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Message: <blockquote data-quote="riprock" data-source="post: 2985866" data-attributes="member: 42506">First off, Pun-Pun is just darn humorous to me for a good half an hour.  I envision that most despised of opponents, the kobold, as an ubergod and I just have to hold my sides and giggle.But after the giggling passes, I feel *relief*.  I've seen a lot of D&D games with very bad DM judgement calls because the DM trusted the rules to be consistent.  In many cases that trust over-ruled logic, reason, player objections, etc.  I've seen a lot of loopholes exploited in various versions of D&D.  A loophole of this magnitude heightens my understanding of loopholes -- although whether I can parley that into better gaming experiences remains to be seen.The worst breakages are accidental, IMHO.  The game publisher didn't playtest enough, and the players get two months into a campaign when suddenly it goes pear-shaped.  That's very frustrating to me, and Pun-Pun gives me a notion of how to avoid it. Then, as you mention, I notice the trend towards options.  Optional rules have destroyed a lot of the "social contract" that is necessary at the gaming table.  It's all very well to say that the rules aren't meant to be definitive, that the DM must exercise judgement -- but nearly every DM I've seen has had at least some bad judgements, and some favoritism.  Those bad judgement calls are often what kills the joy of a campaign for me.  The first step to avoiding such experiences is understanding how they arise. I like to understand how things get put together.  The story of Pun-Pun has led me to converse with one of the designers of Spycraft, which was fun and taught me a lot about how game rules are made.  So that was fun for me.Pun-Pun is a useful thought-exercise.  For me, it would be no fun to play Pun-Pun.  Boredom for four or five levels, followed by total omnipotence ... it would go from too weak to too strong without passing through any happy medium.</blockquote>

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