D&D 4E The (lack of a) Bag of Rats Problem in 4e

[Saeviomagy]

The POINT of the bag of rats exercise was this:

A bad guy who brought a large amount of minions to a fight and then used them as a human shield, surrounding him was harming himself, because he was effectively granting anyone with whirlwind attack and cleave a whole heap of extra attacks.

The bag of rats 'exploit' was brought into existence to show just how stupid that was, not because anyone was trying to use it to do more damage.

3.5 subsequently fixed the whirlwind attack/cleave problem.

Bag of rats lived on.

Note - it's NOT "the players were playing the game wrong" - the original scenario was a legitimate and common one: a bad guy with a lot of weak minions. Using whirlwind attack and cleave in such a scenario was ridiculously effective.

 

[Family]

I've Had It With These Mother Loving Rats In These Mother Loving Bags!!

 

[Blackeagle]

The intent is clear; powers that convey benefits when used in combat are not supposed to generate a perverse incentive to engage in short, weak combats against totally ineffectual foes. But what the rule says does not match what the rule intends.

Which is why we have Rule 0.

Look, we agree that the RAW often produces, when read literally, results that are far out of line with what RAI surely must be. The problem is that identifying RAI down to the fine detail is nearly impossible, and very often, RAI simply didn't cover the specific interaction of rules in general. When that happens, the GM needs to form their own intent, and the more cases where that happens, the less benefit there is to using the rules in the first place. The entire idea of having a standard ruleset is to have a common set of expected interactions that produce good results. DM A can think that it makes sense for a warlock to offer the soul of a giant rat to his pact patron, and that the costs versus benefits of keeping a rat restrained for emergency use do not unbalance the game, and are actually a good way to showcase how Warlocks are different than Ranger-Wizards, and that at the end of the day, a giant rat can injure a warlock, so it's a credible threat. DM B might think that credible threat status refers to the situation, not the creature, and might rule that players can use their powers to, for example, shatter a pillar holding up a cavern and cause a cave-in, but only in the middle of a fight. DM C might rule that a pillar is not a credible threat, and so on.

Why does it matter if the DMs interpret the rules differently? Once the rulebook hits the table it's your game.

I think that the above situation is indicative of poorly-written rules. I personally prefer clear rules that can be unambiguously corrected to unclear ones that require much interpretation and context

What you seem to be asking for, a perfect, unambiguous set of rules that covers all circumstances, is quite literally impossible, even in pure mathematics. The world (or any reasonable approximation thereof) cannot be perfectly represented by mechanistically executed rules. Even scientists and engineers, who have tremendously complex models and lots of computing power, have to use their judgment about which of many models and parameters to choose to represent a given situation.

and I think that anyone who thinks that common sense is an appropriate way to approximate the behavior of a system that is grossly at odds with normal day-to-day experience needs to be slapped with a haddock.

Slap me with a haddock then.

D&D tropes are worse, because there are many ways to interpret what is common knowledge. One GM may have grown up on Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, and enjoyed the works of Jim Butcher, and finds the idea of wizards not having required implements to be a violation of common sense. Another might work out a complex system, in which some spells did require an implement, some required the caster to speak clearly, some for the caster to speak and gesture, and so on. Who is to say that any one set of expectations is more correct than another?

Nobody. The only correct interpretation is what that particular DM decides at that particular table at that particular time. If a different DM wants to decide differently, more power to him.

 

[ForbidenMaster]

What do you do with the rats afterwards? Can you use them again?

 

[Plane Sailing]

I pretty much give up on convincing my opponent and work instead on amusing myself.

Which pretty much amounts to trolling.

thread closed.