D&D 5E Supplemental books: Why the compulsion to buy and use, but complain about it?

[doctorhook]

That may be the case, but one of those people is the DM. And with the extra concerns of mastering the rules, understanding what the PCs can do, planning encounters, and everything esle mastering a game requires, I'm going to usually come down on the side of the DM. You simply can't expect to make the DM run something he doesn't want to run or with conditions under which he doesn't want to run. That's a recipe for a bad game.

Certainly the DM is one of those people. My point was that everyone at the table needs to have a good time and be willing to compromise to that end. Of course the DM bears the largest burden (and players should respect his or her rulings) but it doesn't excuse the DM from being flexible for the sake of the game.

 

[KarinsDad]

OK, well I just wonder, since you changed Dragonborn so much (not warm blooded, reptilian, alien/foreign) and made them monsters would you be opposed if a player asked to let them take Dragonborn and play it as something else... like say a half dragon or something. I mean that way you still have your Dragon born, and the player gets to play a Dragonborn just not the same thing. Even going so far as to say the name is part of your race so he has to be something else?

Wow. Never knew that Dragons and Dragonborn were warm blooded. Course, that doesn't change anything in my game world. They are still draconic.

 

[billd91]

Certainly the DM is one of those people. My point was that everyone at the table needs to have a good time and be willing to compromise to that end. Of course the DM bears the largest burden (and players should respect his or her rulings) but it doesn't excuse the DM from being flexible for the sake of the game.

But how flexible? Surely not infinitely. And what happens when the player asks too much of even a flexible GM? Eventually, it comes down to the GM saying "I will go so far, but no further, and still run this game." What about the players who try to push past that?

 

[prosfilaes]

And if that 6th person is the only one willing to GM and he isn't willing to GM the game the other 5 want, again, no game and it's still perfectly fair. Who really wants a game run by a GM who doesn't really want to run that game?

A lot of my games have been with D&D groups, where it would be hard to walk out from a particular game without walking out from a group. In one of those groups, I recall an instance where the majority of the players were filling seats until the current DM got done with his campaign and a fun DM started running again. So, socially, it's very hard to for players to walk from these groups. On the other hand, I haven't run into many groups that had only one person who was willing to GM, which may impact my willingness to accept ultimatums.

I am skeptical of any game run by a DM who doesn't want to run the game unless it's exactly the list of restrictions given before the start of the game. If your world has to be just so, what are you going to do if we blow the hell out of it or walk off the edge? And who really wants to run a game for a player who doesn't really want to play that game? If one race out of many in the world matters that much to the DM, why can't the one race that the player is playing matter to a player?

On Google Plus, Kenneth Hite talks about the four campaigns he offered his current group, the three new ones in three different eras (with the starting year for one depending on the PCs) under three different systems. When a GM who gets his amazingly creative work published can do that, I don't feel really sympathetic to a DM running in a stock D&D world who narrowly restricts what characters can be played.

 

[prosfilaes]

But how flexible? Surely not infinitely. And what happens when the player asks too much of even a flexible GM? Eventually, it comes down to the GM saying "I will go so far, but no further, and still run this game." What about the players who try to push past that?

Were we talking about a flexible GM? I never got that impression. A GM doesn't have to do anything, but one thread here was about a DM offering a selection of classes and races from the PHB. D&D Encounters with just the 5E PHB is about the most limited campaign for making characters for I've played in my life, so I don't consider that very flexible. Certainly there's a line where it's the player being unreasonable and not the DM.

 

[KarinsDad]

I think anyone un willing to budge on anything is at least a little bit unreasonable, but the farther you get from life and death the more unreasonable it is... when it is in the game we play of make believe I think it is pig headed to say "I'm unwilling to consider a compromise"

If a DM were never willing to compromise on anything, you might have a point.

If a DM just has some campaign rules that he's set up his entire campaign around and only one or two players have an issue with a specific houserule, then, yeah, that's pretty much a problem with that player or players.

Example: DM is unwilling to allow jokes at the table during roleplaying. This is a unreasonable because the DM is attempting to dictate the behaviors of the players and it is typically most or all of the players who might be bothered by this.

Example: DM is unwilling to allow Dragonborn. This is totally reasonable because it is a campaign element. The DM is still allowing a lot of other races and it is typically only one player who might be bothered by this.


The only difference between a DM and a player is that of final decision authority. The DM has final decision authority within the game. The player has final decision authority in not playing the game if s/he feels that it is too egregious.

There is no doubt that a DM should listen to his players and try to compromise, but this idea that he is pig headed and/or unreasonable if he does not compromise on some given item is just plain wrong.

I'm not the one being unreasonable, I just don't like the way it got thrown around that "problem players" are the only issue...

Problem players are not the only issue. There are problem DMs as well.

But if a player says that the DM is unreasonable because he will not compromise on some details of his campaign world, then yeah, that's pretty much a problem with that player. Typically, the rest of the players will not have that issue. Only that one player.

it also comes down to why is someone not willing to bend. Witch again is a Discussion. In an above example the DM said what he didn't like about evil games, the compromise could be to run the evil game BUT the players avoid the behavior in question.

This is totally confusing. Why in the heck would the DM who does not want to have evil PCs in his game compromise that there can be evil PCs, but the players agree to not roleplay them as evil?

Just don't allow evil PCs and be done with it. Why does there have to be a compromise?

 

[KarinsDad]

Were we talking about a flexible GM? I never got that impression. A GM doesn't have to do anything, but one thread here was about a DM offering a selection of classes and races from the PHB. D&D Encounters with just the 5E PHB is about the most limited campaign for making characters for I've played in my life, so I don't consider that very flexible. Certainly there's a line where it's the player being unreasonable and not the DM.

Ok, so one DM uses the Basic Rules for PCs. Another DM uses the PHB for PCs.

Is either DM being inflexible?

 

[KarinsDad]

edit: [MENTION=2011]KarinsDad[/MENTION] I just realized, have you only ever run 1 game and that is it? I mean you talk about how this one world must be X Y Z, but then you say things like "In my games X Y Z" maybe I'm confused, are these limits just for your current game, and you would atleast entertain the notion of changing in the next game you start?

No, I've run dozens of campaigns. At the moment, I am playing, not DMing. But the world I am creating (for the future) has these race/class elements. Most of my campaigns (since the late 80s) have been Forgotten Realms, but I did run some totally home grown (which I no longer have the time for), a few Eberron, some Greyhawk, some Wilderlands of High Fantasy, etc. I'm not big on the more esoteric campaign worlds like Planescape, Ravenloft or Spelljammer. Personal preference. And I'm not too keen on bringing elements from one campaign setting into another. So, no Warforged in my FR world.

 

[Hussar]

But how flexible? Surely not infinitely. And what happens when the player asks too much of even a flexible GM? Eventually, it comes down to the GM saying "I will go so far, but no further, and still run this game." What about the players who try to push past that?

That would be a problem player, of course.

But, the issue here has been some people calling any player who ever tries to push things a whiney, self-entitled, problem player. Anyone who questions the all mighty DM is obviously a problem player right?

 

[Greg K]

Were we talking about a flexible GM? I never got that impression. A GM doesn't have to do anything, but one thread here was about a DM offering a selection of classes and races from the PHB. D&D Encounters with just the 5E PHB is about the most limited campaign for making characters for I've played in my life, so I don't consider that very flexible.

So? What entitles you to have your particular wants met in a game run by someone else? If you don't like their restriction(s), find another table or start another group of your own.