Transition Disposition

Goodbye 2023.  Looking forward to a better 2024.

Here's My Beard ... Ain't It Weird?

I grew my first beard at 17 or 18.  I told people that I did it to look old enough to buy beer, but the truth is, I just wanted to look older.  The combination of being a short kid—my “growth spurt” between 7th and 8th grade consisted of going from 4’1” to 4’6½”—and having an extreme babyface meant that I always felt like my outside wasn’t reflecting the maturity I felt on the inside.  Not that anyone is actually mature at that age, but it’s the age when you really want people to stop treating you like a “kid.”

By the time I turned 21, I’d been repeating the “it’s just so I can buy beer” line so much that I had managed to convince even myself, so I shaved it off on my 21st birthday: I didn’t need to look older any more, I said, because now I am older.  Except ... it really felt wrong somehow.  I didn’t really care for the way my face looked in the mirror, though I couldn’t quite put my finger on it.  Must be that babyface, I thought.  For a few months I tried just a moustache, but that was disastrous.  Soon I was back to the full beard.

Now, many people say that, the first time they try to grow a beard, it itches too much.  Some give up entirely at this phase; others just perservere and eventually the itching goes away.  But I’m a freak of nature, I guess, because my beard never itches when it starts coming in.

But, for some insane reason, once I’ve had it for about 10 years or so, then it starts to itch.

The first time this happened, I suffered for a couple of days, and then I knew that I just had to shave my chin and start over.  But I was still scared of the babyface.  So I decided to go for a “General Burnside” cut.  (This is the fellow for whom “sideburns” are named.)

And this was when I realized: I have no chin.  I come by this honest—it’s my mother’s chin.  To call it a “weak chin” is being overly generous: in order for a chin to be “weak,” it must first exist, and mine ... doesn’t.  Once I had the full sideburns but a clean-shaven chin, I could see it instantly.  The beard was defining my jawline, and, without it, I just looked like a complete goober.  But it is what it is: every 8 – 15 years, the itching starts, and the shaving must be borne, despite the visual horror it produces.  The second time I went with the Burnside again; the third time, I did more of a Ben-Stiller-in-Dodgeball sort of cut.  Now we’ve come to the fourth time around, and I’ve done that again (mostly due to lack of imagination); of course, being older now, my facial hair is mostly white, so it’s not nearly as cool as Ben’s was.  My youngest child had never even seen my chin before (or at least not that she’d remember), so it came as a bit of a shock.  And pretty much all my friends and coworkers have had the experience of being able to say to me, at least once in my lifetime, “oh, hey, you’re right ... you really don’t have a chin.”

So that’s why I look the way I do this week.  Luckily, my facial hair—unlike the head hair—grows very fast, so it won’t take long before I’m back to looking like an itinerant hobo riding the rails.  Until then, I remain a stubbled, chinless wonder.  But not an itchy one.

[Our title comes from an old George Carlin routine that I used to know by heart.  If you haven’t heard it, you really should.]

Third Party Blind

Less than two weeks ago, I was listening to Election Profit Makers, and they read a letter from a younger fan who said that they were not going to vote for Biden because of his approach toward Israel, and they wanted the hosts (David Rees and Jon Kimball) to weigh on in that situation.

At the time, I didn’t realize this was A Thing.  Sure, I’d heard that there’s a growing movement in the U.S. that thinks that the government of Israel shouldn’t be allowed—much less encouraged—to wipe the Palestinian people from the face of the Earth.  I’d even heard that this utterly radical stance was mostly held by younger people, and that they blamed Biden’s willingness to just go along with whatever Israel does (including offering them weapons to do even more of it) on his being a very old man.  After all, blind allegiance to Israel is sort of an American tradition.  Because otherwise you’re antisemitic ... right?

So, sure, I knew it was a thing, and that it was mostly a thing with younger people, but I didn’t know it was A Thing.  But apparently it is: ABC News says it is, The Guardian in the UK says it is, NPR says it is.  So I guess it is.  Apparently it’s quite popular for political experts to weigh in and say that Biden’s pro-Israel stance might seriously jeopardize his chances next year.

So what did the hosts of EPM have to say in response to their young interlocutor?

Rees: When it comes to young voters saying, “I’ll never vote for Joe Biden, this is a, this is a bridge too far (his support of Israel),” I’m like: all right.  I don’t even feel interested in trying to convince young people that they should vote for Biden because Trump would be worse.  ...  I used to totally be the third-party, protest-vote guy.  Now I am much older than I used to be, and I see electoral politics now as nothing more than harm reduction.  ...  One thing I have no interest in, and I will not support, is older voters scolding younger voters for deciding to vote with their principles, even if I happen to think, like “yeah, good luck, let’s see how that turns out, champ.” I’m not gonna ...

Kimball: Totally agree.

Rees: I’m not gonna get on a high horse and try to shame young people.  I think that’s tactically stupid, and also demeans what’s so exciting about politics when you’re younger, and, for some of us, even when you’re older.  It’s like, it is a mechanism by which you can express your idealism.  And that’s beautiful to have that.

(For the full discussion, check out Episode 237, starting at about 24:20; the quotes above kick in about 5 minutes into that discussion.)

And I identified with what David is saying there.  First of all because I have totally been the person voting for a third party, and second of all because I’m much older now than I used to be, and also when he says that trying to shame people into not voting for third parties demeans everyone’s idealism, young or old.  Beacuse, here’s my dirty secret: I still vote for third parties (sometimes), even now that I’m old.  Now, as I’ve pointed out, I live in California, so I have a luxury that many Americans do not: the Democratic candidate for President will win my state, regardless of how I vote.  Therefore, I’m free to vote for the person whose stated opinions and policies most align with my own.  Sometimes that’s the Democrat, it theoretically might be a Republican—while I have voted for Republicans before for other offices, there’s never been a Presidential candidate who’s impressed me sufficiently to get my vote—or it might be a different party entirely, and I don’t give a flying shit if that’s a Green party candidate, a Libertarian party candidate, or just a raw independent.  Your “party affiliation” is just a box next to your name.  It means nothing to me, especially these days, when people like Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema can claim to be Democrats, and the Republican party still (mostly) encompasses people like Liz Cheny and Adam Kinzinger (I could actually see myself voting for that guy for President, depending on the opponents).  What matters is what you (claim to) stand for, and how well your actions match your rhetoric.  If that stuff comes closer to what I want to see than any other candidate, then I don’t care if you’re a member of the Monster Raving Loony party: you get my vote.

But, as I say, I have the luxury of living in California where I actually can vote my conscience and still know that it won’t end up screwing the country.  I used to live in Virginia, where the margin of victory for the Republicans was frequently less than 10 points; I did (sometimes) vote third-party there, but then again I was younger.  If I still lived there today, would I still be so bold as to vote for whoever is the best candidate?  Or would I succumb to the “truth” that you may only vote for the better candidate?

What amuses me most about David Rees’ statement (which so strongly resonated with me and which I found most eminently reasonable), was that I was watching an episode of Democracy Docket with Brian Tyler Cohen and Marc Elias less than a week later, and Elias said this in response to a question from BTC about third parties:

So I, I just got to speak directly to your audience, because I imagine your audience is a lot of good Democrats, but also people who have very high standards for their elected officials.  And let me just tell you something: if you think voting for Jill Stein is doing anything other than electing Donald Trump, you are wrong.  If you vote for Jill Stein you’re voting for Donald Trump. If you vote for Bobby Kennedy you are voting for Donald Trump.  If you vote for the No Labels candidate, whoever he or she is ... if you vote for the No Labels candidate you are voting for Donald Trump.  And I’ll tell you one more thing: if you sit at home, because you’re disappointed, or you sit at home because you think your vote doesn’t matter, or you sit at home for whatever reason, and you don’t vote, you’re helping elect Donald Trump.  So you know I’m tired of the people who are saying ... you know, “I’m gonna have a protest, or I’m gonna sit out ...”.  If you don’t participate in this election, and enthusiastically drag your friends, your neighbors, your family, drag ’em to the polls, make sure they’re registered, drag ’em to the polls and make sure they vote, then you are you are feeding into what Donald Trump wants for this country, which is a dictatorship.

(Again, if you want to follow along, this was the 12/11 episode, and the question and answer happens at about 8:10.)

And, if you don’t know who Marc Elias is, he’s sort of the epitome of what David Rees was talking about when he said “older voters scolding younger voters for deciding to vote with their principles”: he’s a balding, old white guy (not quite as old as I am, according to Wikipedia, but damned close), he’s a lawyer, and just listen to what he’s saying there.  “If you don’t vote for my political party, your vote worse than doesn’t count: it counts for the bad guy.” If a salesman was telling you, if you don’t buy their product, it’s the same as giving your money to burglars so they can come take your stuff, you’d roll your eyes at them.  If a realtor told you that, if you didn’t buy this house, you’re just giving permission to people to come knock your current house down, you’d probably look for another realtor.  But, when it comes to politics, we not only don’t think twice about this sort of rhetoric, we expect it.  Worse, we believe it.  And, regardless of whether it’s true or not, our belief makes it true.

Here’s a simple example: two Democrat groups (Third Way and MoveOn) have issued a statement about the potential new “No Labels” party.  An article says:

Third Way and MoveOn followed up Tuesday by asking the staffers to convince their bosses to publicly denounce the effort.

“We, the undersigned elected officials, recognizing the urgent and unique threat to democracy in the form of right-wing extremism on the ballot in 2024, call on No Labels to halt their irresponsible efforts to launch a third-party candidacy,” reads the statement for the lawmakers’ signatures.

“Their candidate cannot win, but they can and would serve as a spoiler that could return someone like Donald Trump to office. I therefore commit to opposing a No Labels third-party ticket in 2024 for the good of the country.”

Now, I’m not saying voting for the (potential) No Labels candidate is a good idea—I’ll have to make that determination when we’re closer to the actual election, but I will say that so far I’m unimpressed with any of the names being floated—but just look at this statement.  This is what oligopolies do: a small handful of companies in a space very aggressively lobby their customers against considering any possible competition.  You may think the Democrats and Republicans don’t agree on anything these days, but they absolutely agree that they don’t want any more players on the field.  You get to pick one of these two, and yes they’re both shitty, but that’s just the way it is and no one can change it so you might as well get used to it.

Definitely don’t look over there.  Yes, the UK has nearly a dozen major parties, 5 of which have 10 or more representatives in Parliament; Japan has the same, only with six parties holding 10 or more members of the National Diet; Germany has 8 parties with 10 more members in the Bundestag and closer to two dozen in total; France has only 5 major parties, but every single one has more than 60 members in their Parliament.  But pay no attention to those countries.  Just pick one of these two shitty options.  It’s your duty to do that.  And also not to question it.

Look, it’s perfectly acceptable for you to do the electoral calculus and come to the conclusion that, if you don’t vote for Biden, you’re throwing your vote away (or, worse, that you’re effectively voting for Trump).  That’s a lovely thing for any individual “you” to do.  But don’t think it’s okay to try to shove that down everyone else’s throat.  And maybe also think about whether it’s okay to just accept that blindly and not believe it can ever change.

While researching this blog post, I came across this article from The Nation.  Now, The Nation is, admittedly, a pretty liberal news outlet, and it should be read with the understanding of that bias going in.  But this article (which you really should read in its entirety) makes some pretty compelling points, which I will quote here.

The astute reader will note that I’ve been comparing Trump to Biden as if this will be the choice facing American voters next fall. But this is a false choice—a false binary that I subscribe to, but that many young voters do not.  ...

...  Many young people felt pressured into voting for him in 2020 because of the unique threat to democratic self-government posed by Trump. That threat is no less real in 2024, but this time around, Biden’s foreign policy is giving young voters a moral stance to pin their dissatisfaction to. And many voters of color who already viewed voting for Biden as merely a harm-mitigation strategy are wondering how the guy who ran against white supremacy now lets his team smear protesters who call for peace as equivalent to the neo-Nazis in Charlottesville.

Responding to these valid moral criticisms with “Well, I hope you like it when Trump deports your family and takes away your voting rights” might feel like a cutting retort, but it’s actually a schoolyard bully’s threat masquerading as a political position.  ...

...  But just know that your use of Trump as a threat is not convincing them. The people saying they won’t vote for Biden know that Trump would be worse. They’re saying Biden should be better.

Perhaps the primary difference between Marc Elias and the author of this piece, Elie Mystal, is that Mystal is not an old white man.  He’s not necessarily a young man either, but being a person of color perhaps gives him a much better perspective to see how this “strategy” is becoming tiresome.  The Democrats tell us that democracy is at stake ... just like they told us the last time, and the time before that.  Even if they’re right—and I’m certainly not saying they’re wrong—they need new material.  And they need to stop using it as an excuse to muscle out any other party that tries to horn in on their territory.

Call and response

Have you ever been listening to a podcast (or watching a show, or reading a book), and someone in the podcast/show/book says something so crazy, so outrageous, that you just respond out loud?  You know they can’t hear you, but it doesn’t matter: you just feel the need to correct, or clarify, or just answer.

This happens to me all the time.  And I often really do respond out loud.  This week, since it’s an off-week, I thought I’d just a quick rundown of my responses-to-the-air for this week.

There’s probably somebody in your life who you, you feel maybe you’re disconnected from.  ...  Maybe ... send them a letter, write ’em a handwritten letter and send it to ’em. They would really appreciate it.

— Cody Johnston on Even More News, “Santos’ Little Cameos, New House Resolutions, And EVEN MORE GTA VI Reactions”

No, they wouldn’t, because they wouldn’t be able to read it.

[Context: Even More News is the “in between weeks” podcast that goes along with Some More News, and every week they start with some wacky holidays that are listed on the various wacky-holiday-calendars around the Internet and comment on them.  This helps inject a bit of levity before they have to descend into the actual news, which is often hard to be humorous about.  In this case, it was National Letter Writing Day, and this was an easy response: my handwriting is terrible.]

And for Prosperity to be built, there is only one way only, Prosperity can be built.  Prosperity is built by entrepreneurs.

— Magatte Wade on Drilled, “Messy Conversations: Magatte Wade, Atlas Network’s Center for African Prosperity”

To quote Wikipedia, according to whom?

[Context: The Atlas Network is a web of “think tank” organizations with one goal: funded by the oil and gas industry (as well as the coal industry, lumber industry, mining industry, etc), they produce intellectual-sounding opinion pieces and “studies” that they then pass off to media outlets in order to spread the word that fighting climate change is bad.  Magatte Wade is an African native (she was born in Senegal) and she pushes the idea that it’s unfair to try to curtail oil and gas production in Africa, because that just keeps Africans locked into poverty.  Obviously what they need is for people to come in and help them exploit their natural resources, and that way they’ll develop their economies.  As you can imagine, this makes her a darling of right-wing talking heads (the first time Drilled used a clip of her rhetoric, it was from an appearance on Jordan Peterson’s show).  The sad part is, she actually has some valid points buried in there.  But, in this episode, where she challenges climate journalist Amy Westervelt to a “debaite,” you can see that she’s far more focussed on running roughshod over the arguments of the other side and “winning” the debate than in any sort of honest exchange of ideas.  She certainly isn’t afraid to play the “I’m from Africa and you’re not, therefore I know what I’m talking about and you don’t” card, nor is she (as you can see from the quote above) afraid to just state very shaky premises as “facts” upon which she then builds entirely unsound arguments.  What I found the most infuriating, though, was her tendency to just talk faster and more forcefully and just ... more ... than Amy.  This quote is from the first ten minutes, during which Amy lets her go on until she finally winds down; at the end of that, she lets Amy talk for about two minutes before trying to interrupt her.  She’s clearly from the “whoever talks the most wins” school of debate.)

[affecting nasal voice] And I would sing like this, which I never sang like before.

— Fred Schneider on Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me, “Fred Schneider”

Give it up Fred: we have ears.

[Context: Fred, talk-singer of the B-52’s and utterer of such iconic lines as “it wasn’t a rock ... it was a rock lobster!” and “love shack, baby!!”, was responding to a description of the improv game “Hey Fred Schneider, what are you doing?” He apparently doesn’t think he sounds like that.  This is reminiscent of Kurt Cobain adamantly insisting that Nirvana wasn’t a grunge band, or George Bush Sr’s response to Dana Carvey’s spot-on impression of him, wherein he claimed he’d never said anything like that in his life.  The problem with such denials is, you’ve been recorded.  We can hear you.  Yes, Nirvana, you are grunge (in no small part because the word was coined to mean “music that sounds like Nirvana”), and, yes, Mr. Bush, when you try to say “not gonna do it,” it quite often sounds like Carvey’s “na ga da,” and, yes, Fred Schneider, when you call out “hop in my Chrysler, it’s as big as a whale, and it’s about to set sail!” ... you sound kinda nasally.  You just do.  Own it, man.]

And that’s all for this week.  I thought you might enjoy hearing my (normally solitary) mini-rants.  If you didn’t, you can just wait around till next week, I suppose.

We All Need a Little Guidance Sometimes

The D&D community rarely shows concensus about anything.  Give them pretty much any topic and you’re nearly guaranteed to find an equal number of rabid fans both lauding and decrying it.  And yet, there are a few topics that tend to unite D&D gamers, and one of them is that the guidance cantrip is overpowered.

I probably don’t need to tell you, but guidance is a simple little cantrip that grants you or an ally a 1d4 bonus to one ability check within the next minute.  It’s a nifty bonus, for sure, and it’s nearly always going to be useful, but the main thing that the Internet objects to is that, as a cantrip, you can cast it over and over again, without limit.  In general, cantrips are minor spells where it’s okay for someone to cast it over and over.  Sure, a wizard with fire bolt can cause 1d10 of damage every round (or as many times as they can hit their enemy’s AC, at any rate), but then so can any twit with a pike.  A bard with mending can cast it over and over to fix a completely destroyed chain, or clothing which has been ripped to shreds, but since it takes a minute for every casting, it’s often possible that a skilled craftsperson could do the same job in less time.  This guidance though ... the Internet seems pretty convinced that being able to grant this bonus over and over is appalling, if not apocalyptic.

There is quite a lot of discussion out there that supports this claim.  It’s regularly found on lists of the most powerful cantrips: in the middle of the list, mentioned second, listed at #5 out of 10, all the way to #1 of 15 or even #1 of 20.  A Redditor asks “5e Guidance Cantrip is OP?” One EN World poster laments What, +1d4 to every check ever? And the Alexandrian simply says “Guidance is a terrible spell.”

Well, I don’t agree.  I think that what the Internet overlooks (or sometimes deliberately ignores) is that guidance has a number of important limiting factors.  And it further frustrates me that you can quite often see these limits being steamrolled over in popular streaming games, played by professional TTRPG gamers.  And I hate to pick on Critical Role, but it is the OG streaming D&D game, and almost certainly the most popular, and I find it fascinating that Matt Mercer, its very brilliant DM, is sometimes very obviously frustrated by his players’ over-reliance on guidance, and yet he often doesn’t seem to adhere to the simple limitations I outline below.

Now, I’m a firm believer that an article that tells you that a thing isn’t as bad as you think it is isn’t all that likely to be useful: it’s hard to dislodge strong opinions.  So I’d rather you consider this a list of advice, especially if you’re a GM whose players are overly fond of shouting out “Guidance!” at the drop of a wizard’s hat, but even if you’re a player who is starting to feel like you’re breaking the system somehow by casting this useful cantrip at every opportunity.  Remember these limitations, and maybe police yourself so your GM doesn’t have to.

Without further ado then ...

The reasons why guidance isn’t overpowered:

Guidance requires touch

You have to be able to touch the person you want to guide.  How many times have I watched someone on screen call out “Guidance!” when their fellow party member tries to do something, and watched the GM struggle to figure out a reason why it doesn’t apply?  “Um, I’m going to say you can’t use guidance in this case because ... um, you didn’t know they were about to do that, so you didn’t have time to cast it.” So silly.  How about, there are 3 people between you and them, so you just can’t reach them?  How about, you’re holding your spell focus in one hand and your weapon in the other; what are you going to touch them with?  No touch, no guidance ... it’s just that simple.

This is most applicable in combat situations where maneuvering to get to an ally comes with its own risks.  Definitely not applicable if the character is guiding themselves (which is a perfectly legitimate thing to do).

Guidance requires concentration

Absolutely no one seems to remember this.  If the caster is already concentrating on another spell, guidance would instantly end it, and guidance is hardly ever worth that cost.  I’m not saying that you as the GM should use that to engineer a “gotcha” moment: “haha! since you cast guidance, you lose your other spell!!” No, I’m just saying that it’s perfectly reasonable for you to remind your player of the consequences of their actions—perhaps “you know that if you use guidance you’ll drop concentration on your other spell, right? are you sure you want to do that?”

Most applicable in combat, but surprisingly pertinent even out of combat.  “Sure, you can do guidance if you want, but everyone will lose their pass without trace bonus ...”

Also rare, but if the caster throws out guidance in those situations where they’re worried that their party member might need help on an ability check, they’re then concentrating on a spell.  They either can’t cast another concentration spell at that point, or the ally will lose the guidance.

A more commonly encoutered limitation: having to maintain concentration means you can’t cast guidance on multiple allies.  That means that grandiose statements like “a spellcaster with Guidance can make their entire party better at anything they set their mind to” necessarily comes with a pretty big caveat: as long as they only set their minds to things one at a time.

Guidance requires an action

For some reason, it’s very common for people to use guidance on themselves during combat, to give themselves a little juice on whatever cool thing they’re trying to do.  And I have never seen a single GM object to that, despite the fact that it can almost never work.  Trying to use guidance on that Athletics check to escape the monster’s grapple?  Well, too bad: the Athletics check is an action, and the guidance is an action, and you don’t have two actions.  I suppose you could use guidance this turn and apply it to the Athletics check next turn, but do you really want to do that? for a measly 1d4 bonus?  Even when the thing you’re doing is not action, it’s rarely worthwhile to actually use guidance on it.  Let’s say you want to maneuver through the crowded battlefield to get to an enemy, and your GM says you can only do that if you can make a decent Acrobatics check.  Since the Acrobatics is part of your movement, you could use guidance to help out ... but then, when you succeed and get to the enemy, you don’t have an action left to attack or cast another spell.  So you’re probably worse off than if you’d just taken the straight roll.

Guidance requires it to be your turn

This is another thing that I often see GMs letting people get away with in streaming games.  Player A: “Okay, I’m going to spend this round trying to figure out the puzzle.” GM: “Okay, give me an Investigation check.” Player B: “Guidance!” Except: no.  Even if player B is close enough to touch player A (see first bullet), it’s not player B’s turn.  And they can’t cast a spell—not even a dinky cantrip like guidance—when it’s not their turn, unless the spell is a reaction (which guidance isn’t) and the situation fulfills the requirements of the trigger (e.g. you can’t cast feather fall unless someone is falling).  And there’s isn’t any trigger for guidance, because it isn’t a reaction spell.  So, you know ... no.  You can’t cast guidance on the player doing the Investigation check.  It isn’t your turn.

Guidance requires somatic components

Now, this one doesn’t apply as often, but it definitely is yet another case where I see people getting away with it on streams when the GM really should know better.  The party goes up to talk to a group of suspicious NPCs, and the party’s face starts to spin a tale to keep things from escalating.  Simple enough: the GM calls for a Deception (or Persuasion) check.  Inevitably, someone in the party will yell “Guidance!” Except ... guidance is a spell.  You’re a group of oddly-dressed, dangerous-looking, often only vaguely humanoid people, talking to a bunch of nervous, twitchy folk who are already a bit suspicious of you, and someone in the back starts casting magic?  Yeah, that ain’t gonna go down how you hope.  Again, I’m not recommending you as the GM use this as a “gotcha” moment; just gently remind the guidance-happy caster that there will be consequences if they start breaking out the funky hand gestures and mystic words in the middle of the tense negotiations.

To be fair, this is one I do hear GMs (particularly Matt Mercer) call out on occasion, as well they should.  I just don’t hear it enough.

Guidance requires verbal components

This is a lesser requirement, but the caster does need to be able to speak to cast guidance.  No guiding if you’re gagged, no guiding inside the radius of a silence spell, and I would at least call for another Stealth check if someone tried to cast guidance while they were hiding or otherwise trying to avoid discovery.

Guidance only lasts for a minute

Don’t forget that guidance only lasts for a short time, so any ally you cast it on has to use it or lose it within the next minute.  This doesn’t come up that often, but I have seen players try to cast it on an ally who was about to head off on a scouting mission (to help with their Perception checks), or one about to sneak into an enemy encampment (to help with Stealth).  But that only works if they can achieve the objective in under a minute.  Also consider that if the task takes longer than a minute to complete—say, an Investigation check to search a room, or a Sleight of Hand or Thieves’ Tools check to disarm a trap—the GM is well within their rights to say that the guidance doesn’t last long enough to grant the bonus.

Guidance only benefits ability checks

I mean, it’s pretty clearly laid out in the spell description, and I don’t really notice people trying to use it on attacks or saves, but I do think this is a pretty obvious limitation that should be more thoughtfully considered when people are trying to talk about how “overpowered” guidance is.  Guidance is hardly ever going to turn the tide in combat, and, even outside combat, saving throws are way more imporant than ability checks in terms of influencing game outcomes.

Guidance requires the caster to know about the ability check

This is a subtle one.  But, to take a simple example, I have difficulty imagining any situation where guidance could be used on an Insight check.  How could the caster possibly know that the ally was trying to figure out whether or not someone was lying?  Unless the caster is the one doing the insight-ing, but then you have the problem described under the somatic components bullet: your target is bound to suspicious if you start waving your hands around mystically while you’re talking to them.

At the end of the day, guidance only gives you a d4 bonus

Seriously.  It’s just a d4.  Sure, you can do it for every single ability check because it’s a cantrip—well, every single ability check made by a person you can reach, when it’s your turn and you have an action and you’re not concentrating on anything else and you have at least one hand free and you can talk—but ... so what?  As a GM (or, even worse: as an armchair game designer), why would you get all hot and bothered to an average improvement of 2.5 points on a bunch of ability checks?  Let the characters have this one.  They get so few pleasures in life, and those 2 or 3 points are not going to make your story any less challenging.  Trust me.

And this works in the opposite direction as well.  The Alexandrian, as much as I admire him, is going a bit overboard when he says you’re just making your party worse when you don’t cast it.  It’s just a d4.  Your party will be fine if you forget once or twice, or if your GM points out one of the reasons above and shuts down your last-minute casting.  Use it when appropriate, skip it when inapplicable ... it’s just a fun little bonus, no biggie either way.

And that’s why guidance is not overpowered, and it’s just fine to allow in your games.  Keep your players honest, but let them have fun.  At the end of the day, that’s what it’s all about, right?