RE: Re: Tracking

From: Phil Hibbs <phil_at_...>
Date: Thu, 23 Nov 2000 22:25:00 -0000

>And please, how do you judge what the situation warrants?
>As far as I know, there is no "judging" here, at least not
>in terms of tracking, but only in terms of "Will the story
>be more fun if the tracks are difficult or easy to follow?"

I'm no expert hunter, I can't accurately work out how difficult a trail should be to follow. I'm not a linguist, I can't work out how closely two languages are related. I'm not a marksman, I can't work out how difficult a fast-moving target is to hit. I'm not a baseball player, I can't work out how far a stick can hit a stone. I'm a narrator, I CAN work out what makes an enjoyable and challenging game. I'll stick to what I'm good at, because I'm also no good at looking up loads of tables from a rulebook.

There's no way that Issaries are going to print a Prax Pack with a table of difficulty modifiers for the "Track" skill. How would the modifiers differ if the skill is "follow animals"? That's plural, so it's optimised for groups, so the group modifiers will apply differently to that skill than to "Follow large animal" ability.

PS. Can we have less of the "RE: Digest Number 363" subject lines, please? It's especially confusing as I don't get digests, so I can't even guess how old the subject line is or what group of messages it might be about.

Phil.
Opinions expressed may not even be my own, let alone those of any organisations, nations, species, or schools of thought to which I may be affiliated.