D&D 5E Deal Breakers - Or woah, that is just too much

[The Crimson Binome]

Just to be clear there is nothing wrong at all with not liking the planes (they aren't for everyone) I was just curious if you had a bad experience that caused this outlook.

If there was one experience which specifically put me off from planar travel, it was the Legacy of Fire adventure path for Pathfinder. The fourth book sends the party into a demiplane of random unpredictable magical effects. Spoiler alerts for that path:
[sblock]

• One part of the world has a huge (invisible) anti-magic zone. This, shortly after the party is given an intelligent magic carpet to try out.
• Wild magic surges uncontrollably. Roll on a random chart every hour. We were hit by giant squid falling from the sky on more than one occasion.
• In order to progress, you need to sail a boat off the edge of the map, whereupon you will fall very far and then not die. Because that's what passes for physics in this world.

[/sblock]To summarize, catastrophe around every corner with no way to predict or mitigate any of it. Suffice it to say, nobody at the table was having much fun. That is what planar travel represents to me.

 

[nickverto]

If there was one experience which specifically put me off from planar travel, it was the Legacy of Fire adventure path for Pathfinder. The fourth book sends the party into a demiplane of random unpredictable magical effects. Spoiler alerts for that path:
[sblock]

• One part of the world has a huge (invisible) anti-magic zone. This, shortly after the party is given an intelligent magic carpet to try out.
• Wild magic surges uncontrollably. Roll on a random chart every hour. We were hit by giant squid falling from the sky on more than one occasion.
• In order to progress, you need to sail a boat off the edge of the map, whereupon you will fall very far and then not die. Because that's what passes for physics in this world.

[/sblock]To summarize, catastrophe around every corner with no way to predict or mitigate any of it. Suffice it to say, nobody at the table was having much fun. That is what planar travel represents to me.

Oh man that sounds terrible. Trust me all planar travel is not like that. I don't play Pathfinder but I know the planes in D&D are NOT like that experience (or at least shouldn't be if played right).

This conversation will get me to update my Roll20 campaign page to note that the party could on occasion visit other planes as side adventures. I would feel bad if someone joined and was having fun but hated the planes and dropped out because of it.

 

[Hussar]

I don't like planar stuff in D&D. ((Heh heh - anyone who's seen me post on this has seen my soapbox schpiele before. ))

For me, the biggest issue with the planes is that they are completely divorced from whatever setting you start out on. Whether you start from Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Eberron, or Dragonlance, the second you step into the Planes as a setting, it's the same Planes. Same Asmodeus, same Demogorgon, same Sigil. Same everything. Which, to me, is far too bland and contradicts the settings in question. Why on earth would there be an Asmodeus if you are playing a Dragonlance campaign? There's no Hell in Krynn. At least, not until the folks at TSR decided to force the Planes onto every single setting, regardless of whether it made sense or not.

It should matter what setting you start from when you travel to the Planes. There should not, IMO, be a single Planar Setting that applies to every other setting. A Vrock in Dragonlance should be very different from a Vrock in Forgotten Realms. When my Scarred Lands setting material has to reference the Great Wheel and everything that entails, I have a serious problem with The Planes.

You can bet dollars to donuts that my Primeval Thule Campaign will ignore 100% of the Great Wheel material.

** NOTE: The above is 100% just my opinion and should not be taken as anything more than simply my own personal tastes.**

 

[The Crimson Binome]

It should matter what setting you start from when you travel to the Planes. There should not, IMO, be a single Planar Setting that applies to every other setting. A Vrock in Dragonlance should be very different from a Vrock in Forgotten Realms. When my Scarred Lands setting material has to reference the Great Wheel and everything that entails, I have a serious problem with The Planes.

One of my favorite things about D&D is that nothing aside from the core races/classes is assumed to exist unless the DM explicitly adds it. Just as Dragonborn and Vrocks don't exist unless the DM says they do, neither does the Great Wheel or Sigil. That whole section of the DMG, about throwing out things you don't like and replacing it with stuff you do like, is just great.

 

[Hussar]

One of my favorite things about D&D is that nothing aside from the core races/classes is assumed to exist unless the DM explicitly adds it. Just as Dragonborn and Vrocks don't exist unless the DM says they do, neither does the Great Wheel or Sigil. That whole section of the DMG, about throwing out things you don't like and replacing it with stuff you do like, is just great.

100% agree.

But, what it means in practical terms is that I can never use any planar sourcebooks. I have to make everything up 100% on my own. The Planar stuff is almost never self contained. Importing, say, a module from Forgotten Realms to Dragonlance isn't generally that hard. Yes, I have to make changes of course, but, I can certainly use large chunks of that module. The planar stuff is just so strongly tied to all the other planar stuff that I've almost never been able to adapt it. Personal failing on my part, but, after the third or fourth attempt, I've just thrown up my hands and completely ignore all of it.

 

[innerdude]

Personally, I dislike it because it's too magical and unpredictable. A game is supposed to be a series of choices, but if you don't have any way of guessing what might happen next, then there's not enough context to make any informed decisions, so your choices become meaningless. I'm fine with magic and dragons as understood properties of an internally-consistent world, but it's hard to account for suddenly losing a consistent orientation of gravity (for example). That sort of thing just doesn't exist in my hypothesis space.

I view it as someone who will only eat food, and isn't willing to experiment with random objects found on the ground, regardless of how interesting they might taste.

Nailed it, @Saelorn. Planehopping has always just struck me as an excuse by the GM to say, "Hey guess what! None of the old rules apply, now I can REALLY lay on the fiat nice and thick, and you can't do anything about it because Ethereal Plane reasons."

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

Planehopping has always just struck me as an excuse by the GM to say, "Hey guess what! None of the old rules apply, now I can REALLY lay on the fiat nice and thick, and you can't do anything about it because Ethereal Plane reasons."

I'm guessing that you have found yourself with quite a number of adversarial DMs and DMs afraid of the players "ruining their story." Bad experiences like that are hard to shake off - not that I had DMs which did those particular things with planehopping, but I have had DMs that were more concerned with having things their way than with letting, let alone helping, anyone have fun at their table, and it has been a very deliberate process not to hold those DMs' mistakes against any other DMs.

 

[Shasarak]

I don't like planar stuff in D&D. ((Heh heh - anyone who's seen me post on this has seen my soapbox schpiele before. ))

For me, the biggest issue with the planes is that they are completely divorced from whatever setting you start out on. Whether you start from Greyhawk, Forgotten Realms, Eberron, or Dragonlance, the second you step into the Planes as a setting, it's the same Planes. Same Asmodeus, same Demogorgon, same Sigil. Same everything. Which, to me, is far too bland and contradicts the settings in question. Why on earth would there be an Asmodeus if you are playing a Dragonlance campaign? There's no Hell in Krynn. At least, not until the folks at TSR decided to force the Planes onto every single setting, regardless of whether it made sense or not.

It should matter what setting you start from when you travel to the Planes. There should not, IMO, be a single Planar Setting that applies to every other setting. A Vrock in Dragonlance should be very different from a Vrock in Forgotten Realms. When my Scarred Lands setting material has to reference the Great Wheel and everything that entails, I have a serious problem with The Planes.

You can bet dollars to donuts that my Primeval Thule Campaign will ignore 100% of the Great Wheel material.

** NOTE: The above is 100% just my opinion and should not be taken as anything more than simply my own personal tastes.**

I dont know why the Planes gets called out for special mention when almost every DnD game sees the same races using the same classes casting the same spells and using the same items just like every other game. You see one Elf, you have seen all the Elves.

 

[Hussar]

I dont know why the Planes gets called out for special mention when almost every DnD game sees the same races using the same classes casting the same spells and using the same items just like every other game. You see one Elf, you have seen all the Elves.

That's not even remotely true. A kender, a dark sun halfling and an Eberron halfling aren't remotely similar. Krynnish elves are pretty far removed from Forgotten Realms elves. There's a bajillion dragon variants. On and on.

If all you play is genericland DND then fair enough I suppose. I haven't done that in a very long time.

 

[Mecheon]

That's not even remotely true. A kender, a dark sun halfling and an Eberron halfling aren't remotely similar. Krynnish elves are pretty far removed from Forgotten Realms elves. There's a bajillion dragon variants. On and on.

If all you play is genericland DND then fair enough I suppose. I haven't done that in a very long time.

Eh, Halflings you raise a point, but Elves? Elves are really same-y, even without FR having 7 versions, Dragonlance having like, what, two different aquatic elves because ???, and all that.