Upgrade your account to a Community Supporter account and remove most of the site ads.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="N'raac" data-source="post: 6116214" data-attributes="member: 6681948">This incorporates you imposing a goal on my character, being battle with goblins.  I thought we were investing the players with power, not constraining their choices. Here again, if other players can impose backstory elements on me that I did not want, what has happened to my power as a player?  And yet the middle one is intended to be that group of refugees from the city which were fine above.  However, if the desert encounters are viewed as timewasting roadblocks to be avoided, we hide when we see the dustcloud or otherwise refuse to engage the refugees. If the GM simply assumes the players start walking, rather than asking what they choose to do, Hussar is denied the option of summoning that Centipede mount.  Again, where did that player choice go?I have yet to see anyone suggest we play out the PC’s “wandering about aimlessly”, as opposed to travelling to the city, nor have I seen it suggested we make the players address “needless minutia”.  What I am seeing is the player assumption that anything in the desert is a needless timewaster that cannot be “terribly relevant”.  While I don’t deny that is possible, I believe it is fact, not opinion, that it is also possible for relevant encounters to occur during the journey through the desert, even if we discard the possibility of an encounter not of obvious and immediate relevance to whatever the goal was in the city having any possible merit, such as fun.  I think players spending character resources on a “niche skill” is signaling an investment in situations where that skill will be useful.  If one character has been designed as a specialist in NPC interaction, I think that player is treated unfairly if NPC interaction is consistently handwaved to make someone else happy. If, at any time, we have a disagreement over whether a given scene should be played out or handwaved, then someone will not be happy.  I don’t believe the whiniest player at the table should consistently be given his/her way.  If anything, I lean the other way to avoid rewarding such behaviour.  Leaving that bias aside, the quiet player who doesn’t want any player conflict should not always give up what they want from the game to keep the whining down.  Then why is it objectionable to suggest that it should not require acquiescing to a single player’s wishes in respect to how the desert crossing is handled?STR 17 (huge centipede) > 260 lb heavy load x4 for Huge size. So it depends how big the party is, and how laden wth gear. You try sitting on something fairly slick, 5’ wide and lightly curved as it motors through the desert.  I think it is not unreasonable to conclude it is not suitable as a mount.  Pemerton, you seem to agree.  So if the GM can indeed call this either way, and does not call it in my favour, I submit that does not make him a bad GM for refusing to acquiesce to my wishes. As to carrying capacity, let’s remember that part of [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION]’s argument was that this thing barrels through the desert at top speed.  If it is carrying more than its light load limit, it moves slower.  A heavy load reduces that Run speed he centipede was to maintain.  That takes us down to 520 pounds as a light load, 1,040 medium and 1,560 heavy.  An average half orc weighs 150 lb + [2d6 x 2d12] so 241 lb, with no gear.  A Dwarf averages 165 lb and an elf about 110.  Half elf 145, human 175.  Smaller creatures find a horse unsuitable as a mount and need a pony – a 5’ wide centipede seems problematic.  So that’s 165 – 170 lb on average x 5 characters (4 PC’s plus that plane shifting NPC) is well over 800 lb without any gear.  Maybe it can carry the group, but it’s not moving at top speed. Those limited circumstances include the animal rearing, but you would not extrapolate that to climbing a near-vertical slope (one of Hussar’s examples of how it can speed travel)?  Even if we ignore the potential for combat, I suspect damage from leaving the saddle 50’ up a cliff face may not be trivial.  [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION] has been just as vocal that he does not wish to interact with NPC’s not of immediate relevance to his goals.Again, no one is suggesting we must play out travel procedures.  We are, or at least I am, suggesting [MENTION=22779]Hussar[/MENTION]’s outright dismissal that there could be any possible encounter in the desert which could possibly have any relevance or value to the game is premature and inappropriate.  My opinion in that regard remains unchanged. If a player said “**yawn**, looks like a boring travelogue – anyone mind if I go home and you call me when we get somewhere interesting”, then my desire to have that player return would certainly be diminished.  Would it mean “sure and don’t come back” is the only answer?  Not necessarily, but I’d better have seen some merits in the player, or he’s likely to get the message we’re “still crossing the desert” for quite a while.</blockquote>

Verification