He's going to be a goat gifted with telepathy and possibly telekenisis. Ho communicates through telepathy, although I'm tempted to make him role play not being able to communicate. After all, he's the one that wants to be a goat.
How do I work him into the party? imagine any generic campaign, how does a goat enter the scene?
It;s an interesting GM challenge, but I could kill my friend for wanting to play a goat.
Well, first off, if you aren't happy with it, I'd have that conversation right away. If you're at all annoyed with it, it's probably worth a chat to make sure you and your player are on the same page and can enjoy the game equally. Your sense of fun is important, too.
As for how to work it in, perhaps he was turned into a goat by a curse, or a magical accident. Polymorph spell gone wrong kinda situation. If you're open to it, maybe it's something that's known to happen in the region the character's from and nobody is really thrown off by it (after all, druids exist). You can lean into the humor or steer clear of it as suits your campaign.
Biggest issue is whatever class the player picks is going to be seriously compromised do to the lack of any ability to manually manipulate anything. Goats don't have hands. Maybe allow it to be a fighter with unarmed fighting style, or a barbarian who also fights unarmed. Why/how is this goat sapient so that it's telepathy (and I'd say no to that, and definitely no to telekinesis), that's for the player to answer in a way that persuades you.
Playing a beast might be fun, and can I feel be done well, but if the player is just planning on being a 'toon and that's not the style of game you (and the other players) want to run, tell 'em to try a satyr. There's a tendency for "wild idea characters" to be sort of these one note gimmick things that because of the limitations (i.e. no hands, or speech) are sort of useless to the party aside from comic relief so you have to actually structure encounters in a way where one character may be functionally useless and you have to accommodate moments where the goat player insists on bringing one of their "hey, wouldn't it be funny" ideas to the table. Again, it's possible to play well, but think of the odds of the friend playing this well as opposed to an obnoxious aggravation (CONSTANTLY disrupting RP moments with bleating noises for instance) and decide from there.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
But, if the player is insistent enough, maybe you could allow him to play some kind of homebrew Were-Satyr. He's a satyr who can shapeshift into a goat. But even then there would be limits, like maybe just once per day, or only during a full moon.
But goats can't wear armor they can't wield weapons, they can't cast spells - heck, can goats even walk down stairs? I've honestly never seen a goat walk down stairs!
Just show the player the list of official player character races and say, "Pick one."
But goats can't wear armor they can't wield weapons, they can't cast spells - heck, can goats even walk down stairs? I've honestly never seen a goat walk down stairs!
Goats are actually super agile, not just the "mountain goats". They get around by leaping, and I've seen then get up on one story structures using cars as "the step." If we were still binding ability mods, I'd say Goats get +2 DEX +1 CON. But yeah, they can't manipulate anything, so they're left with natural weapons.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
One of the players wants to play a goat. How the heck do I work a goat into my campaign?
Very baa-aa-aadly. (See what I did there?)
But seriously, first things first, find out why he wants to play as a goat. If he has what you consider to be legitimate reasons then I’m sure you two can work together to figure it out. Note, the word “together” is bold there. Make him meet you halfway on everything and do half the work to realize his goaty dreams. “After all, he's the one that wants to be a goat.”
If he just wants to do it because he thinks it’d be funny or whatever, then I can guarantee you his clowning will get very old, very very quickly and the other players will end up unhappy with the situation. No bueno. That’s when you explain that such a ridiculous character would likely be better suited for a different campaign than the one you’re running.
But goats can't wear armor they can't wield weapons, they can't cast spells
Goat Monk!!! Goat monk needs none of your weapons armor or spells.
But seriously, if you’re going to allow it, I’d agree with a reskinning satyr, or maybe centaur. Or there’s always a custom lineage from Tasha’s.
As far as how, someone cast awaken on old Buttercup. Why is the more interesting question, but that’s also more of a story question for you to sort out with your player. I’ll just add again, for emphasis: Goat Monk!!!
Another option would be for him to take a more conventional PC (goat-themed, like the Satyr, if he wants) but also control a goat Sidekick. They could share a telepathic link, if you’re ok with that, but otherwise the goat can’t communicate verbally with other creatures.
He's going to be a goat gifted with telepathy and possibly telekenisis. Ho communicates through telepathy, although I'm tempted to make him role play not being able to communicate. After all, he's the one that wants to be a goat.
How do I work him into the party? imagine any generic campaign, how does a goat enter the scene?
It;s an interesting GM challenge, but I could kill my friend for wanting to play a goat.
In short, don't let them.
Sometimes players come up with really cool ideas. A lot of ideas though just don't work. Said Goat will never be able to cast spells as they don't have the ability for the Somatic or Verbal components. That right there is to me the reason to say that they can play a goat humanoid in which case just reskin another humanoid species. Otherwise, this is just one of those ideas where you should sit the player down and tell them that if they want to play an animal there are plenty of other TTRPGs out there. This is an idea that does not mesh well with D&D without locking them out of an inordinate number of different actions, spells, and skills.
It's kind of like the player who once asked to play an INT 1 character. I immediately shut that down. Not all ideas are valuable. Not all ideas should be entertained.
That said, it's your table and if you feel it'll work for you...go for it. I don't envy you the work required to make this all workable.
i really like ThelenyiWhinlaw's idea of the sidekick: "this? this. this is my lucky dungeon goat. she started out as a way to trigger traps and ambushes, but heck if she don't now sniff 'em out better'n any nervous rogue missing a few 'lessons learned' fingers! i'll follow Judas here into just about any narrow tunnel or creepy portal, happy as a sheep!" even better if the telepathy is merely imagined. it would be my strong recommendation to retain DM control of such a sidekick. at least then they're goat adjacent. you could spice it up saying that if anyone ever bothered to check with the right spells they'd realize the animal was possessed by a mischievous fey spirit who has been pretending off and on to be this guy's familiar to see if it would drive him crazy. player has alert feat and the goat adds tool proficiency to investigation rolls.
but the real answer is satyr druid who, through many hours of practice, can maintain the wildshape of a goat well beyond the boundaries of a typical druid wildshape. it's up to the player to decide when/if/where they will first break observably from goat form to manipulate doors or whatever. how long can the player keep it a secret from the rest of the table? maybe the character themselves doesn't consider it a secret so much as a coping mechanism for social situations (which you might find the player resonating surprisingly strongly with) involving city life, so far removed from their experience as a lonely druid up till now. could be fun to involve a locked room mystery early on where the character frees themself and retrieves the treasure but the rest of the party, when they open the door and find only a goat, can't figure out how it was accomplished. "wait, how did it light both candles? and it filled the jug of water??" ...and, most importantly, this gives them an out for later becoming an actual functioning member of the team without rerolling once the goat introduction wears off.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: providefeedback!
Play a different TTRPG if the player wants to be a goat, lol. It's not suited to any form of DnD5e, honestly. (just like everybody else has already said)
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
Play a different TTRPG if the player wants to be a goat, lol. It's not suited to any form of DnD5e, honestly. (just like everybody else has already said)
i don't know. i feel like it's right in line with past threads here about how disruptive it might be to allow a character to be unable to communicate or unwilling to participate in combat. 'flavor is free,' so it's really not hard to just have a guy that looks like a goat in 5E. rather than the character concept itself, i'd say instead it's the new player's attitude that's not suited to the table. the issue is a player encountering a box, attempting to climb outside the box, and then wasting that privilege on remaining pressed right upside the box while wiggling their fingers distractingly. "hey, isn't this clever? hey!"
i'd argue that it's an entirely salvageable situation, but looking a lot like an uphill struggle for the DM and maybe the other players as well.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: providefeedback!
D&D is not designed for exotic PCs, though it can be done with house rules. The easy method is to just have the character work like any other PC and being a goat is just a skin (it changes how you describe what you do, but not what you can actually do). Anything else is going to be a lot of work for the DM.
my initial response was along the lines of “say no”, but that isn’t what is asked. And I have played sentient animals and such as a DM for decades, so it really shouldn’t be hard.
The question I have is if they are just a goat. If the answer is yes, give them a stat block and have fun. Goats don’t learn, don’t have a class, don’t have a level, etc. not fun.
so there has to be something special about this goat, some kind of reason that this goat is now off on an adventure, has the capacity to reason, is interested in more than just eating and making more goats, etc.
Which tells me they are a special goat. So…
make them roll the character up like normal. They are a goat, so they don’t have vocal chords, so verbal and most somatic spells are out. They can’t hold a weapon, but they still have attacks.
I would suggest just go with it that way. There is a mystery to why this Goat is an adventurer. Lean into that.
I wouldn’t allow it, myself, because it is the kind of thing that is often used to be disruptive, but if there was enough stuff behind it, I might be willing to allow it.
No class, but they can still level up. No magic, no weapons, no way to communicate. And some folks would love to add a goat to their herd. If a girl goat, well, cheese is a thing.
just some random thoughts.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities .-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-. An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more. Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Methinks the only way this would really work (outside of letting player be a Druid whose favorite Wildshape is Goat), would be to builid an adventure where ALL the PCs are temporarily turned into farm animals. They would retain their skills and hit points from before they got transformed. Instead of killing monsters and looting (other creatures') treasure, the PCs would instead have the quest of staying alive and transforming themselves back to humanoid/fey creatures in a world where Humanoids typically enslave and/or kill for food said farm animals. THAT would be an interesting adventure hook.
Goats are actually super agile, not just the "mountain goats". They get around by leaping, and I've seen then get up on one story structures using cars as "the step." If we were still binding ability mods, I'd say Goats get +2 DEX +1 CON.
I wouldn't. I'd say, "Here is goat, go for it." and smile evilly.
He's going to be a goat gifted with telepathy and possibly telekenisis. Ho communicates through telepathy, although I'm tempted to make him role play not being able to communicate. After all, he's the one that wants to be a goat.
How do I work him into the party? imagine any generic campaign, how does a goat enter the scene?
It;s an interesting GM challenge, but I could kill my friend for wanting to play a goat.
Well, first off, if you aren't happy with it, I'd have that conversation right away. If you're at all annoyed with it, it's probably worth a chat to make sure you and your player are on the same page and can enjoy the game equally. Your sense of fun is important, too.
As for how to work it in, perhaps he was turned into a goat by a curse, or a magical accident. Polymorph spell gone wrong kinda situation. If you're open to it, maybe it's something that's known to happen in the region the character's from and nobody is really thrown off by it (after all, druids exist). You can lean into the humor or steer clear of it as suits your campaign.
I'd say make them do the work and come up with a viable excuse if they really want to do it.
Review the stat block and have the player come back with a PC species:
https://www.dndbeyond.com/monsters/16906-goat
Biggest issue is whatever class the player picks is going to be seriously compromised do to the lack of any ability to manually manipulate anything. Goats don't have hands. Maybe allow it to be a fighter with unarmed fighting style, or a barbarian who also fights unarmed. Why/how is this goat sapient so that it's telepathy (and I'd say no to that, and definitely no to telekinesis), that's for the player to answer in a way that persuades you.
Playing a beast might be fun, and can I feel be done well, but if the player is just planning on being a 'toon and that's not the style of game you (and the other players) want to run, tell 'em to try a satyr. There's a tendency for "wild idea characters" to be sort of these one note gimmick things that because of the limitations (i.e. no hands, or speech) are sort of useless to the party aside from comic relief so you have to actually structure encounters in a way where one character may be functionally useless and you have to accommodate moments where the goat player insists on bringing one of their "hey, wouldn't it be funny" ideas to the table. Again, it's possible to play well, but think of the odds of the friend playing this well as opposed to an obnoxious aggravation (CONSTANTLY disrupting RP moments with bleating noises for instance) and decide from there.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Simple. You don't. "You're not a goat."
But, if the player is insistent enough, maybe you could allow him to play some kind of homebrew Were-Satyr. He's a satyr who can shapeshift into a goat. But even then there would be limits, like maybe just once per day, or only during a full moon.
But goats can't wear armor they can't wield weapons, they can't cast spells - heck, can goats even walk down stairs? I've honestly never seen a goat walk down stairs!
Just show the player the list of official player character races and say, "Pick one."
Anzio Faro. Protector Aasimar light cleric. Lvl 18.
Viktor Gavriil. White dragonborn grave cleric. Lvl 20.
Ikram Sahir ibn-Malik al-Sayyid Ra'ad. Brass dragonborn draconic sorcerer Lvl 9. Fire elemental devil.
Wrangler of cats.
Goats are actually super agile, not just the "mountain goats". They get around by leaping, and I've seen then get up on one story structures using cars as "the step." If we were still binding ability mods, I'd say Goats get +2 DEX +1 CON. But yeah, they can't manipulate anything, so they're left with natural weapons.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Very baa-aa-aadly. (See what I did there?)
But seriously, first things first, find out why he wants to play as a goat. If he has what you consider to be legitimate reasons then I’m sure you two can work together to figure it out. Note, the word “together” is bold there. Make him meet you halfway on everything and do half the work to realize his goaty dreams. “After all, he's the one that wants to be a goat.”
If he just wants to do it because he thinks it’d be funny or whatever, then I can guarantee you his clowning will get very old, very very quickly and the other players will end up unhappy with the situation. No bueno. That’s when you explain that such a ridiculous character would likely be better suited for a different campaign than the one you’re running.
Creating Epic Boons on DDB
DDB Buyers' Guide
Hardcovers, DDB & You
Content Troubleshooting
Goat Monk!!! Goat monk needs none of your weapons armor or spells.
But seriously, if you’re going to allow it, I’d agree with a reskinning satyr, or maybe centaur. Or there’s always a custom lineage from Tasha’s.
As far as how, someone cast awaken on old Buttercup. Why is the more interesting question, but that’s also more of a story question for you to sort out with your player. I’ll just add again, for emphasis: Goat Monk!!!
Another option would be for him to take a more conventional PC (goat-themed, like the Satyr, if he wants) but also control a goat Sidekick. They could share a telepathic link, if you’re ok with that, but otherwise the goat can’t communicate verbally with other creatures.
In short, don't let them.
Sometimes players come up with really cool ideas. A lot of ideas though just don't work. Said Goat will never be able to cast spells as they don't have the ability for the Somatic or Verbal components. That right there is to me the reason to say that they can play a goat humanoid in which case just reskin another humanoid species. Otherwise, this is just one of those ideas where you should sit the player down and tell them that if they want to play an animal there are plenty of other TTRPGs out there. This is an idea that does not mesh well with D&D without locking them out of an inordinate number of different actions, spells, and skills.
It's kind of like the player who once asked to play an INT 1 character. I immediately shut that down. Not all ideas are valuable. Not all ideas should be entertained.
That said, it's your table and if you feel it'll work for you...go for it. I don't envy you the work required to make this all workable.
DM session planning template - My version of maps for 'Lost Mine of Phandelver' - Send your party to The Circus - Other DM Resources - Maps, Tokens, Quests - 'Better' Player Character Injury Tables?
Actor, Writer, Director & Teacher by day - GM/DM in my off hours.
i really like ThelenyiWhinlaw's idea of the sidekick: "this? this. this is my lucky dungeon goat. she started out as a way to trigger traps and ambushes, but heck if she don't now sniff 'em out better'n any nervous rogue missing a few 'lessons learned' fingers! i'll follow Judas here into just about any narrow tunnel or creepy portal, happy as a sheep!" even better if the telepathy is merely imagined. it would be my strong recommendation to retain DM control of such a sidekick. at least then they're goat adjacent. you could spice it up saying that if anyone ever bothered to check with the right spells they'd realize the animal was possessed by a mischievous fey spirit who has been pretending off and on to be this guy's familiar to see if it would drive him crazy. player has alert feat and the goat adds tool proficiency to investigation rolls.
but the real answer is satyr druid who, through many hours of practice, can maintain the wildshape of a goat well beyond the boundaries of a typical druid wildshape. it's up to the player to decide when/if/where they will first break observably from goat form to manipulate doors or whatever. how long can the player keep it a secret from the rest of the table? maybe the character themselves doesn't consider it a secret so much as a coping mechanism for social situations (which you might find the player resonating surprisingly strongly with) involving city life, so far removed from their experience as a lonely druid up till now. could be fun to involve a locked room mystery early on where the character frees themself and retrieves the treasure but the rest of the party, when they open the door and find only a goat, can't figure out how it was accomplished. "wait, how did it light both candles? and it filled the jug of water??" ...and, most importantly, this gives them an out for later becoming an actual functioning member of the team without rerolling once the goat introduction wears off.
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: provide feedback!
Play a different TTRPG if the player wants to be a goat, lol. It's not suited to any form of DnD5e, honestly. (just like everybody else has already said)
I know what you're thinking: "In that flurry of blows, did he use all his ki points, or save one?" Well, are ya feeling lucky, punk?
i don't know. i feel like it's right in line with past threads here about how disruptive it might be to allow a character to be unable to communicate or unwilling to participate in combat. 'flavor is free,' so it's really not hard to just have a guy that looks like a goat in 5E. rather than the character concept itself, i'd say instead it's the new player's attitude that's not suited to the table. the issue is a player encountering a box, attempting to climb outside the box, and then wasting that privilege on remaining pressed right upside the box while wiggling their fingers distractingly. "hey, isn't this clever? hey!"
i'd argue that it's an entirely salvageable situation, but looking a lot like an uphill struggle for the DM and maybe the other players as well.
unhappy at the way in which we lost individual purchases for one-off subclasses, magic items, and monsters?
tell them you don't like features disappeared quietly in the night: provide feedback!
D&D is not designed for exotic PCs, though it can be done with house rules. The easy method is to just have the character work like any other PC and being a goat is just a skin (it changes how you describe what you do, but not what you can actually do). Anything else is going to be a lot of work for the DM.
I have been puzzling over this one a bit.
my initial response was along the lines of “say no”, but that isn’t what is asked. And I have played sentient animals and such as a DM for decades, so it really shouldn’t be hard.
The question I have is if they are just a goat. If the answer is yes, give them a stat block and have fun. Goats don’t learn, don’t have a class, don’t have a level, etc. not fun.
so there has to be something special about this goat, some kind of reason that this goat is now off on an adventure, has the capacity to reason, is interested in more than just eating and making more goats, etc.
Which tells me they are a special goat. So…
make them roll the character up like normal. They are a goat, so they don’t have vocal chords, so verbal and most somatic spells are out. They can’t hold a weapon, but they still have attacks.
I would suggest just go with it that way. There is a mystery to why this Goat is an adventurer. Lean into that.
I wouldn’t allow it, myself, because it is the kind of thing that is often used to be disruptive, but if there was enough stuff behind it, I might be willing to allow it.
No class, but they can still level up. No magic, no weapons, no way to communicate. And some folks would love to add a goat to their herd. If a girl goat, well, cheese is a thing.
just some random thoughts.
Only a DM since 1980 (3000+ Sessions) / PhD, MS, MA / Mixed, Bi, Trans, Woman / No longer welcome in the US, apparently
Wyrlde: Adventures in the Seven Cities
.-=] Lore Book | Patreon | Wyrlde YT [=-.
An original Setting for 5e, a whole solar system of adventure. Ongoing updates, exclusies, more.
Not Talking About It / Dubbed The Oracle in the Cult of Mythology Nerds
Methinks the only way this would really work (outside of letting player be a Druid whose favorite Wildshape is Goat), would be to builid an adventure where ALL the PCs are temporarily turned into farm animals. They would retain their skills and hit points from before they got transformed. Instead of killing monsters and looting (other creatures') treasure, the PCs would instead have the quest of staying alive and transforming themselves back to humanoid/fey creatures in a world where Humanoids typically enslave and/or kill for food said farm animals. THAT would be an interesting adventure hook.
I wouldn't. I'd say, "Here is goat, go for it." and smile evilly.
I would write him in as a tasty goat curry with onion and peppers.
I spoke with the player and he is cool with making a different character. He didn't mind much at all.
Just re-flavor Centaur as a giant goat with the head and torso of a humanoid. Easy peasy.