Look, there's always varying extents to which people want to pursue simulation, whether for taste or time's sake. Sometimes it's not that important and you don't care whether the orc is 5 feet away or 10 feet or whatever. Sometimes you really want to stage things and laying things out precisely is important. Feel is also an important part of simulation – if all your swordfights feel like tax audits, that can be considered a failure of simulation. And, finally, nobody goes all the way with it, nobody. There's always a tolerance point. You are not calculating the delta-v and psi of every sharp object in every fight.

Quote from: Imp;544637Look, there's always varying extents to which people want to pursue simulation, whether for taste or time's sake. Sometimes it's not that important and you don't care whether the orc is 5 feet away or 10 feet or whatever. Sometimes you really want to stage things and laying things out precisely is important. Feel is also an important part of simulation – if all your swordfights feel like tax audits, that can be considered a failure of simulation. And, finally, nobody goes all the way with it, nobody. There's always a tolerance point. You are not calculating the delta-v and psi of every sharp object in every fight.

Well stated

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;544635gleichman if I insulted you at all, that was not my aim. For what is worth you seem a very intelligent poster even if we disagree on how possible it is for a gm to be fair and consistent. I certainly think these threads could be more civil at times, but you have to admit you stormed in hurling insults yourself and employed a tone was likely to set people off.

You are not an offender on this point- Drohem, Sigmund and Benoist are.

Quote from: Imp;544637Look, there's always varying extents to which people want to pursue simulation, whether for taste or time's sake. Sometimes it's not that important and you don't care whether the orc is 5 feet away or 10 feet or whatever. Sometimes you really want to stage things and laying things out precisely is important. Feel is also an important part of simulation – if all your swordfights feel like tax audits, that can be considered a failure of simulation. And, finally, nobody goes all the way with it, nobody. There's always a tolerance point. You are not calculating the delta-v and psi of every sharp object in every fight.

Indeed.

All that I want is for people to admit that Advantage/Disadvantage may well (and rightfully) go too far for certain play styles.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;544636Perhaps you could point out where our posts agree. No point in arguing if we agree

We agree that style of a player is personal preference.

We agree that includes the like or dislike of individual mechanics such as maps and mini, advantage/advantage, etc.

Quote from: gleichman;544643Indeed.

All that I want is for people to admit that Advantage/Disadvantage may will (and rightfully) go too far for certain play styles.

I can agree that any mechanic could do that. If the rule doesn't work for your style of play, then it doesn't work for your style of play. The problem wotc faces is they need to strike exactly the right balance in the core to attract as many gamers as possible. The grid reliance and system mastery of 3e and 4e were a barrier for many. Presumable they will have a more granular option to layer ontop of the core.

Quote from: gleichman;544641You are not an offender on this point- Drohem, Sigmund and Benoist are.

And yet you willfully continue to use derogatory language, and now apparently are doing so to "get back" at us. I'd stay down off that high horse brother.

Quote from: gleichman;544650We agree that style of a player is personal preference.

We agree that includes the like or dislike of individual mechanics such as maps and mini, advantage/advantage, etc.

Absolutely. My only objection was your use of the term mother may i and the claim you made that my style of play is unachievable without grids or deep rules.

Quote from: gleichman;544641You are not an offender on this point- Drohem, Sigmund and Benoist are.

Stop saying stupid shit.  So easy.  People won't have to call you on your stupid shit and then your vagina won't instantly swell with an epic sandstorm when you are called on your stupid shit.  

Really, dude, you are nothing but a pussy.  You start throwing insults around left and right, but when an insult is thrown back at you, you start crying and running for your mother's skirt hem.  It's sad really, but, oh so funny to read time after time.  Keep posting your stupid shit, dude, I need a laugh now and again.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;544564i have to say that this post suggests my experience with GM-player relationships is possbly different from yours. There appears to be an adversarial assumption at work here. In my games I welcome players questioning my judgment and am happy to make changes when It looks like I was wrong about something. This happens in any game (miniatures or no). It doesn't take any backbone for a player in my group to say "brendan I think you have that wrong".

I think this goes back to the bad DM vs. good DM issue.

If you have a bad DM, you want every possibly issue covered by the rules, because there isn't mutual trust between the players and DM.

If you have a good DM and players who all trust each other, having every possible issue covered by the rules isn't important.

Quote from: BedrockBrendan;544651I can agree that any mechanic could do that. If the rule doesn't work for your style of play, then it doesn't work for your style of play..

Then we agree.

QuoteThe problem wotc faces is they need to strike exactly the right balance in the core to attract as many gamers as possible. The grid reliance and system mastery of 3e and 4e were a barrier for many. Presumable they will have a more granular option to layer ontop of the core.

It should be pointed that that 3E was by far the most successful and popular, and remains so today in Pathfinder. That seems to have been the right balance to attract as many gamers as possible.

WotC has a nearly impossible task for itself. It tossed it's IP away and fragmented the market. I don't see anything putting the eggshell back together again.

Quote from: gleichman;544641You are not an offender on this point- Drohem, Sigmund and Benoist are.

I wont deny they used some spicey language but that door was swinging both ways in this case. You come out swinging  with mother may I and you are bound to get those kinds of reactions ----it would be like me jumping on the forge and calling everyone swine. I am going to be insulted if I do that. Like I said we can all dial down the rage once in a while.

Quote from: gleichman;544629I'm sorry, but not knowing your rules I can't relate to your argument.

I can handle most D&D, HERO, CoC, GURPs, and some other sysems as I have reference points. With you, nothing.

I'm pretty sure there are JRPGs and FATE variants that use something similar to what I'm describing, as well as 3 and 4e players who use this sort of thing as houserules (I found something on the WotC boards and could've sworn it was plagiarism, but it turns out the idea is just common or something).

Silhouette has some similarities when you're running mechs and individuals alongside each other as well, IIRC. And space battles (and other 3d combat systems) find their own ways of dealing with similar problems when map-based combat gets inadequate.

Let's put down a simple version then. Starting by defining terms.

Zone: An area of 15-30 feet. Outdoors it'll be a 30ft hex. Indoors, it can be smaller as a result of enclosed spaces that will end area effects and slow movement by forcing you through doors and shit (so a zone will pretty much correspond to a space cut off from other spaces somehow).

Some zones have traits, including cover/concealment/difficult terrain.

Point: A landmark within a zone. A door is a point you have to move through to get to another zone for example, so someone can hang around the door and get AoO's as people pass through. A statue might be treated as a point that provides cover, and so on.

Group: When you engage in melee with a character or creature, you are in a group. You are treated as part of a group with anyone else who happened to engage. Allies can group as well.

Periphery: You can ask if you want, but it's specific to reach weapons and would be a waste of time to get into now.

Ranges: Melee, Short (anyone in this or the next zone), Long (effectively sight until sufficient cover gets in the way, maybe a per-zone range increment penalty).

Areas: Target, Group (everyone in a group), Zone (everyone in a zone)

Movement: You can move anywhere in this zone or the next as a move action. For a second move you can move one or two zones further.

Anyway, as I've said, variations on this theme are not uncommon, as rules variants go. Apparently they pop up independently here and there, and I'd argue is the reason they do is their similarity to typical speech-based movement handling.

I only refer to my house rules in reference to the point that footage isn't relevant to a lot of games in the same way that most games don't get down to the inches. It's just more information than people tend to care about when their primary interest is in the effects (who can I hit? where can I go?) and not the way they're getting there (how many feet away is he?).

Quote from: Mistwell;544658I think this goes back to the bad DM vs. good DM issue.

No it doesn't.

I have what I consider to be excellent GMs. But they're human, they can't consistency and accurately determine all the important factors free form- they must be done within the framework of the rules.

Quote from: beejazz;544662I'm pretty sure there are JRPGs and FATE variants that use something similar to what I'm describing, as well as 3 and 4e players who use this sort of thing as houserules (I found something on the WotC boards and could've sworn it was plagiarism, but it turns out the idea is just common or something)....

The only difference I'm seeing here is scale (30' hex instead of 5' say). Is that the case?