Spells that simply shouldn't be at that high a level

[Sacrieur]

Actually it wouldn't, because rustling your clothes, or adjusting them is not an action. It's kept under the belt for quick access, as it takes no true effort, time, or concentration to make your bag available (even IRL with wallets and such).
You could make a case for it taking a move action, as a standard "manipulate an item" to make it out in the open, as this rule includes pulling stuff from a backpack ("Stored")....which I'd argue is a bit harder than popping something out of your clothes, but maybe I have quick draw feat, or some shift. Even bag of holding makes the comparison to back packs for its action.
(Do note that drawing a weapon is normally a move action. Making the weapon hidden doesn't even make it a full-round action [ie. double move].)

I advise you to read the Sleight of Hand skill.

Ah, the famous strawman. Long friends we were. Lovers, perhaps. But it was not our fate to be together, you and I. So, I must take leave here. I give you my best wishes.

If I did, which position did I distort to disprove and where did I assert that this that this position was then faulty as a result of that?

More seriously: a DM can do anything he damn well pleases. The monster he unleashed on you was not in the manual? Doesn't matter. The world is not the book. If the DM chooses to not enable fun gameplay at his table, he's not doing something right.
Hell, even homebrew, so long as everyone agrees, is 100% fair. Is it balanced? That's a case by case basis.

The DM is welcome to homebrew whatever rules he likes.

And, I never said, not once, "You should ignore expensive materials."

I'm glad you don't oppose using a reasonable and worthwhile game mechanic that is included in the core rules.

Who said anything about not following rules that others in the game are? And, as mentioned, it doesn't make you any more powerful, especially when you never used spells that required the requirement to begin with. But, only power gamers disagree with you.

It's unfair to others that you can ignore a rule that benefits your character but may not benefit their's, especially. Just because the DM waives it doesn't mean it's acceptable. There have been several threads in the past I can remember where a player has experienced frustration that another player wasn't following the rules and the DM just let them do it or won't accept that the rules say what they say. If you're going to houserule otherwise, it should be upfront; but simply treating the game all along like it's just not something that really matters is bad. I've been in multiple groups and have experienced this as a player firsthand, I'm not just talking about theory here. I've been there, on both sides of the table, and I can tell you flat out that only one group I was in actually said, "We're a bunch of power gamers so we just changed the rules a bit" upfront instead of me learning later on that the Wizard using his Limited Wish spell constantly wasn't actually paying for it.

Ah, yes, the Ad Hominem. Long friends...OK, I'll stop.

An ad hominem is an attack against a person with the conclusion that their argument must be bad as a consequence. I concluded their arguments were bad before I resorted to calling anyone a power gamer. And pointing out that someone's motives seem selfish isn't fallacious in the least, since I haven't disagreed with any legitimate argument.

There is nothing difficult about entering data in to a data base either. Try and find someone who does that as a living and has high job satisfaction.

I'd say this is the closest thing contending for a strawman in this post. You equated writing down a few numbers to spending 40 hours a week entering data into a machine, then proceeded imply because people don't like entering data into a computer for 40 hours a week, keeping track of a handful of numbers is too tedious.

And, it is not more "challenging", but more "tedious" than tracking gp.

Taking about 20 seconds a session to write down some numbers is more tedious than keeping track of multiple numbers that all convert between each other?

Hell, people even don't bother keeping track of other currencies, but just uses it as a portion of GP, if at all (1 CP is insignificant compared to >1,000 GP, and thus is often not worth consideration).

So you're telling me other people also don't follow the rules and the DM waives it over. If that's how he wants to houserule it, that's fine, but don't tell me that's how the game should be played because it isn't.

I keep track of every copper the PCs spend and regularly audit their sheets so they have the the legitimate amounts. And I have found pretty large discrepancies not because of cheating, but merely from mistakes in keeping track of it. Discrepencies as large as 100's of gp, and this group is very good with numbers and paying attention to detail. In any case, I'm going to keep following the rules on this and not waive over this mundane aspects for DM reasons that would take too long to explain and would be off topic.

And it takes demonsterably more time and effort to track individual spell components than GP. For both hard and digital versions.
Situation 1, Tracks just GP: action 1) finds out he needs to use x GP. Action 2) Get your character sheet out/pull it up. Action 3) Find a pencil, or move your curser to the appropriate section [scrolling portion of the digital version factored into action 2]. Action 4) memorize, or write down your current value. Action 5) Do maths. Action 6) Delete the old number. Action 7) Insert new number. Action 8) None, or add item to character sheet, depending on what's going on.

That's maybe 10-20 seconds of minimal effort, tops.

Situation 2, micro manages spell components: All of Situation 1, for buying the spell component. Then, all of situation 1, again, for when you use the spell component, but add +1 action for searching a list of other spell components between 2 and 3.

It's not micromanaging. I'm not telling them where to put it on their sheet and how to put it on their sheet. It's simply managing.

There, done. And before you say "Oh, consumables". Ask yourself, how often do you use consumables, and how often do you cast spells as a spell caster.

Food is the one thing I did simplify because it does very often needlessly bogged down the game during traveling (so I created a basic ration pack that costs a standard amount everywhere). It retains balance while removing some of the more boring aspects out of the equation. The reason I kept it in the game is because there are races which don't have to eat or drink and this is factored into their CR as a racial trait.

Ah, Strawma..right, I said I'd stop.
No one had said they were surprised others do this. Not a single person. People were only saying that they don't like it. And it's tedious, not difficult.

You just said you had a problem with power gamers, but I appreciate that you came around to seeing the light. Again, no one recommended cheating.

I think we're getting off topic and I'm getting carried away so I'll reassert the original position.

It's unreasonable to say that casters are overpowered while simultaneously ignoring many of the restrictions that go with casting. This is to say if you're applying houserules to change the game's balance, then you can't argue that the unaltered game is imbalanced from your own experiences.


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If you'll notice, I was one of those people that said there's nothing wrong with tracking expensive components as the rules call for. It is indeed a fairly simple task.

Then I'm glad we're in agreement.

The frustration comes from you, and people like you, conflating the terms powergamer, munchkin, cheater, and optimizer.

A player who simply marks off the necessary gp from his sheet when he casts such a spell when that's something his DM allows isn't cheating. Neither is he being a munchkin or even, necessarily, powergaming. He's working within his DM's (possibly ill-advised) houserules.

Okay I got carried away; you're right.

Most of the people invoking grod's law upthread were almost certainly confused and thought you meant you enforced -all- material components being tracked, which is indeed a stupid and ineffective ruling. Several others said quite plainly that they or their DM's expressly allowed them to save the paperwork and just mark off the appropriate amount of gp. You called all of them "power gamers" and apparently meant "cheaters." If you can't understand why that might ruffle some feathers, I don't know what to tell you.

If you mean cheater, say cheater. Maligning separate groups because of occasional overlap with a group you take issue with is a very quick way to alienate people.

I don't think it's the case that they should be upset with me for missing the repeated explicit mentions otherwise, but I can see why they might be frustrated even if it isn't justified. This happened in a previous thread where I recall someone asking for help and it turned into a long debate about what the original author originally intended. This seems to be a recurring trend.

I recognize that you're not accusing me of being at fault here (nor been a culprit in misunderstanding me), but I do want to make clear to everyone that understanding what's been written is important. In the future I'll strive to make a greater effort to be less argumentative, but it should certainly not be the case that after someone explicitly mentions something it's completely overlooked. And it should especially not be the case that they're at fault for upsetting anyone.

[SangoProduction]

Continuing this in the thread: Argument Thread.

[Svata]

Most of the people invoking grod's law upthread were almost certainly confused and thought you meant you enforced -all- material components being tracked, which is indeed a stupid and ineffective ruling.

Can't speak for anyone else, but I certainly did.

If you mean cheater, say cheater. Maligning separate groups because of occasional overlap with a group you take issue with is a very quick way to alienate people.

Seems he has the opposote problem of the one who caused the origination of Grod's Law. They would say cheater and mean something else, while here we see someone meaning cheater and saying something else.