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<blockquote data-quote="Jer" data-source="post: 3767555" data-attributes="member: 19857">Cadfan already talked about Paranoia (which is a classic &quot;you don't need to know the rules&quot; setup), so I'll answer this a different way.&nbsp; Back in the day I remember reading articles in Dragon about playing AD&amp;D 1e without letting your players see their character sheets.&nbsp; They'd tell you what kind of character they wanted to be, and you'd create the character for them under those constraints.&nbsp; The goal was to give the game a more narrative feel - to make it more about ROLEplaying and less about fiddling around with game mechanics.&nbsp; And while some people might run it as a &quot;mother may I&quot; sort of thing, it was usually more of a &quot;of course you can try to do that - let me come up with how that would work&quot; on the DM's part - if there was a rule that covered it you used the rule and if there wasn't you winged it (which pretty much describes how 1e AD&amp;D was played even when everyone did know the rules in my experience). It was a valid style, and it worked for some groups.&nbsp; There may very well be groups out there who play 3e D&amp;D that way - but I certainly wouldn't want to try it myself.&nbsp; Because nowadays there are so many RPGs out there that will let you get at that narrative style of play - where the mechanics of the game actually reward and sometimes enforce a narrative style - that trying to pigeonhole 3e D&amp;D into that style is more work than it's really worth to me.&nbsp; I'd rather grab my copies of &quot;Sorcerer&quot; and &quot;Sorcerer and Sword&quot; off the shelf and run that for that sort of fantasy game than try to make D&amp;D fit into that particular hole.But that's a playstyle preference, and different groups are going to play the game different ways.&nbsp; That's actually the beauty of roleplaying in my mind - since it isn't competative, each group can come up with their own style of play that best fits their needs.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Jer, post: 3767555, member: 19857"] Cadfan already talked about Paranoia (which is a classic "you don't need to know the rules" setup), so I'll answer this a different way. Back in the day I remember reading articles in Dragon about playing AD&D 1e without letting your players see their character sheets. They'd tell you what kind of character they wanted to be, and you'd create the character for them under those constraints. The goal was to give the game a more narrative feel - to make it more about ROLEplaying and less about fiddling around with game mechanics. And while some people might run it as a "mother may I" sort of thing, it was usually more of a "of course you can try to do that - let me come up with how that would work" on the DM's part - if there was a rule that covered it you used the rule and if there wasn't you winged it (which pretty much describes how 1e AD&D was played even when everyone did know the rules in my experience). It was a valid style, and it worked for some groups. There may very well be groups out there who play 3e D&D that way - but I certainly wouldn't want to try it myself. Because nowadays there are so many RPGs out there that will let you get at that narrative style of play - where the mechanics of the game actually reward and sometimes enforce a narrative style - that trying to pigeonhole 3e D&D into that style is more work than it's really worth to me. I'd rather grab my copies of "Sorcerer" and "Sorcerer and Sword" off the shelf and run that for that sort of fantasy game than try to make D&D fit into that particular hole. But that's a playstyle preference, and different groups are going to play the game different ways. That's actually the beauty of roleplaying in my mind - since it isn't competative, each group can come up with their own style of play that best fits their needs. [/QUOTE]

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