The Trouble With Rules Discussions

[James Gasik]

In the decades I've been playing TTRPG's, one thing I've noted is that it's very rare for two groups to be using the same rules. Individual DM's have their own rulings, and usually copious pages of house rules.

Even in public play, there's always some room for variance, so that your experience from group to group can be different.

Often, when discussing rules, especially for games past, I run into a brick wall where I cite the rulebook, and get the response (or a variation thereof) "well, we didn't play it that way", which generally ends the discussion on the spot.

This can lead to wildly different game experiences, as one can imagine, yet I've encountered people who can't seem to grok the idea that people played a game any differently than they did, and that if you did such a thing, you were/are "playing it wrong".

I myself have my own house rules and rulings, but I always try to figure out how it's meant to work first, before tinkering under the hood. Anyways, the point of this thread is to gather a little information on the topic.

What experiences have you had where you and someone else were at loggerheads because one party deviates from the rules, yet insists their way is correct?

Were you able to find common ground, or did you simply have to disengage, agreeing to disagree?

Were there times when you ultimately decided you were wrong?

I'll go first.

Way back in my 2e AD&D days (yes, it's still AD&D, even if some 1e fans hate to admit it), sometime well before the current century, I had a Fighter with a ring of free action. I asked to look in the DMG, and was referred to the spell in the PHB. Ok.

I looked at it and was amazed at how much this spell could do! But it seemed like every time I tried to claim the benefits of the spell, whichever DM I was playing with had a problem with it (back in those days, it was fairly common to play the same character with multiple DM's!).

The final straw was when I got poisoned and the DM said I was paralyzed. "Aha! I'm immune!"

"What? Why? How?"

I told him as much, showing him the spell.

"I don't see how that can protect you from a poison that paralyzes you. The ring protects you from magical paralysis."

"It doesn't say that."

"Well it only protects from magic."

"What about underwater movement then? It says I can move normally in water, that's not a magic effect!"

"That's an exception that is specifically called out."

I was pretty peeved. It seemed like no situation ever came up where my ring was of any use, despite supposedly being quite powerful!

I was mad about it for some time, even though my character luckily avoided death, as a result of having "too many hit points" (according to most DM's, lol) thanks to a super high Con score and lucky hit point rolls. Much later, however, I was pointed at the DM description of the ring, and it doesn't mention paralysis, magic or otherwise, at all, beyond hold spells! Even though I was pretty sure the ring is intended to protect you from magical paralysis, the text didn't support that interpretation, so I had to admit I was in the wrong.

Amusingly, years later, in 3e, I had a player with a Cleric with the Travel Domain, which gave him a limited use freedom of movement, and suddenly I understood why my previous DM's seemed to hate the effect with a passion, lol.

 

[GMMichael]

Maybe I'm weird, but I don't argue about rules with my group.

If someone else is game mastering, I tend to accept whatever the GM ruling is. Because it's a game, I don't want to slow it down, and I'll just find another crazy idea if my first one doesn't fly.

If I'm game mastering, I often use my rules (so how could I be wrong? ), but in other games I'm happy to accept a PC interpretation of a rule if it doesn't immediately ruin everyone else's fun.

Few things are less fun to me than rules arguments (discussions are a different story), which is probably why I dislike hefty rulebooks.

XP for admitting you were wrong, JG!

 

[James Gasik]

Maybe I'm weird, but I don't argue about rules with my group.

If someone else is game mastering, I tend to accept whatever the GM ruling is. Because it's a game, I don't want to slow it down, and I'll just find another crazy idea if my first one doesn't fly.

If I'm game mastering, I often use my rules (so how could I be wrong? ), but in other games I'm happy to accept a PC interpretation of a rule if it doesn't immediately ruin everyone else's fun.

Few things are less fun to me than rules arguments (discussions are a different story), which is probably why I dislike hefty rulebooks.

XP for admitting you were wrong, JG!

I'm not really talking about arguing with one's own group though. Often, when discussing with people I don't play with (such as on the internet), you'll see a discussion where person A says "this is how the game is played".

Person B will reply with "that's not supported by the rules."

And person A fires back with "I recognize the designers made a decision. But given that it's a stupid-ass decision, I've elected to ignore it. This is how the game was played, and anyone who says otherwise is lying".

-----

Thanks for the XP, though I'd rather not level anytime soon, as leveling up seems to be intrinsically tied with getting older!

In my defense, part of why I was wrong was that I was not given the correct rules for the item, as when I got it, the DM didn't want me to look in the DMG. So I made an assumption, but I suppose it's still on me because I owned a DMG, lol.

Now if the spell, free action would protect one from paralysis is something I'd fight about, but if memory serves (and it's not as reliable as it used to be, sadly), somebody asked Sage Advice this very same question and they felt that it should only cover magical effects.

I have another example of where I was on the other end of the spectrum.

I joined a 2e game with a lot of people I'd never gamed with before. In combat, an Elf Fighter who was dual-wielding Scimitars of Speed was given a haste spell. I was expecting them to make 7 attacks (3/2 from class, 2/1 for scimitar, 5/2 with specialization, off hand attack*, doubled).

*I'd accept an argument for this being 3/2 despite the PHB stating that you only ever get one attack for an off hand attack, since the SoS is magical, after all.

Instead they made 10 attacks, stating 5/2 for both hands, then doubled. I pointed them at the rule that stated otherwise, got told both "well, we don't play it that way" and, bizarrely, that otherwise "haste would be useless" (?!?).

Having joined with a shield user, already a terrible idea in 2e, lol, I quickly decided to stop playing with that group. In what reality is 7 attacks per round useless? Lol.

 

[tetrasodium]

The biggest change I've noticed is the lack of willingness to even admit that the rules were changed to avoid some rules element being discussed. It's shockingly common to see what amounts to little more than Alice:"$x is undesirable and is the result of [specific rules choices made by the edition]>Bob:"no that's not a problem, you are just a bad gm who needs to skill up">Alice many exchanges later:"do you not see how that rules change you are just now admitting mitigates avoids or changes $x? Why not mention it originally?">Bob:"there was no reason to mention it because we play standard Rules As Written, there is no problem"

 

[Snarf Zagyg]

@James Gasik

Well, as someone who enjoys going back into the minutiae of old rules as they were written, I can somewhat appreciate what you're saying.

However, I find that on these threads, it doesn't come up as often so long as you are carefully delineating what it is you are discussing. If you carefully note that you're trying to understand the exact RAW, you usually get a bunch of good and thoughtful responses.

I think that two issues often pop up-

First, when the person doesn't carefully delineate that they are just interested in the actual rule, but instead are trying to argue a position, or show why a particular interpretation is correct. Things often get derailed.

Second, when people misunderstand the issue, and look at it as "How should the rule be applied, or how does you table do it?"

I think most people here can understand and appreciate the difference between RAW and RAI (or table and house rules). Of course, then there will be those who argue for rules, and those for rulings, etc. But that's life on the internet.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

Having joined with a shield user, already a terrible idea in 2e, lol, I quickly decided to stop playing with that group. In what reality is 7 attacks per round useless? Lol.

When you're fighting an octopus!

 

[MGibster]

What experiences have you had where you and someone else were at loggerheads because one party deviates from the rules, yet insists their way is correct?

Were you able to find common ground, or did you simply have to disengage, agreeing to disagree?

When I'm running a game, I typically err on the side of the player. I might change my mind about the rule later, and I'll let the players know, but in the interest of moving the game along I favor the player. But what happens when it's player vs. player? Who do you favor?

I was running a game of Alien, and one of the players had the Pull Rank ability which allowed them to give someon, even a fellow PC, and order that had to be followed so long as the subject was lower in rank. In this particular case, the captain ordered a crewmember (PC) to kill another crewmember (PC). Seems pretty straight forward, right? In Alien, if you want to kill a helpless human being you have to fail your Empathy check. So I had the captain's player roll for Empathy, which he passed, and I said she couldn't find it within herself to give the order.

During the next session, I apologized for making a bad ruling. What I should have done was allow the captain to make her Command role, allowed the crewmember to resist with their Manipulation attribute, and if they failed have them make an Empathy roll to see if they can kill someone who is of no threat to them.

 

[MGibster]

It can be frustrating discussing rules with people who are die hard fans of a game they've been playing for years. Very often they have so much experience with the rules they no longer see the flaws because they have workarounds. I asked for some advice for Call of Cthulhu years ago because investigations would sometimes come to a screeching halt because all the PCs failed their relevant investigatory skill rolls.

The advice I got from long time Cthlhu players was to just give the players whatever clue they needed to continue with the scenario. Not bad advice, and it's actually printed in the 7th edition CoC rules, but at the time it wasn't a part of the rules. I pointed out this was a flaw in the rules and it was like a Monty Python sketch.

CoC Fan: It's not a flaw in the rules.
Me: You literally have a workaround to the problem.
CoC Fan: That doesn't mean the rules are flawed.
Me: You don't make a workaround for something that works.

I run into the same problem from the other side to. I love Savage Worlds, but when a die hard fan takes umbrage when someone refers to the system as "swingy" I can't help but acknowledge the criticism. It is swingy.

 

[pemerton]

I had a Fighter with a ring of free action.

I'm going to guess that the 2nd ed version was pretty similar to the 1st ed version:

This ring enables the wearer to move and attack freely and normally whether attacked by a web, hold, or slow spell, or even while under water. In the former case the spells have no effect, while in the latter the individual moves at normal (surface) speed and does full damage even with such cutting weapons as axes and scimitars and with such smashing weapons as flails, hammers, and maces, insofar as the weapon used is held rather than hurled. This will not, however, enable water breathing without the further appropriate magic. (DMG p 130)​

Because it's AD&D, it's very unclear how it is supposed to generalise. Are web, hold and slow spells illustrative examples, or an exhaustive list? Does this ring negate the effects of ghoul paralysis?

A PC in the first AD&D game I GMed had one of these rings, but I can't recall now how we ruled it. It's possible we didn't even notice its effects beyond the water movement stuff.

 

[James Gasik]

It can be frustrating discussing rules with people who are die hard fans of a game they've been playing for years. Very often they have so much experience with the rules they no longer see the flaws because they have workarounds. I asked for some advice for Call of Cthulhu years ago because investigations would sometimes come to a screeching halt because all the PCs failed their relevant investigatory skill rolls.

The advice I got from long time Cthlhu players was to just give the players whatever clue they needed to continue with the scenario. Not bad advice, and it's actually printed in the 7th edition CoC rules, but at the time it wasn't a part of the rules. I pointed out this was a flaw in the rules and it was like a Monty Python sketch.

CoC Fan: It's not a flaw in the rules.
Me: You literally have a workaround to the problem.
CoC Fan: That doesn't mean the rules are flawed.
Me: You don't make a workaround for something that works.

I run into the same problem from the other side to. I love Savage Worlds, but when a die hard fan takes umbrage when someone refers to the system as "swingy" I can't help but acknowledge the criticism. It is swingy.

Yeah, you see this sort of thing a lot. It's like 3.x rules discussions where someone says "X is broken" and someone replies "no, it's fine, because you can always use Rule 0 to fix it".