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Message: <blockquote data-quote="TwoSix" data-source="post: 6232142" data-attributes="member: 205">I think rule zero has always been around, in the context that the DM is not limited to the scenarios and resources presented in the books.  The DM has the right to insert and modify encounters to match his vision (and whether his vision be the greater or story or simply the framing of any one scene).The true issue with rule zero becomes when the DM-enforced changes become intrusive enough to make the players feel deprotagonized.  The 2e/WoD mantra was that the DM-story should have a higher precedence that the player's desire to drive the action, which often mandated heavy use of rule zero.  That's why such uses of rule zero are frowned upon in indie games, where being player-centric is a major tenet.Ultimately, what constitutes a fair use of rule zero is an (explicit or implicit) negotiation between the players and the DM.  There's nothing wrong with illusionism (making changes to rules that aren't visible to the players) in and of itself.  But there's nothing wrong with also expecting the game to do what it says.  If a game offers the promise of cinematic battles, but the enemies always die in one round, I'm going to have to resort to illusionism to make the game run the way it was offered (as I don't see a cinematic battle being over in 6 seconds).  But that's not a logic issue.  For his preferences, GM meddling taints the game.  The GM should set up the encounters, and run them according to the rules.  He shouldn't give the enemy 50 extra hit points because it got critical'd by a daily power.  But that isn't really fiat.  You have a house rule that criticals do max damage plus an additional narrative effect.  You've negotiated with your players to take back some narrative authority upon certain resolution results.  It's not indie or anything, but I don't think of it as fiat.  Fiat is "Sorry, your vorpal sword can't cut off this guy's head because he's wearing armor that covers his neck."  It's the imposition of DM preference (whether in the cause of story or greater simulative "fidelity") to override a player's rules-granted authority to shape the fiction.  I think your thesis would be stronger if you could identify what the "something" is.  To be honest, the campfire story is kind of lost on me, since I never really did that.  (I could invoke "Are you Afraid of the Dark?" on 90s era Nickelodeon, but that might just prove your point! <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> )  I've seen similar arguments about animation styles, especially hand-drawn versus photorealistic CGI.  Or possibly between novels and graphic novels, where in reading you have to generate your own images, but a graphic novel does it for you.  I've always found novels to be immersive, and graphic novels not to be (I generally find them a waste of money, as I read too fast for them to provide much value), but I don't think that's anything else than a product of my own style of cognition.See, I guess where you see marginalize, I see deemphasize.  And again, I think this is a function of player-type, not system.  Even in old-school games, most players I met would simply attack, or look through their magic items.  Spellcasters would look over their spells.  I've never played in games where players were always looking for chandeliers to swing on or fireplaces to push people into.   The best way to get players to improvise, I've found, is to give them upfront knowledge of the outcome and that attempting to engage with the environment (which is really what improvise means) is their tactically most sound option.  You're right that 4e powers are reliable, so that people will default to them.  I certainly think 4e powers could be improved by adding in narrative conditions to triggers rather than a reliance on the ED part of AEDU system and reskinning.  (My own 4e hack has no encounter powers, for example).  But I've never found any other D&D system to do a better job.  When we played OSR, people just attacked, and hoped I gave them a bonus.  They told me in our last OSR session that they were bored because there was nothing for them to choose in combat, they just told me what they were doing and hoped it work.  They wanted control.  So we're back to a (hacked) 4e.</blockquote>

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