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Message: <blockquote data-quote="jodyjohnson" data-source="post: 1922521" data-attributes="member: 5590">Normally I want my players to win or at least have fun losing.For a while our game was sliding towards "smart" play rather than "role-playing" and certainly not sticking to genre (rather than heroic it was efficient).What was really bothering me as a DM is to see spells that belong in the game and can be fun taken to their logical and efficient end - basically spells used against the conventions of the genre.Examples:Sleep/Hold spells followed by CDG.Entangle vs. Melee brutes followed by cutting them down with ranged attacks.Baleful Polymorph as a Save or Die (moreso in <3.5)Curse/debuff in order to killBless/buff in order to kill fasterBasically every spell becomes another tool to kill something as efficiently as possible.  It just doesn't leave much variety in the story.The trend lead me to institute a nebulous concept known as "fairness" by which the majority of creatures abided whenever they could - making the exceptions more remarkable.For example ...- Immobilization spells are to be used to avoidance, preparation, or positioning.- Lethal weapon use is not to be combined with non-lethal (i.e.  going lethal after building a pad of non-lethal when subduing creatures)- Cursed or severely limited creatures are made so in order to avoid killing them (slow, blindness, exhaustion, etc.) except in the cases where it is necessary to bring the opponent down to the party's level (usually meaning that the effect isn't all that limiting).- You don't bring a greatsword to a bar fight.- No blindsiding.  Warning should be given although not a lot of warning (and maybe the warning is implied).- Avoid un-beatable combos; scry and teleport are allowed but not Buff/Scry/Teleport.Is this too heavy handed?</blockquote>

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