Quote from: Ned the Lonely DonkeyOr Rolemaster-style skill bloat: "Okay, I managed my Find Herbs, scraped through on my Prepare Herbs but fumbled my Use Herbs. Back to the drawing board!"

Or: "So, I got a critical on Insulate Loft, but fumbled my Seal Windows. I guess we're going to take three points a day cold damage until I get a chance to re-roll my Purchase Lagging skill for the boiler."

Edit: And speaking from experience of these kinds of boy scout games in D&D and Rolemaster, I can confirm that it's fucking boring and after a couple of hours you're simply gagging for something to kill.

Ned

Plus you don't add interest by taking it from being one roll to making it several rolls, it's still just rolling.

That and also, if I need to roll three or four skills to survive the day, I'm toast.  The more I'm made to roll, the likelier I am to fail one of them.

To be interesting it has to be taken away from dice rolling, but at the same time not reliant on player knowledge.  I know nothing about this stuff and would be most hacked off to learn my 14th level ranger or whatever died of exposure because in real life I've never gone camping.

Quote from: Ned the Lonely DonkeyOne way to make vs. the environment more interesting is to make it a battle against your self.

Like this classic Jack London story?

Yeah, that's a great example. I wonder if London and his imitators aren't what the Pundit is thinking of? I keep thinking more of true-life survival tales like Touching the Void, Shackleton or Scott. I haven't read a lot of survival fiction, I guess, so I'm struggling to see how it could be turned into a good rpg session. But then, not all good things can be given the rpg treatment. And some things might turn out to be more fun in play than they sound when typed out on a message board.

Ned

I've run a lot of man vs nature games in In Harm's Way. Storms and hurricanes are deadly opponents. When that rogue wave sweeps away the Lieutenant, do you let go your hold on the rope and try to save him? When the wind whips the sail out of your hands while reefing it, do you risk it all to cut it away before it tears the mast out, or do you slide down the backstay to the safe deck? It's all about small decisions you can make that are important to yourself and to others. You can save yourself, or you can risk something more and save others.

-clash

It just reminds me of the old "Scott of the Antarctic" sketch for Monty Python, where the hollywood director decides that the story is too dull so he adds the Lion, and later the Giant Electric Penguin, for Scott to fight.

Are most gamers really that director dude?

RPGPundit

Dunno. Maybe the story really is that fucking boring. Who can forgot the heroic exit of Capt. Oates? "Jesus, this is fucking boring. I'm going to the pictures, anyone coming?"

Ned

QuoteThe problem with "environmental conflicts" is that the environment doesn't want anything. It's just there. If you insulate your house, the cold doesn't find new and crafty ways to get in. If you kill enough mammoth to see you through the winter, the winter doesn't find ways to make you hungrier. As such, the environment is not an interesting or engaging opponent.

See there I think you're wrong.  Maybe it rains hard enough to rot a hole in the roof, or the mammoth meat spoils.  Now you've got to venture out into the icy cold and try and replace some of that lost meat.

There's never, ever an end to the fight for survival.

Quote from: RPGPunditIt just reminds me of the old "Scott of the Antarctic" sketch for Monty Python, where the hollywood director decides that the story is too dull so he adds the Lion, and later the Giant Electric Penguin, for Scott to fight.

Are most gamers really that director dude?

Yes.

Also, Risus handles this kind of conflict with panache.  I've used the basic combat system to simulate people trying to navigate the non-Euclidean horrors of New York City.

I agree: Yes, they are that director dude.

Nature isn't an interesting opponent because nature doesn't strategize. You can't outthink it. The result as some have pointed out is that dealing with nature is a resource-management problem. Economics.

I happen to think those things are interesting. In fact they factor very highly in one of my favorite solo wargames, Voyage of the BSM Pandora, about a biological survey mission sent to explore a bunch of planets. You have to juggle time and resources both on the macro scale of moving the ship from one star system to another and on the micro scale of outfitting landing parties and travelling over the surface.

The thing is that to really make this sort of thing interesting--with multidimensional decisionmaking--you need to do a bunch of bean counting. And I don't think many roleplayers are very much into that.