I'd hazard it's "stop looking for old questions to close" backlash
also, in today's fine D&D legal writing: "The effect ends early if [...], if any creature uses its action to expend one use of a healer’s kit, or if ..."
if anyone, anywhere, uses a healer's kit, you're golden
Interpreting that question as seeking designer reasons is misclassifying it and focusing on the least important part of the question to the exclusion of what the question is actually trying to understand.
@Trish I think this is the appropriate resolution.
Only, I don't think there's any serious problem with the question as asked.
I suspect the actual resolution is to recognise that it is tangentially asking for designer reasons as a possible avenue to seeking the understanding it's looking for, as part of an actually very good on-topic question, and that it isn't primarily seeking designer statements.
(the sad part being that without that context, asking for reasons from the designers is a way to try and ensure that the answers you get are properly evidenced, which I note all the answers to that question... aren't)
Im having a hard time aligning "they dont care what the designers say" with the text of the question that says "Did the game's designers ever explain it, either officially or anecdotally?"
@ThomasMarkov the interpretation is that "why does this rule exist?" is their real question and "have the designers ever explained it?" is their guessing at where the answer will come from
and "why does this rule exist" might as well be "what's the effect of this rule"
@ThomasMarkov "why is a ladybug red? Is it so that it scares its enemies?" is a question fundamentally asking about why a ladybug is red, not a question fundamentally asking whether a ladybug's redness is to scare its enemies. The second part is seeking to prompt a potential answer to the first part. But if I were to say "what is this question about?" I would not pick the second thing, I'd pick the first thing.
at any rate - as far as that particular question goes - I think the strongest clue that it might as well be changed is that all the answers it has would remain completely applicable
@Akixkisu I dont have to make a meta to change tag descriptions. Its a 20k rep feature. If you want to change the edit I made, suggest an edit and the queue will review it.
Why do characters with a high prime requisite gain bonus XP?
The question presents some information, then asks:
What is the reason for this rule? Did the game's designers ever explain it, either officially or anecdotally?
Is this a "designer reasons" question that should be closed, since "desig...
in as much as they all already simply extrapolate what the consequences of the rule are (encourages players to create characters that have attributes appropriate to their class), and don't rely at all on any actual reference to reasons expressed by designers.
(Korvin's answer is at least quoting the PHB, but he seems to have interpreted it on a slight tangent)
@ThomasMarkov of course you can do that, I'm not questioning that you can do it. I'm asking - why did you choose to approach it that way when there is clearly a messy situation going on.
"What is the reason for this rule" still reads like designer reasons to me, and I doubt its a unique opinion. If there's a more clear expression of the question that we can both get behind, we should work toward that.
@doppelgreener I would edit it to remove the last and rephrase the question as "what's the effect of this rule?" if for no other reason than to make it harder to argue about the question
I learned this week that parmesan has glutamates, which activate the umami receptors, the same thing MSG does. Which is what gives it such a distinct taste.
Today I got back to thinking about my on-again off-again Avatar: TLA/LOK hack. It hasn't been on my mind in a long, long time; it's sorta just sitting there. Last time I was thinking about it, I was intending for it to be Fate, but ... that won't work because it needs the system to be more concrete in places Fate is not concrete at all. I wanted to see if Cortex will work. And, well, this time it came to mind, I've actually played Cortex! And it will, I think.
Something I was especially interested in is that the Avatar State has different uses between the avatars we see. Aang uses it as an emergency state when all else fails. Korra channels it more casually for occasional power boosts, and is way more experienced at diving in and out of it in ways we only occasionally see Aang do.
In my Fate hack, I was going to give the player one of two Avatar stunts to pick up to represent these two different ways of channeling the Avatar state. But now I realise I should probably offer both, with different penalties and trade-offs. Players are going to define their own style simply by which ones they use more frequently, based on which of the costs and benefits they consider acceptable and when.
@ThomasMarkov Remo Williams and Chiun beg to disagree. (Sorry, that pulp lit reference may not work) I think my brother and I read all of the Destroyer books up to 14? Way back when. Long before the movie came out.
@MikeQ well only one player would be allowed to be the avatar in this version, but i would definitely carve out space for exceptions: what if a generation lead to two avatars being born? what if there was someone who could bend two elements, despite not being the avatar? i wouldn't try to provide justification, the players might already have it or might enjoy discovering the answers themselves
@doppelgreener I can see a smash hit musical on Broadway, with the hit song from the album "You have a friend in Glutamine" being sung by Tim Curry ... there's our first million!
Ooh, he's still alive, right? Man, it's been a lot of years since Clue the movie, came out.
@doppelgreener I of course remember him from Rocky Horror, first time I saw him anywhere (movie late 70's) but I also saw him in Hunt for Red October. I still have the RHPS soundtrack on vinyl ...
He did a fantastic parody of Mick Jagger as a guest on SNL also. Had me in stitches
@Glazius I have seen all of Korra and boy do I have opinions for days about it. I could make a list of the good, the bad, the ugly, and lists for what I'd change and what I'd keep, and lists of what works well and what doesn't work well and what's salvageable and what isn't and what gets a bad rep despite being pretty good and talk about any given bullet point at length and hoo boy.
I could even point out things that don't seem like much of a problem but are. Like the fact we have a city that's less than thirty years old and has a brand new state-of-the-art architecture not seen anywhere else, despite the fact it should really have tons of evidence of transition including old towns where things look just earth kingdom or so on. It's like the whole city was deleted and rebuilt once they figured out a new aesthetic.
Real life doesn't work like Cities Skylines!
It has layers, like an ogre.
Anyway my goal would be to give you a framework to set up your own Avatar world and turn the dial on the elements available, with Aang's world as the baseline.
yes. and in lieu of that, if a city is built by (mainly) earth nation people, we should see traditional earth nation housing, because that's what they were used to building when they moved there. we should see styles mingling. and we should see juxtaposition of new and old: if you go to any old city like London, you'll see buildings of very ancient styles very close to buildings of very modern styles, because it's organically grown this way.
Republic City just spontaneously developed a consistent distinct modern aesthetic out of nowhere
@Glazius Just out of curiosity, would Brasillia be an OK example? Remembering stuff from grade school, but they went and built this new city in Brazil and moved the capital to it partly due to something about Rio De Janeiro... I need to check, but as I remember it that locale had a modern city created ex nihilo ...
Yeah, it's the same idea. If a city was created by a central authority rather than individual efforts, an architectural unity makes a little more sense.
it does, but there'd still be people who want to live there before they can start figuring that out. there'd be an old town somewhere. we just ... don't see it anywhere
everything there is modern europe/america/hong kong
There was this old spirit feud that made the place kind of forsaken for a while, until some guy was out prospecting and found some crystals. Aang had to show up and deal with the re-eruption of it when it was a mining camp.
This was in a side comic, gimme a sec for the title...
Yeah, it was chosen to be the capital mostly because of its symbolic nature as the place where harmony between the elemental nations was tested and restored. I'm pretty sure you could probably find bits of the old Cranefish Town refinery and dormitories somewhere in the industrial district, but Republic City was pretty much built on nothing.
I don't think you want to put mechanics around something like "the death of the Avatar in the Avatar state" because the actual mechanics around that are, like, slams fresh campaign binder down on table
@AncientSwordRage You have been SUBSCRIBED to DOPPEL'S AVATAR WORK. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please send a carrier pigeon with a green ribbon strapped to its left leg. It'll know where to go.
@Glazius Ha! I was thinking about that too, honestly. Like, the actual handling of that would have to be "Well, this world is doomed. You may roll up a new character and continue to explore this doomed world for a little longer or you may create a new world." But really, the rules should never reach that state. Death is almost never on the table in Avatar, and that's a good decision: there are way more interesting stories to tell and death is the least interesting one.
But if you're using Cortex then, hmm... Avatar State as Past Selves is probably just like "invent whatever skills and powers make sense, including bumps to your own skills, then after it passes step them up and take them as stress".
Your pick of track, dissociation and distance are as much a part of the crash as weariness.
I figure my scale would be: d4 = you technically can bend, but you've had no training and have no knack for it. d6 = you're pretty alright at this. d8 = you've had some serious training or you're a natural. d10 = you're a master at this. you've been practicing for years. d12 = you are one of the most powerful people on the planet in this skill and in general. you could count your peers on one hand, if you have any at all. or you're the avatar channeling the avatar state to their utmost.
But even then, the Avatar state can be used to do things beyond _any_ human capacity from time to time, …
Likewise, the system would 100% throw the same scale toward non-Bender players, who I want to give freedom of expression to. You pick d10, and yes, you really are that good at hand-to-hand combat. But they need specialties available as well to give them the problem-solving range that a bender has.
Like, you know, tactics, technology, chi blocking, and more.
i figure d12 is like: Earthbending: Toph in her prime, and Bumi on a good day. Firebending: This _would_ be Azula, if she'd been able to take Zuko's path. that's the entire list
@Glazius It just clicked for me what you're talking about here—the dichotomy between the two interpretations of the Avatar state. "The Avatar State is the Light Spirit pumping Pure Power into you" vs "The Avatar State is like a hundred people all working together and holy cow do they get stuff done"
Why do characters with a high prime requisite gain bonus XP?
The question presents some information, then asks:
What is the reason for this rule? Did the game's designers ever explain it, either officially or anecdotally?
Is this a "designer reasons" question that should be closed, since "desig...
