Celebrim said:
Of all the perilous turns this thread has made, this to me is the most dangerous.
I'm going to refrain from replying to that in the way I think it deserves.
The posters in this thread so far have successfully managed to avoid taking anything personally. Let's not meta-discuss the discussion and risk blowing that.
Secondly, I've managed to branch off from my original thesis in the past few posts.
Yes, in as much as I think 'consistant standards' are a hallmark of a well refereed game, I think that 'my way' is objectively better than the alternatives. The alternatives are more likely to confuse the players, whose expectations must unavoidably be in no small part created by the rules (specifically, the rules that they've experienced). The only way to get around this IMO is to creatively signal that off stage events aren't really part of the game, and I think that blows emersion all to heck. But this is, I admit, purely an argument over opinion and not something I think I can prove beyond any reasonable argument.
But my actual thesis doesn't depend on my way being better. My actual thesis, that the game rules are the physics of the game world is not currently being challenged. In particular, in arguing whether or not my way is objectively better, the people on the other side of the debate are increasingly arguing for a game system which has as its formal resolution system two action resolution systems - one for PC's and one for non-PC's - and in effect, PC's move around in a pocket universe in which one set of physics apply, and NPC's outside of thier radius operate under a different set of rules. But this set up, whether it is incongrous or whether it is ideal, is still a universe where the physics have been described by the rules. The rule exempting the area outside of the PC's pocket universe is still one of the rules of the game, and the action-resolution system outside of the PC's pocket unverse (bad as I think it is) is still one that can be described. No one has as yet advocated playing in a game universe wear my assertion that the game rules are always the physics of the game world doesn't apply. I described one such universe, and so far there have been no takers that think that is a good thing.
Celebrim, I think that the narrativists claim that there aren't physics to the universe; if the DM declares "The world is such." then the world is such (hopefully in accordance with the wishes of the the players and the development of the story). There are no physics, and consistency is not needed nor required. Characters do not make plans or decisions based on their in-world expectations of the universe in this model; all characters (including the PCs) base their actions entirely upon their shared understanding of the narrative. The universe is something like that of Kidd Rad's meta-game universe; each character is in essence programmed by the narrative moment by moment, and if we see a longsword tend do deal 1d8 damage to various characters in the world, it's only because it was dramatically appropriate to happen at that time to that character.
Heck, I even agree with this view; however, the only narrative I will expect from it is "What the dice and rules say.", and conflicting with this narrative will produce frustration and resentment. Moreover, I have an extremely low tolerance for having characters simply ignore glaring inconsistency in the game world; if it is possible for falls to be dire in a way that being stabbed by monsters isn't, then the rules should reflect this, and if high-level characters should be vulnerable to single sudden injuries, the rules should reflect this as well. I want a persistent world, in which causes and effects don't spontaneously warp solely because the GM thinks it was a good idea. In fact, I cheerfully submit (especially given the examples already presented) that, if you have players who care about the rules, there is no reason to use the examples presented. You've established a character as having certain properties? You want to have something in-game interact with him to produce a particular effect? Then you look at what exists in-game that can have that effect, and choose from that set, or, if there is nothing (or the rules of the game fail to simulate what you're trying to do completely).
D&D is not a world simulator. It is a heroism simulator; there are clear, explicit, unambiguous rules as to what heroes are and what they can accomplish. I, by and large, like these assumptions; mucking with them in pursuit of greater realism does not generally result in a superior play experience for me. Altering the rules to produce a different-but-better consistent universe? Good. Making rulings in violation of rules to the contrary to acheive a narrative effect of questionable desirability? Bad.
And, I'll add, nonrealistic. When presented with a set of dice that keep rolling fives and sixes, the reasonable explanation is not that they are lucky dice, but they are weighted. If my character engages in battles that a human has a slim chance of survival and keeps surviving, then at some point, it's more reasonable to assume that I'm not human than that the odds just keep lining up like that.
