Use of Huntmastery in book 6

[Dave]

Hi folks,
I'm garnering opinons on whether folks think the following interpretations are good ones:

#1) in sec 232 of book 6, you are in the tavern, about to either order food from the innkeep, or go to your room and eat meal. The footnote says

You should deduct the Meal from your Backpack immediately if you decide to head to your room. The ensuing sections will make it clear why this is so.

So, I've interpretted that as you cannot use Huntmastery to fulfil the meal requirement. But maybe Lone Wolf really would just duck outside, hunt down a quick meal, and then return to the tavern, where he has his next encounter. What do you think?

#2) Similarly, in section 253 of book 6, you go inside the tavern and hear:

‘Looks as like y'made it here jus' in time,’ says the cheerful innkeeper, pointing to a rain-streaked window pane. ‘It's going' t'be a rough night t'night, no mistakin'.’

So, I've currently interpreted this as Huntmastery not applying again, since it's getting dark, and it's stormy out. Now, maybe LW really *would* just duck out into the storm real quick-like, and actually find some kind of meal out there, and dash back to the dry comfort of the inn, but I don't think so.

If you *do* think so, would you also please tell me whether you think the Kai discipline of Hunting would be able to fulfill the meal requirement (provided LW has the loyalty bonus for completing ALL Kai books, but did not take Huntmastery in Magnakai).


Thanks for sharing your thoughts and opinions with me on this subject.

[cormacbamc]

#1: No hunting:
Oddly, do you even eat the meal at the subsequent section? I guess you do, since you aren't prompted to do so. But, isn't the situation a little... pre-emptive of any eating? The wording of the subsequent section doesn't even say "eat a Meal", it says "think about how and whether you're gonna eat a Meal", basically. But you do deduct it... So you can't even use the discipline in that section, because the situation requiring the consumption of a Meal hasn't been triggered. You can't pre-eat Meals to stave off hunger ahead of time, so you can't pre-Hunt here either. It's obviously not assumed that Hunting/Huntmastery is done ahead of time- in fact, there are situations where having it explicitly prepares you for a time with no food (the book 2 post-shipwreck immediately comes to mind) but absent those situations you aren't preparing because you either can't or won't.

#2: No hunting: I have always been vaguely uncomfortable with Hunting usage when in a city environment, and I'd say that if things are even remotely adverse, what are you gonna do, wander all the way back out of the city for a while? Again, there's a can't or won't situation here that takes arguing to even sound right.

[Pike]

Have you ever considered adding a "Use intelligent hunting" option to match the other options, that way you could be fairly restrictive about hunting usage but people would still have the option of playing to the letter of the rules?

IMHO I think both sections in the OP should require actual meals not hunting, since I'm not sure what the loyalty bonus is I won't attempt to answer the second part.

There's also a similar dilemma in book 1 section 168 where LW is hiding on the roof of a moving carriage but can still use hunting (maybe he has a lasso!).

[Dave]

Pike,
Thet loyalty bonus is simply this: If LW played all of the Kai books 1-5, he can use Hunting to get a Meal when the text says "eat a meal", just like Huntmastery. He still doesn't gain the ability to move quickly, not be surprised, etc. but can gain some free meals.

He can't use this bonus in areas of wasteland or desert, however. For LW to get free meals there, he would have to actually have Huntmastery. That's all I was referring to in the OP.

[kamikaze1900666]

Hunting for both instances would be disabled in my opinion- the immediate environment and time-frame isn't very permissible for a general hunt.

The way I always pictured part of the upgrade from Hunting to Huntmastery, however, was that LW would be able to catch a rat to eat or notice some edible berries on a vine tangled in the deep branches of a decorative bush when in a more urban setting. I do recall in book 11, it specifically says in one instance that you definitely cannot use Huntmastery to fulfill a meal requirement for one section in that book (riding in speeding chariots)- perhaps others would mention when it's not an option?

[altwren]

Maybe the innkeeper has a cat.

[Dave]

Sept 2, 2010 16:35:44 GMT altwren said:

Maybe the innkeeper has a cat.

Or, do you mean, the innkeeper had a cat.

-------------

Lone Wolf : "Tastes like chicken..."

[norshire]

I don't read Hunting/Huntmastery as "It's time to eat; let's go hunt down a nice juicy rabbit!", I read it as LW having the skills to bag a rabbit or marsh-bird or whatever while he's riding, and then at meal-time, he has the tasty rabbit just waiting to be eaten (or maybe he ate it earlier and isn't going to be weak with hunger in the "Eat a Meal" section after all).

I have a similar problem with the places where the footnotes say "Hunting isn't realistic here" (like in the Maaken mines -- haven't the PA editors ever heard of bats, rats, mice, snakes, or other assorted critters that eke out a living alongside the miners?)

[outspaced]

norshire: But if you're catching food some time before needing to eat it, then you need somewhere to carry it. It therefore should become a Meal and take up a slot in your Backpack. Except, for "realism", an un-skinned rabbit should probably take up two slots; since half of it will be discarded as inedible, it must take up twice as much space as a regular Special Ration.

Or more likely, the simplified rules system used in the books really does mean that use of Hunting now means using Hunting now. And the text of the Hunting Discipline does say: "He will always be able to hunt for food for himself except in areas of wasteland and desert." As caverns/dungeons/mines/urban areas are not a "natural environment" where one can just go hunting for food when hungry, we added the footnotes.

Of course, anyone is free to ignore it--the books are supposed to be played/read/enjoyed, and everyone can interpret the rules differently. But it wasn't done on a whim; we did think long and hard before adding those footnotes.

[altwren]

Sept 3, 2010 16:10:45 GMT outspaced said:

Except, for "realism", an un-skinned rabbit should probably take up two slots; since half of it will be discarded as inedible, it must take up twice as much space as a regular Special Ration.

Oh, don't get me started on that... I'm still not over having to discard my cigarette lighter in FW so I could pick up a 10 foot tow-chain