10 Table Rules/Expectations for RPGs (Pathfinder 2e Rule Reminder

[@HowItsPlayed]

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[@Zedrinbot]

14:51, the thing I would add to this though, from the GM side: not every fight has to be winnable, but make sure you *always* give your players some form of agency, and that, even if it's a mistake, they chose to pick those fights. An encounter where they get ambushed and downed before anyone gets a turn to react just feels terrible for everyone. If they're getting in over their heads, scare em off and let em run/turn it into a chase if you have to.

[@NathanDarvish]

One of my big rules is that we do not play off of someone else's character sheet. That is to say let other people play their own character and make their decisions. Just because you know what's on their sheet and you think you know what's best that they do, don't but in. A light touch of advice is best.

[@gabrielrognon6238]

that's one of the thing I'm having the most difficulty to do but I fully agree with it. (I'm kind of a book worm and I know D&D rule and every other player class and capacity better than the player does so it is sometime hard to let them do obvious decision mistake without trying to control their actions^^)

[@gabrielrognon6238]

@@Kneejair it can be. I know among my friends who don't like it and who prefere to know so I take on myself to shut up when needed. I'm a forever DM most of the time so I have to know the rule of every class

[@mentalkitty789]

Great video some really good points in it! I disagree with "Be Heroic" but not because it is entirely wrong it is a matter of 'Bring a character to the table who is able to work in the narrative being told'. If you play someone heroic in a villainous campaign your character is at the wrong table. If in an exploring game you never want to leave the city, your character is in the wrong game!

[@kalfive555]

Yep, a more alignment agnostic version would be: "Work with your party, and involve yourself in the storyline." Evil and unusual concept campaigns can be great fun, but they still need the party to overall work together - and if they want to go majorly off the plot *as a group*, consult the GM in advance.

[@erickteixeira7251]

Amazing, it's incredible that I agree with everything you said, I've always watched your channel and I've always been inspired by your good sense but I never imagined that I would agree with all 10 and I myself already use from 1 to 8 without even having talked or seen one of your games, excellent video as always.

[@HowItsPlayed]

Great minds think alike! 😄

[@erickteixeira7251]

@@HowItsPlayed ha ha ha, nice.

[@coolboy9979]

I think for me one of the most important things is: "To roll with the unfortune dice (pun not intended)", or with failure in general. Its what makes the nerrative better. Success is only cool because of the possibility of failure. If it doesnt happen then there is no possibility of it. Dont be moody and mad for the whole session because of unlucky dice. If the bad dice are the only reason for a TPK, then the GM will probably do a work around and do a total party failure instead (Captured, looted, saved, mission failed). If something just didnt work out then dont be mad, but try to roll with the narrative. Its not like the GM wants to see the players fail.

[@douglasbaiense]

I have created a table rule that ended almost all player conflicts: no rolls or system rules will be used for anything you do to another PC. The player that controls the target PC will simply decide what happened. So, if player A wants to steal Player's B Character, mind control him, attack him or whatever, it does not matter how good he is or what spell he has, player B decides what happens and describe it to the table.

[@jacobshaftoe8326]

Perfect means by which to override the "But what if they're okay with it?" response from most people playing this strange and usually antisocial metagame. I like it.

[@ollywright]

Nice. I'll borrow that thank you!

[@devcrom3]

I have created a table rule that ended almost all player conflicts. If player A wants to steal from player B, mind control, attack or whatever, player A is banned immediately and permanently for being a problem player.

[@Masterom2000x]

@@devcrom3 I think context matters. It depends on the situation, but sometimes that high conflict builds character if it's story based stuff going on. If it's just for malicious reasons though, boot their asses. Problem is it really depends on the group and if they can play it out properly.

[@cfalkner1012]

I really like this. I’ll definitely use a version of this at my table.

[@ninten90z70]

For number 10, it should be stated that players ought to resolve their in character disputes, their conflicts, their disagreements, etc within a reasonable amount of time. If no player character involved is willing to compromise or budge on a matter then it's time to move on and forward. Internal conflict has its place in games and stories, but not at the expense of most or all the session time.

[@bmardiney]

"Be heroic" is, I would say, not the best way to put that. Rather, "Be curious, be engaged, be enthusiastic". Because if I'm playing a chaotic neutral mercenary type, I'm not going to be motivated by heroism. But I will be motivated by coin, maybe even by revenge or misplaced anger due to my own past experiences. I actually don't even like playing heroic characters. The fighter I'm playing with my group right now is only going on the current quest because he's a drunkard who was recently kicked out of the town guard and he's desperate for money to pay off his gambling debts. That's not heroic at all, but it is very fun to roleplay and he is very motivated to get the job done and be thorough.

[@epidjxd8704]

Players may Roll dice if they interact with each other but the other Player can determine the outcome for themselves (For example "I Want to determine if the Character is lying" or "I want to intimidate the others to bring my Point across". This allows Players to use their Charakters abilities in Roleplay between players but noone feels like they got forced to do something they wouldn't or react in a way their character wouldnt do. For example if i had a Player and they were not good at lying as a Player, But their Character had solid Deception, making the Player Responsible to keep a Secret thats relevant to the Character rely soley on their Players ability to misdirect about it would be wrong. At least let their Character "Lie for them" even if it just impacts Character Knowledge and not Player Knowledge.

[@aloseman]

Dave, I'm only about half way through this video, and so far this advice is perfect for creating the type of game I'd want to play in/ run. I think these are all generally desired, but hard to name, to put words to. Thank you for making this. I'm starting to gear up to start running again, and I'm going to use this. Also, for the algorithm!

[@coolboy9979]

From the thumbnail I first thought we are talking about tables in the CRB, stuff like Encoutner building table, DC by level and such lol.

[@TarEcthelion]

Good stuff. An additional rule I have at my table is "until it's been seen it didn't exist" which is my way of saying, if you took a feat or had a backstory element or whatever it may be, and you change your mind later... If it was never used, or never a plot point, then absolutely we can change it. And no you don't need to retrain or RP it out. Once it's been a part of the story at the table, then it's real and re-training/RP/etc. becomes a thing.

[@draggo69]

Thanks for doing these videos!

[@jacobshaftoe8326]

I've noticed a trend with larger TTRPGs of late trying to use publisher-level editing to solve what are at the table issues. Fundamentally, your expectations drill down to the most common issues, all of which are solved by/at the table/GM level, such as broader versions of your expectations I hold dear: Players playing against other players, instead of against the actual enemies, and finding more fun personally in roleplaying sociopaths for their own amusement. This one is simple, if you're not the GM, you shouldn't be having an active negative effect on party members, and if you want to play a game where you actively take steps to mess with the players, why not actually GM instead, or, failing that, go away. Deciding you want to play checkers mid chess game earns you just the same amount of respect and admiration, and you get invited back just as often. As for rolling with the failures, with experience we all learn this. Some great means to learn this well include learning from more experienced players and/or just playing Paranoia until the idea of dying seven times in a row, all in terrible ways, no longer holds any fear for you. The character isn't you, and interactions between the players, the GM and the system all determine outcomes, and wanting to know what those outcomes will be is the key attitude. The character wants things, the player wants to see how it works out. Some of my favorite and best stories about characters are their deaths, and every good story needs an ending. To politely paraphrase Egar Dragonsbane from the epic series A Land Fit For Heroes "Please not a crap death.". He got that in spades, and his arc would have been worth so much less without it. Other than that, there's my expectations regarding GM's, myself included. If you're not playing from fixed material (Modules, Adventure Paths, whatever you want to call the things), learn what makes your players happy, collectively and individually, and try to allow for more possibilities for such things to occur. As ever, the better they are, the bigger the risks taken to earn them. I'm still struggling with one player (my kid) who wants to meet more animals. Never GM'd as much Fantasy as we're doing now, and really need to work on this some more, not even 100% sure what they even mean by that, but I've done some things that seemed to work, and ever mindful of finding more. Still, these are all at the table things. Anyone playing in a game of mine kind of has to accept pretty graphic depictions of what happened when they fatally critically hit an enemy, it's what I do, and I feel empty inside if I don't say something. New players get warned, younger players get descriptions with less horror and more humor ("The look on his face! Well, the look of his face!? Well, the look on whatever you'd call what used to be his face..."). Bad experiences are, in my experience, a failure of one or more of these fundamental aspects of the game at the table. If I'm at a table where another player looks at me, then hands a note to the GM, who laughs and looks my way, then makes a few secret die rolls while giggling, I'll find somewhere else to be next week...

[@blackfox2973]

For rule 10 I let them roll to see how well they did. But then leave it up to the target to decide, they can use the rolls or not. But it gives them role as opportunity to make a decision. If they see the other guys roll was high and theirs was low, they might let the person win because it makes sense for the moment. *toss roleplay ideals on the fires*

[@hexenhammer483]

A rule I've found helpful. "Be proactive. You need to find ways to get your character involved in what's going on. Other wise they are an NPC."

[@charleswatson2605]

lol, I remember party rogues "practicing" on the other characters, and also skimming from treasure. Eventually at least the rogue used that cash to buy healing potions and shared them.

[@JacksonOwex]

5:12 But... but sometimes I just want to be an evil necromancer!!!

[@KalaamNozalys]

I have to say, one thing I personnaly struggle with is to not get frustrated when bad luck creates long lasting failings that turn situations into way harder stuff then they should be. It's hard not to let that frustration out. Encouraging the backstory and rp stuff within the group is also fairly hard.

[@sctoomon]

This video triggered unwelcome memories lol. It’s all part of the learning process.

[@SneakyNinjaDog]

I disagree a little w rule 10. While I do not want characters to sort of jedi-mind-trick the other into doing stuff they don't want I think it is totally fair to roll for lying or bluffing or even intimidate. I would expect them to roleplay accordingly and not rely on knowlegde their character does not have. If a characters major thing is that he has a silver tongue and talks his way out of things and has the skills to back that up it could be argued that you are also removing his agency by robbing him of these skills. Allow him to roll and the other character might be like "Okay, I can't quite poke a hole in that but I am watching you from now on". Finally I believe in character skills over player skills. Bob might have that smooth talking bard, but Bob himself is maybe not that in real life. Forcing him to ditch his skills and debate against another player seems wrong to me!

[@Masterom2000x]

Player skills are not there to use against the party, and unless it's something background or story related (IE not admitting to something they did in the past etc), there would be zero reason to keep someone in your party that was lying/manipulating to harm the group for personal gain, as any adventuring group would not travel with people they don't trust unless they have no choice. Some classes don't get high social skills, so having someone in that group use social skills to manipulate them/deceive them ruins their agency way more than not letting a player roll dice against another player would. There are plenty of NPCs they can use those skills on.

[@blaydsong]

@How it’s Played; sounds like you run my kind of game. 🤠

[@jamesshearer3936]

One thing that I am going to be asking of all of players in the future: I need to be able to read the player's dice from where I sit at the table. Anything they roll, I should be able to see. It's not that I don't trust the players, but if I can read it, so can they, WITHOUT having to pick it up to see it.

[@andrewgavrilov7273]

I disagree with the last one. Solving character disagreement through rolls could be a lot of fun as long as all players agree to this

[@Masterom2000x]

Fun for everyone except the fighter or certain classes that don't get social skills and don't get to play the game since the rogue/sorc keep manipulating them.

[@andrewgavrilov7273]

@@Masterom2000x That's where the last part part kicks in - as long as all players agree to this

[@Masterom2000x]

@@andrewgavrilov7273 It's not worth the eventual headache for them to make a bad choice for themselves because the person that is sly in real life rolls against them to convince them it's a good idea lol.

[@andrewgavrilov7273]

@@Masterom2000x if players get headache from making a bad choice for their characters, that's surely not an option. But people and groups are different, many have fun in dealing with non-optimal choices, especially made as part of roleplay

[@9e7exkbzvwpf7c]

@@Masterom2000x "You use big words, confuse Grok, Grok smash". If we want to roll dice we should get to roll damage dice as well.

[@natanoj16]

You have very pretty eyes! ^^

[@JLorak13]

I ran an Evol campaign once. My big rule was no player could screw over another. They could do horrible things to the NPCs, but not each other. And it went very smoothly.

[@DogsNotGods]

#11: Gib GM snako's

[@jacobshaftoe8326]

Last session I ran they stored the snako's on the wrong side of the GM screen and ate them all before I knew what happened. Next session shall involve things that like to eat players, so help me...

[@Kevlar-78]

“I don’t want to hear about encounter balance “. Perfection. Use your brain, players. Use your collective brains …..

[@mastermind9393]

Definitely writing these gems down. Some conflict comes from people being jerks, but a lot of it is just misalignment of expectations (between players, or between player and gm).

[@Radiotomb]

Totally agree with every rule. On the other hand, I know at least a dozen 5e Twitter people who would burn you at the stake for this! 😆 "Be a reasonable, responsible adult? Heresy!"

[@lyingcat9022]

Stealing from a PC is stealing from the Player. Their in game items are their own to play with as they see fit. It is no different from grabbing their Character sheet, erasing an item and writing it on your own.