PHB2 Races = Mos Eisley Cantina

[Greg K]

Plus you'll always have those players wandering in and out of most campaigns who aren't all that familiar with the world and show up with 'joe the deva' or whatever. It isn't the end of the world, but sometimes it does kind of put a dent in the setting.

Don't let them just show up with a character.

Unless the setting is REALLY extraordinarily in your face players are just going to basically be like "yeah, so what your world has intelligent plants instead of Tieflings, I want to play a Tiefling Warlock!" What are you going to say?

"See the door? That is the exit. You can choose to play in the setting or use the door." Actually, my players would show the person the door first.

In the end if you want things to be just exactly so, then write your own setting appropriate RPG. Otherwise you gotta take what you get.

No. There is no need to create you own rpg. Create your setting is perflectly viable.

 

[Mallus]

Actually, the creator of the games said what he had to say about this in the 1st Ed DMG.

Actually, the other creator of the game created Blackmoor, so powerful weirdness we have always had with us...

 

[Nivenus]

I think alot of people forget that some players genuinely like playing the social outcast who's too tough to mess with anyway. That said, having any race stigmatized needs to be something that's based on player-DM agreement. A DM should be completely upfront about what place each race has in the setting and not sugar coat it nor try to discourage the player. If the player still wants to play the race than it is the DM's responsibility not to deliberately try and kill the player off. Similarly, it is the player's responsibility to accept what she or he signed up for and not complain about their race being mistreated.

Currently, my game has the following:

1 Dwarf
1 Elf
1 Eladrin
1 Gnome
1 Human
2 Tieflings

The last bit sort of informs my point. I made it clear tieflings weren't well liked and would attract suspicion and prejudice. The players were fine with that and, in fact, I think that's part of what attracted them to the race. After all, it wasn't long before it was written into their backstory.

As for the original topic, the only appearance I really have trouble with is the deva's. Not because it isn't cool (it looks pretty good actually) but because it's really, really hard to reconcile with the aasimar (as is the backstory), which is a problem given that, in the setting I'm running (FR) devas are aasimar, as RAW.

 

[Kask]

If the player still wants to play the race than it is the DM's responsibility not to deliberately try and kill the player off.

DMs should run the world as it exists. If a player jumps off a cliff and knows gravity exists, the only job of the DM is roll damage dice and describe what happens, not make an air bag materialize...

 

[Wolfwood2]

The problem with just banning certain races is twofold. One is that the game actually kind of depends on those races existing. That was not true in earlier editions, but in 4e there are just a lot of classes and builds that work a LOT better with dragonborn, and if you don't happen to want to include that race in the campaign setting, then it does have some impact on play.

This is a pretty weak problem. There's not a class in the game that doesn't play perfectly fine as a human. Dropping a few races, or all of them except humans, won't suddenly mean that roles go unfilled and game balance flies out of whack.

Secondly you WILL get player pushback. Players usually don't really care so much about atmosphere. They're busy worrying about hitting things and getting from here to there. Unless the setting is REALLY extraordinarily in your face players are just going to basically be like "yeah, so what your world has intelligent plants instead of Tieflings, I want to play a Tiefling Warlock!" What are you going to say?

Say no. Or even just be totally honest and say, "You can play whatever you want, but I will have your PC mobbed and killed in the first NPC encounter and you will have wasted your time creating the character."

Saying yes when you don't really mean yes will lead to way more player pushback than an honest no.

 

[Wolfwood2]

DMs should run the world as it exists. If a player jumps off a cliff and knows gravity exists, the only job of the DM is roll damage dice and describe what happens, not make an air bag materialize...

No, the job of the DM is pause the game and find out why the player thinks having his character jump off a cliff is a good idea. Either:

A. Some cirumstance has come up where the player believes this is a survivable and intelligent plan. Perhaps he misunderstood the height of the cliff. Perhaps he just spent twenty minutes describing his character tying cloth to a wooden frame and believes that his character should be wafting to safety on a glider.

or

B. The player is trying to kill his character. In that case, there's no need to disoblige him by rolling dice. Declare the character dead and move on.

 

[Nivenus]

No, the job of the DM is pause the game and find out why the player thinks having his character jump off a cliff is a good idea. Either:

A. Some cirumstance has come up where the player believes this is a survivable and intelligent plan. Perhaps he misunderstood the height of the cliff. Perhaps he just spent twenty minutes describing his character tying cloth to a wooden frame and believes that his character should be wafting to safety on a glider.

or

B. The player is trying to kill his character. In that case, there's no need to disoblige him by rolling dice. Declare the character dead and move on.

qft

In such a case as the player jumping off a cliff it is clear that either of the two situations is the case. Either the player really has no clue what he or she is doing, in which case it is the DM's responsibility to pull them aside and clue them in, or they're tired of the game and want to kill their character (either in order to give them an exit or a reason to make a new character). A possible third option is they're baiting you. But the two responses listed above are the only reasonable ones.

Playing a smart--- with your players is a quicky way to get them to resent you. It's fine so long as you're actually being clever and entertaining in the process. But killing off players for not doing things exactly the way you'd like them is not good DMing.

 

[darjr]

Actually, the creator of the games said what he had to say about this in the 1st Ed DMG.

That very same guy, in that very same book, also suggested that a great way to play would be to include characters from gamma world. Those PC's would make the Cantina seem like candy land.

 

[davethegame]

DMs should run the world as it exists. If a player jumps off a cliff and knows gravity exists, the only job of the DM is roll damage dice and describe what happens, not make an air bag materialize...

I don't think the DM should do anything except what he and his group agree on. Maybe in your games your players like it when they pick an unusual race and your townsfolk always try to kill them (and that's fine), but I prefer to run a game where my friends can play the character they want to play (because the race sounds cool, because they have a specific concept in mind that fits a weird race, etc.) without having to deal with being forced to sit out while the rest of the party visits a town. I really don't think there's a "correct" answer here except for what works for your group.

 

[Reynard]

This is a pretty weak problem. There's not a class in the game that doesn't play perfectly fine as a human. Dropping a few races, or all of them except humans, won't suddenly mean that roles go unfilled and game balance flies out of whack.

I might actually be convinced to run 4E if I could do it as an all human, all martial gritty S&S game.