When does Verisimilitude break down?

[Mercule]

Exactly my point, and I remember a conversation I had with SHARK once upon a time, where I told him that we both see the same problem (a disparity between what the rules say the world should look like and what the world actually looks like) but that we had completely opposite approaches to the problem. I tend to tinker with rules, he tends to tinker with setting assumptions.

I'm more on your end of the spectrum, Joshua. Still, I think SHARK may have found the simplest answer.

 

[Joshua Randall]

A loooooooooong time ago in a Dragon magazine review (of an undead supplement by a non-TSR company whose name escapes me), the reviewer wrote that what you want is not depth (verisimilitude), but the illusion of depth. In other words, if you try to build your world so that it makes sense at every level, macro and micro, so that every village has a realistic economy, so that races and classes are properly distributed throughout the kingdom -- you'll never be finished. And what's more, most players won't care. (Emphasis on most: some will care, a lot.)

I used to worry about verisimilitude. Now I worry more about fun. So I'm not trying to stifle any discussion here; just pointing out that you (the DM) can rest a lot easier once you transfer your focus from verisimilitude to fun.

Game on!

 

[Desdichado]

Yep. There was a whole series of articles in Dragon about that, actually (and not that looooooong ago) called Dungeoncraft by Ray Winninger.

And the illusion of verisimilitude is implied, I think, whenever someone says verisimmilitude.

 

[Numion]

Odd. Very few people around here (I thought I was a somewhat unusual exception) actually do tinker the rules to fit the world.

However, very few people actually tinker their settings to match the rules as well. Most people just accept the paradox and don't let it affect them. SHARK being a notable exception to the contrary.

Thats right. But if the paradox gets on ones nerves, then I'd alter the rules, rather than to make a world that was a slave to the rules.

I've got no problem with any paradoxes.

 

[silentspace]

Odd. Very few people around here (I thought I was a somewhat unusual exception) actually do tinker the rules to fit the world.

However, very few people actually tinker their settings to match the rules as well. Most people just accept the paradox and don't let it affect them. SHARK being a notable exception to the contrary.

Who is SHARK? And what's his campaign world like?

 

[silentspace]

I used to worry about verisimilitude. Now I worry more about fun. So I'm not trying to stifle any discussion here; just pointing out that you (the DM) can rest a lot easier once you transfer your focus from verisimilitude to fun.

Game on!

For many, if not most, verisimilitude is the same as fun. It's like the notion of 'suspension of disbelief' that they use in the movie industry. As long as the audienc suspends their disbelief, then its fun. If you go too far, then you've lost the audience. Of course, the point at which this happens differs from person to person. But if you don't have verisimilitude, you're not playing an RPG. Basically, you're just playing dice.

 

[silentspace]

At first I thought that verisimilitude breaks down with the more powerful spells. But thinking about it further, that doesn't bother me so much. What bothers me more is hp! It's just wierd when you can survive a fireball while the dozens of strong men surrounding you are burned to a crisp. Or you're able to fall great distances and walk away. Hp works great in a lot of other instances though, and its much simpler than the more complicated systems. Strangely, I can wrap my head around teleporting and gating and scrying and divination and plane shifting and killing demons and gods, but when you have too much hp, it bothers me!

 

[Arc]

What bothers me more is hp! It's just wierd when you can survive a fireball while the dozens of strong men surrounding you are burned to a crisp. Or you're able to fall great distances and walk away. Hp works great in a lot of other instances though, and its much simpler than the more complicated systems. Strangely, I can wrap my head around teleporting and gating and scrying and divination and plane shifting and killing demons and gods, but when you have too much hp, it bothers me!

HP is thing that bothers me too. We all (or most of us) admit that it's an unrealistic approach to balancing combat, and that it has several inherent contradictions... but I have yet to see a truly effective manner of circumventing it.

I think that Hollywood suspension of disbelief fits in with the 'setting to the rules' formula of campaign design. After all, if a story is set in a science fiction universe, and sticks to that universe without contradicting itself, it's much easier to believe. Trying to fit unusual events, technologies, or actions into a 'normal' world breaks suspension of disbelief, because the audience doesn't expect them to occur.

 

[A'koss]

I can deal with hp (for the most part), I can deal with magic, but where it breaks down for me is in the portrayal of beings much, much smarter and wiser than I am.

For example, trying to differentiate between the plans and actions of a creature that has a 26 Int and/or Wis, another with a 36 Int and/or Wis and a third with a 46 Int and/or Wis.

A'koss.

 

[Desdichado]

SHARK is a guy that (lately, at least) is an infrequent posters who used to start discussions off with very long, detailed essays about his campaign setting and then asking for discussion. I don't know if his setting has a webpage or anything like that (in fact, I seem to remember specifically that it does not) but tons of info is floating around in the bowels of ENWorld old posts.