D&D 5E Do you allow adult situations in your games?

[ruleslawyer]

In general, I find it a bit weird to put "adult" stuff (graphic violence etc) into explicit terms unless the goal is to shock the players (as opposed to the PCs), in which case you're usually playing a horror or similar genre RPG. Rape, torture, etc can certainly be in the background, but I can't imagine spending too many words narrating it unless it's happening in-game in the here and now. For example, if the PCs were to happen upon a torture chamber, I would certainly tell them that there were prisoners in various states of distress, but I wouldn't deem it necessary to go into the specific effects of the rack or brand or flensing knife any more than I feel the need to discuss a PCs specific physical symptoms every time he takes damage from a claw or dragonfire.

As for sex: I don't see why you would narrate this any more than you would visits to the privy or how a PC chews his food. PCs can certainly court romantic partners or hire escorts, but explicitly talking about how that all pans out seems a bit silly. Obviously, if a PCs sex partner turns out to be a doppelgänger or succubus or some such, I'll narrate to the reveal, but that's about it.

Were I playing with kids, all this stuff would be off the table but I'd also probably run my games with a different approach anyway.

 

[the Jester]

Yes, adult situations do show up from time to time. There are sometimes in-game romances, there are drugs and slaves and prostitutes, all that stuff. It's a part of the background of the world, so it appears where appropriate. I even had some weird monster porn once (by which I mean it was a mind flayer's idea of porn).

 

[Herr der Qual]

As a DM, if the PCs started torturing an NPC, I would just say "so you're torturing him - OK, we don't need to know the details" and fade to black in the game.

For me, NPC's torturing one another is fine to generalize, but I need to know how dark my player has gone in his torture, it has important ramifications on how the rest of the party will view him if they were present, how NPC's will react and if he can even maintain his alignment. Torture is pretty broad, did he tie a guy to a chair and punch him around a bit, or did he strap him to a table and pull finger nails, there's a big big difference there. If the party isn't present, I will generally give the rest of the players a smoke break and quickly go through it with him, so their opinions aren't altered and affect the character's relationships with out of game personal feelings.

 

[Nefzyflin]

Right group and right time, I am all for this kind of play. But even so, I prefer it in small doses throughout an adventure / campaign, otherwise it can get old very fast.

Nef

 

[gyor]

Actually I've read novels in FR that would put Westeros to shame, I've read FR novels, with attempted sexual assaults, drow rape revenge brothels, childern being tortured by relatives, alot of brothels, incest, magical mutalation, genitial mutilation, executions, childern being turned into abominations yet retaining something of the innocent child to them, sadomasicstisic Shadar-Kai, oppressive Drow Matericarcies, a Goddess of Pain, a Goddess of Brothels, horrifying forms of undead that make zombies, vampires, seem like saturday morning cartoons, battles the come off as violence porn, soul death, attempted infanticide (leading to the infant being crippled), violent rape, enchantment magic based rape, demonic and devilish worship, achololism, severe drug abuse of various sorts, Lovecraftian horror, genocide, murder, war, war crimes, LGTB issues, men's issues, women's issues, slavery, poverty, crime, horrifying hells of various forms, the slow brutal and disgusting mutalation and torture of Elminster is very graphic terms, assassinations, sex, nudity, orgies, slaughtered families, damnation and I'm sure I'm missing something.

Even during FRs most innocent days during the TSR days, stuff got through.

 

[Bayonet]

Mentioning that it occurs or "hand-waving" it is fine with me "and the rogue gets dragged off to the back room by an enthusiastic, and burly, half-orc barmaid. The next morning, you set off..." . The "wink and a nod" approach is probably the best way.

Alluding to adult situations in a scene is also okay, and can serve to really bring the setting to life. " Saucy trollops wave to you from the balconies of the festival district", " blood-stained implements are scattered around the torturer's chamber", "Women carry arms openly in this part of the docks after dark, and children are kept close at hand", etc.

However, If I was involved in a game where a PC was running around raping people, or going into lurid detail about some weird sex scene, I wouldn't stand for it. Subjecting other people to your weird fetish is a good way to get smacked across the face.

 

[gyor]

It really depends on the context and who you're playing with. If your gaming in a adult forum, but all means good and raunchy and twisted. If your with a bunch of buddies its usually poor ettique.

Actually I've toyed with having a more adult/explicted d&d session. I was at a Strip Club one time and saw this dancer called Rain (not her RL name obviously), with cool drain tattoos and I jokingly told her that I was going to take her into the VIP to play dungeons and dragons with her. She said sure, but I was just kidding, I had no d&d stuff there, nothing prepared, and paying for her time at 20 bucks a song for the length of a game session or even worse a campaign would have cost me enough that I would've have had to take out a mortage.

Still hiring some escorts for erotic d&d is a fantasy of mine.

Some good D&Dish erotic stories are out there at sites like Naked Blade, Literotica Sci-Fi/Fantasy,
Nonhuman, and horror sections, Mr. X's site, a Temple of Sharess site (I don't know if that sight is still up), and the Grey Archieves.


One particular favourite of mine is George Tasker, one Literotica, who writes the The Double D's Play D&D, The adveturers of C@ckweasel (about a leecherous, but unusually clever goblin), and its sequals, C@ocweasel and the Paladin, Sir C@ockweasel, C@ockweasel meets the King, Prince Charming, King Charming, Queen Charming, Busty Space Pirates, Dirklong Sabre, a bunch of other stories.

I used a @ instead of an o out of respect for Morrus obviously.

 

[MechaPilot]

So... when does the Book of Erotic Fantasy pdf go up for sale at dndclassics.com?

That wasn't that good of a book if I recall. Most of the books on the topic from that time don't hold up well anymore

I still own a copy of the BoEF, and I usually say that it is both a good book and a bad book. It's bad in the sense that most of the mechanical bits (feats, % chance of conception table, table of fantasy world STDs, and so on) aren't good. However, there's a very good section at the beginning of the book that talks about the topics of sex in RPGs, the human tendency to be humorous about sex to ease or cover discomfort, different models of marriage and divorce, and so on.

 

[MechaPilot]

Yes, adult situations do show up from time to time. There are sometimes in-game romances, there are drugs and slaves and prostitutes, all that stuff. It's a part of the background of the world, so it appears where appropriate. I even had some weird monster porn once (by which I mean it was a mind flayer's idea of porn).

Your porn reference actually reminds me of an adventure location I wrote up: it's a ruined temple of a deity of love/lust. The statues and frescoes were all of an amorous/erotic nature, and one of my players busted out laughing when I described a stained glass window depicting a satyr with a comically large phallus which was adorned with wreathes of flowers.

 

[Nebulous]

What about your campaigns. How do adult situations show up or do they at all?

We don't have any children around so we cuss and are crude if we want to be. I usually don't add "adult" stuff, although I have from time to time, such as half-demon/drow brothels where the females are impregnated in chambers to birth demon children. That particular arc was very adult, but it was short lived. Romance is usually not something i find enjoyable in a D&D game.