|
I have to agree. If people make their campaign worlds with undefined areas it will leave room for new things. That way it is easier to allow things without rewriting the history of the world. If the GM has this issue then it is by his own design, and not the player's fault.
Oh yes, good point!
One of the flaws with methodical world-builder GMs, such as myself, is that we tend to overbuild / fully realize our settings, and not leave room for shiny new ideas like a new race or culture.
It's definitely a good idea to leave some open undeveloped areas, into which you can plonk down something new that you didn't think of at the time, or that one of your players wants to use, that you didn't include in your original world-plan (so long as it isn't crazy out of line).
Giving a creative player the ability to make a corner of the world 'theirs' helps to keep them invested, IMO. Whether it be an unusual race, a third-party class, something not-quite third-party, but still unusual (binder, psionicist, warlock) or even their own community or culture or diety, allowing the players to make their mark on the setting keeps it from being too much an exercise in GM self-gratification, with the players as passive passengers in the GM's story--vehicle.
For instance, while I was never a huge fan of the 'godless cleric' concept for most settings, I did allow players to design their own god, so long as they weren't overtly cherry-picking the best domain choices and / or favored weapon choices, and work it in as a 'minor god' or 'regional god' with limited or local influence.
wow. I posted this and there were no responses for like 2 hours so I just thought no one was interested in the topic.
Im actually quite surprised that so many people see things my way, which is to say, set clear limits prior to the game so that players know the bounds from jump. I also tend to give the players an idea of what to expect from the campaign so that players dont get their heart set on a race or class that will be incompatible with plot development.
having said that I think that I am a bit more restrictive than some GMs.
I basically restrict players to core races unless they can come up with a very good excuse for why they MUST play some random race and they must be willing to accept any RP issues that choice may incur.
Its not that I am trying to be a dominating DM. its simply that as DM I feel as if I have to know a WHOLE LOT of information and have answers for a WHOLE LOT of possibilities. the more random race/class options out there the more difficult that becomes and so for the sake of running the best game I can I have to limit some of the variables.
My solution to the "He wants to play an Albino Minotaur with a Sentient Accordion Animal Companion" is this:
1) Show me the mechanics. If it's not obviously broken, sure. If it is obviously broken, I'll rewrite it.
2) Write up how your Albino Minotaur with its Sentient Accordion made it to <Location X>
3) Write two traumatic events into her past.
4) Give me your stat array.
5) I will chase you from the room, and your fellow players will pick your initial starting traits based on your traumas and backstories, and they'll pick your feats.
Step 5 is very important. It also lets the other players say, freely, "Y'know, Bob is going to completely hog the damned spotlight if he plays the White Bull Bard of the Catskills..."
My job as a GM is to make sure everyone else has a fun time as well as me. My gut response to someone coming up with a crazy idea for a character race/class combo is skewed by other things I've seen that player do. There seem to be two failure modes.
Failure Mode 1: "Look, a character that gets +6 to STR and +2 to CON for taking a -4 to INT and -2 to CHA is perfectly balanced. There some crazy set of mechanical advantages the player wants to try for two or three fights, and then will get bored with because it's clearly the Option You Use For Everything.
Failure Mode 2: "My character is the Child of the Goddess of Death by way of..." which means they want a campaign where they are the Protagonist and everyone else is the Sidekick.
Letting other players have input helps avoid both failure modes.
Maybe you're having problems because you can't see that it's not a problem of difficulty but aesthetics? Someone might come up and ask me for clearance to play a flumph. And unless I've built the campaign to depict them as anything other than the sorry jokes that White Dwarf created them as, I'd say no, because they'd clash with the aesthetics of the world I'm building at the time. The fact that you think it's "neato" "cool", "funny" or because "The DM down the street is doing it" doesn't factor into my reasons for denying it.Even in published settings I can find a way to fit things in. That is why I don't see why these GM's act like it is so difficult to fit ____ into a homebrew world.
The race does not have to be common, just make up a reason for its existence. I had warforged in Golarion before. They were a weapon of the runelords that had been forgotten about, and since very few ever saw use almost nobody knew about them. The player was one that was accidentally reactivated.
I was not saying everything should be allowed, and I understand the aesthetics arguement. My statement was more for GM's who design the world so tightly that there is almost no room for anything, and if a player finds room the GM still shuts them down for fear of his work being undone claiming that "it won't work" .
|
|
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Its not that I am trying to be a dominating DM. its simply that as DM I feel as if I have to know a WHOLE LOT of information and have answers for a WHOLE LOT of possibilities. the more random race/class options out there the more difficult that becomes and so for the sake of running the best game I can I have to limit some of the variables.
As someone who writes and draws and stuff, a hugely important 'rule' is to not attempt to use every word you know, or every color on your palette, because that just makes an overly 'busy' mess. The line between 'paint explosion' and 'representative artwork' is in limiting yourself to a certain set of colors, and 'drawing inside the lines,' as it were. Same with writing. Cutting down the extraneous words or explicatory descriptions (which I, obviously, never learned to do) makes for a stronger bit of prose.
So, in GM world/setting design, it's tempting to do the same thing, and restrict yourself to a certain set of thematically linked or 'appropriate' options.
But, if you actually plan on GMing in said game-world, and it's not just a thought exercise, it's just as important, I think, to consult the people who will be *playing* in that game world, to see what *they* want included. It flies in the face of the lone artist presenting the world with his own unique vision, but that's not what collaborative role-play gaming is all about, IMO.
The 'special snowflake' derisor goes both ways. Some players are indeed special snowflakes, and want to play something unique and theme-defying, and some even go further and take a special joy in messing up the game for others with disruptive shenanigans (mooning the king or whatever). And some world-creating GMs are just as special of snowflakes, and want to present a untouchable world of their own creation that the players will only mess up if they get their filthy hands on it, like those people you know with the showcase 'living' room full of expensive designer stuff that their kids aren't allowed to enter.
Ideally, setting design should be a team sport. Possibly even a full-contact one.
My solution to the "He wants to play an Albino Minotaur with a Sentient Accordion Animal Companion"...
That's kind of an exaggeration, and misleading for those who'd want a fair assessment from both sides of the argument. The homebrew races I've statted up are on par with Core races, they're not on the Drow Noble level of power. I'd assume only munchkins honestly would go for something as absurd as a PC Minotaur, unless the stats are taken from Dragonlance.
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
One thing I'm big on as a GM when races outside the "norm" show up is this:
The world at large might react negatively to them. But the world is also not static. NPC reactions aren't going to be shaped by race and/or appearance alone. Once PC actions come into play, things become more dynamic. Some things may get better. Some things may actually get worse. And some things may be essentially the same as it ever was. That's part of the fun of playing a "monstrous" race for many; they get to fight for and earn the good times that make the bad times worth it.
I much prefer a "working with" GM/player relationship than "working against". Allowing a race and then setting out to make that player's experience misery porn regardless of what they do and how much they invest in the game is pretty much a no-no. If a race absolutely cannot fit into the game that the group wants, it never makes it in.
Granted, opinions on what fits into campaigns and/or settings are going to vary wildly, even published settings between different groups. Take a look at the Campaign Setting forum here for example, or the myriad reactions to the ARG and every race book coming out in the Companion line now.
(eagerly awaiting Kobolds of Golarion, though I'll probably be importing the look of Kobold Quarterly/3.x's kobolds....they're adorable)
That's the weirdest phrase to be associated with D&D / Pathfinder I have seen so far.
I'm curious to Dudemeister's view on homebrew races, though.
Also, one reason why I faved your post was the kobolds. They deserve more love.
In pathfinder its not exactly unusual for a player to decide they want to play some off the wall concoction like a half demon lizard man with flaming wings and a pet huge sized flaming spider.
LOL - sounds like some of the "builds" the DDMs were putting out during the 3.5/4Ed transition. Except you left out the classes: Barbarian 2/Scourge of Framaldahereia 3/Brain-Biter 4/Nail Crapper Sailspear 8.
But, back on topic, I remember the first time, waaaay back in some long lost edition, when one of my players decided to take a drow. Whenever I tried to play the common folk as freaking out, one of two things would happen.
Either some of the players would get after me, acting as if I were singling the player, not the character, out.
Or, the session would devolve into a battle between the PCs and mobs of commoners and town guardsmen, with one particular problem player always ending up threatening to kill everyone or rush off to his death.
Quickly determined that it wasn't worth a lot of trouble. After awhile, I decided to limit the reactions to such characters (because many more followed, including lizard women, dragon women, leprechauns, etc.) to casual disdain from a distance, and to especially important roleplaying moments. In the case of the latter, yes, they can either find themselves ostracized, in a heated argument, or pleasantly surprised by somebody who actually respects their people.
Which setting was that? The drow are rather exotic in Golarion and Eberron, so the open hostility thing wouldn't work in those.
Also, didn't the party speak out for their ally, try to convince people that the drow is indeed not evil, that he/she is an exception to the norm?
Which setting was that? Because the drow are rather exotic in Golarion and Eberron, so the open hostility thing wouldn't work in those.
If you're asking me, it was a homebrewed 2nd Ed game. The player was trying to pull a Drizzt.
The players wanted a reaction. But then they got it, and quickly began to realize that you ought to be careful what you wish for.
Trying to pull a D'rizzt?
You mean he wanted to play a good-aligned character?
If that is indeed the case, the people freaking out on the guy who'd naturally do them no harm seems illogical, since he could still prove that he can be trusted, which is the point Mikaze was probably getting at in the earlier post. And are you sure you can speak on the player's behalf with such derision? Did he tell you he wanted a reaction, or are you just making assumptions here? Because as much as I dislike people who want to copy D'rizzt (serious lack of imagination), I have a stronger dislike for people who mock ideas and make assumptions about others in such a manner.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
There's a lot of work that goes into a campaign on my end and a setting is as defined by what's not included as what is. I don't allow Drow because it's clear they're a secretive race.
Homebrew races require history and integration. That means if I'm running an AP, I need to change encounters to make a homebrew character race fit.
When I was younger I loved homebrew races, because elves, dwarves and gnomes were so cliché. But over time I've realised the power of shorthand and archetypes. Pathfinder is a game of word pictures. If you say Elf a player has a definite picture in their mind. If you say Alvaxor, nobody knows what you're talking about even of you explained it weeks ago.
Constraint breeds creativity.
I might go for a homebrew mix of races in the future, but it wouldn't be for an AP.
Homebrew races require history and integration. That means if I'm running an AP, I need to change encounters to make a homebrew character race fit.
The bolded part confuses me. How is that a problem?
Hell, I'm including two of my homebrew races in an upcoming Kingmaker campaign, and it's been a cakewalk so far.|
|
Because its a time/spotlight issue.
If I put an hour of work into changing the game for one player, that's an hue work I can't put elsewhere. If I give that player an extra 10 minutes of RP spotlight time (aggregate) in a session because NPCs react to him or her being a weird/monstrous/obscure race, that's 10 minutes other players don't get in the spotlight. If I don't have NPCs react to the weird NPC, then what's the point of them being there?
That said: If you've homebrewed a race, and made it canon, and the players are familiar with that race, and in your home game's canon that race isn't super obscure/weird for the region then that circumvents the problem.
To use an example one of my players is a Grippli, in order to integrate her character I'm replacing the Bog Striders with Grippli in book 4. It's literally a 1 for 1 change. Characters in the kingdom know what a Grippli is, and it's rarely remarked upon. It took no extra work on my part, and doesn't steal focus.
If I homebrew a race that race better play a part in that campaign as an NPC, villain, organisation or something so the players don't feel like their choices are ignored.
DMs coming up with homebrew stuff, for me, are creative DMs willing to give new ideas and weird approaches a try. That doesn't mean they won't find a way to fix it if that DM realized it doesn't work out.
The biggest thing is, the DM has to be very clear about how your average commoner reacts to those new creatures, or to that guild grabbing power.
Also make sure that players who want to play that cool "uber" race, understand _all_ the implications.
If a player insisted to play a Drow (D&D Forgotten Realms Drizzt version), I'd tell him clearly before the game starts, to expect harrassment in pretty much all fights... his evil siblings are probably helping whatever evil the group is going for and that Drizzt-ish guy can expect to be target number one from enemy perspective... he'll be biting dust often.
I'm fairly sure that while some players might find it cool to be target number one, they'll soon realize how unfun it is to allways be number one down.
Every advantage comes at a price, make sure everybody _knows_ the price, and don't allow them to complain once they realize that they will have to pay the price in full, no discounts.
And while that Drizzt-guy gets spotlight-harrassed in combats, I'll make sure that commoners giving the party intel will be wary of that black-skinned guy, thus the'll gladly talk to the other party-members... but in private, so Drizzt-guy can't hear them. That way the others get sure spotlight in towns.
Usually just explaining this, will either be planned for by all players and expected. Or the player with crazy ideas will tone it down and go for cool/weird without grabbing the spotlight.
On the other hand I don't like it when races are enforced (ie. you have to be all humans, or have to be all monsters). As a DM I like my players to go as creative, as I strive to be with my DMing.
As a player I dislike it when a DM cuts down my creativity and forces me to play "his way"... feels like running a guest NPC, usually I loose interest quickly (getting distracted during the game) or the (N)PC dies some stupid death because I don't care.
Maybe it's a thing about how long you've been roleplaying and what games... playing the same things over and over gets boring, so after a while you want to try something new and different... after that you want to revive some old cool character you loved "back then" and really want to give it another go... Or you get tired of starting as low-level yet again but no DM feels like running an old group that's high level? So you start as highlevel monsters and realize it's just like being lowlevel just with more hitpoint and more damage (might as well play D&D4 at that point, not my cup of tea).
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
On the other hand I don't like it when races are enforced (ie. you have to be all humans, or have to be all monsters). As a DM I like my players to go as creative, as I strive to be with my DMing.
As a player I dislike it when a DM cuts down my creativity and forces me to play "his way"... feels like running a guest NPC, usually I loose interest quickly (getting distracted during the game) or the (N)PC dies some stupid death because I don't care.
That's basically been my point this whole time, but I never managed to phrase it that way. Though now I've seen more than one person speak about "the spotlight" being an issue. Seriously, I've never seen that come up in any campaign, neither as a player nor as a DM. Nobody's complained about being "ignored" during odd occurences, nor have they complained about getting too much attention. If I were any more cynical, I'd call it an excuse to slack up on DMing or on accepting homebrews and placing them in a campaign, because as I said, I've done it and I find it really darn easy to do.
@Icyshadow
I guess the spotlight issue can come up when you happen to have a player who craves attention AND you have a DM who doesn't know how to handle that.
I don't know how often such a combination comes up, but it can come up. If that's the case, allowing custom stuff or not won't change the problem... at that point you are treating the symptoms instead of treating the problem itself.
I say: go creative, that's what Pen&Paper games are about :-) Just make sure everybody is having fun.
8-D
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Though now I've seen more than one person speak about "the spotlight" being an issue. Seriously, I've never seen that come up in any campaign, neither as a player nor as a DM.
It's less of a problem in d20 type games than some others. AD&D/PF assumes the party more or less sticks together and deals with stuff together. In games like Shadowrun, where a Decker might go off on an extended cyberdecking 'mini-encounter' or in Vampire the Masquerade, where a PC might have wheels within wheels plots going on that practically require the rest of the party to go cool their heels in the other room while the ST resolves those independent excursions, the attention hog / drama queen player can be a lot more of a problem.
(This is actually one of the problems I have with characters that have a movement option, like at will flight, or aquatic subtype/swim speed, or even a great stealth skill, that the rest of the party doesn't share. The temptation to go off and use that ability, splitting the party and leaving 3/4ths of the gaming group holding their cheese and quoting Monty Python/the Princess Bride, is great, and the d20 encounter system, which assumes a challenge for your entire party, tends to mean that the guy who flew/swam/snuck off to scout ahead is gonna get messily devoured by whatever he runs into. At the end of the day, everyone's time is wasted as most of the players sit around, and the one who had an unscripted 'solo adventure' has to write up a new character, wasting yet *more* of everyone else's time...)
The sort of player who craves the spotlight is generally a short term problem in D&D style gaming, as they either get frustrated with the lack of individual attention they are getting, or the rest of the group gets frustrated with their attempting to always be the center of attention and 'johnny everywhere' tactics (always being part of every conversation, to the point of having their character inexplicably be in multiple rooms at the same time, so as not to miss anything). Many, if not most, manage their expectations, adapt and turn out to be great role-players. Others never do adapt to the RPG equivalent of 'team sports,' decide that this collaborative storytelling gamestyle isn't for them, and move on to entertainment forms that appeal more to their own interests.
IMO, it's less a problem with 'drow' or 'half-demon minotaurs' or 'squashlings' or whatever, and more an issue of finding the happy medium between the level of attention, input and focus that an individual player craves and the amount that the GM is capable of splitting among all of the players.
Newer GM's, in particular, are less comfortable letting players put their hands on the reins from time to time. A drama queen player who selfishly monopolizes every scene can be a problem, but is easier to deal with than a temperamental frustrated artiste GM with control issues.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I run RPGs off of relationship maps, and "scene cut" cards.
A relationship map starts with the central antagonist on the center of the paper, their 3-4 lieutenants, and then the NPCs the players actually like and care about, then the player characters at the outside edge.
The map is defined by two layers of lines - black lines indicate the strength of the tie between characters. Red and blue arrows indicate like and dislike.
I've got little notes as to what the antagonist wants and what each of his lieutenants want, and notes about what the individual characters want.
Scene cut cards are plot cards.
They describe a scene: It presents a problem, who's causing the problem, who's the victim of the problem. The right edge has a color code on the side which shows which PC (or PCs) I expect to care about the problem.
At the bottom edge, there are four outcomes; all resolve to "Did the PC solve the problem?"
The answers are "Yes, but...", "Yes, and...", "No, and furthermore" and "No, it was a debacle." Each of these outcomes points to a different scene...
I also put "expected run time" for each scene on the card; I also make sure that players understand that their job when a scene doesn't involve them is to be a respectful audience.
Some scenes are "Action Movie Set Pieces." They're the combat scenes for the entire party (or a significant fraction of it.)
I don't run scenes that don't change relationships on that relationship map. I try to make sure each character gets at least one scene where they're the focus on each session, even if it's only a 10-15 minute scene.
I try to make sure there are multiple scenes that involve multiple characters.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
...I look away for a few hours and suddenly someone links to M-rated sites? What is going on here?
|
The DM does not (and most certainly should not) automatically get respect from his/her players. He/she has to work for it.
I loathe this idea.
Every human being should automatically be treated with respect by their fellow man/woman. Sure, you can lose respect, but everyone who enters into any situation involving another human being should begin with a reciprocal expectation of mutual respect.
|
I don't even see how something on an adult website could be relevant to the topic. Unless we're talking about a race where every town of theirs looks like a porn scene.
...
I just suddenly had an idea for a campaign session.
A certain site known for anything goes pictures has a section that often has anime "monster girls" including one that matches the physical description of that custom minotuar-lite race perfectly.
The DM does not (and most certainly should not) automatically get respect from his/her players. He/she has to work for it.I loathe this idea.
Every human being should automatically be treated with respect by their fellow man/woman. Sure, you can lose respect, but everyone who enters into any situation involving another human being should begin with a reciprocal expectation of mutual respect.
You might have misunderstood me, in this case. That initial respect is automatic, of course. What I meant to say is that I refuse to give "extra" to someone just by the virtue of him or her choosing to DM a game I take part in. Neither will I demand this extra respect when I am the DM. Though like you said, if someone manages to make you lose their respect for them, then it was most likely their own fault.
Looking at this from a GM standpoint.
I am fairly lenient in allowing certain things. I do not respond well to strong arming (let me play my drow noble OR ELSE I LEAVE!) nor temper tantrums (But... I WAHNNA PWAY MAI DROW NOOOBLE!!). There are certain things I don't allow for setting reasons. For example, I didn't allow firearms in one because it didn't fit my vision for the setting. No problem. In another, I didn't allow drow because I had drow as denizens of the negative energy plane that were literally made of evil energy. These were campaign and setting appropriate reasons and I made sure to let my players know ahead of time, before character creation.
I do allow many races and classes as long as the player and I can work together on a good backstory. As long as we both respect each other (which amongst my friends, we do), we get along and have a fun game. I've been blessed in not having any problem players in a long time and (I hope at least) my GMing has eased quite a bit.
In the end, I think the GM has the right to not allow certain aspects of the core rulebook if they do not wish to have them in the setting. As long as they let the players know beforehand, it's fine in my book.
|
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
That's basically been my point this whole time, but I never managed to phrase it that way. Though now I've seen more than one person speak about "the spotlight" being an issue. Seriously, I've never seen that come up in any campaign, neither as a player nor as a DM. Nobody's complained about being "ignored" during odd occurences, nor have they complained about getting too much attention. If I were any more cynical, I'd call it an excuse to slack up on DMing or on accepting homebrews and placing them in a campaign, because as I said, I've done it and I find it really darn easy to do.On the other hand I don't like it when races are enforced (ie. you have to be all humans, or have to be all monsters). As a DM I like my players to go as creative, as I strive to be with my DMing.
As a player I dislike it when a DM cuts down my creativity and forces me to play "his way"... feels like running a guest NPC, usually I loose interest quickly (getting distracted during the game) or the (N)PC dies some stupid death because I don't care.
Luckily for me you aren't any more cynical though, so you don't think that long part at the end right?
I don't think enforcing what is and isn't allowed at the start of a campaign impinges creativity. Why is a minotaurling more creative than an elf?
I've run all halfling games before, because the story was about rescuing halfling slaves from Cheliax. The story has less impact if any player says: "I want to play a psionic half-giant and if you don't let me, you're impeding my creativity."
Why can't a halfling be fun and creative?
If at the beginning of the campaign the GM makes the themes, races and classes clear the player can then choose to play under those constraints or not. Nobody is making you play in a game. A creative player is creative when he can play anything or when his choices are "must be human and must be a martial class".
Finally, my Kingmaker sessions are 3-4 hours each. Every minute spent catering to one weird PC is a minute not doing something else. Focus is important as is everyone (GM included) being willing to serve the story. I don't allow homebrew races, and most ARG races for that reason.
In another game I might, but for me I'd rather put together fun encounters the whole party can participate in.
I'm not judging the way anyone else plays, I'm giving my rationale for the way my group plays. Nobody has complained about my GM style yet.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
Guess the styles differing just set up different circumstances, given I can still run Kingmaker with homebrew races without forcing focus on the "unusual" things. As for that part about not allowing something, whether or not it has been said in advance...
As a player I dislike it when a DM cuts down my creativity and forces me to play "his way"... feels like running a guest NPC, usually I loose interest quickly (getting distracted during the game) or the (N)PC dies some stupid death because I don't care.
That's the problem I have usually wanted to avoid when playing with that more restrictive DM, and it has almost happened too. If I had some cool idea for a PC that I've wanted to play for a really long time yet the DM keeps throwing campaigns where they "coincidentally" don't fit or aren't allowed kinda makes room for that frustration to build up. Sure, you might have had the cool idea of Halfling freedom fights in Cheliax, but did you expect all the players to be equally enthusiastic about it? If I voiced my opinion on it ("Dude, I've wanted to try that one character for ages now..."), I'd half-expect a "my way or GTFO" as a response and grudgingly play that Halfling, which would of course result in that which Kyoni mentioned. The DM wanted one thing, the player wanted something else.
I factor in geo-politics and the relationships between species. So you might have an Isgerian hobgoblin npc raised in Andoran that is pretending to be a half-orc, so they can get through Isger and do some good.
You can play an Otyugh in my games, and other such things, and people will allow you to move about, but if you attack folk you are treated as a very disgusting bandit. It is great to see the pcs alter their responses too.
Some types, if you are say a fey, might get positive receptions, if fey/druid worship exists where you are.
Racism can come in, speciesism can come in.
Racism and specieism can be expected in any game, really. Half-orcs are usually prime targets, it's been mentioned in canon. However, not everyone is a raging discriminative arse, though it seems some people RP commoners as such, perhaps out of a skewed perception or out of laziness. It all depends on region and prevalence of species. In some areas, fey are a good omen, and an ill one in others, just to name an example.
|
I would have the NPCs respond based on 2 things :
1) does the character/ability/whatever look like something that the NPC has bad or good experience with (or knows stories/legends/superstitions with bad or good implications) ?
For example, if you look like an undead, almost any NPC will treat you as such until you prove to their satisfaction that you're not .
2) does the character/ability/whatever look dangerous or harmless ?
If you look like a shark, my NPCs will be more cautious/hostile than if you look like a cute kitten
Of course this is for first contact reactions. Afterwards, the attitudes will quickly adjust to the PC's actions and reputation. Except for the diehard xenophobics of course
|
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
The DM does not (and most certainly should not) automatically get respect from his/her players. He/she has to work for it.
Even if the GM is using a pre-written scenario, there's still at minimum a few hours of tinkering and (at the very least) familiarization involved. The amount of perparation shoots up considerably if he heavily customizes that material, and even more so if he's running an adventure he created himself.
A player essentially just has to show up and react.
So yeah, I think the GM is due a bit of extra leeway/respect, if only in deference to the fact that he's gone to a hell of a lot more trouble to get the evening's entertainment together than all the other players combined.
Now I'm tempted to write a fantasy setting where the only player race is human.
I've already got one with 45 PC races and no humans.
@Kthulhu
1. You make it sound a lot harder than it is. I have been a DM myself, you know.
2. Please refer to my recent posts before quoting an older, more extreme statement of mine.
@Umbral
You plan on calling it "Real Life, the Game", by any chance? =P
Because I can hardly see Fantasy as a setting if no supernatural beings or other humanoids of any kind exist.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Absolutely not, and I'm disappointed that you'd think that. There are vast swathes of quality fantasy fiction out there where there are no sentient races other than humans.
About some of my worlds:
In my main one, the main PC races are human, elf, dwarf, goblin and kobold, plus a couple of hybrid races. I would remove halflings and gnomes from the setting entirely, as I have never had a solid place for them within the history of the world, its culture and civilisations. I should not have to feel obligated to make space for them. Nevertheless, they are left in out of apathy rather than a want to include them. After a while, I just didn't care enough to say they didn't exist.
However, beyond those few, there are no other player races. There are other intelligent humanoids, but those are the kind with problematic abilities and monster hit-dice. If I could, I'd include gnolls and minotaurs in the PC list. Gnolls are easy. Minotaurs are hard to fit in without taking away their minotaurness. Hobgoblins and bugbears exist but not as separate races. They are just particularly large goblin individuals.
If someone says they want to play an orc, I tell them that there are no orcs in this world. They aren't living somewhere in secret, yet to be discovered. There are simply no orcs. There are stories of orcs, and the myth of the orc plays a large part in the history of the world. They were invented as an imaginary threat to explain some strange creatures that turned out to be half-goblins (half-goblins are like ligers; bigger than both parents).
There are no drow at all. The only 'dark elves' are dark-skinned elves with no demon worship or underground cities. They live on the surface.
Occasionally, a unique creature might be allowed as a result of an experiment, but I do not allow new races that require a place in the world for their kind retconned in.
Oh, and there are dhampir, too, but they come from a parallel timeline where all life was destroyed by undead. Vampires kept the last few humans as slaves and food and warped them into dhampirs so they could have slaves kept on the edge of death without reducing their usefulness. They're immune to the effects of negative levels, but not death from them equalling hit dice, so the vampires keep them all a single touch from death.
I was half-joking when I said that earlier thing, but I really have gotten tired of Fantasy excluding other humanoids.
However, one of my favourite fantasy books of all has humans as the only sentients.
Despite that fact, I still prefer my D&D (and fantasy in general, as seen from my own written works) with more variety.
Also, that one world of yours sounds rather interesting, though I wonder if it contains Minotaurs or large amounts of fey.
Umbral, you can escape Tolkien you know? Almost got there by taking away orcs.
|
|
I'm well known to my players for allowing all kind of weird race combinations to my player.
lately they are kinda stretching it.
It appears that my next campaign will have a drow shackleborn tiefling and a half gnome half catfolk.
It's all good to me... of course they will be strange and exotic.. but since we will play in the river kindoms I don't think they will face some kind of persecution (not more than any other race at least).
of course should they travel to more narrowminded countries that should pose a problem.
actually more than the races people would react way worse if they knew that the shackleborn drow bard is a follower of zon-kuthon from Nidal and the seemingly common human is an anti-paladin of Urgathoa from Geb.
What exactly did you mean with the phrase "truly non-human intelligence" there? I'm not a native speaker of English, and that just comes off as vague to me. Then again, said vagueness is probably why I'm so curious about the meaning.
I am not sure if you read what I said correctly.
I don't think enforcing what is and isn't allowed at the start of a campaign impinges creativity. Why is a minotaurling more creative than an elf?
I've run all halfling games before, because the story was about rescuing halfling slaves from Cheliax. The story has less impact if any player says: "I want to play a psionic half-giant and if you don't let me, you're impeding my creativity."
Why can't a halfling be fun and creative?
I'm not saying it's less creative that one time. But it gets boring as hell when you get to play a halfling thief for the 20th time, because your DM wants to do a halfling campaign and the group in general disallows anything but the core rule book... which means, while you can flavor your character, you'll end up playing the same character that you've played 5 times already.
To make a non-gaming analogy:wouldn't you be sick of roast-beef at every lunch even if it can with a different sauce and different veggies every time? I would. And I would also be sick of a menu if I have to eat that same menu every monday and that other menu every wednesday. I like new things, I like different flavors and exotic types of food I've never seen or heard of before.
Maybe some people love to go eating at that same fast-food restaurant every day... I'd have to be starving to keep eating the same food over and over and over.
If at the beginning of the campaign the GM makes the themes, races and classes clear the player can then choose to play under those constraints or not. Nobody is making you play in a game. A creative player is creative when he can play anything or when his choices are "must be human and must be a martial class".
I'd probably say: "No thanks, I'm not into bashy-bashy... I'd end up ruining your fun by either optimizing the s!## out of a dwarf barbarian (that group dislikes damage-optimized-1hitting-machines) or I'd be playing on my smartphone and not paying attention... because I'd be bored... You'd want neither so you go ahead and play without me."
I must admit that whenever DMs try to push me into Warrior-roles, these characters end up as lawful-stupid-me-bash, no matter how high their int/wis/cha is on the sheet. I know they can be great when others play them, and I can play them myself for a short time as NPCs... but I can never grow attached to them as I do when I get to play some sneaky/caster/weirdo: I think I have run pretty much any multiclass combination of sneaky and caster (arcane/divine/psionic) that's remotely possible.Edit: To be clear, it's not that I cannot play a human warrior... I can, but I'll never get attached to it. I'll play him like an NPC and thus won't really care about that character.
When you DM an NPC you have a little background and thats it.
When you play a PC you flesh him out in detail and at least I care a lot about my PCs, so a DM with a habit for regular TPW would not sit well with me.
Finally, my Kingmaker sessions are 3-4 hours each. Every minute spent catering to one weird PC is a minute not doing something else. Focus is important as is everyone (GM included) being willing to serve the story. I don't allow homebrew races, and most ARG races for that reason.
I'm not sure why you feel you have to pay special attention to that "weird" guy?
When I DM I usually try to take one thing out of each character's backstory and tie a little gimick around it... usually the choice of traits is a nice target, or something that hits my eye about the character's parents, siblings, former teacher, bullying classmate, ... it keeps my players more. Especially when they put a big red attention plot-hook in their story I try to go with that, but always give it my little twist, I never let them write what's gonna happen for me. :-)