Why are many DMs seemingly afraid, or at least opposed to allowing all content for a setting? Whether it be certain classes, prestige classes, races, or systems. Almost every DM I've ever met has certain things they don't allow.

Why?

Books are available as a pdf all over the internet for free so it can't be a lack of resources. Just a prejudice against certain things? That seems very arbitrary. I really don't get it.

Some of us have jobs and families.

Some official content is poorly balanced.

A GM might have a specific vision of their setting or style of play and disallow content outside it.

Some GMs are busy and want to limit content so keep the game simple.

I'm sure there are other reasons.

Might be for setting/concept conceits, might be for mechanical balance purposes, might just be they don't like dealing with a particular aspect of a game element and the easiest way to deal with it is to just not allow it.


There's a myriad of reasons a gm could have.

Anecdotally I'd say most restrictions I've seen have primarily been for mechanical reasons.  Either a gm thinks something doesn't jive with everything else, or they're only familiar with a particular swath of material and have a preference for not inserting something they're unfamiliar with which may end up being disruptive.

In reply to Winter51 (msg # 2):

That has literally nothing to do with it. I never suggested people devote their whole life to gaming. I have a job and a family too. I've just been gaming for 25 years and know much of the content by heart. The rest I've read at least a couple of times and wouldn't need more than a single read to refresh myself on.

I'm sure there are holes in my knowledge but thats what rule 0 is for. And to me gaming has always had the same prime directive no matter what ttepg I'm playing. Story>rules always.

Twenty five years?  Pffft!  Kids!

It all comes down to GM preferences.  Maybe the GM doesn't like the way certain things work, so he doesn't allow them.  Or a specific concept doesn't fit his vision of the game world.  Or maybe he just doesn't like the idea.  His game, his choice.

For example, I never liked psionics in D&D, so I don't allow those rules.  For any reason.  No matter how awesome the player thinks his character is, if it requires psionics, then the player will need to take his awesome character somewhere else.

And not everyone has time or energy to read all books once, let alone "at least a couple of times", and there are many player-facing books some DMs never read unless they need to look up a spell or class, etc. Time is a resource not everyone has to put into RPGs as much as they'd like - if you do, that's amazing, but many don't.

But other than that could be plot or story reasons, including that the standard races don't fit their view of the setting - such as DnD 5e having drow when previous editions had them as deeply seated in the evil monster race, which is where some DMs leave them.

As mentioned, there is also power creep - that affects most games eventually - as companies need to make their newer books stronger to entice players to buy them.

I would rarely say it is ever a fear, usually a preference not to have X in their game, whether it overpowers everything else or doesn't fit their idea of what the game is.
This message was last edited by the user at 09:07, Sat 05 Dec 2020.

I was just saying I don't get it. Different philosophies and all that. This seems to have severely offended some people though. I read very quickly and have a job that affords a lot of down time. Beyond that I've found that carving out time to read things I enjoy takes very little effort on my part and that's with a wife and kids.

Feel free to disagree but at least try to stay civil.

You want Kender in every game ?!!  You're a braver man than I !  ;>

In reply to Draegnoth (msg # 8):

I don't like every option a game allows.

I don't trust every group of players with every option a game allows.

Not every option a game allows is appropriate to the kind of game I want to play.

That said, as long as I feel like someone is on the same page as me and the ret of the group, and is cabable of and honestly attempting to make the experience more fun for everyone, I'm pretty likely to allow an option in my preferred game, even if I'm no familiar with it. But part of why it's my preferred game is because I generally feel like the options I'm not as familiar with won't cause issues.

Hell, 2nd edition came out with a series of books with options that rewrote the game. Sometimes options are just too much of a change.

And, to be fair, players don't always want some options. Like 5e encumbrance rules.

And, sometimes, options are just ways that the publisher playtests things that might become canon in the next edition. Proficiencies started out that way in 1st edition.

Options are just that: Optional. They are meant NOT to be used by some. Otherwise they'd be Canon...which is still optional, when it comes down to it.

Every option gives some different power and ability to players.  A game has to take these into account, and have challenges specifically suited to these abilities.  Some are more easily dealt with than others.   Some abilities can be relatively harmless in one setting but overwhelming in another.

Sure it can be fun being the character with the easy solution to every challenge because you found this neat ability in a source book which just happens to incredibly valuable in this specific campaign.

It's not fun running any of the other characters, though.

And then you hit the sad state where you either have to let it happen, or find a way to neutralize that annoying ability *every time* you want to challenge the party.

If the game features mystery and diplomacy, for example, you either let a character with a mind reading ability ruin everything, or render the ability useless because everyone in this kingdom is somehow protected from mind reading abilities.  Otherwise the whole plot of discovering which NPC's are secretly in league with an enemy planning an invasion becomes useless.

You have to gear a campaign to abilities, but also gear abilities to a campaign.

It doesn't need to be made useless, just risky or unreliable or usable only in certain circumstances. Granted, those modifications can be tricky to think of, but if the players want the ability then there's a good chance they're willing to come up with ways to help you balance it. If they're not, then they probably planned to abuse it and it should be restricted as an option.

Well that's true, 100% useless isn't necessary, but as you note, nerfed to the point where it isn't game upsetting.

But that can be very, very tricky.

It's interesting that DnD's writers have been thinking along the same lines.  This is exactly why "know alignment" is gone.

Too easy for governments to simply exile everyone who is evil.

Of course, in the modern view, doing so to people who haven't actually done anything evil (yet) might be evil on its own, but such are alignments.

Why are so many people seemingly afraid, or at least opposed to having all toppings on their pizza? Whether meats, vegetables, sauces, or cheese. Almost every person I've ever met has some things they don't want on their pizza.

Why?

Toppings are available at the store, so it can't be a lack of resources. Just a prejudice against certain things? That seems very arbitrary. I really don't get it.

---

Sometimes, yeah, it's arbitrary. Sometimes there's a "good" reason, not that there has to be.

Let's take a class for an example - bards. A GM might ban bards because they think they're a stupid class, what with their magic flute powers and killing people with bad limericks (or,  in the above parody, they just don't like mushrooms). Yep, arbitrary personal preference.

Maybe in their setting, magic is much more codified, so classes that step out of the traditional wizard/priest arcane/divine dichotomy are inappropriate to the setting, so bards are out (they're going for a classic Chicago-style deep dish, so that white onion sauce won't do).

Or maybe there's a mechanical problem. For this one, let's trade bard for a specific prestige class I've seen plenty of complaints about over the years - Initiate of the Sevenfold Veil. A GM basically has to build their entire campaign around the little boogers whenever they turn up, because their fancy shields can be darn near impenetrable. The GM doesn't want to have to deal with that, so no Initiates allowed (yeah, just because that one nutball put Pop-Tart filling on a pizza doesn't mean it won't ruin the experience for everyone else).

I'm good with all traditional toppings.  Just don't ask me to put chocolate and cashews on a tomato-based pie.  :-P

---

When playing a game on here, I prefer one that doesn't restrict official sources, as I like to be creative with my character designs, and the more options the better (if it's someone else's game, and they allow homebrew, I say whatever).  When I'm running a game, I will always allow all official sources.  But in general, I avoid allowing most 3rd party, homebrew, or anything someone drew up on a cocktail napkin.  Those tend not to have been playtested extensively for balance.  Obviously exceptions can be made (Matt Mercer's releases, some of the more widely accepted 3rd party Pathfinder books, etc.), but I don't want someone's demigod-level Frankenstein creation to unbalance the game for the rest of the players.

Because I don't like turds on my pizza.  Or if you insist we limit the discussion to only the "good" toppings, now we have to, by committee, decide what are the "good" toppings.

In reply to evileeyore (msg # 17):

That which is a turd to you may be someone else's favorite aspect of the game though. People disagree. Instead of excluding things you dislike it would be better to allow it. Either their character will stink and not be able to contribute much or it will die and they'll have to reroll. Either way you are vindicated. Unless you're just wrong and their character excels at the game. Then you eat crow and admit your own bias.

Unfortunately, as the GM, if I find that I don't like a particular piece of content, then I probably won't enjoy running a game that includes that particular content.

Guess what happens to a game that I'm not enjoying.

That's right... I stop running it, and run something that I do enjoy instead.

I've run a few games here that lasted 10-15 years.  None of them contained stuff that I didn't enjoy running.

I freely admit my bias... that's why I tell people what I won't include - saves them wasting time for both of us by creating a character that I'll automatically reject.  Just because a player likes something, doesn't mean I have to.

And, as the GM, I have the final word on what is acceptable in my game.

Hence:  "committee".  If you love [X] but enough people at the table hate [X], the game is highly unlikely to include to [X].

Or as bbr says, (paraphrasing) "The GM runs the game they enjoy, the Players have two choices:  Play in it, or find a GM who runs games they prefer."

Likewise, if a GM runs games that their group doesn't enjoy, they have 2 choices... and I can tell which choice I've made time and again (Hint: it's not run a game for that group).


Nope.  And for one simple reason:  It's better to have the Player adjust and play something they will enjoy, than to have a terrible time and decide they hate gaming.

Now, if the Player is some "stuck in their rut, old grognard, bad-wrong-type" who twists the play into what they want despite being warned and having that premise rejected and they still end playing they rejected premise somehow*, then sure, I'll let them crash and burn against the wall of "Nope, I'm the GM and things don't work that way".

* This has happened twice to me.  Both times the Player ended up leaving and never coming back to my games.

And yes, I've looked at premises and said "I don't think that's going to work in my game, but we'll see as long as you agree if it's going badly you're fine with course correcting down the road", and have it go the way I thought and needing correction as well as working fine and never needing adjustments.  It happens.


Or it will crush certain encounters type with ease... and then that type of encounter ceases to ever come up again in any meaningful way, or the other Players will sit around with their thumbs up their butts waiting for a moment where they can do something useful.

Frex:  In GURPS Dungeon Fantasy there is the Bard profession which dominates social situations and has strong mind-control, but outside of that they have minimal impact (Nymph Bard is just stupidly broken that way).  So the GM either has to resign to never having social encounters give the group a challenge, or they have to put their thumb on the scale so heavily that that no one but the Bard can ever manage a social encounter.

This is fine if the group and GM enjoy that.  A "Back to the Dungeon" or "Orc and Pie" can be fun that way, but I don't run those games, so I, as a GM, don't allow Bards in my GURPS DF games (despite GURPS DF literally being built for back-to-the-dungeon and orc-and-pie).





I agree 110% with everything you said, but these two sentences stand as bearing repeating.

Players aren't entitled to my games, however they are entitled to me running the best game I can run, when I do run for them.  This does mean I won't run what I don't enjoy running.

Similarly, I don't play in games I don't enjoy.  This is a two-way street, and it's surprising to me when Players forget this.
This message was last edited by the user at 17:27, Sun 06 Dec 2020.

In reply to bigbadron (msg # 19):

Basically, this.

I handle that by requesting potential players submit 3-4 character concepts they're willing to play. I make it clear I will pick which one comes in and that the player should be willing to play any submitted character. I do this for three reasons. 1. Filter out things I don't want in the game, and; 2. Make sure the party is roughly balanced and not repetitive, and; 3. It speeds up the RTJ process immensely.

I'm a guy who writes games where I think of as many possibilities for the players to include as I can, because about 75% of my gaming experience has been generic/kitchen sink games, starting at the point where I diverged from d20 to GURPS back around 05. I once let a guy write a sentient candy tank in GURPS for no reason other than the thought exercise. He ended up not playing because he thought it was too absurd. He was right. I still allowed its creation out of my personal sense of amusement. Even still, I make a point of including enough bells and whistles in my games that in order to turn one dial up, you HAVE to turn others down. They're mutually contradictory. e.g Realism vs. Genre Convention as a continuum can have 10 different games on 10 different spots when the genre is anime and the game caters to a variety of different subgenres ranging from mecha or Saiyans  on down to slice of life.

I actually made what I now acknowledge as a mistake running a game that was simultaneously slice of life, and Fantasy JRPG inspired by the likes of Persona--at least 3+. The thing is I'd still do it if I had any thought that it might succeed. At some point one has to concede the point that including everything will produce... Well, we'll call them H-Clusters for the sake of censorship. Even if one does not want to concede that point very strongly.

Well, you're saying to allow what the GM doesn't want to make the player happy. But the corollary is to not play what the GM doesn't like to make the GM happy.

Why should the player be able to over rule the GM? That is basically what you're saying should happen, and Ron has described what happens then: The GM lets the game suffer because he doesn't want to be there anymore.

Isn't it better to find a game that is a better fit for you and might have a long life than to potentially ruin a whole game to get what you want for the short time the game remains?

Somewhere there is a GM willing to allow what you ant. Just be patient and keep looking.

Yes, we'd all like the games to be all about us and perfect fits for our desires. But there are other players in the game (usually) and they might (and probably do) have different desires. You can't please everyone, so a GM has to do what makes him or her comfortable and find players that can deal with it.

A balance has to be struck, which means someone is going to be disappointed, and it's going to be you on occasion. There's nothing that can be done about that other than a solo game with the right GM.

Actually, cashews are quite good on pizza, lol.

I look at it this way.  If a GM doesn't like an option I like in a game chances are that I am not going to like their GMing so why would I want to play that game?  I like to know that in advance before I put forth the amount of effort it takes to come up with an interesting concept, :).

In reply to Draegnoth (msg # 18):

You appear to feel that the reason the GM isn't allowing something is because it's /under/powered rather than overpowered. I think that's much less common of a concern, unless it seems like a player is making a character that seems like it can't possibly contribute in the way the GM wants. Like, maybe the GM wants to run a game about soldiers and the player wants to be a photographer, which is a valid option for the game, but not what the GM had in mind.

It might help if you were more specific about the option or options that actually drove you to post this. I'm quite curious now.

Everybody else thinks that cyanide is a bad pizza topping, but I really like that almondy aftertaste, so every pizza should have cyanide on it.

The way I usually do things for d20 is that all official content, barring specific pieces that have proven disruptive in the past, is allowed, certain third-party content from specific vetted publishers is allowed, but anything else 3rd party is not, and no homebrew content.

Usually. But if I'm running a setting that doesn't have firearms, you can forget about the gunslinger class. If I'm running a low-magic game, your crafting-focused wizard is out.

That's nonsense. It's my game. I'll run it the way I like. If someone doesn't like it, they can look elsewhere. That's one of the beauties of this place.

Maybe I don't have access to all the materials other players do. "It's available online for free" doesn't mean I want to illegally download something, or feel like I need to do massive amounts of research and keep multiple Wiki tabs open just to ensure players aren't cheating. If I say "core rulebook only," it means that's what I have, and that's what I'm consulting. If I have all the books, or access to all the books, then that's what players can use.

Some people seem to think that just because they're in possession of material, they should be allowed to use it, but that's not the way gaming works. The DM is the one who puts up the rails, and it's up to the players to abide by it. You own every supplement and have memorized them all? Yay for you. That doesn't mean I'm obliged to allow page 358 of The Wankdoodle Guide to Slaphappy just because WotC floated it on DM's Guild.
This message was last edited by the user at 21:16, Mon 07 Dec 2020.

I don't know, there's some good stuff in there, but yes, Wall of Psychic Salmon is overpowered to the point of being unbalancing.

What're you talking about? Okay, yeah, it's pretty good under certain circumstances, but can you really say it's any more powerful than Wail of the Hungry Hippo, which I might add is a full spell level lower than WPS??

People have different visions, and that's okay. What I allow when running the game depends on my comfortability with the system, my vision of the game world, and the medium I'm running on.

If the game you want to play isn't out there, be the change you want to see and run it. Odds are you'll find a player who is happy to pay the good deed forward.

So in all seriousness the PrC in BoeF that let you take stat damage to power meta magic is pretty solid.

That fact that neither of you mention the Brown Note 4th level Bard Feature (NO SAVING THROW if target CON is less than 12?) goes to show how much this thing was in need of an editor.
This message was last edited by the user at 17:45, Tue 08 Dec 2020.

Is this thread about D&D 3.5? Because this thread sounds a lot like it’s about D&D 3.5, and the least balanced book in D&D 3.5 is the Player’s Handbook 1. None of the rest even come close.

I think D&D 3.5 is where the issue is more prevalent/obvious - and where it seems the discussion has devolved to - however it is applicable to almost any game system with more than one book. Though it could still apply to rule systems that only have one book, with a GM not using/permitting a chapter, mechanic, race, etc.

In reply to Sith_Happens (msg # 33):

In message 18, the issue seems to be about being allowed to use poor options. Now, from what I remember, the 3.5 PHB contained a lot of what many considered to be "poor" options, some of which were core classes and races that were, perplexing, presented as being on equal footing with all the others. But I don't recall ever hearing of GMs who didn't allow such options. The focus as I've seen it has always been on limiting stronger options.

In my response to message 18 I asked what this thread is really about, but I didn't see an answer.

I wrote 2 books and a little pamphlet for one of the systems I wrote, and it's actually applicable within the first book so having secondary and tertiary sources isn't the only factor.

Exactly.  A little more 'famously' (or infamously) GURPS is well known for having a stupid number of options, rules that are presented for the GM to use or not in their games as they wish, within the Core rules.  Likewise GURPS is stupidly easy to build an absolutely unbalanced (under/over powered) Character in without even trying so it's almost mandatory that GMs be firm in guiding Players during chargen.

As much as I love GURPS, it is not a 'starting player' friendly system (not without the GM or a book author doing a lot of up front work).

That's going to be true of any generic system, as they're not intended to be used with all possible options. However, it certainly is true of D&D and similar as well, depending on setting. Not every d20 modern game, for instance, is going to allow spellcasters, even though they're in the core rulebook.

In reply to engine (msg # 25):

Oh nothing specific. I was just thinking about after looking at several games on here. They all had various things they ban or restrict. One specifically wanted someone who was good with traps/disabling devices then went on to ban the class and race that would be best suited to doing so in their campaign. It was like they were demanding someone play the character THEY wanted them to play. That's not how this works. Or you continue to play without said trap springer.

Other examples are to ban certain books, psionics entirely (that one is surprisingly common), and the use of certain items.

By all means if you want to play a certain way then go for it. There are all kinds of groups and each player has different motivations.

I've always looked at the GM as a storyteller though. Even when its me. Its not up to me to decide what is fun and what is bad wrong fun. I craft the story and let the players run with it. Unfortunately every time I have tried to DM irl the party was composed of idiots who blundered forth like they were invincible just because they were the players in the story. I laughed and changed nothing. I simply watched as they tpk'd. Sometimes to obvious traps, sometimes to monsters they were warned were beyond their power level, sometimes by NPCs.

Point is if you wanna play Pun Pun in my game then go for it. I'll make a challenge appropriate for your lizardy behind.

The ban on psionics is always infuriating "oh regular magic just slightly more balanced and easier for players to understand? A system that would have been implemented as the core magic system had Gygax not read a single book no one else ever has? Ya, I don't like it because crystals and stuff." that's what y'all sound like.

Or someone else comes along with a character more in line with a group's expectations.

I'm no master of internal consistency myself, but it sounds like you're saying that it's not up to you to determine what is fun, but certain people are idiots because of what they thought might be fun.

I've had it pointed out to me that not everyone wants a challenge. They make game breaking characters to break the game. That's what's fun for them.

I've never seen anyone say that they decide what is fun for others, so there's nothing groundbreaking there. Literally no one is saying that here, except you sort of are, if I understand your attitude toward the "idiots" in your game. But part of people deciding what's fun for themselves is DMs deciding the kind of game they want, which doesn't always (or even often) include allowing every option. Ideally they're upfront about this, so that the people who join their game are in it because that's the kind of game they enjoy, but clearly not everyone is, and conflicts arise.

In reply to engine (msg # 41):

No. I'm not saying they thought running headlong into everything was fun for them and necessary for them to have a good time. They actively got mad when their very poor decisions got them killed. I don't care if you do roll a natural 20 with great bonuses, the dragon is not gonna hand you its hoard. I've literally had that happen. Then they got mad at me because they weren't reasonable. I have played with good groups but they seem to be few and far between.

In reply to Draegnoth (msg # 42):

Think we're off-topic.

To answer your original question since you've asked for "advice", find a game where you and the GM are aligned to have the best experience. As a GM, I'm open to discussion but I will have my reasons that I may not disclose fully at the time.

Plot elements and storyline is my thing. My best games when I look back on DnD5e is where I've only allowed the players to use the PHB for character creation. And everything else was GM materials.

Hope this helps you understand the reasoning behind one GM's point of view.

You do you man. I wasn't asking for advice. I was seeking justification from others as to why they limit things.

To me all options being allowed makes it more realistic. We don't get to pick how people behave in real life. They can do whatever they want no matter how ill advised. People shouldn't smoke crack and beat their kids but they do. There are consequences but they do. In a game if you pick certain things during character creation then you could be making either a Pun Pun dragon eater or a useless lol character who can't do anything well.

Leaving everything on the table makes the game more real for me. More realistic. That's just me though. I've gotten what I was looking for from this thread and I now leave it to you good people.

See, what you're missing is, that's exactly how it works.

You are even doing it yourself.  You want Players that are cautious and properly 'read the wind' and manage every risk, so you TPK your group when they fail to play to the style you think is fun.

You just aren't being upfront about it.  I mean, your group probably knows now, but before...


Slow up.  Think about what you just said.

People don't do things "lol because they are idiots".  They do things because, wait for it, it is what they think is the right, fun, or necessary way to do things.

So what I'm reading here is "They got mad when they were punished for trying to have to fun".

Now, it's clear their idea of fun and yours were at odds.  So maybe ease back on the "lol everyone but me are idiots" line and maybe reassess the "but I wanna play the [WHATEVER], but these idiot GMs don't know how to have fun" angle you're grinding.

Again, this particular forum is for Game Proposals, Input, and Advice.

As a GM, my justification is the storyline and campaign world. It takes a lot to run my games so my parameters for character creation is to limit my players to the PHB. They know it when I give them the outline of the campaign setting before they start building their characters.

Hope this helps.

In reply to Draegnoth (msg # 44):

Actually  leaving everything on the table isn't always that realistic. Sandy deserts don't have snow trained rangers and druids, for instance. On the other hand, there ARE deserts above the snowline. I live in one, currently.

Some things just do not fit. I run a setting based on Earth Myth and Legend. Elves are from Northern and Western Europe. They aren't found in Japan or Africa in myth or legend (t least that I've seen). Dwarves are both more and less restrictive, but the ones found in D&D are Norse based. The oriental based dwarves need heavy rewrites, so I don't deal with them at present.

Halflings aren't even from Myth, they're from Tolkien. I DID manage to find a place for them, but only barely, and they don't get around much.

Sometimes a restriction is about being realistic according to the setting. That makes  ignoring restrictions the very "not realistic" you're complaining about.

There are a LOT of reasons for limitations, from "realism", to a GM (understandably) not creating a game he won't enjoy running, to a GM's lack of applicable reference materials, to just not liking the way most 3rd party materials seem to boost their classes and spells a bit above canon publications.

If there is something specific you want and you're having a problem finding someone to allow it, try a GM Wanted ad.

But your original complaint has been addressed repeatedly, and from multiple directions and reasonings (because there really are many reasons to disallow something). If you don't have your answer now, it's because you don't want to acknowledge (or accept) it.
This message was last edited by the user at 17:13, Thu 10 Dec 2020.

Setting limitations are different. So are game conceits. If the setting is that the gods are dead then your cleric is just a fighter and his faith is background. It's categorical not book based.

I ran a Psionic Rokugon game (Psikugon if you will) if you were Samurai caste you were psionic, full stop. That was a decision I made for the setting. I wanted to focus on a specific thing so the ancillary systems were banned.

Only War games you see a lot of them where support specialists are banned. They are in the core book. But if you are running a Catachan Regiment it bothers a lot of GM's that over half+ of this squad of Catachans are not even real members of the regiment. They wanted to focus on being Catachans not a Tech-priest, a Krieger Comissar, and a Priest stumbling through the jungle with borrowed chameoline cloaks.

The issue here seems to be that the OP wants to do something that GMs keep refusing to allow. The only real fix for that is GMs Wanted and tell them what you want to do in the ad. If you don't get any GMs willing that's a sure clue that what you are trying to do is too far out there.

As far as Input/Advice goes, that's pretty much it: Try a targeted request for a willing GM.

Rehashing the same old arguments about why GMs do or don't do as they do or don't do belongs in Community Chat, not here, as I think has been mentioned before, more or less.
This message had punctuation tweaked by the user at 21:05, Thu 10 Dec 2020.

First of all... "It's more realistic" is a very questionable argument to use when discussing fantasy games.

Second, we haven't been talking about how characters behave so much as they what they ARE.  And in "Real Life"... a lot of options are not on the table.

You don't get to be a dwarf unless you were born one.  You don't get to have any powers outside of the laws of physics.

And an exotic character like a Dolphin?  Even though they are well within the laws of physics?  Right out.  They don't let you become a dolphin.  You can demand all you want, "Look, here it is, page 56, Dolphins,"... no.  They won't let you be a dolphin.

If you insist on squealing and clicking and eating whole raw fish, you'll still never be accepted into a pod of real dolphins, and you'll probably wind up in the funny farm.

No, if you really want to be a dolphin, the best you can hope for is to find a willing GM and play one in a game.  But if the GM says "No dolphins" then that's that, accept it and move on.

(My sincere apologies if anyone out there actually is a dolphin, just in case.)
This message was last edited by the user at 21:03, Thu 10 Dec 2020.

However, I can then choose to decide if I want to deal with people who may be problematic to me or what I care about.

If I'm running a low-magic, human-only, limited to martial classes 3.5 game and you're insisting on running an aasimar wizard and "whhhhhhhhhhhhhhhy can't you just make an exception for (only) MEEEEEEEE?!?!" instead of looking for a game that may be more open to your wishes, you are not going to be in my game.

And, it wasn't what you wanted to play that turned me off, it was the entitled attitude.

But that is a far thing from the misguided "Core Only" assertions a lot of people put forward.

But the point does sort of come around to answering the original question. We play the games here we couldn't get away with in real life. If I told my home group "Low magic, human only, Fighters and Rogues or bust" they would tell me to shove off and we would keep brainstorming for the next game. But there are so many players here starved for the love of a caring GM that I can pitch ANYTHING and get at least a party worth of apps. There's not even a real reason to make my game generally appealing.

Having fewer options is an option that some players seek. How does one provide that and all options?

In reply to Malakan (msg # 53):

This has explicitly happened to me, and fairly recently. I set up another game on another forum and said "the archetypes in the main book are available, but other archetypes and other races may be available on a case by case basis." My game has an established history of celestial, and eldritch, and demonic lineage characters, along with very strongly implied catgirl existence, and speculative vampire existence. The fact that part of it involves a VR MMO also means that many or all of the other races from the other books are available in the context of the VR. Nobody chose any of those options, not even for playing the VR game.

Man, I love you.  I could swear we'd literally just had this conversation with the OP 3-4 weeks ago but couldn't find this thread.

In reply to evileeyore (msg # 55):

Well the last post before his was 5-6 weeks ago, so it was probably this thread.

In reply to Sir Swindle (msg # 56):

Not necessarily.  Since then the OP has started a similar thread in Community Chat.

Yeah, and I was looking in Comm Chat for this thread, which is why I missed it.  I was going to reference back to "Aren't we making the same arguments we made [X] weeks ago?".

So, again thanks for resurrecting this thread Malakan, if nothing else it kept me from wondering if I'd started imagining conversations...