What are you a minority about?

[Derulbaskul]

I really like the post-Spellplague Forgotten Realms (except for the map: there is no excuse for that to have been allowed to be published).

 

[Aeolius]

I play exclusively over a virtual tabletop. Haven't played in a face to face game in years. I play with my gaming friends, not my every day friends.

This. I haven't DMed a face-to-face game since 1994. Add a few years longer since I was a player.

 

[Dausuul]

A friend confides to you that he has committed a particular crime and you promise never to tell. Discovering that an innocent person has been accused of the crime, you plead with your friend to give himself up. He refuses and reminds you of your promise. What should you do?

LG : Turn him in, promises are for pansies, not paladins
NG : Turn him in, but only after much thought, and right before the outcome of the trial
CG : Turn him in, then exile myself from the party ~~ f o r e v e r ~~
N : Let it pass, it has happened before and it will happen again
LE : congratulate him, "Well played my friend"
NE : Turn him in after the first man has been executed, collecting a bounty from both the original party and the greiving family of the innocent man.
CE : stab him in the back for being a bastard.
LN : Keep your promise, but work to clear the innnocent man
CN : let it go, but remind him that karma is a harsh mistress.

Huh, that's not how I'd see it. Assuming the crime is a serious one (punishable by execution, maiming, et cetera), here's my take:

LG: Tip off the authorities. If I can do it without breaking the letter of my promise, good, but justice must be served. Do penance afterward for a) breaking my word and b) promising to cover up a crime in the first place.
NG: Work to clear the innocent person in any way possible, preferably without breaking my promise. Break the promise if there's no other way. I can't let an innocent person be executed.
CG: Work to clear the patsy, but don't give up my companion. Betraying a friend to the law is never an option. If necessary, I'll bust the falsely accused person out of jail and smuggle him/her to safety in a neighboring kingdom.
LN: Turn in both my friend for committing the crime and myself for conspiring to cover it up. (For the less suicidally law-abiding, turn in my friend for committing the crime and do penance for the cover-up.) I should never have promised to conceal the deed.
N: Why is this my problem? It's the job of the authorities to execute the right people. If they can't, somebody should probably do something about it, but I don't see why "somebody" has to mean "me." Shrug and go about my business.
CN: Way to go, buddy! Stick it to the Man! I'll keep an eye out and let my friend know if they start sniffing at his backtrail.
LE: The important thing is to dissociate myself from the mess somehow, so if the heat comes down I'm not the one getting burned. Arrange for the innocent person to have an accident before the case goes to trial; then arrange for another accident to befall my tricky friend. That way, if anyone discovers I knew who the culprit was, I can say "I would have turned him in, but with both him and the person he framed dead, it seemed like a moot point."
NE: Sure, I'll keep the secret. For a price.
CE: My friend has set me a good example. I will strive to emulate him. Next time I commit some dastardly deed, I'll ask him for advice on how I can get someone else to take the fall.

 

[Mallus]

Here are the things I think place me in the minority. But hey, who knows?

I'm not fond of dungeons.

I'm not fond of dragons.

I'm not particularly fond of the "take their stuff" part of "kill them and take their stuff", so I de-emphasize that aspect of the game.

I do like to make shi stuff up, so, in turn, I try to give players my players a lot of narrative/authorial rights, making them free to embellish both their characters and the game world around their characters.

I do like the sillier/more absurd parts of D&D. I embrace them, hardcode them into my settings. This reflects both my personal preference and my reading of the game over the years, particularly the older versions. My take on D&D was it's the brainchild of a group of smart, goofy, playful people who had a child-like love of playing "let's pretend", fueled by a copious amount of education and a host of idiosyncratic interests.

Thus D&D is part celebration of history, myth and literature and part taking the piss out of history, myth, and literature. This appeals to me. Whether or not it's entirely accurate is irrelevant, but I do think it puts me in the minority (at least around here).

 

[Rechan]

LE : congratulate him, "Well played my friend"
NE : Turn him in after the first man has been executed, collecting a bounty from both the original party and the greiving family of the innocent man.
CE : stab him in the back for being a bastard.

What, none of these are "Blackmail the friend while telling the innocent man you'll clear his name if he pays you"?

NE: Sure, I'll keep the secret. For a price.

There we go.

 

[Dragonbait]

...words...

I agree with all that Ari said, and....

I dislike metaplot settings. When I look at a campaign setting, I want to see many possible story lines. I don't want to see a setting specifically designed for a single story.

I get annoyed when I see many PC races, but all are human or very close to being human. I want to see at least one outlandish creature in there, and I don't consider a short human or a hairy human (halflings and dwarves) outlandish. Those are just humans in funhouse mirrors. Give me an orc, gobbo, kobold, dragonman, wolfman, living golem or something. They don't need to be common but its nice to have a race that defies the ugly = evil fantasy trope.

 

[firesnakearies]

5) I love stunt-based, descriptive combat. I want cool visuals, and I want the DM and the players to actually take the time to describe them. I want to see the use of funky stunts/use of terrain at least a couple of times per combat. And I'm all for the DM giving small mechanical bonuses to really creative ideas or nifty descriptions.

I love this, too!

 

[Tequila Sunrise]

I think I'm in the minority of loving Planescape, and more specifically for thinking that Sigil slang is the best tone-setting device since...the Lady of Pain, who's equally cool.

I too despise point-buy (this one might not be as much of a minority as some think), fixed h.p. per level, and anything else where a bell curve via dice roll would do a better job of reflecting reality.

To those who like rolled abilities and hp because they're realistic, does your preference extend to other stats that should also be realistically random? For example, everybody has different skills, so it'd make sense to roll for whether you get a W/NW proficiency every level. Right?

Just curious.

 

[Dragonbait]

I think I'm in the minority of loving Planescape, and more specifically for thinking that Sigil slang is the best tone-setting device since...the Lady of Pain, who's equally cool.

You are not alone on this.

 

[billd91]

2e AD&D rates very close to being my favorite edition of D&D (barring a few hiccups here and there). The 3x family (currently PF) beats it by only a smidge as being my game of choice.

I believe 1e/2e games have better balanced combat rules and are better balanced games in general than most people realize.

I prefer game sessions with no combat to sessions of nothing but combat.

I prefer to make do with what I get as a character (with stat rolls, hit points, and magic items) than to fuss over designing the ideal build.

I believe that allowing players to pick their defensive bonus stats in 4e is one of the game's worst design flaws. Given my druthers, I'd define 3 offensive stats for each class (1 primary, 2 secondary) and define the defensive stats as the remaining 3 statistics so that all 6 stats were of significant value. If they aren't, why not cut down to 3 stats?