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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dausuul" data-source="post: 5192735" data-attributes="member: 58197">This is a very touchy subject, because it goes directly to the player's conception of his/her character, and that's something you tamper with at your peril.In your second example, clearly it was central to the halfling player's concept of the character that he was a halfling; even though being big might have been tactically to his advantage, it wrecked the image he had in his head. If that player comes to the gaming table because he wants to be the little guy sneaking around and darting between the feet of the big dumb humans, then enlarging his PC means you're destroying his fun. The battle may be won, and he may play a part in it, but his character - his sneaky little hero - won't have been part of that victory.This is the same reason I have learned as a DM to avoid anything that messes with a PC's character concept, except with the player's express consent. I can blast PCs with dragonfire, afflict them with disease, suck their life out with necromantic magic, or declare that rocks fall and they die*. But (for instance) forcibly replacing a PC's hand with a magical silver prosthetic is an absolute no-no. Not even if the magical silver prosthetic gives the PC awesome new powers. You just don't go there. That territory belongs to the player alone, and I have no more right to mess with it** than the player has to demand that I incorporate modrons into my game world.[SIZE=-2]*Okay, maybe not that last one.**Caveat: I do consider that I have the right to disallow certain things, e.g., I can say "No warforged in this world," and players don't get to ignore that and make warforged PCs. But having allowed a warforged PC, I don't get to turn him into a human later.[/SIZE]</blockquote>

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