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Message: <blockquote data-quote="firesnakearies" data-source="post: 4567480" data-attributes="member: 71334">Gah, this continues to drive me crazy.  This seemingly automatic and totally unchallenged assumption that the four options listed above are, essentially, the only ones on the table.Now, the fifth option I'd propose COULD simply be a subset of your (4) above, but in my opinion, you'd simply be applying the word "ridiculous" in a pretty darn arbitrary manner at that point.What about:(5) Players assume that D&D 4E takes place in a much more inherently magical world than Earth, every PC is somewhat superheroic and "magical" in some sense, and so the heroes recovering with seemingly-miraculous speed from terrible injuries without requiring the aid of Arcane or Divine spells or items is not a narrative disconnect, but merely a different theme for the game, and a different model of in-world physical reality?I totally understand that lots of players don't LIKE that kind of world, that kind of narrative, that kind of underlying assumption as to how the D&D fantasy world works, but not liking it doesn't mean that it literally cannot be considered as being what the game is intended to model.The ONLY argument I've ever seen against that possibility amounts to "Yeah, but I don't want to play that kind of game.  I want to play Conan or Lord of the Rings, not The X-Men."  I get that, and more power to you, but that PREFERENCE doesn't totally invalidate the possibility that 4th Edition D&D is built to represent a different sort of fantasy world than you're used to or would prefer.I'm not asking that anyone embrace that idea, if they don't like it.  I just want to see the possibility listed with the others, because if it is, it means that not EVERY choice has to equal an inherent brokenness in the game or a necessary willful choice by players to turn a blind eye to something intrinsically inconsistent.Of course, you could say, "That's just part of (4), because suggesting that anyone would recover from being disemboweled to being just FINE after a night's rest, or following a rousing pep talk from the Sarge (who has never studied a lick of magic in his life), is plainly ludicrous."But that's just a personal preference issue in game theme.  There's nothing MORE ridiculous about that kind of "fantasy world physics" than any of the other "not congruent with Earth reality" assumptions and tropes which are already widely accepted by gamers and fantasy fiction lovers.And, in my view, since the game rules as written directly suggest that such IS the way the D&D world actually works, in-game and in-narrative, it's my opinion that the possibility that 4th Edition is, in fact, built around such an assumption of altered reality, and thus contains no actual disconnect between the mechanics and the in-story occurrences.I'd be MUCH happier to see people saying something like, "Oh wow, WotC has turned D&D into Marvel Superheroes, and every character is Wolverine now.  How lame!  The rules are consistent with that in-world narrative reality, so it works as a game system with no need to jump through hoops, thus it isn't actually broken as such.  However, I REALLY hate that thematic choice, and feel that it doesn't adequately present the kind of fantasy world and story that I want to play in, or am used to, and I will thus either change the game or not play it.  Furthermore, I'm so unhappy about this drastic change to the basic nature of the game world and fantasy style of D&D that I'm going to continue to complain about it here, because it was really such a poor idea," instead of, "There's NO possible way that anyone could EVER intend to tell a fantasy story in which the heroes heal that fast naturally, or in which some non-magic-using mundane guy shouting at your unconscious body suddenly causes a giant axe wound in your chest to close as you jump back to your feet ready to fight.  That's just silly.  So therefore, D&D 4E is BROKEN and in order to make it work, you HAVE TO play all sorts of metagamey narrative tricks or change the rules themselves for consistency with the only sort of "realism" which could POSSIBLY be considered "non-ridiculous".  This is so patently obvious that in any discussion of this whole topic, I will always portray the situation such that the game MUST BE flawed, and the ONLY options are to ignore the rules, ignore the narrative, perform an amazing juggling act with the rules and the narrative to fit my idea of what should be realistic, or house rule some stuff."The first example above is reasonable, to me.  I don't mind people HATING the new edition, bashing it, loudly stating that it doesn't fit their preferences, and even saying that it's "not D&D as I understand the definition".  But the second example is what I'm seeing a LOT of, whether or not they put it in such direct terms, and it just seems extremely tunnel-visioned to me.This is not a straw man.   This is really how I see the arguments playing out in these threads.</blockquote>

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