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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Argyle King" data-source="post: 5393331" data-attributes="member: 58416">I just felt the need to chime in because what I quoted here was in response to a response that Hussar had to something I said.  I feel as though the conversation branched into a direction which drifted too far away from the original comment. Here's what was said prior to Pem: Me: No problem with anything you've said here... but I do want to point out that what is true of D&D is not necessarily true of how other games work. There are many games in which you could indeed claim to be a prince or an avatar of a diety, and it would indeed grant you tangible benefits -benefits which are just as supported as the rules for magic swords and hacking through goblins. Likewise, there are games in which you could indeed have some amount of control over NPCs by having hirelings or gaining allies; alternatively, skills such as propaganda, diplomacy, and various other things can be used. Originally Posted by Johnny3D3D <a href="http://www.enworld.org/forum/general-rpg-discussion/297429-why-i-dont-gm-nose-post5390010.html#post5390010" target="_blank"><img src="http://www.enworld.org/forum/images/enw/buttons/viewpost.gif" alt="" class="fr-fic fr-dii fr-draggable " data-size="" style="" /></a> No problem with anything you've said here... but I do want to point out that what is true of D&D is not necessarily true of how other games work. There are many games in which you could indeed claim to be a prince or an avatar of a diety, and it would indeed grant you tangible benefits -benefits which are just as supported as the rules for magic swords and hacking through goblins. Likewise, there are games in which you could indeed have some amount of control over NPCs by having hirelings or gaining allies; alternatively, skills such as propaganda, diplomacy, and various other things can be used.Hussar: Oh totally. Yes. I certainly didn't want to imply that there were games which didn't provide players with this level of authorial control over the campaign.Just that D&D isn't one of them.-------------------------------------------------------------  I think (perhaps wrongly?  I'm sure Hussar will correct me if I am assuming what he meant wrongly) Hussar was talking about having control over the setting and some amount of authority over the narration and fluff of the setting.   In the current version of D&D*, by default; at best, saying you are the son of the local baron or something of that nature tends to grant you a whopping +2 bonus on a skill related to your background, perhaps a feat, or some sort of situational bonus.  Beyond that, you're not assumed to have any real authority over any of the NPCs in the game or have any added wealth or status beyond that given to the other characters (*Be aware that I have virtually no knowledge of 4E.E at all.  If it is different, I am not aware of that.) There are other games which do not function the same way as D&D.  There are games in which claiming to be the son of the local Baron has a more tangible value, and has benefits which are just as useful and just as supported by the structure of the game as a new magic sword or knowing a certain spell.  You could use your status, social influence, and other such things and get a little more out of it. This is not meant as a slight against D&D; my original comment (and this one) are only intended to illustrate that not every rpg functions the same way.  D&D's style and the ideals upon which D&D are built assume certain things about the type of game a group of people will be playing that other games might not.  As such, there are certain in-game activities and certain aspects of characters which are given more prominance and support in D&D; likewise, games which have different ideals highlight other things about a character.  With all of that being said, I also feel that I should clarify my position somewhat.  A lot of the discussion seems to focusing on DM power vs Player power.  I was looking at things from more of a Character power point of view.  Yes, the character is ultimately controlled by the player; however, I feel that the point of view is somewhat different. While I would agree that I have a little more out-of-game power than my players do in the game I currently run by virtue of having to abide by the parameters of the game I have set** (i.e. point values of characters, races available, etc,) I don't not necessarily feel that their characters have a lack of in-game power and/or control over the progression of the game.   To give an example, one of the PCs has aspirations of building a castle and claiming a section of land; his character is free to pursue that goal.  That doesn't mean there won't be reactions to his actions.  There may be NPCs who aren't thrilled with the idea, but those reactions are also things which are character generated.  As the out-of-game entity of DM, I am in no way telling the out-of-game entity which is the player that he cannot have his character attempt to do that.  As the player of an in-game character (NPC) I am reacting to the actions of another player's in-game character (PC.)  This is a shared experience; not a dictated one.**I should mention that this particular campaign is a little bit of an exception to this statement though.  The only thing I had sketched out and set in stone was the area where the PCs were meeting to begin the campaign.  The rest of the surrounding area was fleshed out using what the players had included in a background story.  To give an example of this, the player of a mage character had in his character's background story that he was exiled from a cabal of mages who live on an island off the southern coast of the main land.  As a result, that location and the group of mages are now part of the game world.  I still have a lot of power over what exactly is there, and what I felt was reasonable to add to parts of the setting, but the players had a far greater amount of control in creating the setting than I imagine is typical of most games.    Comments on a few other things: If I was not informed of the houserule ahead of time, I think I would be somewhat irked by the jumping rogue situation.  It is a common houserule, but I wouldn't like being told mid-game (especially when in a situation where how the rule worked could impact the life of my character!) that it was suddenly being implemented out of the blue.   I would not be upset at a DM not including a certain race in a game during character creation nor would I be upset about fluff or other things being changed about a game.  There are two main reasons this wouldn't upset me.  A) Because this is something which would be communicated to me before the actual wheels of the game started turning.  If I chose to still participate in the game after being told Race X isn't available, I am agreeing (as a player in the game) to abide by those limitations, and B) Because I feel that the person doing all of the preperation work to create the game, create the setting, keep track of every NPC in the world, and writing encounters should be entitled to at least some amount of narrative control so as to help make all of that work feel like a more rewarding experience.   I dunno... I'm just a guy who gets together with some friends on the weekend to roll dice, satisfy my urge to game, and drink a little Mt. Dew, but that's how I see it.</blockquote>

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