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Do NPCs in your game have PHB classes?
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<blockquote data-quote="The Crimson Binome" data-source="post: 6886366" data-attributes="member: 6775031"><p>As previously mentioned, some pages back, Gygax's game does not meet the strictest definition of an RPG, by the standards of the modern era. I try to not judge his statements too harshly, since those were primitive days, and he was making up everything as he went along. As I understand it, he was more or less removed from the project by the time 2E came around, when designers actually started caring about role-playing as its own virtue.</p><p></p><p>No, they are also performing their actions over the course of the six-second period between their last turn and their next turn.</p><p></p><p>And to answer your next question, about how we know whether someone would be affected by this spell, when you cast it into an area that they were currently in the process of moving out of - that's where initiative comes into play. The reality is that they are <em>somewhere</em> along their course of motion, at the point when you cast that spell, and if your turn came along first then they were not far enough along their course in order to clear the effect by the time your spell goes off.</p><p></p><p>It's an approximation of reality. It's a simulation. It's a simplification. Just as the Navier-Stokes equation simplifies down to Bernoulli under certain assumptions, and this is sufficient to build a functional aircraft; so can a fluid combat scenario be described using a manageable collection of game mechanics, with a meaningful outcome derived. The more complicated you want to make the equations, then the more accurate your final answer will be, and the more difficult it will be to reach.</p><p></p><p>Picking up the die is not a <em>decision</em>. You're not making a <em>choice</em> about what happens to your character, or about anything else within the game world, and thus the possibility of meta-gaming is never called into question.</p><p></p><p>You can't <em>choose</em> to be inspired, though. You can <em>be</em> inspired, surely enough, and a reasonable game system may well include mechanics to that effect, but it's not a <em>choice</em>, any more than you can <em>choose</em> to be hungry or afraid.</p><p></p><p>An argument could be made for the player being in a better position to know how their character should feel about stuff than the GM does - while you <em>are</em> the character (or "channeling the character", as some call it), then you <em>should</em> know when you are <em>actually</em> inspired. The temptation to meta-game would be present, and it would require the player to take off their PC hat and put on a GM hat for a second, but as long as the player is being honest, then it could potentially work out. (Fate points are a bad example of this, for other reasons which are only tangential to the topic at hand.)</p><p></p><p>So you have to ask yourself, do you want to pretend to be a real elf, in a world where dragons and magic are actually real? Or do you want to pretend to be a character in a story, where dragons and magic are plot contrivances? Because you can't be both at the same time. </p><p></p><p>The premise of role-playing is that you're pretending to <em>actually</em> be an elf, and you can't do that while you're simultaneously <em>choosing</em> to invoke fate or luck or whatever. That's not a <em>choice</em> that the <em>character</em> is in any position to make; nor, in the case of passive mechanics, is it a <em>fact</em> that the character can <em>know</em>.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="The Crimson Binome, post: 6886366, member: 6775031"] As previously mentioned, some pages back, Gygax's game does not meet the strictest definition of an RPG, by the standards of the modern era. I try to not judge his statements too harshly, since those were primitive days, and he was making up everything as he went along. As I understand it, he was more or less removed from the project by the time 2E came around, when designers actually started caring about role-playing as its own virtue. No, they are also performing their actions over the course of the six-second period between their last turn and their next turn. And to answer your next question, about how we know whether someone would be affected by this spell, when you cast it into an area that they were currently in the process of moving out of - that's where initiative comes into play. The reality is that they are [I]somewhere[/I] along their course of motion, at the point when you cast that spell, and if your turn came along first then they were not far enough along their course in order to clear the effect by the time your spell goes off. It's an approximation of reality. It's a simulation. It's a simplification. Just as the Navier-Stokes equation simplifies down to Bernoulli under certain assumptions, and this is sufficient to build a functional aircraft; so can a fluid combat scenario be described using a manageable collection of game mechanics, with a meaningful outcome derived. The more complicated you want to make the equations, then the more accurate your final answer will be, and the more difficult it will be to reach. Picking up the die is not a [I]decision[/I]. You're not making a [I]choice[/I] about what happens to your character, or about anything else within the game world, and thus the possibility of meta-gaming is never called into question. You can't [I]choose[/I] to be inspired, though. You can [I]be[/I] inspired, surely enough, and a reasonable game system may well include mechanics to that effect, but it's not a [I]choice[/I], any more than you can [I]choose[/I] to be hungry or afraid. An argument could be made for the player being in a better position to know how their character should feel about stuff than the GM does - while you [I]are[/I] the character (or "channeling the character", as some call it), then you [I]should[/I] know when you are [I]actually[/I] inspired. The temptation to meta-game would be present, and it would require the player to take off their PC hat and put on a GM hat for a second, but as long as the player is being honest, then it could potentially work out. (Fate points are a bad example of this, for other reasons which are only tangential to the topic at hand.) So you have to ask yourself, do you want to pretend to be a real elf, in a world where dragons and magic are actually real? Or do you want to pretend to be a character in a story, where dragons and magic are plot contrivances? Because you can't be both at the same time. The premise of role-playing is that you're pretending to [I]actually[/I] be an elf, and you can't do that while you're simultaneously [I]choosing[/I] to invoke fate or luck or whatever. That's not a [I]choice[/I] that the [I]character[/I] is in any position to make; nor, in the case of passive mechanics, is it a [I]fact[/I] that the character can [I]know[/I]. [/QUOTE]
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