D&D General Reification versus ludification in 5E/6E

[Lanefan]

Why is that a problem? The player has no idea how much damage a monster can do and no idea how that damage is calculated.

The only person with a problem is the sausage maker - the DM.

How did the monster do X damage is not a question that any dm should have to answer.

I highly disagree with the last. If a Hobgoblin walks up to me and clobbers me for 25 points damage using what looks like a mundane longsword, I think I-as-player (in or out of character, either way) have a right to ask "How the hell did it do that?" and expect to get some narration back that points to the cause e.g. "Even his muscles have muscles" or "She looks to have gone berserk" or something that I can use to inform my next move, assuming the 25 I just took didn't drop me.

Put another way: a player might not know how much damage a monster can do but should in theory know (or, from experience, be able to learn) what damage a longsword can do, and a longsword is a longsword no matter who or what happens to be wielding it at the time.

 

[Charlaquin]

One of the points I'm advocating for is that it is substance. Not just presentation and preference. That being worth doing means it is doing some work in the play of the game.

It is pretense, but so are many things of substance in the game. Monster stats themselves are a pretense.

I agree, but I say it’s preference because everyone draws a different line for where it stops being worth doing for them. Some amount of that artifice is sure to be desirable for anyone who’d rather be playing D&D than Yahtzee. But how much is desirable will vary from person to person, sometimes greatly so.

 

[GobHag]

I'm more of a player generally and I do in fact know how the sausage is made; I just do not care if you justify the Hobgoblin doing 2d10 with a longsword instead of a 1d8 by trying to use stuff like 'Hobgoblin Sword Training' instead of just going 'I need this enemy to do decent damage, so let's just give it 1d10'.

 

[Remathilis]

If a hobgoblin no stronger than the PC fighter swings a sword and hits much harder for no discernable reason, that's an in fiction issue. Unless magic is involved, which it isn't. The fiction needs to be consistent and make sense for many of us. If you don't mind it not making sense, that's fine. That works for you. It doesn't work for me.

It would not have been difficult to give the hobgoblin an ability to explain the damage increase. They should have done that.

You know, a while back we had a discussion about high level martial characters having powers beyond normal people. I distinctly recall saying I'd be fine with that as long as there was a in-fiction explanation on why a high level fighter could fly and I also recall vehement opposition to the idea that it needed any explanation or source of power. I even recall some people said "D&D is full of magic and a fighter could just become suffused with it as they gain levels."

So here is my explanation on why hobgoblins do more damage with a longsword: D&D is suffused with magic and a specific type of hobgoblin being discussed has absorbed enough of it to hit harder with a weapon than a human of similar size and strength. That particular hobgoblin statblock is a fey, so it's magic of the feywild that makes his sword swing sharper.

So you want to know why the hobgoblin does more damage with a longsword? It's magic, I don't have to explain $#!+.

 

[mamba]

And it’s 2008 again and everyone is up in arms about presentation and not substance.

the two very much intermingle here…

 

[Pedantic]

You know, a while back we had a discussion about high level martial characters having powers beyond normal people. I distinctly recall saying I'd be fine with that as long as there was a in-fiction explanation on why a high level fighter could fly and I also recall vehement opposition to the idea that it needed any explanation or source of power. I even recall some people said "D&D is full of magic and a fighter could just become suffused with it as they gain levels."

So here is my explanation on why hobgoblins do more damage with a longsword: D&D is suffused with magic and a specific type of hobgoblin being discussed has absorbed enough of it to hit harder with a weapon than a human of similar size and strength. That particular hobgoblin statblock is a fey, so it's magic of the feywild that makes his sword swing sharper.

So you want to know why the hobgoblin does more damage with a longsword? It's magic, I don't have to explain $#!+.

This is a weird stance. You realize the people on the "fighters need powersources" side are generally the same people on the "longswords should be a discrete thing" side, right?

 

[Hussar]

If a hobgoblin no stronger than the PC fighter swings a sword and hits much harder for no discernable reason, that's an in fiction issue. Unless magic is involved, which it isn't. The fiction needs to be consistent and make sense for many of us. If you don't mind it not making sense, that's fine. That works for you. It doesn't work for me.

It would not have been difficult to give the hobgoblin an ability to explain the damage increase. They should have done that.

Hobgoblin hits for 15 damage. How did he do it? Same way the fighter did. After all, a fighter can do 15 damage with a non magical long sword trivially easily. Battlemaster. Feat. Various other goodies.

If you cannot narrate a hobgoblin doing 15 damage with a long sword, how do you do it with a fighter?

 

[Maxperson]

You know, a while back we had a discussion about high level martial characters having powers beyond normal people. I distinctly recall saying I'd be fine with that as long as there was a in-fiction explanation on why a high level fighter could fly and I also recall vehement opposition to the idea that it needed any explanation or source of power. I even recall some people said "D&D is full of magic and a fighter could just become suffused with it as they gain levels."

I don't know who those people were, but most of the time I see a lot of people that want there to be an explanation for how, even if it's their training rises past the mundane and into the supernatural. And a lot on the other side. It's not one sided like you are implying there.

So here is my explanation on why hobgoblins do more damage with a longsword: D&D is suffused with magic and a specific type of hobgoblin being discussed has absorbed enough of it to hit harder with a weapon than a human of similar size and strength. That particular hobgoblin statblock is a fey, so it's magic of the feywild that makes his sword swing sharper.

So you want to know why the hobgoblin does more damage with a longsword? It's magic, I don't have to explain $#!+.

I'm not going to accept that any more than I would accept it for supernatural martial abilities.

 

[Maxperson]

Hobgoblin hits for 15 damage. How did he do it? Same way the fighter did. After all, a fighter can do 15 damage with a non magical long sword trivially easily. Battlemaster. Feat. Various other goodies.

Excellent. Then my PC can see and identify those abilities the same as he would the fighter. So specifically which ones were they and why aren't they written in the hobgoblin stat block?

If you cannot narrate a hobgoblin doing 15 damage with a long sword, how do you do it with a fighter?

Fighters have pre-established and identifiable abilities that allow for proper narration. Where are those for hobgoblins?

 

[Lanefan]

You know, a while back we had a discussion about high level martial characters having powers beyond normal people. I distinctly recall saying I'd be fine with that as long as there was a in-fiction explanation on why a high level fighter could fly and I also recall vehement opposition to the idea that it needed any explanation or source of power. I even recall some people said "D&D is full of magic and a fighter could just become suffused with it as they gain levels."

So here is my explanation on why hobgoblins do more damage with a longsword: D&D is suffused with magic and a specific type of hobgoblin being discussed has absorbed enough of it to hit harder with a weapon than a human of similar size and strength. That particular hobgoblin statblock is a fey, so it's magic of the feywild that makes his sword swing sharper.

So you want to know why the hobgoblin does more damage with a longsword? It's magic, I don't have to explain $#!+.

Magic, eh? Fine. Dispel Magic coming online in three...two...one...

This is exactly the sort of thing I mean when I say the player - both in and out of character - needs these rationales or explanations in order to be able to better deal with the threat faced by the character.