D&D 5E What DM flaw has caused you to actually leave a game?

[5ekyu]

It is a rule, but it's easier and more often changed than other rules. Here's the fluff for a cleric, "Divine magic, as the name suggests, is the power of the gods, flowing from them into the world. Clerics
are conduits for that power, manifesting it as miraculous effects." Unless the DM changes it, that is what a cleric is. A divine caster who is a conduit for the power of his god. That's as strong as any rule in the book. Sometimes fluff is less restrictive and gives you options, like some rules are less restrictive than others and give you options.

Rules do not have to be mechanical in nature. Over the years it seems like a lot of people have forgotten that fact. They argue as if unless something is mechanical in nature, it can't be a rule.

To me this is more an approach that varies greatly between different players and likely heavily influenced by experience.

I think players who have played a lot more "universal multi-genre" point by games like HERO abd some indie etc. but there are plenty tend to be more along the mindset of separate mechanics rules and setting dials. Others who either did not play a lot of those or did and found it wanting i think are more likely to find it more to there liking to have clerics required to deal with npc church and divinity or warlocks not to "follower" or "minionize" their patrons to the role of off-screen sfx.

I do not think either is bad as long as its universally agreed at a table and implemented well.

However, DnD does not present itself as a generic separation between mechanics and fluff system but as a married setting to mechanics with alot of homebrew enabled.

 

[Maxperson]

Are you even arguing in good faith any more?

I had this same thought about your last response to me, and this one isn't any better. Looks like we're done.

 

[Maxperson]

That every god has clerics doesn't entail that every cleric has a god.

I just said that.

The 3E "fluff" is about 3E clerics in general. Eberron clerics are only a subset of 3E clerics. So there's no reason to expect them to exhibit various properties with the same frequency as those properties are distributed over 3E clerics as a whole.

Yes, it's a subset that doesn't allow for the full 3e cleric class options. It has changed the 3e cleric class fluff like I said.

 

[Maxperson]

This is like saying every weapon is intended to be used, and so having a party without a Bohemian earspoon is a houserule.

No. That's not at all what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that every weapon in the PHB is intended to be used, so if you make a campaign setting with no swords, spears or maces, you are not playing by the PHB weapon rules. You have altered them to fit your setting. There's nothing wrong with that of course, but it's still an alteration of the weapon rules.

 

[S'mon]

If they are DMing at my table and half way through the campaign they decide to add rules to the game that make it less fun, and ignore me when I tell them I do not wish to play with such pointless rules, then I am under no obligation to invite them back to my table to continue their campaign.

So you set the rules, even though they're the one GMing?

Hmm. I can imagine following your approach in extreme cases, but I generally believe in trusting the GM, even if I disagree with one decision, and although I consider myself a bad/demanding player who often quits games, it takes a lot of bad GM decisions for me to quit a game - unless they are truly awful this normally takes several sessions of piled-up bad decisions or other unfun stuff. I guess I only have people I trust GM at my abode, so I have never kicked out a GM/group.

 

[Aldarc]

Yes, it's a subset that doesn't allow for the full 3e cleric class options. It has changed the 3e cleric class fluff like I said.

That's not a class option anymore than saying that player characters of the barbarian class can like cities changes a class option. The flavor text creates expectations for the range of possible play that one may encounter in a campaign, but it does not dictate that a cleric will, should, or must encounter all such divinities in a given campaign to validate the flavor text. It is that some variety of these different expressions may be present.

 

[pemerton]

it's a subset that doesn't allow for the full 3e cleric class options. It has changed the 3e cleric class fluff like I said.

Where is the rule that every campaign setting must range over the full range of PHB descriptions at the frequemcy the PHB suggests for those descriptions? I've never encountered it.

Here's a bit of fighter text from the 5e Basic PDF (p 24; I quoted it already upthread but got no response):

Questing knights, conquering overlords, royal champions, elite foot soldiers, hardened mercenaries, and bandit kings—as fighters, they all share an unparalleled mastery with weapons and armor, and a thorough knowledge of the skills of combat. And they are well acquainted with death, both meting it out and staring it defiantly in the face.​

You appear to be committed to holding that a fighter who has, at the start of play, never killed; and/or a fighter who refuses to kill (by taking advantage of the "unconscious at zero hp" rule) is a house rule. Which is absurd.

Likewise you seem committed to holding the idea of a paladin rather than a fighter being a questing knight a house rule. Etc.

The cleric is not the only class with "fluff" (to use your label),

 

[Lanefan]

Short answer: Yes

Long answer: Yeeeeessssss

Longer answer: I play DnD to have fun and I want my fun maximized. If a DM proposes a new rule, I expect it to increase fun. A rule that decreases fun is a pointless waist of time.

For you, perhaps, but a rule - any rule - that needlessly clobbers realism as hard as that one does simply has to go, and fun be damned.

Just about every optional rule introduced in Xanathar's, especially sleeping in armor, is a pointless waste of time that decreases the overall fun of 5e. If a DM tells me that in their campaign they are going to be using optional rules from Xanathar's, I know that there is a strong likelihood that game will be less fun than a campaign in which the DM is not using rules from Xanathar's (other than the player options).

I can't speak to Xanathar's specifically as I've never read it, but the general principle here - that you'll only accept new rules if they give more options to the player - sets off some alarm bells in my little DM head.

If I am aware that such rules will be used at the start of the campaign, I will likely either not join their game or I will not invite them to DM at my table. If they are DMing at my table and half way through the campaign they decide to add rules to the game that make it less fun, and ignore me when I tell them I do not wish to play with such pointless rules, then I am under no obligation to invite them back to my table to continue their campaign.

Yikes!

If you don't agree with a DM's rules you'll pull rank as host and throw the game out. Fair enough from the you-as-host perspective - it's your dwelling, after all, and you've got final say over who is welcome there - but blatantly unfair in the perspective of player equality at the table: if another player doesn't like the DM's rules (but you do) that player has no equivalent hammer to wield.

The flip side is that if you do something that annoys the DM and-or other players enough to want to throw you out of the game, it can't be done unless the game can find somewhere else to be held: you've got the hammer there too.

Where possible, the DM should also be host* if only to avoid everything I've just said above. Where not possible, that's what pubs and coffee shops and FLGS's are for.

* - as a general rule. Occasional "road trips" where the game sails at a player's house instead - or somewhere else - are a different matter.

Lanefan

 

[Sadras]

And that is perfectly fine, but in my case, the DM was a new member of the weekly RPG group I established a decade ago, that is hosted in my home, where my wife and I provide dinner.

I'm in the same boat as you in that I host and provide dinner, however I guess we have differing playstyles. I'm player in a Westeros games hosted at my house and I respect the rules that the DM sets out, at any time during the campaign. We have a table that openly discusses rules, so the DM get's our buy-in and thoughts on particular issues, and then makes the final call AND can amend them later if we see it not working.

I understand that this guy is new at your table, but this attitude seems particularly bullish. Sorry.

 

[Nagol]

So you set the rules, even though they're the one GMing?

Hmm. I can imagine following your approach in extreme cases, but I generally believe in trusting the GM, even if I disagree with one decision, and although I consider myself a bad/demanding player who often quits games, it takes a lot of bad GM decisions for me to quit a game - unless they are truly awful this normally takes several sessions of piled-up bad decisions or other unfun stuff. I guess I only have people I trust GM at my abode, so I have never kicked out a GM/group.

Table rules were set at the start of the campaign. The DM wanted to alter the rules without player unanimity. I believe that to be a big no-no.