3 ms·

Encumbrance record keeping was annoying pre-PCs but did any well known RPGs ever implement the D&D encumbrance system and thus steer players to carry lighter we

• hipadev23 3y ago
  It was common in Everquest. Certain races or classes had lower weight limits. Encumberence would get you killed. There was a certain gemstone (peridot) which could be carried in stacks of 20 and had essentially no weight (0.1 stone per stack) compared to 1 stone per 20 coins. . Peridot was worth ~10 platinum and retained most its value at merchants. So at higher levels people just carried around stacks of them.
  • jerf 3y ago
    Well, sure, computers eat that sort of bookkeeping for breakfast. Even now they'd "rather" track the location and weight of a million items than try to have one realistic conversation with an NPC that the player takes off the rails (which games don't even permit generally since the computer is so incapable of handling it). How many human DMs obsessed about it is an interesting question, though given the diversity of player and playstyles I'm sure the answer is quite non-zero. (And then there's the "cheat the DM/game either accidentally or on purpose" metagame that emerges has its own intricacies. "Hey, guys, I didn't notice this, but it turns out I've been hauling around a literal ton of copper in my small leather wallet for the last several months... whoopsiedoodles.")
    • smegger001 3y ago
      I know in pencil and paper D&D my go to move durring character creation has been to buy a mule and cart so I can pretty much ignore encumbrance rules until the early mid game at which point buying bags of holding portable holes and other extra dimensional storage is easily affordable.
• pavel_lishin 3y ago
  As I recall, Mouseguard has a physical space on the character sheet for items, and items are small bits of paper that take up that physical space. I haven't played it myself, but I like that idea. I believe that some computer RPGs also took a similar approach - I think in the original Diablo, you had to tetris your stuff in your inventory, which itself could be upgraded to be larger. Maybe in another campaign, I'll try this out, with weapons & items having interesting shapes that must be accounted for when storing in a backpack. After all, running around with twelve recovered goblin swords, five spears, and three shields is just not particularly plausible.
  • ecshafer 3y ago
    If you've played mouse guard, you may have also played Torchbearer which is a dungeon delving game that entirely focuses on your inventory basically. You have physical slots for items, like Diablo (potion takes 1 slot, rope takes 2, etc.) so you have this balance between trying to survive and get the most money.
    • pavel_lishin 3y ago
      There was another game I looked at where even spells took inventory slots - no more mucking about with "Oh, I have three 2nd level spells..." What you have in your inventory is what you have, period.
• Al-Khwarizmi 3y ago
  In TES II: Daggerfall, gold pieces have a weight which is not trivial if you're reasonably wealthy. To avoid carrying them around, you can open an account at a local bank, or you can have a bank sign you a letter of credit (for a fee) that can be converted to gold at other banks, IIRC. In ADOM, gold pieces also have nontrivial weight. There is an item, the girdle of greed, that increases your carrying capacity according to the amount of gold you have, and lets you carry insane amounts of gold.