Recent content by TwoSix

To be fair, the people you should be listening to about evaluations of various character strength ARE the people interested in optimization and power gaming. If your game is focused on character presentation and thespianism, then obviously character efficacy is of relatively little importance.

Have you tried "Combat as Theater" or "Combat as Professional Wrestling"? That was recently going around. :)

People who favor OSR play typically use "skilled play" as shorthand for "play involving negotiation of described situational factors with the GM" (like putting poison in the drinking water, or dropping rocks on a patrol from above) as opposed to play referencing character abilities granted by...

To me, "combat as war" is where game play revolves around "There are two dozen goblins in the main hall. Instead of risking a big melee, we lock all the doors and then throw in poison gas".

I'm reasonably sure that the "combat as war" camp wants effectiveness WHEN it's the result of ingenuity and planning. The characters might want overpowered weapons that kill all enemies with zero risk, but I don't think there are many players advocating for that to be added to the game. (Note...

Exactly. Anyone suggesting a DPR measure is an exact measure of efficacy is obviously making a large mistake. There are plenty of times when invisibility or suggestion or hypnotic pattern has much greater efficacy than fireball. DPR (and also eHP calculations for damage taken) do have a...

Yes, but you should always disagree with people on the question they are answering, not the question you think they should be asking. That's what causes so many disagreements. The relevant question that should have been asked at the start of the exchange when @FrogReaver said that the...

Because those are the metrics that are being measured. @FrogReaver never said that Fighter3/Bard3 is a poor choice or has no utility; they said that the Fighter3/Bard3 is "abysmal in combat" compared to a Barbarian 6. And going by the metric of "who is going to fall down first, them or me?"...

It's also crucial to have a relatively moderate baseline because the relative value of accuracy versus damage expression changes if the target has a low or high AC. For enemies with high AC, every point of accuracy becomes crucial. If you only started with a 10% chance to hit, then getting a...

For baseline character comparisons, it's generally assumed to be with prof and attributes added. People who are doing their comparisons properly will spell out their calculations, of course, although shorthanding/assuming those calculations becomes commonplace as the conversation gets longer.

Bog standard 5e design is that players will be successful roughly 2 out of 3 times, which makes 65% the closest approximation that actually occurs in normal play. If you look at monsters with a CR commiserate to an appropriate level character, the average AC is basically right around that...

Agreed. Whenever I see people proposing ideas for an evolved 5e or a 6e, so many of the ideas floated are concepts SotWW is already doing.

It's not "exactly" about marketing, as much as it is about presentation and a design choice to allow the art and text of the game to showcase a setting flavor with some specificity. Other points: I see a difference between "generic" and "universal". You could use a setting-stripped core 5e...

And I'm fine leaving that choice up to the devs. Being a generic system isn't an inherent property of a rule system; it's a choice made in the presentation. Any resolution system could be made generic if you're willing to do the work peeling off all the embedded setting conceits.

My groups always eat first; we just do snacks at the table for the game session. I'm of the opinion that breaking to eat in the middle of a game kills the momentum.