experience of how a semi maneuvers so you can anticipate their behavior on the road and what they need from you.

A semi reacts slowly and poorly, requiring you to scan far further ahead and use more advanced anticipation skills than the vast majority of 4 wheel drivers exhibit. You have a higher vantage point as well, giving you a better viewpoint to see other vehicles and how they move.

There's also some more niche skills you learn more often, like skid training and black ice training, and just learning to effectively pre-trip puts you ahead of most 4 wheel drivers.

It's certainly not impossible to pick up those skills just driving a 4 wheeler, but it's a level of awareness usually only found in other professional drivers like state troopers.

I know how traffic flows. Extremely well from decades of experience with it. Further I do anticipate their behavior already, aiding them in switching lanes and more. As for scanning further ahead, well you can do that when you're several feet higher up than a car. I already scan as far ahead as I can and am rarely surprised. Being able to see farther in a semi doesn't help me in a car. Being aware of everything around you for as far as you can see is how you avoid accidents, and I don't like being in accidents.

There's nothing there that objectively increases my ability to drive my car. There's stuff there that could increase some folks ability to drive, if they didn't already do the things you mention.

About the only thing you mention that I don't have skill with is black ice training, but it won't help me drive better because Southern California doesn't have black ice. Or any ice for that matter.

 

[Hussar]

Prove it then. How specifically will it directly and objectively translate into increased ability to drive my car?

That's absolute fact. You can in fact be a great DM that way. I've played with great DMs who haven't played an RPG outside of D&D. You do not need to even read a single other RPG to be a great DM. It might help you or it might not.

Ok.

Now, in all honestly, I've never driven a semi. I have considerable experience driving very large vehicles in the armed forces though. Tandem trailers, large armored vehicles, large trucks. Just not a semi specifically, so, I can only speak to my own experience. But, I imagine that there would be very similar training.

When driving a very large vehicle, there are no small mistakes. The margin for error is much, much smaller. If you make a mistake with your Toyota Carolla, most of the time, the worst thing that happens is that someone is limping for a couple of days. When you make a mistake with a multi-ton armored vehicle, people don't walk away, they die.

Which means that training with very large vehicles requires a significantly heightened level of vigilance that you just don't need with a normal car. You can 't make a mistake with a tank because mistakes cost lives, or, at the very least, in one particular incident, the front end of someone's car. ((The less said about that the better.))

So, right off the bat, training to drive a large vehicle will make you a better driver overall because you have to develop a much higher sense of awareness of everything around you.

There's a reason that people with truck licenses have much cleaner driving records than those who don't. They don't give HUGE discounts on car insurance to people with A licenses for nothing. Heck, even car insurance companies think that learning to drive heavy vehicles makes you a better driver.

 

[Maxperson]

Ok.

Now, in all honestly, I've never driven a semi. I have considerable experience driving very large vehicles in the armed forces though. Tandem trailers, large armored vehicles, large trucks. Just not a semi specifically, so, I can only speak to my own experience. But, I imagine that there would be very similar training.

When driving a very large vehicle, there are no small mistakes. The margin for error is much, much smaller. If you make a mistake with your Toyota Carolla, most of the time, the worst thing that happens is that someone is limping for a couple of days. When you make a mistake with a multi-ton armored vehicle, people don't walk away, they die.

Which means that training with very large vehicles requires a significantly heightened level of vigilance that you just don't need with a normal car. You can 't make a mistake with a tank because mistakes cost lives, or, at the very least, in one particular incident, the front end of someone's car. ((The less said about that the better.))

So, right off the bat, training to drive a large vehicle will make you a better driver overall because you have to develop a much higher sense of awareness of everything around you.

There's a reason that people with truck licenses have much cleaner driving records than those who don't. They don't give HUGE discounts on car insurance to people with A licenses for nothing. Heck, even car insurance companies think that learning to drive heavy vehicles makes you a better driver.

What you just told me was that driving those vehicles gave you a heightened vigilance to avoid things that don't really matter to cars, because they have the larger margin of error, but I doubt that's the message you wanted to convey.

Now maybe it's because I live in Los Angeles, where they have added multiple lanes to the freeways without actually widening the freeways, so the lanes are incredibly narrow. There is no or little margin for error, especially when driving next to a semi, so I have that heightened vigilance you mention. I'm aware of everything around me, since Los Angeles drivers are also very crappy drivers in general. I drive expecting everyone around me to try and kill me with their vehicle. I'm also watching several cars out, because those folks can kill me by getting into an accident in front of me. As I result, I'm really good at avoiding incidents to the point where I have had people in my car tell me that they are glad they weren't driving, because they would have gotten into the accident.

All without ever having driven those large vehicles.

 

[Hussar]

Sigh.

So, every car insurance company in the world giving you massive discounts on your car insurance isn't proof that having a truck license doesn't make you a better driver?

What evidence would you like?

Again, as I said earlier, that's the perfect encapsulation of exactly the issue when talking about running other games making you a better DM. There is absolutely no proof that will be accepted. Nothing. Doesn't matter what evidence is brought forward. Nothing will break through that rock hard shell of being absolutely convinced that a person is right based on zero evidence or actual facts.

 

[Maxperson]

Sigh.

So, every car insurance company in the world giving you massive discounts on your car insurance isn't proof that having a truck license doesn't make you a better driver?

What evidence would you like?

That might improve some folks, but it's not objective improvement as other folks get that ability elsewhere. That's the problem. You are claiming objective improvement when there isn't any. Some folks can take those lessons and not improve at all. Others don't need those lessons to be that good.

Nothing will break through that rock hard shell of being absolutely convinced that a person is right based on zero evidence or actual facts.

I have provided facts and evidence. Los Angeles roads, my experience, my hyper vigilance, etc. are all facts and evidence. Nothing you described erases that or improves upon it. I cannot be more vigilant than I am, or more aware of what goes on around my car than I am. There isn't more to notice. And that's a level that I reached a different way than your method.

We aren't discounting your way. We are 1) saying that your way is not the only way to reach the heights of DMing(this is fact), and 2) your way isn't actually any better since it's all subjective. There's nothing you can bring into D&D that will make an objective improvement since the entire game is based on subjective likes and dislikes.

Your way isn't better or worse. Just different.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Mod Note:

Things aren’t exactly bad up in here, but this thread IS generating multiple reports on more than one person. Incivility is being perceived, even if it’s not intended or even extant. I suspect some of that is due to the subject matter. Some may also be due to familiarity with verbal sparring partners. There’s also posters talking past each other.

So, please be a bit more aware of your tone & rhetorical style in this thread going forward. Thanks.

 

[Hussar]

I have provided facts and evidence. Los Angeles roads, my experience, my hyper vigilance, etc. are all facts and evidence.

I'm sorry but these are not facts, nor are they evidence. Your "fact" is that you were told by some friends in your car that you are a good driver. My facts are EVERY SINGLE car insurance company IN THE WORLD says that you are wrong. I mean, good grief, you yourself talk about not having experience driving with black ice. So, you're only a really good driver so long as you stay south of San DIego and never drive into the mountains?

Again, no. This is precisely the point I'm making. Your "facts" are just gut feelings. Not based on any actual experience. Just like people claiming that the path to running a better game is found by refusing to play any other system. It's just not true. For evidenc on that, I point to all the really great DM's we see out there. The Monte Cook's (got his start in Rolemaster), Chris Perkins, Matt Mercer, on and on and on. Every great DM you care to name out there that we can point to and say, "Yup, that's a great DM" has the same thing in common:

They all play multiple systems.

 

[Maxperson]

I'm sorry but these are not facts, nor are they evidence.

It's absolute fact. I am hyper vigilant. That's a fact. The Los Angeles freeway lanes are very narrow. That's fact. That narrowness is a large reason for my hypervigilance. That's fact. These facts are evidence. You can ignore the facts and evidence, but that doesn't change what they are.

My facts are EVERY SINGLE car insurance company IN THE WORLD says that you are wrong.

No. They don't say that I'm wrong. They only say that enough people could use the help that the companies incentivize the behavior. It doesn't even mean that a majority of drivers are like that. Only that it's enough to affect the company bottom line.

I mean, good grief, you yourself talk about not having experience driving with black ice. So, you're only a really good driver so long as you stay south of San DIego and never drive into the mountains?

I live north of San Diego already. A whole lot of Southern California doesn't get ice. And no, I don't go up into the high mountains during icy season.

Again, no. This is precisely the point I'm making. Your "facts" are just gut feelings. Not based on any actual experience. Just like people claiming that the path to running a better game is found by refusing to play any other system. It's just not true. For evidenc on that, I point to all the really great DM's we see out there. The Monte Cook's (got his start in Rolemaster), Chris Perkins, Matt Mercer, on and on and on. Every great DM you care to name out there that we can point to and say, "Yup, that's a great DM" has the same thing in common:

They all play multiple systems.

And that means nothing, because I've played with multiple great DMs who haven't. I'm not the one claiming objective fact to subjective things. You are. You can't point to a single technique or rule from any game that will objectively improve D&D. You simply can't do it, because no such rule or technique exists. Every last one of them is subjective. As is, by the way, DM greatness. Mercer is good, but I wouldn't call him great. I've played with better(again subjective opinion as this all is.)

 

[GrimCo]

My facts are EVERY SINGLE car insurance company IN THE WORLD says that you are wrong.

You sure? Cause, at least here, and in most EU ( and some non EU European countries), having C/D license (trucks and buses) doesn't affect your car insurance price. At all. What affects price is - your age and driving experience (how long do you have licence), your history of insurance claims and traffic violations, car power and value (those two are big ones), town/city where car is registered. For bonus (aka discount), they look at how long was your record without any claims (in years). Longer the period, better bonus. Short periods can even give you malus (increased price).

In one of my earlier posts, i referenced why comparing ttrpgs and things like sports or driving isn't good comparison. Driving is not pure mental effort. It involves physical aspect, muscle memory ( specially if you drive manual, and here, we mostly drive manuals in driving schools and take driving tests on manuals, most people drive manuals in general), hand eye coordination, spatial awareness etc. All of those are things you need real practical experience to get better at. TTRPGs aren't physical. They are rules, concepts, restrains, but they are adjudicated by words and reasoning. Things work way they work cause we say they do. I can explain you core concepts from rpg you never played, how and what it does in the game, and you will understand it on good enough level to know how/if you can/will/won't incorporate it into your own game.

 

[definiteFreakyFishGuy]

They don't give HUGE discounts on car insurance to people with A licenses for nothing.

Is this true? I tried to do a search online to verify. Am I searching incorrectly? (Would love to lower my rates )

• Why don’t CDL holders get a discount on auto insurance!?
• Any insurers that offer discounts for CDL drivers?
• Does trucking significantly lower your car insurance?
• Does Having A CDL Lower Your Car Insurance? - Reassured.Me