Reason 'squares' is better than 'feet': the metric system

[Bold or Stupid]

I like squares, as does my entire gaming group. They are an abstraction to make things easier. We don't see enough advantage from the diagonal 1-2-1 counting to miss it.

I my game worlds the unit "Square" will exist it will refer to the stanard unit of cloth most people buy 60"*60" this is based on the fact that most cloth is 60" IRL and the sqaures would be easy to masure out. Thus my players can describe areas is terms of squares.

 

[Danzauker]

"You know how they call a 10 foot pole in Amsterdam?"
"How?"
"Royale pole"

Sorry. It HAD to be done.

 

[Wolfspider]

"You know how they call a 10 foot pole in Amsterdam?"
"How?"
"Royale pole"

Sorry. It HAD to be done.

No, it didn't.

 

[Derren]

Yes, I agree with your "metric" friend.
I am not good at judging distances, but trying to it with measurement units I never use in real life? Far too difficult. I always have to recalculate in my head.

You use square measurment in real life?

 

[SaffroN]

My objections to it are two-fold.

1. The term is pure crunch and can not be used for fluff, making a disconnect between the two that is entirely unnecessary.
2. It is in fact more difficult to use and by naming a 1 dimensional measurement after a 2 dimensional shape they invite confusion.

1. Its just a name change. 5ft = 1 square. Its very easy to put back into place. I will be telling my players distances in meters frequently. The term is pure fluff and can be changed easily.
2. i don't see how you can claim that squares can cause confusion more than anything else. For me it is the most simple of all possible measurements. I could see how it could be confusing if you were trying to describe the dimensions of a barrel to your players. But i would like to think that most players would only use squares on the battle mat.

 

[malraux]

At least for me, multiplying by five is a much faster mental action than dividing by five.

 

[Lackhand]

You use square measurment in real life?

Sure, all the time, on the D&D battle map.

 

[Danzauker]

You use square measurment in real life?

In Japan they measure houses in tatami, which aren't even square!!!

OMG, D&D 4E IS SO ANIME!!!

 

[Geron Raveneye]

I my game worlds the unit "Square" will exist it will refer to the stanard unit of cloth most people buy 60"*60" this is based on the fact that most cloth is 60" IRL and the sqaures would be easy to masure out. Thus my players can describe areas is terms of squares.

I have to say, I like this one, at least as a reasoning for area measurements in 5' squares. It's akin to measuring a room in Japan in multiples of "tatami mats".

2. i don't see how you can claim that squares can cause confusion more than anything else. For me it is the most simple of all possible measurements. I could see how it could be confusing if you were trying to describe the dimensions of a barrel to your players. But i would like to think that most players would only use squares on the battle mat.

The question is more if the battlemap represents all of D&D reality, and hence the rest of the world is represented by a giant battlemap, or if the battlemap is simply a tool to make representing battles easier, and hence is only an abstraction of reality for the duration of combat. Because I doubt that "squares" is the most simple of all possible measurements for anything outside of pushing minis around on a battlemap. It opens up all kinds of wonky consequences, from talking about "square squares" when measuring REAL areas, to the question how you measure out a perfect circle, to the wonkyness of diagonal movement leaking out into the "real world" of D&D. Using an area measurement to measure linear distances is...extremely abstact, and generally found in boardgames (HeroQuest, for example), and a lot less useful for anything else than that usage.

 

[Mirtek]

The German edition uses 5 feet = 1 meter = 1 square on the table

Actually no, it doesn't. The German (and AFAIK any other european country with metric system and an own edition) uses 5 feet = 1.5 meters = 1 square on the table