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<blockquote data-quote="FireLance" data-source="post: 5342797" data-attributes="member: 3424">I think this instant friends debate drives home the point that some of us prefer rules and others prefer rulings.As written, instant friends pretty much requires the DM to make rulings on a case by case basis how effective the power is going to be. Naturally, this does not seem like a problem for players and DMs who prefer this playstyle.Conversely, it does seem like a problem for those of us who prefer rules, and who would automatically focus on the worst-case scenarios: the DM makes the power too weak, the DM makes the power too strong, the player and the DM disagree on how the power should work, the power is too weak in some circumstances and too strong in others, etc. Now, I freely admit that I prefer rules to rulings as a player and a DM myself. If one of my players selected this power, I would sit down with him to clarify how it would work in my game (in terms of rules) beforehand in order to head off most potential problems. In my view, it's not a bad power in itself. I just need to do a bit more work in order to adapt it to suit my preferred playstyle.That said, the majority of posts in this thread seem be either highlighting the potential problems that could be caused by the power as written, or explaining why the problems identified aren't actually problems with the power. I'm curious to know what those who like the way the power is currently written see as the advantages to retaining the current wording, or what they think would be lost if the power was re-worded to have a more mechanically precise effect.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="FireLance, post: 5342797, member: 3424"] I think this [I]instant friends[/I] debate drives home the point that some of us prefer rules and others prefer rulings. As written, [I]instant friends[/I] pretty much requires the DM to make rulings on a case by case basis how effective the power is going to be. Naturally, this does not seem like a problem for players and DMs who prefer this playstyle. Conversely, it does seem like a problem for those of us who prefer rules, and who would automatically focus on the worst-case scenarios: the DM makes the power too weak, the DM makes the power too strong, the player and the DM disagree on how the power should work, the power is too weak in some circumstances and too strong in others, etc. Now, I freely admit that I prefer rules to rulings as a player and a DM myself. If one of my players selected this power, I would sit down with him to clarify how it would work in my game (in terms of rules) beforehand in order to head off most potential problems. In my view, it's not a bad power in itself. I just need to do a bit more work in order to adapt it to suit my preferred playstyle. That said, the majority of posts in this thread seem be either highlighting the potential problems that could be caused by the power as written, or explaining why the problems identified aren't actually problems with the power. I'm curious to know what those who like the way the power is currently written see as the advantages to retaining the current wording, or what they think would be lost if the power was re-worded to have a more mechanically precise effect. [/QUOTE]

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