Quote from: Exploderwizard;691506an insect plague spontaneously coming out of my ass to devour the enemy, can't say that I would.

What level spell is that?

To all: does the length of combat in real time affect the level of detail you prefer in your descriptions?

I have found that the "Roll vs. AC 20.  I hit.  6 damage.  It's dead" thing comes up a lot when I'm playing Pathfinder, but when I was testing out both RQ6 and MHR, despite the individual attack resolution mechanics taking a lot longer and being fairly complex, the fights as a whole only lasted two or three successful hits.  So we got a lot more descriptive per strike.

Quote from: Nexus;691306Describe a combat hit that inflicts notable but moderate damage to the target in manner you would consider:

It really depends on circumstances: Sometimes you need to just cruise through the mechanics for a stretch. Other times you'll want to lavish detail onto a single blow. Sometimes you'll resolve several actions mechanically and only afterwards string those together into a narrative of what happened.

Things to pay attention to include:

- The mood of the table. (Are the players not particularly interested in the current encounter? Sometimes that means you need to speed through mechanical resolution. Sometimes it means you need to paint a more vivid picture of the situation.)

- Effective pacing. (Kinda ties into the last one, but there's both a creative pacing and a mechanical pacing: If you know that Bob is still looking up the spell he wants to cast, it can be useful to fill a little more time with a vivid description. Sometimes you ask Mark what he's doing while Clara is rolling the dice and sometimes you don't; it depends on how portentous Mark's dice roll is and whether or not Clara's action is likely to be impacted by Mark. Do you describe the action up to its penultimate moment of resolution and then wait for the dice roll to provide closure? Or do you resolve the whole thing mechanically and then apply a description in its totality?)

- The stakes involved. (The PCs sneak into a room and shoot a ratman in the back of the head: If it's just some random guard, that can probably be quickly dispatched with. If it's actually a major villain that they've been tracking for several sessions, I'll probably spend some time on that moment.)

- The sense of cool in the mechanical resolution. (And this can go both ways. Sometimes the dice roll itself is so awesome or so dreadful that you'd only detract from it. Often, though, you can take moment and propel it to even greater heights with properly executed description. For example, the time that one of my PCs used a vorpal sword to cut the head off a major villain on the very first action of a combat... twice in a row. Or the time that the last PC standing had been reduced to 0, so that firing his crossbow at the last remaining NPC was going to make him fall unconscious no matter what.)

- Information that needs to be conveyed. (While you can certainly just tell the players "this thing has DR 5" it can often be more effective, IME, to describe the effect of the DR narratively.)

Quote from: daniel_ream;691518To all: does the length of combat in real time affect the level of detail you prefer in your descriptions?

I have found that the "Roll vs. AC 20.  I hit.  6 damage.  It's dead" thing comes up a lot when I'm playing Pathfinder, but when I was testing out both RQ6 and MHR, despite the individual attack resolution mechanics taking a lot longer and being fairly complex, the fights as a whole only lasted two or three successful hits.  So we got a lot more descriptive per strike.

Thats probably because RQ is more simulationist and not an abstract AC/HP system like Pathfinder. Detailed descriptions work better with those systems because there is less ambiguity as to whats going on behind the numbers.

When your blow cripples a leg per the rules, its easier to describe it as such.

Quote from: daniel_ream;691518To all: does the length of combat in real time affect the level of detail you prefer in your descriptions?

Yes, I'd say its a factor.

Quote from: Nexus;691565Yes, I'd say its a factor.

Excellent point; also, how long you WANT combat to take, and how many combats you plan to have, and what percentage of the time you want taken up by said combats.

Quote from: Old Geezer;691464"And then the EARS, I get the IDEA, get ON with it!"

C'mon I like my fakey REH descriptions. The player's don't seem to mind either.

Quote from: baran_i_kanu;691600 C'mon I like my fakey REH descriptions. The player's don't seem to mind either.

If everybody at the table is having fun, you're doing it right.

There are people who eat green peppers, too, and I'd literally rather go hungry.

Quote from: estar;691441Yes they are OOC mechanics but it is still roleplaying because the players are acting as their character would.Using the terms of the combat system rather than this.

No.  Sorry.  "Alright ... I rolled a six, so I hit.  Here goes ... I did 11 points of damage before armor" is not, and never will be, roleplaying.  The character has no notion of rolling dice, and no notion that he can do "11 points of damage" with his axe.  That's like claiming it's "roleplaying" to say "My character tells the NPC to go screw."

Quote from: Ravenswing;691873No.  Sorry.  "Alright ... I rolled a six, so I hit.  Here goes ... I did 11 points of damage before armor" is not, and never will be, roleplaying.  The character has no notion of rolling dice, and no notion that he can do "11 points of damage" with his axe.  That's like claiming it's "roleplaying" to say "My character tells the NPC to go screw."

Fancy descriptions of what occurs on a successful hit isn't roleplayer either. Its narration. It can also be inaccurate narration in an abstract system such as D&D. During combat in a D&D round the damage you inflict on a successful attack roll represents the fruit of your efforts for the round. There is no direct mapping to one specific hit to one application of damage.

Unless of course you believe that someone only attacks once in a 10 second or 1 minute combat round?

GURPS combat of course IS more accurately mapped to each blow and damage as well as effects from said damage and thus more compatible with desciptive narration that accurately reflects what took place.

Some narration and description is fine when you stab a monster.
Too much might conflict with what actually happened though, or create baggage.

Quote from: Exploderwizard;691532Thats probably because RQ is more simulationist and not an abstract AC/HP system like Pathfinder.

The reason I mentioned RQ6 and MHR is that RQ6 puts all the description at the end of resolution, which in other similar systems (like Rolemaster) tends to suppress description as the players just wait for the dice to tell them what happened.  And MHR is a lot more abstract than D&D.

The fact that I see a lot more player description out of both led me to believe that speed of play was more of a factor than anything else.  When a fight is only going to last two or three hits, players seem to want to maximize their spotlight.

Quote from: Ravenswing;691873No.  Sorry.  "Alright ... I rolled a six, so I hit.  Here goes ... I did 11 points of damage before armor" is not, and never will be, roleplaying.  The character has no notion of rolling dice, and no notion that he can do "11 points of damage" with his axe.

And I don't have an axe and am not swinging it in real life.  It's what my character is doing, so it's roleplaying.

QuoteThat's like claiming it's "roleplaying" to say "My character tells the NPC to go screw."

Yes, that's roleplaying.

It's "roleplaying", not "roleperformance".  It can be, if that floats your boat.  But any time I'm describing the will and actions of someone who's not me, it's roleplaying.

Quote from: Iosue;691964And I don't have an axe and am not swinging it in real life.  It's what my character is doing, so it's roleplaying.


Yes, that's roleplaying.

It's "roleplaying", not "roleperformance".  It can be, if that floats your boat.  But any time I'm describing the will and actions of someone who's not me, it's roleplaying.

Pretty much. The CHARACTER has no concept of "11 points of damage" but his player certainly does. Where did this idea come from that roleplaying isn't a game? Games have rules and games have jargon; using such jargon while playing the game doesn't detract from the overall experience.

Quote from: Iosue;691964Yes, that's roleplaying.

It's "roleplaying", not "roleperformance".  It can be, if that floats your boat.  But any time I'm describing the will and actions of someone who's not me, it's roleplaying.

This. Language can sometimes be a blunt instrument and in this as in much else in our hobby, it hasn't quite caught up yet.