There is no "Rule Zero"!

[Malevolence]

In my experience, house rules usually come about as a reaction to dissatisfaction with the printed rules. They aren't thought out in advance, unless you're returning to a system you're familiar with.

So I'd say you're exactly wrong there.

Yes, houserules come about as a reaction to dissatisfaction with the printed rules. And as a direct result of this, the DM has a list of house rules at game start. At worst, he notices a problem mid game, takes some time to think it through, and then presents a math tested solution next session.

So I'd say I'm exactly right there.


Again, in my experience, Rule 0 is invoked when time is a real world importance. It might be to avoid looking something up and breaking immersion. It might be because a specific is in a book that hasn't been brought that night, or in one that doesn't have an index.

Precisely. The experienced DM knows the rule, and can just point it out. The inexperienced one doesn't, and has to look it up. So he has to make up something to fill in for the lack of actual rules. And since he is inexperienced, whatever he makes is not going to be good. It's a catch 22 you see - anyone who could use rule zero effectively doesn't need it.


And the speed a decision is made at has little to do with how considered a decision is. Especially when the decision is made by someone experienced and familiar with the kind of situation at hand.

If they were experienced, they'd know the actual rules. Speed does make a difference. Show me how to disassemble, and reassemble a car. You have one minute to research. Begin.


Citation?

The very definition of what experience and inexperience mean.


It's a tool. Nothing more, nothing less. Are you wary of your screwdriver? Because that's how wary you need to be of Rule 0.

If someone picks up my screwdriver and waves it around like a weapon, I certainly will be wary of them. Sure they will not definitely stab me, but it is quite possible that they might try to. And that is what rule zero is - something not inherently dangerous, but potentially so, being used in a potentially threatening manner.


You're all about the abuse and the need to curb it. But I say that abuse is as abusers do. As has been observed several times, a GM doesn't need Rule 0 to be abusive. Just as players can be abusive without any help.

Abusers are lazy. While it's possible they'll learn the actual rules to mess with people, most people that get over the wall of actually knowing the rules of the game they are playing are mature enough to not resort to such PvP like antics.

The fact of the matter is that players who wanted to play a freeform game would play a freeform game. Those that want D&D, or whatever system you are playing want that. They didn't waste their money buying rulebooks for that system, and their time learning said system to be bait and switched into a freeform game. If they wanted that, they could have saved their money.


I don't agree. It's entirely possible to fail every possible goal your character started with, and still have a great time in the game. Paranoia is a blast, but y'll lose at least half your clones, and probably not achieve anything. In Call of Cthulhu you'll most likely end up mad or dead. People still play it.

The point of those games is to attempt to be this guy:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3467/3931678882_73868c65b2.jpg

As such, no one takes them seriously. In serious games, which means any system but the two in which the whole point is to be jerked around, success and failure is directly proportional to how well you are, or are not accomplishing character goals.

[obliged_salmon]

Not really. It's a dictatorship where the citizens can argue the laws and are not controlled by a military or police force. It's a dictatorship where, at any point, the citizens say "We don't want you to rule us anymore, Mr. King President Prime Minister for Life" and the dictator then steps down. It's a dictatorship where the citizens are free to leave, if they don't like the country anymore, or just found their own country in the same spot.

Sure, out of game, the players can band together and call the shots. Oust the GM from power. In the game, they can't. e.g. Bob the fighter's player can't say "Bob has a wizard stepbrother who can help us locate the treasure!" without the GM's approval. If you oust the GM out of game, it doesn't mean anything with regard to Bob's alleged family.


It's not hard to understand, it's just a completely undesirable situation. The people who disagree with this don't want a process; they're not there to play Rules Lawyer: The Sleepening...they're there to play their character Joe the barbarian.

Heh, I don't think anyone who wants to play a cut and dry barbarian is also interested in building complicated land ships that sail over the polar ice caps with the help of rulebook loopholes combined with real world physics.

More to the point. Group consensus takes about two seconds longer in my group than GM alone decision would take. It's quite simple. Whoever suggests the effect of the ruling asks the table, "is that all right with everyone?" Everyone grunts assent, or gets a chance to put forth a different opinion (rare). Consensus rules, we move on. That might not work as well for every group, but for us it works just fine. It's not the horrible, time consuming, immersion breaking mess everyone seems to think it might be.

[Britter]

A). No; that's not necessary, or even desirable. Adding more rules doesn't necessarily make things any better and can (in fact) make things worse.


A comprehensive or coherent ruleset doesn't neccessarily need to be unmanageably large. For example, I find Burning Wheels ruleset to be very comprehnsive. It is also manageably small. On the other extreme, I find 4e's ruleset, specifically character powers, to be simultaneously too large and too limiting.

The assumption that when people say "get a ruleset that allows you to rule fairly on a very wide variety of possible actions" we mean "get a ruleset that deliniates each possible action your character can do" is incorrect. You can have small, tightly constructed rules that allow easy extrapolation of a very wide variety of actions, without the need to go into the nebulous territory of "Rule Zero". Of course, such rule sets do fit the definition of Rule Zero for some participants in this thread, so ymmv on that issue.

For me, if a ruleset specifically gives the GM advice for how to build the difficulty levels of dice checks in a generic way, applying that scale to non-standard situations is not a Rule Zero thing.




B). They do; it's the same recourse that you have if you don't like what any other of your elected officials do: you can convince them that they are acting in a manner that you don't approve of and that you won't re-elect them if they continue, and then you can follow through with that. THis has nothing to do with Rule 0.


No, these are not correct; it's not a dictatorship, it's a representative democracy. You choose (elect) your GM, just like you would a president or congressman. Once you've elected him, he makes the decisions; your only option if you don't like what he's doing is kick him out and elect someone new, which you can always do.

It would only be a dictatorship if the GM prevents you from picking another GM... which has nothing to do with rule 0.

No, it is not a representative democracy if there is only one vote that actually matters. It is the illusion of democracy. If your options are "agree with me or replace me/walk away" that is not a democracy.

Now, if a democracy is desirable as the foundation for an RPG is debateable. I don't like it myself. I prefer to have the rules clearly deliniate the powers AND limitatipns of the GM and the players. For example, Burning Wheel's "Say Yes or Roll the Dice" was brought up earlier as a rule that prevents the GM from just saying no. But it also gives the GM the authority to say to players "To do that/have that be true/convince him of that/etc, you have to make a roll and risk failure. If you won't make a roll, you can't have your way." The player can ask to do anything. The GM can require a roll and dictate failure consequences. If the player won't roll, the GM doesn't have to give them what they want. Thats the written rules of the game.

I consider that to be a good example of how to deliniate who has what powers in the game.

[Eldan]

YPrecisely. The experienced DM knows the rule, and can just point it out. The inexperienced one doesn't, and has to look it up. So he has to make up something to fill in for the lack of actual rules. And since he is inexperienced, whatever he makes is not going to be good. It's a catch 22 you see - anyone who could use rule zero effectively doesn't need it.

Hold on, hold on. Counting every book ever printed, D&D has many thousands of pages of rules. No one can remember them all. Furthermore, even if you make your house rules before the game, one of the things that makes it in fact most enjoyable is that there is always something unexpected. Your players will be almost guaranteed to come up with something you didn't expect. In that case, you can't just say "Well, I'll decide on a rule tomorrow, when I have time to run the statistics". IN that case, you want a rule now.



The point of those games is to attempt to be this guy:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3467/3931678882_73868c65b2.jpg

As such, no one takes them seriously. In serious games, which means any system but the two in which the whole point is to be jerked around, success and failure is directly proportional to how well you are, or are not accomplishing character goals.

Since when does no one take Call of Cthulhu seriously? In fact, it's one of the more serious games I know. You create a horror atmosphere, when successful. That tends to be, you know, serious.

[Tyndmyr]

You're all about the abuse and the need to curb it. But I say that abuse is as abusers do. As has been observed several times, a GM doesn't need Rule 0 to be abusive. Just as players can be abusive without any help.

So what you're actually saying is, given the opportunity, all GMs will be abusive. And all players need to be sure that their GM is playing by exactly the same rules as them.

Which is ridiculous.

Well, when there is abuse, it should be curbed, obviously. Yes, rule 0 is not the only possible means of rule abuse, but this topic is not about all possible means of abuse, just rule 0.

And no...this doesn't mean all GMs will be abusive. That's a poor way to put it. I feel that some rules are worse than others, and are more prone to misuse. Those rules most prone to misuse are best replaced or improved by clearer or more specific rules.


You still haven't come up with a definitive reason why Rule 0 is bad. It's all possibility, supposition and assumption that a GM using it will be a power tripping monster. I'm sorry you had such a hard time of things during your time as a gamer, but that doesn't excuse your reliance on a logical fallacy to make your point.

Sure. Single point of failure. Look, all GMs make mistakes. They need not be a power tripping monster to do so. I've made mistakes, I'm sure everyone else has at some point to...we're human, and thus are not perfect.

However, it is less probable that any group of humans will be wrong in the same way at the same time. Thus, a concensus based system is less vulnerable to mistakes. I make no claim at perfection, only improvement.


And they have different requirements from the rules. BUt games like D&D force the Gm to use the same system for NPC and monsters as the PCs use for their characters.

Remind me why I need such a time consuming and involved system to keep track of abilities, AC, hit points and magic items again.

Well...that's the kind of game you're playing. If you don't want that kind of game, D&D is probably not a good choice for you. Tracking things like AC and hit points is pretty normal in it.

Yes, NPCs and monsters use the same basic system as PCs. This is not that unusual. It's probably generally better than having two separate systems to keep track of. 3.5 is complex enough already.


Nor does newness make something desirable.

True, but I never cited newness as desirable. You cited the age of rule zero as support. In fact, I'm quite sure nobody has.

So...this statement of yours is irrelevant.


However, all RPGs are based on the consensus that the GM is the final arbiter of rules and events. The player might be able to convince the GM to decide in his favour. But at the end of the day, the GM has the last word.

Amber Diceless has no GM. Therefore, this statement is false.


Or he's not a GM, he's some poor individual that's been browbeaten into submission by abusive players.

Not all systems have a GM. Not all systems put the same responsibilities on the GM. Hell, not all GROUPS put the same responsibilities on GMs. I would not assume that a GM is "browbeaten" based solely on this one bit of information.


When you don't know what the RAI were and the RAW doesn't make sense for your situation, what do you do without Rule 0?

As I have said, you come up with an agreement as to how your group wishes to house rule it.

[Eldan]

For me, if a ruleset specifically gives the GM advice for how to build the difficulty levels of dice checks in a generic way, applying that non-specific scale to non-standard situations is not a Rule Zero thing.


Let me give an example of what I mean here. One that is totally made up.

Let's take the action of climbing.

The rulebook says, on the subject of difficulties:
-Climbing a rope is Difficulty 3
-Climbing a rope ladder is Difficulty 2.

Now you have the situation where someone climbs a rope with knots in it. That's between those two. Who decides whether it should be 2 or 3?

[Britter]

For me, if a ruleset specifically gives the GM advice for how to build the difficulty levels of dice checks in a generic way, applying that non-specific scale to non-standard situations is not a Rule Zero thing.


Let me give an example of what I mean here. One that is totally made up.

Let's take the action of climbing.

The rulebook says, on the subject of difficulties:
-Climbing a rope is Difficulty 3
-Climbing a rope ladder is Difficulty 2.

Now you have the situation where someone climbs a rope with knots in it. That's between those two. Who decides whether it should be 2 or 3?

My honest opinion is that that scale is poorly designed and way too specific. I prefer things like this:

Obstacle 1 = Easy
2 = Routine
3 = Difficult

etc. Now, of course some of you are saying "But Britter, that means you have to rule zero if a task is Easy or Routine!" Maybe so. It is definitly an art, not a science. One does have to go off of examples in the rules, and make a call from there. since in the systems I use, that is the rules as written, it is obviously not Rule Zero for me. Ymmv.

If I were forced to make a ruling and forced to accomodate that scale, I would go with difficulty 2, because a rope ladder is easier to climb than a rope. But I dislike that sort of highly-secific ruleset, and I wouldn't use it.

Edit - Bah, ignore the above, I misread the example. I would make them roll for a difficulty 3, but give them an advantage die for the knots. Most systems give a situational bonus mechanic that I feel is appropriate to that sort of thing. It is still a rope, just a little easier to climb.

I still don't like the rules and the example though...too specific and wonky.

[Malevolence]

Hold on, hold on. Counting every book ever printed, D&D has many thousands of pages of rules. No one can remember them all. Furthermore, even if you make your house rules before the game, one of the things that makes it in fact most enjoyable is that there is always something unexpected. Your players will be almost guaranteed to come up with something you didn't expect. In that case, you can't just say "Well, I'll decide on a rule tomorrow, when I have time to run the statistics". IN that case, you want a rule now.

An experienced DM has been at it for years. While memorizing thousands of pages of rules in a short amount of time isn't reasonable, someone who has been at it for years probably has.

And chances are, there already are rules for whatever they are trying to do. Jump + Balance + charge action to swing on the light fixture and attack the guy, for example. It even tells you DCs.

Granted, not all archetypes are supported. But the ones that aren't are not because they are conceptually flawed. Which means Rule Zero, houserules etc won't help, because it is not a fixable problem.


Since when does no one take Call of Cthulhu seriously? In fact, it's one of the more serious games I know. You create a horror atmosphere, when successful. That tends to be, you know, serious.

Since it's a game all about failing epically at everything you sought to do. Which means always.

[Eldan]

I made it up in 30 seconds, yeah. Not a great one at all.

See "Rope" and "Ladder" as examples for difficulties, then.

We have the three difficulty classes you presented, and someone still has to decide which grade it is, as you said.

Really, every system of rules for an RPG will always have certain cases which aren't clearly defined and need a judgement.


Since it's a game all about failing epically at everything you sought to do. Which means always.


CoC is not about failing. It's about winning narrowly and at a terrible cost. Two party members die and the third goes insane, but you have given humanity another ten years.

And I'd just like to say that I've DMed for about ten years now, and I'm far from knowing all the rules of D&D. Many books I've never even looked at.

Archetypes that are not supported are flawed? What about:

Guy using a one-handed sword and keeps his off-hand free for grabbing torches, loot or other things? Classic adventurer. Portrayed in countless cartoons, comics and books. Constantly outclassed by TWF or THF.
-Swashbuckler. A classic, but just bad, as written.
-The Fighter.
-The monk
-The Samurai.
-The Truenamer.

There's homebrew variants for many of these, which work just fine.

[McSmack]

No, it is not a representative democracy if there is only one vote that actually matters. It is the illusion of democracy. If your options are "agree with me or replace me/walk away" that is not a democracy.

- actually is a represenative democracy. "The representatives form an independent ruling body (for an election period) charged with the responsibility of acting in the people's interest, but not as their proxy representatives not necessarily always according to their wishes, but with enough authority to exercise swift and resolute initiative in the face of changing circumstances."- Representaive democracy- Wikipedia.

[Britter]

I made it up in 30 seconds, yeah. Not a great one at all.

See "Rope" and "Ladder" as examples for difficulties, then.

We have the three difficulty classes you presented, and someone still has to decide which grade it is, as you said.

Really, every system of rules for an RPG will always have certain cases which aren't clearly defined and need a judgement.

Yup. Not disputing that. I am disputing that that is Rule Zero. I can consult example obstacles, and offer a difficulty to the player and have them roll. To me that is not rule zero. It is using the rules to adjudicate a situation consistently. Once we esthablish that it is routine to climb a ladder, for instance, then it is always routine, barring a change in the circumstances (in this example, climbing a ladder in a hurricane would be difficult, at least, for instance)

[Frozen_Feet]

However, all RPGs are based on the consensus that the GM is the final arbiter of rules and events.

I'd dispute that. I'm fairly sure there are roleplaying games without a GM, where rules disputes are solved by voting, I-ching, fortune cookies or, you know, just rolling dice.

Anyways, I think the whole topic is stupid, for the sole reason that the thing called Rule Zero is not, in fact, "Rule Zero" in many systems that utilize it. In great many systems, it's rule number one, explicitly written down and there for all to see. It's as much part of the game as weapon damage or something.

Arguing that the GM doesn't have the final say in a game that explicitly states otherwise is waste of time.

[Tyndmyr]

An experienced DM has been at it for years. While memorizing thousands of pages of rules in a short amount of time isn't reasonable, someone who has been at it for years probably has.

I probably have thousands of pages worth of rules in my head. I certainly have memorized the majority of rules for a few systems. And by "the majority", I mean, I might not be able to rewrite the book from scratch, but if I tried, the mechanics of it would be 99+% correct.


Since it's a game all about failing epically at everything you sought to do. Which means always.

I have no problem with CoC. Or paranoia for that matter. If I sat down to play a game advertised as D&D, and the DM tried to run it like a game of paranoia, I'd be upset though. Probably suck terribly.

Not every system is equally good for every type of game. In Paranoia, the GM is supposed to act in certain ways that promote the atmosphere and style of the game. In Paranoia, these actions work well. However, I wouldn't generally recommend specifically trying to create distrust, paranoia and conflict in your PCs in D&D. It'd likely end quickly and badly.

[Eldan]

Yup. Not disputing that. I am disputing that that is Rule Zero. I can consult example obstacles, and offer a difficulty to the player and have them roll. To me that is not rule zero. It is using the rules to adjudicate a situation consistently. Once we esthablish that it is routine to climb a ladder, for instance, then it is always routine, barring a change in the circumstances (in this example, climbing a ladder in a hurricane would be difficult, at least, for instance)


To me that is the very definition of rule 0, and the most often used case. It comes up in D&D quite often.

Your player decides to do something unorthodox. You look in the rules, they tell you "Dexterity is for this kind of action", which fits, so you use dexterity. Then you look at the DC of other actions, and see "DC X is this kind of actions, and very difficult", so you set DC X-1. If it comes up again, you remember your earlier decision.

You make a decision on something not entirely covered on the basis of the existing rules. Same thing.

[Britter]

- actually is a represenative democracy. "The representatives form an independent ruling body (for an election period) charged with the responsibility of acting in the people's interest, but not as their proxy representatives not necessarily always according to their wishes, but with enough authority to exercise swift and resolute initiative in the face of changing circumstances."- Representaive democracy- Wikipedia.

There is only one vote, total, in a situation where the GM has rule zero authority. That GM is also not a representative of the players. That GM is the opposition, the guy whos job it is to challenge the players. He or she is not there to represent the peoples interest. The GM there to put obstacles in front of the players and run a game.

In no way does it resemble a democracy. I'm going to avoid political examples due to forum rules, but a system where one guy has the one vote that can force everyone else to do things his way is not a democracy.

[Tyndmyr]

Yeah, rep democracy would be if there was six players, and they elected three of their number to vote on rules.

It strikes me as a fairly unlikely system to come up in actual practice. Perhaps a multiple-GM game. That's about it, but even so...it's unusual for them to be voted in.

No, the most common model is "GM decides", and next most common is "group decides". The latter is generally quite informal.

[Apophis775]

Once many years back, in a DND book, we were having an arguement with our DM over something. Don't remember what it was, but it was trivial to him and he wanted it to happen (i think maybe we were being knocked unconcious).

Anyway, after about 20 mins of us arguing with him, he grabbed a 3.0 or 3.5 DM's guide flipped to a page near the beginning, and showed us a paragraph that said basically this:

"These rules are a suggestion for the DM" There was more but I don't remember. I do know, that I have searched through my 3.5 DM guide a few times for this passage and can't find it.

Anyway, he basically used it as a "Screw your argument, I make the rules" thing.

Nevertheless, we almost always had fun.

[Britter]

To me that is the very definition of rule 0, and the most often used case. It comes up in D&D quite often.

Your player decides to do something unorthodox. You look in the rules, they tell you "Dexterity is for this kind of action", which fits, so you use dexterity. Then you look at the DC of other actions, and see "DC X is this kind of actions, and very difficult", so you set DC X-1. If it comes up again, you remember your earlier decision.

You make a decision on something not entirely covered on the basis of the existing rules. Same thing.

I disagree. If you are using as the basis for your arbitration a reference to similar rules, than you are using the rules to make the call. It's not like you need a specific rule entry for, say , every profession skill DnD could have to use the skill effectively.

A GM is going to have a certain degree of authoroty over rules calls. If you reference the existing rules to create the situation for an unorthodox roll, I don't see how that can even be Rule Zero. It's using the rules to let the player do something.

This is the core of a lot of this argument. No single definition of Rule Zero exists that will satisfy all of us, so we are all arguing for or against our preferred interpretation.

[Thufir]

Yeah, no. Bolded is why I disagree with you here. There's no reason you can't have a group decision on which rules should be applied, and there's no reason a DM should be the final judge jury and executioner.

But there is. Because that's what the DM is. As I said, any rule change has to be applied by the DM, because the DM is the one who applies the rules. At any given point in a game, we may have this exchange:
PLAYER: I do [action]
DM: OK, make [check(s)]
PLAYER: *Rolls dice, adds numbers* I got [Number(s)]
DM: [Stuff happens]
The DM applies the rules and determine the results. Yes, you can have a group decision on which rules should be applied (Though personally I feel having to discuss it in every instance would be rather boring), but it is the DM who actually applies them, and determines DCs and so on.


Other people have argued that campaign design is rule zero. I say this is silly, because you need a setting to play, and the rules heavily assume that the DM is free to create or modify a setting. I don't consider this to be a use of rule zero unless you are changing setting elements DURING PLAY. Rule zero covers exceptions. It doesn't cover normal things that other rules already cover, and the DM certainly has the power to create adventures and such by RAW.

But the rules don't actually cover the creation of a world. Or say, the history of that world. Say there was some complicated political situation, which eventually led to a civil war. Well, that should be covered by the rules, diplomacy and then lots of combat. The DM won't make all those rolls though, they'll just say "These things happened."
Alternatively, say this comes up during play. But it happens behind the scenes. Again, the DM isn't going to roll a load of dice while the PCs are doing something else, they're just going to announce that for whatever reasons, a civil war has broken out and go from there.
This seems to me to be much like what Yukitsu was saying. As far as I can see, this clearly is use of Rule Zero, because it's the DM deciding things purely based on the rules, but you say it's not because you agree with this but you're arguing against Rule Zero.
Certainly it's silly to play without a setting, but that doesn't mean designing a setting isn't Rule Zero. That's why I feel it's silly to play without Rule Zero.


But you're missing the point. It's not rule zero since it's a group decision. We're ok with a lack of half-x, because it doesn't particularly affect us anyhow, but we wanted specific other races. So, everyone chats about what they want and why, and we come to a conclusion.

But it is Rule Zero. It may be done with the consent of the group, but it's still the DM who made the decision.
And, to extend the example, what if the DM decided a different race doesn't exist? A race none of you considered playing as, so it never comes up in discussion? Well, then it's clearly not a group decision, though you may well still be OK with it. And this can be applied to other setting details as well - the DM is obviously not going to clear every setting detail with the players, because firstly it would take too long and secondly some things should come as surprises. So they make the decisions on their own, through use of Rule Zero. That is what Rule Zero is. It's the DM's basic right to say "This is how things are in my world."

[Tyndmyr]

But the rules don't actually cover the creation of a world. Or say, the history of that world. Say there was some complicated political situation, which eventually led to a civil war. Well, that should be covered by the rules, diplomacy and then lots of combat.

Of course the rules don't cover all those things. If they did, then they would have already made the world. The rules, instead, allow the GM to make the world. He is given a lot of latitude in doing so. If he wishes to make entirely new monsters for this world of his, by RAW, he is permitted to do so. If he wishes to create entirely new spells in this world, he may, again, as expressly stated in RAW, do that.

You are mistaking rules for "you must roll on a table".


But it is Rule Zero. It may be done with the consent of the group, but it's still the DM who made the decision.

No, no it's not. The group makes the decision. DMs have made decisions and been vetoed by the group.

If final responsibility rests with the DM, and he can overrule the group, then it is rule zero.

If not, then it's not rule zero.


And, to extend the example, what if the DM decided a different race doesn't exist? A race none of you considered playing as, so it never comes up in discussion?

Go back, reread the post. He had a list of races he didn't want to exist. One of them was half-orc. We let him declare the half-x races nonexistant, since nobody wanted to play as one.

So...it came up, and everyone was cool with it. Done deal.


Well, then it's clearly not a group decision, though you may well still be OK with it. And this can be applied to other setting details as well - the DM is obviously not going to clear every setting detail with the players, because firstly it would take too long and secondly some things should come as surprises. So they make the decisions on their own, through use of Rule Zero. That is what Rule Zero is. It's the DM's basic right to say "This is how things are in my world."

No, and he doesn't have to use rule zero to create a world. World creation is allowed for DMs. It's in the rules.

[Apophis775]

There will always be 2 sides of this argument:

1: Players who have never DMed or GMed

2: Players who have DMed and GMed and realize that sometimes the occasional "It is that way because that is the way that it is" is necessary.


My suggestion: Players who argue against this should try DMing and time how long until they have to make a decision that approaches rule zero. Might take awhile, might not, but it WILL HAPPEN.
Almost 100% guaranteed.

[Tyndmyr]

There will always be 2 sides of this argument:

1: Players who have never DMed or GMed

I'm mildly offended that you believe everyone who disagrees with you has never GMed.

For a trivial proof of this as incorrect, feel free to use the search function and find "The Endless Dungeon"

[Britter]

There will always be 2 sides of this argument:

1: Players who have never DMed or GMed

2: Players who have DMed and GMed and realize that sometimes the occasional "It is that way because that is the way that it is" is necessary.


My suggestion: Players who argue against this should try DMing and time how long until they have to make a decision that approaches rule zero. Might take awhile, might not, but it WILL HAPPEN.
Almost 100% guaranteed.

Again with the false dichomoty...

I have DMed/GMed and I don't believe Rule Zero is neccessary. There is a spectrum here, a scale of opinion on how much authority a GM should have that runs a pretty wide gamut.

Don't try to boil it down to "the ignorant and the wise", because that is really unfair to everyone involved.

[Apophis775]

Again with the false dichomoty...

I have DMed/GMed and I don't believe Rule Zero is neccessary. There is a spectrum here, a scale of opinion on how much authority a GM should have that runs a pretty wide gamut.

Don't try to boil it down to "the ignorant and the wise", because that is really unfair to everyone involved.

You've never made a decision that was against the rules?

If you haven't, good job.

If you have, then you have USED RULE ZERO.

[Britter]

You've never made a decision that was against the rules?

If you haven't, good job.

If you have, then you have USED RULE ZERO.

Yup. I did. All the time, as I mentioned upthread a bit. And years later after I learned that there were better designed systems that didn't require that sort of thing, I stopped playing the poorly designed system propped up by Rule Zero and went to games that fit my interests and prefered play style better and STOPPED breaking the rules just becuase I was the GM.

The point I am making is that there are many people with reasonable arguements on both sides of this issue, and that to break it down to "Well, if you have GMed you are obviously enlightened and understand the need for this rule, but if you havent you are just unaware of how neccessary it is" is not an accurate portrayl of the situation.

[Malevolence]

I made it up in 30 seconds, yeah. Not a great one at all.

See "Rope" and "Ladder" as examples for difficulties, then.

We have the three difficulty classes you presented, and someone still has to decide which grade it is, as you said.

Really, every system of rules for an RPG will always have certain cases which aren't clearly defined and need a judgement.



CoC is not about failing. It's about winning narrowly and at a terrible cost. Two party members die and the third goes insane, but you have given humanity another ten years.

And I'd just like to say that I've DMed for about ten years now, and I'm far from knowing all the rules of D&D. Many books I've never even looked at.

Archetypes that are not supported are flawed? What about:

Guy using a one-handed sword and keeps his off-hand free for grabbing torches, loot or other things? Classic adventurer. Portrayed in countless cartoons, comics and books. Constantly outclassed by TWF or THF.
-Swashbuckler. A classic, but just bad, as written.
-The Fighter.
-The monk
-The Samurai.
-The Truenamer.

There's homebrew variants for many of these, which work just fine.

Most of those are examples of fundamentally flawed archetypes. Most of them have also received a large amount of ineffective fixes, most of which completely missed the point, and almost none that actually are effective. Especially Fighters. I can't read any more Fighter fixes without risking taking enough Sanity damage to lose it. And since failing in hilarious ways is still failing...

And I've DMed before. I primarily do DM. I still argue against Rule Zero as it is a crutch for the inexperienced and the poor DMs. If you're bad at something, get better at it.

[Thiyr]

Just woke up, few responses all around.


Having established that there are both productive and abusive uses for Rule 0, the smart thing to do would be to distill and separate the productive uses, and use them to replace Rule Zero.

But that would do nothing in terms of this argument, as you would simply be replacing r0 with r0, if it is even possible to separate these uses from each other. The abuse is all the potential the rule has, but without that potential, the rule does nothing.



It's like saying that all role-playing games are expressions of Rule Zero, because some designer somewhere sat down to type out words that made up the original game text, and possibly- *gasp*!- even refined and modified them on the basis of feedback from playtesting. This is accurate but meaningless- by that standard, what, exactly, doesn't count as an expression of Rule Zero? If it applies to everything, if effectively applies to nothing.

I would argue that it would be far from meaningless, but it doesn't count as an expression of rule 0 now. This serves the purpose of an excellent example of how r0 is supposed to work: Decisions are made and codified as best as possible to keep them consistent, and fixed when they're shown not to work. Take out that he's a game designer, and there'd be no issue. Once we add that back in, and it gets published, though, it's no longer him or his playgroup running the game (or rather, not only them), so what was a large group of r0 rulings has become a ruleset.


Because I consult with the other players. Because it's a process, not an off-the-cuff decision. None of this is specified within Rule Zero, and if you DO specify this, it ceases to BE Rule Zero.

What is so hard to understand about this?

Because even if you consult with other players, even if you decide to do nothing without their say-so, you're still holding the authority there. Where does it say r0 must be off-the-cuff and not a process? And if you specify that it being a process makes it cease to be r0, then that same reasoning could be made to say it is the same for off-the-cuff decisions (as that isn't specified anywhere within the rule), at which point r0 doesn't exist at all due to a RAW technicality (which is kinda ironic).


If your solution to persistent rule-disagreements is to dissolve the group, I would argue that the rules are not doing their job very well. It's like saying 'wait until the market crashes' is a substitute for economic regulation, or that a bloody revolution is the solution to a poor government. It's technically accurate, but most of us would prefer a more nuanced methodology for smoothing over procedural disagreements. If the overall level of interpersonal tension has risen to the point where the GM has to be ousted, then there is likely to be serious fallout.

Can't say I agree with your analogies here. You're confusing the government/economic regulations for the people that put them in place. Saying "wait ti the market crashes, then change the regulations because they obviously didn't work" would be like saying "play 3.5 until it's abused so hard it's useless, then switch to playing WoD." And if the rules don't allow a way for the rules to be changed, that is your only option. Ousting a GM is more like saying "Okay, these market regulations are terrible. Guy who put them in place, you're out of a job, new guy, take over." You can call it a revolution if you want, but that is also your only real course of action if the rules don't give you a better option than the tyrannical leader you have. This wouldn't be over poor government, though, but over poor leadership, unless the government explicitly disallows for the change of its own laws by new leaders.


Someone mentioned congress and presidential veto power a while back. That's not what rule 0 is about. Rule 0 is about dictatorship. The GM has ultimate power over the game. Players can't do anything without his say-so.

The players can do nothing except get rid of him. If your playgroup finds someone to be a bad DM for them, that person won't be a DM in the first place, as the players won't give him any power. If a DM becomes a bad DM mid-game, the players can easily walk out on him, deny him his power, and again, he is powerless. The DM has ultimate -expression- of power in his game. The players are the -source- of that ultimate power, however.

[qupte]e.g. Bob the fighter's player can't say "Bob has a wizard stepbrother who can help us locate the treasure!" without the GM's approval. If you oust the GM out of game, it doesn't mean anything with regard to Bob's alleged family.[/quote]

But Bob the fighter can say that. If he had it in a pre-written backstory, it may well have been approved already. If, however, he didn't, then the DM makes a call (This is what prevents the player from saying he's got a Holy Avenger his dad left him stashed in his closet). At that point, if the players say "yes, he does', then the oust the DM, insert a new one, and now, bob does have one. If this is done or not is based entirely on the player's tolerance for their leadership, and how much they want to exercise their power.


More to the point. Group consensus takes about two seconds longer in my group than GM alone decision would take. It's quite simple. Whoever suggests the effect of the ruling asks the table, "is that all right with everyone?" Everyone grunts assent, or gets a chance to put forth a different opinion (rare). Consensus rules, we move on. That might not work as well for every group, but for us it works just fine. It's not the horrible, time consuming, immersion breaking mess everyone seems to think it might be.

This is good. This is what we do for our games at home. And as a number of us have been trying to explain, we see that this is rule 0. If the DM decides that consensus will rule, then he still has the power, but he is delegating it to the group as a whole.

In fact, that just made me realize something about r0: It's only specified because the DM is separated out anyway. Consider: the group decides on a ruling, and the DM refuses to run the game with that ruling. The DM does the only thing one can expect him to do, and quits. Does the group: find a new DM, or compromise and keep their old dm (who for the most part is a good dm, even if he disagrees with this ruling). If they choose option 2, r0 is invoked. if they choose option 1, r0 is still invoked, simply by whoever they replace the DM with.


If someone picks up my screwdriver and waves it around like a weapon, I certainly will be wary of them. Sure they will not definitely stab me, but it is quite possible that they might try to. And that is what rule zero is - something not inherently dangerous, but potentially so, being used in a potentially threatening manner.

I agree with this statement. The problem is that people are treating the tool as the problem, and not the person wielding it as the problem. Saying to get rid of r0 because maniacs wield it threateningly is like banning screwdrivers from sale because some people go on stabbing-sprees with them.


Yeah, rep democracy would be if there was six players, and they elected three of their number to vote on rules.

Having a single representative is still a rep democracy here, imo. Because the players can still put in their input, and the DM, as representative, still has to consider what they want or get voted out and replaced. In this hypothetical three-person D&D nation, the DM is elected into power. He can do ANYTHING. MUAHAHAHAHA. But he can only enforce his rules by getting everyone else to willingly submit to them. I suppose he could hire people to beat up anyone who doesn't agree with his rulings, but if we're only involving the people in this playgroup, the authority to have this power is grated to him. He can do nothing to keep it but appease those that put him there, or walk away and move to a new group.

[Apophis775]

Yup. I did. All the time, as I mentioned upthread a bit. And years later after I learned that there were better designed systems that didn't require that sort of thing, I stopped playing the poorly designed system propped up by Rule Zero and went to games that fit my interests and prefered play style better and STOPPED breaking the rules just becuase I was the GM.

The point I am making is that there are many people with reasonable arguements on both sides of this issue, and that to break it down to "Well, if you have GMed you are obviously enlightened and understand the need for this rule, but if you havent you are just unaware of how neccessary it is" is not an accurate portrayl of the situation.

So your saying if players are arguing with you about the rules or something that can happen, and looking up reveals nothing but just continues the argument, that you let it go on forever?

Because if you don't and make a ruling. Thats rule zero.

[Tyndmyr]

In fact, that just made me realize something about r0: It's only specified because the DM is separated out anyway. Consider: the group decides on a ruling, and the DM refuses to run the game with that ruling. The DM does the only thing one can expect him to do, and quits. Does the group: find a new DM, or compromise and keep their old dm (who for the most part is a good dm, even if he disagrees with this ruling). If they choose option 2, r0 is invoked. if they choose option 1, r0 is still invoked, simply by whoever they replace the DM with.

Not at all. I was once selected to replace a GM that was kicked out because he was really, really bad about abusing rule 0. He had other issues too, but that was the main one, and he wasn't at all good with listening to the desires of the group to use the actual rules. So, he had to go.

I then, did not use rule 0. Problem solved, campaign goes on.


Having a single representative is still a rep democracy here, imo.

I am unable to find a definition for representative democracy that acknowledges the possibility of a single representative.

So, I'm faced with your definition, or that used by the rest of the world. Ima guess you're wrong.

[obliged_salmon]

But Bob the fighter can say that. If he had it in a pre-written backstory, it may well have been approved already. If, however, he didn't, then the DM makes a call (This is what prevents the player from saying he's got a Holy Avenger his dad left him stashed in his closet). At that point, if the players say "yes, he does', then the oust the DM, insert a new one, and now, bob does have one. If this is done or not is based entirely on the player's tolerance for their leadership, and how much they want to exercise their power.

Sure, unless new DM decides he doesn't want Bob to have a cousin after all.




This is good. This is what we do for our games at home. And as a number of us have been trying to explain, we see that this is rule 0. If the DM decides that consensus will rule, then he still has the power, but he is delegating it to the group as a whole.

I still argue there's a distinction. In my game, everyone at the table is equal. I think you're saying that we're only equal because the GM is allowing us to all be equal. I don't think that's how equality works.


In fact, that just made me realize something about r0: It's only specified because the DM is separated out anyway. Consider: the group decides on a ruling, and the DM refuses to run the game with that ruling. The DM does the only thing one can expect him to do, and quits. Does the group: find a new DM, or compromise and keep their old dm (who for the most part is a good dm, even if he disagrees with this ruling). If they choose option 2, r0 is invoked. if they choose option 1, r0 is still invoked, simply by whoever they replace the DM with.

Your way sounds a lot more obnoxious than just agreeing to compromise on these things from the get-go.


So your saying if players are arguing with you about the rules or something that can happen, and looking up reveals nothing but just continues the argument, that you let it go on forever?

Because if you don't and make a ruling. Thats rule zero.

Hmm, two people who disagree, and have equal power in the situation have a special tool that lets them resolve their differences called "compromise."

[tonberrian]

Nah. Gust of wind will shove a medium creature x far. While this is not a precise number, you can, via newtons third law, determine the rough thrust from this by estimating the weight of a medium creature.

I've estimated the weight of medium creatures. They range from 82 to 438 lbs., not counting equipment (which you should). With equipment, I can have Kiara, the elven sorceress-courtesan who's only wearing a negligee made of gossamer and dreams that's effectively weightless (82 lbs.), and P. K. Rat, the Half-Orc artificer who finds it necessary to persist Bite of the Werebear and Valiant Fury just to carry all his equipment (20 base strength + 5 levels + Inherent + 16 enhancement [Bite of the Werebear] + 2 typeless [Silithar Muscles graft from LoM] + 4 morale [Valiant Fury] = 52 strength = 33280 lbs. of equipment + 438 base weight = 33718 lbs.). Notice that P. K. Rat effectively weighs a little more than 411 times what Kiara does. If they fail their saves, they are effected equally by the spell (which has it's own variance of distance by a multiplier of six).

The calculations are not quite as simple as they seem. I can't figure the exact numbers involved since the dynamics of this situation isn't my specialty, but I can tell you that the force scales linearly with the mass, which scales linearly with the weight. Thus, our answers will differ by two orders of magnitude between Kiara and P. K. Rat. Any estimates we get are effectively meaningless at that variance.

This doesn't even get into the fact that if P. K. Rat dies and is reincarnated into a Gnome, his carrying capacity drops to 14400 lbs. (weight down to 48 lbs.) and after going through extensive therapy to only carry that around, he is still pushed back twice as far as Kiara, despite effectively weighing a little more than 176 times what she does.

The numbers just aren't consistent enough to gain any useful information out of them.

[Thiyr]

Not at all. I was once selected to replace a GM that was kicked out because he was really, really bad about abusing rule 0. He had other issues too, but that was the main one, and he wasn't at all good with listening to the desires of the group to use the actual rules. So, he had to go.

I then, did not use rule 0. Problem solved, campaign goes on.

I presume that some of the ruling which this person made were done away with by you. Is that a safe assumption? Doing that, you invoked r0, presuming it was still the same campaign. If it wasn't, then I admit, you didn't use r0, but (and I apologize if i worded that poorly before), that isn't the situation I posed.


I am unable to find a definition for representative democracy that acknowledges the possibility of a single representative.

So, I'm faced with your definition, or that used by the rest of the world. Ima guess you're wrong.

You're correct here. I did a bit more searching and realized I was calling it the wrong thing. This is actually more like a direct democracy than a representative democracy, more i look at the basics. The DM in that situation is an official, put in place and removed by the voters, who otherwise serves in the capacity as the person who runs the game. Thank you, otherwise i'd have probably kept going on mis-using that.


Sure, unless new DM decides he doesn't want Bob to have a cousin after all.

But, if this is the deciding factor (silly as it may be), then what makes you think this new DM would remain in power as well?


I still argue there's a distinction. In my game, everyone at the table is equal. I think you're saying that we're only equal because the GM is allowing us to all be equal. I don't think that's how equality works.

You're right, but I didn't feel like getting into the whole "The DM is only allowed to allow you to be equal because the players allow him to" thing. Regardless, I think we're arguing the same thing and disagreeing on terminology at this point. Just understand that when I talk about r0, I'm not making that distinction, as I feel that is the best heading to put it under. You want to call it something else, no problem, just don't expect me to as well.


Your way sounds a lot more obnoxious than just agreeing to compromise on these things from the get-go.

This is just spelling out the steps of compromise, and posing a situation in which compromise doesn't work. If something is a dealbreaker for one person, and that issue going the other way is a dealbreaker for a second, then the situation I posed is what comes into play, and is more likely to go with situation 1 over situation 2.

[Tyndmyr]

I presume that some of the ruling which this person made were done away with by you. Is that a safe assumption? Doing that, you invoked r0, presuming it was still the same campaign. If it wasn't, then I admit, you didn't use r0, but (and I apologize if i worded that poorly before), that isn't the situation I posed.

The main thing done away with was the terrible, repeated use of rule zero. We did, by mutual agreement, decide to throw out all his terrible changes. This happened even before we kicked him out and determined who was going to replace him as DM. The only thing I can think of that was actually relevant was his extremely confusing and inconsistent use of the undead type(zombies immune to turning, what?). We just reverted to using RAW for it.

I wouldn't call reverting to RAW on the basis of the entire groups decision rule zero.

[Britter]

So your saying if players are arguing with you about the rules or something that can happen, and looking up reveals nothing but just continues the argument, that you let it go on forever?

Because if you don't and make a ruling. Thats rule zero.

Actually, in my current system I don't have that issue because the rules are well enough written that, when those disputes come up, I have rules, procedures, and references from the books that allow me to make a ruling.

Look, if we are going to argue that all GM intervention is Rule Zero, this will be a short conversation. Refs in sporting events make calls constantly, based on the rules and what they saw occuring, and that is not rule zero. That is how I view my role and responsibility as GM. I make a call based on my understanding of the rule. I have never considered that rule Zero. If you do, ok thats cool. I just disagree with you.

[obliged_salmon]

But, if this is the deciding factor (silly as it may be), then what makes you think this new DM would remain in power as well?

Point taken. On the other hand, if the only power players have to affect in-game occurences is threat of removing DM from power, this still does not seem ideal to me.




You're right, but I didn't feel like getting into the whole "The DM is only allowed to allow you to be equal because the players allow him to" thing. Regardless, I think we're arguing the same thing and disagreeing on terminology at this point. Just understand that when I talk about r0, I'm not making that distinction, as I feel that is the best heading to put it under. You want to call it something else, no problem, just don't expect me to as well.

You know, I think we kind of are. I think at this point it's more a semantics issue than anything. I think there's a negative sort of power implied in the term "rule 0," but the situations we're describing are indeed technically the same. Regardless, I shall not compel you to abandon your terminology, eh?

[Tyndmyr]

A referee in a sporting event is a good example for the portion of a DMs job that is ajudication.

Yeah, the "official" rules for baseball may specify a ref, but you don't actually *need* a ref to play baseball with your buddies.

[Britter]

A referee in a sporting event is a good example for the portion of a DMs job that is ajudication.

Yeah, the "official" rules for baseball may specify a ref, but you don't actually *need* a ref to play baseball with your buddies.

Yes, I agree.

and I am not saying that tabletop RPGs are analougous to sports. They aren't. The rules of a sport are far less flexible, because they are working with more limited set of possible actions.

What I am protesting the most about Rule Zero is, honestly, the type of GM behavior that it engenders, and the ramifications of that behavior in games.

For instance Tyndmyr, I recall you often giving people advice on fool-proof, absolutly leagal, by the book, air-tight ways to kill DMPCs. You had to do so because the GMs in question were using the "unlimited cosmic power" to screw with players consistently. The only way to stop them was to show that they were willingly and repeatedly ignoring the rules for their own fun and to heck with the players.

Heck, I think most Practical Optimization exists to end encounters before the GM can start really screwing around with players. This is, of course, just my opinion, but I see many requests for practical op due to challenges in game (a dm killing off every one of a players new characters, or a badguy that always teleports away at the last second no matter what, etc)

The problem exists, in my opinion, because rules DO create behaviors in the people who play games. Thats the role of games - to get you to do things you might otherwise not do, and generally to have fun doing it. If there is an explicit rule allowing the GM to do anything he wants whenever he wants, that is going to shape his behavior within the game. I have played with guys who I love to hang out with, yet as soon as they step behind the screen its railroad city, telling me what I think and do, redefining how spells or abilities work to allow the awesome encounter he wants, etc. The only way to curb that is to remove the element of design that creates it, imo.

[Tyndmyr]

For instance Tyndmyr, I recall you often giving people advice on fool-proof, absolutly leagal, by the book, air-tight ways to kill DMPCs. You had to do so because the GMs in question were using the "unlimited cosmic power" to screw with players consistently. The only way to stop them was to show that they were willingly and repeatedly ignoring the rules for their own fun and to heck with the players.

Yup. That'd be me. It's intended as an educational exercise. In an ideal world, for the GM. In practice, it mostly ends up highlighting the problems of the situation to any players still on the fence. I'll admit, rule 0 to save a DMPC is an extremely bad instance of rule 0...but I've seen it in practice, by more than a few DMs.

And sure, rules affect behavior. If they didn't society, government, law would all be pretty pointless things. Granted, the rules of a game are on a much smaller scale, but even so...players don't play Paranoia the same way they play D&D. Players do attempt to "win"...and by win, I mostly mean be successful. It's an incredibly broad condition as success varies immensely between games, but it's that very variation that creates such different behavior between games.

[Yukitsu]

I'm not talking about this. I never once mentioned NPCs surviving.
I'm talking about consistency and verossimilitude.
If someone with high Wisdom takes a foolish decision, I would tell the player 'are you sure? that sounds foolish because of X and Y'. I find to be just fair that I'd do the same for NPCs.

This is only an issue if you lose suspension of disbelief when "intelligent" does not equate to "infallible." Incredibly intelligent people still miss things, still make errors and can still blindly do something wrong.


Yeah... sounds like bad GM'ing

Normally I'd agree, but it was more like this XKCD comic, so it's somewhat forgiveable. http://xkcd.com/872/


But there is. Because that's what the DM is. As I said, any rule change has to be applied by the DM, because the DM is the one who applies the rules. At any given point in a game, we may have this exchange:
PLAYER: I do [action]
DM: OK, make [check(s)]
PLAYER: *Rolls dice, adds numbers* I got [Number(s)]
DM: [Stuff happens]
The DM applies the rules and determine the results. Yes, you can have a group decision on which rules should be applied (Though personally I feel having to discuss it in every instance would be rather boring), but it is the DM who actually applies them, and determines DCs and so on.

Is the DM dictating the rules here, or are the rules?

If I, as a player, randomly generate that scenario, and then reference the rules of the game, would I get different results? If the DM was running the actual rules, he's not arbitrating, expounding upong, altering, or stating the rules. He's merely acknowledging that I've complied to them.

If we, the players in this randomly generated dungeon, decide that the rules for poison make no sense, and believe that the damage should be in finer increments, does this suddenly make us DMs? Are we incapable of making that ruling by lack of DM?

This notion that only DMs can touch the rules is only there because people insist that they can't find better gaming groups, and absolutely have to play with the people they are playing with. If you find a group that is mature enough to cooperate, the need for an authority on the rules basically evaporates.

[The Big Dice]

Yup. That'd be me. It's intended as an educational exercise. In an ideal world, for the GM. In practice, it mostly ends up highlighting the problems of the situation to any players still on the fence. I'll admit, rule 0 to save a DMPC is an extremely bad instance of rule 0...but I've seen it in practice, by more than a few DMs.
See, sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. And your solutions are often the kind of things that end with long term friends at each other's throats over stupid games.

That's not a good thing in my book. Any action that promotes more hostility than absolutely needed is a bad solution. It's throwing the baby out with the bathwater in exactly the same way that saying just leave if you don't like it.


And sure, rules affect behavior. If they didn't society, government, law would all be pretty pointless things. Granted, the rules of a game are on a much smaller scale, but even so...players don't play Paranoia the same way they play D&D. Players do attempt to "win"...and by win, I mostly mean be successful. It's an incredibly broad condition as success varies immensely between games, but it's that very variation that creates such different behavior between games.
In my experience, people being competitive in the wrong way is the bigger problem. There's a lot of fear of abuse gets talked about on these boards. Fear of giving the Gm any real authority or responsibility in the games he runs. But comparing the Gm to a nation is just stupid. For one thing, you can't leave a tyranny and one vote in a democracy is simply another snowflake in a blizzard.

But you can walk out of a gaming group and one voice can make a huge difference. In both good and bad ways.

[Tyndmyr]

See, sometimes the cure is worse than the disease. And your solutions are often the kind of things that end with long term friends at each other's throats over stupid games.

That's not a good thing in my book. Any action that promotes more hostility than absolutely needed is a bad solution. It's throwing the baby out with the bathwater in exactly the same way that saying just leave if you don't like it.

Nah. Sometimes you have those bad DMs where people just trickle away, leaving one after another. The group doesn't stay together, the DM doesn't learn the error of his ways, since nobody says anything...or if only one person does, it gets dismissed as just one dude.

Sometimes a bit of confrontation is fine. It's the exception, mind you, but in a situation where you sense everyone is getting sick of the same things, it can be better to bring it to a head.


In my experience, people being competitive in the wrong way is the bigger problem. There's a lot of fear of abuse gets talked about on these boards. Fear of giving the Gm any real authority or responsibility in the games he runs. But comparing the Gm to a nation is just stupid. For one thing, you can't leave a tyranny and one vote in a democracy is simply another snowflake in a blizzard.

Plenty of people in real life have left tyranny throughout history.

Democracy is a generic name for a system. They come in all sorts of sizes. Any worries about being "a snowflake in a blizzard" might be relevant to a large mass of people, but don't seem to be a reasonable objection to a group of people the size of a typical gaming group.

[Britter]

In my experience, people being competitive in the wrong way is the bigger problem. There's a lot of fear of abuse gets talked about on these boards. Fear of giving the Gm any real authority or responsibility in the games he runs.

See, here's the thing. I am an adult, and I already have a boss at work. I don't think that the person who runs my entertainment on the weekends needs or deserves any great deal of authority over me.

Now, please don't take that to mean I want everything to go my way and I want a pushover GM. I don't. I want a ruleset that deliniates the powers of the GM, and gives him or her strong authority to make rules calls.

Similarly, I want a ruleset the deliniates the players powers, and limits them accordingly so that the GM can challenge them.

The GM is not the sole owner of a game. There are some gaming models where in the GM does have a larger stake in the creation of the game, that is true, but still, you can build the best world ever, and if no one will play it with you it is wasted paper.

A ruleset that acknowledges the limits of both GM and player power in the game, and clearly defines those abilities, does a lot to minimize the type of dangerous competiton that arises in some gaming environments.

And, though I can only speak for me, my opposition to Rule Zero stems entirely from how I used to use it, and the effects it had on my games and players. I never abused anyone, but I was a railroader, I made things come out the way I wanted them to, I limited and definied victory conditions...I was, in essence, playing with myself and using my friends around the table as pawns, enacting my will through them because I gave them little choice in the matter. Their decisions were not meaningful. They had fun, sure, but at times they were upset, or unhappy with my calls, or were not having any fun because they knew I would do things my way NO MATTER WHAT they did.

The systems I currently play, with some of the same people, give me a very specific amount of authoirty. I use it all the time, throwing challenges and dangers at players like a madman, forcing difficult decisions, creating interesting consequences. I am anything but a psuhover. My players occasionally hate me, I think, but in a good way. They know they are being honestly challenged, and they thrive on it. I have no rule zero to fall back on though, and I do have to occasionally check myself, listen to a players complaint or disagreement, and say "ok, overstepping my granted ability in the rule set, lets adjust this and procede". I am not a pushover. My players would not, to the best of my knowledge, describe me as such. I am capable of horrible cruelty and challenge, all within the limits of my defined powers. They have to fight me very hard to overcome the challenges in my games.

The people I play with are all adults with their own lives and responsibilities. I don't want to have authority over them in the context of our mutual fun. I don't see how it has ever helped the game. I just want to play. I feel a rule-zero free environment is better for that, at least for me.

It won't work with every game model.
It won't work with every system.
And Rule Zero is not always bad.

I will certainly concede those points.

But the me I am at the game table now is a me I prefer being when playing with my friends. The guy who had rule zero at his beck and call could be a real horse's posterier in game.

So, the point I am making here is that if there is undesireable behavior at the table due to a rule, should we not analyze how to create a better rule that generates the behavior we want at the table? There are many systems that operate under different assumptions than DND and games like it. To say that Rule Zero is a universal neccessity is not accurate. I am willing to say that NOT having Rule Zero would be just as disastrous for some approaches to gaming as it's presence would be in mine. That is becuase the rule sets are trying to encourage two different behavioral models. I can live with that.

Just don't say that the reason I dislike rule zero is that I am a whining angry child who just wants his way and the big bad GM won't let me have it, or that I want to strip away power from someone because I can't handle them having it. If anything, I want to strip away power from MYSELF, becasue experience has shown me I can't handle it.

[BRC]

Post
Here's the thing, I wholeheartedly support rule zero because of how I use it.

I take the philosophy that novelty is the best way to makes a game fun, make each session memorable and unique. With that in mind, I love using Rule Zero within my adventure design to create situations and enemies. I have never run a standard "swords and horses" fantasy setting, so I homebrew firearms and modify classes to make things work.
I create enemies with gimmicks that don't exist in the rules, I love giving the PC's unique powers, just for one climactic encounter.

In my mind, Rule Zero means the Freedom to design adventures however I want them. Rule Zero rarely comes up after the session starts, but I make liberal use of it while designing things.

Call me lazy or sloppy, or risking destroying my PC's with unbalanced encounters, but I'll stop using Rule Zero when my group stops having fun with it.

[Yukitsu]

Here's the thing, I wholeheartedly support rule zero because of how I use it.

I take the philosophy that novelty is the best way to makes a game fun, make each session memorable and unique. With that in mind, I love using Rule Zero within my adventure design to create situations and enemies. I have never run a standard "swords and horses" fantasy setting, so I homebrew firearms and modify classes to make things work.
I create enemies with gimmicks that don't exist in the rules, I love giving the PC's unique powers, just for one climactic encounter.

In my mind, Rule Zero means the Freedom to design adventures however I want them. Rule Zero rarely comes up after the session starts, but I make liberal use of it while designing things.

Call me lazy or sloppy, or risking destroying my PC's with unbalanced encounters, but I'll stop using Rule Zero when my group stops having fun with it.

Actually, in D&D at least the DM's ability to create new monsters, abilities, items etc. is a seperate defined one. He doesn't have to say "final arbiter" they simply have a rule allowing the creation of anything necessary.

[obliged_salmon]

And, though I can only speak for me, my opposition to Rule Zero stems entirely from how I used to use it, and the effects it had on my games and players. I never abused anyone, but I was a railroader, I made things come out the way I wanted them to, I limited and definied victory conditions...I was, in essence, playing with myself and using my friends around the table as pawns, enacting my will through them because I gave them little choice in the matter. Their decisions were not meaningful. They had fun, sure, but at times they were upset, or unhappy with my calls, or were not having any fun because they knew I would do things my way NO MATTER WHAT they did.

This. If you remove rule 0, then the only thing left to drive play forward is player agency. Not saying you can't have both rule 0 and player agency in tandem, but they are the only two things that can drive play forward. In my opinion, a game driven forward exclusively by player agency is more fulfilling for everyone.

GM's job is to beat the heck out of characters, not invalidate their decisions at his discretion.

[BRC]

Actually, in D&D at least the DM's ability to create new monsters, abilities, items etc. is a seperate defined one. He doesn't have to say "final arbiter" they simply have a rule allowing the creation of anything necessary.

In my mind it's still working outside the written rules, it's just as much Rule Zero as making rules decisions in-game. A line that says "The DM can override the rules" just acknowledges Rule Zero, it doesn't actually change what it is.

[tonberrian]

Rule abuses are an OOC thing. They should be handled OOC. Trying to handle a rule abuse by escalation IC will only lead to more escalation, and the DM has access to many more things to abuse than a player does.

[Britter]

Here's the thing, I wholeheartedly support rule zero because of how I use it.

I take the philosophy that novelty is the best way to makes a game fun, make each session memorable and unique. With that in mind, I love using Rule Zero within my adventure design to create situations and enemies. I have never run a standard "swords and horses" fantasy setting, so I homebrew firearms and modify classes to make things work.
I create enemies with gimmicks that don't exist in the rules, I love giving the PC's unique powers, just for one climactic encounter.

In my mind, Rule Zero means the Freedom to design adventures however I want them. Rule Zero rarely comes up after the session starts, but I make liberal use of it while designing things.

Call me lazy or sloppy, or risking destroying my PC's with unbalanced encounters, but I'll stop using Rule Zero when my group stops having fun with it.

If it works for you, it's cool.

But, I don't see how unique and memorable requires Rule Zero. I have a very memorable, Rule Zero free game going right now. I just finished another one. They were great.

So, what I am saying is that your ability to create a memorable game is not inherently linked to Rule Zero. There are many ways to do that, without having to fall back on some sort of ultimate GM "get out of jail free" card.

[druid91]

If it works for you, it's cool.

But, I don't see how unique and memorable requires Rule Zero. I have a very memorable, Rule Zero free game going right now. I just finished another one. They were great.

So, what I am saying is that your ability to create a memorable game is not inherently linked to Rule Zero. There are many ways to do that, without having to fall back on some sort of ultimate GM "get out of jail free" card.

Yes, and when you game for years you run through all the ones your group finds interesting.

Then you have to start making stuff up.

[Britter]

In my mind it's still working outside the written rules, it's just as much Rule Zero as making rules decisions in-game. A line that says "The DM can override the rules" just acknowledges Rule Zero, it doesn't actually change what it is.

Again though, at what point do we cut off the definition of Rule Zero? I have never heard anyone prospoe setting as the domain of Rule Zero. Or custom monsters, or challenges, o traps. If you guys are lumping all that world building stuff into Rule Zero, it is no wonder you are upset at those of us who want to get rid of it...you think we are prosposing limiting yout o the written rules and thats it.

Thats not what I mena. I have always assumed rule Zero existed in play, in the ruling made by the GM one the fly that have no actual relation to the games esthablished rules. House rules, custom classes, all that stuff is just variations on a theme, the theme being the games setting.

Once again, definition rears its ugly head. :smallcool: It is so hard to come to a common understanding of the term, much less its use and misuse.

[Yukitsu]

Rule abuses are an OOC thing. They should be handled OOC. Trying to handle a rule abuse by escalation IC will only lead to more escalation, and the DM has access to many more things to abuse than a player does.

Actually, that's the entire basis of the much more applicable "if it's good for them, it's good for me" gentleman's agreement.


I've estimated the weight of medium creatures. They range from 82 to 438 lbs., not counting equipment (which you should). With equipment, I can have Kiara, the elven sorceress-courtesan who's only wearing a negligee made of gossamer and dreams that's effectively weightless (82 lbs.), and P. K. Rat, the Half-Orc artificer who finds it necessary to persist Bite of the Werebear and Valiant Fury just to carry all his equipment (20 base strength + 5 levels + Inherent + 16 enhancement [Bite of the Werebear] + 2 typeless [Silithar Muscles graft from LoM] + 4 morale [Valiant Fury] = 52 strength = 33280 lbs. of equipment + 438 base weight = 33718 lbs.). Notice that P. K. Rat effectively weighs a little more than 411 times what Kiara does. If they fail their saves, they are effected equally by the spell (which has it's own variance of distance by a multiplier of six).

The calculations are not quite as simple as they seem. I can't figure the exact numbers involved since the dynamics of this situation isn't my specialty, but I can tell you that the force scales linearly with the mass, which scales linearly with the weight. Thus, our answers will differ by two orders of magnitude between Kiara and P. K. Rat. Any estimates we get are effectively meaningless at that variance.

Getting back to this, the problem is only evident when you assume gust of wind creates a specific value of wind pressure per casting. It doesn't. A man in a body tight wind tunnel in zero G getting hit by it will move a distance ranging from 5 feet to 30 feet, and even in one case, can move as little as 1 inch. All of those values are weight independant. What's worse, several of them, since it states you stop at the edge of the spell, explicitly violate newtonian physics and conservation laws. Is this a problem? Not at all, because magic doesn't have to make physical sense.

This just means gust of wind is an effects based spell, where it does whatever is necessary to create a certain mechanical effect, and has variable wind pressure based on luck, and on the targets and their relative positions. It doesn't provide a specific thrust value consistently, and there is no reason it is implied to generate consistent volumes of pressure, nor is there a reason it should have to.


In my mind it's still working outside the written rules, it's just as much Rule Zero as making rules decisions in-game. A line that says "The DM can override the rules" just acknowledges Rule Zero, it doesn't actually change what it is.

You don't have to override any rule to state the DM can create things. That's my point. It's not even outside the rules, and insofar as I can tell, is expected of the DM by the designers. Unless your monsters are so far out that they no longer conform to the general patterns, but I honestly don't see why you would feel the need to do that.

[Tyndmyr]

Actually, in D&D at least the DM's ability to create new monsters, abilities, items etc. is a seperate defined one. He doesn't have to say "final arbiter" they simply have a rule allowing the creation of anything necessary.

Yeah. I'm pretty sure I've stated that at least four times now. It keeps getting dredged back up, over and over. I can happily quote page numbers for all those things as explicit rules.


This. If you remove rule 0, then the only thing left to drive play forward is player agency. Not saying you can't have both rule 0 and player agency in tandem, but they are the only two things that can drive play forward. In my opinion, a game driven forward exclusively by player agency is more fulfilling for everyone.

What? How is rule 0 a "move play forward" thing? I literally don't understand what you're getting at.

Are you trying to imply that NPCs doing things is rule 0? Or that you can't move plot forward by NPC actions, because there's what....rules against NPCs taking actions or something? I don't get it.


In my mind it's still working outside the written rules, it's just as much Rule Zero as making rules decisions in-game. A line that says "The DM can override the rules" just acknowledges Rule Zero, it doesn't actually change what it is.

No. Rule Zero is "the DM can override the rules". The rules already grant you the ability to create monsters. Explicitly. Not anyone, just the GM. Page 295, monster manual. You are not working outside the written rules to do so.

So, logically, forbidding the DM to make monsters WOULD be rule zero.

[Britter]

Yes, and when you game for years you run through all the ones your group finds interesting.

Then you have to start making stuff up.

There is no correlation AT ALL between making up new things to do in game, and rule zero, in my mind. You don't need one to have the other.

[The Big Dice]

Here's the ultimate crux of the issue. Where does the buck stop?

Does the GM have the final say over what is and is not allowed at his table? Because if he doesn't, then the word Master (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/master), which functions as both a noun and an adjective in the context of what a GM actually does, needs to be replaced.

All the fear over Rule 0 is kind of sad to me. It says that GMs are afraid of their players and players are afraid to let the GM be responsible for what goes on at the table. There is a constant ducking of any kind of culpability that comes with the notion of "the group" as a deciding force. Because the group decided, no individual is responsible.

If your players don't trust you to use Rule 0 in a responsible manner, that means your players don't trust you. You can split hairs, argue semantics, deny the truth and argue the toss, but it all boils down to a lack of trust.

And if your players don't trust you to use Rule 0 responsibly, what else do they not trust you to do?

It really is a shame that so many people are filled with shame at what they have done in the past and rather than learn from it, they choose to deny it. Because like every other heavy duty tool in the GM arsenal, from fudging, altering the rules, homebrewing to full scale reality shifts and outright retcons should always be done for the same reason.

To make the game a better experience for all involved.

However, if there is a fundamental lack of trust, as implied by an unwillingness on the behalf of players to grant the GM full and unrestricted access to all the tools he should have at his disposal, I'm not sure a really good metagame situation is possible. And if hte metagame is strained and untrusting, the game itself is almost certain to suffer.

[Tyndmyr]

Does the GM have the final say over what is and is not allowed at his table? Because if he doesn't, then the word Master (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/master), which functions as both a noun and an adjective in the context of what a GM actually does, needs to be replaced.

I agree. I hate the title. I feel Dungeon Master, Game Master, and Storyteller are all insufficient titles. I'd like to come up with a catchy one that doesn't have such baggage.


All the fear over Rule 0 is kind of sad to me. It says that GMs are afraid of their players and players are afraid to let the GM be responsible for what goes on at the table. There is a constant ducking of any kind of culpability that comes with the notion of "the group" as a deciding force. Because the group decided, no individual is responsible.

Or...all of them are. Fear is not the only possible motivation for changing the rules.


It really is a shame that so many people are filled with shame at what they have done in the past and rather than learn from it, they choose to deny it.

He did learn from it. Now, his solution to his issues might not be the same as yours...but that's not the same as not learning.

And my metagame is friendly and casual. There is no need for a "MASTER". Everyone knows each other, we hang out outside of D&D, and quite a few of us know the rules well. DMing is switched off to whoever has a campaign idea everyone likes. System switches as well. The casual agreement way of resolution works because we all know and trust each other. A lengthy rules dispute is one that lasts long enough for someone to scoop up the book and find it. Those are pretty rare.

[Yukitsu]

Here's the ultimate crux of the issue. Where does the buck stop?

Does the GM have the final say over what is and is not allowed at his table? Because if he doesn't, then the word Master (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/master), which functions as both a noun and an adjective in the context of what a GM actually does, needs to be replaced.

All the fear over Rule 0 is kind of sad to me. It says that GMs are afraid of their players and players are afraid to let the GM be responsible for what goes on at the table. There is a constant ducking of any kind of culpability that comes with the notion of "the group" as a deciding force. Because the group decided, no individual is responsible.

If your players don't trust you to use Rule 0 in a responsible manner, that means your players don't trust you. You can split hairs, argue semantics, deny the truth and argue the toss, but it all boils down to a lack of trust.

And if your players don't trust you to use Rule 0 responsibly, what else do they not trust you to do?

Actually, if you rule something with the only backing for the decision being your authority as the DM, no, I don't trust you, and do not trust you to run a fun campaign that is as interesting to the players as it is to you.

[The Big Dice]

And my metagame is friendly and casual. There is no need for a "MASTER". Everyone knows each other, we hang out outside of D&D, and quite a few of us know the rules well. DMing is switched off to whoever has a campaign idea everyone likes. System switches as well. The casual agreement way of resolution works because we all know and trust each other. A lengthy rules dispute is one that lasts long enough for someone to scoop up the book and find it. Those are pretty rare.
You never answered the most important questions. Where does the buck stop and who is ultimately responsible for implementing the will of the group?

You can't say that it's all done by mutual agreement, because there are going to be times when decisions aren't unanimous. And you can't say that the buck doesn't stop anywhere, because someone has to make the final decision, especially in cases of a tie.


Actually, if you rule something with the only backing for the decision being your authority as the DM, no, I don't trust you, and do not trust you to run a fun campaign that is as interesting to the players as it is to you.
You're in combat. Someone decides he wants to do something not explicitly covered by the rules set that you are using. Like the classic jump up and swing on the chandelier to kick the bad guy. Who decides and how fast do you get a decision?

You can go out of combat, lose all immersion and momentum to debate things. Or the GM can make a call and things can move on.

The fact is, by agreeing to take part in an RPG, you are agreeing to give a member of the group a little more control and a different set of responsibilities. And that's not always the bad thing that people are making it out to be. It's been a central feature of RPGs for almost 40 years now, and that should say something.

Of course you can argue that old doesn'ta lways mean better. But trial, experience and the practical results of literally millions of man hours of gaming across the world have shown the GM-Player relationship to be sound.

Yes, it can be abused. But so can any relationship, so fear of abuse is ultimately self limiting as that fear prevents the releaionship from developing.

[Britter]

Here's the ultimate crux of the issue. Where does the buck stop?

Does the GM have the final say over what is and is not allowed at his table? Because if he doesn't, then the word Master (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/master), which functions as both a noun and an adjective in the context of what a GM actually does, needs to be replaced.

All the fear over Rule 0 is kind of sad to me. It says that GMs are afraid of their players and players are afraid to let the GM be responsible for what goes on at the table. There is a constant ducking of any kind of culpability that comes with the notion of "the group" as a deciding force. Because the group decided, no individual is responsible.

If your players don't trust you to use Rule 0 in a responsible manner, that means your players don't trust you. You can split hairs, argue semantics, deny the truth and argue the toss, but it all boils down to a lack of trust.

And if your players don't trust you to use Rule 0 responsibly, what else do they not trust you to do?

It really is a shame that so many people are filled with shame at what they have done in the past and rather than learn from it, they choose to deny it. Because like every other heavy duty tool in the GM arsenal, from fudging, altering the rules, homebrewing to full scale reality shifts and outright retcons should always be done for the same reason.

To make the game a better experience for all involved.

However, if there is a fundamental lack of trust, as implied by an unwillingness on the behalf of players to grant the GM full and unrestricted access to all the tools he should have at his disposal, I'm not sure a really good metagame situation is possible. And if hte metagame is strained and untrusting, the game itself is almost certain to suffer.

See, my players trust me impliclty. And I trust them implictly. Because we don't have rule zero anymore. No other way to say it. Didn't have that when we used Rule Zero. Have it without it. Direct correlation.

As for "if the group decided, no individual is repsonsible" I would say yup. If we all decide, and it is a bad decision, we are ALL responsible. Knowing that we are all responsible for how much we all enjoy the game, we tend to consider our decisions more throughly, I believe. If you can say "well, the game sucked because the GM was bad" than you are ducking any responsibility at all for your own actions and how they may have negatively impacted the game. If on the other hand you acknowledge you have an impact on the enjoyment of everyone at the table, I believe that people will act more responsibly, and work harder to create an enjoyable play space.

Group decision making is not dodging responiblity. It is accepting your place in the group has importance and weight, and that you have to live up to that.

There is a lot of other issues wrapped up in your comments, about power and shame, and all that stuff. It seems a little out of place to me. I don't know how else to say it. I don't feel shame for prior gaming decisions. I do feel I learned from them and found a better way. I don't see the need to have a lot of power over others. It's a game, after all. Dunno. I'm not exactly sure how to address your points.

[tonberrian]

Actually, that's the entire basis of the much more applicable "if it's good for them, it's good for me" gentleman's agreement.

It's not more applicable. Regardless of what immunities you have, the DM can brew up an effect or ability that lets his creatures ignore it. There's even precedence - see Nightmare Spinner. Rule abuses need to be handled OOC.


Getting back to this, the problem is only evident when you assume gust of wind creates a specific value of wind pressure per casting. It doesn't. A man in a body tight wind tunnel in zero G getting hit by it will move a distance ranging from 5 feet to 30 feet, and even in one case, can move as little as 1 inch. All of those values are weight independant. What's worse, several of them, since it states you stop at the edge of the spell, explicitly violate newtonian physics and conservation laws. Is this a problem? Not at all, because magic doesn't have to make physical sense.

This just means gust of wind is an effects based spell, where it does whatever is necessary to create a certain mechanical effect, and has variable wind pressure based on luck, and on the targets and their relative positions. It doesn't provide a specific thrust value consistently, and there is no reason it is implied to generate consistent volumes of pressure, nor is there a reason it should have to.

What about Kiara and P. K. Rat effected by the same casting? The same casting should produce the same pressure, and yet they can be effected totally differently. You should also note that the Weather section of the DMG specifically calls out the gust of wind spell as an example of severe wind, and the numbers generally match up.

And while weight may not be important, mass is. Since both Kiara and P. K. Rat are effected equally by gravity, we can determine the ratio of their masses. It's the same ratio of their weights. We need mass to determine acceleration from the force applied by the wind. Any measurement of this force will be wildly inconsistent.

[Tyndmyr]

You never answered the most important questions. Where does the buck stop and who is ultimately responsible for implementing the will of the group?

You can't say that it's all done by mutual agreement, because there are going to be times when decisions aren't unanimous. And you can't say that the buck doesn't stop anywhere, because someone has to make the final decision, especially in cases of a tie.

We don't get ties. We figure out a compromise or something that makes everyone happy. Well, almost everyone at least. We still have the group idiot. But we don't really bother with formal voting, we just chat about it a bit till people are happy with it.

I should mention that when I DM, as the person who has for the longest time ignored rule zero entirely, I just don't have to worry about people calling me on things, or asking me how I did things(unless out of pure curiosity). They just know that it's going to be legal by this point. If that isn't trust, I don't know what is.

[obliged_salmon]

Here's the ultimate crux of the issue. Where does the buck stop?

Does the GM have the final say over what is and is not allowed at his table? Because if he doesn't, then the word Master (http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/master), which functions as both a noun and an adjective in the context of what a GM actually does, needs to be replaced.

All the fear over Rule 0 is kind of sad to me. It says that GMs are afraid of their players and players are afraid to let the GM be responsible for what goes on at the table. There is a constant ducking of any kind of culpability that comes with the notion of "the group" as a deciding force. Because the group decided, no individual is responsible.

If your players don't trust you to use Rule 0 in a responsible manner, that means your players don't trust you. You can split hairs, argue semantics, deny the truth and argue the toss, but it all boils down to a lack of trust.

And if your players don't trust you to use Rule 0 responsibly, what else do they not trust you to do?

It really is a shame that so many people are filled with shame at what they have done in the past and rather than learn from it, they choose to deny it. Because like every other heavy duty tool in the GM arsenal, from fudging, altering the rules, homebrewing to full scale reality shifts and outright retcons should always be done for the same reason.

To make the game a better experience for all involved.

However, if there is a fundamental lack of trust, as implied by an unwillingness on the behalf of players to grant the GM full and unrestricted access to all the tools he should have at his disposal, I'm not sure a really good metagame situation is possible. And if hte metagame is strained and untrusting, the game itself is almost certain to suffer.

I think you're saying that a game where the GM does not have ultimate control (rule 0) is a game without trust. I find this idea incorrect on many levels.

I trust my GM, who does not have ultimate power over the game. He trusts me to bear my end of the gaming responsibly. We both create the story, in play, as equals. Much fun ensues. Full of mutual trust.


What? How is rule 0 a "move play forward" thing? I literally don't understand what you're getting at.

Are you trying to imply that NPCs doing things is rule 0? Or that you can't move plot forward by NPC actions, because there's what....rules against NPCs taking actions or something? I don't get it.

Hmm, I'm not trying to imply that NPC actions are rule 0. However, in the sense that NPC abilities are covered under the rules, and the GM is playing them, I would argue that NPC actions fall under player agency. Also, I feel that NPC actions should, ideally, be directly linked somehow to decisions players have made, about their characters and about the setting. If not always, then frequently.

[The Big Dice]

See, my players trust me impliclty. And I trust them implictly. Because we don't have rule zero anymore. No other way to say it. Didn't have that when we used Rule Zero. Have it without it. Direct correlation.
You are saying that as a GM, you never change anything, you play by strict RAW and nothing but strict RAW? In every system you play? You never allow homebrew, because there is a direct relationship between the GM being able to change things and hombrew. Which is changing things by addition or subtraction.

I'm sorry, I don't believe you.

I think you're saying that a game where the GM does not have ultimate control (rule 0) is a game without trust. I find this idea incorrect on many levels.

I trust my GM, who does not have ultimate power over the game. He trusts me to bear my end of the gaming responsibly. We both create the story, in play, as equals. Much fun ensues. Full of mutual trust.
I'm saying a game in which the players don't allow the GM to use all the tools he has at his disposal in a way consistent with making sure everyone has a good time is a game without trust.

For example, one poster in this thread has claimed to routinely do statistical analysis of rolls made by other players and the GM. Which to me says there's a fundamental failure of trust.

[Britter]

We don't get ties. We figure out a compromise or something that makes everyone happy. Well, almost everyone at least. We still have the group idiot. But we don't really bother with formal voting, we just chat about it a bit till people are happy with it.

and hey, if a call is neded, at least at my table, and consensus can't be reached, the GM makes it. That is, after all, part of the job. He just doesn't make it before we have a quick talk about it.

[Frozen_Feet]

I agree. I hate the title. I feel Dungeon Master, Game Master, and Storyteller are all insufficient titles. I'd like to come up with a catchy one that doesn't have such baggage.
I've never had any gripes with the Finnish term, "Pelinjohtaja", which translates to "Game leader". Because that's what he does - leads the game. Without him, it doesn't go anywhere, Rule Zero or not.

Actually, if you rule something with the only backing for the decision being your authority as the DM, no, I don't trust you, and do not trust you to run a fun campaign that is as interesting to the players as it is to you.

As hard as I find imagining the situation where there are no other conditions to be taken into account, there are several games and several situtations where the GM is not only right, but required by the rules to do just that. Again, this "Rule Zero" you all keep yapping about is not zero, or OOC thing in quite a lot of games. Quite many explicitly say it's GM's job to do that.

In any case, losing trust a priori over a notion that doesn't mean anything in a vacuum is pretty extreme.

[BRC]

No. Rule Zero is "the DM can override the rules". The rules already grant you the ability to create monsters. Explicitly. Not anyone, just the GM. Page 295, monster manual. You are not working outside the written rules to do so.

So, logically, forbidding the DM to make monsters WOULD be rule zero.

So if the Rules give me the ability to override the rules, does that mean I can't override the rules?

Alright, think about it this way. At one point I sent my PC's up against group of Fleshrippers, nasty little CR4 lizards from MMIII. During the fight I realized they were incredibly powerful for their CR, so I eliminated their poison and reduced their attack bonus.
That was Rule Zero. The Rules said that Fleshrippers used a 1d6 dex damage poison (or whatever) every time they hit with their claw or bite attacks. I said that they did not. The players may have supported the decision, but it was my authority as the DM that caused it to happen.

Now, what if I had taken a good, hard look at Fleshrippers back when I first selected them for that encounter and thought long and hard about the implications of that poison. If, back then, I had decided to get rid of the poison, home brewing a version of the Fleshripper that was identical except for it's poison. The effect would have been exactly the same as my decision to get rid of the poison after the first round of combat.

I sent my PC's up against a boosted Scout who moved at double speed, dealt extra damage with her skirmishes, and had Spring Attack despite not meeting all the pre-reqs. I did this because I liked the idea of sending them up against a lightning-fast knife fighter, but knew that Scouts sucked. They did just fine against her.

In my mind, No Rule Zero means a DM can take statblocks exactly as written, or follow explicit formulas for creating new content (Like the Magic Item Creation rules, or the Character Creation rules for making an NPC).

Also, I could make unique encounters without resorting to Rule Zero, there are certainly enough monsters in the book (especially if you don't call Refluffing a use of Rule Zero), I just find it easier to start with what I want, then create it, rather then search through all the books finding something that fits.

aaand I should get back to work...

[The Big Dice]

and hey, if a call is neded, at least at my table, and consensus can't be reached, the GM makes it. That is, after all, part of the job. He just doesn't make it before we have a quick talk about it.

Sometimes there isn't time to debate it at a comittee. Other times it isn't important enough to debate it. Personally, I take the line that if I make a ruling it stands at the time it gets made. If you've got a problem with it, bring it up after the session ends. And no retcons, even if I made a wrong call.

Rule 0 with a willingness to admit to mistakes is still Rule 0.

[tonberrian]

See, my players trust me impliclty. And I trust them implictly. Because we don't have rule zero anymore. No other way to say it. Didn't have that when we used Rule Zero. Have it without it. Direct correlation.
Correlation does not necessarily mean causation. You admit to abusing Rule 0 in the past. You also admit to a lot of other common GM mistakes. Simple growth as a GM (irregardles of not (ab)using Rule 0) could have led to that trust.

[Tyndmyr]

For example, one poster in this thread has claimed to routinely do statistical analysis of rolls made by other players and the GM. Which to me says there's a fundamental failure of trust.

I do that routinely with new GMs who I don't know and trust. Well, unless they roll in the open. Then I just keep track of rolls out of idle curiosity to curse luck/fate as players do when the dice try to kill them.

It's not necessary with my main group, fortunately. At least, not since we kicked out the troublesome fellow.

Game Leader seems a reasonable title. It doesn't have quite the same connotations as Master does, and is fairly accurate.


Sometimes there isn't time to debate it at a committee. Other times it isn't important enough to debate it. Personally, I take the line that if I make a ruling it stands at the time it gets made. If you've got a problem with it, bring it up after the session ends. And no retcons, even if I made a wrong call.

See, this sounds rough. If something happens wildly different because of a bad call on the GMs part that I'm not "allowed" to point out...I could see someone being terribly disapointed.

Are rule disputes really so common?

[Eldan]

Most of those are examples of fundamentally flawed archetypes. Most of them have also received a large amount of ineffective fixes, most of which completely missed the point, and almost none that actually are effective. Especially Fighters. I can't read any more Fighter fixes without risking taking enough Sanity damage to lose it. And since failing in hilarious ways is still failing...



We seem to have different definitions of "archetype", then. I'm not talking about the character class as represented by D&D. I'm talking:
Guy in light armour and rapier, fighting with finesse.
Guy with heavy armour, fighting with heavy weapon and skill.
Unarmoured, unarmed combat master.
Honour-bound retainer/knight of a noble lord.
Magic working over the true names of creatures, objects and forces.

All of these are story archetypes a fantasy game should be able to represent in an effective manner. Whether the actual class of that name is any good is secondary. I see the Warblade as a rather good fighter fix, as an example.


I've estimated the weight of medium creatures. They range from 82 to 438 lbs.


Could be worse. Adamantium warforged can weigh in the thousands.

[Yukitsu]

It's not more applicable. Regardless of what immunities you have, the DM can brew up an effect or ability that lets his creatures ignore it. There's even precedence - see Nightmare Spinner. Rule abuses need to be handled OOC.

Actually, it's if the player is using a rules abuse, there's no reason the DM can't as well. Not that he should escalate it.


What about Kiara and P. K. Rat effected by the same casting? The same casting should produce the same pressure, and yet they can be effected totally differently. You should also note that the Weather section of the DMG specifically calls out the gust of wind spell as an example of severe wind, and the numbers generally match up.

And while weight may not be important, mass is. Since both Kiara and P. K. Rat are effected equally by gravity, we can determine the ratio of their masses. It's the same ratio of their weights. We need mass to determine acceleration from the force applied by the wind. Any measurement of this force will be wildly inconsistent.

It means both people in that line are getting targeted along that line by different amounts of pressure. I don't see what's difficult about this. :smallconfused:

The only problem is when you have a form fitting line, where air going around one target blocks the wind to the others completely, though in that case I'd have to check to see if lines ignore obstacles, which I don't think they do.

Now does this mean it's a line of magical homing air that arbitrarily hits fatties harder? Well, yes, but honestly I don't see why that's a problem.

[The Big Dice]

See, this sounds rough. If something happens wildly different because of a bad call on the GMs part that I'm not "allowed" to point out...I could see someone being terribly disapointed.

Are rule disputes really so common?
They happen. Not everyone is a walking encyclopedia. But I do have one of those in my group. However, if he can't give me an answer to a rules question in a reasonable amount of time then I make a ruling then and there.

If you don't like the ruling, more often than not bringing that up then and there stalls the game even more, so don't. Bring it up when time isn't an issue and there's less chance of emotions being heightened. Unless you want to cause a discussion to explode into a full blown argument, in which case you won't be invited back next week.

I'm quite happy to admit to mistakes. We all make them and being open about it is much less painful in the long run than trying to maintain a facade of perfection. Even so, I'm not changing the outcome of an event after the fact.

[Britter]

You are saying that as a GM, you never change anything, you play by strict RAW and nothing but strict RAW? In every system you play? You never allow homebrew, because there is a direct relationship between the GM being able to change things and hombrew. Which is changing things by addition or subtraction.

I'm sorry, I don't believe you.

Its cool dude, I don't need you to believe me.

When it comes to homebrew, there is actualy a RAW way to add things to Burning Wheel. It involes peer and GM review as part of the process, and gives you step by step guidleines as to build and add whatever you may want, creature and character wise. Same with adding things or world building. The game gives solid information on how to build those, with the group, in a manner condusive to playing the system. So, what I am saying is that my game system is operating on different principles than what you may be used to seeing.

I have yet to play some of the other systems I want to play, but all of them will be played by the book, with the dice rolls in the open. I don't run DnD or Shadowrun anymore because I can't play this way. I miss this manner of play and feel like my hands are tied when I have to use that sort of system. It lacks tools that I feel I need to run a good game.

Regardless of if you do or do not believe me, all I can say is that my Burning Wheel games are conducted by the book. I haven't run anything else except RISUS of late (and RISUS was run by the book, if you can even call it that...barely any rules there to use really).

[Britter]

Correlation does not necessarily mean causation. You admit to abusing Rule 0 in the past. You also admit to a lot of other common GM mistakes. Simple growth as a GM (irregardles of not (ab)using Rule 0) could have led to that trust.

In my situation, it was specific exposure to and adaptation of a system and approach that lead to this trust. Prior to that, there was not implict trust, despite my being a pretty good GM. I know I was a good GM before that shift, but I know that my players didn't always trust me.

Again though, this is my experience, and therefore is not really any sort of valid argument.

[Tyndmyr]

I stay quite close to RAW as well. My typical house rules can be listed on a post card. Let's see...

No multiclass penalty.
No infinite combos.
No Tainted Scholar or Beholder Mage.

I've had more specific games, sure...but that's the generic list. It works.

[The Big Dice]

Regardless of if you do or do not believe me, all I can say is that my Burning Wheel games are conducted by the book. I haven't run anything else except RISUS of late (and RISUS was run by the book, if you can even call it that...barely any rules there to use really).
I've ran Fighting Fantasy by the book. Mostly because there's no other way to run a game with three traits and not much else. Nothing else works exactly as it's printed, because there's always something that you interpret differently from the writer.

And that's cool, it's part of what makes RPG so involving and into (for me anyway) a multi decade hobby.

As for Burning Wheel, Rule 0 is embedded so deeply into the structure of the game that it's part of the fabric that holds it all together. You don't see it in the same way you don't see wallpaper paste. It's just there. And Rule 0 has nothing to do with rolling in the open or behind a screen.

Though I have to say that a screens are great props. You can really make players nervous just by rolling a dice and scratching a note behind a screen. You can't do that without one. Not with the same effect, anyway.

[tonberrian]

Now does this mean it's a line of magical homing air that arbitrarily hits fatties harder? Well, yes, but honestly I don't see why that's a problem.

It's a problem when trying use it to determine thrust like you told me to do.

[Yukitsu]

It's a problem when trying use it to determine thrust like you told me to do.

It varies by how many fatties you're hitting.

[Britter]

As for Burning Wheel, Rule 0 is embedded so deeply into the structure of the game that it's part of the fabric that holds it all together. You don't see it in the same way you don't see wallpaper paste. It's just there. And Rule 0 has nothing to do with rolling in the open or behind a screen.



Lets agree to disagree on this part. I think that BW uses rules in a manner that is different from how most systems with a Rule Zero use them, and therefore doesn't need it. That has a lot to do with how I see Rule Zero. It also has to do with extensive research and reading and whatnot. I have seen games run by the designer, and he runs the system pretty much exactly as I do. I can only surmise that is because the rules do what they say they do, and are clear enough to reproduce the desired results.

I do concur that where you roll is not Rule Zero, however, allowing the player to see your rolls and know that you are not lying to them is a big element of bulding trust in my opinion.

Regardless, I do agree that there is no single way to game, and no badwrongfun as long as everyone is having fun around the table.

[Frozen_Feet]

Though I have to say that a screens are great props. You can really make players nervous just by rolling a dice and scratching a note behind a screen. You can't do that without one. Not with the same effect, anyway.

Yes you can. You can do it by smiling. All the time. At every roll. The players start getting nervous the moment they suspect something is not going their way, no matter what it is. >=D

[Eldan]

It varies by how many fatties you're hitting.

So you have to have a warforged hovering behind you to move really fast?

[Yukitsu]

So you have to have a warforged hovering behind you to move really fast?

Well, ideally you'd use infinite grappling commoners, but they probably wouldn't be capable of keeping up with you.

[Eldan]

Yes you can. You can do it by smiling. All the time. At every roll. The players start getting nervous the moment they suspect something is not going their way, no matter what it is. >=D

And there are so many ways of smiling. There's the broad grin. The little smirk. The little smirk that quickly vanishes again. The one-sided grin. The chuckle. The innocent smile. The innocent smile with evil eyes. And of course, the innocent smile while saying that everything is okay, in either a neutral or non-neutral voice.

I, for one, hate screens when I DM. They create too much distance between me and the players for my tastes. I just trust them not to look at my notes, if I have any.


Well, ideally you'd use infinite grappling commoners, but they probably wouldn't be capable of keeping up with you.

They should move pretty fast. Alternatively, use free-action dismounting and re-mounting on an infinite line of horses. The problem with all these is terrain. They can't cross oceans, for one.

[tonberrian]

It varies by how many fatties you're hitting.

That's stupid.

[Eldan]

No, it's magic.

And stupid.

Also, normal weather is made by elementals and weather gods, so it's also magical.

Isn't magic wonderful? :smalltongue:

[Yukitsu]

That's stupid.

Yeah, well that's what Max Von Laue said about quantum physics, but it's not like they threw that out just because it didn't make any sense.

[Eldan]

Newton. Gravity.

"What kind of physics doesn't have an explanation for where the forces come from? It's a stupid theory. Interactions can't just work at a distance." (Paraphrased).

[tonberrian]

Yeah, well that's what Max Von Laue said about quantum physics, but it's not like they threw that out just because it didn't make any sense.

Well, Gust of Wind makes the reference that it "can do anything that a sudden blast of wind would be expected to do." So in the abscence of a target, what are its effects?

And for the absurd, since Gust of Wind is consistent with the Wind rules in the DMG, "If a wind blows in a forest, and there's no one there to feel it, does it blow anything over?"

[The Big Dice]

Lets agree to disagree on this part. I think that BW uses rules in a manner that is different from how most systems with a Rule Zero use them, and therefore doesn't need it.
In my experience, 99% of systems never even bothered to write a Rule 0. The fact that it had to be assigned a 0, like the Zeroth Law of Robotics, is kind of awkward and uncomfortable. Prior to someone (I'd like to know who and where) put it in print, the idea that the GM could over rule the rules as printed was hardwired into all RPGs.

So using it differently isn't an issue, as it's always been a kind of unwritten rule.

Of course, in today's post CCG mentality, people seem to want everything written down and spelled out for them. It seems like "change stuff when you need to, don't bother when you don't need to" needs explaining in simple terms to some people.

[Yukitsu]

Well, Gust of Wind makes the reference that it "can do anything that a sudden blast of wind would be expected to do." So in the abscence of a target, what are its effects?

Figure out how much of everything else it's moving at 50 MPH. Generally that'll just be air, dust etc. Here's where referencing how many air elementals can occupy a 60 foot line is relevant.

[tonberrian]

Figure out how much of everything else it's moving at 50 MPH. Generally that'll just be air, dust etc. Here's where referencing how many air elementals can occupy a 60 foot line is relevant.

And why are air elementals the same density as air? It's not a stupid question.

Also, the answer is "infinity", as outlined by the grappling rules. Not very helpful.

[Britter]

Of course, in today's post CCG mentality, people seem to want everything written down and spelled out for them. It seems like "change stuff when you need to, don't bother when you don't need to" needs explaining in simple terms to some people.

I think it is the inevitable, and mostly positive, evolution of the hobby, myself. I would rather see more clearly defined, better written, and mechanically consistnet and sound rulesets, and I think that is what lies at the heart of this sort of issue. Better designed games will mean that in the future, we may not have to have 10+ page debates on what a rule is or is not. Or at least, that is what I would like to see in the future.

[BRC]

I think it is the inevitable, and mostly positive, evolution of the hobby, myself. I would rather see more clearly defined, better written, and mechanically consistnet and sound rulesets, and I think that is what lies at the heart of this sort of issue. Better designed games will mean that in the future, we may not have to have 10+ page debates on what a rule is or is not. Or at least, that is what I would like to see in the future.

Well, this gets into the question of what is "Better designed. A better Designed game would need neither modification nor addition, but it would also need to be simple enough to understand, can a game allow for a full range of player choice, provide a clear way to handle every situation, AND be simple enough to understand, all at the same time?

[Britter]

Well, this gets into the question of what is "Better designed. A better Designed game would need neither modification nor addition, but it would also need to be simple enough to understand, can a game allow for a full range of player choice, provide a clear way to handle every situation, AND be simple enough to understand, all at the same time?

Its a good question. I am not sufficently knowledgeable about game theory and mechanics design to really be able to verbalize what I believe "better design" implies. Generally, I think consistent mechanics, ease of use, and flexiblity are important. No rule set can do everything, of course. It is a question of if the ruleset can do what the designer claims it can do.

[The Big Dice]

I think it is the inevitable, and mostly positive, evolution of the hobby, myself. I would rather see more clearly defined, better written, and mechanically consistnet and sound rulesets, and I think that is what lies at the heart of this sort of issue. Better designed games will mean that in the future, we may not have to have 10+ page debates on what a rule is or is not. Or at least, that is what I would like to see in the future.
The problem isn't that there's a debate about a rule. That's something that's been around for longer than roleplaying games. In fact, you should have seen some of the fights that the battle gamers used to get into at my high school gaming club. One argument only got resolved because one person picked up a hammer and was using it to illustrate his points.

The problem with Rule 0 is it was tacked on as an afterthought. And what is Rule 1 anyway? How many rules are there? Is it like the Evil Overlord list and it gets updated now and then? It's something that had always been implicit that for some reason was made explicit.

John Wick, controversial as he may have been at the time, had it right when he wrote "Know your rules. Not know THE rules, but know YOUR rules" in the L5R GM pack. That is, the rules as written don't matter. It's the rules as you use them in play that really matters. The rules are only a means to an end, not an end in themselves.

Of course that was in the early days of narrative being king, where now thanks partly to D&D, there's a much broader spectrum ranging from all rules to no rules and all points in between. BUt the principle is sound, and has been there since Dave and Gary came up with the idea of playing a single piece from an army rather than the whole army.

[Eldan]

I think it is the inevitable, and mostly positive, evolution of the hobby, myself. I would rather see more clearly defined, better written, and mechanically consistnet and sound rulesets, and I think that is what lies at the heart of this sort of issue. Better designed games will mean that in the future, we may not have to have 10+ page debates on what a rule is or is not. Or at least, that is what I would like to see in the future.

Strange. I love these debates. Personalizing the rules is a joy to me.

[Tyndmyr]

Yes you can. You can do it by smiling. All the time. At every roll. The players start getting nervous the moment they suspect something is not going their way, no matter what it is. >=D

It doesn't even require a roll. A player can declare an action, and you can grin widely and say "reaaally". Oh, playing with player expectations/fears is easy, and great fun.

I do agree that rolling in the open is a pro-trust thing though. Nobody is wondering if you're fudging those crits or saves. Instead, they're focused on the game. Or bemoaning their luck, but hey, that happens in any game with dice.


So you have to have a warforged hovering behind you to move really fast?

Yup. It's better if there's even more than one there. For hovertank drag-racing, seek out your local Weight Watchers meeting.

Oh, I love D&D physics.

[Britter]

Strange. I love these debates. Personalizing the rules is a joy to me.

I actually enjoy these debates myself. They help sharpen my own arguments and opinions, as well as remind me that there are a lot of good reasons for doing things differently than I am used too. It is to easy to forget that there is a big world having fun outside of your own table, and bouncing ideas off of other gamers is a good way to be reminded of that.

[Tyndmyr]

Would agree. Even the most heated debates can be quite interesting, and occasionally educational.

Hell, sometimes I pop open a book to dig for the one thing I *know* is in there to prove my point, and get distracted on something else entirely. Discussing and debating rules is a great way to learn those rules.

[The Big Dice]

I think there's a generation of gamers that have never known what it's like to only get ideas and opinions from magazines and gaming books. Gaming books that you often didn't realise existed until a friend introduced you to them. And magazines that appeared, then vanished just as quickly.

Discussion and debate is a good thing. But what I've found is discussing THE RULES has made me realise that D&D isn't a very good game. And that RULES don't concern me, but the principles behind those rules do.

Still, I'm strange and I think I'm at last starting to understand the Tao of Gaming. Soon the pool of ideas will bubble and the new paradigm I'm looking for will start to be born.

Or I've just got indigestion.

[Yukitsu]

And why are air elementals the same density as air? It's not a stupid question.

Because last I checked, they're made of air, though I could be wrong about that one, it could be air+. I don't think they are though.


Also, the answer is "infinity", as outlined by the grappling rules. Not very helpful.

Sorry, I meant uncompressed air, or perfectly lined up air elementals who aren't overlapping. Though grappling air elements would tell ya how much you alter by different pascals.

[tonberrian]

Because last I checked, they're made of air, though I could be wrong about that one, it could be air+. I don't think they are though.

It doesn't say that. In fact, from the description, Air Elementals (not Elementals with the Air subtype) are made of various different vapors. Also, the assumption that they are only made up of air is a poor one, since they are obviously different from normal air (since their size is unaffected by pressure and normal air can't, you know, talk).

Now excuse me, I have to use my Gust of Wind powered adamantine disk and an infinite mob of grappling commoners to create a siege weapon of unparalleled power.

[Fhaolan]

And there are so many ways of smiling. There's the broad grin. The little smirk. The little smirk that quickly vanishes again. The one-sided grin. The chuckle. The innocent smile. The innocent smile with evil eyes. And of course, the innocent smile while saying that everything is okay, in either a neutral or non-neutral voice.

Personally, I like to mix it up with a somewhat sad and disappointed face. A 'Oh, I'm so sorry' mixed with 'Now look what you made me do' kind of look. :smallbiggrin:

And then the blood flies....

[Tyndmyr]

Yea, that's good. Especially when you quickly alternate between the two. Go from a huge smile to a look of surprise and sadness.

Sometimes, I mumble things very quietly. Quietly enough that I know they can hear.

[Eldan]

Frowning, too. Roll a die, frown, mumble to yourself, look at the player, write something on a note card.
Then add any other expression, it doesn't really matter.

Good things to mumble:
"Really..."
"Oh..."
"Can that..."

[The Big Dice]

Frowning, too. Roll a die, frown, mumble to yourself, look at the player, write something on a note card.
Then add any other expression, it doesn't really matter.

Good things to mumble:
"Really..."
"Oh..."
"Can that..."

If you don't have a screen and your dice roll or notes can be seen, these kind of games become obvious after a while. The trick is not to overdo it. Because if your players think you're just winding them up, they'll ignore you what you try to be oh-so-clever and theatrical.

[Fhaolan]

If you don't have a screen and your dice roll or notes can be seen, these kind of games become obvious after a while. The trick is not to overdo it. Because if your players think you're just winding them up, they'll ignore you what you try to be oh-so-clever and theatrical.

Depends on the player. I've had several who *like* being wound up, they view it as part of the experience. :smallsmile:

[Samurai Jill]

As for Burning Wheel, Rule 0 is embedded so deeply into the structure of the game that it's part of the fabric that holds it all together. You don't see it in the same way you don't see wallpaper paste. It's just there. And Rule 0 has nothing to do with rolling in the open or behind a screen.
It does, insofar as it allows the GM to apply Rule Zero without the players' noticing, which may or may not be worse than using it openly.

Again, I would like to see some evidence that BW is somehow dependent on Rule Zero in a way that doesn't apply to every RPG, and is therefore hopelessly non-descriptive. BW gives fairly comprehensive rules for a wide array of possible situations along with suitable example text for all of them. One very rarely, if ever, needs to invent new rules ex nihilo.

This 'where the buck stops' argument is silly, because it assumes that the buck has to stop with the same person for every aspect of play. There are aspects of play one can give the players' absolute authority over, and aspects of play one can give the GM absolute authority over (assuming one even has a single dedicated GM.)

[Narren]

It's like this idea that a benign dictatorship can be a wonderful form of government because a well-meaning, enlightened and strong-willed leader can solve all the country's problems. That's great if you've fortunately happened to stumble upon such a leader. But why not just isolate the kinds of decision-making that effectively solve problems in the first place, formalise those as legal institutions, and do away with the concept of dictatorship, benign or otherwise?


So....house rules? :smalltongue:

[Malevolence]

We seem to have different definitions of "archetype", then. I'm not talking about the character class as represented by D&D. I'm talking:
Guy in light armour and rapier, fighting with finesse.
Guy with heavy armour, fighting with heavy weapon and skill.
Unarmoured, unarmed combat master.
Honour-bound retainer/knight of a noble lord.
Magic working over the true names of creatures, objects and forces.

All of these are story archetypes a fantasy game should be able to represent in an effective manner. Whether the actual class of that name is any good is secondary. I see the Warblade as a rather good fighter fix, as an example.

I am referring to archetypes.

The first guy can't be relevant, because he can't hurt things. The second guy can't because swinging a weapon around doesn't let you keep up with supernatural threats, such as everything mid and high level. The third guy can't for the reasons as the first two and others. The fourth one can't for the same reason as the second, plus being low level, and largely an anachronism. The fifth is fluff text for a caster.

[The Big Dice]

This 'where the buck stops' argument is silly, because it assumes that the buck has to stop with the same person for every aspect of play. There are aspects of play one can give the players' absolute authority over, and aspects of play one can give the GM absolute authority over (assuming one even has a single dedicated GM.)
Elucidate further. Who, other than the GM has responsibility and jurisdiction over the rules of the game? I'm seeing lots of "Ahh, but" with very little in the way of "Actually, it's like this."

Players have absolute authority over the actions of their character. The GM has the same over every other aspect of the game. How the GM chooses to use that isn't the question at hand. It can be used well or badly, just as a player's control over their character can. But the GM choosing to devolve power to the players is the GM making the choice. Not anything making the choice for him, and it's not a decision that has to be made.

So I ask again, if the buck doesn't stop with the GM, that is to say, the GM has final say over what gets used, left out, changed and all that other stuff, who does it stop with?

[Frozen_Feet]

I am referring to archetypes.

The first guy can't be relevant, because he can't hurt things. The second guy can't because swinging a weapon around doesn't let you keep up with supernatural threats, such as everything mid and high level. The third guy can't for the reasons as the first two and others. The fourth one can't for the same reason as the second, plus being low level, and largely an anachronism. The fifth is fluff text for a caster.

You're thinking of D&D, whether you admit it or not. There are systems where the finesse warrior can hurt things, where the heavy infantry can fight supernatural enemies without magic, where the unarmed combatant can punch things immaterial, where the Knight can slay the dragon without the wizard, and so on. You're right that the last is just "fluff text" for caster, but that's the point. All of those archetypes are just fluff texts for different character types, but you go around attaching mechanical cave-ats to the them that would not necessarily exist in a system portraying them.

Dynamics between the archetypes aren't set in stone; it's possibe for the "Magic working over the true names of creatures, objects and forces" to be least effective option in a given system. Don't get hung up on how they line in D&D mechanics.

[Malevolence]

You're thinking of D&D, whether you admit it or not. There are systems where the finesse warrior can hurt things, where the heavy infantry can fight supernatural enemies without magic, where the unarmed combatant can punch things immaterial, where the Knight can slay the dragon without the wizard, and so on. You're right that the last is just "fluff text" for caster, but that's the point. All of those archetypes are just fluff texts for different character types, but you go around attaching mechanical cave-ats to the them that would not necessarily exist in a system portraying them.

Dynamics between the archetypes aren't set in stone; it's possibe for the "Magic working over the true names of creatures, objects and forces" to be least effective option in a given system. Don't get hung up on how they line in D&D mechanics.

Doesn't matter what system it is. Low level archetypes don't work past low levels. If they do at all. People like Conan owe their every breath to author fiat, as they'd never win any real fight otherwise. And he's still an example of a low level archetype at low levels.

[Frozen_Feet]

Doesn't matter what system it is. Low level archetypes don't work past low levels. If they do at all. People like Conan owe their every breath to author fiat, as they'd never win any real fight otherwise. And he's still an example of a low level archetype at low levels.

Which ceases to matter if a given system never gets out of the "low levels", or if the system, in fact, gives these archetypes tools that make them "high level" within the context of the system. You are dismissing vast amounts of possible design space a priori.

[The Big Dice]

Doesn't matter what system it is. Low level archetypes don't work past low levels. If they do at all. People like Conan owe their every breath to author fiat, as they'd never win any real fight otherwise. And he's still an example of a low level archetype at low levels.

So how do real fighters, say Brock Lesnar or Mike Tyson, go from guys on the street to world champions? How do real soldiers end up winning Victoria Cross and Medal of Honour type awards? And it's no good insisting the wizards are better, because they can only exist by author fiat.

You need to go away and spend a couple of years playing systems other than D&D. And in a variety of genres. Because you're coming at things from a very uniformed angle.

[Eldan]

I am referring to archetypes.

The first guy can't be relevant, because he can't hurt things. The second guy can't because swinging a weapon around doesn't let you keep up with supernatural threats, such as everything mid and high level. The third guy can't for the reasons as the first two and others. The fourth one can't for the same reason as the second, plus being low level, and largely an anachronism. The fifth is fluff text for a caster.

Why? There's plenty of swashbuckler-types in fantasy movies, and they do just fine with rapiers. Mythological heroes from Theseus to Beowulf, and fantasy heroes from Conan to Fafhrd did just fine with swords. Wuxia movies shows plenty of people battling supernatural threats with their bare hands. It's not exactly rare in western mythology either: man wrestling beast is pretty common.

All these archetypes can battle giants, hydras, minotaurs and dragons. If you count gods fighting with weapons, well, Thor can take the Midgard Serpent.

If D&D was supposed to be a semi-universal, world-independent RPG system instead of what is basically Mage or Ars Magica plus some dudes with swords who are irrelevant, it should be able to do these archetypes some justice.

[Frozen_Feet]

Wrestling beasts? Pfft. One guy in a certain book is credited with wrestling God. How's that for a benchmark?

Anyways, story time.

In less than hundred days, during polar night and harsh winter where temperature rarely rose above -20 degrees Celsius, a single man killed 505 people with an obsoleted sniper rifle, using iron sights. He killed many more with a sub-machinegun. He was feared to the point that the opposing army ordered artillery strikes to the general area where he was just to get rid of him. He was eventually shot to the head, but survived, and lived to the age of 96.

This is what an ostensibly mundane soldier can achieve at best. Within the context of RPGs, we're often talking of folks of mythical sort, the kinds of which stand head-above-shoulders so-called "mundane" folks.

So why shoudn't they be able to achieve something as extraordinary?

[Eldan]

By wresting beasts, I meant such things as dragons, midgard serpents, fenrirs, and so on. Mythological creatures of awesome might.

[Frozen_Feet]

I got that. I still think God tops them off. XD

[Eldan]

True. Who was that supposed to be? Never heard that one.

[Frozen_Feet]

Jacob, thereafter known as Israel.

[Tyndmyr]

Wrestling beasts? Pfft. One guy in a certain book is credited with wrestling God. How's that for a benchmark?

God probably couldn't understand the grapple rules, is all.*


Anyways, story time.

In addition, look up the tale of Churchill. No, not the one you're thinking of. Jack Churchill. This was a dude that fought nazis with a motorcycle, a longsword, a longbow, and bandoliers of grenades, and was awesome at it. He was pissed when WW2 ended, since he'd been hoping to get in at least a decade of killing.

*I have no trouble with the grappling rules at all, but they're one of those things everyone rips on. I can't help it.

[Eldan]

Jacob, thereafter known as Israel.

Ooh, right. Bible.

You know, we should mention Samson for the improvised weapon rules.

Then carefully move away from the topic, as it's religion and therefore illegal on the board.

[potatocubed]

There was a story in the newspaper this morning about a gurkha in Afghanistan who single-handedly killed 30 enemy soldiers (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/mobile/uk-12854492) who were trying to blow up his position. The last guy he beat to death with a machine gun tripod because he'd used all his ammo on the others.

EDIT: Having read the BBC version of the article, it turns out that maybe it was just 15 guys. He did club someone with a tripod though.

Apparently his thinking was "I just want to take some of them with me when I go."

And if that isn't PC behaviour, I don't know what is.

[Malevolence]

So how do real fighters, say Brock Lesnar or Mike Tyson, go from guys on the street to world champions? How do real soldiers end up winning Victoria Cross and Medal of Honour type awards? And it's no good insisting the wizards are better, because they can only exist by author fiat.

You need to go away and spend a couple of years playing systems other than D&D. And in a variety of genres. Because you're coming at things from a very uniformed angle.

They level from 1 to 3, or 4, or 5.

If you put Mike Tyson up against a CR 3 Ogre, even if the Ogre is unarmed, someone's going to get knocked out, and it probably isn't the Ogre.

Now let's see how he handles an invisible flier, who traps him in Solid Fog, then Spiked Tentacles, then an optional Vortex of Teeth.

See how the low level archetype stops working entirely when faced with mid level abilities?


Why? There's plenty of swashbuckler-types in fantasy movies, and they do just fine with rapiers. Mythological heroes from Theseus to Beowulf, and fantasy heroes from Conan to Fafhrd did just fine with swords. Wuxia movies shows plenty of people battling supernatural threats with their bare hands. It's not exactly rare in western mythology either: man wrestling beast is pretty common.

Meaningless author fiat. I can write that aiming for the creature's horn allows me to hurt it greatly with an attack that it is normally completely immune to. That doesn't mean that I should, for anyone reading the book will be laughing at me. Most, if not all of them get exactly nowhere without it, as they need author fiat to even hop into the ring with the enemy, much less defeat them.

[Yukitsu]

It doesn't say that. In fact, from the description, Air Elementals (not Elementals with the Air subtype) are made of various different vapors.

Normal air is just a various assortment of vapours. :smallconfused: Most gases in that phase state have similar enough of a weight at these volumes that if the player seriously contended the mass values aren't close enough, I'd guess the problem is the player, and not the air elementals.

[Britter]

Meaningless author fiat. I can write that aiming for the creature's horn allows me to hurt it greatly with an attack that it is normally completely immune to. That doesn't mean that I should, for anyone reading the book will be laughing at me. Most, if not all of them get exactly nowhere without it, as they need author fiat to even hop into the ring with the enemy, much less defeat them.

Have you ever READ any of the listed works?

Beowulf, for instance, doesn't hit some magical secret weakspot. He loses most of his men in a surprise attack, wounds the beast Grendel by tearing its arm off, fights an epic wrestling match with Grendel's mother beneath a lake (and to be fair, he does, as I recall, grab a magical sword off of the lake floor to finally kill her, after his own sword breaks), and eventually dies from his wounds after fighting a dragon. Thats just an example.

If overcoming challenges without magic is just meaningless author fiat, than please explain how overcoming them WITH magic is any different?

You have a very specific concept of how games and gaming work, and it is mostly wrong and heavily influenced by DnD, which is one of the worst systems to be a non-magical person in. I strongly agree with The Big Dice. Try some other game system, read some books. You have a definite bias in your approach that doesn't match the reality of the hobby.

[The Big Dice]

If you put Mike Tyson up against a CR 3 Ogre, even if the Ogre is unarmed, someone's going to get knocked out, and it probably isn't the Ogre.

Now let's see how he handles an invisible flier, who traps him in Solid Fog, then Spiked Tentacles, then an optional Vortex of Teeth.

See how the low level archetype stops working entirely when faced with mid level abilities?
See how the real person gets put against something that can only exist in a specific game, and then only by author fiat? And I'd say that an undisputed world heavyweight boxing champion could do surprisingly well in a punch up. Some sources claim Tyson in his prime was benching between 440 and 500 pounds. Which puts his Strength in the 21-22 range. And that means a minimum of 12th level.

So yeah, real people need author fiat.

Like I said, go play something that isn't D&D for a couple of years, then pick this conversation back up with a fresh perspective.

[Frozen_Feet]

They level from 1 to 3, or 4, or 5.

If you put Mike Tyson up against a CR 3 Ogre, even if the Ogre is unarmed, someone's going to get knocked out, and it probably isn't the Ogre.

Now let's see how he handles an invisible flier, who traps him in Solid Fog, then Spiked Tentacles, then an optional Vortex of Teeth.

See how the low level archetype stops working entirely when faced with mid level abilities?
You're again falling back on peculiarities of 3.5 D&D, when there's no necessity for them to be in effect.

A system implementing a "swashbuckling hero" doesn't need to aim for realistic swashbuckling hero. A system can give such an archetype the option to, say, cut steel, jump high enough to cut flying enemies, squirm his way out from the grasp of a monstrous octopus, and so forth.

The dynamics between archetypes are not set in stone. It's all about how the mechanics support different options.


Meaningless author fiat. I can write that aiming for the creature's horn allows me to hurt it greatly with an attack that it is normally completely immune to. That doesn't mean that I should, for anyone reading the book will be laughing at me. Most, if not all of them get exactly nowhere without it, as they need author fiat to even hop into the ring with the enemy, much less defeat them.

Ugh. There's just so much wrong with this...

First of all, magic, as a thing that is non-existent in our world, is something that has to be defined from ground up by the author of a setting. Because of this, magic, and all abilities associated with it, count as one, big, author fiat. What you've been listing as "mid-level abilities" are all magical, and more importantly, from D&D. Again, there's no reason for a system to hold into a design schema like D&D.

Second, what you describe is the "Chink in armor trope". A wizard, or other "high-level archetype" like you call them, is falling back on the exact same trope when he's, say, using Searing Spell to target Fire Immune opponents, or targeting weak save of an enemy.

In Winter War, under-equipped soldiers used birch logs and bottles of burning liquor to take out tanks. That's no different from, say, targeting the eyes of a creature that otherwise has impervious armor. Enemies have weak points. Many of those are outlined in the rules. Benefiting from them is not "author fiat", it's good tactics.

[Eldan]

Similarly, show me how a level 3 expert (or so) can survive falling out a plane in D&D. Then explain to me how real life people could do it.

In D&D a fighter can't survive a vortex of teeth. In another system, perhaps the mage doesn't get that. Perhaps the fighter can deflect the vortex with his shield, because he's just that good. He then proceeds to hold one tentacle in each hand and tear them apart, followed by headbutting the solid fog. There. Done.

[Tyndmyr]

In 7th Sea, Finesse is basically the one stat that almost regardless of build, you never dump. And in it, the idea of chopping down a mage is...extremely plausible.

Yeah, D&D is one take on high fantasy. It's a fun one, sure, but it's not the only possible one.

[tonberrian]

Normal air is just a various assortment of vapours. :smallconfused: Most gases in that phase state have similar enough of a weight at these volumes that if the player seriously contended the mass values aren't close enough, I'd guess the problem is the player, and not the air elementals.

If you can shoot an arrow at it and have it stick, then it's not the same as normal air.

[Fhaolan]

If you can shoot an arrow at it and have it stick, then it's not the same as normal air.

Out of curiousity, why would it stick? Why not pass through, doing 'damage' by interfering with it's internal matrix?

[Frozen_Feet]

^ Maybe the arrow doesn't stick, and just disperses the gases that are vital to the elemental a bit as it flies through? Or maybe it's caught up in the currents of the Air Elemental and disrupts it's gaseous physique by altering the flow of gases?

Anyways, in regards to the other discussion: some real life action heroes. (http://www.cracked.com/article_17019_5-real-life-soldiers-who-make-rambo-look-like-*****.html)

[tonberrian]

Out of curiousity, why would it stick? Why not pass through, doing 'damage' by interfering with it's internal matrix?

There's enough disturbance that the arrow breaks as it hits. Also, the arrow doesn't have a trajectory after hitting the elemental. Now, upon thinking about it, this could be explained by the interior of the elemental being particularly violent, but if that's the case, then there's obviously a property that air elementals have that normal air does not, which makes my point.

Also, air elementals aren't amorphous enough to pass through keyholes and cracks, else they'd be given that ability.

And if air elementals had the same properties as air, they couldn't be coherent in a vacuum - but, barring a DM ruling, they are.

The assumption that air elementals have a similar property as normal air is ludicrous, because there are so many other differences.

[Malevolence]

Have you ever READ any of the listed works?

Beowulf, for instance, doesn't hit some magical secret weakspot. He loses most of his men in a surprise attack, wounds the beast Grendel by tearing its arm off, fights an epic wrestling match with Grendel's mother beneath a lake (and to be fair, he does, as I recall, grab a magical sword off of the lake floor to finally kill her, after his own sword breaks), and eventually dies from his wounds after fighting a dragon. Thats just an example.

See author fiat.


If overcoming challenges without magic is just meaningless author fiat, than please explain how overcoming them WITH magic is any different?

Actual abilities =/= author fiat.


You have a very specific concept of how games and gaming work, and it is mostly wrong and heavily influenced by DnD, which is one of the worst systems to be a non-magical person in. I strongly agree with The Big Dice. Try some other game system, read some books. You have a definite bias in your approach that doesn't match the reality of the hobby.

See me not being remotely impressed by author fiat.


Second, what you describe is the "Chink in armor trope". A wizard, or other "high-level archetype" like you call them, is falling back on the exact same trope when he's, say, using Searing Spell to target Fire Immune opponents, or targeting weak save of an enemy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mXruipuboA

What I describe is called "if you do this, no one will ever take anything you do seriously".


Similarly, show me how a level 3 expert (or so) can survive falling out a plane in D&D. Then explain to me how real life people could do it.

In D&D a fighter can't survive a vortex of teeth. In another system, perhaps the mage doesn't get that. Perhaps the fighter can deflect the vortex with his shield, because he's just that good. He then proceeds to hold one tentacle in each hand and tear them apart, followed by headbutting the solid fog. There. Done.

Level 3 expert, 14 Con = 16 HP.

Falling damage = 20d6. Any number 25 or lower, and he survives. Easy. Not likely to happen, but easy to demonstrate.

[Tyndmyr]

If I understand this correctly then:

Melee having nice things = author fiat.

[Britter]

See author fiat.



Actual abilities =/= author fiat.



See me not being remotely impressed by author fiat.



Didn't answer how "magic" is an actual ability, and how using it to solve a problem is any more or less fiat than "punching" or "speechwriting" or "running really fast" would be. Please give me a reference for a character that uses magic, and explain how it is not author fiat. Until you can give me some sort of idea as to what you are thinking about here, I just can't see your argument at all.

[Malevolence]

If I understand this correctly then:

Melee having nice things = author fiat.

You do not understand this correctly.

[Fhaolan]

Actual abilities =/= author fiat

But having magical abilities in the first place is just author fiat. "I solve this problem because the author says magic allows me to solve this problem." Since magic doesn't exist, the fact that magic is the only effective ability in D&D (and many other RPGs) is purely because the authors of that system defined it that way. Author fiat. They could have just as easily defined magic in a different way.

[Frozen_Feet]

Actual abilities =/= author fiat.


So if a system actually gives non-magical archetypes the abilities required to deal with magical threats, then it's not author fiat by your definition.

Also, that video with Pikachu? It's "author fiat" and bad because it breaks both established rules of the setting and common physics.

It's another thing if a gargantuan beast has vulnerable eyes despite it's otherwise impenetrable hide, and a non-magical hero exploits that.

If a setting establishes that yes, a non-magical warrior can do things X, Y and Z, and then the system used to model that setting follows that promise through, it is not "fiat". It is exactly what the rules tell it is, which is the same case as with magic.

[Yukitsu]

There's enough disturbance that the arrow breaks as it hits. Also, the arrow doesn't have a trajectory after hitting the elemental. Now, upon thinking about it, this could be explained by the interior of the elemental being particularly violent, but if that's the case, then there's obviously a property that air elementals have that normal air does not, which makes my point.

Also, air elementals aren't amorphous enough to pass through keyholes and cracks, else they'd be given that ability.

And if air elementals had the same properties as air, they couldn't be coherent in a vacuum - but, barring a DM ruling, they are.

The assumption that air elementals have a similar property as normal air is ludicrous, because there are so many other differences.

Well, sure they wouldn't be a creature if they were just air. But they are made of air. It doesn't seem to me that this would automatically change the mass of their parts, just because some arbitrary force is animating it.

[Tyndmyr]

It's another thing if a gargantuan beast has vulnerable eyes despite it's otherwise impenetrable hide, and a non-magical hero exploits that.

This would strike me as remarkably logical. Animal has supertough hide? Hit it inna spot where it doesn't have a hide. Not at all fiat, just a logical action to avoid it.

Magic gets used as a deus ex machina all the time. Some series are worse about it than others, but sometimes it seems like the rules change whenever convenient for the plot.

[Fhaolan]

There's enough disturbance that the arrow breaks as it hits. Also, the arrow doesn't have a trajectory after hitting the elemental. Now, upon thinking about it, this could be explained by the interior of the elemental being particularly violent, but if that's the case, then there's obviously a property that air elementals have that normal air does not, which makes my point.

Also, air elementals aren't amorphous enough to pass through keyholes and cracks, else they'd be given that ability.

And if air elementals had the same properties as air, they couldn't be coherent in a vacuum - but, barring a DM ruling, they are.

The assumption that air elementals have a similar property as normal air is ludicrous, because there are so many other differences.

Ah, but why is it assumed that the arrow breaks or doesn't have a trajectory afterwards? Why can't it just be lost afterwards, rather than broken?

And it's a fairly standard rule in a lot of RPGs that elementals of all types *can* pass through gaps, or in earth elemental's case, pass through earth. Mainly because what they are is not what you see. In those systems, for example, the earth elemental is merely constructed of whatever earth material is convienently nearby. If it needs to pass through a stone wall, what's actually happening is that the stone wall itself forms into the earth elemental, and it leaves behind the stuff it used to be made up of. This makes elementals a *lot* more powerful than they are in D&D, but they are usually considered a high-end challenge in those systems.

[tonberrian]

Ah, but why is it assumed that the arrow breaks or doesn't have a trajectory afterwards? Why can't it just be lost afterwards, rather than broken?

And it's a fairly standard rule in a lot of RPGs that elementals of all types *can* pass through gaps, or in earth elemental's case, pass through earth. Mainly because what they are is not what you see. In those systems, for example, the earth elemental is merely constructed of whatever earth material is convienently nearby. If it needs to pass through a stone wall, what's actually happening is that the stone wall itself forms into the earth elemental, and it leaves behind the stuff it used to be made up of. This makes elementals a *lot* more powerful than they are in D&D, but they are usually considered a high-end challenge in those systems.

Ah, but we are talking about D&D. More particularly, RAW, no Rule Zero D&D. I don't like some of the conclusions it leads to, but I'm willing to argue it.

As for not seeing any reason to assume that it isn't the same, I don't see any reason to assume that it is. Vinegar looks a lot like water, and is mostly water, but it certainly acts very differently than water in a lot of respects.

[Tyndmyr]

An air elemental is made of air, sure...but I don't think there's any point at which this is going to be that useful in working out details. It's not like I know HOW air becomes an air elemental, or what that entails physically. Because, basically, it's magic.

In the case of a created Gust of wind doing whatever it is a gust of wind would be expected to do...that expectation is certainly not "make a hovertank fly".

As for using it as an impromptu get engine by putting it in a portable hole...that doesn't make any sense. It would have no intake except for the same hole the wind is blowing out of. So, net thrust = 0.

I can make you a hovertank by RAW, sure, but this is not the way to do it.

[Fhaolan]

Ah, but we are talking about D&D. More particularly, RAW, no Rule Zero D&D. I don't like some of the conclusions it leads to, but I'm willing to argue it.

The wording used to be 'lost or broken' in the rules for arrow depletion. I don't remember that changing as editions went past, but I easily might have missed it. One of the problems with discussing RAW is that you have to be very specific as to edition and sub-edition. 2e + Options is not the same as just 2e, and so on. 4e is not precisely the same as 4essentials, I've been told.


As for not seeing any reason to assume that it isn't the same, I don't see any reason to assume that it is. Vinegar looks a lot like water, and is mostly water, but it certainly acts very differently than water in a lot of respects.

True, and so does mercury, which according to alchemy is the purest elemental 'water' possible. Pure elemental 'air' is likely nothing like the o2/n2/co2 mix that we consider air. [Note, I'm not actually arguing one side or the other here, I'm just discussing.]

[Jayabalard]

Now let's see how he handles an invisible flier, who traps him in Solid Fog, then Spiked Tentacles, then an optional Vortex of Teeth.

See how the low level archetype stops working entirely when faced with mid level abilities?Those aren't mid level abilities in a non-magic world; they're beyond epic level abilities.


EDIT: Having read the BBC version of the article, it turns out that maybe it was just 15 guys. He did club someone with a tripod though.You sure it wasn't 30 men and a dog?


You do not understand this correctly.Then you haven't been very clear... because that's how I read that post as well.


Doesn't matter what system it is. Low level archetypes don't work past low levels. If they do at all. People like Conan owe their every breath to author fiat, as they'd never win any real fight otherwise. And he's still an example of a low level archetype at low levels.No it's totally possible for them to win those fights without author fiat; you can say it's not likely if you want, but that doesn't mean it's not possible.


Meaningless author fiat.So is magic; I really fail to see why you focus on this. There is no difference between magical and non-magical characters in this respect.


Ah, but we are talking about D&D. More particularly, RAW, no Rule Zero D&D. I don't like some of the conclusions it leads to, but I'm willing to argue itMost people on this thread are talking RPGs in general.

[Tyndmyr]

Those aren't mid level abilities in a non-magic world; they're beyond epic level abilities.

Depends on the setting. In modern, a stealth bomber should fill the bill, and then some.

[Fhaolan]

Depends on the setting. In modern, a stealth bomber should fill the bill, and then some.

True, but in a modern campaign a 'normal' hero would be attempting to disable the stealth bomber, or steal the stealth bomber, or shooting it down, not trying to engage it hand-to-hand.

Althought that's an amusing mental image. I'm sure it's been done before somehow, but I'm going to have to figure out a way of getting that scene in my next modern game. :smallsmile:

[Tyndmyr]

True, but in a modern campaign a 'normal' hero would be attempting to disable the stealth bomber, or steal the stealth bomber, or shooting it down, not trying to engage it hand-to-hand.

Oh, I've been doing everything in D20M entirely wrong.

[tonberrian]

Oh, I've been doing everything in D20M entirely wrong.

Oh, I disagree.

[Jayabalard]

Depends on the setting. In modern, a stealth bomber should fill the bill, and then some.nah, a stealth bomber isn't actually invisible. Nor does it include the other abilities cited. Closer would be: steal wonder woman's invisible jet... pretty epic for any non-magic campaign.

[Fhaolan]

Oh, I've been doing everything in D20M entirely wrong.

Probably. :smallbiggrin:

[Samurai Jill]

Elucidate further. Who, other than the GM has responsibility and jurisdiction over the rules of the game? I'm seeing lots of "Ahh, but" with very little in the way of "Actually, it's like this."
Well, for example, in Polaris, IIRC (which ideally runs with exactly 4 players,) the player opposite you controls direct/open antagonists, the player to your left controls mistrustful/uncooperative NPCs, and the player to your right controls NPCs you personally care about. There is no GM. There is no single person responsible for adjudicating the rules. It's certainly a style of play that requires some getting used to, but people apparently manage to. Rune, likewise, has no, and requires no, single centralised GM.

Players have absolute authority over the actions of their character. The GM has the same over every other aspect of the game...
Again, this is not universally true. I am, furthermore, flummoxed as to why you would consider it universally true, or need it to be true. In BW, the players have significant mechanical input to things other than their characters' decisions in the form of Circles tests and Wises, which essentially create aspects of the world.

On the subject of the trust- why would you feel the need to hide roll outcomes or target difficulties from the players? Doesn't that kind of imply you don't trust them? Because that, incidentally, doesn't happen in BW, and is another way in which GM arbitration is directly subject to player scrutiny.

[Tyndmyr]

Steal Wonder Woman's invisible jet? Yeah, that'd be good. I'd play that adventure.

Despite being fairly anti-rule zero in general, I'll certainly admit to their being games that DO rely heavily on DM control and fiat, and in which players conferring about rules is not to be desired.

Ie, Paranoia. It would simply not work without that.

[Samurai Jill]

The fact of the matter is that players who wanted to play a freeform game would play a freeform game. Those that want D&D, or whatever system you are playing want that. They didn't waste their money buying rulebooks for that system, and their time learning said system to be bait and switched into a freeform game. If they wanted that, they could have saved their money.
Yes. This. Absolutely. In fact, it doesn't even become a freeform game, because in freeform, there's no rule stating one person gets their way all the time.

The point of those games is to attempt to be this guy:

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3467/3931678882_73868c65b2.jpg

As such, no one takes them seriously. In serious games, which means any system but the two in which the whole point is to be jerked around, success and failure is directly proportional to how well you are, or are not accomplishing character goals.
I would disagree on that point. I think the purpose of a Simulationist system like Call of Cthulhu is primarily to see if you can accurately reproduce the key characteristics of the source material. As in, you take initial inputs that resemble the start of a H.P. Lovecraft story, mung them and squooze them and confrabulate them via the transformations of system interactions and an emphasis on in-character motivations, and- voilà!- you get final outputs that resemble the end of a H.P. Lovecraft story. The purpose isn't to win, it's to gain a deeper understanding of/immersion in the source material.

(Now, with that said, one can make any number of criticisms of the efficacy of Call of Cthulhu itself as a system, even when bearing that purpose in mind- but I wouldn't consider the underlying purpose ignoble.)

It's also possible to have a style of play where a given character's every starting aim and ambition is thwarted and frustrated, but where that results in character development and an enrichment of theme that enhances the story. Or, the character might accomplish everything they set out to do, but become so hollowed and bitter by the cost incurred that victory turns to ashes in their mouth. Those are rather tragic outcomes, but tragedy can make for a good yarn.

[Hecuba]

Precisely. The experienced DM knows the rule, and can just point it out. The inexperienced one doesn't, and has to look it up. So he has to make up something to fill in for the lack of actual rules. And since he is inexperienced, whatever he makes is not going to be good. It's a catch 22 you see - anyone who could use rule zero effectively doesn't need it.

I consider myself, and most of the GMs I play with, reasonably experienced in the games we usually play. I do not know every rule, nor do they.

I'll use D&D 3.5 as an example. If we know flight maneuverability in combat is going to be a relevant issue because we're going to be fighting Djinni while riding griffins, we'll brush up on the relevant rules. That is desirable and proper.

If however, someone decides that we need to know mechanically how well the rogue disables that trap, I would be severely disappointed if the DM felt the need to waste game time and look up the variant rule for that rather than just making a ruling and running with it.


If someone picks up my screwdriver and waves it around like a weapon, I certainly will be wary of them. Sure they will not definitely stab me, but it is quite possible that they might try to. And that is what rule zero is - something not inherently dangerous, but potentially so, being used in a potentially threatening manner.

And if they pick it up and use it to drive in a screw? What if they were using it to remove a pointy staple from wood?

You can shiv someone with a screwdriver. You can also randomly screw things that need no screws. But occasionally you can use it to drive a screw to hold something together. You can also use it for those pesky staples, even though there's probably a staple remover somewhere if you take the time to look for it.

The first two are problems: they demonstrate bad judgement. I'm not going to play with a DM with bad judgement even if they don't have rule 0 at their disposal-- the only time I might consider it would be in a published adventure.

The second two I'm fine with: in fact, I feel better knowing the the DM can use his tools responsibly.


The fact of the matter is that players who wanted to play a freeform game would play a freeform game. Those that want D&D, or whatever system you are playing want that. They didn't waste their money buying rulebooks for that system, and their time learning said system to be bait and switched into a freeform game. If they wanted that, they could have saved their money.

While it's not true of the groups I most regularly play with, I do know several people who play D&D regularly and don't actually own any of the books or have significant system mastery. I often end up filling in for DM's of such groups by virtue of being the D&D chick working at a comic shop. There's generally a copy or two of the books to go around, minimal optimization, a fast & loose relationship with the rules, and lots of beer and pretzels.

And they are still playing D&D, and they are playing it just as right as you are.

[Malevolence]

I consider myself, and most of the GMs I play with, reasonably experienced in the games we usually play. I do not know every rule, nor do they.

I'll use D&D 3.5 as an example. If we know flight maneuverability in combat is going to be a relevant issue because we're going to be fighting Djinni while riding griffins, we'll brush up on the relevant rules. That is desirable and proper.

If however, someone decides that we need to know mechanically how well the rogue disables that trap, I would be severely disappointed if the DM felt the need to waste game time and look up the variant rule for that rather than just making a ruling and running with it.

In all honesty, if you are playing D&D, and you do not know the rules for flight, you are not experienced. Granted they are convoluted rules, mostly because they insist on using facing rules when the rest of the game does not. But given the prevalence of flight, it is not possible to be an experienced D&D player without knowing how flight works.


And if they pick it up and use it to drive in a screw? What if they were using it to remove a pointy staple from wood?

You can shiv someone with a screwdriver. You can also randomly screw things that need no screws. But occasionally you can use it to drive a screw to hold something together. You can also use it for those pesky staples, even though there's probably a staple remover somewhere if you take the time to look for it.

The first two are problems: they demonstrate bad judgement. I'm not going to play with a DM with bad judgement even if they don't have rule 0 at their disposal-- the only time I might consider it would be in a published adventure.

That would be making thought out house rules instead of just flailing about and taking random actions. Not the same thing.


While it's not true of the groups I most regularly play with, I do know several people who play D&D regularly and don't actually own any of the books or have significant system mastery. I often end up filling in for DM's of such groups by virtue of being the D&D chick working at a comic shop. There's generally a copy or two of the books to go around, minimal optimization, a fast & loose relationship with the rules, and lots of beer and pretzels.

And they are still playing D&D, and they are playing it just as right as you are.

This entire section has nothing to do with anything said here.

[The Glyphstone]

In all honesty, if you are playing D&D, and you do not know the rules for flight, you are not experienced. Granted they are convoluted rules, mostly because they insist on using facing rules when the rest of the game does not. But given the prevalence of flight, it is not possible to be an experienced D&D player without knowing how flight works.

.

In his defense, experience doesn't necessarily correlate to flight - if his group only plays at low levels, they could be playing since 3.5 came out without ever needing the flight rules more than once in a blue moon. Unlikely, but possible.

[Eldan]

Eh, I just tend to wing flight. (ba-dum-tish!) It's rarely important to know where exactly a flying creature is. Just let it move around a bit every turn and it should be fine.

[Talakeal]

I agree. I hate the title. I feel Dungeon Master, Game Master, and Storyteller are all insufficient titles. I'd like to come up with a catchy one that doesn't have such baggage.

Might I suggest Game Trustee?

[Prplcheez]

Snipping out the parts of the OP that I have nothing to say about.


rocks fall, everyone dies".

My friend did this the first time he DM'd for our group. He played a PC as well (we usually do this, it ends up getting unbalanced though :smallsigh:), and his character never seemed to hit any traps, so we (about 6-7 of us, IIRC) complained. He said "fine" and rolled a d20. Natural 20. He said something along the lines of "boulders fall from the ceiling. Roll a reflex save." Me, the cleric, and my friend playing a fighter or something (this was years ago, don't remember exact details) succeeded in the save (which was something ridiculous, like 22 or something for second level characters). He said "anyone who failed the save takes 10d20 damage." He kills himself first, then rolls the 10d20 for the other 4 people. Myself and the other guy still alive had to carry every corpse out of the dungeon to be revived. Since we both had absurd strength, as the result of playing a high-powered campaign, we could each transport about 500 pounds, so the only problem was getting out of the dungeon without getting eaten. We got out, then all 6 or 7 of us proceeded to throw stuff at the DM and tell him he's never allowed to DM again.

TL;DR Rule 0, at least in the sense of "rocks fall, everyone dies," is well within the rights of a DM to do, but no one will ever play with them again.


(Actually, in these circles, there is also a "Rule Zero", but an entirely different one: "Do not play with douchebags")

That's usually an unwritten rule.


The GM (I prefer this more generic term over the D&D-specific DM) can NOT do anything he likes.

Bull. The DM is the storyteller, god, the creator, or whatever else you want to call the general master of everything. The DM is not bound by rules of the game, only by rules of the playgroup. You can Rule 0 a sheet of wallpaper with 36 class levels, and the response of most players would be to laugh and fight it. Unless the DM does something to make the game not fun, Rule 0 is always a valid thing for the DM to use.


The GM is a player like everyone else. If he is allowed to cheat, so is everyone else. Since that would destroy the game, the only possible consequence is: the GM must not cheat.

I suppose you could call the GM a player, but I would call him exactly what GM stands for: the Game Master. They control the game. In a game like D&D that doesn't truly have concrete rules, they do whatever they feel will make the game fun.


The GM has a lot of flexibility without cheating or bending the rules. If he wants the BBEG to have some power that's not in the books, he can create it.

How is this not rule 0?


D&D of all games has probably the least call for this, because there are thousands of everything: PrCs, feats, spells. But that only aside.

I think D&D requires the most improvisation on the part of the DM. All of the variables in the game and interactions between them will invariably result in some problems that the DM will have to rule 0 his/her way past.


Above all, the GM must not castrate a player character by denying him the benefit of a feature the player "paid" for, just because it would ruin his precious plot. If there's nothing in the rules that can stop the player from busting your plot -- well then build a better one for crying out loud!

I completely agree with this, but I don't think it has much to do with rule 0.


D&D offers a plethora of possibilities, both to the DM and the players. It is impossible to know them all by heart. So it can very well happen that a player comes up with something that stumps you. When that happens, either concede defeat or ask for a time-out to come up with a way to continue your adventure. Over time, you will learn.

I think rule 0 fits nicely here. When you, as a DM, are beaten by the players, rule 0 helps you come up with something for a new challenge to the players. Rule 0 doesn't always have to be used for something unfair.


If on the other hand you are concerned that something a player does is "overpowered", it is still bad style to just forbid it. Instead of confrontation, try to build a consensus. Either let yourself be convinced that the thing is not breaking the game, or convince the player that it is. (Hint: the statement "anything you use, the NPCs may use, too" usually works wonders.)

If something a player does with resources that you've given them is something that you consider "overpowered," it's your own fault and on the next challenge you should think more carefully about what you give the players to use. This doesn't really have much to do with rule 0, other than that bad DMs use it to get themselves out of messes like this without having to be creative.


If a player _is_ hell-bent on breaking the game, invoke the new Rule Zero (regarding douchebags).

So much for now. Have fun. ^^

Breaking the game can be fun if the player and the DM go about it in the correct way.

Overall, the things you brought up in this post don't have so much to do with rule 0 as they do with the difference between good DMs and bad DMs.

[Hecuba]

In his defense
It's "her". I really should get around to filling out that little box in the CP.


In his defense, experience doesn't necessarily correlate to flight - if his group only plays at low levels, they could be playing since 3.5 came out without ever needing the flight rules more than once in a blue moon. Unlikely, but possible.

These days we do tend towards E6 in my more permanent groups. But I've used flight a plenty, and I know most of the rules for the higher maneuverability forms by heart. Off the top of my head, Good's the cut off for hover, reverse, and freely angling up, and average for freely angling down.

I don't, however, know the angle and distance requirements for turning at lower maneuverability, nor those for maximum angle up or down. I know that they're in multiples of either 15 or 30 angles and I think that the distances range from 5 to 20 feet increments. But I would have to look at a table to be sure. If I know that these are likely to be in the game I'm playing in the near future, I'd make sure to brush up and have the table out & ready.

But if they came up without preparation, I would heavily prefer that the DM wing it rather than look them up-- even if you're fast, looking something up takes a significant enough bit of time that it breaks the flow of the game.

I can play the game tactically well enough, and it's fun in its own right. But it's not the draw for me: adventuring vicariously through my PC is. And looking at a table that's already out and that you have read through in advance of the session can have a remarkably lesser effect on breaking immersion than grabbing a book and finding a page (even if you have that page bookmarked or you're fast with an index).


That would be making thought out house rules instead of just flailing about and taking random actions. Not the same thing.

My point there is that flailing about randomly isn't somehow inherent to the DM making a judgement call. You can run with that call for as long as necessary, and the DMG actually recommends you do run with it if possible.

The rule may not be perfect, but that doesn't mean you should flail wildly round to round changing things.

To use the flight example above, if I were winging turning in motion, I would probably do (from Clumsy to Perfect) degrees of 15, 30, 45, 90, perfect per 5 feet. And then, in the absence of a compelling reason to the contrary, run with those. I've not chosen randomly: 15 degree increments make 90 degree and 180 degree turns easy to calculate.

It's far from perfect, and if I were making a formal house rule I would examine it closely and add polish. But, in my experience, something like that would almost certainly be functional enough for a single encounter.


This entire section has nothing to do with anything said here.

Yes, it does. To my reading, you posited that people cared significantly about the books that they purchased and that they care about exercising their system mastery. Essentially, that they are emotionally and financially invested to a significant extent in the rules of D&D as a package. That reads to me like an underlying assumption that everyone comes to the table looking primarily for a tactical game.

I find that to be untrue for a great portion of the people I play with.

[The Big Dice]

Well, for example, in Polaris, IIRC (which ideally runs with exactly 4 players,) the player opposite you controls direct/open antagonists, the player to your left controls mistrustful/uncooperative NPCs, and the player to your right controls NPCs you personally care about. There is no GM. There is no single person responsible for adjudicating the rules. It's certainly a style of play that requires some getting used to, but people apparently manage to. Rune, likewise, has no, and requires no, single centralised GM.
Do you understand the concept of the exception that proves the rule? It's something that turns up a lot in biology, but also in other places too.

What yo've just cited are specific cases where the traditional player/GM relationship has been subverted or altered. But you still haven't given me a reason why the GM is not the final arbiter of everything the players don't do at the gaming table. Other than player entitlement and a few fringe game systems experimenting with things, there are very good reasons why RPGs work the way they do.

Again, this is not universally true. I am, furthermore, flummoxed as to why you would consider it universally true, or need it to be true. In BW, the players have significant mechanical input to things other than their characters' decisions in the form of Circles tests and Wises, which essentially create aspects of the world.
And the GM has the final say over whether or not those aspects get included in the game. Because you can not tell me that there is any way at all that a GM would be forced to include something against his will. Not in a system as well conceived and executed as Burning Wheel.

Also, you're arguing specific against general still. I'm saying all cars have engines. You are saying that is not the case, as some cars are mid engine, some have the engine in the front and some have it in the back. For every specific system you cite that messes with the relationships around the table, there are litereally hundreds that don't.

On the subject of the trust- why would you feel the need to hide roll outcomes or target difficulties from the players? Doesn't that kind of imply you don't trust them? Because that, incidentally, doesn't happen in BW, and is another way in which GM arbitration is directly subject to player scrutiny.
Do you understand the concept of the spoiler? Spoilers have nothing to do with trust and everything to do with not telegraphing an outcome before the moment of the reveal. That's all rolling behind a screen is for. It stops the players seeing that I've rolled especially high or low until I tell them the outcome of the roll.

In a way, it's a tool that aids immersion, as it lest me describe events resolved by dice rolling without reference to numbers on the dice. Exactly how is that connected to trust again?

Though mostly I use a Gm screen as a reference thing, keeping track of commonly used rules and tables, with random post it notes stuck there to remind me ot things I'll need during play. It's a tool as much as a prop.

[Malevolence]

In his defense, experience doesn't necessarily correlate to flight - if his group only plays at low levels, they could be playing since 3.5 came out without ever needing the flight rules more than once in a blue moon. Unlikely, but possible.

If you have only played at low levels, you are not experienced. You have only played a fraction of the game. Now, if you want to only play low levels, that's fine, but it means that you are not experienced.

[The Big Dice]

If you have only played at low levels, you are not experienced. You have only played a fraction of the game. Now, if you want to only play low levels, that's fine, but it means that you are not experienced.

If you have say, five years experience of playing at low levels compared to someone with two years of playing at high levels, who has more experience? And given that a large portion of campaigns never make it to high level play, more people who are experienced roleplayers, people with literally decades in the hobby, might have little actual time spent playing high level games.

Does that invalidate their experience?

[Samurai Jill]

Do you understand the concept of the exception that proves the rule?
Actually, I am of the opinion that the great bulk of RPGs include techniques or emphases that are actually dysfunctional to some degree or another.

And the GM has the final say over whether or not those aspects get included in the game. Because you can not tell me that there is any way at all that a GM would be forced to include something against his will...
Yes! That is exactly what could happen! In many ways, that is what the rules of Burning Wheel exist to allow! That the GM can, when the dice go against him, be obliged to include something whether he likes it or not!

For Wises and Circles, a difficulty gets set based on the plausibility of the addition, and if the roll succeeds, it's in there. Now, sure, technically the GM is responsible for adjudicating the difficulty of the check, but there are also clear guidelines established for the adjudication. So he's not likely to get away with "Dunes in a desert? Baker in a big city? Yeah, that's Ob 10 unlikelihood. Sucks to be you."

Do you understand the concept of the spoiler? Spoilers have nothing to do with trust and everything to do with not telegraphing an outcome before the moment of the reveal...
Look, in the final analysis, if your group is having fun, your group is having fun. But you made the assertion that denying Rule Zero implies a lack of trust in the GM. I contend that insisting on Rule Zero can equally be said to show a lack of trust in the players- their good judgement, their discernment, their grasp of the 'big picture'. I would further contend that when a person isn't able to lie to you, you tend to trust them more.

Having a spoiler in mind that will be 'revealed' to the players is, nine times out of ten, predicated on the assumption that the PCs will be in a particular place at a particular time doing a particular thing for a particular purpose when it is belatedly unveiled. In other words, it assumes railroading is in action. And the hiding of information, in turn, facilitates that railroading.

BW, in a sense, does telegraph potential (short-term) outcomes before the moment of the reveal, precisely because it helps to eliminate railroading. Guaranteed long-term outcomes don't get telegraphed because there aren't any. Which is what player control over story implies.

If you want to avoid referencing numeric totals, you can always adopt a system of code phrases similar to FUDGE and other games- "Very difficult" = DC 6, "Easy" = DC 2, and so on and whatever- e.g, "Climbing this wall would be challenging." Then you can roll the dice out in the open, narrate the outcomes, and the players can look at the totals if they like. (Personally, I don't consider calling out numbers to be a big deal, but YMMV.)

The hiding of results is related to trust because- if the players are truly okay with your use of Rule Zero- why would they object to seeing it in action? Or are you afraid that they would behave differently if they saw the full extent to which their actions don't matter? In other words, don't you trust them?

[Britter]

And the GM has the final say over whether or not those aspects get included in the game. Because you can not tell me that there is any way at all that a GM would be forced to include something against his will. Not in a system as well conceived and executed as Burning Wheel.



This is another legitimate point. Let me try to address it. This will not be a short answer, and it will, like so many answers about BW-based questions, not necessarily help. There are more layers to BW that influence this aspect of play than I can enumerate within a single forum post.

By saying that Burning Wheel doesn't support Rule Zero, I am not saying the GM is powerless, in the sense that players can ride roughshod over him at will. While Circles and Wises do give the player a very significant bit of in game power, the GM can say "No, that contradicts a setting fact" and ask for a different roll if someone is using a wise to do something that is entirely inappropriate to the game, or that violates a fact that the GM has already established. The GM never has to roll Circles or Wises to add stuff to the game(that is one of his enumerated powers). A player can also say "No, that contradicts a setting fact I established with a wise last session" or "No, I already rolled for that, Let it Ride is in effect" to either the GM or another player, if they are trying to introduce something that has already been done in play. Thats how the rules are written.

In Burning Wheel, both players and GMs have a pretty clearly designated power within the game world and the table environment. When I say the GM is simply another player, I don't mean he is acting under the same exact scope of authority as the players. If you are trying to run roughshod over me in a BW game, I can tell you to stop it, stop screwing about, and get back to the game.

That is not the same as Rule Zero, in my opinion.

I have always understood Rule Zero to imply that the established rules of the game can and often should be treated as guidelines, to be ignored as needed or desired by the GM. Burning Wheel has no such statement within it's rules. In fact, there are several sections of the rules that indicate that the GM specifically does not have the ability to ignore the rules. The section on Let it Ride, for example, (page 35 of my copy of BWRevised, the Brown book) is fairly specific as to what and why the GM is and is not allowed to do. There is no place where it says that the rule can be ignored if it the GM chooses to.

This level of language is standard throughout the BW rules.

In short, what I am saying is that the GM in Burning Wheel does, in fact, have a larger degree of authority at the table than a player, to a certain extent. After all, he has to set difficulty for rolls, and determine the success and failure of those rolls. That is pretty big stuff. Players are not allowed that level of authority, ever.

However, the GM is not free to discard rules at his whim. He is never advised to do so within the BW rule book, or the Adventure Burner (essentially, a how-to guide for playing and Gming BW). Therefore, BW does not have a Rule Zero. The rules must be followed by both GM and player. However, there ARE different limits on GMs than there are on players.

So, when it comes down to it, the GM runs that game and can, in fact, say "no, that is not appropriate to the game". It happens I am sure, and though I have yet to encounter it myself, I can't argue that I won't someday.

However, because there is a ton of collaborative world building and setting creation, and because the conflicts the players are involved in in-game are primarily of their own creation, it has been my experience that they understand the parameters of how the world works. This limits (and in my case so far, eliminates) any attempts to introduce wildly inappropriate things to the game. Disruptive or undesired in-game actions are not necessary to give the player a feeling of control in the setting, as opposed to a strongly railroaded game where the feeling of player agency is strongly diminished and often the only way off the rails is to try and break them.

Anyway, if you want to consider it a victory to get me to say that yes, the GM can say "no" to his players in a BW game, you win. He can. However, there are circumstances where they can say the same to him. And no where in the rules is the GM given the power or authority, or even the polite suggestion, to ignore the rules.

Now, obviously, you can ignore them all you want. No game police will come along and arrest you. But once you discard the rules, you aren't playing BW anymore. It is not a system like DnD, which is frankly a very patchworky beast, full of legacy design challenges from the last 30 years and a TON of intersecting rules-minutiae that require interpretation. You ignore rules in DnD, you are still playing DnD, because one of the rules gives you that authority. (I am just using DnD for an example, this could apply to any number of systems. 2 and 3e Shadowrun also suffer heavily from this, imo)

Anyway, it is a long message. I hope I have been clear. In short, yes the GM has more setting-specific veto power, and yes, the GM is the guy who will have to make calls in the end. He also has to use the rules. Thems the breaks.

You raised a really good point here. Thanks.

Edit - Just read Samurai Jill's post. I agree with what was said there as well. It matches my experience with the game. I apparently edited out the part of my post where I said that, yes, a GM can and often does have to deal with things being added to the setting that they might not have thought of, intended, or even desired. It happens. The rules do allow it. And it is not that bad of a thing, really. Made some of my games a lot more interesting than otherwise I could have. Never made one worse than it had been before yet.





Yes! That is exactly what could happen! In many ways, that is what the rules of Burning Wheel exist to allow! That the GM can, when the dice go against him, be obliged to include something whether he likes it or not!

For Wises and Circles, a difficulty gets set based on the plausibility of the addition, and if the roll succeeds, it's in there. Now, sure, technically the GM is responsible for adjudicating the difficulty of the check, but there are also clear guidelines established for the adjudication. So he's not likely to get away with "Dunes in a desert? Baker in a big city? Yeah, that's Ob 10 unlikelihood. Sucks to be you."



This is one of the reasons I love Burning Wheel (as a GM and a player), said here much more elegantly than I ever have managed to say it.

[Samurai Jill]

This is one of the reasons I love Burning Wheel (as a GM and a player), said here much more elegantly than I ever have managed to say it.
Thanks. :) Though it's only because I have too much time on my hands...

[Malevolence]

If you have say, five years experience of playing at low levels compared to someone with two years of playing at high levels, who has more experience? And given that a large portion of campaigns never make it to high level play, more people who are experienced roleplayers, people with literally decades in the hobby, might have little actual time spent playing high level games.

Does that invalidate their experience?

Someone who has not played through the entire game, and that means low, mid, and high levels is not experienced. Is a Diablo 2 player experienced because they defeated Andariel a hundred times, but never advanced far into act 2? According to you, they are, but such a belief is obviously foolish. Now there isn't any shame in being inexperienced, but call a duck a duck.

Yes, you will most likely make a lot of mistakes the first time, and perhaps even after that as well. There's no shame in that either. It's how you learn, and more to the point become experienced.

[Frozen_Feet]

They are epxerienced with the game up to that point. It is possible for the player who defeated Andariel a thousand times to be vastly better player what comes to those points of the game, than the guy who breesed through all the chapters.

There are many optimization tricks, rules and players choices in E6 and low-level vanilla D&D that you do not see much in high-level play, because they are obsoloted. What was the last time anyone had to look up, say, rules for starvation in a game above ECL 10?

However, said tricks, rules and choices can be vital to games that stick on low levels. So while someone who's unexperience with high-level play might not remember flying rules, he might be vastly better at getting his characters through levels 1 to 6 than a player used to high-level environment.

[stainboy]

These days we do tend towards E6 in my more permanent groups. But I've used flight a plenty, and I know most of the rules for the higher maneuverability forms by heart. Off the top of my head, Good's the cut off for hover, reverse, and freely angling up, and average for freely angling down.


This is a good point. I've played a warlock, run a game where every member of the party could fly (and did constantly), and run another game where the party constantly fought flying enemies from the decks of airships, but I still have to look up the rules for lower maneuverability. Most of the time when something flies it has Good or Perfect, so the restrictions on turning don't matter.

[The Big Dice]

Now, sure, technically the GM is responsible for adjudicating the difficulty of the check, but there are also clear guidelines established for the adjudication.
How is that different from any other Difficulty based game system in existence? The writer provides guidelines, the GM uses those guidelines to decide on difficulties for tasks that are not explicitly covered by the rules.

The claim that Burning Wheel is somehow better or superior is just ridiculous. It may be better written, it may provide more support in terms of giving guides to GMs on how to assign a numerical value ot a given dice roll.

But the GM still sets the difficulty and the player still rolls the dice. It's no different from L5R, 7th Sea, D&D or any of the other 'beat a difficulty with a dice roll' systems that are out there.

But you made the assertion that denying Rule Zero implies a lack of trust in the GM. I contend that insisting on Rule Zero can equally be said to show a lack of trust in the players- their good judgement, their discernment, their grasp of the 'big picture'. I would further contend that when a person isn't able to lie to you, you tend to trust them more.
Again the confrontational assumptions. Again, the belief that the relationship between player and GM is a hostile one, and the the GM somehow needs to be controlled, reigned in. That the GM is going to lie to the players for no other reason that because he can.

I find that attitude to be reprehensible. There should be a mutual benefit, a symbiosis between player and GM. A feedback loop that provides enjoyment for all involved.

I maintain that fear of the GM is the root cause of the thought that the GM needs to be controlled by the players. That in some way, the players feel that they should really be the ones making all the decisions. And guess what, there's an easy answer to that: GM a game yourself.

Except instead of embracing trust and sharing in creating an experience for all at the table, there are people who want to restrict the person who puts the most effort into the game.

Having a spoiler in mind that will be 'revealed' to the players is, nine times out of ten, predicated on the assumption that the PCs will be in a particular place at a particular time doing a particular thing for a particular purpose when it is belatedly unveiled. In other words, it assumes railroading is in action. And the hiding of information, in turn, facilitates that railroading.
Do you have the faintest understanding of the espionage genre? Of political machination in RPGs or any kind of social interaction where there is no realistic way the characters could know if they have succeeded or failed at a given interaction?

Because that post makes it clear that you have no clue about things like betrayals, double crosses, bluffs, double bluffs or using misinformation. And that you don't have a deep understanding of the use or misuse of railroading as a GM tool.

In many ways
in a senseThere's a lot of maybe and kind of and other not really being able to equate the game with what you're trying to say there.


If you want to avoid referencing numeric totals, you can always adopt a system of code phrases similar to FUDGE and other games- "Very difficult" = DC 6, "Easy" = DC 2, and so on and whatever- e.g, "Climbing this wall would be challenging." Then you can roll the dice out in the open, narrate the outcomes, and the players can look at the totals if they like. (Personally, I don't consider calling out numbers to be a big deal, but YMMV.)
You do realise that the idea of assigning a difficulty ranging from Very Easy to Almost Impossible isn't unique to FUDGE? Cyberpunk 2013 was the first game I came across to use the idea and that was in 1988. So yeah, FUDGE is a little behind the times there.

And what sounds more immersive:
"Ok, that car is a mess. It's going to be Difficult to get it going again, and Very Difficult to get it to pass inspection." or "That car is a mess. You'll need a 25 to get it running, or a 30 to get it to pass inspection."

Surely Burning Wheel discusses these kind of topics as well.

The hiding of results is related to trust because- if the players are truly okay with your use of Rule Zero- why would they object to seeing it in action? Or are you afraid that they would behave differently if they saw the full extent to which their actions don't matter? In other words, don't you trust them?
Why do you need to see Rule 0 in action? Do you want a big neon sign that gets turned on when the GM is about to use Rule 0? What about the mysterious Rule 1? Or any other rule? You really think that having the mechanics of the system front and center, right there on view at all times is a desirable thing?

Since I do trust my players and they trust me, there is no need to make a big deal out of things like that. Making mountains out of molehills is a sign that mistrust is an issue. And the person complaining the loudest is usually the one with the axe to grind. There's a lot of psychology going on with attempting to control the GM, assuming the GM is going to be lying to you and trying to curb that before you even see a hint of it.

[The Glyphstone]

Someone who has not played through the entire game, and that means low, mid, and high levels is not experienced. Is a Diablo 2 player experienced because they defeated Andariel a hundred times, but never advanced far into act 2? According to you, they are, but such a belief is obviously foolish. Now there isn't any shame in being inexperienced, but call a duck a duck.

Yes, you will most likely make a lot of mistakes the first time, and perhaps even after that as well. There's no shame in that either. It's how you learn, and more to the point become experienced.


They are epxerienced with the game up to that point. It is possible for the player who defeated Andariel a thousand times to be vastly better player what comes to those points of the game, than the guy who breesed through all the chapters.


It's also a false dichotomy, because Diablo 2 is a single story and game that stretches from Act 1 to Act 4. If we keep with your flawed example, you're saying that someone who only played Diablo 2 all the way through Hell Difficulty Hardcore, but never bought Lord of Destruction, is inexperienced because they haven't completed the entire D2 storyline or collected all the Rune Words. Comparatively, if Acts 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 were all sold as independent stand-alone games that you could import characters forward into (sorta like Mass Effect) - you could be extremely experienced with one or two of all of them, exactly like only playing low-level games, mid-level games, high-level games, or games that start low and end high.

[The Big Dice]

Comparatively, if Acts 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 were all sold as independent stand-alone games that you could import characters forward into (sorta like Mass Effect) - you could be extremely experienced with one or two of all of them, exactly like only playing low-level games, mid-level games, high-level games, or games that start low and end high.
That analogy works pretty well with the Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter Nights lines of games. Both of them have you start off as a 1st level n00b. But the expansions have you starting at higher levels and let you play to higher levels.

[Malevolence]

They are epxerienced with the game up to that point. It is possible for the player who defeated Andariel a thousand times to be vastly better player what comes to those points of the game, than the guy who breesed through all the chapters.

There are many optimization tricks, rules and players choices in E6 and low-level vanilla D&D that you do not see much in high-level play, because they are obsoloted. What was the last time anyone had to look up, say, rules for starvation in a game above ECL 10?

However, said tricks, rules and choices can be vital to games that stick on low levels. So while someone who's unexperience with high-level play might not remember flying rules, he might be vastly better at getting his characters through levels 1 to 6 than a player used to high-level environment.

When is the last time those rules mattered at low levels? You can literally find food indefinitely by taking 10 with 10 Wis and 0 ranks in Survival. If for whatever reason your Wis is lower than 10, someone with a Wis of 14 counteracts that.

And ignoring levels 1 and 2, that are purely luck based no matter what, it doesn't exactly require a lot of skill to go 3-6. The game is still simple at that point. Just like going from game start to Andariel. But you get to mid and high levels, and the whole game changes. The low level only guy is not experienced, for the same reason the guy who beats a game on the easiest difficulty and no others is not experienced.

[Frozen_Feet]

When is the last time those rules mattered at low levels? You can literally find food indefinitely by taking 10 with 10 Wis and 0 ranks in Survival. If for whatever reason your Wis is lower than 10, someone with a Wis of 14 counteracts that.

This tactic does not work if pursued, in poor or hostile weather conditions, when there are dangerous animals around, or a number of other conditions that would preclude taking 10.

But let's not get bogged down by this singular example - the general point still stands. In a game where different rules apply at different phases, it is possible for a player to be more experienced with some and less with others. Experience is not binary. That guy who breezed though the game once in Easy mode still has more experience than the guy who once tried the game for two hours.

Yes, a guy who's played several campaigns of D&D from level 1 to 20 is more experienced than a gall who's only played campaigns fom 1 to 13. But the gall is still more experienced than a guy who's only played it once at level 19 and 20.

[Britter]

How is that different from any other Difficulty based game system in existence? The writer provides guidelines, the GM uses those guidelines to decide on difficulties for tasks that are not explicitly covered by the rules.


It's not. That is one of the issues here - is assigning the difficulty of tasks, in fact, excersisng rule zero, or is it running the game based on the rules. I consider it the later. Some in this thread consider it the former. Never going to get a consensus.



The claim that Burning Wheel is somehow better or superior is just ridiculous.


Total agreement, from the perspective of being a tool for having fun. Any and all games have the potential. Frankly, BW will absolutely suck as a platform for entertainment for some people.



It may be better written, it may provide more support in terms of giving guides to GMs on how to assign a numerical value ot a given dice roll.


Here is where I see it as superior, from a design perspective only. It is a game designed by people with an understanding of game theory (and again, NOT GNS, which I know some people are not fans of. I mean the same sort of mechanism design that does into board and video games, and that you can earn a degree in). All the pieces are designed to fit together and create a set of behaviors and reactions at the game table.



But the GM still sets the difficulty and the player still rolls the dice. It's no different from L5R, 7th Sea, D&D or any of the other 'beat a difficulty with a dice roll' systems that are out there.


Except, it doesn't. Ok, yes, in the specific aspects you just indicated, sure. GM sets the number, player rolls. That is the task resolution mechanic. It is not the limit of the rules of the game. There are rules, such as Let It Ride and Intent and Task, and the rewards cycle, which frame the use of the mechanics. Some of those frames are designed specifically to avoid certain behaviors that some, including me, perceive as railroading (Let It Ride is explicitly in this camp, designed to prevent situations where a GM insists on a large number of rolls for the resolution of a single, extended task, in order to get a failure or success as the GM desires [eg - an adventure can only continue forward if a gather info check is made, meaning the players roll till they get a success. An adventure can only continue if the players get captured, meaning stealth is rolled until the players fail. Yes, these are heavy handed examples])

There is a lot of structure and rules in BW that involve when and why to roll, as well as when not to roll. Honestly. I have never played a game that was as clear on when to roll dice.



Again the confrontational assumptions. Again, the belief that the relationship between player and GM is a hostile one, and the the GM somehow needs to be controlled, reigned in. That the GM is going to lie to the players for no other reason that because he can.

I find that attitude to be reprehensible. There should be a mutual benefit, a symbiosis between player and GM. A feedback loop that provides enjoyment for all involved.

I maintain that fear of the GM is the root cause of the thought that the GM needs to be controlled by the players. That in some way, the players feel that they should really be the ones making all the decisions. And guess what, there's an easy answer to that: GM a game yourself.

Except instead of embracing trust and sharing in creating an experience for all at the table, there are people who want to restrict the person who puts the most effort into the game.


Two points. One, how can I have total trust of you if you posses a method to irrevocably override me? Thats Rule Zero. It makes it impossible to fully trust someone if they can veto you or change your course and you have no option for input, feedback, or protest beyond stepping away from the table. Trust can't really exist if the nuclear option is on the table. (there are some games, Paranoia springs immediately to mind, where this is not true. Paranoia won't work in an open environment.)

Two. One of the reasons your argument is not persuasive to me is that I do not agree that the GM puts the most effort into all games. Yes, in DnD, 7th Sea, and similar games (many of which are very good and very fun to play) the GM does a lot of work. In BW and similar games, the traditional GM roles of world creation, narrative control, and NPCs are split across the entire table. GM and player are both equally involved and committed. They are both putting a tremendous amount of effort into the game. It ceases to be mine or yours. It becomes ours.

re: Misinformation. I will let Alfred Hitchcock speak for me here:

"There is a distinct difference between "suspense" and "surprise," and yet many pictures continually confuse the two. I'll explain what I mean.

We are now having a very innocent little chat. Let's suppose that there is a bomb underneath this table between us. Nothing happens, and then all of a sudden, "Boom!" There is an explosion. The public is surprised, but prior to this surprise, it has seen an absolutely ordinary scene, of no special consequence. Now, let us take a suspense situation. The bomb is underneath the table and the public knows it, probably because they have seen the anarchist place it there. The public is aware the bomb is going to explode at one o'clock and there is a clock in the decor. The public can see that it is a quarter to one. In these conditions, the same innocuous conversation becomes fascinating because the public is participating in the scene. The audience is longing to warn the characters on the screen: "You shouldn't be talking about such trivial matters. There is a bomb beneath you and it is about to explode!"

In the first case we have given the public fifteen seconds of surprise at the moment of the explosion. In the second we have provided them with fifteen minutes of suspense. The conclusion is that whenever possible the public must be informed. Except when the surprise is a twist, that is, when the unexpected ending is, in itself, the highlight of the story." This passage is from Hitchcock by Trufant.

In other words, no knowledge of the source of possible dramatic change equals no possibility of suspense. I tell my players what is happening and let them savor the suspense. It works just fine. It is different from the surprise, unexpected reveal, 'tis true. But, like Hitchcock, I don't feel that those are very powerful unless you are going for that unexpected twist (the Sixth Sense, for instance, which totally floored me. There is a good example of well done surprise, for my money). The players are the audience. The characters in the game don't know what is happening, even if the players do. It makes for some damn tense games.

edit: I should expand on this. I tell my players who is, for example, lying to them. If they are interested in uncovering that, they tell me and they go after it. That is how I play espionage and similar thing. I tell the players what is up. If they aren't interested in working with it, then they aren't. If they are, they know what is at stake and what is on the table, because the players are not the characters. End edit.

And, just to be abundantly clear, if you and your table are having fun, hey you must be doing something right. I don't think there is one perfect system for all people. There are just the systems that let us run the games we want to run. It is my opinion that many of us just don't understand the variety of tools out there to run games, and we get forced into a single model and never leave it. That is a real shame.

[Samurai Jill]

How is that different from any other Difficulty based game system in existence? The writer provides guidelines, the GM uses those guidelines to decide on difficulties for tasks that are not explicitly covered by the rules.
It's not any different, so far as you describe it. I'm simply pointing out that this has nothing to do with Rule Zero. Rule Zero would specifically allow you to ignore the guidelines, the roll, and/or the results.

Again the confrontational assumptions. Again, the belief that the relationship between player and GM is a hostile one, and the the GM somehow needs to be controlled, reigned in. That the GM is going to lie to the players for no other reason that because he can.
Just because the GM has a reason for using Rule Zero doesn't mean it's a good reason. And if you have some reliable method for distinguishing the good reasons from the bad, write them up, codify them, enshrine them as rules in their own right, and substitute them for Rule Zero.

Except instead of embracing trust and sharing in creating an experience for all at the table, there are people who want to restrict the person who puts the most effort into the game.
Again, I would point out that less power means less responsibility. When the GM does not, and cannot, control and dictate every facet of the world around the players, it tends to substantially reduce their workload. There is often less stress involved.

Do you have the faintest understanding of the espionage genre? Of political machination in RPGs or any kind of social interaction where there is no realistic way the characters could know if they have succeeded or failed at a given interaction?
I think you are assuming that the players are incapable of separating in-character knowledge and motivations from real-world, OOC knowledge and motivations, and/or that they would inherently abuse such knowledge. Which, again, perhaps indicates a lack of trust in the players.

I find that attitude to be reprehensible. There should be a mutual benefit, a symbiosis between player and GM. A feedback loop that provides enjoyment for all involved.
I am in absolute and total agreement and accord with this sentiment. I simply disagree radically about the best methods for promoting and structuring that trust.

I am not saying that the GM shouldn't have significant input to the large-scale story being told. If story-creation is the purpose of play, then every person at the table should have input. That's the whole point. It's not a case of the GM controlling the players or the players controlling the GM. They both get a say, they both venture opinions about where the story should go, and the dice decide the matter.

But I feel the 'symbiosis' promoted in traditional RPGs- where the GM exerts near-total control over every aspect of the world and every twist of the long-term plot, and the players contribute only to the ephemeral details of how a short-term conflict or encounter is resolved, with long-term outcomes a foregone conclusion- is actually very lopsided. Can that be a symbiosis? Sure, if short-term conflicts or superficial colouring of a scene are sufficiently complex and detailed that the players can be interested and engaged within that limited arena. If they are, well and good. But then again, they may not be. The idea of the GM as a kind of Nietzschean Superman above the judgement and oversight of lesser mortals has by no means universal appeal.

You do realise that the idea of assigning a difficulty ranging from Very Easy to Almost Impossible isn't unique to FUDGE? Cyberpunk 2013 was the first game I came across to use the idea and that was in 1988. So yeah, FUDGE is a little behind the times there.
Thank you for the information.

...assuming the GM is going to be lying to you and trying to curb that before you even see a hint of it.
Well... if you're hiding the dice behind a screen, you're never going to see a hint of it. That's rather the point.

As for having mechanics front and centre- possibly not, but there's no reason why players shouldn't be able to peek under the hood (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWyCCJ6B2WE&t=0m30s). Or are you afraid they'd wander off the beaten path (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31EydOVS4no&t=0m8s)?

[Samurai Jill]

Total agreement, from the perspective of being a tool for having fun. Any and all games have the potential. Frankly, BW will absolutely suck as a platform for entertainment for some people...

...And, just to be abundantly clear, if you and your table are having fun, hey you must be doing something right. I don't think there is one perfect system for all people. There are just the systems that let us run the games we want to run. It is my opinion that many of us just don't understand the variety of tools out there to run games, and we get forced into a single model and never leave it. That is a real shame.
Just wanted to add my agreement to this. If the group is having fun... well, obviously the group is having fun. I just feel that Rule Zero does not, on average, promote fun, in that average GMs are more likely to use it badly than well, and that the GMs who do use it well are the end result of a sort of 'natural selection' process that can generate a lot of hurt feelings and failed games.

[Asarlai]

I'm sure there could be useful applications of this, however, I usually encounter bad ones.

"The monster is about to kill you."

"Hm... I do this unexpected action you didn't prepare for, add this spell, and jump over here, pulling out my bag of oil and blah blah blah."

"No, you can't do that."

"Why?"

"Ruins the plot."

"But it's here on page 46, see?"

"Nope, doesn't count. House rule."

"Uh, that's a bit ridiculous, but whatever. Okay, I cast this spell."

"You didn't say you were casting defensively, the monster hits you for... 86 damage."

"The monster was 25 feet away... when did it move closer?"

"While you were arguing."

"..."

"So yeah, you die. Roll up a new character, we'll bring it in later."

[tonberrian]

Just wanted to add my agreement to this. If the group is having fun... well, obviously the group is having fun. I just feel that Rule Zero does not, on average, promote fun, in that average GMs are more likely to use it badly than well, and that the GMs who do use it well are the end result of a sort of 'natural selection' process that can generate a lot of hurt feelings and failed games.

And I think that those few are worth it.

To expand upon that, I feel that instead of trying to limit what a GM can do, which might be very well changed at the table level for the convenience of that group, our time would be better spent trying to teach and encourage GM's to pick up good habits, like not screwing over a player.

[The Big Dice]

It's not. That is one of the issues here - is assigning the difficulty of tasks, in fact, excersisng rule zero, or is it running the game based on the rules. I consider it the later. Some in this thread consider it the former. Never going to get a consensus.
Which is one of the good things about roleplaying. It shows that there's a spectrum rather than (as L5R 4th ed put is) a right way and a wrong way to play.


Two points. One, how can I have total trust of you if you posses a method to irrevocably override me? Thats Rule Zero. It makes it impossible to fully trust someone if they can veto you or change your course and you have no option for input, feedback, or protest beyond stepping away from the table. Trust can't really exist if the nuclear option is on the table. (there are some games, Paranoia springs immediately to mind, where this is not true. Paranoia won't work in an open environment.)
Did you miss the bit where the player is responsible for the character's actions and the Gm is responsible for the reactions of those around the character? Rule 0 can be interpreted in lots of ways, and the fact that Burning Wheel lets you hand out parts of world design to the players (something that I first ran across in a mid 90s copy of Pyramid, so it's not exactly a new idea) doesn't mean that the GM isn't the one ultimately making the decisions. It might just be to rubber stamp things the players have created. It might be part of a more involved process. But someone still has to be the final word on what gets included and what doesn't.

Two. One of the reasons your argument is not persuasive to me is that I do not agree that the GM puts the most effort into all games. Yes, in DnD, 7th Sea, and similar games (many of which are very good and very fun to play) the GM does a lot of work. In BW and similar games, the traditional GM roles of world creation, narrative control, and NPCs are split across the entire table. GM and player are both equally involved and committed. They are both putting a tremendous amount of effort into the game. It ceases to be mine or yours. It becomes ours.
Who does the most work in between sessions? Because based on the players I've known over my time as a gamer, it's not going to be the players. Sure, they might do a bit. But they aren't going to do anything approaching the amount or variety of tasks that prepping a typical gaming session requires.

re: Misinformation. I will let Alfred Hitchcock speak for me here:

"There is a distinct difference between "suspense" and "surprise," and yet many pictures continually confuse the two. I'll explain what I mean.

<snip, long>
I think you're missing the key difference. Hitchcock was talking about the audience knowing what's coming, not the characters in the movie. And one thing an RPG lacks is an audience. The players are all protagonists in the unfolding plot that is the experience of playing an RPG. Even if that plot is as basic as "We went into a hole in the ground and killed some goblins. Dave got eaten by an owlbear and we all ran away with some loot."

However, if you're running a suspense thriller type scenario, you have to be aware that if you give your players too much information, they will act on it because the assumption is usually that the GM will tell them what their characters are aware of. So the situation with the bomb under a bench becomes oddly less suspenseful if the players know of the bomb.

You have to treat the characters like the characters in a movie, book or comic or the temptation to use metagame knowledge becomes difficult to resist. It's all well and good telling people to keep player and character knowledge separate. But as a GM you have to be aware that too much player knowledge can spoil the experience for the character.

It's not any different, so far as you describe it. I'm simply pointing out that this has nothing to do with Rule Zero. Rule Zero would specifically allow you to ignore the guidelines, the roll, and/or the results.
What's wrong with that? The GM has no responsibility to anything other than making the game a better experience for all involved. Sure, some prefer to go purely by the book. I've done it myself and seen a turnover of character sheets that was truly horrifying. Like, I burned out a shredder when I found the file full of Cyberpunk and L5R sheets from the late 90s.

Going by the book and rolling in the open is a two edged sword. I've had campaigns derailed too many times and had players get irate too often because characters were killed at the exact worst time for it to happen.

Just because the GM has a reason for using Rule Zero doesn't mean it's a good reason. And if you have some reliable method for distinguishing the good reasons from the bad, write them up, codify them, enshrine them as rules in their own right, and substitute them for Rule Zero.
You're assuming that a GM having a reason for using Rule 0 is automatically a bad reason. And frankly, the times I've used my right to veto the rules have usually been when time is a pressing matter. I dislike intensely having to look things up in a book. Especially during combat when it's not going to be a deciding factor. And even more so when there are people waiting to take their turn.

I would much sooner run games by the seat of my pants than be forced to stop every now and then, breaking the immersion and looking up an obscure point on exactly how and when a super power in Mutants and Masterminds gets overloaded. Or to check what the exact modifier for different types of footwear is when using Stealth in GURPS.

Say yes, then roll the dice when a player asks to do something unusual, to coin a phrase.

Again, I would point out that less power means less responsibility. When the GM does not, and cannot, control and dictate every facet of the world around the players, it tends to substantially reduce their workload. There is often less stress involved.
The urge to create an entire world, such as those found in commercially published materials is more of a problem than letting the GM control things. Don't create what you don't need, to borrow an idea from a moderately successful author and world builder called Stephen R Donaldson.

I think you are assuming that the players are incapable of separating in-character knowledge and motivations from real-world, OOC knowledge and motivations, and/or that they would inherently abuse such knowledge. Which, again, perhaps indicates a lack of trust in the players.
Or perhaps it's an acknowledgment of a fact of human nature: that people find it easier to resist temptation when they are not confronted with the source of that temptation. Trust isn't a problem, the problem is attributing the wrong motivations to people.

To use a metaphor, out of sight is out of mind. Or in gaming terms, players aren't going to worry about things they aren't told. You can use this to justify all kinds of things, but then the entire roleplaying hobby is filled with ways for people to try and abuse each other's trust and friendship, so why worry about one that's been there since the beginning?


I am not saying that the GM shouldn't have significant input to the large-scale story being told. If story-creation is the purpose of play, then every person at the table should have input. That's the whole point. It's not a case of the GM controlling the players or the players controlling the GM. They both get a say, they both venture opinions about where the story should go, and the dice decide the matter.
Write a beginning and an end, let the players come up with the middle. I've successfully used that theory with a number of different gaming groups over the past 15 years. Yes, the often means that the end may not be the one I set out aiming for, but it always means that any story (and I despise the concept of RPGs as a story telling medium, but that's another topic) is a complete collaboration rather than a dictatorship.

But I feel the 'symbiosis' promoted in traditional RPGs- where the GM exerts near-total control over every aspect of the world and every twist of the long-term plot, and the players contribute only to the ephemeral details of how a short-term conflict or encounter is resolved, with long-term outcomes a foregone conclusion- is actually very lopsided. Can that be a symbiosis? Sure, if short-term conflicts or superficial colouring of a scene are sufficiently complex and detailed that the players can be interested and engaged within that limited arena. If they are, well and good. But then again, they may not be. The idea of the GM as a kind of Nietzschean Superman above the judgement and oversight of lesser mortals has by no means universal appeal.
What about the GM as the person taking responsibility for the care and feeding of his game?

After all, no GM, no game.


Well... if you're hiding the dice behind a screen, you're never going to see a hint of it. That's rather the point.

As for having mechanics front and centre- possibly not, but there's no reason why players shouldn't be able to peek under the hood (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWyCCJ6B2WE&t=0m30s). Or are you afraid they'd wander off the beaten path (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31EydOVS4no&t=0m8s)?
Are you wanting to look under the hood, or behind the curtain (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWyCCJ6B2WE).

[Britter]

Which is one of the good things about roleplaying. It shows that there's a spectrum rather than (as L5R 4th ed put is) a right way and a wrong way to play.


Yup! I agree.




Did you miss the bit where the player is responsible for the character's actions and the Gm is responsible for the reactions of those around the character? Rule 0 can be interpreted in lots of ways, and the fact that Burning Wheel lets you hand out parts of world design to the players (something that I first ran across in a mid 90s copy of Pyramid, so it's not exactly a new idea) doesn't mean that the GM isn't the one ultimately making the decisions. It might just be to rubber stamp things the players have created. It might be part of a more involved process. But someone still has to be the final word on what gets included and what doesn't.


Firstly, nothing new under the sun. I don't think BW is particularly innovative, in that it is borrowing from a lot of existing things (shoot, the dice mechanics is like 70% Shadowrun, if not more). I think it put them together in a tightly connected, extremely well designed way - therein lies it's innovation and appeal.

As for the rest, some of it may be semantics. Can't say. I think we have some similar ideas, but I think we have a different feel for what is required to enact those ideas.



Who does the most work in between sessions? Because based on the players I've known over my time as a gamer, it's not going to be the players. Sure, they might do a bit. But they aren't going to do anything approaching the amount or variety of tasks that prepping a typical gaming session requires.


Current games, I do about 30 minutes total of prep for each week. I can't speak for my players, but I am sure they think about the game for at least that long in a week. And, as far as prepping a "typical" session, we are right back at defining typical again. I run some very complex, interesting, action packed stuff based entirely off of players goals. A great deal of my game is improvised.



I think you're missing the key difference. Hitchcock was talking about the audience knowing what's coming, not the characters in the movie. And one thing an RPG lacks is an audience. The players are all protagonists in the unfolding plot that is the experience of playing an RPG. Even if that plot is as basic as "We went into a hole in the ground and killed some goblins. Dave got eaten by an owlbear and we all ran away with some loot."

However, if you're running a suspense thriller type scenario, you have to be aware that if you give your players too much information, they will act on it because the assumption is usually that the GM will tell them what their characters are aware of. So the situation with the bomb under a bench becomes oddly less suspenseful if the players know of the bomb.

You have to treat the characters like the characters in a movie, book or comic or the temptation to use metagame knowledge becomes difficult to resist. It's all well and good telling people to keep player and character knowledge separate. But as a GM you have to be aware that too much player knowledge can spoil the experience for the character.


I disagree with this. Firstly, players are an audience. They absolutely are. They may be running the character, but they are also watching the game, watching the GM and his characters, watching other players. It is totally an audience.

I also shy away from plot. I never have any outcomes fixed in my mind when I set up the game anymore. I do have goals and beliefs for the antagonists, and I have them fight as hard as they can to get their way, but I have no problems putting cross-hairs on any aspect of the game I have introduced and killing it dead if the players do something that is directly counter to what I had hoped they would do or that I wanted.

And, back to trust here, I trust my players to not metagame, in the sense of using out of character knowledge to abuse the game. They know everything I know, they don't need to cheat. They use the things they know to direct their characters into situations that provide suspense, drama, and action. So far it works just fine. As a counterpoint, I used to hide a ton of stuff in my Shadowrun games, and you know what I found? That players were entirely uninterested in my big reveals. they only cared about what their characters had gotten involved in. They had no "big picture" view of the game, and so they simply didn't give a rip. Under the "reveal all, hide nothing" model, I get a lot more buy in.

In my current game I revealed several very important details right before a rescue mission, about the true nature of the relationship between captive and captor. The suspense in the room nearly became physical. the player knew his character was walking into a real bad spot. He was looking forward to it. We both have had a ton of fun with the suspense.

All I am saying is that the assumption that you NEED an all-powerful GM to run your game is no more universally true than saying you don't. I can meet your arguments about the need for that final point-of-arbitration with all the times my players have self arbitrated. I can talk about the differences between resolution systems and rules, and how they interact. No amount of it will really budge either of us from our core principle. Based on how you talk, I suspect we have more in common than not. And I would play at your table, as I would anyone's table if they weren't being obviously abusive. And I would play by the tables conventions, because thats both polite, and the only way to understand another's approach.

Assuming that the way things have been results in the best set of outcomes, without looking at alternate approaches, will never result in improvement. I used to have an opinion very much like yours. I was also a very good GM, and my players had fun. Now, in my opinion and that of the folks I play with, I am better. So, for us, this play-style has benefits. It might not work for you or your group. It should still be investigated, as I keep finding your points require me to investigate other points of view, so that each table and GM can find out how to play in a manner best suited for them.

It took me more than a year to really wrap my head around BW and it's approach. It is a paradigm shift, in my opinion, and because of that it is somewhat challenging to communicate across the gap. There is a difference in playstyles that can only be seen once you sit down and try it. And again, not saying it is better. Just different. I THINK it is better. I think it is what a lot of people are looking for. Thats why I push it as hard as I do.

Different strokes, different folks.

[Malevolence]

This tactic does not work if pursued, in poor or hostile weather conditions, when there are dangerous animals around, or a number of other conditions that would preclude taking 10.

If something is chasing you, you die, because it's faster than you. The assumption that you are seeking food precludes the possibility of being dead. So even if you ignore things like trail ratios being cheap at any level, and infinite food being cheaper at any level past 1...

Assuming some other scenario in which you can't take 10, and you don't have super cheap food, it's still quite pointless because a single result of 16 is good enough for an entire party of 4.

[Eldan]

Two points. One, how can I have total trust of you if you posses a method to irrevocably override me? Thats Rule Zero. It makes it impossible to fully trust someone if they can veto you or change your course and you have no option for input, feedback, or protest beyond stepping away from the table. Trust can't really exist if the nuclear option is on the table. (there are some games, Paranoia springs immediately to mind, where this is not true. Paranoia won't work in an open environment.)

Just one thing:
This is not, to me, how it works at all. The GM doesn't determine the course of the game, the players do. The GM creates and populates a world. The players create protagonists of a story. The GM creates the starting point of a story. The players choose how the characters progress through the story. They make all the decisions how it progresses. The GM reacts to it.

In the end, the GM does not direct the characters. That falls to the players. His job is making the world react to them in a believable way.

[Britter]

Just one thing:
This is not, to me, how it works at all. The GM doesn't determine the course of the game, the players do. The GM creates and populates a world. The players create protagonists of a story. The GM creates the starting point of a story. The players choose how the characters progress through the story. They make all the decisions how it progresses. The GM reacts to it.

In the end, the GM does not direct the characters. That falls to the players. His job is making the world react to them in a believable way.

I agree that it should work that way. I have rode on far to many railroads to believe that every GM is so accommodating and acts in that manner. I believe Rule Zero is the culprit for creating those railroad situations where in the players have been deprived of any sort of in-game agency or control of their actions.

[Eldan]

And I think, once again, that rule 0 is what makes this possible. Everyone at the table knows how something should react, but the rules say differently? Toss the rules.

[Samurai Jill]

Going by the book and rolling in the open is a two edged sword. I've had campaigns derailed too many times and had players get irate too often because characters were killed at the exact worst time for it to happen.
Then you will be relieved to hear there are- shockingly- systems that allow you to both follow the rules and enjoy yourselves. Where, in fact, a strict adherence to the rules increases enjoyment. Where the rules may even be simple enough that the great bulk can be memorised in a few sittings.

You're assuming that a GM having a reason for using Rule 0 is automatically a bad reason...
...Or perhaps it's an acknowledgment of a fact of human nature: that people find it easier to resist temptation when they are not confronted with the source of that temptation.
Then why not eliminate the temptation to abuse Rule Zero? Why do you assume that any use of OOC information is neccesarily bad? Why the double standards?

Look, perhaps it might be more productive if you gave some specific examples of what you considered to be 'productive' uses of Rule Zero. Because if you genuinely have a clear, consistent idea of the situations that demand/justify it's use, I would contend you already have some implicit notions on how to fix the underlying rule-set so it works, without the need for constant fudging. And then you can throw out Rule Zero.

In other words, the GMs that know how to use Rule Zero don't need it.

Don't create what you don't need, to borrow an idea from a moderately successful author and world builder called Stephen R Donaldson.
I don't disagree with this sentiment, but in that case I fail to see why the GM would end up saddled with a disproportionate workload. Which I believe was your original complaint.

Write a beginning and an end, let the players come up with the middle. I've successfully used that theory with a number of different gaming groups over the past 15 years. Yes, the often means that the end may not be the one I set out aiming for...
Again, I don't have any inherent problem with that general description, but if you're not particularly fussed about the overall conclusion of the narrative, or where it meanders between start and end, why do you feel the need to railroad at all? If you genuinely want to incorporate the players' input about where the story goes, why cling to a rule that exists primarily to override that input?

Also, I would distinguish between storytelling and story authorship within RPGs. The former term has generally been an excuse for some fairly grotesque railroading techniques, and is exactly what narrativist design has been trying to get as far away from as possible.

(And again, I'm really not certain what more I can do to disabuse you of this 'every game needs a GM' conceit. We've been over this.)

[The Glyphstone]

Rule 0 is like the Force - there's a dark side and a light side to it, but as a whole it's not automatically good or evil.

[Eldan]

I don't disagree with this sentiment, but in that case I fail to see why the GM would end up saddled with a disproportionate workload. Which I believe was your original complaint.

I don't see it as being saddled with work. I see it as sitting down and doing what I enjoy. Building worlds is my hobby. I try to sit down for half an hour or more every day and write worlds a bit.

[Britter]

And I think, once again, that rule 0 is what makes this possible. Everyone at the table knows how something should react, but the rules say differently? Toss the rules.

That is one possibility. I say, write better rules, and the problem goes away.

Again, no really correct answer here.

[bloodtide]

So ''Rule 0'' here is only about when crazy DM's do crazy things, right?


I see Rule 0 as more of the fill in for all the rules that don't exist. What is the DC to jump onto a horse as the horse is jummping over a pit of lava? Well, I've looked through the books and there is no rule for that. So as a DM, you have to make some rules for that. That is Rule 0.

The players want to sneak into the Orc Kings castle, but how many guards does the castle have? And where are they? What equipment do they have? Again, you can't find 'orc castle guards' anywhere in the rules. So again, the Dm has to make all that up with Rule 0.

[tonberrian]

Rule 0 is like the Force - there's a dark side and a light side to it, but as a whole it's not automatically good or evil.

I agree with the abomination from beyond time and space.

[Samurai Jill]

To expand upon that, I feel that instead of trying to limit what a GM can do, which might be very well changed at the table level for the convenience of that group, our time would be better spent trying to teach and encourage GM's to pick up good habits, like not screwing over a player.
Telling the GM he or she can only use his powers for good IS limiting his or her powers. Moreover, in order to give him or her a useful idea of what 'good uses' of that power would be, you have to give some fairly specific advice. Guess what? That's tantamount to a set of new rules replacing Rule Zero. That's my exact point!

[Eldan]

No set of rules can ever cover up the impossibly huge number of permutations that could ever come up where it would be required. Plus, I gave my definition of rule 0 about 20 pages back.

[The Big Dice]

Also, I would distinguish between storytelling and story authorship within RPGs. The former term has generally been an excuse for some fairly grotesque railroading techniques, and is exactly what narrativist design has been trying to get as far away from as possible.
I'm sorry, right there you just made your well reasoned arguments look as solid as an umbrella made of toilet paper in a monsoon. GNS has been debunked, torn apart and generally proved to be something of no relevance to the wider hobby. And yet people still insist on dragging it's ugly carcass into the light.

As I've said before, adding -ist to the end of a word and then changing the meaning of the word you modified does not make you big and clever. And claiming some kind of agenda (another word used incorrectly in GNS) for game designs based around narratives means you're claiming that GNS is a concern for people like John Wick. Which I'm quite certain it isn't.

That is one possibility. I say, write better rules, and the problem goes away.

Again, no really correct answer here.
Do you play by the rules, or THE RULES. Because you're advocating THE RULES. Where I'd say the rules are only as important as you want them to be.

[Samurai Jill]

No set of rules can ever cover up the impossibly huge number of permutations that could ever come up where it would be required.
Then no GM can possibly know under what circumstances applying Rule Zero is justified. If he does know when and if, he should be able to articulate that knowledge and make it public. Unconscious rules are still rules.

[Samurai Jill]

As I've said before, adding -ist to the end of a word and then changing the meaning of the word you modified does not make you big and clever...
As I've said before, the difference between being told a story and authoring one is that the former sense implies that the story has already been written and you are a passive audience. The latter sense implies you decide where it goes. Those are directly opposite meanings.

I see no point to addressing your other remarks, as I'm not sure they had any direct logical content.

[tonberrian]

Telling the GM he or she can only use his powers for good IS limiting his or her powers. Moreover, in order to give him or her a useful idea of what 'good uses' of that power would be, you have to give some fairly specific advice. Guess what? That's tantamount to a set of new rules replacing Rule Zero. That's my exact point!

NO.

Don't tell them he can only use his powers for good. Tell him he should. You don't need to tell him what the good uses of that power would be. That's going to come down to the group level, and will differ from GM to GM. No, as a general guide, we should tell him bad behaviours to avoid, like railroading or DMPC's or abuse of the rules, 0 or otherwise.

And the simplest expression of Rule 0 is that if the rules aren't fun, change them. Simply because that power lies with a group (by Rule 0 in most systems, I might add, because it's expressed as a GM power in those systems, not a group power) rather than a group power doesn't change the fact that it still exists in some form. Are you arguing against being able to modify the game so that the group can decide to modify the game?

[Samurai Jill]

Don't tell them he can only use his powers for good. Tell him he should. You don't need to tell him what the good uses of that power would be. That's going to come down to the group level...
So... the fact that good uses of power differ drastically from group to group makes how best to apply that power obvious? ...I'm not following that logic. Also, again, why leave the option for non-productive uses open at all?

[The Big Dice]

As I've said before, the difference between being told a story and authoring one is that the former sense implies that the story has already been written and you are a passive audience. The latter sense implies you decide where it goes. Those are directly opposite meanings.

I see no point to addressing your other remarks, as I'm not sure they had any direct logical content.

My point is, GNS has no place in discussions about gaming. It's too biased, doesn't hold up to close examination and uses the English language in a way that confuses the issues it claims to illustrate, and doesn't say what it means even when it means what the writer says.

As for the difference between being told and authoring stories, the separations between the two are profound. It's the difference between creation and observation. I don't see how your point has any relevance, since you're talking about the difference between making and watching something that is already made.

So... the fact that good uses of power differ drastically from group to group makes how best to apply that power obvious? ...I'm not following that logic. Also, again, why leave the option for non-productive uses open at all?
By taking away the option, you are not just taking away the chance for non productive uses of power. You are cutting off the option for creative applications on non-rules based roleplaying. You are delibarately removing the right brain (http://www.funderstanding.com/content/right-brain-vs-left-brain) from the gaming equation. And that's just ridiculous. You're cutting off freedom of expression in favour of mindlessly following rules, even when those rules may not be what is needed in the moment of play.

[BRC]

Telling the GM he or she can only use his powers for good IS limiting his or her powers. Moreover, in order to give him or her a useful idea of what 'good uses' of that power would be, you have to give some fairly specific advice. Guess what? That's tantamount to a set of new rules replacing Rule Zero. That's my exact point!
You can't put hard rules on it, you have to train GM's to have the right instinct.

Consider it this way, I have yet to encounter a game where the DM cannot, with no malice, and while staying completely within the bounds of the rules as commonly interpreted, screw over the entire party and make not the game no fun. This isn't "Rock's Fall" stuff, this is sending a rogue heavy party up against Zombies, or giving enemy archers a wall to hide behind. Something as small as how well lit a room is can mean the difference between a fun and challenging encounter and a TPK that leaves everybody angry.

And yet, we don't have a set of hard rules about where to put walls, or what encounters should be sent up against which party. We don't have a chart that says "If you have one person who has never played before, two experienced players who love RP, and one guy who is into optimization, do X".

We don't have rules for this type of stuff. Learning what to do in these situations is part of what makes a good GM, I would argue these skills are MORE important than a knowledge of the system.

So, if you are already trusting a GM's judgement for designing the adventure, controlling the NPC's, and arbitrating the rules, why is it such a stretch to trust them with Rule Zero.


A DM can't know for sure when, or how to use Rule Zero, not until after they've used it, but they can develop the instincts to get a pretty good idea.

[Eldan]

Then no GM can possibly know under what circumstances applying Rule Zero is justified. If he does know when and if, he should be able to articulate that knowledge and make it public. Unconscious rules are still rules.

Okay, this is a general question, but: Why do you need clear rules for everything? I think some things can really just be handled as you go along. There's no need to write everything down.

[tonberrian]

So... the fact that good uses of power differ drastically from group to group makes how best to apply that power obvious? ...I'm not following that logic. Also, again, why leave the option for non-productive uses open at all?

We can't know, in general, what the best uses of that power would be for each group. As a general guide, we can't try to define that, else it'll be wrong and useless for some or even most groups.

The only thing we can teach is common mistakes and ways to find what the players of that group actually want. Occasionally, we could even extrapolate how some things might make players react.

In short, you can't teach good GMing. You can teach how to get better.

[Britter]

Well folks, I've said my piece, so I'm gonna bow out. I think we've hit the point where we are retreading ground, and I don't want to see a pretty solid thread end on a down note.

Thanks for the discussion. Some really good points made in here. I am going to continue to contend that you can write a better rule than Rule Zero.

I really think people should do a little research on game design and mechanism design in games. It really gives you a new insight into the ways systems work, and where they can be improved or streamlined to do what you want them to do.

Have fun around the tables folks. Roll success and kick butt.

[Samurai Jill]

As for the difference between being told and authoring stories, the separations between the two are profound. It's the difference between creation and observation. I don't see how your point has any relevance...
You mentioned that you loathed the idea of RPGs as a medium for 'storytelling'. I was suggesting that your revulsion to the term may be rooted in RPG designs that view story as a fixed product to be imposed upon the players. I was explaining that narrativist design has, by contrast, aimed to incorporate the input all players in determining story direction, which is antithetical to railroading. In other words, story authorship. The precise opposite of the sense which I presumed you found so offensive.

By taking away the option, you are not just taking away the chance for non productive uses of power. You are cutting off the option for creative applications on non-rules based roleplaying...
I don't see the logic here. To give possible examples of what such rules might look like- "Thou shalt override roll outcomes no more frequently than thrice per session" still allows for a good deal of discretion in how and when you use that power.

Yes, there are, conceivably, potential situations that might call for overriding outcomes more than thrice per session, or less than that. There are also potential situations where "Thou shalt not kill" breaks down. But giving people free reign to kill eachother whenever they please does, on average, more damage than saying "No. No killing ever. Period." You have to weigh the pros of various degrees of freedom against the cons.

If you wanted to extend/refine "Thou Shalt Not Kill", you might append "Except in self-defence." Analagously, if you wanted to extend/refine "Thou shalt override roll outcomes no more frequently than thrice per session", you might say "Excepting to save a PC's life from certain danger, which thou mayst do twice more." (Which actually opens a whole 'nother can of worms, but never mind for now.) Or perhaps, "Thou mayst decide the outcome of any roll where the result standeth within two points of yon target number". And so on.

Heck, you can even farm that responsibility out to the players in exchange for convincing role-play, which is a purpose that Hero Points in Mutants and Masterminds can fulfill, or Spiritual Attributes in The Riddle of Steel, or the Artha system in BW. They can save their own skins that way, and distort events to shape a better story on their own initiative.

There's plenty of room for creativity there. Arguably more, since you've got everyone in on the action, and not just one guy's right brain.

[Aux-Ash]

In every swedish roleplaying game I have seen, this rule zero is actually three rules that comes in the very first chapter, just after the description on what roleplaying games are;

Rule 1: [when it comes to rules, rulings and setting] The GM is always correct
Rule 2: If the GM would, for any reason, be wrong. See rule number one.
Rule 3: All the following rules should be considered guidelines and suggestions, they should be changed, removed, overridden or added to as is needed to make the game more fun/enjoyable for the players.

These three are the followed by the rest of the rules.

Knowing how and when to apply this is of course the hallmarks of a good gm. In some groups it is never, in some it is frequently. It all comes down to what this particular group needs and wishes.

And that cannot be written down. Because it is a social skill. Not a technical one.

[The Big Dice]

You mentioned that you loathed the idea of RPGs as a medium for 'storytelling'. I was suggesting that your revulsion to the term may be rooted in RPG designs that view story as a fixed product to be imposed upon the players. I was explaining that narrativist design has, by contrast, aimed to incorporate the input all players in determining story direction, which is antithetical to railroading. In other words, story authorship. The precise opposite of the sense which I presumed you found so offensive.
No, my distaste is rooted in the basis of a reasonable understanding of what makes a story a story. That is based on A-Level (or college degree equivalent as best I can tell) English Literature. A story has a beginning, a middle and an end. With the story teller knowing before he starts where these points in the narrative will be.

Roleplaying games are much more dynamic and fluid than this, with characters who aren't always aware that there's a script and act accordingly. As a medium for telling a story, a roleplaying game is dreadful. And you can waffle on with that dreadful psychobabble called GNS, using terms like Narrativist, coined by people who were literally inventing new meanings for words that have been around for centuries. All that does is make it look like you're rooted in concepts that were already outdated at the turn of the millennium.

I don't see the logic here. To give possible examples of what such rules might look like- "Thou shalt override roll outcomes no more frequently than thrice per session" still allows for a good deal of discretion in how and when you use that power.
You don't understand because you let your rational left brain do all your thinking. You don't trust intuition and instinct, so therefore you propose a gaming structure that restricts the very drives that the person in the GM seat needs to be able to draw upon when players go off on a random tangent.

Yes, there are, conceivably, potential situations that might call for overriding outcomes more than thrice per session, or less than that.
Nobody except you is putting numbers on things. In my own experience, I can go months of regular sessions without needing to change, make a ruling or otherwise exercise my right as GM to do what I feel needs to be done to make the game a better experience for all.

Other times, I might be winging it from 30 mins after the session starts. You can't put numbers and rules and regulations on instinct and experience. Things that were shaped by making mistakes, learning from them and finding ways to make sure those mistakes don't happen again.

If you wanted to extend/refine "Thou Shalt Not Kill", you might append "Except in self-defence." Analagously, if you wanted to extend/refine "Thou shalt override roll outcomes no more frequently than thrice per session", you might say "Excepting to save a PC's life from certain danger, which thou mayst do twice more." (Which actually opens a whole 'nother can of worms, but never mind for now.) Or perhaps, "Thou mayst decide the outcome of any roll where the result standeth within two points of yon target number". And so on.
What?

I'm sorry, but this makes no sense at all.


Heck, you can even farm that responsibility out to the players in exchange for convincing role-play, which is a purpose that Hero Points in Mutants and Masterminds can fulfill, or Spiritual Attributes in The Riddle of Steel, or the Artha system in BW. They can save their own skins that way, and distort events to shape a better story on their own initiative.
That's not what Hero Points in Mutants and Masterminds are in the slightest. They are a reward to players for the GM cheating. Sure, they give some benefits and my players love them. But ultimately, they are a means of putting a thin veneer of legitimacy on something that GMs have done since roleplaying games were conceived.

And you can argue that old isn't always better. Which I can counter with new isn't always better either. But that is going round in circles.

There's plenty of room for creativity there. Arguably more, since you've got everyone in on the action, and not just one guy's right brain.
So rather than let creativity and expression have free roaming abilities, you prefer that everything has to be ruled, regulated and monitored by the group?

[Hecuba]

Two points. One, how can I have total trust of you if you posses a method to irrevocably override me? Thats Rule Zero. It makes it impossible to fully trust someone if they can veto you or change your course and you have no option for input, feedback, or protest beyond stepping away from the table. Trust can't really exist if the nuclear option is on the table. (there are some games, Paranoia springs immediately to mind, where this is not true. Paranoia won't work in an open environment.)

That would be the difference between trusting what you know about someone's motives and capacities and actually trusting them. While there are options (like BW, which can be worlds of fun) where GM's don't have quite the role in world design that they do in more mainstream games, I still don't see how you would have any easier time trusting a GM to use the equally powerful and exploitable tools of world/encounter design if you don't trust they to use a rule 0.

[Ozreth]

Rule 0 typically means that you don't play in a DM vs. players type of game. Its a cooperative game, meaning ALL of the players (dm included) should do whatever they can to make as complex as this one run smoothly.

It sounds like you have bad experiences with this because you may not play with a group of close friends? I could see how gaming with people at your local game store etc would make you not want to use this. But in most home situations people encourage it for good reasons.

[Talakeal]

This thread reminds me of one a couple years back in which a large segment of the posters claimed that the game rules were the physics of the game world and they considered it cheating if the GM's plot involves elements that are realistic but against the game rules, the example given was a high level knight being killed in a riding accident given in the background for the adventure.

That thread taught me that there was a large population of hardcore rules lawyers of a magnitude which I never even dreamed existed, and I consider myself to have been a member of some pretty dysfunctional gaming groups. This thread gives me the same feeling.

Are there really so many posters who have so little trust for the Game Master or such a fixation on the rules (odd because "rule 0" is one of the rules) that you need to stop the game and have a group brainstorming session to figure out what roll you need to make to catch a ball? Or that you think the DM is being a tyrant when he steps in and says "no you can't have infinite wealth from fabricate / wall of iron, use an efreet to wish for a ring of infinite wishes, or play Pun-Pun?".

Now, of course, the Game Master can abuse rule zero, likely as a knee jerk reaction to something unexpected a player does or to keep the game "on the rails", but remember that this abuse goes both ways. If the players, who are in my mind even more biased than the GM, are given "majority rules" ability to create new house rules I think you would see far more abuse, not less. And if you don't let anyone make the calls, the game will abruptly stop. Every game of any complexity has odd situations which need arbitration, especially one with an open ended nature like a typical RPG. You can say "well, they should have written better rules then", which is, too an extent, true, but not a realistic expectation, and not one you will get with any published system that I am aware of.

Finally, a little secret of RPGs. The Game Master wants you to win, because if you lose 99% of the time plot is just as badly "off the rails" as any player action could bring it, plus you have an entire table of pissed off players. They aren't going to use rule 0 to give you an unfair disadvantage, they don't need to, if the GM wants you to die they can easily set up an unwinnable encounter with no house rules at all.

Lastly, if I recall correctly there is no actual "Rule 0" in D&D. There is a step 0 of character creation which says to check for any house rules or campaign specifics before starting, but that isn't a rule. Likewise in the DMG there is a rule which states that the DM can change the rules under the conditions that he does so in a manner that is fair, consistent, and well thought out. As far as I know there is no rule listed as "rule 0" or one that implies the DM can do whatever they want for any reason. I don't have my books with me atm so I could be wrong here, but I don't think I am.

[Samurai Jill]

No, my distaste is rooted in the basis of a reasonable understanding of what makes a story a story. That is based on A-Level (or college degree equivalent as best I can tell) English Literature. A story has a beginning, a middle and an end. With the story teller knowing before he starts where these points in the narrative will be.
Without getting into a great deal of discussion on the subject, I will just say that it is entirely possible to have a 'sequence of events' that has a well-defined beginning, middle and end, and yet be entirely lacking in character development, drama or expression of theme. A dungeon crawl, for example. I would contend this typically has little or no value as a story.

Conversely, I would contend that if you actively cultivate character development, drama and expression of theme during play, then the final transcript of events will contain a good story. I would go on to claim that doing so makes predicting overall story outcomes difficult, if not impossible.

To illustrate, drama involves pitting one of the character's motives against another. This necessarily creates a sense of ambivalence or tension which makes the character's reaction difficult to predict. And if you allow the character's reaction/decision to have actual long-term consequences- which is neccesary to give gravity to the decision- then any fixed plotline gets shot to hell very quickly.

So, yes, I absolutely agree that RPGs are much more fluid and dynamic than any fixed plotline would suggest or accomodate. I simply contend that, within RPGs, you not only don't need a fixed plot to get a good story, but that fixed plotlines inhibit good stories.

Other times, I might be winging it from 30 mins after the session starts. You can't put numbers and rules and regulations on instinct and experience.
Again, I would contend that if you need to 'wing' it more-or-less incessantly during a session, then you are using ****ty rules for whatever you're trying to do.

The point I am making, by giving these example rules, is that one can place limits on the GM's ability to shape events while still giving the GM ability to 'patch over' rough spots to a reasonable degree. If you need to go beyond that reasonable degree, I would argue you need to replace your rules.

That's not what Hero Points in Mutants and Masterminds are in the slightest. They are a reward to players for the GM cheating...
They can be deployed in that way, but there is a definite implication that Hero Points should be used as a reward to players for embodying their character's disadvantages (in the same sense that they're used in GURPS, which is to model traits or personality characteristics that might conceivably cause the character's behaviour to deviate from the optimally rational or self-interested. Which is to say, role-playing at all.) So, depending on the style of the GM, they may well be used as a form of currency for promoting role-play, without any necessary 'cheating' on the GM's behalf.

My general point is that Hero Points allow the player to distort 'default' system outcomes in their favour, to 'patch over' rough spots in system resolution at their discretion, in a way that certain GMs feel is somehow their exclusive province and responsibility, to they extent that they feel entitled to overturn any rule, at any time, for any reason, as often and as broadly as they like. And that is not a rule. That isn't even a game. That is an elaborate version of Mother-May-I.

[Tyndmyr]

Do you understand the concept of the exception that proves the rule? It's something that turns up a lot in biology, but also in other places too.

No. That's not what that phrase means.

Exception that proves the rule is something like "Special permission is given for children to stay up past 8pm tonight". The exception indicates that a rule exists by the way it is phrased. In this case, you can conclude that the usual rule is for children to go to bed at 8pm.

Just because it's an exception doesn't guarantee that it proves anything, though, and in this case, it certainly does not.


What yo've just cited are specific cases where the traditional player/GM relationship has been subverted or altered. But you still haven't given me a reason why the GM is not the final arbiter of everything the players don't do at the gaming table. Other than player entitlement and a few fringe game systems experimenting with things, there are very good reasons why RPGs work the way they do.

Could you enumerate those reasons? I've played GMless games before. It's certainly not impossible. Some systems work with it, some don't. I don't consider it sacred just because it's common.


If you have only played at low levels, you are not experienced. You have only played a fraction of the game. Now, if you want to only play low levels, that's fine, but it means that you are not experienced.

I am forced to reluctantly agree. I know people that have never played past level six, despite having played D&D a fair bit. I would consider them intermediate players. They can make their own char and know a bunch of the basics, but there is a significant portion of the game that they simply don't understand well. They may understand the portion that they play quite well indeed, but that still leaves them with spotty knowledge of the system as a whole. They'll be a fine player in E6, but expecting that experience to be applicable to an epic game is questionable logic.

I would also like to state that there is a huge difference between "DM is powerless" and "DM can't use rule zero". D&D and many other systems make many explicit powers available to the DM/GM/etc. It need not be crippling at all. Likewise, it need not be a trust issue. In many cases, the DM is explicitly told to make a judgement call as to the effect of something. That's the rule. It isn't rule zero for him to follow that rule. Getting rid of rule zero is not the same as getting rid of all subjective interpretations.


No, my distaste is rooted in the basis of a reasonable understanding of what makes a story a story. That is based on A-Level (or college degree equivalent as best I can tell) English Literature. A story has a beginning, a middle and an end. With the story teller knowing before he starts where these points in the narrative will be.

Roleplaying games are much more dynamic and fluid than this, with characters who aren't always aware that there's a script and act accordingly. As a medium for telling a story, a roleplaying game is dreadful. And you can waffle on with that dreadful psychobabble called GNS, using terms like Narrativist, coined by people who were literally inventing new meanings for words that have been around for centuries. All that does is make it look like you're rooted in concepts that were already outdated at the turn of the millennium.

While I agree with everything you stated here quite a lot, I feel it's probably a sidetrack to the main discussion. Yes, GNS is terrible. Certainly, I cringe whenever I hear people describe GMing as "telling a story" or saying "my story is most important"...and I've even been known to tell such people to stop GMing and write a book, but I don't think SJ was trying to turn the conversation into a discussion on GNS.

[Malevolence]

I am forced to reluctantly agree. I know people that have never played past level six, despite having played D&D a fair bit. I would consider them intermediate players. They can make their own char and know a bunch of the basics, but there is a significant portion of the game that they simply don't understand well. They may understand the portion that they play quite well indeed, but that still leaves them with spotty knowledge of the system as a whole. They'll be a fine player in E6, but expecting that experience to be applicable to an epic game is questionable logic.

This behavior is only a problem when these people attempt to speak as though they are experienced, even though they clearly are not. Unfortunately there are a large number of people that do exactly this. There are even whole forums of said people. E6 itself comes about because there are people that do not understand that D&D is a game that changes fundamentally every few levels. Which puts it in the same category as people who go to a strip club seeking intellectual discussion - you can do it, and it might even work, but you are completely missing the point, and could better find what you seek in other ways. Now I'm not seeing too much of that behavior here, but it is worth pointing out anyways.

[The Glyphstone]

This behavior is only a problem when these people attempt to speak as though they are experienced, even though they clearly are not. Unfortunately there are a large number of people that do exactly this. There are even whole forums of said people. E6 itself comes about because there are people that do not understand that D&D is a game that changes fundamentally every few levels. Which puts it in the same category as people who go to a strip club seeking intellectual discussion - you can do it, and it might even work, but you are completely missing the point, and could better find what you seek in other ways. Now I'm not seeing too much of that behavior here, but it is worth pointing out anyways.

I believe you are horribly, horribly misunderstanding E6. The reason it exists is nothing less than exactly because people understand D&D is a game that changes fundamentally every few levels. The tipping point between lvl6 and lvl7 is one of those fundamental points, as 4th level magic is where wizards stop getting fight-changers and start getting campaign-changers, beginning the quadratic curve. At 6th and lower, they are still more powerful than melee, but only marginally slow, and still subject to their weaknesses. That's why E6 exists - because people know that the game changes fundamentally once you hit double-digit levels, and they want to avoid that while preserving the band of levels where melee and magic maintain relative parity. It's a deliberate hampering of their characters' power for the sake of party balance and campaign versimilitude, not 'going to a strip club for conversation'.

[Malevolence]

I believe you are horribly, horribly misunderstanding E6. The reason it exists is nothing less than exactly because people understand D&D is a game that changes fundamentally every few levels. The tipping point between lvl6 and lvl7 is one of those fundamental points, as 4th level magic is where wizards stop getting fight-changers and start getting campaign-changers, beginning the quadratic curve. At 6th and lower, they are still more powerful than melee, but only marginally slow, and still subject to their weaknesses. That's why E6 exists - because people know that the game changes fundamentally once you hit double-digit levels, and they want to avoid that while preserving the band of levels where melee and magic maintain relative parity. It's a deliberate hampering of their characters' power for the sake of party balance and campaign versimilitude, not 'going to a strip club for conversation'.

And in doing so, they attempt to make D&D into something that it is not, thereby completely missing the point. Granted, it's worse when people think that the 20 level game is E6, and try to apply low level things at higher levels but even when actually playing E6, they are still missing the point. Which again is something that they can do, but they would be better served with a system that was meant to be effectively low level only. Particularly since even in E6 there are still plenty of things that derail overly narrow campaigns. For example, the same DM who gets upset about someone Dimension Dooring out of jail, and therefore plays E6 so you can never cast Dimension Door is going to be just as mad when they use an Anklet of Translocation or a Shadow step maneuver or similar effect to do the same at lower levels.

[The Glyphstone]

So, the only purpose of low levels is to delay players reaching high levels? Playing low-level games where the characters are not almost unbeatable demigods has no value in itself, and it's not 'real D&D' unless you're high level? If D&D was meant to only be played at high levels, the PHB wouldn't start at level 1, it'd start at level 15. You're free to dislike low-level play (I can't stand it), but that in no way invalidates it as a valid taste.

[Malevolence]

So, the only purpose of low levels is to delay players reaching high levels? Playing low-level games where the characters are not almost unbeatable demigods has no value in itself, and it's not 'real D&D' unless you're high level? If D&D was meant to only be played at high levels, the PHB wouldn't start at level 1, it'd start at level 15. You're free to dislike low-level play (I can't stand it), but that in no way invalidates it as a valid taste.

The purpose of low levels is to act as a small fraction of the game. Keyword: Small fraction. Kind of like how most games have "training missions" before the actual game starts.

There's also no such thing as near unbeatable demigods, and if there was, they'd be fighting other demigods so it's really a moot point.

The PHB should have started at level 3 though, to get around the whole completely random death thing. But that is a separate point.

[Tyndmyr]

This behavior is only a problem when these people attempt to speak as though they are experienced, even though they clearly are not. Unfortunately there are a large number of people that do exactly this. There are even whole forums of said people. E6 itself comes about because there are people that do not understand that D&D is a game that changes fundamentally every few levels. Which puts it in the same category as people who go to a strip club seeking intellectual discussion - you can do it, and it might even work, but you are completely missing the point, and could better find what you seek in other ways. Now I'm not seeing too much of that behavior here, but it is worth pointing out anyways.

I don't know if that's so much a "don't understand" as "don't like". Personally, I like the fact that D&D changes radically over 20+ levels, but not everyone does. E6 is a solid game for what it is...a way to lengthen the low-end game at a point where the classes are of similar power. I've played E6, and enjoyed it immensely. It's a very different exercise in optimization.

[BRC]

And in doing so, they attempt to make D&D into something that it is not, thereby completely missing the point. Granted, it's worse when people think that the 20 level game is E6, and try to apply low level things at higher levels but even when actually playing E6, they are still missing the point. Which again is something that they can do, but they would be better served with a system that was meant to be effectively low level only. Particularly since even in E6 there are still plenty of things that derail overly narrow campaigns. For example, the same DM who gets upset about someone Dimension Dooring out of jail, and therefore plays E6 so you can never cast Dimension Door is going to be just as mad when they use an Anklet of Translocation or a Shadow step maneuver or similar effect to do the same at lower levels.
If DnD was what they wanted it to be, they wouldn't need to change it.


Some people like High level play, they like picking from a massive list of powerful spells, they like playing paladins who soar through the sky on the back of a Pegasus. They like taking on dragons the size of houses, they like going face-to-ankle with Giants and emerging the victor. They like fighting for the fate of the world, fighting evils so great as to be called apocalyptic.

Some people prefer low level play. They like games where the city guard represents a force to be reckoned with, where anybody is a two rounds away from death in combat. games where the wizard has few tricks up their sleeve but makes good use of them, games where you face small, ordinary foes. Games where anybody who can hold a sword is a potential threat.


Are either of these playstyles Wrong? Must a group that enjoys high level play slog through the low levels before they can have their fun? Must a group that enjoys low level play eventually trade the thrill of surviving by the skin of your teeth for the certainty of triple digit hit points and a cleric that can cast Ressurection?


Why not let the first group start at level 15, so they can craft the stories that become legends, why not let the second group stay below level six, so they can forever stay in the shadows, pulling out every trick they can think of to survive against a group of low level warriors.

[Yora]

but even when actually playing E6, they are still missing the point. Which again is something that they can do, but they would be better served with a system that was meant to be effectively low level only.
Name one. If there happens to be a game that is similar to E6 but works better, I'm sure there are hundreds of people who would want to know.

[Talakeal]

The phrase "the exception proves the rule" is, I am told, originally a old legal term meaning that if someone leaves a hole in their alibi it is an admission of guilt. In this case exception means something left out and rule means a decision, or ruling, made by a court.

What is has come to mean in common speech, however, is something which deviates from the norm thereby making it unique. For example humans can't fly, which is (among other things) why Superman is so well known, because he can do something 6 billion other people can't. If everyone could fly, superman wouldn't be known for it. Likewise a platypus is known for laying eggs because thousands of other mammal species do not.

[Yora]

Not that a platypus is a mamal. :smallbiggrin:

The exception, by virtue of being exceptional, proves that there is in fact a general rule that usually, but not always applies.
In German it's "Die Ausnahme bestätigt die Regel", while Regel is actually closer to "guideline" than to "law", making it less ambigous.

[Gnoman]

The phrase "the exception proves the rule" is, I am told, originally a old legal term meaning that if someone leaves a hole in their alibi it is an admission of guilt. In this case exception means something left out and rule means a decision, or ruling, made by a court.


It's quite different actually. The original meaning was ""the exception tests the rule." (Proof used be used to mean "test" much more often. It means you examine the exception to see if it invalidates the rule.

[The Big Dice]

It's quite different actually. The original meaning was ""the exception tests the rule." (Proof used be used to mean "test" much more often. It means you examine the exception to see if it invalidates the rule.

In biology it's used in the sense that veins always carry blood to the heart. Except the hepatic portal vein, which runs between the liver and intestine. Or arteries always carry oxygenated blood. Except for the pulmonary artery. Or mammals always give birth to live young. Except for the platypus and other monotremes.

[Malevolence]

I don't know if that's so much a "don't understand" as "don't like". Personally, I like the fact that D&D changes radically over 20+ levels, but not everyone does. E6 is a solid game for what it is...a way to lengthen the low-end game at a point where the classes are of similar power. I've played E6, and enjoyed it immensely. It's a very different exercise in optimization.

There's a lot more in the former group than the latter group. In any case the bit about missing the point still stands. And is quite off topic.


Some people prefer low level play. They like games where the city guard represents a force to be reckoned with, where anybody is a two rounds away from death in combat. games where the wizard has few tricks up their sleeve but makes good use of them, games where you face small, ordinary foes. Games where anybody who can hold a sword is a potential threat.

You speak as if anyone is not two (or one) round(s) away from death in combat at all levels.


Are either of these playstyles Wrong? Must a group that enjoys high level play slog through the low levels before they can have their fun? Must a group that enjoys low level play eventually trade the thrill of surviving by the skin of your teeth for the certainty of triple digit hit points and a cleric that can cast Ressurection?

At this point you are missing the point. The point is that to be experienced, you must have played at all levels of play. Whether you do or do not like a given level is irrelevant, only that you have experienced it. Someone like me is experienced because they have played at low, mid, and high levels. So when say, I make fun of level 1 for being purely luck based, that's speaking directly from personal experience. When I say the game changes fundamentally every few levels... well you get the idea.


Name one. If there happens to be a game that is similar to E6 but works better, I'm sure there are hundreds of people who would want to know.

Pick a system that isn't a joke system, and isn't D&D. 90% chance it sticks everyone in low level mode indefinitely. For those of you following along at home, that's all but a handful of systems.

[Talakeal]

It's quite different actually. The original meaning was ""the exception tests the rule." (Proof used be used to mean "test" much more often. It means you examine the exception to see if it invalidates the rule.

Do you have any proof of this? I have heard many people say this, most notable the late George Carlin, but I have never actually seen this definition listed as a source in an actual printed reference. A simple Wikipedia search shows a legal definition (although not quite the same one as I listed) and makes no mention of "testing" the rule.

[Hecuba]

This behavior is only a problem when these people attempt to speak as though they are experienced, even though they clearly are not. Unfortunately there are a large number of people that do exactly this. There are even whole forums of said people. E6 itself comes about because there are people that do not understand that D&D is a game that changes fundamentally every few levels. Which puts it in the same category as people who go to a strip club seeking intellectual discussion - you can do it, and it might even work, but you are completely missing the point, and could better find what you seek in other ways. Now I'm not seeing too much of that behavior here, but it is worth pointing out anyways.

For the record, I didn't say I didn't know flying rules in general. What I said is that I don't know the turning rules for average maneuverability off the top of my head, and I don't: I almost always use perfect or good maneuverability as a player. As a dm, if it's planned, I note it by a copy of the stat block.

If it's unplanned, I wing it. I've been doing it since that unnecessarily tedious table came out in 2000, and it's never been a significant issue.

I make little effort to have an eidetic knowledge of the rules. Instead, I make sure to know the big ones, brush up on the little ones that I expect to see soonish, and don't worry about the rest.

The lower maneuverability flight options are simply relatively uncommon: reasonably optimized players and enemy spell-casters are overwhelmingly going to tend towards good (and I do make a point to remember that good is 90 per 5). Outsiders and elementals are primarily good and perfect. Animal companions and druid forms can have it noted in advance. Dragons and some demons have it, but unless you leave tons of those sitting around unstated, they're probably not going to be entirely unplanned fights.

That leaves (primarily) a handful of magical beasts and the polymorph line (which I will gladly tell players, in advance, that I won't allow if they have to look things up mid fight).

Just because I don't place high value on system mastery does not mean that I don't think a certain amount is useful.


E6 itself comes about because there are people that do not understand that D&D is a game that changes fundamentally every few levels.

The fact that the game changes every few levels doesn't make any one level range superior to another. You seem to be operating under the assumption that 17-20 is the "real" 3.5. I find that that portion of the game is fun if you want a tactical challenge. I enjoy 1-10 far more, even with lots of random level 1 deaths. (And enjoy it far more than, for example, Iron Heroes).

[Tyndmyr]

You speak as if anyone is not two (or one) round(s) away from death in combat at all levels.

In most games, they are not. I see average combats lasting about four rounds in most groups...more in some.


That leaves (primarily) a handful of magical beasts and the polymorph line (which I will gladly tell players, in advance, that I won't allow if they have to look things up mid fight).

This is reasonable. Limitations on amount of time spent on a turn is often helpful, and any looking up of spells and such should ideally be done in advance. My group does not prohibit looking things up in combat, but we do prefer that people at least look things up in advance of their turn, and be ready to act on it.

[Yora]

Pick a system that isn't a joke system, and isn't D&D. 90% chance it sticks everyone in low level mode indefinitely. For those of you following along at home, that's all but a handful of systems.
Can you name one? Because none come to my mind.

[Tyndmyr]

Can you name one? Because none come to my mind.

Exalted would be my guess. It's generally a go-to game for fairly high power levels.

I do agree that high-level D&D play is toward the top end of the roleplaying game power curve, though.

[Toofey]

I think that people who are actually attributing new eds to game design issues are totally missing the profit motive involved.

[Tyndmyr]

Well, yeah. That's certainly there too. The rate of printing books for 4th ed is almost certainly heavily influenced by profit...

That said, I do feel they explicitly went after balance when designing it. The entire philosophy of it's design is fairly apparent. Now, I don't like or agree with this design, but I completely understand why they chose it, and they had some decent reasons.

[Gnoman]

Do you have any proof of this? I have heard many people say this, most notable the late George Carlin, but I have never actually seen this definition listed as a source in an actual printed reference. A simple Wikipedia search shows a legal definition (although not quite the same one as I listed) and makes no mention of "testing" the rule.

I've seen it referenced in that manner in old (~1800) history books at work.

[Hecuba]

Do you have any proof of this? I have heard many people say this, most notable the late George Carlin, but I have never actually seen this definition listed as a source in an actual printed reference. A simple Wikipedia search shows a legal definition (although not quite the same one as I listed) and makes no mention of "testing" the rule.

It's a common misconception: it's actually derived from the legal definition (which is originally derived from arguments by Cicero). I got a lecture on this from a college professor (my boss's late husband) once when I echoed George Carlin once.

P.S. The wikipedia entry has a link to AUE with good historical citations.

[Malevolence]

Exalted would be my guess. It's generally a go-to game for fairly high power levels.

I do agree that high-level D&D play is toward the top end of the roleplaying game power curve, though.

Exalted would be an example of the 10% that doesn't.

[BRC]

At this point you are missing the point. The point is that to be experienced, you must have played at all levels of play. Whether you do or do not like a given level is irrelevant, only that you have experienced it. Someone like me is experienced because they have played at low, mid, and high levels. So when say, I make fun of level 1 for being purely luck based, that's speaking directly from personal experience. When I say the game changes fundamentally every few levels... well you get the idea.

So, how does this mean E6 is wrong? If somebody has played at all levels, and has decided they like low level play the best, what's wrong with playing E6?
I'm having trouble figuring out your point. Are you arguing that in order to "Truly" play DnD one must experience it at all levels? If that's the case I would agree with you, the game changes dramatically every two levels. If you have not played at every level, then you have missed some part of the DnD experience.
Mind you, you could say the same thing about not having played every class at every level with every potential group makeup and every potential adventure, but that's besides the point.

My point is, just because one must play at every level in order to fully experience the game, doesn't mean that experience is the end goal of play. The end goal is to have fun. As a player, you have no obligation to play through the entire game. If you know you have fun at low levels, there is nothing wrong with isolating that experience, using something like E6 to focus on the game experience you most enjoy.

[Tyndmyr]

So, how does this mean E6 is wrong? If somebody has played at all levels, and has decided they like low level play the best, what's wrong with playing E6?

There's nothing wrong about it...but you take anything they say about expertise with D&D and weigh it accordingly. They play nothing but E6? Sure, I'll bet they know levels 1-6 fantastic, but I'll certainly be skeptical of their opinions on epic play.

[Malevolence]

So, how does this mean E6 is wrong? If somebody has played at all levels, and has decided they like low level play the best, what's wrong with playing E6?

Most of the people that play it only play low levels.

[Yora]

So, how does this mean E6 is wrong? If somebody has played at all levels, and has decided they like low level play the best, what's wrong with playing E6?
Yes. Stop having fun with something that I don't like! By playing the game in a way different from mine, you are ruining it for me.

Not that I would actually take such a viewpoint and I'm actually a big fan of E6, but I think you get what I'm getting at. :smallwink:

[Samurai Jill]

While I agree with everything you stated here quite a lot, I feel it's probably a sidetrack to the main discussion. Yes, GNS is terrible. Certainly, I cringe whenever I hear people describe GMing as "telling a story" or saying "my story is most important"...and I've even been known to tell such people to stop GMing and write a book, but I don't think SJ was trying to turn the conversation into a discussion on GNS.
I was pointing out that, for reasons (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=10648759&postcount=713) I explained, what you describe is the precise opposite of narrativist play. In turns out that (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNS_Theory#Narrativism:_Say_Something), within an interactive medium, the more control one person exerts over plot, the worse the final quality of the story is likely to be. So spare me the bile and venom.

Getting back to the subject at hand... uh, I got nuthin'. Rule Zero sucks.

[tonberrian]

Most of the people that play it only play low levels.

[Citation needed]

[The Big Dice]

I was pointing out that, for reasons (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=10648759&postcount=713) I explained, what you describe is the precise opposite of narrativist play. In turns out that (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNS_Theory#Narrativism:_Say_Something), within an interactive medium, the more control one person exerts over plot, the worse the final quality of the story is likely to be. So spare me the bile and venom.

Getting back to the subject at hand... uh, I got nuthin'. Rule Zero sucks.

That article about GNS ideas is completely wrong. There is no reason why characters in a game that concentrates on narrative (rather than pushing a Narrativist Agendas, which is one of the ugliest terms I can think of) can't develop and become more powerful through play.

What that link actually describes is comic book characters such as Spider-Man and Batman. The simple truth is, any RPG that stands the test of time includes aspects of all so-called Modes, but doesn't actually pander to or acknowledge any of them.

GNS is simply snobbery.

As for Rule 0, you use it all the time. As with things like Railroading, you might not realise it, but that's more a case of not perceiving the true depth that concepts like this really have. But the truth remains that any time you accept a ruling on something, even if it's reached by committee rather than one person making the call, you are accepting Rule 0.

[Tyndmyr]

[Citation needed]

It seems a reasonable generalization. If you play E6, at least the games that are E6 will be low level only. I wouldn't go so far as to generalize to most people...but I would say that their experience would tend to be focused more on lower level play on the whole.



As for Rule 0, you use it all the time. As with things like Railroading, you might not realise it, but that's more a case of not perceiving the true depth that concepts like this really have. But the truth remains that any time you accept a ruling on something, even if it's reached by committee rather than one person making the call, you are accepting Rule 0.

You're using Rule 0 as if it were a synonym for arbitration. It's not. Essentially all games require arbitration, yes. Arbitration need not be reliant on such a crude tool as rule 0, though.

I don't know that GNS applies terribly well to rule zero. Sure, you can get some generalized advice about game types...but not only does rule zero, as a concept, clearly exist across a variety of differently intended games, it's frequently used almost identically by the same GM in different games. I don't think GNS gives us any useful handle on it.

[Samurai Jill]

GNS is simply snobbery.
I really can't get into an involved debate on the subject without completely derailing the thread, so perhaps we should take this up by PM.

As for Rule 0, you use it all the time. As with things like Railroading, you might not realise it, but that's more a case of not perceiving the true depth that concepts like this really have. But the truth remains that any time you accept a ruling on something, even if it's reached by committee rather than one person making the call, you are accepting Rule 0.
"This isn't right. This isn't even wrong (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong)."

[tonberrian]

It seems a reasonable generalization. If you play E6, at least the games that are E6 will be low level only. I wouldn't go so far as to generalize to most people...but I would say that their experience would tend to be focused more on lower level play on the whole.

There are any number of things that seem reasonable under a first glance that aren't actually true. And he is generalizing to people, so this doesn't actually impact my point at all.

[Tyndmyr]

There are any number of things that seem reasonable under a first glance that aren't actually true. And he is generalizing to people, so this doesn't actually impact my point at all.

I can say that, in my experience, those who enjoy E6 tend to prefer lower level play, and as a result, tend to do more lower level play.

I think inferring causality from the correlation is fairly justified, since E6 exists to lengthen lower level play.

[tonberrian]

I can say that, in my experience, those who enjoy E6 tend to prefer lower level play, and as a result, tend to do more lower level play.

I think inferring causality from the correlation is fairly justified, since E6 exists to lengthen lower level play.

That is not what he's saying. He's saying that most people who play E6 do not and never have played high level. That's a claim that needs backup.

[The Big Dice]

You're using Rule 0 as if it were a synonym for arbitration. It's not. Essentially all games require arbitration, yes. Arbitration need not be reliant on such a crude tool as rule 0, though.
Actually, I'm using it as a synonym for inspiration and improvisation. It's what you turn to when you're so far outside the box that the box is a dot. Normally, the rules are the tools of the rational, deductive and ordered side of the brain. Rule 0 is the way to involve the intuitive, irrational and randomly creative side of the brain.

In other words, it's bringing the side of your mind that isn't bound and restricted by what you know to the table. Yes, it can be used badly, but that's no reason to fear it. Being a good GM isn't a result, it's a process. And part of that learning process is experimenting with Rule 0 to learn where it works and where it doesn't

I don't know that GNS applies terribly well to rule zero. Sure, you can get some generalized advice about game types...but not only does rule zero, as a concept, clearly exist across a variety of differently intended games, it's frequently used almost identically by the same GM in different games. I don't think GNS gives us any useful handle on it.
I don't think GNS applies terribly well to anything other than GNS.

I really can't get into an involved debate on the subject without completely derailing the thread, so perhaps we should take this up by PM.
Feel free to PM me if you want to carry on the discussion there.

"This isn't right. This isn't even wrong (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong)."
See the bit that says "a friend showed [Pauli] the paper of a young physicist which he suspected was not of great value but on which he wanted Pauli's views. Pauli remarked sadly, 'It is not even wrong.' "

That's not a positive comment.