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Enchanted Trinkets Complete--a hardcover book containing over 500 magic items for your D&D games!

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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Willie the Duck" data-source="post: 9827461" data-attributes="member: 6799660">The <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/resource-management-or-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-about-rations-and-love-mana.716091/#post-9795236" target="_blank">OP</a> was asking why people liked certain playstyles. I don't see that it was exclusively in the context of any specific game style. My understanding of the OP premise was to dissect the reason why people like/dislike the playstyle. Re: wargaming--haakon1 also mentioned D&D's wargaming roots, and they are undeniable. D&D started as an add-on to a wargame (+braunstein). I'm not 100% sure if the logistics aspect of the game was more contingent on that*, or EGG's notion about what players of this new proto-game liked to do ("fight things and collect treasure") and creating a play dynamic around the important decisions that come up in that context (press-on/press-your-luck or retreat with what you've collected so far). Either way, the focus on encumbrance and reward for how much loot you could cart out of the dungeon (often in heavy piles of copper coins) make very clear the initial focus on logistics that the game had. *one of the corollary points of the game being based on a wargame is that it must be something more than a wargame, else it wouldn't exist -- they already had one of those-Chainmail. That's why it's so interesting to me that many people whom I know started in the (pre-2E) TSR era didn't or don't now want to deal with that kind of logistics. Also the places in the game rules indicate that the devs also didn't (always) want to deal with it (ex: bags of holding showing up in LBB oD&D, the entire basic/classic line devoting a fixed encumbrance to rations/survival gear and not updating that when the game supposedly shifts to wilderness hexcrawling). I think that's what you, GMMichael, and others have been giving examples of. It's certainly worked for some of my groups. I think what happened historically is that, instead of making it exciting, many groups simply ignored it/glossed over it/made or found fixes to not have to worry about it. That's where I think some added support in the rules text might have done something to sway some minds. In a BRP-based game my group kitbashed together, we made an entire social rules system which included clothing. There was a rock-paper-scissors chart of what various outfits were strong and weak against, as well as overall levels of effect. This was effectively the 'goals/collectables' for the party Face characters (whereas fighting types might be looking for high-quality weapons and armor, etc.; and casters new spells, etc.). It allowed a lot of variety, planning, coordination, and trade-offs (so logistics, briefly). It's a great example of how you can make logistics fun, and I think a reason it had so much buy-in was because it wasn't a commodity-level thing you just selected off an equipment list when going to town to re-stock. Instead, you had to find out that the courtier color to wear was crimson, that wearing 1000 gp earings would be seen as putting yourself above the lord you were attempting to influence, and that the local fashion requires rolled cuffs.</blockquote>

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