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<blockquote data-quote="Tony Vargas" data-source="post: 6659184" data-attributes="member: 996">If you let a player a create a character from a selection of many, meaningful, viable options, through which he determines the range of specific, interesting, useful, and/or dramatic choices he'll have in play, then, yes, he will 'limit' himself to those choices much of the time.&nbsp; Afterall, he picked those options to represent the abilities of the character he wants to play, so using them re-enforces and expresses that character concept, while &quot;improvising&quot; something else may be contrary to that concept, or step on someone else's.OTOH, you give a player a character that has only a few explicit options, that aren't unique, and aren't even that dependable or effective when he does use them, and, yes, he might just go out on a limb and try to 'improvise' additional actions in order to have something interesting to do, or to differentiate his character from the next one, or just to play the character more effectively.OTOOH, if you give a player a plethora of options, most of which are mediocre to bad, some of which are 'traps' and a few of which are exceptional, you'll probably see them using the exceptional options a great deal, once they figure out what they are.&nbsp; Until they figure that out, though, you just might see them trying to 'improvise' in exasperation after finding out how bad some of their initial choices were.&nbsp; But, even if they do, they can run up against collisions with the established options.&nbsp; If you realize, too late, that your cosmopolitan-nosefork is an inferior weapon, for instance, you can't just improvise it into doing things that require a bladed-whipsaw, since they're already established as possible with that weapon, and not with the one you're using.Having a catch-all option of some sort for 'everything else' isn't a bad idea, and all eds of D&amp;D (and all RPGs, really) do have such an option, if only in the form of GM fiat.&nbsp; It's not something that differentiates one ed or one RPG from the next.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Tony Vargas, post: 6659184, member: 996"] If you let a player a create a character from a selection of many, meaningful, viable options, through which he determines the range of specific, interesting, useful, and/or dramatic choices he'll have in play, then, yes, he will 'limit' himself to those choices much of the time. Afterall, he picked those options to represent the abilities of the character he wants to play, so using them re-enforces and expresses that character concept, while "improvising" something else may be contrary to that concept, or step on someone else's. OTOH, you give a player a character that has only a few explicit options, that aren't unique, and aren't even that dependable or effective when he does use them, and, yes, he might just go out on a limb and try to 'improvise' additional actions in order to have something interesting to do, or to differentiate his character from the next one, or just to play the character more effectively. OTOOH, if you give a player a plethora of options, most of which are mediocre to bad, some of which are 'traps' and a few of which are exceptional, you'll probably see them using the exceptional options a great deal, once they figure out what they are. Until they figure that out, though, you just might see them trying to 'improvise' in exasperation after finding out how bad some of their initial choices were. But, even if they do, they can run up against collisions with the established options. If you realize, too late, that your cosmopolitan-nosefork is an inferior weapon, for instance, you can't just improvise it into doing things that require a bladed-whipsaw, since they're already established as possible with that weapon, and not with the one you're using. Having a catch-all option of some sort for 'everything else' isn't a bad idea, and all eds of D&D (and all RPGs, really) do have such an option, if only in the form of GM fiat. It's not something that differentiates one ed or one RPG from the next. [/QUOTE]

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