D&D 5E Newbies reading the MM and DMG?

[Joddy37]

Edited double post....

 

[KarinsDad]

How do you get that from this:


There's nothing wrong with my phrasing.

Simple:

"tell him to either stop it or leave the game"

very explicitly says "either / or". It implies no middle ground.

Yours is the second post that I responded to yesterday where some person here said "my way, or the highway". It seemed to be a reoccurring theme.


Personally, I do not think that a player reading the DMG and MM is so disruptive that the DM has to give him this type of choice. There are several other ways to handle this if it bothers the DM without kicking a player out of the group and possibly our gaming community.

 

[KarinsDad]

If I threw out every player for metagaming I would have no one to play with.

If only my fellow players were so invested in the game that this could happen.

 

[ExploderWizard]

If someone is interested enough in the game to purchase all the books then the first step in creating a future DM has been taken. Encourage the player to read and enjoy the material and steadily nudge the player toward running a game. I wouldn't discourage anyone interested in becoming a hardcore D&D nerd.

As far as metagaming is concerned, show the player that being an experienced skilled and creative DM is about much more than what is found in the rulebooks.

 

[Emerikol]

It's a tragedy but it's his tragedy. I would never change those days when I entered the game a total newbie and didn't know anything. Those were magical times and to some extend never to be recaptured. If he reads the MM and DMG, then he is throwing away that mystery and magic but he is only hurting himself.

As a DM, you will have to deal with players reading those books ultimately because some of them will of course be DMs themselves. I keep everyone on their toes by making a lot of my own monsters and by changing up the uncommon and rare ones in odd ways. I do not consider the MM as something the players "officially" know about so I am under no obligation to use any creature as written. If they make assumptions and ultimately suffer for those assumptions (suffer as in in game suffering ), that is just a lesson learned. I tend to view the common monsters as more widely known by the educated so it doesn't bother me that they know about those creatures.

I never worry about players dictating from the rulebooks anyway. I've long ago firmly established the nature of my games and it's on a take it or leave it approach. I have all the players I can handle and more. I don't feel given the popularity of my game that I need to change my playstyle to suit a particular player. I won't do the new way very well which will disappoint the other players and the player wanting it his way ultimately won't have fun either because I won't be competent at that style. So I do what I do and I think I do that well. The players I do have are happy.

 

[am181d]

Folks can buy whatever they want. A player it one game may be a DM in another. You shouldn't run your D&D game assuming that everything in the MM and DMG will be a surprise to your players.

 

[Sacrosanct]

People grow up today thinking that it is perfectly acceptable to cheat in games, use cheat codes, know things about mobs, etc. If that behavior is not what a DM likes, then he should work with the player. It's not that I condone cheating, but our young people are being taught that it is becoming more and more acceptable (just look at the percentage of cheating at college campuses)..

Yeah, this is completely bogus. Let's put aside the obvious assumption that you probably don't have any credible sources that back up your claim that kids today are more prone to cheat than before, and look at the equally obvious:

↑↑↓↓←→←→BA

I.e., people who are OK with cheating have been OK with it since day 1.

 

[Joddy37]

Don't discourage your players to read those books. If your player is interested in every aspect of the game, that's very fine. He can be a good DM someday, you never know. If he is interested in the books only to metagame, you can always alter some stats while building encounters, demand successful lore checks from him to see if his character knows the actual information.

 

[Pickles JG]

5e monsters are so bland it won't make much difference.

I seriously cannot split character knowledge from player knowledge now even if it's
just me as a player having a certain degree of tactical competence & being unable to turn it off (thoiugh again in 5e this is mostly "focus fire"- the decision making is more interesting at an "operational" level)

I also DM and play so need the knowledge of monsters (I did memorise the 1e MM when I was 13)

 

[KarinsDad]

Yeah, this is completely bogus. Let's put aside the obvious assumption that you probably don't have any credible sources that back up your claim that kids today are more prone to cheat than before, and look at the equally obvious:

↑↑↓↓←→←→BA

I.e., people who are OK with cheating have been OK with it since day 1.

Doubtful for most people. Cheating, lying, and other improper behaviors are often learned and reinforced behaviors.

For example, when we lived in Colorado, my daughter never swore. Ever.

We moved to NJ and she swears almost on a daily basis (and started shortly after she got here). The most obvious reason for this is that many people here, even the kids in high school, swear. A lot. Many of the parents work in NYC or other urban areas and I suspect that they bring that behavior home with them. The kids then take it to school (my daughter also got her swearing under control over the summer when she was no longer encountering it every day).

Same with cheating. It's a learned behavior that tends to start small and progress as the kids do not get harsh penalties for doing so.

Harvard Cheating Scandal
75% of students cheat

I found it humorous that it's called the Harvard Cheating Scandal as if everyone did not know that it was occurring there and on many campuses for decades. The difference today is that it is a lot easier to cheat with the electronic resources that kids have. Hence, my supposition that it happens more often.