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<blockquote data-quote="Balesir" data-source="post: 5776832" data-attributes="member: 27160"><p>No, because the real world does not work on DCs! But I have a vast amount more modelling information than "it's small and it's a pretty long way away". Most of that information is held as memories, impressions, pictures, imaginary constructs and comparisons with sensory information incoming, though - it's very hard indeed to communicate even a useful and significant proportion of it in a timely manner. Give me a couple of weeks where I take you out into a field and we shoot together at a variety of targets and I can show you enough to give you a fair idea - but over a gaming table or a discussion board it's just not really feasible.</p><p></p><p>And I'm not going back to "the game world is like the real world", here, except insofar as I can't see that the quantity of information the character archer will have is significantly less than the quantity <em>I</em> have when I'm shooting. Quantity, in this case, has a quality all of its own.</p><p></p><p>Sure - and the wizard's picture of the bowshot will be much more "pixellated" and much less accurate than the elf's - but the wizard will have a very much more complete model of the difficulty of casting a spell at the same target, I would expect.</p><p></p><p>I can see your issue, here - but the single word description would be just as much a 'slap' to immersion to me as the number apparently would to you. Because the brief verbal description leaves me with the feeling that I still have nowhere even approaching as good an idea as I would expect my character to have what the situation is. Numeric, system data I can internalise really quickly to have an <strong>internal picture</strong> of the task before my character that is actually a <strong><em>lot</em></strong> closer to the model I have in my head for things I actually do in the real world than some single-phrase summary. As such, I actually find immersion far <em>easier</em> if I am told the system details (provided they are brief!) than if I am told some physical description that, generally, does not even begin to describe all of the myriad relevant factors of the situation as they present to the (skilled) eye, ear, nose and touch of a character.</p><p></p><p>Edit: Actually, I think this illustrates an advantage I see in having explicit systems. That DC figure references a whole range of system detail that I already know, and thus does not need to communicated at that time. Learning the (fixed and unambiguous) system becomes 'investment' that can be leveraged to vastly increase the amount of information communicated at the table.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Balesir, post: 5776832, member: 27160"] No, because the real world does not work on DCs! But I have a vast amount more modelling information than "it's small and it's a pretty long way away". Most of that information is held as memories, impressions, pictures, imaginary constructs and comparisons with sensory information incoming, though - it's very hard indeed to communicate even a useful and significant proportion of it in a timely manner. Give me a couple of weeks where I take you out into a field and we shoot together at a variety of targets and I can show you enough to give you a fair idea - but over a gaming table or a discussion board it's just not really feasible. And I'm not going back to "the game world is like the real world", here, except insofar as I can't see that the quantity of information the character archer will have is significantly less than the quantity [I]I[/I] have when I'm shooting. Quantity, in this case, has a quality all of its own. Sure - and the wizard's picture of the bowshot will be much more "pixellated" and much less accurate than the elf's - but the wizard will have a very much more complete model of the difficulty of casting a spell at the same target, I would expect. I can see your issue, here - but the single word description would be just as much a 'slap' to immersion to me as the number apparently would to you. Because the brief verbal description leaves me with the feeling that I still have nowhere even approaching as good an idea as I would expect my character to have what the situation is. Numeric, system data I can internalise really quickly to have an [B]internal picture[/B] of the task before my character that is actually a [B][I]lot[/I][/B] closer to the model I have in my head for things I actually do in the real world than some single-phrase summary. As such, I actually find immersion far [I]easier[/I] if I am told the system details (provided they are brief!) than if I am told some physical description that, generally, does not even begin to describe all of the myriad relevant factors of the situation as they present to the (skilled) eye, ear, nose and touch of a character. Edit: Actually, I think this illustrates an advantage I see in having explicit systems. That DC figure references a whole range of system detail that I already know, and thus does not need to communicated at that time. Learning the (fixed and unambiguous) system becomes 'investment' that can be leveraged to vastly increase the amount of information communicated at the table. [/QUOTE]
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