Confirmed: Magic items and summoned monster stats in PHB

[Raven Crowking]

Fine. Allow me to rephrase: I care more about the story than I do about minutia. Minutia and simulation be damned.

Really? What story is not made up of minutia and simulation? What story's success is not examined in the light of these benchmarks.

DM: Going down the corridor, you see some orcs. They attack you.

Player 1: How many orcs?

DM: Don't bother me with minutia! They're some orcs! You fight them and win....

Player 2: Don't we need to make some die rolls to win?

DM: I care more about the story. Simulation be damned.

Player 1: I guess we loot the bodies.

DM: You find some gold and some potions of healing.

Player 2: I guess there's no point in asking how much gold, or how many potions of healing, is there?


The worst modules of all time can be considered gems if you are only concerned with "the story" and not the things that the story is comprised of. "You see a group of people walking down the road. They are not skipping. They are not singing. They are walking neither fast nor slow....."

If you ignore keeping track of ammo, why bother keeping track of gp? Or hit points? Or AC, for that matter? To me, this smacks of "D&D with ADD".


RC

 

[hong]

If you ignore keeping track of ammo, why bother keeping track of gp?

Why indeed? Gold grinding is so videogamey.

Or hit points? Or AC, for that matter?

Because this directly impacts on the promulgation of violence. NEXT!

To me, this smacks of "D&D with ADD".

You say this like it's a negative thing.

 

[Wormwood]

DM: Don't bother me with minutia! They're some orcs! You fight them and win....

Good ol' reductio ad absurdum. The classics never go out of style.

 

[BryonD]

Good ol' reductio ad absurdum. The classics never go out of style.

Though in this case it didn't really require much reductio. The actual idea was already right there at absurdum.

 

[FireLance]

Really? What story is not made up of minutia and simulation? What story's success is not examined in the light of these benchmarks.

It depends on whether you consider the one (or maybe two - offhand, I can't remember the minutiae) time that Legolas ran out of arrows in the Lord of the Rings to have happened because:

1. Tolkein kept careful track of the number of arrows that Legolas had with him at all times, how many he used in battles, how many could be salvaged after the fights, how many were replaced through crafting or purchase, etc. and discovered that Legolas happened to run out of arrows at Helm's Deep; or

2. Tolkein decided that it was dramatic and/or logical that Legolas ran out of arrows at that point.

 

[Celebrim]

It depends on whether you consider the one (or maybe two - offhand, I can't remember the minutiae) time that Legolas ran out of arrows in the Lord of the Rings to have happened because:

1. Tolkein kept careful track of the number of arrows that Legolas had with him at all times, how many he used in battles, how many could be salvaged after the fights, how many were replaced through crafting or purchase, etc. and discovered that Legolas happened to run out of arrows at Helm's Deep; or

2. Tolkein decided that it was dramatic and/or logical that Legolas ran out of arrows at that point.

So in other words, the DM decides when you run out of arrows because its dramaticly appropriate to the story? Again, story narratives don't really offer a good analogy to the sort of story creation which is being created within a game, and the game needs are different than story creation needs.

Besides which, as long as we are talking stories, Legolas runs out of arrows practically every time that they fight. He's always scavaging for arrows on the battlefield. He's almost always forced to do 'knife work'. He's always firing off 'his last arrow'. Gimli is pretty much always catching up to him in effectiveness because Legolas doesn't have unlimited ammunition. I don't think that Tolkien decides merely that it is dramatically appropriate for Legolas to run out of arrows at some point. Pretty much universally, he decides that its dramactically appropriate for archers to run out of arrows and there is rarely a battle with archers where they don't.

 

[Raven Crowking]

It depends on whether you consider the one (or maybe two - offhand, I can't remember the minutiae) time that Legolas ran out of arrows in the Lord of the Rings to have happened because:

1. Tolkein kept careful track of the number of arrows that Legolas had with him at all times, how many he used in battles, how many could be salvaged after the fights, how many were replaced through crafting or purchase, etc. and discovered that Legolas happened to run out of arrows at Helm's Deep; or

2. Tolkein decided that it was dramatic and/or logical that Legolas ran out of arrows at that point.

Is there any battle in which it is not explicit that Legolas is forced to scavenge arrows from the field? I hope you realize that we are talking about the guy who was so careful with verisimilitude that he can have Sam realize that more time passed in Lothlorian than it seemed like because of the phase of the moon.


RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

So in other words, the DM decides when you run out of arrows because its dramaticly appropriate to the story? Again, story narratives don't really offer a good analogy to the sort of story creation which is being created within a game, and the game needs are different than story creation needs.

Also this.

I don't think that Tolkien decides merely that it is dramatically appropriate for Legolas to run out of arrows at some point. Pretty much universally, he decides that its dramactically appropriate for archers to run out of arrows and there is rarely a battle with archers where they don't.

Yup.



RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

Though in this case it didn't really require much reductio. The actual idea was already right there at absurdum.

Exactly so. The minute degree of reductio required actually demonstrates the absurdum of that which is being reduced.


RC

 

[hong]

Besides which, as long as we are talking stories, Legolas runs out of arrows practically every time that they fight. He's always scavaging for arrows on the battlefield.

To be precise, he always talks about scavenging for arrows. Actually, no, he sometimes talks about scavenging for arrows. Or maybe, once or twice, he talks about scavenging for arrows.

He's almost always forced to do 'knife work'.

Damn AoOs.

He's always firing off 'his last arrow'. Gimli is pretty much always catching up to him in effectiveness because Legolas doesn't have unlimited ammunition.

Gimli is always catching up to him in effectiveness because Gimli is always behind in the first place, because Legolas never seems to want for ammunition.