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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lanefan" data-source="post: 9510544" data-attributes="member: 29398">And that the player can arbitrarily decide the when and where to invoke these meta-bennies is the crux of the debate.Further, there's three types of meta-bennies: 1. those that obviate a die not yet rolled by forcing a success2. those that add a bonus or benefit to a die not already rolled3. those that do something to change or negate the results of a die that has already been rolled, or force a re-roll.Of those, 2 is by far the least objectionable.  1 is fairly uncommon but bad in that it can trash an otherwise exciting will-it-or-won't-it moment.And 3, IMO, simply should not exist.  Once a die is rolled, it's rolled, and you shouldn't get to see the results before deciding whether or not to make changes to that roll.  It's baked-in player-side fudging with lipstick on.I think it was Yogi Berra who once said regarding baseball something like "You're gonna win 1/3 of the games no matter what you do.  You're gonna lose 1/3 of the games no matter what you do.  It's what you do with the other 1/3 that makes you a good or bad team."The same holds true in D&D design.  A certain amount of rules are going to be dissociated/unrealistic/etc. no matter what you do.  A certain amount are going to be realistic no matter what you do.  It's what you do with those rules where you have a choice that makes the end-result difference.......and here's a good example of where there is a choice.  A fire spell could be ruled to potentially ignite flammable objects in its AoE (which is realistic) or not (which is unrealistic).  For my part, in these cases I say go with the realistic option whenever you can.I think the rules have focused far too much on balance (which is a fool's errand at the micro level and fairly easy to achieve at the macro level) and character uptime, and in so doing have done something of a disservice to actual roleplay and immersion.The other issue underlying all this is one of pacing.  4e-5e design wants the characters to be going like little energizer bunnies from one long rest to the next, with (in 5e) a few shorts in there to prop up some classes.  This paradigm is why healing has been dialled to eleven, and is also utterly unrealistic.Realism, however, suggests the characters (if at all wise) are going to want to be considerably more cautious and long-rest whenever they can; a more realistic game design would assume and embrace the idea of the 5-minute workday in the knowledge that, given the choice, that's what the characters would try to do.  Realism also suggests that a character who is close to death (i.e. making death saves) shouldn't be up-'n'-at-'em after just one cure and right as rain the next morning.  In other words, realism calls for a much slower pace where getting hurt is a bad thing and where curing hit points before someone is down (or just not taking the damage in the first place!) is far preferble to waiting until after someone is down.And yes, natural recovery in 1e as written is unrealistic the other way: it's too slow.</blockquote>

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