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

[Mecheon]

Do tortles have any significant culture to speak of? Won't that potentially change from campaign to campaign? I never saw anyone proposing getting rid of the mechanical benefits other than saying the mechanical benefits were not the primary reason they wanted to play a tortle.

Back in the day they had some limited stuff, though not much. The main thing is they build these stone structures on the beach that they lay their eggs in to protect them. Every single NPC would rather just go into their shell rather than fight back if you attacked them, this was repeated on every single NPC description. They later got some weird stuff, such as the source of their low lifespan being "When tortles mate, they die" which. Directly contradicted X9 that had a tortle and her kids as one of the random beach encounters

Also it included rules for how to turn those eggshells into armor for. Some reason. Eggshells aren't exactly what I think about when I think 'material to make good armor from'

 

[AlViking]

Back in the day they had some limited stuff, though not much. The main thing is they build these stone structures on the beach that they lay their eggs in to protect them. Every single NPC would rather just go into their shell rather than fight back if you attacked them, this was repeated on every single NPC description. They later got some weird stuff, such as the source of their low lifespan being "When tortles mate, they die" which. Directly contradicted X9 that had a tortle and her kids as one of the random beach encounters

Also it included rules for how to turn those eggshells into armor for. Some reason. Eggshells aren't exactly what I think about when I think 'material to make good armor from'

To be honest I've never really paid much attention to tortles and since I don't use FR as a campaign sourcebook all I have to go by is Monsters of the Multiverse.

 

[Umbran]

Its all subjective and throwing a tantrum on ENworld wont change a thing.

Mod note:
Guess what? Your insistence on being insulting probably means that your statement won't change a thing, either.

So, really, resist the temptation. It isn't helping.

 

[tetrasodium]

To be honest I've never really paid much attention to tortles and since I don't use FR as a campaign sourcebook all I have to go by is Monsters of the Multiverse.

I'm not a fan of fr, and generally make bo secret of my distaste for it, but frcs(I think) has a good few pages on Thay that get better when you realize Greenwood's original Thay had the longer lived slower breeding more advanced elves and dwarves losing a war to and being slowly enslaved to the faster breeding more numerous/expendable humans.

I highly doubt that it says anything about tortles

 

[Scott Christian]

It depends on what reason/explanation the player has to want to play a tabaxi, and what reason/explanation the GM has to not allow them. All of your questions require an instant answer but the point isn't that players or GMs should always get their way. The point is that you start with an assumption of good faith on both sides and explore whether a compromise can be made. The point is that this should be a conversation not a snap response.

See the bold. This is my point. It doesn't matter. Neither does the DM reason. I get it, on some meta-level, we feel that there is nuance to be had. The DM has 200 pages of lore and has built the world for twenty years. Does that mean now we suddenly respect the reason, and in turn, allow him to say no to a new species? Or vice-versa, the player has spent weeks creating and painting their mini and also painted a portrait of them for use on their character sheet. They also already bought a tabaxi themed journal to take notes in. Since they spent the time and money, does that mean the DM should have to allow it?

In the end, these reasons shouldn't really matter. The core question remains the same: Does the DM have the right to say no to your tabaxi or tortle or spell or class at the end of the day?

 

[soviet]

See the bold. This is my point. It doesn't matter. Neither does the DM reason. I get it, on some meta-level, we feel that there is nuance to be had. The DM has 200 pages of lore and has built the world for twenty years. Does that mean now we suddenly respect the reason, and in turn, allow him to say no to a new species? Or vice-versa, the player has spent weeks creating and painting their mini and also painted a portrait of them for use on their character sheet. They also already bought a tabaxi themed journal to take notes in. Since they spent the time and money, does that mean the DM should have to allow it?

In the end, these reasons shouldn't really matter. The core question remains the same: Does the DM have the right to say no to your tabaxi or tortle or spell or class at the end of the day?

Since when has the GM had 200 pages of lore going back 20 years? Is this like The Shining where it's just 'Absolutely No Turtlemen' over and over again? You keep adding details to the hypothetical to make the player seem unreasonable.

 

[Justice and Rule]

This is so far removed from my way of doing things it could be on the other side of the galaxy. My players are not consumers. They are not there to share in the beauty of narrative. They are not expected to listen passively and provide feedback. If it wanted that, I could have been a storyteller (as in the campfire, not WoD definition). I don't want to sit on the tracks of the railroad and bask in the glory of your NPCs. I want to tell my story about my character too. If my value to you is as an audience, then get off your butt and write that novel.

Yeah, I really relate to this. The whole idea that the PCs are in your world going through your story is foreign to me. I tried doing that when I was younger and they just didn't work; it took some time before I realized that I'm not telling my story, but helping my players tell theirs that people really started to enjoy and invest in my games.

Exactly. If that's the goal, go write a book.

Now I can imagine how that.doesnt work for a particular player type, but I don't want to be uncharitable in my assumptions.

I dunno, I often find it's DMs that are way guiltier of that critique than anyone. Like, GMs who want to tell their story regardless of player actions, who want to keep their chosen characters alive because they need to, who have their GMPC who everyone is secondary to, to want to make sure everything follows the lore and canon of their world... I'm not saying that players can't have main character syndrome, but there are just so many more ways for GMs to really fall into that trap. Hell, I definitely fell into that last one as a younger GM.

I think we should just start numbering these arguments.

#	Argument	Counter
1	The player comes up with a reason a species that doesn't exist can be added to the world.	It's never been that I can't come up with a reason, after all it's a game of imagination. It's because I want a specific theme or feel to my game.
2	If the DM has final say on rulings or what species are allowed they're entitled jerks and players are always having less fun.	I let people know what my restrictions are before they join. I can't please everyone so I find people that have similar preferences. People I play with all have fun.
3	Collaborative world building is better.	While it may be better for some and you should do what works for your group, it doesn't work better for me and it is not the default assumption of D&D.

I'm sure there are subtleties that I'm missing and different phrasing. I thought there should be more but I can't think of any off the top of my head, it's all just a variation of these 3.

Am I missing anything?

I mean, I think there is way more nuance there, but you could probably just put the counter as "Because I don't want to" given how the arguments here go? Like, I think the biggest problem I've seen from the "GM shouldn't given in" part is not really based around some sort of reason that comes from how the game will be played, but more out of resistance to the GM giving ground. The "Take it or leave it" attitude is... honestly wild to me as a guy who constantly GMs, because I find not letting the players own a bit of the world like that largely makes players disinterested in the game they are playing.

See the bold. This is my point. It doesn't matter. Neither does the DM reason. I get it, on some meta-level, we feel that there is nuance to be had. The DM has 200 pages of lore and has built the world for twenty years. Does that mean now we suddenly respect the reason, and in turn, allow him to say no to a new species? Or vice-versa, the player has spent weeks creating and painting their mini and also painted a portrait of them for use on their character sheet. They also already bought a tabaxi themed journal to take notes in. Since they spent the time and money, does that mean the DM should have to allow it?

In the end, these reasons shouldn't really matter. The core question remains the same: Does the DM have the right to say no to your tabaxi or tortle or spell or class at the end of the day?

If you have 200 pages of lore, maybe it's time to reboot things and try something new. Or hell, allow for new and interesting things. Seriously, I've never seen a worse reason for "We should let the GM dictate this" than "Have you seen how big this lore bible is?"

 

[AlViking]

Since when has the GM had 200 pages of lore going back 20 years? Is this like The Shining where it's just 'Absolutely No Turtlemen' over and over again? You keep adding details to the hypothetical to make the player seem unreasonable.

My game goes back to the late 20th century so more than 20 years. Since I store all my details and game logs online I don't know how many pages it would be but if I included all the character stories people have written, all the reference material? Not sure how long it would be. I'm playing with someone who threw all their data into an LLM and created a resource that requires a binder.

I don't expect anyone to know any more than the basics I can go over briefly in a session 0 and I drop little bits of lore here and there, but I still use it as a reference. Heck, I still have the original map I made in colored pencil on graph paper. Just because you don't have that does not mean no one does.

 

[Maxperson]

I would ban a tortle on Darksun.

What about a tortoise?

 

[Mecheon]

What about a tortoise?

Tortles are tortoise guys so they'd be fine in Dark Sun by my count.

Now, Snappers, the chaotic counterpart to the Tortle who, unlike them, can swim? Yeah, they'd be in a bit of trouble in Dark Sun