It's a sign of badly written rules that such a basic rules matter can be argued at such length.
I'm not satisfied with YGMV. OF COURSE my game may vary; I don't need to buy rules that tell me to do whatever I feel like. Sure, every long-running game ends up with house rules, but it shouldn't have to START with them.
I'm spending money on rules and modules because I'm buying someone else's time -- the time of the person who wrote the rules or the modules. I don't want to be told to use my own time -- if that was my intention I wouldn't have bought the thing in the first place.
I do want to have rules that explain such basic points as the ones we have been discussing. If I don't like them, I won't use them, but I sure would like to know what they are. Just as in modules, I always hated the "we have left the other characters undescribed so you can adapt them to your own game" trope, which i always took to mean: "I've run out of ideas or am too lazy to do any more work, so you do it."
Augments used in this extended contest: Repetition, Pounding the Table, Bore Them Silly, Sarcasm, Insult, Repetition (yes that's twice, but it is repetition, isn't it?), and 20 other things I'm too tired to think of.
jim Chapin
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