Oh good grief. You're splitting the hair between "better" and "smoother"? Seriously? And then double down by saying that by not following the rules I'm "working at cross-purposes to the game's design"? Come on, for someone complaining about being misrepresented, that's about as pedantic as it gets.
Well, smoother and better do have different meanings. And if the game is designed a certain way and you play it a different way, your purposes are objectively crossed with the games. There’s nothing wrong with that if that’s what you want to do. Also, if you tell me your game runs smoothly the way you run it, I’ll believe you. It’s entirely possible to rn the game differently than it was written and have a smooth gameplay experience.
And it's hardly vilifying is it? That's pretty strong. I'm not vilifying anyone. Simply disagreeing.
Disagreeing on the basis that he’s making a different, more malicious point than he’s actually making.
Of course the implication that my game runs less smoothly (or less well in plain English) because I do not play your way is pretty clear.
Again, smoothly and well are not the same thing. If you and your players enjoy running the game the way you do more than you enjoy running it the way Iserith does, then your way works better for your group, no arguments there. That greater enjoyment may be in spite of, or even because of, some places where your play style conflicts with the intended play, and creates inconveniences that you may or may not notice or be bothered by.
See, the problem is, [MENTION=97077]iserith[/MENTION], you're presuming that the rules ONLY support one experience. That unless I play exactly the way you do, I cannot understand it, nor have I apparently ever played that way. Despite repeatedly being told that I have, in fact, played the way you play, done it for years in fact, and didn't enjoy it, I'm apparently unable to understand what you are saying.
You played
D&D 5th edition that way for years? Or did you play a different game that way, like AD&D or AD&D Second Edition? Those games, from what I have heard (I haven’t played or run them myself) has a similar intended play style to D&D 5th Edition, and were a major source of inspiration to the developers of D&D 5th Edition. But they are different systems, and playing each as intended will lead to different play experiences. Now, your experience playing those games may help give you a sense of what the intended play experience of D&D 5th Edition is, but it is not exactly the same experience.
Or, to put it another way, only people who agree with you apparently understand what you are doing. That's pretty convenient no?
The reason many of us think you don’t understand our play style is that the way you talk about it does not line up with our experiences playing it. You seem to dislike a play style other than the one we are advocating. At a guess, probably the style of play you experienced for years playing another system in a similar manner. And you assume that the way we play is just like that, and you therefore wouldn’t like it. You may well be right that you wouldn’t like it. In fact, I would expect you probably wouldn’t like it. But the way you talk about our style and the way it actually goes don’t line up, which leads us to think you don’t actually understand it.
Whereas I look at the fact that a very large chunk of the books are written very much for those with little or no gaming experience means that there are large chunks of the book that I can safely ignore or change. Such as this clear delineation between player and DM roles. The books are chock a block with it. It's simply a different interpretation that yours [MENTION=97077]iserith[/MENTION]. Which leads us to treating the books and the guidelines/rules contained therein very differently.
There is an implicit value judgment here that a clear delineation between player and DM roles is something “for inexperienced players.” You are mistaking your preference for more give-and-take of narrative control between the players and the DM for a more refined taste that players and DMs will naturally grow into with experience.
