Because it just starts there. One sentence turns into 5 sentences turns into 10 and so on until you've added many pages. Not just about this but about this and more that seems unclear because FFG decided to leave some things to GM discretion and common sense.

"It seemed to me," said Wonko the Sane, "that any civilization that had so far lost it's head as to need to include a set of detailed instructions for use in a package of toothpicks, was no longer a civilization in which I could live and stay sane."

10 Points for the Hitchhiker reference.

4 pages for such a topic...

it defies common sense

I never read the rules. The cover didn't tell me to.

And I wouldn't be sure about the order I should read them in. Are we to accept that those little numbers on the bottoms of the pages suggest an order? Where is that specified?

I see a guild raid coming up....

I used to run an old Dungeons and Dragons Online guild called "You've Got Nice Stuff, Dragon"... sort of a homage to a tabletop player I used to game with that uttered that phrase when a dragon caught us pawing through his hoard.

I never read the rules. The cover didn't tell me to.

And I wouldn't be sure about the order I should read them in. Are we to accept that those little numbers on the bottoms of the pages suggest an order? Where is that specified?

I'm pretty sure that reading in numerical order is 'Legends' and thus no longer canon.

I never read the rules. The cover didn't tell me to.

And I wouldn't be sure about the order I should read them in. Are we to accept that those little numbers on the bottoms of the pages suggest an order? Where is that specified?

I'm pretty sure that reading in numerical order is 'Legends' and thus no longer canon.

We really need an official answer, but FFG can't be bothered publishing an errata about the issue. What a disgrace.

I never read the rules. The cover didn't tell me to.

And I wouldn't be sure about the order I should read them in. Are we to accept that those little numbers on the bottoms of the pages suggest an order? Where is that specified?

I'm pretty sure that reading in numerical order is 'Legends' and thus no longer canon.

We really need an official answer, but FFG can't be bothered publishing an errata about the issue. What a disgrace.

Literally unplayable.

We really need an official answer, but FFG can't be bothered publishing an errata about the issue. What a disgrace.

The only thing left is to go straight to Bob Iger.

EDIT: In all seriousness, though - even though common sense should prevail, to the OP I say it is never bad to seek clarification if you're worried that there might be some kind of loophole or just something you're missing. Stubborn players can be hard to sway with logic and common sense, and at times it can be a lot easier to defuse a bomb like this with "See, here's where it says you can't do that" rather than with "because I said so, that's why" even though both are perfectly legitimate answers.

Well I'm glad the community has demonstrated it's typical level of maturity in response to a discussion about game design.

Well I'm glad the community has demonstrated it's typical level of maturity in response to a discussion about game design.

Hahahahahahahahahahaha. Are you for real?!?!?!

I tried to express my view that it would be useful if the book included a simple passage for clarification to help reign in players and help new GMs.

The responses claim it would take 300 pages, and mocked with claims that without clarification people can't read the book in order.

Yeah, I'm "for real".

Gathered some statistics. Purely based on my own opinion of course, but I think you get the idea:

PAGE 1

Discussion on OT / Off-topic Response in Good Humor: 19

Validity of Question / Rant on Someone Else's Comment / No value to OT: 1

edit

I tried to express my view that it would be useful if the book included a simple passage for clarification to help reign in players and help new GMs.

The responses claim it would take 300 pages, and mocked with claims that without clarification people can't read the book in order.

Yeah, I'm "for real".

Let me be clear then on everyone's behalf, the main reason this has gone on for the # of pages it has is because the notion there needs to be a printed sentence telling people they can't wear an infinite number of backpacks is f*cking stupid, and the fact that you can't just let it go that everyone here thinks, except you, it's f*cking stupid. So at any point it might have dawned on you that no one was going to entertain any serious discussion about what a f*cking stupid idea that is you could have simply stopped posting and gone off to happy/mature/gamedesigners.com and been perfectly content. You invited the rolling satirical commentary with your odd need to prove I'm not particularly sure what here on these forums.

Even the OP had sense enough to not post again.

Let's get this train wreck of a thread to 50 pages like in the old ErikB days!

Shall I start by accusing everyone of being Nazis?

And Desslok can say something about Red Dwarf and then we can talk about that.

(I miss the old days )

Oh the nazi's have been mentioned, this conversation is ORGEWHELMING! IT'S ORGE NOW!

On subject, the only way I would allow more then one backpack is if it was refluffed as a duffet bag, cap it's encumbrance at 3 and make them unable to use said arm while carrying it.

Let's get this train wreck of a thread to 50 pages like in the old ErikB days!

Shall I start by accusing everyone of being Nazis?

And Desslok can say something about Red Dwarf and then we can talk about that.

(I miss the old days )

The only legitimate way would be to state even the f*cking Nazis would think the notion of wearing infinite backpacks is f*cking stupid also....

I tried to express my view that it would be useful if the book included a simple passage for clarification to help reign in players and help new GMs.

The responses claim it would take 300 pages, and mocked with claims that without clarification people can't read the book in order.

Yeah, I'm "for real".

Let me be clear then on everyone's behalf, the main reason this has gone on for the # of pages it has is because the notion there needs to be a printed sentence telling people they can't wear an infinite number of backpacks is f*cking stupid, and the fact that you can't just let it go that everyone here thinks, except you, it's f*cking stupid. So at any point it might have dawned on you that no one was going to entertain any serious discussion about what a f*cking stupid idea that is you could have simply stopped posting and gone off to happy/mature/gamedesigners.com and been perfectly content. You invited the rolling satirical commentary with your odd need to prove I'm not particularly sure what here on these forums.

Even the OP had sense enough to not post again.

Let me be clear on my behalf, which is all I've tried to do here.

I'm not asking for a rule that states PCs can't wear infinite backpacks. I never asked for that here, or elsewhere, ever. I've stated it would be helpful (not necessary, but helpful) if text had been included in the core products that discusses how heavily this game relies on 'common sense' (which is anything but common, and is highly subjective), particularly moreso than previous RPGs.

Now if my comments had just been ignored, or respectfully disagreed with, I wouldn't have pressed the issue. However, practically every bit disagreement posted was based terribly hyperbolic misrepresentations of what I had said, and your claim that I'm asking for a no-infinite-backpack rule is a prime example. I keep commenting because I'm trying to clarify that the hyperbole is in no way represents my original point.

I'm also not the only person that holds this opinion, as SnowDragon's post demonstrates. The brief inclusion I've repeatedly tried to discuss here would be a massive quality of life improvement for GMs, novice and veteran, in this system.

And do you really think other posters are going to speak up in a thread to agree with me after reading these responses?

To be clear, like most people, I'm here to discuss a game I enjoy in what should be a respectful atmosphere. The mockery and misrepresentation is totally counter-productive.

TL;DR If you want me to shut up and go away, just don't misrepresent my posts and disagree with what I actually wrote respectfully instead of what you fabricated.

Well I'm glad the community has demonstrated it's typical level of maturity in response to a discussion about game design.

Let me be clear on my behalf, which is all I've tried to do here.

Just to be actually clear, no, that isn't all you've tried to do LD. You don't mind insulting the entire community's relative level of maturity, but you sure love to press the report button.

Let me be clear, I reported your abusive condescending insult in regards to my level of maturity because it seems to me to not report you would allow hypocrisy to stand.

I would urge everyone who feels someone who apparently loves to insult the entire community's maturity and then turns around and hits the report button that they themselves should go ahead and report LethalDose. I mean if we are going to be completely fair about all this that is.

You know, I remember we had a whole spate of 'how many suits of armour can I wear at once' threads pop up at one time...

This (completely insane) thread is really just the bastard offspring of those conversations...

I was a big fan of the old 'Lone Wolf' solo gamebooks when I was a girl. They really were excellent in terms of action and story and world-building... but they had an odd obsession with describing exactly how your character (a kind of Jedi in a high-fantasy world) wore his gear. So they had stuff like 'Helmet: this is worn on the head' . Seriously, just in case someone tried to put it on thinking it was a pair of pants or something...

You've never head of "pants on head stupid"?

I'm not asking for a rule that states PCs can't wear infinite backpacks. I never asked for that here, or elsewhere, ever. I've stated it would be helpful (not necessary, but helpful) if text had been included in the core products that discusses how heavily this game relies on 'common sense' (which is anything but common, and is highly subjective), particularly moreso than previous RPGs.

All of which is handled already in the EotE core book, starting on p 287 which is the GM section. It doesn't use the phrase "use your common sense", but that's pretty much the gist of what is stated there, and it gets into more detail from that point on.

Now, either you didn't know that section existed, or you are in fact demanding more specificity than is reasonable. I find the former hard to believe, so I'll stick with the latter.

I'm not asking for a rule that states PCs can't wear infinite backpacks. I never asked for that here, or elsewhere, ever. I've stated it would be helpful (not necessary, but helpful) if text had been included in the core products that discusses how heavily this game relies on 'common sense' (which is anything but common, and is highly subjective), particularly moreso than previous RPGs.

All of which is handled already in the EotE core book, starting on p 287 which is the GM section. It doesn't use the phrase "use your common sense", but that's pretty much the gist of what is stated there, and it gets into more detail from that point on.

Now, either you didn't know that section existed, or you are in fact demanding more specificity than is reasonable. I find the former hard to believe, so I'll stick with the latter.

Again, let's be clear, I'm not demanding anything. This is very clear in the quote you cited I think expansion of this material is helpful.

Not required.

Not demanded.

Just helpful.

I am aware of what's written on pg 287 and what's sprinkled thoughout the rest of that section. My opinion (not demand, but opinion) is that the game and text would be vastly improved by giving more emphasis to the importance of what's implicit in the text and the role of common sense (not my preferred term for the concept, but it's been too ingrained in this thread to change now), e.g. "if there appears to be action or strategy that is not explicitly disallowed by the rules, but seems abusive

I think taking 300 pages to do so, however, would be excessive.

One of the major reasons I expressed this point of view is that this information is widely assumed to be written in the text by veterans (see Desslok's post where he claimed it was covered in the extensive section on common sense rules) when in reality, there's no such section. If it's so widely assumed to be there, I'm of the opinion that it should probably be there. It would be extremely useful to new GMs to have the design theory behind this game system much better explained. GMing is hard enough, I'm all for giving as much assistance as is possible to novices.

Frankly, misrepresenting what I've written as a "demand" or a false dichotomy between ignorance of the rules and going beyond reason is the exact problem here. I've explained that the primary issue has become hyperbolic misrepresentation, and the immediate responses are more misrepresentation of what I've written, and attempts to incite mob reporting as retribution for my reporting abusive and antagonistic behavior. It's clear that it's not going to be possible to have respectful, or even civil, discourse on the topic in this thread.

I think the bickering between unnamed parties (plural, not singular!) is far, far sillier than the initial question or requests for clarification to rules text. I can get caught up in the heat of the moment as much as the next person, and frequently do. Some of the outright hostility (intentional or not, text is a bad medium for hoping people catch subtle context clues as to true intent) is embarrassing. Please keep that in mind the next time you don't see eye to eye. If you really need to know whether or not a response is appropriate, ask yourself if you'd say it to a short-tempered and armed stranger. If you determine that it might end up with you getting tazed, or subjected to percussive personality recalibration, rethink your approach.

Anyway, as much fun as some of this thread was, my buzz has officially been harshed. See you guys in the next thread that comes up.

You know, I remember we had a whole spate of 'how many suits of armour can I wear at once' threads pop up at one time...

This (completely insane) thread is really just the bastard offspring of those conversations...

I was a big fan of the old 'Lone Wolf' solo gamebooks when I was a girl. They really were excellent in terms of action and story and world-building... but they had an odd obsession with describing exactly how your character (a kind of Jedi in a high-fantasy world) wore his gear. So they had stuff like 'Helmet: this is worn on the head' . Seriously, just in case someone tried to put it on thinking it was a pair of pants or something...

Loved those books when I was a kid (still do, but never have the time to play through them)...they're what got me started in rpg's.

I tried to express my view that it would be useful if the book included a simple passage for clarification to help reign in players and help new GMs.

Well, to be fair, commone sense seems to be in short supply these days...

We could easily double the page count of the book if we needed to apply common sense to every facet of the rules.

subtitle: a Captain Picard Facepalm mosaic made up of facepalm pictures