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Message: <blockquote data-quote="DEFCON 1" data-source="post: 9098085" data-attributes="member: 7006">I'm of the opinion that pretty much most of these questions/concerns/wants/needs come down to players and DMs both wanting to play the game in a certain way... and just not trusting the other side to follow them or play that way too.Why do so many DMs get angry about so many species with Darkvision?  Because they want to run their games in such a way that having monsters hiding out in the darkness and then being able to surprise and attack the players from the darkness without the players noticing them is a story they want to tell.  But if all the players play species with Darkvision... that's them telling the DM "We don't like that story, so we are deliberately choosing options that stop us from having to be handed that story."In the better case scenario... the DM would just say "Okay!" and not care that all the PCs have Darkvision and stop worrying about trying to set up stories where monsters attack the characters from the darkness.  But usually the DM just gets annoyed that that maneuver is now off the table and they decry WotC for making that removal possible.Likewise... a player who wants an advanced skill system that can make a declaration in the fiction (via chart or table) that says they have a 100% success rate in bending/breaking bars is telling the DM that getting caught behind minor and arbitrary barriers like gates or portculli is not fun.  Same thing for the wizard player who takes Misty Step as a spell.  They both find coming up against these barriers and being unable to get past them to be annoying and stupid and they want abilities/skills/rules that allow them to just easily bypass them without even having to roll a die.In the better case scenario... the DM would not fight against their player's wishes and instead just cut back or eliminate using these arbitrary hurdles and roadblocks in their stories altogether.  The game doesn't HAVE to have iron gates or locked doors or things that block passages.  You CAN remove them.  It's no big deal.  And the DM can just choose to play into that story fantasy of the character just bypassing or avoiding gates quickly and easily rather than constantly trying to block it.  The PC Rogue character that has taken Proficiency, Expertise, and has Advantage on Thieves' Tools?  They're telling the DM that they want to be able to get past most locked/barred doors and obstacles quickly and easily (either because it makes them feel cool to be able to do so, and/or because they find those obstacles to advancing the story to be irritating to constantly be stuck behind.)  No DM worth their salt should fight against that.  The DM can just as easily find other types of obstacles to throw up against the party instead.PC wants a species that can fly?  It tells us they don't care about story hurdles that involve being unable to access certain areas.  So DMs should just stop using them as story fodder.  PC takes Proficiency, Expertise, and Advantage in Perception?  It tells us that they've probably been burned so many times by DMs constantly "taking them by surprise" (because it's fun for the DM?)  that they don't want to be surprised ever again.  PC ever and always has 'Comprehend Languages' and 'Tongues' prepared as spells?  They probably are tired of the "can't understand the person they're speaking to" story trope and want to get around it if the DM constantly tries to use it.Even without being told, a DM should be able to get a pretty good sense of what their players are looking for in the game and the story based on how those players have built their characters.  And the DM can either following along with the players and not use those tired roadblocks the PC have deliberately been built to get around... or they can just play their own game and not give a rat's ass about their players and keep banging their (and the player's) heads against a wall throwing up more and more ridiculous uses of those tropes just because.At some point both sides need to just come to an accord about what is truly meaningful and fun for everyone in the game of Dungeons & Dragons.</blockquote>

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