Is house ruling fair to the game or gamers when first introducing it?

[Rel]

What if your friends end up disliking the game as you introduced it?

Impossible. All my games are fun.

 

[Mallus]

I'll try to be brief...

The rules aren't the game.

The experiences at the table during play are the game.

The rules are no more, or less, than helpful tools and guidelines.

The only thing that's unfair to players is failure to make changes once it's clear they're not having a good time.

This could entail both deviating from some rules and more strict adherence to others. Or not.

There is no singular game of D&D. There are campaigns. Which may bear only superficial similarity to one another, if that.

 

[Hussar]

If the game is to be a one-off then it's irrelevant. If it's going to be an ongoing game to be played - why would the players not be given copies of the rules or obtain copies for themselves? And also if the players can be reasonably expected to go off and play this game with others where they might be expected to know and abide by rules as written would you not merely be telling them what you're changing and why?

You write out your house rules in a format that you can hand to your players?

Damn, that's dedicated DMing. I'm way too lazy for that.

Then again, maybe that's why I do extremely little house ruling any more. Other than a couple of table rules (like shot clocks in 3e) I'm actually drawing a blank about the last house rule I've made.

Well, to be fair, if I'm playing a real rules light game, then I suppose I'm house ruling all the time, but, it's more along the lines of implementing and extrapolating existing rules rather than actually rewriting.

Way, way too lazy to do that much work. I'd rather switch systems to something that doesn't require me to tinker that much.

 

[Barastrondo]

I'd say that any responsibility to train new gamers to play in other people's games does not supersede our responsibilities to teach them how to play in our own, or even to make sure that they have a good time regardless of what they "learn." If I worry about people I've taught RPGs to going off and being in other people's groups, I'd hope that they've learned the basics of social contracts, give-and-take, and never taking a game far too seriously first and foremost. "Talk to the next group you play with to find out how they like to do things" is a far more important thing to get across than "in by-the-book D&D you will not have as many points to build your character with and you will get more magic items in return", I believe.

It may be selfish and myopic of me, but I look at my players as my friends first and foremost and potential gamers in other people's campaigns as a much secondary factor. Concepts of "being fair to the game" and "being fair to other gamers who might want my friends to play with them under different/no house rules someday" are present. But they're not as important as "doing my best to make sure everyone enjoys the game," much less more.

 

[Joshua Randall]

I think there is a fundamental difference between house-ruling a board game and house-ruling an RPG. (Even though I did mention board games in my first post.)

As others have said, RPGs practically require houserules -- or at the least, have a long history of embracing house rules.

But I'm struggling to think of a single RPG house rule so sweeping that including it would make people like or dislike that RPG, and removing the house rule would reverse their opinion.

Would someone ever say the following?

"Man, I really liked D&D until I found out that failing a skill check on a natural 1 was a house rule. Now that I know you could potentially succeed on a skill check even on a natural 1, I just don't like the game any more."

I could see how a massive infusion of house rules could change a game sufficiently that it played like a different game. And then people might not actually like or dislike Game X, they would actually like or dislike Game X + JimBob's 1001 House Rules.

But this is why I said, before, that I would only ever include a few house rules when introducing a game. A few meaning 2 or 3.

 

[Raven Crowking]

You write out your house rules in a format that you can hand to your players?

I do.

I even call it by another name.

 

[Hussar]

I do.

I even call it by another name.

Yeah, but, when you give it to your players, they get a hernia trying to carry it.

/edit for removing something that sounded better in my head.

 

[Umbran]

What if your friends end up disliking the game as you introduced it?

Well, then we discuss it. I'd find out what they didn't like, and if we're going to go forward, we see what we could do about it.

This is basic stuff you do with folks who are new to your table - be they new to RPGs or old hands, if you're using house rules or not.

Your questions seem to assume that we don't talk to players, that we just present rules and play and don't otherwise communicate about the game. My personal experience is not that GMs don't communicate, but more that it's hard to get us to shut the heck up.

 

[Raven Crowking]

Yeah, but, when you give it to your players, they get a hernia trying to carry it.

They refer to it as "The Good Rules".

I'm slightly more modest.

 

[Bullgrit]

Your questions seem to assume that we don't talk to players, that we just present rules and play and don't otherwise communicate about the game.

Not really. I am probably assuming that gamers either don't have a lot of free time to sink into trying games, (like me), or aren't always willing to give a game they've experienced another try if they didn't like it the first time.

For instance, I've tried Vampire the Masquerade, and I didn't much care for it. As I don't own the books, myself, I don't know if my not enjoying the game was from the game as written or from the Storyteller's style/house rules, (which he admitted he was using some, though I don't know what). My free time is very limited, so I'm not really interested in giving the VtM system another go, nor am I willing to invest dollars into buying the books to read for myself.

As for assuming things, it looks to me that more people assumed something in answering my question than I assumed in asking it. For example, it seems that most people assumed the friends enjoyed/liked the game introduced -- so who cares if house rules were introduced if everyone had fun. No one has addressed the issue of what if everyone didn't have fun. And some people have assumed I'm talking about a particular game, though I've not mentioned it in any post in this thread. Heck, I'm not even limiting the discussion to a type of game -- this post is the first time I've even mentioned an RPG.

Bullgrit