Do You Use Your RPG Rules as Written?

[HellHound]

Depends on the game.

I haven't house ruled anything in my Vampire or Scion games at this point. Although I'm tweaking the rules for Lacuna as I keep running it.

 

[Ed_Laprade]

Bleh. The poll was: Do you use the rules as written, yes or no. I only read the first dozen replies, but at least half of them voted 'yes', then said they used at least a few house rules. Which makes their votes invalid. So dump the poll and make a new one with more than yes/no for responses.

 

[Runestar]

Bleh. The poll was: Do you use the rules as written, yes or no. I only read the first dozen replies, but at least half of them voted 'yes', then said they used at least a few house rules. Which makes their votes invalid. So dump the poll and make a new one with more than yes/no for responses.

Then the answer would be a resounding no, since by that interpretation, even the smallest and/or most insignificant of houserules would disqualify you from answering yes. I don't think anyone would faithfully follow the RAW at all times, there has to be times when minor tweaks are made here and there.

A better way of asking might be: how closely do you follow the rules as written on a scale of 1 to 10 or something like that. At least, it would seem more meaningful, IMO.

 

[Olaf the Stout]

I voted no. I use most of my RPG rules as written but, like almost all gamers, I have a few house rules. I have gotten rid of quite a few of them lately though. I used to have quite a few house rules but now I am down to a 1 page document of house rules. I found a lot of my house rules weren't actually adding anything to the game (besides more rules) so I got rid of them.

Olaf the Stout

 

[Plane Sailing]

I use the rules. I don't let the rules use me.

Which is to say I use them as long and as far as they work for what I am trying to acheive. As soon as they don't, I'm not shy about changing or overruling them... preplanned or on the spot, as the case may be.

Preach it, brother!

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

We use the Rules As Written (and interpreted by us ) as long as possible before we make any house rules.

 

[Aus_Snow]

Hell, no.

Whatever works.

 

[Ed_Laprade]

Then the answer would be a resounding no, since by that interpretation, even the smallest and/or most insignificant of houserules would disqualify you from answering yes. I don't think anyone would faithfully follow the RAW at all times, there has to be times when minor tweaks are made here and there.

A better way of asking might be: how closely do you follow the rules as written on a scale of 1 to 10 or something like that. At least, it would seem more meaningful, IMO.

Exactly my point. If you're going to ask for a yes/ne response, there better only be two ways to respond! If there are any other valid responses, as there certainly are in this poll, then the poll results are invalid. Thus my call for a new poll with more than two possible responses.

 

[jinnetics]

Yes. That's why I pay for books. Take the good with the bad.

 

[steenan]

In general, no, I don't play by RAW.

One thing is that I don't like to waste time for searching books during gaming session and I have more important and/or fun things to do than memorizing hundreads of rules. Thus, I follow the basic rules and in exotic situations I base my rulings on realism, heroic feel or cinematic feel, depending on the game style. Sometimes, I contradict RAW (that I don't remember) doing that. I don't care and my players don't mind.

Also, I houserule. I very rarely add new rules, but I quite often change them: to fit the campaign world, to prevent abuse, to make some character concepts viable, to achieve logical consistency. The more rules a system has, the more often I find ones I don't like. Thus, I houserule D&D heavily, WoD quite often - but Earthdawn not even once till now. It's not that it is better overall than the previous two, it just leaves much more to the GM instead of trying to rule on it.