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Message: <blockquote data-quote="KarinsDad" data-source="post: 6394858" data-attributes="member: 2011">I find it interesting how many DMs here on the boards take this hard line with (sometimes) old time friends.Most people I've ever gamed with state that the DM is the final arbitrator and most DMs I've seen play RAW unless something unusual is going on (like the PCs are affected by the magic mushrooms).The reason is the shared social contract. Every player at the game table (including the DM) is contributing to the game. The players rarely have a good time if the DM cannot create a decent adventure and/or treats his players in a negative way. On the other hand, the DM does not even have a game without players.It's not a matter of players being rules lawyers, it's a matter of the DM not going so far off the deep end with his RAI that the game becomes inconsistent. With RAW, that rarely happens.And I have been at many tables where we do not bother looking up rules until afterwards. It's ok and even sometimes expected for the DM to use RAI if nobody knows the rules, but purposely ignoring or changing the rules on the fly tends to impact the shared social contract for some players. DMs only have so much power. Cross the line too much, it might be time for the DM to move on.I once joined a Champions group. The first 6 hour session had two 1 turn combats with little roleplaying in between. After each PC's or NPC's turn, the DM literally took a minute to a minute and a half writing stuff behind his gaming sheet. He was so excruciatingly slow. So a few days after the game on his blog site, I recommended a few things to speed it up (like dropping a minor foe if it still had 2 or 3 stun remaining, etc.). He said that nobody ever told him that it was slow and every other player suddenly chimed in and told him. The game actually disintegrated at that point because the DM took offense, but what I found interesting was that the players were willing to put up with a really painful campaign because they thought that the DM had all of the power and their perspective did not matter as much as the DM's.No, it's a shared social contract with both players and DM. Like most things in life, both sides have to give and take a little for the benefit of all.</blockquote>

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