Terrifying GM Statements

[lvalero]

In Spain we have the 0th floor and it is called Ground Floor.

[Skarg]

"Whoever drank the wine, make a health roll... at half."

Even the one or two people who made the roll were about to pass out.

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by Purple Haze

I can tell you from personal experience that the entirety of Europe and the province of Québec have 0th floors. I suspect that once again it is North America that is the weird one.

Ooh, for once we're weird in a way that makes sense. There is no zeroth year or really anything else. The first anything is the first. Funny how other nations apply the concept to actual first floors.
How many floors does your house have? Zero. lol ;)

[tshiggins]

Originally Posted by lvalero

In Spain we have the 0th floor and it is called Ground Floor.

To add to the weirdness, in a lot of places in the United States, we have what's called the "Garden Level." We use that for floors that are halfway buried in the ground, but which frequently have a doorway (with short stairwell if needed, but straight out if on a slope) to the outside.

This is distinct from the basement, which almost always refers to the level almost completely buried (although it may have window wells to let light in, for small windows up near the ceiling).

For buildings with garden levels, the elevator buttons sometimes look like this:

...
2
1 <-- 1/2 story above Street Level
G
B

Adding to the complexity, if the first floor has a large open atrium that extends to what would be the ceiling of the second floor, which is overlooked by a mezzanine, then the second floor is sometimes just called the mezzanine.

That means one of the buildings mentioned prior, which had a mezzanine, might have a set of elevator buttons that looks like this:

...
3
M
1 <-- 1/2 story above Street Level
G
B

or even this (though I've only seen this one, rarely):

...
2
M <-- Usually a partial floor that mostly just consists of the Mezzanine
1 <-- 1/2 story above Street Level
G
B

Throw in a couple of sub-basements, and you get:

...
3
M
1 <-- 1/2 story above Street Level
G
B1
B2
...

Add in parking levels below ground and you could get:

...
3
M
1 <-- 1/2 story above Street Level
G
P1
P2
...

And, of course, if you have no Garden Level, but do have a basement and then parking levels, you get:

...
3
M
1 <-- Street Level
B
P1
P2
...

I have no idea how those would look in other countries, though. When I travel to other places, I mostly stay out of tall office buildings, since I'm on vacation.

(Oh, yeah. In American English, "storey" is spelled, "story.")

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Purple Haze

I can tell you from personal experience that the entirety of Europe and the province of Québec have 0th floors. I suspect that once again it is North America that is the weird one.

Well, it's certainly not all of Europe. Our floors start from 1, but that's no less silly.

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

Ooh, for once we're weird in a way that makes sense. There is no zeroth year or really anything else. The first anything is the first. Funny how other nations apply the concept to actual first floors.
How many floors does your house have? Zero. lol ;)

There may or may not be a zeroth year, but there is, however, the zeroth hour fifteenth minute (0015).
Or the zeroth item of a list: https://gyazo.com/fe72015ac8ea99c1afb1989e73c62d52

[Flyndaran]

Originally Posted by vicky_molokh

Well, it's certainly not all of Europe. Our floors start from 1, but that's no less silly.

There may or may not be a zeroth year, but there is, however, the zeroth hour fifteenth minute (0015).
Or the zeroth item of a list: https://gyazo.com/fe72015ac8ea99c1afb1989e73c62d52

When I turned 6 months of age I was in my first years of life, not zeroth. I don't understand why certain cultures in certain contexts overrule that rule.
But to pull back to topic, I guess GMs that derail adventure to correct PCs' grammar would be terrifying.

[vicky_molokh]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

When I turned 6 months of age I was in my first years of life, not zeroth. I don't understand why certain cultures in certain contexts overrule that rule.
But to pull back to topic, I guess GMs that derail adventure to correct PCs' grammar would be terrifying.

Sorry, somehow I managed to confuse 0 and 1 while typing. Now fixed. I'd be grateful if you fixed it in the quote.

As for 'overriding': not really. Think of it: there is an integer of hours, an integer of minutes, an integer of seconds and so on on the display of the clock. There are 24 hours in a nychthemeron. The counter is incremented when a whole hour passes since midnight. No whole hours (zero hours) have passed at a few minutes past midnight, so it's the hour #0.
I mean, look at minutes: you don't have minutes starting from 00:01 and reaching 00:60. You have minutes going from 00:00 to 00:59:59, past which you go to 01:00:00.

Back to statements:
Your housecat and your [amphibious cephalopod] had a fight, and both of them are near 0HP now, with broken ribs and deep claw cuts respectively, wounded but stable. That's the good news about them.
(The party got nervous.)

Spoiler:  

Continued statement:
The bad news is that there's too much iron and crystals in the cat.
Further clarification:

Spoiler:  

A mnemocrystal (think microcomputer), an antenna and a microphone.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_Kitty

[evileeyore]

Originally Posted by Flyndaran

But to pull back to topic, I guess GMs that derail adventure to correct PCs' grammar would be terrifying.

Player: "Irregardless of that my character Jocasta will..."

GM: "Rocks fall and Jocasta dies irregardless of any defenses."

[ericthered]

GM: "What's your margin of success again?"

Context is important, but still.

[Humabout]

Originally Posted by evileeyore

Player: "Irregardless of that my character Jocasta will..."

GM: "Rocks fall and Jocasta dies irregardless of any defenses."

GM: Al Werid, Lord of the Eternal Lexicon and Bringer of Justice appears and declares, "For the flagrant use of 'irregardless', which is not a word, I hereby sentence you to death for your word crimes!"

More on point...

PC: I want to know who keeps making these stupid magical traps! I mean is there some guy sitting around asking himself, "what completely useless magical item can I make to hose people over today"? Anyway, I drink some water from the bowl.
GM: Roll HT-2.
PC: What? ~clank~ Nooo!
GM: The water causes 2d fatigue loss with the dehydration modifier.
PC: Dehydrating water?! This is exactly what I mean! What the hell?!