There is an interesting balance in RPGs that I think is overlooked. In a recent game, the party found themselves in a jam without a spell that could have helped them out. The party magic-user had the spell in her repertoire, but had not memorized it

There was a lot of moaning and complaining about that. “But I HAVE that spell, and it would be PERFECT for this, can’t we just say I memorized THAT spell instead?” There is a tendency in RPGs to think to yourself, “Well, why can’t they just have the right spell?”

I resist those tendencies when they come up, and no, it’s not because I want to run an “elite level” game, or punish the players, or anything like that. It’s because the yin is always matched by the yang. So yes, there are going to be times when you don’t have what you need

And that sucks. Times when you are going to have to travel to get to your destination (“why can’t we hand wave this”), times when you don’t have the right spell, times when you forget to do something important (“can’t we just say we did that!”), etc, etc, etc.

However, there are also going to be times when you happen to have exactly the right spell available, and as a result you get to shortcut the difficulty of the adventure. In my most recent game, the party priest happened to have detect evil available. Now, just for context…

This is a very rarely used spell in my game. Still, the priest had it, and using it he navigated the dungeon directly to their goal, avoiding a lot of dangerous encounters and saving them time. They skipped about ½ the dungeon due to having this spell. It made it MUCH easier.

The thing is, I don’t interfere in either situation. If the party doesn’t have what they need, tough luck. If they have what they need and it makes the dungeon a cakewalk (or much easier), then tough luck for the ref! But I have seen people suggest you SHOULD intervene..

... in situations like this, do something to allow them to circumvent that obstacle, or nerf their spell that allows them to circumvent your challenge, all in the name of “story”. Interestingly, this does two things. One, if you have a bias as a ref (you want it hard, or easy)

Then this just magnifies your biases. Then the game becomes ALL ABOUT THE REF, and the ref’s preferred style of play. I don’t want that, I want the game to be about the players and their choices, about the consequences of their decisions. I find this make the game…

… more immersive and “real”, and it gives them a greater sense of achievement. There is always temptation to jump in, particularly when it seems “too hard” or “too easy”. My advice is this: let it roll, and let them reap their rewards or suffer their consequences.

It also puts a huge burden on the ref to "manage" the game, to make sure it isn't too hard or too easy by micromanaging the party's actions, rather than letting them play out. No thanks. I don't want to have to figure out what the "story" is to control my game

I want to let the PCs interact with the world, and the "story" emerges from that, it doesn't inform what I do except in the sense that the PCs actions have consequences that I have to determine. Sometimes that makes it easy, sometimes hard, but always engaging