I don't allow just whatever the player wants because I find historically that optimizers who optimize without any thought to an in-game explanation typically doesn't end well. Power-gaming isn't my thing, I don't enjoy it when other players do it, whether I'm the DM or not. When I am the DM, I have some control over it. I don't mind optimization as a rule--it makes sense once you have your character concept to take certain options that are more beneficial. There's nothing in-game problematic about a wizard--the character--saying "You know, I get hit a lot, so I'm going to work on my dodging a bit." That's a far cry from the character saying "You know guys, I could be a lot more effective. I suddenly have a demon ancestor I didn't know about.." Similarly, if that same wizard, who has spent his entire life and the entire campaign in an urban environment, suddenly said "Hey guys, I've recently learned how to be a Barbarian!", I'm going to have issues. If you haven't done anything in-game to move in any way towards being a Barbarian, you aren't going to be able to multi into Barbarian.
I cater to roleplayers over non-roleplaying optimizers (I'm okay with the combo of roleplaying optimizers) because I simply don't enjoy unexplained, ad hoc optimizing. I don't have, and don't think I need, any other reason. I'm very much on the side of 'we're crafting a cool story here'. And that cool story, the ability for people to try to immerse into the game, is hindered when a character suddenly becomes a barbarian, or a dragon-blood, or anything, with no explanation. I create plots based on your characters, I weave them into the world. And they stop making sense pretty quickly, and stop being interesting to me and the other players, with ad hoc optimizing.
In reality, there's very little that falls into this category, and very little that I ever end up having to say no to. New weapons? Fine. Feats? Most aren't a problem at all. Races? I mean, you can't 'change' during the game, but I have run campaigns where certain races weren't allowed at all--because they weren't in that world, the history and the setting (Dragonborn is a good example). Any multi-classing needs to be approved, but it can be as easy as spending a couple sessions doing something that leads to the multi-classing. Want to be a druid because you think your character should be sympathetic to 'nature'? Tell me, and I can find ways to introduce druidry into the game if it's not there, get your character going. Not a problem. Interested by Sorcerer and want to try it out? Let me know. It's rare that I've had someone want to do something for purely mechanical reasons. But I have no problem denying that when it happens. Because that player just wants to power game. I don't run power games, so it will be running counter to the goals of the rest of the group.
I get where you're coming from. I try to fill in the gaps left by my players whenever I can, rather than disallow their choices, but there's a strong argument to be made that that shouldn't be the DM's job. Also, I'm a bit of an optimizer, so I'm more sympathetic of those types of players. In any case, if a player is going to be a problem, for whatever reason, it's certainly the DM's prerogative and duty to deal with them, to avoid the problem.
On the other hand, in the example you picked, note that disallowing Reactions while long casting means no Shield while long casting, which means a significantly better chance of being hit, which means a better chance of getting their Concentration disrupted, so the effect is significant. (Again, if, given your experience, that's not a big problem, maybe even a desirable change, then great! Run with it!)
Of course, some things are drastic changes, but are perversely important to me. Falling damage in my games is downright lethal, because I cannot make myself put up with a human being falling 120' and immediately bouncing to his feet and walking away. That changes some aspects of the game fairly dramatically. But if I tell players that, they act accordingly, and it's all good. :) At the same time, if someone (like most people do) uses RAW falling rules for their game, I'll play in the game, and be content. And, if they rule I can get up after a 120 foot fall and walk away, of course I'm going to go with their ruling, LOL.
That sort of change is different, though, since it affects everybody similarly. (Well, arguably it affects low-HP character more, but probably not enough to make a big difference.) Plus, it's something that will prove to work or not fairly quickly, so it's easier to adjust on the fly. Remind me to play an Aarakocra in your games. ;-)
Aarakocra, or a handy Feather Fall. :)
See, that's my power-gamer side talking... I was thinking more of grappling, flying, and dropping enemies, than protecting my character from lethal falling damage. :D
But really, I see the rules I'm talking about as rules that do apply to everyone, and affect everyone similarly. The reaction spell rule doesn't affect Fighters, sure. But it affects them if they learn to cast some spells. :) Honestly, when we say the game is 'balanced', it's not like the game balance is some super fragile thing that will be even noticeably harmed by a change like this. If we changed the rule to not allow mid-spell spellcasting, there wouldn't be anyone who would say "Well, man...spellcasters are really screwed now." It would barely be noticed.
Games aren't balanced at that granular of a level. Making this one change to spellcasters doesn't necessitate making any changes to anyone else. Now if you said "Forget 'long rests', I'm going back to 1st edition, where your slots are for the whole day and you need to wait until tomorrow to cast again, yeah, now you've unbalanced things wildly.
But there are enough spellcasters in the game as it is, this rule isn't 'unfair' at all.
I tend to consider balance as a pretty fragile thing, but I'll admit I have insufficient evidence to support that.
Objectively speaking, though, the specific case of disallowing mid-long-cast spellcasting doesn't seem to have a big impact, considering how infrequently long-cast spells are used mid-combat. (In my specific case, though, it's a change I feel is unnecessary. But I would certainly not complain if I played with a DM that ruled that way.)
I find odd that you feel switching from long rests to daily slots would be a significant change. Do characters in your games routinely take long rests multiple times per day? In my table, we're all old farts, who've been playing since Basic, so we're used to "daily spells", and hence our adventures tend to have one big encounter per day, at most, and very rarely have small encounters during the adventuring day. So we, in effect, still have "daily spells", we rarely take short rests. And yes, that means Warlocks are mostly screwed, something I've been trying to fix. (We rotate the DM slot, so when it's my turn, I try to do multiple smaller encounters rather than a single big one, some of the time. But at least one player complained about moving forward after an encounter without "taking a long rest" (i.e. sleeping for the night): they insisted it made no sense to keep adventuring while not being at full power, that any reasonable adventurer would wait until they got all their spell slots and hitpoints back before continuing. Yah, it's tough to teach an old dog new tricks.)
I get where you're coming from. I try to fill in the gaps left by my players whenever I can, rather than disallow their choices, but there's a strong argument to be made that that shouldn't be the DM's job. Also, I'm a bit of an optimizer, so I'm more sympathetic of those types of players. In any case, if a player is going to be a problem, for whatever reason, it's certainly the DM's prerogative and duty to deal with them, to avoid the problem
I see it as maintaining the theme, feel, and nature of the campaign. If I'm the DM, and I and the players say "We're playing a campaign that's (insert adjective here--gritty and realistic, role-playing intensive, PCs-as-central-to-world-shaking-plots, etc etc)" and a player wants to do something with their character that will totally break the campaign in those terms, it is my role to stop that from happening. If we're decidedly not playing a power-gaming campaign, and someone tries to power-game, to allow that would be to allow that one player to have fun at the expense of the rest of the table. If no one else is power-gaming, the power gamer takes over combat, and in my experience also usually turns into the overbearing sort of rules-lawyer.
It comes down to one basic rule that applies to everyone--you have to have more than just a purely mechanical rule for major changes to your character. Changes in class, changes in which deity your cleric serves, etc etc. Otherwise it's just power-gaming, which won't fit in well with 90% of the games I run. I can power-game too, but if this isn't that game, it doesn't fit in here, that's all.
See, that's my power-gamer side talking... I was thinking more of grappling, flying, and dropping enemies, than protecting my character from lethal falling damage. :D
No, totally. Dropping people from high up is, and should be, super lethal. For PCs as well. If you don't die from falling 200 feet, then why do you suffer damage when an arrow hits you or a rock falls on you? D&D falling damage is like playing a video game with very realistic physics, but suddenly finding a crack in the code that lets you, well, fall from a plane and live. Disappointing to the overall experience of playing the game.
And those rules came from a total misunderstanding of Gygax's falling rules anyway. Not that I'm one for 'the old guys who wrote the first game are always right'. Far from it. But the D&D falling rules came from a mistake, never made any sense whatsoever, and with a max damage cap now, make even less sense. And from what I can tell, no one has ever really cared that they are absurd. :)
I find odd that you feel switching from long rests to daily slots would be a significant change. Do characters in your games routinely take long rests multiple times per day? In my table, we're all old farts, who've been playing since Basic, so we're used to "daily spells", and hence our adventures tend to have one big encounter per day, at most, and very rarely have small encounters during the adventuring day. So we, in effect, still have "daily spells", we rarely take short rests. And yes, that means Warlocks are mostly screwed, something I've been trying to fix. (We rotate the DM slot, so when it's my turn, I try to do multiple smaller encounters rather than a single big one, some of the time. But at least one player complained about moving forward after an encounter without "taking a long rest" (i.e. sleeping for the night): they insisted it made no sense to keep adventuring while not being at full power, that any reasonable adventurer would wait until they got all their spell slots and hitpoints back before continuing. Yah, it's tough to teach an old dog new tricks.)
It actually happens quite a lot. If you're on some sort of mission/dungeon crawl with a continuous plot, the difference between "We'll find an empty cave and hole up for 8 hours" and "We'll find an empty cave and hole up for 20 hours" can be hugely significant. In my campaign right now, we're frequently running into situations where we have to go do something at night in the city, and then we discover something important, and need to go take care of that thing ASAP. So if we go on a raid at 2am, and use spells, and now we need to go stop the bad guys that afternoon from achieving their goals--if your spells restock every day, you're out of spells that afternoon. On a long rest, you can get one in before the afternoon. Big difference, and something that happens a lot, I think.
I get where you're coming from. I try to fill in the gaps left by my players whenever I can, rather than disallow their choices, but there's a strong argument to be made that that shouldn't be the DM's job. Also, I'm a bit of an optimizer, so I'm more sympathetic of those types of players. In any case, if a player is going to be a problem, for whatever reason, it's certainly the DM's prerogative and duty to deal with them, to avoid the problem.
See, that's my power-gamer side talking... I was thinking more of grappling, flying, and dropping enemies, than protecting my character from lethal falling damage. :D
I tend to consider balance as a pretty fragile thing, but I'll admit I have insufficient evidence to support that.
Objectively speaking, though, the specific case of disallowing mid-long-cast spellcasting doesn't seem to have a big impact, considering how infrequently long-cast spells are used mid-combat. (In my specific case, though, it's a change I feel is unnecessary. But I would certainly not complain if I played with a DM that ruled that way.)
I find odd that you feel switching from long rests to daily slots would be a significant change. Do characters in your games routinely take long rests multiple times per day? In my table, we're all old farts, who've been playing since Basic, so we're used to "daily spells", and hence our adventures tend to have one big encounter per day, at most, and very rarely have small encounters during the adventuring day. So we, in effect, still have "daily spells", we rarely take short rests. And yes, that means Warlocks are mostly screwed, something I've been trying to fix. (We rotate the DM slot, so when it's my turn, I try to do multiple smaller encounters rather than a single big one, some of the time. But at least one player complained about moving forward after an encounter without "taking a long rest" (i.e. sleeping for the night): they insisted it made no sense to keep adventuring while not being at full power, that any reasonable adventurer would wait until they got all their spell slots and hitpoints back before continuing. Yah, it's tough to teach an old dog new tricks.)
I see it as maintaining the theme, feel, and nature of the campaign. If I'm the DM, and I and the players say "We're playing a campaign that's (insert adjective here--gritty and realistic, role-playing intensive, PCs-as-central-to-world-shaking-plots, etc etc)" and a player wants to do something with their character that will totally break the campaign in those terms, it is my role to stop that from happening. If we're decidedly not playing a power-gaming campaign, and someone tries to power-game, to allow that would be to allow that one player to have fun at the expense of the rest of the table. If no one else is power-gaming, the power gamer takes over combat, and in my experience also usually turns into the overbearing sort of rules-lawyer.
It comes down to one basic rule that applies to everyone--you have to have more than just a purely mechanical rule for major changes to your character. Changes in class, changes in which deity your cleric serves, etc etc. Otherwise it's just power-gaming, which won't fit in well with 90% of the games I run. I can power-game too, but if this isn't that game, it doesn't fit in here, that's all.
No, totally. Dropping people from high up is, and should be, super lethal. For PCs as well. If you don't die from falling 200 feet, then why do you suffer damage when an arrow hits you or a rock falls on you? D&D falling damage is like playing a video game with very realistic physics, but suddenly finding a crack in the code that lets you, well, fall from a plane and live. Disappointing to the overall experience of playing the game.
And those rules came from a total misunderstanding of Gygax's falling rules anyway. Not that I'm one for 'the old guys who wrote the first game are always right'. Far from it. But the D&D falling rules came from a mistake, never made any sense whatsoever, and with a max damage cap now, make even less sense. And from what I can tell, no one has ever really cared that they are absurd. :)
It actually happens quite a lot. If you're on some sort of mission/dungeon crawl with a continuous plot, the difference between "We'll find an empty cave and hole up for 8 hours" and "We'll find an empty cave and hole up for 20 hours" can be hugely significant. In my campaign right now, we're frequently running into situations where we have to go do something at night in the city, and then we discover something important, and need to go take care of that thing ASAP. So if we go on a raid at 2am, and use spells, and now we need to go stop the bad guys that afternoon from achieving their goals--if your spells restock every day, you're out of spells that afternoon. On a long rest, you can get one in before the afternoon. Big difference, and something that happens a lot, I think.
Looking for new subclasses, spells, magic items, feats, and races? Opinions welcome :)