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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 7752747" data-attributes="member: 996">Nod.  You're saying that the sense of mystery is helpful in achieving the goal of immersion, I'm saying that a sense of immersion is helpful in achieving the goal of mystery (or maybe I should say 'uncertainty' or 'disocvery' or 'wonder').  Six of one, half-dozen of the other.  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> The point is, you can't go letting players make a magic-item 'wish list' OOC, that the DM will even take into consideration.  They could, IC, learn about and decide to quest for specific items, of course.  And here's the problem I so often encounter when defending this style to someone who doesn't appreciate it, someone who does will come in with claims like this that won't make sense to the other side, at all.  We are talking about a minor/optional difference evinced by one ed of D&D, and you just ascribed an intractable level of the same issue kind of issue in every edition of D&D, especially the classic ones where this particular style arguably orginated and was used with the greatest enthusiasm.  And that's going to seem like a blatant contradiction of any point I may have managed to make in explaining the issue with "wish listing" items... Again, you're introducing a blatant contradiction:  compared to going through spells in any ed or the rules for maneuvers in 3.x/PF, parsing a power is fast & unintrusive.   Funny thing is, you just game an example of a complicated vs a simple rule as if both were complicated.  Sure, the latter might have been comlicated for the designer to create in the context of the whole, more 'balanced,' game, but as far as understanding an resolving one power, it's about as simple as you can get without an even greater level of abstraction:  like 'roll hit,' 'roll damage.' The problem with too-specific rules for item creation is that they can set you up with the same problems as a wish list.  If a healing potion requires treant sap or troll blood, for instance, those monsters had better be fairly common in your world if healing potions are going to be fairly common - what's more, if the players gain OOC knowledge of the rules-dictated ingredients, they can meta-game to manufacture opportunities to manufacture items.  OTOH, if it's just Xgp of materials, you just need a basic economy set up to determine availability.  You can fill in the details of what the materials are for color to match your world.  And, yeah, if you're winging it, should maybe write it down - though magic is supposed to be pretty wonky... Having had many of these discussion, I've reached the conclusion that there's no objective level or degree of abstraction or detail or whatever that is, however subjectively, a line that, once crossed, is too much.  Rather, it appears the issue with a given mechanic getting in the way of the style of play is subjective to the point of being entirely arbitrary, and if there is a consistent determinant, at all, it's long familiarity with and acceptance of working around the mechanic in question to get the desired feel from the game.While that's not an invalid issue, trying to design a new game (or meaningfully improved version of an existing game) around it is futile.  It's, at it's least destructive, an unfortunate source of innertia in the hobby.  It's nothing to do with the kind of person I am, and I do often enjoy & run the style we're defending.  (I do also enjoy playing & running in others, as well, which is a source of consternation in these debates - I look like I'm 'waffling' or arguing both sides just to argue.)It is just, in objective fact, that a TTRPG is an actual game.  No matter how avidly we may persue a style that tries to evoke a genre or model an imagined reality, the tools we are using to do so remain the rules & trappings (& inherrent limitations) of a game.  That or we end up played by Tom Hanks in the movie adaptation.  ;PLike I actually said, though, I appreciate that kind of style, which is why I often find myself defending it to pemerton &c.  I'm just not as convinced as some of my fellow adherents that a game must be mechanically lacking in order to facilitate it.  Hidden from the players in the old Gygaxian sense can certainly help, though. Once again, FATAL saves D&D from being the worst RPG of all time.  ;PAnd, its rediculous:  if you're running an ocean-going adventure, you should know who big the dock is before the party tries to moor its boat. I suppose LotR was just an example.  Residuum & magic-item economies won't resemble any other classic fantasy sub-genre, either.  It might harken to comic book supers or sci-fi, a bit, with Residuum taking the place of Marvel's Vibranium or Dune's Spice or whatever sort of unobtanium is smoothing over the throwaway details.   Well, we can agree to disagree on that one.   I quite liked it:  it had a very scientific, or at least practical, attitude towards magic and the workings of the five different kinds were delved into in some detail.  The sequel got more than a little wierd, though.  However, I don't recall any analog to Rediduum. I do agree that it was a neat/simple idea for dealing with the issue of making/re-making/liquidating magic items, though.  Though more on the "it's a game," pro-abstraction, level... <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /></blockquote>

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