D&D General [rant]The conservatism of D&D fans is exhausting.

[AnotherGuy]

Good grief @el-remmen your first quote by @NN is from page 167

 

[Maxperson]

There is no difference between "confirming" and "making it up". I mean, any other GM in your position might have decided to use the absence of a farrier as a clue, turning an oversight into an opportunity - "Hmm, yes, it is strange that there's no farrier in this village."

There is in fact a difference. I came up with that town waaaaaaay before that session, so that's when the farrier was there, not during the session the player reminded me that I had forgotten to write it down.

The difference is timing. Making it up when the player asks is creating it on the spot. Confirming the existence of something that was in the town prior is not making it up on the spot.

This is just a particular illustration of the general point, that when we are making things up the metaphysics bend to our wills. The village has no objective existence which establishes that it does have a farrier in it.

It has no real world existence, but it does objectively exist within the world that I use. I put it there. It was written down.

This is contentious, as I assume you know from reading the thread. Some posters thing that the more skilled a burglar is, the less likely they are to blunder into someone on the other side of the door they are opening.

1) You can only be less likely to blunder into that person that is behind the door if that person is there regardless of that roll
2) The more skilled PC will be less likely to blunder into someone behind the door, but the skill used isn't lockpicking. Lockpicking only deals with opening the lock. Perception, experience, etc. will allow the PC to be aware of someone behind that door and perhaps wait to open it until after the cook leaves.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Then it would have happened on success or failure. The fact that it only happens on a failure, that the room is empty on a success is the issue.

But, that's not your answer so I accept that you will never acknowledge that someone else could legitimately run their game differently.

Then why does the dragon only exist there because the roll """failed"""? (I know it's not a "failure" because that's not how we classify the results from random-monster rolls, but for most parties, running into a red dragon on a random-monster roll would be at least as bad, if not MUCH worse, than most "failures" proper.)

The dragon's existence is exactly as undefined until after the roll completes. Why is indefinite existence until after a a roll completes acceptable in one context and utterly forbidden in the other? Why is the hand that throws the die relevant to acceptability?

These are questions I've asked multiple times, and I've yet to see an answer that isn't circular reasoning or proof by assertion.

If the assertion is that the problem is the indefinite nature of the dice, then both things are precisely equally at fault. I have yet to see a single post even attempting to indicate an actual difference that isn't "the GM is the one who rolled it" (which, again, why does the hand that throws the die matter?), or a simple declaration that it IS different with no further explanation.

 

[Umbran]

While I probably am sympathetic to your viewpoint, if you are saying having a cook in the kitchen in the middle of the night is implausible, let me say there are midnight snackers who end up in the kitchen all the time. So it's not that implausible.

Also, we are not talking about you cooking dinner for your family with modern grocery stores and cooking equipment. This is a pseudo-medieval cook for a household, who has to do everything, from scratch, every day, without electrically-powered tools. While 2:30 AM might be a bit early, 4 AM probably would not be.

 

[Emerikol]

@pemerton just for clarification. Are you arguing that even those that eschew formally making things up on the spot are doing so informally anyway? I'm trying to understand what you are saying. It seems a bit inflammatory if you are saying what I described.

 

[Emerikol]

Also, we are not talking about you cooking dinner for your family with modern grocery stores and cooking equipment. This is a pseudo-medieval cook for a household, who has to do everything, from scratch, every day, without electrically-powered tools. While 2:30 AM might be a bit early, 4 AM probably would not be.

I wasn't sure the context despite the thread being D&D general. Often times these things stray off the track but I agree in any sort of medieval setting people are away much later and much earlier. I read that some people had an hour in the middle of the night where they'd get a snack and interact before going back to bed.

 

[AlViking]

While I probably am sympathetic to your viewpoint, if you are saying having a cook in the kitchen in the middle of the night is implausible, let me say there are midnight snackers who end up in the kitchen all the time. So it's not that implausible.

As a random encounter? No problem. Added as a result of a failed attempt to open a lock when it takes the same amount of time, makes the same amount of noise? That's why I wouldn't do it.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Also, we are not talking about you cooking dinner for your family with modern grocery stores and cooking equipment. This is a pseudo-medieval cook for a household, who has to do everything, from scratch, every day, without electrically-powered tools. While 2:30 AM might be a bit early, 4 AM probably would not be.

Moreover, in households from medieval times all the way up through the Victorian era, servants were never supposed to be seen by residents in most cases, unless they were direct personal servants. Messes were, in effect, supposed to seem like they magically cleaned themselves, with entire staircases, hallways, etc. all present, almost a shadow household to keep the servants out of sight. Many of them would do the majority of their work only after the "masters" had gone to bed.

So the idea that you have a cook--or some other servant--awake at 2:30 doing something generally in that area? Not only possible, extremely likely because of the social mores of medieval, renaissance, and early-modern Europe.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

As a random encounter? No problem. Added as a result of a failed attempt to open a lock when it takes the same amount of time, makes the same amount of noise? That's why I wouldn't do it.

What makes this different from the DM rolling on a random encounter table? This seems even more related than the previous examples, because now it's (quite literally) a direct connection. Failing to pick a lock nearly guarantees that you've spent a lot of time trying. You don't spend two seconds and then realize "oh, unpickable". That stuff takes time. And time spent locked down, in one specific place, doing something that does make noise, is one of the greatest risks to a would-be thief. That's why locks exist. Locks don't guarantee people can't get in. They make getting in sufficiently slow and onerous that burglars decide to burgle elsewhere.

For goodness' sake, this roll IS specifically tied both diegetically and physically to whether or not someone MIGHT get discovered. That's literally the physical reason why locks exist! This has greater similarity to what locks truly do! It has the form of truth! It IS VERISIMILITUDINOUS!

 

[el-remmen]

Good grief @el-remmen your first quote by @NN is from page 167

Would you believe I re-read all 1396 intervening pages?