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<blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 9439692" data-attributes="member: 2067">When a PC says something unexpected to an NPC (&quot;I tell the king he's an idiot.&quot;), and you need to come up with a response, that's open-ended gameplay. The PC could say something extremely disruptive or use some element to thwart your plans easily. Or if a PC finds a way through a locked door that isn't &quot;find the key I planted,&quot; that's open-ended gameplay, where you need to judge what happens based on the shared fiction and not based on explicit mechanics. And the PC could bypass whole dungeon sections if they pick the lock well enough. Or if a PC convinces an NPC to take point and walk through the trap-filled tomb. Or if the PCs do the LotR thing and have the eagles fly them to Mordor. Or a million other things where the gameplay is more about playing off of each others' ideas and adjudicating results rather than following a deliberate script in the rules.And we do these things as DMs, over and over and over, every session, all the time. For me, they're a core part of the delight of playing D&amp;D, but even if they're not that important to you, they're something you definitely do, minute after minute, while playing D&amp;D.So, we're comfortable, generally, adjudicating open-ended gameplay, over and over again. We do it. It's part of the game.Why, then, is it an exception to that when a player introduces some open-ended gameplay due to a class feature they want to use? What's the difference between using the command spell to tell someone standing next to a window to &quot;defenestrate&quot; and shoving that same NPC out of a window, or a PC using acid to dissolve the hinges on a locked door, or a PC offering to cook a meal for the banquet and giving everyone food poisoning? Why is the former a bigger burden, when we are asked to do this same task as a DM, over and over and over again, in many other situations?</blockquote>

[QUOTE="I'm A Banana, post: 9439692, member: 2067"] When a PC says something unexpected to an NPC ("I tell the king he's an idiot."), and you need to come up with a response, that's open-ended gameplay. The PC could say something extremely disruptive or use some element to thwart your plans easily. Or if a PC finds a way through a locked door that isn't "find the key I planted," that's open-ended gameplay, where you need to judge what happens based on the shared fiction and not based on explicit mechanics. And the PC could bypass whole dungeon sections if they pick the lock well enough. Or if a PC convinces an NPC to take point and walk through the trap-filled tomb. Or if the PCs do the LotR thing and have the eagles fly them to Mordor. Or a million other things where the gameplay is more about playing off of each others' ideas and adjudicating results rather than following a deliberate script in the rules. And we do these things as DMs, over and over and over, every session, all the time. For me, they're a core part of the delight of playing D&D, but even if they're not that important to you, they're something you definitely do, minute after minute, while playing D&D. So, we're comfortable, generally, adjudicating open-ended gameplay, over and over again. We do it. It's part of the game. Why, then, is it an exception to that when a player introduces some open-ended gameplay due to a class feature they want to use? What's the difference between using the [I]command [/I]spell to tell someone standing next to a window to "defenestrate" and shoving that same NPC out of a window, or a PC using acid to dissolve the hinges on a locked door, or a PC offering to cook a meal for the banquet and giving everyone food poisoning? Why is the former a bigger burden, when we are asked to do this same task as a DM, over and over and over again, in many other situations? [/QUOTE]

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