D&D General On simulating things: what, why, and how?

[Charlaquin]

It would have to be a bonus action in 5e I would think. I prefer it a set bonus and then maybe fighting style grants a bonus w/ a reaction or bonus action or both. The idea that you have to use a whole action to raise a shield, which is protecting you even if it is not raised, seems a bit off to me.

An action in PF2 is more like half an action in 5e. You get three actions per turn, which can be move, draw weapon, attack; raise shield, attack, attack; move, move, move; whatever you want. Spells cost one action per component and are often flexible in how many components they involve with more powerful effects if you use more components (for example, heal affects one creature you touch with one component, one creature within 30 feet with two components, or each creature of your choice within 30 feet with three components.) Most special maneuvers cost multiple actions for some sort of additional benefit.

 

[dave2008]

An action in PF2 is more like half an action in 5e. You get three actions per turn, which can be move, draw weapon, attack; raise shield, attack, attack; move, move, move; whatever you want. Spells cost one action per component and are often flexible in how many components they involve with more powerful effects if you use more components (for example, heal affects one creature you touch with one component, one creature within 30 feet with two components, or each creature of your choice within 30 feet with three components.) Most special maneuvers cost multiple actions for some sort of additional benefit.

Yes, I am aware. I have the core rulebook, Bestiary, and GMG, I still think one action to raise shield to much. Now, if they revised the action economy to a 6 action system, as I have advocated in the PF forum, then one action might be acceptable.

 

[Umbran]

Verbiage seems to be a recurring problem, and I think that particular bit of verbiage ("high concept simulation") just might be a specific contributor here. There's a difference between simulation and emulation, and verisimilitude is yet another thing, with consistency contributing heavily to all three.

I have always found "high concept simulation" to be overreach for the word "simulation", in that "high concepts" are usually too abstract to simulate. There was a time when folks were trying to fit everything in gaming under three words, even if it called for some hammering of square pegs into round holes, and I think this was one of the results. I don't find a need to fit the function under "simulation".

In a practical sense, most of what I see happen under "high concept simulation" is what I'd call genre enforcement.

 

[pemerton]

When your archmage casts Lightning Bolt at a demon, you have rules to adjudicate that thing that just happened in the fiction, that simulate what would happen.

There is no what would happen. It's all made up.

In the case of fantasy stuff, of course someone at some point made up all those things.

Right. Nothing is being simulated. There's no simulation.

But if you want verisimilitude, those made up things are consistently used to create a simulation of the event (lightning bolt is lightning bolt, the same demon is depicted the same way).

This is a non-sequitur. JRRT wrote verisimilitudinous fantasy fiction. He didn't need AD&D mechanics to do so.

And notoriously, the AD&D mechanics put pressure on verisimilitude in some cases (eg why does a paralysed demon nevertheless get a saving throw vs the lightning bolt?). Not to mention that even if we hold the demon's hit points constant, between magic resistance, damage dice and saving throws the very same sort of event (an archmage hurling a lightning bolt at a Type VI demon) can mechanically produce results ranging from basically no effect, all the way to a dead demon. So what depiction, generated by whatever other method, would not be verisimilitudinous?

 

[Micah Sweet]

There is no what would happen. It's all made up.

Right. Nothing is being simulated. There's no simulation.

This is a non-sequitur. JRRT wrote verisimilitudinous fantasy fiction. He didn't need AD&D mechanics to do so.

And notoriously, the AD&D mechanics put pressure on verisimilitude in some cases (eg why does a paralysed demon nevertheless get a saving throw vs the lightning bolt?). Not to mention that even if we hold the demon's hit points constant, between magic resistance, damage dice and saving throws the very same sort of event (an archmage hurling a lightning bolt at a Type VI demon) can mechanically produce results ranging from basically no effect, all the way to a dead demon. So what depiction, generated by whatever other method, would not be verisimilitudinous?

So are you also saying that there's no such thing as simulation in a fantasy RPG? Again, this just seems like a way to end the conversation.

And JRRT created verisimilitude in a story, not a game. Stories don't need mechanics.

 

[pemerton]

I've played Riddle of Steel. It's great.

I played in a short campaign of Riddle of Steel about 10 years ago, and remember really liking the combat system. I don't remember much else about the game, to be honest.

Riddle of Steel is what you would call a "story" or "narrative" RPG. The PCs all have Spiritual Attributes - goals, convictions, emotions, etc - which are rated as dice pools, and which apply to relevant actions.

The designer of TRoS - Jake Norwood - wrote the Foreword to the 2011 edition of Burning Wheel. BW has a broadly similar design ethos to TRoS: harness mechanically heavy resolution processes, reminiscent of games like RuneQuest and Rolemaster, to the goal of intense, character-focused RPGing.

 

[pemerton]

The point of simulation is that when a rule causes a result it does so because that is what would happen in the world based on the agreed upon reality of that world. As opposed to causing a result because it makes for the best narrative, or because it makes for the most fun play

What is the agreed-upon reality of a Hero, and an Ogre, such that we can tall whether our simulation of a fight between a Hero and an Ogre is producing a result that is what would happen in that agreed-upon reality?

As far as I know, we have no answer other than whatever the mechanics for D&D happen to tell us. So now it counts as a simulation simply on the grounds that it is the outcome of the rules process and the rules process doesn't invite anyone to decide what would be the best narrative or what would be the most fun. Apoclaypse World satisfies those constraints - it generates outcomes via a rules and those rules don't require anyone to decide what would be the next narrative or what would be the most fun. So does Burning Wheel, but I doubt that you or @Micah Sweet would count them as simulations!

If a character is not supposed to be magical, I want them to be no more fantastic than action movie physics allow.

I'm not sure what counts as "action movie physics". Using action movie physics, what's the DC for a Hero to spring into the air and grab hold of the talons of a dragon flying 10 feet above them (similarly to how Tom Cruise-types leap into the air and grab hold of helicopter skids)? And what happens if the Hero tries and misses?

How do we divorce the concept of "action movie physics" from the concept of "what would make for the best narrative, or the most fun"?

I’d imagine those taking the opposite stance are considering the stat blocks/attributes “its properties,” invented though they may be.


And, similarly, seeing the relevant rulebooks as that meaningful process.

<snip>

the agreed upon framework at any given point suffices as that process.

All this seems to amount to is we used the rules to find out what happens. If that's the threshold for a simulation, what RPG isn't? Eg 4e D&D would obviously count as a simulation by these lights. So would Marvel Heroic RP.

What benefit is gained by relabelling playing a RPG according to its rules as simulation?

 

[pemerton]

So are you also saying that there's no such thing as simulation in a fantasy RPG? Again, this just seems like a way to end the conversation.

And JRRT created verisimilitude in a story, not a game. Stories don't need mechanics.

RPGs use mechanics to generate agreement on the shared fiction. That's their principal function. They're not needed to maintain verisimilitude, and I already posed a very well-known example of how they threaten verisimilitude. Another example has been given in this thread: the mechanics for gaining levels in D&D.

I'm familiar with the technical term (or jargon) simulationism to describe an approach to RPGing, and some mechanics and techniques that are associated with that approach. But as per the OP, that is not what this thread is about.

Using simulation in it's ordinary sense, as quoted by @AbdulAlhazred not too far upthread, there cannot be a simulation of an archmage blasting a Type VI demon with a lightning bolt, because there are no correctness conditions.

Rolemaster resolves it one way - the archmage spends spell points, the lightning bolt is resolved (mechanically) in the same way as a shot from a bow would be (using an attack table and associated crit tables), the demon's toughness is represented using devices including concussion hits ("meat points") and crit reduction (comparable to the SIZ stat in RQ) and perhaps spells that provide it with resistance to the elements.

AD&D resolves it a different way - the archmage expends a memorised spell (from a limited pool), the lightning bolt is resolved quite differently from how a bow attack would be (auto-damage with a save for half), the demon has a magic resistance stat and a saving throw and hit points, and it's far from clear what each of them corresponds to in the fiction (according to Gygax, both the hit points and the saving throw represent luck and skill, among other things; we're never really told what magic resistance is). The demon is as tall as a Fire Giant but has fewer hp (about the same number as an elephant) and does far less damage with its attacks; so it's not really clear what any of this is supposed to correspond to in the fiction either.

Burning Wheel resolves it yet a different way - the archmage performs a spell casting action which generates the possibility of "tax" (ie tiredness/exhaustion due to spell use), the attack is resolved differently from how a bow attack would be in some respects (auto-hit if the spell is cast successfully) but similarly in other respects (roll a die to determine the severity of the attack), and the upshot of the attack is a wound rated somewhere between "less than Superficial" (ie no effect) up to "Mortal" (ie the demon dies).

Which is the more accurate simulation? I assert that there is no answer to that question. (I can tell you which is more or less simulationist in the jargonistic sense, but again that's not the OP wanted to talk about.)

 

[Scott Christian]

Personally, I have always been more interested in the which and why a player decides to utilize simulation - because we all do to some extent. Some, I can readily grasp because they reflect the physics I encounter in the world. Others, I can grasp because, you know, magic. Others, I can't seem to get behind. Listening to others explain their "which" and "why" is fascinating to me.

 

[Reynard]

Nevermind.