do you understand that this statement is equally true for the people you disagree with?
I have specifically set up processes to avoid these outcomes. I put those in place after I found my D&D 4e game was not very good, having come from D&D 3.Xe without changing my mindset. Once I got rid of the baggage I was carrying from the previous game, my D&D 4e game really took off. I was playing that game for all that it was, not holding onto ideas from another game that didn't work. I did the same for D&D 4e and D&D 5e. My D&D 4e game and D&D 5e game are nothing alike. And that's not because I want to play like older editions of D&D which I don't even remember. I actively work against doing this, and have no agenda for playing any game a certain way except as the rules say to do in order to assess it fairly, so your assertion holds no water with me.
I absolutely do not say that D&D 5e is "written for" pixel-hunting. That's you hearing "reasonable specificity" and imagining the worst excesses of games from your past. You could choose not to do that.
Not all readings of the rules are going to be correct, sorry. Again, I suggest thinking about why that matters to you.
no I interpret reasonable sepcificity to be "Can I use athletics to get past the hole?" "I intimidte the orc" and "I search the desk"
Except you insist that just nameing a skill that someone wants to use isn't good enough even if you understand what they mean
That is not supported by the rules in my view. Fine if you want to play that way, and I hope that you and your players have fun doing that, even if it sometimes requires you to go back and clarify what the character is doing (as you said may happen from time to time). By having reasonable specificity in my games, I don't have to do that, ever, and it's easy to see what success and failure look like, what ability check and skill or tool proficiency applies, and what the DC is. A lot of people say that DMing is hard. Not me and part of that is because my players aren't making it harder than it needs to be.
no but when someone shows you why they read it that way, and you dismiss all evidence that counteracts your point and focus only on things that support it (some how missing that both are present) it shows some bias on your part.
because you are spreading your 'one true reading' as fact. the same reason you don't like me posting my opinon, except I can see where you are coming from and you at least pretend you can not.
There is no “formal rule.” At session 0, I express to my players that I prefer they favor declarations of action over questions (e.g. “I look for another exit” is preferable to “can I see any other exits?”) and that in order to resolve an action I need to understand what their goal is and what their character is doing to try and accomplish it. When in doubt, “I try to X by Y” usually conveys all the information I need, but the phrasing doesn’t matter as long as I can understand those two things without having to make assumptions.
Because I am clear about the expectations starting from session 0, it is very rare that I need to stop anyone to ask them to rephrase an action. Sometimes someone who is new to my table will need to be asked for clarification once or twice near the beginning of a campaign, but people tend to catch on quickly, because it’s really very simple to do. I imagine you’ve never had to stop and play 20 questions because you’re willing to make a lot more assumptions about an action than I am. When a player says “I intimidate the orc,” you don’t feel the need to ask any clarifying questions, because you’re fine with assuming the specifics of how the character tries to do that, and to what end. I am not, so I would need to ask the player, “what are you doing to try to intimidate him?” and “what do you want to accomplish by intimidating him?” So rather than set myself up to have to do that every time, I just tell the players in advance what information I’m looking for out of an action declaration and recommend an easy go-to phrasing they can use when they aren’t sure.
Part of that is just getting old. I played AD&D 2e in high school in the 90s. I couldn't tell you a single thing about the rules of that game except THAC0. I suspect we weren't even playing by the rules very well anyway. I can only barely remember some things from D&D 3e since I haven't played that since D&D 4e game out. Like I can remember certain references to things, but I could not tell you the different types of actions PCs can take or the like. The memory is very low resolution now. If I were to play D&D 4e now, I'd have to have a refresher.
I do have a bias and preference for a correct reading of the rules, yes.
