D&D General Poll: As a player, I am always justified in pursuing every advantage I find, no matter what.

[Charlaquin]

The question I think, then, comes from whether the social contract is part of "the rules" or not. From our past interactions, I'm fairly sure you would say that (at least in this context) it is part of "the rules," but if I'm wrong about that I welcome correction.

Yeah, in this context I would say it is.

 

[James Gasik]

Of course, that said, getting a "loot box" is only really a problem if

• The "loot box" advantage is disruptive,
• Other folks aren't getting loot boxes, and
• Players start to tie their good behavior to the likelihood of receiving those loot boxes.

A common thing I used to see was DMs who would give out inspiration for doing the last session's recap. Not a Holy Avenger in terms of reward, but also behavior that is not crazy different from providing a snack budget, hosting the session, providing the minis, helping the newbie, etc.

I once had a player offer me 100 dollars in an attempt to gain a significant advantage. I don't mind occasional DM bribes (the GM's job is oft a thankless one), but I felt that was definitely over the limit and denied him outright.

 

[iserith]

I once had a player offer me 100 dollars in an attempt to gain a significant advantage. I don't mind occasional DM bribes (the GM's job is oft a thankless one), but I felt that was definitely over the limit and denied him outright.

I would have done the same thing then counteroffered at $200.

 

[James Gasik]

I would have done the same thing then counteroffered at $200.

Believe me, I wanted to take it, but my one experience as a "paid DM" soured me on the whole affair. I may be a hack DM, but when someone else starts dictating how I should run or demand "perks", my policy is to tell them to find someone else. The love I have for the game may be foolish, but it is what it is.

 

[DND_Reborn]

If you as a player see an advantage you could exploit, whatever it might be, whether in the rules or outside them, are you always justified in pursuing it?

Well, as you edited in your OP, as long as I'm not "cheating" LOL why wouldn't I? Provided, of course, it fits within the bounds of what my character would also do!

Otherwise, as far as combos and such synergies, to me they are simply part of the game. In that respect, I feel a player is always "justified" in it, whether or not they ultimately choose to do it.

 

[Medic]

The only advantage in Monopoly involves a fire pit...

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Except that you took too many different statements & rolled them into one while stripping them of context & the result is something that doesn't show anything but artificially skewed results rather than how common they are.

Even with the (as you say) very strong wording, 11 people have still said "true" as of this post. That tells me it cannot be so biased as to genuinely exclude absolutely everyone. The people saying "true" must be pretty serious about believing it!

I expected most people to vote "false." If it had been even a slightly close situation, I would have been concerned. But, to put this in perspective: if we make the (rash) assumption that voters on this poll are representative of ordinary players, then you have approximately a 14% chance of any individual player believing this at a given table. With a table of five players, you'd expect at least one of them to think this, or roughly a 53% chance of encountering someone like this at a randomly-selected table. Now, we both know tables don't work like that and this poll almost certainly isn't representative. We cannot make such reasoning from the "data" gathered by this poll. But it is still informative (in an entertainment sort of way) to me that about 1 in 7 players thinks this is true.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Well, as you edited in your OP, as long as I'm not "cheating" LOL why wouldn't I? Provided, of course, it fits within the bounds of what my character would also do!

Otherwise, as far as combos and such synergies, to me they are simply part of the game. In that respect, I feel a player is always "justified" in it, whether or not they ultimately choose to do it.

Well then, this leads to more or less the same question I had for Charlaquin above, though this time I don't know you well enough to predict the answer. That is: Does this mean you don't consider the social contract for such concerns? Because, as I said upthread, the reason I'm asking is that someone (with others agreeing or lamenting that their own players agree) essentially said that they would absolutely do something like this, even while knowing that the DM politely asked them not to and that the DM would be frustrated and upset if they chose to. That's not cheating, not by any means; ruining another player's fun is rarely cheating. But several people in the thread have said that's a red line they wouldn't cross, no matter what delicious goodies lie beyond it (which is the answer I expected most people to give.)

As an aside, "the bounds of what my character would do" is a rather weak limit, don't you think? You, the player, decide what your character would do. Perhaps taking whatever advantage this is is your character showing their change of heart--and even if it isn't, it's not like it's that hard to find excuses for a kindhearted character to be cruel, or a hothead to be calm, or whatever else.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

I know people say badwrongfun = bad.

I am always OK with calling BS. A player by the rules can absolutely abuse other PCs, do cheesy things the rules allow and genre action and designers did not envision or want and makes the action seem silly for other participants.

No, if it interferes with group enjoyment, it’s a badwrongfun advantage to me.

Say I have an auto kill spell—by the rules: it’s legal and ends each combat the same and obviates every other character. That would not be OK even if legal.

Thankfully there are not a lot of auto wins…just stinky cheese. The answer lies in the group. Are they down with it? If so, take every advantage. If not, social expectations say it’s a no go.

I said no which is really a “it depends”

 

[EzekielRaiden]

I said no which is really a “it depends”

As far as I'm concerned, your rationale given there is clearly and unequivocally "no," because there are several reasons you would pass up an advantage--even a fully-legitimate one that the rules themselves intentionally offered.