Difference between revisions of "FRRpart2"

From RPGnet
Jump to: navigation, search
(jiNspOFQhGVAkpzjn)
Line 1: Line 1:
Part 2/3 of the FATAL Review Rebuttal. --[[User:Knockwood|Lord Knockwood the Mad]]
+
Dank je! =ben je aan het schilderen geaelgsn= Nou bijna! @Joost, dank je! @100_woorden, dank voor de tip, maar daarin verschillen de meningen, en tja ik blijf purist    @Ghijsa, dank! Maar, "zee en water" eigenlijk "zee en lucht" of "water en lucht"? @StadsfotograafVelsen, mooie plek en een aanrader! Dus gaan! @Vogel-vrij, schijn bedriegt, het was afgaand tij en dan stroomt het echt heeeeeeel hard de bay van Archachon uit! Dank! @Svara, dank je, je bent het eens met 100_woorden. Die lijnen ha, voor jou een vraag
----
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">So check this out: There's five primary stats, right? But, in a
 
  nod towards the residents of insane asylums who smear the walls with their own feces, each
 
  stat has four sub-stats which determine vital, important information like, say,
 
  enunciation, or kinetic beauty. So, you actually have a stat that determines how well you
 
  can speak, or how pretty it looks when you move. </font></p>
 
 
 
  <p>You should have used &quot;that&quot; instead of &quot;which&quot;. Enunciation and
 
  Kinetic Charisma (not beauty -- by now the reader should not expect accuracy from Darren)
 
  are important sub-abilities (not sub-stats). For example, if a character is a
 
  spell-caster, then Enunciation is important to their spell-casting. Enunciation is also
 
  important to bards. Kinetic Charisma is important to a dancer, and probably anyone trying
 
  to seduce another character. There are well over 100 occupations, and each uses a
 
  different blend of the sub-abilities. Did Darren read the game?</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Just to elaborate once again. Imagine a mage getting
 
  charged by a hill troll. Before the troll gets there, which is determined by the
 
  sub-ability of physical fitness, the mage tries to cast Wooden Carapice, which would give
 
  himself an additional 15 to current armor. Enunciation would determine if he could speak
 
  the chant fast enough to cast the spell. </font></p>
 
  <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Sartin: Would this be a bad place to mention that you have to randomly
 
  roll all 20 sub-abilities? And the roll is 4d100, halve it, and subtract 1? Then you go
 
  back and calculate each primary ability by averaging all four of its sub-abilities. Which
 
  is really cool when you consider that primary abilities are rarely if ever used by the
 
  rules. </font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in">4d100 has changed to 10d100. Keep in mind that a character can be created in five minutes or
 
less with the FATAL Character Generator, available free at fatalgames.com. Then again, the
 
complexity of determining sub-abilities ((10d100)/5 - 1), compared to other RPG's,
 
supports my claims that it is the most difficult, detailed, and realistic RPG available. I
 
mentioned realism because the curve produced by 10d100 is superior to anything else
 
I've seen, as well as the fact that the mean is 100, which is easy to interpret.
 
Therefore, the statistical curves produced by rolling for sub-abilities in FATAL are more
 
realistic, and represent real distributions better than other RPG's. Although primary
 
abilities are used less frequently than sub-abilities, I disagree with &quot;rarely&quot;.
 
Just the same, the focus is on sub-abilities, not abilities.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Go ahead and make about 20 characters and see how well
 
  they fit into the Bell curve. I&#146;ve tried and it&#146;s much more accurate than
 
  anything I&#146;ve seen.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">So, basically, saying
 
  that this game should be burned is an insult to fire.</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">Saying that this game should be burned is an
 
insult to RPG's and gamers worldwide.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">The worst part of reviewing this shit is that I actually have to
 
  think about it. I actually have to read this shit, then try to explain it to you, then I
 
  have to spend half an hour with a pencil up my nose trying to fish out the piece of brain
 
  that died the minute that I tried to use it to understand FATAL. And God almighty, that's
 
  not a fun job. I'm genuinely worried that this is going to start interfering with my life,
 
  so that I start wind up adding on pointless, redundant statistics to everything that I do,
 
  like the guy who writes [http://philippe.tromeur.free.fr/hybrid.htm Hybrid]. </font></p>
 
  <p>Based on the lack of quality of Darren's comments, I doubt he thought about FATAL or
 
  read much at all.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Come on now, giving credit where it&#146;s due he
 
  probably read it. Just he couldn&#146;t understand most of it. That&#146;s why he&#146;s
 
  thinking so hard and &#147;fishing out his brain.&quot;</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p><font color="#009900">Also, for x=(c)(number of words in review)*ycc+kill me you fucks
 
  kill me.</font></p>
 
  <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Sartin: It's hard to believe, but even Hybrid is less of a waste of atoms
 
  than FATAL. You can catch my review of it [http://atrocities.primaryerror.net/hybrid.html here].</font></p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">Just for example: Charisma includes Facial Charisma (how good you
 
  look), Vocal Charisma (how you sound,) Kinetic Charisma (how pretty you look when you
 
  move), and Rhetorical Charisma (how fast you CAN FUCKING SPEAK.) That's right, everybody:
 
  You can determine how fast your character can speak, in words per minute. What a
 
  statistic.</font></p>
 
  <p>While speech rate may seem pointless to a reviewer who doesn't read closely, Rhetorical
 
  Charisma is important to some characters, just as with Enunciation and Kinetic Charisma,
 
  noted above. Above all, the information is there, if needed. If not needed, it doesn't
 
  need to be read.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Just a side note, Facial Charisma is not how good you
 
  look. It&#146;s how good your face looks.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Sartin: Yeah, where to begin? I mean, I can't count the number of
 
  campaigns I've seen where it matters whether your face can be THAT much prettier than your
 
  body. But don't worry. Even if you blow that 4d100/2-1 roll for it, you can beat it by
 
  wearing a bag over your head, like most FATALites probably do in real life.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p>It would be interesting to have a poll with hundreds of anonymous participants who rate
 
  photos of their faces and ours, just to see.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: I believe in giving details so here we go again.
 
  Imagine, if you will, fighting your way to the top of a tower where a female mage is
 
  attempting to cast the spell FATAL upon the world. Now when you get there you have the
 
  option of outright killing her. But there are so many options in FATAL one of which is
 
  trying to seduce her and make her break her concentration as a by-product. Now being a
 
  mage of high enough level to cast FATAL she obviously has high skill points in spell
 
  casting, familiarity. So in order to break her concentration you need to seduce her AND
 
  roll a high enough sexual adeptness check to be considered exceptional (80 or higher). In
 
  order to do this it would help to have high Facial Charisma and Bodily Attractiveness
 
  sub-abilities. </font></p>
 
 
 
  <p><font color="#009900">And while we're on the subject, it's cool that Kinetic Charisma
 
  is entirely separate from Hand-Eye Coordination and Agility. That's right! You can be the
 
  clumsiest, most spastic sack of shit who ever lived, and yet still inspire boners because
 
  the way you pick up that bottle of Jack Daniels to help you get through this game is just
 
  so Kinetically Charismatic. Meanwhile, you fans of the controversial pastime of hot,
 
  sweaty man-love will enjoy how, with Vocal Charisma, the lowest possible rating will get
 
  you a description of &quot;gay&quot;.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p>Finally, Darren provides an argument. Should Kinetic Charisma be correlated with
 
  Hand-Eye Coordination and Agility? If there is a correlation, it should be weak. Consider
 
  a female in high school or college, who moves attractively. The gestures she makes with
 
  her wrist, the way she moves her head, and how she walks -- most consider her to be
 
  kinetically charismatic. However, I believe it is reasonable for a female like this to be
 
  tested by a Phys. Ed. teacher regarding either Hand-Eye or Agility, and perform poorly.
 
  The opposite also seems plausible. Therefore, if a relationship exists, it is weak. As
 
  these sub-abilities stand, orthogonal to each other, is reasonable. Just the same, I am
 
  interested in exploring this further. I thank Darren for providing one argument not devoid
 
  of all reason or support.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Darren claims we are homophobic yet, he uses the term
 
  hot, sweaty man love.</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">And Rhetorical
 
Charisma...yeah. I mean, this happens all the time in the dungeon:</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">The scope of FATAL is much wider than
 
adventuring in a dungeon. In fact, if you consider the majority of occupations, the most
 
general form of role-playing in FATAL should be gaming either as a peasant in a hamlet or
 
a serf in a town.</p>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:1.0in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;
 
mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Player: Okay, the dark priest HAS to be down to his last few hit points.
 
As I take my next strike, I'm gonna shout &quot;This is for my brother! Eat testicle pubes
 
and die, scrotum breath!&quot; </font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Gamemaster: Now,
 
hold on! I'm not sure you could get that entire sentence out before you hit. Oh, if only
 
there was SOMETHING we could roll to see!</font></p>
 
 
 
    <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Actually I believe what Sartin is looking for is
 
    Enunciation not Rhetorical Charisma. In this case if his Enunciation were not high enough
 
    he has the option of waiting to finish the sentence before striking. Though, if he chooses
 
    that he runs the risk of the dark priest attacking first. Anyway, Rhetorical Charisma is
 
    used more in the case of Haggling for a lower price for buying equipment or a higher price
 
    for selling.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">If Jason read the game, he'd know that
 
should be MaimMaster, not Gamemaster.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">I spent some time trying to scream, but nothing came out but
 
  blood.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p>Please try again.</p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Sartin: Okay, people. Remember that Darren's a professional, and we're
 
reviewing on a closed course. Don't projectile vomit blood at home!</font></p>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in">Darren's a professional? Professional at what? It's sure not debating or reviewing. I wonder if
 
Darren's capable of an advanced degree? Nevermind, they're easy to get.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Isn&#146;t it obvious Byron. He&#146;s a professional at
 
  projecting vomitous blood, iIn accordance to the wording used by Sartin.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p><font color="#009900">I should also spend some time describing the artwork for this
 
  game. Most of it is obviously photographs run through the [http://www.adscape.com/eyedesign/photoshop/four/filters/graphicpen.html Graphic Pen] filter in Adobe Photoshop; and most of the photographs depict two beer-swollen
 
  morons pretending to fight about as smoothly and realistically as any fight on Star Trek -
 
  which is to say that it's stiff and really, really staged. There's also startling
 
  depictions of the ARTWORK HERE monster, and crudely drawn pornographic sketches here and
 
  there. As a matter of fact, the ARTWORK HERE monster must be the most common wandering
 
  monster in FATAL, given its frequency of appearance.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p>There is only one &quot;crudely drawn pornographic&quot; sketch, and it was drawn by my
 
  wife. Actually, it was the fun of the moment, not intended as permanent artwork. She is a
 
  capable artist, though someone who sees that sketch should know that it took her less than
 
  five seconds to sketch it. As for the altered photos, they are also not intended as
 
  permanent artwork. The Artwork Here monste r(which, by the way, is not all caps, just in
 
  case Darren's interested in getting it right) is now dying a slow death, since art is
 
  being added and is one of the reasons the most recent version has not been made available
 
  for some time. A professional artist is now working on FATAL.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: To give credit where it&#146;s due, Darren is somewhat
 
  right on one point here. Being one of the people in the photographs he&#146;s speaking
 
  about, I can say that one other person and I were drunk when taking these pictures. And as
 
  Byron stated they were never meant to be in FATAL, even worse permanent artwork. By the
 
  way, if you&#146;ve ever played with a bardiche while drinking you would now it&#146;s
 
  better to look staged than to chop your buddy&#146;s head off.</font></p>
 
 
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Sartin: Wait, he was trying to be intimidating? I thought he was going for
 
a &quot;Hi! I'm a silhouette of a bearded jackass who couldn't pass muster in the
 
SCA!&quot; look. Really, take a white marker and scribble on some black construction
 
paper, and you won't be too far off from what little artwork HAS been filled in here. If
 
Hall used Photoshop to create these images, he sucks at it. </font></p>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in">Who was trying to be intimidating? The last potential creature Darren mentioned was the
 
Artwork Here monster. Was the Artwork Here monster trying to be intimidating? My question
 
is: can Jason write clearly? Who is bearded? I was definitely no good at PhotoShop when
 
altered pictures of myself and my buddies. In the last few months, I'd say I got pretty
 
decent at PhotoShop. For example, I thoroughly redesigned the Fatal Games Website.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Here, check it out:</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Really. It's from the
 
combat section. Actually, that one isn't so bad...the guy on the right is obviously Hall,
 
and no illustration that depicts Hall in a state of imminent fustigation can be all bad.</font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p>The image used without permission is on the second page of Chapter 10: Combat.</p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Hmmm...</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Oh, yeah. I'm either
 
drunk or half-blind, or someone needs to try harder.</font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p>I'm guessing Jason's drunk.</p>
 
 
 
  <p><font color="#009900">Or check this description of an ability check:</font></p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">For example, a slovenly trollop offers herself to a strapping
 
  young adventurer if and only if he can expediently say a tongue-twister of her choice.
 
  Driven by hormones, the young male agrees, and asks what is the tongue twister. The
 
  courtesan challenges &quot;Huge hung hero hunks hastily hump horny heaving hot whores. How
 
  'bout it, huh?&quot;</font></p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">So: Not only do we have a splendid example of the level that
 
  FATAL operates at, we also have an example of the game's utter misogyny. You will never,
 
  ever find a female character in this game who isn't a prostitute and/or proclaimed slut,
 
  because that's the only kind of women that exist in these dipshits' imagination. There's
 
  also not-English (&quot;what is the tongue twister&quot; instead of &quot;what the tongue
 
  twister is&quot;), and, for the final kick in the balls to my leathery psyche, you have to
 
  check against your Enunciation stat in order to say it.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p>I admit to making a mistake. However, Jason's powers of observation seem to leave much
 
  to be desired. For example, it should be, &quot;and asks 'What is the
 
  tongue-twister?'&quot; Did he expect the reader to overlook his misuse of the colon next
 
  to &quot;So:&quot;, or simply not notice the dangling preposition &quot;at&quot;, which
 
  would be better written as &quot;the level at which FATAL operates.&quot; For that matter,
 
  FATAL does not 'operate' in the sense he meant. His poorly worded attack is actually
 
  hypocritical. By the way, Enunciation is better termed a sub-ability than a stat.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Darren states &#147;You will never, ever find a female
 
  character in this game who isn't a prostitute and/or proclaimed slut, because that's the
 
  only kind of women that exist in these dipshits' imagination.&#148; I take offense to
 
  these remarks but will answer in terms of the game itself. With exception of very few,
 
  like Hierophant and Druid, a female can choose to be any occupation she so desires and
 
  there are even occupations set aside just for females, other than whore. Like baroness,
 
  chambermaid, dairymaid, delouser, duchesses, queen, laundress, lacemaker,and ladies,
 
  amongst many others. There are also many occupations where both males or females are rare
 
  or uncommon but they do exist.</font></p>
 
 
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Sartin: Appropriately enough, that example ends with the adventurer
 
blowing it and losing the girl. How unintentionally autobiographical! </font></p>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in">Is that what Jason needs to believe to feel better? His suppositions sound as unreasonable as
 
grounds for religion.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">But while we're on the
 
subject of whores and sluts, there are also few occupations in this game that get more
 
wordage from Hall than whoring and all things related to it (and even those only exceed
 
the whoring volume through huge charts or long, boring ass skill lists).</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">Whoring doesn't get much attention at all.
 
Would anyone like to make any comparisons? Jason refuses to support his argument.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Sure I&#146;ll make a quick comparison. Ok whore as an
 
  occupation gets a page and a half with no charts. I&#146;ll check how many have that much
 
  or more. Assassin has two pages with one four line chart. Brotheler gets a page and a half
 
  no charts. Clerk gets a page and a half no charts. Doctor gets a page and a half no
 
  charts. Druid gets three and a half pages including three charts that cover about a full
 
  page. Gladiator gets a page and a half no charts. Knight gets a full page no charts. Mage
 
  gets three pages about one and a half in charts. Ranger gets a page and a half no charts.
 
  Scribe gets a page and half no charts. Sorceror gets two pages about one and three
 
  quarters pages in charts. That&#146;s all. I count 11 occupations that get the same or
 
  more wording than whore. Seems like more than few to me. There are also a lot that get a
 
  whole page to themselves so whore doesn&#146;t get that much more than them.</font></p>
 
 
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">And all the whore and
 
whore-related profession descriptions, of course, instantly footnote you to
 
&quot;information on whores has been obtained from Medieval Prostitution, by Jacques
 
Rossiaud&quot;. Which, as it turns out, is a book on prostitution...in southern
 
France...in the time period spanning the 1400s. And yet Hall is basing an entire world on
 
it. Yes, people, this is what passes for &quot;research&quot; and &quot;historical
 
accuracy&quot; in FATAL.</font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p>If Jason read the book, he'd&nbsp; know that in numerous places, information on
 
  brothels and whoring is generalized to Europe. The arguments of Jason fail to stand here,
 
  as usual. Finally, He has no idea how the world for FATAL (Neveria) will end-up, based on
 
  the FATAL system rules alone. The reader should know that this is what he tries to call a
 
  review.</p>
 
 
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Actually, I tell a
 
lie. One aspect of whoring you won't see FATAL spend time on is sexually transmitted
 
disease. Yep, with the loving attention Hall pays to sex, genitalia, whoremongering, and
 
rape, there isn't one damn word in the entire book about STDs.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">So Hall's either
 
careless beyond imagination, or didn't feel &quot;the most difficult, detailed, and
 
realistic game available&quot; needed to present anything that might be a possible
 
consequence to raping and fucking your brains out. Your call!</font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p>I searched for information on sexually transmitted diseases in the Middle Ages.
 
  Although I did not search with vigor, the few times that I have searched, I have failed to
 
  find any information. Some others have made this same argument. When I asked them to
 
  provide a source, so that I can include the information, I never heard from them again. If
 
  Jason were credible, he would provide a scholarly source.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: From what I have heard, they existed but nobody was able
 
  to diagnose STD&#146;s. Not that I see it mattering much. Considering the fact that in
 
  FATAL you&#146;d be lucky if a character lived long enough to be effected by the long term
 
  effects of STD&#146;s. And in the short term most would be nothing more than minor
 
  annoyances. Every 1d4 hours you must scratch your balls due to crabs. Or due to urinary
 
  tract infection take 1d2 LP of damage during each urination over the next 1d4 weeks. Only
 
  problem is, as stated by Byron, no one has brought a scholarly text to prove they even
 
  existed let alone could be diagnosed.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p><font color="#009900">Then there's the charts - pages and pages and pages of charts. I
 
  should mention that the Bodily Attractiveness stat affects your breast cup size, although,
 
  of course, only for women.</font></p>
 
  <p>Does Darren intend to argue that Bodily Attractiveness should affect the cup size of
 
  men? I hope that Darren's lack of clarity does not frustrate the reader. By the way,
 
  multiple historical texts indicated that large, spherical breasts were desirable. This was
 
  noted in the series by Giles, in either _Life in a Medieval Village_, _Life in a Medieval
 
  City_, or _Life in a Medieval Castle_. It has been noted in other books as well, but these
 
  are sufficient to support my claim for now, especially since Darren's claim is unclear, at
 
  best.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">Oh, and you can get &quot;retard strength&quot;. Check the
 
  formula out for determining this:</font></p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">(71 - retard Intelligence) x 3 = (% chance of Retard Strength).</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p><font color="#009900">I hate the author. I really fucking do.</font></p>
 
  <p>Is Darren close to retardation, or is he close to those with retardation? There must be
 
  a reason he is emotional and takes this so personally. He only notes that Retard Strength
 
  exists, and that he hates me for it. By the way, I have neither searched nor found any
 
  material supporting Retard Strength. However, it is important to note that it is based on
 
  the experiences of some females I knew in college. Their jobs, about which they were
 
  obviously never overjoyed, consisted of taking care of retards. They would tell stories of
 
  how some of them would flip out, and how it would take multiple male nurses, or whatever
 
  they are, to subdue them. At any rate, the girls were impressed with each such occurence,
 
  stunned by the surprising strength of retards. In fact, if you observe the features of
 
  someone with Down's Syndrome, for instance, you will notice that their metabolism seems
 
  not quite right, and that they seem thicker than average. Another thought is that retards
 
  may not know the limits of their strength. Sometime I will focus on exploring the validity
 
  of Retard Strength, but for now, that is all the information I have on the subject.</p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Sartin: As bad as Darren's making this sound, he hasn't been telling you
 
the tenth of it. These abilities - and the charts for them - could deep-throat a sperm
 
whale. </font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Not counting the
 
4d100/2-1 roll (may it burn in hell), there are three central, massive idiocies at work
 
here. In order:</font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: It&#146;s your opinion that the roll should burn in
 
  hell. Then show any other RPG that has a roll for abilities that better emulates the Bell
 
  Curve.</font></p>
 
 
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Lame ass references
 
and quotes</font></p>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:1.0in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;
 
mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">I love how when every sub-ability mentions skills or bodily features or
 
combat stats, we get a big &quot;(SEE CHAPTER (insert lame ass chapter number
 
here))&quot;, as though we're too stupid to catch the chapter references in any of the
 
other 19 sub-abilities that are right next to it. But then again, FATAL was written for
 
FATALites, not you or me or anyone else whose IQ doesn't begin with a decimal point, so I
 
guess it's necessary.</font></p>
 
 
 
    <p>And even though I've gone to great lengths to be clear, such as with the premises of
 
    the game, Darren and Jason failed to consider them. Also, one reason for multiple
 
    references to other chapters on the same page (but not to the same chapter from the same
 
    sub-heading) is because a reader may randomly select a page and a paragraph, and be
 
    redirected appropriately. Unlike a conventional book, a gaming book is not often read in a
 
    linear, front-to-back, fashion, even if it should be (and these two provide the example).</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">And I have to love
 
that &quot;Brute force bereft of wisdom falls to ruin by its own weight&quot; quote -
 
yeah, it's utterly hypocritical, but it's also half-assedly ironic, given that nearly
 
every FATALite to date has presented themselves as a total death- and rape-monger while
 
having no clue how much their belovedly rape-enabling game sucks.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">Whether you like or dislike this quote, it
 
is from Roman times, so it supports historical accuracy. Why is it hypocritical? In fact,
 
isn't it hypocritical for Jason to call it hypocritical (see above)? Besides, I've never
 
presented myself as a rape-monger, though FATAL does enable rape. </p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">General
 
idiocy/pointlessness</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Like Intelligence:
 
Spacial. With a way cool &quot;Unfamiliar Object Assembly (# of pieces)&quot; column. This
 
would be the most complex machine a character can understand or some shit. Those with 100
 
Spacial can only understand machines with 200 parts, but with above-average Spacial, that
 
will quickly grow to thousands of parts. Of course, where you're going to find something
 
with that many parts in the most realistic fantasy setting available is a mystery to us
 
both.</font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p>By the way, it's not &quot;Spacial,&quot; but Spatial Intelligence. Since Jason's
 
  imagination seems limited, I will offer instances of objects with numerous parts: A
 
  clockmaker qualifies as someone who needs to understand objects with numerous parts. An
 
  engineer such as an archtect needs to understand objects with numerous parts. FATAL is
 
  possibly the only fantasy medieval game that lets a player role-play diverse and accurate
 
  characters such as these.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Actually I find Spatial Intelligence very important in
 
  my line of work even though not dealing directly with mechanical parts. Being a Quality
 
  Control Supervisor I have to look at blueprints and imagine how the part will look in a
 
  three-dimensional space by only seeing one to three views in two-dimensional space. In
 
  some instances the part can&#146;t be made from only one piece so I have to figure out
 
  what the smallest number of pieces it would take to complete said part. Quite an
 
  intriguing concept. </font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Or the Math
 
sub-ability, with a &quot;Highest math possible&quot; column. Huh. I had no idea Geometry
 
is the highest math any character can understand.</font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p>A premise of the game is historical accuracy. In terms of technology, the year for the
 
  game is 1335 A.D. Calculus was not invented prior to this year, so geometry is the highest
 
  possible math that a character can understand. Again, Jason offers no support for his
 
  argument, which is obviously fallacious.</p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Or the Common Sense
 
sub-ability, with a &quot;likely to&quot; column to explain what low Common Sense
 
characters are likely to get caught doing. The lowest possible rating is &quot;Get caught
 
for greater scheme: attempt to kill a god&quot;, but &quot;Appear at emergency room after
 
getting dick caught in zipper&quot; and &quot;Write FATAL&quot; are just as likely.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">The Vocal
 
sub-ability has that &quot;gay&quot; note, of course, but if you're around 88-114, your
 
description is &quot;ordinary&quot;. Now check out the descriptions above and below it: </font></p>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:1.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;
 
mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;margin-left:1.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">84-87: &quot;Always says 'uh' or 'uhm'&quot; <br>
 
88-114: &quot;Ordinary&quot; <br>
 
115-120: &quot;Avoids 'uh' or 'uhm'&quot;</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">So where does this
 
leave &quot;ordinary&quot; speakers? Do they avoid &quot;uh&quot; and &quot;uhm&quot; half
 
the time, and always use them the other half? It's a mystery for the ages, or for
 
whoever's got Hall's bong.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">Yes, the ordinary person uses vocal
 
fillers such as &quot;uh&quot; and &quot;uhm&quot;.</p>
 
 
 
<p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Let&#146;s just say an ordinary person uses them. But
 
not always. But, also fails to avoid them. So they sometimes use &#147;uh&#148; and
 
&#147;uhm&#148;.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">And it's cool to
 
know that Health will help out with that Urinating skill. And it helps with your hearing,
 
too, for some reason. Also, did you know that only people with below-average Health can
 
have allergies? So if you have even one allergy, congratulations: you're a FATAL weenie
 
and will have a penalty on Urinating. Disgraced, you will be hopeless until you realize
 
that all you have to do is fucking drink a two liter already and wait a day, which will
 
give you a high enough mod to automatically score a &quot;flood&quot; on the chart and (if
 
you're average height) get it as far as 16 feet with total accuracy (naturally, being
 
&quot;the most realistic game available&quot;, FATAL makes no distinction between power
 
and accuracy. Or, for that matter, the ever-increasing difficulty in &quot;holding
 
it&quot;).</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">Although I'll refuse to consider why Jason
 
may have difficulty holding it, I'll admit that FATAL could be more realistic here, which
 
is a core goal of the game. It seemed overly complicated to introduce hearing as a
 
sub-ability, so realism was sacrificed in this instance. As nothing's perfect, Jason
 
successfully attacks an element of the game. I can live with it.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">But speaking of
 
realism and Urination, what's really cool is that you can't piss unless you roll over
 
5...and the roll is d100 + Urination Skill Points + (average of Health and Hand-Eye
 
Coordination skill modifiers) +/- (&quot;Time Since Last Urination vs. Ounces Drunk&quot;
 
modifier).</font></p>
 
<p>That sounds realistic to me. Though a person can usually force a little out, it's
 
possible to truly not have to go. And for what it's worth, Health can certainly relate to
 
a character's bladder.</p>
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Of course, you'll
 
have to drink at least 16 ounces if you want to urinate without a penalty or having to
 
wait more than half an hour, but that isn't very hard. FATAL characters can practically
 
urinate at will! I have this stupid image in my mind of them beating down their opponents,
 
chugging down those drinks, and standing around holding their dicks (and diddling every
 
open hole in sight) for that half an hour just waiting for that Urination roll. Hell, they
 
probably carry huge funnels so they can be extra quick with getting in the 256 ounces (and
 
+80 mod) that will all but guarantee a &quot;flood&quot;. Fucking shit, they probably have
 
greasy T-shirts over their armor that say &quot;PENIS! CUNT! ANAL CIRCUMFERENCE! Put a
 
condom on my head, I'm a FATALITE!&quot; God with a flying orgasm, SenZar has never looked
 
so mature and deep as it does this fucking moment.<o:p></font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: I would just like to point out the hypocritical nature
 
  of the urination statement made here. While he attacks the skill itself and finds no need
 
  he stated earlier (Glad you remembered from page one) that he wanted to&nbsp; &#147;inject
 
  kerosene into my bladder, piss on them, and then set them on fire.&#148; So he forces me
 
  to ask if he would have a need for a urination skill check instead of injecting kerosene.</font></p>
 
 
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">But hey. If you can
 
get that Urination skill up to 100, that will cancel out the worst possible penalty for
 
drinking 0 ounces. Spell your name with the realism!</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">Of course, what Jason fails to consider is
 
that for a character to acquire a Urination skill with a Skill Modifier of 100, the
 
character must, on average, have achieved 20 levels, which most never will.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Oh, and about that
 
Retard Strength? It's only +2d10 for humans. And with abilities running from 1-199 (and
 
occasionally beyond), that's not exactly worth bothering with. But that's what makes it so
 
100% FATALish - it reveals Hall's total wankerness, but adds more or less nothing to the
 
game.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">It adds realism to the game. A gain of 20
 
Strength sub-ability points can be considerable. For example, if an average male human has
 
115 Strength and bench presses 150 lbs., then an average male human with a maximized
 
Retard Strength of 135 (115 + 20) could bench press 203 lbs. Therefore, it adds something
 
to the game. More than anything, it (hopefully) discourages players from being so willing
 
to play retards. In DnD, the most popular RPG, abilities are determined with 3d6, offering
 
a range of 3-18. I think most gamers have known fighters who easily accept a character who
 
is retarded, if Intelligence were truly considered as a normal curve.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">The fact that there
 
  are fucking *20* increasingly pointless and redundant stats, and the way they interconnect
 
  or fail to is stupid</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">None of the sub-abilities are redundant. As
 
usual, Jason does not support his argument.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Actually, in contrast all the abilities and
 
  sub-abilities are very useful for at least three separate skills. </font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:1.0in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;
 
mso-margin-bottom-alt:auto;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Let's go right to Bodily Attractiveness. Oh, look: &quot;Males with high
 
Bodily Attractiveness tend to have high Physical Fitness, Strength, and Height&quot; -
 
yeah, maybe if all four stats weren't ''totally random''. Sure, high Bodily Attractiveness
 
will boost those a little, but even if yours is the mind-blowingly maximum roll of 199,
 
you'll only get a +18 bonus. You'll forgive me for going &quot;Woooooo!&quot; in the most
 
intensely sarcastic voice I can muster. It's not enough of a &quot;tendency&quot; to
 
matter much of a shit against the random element. <o:p></font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p>Bear in mind that the &quot;random element&quot; creates a distribution that
 
  approximates a normal curve. Jason mistakenly implies that players roll a single die that
 
  produces a range of 1-199, which is obviously false. For example, if a male has a Bodily
 
  Attractiveness sub-ability of 199, then it would increase their Physical Fitness,
 
  Strength, and Height by 18. Considering only Strength, a male character that had an
 
  average Strength of 115, would apply the + 18 modifier, and have a Strength of 133. This
 
  character's bench press would increase from 150 to 190. Of course, the ludicrous portion
 
  of this example (the Bodily Attractiveness of 199) is part of Jason's argument. In order
 
  to have this sub-ability, a player has to roll '00' (otherwise known as 100), 4 times
 
  consecutively. The odds are 1-in-100,000,000 (100 x 100 x 100 x 100). Even in this extreme
 
  instance, FATAL seems realistic. Jason made a weak argument, again.</p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">But fuck it. For
 
FATAL guys, pretty = stronger. I'd add some crude speculation here about what team Hall is
 
batting for, but I can't think of one homosexual on this forum who even remotely deserves
 
the degradation of being lumped in with him. (It's just too damn bad my team doesn't want
 
him, either.)</font></p>
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">For most females, attractive males =
 
stronger males, within reason. Jason seems adversive to the thought; I wonder why.</p>
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: I guess Sartin hasn&#146;t had enough contact with
 
  females to realize this yet. But if I remember correctly it was a female who brought this
 
  to your attention wasn&#146;t it Byron?</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Meanwhile, the
 
inverse is also presented - low manly Bodily Attractiveness penalizes your Physical
 
Fitness, Strength, and Height. Guess there aren't historical or realistic
 
&quot;tendencies&quot; towards ugly bruisers.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">When a male is stronger, he tends to be
 
more athletic. Males who tend to be more athletic also tend to be more physically
 
attractive to females. Nevertheless, Jason oversimplifies his argument. Jason fails to
 
consider two other factors: Physical Fitness and Facial Charisma. He seems to have meant
 
that a character who is strong, has an ugly face, but isn't very fit. This combination is
 
likely. Jason's argument is poorly considered.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: I&#146;m starting to get tired of finding contradiction
 
  in the reviewer&#146;s statements. But here we go again, he just said a couple paragraphs
 
  ago that it&#146;s not a big enough mod to be effective against the random element. Now he
 
  states that because of the inverse, ugly bruisers weren&#146;t the tendency. The fact is
 
  according to what I&#146;ve seen during game-testing, both ugly and good-looking bruisers
 
  are, about, equally probable.</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">But guess what! All
 
that shit's only for males. Like Darren already mentioned, female Bodily Attractiveness
 
increases your Cup Size. It also decreases your Strength and Weight. Again, total
 
bullshit. But what the hell. It's nice to know the ideal FATAL girl is a death camp
 
survivor with a basketball under each nipple.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Somehow, I don't
 
think that shit flew during history, either.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">I always thought that the medieval
 
standard of beauty for a female was that she was fat, because it meant that she was
 
wealthy. This is not true according to the Giles books, cited earlier. They quote another
 
historical source, that claims that the perfect woman has large, round breasts, blond
 
hair, and a waist that a man can fit his hands around. Obviously this is as unrealistic as
 
the measurements of the Barbie doll. Some things never change. Jason thought wrongly, as
 
seems to be the case in this 'review.'</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: This really surprised me as well. I thought the medieval
 
  standard of beauty wasn&#146;t fat, but plump. For both the wealth factor and the fact
 
  they assumed larger waist meant they could bear more children.</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Naturally, most
 
games just give you stats and let you picture how they fit together. (It's a fun process I
 
call &quot;getting to visualize the character you actually created&quot;.) But then, those
 
games weren't designed by misogynistic human accidents who would lose a battle of wits
 
with an plus-sized assplug dressed up as a crack pipe. FATAL, sadly lacking that
 
distinction, insists on drunkenly interconnecting these stats in ways that have a flung
 
piece of shit's chance in heaven of being &quot;historically/mythically accurate&quot;
 
because, gee, it's not like standards of attractiveness have been TOTALLY DIFFERENT in
 
different eras, places, and myths or anything.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">TOTALLY different? So, a female that is
 
obese and flat-chested was the greatest natural aphrodisiac in what era, place, or myth?
 
Obviously, Jason doesn't mean what he says. Just the same, I admit that cultural variation
 
exists, but also acknowledge the norm across such variance. Cultural variation is not
 
covered in the core FATAL book, and will be covered in the second and final book,
 
_Neveria_.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#808080">Burnout: Actually I
 
find what is called &quot;getting to visualize the character you actually created,&#148;
 
more like laziness of game creators to make a complete character. Whenever gaming in
 
D&amp;D or any other game, the fact that they didn&#146;t state eye color, hair color, or
 
anything like that, I never cared to know those things. But, now playing FATAL where they
 
are stated for you I find it&#146;s nice to know such things. </font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">But noooooo. In
 
FATAL, sexiness has one standard, everywhere, all the time, all over the world, because
 
Hall apparently forgot the exact meaning of the words &quot;realistic&quot; and
 
&quot;historically&quot; after he hit his head on that toilet I mentioned when I
 
deciphered his research. Oh, well.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Of course, FATAL
 
hardly gets its head any farther out of its ass with the stats it doesn't stupidly try to
 
interconnect. Can you predict what can happen when character facets like speech or beauty
 
or intelligence are governed by three or four totally random stats each? Just keep
 
reading.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">If Jason read the game, then he knows that
 
sub-abilities are not totally random. In addition to the sub-abilities representing a
 
normal curve, each may be modified by other factors, such as gender and race. Rants do not
 
even take effort to undermine with reason.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Facial Charisma at
 
175+ gives you a description of &quot;causes wetness&quot;. And with all the total
 
randomness, it's so cute that you can blow that Bodily Attractiveness roll badly enough to
 
get a head start on being the strongest, fattest woman alive, but still roll enough Facial
 
Charisma to catch boners anyway. Fucking FATAL.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">See above.</p>
 
<p><font color="#808080">Burnout: First off, I&#146;d like to see such a variance occur,
 
with the rolls being closely related to a Bell curve I just don&#146;t see it happening.
 
Besides, I have seen females that from the neck up are pretty good looking. It&#146;s just
 
less common than the inverse, which I&#146;ve also seen, it&#146;s so common I actually
 
have a word to describe them &#147;Butterface&#148;. When someone looks good all over
 
&#147;but her face.&quot;</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Wow, look!
 
Enunciation! Naturally, this is a sub-ability of Dexterity. You'd think it would be under
 
Charisma or Intelligence, but I guess you see something stupid every day. Anyfuck, I
 
really like how Enunciation determines your &quot;Maximum Speech Rate&quot;, but
 
Rhetorical Charisma determines your &quot;Average Speech Rate&quot;. Ugh. NO ONE FUCKING
 
CARES.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">Cool, so don't use it. However, if Jason
 
played a character who needs Enunciation, then it would be important to him. Jason seems
 
incapable of seeing beyond his nose, since the world is full of people who'll probably
 
play differently than he does. FATAL accommodates more gamers with more occupations,
 
realism, detail, accuracy, etc., than any other game, as far as I know.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: What Sartin also forgets to mention is that with a
 
  higher or lower than average Enunciation, spell chanting time is adjusted to make it take
 
  less or more time respectively.</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Of course, since
 
both sub-abilities are (say it with me) totally random, we don't really know what happens
 
when your Maximum Speech Rate ends up being lower than your Average Speech Rate, but it's
 
just on this side of &quot;totally possible&quot;.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">See the annihilation of his &quot;totally
 
random&quot; argument above.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Tying into these two
 
nicely, of course, is Language (an Intelligence sub-ability). Especially that
 
&quot;possible # of languages learned&quot; column. Naturally, with FATAL being the
 
&quot;detailed&quot; and &quot;realistic&quot; game that it is, it's possible to get a
 
high Enunciation and Rhetorical Charisma without rolling high enough in Language to
 
actually be able to speak a language.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">Has anyone ever seen a review of a review?
 
Jason's adverb &quot;nicely&quot; is misplaced. Since it relates to the verb, it is better
 
suited next to &quot;Tying,&quot; such as &quot;Tying nicely into...&quot; Some animals
 
are capable of enunciating very specific sounds, yet do not speak a language as FATAL uses
 
the term. Perhaps the bellow of one retarded ogre is more charismatic than that of
 
another. After all, the definition of Rhetorical Charisma states that it is to solicit
 
emotions. On that level, one bellow could solicit emotions better than another. I think
 
Jason's point was that if a character plays a retarded ogre who is incapable of language,
 
that it frustrates him that his character could still have a high Rhetorical Charisma,
 
even though it seems useless. From the normal curve of nature, Jason's arguments seem
 
useless, yet he still wrote a review. See a similarity?</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#808080">Burnout: To
 
elaborate, we&#146;ve all probably heard a parrot talk or say a few words. Does that mean
 
it knows a language? Of course not, it can just enunciate those few words well and,
 
probably doesn&#146;t know the meaning of them, except that it means the parrot gets a
 
treat.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in"><font color="#FF00FF">Am I amazed that
 
Hall came up with all those bullshit interconnections for Bodily Attractiveness, but
 
didn't bother to imagine how any of his other attributes might fit together? If FATAL were
 
a movie, it would make Battlefield Earth look like an utterly convincing, well-considered
 
masterpiece.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:1.0in;margin-left:1.0in">At least Jason tried to support this
 
beforehand, even though he failed miserably.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Of course, we can't
 
let all this shit go without looking at the age modifiers.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Infant modifiers are
 
presented, in case you wanted to play Baby Geniuses against a backdrop of anus fisting and
 
16 foot urination. And it's not as crippling as you'd think, either. The total Strength
 
modifier is -90, so if you were lucky enough to roll 180 Strength or so, your infant
 
adventurer will be about as strong as an average adult human. Bodily Attractiveness is
 
also -90, so again, an excellent roll will still leave you with average adult fuckability
 
and little or no BA penalty to those Seduction and Sexual Adeptness rolls.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">I am surprised to read a valid argument from
 
Jason.&nbsp; I thank him for thinking, even if it took 300 attempts (eh, rough guess).
 
This is easily fixed. Instead of the modifier being a - 90, it will be a - 90%.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#808080">Burnout: I think
 
without a doubt he hit upon something that needed to be changed, and changing it to a
 
percentage will definitely do the trick. Now we&#146;ve come across, finally, the reason
 
for a review.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">I've flushed RPGs that
 
were better thought out this.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">It seems Jason meant &quot;thought out THAN
 
this.&quot;</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Language is also a
 
blast when you toss it through the age modifier bullshit. With the Child-category penalty,
 
you'll have to roll at least 95 for that, or you won't be capable of learning a language
 
until you hit puberty. (Roll less than 65, and you'll have to wait until adulthood. Below
 
55, of course, is that magical threshold where you'll either jump off a cliff or face a
 
lifetime of being unable to say &quot;Look, shithead! I can't learn any languages!&quot;)
 
Of course, if your race happens to be most varieties of Ogre (-50 to Language) or Troll
 
(-90)...</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">By changing the modifier to a percentage,
 
this works perfectly.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">I also like how
 
Reflection (which determines your earliest memory) increases at Middle Age and Old Age. I
 
had no idea getting older makes you remember more of your childhood.<o:p></font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p>Of course, when a character is Venerable, they lose 50% of Reflection. However, Jason
 
  is right that the Earliest Possible Memory should not increase into Old Age. This may
 
  forever be a small limitation of the system, since nothing is perfect. I'm tempted to
 
  applaud Jason, but I will not be fooled by a mere moment of coherence out of an hour of
 
  diatribe.</p>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: I&#146;m starting to see signs of a real review here.
 
  I&#146;m getting worried. I&#146;m not sure how to imagine that one working out. But, it
 
  will be worth looking in to.</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">After all this crap,
 
though, I have to admit to one bright point. I liked how some of the sub-abilities
 
provided real life-kinda examples or descriptions for each score. Like Strength listing
 
how much you can lift, or the Vocal Charisma and Math columns I mentioned (okay, those
 
ended up being dumb anyway, but the basic idea wasn't so bad). Examples like these can
 
give solid ideas on how good a score really is, something many RPG systems have had
 
trouble with. Of course, this hardly makes up for how the generation rolls are 4d100/2-1,
 
or how my bitching troll berserker probably won't know any languages, or how there are 20
 
attributes for things a sane game could have covered with 8-10, but whatever.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">A game that Jason considers sane, I consider
 
simple. I need it to be more complicated to keep my interest.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Could the 20 sub-abilities be done in 8-10? Yes
 
  probably. Would it be just as detailed? No chance in hell. That is of course one thing
 
  FATAL shoots for, is to be more detailed than other RPG&#146;s. In this aspect, FATAL
 
  succeeds.</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Anyway, I hope this
 
entire section was mind-numbing for you. Because you can barely imagine what it's like to
 
read and dissect this shit-hauling train wreck.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">And on that note,
 
let's let Darren have the review back. </font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">Or, check this shit out:</font></p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">According to a prominent philosopher, males tend to be more
 
  spirited, savage, simple, and less cunning. Females, on the other hand, tend to be more
 
  compassionate than males, more easily moved to tears, at the same time are more jealous,
 
  more querulous, and are more apt to scold and strike. Females are, furthermore, more false
 
  of speech, and more deceptive. Females are also more wakeful, shrinking and difficult to
 
  rouse to action.</font></p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">And later:</font></p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">The philosopher's observations presented above are
 
  generalizations and do not hold true for all characters. Certainly, it is possible to find
 
  a surpassingly shameless male, or a female who is less susceptible to depression than
 
  males, but these instances are the exception to the rule, assuming that the above
 
  observations are correct.</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p><font color="#009900">This is what the authors are talking about when they say that the
 
  game is &quot;historically accurate&quot;; they've taken Aristotle's thoughts on gender,
 
  then used them to justify their own sexist stupidity.</font></p>
 
  <p>Darren fails to represent my work, so here's the actual footnote:<br>
 
  &quot;In Book IX of &quot;Historia Animalium,&quot; Aristotle refers to gender differences
 
  and compares animals as well as humans. His comments are deemed relevant to the setting of
 
  F.A.T.A.L., due to the prevalence of his opinion throughout the Middle Ages.&quot;</p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">They make assertions, then try to weasel out of them later on in
 
  the same paragraph - &quot;This is all true unless what the philosopher says isn't true,
 
  in which case it isn't true.&quot;</font></p>
 
 
 
  <p>Of course, Darren is only quoting his imagination. Actually, my comments are not in the
 
  same paragraph as Aristotle's, but the following paragraph (poor Darren can't seem to get
 
  anything right). As a matter of fact, here is the paragraph about which Darren wrote:</p>
 
  <p>&quot;The philosopher's observations presented above are generalizations and do not
 
  hold true for all characters. Certainly, it is possible to find a surpassingly shameless
 
  male or a female who is less susceptible to depression than males, but these instances are
 
  the exception to the rule, assuming that the above observations are correct.&quot;</p>
 
  <p>As the author, I neither agreed nor disagreed with Aristotle's observations in FATAL.
 
  Personally, I disagree with Aristotle's opinions on women, and consider Aristotle sexist.
 
  This, however, is irrelevant. His opinions existed historically, and were accurate to
 
  Ancient Greece, Rome, and the Middle Ages as well. This is why I noted &quot;...assuming
 
  that the above observations are correct.&quot;</p>
 
  <p><font color="#009900">Aristotle may have been a brilliant philosopher, but when it came
 
  to women, his head was up his ass; ditto Plato, who thought that human women had fewer
 
  teeth because horses were the same way. On top of that, the statements that Aristotle make
 
  are internally self-contradictory; women are more wakeful, yet difficult to rouse to
 
  action?</font></p>
 
  <p>Just think about it for a second, understanding that it is a translation. I'm
 
  suggesting that anyone should agree with it.</p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right:.5in;mso-margin-top-alt:auto;mso-margin-bottom-alt:
 
auto;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Sartin: Of course philosophers are who you turn to when you're creating
 
something with a basis in reality. (And yes, especially when your beliefs are so
 
limp-dicked that you're only &quot;assuming&quot; the philosophers are correct.)</font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p>As should be obvious, I do not assume that Aristotle was correct. However, in an
 
  accurate gaming world, it is better to assume that Aristotle is correct than to impose
 
  modern norms.</p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">That's much better
 
than basing your shit on the findings of, oh, researchers or historians or scientists or
 
anyone else whose ponderings and conclusions actually have to be based in reality.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">It is hypocritical to argue (earlier) that
 
FATAL should be historically accurate and not impose modern ideas on the fantasy medieval
 
world. Yet, here Jason proposed the opposite: that it is better to use modern ideas than
 
classical ones. Does he understand how inconsistent his arguments are? As the footnote
 
states on the page he probably never read, Aristotle is appropriate to a fantasy medieval
 
gaming world, regarding gender; his thoughts were very influential, perhaps moreso than
 
anyone else.</p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Not having read much of Aristotle&#146;s work, I&#146;m
 
  gonna stay out of this one.</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Then again, Hall also
 
tries to wank &quot;scholarly literature&quot; by us to justify heavier female attribute
 
penalties. Here's the official rationalization:</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">According to the
 
adjustments above, it may seem as though males are superior, though it is important to
 
understand that there are other instances, such as nurturing, that are not apparent in the
 
adjustments and may become evident and valuable during role-playing. The function of
 
altering gender according to the table above is to shift the averages of the sexes to more
 
closely resemble reality. The shift in range represents masses of characters better than
 
extreme instances. For instance, the highest measured Intelligence is that of a female,
 
though by large numbers females tend to score slightly lower than males in Intelligence.
 
In this case, shifting the range lower for females also prevents the possibility of a
 
female possessing the highest Intelligence. This is an unfortunate limitation.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Fucking god, where to
 
begin?</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">By understanding that the &quot;shift in
 
range represents masses of characters better than extreme instances.&quot; If Jason
 
understand this, then all the rest should fall into place.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">&quot;For instance,
 
the highest measured Intelligence is that of a female, though by large numbers females
 
tend to score slightly lower than males in Intelligence&quot;?</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Yeah, I'm sure that
 
when he wasn't attending to Sexpot Annie, Hall had a lot of fun rounding up women from
 
medieval Europe and testing them. Of course it's perfectly valid and &quot;historically
 
accurate&quot; to assume they would have the same Intelligence-reducing (and Bodily
 
Attractiveness-raising) &quot;nurturing&quot; and &quot;background&quot; as modern day
 
women, right?</font></p>
 
 
 
<blockquote>
 
  <p><font color="#808080">Burnout: Assuming that historical texts are correct, by and
 
  large, most women didn&#146;t have any schooling at all. While some males didn&#146;t
 
  either, even less females did. Also, going by in terms of masses the female gender would
 
  have slightly less intelligence than male.</font></p>
 
</blockquote>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">What better information does Jason have?
 
Does Jason offer any support for his criticism? No.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">And on that note, even
 
if Hall were claiming this shit as modern gender modifiers, he only selected the parts of
 
his &quot;scholarly literature&quot; that went along with his retarded views. Even the
 
first work listed, &quot;The Smarter Sex: A Critical Review of Sex Differences in
 
Intelligence&quot; (by D. Halpern and M. LaMay) claims that males more frequently have
 
certain types of mental retardation, but you're sure as fuck not going to find that in
 
these rules.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">This is because Jason fails to understand
 
distributions of Intelligence when controlling for gender. Males have wider distributions,
 
or distributions with less central tendency, larger standard deviations, etc. Considering
 
Intelligence, female distributions have more central tendency. What this means is that
 
when considering large numbers of females, they tend to be closer to the mean, while males
 
tend to deviate farther from it. Therefore, there are more male retards and geniuses, and
 
females are more average. However, this is irrelevant to the gender modifier. The gender
 
modifier does not affect the central tendency of the distribution, but the mean itself.
 
Jason seems to know nothing of even basic statistics.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">As a side note, I have considered having
 
separate die-rolling methods for males and females. Male characters roll their
 
sub-abilities with [(8d100)/4 - 1], while females roll [(10d100)/5 - 1]. When both
 
standard deviations are considered, the average is 15! This would be a novel contribution
 
to RPG's.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">&quot;In this case,
 
shifting the range lower for females also prevents the possibility of a female possessing
 
the highest Intelligence. This is an unfortunate limitation&quot;?</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#808080">Burnout: What Sartin
 
forgets to mention is that according to gender modifiers, males can&#146;t acquire the
 
highest bodily attractiveness, language, intuition, or reflection. This is also an
 
unfortunate limitation.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">Translation:
 
&quot;Yeah, this is an unfortunate limitation...which I just admitted creates a result
 
that isn't true in reality (because I forgot I'm designing the most realistic RPG
 
available)...but guess what? I haven't taken it out, because I would rather claim that the
 
female masses are stupider than men than make my rules accept that at least one woman has
 
scored a higher IQ than any man to date!&quot;</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">Wrong. Even though I include this
 
information, I am fair and not sexist. I understand that these issues are always
 
sensitive. Just the same, it is less biased to consider the mean to be more important than
 
an outlier. Especially when it is now possible (though not in the version currently
 
available -- I'll update it soon) for a female character (and a male as well) to raise
 
their Intelligence. Therefore, a studious female may surpass all males. I am very proud of
 
how closely this models reality, especially considering the simplicity of the model.</p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in"><font color="#FF00FF">It's an ugly game.</font></p>
 
 
 
<p style="margin-right:.5in;margin-left:.5in">This is an ugly review.</p>
 
----
 
[[FRRpart3|Go to part 3]]
 

Revision as of 01:43, 11 June 2012

Dank je! =ben je aan het schilderen geaelgsn= Nou bijna! @Joost, dank je! @100_woorden, dank voor de tip, maar daarin verschillen de meningen, en tja ik blijf purist @Ghijsa, dank! Maar, "zee en water" eigenlijk "zee en lucht" of "water en lucht"? @StadsfotograafVelsen, mooie plek en een aanrader! Dus gaan! @Vogel-vrij, schijn bedriegt, het was afgaand tij en dan stroomt het echt heeeeeeel hard de bay van Archachon uit! Dank! @Svara, dank je, je bent het eens met 100_woorden. Die lijnen ha, voor jou een vraag