D&D General A glimpse at WoTC's current view of Rule 0

[EzekielRaiden]

I dunno, that seems fairly dismissive of the players' vision for their PC.

Oh, it absolutely is. But being blatantly dismissive is perfectly acceptable for one side of this argument.

Everyone thinks their character is special. Until they make their next character.

Huh? I don't think my characters are special. I think they're interesting, and I would like to see where they go. Their "specialness" is really only because they have the experience, both literally having-seen-stuff and abstractly having-gained-many-levels, to tackle problems that most folks can't, don't, or won't.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

Then why do you and others respond with the types of arguments above, which depend on players being absolute craptacular human beings?

I have not used such negative language. But that is the sort of behaviour you by my understanding seem to be espousing. Except you say you are not... But then I don't understand what you actually mean and you refuse to clarify.

Okay so...you're doing the thing you said you don't do. You're assuming incredibly crappy player behavior as the ONLY alternative. That is, in this specific paragraph, you have just divided all players into two and only two categories:

1. Those who purely accept what the DM tells them they can pick from, with only extremely rare deviation, or...
2. Those who are buttholes that insist on utterly ridiculous, outlandishly provocative choices and become disruptive if denied

So, when someone tells me those are my options--accept what you're given or you're a butthole--can you see why I would respond negatively?

I have not used such negative language. This is again your antagonistic attitude reading an offence that is not there. Like I don't get what you even actually mean. If you would not insist on playing a wookiee in Star Trek, dragonborn on Middle-Earth or an elf in explicitly elfless Artra, then what do you mean? Why are these strawmen? These are examples of what you been talking about, the player requesting the character concept the GM has not considered to be part of the game due the setting.

 

[pemerton]

Everyone thinks their character is special. Until they make their next character.

So what is the point of players, then? I mean, why does the GM just not write some more setting bible if they have such little interest in the players and their play of their PCs?

 

[pemerton]

If you would not insist on playing a wookiee in Star Trek, dragonborn on Middle-Earth or an elf in explicitly elfless Artra, then what do you mean?

If I sign up to play Star Trek, there are no Wookies but I would expect Vulcans. If sign up to play LotR/MERP, there are no Dragonborn but I would expect Dwarves. If I sign up to play D&D, I would expect Elves and Dragonborn, both of which are right there in the rulebook.

Now maybe Artra is sufficiently compelling, despite its lack of Elves, that I can get on board. But speaking at least for myself, I wouldn't have the sort of independent interest in an Artra game that I might have in a Star Trek or LotR/MERP game.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

How I see this is that if a GM says "Hey, I'd like to run a thing, anyone wanna play?" And the player says "Sure," but then comes up a character idea not suited for the thing, then they don't actually want to play the thing. And this is something I faintly recall happened when I played as a kid. But these days I expect people to have awareness and communication ability to just say "Sorry mate, never really liked the thing, I'll pass," instead of trying to force the thing to be not the thing via their character choice. And of course if enough people are not interested playing the game the GM wants to run, then the game doesn't happen and the GM needs to come up with another idea.

 

[Emerikol]

I emphatically do not believe that in general, and certainly not of several people who currently are posting in this thread.

If they were to explicitly say otherwise, then of course I would accept that. But I have never gotten the impression that, for several active posters in this thread, would ever consider consulting with their players even for a moment if they believed doing so could even potentially threaten their prewritten setting contents, in any way whatsoever.

Yes, I mean that exactly as strongly as I have said it there. Several people on here have made it exceedingly clear that the setting is vastly more important than anything their players like, want, or take interest in.

I have said it before but I will say it again. This would hold true moreso in session 0 or during downtime than during the session.

I create the campaign first generally. I do though have friends and when we are sitting around drinking coffee one of them might say "Man I really like X. Have you ever thought of designing a campaign around X?" Well if I like X, and probably after it germinates in my mind for a while, I may decide to create a campaign based on X.

How it typically works...
If I do have houserules, and this was far more common in 1e,2e than 3e,4e, I present them in session 0 along with the general theme of the campaign and how I DM. This would include the style of game which if I understand trad right it is trad. Preparation, smart use of skills, effective exploration approaches, and good combat tactics will all matter.

Now there are flavor restrictions. I may at any time in the design of a campaign decide to restrict something. I can say that only these races are available as PC races. I could say only these classes or only these variations of classes are available. Most often this is for flavor but there are rare cases where I just hate the race or the class. I also have a standing rule that only the PHB is assumed official and everything else must be requested. If I don't own the extra book I will have to buy it.

Most potential players know the kind of game I run. If it's a new player that player will usually just go along with what is presented. All the other players though will likely believe in my DMing philosophy as much as I do. We may argue about a rule during downtime and sometimes if their arguments are effective I will propose a new houserule. Many times I won't change anything. DMing for 30+ years has given me a lot of experience. Often the new player may at first not buy in totally but in time they often do. You gain a lot for what you "supposedly" give up.

There is not the conflict in my games that I think you think there is. I had a lot of conflict in 9th grade. Many of my mistakes from those days was allowing stuff into the campaign that didn't fit. I stopped doing that after a while. I learned. So my approach or me and many groups since has worked well and we've had fun. I think it's a style that could work for many groups. I don't think it is great for all groups.

I'm not trying to get you to quit playing your way. I will though defend aspersions cast on my playstyle which is what I'm doing a lot it seems. And I will admit that when someone is especially snarky I can snark back. I need to rein that in as much as possible.

 

[FrozenNorth]

And you use such strawmen all the time I wonder if it is even worth rebutting at this point. A DM has the final say. Having the final say does not in anyway reflect on how willing you are to receive input or react to that input. Not related.

You’re in no position to call strawman when your last post literally compared your players to animals too dumb to avoid overeating to death.

No. In a roleplaying game, players will often choose poorly when it comes to what their characters can do an why and it can often kill a game. I liken it to some animals will eat themselves to death if given enough food. And no I am not saying they are animals before you make such a remark. It's an analogy.

The DMs job is to keep his players hungry for the next thing and eager for exploration. It is not to sate every whim they've ever had.

 

[Emerikol]

So, when someone tells me those are my options--accept what you're given or you're a butthole--can you see why I would respond negatively?

They should just say "Our game is not for you." If though you get all the way into the game and then start trying to undermine the DM who did detail things out in session 0 then your exit from the group should be a hard bounce. And no I am not saying you are doing that but there are people who do.

 

[Emerikol]

You’re in no position to call strawman when your last post literally compared your players to animals too dumb to avoid overeating to death.

I explained it was an analogy and yet you still did exactly as I feared. I did not call them animals. I did use an example to illustrate that not always do players do what is in the best interest of the game. In fact on rules and rulings, they rarely do. But that may be again play style. Ours is a skill game. I would never ask either team in the NFL to referee. Why? They are biased for their team. They want to win. The DM's job is to be a neutral arbiter.

Edit:
And whatever you think about my example, it was not a straw man.

 

[Crimson Longinus]

If I sign up to play Star Trek, there are no Wookies but I would expect Vulcans. If sign up to play LotR/MERP, there are no Dragonborn but I would expect Dwarves. If I sign up to play D&D, I would expect Elves and Dragonborn, both of which are right there in the rulebook.

Now maybe Artra is sufficiently compelling, despite its lack of Elves, that I can get on board. But speaking at least for myself, I wouldn't have the sort of independent interest in an Artra game that I might have in a Star Trek or LotR/MERP game.

It of course is perfectly understandable that established IPs the participants are familiar with might be more compelling than whatever harebrained concoction the GM has cooked up. But at least when I play, I am really interested in seeing new worlds people have created, so bespoke words the GM has crafted are a selling point to me, even if their creative vision would differ from mine.

But what I absolutely reject, is the idea that the chosen rule system should dictate the contents of the setting, in a manner that everything that is available in the rule system is available in the setting. Now rules certainly matter, and one should endeavour to choose a system that is suited for representing the setting in question, but the rules still cannot dictate the setting. I am no more required to include elves or centaurs in my fantasy game using 5e D&D rules than I am required to include space ships in my Victorian noir game using GURPS even though the systems in question have rules for these things.