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Message: <blockquote data-quote="pemerton" data-source="post: 8828367" data-attributes="member: 42582">If a player knows - from reading a rulebook, or from past play experiences - that trolls are vulnerable to fire, or that a lightning bolt will split an ochre jelly into two smaller jellies, or whatever else about the weird spreads of resistances and vulnerabilities in D&D, how is it cheating to use that knowledge in play? How is using that knowledge an "unearned advantage"?The player earned the knowledge through play or through reading, and is now using it. That's how most games work.To cash this out in the context of D&D: the Moldvay Basic rulebook advises prospective players (who are not intending to be GMs) to read the whole book, except for the sample dungeon. This includes the monster chapter. And clearly Gygax intended players to carry their hard-earned knowledge with them. That's why he suggests that new players should start playing with other new players rather than experienced players, so the new players can have the experience of learning for themselves (he does flag the possibility of experienced players playing mercenaries or similar hirelings, who will help make up numbers and help with the rules but not make decisions or give advice). And it's also why he is so disdainful of players who play high level PCs but who haven't "earned" the right to do so by dint of serious play (this is his main objection to Monty Haul D&D).I don't know quite when the idea gained currency that players who know how to play the game, who know what trolls are and how they work, etc should pretend that they don't. But to me, whatever the merits of that approach in itself (I'm not a big fan, but some people seem to enjoy it), I don't see that it has any connection to notions like "cheating" or "unearned advantage".</blockquote>

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