Agreed. The PC that took Alert made a substantial investment to always be "conscious of a threat" the same way that real life military and police are constantly watching people's body language and hands, checking exits, keeping the door in front of them, etc. The feat is fine the way it is.
I really like this analogy between the alert feat and law enforcement and military.
Yes. It’s a lot like those.
from a psychology standpoint, it’s a lot like a the psychosis of Hypervigilance or of Paranoia as well.
If you as a DM think that the Alert feat is ruining the experience, and permit the player to take the feat, there's a problem.
As a DM I never allow feats, as a player, I'm stuck with whatever the DM decides.
What is fair is relative. Is it fair that a Wizard casts spells and a Fighter does not? Rules aren't created to be fair, they are created to be good.
I mean being fair within the rules. When you set up a game of D&D, you and the group implicitly agree to a set of rules. You could call that a social contract. The DM is designated many roles, one of them being the arbiter of the social contract.
Of course there is some leeway in interpreting the rules, but before you throw any rule out, you need to get consent from the other participants.
If you are honoring a feat sometimes, and sometimes not, that is unfair toward the player who chose that feat, expecting it to work in a certain way 100 % of the time. If something is not working reliably, and not working when your DM needs it to, it is useless for the player, and they would be better off having chosen something else.
I had a player who wanted to play an Aarakocra. A flying PC did not fit into the one-shot I was running, so I asked him if he was OK with not being able to fly. He was cool with it, and we explained it away with him having an injured wing, that needed time to heal. After the part in the adventure was over where a flyer would have made it difficult for me, they encountered a healer, who was able to restore the wing, just before the final boss encounter. Everyone had a blast, and I didn't violate the social contract, I amended it instead.
It is not fair when you take away a feature that the player is counting on and that he has the 'right' to according to the established rules. It would equate to taking away extra attacks from the fighter, having a spell just not work. Good rules are created to be fair.
I have taken away features from players, albeit with a solid in-game explanation (only the players didn't know about it, yet), and my players were (rightly) upset. They eventually caught on that there was something wrong with the environment, but for a while, the tension at the table was not story driven, but between the people playing the game. That is not a good situation to be in, as it erodes trust and is not in the spirit of a collaborative game.
Yes, a DM *can* handwave almost anything away, but you should be aware of the consequences that will carry.
Yes. It’s a lot like those.
from a psychology standpoint, it’s a lot like a the psychosis of Hypervigilance or of Paranoia as well.
I mean being fair within the rules. When you set up a game of D&D, you and the group implicitly agree to a set of rules. You could call that a social contract. The DM is designated many roles, one of them being the arbiter of the social contract.
Of course there is some leeway in interpreting the rules, but before you throw any rule out, you need to get consent from the other participants.
If you are honoring a feat sometimes, and sometimes not, that is unfair toward the player who chose that feat, expecting it to work in a certain way 100 % of the time. If something is not working reliably, and not working when your DM needs it to, it is useless for the player, and they would be better off having chosen something else.
I had a player who wanted to play an Aarakocra. A flying PC did not fit into the one-shot I was running, so I asked him if he was OK with not being able to fly. He was cool with it, and we explained it away with him having an injured wing, that needed time to heal. After the part in the adventure was over where a flyer would have made it difficult for me, they encountered a healer, who was able to restore the wing, just before the final boss encounter. Everyone had a blast, and I didn't violate the social contract, I amended it instead.
It is not fair when you take away a feature that the player is counting on and that he has the 'right' to according to the established rules. It would equate to taking away extra attacks from the fighter, having a spell just not work. Good rules are created to be fair.
I have taken away features from players, albeit with a solid in-game explanation (only the players didn't know about it, yet), and my players were (rightly) upset. They eventually caught on that there was something wrong with the environment, but for a while, the tension at the table was not story driven, but between the people playing the game. That is not a good situation to be in, as it erodes trust and is not in the spirit of a collaborative game.
Yes, a DM *can* handwave almost anything away, but you should be aware of the consequences that will carry.
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