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Verboten! What do you NOT allow in your campaigns?
- Thread starter AFGNCAAP
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Dark Dragon
Explorer
chris7476 said:I think I would like this group.
Somehow I have the feeling that the party may need a rogue character in the coming sessions (They'll enter an undead-infested dungeon soon...and I'm a VERY evil DM...and the party consists of a cleric, a paladin, a druid and two wizards... ![:]](http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/smilies/devious.png "Devious :]")
). chris7476 said:
Same for me, but sometimes the players want to take the whole arm instead of the offer in your hand...
I don't have a problem with monstrous PCs as long as they are reasonably designed. I have some problems with unbalanced spells or unbalancing spell combos, but I tend to correct the unbalancing factor instead of removing spells. If that does not work, the players have to accept that their party-based deadly combos will be used against their PCs sooner or later. There is always a smarter and more experienced BBEG out there...
Mystery Man
First Post
No beans in any food type at least 24 hours before game time.
And no psionics or evil PC's.
And no psionics or evil PC's.
Achan hiArusa
Explorer
My Restrictions
I'm on DM hiatus pending finishing my thesis (which I should be working on now). But after my Forgotten Realms campaign, the following will not be allowed
No magic stores. The Red Wizard stores have to be the dumbest thing ever invented. My characters made it their specialty to rob the darn things. No matter how many traps I put it or guards I put in, they still managed to get away with theft.
No Psionics. Yes, I have been a great fan of psionics for the longest time, but the new 3.5 version has left me cold. Until I can sit down and make a 3.25 version that will make me happy, I'm not using psionics. I'll save that for my Adventure! d20 and Transcthulhu Space/Trinity d20 game, when I get the chance (and I am using their systems).
No nonstandard races.* D&D has become worse than World of Darkness about race/clan/werebeast variants and things just became insanely complicated. *That's not completely true, I've made or adapted variant races, but they are all ECL +0 and close to humanity.
No exceptional abilities when polymorphing/wild shape. This harkens back to 1st edition, but some of those exceptional abilities are better than the supernatural/spell-like abilities that the creatures have.
I'm probably going to make teleporting a little harder to. Get rid of Teleport without Error (sorry, Greater Teleport) and make Teleport that level. Give an error to every spell that allows such transport (even dimension door). And use the Portal stones from Wheel of Time.
No gods. I am going to run a game with the basic philosophies from the Complete Priest Handbook and see how it goes. The world was nearly destroyed in a Holy War. It went from a few major continents to an island campaign (ergo no Drow or Underdark), using the System guide to Aegis from Alternity.
And number one NIMC (not in my campaign): The Vow of Poverty. I am very stingy with magic items (maybe that's what drove my characters to theft) and actually make the characters sacrifice their own XPs if they want to make a better magic item (you've got a +1 sword and want to make it +2, then go to a wizard, go gather the things he needs to do it, and spend the 300 xp deficit yourself). So the "disadvantage" of the Vow of Poverty is not that much of a disadvantage in my games.
What I allow:
Okay, variant races. I have always loved the Irda, so I gave them the restrictions from the 2nd ed Monster Compendium and eliminated all melee weapons, armor and shields from their initial proficiencies. If they take a class with melee weapons they simply don't get them. They have to buy a feat in order to get melee weapons (simple weapons for all simple melee weapons, and martial weapons for each ranged weapon), armor, and shields. This applies even if they multiclass. Also they have a -2 penalty to save vs. poison. I feel this justifies moving their ECL to +0.
Andamen. This is from the Bard's games Atlantis supplement. I used it to create a generic Animal race, instead of having to create a new race for each type of animal. They can interbreed with each other, humans, or animals to produce new Andamen (only 30% successful, the rest are born as animals). If they want other animal qualities I may allow them to buy them as feats (They have low-light, claws, bonuses to skills and abilities, and ability to speak with animals, favored class: ranger)
Ogier. I love the race from Wheel of Time and have decided to use them. My game twink hates them because they are a noncombat effective Large race, which makes me like them even more.
The Verrik. I like the look of them and gave them a third eye. Not sure exactly what I'll end up doing with them since I created them for a psionics game. May not use them at all.
Classes: The AU classes of akashaic (the reason I bought the book), champion, mage blade (made him a spellbook caster like the wizard, compensated with a few bonus feats), and totem warrior. The generic expert class (upped his bonus feats to the same schedule as the fighter, and gave him 8+Int skill points), the noble from Dragonlance (added back in the Star Wars d20 non-revised inspiration ability at 17th level, added the revised Resource Access compensated from the exchange rate, and added talents from the Charismatic Hero's charm tree).
Modified Classes. I am giving bards Wild Shape a little slower than a Druid, also it will only be for medium, small, and tiny creatures (and they get all the spells from the 3.0/3.5/and UA variant lists). Wizards will have Spell Secret from the Wu Jen, Slow Aging and Magic Familiarity from the WoT initiate, and some of the class features from the AU Magister (and still get their feats). The Sorceror will have a few of the class features from the AU Magister and will have a block like Males from WoT and will slowly go insane like they do, I will allow them to buy bloodlines.
Action Points. However, I allow characters that can spend multiple action points to add them together instead. And I will allow characters to re-earn them through dramatic flair. This compensates for my and a few of my other players lousy rolling.
Dodge as a skill. The dodge feat sucks. So I am making dodge a cross-class skill for everybody, and any feat that requires dodge must instead have +1 or more ranks in dodge. Dodge will not stack with armor unless you are a fighter. Otherwise, it works just like a defense bonus.
Reputation. I like it, plus I am going to incorporate the feats of wit article so its a little fluid.
Guns. I am going to use my own primitive gun rules (a version of which used to be on this site with some very bad grammar on my part).
I'm on DM hiatus pending finishing my thesis (which I should be working on now). But after my Forgotten Realms campaign, the following will not be allowed
No magic stores. The Red Wizard stores have to be the dumbest thing ever invented. My characters made it their specialty to rob the darn things. No matter how many traps I put it or guards I put in, they still managed to get away with theft.
No Psionics. Yes, I have been a great fan of psionics for the longest time, but the new 3.5 version has left me cold. Until I can sit down and make a 3.25 version that will make me happy, I'm not using psionics. I'll save that for my Adventure! d20 and Transcthulhu Space/Trinity d20 game, when I get the chance (and I am using their systems).
No nonstandard races.* D&D has become worse than World of Darkness about race/clan/werebeast variants and things just became insanely complicated. *That's not completely true, I've made or adapted variant races, but they are all ECL +0 and close to humanity.
No exceptional abilities when polymorphing/wild shape. This harkens back to 1st edition, but some of those exceptional abilities are better than the supernatural/spell-like abilities that the creatures have.
I'm probably going to make teleporting a little harder to. Get rid of Teleport without Error (sorry, Greater Teleport) and make Teleport that level. Give an error to every spell that allows such transport (even dimension door). And use the Portal stones from Wheel of Time.
No gods. I am going to run a game with the basic philosophies from the Complete Priest Handbook and see how it goes. The world was nearly destroyed in a Holy War. It went from a few major continents to an island campaign (ergo no Drow or Underdark), using the System guide to Aegis from Alternity.
And number one NIMC (not in my campaign): The Vow of Poverty. I am very stingy with magic items (maybe that's what drove my characters to theft) and actually make the characters sacrifice their own XPs if they want to make a better magic item (you've got a +1 sword and want to make it +2, then go to a wizard, go gather the things he needs to do it, and spend the 300 xp deficit yourself). So the "disadvantage" of the Vow of Poverty is not that much of a disadvantage in my games.
What I allow:
Okay, variant races. I have always loved the Irda, so I gave them the restrictions from the 2nd ed Monster Compendium and eliminated all melee weapons, armor and shields from their initial proficiencies. If they take a class with melee weapons they simply don't get them. They have to buy a feat in order to get melee weapons (simple weapons for all simple melee weapons, and martial weapons for each ranged weapon), armor, and shields. This applies even if they multiclass. Also they have a -2 penalty to save vs. poison. I feel this justifies moving their ECL to +0.
Andamen. This is from the Bard's games Atlantis supplement. I used it to create a generic Animal race, instead of having to create a new race for each type of animal. They can interbreed with each other, humans, or animals to produce new Andamen (only 30% successful, the rest are born as animals). If they want other animal qualities I may allow them to buy them as feats (They have low-light, claws, bonuses to skills and abilities, and ability to speak with animals, favored class: ranger)
Ogier. I love the race from Wheel of Time and have decided to use them. My game twink hates them because they are a noncombat effective Large race, which makes me like them even more.
The Verrik. I like the look of them and gave them a third eye. Not sure exactly what I'll end up doing with them since I created them for a psionics game. May not use them at all.
Classes: The AU classes of akashaic (the reason I bought the book), champion, mage blade (made him a spellbook caster like the wizard, compensated with a few bonus feats), and totem warrior. The generic expert class (upped his bonus feats to the same schedule as the fighter, and gave him 8+Int skill points), the noble from Dragonlance (added back in the Star Wars d20 non-revised inspiration ability at 17th level, added the revised Resource Access compensated from the exchange rate, and added talents from the Charismatic Hero's charm tree).
Modified Classes. I am giving bards Wild Shape a little slower than a Druid, also it will only be for medium, small, and tiny creatures (and they get all the spells from the 3.0/3.5/and UA variant lists). Wizards will have Spell Secret from the Wu Jen, Slow Aging and Magic Familiarity from the WoT initiate, and some of the class features from the AU Magister (and still get their feats). The Sorceror will have a few of the class features from the AU Magister and will have a block like Males from WoT and will slowly go insane like they do, I will allow them to buy bloodlines.
Action Points. However, I allow characters that can spend multiple action points to add them together instead. And I will allow characters to re-earn them through dramatic flair. This compensates for my and a few of my other players lousy rolling.
Dodge as a skill. The dodge feat sucks. So I am making dodge a cross-class skill for everybody, and any feat that requires dodge must instead have +1 or more ranks in dodge. Dodge will not stack with armor unless you are a fighter. Otherwise, it works just like a defense bonus.
Reputation. I like it, plus I am going to incorporate the feats of wit article so its a little fluid.
Guns. I am going to use my own primitive gun rules (a version of which used to be on this site with some very bad grammar on my part).
eris404
Explorer
It's funny- I think the players in our group are more likely to put restrictions on themselves than the DMs are. In "normal" D&D campaigns (see below), the players usually don't choose to play evil-aligned characters, non-humans and/or non-core classes. Prestige classes weren't even that common until just recently, either.
We have three campaigns currently running, quite different from each other:
1. The Vile Greyhawk Campaign (Vilehawk for short) - Yep, we're playing the bad guys. No good-aligned characters, no paladins, no bards, no halflings (well, no normal halflings anyway...) and no gnomes. I'm not sure gnomes even exist in the DM's version of Greyhawk. Everything else goes, with DM's approval.
2. Crystalmarch - Homebrew world. I don't think the DM would like non-standard races or evil characters, but he might be OK with it if the player had a good reason or story behind it. He's pretty open to non-WOTC sources, too, but would like to look over and approve any additional materal.
3. Forgotten Realms - DM's approval, but the DM is pretty permissive.
Here's the thing: in our group we're all D&D junkies, DMs and players alike, and we buy gaming books and magazines all the time. Our DMs think there's no point in buying this stuff if you can't use it once in a while, so generally they find a way to allow new material without wrecking their campaigns in the process. So far, they've been pretty successful.
We have three campaigns currently running, quite different from each other:
1. The Vile Greyhawk Campaign (Vilehawk for short) - Yep, we're playing the bad guys. No good-aligned characters, no paladins, no bards, no halflings (well, no normal halflings anyway...) and no gnomes. I'm not sure gnomes even exist in the DM's version of Greyhawk. Everything else goes, with DM's approval.
2. Crystalmarch - Homebrew world. I don't think the DM would like non-standard races or evil characters, but he might be OK with it if the player had a good reason or story behind it. He's pretty open to non-WOTC sources, too, but would like to look over and approve any additional materal.
3. Forgotten Realms - DM's approval, but the DM is pretty permissive.
Here's the thing: in our group we're all D&D junkies, DMs and players alike, and we buy gaming books and magazines all the time. Our DMs think there's no point in buying this stuff if you can't use it once in a while, so generally they find a way to allow new material without wrecking their campaigns in the process. So far, they've been pretty successful.
eris404
Explorer
related question
For the DMs out there: do you think you're more likely to make restrictions based on campaign concept/flavor, personal taste or out of reaction to past campaigns? For example, if you were disallowing elves as a player race would it because you have an idea to make elves more powerful in a new campaign world or because you personally dislike the idea of elves or because all the players in the last campaign played elves (for whatever reason)?
For the DMs out there: do you think you're more likely to make restrictions based on campaign concept/flavor, personal taste or out of reaction to past campaigns? For example, if you were disallowing elves as a player race would it because you have an idea to make elves more powerful in a new campaign world or because you personally dislike the idea of elves or because all the players in the last campaign played elves (for whatever reason)?
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