D&D 5E D&D Without Adding House-Rules/Home-brew

[Vaalingrade]

Using one of the PH halfling pictures as your character portrait?

Reported to the UN for War Crimes.

 

[Mort]

For me, this is like asking if I would eat a potato without salt or seasoning.

If I had absolutely no other choice. Like, I've already eaten my shoes and the other plane survivors have grown wary of my hungry stares and are on guard..

I'd much rather eat an unseasoned potato than "mystery stew" served by someone cackling and picking their nose!

I've been in games where the house rules / homebrew elements felt like the latter.

 

[Vaalingrade]

I'd much rather eat an unseasoned potato than "mystery stew" served by someone cackling and picking their nose!

I've been in games where the house rules / homebrew elements felt like the latter.

Most of my homebrew is to pick out all the designers' boogers.

Edit: From the game. Not their noses.

Unless they pay really well. I don't kink shame, or turn down good money.

 

[Shiroiken]

Can you provide an example of when using RAW would hurt the game?

I mean, I can see plenty of situations where house rules, 3rd party supplements etc. might increase the fun at the table sure. But I'm having a hard time picturing how using "straigh RAW" (if there even is such a thing, really) would hurt the game?

Pre-Xanthar's Coffelock comes to mind, but there's other RAW exploits as well. It hasn't happened in a while, since I don't run RAW, but sometimes you run across a corner case in play where by RAW it doesn't make sense and ruins the fun for both the players and the DM. I'd have to take a deep dive to come up with an actual example though.

 

[TwoSix]

I'd much rather eat an unseasoned potato than "mystery stew" served by someone cackling and picking their nose!

I've been in games where the house rules / homebrew elements felt like the latter.

I can understand some concerns around DMs who have hundreds of pages of "special house rules" in a giant binder, and who have changed pretty much the entire baseline of the game.

My problem is more with DMs who refuse to consider alternate approaches to character building (whether that be a reskinned race, or a homebrewed class or subclass) when the player makes a request for consideration in good faith.

It really only takes a few minutes to determine if a homebrew has some egregious balance issues, and any balance issues less than "egregious" are already present in RAW.

 

[Mort]

Pre-Xanthar's Coffelock comes to mind, but there's other RAW exploits as well. It hasn't happened in a while, since I don't run RAW, but sometimes you run across a corner case in play where by RAW it doesn't make sense and ruins the fun for both the players and the DM. I'd have to take a deep dive to come up with an actual example though.

Ah, I see.

Rules interactions that lead to absurd/unwanted results. Yes, I can see how that would be an issue.

And that's why the DM is there. Even "mostly say yes..." DMs need limits.

 

[DND_Reborn]

Pre-Xanthar's Coffelock comes to mind, but there's other RAW exploits as well. It hasn't happened in a while, since I don't run RAW, but sometimes you run across a corner case in play where by RAW it doesn't make sense and ruins the fun for both the players and the DM. I'd have to take a deep dive to come up with an actual example though.

To reiterate:

You CAN REMOVE content not appropriate to your world.

Any RAW exploits that you find troublesome can easily be removed within the parameters of the OP.

 

[Voadam]

The last time my group was discussing a new campaign with me DMing I came up with a list of about 20 big modules/Adventure paths that I had and was interested in running in 5e. One of them was Rime of the Frost Maiden so that would have been a straight official D&D adventure which I might have run with all official D&D monsters. We ended up going with one of the 19 others though and I have used a lot of 3rd party monsters with it.

 

[Umbran]

I mean, I can see plenty of situations where house rules, 3rd party supplements etc. might increase the fun at the table sure. But I'm having a hard time picturing how using "straigh RAW" (if there even is such a thing, really) would hurt the game?

So, I can see situations where this can happen, specifically when "the game" and "the game rules" are not the same.

One of our former moderators (Rel, for those who remember him) at a house con we both attend, has a habit of prefacing the one-shot games he runs with a statement of "How to find the fun in this game." For most systems, if you ignore that when playing, the rules and the game you are trying to play wind up in conflict.

For example, if I were running a mystery investigation, there are rules (and gaps in rules) in D&D that would hurt play. The game (my campaign) is hurt by the game (the D&D RAW).

To avoid this, when you pick up the game rules, and instead of ask "How can I use this to do my campaign concept," you first pick up the rules, and ask, "What campaign concepts does this do well?"

 

[MonsterEnvy]

I voted NO and wished that I could have voted NO! Having to encounter 6-8 combat encounters in a 24 hour period would destroy the game for me.

That’s optional it’s not part of the required rules or anything.