tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post5055260817311678672..comments2024-03-29T20:04:30.755+08:00Comments on Monsters and Manuals: Why Everyone Should Have 3d6 For StatsUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger43125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-64527334079323295502019-08-13T03:31:15.526+08:002019-08-13T03:31:15.526+08:00I hate adding to old content, but this one I canno...I hate adding to old content, but this one I cannot help it. stop trying to make D&D about 12th century england, or whatever. if it is anything, it is NINETEENTH Century England (with magic instead of guns).<br /><br />Any world that has fireball, does not have peasants. Either Watt Tyler wins, or we are stuck in an assassination/ressurection loop. So skip.<br /><br />Sorry to comment on an old post, but this bugs me.Richardhttp://www.bing.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-50019578320643471482010-09-22T06:29:40.437+08:002010-09-22T06:29:40.437+08:00faustusnotes wrote: "Okay, so riddle me the d...faustusnotes wrote: "Okay, so riddle me the difference between these two inductive fallacies:<br /><br />"1. all peasants have 2d6 stats, so the next peasant I meet will have 2d6 for his/her stats. . . ."<br /><br />Please forgive me for possible nitpicking, but isn't No. 1 a deduction rather than an induction? Didn't you mean "all <i>known</i> peasants have 2d6 stats, . . ."? That would make it inductive, and the conclusion about the next peasant encountered would be speculative and therefore subject to error, as you suggest.Steve Lalannehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12257236994766166129noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-3314011090125882392010-09-22T04:14:42.664+08:002010-09-22T04:14:42.664+08:00faustusnotes wrote: "For clear evidence of th...faustusnotes wrote: "For clear evidence of this you don't need to look further than your own blighted shores, where the poorest 20% of the population do worse on every measure - education, life expectancy, academic achievement, child mortality, etc - and in quite noticeable ways."<br /><br />True. Insofar as society is performance-based, poverty is caused by deficiencies of character or ability, rather than by (social) class barriers. In D&D terms, affluence in the modern world tends to vary directly with ability scores. <br /><br />In societies with class barriers, the upward mobility of those with superior ability scores is hindered. On this account, we therefore expect to find an equal distribution of ability scores among the social classes. But we also expect lower ability scores for the lower classes because of poor diet--theirs and their parents' diets. (When parents eat poorly, their children are more likely to be deficient.)<br /><br />So, I think everyone who's been debating this is more or less right. To the extent that the lower classes are less healthy, their ability scores would suffer.<br /><br />An interesting question is the D&D strength score of labourers. A labourer is stronger than average due to the nature of his work, but his nutritional requirements are also greater. Because of his relative poverty, can he afford the additional sustenance to sustain his strength? For a labourer, strength is needed to earn money for food, and food is needed for strength. How does his strength compare to that of the average person? The answer is not obvious to me; it would seem to depend partly on prevailing economic conditions (e.g., famine vs. prosperity), which are, of course, subject to change.Steve Lalannehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12257236994766166129noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-78454623683286011522010-06-01T01:26:46.716+08:002010-06-01T01:26:46.716+08:00Vincent: Well put.
I'm not saying this is tr...<b>Vincent</b>: Well put. <br /><br />I'm not saying this is true of faustusnotes, but there is a tendency to make assumptions about people who live in poverty in developing countries that simply aren't true, based on what is in news reports. <br /><br />There is also an unfortunate tendency among certain groups to rely more on statistical models and rationality than personal experience in trying to understand how the world works. This approach can yield very useful results, but it can also cause all kinds of mistaken thinking.noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-83861304749873803812010-06-01T00:49:40.348+08:002010-06-01T00:49:40.348+08:00All the genetic, personal and national traits you ...<i>All the genetic, personal and national traits you describe in your comment will be washed out by the single fact of this grinding poverty and servitude.</i><br /><br />I should be depressed to imagineer this true of anyone in a fictional world - and I certainly don't believe it of the real individuals composing the linguistic fictions bandied about about in our world.<br /><br />It strikes me as little more than superstition.Vincent Diakuwhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12176340701893887319noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-62760908566971951872010-05-27T20:47:17.283+08:002010-05-27T20:47:17.283+08:00faustusnotes: it doesn't predict individual va...<b>faustusnotes</b>: <i>it doesn't predict individual values</i><br /><br />It restricts the range of individual values, which is really functionally equivalent to predicting individual values. The argument just moves to a slightly higher level of abstraction.<br /><br /><i>"It's almost as if" is clearly a piss-take and not an allegation. You really are over-sensitive!</i><br /><br />Yeah, I get a little prickly when somebody starts telling me what "being a peasant means" when I have a reasonable idea, having seen it first hand.<br /><br />More to the point, you weren't really representing Alexis' argument with your little spiel about the life of peasants, because his system builds in a weird form of meritocracy that means, e.g. that peasants with long arms can be basketball players, or whatever the medieval equivalent is.noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-27896145317592426002010-05-27T19:38:17.093+08:002010-05-27T19:38:17.093+08:00and here you show your idiosyncratic view of the m...and here you show your idiosyncratic view of the model Alexis proposes. The model merely proposes a random distribution for members of a class - it doesn't predict individual values. He's suggesting only that the variation between groups in his society is large relative to their within-group variance, and putting a putative maximum on the values (just as you do). Did you ever take a course on Analysis of Variance? All that he's doing is simulating data for an ANOVA experiment. <br /><br />"It's almost as if" is clearly a piss-take and not an allegation. You really are over-sensitive!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-47835636846879545042010-05-27T18:17:28.240+08:002010-05-27T18:17:28.240+08:00faustusnotes: It's your main contention, Noism...<b>faustusnotes</b>: <i>It's your main contention, Noisms, because you are proposing that a class-based division of statistics is wrong</i><br /><br />That a class-based division of statistics that predicts anything on the <b>individual level</b> is wrong.<br /><br /><i>It's almost as if you think that for a peasant, grinding poverty means they go out to the chippy on Friday instead of Waterstones, and have to practice cricket with a rubbish bin and a tennis ball. </i><br /><br />Believe it or not, I do know a little bit about how contemporary peasants - subsistence farmers in central asia - live their lives, and the sort of grinding poverty they experience. So let's not get into speculating about what I think, please.noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-62379601426190571442010-05-27T07:40:13.399+08:002010-05-27T07:40:13.399+08:00It's your main contention, Noisms, because you...It's your main contention, Noisms, because you are proposing that a class-based division of statistics is wrong, and you're doing so because you think the myriad reasons like "he has long arms" are as important as the single most powerful factor in a peasant's life, which is their continual grinding poverty.<br /><br />It's almost as if you think that for a peasant, grinding poverty means they go out to the chippy on Friday instead of Waterstones, and have to practice cricket with a rubbish bin and a tennis ball. <br /><br />Being a peasant means it doesn't matter how long your arms are, you don't get to be a basketball player; it means that even if you had the genetic potential to be 10' tall, your diet will make you 5'1; it means that you will work so hard in winter that you have no time to practice sewing and get dexterous, except perhaps for a few nights in August; it means that you'll never hear any stories except from a travelling minstrel in the markets a few times a year, and will never learn anything about the world except what the Priests tell you on Sunday morning, so you'll never develop any wisdom or intelligence beyond knowing when to plant parsley. Even the wisdom of your own religion is written in a language you can't read, and denied to you by your betters.<br /><br />All the genetic, personal and national traits you describe in your comment will be washed out by the single fact of this grinding poverty and servitude. Those factors are the benefits of life in a post-feudal world, when commerce and free association became possible beyond the merchant class.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-37959253011263005362010-05-26T21:51:00.283+08:002010-05-26T21:51:00.283+08:00faustusnotes: "Giving reasons" - and wha...<b>faustusnotes</b>: <i>"Giving reasons" - and what do you base your reasons on, Noisms? Blind guesswork? Or some kind of underlying model of the human condition, in which practice improves certain traits? Do you perhaps use a statistical model, in which agile people are more likely to take up basketball? One things for sure, you don't base your "reasons" on nothing, or they wouldn't be reasons.</i><br /><br />They certainly aren't based on one model. Are you seriously suggesting that one can postulate a model which says "agile people are more likely to take up basketball" while neglecting to say "tall people are more likely to take up basketball" and "American are more likely to take up basketball than Italians" and "Lithuanians are more likely to take up basketball than Poles" and "the longer someone's arms are, the more likely the are to take up basketball" and "people who are encouraged by their parents to take up basketball are more likely to take up basketball" and "people who are too strongly encouraged by their parents to take up basketball are less likely to take up basketball", etc., etc., and have this model taken seriously as a way of explaining why people take up basketball?<br /><br />We're going round in circles here, but life is complex. People aren't the way they are because of one variable. There are many many different variables, of which social status is only one.<br /><br /><i>Which brings us back to your main contention - that peasants had the same opportunities as lords. Where were we going with this one, again?</i><br /><br />Where the fuck do you get the idea this is my "main contention"? Inasmuch as I contend anything on this specific point, it's that "having opportunities" is only one variable among many. (And a highly nebulous variable at that.)<br /><br /><i>I'm pretty confident that my position on Giants is backed up by contemporary biophysics and the statistics of the human growth curve, though sadly I can't check these things very completely from my home; however, by all means, reject biology and epidemiology as well as economics!</i><br /><br />More smoke. I'm not talking about what "contemporary biophysics" says. Contemporary biophysics does not have perfect theories about human evolution, does it? Do you accept that much? That nobody can predict what mutations can occur in a human genome with perfect accuracy?<br /><br /><i>The probability of meeting a 10' tall person is not zero</i> (unless you're speaking in the sense in which a probability of 0 can still include events that are technically possible). It is possible that it might happen, though the chance is exceedingly low.noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-61554314213454345342010-05-26T08:16:12.582+08:002010-05-26T08:16:12.582+08:00"Giving reasons" - and what do you base ..."Giving reasons" - and what do you base your reasons on, Noisms? Blind guesswork? Or some kind of underlying model of the human condition, in which practice improves certain traits? Do you perhaps use a statistical model, in which agile people are more likely to take up basketball? One things for sure, you don't base your "reasons" on nothing, or they wouldn't be reasons. <br /><br />None of your process of giving reasons is incompatible with a 2d6 spread, in any case; you roll a peasant with 11 dexterity and 4 strength and claim that they spent a lot of time sewing because they had polio as a kid. This very accurately reflects the balance of determinants in their lives - first and foremost is their place as a grindingly poor indentured labourer, which controls almost all of their aspirations and puts strict constraints on what they can achieve; second comes their employment of free will to maximise their chances within this restrictive framework.<br /><br />That wasn't difficult was it? You do the same thing with 3d6 stats - the 3d6 stats put a fundamental limit on what ordinary people can achieve (because they aren't Gods or Giants, who you presumably accept have a different spread of stats...???) But the person whose 3d6 gives them an 18 strength becomes a fighter, while the 18 intelligence is a wizard.<br /><br />I presume you aren't arguing that there is no physical limit on human potential in the game world? You do support the use of 3d6, after all... so the primary limit on the spread of peoples' achievements is their humanity (3d6); and within that you give reasons for their particular variation (or more strictly speaking, on its expression). This is the same process as for the peasant - first recognise the largest cause of variability (the gross restriction on stats) then the smaller causes.<br /><br />Which brings us back to your main contention - that peasants had the same opportunities as lords. Where were we going with this one, again?<br /><br />It's interesting to watch you describe basic empirical facts as a "smokescreen." I'm pretty confident that my position on Giants is backed up by contemporary biophysics and the statistics of the human growth curve, though sadly I can't check these things very completely from my home; however, by all means, reject biology and epidemiology as well as economics!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-32527411615932120882010-05-25T21:26:12.368+08:002010-05-25T21:26:12.368+08:00Noisms, if you can claim that there can be a causa...<i>Noisms, if you can claim that there can be a causal relationship between a phenomenon (people sew) and a physical property of those people (they are dexterous) then you have a model. This ain't sophistry.</i><br /><br />Whatever you say. The rest of mankind calls this giving reasons.<br /><br /><i>Accepting the randomness of the world and blanketing it in 3d6 means accepting that you have no explanation for Conan's strength. Or Fergie's stupidity.</i><br /><br />No, it means accepting that there are different and various reasons why people are strong or stupid.<br /><br /><i>Regarding your division of peasant's traits by these second order properties, you're clutching at straws. It's simple analysis of variance. 40% of a person's height is determined by that of their parents; more than 40% of a peasant's stats will be determined by the single biggest factor in their life, which is their indentured slavery. The parts you're suggesting might have an influence (this person sewed a lot, etc.) will be a tiny bit of window dressing on that 2d6, easily fiddled with by, for example, saying that a person who sews should have their highest 2d6 score assigned to intelligence. Self-selection, and all that. </i><br /><br />You're still missing the point. It's not just whether somebody sewed a lot, which is a small variable; it's EVERYTHING ELSE THEY DID, TOO.<br /><br /><i>So, 100 trillion person-years is about 14000 years at the current population of the earth. The secular trend in height is expected to stop - or start declining in some developed countries - in this generation or the next. There is no record of anyone of a height of 10' anywhere in the world, outside of mythological creatures. I'm quietly confident that you won't be meeting any 10' people soon, Noisms, nor will your children or their children. Or their children, who will probably on average be about the same height as your children.</i><br /><br />Smokescreen. The probability isn't zero.<br /><br /><i>btw, the 50 or so main genomes responsible for height have been mapped and published, and I think there are established bio-physical reasons as well why height can't continue to increase.</i><br /><br />So you're saying scientists can predict mutation with perfect accuracy nowadays?noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-59872591838105818642010-05-25T20:56:36.542+08:002010-05-25T20:56:36.542+08:00Noisms, if you can claim that there can be a causa...Noisms, if you can claim that there can be a causal relationship between a phenomenon (people sew) and a physical property of those people (they are dexterous) then you have a model. This ain't sophistry. Accepting the randomness of the world and blanketing it in 3d6 means accepting that you have <i>no</i> explanation for Conan's strength. Or Fergie's stupidity.<br /><br />Regarding your division of peasant's traits by these second order properties, you're clutching at straws. It's simple analysis of variance. 40% of a person's height is determined by that of their parents; more than 40% of a peasant's stats will be determined by the single biggest factor in their life, which is their indentured slavery. The parts you're suggesting might have an influence (this person sewed a lot, etc.) will be a tiny bit of window dressing on that 2d6, easily fiddled with by, for example, saying that a person who sews should have their highest 2d6 score assigned to intelligence. Self-selection, and all that. <br /><br />Your responsibility in defense of an alternative theory is to postulate a way in which being a peasant could possibly have such a small effect on their life that their sewing hobby would be a noticeable influence on their basic physical stats.<br /><br />So, 100 trillion person-years is about 14000 years at the current population of the earth. The secular trend in height is expected to stop - or start declining in some developed countries - in this generation or the next. There is no record of anyone of a height of 10' anywhere in the world, outside of mythological creatures. I'm quietly confident that you won't be meeting any 10' people soon, Noisms, nor will your children or their children. Or their children, who will probably on average be about the same height as your children. <br /><br />btw, the 50 or so main genomes responsible for height have been mapped and published, and I think there are established bio-physical reasons as well why height can't continue to increase. I think this example of scientific philosophy at its purist isn't going anywhere useful!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-71546546013660655662010-05-25T16:44:42.589+08:002010-05-25T16:44:42.589+08:00faustusnotes: Noisms, saying that things have reas...<b>faustusnotes</b>: <i>Noisms, saying that things have reasons, and then offering plausible reasons, and inducing a plausible reason (or set of reasons) the next time you meet someone with a certain characteristic is precisely the definition of a model.</i><br /><br />Faustusnotes, you are engaging in sophistry. If it entertains you to play around with words like this, then I suppose what I'm doing is postulating a model, inasmuch as saying "the reason why the goal was scored was that Wayne Rooney kicked the ball and it went in", or "the reason why I find Scarlett Johansson attractive is that she has great tits" is postulating a model. For the rest of mankind, though, this just constitutes giving reasons for things.<br /><br /><i>It's just that your model is very very crap, because it has no theoretical basis against which (to use your ideals) it can be falsified.</i><br /><br />I don't have a model. I can't believe that after 29 comments you're still banging on as if you think I do. I'm saying human society is too complex for a model by which you can map D&D stats to social background in the way Alexis is doing. What you have is a huge bundle of variables which affect each individual's development - or, put more prosaically, a huge bundle of reasons for why a person is the way they are.<br /><br />You have to represent a person's stats in some way for there to be a game, so better to use 3d6 for everyone and cloak all of those multitudes of un-modellable reasons in randomness.<br /><br /><i>The reason that peasants are poor is precisely one - they were born into grinding, indentured labour. They aren't countless.</i><br /><br />You misunderstand me. What I mean is that reason X ("peasants are poor") is only one of a huge number of the possible reasons why a person has a given set of stats. There's also reason Y ("fishermen are very perceptive"), reason X ("people with one leg don't run very fast"), reason Z ("very tall people have long reach"), reason A ("people who sew are very dextrous")... and so on to near-infinity. Because you have all these different potential reasons coming into play, it doesn't make sense to boil everything down to "Peasant = poor = 2d6 stats" and "Liege = rich = 4d6 stats". (For one very obvious thing, where does old age come into play? What about sex?)<br /><br /><i>And no, I don't think the probability of someone being 10' tall is "very low" but not zero. Remember that the world is not normally distributed (Taleb!), there are probabilities that will be 0. I think it's currently biologically implausible, therefore its probability is 0. Not even 1 in 6 billion, currently, or even 1 in 180 billion person-years.</i><br /><br />Aren't you supposed to be a scientist? It's biologically <b>implausible</b> so the possibility is <b>zero</b>? What about 1 in 100 trillion person-years? You're saying that you know the details of every single potential random mutation that could possibly affect a human being and none of them could lead to somebody being 10' tall? You need to get on the phone to those people at the Nobel Prize committee, quick! When are you going to publish your results in a paper?noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-77412501203766498472010-05-25T06:34:36.889+08:002010-05-25T06:34:36.889+08:00Noisms, saying that things have reasons, and then ...Noisms, saying that things have reasons, and then offering plausible reasons, and inducing a plausible reason (or set of reasons) the next time you meet someone with a certain characteristic is precisely the definition of a model. It's just that your model is very very crap, because it has no theoretical basis against which (to use your ideals) it can be falsified. <br /><br />Obviously a more detailed model can more easily be wrong, which is the point of falsification as a concept. But a detailed model predicting within its posited framework, with statistical uncertainty factored in, is often very reliable. That's why life tables remain very popular.<br /><br />I'm not sure what you're saying otherwise when you say <br /><br /><i>If you're saying that the reason "peasants are poor" is the same as the countless other reasons that may exist for people having the ability scores they have, then we're not in disagreement. </i><br /><br />The reason that peasants are poor is precisely one - they were born into grinding, indentured labour. They aren't countless. But I'm not saying anything about this, I'm arguing that this <i>certain fact</i> that a peasant is, by definition of being a peasant, grindingly poor and indentured (i.e. not free) is a single overriding factor in their lives that can be used to explain a lot of things, e.g. the fact that they have never travelled, can't read, are short, have many diseases, are weak, can't count, can't fight, and probably have gait or posture disorders.<br /><br />So, when you meet a peasant, it's very easy to predict that they have 2d6 stats.<br /><br />And no, I don't think the probability of someone being 10' tall is "very low" but not zero. Remember that the world is not normally distributed (Taleb!), there are probabilities that will be 0. I think it's currently biologically implausible, therefore its probability is 0. Not even 1 in 6 billion, currently, or even 1 in 180 billion person-years.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-61234907625649996482010-05-25T00:35:41.867+08:002010-05-25T00:35:41.867+08:00faustusnotes: Saying that things have reasons is n...<b>faustusnotes</b>: Saying that things have reasons is not <i>positing a model</i>. If you're saying that the reason "peasants are poor" is the same as the countless other reasons that may exist for people having the ability scores they have, then we're not in disagreement. The point is that all the reasons are a) to all intents and purposes countless and b) not reducible to a single broad category like "poor".<br /><br /><i>As for 10' people - no, I don't have an open mind to the possibility of meeting giants.</i><br /><br />The probability may be very low, but not zero - would you agree?noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-36779654610169599402010-05-25T00:20:32.909+08:002010-05-25T00:20:32.909+08:00Okay, so riddle me the difference between these tw...Okay, so riddle me the difference between these two inductive fallacies:<br /><br />1. all peasants have 2d6 stats, so the next peasant I meet will have 2d6 for his/her stats<br /><br />2. all unusually strength is caused by some kind of physical activity (driving a mill for 15 years like conan, military training, sporty dad, etc.), so the next person I put in my campaign with high strength will have a back story involving some kind of physical activity<br /><br />The first is Alexis's, the second is yours. What's the difference? You posit a model, and then fit your next observation to it. Your model involves some more variables, sure (more types of physical activity back-stories), but it still has them. All your arguments at Alexis's place also posit causes for observed stat values (your constitution example, for example). These are models too.<br /><br />As for 10' people - no, I don't have an open mind to the possibility of meeting giants. I have a pretty robust biological model says I won't be meeting any in my lifetime, either. I also don't expect to meet humans with elephant trunks, elephants that can sing Opera, or any one of a number of other things that an anti-modelling approach to theory would allow me to believe in.<br /><br />And what is it with openid errors on your blog?!!Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-70137667587085810682010-05-24T23:46:19.229+08:002010-05-24T23:46:19.229+08:00faustusnotes: but it's not enough to keep repe...<b>faustusnotes</b>: <i>but it's not enough to keep repeating this against the fairly sure knowledge we all have that being a peasant was the single most damning aspect of a human being's life, against which all other factors were background window dressing.</i><br /><br />The weird things is that this isn't what Alexis is saying. Read his posts; he's postulating a very strange anachronistic meritocracy.<br /><br /><i>just as it's perfectly reasonable inductive logic to say that the next human being you meet will be less than 10' tall. Or do you keep an open mind against the possibility you might meet a giant on the streets of Liverpool today?</i><br /><br />What an odd thing to say. I don't have a <b>closed</b> mind against it, that's for sure. Do you?noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-38683537011345446282010-05-24T07:45:07.669+08:002010-05-24T07:45:07.669+08:00Zak, doctors et al apply diagnostic methods to ind...Zak, doctors et al apply diagnostic methods to individuals within a very strong modelled framework, or they wouldn't be able to do their job. They apply inductive logic to a strong set of models about the human body and disease. Certainly this is about treating individuals differently, but it's also very much about analysing structure and models of the human condition; their prescriptions even more so.<br /><br />I agree about your view of how DMs work, but I don't think it's possible to say we aren't working from a strong set of models. That's what monster and NPC stat blocks are. It seems passing strange to me to object to constructing such models for NPCs based on social class, when one already happily uses them based on character class, race, or even (in many games) location and nationality.<br /><br />Noisms, you keep saying that social class is only one of the determinants of stats, but it's not enough to keep repeating this against the fairly sure knowledge we all have that being a peasant was the single most damning aspect of a human being's life, against which all other factors were background window dressing. If he were saying that the lowest class in England now get 2d6 you might have a point, but he's talking about a class of people who were abjectly poor, had no education, and were malnourished for the vast majority of their lives (actually, that does sound like the British lower class now). It's a perfectly reasonable application of <i>induction</i> to say that this means the next peasant you meet will have stats in the 2d6 range, just as it's perfectly reasonable inductive logic to say that the next human being you meet will be less than 10' tall. Or do you keep an open mind against the possibility you might meet a giant on the streets of Liverpool today?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-47938082265531221442010-05-24T04:30:15.959+08:002010-05-24T04:30:15.959+08:00faustusnotes: If you have a problem with the idea ...<b>faustusnotes</b>: <i>If you have a problem with the idea of "modelling" people or saying anything about the consequences of peoples' life course for their stats</i><br /><br />No, silly, I've no problem with that - you should really have gathered this by now! The point is that individuals all have different life courses in which all manner of complex factors come into play. Social level is only one of these things.<br /><br />You keep bringing up "epistemological" arrogance (sic) as if you think it means something it doesn't. It's about induction/prediction. It isn't about facts (for instance: Peasant Billy has a Strength of 18 because of reasons x, y and z).<br /><br /><b>Zak S</b>: Pretty much!noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-61895500249464411772010-05-24T03:18:22.980+08:002010-05-24T03:18:22.980+08:00I think there's a fundamental difference betwe...I think there's a fundamental difference between tasks where you have to view people as individuals and tasks where you view people in bulk.<br /><br />If you make psychiatric medicines, you need to view people in bulk: What works MOST of the time for MOST people.<br /><br />If you are a shrink, you need to view people as individuals: what will work on THIS person in THIS individual case, whether or not it accords with what USUALLY works.<br /><br />McDonalds employees, military logistics officers, and postal workers NEED to view people in bulk in order to survive.<br /><br />Emergency room doctors, massage therapists, and portrait painters NEED to view their clients as individuals to survive.<br /><br />Now: is DMing a "bulk" activity or a personalized one?<br /><br />Alexis LOVES creating rules he can broadly apply to his entire universe--thus he deals with NPCs in bulk. What's USUALLY true is what hes after.<br /><br />Most GMs don't do that--they tailor encounters to be interesting a few days ahead of time or on the spot, and assume that next time, things may be completely different and eccentric, so they deal with people as individuals.Zak Sabbathhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08812410680077034917noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-31493965030420429052010-05-23T17:08:20.702+08:002010-05-23T17:08:20.702+08:00and that's your losing wicket right there. Mod...and that's your losing wicket right there. Modelling differences between people is really not that hard. Epistemological humility and intellectual nihilism aside, we're really quite good at it. Alexis's models aren't even very modelish. The next peasant you meet will have a strength between 2 and 12, while the next lord you meet will have a strength between 3 and 18. <br /><br />If you have a problem with the idea of "modelling" people or saying anything about the consequences of peoples' life course for their stats, then how are you going to explain it when you roll an 18 strength for a peasant? I mean, if people are too complex to model, surely it's epistemologically arrogant to suggest that this peasant's strength is due to a career as a woodcutter? Or whatever explanation you give?<br /><br />As soon as you attach such an explanation to a 3d6 roll, you've broken your own framework.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-29854852584187525242010-05-23T00:21:42.754+08:002010-05-23T00:21:42.754+08:00Barking Alien: As a GM, if I want a genius merchan...<b>Barking Alien</b>: <i>As a GM, if I want a genius merchant, a foolish and inept king, a wise beggar or a physically imposing sage I make one.</i><br /><br />Where's the fun/surprise in that? <br /><br /><b>faustusnotes</b>: <i>thinking that you can't model social systems in a broad sense - by, for example, stating the difference between peasants and lords </i><br /><br />I don't know where you're getting this from, because I've said in most of the comments on Alexis' thread that there are going to be differences between peasants and lords as classes and that I have no problem with that.<br /><br />What I'm talking about is the individual level of predicting what a certain person the PCs come across will be like. Who knows what has happened to Peasant X or Lord Y in his life? As Vincent put it, "In the mix of fate, will & chance there are just too many factors to try and model differences in outcomes using only differences in initial conditions (apparently, differences in one initial condition)."noismshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09933436762608669966noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-75727260861545942422010-05-22T23:32:15.852+08:002010-05-22T23:32:15.852+08:00if you think there can't be a system, why both...if you think there can't be a system, why bother with 3d6? That's a system. <br /><br />As I said above, thinking that you can't model social systems in a broad sense - by, for example, stating the difference between peasants and lords - is just flying in the face of all the available evidence. Taleb's foolish ideas about epistemological arrogance aside, we know from over 100 years of epidemiological research that differences between classes in rates of disease, death and childbirth are very easy to model in England, for example. <br /><br />Which is why I said you're on a losing wicket. Go check the ONS neighbourhood statistics data if you're not sure about this - class differences can be very easily represented statistically, and if you were trying to represent the characteristics of the different classes of modern britain for a role-playing game, it would be very easy to construct plausible systems based on them.<br /><br />The alternative is a plea for structurelessness. Why would you want that?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2513019539869706574.post-41386997182215178582010-05-22T21:51:05.968+08:002010-05-22T21:51:05.968+08:00"In fact, human society is grotesquely, exhub..."In fact, human society is grotesquely, exhuberantly, vastly, incomprehensibly complex."<br /><br />Is it? Really? Personally I've always felt we as a species are not complex at all but rather that we have added layer upon later of unnecessary elements to make getting anything truly worthwhile done on a global level virtually impossible.<br /><br />One a similar note...while I find the discussion fascinating, I'm not a D&D fan so it almost seems on argument over which hammer is better for peeling grapes.<br /><br />As a GM, if I want a genius merchant, a foolish and inept king, a wise beggar or a physically imposing sage I make one. The only time 3d6 is rolled in my few D&D games is when creating a PC and none of them are peasants or lieges (at least very rarely). <br /><br />They're adventurers.Adam Dicksteinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04840144928096089178noreply@blogger.com