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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Professor Phobos" data-source="post: 4158275" data-attributes="member: 18883">Right. Now, I know I'm about to get hit with a lot of accusations of being a fiat-happy abuser of players, but let me relate a pair of anecdotes:I'm playing. This is a long time ago in a game not D&D. I come upon a door. A wooden door you might find in a modern suburban home (the kind I'm sure we've all angrily kicked a hole in whilst in our angsty teenage years). It is locked. I say, "I bash open the door, what with this big sledgehammer I have." The GM, thankfully, didn't make me roll to hit...but he had me roll damage until the door was broken. This took three-four rolls, 'cause I was rolling 1s that night. Now, granted, there were rules for breaking things and he was using them. And if there had been some time element involved, I'd have had no problem. I've used that trick myself. But there wasn't any time element involved. The house was empty. I was just tearing it apart for clues. So why was I rolling damage? It was a waste of time. Later, same game as it so happens, I have a vicious cultist at my mercy. Tied up to a chair. We (the group), having been rudely abused by this cult and driven to desperation, decide to torture the guy. So I say, "I cut out his eyeball with my pocket knife." The GM said I couldn't do it because there were no rules for hit locations. He said I could stab him (with a to hit roll and everything!) but not do any kind of specific injury. And that's exactly what I'm talking about here- I should have been able to do that. Just because the rules cover combat and injury doesn't mean they cover all violence and injury. If you really demand a roll to adjudicate eye-poppin' torture, I'm sure an "Intimidate" or "Interrogate' or a "Torture" or a "Knife" roll would have sufficed. Special case, adjudicated on the fly using common sense- and it would have improved the game experience tremendously.Yes! I was trying to get at this very idea, but my clumsy fingers could not articulate it!</blockquote>

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