Does Your Group Allow Homebrew or 3PP Material for D&D Games?

Mine does, although so far we haven't actually used any, other than a couple of minor tweaks to the core material for flavor's sake. A few items were brought up and discussed and we said we'd try them out, but then they were never followed up on.

So although right now everything in our game is from the core material, we're totally open to the possibility of 3rd party or homebrew material.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

Allowing something implies permission to someone else, and I've never heard of a player asking the DM permission for the DM use something. Very few people would use the work "allow" when referencing themselves (dieting is the only example I can think of). When referring to oneself, most people would use the phrase "DMs use."

Thanks for sharing your point of view so I could better understand where you were coming from.

I suppose the reason for the different understanding comes down to that I as a DM have always disagreed with the old sentiment (found in the AD&D 2nd DMG, if not also other places) that players are inherently going to be trying to get one over on the DM or squeeze out unfair advantages (and thus would approach character options looking to "sneak" something into the game that makes them "win"), so I don't normally think of things like that a DM would be saying "I don't allow 3rd party material" meaning not that they don't allow their single cooperative team (the way I view myself and my players, as we all have the same goal of shared enjoyment - not the AD&D 2nd assumed DM trying to have a fun game and players trying to wreck shop and embarrass/agitate the DM), but that they don't let the other team that is the players have access to the same kinds of tools that they give their team access to.

As for players asking the DM for permission for the DM to use something - I have had that happen quite a few times. Since that is what asking me to run a particular system ("Can we play some Shadowrun?"), or adventure ("Since we TPKed in Swords & Wizardy, but it was totally fun, can you convert Rappan Athuk to 5th edition?"), or to check out a particular product ("My other group was talking about a Book of Lost Spells that got put out. Maybe there are some cool spells in it?"), or even just include a particular theme/trope ("Can we go to war in this campaign?") is doing, and that is not a rarity in my experience.

 

[Henry]

Maybe because as a newish DM I'm not arrogant enough to assume I know better than a team of professional game designers? There are plenty of options that have been thoroughly tested in the official sources.

Sent from my SM-G900P using Tapatalk

It's not arrogance to introduce non-official rules material to a game; I don't know your experience, but for people like Russ and myself, we have the perspective of having met a lot of these professional game designers in person, and seeing how the only thing that separates us from the "professionals" is experience and collaboration, both of which are not hard to attain these days if a person wants to.

Mearls, Crawford, even old-timers like Gygax, Lisa Stevens, and Monte Cook were cobblers, marine biology students and amateur writers before they were game designers. They're standing on a FREAKIN' GIGANTIC MOUNTAIN OF FAILURE that we don't see because we just see the honed finished product. That's kind of comforting - to be a game designer, you don't need tons of innate talent and years of specialized training - you just need to start somewhere. Same with DMing, for that matter, as most of the people in this thread know quite well.

Old quote attributed to Gary Gygax, writer of AD&D, one of the "founding fathers" of the hobby: "The secret we should never let the gamemasters know is that they don't need any rules." I vaguely remember Mike Mearls paraphrasing this very thing on these forums about three or four years ago, though I can't find it now.

http://www.allenvarney.com/rev_04a.html

 

[Corpsetaker]

Yeah, this is a good example why it's so difficult to discuss when we aren't specific enough.

Reminds me of the WoTc survey about not wanting bloat. Unless you are specific with your answer, that can be interpreted in many different ways.

PS: Just want to say that the purpose of this poll is just to try and give a big "I told you so" to me.

 

[Corpsetaker]

It's not arrogance to introduce non-official rules material to a game; I don't know your experience, but for people like Russ and myself, we have the perspective of having met a lot of these professional game designers in person, and seeing how the only thing that separates us from the "professionals" is experience and collaboration, both of which are not hard to attain these days if a person wants to.

Mearls, Crawford, even old-timers like Gygax, Lisa Stevens, and Monte Cook were cobblers, marine biology students and amateur writers before they were game designers. They're standing on a FREAKIN' GIGANTIC MOUNTAIN OF FAILURE that we don't see because we just see the honed finished product. That's kind of comforting - to be a game designer, you don't need tons of innate talent and years of specialized training - you just need to start somewhere. Same with DMing, for that matter, as most of the people in this thread know quite well.

Old quote attributed to Gary Gygax, writer of AD&D, one of the "founding fathers" of the hobby: "The secret we should never let the gamemasters know is that they don't need any rules." I vaguely remember Mike Mearls paraphrasing this very thing on these forums about three or four years ago, though I can't find it now.

http://www.allenvarney.com/rev_04a.html

I just want to chime in a moment.

I think there is a gigantic disconnect going on here. Changing rules around and making rulings when the rules aren't clear is not the same as allowing 3PP/fan made material. You can create house based rulings and still stay with in the official framework of current D&D.

 

[Morrus]

[PF][/PF]

I just want to chime in a moment.

I think there is a gigantic disconnect going on here. Changing rules around and making rulings when the rules aren't clear is not the same as allowing 3PP/fan made material. You can create house based rulings and still stay with in the official framework of current D&D.

No True Scotsman, yet again? It's become your go-to logical fallacy.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_true_Scotsman

Any evidence which contradicts the narrative in your head doesn't count.

You're welcome to disallow any viewpoints which don't match yours on claims of personal standards of validity, but it's no contribution to any serious discussion. And it runs the danger of turning you into a one-man Monty Python sketch, which is presumably contrary to your aims.

 

[AaronOfBarbaria]

PS: Just want to say that the purpose of this poll is just to try and give a big "I told you so" to me.

That's how you view someone getting more information when you say something that they don't think is correct?

Then what's your poll for? Are you giving yourself a big "They told me so"?

 

[dave2008]

To me, the interesting issue is whether DMs allow 3PP for my character.

That is why I voted "no" even though I use 3PP and homebrew material all the time, on my side of the DM screen.

CapnZapp, first I apologize because I feel you may have addressed this elsewhere in this thread but I couldn't find it. Second, I hope this doesn't come off as judgmental, I'm just trying to understand your position because I respect your opinion. Now, why don't you allow players to introduce 3pp or homebrew content? Is it:

1) at time issue - you don't have time to vet it or modify it with the player?
2) a social issue - you aren't willing to prevent abuse? Ex.: if something is unbalanced you don't feel like you can work with the group to modify it to make it balanced
3) You don't like saying no? i.e. say it once (no homebrew or 3pp content) so you don't have to say it every time your players want to add something.
4) Group dynamics? i.e. you play and adversarial game where the players are trying to "beat" the DM and this will always lead them to submitting options to abuse the rules.
5) something else?

Personally the groups I play with I work cooperatively with to produce HB content. If I make a change on the DM side (other than making monsers, items, locations, etc.) I discuss it with them and we usually try it out. If we don't like it, we go back. I treat player content the same way.

For example, in 4e I wanted to ditch AC as a defense and make it damage reduction. We tried it RAW first for a few adventures and then tried it as DR. The group much preferred it as DR so we made the change permanent. Conversely, I wanted to mess around with the action economy and though I don't remember what I did, I remember it ended up being a significant boost to the ranger in the group. As a result we switched back to the RAW and that worked for everyone.

 

[Jester David]

I just want to chime in a moment.

I think there is a gigantic disconnect going on here. Changing rules around and making rulings when the rules aren't clear is not the same as allowing 3PP/fan made material. You can create house based rulings and still stay with in the official framework of current D&D.

But you can also create house rules that vary greatly from the framework of current D&D. Changing hit points to vitality and wounds. Swapping d20s for 3d6. Armour as Damage Resistance.

New homebrew subclasses don't change the game any more than adding official ones.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Yep. We have to all basically agree it's not broken or against the tone of the campaign, but we aren't strict about that.

We are the types thst can't immerse into a pseudo medieval Spain setting if it has living constructs, or hyena people.

in 4e games we use much less homebrew and no 3pp, but mostly because 4e has so many options and so much fluid customization it doesn't come up.

 

[I'm A Banana]

House-ruling something and home-brewing are not the same thing. Making a ruling on how something works or adjusting a rule so that it better fits your group's playstyle is a house-rule. Creating your own world or race or class is home-brew.

Like I said, the difference is one of degree. When you decide that a white dragon lives in the mountains near Neverwinter, you're creating your own world and making a ruling fitting the game to your group. When you decide that centaurs are a playable race in your game, you're also adding to your world an making a ruling fitting the game to your group. Turn that white dragon into a monster from Fifth Edition Foes and turn that centaur into a dragonborn, and it's still the same kind of decision. When you decide that a 15 on 1d12+1d8 is an encounter with 2d4 owlbears, you're doing the same thing. When you declare that a high Perception check reveals the hidden doors in a room, it's still the same kind of thought process. The difference is mostly in how big a potential impact these decisions have on the game going forward - a centaur or dragonborn in the party is a larger-scale decision tha "this room has hidden doors," which itself by the same token is probably smaller in scale than using a third party monster in your dungeon.

Or to put it another way: your decision to let Perception search a room isn't any less significant than your decision to allow the Noble from EN5IDER.

Banana begins with a statement including "hostile to homebrew". Does he by that mean he demands access to 3PP options for his character? Apparently he does. Personally, I find that completely unreasonable.

But.

Then he significantly nuances that statement. By homebrew he might just mean something as innocous as making stealth rulings? Then I'd have to completely retract my opinion. After all, who doesn't need to make rulings on the clusterfrack that is the stealth rules?

So what is it, Banana? Are you completely unreasonable or not?

I mean, I probably am, but not for these reasons.

To maybe clarify a bit: I don't think that having to make a ruling on Stealth is all that different from making a ruling on whether or not to allow a 3PP race, and so if a DM is comfortable doing one but uncomfortable doing the other (ie, you ban all 3PP content because you don't want to make that ruling), it undermines some of my confidence in that DM, and might make me question if I'd be comfortable in that DM's campaign. Not because of any specific thing that DM permitted or banned, but because that DM seems uncomfortable with making rulings to make the game better for their players, which is something I'd want my DMs to be comfortable with.