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Historically, for me, a Rules Lawyer was someone who typically knew the rules very well and staunchly insisted that everything be done by RAW. Further, they would argue that varying interpretations or ambiguities be handled based on how they interpret it. Notoriously these people would pedantically correct everyone and slow down the flow of the game.

Similarly, Rule of Cool, use to mean occasionally allowing something to happen for the sake of a cool scene or character moment, even if not allowed or within the rules.

Now, if I see game advertisements like, "We play by Rule of Cool, no Rules Lawyers;" I am coming to find what they are actually saying is, "Our group has a poor grasp of the rules, we aren't bothering to learn them; and don't disagree when our arbitrary, whimsical, and ever-changing 'homebrew' has adverse effects on your character."

I didn't know if this is a growing phenomenon or I just had some bad luck.

Edit 1: I was not the person accused of being the Rules Lawyer by these groups.

Edit 2: Since there were some request for context.

Situation 1: A player was playing PF1e. The player made a single diagonal move on the grid. Then a group member and the GM said, "You cannot do that, you don't have enough movement to move 10ft." (Which is hypocritical for a group claiming they don't like Rules Lawyers). The player said, "The first diagonal is only 5 feet." Then the established group mobbed the player saying he was a Rules Lawyer and that isn't the way they play. The group didn't know the rules, and jumped all over the player for correcting their error, while they were trying to correct that player, erroneously as per RAW. Then the group chimed in invoking Rule of Cool, which in their terms, seemed to mean whatever arbitrary decision the GM made was better than just reading the book.

Situation 2: Also, PF1e. A player cast a spell that was not subject to Spell Resistance. The GM said, "Roll to break Spell Resistance." The player, very normally, said, "This spell is not subject to Spell Resistance." The GM said "I think Spell Resistance should apply to any spell, or else what's the point." Then, once again, all the established players chimed in supporting the GM's off-the-cuff ruling and accusing the person of being a Rules Lawyer and power gaming, further adding that they play by the Rule of Cool, which made no sense based on my understanding of Rule of Cool.

I am not here to argue in favor of one side or the other. I posted this to just see if those terms may have morphed to mean something different than what I understood them to be for a long time.

My friend is trying to get me into the Infinity Wargame and I noticed that they had a TTRPG as well made or produced by Modiphius. I've had no experience with their games and the only thing I've heard about them was a negative review from one of my other friends so not really any well sourced argument.

A bit of background: I've played RPG's with various gaming groups for decades, and most of the time I end up as the GM. I do a lot of improvisation and character voices in my games, and I can usually come up with a simple story and just let the players provide the input to fill in the gaps.

Fast forward to this weekend. I'm cleaning up some stuff and my daughter finds a pair of D20's and asks how they work. After showing her a few rolls, she wanted to "play" with them by each rolling and seeing whose was higher. I laughed and told her there were better ways to play with them.

So, after I finished tidying up, I grabbed the two dice and told her to follow me downstairs,. I said we're going to play a game where we make up a story and when it comes time for a choice, we'd roll the dice, and whoever got the higher roll would get their option.

My daughter absolutely loves The Smurfs, so I had decided to base the story in that setting: What villain was going to encounter the Smurf Village, which Smurfs would go on the adventure to solve the problem, and how they would deal with the villain were all determined by our dice rolls. I used my GM skills in improv to tell the story and I used as many voices as I could for each of the characters. In the end, the Smurfs ended up rescuing some of their friends from Gargamel's castle by luring the Ogre Big Mouth there with a blueberry pie. They then escaped using a magic catapult which flung them back to the Smurf Village after trapping Gargamel's cat Azreal in a broom closet.

Let me tell you, I have never had so much fun playing a game with my daughter as what we did today. She laughed at the funny outcomes, cheered at the results of the dice rolls, and we both had a blast. This was roleplay as I have always enjoyed it, and we're definitely going to try it again soon! Just figured I'd share, but I think this was a great first step in showing her some of the games I like to play!

I’ve been wanting to explore the post apocalyptic genre, in particular the crazy/far out kind of vibe. In terms of games I like I tend towards more narrative games but I can sway to some crunch as well. Any suggestions are appreciated!

I just wanted to know if anyone did, so I could know approximately long I’ll be waiting, as well as how people are having fun with the book itself compared to PDFs.

With One Page RPG Jam 2026 kicking off on Monday, thought I'd list down my favourite entries from previous iterations of the Jam.

Aside from The Wildsea and PICO, I'm not able to find any other Wild Words Engine TTRPGs.

My players and I love the engine! It strikes just the right balance between feeling game-y and crunchy, while still being fiction forward and built primarily for stories.

I've heard LANCER might be getting a Wild Words game? Is that it?

I've also heard comparisons to Forged in the Dark, but having played both, the differences are notable enough to consider it it's own thing, I think...

Where could I find other Wild Words games? Do we think there's hope for this engine to catch on?​

Just bought like 30$ worth of terrain to try out off Temu, wondering if anyone’s ever used them before I’ve never bought anything off it before, so curious as to what to expect quality wise. Seems to be exponentially cheaper than other places.

Having a not great campaign right now (short version: some of the craziest railroading I’ve ever seen, having good rolls in combat get negated, etc), so I thought it would be cathartic to talk about what keeps us going in campaigns that are not great or struggling (doesn’t have to be a nightmare scenario: maybe nobody can make it for months at a time, drop in game can never get enough players, etc.

In this campaign what’s keeping me going is simple: we’ve been fighting this cult for the whole campaign. we had an early encounter where they partially summoned their god and I had my skunk familiar spray it in the face. now they’re trying to summon it again and the god sprayer will get to strike again.

But more seriously: I once had a DCC campaign where the DJ was really have a rough time in his life so even though my own schedule was tight and we could rarely get enough players, I stuck with it so I could check on him and let him have some fun running his favorite modules

Hi! I am interested in getting into roleplaying games again, with my adult kids, after not really playing since high school in the late1980s :)

The games that I used to play included DnD, warhammer rolepay, Gamma world, Traveller, MERP, Paranoia, and others that I can't think of right now. As I am currently living in Sweden and like the look of Free League games, I would like to hear people's thoughts on their games.

Because Gamma World has a place in my heart, I am interested in Mutant. But Mörk Borg also looks interesting, and I am also a LOTR nerd.

Also, because we would play online, I would prefer games that have good resources for that.

Any thoughts or suggestions? Thanks!

I was looking for a TTRPG system where a high level character can be realistically be threatened by a group of guards.

Like, obviously he can dispatch them if he's good enough in combat, but for example in DND there is no way a level 10 character can be threatened by level 1 enemies. I'm looking for a game system where going into battle can be dangerous even against basic soldiers, and I don't necessarily need to add exceptional enemies to make fights interesting.