Game Balance - A Study in Imperfection (forked)

[Dannyalcatraz]

That's always been a D&D cliche that I've found slightly mystifying. If the player, who plays D&D as a hobby, know that a mummy is vulnerable to fire, why wouldn't the character, whose life depends on knowing how to fight monsters?

Well a 1st level PC shouldn't be a know-it-all...and not everything's vulnerabilities are as obvious as a Mummy's.

Why, after all, should a farmboy who just traded his plow in for a shortsword and a battered shield last week know that some critter living deep underground can have the adhesive on its grasping tentacles be diluted/dissolved by high-proof alcohol?

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

My 5th level PC did "no damage" to some kind of rat-human hybrid monster using a regular dagger, so he whipped out a silver dagger and stabbed it again. The DM tried to get pissy about "metagaming", but seriously, what kind of idiot doesn't know that you try the obscure metals when regular steel isn't doing the job. And how did this hypothetical person manage escape from the Adventurer's Mart without a helpful sales representative explaining it to him.

And that PC would have been surprised if the silver dagger hadn't worked, right?

Because if it were actually an extraplanar critter who was simply immune to damage from daggers (or maybe non-magical weapons) and merely LOOKED like a were-rat, but was damaged by playing pan-pipes and your 5th level PC were prepared for THAT eventuality...

 

[Nifft]

And that PC would have been surprised if the silver dagger hadn't worked, right? Because it was actually a critter who was simply immune to damage from daggers (or maybe non-magical weapons) and merely LOOKED like a were-rat.

The PC was surprised that his regular masterwork dagger didn't work. If neither of his daggers had worked, he would have run away.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Raven Crowking]

Loads of experience with high-proof alcohol (moonshine)?

Seriously, though, pre-industrial people had (and have) a large body of lore for dealing with situations that they encounter, and some of that includes knowing how to apply adhesives and clean up afterward.

The origins (and original presentation) of some monsters implies, IMHO, that the designers expected the players to know this sort of thing. I.e., to apply general knowledge to the specifics encountered.


RC

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Seriously, though, pre-industrial people had (and have) a large body of lore for dealing with situations that they encounter, and some of that includes knowing how to apply adhesives and clean up afterward.

The key phrase is "situations that they encounter."

You're a plowboy who just bought his first real weapon and armor. A week later, you find yourself clanking around in the dark, hundreds of feet below the earth...and something's tentacles whip out of the even deeper darkness of an underground chasm to drag off the Gnome thief and the first thing you reach for is hootch?

I'm calling shenanigans.

This unknown creature could have suckers or claws or thorns or something on those tentacles- TENTACLES...limbs quite unlike the arms and legs of the surface creatures John Farmer has seen for the first 16 years of his life- to aid its grip, and he knows that he's supposed to use alcohol?

 

[ExploderWizard]

The key phrase is "situations that they encounter."

You're a plowboy who just bought his first real weapon and armor. A week later, you find yourself clanking around in the dark, hundreds of feet below the earth...and something's tentacles whip out of the even deeper darkness of an underground chasm to drag off the Gnome thief and the first thing you reach for is hootch?

I'm calling shenanigans.

Seems reasonable to me. If a tentacle just dragged away a buddy I would need a stiff drink too!

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

That would be a sensible reaction...right after running away screaming like a little girl!

 

[Raven Crowking]

The key phrase is "situations that they encounter."

You're a plowboy who just bought his first real weapon and armor. A week later, you find yourself clanking around in the dark, hundreds of feet below the earth...and something's tentacles whip out of the even deeper darkness of an underground chasm to drag off the Gnome thief and the first thing you reach for is hootch?

I'm calling shenanigans.

St. Cuthbert of the Cudgel willing, you are not "a plowboy who just bought his first real weapon and armor". Because, in 1e anyway, if you are a normal man (and not someone who, say, trained as a fighter or something), you can kiss your adventuring career goodbye.

In 3e, I am guessing that a Commoner 1 is also in trouble.

Moreover, if I am a 1st level fighter and the DM says "something's tentacles whip out of the even deeper darkness of an underground chasm to drag off the Gnome thief", I am going to assume that the 1st level thief is a goner, and my first thought is run!

(I might hit the hooch later, to calm my nerves.)

How would metagaming tell the players which of myraid tentacled monsters they were facing, anyway? Only reading the DM's notes would do that, and that is something I frown upon.


RC

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

How would metagaming tell the players which of myraid tentacled monsters they were facing, anyway? Only reading the DM's notes would do that, and that is something I frown upon.

That's kind of my point- players who routinely use knowledge their PC has no reason to know can be quite disruptive...so I have no problem with DMs who crack down on that kind of behavior.

 

[Nifft]

The key phrase is "situations that they encounter."

Nah, there's also "situations they hear about". Damn near everyone in Western civilization knows you need silver (often in the form of a bullet) to kill a werewolf, and I guarantee this is not a situation we have all encountered.

How a PC might know about the alcohol thing:
- "I figured it might be some kind of plant-monster, and we all know how you get sap out of wool..."
- "Actually I was trying to soak it in alcohol so's I could light it on fire better."
- "Uncle Bob told me he could sell his hooch for a whole gold coin if he labeled it 'Roper Tentacle Cure'. I guess this is why."

Cheers, -- N