Whetstone and Chalk

grittier games can call for more realism as can games that do more tracking. Further, some folks (both DMs and players) want/need more than the "bare essentials" when designing dungeons and bastion spaces so leaving in those container types etc. can be useful for some of us. If they aren't for you just ignore them. I'm kinda tired of folks that don't want/need things I do want/need trying to tell me I can't/shouldn't have them because they don't need/want them.

Quote from TheGnome5786 >>

Carry some rations and water.

 

Plus how do you feed and water your horses?

Horses can pull wagons of food and water.

 

The DM does not need to disable Goodberry. Your group just doesn't have a caster with the spell.

Twisting a non druid character into something that can cast the spell is normally not needed and something better for that character can be picked.

I am firmly part of the "realism isn't fun regarding tracking supplies" camp. A lot of it is busy work, and as someone who has played Joel Hardin's Mogul to the end...busy paperwork is not fun for me.

Rangers & several subclasses can learn Goodberry, too.

Can we not descend into Simulationist VS Abstractionist gameplay style arguments? They are tedious and unproductive as edition wars.

Different stroke for different folks. Move on with your lives.

Quote from TheGnome5786 >>

The DM does not need to disable Goodberry. Your group just doesn't have a caster with the spell.

I am curious: how many times have you brought new players into a campaign where you are clear with players that tracking rations and food is going to be a thing you do as dm, that severe environments will be a common thing, how many times do you do that and no one chose to build a charavter that can magically create food?

Druids and rangers can cast goodberry. Clerics, paladins, and artificers can cast create food and water.

Thats 5 different classes that could prepare one spell and make the problem go away. Plus the Guide background gives folks access to the goodberry spell and shillelagh cantrip, which can be used by many other builds, since you can select int, wis, or cha as your spellcasting ability.

How many times have you seen a party in a extreme survival envirment campaign, and no one had a magical means to make it go away?

How many parties saw an extreme environment with possible starbation being a refular ocurence, and everyone said, you know what, im NOT taking goodberry spell?

The only party ive ever seen where no one had the goodberry spell was a campaign where the dm banned it cause they thought trying tonstarve us would be something players would enjoy.

Quote from GnollitAll78450 >>

Can we not descend into Simulationist VS Abstractionist gameplay style arguments?

Hasn't that been the focus of this discussion from the start?

There are a couple of basic ways of handling a PC announcing "I'm going to mark our path with chalk" (or whatever)

1. Let them do it if they have chalk on their character sheet. Keep track of how much chalk they use.
2. Let them do it if they have chalk on their character sheet. Don't bother tracking how much they use, unless they try to do something silly.
3. Let them do it if they have some other composite component on their character sheet.
4. Give the player a roll to see if they thought to bring chalk. Or let them use some sort of metagame currency to 'buy' chalk.
5. Just assume they can have chalk if they want it.

Simulationist play tends towards the top of that list, abstract or cinematic play tends towards the bottom. D&D isn't all that consistent though its default is probably closest to (3). There's an argument for having some exploration type tool proficiencies, and having abstract equipment kits (like component pouch), so a Spelunker's Kit would have a bunch of stuff appropriate for exploring caves.