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Message: <blockquote data-quote="tetrasodium" data-source="post: 9827081" data-attributes="member: 93670">It's a reasonable question and one with a real experience already already <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/the-monsters-know-what-theyre-doing-are-unsure-on-5e24.716720/post-9823673" target="_blank">in the thread back in 409</a>. One of the posters pushing the It'S mY cHaReCtEr /nOt YoUr WoRlD side of the discussion where players☆ should not be expected to have any responsibility in fitting their character to the world/setting has already leapt in with the toxic 4e ECG quote & others with Keith's correction.  I'll circle back to that with the ECS ECG & RftLW snippets, but I feel like more context from that example is needed first because it shows how a lack of player☆ responsibility to work with the gm in fitting their character leads to problems.  The player described in 409 joined the game because one of my existing <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/is-wotcs-5e-d-d-easy-trust-me-this-isnt-what-you-think-maybe.703211/post-9295717" target="_blank">AL sourced players☆</a> said "hey I have a friend who would like to join" as we were wrapping up one campaign about to start another & you know how that goes. The new player☆ first was told "it's going to be an eberron game" and given a quick description of eberron after admitting they knew nothing about the setting. Setting knowledge is not required though and I told them that we could probably work something out & figure out how the phb lore needs to change to fit if he tells me a little about he wants to play -> "Let me tell you about my fursona" -> "No. Please. Stop. " ->Moving on from that, the player asked if they could play an asimaar. I pointed out that the gods in eberron are extremely different and hands off to the point that they might not even exist but described manifest zones & said that it would be fine if he was a mutated something or descendant of a mutated something that lived near a manifest zone because that sidesteps all of the lore stuff he didn't know while fitting the setting & cleaving off some of the stuff from the last exchange. Things went downhill from there & he started telling me about his 4e character where every <img class="smilie smilie--emoji" alt="🛑" src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f6d1.png" title="Stop sign    :octagonal_sign:" data-shortname=":octagonal_sign:" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" />no but/no because/yes if<img class="smilie smilie--emoji" alt="🛑" src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f6d1.png" title="Stop sign    :octagonal_sign:" data-shortname=":octagonal_sign:" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" /> was being pushed aside with suggestions about how I could just change something about the setting even when the <img class="smilie smilie--emoji" alt="🛑" src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f6d1.png" title="Stop sign    :octagonal_sign:" data-shortname=":octagonal_sign:" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" /> being suggested for revision literally came up while explaining why making some other change to the setting would have huge ripples  that made the setting  something unrecognizable that I didn't want to track.  Eventually he settled on an aberrant marked paladin & I don't remember anything else about it. All of that occurred because instead of working with me to actively adapt their concept they just kept looking for ways to justify how some portion of it already fit & making suggestions for how the setting could be changed. That disconnect and recusal to collaborate so their character fit the existing setting caused things to get more and more extreme  until getting to the character concept described in 409[spoiler="relevant setting snippets"] [ATTACH=full]425939[/ATTACH][/spoiler]Those snippets are relevant to what I prefer to disallow in my eberron games.  At the time I had the 3.5 ECS & the spiral bound printout of <a href="https://www.thepiazza.org.uk/bb/viewtopic.php?t=18233" target="_blank">a pseudo-setting guide</a> complete with a bunch of character options, the constant finger wagging suggestions looking to shield problem player behavior by saying that a GM should offer new options when adding limits is frankly insulting when it was dozens of pages at that point.  I generally allow most races & classes in my eberron games but quickly draw a hard line when it's obvious that the thing in question will be used as a vehicle to loredump stuff from FR or Tolkien where I'm more likely to just say no or ask the player to reconsider.  Drow and Dwarves are frequently high on that list & I have several posts talking about why on drow in <a href="https://www.enworld.org/threads/dungeons-dragons-has-done-away-with-the-adventuring-day.707237/post-9494157" target="_blank">this thread</a> & feel like my reasons are pretty clear there, dwarves simply because I'm tired of Gimli clones loredumping FR & Tolkein when eberron's dwarves known best for very different stuff like banking.  The most frustrating thing about trying to collaboratively work with players to adapt things to eberron where those things can probably fit but be expected to have some "twist" is that collaboration is a two way process  and one side of the collaboration often no longer acts like an active participant rather than holding their ground while simply looking for the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=baY3SaIhfl0" target="_blank">square hole</a>...  I did not really have that problem in my pre-5e eberron & darksun games when I generally found players eager to find ways they themselves could pour their PC into a setting shaped mold hoping it would earn them some gm granted cool thing added to the resulting PC's  character sheet.☆ Remember "player" describes someone who somehow learned about a game, agreed to join said game, and has not yet chosen to leave the game for whatever reason so is presumably still a "player".</blockquote>

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