thread: 2009-04-09 : cloud-to-cloud
On 2009-04-09, Ben Lehman wrote:
So, to clarify, if I'm playing D&D, and tracking hit points in my head rather than noting down every hit, that means that hit points are no longer a cue, but instead part of the cloud?
Cool. Here's a rule. Do that, then at every multiple of 20 write down your present number of hit points on your sheet, while continuing to track in your head. Tah-dah!
Now we're referring materially to the fiction*!
( * Now do you understand why I have an issue with the idea that, by memorizing a mechanical component, we make it part of the fiction?)
I have played many role-playing games without the appropriate accessories (on car trips, on camping trips, and the like). Doing so doesn't fundamentally alter the relationship between cues (or whatever you want to call them when we've internalized them) and fiction. You're getting at something important here, which I want to talk to you about, but I can't talk about it with you without first having firm basics. Which your diagrams, thus far, ain't.
yrs—
—Ben
