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Message: <blockquote data-quote="P1NBACK" data-source="post: 5573263" data-attributes="member: 83768">How is that possibly true? You need to know how you are attacking to determine damage die, no? You can't just say, "I attack" without some sort of description, like, "with my axe..." and get a damage result. Not true. See above. The DM needs that information in order to resolve the attack. "How are you attacking? Are you using your axe, or your bow?" It's necessarily information to resolve the attack. Yup. Exactly. It's completely disassociated from what you are actually doing. If you have all the necessary information, "I attack with my sword." Sure. That's fiction though, right? Then we go to rules... "Roll d20. Roll for damage." 4E can occur like this: "Footwork Lure, Roll d20, Slide 1, Roll for damage." Success! "Oh, cool, I attack him with my sword and he falls forward." Or, it can be any other description you want to make up. "Oh, I swing my sword in the air and it creates a whirlwind that blows the guy toward me and I slap him in the face with my sword blade..." It doesn't really matter what you say, does it? There's a difference between ignoring the fiction, and not requiring the fiction. If someone says, "I hit AC. I do 10 damage." I'm going to say, "Huh?" Because it makes no sense. Did you attack with your axe? Or, did you use a dagger? "I attack with my axe" is sufficient. But, "AC, hit. 10 damage" is not. How do we know to apply 10 damage? Where did that come from? What may be happening there is, a lack of communication. Clearly, the player is drawing the 10 damage and attack vs. AC from somewhere? Right? It's like someone saying, "Dungeoneering. Success." How do you adjudicate that? What were they trying to do? You simply can't. You need the fiction to resolve it. You keep saying this. My response is, no you need details to determine d20 bonuses, damage type, etc. If I'm using my +1 sword, that is going to make a difference on my attack. If I'm using my dagger, that'll make a difference in damage. That's not entirely true. If the player says, "I swing at him with my sword!" You can't say, "Uh, no. I'm modifying that. Use your dagger instead." Well, maybe you can, but my players wouldn't have it. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f609.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=";)" title="Wink    ;)"  data-smilie="2"data-shortname=";)" /> Yup. Agreed. I never said all the rules of 4E are disassociated. Being "dazed" has particular fictional weight to it. You can't do anything. That's certainly fictional. You don't need "fancy words" for fiction. You just need to know what's happening. "I swing my axe." Is as simple as it goes. But, guess what? It's fiction. And, now we know what rules to apply: d20 attack, using axe damage dice.By contrast:"I use Butt Fandom Squeamish Fiery Death!" Cool: d20 attack, axe damage, knock prone, poison ongoing 5. See? What happened? Who knows? We don't need to know. Everything is in the real world on dice, minis, character sheets, etc.Edited to add: Actually, that's not entirely true. We know an axe was involved. I would say, "And, a guy is lying on the ground." But, apparently in 4E (according to many members of this board), "Prone" is not a fictional thing - it's simply a mechanical condition. It doesn't inform us about what actually happened, but what "state" (combat advantage, etc.) the target is in. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> I disagree of course, especially since they errated the condition to say, "When a creature is prone, it is lying down."</blockquote>

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