The real problem with "Rulings Not Rules" in DnD

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Күн бұрын

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Пікірлер: 310

@QuestingBeast 2 ай бұрын

@Calamindir 2 ай бұрын

Great resources. RIP Google+

@DungeonMasterpiece 2 ай бұрын

I love the phrase "...then OSR tools are solutions without problems."

@Calamindir 2 ай бұрын

I feel these 2 concepts could be expanded onto a dedicated video. Solutions without problems and problems without solutions, and the players connecting them.

@Calebgoblin 2 ай бұрын

Baron & The Beast collab video when?

@helixxharpell 2 ай бұрын

Baron, what games have you seen out there help to bridge the gap between OSR & 5e(new school?)

@DungeonMasterpiece 2 ай бұрын

@@helixxharpell SHADOWDARK!!!!!!! and also five torches deep

@DungeonMasterpiece 2 ай бұрын

@@Calebgoblin soon.... Very soon.....

@SingularityOrbit 2 ай бұрын

Original D&D told players to use the Chainmail rules to resolve combat, and to use the Outdoor Survival game to resolve wilderness travel. So the idea seems to be that most situations are handled by the DM ruling on the players' choices; uncertain situations are handled with a simple die roll; and chaotic situations are handled with a minigame add-on. That's what overland hex crawling and round-by-round combat are in D&D: minigames. That's why the game has both magic items that are "solutions without problems" (I love that phrase) and also +1 swords. The Immovable Rod is for normal play, whereas the +1 sword is for the combat minigame.

@paxtenebrae 2 ай бұрын

Funny. I remember hearing Matt Colville, who I think it's fair to say is not especially OSR, talk some time ago now about how he prefers to develop challenges without specific solutions in mind for this very reason of it promoting better creativity. Fun to see different creators using different tools converging on similar solutions.

@donovanpeterson837 2 ай бұрын

Maybe he reads Goblin Punch too. Also, he has done lots of gaming with Jim Murphy, so proto OSR.

@stewi009 2 ай бұрын

This is a good example of how "Old School" and "New School" don't necessarily need to be either/or. You can mix the two styles if you're so inclined, to produce a game you (and your table, one hopes) will enjoy. You don't need to appease the whole internet, only your table.

@omarbenmegdoul8950 2 ай бұрын

The difference is Matt is much more likely to say it's the DM's job to then "solve their solution", is willing to move a secret door to make it accessible to the players if they get backed into a corner, etc.

@danielrowan4716 2 ай бұрын

I just had this conversation with my group. I don’t know or have a specific solution in mind for every problem / puzzle / encounter like it’s a video game or Choose Your Own Adventure. I’ve been playing with these guys for 35yrs and they never grasped that until now

@leonardorossi998 2 ай бұрын

Well, coming up with creative approaches to non-obvious problems is the bread and butter in games like Shadowrun and Vampire: the Masquerade, which are pretty damn far from OSR, so it's not necessary for it.

@dragondreams5503 2 ай бұрын

One problem I run into is that players want consistency in rulings, and they're usually right to. When I rule on something, that means I'll have to write down how I ruled, so I can remember to do it the same way next time. This is essentially the same as making a new rule. So, it's tricky. When do we want rules? When do we want rulings? When do we want to make new rules via rulings? What I've started doing is telling players how I will handle something before they take an action. Ex. PC: "my swashbuckler will swing from the chandelier, kick one guard in the head, and draw his rapier, and run the other guard through." Me: "Okay, cool! I'm going to call for a DEX check to swing from the chandelier. If you fail, you'll take 2d6 falling damage and lose the next round getting up. If you succeed, you'll surprise the guards, but you can only kick one of them in the face on one round and stab the other on a subsequent round. Do you still want to do that?" (Or however I rule... not necessarily saying this is how I'd really rule, just an example of how I'd let them choose a different action if they don't like how I'd handle it.)

@SeanBoyce-gp Ай бұрын

I love that approach. It's very similar to what I do. A great way around that "locked in" thing is to say "in this instance, in these circumstances, I'm going to say 'x' because I think it's cool. But I might be wrong about that, so we can revisit it."

@andershusmo5235 Ай бұрын

Yeah, putting that info up front is something I've started making a habit of as well. For one, it helps make players feel in control of their own destiny, even if it does come down to the same die roll. Knowing the risks, they don't end up feeling cheated if things don't go as they hoped or expected. The transparency also fosters a more cooperative relationship between players and DM, I feel. But for me, the best part about doing it this way is to create tension. When you establish stakes and risks beforehand, that die roll suddenly becomes a lot more exciting. Particularly powerful when combined with the principle of rolling dice very sparingly - only in situations that involve genuine risk and uncertainty. If I can't think of an interesting or impactful consequence of a failed roll, I don't call for one.

@ericjome7284 2 ай бұрын

Inspired by the sampo, I once gave the party a salt shaker that would never run out. Anything you put into it had to be a powder and you had to shake it to get that powder out, but it would never run dry. Of course, they put gold in it right away...

@ericjome7284 2 ай бұрын

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sampo

@michaelwoodbury1788 2 ай бұрын

Meanwhile a local dragon wonders why she doesn't have as much gold as she used to have...

@xarthesailor 2 ай бұрын

@@michaelwoodbury1788 Nice idea

@khpa3665 Ай бұрын

That reminds me of a legend of how the North Sea got its salt. A peasant acquired a magic hand-mill that could grind out anything, but needed a magic word to stop. He became rich because he knew the word, but it was stolen by a sea captain who asked it to mill salt that he could then sell (because salt was very valuable back then). The captain didn't know the word, and when it didn't stop, it sank his ship under the weight of all its salt and it is at the bottom of the North Sea to this day, keeping the water full of salt.

@torinmccabe 2 ай бұрын

The quote by Thomas Sowell: “There are no solutions. There are only trade-offs.” is informative for open ended RPG game play. Move from the "solution" of reducing the monsters hit points to zero to the trade-offs of how the other factions in the world will react to your interaction with this monster

@quincykunz3481 2 ай бұрын

Rulings are always going to be necessary. The primary strength of ttrpgs is the ability for a human GM to respond and improvise to actions taken. However, I find that a lot of the time rulings can become inconsistent or have knock-on effects due to being essentially slapdash rules. Put another way, rules are just rulings made in advance with more thought put into them. Rulings buy flexibility at the cost of GM responsibility. Rules ease GM responsibility at the cost of rigidity. The more of a game-designer a GM is, the more responsibility they can take without causing problems in the game itself.

@jadoaesra3011 Ай бұрын

the primary function of the ruling is to interpret the applicability of a prior established rule.

@kevincostello4905 2 ай бұрын

I really love Questing Beast. Such a great job respecting the old traditions. As a 58 year old gamer who was there at the (not so much dawn, but early morning, lol) of D&D, to have so many love letters to OSR games and the good old days is great. Always enjoy you, sir!

@aaroncorbett6352 2 ай бұрын

I love ALL of Questing Beast's videos. I either learn something new or come away with a new way of thinking about something every time.

@petoperceptum 2 ай бұрын

"What do you intend to happen?" is always a great question to ask players when they start describing actions. And likewise for players, if you explicitly tell your GM why you are doing something, they can better tell you if you succeed. So often I've seen something that started out looking like moon-logic turn into a good idea once everyone is on the same page.

@bobhill-ol7wp 2 ай бұрын

Yah I often like to think of this as appraoch and intent, if a player can learn to describe their actions with how they plan to do it and what they hope will happen, leads to a lot of fun and even negotiating. Kind of like Blades in The Dark but with less specific procedure.

@kasperv967 2 ай бұрын

Totally agreed! I have a hard time anticipating what my players will do more than often, so if they tell me their desired result, and what they want to do to achieve it, I can arbitrate the rolls and narration so much easier.

@zenithquasar9623 2 ай бұрын

Yeah, prying the intent is so important imo.

@orkcol 2 ай бұрын

"What is your intent?" And "If you succeed at the roll, what is it you get?" Are some of my most commonly used phrases at the table. Getting the intent let's everyone get on the same page and if discussion is needed we're all clear what we're discussing.

@atinaroart 2 ай бұрын

Questing beast is my favorite RPG channel all the videos are fire

@aaroncorbett6352 2 ай бұрын

I love ALL Questing Beast videos.

@avengingblowfish9653 2 ай бұрын

I commonly hear that it's the player's job to figure out how to solve the problem, but that never felt right to me as a DM because if I don't have a solution in mind, then that creates the possibility of no solution which I don't think is very fun. I prefer having a solution, but being open to the players trying something I didn't think of... this way, if the players are truly stumped, I can start dropping hints.

@HoplooWare 2 ай бұрын

Solutions to that I feel is to have multiple paths in a dungeon/adventure, if one problem feels too utterly 'unsolvable' to players they can either try their chances with a different problem; or if it is REALLY unsolvable just treat it like a locked door and put some 'key' somewhere that will allow them to either solve or bypass it.

@hozie6795 Ай бұрын

Generally I'd say that for most TTRPG problems I try to brainstorm 2-3 ways I would solve it with common PC resources and if I can think of a few solutions then it's good to go. Sometimes I'll include some very standard problems (e.g. pits, climbs, spikes, darts, etc...) without bothering to think of a specific solution, because there's so many ways to solve them that it's really unlikely a determined group will be stumped for too long. Other times I'll include something with just one solution (e.g. a magic portal that requires a specific ritual to open) but then I'll make sure that the solution can be learned via some other diegetic source and I generally try not to gate progression entirely behind this sort of thing.

@atomzero1 Ай бұрын

Yeah, I like to have a solution or two in mind while remaining open to good ideas that the players come up with.

@marktownsend2198 2 ай бұрын

I'm really enjoying these blog synopsis videos. Great stuff and lots of material to follow up on in the links.

@Stephenmcabrera 2 ай бұрын

Yeah same. In most cases I've already read the original blog posts but the recap and discussion from you is fun, and your curation is on point (you pick good posts!) Keep 'em comin'!

@jasonmenard3098 2 ай бұрын

You should sign up for his newsletter, it’s full of these type of posts, thoughts and info.

@aaronsmith5055 2 ай бұрын

Yes, but... I miss hearing BEN's thoughts.

@JonathanAwesomeify 2 ай бұрын

I'm conflicted on this. I read through the Goblin Punch article and landed on this comment which stuck with me: "There is no such thing as a ruling. The DM is making up a rule and adjudicating its results." I'm not super plugged into the OSR community, but from the outside a lot of it seems like an outsized reaction to 3.5. As if players literally can't look up from their character sheet; that if they don't have a "dispel magic mushroom circle" ability they just stop playing. My group has primarily played 5e and 13th Age and we've never had this problem. Maybe I'm lucky. But when I had a beholder ask them to sabotage a nearby cultist without it looking like a direct attack, they had a great time. (They convinced the acolytes to unionize and rebel, then tipped the scales of the fight in their favour.) Or when a father asked them to check on his daughter at a clinic who he wasn't allowed to see, they cast Minor Illusion on the halfling bard to make him look like a child and be admitted himself. Was that OSR? Was that rulings not rules? Maybe? It was before I'd even heard the term. I guess ultimately, if I were being snarky, I'd say I fall into the camp of encouraging creative use of abilities on their character sheet, not throwing their sheet in the trash and playing Calvinball. Instead of "rulings not rules" I believe in "good rules lead to good rulings." (Like Forbidden Lands! We had a blast with that.) Ok, semi-coherent rant over. I might change my mind in an hour. Thanks for the video anyway, I love all Questing Beast videos!

@theoldwarlock 2 ай бұрын

Being one of those grognard guys, when I saw the title of the video without checking context it immediately got my hackles up. Should have known better - this is more excellent content. The statement at 7:23 about the fun of watching players overcome OSR style problems was spot on. It's definitely the best part of being a DM AND it tests and encourages my own creativity and imagination when creating the next set of challenges. The term/phrase "problem without a solution" is now part of my RPG lexicon. Off to check GP's blog now. Thanks for this!

@israelmorales4249 2 ай бұрын

the "common sense" is the least common of senses....i preffer crunchy rules and only "rule" when there is no choice

@Joker22593 2 ай бұрын

"Common Sense" always means "in agreement with my standards".

@badnewsBH 2 ай бұрын

I don't mind a little leeway, but I agree, I'd rather have at least an idea of a rule than have to make it up all the time. This is a game, after all.

@Jeremy_Fisher 2 ай бұрын

That's certainly one way of thinking. I know I have a player who cannot make a 'creative' choices and really wants rules laid out for acceptable actions. For that player, 'You can do anything' turns into 'You can't do anything'. Unfortunately, that player is at an OSR table and everyone else really prefers the 'rulings not rules' mentality.

@DrakeBarrow 2 ай бұрын

Yeah, this is my take as well. I found that 3.x era D&D was liberating _because_ of the rules present, and they didn't get in the way of 'rulings' when those were necessary. I _want_ to know what my character can do, and 'rulings not rules' has devolved into nonstop 'Mother May I?' situations. You need a good DM _that is trustworthy_ to make a more free-form game with 'rulings' work.

@tombayley7110 2 ай бұрын

OSR PROBLEM - a vampire medusa (30 years on and the DM who did that to the party is still chuckling )

@CastorGaming 2 ай бұрын

When I think of “Rulings, not Rules” in the context of adding to the adventure, I am immediately hit with the feeling of making a roll, rolling low resulting in a failure, and being left feeling unfulfilled. When being the DM, if a player tries to (for example) pick a lock, and despite having proficiency and high stats, still rolls low, it can be souring to just move on. I’ll often try to add something there to explain why an otherwise talented lockpick failed what should have been quick and easy. Perhaps the lock is overly complex, which begs the question “why?”. This adds to the adventure, by complimenting the character’s skill, but also providing a potential hook to further drive the plot. What’s behind the lock? I can put anything I want there, and if that’s the direction the party takes, then I successfully turned a failed roll into a full quest.

@zenithquasar9623 2 ай бұрын

Yeah, can definitely be utilised this way and help with more emergent stuff but could also be a nuisance if it is not in the service of the story/adventure or the goals of the players/DM for the game imo.

@pedrogarcia8706 17 күн бұрын

If the consequence of failure is just "the adventure stops" that's a poorly designed test. A character with high enough proficiency in lockpicking should always be able to roll a lock, but the roll can decide several things: maybe it takes a long time and some other time sensitive task has to be sacrificed. maybe it makes a loud noise and alerts a guard. maybe their thieves tools break. Maybe the lock is damaged so at a glance someone will be able to tell it was picked. There are lots of results to a "failed" check than just "you can't do it."

@ClockMonsterLA 2 ай бұрын

I'm an avid proponent of "old school gaming", but I think it is critical to acknowledge that most GMs don't have what it takes to run a good game without a lot of guidance from the rules and the game's detailed mechanics. The game world is a simulation after all, and so it needs to operate according to well-understood, logical and consistent rules/mechanics. The best games have flexible mechanics that allow the world to work logically and consistently even when a situation not explicitly covered by them comes up in play. But expecting your average GM to just come up with an "X in 6" probability on their own is completely unrealistic, particularly when you also expect "satisfying" results. A good game system shouldn't try to explicitly cover every single eventuality, but instead should provide the logical frameworks necessary to simulate everything in the fictive game world without asking the GM to just wing it according to their own judgment all the time. This is especially true in this day and age of GMs who rely entirely on "adventure path" books to do all the work of building the world and constructing the adventures for them.

@captainnolan5062 2 ай бұрын

The argument that just because something is not in the rules means you can't do it doesn't hold water. If it is not covered, then that topic is ripe for a DM ruling. Also, Matt Finch is not saying you should not use common sense in making your rulings.

@AaronManley 2 ай бұрын

I think the intent of that statement was more along the lines that systems that lean toward "rules for most the things" vs "rules for very few things" can encourage a certain style of play wherein things are run almost procedurally to the point that anything not spelled out in the rules is considered out-of-bounds. Or, put another way, OSR kind of embraces the idea of "things outside the system _are_ inside the system" (hows that for irony?), whereas very rules-heavy games may tend more towards "things _not_ inside the system, are outside the system." Though by no means is this a mutually exclusive distinction.

@pistol975 2 ай бұрын

Always love to see a Questing Beast video! Awesome stuff

@drew-g-b3180 2 ай бұрын

I love all Questing Beast videos! Thanks Ben! Also, i've found the Fable Table books to be a great resource on OSR style "items without problems"

@perkinsdearborn4693 2 ай бұрын

Excellent content! I love how you pick and present the OSR blog posts. I am struggling to get all 4 game elements going at the table. Prompting players is essential. The simple "What do you do?" can fall flat, if the flow of information has faltered.

@muddlewait8844 2 ай бұрын

This is a GREAT comment. Thank you.

@JS-tj9zl 2 ай бұрын

I love videos like this one, Ben. Great showcase of Goblin Punch and its advice.

@MemphiStig Ай бұрын

You got a whole movement started with love for all your videos. Good going!

@victorsinger9265 2 ай бұрын

Great tips Ben! I'm always excited to see your new videos.

@chriscooper7962 2 ай бұрын

I love ALL of Questing Beast's videos. Great stuff Ben.

@themcchuck8400 2 ай бұрын

I love all Questing Beast videos! Knave's 100 utility spells are well worth the price of admission. Put them in all your games. Let the characters find a wondrous item (ring, amulet, scroll, whatever) that allows them to cast a single, random spell every day.

@irvin_moe 2 ай бұрын

I totally forgot about d100 tables from Goblin Punch! Those are amazing, thank you for the reminder. As always, such an interesting and cool video, thanks Ben!

@haysmcgee801 2 ай бұрын

I really like this type of video and the last couple as well. They are chock full of great and quick inspiration or just a simple perspective shift that can make all of the difference in the world.

@tbb4023 2 ай бұрын

The main issue I always had with "rulings not rules" is it puts a lot of stress on an inexperienced GM, or even a GM just not used to a particular set of mechanics. I have been playing for so long, I can handle things, but the GM just coming up with rules for falling damage,. disease, poison, or whatever, is pretty hard without killing off a lot of characters while you get the nuances right.

@billcedarheath387 2 ай бұрын

There is a quote from a prominent figure in this that also needs to be considered. “The secret we should never let game masters know is that they don’t need any rules.” Gary Gygax That speaks volumes in the rulings not rules theory imo.

@jadoaesra3011 Ай бұрын

I mean, they do if they want to stay GM.

@billcedarheath387 Ай бұрын

@@jadoaesra3011 I’ve been GMing since 1977 as a forever GM. I haven’t played as a player character since the early 1980s. I know that quote quite well and adopt the philosophy it speaks to. 💪 I must be doing something right to have that history. 👍

@oz_jones Ай бұрын

@@billcedarheath387 Or you have old school charm spells :p

@akimdemianenco Ай бұрын

And where exactly did you get this quote from?

@billcedarheath387 Ай бұрын

@@akimdemianenco it’s a well known quote of Gary Gygax. If you want to know more, Google is your friend. Search Gary Gygax quotes and you’ll discover all about this one and many more.

@ixis 2 ай бұрын

My favorite trap is my annual "Shocker Lizard" trap. The original trap came from some old adventure from a while ago, where there was a room with a well of healing water in the middle, overflowing with water and healing anyone who steps into it. Along the walls are clay jars which are held up on wooden planks. The planks are trapped, and when the trap is triggered the jugs will fall into the water. The trick is that the jugs are full of shocker lizards, turning a healing font of water into a deadly trap. Every year I re-arrange the facets of the trap. Sometimes the lizards are in the water, and must be placed in the jugs. One year the well summoned infinite shocker lizards, and the jugs contained water. Once I switched it so the lizards were actually healing lizards, and the well was heated, with an electric coil on the bottom, so when filled with water it would shock players. Few referees use re-occuring traps, but I think they're great. They make it so you have to think up less traps over an adventure, and everyone can have fun figuring out how the aspects of a trap have changed, which encourages a new way to solve the problem.

@Sanguivore 2 ай бұрын

That’s pretty dang good! xD

@Loweves2 2 ай бұрын

Great stuff here. And tye links are just pure gold as well.

@MacrosCazador 2 ай бұрын

Such great content! I love all your videos about OSR

@SingularityOrbit 2 ай бұрын

I noticed two related elements of the video, one where Ben mentions adding simple mechanics to aid rulings into more complex games (such as adding percentiles or X-in-6 rolls to a game that normally doesn't use them), and later where he talks about letting players try things with a chance of success even if the DM isn't sure they'd work -- the players are trying to be creative, after all. Matt Mercer, the DM on Critical Role, does this in almost every episode. "You can certainly try" is practically his mantra. The specific example of adapting dice mechanics is his way of allowing spellcasters to flex spells in unusual ways: he uses the rule for Counterspell (basically, roll a d20 + spellcasting ability to beat a difficulty DC) as a way to resolve any weird spell effect. The result is that strange uses of spells in his games are possible, but unreliable, which actually manages to make 5th Edition spellcasting more magical (that is, strange and unpredictable) at the cost of some risk. I'm not saying everybody should do this, but just that it's one example of how the advice could be implemented. There are probably twice as many ways of using rules in unexpected ways as there are RPG systems.

@timsanty3052 2 ай бұрын

Ben is always coming through with great resources and insights. The patron saint of the OSR GM!

@SeanBoyce-gp Ай бұрын

I actually think the concept of old school vs. new school just comes down to "are you more interested in narrative logic, or are you more interested in mechanical logic." By Narrative logic, I mean (spoiler) when The Bride gets buried alive in Kill Bill Vol. 2, new school games are interested in the player saying "well, I'm still playing, so how do I get out of here?" and then the GM saying "Well did you learn anything in your training that could help?" and then you get this whole flashback montage style system. In mechanical logic, an old school GM and an Old School game will say "you're buried alive, what do you do?" and the olds chool approach is that you would expect them to have read the WikiHow on escaping from being buried alive or have already arranged for someone to find you and have a way to help you, you're just gonna die down there. I love all the design logic around what you're saying, but I feel like ultimately that's what we're taklking about: the difference betewen "being good" at the game being an expression of logic and an expression of storytelling. New school leans more toward the latter. Old school more toward the former.

@swirlingtoilets 19 күн бұрын

That's the real kicker for me. In OSR style gaming, your character's ability to solve problems is explicitly tied to you, the player's, ability to visualize problems from storyteller descriptions and solve them logically in real time. It's the same issue with players who maybe aren't the most charismatic or charming playing persuasive characters; if your character's ability to do something is tied to *your* ability to do something, then you're ultimately just restricted by your own intelligence or personality, which can feel pretty shit. Now, when I fail to adequately solve a problem in-game, it's not that perhaps my character was ill-equipped to handle that particular challenge, now it's a negative reflection of me, the player. Talk about a buzzkill.

@jakestaples8498 2 ай бұрын

I love all Questing Beast videos When I first got into D&D in the 80’s, my group made up magical items. Some of our favorites were a gem of teleportation, a gem of disintegration, magical weapons that didn’t have a bonus to hit but caused 1d20 damage, a ring of polymorph, and gauntlets that allowed the wearer to shoot darts and fly. We also made up cursed magic items like a cloak of disintegration but the villain wore a shell-like breastplate that prevented instant death. My character wasn’t so lucky when he tried the cloak on without the breastplate…

@JeffreyKamo 2 ай бұрын

This is great, I love the return to an analysis of game concepts and principles. I hope to see this trend continue with more blog posts!

@TourFaint 2 ай бұрын

My player recently suddenly asked if they could use their magical bazooka, (savage worlds, weird science) to blast themselves forward during a chase scene. Instead of trying to find the ""rules for tf2 rocket jumping" paragraph in a rulebook somewhere, i just decided to let them roll shooting instead of athletics that turn for movement, and gave a bonus for the mana they spent. I'm sure there is a rulebook where someone considered solid and concrete rocket jumping rules and if there's not, i could make them, but its better to just decide on the spot and move along.

@Fo0tie 2 ай бұрын

Great example for a non-osr system. Thanks

@Badepfropfen 2 ай бұрын

Man. This video is a gold mine. Thank you for covering such important blogposts!

@willmendoza8498 2 ай бұрын

I think every OSR game Master should watch this and read that article. A lack of understanding of these principles is why I end up turning away quickly from most OSR actual plays and content creators.

@zipperman1448 2 ай бұрын

I love all Questing Beast videos!

@equiter102 2 ай бұрын

I LOVE all QUESTING BEAST videos! Keep up the great work!

@tDude666 2 ай бұрын

The documents you cited in this are absolutely incredible! Great Video on the subject!

@voodoocupcake2293 2 ай бұрын

I love all of Questing Beast’s videos. One of my favourite channels!

@kristianmagnusson8735 Ай бұрын

Once again, great advice and well structured presentation. Thank you.

@oldmanofthemountains3388 2 ай бұрын

What a fantastic video! I've been wanting to add more OSR items to my game but I couldn't quite figure out how to create them! Now I know!

@ShannonFerguson 2 ай бұрын

Thanks for the guidance. I enjoy all of Questing Beast's videos.

@aaronthomas8190 2 ай бұрын

Once again, so much good advice! Thank you, Ben!

@andrewjoy4084 2 ай бұрын

Thank you, I've been looking for a nice way of explaining the approach to my friends and this video seems perfect 👍

@GooberMcSnorford 2 ай бұрын

I love all the videos on Questing Beast!

@marclehman3889 2 ай бұрын

Awesome video, I've been struggling with this in my DMing, but hadn't been able to put it into words yet

@jeffstormer2547 Ай бұрын

I love all questing beast videos! the punch is great too! hats off to you, sir, for so consistently spreading the joy w/ munchkins too. nothing like watching kids light up in imaginative play and not have their noses stuck in a screen. also a fan of your games, too! just wish i could get more folks to at least try something other than The Game That Shall Not Be Named. another great post Ben!

@mikehallaron 2 ай бұрын

Great content Ben. Thank you!

@lowRolls 2 ай бұрын

As always, great stuff! Thanks!

@tombayley7110 Ай бұрын

The idea of OSR solutions can be extended to the character classes of AD&D. The AD&D illusionist, the AD&D druid, the AD&D monk, all excel at approaching problems side-on rather than from the front. This style of play can cause friction with a rigidly structured rule set. This might explain why the classes were effectively abandoned or re written from the ground up in later editions.

@samuelteare8160 2 ай бұрын

Very insightful and inspiring. Thanks, Ben.

@deathbare5306 2 ай бұрын

Love the Questing Beast content and the email list is useful!

@AndrewCooperSooperGenius 2 ай бұрын

Thanks for a great video, Ben. I love everything by Questing Beast.

@BDCSam 2 ай бұрын

I love this type of video. So simple. Time to get back to these roots in my game.

@enzobambino 2 ай бұрын

Always love your channel!

@ganzagaming1849 2 ай бұрын

"OSR tools does one highly weird specific thing that you *think* is only going to be useful in pretty narrow circumstances," is the essence of the Cypher System. Getting slots for such tools is built into your PC.

@MrExit181 2 ай бұрын

love it. thanks for turning me onto a great blog.

@bobkarstenson1792 2 ай бұрын

Love all the questing beast videos

@fjordojustice Ай бұрын

I always strive to give my players tricky challenges without a specific solution, and one tool they've gotten a lot of use out of has been an item that's functionally a portal gun, from the game Portal. I admit a portal gun is not quite an OSR style tool the way you described, since it's so clearly powerful and useful in a ton of different situations, but it fits the tone of my game and I've had a lot of fun seeing the wacky and creative things my players have gotten up to with it. I think even in high-power, high-magic games like mine, players really benefit from having open-ended tools they can use to leverage their creativity.

@robertbromley5230 2 ай бұрын

I generally agree with the “OSR” approach to problems. That said, myself and many of my friends have greatly enjoyed 3.5 and Pathfinder one, especially when it came to character building benefitting from a kind of creeping system mastery. In my experience, some of our best times, role-playing benefited simultaneously from mechanics on our sheets and creative problem-solving. I’m not suggesting our experience is somehow “one size fits all”. But I do think crafting problems like this benefit every game system, crunchy or otherwise.

@alchemicalcreations Ай бұрын

One of my favorite items that I came up with is the "book of faces" a book full of portraits of people that can transform into an assassin's dagger. When this dagger is used to take a life the book gains a portrait of the person killed. It can be a great story telling device when the party finally discovers what the book does and realizes some important figures in the world's history were actually assassinated.

@richardfortier 2 ай бұрын

Thank you for pointing to those lists, they will be useful :)

@StrinrathWorldofFantasyA-to3vh 2 ай бұрын

I love ALL of Questing Beast's videos

@alantesser1645 Ай бұрын

This was very helpful in expanding past the very obvious parts of “rulings not rules.” Great job.

@stevenappel1603 2 ай бұрын

Hi Ben, thanks for your recommendations, I will in time read up on both the arcticles you mentioned. 😎👍

@andytucker1769 2 ай бұрын

Fantastic video - very inspiring!

@georgelaiacona111 2 ай бұрын

Excellent video! Thanks for this. Everything is a valuable treasure, if you find the right use for it.

@tombayley7110 2 ай бұрын

Only the other night I was thinking about how important it is to trust your players and even to side with the players against the dungeon. It’s the dungeon that should provide the challenges NOT the DM.

@uyaratful 2 ай бұрын

This is so wonderful. We played dnd like that, 100 years ago, because we didn't know any better. It was so exciting, creative and strangely... intimate? I mean you were really close with the world, experiencing it via senses of the character, experimenting with everything. Best way to play.

@solaris_cc4353 2 ай бұрын

This comment sums it up perfectly, thank you.

@marklaurenzi1609 2 ай бұрын

Love these tips. Keep it up

@reversegoat3260 2 ай бұрын

I enjoy QB's videos, but these last three are pure gold.

@LokisLair 2 ай бұрын

Honestly this is very insightful, thanks for posting.

@helixxharpell 2 ай бұрын

I LOVE every video question beast!

@divideby000 2 ай бұрын

This one was a real banger. Thanks!

@batmenic365StopMotion 2 ай бұрын

That article is in Knock 1, it's a good read and really helped me improve my gaming back when I ran 5E. Your articles were also really interesting, Ben!

@tednovy7762 2 ай бұрын

Great post-thoughtful and detailed.

@ChrisBrown-iu8ii 2 ай бұрын

Thank you thank you thank you. I am forwarding this to all my DM friends.

@keithvanboskirk7327 2 ай бұрын

thanks for highlighting goblin punch

@TheArcaneLibrary 2 ай бұрын

This is a great video, Ben!

@QuestingBeast 2 ай бұрын

Thanks Kelsey!

@Tomastyr 2 ай бұрын

I Love ALL Questing Beast's videos!!

@Snoil Ай бұрын

All I can say is you schoed what I have been doing since the 80s and as a forever DM, you are spot on!

@kayosiiii 23 күн бұрын

I think my favourite of these types of puzzles I have created is also one of the simplest. A locked door with a pit in front of it where the door was flush with the wall of the pit (no overhang).

@QuestingBeast 23 күн бұрын

Oh, that's a great one

@mrgunn2726 2 ай бұрын

Excellent article!

@trynda1701 2 ай бұрын

As always, love the Questing Beast channel advice. 👍👍👍👍😎😎😎😎 I think this shows that even in OSR games, everyone is working together to create a great gaming experience. 😃😃😃😃

@Patrick-nl4zp Ай бұрын

Phenomenal. Love your videos

@natbarmore 2 ай бұрын

My slightly different formulation of what makes a good magic item or spell is: • It shouldn’t directly give a numerical bonus (or penalty) [in play, the GM might rule that a particular use results in a bonus to a roll or taking less damage or whatever, but it shouldn’t just be “+2 to stealth”] • it should do or enable something that can’t be done without magic. Much like the prohibition on direct numerical bonuses, I don’t want a magic item to substitute for experience or experience levels. A 3rd-level thief with a magic item shouldn’t be the equivalent of a seventh level thief- the seventh level thief should still be better at thieving; the magic items should let the third level thief do things that neither of them could do without the Magic item. • be creative. Be weird. Come up with something specific and narrow in scope.

@Madkingstow 2 ай бұрын

I love OSE now that I'm an experienced DM, however one of the reasons I was drawn to D&D 3e in my 20's was because of their rules. The rules protected the player from bad DM's. At the time we had played with many bad DM's in our teens - the kind who treated the players like prisoners in their fantasy funhouse. They would make up rules whenever they wanted, made changes to our characters without our permission, created constantly unbalanced encounters, were biased in their treatment of certain players, etc. With D&D we had rules we could depend on, such as Challenge Ratings, Loot tables, XP per monster, leveling abilities, etc, so it was something we could point at when the DM tried to mess with us and we could say "That's not what the rules say". After all these decades I now feel very differently about it, but just wanted to share my experience and explain why some players may not love the systems which are open to interpretation and allow DM's more influence over the balance of the game.

@arthurmarques6191 2 ай бұрын

I need to go over your videos and make a "How to Questing Beast" just with great analysis and advice, seriously 🎉🎉

@johncook158 2 ай бұрын

Fuckin love goblinpunch. The better tigers article changed my everything for setting up challenges.

@_Grimblewedge_ 2 ай бұрын

I love these videos. My only complaint is they weren't around when I was fumbling around for a GM style after the DM Guide left me with more questions than answers.😂.