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Message: <blockquote data-quote="I'm A Banana" data-source="post: 1475052" data-attributes="member: 2067">You're putting connotation where there is none. Ditching isn't deragatory, man. It's not arbitrary or negative. It's just a synonym for "removing."And you're "removing" it because it's in the instruction manual for playing the game. If someone wanted to play Monopoly without Chance cards it'd be the same question: "Why isn't it?" Like it or not, when you RTFM, it has elves. You don't. Why, if you call your game the same thing, does it not have elves? I mean, if you just put up a post requesting players and said "no elves," I'm going to want a reason to accept that. Well, there's part of your "Good Answer" right there. Something like: "They don't live in the area in which the campaign is taking place." Now all that's left is to give them alternatives...maybe something like "Gnomes live in the forest and enjoy magic, you could try them," or "There are forest human tribes that live in the trees, they might interest you." And viola, you've given them something with which to integrate themselves within your campaign, and given them a reason to accept your judgement. A justification.I might not be clear enough -- I'm not saying there *must* be any. I'm saying that if there's not, tell me why. Feel free to re-write the manual, but don't expect me to just mindlessly follow your edicts. I know this might not be typical, but it could be explaining this "gimmie gimmie attitude" that's being seen. In the Core Rulebook (book of rules), there are certain races. Remove one of those, and you're effectively removing a Core Rule. Just like every DM, you can go wild and do it as much as you want. I do it quite a bit myself. But I think it may be a bit much to expect people to bend and sway without questioning when you change something.I probably haven't been playing for as long as many, and I've probably been luckier than many, but I've only rarely encountered brats spoiled enough to be intractable. It's not the specific combination most people want -- it's the effect the combination achieves, and that effect is much more easily translatable than the combination itself. Most people -- DM's and Players alike -- are flexible enough to play within the world the DM sets up, as long as they're given a reason to accept it. The concept is the issue. By saying "No paladins," on some campaign, people read that as "Every concept you have involving Paladins -- it is invalid in this setting." By saying "Selfless heroes will die very quickly," it gives a lot more dimension, without invalidating any concept.All I ever really ask for is a reason. A cause to not obey the rules as written, and to trust in the DM.Well, it's pretty much what my opinion has been all along. I have no desire to eliminate flavor, I have every desire to change it as it suits the campaign.They could've. They didn't, but it would've been easy enough. The rules should serve the game, as psion said. For most campaigns, the easiest way to do that is to change the flavorbabble, without changing the mechanics.Nice, man, write my actions for me.There's not many explanations that don't work, and what they are will undoubtedly change from player to player. Some will get upset that they can't be drow, throw a hissy fit, and leave crying. Some, like me, don't really bother even getting into a game until the DM can at least reason with me.There's a big difference between asking for an explanation, a reason, a motivation, a justification -- and crying because I can't be an elf. As I said above, it's a step in the right direction. If elves never came about, and I'm interested in playing an 'elfish archetype,' I'll want what I can do to achieve that result with the tools the world has....and this is a problem with *your* stance. Calling me names and setting up straw men do nothing to convince me to your way of thinking. What makes you think that I would not be as flexible as I would demand from a DM? I can live with "because this setting is gritty survivalist, high-falootin' moral codes are not useful for the heroes to hold, and more often than not leads to their untimely demise." I can't live with "No Paladins. Accept my authority! Do not question me! Silence, hypocritical whiney troublemaker, *I* make the rules!"In a similar manner, as a player, I don't consider a DM "unworthy" because they ban half-elves. I do consider a DM unworthy if she pulls rank, refuses to explain herself, and prattles on like a spoiled brat about their precious, precious campaign. I think there's probably about the same frequency of extremes, and most people live in between -- where they can accept, change, and adapt, and be happy with a compromise.Now that things make sense in the rules themselves, they're more likely to ask that DM's make sense in their own rulings?</blockquote>

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