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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Crimson Longinus" data-source="post: 9617651" data-attributes="member: 7025508">First, I think almost all of us recognise that some limits are beneficial, were they to take shape of following logic, established fiction or genre conventions or hard and fast rules.And I actually partially get your sentiment. Some situations in some games are such that, it becomes too much of "GM makes something up" and some additional structure would be beneficial. I for example have long advocated for more guidance, examples and structure for 5e skill section (sadly 5.5 made it even worse than it was, which certainly was an impressive feat.)I just really, really do not think the Alarm spell is such a situation and I feel that the TB method that is seen as preferable to some strips elements that I feel to be important. But like I've been saying before, it also is a matter of preference at what level of detail you want to handle certain things in an RPG. In practice we end up eliding various factors that matter when utilising various rules, and I don't think there is one objective answer to how much is too much.Yes, but I think that is rather different thing than specific responses and counters to specific tactics.I think several people have been trying to explain them to you. I prefer to run 5e in pretty high myth way, prep situations not plots, and have clearish mental guidelines to fiction rules connections. These all are sort of "limits to GMs whims" that you as well seem to desire.Like before the session begins I want to have clear picture of what the situation is, what are salient parts, what are the motivations of NPCs, and what their capabilities are. I also have more general ideas about the setting, and what rules are used to represent what, which help me to extrapolate consistently. Like as one example that I've mentioned before, I like more powerful NPCs to (roughly) use similar class mechanics than PCs, and the classes sort of have diegetic existence. I also have rough ideas of what levels mean and how common NPCs of various levels are. So if I need to extrapolate capability of a just invented NPC, I have guidelines for it, it cannot be just anything. Similarly this is information the players too can use. Like in the last session they were dealing with a wizard antagonist, and when sussing out what the NPC could potentially do, the knowledge whether certain spell was a wizard spell was relevant to them.Now where do these practices come from? Not from 5e DMG certainly! From decades of experience with running RPGs and general accumulation of osmosis of good practices. And I don't mean to say one must run 5e this way, but it works for me, and I think it actually addresses some of the issues you are having even though not in the exact manner you would prefer.Not multiple. It was lone adult dragon against a second level party. The PCs wisely fled. And of course the PCs often encounter NPCs that are much weaker than them, though many of them have good sense not to attack them. But yeah, in game like D&D some considerations for "level appropriateness" need to be done, but actually far less than the guidelines might suggest. The PCs in my game have fought things that by the guidelines should have been a clear death sentence and won. Furthermore, in my game this "level calibration" happens mostly via the player choice. There are different sorts of dangers and more safe and more lethal places in the world, and the players make choices about what to engage with.Ok. I get that. But also I don't think this is really "actionable" information. Like if an enemy bypassed their defecences via certain method, then it is useful information. They can take precautions against that methods in the future and use similar method against enemies. To me this is more fun information than just dice odds. It gets the players engaged in the fiction. Making it all just a roll removes this aspect. That's what I do not like about it.I suspect they have more than myth in them, at least the way I mean myth. Like they are not just situations, they're plots. It is the plot that makes them railroads, the GM having to contort the play into a certain path.</blockquote>

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