GURPS Vehicles had some options that you needed to do a little calculus for, iirc. To be fair, that was an extremely optional add-on, and the calculations were done as part of designing your custom vehicle, not in play!
Their speed/range penalty calculation is also logarithmic I think, but nobody actually calculates that - you just look up the adjustments on the table, which is reprinted all over the place (rulebooks, character sheets,GM screens…)
Lol there have been some VERY obscure games that have tried this. Expectedly, they never took off and usually had many other problems with lacking fun.
Usually the author just liked math and wanted to pen-and-paper simulate a universe, but forgot to make it fun to care about or play in.
not for D&D, but in wargames with minis and terrain and stuff, I absolutely want to know the trajectory of the artillery shells being fired on my position. As well as the blast radius of the detonation and (if applicable) the size of the fireball and radius in which any shrapnel might be an issue.
Gotta know how many of my men are left and if their fortifications are left standing.
If it’s 3rd edition you just do basic skill checks on any ones of the 30-odd should skills for everything. Yes, including leveling up.
If it’s 4th edition you run a spreadsheet program to track the five dozen skills you selected and curse yourself as you have to walk down a stone stair but you only have points in walking up wooden stairs.
If it’s 5th edition you basically play it like 3rd ed but with a point buy system that allows you to accurately construct an artistically inclined vintner with a large bladder.
(Yes, having a large bladder capacity is an official perk from an official rulebook but few DMs are going to be insane enough to actually play with that rulebook.)
This is exactly what I mean. The stairs thing seems to be a common joke.
“Roll to ascend the stairs.” was a common joke in our group.
I remember all the spells being overly specific to the point of uselessness. “You can conjure a cat. It’s just a regular cat and will probably flee from you. You can do this once a month and it costs a billion dollars.”
DSA (aka The Dark Eye, as it’s international release is called) does tend towards a low power level so magic is severely limited compared to e.g. D&D. You can throw fireballs but not as frequently. High-level magic can take days to recover from. I have my own criticisms of how the magic system works but it does work if you accept that a high-level TDE caster is at a lower power level than a mid-level D&D caster.
The overall complexity was insane in the 4th edition; 5th ed did a lot to fix that. There are still a lot of skills but it actually feels manageable now.
I actually like that the system can model mundane professions; it can be pretty cool to play a regular person who gets forced into adventure but is still competent at something, even if that something is not generally applicable to adventuring.
Yeah, it’s just basic arithmetic with (usually) small numbers, and if you’re the min-maxing type you might add probability calculation into it, but the latter is strictly optional and the former is basically the fun part about maths.
TBH I think probability calculation is fascinating, but it can get a bit cerebral if you want to do it during play.
I have a friend who once complained that adding 5ft every other diagonal was too complicated.
Now if you’re playing 1st edition Pathfinder and juggling 7+ buffs some of which do stack and some don’t, then yes that gets complicated. But an extra 5ft every other diagonal is easy.
I mean, it’s pretty basic math. I don’t think that many people would be too interested if it had trigonometry or calculus lol
Gotta use trigonometry to accurately calculate the distance to flying enemies
Plus all the other sweeties that the great old one warlock attracts from other dimensions.
Is there any rpg where you need to do so? May be Fatal?
GURPS Vehicles had some options that you needed to do a little calculus for, iirc. To be fair, that was an extremely optional add-on, and the calculations were done as part of designing your custom vehicle, not in play!
Their speed/range penalty calculation is also logarithmic I think, but nobody actually calculates that - you just look up the adjustments on the table, which is reprinted all over the place (rulebooks, character sheets,GM screens…)
Lol there have been some VERY obscure games that have tried this. Expectedly, they never took off and usually had many other problems with lacking fun.
Usually the author just liked math and wanted to pen-and-paper simulate a universe, but forgot to make it fun to care about or play in.
Have you seen some of the homebrew rules people use to track inventory and encumbrance?
No. And I don’t think that I’d like to. :)
not for D&D, but in wargames with minis and terrain and stuff, I absolutely want to know the trajectory of the artillery shells being fired on my position. As well as the blast radius of the detonation and (if applicable) the size of the fireball and radius in which any shrapnel might be an issue.
Gotta know how many of my men are left and if their fortifications are left standing.
Can I interest you in German TTRPG Das Schwarze Auge?
Nein. Bitte, nein.
Yes, ill bring draino and cesium chips!
Oh come on. It’s not that complicated.
If it’s 3rd edition you just do basic skill checks on any ones of the 30-odd
shouldskills for everything. Yes, including leveling up.If it’s 4th edition you run a spreadsheet program to track the five dozen skills you selected and curse yourself as you have to walk down a stone stair but you only have points in walking up wooden stairs.
If it’s 5th edition you basically play it like 3rd ed but with a point buy system that allows you to accurately construct an artistically inclined vintner with a large bladder.
(Yes, having a large bladder capacity is an official perk from an official rulebook but few DMs are going to be insane enough to actually play with that rulebook.)
This is exactly what I mean. The stairs thing seems to be a common joke.
“Roll to ascend the stairs.” was a common joke in our group.
I remember all the spells being overly specific to the point of uselessness. “You can conjure a cat. It’s just a regular cat and will probably flee from you. You can do this once a month and it costs a billion dollars.”
DSA (aka The Dark Eye, as it’s international release is called) does tend towards a low power level so magic is severely limited compared to e.g. D&D. You can throw fireballs but not as frequently. High-level magic can take days to recover from. I have my own criticisms of how the magic system works but it does work if you accept that a high-level TDE caster is at a lower power level than a mid-level D&D caster.
The overall complexity was insane in the 4th edition; 5th ed did a lot to fix that. There are still a lot of skills but it actually feels manageable now.
I actually like that the system can model mundane professions; it can be pretty cool to play a regular person who gets forced into adventure but is still competent at something, even if that something is not generally applicable to adventuring.
Yeah, it’s just basic arithmetic with (usually) small numbers, and if you’re the min-maxing type you might add probability calculation into it, but the latter is strictly optional and the former is basically the fun part about maths.
TBH I think probability calculation is fascinating, but it can get a bit cerebral if you want to do it during play.
I have a friend who once complained that adding 5ft every other diagonal was too complicated.
Now if you’re playing 1st edition Pathfinder and juggling 7+ buffs some of which do stack and some don’t, then yes that gets complicated. But an extra 5ft every other diagonal is easy.