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

[Maxperson]

Maybe you are exceptionally good at making it interesting. I can only speak from my personal experience (and ability).

I do describe things well, but I'm not speaking from just my DMing experience, but also from play under many other DMs. Do all players want lore? No. I've seen plenty who just want combat, treasure, to explore places, or whatever. Most of those I've DM'd for and played with have enjoyed the lore, though.

 

[TheSword]

In my opinion, absolutely not. It’s not the DM’s game, it’s everyone’s game. The DM’s personal tastes are no more important than any other player’s. If the group were to take a vote and the majority decided they didn’t like tortles, that would be a good enough reason.

If the DM has advertised the game as a low fantasy game, and everyone had signed up for that, then that would be a good enough reason (along with elves, dwarves and other assorted sub-Tolkien cliches). But there is no need to “ban” anything. If the players are on board with the concept, they will make something that fits the concept.

No more important, and yet still important.

Taking a vote and forcing one player (the DM) to agree or be deemed unreasonable is one approach.
Another approach is to just to agree collectively not to include things that other folks don’t like. I equally wouldn’t like it if the DM was forcing an encounter or villain on a player that they didn’t like simply because the player was in the minority.

The veto is common approach to reaching decision and can work on both sides. D&D is a big game and there is plenty of stuff in there for people to choose from even if a few get the veto.

Obviously the whole situation presumes the players haven’t all agreed this in advance. Lines and Veils are great, but at the same time it’s an evolving process not a one and done. Not everyone knows what they don’t like until they experience it.

 

[M_Natas]

I do describe things well, but I'm not speaking from just my DMing experience, but also from play under many other DMs. Do all players want lore? No. I've seen plenty who just want combat, treasure, to explore places, or whatever. Most of those I've DM'd for and played with have enjoyed the lore, though.

I would add, that you need a setting to have a game at all.
Yes, that Settimg can be improvised at the table without prep, or planned im advance.

My preference is to plan important details of the Setting in advance. Which makes it easier to have a consistent setting.

For my spelljammer campaign, I knew the PCs will start in an asteroid field and fly along the first levels with an asteroid hopper (a non spelljamming ship that with the help of hooks and ropes basically swing from asteroid to asteroid, the field is a fantasy asteroid field where the asteroids are quite close together). For that asteroid field I created (not in detail) several small settlments and the starter town - Plank City, which is a settlment of asteroids coppled and hold togethter by robes and planks, run by a church or chauntea. I had NPCs and locations for that town ready.
The settelment started out as a refugee camp 400 years or so ago, when the main planet was destroyed in that wildspace system. I also noted down some secrets for the settlements, some names, some history bits for the players to discover, and the name/concept of the next bigger settlement they could reach with the asteroid hopper (Flumphaven - a star harbor city build on the back of a gigantic space starfish). Also a possible antagonist for the first tier of the game (Neogi Pirate who stole two Ships and "the ultimate slave making machine" and Slaves from his Master to himself become a Master, now terrorising the poor space guppy fishers and Ice farmers of the asteroid field).

But that are like setting things you need to run a game.
Of course I can make that all up on the spot. But it is way easier to prep a setting beforehand.

Like, 99% of all GM game prep is setting prep. Every location, encounter, NPC, monster, adventure hook is setting. I prefer my GM is preparing at least some of that so that it stays consistent.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I would add, that you need a setting to have a game at all.

But you can pick one off the peg, thus avoiding the proprietorial sense of DM ownership of the world.

Even better if it’s something the players are familiar with from other media.

 

[tetrasodium]

No.

IMO, of course.

If that's the beginning and end of it, "I dislike humanoid turtle people." No.

IMO, players should have primary agency over their characters. Keeping in mind the group.

Except in the tortle quagmire the player has consistently without refused to make use of that agency after the gm says why the initial tortle is rejected alongside suggestions about things that could change that
Examples have been the animism tribe in one game and being from Droaam in a second
It's worse than useless and does nothing but encourage players to avoid using that agency to focus douch on the gm while entirely omitting the player's next step in making use of that vaunted agency.

That next step is for the player to make use of that agency by proactively modifying the rejected character concept based on gm feedback with something like "I see, how about xyz". I add that underscore to character because there has been more than one poster to suggest that the next step is to ignore what the gm says and suggest how the gm could modify the world before complaining the gm is unwilling to work with or compromise with an uncompromising position.

If the DM is trying to curate and craft a specific campaign or theme and really doesn't feel that turtle people fit into that campaign . . . we should talk about that in the initial pitch or at Session Zero.

It doesn't really matter why the gm is saying no to the hypothetical tortle in a discussion of a hypothetical negotiation during a hypothetical character creation. What does matter is that the gm is willing to say why a given PC concept is unacceptable to the campaign or setting and potentially offer suggestions about ways that the problems can be mitigated. By extension it is also equally important for the player to be willing to take that feedback and talk about ways to modify the character so it will clear the bar or offer a new character that avoids the stated reasons for rejection.

 

[Zardnaar]

But you can pick one off the peg, thus avoiding the proprietorial sense of DM ownership of the world.

Even better if it’s something the players are familiar with from other media.

Still need someone to run it. A lot of ENworlders are allergic to running games.

And playing games.

 

[M_Natas]

But you can pick one off the peg, thus avoiding the proprietorial sense of DM ownership of the world.

Even better if it’s something the players are familiar with from other media.

I don't run published settings, because it is way easier for me to create from scratch then to learn an established setting and then having the pressure to get it right (also the 5e Settings guides outside of Ebberon and Ravenloft sucked so far - haven't seen the 5.5e ones yet). Like, prepping a published WotC 5e adventure looks like just to much work (because you have so much to prepare to make it runable at all) that in half the time I can make up my own adventures that I also know better.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

having the pressure to get it right

You don’t need to “get it right”. Every table’s version of a setting is unique to that table. The point is to avoid the sense of exclusive ownership, and wasting time creating stuff that the players aren’t interested in.

 

[tetrasodium]

Maybe it's because I live in Los Angeles, but most of those I've played with have enjoyed the setting lore.

Probably not. I have the same experience here in Palm Beach county Florida and don't think it's any "exceptionally good" gming given that I observe similar enjoyment of GM setting maintenance from players at other nearby tables in open games.

I think that the disdain more likely says something about the preferences of those showing it. The volume of that disdain is likely just the ratio that comes with discussing it in an online forum where players who primarily or exclusively play in the sort of online uncurated games and short lived campaigns you often find on roll20 and various discord LFM postings make up a larger share than gets seen offline in meatspace gaming interactions

 

[EzekielRaiden]

That's not the point. Im not interested in a player trying to justify their desires. Im more interested in players enthusiastic to play an Egyptian themed game.

Turned out it was really easy to find those players. Egyptian theme was popular.

I had taken a break for a year+ at that point didn't have a group.

But isn't that a direct denial of what folks have been saying?

Now you don't care if the player is trying to meet you in the middle. They have to give you everything you want, or you don't want them around. That's precisely the opposite of what folks keep saying.

Does anyone wonder why people hear the insistence that meeting in the middle is supposedly a thing, and then hear this, and see the previous insistence as seriously disingenuous?