There are quite a few things that I do not want in my custom setting, and I make it very clear that I don't want them If someone insists, I will sit down with them in private and discuss it with them. They will be warned about the consequences, in detail, and the probable results. If they still want to do it, fine. I will let them. I will kill them the moment they give me an excuse, and take great pleasure in doing so. If they get mad enough to leave the game I will smile and wave as they go. Anyone fool enough to ignore everything I tell them isn't going to be someone I want in my game.
As an example, I don't allow Drow or anything related to them. If you have blackish skin and whiteish hair, you're likely to be killed out of hand before you can draw a breath to speak. Drow are living nightmares who raid the surface world just often enough that they are among the most hated races in my game. They kill almost everyone they can catch, keep a few of the ones who remain, and those are taken as prisoners who will be tortured to death at the Drow's earliest convenience, then eaten once the Drow have wrung all the fun out of them that they can.
Even if I use a published setting like the Realms, I still don't want to allow things that mess with the setting. I will listen, I will decide, and I'll cheerfully murder the character if they won't take my warning seriously.
My group will float ideas like, "how about a campaign where everyone has to be a small race?" If the response is good, the person will start working on the campaign. But some of the ideas we just kind of pass over. If you're playing with a fixed group of friends I think it's best to work together to determine what kind of game you want to play, and that includes restrictions on character options. In a more general sense though, I very much support a DM's right to set boundaries (and a player's right to walk away guilt-free if they don't like them).
2. You should, as a DM, restrict anything you need to for the purposes of realizing world-building, creation of tone, and the like.
3. Either way, if you restrict things outside the normal expectations (that is, if you play in Eberron but do not restrict things to what the Eberron books say, same for any other setting) you should tell the players ahead of time.
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Of course, this is your universe and can technically do whatever you want. It can be disapointing from the player's perspective but if it doesn't make sense to have it in the game to you, you have the ability to restrict it.
It's within your rights as a DM. If you've created and entire homebrew world and a player comes to session 0 with a Loxodon rogue, it's okay to say no. You shouldn't have to shoehorn an origin for elephant-people into your cosmogony.
That said, restrict them for the right reasons. Don't restrict them just to be a stickler for rules or canon lore. And don't restrict them just for personal taste. But if it's more about consistent narrative tone or a need to integrate with published modules, okay.
I think it's completely fair to restrict races. You're the DM, it's your world and you know which races live in your world. Cover this during session zero where you also cover the tone of the campaign, theme and what the players and you think is fun and where there's overlap in your "fun zones".
One thing people don't always think about because it's easy to think about fantasy like just a big general pile of fantasy and then assume it's easy to just do whatever in it where as it's more like hundreds of different types of settings labeled inside a fantasy label. And the truth about it is that dm's are good at different things.
I mean I'm a great dm, I frequently wing stuff on the fly and can make a great story while keeping both the players own stories going at the same time as my own. But, this means it has to be within certain boundaries.
I CAN do horror a bit, I've done it a few times and it's worked out well but this requires actually planning stuff because I can't make it up on the go like some other dm's can. I'm absolutely horrible at futuristic Sci fi things, especially with high tech stuff. I have had ideas about and even written a pretty cool setting about it I just absolutely can't get it going with a good flow.
As for fantasy I'm at my absolute best when I can make most of it up myself, I can preferably limit the races because then I can up the mysticism around them plus I usually twist them in some way. I love magic but I usually throw in a lot of fear around it, and make it rare but existent. I almost always have someone play a different race or a mage despite this but with the set limits beforehand I can make them so much more story wise.
And it's not all about me having fun but I don't want to dm a game where I make a bad job, so this means if you want me as a dm then there's a specific setting that would work best and a few other things I can do but it won't be as good, which can be just fine, and then some where you simply won't enjoy it because I'm doing a bad job and honestly I'm not up for it. (worst was probably trying to run a Warhammer 40k game..) I've also dm'ed for a long time and so I have tried many different kinds of games which means I know what I can do good and not (I don't mind trying new stuff either). But I think it's important to understand that it's not just sitting down and narrating things just like that.. It still needs to be something the dm wants to do and is willing to try out. The dm does a lot of work even if we make the stories together.
I mean I'm a great dm, I frequently wing stuff on the fly and can make a great story while keeping both the players own stories going at the same time as my own. But, this means it has to be within certain boundaries.
This is true of everyone, even the best DMs. We all have strengths and weaknesses. We all have our wheelhouse.
Also, we have to remember that if you take all the options in all the books in all of 5e, they are all there for you to use, but there is nothing that says everything must be in every world or even every campaign. It can often make a world feel generic and uninspiring if you can just "play every race and class without restriction." Maybe in some campaigns, there are no Warlocks. In others, there are no Clerics. In some, there are warforged, and in some there are not. In some there are elves, and in some there are no elves but maybe there are a lot more dwarf types. These restrictions give the world flavor and also can play into the wheelhouse of the DM, who maybe feels comfortable playing dwarves but not elves as NPCs for some reason, etc.
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I mean I'm a great dm, I frequently wing stuff on the fly and can make a great story while keeping both the players own stories going at the same time as my own. But, this means it has to be within certain boundaries.
This is true of everyone, even the best DMs. We all have strengths and weaknesses. We all have our wheelhouse.
If it makes sense for your setting, just do it. I've banned warforged in my game because it's a survival setting and having playable races that just go into "sleep mode" without needing to eat or drink is pretty much cheating. There's no complaints so far.
That's not really necessary. Unless the party is all warforged, they still have pretty much the same survival challenges to overcome.
You can say "no" to whatever you want. You can say "no" to classes, subclasses, species or races or lineages or whatever they want to call them now, to certain ways to generate a stat array, to spells, to magic items. What you allow, and disallow, is up to you.
As a general rule, especially if you are using Waterdeep, I would not say "no" to what is typically expected to be found in a given setting. If the Waterdeep books have lots of monstrous races wandering around the city (as a detester of the Forgotten Realms, I would have no way of knowing whether those books do, or don't), then I would not, as a DM, restrict those races, as it runs contrary to the established lore of the city. If the books don't have those, or are mute about them, then it's completely your call. And I want to be clear -- it's your call anyway. You could say, "I know this is Waterdeep but for this campaign I want everyone to play a human," if you want. But I wouldn't do that in a setting like Waterdeep, without a reason.
But you definitely, as a DM, have every right to make whatever restrictions you want. Matt Coleville has a good recent video about this, in which he discusses the various roles of DM vs player agency. A lot of people think that "player agency" is "I get to play whatever character I envisioned and a good DM will allow it." Coleville gives the negative to that, and I agree with him. In his phrasing, which I like, the DM agency is to determine the situation, and the player's agency is to determine the response to that situation. So if, as a DM, you determine that the situation is "You can only play non-evil halflings in this game," then that's it. Player agency doesn't allow the players to say "No, I'm playing a goliath and you have to let me."
However -- you have to realize if you restrict the players by your choice of situation to something they don't like or have fun doing, another aspect of player agency is walking away from the game. Therefore, as a GM, you want to give your players as many choices as you can reasonably give them, while still maintaining your vision for what the situation/setting will be.
I would say alignment is part of how you respond to a situation, so restricting to non-evil characters is starting to encroach on player agency. But it is a reasonable session 0 stipulation. "You could play an evil character, but you wouldn't be in this party."
I’m not assertive enough to do so but I really want to. A big part of my struggle with it is because I don’t have a good reason to ban certain species but I just find it immersion breaking when each party is entirely composed of creatures that yes exist but are supposed to be very rare in my world. Going forward I’m thinking about instituting an “only one non-PHB character per party” rule but I’m not sure yet.
I outright ban evil characters in all my games though; players have six alignments to choose from as far as I’m concerned.
The party I play in is one human, one warforged, one tiefling, and one kalashtar. Each of the three non-human races is represented by maybe a dozen individuals in the world. It makes sense though because as part of the story we're like chosen one heroes. Maybe our uniqueness is part of why we were exceptional.
In the game I DM, the party is one warforged, one aarakocra, one tiefling, and one dragonborn. NPCs do comment on their unusual assortment, and there is no plausible explanation for how so many rare creatures were thrown together, but it never really distracts from the storyline for more than a minute, and it's a sandbox game, so I let them have their fun.
I would say alignment is part of how you respond to a situation, so restricting to non-evil characters is starting to encroach on player agency. But it is a reasonable session 0 stipulation. "You could play an evil character, but you wouldn't be in this party."
How is that not restricting the campaign to non-evil characters?
"I get to play anything I want that exists in any rulebook published by WTOC" is not player agency -- it is the player trying to co-opt the role of the DM. If the DM wants to run a campaign of heroic, good PCs, then the DM has every right to restrict is game by alignment. Your agency, as a player, if you insist on not playing a good character, consists of saying "this is not the game for me," in that case.
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I would say alignment is part of how you respond to a situation, so restricting to non-evil characters is starting to encroach on player agency. But it is a reasonable session 0 stipulation. "You could play an evil character, but you wouldn't be in this party."
Nothing against player agency, but non-matching alignments encroach on player agency too. Kind of difficult to have a lawful good and a chaotic evil character work together effectively and travel together in a cohesive party. You can have the evil character act out his evil tendencies in secret only (arguably not a bad idea with regards to the rest of the setting anyway), but that is dictating a character's response to situations as well. Generally player agency is restricted by the fact that your character is part of a group and most campaigns assume you're at least going to try and not break up the team completely, occasional side forays notwithstanding.
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DM builds the world including rulings on character options. Players develop characters that fit in that world. "Drow aren't a playable race in my world" is perfectly fine DM declaration, just as much as "Humans don't exist in my world."
That said, in negotiation and collaboration it's usually better to say "No, you can't; but you can...." rather than "No you can't. Just no." I think rather than simply cataloguing restrictions to your game, which wouldn't be so much a session 0 as a session circle with a line through it, if you want players to play by your rules, it'd be more productive if you sell your world as a way to generate player buy in. So in session 0 you're basically presenting your investment in your game world ( to get that player buy in) so give the players a chance to see how the allowable PC races exist. Which races are integrated among each other, which are the outsiders. What sort of social stations would players come from etc. What sorts of gods do Clerics adhere too. What would being a Druid or Ranger or particular Palladin oath say about that characters place in the world. Are there wizards and/or sorcerers and what's their place? In selling the drama of your world you're showing your time and effort and giving the players a foreshadowing of your ability to draw then into your world. Successfully done, your players will want to participate in your world building with characters constructed with the level of care with which you've put the world together. This is the ideal.
Of course if you simply say "No Drow, because I don't like them" that's a bit of a harder sell. You need to make that matter to the world rather than the simply DM preference. So explain the Drow are not a player option in your game because Drow are a major antagonist force in your world, and the "good Drow" or "exceptional Drow" that have popped in the lore of other worlds just aren't allowed here. If the player wants to play a species that has a sort outlander or suspect standing in your game's world, give them options (Tieflings generally work). If they just want the Drow powerset apologize that they just don't work here and show possible paths in game where Drow like traits could eventually be acquired. Most mature players will respect your willingness to work with them to find a place in your world. Yes, there will be folks who ignore your effort and still try to show up your table with a Drow Bloodhunter, at that point reiterate the time you took to show the players how your world works and you need the player to come up with a character that functions within the parameters you set. If you got the time you can call their bluff, have them explain how their Drow can be the exception, and then break down the story's failing point by point if your Drow are that developed in your world.
Bottom line, I think the best parties are put together and settle into a game world well if the DM and players work together. Early on defiance is sometimes an indicator of a player (or a DM) who sees the player / DM dynamic an oppositional dynamic that's sometimes associated with old school (though that's pigeon holing what "old school" was). If you approach your players not as an enforcer declaring certain character concepts as out of bounds; but instead as a someone invested in the game that wants to see the players succeed, it helps get what you want. Demonstrating enthusiasm for the game and a desire for everyone to have fun is like the ideal Session Minus One posture for a DM to assume.
Now I'll return to my regularly scheduled "how am I going to get this to work" Sunday meditation on my CG Tagbaxi Inquisitive, LE Hobgoblin War Magician, NG Tifeling Champion, NG/LG Dragon Born College of Lore and CG/CN Half Elf College of Whispers campaign. Seriously, we're having a good time. Maybe because the characters themselves, not just the players are largely "in it for the stories" in this campaign.
Of course if you simply say "No Drow, because I don't like them" that's a bit of a harder sell. You need to make that matter to the world rather than the simply DM preference.
Although I do agree that it can be helpful if there is a good in-world reason why something is not allowed... I would argue that "I just don't like it" is a valid reason for a DM to disallow something. Sometimes there *isn't* a good reason and you really just do *not* like something as a DM, arbitrarily, the same way you might not like coffee ice cream. If the DM isn't able to disallow things that he or she really doesn't like, and is forced to not just have it tangentially in the world but to live with it session-in and session-out for maybe years of time as you watch the player hour after hour RPing a race that the player may like, but you personally detest -- that is a tough thing to ask any human being, DM or not. I know DMs are generally the person at the table we expect to "take it on the chin" to help everyone have a good time, but there are limits. And as I keep trying to warn people, if you make the DM unhappy enough, your campaign is done. As soon as the DM realizes that they can escape this frustration by just not DMing, the game is over.
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WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Of course if you simply say "No Drow, because I don't like them" that's a bit of a harder sell. You need to make that matter to the world rather than the simply DM preference.
Although I do agree that it can be helpful if there is a good in-world reason why something is not allowed... I would argue that "I just don't like it" is a valid reason for a DM to disallow something. Sometimes there *isn't* a good reason and you really just do *not* like something as a DM, arbitrarily, the same way you might not like coffee ice cream. If the DM isn't able to disallow things that he or she really doesn't like, and is forced to not just have it tangentially in the world but to live with it session-in and session-out for maybe years of time as you watch the player hour after hour RPing a race that the player may like, but you personally detest -- that is a tough thing to ask any human being, DM or not. I know DMs are generally the person at the table we expect to "take it on the chin" to help everyone have a good time, but there are limits. And as I keep trying to warn people, if you make the DM unhappy enough, your campaign is done. As soon as the DM realizes that they can escape this frustration by just not DMing, the game is over.
I don't think you're wrong. Of course the DM has prerogative. I don't dispute that. My advice is simply that working with your players to solicit buy in (to what they can do) will likely engender more pre-game good will than "No. Just no." These activities rather than enforcing limits can sort of verbal judo players into establishing a sense of place in the game, especially their characters place in it. Again this is sort of negotiation 101, and in my model the DM comes off authoritatively where as the "no just no" model leans more into authoritarian communication styles. DM rule is still set, but players appreciate the former where as feel like they're encountering a wall in the later. Of course there are places where a DM should frame their position as "absolutely not" particularly when a player conduct is injurious to other players, outright cheating etc. I think at a game's foundational level, which is what Session 0 and attendant activity basically is, it's better to solicit what you want with honey than blast what you don't want with bug spray. And no, this method doesn't work on the player who lacks the maturity to let go of a "cool character" that actually has no place in the DM's world.
My advice is simply that working with your players to solicit buy in (to what they can do) will likely engender more pre-game good will than "No. Just no."
I absolutely do agree with this.
That's why I said either earlier here or maybe elsewhere, that I present the players with a list of "here are all the races you can play in this world" rather than a list of "here are the races you can't." Presenting them with a list of "here's all the stuff you can do" usually prompts them to find something they like from that list, which is part of that negotiation process you are talking about. Heck, I presented my players with 2 possible campaigns before we did anything else. They *chose* the Roman Empire campaign, and I did warn them that choices of things like race and class would be more restrictive than my other option, which was sort of a generic fantasy D&D world, because if we are trying to enforce a Roman aesthetic some stuff just will not be in character. So they picked the more restrictive option, when given the choice. Again, this is negotiation, and discussion, which is clearly preferable to "no, just no."
It helps if the DM and the players work together on this... rather than the DM just coming up with the world/setting in isolation, the player coming up with a character in isolation, and then getting into a conflict over the fact that these two completely separate creative endeavors produced incompatible results.
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WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I would say alignment is part of how you respond to a situation, so restricting to non-evil characters is starting to encroach on player agency. But it is a reasonable session 0 stipulation. "You could play an evil character, but you wouldn't be in this party."
How is that not restricting the campaign to non-evil characters?
"I get to play anything I want that exists in any rulebook published by WTOC" is not player agency -- it is the player trying to co-opt the role of the DM. If the DM wants to run a campaign of heroic, good PCs, then the DM has every right to restrict is game by alignment. Your agency, as a player, if you insist on not playing a good character, consists of saying "this is not the game for me," in that case.
That's what I was saying.
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There are quite a few things that I do not want in my custom setting, and I make it very clear that I don't want them If someone insists, I will sit down with them in private and discuss it with them. They will be warned about the consequences, in detail, and the probable results. If they still want to do it, fine. I will let them. I will kill them the moment they give me an excuse, and take great pleasure in doing so. If they get mad enough to leave the game I will smile and wave as they go. Anyone fool enough to ignore everything I tell them isn't going to be someone I want in my game.
As an example, I don't allow Drow or anything related to them. If you have blackish skin and whiteish hair, you're likely to be killed out of hand before you can draw a breath to speak. Drow are living nightmares who raid the surface world just often enough that they are among the most hated races in my game. They kill almost everyone they can catch, keep a few of the ones who remain, and those are taken as prisoners who will be tortured to death at the Drow's earliest convenience, then eaten once the Drow have wrung all the fun out of them that they can.
Even if I use a published setting like the Realms, I still don't want to allow things that mess with the setting. I will listen, I will decide, and I'll cheerfully murder the character if they won't take my warning seriously.
<Insert clever signature here>
My group will float ideas like, "how about a campaign where everyone has to be a small race?" If the response is good, the person will start working on the campaign. But some of the ideas we just kind of pass over. If you're playing with a fixed group of friends I think it's best to work together to determine what kind of game you want to play, and that includes restrictions on character options. In a more general sense though, I very much support a DM's right to set boundaries (and a player's right to walk away guilt-free if they don't like them).
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
As the DM, it's your world, and you can restrict or allow anything you want.
That being said, I would bring up any restrictions during a session zero. Otherwise you could end up with unhappy players in session 1.
I think to sum up all the advice:
1. You can, as a DM, restrict anything you want.
2. You should, as a DM, restrict anything you need to for the purposes of realizing world-building, creation of tone, and the like.
3. Either way, if you restrict things outside the normal expectations (that is, if you play in Eberron but do not restrict things to what the Eberron books say, same for any other setting) you should tell the players ahead of time.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Of course, this is your universe and can technically do whatever you want. It can be disapointing from the player's perspective but if it doesn't make sense to have it in the game to you, you have the ability to restrict it.
It's within your rights as a DM. If you've created and entire homebrew world and a player comes to session 0 with a Loxodon rogue, it's okay to say no. You shouldn't have to shoehorn an origin for elephant-people into your cosmogony.
That said, restrict them for the right reasons. Don't restrict them just to be a stickler for rules or canon lore. And don't restrict them just for personal taste. But if it's more about consistent narrative tone or a need to integrate with published modules, okay.
I think it's completely fair to restrict races. You're the DM, it's your world and you know which races live in your world. Cover this during session zero where you also cover the tone of the campaign, theme and what the players and you think is fun and where there's overlap in your "fun zones".
Altrazin Aghanes - Wizard/Fighter
Varpulis Windhowl - Fighter
Skolson Demjon - Cleric/Fighter
One thing people don't always think about because it's easy to think about fantasy like just a big general pile of fantasy and then assume it's easy to just do whatever in it where as it's more like hundreds of different types of settings labeled inside a fantasy label. And the truth about it is that dm's are good at different things.
I mean I'm a great dm, I frequently wing stuff on the fly and can make a great story while keeping both the players own stories going at the same time as my own. But, this means it has to be within certain boundaries.
I CAN do horror a bit, I've done it a few times and it's worked out well but this requires actually planning stuff because I can't make it up on the go like some other dm's can. I'm absolutely horrible at futuristic Sci fi things, especially with high tech stuff. I have had ideas about and even written a pretty cool setting about it I just absolutely can't get it going with a good flow.
As for fantasy I'm at my absolute best when I can make most of it up myself, I can preferably limit the races because then I can up the mysticism around them plus I usually twist them in some way. I love magic but I usually throw in a lot of fear around it, and make it rare but existent. I almost always have someone play a different race or a mage despite this but with the set limits beforehand I can make them so much more story wise.
And it's not all about me having fun but I don't want to dm a game where I make a bad job, so this means if you want me as a dm then there's a specific setting that would work best and a few other things I can do but it won't be as good, which can be just fine, and then some where you simply won't enjoy it because I'm doing a bad job and honestly I'm not up for it. (worst was probably trying to run a Warhammer 40k game..) I've also dm'ed for a long time and so I have tried many different kinds of games which means I know what I can do good and not (I don't mind trying new stuff either). But I think it's important to understand that it's not just sitting down and narrating things just like that.. It still needs to be something the dm wants to do and is willing to try out. The dm does a lot of work even if we make the stories together.
This is true of everyone, even the best DMs. We all have strengths and weaknesses. We all have our wheelhouse.
Also, we have to remember that if you take all the options in all the books in all of 5e, they are all there for you to use, but there is nothing that says everything must be in every world or even every campaign. It can often make a world feel generic and uninspiring if you can just "play every race and class without restriction." Maybe in some campaigns, there are no Warlocks. In others, there are no Clerics. In some, there are warforged, and in some there are not. In some there are elves, and in some there are no elves but maybe there are a lot more dwarf types. These restrictions give the world flavor and also can play into the wheelhouse of the DM, who maybe feels comfortable playing dwarves but not elves as NPCs for some reason, etc.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Exactly ;)
That's not really necessary. Unless the party is all warforged, they still have pretty much the same survival challenges to overcome.
I would say alignment is part of how you respond to a situation, so restricting to non-evil characters is starting to encroach on player agency. But it is a reasonable session 0 stipulation. "You could play an evil character, but you wouldn't be in this party."
The party I play in is one human, one warforged, one tiefling, and one kalashtar. Each of the three non-human races is represented by maybe a dozen individuals in the world. It makes sense though because as part of the story we're like chosen one heroes. Maybe our uniqueness is part of why we were exceptional.
In the game I DM, the party is one warforged, one aarakocra, one tiefling, and one dragonborn. NPCs do comment on their unusual assortment, and there is no plausible explanation for how so many rare creatures were thrown together, but it never really distracts from the storyline for more than a minute, and it's a sandbox game, so I let them have their fun.
How is that not restricting the campaign to non-evil characters?
"I get to play anything I want that exists in any rulebook published by WTOC" is not player agency -- it is the player trying to co-opt the role of the DM. If the DM wants to run a campaign of heroic, good PCs, then the DM has every right to restrict is game by alignment. Your agency, as a player, if you insist on not playing a good character, consists of saying "this is not the game for me," in that case.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
Nothing against player agency, but non-matching alignments encroach on player agency too. Kind of difficult to have a lawful good and a chaotic evil character work together effectively and travel together in a cohesive party. You can have the evil character act out his evil tendencies in secret only (arguably not a bad idea with regards to the rest of the setting anyway), but that is dictating a character's response to situations as well. Generally player agency is restricted by the fact that your character is part of a group and most campaigns assume you're at least going to try and not break up the team completely, occasional side forays notwithstanding.
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DM builds the world including rulings on character options. Players develop characters that fit in that world. "Drow aren't a playable race in my world" is perfectly fine DM declaration, just as much as "Humans don't exist in my world."
That said, in negotiation and collaboration it's usually better to say "No, you can't; but you can...." rather than "No you can't. Just no." I think rather than simply cataloguing restrictions to your game, which wouldn't be so much a session 0 as a session circle with a line through it, if you want players to play by your rules, it'd be more productive if you sell your world as a way to generate player buy in. So in session 0 you're basically presenting your investment in your game world ( to get that player buy in) so give the players a chance to see how the allowable PC races exist. Which races are integrated among each other, which are the outsiders. What sort of social stations would players come from etc. What sorts of gods do Clerics adhere too. What would being a Druid or Ranger or particular Palladin oath say about that characters place in the world. Are there wizards and/or sorcerers and what's their place? In selling the drama of your world you're showing your time and effort and giving the players a foreshadowing of your ability to draw then into your world. Successfully done, your players will want to participate in your world building with characters constructed with the level of care with which you've put the world together. This is the ideal.
Of course if you simply say "No Drow, because I don't like them" that's a bit of a harder sell. You need to make that matter to the world rather than the simply DM preference. So explain the Drow are not a player option in your game because Drow are a major antagonist force in your world, and the "good Drow" or "exceptional Drow" that have popped in the lore of other worlds just aren't allowed here. If the player wants to play a species that has a sort outlander or suspect standing in your game's world, give them options (Tieflings generally work). If they just want the Drow powerset apologize that they just don't work here and show possible paths in game where Drow like traits could eventually be acquired. Most mature players will respect your willingness to work with them to find a place in your world. Yes, there will be folks who ignore your effort and still try to show up your table with a Drow Bloodhunter, at that point reiterate the time you took to show the players how your world works and you need the player to come up with a character that functions within the parameters you set. If you got the time you can call their bluff, have them explain how their Drow can be the exception, and then break down the story's failing point by point if your Drow are that developed in your world.
Bottom line, I think the best parties are put together and settle into a game world well if the DM and players work together. Early on defiance is sometimes an indicator of a player (or a DM) who sees the player / DM dynamic an oppositional dynamic that's sometimes associated with old school (though that's pigeon holing what "old school" was). If you approach your players not as an enforcer declaring certain character concepts as out of bounds; but instead as a someone invested in the game that wants to see the players succeed, it helps get what you want. Demonstrating enthusiasm for the game and a desire for everyone to have fun is like the ideal Session Minus One posture for a DM to assume.
Now I'll return to my regularly scheduled "how am I going to get this to work" Sunday meditation on my CG Tagbaxi Inquisitive, LE Hobgoblin War Magician, NG Tifeling Champion, NG/LG Dragon Born College of Lore and CG/CN Half Elf College of Whispers campaign. Seriously, we're having a good time. Maybe because the characters themselves, not just the players are largely "in it for the stories" in this campaign.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Although I do agree that it can be helpful if there is a good in-world reason why something is not allowed... I would argue that "I just don't like it" is a valid reason for a DM to disallow something. Sometimes there *isn't* a good reason and you really just do *not* like something as a DM, arbitrarily, the same way you might not like coffee ice cream. If the DM isn't able to disallow things that he or she really doesn't like, and is forced to not just have it tangentially in the world but to live with it session-in and session-out for maybe years of time as you watch the player hour after hour RPing a race that the player may like, but you personally detest -- that is a tough thing to ask any human being, DM or not. I know DMs are generally the person at the table we expect to "take it on the chin" to help everyone have a good time, but there are limits. And as I keep trying to warn people, if you make the DM unhappy enough, your campaign is done. As soon as the DM realizes that they can escape this frustration by just not DMing, the game is over.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
I don't think you're wrong. Of course the DM has prerogative. I don't dispute that. My advice is simply that working with your players to solicit buy in (to what they can do) will likely engender more pre-game good will than "No. Just no." These activities rather than enforcing limits can sort of verbal judo players into establishing a sense of place in the game, especially their characters place in it. Again this is sort of negotiation 101, and in my model the DM comes off authoritatively where as the "no just no" model leans more into authoritarian communication styles. DM rule is still set, but players appreciate the former where as feel like they're encountering a wall in the later. Of course there are places where a DM should frame their position as "absolutely not" particularly when a player conduct is injurious to other players, outright cheating etc. I think at a game's foundational level, which is what Session 0 and attendant activity basically is, it's better to solicit what you want with honey than blast what you don't want with bug spray. And no, this method doesn't work on the player who lacks the maturity to let go of a "cool character" that actually has no place in the DM's world.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
I absolutely do agree with this.
That's why I said either earlier here or maybe elsewhere, that I present the players with a list of "here are all the races you can play in this world" rather than a list of "here are the races you can't." Presenting them with a list of "here's all the stuff you can do" usually prompts them to find something they like from that list, which is part of that negotiation process you are talking about. Heck, I presented my players with 2 possible campaigns before we did anything else. They *chose* the Roman Empire campaign, and I did warn them that choices of things like race and class would be more restrictive than my other option, which was sort of a generic fantasy D&D world, because if we are trying to enforce a Roman aesthetic some stuff just will not be in character. So they picked the more restrictive option, when given the choice. Again, this is negotiation, and discussion, which is clearly preferable to "no, just no."
It helps if the DM and the players work together on this... rather than the DM just coming up with the world/setting in isolation, the player coming up with a character in isolation, and then getting into a conflict over the fact that these two completely separate creative endeavors produced incompatible results.
WOTC lies. We know that WOTC lies. WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. We know that WOTC knows that we know that WOTC lies. And still they lie.
Because of the above (a paraphrase from Orwell) I no longer post to the forums -- PM me if you need help or anything.
That's what I was saying.