Errata: Tech-World UWP and write up don't match - Aslan and Trojan Reaches both broke

[MasterGwydion]

The analogy i like to use is comparing UWP to a character in a fictional universe.

For instance, imagine Lord of the Rings. Gandalf is a character in the books. This seems like Gandalf is Gandalf is Gandalf. But.. in every movie series, Gandalf is different. They're still all Gandalf, and no one tells us at the start of the movie 'hey, this Gandalf doesn't do this, or does do that'. They don't need to. Even though Gandalf changes, and has many, MANY details different, we still know its Gandalf, and that is good enough - and not just good enough, its so good, that we as audience can make highly informed predictions about Gandalf based on what we know from the books or from other movies, even if this Gandalf is played by a different actor.

To your analogy of the Greyhawk map.. I've absolutely completely changed the distances between 2 cities before, without changing the map. Yes, that changes the cities location relative to everything else. As long as I have a good reason, gameplay and story wise, the players are all happy with that - even if they're surprised. I've changed the whole scale of maps in published documents because it didn't make sense for our group, in which case I changed what it says. But that isn't always appropriate.

As long as you marked the changes on the map, I see no problem with this. Just like if a UWP is changed, that is not a problem. The only problem is when it isn't recorded. If the change is not recorded, how is anyone supposed to know that it changed? They look at the map and see it the way was, not the way it is. Referees can and should make changes to their games. All I am saying is that the changed should be recorded in the stats.

In your Gandalf example, We all know it is Gandalf regardless of who plays him, an actor has no stats. If in game, your Entertainer/Actor plays a Balrog, do his stats change? No. He is not a Balrog. He is a man playing a Balrog. That is like showing people a picture of Earth and saying everyone knows that this is Earth. Yes, it is. Now what are the stats of that picture? A picture has no stats. So the "highly informed predictions" that We can make based on what We know about Gandalf from the books and movies, are just guesses. No matter what We guess, guesses are not stats. If Gandalf is rolled up in an RPG with stats, now Gandalf has stats.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on the example I wrote above about economic in one case, but physical in another. (I don't actually remember how many sessions were between the 2, but that's a real example from a game I ran).

I am not sure what two scenarios you are talking about, but if you enlighten Me, I will be more than happy to give My opinion, if you wish.

 

[tytalan]

The analogy i like to use is comparing UWP to a character in a fictional universe.

For instance, imagine Lord of the Rings. Gandalf is a character in the books. This seems like Gandalf is Gandalf is Gandalf. But.. in every movie series, Gandalf is different. They're still all Gandalf, and no one tells us at the start of the movie 'hey, this Gandalf doesn't do this, or does do that'. They don't need to. Even though Gandalf changes, and has many, MANY details different, we still know its Gandalf, and that is good enough - and not just good enough, its so good, that we as audience can make highly informed predictions about Gandalf based on what we know from the books or from other movies, even if this Gandalf is played by a different actor.

To your analogy of the Greyhawk map.. I've absolutely completely changed the distances between 2 cities before, without changing the map. Yes, that changes the cities location relative to everything else. As long as I have a good reason, gameplay and story wise, the players are all happy with that - even if they're surprised. I've changed the whole scale of maps in published documents because it didn't make sense for our group, in which case I changed what it says. But that isn't always appropriate.

I'd love to hear your thoughts on the example I wrote above about economic in one case, but physical in another. (I don't actually remember how many sessions were between the 2, but that's a real example from a game I ran).

Shoot even without any changes you did compare the various versions of the Greyhawk map.

 

[Nelphine]

As long as you marked the changes on the map, I see no problem with this. Just like if a UWP is changed, that is not a problem. The only problem is when it isn't recorded. If the change is not recorded, how is anyone supposed to know that it changed? They look at the map and see it the way was, not the way it is. Referees can and should make changes to their games. All I am saying is that the changed should be recorded in the stats.

In your Gandalf example, We all know it is Gandalf regardless of who plays him, an actor has no stats. If in game, your Entertainer/Actor plays a Balrog, do his stats change? No. He is not a Balrog. He is a man playing a Balrog. That is like showing people a picture of Earth and saying everyone knows that this is Earth. Yes, it is. Now what are the stats of that picture? A picture has no stats. So the "highly informed predictions" that We can make based on what We know about Gandalf from the books and movies, are just guesses. No matter what We guess, guesses are not stats. If Gandalf is rolled up in an RPG with stats, now Gandalf has stats.

I am not sure what two scenarios you are talking about, but if you enlighten Me, I will be more than happy to give My opinion, if you wish.

Post #129 is the scenario (1 singular scenario, not 2) where pop rating meant economic power at one point, and meant physical population at another point.

 

[tytalan]

Post #129 is the scenario (1 singular scenario, not 2) where pop rating meant economic power at one point, and meant physical population at another point.

I can see running it that way. I’m more likely to either tell them the population stat on the UWP was wrong or some other justification (if I’m reading your post right the population of 6 is more than the planet can support so in this case they’d probably find O’Niels at the world L points that contribute to the population number.). I just tend to come up with explanations. In the Trojan Reach I tell my players that parts of the UWP could be wrong or out of date it is the frontier

It’s just a different way of doing things.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Post #129 is the scenario (1 singular scenario, not 2) where pop rating meant economic power at one point, and meant physical population at another point.

I would actually be fine with either definition for Population, economic power or actual population. As long as We pick one thing and stick to it.

Edit: The more I think about it, the more I think that originally, Population was the physical number of sophonts on a planet. Over time, problems were noticed with the randomly generated UWPs on the sector maps, so the writers at the time made the decision for it to function as both, creating the problem. If you use it only for Population, then you never know what the economy there is like because no stat actually covers Economy". If you use Population only to mean Economic Power, then it functions for other calculations as well, but you will never how many physical sophonts are on the planet, since Population would mean Economic Power, there would be no stat for the number of actual physical sophonts.

Which brings Me back to either way is fine, just pick one. lol I can work with it either way. I can't world-build using mechanics if the definition of those mechanics change based on someone's whim in the moment.

 

[Nelphine]

That sidesteps the point of my question. That scenario is, to me, a completely valid scenario where pop rating meant different things at different times, both times done for the players benefit. And in particular all the players (including myself as the ref as a player) were happy with it. And it didn't interfere with either my ability to world build, nor the other players ability to predict future worlds and how they would interact with things like trade rules.

 

[MasterGwydion]

That sidesteps the point of my question. That scenario is, to me, a completely valid scenario where pop rating meant different things at different times, both times done for the players benefit. And in particular all the players (including myself as the ref as a player) were happy with it. And it didn't interfere with either my ability to world build, nor the other players ability to predict future worlds and how they would interact with things like trade rules.

Okay. Maybe I will try and explain it this way. If the UWP stat is linked to other stats, such as WTN of Trade Codes, and you change the meaning of that particular UWP stat, it changes everything connected to it. GWP and all of the stuff in the WBH under Culture and Economics. That seems like a ton of work, just to be able to say, "This stat means whatever I say it means." That is why I wouldn't want it that way in the rules. Too many changes have to be made with every little change. You have to recalculate 2 whole sections of the WBH for every stat change.

Edit:
If it means one way or the other all of the time, this problem goes away. It only exists if the meaning of the UWP stats are variable.

 

[Nelphine]

Sure. But my point is that, by saying 'it can change, but should only change when it is a benefit to gameplay and story', that means (like in my scenario) that it gets changed when changing it is less work.

In my scenario, every other UWP.. was exactly what was in the book. That's hundreds of worlds, just in that game. But, when we encountered one that didn't make sense, we didn't have to twist the world - we just said, yup, the UWP means this today. And everyone was able to say 'right, that makes sense, in this case. And it doesn't change anything else that we know about the rest of the universe.' And most importantly, even though the UWP was 'wrong' - the points that the players were making their decisions on (which includes me, the referee who is also a player, for world building) were right. When it needed to be for the game, it was the economic value. When it needed to be for the game, it was physical population. And NEITHER of those decisions warranted changing a single other world in the entire universe that we interacted with.

You absolutely should say, and the rules do say, that in almost all circumstances, pop rating (and everything else about UWP) is so reliable that you can world build, that you can make informed character decisions. BUT, it leaves the caveat 'when it makes sense, at the localized level, this can be changed. Our explanation of this is that it is in game information, and therefore may be out of date. But the whole point, is to make the game more intuitive and friendly, so when a hard rule would actually interfere with that - which is very rarely, but does happen - its not actually a hard rule.' And this applies to players (such as referees) but also the publisher, and authors of adventures.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Sure. But my point is that, by saying 'it can change, but should only change when it is a benefit to gameplay and story', that means (like in my scenario) that it gets changed when changing it is less work.

In my scenario, every other UWP.. was exactly what was in the book. That's hundreds of worlds, just in that game. But, when we encountered one that didn't make sense, we didn't have to twist the world - we just said, yup, the UWP means this today. And everyone was able to say 'right, that makes sense, in this case. And it doesn't change anything else that we know about the rest of the universe.' And most importantly, even though the UWP was 'wrong' - the points that the players were making their decisions on (which includes me, the referee who is also a player, for world building) were right. When it needed to be for the game, it was the economic value. When it needed to be for the game, it was physical population. And NEITHER of those decisions warranted changing a single other world in the entire universe that we interacted with.

Instead of saying the UWP means this today and something else tomorrow, why not just actually change it to something that does make sense? From then on, that is its new UWP in your universe. Problem fixed.

You absolutely should say, and the rules do say, that in almost all circumstances, pop rating (and everything else about UWP) is so reliable that you can world build, that you can make informed character decisions. BUT, it leaves the caveat 'when it makes sense, at the localized level, this can be changed. Our explanation of this is that it is in game information, and therefore may be out of date.

Here is the whole point. If UWP is a mechanic, it needs to be out of game. That doesn't mean that the in-game UWPs can't change or be wrong. Every time I say that I am discussing an out of game mechanic, someone uses the reasoning that UWP is an in-game thing. I am not talking about in-game. I am only discussing out of game. Within that very narrow scope of mechanics and how the game system relates to other parts of itself. Nothing I am discussing is in-game.

But the whole point, is to make the game more intuitive and friendly, so when a hard rule would actually interfere with that - which is very rarely, but does happen - its not actually a hard rule.' And this applies to players (such as referees) but also the publisher, and authors of adventures.

 

[Nelphine]

Right, so how would you change the UWP for the scenario I presented?

There was a number on the map. The players made a decision, assuming it meant physical population and were relying on the mechanics based on that (but also operating under the usual assumption that it also meant economic power). When we actually did the adventure, we realized it made no logical sense to have it also mean economic power. We didn't know that ahead of time. But, figuring that out, we decided, ok sure. For this world, it means physical population (because that was why they went there) and not economic power (because it made no logical sense, and it was fine for gameplay if it was changed).

Then, later on, there was another number on the map. The players made a decision, assuming it meant economic power and were relying on the mechanics based on that (but also operating under the usual assumption that it also meant physical population). When we actually did the adventure there, we realized, it made no logical sense to mean physical population. We didn't know that ahead of time. But figuring it out, we decided, ok sure. For this world it means economic power (because that was why they went there), and not physical population (because it made no logical sense, and was fine for gameplay if it was changed).

Your suggestion is that in one of those cases, we either should have known the logical contradiction ahead of time, and therefore changed the number, and therefore, the party shouldn't have gone there at all. OR, that we should have said 'well, logic can't be wrong, so there must be some complicated reason why it isn't wrong but the number is also right which has nothing to do with the current adventure' in order to let the hard rule number work instead of simply allowing the number to be flexible.

That is more difficult on the table. What benefit is there for that?

 

[MasterGwydion]

Right, so how would you change the UWP for the scenario I presented?

There was a number on the map. The players made a decision, assuming it meant physical population and were relying on the mechanics based on that (but also operating under the usual assumption that it also meant economic power). When we actually did the adventure, we realized it made no logical sense to have it also mean economic power. We didn't know that ahead of time. But, figuring that out, we decided, ok sure. For this world, it means physical population (because that was why they went there) and not economic power (because it made no logical sense, and it was fine for gameplay if it was changed).

If they knew that it meant one or the other from the start, then there would be no problem. If the UWPs were not stupidly generated using random dice rolling, then there wouldn't be a problem. If any of those UWPs were fixed in the almost 50 years since they were first rolled up, then there would be no problems. You are having problems because you are assuming 2 meanings when there should only be one. When I encounter problems like the ones you encounter with UWPs that do not make sense, I just change the UWP so it makes sense. My players have never wandered out of a subsector without letting Me know a bit ahead of time so I can learn about the new subsector. When I learn about a new subsector that My players want to go to. I check every planet in the subsector to see if they make sense. If not, I change them. I check all of the trade routes, X-boat routes (if any), Bases, likely spots for pirates. My players let Me know generally where they are wanting to go in the future and I blaze ahead of them getting everything ready, so no problems like you are describing exist in My games. I fixed them before the PCs ever entered the subsector.

Then, later on, there was another number on the map. The players made a decision, assuming it meant economic power and were relying on the mechanics based on that (but also operating under the usual assumption that it also meant physical population). When we actually did the adventure there, we realized, it made no logical sense to mean physical population. We didn't know that ahead of time. But figuring it out, we decided, ok sure. For this world it means economic power (because that was why they went there), and not physical population (because it made no logical sense, and was fine for gameplay if it was changed).

Your suggestion is that in one of those cases, we either should have known the logical contradiction ahead of time, and therefore changed the number, and therefore, the party shouldn't have gone there at all. OR, that we should have said 'well, logic can't be wrong, so there must be some complicated reason why it isn't wrong but the number is also right which has nothing to do with the current adventure' in order to let the hard rule number work instead of simply allowing the number to be flexible.

I don't run "adventures" I design campaigns. The players come up with their own adventures based on the decisions that their characters make. So, I sandbox a whole subsector, so that no matter where in the subsector they decide to go, I have it covered already. Every planet in the subsector with a list of ten names for NPCs that they may meet there, something that makes them special or different, etc. My campaigns usually take months of work to plan for and usually last for several years. So, yeah. My campaign worlds feel very lived in.

That is more difficult on the table. What benefit is there for that?

It is more difficult to let the problem occur in the first place. I do more prep work so that never happens.

 

[tytalan]

See that where I don’t agree with you changing the meaning of a number on the UWP just for one world add confusion and doesn’t explain the issue on a larger level. It leads to the players not trusting the map at all while a good RP reason gives them a story behind the discrepancy and actually helps them get better invested into the universe.

Explaining the change using a RP reason makes sense and gives the galaxy a more realistic feel. For example Tech World has a much greater population than it’s supposed to well the answer is right in the text. Researcher have been flocking to the system and cloning has become common so the UWP is out of date. It’s not an imperial world so the fact that the library database is out of date is not surprising. I’m sure that the IISS will get it fix within the next 50 or so years.

 

[Nelphine]

If they knew that it meant one or the other from the start, then there would be no problem. If the UWPs were not stupidly generated using random dice rolling, then there wouldn't be a problem. If any of those UWPs were fixed in the almost 50 years since they were first rolled up, then there would be no problems. You are having problems because you are assuming 2 meanings when there should only be one. When I encounter problems like the ones you encounter with UWPs that do not make sense, I just change the UWP so it makes sense. My players have never wandered out of a subsector without letting Me know a bit ahead of time so I can learn about the new subsector. When I learn about a new subsector that My players want to go to. I check every planet in the subsector to see if they make sense. If not, I change them. I check all of the trade routes, X-boat routes (if any), Bases, likely spots for pirates. My players let Me know generally where they are wanting to go in the future and I blaze ahead of them getting everything ready, so no problems like you are describing exist in My games. I fixed them before the PCs ever entered the subsector.

I don't run "adventures" I design campaigns. The players come up with their own adventures based on the decisions that their characters make. So, I sandbox a whole subsector, so that no matter where in the subsector they decide to go, I have it covered already. Every planet in the subsector with a list of ten names for NPCs that they may meet there, something that makes them special or different, etc. My campaigns usually take months of work to plan for and usually last for several years. So, yeah. My campaign worlds feel very lived in.

It is more difficult to let the problem occur in the first place. I do more prep work so that never happens.

Ah. Classic improv campaign vs prep campaign. My campaigns also last for years, and feel very lived in. My worlds are sandbox. But I do far less prep work - my playstyle would see your change as a huge problem. Your playstyle already fixes the problem by knowing both of my planets ahead of time, and so you can fix them. The party wouldn't have gone to one of those worlds.

But if you're doing that level of prep work.. the problem you are proposing to fix, is already fixed in your game. You can already say 'it always means both'. You've done the prep work to know that.

So, if it doesn't improve your playstyle, and it hurts my playstyle, again, what benefit does your suggestion bring? The publisher needs to accommodate both our games - but even if hurting my game wasn't an issue, it doesn't HELP your game either.


To be clear, your solution to my scenario has nothing to do with the UWP. Instead, you decided to not allow the line 'we didn't know ahead of time.'

That's a super key point. If you always know ahead of time, of course YOU can go ahead and make a hard rule. But your hard rule is based on knowing ahead of time.

My problem with your suggestion, is predicated on not knowing ahead of time. To me, this is a feature of the game, and I am confident my players also enjoy my playstyle, so for my table as a whole, it is a feature.

So, this whole discussion, and all the disagreement, comes from a difference of playstyle, which has nothing to do with UWP

 

[Nelphine]

See that where I don’t agree with you changing the meaning of a number on the UWP just for one world add confusion and doesn’t explain the issue on a larger level. It leads to the players not trusting the map at all while a good RP reason gives them a story behind the discrepancy and actually helps them get better invested into the universe.

No, I'm very careful to make sure my changes always enhance the gameplay and the story. Which means the changes have to be done in such a way to emphasize that they can and should trust the map. And I make sure that the changes are for the story, not willy nilly.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Ah. Classic improv campaign vs prep campaign. My campaigns also last for years, and feel very lived in. My worlds are sandbox. But I do far less prep work - my playstyle would see your change as a huge problem. Your playstyle already fixes the problem by knowing both of my planets ahead of time, and so you can fix them. The party wouldn't have gone to one of those worlds.

But if you're doing that level of prep work.. the problem you are proposing to fix, is already fixed in your game. You can already say 'it always means both'. You've done the prep work to know that.

So, if it doesn't improve your playstyle, and it hurts my playstyle, again, what benefit does your suggestion bring? The publisher needs to accommodate both our games - but even if hurting my game wasn't an issue, it doesn't HELP your game either.


To be clear, your solution to my scenario has nothing to do with the UWP. Instead, you decided to not allow the line 'we didn't know ahead of time.'

That's a super key point. If you always know ahead of time, of course YOU can go ahead and make a hard rule. But your hard rule is based on knowing ahead of time.

My problem with your suggestion, is predicated on not knowing ahead of time. To me, this is a feature of the game, and I am confident my players also enjoy my playstyle, so for my table as a whole, it is a feature.

So, this whole discussion, and all the disagreement, comes from a difference of playstyle, which has nothing to do with UWP

Your playstyle is usable with the rules "as is" because the meanings of things don't matter to you (in that they are "fuzzy" in their meaning). My playstyle requires that meanings stay the same.

Your playstyle is functional if they make the changes I want or not. Mine is not without having to do a cubic ass-ton of work just to make sure that the setting functions as the rules say they do. So, if they make My changes, it changes nothing for you, but it changes everything for Me and improves My quality of life greatly. So why argue against something that doesn't affect you, since you don't play that way anyhow? This would only affect Me and others who play like Me.

Not knowing ahead of time where your players are wanting their PCs to go is either poor planning or poor communication. You can not write a story collectively without everyone having a general idea of where everyone is going. As a kid, We used to write stories. I write one line, the next person, the next line, and so on. If We wrote the stories with zero communication between Us, they always came out funny, but were a disjointed mess. With communication they often became something that made Us wish We were better writers, because the collective ideas were so cool.

That seems to be the differences in Our two styles. I plan ahead and coordinate with My players and so do not encounter problems like you have encountered. You do not. I am not saying that one style is better than another. I am only saying, what works for your style of play, may not work for Mine. My style of play requires defined rules. Your's does not.

In your style of play, you can use just the CRB and almost nothing changes for you. You just make up whatever and it works for your table. You just make up robots, or vehicles, etc and don't need actual rules for how each thing functions.

In My style of play, I need everything defined so that results are predictable and repeatable. (bad die rolls, notwithstanding) I expect My players to know the rules for things ahead of time and they expect the same of Me, hence all of My questions about, (What does it cost to ship in-system freight? Or... What is the maximum distance a jump flash can be detected? Or... Where does the Tobia Commerce Guild run its ships and on what routes?) My players, most players likely, are crazy creative when it comes to figuring out ways to do things that I never even considered. If I do not have the world defined ahead of time, I will have no idea how to respond to unplanned situations, but if I know the world and know the system, I can usually give them a fairly reasonable answer that doesn't violate any rule. If My players point out that an NPC just violated the rules, I want them to tell Me so that I can fix My mistake so that it never happens again. If My players cannot point out to Me as the Ref when My actions do not match up to the rules, I don't want to play in that kind of game. If the Ref is always right regardless of the written rules (or the rules as agreed on before game), then I will never play with that Ref. That is just giving a narcissist a soapbox to abuse his players. Of course, it also means that I do not let people who are not narcissists do that either. A rule isn't a rule if it doesn't apply equally. Gaming is as communal activity and is done collectively. So at your table changing the meaning of things on the fly works. That is okay. You can keep playing that way with zero alteration, even if they make a change in how UWPs are understood. You still don't have to use them. The UWPs themselves are not changing on the fly. If UWPs change it will be a change known in advance, probably in a published Mongoose book.

My main problem is that I see UWP and the exact same thing a PC's stats. PC stats mean one thing and one thing only. Therefore, a planet's stats should mean one thing and one thing only. Ability Scores are stats for a sophont. UWPs are stats for planets. They should be the same since they are both descriptive stats for the object or person in question. By your definition, a DEX 6 might actually count as a DEX 5 or a DEX 35. There is no predictable rhyme or reason to it. If something is not predictable, it is therefore not repeatable. If something is not repeatable, then you cannot design a system around it. Because you cannot predict what will happen. That is all a "system" is. A set of rules that allow you to predict outcomes. Even if it is only a problem in 1% of cases. Look at Newtonian Physics and Quantum Physics. We have no unified theory for how they relate to one another, therefore a system cannot be created that accounts for a mathematically describable result. The same applies to RPG rules. If the speed of light changes from one moment to the next, there has to be some "reason" that it changed. You can't have science and math if things do not have concrete definitions. With concrete definitions we can evaluate Our collective gaming system to find out what works and what doesn't. Without concrete definitions, no agreement is possible, which is what We have here.

 

[Nelphine]

Again, you're jumping from 'it was changed once in order to specifically ensure that the mechanics the players were basing decisions on stayed true, and so that the story that we collectively as a group had already decided stayed true' to 'therefore numbers have no meaning and any npc could have a +12 modifier if they have 5 dexterity'.

That jump is completely false, and isn't at all what happens.

I know the system inside and out. Many of your world building questions are incredibly interesting to me, and I've developed entire ship building systems (that geir thought was too detailed), and creature building systems, and I use a home brew world building system because I think the current one has flaws (though I don't have WHB)

But i do all that so that I can say that in every single situation, i can give a consistent answer to my players. They always know how things are going to work, even if the mechanic is super obscure and they haven't read every book and so they don't know that mechanic - they know how it's going to work anyway, because they know I know the system so well that I can give a consistent ruling anyway.

But I have never encountered any rule system or world building effort that was perfect. So my style is that if something comes up that doesn't fit into a hard rule, I can still give a consistent ruling, and my players rely on that.

So having the 1% flex.. is the core of that. They know, even if a number makes no sense, that the world will, and the story they are helping create, will not be inhibited by anything other than the players. The mechanics don't rule the world when theyre wrong, the gameplay (including consistency, intuitiveness, and predictability) and story do.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Again, you're jumping from 'it was changed once in order to specifically ensure that the mechanics the players were basing decisions on stayed true, and so that the story that we collectively as a group had already decided stayed true' to 'therefore numbers have no meaning and any npc could have a +12 modifier if they have 5 dexterity'.

That jump is completely false, and isn't at all what happens.

I know the system inside and out. Many of your world building questions are incredibly interesting to me, and I've developed entire ship building systems (that geir thought was too detailed), and creature building systems, and I use a home brew world building system because I think the current one has flaws (though I don't have WHB)

If they are too detailed for Geir, they would totally explode My brain. lol. He is way smarter than Me.

But i do all that so that I can say that in every single situation, i can give a consistent answer to my players. They always know how things are going to work, even if the mechanic is super obscure and they haven't read every book and so they don't know that mechanic - they know how it's going to work anyway, because they know I know the system so well that I can give a consistent ruling anyway.

All of My players except the noobies know the system at least as well as I do. So, they all know things are going to work because most of them have memorized the books even moreso than I have.

But I have never encountered any rule system or world building effort that was perfect. So my style is that if something comes up that doesn't fit into a hard rule, I can still give a consistent ruling, and my players rely on that.

So having the 1% flex.. is the core of that. They know, even if a number makes no sense, that the world will, and the story they are helping create, will not be inhibited by anything other than the players. The mechanics don't rule the world when theyre wrong, the gameplay (including consistency, intuitiveness, and predictability) and story do.

Mechanics do rule the game world, the same as physics rules Our world. If the mechanics are wrong, change them. Then you are back to not having a problem that you have to address again. You may encounter new problems, but that old problem will never come up again, because the rule was fixed, not the setting, the rule. So, when the same problem comes up in the setting, you now have a rule that covers it and it isn't 'a problem. Everyone at the table knows all of the rules and follows all of the rules, so everything runs very smoothly. If a player has a idea that is outside of the rules as written, then We will work to create a new rule that includes that possibility. Again, in the future, this problem no longer exists because the rule was fixed. You try and fix situations. I try and fix the rule that caused them. These things are not the same. To fix situation, having "flex" is good. To fix rules that caused the situation to exist in the first place requires permanent rule changes.

 

[MasterGwydion]

Another question. Aslan use different government types from humans. All Aslan government types all basically boil down to Feudal in human-speak, so it makes sense for the UWPs from the Scout Service to be inaccurate, but why are the actual Aslan UWP Government types not on any map anywhere? Or in any UWP anywhere as far as I can tell?

 

[tytalan]

Again, you're jumping from 'it was changed once in order to specifically ensure that the mechanics the players were basing decisions on stayed true, and so that the story that we collectively as a group had already decided stayed true' to 'therefore numbers have no meaning and any npc could have a +12 modifier if they have 5 dexterity'.

That jump is completely false, and isn't at all what happens.

I know the system inside and out. Many of your world building questions are incredibly interesting to me, and I've developed entire ship building systems (that geir thought was too detailed), and creature building systems, and I use a home brew world building system because I think the current one has flaws (though I don't have WHB)

But i do all that so that I can say that in every single situation, i can give a consistent answer to my players. They always know how things are going to work, even if the mechanic is super obscure and they haven't read every book and so they don't know that mechanic - they know how it's going to work anyway, because they know I know the system so well that I can give a consistent ruling anyway.

But I have never encountered any rule system or world building effort that was perfect. So my style is that if something comes up that doesn't fit into a hard rule, I can still give a consistent ruling, and my players rely on that.

So having the 1% flex.. is the core of that. They know, even if a number makes no sense, that the world will, and the story they are helping create, will not be inhibited by anything other than the players. The mechanics don't rule the world when theyre wrong, the gameplay (including consistency, intuitiveness, and predictability) and story do.

See what I don’t agree is putting all the effort to make sure a RP tool is always correct. And that’s the core of what the map is. Since the beginning of Traveller the UWP on the map has been treated as only correct about 95% of the time. Look at Darrian for an example it’s listed in CT as tech level 16 but in the lore you find out that it’s not actually at that TL. One of the Old JTAS had an adventure where the world’s atmosphere was supposed to be clear but actually thanks to a volcanic eruption 20 years before it was now tinted. The ideal that the map is instantly updated is rather unrealistic when you consider travel times. While having flex in the rules is a good thing demanding a primary RP tool not have that flex seem unreasonable.

The players shouldn’t completely trust the map it’s not given by some omnipresent being it’s a publication of the imperial government and when you are outside the imperium where it comes from it is even more suspect. You should see some of the charts of the Great Lakes produced using coast guard data. You can find whole islands that are not on the map even with satellite imagery. Never mind depth reading. And that’s just the Great Lakes now let’s talk about something the size of the 3rd Imperium. The concept that the UWP must always be accurate is just unrealistic instead of worrying about making it absolutely accurate you should instead come up with a reason for the discrepancy. Did something happen to change it? Was the data purposely misrepresented? Or is the world just so far off the beaten path that the data was wrong. If your players planned a cargo for a world and the UWP was wrong then that’s the chance merchants take otherwise it wouldn’t be call speculative trade.

 

[MongooseMatt]

Another question. Aslan use different government types from humans. All Aslan government types all basically boil down to Feudal in human-speak, so it makes sense for the UWPs from the Scout Service to be inaccurate, but why are the actual Aslan UWP Government types not on any map anywhere? Or in any UWP anywhere as far as I can tell?

That is a very good question.

Basically, it comes down to us not being completely ready to do the mass change at this point. It will likely come once we have a few things figured out (and Aslan codes themselves may need a revision before we do, as we are not absolutely wild about having a massive addition to Government codes), but this is not a 'soon' thing.