Do the PCs follow the same rules as everyone else?

[ThirdWizard]

They're equal. If a PC can do it, an NPC can do it, and if an NPC can do it, a PC can do it. Somehow.

As for character creation, I use Point Buy for NPCs, just like for PCs. Usually its a lower PB for the NPCs, but that's by the NPC player's choice (who happens to be the DM), and the PCs' players could choose to do the exact same thing. NPCs get average hp (with max at 1st level), and PCs roll, but that's just convenience on my part, since rolling tends toward the average anyway. So, equal.

 

[Voadam]

No.

As in RAW, NPCs don't get max hp at 1st level, can't affect PCs solely with certain skills, and many times I don't even have stats for them or generate stats on the fly. Ones that I do generate stats for are not restrcited to one formula for the campaign for generating abilities.

I require PCs to have their characters fully defined mechanically and stick with character creation guidelines for the campaign.

 

[ThirdWizard]

As in RAW, NPCs don't get max hp at 1st level

Elite NPCs get max hp at first level. DMG pg 110

 

[helium3]

Inhabitants of my worlds can be pretty well broken into two categories: "mooks" and "heroes."

Mooks, such as Joe Farmer, Joe Orc Warrior, or Joe Roper, get 10s and 11s for their stats, plus racial modifiers, and NPC classes if they get classes.

Heroes, such as named villains, important NPCs, and the player characters, will have either rolled statistics, point-buy, or default array, and have access to PC classes.

-The Gneech

It's interesting actually. If you were to roll scores using a 3d6 for every single NPC encountered, a relatively small percentage of them would have all 10's and 11's, something along the lines of around 2.5% of the population. One person in 216 would have a score of 18 and another one in 216 would have a score of 3. The bell curve isn't quite as narrow most RPG players seem to think it is.

 

[genshou]

In my 5 most recent campaigns, the PC has always been special in some way. This works well in a single-player campaign, as it places more focus on his character. In Pledge of Tyranny, the PC and the NPC party members who regularly travel with him are gestalt characters, as are the major campaign villains. As usual, the first "hit die" (in this case vitality die) is maximum. The party members and major villains can also use the Sense Motive skill to determine some statistics of a hostile character simply by seeing them, a sort of "sixth sense" that follows the rules for the Stance phase of iaijutsu duels from Oriental Adventures, but applies automatically against hostile characters, without having to be in a formal duel (you can have it activate just walking down the street and walking past someone who wishes you ill will). Gives the important characters sort of a Zen awareness.

 

[John Q. Mayhem]

I often bend the rules for NPCs, mostly when I'm rapidly creating them to fight PCs. I ignore prerequisites and all that. It speeds things up.

 

[Elder-Basilisk]

I usually like PCs and NPCs to go by the same rules... but in a recent game, I radically restricted available PC classes and used some of the restricted ones for NPCs. Why? Partially because the restrictions were alignment and setting based. NPCs can take the prestige class for the evil bodyguards of the necromancer king. PCs can't (or they'd become NPCs somewhere along the way--I don't want to run an evil campaign). The other part of the reason, however, was a lot more practical. If I list an NPC as a cleric, I don't have to have him use every spell available to him and to wonder why he doesn't do X, Y, or Z. I just have to treat the cleric class as representing abilities granted by his god and any abilities I don't want him to use, he doesn't have. For PCs to do that, I need to have them use the favored soul class instead of cleric.

 

[Man in the Funny Hat]

Voted No, PC's are special but there isn't actually an option that's appropriate. The PC's follow the rules for PC's and are seldom allowed to flagrantly exceed those rules. As a matter of course it's best to have NPC's following the same rules if not actually more limited in what they do. PC's are supposed to be special. The entire game is about THEM. But as DM I do not consider myself bound for any reason whatsoever to stick to those same rules when it comes to creating and running NPC's. The rules are NOT there to RESTRICT what I can do as DM.

That gives DM's a LOT of power and DM's are known to abuse that power from time to time but not letting NPC's do something new, interesting, and UNAVAILABLE to PC's? How dull is that? I'd rather have the PC's fight Ninjas throughout a campaign and never have a PC allowed to become one than to feel obligated to allow PC Ninjas as soon as I introduce Ninjas as a class/organization in the campaign and have to tone down or lose all the mystique and imbalanced powers as a result. If I want Sloth Monks then I'll have Sloth Monks - but that doesn't mean I should let PC's play a Sloth!

 

[Altalazar]

PCs play in the same rule system as NPCs.

Admittedly, sometimes as DM I'll just assign hp to certain monsters / NPCs, but that is more of a time-saver than anything else.

I don't like games where some individuals play under different rules than others - that's why I don't like computer games where the AI "cheats" by making certain things easier or harder for the computer players.

 

[Steel_Wind]

PCs sometimes get special consideration
Named Villains sometimes get special consideration

These are "special" cases.

Vanilla NPcs and Mooks do not.

So - my answer is not really reflected in the poll.