Missing Rules

[dave2008]

Just look at general athletics section. There was no reason other than deliberate to list only climbing, jumping and swimming.

Poor word choice / organization is a plausible reason. Have you asked in Sage Advice? It is an easy enough fix that it might be corrected in the next printing if you point it out. This could be a case of RAW and RAI are not lined up and they do want to try and correct those when they can. Let them know.

 

[Maxperson]

I really do need to get proficiency in investigation/reading someday. Never mind.

No worries! We've all misread things here.

 

[Maxperson]

For me a claim that rules are in some sense inferior to rulings is extraordinary, and important. The D&D rules are foundational to the D&D game - the game literally would not exist, were it not for those rules. Thus I am not content with the appeal you are making, because I think it misrepresents the authority in question, and because I think we're able to add worthwhile thinking to what they have said. Especially by considering the work of philosophers on rules and meaning.

Hence I don't believe it was the project of the designers to make rules inferior to rulings. For one thing, that contradicts the commercial intent of professional designers, who, ultimately, are designing products for use. Their livelihood depends on the value of the rules and narratives they sell.

This is a nuanced argument, and while I'm trenchant in debating it, I do so to learn. I'm interested in why some DMs have taken designer comments that amount to authorising DM fiat, to argue for an absence of concrete meaning in any of the D&D RAW. If that is what they are doing?

Rules cannot be equal to rulings. Rulings must trump rules in order for the game to work the way that it does. If the DM can overrule a rule and change it, the rule is automatically inferior to that ruling, otherwise the DM could not change it. If the rules were equal or superior, the DM would be constrained to follow them like we do with board games.

5e focuses on rulings over rules by making lots of the rules vague, and setting the game up for the DM to decide a lot of things like how to jump farther, how much farther the PC can possibly jump, and what DCs to assign the attempt.

In that vein, your comments have definitely influenced me, positively. I like your suggestion of "including" for the Athletics rules, and I absolutely endorse a position that DMs can - and should - alter or ignore rules. I agree with your heads up that the designers took that into account when writing 5e... yet 'twas always thus. Gary Gygax made similar comments, briefly, back in the day. As others have said -

I also take things from the debates here and use them in my game. Sometimes I take it as is, sometimes I have to tweak it a bit to make it work for my game, and some times it just doesn't work out and has to be abandoned. I love this site for ideas on how to run my games, though.

Hence I don't believe it was the project of the designers to make rules inferior to rulings. For one thing, that contradicts the commercial intent of professional designers, who, ultimately, are designing products for use. Their livelihood depends on the value of the rules and narratives they sell.

This is a nuanced argument, and while I'm trenchant in debating it, I do so to learn. I'm interested in why some DMs have taken designer comments that amount to authorising DM fiat, to argue for an absence of concrete meaning in any of the D&D RAW. If that is what they are doing?

A few things. As I mentioned above, the fact that the DM can override the rules with his rulings automatically makes them inferior to said rulings. If his rulings were not above the rules, he could not make them except where the rules just don't cover something. Second, we are not arguing for an absence to concrete meaning in RAW. RAW needs to have meaning, even if a lot of it is vague or incomplete like 5e rules. We just expect that those rules are secondary to our rulings such that we can add, subtract or alter those rules as we see fit to make the game better for our players.

 

[Maxperson]

Poor word choice / organization is a plausible reason. Have you asked in Sage Advice? It is an easy enough fix that it might be corrected in the next printing if you point it out. This could be a case of RAW and RAI are not lined up and they do want to try and correct those when they can. Let them know.

It would be a plausible reason for a few instances. 5e has so many of them, that I find it wholly unbelievable that professional game designers could make that many mistakes in wording. I think that some of it, such as the Magic Missile contradiction is a mistake, but that most of it is intended to force DMs and players go to rulings.

 

[dave2008]

It would be a plausible reason for a few instances. 5e has so many of them, that I find it wholly unbelievable that professional game designers could make that many mistakes in wording. I think that some of it, such as the Magic Missile contradiction is a mistake, but that most of it is intended to force DMs and players go to rulings.

Hmmm. I feel like there is a misunderstanding here somewhere.

I agree that the book was written to make DMs and players go to rulings. That has a been a big theme of 5e. However, I thought you said that the rule for Athletics by RAW only applied to 3 things. Thus it was not written well for rulings. That is why your suggested revision was better and why I believe it may have been a mistake as written (since it was not guiding us to rulings as I believe was the intent).

 

[Mistwell]

For me a claim that rules are in some sense inferior to rulings is extraordinary, and important...
Hence I don't believe it was the project of the designers to make rules inferior to rulings.

"I think D&D is at its best when the game is about the DM's rulings rather than the actual rules. The rules are a tool that a DM usea to keep the game moving and inform decisions. The rules don't make decisions for the DM, unless that's how the DM wants the game to work." - Guy who wrote these rules.

That sure sounds like the rulings are superior to the rules.

 

[Maxperson]

Hmmm. I feel like there is a misunderstanding here somewhere.

I agree that the book was written to make DMs and players go to rulings. That has a been a big theme of 5e. However, I thought you said that the rule for Athletics by RAW only applied to 3 things. Thus it was not written well for rulings. That is why your suggested revision was better and why I believe it may have been a mistake as written (since it was not guiding us to rulings as I believe was the intent).

Quite possibly. I was thinking that response was more than it was and applied it to all of the athletics portion. My bad.

 

[robus]

It would be a plausible reason for a few instances. 5e has so many of them, that I find it wholly unbelievable that professional game designers could make that many mistakes in wording. I think that some of it, such as the Magic Missile contradiction is a mistake, but that most of it is intended to force DMs and players go to rulings.

The fact that running, for one, is not included in athletics seems like a big clue that they probably meant it as suggested athletic endeavors rather than an exhaustive list. (failed my wisdom save again it seems )

 

[robus]

"I think D&D is at its best when the game is about the DM's rulings rather than the actual rules. The rules are a tool that a DM usea to keep the game moving and inform decisions. The rules don't make decisions for the DM, unless that's how the DM wants the game to work." - Guy who wrote these rules.

That sure sounds like the rulings are superior to the rules.

And the first ruling is when to apply the rules. One ruling to rule them all

 

[clearstream]

That sure sounds like the rulings are superior to the rules.

Rules cannot be equal to rulings. Rulings must trump rules in order for the game to work the way that it does. If the DM can overrule a rule and change it, the rule is automatically inferior to that ruling, otherwise the DM could not change it. If the rules were equal or superior, the DM would be constrained to follow them like we do with board games.

I am saying that just because a DM can overrule a rule, that does not prevent that rule being equal to the ruling. What do I mean by equal? I mean - equal in enabling a group to play D&D. I am contrasting that with a putative hierarchy of rulings (superior) over rules (inferior), which I think could imply that rulings are more important than rules in enabling a group to play D&D.

Linguistic, metaphysical and ludological philosophy about game rules frequently describes them as constitutive. You see this in references like "Rules of Play" and Reiland's "Constitutive Rules". Constitutive rules are in contrast to regulative rules, and the basic difference is this:

...regulative rules regulate antecedently or independently existing forms of behavior; for example, many rules of etiquette regulate inter-personal relationships which exist independently of the rules. But constitutive rules do not merely regulate, they create or define new forms of behavior. The rules of football or chess, for example, do not merely regulate playing football or chess, but as it were they create the very possibility of playing such games. The activities of playing football or chess are constituted by acting in accordance with (at least a large subset of) the appropriate rules (Searle 1969)

Generally, it is believed that game rules are required to be known and accorded with for a game to exist at all. If there were no D&D rules, there could be RPG, but there could not be D&D.

That is a super-short summary. It is why I think rules must be on equal footing with rulings, even if a DM can overrule them. D&D rules enable a group to play D&D. Rulings tailor the rules to a group's preferences and fill in where the rules do not cover some eventuality. The designers, in their comments, acknowledge and endorse both of those activities - tailoring to preferences, covering eventualities. If by "inferior" you mean only that the rules are subject to tailoring and filling in. Then I agree with that. I just wouldn't use the label inferior because to me it does a poor job of explaining what is happening. The designers don't rank rules inferior to rulings, in my sense.