D&D General Do you like LOTS of races/ancestries/whatever? If so, why?

[Aldarc]

The player entitlement in this thread is astounding.

If the GM does not provide the game you want, your freedom as a player is to decline and join or start another game. Full stop.

If your goal was to condescendingly insult others and poison the well in this thread, then congratulations. You succeeded. Full stop.

 

[Incenjucar]

It's upsetting when you spend a bunch of money and time on a game only to find out that you can't play it because you can't find anyone who wants to play the version of the game you want to play. It's a major reason video games are much more popular.

 

[Minigiant]

Heck, I would even say 99% of the time. Even in my own game, if a player asks "Can I play a Yuan-Ti?" and I reply "No, I don't allow them as PCs in my game" they say, "Ok" and choose something else. To be honest, I've never a had a player so set on playing something that they actually left the game, but that would always be their option.

Indeed.

I'd ask "Why do you want to be a Yanti Pure blood"

If it's to be poisonous, I'd let them be a Human with a poison based feat

If it's is to be secretly from an evil faction, I'd show them one of the evil factions of the allowed races.

If it's to be a good PC of a "evil" race, I'd show them one of the evil allowed races.

If it is to be snakey, I'd display ways to be snakey in my setting.

If they disagree with all these options then they are being unreasonable.

If my setting has none of these options then my setting is too narrow or too boring for standard D&D.

 

[Minigiant]

It's upsetting when you spend a bunch of money and time on a game only to find out that you can't play it because you can't find anyone who wants to play the version of the game you want to play. It's a major reason video games are much more popular.

Video games are very popular mostly because video game developers put a huge emphasis on making games that other people want want to play.

DM's do not automatically have this onus so they can make a game style that they might like and only hope that they find players who also like it. There's nothing wrong with making a game for yourself but you're making a game for yourself.

You will constantly find a huge difference between World builders who are making a game for their own use and World builders who are making a game for sale.

 

[Reynard]

If your goal was to condescendingly insult others and poison the well in this thread, then congratulations. You succeeded. Full stop.

If you say so, but you are the one dying on the hill of GMs not having the right to say "no" for any or no reason at all.

If I'm playing with friends and one of them comes to me with an out of bounds request I'm going to discuss it with them. If I'm interviewing randos for an online game, I'm probably not going to do so. But in either case if I decide I don't want that particular element in my game or at my table, I get to say "no."

 

[Minigiant]

GM: "I want to run a campaign based on historical France in the 13th Century".
Player 1: "Cool. Can I be a cleric of Lathander?"
Player 2: "Cool. I'll play a Force-sensitive Twi'lek".
GM: "Err, I think you might want to fit the premise better..."
Enworld crowd: "booo, bad GM".

GM: "I want to run a campaign based on historical France in the 13th Century".
Player 1: "That is very narrow on the types of PC. Can I be a cleric, elf, or warlock?
Player 2: "Cool. I'll play a dwarf sorcerer".
GM: "Err, I think you might want to fit the premise better..
Enworld crowd: "booo, bad GM"."

A DM should be able to run what they want. However there are only so many limitations a DM can impose without being considered unreasonable without actively attempting to hook the players in.

13th Century Dance doesn't match base D&D assumptions at all. That's when the onus shifts from players to confirm to DMs to seek out like players or to convince unlike players.

There is a point where the responsibility shifts.

 

[Aldarc]

If you say so, but you are the one dying on the hill of GMs not having the right to say "no" for any or no reason at all.

Your accusations against me would land harder if they were accurate or true, but sadly they are nowhere close, which leaves you just being insulting for any or no reason at all.

 

[Aldarc]

GM: "I want to run a campaign based on historical France in the 13th Century".
Player 1: "That is very narrow on the types of PC. Can I be a cleric, elf, or warlock?
Player 2: "Cool. I'll play a dwarf sorcerer".
GM: "Err, I think you might want to fit the premise better..
Enworld crowd: "booo, bad GM"."

If all the players, as per the example, want something that lies outside of the GM's pitch, then maybe the fault does not lie with either the GM or the players, but with the GM's pitched setting. There is likely a mismatch of play desires here. It's easy to say "what the GM says goes," but maybe this isn't the right group to pitch running this setting to. If so, the GM can leave or the GM can pitch a different setting to the players.

I usually have a few pitches that I'm fairly excited about, and then I pitch those ideas to players to see which ones they latch onto most rather than get upset that they are not rallying around a singular pitch. Colville did something similar with his Chain of Acheron game. The mercenary band campaign was the idea that the group picked out of a set of ideas. But if the players aren't really in the mood or onboard with the setting/game that I'm pitching, then I'll just drop it for another time rather than get upset about it.

 

[Jfdlsjfd]

A DM should be able to run what they want. However there are only so many limitations a DM can impose without being considered unreasonable without actively attempting to hook the players in.

I agree that it would be a case of the players wanting to play in a "all-inclusive" setting while the GM expects something very specific and probably a case of mismatched expectation. However, without knowing anyone in this thread, I am nonetheless pretty sure that @Oofta, for example, isn't advocating against the "active attempting to hook the players in", even if it's only by saying "trust me on the curated list, I have built a world very fun to play in over the last decades, I understand not everything fits in it but it's part of the appeal, sure you don't want to try it?" I assume that actively attempting to hook the players is the baseline when proposing to GM, irrespective of the pitch, that can be very different. One could replace 13th century france with "an all-dwarf campaign" or an "all wizard campaign". It isn't THAT FAR outside of D&D central concept and yet it would lead to the same debate over GM's right to accept a fighter in his all-wizard campaign. It's imho not different from wanting to run in their homebrew world where the creator god decided to create exactly THREE sentient races in his image, out of each of his kidneys.

Sure the GM wants to play something and he's enticing his players to do it, but it fits for anything, not only the world but also the campaign... Let's take RotFM. Some GMs will want to play it as "adventuring in a snow background, let's be merry and snowball throwing and adventure like everywhere else, but with snow-covered firs instead of deciduous trees -- oh, look, cute chwingas!" while other will notice that the campaign deals with human sacrifice, cannibalism and so on and what to play it "horror-style" which is outside of the standard D&D parameters as well. BOTH will pitch their vision actively and try to interest the players.


And if players want to play an horror version of RotFM and the GM wants to gloss over the bleaker aspects, then I don't think he should compromise. If it's not fun for him, he is under no obligation to play, exactly like any other player. One rule for everyone.

 

[TwoSix]

Realistically, who has the authority to make final determinations about the setting and campaign pitch is based on the market. If you're a forever DM with 10 players wanting to be in your campaigns, then you have a great deal of latitude to exclude any sort of player concept that doesn't fit with what you want. If you have exactly 2 players, and decide you want to do a no-magic Game of Thrones game when your two players always play casters, any appeals to "The DM has final say over the setting" are probably going to fall short.

We can quibble over exactly what moral constraints exist that demand flexibility on any of the participants, but, IME, supply and demand is the real arbiter.