Humans in Funny Suits

[Shadowslayer]

Role playing, in a game: I come to a path with a fork, and I get to choose left or right. I'm playing a role.

Are you playing a path or a fork?

That was funny though.

DM: Youre travelling along the path and you come to a fork.

Dwarf: I pick up the fork, stab the elf with it, and say "take that ya pansy"

Elf: Stop, the DM says that's a forbidden cliche and you won't get any bonus XP.

Dwarf: Right sorry. I pick up the fork and say "Ah....I once had a fork like this. Its was back when I was a wee lad back in the Mines of...um....or the flower meadows of...or the cloud gardens of.... Wherever the hell the DM says Dwarves come from. Sigh.

[jdizzy001]

No that likely wouldn't work, given the mechanics 2 completely different game systems. BUT, if I decided that I wanted to play (and actually I did this once) a psionicist that borrowed heavily from Yoda's personality, or (which I also did) a barbarian that was a very thinly veiled Lt Worf, that is perfectly acceptable to me as a player, and perfectly acceptable to me for a player to do if I'm the DM. (And those two characters were both long running PCs that I had a hell of a lot of fun with.) Heck I might be the only DM on the planet that doesn't get pissed off when one of my players wants to play some kind of Drizzt clone. At least the player is coming to the table with SOME kind of personality in mind.

The players play them the way they play them....how they do it isn't my department, speaking as a DM. The only concession I've ever required is "no evils"...that's the extent of my meddling in PC affairs.

Agree.

Maybe this is where we differ. The way I've always looked at it (since a player many moons ago gave me rude awakening) is that everyone who comes to the table, DM or PC agrees to abide by whatever general consensus the table comes up with, regarding fun, given the framework of whatever game we're playing.

And understand, my old game group - the one I did the lion's share my playing with had an interesting way of doing it. Once the DM for this time around was appointed, he'd sit down with the players and ask them what they wanted to do this time. If he had an idea, he'd float it. Or he'd say "Ok what are we doing this time...you wanna be pirates? Wanna do a knights of the round table sort of thing? Plain old vanilla D&D? Any other thoughts?" and then take it from there. And SO many great, and long running, games came out of that. I don't know if there's something to be said there or if I just lucked into an amazing group.

I mean...I know the philosophy holds some sway here...but I could just never buy into the idea that its the DM's table. ie You're welcome at MY table. You'd not be allowed to sit at MY table. These are the rules at MY table. bleh. If you actually had the nerve to say something like that out loud, I'd have to throw dice at you. (Nice big d30s too....maybe even the big honking d20 w letters on it that came from my wife's Scattergories game. If I hit you enough times with that, I might be able to spell "I'm the DM" on your forehead. Just so no one forgets that its YOUR table. )

I'll tell you what I've learned:

A: Role players (and in this case I refer to the backstory writing/ham acting/take an hour to haggle in the market square roleplayers) are gonna roleplay no matter what. Its in them and its a good part of the reason why they come to the table.

B: No amount of DM brownie points awarded is gonna make someone roleplay better, if they DON'T already have it in them to give RP that much thought. You can take that to the bank.

So I figure, if you're a homebrew DM with a lot invested in his world, relish the time spent with the guys who buy into it....and maybe don't worry so much about the guys who are not "seeing your vision". They still come in handy when a dragon attacks.

I agree here too. Our experiences are the same. I would never tell a player how to play their character. However, a pc and dm should collaborate as to how races as a whole function if it is outside the norm in a specific campaign. Take for example halflings from 4e dark sun. Halflings are literally cannibals in 4e dark sun. It would be unfitting for the campaign if someone played a Frodo like hobbit in a dark sun campaign.

Also, I'm sorry to hear you were accused of rpg'ing wrong. I sympathize with the whole, being an adult who doesn't have time to do more than 1 shots or widely spaced out sessions.

[Shadowslayer]

Its all good. Actually no one ever accused me of RPing wrong...but I did get accused by one of my players, and my best friend, of being a douchebag DM. And he was right.

I can still remember him, after being told for the umpteenth time that he had assumed wrong regarding my setting, and that "elves aren't like that in my world" (or some such) and he just stood up, grabbed his PHB, shook it at me and said "well I don't know what game you're playing, but this is the one I came to play." and walked out.

See we forget sometimes that over the years, fantasy RPGs, particularly DnD, through a whole bunch of mashed up mythologies, has almost formed its own mythos. And a good number of players, when they sit down at the table to play, are buying into that mythos by choice. DnD means Elves live in the woods, Dwarves live in mines, dragons are color coded, and sooner or later you'll run into a Mind Flayer, a Beholder, Drow, or what have you. Sure...there's variations, like your Dark Sun analogy, but there is an assumed baseline. And for many, that's comfort food.

I just think we, especially as we get older, should be aware of that, and double think the need to change it all up just to be different. Yeah, if you have your own core group and want to go against the grain...nothing wrong with that. Its all games. But if your game time is precious - which if you're over 30, I'm betting it is, then maybe you should just loosen up a bit and try to enjoy the games as is...cliches and all. Especially if your pool of players is small and irregular. It can be liberating.

[jdizzy001]

I hear that. 99% of the time, I embrace the cliches, but once in awhile, I like to shake it up. Thankfully, my core group (which just broke up for geographical reasons ) was fine with shaking things up. The only element we ever clashed on was between my best friend and myself in regards to magic. He shared the current dnd view that in a world so steeped in magic, everyone has knowledge of it. Not casting per se, but for example it is common knowledge in his world that if someone dies you find the local priest and have them ressurected. I, on the other hand took a more mythological approach to magic. I preferred magic to be rare and difficult to obtained. This can be seen in the number of magic items we hand out. His games are oozing with magic items. Mine, well, lets just say everyone gets at least 1 magic item. Not a magic weapon per se, but at least 1 magic item. To reconcile these differences we took turns dm'ing. Sorry to hear you got called a bad dm because of your choice to shake it up. That sucks, i'm sure.

Frankly, if that happened to me, i'd be glad the guy left. I don't get to game often enough to have bad player experiences (BPE's). Now, having said all of that, I know how much goes into game prep. I've been playing rpg's for somewhere between 16 to 18 years (sorry, i've lost count) and i've been dm since day 1. If I ever find myself in a game as a player, I try really hard to wrap myself in the dm's universe. I expect the same courtesy in return. So, if I say dwarves are dead in the campaign I am running, then dwarves are dead. But as noted, during pre charatcer planning I would discuss this sort of thing with my players up front. For example I always let my players know, before they generate characters, by default my fantasy worlds are 50% human population and 50% everything else. So if on game day 1 the party shows up and they're a group of demi humans, they can expect a bit of racism from the npc population.

[muneshige]

I think it is fine to change things about the races, but well... you kind of have to let people know that things were changed, you know. You can't really try playing something and then be told you are wrong whenever you try to give your character any depth or background. It gets a little... annoying. It takes any possible authorship of the world away from the player and that's generally a bad thing. No one likes to be told they are doing it wrong every 10 minutes.

So, if you are going to change things to be terribly different from the base, it is probably best to do a full write-up and hand it out to people interested in playing whatever has been changed. That way they at least have a fair chance to know how things are different.

[jdizzy001]

Well said.

[Captain_K]

What was the topic again? Great banter, great topics, but it is a game and we're supposed to have fun.

Example: My son when he was 13 years old played with the two boys next door (about the same age), I was DM with 30+ years experience. They all wanted to be elves and they did fine. Played well, but like 13 year old boys they were kind of silly... one night they got it into their heads that when I told them they were out of food that eating the Orc they just killed was fine.. I suggested an elf would likely rather starve to death than eat an Orc... they then wanted to eat everything they killed... so what was I to do? Kill the fun for them.. you guessed it, I ruled they could not do that, they quit playing. Who really one?

[Captain_K]

You would think at my age I could spell,,, damn, I hate posting and seeing terrible type-os ... WON!

[Shadowslayer]

That kind of sucks Captain K, sorry it worked out that way. Kids can be flaky. As a dad, I can understand not wanting to encourage that behaviour too.

I might have ruled that they would face a possible consequence of some type to eating everything they killed - maybe save vs...I don't know...incompatible meat? Basically an easy save vs poison or something. Then its not just you telling them they can't, but making them decide if its worth the risk. But ultimately it might have worked out to the same thing.

Its funny, this game I'm working on getting together. I've already told my mrs that if she wants to play, shell have to take off her "annoying mom" hat. . (I can imagine her telling the orcs to "use their words please.")