D&D 5E We Would Hate A BG3 Campaign

[Mecheon]

Surfing lizardmen has been explained away. It was in TSRs dying days.

I don't use much for Darksun after 1993. The original concept was great run into the ground by freelancers.

Athas doesn't need Djinn or anything like it. Its not Arabian Nights.

its not just Athas.org the Darksun facebook group, Reddit group basically all the najor groups right there.

It's the prime example why things should be excluded as all the add on watered down the setting. That and TSR rampant metaplot.

Stupid ideas that should have seen the light of day.

Warlocks as Templars. Setting where Arcane magic destroys the environment...... A few pet defilers sure. Entire group of them erm no.

Teleporting Elves. See magic.

Reskining phb Dragonborn as Dray lol.

Dray in general just after Kalaks death.

Tieflings full stop. Genasi would name more sense.

Goliaths lol.

Eliminating clerics (erm derp....)

So yeah it was about shoehorning in 4Eisms regardless. Consequences are no one really cares now. They didn't do it organically it was square peg round hole.

A bit more care they could have slotted in some things and respected the setting. Eg variant Dragonborn more in line with the Dray original presentation.

If I was doing Darksun and adding new stuff I would look at what makes sense at least. Eg Genasi, Barbarians, Sorcerers (with Athasian origin, subject to defilng rules as well).

But no shoehorn in Tieflings. Settings almost screaming out for Genasi.

Doesn't matter if it was the dying days, that's your comparison point. That was Dark Sun's last gasp for decades. If you say you want it back to 2E days, that's 2E days. Surfing lizardmen. Writers pet NPCs killing off all the big threats rather than letting the players handle it. That's the direct comparison point

Athas is a swords and sorcery setting and "You run into a Mysterious Glade where there's something of the past that leads to a lost city out of time that's barely holding on due to the destruction of the world" is part and parcel for that. Or are you saying that the various fey things that existed prior just, didn't exist? They had a villain called the Pixie Blight, of course there's going to be some ruined fey things about. This is just establishing it as a wider thing and fulfilling the same role "Conan the Barbarian runs into a djinn" would fulfil

What, mechanically, differentiates the way templars get their powers from warlock? They weren't going to design a whole new class for an incidental thing, and they're both drawing on the power of the Sorcerer King and using it to cast magic. You know from 5E that warlocks can use divine stuff after all, to tap into the cleric vibe

Fey step isn't an arcane teleportation and, we are talking Athas here, where Arakocra and Kenku (and this is 2E kenku, where they absolutely are able to fly) are already noted, confirmed canonical playable races, so given the forum's view on flying PCs its hardly the worse

Dray are fine after Kalak's death. The Sorcerer Kings have been alive for centuries, they have weird little side projects like this they work on. Hell, Nightmare Beasts are basically "oops we introduced a problem" but they're an iconic Dark Sun critter. And like... Looks. Let's look at Dray stats. Y'know what they had in 2E? Fire resistance and okay armor. That's it. They're nothing special. Is it that shocking the weirdos Dregoth threw out into the world, that the 2E books even say can have whatever weird power you want, may develop other powers due to being a prototype for the final Dray he's cooking up? The world had a whole Thrii-Kreen empire out that that apparently just existed the whole time and never interacted, yet a few unloved lizard guys taking up the trade of killing folks is the unbelievable thing?

Good news, Genesi are also there! I didn't mention it because, genasi weren't a PHB1 race

Ggoliahts are half giants through and through. Unless you want their original rules which are, well, I get why you're laughing because original Dark Sun half giant rules are dumb. Heck, they even noted "Someone wants to be a minotaur? Beasthead giants exist, link them to 'em"

Clerics are still there and noted very specifically they're mostly of the elemental variety, just like original Dark Sun

All it'd take for making them more like original Dray is weakening them, because Dray were pretty bleh in their original stats. The active dragonfear or elemental breath weapons are a lot more interesting in a tactical game over "You can resist fire more", much the same way "Here's some alignment nonsense because you're ~so silly~" was never brought back as a rule for half giants in 3E, 4E or 5E

Good news, you can defile as a 4E sorcerer! Its just, y'know. A choice

 

[Maggan]

The way you and others act, it's a game just for the DM. The players are simply there at the DM's concession, a gracious dispensation from on high that can and will be revoked without notice should the player slip up.

Not at all.

Next week we're playing the last session of our Alien game, and after that we'll sit down with some coffee or tea (for me) and talk about what we want to play next. One GM will get the go-ahead depending on how we feel about the ideas and how much or little GM:ing they've done (I've recently wrapped up a 42 session campaign, so I am quite far back in line). The other GMs shelve their idea for later or start preparing it for another time. Then we either create the PCs together during session 1 or if it's a game we all have access to we create them at home while chatting over Facebook to sync our concepts. If a GM says "only humans or dragonborn" we create humans or dragonborn.

There is no conflict brewing below the surface, we aren't secretly frustrated that the GM is actually running the game we're going to play, people aren't leaving the games in frustration to never come back.

We are not there at the GM's concession, we are there because we like to play role-playing games together.

Another situation for me is the occassional games I run online for people asking for a game. Occasionally people voluntarily ask for me to GM a game for them, e.g. for an actual play podcast. And they do that not because I graciously allow them to bask in my glory, but because they know they will play in an entertaining game where I give the players a lot of leeway to express their characters within the framework that I set for the game, and they know we'll have fun.

Of course, I don't know if hundreds of players are actively avoiding me and my games, but given that I have more requests than I can run games, I don't particularily worry about those hypothetical disgruntled gamers that neither you nor I know exist.

 

[Maggan]

I think a thing that tables have a hard time pulling off is talking their way out of combat. BG3 does this to great effect, especially in act 2. I’ve never really seen it done otherwise. Thoughts?

I must commend your for trying to weave BG3 into the discussion!

Unfortunately I haven't played the game so I can't assist.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Not at all.

Next week we're playing the last session of our Alien game, and after that we'll sit down with some coffee or tea (for me) and talk about what we want to play next. One GM will get the go-ahead depending on how we feel about the ideas and how much or little GM:ing they've done (I've recently wrapped up a 42 session campaign, so I am quite far back in line). The other GMs shelve their idea for later or start preparing it for another time. Then we either create the PCs together during session 1 or if it's a game we all have access to we create them at home while chatting over Facebook to sync our concepts. If a GM says "only humans or dragonborn" we create humans or dragonborn.

There is no conflict brewing below the surface, we aren't secretly frustrated that the GM is actually running the game we're going to play, people aren't leaving the games in frustration to never come back.

We are not there at the GM's concession, we are there because we like to play role-playing games together.

Another situation for me is the occassional games I run online for people asking for a game. Occasionally people voluntarily ask for me to GM a game for them, e.g. for an actual play podcast. And they do that not because I graciously allow them to bask in my glory, but because they know they will play in an entertaining game where I give the players a lot of leeway to express their characters within the framework that I set for the game, and they know we'll have fun.

Of course, I don't know if hundreds of players are actively avoiding me and my games, but given that I have more requests than I can run games, I don't particularily worry about those hypothetical disgruntled gamers that neither you nor I know exist.

Then why this incredibly strident, "my way or the highway," "DM Vision is more important than anything else, including player interests" attitude?

 

[Maggan]

Then why this incredibly strident, "my way or the highway," "DM Vision is more important than anything else, including player interests" attitude?

I think you are extrapolating an awful lot from what I and maybe others have been saying in this thread.

For me it comes down to me as a player allowing the GM to set the framework of their game, or in other words set limitations for their game, so that they can run the game to the best of their abilities.

And I don't feel that I have to second-guess why these limitations are set. I appreciate every GM who steps up to the table to run a game and don't want to make it harder for them than it might already be.

Conversely I want my GMing to be as good as it can be and have some things that help me with that, among them limits that I set for my games.

 

[Remathilis]

I guess that means you've presented a bad analogy then.

I guess it means most DMs would throw a terrible party!

 

[Remathilis]

It's probably dwarfed by other editions functionally dead.

Athas.org doesn't support 4E in any serious way the Facebook group polling virtually no one's playing it.
It's basically 2E and 3.5 with a bit of 5E.

So yeah it seems 4E Dark Sun is functionally dead. So a bit disingenuous claiming its changes are good and popular when it gas virtually no legacy.

Maybe people would have cared if it hadn't made the changes it did. Same with 4E FR. They attempted to kitchen sink it and it's a prine example of why you don't do that to established lore.

Not the only one we see the process repeat.

That's probably a function of the fact it's a 4e setting. The hostile reaction to 4e taints the perception.

 

[Remathilis]

Except this isn't a game just for the players, it is for me as well.

Ever play D&D without other players? I assure you it's not as much fun as in a group. But if all you care about is your satisfaction, hopefully you find players who care about that as much as you do.

 

[CreamCloud0]

Ever play D&D without other players? I assure you it's not as much fun as in a group. But if all you care about is your satisfaction, hopefully you find players who care about that as much as you do.

we do care about the player's satisfaction and desires when playing the game, but we ask that the players give us the same respect for our desires in return, you can play DnD without having access to every single species option in a campaign at all times, why is the GMs desire to run a certain type of campaign any less valid than a player's desire to run a certain character?

if you're going to join an advertised-as-curated campaign and then demand you need to play an excluded species to have your fun then i'm not really sure why you applied to it in the first place, and if you're going to behave like that about your species choice i don't think i'd want you in my game either.

 

[mamba]

It's not a strawman. It's quite a reasonable interpretation. Because, guess what, I actually have Jewish, Muslim, and vegan friends, and more than a few friends who have unusual allergies or bad food reactions. (One example, the person who plays the bard in my Dungeon World game has a bad food reaction to bell pepper: it causes mouth bleeding.)

I’ll accept it as an analogy once you get mouth bleeding from not playing a dragonborn or have a religious doctrine demanding you do. Until then it is a bad analogy to me