Waibel's Rule of Interpretation (aka "How to Interpret the Rules")

The only CORRECT interpretation is the one I say!

The sooner the rest of the world gets that, the sooner we can all sit down and have fun...and end all fantasy rpg forum arguments everywhere.

heheheh.

[Seliousry though, nice chart. ]

 

[Sacrosanct]

Now now, are you rules lawyering there?

I personally dont care if Gygax writes to jump off a cliff. Everyone makes the same time commitments to turn up and play on game day, it's just as much the players game as the DM, in many cases.

You can either be a dictator or referee, whatever floats your boat.

That's not rules lawyering because it's not a rule I mentioned. It's simply a guideline. I also mentioned how ironic it was earlier that these die hard rules lawyers seem to ignore those parts of the book as well but treat something like where a manticore lives as unwavering doctrine.

The reason I mentioned it is thus:

We can get a really good idea about how the game was meant to be played, and what the spirit of the game is, when we have the creator(s) of the game specifically tell us what those things are. So when someone prefers to play the game counter to those things, and someone happens to call that out, it's pretty disingenuous to flee under a "don't accuse me of badwrong fun!" because it's not something that really falls under subjectivity any more, does it? I mean we have it in black and white; it's not my personal preference or opinion. It's objective. It's like someone saying, "Don't accuse me of playing monopoly wrong if whenever someone has to pay rent, we split it evenly among all the rest of the players." If you like playing that way, fine. But it's not in alignment with the spirit of the game.

[sarcasm]
DMIng advice from the very earliest rpg book ever written is 100% infallible, so it's a good thing you brought this up. Otherwise we would be lost.

In unrelated news, why do they keep posting speed limit signs of 65 and 70 mph? My Model T Ford only gets up to around 45 tops. Surely there is no finer vehicle able to go faster than it?
[/sarcasm]

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

In plainer, more civil terms, you can play however you want, and despite my sarcasm earlier, I really don't think that Gygax's style is inferior to any other. But we have done a lot more thinking on it since then, and a lot of people run things in ways that would make old Gygax's head spin, and that's not a bad thing at all.

The point of all that was to show that we can objectively tell what the spirit of the game is, and how it was meant to be played. If you can't believe the people who actually created the game, who can you believe? You? Me?

 

[Sacrosanct]

As for universal views of D&D - I think a "tongue in cheek" flowchart which is summarised, in post 164, as "won't anyone think of the rules lawyers", is an attempt to label all those who don't play in a GM-driven, 2nd ed AD&D style in pejorative terms.
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No it wasn't. That's you projecting. The rules lawyer thing didn't even come up until after Hussar's example of a player getting into a "lengthy argument" to bully Hussar into removing a manticore from a forest because the rulebook said they don't live there, and people defending that player's behavior. I.e., ruleslawyering at it's worst because it wasn't even a real rule. That's when the rules lawyer thing started. My OP is exactly what I said it was. And truth be told, it was sparked based off the discussion re: stealth in the other thread. It was meant for those rules that do have ambiguity, and I'll repeat what I've said twice already now: if a rule seems unclear to you, look to see if you can make better sense of it by looking at other rules and the context/intent of the entire game, and if it's still unclear, go with what works for you because no single rule is important enough that you should stop playing the game in gridlocked debate.

Is that clear enough for you? To make accusations about me and my intent based on topics that happened later, especially since I've already cleared it up at least twice, is pretty darn disingenuous of you.

 

[Celebrim]

Wait, so you're objecting to my hearing you out and asking questions before explaining how you've got it all wrong?

You have so much wrong I don't know where to begin, starting with the claim that you are hearing me. But, I was objecting to silence and the concealing of thought because I knew you weren't hearing me. And "Thank you" is meaningless and conveyed no information. It's no better than Biblo's breezy "Good morning". I know you'll dismiss me without hearing or listening, so it's not a question of what I want. What I want is your words, whether dismissive or not.

False. "You're right, a whole fleet of star destroyers couldn't destroy a planet." Or if you still consider that "setting" information about the capabilities of star destroyers, "Roll an Intelligence check. [On success] You're right, it would take a massive amount of firepower to destroy a planet, more than you think a whole fleet of star destroyers would have. Isn't that interesting?"

It is false that the GM has no recourse at the metagame (i.e. rule) level.

To begin with, the GM in the satire I wrote conveyed the very information you cite here in game. So once again you are suggesting something I already agree with and at the same time failing to understand the point. There was no question in anyone's mind whether a whole fleet of star destroyers could destroy a planet. But, you would have the GM drop hints and nudges in the right direction until the Luke player was on the right track and had this affirmed out of character by the GM - the sort of behavior that just encourages more dysfunctional whining. So you've actually shown exactly why I think the approach wouldn't work.

but: (a) is false.

Rather than refuting the all rest of your statements one by one, let's just stop here and settle this question using actual facts and reasoned argument. You claim that it is false that favored terrain rules are a guideline. You do so providing no evidence at all. You claim this providing no reasoning at all. You claim this despite the clear suggestion of the words themselves. Fine.

I happen to have the 2nd edition Monstrous Manual, copyright 1993, open in front of me. I 'm turned to the first page of the text with the heading "How To Use This Book", and on that page is a section header for "CLIMATE/TERRAIN", and it reads, "CLIMATE/TERRAIN defines where the creature is most often found." Most often is here a limiting qualifier that provides for exceptions to the normal, making these lines in the monster entries mere suggestions or guidelines. They are particularly weak even as suggestions, because since they convey no information about process resolution and instead only setting information, they are by normal conventions things you'd expect DM's to fiddle with even if the text didn't specifically empower them to do so without even considering it a house rule. (How could it be a house rule that Manticores also appear in forest, when the literal plain reading of the rules as written allows them to?) So I think it safe to say on the basis of actual evidence that the "CLIMATE/TERRAIN" entry is most definitely a guideline.

But what is even more interesting is that if we turn to page 246 of this same text, we find the 2nd edition entry for Manticore, and the first line of that entry after the name reads: "CLIMATE/TERRAIN: Any". Feel free to verify that. Further more, if we examine the ecology section of the entry it reads: "Ecology: Manticores are wide-ranging carnivores that have successfully survived in every region inhabited by humans, whether in the wilderness or underground." This does nothing to overturn Hussar's recollection that somewhere Manticores are listed as primarily desert creatures, but does pretty much destroy the rest of your ... I don't even know what to call it. It's not an argument. It's not a rebuttal. You'd actually have to have used facts for that instead of something like 'You're wrong'. But among other things, examine that fact in the light of your rejection of my point 'j'. First, it's not just a restatement of 'a', which can be shown in many ways but the easiest way would be to point out that 'j' could potentially remain true even if we'd resolved that 'a' was false. If both were rules, it still wouldn't follow that the group had agreed to use this particular rule. Your rebuttal that because they were playing AD&D2 the rule was implied to be in force falls not just because it isn't a rule, but because every rule from every supplement from AD&D2 is not necessarily in play just because they are playing AD&D2. The Monstrous Manual itself was clearly not in play, or this particular bit of rules lawyering - stupid as it was - could have never held, since the description of the Manticore in the 2e Monstrous Manual makes it clear that Manticores can appear in any terrain even if it were true that the CLIMATE/TERRAIN entry was a hard and binding rule and not merely as the text says a suggestion.

hopefully the opposing position is clear now as well and you can stop using straw men. Whether you actually do stop will say more about you than about me.

I'm using straw men? Even if it were true that I'd erected straw men arguments, which I deny, I at least have done you the dignity of trying to build an argument and substantiate it. If my argument is made of straw, yours is no more than hot air. Your declaration that my argument is made of straw is no more substantial than your declaration that "(a) is false". Saying it is so doesn't make it so.

 

[Mistwell]

I think you are wrong to imply, as you did (you virtually stated it), that [MENTION=6696971]Manbearcat[/MENTION] and I are an extreme minority relative to the rest of the posters on these boards. There is not even any need to name names, as many people who take a similar view to the two of us about the role of rules, and/or the GM, are posting in this very thread.

My point in mentioning how you guys are sometimes in the minority is that you should appreciate better than most that there is no universal view of D&D. You took it as a pejorative, but it wasn't meant that way if you look at the context where I said that.

As for universal views of D&D - I think a "tongue in cheek" flowchart which is summarised, in post 164, as "won't anyone think of the rules lawyers", is an attempt to label all those who don't play in a GM-driven, 2nd ed AD&D style in pejorative terms. I am not the one pushing the "universal view" - [MENTION=15700]Sacrosanct[/MENTION] is, by attacking those who take a different attitude towards the role of rules, and the GM, in the game.

And I am not the only poster in this thread to have made this point.

NONE of what you just said is a reply to my point, and it's a total strawman. I was not justifying the joke flow chart in any way, and even a casual reading of what I wrote would tell you that.

A different comment, from a different poster, was made saying that they knew of a universal view of how to play D&D - that some DM decision-making MUST ALWAYS drive away players no matter what. I responded it was not true for my game, and explained why, and that it was not true for some others in this thread who had said so. IN response to that, your buddy ManBearCat started with the snark (uncalled for - no snark had been directed at him) and then said then my view was the extreme outlier which justified his total dismissal of my experiences and views - with zero evidence to support that claim.

And then you jumped to his defense, also with no evidence, misunderstanding why I had mentioned my surprise at that reaction given you and he had experience knowing how there are no universal ways to play D&D as you had both been on the minority end of discussions before and that didn't make your views actual extreme outliers.

SO I am asking you a second time - do you actually agree that any dissent from that view I was responding to makes me an extreme outlier, despite zero evidence of such? Because if your threshold for being extreme outlier and dismissed as such is now that low, that's cool. Just understand it's a tactic that will be turned on you countless times hereafter. Ball is in your court, just don't pretend you have no idea what game we're playing right now and try and change the subject to something else. I've got my teeth on this topic pretty strongly at this point.

 

[Hussar]

How did my player "bully" me Sancrisanct? I never characterized it that way. Nor did I make a single comment on the quality of the player.

Every single time you or others bring this up though you automatically interpret the sittin the most negative light possible. Why is that?

 

[Eric V]

How did my player "bully" me Sancrisanct? I never characterized it that way. Nor did I make a single comment on the quality of the player.

Every single time you or others bring this up though you automatically interpret the sittin the most negative light possible. Why is that?

I was wondering the same. To automatically, intuitively interpret what happened as "bullying" betrays a very specific (and IMO) unhealthy point of view.

 

[Sacrosanct]

How did my player "bully" me Sancrisanct? I never characterized it that way. Nor did I make a single comment on the quality of the player.

Every single time you or others bring this up though you automatically interpret the sittin the most negative light possible. Why is that?

Because when someone says, "I had this really cool idea of having a manticore in the forest, and this player disagreed and got into a lenghty heated argument over it because he said in the book, Manticores are in the desert only.", that comes across as them trying to bully you with rules lawyering. Because that's what rule lawyering is. And even if it weren't, it's incredibly behavior. Who gets into a heated argument with the DM over that? Someone with issues, that's who. You weren't unreasonably nerfing his PC. You weren't even wrong. And that player got into a long argument with you anyway because manticores can't be in a forest? SMH. The fact that you felt like you had to give up on an idea you thought was cool because of that behavior is just sad, even if you don't see it. And this isn't the first time this sort of thing has happened with your posted experiences.

 

[Sacrosanct]

Or, another time, I bombed the party with a manticore. I love manticores. One of my favourite critters. A player piped up and complained that I was using a manticore in a completely wrong terrain - manticores in 2e were desert monsters and we were in a temperate forest. Now, he was 100% right, but, I stuck to my guns. It wound up being a rather lengthy argument at the table, so it stuck in my mind. I often wonder if I had of just admitted that I screwed up and skipped the encounter, if it wouldn't have been a better solution.
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This Hussar. This right here is why I say they were bullying. Because this is how you describe it. I strongly suggest that those who have said, "I didn't see any negative behavior on the player" or "I don't know why you assume the player was bad" reread this post.

You wanted to have a manticore in a forest
Your player disagreed and tried rule lawyering you
It was a lengthy argument that was memorable
You think you should have give in to the player's demands (even though the player was wrong, not you, as has been explained by others above).

That seems pretty clear to me that your player was a jerk. Metagaming, arguing over something that wasn't all that important just to get his way, and trying to remove cool ideas because of his mistaken assumptions? Seems pretty clear to me.

I was wondering the same. To automatically, intuitively interpret what happened as "bullying" betrays a very specific (and IMO) unhealthy point of view.

You can keep the passive aggressive attacks to yourself. Because you'd be totally wrong in your assumptions about me or my "points of view". it's clear that this player was in the wrong. Both quite literally in his assumptions, and in his behavior by arguing the DM at length over it.

Folks like yourself might like to call people like me "unhealthy" or "dictatorial" DMs just because we don't give in to every player's every whims, but the fact that folks with similar DM styles as myself (like Jester) always have a line of people wanting to be in our games, and the overwhelming response from fans in the surveys leads me to believe that we're doing a pretty damn good job DMing in that style and that's what people want.

The next time you guys wonder why it's so damn hard to find DMs in organized play, cons, or other functions (FLGS owners and WoTC literally have to bribe us), it's because most people don't want to DM if they have people like what Hussar described sucking the fun out of every session.

I said it before and I'll say it again. There is a very real reason why rules lawyers have always been held with contempt. Think on that.

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

Good stuff. When I'm DMing, I have absolutely no problem with players who correct me on the rules. On the contrary, I appreciate it. It strengthens my understanding of the rules. When I'm a player, I like DMs who feel the same way, unsurprisingly (and I'm not trying to catch out the DM or prove my superior knowledge here; I bring something up if I think it will cause more of a problem down the road - for DM and players alike - unless I do). And things like courtesy and timing always play their part. My guiding principle is rulings are for the table, debate is for after the game. By your reasoning, that makes me a collegial DM, to an extent at least.

A creature showing up outside its preferred or typical habitat is not a rule gone awry. It does not, in my opinion obviously, open the door to a game-stopping debate on the fairness of it turning up elsewhere. My opinion on this does not make me fall into the hyperbolic 'never question the DM' camp as some people who disagree with my opinion (and who are welcome to do so) believe.

You know what? Your approach to rules is reasonable. I disagree with your epistemological approach on the manticore (I don't think we know enough to conclude anything about the scenario) but ultimately, that is just one event that happened many years ago, at which nobody here was present except Hussar. I can live with that kind of disagreement.

Peace,
Max

 

[FormerlyHemlock]

[MENTION=6787650]emdw45[/MENTION] - thanks for the reply!

All this fits me pretty well - especially what you say about backstory/world creation and the players' role in that. Sometimes I might be a little bit more strict than you on the "push back on a ruling" - it's hard to compare styles across just a series of posts, but I might lean a bit more towards balance and a bit less towards simulation.

Thanks again for the reply.

It is indeed hard to compare styles across just a series of posts. Also, I was trying to illustrate a point which involved me saying "Yes" to a player so I picked Elvish sleep, but I could just as easily gone the other way on that house rule and said "No". (In this specific case I was already on the fence about Elvish sleep, since I can't see any other reason for that racial ability to exist, especially given that humans already only sleep for 6 hours during a long rest.)

But yeah, if you know you're not a simulationist, you probably really are more concerned with balance than I am. I let a barbarian domesticate a captured wolf over a period of several weeks, not because I thought through the balance implications of a 2nd level barbarian having an extra attack with proning and a handful of extra HP, but because the goblins who had the wolf previously had obviously domesticated it and so it made sense that the barbarian could too.