Back after taking Christmas off (Also chunk posting, since I have a feeling these are going to get super long if I don't)
The entirety of the picture eluded you. She is in a tavern. Looks kind of tight too. You know, like a lot of taverns. But please let the horse in so the player has a chance to RP. I'm sure the bar is built for horses too. In fact, the rooms at the inn are built for them too.
Now I feel certain you can come at me with "a good DM could have centaurs and the builders of said tavern would have accommodated for them long ago, especially if they had coin." Except in a world where they didn't exist before until the player forced the DM to put one in. But, that's no big deal. Just change all the architecture of the buildings. That's doesn't change the world does it? Redraw the six tavern maps you spent 20 hours on? No big deal.
First of all, if Centaurs are common customers, then the best inns or inns near them would find a way to adjust. And that is part of what makes putting a Centaur in your world interesting.
Secondly, let us say that none of the inns are built to accomadate them... Then you still can have them and interesting roleplay. Unless your adventure
requires the entire party to enter into the bar for it to work, then the game can still go on. it is a challenge, sure, but right before you
@overgeeked was just saying that players never want to be challenged anymore, so why shut down a player who wants to play a centaur and work out ways to overcome challenges that most people never face?
And yeah, just like a DM is meant to adjust to a party with zero healers, or a party who has no ranged attacks, or any number of other things that might come up, a DM should adjust to sometimes let the Centuar player contribute because of their biology, or not have to face that particular challenge. If your entire problem with that is "I don't want to do more work" well, you won't get sympathy from me on that point.
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What are you even trying to say here?
I thought I was being fairly explicit, but I guess not.
If a person (in general) believes that a player can play a concept that they are not enthusiastic about and it can become one of their favorite characters over time, then they must accept that a DM could run a concept they were not enthusiastic about and can at least come to enjoy it.
Because to claim otherwise is to claim that somehow players and DMs are fundamentally different. That DMs opinions are somehow immune to being changed.
Literally nobody on our side is saying a player should play something they don't like. We are saying that should never happen. If they can't find fun in our game, they should go find another game to find fun in.
Right, sure, because "go find a different game" is a trivially easy thing for them to do. But, you'll note that I didn't say anything about "hating" the thing, only not being enthusiastic about it. I mean, the player is expected to have hundreds of different concepts, otherwise they are unimaginative in the extreme, right? But do you honestly think idea #10 has the same enthusiasm as idea #2?
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Again, a front-flip with two backflips.
Not one DM has said you are doing it wrong. It worked for your table. You had a great experience. That is a good thing. If we had an applause meter, I feel certain every single person in here would be clapping and saying - cool!
What is being discussed is the reverse of this is not true. The DM does check their assumptions and still decides no. They are badwrongfun. That is - not cool.
Sure, but most of the people responding here don't seem to be inclined to check their assumptions. They are right, they know better, they won't give players a chance like that again.
I have answered this question multiple times. Here are some of my answers on why it is okay to ban a race (perhaps this will refresh your memory):
- Physiological reasons
- Geography (both for the world and the individual setting pieces for play)
- Thematic settings
- Deity or godly interventions
- Magical reasons
- Campaign friction reasons
- Personal (I don't like it) reasons
- Logical reasons outside of the game like time constraints to rewrite a timeline and another fifty pages of lore
- Session 0 has clear parameters
I have discussed every single one of these reasons. And again, it comes back to either:
- One side eliminates session 0 and pretends it never existed
- One side doesn't like the reasons
- One side accepts some reasons and not others
That one I bolded and underlined? That is the single reason being asked about. Every single other thing you listed? Pointless to the question because the question was "Is the reason "Because I don't like it" a good reason to ban something?".
But, you finally answered the question at least. "I don't like it" is a fine reason for the DM to ban something. We disagree on that. I think it is a terrible reason to ban a whole race. Why should my personal dislike for something ruin someone else's enjoyment of that thing?
No. I am saying Hussar falls into category three: He accepts some reasons and not others. He does at least accept that no side is better. But it is clear from his past experience in the DMing world, that he thinks the effort of creating a setting is pointless. He is sick and tired of the same tropes, including races like humans. And has clearly stated that several of the DM's reasons listed above are close minded.
Who cares? The entire point wasn't that
@Hussar accepted some reasons and not others. The entire point was that "I don't like it" was a poor reason to ban something, and that refusing to consider someone else's enjoyment before your own, while you are the referee of the game was a bad sign.
Nothing else mattered to his position, which you kept mis-portraying for whatever reason.
The point of conflict is the point of conflict, not the resolution. The two are different things. The resolution that is obvious is the player accepts the list the acceptable race list the DM gave him. There, did that nullify the conflict? Did it clear things up? No, it didn't. The reason is because you need to know why. Just like the DM side wants to know why. In order to find out why, one must know exactly where the conflict is.
Dude, you are again acting as though you are completely ignorant to what we have said. Because that "resolution" that your provided? That is not what I am talking about.
But, let us take what you gave and what I am talking about, which to remind you since you seem to keep ignoring it is
"THE DM CHANGES THE PARAMETERS OF THEIR CAMPAIGN TO MATCH THE PLAYERS REQUEST"
So, our two resolutions are either the player conforms or the DM changes. This highlights to point of conflict. The DM or the player being unwilling or unable to change their creative endeavor. That is our point of conflict, that is what this is all about.
So, to repeat the question, why is the DM changing the parameters of their campaign so unreasonable that you won't even post it as a potential option? I'll accept that the player might conform to the DM, so why can't you accept that the DM might change?
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Who said anything about antagonists or villains? And why should it matter whether Mel is a PC or an NPC? Players have goals. NPCs have goals. Those goals don't always align, and that's going to be true of all characters, player-controlled or otherwise.
sigh
The fact that you even have to ask means you weren't really paying attention.
The DM creates a world, they refuse to let any player do anything to change their world before session 1. Following?
Okay, now during the campaign, the players build the Barony of Bob. This is a new thing that they added to the DMs campaign, the thing the DM previously would never have allowed.
Then, after that campaign they are starting a new campaign and find out that the Barony of Bob was destroyed utterly by Mel, everything the PCs built and added to the campaign world is erased, and the world is.... back to the status quo the DM set before the last campaign, the thing that they would not allow the players to change.
Or, let us say that the build the Barony of Bob, and then at the start of the new campaign, the DM sets the Barony to be the villain of the new campaign, with the player's goal being to destroy the Barony. Which... puts the world back into the status quo that the DM didn't want the players changing.
To me? This is clearly a sign that the DM being "perfectly willing" to allow the players to change their gameworld through the campaign is a lie and a smokescreen. Because the reality is that the DM is just going to find a way to destroy their contributions and reset the world to how the DM wants it to be.
And that is why it matters. Because if the DM is just going to hand-wave and destroy the things the players made, then have they really allowed the players to affect the world in a meaningful way, or do they just want the status quo of their vision to remain?
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