Campaign Settings and DM Strictures, the POLL

Mort · Dec 5, 2018

Eltab said:
....
It is a problem waiting to blow up in your face if you have "unwritten rules" that the players and their characters will only discover by transgressing them.
For instance, if you dangle a little girl in distress in front of them and expect the PCs to drop everything to help her find her lost kitty, and punish them if they continue with their Important Mission, your game will break down as the players begin playing defense to protect their characters, and playing offense against you - instead of working with you to create an entertaining story.

This seems to be a different issue?

1. "unwritten" rules are bad (I can't even think of any exceptions at the moment) - the players should know the rules of the game before the game starts. If a known rule rule proves problematic the DM should initiate a discussion as to what the problem is and change the rule if necessary.

2. The above example seems to be a narrative issue rather than a mechanics one. An issue where the DM wants his campaign to go in a certain direction, and only that direction,- but didn't bother telling the players. This is also bad because the player and DM have different expectations. Punishing the players for expectations they don't even know about makes no sense! But it's different than the OP scenario because the DM isn't changing the rules on the players - he's enforcing rules he never disclosed - something that I just can't think could ever be a good idea - certainly not in 5e!

Jester David · Dec 5, 2018

lluewhyn said:
Anyone wanting to play a kender in any game of mine, even it was Dragonlance, would find that character dying in a fire. Exponentially more disruptive than the average evil character. Ok character for a novel, trash concept for a cooperative gaming experience.

On a more serious tone, I voted 5 myself. I'm happy to work with most character concepts and tend to run more episodic games, but I reserve the right to enforce changes for game balance, whether it be for rules or role-playing reasons, and my players understand that. Usually it's by lifting someone up rather than nerfing someone down, but exceptions could occur. I have one of my long-time players who still today talks about his 3.5 Sorcerer "accidentally" failing a save (he could have done something to mitigate it, but chose not to) because he felt that his character was vastly overshadowing everyone else at the table.

If someone wants to play something questionable, but can pitch it to me how it won't be a disruption to the other players, I'm usually keen on going with it (although you'd have to make a really good pitch to persuade me to let you play a Kender).

I think there are two big problems with kender.
The first is that one of the most beloved characters in Dragonlance was a kender and presented as the archetype, so many people want to just play another Tasselhof.
The second is that so few people remember what it's like to be young children.

Kender are presented as eternal children with limited knowledge of property ownership.
However, most people think of children as innocent and guileless. They forget that children are basically born as amoral jackholes who are incredibly sociopathic and self centered.
Most kender can and should be dark. Children from fractured fairy tales.

Laurefindel · Dec 5, 2018

A jerk DM will be a jerk DM no matter what amount of restriction he/she imposes on players. I believe this is also true about a good DM.

I don't think imposing restrictions on a theme, or ignoring/altering/ban any elements of the game automatically makes you a jerk, or a good DM for that matter.

hawkeyefan · Dec 5, 2018

Jester David said:
Is the player dying? Like, do they have a terminal illness?
If "yes", then, yeah, they should probably be allowed to play a tiefling.
If "no", then they can make another PC. There's an infinite number of ideas for characters. I'm sure they can find one that doesn't suck if they think hard enough.

Counting one-shots but excluding the pre-gens, I've played maybe twenty characters in D&D/Pathfinder games. (I'm mostly a DM). Possibly more.
However, for every single character I made, there's two or three ideas I had prior to settling on a concept. Or back-up characters I had planned in case of an untimely death. If I sat down long enough, I could probably list off thirty or fourty characters that never made it beyond the planning state, or only existed as sketched out builds on looseleaf.
In one instance, the character I initially had for 4th Edition to play in Living Forgotten Realms wasn't used in 2008, as LFR never took off in my area and I wasn't a 4e fan. And I wasn't able to use that concept until I needed a character for a one-shot this summer, ten years later. And the character was still fun and recognisable.

If the character concept is solid, it will keep and still be fun in a month or a year or a decade.

I don't think character creation comes as easily to everyone. Or at least, creating a character they're truly invested in. I have a player who I've been playing with for decades. I can't tell you how many characters he's played. But I can tell you exactly how many characters he's played that he cared about a lot.

What I want as a DM is for players to care about every character they play in one of my games, and to care about them a lot.

Jester David said:
I don't disagree.

But what if it will have the impact?

What if the concept of the setting is, oh, the world is planarly locked and extraplanar beings (genies, devils, demons, angels) can't cross over, you can't travel to other planes, and even the spirits of the dead cannot leave causing undead to be a plague.
A half-demon tiefling is going to be an oddity. As would the genasi, aasimar, and gith.

As others have said, had the DM explained the setting beforehand, and the player comes with a tiefling, that shows a staggering disrespect for the DM. They're advertising that they either did not read the campaign doc, or flagrantly chose to ignore it.
That's going to make me question their willingness to abide by other social contracts at the table and if they're going to be a disruptive influence. If they're not going to listen when I explain the setting, are they going to listen when I make a ruling? Or if someone asks them not to say or do something.

I'd look at the example and see if we couldn't come up with something that makes the idea work. Maybe the planes were locked long ago, but not before there was a bit of crossover and a tiefling bloodline was established? Maybe you remove the infernal connection and the tiefling is actually just a race that has horns the way elves have pointy ears. Maybe the tiefling is some kind of construct or experiment by a mad mage. None of these seem to be so counter to the campaign concept as to have it come crashing down. The DM and the player can talk it out and hopefully find some common ground.

If there's absolutely no way to reconcile the two things, then I'd likely see how the other players wanted to handle it. If at that point there was still no decision, then I'm honestly not sure....I suppose it would depend on how badly the setting truly was disrupted by the player choice. I'd lean toward "not as much as I may think" and to let the player play what they'd like, but I wouldn't say I'd always make that call.

Jester David said:
Being a diva about a character option, when there's literally a dozen other choices, is a giant red flag about a player.

Being a diva about a setting element, when there's literally hundreds of other choices, is a giant red flag about a DM.

hawkeyefan · Dec 5, 2018

Jester David said:
I'm at the stage of my DMing life where I no longer care about working in some BS race crammed into a splatbook by the publisher or accommodating the latest subclasses.
Where I want more from my fantasy setting than being some generic kitchen sink Forgotten Realms knockoff that was pretty forgettable in the late '80s.

This seems to me to really say that it's more about preference than anything, and the setting is just the means to justify the preference. You don't want to deal with BS races or subclasses, so you create a setting that doesn't allow them.

Again, all fine if everyone's onboard and things are worked out ahead of time, but I just wanted to point this out.

Jester David · Dec 5, 2018

hawkeyefan said:
I don't think character creation comes as easily to everyone. Or at least, creating a character they're truly invested in. I have a player who I've been playing with for decades. I can't tell you how many characters he's played. But I can tell you exactly how many characters he's played that he cared about a lot.

What I want as a DM is for players to care about every character they play in one of my games, and to care about them a lot.

In my experience, what makes a player care about a character is time played and the memorability of the campaign.

Few people strongly care about a character they have never played and is just a concept.

hawkeyefan said:
I'd look at the example and see if we couldn't come up with something that makes the idea work. Maybe the planes were locked long ago, but not before there was a bit of crossover and a tiefling bloodline was established? Maybe you remove the infernal connection and the tiefling is actually just a race that has horns the way elves have pointy ears. Maybe the tiefling is some kind of construct or experiment by a mad mage. None of these seem to be so counter to the campaign concept as to have it come crashing down. The DM and the player can talk it out and hopefully find some common ground.

If there's absolutely no way to reconcile the two things, then I'd likely see how the other players wanted to handle it. If at that point there was still no decision, then I'm honestly not sure....I suppose it would depend on how badly the setting truly was disrupted by the player choice. I'd lean toward "not as much as I may think" and to let the player play what they'd like, but I wouldn't say I'd always make that call.

So the DM should just acquiesce to whatever demands a player wants?

Dragonborn paladins in Middle Earth?
Ravnica elephant men in Dark Sun?
Free access to any and all 3rd party material?

Jester David · Dec 5, 2018

hawkeyefan said:
This seems to me to really say that it's more about preference than anything, and the setting is just the means to justify the preference. You don't want to deal with BS races or subclasses, so you create a setting that doesn't allow them.

Again, all fine if everyone's onboard and things are worked out ahead of time, but I just wanted to point this out.

Not really.
I just care about having a world that makes sense without having dozens of random humanoid pop up in every single valley, with unsustainably small population numbers. To have species that have a role and place in the world and it’s history and actually matter, rather than just being there. Just appearing as some bolted on species lacking culture or relevance.
I care about making a better campaign setting and world than one I farted out in high school that just mashed everything together without rhyme or reason.

ccs · Dec 5, 2018

aco175 said:
I'm saying that you should at least think about it and try to allow it. If I say no because when I created my world in 2e days they were not around and now I cannot figure out a way to allow it, then I'm not doing my job. There are things you may need to exclude which is fine, but when a player wants to do something you should try to work with him.

1st: You need to go back & read my general reply in post #27.

2nd: I don't have to work with a player concerning things I don't like. They have to accept that if they want to play in a game I DM, then xyz aren't options.
I've used this example before, but I'll repeat it again here.
Psionics. I've never liked psionics in D&D. Not in 1e, 2e, 3x, PF, 4e, 3rd party... I'm sure 5e won't change my mind. Not their flavor nor their rules. So in my games there are simply no psionics. Period. End of discussion. Not even in settings like DS where you'd expect them. And I don't care what your opinion of psionics is. If you're dead set on playing a psionic then you need a seat at some one elses table.
You'll know this before you make a character.

aco175 said:
I guess I kind of figure that the DM has so much to do and create with so much free reign, that character creation should be where players can have free reign.

Absolutely. You can make whatever you like - as long as what you're making falls into the parameters of what someone's willing to DM for.

Azzy · Dec 5, 2018

hawkeyefan said:
Being a diva about a setting element, when there's literally hundreds of other choices, is a giant red flag about a DM.

Wow. You're really going there. Conversely, that can be rewritten as:

Having entitlement issues about playing a specific character type that the DM has restricted, when there's literally hundreds of other choices, is a giant red flag about a player.

hawkeyefan · Dec 5, 2018

Azzy said:
Wow. You're really going there. Conversely, that can be rewritten as:

Having entitlement issues about playing a specific character type that the DM has restricted, when there's literally hundreds of other choices, is a giant red flag about a player.

Yeah, that was already said. I was replying to explain that it goes both ways.