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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 2199188" data-attributes="member: 4937">Let me jump ahead a few exchanges and get down to the heart of this problem.   The whole arguement strikes me as coming from a very rules lawyerish position.   All rules in the game bow to the Zeroeth Rule: The DM is always right.   If you the DM feel that in this particular situation is unique enough that all three PC's ought to go first, then don't bother rolling the dice.   Simply rule that all three players go first on the grounds that its a better simulation of the circumstances than the rules.But I would argue that this whole mess has come into being because inexperienced DM's have relied to heavily on The Zeroeth Rule and consistantly screwed thier players when the situation is reversed.   If you go back and look over this thread, you'll find lots of people complaining how when they stopped to parley the DM ruled - in violation of all the initiative rules over the whole history of the game - that the monsters where now eligible for a surprise round or now gained this advantage or the other over the PC's.   So the PC's learned thier lesson and now don't parley.  The current rules, applied consistantly and with attention to detail now handle the job pretty darn well.   The vast majority of complaints I hear about the current D20 rules have to do with poor DMing and not problems inherent in the rules.  Good rules are never going to able to substitute for a good DM, but alot of bad DMing would be avoided if new DM's would just learn to consistantly apply the rules, demand skill checks, roll reaction checks, and treat the NPC's and the PC's equally and fairly at all times instead of relying on their own judgement for what should happen because clearly - rule zero not withstanding - we can all think of situations where the DM wasn't right.   The DM has to approach the game with the idea, what would I think was fair if I was the PC in this situation.   You think that way consistantly, and you've gone along way towards being a good DM.</blockquote>

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