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Here is how I imagine a civil conversation between a highly invested custom-world building GM and a highly invested Rules-lawyer player might go:
GM: "I don't allow gunslingers in my world."
Player: "Hmm... I like gunslingers, in fact I spent three days working on this awesome gunslinger concept that I was planning on playing in your upcoming campaign."
Alternate version of the rest of the conversation:
GM: Why did you spend three days working on your character concept without first asking whether the class it's based on is even allowed? Didn't I tell you to check with me when making characters? Whose fault is it that you didn't do that?
Player: Uh... well, I really want to play a gunslinger. Actually, I spent a lot of effort on making this character before you even mentioned your campaign. It's just a character concept that I really, really want to play.
GM: Well, it's not appropriate for the campaign world. All the other players have managed to make characters that don't violate my rules. You can do it too! I believe in you.
Player: But I wanna!
GM: Too bad.
OR:
Player: "OK, so let's not play in your world."
GM: Ok, don't. When I said "Hey, I'm starting a campaign, want to roll a PC and play?", that was an invitation, not an ultimatum. I won't kidnap your dog or anything if you decide not to join.
In either case, either the player makes an acceptable character (and the problem is fixed), or decides not to play in the campaign (and the problem is fixed).
But then, what Cranefist said about "player budget" is probably the key issue here.
Why do you think that their decision to make you GM entitles you to dictate the terms of the game in a unilateral fashion?
(I wanted to respond to this specifically, as it seems to be representative of the thinking of a number of posters in this thread.)
What is this "their decision to make you GM" business? Not every gaming group operates like that. Here's how it happens for me:
Me, addressing a group of my friends: Hey guys, I'm planning to run a D&D game. Allowed stuff is <list of stuff>. House rules are <list of house rules>. Who's in?
Some people: Yeah!
Other people: Nah
No one: Whoa, dude, you're not allowing <stuff I'm not allowing>??! Wtf man! But I want to play <stuff>!
The things you, and other people on this thread, have said, leads me to imagine something like this:
(in a group of N gamers:)
N-1 of the people in the group: Person #N, we have decided to appoint you as our GM. You will now run a game for us.
Person N, the GM-to-be: Uh... ok, I guess, if that is the will of the people. What sort of game am I to run?
Players: You will run us a campaign in setting So-And-So. And we shall be playing classes/builds X, Y, and Z. Make it so.
Newly-minted GM: The people's will be done.
Edit: And that's fine. It's just that not everyone does things that way.
Not necessarily. Clearly a GM has veto power over anything in the game (since you can't have a game without a GM*), but it's equally clear that the players have veto power as well (since you can't have a game without players).
But as we've already discussed, it's far easier to go out and find another player willing to put up with a particular GM than it is to go out and find a GM willing to accommodate what might be an unusual request on top of being asked to run a game.
(Especially since, based on this thread, GMs who refuse to accommodate unusual requests for fear of ruining their precious setting seem to be fairly common.)
And I don't see how having a player go out and find a group he's more happy with is somehow a failure rather than a success.
It's only a success if he actually finds a group he's more happy with.
I don't know what to tell you. The way you phrased it ("their decision to make you DM") sounds even more bizarre and dysfunctional to me; I certainly don't think the players should should be the "employers" and the GM should be the "employee", considering the GM has the harder job.
Neither ought to be the case. It should be a group of friends hashing out - together - the sort of game they want to play.
It's like a sandbox with no sides...You show up and the setting gets built around you.And this is why I run blank slate settings.I'm curious what that means. Not a term I've heard before.otherwise known as a desert
... or a beach!
With bikinis!
Alternate version of the rest of the conversation:GM: Why did you spend three days working on your character concept without first asking whether the class it's based on is even allowed? Didn't I tell you to check with me when making characters? Whose fault is it that you didn't do that?
Player: Uh... well, I really want to play a gunslinger. Actually, I spent a lot of effort on making this character before you even mentioned your campaign. It's just a character concept that I really, really want to play.
GM: Well, it's not appropriate for the campaign world. All the other players have managed to make characters that don't violate my rules. You can do it too! I believe in you.
Player: But I wanna!
GM: Too bad.
Yet another alternate version:
GM: "No gunslingers"
Player: "What? Why?"
GM: "My world, doesn't have guns."
Player: "Wait, you went and created an entire world that excludes an entire class from a book we agreed to accept? After we agreed that any major decision would be agreed to by the group first?"
GM: "I actually did most of the work on this before you guys picked me for GM."
Player: "And you waited until now to tell us this?"
GM: "My world, my rules."
We can play these games forever.
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Alternate version of the rest of the conversation:GM: Why did you spend three days working on your character concept without first asking whether the class it's based on is even allowed? Didn't I tell you to check with me when making characters? Whose fault is it that you didn't do that?
Player: Uh... well, I really want to play a gunslinger. Actually, I spent a lot of effort on making this character before you even mentioned your campaign. It's just a character concept that I really, really want to play.
GM: Well, it's not appropriate for the campaign world. All the other players have managed to make characters that don't violate my rules. You can do it too! I believe in you.
Player: But I wanna!
GM: Too bad.
Yet another alternate version:
GM: "No gunslingers"
Player: "What? Why?"
GM: "My world, doesn't have guns."
Player: "Wait, you went and created an entire world that excludes an entire class from a book we agreed to accept? After we agreed that any major decision would be agreed to by the group first?"
GM: "I actually did most of the work on this before you guys picked me for GM."
Player: "And you waited until now to tell us this?"
GM: "My world, my rules."We can play these games forever.
I think the lesson to take away from this is that we all have tiny little jerk people living in our heads that we can take out and play with when we get into internet fights.
Alternate version of the rest of the conversation:GM: Why did you spend three days working on your character concept without first asking whether the class it's based on is even allowed? Didn't I tell you to check with me when making characters? Whose fault is it that you didn't do that?
Player: Uh... well, I really want to play a gunslinger. Actually, I spent a lot of effort on making this character before you even mentioned your campaign. It's just a character concept that I really, really want to play.
GM: Well, it's not appropriate for the campaign world. All the other players have managed to make characters that don't violate my rules. You can do it too! I believe in you.
Player: But I wanna!
GM: Too bad.
Yet another alternate version:
GM: "No gunslingers"
Player: "What? Why?"
GM: "My world, doesn't have guns."
Player: "Wait, you went and created an entire world that excludes an entire class from a book we agreed to accept? After we agreed that any major decision would be agreed to by the group first?"
GM: "I actually did most of the work on this before you guys picked me for GM."
Player: "And you waited until now to tell us this?"
GM: "My world, my rules."We can play these games forever.
That's a valid point, there's a more infinite combination of ways that coversation can go then character and world concepts.
Alternate version of the rest of the conversation:GM: Why did you spend three days working on your character concept without first asking whether the class it's based on is even allowed? Didn't I tell you to check with me when making characters? Whose fault is it that you didn't do that?
Player: Uh... well, I really want to play a gunslinger. Actually, I spent a lot of effort on making this character before you even mentioned your campaign. It's just a character concept that I really, really want to play.
GM: Well, it's not appropriate for the campaign world. All the other players have managed to make characters that don't violate my rules. You can do it too! I believe in you.
Player: But I wanna!
GM: Too bad.
Yet another alternate version:
GM: "No gunslingers"
Player: "What? Why?"
GM: "My world, doesn't have guns."
Player: "Wait, you went and created an entire world that excludes an entire class from a book we agreed to accept? After we agreed that any major decision would be agreed to by the group first?"
GM: "I actually did most of the work on this before you guys picked me for GM."
Player: "And you waited until now to tell us this?"
GM: "My world, my rules."We can play these games forever.
Sure. Like I said, the idea of "you guys picked me for GM" (and the corollary ideas of "a book we agreed to accept" and "any major decision would be agreed to by the group first") is totally alien to me. In any gaming group I've seen, all of these conversations end the same way:
GM: No one is forcing you to play in this game that I am running.
And I'm not saying that's the only way to do things — only that assuming that the opposite way is the only way to do things, is also bad.
Also: if enough people say "well, ok, I guess I'm not playing in this game that you are running", then I don't actually have a game. So it's in everyone's interest for me to decide to run a game that my prospective players can find to their liking. Still, though, it's my game, that I am running, and if a potential player doesn't like it, then no one's forcing them to participate.
The issue we've identified is that when it comes right down to it, the fact that it's way easier for a GM to carry on without a single player than it is for a player to carry on without an accommodating GM creates a pretty significant imbalance in favor of GMs, and leads to a lot of GMs feeling very secure in making unilateral decisions with regards to the game.
That, to me, looks like someone taking advantage of a position of power, which ideally shouldn't happen between friends.
Yet another alternate version:
GM: "No gunslingers"
Player: "What? Why?"
GM: "My world, doesn't have guns."
Player: "Wait, you went and created an entire world that excludes an entire class from a book we agreed to accept? After we agreed that any major decision would be agreed to by the group first?"
GM: "I actually did most of the work on this before you guys picked me for GM."
Player: "And you waited until now to tell us this?"
GM: "My world, my rules."We can play these games forever.
Actually, I have a question about the whole "a book we agreed to accept" bit.
Perhaps I am misunderstanding you... but are you suggesting that, in your experience, a gaming group collectively decides to accept an entire sourcebook wholesale, and this decision thenceforth binds all GMs who run games in that group to allow all material from that book in their games?
Like... "we decided to accept Ultimate Magic, and all of us agree that, if we ever GM in this group, everything from Ultimate Magic will be allowed in our games, regardless of whether the game's set in Golarion, or a homebrew setting, or what"?
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TOZ don't tan; he BRONZES
I've done just about all these kinds of game settings. When I was a kid I played right out of Greyhawk, such that it was. Whatever was in those books I ran. Then in HS I started making my first world around the lands of Impasse. When asked to run one-offs or come up with something on the fly, I played the way T-time suggests and created around the players. One time I sat down for a game with a bunch of new players and all I knew was that in 5 levels they'd face an ogre magi...that's it.
I've tried prepless, overly-prepped; even preppy (gaming while wearing an Izod with the collar up). Nowadays though I just prefer to make my little world, add to it, and tweak it here and there.
Now if your GM won't allow gunslingers, but you want to be one... I see all viewpoints on the matter. I'm not saying its right or wrong, but here's what I did with Karnoss for the case of monks.
I had a PC who wanted to play a full on eastern monk. My game world's flavor is based around vikings mingled with eastern europe (Hungary, Russia, Turkey and Germany a little). So we sat and had a coffee.
Over beverages I discovered that my optimizer friend just simply had a manuever master build he wanted to try out; he ended up not really caring about the flavor of it. So instead of monasteries like hy-ya, I stole an idea from Conan and made them...War Master guilds.
So the ancient Dunevain, before the rise of Karnoss, had these guilds with specialists in all sorts of war skills: weapons (Weapon Master monks, Zen Archer monks,) hand to hand, war philosophies and what not. These masters begat orders in a time of chaos, and so membership in them was both suspicious and respected at the same time.
When the Karnossov, a brutal and ambitious tribe in the mountainous central region of the land, came to power and began to subjugate the other peoples of the Dunevain, they smote down as many of these orders as they could. In the north they survived but faded into obscurity in favor of the religious orders that I'd based my game around.
Now today in Karnoss, over 2 decades have passed since the fall of the High Kingdom but only now are these orders beginning to emerge from the veil of secrecy they've been under. While their methods are unorthodox and many of their customs antiquated, the Warrior Monks of the orders still practice many secrets of the Old Ways and their power is once again feared.
Now the only down side was that all through the source material I made references to monasteries and holy orders; places where NPC Experts and some PC class clergy supported NPC Warriors, Inquisitors and Paladins, in the tradition of European monks in the real world. It was a tad confusing at first but eventually everyone got it and now people tell me they have a lot of fun in Karnoss.
So for me, accommodating my players worked out. Does anyone else have any SUCCESS stories so we can make the first-ever positive rant thread?
The issue we've identified is that when it comes right down to it, the fact that it's way easier for a GM to carry on without a single player than it is for a player to carry on without an accommodating GM creates a pretty significant imbalance in favor of GMs, and leads to a lot of GMs feeling very secure in making unilateral decisions with regards to the game.
That, to me, looks like someone taking advantage of a position of power, which ideally shouldn't happen between friends.
I don't know about any of that. I live in New York City; there are gaming groups everywhere. Finding one isn't hard. (I acknowledge that this is different in other places.) So it's not like I have some kind of stranglehold on everyone's fun.
Besides, if Alice, Bob, and Chris aren't entirely happy with the way Dave's running his game, no one is stopping Alice from starting a game of her own. Probably Dave would even be perfectly happy to play in it (I bet he's tired of DMing all the time). That way Bob and Chris can play the gunslinger and synthesist summoner they've been wanting to try, Dave can get a break from DMing, and Alice can gain an appreciation of what it takes to run a game. Everyone wins, and no one has to give up unilateral control of their own game! Yay.
Actually, I have a question about the whole "a book we agreed to accept" bit.
Perhaps I am misunderstanding you... but are you suggesting that, in your experience, a gaming group collectively decides to accept an entire sourcebook wholesale, and this decision thenceforth binds all GMs who run games in that group to allow all material from that book in their games?
Like... "we decided to accept Ultimate Magic, and all of us agree that, if we ever GM in this group, everything from Ultimate Magic will be allowed in our games, regardless of whether the game's set in Golarion, or a homebrew setting, or what"?
Sometimes, yes. In fact the Carrion Crown adventure we are about to begin is explicitly following this approach. The GM for the module (who happens to be our part-time GM who volunteered for this) sent out an email with the initial gaming guideline proposal and explicitly said he would want to stick to the CRB the APG, Ultimate Magic and the CC Players Guide for content.
In several follow ups to that he has clarified the content limitations, basically saying (and I think this is absolutely fair) that he has and has read those books and is comfortable with them but he has not read and is not comfortable with other books.
So as players we are building our characters accordingly.
Now, we do operate a little differently than most groups I think. We send our completed character sheets for our main and our first alternate to the GM for review and approval long, long before we actually sit down to play. Of our five players three of them have already sent the GM our characters and we haven't even nailed down our first gaming date yet.
Now, if the books in question have specific region specific content and we aren't playing in that region, I doubt anyone in our group would choose anything and if the GM disallowed it based on regional availability, nobody would complain.
The issue we've identified is that when it comes right down to it, the fact that it's way easier for a GM to carry on without a single player than it is for a player to carry on without an accommodating GM creates a pretty significant imbalance in favor of GMs, and leads to a lot of GMs feeling very secure in making unilateral decisions with regards to the game.
That, to me, looks like someone taking advantage of a position of power, which ideally shouldn't happen between friends.
I don't know about any of that. I live in New York City; there are gaming groups everywhere. Finding one isn't hard. (I acknowledge that this is different in other places.) So it's not like I have some kind of stranglehold on everyone's fun.
Besides, if Alice, Bob, and Chris aren't entirely happy with the way Dave's running his game, no one is stopping Alice from starting a game of her own. Probably Dave would even be perfectly happy to play in it (I bet he's tired of DMing all the time). That way Bob and Chris can play the gunslinger and synthesist summoner they've been wanting to try, Dave can get a break from DMing, and Alice can gain an appreciation of what it takes to run a game. Everyone wins, and no one has to give up unilateral control of their own game! Yay.
YET ANOTHER NY GAMER.
We have got to hang out. Maybe even game!!!!
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To me, this whole argument of entitlement usually comes about from a lack of discussion from both parties (players and GM's) and someone not being willing to be flexible somewhere in the discussion. On the GM's side we can also forget that GM'ing is as much a gift given to us by our players since they are telling us that we get to essentially play god on them for a session (however long that might be) and an issue of players sometimes forgetting the sheer amount of work and effort it takes to run a game let alone actually build a world and is something that even then isn't totally describable till you've actually tried it.
For me the answer always seems to break down like this. First and foremost I as a GM accept that this role is a gift given to me by whomever my players are as even though I wield the power of the game world they wield the power of the group and should they leave I cannot GM and if they are not having fun I am failing in my duty to them. After that during the first game meeting I kind of lay out my rules, idiosyncrasies, and some of the genre's I pull from when I'm working on a game to give them an idea of what they are in store for. Next I try to make sure that I get some time with each person to try and figure out what they want to get out of the group as a person and what they want to get out of the characters they are wanting to play. This allows me to start thinking of interesting ways to help them create that character and have it be hooked into the greater campaign world.
After that I get to talking with each player and start bouncing ideas back & forth with them for back story, important personal npc's, and where they think they want to go with this character long term until we get something workable for game. During this time I accept that this player can alter and add to the campaign world in some way or another and just pick my battles as to what I think is interesting, what I can work with, and what I feel like needs to change to sync up with either my world or the story I'm trying to tell. One of the big things I remember and I try to impress upon my players is that regardless of what rules and things I have laid out I am as much a viewer of the tale we are about to create as a GM and tell and if they can really sell me on a cool idea and back it up through play I will probably say yes. Next up I try to make sure they also understand that characters that you play are as much a collaborative process as an individual one i.e. the player is not the sole individual molding that character since they will have to react and build off both the world around them, the campaign as it unfolds, and the other players. On top of this I try to remind them that they don't have to and in fact shouldn't try to have every single detail of this character figured out yet since it doesn't leave much room for the game story to occur and having that flexibility of unfilled in story allows both I as the GM and they as the player to add and modify their character as the story progresses to fit whatever both of us needs to move the game along.
As for rules one of the things I try and do is make sure not to spring new rules on someone mid game and especially avoid changing mechanics mid game and try to relegate things like that to either before game or during a break. This means that we go with my ruling during combat in the interests of time or rule of fun and if we want to dispute it we handle that either after game or during a break. If they really must debate it at the table they need to be able to handle it or have someone else do so without interrupting the flow of game.
Finally and most importantly I remember what my players have told me about what they want out of this group and what they want out of their character and use that to craft the way I tell the tale and GM. Remember that a GM is first and foremost the the player an enabler, they give them the tools to do the things they want. Now what form those tools take or who, what, when, where, how, and why these characters get them in story is mine to decide but it is important to let the players clearly feel like there is a light at the end of the tunnel if they let me be their GM. For example say a player wants to become the king of the barbarians. As a GM it is my job to give that to him should the game permit it which, if I ok'd the character it should be. On the other hand both he and I need to be aware that this lofty goal is not something I have to give to him first game and he will have to work for it in someway. That being said I want to make it both a challenge for him to accomplish and interesting for the rest of us in the group to watch play out over the course of the campaign and I as gm need to both make sure that the thing's I am designing are hitting their desired marks and to pay attention to that players wants should they change, grow, or mutate into something different and be accordingly flexible.
Other thing I like to make sure players understand is that choices have consequences both in and out of game as well as rewards. For in game choices they need to realize that I am not here to judge them on those and instead just let it play out with whatever rewards or punishments may come with it. I try to be as much an umpire as a storyteller in most situations and just make sure that I know how they want to execute whatever they want to do mechanically and that they understand as a player what they are doing. An example might be that I have a player running a LG fighter in an urban game. He is a guard working the city and trying to protect its citizens while simultaneously trying to uphold the tenets of good lest he becomes one of the monsters he protects his people from. That being said during one of his first games he gets a little crazy and after some epic visceral combat with a group of opportunist and impoverish street thugs he decides he wants to beat a confession out of the only one standing. Before he does this I repeat back what he wants to do to him in the form of a question, "So you want to beat this kid who just watched all his buddies die at your hand in order to get him to talk?" Usually at this point said player thinks it over and goes "Wait my character wouldn't do that, we just got jumped in the street and he surrendered if I beat his face in after that I am as much a monster as anything I fight. Besides after that fight I'm pretty sure he might just vomit up every thing I want to know and pass out if I sneeze wrong so the extra violence is unneeded." If this isn't the case then I assume that he, as a player fully grasps what he's doing and that it could very well bring on consequences even he can't see and let it play out. Now later that NPC might show back up and depending on what he did either help him out in some way or another (even say becoming a hireling or cohort) or become a villain, a tool to motivate another villain (say it was his cousin), cause others to turn against him, or have even the very act used against him (it's hard to take in a corrupt noble you've beat to a pulp when you have a record of assaulting witnesses).
Now that's all I've got right now for GM's I'll hit some of the player side later
First off, I have been running APs for the last years and many sessions still give me at least an hour of prep time and additionally whole afternoons to plan out the more onerous tasks Paizo comes up with ( like planning the caravan route encounters for Jade Regent ).Sure, but you can run them on the fly, too. Prep time is nice, but not everyone has it.
And heck, I ran the Jade Regent caravan bits from chapters 1 and 2 on the fly less than a month ago. Totally doable. (And we weren't even playing Pathfinder!)
Well, be prepared to do some heavier lifting for the third module, where the caravan actually becomes important. Or just copy what others have put on the Jade Regent board, at least one person already pre-rolled the encounters for the entire route.
And secondly, yes, GM's should have ultimate decision power over what goes and what doesn't in their games. I don't mind argueing with my players about their class choices and I am open to be persuaded on many things. But some things, about all of which I've seen in action before, are off limits and I think that is the prerogative of putting in the additional time. Writing a detailed backstory is cool, but it's a one-time task which I can do myself in a minuscule amount of time, compared to what time I have to invest to run the game.But what if you weren't? What if you, as the GM, invested less time in the game than your players did (and assuming they still wanted you to GM)?
Interesting situation. Since I've never been in it, I don't have a good answer. And I can't really see where it would happen, unless there really are GMs who read their AP module exactly for the first time at the same time when they are running it.
@AD: I would love to play in that world. You seem to me atleast as GM that I would love to play under. IE reasonable. Where do you live?
Who knows I might be able to convince you to allow me to play a gunslinger...if not that is ok I have hundreds of other concepts....and probably more from reading about your world.
I think the problem is on the internet and this particular discussion is that certain people take these stories and rants too personaly. They automaticaly veiws attacksa on GMs who ban things as attacks onn them for banning thing.
Personaly I have heard a ton of a reasons to bans something that makes perfect sense...I might not like it...but I can live with it. But that does not mean all reasons to ban something is actual thought out or fair.
I love playing drow. I am not a Drizzt fan boy. None of my drow characters even closely reasamble Drizzt. So it is frustrating to hear about a drow ban because the GM does not want to see a Drizzt clone. To me this has got to be the weakest excuse ever to ban Drow. So you are limiting my creavtivity because of uncreative players?
The issue we've identified is that when it comes right down to it, the fact that it's way easier for a GM to carry on without a single player than it is for a player to carry on without an accommodating GM creates a pretty significant imbalance in favor of GMs, and leads to a lot of GMs feeling very secure in making unilateral decisions with regards to the game.
That, to me, looks like someone taking advantage of a position of power, which ideally shouldn't happen between friends.
Neither should friends take advantage of the guy who invests more time then all of them combined into the game. Which is what every player does to a GM. By your definition, that doesn't sound very friendly, either.
And still I continue to have the same circle of friends I've been sticking with for the last 15 years. Strange that, hmmm.
Neither should friends take advantage of the guy who invests more time then all of them combined into the game.
I don't view wanting to have a single character concept for a single person inserted into an entire game world as taking advantage of someone.
Any GM who believes his setting is more important than his players has his priorities totally screwed up.
Neither should friends take advantage of the guy who invests more time then all of them combined into the game.I don't view wanting to have a single character concept for a single person inserted into an entire game world as taking advantage of someone.
Any GM who believes his setting is more important than his players has his priorities totally screwed up.
Well, that's a lot of screwed up people on this board, if the other thread is any indication. But feel free to believe that. As I said, do in your games as you like.
Luckily for me, not only does no one else ( after the first guys ) want to play Gunslingers and Summoners, but those two classes are also the rarest ones on Golarion, according to James Jacobs. And the Summoner can be easily replaced with a Conjurer Wizard.
I doubt any of you actually game... It sounds like you spend all your time pointlessly arguing between players and GMs.
I mean really if I prepare a setting with no guns and everyone but one guy wants to play in that setting then I tell that guy to shut up and play something else or leave... done. No need to argue anything. If most of the people don't want to play in that setting I just wasted my time and we have no game until I dream up something else or someone else puts on the big boy pants and GMs.
I doubt any of you actually game... It sounds like you spend all your time pointlessly arguing between players and GMs.
Five completed campaigns ( three from levels 1-20 ) say otherwise. Wooo! ;)
I doubt any of you actually game... It sounds like you spend all your time pointlessly arguing between players and GMs.Five completed campaigns ( three from levels 1-20 ) say otherwise. Wooo! ;)
:)
You wouldn't get the impression much gaming gets done with all the quoted player vs GM arguments I had to read through just now.
Well, even if we go by the standard of the first group I am GM'ing for, which is three hours of game time once a week, there is some time to discuss about the setting and the characters. But the majority of time is spent playing the game.
Now, if we'd have a discussion about the combat to RP ratio of Pathfinder APs, it would be me who'd be ranting like a madman about how combat eats up 75% of game time. ^^
And lest some people think that I am overly rigid with my players, in my current Jade Regent campaign we got a Kitsune Ninja, a Beastbrood Tiefling Wizard/Ninja and an Aasimar Oracle/Priest (third party class), aside the three human characters. The Tiefling and Aasimar could use player options from Blood of Angels/Fiends and the ARG. And I allow the human Fighter/Wizard/Eldritch Knight to use Dervish Dance with a katana.
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I don't object to a GM putting in restrictions and have done it myself on my own world. I am slowly building my own campaign world. So far I have several new races, several kingdoms, and different gods. I am also crafting archetypes for some classes. Currently my gods are being overhauled to look more professional and put a nice polish on them.
Now when I started I had four classes banned. I told my players it was mostly due to my not really liking them. They objected to the bans and we negotiated the classes.
In the end gunslinger remained banned as I truly don't want them in my campaign. The other three alchemist, ninja, and samurai were restricted to appropriate countries. We were all satisfied with the results and my players said they can deal with no guns in the game.
That is about how we handle everything even adding or subtracting rules mid-campaign will have discussion like that before game. It eats into game time sometimes, but we end with a rule or rules we like.
[Funniest part about the class negotiations is none of them want to play those classes. They just objected to them being banned outright.]
I doubt any of you actually game... It sounds like you spend all your time pointlessly arguing between players and GMs.
I mean really if I prepare a setting with no guns and everyone but one guy wants to play in that setting then I tell that guy to shut up and play something else or leave... done. No need to argue anything. If most of the people don't want to play in that setting I just wasted my time and we have no game until I dream up something else or someone else puts on the big boy pants and GMs.
Um...most of the times these discussions(I perfer thet term more) happen during e-mails before we meet to creat characters. So it does not eat into game time at all.
Also as GM I want my players to be invested in my game...asking questions and showing a interest tells me the are.
A very few people here have actual said you should cave into every player's demand. I don't think you should atleast. But you should atleast listen to what your players have to said. You should also keep a open mind. Is all that we on the player's side are saying.
Are there bad players sure...weed them out but asking why is not neccessarily a sign of a bad player.
Just curious why don't you like guns?
Well, even if we go by the standard of the first group I am GM'ing for, which is three hours of game time once a week, there is some time to discuss about the setting and the characters. But the majority of time is spent playing the game.
Now, if we'd have a discussion about the combat to RP ratio of Pathfinder APs, it would be me who'd be ranting like a madman about how combat eats up 75% of game time. ^^
Entirely gm dependent. Run through two of the aps for pathfinder so far, and in both there we entire three hour sessions spend with barely any combat whatsoever.
I doubt any of you actually game... It sounds like you spend all your time pointlessly arguing between players and GMs.
I mean really if I prepare a setting with no guns and everyone but one guy wants to play in that setting then I tell that guy to shut up and play something else or leave... done. No need to argue anything. If most of the people don't want to play in that setting I just wasted my time and we have no game until I dream up something else or someone else puts on the big boy pants and GMs.
Um...most of the times these discussions(I perfer thet term more) happen during e-mails before we meet to creat characters. So it does not eat into game time at all.
Also as GM I want my players to be invested in my game...asking questions and showing a interest tells me the are.
A very few people here have actual said you should cave into every player's demand. I don't think you should atleast. But you should atleast listen to what your players have to said. You should also keep a open mind. Is all that we on the player's side are saying.
Are there bad players sure...weed them out but asking why is not neccessarily a sign of a bad player.
Just curious why don't you like guns?
As a player, I should want my GM. To be invested in the game. Sometimes that means playing my second favorite class rather than my first.
Entirely gm dependent. Run through two of the aps for pathfinder so far, and in both there we entire three hour sessions spend with barely any combat whatsoever.
If we go by "what really is in the AP module", that is factually wrong.
Yes, you can interject your own NPCs or the PCs can interact with each other and the world, but if we go by the plot given in the AP module, combat encounters heavily outnumber RP encounters in the vast majority of APs.
Number of encounters is not equal to the time spent doing them.
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I doubt any of you actually game... It sounds like you spend all your time pointlessly arguing between players and GMs.Five completed campaigns ( three from levels 1-20 ) say otherwise. Wooo! ;)
:)
You wouldn't get the impression much gaming gets done with all the quoted player vs GM arguments I had to read through just now.
Arguments take less time than games.
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Part of what I love of GMing--a lot of what I love of GMing--is running in a world that I homebrew. I also like to see another GM's homebrew world if it's a well written one.
Playing in homebrew worlds--or any setting that does not default to "all the options ever"--requires compromise. Even if it's something like simply understanding that this world's elves live in swamps and fight with battleaxes, rather than in forests and with swords and bows. Let alone something like "there are no dwarves in this world." You have to be willing on both sides to be adaptable. As a player, you have to accept that a concept you walk into the game with may not work like you thought it did, and be ready to alter it or switch to a different concept. As a GM you have to be willing to work with a player's concept within the confines of your world to ensure the player is getting to play something he or she truly feels is fun.
Compromise is something some gamers are not willing to do. They are probably not best suited to run or join in homebrew play.
Compromise is something other gamers are more than delighted to do. I am lucky enough that most of the gamers in groups I play in these days are like that, so I can sally forth with my homebrewing.
As a player, I try to learn from the GM FIRST what the homebrew world is like, BEFORE creating a character for it. If my heart is set on playing a dwarf battlerager and then I discover there are no dwarves, then I'm utterly at a loss--and might make the GM feel guilty along the way. But if I read the setting first and then go, "Okay, there are no dwarves, so I'll shelve the battlerager, but hey, they have a neat option for halflings here, and I've always wanted to play a halfling bard..." then none of the heartbreak or guilt has to happen. Especially since a lot of times setting material itself can inspire a character concept I never thought of before, which is great. Also, while I might have some concepts I'm itching to play, I always have usually a half dozen floating around in my head at once, so if there's one that just doesn't work, there's always something I can switch to that probably will.
As a GM, I try to be very clear about what is and isn't available in my homebrew setting from the get go, before character creation. I am very willing to be flexible to try to work in a character concept that may not by default work in the world. While if I say, something like "sorry, there are just no tengu in this world, period," I would like players to accept that without arguing, but at the same time I think if he has an idea that is unorthodox for my world but there's leeway, I will find what room there is to make it work--and offer suggestions ("no tengu but how about some kind of shapeshifter character with a bird focus").
(For example, a potential player recently approached me with a "halfling raised by savages" idea. I told him my world didn't have "savage tribes" save for orcs and hobgoblins, who would not raise a halfling save in extremely unusual circumstances. The barbarian class in my world often reflected a certain kind of thugs, skirmishers, and berserker warriors but were members of "civilization" as much as any other member of a "civilized" race [the inverse of this is that if you want to play a barbarian, it doesn't mean you are required to come up with having the background of living like a caveman, which was my aim, as some gamers I know seem to think you can only be a barbarian if you play some kind of parody of a neanderthal]. BUT that if he wanted to be a halfling with the barbarian class, he could certainly be adopted by XYZ culture with a berserker warrior tradition, etc. etc. etc. He said that he could work with that and re-concept the character and go from there, and everyone was happy. And if he didn't like that we could work on something like he was forced to fend for himself in the wilderness for many years and is himself uncivilized, etc. etc.))
In the many years of playing, I can think of ONE instance where a player chose not to join a game of mine because I was not allowing splatbooks he wanted to use. I will note this player was notorious for trying to urge GMs to use splatbooks with obviously broken classes in them and making the most broken builds possible with them, but I also knew he could make a solid character with whatever he was handed, and hoping he'd rise to the challenge. I knew (he was a friend of mine and I knew him well) that if he really wanted to just have an opportunity to play with me and our other friends, he'd find something in core that could give him a roleplaying challenge regardless and enjoy it, but if he was in a "break the system" frame of mind, he'd opt out. He opted out. He opted out with no hard feelings between either of us, no fighting, no whining, no pushing, no shoving. Just a "You know, if I can't do this XY build I wanted to try, I don't think I want to play right now. Have fun." And he and I are still friends, no hard feelings. :) And I found plenty of other players for that campaign (it ended up being full to the brim--I think I had 6 players which is about as large as I can manage--anyway).
As to "growing" the campaign world for new books... I will do it if I can, but don't feel beholden to it.
When I designed my homebrew world, I designed it to accommodate for the existence of everything in the core rulebooks (3.0/3.5 at the time). So I made sure there were all the core races, made sure there was a place for all the core classes, a habitat for all the monster manual monsters. That way if you rolled up a character's stats using core, you should be able to find a way to fit it in my world.
But through the process of designing cosmology, politics, and general theme and feel of the world--all the things you need to do to make the world feel living and vibrant--eventually fluff gets in the way of things that might be added to the rules later. To this day my world works with core Pathfinder, but some stuff added in the other RPG lines don't work. I established early on in the development of my world that there were no firearms or explosives whatsoever. That gunpowder just didn't work, that those chemicals just didn't combine that way, end of story. The reason was I wanted to focus on a mythical/fantasy theme, and I very particularly wanted to explore the idea where magic and more fantastical alchemical items WERE the SOLE technology of war. So when Ultimate Combat came out, I had to say, no gunslingers, no guns, not an option, period, because otherwise I up-end part of the whole theme and feel in my game. (I've got nothing against guns, they just don't fit in my setting. I'm fine with them in someone else's, or even a different setting of my own.) Many of the other splat classes I feel don't fit the flavor of my world (or I don't want it to become overrun with spellcasters of a billion flavors). Even little things -- the APG came out with the alternate racial traits. Elves have one called "desert runner." There's one small desert in my world, and there ain't no elves in it, and I had little interest in putting any there and create a retro-continuity just for one little alternate trait. So you can't use that alternate racial ability.
I cannot anticipate the content of books that don't yet exist. I have to develop my world as I see fit, when I need it to be developed. I started writing up my world in 2002. I can't be expected to accommodate a splatbook published in 2011. I can do my absolute best to be flexible to work in what will work, but I'm not going to cease the growth of my world in case something new may or may not come into existence in what are, in the end, supplementary, optional rulebooks.
That said, there's very little I'll be absolute about saying no to. Guns are one of very few, for this particular setting only. You're dying to play an oracle, we'll figure it out. You want your elf to have shipwrecked off the hot continent and end up in the desert for 20 years, okay fine, take desert runner after all. But I DO ask my players to work with me, and be willing to compromise (you CAN be a halfling barbarian, you cannot be raised by a society that doesn't actually exist). 99.9% of the time, they do.
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OK, and why do you feel entitled to dictate the terms of another person's fun?While I'm running the game? No, pick a different option you will also enjoy. Next time around, someone else can run a game in which everyone plays gunslingers.So, tri, he can ONLY have fun playing a gunslinger out of all of the nearly infinite options in the game?I ask again, can he NEVER play a gunslinger then?
The same can be said in this situation as well. Why should the player get to disrupt the DMs vision of the world that he created? Why should the player take precedence over the DM? Is this an extra special player or something?
Like it or not, the DM has a bit more leverage than a player does. DM quits then the whole game stops, one player quits then it can keep going.
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So you're both dictating to each other then. Why do you get to win?OK, and why do you feel entitled to dictate the terms of another person's fun?While I'm running the game? No, pick a different option you will also enjoy. Next time around, someone else can run a game in which everyone plays gunslingers.So, tri, he can ONLY have fun playing a gunslinger out of all of the nearly infinite options in the game?I ask again, can he NEVER play a gunslinger then?Why do they feel entitled to dictate mine?
Because the book has given the DM the power to be the final arbiter.
Now what that means is that if the group as a whole cannot decide then it is up to the DM to make the final call. It actually isn't a full joint operation because there could never be an end to the argument. That's why DMs have that power.
Heaps!
Perfect.
What you have stated here is what I will from now on refer to as the "moderate" point of view on this issue, and it's one that I totally ascribe to.
If we go by "what really is in the AP module", that is factually wrong.Yes, you can interject your own NPCs or the PCs can interact with each other and the world, but if we go by the plot given in the AP module, combat encounters heavily outnumber RP encounters in the vast majority of APs.
You don't even have to interject your own NPCs to do it. How much time do the PCs spend interacting with the locals in Sandpoint after the fight at the Swallowtail Festival? It is undefined but, presumably, players could spend a lot of time at it. Same with interacting with their fellow crewmates in Skull and Shackles. Same again with interacting with their fellow Children of Westcrown in Council of Thieves.
But even if you didn't rely on the AP's own NPCs, I expect a lot of GMs (maybe even most) will interject a lot of additional NPCs based on PC backgrounds and contacts, based on things they do about town like commissioning or buying magic items, a whole lot of the additional stuff that fleshes out the setting and makes playing RPGs so much fun between combats and dungeon explorations.
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Does anyone else have any SUCCESS stories so we can make the first-ever positive rant thread?
I have several success stories about joining a group that wasn't a good fit, bowing out gracefully, and then later finding a group that's just about perfect for me.
I don't have any success stories about joining a group that wasn't a good fit and trying to change it from within, however.
Part of what I love of GMing--a lot of what I love of GMing--is running in a world that I homebrew. I also like to see another GM's homebrew world if it's a well written one.
Playing in homebrew worlds--or any setting that does not default to "all the options ever"--requires compromise. Even if it's something like simply understanding that this world's elves live in swamps and fight with battleaxes, rather than in forests and with swords and bows. Let alone something like "there are no dwarves in this world." You have to be willing on both sides to be adaptable. As a player, you have to accept that a concept you walk into the game with may not work like you thought it did, and be ready to alter it or switch to a different concept. As a GM you have to be willing to work with a player's concept within the confines of your world to ensure the player is getting to play something he or she truly feels is fun.
Compromise is something some gamers are not willing to do. They are probably not best suited to run or join in homebrew play.
Compromise is something other gamers are more than delighted to do. I am lucky enough that most of the gamers in groups I play in these days are like that, so I can sally forth with my homebrewing.
As a player, I try to learn from the GM FIRST what the homebrew world is like, BEFORE creating a character for it. If my heart is set on playing a dwarf battlerager and then I discover there are no dwarves, then I'm utterly at a loss--and might make the GM feel guilty along the way. But if I read the setting first and then go, "Okay, there are no dwarves, so I'll shelve the battlerager, but hey, they have a neat option for halflings here, and I've always wanted to play a halfling bard..." then none of the heartbreak or guilt has to happen. Especially since a lot of times setting material itself can inspire a character concept I never thought of before, which is great. Also, while I might have some concepts I'm itching to play, I always have usually a half dozen floating around...
Just line I think its rathe rude of a gm to ask players to create characters before telling them the ground rules, I think its rather rude and presumptuous of a player to create a fully fleshed out PF, with all the bells and whistles without asking if there is anything about ithe concept or build that is problematic for the campaign and then presenting the character as a fiat ultimatum.
It is, indeed, also rude to not at least make a perfunctory attempt to see if the impasse is something that can be worked around.
If we go by "what really is in the AP module", that is factually wrong.Yes, you can interject your own NPCs or the PCs can interact with each other and the world, but if we go by the plot given in the AP module, combat encounters heavily outnumber RP encounters in the vast majority of APs.
You don't even have to interject your own NPCs to do it. How much time do the PCs spend interacting with the locals in Sandpoint after the fight at the Swallowtail Festival? It is undefined but, presumably, players could spend a lot of time at it. Same with interacting with their fellow crewmates in Skull and Shackles. Same again with interacting with their fellow Children of Westcrown in Council of Thieves.
But even if you didn't rely on the AP's own NPCs, I expect a lot of GMs (maybe even most) will interject a lot of additional NPCs based on PC backgrounds and contacts, based on things they do about town like commissioning or buying magic items, a whole lot of the additional stuff that fleshes out the setting and makes playing RPGs so much fun between combats and dungeon explorations.
And nothing of this changes one bit what I said in the post you quoted.
And nothing of this changes one bit what I said in the post you quoted.
If we go by "what really is in the AP module", that is factually wrong.Yes, you can interject your own NPCs or the PCs can interact with each other and the world, but if we go by the plot given in the AP module, combat encounters heavily outnumber RP encounters in the vast majority of APs.
You don't even have to interject your own NPCs to do it. How much time do the PCs spend interacting with the locals in Sandpoint after the fight at the Swallowtail Festival? It is undefined but, presumably, players could spend a lot of time at it. Same with interacting with their fellow crewmates in Skull and Shackles. Same again with interacting with their fellow Children of Westcrown in Council of Thieves.
But even if you didn't rely on the AP's own NPCs, I expect a lot of GMs (maybe even most) will interject a lot of additional NPCs based on PC backgrounds and contacts, based on things they do about town like commissioning or buying magic items, a whole lot of the additional stuff that fleshes out the setting and makes playing RPGs so much fun between combats and dungeon explorations.
And it doesn't matter a bit to me saying that its not the number of specific encounters but what you DO with them that matters. Frankly, I prefer dm inserted or tailored social encounters, because they can be made much more appropriate to the wildly divergent personas of the pcs.
I doubt any of you actually game... It sounds like you spend all your time pointlessly arguing between players and GMs.
I mean really if I prepare a setting with no guns and everyone but one guy wants to play in that setting then I tell that guy to shut up and play something else or leave... done. No need to argue anything. If most of the people don't want to play in that setting I just wasted my time and we have no game until I dream up something else or someone else puts on the big boy pants and GMs.
Um...most of the times these discussions(I perfer thet term more) happen during e-mails before we meet to creat characters. So it does not eat into game time at all.
Also as GM I want my players to be invested in my game...asking questions and showing a interest tells me the are.
A very few people here have actual said you should cave into every player's demand. I don't think you should atleast. But you should atleast listen to what your players have to said. You should also keep a open mind. Is all that we on the player's side are saying.
Are there bad players sure...weed them out but asking why is not neccessarily a sign of a bad player.
Just curious why don't you like guns?
By e-mail... fair enough.
The questions I saw quoted were NOT the sort about "what is this setting like" they were more along the line of "I want this and will hold my breath till I get it... waaahhh!" vs "I am not just going to say no, I will belittle you as well!"
I do keep an open mind when the player is nice about stuff. But digging your heels in and refusing to play anything but your pet concept is not nice even you have to admit. I guess it isn't just asking why that bothers me but the way you ask why.
You come up with a lot of cool ideas about settings, house rules, and more when you play the game. These are things you most often CAN'T do till you get your chance to sit in the GMs seat. This is your big chance to set up the game the way you always wanted to. When an argumentative player gets in my way it steals that fun of trying out something new from me as the GM. What is wrong with showing the GM a little respect? I respect you when you GM and toss out an idea I don't like. I roll with it. Shouldn't I be afforded the same courtesy? If I see people aren't liking it I am not a stone... I will sadly set it aside. But at least give it a play, you just might enjoy it.
Deathquaker, reading your post is like reading a more eloquent version of my opening post. I find myself thinking that if you and I sat down to compare notes, we would find a lot of remarkable similarities in our worlds and our experiences.
A few people have asked where I live. I live in a tiny town in the Rocky Mountains west of Denver. I game in the southern Denver metro area, mostly in a place called "Highlands Ranch". Our gaming group includes people who live in Longmont, Loveland and local towns in the metro area. We are mostly middle aged guys with kids and some of us are watching our kids get into marrying age, so grandparenting is likely to pop up in our group in the next few years.
To get back to the subject at hand, I started this thread explicitly to get away from the polarization that I see on all of the other threads on this same subject, but it happens here too in spite of my and others desperately trying to haul this discussion back into the realm of actual real-world social interaction.
Let me try to take this angle. In my initial post I mentioned that my world does not have Tengu or catfolk. It also lacks any sort of mechanical race. So if you read through my material on my blog, it would be quite reasonable to assume that a Tengu, catfolk or mechanical PC would not be allowed.
But that's not necessarily the case.
So here's what that means in real life. Let's say I announce a campaign and one of the players decides at the last minute to show up with a Tengu PC. That's going to be a problem for me because I simply haven't put together any plausible rationale for why a bird-person might suddenly appear in my world. So I would probably say "no".
But if that player were to contact me when they first contemplated playing a Tengu then this conversation could happen:
Player: "Hey, I notice that your world's list of races doesn't seem to include Tengu. Is that true, are there no Tengu on your world?"
Me: "Hmmm. Why do you ask? Are you just curious, or do you want to play a Tengu PC?"
Player: "Well, yeah, I have this Tengu concept I really like, but if that doesn't work in your world, I understand."
Me: "Hmm... you know I've been thinking about lots of races and whether to add them to my world for a while. It's just a lot of work."
Player: "Work? Why?"
Me: "Well, I just feel like my world has to 'hang together', you know? If a bird-man shows up somewhere people will be curious and questions will be asked. There needs to be some answers to those questions."
Player: "Well, if you don't want me to, I'll just play a halfling."
Me: "No, give me a minute to think about it. I just have to figure out some stuff and mostly I have to figure out if I can accommodate this in the time I have before the game with all the other stuff I have to do too."
Player: "Well, what should I do?"
Me: "Tell you what. You probably need to work on that halfling concept in case I can't make this work, but I'll think about it overnight and get back with you tomorrow and let you know if you should pursue the Tengu too. We'll consider it a provisional character dependent on me getting off my lazy butt and working Tengu into my world."
Player: "Hmm... OK. Let me know."
This is what I mean by GM/Player cooperation, dialog and negotiation. The likely outcome of this would be me doing what I've been thinking about for a long time anyway and putting a Tengu nation on one of my southern continents with a large "terra incognita" section left to flesh out. If I manage to get it done my world expands, my geopolitics gets a new angle, my trade routes get extended and my world grows and evolves. Plus the player gets to play a Tengu. Everyone wins.
And it doesn't matter a bit to me saying that its not the number of specific encounters but what you DO with them that matters. Frankly, I prefer dm inserted or tailored social encounters, because they can be made much more appropriate to the wildly divergent personas of the pcs.And nothing of this changes one bit what I said in the post you quoted.
If we go by "what really is in the AP module", that is factually wrong.Yes, you can interject your own NPCs or the PCs can interact with each other and the world, but if we go by the plot given in the AP module, combat encounters heavily outnumber RP encounters in the vast majority of APs.
You don't even have to interject your own NPCs to do it. How much time do the PCs spend interacting with the locals in Sandpoint after the fight at the Swallowtail Festival? It is undefined but, presumably, players could spend a lot of time at it. Same with interacting with their fellow crewmates in Skull and Shackles. Same again with interacting with their fellow Children of Westcrown in Council of Thieves.
But even if you didn't rely on the AP's own NPCs, I expect a lot of GMs (maybe even most) will interject a lot of additional NPCs based on PC backgrounds and contacts, based on things they do about town like commissioning or buying magic items, a whole lot of the additional stuff that fleshes out the setting and makes playing RPGs so much fun between combats and dungeon explorations.
Still not responding to what I actually wrote.
I've been working on a few settings at once (probably a bad idea) for a while now. And I recently decided to make a change in my approach.
Specifically, for the one that uses Pathfinder rules, I'm going to adapt a module or two or three to the setting, and then I'm going to use my friends to crowdsource some setting development. I'll be prepared to veto things that simply do not fit the setting at all (I see no way to comfortably incorporate gunslingers into the high-magic, pre-roman Mediterranean), but mostly, I want to find how to make whatever idea they have work. I especially want this in working out how the various races other than human fit into the setting.
In essence, exactly what Adamantine Dragon is describing just a couple of posts above. Except that I may also be asking them to help. If someone wants to play a catfolk in the setting... well, I'll be inclined against it; it's too unusual, at least to be common. But for a one-shot? Let's sit down and figure out where such a character would come from. Egypt is likely, off the top of my head. I don't think I'd be likely to allow a catfolk in a full campaign in the setting, but for a one-shot I can be more flexible; perhaps this character was rescued from an ancient pharaoh's tomb, and might be the last of his kind. Might have to deal with unpleasant NPC reactions, as they've never seen a cat-person before.
Less than a year ago, I was prepared to put a hard ban on any race but human in the setting. I was planning to just have human subraces, using normal human rules, except with a specific +2/+2/-2 stat modifier array, and one skill always being class. Some discussions, primarily with my fiance, led me to realize that this would alienate quite a few potential players, who prefer to not play as humans. (Perhaps not many of my most-likely players, who tend to play human because it's the most powerful. In fact, one of them is running a game where human is the only available race, and most of the other core races don't exist at all.)
Edit:
Just to add... no guns in my Atlantis setting? No, definitely not. Guns in my Clan Holds setting? No. Guns in my pseudo-Dark Sun setting? Yes. Definitely guns there. Chances are, one of my three settings will accommodate most any concept. (Not that I know what rules I want to use for the Dark Sun-ish setting, or have the rules ready for the Clan Holds one.)