D&D 5E We Would Hate A BG3 Campaign

[Neonchameleon]

no, I said nothing about that part. Why is it that the ‘DMs are evil tyrants’ side always have to twist words, is that just coincidence…

Because it was in the part you quoted and was unchallenged. It was an exact mirror of what you were saying. Not twisting words.

If restricting races is not restricting what someone does then everyone should be able to do it. Why is it that the "DMs are God and should use their power however they want" side never actually likes looking in a mirror?

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

"This attitude" is coming from a near perma-DM. So I'm being selfish because I want to engage the players in the world and let them play what they want? How does this work?

And yet by treating players like adults and empowering them I've found that consistently when they have picked something I hadn't forseen it has been because, like the Tiefling example in a religious campaign, they've found a way of enhancing the themes I'd set up. Meanwhile every single time I've seen a DM try to keep a tight grip on things like races they've been precious about the rest of the setting leading to a much less fun campaign. I even used to do this myself when I started DMing.

Meanwhile I have learned from experience that players, good and bad alike will look at what you point at as DM.

• When you explicitly restrict races that is the strongest signal you're sending. And will immediately draw attention.
• When you don't the strongest signal you send is the pitch, so everyone is going to try to create characters based on the pitch
• Players who are used to over-controlling DMs who are allowed to go wild will for the first character after. But this lasts one character

Which means I ban basically two types of characters. Brooding loners who don't want to join with others, and characters brought in from other campaigns. And this works at an open table for all levels of experience.

When/what/how are they doing this? Like I've said I've almost never seen a player pitch something that wasn't inspired by what I laid out for them. But a ban list is an attention grabbing part of the pitch. (Incidently telling people what not to do is considered bad teaching for the same reason). Meanwhile the people that don't fit are both good adventurer fodder and working out what happens to them adds depth to the worldbuilding.

You mean you don't work characters into the game world?

So apparently now the players didn't actually accept the "rules of the game world". They are chafing at them. It sounds as if you're having to use a lot of brute force for your pitch.

My view is this; as a DM, making a request that people don't do things is rude and treating them like children. It both speaks to poor DM skills and an unwillingless to allow player agency. And I say this as a near-perma DM.

You seem to be misinterpreting the premise of 'one player exerting undue influence' as 'one DM exerting undue influence'. If you could go back and rewrite this post with that clarification in mind...

 

[Charlaquin]

It was a thing in 4E. Was it a common house rule before then? It's a good house rule (inasmuch as it makes using potions actually viable... a bit damaging to verisimilitude for some, but I see them as being tiny vials, not these Big Gulp 7/11 type of things), so I'm not surprised that it's widespread. It could be that a 4E gamer propagated it to a 3E/Pathfinder/whatever game and it spread from there I suppose.

Probably that has happened at some point. Probably some people have been using a similar house rule since before 4e. Probably some people saw it on Critical Role. Probably some people who have only ever played 5e came up with it on their own. The idea that there’s one source for a common house rule is kind of absurd to me. As if people can’t independently think “I’d like it if you could use a potion and attack on the same turn, so I’m going to house rule that you can.”

 

[ezo]

The players' desires don't always have to be accommodated - but where they aren't then something has failed. If it's on balance grounds then the designers have failed. (Twilight Clerics being the main 5e example). If it is to fit the tone and theme and the DM has been clear then the DM should then reflect on why their pitch and communication has failed and where they could have done better.

It isn't a "failure" necessarily (although it certainly CAN be!). More often than not IME it is just a difference in opinion and/or play style --- which is certainly not a "failure" IMO.

 

[Oofta]

Perhaps, to you, it is.

To me it is not. It significantly influences my experience of every event to come after, in much the same way that class and ability scores do. Hence why I care so much about all three things. They are both soil and seed. How the plant itself actually grows, of course, will depend on the actual campaign, as it should. But to tell me that it makes no difference whether I plant a rose or a daffodil is silly at best.


I genuinely have no idea what you're saying here.


As I have said elsewhere, I tried. For over a year. Slowly, slowly loosening my expectations until it became "literally anything, even 5e, that actually offers something vaguely like the kind of game I might enjoy." I came up empty. If I am bitter, it is because I literally cannot find games that offer what I'm looking for. Despite constant, weekly or even daily effort.


It is the "ideally" here that ruins it for me--and the "if neither one is willing to compromise, then I tend to side with the DM." You are giving the DM carte blanche to refuse to compromise, which means you expect players to capitulate. It is a nice thing, an ideal, a pleasant notion if that doesn't happen. But if it does? You give the DM license to ignore compromise as much as they like.

Nobody should get such license. Not players, and not DMs. Nobody. It's not merely a faraway ideal to be dreamed of.


Perhaps not. But I genuinely did not mean to twist your words. It genuinely--as I have just quoted above--came across as indicating that compromise really is only for players, and that it's a pipe dream to expect it from DMs. I am absolutely, completely sincere when I say I believed you meant that it is an unachievable ideal, and thus players necessarily must always capitulate.

I don't have a problem with you having different preferences than I do. I assume we all have lines we won't cross. What I disagree with is this demonization of any DM that limits races. It's a game. One with a shared fiction that impacts everyone at the table. We are always limiting what we can or cannot do. I can't play a Kryptonian and expect to have an effectively unlimited strength, the ability to fly, shoot laser beams out of my eyes or be invulnerable to virtually all damage.

So if every* game of D&D has limitations, if a game has limitations that would make the game unfun for me I simply won't play that game. I'm not going to call the DM a control freak.

*And yes, italics are awesome!

 

[mamba]

It is the "ideally" here that ruins it for me--and the "if neither one is willing to compromise, then I tend to side with the DM." You are giving the DM carte blanche to refuse to compromise

I am giving everyone carte blanche to not compromise… the DM cannot force the player to compromise, and vice versa.

Ideally both sides would, as I wrote. If one side absolutely refuses and the other gives in to avoid blowing the whole thing up, fine. If the whole thing blows up because neither one does, also fine.

As to siding with the DM, for one that means I will not blow it up if the DM does not compromise, and for another that to me the DM has the right to not compromise. That is a far cry from expecting the DM to never compromise and the players always capitulate that you try to turn this into.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

It is the "ideally" here that ruins it for me--and the "if neither one is willing to compromise, then I tend to side with the DM." You are giving the DM carte blanche to refuse to compromise, which means you expect players to capitulate. It is a nice thing, an ideal, a pleasant notion if that doesn't happen. But if it does? You give the DM license to ignore compromise as much as they like.

Nobody should get such license. Not players, and not DMs. Nobody. It's not merely a faraway ideal to be dreamed of.

I literally do not understand how else you imagine this working? As no one is forced to play in or run a a game they don't want to, how on Earth every participant doesn't have the ability to reject a compromise they don't like? The only way the GM has more power in this situation, is that they can probably still run their game if one person refuses to participate, though if several or all do, then they don't have game either. But that is just simple maths of the game requiring one GM and several players, so there is not getting around of that.

 

[Ulorian - Agent of Chaos]

Probably that has happened at some point. Probably some people have been using a similar house rule since before 4e. Probably some people saw it on Critical Role. Probably some people who have only ever played 5e came up with it on their own. The idea that there’s one source for a common house rule is kind of absurd to me. As if people can’t independently think “I’d like it if you could use a potion and attack on the same turn, so I’m going to house rule that you can.”

Yeah, it's pretty obviously a good rule. That increases the probability that it's got multiple vectors into the modern zeitgeist (sorry, I'm super into italics atm).

 

[EzekielRaiden]

That is a situation that can and often happens. There's a big difference between the scenario you described and what's being outlined here though. You're talking about the DM having a singular view that's objectionable to the entire table. The discussion here is about a single player creating a situation potentially disruptive to the rest of the table.

@EzekielRaiden and @Neonchameleon ... thoughts on this? How does this line up with what you're saying?

What they said squares pretty well with my perspective, though your summary is somewhat biased. That is, @Mustrum_Ridcully makes clear that advocating for one's preferences is not "selfish" for any participant, DM or player alike. As they said, "That isn't a disrespect or selfishness. DMs and players like what you like, and if they want to play together, they are going to have to find common ground. Maybe sometimes DM and player interests are too far apart, but I think most of the time they can work something out."

Framing it as "one disruptive player, everyone else totally fine" or "DM disruptive, every other player against them" is needless. It's just different people advocating for their interests. That isn't disrespectful nor selfish--indeed, it very often comes from a place of wanting to have fun alongside everyone else.

I fundamentally disagree that it is all that common for player and DM preferences to be that far apart. As a GM, I have found that in nearly all cases--all but one or two exceptions in several years of GMing--it is eminently possible to drill down, find what the player truly values, and make that happen in a way that all parties enthusiastically support. And the only exceptions I can think of came from players who were, as I have said previously, being abusive, coercive, or exploitative, hence why I call those things out.

Because the input a player provides CAN be accepted by the DM, since I wrote the DM might or might not accept it.

If the DM agrees, everyone is happy. If the DM doesn't, then the player has to put up or shut up.

So...I honestly can't tell if you're trolling or not here. But you do realize that that's literally not actually anything, right? You're literally saying that the player gets only whatever the DM doles out to them. You haven't disputed any part of what I said.

Like everything in D&D, the DM makes the final decision on all things. Personally, most DMs IME only "drop the hammer" if it is something vital to their game world or style of play--otherwise they go with the flow or offer things up to a vote of the table (and break ties if necessary).

Whereas I find--based on the testimony of people on this very forum, including participants in this very thread--that they drop the hammer frequently and for light and transient reasons, often little better than whim.

As to siding with the DM, for one that means I will not blow it up if the DM does not compromise, and for another that to me the DM has the right to not compromise. That is a far cry from expecting the DM to never compromise and the players always capitulate that you try to turn this into.

....if the DM has the right to never compromise, then you are explicitly saying that the player has the duty to always capitulate. That is the nature of rights--every right has an equal and opposite duty. And yes, I consider "leave the game" a form of capitulation.

I literally do not understand how else you imagine this working? As no one is forced to play in or run a a game they don't want to, how on Earth every participant doesn't have the ability to reject a compromise they don't like? The only way the GM has more power in this situation, is that they can probably still run their game if one person refuses to participate, though if several or all do, then they don't have game either. But that is just simple maths of the game requiring one GM and several players, so there is not getting around of that.

The thread at large has made quite clear that they expect players to meekly accept whatever DMs hand down to them.

 

[mamba]

The DM does not need to - but every time the DM feels they are required to reject something that someone requests and that the basic rules would allow then that is a failure by the DM.

I disagree, just because something is in one book and not another means absolutely nothing