Just make it up

Making stuff up on the fly is part and parcel of being a DM, at least IMO. If I need something non-specific (people, monster, item, etc.) I just wing it, keeping notes as I go so if I use it again, at least there is continuity. The only thing I have trouble with on the fly is names...and my players always want to know the names of everyone and everything they meet. So I made lists of names for that.

hunter1828

Grazzt said:

Like, when 3e first came out, and there were no rules in the books for underwater combat and stuff. "Well, we can't have any underwater games at all, and my whole campaign in 2e was based there. WotC ruined my game with 3e."

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Actually, my underwater campaign started with the 1e AD&D rules then dove straight into 3e, having retrofitted a few 2e supplements along the way.

The campaign is set in the Dramidj Ocean on Oerth, the World of Greyhawk. In the 1e rules, the year was 579. In 3e, it was 591. So, I created a new beastie, the hydrimera, to solve my dilemma. Part dire shark, part giant squid, and part feline sea lion (now sea cat), the hydrimera could expel an ink cloud which would turn its victims to stone. So, the PCs spent twelve years as statues of stone, thousands of feet below the surface of the ocean. To make matters interesting, granted the PCs the ability to sea and hear, while they remained immobile. They also shared a communal dream, each night. During the dozen years, the PC statues were first kept by a vodyanoi (marine umber hulk) then a deep elf (envision the aliens from "The Abyss"), who eventually grew in power as a sorceress and was able to counter the petrifying effect of the ink.

In effect, the PCs took a 12 year "nap"; being turned to stone in pre-Wars 1e AD&D and waking up in post-Wars 3e D&D.

As for undersea campaigns lacking support and rules, D&D v3.5 has resolved that, to a degree. Prior to the revision, there was the "Effects of Water" chart in the RttToEE web-enhancement and a plethora of third-party support with products like "Seas of Blood" and "Seafarer's Handbook".

Keep an eye out for "The Deep", Mystic Eye Games' upcoming undersea supplement, and "Boundless Blue", an aquatic creature collection from Goodman Games.

I've been gaming a long, long time

Of course I make things up! I have been caught short on time for a game and have created whole adventures on the fly, including new monsters and treasures. Conversely my players accept me as someone who "plays fair", in that I give the same sorts of advantages to PCs and NPCs alike.

Players in my games get upwards of 50 pages of background material before I start any campaign. Included in the packet are general house rules (which core classes andPrCs are in and out, new types of feats and skills, some known monster types, changes to spells, etc.) and deep background (social classes, short histories, major NPCs, legends, etc.). As one of my players put it, "Trees fear the start of a new Wombat campaign!"

Despite all the background material, nothing is ever covered 100%. As I said, I make up new monsters, new spells, new groups, add in PrCs, etc. Some of this I make up on the fly; some of this after much thought. Equally I allow my players to add new elements to the campaign -- whole new races, types of treasures, skads of feats, PrCs, etc., have all been added by my players, with my approval, of course.

Making up monsters, spells, feats, and the like is why I like RPGs over static rules games. One of the posters here compared rules to physics -- I can agree, but with a proviso -- for a long time the Western World accepted and used Aristotelean physics; they worked and explained matters as far any anyone understood. Now we are in a post-Einsteinian view of physics. Maybe the rules haven't changed, but our understanding of them certainly has -- in the end physics is not as stable a set of rules as might be imagined.

So yes, I make things up in my RPGs and I always will.

I don't make stuff up on the go. It's not like this was somehow limiting my imagination - I've got lots of 3.0e products, written by more imaginative people than me.

I like to use my effort and imagination to use and combine existing elements in the rules rather than make of totally new stuff. Besides, no idea is totally original anaway

I've been DMing for about 15 years, FWIW.

Personally, I'd much prefer to play in a world where the DM and the bad guys at least make a nod towards the rules, or at least applies the same sort of attitude towards PC's and NPC's.

ie - if the NPC's do things which are outside the rules because they're beneficial to the plot, then periodically the PC's should be able to do the same sort of things.

Umbran said:

As Mouseferatu says, we as players are not supposed to know in detail what everyone is able to do. Just as we, as real peole, don't know all the things that are possible under the laws of physics.

Nobody, in the real world or in the fictional one, is privy to the details of all the rules of the universe in which they operate. So, they cannot know in detail all the possibilities. That leaves a lot of room for whim, and for things to operate differently than you'd expect.

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No, but neither should the rules change from session to session. If you decide that it takes a 3rd level spell to do something then I as a 5th level mage should be able to research it and come up with a similar spell. On the other hand if you decide that fireball is 5th level then all of the similar spells like lighting bolt should also be 5th level unless there is a in game reason.

As I said, I also include house rules and that would include things beyond the knowlage the knowlage my character. If a DM said at the begaining of a campiagn that there are some house rules that might come into play later, and he was going to keep secret because it would affect the actions of our characters then that is find. The rules (even if just in a vague form) are there. Both my character and I can learn about them in game.

I don't like things that are rules busting just because it would make a fun encounter. It tends to come back and hurt the game.

Psions position is close to mine. I just had to many DM decide that the rules were just for PC and not the monsters so we ran into spells and effects that we could not copy or do even while the enemy where suppose to be of the same race/class and around the same level.

One example: We where working with another group. Their wizard was using a spell that looked real neat and seemed to be of lower level. We knew from in game effects that we where close to the same level so when that party was destroyed (forgot how) I took the spell book to learn the spell. DM said that the spell was usless to me even thought the rest of the book was not.

Saeviomagy said:

ie - if the NPC's do things which are outside the rules because they're beneficial to the plot, then periodically the PC's should be able to do the same sort of things.

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Absolutely I always tell my players to do what they want and just maybe it will work- theres always something (including divine intervention) which will allow normal characters to do incredible even impossible deeds.

Which basically means I ignore the rules on a regular basis and make things up for the fun of it..

I will certainly make up background & ritual magic that isn't detailed in the rules; eg there are several areas IMC shielded against magical entry & scrying much more strongly than 3e rules seem to allow. There are artifacts that don't obey any rules, too. However when I make up NPCs I follow the rules, which can be quite a headache in 3e. The 3.0 DMG tables help somewhat.