It is also tricky because things like strength can be improved by training and hard work. How much of that is skill and how much is raw ability can be difficult to decipher. Not saying every body type can get 18/00 strength but it is true that skill factors in there to a degree.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;644998It is also tricky because things like strength can be improved by training and hard work. How much of that is skill and how much is raw ability can be difficult to decipher. Not saying every body type can get 18/00 strength but it is true that skill factors in there to a degree.

True.

Rolemaster played with that idea and I considered it myself. However in the end I just decided that a character's Strength score represented his potential and (baring the effect of his age group) he gets to start the game with it.

Even I pass on complexity and go with the simple solution now and then.

Quote from: jibbajibba;644988Okay vis a vis your elephant.
Strength is important because of the damage dealt.
Strong doesn't let you hit more often strong means your hits are deadly and you are hard to hurt because all of your muscles protect your vital organs.

Sure it does. Watch a lightly built petite woman try to swing a two handed sword and count how many swings she manages in a minute versus Arnie in his prime.
 

Quote from: jibbajibba;644988A 5' tall elephant still have 4 times the mass of a 6 foot tall man.
Now I would expect a skilled warrior to hit the elephant more often but the elephants hits to do more damage.
Vis a vis skill the elephant's skill and combat technique depends on its size. It has evolved/been made by Jesus to be big and bulky and it uses that in combat against faster foes with more powerful weapons. So if you reduce its size its combat techniques won't work.

The emperor's got no clothes here. If there's a problem with a system it's usually better to fix the problem than wander down the garden path of ninja elephants who lose their ninja skills when they get hit with a shrink ray, I'm genuinely trying to help in that regard.

Quote from: flyingmice;644992Shrug. This has turned into an argument. As arguments are not discussions, and thus are wastes of time and effort, I will bow out. You have your position, it works for you, and I leave you to it.

Do all the discussions you lose turn into arguments?

Quote from: flyingmice;644992I almost always disagree with gleichman, but I feel no need to insult or belittle him. His ideas are always thought out, and make sense if you accept his basic world view, which I don't. He's perfectly liable to call someone an idiot, but I've never heard him use being gay as an insult. On the other hand, I don't put people on ignore for disagreeing with me, either. I can always learn something. More data is always a good thing.

Who was insulting him? That's more or less literally what he said, check it out, he was in full flow in that "the role of the GM " thread linked in my sig. I politely asked him for his ideas after he'd spent several pages shitting on everyone and he came out with the homosexual thing. Really, don't take my word for it. I place little value on his ideas at this point mind you, he knows how to stir trouble but when pinned down on any facts he's invariably caught short.

Oh and gleichman if I catch you stalking me any more through quotes you'll join the two idiots I've already reported for the same thing, you unbalanced maladjust.

There, that was insulting him.

Quote from: The Traveller;645000Who was insulting him? That's more or less literally what he said, check it out, he was in full flow in that "the role of the GM " thread linked in my sig. I politely asked him for his ideas after he'd spent several pages shitting on everyone and he came out with the homosexual thing. Really, don't take my word for it.

The link in your sig just shows the OP.

Quote from: One Horse Town;645002The link in your sig just shows the OP.

No, that's post number 330 in the thread. The thread is linked above that if you click on it.

Quote from: The Traveller;645000Do all the discussions you lose turn into arguments?

How does one lose a discussion? One loses arguments or debates. They are not the same thing.

-clash

Quote from: The Traveller;645004No, that's post number 330 in the thread. The thread is linked above that if you click on it.

I'm not trawling through that lot. Either link to the post where Gleichman said what you think or belt up about it.

Quote from: Ghost Whistler;644889Should Attributes function differently rather than just "skill + attribute"?

I don't know about "should," but I tend to prefer games where skill is more of a determinant of success than ability; I like ability to mark the difference between equally skilled. For me, this means the input from ability should be somewhat muted relative to skill; to use your construction, perhaps something along the lines of Skill x + Ability y/2. For me, this captures the difference between, say, practicing diligently and having innate ability.

Something else to consider is that skills can also function as gatekeepers: 'you must be this tall to ride the Tilt-a-Whirl.' No matter what your ability, frex, you cannot pilot a starship without the Starship Pilot skill.

Quote from: One Horse Town;645009I'm not trawling through that lot. Either link to the post where Gleichman said what you think or belt up about it.

I had to temporarily take him off ignore to wade through pages of his vitriol, and no indeed he didn't say what I thought he had. He came close on a few occasions, but apologies to gleichman for not committing the tirades of abuse to memory. By way of compensation, here's a selection of his greatest hits from that thread:

QuoteLittle child, you have no idea what you're talking about. If I had any respect or even a faint hope you were capable of learning something- I'd explain your error.

But I don't waste my time on fools.

That is the nature of this hobby, fragmented and generally speaking made up of underwhelming players, designers and GMs. It's only due to the incompetence being so widely spread that the hobby survives, for fools will still play with fools.

This is such a silly comment. And so typical of therpgsite.

And you wonder why I can't take you seriously...

I'd have to care about the opinions and ideas of such as yourself to have grief, and I'd have to submit to your views to be a victim.

You think too highly of yourself, as usual.

Strawmen and Knee-Jerks are the only significant reaction by many here.

One of the reasons I think so little of you is your inability to grasp the concept that most things are a mix of conflicting concerns that must be dealt with in order to achieve a goal.

His is pipe dreams and rose color glasses, a place to hide from reality.

You're such a child.

One that lives the past, yet unable to apply it to the present because you've spent so much effort distorting it to meet your personal needs.

Be a man and owe up to what you've said and accept, the fault of your words are not mine.

And that is why I've got him on ignore. You're welcome.

Quote from: The Traveller;645015I had to temporarily take him off ignore to wade through pages of his vitriol, and no indeed he didn't say what I thought he had. He came close on a few occasions, but apologies to gleichman for not committing the tirades of abuse to memory. By way of compensation, here's a selection of his greatest hits from that thread:

And that is why I've got him on ignore. You're welcome.

As I said, "He's perfectly liable to call someone an idiot, but I've never heard him use being gay as an insult." These are all variations on "You're an idiot."

-clash

Case closed.

Dealing with animals and monsters in a skill system isn't that difficult.  For a predator, it only lives if it kills, so skill level should be at least the equivalent of a Professional level human, if not Expert.

A prey animal that defends by running probably isn't going to have much skill, but one that does fight, probably also fights to mate so is probably going to be just lower then the predator.

So a lot of animals are going to be at least as skilled as a character, but are going to also be stronger, faster, and maybe have armor.  You don't use a sword to kill a big animal, you use a spear or bow and kill it before it kills you.

As far as a Troll goes, if it is still alive, then it's good at killing.  It might be slow, but if it hits you, look out.  Also good luck killing it without a critical hit system.

You could go through and give each monster and animal a completely different skill profile, but that's not really necessary.

Quote from: CRKrueger;645020As far as a Troll goes, if it is still alive, then it's good at killing.  It might be slow, but if it hits you, look out.  Also good luck killing it without a critical hit system.

Yes but shrink a troll down to human size and you're left with a basic street ruffian. Systems that disproportionately focus on skill aren't much use when it comes to non human monsters since they don't represent the other natural advantages these things have, unless you wanted to dispense with basic attributes entirely.

Quote from: The Traveller;645023Yes but shrink a troll down to human size and you're left with a basic street ruffian. Systems that disproportionately focus on skill aren't much use when it comes to non human monsters since they don't represent the other natural advantages these things have, unless you wanted to dispense with basic attributes entirely.

Well, I'd argue a skilled street ruffian, life for a monster depends on killing every day or so for survival, life for a street ruffian does not unless he's in a crazy-bad section of town.

Your point is taken though in that what really makes a Troll dangerous is his strength, claws, regeneration, tough hide, etc...  however, that doesn't mean that it has low or average skill when compared to a person.  Yeah it doesn't know 35 different claw moves but it knows a couple and uses them every day - or it dies.

No human goes through the life and death struggle that a predator or monster does, it's like being a Spartan or something really, only with self-learned combat experience.

Quote from: CRKrueger;645020You could go through and give each monster and animal a completely different skill profile, but that's not really necessary.

I would think this depends to at least some degree upon your system, how much room it allows and how you view your more fantastic creatures (and even the more common ones). I take the genre based viewpoint that each creature is on the same human-to-heroic rank system as players. Some are likely to exceed the skill level of even the most impressive heroes. Some of these may be rather large. Bring friends or other advantage(s).

Of course how well the system being used shows the impact of different advantages has an important impact on what we're talking about. For example, if you're playing something that doesn't provide significant damage and toughness bonuses to large creatures, then large creatures will be more difficult to represent in the system.

The more abstract one is, and the fewer factors you have to take advantage of- the more trouble you run into, and the less special battles with large creatures become. At the worst case, they have no significant differences and require no change at all in engagment tactics.