If I’m being honest, I ignore the weight values for items unless it specifically comes up or if a player starts hoarding things aggressively.
Exactly. Want to haul the locked chest back to town? Then its size matters. Want to pick up a dagger and some coins? Who cares, we’re trying to have fun here not micromanage inventory.
Yeah, encumbrance, rations, and even sleep can be too crunchy to deal with all the time. We’re making so little progress as it is! But they can be nice as occasional plot points.
Yup. Same goes for temp/hunger/thirst. Unless the environment creates a situation that directly challenges that, like arctic conditions, desert, underwater, extended covert ops etc., these things do not serve the story and get in the way.
Plus, a bag of holding neatly side-steps a lot of encumbrance problems and I firmly believe that’s why it’s been a part of D&D lore since at least 2nd ed.
Meanwhile, if the table wants to go deep simulation on all this, the rules are there for that. But I wish everyone good luck with fighting monsters up close in a cave where weapons bigger than daggers are too large to swing, and heavy armor too bulky to be practical.
Alexander could easily cut through that bullshit. /s
My assumption is they meant a much thicker rope, but yeah, definitely not as heavy as they say.
Thicker rope would presumably have a higher test value though, and it seems that most people interpret the hempen rope in 5e as being under 800-test.
Yeah I wouldn’t even call that rope. Cord, perhaps, but it seems too thin to be called rope.
Modern climbing ropes are still less than 10lbs at four times the length. Not sure how the density compares, but it’s not 4 times denser either.
I imagine that D&D uses a similar encumbrance system to project zomboid. Those values don’t only represent weight, but the actual “encumbrance” of the item which sort of takes into account weight, the volume of the object and how awkward it is to hold.
But even then it feels too heavy for rope
I once bought 2cm thick hemp rope for reenactment purposes (can’t recommend, it’s worse than nylon and costs more and maintaining it sucks).
I don’t have any spare, but I chucked some on a scale, and it seems to be about 250 grams per meter, for about 8.5lbs per 50ft.
So D&D rope is even thicker, or its tarred (which you absolutely should do if you dislike drying rope).
Oh come on everyone loves maintaining their ropes, it’s a classic hobby. Wake up, churn your butter, maintain your rope, then it’s time to roast some chicory for your morning coffee.
- Braided, not twisted.
- Manila not hemp.
- Go ahead and try to climb that rope with bare hands.
