House rules are great

PleasantKenobi published a clickbaity video titled “House Rules Don’t Work For Magic” in which he argues that people should not do house rules. It’s clickbaity because in the video he lists some house rules that he actually likes. More about that later. I commented on the video with “My hot take on house rules: if you don't like them, don't use them.” I wanted to expand on my thoughts and comment on a bunch of points he made in his video. House rules in tabletop gaming Let’s start by talking about house rules in tabletop games in general and then touch on the topic of Magic. House rule is a rule that’s not part of the official rules of a game but that a group playing a game has agreed to introduce — usually to increase their enjoyment of the game. Some games, like UNO, are taught through tradition and are so riddled with house rules that you usually need to have a discussion every time before you start playing to make sure everyone’s on the same page with how the game works this time.…