Every action deserves an equal and meaningful reaction. This is what makes our game worlds interesting to play within: we can change them, and we can gain a sense of mastery in knowing how to change the world.

Except when the consequences arbitrarily change.

We’ve all seen this in varying forms. From fudged die rolls that change an outcome to insurmountable obstacles funnelling PCs towards The Plot, removing and rearranging the world because it’s easier than letting natural consequences isn’t great. Removing consequences is a result of bad world building (and encounter building), for a few reasons.

Uneven Stakes Reeks of Favouritism

Few things suck quite like favouritism. The fastest way to break trust is to break impartiality.

Ultimately, this goes both ways: the favouritism going in or against the PC’s favour doesn’t matter. If NPCs die easier than PCs, then the world begins to revolve around the PCs. Naturally, players will start treating other people in the world less like people and more like… walking plot devices. Empathy is the cornerstone of interesting role-play, and making some people less than others will naturally damage capacity for empathy.

If NPCs are more protected than PCs (looking at you, GMPC)), PCs will resent them. Almost certainly, the PCs will eventually try to even things out by injuring, stealing, or sabotaging the NPC recipients of favouritism, distracting from the plot of the game and generally getting a bit nasty.

GMs should be fans of their players’ characters. But the best way to be a fan of your players is to give them meaningful, equal consequences.

Less Comprehendible World

If rules can be altered to save (or kill) a character, then those rules hold less weight. The physics of the world can be changed based on fiat, which means the world is less real.

Besides disempowering players, the game world becomes less comprehendible. The amount of knowledge or understanding a given player can have of the world will always have a margin of error equal to the amount of fiat power the GM chooses to hold. In turn, this means the amount of planning or strategy a player can use to interact with the game will be limited by this same margin.

If you want to encourage players to come up with clever solutions, you must minimise this margin of fiat as much as possible. Otherwise, you’re going to get Murder Hobos, because consequences are arbitrary and planning is meaningless.

Harder to Play

Uneven consequences ultimately makes the game harder to play. Players start worrying about out-of-character factors and begin meta-gaming rather than playing. Politics enters the game, and the table vibe suffers. Flow-state is harder to hit because the mental model of the game is too complex and too easily changed based on factors outside of the primary actor’s control.

If changes need to happen, make them everywhere. Think through what needs to change and update the rules and setting to reflect the changes.