Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 8418671" data-attributes="member: 82106">Is that really necessary though? I mean, in RPGs generally there's always some element of different knowledge, potentially, between characters, and maybe players too. This is one of the distinguishing features of these games. Need we have ANY final unequivocal narrative at any specific point in time? I think its reasonable to assume that a canonical narrative will emerge eventually, but even that seems like potentially an assumption and I'm strongly tempted to question it. lolNot that I don't see any point to your comment, but is it really necessary, and SO critical that it happen RIGHT NOW BEFORE THIS GUY'S TURN ENDS that I as a game designer am forced to restrict myself to only a subset of all possible approaches? Is that worth it? I personally have embraced the concept of a lack of complete clarity and definitive resolution, at least contingently, as a potentially beneficial and useful game design concept. The authors of 4e apparently concur with me on that...No, they will make decisions based on their acknowledged to be contingent and limited character-eye view of what the situation is. Battle has been described as "20 seconds of terror." Well, in 4e it is actually about 30-40 seconds, but that is literally the length of a standard battle. Its quite likely not all the bodies from round 2 have even hit the floor yet by the time the thing is over. This is how I think about it. It is in fact basically pretty much inconceivable to me to imagine that any of the PCs has even a friggin clue what is going on DURING the fight. They are operating largely on guesses, instinct, long practiced and rehearsed tactics, etc. The idea that anybody is aware of the fighter's medical condition, including the character himself, is pretty tenuous at best. It is certainly in no way realistic.I agree that it is possible someone will act mistakenly. This happens in the real world too. What I would say is, the retcon itself is a contingent explanation. It isn't the only possible one, just one of several. Maybe the orc did move, maybe it was just so plain to everyone that was where the orc was going, that it was assumed in the response, but then suddenly the fighter blocked it. I entirely admit this is all just making up narrative, but is it any more made up than whatever way you describe a hit in any edition of D&D? The game clearly leaves leeway for mechanics to have some degree of give and take in what they represent.Again, I just question any such statement, hehe. You can call me Dastardly Alhazred for that...Right, well, it was a few years back, but if you dig down in the thread archives, you will find it was beyond ridiculous. I mean WotC literally gave up and closed their boards in the wake of all that. I mean, I criticize 5e, there's just certain things about it I really honestly don't like, but its not some sort of war. It is all long past, but all the rhetoric is still with us, it cannot be undone.It is magical though. I mean, there is not the slightest chance that the things even 5e fighters pull off at higher levels is physically possible. Whatever it is, its supernatural.Well, that's a bit of a different discussion. I mean, sure, there could be more variety in design of classic 4e leaders, but NO MATTER WHAT the design is, I guarantee you the result is that it will be unsatisfactory to traditionalists, and that is flat out because the boundaries of what a D&D fighter can do is set by something, 1e I'm guessing basically, and anything that treads on that gets the Body Snatcher alert cry! I don't think its sameness that is actually the issue is what I'm saying. Otherwise why isn't there a Warlord in 5e? Its not that hard to create some different leader type mechanics. Yet MM absolutely categorically denies the possibility of ANY such thing being added to the game, period end of discussion WotC.</blockquote>

Verification