D&D 5E Restrictions in D&D Next

[El Mahdi]

...It's very easy to remove restrictions at the individual table. It's harder to promote and maintain a distinctive identity in the RPG marketplace.

I don't think that's generally true.

If the restriction is used to create game balance - say, if the paladin is restricted to LG, so that his behavior will keep his massive holy power in check - then we might say it is difficult to remove. We'd still be wrong, because removing it is as simple as the GM saying, "That restriction does not hold!" What may be difficult is removing the restriction and not having the resulting character be unbalanced. And that's only an issue if you care about that sort of thing.

If the restriction is not part of the balance in play, then it is no harder to remove it than it is to add it.

I disagree. Restrictions can be incorporated throughout the games mechanics in ways that aren't always obvious at first. Simply removing the restriction can leave the remaining unknown parts intact, like the roots of a weed when just yanked out. But having a module to add restrictions in, can clearly list and define all the other additions that need to be made throughout the system. One could argue that a module could be made for removing restrictions also, and list all related changes that must be made, but that's in essence a lot of rewriting or redacting your rulebook, than it is simply referencing an additional part of the book. I can see the possibility for unbalancing with either approach, but I still think that generally, it's easier to add rather than subtract.

For example, although not one about restriction, the recent blog on Paladins:

2. A paladin can see and smite evil.
A paladin knows when something supernaturally adverse to the deity or calling he or she champions is nearby. For instance, although a good paladin cannot unerringly zero in on a specific threat merely by walking past a structure infested with evil, the paladin knows something is wrong. Regardless of a given creature’s actual nature, a paladin can judge it unworthy and smite it with divine power that energizes his or her sword blow.

If one does not use alignments at all, then this starts getting tricky. If you remove the qualification that the extra damage from a "smite" only applies to "Evil", do you allow the smite to work on everything, or do you eliminate it entirely? If you allow it on everything, that may significantly overbalance the system. If you don't allow it at all, that may significantly underbalance the class. If you go with not allowing it at all, then you're in the position as DM to find something else to add that rebalances it, but may end up not being thematically relevelent to being a Paladin.

But if instead, the class is designed with two optional elements that are equal in balance from the start, then one or the other can be added in with no problem.

Another example with alignment: alignment is a naturally restricting system. It limits options. If it's incorporated into the base system, simply removing it isn't very easy. The baseline assumptions extend to magic, magic items, interactions with creatures and NPC's, etc. Simply removing it is tantamount to fighting an infestation of vermin. It's meticulous, painful, and time consuming...and one can't always be sure you've found every aspect of the rules that needs to be changed. However, adding alignment restriction can list all aspects that need to be changed, and you're aware of them from the start.

As said, removing is not difficult if there are no balancing issues or other aspects of the rules to be concerned with. But I've found those issues to be present more times than not, and more impactful when subtracting such restrictions or mechanics, rather than when adding them.

 

[Invisible Stalker]

WOTC should just contact each DM on what restrictions they'd like in their game, and print the rulebooks to order.

 

[Doug McCrae]

To my mind, core D&D should be an all-purpose fantasy RPG, appealing to the broadest possible audience.

It never really has been. D&D's not Fantasy HERO or GURPS Fantasy.

Most editions have had only one magic system - Vancian. 3e's sorcerer and bard still have the spells per day limitation.

All the classes are specific, not archetypal. The fighter's not an archetypal warrior, he's a medieval foot soldier in platemail. The cleric's not a generic holy man, he's a weird mix of medieval fighting priest, Van Helsing, and spell-laden Vancian caster. Wizards are all bookish masters of non-sentient forces, not shamans, necromancers, or diabolists. Even 3e's rogues, which are pretty generic 'skill guys', all have to be stabby.

The core rules assume a world vaguely resembling late-medieval Europe twinned with the Wild West (for the concept of the frontier and much greater social mobility), infested with monsters and magic.

 

[Doug McCrae]

The bladesinger's not in the core rules, btw. In 3e it was in Tome and Blood, Races of Faerun and Complete Warrior. Though the 3e DMG does have the dwarven defender and arcane archer PrCs, which are for dworfs and elfs only.

 

[ForeverSlayer]

The bladesinger's not in the core rules, btw. In 3e it was in Tome and Blood, Races of Faerun and Complete Warrior. Though the 3e DMG does have the dwarven defender and arcane archer PrCs, which are for dworfs and elfs only.

Well the Bladesinger was in 4th edition and in 4th edition everything was considered core. Even the description said that it should be elves, half elves and eladrin only but it didn't have the restriction built in.

 

[Aenghus]

About restrictions-

3. The only time a restriction provides a meaningful impact on the game is when one player doesn't want to follow it, and other players want him to. And I don't need the rules of a game to resolve what is essentially an interpersonal dispute.

This is the disfunctional situation, where players themselves disagree.

The functional equivalent where restrictions provide a meaningful impact is when the characters disagree, and the players are willing to play the situation out and see where it goes, without disagreeing OOC.

It's when players associate with their PCs too closely and ascribe versions of their own personal beliefs to them, that you get the sort of dysfunctional play that leads to interminable paladin threads.

 

[Libramarian]

About restrictions-

1. If you think that the flavor of a class at your game table is dependent on the way that I play the class at MY game table, you're roleplaying wrong. You want Class X to be rare, and you're bothered that my game table has eight players all playing it? Cope. You're not at my table, its not your business.

2. If you want to play classes according to the flavor of the class, then by definition you don't need a restriction forcing you to do it.

3. The only time a restriction provides a meaningful impact on the game is when one player doesn't want to follow it, and other players want him to. And I don't need the rules of a game to resolve what is essentially an interpersonal dispute.

No, that's not true. Restrictions can have an impact in the game system. They're a method of class/race balance. If you don't use restrictions, that's a restriction of the designer's methods of balancing classes and races. It's restricting to refuse to use restrictions.

For ex. you can introduce imbalance into the classes and races if you disallow the most powerful class/race combinations.

If you refuse to use class/race restrictions, then you have to balance each class and race in its own group, which can feel over-symmetrical.

 

[The Shadow]

I've actually got a lot of sympathy with both sides of this.

On the one hand, I generally don't want the game system dictating setting to me. I build my own worlds, thank you very much, and I don't see why they should necessarily have to resemble Greyhawk.

On the other... One of the most wonderful tools in world-building is *leaving things out*. You do not have to have the entire kit and kaboodle in your world, and very often it's a good idea not to. But if something's printed in the core books, people tend to expect it to be there - there can be a certain pressure to allow everything in the PHB.

What I'd like to see?

1) No restrictions hard-coded into the rules, but:

2) Plentiful side-bars pointing out traditional restrictions, and:

3) Robust discussion in the DMG of the exact point I said above: The power of leaving things out. Ideally, it would give some actual brief examples: A paragraph about the possibility of (say) having warlocks be the only arcane casters; or not allowing divine classes at all; or cutting back on races; and so on.

 

[eamon]

The argument that it's hard to add or remove restrictions fairly weak. I don't think that's an argument for or against having them in the core rules - sure, they're a good thing to keep a campaign in focus, but that doesn't necessarily apply to the whole base game. If it's just about mechanics, it's trivial to add restrictions and probably even more trivial to remove them.

What's much harder is making pervasive, setting-relevant crunch that's consistent with the fluff when that fluff isn't defined.

So, rather than seeing an anodyne "holy warrior", I'd prefer a paladin that's strongly tied to an alignment. There's just so much interaction with what kind of holy warrior and the crunch of what such a warrior might do that I don't see much value in a flavor-free variant.

I'd like to see restrictions - not as a form of balancing, but as an tool for consistency. Of course you could take the paladin an turn him into a blackguard (that's a traditional variation, after all), but doing so should involve changes in the crunch to reflect the change of flavor.

Especially if the classes do not silo powers, such a change might be fairly easy. It's just a matter of tweaking key class features and adapting the power-list to match, and hey-presto! The DMG might even have an example of how to re-imagine a druid as a blighter or a paladin as a blackguard, but the prototypical example should be fully fleshed out - and that means including lots of details that don't make sense without flavor restrictions.

Details really matter; I want restrictions to the degree they help flesh out the flavor.

 

[ForeverSlayer]

I just want to say that GURPS has the whole "generic" RPG system already out there and D&D doesn't need to try and emulate that. I don't want D&D to be a generic system, I want it to have it's own unique flavor. I'm not talking about the combat and non combat mechanics. I am talking about the games structure from an RP point of view. I want classes that contain certain restrictions because of something D&D introduced - I want feats that are only available to certain races because that makes the races even more unique. There is more to a race mechanically than it's ability score mods, or it's racial power - feats are one of those areas that allows you to define your character even more with the mechanics.