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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Jackelope King" data-source="post: 2572856" data-attributes="member: 31454">Actually, no. It's an example of a house rule being introduced as part of a bad GMing call, and this sort of thing is encouraged when you tell the GM to make such calls. The more guidance you give GMs in how and when to make such calls, the fewer of these you'll see, even from bad GMs. If the game does ask you to come up with a novel resolution system for every challenge, then this sort of thing runs rampant, and it takes a good GM to keep it under wraps. If the game minimizes the need for novel resolutions, then you'll see fewer bad call house rules. Can you run a game that demands many novel resolutions in the course of the game and have it be great? Absolutely. I've known many GMs who could probably pull an entire game system out on the fly and make the game wonderful. But I've known many, many, many more good GMs who would be hard-pressed to keep things consistent and fun for their players in such a situation.The problem is that certain styles of play seem to necessitate the abundant use of novel house rules in order to achieve a functional experience, often with the GM using "common sense" as the yard stick for controversial calls (like the aforementioned gnome intimidating a dragon or an archer hitting his allies). For the GM, it's just common sense that a three-foot tall thing can't scare a giant dragon. But the player has seen Casino and Goodfellas and he knows not to judge someone based on their size, because there's a very good possibility that the shrimp is a psychopath who will pop your eyeball out in a vice given half a chance."Common sense" is anything but in many cases. Ideally, a game system (or a set of house rules) should put concrete rules in places where there could be a disagreement of "common sense". The intimidate rules are perfect for this... it might be against "common sense" for a gnome to intimidate a dragon, but it already reflects that with the modifiers for the check.Ideally, a GM should have to rule and adjudicate as little as possible during a game and be given the opportunity to focus mainly on presenting the world of the game to the players. The rules should serve to facilitate the shared experience of that world, so that a player can hear the GM describe an area or situation, size it up, and be able to make the same predictions that we can make in real life because of a consistent ruleset underlying that environment. This is what a ruleset should strive towards.</blockquote>

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