D&D (2024) Command is the Perfect Encapsulation of Everything I Don't Like About 5.5e

[MarkB]

And yet I somehow do not see this kind of behavior in more open-ended games, so I do not believe this argument. it's not just that the players ignore session zero and you canjnot stop this kind of behavior, it's that in a more strict game some people's desire to "break it" through exploits may override respect for fellow players and poorly-designed spells like Command enable them to do exactly that. Maybe if D&D was overall more open-ended game, this would not be a problem. But not only it isn't, we're literally on forum of a website selling version of the game with 200% more specific rules. Command being so open-ended does not fit design philosophy and enables people trying to "break" the game to feel clever.

I haven't seen a lot of this behaviour at all, but what I have seen of it occurred regardless of system. And while D&D's rules may be more specific in outcome than those of other games, it's certainly not my experience that they enforce a more serious style of play that players might rebel against.

That seems more like something that specific DMs might do, again regardless of system.

 

[plecostomus]

I'm glad they removed the language requirement since it's hard to know whether to prepare or use Command sometimes. A few sessions ago we were fighting a chimeric sort of beast. We knew these beasts speak, but their known languages are numerous, and Common is pretty rare. At one point the DM said the beast "shouted in pain". I perked up and said, "Oh, what word did it shout?" The DM replied, "It was just a beastly sort of noise." How obnoxious! And I don't think the DM was consciously trying to make me gamble on whether or not Command would work.

Command is magic so it can just magically tell the enemy your intent. That's definitely OK by me.

I've never made up a Command word myself. The listed words are useful enough. I'm sure the jokester players in my group would enjoy making up words if they had access to the spell though.

Actually I suspect one of them has Command, he's just never looked at or changed his prepared spells.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'm glad they removed the language requirement since it's hard to know whether to prepare or use Command sometimes. A few sessions ago we were fighting a chimeric sort of beast. We knew these beasts speak, but their known languages are numerous, and Common is pretty rare. At one point the DM said the beast "shouted in pain". I perked up and said, "Oh, what word did it shout?" The DM replied, "It was just a beastly sort of noise." How obnoxious! And I don't think the DM was consciously trying to make me gamble on whether or not Command would work.

Command is magic so it can just magically tell the enemy your intent. That's definitely OK by me.

I've never made up a Command word myself. The listed words are useful enough. I'm sure the jokester players in my group would enjoy making up words if they had access to the spell though.

Actually I suspect one of them has Command, he's just never looked at or changed his prepared spells.

See, to me it's just a 1st level spell slot, and in a situation like you describe you risk losing it or you don't. Same thing would happen if the monster spoke French and you don't.

 

[Lanefan]

When the issue was people were abusing the spell to force juvenile behavior into the game where it doesn't belong, I doi not beleive it is irrelevant. It was very clearly an issue people struggled to solve even with session zero o talking to problem players and likely contributed to newshape of Command spell.

The bolded is a statement not everyone will agree with.

 

[Lanefan]

People who do not want to take the game seriously, do not respect collaborative storytelling and need to drag everything into level of juvenile poop jokes

As a player I take the game seriously enough to show up on time ready to play.

What happens within the game I take with a widely-varying degree of seriousness based on a host of factors, of which a big one is the character I'm playing at the time.

Life's a joke to Lanefan the character*, as are most of the people he meets; and I'll play him as such. Meanwhile, it's all deadly serious to some other characters of mine for whom high drama and angst seem to be the norm.

* - who, after a multi-year absence while he built his stronghold, is back in the field as of next session - lookout, world.

 

[Not a Decepticon]

The bolded is a statement not everyone will agree with.

And they can play their gross games where they allow things like that. Why must enabling gross behavior be thedefault mode of the game?

As a player I take the game seriously enough to show up on time ready to play.

So you wouldn't respect the game to respect other people's boundaries and don't do gross toilet humor when it drives people sick?

 

[Lanefan]

So we should teach kids it's ok to try to force your way to displeasure of others?

Hard to call it displeasure when they're all too busy laughing...

Your creativity ends on disrespecting other players boundaries. Which I argue the abuse-prone spell like Command enables by giving you an excuse to bypass established boundaries in name of "clever and creative roleplay". It's grotesque.

If poop jokes are "beyond established boundaries" methinks those boundaries have become far too confining. The Victorian Era of prudishness came and went well over a century ago, the Puritan Era several centuries before that, and hopefully neither will return.

 

[Not a Decepticon]

Hard to call it displeasure when they're all too busy laughing...

If poop jokes are "beyond established boundaries" methinks those boundaries have become far too confining. The Victorian Era of prudishness came and went well over a century ago, the Puritan Era several centuries before that, and hopefully neither will return.

So I'm now being a puritan for not wanting on my table gross humor that makes me nauseated?

 

[Micah Sweet]

And they can play their gross games where they allow things like that. Why must enabling gross behavior be thedefault mode of the game?


So you wouldn't respect the game to respect other people's boundaries and don't do gross toilet humor when it drives people sick?

I don't see the game, past or present, as "enabling gross behavior" in particular, we're just not going to agree on that.

And you have issues at game time with that sort of behavior, have made it clear you don't appreciate it, and are subjected to it in your game anyway, that is not a problem with the rules.

 

[Lanefan]

So I'm now being a puritan for not wanting on my table gross humor that makes me nauseated?

No, but expecting the entire game to change to solve an issue that affects what would seem to be an extreme minority of players (of all the D&Ders I've ever interacted with either in-person or in forums you're the only one I know of who becomes nauseated by gross humour) is a bit much.