D&D 5E "When Running a 5E Campaign I Always Ban at Least One Core Race, Class, or Sub-Class" (a poll)

[Tonguez]

Yep no tieflings, no dracons.

depending on campaign I’ve also removed dwarfs (they didnt fit), and made half-orcs and half-elfs into human variants.
if a player has a good concept I might allow them to play a half-dragon or a fiend-tainted human

 

[Hussar]

My players are all mid to late 40s so we rarely playing anything more exotic than a halfling or orc. I’ve never had to ban anything.

I really don't know why people seem to think this is an age thing. My group is six players (including myself). Our current campaign line up is a tiefling, war forged, owl folk, dragonborn and the reified dream of an aboleth. The youngest member of the group is over forty.

Last campaign? We had a kobold, goliath, and a bunch of other stuff that I can't remember off the top of my head.

I can't imagine playing D&D as long as we have an still sticking to Tolkienesque races. Don't you get bored of playing the umpteenth thousandth elf?

 

[Larnievc]

I really don't know why people seem to think this is an age thing. My group is six players (including myself). Our current campaign line up is a tiefling, war forged, owl folk, dragonborn and the reified dream of an aboleth. The youngest member of the group is over forty.

Last campaign? We had a kobold, goliath, and a bunch of other stuff that I can't remember off the top of my head.

I can't imagine playing D&D as long as we have an still sticking to Tolkienesque races. Don't you get bored of playing the umpteenth thousandth elf?

Dunno. I’m the DM. Haven’t been a pc is years.

 

[Larnievc]

I really don't know why people seem to think this is an age thing.

Probably an age thing.

 

[Mercurius]

I take issue with the word "ban," because it implies that D&D is one, set thing and all campaigns are, at core, the same -- a simulacrum of the core rules.

I have always followed the premise that every campaign is different, every setting is different. To some extent, D&D is D&D - and every D&D campaign draws elements from the same tool box. But not only are there other possible tools in a given campaign (house rules, unique elements to the setting, etc), but every DM will utilize different tools, based upon the setting they've put together.

So it isn't banning, because it there's no one-size fits all version of D&D that we all play. Certainly, the official rules provide a default, but that doesn't mean that every game should assume to include everything in the official rules.

Maybe I'm nitpicking on semantics, but I think "ban" has certain connotations that implies that if a DM doesn't include certain elements in their campaign world, they're being restrictive.

I mean, it isn't unlike cooking - say, a soup. If you don't include every spice and ingredient in your cupboard in the soup, you're not "banning" anything. You're just making a soup with specific elements towards some kind of theme or flavor.

 

[Cadence]

Sometimes. One recent game didn't allow the players to have any of the classic Demi-Human races in 5e. (The LNish humano-fascists were one of the enemies).

 

[Mercurius]

I really don't know why people seem to think this is an age thing. My group is six players (including myself). Our current campaign line up is a tiefling, war forged, owl folk, dragonborn and the reified dream of an aboleth. The youngest member of the group is over forty.

Last campaign? We had a kobold, goliath, and a bunch of other stuff that I can't remember off the top of my head.

I can't imagine playing D&D as long as we have an still sticking to Tolkienesque races. Don't you get bored of playing the umpteenth thousandth elf?

I think age is a secondary factor that may or may not impact a more primary factor: To what degree the players have been exposed (or are interested in) what we could call "non-traditional fantasy ideas" and other aspects of geek culture.

A lot of more casual players, and especially players that don't play video games or engage in a wide range of "geek culture," associate fantasy with Tolkien or Conan, or other more traditional, classic forms. So a dragonborn or warforged is exotic. Whether that is perceived as a good or bad thing, depends on the individual. Some are interested, some not - and the determining factor might mostly be a matter of subjective taste.

Even some long-time D&D players just never got into certain aspects of geek culture, be it World of Warcraft or anime or steampunk or whatnot.

And of course there's the matter of taste - different strokes for different folks.

 

[Reynard]

More seriously, I need to get better at "saying No" to players in order to achieve and/or maintain a certain tone or theme. I generally don't view it as the Gm's job to make character decisions, but at the same time I don't want funny talking bird people in my grim and gritty fantasy world.

 

[Plaguescarred]

Each campaign may have specific options allowed or banned so it depend. My courrent GREYHAWK campaign for exemple didn't have dragonborn available as a race. And tiefling is an extraplanar race most commonly found in Sigil and very rarely found on Oerth.

 

[iserith]

I take issue with the word "ban," because it implies that D&D is one, set thing and all campaigns are, at core, the same -- a simulacrum of the core rules.

I have always followed the premise that every campaign is different, every setting is different. To some extent, D&D is D&D - and every D&D campaign draws elements from the same tool box. But not only are there other possible tools in a given campaign (house rules, unique elements to the setting, etc), but every DM will utilize different tools, based upon the setting they've put together.

So it isn't banning, because it there's no one-size fits all version of D&D that we all play. Certainly, the official rules provide a default, but that doesn't mean that every game should assume to include everything in the official rules.

Maybe I'm nitpicking on semantics, but I think "ban" has certain connotations that implies that if a DM doesn't include certain elements in their campaign world, they're being restrictive.

I mean, it isn't unlike cooking - say, a soup. If you don't include every spice and ingredient in your cupboard in the soup, you're not "banning" anything. You're just making a soup with specific elements towards some kind of theme or flavor.

Completely agree. I don't really care about "balance," for example, so I'm not banning anything for that reason. I'm choosing which options are available based on the setting, tone, theme, etc. These are meant to enhance engagement and the play experience, not take away the players' toys. Creativity is also helped by reasonable constraints in my view.