D&D General D&D isn't a simulation game, so what is???

[DND_Reborn]

I've been playing this really realistic simulation game for the past 48 years. Very immersive. I think I'm winning it.

LOL I've been playing the same game for just as long---so far I think its a draw.

However, I doubt a realistic game would be very much fun. A 'realistic' game with a dragon that stands 8 stories tall would be ... short.

Not when the game also includes magic... items and/or spells.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Step 1, the step everything that's tried to make D&D into a simulation skips over with much glee and enthusiasm, is to ask what you're simulating? Earth with a vague veneer of magic sloppily smeared over it? The feel of a specific genre of fantasy replete with tropes? A specific franchise? A world of your own devising?

Step 2 is how deep do you want to simulate? Are you that mad lad who made Dwarf Fortress who wants to eventually simulate every cell and molecule? Are you okay with some fudging to come up with a reasonable facsimile? Are you willing to do the research into aaaalll the many discipline you will be judged and judged harshly on by the internet to simulate everything?

 

[Grendel_Khan]

Let the anger from offended D&D fans flow through you. Use it!

...to go check out the BRP games mentioned earlier, and also maybe GURPS Fantasy. There are definitely fantasy games that are more directly simulationist than D&D. GURPS, for example, uses something like 1-second combat turns, and has much more specific mechanics for stuff like damage from specific weapons against specific types of armor.

 

[Ancalagon]

some aspect of warhammer frpg (I recommend 2nd ed) are more simulationist than D&D - combat with armor being ablative, hit location...

 

[jgsugden]

...

...However, I doubt a realistic game would be very much fun. A 'realistic' game with a dragon that stands 8 stories tall would be ... short.

Not when the game also includes magic... items and/or spells.

While you can use this as an explanation, think about how powerful the magic needs to be to survive a realistic 8 story monster breathing an inferno that can melt rock walls. Then consider that you want to scope this into a realistic simulation scenario. Those power levels and realistic ramifications for power use are ... tough to reconcile.

 

[not-so-newguy]

It's a shared waking dream world with rules and dice.

 

[Lyxen]

D&D is clearly a simulation, just not of the real world, but it's a fairly accurate (although not detailed) simulation of the (high) fantasy genre, I have no problem recreating scenes from books/movies/shows using the ruleset.

For a more real-world simulation, indeed Runequest is what I've found the closest to real-world combat (in particular the rules about Strike Ranks, reach, engagement, etc.), and a friend of mine who rose to be the King of Britain through the SCA (and combat) was of this opinion as well.

 

[MichaelSomething]

D&D is Calvinball. I don't mean it as a bad thing. It's the act of creation and being in it while it's evolving. It may not make sense to an outsider, but it'll be a reflection of what YOU want to play.

 

[Hussar]

D&D is clearly a simulation, just not of the real world, but it's a fairly accurate (although not detailed) simulation of the (high) fantasy genre, I have no problem recreating scenes from books/movies/shows using the ruleset.

For a more real-world simulation, indeed Runequest is what I've found the closest to real-world combat (in particular the rules about Strike Ranks, reach, engagement, etc.), and a friend of mine who rose to be the King of Britain through the SCA (and combat) was of this opinion as well.

This perspective always baffles me. A simulation, in order to actually BE a simulation, has to tell you something about what it's simulating. In other words, if I make a computer simulation of a car in a wind tunnel, that simulation will tell me how air moves over that car. It might be a good or a bad simulation, that's not the point. The point is, in order for it to be a simulation of a car in a wind tunnel, it HAS to tell me how the air moves over the car.

But nothing in D&D does that. Nothing in D&D answers the question of how. It barely answers what most of the time. If a character attacks a monster and hits for 5 points of damage, absolutely nothing in the system tells you anything about what just occured. Sure, you can make up some sort of narrative, but, any narrative you create is equally valid. The monster took 5 points of damage because it feels really bad about my poor swordsmanship is just as valid as I hit it with my sword.

So, in what way is D&D a simulation of anything?

 

[DND_Reborn]

While you can use this as an explanation, think about how powerful the magic needs to be to survive a realistic 8 story monster breathing an inferno that can melt rock walls. Then consider that you want to scope this into a realistic simulation scenario. Those power levels and realistic ramifications for power use are ... tough to reconcile.

While I understand and appreciate your point, a lot depends on the RPG and how the "fantasy works".

For instance, dragons in AD&D where NOT (according to the MM1) "8-story monsters". For instance:

At large, is 48' long -- so not really 8-stories.

Also, the "melt rock walls".... Why melting rock walls? If your fantasy indicates dragon breath is roughly 1500 C or hotter, then sure, but it is also then melting steel-- so any PC in armor is (literally) toast. FWIW steel will soften and weaken at much lower temperatures (about 600 C IIRC).

For myself, I never imagined dragonfire to be that hot, but I know other people certainly might.

It isn't hard (for me at least) to reconcile powerful magic and fantasy creatures in a game which (otherwise) more simulates real-world use of armor and weapons, capabilities of creatures, and lethality.