D&D General DM Authority

[EzekielRaiden]

How did you even get that? The very last paragraph stated that sometimes I don't change the ruling. That is possible because I'm the ultimate authority. I just don't use it that way very often.

I'm done discussing this with you. If you cannot see how "I listen to what they have to say, and if the whole group is against me on the issue I would be INCREDIBLY unlikely to oppose them, even if very, very rarely I might still do so" does not equate to "my authority is not entirely final or absolute," we have nothing further to discuss. You have a review committee: your players. If you don't see that from the words you literally used, there's nothing more to be said.

But obviously you are a perfect DM who has perfected something I've never seen any group accomplish over the decades I've played so there is no reason to continue the discussion.

You really aren't helping your case with these facetious and, frankly, insulting comments.

* Most players don't want to collaborate on building a world, deliberately crafting a story, or developing sub-systems and houserules. They just want to play their PCs. This narrow focus is one of the main draws of being a player, and why most players don't want to ever GM.

My experience says otherwise.

* Given the narrower focus that players have, they often don't consider how their wants might negatively affect the rest of the players, the game system, or the DM's campaign. Which doesn't mean they're obnoxious or selfish - they just aren't in a mindspace where they're concerned about whether their stack of ranged attack abilities overshadows other PCs or makes the GM's campaigns less challenging or satisfying.

And a polite conversation is all that is needed to fix any accidental off behavior. No need for "authority," hell, no need for even rulings much of the time. If a polite conversation is not enough, we aren't talking about players acting in good faith anyway, so it's not a relevant example.

* This makes the GM the obvious choice for making the final call when a) something comes up that isn't covered in the rules, b) the game or campaign is getting unbalanced, and c) the group doesn't quickly agree on a solution to a or b.

Making the occasional "we need to move on" decision is fine. That doesn't mean the group isn't coming to a consensus decision eventually. They're just accounting for timing. Just as (for example) democracies usually place a lot of "respond to a crisis RIGHT NOW" power in the hands of a single-person "head of state" office, but retain override and review powers for a different, more deliberative body (like a legislature, court, or both).

At the table, a decision needs to be right away, in real time; whether that ruling is perfectly balanced mechanically, or respects egalitarian ideals and the right to self-actualization of everyone at the table are only considerations when sitting back in our chairs, puffing metaphorical pipes, and tapping away on our keyboards for hours and days on end.

The last half of this is false. Respecting your players is absolutely a practical concern. I would not push so hard about it if it weren't. Yes, "we need a fix/response/operating plan NOW" situations are perfectly appropriate for a DM to say "we're going to proceed this way." There's nothing wrong with that. It's why I haven't responded much to the times Oofta and others bring it up; it isn't relevant.

In other words, he does have ultimate authority. He has the ability to overrule a group decision, but the won’t exercise that ability unless he has a good reason to do so.

See above. I flatly disagree.

The fact that you took his post to mean he doesn’t have ultimate authority only further confirms my suspicion that the people opposed to such authority are really just opposed to the word authority rather than the way the people who support it actually use it.

I really, truly don't have a problem with "authority." I have a problem with "ultimate," with "my way or the highway," with every bloody example being a player acting in bad faith or actively trying to destroy the game.

Honestly. I challenge you to find even a tenth as many examples of a perfectly good-faith player inducing a need for this vaunted "ultimate authority" in order to resolve a problem, compared to the LITANY of examples of bad-faith players. Hence my repeated calling-people-out for getting all huffy when DM bad-faith behavior is used as an analysis, but CONSTANTLY, REPEATEDLY, and INTENTIONALLY only using player bad-faith behavior as their examples.

Since I seem to be failing to communicate why this is a problem: Consider "no one may own guns" laws. A common response to such things is, "That means every person who owns a gun is a criminal. Do you really want that?" That's how this comes across; it paints every person who criticizes as BEING a problem. Whether or not that is intended or meant is irrelevant. When the only practical examples given are bad-faith players, what am I to think? I am not being irrational or putting words in someone's mouth. I am just deeply, DEEPLY frustrated at how many people IMMEDIATELY resort to (intentional or unintentional) abusive or destructive behavior as their examples.

Take just one example. Guy running a cleric of Odin.

See above. It'd be real gorram nice if you ever had any example that wasn't an abusive player. It would feel a lot more like you aren't of the opinion that challenges to you don't exclusively take the form of abusive or destructive behavior. Because the only examples I can recall from you are Tornado Monk, Odin Cleric, "why can't we just say we beat the BBEG right now?"/"I declare I have an I-win button," and...one other that literally just vanished from my mind. But literally every single one of them was a player acting in bad faith. Maybe try having, I dunno, an example or two that is a good-faith player actively trying to work with, rather than against, you?

How do you resolve that other than the DM saying "no it doesn't work that way"?

The group doing so, or, if ABSOLUTELY pressed because there's no time or some other immediate unavoidable practical contingency, the DM saying, "we'll talk about it later, but for now, it doesn't work that way."

Because that's actually respecting the player's right--and yes, I DO consider it a right!--to speak up and question what's going on.

But there will always be a new player that will try push his luck to see what the DM is actually made of. I have DM and Created a dozen or so tournament in the eighties and these players are out there.

I will ask the same question I have asked everyone here:
Why is it we only talk about bad-faith players, and good-faith DMs? Why is it the moment a bad-faith DM is brought up, a chorus of voices shuts it down as obviously inappropriate, but a bad-faith player is perfectly 100% acceptable and discussing GOOD-faith players is dismissed or ignored?

Unless and until you defend this asymmetry, I'm not going to give these arguments the time of day anymore, other than to call them out.

Most players that want to "modify" or "participate" in the DM's world will want to get something (read here:"an advantage of some sort") to make their character better.

[Citation needed.]

Because you are literally saying the only reason I invest in campaigns is to grub for advantage. Now who's being insulting?

So yep, Oofta is right. Unless the DM calls it. Players should not triffle with world building.

The above problem, even if it really is true, does not defend this notion. Or, rather, it defends only that players shouldn't trifle with worldbuilding; they should take it seriously, and if they can't actually do so, THEY ARE ACTING IN BAD FAITH ANYWAY. Because WE ALL AGREE that bad-faith player behavior shouldn't be tolerated! Doesn't matter if it's single-person or whole-group bad faith, if someone is acting that way THEY ARE WRONG. PERIOD. END OF STORY.

I did and still allow players to make villages and what not for their back ground, but the characters the players play can have no benefits in that creation. With this single restriction, I see a lot less willingness and desire to build the world. That said, some of the best creations in my world came from players. The second restriction is to respect the tone of the campaign. And this one is easier said than done.

You don't exactly strengthen your point when you admit that your world would be significantly impoverished if you actually prevented players from participating in worldbuilding....

The approval of a decision does not have to be said out loud. Saying nothing is approving the decision in these cases.

Again with this "tacit authority" malarkey. If you say nothing, that's not authority, and I have yet to be presented with any real argument to the contrary. "Yes it is" is not an argument; it's just setting up a "yes/no/yes/no" line of BS.

Implying that I've brow-beaten them into submission is not blunt, it's insulting.

Implying that every player who challenges you is acting in bad faith is insulting.

Implying--or explicitly stating--that every player who participates in worldbuilding or decision-making is grubbing for advantage is insulting.

And it is FROM these implications that we derive the notion that you equate opposition to abuse.

It’s possible to have the authority to do something without it being a good idea, or even an option taken 1 time in a 1000. It doesn’t mean the authority isn’t there. It’s a final call, not a go-to-solution.

Again, I disagree. If the authority is not used in practice, it is not real. See: the monarch of the UK, who theoretically retains absolute power to block whatever Parliament says...but would never actually use it even if it's totally legal to do so because doing so would be idiotic.

I expect as DM the opportunity to review player background and design. Including all third party material or UA. It doesn’t mean that I would intervene regularly. However I certainly have in the past needed to when a player had wildly different expectations to the rest of the group and wasn’t willing to make amendments voluntarily.

"Review player background and design" means you're okay with it happening, you just want to be centrally involved and able to talk out disagreements--WHICH IS COLLABORATIVE AUTHORITY. As I have REPEATEDLY said.

And, again, with the IMMEDIATE leap to examples of bad-faith players, rather than ones who ARE willing to work with you.

Does this not illustrate my point? Does this not show how it seems IMPOSSIBLE for someone to talk about "final authority" without immediately resorting to a presumption of bad-faith players?

I think it’s sometimes good for players to channel criticism through an authority figure like a DM to avoid conflict between players. In the amateur theatre world it can be considered bad form to directly criticize a fellow player ... you raise it with the Director if you feel strongly.

This is a useful application of the DM's independence, sure. I don't see it as being an authority figure. I see it as being an involved participant that can leverage an extra degree of trust, and who can determine and implement consensus without some of the potential faults of doing everything "en banc" as it were.

I would say that the vast majority of questions that come up are resolved with a simple conversation and occasionally looking up a rule. Even when it's a DM ruling it's not like it's ever been a big deal in a very, very long time. The DM makes a decision, we move on. Sometimes we'll chat about it more offline.

It sure as heck doesn't sound like it, given how nearly every example you give is a player being crappy. It'd be a lot easier to grok the collaborative parts of your approach if you, y'know, ever gave examples of doing so, or talked about times where players were working with you rather than being unpleasant or foolish.

When it comes to backgrounds and downtime stories, I do have editorial input but most of the time it's the player wanting a specific aspect of their PC and I help fill in the blanks. For example when creating a new PC, where do they come from? Can we link some of their history to historical events either through their family or (especially long lived races) their own story.

But I've also been in situations where we basically had to have an intervention. One player was dominating play (long story) in a way that was detrimental to the group. One day that player was late to the game so we all chatted with the DM about what the issues were ... then she talked one-on-one with the player. I think that worked a lot better because he didn't feel attacked or put upon.

Again: the IMMEDIATE turn. The NEED to add "but but but bad-faith players!!!"

I get that some people claim to have complete harmony and never have a disagreement. I'm happy for them. It's great.

Not sure who you're talking about, unless you're doing that detrimental-facetiousness thing again.

I've just never seen it and other than "take a vote" (I explained my issues with that above) there's no real explanation of how it works. I also haven't seen a good explanation as to why it's a an issue for a reasonable DM to be the final rules arbiter. It's not like it comes up very often.

It works by:
1. Having a respectful, open conversation as soon as practical. Yes, you are correct that SOMETIMES that means deferring the conversation to later so that things can move on right now, but such concerns must also be mitigated. Most of the time, a quick resolution isn't difficult if both sides actually listen to each other.
2. Reviewing the situation after the fact and asking for feedback, both collectively and individually. (Ideally in a three-step "anyone have any comments as we wrap?"/"hey, just wanted to check in with you personally between sessions, see if you had anything to add"/"now that we're back together, anyone wanna talk about any game stuff before we begin?" pattern, which balances out certain flaws of each approach.

There can be plenty of collaboration without deciding rules or designing worlds by committee.

Yes. That's literally what I've asked for, and why I've said that deriding it (even if you don't mean to) as "design by committee" is unhelpful. Again: you bristle at implicit insult, yet openly insult others' choices and then deflect that as just word choice? Not helpful, dude.

Just as there's a wide spectrum in the collaboration side of things, there's a wide spectrum in the "DM is final rules arbiter". Saying that anyone on this thread who believes in the latter is stating anything like "I have the authority, power, and indeed duty to defend my game and my fun from the lawless, dissolute players who would tear it to pieces if allowed to run free. Only under my careful guidance can I, and thus the group, have fun." is ludicrous hyperbole and a strawman.

It's just an exemplar. Most rules decisions are quite minor.

Most rulings are so minor that we all forget about them 5 minutes later. It's the extreme examples that stick with you.

I'm not assuming bad faith, at least not intentional.

Then please, for the love of God and all that is holy, ACTUALLY START TALKING ABOUT GOOD-FAITH PLAYERS?

Having exemplars that aren't about crappy player behavior would be incredibly nice. It would help communicate that you don't equate a question or challenge from your players with crappy player behavior.

Just because I don't need to make a final ruling very often doesn't mean I don't reserve the right to do so.

Just because the monarch of the United Kingdom hasn't exercised absolute authority in two centuries, doesn't mean the United Kingdom isn't an absolute monarch.

In cases like this, it isn't the DM that needs to make rulings to stop this sort of thing. Instead, the entire group (both DM and the other players) needs to have a discussion with the player about what sort of behavior is acceptable.

This exactly.

I agree that the DM should take the group into consideration and obviously I want people to have fun. For that matter, the players now and then point things out when I goof. Nobody's perfect.

Sure. It'd be nice if you ever had stories about player behavior that was in this vein, too. Not just good-faith, but actively trying to HELP you DM rather than attacking you.

I probably should have put the word 'worthwhile' in there somewhere.

You do realize this is literally a no-true-scotsman argument in pure, distilled form? "X can't be done" "well here's an example of doing X" "I should have said worthwhile X can't be done."

Not necessarily. A player might have the very best of intentions yet still mess something up rules-wise, be it intentionally or not; and the DM has to sort it out.

Yes, some people act in bad faith. A DM has to deal with it. Sometimes they do it knowingly, sometimes without realizing it. Other times it's just because reasonable people can come to different conclusions.

It is not possible to act in bad faith without knowing it. That's literally part of the definition of "bad faith." And it is certainly not possible for "reasonable people...com[ing] to different conclusions" to qualify as "bad faith."

Someone acting in bad faith is deceiving people. Sometimes it's self-deception, but it's a bit hard to square self-deception in this context. Acting in ignorance cannot be self-deceptive bad faith, because an ignorant person honestly believes something false, as opposed to hypocritically knowing something is false but trying to believe it anyway.

If you ever want to have a conversation without making naughty word up, let me know.

Again with the unhelpful facetiousness.

You are responding to "not all players act in bad faith" by saying "But what do you do when a player acts in bad faith"

Does seem to be missing the point trying to be gotten across.

Yes. Exactly.

Every conversation about this inevitably dismisses talking about good-faith players and gets incredibly defensive (with cries of "insult!") whenever bad-faith DMing is even implied, let alone discussed. And then people get upset when we interpret post after post after post after post after post after post of "well here's the deal, players acting in bad faith" as meaning this "ultimate authority"/"final arbiter" stuff is used as a club to ensure no player ever dares to act in bad faith.

 

[Oofta]

As it relates to the options presented, it would, because none of them reflect how the spell works.

Either
1. the creature takes damage and holds or wears the thing being heated. In which case, they get the disadvantage.
2. They take the damage and drop or somehow get rid of the thing they took damage from, in which case, no disadvantage, or
3. They don't take damage and so don't incur disadvantage.

So if you say the creature takes the damage, there is no ambiguity regarding if pieces of whatever are touching it, and there is no ambiguity in the spell's effect.

Which is your ruling at your table. I've had other DMs rule differently. Which was my point.

 

[Maxperson]

I'm done discussing this with you. If you cannot see how "I listen to what they have to say, and if the whole group is against me on the issue I would be INCREDIBLY unlikely to oppose them, even if very, very rarely I might still do so" does not equate to "my authority is not entirely final or absolute," we have nothing further to discuss. You have a review committee: your players. If you don't see that from the words you literally used, there's nothing more to be said.

Then we're done, because it absolutely does not equate to that. I can and do sometimes exert my authority to overrule them. That CANNOT happen in any situation where my authority does not exceed theirs.

And I'm not the only one who recognized that once again, I said up and you responded as me saying down.

 

[Chaosmancer]

I get that some people claim to have complete harmony and never have a disagreement. I'm happy for them. It's great.

No one has said "complete harmony and no disagreements"

What we are saying is that we generally find in most situations where mature people disagree, they can talk it out and decide between them how to resolve it, without needing a third party "authority" to come in and tell them exactly how it will be.

I've just never seen it and other than "take a vote" (I explained my issues with that above) there's no real explanation of how it works. I also haven't seen a good explanation as to why it's a an issue for a reasonable DM to be the final rules arbiter. It's not like it comes up very often.

A reasonable DM is just as likely as reasonable players.

And as I've been pointing out, you always seem to assume unreasonable players. Yet a reasonable DM.

 

[Oofta]

I'm done discussing this with you. If you cannot see how "I listen to what they have to say, and if the whole group is against me on the issue I would be INCREDIBLY unlikely to oppose them, even if very, very rarely I might still do so" does not equate to "my authority is not entirely final or absolute," we have nothing further to discuss. You have a review committee: your players. If you don't see that from the words you literally used, there's nothing more to be said.


You really aren't helping your case with these facetious and, frankly, insulting comments.


My experience says otherwise.


And a polite conversation is all that is needed to fix any accidental off behavior. No need for "authority," hell, no need for even rulings much of the time. If a polite conversation is not enough, we aren't talking about players acting in good faith anyway, so it's not a relevant example.


Making the occasional "we need to move on" decision is fine. That doesn't mean the group isn't coming to a consensus decision eventually. They're just accounting for timing. Just as (for example) democracies usually place a lot of "respond to a crisis RIGHT NOW" power in the hands of a single-person "head of state" office, but retain override and review powers for a different, more deliberative body (like a legislature, court, or both).


The last half of this is false. Respecting your players is absolutely a practical concern. I would not push so hard about it if it weren't. Yes, "we need a fix/response/operating plan NOW" situations are perfectly appropriate for a DM to say "we're going to proceed this way." There's nothing wrong with that. It's why I haven't responded much to the times Oofta and others bring it up; it isn't relevant.


See above. I flatly disagree.


I really, truly don't have a problem with "authority." I have a problem with "ultimate," with "my way or the highway," with every bloody example being a player acting in bad faith or actively trying to destroy the game.

Honestly. I challenge you to find even a tenth as many examples of a perfectly good-faith player inducing a need for this vaunted "ultimate authority" in order to resolve a problem, compared to the LITANY of examples of bad-faith players. Hence my repeated calling-people-out for getting all huffy when DM bad-faith behavior is used as an analysis, but CONSTANTLY, REPEATEDLY, and INTENTIONALLY only using player bad-faith behavior as their examples.

Since I seem to be failing to communicate why this is a problem: Consider "no one may own guns" laws. A common response to such things is, "That means every person who owns a gun is a criminal. Do you really want that?" That's how this comes across; it paints every person who criticizes as BEING a problem. Whether or not that is intended or meant is irrelevant. When the only practical examples given are bad-faith players, what am I to think? I am not being irrational or putting words in someone's mouth. I am just deeply, DEEPLY frustrated at how many people IMMEDIATELY resort to (intentional or unintentional) abusive or destructive behavior as their examples.


See above. It'd be real gorram nice if you ever had any example that wasn't an abusive player. It would feel a lot more like you aren't of the opinion that challenges to you don't exclusively take the form of abusive or destructive behavior. Because the only examples I can recall from you are Tornado Monk, Odin Cleric, "why can't we just say we beat the BBEG right now?"/"I declare I have an I-win button," and...one other that literally just vanished from my mind. But literally every single one of them was a player acting in bad faith. Maybe try having, I dunno, an example or two that is a good-faith player actively trying to work with, rather than against, you?


The group doing so, or, if ABSOLUTELY pressed because there's no time or some other immediate unavoidable practical contingency, the DM saying, "we'll talk about it later, but for now, it doesn't work that way."

Because that's actually respecting the player's right--and yes, I DO consider it a right!--to speak up and question what's going on.


I will ask the same question I have asked everyone here:
Why is it we only talk about bad-faith players, and good-faith DMs? Why is it the moment a bad-faith DM is brought up, a chorus of voices shuts it down as obviously inappropriate, but a bad-faith player is perfectly 100% acceptable and discussing GOOD-faith players is dismissed or ignored?

Unless and until you defend this asymmetry, I'm not going to give these arguments the time of day anymore, other than to call them out.


[Citation needed.]

Because you are literally saying the only reason I invest in campaigns is to grub for advantage. Now who's being insulting?


The above problem, even if it really is true, does not defend this notion. Or, rather, it defends only that players shouldn't trifle with worldbuilding; they should take it seriously, and if they can't actually do so, THEY ARE ACTING IN BAD FAITH ANYWAY. Because WE ALL AGREE that bad-faith player behavior shouldn't be tolerated! Doesn't matter if it's single-person or whole-group bad faith, if someone is acting that way THEY ARE WRONG. PERIOD. END OF STORY.


You don't exactly strengthen your point when you admit that your world would be significantly impoverished if you actually prevented players from participating in worldbuilding....


Again with this "tacit authority" malarkey. If you say nothing, that's not authority, and I have yet to be presented with any real argument to the contrary. "Yes it is" is not an argument; it's just setting up a "yes/no/yes/no" line of BS.


Implying that every player who challenges you is acting in bad faith is insulting.

Implying--or explicitly stating--that every player who participates in worldbuilding or decision-making is grubbing for advantage is insulting.

And it is FROM these implications that we derive the notion that you equate opposition to abuse.


Again, I disagree. If the authority is not used in practice, it is not real. See: the monarch of the UK, who theoretically retains absolute power to block whatever Parliament says...but would never actually use it even if it's totally legal to do so because doing so would be idiotic.


"Review player background and design" means you're okay with it happening, you just want to be centrally involved and able to talk out disagreements--WHICH IS COLLABORATIVE AUTHORITY. As I have REPEATEDLY said.

And, again, with the IMMEDIATE leap to examples of bad-faith players, rather than ones who ARE willing to work with you.

Does this not illustrate my point? Does this not show how it seems IMPOSSIBLE for someone to talk about "final authority" without immediately resorting to a presumption of bad-faith players?


This is a useful application of the DM's independence, sure. I don't see it as being an authority figure. I see it as being an involved participant that can leverage an extra degree of trust, and who can determine and implement consensus without some of the potential faults of doing everything "en banc" as it were.


It sure as heck doesn't sound like it, given how nearly every example you give is a player being crappy. It'd be a lot easier to grok the collaborative parts of your approach if you, y'know, ever gave examples of doing so, or talked about times where players were working with you rather than being unpleasant or foolish.


Again: the IMMEDIATE turn. The NEED to add "but but but bad-faith players!!!"


Not sure who you're talking about, unless you're doing that detrimental-facetiousness thing again.


It works by:
1. Having a respectful, open conversation as soon as practical. Yes, you are correct that SOMETIMES that means deferring the conversation to later so that things can move on right now, but such concerns must also be mitigated. Most of the time, a quick resolution isn't difficult if both sides actually listen to each other.
2. Reviewing the situation after the fact and asking for feedback, both collectively and individually. (Ideally in a three-step "anyone have any comments as we wrap?"/"hey, just wanted to check in with you personally between sessions, see if you had anything to add"/"now that we're back together, anyone wanna talk about any game stuff before we begin?" pattern, which balances out certain flaws of each approach.


Yes. That's literally what I've asked for, and why I've said that deriding it (even if you don't mean to) as "design by committee" is unhelpful. Again: you bristle at implicit insult, yet openly insult others' choices and then deflect that as just word choice? Not helpful, dude.





Then please, for the love of God and all that is holy, ACTUALLY START TALKING ABOUT GOOD-FAITH PLAYERS?

Having exemplars that aren't about crappy player behavior would be incredibly nice. It would help communicate that you don't equate a question or challenge from your players with crappy player behavior.


Just because the monarch of the United Kingdom hasn't exercised absolute authority in two centuries, doesn't mean the United Kingdom isn't an absolute monarch.


This exactly.


Sure. It'd be nice if you ever had stories about player behavior that was in this vein, too. Not just good-faith, but actively trying to HELP you DM rather than attacking you.


You do realize this is literally a no-true-scotsman argument in pure, distilled form? "X can't be done" "well here's an example of doing X" "I should have said worthwhile X can't be done."



It is not possible to act in bad faith without knowing it. That's literally part of the definition of "bad faith." And it is certainly not possible for "reasonable people...com[ing] to different conclusions" to qualify as "bad faith."

Someone acting in bad faith is deceiving people. Sometimes it's self-deception, but it's a bit hard to square self-deception in this context. Acting in ignorance cannot be self-deceptive bad faith, because an ignorant person honestly believes something false, as opposed to hypocritically knowing something is false but trying to believe it anyway.


Again with the unhelpful facetiousness.


Yes. Exactly.

Every conversation about this inevitably dismisses talking about good-faith players and gets incredibly defensive (with cries of "insult!") whenever bad-faith DMing is even implied, let alone discussed. And then people get upset when we interpret post after post after post after post after post after post of "well here's the deal, players acting in bad faith" as meaning this "ultimate authority"/"final arbiter" stuff is used as a club to ensure no player ever dares to act in bad faith.

Wow. That's a whole lot of typing that ignores much of what I've said repeatedly and directly contradicts what people have been actually saying.

 

[Haffrung]

One thing I have trouble understanding is why - if so many players out there really do help develop the setting, craft collaborative stories, and make rulings on the mechanics - there's such a shortage of GMs? Because a player doing all that stuff is 80 per cent of the way to being a GM.

 

[Gammadoodler]

Which is your ruling at your table. I've had other DMs rule differently. Which was my point.

I mean sure, misreading what a spell does and making it work differently than it is described is a different way of ruling. But it's not like it has equal merit with ruling it the way it's written, unless your starting place is that the rules in the book just don't matter at all. (Seriously this spell just isn't that ambiguous. I'm sure there are other examples that better illustrate your point though, probably one of the conjuring ones)

If abandoning the rules is your starting place though, of course DM authority is absolute, because at that point they're making up the game rules and the world rules.

 

[Oofta]

No one has said "complete harmony and no disagreements"

What we are saying is that we generally find in most situations where mature people disagree, they can talk it out and decide between them how to resolve it, without needing a third party "authority" to come in and tell them exactly how it will be.




A reasonable DM is just as likely as reasonable players.

And as I've been pointing out, you always seem to assume unreasonable players. Yet a reasonable DM.

And ... Opposite of what I actually said day continues.

 

[Azzy]

One thing I have trouble understanding is why - if so many players out there really do help develop the setting, craft collaborative stories, and make rulings on the mechanics - there's such a shortage of GMs? Because a player doing all that stuff is 80 per cent of the way to being a GM.

One can hope that they go the other 20% so that their current DM can be a player for once.

 

[Oofta]

I mean sure, misreading what a spell does and making it work differently than it is described is a different way of ruling. But it's not like it has equal merit with ruling it the way it's written, unless your starting place is that the rules in the book just don't matter at all. (Seriously this spell just isn't that ambiguous. I'm sure there are other examples that better illustrate your point though, probably one of the conjuring ones)

If abandoning the rules is your starting place though, of course DM authority is absolute, because at that point they're making up the game rules and the world rules.

I never said how I rule, just saying how I've seen other DMs rule. I'm not going to argue about which interpretation is correct.