[OOC] The Everlasting Arena: Main Thread

[Innue]

Vordak said
I can't understand what exactly you'd like to know and why. Could you please explain it to me in detail?

It's fine, Schradinger already answered (unless you disagree).

I was wanting to know why the relationship between punch force and lifting strength was done the way it was. I'd rather keep the why to myself.

[Schradinger]

Well, what would you prefer? Should we sit down and calculate the exact amount of strength required to generate X amount of force with varying levels of training? The simplicity I was referring to was the fact that none of us here are physicists. We're not here to create a completely accurate picture of the forces and effects at work in combat situations. We're here to kick ass and take names, and have fun doing it. No one here is going to sit down in the middle of the fight and work out exactly how many joules of energy their punch transfers to the target. At best, they're going to give a general idea of how hard the punch is and just go from there. Setting punching power at 2x lifting strength avoids the absurdity of someone who can lift 2,000 pounds only being able to punch that hard (especially since there are real life fighters who can punch with over a ton of force, but not lift even close to that amount), while still giving characters with less strength yet more training the ability to maintain an even playing field.

The simplicity is not in the reasoning behind the number, it's in the fact that using that number makes the whole thing less complicated to understand and easier to enact.

Though if you meant something else again, please feel free to elaborate.

[Lalliman]

The deadlifting world record is about 1000 pounds, but that's only for lifting it a few inches off the ground. If you look at Jean Baldwin's CS, you can see the max lifting weight section is meant to indicate how much you can lift above your head, not just off the ground. Thus why he went with 600 lbs as the tier 1 limit instead of 1000. I assume that's the thing you were wondering, as the tiers above 1 are pretty much arbitrary.

As for punching force, i agree it's questionable to use 2x lifting weight for everyone, even those people with significant training. I suppose it's only a rule of thumb though, and the creators of highly trained characters should put the punching force into their CS after all.

Edit: several posts were made while i was typing this, so my comments might be obsolete.

[Innue]

Schradinger said
Well, what would you prefer? Should we sit down and calculate the exact amount of strength required to generate X amount of force with varying levels of training? The simplicity I was referring to was the fact that none of us here are physicists. We're not here to create a completely accurate picture of the forces and effects at work in combat situations. We're here to kick ass and take names, and have fun doing it. No one here is going to sit down in the middle of the fight and work out exactly how many joules of energy their punch transfers to the target. At best, they're going to give a general idea of how hard the punch is and just go from there. Setting punching power at 2x lifting strength avoids the absurdity of someone who can lift 2,000 pounds only being able to punch that hard (especially since there are real life fighters who can punch with over a ton of force, but not lift even close to that amount), while still giving characters with less strength yet more training the ability to maintain an even playing field.The simplicity is not in the reasoning behind the number, it's in the fact that using that number makes the whole thing less complicated to understand and easier to enact.Though if you meant something else again, please feel free to elaborate.

No, it is what I expected as an answer.

I asked because I was trying to find some congruence between my combat and RPG combat. It is just entirely different philosophies. *shrug*

Lalliman said
The deadlifting world record is about 1000 pounds, but that's only for lifting it a few inches off the ground. If you look at Jean Baldwin's CS, you can see the max lifting weight section is meant to indicate how much you can lift above your head, not just off the ground. Thus why he went with 600 lbs as the tier 1 limit instead of 1000. I assume that's the thing you were wondering, as the tiers above 1 are pretty much arbitrary.As for punching force, i agree it's questionable to use 2x lifting weight for everyone, even those people with significant training. I suppose it's only a rule of thumb though, and the creators of highly trained characters should put the punching force into their CS after all.Edit: several posts were made while i was typing this, so my comments might be obsolete.

Far from obsolete. :D

[Schradinger]

Lalliman said As for punching force, i agree it's questionable to use 2x lifting weight for everyone, even those people with significant training. I suppose it's only a rule of thumb though, and the creators of highly trained characters should put the punching force into their CS after all.

That's not actually what the 2x means. If a tier 3 character can only lift 500 lbs, yet has some ability that grants him extreme physical power, he could still punch with up to 10 tons of force, regardless of his ability to lift weights. The two aren't tied together.

If I'm being completely honest though, tying max impact force to max lifting strength isn't the best idea anyway. You can't tell me that Jean can only swing that club hard enough to generate 600 tons of force when she can fairly easily lift half that. The amount of force she'd be generating would be in the kiloton range. Professional baseball players, who aren't known for being able to lift great weights, can allegedly generate over 4 tons of force in a swing. Assuming they can lift 250 pounds with ease, that's over 32x more force than the weight they can lift, or in Jean's case, 9.6 kilotons.

[Innue]

Schradinger said
That's not actually what the 2x means. If a tier 3 character can only lift 500 lbs, yet has some ability that grants him extreme physical power, he could still punch with up to 10 tons of force, regardless of his ability to lift weights. The two aren't tied together.If I'm being completely honest though, tying impact force to lifting strength isn't the best idea anyway. You can't tell me that Jean can only swing that club hard enough to generate 600 tons of force when she can fairly easily lift half that. The amount of force she'd be generating would be in the kiloton range. Professional baseball players, who aren't known for being able to lift great weights, can allegedly generate over 4 tons of force in a swing. Assuming they can lift 250 pounds with ease, that's over 32x more force than the weight they can lift, or in Jean's case, 9.6 kilotons.

That is why I posed the question specifically in reference to the absence of that kind of ability, thus the lower tiers in my original question.

Also it wasn't impact force I was necessarily referring too, very specifically it was for a punch, not an item such as a bat.

[Schradinger]

Well if it helps, someone like Georges St Pierre would be in tier 2. It's very difficult trying to comprehensively answer a question that hasn't been asked, though (since there's obviously some other reason you want to know, beyond just the knowing itself).

If you don't want to voice it here, for whatever reason, PM's are always an option as well.

[Innue]

Schradinger said
Well if it helps, someone like Georges St Pierre would be in tier 2. It's very difficult trying to comprehensively answer a question that hasn't been asked, though (since there's obviously some other reason you want to know, beyond just the knowing itself).If you don't want to voice it here, for whatever reason, PM's are always an option as well.

It is very little beyond wanting to know. Particular answers significantly would have affected my relative interest in doing combat roleplay (in an Arena capacity) on RPG. However, the answer provided is exactly what I expected it would be. *shrug*

[Schradinger]

I see. Well, this is not the only place to RP combat in the arena, and the rules can vary significantly from thread to thread. You could even start your own and give it the rules you want, whether it be for a single fight or several.

[Innue]

Schradinger said
I see. Well, this is not the only place to RP combat in the arena, and the rules can vary significantly from thread to thread. You could even start your own and give it the rules you want, whether it be for a single fight or several.

I'm aware of both of these, but there does seem to be a significant amount drawn from this tier list by others as well and I'm not generally interested in crafting an Arena thread at the moment.

[Tantalum]

A few people here might be reading too much into those numbers. At most, they serve as a way of gauging how strong a character is at a glance. In-character, they aren't going to do anything.

If you're looking for proper rationalisation, LeeRoy might be able to give you that -- but as they're used solely for guidelines, I personally don't think the rationalisation matters (so long as the actual characters aren't as vague). I guess it should also be said that the tier system being referenced in (most) other threads was from before the new Guild, and wasn't tiered by stats and numbers in the way that this system is.

All in all, I'd really hope that this isn't what's turning yourself (and possibly others) away from this tiny corner of RPG, we're a small enough group as it is =S.

[Innue]

Tantalum said
A few people here might be reading too much into those numbers. At most, they serve as a way of gauging how strong a character is at a glance. In-character, they aren't going to do anything.If you're looking for proper rationalisation, LeeRoy might be able to give you that -- but as they're used solely for guidelines, I personally don't think the rationalisation matters (so long as the actual characters aren't as vague). I guess it should also be said that the tier system being referenced in (most) other threads was from before the new Guild, and wasn't tiered by stats and numbers in the way that this system is.All in all, I'd really hope that this isn't what's turning yourself (and possibly others) away from this tiny corner of RPG, we're a small enough group as it is =S.

I will be incredibly frank then. At least with the way RPG is doing, and has done, its tiering does turn me off from participating in it.

In regards to the numbers, if they are as loose as you say they are, why even bother utilizing them?

The clarification that it lacked the numbers in the previous guild (which I could not recall) incarnation is good to know.

[LeeRoy]

Tantalum hit the nail on the head there.

Also, I've made the initial post.

The list of battlegrounds is the second post in the main OOC thread, check those out so you can see what battlefields we'll be using.

All people who wish to participate in the RP should finish posting their character sheets.

Also, Innue, if you're gonna make persistent criticisms about an RP that you're not participating in then you have all rights to leave.

[Innue]

LeeRoy said
Tantalum hit the nail on the head there.Also, I've made the initial post.The list of battlegrounds is the second post in the main OOC thread, check those out so you can see what battlefields we'll be using. All people who wish to participate in the RP should finish posting their character sheets.Also, Innue, if you're gonna make persistent criticisms about an RP that you're not participating in then you have all rights to leave.

I generally ask questions before deciding if I will participate in a roleplay to better understand it. In no way was it a criticism to your thread, but so I could understand if this incarnation of an Arena would be fitting for my participation - I was on the fence and considering returning to doing combat roleplay.

[LeeRoy]

The current Tiering system that I am using is based on the Marvel Character Grading system combined with heavy influence from the previous 2 large scale Arena roleplays. With added elements to allow for balance among characters.

While yes, I could rightfully do the math and say that every single character can punch at about 32x their lifting weight, nobody wants to sit down and spend an hour or so doing math just to deliver a singular punch.

I made the system that is currently running to allow any character, from any branch of RP, from any branch of writing, to be able to enter without fear of being seen as broken or useless in this system. Every build is completely viable, and it relies entirely on the skill of the writer. Rather than just having a character be labeled as "Powerful" we have characters who have abilities and are remarkable in their own ways. However they do not outshine other characters without first proving that the Player can outwrite their opponent.

The Tiers are a guideline to gauge just how strong a character is, rather than to put them into a bracket. Look at the five bosses. They're all labeled as Tier 7. However, they themselves are not completely superior in every regard to a lower tiered character. The most notable example is Solomon, whose physical abilities are on par with that of a Tier 3, however his training and mastery of weapons places him into the tier he is in.

The tiers of the characters are the sum total of their combined abilities. The extremes that I placed as bosses are to show that you can focus on one stat and have it be entirely viable, or you can focus on all five stats and have it be viable.

I hope this clears it up.

[Innue]

It clears of the reasoning behind your construction of the system, as well as the background you are pulling it from, which is good to know.

My comments were never about the math, or the importance of it, just merely that the inclusion and execution of it were rather confusing for me.

I would like to reinforce that I never once criticized your roleplay and I am not particular fond of anything I've said being classified as such. If you felt it was, I apologize if my phrasing led it to be construed in that manner, but I do not have the historical background with any of the tiering systems utilized on RPG (or most others for that matter), as I honestly avoided it on the previous guild for very similar reasons (that and avoiding a particular toxin that migrated from the RuneScape Forums).

For now I will remain in other sections of the forums, I do think.

[Vordak]

Well, Tantalum may have made the numbers sound a bit less significant than they are. True, there is no reason to nitpick every detail - but those numbers still are related to real world measurement systems, which allows, in its turn, to compare a given character's abilities to real life processes. For example, how many Vulcan rounds does your opponent's punch equal to, and how your armor, which is ten times as durable and has the capacity to absorb about 15 times the kinetic energy a Kevlar vest can, will react to this strike. And if you do it right, there will be no need for any arguments at all.

Morever, it is just much more simple and neat when you write the numbers instead of something like "1500 trucks falling onto your face from the Eiffel Tower", and it is sure easier to compare characters that way as well, to knoew who will have an upper hand in battle. Seriously, even "1 truck off the Eiffel Tower" is actualy a darn unit of measurement, and you can be sure that a character who punches with 1 truck of force is weaker than one that can with 2 beacuse of that.

[Innue]

Vordak said
Well, Tantalum may have made the numbers sound a bit less significant than they are. True, there is no reason to nitpick every detail - but those numbers still are related to real world measurement systems, which allows, in its turn, to compare a given character's abilities to real life processes. For example, how many Vulcan rounds does your opponent's punch equal to, and how your armor, which is ten times as durable and has the capacity to absorb about 15 times the kinetic energy a Kevlar vest can, will react to this strike. And if you do it right, there will be no need for any arguments at all.Morever, it is just much more simple and neat when you write the numbers instead of something like "1500 trucks falling onto your face from the Eiffel Tower", and it is sure easier to compare characters that way as well, to knoew who will have an upper hand in battle. Seriously, even "1 truck off the Eiffel Tower" is actualy a darn unit of measurement, and you can be sure that a character who punches with 1 truck of force is weaker than one that can with 2 beacuse of that.

It's fine, but I don't really fit in with this structure and that is why I asked questions. Thank you to everyone who took time to try to answer the questions I posed. This isn't the place for a further discussion on the available structures and philosophies for combat, so if you wish to reach me, you can reach me via PM.

Good luck with the thread.

[Green]

Innue - A good way to ask question like that would have been to present how you personally would have preferred it to be, or whatever it is you were looking for. That way we gain some insight into the nature of the questions, and become more capable at answering them in a desired manner. Heck, we might have thought that whatever you hoped it would be was a pretty cool thing, and done some adjustments towards that end ourselves.

Tl;DR: Vague questions without additional information will never give you the answers you want. It's a give and take kind of thing. A two-way road.

[Goldeagle1221]

Who shall post first?