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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Xetheral" data-source="post: 8200290" data-attributes="member: 6802765">(Emphasis added.) In the bolded portion you appear to be skipping a step in your reasoning. The first part of the sentence is arguing in favor of taking a narrower view of the rules, but your justification for doing so in the latter part of the sentence is to better understand “the picture of play as the designers envisioned”. That doesn’t make any logical sense unless you also take as a premise that the designers envisioned a narrow picture of play.That premise is what I’m calling into question in the post you quoted, so I don’t think a response that hinges on the premise I’m questioning can answer the question I asked. <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 entirely agree with the portion of your post that I’ve italicized, but if the design purpose was to enable a broad scope of play, then taking a narrow interpretation of the rules necessarily conflicts with that design purpose, frustrating the goal of being better equipped to create house rules with purpose and intent.Ultimately, our specific disagreement is over whether the rules for climbing complications should be read narrowly, directing DMs to stick to complications sufficiently similar (by some unstated measure) to the provided examples, or whether they should be read more broadly, giving the DM the authority to identify climbing complications that they personally consider sufficiently similar to the examples. Unless we can somehow resolve that disagreement, it remains unsettled between us whether the designers envisioned the rules to encompass a narrow scope or a broad scope for the rules for climbing complications.I’ve argued in favor of the broader reading based on the specific text (e.g. “At the DM’s option…”). I’ve also argued in favor of the broader reading based on the functional observation that the narrower reading is incomplete (it doesn’t provide a standard for determining what qualifies as “sufficiently” similar to the examples) and I think it unlikely the designers would intend to limit the scope of play without including the standard necessary to do so. I’ve also argued that 5e is intended as a “big tent” edition, and thus I think there is a modest presumption in favor of readings broad enough to encompass multiple styles of play (and I’ve identified a discussion in the DMG that, in my opinion, supports the notion that the designers intended 5e to support multiple styles of play).In the post you quoted, I additionally identified what appears to me to be an unsupported presumption on the part of several posters in this thread in favor of narrower readings over broader readings, and since your response logically hinges on such a presumption, I think that’s fair evidence that it’s a presumption you’re comfortable with making. <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=":)" /> So my question remains. To reword: why do you think a presumption in favor of narrower readings is justified? What evidence do you have supporting the idea that the designers intended to prescribe a narrow scope of play limited to a specific playstyle? (And note that since you're using a presumption in favor of a narrow reading to support your reading of the text on climbing complications, using your reading of the text on climbing complications to support a presumption in favor of a narrow reading would be circular.)</blockquote>

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