D&D General Let's list/complain about things we don't like

[Remathilis]

The consolidation of different races into the same mechanical presentation. No, damn it, goliaths are not half-giants, dragonborn are not draconians, etc. They're different!

I'll do you one further.

There is an incessant need in the community to fit all the PC options of D&D into a bullet point list on a Post-it note. Often, this takes the form of removing and combining as many classes and species as possible using either exceptionally generic choices, build-a-bear systems, or refluffing to differentiate between them. The common versions of this include making all arcane casters one class, making all martial classes into subclasses of fighters, making all short species (gnome halfling etc) one species, making all planar species one species, and making all animal-based options one species.

The fetishization of the Basic "fighter, cleric, thief, magic-user, elf, dwarf, and halfling is all you need" needs to die in a fire.

 

[Remathilis]

Differing NPC and PC rules. The difference should be a matter of encounter adventure design, not mechanical interaction.

I was there when monsters used the same rules as players. When you had to account for their math with feats (which were forgotten or had to be looked up) and crappy +1 items to make their math work. I am absolutely ok with NPCs working on their own math if it means never having to make dozens of PC level monsters again...

 

[Distracted DM]

It's not the biggest deal, just one of my pet peeves, but I dislike it when everyone in the group wants to play a rare species. If the world is half humans, quarter dwarves, and most of the rest elves and halflings, then it breaks my immersion when the party that met in a tavern consists of a plasmoid, a tortle, a dhampir, and a warforged.

Usually I play a human, elf or half-elf to balance things out because I know the rest of my group is going to go for rarer, gimmicky, or homebrew species. Sometimes I want to play the gimmicky species or use a homebrew, but I know it won't feel special in my group, so I end up saving that for oneshots. I want to feel special too, dangit!

I'm going to be dming a game soon and I'm rather excited that one of my players actually chose to play a human, and another an elf. Finding joy in the little things, I guess lol.

I'm not sure what I've done to deserve so many players that play core ancestries so frequently, especially humans! And the players that play stuff like Dragonborn are because they genuinely enjoy the culture and history surrounding those things in my setting. Usually the people that want to play something weird are new, but most of them end up making later characters with ancestries that are better plugged into the setting.

 

[Remathilis]

: I never had any complaints about B/X (BECMI) or AD&D (1E or 2E).

Ok. I do.

• Rolling ability scores. Nothing better than the player next to you having rolled nothing less than a 14 while you have a single solitary roll above 12.
• Ability score minimum: My heart says I want to play a ranger. My dice says I'm playing a mediocre fighter.
• Race/class restrictions. Elves, a race that has spent hundreds of years perfecting art, music, magic, and culture, cannot be bards?
• Alignment restrictions. Or, how will I lose my paladin hood THIS time?
• Unreliable class features. Ah yes, I'm a thief. I have a 10% chance to hide successfully. I feel so thiefy.
• Unreliable spell selection. Behold! I am a student of the arcane arts! I know read magic, Nystl's magic aura, and protection from good/evil. Fear Me!
• Silly restrictions. What do you mean you left the helm of telepathy? Well, the dwarf failed his check to see if he could use it, the paladin is already at his limit for magic items, and the druid can't use it since it's made of metal. So we left it in the dungeon for the next group of adventurers.
• Level Limits. Well, Gimli's 8th level now. Time to retire.

 

[Jack Daniel]

▯

 

[Pedantic]

I was there when monsters used the same rules as players. When you had to account for their math with feats (which were forgotten or had to be looked up) and crappy +1 items to make their math work. I am absolutely ok with NPCs working on their own math if it means never having to make dozens of PC level monsters again...

That's such a solvable problem, and more an issue of feat design than anything else. Creating a simple set of feats by role for monsters/NPCs would have dealt with most of it. Plus we live in a modern age of digital tools.

CR and magic item scaling are issues in their own right, but that's a whole other design issue that shouldn't be lumped in with universal design.

 

[Fifinjir]

The designs of the extraplanar outsiders is too naturalistic. Why does a being made out the the good-evil-lawful-chaotic energy built up in a person’s soul look like it can be (by D&D mortal species standards) my cousin? (Actually with tieflings and aasimar running around they could be).

 

[shirleyishmael]

How comon magic is. How common non humans are. How cantrip destroy the economy. Ohhhh and Darkvision.

Almost every pc now has the ability to cast magic spells, or can teleport with a species ability, or some fantastical ability. It's to mystical for me. Combine that with all the diffrent species and it's a lot.

I understand the want to make all the rules accessible to everyone. However it does seem to undermine the idea of race and class.
There are plenty of games that are classless. If I want to play those I play those.
I enjoy race and class mechanics. I think it makes things more interesting, making you utilize the tools available to you.

 

[the Jester]

I'm still not over Drow as pcs. Also their seeming ubiquity. Drow should be scary monsters known only in legends and spoken of only in whispers. Personally, I only use them about once or twice per edition, and I treat them like 1e did before G3- nobody knows about them except for a few elven sages, they are far removed from humanity/elfkind, they are thoroughly corrupt demon-worshipers (NOT just Lolth fanatics), etc.

If you want to play a dark skinned elf, you can be... an elf with dark skin. No problemo. I have no problem with that. But Drow are (in my game) the negative version of the quintessential elf: bright (morally), shining exemplars of freedom, the best of the fey adjacent races. Drow are depraved, dark, preternaturally awful, inhuman in the worst way, with the worst traits of the fey- capricious, arbitrary, a profound lack of concern for human(oid) morality and a love of cruelty.

 

[ezo]

Ok. I do.

• Rolling ability scores. Nothing better than the player next to you having rolled nothing less than a 14 while you have a single solitary roll above 12.
• Ability score minimum: My heart says I want to play a ranger. My dice says I'm playing a mediocre fighter.
• Race/class restrictions. Elves, a race that has spent hundreds of years perfecting art, music, magic, and culture, cannot be bards?
• Alignment restrictions. Or, how will I lose my paladin hood THIS time?
• Unreliable class features. Ah yes, I'm a thief. I have a 10% chance to hide successfully. I feel so thiefy.
• Unreliable spell selection. Behold! I am a student of the arcane arts! I know read magic, Nystl's magic aura, and protection from good/evil. Fear Me!
• Silly restrictions. What do you mean you left the helm of telepathy? Well, the dwarf failed his check to see if he could use it, the paladin is already at his limit for magic items, and the druid can't use it since it's made of metal. So we left it in the dungeon for the next group of adventurers.
• Level Limits. Well, Gimli's 8th level now. Time to retire.

LOL I could challenge each and every one of these... but that isn't the point of the thread so VENT AWAY.