I think this is needlessly pejorative.it's easier for us to strip out some rules then for rules monkeys to add them in...
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they have to design the game to.... and I hate to say this.. the lowest common denominator
They have to design the game to some specification rather than another. There is nothing inherently virtuous about a game lacking second wind or action surge. And there is nothing "lowest common denominator" about having them in the game.
They are very simple ways of giving the player of a fighter "moves", much like the player of a rogue has "moves" (via cunning action) and the player of a spell-caster has "moves" (via choosing which spell to cast).
They are not the only way to give a fighter player moves - another possible system has been sketched a handful of posts above this one - but they happen to be the one that the designers have settled on.
VS, that's not a bad little idea. Nice and fun. But, that can be added to any system, which means that it actually isn't related any edition of D&D in any way, shape or form.
I think there is more going on than just the "blank canvas".Old school games lacked a lot of the roleplaying advice which was intuitive for some.
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Roleplaying isn't like science or engineering. It's an art form, and that makes it interpretive.
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AD&D's blank canvas seemed to give old school gamers more license to just make stuff up. Of course, a blank canvas goes both ways. It can also be interpreted as featureless.
In a system of called shots for a minor penalty (eg increased natural fumble range), can a player declare as a called shot "I cut off its head"? Which permits bypassing the hit point system altogether (as well as the need for a vorpal sword, which is the most powerful magic weapon in the game and has as its sole power the ability to decapitate).
And then the next question is, can an NPC make the same action declaration and bypass a PC's hit points?
In other words, the presence of the hit point system in D&D, with the obvious implication that bypassing that system via SoD is a big deal, is a major barrier to introducing free-form stunts. Because it interposes a mechanical barrier between intention and realisation - the attacker is always intending to win the combat, but a successful to it roll is not enough to realise that intent until the opponent's hp have been run down.
Good post.the reason harpies have that many HP is because they are meant to be a threat to an X level party, not because of any sort of in world reason - but, apparently that makes for a consistent world?
How is that consistent? In what way does a completely arbitrary set of decisions with absolutely no backing in the game world or even remote nods to things like physics or biology result in consistency?
The whole point of simulation is you can answer the why questions. That's the reason you use sim based play. If you cannot actually tell me why a harpy is tougher than an orc or even a large giant like an Ogre, then how can you claim any consistency? Ogres have more HP than orcs because ogres are bigger than orcs. That makes sense. Bigger things have more HP. Ok, consistent. But, it's not actually true. Things that are much smaller also have more HP - a harpy is tougher than an ogre.
In Rolemaster, the harpy would have fewer concussion hits than the ogre (concussion hits in RM are one aspect of meat - attrition of them represents bruising and bleeding; other parts of meat are represented via a fairly intricate system of crit-delivered debuffs). But to represent its magical nature it might have a high defensive bonus (somewhat analogous to a 3E deflection and/or enhancement bonus) or critical reduction (somewhat analogous to DR/+X in 3E). In other words, the mechanics are presented in such a way as to answer the "why" question.