D&D General The Monsters Know What They're Doing ... Are Unsure on 5e24

[TheSword]

Same. I know very little about Warhammer, but a quick google isn’t showing skaven as a PC option for Warhammer.

I definitely view not facilitating a non-defined race as less problematic that excluding an existing race.

They have been playable in other editions just not yet. Though there are several fan versions and at least one companion book added rules that would make it very easy to add one.

 

[SableWyvern]

I’m very lucky that my main group basically always says to me “We will enjoy the game most, that you enjoy running the most” and they pretty much always let me pick what to do. I get where they’re coming from. A game I’m enjoying is going to get more time investment from me. I’ll work harder at it and it’s more likely to last longer. The reverse also applies.

This is pretty much exactly the position I'm in.

I'm very grateful to have a group of players that enable me to run whatever game I want to run. My players are grateful that I provide them with games to play, session after session, over a period of decades.

 

[TheSword]

This is pretty much exactly the position I'm in.

I'm very grateful to have a group of players that enable me to run whatever game I want to run. My players are grateful that I provide them with games to play, session after session, over a period of decades.

The same applies when my friend DMs for me. I’m grateful for the time he puts in and his skills. There is very little I wouldn’t agree to.

 

[SableWyvern]

I definitely view not facilitating a non-defined race as less problematic that excluding an existing race.

When I'm prepping a game that I may run in the future, any "official" material carries absolutely no special weight for me. I take what is useful to me, change what I need to, discard that which is no of value to me. The idea that I should treat something as more important because someone else who will never game at my table put it in a book is alien to me.

To be clear, I'm not saying your position is invalid, simply trying to explain why I don't share it.

 

[SableWyvern]

The same applies when my friend DMs for me. I’m grateful for the time he puts in and his skills. There is very little I wouldn’t agree to.

If a friend is GMing, I'm most likely participating mostly because it's a social thing to do and it helps maintain group cohesion until I'm back in the GM seat. But yeah, while I'm there, I absolutely do anything I can to support that GM and make their job as easy as possible.

 

[TheSword]

Is it even a problem if something is excluded because as a DM I simply don’t like it? Not that it couldn’t be worked in, but because I don’t want to have to? If there is enough overlap in the Venn diagram why pick stuff that’s not in the overlap.

I’m not a fan of anthropomorphic races. I just find them quite annoying. Tabaxi arent too bad, but I wouldn’t be very happy if a player brought one of the others to the group. It would make me less enthusiastic about the game. It all comes back to the circus party discussion. As a DM I certainly wouldn’t add a monster, NPC or situation that I knew a player didn’t like.

In the same way I wouldn’t cook a meal with prawns if one the guests didn’t like prawns. They wouldn’t need to be allergic to them. It would be enough for me that they don’t like them.

Apologies if this has been discussed already. Don’t feel the need to respond if it has.

 

[TwoSix]

When I'm prepping a game that I may run in the future, any "official" material carries absolutely no special weight for me. I take what is useful to me, change what I need to, discard that which is no of value to me. The idea that I should treat something as more important because someone else who will never game at my table put it in a book is alien to me.

To be clear, I'm not saying your position is invalid, simply trying to explain why I don't share it.

Sure. But the difference here is I don't view myself as having special privileges to decide things about the game before it starts. And all those published materials contain information and concepts that are accessible to all of us as players. Therefore, I'm not making any modifications to the core concepts until gameplay starts and the players have made the decisions about what is important to them.

Once the game starts, of course, I have full authority to frame scenes as I wish with the content I wish, as long as I'm not explicitly negating something already present within the fiction or violating the resolution methods of the game engine.

 

[TwoSix]

Apologies if this has been discussed already. Don’t feel the need to respond if it has.

I will respond only to confirm that topic did crop up a few days (and hundreds of posts) ago.

 

[TheSword]

I will respond only to confirm that topic did crop up a few days (and hundreds of posts) ago.

Oh lord I’ve just read the posts. No need to get into that again.

 

[SableWyvern]

Sure. But the difference here is I don't view myself as having special privileges to decide things about the game before it starts. And all those published materials contain information and concepts that are accessible to all of us as players. Therefore, I'm not making any modifications to the core concepts until gameplay starts and the players have made the decisions about what is important to them.

Once the game starts, of course, I have full authority to frame scenes as I wish with the content I wish, as long as I'm not explicitly negating something already present within the fiction or violating the resolution methods of the game engine.

Yeah, again, I'm just pointing out where I'm coming from, not trying to argue about whose process is the correct one or talk you out of doing things your way.

Edit: For some additional context about my process, I am currently running a Rolemaster game that I expect (hope) to continue for the next couple of years.

Meanwhile, I am also working on prep and planning for:

• Mythras Planescape
• Delta Green
• Ars Magica in the Levant
• WFRP The Enemy Within
• A sci-fi version of Masks of Nyarlathotep (probably using EABA)
• A potential SotDL campaign.
• A Cthulhutech game
• Mythic Bastionland

I will move back and forth between these as the mood takes me, tinkering away, thinking about ideas, crafting rules, creating setting details, thinking about stylistic choices and all sorts of stuff. Some of these games might not reach the table for a decade. As I'm doing this, I might occasionally ask my players questions about what interests them or for feedback on specific parts but, for the most part, they literally don't care and aren't interested in what character options might be available in some hypothetical game they might never participate in. The only person realistically in a position to decide or interested in deciding things about these games at this stage is me.