How Wizards spends its money is irrelevant to the point. Your campaign isn't harmed by their decision to add a single chart to the rulebook any more than its harmed by their decision to use one particular piece of artwork over another. If you don't like a rule, you toss it out as per Rule Zero. No one is forcing you to use rules you don't like or agree with. Arguing otherwise is foolish.
So, you're making an "Enh, why not?" argument for as many rules as conceivably be wedged into the book. Through "rule zero", you mean to suggest that any rule that's problematic or hampers gameplay or contradicts other rules will simply be ignored or re-written or replaced with something else on the consumer side, so its development and inclusion in the rules matter presents no problem. Is that all accurate? Because I'm willing to admit that from a purely theoretical standpoint, I agree. Rule zero exists, and problematic mechanics and rules are often ignored, and the right set of players can make even an explicitly unplayable game fun, with the right House Rules. I'm sure there's a 4e group somewhere out there that's turned the Witchalock into a playable class, even.
The only problem is, why are we bothering to buy books full of rules, in that case? If we're just going to ignore or replace half of the rules anyway, what are we spending our money on? Your argument is predicated on the assumption that for everyone playing the game everywhere, the rules don't matter, and therefore the existence (or, for that matter, non-existence) of any particular rule or mechanic is not going to impact anyone's game. And yet, people are still buying the books, and paying attention to those rules, and even arguing over the minutia of those rules in these forums. So, true or not In Theory, from a practical standpoint, this is clearly incorrect.
The rest of us are mainly arguing that the rules DO matter. Perhaps not to everyone, perhaps not all the time, but to enough people, enough of the time, that the kitchen sink approach to rulemaking is not terribly appropriate. Most players new to the system are going to follow the as-written system as closely as possible, before introducing house rules, to ensure they understand how the system works by default; older games had this nasty habit of being less-than-playable out of the box, leading to a culture where DMs were viewed as a rarefied, elite breed, rather than just another role a player might take on, and were further encouraged to introduce major house rules without understanding the base system, and implementing those house rules without considering how they might interact with the rest of the game.
Further, RPGA and similar systems exist, which oblige DMs to use a standard rule set for play. Once again, the rules DO matter in this case, because house rules are NOT an option. Which non-optional, non-variant rules a system uses matter a lot in this case. Of course, that's already been broached by others, and you rejected that line of argument out-of-hand, so I fully expect for you to do the same here. Doesn't make you right, though.
WotC isn't likely to absorb the cost. They will either cut other material or increase the price. Either one can harm a campaign, if only slightly.
How? Please demonstrate how adding a single table to a book will cause lasting, unendurable, permanet harm to a campaign, as Vaal proposed it would.
Also you used an Oberoni Fallacy by saying that bad rules are not a problem because you can get rid of them with Rule 0.
Untrue. The Oberoni Fallacy argues that the fact that Rule Zero can be used to get rid of bad rules, the rules aren't bad. I'm not saying the Putrescence chart isn't a bad rule... I'm simply saying that, regardless of its level of badness, it would not be a harmful rule in direct contradiction to Vaal's statements that it would be.
In edition "argumentum ad baculum" or appeal to the stick is the wrong fallacy. You're think of "argumentum ad consequentiam" or appeal to to consequences. However, you cannot use that to say either to say that the consequences do not exist, which is the bases of the argument that you are putting forth.
No, I'm thinking "argumentum ad baculum". Its also called "the appeal to fear" or "scare tactics". As per Nikzor, it fits the following pattern:
1. "I was in a game where the DM was overly rules-oriented and no one had any fun at all!"
2. Therefore, the presence of a Putrescence chart would utterly harm all campaigns everywhere.
Which is exactly what Vaal was claiming. As we all know, this is fallacious reasoning, because trying to scare people with stories of a horrible game session at a convention isn't evidence that the presence of such a chart would harm anyone's game at all.
Now, it is possible that Vaal is also making an Appeal to Consequences by repeating that the presence of a Putrescence chart would harm all campaigns everywhere through the mechanism of "Vaal wishes it were true, thus it is true", but his arguments have not been made in that manner.
You're the one that used a universal statement. Therefor one personal experience can counter it. You're line of reasoning is flawed as you will not except an instance of harming a campaign to show it can harm a campaign. It need not be universal to actually happen.
Given that the example did not involve the presence of a single chart ruining the campiagn, but rather a DM who was over-zealous in adjudicating the rules, I'd say his example is a Red Herring, actually. While yes, he did show how bad GMing can harm a campaign, he hasn't shown how the mere presence of the hypothetical Putrescence chart can harm any campaign at all... and that was his initial claim.
This line of reasoning is ridiculous...
Of course it is. As ridiculous as the original argument, which your response ably showed, thank you very much.
But you dont want just a single chart. In fact given the amount of material you seem to want, I think costs would be an issue. That was the point of my post.
But I haven't been addressing "the amount of material I seem to want". I've been addressing Vaal's proclamation that the presence of a single chart in the rulebook would do irreperable harm to every campaign in the world. My response to that claim is that no single chart could do harm to any campaign, much less every campaign.
If you want to address that point, I'd be glad to hear your views.
But I haven't been addressing "the amount of material I seem to want". I've been addressing Vaal's proclamation that the presence of a single chart in the rulebook would do irreperable harm to every campaign in the world. My response to that claim is that no single chart could do harm to any campaign, much less every campaign.
If you want to address that point, I'd be glad to hear your views.
Vaalingrade Ashland said nothing of the kind. You took a single rebuttal point unrelated to the main point and then made a straw man out of it, by countering that instead of the stronger points that lead to the same conclusion. He argued that DMs forcing those rules on the players would harm the campaign. Also he said nothing about it being RAW, or universal. So you straw maned that rebuttal point as well.
However the main point of where to draw the line at what rule to include has not been addressed by you at all. Instead you nitpicked.
Vaalingrade Ashland wrote:
Calanar]Seriously though. I role play whether the waitress likes you. I don't DC check it.
And hobbies, yeah well some people's hobbies are another's strong traits. Ones they want to be part of the storyline not the periphery. No choose your own adventure style or make it up as you go along but something in between. I'll grant you everyone draws the line differently. I draw it at flirting with the waitress and riddles and puzzles. Those I have the players deal with in role playing.
And yet, someone is demanding it. Which is the problem. why should we draw the line at your tolerance and not his? Why not mine? This is a pertinent question because I would just stop playing if I had to roll to talk.
Seriously though. I role play whether the waitress likes you. I don't DC check it.
And hobbies, yeah well some people's hobbies are another's strong traits. Ones they want to be part of the storyline not the periphery. No choose your own adventure style or make it up as you go along but something in between. I'll grant you everyone draws the line differently. I draw it at flirting with the waitress and riddles and puzzles. Those I have the players deal with in role playing.[/quote] And yet, someone is demanding it. Which is the problem. why should we draw the line at your tolerance and not his? Why not mine? This is a pertinent question because I would just stop playing if I had to roll to talk.
If it is figuring out if they can use their blacksmithing to tell which race made the weapon they found in the mine and perhaps it's origin then yeah I want that to be a DC check. I don't leave it to the, okay I just decide to, you know, role play it out. Or for a funny example.
"Hey scimitar how you been? Kill a lot of orcs lately? No? Drow? Oh you were made to kill Druegar? Awesome! Check it guys there is probably an entrance to the underdark somewhere in this mine. I role played the non-intelligent sword into telling me."
Or, instead of actively trying to be disruptive, you can ask the DM if the tools are distinctive enough for your smith's eye to discern anything -- based on how good/what kind of smith you are.
Remember way, way back in this dreadful, dreadful thread when I was talking about it being very important for the player to go into better detail and thought than 'I am a blacksmith' when describing their background? Here's where it comes into play.
And it's actually so much better than a skill check. Know why? Because it gets to slip by the question of why the country smith who never saw the world suddenly knows what the hell a deuregar is.
I know it is funny to over state our position but no most of us don't want a system for leching on the barmaids.
But why should we use you as the baseline? Why not the guy that wants you to roll for casual interaction? Why not me who just wants an ad hoc DC system just in case and to roleplay the rest? Why do you get to be the important one to my determent?
Once more as I have patiently tried to explain we are looking for a way to use existing rules with some additional values and examples to weave in deeper backgrounds than "everyone is a great blacksmith and so are you."
And agian, you don't need numbers to do this. You just need a player willing to sit down and thing about how good a smith his character is and what kind.
More importantly, this is a false example because no system we've discussed says "everyone is a great blacksmith and so are you.". You just made that up wholecloth.
And please don't start throwing other editions at me. I know 3.5 didn't do it well.
3.5 didn't do it well because it tried doing it at all.
Why can I say that? Well, remember the system I linked that I made? There is a fatal flaw to it that inherently exists in any system that requires resources to be spent to have a hobby or interest:
The Renaissance Man
See, people don't tend to limit themselves to just 3 or 4 hobbies. Most people are at least proficient in dozens of things. Think of all the things you do as a hobby, or are good at. Each one of those is potentially a skill.
How? Please demonstrate how adding a single table to a book will cause lasting, unendurable, permanet harm to a campaign, as Vaal proposed it would.
I'm calling foul here, in the interest of maybe bringing this line of pointless bickering to a close. You've taken an off hand sarcastic remark Vaal made and twisted it around as though he were offering it as a serious argument. For all your complaint about straw men, this one looks pretty thatchy to me.
Can we put this one to rest now, please?
EDIT: Humm, I appear to have been ninja'd by calron...
What about his palyers who woudl rather get on with thier lives, but Jimmy is the only one willing to DM, so they's stuck in roll hell. I've been in those games. Trust me, it hurts the game and makes you feeling the lingering urge to gnaw off your own leg to escape. Thank god it was just a con game.
Emphasis added.
Now, granted, I asked him how the presence of the hypothetical Putresence chart could harm anyone, and he responded with how bad GMing could harm "the game" in general, but he was still making a claim about the game in general.
Vaalingrade Ashland What about his palyers who woudl rather get on with thier lives, but Jimmy is the only one willing to DM, so they's stuck in roll hell. I've been in those games. Trust me, it hurts the game and makes you feeling the lingering urge to gnaw off your own leg to escape. Thank god it was just a con game
Emphasis added.
He is saying that a DM that inflicts bad rules on the players "hurts the game". It is quite clear he was speaking of the game he was playing in this example in instead the games in general. He also said nothing about it being RAW and still it came from the DM inflicting those rules on the players.
[edit] Here's an example on usage of "the game". "I cannot stay to watch TV, I have to get to the game." Does this mean that "the game" is referring to games in general? No, it is speaking of one game alone. [/edit]
Now, granted, I asked him how the presence of the hypothetical Putresence chart could harm anyone, and he responded with how bad GMing could harm "the game" in general, but he was still making a claim about the game in general.
Yet he said nothing about it being RAW or the game in general. He is speaking of a specific act that harmed a game that he played in.
ChefJackButler wrote:
He was offering it as serious argument. I merely responded to him.
Where are you getting this stuff? I'm arguing against a claim that the presence of one table would cause harm to every campaign on the planet.
where indeed? Perhaps it was this:
ChefJackButler wrote:
How? Please demonstrate how adding a single table to a book will cause lasting, unendurable, permanet harm to a campaign, as Vaal proposed it would.
[...]I'm not saying the Putrescence chart isn't a bad rule... I'm simply saying that, regardless of its level of badness, it would not be a harmful rule in direct contradiction to Vaal's statements that it would be.
Or this:
ChefJackButler wrote:
And unless you regularly have people burst in on your D&D sessions, waving guns in the air and forcing you to do as they command you to do by putting pistols to your heads, such people are really not that much of a concern. Neither is the presence of rules you think are overly ****-retentive, because of Rule Zero.
If someone, somewhere wants to use a putrescense chart in their game, it causes absolutely NO HARM WHATSOEVER to your game. Or to mine. Or to anyone else's, including the putrescence-chart-user, because he's got a right to play that way if that's how he wants to play,
Which I suppose is a rambling, over-wordy way of saying that your continual pronouncements of how DOOOOOOOOOOOOOM! will occur because some uncreative soul wants rules governing personal appearance or dating or the rate of oxidation on exposed ferrous metal or precisely how many minutes of sunshine are available on June 14, 1182 AD are really very silly, when you think about it.
Or:
ChefJackButler wrote:
Reasonable points for all that they are utterly irrelevant in the long run, simply because even if the putrescence chart had been included, and had supplanted something you might have considered more important, you never would have known the difference anyway, because the "more important" stuff wouldn't have been there for you to find more useful. And as a wiser man than I said, a difference that is completely undetectable is no difference at all.
And because you'd never would have known the difference anyway, your campaign wouldn't have been impacted at all by the inclusion of a putrescence chart.
Or:
ChefJackButler wrote:
i]Your campaign WOULD STILL NOT BE IMPACTED THE SLIGHTEST BIT so your whinging and cries of DOOOOOOOOOOOOOM! because of the inclusion of such material is silly, when you think about it.[/i]
?:
ChefJackButler wrote:
The value of every rule's usefulness is entirely subjective, period. Rule Zero means that if you don't want to use a rule, you don't have to. So if you find a putrescense chart in the DMG and don't want to use it, out it goes.
ChefJackButler wrote:
DO NO HARM WHATSOEVER
ChefJackButler wrote:
If you don't like a rule, you toss it out as per Rule Zero. No one is forcing you to use rules you don't like or agree with. Arguing otherwise is foolish.
Of course, maybe you could argue with the substantive point of my post, rather than an off-hand dismissal. Here, let me re-post it for you, sblocked for the people with reading comprehension: Spoiler:Show
The only problem is, why are we bothering to buy books full of rules, in that case? If we're just going to ignore or replace half of the rules anyway, what are we spending our money on? Your argument is predicated on the assumption that for everyone playing the game everywhere, the rules don't matter, and therefore the existence (or, for that matter, non-existence) of any particular rule or mechanic is not going to impact anyone's game. And yet, people are still buying the books, and paying attention to those rules, and even arguing over the minutia of those rules in these forums. So, true or not In Theory, from a practical standpoint, this is clearly incorrect.
The rest of us are mainly arguing that the rules DO matter. Perhaps not to everyone, perhaps not all the time, but to enough people, enough of the time, that the kitchen sink approach to rulemaking is not terribly appropriate. Most players new to the system are going to follow the as-written system as closely as possible, before introducing house rules, to ensure they understand how the system works by default; older games had this nasty habit of being less-than-playable out of the box, leading to a culture where DMs were viewed as a rarefied, elite breed, rather than just another role a player might take on, and were further encouraged to introduce major house rules without understanding the base system, and implementing those house rules without considering how they might interact with the rest of the game.
Further, RPGA and similar systems exist, which oblige DMs to use a standard rule set for play. Once again, the rules DO matter in this case, because house rules are NOT an option. Which non-optional, non-variant rules a system uses matter a lot in this case. Of course, that's already been broached by others, and you rejected that line of argument out-of-hand, so I fully expect for you to do the same here. Doesn't make you right, though.
Okay, I should un-sblock that last bit:
Of course, that's already been broached by others, and you rejected that line of argument out-of-hand, so I fully expect for you to do the same here. Doesn't make you right, though.
Look Ma, I can predict the future!
Oh, and just out of curiosity:
ChefJackButler wrote:
Do you know what "argumentum ad baculum" means?
ChefJackButler wrote:
I asked you earlier if you know what argumentum ad baculum means. Now I'd like to know if you understand the definition of reductio ad absurdum.
ChefJackButler wrote:
Appeal to Consequences[...]Red Herring
Jack, you seem to love invoking fallacies, even though we're not engaged in a formal, inductive debate. Tell me, do you know what "argumentum ad logicam" means?
