D&D General The Monsters Know What They're Doing ... Are Unsure on 5e24

[Sorinth]

I fail to see your point. I can't begin to count the number of species my game would have to support if I had allowed every species ever added to the game. People have also been playing evil characters since the games inception and I don't allow those either.

I'm running the best game I know how and that includes having a limited set of species that I can actually wrap my head around and give some depth to their culture and history. If that means that I'm not the DM for you I wish you luck finding a different DM.

Somewhat unrelated to the topic at hand, but why does each of your species need a unique culture & history? In a cosmopolitan world, you just need to create the culture/history of the kingdom/empires as normal. For example a Dwarf that comes from an evil empire ruled by a Lich has the culture and history of that Lich ruled empire, a Dwarf from a viking inspired archipelago has the culture and history of that archipelago. They don't need nor have some unique common Dwarven culture/history.

 

[Dire Bare]

Every elf is a wizard. Even the babies.

Well, that's just facts.

Elven babies are presented with their first pointy hat immediately after they come home from the elf hospital.

 

[Dire Bare]

I mean, I have a theory as to why.

Scarcity.

I bet the behavior is different if DMs are a dime a dozen, and players are hard to find. But, as a DM who runs games online, for random people, I have no incentive to compromise for a player unless I have a history with that player. In fact, I've never been asked to compromise at all, dozens and dozens of players just accept what I post. Each eager to play.

This leads me into situations where I do restrict character creation choices for flavor reasons. Allowing only a small number of races plus reskins of other races. And I just state up front the restrictions. And I fill the game easily.

For example, my last game I posted on r/LFG last spring, restricted races to one of 9. In 24 hours, I had 81 replies in my google form. I had fourteen willing players in under 60 minutes.

Do I have any incentive to loosen my restrictions when the game fills in minutes?

Right or wrong. I think this is why, in practice, DMs always win. And likely always will. They simply have no reason to compromise, when players are so readily available. And players who wish to play, have every reason to compromise.

Is this fair? Nah. But what is the DM's incentive here? There is none.

Well, yeah . . . If you are DMing an open table at a convention, local game store, or online . . . yeah, you probably have your pick of players no matter what you do. Heck, maybe even if you are the forever DM in your local play group. Sure, there have always been more folks wanting to play than DM.

As a player looking for a game . . . you do have to sometimes decide to join a game that doesn't suit your tastes or not play at all.

Me? I'd rather not play at all than play in some of the overly restrictive and controlled games being described by some in this thread. I've got plenty of hobbies to keep me busy. I don't want to play with the guy who tells me he's banning my tortle character . . . because he can!

 

[Dire Bare]

And that's now "anecdotes," not data?

Yes.

That's pretty much the definition of "anecdotes" you got right there. A collection of individual opinions is not data nor is it facts.

 

[AlViking]

Hardly. I'm using the barely expanded rules of the game. At worst I'm adding a bit of garnish to the meal. I'm adding some sauce to the sausages. I like barbeque sauce, but other people can grab mustard, tomato, whatever, whereas the original idea is banning all sauces eternally.

Tortles were considered completely fine for most tables, this thread is basically the biggest opposition against them in the entirity of the internet. You look anywhere on the internet outside of this thread on tortles and the resounding opinion on them is "Yeah I don't know anyone who bans them, they're pretty ordinary, prepare for ninja turtle/master oggway puns"


Why is your world so absurdly detailed yet shallow, then? Heck, why are you even using D&D for this world if you're not including half of what it offers. You don't even need to support them! Just, pick some far off corner folks rarely travel to. "Yeah, tortles? They're from out east generally, sometimes travel this way as merchants, tend to be nice go-betweens between ocean races and land ones". Wham, blam, that's all you need for them

How much info do you need on this limited set of species so that adding anything further breaks things?

I'm fine having them over my side because my world doesn't break from introducing new stuff. If I like something and there's room for it? I'll be able to slot it in somewhere.

If you're at my table I told you what species I allow, a handful of other restrictions and house rules. If those don't work for you then you are free to find a different game.

Why is it that your explanation of why you want to play a tortle is "because I want to" is all you need and my answers with detailed explanation is worthless?

I'm building the world, creating the adventures, hosting, scheduling, keeping things going. So if I feel like not allowing tortles then I'm not going to. It's not just turtles. If I allow them I have to allow any and every species. That shouldn't be hard to understand.

 

[AlViking]

Somewhat unrelated to the topic at hand, but why does each of your species need a unique culture & history? In a cosmopolitan world, you just need to create the culture/history of the kingdom/empires as normal. For example a Dwarf that comes from an evil empire ruled by a Lich has the culture and history of that Lich ruled empire, a Dwarf from a viking inspired archipelago has the culture and history of that archipelago. They don't need nor have some unique common Dwarven culture/history.

You run your game your way, I'll run mine my way. I want cultural differences to matter. That can include differences in nations of the same species.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Fascinating: outside of the established, pre-defined fantasy kitchen settings, I always looked at D&D as a toolkit to “build up” your own settings, not as “shoehorn all of these options into your setting, no matter what”.

Personally, I've never seen D&D as a toolkit. Not even the editions which billed themselves as such. They are quite biased toward specific thematic, conceptual, and mechanical/procedural elements, and often really bad at anything outside that space. E.g. they're decent at survival, but pretty bad for intrigue, other than having the absolute bare bones minimum of "well roll a die and we'll find out".

Is a DM really considered a power hungry, narrow minded snowflake if their homebrewed setting doesn’t have orcs as a playable species? That’s hyperbolic but it seems to be the explicit opinion by some here.

No, but the way a lot--and I mean a LOT--of GMs talk about this isn't like that. It's not "well there just...aren't orcs in this world".

This thread is like a microcosm of internet discussion. Everyone (including me) taking others’ statements in mostly bad faith and yelling past each other.

Perhaps so; perhaps not. Remathilis did note, upthread, that AlViking, for example, did exactly the thing I was calling out: pushing an extreme viewpoint where there are only two possibilities, either the loudest jerk runs roughshod over the whole group, or the GM is always right no matter what and the players never get anything they want if the GM isn't already on board.

I’ve done the whole “collaborative world building, never say no to the players’ ideas” thing and it always ended up turning into the infamous Homer Simpson car. I had to give up all preplanning and just ended up improvising everything. That was fun for a session or two before I lost all interest or incentive to go on DMing it.

To each their own, but if the players tell me that they want to play a lore-adherent Witcher campaign using D&D, and someone still insists on being a Tortle, I’ll feel a tinge of annoyance. Yes this has happened to me (replace tortle with ninja cat furry).

But isn't this exactly the extremism you just decried? The only options then are that the player surrenders everything, or the GM surrenders everything and throws all consistency and caution to the wind, necessarily meaning any player contribution destroys all the good or worth in it.

God forbid we actually have some middle ground here where GM and player work together, actually building something they agree is awesome rather than one person shouting all their demands and the other person either accepting absolutely everything, or walking.

 

[Sorinth]

You run your game your way, I'll run mine my way. I want cultural differences to matter. That can include differences in nations of the same species.

No offence but if you want cultural differences to matter and be important parts of your world then you should probably think of going beyond all species except humans having a monolithic culture. But sure you do you.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Where have I said the DM is always right? Is the player always right? For that matter, who invests more in the campaign, DM or player? If the DM doesn't like the look or feel of a game how do you expect them to run an engaging game?

I'll go back to a question you haven't answered. If you want to play a tortle is there any "compromise" that doesn't end up with you playing a tortle?

The only possible conclusion, from your hard-binary presentation, is either that giving the player anything at all that the GM wasn't already bringing to the table means the player has "won", or that the GM has "won" and the player doesn't get the thing. So if the player doesn't "win"...they aren't getting anything at all that they want, unless it was something the GM was already offering. Which means there is no compromise at all--the "compromise" is "You get to choose any race you want, as long as it's one of the four I permitted you to choose." How is that not the GM being always right, and the player being always wrong unless and until they agree with the GM?

 

[EzekielRaiden]

No offence but if you want cultural differences to matter and be important parts of your world then you should probably think of going beyond all species except humans having a monolithic culture. But sure you do you.

Exactly.

There should not be monoracial cultures (a culture where 100% of members of that culture belong to just one race). There also should not be monocultural races (a race where 100% of all its representatives belong to just one culture).