D&D General The Tyranny of Rarity

[hawkeyefan]

Hyperbole is often used on both sides. I haven't seen an instance of that where I believed that the person was serious. Same with all the, "If you curate even one race you are a fascist authoritarian dictator who just wants to assert his dominance" posts.

Then why is the cantina effect even mentioned in connection with player requests? Why is that always the conclusion?

No, I think that this thread has been rife with that. It’s literally the concern many have expressed.

I’ve had to clarify my stance repeatedly as not being against curation but against DM as sole authority. Others have as well.

People aren’t even seeing that as the argument. At times it seems like people can’t even get away from the “curated list vs. cantina” dichotomy.

I have posted several times “I’m not against curating playable races, I just don’t like the DM as sole authority” and responses to that have at times been “Well I like curated lists, if you want to allow every playable race you go ahead.”

So no, I don’t think it’s been mostly hyperbole.

Edited to add: see the example that follows.

 

[Lanefan]

I don't think anyone has said that some worlds couldn't be consistent allowing everything.

Consistency would be a headache, but a manageable one I think.

The bigger - and IMO unmanageable - headache would be the absolute crap-ton of design work I'd have to do were I to expand my PC-playable species list from what it is to even just what's in the 5e PHB.

Another thought occurred to me in response to @hawkeyefan 's idea of having the players roll up their PCs and then designing around that, which is:

While such a plan might be workable for the very first round of PCs or in a game where the players can expect to keep the same PCs all the way along, what happens in a more lethal game where three sessions in half the party have died and a round of replacements is being rolled up, or fifteen sessions in when the whole party might have turned over at least once? Are the species first used established as the limit, or do I-as-DM have to redesign everything on the fly to account for whatever new species they want to try as replacement PCs?

 

[Maxperson]

Then why is the cantina effect even mentioned in connection with player requests? Why is that always the conclusion?

No, I think that this thread has been rife with that. It’s literally the concern many have expressed.

I’ve had to clarify my stance repeatedly as not being against curation but against DM as sole authority. Others have as well.

People aren’t even seeing that as the argument. At times it seems like people can’t even get away from the “curated list vs. cantina” dichotomy.

I have posted several times “I’m not against curating playable races, I just don’t like the DM as sole authority” and responses to that have at times been “Well I like curated lists, if you want to allow every playable race you go ahead.”

So no, I don’t think it’s been mostly hyperbole.

Were going to have to agree to disagree on the hyperbole issue, especially since...

Edited to add: see the example that follows.

This isn't even an example. @Lanefan said that you can do a "cantina" game with consistency, but it would be work. What he said wouldn't work would be adding those races into his specific setting. His settings are long lasting with lots of play history, as well as detailed world history. It's often easier to build something from scratch than to modify something else into it.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Mod Note:

Several pages ago, I cautioned a single poster about rhetoric. I did this because I noticed the discourse up in here getting chippier and chippier.

Judging by the flood of reports for this thread, I t seems as if only a few people got it, and thought the orange text wasn’t intended for them. Well, at least part of that is on me not delivering a clear message, I’ll have to do better going forward.

So now we’re at a red text moment.

I’ve reviewed the pages since my caution, and frankly, there’s too much bad behavior to easily untangle, I could hand out a few threadbans for posts both reported and not.

Instead, I’m laying this thread to rest.