D&D 5E What is the appeal of the weird fantasy races?

[Jack Daniel]

A DM hears that their player wants to play a race, lets say a Tabaxi. So they Add them as a brand new race to the world, something never before seen. That way they can have every single town and village turn out the pitchforks and torches, every shop jacks up their prices, every crime is blamed on them, and they are generally treated as being unwanted and despised in every single place they go.

Does that rather minor limit of who is allowed to have been a race back when the kingdoms were established, with the explicity reasoning of treating the PC as horribly as possible count for you? You did ask for only one example, and people in this very thread have proposed doing exactly that. So I'm not even proposing something absurd.

You claimed that it was possible for the DM to be either incorrect or immoral by disallowing certain options at character creation. Your example is not that. Still waiting.

Two people sit down to play a game of DnD. They are at the start of character creation. One of them wants Dwarves. One of them does not. Why should the one who took the title of DM get their way automatically, while the one who is the player does not?

("took the title"?) Still meaningless without context. I've consistently been talking only about players joining extant games wherein the DM has already imposed limitations on character creation because of setting lore, campaign theme, or (at the extreme) choice of ruleset. My position has consistently been that just because an option is in a game's core book, that's no cause for a player to assume it's automatically available in every campaign; and that DMs are largely free to impose such constraints prior to the start of a campaign, for any reason, without external justification. Nothing more than that; nothing less than that. I'm not talking about a group of players and a DM negotiating the initial parameters of a campaign; that's not remotely relevant to anything I've been discussing here.

So clarify this scenario to me. "The start of character creation" is not, after all, the same thing as "the start of the campaign". How long has the DM been running this campaign? How long has the DM been using its setting? Does the DM intend for the campaign to have a specific theme that might make dwarves a poor fit for the game, even if they exist in the game world? Details, please.

Yeah, maybe you should open up the PHB and check some backgrounds.

<snip>

Sure, you can play the game with nobody tourists who have never done anything, but the game itself does not assume that as the absolute default.

Interesting assumptions.

I think this plays into this issue we are having in communicating.

You don't care about your player's ideas. You attribute it to not knowing them well enough, but I personally find that a bit misleading, as I have run for many years for a local guild and I've had at least one new person I've never met before a year, and I do care about their ideas.

But that is a massive disconnect between our two positions.

(Well that's certainly an artful way to dodge my question about Ohioans vs. tabaxi.) But, no, I suppose I really don't care, when you get right down to it.

I don't think it's in my job description to care. When I DM a game, my job is worldbuilder and referee. I'm there to arbitrate the rules and maintain the integrity of the milieu, both of which have to have already been set in stone before the campaign begins, or else there's no campaign. It's not even relevant to my position whether any players have been involved in the design process or not. The point is that the decisions have been made; they're finalized; the law hath been written, and my job is now to enforce it.

Given those circumstances, the game elements that fall under the purview of the DM—whatever setting lore exists, whatever game rules and house rules are in force, and whatever rulings the DM makes during play—all have the coequal force of law in that campaign. (Again, it's not pertinent here whether that law is backed up by the authority of a tyrannical DM or a benevolent consensus of players. The point is simply that it's there and it's being put into practice by all involved.) That includes nonstandard constraints on character creation, which are, after all is said and done, nothing more than a set of a priori rulings (if the constraints are there to enforce a theme) or a convergence of setting lore and house rules.

So if a player has a character idea that falls outside of the campaign's predetermined limitations on permitted playable character types, I fail to see how that's any different from a player who has an "idea" to (e.g.) summarily grant themselves 18s (or, hell, 100s) in all of their ability scores. The latter idea is obviously absurd, and I'm under no obligation to entertain it, never mind care about it. The same applies to the former.

 

[zarionofarabel]

At my table what would happen is that you, the player, might feel left out as the other players get to have their characters explore and resolve the various side plots tied to personal back story and goals.

Or, if you just want to throw dice and kill things, you can do that in exploration of other characters plotlines and not have to put any effort into the story.

Yay!

 

[Oofta]

And then how does he expect me to collaborate in building a story, if he keeps me in the dark? How am I supposed to work on a game if I don't know what kind of design process is in place?

You create a PC that fits into the world, work with the DM to come up with a backstory that makes sense. then your PC interacts with the world.

This is pretty common these days because it helps people get invested in the world

All you have to do is "My pa won the Oaksbury Pumpkin Contest with a super-giant pumpkin, but we could never get that thing back home, it seemed to grow more when it was there and crushed the wagon we brought it there on" and blapo, you're done and also at some point you might have to deal with The Great Pumpkin being a thing

Backstory happens before level 1. Its why your character is off adventuring

Maybe they were raised by a single parent and are setting off to discover who their other parent was. Maybe they're a bastard of a royal family who's gotten to the 'burn it all to the ground' stage of living and picking up power to do so. Maybe they're the last survivor of a mountain tribe duty-bound to keep something secret, and need to get back there to ensure their charge isn't disturbed. Or maybe they're trying to turn around their life of being a dock-rat of a kid and are now trying to turn it around by instead aiming to be the greatest of chefs, hoping to challenge the Iron Chefs to dramatic cooking battles in Kitchen Stadium

Your characters are not spat onto the world, fully-formed and a blank slate at level 1. They have a history

Cool. Did you okay it with me? Great. I'll work the giant pumpkin into the story. Create a backstory that you're a paladin and you inherited a holy avenger? Sorry, it gets vetoed, or at least modified so that the sword's power is suppressed at level 1 and only eventually gains power.

Spoiler: Pumpkin King

I agree backstory happens before the adventure starts. Maybe it's during a session 0, maybe it happens over chat/email. That doesn't mean the player has carte blanche to make up whatever they want without prior approval.

<STORY_TIME>I had player with a PC start with no background (they were introduced midway through the campaign). Throughout the campaign they had weird memories, and people that were hundreds of years old recognized him even though he was human. Bit convoluted, but the ultimate reveal was met by a bunch of "Oh ... my ... god" and the player literally getting up and taking the piece of paper away from the table to read accompanied by more exclamations. It was pretty awesome. </STORY_TIME>

 

[Minigiant]

The unfortunate truth is, IME, there are far, far, far more players out there and DM's who think this way than think that backstory or motivation is important. I've had so many Man Without a Name characters presented to me for play. Far, far more than ones with actual thought and backstory.

And, honestly, I think it's because those players are trained from early play by DM's who insist that PC's are blank slates.

At a lot of combat or meatgrinder tables, it was better to not give your character's histories and background unless they made it to a certain level. You'd survive to level 5 or something, then describe your brackground at campfire or a backroom of a tavern.

"Where are you from, Fighter" says Dwarf.

This is what promotes a lot of racial stereotype PCs. Because from 0e-3e, it was a bad idea to invest in a PC's story unless a DM informed you it mattered. Because levels 1-3 were super deadly.

 

[Oofta]

The unfortunate truth is, IME, there are far, far, far more players out there and DM's who think this way than think that backstory or motivation is important. I've had so many Man Without a Name characters presented to me for play. Far, far more than ones with actual thought and backstory.

And, honestly, I think it's because those players are trained from early play by DM's who insist that PC's are blank slates.

Case and point:


It's been one of the main reasons why I've pretty much given up on detailing settings over the years. Players don't give a toss and so many are just happy that the DM rolls up the plot wagon and spoon feeds the adventure du jure every session. I really wonder if I shouldn't just go through alphabetically in the Monster Manual, session after session.

After all, if the players are going to provide so little input into the game, why should I bother?

Yeah, I have a bad habit of making up interesting background details if the player shows up with no backstory or history. Different people have different styles, but I try to integrate who the person is and where they come from into the story as much as possible. I should probably limit my table to 4 PCs instead of the 6 I seem to inevitably end up with to make that easier but no one is perfect.

 

[Oofta]

I think for more traditional (or old) GMs it's hard to relinquish that much narrative control. The last bit of conversation on this thread makes me sad that games like Burning Wheel aren't way more popular. Many games other than D&D do a much better job allowing for players to have narrative input because it is explicitly stated by having rules that cover such things. D&D was built on the idea that the GM provides all the details. I'm glad to see that more and more D&D players want more out of the game than to be lead around by the nose through the GM's preplanned story. Sadly D&D is way behind the times when it comes to mechanical reinforcement of player narrative input.

Also, I don't think you are a bad player for wanting to be able to add more of your own ideas into the game world. I think you are using the wrong system.

Not adding significantly to the campaign world's story before play starts is not the same as the DM leading the players around by the nose. As a DM I set the stage, what the actors (PCs) do is up to them. If they want to collect butterflies instead of stopping Rome from burning, then Rome burns and they may have an awesome butterfly collection. It will always be their choice. At the end of every mini-arc (typically 1-3 sessions) I give the players the option of where to go to next and ask if there's something else they want to do. Then I prep whatever direction they want to head.

The PCs can have a massive impact on the world, and regularly influence the world in ways I never anticipated. For example, it was awesome when the PCs slowly converted an NPC that was supposed to be a major nemesis into an ally and a hero. But the players outside of their PC's actions? They can make suggestions but I get final say.

 

[FrozenNorth]

Orrrrr, play D&D. You don't get to say how D&D should be played. You only get to say how YOU prefer it for YOUR games. The way he described playing is every bit as valid as your method.

I don’t know. Stating that by RAW D&D is a game about creating stories does not seem meaningfully different to me from stating that dragonborn and tabaxi are exotic by RAW and therefore the DM should feel free to be a jerk to dragonborn and tabaxi PCs.

 

[xoth.publishing]

It is kind of off-putting when your player party is a bunch of bird people, elephant people, demon people, cat people... and so on. I mean are humans even relevant in D&D anymore?

I feel your pain

I've always liked the humanocentric, low magic, swords & sorcery (or swords & planet) style better than "everything goes" high fantasy. Check out the Freebies section on my website to see how you can do a human-only campaign using Pathfinder or 5E: xoth.net publishing - sword and sorcery roleplaying adventures

 

[Morrus]

Well, no, they naughty word talk.

First, the player needs to explain why they want to play a dwarf. Is it for armour proficiencies and +2 to STR and CON and they're fine with playing a dwarf reskined as a human.
Then, the GM needs to explain why they don't want dwarves. Is this because of a personal preference (and then, how deep that preference goes? Do they hate dwarves or just bearded people in general? Or artisians?) or because no one wanted to play a dwarf before, so no one thought of a place where they can originate from (so maybe a better solution would be to introduce the new PC as a far traveler from distant lands, instead of just banning dwarves outright).

If the GM starts screeching "NAH MAH WORLD I AM THE AUTHORITY" that's not just assholish, that's just idiotic.

Watch the language, please.

 

[FrozenNorth]

After all, if the players are going to provide so little input into the game, why should I bother?

Because some players do.

I am going to echo what Chaosmancer said above. If a player comes to my game with an engaging backstory, especially one tied into what I’ve described about the campaign world, and one player is essentially a blank slate, I will be pulling hooks and sidequests from the first players’ background, and the second isn’t well-placed to argue that his character doesn’t get enough focus.