D&D 5E I for one hope we don't get "clarification" on many things.

[Sunseeker]

I have the exact opposite opinion. The rules should be as clear and concise as possible with as little room for interpretation as possible.

I agree. Unless there is a particular need for something to be vague and be left to DM hands, rules should be rules: concise, specific, hard. If there is a single rule attempting to cover a large area of the game, I understand that it should be as loose as possible in order to fit a variety of circumstances, however that doesn't mean it needs to be unclear, lengthy or vague.

I do understand that 5th is to a large extent trying to be "everyone's game" and that calls for a certain degree of flexibility to the rules. While flexible rules are certainly possible, being flexible is no excuse for them to be unclear, vague, fiddly or lengthy.

I prefer rules to be rules. Without them, what am I paying WOTC for if I have to figure it out on my own?

 

[Mirtek]

I absolutely am in favor of rulings over rules, because (unlike with board games) the last thing I want at the table is for my players to be thinking about rules.
This is just as true for organized play.

And for that the rules need to be clear, especially in organized play. The last thing we need in organized play is DM1 ruling hide works like this and DM 2 ruling hide works like that. In OP a player needs to be able to go from table to table and have the same rules applying in the same way

If only this were true. I mean seriously, they're known for having unclear instructions, with few to zero words, and really sketchy vague diagrams supposedly showing movement of pieces in awkward ways. Daily Mail even did an entire joke article headline on it.

Maybe Ikea Germany does it better, but I had never problems. I have two left hands when it comes to do-it-yourself and don't even dare to just exchange a lamp for a new one (urg, electricity! HELP!), but I never had trouble putting something from Ikea together. Sure, I might need 2h instead of 45 mins like it said in the manual, but that's do to my ineptness of putting into reality what's shown in the manual, not due to not understanding what is shown there

 

[Afrodyte]

Words of wisdom.


See rule zero. Which, I now suspect, should be followed by another rule: the GM may not say "no."

It's a Catch-22 really; keep the rules light and your GM can run the game faster, unless you have a bad GM. Make the rules heavy and your GM doesn't need to make a judgment, but you'll spend a lot of time looking through books instead of playing.

In addition, it makes the game less appealing to anybody who has a full-time job, a family, and a social life outside of D&D. For many (most?) people who would be DMing D&D, free time is at a premium. Fewer people these days have the time to master a complex ruleset and work on the worldbuilding and storytelling elements that appeal to current and potential DMs. Most of the time when I DM, all I really need is a general idea of how things work and maybe a few suggestions to facilitate decision-making. Too many fiddly bits make a system far too cumbersome to be enjoyable, and I'm at a phase in my life where I'd rather not game at all than play a game I don't enjoy.

 

[DEFCON 1]

I prefer rules to be rules. Without them, what am I paying WOTC for if I have to figure it out on my own?

Assuming you bought the 5E Player's Handbook... you're paying WotC for the Player's Handbook. Everything that is written down on all those pages is what you bought. If you didn't like some of the things written there... well, not much can be done about it now, is there? Short of returning the book that is.

Which is why when people talk about what they feel is lack of rules clarity and they say "I'm not paying WotC to do their work for them"... yes, as a matter of fact you are. When you buy the 5E Player's Handbook (or any rulebook for that matter) you are only buying that which is contained with in. Nothing more. Nothing less. And if certain parts are lacking in the clarity to which you want... you either have to go ahead and clear it up for yourself... or you don't buy the book in the first place. It's up to you.

 

[DEFCON 1]

See rule zero. Which, I now suspect, should be followed by another rule: the GM may not say "no."

If you want to be a better DM (and roleplayer for that matter)...you should take a couple series of improv classes. You'll learn straight away the advantages and disadvantages of saying 'No' in a scene.

(Of course... the really fun part of improv is when you and your scene partner have gotten so comfortable with doing it... you both *CAN* say 'No' during every part of a scene *and still* have the scene work gangbusters. But that ain't something for the inexperienced.)

 

[pming]

Hiya.

If you were playing a halfling with a dagger and hit a dragon (clearly making the AC), how would you feel if the DM told you "I didn't ask for you to roll damage" because it made no sense for a dagger to pierce a dragon's hide? Combat works because we all know and agree upon the rules and there is clarification.

Apples to oranges, my friend. There is a whole section on Combat in the rules....not so for Social Combat (although that would be kinda cool to see!...I always thought "The Game" as presented in the Wheel of Time books and RPG was a really neat concept to incorporate into play....).
In answer to your question...I may be a bit surprised, and ask for reasoning, but I'd be cool with it. Why? Mainly because the DM is in charge of how 'reality' works in his game...not me, and not the RAW. After the game, I'm sure I'd discuss it with him/her and maybe point out the need for a house rule about creature size and minimum damage needed to penetrate or some such thing. This is a GOOD thing, by the way. It adds flavour and distinction to an individual campaign. It gives chaos and differing outlooks. It adds vibrancy to the entire D&D community...players and DM's at CON's could all swap ideas, stories, and all that other cool-azz imaginative stuff that *should* be coming from everyone playing. If the only thing "imaginative" discussed is what splat books someone uses for their campaign...well, that'd be just sad.

If you've made it clear how you deal with diplomacy upfront, that's one thing. But there is a concept of a character who can fast-talk anyone, who could convince the guard that he was really Pope Benedict and he shouldn't mention the visit to anyone, and that's not that outlandish a character concept as D&D characters go, so it makes no sense to you, but may well make sense to other people. The lack of clarification here, both inherently in the Diplomacy rules and how you're applying them is what's causing the problem.

I don't think it is "lack of clarity". I think it is lack of "player expectation". Right now, because of 3.x/4e/PF/etc's "lets codify everything and then publish 335 ways to ignore all that by taking a certain class/feat/race combo!"...the general player base sees it this way. They see "clarified" rules as something they can point to and say "I can ignore that because I have X, Y and Z". They have the opinion that, because the rules say X, and they have Y, that anything the DM says or does that goes against that, is somehow "wrong", or the DM is cheating. If rule X is sufficiently vague (e.g., open to DM interpretation), then ability Y is automatically open to interpretation as well. Ergo, you don't have all the "negative emotions" I mentioned earlier instantly popping up at the table because the player knows that it's up to the DM to make a ruling....not the player, not the rules.

I also firmly believe that 5e is actually built to be kinda loosey-goosey. Much like 0e/1e/(2e), the rules were there to be used as a structure for an individual campaign to be built on. Each game of AD&D that I ever played in was different. DM's and players had different interpretations of things. Those things were all easily recognizable, but still different enough to make me go "Oh! Hey, I never thought of it like that!", or "Wow...thats really cool! I think I'll use something like that too!". Some DM's used the "1d6/10', cumulative", others used the flat "1d6/10'" with regards to falling damage (re: falling 40' was either 10d6 damage, or 4d6 damage)...but everyone still knew what the base idea was; you fall, you take X d6 damage based on distance. So, I think 5e is attempting to go back to that state. It's like the half-way mark between a totally free-form system and a codified compilation of complicated circumstances. It's not as loose as FATE, but not as codified as 3.x/Pathfinder...it's somewhere in between. IMHO, this is a good spot to be right now for D&D.

^_^

Paul L. Ming

 

[Sunseeker]

Assuming you bought the 5E Player's Handbook... you're paying WotC for the Player's Handbook. Everything that is written down on all those pages is what you bought. If you didn't like some of the things written there... well, not much can be done about it now, is there? Short of returning the book that is.

Which is why when people talk about what they feel is lack of rules clarity and they say "I'm not paying WotC to do their work for them"... yes, as a matter of fact you are. When you buy the 5E Player's Handbook (or any rulebook for that matter) you are only buying that which is contained with in. Nothing more. Nothing less. And if certain parts are lacking in the clarity to which you want... you either have to go ahead and clear it up for yourself... or you don't buy the book in the first place. It's up to you.

I borrowed the book and am reading through it before buying. I sat down in the bookstore to read it a bit, but someone else wanted to actually buy it so I moved along. I also read through much of the playtest documents back when that was happening.

I never buy anything without significant research ahead of time.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

My philosophy is somewhere between the two extremes. I think there should be very FEW rules...but the ones that are written in the game should be clear and concise and universal.

For instance, I don't want to sit down at a table with a new DM and find out that it is completely impossible to stealth past anyone in their game only to move to another game and find that stealth is so powerful that anyone who sneaks immediately kills all their opponents in one hit and still isn't seen. That makes me feel like I am playing 2 different games. I'd like to play two different STORIES, not two different games.

On the other hand, the last thing I want to do is spend all my time at the table pouring over rulebooks to make sure we are following them correctly. The rules should be easy to understand, remember, and apply.

The stealth rules might be the most complicated rules in 5e. They might need to be, though. They are rules that will be used fairly often in every game and there are so many possible things that could affect them. Plus, application of them even slightly differently can mean the difference between a total party kill and an extremely easy encounter. This has been shown in the dramatic difference in the difficulty of a couple of the encounters in Lost Mine of Phandelver that have been discussed here. The main difference in the tables appears to be a slightly different application of the Stealth rules.

 

[Mistwell]

I think it would be useful to look at Mike Mearl's answer from the Escapist Magazine interview from August 21, 2014. He goes into detail on an example of why they tried to keep some rules brief, and more vague than some people would prefer.

Interviewer: "Do you have any other examples of what you think of as the DM’s power and responsibility?"

Mike Mealrs: "Our rules for stealth, which may sound like a funny example. But having worked on 3rd and 4th edition, creating a set of rules for hiding from other people and monsters that run without a DM, is crazy. You always end up with a situation where you’re standing right in front of the monster but he can’t see you, because there’s a loophole in the rules."

"So we just came out and said you know what, let the DM decide. We’re going to tell you the mechanic and just say, look DM, does it make sense that a player can hide in this situation? If so, let the player make the check. If not, don’t let him make the check. If maybe, then maybe advantage or disadvantage, that covers the middle ground."

"There is this funny thing that happens, and stealth is a good example of this. If you want to make a rule that is DM-proof, you end up with a rule that when humans try to read it, it just seems really weird. It’s like the old Carl Sagan quote from Cosmos, “If you want to create an apple pie, you must first create the universe.” I just want to make an apple pie, why are you describing how to make a black hole? Because this is way beyond what I need. So the rules just take on this tone where it doesn't seem like what’s actually happening at the table."

"Instead when you rely on the DM, it’s more the human element, and the rules just seem sensible. You can hide, when people can’t see you. Of course, if someone can see me, then how can I hide? It just seems like common sense. Where, when you’re like, use the grid, and here’s the different gradations of cover, it ends up introducing all this jargon. We can take the simplest concept, like trying to hide, and turn it into something which looks completely alien to someone just reading it."

 

[Halivar]

The "what am I paying them for" argument makes no sense to at all. The entire point of playing PnP over an MMO is the DIY imaginative aspect. Most of the game is from you and by you anyways. I mean, you don't ask them to make your characters, do you? Your NPC's? They don't do anything but provide a framework for a game that you write, run, and adjudicate.

Also, you know what? I never actually read the Stealth rules in previous editions. Minutiae bores me, and I'd rather be gaming. If I have to crack open the book to research something because no one​ knows how it works, the rules have failed me.