Extensive Character Sheets Are GM Oppression

[Umbran]

I'm an ex-fencer

It isn't like I couldn't easily find an ex-fencer who disagrees with you, though. So that's not really telling.

And what about those who were never fencers. Should fencing in a RPG only be made for ex-fencers?

And, if the game-writers are not themselves high-end competition grade fencers, they are unlikely to just happen to hit on what you'd like in the simulation anyway.

Look, it is okay to want what you want. But being a specialist in a real-world practice doesn't mean that what you want is the best way to make a game version of what you are a specialist in.

As you can see, I disagree. Speed is a virtue, but its not the only virtue, even here.

I made no claim as to it being the only virtue - that's a strawman. I merely noted that complexity sacrifices the virtue of speed.

 

[Thomas Shey]

It isn't like I couldn't easily find an ex-fencer who disagrees with you, though. So that's not really telling.

No, but it was also noting that speed is not the defining trait of the fencing experience, even to those who've done it.

And what about those who were never fencers. Should fencing in a RPG only be made for ex-fencers?

Given I've heard the same statement about other martial arts from people who've never done it, I don't think it required to be one to appreciate the game actually engaging with any elements that actually make fencing or martial arts more than a label.

And, if the game-writers are not themselves high-end competition grade fencers, they are unlikely to just happen to hit on what you'd like in the simulation anyway.

Research is a thing. Its not like the concept of techniques and elements isn't out there to be read about if you care.

Look, it is okay to want what you want. But being a specialist in a real-world practice doesn't mean that what you want is the best way to make a game version of what you are a specialist in.

It also doesn't mean because you don't care that glossing over any of the distinctive elements because you'd like speed and simplicity at all cost is, either.

I made no claim as to it being the only virtue - that's a strawman. I merely noted that complexity sacrifices the virtue of speed.

And usually provides the virtue of actual engagement beyond just rolling some dice. But apparently that's not relevant just because some people don't care about it.

Look, I've acknowledged for people who really just want to get through fights quickly and have a little gloss of a particular type of fighter this may not be worthwhile. But if you want me to think they're doing more than that in their combat system, you've come to the wrong address.

 

[kigmatzomat]

Meaning that from base principals (an engineer) can reason out what to do for a lot of complex carpentry. ....
What it can't give ... is muscle memory. The "cut this board in a straight line" part is NOT an int check. Same goes for hammering nails. Those are mix of dex and str checks.

The corrolary is a carpenter building a structure with requirements they have never encountered. A Canadian carpenter won't know how to make an earthquake proof structure and a carribean carpenter has no idea how to make a roof that won't collapse under snow load.

But do you want to be this granular? I don't.

I realized I had implicitly answered my own question on how to handle tests that realistically require multiple distinct steps reliant on different stats without rolling repeatedly: make the character roll using the weakest stat because that is likely where they will fail.

A carpenter working on their typical kind of structure can use their prime stat, just as an engineer doing their typical work. But put them in a scenario where they aren't doing rote work (the engineer has to fire up a welder, the carpenter is asked to fix a WWI bi-plane wing) and now they need to roll using the stat most likely to cause a failure.

 

[Thomas Shey]

I realized I had implicitly answered my own question on how to handle tests that realistically require multiple distinct steps reliant on different stats without rolling repeatedly: make the character roll using the weakest stat because that is likely where they will fail.

A carpenter working on their typical kind of structure can use their prime stat, just as an engineer doing their typical work. But put them in a scenario where they aren't doing rote work (the engineer has to fire up a welder, the carpenter is asked to fix a WWI bi-plane wing) and now they need to roll using the stat most likely to cause a failure.

Though you might have a situation where different people do different steps. There's also an issue of where failure is more likely at some stages than others independent of the attribute involved.

(Yes, I'm overthinking it.)

 

[aramis erak]

There is no single level of detail desirable in games. Games come in a wide variety of levels of detail in their various aspects to meet a wide variety of desires

True... to a point.
If one is trying to capture a given feel, one at least needs to difference it.

Do you?

Because, fencing sure looks like it is made of extremely fast paced action, and drilling down in rules systems... isn't. I don't think detailed rules would FEEL like fencing much at all.

As a heavy-blade (rapier) fencer, D&D abstracts away everything that makes fencing different than 10th-15th C Sword-n-Board with Broadswords and heaters.
Feng Shui likewise.

For a fencer to make sense and be different than any other fighter, the abstraction needs to be lessened...

Rapier vs Rapier isn't as fast as olympic - olympic is trained twitch reactions and stylized heavily... tho' if one sharpens the tip of the blades, and the edges of the saber and épée, one can do very real and serious damage with them.

The actual clashes and exchanges in Rapier are usually in the range 1-6 seconds... with twice to thrice that between. Olympic also the same general range, but slanted towards the shorter end heavily...
In maximum effort mode, I've seen continuous bladeplay for up to 30-seconds before a pause, but those were the exceptions.

It's largely about seeing when an opening happens and if you can exploit it before they do the same to you, then pulling it off.

It might model the action better, but "more accurate simulation of the detailed action of fencing" is not "more accurate evocation of the feeling of fencing"

Hard disagree. No light set I've seen has captured the decision making nor the timing feel of actually fencing. Nor, for that matter, of iaijutsu/iaidō. The feel of it as experienced by those who do it.

One big caveat here: fencing as experienced by fencers generally feels nothing like fencing as portrayed in movies nor TV. Thomas and I are both coming from the experience of wait-wait-spot-strike-withdraw... the thing almost no RPG gets right is that they all lack the spot... the spot an opening and then attack...
Plus, a rapier attack is about 0.5 to 2 seconds, from spotting the opening to return to en garde. Olympic is faster still... but the feel of actual fencing is anticipation and waiting.

Patience is a fencer's most important ability, perceptiveness second, skill with the blade and doing the needed footwork tie...
While a tourney bout of fencing with rapier might take up to several minutes, the mindset needed is patience and remaining sharp. (Pun intended.) So there's this constant calculation and anticipation, and when the opening happens, the mental leap to employ it.

To be honest, the game I've gotten the most fencing like feel from playing was Savage Worlds, closely followed by Arrowflight 1e, then Palladium Fantasy (where it's out of place).

If you want the feel of watching an Errol Flynn movie, you aren't simulating Fencing as done by Fencers - you're simulating stagefighting, which is a VERY different thing.

Keep in mind: Olympic style fencing tournies are usually free for the audience, but pay to play for the fencers... the action is too fast for many to see.

 

[Thomas Shey]

True... to a point.
If one is trying to capture a given feel, one at least needs to difference it.


As a heavy-blade (rapier) fencer, D&D abstracts away everything that makes fencing different than 10th-15th C Sword-n-Board with Broadswords and heaters.
Feng Shui likewise.

...

If you want the feel of watching an Errol Flynn movie, you aren't simulating Fencing as done by Fencers - you're simulating stagefighting, which is a VERY different thing.

Keep in mind: Olympic style fencing tournies are usually free for the audience, but pay to play for the fencers... the action is too fast for many to see.

Even stage fencing isn't well simulated by an overly simple system. In fact, I'd argue few fighting styles are. They may have techniques that are, effectively, buried in the abstraction, but that's the point; once you bury all of that, all the styles involved fundamentally look the same in play (barring, essentially, trying to recreate it on the fly by GM/player interaction, which seems to work for some people but I believe requires other things that don't make it a reliable choice for most). This was one of the things that chased me out of OD&D many a year ago; fundamentally all a fighter had in supported decision was what weapon to use and who to use it on.

(As an aside regarding something you said in the part I clipped: one of the problems I had with GURPS when I ran it is that its very short melee cycles actually resolved combat too fast, and the biggest part of that was it didn't recognize how much of virtually every form of combat is spent either reassessing the situation between exchanges (and this is, far as I can tell, just as true of an exchange of gunfire as a knife fight), trying to reposition, or watching for openings. While many combat round cycles are too long, even for firearms combat, resolutions that will have combats reliably over in ten seconds have just erred in the opposite direction).

 

[aramis erak]

(As an aside regarding something you said in the part I clipped: one of the problems I had with GURPS when I ran it is that its very short melee cycles actually resolved combat too fast, and the biggest part of that was it didn't recognize how much of virtually every form of combat is spent either reassessing the situation between exchanges (and this is, far as I can tell, just as true of an exchange of gunfire as a knife fight), trying to reposition, or watching for openings. While many combat round cycles are too long, even for firearms combat, resolutions that will have combats reliably over in ten seconds have just erred in the opposite direction).

Yeah, it's one of those things that became genre important for GURPS Special Ops... their solution was oversimple, but it works ok. IIRC: After 1d6 rounds, you have to go to cover for 2d6 rounds or until reengaged. Even then...
It should be core, but few actually process that GURPS uses 1 round=1sec.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Yeah, it's one of those things that became genre important for GURPS Special Ops... their solution was oversimple, but it works ok. IIRC: After 1d6 rounds, you have to go to cover for 2d6 rounds or until reengaged. Even then...
It should be core, but few actually process that GURPS uses 1 round=1sec.

The two campaigns I ran it came up a few too many times because, say, reinforcements were responding and on their way (but of course one of the side effects of the really short melee rounds were that per-round the movement was pretty slow; this wasn't always a bad thing in closing engagements and such, but it meant you didn't have to be super far away for it to be forever before anyone got there). This was particularly obvious if I made the mistake of just ad-hoc saying "It'll be about a minute before they get there" in a system where a minute was forever (I mean, it was even forever in Hero where, depending on whether heroic or superheroic scale, the practical action time was half or a quarter as fast as GURPS, but in the latter it was largely meaningless since everything would absolutely be done before any backup arrived).

So I couldn't actually forget that time scale, and it became a persistent itch. I'm not sure it would have jumped out at me as much in a fantasy game, but damn it was hard to forget in a modern period game.

 

[rmcoen]

@Thomas Shey This has been my experience in every game I've played, from BattleTech to D&D, from Champions to GURPS, even for massive wargames. Battles are always resolved with what's there when the battle starts, because combat in games is so fast, there isn't time to move more than 1 room / map / house away. D&D battles these days are famously resolved in 3 rounds (more like 5-8 in my experience), BattleTech fights are over in a couple minutes, Champions fights - granted, haven't played in years - sometimes resolved before the first 12-phase "round" is done! Reinforcements, pauses to talk things out (or exchange insults), repositioning... none of this occurs in the 18-60 seconds a battle lasts (according to the rules).

That is, of course, off the topic of Character Sheets...

 

[Thomas Shey]

It used to be different in OD&D, but then, OD&D swung ridiculously in the other direction, where every round was a minute.

It just seems to be the sort of thing that's hard to get right. Even a serious attempt like EABA 2e got--weird.