Game rules are not the physics of the game world

[S'mon]

Thanks Celebrim, very enlightening - and as I am married to an American and likely to be moving to the USA in a few years, also potentially useful.

 

[S'mon]

nor any worse wound than being stabbed by a shortsword (which is to say, lethal to most, insignificant to you and other heroes).

If the hero deliberately stabs himself with shortsword in attempted lethal manner (hara-kiri style, say), I'd make that a Coup de Gras at minimum. If he nicks himself lightly on the arm in the manner of a pathetic goblin attacking him, then sure, d6 damage.

 

[AZRogue]

Well, one way to figure it out would be to put on a Ring of Regeneration and fall off a horse until the cows came home, and not suffer a broken neck, nor any worse wound than being stabbed by a shortsword (which is to say, lethal to most, insignificant to you and other heroes). This would then lead you to believe that if there's nothing special about falling off a horse that violates what you thought you knew of the world, something must be off with the hero; the most obvious solution is that he wasn't actually a hero*.

* Hero again being used as a term of art to describe a sufficently-leveled character.

Haha, I can't see that happening at my table, but I'd love if it did.

Player: "The old Hero of Northmarch, Thud, died from falling off a horse? INCONCEIVABLE! He is a HERO! It's impossible for us to die from falling off a horse or, indeed, even from jumping from a tall mountain. I must discover the truth for myself. I put on my Ring of Regeneration and mount my horse. I will fall off my horse over and over again, every waking moment for one week, until my neck breaks. We will discover the truth of this soon enough! The world no longer makes sense to me!!!!"

Me: "No need for the experiment. People can, indeed, die from falling off a horse. Would you like to investigate to see if that's what actually happened to Thud? Do you suspect foul play?"

Player: "I'm not sure. First, I have to discover if the universe works in this way. Can an actual neck, if it's attached to one of the mighty, be broken by a fall from a mere eight feet off the ground? I begin my test. What do I roll?"

Me: "Nothing. This isn't DnD Mythbusters, I already told you how the world works."

Player: "I don't believe you! I must find out for myself!!!"

Me: <sigh> "Okay, then. Get out your d20 and roll initiative."

Player: "Why?"

Me: "Because, you've annoyed the Gods as much as you have annoyed me and Moradin, Pelor, and Bahamut have all appeared to kill you."

All the other Players: "Kill him. We need to get this thing moving. We work tomorrow."

 

[S'mon]

Me: "Because, you've annoyed the Gods as much as you have annoyed me and Moradin, Pelor, and Bahamut have all appeared to kill you."

All the other Players: "Kill him. We need to get this thing moving. We work tomorrow."

Hm, I'd just have gone with:

"OK, on the 84th fall your neck breaks."

 

[AZRogue]

Hm, I'd just have gone with:

"OK, on the 84th fall your neck breaks."

Yeah, that's much better. I like to kill things with a bang.

 

[S'mon]

The default assumption of D&D says nothing about protagonist, antagonist, interest, or extra; all characters play by the same rules. This is a default, shared assumption about the universe, encoded into the rules. You wanna change it, change it. But please understand that in doing so, you're changing a lot of other things, both mechanical and narrative.

The rules definitely don't say or imply that NPCs interacting with other NPCs off-camera are supposed to use the rules. That would be impossible to run.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

Thanks for that.

Yeah, I'm firmly in the second category. As a matter of fact, I would say that the first category can't even exist, really, because how would a character, in-game, know that great heroes CAN'T die from falling off a horse? As a matter of fact, once I said that it happened, reality would have shown that character, in-game, that he was wrong. He should then say something like "wow, I thought great heroes couldn't die from falling off a horse. But that guy just did. Live and learn."

um, yeah. As soon, you mean, as you say that an npc says that's what happened, you mean? As opposed to "hrm, that seems impossible to happen. Perhaps this isn't really the king who died, or the king really wasn't the hero he claimed to be, or there was another cause of death, or something else consistent with both the reality my character experiences and what I am learning here..." ? I would find a game where I was expected to just take everything at face value until a narratively enhanced npc spoon fed me the part I needed to think critically about pretty boring.

Your question about how the characters would know what was plausible could be easily answered by reading this thread I would think. The entire second category (which does exist, thanks) is just the idea that the PCs actually experience the things we roleplay, and remember them happening, and even integrate their experiences into their view of 'how things work' aka physics. It's that simple. If my character has actually experienced everything that has happened so far in the campaign, and has some idea of both what it takes to slay a dragon, and what it takes to kill someone who has what it takes to slay a dragon, why would you ask how they would know to apply that knowledge?

 

[AZRogue]

The rules definitely don't say or imply that NPCs interacting with other NPCs off-camera are supposed to use the rules. That would be impossible to run.

I agree. I don't think that the game was ever designed to be ran that way, in any edition.

 

[Kahuna Burger]

Well, I think I get it. You know how the villians always empty their guns at Superman? And they're always surprised when it doesn't do anything? Well, if you assume that A the default assumption is that people can be shot (or die falling off of horses), and B you are incapable of noticing that in specific cases (such as Kryptonians or legendary heroes) this never actually happens, then you're surprised every time your bullets bounce off,

This reminds me of a 50th anniversary of superman special, which included "interviews" with supervillains as well as common thugs. And there was this one guy going "The money we wasted in bullets! It was like we were convinced that if we could hit that S at just the right angle, that bullet would work!"

You also get a universe in which villians, heroes, extras, and designated victims all know their place, and act according to the Narrative, rather than the Narrative being formed from what each of those characters (who believes themself to be the hero of their own story) chooses to do (or is simulated choosing to do, based on the DM's approximations).

Stories in which the actions of the NPCs and the tangible results of the universe bend to how the Narrative considers you do not entertain me.

They would entertain me only when running a Discworld campaign. Within that setting "narrative causality" exists as an actual universal force, and thus is allowed. I'd also note that while folks have accused the rules as physics" side of being "order of the stick silly" a world in which there really are two classes of people - PCs and npcs - is very "order of the stick" as well.

 

[AZRogue]

The entire second category (which does exist, thanks) is just the idea that the PCs actually experience the things we roleplay, and remember them happening, and even integrate their experiences into their view of 'how things work' aka physics. It's that simple. If my character has actually experienced everything that has happened so far in the campaign, and has some idea of both what it takes to slay a dragon, and what it takes to kill someone who has what it takes to slay a dragon, why would you ask how they would know to apply that knowledge?

I've never seen a man fall of a horse and break his neck. Yet I know that such CAN happen because it has happened to people before (the horse thing is probably not neccessary--we can just as easily say a person who falls about 10' and breaks their neck).

Using the analogy that the NPC killed a dragon, and the PC has killed a dragon, and the PC knows that he can't die from falling off a horse so therefore the NPC must not be able to die from falling off a horse isn't a good one. Just because "A"-the player, and "B"-the NPC, have both killed a dragon does not mean that they are both going to be subject to "C"-breaking a neck from falling.

The rules can never accurately simulate the physics of a world. They are in place to provide a structure for the players to interact with the world and to help the DM adjudicate the results. The rest of the world doesn't need this strict structure because there's no need to adjudicate their actions. I know what I intend and so can provide the description of events to the players directly.