Recent content by Emerikol

I'm not a marginalized group but people say offensive things to me all the time.

This would be cool.

@Hussar this is exhibit A. I've always considered it an undesirable playstyle but not negative beyond that point. Just like I consider the fiction generation by players, a view held by many, to be negative. It's not that I'm saying it's bad inherently for everyone. Just bad for me. Now...

Very much so and I am fine with settling on these definitions. I don't think a lot of people though think that is the definition. For example, a lot of people think Adventure paths from Paizo or even numbered series of adventures are railroad. But in fairness, the first definition and the...

Dwarves are probably the only race besides human that have appeared in every campaign I've ran. They are incredibly popular in my circles. I think his idea for elves and your idea for elves overlaps.

This community is a tiny sliver of highly devoted fans. I am not sure I'd draw any conclusions from it one way or the other. And many of WOTC decisions are being challenged because it seems like they've forgotten anyone plays the game outside their bubble.

It's probably a senseless pedantic misunderstanding. If I were an archeologist and I found some ancient lost text and translated it I might very well say "I determined what the runes mean" but in reality the runes already meant something. The writer of the runes determined what they mean...

I think you are reading too much into it. The player would be stopped right off if he said he wanted a forest in the middle of a dessert. If he wants a hill surrounded by forest in a forest then that can be found and can be subsumed but it's never the case that something the DM objects to can...

Maybe someone should tell us what the difference between a linear campaign and a railroad campaign is? Other than a name change I don't know. Maybe use a table and bullet points.

For my groups, if it was in the PHB and I didn't want it I definitely had to tell them I was not allowing it. The rest of the books were assumed to be not allowed unless they contact me and I approved. And I did approve things on occasion but that was the way our groups worked.

I think it is playstyle more than rules. Gary's game was brutal and required player skill to survive. You actually got "good" at the game. D&D has been moving away from that idea ever since. This is why I said I like the 3e rules framework but I want the Gary 1e playstyle.

Perhaps they were common in many games but most of us old school DMs didn't put them in every adventure. In fact I'd venture some campaigns never say them even once. So most of the time it was a long process to earn the levels back prior to being able to get a restoration.

This seems a matter of taste. I think the debate I suppose is what is in the PHB and thus considered default without DM approval. I always send out a packet that sets up all of these decisions for the campaign ahead of time so the PHB doesn't matter all that much to me. Still, if I were WOTC...

Well for me it is negative but I assumed some people like it. So it was "neutral" in the broader world but it was a negative to me. I mean Paizo sells a lot of adventure paths. I don't mind though the change of terms if railroad has become too toxic but then why is linear good? Won't it soon...

Yes. Creativity and immersion can be enhanced by limits. And since it is a voluntary pursuit, no one is forced to do anything. It is choosing to play in a DMs campaign and agreeing to play by the limitations of that campaign. For me the very best players are those who embrace the idea and...