D&D 5E What Races (classes) do you allow or disallow in your campaign?

[Ninja-radish]

"And on this week's episode of "Grognards Ruin Everything" we're discussing D&D classes and races". Seriously, why is every thread started by a Grog about crapping all over other people's fun? Is the idea that someone else out there might be having fun doing things differently than you really so frightening?

There are already a thousand OSR games catering to you, let the rest of us have something nice for a change.

 

[hastur_nz]

I've run all sorts of different campaigns, in all editions, and I always just let the Players choose whatever they like from the edition we are playing; same goes for a fellow DM who runs a game I'm in. The outline of the campaign is clear before we start, so it's up to each player to make sure things "make sense". Limiting people's choices might seem like a good idea to some DM's, but in my experience it's actually a bad idea. So for example...

A player in my Curse of Strahd campaign wanted to be a Gnome with Green Hair, so I helped tweak it so that while functionally she was a gnome it turned out she was an ex-resident who on returning eventually found out she was the mutant offspring of a beserker and a shape-changed druid. Another player wanted to be a Goliath, kind of like an Ogre, so we made him the 'boogy-man from the woods', who was compelled to try and be Good by a magical sword he found, and hence got a reputation with the locals as being kinda nice. In both cases, the player got the mechanics they wanted, and together we made a fun back-story that also had relevance to the ongoing campaign.

A fellow player in a Out of the Abyss meets Planescape plays a Dragonborn, which is totally not Munchkin BTW, and the campaign has always included all sorts of weird stuff so a draconic PC isn't terribly out of place. I recently swapped my Human PC Fighter for an Aasimar Warlock, simply because the race fitted the concept I had in mind the best (Hexblade i.e. fighter-type with a bad attitude).

Personally, as a player I find DM's who impose all kinds of restrictions on their players, actually end up adding nothing to the game's fun factor, and very little added "immersion". In return, they often risk causing a lack of imagination and/or outright resentment from people that feel they want to try something different for a change but can't - after all, it's Fantasy, and everyone's definition of what that is differs, so conforming to only one person's view of what is and isn't Fantasy, is quite blinkered.

So to anyone who feels the need to impose all kinds of restrictions on their players, I simply say "are you sure?", then, "why", and "are you sure?" one more time.

 

[cbwjm]

"And on this week's episode of "Grognards Ruin Everything" we're discussing D&D classes and races". Seriously, why is every thread started by a Grog about crapping all over other people's fun? Is the idea that someone else out there might be having fun doing things differently than you really so frightening?

There are already a thousand OSR games catering to you, let the rest of us have something nice for a change.

Calm down, dude. Unless you are in his game, you still get to have all the nice things in 5e.

 

[MechaPilot]

Calm down, dude. Unless you are in his game, you still get to have all the nice things in 5e.

Agreed.

Lord knows I probably wouldn't enjoy playing in the OP's game (just as I'm sure he probably wouldn't like playing in mine), but then I don't have to. And, as long as the OP informs his players of what he allows and doesn't allow beforehand (which I have no reason to assume he doesn't) then everyone can make informed decisions about playing or not playing as they please.

 

[Zardnaar]

In response to the original post, how exactly are Dragonborn a munchkin's wet dream?? They are universally thought to be mechanically the worst race in the game by a wide margin.

Fire breathing Dragonman even if mechanically weak is still a fire breathing Dragonman.

If you have not played modern D&D anything much more monstrous than a Half Orc tends to be looked at suspiciously. 2E did not even have half orcs in the PHB.

I had Tieflings, Drow, and Dragonborn banned but kind of allow them so anything in the PHB is fine, I might run a more restrive game later on with a theme.

Those races are still de facto banned as the players are not picking them. Dragonborn is out right weak, Tiefling a bit niche and Drow don't fit the traditional Drow thing (to weak for starters).

 

[guachi]

In my campaigns I allow humans (variant) only as races. I can be talked into allowing an Atlantean.

I was thinking of running a campaign where everyone gets a feat at level one. PCs would use the point buy rules from the PF SRD and be given 11 points. That's the closest equivalent I could get to a variant human.

No matter your race, you get 11 points as described in the SRD for your stats, one feat, one skill proficiency, and whatever your normal racial attribute bonuses are (so +1 to all for humans). Though I did add the ability for any PC to take one +1 from any stat that gets a +2 and add that +1 to any other stat, with a maximum bonus of +2. So an elf could take one + from dexterity and add it to strength instead. Humans can take a +1 from one stat and add it to any other stat for one +2, four +1, and one +0.

It makes humans a little more appealing and it opens up basically any class to any race if they want and not have to be stereotyped.

 

[Ath-kethin]

I was thinking of running a campaign where everyone gets a feat at level one. PCs would use the point buy rules from the PF SRD and be given 11 points. That's the closest equivalent I could get to a variant human.

I don't like point buy. I find it leads to either decision paralysis or munchkinism and often both. I do standard array +2; that is to say, everybody gets 2 points to distribute as they wish on top of any racial modifiers. That gives everybody even footing, minimizes whining, and does everything faster - especially for newer players.

Many people make a lot of noise about MOAR OPTIONS MOAR FLEXIBILITY but in almost 30 years of gaming I've yet to see any situation where a kitchen sink approach brings more to a setting's identity and feel than selective limitations do.

I understand that the sense of identity I seek (and any players who joined my groups seek) are not the same as those preferred by many. That's fine. Everybody joining my campaign knows ahead of time what the options will be, and every single person who has played at my table has said my campaigns were their favorite they'd played in.

It may not work for everybody, but it works for us.

 

[Ilbranteloth]

Howdy-

As preface, I am an old school 1E grognard that still has not shaken those particular habits off of my current 5E games. I also really like how 5E really has much in common with 1E, ease of character generation and a good system in general. I tried to get back into 3,5 earlier this year, but it was just a bit much to really DM. Skipped over 4E since it was not D&D, only in name.

So with that said, as an old grog, I really do not like the way some races and classes are presented in D&D, thankfully I can nix certain races and classes without effecting the system in general. So here is a list of what I disallow in my campaigns and why:

Dragonborne- Really? A munchkin gamers wet dream race come true, and a DM's nightmare on how to handle such a race in their campaigns. These are monsters after all, not heroic core race types.

Tiefling- Gee, really? really? Why on gawds green earth would a demonic creature such as tiefling want to be among-st the prime plane rabble? Another Munchkin gamers dream race come true lol.

Warlock- OMG shades of WoW lol! I nixed this class right off the bat, pacts just do not jive with my campaigns personally and seems better suited as a class for villainous NPC's.

Paladin- I did not nix this class but went old school. The artwork in the PHB for the pally is so wrong on so many levels lol. So what I did do with this class was just make it for Humans only, Lawfull Good and Oathbreakers are N/A.

Do I use the optional stuff from UA online stuff? That is pretty much a case by case situation. I do allow the Gunslinger, one of my personal favorite classes in my campaigns. So I am not all old school all the time lol.

As I said upstream, 5E is probably the best version of D&D I have played, not too complicated, not too simple, it hits that sweet spot for RPG's just right.

Scott

My Forgotten Realms campaign has been going for decades, and I still stick with AD&D style mix of PC and NPC races and classes.

For PCs:

Elves - Gold, Moon, and Wood - no drow
Dwarves - Shield (maybe gold, but quite rare)
Halflings - Lightfoot and Strongheart
Half-elves - no half-drow
Human (my players all have at least 3 characters, and 2 out of 3 must be human)

Bard
Cleric
Fighter
Paladin
Ranger
Rogue
Sorcerer
Wizard

Barbarians, druids, and warlocks (witches) are NPC classes, as are some archetypes. Monks are more of a western variety, although I haven't bothered with a class yet. Think Friar Tuck with simple bludgeoning weapons, no armor, wrestling and boxing, with some spellcasting. If it comes together well, it might be available as a PC class, but I'm guessing it won't be powerful enough for most to consider.

No dragonborn at all, well at least not like the PHB one. Humans and elves can have draconic ancestry (from a male shape-changed metallic dragon, and a female human or elf), and there are those that have fiendish (tiefling) or celestial (aasimar) heritage, but they appear to be whatever their base race is, and have different abilities. Some have more than others (which indicates how far removed they are from their unusual heritage). Many humans have traits that indicate they must have some exotic heritage, but can't determine what it is since it's so far back.

I'm very happy with the 5e framework, but have made a lot of changes to make it more like AD&D and my own preferences. So even my races and classes have changes, some minor, some significant.

 

[ccs]

"And on this week's episode of "Grognards Ruin Everything" we're discussing D&D classes and races". Seriously, why is every thread started by a Grog about crapping all over other people's fun? Is the idea that someone else out there might be having fun doing things differently than you really so frightening?

There are already a thousand OSR games catering to you, let the rest of us have something nice for a change.

Nobodies stopping you from having nice things. Unless by nice things you mean you want to play Drow, psionics, and, to a lesser extent, typical "monster" races in a game I'm DMing.... If that's the case then you'll be disappointed.

 

[Tony Vargas]

There are already a thousand OSR games catering to you, let the rest of us have something nice for a change.

5e prettymuch is an OSR game.
OK, not really, the ruleset has it's modern elements, but the best thing about it is easily the AD&D feel it manages to hold onto in spite of that. And its easy enough to pluck out whatever offends thee.

Besides, you kids have lots of nice things, like, y'know, WoW and MtG and er, twitter and student loans and stuff...

...what was I saying? sorry drifted off there for a sec...

Oh yeah: GET OFF MY LAWN!!
::shakes cane faux-menacingly::








(by 'lawn' of course, I mean D&D)