Rant: Why must thing always be obvious in D&D?

[gizmo33]

I'm with most of the posters on this thread. Shar is the best deity I can think of out of the entire FR pantheon to have distributed networks of followers, each secret and in hiding, the leader of each cell knowing one other cell at best. Especially since Shar has such a rivalry with her sister, who is allied with so many good deities...

And if the OP were asking for advice on how to design his campaign world then this would be relevant. But AFAICT this is about how a player deals with a DM call during the game. As in:
Player: I'm in the tavern, so I order a beer.
DM: This tavern serves only lemonade.
Player: But all taverns serve beer! Says so in the PHB. I'll get the 24 oz in the special mug.
DM: You're not listening, no beer.
Player: Yes.
DM: No.
Player: Yes.
DM: No.
(etc.)

If the fantasy world sociologists on this thread can define the nature of the temples of a "major god" in any given city, then please feel free to do so, quoting chapter/verse and all of that. Otherwise, there are no hard and fast rules and although some folks might choose to do things differently as a DM, they're not the DM in this case. If his taverns don't serve beer, or his cities don't have temples to Zeus, or whatever, it's his world. Granted, I might change my mind about playing a drunken master or cleric of Zeus in such a campaign (is that a real world religion? Or just one we don't worry about?)

IMO let the player make up a new character, and hopefully both parties should try to communicate their assumptions during the character creation process.

 

[Celebrim]

If the DM just didn't want to play out the search, a gather information roll with a bonus for looking for your own flock would be just perfect. As a DM I would rp it instead of rolling, though, to point out that there are inherent dangers to belonging in what is basicly an evil cult bent on destruction.

I would agree.

As for saying "There's no temple here, or the next city for that matter, it's my campaign world", that is certainly within the DMs rights. But why do it? It would bring enjoyment to the player, create RP opportunities, adventuring opportunities, moral dilemmas, etc..

Ok, I can answer that question in any number of ways. Let me begin with what I think is one reasonable scenario.

The DM predecided to set the campaign in a portion of his campaign world that tends strongly to goodness. This setting fits the needs of the majority of players in the group, but when one player strongly expressed an interest in playing a follower of Shar - which is completely out of character for the region - it briefly threw the DM for a loop. However, being a reasonable DM that doesn't want to say "no" and creative one, he quickly thought up a way to work the character into the campaign. He decides that the young Shar proselyte is intended to be a missionary working to secretly and undercover expand the veneration of Shar into hostile territory. The DM likes this because its so very different from the standard, run of the mill approach, of having the character part of a strong existing organization in which there are many NPC's which are initially and for a major portion of the campaign much stronger than the PC. This is to the DM a fresh and different approach that implies interesting RP oppurtunities, adventuring ideas, moral delimmas, etc.

Now, there is a certain downside to this from a meta-game perspective in that the character is on his own with limited resources and nothing to fall back on, but the DM realizes this and notes that the metagame upside is that the PC will inherently be the leader of the church of Shar in the region right from the start. By way of compensation for not having the resources of the church to fall on for support, as the DM weaves potential followers of Shar into the story, the PC will effectively gain the equivalent of a Leadership feat without having to spend the slot. He will have earned it as a reward of good play, just as treasure is earned as the reward of good play.

Now, should I spring all of this on the player without discussing it with him? Certainly not. At the least, the DM should inform the player that he will be assumed to be a missionary in a hostile land. For one thing, the assumption involves manipulation of the character's background, which IMO is not within the DM's rights. The game world belongs to the DM in its totality, but the character belongs to the player. Players should not attempt to run the game world, and DMs should not attempt to run the PC. If the above constraints are unacceptable to the player, once explained (and the DM is under no requirement to tell the PC what rewards he may reap), then the player should play something else. If a player insisted on playing a follower of Shar with the constraints of his own choosing, I'd simply say that I was sorry, that I'd do what I could to help him play the concept he wanted, but that I had to balance his desires against the needs of the other players - including myself.

 

[Storminator]

I see a lot of replies that seem to assume the DM thwarted the player's many attempts to find a secret temple. To me, it looks like player never bothered to look for any secret temples at all.

The player jumps to arguing that the temples should be open and easy to find. The player does not say "super secret temples, huh? Do I know what secret signs to look for? What kind of people should I be asking?"

I think that's the OPs frustration. He assumed finding a secret temple to an evil god should be played out. The OP didn't say "there are no temples so don't look" he said "...there are very few (and pretty secret) temples..." That screams personal adventure hook to me.

PS

 

[Numion]

player demands that since Shar is a "major" deity (strongest) there must be lots of temples​

I wonder how it really went down. We've only heard one side. People usually don't express themselves as strongly as they're told to have done in secondhand accounts.

Not if every time the player says "Can I just ignore that problem" the DM thinks "Instead of thinking about ways to say no, try to think about ways to say yes!"

My philosophy applies to situations where a player says "Can I do X?", not when he asks "Can I not do Y?". It just feels stupid to add the disclaimer every time, because 90% of ENWorld arguments are about player trying to use ability/feat/spell/magic item in some way and the ingrained DM response is to shoot it down. At least I noticed a couple of years back that my default answer to attempts by players to move a little outside the box were usually negative - that's no fun as a player when you've invested resources on your characters abilities, and the DM is just trying to block them.

And it's not a hard rule, just a philosophy or rule of thumb about trying to think of ways to say yes. If my player said "My halfling starts to flap his hands and flies away from the ogres", I would say "Howabout no, you crazy pintsized bastard?". Rules of thumb only work with common sense.

 

[Doug McCrae]

Just to be clear, becoming a Keebler elf is something I have never done in the past and would never willingly do in the future. I regard Keeblerism as an abhorrent and heretical faith. Furthermore, being British I don't even know what a Keebler elf is.

 

[Faraer]

Where in the Realms is this happening, anyway?

 

[gizmo33]

Furthermore, being British I don't even know what a Keebler elf is.

IMC the Keebler elves are the reason the Drow went to war to begin with.

 

[Raven Crowking]

What kangaroos have to do with religion?

IMC, some people worship the Beast Lords...divine representations of animals.

I just don't see how this constitutes a constructive challenge to the player.

I don't see how these challenges are mutually exclusive, or how one is less challenging than the other. Locating a secret cult is challenging. Then becoming embroiled in it internal & external struggles is challenging.

Both ways the character concept is acknowledged and reinforced by the game environment. In one case because the player then knows that he is part of something secret, and he knows how well that secret is protected. In the other case, knowing something about the secrecy of his position means that he knows how much aid he can solicit from his party without being ostracized from (or perhaps sacrificed by) his cult.

Doing anything less would make the game less fun for me.

Respectfully, I think this is nonsense. As DM, I'm not in the business of teaching my players the 'consequences' of selecting characters in the manner of their own choosing. I'm there to help them have a good time. If a PC is a bad fit, I tell them up front.

Ah.

When I play a game, I am not only entertaining (I can do that by writing stories) but I am playing a game and part of that game involves the players making choices and then dealing with the consequences of those choices. It is my job to provide options, and the players' jobs to either figure out options I didn't foresee, or to use those options to their best advantage. Sometimes they succeed. Sometimes they fail.

IMHO, no choice is meaningful unless there are consequences to that choice. Likewise, no choice made in a vaccuum can be meaningful. It is the context of the choice, coupled with the consequences of that choice, that make the choice meaningful. In a game about making choices (which I view RPGs to be), having those choices be meaningful is what makes the game fun.

Hence the importance of setting and in-game logic is to provide context, while the willingness to allow players to succeed or fail on the basis of those choices gives consequence. Without either, the game is meaningless.

To me, at least. YMMV. YDMB.

RC

 

[Raven Crowking]

I wonder how it really went down. We've only heard one side. People usually don't express themselves as strongly as they're told to have done in secondhand accounts.

Perhaps this isn't what happened in the real world; however, this is what happened in the hypothetical situation given in the OP. AFAIK, that's all we have to go on. You can say "If this then that" and I might agree with you that the "if" conditions make the "then" conditions true. The if/then we are given, though, is "if" the OP is in fact correct, what "then" follows?

IMHO.

My philosophy applies to situations where a player says "Can I do X?", not when he asks "Can I not do Y?".

Every "Can I do" can be phrased as a "Can I not do" and vice versa.


RC

 

[Celebrim]

And it's not a hard rule, just a philosophy or rule of thumb about trying to think of ways to say yes. If my player said "My halfling starts to flap his hands and flies away from the ogres", I would say "Howabout no, you crazy pintsized bastard?". Rules of thumb only work with common sense.

I wouldn't even say "No." then. I'd simply interpret the players statement as, "My halfling starts to flap his hands, to try to achieve the result of flying away from the ogres." I'd then determine that, since the halfling didn't have a fly speed, that this was a DC 100 balance check (natural 20 still fails), and ask for a skill check. On failure of that check, the character does indeed start to flap his hands, but fails to achieve the result "flies away from the ogres", and instead flaps around like a crazy chicken but never gets airborne. Considering that these are ogres, I might decide that this sufficiently confuses them so as to alter thier current behavior in responce to the apparently crazy/mystical/dangerous 'flying halfling'. But the ogres are mine to play, not the player's.

I find that alot of my knock down drag out interrupts play arguments with players begin when the player says something which is effectively, "I do X, which will naturally have the result of Y." rather than the more appropriate, "I do X, which I intend to have the result of Y." What sometimes happens when you phrase your action to the DM as, "I do X, which will naturally have the result of Y.", is that the DM (me in this case) instead replies, "When you do X, you obtain the (undesired) result Z." and if the character is the sort that approaches RPing as if it were a competitive, tactical board game, then the fight is as they say "on".