D&D 5E We Would Hate A BG3 Campaign

[Remathilis]

I suppose it depends on how many of your friends this is in your strawman.

I'd assume four less after telling them I'm not changing my menu to accommodate their dietary restriction.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I'd assume four less after telling them I'm not changing my menu to accommodate their dietary restriction.

So you can never host a luau so long as you're friends with people who don't like them?

 

[Divine2021]

So how would you run the Auntie Ethel hag encounters? Both were a lot of fun, and the second one surprised the heck out of me!

 

[Warpiglet-7]

"Hey everyone. I was thinking of having some friends over to throw a huge Hawaiian luau party. Now I know Mary is a vegan, Walid is Muslim, Harold is Jewish and Cynthia has allergy to pineapple, so I guess you guys just don't come? The rest of you, come on over to par-tay!"

Yikes. I don’t think limiting choice of elf subtype is very close to asking someone to give up their religion, go hungry or defile their body.

I think the solution is not to give up on luaus for life…let people come if they want or decline. See if you have enough takers and press on.

My pal likes a lot of movies that bore me. I don’t want to fork out 30 bucks for refreshments and a Movie I don’t like. But he gets the group to say they will go and he organizes it. They like it well enough, apparently.

I don’t say “that sucks! Let’s go see this movie instead!” After he organized it. I say thanks for the invite and play Xbox and catch up with them later and say “have fun!”

 

[Remathilis]

So you can never host a luau so long as you're friends with people who don't like them?

Me: "I'm hosting a luau."
Friend: "I'm sorry, I can't eat that. Can I bring something else?"
Me: "I'm sorry, but the menu is fixed. If you brought something, it would ruin the internal consistency of the whole thing. Really destroy the mood and theme."

I'm pretty sure anyone who tried that would be considered a jerk. Yet that's alright if you replace "host" with "DM" and "menu" with "game options". Most people would make accommodations for their friends, and if those accommodations mean some options that are vegan, kosher or halal, that won't destroy the native Hawaiian menu.

(Of course, the real trick to party planning is to provide enough options and diversity of options that people feel they have options, and if someone does have a dietary preference to find ways to accommodate it.)

 

[Maxperson]

Well, I guess a lot of people who played and liked 4e DS didn't agree with you. I mean, its widely considered, by far, the most successful of the 4e-era classic settings! AFAIK the only races it really doesn't contemplate existing are the ones that are specific to Ebberon and FR, and even some of those might appear in DS...

I wonder how many of those people were 2e era Dark Sun fans and how many never played it before 4e.

 

[Maxperson]

"Tadpole powers" ... Aaaaaargh!

Vision: "Welcome to the West Coast Avengers recruitment drive. What are your super powers?"
Applicant: "I uh, have tadpole powers!"
Vision: "And what would those be?"
Applicant: "I can grow arms and legs over a period of several weeks."
Vision: "Next!"

 

[Mecheon]

I wonder how many of those people were 2e era Dark Sun fans and how many never played it before 4e.

Most of the reaction to 4E I saw was it was a return to form and a lot of people applauding it for going backwards in the timescale, along with very specifically ignoring the Prism Pentad

The biggest upset was with Dray but like.... Dray were given playable stats in the 2E and there was a whole thing of proto-Dray who were exiled anyway, so could have just leaned harder into that

Oh, and half giants used Goliath stats, but original Goliath stats are just 3E half-giants with the psionics stripped off them and 5E's gone harder in on that to boot

I also think the greater subtext matters here because the examples being used are almost always things that are newer to the game and well-liked by younger players (and flavor reasons). It can often come across as antagonistic towards fans of those things when it seems like people want to excise from the larger game. It might be useful to use other examples, including ones that held as sacred. Say elves. Can we agree to burn them in a fire?

S'why I focused on Tabaxi as an example because like.... If you consider them the same as Rakasta (which, D&D absolutely has done in D&D Online), they're a long-standing thing dating back to Isle of Dread

 

[CleverNickName]

D&D was once about embracing the fantastic and the strange, about fueling imagination and derring-do, about effusive creativity. The freedom for DMs to explore any possible world they could conjure up, and players to find new ways to always ensure that no DM plan survived contact with them (for better or worse...)

Now? You will take only what is hard-line traditional and like it. Do not question the wisdom of the ancients. Know your place, player. Be thankful you get any game at all.

Thankfully, the pendulum has begun to swing back the other way.

I'm with you on the first paragraph, but you lost me on the second. I think D&D 5E is an excellent toolkit...always have. Even before Tasha's Cauldron of Everything came along with its "Custom Origins" toolkit, I was plugging things in and out, swapping things back and forth, coming up with all sorts of things for my characters (my spouse was/is my DM, and gave me plenty of room to play around). Where you see a hard line, I see a big ol' wad of clay.

EDIT: I got to reminiscing, so I went back and looked up my first "water genasi" character I created. This was back in 2015, long before there was an "official" Genasi.

Spoiler: Baby's First Genasi

As high elf, except as follows:
Ability Score Increase. Your Dexterity increases by 2, and your Wisdom increases by 1. (replaces Ability Score Increase.)
Aquatic Ancestry. You have resistance to cold. You can breathe underwater, and you have a swim speed of 30 feet. (replaces Fey Ancestry and Trance.)
Weather-wise. You are proficient in the Survival skill. (replaces Keen Senses)
Cantrip. You know the Ray of Frost cantrip. Wisdom is your spellcasting ability for it. (replaces the Cantrip ability.)
Weapon Training. You have proficiency with the scimitar, trident, and net. (replaces Elf Weapon Training)
Languages. You can read, speak, and write Common and Primordial.

Honestly, I think I still prefer this one to the "official" MotM version.

 

[Zardnaar]

So ebd of our CoS session briefly talked about spotlighted races.

Also picked up a new player he ran the afk Fighter.

But his eyes lit up when he saw the Bearfolk and Trollkin art. They're also spotlighted races being locals.

Another player is looking up the Snowcat and winterfolk halfling art and trying to work out how to build it in game.

Other player is looking at the Geomancer wizard.

That's basically what I like if you're using a curated setting. PCs pucked it and yeah they don't get everything but there's 20-30 avaliable races and around 8 spotlighted ones.

I haven't hard banned the Southland races but prefer they not be used. Previous Midgard game was set in the Southlands. They mostly went with those options as well eg Minotaurs, clerics of the local powers etc.