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

[Maxperson]

An odd position to take, given how much you insist on having "absolute power".

Because "absolute power" literally means being able to ride roughshod over anyone who disagrees with you. That's the very thing which makes the power "absolute".

I've said authority over the game, not power over the players. I've also consistently told you that the players can and should leave an abusive DM. The DM cannot run roughshod over the PLAYERS. They can leave the game, so he has no ability to do that. He can tell them they have to bring snacks. They don't.

The DM has no power over the players themselves unless those players grant him that power. The DM does have complete authority over the game granted to him by the rules. The DM should not abuse that authority, and relatively few do. Players do not have complete authority over any part of the game, though they do have near complete authority over what their characters say and do. They players have the same power over the DM as the DM has over them. None unless the DM grants it to them.

There's a distinction between power over the player and power over the game which you don't seem to understand.

 

[Scribe]

That's more of a late-night thing for me, but I admit I don't know what time zone you're in.

 

[Remathilis]

is a tortle that has tortle stats but looks like a lizardman still a tortle? Are lizardman stats in a tortle body a tortle?

Is at least one of them acceptable to the player and GM? So far the answer is yes for the GM and no for the player…

I suggested a mutant or offshoot lizard man (either using the stats of lizardfolk if the AC was a concern or just a lizardfolk who grew a shell and has Tortle stats). To me, that akin to a lizardfolk who looks like a gecco or iguana. It was literally my first offer for compromise and I was counter offered a human in a turtle costume.

So it was acceptable for me, but clearly not for some DMs.

 

[tetrasodium]

I'm going to assume then your world also has a carefully currated list of magic and monsters as well? There is no "a wizard did it" owlbears because "create owlbear" isn't a wizard spell? That all NPCs are bound to the same limitations as PCs when it comes to magic and you can, in theory, catalogue every species in the world because they are finite and new ones are never added?

It does not. That took a special dragonmark that only the humans of house vadalis have and a specially crafted dragonmark focus device/dragon mark specific Eldritch machine that may or may not be building sized and extremely niche specialized knowledge over a period of years.

Magebred animal

Magebred animals are animals augmented by House Vadalis using a combination of selective breeding and arcane magic.[1][2]

eberron.fandom.com

I'm fairly certain that at least one eberron book even mentions mage breeding and owlbears together.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

is a tortle that has tortle stats but looks like a lizardman still a tortle? Are lizardman stats in a tortle body a tortle?

It’s a matter of what aspect of playing a tortle appeals to the player. Which is why it needs to be discussed. Is it the mechanics? Is it the appearance? Is it the theme? Did something you said about the campaign give the player a really cool story idea?

 

[Bae'zel]

And that isn't holding D&D to a higher standard; I would also view a GM adding a lot of restrictions to PF1 or PF2, or 13th Age, or Draw Steel or Daggerheart as violating the feel of expansive optionality those games are all designed around.

Why does an official publisher get a free pass to make a D&D setting with constraints but DM's don't?

Say I wanted to run a Witcher campaign using the D&D system. An official publisher does the same (using the D&D system). Both have species and class restrictions. Why is the DM going against the grain here, but not the publisher?

Why the assumption that DM's just can't get it right? Or that they're always acting in bad faith or personality flaws?

That's what's bothering me about this thread. This feels like "don't make up your own stuff, buy your settings".

 

[Paul Farquhar]

and that one creature happens to be a tortle, so there are no longer no tortles

There doesn’t need to be any more than one tortle. One thing about the TMNT is there are only four of them - and none of them are female.

 

[DinoInDisguise]

That is a lot of words to say "nothing will convince me." So it doesn't matter what reason I have to ask to play one, the answer will be no.

So again, the question of why is irrelevant. It ultimately comes down to a battle of wills.

I would encourage everyone to take my words at face value. I do not hide my meaning, I'm not that good at this forum thing.

My words:

The onus, at that point, is on you to convince me that it fits

Notice they did not say:

"nothing will convince me."

I hope you reconsider my position based on what I actually said, because I assure you that your reading is incorrect.

 

[Maxperson]

@Scott Christian You asked for quotes. I cannot quote the most virulent voices in the thread, so you'll have to settle for secondhand stuff in some of these. Some quotes are for contrast; not all of these are from the "I as GM get to do whatever I want and players just have to lump it" crowd.

However, I will admit--as noted in previous posts!--that there are messages I missed. Some of which had much more friendly content. It may also be the case that one or more of the people I've quoted in this post are on your ignore list (or vice versa if they have two-way ignore active), and thus your view of the thread would have been...rather more congenial, shall we say. Consider opening this post in an incognito tab so you can check for such things.

To avoid producing an insanely long post, I'm putting spoilers around this.

By and large I have tried to quote whole posts. Where I did not, it is usually because there was a long discussion about something unrelated that I felt would not be helpful to quote. If you suspect anything has been quoted out of context, the links are present. Again, I want to reiterate that some of these are direct demonstrations of the negative attitude I've seen, and others are folks calling out the negative attitude or responding to it.

Edit: And one final note, I stopped looking around page 81? 82? (that is, around post 1620 or so), mostly because I'm tired, I have other things to do, and I can't afford to not sleep properly tonight. So I may have missed out on other things that happened in the past 400 posts or so.

So the one quote you have from me in that spoiler 1) has me saying I'm for compromise, 2) is in the context of the discussion around total capitulation being mandated by the player in allowing the playing of the tortle, in this case mandating that the DM allow in a race that would negatively impact his enjoyment of the game, and 3) was in response to @Dire Bare saying it's about prioritizing player fun over world building(DM fun).

So yes, why is the player's fun more important than the DM's? Why should the DM's fun take the backseat? That's are not questions that say that discussion about compromise shouldn't happen or might not be fruitful.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

So yes, why is the player's fun more important than the DM's?

Or visa versa.

world building(DM fun).

The thing about world building is you don’t need any players to do it.