Quote from: Shawn Driscoll;888989I try not to think about game rules while playing. Nothing makes a game session suck more than when a GM has a rulebook in his face.

And that has what relation with the question whether some people are running games RAW?

Quote from: Shawn Driscoll;888989I try not to think about game rules while playing. Nothing makes a game session suck more than when a GM has a rulebook in his face.

He doesn´t need the rulebook in his face during the game when he knows his tools.

Nothing makes a game more sucking than someone arbitrarilly deciding that he can change existing rules at a whim.

Quote from: AsenRG;888887But where I see the rules being used per RAW most often is in Pathfinder and d20/3.5 games. Seriously, there was a thread on Myth-Weavers about whether the GM should be able to restrict the available classes and races.

Eeesh.  To quote the famous Viking Hat post, I'm running the game, not several hundred pages of recycled paper and second-rate art.  I understand RAW as a preference, and I recognize its attraction to drop-in games such as convention runs and FLGS open sessions, but.  It helped that the first RPG I played was EPT and not D&D, but like many another 70s player, I don't think I'd GMed for as much as a month before deciding RAW just did not work for me.

I think the focus in this conflict is not so much on written rules per se, but "desk rules".
You are joining a game with certain expectations according how the game was announced (and the sum of written and house rules is a big chunk of it) and I think you can expect the GM to follow these base lines (most probably he was the one to edge them out in the first place) and in questions of doubt follow honestly the general idea of the proposed style.

Besides: Sentences like "the GM can change any rule anytime without further notice" I consider an immoral clause and thus immaterial (and if it is voiced before the start I am out of the game)

Quote from: AsenRG;888887I must point out that I have run rules 100% by the RAW. Fates Worse than Death, Grunt RPG, GURPS4e, Pendragon, Flashing Blades, Blue Planet 2, Mongoose Traveller 1, Runequest 6, Unknown Armies, Witchcraft, Talislanta, Honor+Intrigue, Sorcerer, Legends of the Wulin, Monsterhearts and ORE (Reign and A Dirty World) all work by the book, IME.

Yep, we also have run rules 100% as written. In fact, this happens most of times for us. Only when we perceive some rules as unnecessarily complex or not producing coherent results we change them (or ignore them). Shadowrun Matrix was such a case, as we concluded it didn't add anything interesting to the game, and just slowed our games down.

QuoteBut where I see the rules being used per RAW most often is in Pathfinder and d20/3.5 games.

Indie/Narrativist games also tend to be used RAW with a big frequency in my opinion, because they tend to be finely-tuned to address certain themes and goals in a way that, even if a small part is changed, can mess with the whole system. (this is specially true to PbtA games, for example, or Pendragon imo).

My current campaign is being run RAW. It helps that it is an old school game with very few mechanics and rules. The whole book, including setting, is only 64 pages. So far the rules have been 2d6+Attribute+Skill bonus vs Target Number, weapon damage, and life points.

No need for anyone at the table to constantly have their face in the rulebook looking up an obscure rule that give a modifier to some particular situation. It just isn't in there.

Here is a statement and a question for the RAW people.

Playing an RPG RAW is more restrictive than adapting the rules to fit the campaign.

How is that not a statement of fact?

Mathematically speaking, any number of given options is still less than infinite options.  RAW restricts characters, setting, resolution, and story options more than a flexible approach to the rules does.  I don't see any way around that.  If someone else does, I'm all ears.

Clearly some people enjoy a style of play where everything is tightly governed by the rules.  There must be some kind of puzzle-solving gamist thing, a strong concern about fairness, or an enjoyment of system for system's sake going on.  I don't know.  I don't understand it.  It might help it the anti-flexability crowed would explain why their way works rather than just painting the inverse negatively by saying that traditional approaches to rules are "insane," "fucked up," or "selfish."  

To be fair, I'd also like to here from the flexible-approach people if they have any trouble with rules consistency, and if so, how they deal with it.

Quote from: Saurondor;888563True. So what happens when the players want to do something the rules don't allow? What do you do?

For example I want to be a barbarian magic user.

Several choices:Change to a ruleset that doesn't have arbitrary restrictions.
Simply allow barbarians to be Magic Users in the current ruleset.
Accept the arbitrary restriction and carry on with a different character.

QuoteOriginally Posted by GnomeWorks
Whatever the fuck it is you are smoking, you need to share.

I can't even comprehend this shit. It's insane.

You honestly expect the DM - who is already juggling handling NPCs, every aspect of the world that isn't an NPC, all the story shit going on, reigning in side-talk at the table - to also have all the fucking rules memorized and understand exactly how your special snowflake interacts with them, and be able to handle this information at your fucking whim?

That is quite possibly one of the most fucking self-centered things I have ever read. The only time this would be vaguely acceptable behavior would be in the context of a new player, and even then I'd expect them to do at least some fucking reading.

Dude, you're the one who's smoking something.  What you are describing is how RPGs were initially conceived, historically played, and still played by large numbers of people.  Essentially your entire post amounts to "RPGs are stupid and people who play them are 'self-centered' and 'insane.'"  Thanks for the insult and for avoiding any significant contribution to the conversation other than pissing on the hobby and the people in it.

QuoteOriginally Posted by DavetheLost
My current campaign is being run RAW. It helps that it is an old school game with very few mechanics and rules. The whole book, including setting, is only 64 pages. So far the rules have been 2d6+Attribute+Skill bonus vs Target Number, weapon damage, and life points.

No need for anyone at the table to constantly have their face in the rulebook looking up an obscure rule that give a modifier to some particular situation. It just isn't in there.

So far, this is the most reasonable argument for playing RAW that I have seen on this thread.  But I have a question, how do you handle stuff that your ultra-simple rules don't cover?

By the way have seen Dark Sagas?  It's basically the game you just described.

QuoteOriginally Posted by CRKrueger
If you're a Game Master, and you're telling me as a player I have to pick up the rules and read them before we play, that's pretty much the absolute textbook definition of Epic GM Fail.

This statement seems to have angered a lot of people, and it might be slightly overstated, but I've seen it over and over at my local store. Struggling GMs routinely come to me for advice, and in my experience, a slavish adherence to the rules, forcing the players to learn all the rules, or an inability to see the game beyond the rules is a very common cause, if not the most common cause of GM and campaign failure.

Quote from: Madprofessor;889013Here is a statement and a question for the RAW people.

Playing an RPG RAW is more restrictive than adapting the rules to fit the campaign.

How is that not a statement of fact?

I'm not sure if I'm a RAW person or not, but I'll take a stab at it.

Rules don't just restrict. They also enable. Or sometimes they just convey ideas that you might not have otherwise thought of.

Rules are also not necessary great at restraints. Is a particular thing possible according to rules as written? You need only cite the rule or rules that allow it. Is something impossible in the rules as written? Unless you can site a rule that expressly forbids it, to answer the question you must first have perfect knowledge of all of the rules as well as every possible logical corollary, including those you haven't thought of--in itself a contradiction.

Quote from: Lunamancer;889026I'm not sure if I'm a RAW person or not

Kind of a simple test.  Do you find yourself, generally, playing the game without altering any of the rules as presented in the X-page rulebook...or not.

QuoteOriginally Posted by Lunamancer
I'm not sure if I'm a RAW person or not, but I'll take a stab at it.

ooh, I didn't really mean to categorize people.  I am interested in any answers.

QuoteRules don't just restrict. They also enable. Or sometimes they just convey ideas that you might not have otherwise thought of.

This is a good answer but I think it is the approach to the rules that we have been discussing that makes the difference.  Strictly interpreted, rules tell you what you can do, or what you can't do as well as how you can do what can be done.  Those precepts, again strictly interpreted, are fundamentally restrictive.

For example, you can be a dwarf, but nowhere does it say you can be a space alien, therefore you  can't be a space alien.  If a rule says the max strength for an elf is 17, you cannot play an elf with an 18 strength.  If a rule says "save vs poison or die," and does not say, "modified by circumstances," then modifying the die roll due to circumstances is not playing RaW - strictly speaking.  With such rules, if you play Raw, you cannot play a campaign with space alien pcs, supernaturally strong elves or characters that have developed a resistance to poison.  The rules restrict it.

You can, as you say, take the rules as suggestions and  adapt them so that you could play such a campaign but that would require a flexible interpretation of the rules. Or am I missing something?

Quote from: Madprofessor;889013Here is a statement and a question for the RAW people.

Playing an RPG RAW is more restrictive than adapting the rules to fit the campaign.

How is that not a statement of fact?

RAW is easier, so that you don't have as many meta-discussions, or interruptions about the rules, rather than to the how's and why's of a more freeform approach's results.

Quote from: CRKrueger;889030Kind of a simple test.  Do you find yourself, generally, playing the game without altering any of the rules as presented in the X-page rulebook...or not.

Here's why it's not so simple.

In AD&D 1st Ed terms (this does have application to many other RPGs as well), there is a rule that says the GM can change the rules. There is also an instruction to play to the spirit of the game, not the letter of the rules.

I know if I suggested to a RAW person that we drop one or two rules I find inconvenient or don't like, they'd scream fowl. Yet a lot of self-described RAW people do decide to drop "rule zero" as well as the instruction to use it.


You could also check out my answer to the question I was responding to. To say with certainty that RAW does not allow for xyz requires a potentially impossible level of rules knowledge. I concern myself more with how real people actually play rather than impossible concepts.

Quote from: Madprofessor;889031For example, you can be a dwarf, but nowhere does it say you can be a space alien, therefore you  can't be a space alien.  If a rule says the max strength for an elf is 17, you cannot play an elf with an 18 strength.

The rules also don't say anywhere that I can play a drunk. They don't say I can't play a character who only speaks in rhymes. Yet if I tried to play either of these characters in D&D, no one would accuse me of breaking the rules or of using some weird splatbook kit that the GM isn't allowing.

The unpublished AsteRogues game basically took the non-human race stats whole cloth from the fantasy version of the game and called them mutants. In terms of rules, it was the same stuff already allowed in the fantasy game, even though the fantasy game made no mention of mutants.

QuoteIf a rule says "save vs poison or die," and does not say, "modified by circumstances," then modifying the die roll due to circumstances is not playing RaW - strictly speaking.

I think this needs to be placed under a microscope for two key reasons.

First, I believe it is an exceedingly narrow view of RAW to assume the position that you need to be told every step of the way you're allowed to modify by circumstance. Especially when the RPG in general already uses situational modifiers.

Second....

QuoteWith such rules, if you play Raw, you cannot play a campaign with space alien pcs, supernaturally strong elves or characters that have developed a resistance to poison.  The rules restrict it.

These are coins with two sides.

Take the last one, just because I think it is clearest. You may look at the rules and say, "Well, this doesn't allow players to play characters with an unusually high level of poison tolerance." But, if you do allow it, I could imagine complaints from the player playing an assassin saying, "These rules don't allow me to create a poison so deadly that it can even kill those with higher resistances to poisons."

I would say the great majority of rules are of this kind. Not all, obviously, otherwise a game with extremely limited options, like tic-tac-toe couldn't exist. But, yeah. A lot of times a restriction is simultaneously making something possible that wouldn't otherwise be. And vice versa.