When “Rulings, Not Rules” Hits Home…

Despite starting my RPG journey with Advanced Dungeons & Dragons in the late 80s, I have almost zero nostalgia for the early days of D&D. It was fun at the time, but laboriously making my way through an improbable dungeon, prodding every square inch of stone with a 10-foot-pole for traps, all so I can heave a pile of loot onto a floating disk, never matched the fantasies that got me into fantasy in the first place.

I would much rather play (or pitch) powerful heroes in(to) stories that see them battle the forces of evil in order to save the world – or at least their local community – and perhaps indulge in a bit of light roleplaying and character development along the way. To my tastes, 5e is a really great system that allows for that more swashbuckling and epic style of fantasy gaming, featuring powerful characters thrust into dramatic storylines (even if the system swings a bit too far towards making the players invincible).

More of this please…. less tracking torches and iron rations

Despite my lukewarm interest in old school gaming, I still think there are lots of lessons we can learn from the early days of D&D, as well as from the many folks that still prefer that style of play. For that reason, I follow quite a few OSR bloggers and Youtubers, as these self-styled ‘grognards’ have certainly been around the roleplaying block, seen many of the age-old RPG debates repeat themselves, and solved many of the problems a contemporary DM faces.

Today I want to talk about one of the core mantras of the Old School Renaissance that I think is relevant to GMs of all D&D editions as well as other RPG systems. And that is: “rulings, not rules”.

If you’re not familiar with the phrase, it means more or less what it says: which is that OSR gameplay prefers to let Game Masters make rulings based on what makes sense in the fiction than have to consult a hefty rules manual for a specific rule on a specific situation.

There are pros and cons to this approach of course, but assuming you trust your Game Master to be an impartial and fair referee, the pros of being able to get on with the game far outweigh the cons of a) having to first consult the rules and then b) argue over their interpretation, and possibly c) find out that the rules don’t cover the situation at all, or are frustratingly ambiguous.

I had already been mulling over the mantra, when a specific incident came up in my 5e Dirty Jobs game that drove it home. My players had to travel from Waterdeep to Neverwinter at breakneck speed in order to retrieve an earring given by Lady Constanzia to Jarlaxle Baenre. Rumours were flying around Waterdeep that the Lady had given this piece of state jewellery to the pirate and her honour and integrity were at stake, were she not able to wear the earring at a state function in 5 days time. (If you recognise the plot, it’s because it’s taken from the The Three Musketeers!).

Richard Lester’s musketeer films will never be beaten!

After some bruising encounters, the players had succeeded in retrieving the jewellery and were within a day’s ride of Waterdeep where they met a road block of White Cloaks (read: Cardinal Richelieu’s men!) awaiting them. The players attempted to charge the road block but lost initiative and the White Cloak Inquisitor cast command on the fighter telling him to kneel. The fighter failed his saving throw, dismounted and kneeled and several other White Cloaks crowded around him to arrest (ie. grapple) him. The player playing the fighter then stated he wanted to use his opportunity attack, granted by the polearm master feat, to attack the first White Cloak that entered his range.

At this point I got out the 2014 Player’s Handbook which states that “the target…. must follow the command on its next turn”. As the fighter’s reaction was taking place on the White Cloaks’ turn, there was in fact nothing in the rules to stop this opportunity attack taking place. However, I felt strongly that this situation was a niche case that was not anticipated in the spell description, and went against the spell’s design intent. For me, the “vibe” of the spell (see below) clearly dictates that the victim loses their self will for one round, as they become temporarily enthralled by the spellcaster. And so I made a ruling that the fighter could NOT make an opportunity attack until the spell had ended (1 round), which the player accepted.

While I felt slightly bad for the player, and I risked opening up an argument, I feel like the integrity of the fiction was maintained and our game was better for it. Making a ruling, especially one that overrides the rules, does rely on player trust, but as Professor DM wryly states in this video, why would you play games with people you don’t trust?

The following day I read a post by Mike Mearls that I felt vindicated my approach. In it he discussed the pitfalls of the 2024 version of the sleep spell, which he complained not only relied on too much technical knowledge of the rules, but also that the language of the spell no longer has an easily understandable “vibe” that DMs can use to make quick rulings at the table and get 90% right.

According to Mearls (one of the lead designers of 5e 2014), the spell requires the DM to understand four other D&D rules, and has seven potential points of misinterpretation. He continues by suggesting a two sentence revised version of the spell and draws several interesting conclusions about game design in the process. Take a look.

The key point I took away from Mearls’ post though is this: it’s a fool’s errand to try to design mechanics that cover every possible situation, and which intersect sensibly with every other existing rule and mechanic in the game. D&D is better when the rules are written in a way that clearly signal the design intent of the mechanic and empower the DM to make rulings, using their best judgement, rather than when they are written to try and legislate for every possible outcome.

Design intention, signalled by natural language in 2014, has – at times – been replaced by heavily coded technical rules descriptions in 2024.

This, I believe, might be why the 2024 version of the hiding rules are such a disaster, and are causing so much strife for Dungeon Masters running the new edition. In trying to iron out a few ambiguities in the 2014 rules (rules which most DMs could improvise through satisfactorily in any case), the designers have instead created the exact situation that Mearls laments in his post about the sleep spell. Dungeon Masters are handed a thicket of technical conditions and rules wrapped up in unnatural language, so that even DMs who are usually happy to “vibe” their way through the rules  have no idea how to run this aspect of the game.

You might say, through their failings, the 2024 hiding rules are the best possible advert for the mantra “rulings, not rules”.

More on “Rulings, Not Rules”…

In my interpretation of the phrase “rulings, not rules”, above, I overlooked the fact that a key part of the mantra is about encouraging players to try anything they think might work for their character in the situation they find themselves in, rather than look to their character sheet for a specific ability they can use. The idea being that by having less specific rules, characters will feel empowered to attempt creative solutions to problems – the results of which will be decided by a GM ruling. I think that’s a separate facet of the mantra that I will hope to tackle in a separate post however.

In the meantime I’d like to share some of the material I’ve been digesting recently, which led to this post, starting with this great video by Questing Beast that introduces the topic pretty well:

You’ll notice Ben was heavily influenced by Goblin Punch, and I think that blog deserves a link too.

But before you start chanting the “rulings, not rules” mantra in a cult-like trance, while burning all your crunchiest RPG tomes, you might want to read The Alexandrian’s caveats on the meme, as well as some additional advice on how to best interpret it by Grumpy Wizard.

I think my favourite video on the topic, that most aligns with my current thinking is the video I just discovered by Matt Colville. As ever he seems to eloquently take on and resolve the entire topic in a short space of time!

Interestingly, Colville actually points out that 4th and 5th edition D&D designers were actually deliberately trying to cultivate a “rulings, not rules” spirit back into the game, after the rules-dense 3rd edition. I am not sure many OSR stalwarts feel they succeeded in that regard! (Side note: I also love the fact that Matt stresses the importance of drama in RPGs… the word that I once described as the one-word secret to great D&D!).

As ever, I’d love to hear your own thoughts on “rulings, not rules” in the comments.

Book Update: Ed Greenwood Answers Clarion Call!

When an unknown author makes a suicidal run towards the towering walls of the seemingly unassailable book market, he is likely to get shot down before reaching the base of the ramparts if he doesn’t succeed in rallying a few powerful allies to his cause. Thank god then for Ed Greenwood, who very kindly agreed to lend his name and prestige to The Creative Game Master’s Guide to Extraordinary Locations by penning the book’s foreword! Ed has kindly added some thoughts about the importance of locations in our fantasy games… and as the creator of the Forgotten Realms that’s certainly his area of expertise.

In fact, it’s not only Ed who has stepped up to support the book. Half a dozen of my favourite bloggers and Youtubers have written testimonials supporting the book, and I now feel like I’m charging the palisades with some of the world’s most trusty RPG veterans at my back.

Anyway the book is coming out on Jan 13th 2026, and you can now see an updated cover on its Amazon profile page where it’s also available to pre-order. At 25 dollars you’re getting 30 fully developed locations, each with a full-page, full-colour, hand-drawn map (including digital versions), and plenty of adventure hooks for easy integration into your games. That’s less than 1 dollar per location, plus there’s some useful tables for generating your own extraordinary locations… and did I mention a foreword by Ed Greenwood?