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What feels right for a Level 1 Character, vs a Level 2 Character; or a Level 5 Character?

Do we really need Level progression in RPGs?

I suspect that some people need it. Numerical achievement seems to be why they play.

Maybe I could do without it, but can't be sure since I've never played or run such a game. Maybe in a "troupe style" game, where I could switch between characters, so as not to get bored.

It would certainly be easier to design a realistic game in which players did not climb a power curve toward superhero status. Balance would be more predictable.

Maybe the real reason I think it would work for me is that when I read speculative fiction, I prefer stories where the hero is an average guy in strange circumstances, rather than a typical action hero. But given how hard it is to find good novels like that, I suspect that most writers and publishers have concluded that that the market demands not just heroes, but superheroes. If true, that might apply to RPG's as well.

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 08, 2021, 01:57:00 PM
What feels right for a Level 1 Character, vs a Level 2 Character; or a Level 5 Character?

Do we really need Level progression in RPGs?

Obviously we don't need level progression, since there are hundreds of RPGs without it.

I'm not sure about what "feels" right. The weird thing to me in D&D-based systems is how characters think about it. i.e. Even though they won't speak of "levels", does a first level character understand about just how powerful they will become? Would they expect similar of NPCs?

Almost all experience systems are largely metagame, but most of games have less extreme advancement that are easier to picture.

Could you enjoy playing a game; wherein you get a few bells and whistles at the start, but then not progress to ridiculous levels later?  Ex: Level 1 D&D characters, who might pick up a few magic items throughout their entire adventuring career. 

Or perhaps an E3 D&D campaign, that's never meant to climb and climb and climb the ladder to Level 20?

I'm creating 4 1st Level characters for D&D 3.0; and even though I haven't selected spells for the 2 casters yet, they have lots of bonuses and trained skills.  Their only weakness is them having low HP.  4 pregens ready to go, that I as a DM am very familiar with.

I don't think it's necessary but I think most players want it.

Levels tend to serve two purposes, progression and novelty.

The heroic journey archetype generally involves a character moving from being novice, to undergoing challenges, overcoming them, and coming out stronger. Because the TTRPG hobby has developed a lot of mechanics for all kinds of things, we also generally want a mechanic to express this type of narrative progression.

Levels also allow us to mechanically introduce new aspects to characters. Novelty feels good, and while you could always just run a different character, tying that novelty in to the narrative & mechanical progression amplifies that good feeling even further.
When executed well narratively, you get something like Harry Dresden's arc over 3-4 novels. And mechanically if you're running a crunchier game system (D&D3+) it's fun to see how your new power influences what you can do on the battlefield.

Becoming better at something in real life is enormously satisfying.  Doing so in RPGs is less so but still very enjoyable.  Having RPG characters improve is a big reward for many (I want to say an overwhelming majority but don't have data to back that up) players, and taking it out would certainly lessen motivation to play the game.

I like the idea of character advancement and improvement, and you kinda need it if you want to emulate characters getting better at stuff, which is something that people do in fiction as well as real life. But it doesn't have to be character levels, specifically. You could do it with individual ability increments by spending points on them or even through random checks to see if you improve.

The amounts by which characters or specific abilities can improve depends a lot on the mechanics used in the system, what you're trying to emulate, how complex you want the system to be and how high you're willing to allow ability levels to get to.

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 08, 2021, 01:57:00 PM
What feels right for a Level 1 Character, vs a Level 2 Character; or a Level 5 Character?

Do we really need Level progression in RPGs?

A buddy of mine who plays in a Soulbound RPG game (which I'm not in unfortunately) doesn't like advancement in it as much due to lack of levels.  He feels he can't properly gauge how much his character is progressing or if he's on the correct track.

Quote from: KingCheops on May 09, 2021, 09:35:29 AM

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 08, 2021, 01:57:00 PM
What feels right for a Level 1 Character, vs a Level 2 Character; or a Level 5 Character?

Do we really need Level progression in RPGs?

A buddy of mine who plays in a Soulbound RPG game (which I'm not in unfortunately) doesn't like advancement in it as much due to lack of levels.  He feels he can't properly gauge how much his character is progressing or if he's on the correct track.

Well, for one thing, a game like that doesn't have a "correct track" of advancement. Instead, it has many possible paths of advancement and they can intertwine in various ways. For players that want their characters to grow as the play directs rather than along a preset character build, it allows a lot of freedom. However, it isn't so great for optimizers as it makes it very hard to determine if something is objectively optimal. However, I can't agree that Soulbound progression is hard to gauge. If your numbers are getting bigger, you're getting better.

The thing I think could stand to be better modeled is the actual learning progression. Whether level or skill-based a lot of systems just use steadily increasing progression costs where somehow starts at +0 and each +1 costs some ratio of the initial cost (i.e. 1000xp to reach level two, 2000xp to reach level 3, etc. or 2 x current skill rank to increase it by one rank).

The thing is, that's not generally how people actually learn. Usually there's an initial barrier to picking up a specific skill (learning a brand new computer program for example) where it seems daunting. Then something clicks and the student rapidly gains a degree of proficiency with the skill; not mastery or even expertise, but enough so that they can perform the basics under routine conditions.

After that comes years of honing the skill to gain expertise and eventually mastery of the skill (though lack of practice can also result in backslides... though often with much faster recovery of lost skill if practice is resumed than when advancing for the first time... another thing games don't routinely model). Many times this will involve periods where someone "plateaus" for a time until another smaller period of rapid growth where some more complex aspect "clicks."

The point being that a more realistic progression from 1-10 might look like 1, 3, 5, 5, 6, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10; quick growth to competency then a bit of a plateau period and before a final slow but steady increase to wherever the peak lies.

Or, alternatively, if you wanted PCs to start with proficiency in their core skills, start them at 5 and the rest of their advancement is getting to 10 (vs. starting them at just +1 over someone completely untrained and only eventually getting to 5 and later 10).

Of course leveling is unrealistic. It's a completely gamist construct, designed to engage players, not to simulate reality. That's why it's a continual, steady improvement, because there always needs to be a new reward to chase. It's also why it comes in packages, because periodic but quantum jumps are more compelling than continual but marginal improvements.

Note - Jam the MF is talking about a game where characters still improve in their abilities, but rather than improving in levels, they have more incremental improvements.

For those that aren't familiar, "E3" is a version of the "E6" or "Epic 6" (https://www.enworld.org/threads/e6-the-game-inside-d-d.206323/) version of D&D 3.X or Pathfinder, where characters improve as normal to level 3, and then after that, they stop gaining levels but continue to gain feats at 1 feat for every 5000 XP.

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 08, 2021, 03:41:46 PM
Could you enjoy playing a game; wherein you get a few bells and whistles at the start, but then not progress to ridiculous levels later?  Ex: Level 1 D&D characters, who might pick up a few magic items throughout their entire adventuring career. 

Or perhaps an E3 D&D campaign, that's never meant to climb and climb and climb the ladder to Level 20?

I'm creating 4 1st Level characters for D&D 3.0; and even though I haven't selected spells for the 2 casters yet, they have lots of bonuses and trained skills.  Their only weakness is them having low HP.  4 pregens ready to go, that I as a DM am very familiar with.

I've never used E3 or E6 per se, but I've played in plenty of games that don't advance into extreme power levels later. One of my mainstay games is Call of Cthulhu, where advancement is even more limited. I just wrapped up a year-long CoC campaign, which had very limited advancment and as well as four PC deaths.

In fantasy games, I've often used other systems - like GURPS, Burning Wheel, and others with more incremental improvement instead of leveling.

It also helps for there to be story, material, and social progress, where the PCs gain in information, resources (magic items and money), and contacts/allies.

I am not  fan of 'levels" in rpgs, especially when it means a 5th level character can survive damage that would kill one or more 1st level characters.

Gurps and BRP do things right with experience improving people, IMO.

What I like about the Call of Cthulhu approach is that you improve in the skills that you use. However, I have seen a player treat it very mechanically and not even try things if they already had a tick in the skill.

My tweak would be to improve if when you fail rather than when you succeed. That way it balances itself and encourages you to try even if you have a low chance of success.

As others have mentioned, many game systems lack incremental progress.

RuneQuest had percentile skills, each time you used one you gave it a tick, and after the adventure you had to roll above your current skill level to be able to add a few points to it - and those points were random. Thus, progress from 20% to 30% tended to be rapid, and progress from 80% to 90% much slower. This well-reflects the real world diminishing returns of efforts in any skill area - your first 100 hours learning a language or driving teach you a lot more than does your 10th 100 hours.

Classic Traveller has as a default no skill advancement at all. However, you can choose to try to improve something. Once you start lessons you get a temporary boost, then after some years you make a dedication throw (8+ on 2d6, ie 15/36 or 42% chance of success) to see if it sticks. That's like the people who come to my gym for a while and then leave - after 3-6 months they know what to do, but do they actually do it on their own?

In reality, there are only four meaningful skill levels: shit, suck, good, great. To be not shit doesn't take much time or effort. Being good takes a lot of time and effort, and great takes dedicating your life to that thing. People do have natural talent levels, but rarer than talent is people willing to make the effort to be something other than just not shit. Most people are shit at almost everything, and not shit - suck - at a few things. Most people aren't good at anything, let alone great.

That's reality. Whether you care about reality in a game with orcs and elves and fireballs and wands of resurrection or warp drives and phasers and unobtanium is another matter.

Traveller PCs very rarely change mechanically. You may gain more money which may allow you to buy bigger and better toys, but your stats and skills usually stay the same for most PCs.

Quote from: The Thing on May 09, 2021, 06:15:07 PM
I am not  fan of 'levels" in rpgs, especially when it means a 5th level character can survive damage that would kill one or more 1st level characters.

For me it depends on the genre. Some types of games absolutely require high level characters to absorb damage that would kill normal men.

However, I can see a game with a curve that's that is flatter than regular D&D. I'm not a fan of something like E6 which has one set of rules for early game and another, different, set of advancement rules after a certain point. You could just as easily adjust the leveling charts to account for limited hit point growth, for example, without actually stopping level advancement.

Or use a system, such as the old Bushido, where hit point growth was independent of skill values. So a first level character could have a max skill while a high level character could only have basic training.

I just finished creating a 1st level 4 member adventuring party for D&D 3.0

That took me a long time.  The characters have lots and lots of bonuses, adjustments, and skills.  Enough magic spells per day to completely overshadow any 1st level OSR casters.  Low HP is their only real weakness.

I could see the party being able to accomplish a lot; even if I only gave them extra hp at every level, and an ability score increase every 2 or 3 levels.

There were some groans from at least one player when I advised them I would be using a very slow progression in Traveller, and they shouldn't expect to see any kind of significant skill advancement over the course of the campaign. (You get one XP for every six months in game time. 1XP is enough to get you a chance of learning a new skill or increasing a low one. Increasing a skill already at 2 would take about two years of XP saving in-game to get your first chance.)

Seven sessions in, and I haven't heard mention of it. Of course, it helps that the characters start competent. They don't actually need to advance their skills to do cool shit. Stealing a ship, achieving an objective, making allies, generating a reputation, upgrading gear and advancing towards their goals are providing a more-than-sufficient sense of progress and advancement.

When I was running d20 Conan, and wanted slow progression, I broke down all class features (BAB, defence, HD, special abilities) etc ... into discrete items bought with XP. You could still only buy the things available at your next level, but while it took while to gain a full level, the characters were constantly gaining at least small improvements, and enjoyed the sense of constantly advancing.

On the other end of the scale, when running Lone Wolf d20, I was giving out a level per book. Several players actually felt that was too fast.

Quote from: Sable Wyvern on May 10, 2021, 03:48:29 AM
Of course, it helps that the characters start competent. They don't actually need to advance their skills to do cool shit.

This is key in a game with no/minimal advancement. In Star Trek Adventures (Modiphius 2d20), mechanical character growth is minimal, with your character more likely to shift a few points or traits around rather than pick up a net gain in total power. However, as they start as well-rounded, hyper-competent Starfleet Officers, this isn't really a problem. If it is, there are some alternate rules in (IIRC) the Klingon book that can change this up some.

Quote from: hedgehobbit on May 09, 2021, 10:07:07 PM
However, I can see a game with a curve that's that is flatter than regular D&D. I'm not a fan of something like E6 which has one set of rules for early game and another, different, set of advancement rules after a certain point. You could just as easily adjust the leveling charts to account for limited hit point growth, for example, without actually stopping level advancement.

Old school D&D already has something similar to E6. Hit point progression doesn't stop at name level, but it does flatten out. A Basic fighter, for instance, gets 1d8+Con bonus/level up to 9th level, then +2 hp/level after. XP requirements to gain a new level also shift from exponential (x2/level) to linear (+X per level). The main difference is a Basic fighter continues to advance in to hit rolls and saves, and if used, skills and weapon mastery. And spellcasters still gain new spell levels (up to 16th to 21st level) and spells.

In contrast, E6 characters stop gaining hp, BAB, base save bonuses, and just gain new feats (which can be used to gain new skill levels and spells, but not to exceed the spell or skill level caps). XP requirements also shift from triangular to linear (+X/3 per new feat).

So E6 shifts to a kind of lateral progression at 6th level, where improvements in the primary game-stats are capped (with some minor exceptions), and characters are restricted to adding new abilities rather than improving existing ones. In contrast, the old school version only really caps hit points. Which is odd, because things like fireball damage still increase, which ends up hurting warriors and helping spellcasters (who really don't need it, at that point). Both BECMI and AD&D2e tried to deal with this by adding damage caps to at least some spells (20d in BECMI, variable but often 10d in 2e).

I find E6 to be more coherent. It really is a cap, while the name level cap in old school D&D is mostly about XP and hit points. Extending the concept, an E9 version of Basic D&D would cap saves, the to hit tables, spell levels (5th), and probably cap the maximum level of weapon mastery (Expert? Grand Master?), but allow new weapon mastery, skill, and spell slots. Have to play with the XP costs in BECMI E9, but each new feat after 6th level in E6 costs 1/3rd the number of XP required to reach 6th level. Charging say 60K for new skill slots, 60K for a new weapon mastery slot for fighters and 120K for everyone else, and 50/75/100K for new spell slots for clerics/magic-users/elves might be reasonable.

Quote from: The Thing on May 09, 2021, 06:15:07 PM
I am not  fan of 'levels" in rpgs, especially when it means a 5th level character can survive damage that would kill one or more 1st level characters.

That mostly happens in D&D or games derived directly from it. In most other games I've seen with level-based progression (like Palladium system) characters start out with a decent amount of HP, then only get a minimal amount of HP per level.

Another problem with D&D is that 1st level characters can be killed by things most normal couch potatoes in real life would survive, even if seriously injured. I mean seriously, a RAT can kill a 0-level commoner in D&D with little effort. D&D doesn't handle survivability well.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 10, 2021, 07:53:13 AM
Another problem with D&D is that 1st level characters can be killed by things most normal couch potatoes in real life would survive, even if seriously injured. I mean seriously, a RAT can kill a 0-level commoner in D&D with little effort. D&D doesn't handle survivability well.

It's fine for creatures that are roughly human-size or larger. But yes, for smaller critters, old school D&D has some issues. The basic problem is about 1 in 3 or 4 NPCs has 1 hp. An attack that does even 1 point of damage is a potentially fatal wound, for at least 25% of the population.

Is there a reasonable chance an animal can kill a healthy human being who is actively defending themselves? If the answer is no, the animal should do 0 damage. This applies to small dogs, squirrels, hawks, eagles, and even the fabled domestic cat. If they have attacks, it should be of the nuisance variety, not the damage variety (ordinary bats in B/X are a good example).

Critical Hit Damage can also be a misnomer.

A non-critical hit from a short sword can potentially be 6HP.

A x2 Critical hit from a short sword can potentially be 2HP.

What then, is Critical about the hit?

How about Critical Hits always do maximum damage, without requiring a damage die roll?

That makes more sense.  It's consistent.

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 10, 2021, 01:09:09 PM
Critical Hit Damage can also be a misnomer.

A non-critical hit from a short sword can potentially be 6HP.

A x2 Critical hit from a short sword can potentially be 2HP.

What then, is Critical about the hit?

How about Critical Hits always do maximum damage, without requiring a damage die roll?

That makes more sense.  It's consistent.

This is off-topic, but alternately, to keep variability, you can have critical damage be maximum + regular roll. That's what Call of Cthulhu / BRP has for impale results.

Quote from: Pat on May 10, 2021, 08:33:15 AM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 10, 2021, 07:53:13 AM
Another problem with D&D is that 1st level characters can be killed by things most normal couch potatoes in real life would survive, even if seriously injured. I mean seriously, a RAT can kill a 0-level commoner in D&D with little effort. D&D doesn't handle survivability well.

It's fine for creatures that are roughly human-size or larger. But yes, for smaller critters, old school D&D has some issues. The basic problem is about 1 in 3 or 4 NPCs has 1 hp. An attack that does even 1 point of damage is a potentially fatal wound, for at least 25% of the population.

Is there a reasonable chance an animal can kill a healthy human being who is actively defending themselves? If the answer is no, the animal should do 0 damage. This applies to small dogs, squirrels, hawks, eagles, and even the fabled domestic cat. If they have attacks, it should be of the nuisance variety, not the damage variety (ordinary bats in B/X are a good example).

The problem with that approach is that it doesn't emulate damage very well because a rat could still potentially kill a healthy human being. Eventually. Specially if it's a bunch of rats gnawing at the bits or the human keels over and can't get up (or is bound). So a rat bite should do some damage (not to mention risk of disease or infection). But when the system starts out with the assumption that an average healthy human who isn't an experienced adventurer only has a single hit dice and they need to hit points, you don't have a lot of room to work with, even if you lower a tiny creature's bite to just 1hp per hit.

Even when dealing with medium or larger creature attacks it still remains an issue, because a person who rolled one single HP on their HD would still be instant-killed if they get hit with a stick. Once! With ANY hit no matter how low as long as it inflicts damage. And that's freaking absurd.

A 1hp commoner could die from a hard bitch slap from a high Strength fighter.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 09, 2021, 07:37:48 PM
As others have mentioned, many game systems lack incremental progress.

RuneQuest had percentile skills, each time you used one you gave it a tick, and after the adventure you had to roll above your current skill level to be able to add a few points to it - and those points were random. Thus, progress from 20% to 30% tended to be rapid, and progress from 80% to 90% much slower. This well-reflects the real world diminishing returns of efforts in any skill area - your first 100 hours learning a language or driving teach you a lot more than does your 10th 100 hours.

Classic Traveller has as a default no skill advancement at all. However, you can choose to try to improve something. Once you start lessons you get a temporary boost, then after some years you make a dedication throw (8+ on 2d6, ie 15/36 or 42% chance of success) to see if it sticks. That's like the people who come to my gym for a while and then leave - after 3-6 months they know what to do, but do they actually do it on their own?

In reality, there are only four meaningful skill levels: shit, suck, good, great. To be not shit doesn't take much time or effort. Being good takes a lot of time and effort, and great takes dedicating your life to that thing. People do have natural talent levels, but rarer than talent is people willing to make the effort to be something other than just not shit. Most people are shit at almost everything, and not shit - suck - at a few things. Most people aren't good at anything, let alone great.

That's reality. Whether you care about reality in a game with orcs and elves and fireballs and wands of resurrection or warp drives and phasers and unobtanium is another matter.

I partially agree with this, but only for unopposed checks and systems where modifiers are rare.

If two swordsman are in a duel and both are "good" but one is significantly better than the other, then that difference will be very important to the outcome of the duel.

And if a climber is "good" but there are modifiers apply to the current climb because the surface is wet (or whatever) but not to the extent that he should be treated as "suck," then small differences in skill level will be important too,

Quote from: jhkim on May 10, 2021, 01:25:24 PM

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 10, 2021, 01:09:09 PM
Critical Hit Damage can also be a misnomer.

A non-critical hit from a short sword can potentially be 6HP.

A x2 Critical hit from a short sword can potentially be 2HP.

What then, is Critical about the hit?

How about Critical Hits always do maximum damage, without requiring a damage die roll?

That makes more sense.  It's consistent.

This is off-topic, but alternately, to keep variability, you can have critical damage be maximum + regular roll. That's what Call of Cthulhu / BRP has for impale results.

I'd say it's related to success improvement; since part of the character's advancement, usually involves them acquiring more powerful weapons and magic items.

The level treadmill and its lack of connection to fiction is one of my bigger gripes when it comes to D&D. I understand why developers/publishers want to provide this content, but at my actual gaming table there's no reason it has to be this way.

In future campaigns I run I might try to tie character progression to more meaningful story beats. If the player characters defeat a goblin tribe, slay a dragon, or banish a demon-prince, then based on what they actually accomplished give them some benefits. Of course negotiating with players on what they want and how to handle it is a lot more work, but personalizing the game is pretty much the point of running TTRPGs.

Quote from: Zelen on May 10, 2021, 06:56:49 PM
The level treadmill and its lack of connection to fiction is one of my bigger gripes when it comes to D&D. I understand why developers/publishers want to provide this content, but at my actual gaming table there's no reason it has to be this way.

In future campaigns I run I might try to tie character progression to more meaningful story beats. If the player characters defeat a goblin tribe, slay a dragon, or banish a demon-prince, then based on what they actually accomplished give them some benefits. Of course negotiating with players on what they want and how to handle it is a lot more work, but personalizing the game is pretty much the point of running TTRPGs.

Personally, I hate these kinds of milestone xp systems. I like xp and levels and I like the system to have some granularity so the GM can modulate the xp awards.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 10, 2021, 01:28:21 PM

Quote from: Pat on May 10, 2021, 08:33:15 AM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 10, 2021, 07:53:13 AM
Another problem with D&D is that 1st level characters can be killed by things most normal couch potatoes in real life would survive, even if seriously injured. I mean seriously, a RAT can kill a 0-level commoner in D&D with little effort. D&D doesn't handle survivability well.

It's fine for creatures that are roughly human-size or larger. But yes, for smaller critters, old school D&D has some issues. The basic problem is about 1 in 3 or 4 NPCs has 1 hp. An attack that does even 1 point of damage is a potentially fatal wound, for at least 25% of the population.

Is there a reasonable chance an animal can kill a healthy human being who is actively defending themselves? If the answer is no, the animal should do 0 damage. This applies to small dogs, squirrels, hawks, eagles, and even the fabled domestic cat. If they have attacks, it should be of the nuisance variety, not the damage variety (ordinary bats in B/X are a good example).

The problem with that approach is that it doesn't emulate damage very well because a rat could still potentially kill a healthy human being. Eventually. Specially if it's a bunch of rats gnawing at the bits or the human keels over and can't get up (or is bound). So a rat bite should do some damage (not to mention risk of disease or infection). But when the system starts out with the assumption that an average healthy human who isn't an experienced adventurer only has a single hit dice and they need to hit points, you don't have a lot of room to work with, even if you lower a tiny creature's bite to just 1hp per hit.

Even when dealing with medium or larger creature attacks it still remains an issue, because a person who rolled one single HP on their HD would still be instant-killed if they get hit with a stick. Once! With ANY hit no matter how low as long as it inflicts damage. And that's freaking absurd.

A 1hp commoner could die from a hard bitch slap from a high Strength fighter.

That's terrible design, and thinking like that is the reason the problem exists in the first place. The hit points system is not designed to reflect psychological stress in combat, like freezing. It's not designed around realistic injuries, like sprains, blood loss, and shock. It's not a good measure of disease progression or fatigue. It doesn't handle slitting someone's throat in their sleep well.

It's an abstract system designed to provide a meter between fresh and dead in combat, using granular quanta, and it does that quite well. If you want a rat slowly chewing on a bound prisoner, the hit point system and damage per attack is completely the wrong tool. Have the DM make a judgment call, perhaps roll for save, say a rat does 1 point of damage/hour, whatever seems reasonable. Just don't roll individual hits, and then roll for damage for each them. And for Zagyg's sake, don't try to use a rat slowly gnawing on someone as a justification for why small creatures need to do more than 0 damage in the standard combat system. It breaks what hit points do well, without adding anything of value.

Rats do 0 hp.

Quote from: Zelen on May 10, 2021, 06:56:49 PM
The level treadmill and its lack of connection to fiction is one of my bigger gripes when it comes to D&D.

Well, yeah, because D&D isn't interactive fiction, it's a game. And games have scorecards.

Personally I like level and non-level based games, even ones like Traveller with relatively nonexistent character growth. They all offer a different gaming experience, so limiting yourself to one genre is just dumb.

Is a single rat a metaphor for something? I don't ever remember a stat block for a single New York style rat. Swarms of Rats over a foot long, yes, and three foot giant rats as well, but I have never seen a singular basic bitch rat in D&D.

Quote from: FingerRod on May 10, 2021, 08:53:59 PM
Is a single rat a metaphor for something? I don't ever remember a stat block for a single New York style rat. Swarms of Rats over a foot long, yes, and three foot giant rats as well, but I have never seen a singular basic bitch rat in D&D.

Stats for a single rat have been around for a while, since rats are an option for familiar animal. I see stats for a single rat in 3rd ed and 5th ed Monster Manuals. I'm not sure about 2nd edition.

Quote from: Mishihari on May 10, 2021, 01:34:30 PM
If two swordsman are in a duel and both are "good" but one is significantly better than the other, then that difference will be very important to the outcome of the duel.

These differences will be indistinguishable from chance. If my skill is 62% and yours is 65%, and we must roll d100 to hit, and d100 to parry, the variation due to the dice roll is far, far greater than the variation due to our skills. Now, if each hit did 1 hit point of damage and we each had 1,000 hit points, we could perhaps notice our skill differences over the course of the combat. But if we each have 6 hit points then no, we won't notice - and even 40% to 60% will often be missed.

So the assumptions we make about a skill system, and skills in use, also tie into the assumptions we make about results of combat. And that's tricky, because while we like to imagine skills as continuous (having many small increments), combats are discrete - you only have four possible results, you are okay, injured, injured badly, or dead. D&D resolves this by having hit points, so that combat results can be continuous, too.

But again, we must decide whether we are speaking of what is realistic, what is reasonable, or what makes a fun game. In Conflict I hope I've found the overlap in that Venn diagram, but they are nonetheless three distinct qualities, and you can have one without the other two, or two without the third.

So that's the question in game design: do you want realistic, reasonable or fun? Or some combination of the three? Commonly people who find some particular subsystem of a game to be not fun will complain it's not realistic. But they are different things. Chess is fun, but it is not realistic. The 1d6 combat resolution I suggested in the firearms thread is realistic, but would not be fun.

I'm offended at this whole line of discussion about rats.

Quote from: jhkim on May 10, 2021, 09:06:19 PM

Quote from: FingerRod on May 10, 2021, 08:53:59 PM
Is a single rat a metaphor for something? I don't ever remember a stat block for a single New York style rat. Swarms of Rats over a foot long, yes, and three foot giant rats as well, but I have never seen a singular basic bitch rat in D&D.

Stats for a single rat have been around for a while, since rats are an option for familiar animal. I see stats for a single rat in 3rd ed and 5th ed Monster Manuals. I'm not sure about 2nd edition.

Ahhh, well thank you for the education. I know they are either unstated as small animals or listed in swarms in the early versions (Basic and OD&D).

I agree with the sentiment that a single rat cannot, under normal circumstances, kill a PC. Anyway, thanks again!

Quote from: FingerRod on May 10, 2021, 08:53:59 PM
Is a single rat a metaphor for something? I don't ever remember a stat block for a single New York style rat. Swarms of Rats over a foot long, yes, and three foot giant rats as well, but I have never seen a singular basic bitch rat in D&D.

They're in the AD&D1e Monster Manual 2, but they don't do damage. They have a chance of causing disease, though.

They're wimps compared to the ordinary squirrel, which does 1 point of damage. (Seriously. They have the giant black squirrel, the carnivorous flying squirrel, and the plain old ordinary squirrel. The MM2 went kind of crazy statting out mundane little animals.)

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 10, 2021, 09:11:00 PM

Quote from: Mishihari on May 10, 2021, 01:34:30 PM
If two swordsman are in a duel and both are "good" but one is significantly better than the other, then that difference will be very important to the outcome of the duel.

These differences will be indistinguishable from chance. If my skill is 62% and yours is 65%, and we must roll d100 to hit, and d100 to parry, the variation due to the dice roll is far, far greater than the variation due to our skills. Now, if each hit did 1 hit point of damage and we each had 1,000 hit points, we could perhaps notice our skill differences over the course of the combat. But if we each have 6 hit points then no, we won't notice - and even 40% to 60% will often be missed.

That is not my experience.  I'm not a swordsman, but I do have a good decade of martial arts experience.  That doesn't make me an expert or an authority, but I think it does give me some relevant insight.  I'm pretty good, and I know a lot of other people that are pretty good, some a bit better than me and some a bit worse.  The guys that are a bit better can beat me about 3 out of 4 times.  A relatively small difference in skill makes a big difference in who wins the fight.  Maybe it's because real life doesn't use dice, aside from the rare environmental factor it's pretty deterministic.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 10, 2021, 09:11:00 PM
So the assumptions we make about a skill system, and skills in use, also tie into the assumptions we make about results of combat. And that's tricky, because while we like to imagine skills as continuous (having many small increments), combats are discrete - you only have four possible results, you are okay, injured, injured badly, or dead. D&D resolves this by having hit points, so that combat results can be continuous, too.

But again, we must decide whether we are speaking of what is realistic, what is reasonable, or what makes a fun game. In Conflict I hope I've found the overlap in that Venn diagram, but they are nonetheless three distinct qualities, and you can have one without the other two, or two without the third.

So that's the question in game design: do you want realistic, reasonable or fun? Or some combination of the three? Commonly people who find some particular subsystem of a game to be not fun will complain it's not realistic. But they are different things. Chess is fun, but it is not realistic. The 1d6 combat resolution I suggested in the firearms thread is realistic, but would not be fun.

Well, that is the trick isn't it?  To make the design process even more fun, everyone has their own ideas about what is realistic, reasonable, and fun.  It's absolutely impossible to please everyone.  If you've managed to get all 3 for even a moderate sized group of people, then that's impressive.

Quote from: Mishihari on May 11, 2021, 04:26:50 AM

Well, that is the trick isn't it?  To make the design process even more fun, everyone has their own ideas about what is realistic, reasonable, and fun.  It's absolutely impossible to please everyone.  If you've managed to get all 3 for even a moderate sized group of people, then that's impressive.

I think part of the trick is to get "good enough" realism that is also targeted towards the kind of fun the game is supposed to produce.  Which sounds obvious, but it is amazing how often it is ignored.  For the example, if the fun of your game is supposed to be the nervousness and excitement of combats that happen fast, then your nods to realism shouldn't be mechanics that turn combat into a slog. Instead, they should be things that make you worry and require (relatively) fast decision by the players.  In contrast, if the fun is that combat goes into "slow mo" action scenes where a lot of intricate things happen in sequence, then your nods to realism should make sure to have a good way to incorporate phased movement into the multiple actions or use a relatively short length of rounds.  Both are bad choices where the combat is more operational resources than tactics.

It's not merely that some elements of good enough realism are mutually incompatible with reasonable and fun.  It's also that some such elements are mutually exclusive with each other in a given model.

Quote from: Mishihari on May 11, 2021, 04:26:50 AMThe guys that are a bit better can beat me about 3 out of 4 times.  A relatively small difference in skill makes a big difference in who wins the fight.  Maybe it's because real life doesn't use dice, aside from the rare environmental factor it's pretty deterministic.

Now you're saying real life is... diceless?!

What you're saying is an argument for some sort of comparative system. Roll the dice, add skill, highest wins. Given the right choice of dice range and skill range you'd get that result. It'd also depend on what each roll means, since given enough exchanges even a small difference will become obvious.

For example, we could imagine a simple d6 vs d6, with the highest roll defeating the foe, ties being resolved as "play on." let us further imagine that they add +0 to +2. Of course, the +1 or +2 could be due not just to skill, to one being on higher ground, one being armoured and the other not, one being wounded and the other not, one drunk and the other sober, and so on. For the purpose of argument let's consider it as much the same thing - you get a +1 or -1, and call it "skill difference." With d6+modifiers vs d6+modifiers, a +1 vs +0 or +12 vs +11 give the same result.

• If neither adds anything, then A wins 15 times out of 36, ties 6 times, and B wins 15 times. Of all interactions with a result (ie excluding ties), A wins 50%.
  
• If A has a +1, then we get A winning 21/36, ties 5/36, and B wins 10/36. Of all interactions with a result, A wins 68%.
  
• If A has a +2, then A wins 26/36, ties 4/36, and B wins 6/36. A wins 81%.
  
• A+3 means 91% victory.
  
• A+4 is 97% victory.
  
• A+5 and above makes victory certain, and this is also the last time B can even hope for a tie.
  

With comparative rolls, when the range of skill difference is equal to the range of the dice, then a single step up or down makes a big difference to the likely result.

Some skills can be rated by objective measures. How much can you do of X, Y and Z? The nature of combat skills is that we mostly rate them comparatively - did you beat the guy? So it's a bit difficult to rate abilities exactly the way it is for, I dunno, calculus or language or something.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 10, 2021, 09:11:00 PMWell, that is the trick isn't it?  To make the design process even more fun, everyone has their own ideas about what is realistic, reasonable, and fun.  It's absolutely impossible to please everyone.

Of course, because there is so much misinformation out there, especially in the form of movies. As for combat, what has been noted recently is that some "realistic" war movies are popular among those who have been to war, and some among those who haven't. Generation Kill and Hurt Locker are the two best examples. Twenty minutes into Kajaki I realised it was based on a true story, why? Because it was a bit boring, and the guys were talking shit. The fictional ones are either lighthearted gungho, or Terribly Serious And Emotional.

Quote from: Mishihari on May 11, 2021, 04:26:50 AM

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 10, 2021, 09:11:00 PM

Quote from: Mishihari on May 10, 2021, 01:34:30 PM
If two swordsman are in a duel and both are "good" but one is significantly better than the other, then that difference will be very important to the outcome of the duel.

These differences will be indistinguishable from chance. If my skill is 62% and yours is 65%, and we must roll d100 to hit, and d100 to parry, the variation due to the dice roll is far, far greater than the variation due to our skills. Now, if each hit did 1 hit point of damage and we each had 1,000 hit points, we could perhaps notice our skill differences over the course of the combat. But if we each have 6 hit points then no, we won't notice - and even 40% to 60% will often be missed.

That is not my experience.  I'm not a swordsman, but I do have a good decade of martial arts experience.  That doesn't make me an expert or an authority, but I think it does give me some relevant insight.  I'm pretty good, and I know a lot of other people that are pretty good, some a bit better than me and some a bit worse.  The guys that are a bit better can beat me about 3 out of 4 times.  A relatively small difference in skill makes a big difference in who wins the fight.  Maybe it's because real life doesn't use dice, aside from the rare environmental factor it's pretty deterministic.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 10, 2021, 09:11:00 PM
So the assumptions we make about a skill system, and skills in use, also tie into the assumptions we make about results of combat. And that's tricky, because while we like to imagine skills as continuous (having many small increments), combats are discrete - you only have four possible results, you are okay, injured, injured badly, or dead. D&D resolves this by having hit points, so that combat results can be continuous, too.

But again, we must decide whether we are speaking of what is realistic, what is reasonable, or what makes a fun game. In Conflict I hope I've found the overlap in that Venn diagram, but they are nonetheless three distinct qualities, and you can have one without the other two, or two without the third.

So that's the question in game design: do you want realistic, reasonable or fun? Or some combination of the three? Commonly people who find some particular subsystem of a game to be not fun will complain it's not realistic. But they are different things. Chess is fun, but it is not realistic. The 1d6 combat resolution I suggested in the firearms thread is realistic, but would not be fun.

Well, that is the trick isn't it?  To make the design process even more fun, everyone has their own ideas about what is realistic, reasonable, and fun.  It's absolutely impossible to please everyone.  If you've managed to get all 3 for even a moderate sized group of people, then that's impressive.

  I am an expert.  I ask you, what is the relative difference in skill level?  5 percent?  10 percent?  etc.  Real life "small" difference is not the same as statistic probabilities in my experience.  I also think the person who is coming up a bit short sparring is not always understanding (especially in striking) that a real fight is different, and one or two solid shots quickly "demote" their dance partners in a real altercation.

Quote from: oggsmash on May 11, 2021, 08:07:04 AM
  I am an expert.

How is this assessed?

This is a serious question. Because if we have some way of assessing competence, then if we are looking for a realistic-ish skill system, we can use a similar approach, or use the real-world assessment system to guide our system design.

Quote from: Pat on May 10, 2021, 08:20:34 PM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 10, 2021, 01:28:21 PM

Quote from: Pat on May 10, 2021, 08:33:15 AM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 10, 2021, 07:53:13 AM
Another problem with D&D is that 1st level characters can be killed by things most normal couch potatoes in real life would survive, even if seriously injured. I mean seriously, a RAT can kill a 0-level commoner in D&D with little effort. D&D doesn't handle survivability well.

It's fine for creatures that are roughly human-size or larger. But yes, for smaller critters, old school D&D has some issues. The basic problem is about 1 in 3 or 4 NPCs has 1 hp. An attack that does even 1 point of damage is a potentially fatal wound, for at least 25% of the population.

Is there a reasonable chance an animal can kill a healthy human being who is actively defending themselves? If the answer is no, the animal should do 0 damage. This applies to small dogs, squirrels, hawks, eagles, and even the fabled domestic cat. If they have attacks, it should be of the nuisance variety, not the damage variety (ordinary bats in B/X are a good example).

The problem with that approach is that it doesn't emulate damage very well because a rat could still potentially kill a healthy human being. Eventually. Specially if it's a bunch of rats gnawing at the bits or the human keels over and can't get up (or is bound). So a rat bite should do some damage (not to mention risk of disease or infection). But when the system starts out with the assumption that an average healthy human who isn't an experienced adventurer only has a single hit dice and they need to hit points, you don't have a lot of room to work with, even if you lower a tiny creature's bite to just 1hp per hit.

Even when dealing with medium or larger creature attacks it still remains an issue, because a person who rolled one single HP on their HD would still be instant-killed if they get hit with a stick. Once! With ANY hit no matter how low as long as it inflicts damage. And that's freaking absurd.

A 1hp commoner could die from a hard bitch slap from a high Strength fighter.

That's terrible design, and thinking like that is the reason the problem exists in the first place. The hit points system is not designed to reflect psychological stress in combat, like freezing. It's not designed around realistic injuries, like sprains, blood loss, and shock. It's not a good measure of disease progression or fatigue. It doesn't handle slitting someone's throat in their sleep well.

It's an abstract system designed to provide a meter between fresh and dead in combat, using granular quanta, and it does that quite well. If you want a rat slowly chewing on a bound prisoner, the hit point system and damage per attack is completely the wrong tool. Have the DM make a judgment call, perhaps roll for save, say a rat does 1 point of damage/hour, whatever seems reasonable. Just don't roll individual hits, and then roll for damage for each them. And for Zagyg's sake, don't try to use a rat slowly gnawing on someone as a justification for why small creatures need to do more than 0 damage in the standard combat system. It breaks what hit points do well, without adding anything of value.

Rats do 0 hp.

Disagree. This is all a cop out to sidestep the fact that a single rat bite can still be an excruciatingly painful and potentially serious injury, with longer lasting effects than merely being an annoyance.

It also conveniently leaves out the part of my post where I bring up a 1hp peasant being instantly killed by any hit with a stick large enough to cause damage. Not a critical hit or a hard hit to the back of the head, or whatever, but just ANY random hit that causes ANY amount of damage. A rock would have the same effect. Yet neither of these items would instantly kill anyone (even an out of shape couch potato or a child) in real life, unless the attack involved an extremely lucky hit to the head. But they can instantly kill a peasant who rolled 1hp on their single HD in traditional D&D.

But make that peasant a level 10 PC, and it suddenly becomes almost impossible to kill them with a stick or a rock, even on a critical hit to the head, David vs Goliath style.

The problem isn't small animal bites causing HP damage. The problem is that D&D SUCKS at handling damage all around.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 11, 2021, 08:18:15 AM

Quote from: oggsmash on May 11, 2021, 08:07:04 AM
  I am an expert.

How is this assessed?

This is a serious question. Because if we have some way of assessing competence, then if we are looking for a realistic-ish skill system, we can use a similar approach, or use the real-world assessment system to guide our system design.

Black belt in BJJ (training and teaching for 26 years), kickboxing  training and teaching for 28 years, 9 MMA fights, trained and cornered people for over 100 fights, took direct hand in training with and sparring a couple UFC fighters for their UFC fights. 

   If that does not qualify me as an expert in martial arts (at least when it comes to hitting, choking and joint locking),  well then let me know what would.

Frankly, the death by house cat issue is why I always preferred Palladium's HP = PE attribute (rolled on 3D6) + 1D6/level approach as it put an ordinary person's HP at about 14.

Actually their approach in general with skills starting at a moderate percentage when first acquired and then slowly improving from there (30%+5%/level being exceptionally common) matching their approach to HP was one I largely prefer and might best be summed up as "Higher Floor/Lower Ceiling."

I certainly took that approach to heart in designing my own system; skill training starts with a +3 and then over 15 levels rises to +8. The HP analogue starts at 25, but is only 50 at level 6, 75 at level 11 and caps at 95 at level 15.

Come to think of it, just about every system I actually enjoy using has a comparable approach; you're not typically the best ever to start, but you're solidly competent and then slowly improve from there.

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 11, 2021, 09:39:17 AM
Frankly, the death by house cat issue is why I always preferred Palladium's HP = PE attribute (rolled on 3D6) + 1D6/level approach as it put an ordinary person's HP at about 14.

Actually their approach in general with skills starting at a moderate percentage when first acquired and then slowly improving from there (30%+5%/level being exceptionally common) matching their approach to HP was one I largely prefer and might best be summed up as "Higher Floor/Lower Ceiling."

I certainly took that approach to heart in designing my own system; skill training starts with a +3 and then over 15 levels rises to +8. The HP analogue starts at 25, but is only 50 at level 6, 75 at level 11 and caps at 95 at level 15.

Come to think of it, just about every system I actually enjoy using has a comparable approach; you're not typically the best ever to start, but you're solidly competent and then slowly improve from there.

Or alternately, if using the D&D style, I think it makes a lot of sense to design it with level 1 (or even level zero) characters as kind of incompetent, but with no intention of starting PCs there.  For one thing, it leaves a little wiggle room for generic commoners, kids, etc. without having to play tricks with the main design.  That's more or less how I'm designing:  Levels running from zero to 24, but play expected to be between 3 and 20.  Not coincidentally to this discussion, a level 3 character averages about 13 "hit points".

Quote from: oggsmash on May 11, 2021, 08:07:04 AM

Quote from: Mishihari on May 11, 2021, 04:26:50 AM

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 10, 2021, 09:11:00 PM

Quote from: Mishihari on May 10, 2021, 01:34:30 PM
If two swordsman are in a duel and both are "good" but one is significantly better than the other, then that difference will be very important to the outcome of the duel.

These differences will be indistinguishable from chance. If my skill is 62% and yours is 65%, and we must roll d100 to hit, and d100 to parry, the variation due to the dice roll is far, far greater than the variation due to our skills. Now, if each hit did 1 hit point of damage and we each had 1,000 hit points, we could perhaps notice our skill differences over the course of the combat. But if we each have 6 hit points then no, we won't notice - and even 40% to 60% will often be missed.

That is not my experience.  I'm not a swordsman, but I do have a good decade of martial arts experience.  That doesn't make me an expert or an authority, but I think it does give me some relevant insight.  I'm pretty good, and I know a lot of other people that are pretty good, some a bit better than me and some a bit worse.  The guys that are a bit better can beat me about 3 out of 4 times.  A relatively small difference in skill makes a big difference in who wins the fight.  Maybe it's because real life doesn't use dice, aside from the rare environmental factor it's pretty deterministic.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 10, 2021, 09:11:00 PM
So the assumptions we make about a skill system, and skills in use, also tie into the assumptions we make about results of combat. And that's tricky, because while we like to imagine skills as continuous (having many small increments), combats are discrete - you only have four possible results, you are okay, injured, injured badly, or dead. D&D resolves this by having hit points, so that combat results can be continuous, too.

But again, we must decide whether we are speaking of what is realistic, what is reasonable, or what makes a fun game. In Conflict I hope I've found the overlap in that Venn diagram, but they are nonetheless three distinct qualities, and you can have one without the other two, or two without the third.

So that's the question in game design: do you want realistic, reasonable or fun? Or some combination of the three? Commonly people who find some particular subsystem of a game to be not fun will complain it's not realistic. But they are different things. Chess is fun, but it is not realistic. The 1d6 combat resolution I suggested in the firearms thread is realistic, but would not be fun.

Well, that is the trick isn't it?  To make the design process even more fun, everyone has their own ideas about what is realistic, reasonable, and fun.  It's absolutely impossible to please everyone.  If you've managed to get all 3 for even a moderate sized group of people, then that's impressive.

  I am an expert.  I ask you, what is the relative difference in skill level?  5 percent?  10 percent?  etc.  Real life "small" difference is not the same as statistic probabilities in my experience.  I also think the person who is coming up a bit short sparring is not always understanding (especially in striking) that a real fight is different, and one or two solid shots quickly "demote" their dance partners in a real altercation.

I am not an expert.  I have avoided a lot of fights.  I am old and worn out, and I have minimal interest in actually fighting; but I do know that a couple of solid shots to the face are momentum changing, for sure.  That will not stop a really tough guy, but it will cause a wannabe tough guy to question his ability to win.  It takes actual damage to stop a really tough guy.  In real life, there are no rules in a fight. 

How should we model that, in an RPG?

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 11, 2021, 12:43:07 PM
I am not an expert.  I have avoided a lot of fights.  I am old and worn out, and I have minimal interest in actually fighting; but I do know that a couple of solid shots to the face are momentum changing, for sure.  That will not stop a really tough guy, but it will cause a wannabe tough guy to question his ability to win.  It takes actual damage to stop a really tough guy.  In real life, there are no rules in a fight. 

How should we model that, in an RPG?

Hit points do a pretty good job of that; high-level fighters have a lot of hit points.

Quote from: Ratman_tf on May 10, 2021, 07:22:51 PM

Quote from: Zelen on May 10, 2021, 06:56:49 PM
The level treadmill and its lack of connection to fiction is one of my bigger gripes when it comes to D&D. I understand why developers/publishers want to provide this content, but at my actual gaming table there's no reason it has to be this way.

In future campaigns I run I might try to tie character progression to more meaningful story beats. If the player characters defeat a goblin tribe, slay a dragon, or banish a demon-prince, then based on what they actually accomplished give them some benefits. Of course negotiating with players on what they want and how to handle it is a lot more work, but personalizing the game is pretty much the point of running TTRPGs.

Personally, I hate these kinds of milestone xp systems. I like xp and levels and I like the system to have some granularity so the GM can modulate the xp awards.

YMMV. I've never felt like highly granular XP rewards were very good. XP has never motivated me as a player, and as a GM I just don't care to fiddle with it with all of the hassles it can entail. My group has been using "milestone" experience for the better part of this last decade. What I'm imagining is actually a lot more finely-grained than what we currently do, since I would be actually rewarding players for significant events, not just level-up at the end of a particular subplot. Though obviously subplots wrapping up is part of that greater set.

Quote from: oggsmash on May 11, 2021, 09:08:21 AM
   If that does not qualify me as an expert in martial arts (at least when it comes to hitting, choking and joint locking),  well then let me know what would.

I think it does. But don't get shirty, you're posting on an rpg board under a pseudonym and none of us have any clue who you actually are. It would of course be obvious in person. And in any case, I said, "how is this assessed?" I meant, what's the objective standard? Obviously a guy comes into your gym and you move together you'll know in ten minutes - but what's the ISO9000 standard, here? Objectively?

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 11, 2021, 12:43:07 PMI do know that a couple of solid shots to the face are momentum changing, for sure.  That will not stop a really tough guy, but it will cause a wannabe tough guy to question his ability to win.  It takes actual damage to stop a really tough guy.  In real life, there are no rules in a fight. 

How should we model that, in an RPG?

As Brad said, hit points do fairly well for that. Aside from that, it's the good old morale check. Fighting requires that you be willing and able to do others harm. Game systems tend to focus on the able part, skills and toughness and so on. The willing part is either assumed or left up to roleplaying, decisions not systems.

Most people are going to choose to leave a fight, if they are able to, before they physically can no longer fight - indeed, often before they're hurt at all. This is typically forgotten by players, since if your character takes a jab with a sword, you are not feeling the pain, and if you are playing a computer game, squatting down behind cover and/or bandaging your arm for thirty seconds heals all wounds - for you, though not the enemy, of course. And almost all computer games and too many GMs have the enemy all fight to the last man, no matter what.

But in reality normal people will do their best to avoid a fight, and if they do fight do their best to avoid injury, and if they do get injured, do their best to get the fuck out of there ASAP.

Players should not, I think, have morale checks imposed on them. If you want to be a suicidal idiot, great - we need a player to go do the pizza run anyway.

Rory Miller expressed it well in A Writer's Guide To Violence, where he described people's levels of being willing to use violence to achieve their ends. The ranking of people, in descending order of frequency in the population, was: nice, manipulative, assertive, aggressive, assaultive and murderous. Most people default to one level, are scared of and uncomprehending of people a level above, and have some degree of contempt for people a level below.

Assertive is probably the right level for most fighter types. Nice people don't want to hurt anyone. Manipulative people become magic-users or thieves. The aggressive ones will get themselves into more trouble than they planned for when they become aggressive towards someone who is assaultive, and the murderous one ends up in prison, shot by police, lynched by the village, etc.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 11, 2021, 08:27:11 AM
Disagree. This is all a cop out to sidestep the fact that a single rat bite can still be an excruciatingly painful and potentially serious injury, with longer lasting effects than merely being an annoyance.

It also conveniently leaves out the part of my post where I bring up a 1hp peasant being instantly killed by any hit with a stick large enough to cause damage. Not a critical hit or a hard hit to the back of the head, or whatever, but just ANY random hit that causes ANY amount of damage. A rock would have the same effect. Yet neither of these items would instantly kill anyone (even an out of shape couch potato or a child) in real life, unless the attack involved an extremely lucky hit to the head. But they can instantly kill a peasant who rolled 1hp on their single HD in traditional D&D.

But make that peasant a level 10 PC, and it suddenly becomes almost impossible to kill them with a stick or a rock, even on a critical hit to the head, David vs Goliath style.

The problem isn't small animal bites causing HP damage. The problem is that D&D SUCKS at handling damage all around.

Painful != 25% of the population dies.

And sure, you can make an argument that there should be nonlethal damage (oh wait there is), or that weapons do too much damage. Or that 0- and 1st level character have too few hp. But that's also not what the combat system is about. It's not about randomly walking up to a peasant and smacking them with a stick. It's about combat. It's about a healthy person using a weapon to actively try to kill someone else. And guess what? If someone swings a baseball at your head with the intent to kill, there's a good chance you'll die.

The rest seems to be your subjective dispreference for a system that works quite well for other people. <insert a quote from the Dude>

Rats do 0 points of damage.

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 11, 2021, 09:39:17 AM
Frankly, the death by house cat issue is why I always preferred Palladium's HP = PE attribute (rolled on 3D6) + 1D6/level approach as it put an ordinary person's HP at about 14.

In 1e someone doesn't croak until -10 hp, especially if the common misreading of that rule is used. Which works out to 13 to 14 hp. Coincidentally, that 10 extra hit points also works out to roughly 3d6. So you can make an argument that the default character in AD&D has the equivalent of 3 HD, with their class HD on top. Stretching it even further, you can argue that the class hit points on top are a character's heroism or staying power. After all, in a real fight, most people go down after one hit, regardless of the severity. The class hp on top are just your chance to keep fight. Plus, didn't Gygax start characters at 3rd level, at least in his later years? 3 HD also roughly corresponds with the expected HD for a natural animal of roughly human-size, like a hyena, wolf, or leopard. Overall, there's a decent argument that a capable adult human should have 3 HD.

Which might put weapon damage in context, a bit.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 11, 2021, 08:34:46 PM

Quote from: oggsmash on May 11, 2021, 09:08:21 AM
   If that does not qualify me as an expert in martial arts (at least when it comes to hitting, choking and joint locking),  well then let me know what would.

I think it does. But don't get shirty, you're posting on an rpg board under a pseudonym and none of us have any clue who you actually are. It would of course be obvious in person. And in any case, I said, "how is this assessed?" I meant, what's the objective standard? Obviously a guy comes into your gym and you move together you'll know in ten minutes - but what's the ISO9000 standard, here? Objectively?

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 11, 2021, 12:43:07 PMI do know that a couple of solid shots to the face are momentum changing, for sure.  That will not stop a really tough guy, but it will cause a wannabe tough guy to question his ability to win.  It takes actual damage to stop a really tough guy.  In real life, there are no rules in a fight. 

How should we model that, in an RPG?

As Brad said, hit points do fairly well for that. Aside from that, it's the good old morale check. Fighting requires that you be willing and able to do others harm. Game systems tend to focus on the able part, skills and toughness and so on. The willing part is either assumed or left up to roleplaying, decisions not systems.

Most people are going to choose to leave a fight, if they are able to, before they physically can no longer fight - indeed, often before they're hurt at all. This is typically forgotten by players, since if your character takes a jab with a sword, you are not feeling the pain, and if you are playing a computer game, squatting down behind cover and/or bandaging your arm for thirty seconds heals all wounds - for you, though not the enemy, of course. And almost all computer games and too many GMs have the enemy all fight to the last man, no matter what.

But in reality normal people will do their best to avoid a fight, and if they do fight do their best to avoid injury, and if they do get injured, do their best to get the fuck out of there ASAP.

Players should not, I think, have morale checks imposed on them. If you want to be a suicidal idiot, great - we need a player to go do the pizza run anyway.

Rory Miller expressed it well in A Writer's Guide To Violence, where he described people's levels of being willing to use violence to achieve their ends. The ranking of people, in descending order of frequency in the population, was: nice, manipulative, assertive, aggressive, assaultive and murderous. Most people default to one level, are scared of and uncomprehending of people a level above, and have some degree of contempt for people a level below.

Assertive is probably the right level for most fighter types. Nice people don't want to hurt anyone. Manipulative people become magic-users or thieves. The aggressive ones will get themselves into more trouble than they planned for when they become aggressive towards someone who is assaultive, and the murderous one ends up in prison, shot by police, lynched by the village, etc.

  Sorry about the tone, I guess I do not understand why anyone would lie about spending almost all their adult life developing Cauliflower ear, sore elbows, cracked sinuses, torn hamstrings, scar tissue filled knees, a sore back, a brain that likely has a level of CTE,  and sinuses that drain for a while every time the climate goes through a drastic shift (from humid to dry).  If I said I was a lawyer or had a master's in computer science no one would even raise an eyebrow.  I think I might not spend enough time online, is it that common to hear this sort of thing lied about?  In my day I guess the lie in the bar was everyone said they were former "special forces" and almost always SEALs.   I think I also likely have a very different point of view of the decision making process of people who decide to fight in a cage or a ring, as in it is generally a bad idea, especially in the long run.

   GURPS has a pain and shock penalty to skills when you take damage (thus demoting that skilled fighter after he gets hit), this is largely compensated for by dedicated fighters in taking high pain threshold.  I would say hit points to represent being tougher fairly well, but are also abstracted in the sense they are a whittling away of "luck" in as much as an erosion of physical durability.  Here again I like that the "tough" guys in GURPS are the guys with advantages towards that as well as high health, allowing them to stay up and fighting while below 0 hitpoints and simulating a person with serious injuries continuing to fight.  It is also heavily suggested for running GURPS that most NPCs of the mook variety will play dead or flee after taking a wound, and will never attempt health checks when taking damage to get HP to 0, and collapse and "play dead" or surrender no moral checks needed.   I prefer GURPS to D&D like rules for something a bit more human centric (meaning human in the sense of not super heros, and D&D adventurers are not human level, they are super heros) and especially prefer it in modern or high tech settings with firearms.   It also models incremental gains and skill differences, and allows for techniques and situations where high skills can be over come or overwhelmed.

Quote from: oggsmash on May 12, 2021, 06:35:34 AMI guess I do not understand why anyone would lie about spending almost all their adult life developing Cauliflower ear, sore elbows, cracked sinuses, torn hamstrings, scar tissue filled knees, a sore back, a brain that likely has a level of CTE,  and sinuses that drain for a while every time the climate goes through a drastic shift (from humid to dry).

You hadn't mentioned those things before, at least not in a thread I've seen. If you'd mentioned how fucked-up you were then I would have taken that as indicating at least some expertise ;) Again remember we can't see you. You just said you're an expert. You should have led with the ears.

In any case, with or without these things, the more general question remains: how do we assess "expertise" in this or that?

QuoteIf I said I was a lawyer or had a master's in computer science no one would even raise an eyebrow.

Ah, but if you said you were an expert lawyer or the best computer science guy then some people might ask questions.

QuoteI think I might not spend enough time online, is it that common to hear this sort of thing lied about?

We've no way of knowing. But it is human nature for us to overestimate our level of competence. Almost every person I have ever met has told me that, "Basically I'm the one doing all the work at the office, half the other guys are idiots, especially the manager, I have to tell them everything, they're useless." Nobody has ever said to me, "Look, I'm pretty mediocre," still less have they said, "I'm the dumbest guy in the room, fuck knows why they hired me." Perhaps I'm fortunate and only meet the hardworking smart people? But not likely. Much more likely is that it's hard to assess your own level of competence in things.

QuoteI think I also likely have a very different point of view of the decision making process of people who decide to fight in a cage or a ring, as in it is generally a bad idea, especially in the long run.

Yes. That's the benefit of areas like yours or mine (I'm a barbell-focused trainer) - there are distinct measurable outcomes that are pretty hard to argue with. If I can pick up 300lbs and you can pick up 400lbs, you're better. If we get in the cage and eleven seconds later I'm face-down with one arm bent back and the other arm tapping out, you're better. When people walk into our facilities any cockiness lasts ten minutes, tops.

Other skills are a lot fuzzier, though. And of course, a lot of guys who would never walk into one of our places have a lot to say about it. "Yeah in high school I used to bench about tree-fiddy."

If you ever want an hour or two of shaking your head sadly at the world, watch out for a Statting Yourself As A Character thread on an rpg forum. It's... embarrassing. The GURPS forum had one about 2006, I'm still getting over it.

QuoteI prefer GURPS to D&D like rules for something a bit more human centric (meaning human in the sense of not super heros, and D&D adventurers are not human level, they are super heros) and especially prefer it in modern or high tech settings with firearms.   It also models incremental gains and skill differences, and allows for techniques and situations where high skills can be over come or overwhelmed.

I can see that. I just think the execution in GURPS is needlessly complicated. In our society it's common for people to mistake precision (how many decimal points a measurement has) with accuracy (whether it's right). If I say that someone is 152.21lb people are more likely to believe me than if I say "he's about 155" - though he's actually 156, so the second one is more accurate.

Likewise, if an rpg system set has a lot of detail (precision), people will assume it's realistic (accurate). So much so that they believe all that detail is actually necessary. I don't think it is.

Quote from: Pat on May 11, 2021, 09:15:57 PM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 11, 2021, 08:27:11 AM
Disagree. This is all a cop out to sidestep the fact that a single rat bite can still be an excruciatingly painful and potentially serious injury, with longer lasting effects than merely being an annoyance.

It also conveniently leaves out the part of my post where I bring up a 1hp peasant being instantly killed by any hit with a stick large enough to cause damage. Not a critical hit or a hard hit to the back of the head, or whatever, but just ANY random hit that causes ANY amount of damage. A rock would have the same effect. Yet neither of these items would instantly kill anyone (even an out of shape couch potato or a child) in real life, unless the attack involved an extremely lucky hit to the head. But they can instantly kill a peasant who rolled 1hp on their single HD in traditional D&D.

But make that peasant a level 10 PC, and it suddenly becomes almost impossible to kill them with a stick or a rock, even on a critical hit to the head, David vs Goliath style.

The problem isn't small animal bites causing HP damage. The problem is that D&D SUCKS at handling damage all around.

Painful != 25% of the population dies.

And sure, you can make an argument that there should be nonlethal damage (oh wait there is), or that weapons do too much damage. Or that 0- and 1st level character have too few hp. But that's also not what the combat system is about. It's not about randomly walking up to a peasant and smacking them with a stick. It's about combat. It's about a healthy person using a weapon to actively try to kill someone else. And guess what? If someone swings a baseball at your head with the intent to kill, there's a good chance you'll die.

The rest seems to be your subjective dispreference for a system that works quite well for other people. <insert a quote from the Dude>

Rats do 0 points of damage.

Whatever dude. I addressed the attacks to the head thing since post 1 on this side topic. A random successful hit does not represent a strike to the head. That would be more in line with a critical hit. If we go by your assumption that means a 1hp peasant ALWAYS get struct in the head whenever hit with a low damage weapon, just so you can bend yourself into a pretzel to try to justify why level 0-1 characters have such ridiculously low HP. Working backwards from the assumption that D&D can do no wrong.

D&D is trash.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 12, 2021, 07:16:40 AM

Quote from: oggsmash on May 12, 2021, 06:35:34 AMI guess I do not understand why anyone would lie about spending almost all their adult life developing Cauliflower ear, sore elbows, cracked sinuses, torn hamstrings, scar tissue filled knees, a sore back, a brain that likely has a level of CTE,  and sinuses that drain for a while every time the climate goes through a drastic shift (from humid to dry).

You hadn't mentioned those things before, at least not in a thread I've seen. If you'd mentioned how fucked-up you were then I would have taken that as indicating at least some expertise ;) Again remember we can't see you. You just said you're an expert. You should have led with the ears.

In any case, with or without these things, the more general question remains: how do we assess "expertise" in this or that?

QuoteIf I said I was a lawyer or had a master's in computer science no one would even raise an eyebrow.

Ah, but if you said you were an expert lawyer or the best computer science guy then some people might ask questions.

QuoteI think I might not spend enough time online, is it that common to hear this sort of thing lied about?

We've no way of knowing. But it is human nature for us to overestimate our level of competence. Almost every person I have ever met has told me that, "Basically I'm the one doing all the work at the office, half the other guys are idiots, especially the manager, I have to tell them everything, they're useless." Nobody has ever said to me, "Look, I'm pretty mediocre," still less have they said, "I'm the dumbest guy in the room, fuck knows why they hired me." Perhaps I'm fortunate and only meet the hardworking smart people? But not likely. Much more likely is that it's hard to assess your own level of competence in things.

QuoteI think I also likely have a very different point of view of the decision making process of people who decide to fight in a cage or a ring, as in it is generally a bad idea, especially in the long run.

Yes. That's the benefit of areas like yours or mine (I'm a barbell-focused trainer) - there are distinct measurable outcomes that are pretty hard to argue with. If I can pick up 300lbs and you can pick up 400lbs, you're better. If we get in the cage and eleven seconds later I'm face-down with one arm bent back and the other arm tapping out, you're better. When people walk into our facilities any cockiness lasts ten minutes, tops.

Other skills are a lot fuzzier, though. And of course, a lot of guys who would never walk into one of our places have a lot to say about it. "Yeah in high school I used to bench about tree-fiddy."

If you ever want an hour or two of shaking your head sadly at the world, watch out for a Statting Yourself As A Character thread on an rpg forum. It's... embarrassing. The GURPS forum had one about 2006, I'm still getting over it.

QuoteI prefer GURPS to D&D like rules for something a bit more human centric (meaning human in the sense of not super heros, and D&D adventurers are not human level, they are super heros) and especially prefer it in modern or high tech settings with firearms.   It also models incremental gains and skill differences, and allows for techniques and situations where high skills can be over come or overwhelmed.

I can see that. I just think the execution in GURPS is needlessly complicated. In our society it's common for people to mistake precision (how many decimal points a measurement has) with accuracy (whether it's right). If I say that someone is 152.21lb people are more likely to believe me than if I say "he's about 155" - though he's actually 156, so the second one is more accurate.

Likewise, if an rpg system set has a lot of detail (precision), people will assume it's realistic (accurate). So much so that they believe all that detail is actually necessary. I don't think it is.

     regarding GURPS, and self statting, is it ever settled as to what the 8x basic lift was supposed to be?  I always assumed it meant a standing press, with a clean, given the amount of time it took to get up.  I have seen it argued as a snatch, clean and jerk, and even a deadlift as well.

  I have mentioned being a BJJ BB on the forum before, but I think it was passing and likely not on this forum (probably off topic) in that it really has no bearing usually here.

I really want to try out Savage Worlds because it seems to have an in-between of levels and Point buy.
You get 1-2 points a level, and some abilities are gated off until you reach a high enough level.

In lethality, there is always a chance (even a low one) for a one-hit kill, no matter the level because of exploding dice.

Quote from: oggsmash on May 12, 2021, 06:35:34 AMIn my day I guess the lie in the bar was everyone said they were former "special forces" and almost always SEALs.

The copypasta
https://genius.com/Copypasta-navy-seal-copypasta-annotated (https://genius.com/Copypasta-navy-seal-copypasta-annotated)

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 07:46:00 AM
D&D is trash.

Nahh, you're just too dumb to understand it.

Quote from: Shrieking Banshee on May 12, 2021, 09:15:36 AM
I really want to try out Savage Worlds because it seems to have an in-between of levels and Point buy.
You get 1-2 points a level, and some abilities are gated off until you reach a high enough level.

In lethality, there is always a chance (even a low one) for a one-hit kill, no matter the level because of exploding dice.

   I like savage worlds. GURPS is my preferred game system, but I think GURPS takes some time to decide what you do or do not want to use.  Savage Worlds has a nice combination of incremental increases, as well as some abilities you can get later to make a hero larger than life.   The scenario I always think of that determines my preference for a game system is this:  If a warrior of good capability (lvl 10 fighter, a warrior archetype in GURPS around 200-250pts, or a seasoned - even hero level SW) is surrounded by 8 guardsmen all aiming heavy crossbows at him, is he concerned?  Dungeons and dragons he has no worries.  GURPS he is very worried.  Savage Worlds he is also very worried.   

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 07:46:00 AM
I addressed the attacks to the head thing since post 1 on this side topic. A random successful hit does not represent a strike to the head. That would be more in line with a critical hit. If we go by your assumption that means a 1hp peasant ALWAYS get struct in the head whenever hit with a low damage weapon, just so you can bend yourself into a pretzel to try to justify why level 0-1 characters have such ridiculously low HP. Working backwards from the assumption that D&D can do no wrong.

D&D is trash.

Yeah, at this point you're completely irrational.

Old school D&D doesn't have critical hits, so yes, a hit to the head is a normal hit. Or to be even more precise, hit points are an abstract measure of injury that's uncorrelated with any specific wound, which means the DM, or even the player depending on the social contract, can describe injuries in any way they see fit, including as head wounds.

And I specifically pointed out that hit points were pretty damn low for 0-level peasants, and argued the baseline should be more than 3 HD. I literally said the opposite of what you're claiming I'm contorting myself to support.

The real example of someone starting with a conclusion and then contorting everything to try to support it is your claim that D&D is trash because an abstract mechanic designed to create a good flow in a game doesn't sufficiently match your perception of reality.

Quote from: Pat on May 11, 2021, 09:27:27 PM

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 11, 2021, 09:39:17 AM
Frankly, the death by house cat issue is why I always preferred Palladium's HP = PE attribute (rolled on 3D6) + 1D6/level approach as it put an ordinary person's HP at about 14.

In 1e someone doesn't croak until -10 hp, especially if the common misreading of that rule is used. Which works out to 13 to 14 hp. Coincidentally, that 10 extra hit points also works out to roughly 3d6. So you can make an argument that the default character in AD&D has the equivalent of 3 HD, with their class HD on top. Stretching it even further, you can argue that the class hit points on top are a character's heroism or staying power. After all, in a real fight, most people go down after one hit, regardless of the severity. The class hp on top are just your chance to keep fight. Plus, didn't Gygax start characters at 3rd level, at least in his later years? 3 HD also roughly corresponds with the expected HD for a natural animal of roughly human-size, like a hyena, wolf, or leopard. Overall, there's a decent argument that a capable adult human should have 3 HD.

Which might put weapon damage in context, a bit.

The only issue with treating the -10 as equivalent to Palladium's PE+1d6 per level is that as soon as you go negative in D&D you fall unconscious and start losing an additional point every round (so 1/minute) until someone treats you or you die. That's not the realistic outcome of a housecat attack even on someone so sickly as to have the minimum hit points (which in Palladium would be 4).

Palladium also has negative hit points; you die at -PE hit points (and their checks for dying come every hour instead of every round... which makes it a bit more foregiving for settings without magic) so that's actually the analogue to the -10 in D&D.

Another factor that's relevant too, particularly in this discussion, is the way Palladium's approach (at least in 1e) also greatly capped the upper end of the hit point range. There were no bonus hit points per level; it was all front-loaded into using your PE score as the base.

So in AD&D a high Con (+3 mod) fighter might start with 9 hp, averages 77 hp at level 9 and 95 hp at level 15. In other words they start at under 10% of their maximum potential.

By contrast a high PE (20 because of the bonus d6 if a stat is 16+) character in Palladium might start with 24 hp, but only averages 51 hp at level nine and 73 hp at the system's max level of 15... which means they start at 33% of their maximum potential.

Throw in higher damage (mundane daggers are 1D6, longswords 2D6... dwarven crafted swords could add +6 to that, magic enchantments could add 2D6 more... and that's not counting Strength or Hand-to-Hand bonuses) and it actually takes several levels of advancement in Palladium to be able to add enough hit points to actually take an additional hit and remain standing.

Neither approach is "right", but my preference definitely leans towards Palladium's.

Hit Point accumulation and Weapon / Spell damage should reflect something measurable, in my opinion.  Obviously, I can't use "Magic" as the reference point; but I can use Weapon damage.

In my last game; I rolled up a Wolf, as a random encounter.  A standard, run of the mill Wolf.  I didn't look up any stats.  One PC rolled 6 Damage on a d6, with a Short Sword.  A full damage blow, with a Short Sword.  I said that killed the Wolf, because I know it would be lethal.

Now; if 6 Damage kills a Wolf or a Common Peasant, I can base all other Weapon and Spell damage on how many Short Sword strikes they are equal to.  I can also base Hit Points on how many full damage Short Sword strikes it would take to slay a PC, NPC, Monster, etc.

Maybe that's the answer to my opening post in this thread?

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 12, 2021, 12:50:26 PM
Hit Point accumulation and Weapon / Spell damage should reflect something measurable, in my opinion.  Obviously, I can't use "Magic" as the reference point; but I can use Weapon damage.

In my last game; I rolled up a Wolf, as a random encounter.  A standard, run of the mill Wolf.  I didn't look up any stats.  One PC rolled 6 Damage on a d6, with a Short Sword.  A full damage blow, with a Short Sword.  I said that killed the Wolf, because I know it would be lethal.

Now; if 6 Damage kills a Wolf or a Common Peasant, I can base all other Weapon and Spell damage on how many Short Sword strikes they are equal to.  I can also base Hit Points on how many full damage Short Sword strikes it would take to slay a PC, NPC, Monster, etc.

Maybe that's the answer to my opening post in this thread?

It almost seems more akin to the aformentioned wound system used in Savage worlds....one telling blow drops a mook (there are special case creatures who may not be "named" but have more than one wound), but several, or a massive blow is needed to drop a PC or major character in one shot.   Have you played Savage Worlds?  I has incremental progression, a wound system that seems akin to your example, and its "levels" are really subgroupings of ranges of points for heros.   

Quote from: Jam The MF on May 08, 2021, 01:57:00 PM
What feels right for a Level 1 Character, vs a Level 2 Character; or a Level 5 Character?

Do we really need Level progression in RPGs?

Well, there are only two RPGs I get deep, deep into. Core AD&D 1E and Lejendary Adventure. Everything else I dabble in.

In 1E, an 8th level character is about twice as powerful as a 4th level character, but a 16th level character is only marginally improved over an 8th level character. And I'm fine with that. I think that's really cool in fact.

In LA, the numbers are reversed, so 1st Rank is the best. But it's not just the numbers that are reversed. The paradigm is reversed. You build up your skills and abilities, and that qualifies you for certain orders and rank. It's quite possible to have two starting characters, one at 6th rank and one at 12th rank, and for them to be about equal. It's simpy that the former is specialized around climbing the social hierarchy of the order in question, while the latter probably has a lot of extraneous expertise.

Another thing I thought was really cool back in the day was the BBS game Legend of the Red Dragon. It was a level-based murder grind with approximately exponential power growth by level. But there were a lot of smaller, more incremental power-ups you could get in the course of the game as well. At the lower levels, those little power ups paled in comparison to the level benefits. But at higher levels, since it took longer and longer to get to the next level, the more of those power-ups you would accumulate during regular play, and they became more significant than level.

In all three games, level was important in terms of access. In LA it's simply access to social tiers. In D&D, it meant access to things such as higher level spells. If LORD it affected what encounters you would have as well as who you could challenge, and who could challenge you, in PvP.

But also, in all three games, level wasn't everything. In LORD, it was fairly common for lower level characters to beat higher level ones in PvP. In AD&D, the attribute effect was the opposite of levels: A fighter with 18's in STR, DEX, and/or CON could beat a fighter of 4 levels higher who only had 14's. While there's little difference between a Fighter with 9's and one with 14's. So a high level character gained relatively little from adding a new level, but had a lot more benefit in going from a 15 STR to 16 STR than he would a 10 STR to 11 STR. In LA there is little correlation at all between Rank and how powerful a character is overall.

It's all really nuanced and all really cool.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 07:46:00 AM
I addressed the attacks to the head thing since post 1 on this side topic. A random successful hit does not represent a strike to the head. That would be more in line with a critical hit. If we go by your assumption that means a 1hp peasant ALWAYS get struct in the head whenever hit with a low damage weapon, just so you can bend yourself into a pretzel to try to justify why level 0-1 characters have such ridiculously low HP. Working backwards from the assumption that D&D can do no wrong.

D&D is trash.

Yeah, at this point you're completely irrational.

Right back at you.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AMOld school D&D doesn't have critical hits, so yes, a hit to the head is a normal hit. Or to be even more precise, hit points are an abstract measure of injury that's uncorrelated with any specific wound, which means the DM, or even the player depending on the social contract, can describe injuries in any way they see fit, including as head wounds.

Normal hits in old D&D are always to head so that a 1hp peasant can die of a single hit with a stick. Got it.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AMAnd I specifically pointed out that hit points were pretty damn low for 0-level peasants, and argued the baseline should be more than 3 HD. I literally said the opposite of what you're claiming I'm contorting myself to support.

Where did you argue that? Cuz that has always been more or less my take about base HD in D&D, so if you had mentioned it, I wouldn't have argued against it--cuz that's basically what I tend to do. If fact, NONE of my arguments are against it, but essentially against the idea that 1 HD is enough. The only one I remember bringing up something similar to using 3 HD as a base at one point was Steven Mitchell in this post...

https://www.therpgsite.com/pen-paper-roleplaying-games-rpgs-discussion/incremental-success-improvement-as-characters-progress-in-rpgs/msg1171904/#msg1171904

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AMThe real example of someone starting with a conclusion and then contorting everything to try to support it is your claim that D&D is trash because an abstract mechanic designed to create a good flow in a game doesn't sufficiently match your perception of reality.

That's a really good description of every single reply you've made to me on this topic from the get go.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 05:38:54 PM

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 07:46:00 AM
I addressed the attacks to the head thing since post 1 on this side topic. A random successful hit does not represent a strike to the head. That would be more in line with a critical hit. If we go by your assumption that means a 1hp peasant ALWAYS get struct in the head whenever hit with a low damage weapon, just so you can bend yourself into a pretzel to try to justify why level 0-1 characters have such ridiculously low HP. Working backwards from the assumption that D&D can do no wrong.

D&D is trash.

Yeah, at this point you're completely irrational.

Right back at you.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AMOld school D&D doesn't have critical hits, so yes, a hit to the head is a normal hit. Or to be even more precise, hit points are an abstract measure of injury that's uncorrelated with any specific wound, which means the DM, or even the player depending on the social contract, can describe injuries in any way they see fit, including as head wounds.

Normal hits in old D&D are always to head so that a 1hp peasant can die of a single hit with a stick. Got it.

Where did I say that?

Oh, I didn't.

Never even implied it.

What's that called again? Something involving straw and persons of one gender? Or we could just call it a lie. That's simpler and doesn't require a memeterm.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 05:38:54 PM

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AMAnd I specifically pointed out that hit points were pretty damn low for 0-level peasants, and argued the baseline should be more than 3 HD. I literally said the opposite of what you're claiming I'm contorting myself to support.

Where did you argue that? Cuz that has always been more or less my take about base HD in D&D, so if you had mentioned it, I wouldn't have argued against it--cuz that's basically what I tend to do. If fact, NONE of my arguments are against it, but essentially against the idea that 1 HD is enough.

https://www.therpgsite.com/pen-paper-roleplaying-games-rpgs-discussion/incremental-success-improvement-as-characters-progress-in-rpgs/msg1171981/#msg1171981

So not only did you claim I said something I didn't, but I've posted the very opposite of what you claimed just a page or two ago.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 05:38:54 PM

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AMThe real example of someone starting with a conclusion and then contorting everything to try to support it is your claim that D&D is trash because an abstract mechanic designed to create a good flow in a game doesn't sufficiently match your perception of reality.

That's a really good description of every single reply you've made to me on this topic from the get go.

Bullshit, see above. Sometimes you make worthwhile posts, but you seem stuck in irrational mode on this topic.

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 12, 2021, 11:25:38 AM

Quote from: Pat on May 11, 2021, 09:27:27 PM

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 11, 2021, 09:39:17 AM
Frankly, the death by house cat issue is why I always preferred Palladium's HP = PE attribute (rolled on 3D6) + 1D6/level approach as it put an ordinary person's HP at about 14.

In 1e someone doesn't croak until -10 hp, especially if the common misreading of that rule is used. Which works out to 13 to 14 hp. Coincidentally, that 10 extra hit points also works out to roughly 3d6. So you can make an argument that the default character in AD&D has the equivalent of 3 HD, with their class HD on top. Stretching it even further, you can argue that the class hit points on top are a character's heroism or staying power. After all, in a real fight, most people go down after one hit, regardless of the severity. The class hp on top are just your chance to keep fight. Plus, didn't Gygax start characters at 3rd level, at least in his later years? 3 HD also roughly corresponds with the expected HD for a natural animal of roughly human-size, like a hyena, wolf, or leopard. Overall, there's a decent argument that a capable adult human should have 3 HD.

Which might put weapon damage in context, a bit.

The only issue with treating the -10 as equivalent to Palladium's PE+1d6 per level is that as soon as you go negative in D&D you fall unconscious and start losing an additional point every round (so 1/minute) until someone treats you or you die. That's not the realistic outcome of a housecat attack even on someone so sickly as to have the minimum hit points (which in Palladium would be 4).

I wasn't comparing to Palladium, I'm not familiar with that system. Though you're correct, in AD&D1e the 10 extra points involve dying. I'm not talking about strict RAW. I'm talking about alternate interpretations, drawing on several lines of evidence.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 07:28:52 PM
I wasn't comparing to Palladium, I'm not familiar with that system. Though you're correct, in AD&D1e the 10 extra points involve dying. I'm not talking about strict RAW. I'm talking about alternate interpretations, drawing on several lines of evidence.

Fair enough.

I think I outlined the basics of Palladium Fantasy's approach to hit points in my previous post, but if you need any further info I'll be happy to share.

Its definitely got D&D's DNA, but Kevin had some very solid innovations back in the day and I think his biggest mistake was later trying to go back and unify everything into a single system instead of letting the idiosyncrasies of each setting be.

Fantasy was better without personal SDC, stat-boosting physical skills (and the increased bonuses that went with them that made armor almost irrelevant) and arguably PPE for spellcasting. Robotech was better when it wasn't trying to scale its MDC values to the "everything is MDC" world of Rifts. Heroes Unlimited was better when heroes got to apply their full dodge bonus to gunfire. Trying to make each setting use all the same physics robbed each one of their uniqueness.

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 12, 2021, 09:07:23 PM

I think I outlined the basics of Palladium Fantasy's approach to hit points in my previous post, but if you need any further info I'll be happy to share.

Its definitely got D&D's DNA, but Kevin had some very solid innovations back in the day and I think his biggest mistake was later trying to go back and unify everything into a single system instead of letting the idiosyncrasies of each setting be.

Most people describe Palladium as a fantasy heartbreaker, so it's always interesting to hear what works from people invested in the system. It's really the details and interactions that matter more than raw concepts.

Regarding the 1E discussion here, I have to point out that the house cat example is seriously flawed. And I mean the example itself is the problem, not necessarily the rules per se. The house cat stats come up in 1.5E. And by that time, there was a lot of stat inflation going on. Things like bartenders being retired 4th level fighters were commonplace. It's not really the same game as core 1E that imagines 98% of human human population being 0th level.

There are a few data points that verify what I'm saying. Falling damage was revised to be cumulative. There was a story going around that it was originally intended to be that way but for an editing error. But the early published modules conformed to the flat d6 per 10', not the cumulative one. The story seems bunk. It was revised because in 1.5E there was stat inflation and DMs were concerned that high level PC fighters would start leaping off cliffs as some kind of absurd short cut.

Flat d6 damage per 10 feet, when you assume the world is mostly 0th level, actually fairly accurately syncs up with real world falling fatality statistics. Meaning the original 1E system works perfectly fine as is. The house cat stats were calibrated specifically for a stat-inflated campaign. It was not designed for use with the original concept of the game. Pitting MMII house cats vs 0th level characters is a lot like comparing monster stats from one RPG with human stats from a different RPGs. I wouldn't expect them to make any sense stacked side by side like that.

I believe 1E was in a unique place in the evolution of RPGs. It was the most played RPG of its time. It came late enough that there was already a ton of D&D play experience to draw upon and codify. But it was still too early on in the evolution of RPGs before the form had settled upon one paradigm that would prove to be most popular, which I characterize roughly as "Rag tag band of border-line psychopaths wander the land getting caught up in wacky adventures." And that paradigm was already in full swing by 1.5E.

Core 1E's mission statement was to provide as much fun as possible to as many players as possible for as long a time as possible. And so it was written to accommodate a lot of different play styles. You can play 1E as a wargame as well as the rag tag high fantasy style. The 1-minute melee round abstractions were not tossed in there just to confound intuition. It's to help resolve large scale combat more quickly, and to minimize tracking of things like hit points. It was calibrated to mostly be a one-hit-kill system. What made some units more resilient than others was primarily the armor they wear. Which is also why a "hit" is defined as not just a hit, but a hit that also surpasses armor defense such that armor makes you harder to hit.

Ironically, the Greyhawk hardback brought the 0th level character back to the fore by introducing rules for 0th level PCs. I always thought it was a silly idea. It feels like what happened were Greyhawk originalists were trying to pushing back against stat inflation. Forgotten Realms is for pansies. Real men play Greyhawk, where we're so hard core, you have to work your way to even get to 1st level. And it didn't make sense in the context of the other AD&D works that were published before or after it.

If you want to play gotcha, then hey, you're right. Technically it all flies under the AD&D 1E banner. But if you want to serious and good faith analysis, you can't be talking about house cats.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 07:24:02 PM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 05:38:54 PM

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 07:46:00 AM
I addressed the attacks to the head thing since post 1 on this side topic. A random successful hit does not represent a strike to the head. That would be more in line with a critical hit. If we go by your assumption that means a 1hp peasant ALWAYS get struct in the head whenever hit with a low damage weapon, just so you can bend yourself into a pretzel to try to justify why level 0-1 characters have such ridiculously low HP. Working backwards from the assumption that D&D can do no wrong.

D&D is trash.

Yeah, at this point you're completely irrational.

Right back at you.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AMOld school D&D doesn't have critical hits, so yes, a hit to the head is a normal hit. Or to be even more precise, hit points are an abstract measure of injury that's uncorrelated with any specific wound, which means the DM, or even the player depending on the social contract, can describe injuries in any way they see fit, including as head wounds.

Normal hits in old D&D are always to head so that a 1hp peasant can die of a single hit with a stick. Got it.

Where did I say that?

Oh, I didn't.

Never even implied it.

What's that called again? Something involving straw and persons of one gender? Or we could just call it a lie. That's simpler and doesn't require a memeterm.

I don't give a shit what you call it. To you everything is a StRaWmAn, while your dodges and refusals to actually address what I actually said are somehow iron tight arguments*.

*And yes, I'm sure that this is also a sTrAwMaN.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 07:24:02 PM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 12, 2021, 05:38:54 PM

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:01:48 AMAnd I specifically pointed out that hit points were pretty damn low for 0-level peasants, and argued the baseline should be more than 3 HD. I literally said the opposite of what you're claiming I'm contorting myself to support.

Where did you argue that? Cuz that has always been more or less my take about base HD in D&D, so if you had mentioned it, I wouldn't have argued against it--cuz that's basically what I tend to do. If fact, NONE of my arguments are against it, but essentially against the idea that 1 HD is enough.

https://www.therpgsite.com/pen-paper-roleplaying-games-rpgs-discussion/incremental-success-improvement-as-characters-progress-in-rpgs/msg1171981/#msg1171981

So not only did you claim I said something I didn't, but I've posted the very opposite of what you claimed just a page or two ago.

Oh, so a reply to someone else that doesn't even say exactly what you claimed in the ACTUAL post I replied to? Made after we were already 2-3 posts into this argument that now you're trying to pull off as if that was your argument all along, when that wasn't even your argument in that post, but merely a concession you made by the end when you said "Overall, there's a decent argument that a capable adult human should have 3 HD."

But I'm the one who's being irrational and arguing based on logical fallacies?

You didn't argue that humans should have 3 HD in that post, but extrapolated that due to a -10 HP rule (which I believe was merely an optional rule) it's almost like you actually had 3HD all along. Even though being merely able to survive comatose till -10hp is NOT the same thing as actually having 10hp or 3HD, but merely a buffer that applies while you're lying in the ground helpless and dying. Then by the end you finally conceded that maybe "there's a decent argument that a capable adult human should have 3 HD."

That's not the same as "arguing" that that should be the case. That's arguing that the reality is something else (which I disagree with, as explained above), then essentially saying "but you know what? Maybe, maybe you're right...adult humans should have 3HD (i.e. a concession that, not an argument for)."

But NONE of that was ever your initial argument when you got into a discussion with me. Your initial argument was that rats should do 0 damage cuz 1 in 4 peasants (or something to that effect) only had 1hp. Which would be an argument in support of that status quo, not that maybe all adult humans should have 3HD, but a reinforcement of the idea that 1hp peasants are fine. Rat bites doing damage is what's the problem.

The idea that adult humans should have 3HD didn't even come up till after (in a post to someone else), and it would actually support my position (which is essentially baseline HP in D&D are too low), not contradict it. As it happens, I've been making all adult humans level 3 (3HD; children have 1HD, adolescents 2HD) in my games since the late 90s.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 13, 2021, 01:26:41 AM
I don't give a shit what you call it. To you everything is a StRaWmAn, while your dodges and refusals to actually address what I actually said are somehow iron tight arguments*.

I addressed what you said in that post. I pointed out your lies.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 07:24:02 PM
Oh, so a reply to someone else that doesn't even say exactly what you claimed in the ACTUAL post I replied to? Made after we were already 2-3 posts into this argument that now you're trying to pull off as if that was your argument all along, when that wasn't even your argument in that post, but merely a concession you made by the end when you said "Overall, there's a decent argument that a capable adult human should have 3 HD."

But I'm the one who's being irrational and arguing based on logical fallacies?

You didn't argue that humans should have 3 HD in that post, but extrapolated that due to a -10 HP rule (which I believe was merely an optional rule) it's almost like you actually had 3HD all along. Even though being merely able to survive comatose till -10hp is NOT the same thing as actually having 10hp or 3HD, but merely a buffer that applies while you're lying in the ground helpless and dying. Then by the end you finally conceded that maybe "there's a decent argument that a capable adult human should have 3 HD."

That's not the same as "arguing" that that should be the case. That's arguing that the reality is something else (which I disagree with, as explained above), then essentially saying "but you know what? Maybe, maybe you're right...adult humans should have 3HD (i.e. a concession that, not an argument for)."

But NONE of that was ever your initial argument when you got into a discussion with me. Your initial argument was that rats should do 0 damage cuz 1 in 4 peasants (or something to that effect) only had 1hp. Which would be an argument in support of that status quo, not that maybe all adult humans should have 3HD, but a reinforcement of the idea that 1hp peasants are fine. Rat bites doing damage is what's the problem.

The idea that adult humans should have 3HD didn't even come up till after (in a post to someone else), and it would actually support my position (which is essentially baseline HP in D&D are too low), not contradict it. As it happens, I've been making all adult humans level 3 (3HD; children have 1HD, adolescents 2HD) in my games since the late 90s.

Yes, you're the one who's lying and arguing based on logical fallacies.

It's always been my argument. I made part of in the post I linked, I've made it elsewhere, and I've never said anything to contradict it. You're pretending I've revised my statements, and I haven't. You simply decided what I believed based on your prejudices and irreason, and now you're claiming I'm trying to change my position because I pointed out I never said or believed any of the stuff you made up, and provided an example that contradict your narrative. In your world, proof that I don't believe what you say I believe is somehow me waffling, not you being wrong.

Also, the whole post about 3 HD was me explaining different lines of reasoning to a third party. I wasn't defending any of the things you're pretending I don't believe. That's why it's not structured as a defense for or against the things you're claiming I believe but I don't.

You're correct about one thing: I did say that rats have 0 hp. That was my argument. None of this other stuff you made up.

To repeat: You're an irrational liar.

Quote from: Lunamancer on May 13, 2021, 12:27:18 AM
Regarding the 1E discussion here, I have to point out that the house cat example is seriously flawed. And I mean the example itself is the problem, not necessarily the rules per se. The house cat stats come up in 1.5E. And by that time, there was a lot of stat inflation going on. Things like bartenders being retired 4th level fighters were commonplace. It's not really the same game as core 1E that imagines 98% of human human population being 0th level.

There was some stat inflation in the MM2, but not huge stat inflation. Not enough to justifying turning a 0 into a 1d2/1 and then rear claws for 1d2 (yes, domestic cats in 1e do a lot more than just 1 point of damage). Wild cats, which are basically a slightly larger version of the domestic cat, do 1d2/1d2/1d2 and rear claw for 1d2/1d2, while having as many hit dice as an orc. That's more flakiness in how AD&D treats animals that are smaller than human size than any kind of stat inflation. It's worth remembering that the MM1, which predates any stat inflation because it was literally the first book ever published for AD&D, gives a jackal 1/2 HD and a bite that does 1d2 points. That's crazy for an animal that weighs maybe 20 pounds, and is described as "not particularly fierce nor are they brave".

Is it just me, or do quite a lot of threads VisionStorm participates in turn into a shitfight between him and one other person? Just an observation. I think we could continue having a constructive discussion, and learning from people like oggsmash. That'd be good to do.

I think it's a fair argument that if PCs are running around with a hundred hit points that the system or GM will naturally inflate house cats up to be a nonzero threat to health. In a more realistic-themed game, you might want to have some sort of "nuisance" effect, where something does no real damage, but it does annoy and distract you - like being in a blizzard momentarily, cutting yourself shaving, getting blisters from marching too long, the digestive results of eating nothing but iron rations for a month - or being scratched by a house cat.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 13, 2021, 03:51:24 AM
I think it's a fair argument that if PCs are running around with a hundred hit points that the system or GM will naturally inflate house cats up to be a nonzero threat to health. In a more realistic-themed game, you might want to have some sort of "nuisance" effect, where something does no real damage, but it does annoy and distract you - like being in a blizzard momentarily, cutting yourself shaving, getting blisters from marching too long, the digestive results of eating nothing but iron rations for a month - or being scratched by a house cat.

Like bats in Basic D&D, which do no damage, but can cause confusion in large numbers.

Quote from: Pat on May 13, 2021, 02:06:03 AM
That's crazy for an animal that weighs maybe 20 pounds, and is described as "not particularly fierce nor are they brave".

Funny you should mention that. What does the MM say in the very next sentence after the one you quoted? "They appear here because of the magical bag of tricks (qv)."

I realize "because magic" is usually a weak argument. But when literally the only reason this entry is even included in the Monster Manual is "because magic" then you can't really wiggle out of it. That the bag of tricks is mentioned specifically leads me to believe these stats have more to do with defining the parameters of the bag of tricks than they do of small animals.

This line also says something about the Monster Manual in general--that it is not intended to be a bestiary of ordinary animals that would avoid confrontations with men entirely and present no danger at all. And it shouldn't be interpreted as such. Check the entry on herd animals, for example. It doesn't bother to list precise hit dice or damage from attacks. And it says they will immediately flee from what they perceive the greatest danger to be. Which can lead to a stampede, and that can be deadly if you're caught up in it. And to me that seems like that's the clear purpose of the entry--the danger of a stampede, not fisticuffs with a zebra.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 13, 2021, 03:51:24 AM
Is it just me, or do quite a lot of threads VisionStorm participates in turn into a shitfight between him and one other person? Just an observation. I think we could continue having a constructive discussion, and learning from people like oggsmash. That'd be good to do.

He HATES D&D; isn't that evident? Any sort of argument that shows D&D as anything other than contemptible trash is immediately attacked. I am fine with someone saying they don't want to play D&D for XYZ reasons, but that dude makes it sound like you've got to be some sort of mentally ill cretin to even consider that something like hit points are fine for a game about killing orcs and stealing their stuff.

Quote from: Pat on May 13, 2021, 01:51:08 AM

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 13, 2021, 01:26:41 AM
I don't give a shit what you call it. To you everything is a StRaWmAn, while your dodges and refusals to actually address what I actually said are somehow iron tight arguments*.

I addressed what you said in that post. I pointed out your lies.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 07:24:02 PM
Oh, so a reply to someone else that doesn't even say exactly what you claimed in the ACTUAL post I replied to? Made after we were already 2-3 posts into this argument that now you're trying to pull off as if that was your argument all along, when that wasn't even your argument in that post, but merely a concession you made by the end when you said "Overall, there's a decent argument that a capable adult human should have 3 HD."

But I'm the one who's being irrational and arguing based on logical fallacies?

You didn't argue that humans should have 3 HD in that post, but extrapolated that due to a -10 HP rule (which I believe was merely an optional rule) it's almost like you actually had 3HD all along. Even though being merely able to survive comatose till -10hp is NOT the same thing as actually having 10hp or 3HD, but merely a buffer that applies while you're lying in the ground helpless and dying. Then by the end you finally conceded that maybe "there's a decent argument that a capable adult human should have 3 HD."

That's not the same as "arguing" that that should be the case. That's arguing that the reality is something else (which I disagree with, as explained above), then essentially saying "but you know what? Maybe, maybe you're right...adult humans should have 3HD (i.e. a concession that, not an argument for)."

But NONE of that was ever your initial argument when you got into a discussion with me. Your initial argument was that rats should do 0 damage cuz 1 in 4 peasants (or something to that effect) only had 1hp. Which would be an argument in support of that status quo, not that maybe all adult humans should have 3HD, but a reinforcement of the idea that 1hp peasants are fine. Rat bites doing damage is what's the problem.

The idea that adult humans should have 3HD didn't even come up till after (in a post to someone else), and it would actually support my position (which is essentially baseline HP in D&D are too low), not contradict it. As it happens, I've been making all adult humans level 3 (3HD; children have 1HD, adolescents 2HD) in my games since the late 90s.

Yes, you're the one who's lying and arguing based on logical fallacies.

It's always been my argument. I made part of in the post I linked, I've made it elsewhere, and I've never said anything to contradict it. You're pretending I've revised my statements, and I haven't. You simply decided what I believed based on your prejudices and irreason, and now you're claiming I'm trying to change my position because I pointed out I never said or believed any of the stuff you made up, and provided an example that contradict your narrative. In your world, proof that I don't believe what you say I believe is somehow me waffling, not you being wrong.

Also, the whole post about 3 HD was me explaining different lines of reasoning to a third party. I wasn't defending any of the things you're pretending I don't believe. That's why it's not structured as a defense for or against the things you're claiming I believe but I don't.

You're correct about one thing: I did say that rats have 0 hp. That was my argument. None of this other stuff you made up.

To repeat: You're an irrational liar.

Whatever dude. I was writing a post going over every post leading up to this point in this conversation demonstrating how none of your arguments line up with what your saying now--all bare to see right on this fucking thread--but I accidentally closed the tap before I was done and I'm not going through all of that again.

You're a delusional nitwit that doesn't even the difference between purposefully inflammatory comments and a sTrAwMaN and consistently accuses me of shit that has fuck to do with what I'm actually thinking or saying. I'm done with you.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 13, 2021, 09:49:16 AM
I'm done with you.

Good. Like I said before, you've made some good posts in the past, and we've have some positive exchanges. But I'm really tired of being told what I think, demands that I defend the (strawmen) positions you've made up for me, and then abusive insults when I point out I never believed any of that.

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 13, 2021, 03:51:24 AM
Is it just me, or do quite a lot of threads VisionStorm participates in turn into a shitfight between him and one other person? Just an observation. I think we could continue having a constructive discussion, and learning from people like oggsmash. That'd be good to do.

Yes, and almost all of them are with Pat, who also gets into shitfights with other people and is constantly accusing people or strawmaning or malicious argumentation, or with BoxCrayonTales, who also goes off in his own weird tangents that many others also disagree with on the same thread.

But I notice how anytime someone make this observation none of them can point to the specific post I said something wrong or consider that it takes two to tango.

If you think the house cat stats from 1[.5]e are not realistic, you might not live in Portland OR.

https://time.com/20197/crazed-pet-cat-holds-family-hostage-and-forces-them-to-call-911-for-rescue/

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 13, 2021, 09:58:59 AM
Yes, and almost all of them are with Pat, who also gets into shitfights with other people and is constantly accusing people or strawmaning or malicious argumentation, or with BoxCrayonTales, who also goes off in his own weird tangents that many others also disagree with on the same thread.

Yep, and you fall for it, every time. (The other one to watch out for is jkhim, who shifts goal posts so fast they must be on skates.)

Quote from: Lunamancer on May 13, 2021, 09:02:03 AM
Funny you should mention that. What does the MM say in the very next sentence after the one you quoted? "They appear here because of the magical bag of tricks (qv)."

I realize "because magic" is usually a weak argument. But when literally the only reason this entry is even included in the Monster Manual is "because magic" then you can't really wiggle out of it. That the bag of tricks is mentioned specifically leads me to believe these stats have more to do with defining the parameters of the bag of tricks than they do of small animals.

This line also says something about the Monster Manual in general--that it is not intended to be a bestiary of ordinary animals that would avoid confrontations with men entirely and present no danger at all. And it shouldn't be interpreted as such. Check the entry on herd animals, for example. It doesn't bother to list precise hit dice or damage from attacks. And it says they will immediately flee from what they perceive the greatest danger to be. Which can lead to a stampede, and that can be deadly if you're caught up in it. And to me that seems like that's the clear purpose of the entry--the danger of a stampede, not fisticuffs with a zebra.

If you go back to OD&D, animals appear in the wilderness encounter tables. They're (mostly?) intended to giant animals, which is why toads, lizards, beetles, and weasels are listed, along with lions. But their specific stats aren't listed. But they're clearly intended to be combat encounters. That's fleshed out in the MM, where there are full entries for multiple varieties of things like giant beetles or toads/frogs. which is mostly giant animals, or real animals that happen to be large or dangerous. The MM has them in the encounter tables, as well. Again, they're combat encounters.

The bag of tricks isn't any different. It's literally a combat item, because the animals pulled from it last only "until the current combat terminates". Though there is one contradiction with the jackal entry -- while the jackal entry in the MM says it's only there because of the bag tricks, then why doesn't the MM also have entries for (non-giant) weasels, skunks, rats, owls, goats, rams, and eagles? Because the ordinary versions can be generated by a bag of tricks, which gives their HD, hp, and damage. Out of that list, only the skunk does no damage at all, and owls and goats are spectacularly dangerous, doing 1d3/1d3 and 1d6 damage, respectively.

Though all those animals, and more (like hawks, crows, and the mighty ordinary squirrel) do appear in the MM2, which goes overboard in statting out animals that should be no threat at all.

So the original animals that appeared in the encounter tables or were given stats were clearly intended to be combat encounters. But you weren't supposed to go out and kill Bambi. The strong giant (or Martian) references made it clear these are the animals that appear in legends, or sword & sorcery tales. They're deadly man-eaters in the jungle, vicious pit-beasts with cruel masters, or unnaturally huge or aggressive.

And I think Gygax wanted to figure out the stats of normal animals are, because it gives a baseline for the monsters. There's quite a bit of consistency between size and HD, and the aggressiveness/danger posed by the various animals, for instance. The jackal was probably just an aberration. The MM2 by contrast, seems to be deliberate. I suspect it's mostly just padding. All those mundane animals appear because they had a new book they wanted to publish, and needed some more entries. Probably based on the idea that the animals might be controlled or otherwise forced against the PCs, instead of expecting the PCs to randomly murder ravens.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 13, 2021, 09:58:59 AM

Quote from: Kyle Aaron on May 13, 2021, 03:51:24 AM
Is it just me, or do quite a lot of threads VisionStorm participates in turn into a shitfight between him and one other person? Just an observation. I think we could continue having a constructive discussion, and learning from people like oggsmash. That'd be good to do.

Yes, and almost all of them are with Pat, who also gets into shitfights with other people and is constantly accusing people or strawmaning or malicious argumentation, or with BoxCrayonTales, who also goes off in his own weird tangents that many others also disagree with on the same thread.

But I notice how anytime someone make this observation none of them can point to the specific post I said something wrong or consider that it takes two to tango.

Nonsense, other posters have pointed out (in this very thread) that you do this every time this topic comes up.

And here, you want an example where you said something wrong?
https://www.therpgsite.com/pen-paper-roleplaying-games-rpgs-discussion/incremental-success-improvement-as-characters-progress-in-rpgs/45/?action=post;quote=1172019;last_msg=1172164

That's where the discussion started to go downhill. You were aggressively dismissive, which I don't care much about, but I'm mentioning it because it signifies a shift in tone on your part. And then you put words in my mouth, by saying I was arguing that peasants always get hit the head, and that I was trying to justify why the hp of peasants was peasants. And that's what I objected to, because I didn't say or defend either.

I also never denied that it takes two to tango, that's another false claim about my beliefs. In fact, I fully agree with that statement. I decided when I started posting on this board that I'd try to be nice, and to extend people the benefit of the doubt, and that I'd try to deescalate discussions. That's my normal pattern. But I also decided that I wasn't going to let it stand when people say things about what I believe that are false, like the three statements of yours that I just cited. And that I'd occasionally return insults with insults, but never instigate it.

I certainly could have dropped it, but I didn't. That's an active, deliberate decision on my part.

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:16:36 PM
Most people describe Palladium as a fantasy heartbreaker, so it's always interesting to hear what works from people invested in the system. It's really the details and interactions that matter more than raw concepts.

I suppose that depends on your definition of heartbreaker. If Tunnels & Trolls, Chivelry & Sorcery and Rolemaster are also considered heartbreakers than yes, Palladium would qualify, but Palladium was popular enough to have its own shelf at all the gaming and book stores in my area back in the Pre-WotC days (something only D&D and WoD also managed at the time) and outlasted contemporaries like FASA or WEG (their most recent Fantasy release was February of this year) so if your definition is "niche game no one ever played" then it'd not be a heartbreaker.

I leave the final decision on that to you as it's pretty subjective.

What I find interesting related to it though is It's the way regional perceptions affect whether something is seen as mainstream or a heartbreaker. Anecdotally, in Lafeyette, IN in the late 90's when I was in college you couldn't shake a stick without hitting a WoD LARPer (many of who made the one hour commute to Indianapolis on the weekends to play in larger games). Meanwhile, up in Fort Wayne (where my family lives) at the same time trying to find a game that wasn't Palladium or HERO System was a chore (this was c. 97-99 when TSR was basically bankrupt and WotC hadn't yet stepped in so D&D was on the wane in the area at that time).

Also, as I've previously mentioned, Palladium is the only reason I'm still into gaming at all after a horrible experience with an AD&D DM nearly drove me from the hobby (I have no beef with people who like the OSR, but the experience was bad enough it keeps me from enjoying any TSR-era based game to this day).

The differences in both mechanics (Palladium Fantasy was the first time I could play a light armored warrior like you'd see in fantasy television and movies of the time and not have the system punish you for it) and setting (I was first drawn in by the Robotech RPG being advertised in Dragon Magazine and re-entered the fantasy genre through Palladium Fantasy after that) kept me in gaming at a point when I could have drifted away entirely and so, for that, Palladium has an immense amount of banked good will with me.

Drifting back to the actual thread topic of incremental improvements though, what I liked in Palladium was that the classes were more specific (i.e. instead of fighter there was mercenary, soldier, bowman, knight, etc.) which gave them a better sense of place in the world and, most especially, I liked that PC's started with a presumed level of competence.

You weren't some wet behind the ears rookie; if you chose knight, you didn't start as a squire, you were a full blown knight with the horse, armor and weapons that the station required and the skill to back it up. You weren't the greatest knight ever with the best gear possible, but you wouldn't have to squint to maybe see something that might someday resemble a knight either as it sometimes felt with a D&D Fighter at the time (particularly if you rolled crap on the starting gold).

Your skill percentages in areas your class was expected to be good at were high enough to make your attempts to use them not a joke and they improved slowly from there to virtually assured success at high level. If you picked up a new skill it started at a higher base percentage and also slowly improved from there. Your combat bonuses were adequate at level one, solidified by level 3 and then slowly improved from there.

And it was similar in their other systems. When you played Robotech you didn't start as a raw recruit or infantry grunt. If you selected the Veritech Pilot class you began as a fully trained combat pilot with a fully armed (era-appropriate) Veritech Fighter. A Ley-Line Walker in Rifts started with about 40-50% of their maximum level PPE (spell points) capacity and workhorse spells that accounted for roughly half the spells you'd gain directly from your class (learning additional spells beyond those you started with or worked out by leveling up was a major incentive for adventuring for spellcasting classes).

Of particular note too in terms of advancement was that by level 4-6 PCs were generally developed enough that leveling could be slowed to practically nothing and you'd just not notice (all your key class skills were nearly maxed by then and most if not all class features were unlocked... core combat bonuses had been acquired and spell point capacity was high enough that a full night's rest couldn't even restore it all*).

There was an entire two year period in a Rifts game where the GM just stopped tracking XP (we were level 5-6) and no one noticed because A) we were still having fun and B) the acquisition of better gear and learning spells in the non-leveling way subbed in for experience levels. The settings were generally rich enough that adventuring could be an end unto itself at times rather than just a tool for advancement.**

Indeed, one of the best lessons I think I learned from Palladium's approach was that you can have a fairly low ceiling on vertical improvement as long as there is sufficient lateral improvements for PCs to acquire.

* Spell points (called PPE for magic, ISP for psionics) in Palladium are regained at a flat rate per hour that is independent of level so once your personal PPE/ISP totals exceeded what you could regain in a reasonable night's rest all you were really building up was an emergency reserve that would require downtime or low-magic use days to recover. In actual play spellcasters tended to treat 8-10 times their hourly PPE/ISP recovery rate as a sort of "soft cap" and only reluctantly tapped into points beyond that since recovering those would be far more difficult during an ongoing adventure. Most spellcasting classes reach that 8-10 times recovery level around level 3-5 depending on their initial roll for the size of their pool so for routine casting you didn't "need" to attain a higher level and thus a pause in leveling wasn't particularly onerous as long as you could still learn additional spells in the meantime.

** Palladium never gated things like followers to any sort of level-based mechanics (nor was there a maximum number of henchmen linked to any game mechanics) so the typical TSR-era endgame of domain management was entirely level independent and could begin as soon or late as the PCs showed interest in it... which was another reason that pausing leveling didn't particularly matter after you reached that "core competicy" point.

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 13, 2021, 10:42:22 AM

Quote from: Pat on May 12, 2021, 10:16:36 PM
Most people describe Palladium as a fantasy heartbreaker, so it's always interesting to hear what works from people invested in the system. It's really the details and interactions that matter more than raw concepts.

I suppose that depends on your definition of heartbreaker. If Tunnels & Trolls, Chivelry & Sorcery and Rolemaster are also considered heartbreakers than yes, Palladium would qualify, but Palladium was popular enough to have its own shelf at all the gaming and book stores in my area back in the Pre-WotC days (something only D&D and WoD also managed at the time) and outlasted contemporaries like FASA or WEG (their most recent Fantasy release was February of this year) so if your definition is "niche game no one ever played" then it'd not be a heartbreaker.

It's not based on popularity. The way heartbreaker has come to be used in the RPG world (largely thanks to Edwards' notorious essay), is a game that's based on one and only other game (almost always D&D), which it's trying to fix, by an author who has limited exposure to other games. There may be a gem of an idea in there, but if so it's lost in a highly derivative mess. The "fixes" are usually very familiar, ideas that have been circulating in the community for a while (ditching level limits, adding a skill system, or having crits were common in the AD&D era). Games that are as experimental or widely different as T&T or RQ don't qualify. I'm not familiar with Palladium so I can't judge it directly, but have you seen Palladium's ads in Dragon, back in the 1980s? Based on those alone, it sounds like a heartbreaker, because it's essentially promoting itself as like D&D, but better.

Heartbreaker is definitely a pejorative, but there's nothing inherently wrong with the concept. Even Edwards acknowledged they sometimes have interesting ideas, and it's possible to argue that the whole d20 boom after 3rd edition released is basically a giant heartbreaker bubble, and the same can be said about the OSR. Though those cases can be more accurately described as a burst of creativity centered around a core system. So it's possible for Palladium Fantasy to be both a heartbreaker, and to have surpassed the more dismissive aspects of the term.

Palladium Fantasy is Kevin Siembieda's idea of what D&D should look like, i.e., class-based system with percentile skills and a combat system that allows for defenders to react (parry, block, dodge). At its surface it looks like KS took the best parts of Runequest and D&D and just put them together for publication, but probably more likely he was exposed to all those systems when they came out and just integrated them into his own game as he saw fit, like any one of us does when we actually run games. There wasn't some sort of cohesive design process, more like, "lemme try this, oh that's cool, I'll make that a rule" etc., etc. When I ran AD&D in high school, I used Rolemaster for the crit tables, Palladium psionics and combat system, and some Runequest skills for resolving non-combat stuff. Ripped off whatever I could if I thought it'd be fun. I think the whole notion of a formalized process to create a game is very modern and results in a whole lot of garbage that looks great in a book and sucks at the actual table (D&D 3.X and the "unified mechanic" nonsense). It's easy to pontificate about "fantasy heart-breakers," but most of the time that sort of tripe comes from someone outside looking at the game you're running and enjoying, not understanding why you're doing anything.

Basically, Palladium Fantasy is a GOOD game because it is FUN to play. I would jump at the chance to run it in the future as a nice vacation from Greyhawk AD&D.

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 13, 2021, 10:42:22 AM
Indeed, one of the best lessons I think I learned from Palladium's approach was that you can have a fairly low ceiling on vertical improvement as long as there is sufficient lateral improvements for PCs to acquire.

That's exactly what E6, a d20 variant that caps all characters at 6th level, but allows them to continue to gain feats (and skill points), is about. The cap on level-based mechanics is fairly hard; you'll never hit better than a 6th level fighter or cast more powerful spells than a 6th level wizard, and that also applies to things like skills as well. But while your key stats don't improve, you can improve your other skills, learn new combat tricks, and so on. It works quite well.

You mentioned additional spells and equipment, does Palladium support any other kind of horizontal development, or was that mostly roleplaying and campaign development?

Quote from: Pat on May 13, 2021, 11:44:36 AM

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 13, 2021, 10:42:22 AM
Indeed, one of the best lessons I think I learned from Palladium's approach was that you can have a fairly low ceiling on vertical improvement as long as there is sufficient lateral improvements for PCs to acquire.

That's exactly what E6, a d20 variant that caps all characters at 6th level, but allows them to continue to gain feats (and skill points), is about. The cap on level-based mechanics is fairly hard; you'll never hit better than a 6th level fighter or cast more powerful spells than a 6th level wizard, and that also applies to things like skills as well. But while your key stats don't improve, you can improve your other skills, learn new combat tricks, and so on. It works quite well.

You mentioned additional spells and equipment, does Palladium support any other kind of horizontal development, or was that mostly roleplaying and campaign development?

That depends on the particular sub-game and which edition of it you're using. Heroes Unlimited, for example, had an entire sub-system for learning and improving skills independent of level via (gasp) going to school (something an unsurprising number of superheroes actually do as their day jobs). Beyond the Supernatural/Nightbane included rules for researching new spells (i.e. not just ones from the books, but spells that did entirely new things). Rifts had various means of augmentation a character could choose to undergo (often with potential side-effects). The most recent addition to Palladium Fantasy ("Garden of the Gods") includes how to incorporate divine dreams, visions and blessings from the gods into your campaign (including receiving permanent blessings for performing or in anticipation of undergoing various divine quests).

Other bits, most notably any sort of domain management/henchmen/followers, was entirely roleplaying and campaign dependent. As a general rule Kevin much prefers for anything involving social interaction to be based on actually roleplaying the characters and not on mechanics. The vast majority of skills are used to perform specific physical tasks or as knowledge checks.

For example, there is not an "Interrogation" skill you roll to extract information. Instead the system has "Interrogation Techniques" which, if successfully used, has the GM tell the PC which approaches they believe will be most effective on a subject and/or evaluate whether their subject is lying or being truthful when answering.

So if you want to rule a territory, you need to talk to the right people, clear the land, convince builders to construct your stronghold and convince people you're worth following (with pay, appeals to common goals, etc.). There's no skill checks to make to win people over or mechanical system to follow that limits how many followers you can have or what level they can be; if you can offer the right incentive a 1st level peasant could theoretically have an elder great horned dragon doing his bidding.

In terms of the definition you gave for heartbreaker, then Palladium most definitely isn't. While you can see some D&D in it, as mentioned by Brad its got notions that appear in other systems as well and, I know from having spent quite a bit of time with the man, Kevin is VERY well read in general and the book shelf in his office every time I visited had the entire lines of other game systems on them (along with books on history, biographies, philosophy, science, classic literature, etc.) that he was quite familiar with.

In terms of original recipe Palladium Fantasy, most notable thematic break was dropping Tolkien-inspired versions of races for more broadly mythological interpretations (ex. trolls for example are not green and rubbery nor do they regenerate, kobolds are spirit-folk second only to dwarves in craftsmanship) including what would be deemed monster races in D&D as PC options with their own cultures (including the Wolfen in the core book, Minotaurs in the first sourcebook and many more down the line). Also, half-races, just weren't a thing. Elves were not just humans with pointy ears, they were a different species with different biology.

The other really distinct part on this level was the degree to which Kevin provided a specific world with a specific history to play in. The Palladium Fantasy world was a specific place with different human cultures speaking different languages in different regions who even used their own coinage; the races had specific histories that shaped the world. The role of the Old Ones (Lovecraftian entities who brought all of the myriad races to the Palladium Fantasy dimension as slaves at the dawn of its recorded history), runic weapons (weapons empowered by forging a soul into them) and the non-traditional forms of magic like runes and wards (that are limited to specific classes, not your traditional D&D spellcasting wizards) and psionics built in from the start help make the setting very distinct.

Mechanically, the first deviation would be in stat generation. First, different stats, only some of which map directly to D&D's and even those that do map have different uses. For example, Physical Strength affects only lifting and strength-based damage. Physical Prowess (which is roughly considered the Dexterity analogue) affects your ability to hit, parry and dodge, but has no affect on your skill performance with acrobatics or climbing and Speed is an entirely separate ability score. Mental Endurance is sometimes considered akin to D&D's Wisdom, but has nothing to do with perception or awareness and is most important in being able to resist psionics and insanity.

The second variation in stats is that instead of everyone using 3d6 and then +/-1 to a few; each species rolled its own number of d6's ranging from just 1 to as many as 5 with no attempt at balance; just what made the most sense for the species as defined. Exceptional results on 2d6 (11+) or 3d6 (16+) got an extra d6 added to the results. Related to this too was that there were no penalties for low attributes (except that a low Physical Endurance limited your hit points and low strength limited what you could carry) and bonuses to various things only started at scores of 16 or better, so the number of things that actually got bonuses from attributes was typically fairly small; most of your bonuses came from your class and skills.

The next mechanical change from D&D would be the classes. "Men-at-arms" classes were entirely defined by the skills their class (which, as previously mentioned, was rather specific and grounded in an actual profession/specialty; mercenary, soldier, longbowman, knight, ranger [no magic; a ranger in the real world historic sense], etc.) and there were many different fields of magic that worked differently from each other.

Character creation was thus focused more around the selection of skills known than particular class benefits gained at specific levels. And because there was a list of specific skills that characters possessed there was less ambiguity as to what a warrior-class was expected to be able to accomplish (sometimes just having a list of prepared spells can serve as a launchpad for devising a plan; knowing that your character is particularly good at herbalism or making traps can serve as a similar springboard for non-spellcasters).

In terms of combat, the biggest change was the degree to which it remained relatively flat relative to level, opposed checks for most combat task resolution and definitely the way armor functioned (as essentially a layer of hit points that could be bypassed with a high enough roll).

A warrior with the same PE and level as a wizard probably had nearly the same number of hit points, but their ability to wear heavy armor that needed an 16 or better on a d20 roll with fairly small bonuses to bypass and, most importantly, their no action cost parry ability (which if you were blessed with a high physical prowess could allow you to pull off the lightly armored warrior concept without any special rules or class abilities) increased their survivability compared to non-warriors greatly.

There's also just the little things, like Knights in 2e automatically getting proficiency in Dance (+15%), Heraldry (+20%), Literacy (+20%), Basic Math (+15%) and two skills from the Communication category (things like literacy in additional languages, playing instruments, singing, writing and public speaking at +10% each) in addition to combat related abilities really highlights their position in the First Estate as someone expected to be a member of an upper class household and not just a down-in-the-dirt warrior. The class also gets three bonus skills based on their family background; old nobility, minor landowner, military, business owner, politician, religious or newly knighted; and that you have 1D4 relatives in your homeland can give you a place to rest, recover and live for an indefinite period of time (though you will be expected to assist in maintaining the household if its an extended stay) during which time you'll be fed and have your basic needs attended to and, if really down on your luck, might be given some basic gear to get you back on your feet so long as you haven't worn out your welcome; GM's call on that).

Are their similarities to D&D? Yes. But those are not the defining elements of the game system by any means. It's a whole potpouri of ideas and concepts that really does add up to more than the sum of its parts.

Quote from: Brad on May 13, 2021, 11:38:16 AM
Palladium Fantasy is Kevin Siembieda's idea of what D&D should look like, i.e., class-based system with percentile skills and a combat system that allows for defenders to react (parry, block, dodge). At its surface it looks like KS took the best parts of Runequest and D&D and just put them together for publication, but probably more likely he was exposed to all those systems when they came out and just integrated them into his own game as he saw fit, like any one of us does when we actually run games. There wasn't some sort of cohesive design process, more like, "lemme try this, oh that's cool, I'll make that a rule" etc., etc. When I ran AD&D in high school, I used Rolemaster for the crit tables, Palladium psionics and combat system, and some Runequest skills for resolving non-combat stuff. Ripped off whatever I could if I thought it'd be fun. I think the whole notion of a formalized process to create a game is very modern and results in a whole lot of garbage that looks great in a book and sucks at the actual table (D&D 3.X and the "unified mechanic" nonsense). It's easy to pontificate about "fantasy heart-breakers," but most of the time that sort of tripe comes from someone outside looking at the game you're running and enjoying, not understanding why you're doing anything.

Basically, Palladium Fantasy is a GOOD game because it is FUN to play. I would jump at the chance to run it in the future as a nice vacation from Greyhawk AD&D.

I get you.  I found Beyond the Supernatural to be a very refreshing and fun game, back when it first came out.  It had some really convoluted and backwards mechanics, but you could tell they were from "edge cases" that arose in play, and not a cohesive design structure.  Still worked fine.  There's a case to be made that mechanics and flavor go hand-in-hand (which is why I think Palladium rules worked better for BtS, TMNT, and Robotech than for fantasy, IMHO), but that didn't make the game not fun...

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 13, 2021, 01:26:49 PM
In terms of the definition you gave for heartbreaker, then Palladium most definitely isn't. While you can see some D&D in it, as mentioned by Brad its got notions that appear in other systems as well and, I know from having spent quite a bit of time with the man, Kevin is VERY well read in general and the book shelf in his office every time I visited had the entire lines of other game systems on them (along with books on history, biographies, philosophy, science, classic literature, etc.) that he was quite familiar with.

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 13, 2021, 01:26:49 PM
Are their similarities to D&D? Yes. But those are not the defining elements of the game system by any means. It's a whole potpouri of ideas and concepts that really does add up to more than the sum of its parts.

That's an interesting anecdote. Just as independent evidence, look at all his contributions to Judges Guild magazines, including magazines and Traveller modules. Sure, he mostly contributed art, but that's clear evidence he had at least some broader exposure. But while it's not a strict heartbreaker in the Edwardian sense, it does seem to share some characteristics.

Quote from: Chris24601 on May 13, 2021, 01:26:49 PM
In terms of original recipe Palladium Fantasy, most notable thematic break was dropping Tolkien-inspired versions of races for more broadly mythological interpretations (ex. trolls for example are not green and rubbery nor do they regenerate....

Tom, Bert and William would probably be dismayed at that description. :) If you're not aware, D&D's trolls come from Poul Anderson's Three Hearts and Three Lions, which is a very worthwhile read even without the body horror monster.

In any case, thanks for the thoughtful summaries.

Quote from: VisionStorm on May 13, 2021, 09:58:59 AMYes, and almost all of them are with Pat [...] consider that it takes two to tango.

Perhaps you could allow Pat to put someone else on his dance card for a little while? Or if you are truly intent on dancing with each-other and no-one else, you could get a room among private messages so we aren't tempted to watch?

Quote from: Chris24601Indeed, one of the best lessons I think I learned from Palladium's approach was that you can have a fairly low ceiling on vertical improvement as long as there is sufficient lateral improvements for PCs to acquire.

An insightful post, thankyou.

Quote from: PatThat's exactly what E6, a d20 variant that caps all characters at 6th level, but allows them to continue to gain feats (and skill points), is about.

An idea which I find more appealing as time goes on. I've always felt the more interesting play happens at lower levels.