Join the Navy, see the world.  By the way, the world is 70% water and you're going to see all of it.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;572535let's just gloss over the fact that I probably would allow anyone to attempt to fish, but just because you were a sailor doesn't mean you had ever fished before.

It's not like most sailors, especially on large ships, ever tossed a rod and reel over the side.  They were usually busy doing other stuff.  This is compounded that many sailors were forced to do so and didn't have much choice on their career field.

It's like saying, "Oh, you're a race car driver?  You should totally know how to be a mechanic too then."

fantasy>

Quote from: Sommerjon;572540fantasy>

So what?  What does that have to do with assuming skills of professions that might not have ever used that skill?

Real life example:  When people heard I could program computers, they all asked me why I wasn't the owner of Microsoft, making lots of money like Bill Gates was?

True story; semi related.


A friend of mine who is an artist that mainly did paintings....

He told someone he was a painter.

They asked "Interior or Exterior?"  ha!



But yea, a lot of sailors historically did not know how to swim.

OK guys. Stop it with the blind links. These aren't allowed on the RPG Site. You should describe what the link is about, where it leads to, etc along with the link. We've established that before.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;572542So what?  What does that have to do with assuming skills of professions that might not have ever used that skill?

Because D&D is not historical re-enactments.

You are the one assuming skills because of historical accounts of life on earth.  That has absolutely nothing to do with a D&D.

Quote from: Benoist;572554OK guys. Stop it with the blind links. These aren't allowed on the RPG Site. You should describe what the link is about, where it leads to, etc along with the link. We've established that before.

My apologies, I will comply with that in the future.

Quote from: Bill;572553But yea, a lot of sailors historically did not know how to swim.

a lot is a very relative term here.

No worries. Just think about it in the future. Like...

Here's a 1e fighter vid in 13th warrior!

That's described enough: you know what it is, what type of page (vid) it is. That kind of thing. Doesn't need to be a novel, see?

PS: That link is just an example. It doesn't actually link anywhere.

Quote from: Sommerjon;572556Because D&D is not historical re-enactments.

You are the one assuming skills because of historical accounts of life on earth.  That has absolutely nothing to do with a D&D.

Just because D&D is D&D doesn't mean you can make assumptions the other way.  I mean, that's exactly what you just did.  You assumed that a sailor would be good at fishing.  Not based on D&D (because it's not listed anywhere in D&D that a sailor is also a skilled fisherman), but because of your own perception on real life.  Now that you were wrong about it, you're trying to evade by throwing out a really bad red herring.

Quote from: Sacrosanct;572535let's just gloss over the fact that I probably would allow anyone to attempt to fish, but just because you were a sailor doesn't mean you had ever fished before.

It's not like most sailors, especially on large ships, ever tossed a rod and reel over the side.  They were usually busy doing other stuff.  This is compounded that many sailors were forced to do so and didn't have much choice on their career field.

It's like saying, "Oh, you're a race car driver?  You should totally know how to be a mechanic too then."

This is the problem that background skills present though - agreeing on the scope of the skill.

The reductio version:

"I grew up as a carpenter's apprentice, I should be able to fix this door up so it'll protect us when the zombies come tonight..."

"Well, I was a ninja's apprentice, so I should be able to apply the five-point exploding heart technique!"

I mean, that's terrible, but smaller problems like that do tend to come up. This is why I was never happy with the AD&D secondary skills system, for example, though something even slightly more specific mitigates this considerably.

In D&D all racecar drivers automatically are car mechanics (no penalty).  That's a given that everyone knows (even those that play other RPGs know this fact about D&D).

Quote from: Benoist;572554OK guys. Stop it with the blind links. These aren't allowed on the RPG Site. You should describe what the link is about, where it leads to, etc along with the link. We've established that before.

Where are the forum rules?

Quote from: Sacrosanct;572565Just because D&D is D&D doesn't mean you can make assumptions the other way.  I mean, that's exactly what you just did.  You assumed that a sailor would be good at fishing.  Not based on D&D (because it's not listed anywhere in D&D that a sailor is also a skilled fisherman), but because of your own perception on real life.  Now that you were wrong about it, you're trying to evade by throwing out a really bad red herring.

Your assertions are based purely upon a small percentage of ships/sailors relative to the number of ships playing the seas.   There was thousands of small sailing craft that plied the oceans where the sailors were also fishermen.  You have whole cities based upon it.

No I did not assume a sailor would be good at fishing I said that one particular character was a sailor who knew how to fish, you are the one making the absurd jump of me saying sailor = fishermen.