Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Jer" data-source="post: 7616401" data-attributes="member: 19857">I think the arguments about subtraction and negative numbers being a bit more difficult for folks to grasp have some merit - especially among the folks who were interested in the game but were not mathematically inclined (which is part of the reason I think Vampire took off the way it did - you didn't need to do any addition or subtraction, just counting dice over a threshold).But in addition, a stumbling block that I remember from D&amp;D and bringing new people on board was the inconsistencies on the character sheet and at the table.&nbsp; Sometimes lower numbers were better, sometimes higher numbers were better.&nbsp; When you leveled up some things went up (like hp and thief skills) and some things went down (like saving throws and THAC0).&nbsp; Sometimes beneficial magic items gave you a bonus as a positive number (+1 to hit), sometimes the bonus was negative (-1 to AC).&nbsp; Sometimes you were trying to roll over a number (to hit, saves) and sometimes roll under (thief skills, or ability checks for those of us who used them).&nbsp; And it's another reason that I think Vampire took off and opened things up to a wider audience - yeah it had a lot of quirks, but the die rolling was always a consistent mechanic and as a new player you didn't end up feeling stupid for not remembering the quirks of whichever subsystem you were using for a particular check.ETA: And while I was composing this, Tony Vargas made a similar observation - ninja'd!</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Jer, post: 7616401, member: 19857"] I think the arguments about subtraction and negative numbers being a bit more difficult for folks to grasp have some merit - especially among the folks who were interested in the game but were not mathematically inclined (which is part of the reason I think Vampire took off the way it did - you didn't need to do any addition or subtraction, just counting dice over a threshold). But in addition, a stumbling block that I remember from D&D and bringing new people on board was the inconsistencies on the character sheet and at the table. Sometimes lower numbers were better, sometimes higher numbers were better. When you leveled up some things went up (like hp and thief skills) and some things went down (like saving throws and THAC0). Sometimes beneficial magic items gave you a bonus as a positive number (+1 to hit), sometimes the bonus was negative (-1 to AC). Sometimes you were trying to roll over a number (to hit, saves) and sometimes roll under (thief skills, or ability checks for those of us who used them). And it's another reason that I think Vampire took off and opened things up to a wider audience - yeah it had a lot of quirks, but the die rolling was always a consistent mechanic and as a new player you didn't end up feeling stupid for not remembering the quirks of whichever subsystem you were using for a particular check. ETA: And while I was composing this, Tony Vargas made a similar observation - ninja'd! [/QUOTE]

Verification