Rules don't need to make sense

You're playing your weekly session when Larry starts complaining again.  "I just don't think the crafting rules make any sense, that's not how it works." You see, Larry recently took up blacksmithing, so he has real world experience with crafting weapons and armor.  Larry knows the rules don't mimic the process he's being taught, and he wants to change the rules to mirror reality.  As Larry drones on and on about hammers, anvils, and forges you realize something. The heck of it is he's right, but it doesn't matter.  At all.

roll to heat to exactly 858 degrees...

With all the talk I have been doing lately about the rules, I think it's important to outline some of the structures that make good rules.  It'd be helpful to point out, in my approximation, past failures of game systems, and how to fix them.  Without further ado;

1) Rules should be Intuitive.

This is why THAC0 was such a failure in overall design.  I mean feel free to like their system, or even love THAC0 yourself, but if you do love these things I'm going to hand you a battered gamers pamphlet, with all the local shelters listed, in case a "friend" needs it.

For those of you not familiar, THAC0 stood for ToHitArmorClass0 and was the primary mechanic by which 2nd edition Advanced Dungeons and Dragons.  The lower your THAC0 the better you were at combat.  Which is counter intuitive. Bigger is better, right?  Not for THAC0.  So, as a new player, you're probably going to mess this up a lot.

I'm sure your bonus to hit is "adequate"

Intuitive rules are easier to memorize. Your brain recognizes the information as making sense.  Maybe you have lots of space in your brain to throw away because you never bother to memorize anything else, or have a massive amount of storage, but the rest of us would rather use that space for other things.  Which leads me to my next point.

2) Rules should be simple

Simple rules are easy to remember.  If you remember the rules you're less likely to make a mistake, and less likely to stop to have to look up rules.  You're also less likely, as the GM, to make a ruling that contradicts the rules, disrupting the game.  Any time spent fiddling with the rules, while you should be playing, is a waste of valuable game time.

There is a balance between simplicity and player agency.  More complex rules can give a player an idea of how to play.  Explicit rules help shape gameplay in the same way that ingrained flavor can give a player a place to start with his character concept.  A good example of this is when we compare Cortex plus heroic and Pathfinder.  Pathfinder has explicit rules for almost anything.  You want to build a settlement, they got that.  Want rules on friendships and bonds, got that too.  With all the material Paizo puts out each month gives players lots of ideas on what to do.  Some GM's may rule against certain supplements, but they exist as a reference point for many games.

Cortex Plus Heroic, on the other hand, has only a few rules.  Most of the players handbook has to do with how to make your character.  You describe your actions, then pick the stats that match and roll it all up, pick out your best dice, and away you go. While I've never had to stop to look up rules to Cortex Plus Heroic the system really isn't set up for anything except combat(social, mental, or physical).  There aren't rules for a lot of things, and I've seen new players flounder because they're not sure what to do.  The most common question is "what do I do?" and the answer is "whatever makes sense."  Which makes us sound like sarcastic ass hats.

dammit, no more dad jokes

The problem here is that the player is often informed by the game system of the actions they may take.  These actions often fall into fairly discrete categories.  I swing my sword, shoot my bow, or chop with my ax.  In this version of cortex heroic, this just isn't so.  I leap into the air and fire my eye beams could include a plethora of mechanics that then could do various types of damage.  I could use the eye beams to scare my opponent, or I could hit them to damage them.  Does my super leaping help in this endeavor?  It very well could if you're trying to scare your opponent, but really doesn't help in damaging him.  It turns out that a simplicity of rules often translates into a complexity of action.

The rules should, then, be reasonably simple.  While I don't advocate going full larp, I would say needlessly complex rules are... needless?  How complex or simple will vary from group to group, and is something for you and yours to settle on.

3) Reality is Complex

Reality is far too complex.  I mean some things are simple, like the velocity of a free falling object (about 32 feet/second^2).  Other than that things get pretty hairy pretty quick.  Like those silly butterfly's causing hurricanes(chaos theory).  Look at any combat system.  If you have any experience in any martial art you know they aren't accurate.  They were never meant to be, and don't need to be accurate.  It's often best if they abandon that idea altogether.

this is simple, right?

For example, often enough there is a news story of someone getting stabbed upwards of 100 times.  Do you know any good systems that support low-level characters being stabbed hundreds of times?  I don't.  In fact in Dungeons and Dragons attacks do a minimum of 1 point of nonlethal damage.  Once you accrue an amount of nonlethal damage equal to your hit points you start taking lethal damage.  This essentially means that that nonlethal damage is about half a point of damage.  Even with this adjustment I can't think where a low-level character can absorb that much damage and survive.

It's much easier to assign some hit point value, an ac, and a to hit bonus.  We encapsulate and simulate most of the complex combat variables in this system.  Sure it doesn't match up one to one, but we don't need it to.  It's a game, not a reality simulation.

Conclusion

I want you to make better games

If we accept that rules need to be simple as possible and intuitive we realize that we can't have them mimic reality accurately.  Reality is comfortable, it's what we're used to, so rules should remind us of reality.  I can't tell you what system to play, or where the balance should lie. what I can tell you is you shouldn't add needless complexity to your game. This might occur through homebrew rules, third party supplements, or even core sources if they fail to enhance your game.

As always
Keep those games rolling
The game mechanic