Search results

What you're forgetting in your equation is that the players know there’s a 50% chance they’re getting a bag of poo if they attempt something on Valentine's Day. You're describing an event table, and the magic hat in my example works exactly the same way. Both involve a pre-defined set of...

Outside of combat, it is most certainly is. It is not quite as freeform as OD&D, but fairly close. And like I said in the review too bad that Wizards didn't follow their own advice in their followup products. Rating the DMGs (2009)

It’s important to recognize that this is a two-way street. What you’re describing highlights real problems that can originate with a referee, but that’s only half the equation. The other half is: how do we tell when a player is being unreasonable toward the referee? In my leadership training...

I appreciate the relationship example and that you want to talk about character, I not sure how it addresses any of the questions I raised in the portion of my post you quoted. Those questions weren’t about outcomes in general or about theme arising from character interaction, they were about...

Only people can pretend to be people and have it be any good.

That can work. I am flexible in that regard.

All I can say is that if you believe in standing by your commitment to a principle, the last thing you want to hear at the table is "What the hell is up with that Rob?" Because that means just I screwed something up. All I can say is, if you’re serious about sticking to your principles, the...

I find rules that try to govern the behavior of sentient characters to be inadequate for running a tabletop roleplaying campaign. It’s OK if you don’t feel that way, but I do. For me, the rules are about adjudicating specific actions by the players. I swing my sword, I try to haggle a deal, I...

The existence of the table, or even just rough notes, is a tool for consistency. Yes, I’m still making a decision, whether I’m designing a table or making a judgment call in the moment. But I’m also making a decision about how decisions get made. That’s important. By committing to a model or a...

In the real world, we can gather data about people, say, from my hometown, and generate statistics, like “68% of homes within the city limits are rented.” That includes behavioral data about people. Of course, applying such statistics to individuals is poor reasoning. For individuals, we verify...

I figured that which is why I prefaced my reply with technically no. The best kind of correct. ;)

That and the Dungeoneer's Survival Guide go hand in hand. It also expands the Oriental Adventures skill system to AD&D 1e using non-weapon proficiencies. It is the prototype of what made its way into AD&D 2e.

There are several standards of proof in the legal system. Far more fine-grained than my three categories of most likely, probable, possible. Personally, I think folks should cut to the chase and debate the real point of contention. Who is involved in the process by which judgment calls are made...

Technically no. Pages 40 to 43 of the AD&D 1e Wilderness Survival. Everything you ever wanted to know about Swimming in AD&D 1e and then some. I have to say after looking it over that even GURPS didn't have so many words devoted to Swimming. So in AD&D 1e you can swim in armor but it slows...

I’ve said before that my players can, and do, challenge outcomes, ask questions, and analyze what happened based on what they know or can discover. Just because they don’t have omniscient access to the campaign notes doesn’t mean they’re flying blind. They test the world, interact with it, and...

As it so happens, I was trained as a software engineer. While I did not formally minor in it, I took a fair number of courses in systems analysis. My intended minor was actually geography, with an eye toward entering the GIS field as it existed in the 1980s, but life went in a different...