Help with clarification on how to read the rulebook: What has priority?

[Larstrong]

Hi everyone.

I've been playing 5e for a while, ever since I found a group that I enjoy playing with a while back. One of the players asked me a question about rules that I answered, but I realized I used some logic that I don't remember where I heard it from. I used to play 3.5 a lot and lurk on the 3.5 forums on this site, and I thought I read somewhere that the priority for conflicting rulings in that edition was that "Specific beats Generic", or some similar saying. I.e. that if you have an overall rule, and then a more specific rule conflicts with that rule, the more specific rule takes priority over the generic ruling and should be followed. My questions about this are as follows:

1) Is this still a relevant ruling in 5e (if it ever was in 3.5, like I said my memory of where I read this is hazy at best).

2) If so, should I take this at face value or are there exceptions to this rule? Are there any common misconceptions about how to handle this rule that I should be aware of?

[Silly Name]

"Specific beats General" is still a valid approach, and how the rules are written. If the generic rules say you can't do a thing, but then you have a racial or class feature that says "you can do the thing", then you can indeed do the thing.

E.g., usually Dashing is an Action, but since Rogues have the Cunning Action class feature, they can Dash as a Bonus Action.

For "reference", you can check page 7 of the PHB, under the header "Specific Beats General"

[Unoriginal]

"Specific beats General" is still a valid approach, and how the rules are written. If the generic rules say you can't do a thing, but then you have a racial or class feature that says "you can do the thing", then you can indeed do the thing.

E.g., usually Dashing is an Action, but since Rogues have the Cunning Action class feature, they can Dash as a Bonus Action.

For "reference", you can check page 7 of the PHB, under the header "Specific Beats General"

This is 100% correct.

And if there are more than two rules interacting, then it's the most specific one that primes, followed by the second-most-specific one, etc until arriving to the most general one.

[Dalinar]

It is in the 5e PHB as mentioned by others, yeah. It's honestly so ingrained in the way I think about games personally that I find it odd it ever had to be spelled out in the first place. Obviously the specific rules have to take precedence if they contradict a more general rule, or otherwise there'd be barely any design space in a game at all. It'd be like saying Action Surge doesn't actually do anything because you can only take one action per turn. Ridiculous on its face, right? Maybe there's something I don't know.

I'm not clear on this, but I think I first heard "specific beats general" in the context of explaining how MTG worked when that game was new; did D&D inherit the phrase when WOTC acquired it and made 3e, or am I just wrong?

[Larstrong]

I'm not clear on this, but I think I first heard "specific beats general" in the context of explaining how MTG worked when that game was new; did D&D inherit the phrase when WOTC acquired it and made 3e, or am I just wrong?

I can only speculate but considering the way MTG is designed, from it's rules code seeming like legalese to it's creator being a mathematician, I would believe this. I think it fits for WotC's streamlining efforts with 3/3.5 and the D20 system bringing a sort of Object-Oriented vibe to DnD to also bring the phrase "Specific beats Generic" along with it.

[diplomancer]

When it's a feature against the general rules of the game, the decision is easy, but there isn't much guidance whether a spell takes precedence over a subclass feature, and so on.

[GeneralVryth]

1) Is this still a relevant ruling in 5e (if it ever was in 3.5, like I said my memory of where I read this is hazy at best).

2) If so, should I take this at face value or are there exceptions to this rule? Are there any common misconceptions about how to handle this rule that I should be aware of?

1. I certainly think specific over general usually applies, though I don't have a reference for it.

2. The general conceit from early in 5e was "Rulings over Rules". Or as I would prefer to say it, "Rules as Guidelines" (RAG). The "Rules as Written" (RAW), have places they are unclear, in conflict, and can result in illogical outcomes. So they are better treated as a set of guidelines to be changed/modified/overruled when they stop working correctly. The important thing is just to have a consistent logic to stick to when making rulings, that's what will keep things from seeming arbitrary.

[diplomancer]

If you want the specific rules reference, it's in the first chapter of the PHB, and goes like this:

Specific Beats General
This compendium contains rules that govern how the game plays. That said, many racial traits, class features, spells, magic items, monster abilities, and other game elements break the general rules in some way, creating an exception to how the rest of the game works. Remember this: If a specific rule contradicts a general rule, the specific rule wins.

Exceptions to the rules are often minor. For instance, many adventurers don’t have proficiency with longbows, but every wood elf does because of a racial trait. That trait creates a minor exception in the game. Other examples of rule-breaking are more conspicuous. For instance, an adventurer can’t normally pass through walls, but some spells make that possible. Magic accounts for most of the major exceptions to the rules.

[Psyren]

As others have mentioned, Specific Beats General is indeed part of 5e (in addition to the PHB citation, it's repeated multiple times throughout Sage Advice Compendium.)

Regarding the MTG comparison however, 5e is very much not designed to work like MTG does. MTG rules go beyond being rules to facilitate tabletop play; they're practically pseudocode, intended to remove all resolution ambiguity for a competitive tournament game. And it's understandable that D&D's roots go at least somewhat close to this model given that it too was, in the past, a tournament-style game - but 5e very much is not that, anymore.

[Chronos]

Quoth Psyren:

And it's understandable that D&D's roots go at least somewhat close to this model given that it too was, in the past, a tournament-style game - but 5e very much is not that, anymore.

I think that a number of issues with 5e stem from the fact that the designers were trying to bring the game back to its roots... but the designers didn't all agree on just what roots those were.

[KorvinStarmast]

For "reference", you can check page 7 of the PHB, under the header "Specific Beats General"

+1

This is 100% correct.

And if there are more than two rules interacting, then it's the most specific one that primes, followed by the second-most-specific one, etc until arriving to the most general one.

+2

I can only speculate but considering the way MTG is designed, from it's rules code seeming like legalese to it's creator being a mathematician, I would believe this. I think it fits for WotC's streamlining efforts with 3/3.5 and the D20 system bringing a sort of Object-Oriented vibe to DnD to also bring the phrase "Specific beats Generic" along with it.

Did you mean Specific beats General? MTG is a card game designed to separate whales from money. It is not a TTRPG.

2. The general conceit from early in 5e was "Rulings over Rules". Or as I would prefer to say it, "Rules as Guidelines" (RAG). The "Rules as Written" (RAW), have places they are unclear, in conflict, and can result in illogical outcomes. So they are better treated as a set of guidelines to be changed/modified/overruled when they stop working correctly.

Yes. What's in the book is where you start, not where you necessarily end up.

And it's understandable that D&D's roots go at least somewhat close to this model given that it too was, in the past, a tournament-style game - but 5e very much is not that, anymore.

Maybe it's WotC roots try to do that, but the AD&D attempt to make for better tournament/con/RPGA play was only partly realized, at best.

I think that a number of issues with 5e stem from the fact that the designers were trying to bring the game back to its roots... but the designers didn't all agree on just what roots those were.

We have a winner.

[Psyren]

Maybe it's WotC roots try to do that, but the AD&D attempt to make for better tournament/con/RPGA play was only partly realized, at best.

Oh I definitely agree, and would argue that the very nature of TTRPGs is in conflict with the ideal of highly objective / impartially adjudicable tournament-style games - because at some point you're going to run into a situation the rules don't cover. I was just pointing out that 5e more consciously leaned away from that philosophy than any of its table-lookup-laden predecessors.