Bill Dunn's page

Conventions aren't a 'perk of the job' that you get sent to in order to have fun. They're sending you to work.

They're a bit of both, actually. You're there to work, but you also get to network and meet people - which helps you develop professionally and personally. You also get to participate in the community you support in your job in a way you may not be able to from the offices.

I understand why the blog post was locked, but I'm extremely disappointed that it was before Erik could reply to the question that I and several others raised.

If staff had raised concerns about potentially problematic material, but it was not taken seriously or ignored, then what steps are Paizo leadership doing to keep it from happening again in the future?

This is extremely important to me, and I can't continue to support Paizo-published adventures until this is addressed. Because I know this is not an isolated issue - I have spoken to other people that have worked for or contracted with Paizo over the last decade, and this issue has come up before.

So, what is going to change moving forward?

You might want to consider your own bias here. You've taken Erik's statement that some members of the staff raised concerns that didn't dissuade him at the time and made that into "not taken seriously or ignored". In other words, it looks to me like you've already rendered judgment when it may be that their objections didn't outweigh support from other staff members when making the decision to go forward a year ago.

I appreciate the statement on the blog, but honestly, I was never particularly worried. Did anyone really think Paizo would be putting out a cop-themed AP that didn't at least try to be sensitive? I'd have thought their track record bought them at least some benefit of the doubt there.

I had been thinking of canceling my AP sub, mainly because PF2 isn't really grabbing me like PF1 did and was really grappling with losing my charter subscriber status. But Paizo's statement has convinced me to stay the course, at least for a while. I don't want them thinking I'm dropping because of extremely unfortunate and unpredictable timing that interfaces with their subject matter that they have no control over. The contribution to the NAACP defense fund is unnecessary further inducement as far as I'm concerned, but serves as a nice bit of icing on the cake.

It's not just players that have to metagame/do something. The rogue is now waiting till the 3rd Initiative count to actually fire the crossbow but the guards have to do something on their turns. What should guards who beat a yet to happen threat should be doing before the threat. Thats where the disconnect he is having comes from. Everyone is now Spider man once we move to encounter mode regardless of what skill they roll for init.

Again, I think people are not understanding the situation. Since this is basically an ambush-type situation, the presumption of correct initiative checks would be stealth for the rogue, perception for the guards. If two of them beat the rogue's stealth for the initiative roll, it basically means they've spotted him and can do something about it! Perhaps they spotted his motion as he got his crossbow into position - exactly how they spotted him does matter. What matters is that the rogue's attempt to shoot his crossbow unseen has been spotted as he's setting it up.

The first person to declare something doesn't automatically succeed at being first to implement it. And that's been true in D&D/PF for a long while.

Situation: During a peaceful conversation, barbarian player says to GM they want to initiate combat by charging at the opposing side. Barbarian character has quick-draw like ability.

Initiative is rolled. Opposing wizard beats barbarian in initiative and fireballs the barbarian. Barbarian dies without having drawn his weapon.

Assuming the barbarian character didn't obviously roleplay hostile intent, the wizard has now killed the barbarian based on whatever was perceived by the initiative perception check. This is possibly a gut hunch or sixth sense. Depending on the current setting, the wizard is accused of first degree murder. After all, there's very little tangible evidence that the barbarian had hostile intent - weapon was not drawn. A case of self-defense cannot be made.

This seems absurd to me. Thoughts?

In a word, No.

The logical issue I have with that order of events is that that would require the barbarian to announce his "triggering" action before it's even his turn and then stick to his decision regardless of the actions of everyone else. Because without the sudden charge, we would not have entered combat at all, so anything but having that action as the first action in combat doesn't really work. Instead of having an advantage by rushing the enemy by surprise, he quite possibly gets a major disadvantage that noone else in initiative order normally gets.

Imagine being Irving, the 142nd fastest gun in the West. You draw thinking you're drawing on number 143 and it turns out to be 141... and he draws faster than you... (props to "The Ballad of Irving")

That is the situation anybody would be in if they want to start hostilities without either catching their enemies by surprise or suckering them some other way. There are plenty of examples in appropriate media of someone trying to start a fight but being outdrawn. Well, in game terms, they tried to start the fight... and rolled poorly on their initiatives. They basically started making their move but got beat by a fast reaction (everybody who rolled better initiative).

Bill,

I doubt they'll recast Pietro and probably just bring back Aaron-Taylor instead...

I admit it's a bit of a dark horse. But I'll laugh loud and long if they do it.

Since it's the Multiverse of Madness and the X-Men films are now available to Disney and the MCU, it could be the Evan Peters Quicksilver from Days of Future Past. The whole multiverse angle makes it easy to cheese in any of the X-Men as portrayed in the X-Men movie line by Fox.
Plus, Peters is only a couple years older than Elizabeth Olson so he could easily pass as a twin.

]I just wish casters got more opportunities to use the 3 action economy. They really only get 1 or 2 actions: Cast a spell usually takes 2 actions, and sustaining a spell is often their 3rd action. In effect it feels like there is a split, with martials getting to do 3 things and casters getting to really do just 1 (I feel maintaining concentration should be a free action, or reaction at least, so they could at least move or raise a shield or something...)

To me, that seems about right. Given the power and scope spells can have, they should have to devote more of their actions to them. It's like finally heading back to incorporate some 1e balancing mechanisms to spellcasting.

From a rule balance perspective, the crit/precision damage immunity undead and constructs had to go away in the 3e -> PF conversion because they nerfed the hell out of rogues. Both are highly thematic - if an adventure location is going to have them, they’re gonna have lots of them, and the rogue will be pretty useless. Age of Worms kind of drove this point home.

From an in-game point of view, even if neither will bleed or suffer shock, both have differentiated parts that move or could be more vulnerable to the lucky shot that will undermine their ability to withstand opposition in a fight, even golems.

How does she feel about butchered animals? Would recently butchered pig chunks like heads be similarly problematic? The cruelty is over by that point but the results still gross. It would reduce the complexities of handling the live pig as well.

Or, considering the vicious ankle biter angle, goblins dressed as pigs? Then they can fight back a little.

Years and years of the system not having a consequence for it has resulted in this belief. But now with the 3 action system, it's actually best to make your enemy use actions to get into position whenever possible.

That was true once your opponent got multiple attacks in the 3e/PF family of games already. If they had more than 1 attack, you wanted to keep them from taking a full attack action. Now, in a sense, the same tactic has moved down to level 1 as well.

martyrn wrote:

If combat becomes too tactically based (I'm not moving up because then I can't attack 3 times but they can; I am going to move to the edge of their movement to force them to stride twice to reach me; etc) it starts to play more like a board game and less like an RPG

This entire sentiment is bankrupt. Might as well have said "plays like a video game." Even if you are right and the game play does share traits with another type of game, role-playing isn't inherently excluded by that nor is it even necessarily diminished because there are in-character role-based (and I mean the role of the character as a character in a story, not role as a member of a party such as "the tank") reasons for the behaviors being represented by the actions taken.

Not sure I entirely agree with that. It depends on how you like the interaction between the game mechanics and role-playing the PC. If you approach the game from the perspective of mechanics being the way you operationalize what the player wants the PC to do from an in-person point of view, then there's a lot of potential for the specifics of the mechanics to get in the way of smooth immersion. It may be a valid tactic to hold back and force your opponent to come to you, but spending the effort to make sure that has to be more than a single stride action may detract from play even if that's a stronger strategy on the game board.

This, by the way, isn't limited to RPGs. You see similar artifacts of the mechanics in board games too that don't make sense from a simulative point over view even if they are advantageous in play. (Example from Advanced Squad Leader - assault moving away from an enemy position during movement to break a line of sight and avoid defensive fire and then advancing back into the space during the advance phase - it totally exploits the segmented nature of defensive fire to deny targets, when a real squad would likely have been safer sitting in place)

Despite our annoyance, I can totally understand why Paizo is doing it. After all, if you don't agree with the mob, you get tossed into the fighting pits to entertain and die. Like anyone else, Paizo wants to have a future, and so they are kowtowing to the largest (apparant) common denominator.

Huh. Treating people as equally valuable regardless of how different they are is somehow controversial. If you think that's 'kowtowing to the largest (apparent) common denominator" you may embody the problem Paizo is trying to address.

It depends.

For the most part, rule changes don't bother me much (unless I find the changes themselves problematic). That's because the rules serve a secondary purpose in the game, as I see it, and that purpose is to operationalize what the players want their character to do. How exactly they do so can vary - so the specific rules aren't necessarily that important.

But when a new edition comes along, I'm looking for there to be substantial continuity in the lore and the niches classes, items, and monsters fill. Exactly how they do so may be flexible or they may have more options, but I don't want the old ones closed off. Too much re-imagining and I'll be re-imagining myself playing another game.

But I am getting sucked in to my example, I wasn't intending this to be an argument about spellcasting, but rather about the setting of DCs in general. "Being easy" is a terrible argument imo, adding 11 should not be difficult for anyone.

It's not about being difficult - it's probably all about being easier than 11. And it is.

I'm surprised there seems to be so much resistance to our wanting a little more rules visability.

I think it's less a case of resistance to more visibility and more a case of "just because you didn't spot it doesn't mean it's a trap" or intent to "hide" rules by the writers.

I'm curious where people get the notion that the majority of the populace only worships one deity. Surely it cannot be solely because of the limited space on a character sheet? Said character sheets also only have space for one character name, but that doesn't mean a character cannot have nicknames or aliases.

This has been a long-standing issue in the fantasy role playing community. I don't know if it's because we've been living in monotheistic cultures too long to really understand polytheism or what, but the idea that a character primarily venerates a specific god in D&D games is probably as old as the game itself.

No, we have, with the plethora of other things that were changed. Tier 4 and 6 casters do not exist anymore. Paladins can not lay on hands and smite in the same combat. Even if a strength spell does come back, odds are it won't increase your character's carrying capacity the same as it did 10 years ago.

Option 1: Things did change, but our characters lack the ability to observe and record this fact.
Option 2: Things always worked like this.

Option 1 is not possible, because otherwise the lore would need to provide an explanation to all of the wizards who have noticed their numbers are completely different now, for all of the Paldins who can cast lay on hands far fewer times in a single combat. That leaves option 2, and if things "always worked like this" then continuity doesn't matter.

There is no option 3 where all of the details are different but somehow continuity is important.

Ultimately, why would issues of in-character continuity be that important? I can see why players may have a problem with an edition change - because things work differently, because things they liked in one edition are changed or gone, etc. But why would anyone feel it has to manifest as a continuity change in the campaign setting that characters would perceive? I really don't understand why it would be an issue.

If you're converting from one edition to another in the middle of a campaign, you're simply going to have to deal with the fact that some things changed form one edition to another whether it's dressed up with a "campaign changing event" or not. That's simply part of changing editions in a rules set when the changes are significant. If you don't want to deal with those changes, then don't change horses mid-stream. If you want to proceed with the switch, I suggest lots of hand-waving and not sweating it as the price you pay for switching.

If the conversion from one edition to the next is between campaigns, then it won't matter. You can just say "Things have always been this way".

I don't really see why there's a limit in the creatures types that can be favored enemy.

Seriously, what is it about the ranger that:
1) invites so much redesign from edition to edition
2) is so oddly done on the first iteration (PF1 excepted)

There were also few things about 2e, that were more difficult as a GM than I expected:

First up: Action List. When I played to 2e at Gen con and I said “I swing my sword” Jack, our GM, would often correct me by saying “Ok. You take a strike action.” I found it irritating at the time, but now that I have a game as GM under my belt, I know why he did that. Each of the actions have different attributes. The GM needs to understand clearly what action you are using because these actions may trigger certain reactions. For example, if you say “I take a potion out go over to James and pour it into James’ mouth” what you are really saying is “I use an interact action to take out a potion. I use a Stride action to move to James. then I use my final action to use Interact to poor the potion into James’ mouth.”

Yeah, I'm with Malk_Content in that you don't need to be that anal. You could say (and I'd hope to see more of this): "I take a potion out, go over to James, and pour it into his mouth. That's an interaction, stride, and interaction for my 3 actions, Dan."

He's an NPC, and what's more a 2E NPC. He can't "level up" per se.

That’s about as ridiculous a complaint as I have seen. As an NPC, he’s as tough as the story (and GM) choose to make him. And yeah, he can get tougher even if he doesn’t do so the way PCs do.

This is a good idea, but only really works if your core character concept isn't dependent on one of those uncommon character assets.

Well then it's clear that your core character concept would NOT have worked with that GM in the first place. Good thing you showed up with one that will! Sounds like it works to me.

It's the paralysis caused by the unknowns (see any of my above posts, or threads related to this topic for numerous examples of confusion and frustration). As written many common and iconic character concepts simply aren't possible without a GM to allow it. This is incredibly frustrating for players who don't have access to a GM.

If you don't have access to a GM, then what are you playing? If you're creating characters in a vacuum - absent an ongoing game, that's not really affected by rarity. Go nuts and create to you heart's content.

It's a challenge with incorporating various tropes from pulp stories and other influences - not all of them were racially sensitive at the time they were published and that may taint things a bit even if Paizo tries to handle them with a more enlightened approach. A gorilla king harkens back to Tarzan stories as well as Gorilla Grodd/King Solovar and makes for a great, evocative hook. And I'm sure that was why it was included on a continent that would be the natural home for a gorilla-dominated society.

Same with the Varisian wagons, Harrow cards, scarves, and shady reputation.

That's the challenge. You want enough familiar tropes to populate a world so that RPGers can relate to them. Cultural, historical, and geographic analogs, tropes in literature and mythology. And you want to do them reasonable justice without having to write a PhD thesis on each one and without suggesting the worst aspects of the tropes and stereotypes involved.

Paizo saw this coming a while back, and determined to cater to a customer who was interested in a simpler experience in chargen and play. A customer who needed to be guided through the experience and then have assistance with 'well, what should my character do now' from 1 to 20.

And so, we now have PF2, which caters to a customer who enjoys having many of their decisions made for them. Pick a given path in a class, and then at each level, there's only a couple of things to choose from, rather than the massive number of options available in PF1.

<snip>

As things stand today, however, I will not be transitioning the players at my table over to 2e.

Frankly, with the level of disdain you seem to have for the players you think Paizo is catering to, I'm not sure why anybody'd want to play PF2 with you. You certainly did load your language here.

I think the line you object to "could be sexually attracted to a succubus" mean that it doesn't apply if it doesn't feel to your verisimilitude that it should apply. If you've established in the lore of your story that Jack the wizard is not into girls, then some DMs would rule that he's immune to the lure of the succubi, while another DM doesn't feel that way. If a DM thinks rock monsters wouldn't care, then they are immune.

I think it may come down to something like this. Paizo has spent some effort making sure they validate everyone’s gender/sexuality identities and preferences from the game’s perspective. They don’t want some monster in the Bestiary ignoring that effort. How do you think a player would feel if they’ve established their character isn’t into women yet the DM rules, “Yes, you’re still attracted to her?” Kind of invalidates that choice when it’s actually important.

Kind of depends on just how 'activist' you see the gods being. If you take a more Greek model, you figure the gods are constantly meddling in mortal affairs. Alternatively, you could take a more passive approach in which the gods are more concerned with grand cosmic stuff and not stooping to curse a lowly lawyer. Either approach might be valid for a campaign.

A full attack action can be considered a subset of the set of all full-round actions (which may include things other than making multiple attacks). So they're not exactly the same.

But the kicker here is that since a PC can only take 1 full-round action on his term, he can't do both the Tiger Claw attack and the Flurry of Maneuvers, each of which would take the full-round action. It's like finding out that a plate of potstickers costs $5 and so does a pint of beer. You can't use the same $5 to pay for both of them.

Same with the charge. Each one is a full round action. You don't have enough full round actions in a round to pay for them all.

Warning: the following is hearsay from what other people have talked about online. If someone wants to show me this is false, I will gladly delete it.

There also was the disaster that the lead programmer for their online tabletop software committed suicide. 4e was clearly designed to play well in a 'click your power and choose your target on a grid' sort of system, and as I understand it WotC expected to launch a Roll20 style online platform easily 3 years before any of the current players were up and running.

I think they expected 4e to be popular for people playing with laptops, with everyone's characters linked together through a subscription-based service.

Instead, you had to play the game with minis and doing the math in your head, and it was doable, but not what the system was intended for. When the programmer died, I think that whole team lost their drive and it was scrapped.

It's worse than that. He didn't just commit suicide, Joseph Batten stalked and murdered his estranged wife then committed suicide.

Deadmanwalking wrote:

4E's fundamental problems were threefold:

My recollection from the time was that there were some non-rules issues at play too.

The marketting campaign was not well received and the pulling of the Dungeon and Dragon magazine licenses from Paizo was equally unpopular (to an admittedly more limited section of the fanbase).

However, a hugely significant event at the time was the pulling of 3.5 PDFs - many, many people cited that as being a reason they'd never support WotC. It's kind of faded in people's minds I think, but that was a big deal ten years ago.

They did set themselves up with a perfect storm to try to fly into.

However, 4e did make a ton of money *and* also led to the even more successful 5e. I suspect if WotC could do it all over again the only major deviation they would make would be to apply some sort of sunset to the OGL (or alternate protections against giving rise to a direct competitor).

You say that 4e led to 5e as if it was all carefully planned, when we can be pretty sure that wasn’t the case. 5e is WotC’s response to 4e’s failure to maintain their 800 lb gorilla position in the industry and I think one of the reasons for its success is the veering away from the carefully structured and complex dance that is 4e into something simpler and more flexible.

And if WotC were able to do it all again, maybe they’d have a sunset clause in the OGL (though we’d all be the poorer for it), but I’m pretty sure they’d also jump right over 4e in order to land on 5e.

So why I can make a critical heal to a friend?

Would you really want to have to make an attack roll to heal a friend? Not only would you have to hit their touch AC (usually fairly easy... but not always), but a natural 1 would be an auto-miss. Usually, I'd prefer a somewhat more reliable healing spell rather than one with those drawbacks.

Whatever else may be involved, getting a free dirty trick, disarm, or sunder isn't overpowered. I'd argue most of them are underpowered because they don't generally inflict damage and so just prolong a fight (leading to more risk overall) compared to dealing out damage. This, in effect, gives you a chance at using a maneuver and inflicting normal damage but only if the creature provokes an AoO. In other words, finally the manuevers get something nice.

I'm not going to disagree that torturing someone for the sake of it isn't evil. But neither do I think that a captured assassin is going to reveal who hired him in exchange for a plate of cookies. I also think your second, blackmail example, sits on the spectrum as the priest would be psychologically tortured.

No, they're probably not going to spill their guts for cookies. That doesn't mean you need to torture them to get that information nor that interrogating them in general is torture.

I would expect someone skilled in Profession (Interrogator) would be able to lead the person they're questioning to reveal more information than someone who isn't skilled - whether that's by successful cross-referential questioning, asking deceptively leading questions, or building a positive relationship and levels of trust.

Chromantic Durgon, I agree that fun is the reason to play the game. But if I, as a player, find out that my decisions are meaningless, my fun is ruined. I think that's what blaphers is driving at.

Why would the GM fudging a die roll every once in a while make player decisions meaningless?

People get surprisingly rigid on this topic and, I predict, many will be snarky. But for me, I'm the GM - I can edit anything on my side of the screen, adventures, creature stats, and, yes, die rolls. I just do so judiciously rather than willy nilly.

They've always played second banana. It was just a larger banana than before.

They did basically achieve parity with WotC and D&D right around the time of 4e's D&D Essentials. That's not just second banana, though admittedly it was during the one edition of D&D that, on its own merits, could not keep its publisher in the 800-lb gorilla throne.

But it is true that a more D&Dish edition of D&D (which 5e is) was always going to surge back to that throne and pass PF again.

Ultimately, Paizo's in a tough position. The PF1 rule system is as complete as it's going to get and it creaks with age and clutter, absolutely begging for a new edition to revitalize core sales. But the industry isn't in the same state as it was when PF1 came out so there's less likelihood of it making the same splash and be the same sensation. Meanwhile, 5e has got meteoric popularity and there's a major potential market for more adventure, campaign, and monster content, yet for Paizo to significantly invest in supporting it, they'd undercut their own PF2 (and PF1 for that matter) and make them probably too dependent on WotC's IP again... and that nearly killed them before.

I'm skeptical about 2e too, but for chrissakes, people, they aren't going to invest significant effort in publishing another hardcover for 1e with the 2e launch in August, they aren't kicking your puppies, and they aren't whizzing in your corn flakes. PF1 has pretty much run its course as a product capable of sustaining the needs of the business and I'm willing to bet Paizo's sales data backs that up with all sorts of diminishing returns on the rules supplements.

Grognard here.

I remember playing where failing a save caused all your magic items to be subject to destruction, and not just faling on a natural 1. Getting hit by a fireball was every bit as dangerous for magic item loss as it was from hit point loss. Getting hit by several fireballs was devastating. This is called "hard mode". I had lots of fun.

It is all about expectations. Some want hard mode, others want cushions on all pointy objects to prevent damage. Some don't sweat character death because it is only a speed bump (costing gold to fix) while others wail when their character is hit.

As long as your expectations are met, it is fun.

/cevah

Corollary: If your expectations and those of the GM don't match or if yours don't match the rest of the players', you are in for a bumpy ride. So work those expectations out and adjust them, meld them, or find another table.

is say the summoner has a similar rune appearing on forehead but it doesn't say his glows. so the main problem is the glowing rune on the eidolon.

A good skill check covers all sorts of sins. Considering all eidolons don't suffer a stealth check penalty as part of the rules, I think it's fair to assume that the glowy rune was considered to be inconsequential for such things, if it was considered at all.

While I agree in real life there's a difference, I don't know that there would enough difference for a different condition in Pathfinder.

As you both said, it's a specific type of Unconsciousness, but Pathfinder doesn't really differentiate. There IS an in-game definition of "Unconscious", so if it falls within that purview then it has an in-game definition. The level of detail you'd be adding to the game to have different levels of unconsciousness is at odds with the ease-of-play aspect that the game strives for (For example there's no difference in your abilities/conditions if you're woken up during deep sleep or REM sleep, even though you'd likely have a very different reaction in real life).

Essentially - While I agree that there is a more nuanced definition - I don't think it's a meaningful difference for game-play.

(I also don't remember why this came up, so if someone's trying to game the system from either direction my default is "Don't game the system".)

Understandable advice - and that's ultimately why I, as a GM, would not equate unconscious with comatose in order to bedevil a character making use of ioun stones.

Most of the mental stats (Wisdom and Charisma) put a character into a state of unconsciousness when at 0, but a creature with an Intelligence of 0 is contrastingly called out as comatose. That strikes me as deliberate and another reason I think any equation of comatose with unconscious is questionable.

In the absence of an in-game definition of a term we default to the dictionary definition.

Comatose = unconscious.

That’s going to depend on your dictionary. The ones I’m seeing refer to comatose as a state of deep unconsciousness. Almost all of them add a qualifier to intensify unconscious, hence my comment on reasonable pushback above.

In other words, if you're zonked out for any reason, your orbiting cloud dumps onto the ground bouncing everywhere (and, after regaining consciousness, you'll be blowing several rounds looking for them, scooping them up, and reactivating them). -- And now you know why some wizards nail them into their foreheads.

("Significant intelligence damage" would, I presume, be being dropped to 3 or less, or to "Animal-level intelligence". But the game allows Ioun stone use by animal companions, however, provided a PC assists them in activation, so RAW is a bit cloudy here regarding what happens if you're feebleminded. They should remain active so long you're conscious, but if you go unconscious, then by extrapolation you should need the assistance of your allies in reactivating them if still stupefied.)

-- Number of GMs who have ever enforced any of this, in my anecdotal experience? ZERO.

Comatose isn't a defined condition, but the use in various spells and descriptions of things like intelligence damage suggest it's not merely unconsciousness but something more.

I think any GM who ruled any form of unconsciousness to be equivalent of comatose can reasonably expect pushback from players.

Take notes. Jot down notes afterward. Events that happen in the game will be a lot easier to remember.

We might be waiting a bit. The people in charge decided to inconvenience us and release the movie while my daughter is still away at college. If she doesn't get a chance to see it there (there's a wee, family-run movie theater in Mount Vernon, IA - smallest one I've ever been in), she would not forgive us for seeing it without her.

The item creation feats were a surprisingly massive change to the system when 3e D&D introduced them and their presence and expectation of being able to convert found items efficiently significantly changed how players interacted with magic items.

I heartily endorse keeping them out of a game. You might want to spend a bit more time and effort, however, making sure you sprinkle about items well-suited to the PCs in return.

So...there's a problem with the road you're headed down. I got the fact that Carol's challenges were "in her mind", ala the memory loss. But that internal struggle never really put her or anyone she cared about at risk. This, combined with no physical threat, added up to no real tension in the film.

I also didn't criticize Larson at all. In fact, I cited her performance as one of the highlights of the film.

As to the rant you posted to back up your point... complimenting Larson for portraying Carol Danvers/Capt. Marvel well, giving kudos for portraying Carol's confidence with a quiet cool in contrast to Stark or Thor's egos, highlighting the chemistry she had with the cast she had to interact with, and laying my criticism on the directors, writers, and the wasted potential of the Skrull threat, the typical Sam Jackson we got instead of Nick Fury, the eye loss played for a laugh... none of that is valid because A) I'm a guy, and B) the movie 'wasn't made for me'?!? I mean, you didn't come right out and say that, but I can only conclude that's what you mean if you're linking this "rebuttal" of criticism of the movie to me via your earlier post....snip

Frankly, I think you're actually proving TriOmegaZero's point.

There is a noticeable lack of tension in the film. At NO TIME did I fear for the characters in this film. The prequel structure of the film works against it in this regard.

Going to pull that out of the spoiler tag - I don't think it's particularly spoilery since we all know it's a prequel.

From my perspective, this is something that usually doesn't bother me in a superhero genre movie or comic, because there's usually no reason to fear for most of the principal characters in the genre - superheroes survive.

The genre itself isn't conducive to killing off the super-powered protagonists because its serial in nature - whether comic series or in movie franchises. The tension is almost always sought elsewhere using other suspense-building aspects of the story. "How to they get out of this?" "How does this affect other people?" and so on.

This might actually be a bit different in April since we, as viewers, know that multiple actors have contracts that are ending in Avengers: Endgame. We don't know if they're going to retire, die, or have something else happen to them. The fact that we know something about their future in the franchise is driving tension. Will they kill off Iron Man, Cap, Thor? Who knows?

On the other hand, even though this isn't a prequel, we're pretty sure they aren't killing off Black Widow. Scarlett Johansson's got at least one other moving coming up. Her serial/franchise life will continue.

Essentially, you're stipulating that since the writers don't English well when it comes to the grammatical purpose of paragraphs, that it is then up to their customers to expect that and to get into the habit of deliberately reading badly in order to compensate and reverse-engineer what it is that they assume was the original intent, which is the opened-ended assumption floodgates every power-gamer craves. I can easily envision players arguing that their full-attack archery atop a moving mount is not even subject to -4 penalties if the mount doesn't exceed a single move -- because why not ignore everything in the paragraph and cherrypick out that one sentence that's concentrated awesome-sauce? I mean, if context is something to be cavalierly discarded whenever desired. (In other words, the exact sort of theory-crafting that the idea of RAW is conceptually intended to rein in.)

No, I'm expecting the reader to engage their brain and read and understand the rules in whole context rather than read like a bot only able to apply limited logic to the situation. That whole context makes the rule pretty clear.

By the way, it's easy to envision a player arguing their full attack archer atop a moving mount isn't subject to the -4 if the mount doesn't exceed a single move... because that penalty is only applied the mount taking a double-move. Frankly, I'm beginning to think we're being trolled.