Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!apple!agate!shelby!portia.stanford.edu!elaine0.stanford.edu!draphsor From: draphsor@elaine0.stanford.edu (Matt Rollefson) Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.games Subject: Re: RPG opinions (was Re: Programmer...) Message-ID: Date: 8 Nov 90 04:21:17 GMT References: Sender: news@portia.Stanford.EDU (USENET News System) Organization: AIR, Stanford University Lines: 45 ck31+@andrew.cmu.edu (Christopher Bruce Kidwell) writes: [comments on hit points deleted] >On a different note, have any games dealt with the problem of a group of >about six characters defeating hundreds of enemies without being killed? >In Bard's Tale (I forgot which one) the party has to fight four groups of >99 Bezerkers. It seems to me that if about 20 of them came charging from >all directions, the party wouldn't stand a chance. I seem to remember >someone mentioning a rule like this from AD&D to the effect that if a >character is surrounded by more than four enemies, he is automatically >defeated. Well, there is no such rule in AD&D, as others have noted. However, you do have a point. It depends on what you're trying to do with the game - heroic fantasy where one man can hold off an army, or 'realistic' fantasy, where the guy's dead after the first three or four. This is an issue with 'normal' RPGs as well - GURPS is quite realistic, AD&D much less so. It's just that most of the computer games so far have been in the heroic mold, and even more specifically, the 'hack-n-slash' mode, where the whole point of the game is to kill scads of things. In real life, if you're a good but not incredible swordsman/martial artist/etc, you can expect to defeat up to say 90% of your opponents, if their skills varies in some bell curve and the outcome is not purely dependent on skill. (NOTE: These numbers are completely made up, not based on any real-world numbers or anything. I'm just giving examples.) Given this, how long will it be before you get defeated once? Once you get up to say 50 total combats, the chances of your being undefeated are real low. (Someone could do probabilities if they want to.) In combat to the death, you can only lose once. So bye-bye realism already, in any system where you need to kill >50 monsters/fighters/whatever to complete the game. In summary: Again, it looks like we want more realistic games, more on the order of simulations. (See my previous post.) Anyone want to write one? >Any thoughts? >Chris Kidwell >ck31@andrew.cmu.edu -- Draphsor vo'drun-Aelf draphsor@portia.stanford.edu