Should Players Engage With The Rules?

[Mark Hope]

And then what do you do if they still aren't rule-perfect. Do you take your books and your dice and go home?

Er, no (what a peculiar thing to suggest...) You try again. Umbran put it quite nicely:

If one player who doesn't know the rules is negatively impacting the experience of everyone else a bit too much, then some action needs to be taken. However, I personally won't get tired of explaining. That's part of my job stitting behind the screen.

Sooner or later, the player concerned will get up to speed with the relevant rules. Nobody should be taking an extreme approach - it's meant to be fun.

 

[AOS]

As a new player in a campaign I'm not expected to know all the rules. I have got a copy of the PHB for 3.5 and to be honest I found it hard to understand without actually playing. I'm lucky that I'll playing with a great group who do know the rules (in fact one person I think knows them inside out and in reverse ) as we are playing I get bits explained to me and I go and re-read bits to help my understanding of the game.

I personally think it's rude to play a game and not make the effort to learn the rules. But on the other hand I think it's only fair for the more experienced players and GMs to expect the play to be slightly slower with a newer person for a while.

 

[Storm Raven]

Players should know the rules. THEN, they should also learn the difference between, "Hey, the DM just accidently made a mistake and I should tell him," and "Hey, the DM is trying to do something cool for story purposes that doesn't exactly follow the rules so I'm going to munchkin-rules-lawyer the sh*t out of him for the next two hours."

The GM should know the rules too. Nothing is more annoying than a GM who doesn't understand the system he is running, and you constantly have to ask over and over again what is going on every time he starts doing something that is wildly different from the rules, just to make sure he's doing it intentionally, rather than simply forgetting what he's doing.

 

[just__al]

All I ask is that you know how your character works. That's all. If you pickup anything else, that's great. I'm trying to get into the habit of informing players that they will provoke a couple of times and then let it go from there, but I'm also starting to always tell players when someone provokes on them.

I usually stop a few times to explain benefits/consequences of something weird until a player has seen it a few times and then I'll let it bite them in the ass or let them miss the boat.

But ultimately, just try to learn how your character works, it speeds the game up immensely.

As a player, I really like it when my fellow players understand how their character works and if they can figure out things like they should provide flanking when it makes sense and that the wizard shouldn't fireball me unless absolutely necessary or I'm playing a rogue.

 

[Chimera]

II guess I've never noticed rules knoweledge (or lack there of) as being a big deal. I play games with my friends for fun. Academic qualifications in gaming science aren't required.

I understand you, I just don't agree with you.

I've been in groups where some people never make any effort to know the most basic of rules, even after (literally) years of play. But they expected the GM to know every single rule and explain it to them time and again. Heck, one player even got snippy and angry because "it's the GM's job to know the rules, not mine".

This is not fun for the GM.


I played with friends for fun too. But when they began being petty and willfully ignorant, it stopped being fun for me and they ended up not being my friends.

Sure, "it's just a game". But it goes beyond that quite swiftly.

 

[Seeten]

I'd prefer the players didnt know the rules, aside from how their very own abilities work. I voted for option 2, but, as an example from last night's session, we have a month of downtime, and some spare cash to spend on equipment, etc.

So, I say, I want to sell this magic dagger(I'm a half-orc Barbarian) and get 3000gp worth of admantine. Can I do it? the 3 other players spend the next 45 minutes debating how long it will take, how likely it is, whether we have the time, the effects of this on our downtime, until finally I say, "Are you the DM? No? Then shut up. I am not interested in your opinion or your ruling. I am interested in the DM's. Can I get the materials."

DM says yes. Then we spend 45 minutes more arguing over my crafting it. Finally, I look at the worst offending player, and I say, "Shut up. How does this sound, if 30 days isnt long enough to make my Axe, I continue making it while you all leave and go on your way. Now, until you become the DM, I am STILL not interested in your opinion." DM says, Takes 30 days. Then, its made, and since you took 10 on the craft check, its all taken care of. Then player A says, "But taking 10 on a check takes extra time, it cant be done in 30 days." To which I respond with a withering glare.

You know what, I'd rather have heard, "You get the adamantine, and make your dagger" in 3 seconds, instead of debating it for 90 minutes. Rules knowledge is a 2 way street.

 

[Umbran]

This is not fun for the GM.

Perhaps. But for some of us, neither is it a problem. While it may get on your nerves, try to avoid over-generalizing or over-stating the point.

 

[JoeGKushner]

It's like the Ray Charles thing.

I'll show you how to do something once.

I'll help you out if you forget it once.

Third time you're on your own.

Players should at least know what their characters can do. If they don't want to know a mass of rules, avoid playing a spellcaster. That'll save them from reading half the Player's Handbook right off the bat, and heavily avoid anything that summons creatures as now you've got to know what other monsters do.

 

[Mercule]

Depends on the system. I've run Storyteller games where the players didn't know the rules well enough to even read their character sheet. I planned it that way, liked it that way, and kept it that way. I kept the character sheets for them and let them narrate what they wanted to do. Then, I rolled all the dice. Most of the group agrees that the game was more enjoyable before everyone learned the rules. D&D isn't Storyteller, though. I don't think it's workable to play D&D that way. The players pretty much have to be involved in the rules somehow.

At last estimate, there were 2,500-3,000 pages of rules (including PrCs, spells, and feats) that were active/available in my game. I've read every page of that and purchased all the books. But I don't expect the players to do either. That'd be absurd, especially for the neophytes (<2 years gaming) at the table.

I have a marginal expectation that the players are familiar enough with the PHB to look up a rule if I ask them to, or to find the description for a spell, feat, or skill if the need arises. I have a definite expectation that the players understand their characters, abilities, etc. -- at least in the most straightforward sense. I also expect that they've looked through the "Combat" chapter in the PHB.

Basically, I expect them to look at things when they level up and figure out what everything means. If they don't understand something, they are free to ask me. I don't mind explaining something in the least.

Things that bother me are when, after a year of my current campaign (plus previous campaigns), I have to explain Stardard Actions vs. Move-Equivalent Action, again. Or, when a plaer casts a spell and, when I ask him what it does, he doesn't even know what book the spell is in (hint: not in one he owns), let alone what it does -- he just took it because the name looked cool in HeroForge (note: this is "spells known", not just "spells prepared").

 

[KB9JMQ]

I figure it is like any other game.
The players should know the rules to play well.
You don't have to know them perfectly or even all of them.
But enough to get through a session with miminmal downtime looking up and discussing how the rules work.