damerell

I've been reading back through some old roleplaying books, and came to this glorious take on encumbrance in _Dungeoneer_ - an RPG based on the old Fighting Fantasy gamebooks, and one which also had some serious systematic problems detailed in a boring footnote. [1]

Rather than listing specific item weights in kilos (no, really, quite advanced for 1989), they suggest that a Hero can carry 10 medium-sized items. Light items count as 1/2 an item, Heavy items as three, and Very Heavy items are more. So far, so good. Then we come to the examples of these categories.

Light items include a pouch of coins, a plate, an ale flagon, a dagger... and a domestic cat.

Indeed, yes. Picking up 20 domestic cats seems a totally plausible scenario. You may say, perhaps they are in a sack that someone else will open, or dead, but cats weigh about 4kg. I daresay Thumpface the Mighty can pick up an 80kg backpack, but can they really run around the dungeon smiting orcs with it?

Medium objects end with a smaller creature like a Dwarf or a Goblin. We don't know how big Goblins are, but we do know dwarves are the standard four foot axe maniacs. Ten of those seems ambitious; indeed, a dwarf PC has the same carrying capacity, so can presumably carry ten of their fellow dwarves. Axes and all.

What of Heavy objects? They include a full chest of treasure, a bed, and a creature which is human-sized "or greater". You will want a bed after picking all of those up, especially since you still have room for two domestic cats.

[1] The major problem is that in character creation you roll SKILL on d6+6 and that determines how good you are at everything, aside from taking hits (but since SKILL lets you fight expertly, dodge, avoid falling into pits, climb slopes, and everything, you'd rather have more SKILL than more STAMINA) and being lucky (but SKILL will avoid many times you have to Test your Luck).

Everything. There are a large number of specialist skills, like Sword or Climb. They all default to your SKILL. If you buy levels in them, they add to your SKILL. And to add insult to injury? You get as many levels to buy as your SKILL, and you can't spend more than 4 in any given skill, so if you roll a 7, you can at most get to 11 - using half your points to not even match your lucky friend who still has 12 points to spend.