What defines "playing fair"?
I don't know why you are hitting me with that strawman. I didn't mention handcuffs.
It isn't that players have "intent to ruin the game". The players get new shiny toys provided by WotC and want to use them, as expected, especially when they suddenly realize the new toy is just plain better than their current toy.
I would think "trust your players" in this instance would be to talk to them and say "these are my concerns" and give them a chance to either choose not to use these options, or convince you that it's not as bad as it seems.
Sure, that is how you should handle it--it is what we did when Tasha's came out--and we all agreed on what to adopt and what not to.
I guess that's a fair point. Let's be fair though, many DM's have knee-jerk reactions to new options before even trying them out. Recent example: silvery barbs.Sure, that is how you should handle it--it is what we did when Tasha's came out--and we all agreed on what to adopt and what not to.
But I don't think that is the case (I could be wrong...?), since the post talked about trusting them not to ruin the game...
As a GM, I am not a huge fan of big shifts in assumptions built around PC capabilities happening mid game because it might throw off the internal mental balance I have going on. Of course, you don't need a new book for this to happen: that 7th level jump to 5th level spells can be a doozy and GMs should plan for it, just as an example. I am not intimately familiar with every class ability even in the PHB, let alone the whole game line, and so I have been taken aback by some new trick a player has pulled after a level up. Generally speaking, I try and roll with it, but I know fellow GMs that ban new books mid campaign for just this reason.
I agree, knee-jerk reactions are often wrong, but many times new features are simply over-powering. That isn't to say the feature is bad or too strong in concept, but in execution they sometime border on the ridiculous. At that point, if the concept is ok, the best thing is to rein the feature back in so it is acceptable to the entire table.
I mean, I didn't say you did. Just saying that people in this very thread have done so. But if you would like things building specifically off what you've said...
Why not make the rules actually communicate "the way it is meant to be played," so that confusions like this don't happen? A corollary of "rules cannot protect you from a bad DM" is "rules cannot hamper a good DM." If the former is true, so is the latter.
So, again, why not have the rules actually tell both the GM and the player this information? Why not be clear and direct, so everyone can be on the same page with minimal effort, rather than stumbling blindly into problems and having to learn simple lessons through totally preventable mistakes?
This...basically reads as saying "well yes, but actually no." Like, you seem to be saying that these reactions are often wrong...and then immediately pivoting to "except usually they're right."
This leans toward "what do you want rules to cover?" and for lots of people that enjoy the kind of game I am describing, they don't want rules for this stuff. Some of them reject the whole idea of a thief and skills in general. Skills, they will tell you, are what the player brings to the table. So that lack of rules in this situation IS the rules telling you how the game is meant to be played.
So...silence is now information. That's a new one.
As someone who posted one of the recent threads about killing a PC… I think this is the least charitable interpretation you could take of that thread.
LOL then re-read it? I never said "usually they're right". I said in some instances they are, typically when a feature is so far out of bounds to a table it is obvious it needs to be nerfed or banned.
) and have NEVER said or implied balance sucks. Others might have, I cannot recall any instances but I can accept that you have on good faith.
Doesn't really cover shamelessly exploiting known rules and their limitations, the realm of the rules lawyer. The number of times you may encounter someone who does something technically legal but really crappy to other people will rapidly disabuse you of the notion that it's a question of abiding by known rules.
Silence has always been information. It is weird to me that someone would think otherwise, in fact.
Replace the word "toys" with "spells" and now you can apply this to any conversation about 3E spellcasting!
And how does one identify a rules-lawyer DM if the rules are invisible? As before, the pendulum swings both ways. When the rules are in the open, it is almost always (damn near actually always, IMO) easier to spot rules-lawyering so it can be dealt with.
Do you not see the irony of advocating for "just trust me, it's for your own good/the good of the game" coming from DMs, y'know, the ones who have enormous amounts of power and the ability to massively manipulate things in their favor, while simultaneously treating players as inherently incapable of being trustworthy with the few tools actually afforded to them?
