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Flying Races: Limiting Flight
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<blockquote data-quote="Charlaquin" data-source="post: 7309537" data-attributes="member: 6779196"><p>I didn't ignore that. I specifically said, even if only one player has a flying character, they can break sequence if they are willing to split the party, another thing I prefer to avoid.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Sure, I could still use gates, but "you need to fly past this" would not be among the gates at my disposal. Actually, in a party with all flying characters that would probably be fine because it's the expectation from the get-go. But that's not generally how I assume a party is going to be constructed.</p><p></p><p>The reason I neglect wind is twofold. First of all, it's just not going to be windy all the time in all places where flight might be necessary to pass. Second, and much more importantly, wind is not something that gaining the ability to fly allows you to bypass. "You can't get there without flying" is a different gate than "it's too windy for you to fly there" and is opened with a different key.</p><p></p><p></p><p>You assume that I don't have experience with parties including flying characters. This is an incorrect assumption. It is my experience with flying characters that has led me to the decision to disallow flying characters at 1st level. And "brokenness" is, again, not the issue I take.</p><p></p><p></p><p>I wasn't explaining what gating is to you?</p><p></p><p></p><p>This has not been my experience. Gating can be very effective in TTRPGs, it just depends on how you design your adventures. With the right tutorializing, I have found it very easy to teach players that some obstacles cannot be bypassed with their current capabilities, and that when they encounter such obstacles, they can expect to obtain a power that will allow them bypass those obstacles at some point in the future.</p><p></p><p></p><p>And again, gates and chasms are not necessarily the specific obstacle I would use, just an example of the type of obstacle. But let's assume I have a chasm that is too wide for any tools the players have at their disposal to bridge, too sheer for them to climb, and I decide to use wind to prevent the party aaracokra from flying across it. The rest of the party gaining the ability to fly isn't going to allow them to bypass that obstacle. Unless the wind conveniently stops once they have a party member with the Fly spell, and at that point the fly spell isn't actually the key to the gate.</p><p></p><p></p><p>So suddenly all that player ingenuity that was allowing them to bridge the gap without any flying party members disappears?</p><p></p><p></p><p>I don't punish characters for picking flying creatures. I <em>do not allow</em> players to pick flying creatures. If a player really wants to play a creature that normally has flying <em>anyway</em>, they do so with the understanding that, because I don't allow flying creatures, they will not be able to fly. That's not a punishment for picking a flying race, that's an allowance. If you want to play an aaracokra for some reason other than it's ability to fly (presumably roleplaying reasons), I will allow that, on the condition that you will not be able to fly. Hell, I'll work with you to come up with some other racial bonus to make up for the lack of flying if it's that important to you. If flying is the only reason you want to pick a race, then pick a different one, because 1st level flight is a hard no from me.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Yes, and? I'll make aaracokra NPCs with the normal aaracokra racial abilities. They're not normally a playable race in my games, so the flying isn't a problem. If a player <em>insists</em> that the aaracokra race is so important to his character concept that he will take it even if he can't fly, then I'll work with him to make an allowance for that. Maybe his wings got clipped as a hatchling or something, whatever. Just because the player going outside the rules to play what is, in my games, a monster race, doesn't mean all NPCs of that race has to play by the same rules he does.</p><p></p><p></p><p>Again, that's the player choosing to play a race that I don't otherwise allow. Is it punishing a player for choosing to play a half-dragon if I allow him to reskin the dragonborn racial stats to bring him in line with the other PCs instead of giving him the full half-dragon template simply because that's what he chose to play? Is it punishing a player who wants to play a Doppleganger for allowing her to play a Changeling from the Eberron Unearthed Arcana instead of giving them the full Doppleganger statistics? Flying PCs at level 1 aren't allowed in my game. If you want to play a race that normally has a flight speed anyway, you do so with the understanding that it will not have a flight speed at level 1.</p><p></p><p></p><p>As I've said many times, this has not been my experience, and wind doesn't solve the problem because it has a completely different key.</p><p></p><p></p><p>See above. If this isn't a problem for you, do whatever you want. Fact is, flying at 1st level is a problem in my games, it is absolutely self contained, practical, and solved by banning flying races, not by wind.</p><p></p><p></p><p>As I see this conversation, I stated why I don't allow races with flight speed at level 1 in my games. Those reasons had exactly zero to do with how impressive the things you can do with a bird person is or is not, and my solution is not ribboning, it's straight-up banning. And you persist in trying to give me solutions to problems I don't have and argue that I shouldn't be running the game the way I do because of some nonsense about punishing players for making choices I don't allow.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Charlaquin, post: 7309537, member: 6779196"] I didn't ignore that. I specifically said, even if only one player has a flying character, they can break sequence if they are willing to split the party, another thing I prefer to avoid. Sure, I could still use gates, but "you need to fly past this" would not be among the gates at my disposal. Actually, in a party with all flying characters that would probably be fine because it's the expectation from the get-go. But that's not generally how I assume a party is going to be constructed. The reason I neglect wind is twofold. First of all, it's just not going to be windy all the time in all places where flight might be necessary to pass. Second, and much more importantly, wind is not something that gaining the ability to fly allows you to bypass. "You can't get there without flying" is a different gate than "it's too windy for you to fly there" and is opened with a different key. You assume that I don't have experience with parties including flying characters. This is an incorrect assumption. It is my experience with flying characters that has led me to the decision to disallow flying characters at 1st level. And "brokenness" is, again, not the issue I take. I wasn't explaining what gating is to you? This has not been my experience. Gating can be very effective in TTRPGs, it just depends on how you design your adventures. With the right tutorializing, I have found it very easy to teach players that some obstacles cannot be bypassed with their current capabilities, and that when they encounter such obstacles, they can expect to obtain a power that will allow them bypass those obstacles at some point in the future. And again, gates and chasms are not necessarily the specific obstacle I would use, just an example of the type of obstacle. But let's assume I have a chasm that is too wide for any tools the players have at their disposal to bridge, too sheer for them to climb, and I decide to use wind to prevent the party aaracokra from flying across it. The rest of the party gaining the ability to fly isn't going to allow them to bypass that obstacle. Unless the wind conveniently stops once they have a party member with the Fly spell, and at that point the fly spell isn't actually the key to the gate. So suddenly all that player ingenuity that was allowing them to bridge the gap without any flying party members disappears? I don't punish characters for picking flying creatures. I [I]do not allow[/I] players to pick flying creatures. If a player really wants to play a creature that normally has flying [I]anyway[/I], they do so with the understanding that, because I don't allow flying creatures, they will not be able to fly. That's not a punishment for picking a flying race, that's an allowance. If you want to play an aaracokra for some reason other than it's ability to fly (presumably roleplaying reasons), I will allow that, on the condition that you will not be able to fly. Hell, I'll work with you to come up with some other racial bonus to make up for the lack of flying if it's that important to you. If flying is the only reason you want to pick a race, then pick a different one, because 1st level flight is a hard no from me. Yes, and? I'll make aaracokra NPCs with the normal aaracokra racial abilities. They're not normally a playable race in my games, so the flying isn't a problem. If a player [I]insists[/I] that the aaracokra race is so important to his character concept that he will take it even if he can't fly, then I'll work with him to make an allowance for that. Maybe his wings got clipped as a hatchling or something, whatever. Just because the player going outside the rules to play what is, in my games, a monster race, doesn't mean all NPCs of that race has to play by the same rules he does. Again, that's the player choosing to play a race that I don't otherwise allow. Is it punishing a player for choosing to play a half-dragon if I allow him to reskin the dragonborn racial stats to bring him in line with the other PCs instead of giving him the full half-dragon template simply because that's what he chose to play? Is it punishing a player who wants to play a Doppleganger for allowing her to play a Changeling from the Eberron Unearthed Arcana instead of giving them the full Doppleganger statistics? Flying PCs at level 1 aren't allowed in my game. If you want to play a race that normally has a flight speed anyway, you do so with the understanding that it will not have a flight speed at level 1. As I've said many times, this has not been my experience, and wind doesn't solve the problem because it has a completely different key. See above. If this isn't a problem for you, do whatever you want. Fact is, flying at 1st level is a problem in my games, it is absolutely self contained, practical, and solved by banning flying races, not by wind. As I see this conversation, I stated why I don't allow races with flight speed at level 1 in my games. Those reasons had exactly zero to do with how impressive the things you can do with a bird person is or is not, and my solution is not ribboning, it's straight-up banning. And you persist in trying to give me solutions to problems I don't have and argue that I shouldn't be running the game the way I do because of some nonsense about punishing players for making choices I don't allow. [/QUOTE]
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