D&D 3.x What do you ban? (3.5)

[Ranes]

So, I have to accommodate firearms rules in my bronze age campaign setting or I'm a tyrant?

That's absurd.

 

[Corwin of Amber]

Can we go back to the topic of the thread?

Well, I usually like to make things interesting by giving my players a choice of a free +1 race, +1 template, or a bonus feat to be applied at any level they choose. As such I ask them to consult me if they want to use some of the more powerful ones. Specifically Feral, Mineral Warrior, and Lolth Touched. Although I'm usually fine with them if they decide to slap it on a Monk or something that needs a bit of a boost (although it's never actually come up).

 

[Greg K]

I've always agreed with the statement that the dm is a facilitator not a dictator and I think stopping players from using anything from wotc is tyrannical. you may be dming but its the players game as much as yours.

And, I am sure WOTC loves customers like you.

In my opinion, 90% of the supplements that they released were complete garbage and a waste of trees. As for 8% of the remaining 10 that was not a complete waste, maybe, 10% (at best) of the content was decent.

And, no, when I am running, it is my setting, my game in the sense that I determine which house rules are being used and which supplemental material to allow or disallow.(when three of my players run, it is their game, respectively in this sense).

Now, I will facilitate the players in that they can go where they want and do what they want within the restrictions of the setting and houserules (as long as they are a) not playing evil characters; b) not trying to power game, min/max or plan builds; c) not interested in pure hack and slash).

I'll accomdate non-optimized (read built for powergaming or min/maxing) builds.

If they want to run a bakery, I'll let them.

If they want to go to the homeland of the druid and barbarian and spend an evening, entertaining the clan leaders with the exploits of the druid and barbarian and help them gain status, I will let them.

If they want to go to the knight's homeland to help him restore his name and his House, reclaim his former fiancee set to marry another, and do all this while proving that his fiancee's new husband is a traitor and framed him, I will do it

If they want to drop an adventure, because the barbarian needs to be back home by a specific day and time to take part in an initiation into a secret society of warriors, I will let them. Or the party can decide to stay focused on whatever adventure they have chosen to, currenty, pursue.

If they want to try and fix up the druid with whores, because he is so tightly wound and they believe his virginity and holding out for "true love" to be the reason, I will let them.

However, when I run D&D, I still set the house rules. I still choose the supplemental material being used and even to ignore or alter some of the core material. That WOTC prints it means nothing and just because a player bought something does not entitle its use at the table.

In the above mentioned campaign, for example, the PHB2 Knight will not be used. I have another knight class and a separate supplement for additional material. The druid and barbarian have certain mechanical restrictions/alterations. Tieflings exist, but are NPCs. Warlocks exist as NPCs, but not the Complete Arcane class- as the Thaumaturge from Green Ronin fits the bill for me just fine.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Well, I usually like to make things interesting by giving my players a choice of a free +1 race, +1 template, or a bonus feat to be applied at any level they choose. As such I ask them to consult me if they want to use some of the more powerful ones. Specifically Feral, Mineral Warrior, and Lolth Touched. Although I'm usually fine with them if they decide to slap it on a Monk or something that needs a bit of a boost (although it's never actually come up).

This brings up something I wouldn't mind inquiring about to see if anyone else feels the same way: I kind of wish level adjustment came in two "tiers": LA from race, and LA from templates, instead of having the same effects on your character's growth. Specifically, make the former less punitive than the latter. Because as you named some off, there are a fair number of inexpensive templates to pick from that add great power and can be applied to most race choices. I find that really tacky and cheap and that it detracts from picking non-human-like races. Why be a big strong race with a fixed "package" of benefits and limitations based on flavor, when you can just pick the template you like off a menu and say "can I have human bonus feat with that?" I ran a gestalt game last time and used the E6 idea of LA being treated as lower point buy (I adjusted the values a little, though). If I used that system again, I would definitely like to try making racial LA use a different table or something, that makes the costs less. What do others think? Just the general idea that template LA should be looked at differently from racial LA?

 

[Corwin of Amber]

This brings up something I wouldn't mind inquiring about to see if anyone else feels the same way: I kind of wish level adjustment came in two "tiers": LA from race, and LA from templates, instead of having the same effects on your character's growth. Specifically, make the former less punitive than the latter. Because as you named some off, there are a fair number of inexpensive templates to pick from that add great power and can be applied to most race choices. I find that really tacky and cheap and that it detracts from picking non-human-like races. Why be a big strong race with a fixed "package" of benefits and limitations based on flavor, when you can just pick the template you like off a menu and say "can I have human bonus feat with that?" I ran a gestalt game last time and used the E6 idea of LA being treated as lower point buy (I adjusted the values a little, though). If I used that system again, I would definitely like to try making racial LA use a different table or something, that makes the costs less. What do others think? Just the general idea that template LA should be looked at differently from racial LA?

That's actually a good point. So far I've had to deal with a few Planetouched (there are about a dozen in the various supplements), someone that wanted a bloodline from UA without the level cost, Feytouched (not Unseelie Fey, I don't remember the source), and a Catfolk. I have not noticed what you spoke about, since the majority of what has been use was a race rather than a template.

 

[Celebrim]

So, basically, there is no point in having this discussion here. Your answer to everything is "your arguement is invalid because I houserule everything." This is why internet debates usually try to stay as close to RAW as possible...its the only common ground to stand on. Everything else is "I shot you" "Nuh uhh, I have a houserule".

Don't you already have a thread for discussing your houserules? Can we go back to the topic of the thread?

If I am not mistaken, the topic of this thread was, "What do you ban?"

My answer to that question was, "Well, I ban almost everything."

For that answer I have, and continue recieve, insults against my character, intelligence, and rationality. For example, I'm now being accused of being "tyrannical" and apparantly abusing my players because I don't allow everything that WotC printed for 3.5. (!!!) Not that it matters, but I counter that it would be far more abusive of my players to declare that every bit of text WotC printed for 3.5 was in effect, given the vast bulk of material that would mean, the huge economic cost that would impose on new players who wanted access to the rules, and tremendous variances in quality found in that material.

It is because of the attacks on me that I've taken some pains to say why I ban most everything published for 3.5. My answer to the more responsible sorts of attacks - into which yours does not fall; namely, that in banning this or that I'm creating this or that unforeseen consequence, which quite often are accompanied with the charge that I'm morally or intellectually defective for having done so, is often in fact, "No, I foresaw that would be a problem so I corrected the problem with some comprehensive and holistic change." I'm not defending 3.5 as a system. I'm not defending the RAW, so there is nothing spurious about me answering why I made a house rule by citeing another house rule. If it's a lot of work, why is that your problem? But, frankly I shouldn't have to be answering most of those sorts of attacks, and most of the questions aren't prompted by intellectual curiousity but by no other apparant desire than to be insulting. That they try to veil it behind rhetorical questions makes it no less so.

May I point out that as of the great forum merger, this is now the house rules forum. I was quite content to discuss questions about house ruling in a forum only visited by those that care about house ruling without having persons such as yourself, questioning my intelligence, moral character, and rationality when I discussed house rules. Why the heck in a thread about house ruling which material is included in your campaign should I assume that we are staying "as close to RAW as possible"?

Why should I now have to put up with a bunch of crusading defenders of the RAW who see it as their job to smite down anyone who alters the rules in in a thread and forum about house rules? You call this an "internet debate". To my knowledge it was never intended to be a debate at all. I didn't post to this thread with the intention of defending myself or engaging in a debate, much less that you were going to be set the terms of what I was allowed to discuss to not include "house rules" in a thread that is inherently about DM's excercising Rule 0. I post in threads in the hope that the person asking the original question is geuninely curious and in hopes I can be helpful. I don't do so in hopes to get in a debate with a pack of fools, which I could do anywhere, and not have to come to EnWorld for.

I should very much like to discuss the topic at hand. I think I have actually done so when I'm allowed to. As I have said before however, there are a number of posters in this thread with no interest in the topic at hand who refuse to allow anyone to discuss it in peace and whose sole interest in the thread is a chance to tell those people who do ban some things (of which I'm admittedly an extreme case) that they are having badwrongfun.

If in fact the moderators now jump down my throat because I've used 'trigger words', I don't really care anymore. This thread is getting tiresome and its been a while since its been on topic. I plan this weekend to do prep work for the next session of my campaign, and if I get jumped on now well the hypocricy of them doing so is their's to live with and a vacation from the forums will cause me no harm or grief.

 

[Corwin of Amber]

For that answer I have, and continue recieve, insults against my character, intelligence, and rationality.

Ok. I don't think that a barren naked appeal to authority like that is even remotely a logical point, but oh well. You can believe whatever you like; nonetheless, my rules - valid or invalid - and the reasoning behind them aren't going to change on account of that ... argument... such as it is. No one is asking you to play at my table.

Right. Epee. If you took even a little fencing, you'll know that the Epee scoring system is meant to simulate dualing with a smallsword, and that the foil is a practice weapon and its not meant to simulate any sort of actual combat.

No, you don't. And, I'm not going to be responcible for your education.

Look, I'm not going to go into this in as much depth as I have in the past, because I know you don't want to be educated. So why should I bother?

This is called passive aggressively pretending to have the moral high ground. Instead of actually countering my arguments or presenting your own, you are going to talk about how much you've been insulted and how I'm not actually presenting counter-arguments.

Fail.

Hmmm...
Irony.

More irony.

Thank you. We are so glad we have you here to snarkily tell us these things.
Wow. You are a amazing. I would have never noticed that 3 isn't 400. I've only got 30 hours of college math. It just has never came up before. I don't know how I passed differential equations.

This is nonsense.

But 'Beardfist Fistbeard' is just dumb.

I find the character to be juvenile to the point of infantile.

What is this? Aren't you reading?

I wish we could all be this compasionate and level-headed.

 

[Alexanderone]

I'm not saying dms should let players run riot. If you've made a particular setting then that's cool to say what does and doesn't exist. But why is it wrong for players to power game if that's what entertains them. like min-maxing or not its their game as much as yours so get off your high horse.

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

I wish we could all be this compasionate and level-headed.

Nice compilation work!

 

[Celebrim]

I wish we could all be this compasionate and level-headed.

Yes, because fairness is snipping out excerpts without quoting what I'm responding to.

Chances are, if I'm employing sarcasm, that particular weapon of mass destruction has already been used in a first strike. "Thank you. We are so glad we have you here to snarkily tell us these things.", didn't just come out of the blue.

Neither did the rest of what you quote. The only one of the bunch I regret is, "juvenile to the point of infantile", because Dandu had already had his hopes crushed enough by that point and didn't really need me piling on. Besides, as Dandu said, at least his character doesn't break things with his penis, which does rather cast the character in a better light by way of contrast. And really, saying how his character was "juvenile to the point of infantile" was probably way over the top and immature of compared to say, comparing someone's post to the semen spilled into someone's mouth after an act of oral sex. Not that really would have been...

Oh never mind.