Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="TheCosmicKid" data-source="post: 7141649" data-attributes="member: 6683613">This game is predicated on there being a correlation between the numbers and the in-universe reality. Having a high number in Strength means your character is strong, having a low number means your character is weak. Having a high number in Intelligence means your character is smart, having a low number means your character is dumb. This concern for what the numbers represent about your character is, if anything, the opposite of min-maxer talk -- min-maxers stereotypically have little regard for the in-game reality and try to weasel out of the consequences of low scores.Say you've got two players, Alice and Bob, whose characters both have 8 Int. Alice is unhappy because she wanted to play a smart character but that 8 Int says her character isn't smart. Bob doesn't care and just optimizes his character based on the stats he has, working around the low Intelligence as much as possible when roleplaying. Which one is the powergamer? I don't think it's Alice.But you'll note I used the word &quot;stereotypically&quot; above, and that's a part of the problem too: you're making an implicit judgment based on stereotyped gamer personalities, not real people or games or experiences. So really, we shouldn't call Bob a powergamer either, at least not before we've gotten an opportunity to meet him.I don't think Alice above is &quot;not cool&quot; for deciding she wants to play a smart character. I think if you're going to dismiss character concepts as broad and basic as smart-guy for being &quot;not cool&quot;, you're ruling out so many ordinary plausible character concepts that your endorsement of the character-concept method rings rather hollow.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="TheCosmicKid, post: 7141649, member: 6683613"] This game is predicated on there being a correlation between the numbers and the in-universe reality. Having a high number in Strength means your character is strong, having a low number means your character is weak. Having a high number in Intelligence means your character is smart, having a low number means your character is dumb. This concern for what the numbers represent about your character is, if anything, the [I]opposite[/I] of min-maxer talk -- min-maxers stereotypically have little regard for the in-game reality and try to weasel out of the consequences of low scores. Say you've got two players, Alice and Bob, whose characters both have 8 Int. Alice is unhappy because she wanted to play a smart character but that 8 Int says her character isn't smart. Bob doesn't care and just optimizes his character based on the stats he has, working around the low Intelligence as much as possible when roleplaying. Which one is the powergamer? I don't think it's Alice. But you'll note I used the word "stereotypically" above, and that's a part of the problem too: you're making an implicit judgment based on stereotyped gamer personalities, not real people or games or experiences. So really, we shouldn't call Bob a powergamer either, at least not before we've gotten an opportunity to meet him. I don't think Alice above is [I]"not cool"[/I] for deciding she wants to play a smart character. I think if you're going to dismiss character concepts as broad and basic as smart-guy for being [I]"not cool"[/I], you're ruling out so many ordinary plausible character concepts that your endorsement of the character-concept method rings rather hollow. [/QUOTE]

Verification