GMs don't run That


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I have a dislike of people using the Scotish stereotype for dwarves. I won't ban it but I will let them know I think it is an overused trope.

Kender is something I discourage.... If somebody insists on playing one I let the whole party know if the the kender gets so annoying that people have the urge to kick the character out of the party I will have no problems with it and to go right ahead....

Although some of the creepiest and most bad ass role playing i ever saw was a guy who played a kender gone "wrong".


Alitan wrote:
Funny... I'm hijacking the dwarves in my world to be the dwarf version of imperial Rome. Scottish, they're not.

That is the correct use of Dwarves sir....

Straight roads, brilliant engineers, and architects, digging in and building a fort at the end of a days march. Masters of logistics.

Strict adherence to tradition, political factions, powerful families, clients... Offering non dwarves a chance at citizenship if they spend 20 years as an auxiliary in the army ( or maybe as dwarves are so long lived 2 or 3 generations for humans).

Dark Archive

If it exists (rule, spell, item) and breaks the world consistency then it now doesn't exist in my game or gets re-worked so it can exist.

Two good examples - Teleportation and Scrying.
They both work as written (teleportation has 1st/2nd ed risks) but there are devices such a Wardstones which are commonly employed in most strongholds/estates that block scrying or teleportation. Same thing with flying over strongholds - some of these devices create a no fly zone (at least by spell or item), thus making castles actually relevant and useful (and actually have a reason to still exist). So if you want to get in you have to sneak in, also it the good guys are in a big city the BBEG can't just teleport in and wipe them out. He has to travel there himself (risky) or send minions to do the task - that or take em out on the road.

So some of the troublesome story spells work great in the wilderness and ruins (if the wardstone has failed or is weak) but they don't break city life and structure.

Same goes for unlimited create "whatever" spells at any low to mid level (unlimited water creation, item repair, etc).

What I basically did is looked at all the player based dungeon/adventure convenience spells and said "these do not exist in a vacuum" and that in civilized areas there would be counters to all but the most powerful of magic. There is still a need for tinkerers and there is still a need for walls in my game, the PC spell list didn't invalidate them or make them obsolete.

A few other don'ts:
You can't play characters of the opposite sex. Sorry, too bizarre and there's too much of a player disconnect from the PC.

No romance - it exist, but I don't role-play out love interest interactions/chatter/romps. Again, imo it's a bit bizarre but more importantly a waste of time and not the focus of the game (mine at least).


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any dwarf. scottish, irish, fantasy dwarvish or whatever.
i play with very smart players capable of complex character themes.
the moment they touch a dwarf, they all turn drooling stupid.
getting drunk, picking fights with npcs, and creating conflict with other players all in the sake of "roleplay". the all use the alignment lawful good to justify very stupid behavior.

even the names they pick, irk me to no end.
gruezz dunglick, roundie middlecrack, george smithsmith, farking bigum, ... the list goes on.

all of them dont' do this with any other race/class combination.
i made it very clear that this (drunk/agressive/rude) was a stereo type, and not every dwarf should be a battlerager. i was thinking more 13th warrior, they give me bad santa,

so yes. dwarves exist in my game, but are not connected to the pcs in any way other then antagonists and quest givers.


ravenharm wrote:

any dwarf. scottish, irish, fantasy dwarvish or whatever.

i play with very smart players capable of complex character themes.
the moment they touch a dwarf, they all turn drooling stupid.
getting drunk, picking fights with npcs, and creating conflict with other players all in the sake of "roleplay". the all use the alignment lawful good to justify very stupid behavior.

even the names they pick, irk me to no end.
gruezz dunglick, roundie middlecrack, george smithsmith, farking bigum, ... the list goes on.

all of them dont' do this with any other race/class combination.
i made it very clear that this (drunk/agressive/rude) was a stereo type, and not every dwarf should be a battlerager. i was thinking more 13th warrior, they give me bad santa,

so yes. dwarves exist in my game, but are not connected to the pcs in any way other then antagonists and quest givers.

I know exactly what you mean. I've been lucky to have several really good dwarf characters in my games, but yeah, I've seen some ugly ones.


Auxmaulous wrote:

A few other don'ts:

You can't play characters of the opposite sex. Sorry, too bizarre and there's too much of a player disconnect from the PC.

No romance - it exist, but I don't role-play out love interest interactions/chatter/romps. Again, imo it's a bit bizarre but more importantly a waste of time and not the focus of the game (mine at least).

Just got a good laugh when I read this because it would axe more than half the PCs in both of the interlinked campaigns that I'm running right now. ;)

As you note though, it's simply that such plots are not the focus in your game whereas mine are more focused on politics and social maneuvering. Still amusing to me though. :)

As far as things I disallow, nearly all of them are campaign setting specific:

  • No half-orcs or halflings (setting)
  • No evil PCs (Heroes of Worlds Unknown)
  • No intra-party PvP (unless both sides consent to a duel)
  • Employing negative energy is considered an evil act (setting)
  • No teleportation, but scrying is used quite a bit (setting)


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DungeonmasterCal wrote:
I've never been able to run a module of any kind successfully. When presented with options A, B, or C, my players always take Q. So I end up winging it, anyway. My "written adventures" are a page or so of notes, printouts of monsters and NPCs, and the treasure list.

Amen to that! I completely suck at running modules. I don't have the attention span to sit and run someone else's story for more than maybe 1 or 2 sessions. I can do single dungeon, one-nighter adventures okay, but anything more than 10 pages and my brain just shuts off. So yeah, this means I'm not utilizing any of those wonderful AP's that Paizo is known for; my brain just can't abide. I might sift through the books and lift an encounter or two, but that's it.

I homebrew almost everything, and when not tied down to a module, I have the freedom to react to my players actions accordingly and the game flows much easier. I don't need to sit and dissect the book, seeing if the player's odd choice is going to upset something that happens 30 pages later. I just prefer to run a dynamic, ever-changing world that can and will react to what players do.

RPG Superstar 2015 Top 8

ulgulanoth wrote:

Every GM has things they don't run, systems they don't like, monsters that are too complicated to run, spells that break the game, crazy items that destroy the session, ect.

Lets hear yours!

Generally speaking, I tend not to like a lot of splat material and find trying to include it all gets overwhelming. So there's a lot of supplementary stuff I won't include or will allow only on a case by case basis.

Monsters that are too complicated... I can't think of any off the top of my head that I'd not use outright, but I ran a high level game a while ago that for its concept used a lot of outsiders. They are after all favorite enemies for high level campaigns.

I discovered though three things that I don't like, and that I have thought about tweaking and toying with in future games (with my players' awareness and approval):

- Monsters with LOTS of supernatural and spell-like abilities and/or spellcasting become really hard to run. There is SO much in a single creature to keep track of, and a lot to remember--okay, this is a standard action, this is a swift, if I do this this is all I can do this round... And Paizo's (understandable from the POV of space-saving) editorial decision to put as much cross referencing into the Bestiary as possible means that unless I take the ample prep time required to copy-paste the monster's stat block into my notes and then copy-paste all the descriptions of its abilities into its statblock from the Bestiary and the CRB, I have to spend the whole combat constantly flipping back and forth between rules to run the thing. Combat Manager makes that easier, but if I'm doing this oldskool, it can take forever. Sure, you're supposed to memorize a lot of monster abilities, but I guarantee you, I am not capable of memorizing, say, every single ability and spell a CR 17 fiend can use, for example.

So a lot of creatures I might be tempted to rewrite during downtime into something with fewer abilities to track but the abilities they have are stronger, etc.

- SR
After having to deal with this in a 2 and a half year high level game, I've decided this is a time waster, a die everyone forgets to roll and a number that is normally beaten anyway. I'd rather just make creatures immune to a limited range of abilities than have to check every f!&~ing time someone casts a spell, on top of dealing with saving throws and rolling effects etc. Like, you're a fiend who's good at seduction? Then you yourself are immune to charm and mind-affecting--but other spells might affect you just fine. I need you to be resistant to something else? Then I'll just boost your saving throws instead, since that's already an existing, better mechanic to gauge someone's resistance to magic.

- DR
Similar to above. Attack them with enough creatures that have DR, the players will sit on their thumbs and do nothing until they can find weapons that beat the DR. And either way, there's more unnecessary math to do. Creature is hard to hit/physically tough/heals almost as soon as they're hit? There are other, better mechanics that deal with this: AC, HP, and fast healing and regeneration (for the last, it's ALWAYS easier to add that subtract, and fast healing you calculate once per round, not once per every goddamn hit the fighter throws at a monster). So likewise I've thought about changing DR to fast healing or regeneration, increasing HP, or increasing natural armor bonus.

So I've thought about getting rid of those mechanics but not the monsters themselves. Haven't tried it yet though.

Spells that Break the Game -- Only one in practice so far that caused trouble on both sides was waves of exhaustion. Rather than ban it, I ruled you do get a saving throw to be fatigued instead.

Crazy Items that Destroy The Session -- Haven't encountered any yet in practice. I'd be careful with some artifacts though. I've always wanted kind of to play with a Deck of Many Things but it's just too randomly awesome or awful, so that's another thing to tweak.


The 8th Dwarf wrote:
Haladir wrote:


I don't like any game system which lets the game mechanics get in the way of the story. The mechanics need to serve the story, not the other way around. (RoleMaster, I'm looking at you!)

Speaking of RoleMaster, I don't like any system that takes five minutes of real-world time to determine the outcome of a single combat action. (Attacker rolls to hit. Defender rolls defense. Attacker rolls to counter defense. Hit is determined. Roll on the combat results table. Table shows a Critical Hit! Roll on the Critical hit table. Now roll normal damage. Now roll critical hit result.).

I have the opposite view of Rolemaster. Sure there is a lot of pre-game set up but the game flows so smoothly and fast and it allows for the cinematic.

Combat is quick - once your opponent loses an arm or leg or has their intestines spilling out and are bleeding profusely (unless they are mindless or the DM is stupid) they are going to pull out of the fight.

D20 is just Rolemaster divided by 5.

Well- I suppose that the system may have been streamlined over the years. Last time I played RoleMaster was in the 1980s. It left such a bad taste in my mouth I've ignored it ever since.


Tiny animal criticals. After a common weasel killed a 4th level character, I saw the problems with Rolemaster.


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DeathQuaker wrote:
ulgulanoth wrote:

Every GM has things they don't run, systems they don't like, monsters that are too complicated to run, spells that break the game, crazy items that destroy the session, ect.

Lets hear yours!
Generally speaking, I tend not to like a lot of splat material and find trying to include it all gets overwhelming. So there's a lot of supplementary stuff I won't include or will allow only on a case by case basis.

Not to rain on your parade, but you've reminded me of another kind of game I don't run: core only. Tried it once because I thought it would make the game simpler for brand new role players, but within a week they were chomping at the bit for more options.

So now I run Everything-and-the-Kitchen-Sink style, only banning things due to extreme genre violation and balance reasons. I guess I've never had a problem including everything because I don't try to define the whole fantasy world before a campaign starts.

Grand Lodge

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Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber

If I can't make a character option fit in my setting I don't deserve to DM.

Grand Lodge

TriOmegaZero wrote:
If I can't make a character option fit in my setting I don't deserve to DM.

While I can agree with this in principle, because a good GM can make something work. This does not however, mean that a character option SHOULD be made to work...

There are rules and concepts that as GM, we have every right to deny letting into our campaign setting...

If I'm running a setting that firearms are relics from some past age for example, I'm not going to try and shoehorn in a gunslinger even though I may be able to make the option work. It is a character concept that simply does not fit into my setting...

Grand Lodge

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Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber

Hence my use of "can't" instead of "won't". :)

Dark Archive

"Can't" is a challenge that should be put on every DM who considers running the game an art. Sometimes the opportunity alone can teach you great things - even if an idea flops or falls apart.

Sometimes even "won't" - What I mean by that is try something different every once in awhile - maybe running a different style game and you can walk away with some new skills or experience. The DM should have fun though - I'm not saying run stuff that you don't want to/dislike, just don't close your options out to different things/themes/systems.

RPG Superstar 2015 Top 8

Tequila Sunrise wrote:
DeathQuaker wrote:
ulgulanoth wrote:

Every GM has things they don't run, systems they don't like, monsters that are too complicated to run, spells that break the game, crazy items that destroy the session, ect.

Lets hear yours!
Generally speaking, I tend not to like a lot of splat material and find trying to include it all gets overwhelming. So there's a lot of supplementary stuff I won't include or will allow only on a case by case basis.

Not to rain on your parade, but you've reminded me of another kind of game I don't run: core only. Tried it once because I thought it would make the game simpler for brand new role players, but within a week they were chomping at the bit for more options.

So now I run Everything-and-the-Kitchen-Sink style, only banning things due to extreme genre violation and balance reasons. I guess I've never had a problem including everything because I don't try to define the whole fantasy world before a campaign starts.

Most of the stuff I exclude isn't necessarily because it doesn't fit into the world (a handful of things don't fit into my world but my homebrew world is pretty "standard fantasy" so at the very least 90% of it could apply). It's more about just not wanting to keep track of all that crap and wonder if/how it fits balancedly in with everything already in the game. I don't have a head that easily wraps around that many extra rules and options, and as my players are kind enough to not want to see DQ be overwhelmed and stressed out and not having any fun whatsoever, they'll not beg overmuch for extra stuff and know how to ask for stuff based on concept rather than just wanting X powerful thing that breaks my brain. (As it is, I allow way more in Pathfinder than I ever did in 3.x.)

But if the Kitchen Sink method works for you, then that's great! I'm glad you have something that works for you and your players and that you are having fun.

Grand Lodge

EntrerisShadow wrote:
Maccabee wrote:

Things I ban/avoid when I GM (D&D):

Firearms of any kind. The gunslinger concept is borderline special needs to me.

Just out of curiosity, what do you mean by it being borderline special needs? Like broken and overpowered, or lame and ineffective, or a just plain stupid concept?

The concept itself annoys me, and not just because its firearms in fantasy. IMO it’s a class based on a gimmick, and has little depth to it. Immersion is a big thing to me in game, and when I DM I’m not DM’ng Final Fantasy, WoW, or Battlechasers so that makes the class a no-go. All that aside, it’s essentially a “badass guy with a gun” trope, and my RL experience has shown me how obscenely unrealistic said trope is.

Grand Lodge

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Maccabee wrote:
it’s essentially a “badass guy with a gun” trope, and my RL experience has shown me how obscenely unrealistic said trope is.

Not trying to change your opinion or anything, but "badass guy with a sword", is just as unrealistic. And "badass guy with a fireball" is even MORE unrealistic than both of them combined...

Just saying...


Maccabee wrote:
...not just because its firearms in fantasy.

I will likely never understand why people think that firearms haven't been in fantasy just as long as firearms have existed.

Stories mentioned in Gary Gygax's Appendix N in the 1e AD&D DMG had firearms... and aliens... airships... and pretty much everything else I have ever heard someone pull a "get your chocolate out of my peanut butter," argument about.

Edit to Add: I'm not saying start liking what I like - I'm just advocating statements of preference similar to "I do not like firearms in my fantasy games," replace the statements people usually make that imply their idea of fantasy is somehow more "pure" or "correct" because it doesn't include certain elements that the fantasy genre has, classically speaking, always included.

Grand Lodge

@Digital,

I agree, but REAL people with firearms that think they're either Dirty Harry or Chow Yun Fat is what I'm exposed to more often than not, so that's what draws my ire.

@Drake,

Reread my statement: that's MY opinion, not a diatribe on what constitutes "pure" fantasy. My group tends to agree, so we don't use firearms.


It's all about the DM's personal tastes and flavor. I don't care what real-life historical evidence shows, if it doesn't "fit," in the setting I am running, then it just doesn't fit. Guns don't fit in most of my fantasy games.

Occasionally, I'll do something different where it's totally fine; Star Wars, World of Darkness, etc. But for the time being, when I want swords and spells kind of fantasy, it's gonna be swords and spells.

You want guns? You(figurative, not specific) can run a game with guns.


Palladium is right out. I'm not sure if it got better in the last decade, but it certainly was terrible when I played it as a teen.


Some things our group does not use:
- non-core rules for PCs
- Except for scrolls, magic item creation
- PC romance or relationship stuff
- firearms or gunpowder
- cohorts or followers
- WBL table. I did the math and figure we run at about half the suggested WBL. I could not imagine having 50% more magic items in our game. Crazy!
- Unlimited magic items available for purchase. Now with PF I use the core rulebook suggested method of purchasing magic items in settlements explicitly, and that is much more generous than what we did in 3.5!
- GM does not hoard the dice rolls. PCs roll for monster saves, critical confirmations by monsters (on PCs), and even on occasion if it speeds things up for me, monster damage and to-hits. Not only does it make my job as GM much easier but it removes any guilt or temptation to fudge on my part when a PC gets blasted or wastes a big spell.

Liberty's Edge

I think this is quite appropriate.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Why does everyone say Palladium is terrible? How is it any different from any WoD product? It's a rules (balance) light, heavy RP system.
It works for what it was intended, imho.


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Maccabee wrote:

@Drake,

Reread my statement: that's MY opinion, not a diatribe on what constitutes "pure" fantasy. My group tends to agree, so we don't use firearms.

I apologize for quoting you unclearly, I realize you said "the concept annoys me," which is a statement of your opinion.

but the phrase following that, "not just because it is firearms in fantasy," is a statement that says firearms in fantasy is something someone would think of as annoying without other motivation...

think of a similar sentence: "I find that man annoying, and not just because of his ethnicity." The second half does nothing but cloud the message with attachment to illogical thought... same as your statement about guns in fantasy did.


Kryzbyn wrote:

Why does everyone say Palladium is terrible? How is it any different from any WoD product? It's a rules (balance) light, heavy RP system.

It works for what it was intended, imho.

As I said, I played Palladium a decade ago. That was decidedly NOT rules light. Skills were virtually impossible to use unless they were passive, countless rolls for everything, nigh-impossible-to-cast magic, and, worst of all, stunted scaling of abilities.

I once rolled a Human Assassin that had 36 PS and similarly ridiculous PP and PE because, as an Assassin, I could take all of the major physical skills and, as a Human, I could have dice explosions on every stat roll. This character was more powerful at level 1 than any spellcaster could EVER be and was certainly more powerful than most monster races.

A level 1 character with +20 damage on each hit is ridiculous when anything less than a 16 PS got you bupkis for bonuses to damage. Yes, hot dice make a big difference in dice-based generation, but this character was better than straight 18s for a level 1 Pathfinder character.


Pathfinder Rulebook Subscriber

Oh yeah, I can't argue with that, but it was for powergaming.
I played a mind mage in Palladium Fantasy that due to great stats could pwn any of the martial characters, easily.
I mean this was intended. Look at how you were suppose to roll stats.
4d6 re-roll ones. If any 3 add up to 16 you add in the 4th dice.
Powergaming was intended.
They toned it down later in other systems (Rifts pseudo revamp), but not by much. Well they toned down other aspects of the rule system (not allowing you to dodge lasers and the like) but actually the stat sytem remains.
EDIT: and by rules light I mean the rules really didn't matter much. They told you how to fight and how spells work and such, but other than that, they didn't matter much. They did not balance anything. If you had the skil land physical or mental ability to do something, you did it. RAW was vague and left open on purpose.

The Exchange

Serisan wrote:
Palladium is right out. I'm not sure if it got better in the last decade, but it certainly was terrible when I played it as a teen.

I won't get into an issue here either way, since I've been using that system for most of my gaming career, but I will say there hasn't been a major edition change since inception, so it's probably no more enjoyable for you.


cibet44 wrote:


- WBL table. I did the math and figure we run at about half the suggested WBL. I could not imagine having 50% more magic items in our game. Crazy!

100%. To reach full suggested WBL, you'd need to hand out 100% more loot.

50% more than half is three-quarters. /mathhead

The Exchange

TriOmegaZero wrote:


I don't run adult encounters. I have a wife for that.

did you before you got married, though? :P

As far as bannings go, I don't do much of these. So far Iv'e banned the summoner after finding out that not me neither any of my players knew all the rules envolved in creating an idolon, which meant the summoner always got out of hand very quickly.

Also, no making voices (you know, a drunken voice for the dwarf, a shrill voice for the kobold, a booming voice for the captain of the city watch). voices make evreything goofy way too fast.

Grand Lodge

Pathfinder Adventure, Rulebook Subscriber

Touché.

Voices have their place. We Be Goblins wouldn't be the same without them.

Grand Lodge

thenobledrake wrote:
Maccabee wrote:

@Drake,

Reread my statement: that's MY opinion, not a diatribe on what constitutes "pure" fantasy. My group tends to agree, so we don't use firearms.

I apologize for quoting you unclearly, I realize you said "the concept annoys me," which is a statement of your opinion.

but the phrase following that, "not just because it is firearms in fantasy," is a statement that says firearms in fantasy is something someone would think of as annoying without other motivation...

think of a similar sentence: "I find that man annoying, and not just because of his ethnicity." The second half does nothing but cloud the message with attachment to illogical thought... same as your statement about guns in fantasy did.

"Not just because its firearms in fantasy" meaning, not just because of the 'firearms in fantasy' standard argument. Lets keep this civil and not compare my dislike for firearms in game to racism, thank you very much.

Grand Lodge

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Maccabee wrote:
Lets keep this civil and not compare my dislike for firearms in game to racism, thank you very much.

WOW! Holy over-reaction Batman!

I can't put words in the poster's mouth, but I did not read any actual comparisons to your opinion and racism. All I saw was an example used to illustrate a point and nothing more...

Liberty's Edge

Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber

First thing that comes to mind is my dislike of the goodifying or romanticizing of certain races and creatures. Vampires, drow and werewolves, for instance, all fall into this category.

I won't let a player make a Drow character or play as a vampire or a werewolf (let alone any lycanthrope really.) Lycanthropes and vampires, to me, are monsters, and monsters are NPCs. If a PC becomes a vampire, time to roll up a new character. I'm a little more lenient with lycanthropes and usually allow players to run their characters while in their original form.

I view drow in a similar manner. To me, the drow are and always will be bad guys. I view them as a race born with a genetic predisposition for evil and madness. There are no good or neutral drow in my games, and no drow would ever willingly breed outside its own race and have half-drow childen because, to them, all other races are inferior and worthy only of slavery or genocide. They don't even qualify as evil PCs because, as I imagine them, their proclivity for betrayal, bullying and disrepect for all non-drow life would make them undesirable as companions to any group of adventurers with a lick of sense.


Maccabee wrote:
"Not just because its firearms in fantasy" meaning, not just because of the 'firearms in fantasy' standard argument.

That is my exact point - there is no "standard argument" against firearms in fantasy... at least not one that isn't based on ignorance of facts pertaining to the origin of fantasy, especially as it pertains to the origin of fantasy role-playing games.

The only "standard argument" out there against fantasy firearms is basically one as flimsy, ridiculous, and un-needed as racism.

Maccabee wrote:
Lets keep this civil and not compare my dislike for firearms in game to racism, thank you very much.

I compared your dislike to exactly nothing.

I compared the inclusion of the phrase "not just because firearms in fantasy" to the phrase "not just because of his ethnicity."
Both add nothing to a conversation except the idea that there is some inherent problem with the thing being mentioned, so the comparison is a fair one.


For me it depends on what I'm running.

If it's an AP (which I've been doing more and more of lately), I pretty much go just core four (CRB, APG, UC, and UM).

My personal dislikes/disallows:

- Anthropomorphic player races. I don't want to see catfolk, birdfolk, wolffolk, frogfolk, etc.. It's one of the aspects of Anime that causes me to dislike it so. The idea that everyone needs some sort of animal feature/trait.

- Monks and Firearms, it's not a rules/balance issue, I just don't like the feel of how they are presented. I could flavor the abilities differently, but they still work too flavorfully to the Wuxia/Old west style, and I just don't like in the games I run.

- Emo/Goth/Evil Angsty PC's. I don't like Vampires, Drow, or Necromancers as PC's. It always comes across (from all the players I have witnessed playing them, purely anecdotal) as the "ooh, I'm soo dark, and skirting the edge of evil, I must be a mysterious and cool nonconformist." It has just become an overplayed cliche in my book, and the whole romanticizing of them in popular culture bores me. They very idea of them is evil at heart, accept it and move on. I'm not impressed. Sadly, my wife loves them, and wants to almost always be an evil Drow Necro vampire (I blame EQ, and Jobober).

- Evil PC's. Usually they tend to become the harmful to cohesion "Just playing my character" PC, regardless of anyone I have played with that was playing one (again, purely in my experiences). I often think that some players ask to play evil, already with the idea of how they can get one over on the party. It's a game of Heroes, and I jsut rarely see heroic deeds coming from the evil PC's involvement, and even worse other PC's tend to act more towards evil with one around.

- Silly PC's. I don't take my game too seriously, and we laugh and make jokes at the table, and during the session, but when you are built around a joke it makes me think the character is just a throwaway joke, regardless of how it's played. I enjoy a good creative/playful name in my MMO's (all of my characters there have them), because to me it doesn't matter there. When it comes to where I go to get my RP fix, it doesn't sit as well with me. I'm not opposed to humor, and enjoy it IC and OOC, as long they aren't blatant OOC jokes IC. It's kind of a 4th wall thing for me. If your whole build is based on something you thought would be funny to see, or a name you thought goofy "Shooty Mc Twang the archer". Then I can't take your role seriously.

Now a lot of these are anecdotal, based on what I've seen, but I've seen it quite a lot. Over 20 years of gaming, moving around a lot the whole time (military a lot of it), and having a revolving door of players (either them or myself getting stationed elsewhere), some of these just seem too common in what I've encountered.

Grand Lodge

I actually don't like Drow as an always chaotic evil race, for two reasons:

1) This is Golarion-specific, but the idea that Drow are elves whose skin is blackened by evil makes me feel a bit icky. I know, it's a personal hang-up, but I can't go over that part of the mythology without being reminded of the 'Curse of Ham' arguments for slavery.

and

2)The Drow are supposed to be a powerful society. No nation of chronic backstabbers and usurpers is going to be at all powerful, even if their hatred of surface dwellers might bring them into accord for specific tasks. I can see a loose knit tribe of orcs whose influence doesn't extend far beyond pillaging and raiding being Chaotic Evil. But grand cities require way too much planning and cooperation to ever be constructed by things that evil.

As it is, in my homebrew, I usually play Drow as Lawful Evil supremacists. They might hate surface elves, and only appreciate other races as potential slaves, but they at least look out for other Drow. Mostly.

Liberty's Edge

Pathfinder Battles Case Subscriber

My problem with good and neutral drow goes back way before Pathfinder. I think the 1st edition Unearthed Arcana did it for me. Before that, they were a monster in a great set of modules. After, they started popping up as PCs in just about every campaign I tried to run and every one of them was played the exact same way. Aardvark Barbarian covered that topic.

As far being a powerful society goes, in my campaign, they still are...underground where their strengths lie. They've got a complexity and intellect that raises them above primitive troglodytes but the same sort of Darwinian hierarchy of the strong dominating the weak and, though they'd never admit it, puts them on even ground with the duergar. You need an extremely charismatic, powerful or scary individual to give direction to a society of madmen and keep them in line and that's what I give them in my campaigns. As a race of demon worshipers, I model their society after what they've learned from demons. Afterall, the hordes of the Abyss seem pretty powerful and put together for a bunch of dudes who exemplify chaos, treachery and murder.


Three things, really:
- Antagonize feat: No, it just doesn't work well.

- Book-listed mechanics for Diplomacy and Bluff; I prefer to have NPC reactions be more action/roleplay based. Likewise, having a PC with a +30 Bluff skill convince the guard that it actually IS raining maple syrup that very moment regardless of what manner of personality the guard has sorta ruins verisimilitude for me. Similarly the 10 round requirement for diplomacy makes it kinda difficult for PCs to talk down a "mexican standoff". I just find it easier to set up a system of ad-hoc rulings for both of these skills. I invest a fair bit of effort to keep both skills useful, and allow variable degrees of success to make sure that heavy investment in them is still worthwhile.

- Blatant anachronism. Yes, I frown upon the PC who wants to run a gnome with a rainbow wig and who tries to play said gnome as a pimp.


4th Ed. won't touch it. I have seen people who have played at the local hobby shop. They don't last very long. Eventually they find there way to Pathfinder (the lucky ones) IMO.

Other than Pathfinder I like running James Bond, from the 1980s (a real shame the guy bought up Victory Games just for Squad Leader, or something like that, and publishes out of his garage. On top of that he won't publish anything other people want.) Bad way to run business.


xanthemann wrote:
Other than Pathfinder I like running James Bond, from the 1980s (a real shame the guy bought up Victory Games just for Squad Leader, or something like that, and publishes out of his garage. On top of that he won't publish anything other people want.) Bad way to run business.

I love VG's James Bond. I had a GM who ran a fantasy game once using the system, and it was one of the best roleplaying experiences of my gaming career! :D


What do I not allow:

Drow PC's (half-drow are plausible) I've had too many of them, and they were all difficult players and characters, so I stopped allowing them. I ended up with tieflings, which, oddly, turned out better.

What else... I really like options, so it really depends on the campaign. The Drow PC thing is about the only hard rule i have out there.


Actually, what I do and don't allow depends massively on the setting.

When I prepare a campaign, an AP, whatever, I expect my players to create characters that fit within the scenario. Mind you, I can certainly allow one oddball character if I know the player is going to do it right, but a group consisting of a tengu gunslinger, a catfolk ninja, a kitsune enchanter, a Wayang Cleric of Huraine (who gets the reference?) and an ogrekin barbarian are not the troupe that will be playing, say, CoCT at my table.

I allow evil characters, if the concept fits within my campaign. I do, however, insist that the group consists of team players. If you consider it kewl and in character to sabotage one another, steal from one another, or slit some innocent's throat because 'hey, I'm just playing my character', please play that character at another table.

My world may, or may not contain nonevil undead, nonevil drow (which is unlikely, because I didn't buy into all that drow hype), and use them very sparingly, maybe even out-of-alignment outsiders. However, may does not equal will. Breaking the guidelines on rare occasions can (and should) be the basis of an interesting story. Nixing them all from the start just because you can simply makes the world nondescript and arbitrary.

Among other things, this means your character is most probably not the exception to that rule. I might make an exception if you wow me with a compelling concept that I can weave into the campaign, but a simple 'well, my drow walked out of the underdark because she's just different, end of background' is absolutely not gonna cut it.


No firearms in fantasy settings. No permanent level drains. No silly names. Nothing that's not in the core rule book without express permission. I absolutely hate magic item shops and the way that 3.X/PF revolves around the same half dozen magic items is the one thing that sometimes makes me want to junk it and go back to Runequest.

Silver Crusade

No evil, CN or N...I've yet to meet the person who can play a truly N or CN person.

No player-vs-player. We're here to have a good time and too often, those fights don't end with the role-playing.

No overpowered classes. In Pathfinder,that's Paladins and Magus'.

Remember, you may think you're smart Min-Maxing and Powergaming, but I have 25+ years experience, and nobody does it like me. If you do it, I'll do it, too...and you probably DON'T want to meet my min-maxxed monsters.

Keep the setting to the setting. No Oriental-based stuff in Western-based games, no firearms in fantasy, no magic in sci-fi, etc.


zohaletha wrote:


No overpowered classes. In Pathfinder,that's Summoners, Wizards and Witches.

Fixed that for you.


I'm a fat, middle-aged guy. Think of the android dungeon card shop owner, and you got me pegged. Try hitting on the barmaid npc while I'm gm'ing, and I just might slug you in real life :)

Silver Crusade

cranewings wrote:
zohaletha wrote:


No overpowered classes. In Pathfinder,that's Summoners, Wizards and Witches.
Fixed that for you.

Lol. ^_^


zohaletha wrote:
cranewings wrote:
zohaletha wrote:


No overpowered classes. In Pathfinder,that's Summoners, Wizards and Witches.
Fixed that for you.
Lol. ^_^

Nice (;

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