If you're saying that it's a one-sided declaration about what is allowed to be in the shared imagined space, then I agree. If you are saying that it's about one person's imagination being more important than another, then I disagree. It's about enjoyment plain and simple.
Then why did you
specifically talk about "Ultimate Authority"? Why all these posts about needing your absolute command unquestioned? What is the
point of being so gorram insistent on having PHENOMENAL COSMIC POWER if you never actually DO any of these one-sided declarations? That's the whole reason I keep pushing back. People keep declaring the right to make these one-sided, no-discussion declarations.
Will I have zero fun? No. Will I have substantially less fun as the Dragonborn is a constant "fingernails on the chalkboard" to me? Yes.
I must beg your forgiveness for considering this hyperbolic at best. And if it
isn't hyperbolic...wow. I just don't really know what to say about you being constantly driven crazy by something so utterly mild and even
prosaic as this. It, quite honestly, sounds like a serious problem, if that's the case.
That's false. My fun isn't more important. Either we both have full fun, or something needs to change on the player side of things since the DM has no other options. Only the player has multiple options for fun in a situation like this.
So...the DM...the person with phenomenal cosmic power, "Ultimate Authority," the one who can will literally anything into existence...they're the one who has no options. Are you really sure about that? I don't really see how that
works here.
Also, the dichotomy isn't false if
you're the one who presented it. I didn't invent anything there; I literally just applied your own logic quite simply to the two cases at hand (player's fun is lessened without [insert race here], DM's fun is lessened with it). If the dichotomy is false, it indicates there's something wrong with that underlying logic--because the dichotomy was trivially easy to produce.
No step back was had. Depriving someone of half their fun(arbitrary number for this point) is still depriving that person of fun.
You may not see it as such, but it really is. Having relative differences like this can mean it is possible to resolve the conflict through other means. "If I play an X, but do so with a Y which you've said you find awesome, is that okay?" type thing. When it is no longer all-or-nothing, it becomes possible to have answers that
aren't zero-sum games. That's a distinction I almost can't capture, it's so vast; diplomacy becomes nigh-infinitely easier when you can trade concessions on
different things rather than having to exclusively determine the acceptable midpoint on
each and every thing. If my tax cuts can be palatable to you if I include shifting some of the (overall-reduced) budget to education, suddenly things that were absolute no-go before become not only possible but relatively easy to achieve.
It is being unilateral in the sense that the DM has decided no Dragonborn and that's that. The talking is about how to get the player his fun another way.
And I really think that level of being unilateral is inappropriate most of the time.
Yeah. You've been very consistent and while I disagree with you on some things, I don't think your position is unreasonable and I think we are fairly close together on how to treat these situations.
My words have gotten heated at various points in this thread, so I want to thank you very sincerely for this. It is not easy to be magnanimous, but you're doing so. I truly appreciate you doing this.
Is it a DM fail that Tolkien doesn't allow hobbits to use guns'n'ammo?
1. No, because D&D isn't literature and literature isn't D&D. They support each other, they reference each other, but they are not the same thing, and there are things you can do in either one that won't fly in the other.
2. No, because even if this
were a campaign, as I've said numerous times, sometimes the answer really is "no." My beef is with leaping to "no" without
either a fair hearing (which
means being open to persuasion), or sitting down and explaining why you cannot be persuaded and trying to find another approach (which, as Maxperson said, is pretty close to where he's at.)
3. No, because "guns'n'ammo" are not part of the Player's Handbook for any edition I've played. Things in the PHB, and things part of the well-known cultural background for D&D, are fair game for "thinking they're more likely than not to be playable." Things outside that, even if they're in the DMG, are not appropriate for such belief that they're likely.
4. No, because things after the campaign has already begun are different from things that are worked out during the initial "putting together the campaign" process. (And yes, this means "joined a game in progress" players
are at something of a disadvantage, but that's a price I am willing to accept.)
5. No, because if the player really is going to become a petulant brat about it, the DM is well within her rights to show that player to the door. I just see a parallelism between that and behaviors that real DMs can and (unfortunately) sometimes
do engage in, and which the players would be well within their rights to call out too.
That is why what you've said is a false equivalency. Well, I'm sure there are other reasons. But the above are reasonably comprehensive, I hope.
Further thoughts on the flight issue: Consider, why (in Chess) the queen is a stronger piece (and produces more threat) than a rook or a bishop.
Yet the knight, which can
actually fly (moving while passing "over" enemy pieces in the way), is considered a
substantially weaker piece than the queen or rook (and only
equal to the bishop). In fact, both knights
combined aren't worth the same as the queen!
I still don't get it. Why the consternation? <snip> Why do you care? Why are you writing these massive posts <snip>
I'm bad at being concise. I desire precise, specific arguments, and throw more words at the problem than are needed. I know this fault well, and
try to fix it. (As you've seen, success is...spotty.) I care because you (and thus others) asked questions, and I want to give answers; I care because I know others will read this and potentially learn from it; I care because advocating for respect, discussion, and compromise is always worthwhile in my book.
Seriously... If I'm running a campaign and I don't want X options and the players who are in my game are fine with it. What is the big deal?
I had thought the whole point of the discussion, as it is now, is that people
aren't fine with an option being present or non-present. That the players DO want something you don't, or don't want something you do, or whatever.
But, there is more to this. I think it is about scarcity.
Getting to play is a rare opportunity for me, yes. I said as much earlier in the thread. It's especially rare if I get to play my favorite systems (4e and 13A). I'm only a DM right now because a friend went through a game-experience
so incredibly bad that even my depression couldn't overcome my certainty that I could do a better job.
I don't have enough time to play and run as much D&D as I want to. I could play or run D&D every day of the week if not for my many other responsibilities.
Yeah, that's...pretty much the antithesis of my experience. I've gone years without any gaming at all.
I will admit that I have no such issue. One of the players in my weekly dungeon crawl started their own campaign. It was presented as War of the Roses with fantasy that was human centric. I, personally, was not interested in the concept. When the player asked me if I wanted to play in their campaign, I responded with "No, it is not interesting to me".
I suppose I have a certain privilege in that I can say no to something that is not interesting to me, because I have other options of games I can be a player in.
This is certainly a reasonable thesis. One does not need to ask for negotiation and amelioration if games are plentiful; an easy-come, easy-go attitude is hard to express when it may be years between opportunities.
