You can't play that, you don't RP well enough

[Cassandra]

While I can sympathize with those who say, "Let the player try it, you'll never get better without branching out," I think a line has to be drawn somewhere. Our gaming group (which has sort of faded in and out in the past 15 years, but still has several of the same people) has one fellow who has been gaming since D&D came in three small paper books. Over the years he has played nearly every character class, most races and both sexes. He has also successfully played other RPGs in modern, supers and sci-fi genre. However, one thing he CANNOT play is a Vulcan.

We played Star Trek RPG for a couple years, and this fellow played Vulcans two or three times. After having tried every way we could to explain his characters' emotional reactions to situations, we bundled the last character home to deal with his pon farr and declared the guy could never play a Vulcan again. Harsh? Maybe, but his portrayals required too great of a suspension of disbelief, and made staying in character hard for the rest of the group.

I just don't think every situation can be judged by the same default standards.

 

[eris404]

If you know your players because you've played with them, then it makes sense that you are able to evaluate what they bring to the table and what they take away from it. I do not run games so my friends can become better players. I run games because I have fun playing games with my friends. I order to keep it fun, I may have to tell a guy that he blows at playing LG so please pick a different alignment.

As a player in that game, I do agree in this case - the player in question is much happier, too, to the point that she is able to stop worrying about the rules and create interesting and different characters that just happen to be fighters of one type or another.

But, I also think that this is usually a self-correcting problem anyway. Say that Player A wants to play a charismatic character, but gets tongue-tied every time the DM tries to role-play a diplomatic scene. Either Player A will improve with practice or get frustrated and switch to another character.

With M you at least let her try to play spellcasters and when things got too frustrating, you helped her try other things.

 

[Odhanan]

I have found something disturbing recently. In several places people have been saying “I will not allow players to play a pc concept they don’t have the role playing ability to pull off.”

This I find counter productive, surely they are never going to be able to “pull off” concepts that are “beyond their ability” if never given the chance to play them and increase their familiarity with the concept.

...

if it's just along the lines of "you can't play an elf because you're not any good at it" well that's just crap. It's a game.

...

"you can't play that, you don't RP well enough" not good. not nice. not at my table.

"id ask you not to play that, because i dont feel it fits well within our campaign" perfectly fine.

Amen.

 

[Chimera]

To be honest, I once knew a guy who would pull stuff like that, but his intention was to be petty and mean. If you couldn't talk like the smoothest Bard on the planet and talk him into whatever you were trying to do, he didn't want you playing a Bard, because YOU were incapable of playing a Bard. I disagree with that sentiment.

I agree 100% with the "only if it disrupts the game" sentiment expressed above.

I've told two people in the past that they couldn't play certain classes in my game.

The first was an old friend who only EVER played Rangers. Not because he was RPing them as "rangers", but because a> He was a LotR nut and b> He grew up on 2e where you may as well play a Ranger over a Fighter because of the extra abilities. After some bad play in one campaign (where he acted very un-ranger-like), I suggested that I wouldn't let him play a Ranger in the next game, that I'd like very much for him to try playing something else.

The second was a new friend who was playing a Psion/Bard and not doing very well with managing his skills and RPing (to the point of disrupting the game). Since he was fairly new to D&D, I told him that I wouldn't let him play a character like that in my next game and suggested that he play something more basic, so that he could get a better handle on things.

 

[fusangite]

I'm with Chimera; what matters is that the game is fun for everybody. That's the goal. I'm doing entertainment not education. The GM has a responsibility to prevent things that have a sigificant probability of screwing up the game; that's part of the job description. BelenUmeria has a pretty good list to base this on.

 

[wingsandsword]

The only time I can recall putting a roleplaying-skill prerequisite on anything was the Vow of Poverty feat.

I know too many powergamer-munchkins who see that as a route to Ultimate Power, and want to rack up as much Stuff as possible, turn it into Inherent ability score bonuses, Permanenced effects and other non-possession bonuses, and then take VoP and find every way to dance around the spirit of it while staying within the exact wording of the feat.

Therefore I was very reluctant to allow it into my game, until one player started playing her character. I don't have any abusive players in my group, but I knew to be careful with that feat, because it really does have a RP aspect as much as a mechanical aspect.

She is an old 1st Edition veteran who likes monks, and never played 2nd Edition, and my game was her first 3rd Edition game. She created a half-elf monk, but lamented that the game system was based on the idea that she had to keep getting more and more magic items, and that a humble monk was presumed to be clad in a fortune in magic items enough to build a whole monastery by mid-levels. As she played the character, she reluctantly took magic items the party found, and only because she'd need them to stay alive and useful. So I showed her the VoP feat, she loved the idea of being able to play a monk who didn't need material possessions, and had been playing that concept from the beginning. She's finally taken VoP, and has RP'ed it well, isn't trying to abuse it, and has no problem staying within the strictures of the VoP.

So I only put an RP restriction on things that come with a tall order of RP requirements to play properly, or when I think the player will play the concept in a way that would be offensive or immature (but I don't have any immature players in my group, thankfully, so that hasn't come up.)

 

[Darth K'Trava]

I have found something disturbing recently. In several places people have been saying “I will not allow players to play a pc concept they don’t have the role playing ability to pull off.”

This I find counter productive, surely they are never going to be able to “pull off” concepts that are “beyond their ability” if never given the chance to play them and increase their familiarity with the concept.

How would you know unless you let them try? If you're afraid they won't live up to expectations, then don't let it show until you let them try to see if they can roleplay a certain concept. If they can't then let them know that they shouldn't come up with something that they might not be willing nor able to handle. But neither of you will know for sure until you give them a shot at it. You might be surprised at what they can do, especially if you grant a little extra XP for roleplaying.


I agree that you found that to be counter-productive, which it is. Completely. They should be at least a bit familiar with their own concept they created.... you'd think.

 

[Darth K'Trava]

And a GM has the right to say no if it will:

1.) Be offensive or disturbing to other players.
2.) Negatively impact or disrupt the campaign.
3.) Serve as a "pedestal" to force others to listen to the views of the player.

Just because someone is a player does not mean they can do anything they want. The game has a set of rules for mechanics and a group/GM can have a set of rules that covers what the book does not.

A player could have a concept for "a half-dragon fiendish troll" yet the GM allows core races only. Therefore, the player would need to play something else.

I have no trouble with it. If a player has issues, then I can help them find another game.

I could understand if it does become disruptive in any form to either the game, the DM or other players. The DM is allowed to set his own rules for what he allows in his game, preferably at the first session. The ones I have set their own rules but are willing to at least listen to you if you want to try to have something in his game. But they shouldn't argue if he says "no" to something. Usually he has a reason for it. Sometimes a good discussion might make him change his mind. And there are limits that should be pushed, no matter what.... like the "half-dragon, fiendish troll" is just asking for a smackdown of epic proportions, IMO. The level adjustment alone should knock out that concept right then and there....

 

[Teflon Billy]

I've told tons of players that they couldn't playa certain kind of character becasue they were incapable of pulling it off (Largely jokesters who wanted to play Malkavians in Vampire: The Masquerade)

I see nothing wrong with it. This isn't a classroom, and I don't think valauble play time should be lost while someone without the natural inclination wreacks everything with antics becasue they can't RP.

 

[RandomPrecision]

I'd let anyone play anything, but then, I tend to reward role-playing. If you're a bad role-player, your possible characters aren't limited, but if you do a really bad job of role-playing, it doesn't pay off.

A good RPer wouldn't get XP for his/her RPing, but a paladin who really exemplifies the class will always have the support of his order, whether it be aid in a combat, some useful items, etc. If the party's paladin couldn't stop RPing the chaotic evil rogue that they always play, the order won't give them as much - in fact, I might make a point of having them honor an NPC paladin for being good paladin...maybe the player whose RPing abilities are in question will pick up the rather obvious hint...or maybe not.