What reading level are most games written for?

[jessemock]

As long as you capture the meaning adequately, there is nothing to be gained by having a "higher reading level."

On the contrary, there is something to be gained: pleasure.


For the most rudimentary of goals, a higher reading level serves no purpose, obviously. The 3.x rules books aspire to nothing more, outside of the occasional remark about how some aspect or other is 'cool'.

That's a result of two things: marketing and insecurity. Wizards wants to market to as young an audience as possible, and, indeed, Hasbro recommends D&D products at age 13--there's your baseline reading level.

Appeals to 'professionalism' generally mask insecurity: a writer whittles down his text in order to make it come off as practical and as businesslike as possible, out of an insecurity that anything more extravagant will be recognised as unprofessional frippery.

Thus, the snooze.

Which is disappointing, because D&D products used to provide a rather charming conviviality: barely out of the realm of amateur publications, they didn't owe anybody anything and spoke as freely as they wished--and if they evidenced a less than complete grasp of grammar from time to time, well, they made up for it with a friendly face.

Unfortunately, it seems that the industry has decided to abandon the one, but not the other: D&D continues to have a problematic relationship with English, while it has long since ceased to charm.

In a word, that higher reading level was the charm.

 

[woodelf]

[comments about precision grammar in legal documents]
Yeah, but it doesn't seem to clear up disagreements on the OGL and d20STL mail lists.

That's because the commas are frequently misplaced, so that whole clauses are either self-contradictory or ambiguous.

I maintain it's precisely the fact that they *didn't* use legal precision in writing the contract that it [the WotC OGL] is so unclear. If they'd just written the damn things in good legalese, they'd be crystal-clear, with no questions--even for us non-lawyers. As is, even the lawyers can't agree on what they mean.

 

[woodelf]

Is there any free online or downloadable resource that provides a comprehensive description of English grammer? That would be something I would find extremely useful, especially the placement of commas, but other things too.

No. Strunk&White isn't a grammar text, it's a style guide--if you don't already know the grammar, it won't teach it to you. It *will* clean up your writing, almost assuredly, but it doesn't cover everything by any stretch (it's only 85pp, about 4"x6"). It will help greatly with your commas.

Anyway, AFAIK, there isn't even a comprehensive description of English grammar if you're willing to pay for it. There are, rather, several conflicting "comprehensive" descriptions of English grammar. All that i'm aware of bill themselves as style guides, but in the process they pretty much cover all of the grammar. In the US, the three most prominent are probably AP Style Guide, Chicago Manual of Style (my personal favorite), and MLA Style Guide.

I take that back. Poking around the site linked for Strunk & White, i find they also have American Heritage® Book of English (http://www.bartleby.com/64/) and The Columbia Guide to Standard American English (http://www.bartleby.com/68/). Perhaps one of those will serve you well?

 

[jessemock]

No. Strunk&White isn't a grammar text, it's a style guide--if you don't already know the grammar, it won't teach it to you. It *will* clean up your writing, almost assuredly, but it doesn't cover everything by any stretch (it's only 85pp, about 4"x6"). It will help greatly with your commas.

Just because this point can't be emphasised enough, I'm going to emphasise it some more: style guides and usage/grammar guides are not at all the same thing. 'Correct' grammar can make your style completely whack, and conflicts of style usually have no grammatical resolution.

Anyway, AFAIK, there isn't even a comprehensive description of English grammar if you're willing to pay for it. There are, rather, several conflicting "comprehensive" descriptions of English grammar.

Word. 'Correcting' one's style really amounts to picking a team--and sticking with it: a logical system, consistently used is as correct as it gets.

All that i'm aware of bill themselves as style guides, but in the process they pretty much cover all of the grammar.

Haphazardly, of course. The best guide to English grammar I have seen is the Longman Handbook produced for speakers of English as a foreign language. It follows a perfectly reasonable order. Most style guides get to most of the big topics in the way that your Christmas flight home gets to all of the major cities in the U.S.

 

[Roman]

Converting Reading Levels to Skill Ranks

How would you convert reading levels to skill ranks? Perhaps one rank per level... it would give us a better idea as to how well characters can read a foreign language (yes, I make them take skill ranks in languages and have nerfed translation spells to make languages actually useful...).

 

[Roman]

Thanks everyone for chiming in on the grammar issue.

 

[Hida Bukkorosu]

i wonder if modules have i higher reading level than rulebooks due to use of words like "crenellated" in room descriptions

 

[Ranger REG]

That's a result of two things: marketing and insecurity. Wizards wants to market to as young an audience as possible, and, indeed, Hasbro recommends D&D products at age 13--there's your baseline reading level.

"Age 13"???

The last time Wizards did a customer survey they found that their target demographic is 16-25 age group (mostly male).

As for making it reaching younger audience, I guess it's because their new goal is to make D&D ... sighs ... Wal-Mart friendly. (Yes, you will probably never see BoVD, BoED, and future "Mature Readers" products in that retail store.)

That's like Playboy without the pictorials. :\

 

[ph0rk]

Just as an example, MS Word rates your post at a 9th-grade level. I would have guessed slightly higher.

MS Word is unable to assess the finer points of the text, like everything in item 4. (irony, allusion, allegory, etc). If the beef of your writing is that sort of thing, than word will give you a lower grade level than is accurate.

 

[Goblyn]

Something funny

I just thought I would bring up <a href="http://angryflower.com/bobsqu.gif">this.</a>