D&D 5E How has your personal experience/expertise affected rulings?

[MNblockhead]

Is the DM trying to relate a story or a realistic world? The former tends to lead to railroad answers and the later random dice rolls.

Are these mutually exclusive?

 

[MNblockhead]

In general, I would say that applying our own experiences to the game is probably best done in a way that leaves the rules mostly intact.

I agree. In generally, my real-life experience serves me best when it helps me better tell a story. One benefit of living, working, and traveling in a number of countries is that I can pepper my descriptions bases on places I experiences, come up with names for NPCs based on languages I've had exposure to, and so forth. Whether describing the weather or diving into detailed descriptions of a cave system, having some personal experience helps.

 

[Mercule]

Yes, but if you've travelled widely enough, you know that there are "rednecks" of all races, colors, and socio-economic backgrounds - it's not just the rural Scot-Irish. There is also an incredibly profound relationship between inner city residents that have never left their neighborhood, and rural people who have never left their community. And that's true regardless of socio-economic class. All narrow horizons seem to produce similar tribal outlooks, even if your narrow horizons are say Manhattan.

This is so true.

Having spent considerable time with the faculty teaching both political science and sociology at a major university, I can reasonably say that those ostensibly responsible for teaching/studying this sort of thing spend more time in their own "neighborhood" than they do with the actual focus of their study. It's not so much an echo chamber as a piercing feedback loop.

That's not to knock those folks. Just commenting that, if anyone should be expected to see that trap coming and avoid it, it should be them.

 

[Uchawi]

Are these mutually exclusive?

Of course not.