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Katana_Geldar
2010-04-19, 11:15 PM
It started with just me, but now there's more than one person in my gaming group that is willing to DM, and we've had a few issues regarding character creation.

To start with, I played it safe and asked everyone to stick to the Core Books and the various splat like Martial and Divine Power...but for some reason people have ignored that and gone to Dragon Magazine.

Now I am a subscriber, but not everyone in our group is (including some of the DMs, on) which is why I asked people not to use Dragon. I've also had the sneaking suspicion that some of what comes out through Dragon (like feats, for instance) is not very balanced and can get get rather Munchkiny. Particularly when our group's resident munchkin has gotten almost everything from it.

It is also rather hard to look stuff up if someone has used Dragon without the character builder, which can be a problem if the first time you see a character sheet is five minutes before you play.

Is there anyway I can justify my argument in having Dragon banned from our games?

senrath
2010-04-19, 11:29 PM
You're the DM, you shouldn't have to justify your decision to ban Dragon Magazine. But what you've already said (mainly the fact that not everyone has access to it) should already be justification enough.

Vitruviansquid
2010-04-19, 11:32 PM
First of all, I agree with the sentiment that, as the DM, you need not justify this.

Second,


Now I am a subscriber, but not everyone in our group is (including some of the DMs, on) which is why I asked people not to use Dragon. I've also had the sneaking suspicion that some of what comes out through Dragon (like feats, for instance) is not very balanced and can get get rather Munchkiny.

is a perfectly good justification. Or rather, they're two perfectly good justifications.

arguskos
2010-04-19, 11:35 PM
I'm going to chime in just to say that just because someone is the DM doesn't mean they are free from justifying their actions.

That said, yeah, you have all the reasons you need, IMO.

Katana_Geldar
2010-04-19, 11:37 PM
I'm not The DM, just happen to be one of them.

But I will bring it up when we meet next.

arguskos
2010-04-19, 11:38 PM
I'm not The DM, just happen to be one of them.

But I will bring it up when we meet next.
Still, when it's your turn, ask them not to use said material. Unless you rotate DMs without changing games, which would be... odd.

If that IS the case, meet with your fellow DMs, and make the case to just them, and then once you convince them, use that consensus to convince everyone.

Mando Knight
2010-04-19, 11:39 PM
Now, see, Dragon's actually pretty balanced this time around, though it does include some odd elements that occasionally have significantly more power. However, if they're trying to cheese their characters out by jumping straight to Dragon, it's well within your rights to slap them on the wrists for being so silly. A lot of the early material they should be looking at is in a published book anyway: Weapon Expertise/Focus, feats from X Power and the PHBs, and the books' powers are more than enough to fill up an entire 30 level build, and for most classes will end up about as strong as a 30 level build with as much of the cheesiest stuff from Dragon crammed in.

Gralamin
2010-04-20, 12:40 AM
As long as a majority of the DMs agree, I see no problem with doing away with it.

Thajocoth
2010-04-20, 02:06 AM
If I was a player in your group, I'd argue with you, explain how Dragon stuff isn't overpowered, and how others not subscribing shouldn't have to effect me, especially since I AM paying for something extra... Ultimately though, I am not in your group, so I don't really care, and as DM, you can decide whatever you wish to.

Angelmaker
2010-04-20, 02:46 AM
If I was a player in your group, I'd argue with you, explain how Dragon stuff isn't overpowered, and how others not subscribing shouldn't have to effect me, especially since I AM paying for something extra... Ultimately though, I am not in your group, so I don't really care, and as DM, you can decide whatever you wish to.
If everyone in the group is ok with you having access to something, some MIGHT consider broken or overpowered, then of course you could argue it that way.

But if I were in your game group as a fellow gamer, Iīd argue since I donīt enjoy a disparity between the choices WE as a group have in building our characters, you should stick to the sources WE all have available.:smallbiggrin:

But at least Iīm neither in your or the OP gaming group, so it really isnīt up to me. Iīd consider "Please stick to the sources we all have access to" as kind and fair enough, since we as a group want to have fun. Pulling ominous feat out of some dusty tome of knowledge isnīt going to help with that, so put it away.

Katana_Geldar
2010-04-20, 02:47 AM
Just been talking to the others, we have decided to let some races and classes from Dragon, but not feats. Which satisifies all parties.

And we have agreed to be careful with what we'll allow.

New players won't be allowed to use Dragon at first, similar sort of rule that I have in Star Wars anyway.

Kurald Galain
2010-04-20, 03:55 AM
I've also had the sneaking suspicion that some of what comes out through Dragon (like feats, for instance) is not very balanced and can get get rather Munchkiny.

I know that Dragon has a poor reputation, but at least since 4E came out, this is largely undeserved. Most of the material printed in Dragon is of weak to average power, and most of the "OMG uber" options come straight from Core material. The occasional slip-up tends to be fixed in the end-of-the-month compilation of Dragon; so disallowing everything until it's compiled sounds fair to me.

There are, yes, a handful of exceptions (dice of auspicuous cheese come to mind); but the ratio of "broken stuff" to "OK stuff" seems, if anything, to be lower in Dragon than in the books.

tcrudisi
2010-04-20, 04:38 AM
I know that Dragon has a poor reputation, but at least since 4E came out, this is largely undeserved. Most of the material printed in Dragon is of weak to average power, and most of the "OMG uber" options come straight from Core material. The occasional slip-up tends to be fixed in the end-of-the-month compilation of Dragon; so disallowing everything until it's compiled sounds fair to me.

There are, yes, a handful of exceptions (dice of auspicuous cheese come to mind); but the ratio of "broken stuff" to "OK stuff" seems, if anything, to be lower in Dragon than in the books.

As an optimizer, I endorse everything Kurald just said. Yes, there is some great stuff in Dragon, but when building a character, most of the stuff comes from the books and not Dragon.

mackejn
2010-04-20, 08:03 AM
Honestly, he may just be grabbing stuff from the character builder too. It may have less to do with reading dragon than it is seeing neat options in the character builder.

1of3
2010-04-20, 08:07 AM
Now I am a subscriber, but not everyone in our group is (including some of the DMs, on) which is why I asked people not to use Dragon.

A single subscription allows for FIVE updates a month. Not to mention that you hardly need to update every month to use the character builder.... You get it, right?

valadil
2010-04-20, 08:38 AM
If I was a player in your group, I'd argue with you, explain how Dragon stuff isn't overpowered, and how others not subscribing shouldn't have to effect me, especially since I AM paying for something extra... Ultimately though, I am not in your group, so I don't really care, and as DM, you can decide whatever you wish to.

This attitude is why I quit playing CCGs and switched to RPGs. It was too easy for the rich kids to do well because they could spend more money on good cards. Buying a DDI subscription does not entitle you to use DDI content in someone else's game.

Anyway, I've found Dragon to be harmless in 4e. I started a game a few months ago and told the players they could use Dragon content on a case by case basis, but they had to run it by me first. So far I've approved everything they've shown me, except for one feat. Because 4e is still a new system and classes are published with specific build paths, I really like that 4e is giving my players more options beyond the standard good builds. But it's your game and you should do what you want with it. I'll also point out that DDI subscriptions have been passed around in my game and everyone has equal access in their character builders.

Kurald Galain
2010-04-20, 09:08 AM
So far I've approved everything they've shown me, except for one feat.

Out of curiosity, which one?

Tiki Snakes
2010-04-20, 09:50 AM
As a compromise suggestion; perhaps stick to compiled versions of Dragon only? Generally, any slightly wonky stuff is tidied up by that point, whereas once or twice an error or so has snuck through at the individual article stage.

Really, it's pretty balanced on the whole, though. I'm not suprised your Resident Munchkin has a fair bit of stuff from it though. Because Dragon is where the less obvious stuff, or the more quirky stuff, or so on tends to turn up. It's often the place to look for 'something a bit different'. Between this, and the sheer volume of dragon matirial, many people who enjoy tinkering around with builds themselves will end up with a bit of Dragon here and there.

If you're worried, it's worth vetting character sheets to make sure everything is kosher.
And if the other DM's agree, there's no huge problem in banning dragon. All you'll really be losing is more options.

valadil
2010-04-20, 09:58 AM
Out of curiosity, which one?

Not sure of the name. I think it was Master of all Trades. It was like Jack of all Trades but +3 to untrained skills instead of +2. I didn't object to the power level of it, but I felt it made trained skills less meaningful.

Mando Knight
2010-04-20, 10:05 AM
Just been talking to the others, we have decided to let some races and classes from Dragon, but not feats. Which satisifies all parties.

Then you should also allow the feats made for the Dragon-only races and classes, since otherwise they end up without the support they need to compete with the printed material, since Dragon is the only source for feats similar to the class/race specific feats in the PHBs and X Power books.

Draz74
2010-04-20, 10:11 AM
Not sure of the name. I think it was Master of all Trades. It was like Jack of all Trades but +3 to untrained skills instead of +2. I didn't object to the power level of it, but I felt it made trained skills less meaningful.

Bard of All Trades. (Bard-specific.)

Kurald Galain
2010-04-20, 10:16 AM
Then you should also allow the feats made for the Dragon-only races and classes,

That would make sense. Note that I only count three dragon-only races, and only a single class, so this doesn't strike me as a big deal.

Erom
2010-04-20, 10:38 AM
I notice this is 4e - do you guys use the character builder? I know I rarely if ever even look at where my stuff came from anymore. It never even enters into the mental calculation anymore - it's just picking from the tasty items on the "menu". I'm not saying you should change your stance - just defending your players who may not even realize they're taking Dragon stuff, until they get done and think "Oh yeah, we have that weird source restriction this campaign. Well, let's go back through and see if I messed up anywhere..."

There may be no malice in taking Dragon stuff from your players - with the character builder, it's really easy to do accidentally!

valadil
2010-04-20, 11:05 AM
There may be no malice in taking Dragon stuff from your players - with the character builder, it's really easy to do accidentally!

The campaign settings tab lets you restrict which sources are available. By default, they're all enabled. I kinda wish Dragon Magazine was grouped together so you could remove all of it instead of clicking through each article, but software design was never WotC's strong suit.

Katana_Geldar
2010-04-21, 05:55 AM
The only way we can get Dragon is through character builder. And I think that is how many people get it anyway.

BTW, the guy is playing a Revenant Assassin. And he's a Munchkin Powergamer, a self-confessed one. Need to be very careful with what he wants. In my SW game, where I'm the only Gm and have more authority, I outruled his taking Skill Focus twice and said he could take it again at level 10 and not before.

Kurald Galain
2010-04-21, 06:12 AM
BTW, the guy is playing a Revenant Assassin. And he's a Munchkin Powergamer, a self-confessed one.
All right... revenant assassin is at its core just a useful combination because its stats line up, and the revenant racial is a striker power. I don't believe there's anything particularly wonky about assassins.

However, revenants do have certain issues, particularly if he follows up on either the "half elf soul" line of feats, or the "extra actions when you're dying" line of feats. None of this is problematic at heroic tier, but may be an issue at paragon and epic.

TheEmerged
2010-04-21, 07:45 AM
First of all, I agree with the sentiment that, as the DM, you need not justify this.

Sign me up on that parade as well. It helps if you're using your own campaign world. My previous rule was that if it wasn't published in a hardbound book it wasn't official; I've amended it to include the race books.

JediSoth
2010-04-21, 08:25 AM
If your players are using the Character Builder from DDI, the solution is very simple. You can set up a Campaign Options file where you select which sources you want to be available for your campaign. You then disseminate this file to your players and they load it prior to working on their characters in the Character Builder. IIRC options from books you didn't check won't even show up. They can force the issue, but then it will label their character as illegal for your campaign.

Of course, if you're approaching 4E from an old-school character-building perspective and people are actually creating their characters on paper, then this won't work. :smalltongue:

Thajocoth
2010-04-21, 04:04 PM
The only way we can get Dragon is through character builder. And I think that is how many people get it anyway.

BTW, the guy is playing a Revenant Assassin. And he's a Munchkin Powergamer, a self-confessed one. Need to be very careful with what he wants. In my SW game, where I'm the only Gm and have more authority, I outruled his taking Skill Focus twice and said he could take it again at level 10 and not before.

I played a Revenant Assassin once. A lot of fun. Very mobile class... Revenants are VERY risky to play though. When knocked to 0, they stay up. This makes it far more likely that they'll hit -bloodied and die instantly, but also might give them a chance to Second Wind when below 0.

I had a few combinations of things... One of which required the DM to make a judgment call on how this should work.

As my previous race, I was a Tiefling, so I could take Tiefling feats. I took the feat to give myself Infernal Wrath, allowing me to select each encounter between my Tiefling or Revenant racial power. Then I took a Tiefling feat that replaces Infernal Wrath with a daily transformation power. The way the DM ruled it is, if I use my Tiefling daily in an encounter, then I can't use my Revenant encounter and vice versa, and the daily can still only be used once per day. A less generous DM would've ruled that whichever power I use first in a day, I lose the ability to use the other that day at all. (I told the DM both interpretations and let him decide.)

The other combination was poison damage. A Mordant Weapon can make everything poison damage, and Assassins can take feats to ignore poison resistance and add additional damage when dealing poison damage.

The Dragonmark feat that adds 1 to any shift or teleport is very useful for an Assassin, as they can teleport from adjacent to one creature to adjacent to another as a move at-will (3, 4 or 5 spaces, depending on tier).

Assassins don't, however, deal as much damage as other strikers. Instead, they're very controllery with high mobility, so none of what I did was particularly broken. The Warforged Barbarian in the group was dealing far more damage... I did a lot towards setting up flanks and such.

The party wiped at the end of the first session. My character survived because he ran away 2 rounds before the wipe, thinking his party wasn't stupid enough to stay in an obvious wipe. That ended that campaign...

demidracolich
2010-04-21, 07:58 PM
{Scrubbed}

Mando Knight
2010-04-21, 08:22 PM
Except when Roland comes around and tells you he can't let you do that.