PHB2 Races = Mos Eisley Cantina

[Obryn]

A player telling the GM "My PC goes and rapes the barwench" shouldn't be a game breaker for anyone, with all the violence in the game? Or a racist PC?

I don't want to game with anyone who has fun with let's-pretend rape scenes. I can say pretty categorically they're not the kind of person I want around, no matter the setting.

Or is it just that someone disliking things you can stomach is petty, while those who don't accept things you consider major are not petty?

I have a strong feeling I'd get along better with someone who's normal but wants to play a Dragonborn, than I would with someone who dreams up rape scenes while expecting the other players and DM to sit there and listen.

Are you honestly arguing there's no difference here? You're going down a very self-serving path of relativity, as far as I can see.

-O

 

[Kask]

I have a strong feeling I'd get along better with someone who's normal but wants to play a Dragonborn, than I would with someone who dreams up rape scenes while expecting the other players and DM to sit there and listen.

Amen to that.

 

[Fenes]

I don't want to game with anyone who has fun with let's-pretend rape scenes. I can say pretty categorically they're not the kind of person I want around, no matter the setting.


I have a strong feeling I'd get along better with someone who's normal but wants to play a Dragonborn, than I would with someone who dreams up rape scenes while expecting the other players and DM to sit there and listen.

Are you honestly arguing there's no difference here? You're going down a very self-serving path of relativity, as far as I can see.

-O

What I am arguing is that one single element can be a game breaker. Mallus argued against that. That game breaker can vary a lot. Some won't play with evil PCs even if those do not anything evil, some won't play with Dragonborn, but have no problem with lizardfolk.

Same difference: Personal taste.

 

[Mallus]

What I am arguing is that one single element can be a game breaker. Mallus argued against that.

Mallus didn't expect anyone to lump gnomes and rapists into the same category .

 

[Obryn]

What I am arguing is that one single element can be a game breaker. Mallus argued against that. That game breaker can vary a lot. Some won't play with evil PCs even if those do not anything evil, some won't play with Dragonborn, but have no problem with lizardfolk.

Same difference: Personal taste.

I can't buy into a worldview where wanting to play a dragonborn is somehow morally equivalent to wanting to play out rape scenes.

I'm also not disagreeing with your comment about personal taste. In fact, I'm expressing my personal tastes. And you're ... well, arguing about them, near as I can see.

I thought I've been making it clear that I choose my gaming groups based mainly on the people involved and their behaviors. I don't want to play with prima donnas on either side of the screen, and I don't want to play with pretend rapists. Either one will ruin my fun way more than being allowed or not-allowed to run a tiefling.

-O

 

[Fenes]

The difference is that I don't call you petty for making your choices. I am not calling anyone names ("Prima donnas") for refusing to play in a game they have no fun in - no matter why they have no fun.

If people stopped calling others names for not playing like they do ("No dragonborn? Prima Donna!!!!") We'd not have edition wars, and a lot less trouble on the forums.

That. for me, is morally more important than what other like to roleplay as.

 

[Kask]

If people stopped calling others names for not playing like they do ("No dragonborn? Prima Donna!!!!") We'd not have edition wars, and a lot less trouble on the forums.

That's a function of maturity. I'm sure you choose your gaming group with that as one of the considerations.

 

[Obryn]

The difference is that I don't call you petty for making your choices. I am not calling anyone names ("Prima donnas") for refusing to play in a game they have no fun in - no matter why they have no fun.

If people stopped calling others names for not playing like they do ("No dragonborn? Prima Donna!!!!") We'd not have edition wars, and a lot less trouble on the forums.

That. for me, is morally more important than what other like to roleplay as.

That's ... really not even close to what I'm saying. I'm not directing anything at all at you, apart from at the basic level where we're talking with one another on a message board.

I'm saying this is about what kinds of people I'd want to play D&D with. I have no idea what kind of person you are. Therefore, I have no idea if I'd want to play D&D with you.

It's not about what kinds of things you like in gaming (with a few exceptions, like the aforementioned imaginary rapists, at which point I'll just call you a deranged ass and stay as far away from you as possible). It's about how you present those preferences and work with a group of people who are all there to have fun. A DM who lords his power over his players is a DM I probably don't want to play with. But there's a vast difference between this and, say, a board of directors where the DM is the chairman. By the same token, a player who insists on playing radically insane, murderous characters is a player I probably don't want in my game.

-O

 

[GMforPowergamers]

I want to jump in here for a moment and talk about a 3.0 game I ran about6 or 7 years ago.

One member of the party was from a Magocracy where he was a guardsmen, (Malita) and had spent almost 5 years tracking a serial killer who raped and killed both men and women. His background was twisted and dark. He wrote it this way (with my approval) becuse he was playing a Paliden and wanted a 'nemisiss' that was as dark and vile as he was light and exulted.
We had another party member who was from a small psionic heavy city state. His background included inhuman experaments with makeing intelagent items by psi like power ripping peoples mind out and attaching them to items as a type of slavery. He was appaled at his people and had long since ran away.
Every player new there were some 'dark' parts of my world, and this was a excepted part of it, but most didn't know the enitre of these two stories.
The PCs found out about the city state, and found that they made a psycioactive skin that had 7 diffrent demmons/devils dound to it. Almost everyone right away realized it was a bad Carnige rip off. But it got away.

it was 2 or 3 games later they found a guy who's mind was messed up and he was catatonic, in the woods. I expected this to side track them to a local town, but they decided to instead leave the NPC with him ( a 3rd player character's 15 year old daughter) and continue to the ruins then come back for the two of them.
Now the catch being that catatonic man was the serial killer wearing this new suit. It was 'bonding'. I thought he would wake up in town and there would be a whole show down thing. But the Pcs left him for 3 days with this girl. To make things worse we had a paliden that would use "Detect Evil" at the drop of a hat, but who did not do so here.
The PCs came back and I said "Look instead of discribing what is here we are going to flash forward 25 mins, and tell you what you figured out." then I explained who the guy was what he was wearing, and that he was a X level rouge with that artifact on, that he raped and killed the dauhgter in a gruesom way, and that he had fled but they could track him.

I had though the PC who just lost his (in game) daughter would be upset, but yet another PC (One who has a real life daughter of simalar age) was more outraged, and walked out. He said dark was one thing, but this was too far, he would come back for our next campiagn, but he was out for this.
No one called him a premadonay. No one even said anything about it, if he can't hanndel that sort of thing then we will just adjust for the next time.


How ever 1 PC in that game was a half dragon Fighter. (Infact that would be the PC who's daughter died) Had someone had the same reaction to me allowing the race then it would be diffrent.
I can understand somethings push the wrong buttons, I really can, but to say "I can't play in a game with dragonborn" and then to defend that with "Well you don't want to play in a game with a rapest" is just beyond crazy...

 

[Celebrim]

I can understand somethings push the wrong buttons, I really can, but to say "I can't play in a game with dragonborn" and then to defend that with "Well you don't want to play in a game with a rapest" is just beyond crazy...

You'll note I haven't tried to advance any such argument, mostly because I didn't think it would be helpful.

However, whether comparing a playing a game with a dragonborn in it to a game with a adult themes is crazy depends on what comparison you are drawing between the two things. If by making the comparison you were trying to draw a moral equivalence between the two things, then sure, that's crazy. But if by making the comparison you were trying to draw an aesthetic comparison between the two, then its really not that crazy - just confusing, provocative, and unnecessary.

I think the point that someone was trying to get across was that a campaign with adult themes is at one level just another aesthetic choice. A person could object to certain adult themes at an aesthetic level, not because they though dealing with the subject in recreational role play was immoral, but simply because it made them uncomforable and they didn't like it as a personal preference. At that level, whether the inclusion of adult themes is wrecking of your enjoyment or not is not objectively a bigger or smaller matter than space faring hamsters and teen mutant ninja turtles.

However, I agree that the comparison isn't particularly apt, in as much as the aesthetics of adult themes may not be the only thing at issue, where as almost no one would think space faring hamsters or teenage mutant ninja turtles are inherently moral or immoral content.

I should also point out in defence of the 'whether rapes occur in the campaign' = 'what races are presented' comparison, that the other side of the debate priorly jumped that shark as well with the, 'what races are presented in a campaign' = 'your a racist IRL' comparison.