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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ancoulainn" data-source="post: 9870254" data-attributes="member: 7056539">I said that in response to your claim that it would be. You didn't back yours up, so I didn't have to either.So, yeah, among those DMs who ban things at all, the Twilight Cleric might be one of the first things they ban. Sure, that's possible because it makes sense. Had you said that, I would have responded in the same way as here.I have a different experience, both when playing in person and when playing online, but then again, I also don't play with DMs who ban things because I'd rather have the NPCs use the same abilities, spells, and features on the party than ban them because in my opinion, that makes the game more interesting. So, these DMs are an automatic swipe left for me. But I also rarely meet DMs who ban things and haven't in years. Beyond what the Adventurers' Guild bans, at least, because I understand that it's a good source of reference that DMs use to make their job easier and to avoid miscommunication.Everything is optional all the time. At this time, even the old 2014 PHB subclasses are considered optional and that would include the Enchantment Wizard since the subclass has not been updated in the 2024 PHB. And even when Arcana Unleashed releases this year, like the Heroes of Faerun subclasses, it would remain optional based on your parameters. In other words, we were comparing two optional subclasses here to begin with. Yes, in 2026, since the release of the 2024 PHB, subclasses from the 2014 PHB are "obscure" to use your wording. If you play 5.24e, that is, which I assume since we are talking here about the 2024 Eldritch Knight, not the 2014 version.OkI don't, because I expect the DM to say that upfront and I haven't met one who doesn't, if we include the ones who refer to the Adventurers' Guild guidelines. Nor would I play with one. I simply don't like that exclusionary mentality and to me, it always feels like "I don't want to deal with it, so I ban it" which is not a good enough reason for me and a red flag to me. Besides, it really doesn't take much effort and I do it all the time when I DM. First comes the campaign synapsis and then comes an explanation for character creation. Sentences like "you can choose your species, classes, and subclasses from the PHB, TCoE, EGtE, FRHoF, and FotA" takes ten seconds to write and making that decision is always part of my creation process when setting up a campaign anyway because it's important that the characters fit thematically into the campaign. It's like when you're writing a play, no matter for what, you always have in the back of your mind who you want to play what. And if the player has a good backstory for something I did not originally green-light, I still allow it anyway. If they put in the effort to come up with something good, I'd hate to disappoint them.But character power is never a consideration for me because I can always adjust the encounters and creating a monster that fits the bill takes maybe 15-20 minutes. As a matter of fact, I always want my players to be as powerful as possible because it just makes for more epic combat and since most of us find combat the least interesting part of a campaign, we have no encounters that aren't in the deadly category because if it isn't epic, it's a waste of time to us. As one of my players once put it "If we can't lose the encounter, there's no reason to have it. You might just as well narrate it and get it over with."Same applies to how the ability scores are determined which should also be stated upfront by the DM. I made the mistake once to not do that and ended up with a player who came to the table with pre-rolled ability scores and 4 of them were 18s at level 1. But that was also a guy who wanted to adapt a 3.5 race to 5.24e, wanted to start with 3 origin feats because of what the 3.5 race said unadapted, if I remember correctly, have all the fighting styles because Tasha's was allowed and he ignored that those were alternative choice options, and use two Longswords with Dual Wielder, even though we were playing 5.24.But then again, I now only play with a group of local friends and three of us are DMing a campaign each and the overlap between the groups is about 60%, so we know each other's styles and don't have to say much anymore at all. We all use point buy, never ban anything, and whenever there are questions, we bend the rules in the favor of the player. For example, the equipment of Moon Druids merges with their Wildshape and loses its effect and we don't do that because we think that the difference between Wildshape and Polymorph needs to be more noticeable than it is.And when there's a player whom we didn't know, I always try to work with them. And even when the others in the group ask me to kick them, I usually still try to make things work. Because of that, I don't think I have ever kicked somebody from a campaign. Generally, we just continue to tell them what our expectations are and most people who don't want to play along, leave on their own. Especially my wife is quite expressive with her eyerolls when she disapproves of something. They are impossible to overlook.</blockquote>

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