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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Celebrim" data-source="post: 2244064" data-attributes="member: 4937">For what its worth, I side with Locke when it comes to government.  The authority bestowed on DM's is far too much authority for any mortal if the things being arbitrated are more substantial than the fantasies involved in playing a RPG.  But reality already has an ultimate arbiter, whether you believe it to be the laws of physics or your favorite god, and the fantasy universe does not function well in my experience without some form of one because no set of rules is comprehensive, complete, and perfect.  Hense the old saying, "The DM is god."The really interesting thinig to me is that this sort of 'by the rules approach' appears to be an artifact of 3rd edition, because the rules have gotten good enough that they at least have the illusion of completeness.   For example:It's been a rare session in the history of my gaming were I (as the DM) or my DM (when I was a PC) didn't have to invent a rule on the spot, but apparantly there are now alot of groups that don't feel that this is really necessary.   I suspect that the difference is simply that those groups have agreed to a less free-form, less open game, and all the players know the rules to some degree and so no one ever attempt things unless there is clearly a rule to cover it - nor does anyone generally question whether the rule is doing a good job.Things like that are completely novel sentiments that I've never heard before, and seem to me more appropriate to running a tournament or competitive event in which every DM needs to be ruling in the same way than running a game with the goal of all parties having fun.   That such a sentiment can be offered with a straight face is a testament IMO to just how good the D20 rules have gotten overall.I've been fortunate.  Although virtually every group of gamers I've ever played with has stories like this, I was my own DM through jr. and high school, and then all the groups I've been a PC in were extremely (well usually) mature and well run.  I certainly believe you that you've seen DM authority abused though, and I'm not at all defending anyone that does it.Me too, but for entirely different reasons.   Back then, whenever a player wanted to do something to abuse the turn order like that, I had to convince them that they were drawing a 'riposte attack' (my name for it, drawn from my parry rules) in doing so even though there was absolutely nothing in the books to justify it and even though my own house rules on combat weren't in a very clear and easy to read state (several penciled pages of notes to myself).   Generally speaking, this wasn't that difficult in the long run, because the PC's had been in combat with say a bunch of Zombies earlier that had tried to overwhelm them with grappling attacks (using the old ugly rules for unarmed combat, ugghhh) and had recieve free 'riposte attacks' on each zombie (I didn't have limits to how many you could recieve) as it lumbered forward.Now, not only are the rules clearer, more comprehensive, easier to run, and better thought out than my house rules were, but they are right there in the books so that if some rules lawyer was to challenge me on it I'd could argue with him quite a bit before having to throw 'rule 0' in his face.I quit the older editions in disgust because there was so many common things that they just didn't handle, or more importantly didn't handle well.   I played GURPS for a couple years without being completely happy (the rules were too complex, adventures too hard to prepare in advance).   I fell in love with 3rd edition as soon as I read the PH.  But don't for a second think that the current rules are anything like comprehensive.  There wouldn't be dozens and dozens of expansions and source books if they were.   Ultimately though, its a false dream GM's get - like chasing a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow - to have a fully comprehensive set of rules.  It's just not possible and moreoever not even desirable because the result gets clumsier and clumsier.</blockquote>

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