Discussion Main / RankScalesWithAsskicking

Linking to a past Trope Repair Shop thread that dealt with this page: Ambiguous Name, started by isoycrazy on Oct 16th 2014 at 4:36:37 PM

So let's just be clear; this isn't simply "person in authority is an asskicker". It's "person who kicks the most ass is The Boss".

• For that matter, all skills in d20 games are tied to level - so a well-trained doctor, for example, will automatically be a better fighter than a Marine right out of boot camp.

Removed that part, as knowing the system, it simply isn't true in the D20 system. Attributes, feat, class, and talents play a huge part in combat effectiveness in the D20 system. Although nothing prevents a character from being both a "well trained doctor" AND a good fighter, it is not automatic.

Detailed explanation:

A surgeon probably has higher mental attributes than physical ones. Let's take an ordinary dedicated 1/Smart 1 NPC surgeon surgeon with 14 Wis, max ranks in treat injury, treat injury as permanent class skill from Doctor occupation (+1 Competence bonus), Surgery and Medical training feats. This guy can take 10 and never fail field surgery, assuming he has a surgery kit, the conditions are correct (not optimal, just correct), and he isn't distracted. This guy takes a -4 to firearm use, because he doesn't have the proficiency feat, and doesn't have the armor proficiency feat. HP: 7, without Constitution.

A soldier fresh out of boot camp has the starting occupation: Military (and combat related skills to chose as permanent class skills), is probably a fast/strong or fast/tough ordinary, unless he is a technician/logistics/medic. He also gains a bonus proficiency in either firearms or light armors or the Combat Martial arts feat. He probably spend his feat slots in combat related feats, and his classes have better defense progressions that out surgeon. HP: 8, better defense, and proficient in firearms and armors.

A Marine right out of boot camp, by virtue of being in an elite unit, is either a mid-to-high level ordinary or a low level hero. Let's try both possibilities.

Strong ordinary 2 / Fast ordinary 2. 4 feats: Light armor, personal firearm proficiency feats, Defensive Martial arts, Dodge. BAB: +3, HP: 16, Defense: 10 + 4 (class) + armor + Dex.

Fast hero 1: 3 feats: Dodge, Personal firearms proficiency, Defensive Martial arts. BAB: +0, HP: 6, Defense 10 + 2 + Dext, + 1 against a specific enemy, +1 against CQC attacks, Evasion (can potentially have a grenade blow at his feet and emerge unharmed).

You know, the article on the main page treats this trope like there's nary a hint of truth to it; in reality, this can be Truth in Television. In martial arts, for instance, it follows that the more skill you learn, the more belts you attain, until you reach black belt (at which point you master the art, which is really like getting a Bachelor's degree, not that most works of fiction tell you that). Masters of dojos are actually a good Real Life case of this trope. Can someone add that into the main article?

Magmar Fire: I hope you can request trope name changes from here, because I, for one, think the "Authority/Asskicking Equals Asskicking/Authority" names are kind of confusing. Considering that the trope names are completely commutative in semantics, it's extremely easy to confuse the two pages together, in my opinion. Therefore, I strongly suggest changing equals to implies for both pages. While equality can be read both ways and still be true, one-sided implication does not, so it'll portray the meaning of the tropes much more accurately and less confusingly.

Seanette: Edited discussion of Romanov dynasty to correct a factual error. The hemophilia that played a role in the downfall of the Romanovs was introduced by the last Czarina, Alexandra, who was a granddaughter of Queen Victoria and was not a Romanov by blood. Hemophilia, especially in a time period prior to any treatment for it, is most commonly transmitted from carrier mother to afflicted son, being a sex-linked X-chromosome recessive. Any male (who received his X chromosome from his mother) carrying the gene will be affected, while the daughter of a carrier mother will either be free of the gene (if she got a "clean" X chromosome from her mother) or herself be a carrier (if her maternal X chromosome carries the gene for the disorder). In the relevant time period, a hemophiliac had extremely little chance of surviving long enough to father children, making it very unlikely that the male Romanov line carried the mutation in question.