(07-07-2015, 04:59 AM)Caspar Wrote: [ -> ]Forgive me for drawing this point out, but you did bring it up, and the argument has been done to death in the Grindstone threads. Suffice to say, since it invalidates the entire point of my charater's existence and others like it, I personally cannot abide it. So I mean, of course I'm pretty biased.
This is a world where fistfighters of sufficient skill can canonically fire laserbeams strong enough to lift them bodily off the ground and channel heat-seeking orbs of aether that explode on contact. (I'm going to hold Elixir Field and Forbidden Chakra over the grittier rpers forever, you can count on it...) A tiny person who hits hard shouldn't be much of a stretch. Give them the benefit of the doubt; not every lalafell player who approaches rp from this angle is unaware of how rare that kind of strength ought to be, to say nothing of its consequences. Some will recognize the disadvantage of reach, or understand that their character is effectively a freak for being able to put out the muscle power of a creature much larger than their size implies, and rp the side-effects, both physical and mental, of training to do so. Like becoming socially and educationally stunted due to monomaniacal focus on training, or losing, despite all their strength, due to rushing in heedlessly; my character has fallen victim to that countless times, despite being, on paper, way more dangerous than most. She's lost more than she's won, and that's done a lot of good things for her character development even as it damages her credibility. To me, experience should beat talent, but it'd be boring if every physically strong character was a roeg or highlander, honestly. To assume other races will lose is godmoding, and inconsistent with the setting to boot.
I think there ought be some nod to the disadvantages being short entails, but assuming they should lose just because of it before the fight even starts strikes me as a bit unfair. That being said, I agree it is wrong to assume everyone else is weaker. Generally the approach I take is, if they're more experienced, they win if they're creative enough to make up the gap in intensity of training; no amount of training from hell beats actual combat experience. Or I just /roll, because I always lose /roll, lol.
That aside, since you're looking at a wide gradient of believability, things not fitting into one's personal perception of believability is a pet peeve that is pretty easy to understand. The game and setting itself are at odds with our physics and your sense of realism, so you're going to see a lot of people doing all kinds of crazy stuff. I find it funny that a lot of people are willing to accept the existence of magic and aether, but cannot wrap their head around a person of slight build fighting equally with a person who easily dwarfs them in height and baraness, but these are separate aesthetic concepts that don't mix easily; the martial and magical have been held to inconsistent standards even as far back as the earliest editions of D&D, and fantasy has suffered for it. But that's not going to change the fact that people who go into the game looking to play a hero with a certain aesthetic, especially the low fantasy kind, are going to run into annoying inconsistencies. It is difficult to reconcile their view of what should be possible amongst martial archetypes with those of someone who took to Eastern fantasy, where people are driven mad by reading martial arts' scrolls backwards, fly over rooftops, bore perfect holes in your skull from a distance and handle swords with masterful precision using nothing but ribbons. You can fire lasers and block bullets? What is a gunner going to do, or a non-magical archer? It's things like that which can really damage immersion for a specific kind of player, one way or another, if not handled carefully, and I understand it can be frustrating both ways. It's for this reason that I think it pays to have a very flexible idea of what to do in a scene that matches the mood or general grittiness of the environment. If people want to do stuff in a very mundane way, players shouldn't be afraid to craft excuses to make things more low key, or just handwave it so that the scene stays consistent and feels right.
No, this is fair. I get what you're saying. I'd like to clarify though, I don't mean to poop on lalafell warrior types. If that's the way you want to play your character, go for it. I do, however, think that the disadvantage from lack of reach should be accounted for.
An experienced lalafell warrior would know about it, and be able to deal with it, but it is still there. Reach is not a physical limitation that was negated by "oh, well it's fantasy" even if strength and skill are. I think it should still be addressed.
That isn't to say that, if my character is 6'6 and yours is 3'2, I will win 100% of the time, but the advantage is clear, and the smaller character should have to work around it. The smaller character may know exactly what they're doing and they may win decisively, but that shouldn't be the case ten times out of ten. Like you said, it should come down to experience.
No, my biggest issue wasn't with small characters completely handwaving how strength works in the real world, though I did make it seem that way with my examples, it was really more aimed toward people who, in an emoted combat scenario, will always disregard whoever they're RPing with in an attempt to be Billy Badass and win every fight with cool kid dagger tricks. No RPer should assume that their character is the strongest or the most skilled or the most experienced in present company. I RP a Highlander who has been wielding a variety of melee weapons for over two decades. He's strong, he's big, he's experienced, he's intelligent, and he's even surprisingly agile based on the short stories I've written on him (in the style of Robert E. Howard's "Conan the Cimmerian" or Edgar Rice Burroughs's "Tarzan of the Apes"), but even with all of those advantages I have given him for the sake of good adventure stories, I
never just plainly assume no one around can beat Tancred in a fight, and I get angry when others do that with their characters.
It's not because I think I'm the best RPer in the world or something and need to ironically show off my humility, I just think that everyone loves their character as much as I do and we share a world where we're all our own protagonists. No one character should be able to beat all others in a fight. There's always a bigger fish.
I know that sounds hypocritical with my rant about how smaller characters are weaker than bigger ones, but that is just me speaking in generalities. If I walk into a group of strange RPers, and I want to know who Tancred would single out as the biggest threat, I look for the biggest guy or girl in the room. Could a lalafell or a miqo'te possibly beat Tancred in a fight? Certainly. But with smaller races, I think a bit more explanation is required to convey
how they could from a logical standpoint. I hope that's making sense. It is 5:30 in the morning here...
