Diagonal wonkiness scenarios

[Will]

Keterys, why the snark?

 

[Sir Sebastian Hardin]

Ah. So... the robots with embedded autocad chips shouldn't play 4e?

Though, no... they'd probably be able to model 1 square = 1 square pretty easily. So it's only humans with embedded autocad chips that are a problem.

It's cool, man.

This problem was brought by other posters (that don't have autocad chips in their brains like I do) back in the first pages. I'm just drawing the thing to illustrate the point.

 

[HeinorNY]

Indeed, because that way, you have more fun. Are we having fun yet?

Of course. Fun is what makes me accept roundish squared rooms, fireboxes, nipleless breasted reptiles without getting tired and bleeding.
Beer helps too.

 

[hong]

Of course. Fun is what makes me accept roundish squared rooms,

You mean square rooms.

fireboxes,

You mean fireballs that have the bits poking out chopped off for convenience.

nipleless breasted reptiles

See previous.

without getting tired and bleeding.

That's why you chop off the bits that poke out.

Beer helps too.

You say this like it's a negative thing.

 

[HeinorNY]

Ah. So... the robots with embedded autocad chips shouldn't play 4e?

Though, no... they'd probably be able to model 1 square = 1 square pretty easily. So it's only humans with embedded autocad chips that are a problem.

We don't need to have an autocad chip in our brains to intuitively understand that A is farther from B than C.

All we need is one functioning eye to see that.

That's what this thread is all about. How we can be betrayed by our intuitive senses of space and distance under 1-1-1-1 rules, and make wrong tactical choices because of that.

 

[Sir Sebastian Hardin]

(@ hong)

Wow...
You ARE WotC's b*tch.

 

[Trainz]

1-1-1-1 is really about making the game a little faster, a little easier, and a lot sillier.

Well, to you bud.

To me, it makes the game a lot faster, a lot easier, and just a little sillier (actually, not really).

I integrated the 1-1-1-1 in my SWSE game, and let me tell you, after our first space battle like that, we all (me and my players) expressed a sigh of relief at how smoother things went.

 

[Sir Sebastian Hardin]

Well, anything is smoother than SWSE's 2-2-2-2 diagonals.

1-1-1-1 is closer to 1.41-1.41-1.41-1.41 than 2-2-2-2, anyway.

 

[keterys]

I'm not attempting to be mean spirited with the cad reference... I just found it dreadfully amusing and had to make the joke. It actually reminds me of a rolemaster game I fled many years back because the GM used a scientific calculator so he could do calculus for determining spell results and such. It was a terribly accurate game... and as a very mathematical person I can understand the desire to do it.

It still made the game not fun enough for me, whereas the earthdawn game next door? Immensely more fun.

I've personally found _after hundreds of sessions_ that 1-1-1-1 led to a more rewarding game where it was easier to think in terms of the story of the game without breaking for math and that 1-2-1-2 occasionally causes problems for area effects and movement _especially for certain other people_.

If you've played with 1-1-1-1 for long enough to give it a chance, and you found it as bothersome as you did when examining a theoretical graph, then I salute your decision and regret that you can't take advantage of its play benefits.

If you've never tried it? Then I can't respect your decision. It'd be like voting for a politician because of their appearance. Mathematical purity might be trumping fun, which is fine for theoretical arguments on a forum, but around a table with friends? Blech. I know someone else who prefers 1-2-1-2... but is in a group with 4 other people who _vastly_ prefer 1-1-1-1, so he switched. After _1_ session, he admitted it wasn't so bad and _them not screwing it up_ made him happy enough to overcome his unease over warped geometry.

 

[hong]

That's what this thread is all about. How we can be betrayed by our intuitive senses of space and distance under 1-1-1-1 rules, and make wrong tactical choices because of that.

That's what the battlemat, with its clear visual indication of squares, is for. If you can't instantly grok how big a 5x5 square area is with that help, nothing will work. Now certainly when you start going to ranges of 10 or 15 or 20 it becomes hard to count squares, but IME, just about every D&D combat is going to be with the monsters right in your face.