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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Imban" data-source="post: 4018433" data-attributes="member: 29206">Hmm, that's not true if you define simulationism as the pursuit of internal consistency - which is the definition I'm operating under, at least - definitionally, rules that ruin internal consistency can't be explained as advancing the pursuit of internal consistency. In the more common but less definitional complaint, rules that blatantly embody game design goals without a provided in-world explanation can have creative justifications fashioned - referred to as "fanwank" in most fandoms - but, as they default to not having any justification, are often glaring to players who desire in-world explanations and internal consistency.I point to Asmodeus vs. the gods in Hell in 3e as an example of the former, where the rules themselves return results completely incompatible with what the fluff they're tied to indicates, and also the results of too many things being left up to the DM by the system, especially if multiple DMs are running or prewritten adventures are being used. (While a single DM who very much enjoys internal consistency is certainly likely to deliver internally consistent results, you're going to risk widely disparate views of the same thing in the same campaign when you have multiple people writing the plot and a lot of monsters' powers, for example, are left totally up in the air.)The latter would be... well, I don't actually have a really good example right now. I guess the Ring thing if it's left totally unaddressed beyond a one-liner saying "ring slots are gained at levels 11 and 21" - taken alone, it raises enough questions to make it feel inconsistent ("Why do rings work like this, and nothing else? Why can I only wear one ring at a time now, but next level two is fine?") and more importantly there would be no official explanation to make it in any way internally consistent.As seen above, I dispute that. I find that in most cases, however, the former case I stated is a symptom of bad rules rather than clashing design goals.Actually, this is why I don't like the Ring thing, as I said a few posts above, but I don't think it's because of the design goal this thread's about. As above, one of the other, totally unrelated things I've also always liked about D&D is the ability to adapt it to things and to adapt things to it, which 3e especially brought out. I don't just want it to be a vessel for "D&D fantasy", and the more common things that work in idiosyncratic ways, the more problematic adaptation is. Basically, if it's not flagrantly stupid or broken ("this spell kills any amount of selected targets within 500 miles with no resistance possible and even an apprentice can cast it") and it's within the realm of fantasy, especially fantasy literature, I want to be able to bash D&D into running that or bash the unique material from it into D&D. I mean, 3e had enough room for quarterstaves (the weapons), staves (the things with 50 charges that store spells and cast them based on your caster level and casting stats), and runestaves (the things from Magic Item Compendium) - I don't really want to hear that 4e doesn't have room for any enchanted item from any reasonable fantasy source.</blockquote>

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