D&D 5E Legends & Lore 3/17 /14

[Agamon]

It's tattooed into the elephant. It's tattooed into the giraffe. It's tattooed into the "Keep on the African Savannah" adventure. It's tattooed into the fact that Elephavania and Giraffistan are next to each other on the map that came in the DMG. It's tattooed in the Elephantbane Blade whose lore specifies that it lies in the disputed territory on the border.

Honestly, look at any thread complaining about 4e lore or Planescape lore. Look at the post above where Hussar said it was a PITA to say no all the time.

It is a thing that happens all the time.

You have your anecdotal evidence, I have mine.

I guess the point to this whole debate is that some people read an RPG book like it's a MtG card and what's written is gospel, and some see it more as a malleable suggestion.

Take my own players, for example. They don't think the book runs the game. I do, with their input. We made PCs the other night for an FR game I'm starting. One guy asked if he was allowed to be a gnome. No assumption, even though he knew there were gnomes in FR. And after I told them that the setting is very anti-drow and anti-orc, one player said, "Well, what about this..." and we discussed how he might make a drow and make it work and it turned into a basis for the group template.

I might be lucky to have such players, but I'm in 4 separate groups where I'm the only similar person in each, and there isn't a player out of the 15 that would have trouble with this. Small sample size, maybe, but from my point of view, it doesn't seem like such a big problem.

And maybe I have rose-colored glasses on, but I think they'll do a good job making this kind of stuff easily ignorable. In the playtest, alignment is nothing more than 9 descriptive paragraphs and the game isn't hurt by "black markering" the entire section. Nothing invasive in the mechanics, which is what I mean by "tattooed". I can call the Sword of Kas whatever I want in my game, it's not going to mess with the actual game.

 

[I'm A Banana]

Yeah, well some of us also think that losing pages upon pages of extra monsters just to help those DMs not feel so bad about saying 'No' all the time, is a massive waste.

Good news! You don't need to lose any monsters!

You have your anecdotal evidence, I have mine.

My evidence is just that there IS anecdote. It happens. It's a thing. An avoidable thing. A paragraph in the intro that says "all this is optional!" isn't enough.

Your anecdote doesn't contradict that.

 

[Agamon]

My evidence is just that there IS anecdote. It happens. It's a thing. An avoidable thing. A paragraph in the intro that says "all this is optional!" isn't enough.

Your anecdote doesn't contradict that.

I know I can ramble, but the part of the post you quoted wasn't the main point, so here's the TL;DR: None of the many people I play with find this a problem; and I have a good feeling this won't be as invasive as you think.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I know I can ramble, but the part of the post you quoted wasn't the main point, so here's the TL;DR: None of the many people I play with find this a problem; and I have a good feeling this won't be as invasive as you think.

So this is the part where I point out that the effect is probably greater than most reasonable people would expect, given what we know about the default effect.

If this goes like it usually does, next maybe comes the part where you try to maintain that the default effect has no significant influence on D&D monster lore because D&D and D&D players are special for one reason or another (perhaps because they were all educated in Lake Wobegon).

 

[Agamon]

So this is the part where I point out that the effect is probably greater than most reasonable people would expect, given what we know about the default effect.

If this goes like it usually does, next maybe comes the part where you try to maintain that the default effect has no significant influence on D&D monster lore because D&D and D&D players are special for one reason or another (perhaps because they were all educated in Lake Wobegon).

No, I agree that this indeed a thing. Choosing to run a published campaign is easier than making your own. Choosing to run the game as designed is easier than making up house rules. Choosing to play published adventures is easier than coming up with your own. And choosing if a monster uses his default lore is easier than making up his own.

All the reasoning for the effect come into play here, no argument. But why does that preclude a DM from coming up with his own ideas?

 

[Mistwell]

Well, I have no idea how WotC is going to resolve the question... but all I can really hope for is that they are wise enough not to waste the space putting in additional lore from other campaign settings and instead treat their players like intelligent beings.

Come on, "like intelligent beings"?

Wanting various amounts of lore from different settings is not a knock on someone's intelligence to want that lore.

This is just something reasonable minds differ on. Can we cut the hyperbole and insults?

 

[I'm A Banana]

No, I agree that this indeed a thing. Choosing to run a published campaign is easier than making your own. Choosing to run the game as designed is easier than making up house rules. Choosing to play published adventures is easier than coming up with your own. And choosing if a monster uses his default lore is easier than making up his own.

All the reasoning for the effect come into play here, no argument. But why does that preclude a DM from coming up with his own ideas?

I love being wrong sometimes.

To slightly re-phrase your question, we might ask why that same effect precludes someone from being an organ donor in an opt-in system.

The answer is that it doesn't preclude it. It makes it more difficult. It makes it more difficult to implement your "jackalweres are pseudo-egyptian" lore. (An example of that difficulty is how you need to keep saying no to people who are chugging along with the default).

If D&D is supposed to be a game of imagination and storytelling, it should SUPPORT making your own lore, not make it harder. It should make it easier!

Some of the reasons that specific lore in a monster entry is valuable include newbie-friendliness and DM inspiration, so is it possible to keep that and better support making your own lore?

Totally. One way you could do that is by making your lore opt-in, not opt-out.

One way you can do that is by being specific with your monster lore: "In Metamorphosis, Jackalweres were created by Grazz'zt" is opt-in: do you want the same story as this setting tells? Is it cool enough for you to yoink like you're yoinking from a million other bits of media and fiction to make your game? "Jackalweres were created by Grazz'zt" is opt-out: do you want to pay the cost necessary to change this lore and then make everyone at your table do the same thing?

 

[Agamon]

I love being wrong sometimes.

To slightly re-phrase your question, we might ask why that same effect precludes someone from being an organ donor in an opt-in system.

The answer is that it doesn't preclude it. It makes it more difficult. It makes it more difficult to implement your "jackalweres are pseudo-egyptian" lore. (An example of that difficulty is how you need to keep saying no to people who are chugging along with the default).

If D&D is supposed to be a game of imagination and storytelling, it should SUPPORT making your own lore, not make it harder. It should make it easier!

Some of the reasons that specific lore in a monster entry is valuable include newbie-friendliness and DM inspiration, so is it possible to keep that and better support making your own lore?

Totally. One way you could do that is by making your lore opt-in, not opt-out.

One way you can do that is by being specific with your monster lore: "In Metamorphosis, Jackalweres were created by Grazz'zt" is opt-in: do you want the same story as this setting tells? Is it cool enough for you to yoink like you're yoinking from a million other bits of media and fiction to make your game? "Jackalweres were created by Grazz'zt" is opt-out: do you want to pay the cost necessary to change this lore and then make everyone at your table do the same thing?

And I say, let the lazy GM be lazy. What if someone wants to run the default game? What lore does he use? If it's the default lore, he's going to have one crazy mish-mash campaign setting. He can call it Forebdark Greyplanejamloft. That or he's not allowed to be lazy, he must create the lore for all of the monsters for his given setting. Who is this helping?

 

[I'm A Banana]

And I say, let the lazy GM be lazy. What if someone wants to run the default game? What lore does he use? If it's the default lore, he's going to have one crazy mish-mash campaign setting. He can call it Forebdark Greyplanejamloft.

You say that like D&D doesn't include centaurs and mummies and dragons and sidhe and monks and coutl and warforged and treants and space pirate githyanki and Thor and zombies and....

Is really it any more of a mishmash than what we have now as Greyhawk/FR-based critters?

D&D has always been fatasy-genre fanfic mashup awesomeness when you take the whole thing into account. Even Gary shmushed together wargames and Tolkein and the Elric saga and Greek myth and cheap plastic chinese toys...there is no semblance of genre purity in this game.

At any individual table, this plays out functionally pretty fine. DMs who like monks use them even if their game isn't set in pseudo-Asia. DMs who like mummies use them even if their game doesn't have a pseudo-Egypt or pseudo-Inca Empire. The monsters you use in your game are always a small (often quite small) subset of the entire galaxy of thousands of monsters that exist in D&D. DMs who like braxats will use them, Dark Sun or not.

That or he's not allowed to be lazy, he must create the lore for all of the monsters for his given setting. Who is this helping?

Lazy is good, but we can enable lazy without privileging some subset of lore over others.

 

[Agamon]

You say that like D&D doesn't include centaurs and mummies and dragons and sidhe and monks and coutl and warforged and treants and space pirate githyanki and Thor and zombies and....

Is really it any more of a mishmash than what we have now as Greyhawk/FR-based critters?

D&D has always been fatasy-genre fanfic mashup awesomeness when you take the whole thing into account. Even Gary shmushed together wargames and Tolkein and the Elric saga and Greek myth and cheap plastic chinese toys...there is no semblance of genre purity in this game.

At any individual table, this plays out functionally pretty fine. DMs who like monks use them even if their game isn't set in pseudo-Asia. DMs who like mummies use them even if their game doesn't have a pseudo-Egypt or pseudo-Inca Empire. The monsters you use in your game are always a small (often quite small) subset of the entire galaxy of thousands of monsters that exist in D&D. DMs who like braxats will use them, Dark Sun or not.

But it goes against this default thinking theory. By default, this is how this monster acts in this other setting, so what about in mine? Dark Sun, Ravenloft, Spelljammer, Planescape, Eberron, these exist because they are not the default setting, they are different than the default fantasy D&D world.

As I said before, every D&D has a default setting. I think DMs should be allowed to have one in 5e and those that don't want it can do their own thing, as usual. I don't think I have much more to add than that.