Quote from: SilverlionThat's not really an issue though "only five strength levels" is a matter of taste really (D6 uses very similar spread, Savage Worlds, Unisystem, Even D20 fundamentally uses only 0-5 scale , its just hidden by a 3-18 meaningless subgradiation after all only the bonus matters to /actual/ resolution)

D6 has a 7-point spread for natural human ability (2D, 2D+1, 2D+2, 3D, 3D+1, 3D+2, 4D), and D20 has a 9-point spread (-4 through +4). Five levels is a bit too small for my tastes, as it only allows for "really bad", "bad", "normal", "good", and "really good."

Quote from: DackeD6 has a 7-point spread for natural human ability (2D, 2D+1, 2D+2, 3D, 3D+1, 3D+2, 4D), and D20 has a 9-point spread (-4 through +4). Five levels is a bit too small for my tastes, as it only allows for "really bad", "bad", "normal", "good", and "really good."

And MSH had 6 Sh 0, Fe, Ty, Gd, Ex, Rm. If you count -4 on D20...you have to be fair and count SH 0 in MSH.  (and then again that was only for some traits after all Incredible was the level of an Olympic gymnasts Agility--which is a human attainable rank..) Add to that that unlike some games one could perform feats into the next rank by making a Red Feat (so one could make an Incredible rank Strength Feat with a Red result in the Remarkable column )
So while you had limited ranks one could always stretch a wee bit beyond that range. And that all presumes one needs fine distinction for the low end anyway, after all why is 5 ranks or 4, or three "not good enough" for fantasy? What makes a few numbers, or words not descriptive enough to cover human capabilities at the low, middle, high, end of human scale?

Quote from: SilverlionSo while you had limited ranks one could always stretch a wee bit beyond that range. And that all presumes one needs fine distinction for the low end anyway, after all why is 5 ranks or 4, or three "not good enough" for fantasy? What makes a few numbers, or words not descriptive enough to cover human capabilities at the low, middle, high, end of human scale?

Indeed. I've run "attribute-less" Fudge games like this. Average human strength is default, great strength is a gift and weakness is a fault. That's all I need.

Quote from: SilverlionAnd MSH had 6 Sh 0, Fe, Ty, Gd, Ex, Rm. If you count -4 on D20...you have to be fair and count SH 0 in MSH.

-4 in D20 (stat 2-3) is more like Feeble in Marvel. Shift 0 is -5, and is intended to only be used for situations where your ability is somehow reduced.

Quote(and then again that was only for some traits after all Incredible was the level of an Olympic gymnasts Agility--which is a human attainable rank..)

That's why I specified that it applied to Strength - I think the other stats generally placed human maximum at Amazing or possibly Incredible.

QuoteAnd that all presumes one needs fine distinction for the low end anyway, after all why is 5 ranks or 4, or three "not good enough" for fantasy? What makes a few numbers, or words not descriptive enough to cover human capabilities at the low, middle, high, end of human scale?

Of course. Personally, I think one does need some sort of fine graduation at the lower end of the scale. I like TORG's system, which had logarithmic stats (+5 to the value meant a real-world measure 10x as high, though there were some points where they patched that, mostly dealing with speed values).

wow - this thread has deviated quite a bit from the original poster's topic.  I'll chime in on the railroaded conversation, though lol

it's not about granularity - it's about how specific vs. general the rules are.  Fudge, for example, isn't designed around the concept that THIS much strength means you can lift THIS much weight and push THIS much load... etc.  It's designed around a more general concept.  Other games get more numeric - like Torg's excellent scale.  It all depends on the preference of the players.

But back to the original poster's topic...

The granularity of a set of mechanics - the crunchiness - is still independent of the setting and the player's roles and the story.  You can pull ALL mechanics out of play and go diceless/rules-less (not my cup o' tea btw) if all the players are into the story and their characters and not focusing on what a +1 means to what statistic.

But again that goes back to style of play.  Although this conversation is intriguing, I think it's - when all is said and done - irrelevant.  For some play styles, the numbers and the rules help push the story to focus on certain things (combat, for example, in a game with four chapters devoted to it).  For other play styles, that same game's mechanics aren't important.

Quote from: DackeOf course. Personally, I think one does need some sort of fine graduation at the lower end of the scale. I like TORG's system, which had logarithmic stats (+5 to the value meant a real-world measure 10x as high, though there were some points where they patched that, mostly dealing with speed values).

I hope you mean "I also liked Torg's system" because Torg's system was the exact opposite of having the fine gradiatian you said you liked. (Log scales in general tend to do that.)

Speaking of Logs BTW..that's one of those instance-- Mayfair's DC Hero's RPG for example where system to setting makes a lot of sense, Mayfair used LOG scale (albeit more compressed than Torg's) to measure superheroes, which created problems for the low end but allowed you to easily stat the high end supers. The system was built to allow for the setting which included such people as Superman, Martian Manhunter, Green Lantern, Captain Marvel and so forth.

Quote from: SilverlionI hope you mean "I also liked Torg's system" because Torg's system was the exact opposite of having the fine gradiatian you said you liked. (Log scales in general tend to do that.)

The thing is that TORG's scale allowed you to have a decent amount of granularity at the low end of the scale (humans topped out at 13, with the bottom at 5 or so - 9 different values) while still allowing really big things to be measured on the same scale (without using tricks like Star Wars' character/speeder/starship/capital scale).