trialmaster
Wanderer
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Posts: 68
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Post by trialmaster on Jun 7, 2024 14:01:06 GMT
I agree, I thought it was intentional for exactly that reason.
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Post by CharlesX on Jun 7, 2024 14:01:13 GMT
I’m of the opinion that the STAMINA instructions in Freeway Fighter are clearly a misprint and they're supposed to be 2d6 + 12 as usual, not 2d6 + 24. If I played Freeway Fighter by the rules I would probably interpret them that way. (I'm in no hurry to play Freeway again any time soon though, so it's a pretty safe thing to say!) But not everyone (anyone?) was persuaded of this. I thought that the extra 12 Stamina was intentional due to the higher damage done during blaster combat. (3.5 Stamina average). 175% extra average damage. 150% increase in maximum Stamina 186% increase in minimum Stamina. Seems possible. Yeah, there are also hand to hand combats but as they tend to end in knockouts after 6 Stamina is lost they may be less of a factor. What you're saying very much makes sense, the question is whether Sir Ian was being sensible when he wote Freeway Fighter. He did write Freeway Fighter before Crypt Of The Sorceror, and not that long after Forest Of Doom. It's almost strange, and definitely easy to forget, very early Sir Ian once erred on the side of generosity. Paradoxical Sir Ian strives to have Shadow Of The Giants fair and playtested when he has written some of the most broken FF.
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Post by vastariner on Jun 7, 2024 14:23:00 GMT
Going back to the House of Hell thing, remember that you start at -3 under your initial Skill because you do not have a weapon. When you pick up a weapon you get to add the points back. On a pure Skill basis, this does not make sense, given that you are not suddenly going to get better at e.g. throwing a stone at a target just because you now have a letter-opener in your belt.
But, in context, your initial Skill is where you would be IN COMBAT IF you had a half-decent weapon and were not relying on your fists.
Indeed, you have the usual warning that you cannot exceed initial Skill because that's your natural combat level. BUT, in the Weapons section, there is no mention that a weapon cannot take you above your initial Skill...
And, logically, if a branch is worth 3 Skill points, surely a finely-wrought blade forged in the fires of Hell itself must be a better weapon with which to fight? Indeed, when you pick up the Kris knife, you do NOT get the "this is a WEAPON" bit to add to your skill...possibly suggesting that its ONLY use is in the boss fight.
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Jun 7, 2024 15:41:46 GMT
I’m of the opinion that the STAMINA instructions in Freeway Fighter are clearly a misprint and they're supposed to be 2d6 + 12 as usual, not 2d6 + 24. If I played Freeway Fighter by the rules I would probably interpret them that way. (I'm in no hurry to play Freeway again any time soon though, so it's a pretty safe thing to say!) But not everyone (anyone?) was persuaded of this. I thought that the extra 12 Stamina was intentional due to the higher damage done during blaster combat. (3.5 Stamina average). 175% extra average damage. 150% increase in maximum Stamina 186% increase in minimum Stamina. Seems possible. Yeah, there are also hand to hand combats but as they tend to end in knockouts after 6 Stamina is lost they may be less of a factor. Assuming that you're hitting him with a sword while he's shooting you, yes. Otherwise he's likely to inflict fewer hits on you before he dies due to your extra damage on him...? Your maths is better than mine so you can provide deeper analysis, but the overall damage from blaster combat on average is surely not that much higher than sword combat...?
I went on for a bit about why I think it's a mistake in the thread I linked to, though I abandoned it in the end as I was on my first trip out of the country for years, thanks partly to Covid, and this seemed less important at the time.
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Post by scouserob on Jun 7, 2024 17:29:03 GMT
Thanks for the link it was a good (and amusing) read. 😀👍🏻 (I was giggling away in the pub at your Blood of the Zombies rant whilst waiting for my mate.)
I’m not trying to justify the Stamina increase at any deep mathematical level and you are bang on in that the damage is reciprocated. I do think that the Gunfight opponents in Freeway Fighter have more Stamina than the usual low to mid-level opponents: 12, 13, 14, 12, 15, 17, 11, 9, 13, 14, 13, 14. So that reciprocation will be higher than your usual Orc/Lizard Man/Grunt sword battle where their Stamina may be 6-9.
But yeah, I hadn’t looked into that at all until right now, so, to be honest, my thinking was pretty much exactly the same as Terrysalt in your thread link regarding guessing Ian’s thought process:
"Guns hurt more than swords so make them do more damage. Oh, and bump up the stamina to compensate."
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Post by Wizard Slayer on Jun 10, 2024 8:10:33 GMT
Hm? Of 16 replies, I see a single "never", 14 that fudge to some (mostly smaller) degree, and one "other". The runaway reply is "Where the author's intentions are clear, I sometimes do that" As in, "Where the author's intention was clearly for me to exceed my Initial Skill with this bonus." As in, "I'm totally playing by the rules, just making up for a mistake in the printing." Whatever happened to "it's only a game"?...if someone gets more fun out of applying the Kris Knife bonus...I don't see why they shouldn't. If Wizard Slayer is so keen to play by the rules... I'm not saying people should play any of the books a certain way - I even explained that I voted 'Other'. But I did find it amusing that a lot of people need to believe that letting the Kris Knife bonus take them above Initial Skill is clearly and obviously, without ambiguity, what Steve Jackson would have wanted them to do. Still, it does seem like more of a sore point than a fun discussion. Probably best I keep my opinions to myself then!
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Post by Per on Jun 10, 2024 13:24:08 GMT
The runaway reply is "Where the author's intentions are clear, I sometimes do that" As in, "Where the author's intention was clearly for me to exceed my Initial Skill with this bonus." As in, "I'm totally playing by the rules, just making up for a mistake in the printing." But then you are choosing to describe their way of playing as "totally by the rules" and then berating them for failing to make the distinction, while implying bad faith on top of that. It doesn't seem very meaningful. But I did find it amusing that a lot of people need to believe that letting the Kris Knife bonus take them above Initial Skill is clearly and obviously, without ambiguity, what Steve Jackson would have wanted them to do. No, it's the opposite, they are resolving a perceived anomaly/ambiguity. You are inventing the whole bit about fretting over being cheaters and then having to lie to themselves and others about it.
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Post by Wizard Slayer on Jun 11, 2024 7:42:13 GMT
If they're "resolving an perceived anomaly/ambiguity", why aren't they voting "where the author's intentions are ambiguous"?
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Post by CharlesX on Jun 11, 2024 12:13:53 GMT
If they're "resolving an perceived anomaly/ambiguity", why aren't they voting "where the author's intentions are ambiguous"? I'm feeling this thread is very much blurring the line between player's preferences and author's intent, as I implied in my earlier message. You could always say "where the gamebook's intentions are ambiguous", though I feel that would make (very) little difference, either way. Unlike a mathematical equation there is seemingly no definitive answer (some people would vehemently argue to disregard the cap, and that may even be the author's intent more than we think), so what might seem a convincing case to some - the sort of thing that has been argued here and in The House Of Hell rules question thread, now incorporated into House Of Hell thread - will be unconvincing to others. I agreed with thealmightymudworm's point the bonus is specified as "+6 to your Skill score", which adds to the absence of clarity by adding the word "score" where again, there would be no reason to add another word unless this was actually the author's intent. So I'm back to analogies, this time feeling like a sheep who, from experience, not only won't touch a fence that was once electrified, but is now safe, but will not come close to a fence, that was always safe and indeed nearby from day one. Or maybe a Monopoly player, who in the absence of rules, decides anyone who lands on Free Parking should pay a dollar fine. That is, we're always erring\second-guessing on the side of what the author didn't intend, regardless of pieces of evidence. Agree to disagree, never the twain shall meet, etc.
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Post by Per on Jun 11, 2024 15:55:01 GMT
If they're "resolving an perceived anomaly/ambiguity", why aren't they voting "where the author's intentions are ambiguous"? I would guess because they see a distinction in the wording of the poll that the other option signals higher requirements for confidence in the favoured interpretation, gameplay impact, etc. If you were just thinking about the two instances of the words "ambiguity" and "ambiguous", it's because they refer to (I must assume, though I didn't write the poll) different things.
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Post by CharlesX on Jun 11, 2024 16:39:14 GMT
If they're "resolving an perceived anomaly/ambiguity", why aren't they voting "where the author's intentions are ambiguous"? I would guess because they see a distinction in the wording of the poll that the other option signals higher requirements for confidence in the favoured interpretation, gameplay impact, etc. If you were just thinking about the two instances of the words "ambiguity" and "ambiguous", it's because they refer to (I must assume, though I didn't write the poll) different things. As the author of the poll:
Do you let Skill bonuses exceed your Initial Level indicates the poll, and discussion, is as much about the player's interpretation as the way in which it is written (just as well, the way many FF authors write FF bonuses). Very strictly\sometimes\often Is intended to represent the different shades of certainty with which one interperets the rules. For example technically one cannot complete Gates Of Death at all because you are stripped of all of your possessions, including a vital one, at one point. Anything like a very, very strict interperation of general rules would mean one cannot therefore complete this gamebook. Most players like to feel both that they aren't cheating and at the same time that they are playing FF the way the author intended to write it (as thealmightymudworm puts it in House Of Hel, comparable to a bible that misprints hope as hop). That a minority will or may play more strictly - or less, absolutely - does not mean other side are wrong, especially as these are after all kids' gamebooks. The whole thing should not be a problem, but is, because FF authors do not know their own rules.
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Post by Wizard Slayer on Jun 13, 2024 12:16:53 GMT
Most players like to feel both that they aren't cheating and at the same time that they are playing FF the way the author intended to write it... Exactly what I'm getting at. The point is that for every argument that the Kris bonus was supposed to take you above Initial Skill, there's a reasonable counter argument that it wasn't. Which doesn't make either view clearly right or wrong, which is what makes it ambiguous. As the author of the poll, what did you mean by "Where the author's intentions are clear" and "Where the author's intentions are ambiguous"? What sorts of situations were you trying to distinguish between? Obviously mistakes that make a book literally impossible to complete are clear, but this poll only relates to Skill bonuses. Is there even another example outside of House of Hell where a bonus appears to have been intended to take the player over their Initial Skill value, clearly or otherwise?
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Post by CharlesX on Jun 13, 2024 12:56:47 GMT
Most players like to feel both that they aren't cheating and at the same time that they are playing FF the way the author intended to write it... Exactly what I'm getting at. The point is that for every argument that the Kris bonus was supposed to take you above Initial Skill, there's a reasonable counter argument that it wasn't. Which doesn't make either view clearly right or wrong, which is what makes it ambiguous. As the author of the poll, what did you mean by "Where the author's intentions are clear" and "Where the author's intentions are ambiguous"? What sorts of situations were you trying to distinguish between? Obviously mistakes that make a book literally impossible to complete are clear, but this poll only relates to Skill bonuses. Is there even another example outside of House of Hell where a bonus appears to have been intended to take the player over their Initial Skill value, clearly or otherwise? The different options were an attempt to distinguish between different layers of authorial intent. As such it refers to a personal interpretation of clarity as much as an objective one. As most players don't like to feel they are cheating, accepting the Kris Knife bonus implies they think that is not cheating. If they feel that isn't nuanced enough, they can either vote that it is "ambiguous" or "unfair\arbitrary".
Someone who vehemently dislikes the Skill cap rules might vote "arbitrary" if they would have accepted some Livingstone Skill bonuses (e.g. Trial Of Champions, after making it out of the Walk, or Eye Of The Dragon), which I personally wouldn't do but would get why people would.
Off the top of my head, I can think of two or three other examples of Skill bonuses that disregard the cap:
Port Of Peril, where you have both the Venom Sword giving you a Skill bonus against the Quag-Shuggath and the Yaztromo bonus giving you stats bonuses. The Yaztromo bonus would be accepted by anyone except the very strictest gamer as raising your Skill above its Initial level, more so than Kris Knife - but there is no instruction in the text either way. The Venom Sword is more debatable.
The other example I've repeatedly mentioned already, is The Potion Of Heroism in Dead Of Night. As a kid I was always unsure about how to apply the Potion Of Heroism. If I felt generous I'd apply the Potion bonus, or if I specially wanted to go that path. Not knowing if it was correct affected gameplay (like the ambiguity-ridden Port Of Peril).
Your point about there being a number of arguments for and a number of arguments against puts 100% of the debate on the side of the author (indeed, some people may change their minds about whether to accept a Skill bonus above Initial level based on the author's inconsistency elsewhere). I suggest the reason people are voting "seems clear" not "ambiguous" or more unclear is because, based on evidence and the weight of it (as well as the number of arguments), they feel there is more clarity than absence. That is "innocent until proven guilty", when a judgment is made on a very strong likelihood not a mathematical certainty, a common principle by art scholars (more than science scholars, yes) in the same way someone might say "when my friend told me he was abducted by aliens, it was clear he was lying. I don't have a mountain of counter-evidence, and he has some following, but I work on the basis of truth, not followers".
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Post by Per on Jun 13, 2024 15:06:04 GMT
The different options were an attempt to distinguish between different layers of authorial intent. As such it refers to a personal interpretation of clarity as much as an objective one. That's what I figured, more or less. Presented with an anomaly, someone can be convinced it was meant to be played a certain way ("surely the writer would have wanted me to be able to win the book/apply the modifier he presents"), without ruling out that another can find the opposite solution equally convincing. Neither is going to think, "I'm wrong to make this judgement because there's no consensus." Obviously mistakes that make a book literally impossible to complete are clear, but this poll only relates to Skill bonuses. Is there even another example outside of House of Hell where a bonus appears to have been intended to take the player over their Initial Skill value, clearly or otherwise? Depends on what you count. There's the infamous anomaly at the beginning of City of Thieves where if you go one way you can get a bonus to Attack Strength, but if you go another, you get a useless bonus to Skill, and after that, it's all Skill. Did Ian begin to hate his readers for some reason, or is it rather that we're seeing the exact point at which he lost track of that fine point of the rules? If it's the latter, it could be theorized that a number of magical swords, helmets and the like were supposed to boost Attack Strength while e.g. sipping from a curative spring should just restore lost Skill, though I would assume most people like me just play these as written and then complain on the internet about the unfairness and bugs of Ian's books. One wording which I believe appears in similar forms in various books goes like this: "[The buckler] is perfectly balanced for use with your sword, and adds 1 point to your Skill in combat." (Slaves, p19) I think it could at least be hypothesized that the authors intended it to be applied like this: A. "At step 2 of combat, add an additional 1 when adding your Skill to the die roll." That is to say, it doesn't actually modify Skill itself, but adds to the modifier derived from Skill to be used in combat, and thus effectively becomes an Attack Strength modifier. But if you think this is too much of a supposition, how do you apply the instruction to include an actual Skill modification so that the cap will apply, but only in combat? Maybe like this: B. "At the beginning of combat, gain 1 Skill. At the end of combat, lose 1 Skill." But that's clearly problematic, since if you begin combat at Initial Skill, the addition fails, then the subtraction succeeds, which is probably not the effect the buckler should have had. So maybe instead: C. "At the beginning of combat, gain 1 Skill." But that's also problematic because it means that by fighting repeatedly you could recover from some hypothetical earlier big Skill loss. The way I suspect most people actually play it would be: D. "At the beginning of combat, gain 1 Skill. At the end of combat, lose 1 Skill if you began combat at less than Initial Skill." This feels "reasonable" because it doesn't benefit or punish the player in seemingly arbitrary ways, but I'm not sure it's more conservative in terms of supposition than option A. Clearly it involves fudging a condition that isn't spelled out in the actual instruction, necessitated by the chosen constraint of modifying Skill so the cap will apply. I suspect Paul would say they weren't thinking about it that deeply so it wouldn't be possible to say now whether A or D is actually closer to what they meant. (Another possible approach might be to argue that Skill on your Adventure Sheet splits into two boxes once you read this instruction, Skill-in-combat and Skill-not-in-combat, so you only have to make a one-time modifier to the one and not the other, but this is even less economical in terms of rules fabrication.)
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Post by nathanh on Jun 16, 2024 19:00:21 GMT
We should work together and produce an Official Fighting Fantazine Unofficial Skill Bonus vs Attack Strength rules guide (i.e. decide for each candidate whether it should become an Attack Strength bonus).
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Post by CharlesX on Jun 16, 2024 19:29:20 GMT
We should work together and produce an Official Fighting Fantazine Unofficial Skill Bonus vs Attack Strength rules guide (i.e. decide for each candidate whether it should become an Attack Strength bonus). As you can see from the many exchanges in this thread there would not be a unanimous decision. 'Majority rule' would be useless as it would tell us very little we do not know already.
There will always be very strict people who will not even accept Yaztromo's bonus in Port Of Peril, because there is no clear indication (I imagine they're the person who voted "Never, I play very strictly by the rules"). That's entirely understable even if most people won't feel the same way.
Wizard Slayer isn't it who keeps making the case the Kris Knife shouldn't take your Skill above Initial level, or at least that it's ambiguous, and his vehemence and elaboration testifies to strong feeling that way. Others such as Thealmightymudworm strongly disagree.
The Potion Of Heroism in Dead Of Night has a similar case to the Kris Knife, possibly slightly weaker, but I wouldn't want my view overruled.
Together with Yaztromo's bonus in Port Of Peril, I think only a real rules stickler wouldn't accept the Venom Sword bonus, which doesn't mean it's the wrong view.
Have I missed any?
And Sir Ian's many Skill bonuses that might have been intended as Attack Strength bonuses are the other way around - I think only a generous person would, arbitrarily, accept some as Attack Strength bonuses, but I have no problem with people doing that.
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Post by Wizard Slayer on Jun 17, 2024 9:40:07 GMT
Wizard Slayer isn't it who keeps making the case the Kris Knife shouldn't take your Skill above Initial level, or at least that it's ambiguous... Nooooo, I keep making the case that it's not clear what Steve Jackson intended when he wrote the book. Meanwhile others keep appealing to logic within a game system where a suit of chainmail provides me with no benefit in combat if I'm uninjured, but helps me jump a ravine if I twisted my ankle before finding it.
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Post by CharlesX on Jun 18, 2024 18:32:04 GMT
We should work together and produce an Official Fighting Fantazine Unofficial Skill Bonus vs Attack Strength rules guide (i.e. decide for each candidate whether it should become an Attack Strength bonus). I'm thinking "Official...Unofficial" doesn't sound the best as a title if we ever did get our heads together. Maybe "unauthorised". I have huge sympathy for people who want to stick tight to the Skill rules but i think we're over-thinking this. As Wizard Slayer implies the likeliest scenario is authors like Livingstone and even Bambra & Hand simply forgot the Skill cap rules in the front, and didn't have them in mind when they wrote their FF. Livingstone seems to be a particular offender one has to second-guess in this way.
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Post by thealmightymudworm on Jun 20, 2024 3:12:04 GMT
I'm having some computer problems at the moment so it's difficult for me to post as much/frequently as I would like. It makes no intuitive sense for the Kris knife to compensate for a crippling injury when facing one specific foe, but otherwise be no more effective than a letter opener. The Skill bonus of e.g. a suit of chainmail has always been able to compensate for the Skill penalty of a twisted ankle when rolling against that attribute to jump a narrow ravine. In Fighting Fantasy, intuition is the last thing to call on in relation to Skill ![:D](//storage.proboards.com/forum/images/smiley/grin.png) Yes, I know, but this is typically for 1 point bonuses on objects which are not central to the book. Now I hate the fact that magical SKILL bonuses are usually written so that they don't allow you to exceed your initial SKILL. I hate it because it doesn't make sense and I've bellyached before about how making The Mystic Elven Amulet of Destiny function like a hearing aid rather damages the sense of wonder. Perhaps when an author writes a bonus like this there are four possibilities: a) They mean it to exceed your initial SKILL but fail to specify. b) They really mean it to be limited by the initial SKILL because that's the adventurer's natural limit. c) They haven't really thought about it that deeply/don't care enough to have a definite view. d) They would prefer it to exceed the initial limit, but don't want to go against the FF standard. It seems likely that c) and d) account for much/most of the SKILL bonuses and other FF staples (cf Kieran's exchange with Paul Mason on provisions which last for years in TCT) but not a bonus of a full 6 SKILL points attached to an item mentioned frequently through the book. I'm sure that just sounds very speculative to you. So be it. I just have a hard time believing that SJ would make a central plank of HoH something which holds a huge magnifying glass up to the one of the weakest consequences of the FF rules. It's the difference between being beaten down to 2 STAMINA, having 5 minutes before a final battle and sneakily munching 3/4/5 provisions in those minutes (absurd, but arguably within the rules) vs being repeatedly told that before the final battle you must break into the larder where you're told you can eat enough in 5 minutes to restore 20 STAMINA points.
Right, but there is a bonus and that fits into the standard trope of magic swords giving statistical help in combat as well as just being necessities to do any damage at all. The reasons for these bonuses is often not really spelled out. Perhaps they imbue the adventurer's sword-arm with extra powers of dexterity, perhaps the sword is partially sentient and moves to dodge your opponent's parrying weapon, perhaps it just feels unnaturally light for such a heavy piece of metal, perhaps it magically mesmerises the opponent or transfixes them with fear... But regardless there's no narrative reason to believe that they're merely restorative. Realistic, yes, but by no means overwhelmingly likely, and this is in service of a high concept: that you can't yet control your actions and this endangers you. This only makes sense if we assume SJ was totally inconsistent. Sure, it might make sense if HoH's protagonist was less battle-ready than the average FF adventurer, but the rules have us rolling us a 7-12 SKILL character as normal and then being able to slap around e.g. a couple of great danes with relative ease. Worth noting that HoH came out after The Shamutanti Hills as well so it's not as though SJ hadn't thought of a way of accounting for potentially less accomplished fighters. Also it's really pushing it to list having a total bastard final combat as 'experimental'. Designing two completely different magic systems is experimental. Attempting a sci-fi FF book and being the first to get the player to roll for a whole crew is experimental (even if it's not a very successful experiment). Having the adventurer start as a transformed creature that doesn't understand what's going on and can't even control its own actions is experimental. Having the player battle a super-statted final boss is not. He doesn't need to add that. As I said, the instruction is to add 6 to SKILL, not increase SKILL by 6. There's no need to assume a mistake, merely to refrain from interpreting the paragraph in a pointlessly masochistic way. OK, well I was trying to be conciliatory. To be blunt, I think there's very little to recommend the idea that the Kris Knife should be interpreted as a SKILL bonus limited by initial SKILL for the combination of reasons laid out before. I don't know whether I'd bet my life on it, but it seems by far the most plausible understanding. I respect that there may be intelligent people I can never convince, that's all. To me, it's clear. Put it this way: suppose I made a £1000 bet with another FF fan that we each play three random books and who ever gets the most wins, wins all the money. If they had to play HoH and I didn't, and they asked me if I thought the Kris Knife bonus was (supposed to be) limited by initial SKILL, I'd feel I would be lying if I said 'yes'*.
If that's not clear enough to play HoH with that interpretation, well then I can't play HoH at all because the alternative is anything but clear.
It's not important to me that people think I always play by the rules – I can't speak for anyone else. I do think it's at least as likely though that some people are reluctant to accept that refusing to take the full bonus is incorrect due to the sunk cost fallacy. If you've played HoH without the full bonus and repeatedly been slaughtered by the Hell Demon, it might be hard to accept that that was not virtuous to do this because it was followin the rules, but simply wrong.
*Note that I'm not saying I wouldn't say this.
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Post by Wizard Slayer on Jun 20, 2024 8:42:12 GMT
Steve Jackson wrote one book where you roll over 20 dice to decide the starting attributes and can then complete the adventure without ever having to roll again. He wrote another where, regardless of your stats, dice rolls can randomly lead to your early death without you really getting to make a single choice. He writes paragraphs that give you Skill penalties that you have to apply to your Adventure Sheet when he fully intends to kill you off in the next paragraph or two. He gave you a combat against a Skill 17 enemy and then automatically killed you after two rounds anyway. He gave an unmagical letter opener the ability to undo any Skill penalty you might receive from injuries. He required secret paragraph codes to know an old woman's name or find a secret passage but then allowed you within the rules to say a vital yet random password even if you hadn't encountered it during the adventure. In one book, the text as written prevents you applying a paragraph code needed to progress further and because it's Steve people debated whether it was done deliberately as some form of philosophical commentary. Any claim to clearly know what The Mind of Steve was at any particular moment based on logic and precedent is doomed to failure ![:D](//storage.proboards.com/forum/images/smiley/grin.png)
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Post by CharlesX on Jun 20, 2024 9:17:53 GMT
He writes paragraphs that give you Skill penalties that you have to apply to your Adventure Sheet when he fully intends to kill you off in the next paragraph or two. He gave you a combat against a Skill 17 enemy and then automatically killed you after two rounds anyway. Any claim to clearly know what The Mind of Steve was at any particular moment based on logic and precedent is doomed to failure ![:D](//storage.proboards.com/forum/images/smiley/grin.png) Steve has also been known to give you a Stamina penalty before having only instant deaths within very few paragraphs (no combats let alone way out) that particular aspect is almost certainly more to do with Steve's own semi-sadistic interpretation of gameplay than his failure to do the player justice. You might as well ask the reason why the perpetual loops in Creature Of Havoc where it would 'make more sense' to have a paragraph that is "You realise the monster(s) will respawn infinitely and you will in all likelihood die before the universe ends." Your first point is particularly juvenile and cruel but that appears to be at least as pertinent to gameplay as gameplay rules.
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Post by Per on Jun 20, 2024 13:33:01 GMT
Meanwhile others keep appealing to logic within a game system where a suit of chainmail provides me with no benefit in combat if I'm uninjured, but helps me jump a ravine if I twisted my ankle before finding it. You know, "you people are using logic but I'm not!" may not be the ultimate rejoinder. I'm giving you the benefit of a doubt that that's not what you mean to say, but when you reply to mudworm's explanations to say that Steve Jackson is just this enigmatic creature, I think it's not helping your case. Also: I used to be option 1, but now I'm gradually playing through all my gamebooks without cheating (save a couple of sanity-preserving house rule variants) I'm doing option 3, although the length of time that might have passed doesn't have to be extensive. Basically it's would I realistically have had time to stop and eat since the last time I ate? If the paragraph describes many hours going by then why shouldn't I cross 3 or 4 off my sheet? But if I've been running from Orcs for five minutes since last eating, probably I get to eat none. So in the case of Provisions, a house rule that relies on a case by case personal judgement of thematic propriety is necessary to be "not cheating"? Do 1.5-years-past Wizard Slayer and current Wizard Slayer want to take this outside?
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Post by CharlesX on Jun 20, 2024 16:21:22 GMT
We've had a lot of discussion about the Kris Knife and little about the Potion Of Heroism. Presumably the same arguments would apply in this case? Quite frankly I think one reason people are more willing to apply the Kris Knife bonus is because SJ is inconsistent about Test Your Skill rules and the Letter-opener, yes another is the Kris Knife is specified to give a bonus in the one instance of the Hell Demon. The Potion Of Heroism is more second-guessing, I think losing Skill in Dead Of Night is very rare if at all so it's highly plausible the writers simply forgot about the Skill cap. Champskees says in the solution thread another path is the ideal one, partly over this Potion Of Heroism and also for an alleged 'vital clue'. Perhaps no more vital a clue than the one in Masks Of Mayhem, that is, one a player could easily guess. I'm very much in two minds about the Porion Of Heroism, technically one shouldn't apply the bonus but the face value purpose of the Potion Of Heroism seems to be to apply this Attack Strength bonus in a gamebook where you don't tend to lose current Skill. By the way +4, as I remember it being, might be a bit game-breakingly generous.
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Post by Wizard Slayer on Jun 21, 2024 10:32:02 GMT
So in the case of Provisions, a house rule that relies on a case by case personal judgement of thematic propriety is necessary to be "not cheating"? Do 1.5-years-past Wizard Slayer and current Wizard Slayer want to take this outside? If I was claiming that I was simply doing what the authors clearly meant for me to do then you'd have a point. But I wasn't. You know, "you people are using logic but I'm not!" may not be the ultimate rejoinder. I'm giving you the benefit of a doubt that that's not what you mean to say, but when you reply to mudworm's explanations to say that Steve Jackson is just this enigmatic creature, I think it's not helping your case. Then you don't understand my case, which is nothing to do with how the bonus should or could be interpreted. My case that I keep iterating is that there's no way anybody can claim that Steve Jackson clearly meant the bonus to take you over Initial Skill. Or claim that he clearly didn't. The very fact that for every argument in one direction there's a totally reasonable counter-argument in the other is what makes it so. House of Hell is not rendered some horrifically impossible book by restriction of the Kris Knife bonus. A 10/18/10 character has the same chance of winning as an 8/14/10 character in Creature of Havoc who only takes 1 Stamina damage per hit and has an insta-kill advantage. There are arguments for and against applying the bonus a certain way and none land a knockout blow on the other. But to claim that Steve Jackson clearly meant that the bonus be applied a certain way is to imply that the other view is without any merit.
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Post by CharlesX on Jun 21, 2024 18:40:37 GMT
So in the case of Provisions, a house rule that relies on a case by case personal judgement of thematic propriety is necessary to be "not cheating"? Do 1.5-years-past Wizard Slayer and current Wizard Slayer want to take this outside? If I was claiming that I was simply doing what the authors clearly meant for me to do then you'd have a point. But I wasn't. You know, "you people are using logic but I'm not!" may not be the ultimate rejoinder. I'm giving you the benefit of a doubt that that's not what you mean to say, but when you reply to mudworm's explanations to say that Steve Jackson is just this enigmatic creature, I think it's not helping your case. Then you don't understand my case, which is nothing to do with how the bonus should or could be interpreted. My case that I keep iterating is that there's no way anybody can claim that Steve Jackson clearly meant the bonus to take you over Initial Skill. Or claim that he clearly didn't. The very fact that for every argument in one direction there's a totally reasonable counter-argument in the other is what makes it so. House of Hell is not rendered some horrifically impossible book by restriction of the Kris Knife bonus. A 10/18/10 character has the same chance of winning as an 8/14/10 character in Creature of Havoc who only takes 1 Stamina damage per hit and has an insta-kill advantage. There are arguments for and against applying the bonus a certain way and none land a knockout blow on the other. But to claim that Steve Jackson clearly meant that the bonus be applied a certain way is to imply that the other view is without any merit. This goes back to "strong likelihood" such as the chances I can walk through two different brick walls versus "absolute certainty". Again Thealmightymudworm (and now Per) make a persuasive case. He's therefore "having his cake and eating it" by taking the starting point both sides are totally reasonable, an equal number each way, no knockout blow etc. I could accept this position but that Wizard Slayer himself accepts Kris Knife as an Attack Strength bonus; if he believes its totally reasonable etc. to interpret the Kris Knife as something SJ intended as a current Skill bonus perhaps he could have a bet (maybe with The AlmightyMudworm) and specify the odds where he might think they were what SJ reckoned. I would they were rather long. OTOH a lot of this comes down to semantics (pedantry?) and Wizard Slayer seems to have a different definition of clarity from some.
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Post by Wizard Slayer on Jun 25, 2024 10:05:22 GMT
None of the above makes any sense. You seem to be claiming that because I won't argue that Steve Jackson clearly didn't mean for the bonus to take you over your Initial Skill, I'm somehow not playing fair. If so, there's a world of difference between "clearly didn't" and "didn't clearly" which doesn't require pedantry to understand.
Personally I think arguments such as 'the instruction is to add 6 to Skill, not increase Skill by 6, so it can go over your Initial' are semantics and pedantry. A lot of people seem to forget these were children's books and that your average ten year old might not have picked up on such subtlety.
As for the meaning of clearly, my definition is the common one, no semantics required: without doubt, certain.
When the claim is that "Steve Jackson clearly intended the Kris Knife bonus to take you over Initial Skill" (not "I think he intended...", not "may have intended...", not "it's ambiguous whether he intended...", but instead the claim that it is the conclusion to which all the evidence inexorably leads), to counter it I don't need to argue or even believe that he didn't; only that it's not conclusive that he did, by explaining how the alternative viewpoint has plausibilty.
But when Creature of Havoc is refused as an example against the claim that 'death by dice isn't something Steve Jackson does', or when making Book 4 the first sci-fi FF is experimental yet making Book 10 the first FF with a "super-statted final boss" isn't, it doesn't seem like an exchange of ideas any more so much as an argument about convictions.
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Post by soulreaver on Jun 27, 2024 11:18:12 GMT
I think the rules for Skill (and how it relates to equipment and combat) are a horrendous mess and thus use my own set of house rules. They do heavily influence the level of challenge of some books, but in most cases it tends to make books that are mathematically very unlikely to beat with anything other than a max-Skill character into something more manageable and fun. Ian Livingstone's books tend to come out most radically changed - they tend to be much 'easier', but then I don't think a book is fun if the only challenge is to retry the same thing over and over until you end up being in the 9% probability of getting through without cheating.
Here's the general gist of how I think it 'should' be played: - You can't exceed your Initial Skill unless specifically instructed
- You can only use an item if it is reasonable for you to actually be wearing it or using it. So, only one weapon at a time, only one helmet at a time, only one shield at a time etc. The original rules already state something similar anyway.
- Combat-related equipment (swords, shields, helmets etc) that provide a Skill bonus actually just provide an Attack Strength bonus when used. - If you lose Skill due to losing a weapon/armour/shield, it counts as an Attack Strength penalty instead until you can replace the item.
- Accessories that provide a Skill bonus by enhancing your speed, strength, etc (not specifically combat-related) increase both current and Initial Skill when worn (on some occasions that does require toning down the bonus though) - If you lose Skill due to injury/poison/a curse/whatever, that is treated as normal Skill loss.
- If you regain Skill due to healing/rest/whatever, that is treated as normal Skill gain (and thus can't exceed Initial score)
Not only do the above rules make some very unfair books a lot more fair, but (for me at least) they avoid stupid scenarios that otherwise crop up in the books if you play them exactly as written. Things that resemble the following:
a) The hero hurts their leg, oh no! They have -1 Skill! But luckily they now put on a chainmail vest (+1 Skill) and can now jump just as well as they used to! Somehow!
b) The hero gets a chainmail vest, hooray! It adds +2 to Skill! Except he can't go over his Initial Skill so it does nothing for him. What's that, he had to jump over a wall and dropped his vest? That's -2 Skill for dropping the vest! Now somehow he's worse at everything than he was before getting the vest despite being completely uninjured. c) Our hero loses his sword, oh no! -4 Skill! But that's ok. Drink that Potion of Skill and now your hands are as good as a sword ever was, cutting and slicing through opponents with ease!
d) The hero picks up a sword of ancient might! It glows with light and boosts his strength against the final foe! +4 to his Skill! Except it doesn't really make a difference at all since he didn't get hurt earlier, so he might as well just use his totally mundane sword as per usual.
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