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

[Piratecat]

I have a problem with "In all my worlds I will never have X" if at the same tiem you want a player to play in those games and they love X.

To use your example, you said you would never use guns... If one of your regular players said they really wanted to do a gunslinger, and can only play once a week they would have to choose not to play your game.

And you know what? I think I'm okay with that. It wouldn't mean that we like each other less, it'd just mean that neither of us could compromise. I'd respect them enough to let them go find a more appropriate game if that were the case, or I'd encourage them to GM their own campaign where guns were cool. (Because gaming groups are self-selecting, and we've selected people who aren't particularly dogmatic, this would never happen in our group. Also, everyone works hard to find middle ground. But I get your point.)

My last campaign went 16 years, and this one is going on 6 or 7. People should really like their characters, and I should like them too, because they'll be around for a while. If I say that I'm not willing to include an option that's not fun and fair, I have to be able to live with the consequences of that. It's a player's choice whether they can work within the guidelines I set. If they can't, then it's probably a bad match to start with. And as you'd probably expect, I'd be much more likely to allow a disliked rule in for a one-shot; even I can handle gunpowder in D&D for a one-shot game or two.

That once the DM says no, the player should shut up and choose something else. That there was no obligation whatsoever for the DM to at least try to compromise. The DM, after all, has the authority and control over his or her campaign, so, a player who asks for something, and is told no, should simply either walk or choose something else.

I'm not sure if there's an obligation to compromise, but I think I'd be doing my friends a disservice if I didn't suggest alternatives or try to find a common ground. Also, I'd feel like kind of a dick -- just like I'd think my friend was being a dick if they refused to compromise, either. We play this game because it's fun.

At the moment, I will not run 5e. The issue with 5e at the moment, is the design of most of the classes. I have a few other issues (most of which are very easily house ruled), but I can't stand the mechanical design of most of the classes.

I'm the reverse -- I'm having more fun than I've had in years. To each their own, etc. etc.

 

[Greg K]

I'm not sure if there's an obligation to compromise, but I think I'd be doing my friends a disservice if I didn't suggest alternatives or try to find a common ground. Also, I'd feel like kind of a dick -- just like I'd think my friend was being a dick if they refused to compromise, either. We play this game because it's fun.

And compromise could mean choosing another system

 

[Greg K]

And you see nothing wrong with this statement at all? Me, all I see is how the game is all about you, but, I'm missing where you compromise in order to make sure your players are getting what they want too.

You don't see how this looks like you have pretty much zero trust in your players to know what might make the game fun for everyone? You refuse to use a book because you don't like it. That the player might like it is irrelevant. You don't like it, so, it's not going to get used. End of story.

First, not allowing something /= distrust of the player. Get that through your head.
I am not going to run what I do not enjo. Period. It does not matter if it is a particular play style or particular mechanics/elements that grate on my nerves (no player can change those issues). My time is too valuable. D&D and rpgs are just one hobby. I think other people's time is valuable too. Therefore I make the house rules and campaign setting rules known upfront so it is not sprung on them before they come to the table. They are adults and I trust them to make adult decisions as to whether play or not based on what I am offering and to definitely, not sit, sulk and ruin everyone else's evening, because they have different tastes. If they are so tied to a particular class, race, subsystem have left out for a campaign setting reason or a particular play style I don't want to cater to, I am not really interested in having them at the table. The rest of the group feels the same way and decided to kick out both the min-maxing butt-kicker (for whom I refused to run, but was a problem under one of the other DMs) and a casual gamer who was simply there to hang out and wasting a seat (we were better off freeing the seat and hanging out with him on another day).

That said, I have posted in this thread that there are places where I am willing to compromise. I have allowed the player to have an elf that looked like a drow (and changing the appearance of that nation of elves) when I made a conscious decision that I didn't want drow in the campaign. I am when appropriate, willing to look at their concept, and offer alternate solutions. I have also discussed that I allow the players to drive the direction of game play once it has started including throwing out planned sessions at the drop of a hat to accommodate their new direction provided it does not contradict the ground rules that were set for the campaign.

 

[Greg K]

I'm the reverse -- I'm having more fun than I've had in years. To each their own, etc. etc.

That is cool. For myself, the cleric pales in comparison to 2e specialty priests (been the case for other editions as well although 3e Unearthed Arcana variants and a DMG variant helped me get close). I don't like Barbarian= rager or totem warrior (I prefer the 1e Barbarian and 2e Wilderness Warrior kit as my Barbarians with rage as a culturally appropriate option). I don't like Sorcerers taking on bloodline/heritage features or being wild mages. These are some of the things that stopped me from running/playing both 4e and Pathfinder. WOTC has gotten more wahoo in the core rules then I care for in my D&D
I keep looking at 5e, because I am waiting to see if the DMG addresses any of my issues.

 

[GMforPowergamers]

That is cool. For myself, the cleric pales in comparison to 2e specialty priests (been the case for other editions as well although 3e Unearthed Arcana variants and a DMG variant helped me get close). I don't like Barbarian= rager or totem warrior (I prefer the 1e Barbarian and 2e Wilderness Warrior kit as my Barbarians with rage as a culturally appropriate option). I don't like Sorcerers taking on bloodline/heritage features or being wild mages. These are some of the things that stopped me from running/playing both 4e and Pathfinder.

I totally wish they had gone back to spheres of access (major and minor) and specialty priest. I don't know if I like 1e barbarians better... but I wish there was a subclass like them. Sorcerers I have to completely disagree on... I love the bloodline/heritage.

WOTC has gotten more wahoo in the core rules then I care for in my D&D
I keep looking at 5e, because I am waiting to see if the DMG addresses any of my issues

I think that is the real issue here, I bet most of the people on the DM says so side feel this way... I do sometimes like to run a basic game (right now I am running a myth and magic 2e retro clone) but sometimes I like to run wahoo kitchen sink ones too... and sometime I like to run with ONLY weird race/classes (why yes my campaign has ELans and xeph and dragonborn and changlings... no it doesn;t have humans elves or dwarves)

 

[billd91]

I don't know if I like 1e barbarians better... but I wish there was a subclass like them.

I think 2e called this one right. At its fundamentals, what's a 1e barbarian? A fighter with the right background and skills. The berserker may not be everyone's idea of a barbarian, but it does provide a more notable distinction from the fighter than the 1e barbarian.

 

[Greg K]

I totally wish they had gone back to spheres of access (major and minor) and specialty priest. I don't know if I like 1e barbarians better... but I wish there was a subclass like them. Sorcerer

For the 1e Barbarian, I should be clear that didn't care for the distrust of magic and magic items or the extra AC bonus. I liked how it focused on different cultures/environments and how this determined "skills" and starting weapons. David Howery's fix for the 1e Barbarian that appeared in Dragon is still my favorite.

With 3e I could use the UA variants Crafty Hunter, Favored Environment, and Weapon Groups (Cultural) to get close to the feel of the 1e Barbarian. Then, I could tailor fighting styles by allowing variant Ranger fighting styles to add a little more flavor. I could then do a raging or non-raging "barbarian" as culturally appropriate.

 

[Piratecat]

In 5e, I think a non-raging barbarian is someone with the "outsider" background.

 

[Pentegarn]

I collect books so I get them all, and I use them all. I like to use the stuff I purchase. I can see why someone might want to limit certain things from a book but an entire book wholesale I just don't understand that thinking.

Just also want to say that saying it works for Pathfinder is like comparing apples and oranges, Pathfinder gives away ALL of the crunch from ALL of their books for free online in the SRD. I ran and played many a pathfinder game with very few of the people there having a physical book at all, the SRD was used for everything.

Ah, the SRD. I have to admit, that's one thing I really liked about Pathfinder, though I don't play it any more.

I used to collect all the books too, but 3e and 4e broke me on that practice. Now I will only order books online after I've visited my local hobby store a few times and decide I like it and want to use it. With PF's SRD, I could browse the content here at home and make that decision. So while my PF collection if still large, at least it's streamlined to what I liked and used.

As to the topic, I really do not overly care how a company approaches this subject. All I know is that I turned to Pathfinder when it released, partly because of 3e's flooding the market with splat. I know I didn't have to buy them, but like you I was a collector and I did. I definitely didn't use all of them. But I found that ultimately, I wanted to get away from the system because of all of it. Of course, this was not the sole reason I left 3e, or even the main reason, but it was a reason.

I'm one of those types that like to go all out, or not at all. That can definitely be a fault in many cases, and it's my failing, but it's just who I am. So when I see something, like an RPG in this case, that I'm interested in, I wan't everything I can use, and I want it now, lol. That can be very frustrating when there's a lot of books out for the system. Logically, I should just get what I can at the time, and enjoy it. But usually, I get frustrated with the research I'll have to do, finding and examining the contents of each book so that I can decide whether I want it. So instead, I put it aside for later because I don't want to get into it with what time I might have at the time, then I end up never doing it.

Like I said, it's my own failing, so take that for what it is. But this particular customer ends up not buying into the system, or I end up frustrated and leaving the system.

 

[Elf Witch]

I think the key here is that you will go a ways to figuring out what the player really wants and come up with a way to give it to him (reskinning the gunslinger) that is acceptable to you too. That's perfectly fine and, if you wander way back to the early pages of this thread, I said exactly the same thing.

I was then told that this was unacceptable. That once the DM says no, the player should shut up and choose something else. That there was no obligation whatsoever for the DM to at least try to compromise. The DM, after all, has the authority and control over his or her campaign, so, a player who asks for something, and is told no, should simply either walk or choose something else.

At least, that's the response I got several times in this thread.

back in 2e we had an issue where 1 DM hated Psionics, and 1 player who pretty much only liked psychic characters... so they could not really play together (the DM in question never was a PC until one of my 3e games years later)

The reason that Larry (DM) hated psionics was because he didn't understand them. He used to say things like second level characters having disintegrate at will, or then everyone needs to get defense modes.

The player Ross on the other hand was flighty and hated preparing spells, and also hated playing combat characters (3e and 4e really widened his repertoire with sorcerer bard and warlock). He tried playing Theives once or twice and always had a problem with one part or another...

The way we fixed this was I (third party) spent an entire weekend not only explaining the psionic book and cards to larry, but pitched that he try it, by having his new game have an illythid invasion...

We are now about 17 years later... Larry afterwards let psionics in no problem, and even found he kinda like them... and when he played his first 3e PC was a multi classed Psywarrior.


In less successful news was me trying to run a forgotten realms game, and me trying to play in a pathfinder game (both I have talked about a lot on these boards.)

It isn't something that works everytime. Infact I am sure that a lot of times it doesn't. However I have a few examples of it working great.

I have a problem with "In all my worlds I will never have X" if at the same tiem you want a player to play in those games and they love X.

to use your example [MENTION=2]Piratecat[/MENTION] you said you would never use guns (well to be fair you had a cool refluff idea I like because I also like magitech stuff, but lets pretend you wouldn't even do that.) If one of your regular players said they really wanted to do a gunslinger, and can only play once a week they would have to choose not to play your game.

do you not see how that could be my answer to you as well?



I mean in reality that is the answer to all of this. Some times its a problem player, some times its a problem dm (heck some times I'm the problem player or dm) sometimes there is no problem player or DM sometimes it's just conflicts in two people trying to be reasonable and not communicating well, and sometimes it is BOTH a problem player AND a problem DM...

I know this is all about a D&D environment, but I also play oWoD, and I used to have a Vampire storyteller who was a HUGE control freak... I mean you couldn't even make your own character sheet, you submitted a background (min 800 words max 4,000 words), he read it, made changes then sent it back to you to get your approval, and you could make changes and back and forth until it was agreed on, then he would send you a character sheet fully made (yup the multi page one with backgrounds spelled out in detail) for the game.
He also expected you to keep a log of every xp spent and every change to backgrounds and have it avalibul for 'inspection' at a moments notice...

we put up with it because he had extremely open ended and aswome stories... until the Art issue came up. Art was his best friend who had been away (college another state) who came home and wanted to play a character that he designed... so he wrote in detail everything he trained in, and submitted an example character sheet... The character was a Tremere (magic vampire) and the Story teller had this rule of only 1 Tremere per campaign and another player already had one. Art asked since we all wanted to play a tremere anyway (Yes whole group would love to) what the harm would be if the next campaign the story teller ran was an all tremere group... as a group we discussed how much we wanted to, but the story teller was firm "One tremere per campaign.." So art made a chemist and blew up the entire Elysium (meeting place for PCs and NPCs) TPKing the game... then submitted his tremere for the next campaign...

BOTH problem DM(well storyteller) and A MAJOR problem Player... to make matters worse, the story teller would not kick art ot the curb or even get mad at him... because they were best friends...

HussarI don't recall anyone saying that it was unsuitable to reskin or try and compromise with players. What is being said is this if you can't find a compromise then the DM has the final say and if the player is not happy with that he needs to decide can he play in this game and if he can't then he needs to find a game more suited to what he wants.

In the Pathfinder game the DM went to the Pazio boards to ask for help in reskinning the gunslinger as a wand wielder using the wizard or sorcerer as the base class. The player didn't really like that so she came up with the idea of a rogue using two hand crossbows. He didn't like that either because the damage on crossbows is to low in his opinion to be effective. It was never no gunslinger period. It was lets see what we can do to get the flavor using the core classes.

I have often reskinned things over the years to fit into my world. But I still have the belief that the DM is not obligated to run things he hates he is obligated to be upfront with what he wants to do and to keep an open mind when working with players but at the end it is the DM who gets the final say.

GMforPowergamers that was good of you take the time and help your DM learn the rules for psionics. In my situation the DM knew the rules very well she just hated them and hated the idea of them in a fantasy setting.

I can pretty much say that I will not ever run a Pathfinder game with gunpowder in it. I don't like gunpowder in a game with mounted knights in plate armor.