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Thread: Combat wheelchairs
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2021-01-18, 10:24 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
I steal Signatures, and like General Grevious, add them to my collection. Or, I would, if there wasn't a forum limit to signature length.
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2021-01-18, 10:25 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
I also tend to think it would be more practical if it were a chair with animated legs. Then it would be able to handle rough terrain, stairs, and other obstacles more easily.
I am the flush of excitement. The blush on the cheek. I am the Rouge!
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2021-01-19, 02:16 AM (ISO 8601)
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2021-01-19, 04:17 AM (ISO 8601)
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2021-01-19, 04:45 AM (ISO 8601)
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2021-01-19, 05:20 AM (ISO 8601)
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2021-01-19, 05:35 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
Just to make clear the confusion, at least from my perspective, the homebrew assumes that the wheelchair is both widely accessible and that those using it do need it to adventure on par with those who don't.
It seems to me that there is a heavy implication that it's not something meant to be universally useful (as in it's only supposed to be used by those who can't go without it) so the fact that it is useful and accessible to everyone including those who don't actually need it to adventure comes off as strange.
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2021-01-19, 05:42 AM (ISO 8601)
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2021-01-19, 06:22 AM (ISO 8601)
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2021-01-19, 07:10 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
Ok, to try and put it another way; it's a matter of power creep and escalation.
- You introduce something into the game to account for a situation.
- The thing you introduce is so good that even instances outside of the situation would benefit from using it.
- In order to make the introduced element accessible at the point you want it, you make it easily available at some low baseline.
- Everyone who can benefit from it outside of the intended target takes it up en masse, raising the baseline expected power level of all parties across the board, to the point where NOT using it would be considered unnecessarily hamstringing you character.
Now instead of the Combat Wheelchair, say we were instead talking about Laser Pistols (DMG 268).
Why wouldn't every ranged character be using these from first level? 3d6+mod radiant damage is better than any of the other ranged weapon in the PHB.
IDRotF p303 establishes Gnome Ceremorphs are able to make these, so surely an artificer should recover one and then start producing these en masse to the point of everyone using this weapon.
Bags of Holding are far superior to the regular backpack. It would only make sense that there's a widespread market of producing and selling Bags of Holding to everyone possible. Why be beholden to STR based carrying capacity when you can grab one of these and carry as much loot or more than the STR based adventurer in the group.
Brooms of Flying. No attunement, uncommon, flying speed. Everyone should have these to be on par with flying races.
And on and on and on it goes.
As I said earlier in this thread, I like the concept and appreciate the effort the author has put into this idea.
But the whole thing has a 'my precious homebrew' vibe where they are more interested in pushing their idea rather than adjusting it to fit within the current power balances and existing narratives of what would be available at which tiers of play. It just needs more work.Last edited by Zhorn; 2021-01-19 at 09:54 AM. Reason: Blue text.
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2021-01-19, 07:38 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Jun 2015
Re: Combat wheelchairs
I am the flush of excitement. The blush on the cheek. I am the Rouge!
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2021-01-19, 07:40 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
If the technology (and yes that is the right word) to make these non-attunement items exists, than everyone would be riding in actual tanks. Quite frankly, these wheelchairs, which come at a relatively low cost, and are collapsible and carriable are better than a legendary magic item, the apparatus of Kwalish. Everyone would want to ride these wheelchairs, but there would be better options available for abled people.
And if you can make a so-called mundane purchasable wheelchair better than a legendary magic item, you had better believe that you can make items that aren't wheelchairs a lot better.
These wheelchairs are just there for a power fantasy of the creator, and like most self-inserts they have a disadvantage that makes them better than anyone else.
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2021-01-19, 07:57 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Dec 2020
Re: Combat wheelchairs
Just yesterday in Hong Kong, Lai Chi-wai climbed a skyscraper while in a wheelchair. He is quoted as saying, “Some people don’t understand the difficulties of disabled people, some people think that we are always weak, we need help, we need assistance, we need people’s pity.”
He is also quoted as saying, “Apart from just living, I wondered what drives me? So I began to chase that, knowing that there was a possibility I could climb mountains, even in a wheelchair.”
Regardless of what you think of the homebrew, I don’t think we should dismiss the idea of adventurers in wheelchairs traversing dungeons out of hand, especially in a fantasy game.Last edited by Kvess; 2021-01-19 at 07:58 AM.
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2021-01-19, 08:03 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
The problem I think most have here is not with the idea, but with the implementation. The wheelchair is a lot more powerful than it needs to be and is proposed as "leveling there playing field" between those who need and those who don't, missing that mark to the point that everyone would benefit from having one regardless of whether they could go without it.
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2021-01-19, 08:07 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Dec 2020
Re: Combat wheelchairs
Which is why I have been very careful to say that my comments are in regards to heroes in wheelchairs, not the combat wheelchair rules in particular. I have seen commenters in this thread dismissing heroes in wheelchairs out of hand, saying dungeons would be wheelchair inaccessible — which is one of the things that the homebrew Combat Wheelchair rules actually addresses quite well.
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2021-01-19, 08:45 AM (ISO 8601)
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- Jun 2015
Re: Combat wheelchairs
Which is why I stated earlier that if it cam up in my campaign I think I'd default to it being a narrative rather than a mechanical thing. Instead of describing your character running at the orc, describe your character wheeling at the orc. And like anyone else you can research or pay someone else to research to make you better and better solutions.
I am the flush of excitement. The blush on the cheek. I am the Rouge!
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2021-01-19, 08:49 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
I agree this is the best way to handle it. Stuff like this should live at the fiction/narrative layer rathe than the mechanical layer.
Looking at the Combat Wheelchair mechanics, it's really bloated with lots of stuff that goes well beyond leveling the playing field. The wheelchair is cheap and affordable despite being quite magical and also can be a mount and can be used as a weapon and gives advantage for various checks and still only costs half your movement to get back up from being knocked over and... well, I kind of stopped reading after a while.
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2021-01-19, 09:20 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
I don't think anybody did that though? It was talked about dungeons being likely wheelchair inaccessible and I recall one user mentioning that if a monster has broken somebody's legs they are likely to eat them too (I'm paraphrasing), but nobody actually dismissed the idea of an hero on wheelchair. I think.
Last edited by Valmark; 2021-01-19 at 09:21 AM.
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2021-01-19, 09:33 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
I was kind of making the argument that dungeons (as in "place adventurers risk their lives to explore") would be inaccessible. But my point is that they're intentionally inaccessible even to able-bodied people. They're loaded with traps and tricky spots that test your athleticism and agility.
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2021-01-19, 09:46 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
That's kinda funny, since "getting legless" is (or was) a slang term among my Royal Navy friends for drinking a few ales too many.
Not to mention a slight genre mismatch.
Valmark understood, and explained ...
Hence my first observation, after I took a look through the homebrew document. (My back of the napkin math was "very rare" as minimum magic item rating, which means "I get one of these after I've become disabled over the course of an adventuring career during Tiers 1 and 2" - but my analysis is hardly iron clad given the slightly mushy distinctions between rarity categories.
Bags of Holding are far superior to the regular backpack. It would only make sense that there's a widespread market of producing and selling Bags of Holding to everyone possible.
Brooms of Flying. No attunement, uncommon, flying speed. Everyone should have these to be on par with flying races.
But the whole thing has a 'my precious homebrew' vibe where they are more interested in pushing their idea rather than adjusting it to fit within the current power balances and existing narratives of what would be available at which tiers of play. It just needs more work.Last edited by KorvinStarmast; 2021-01-19 at 12:30 PM.
Avatar by linklele. How Teleport Worksa. Malifice (paraphrased):
Rulings are not 'House Rules.' Rulings are a DM doing what DMs are supposed to do.
b. greenstone (paraphrased):
Agency means that they {players} control their character's actions; you control the world's reactions to the character's actions.
Second known member of the Greyview Appreciation Society
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2021-01-19, 10:58 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
To me this boils down in part to not understanding the community for which this is intended. We know already that some people who could gain their hearing back, refuse cochlear implants because they don't see being deaf as something to "cure". I watched an interesting documentary on exoskeleton legs, and more then a few of those interviewed stated quite plainly that they preferred their wheelchair and had 0 interest in the new technology. That might not make sense to many, but it doesn't have to. Especially when talking about ableism, I don't believe I really get a say in telling a person what the ideal fantasy character for them should be. It might include cool exoskeleton legs, a wheelchair, or maybe just playing a character that doesn't have the issue at all.
So what this boils down to for me, is if you have a player who wants to be the charging barbarian, but in a wheelchair because that's the fantasy that's cool for them, then that's what is cool for them. You don't have to understand it, or identify with it yourself. It's not some agenda that you're being forced to adopt. It's just an option for someone who wants the character they're playing to represent them.
And, no it shouldn't need to come with a bunch of drawbacks because that's "realistic", because that's not how we do that. It's adjacent to the reason that we don't force a person who wants to be a 5'1" character to take a penalty to their strength. If someone wants to play a short really strong character we let them, because that's fulfilling some role their interested in. If you have someone who wants to play the heroic knight in a wheelchair because that's the fantasy their going for, penalizing it is just an underhanded way of saying "yeah, I don't want you doing this, so I'm gonna make it basically not worth it to do that".
One last thing. I feel like sometimes we get caught up in this idea of, "well, if I allow this one person to have this, I got to fit an entire industry of it into my world", and that's simply false. Maybe that character is the only person with that tech. Maybe they themselves made it, or they have a friend who made it, and that's the only person who knows how to build this. In that world, this becomes a tiny blip of an exception. I do that kinda stuff all the time with my players. I'm not a huge fan of the UA ranger who shape shifts into a tree, but I'm letting my player, play that class, and their loving it. It doesn't mean, my world my now contain a bunch of other rangers who can also do this. He's the exception. Their's 1 ranger in my entire world who dedicated themselves to the forest to such a degree that they can become a tree and it's him.
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2021-01-19, 11:15 AM (ISO 8601)
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2021-01-19, 11:56 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
Lets say there's a group where one person wants to play as a wheelchair-bound PC (and they aren't necessarily in a wheelchair themselves).
If they have certain mechanics in mind, or if they want to just keep it narrative and everyone is cool with the specifics then there's no issue.
If it becomes a headache for others or if it breaks their verisimilitude, then that group has to figure out what's more important: inclusiveness/fun of one or more people vs headache/verisimilitude/fun of another person or other people. Ideally they could work it out and find a middle ground where everyone is happy, but that might not be possible.
Spoiler: I disagree with the stance of "Your opinion isn't relevant, you should just let them do whatever they want."I think inclusiveness is cool but I don't think people have an obligation to be inclusive in their hobbies when it takes away from their fun.
Inclusive =/= not ableist, right?
For example, if a trail hiking group gets a new member who is in a wheelchair, are the existing members obligated to push/carry them up the parts they can't go up themselves?
No. If they did, they'd be pretty cool, but helping out is above and beyond their obligations.
If the new member was injured on a climb then they do have an obligation to help, same as they'd do for any member that was injured. But they have no obligation to push/carry when necessary to proceed.
The metaphor isn't perfect, but it's not central to my point.
Maybe I misunderstood what you were saying though.
I also acknowledge that I'm no expert on moral philosophy/social contracts, so if I'm wrong please explain it to me.Last edited by CheddarChampion; 2021-01-19 at 11:59 AM.
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2021-01-19, 12:22 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Oct 2006
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
FWIW, at our table we've given strength penalties to all smaller races (and other stat penalties to other races) because we felt that was something worth exploring - not for the sake of realism, but for internal consistency in our setting. That's not really worth discussing here (nor did it work out exactly as we'd hoped for), but I wanted to point out that something you take for granted isn't necessarily valid at other tables. I think that's the beauty and the curse of D&D; not just that every table is different, but that every table is different for different reasons. In my group, we've decided that creating any character concept possible doesn't give us a lot of value. Instead, creating character concepts within the constraints of our setting is what we're excited about.
I feel it's the same thing with these combat wheelchairs. Some want to use them because being able to have a representation of themselves in the game is important. That's not even a consideration in my group, and not the way we play the game - but does that really matter? If it helps other groups get what they want out of D&D, that's good homebrew in my book, even if I'll never use it myself.
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2021-01-19, 12:34 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
Avatar by linklele. How Teleport Worksa. Malifice (paraphrased):
Rulings are not 'House Rules.' Rulings are a DM doing what DMs are supposed to do.
b. greenstone (paraphrased):
Agency means that they {players} control their character's actions; you control the world's reactions to the character's actions.
Second known member of the Greyview Appreciation Society
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2021-01-19, 12:41 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Oct 2006
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
Yeah, I guess so - realism isn't a goal for us, but the feeling that the setting is a believable world that abides by its own rules is. Or at least that's how I'd describe it, I'm fortunate enough that the people I play with are all mostly on the same page so it's rare that it even becomes a discussion for us, hence no real need to label it. Well, except this one player, she likes sorcerers better than wizards...
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2021-01-19, 12:45 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Jun 2015
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2021-01-19, 12:47 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Texas
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
Avatar by linklele. How Teleport Worksa. Malifice (paraphrased):
Rulings are not 'House Rules.' Rulings are a DM doing what DMs are supposed to do.
b. greenstone (paraphrased):
Agency means that they {players} control their character's actions; you control the world's reactions to the character's actions.
Second known member of the Greyview Appreciation Society
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2021-01-19, 12:56 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Mar 2015
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
For me it's pretty much about implementation. Mainly, that the wheelchair provides too much of a benefit, such that non-disabled PCs would also want to have one. If there's some kind of industry that exists to make and maintain these things, then there's no reason the entire party can't be outfitted with them. If the wheelchair is a one-off, sooner or later it's going to get destroyed or lost or stolen.
The wheelchair needs to simultaneously be no better than being fully-abled and not appreciably worse. To me, that means the best way to handle it is narrative. You get around in dungeons in your wheelchair just like the rest of the party does on foot. How did you get that wheelchair up that small ridge? Athletics check = 18. Very nicely, thank you.
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2021-01-19, 01:21 PM (ISO 8601)
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- Sep 2019
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Re: Combat wheelchairs
It also depends on why a person's in a wheelchair. A few years ago I was in Japan with a group including 2 people in wheelchairs. Japan isn't very wheelchair friendly. One person is in a chair due to spinal damage from a car crash, and when we hit stairs a group of us grabbed the frame and carried them up/down, palanquin style. The other fellow has that glass bones disease, and can't walk without a walker or some hand rails, so he'd usually just grab a handrail and make his way up/down the stairs on his own, and just ask someone to pick up his chair and bring it with. He had a real slick titanium frame, it was very light! If needed, he could slowly makes his way up stairs on his hands and knees bringing the chair with him.
I think it'd be fun to use some tool proficiencies to tinker with a character's own wheelchair, adding some counterweights to help do the fancy wheely trick to go up stairs, or little kickstand things and E brakes, maybe some emergency inflatable floats.Last edited by micahaphone; 2021-01-19 at 01:22 PM.
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