Qestion about implied material

[caimbuel]

What are the implied materials available when people ask questions? Anything I can dream up that is published? Anything WoC does for 3.x and pazio for pathfinder? Or is 3rd party generally acceptable. I only ask because a lot of threads don't specify and it truly is not help to tell them to use something they can't.

Sorry in advance if this is badwrongfun to ask her, just trying to reduce mistakes in the future. Thanks in advance.

[Red Fel]

What are the implied materials available when people ask questions? Anything I can dream up that is published? Anything WoC does for 3.x and pazio for pathfinder? Or is 3rd party generally acceptable. I only ask because a lot of threads don't specify and it truly is not help to tell them to use something they can't.

Sorry in advance if this is badwrongfun to ask her, just trying to reduce mistakes in the future. Thanks in advance.

As a rule, if a person doesn't specify materials in the OP and doesn't attach a PF or 3.0/3.5 tag, I ask upfront about allowed sources. I then explicitly proceed upon the assumption that any first-party materials are permitted. A sample might look like this:

You may want to indicate whether your DM is allowing PF, 3.0, or 3.5 materials, and which sources (if any) are included/excluded.

That said, assuming everything is go, this looks like a great opportunity for the Warblade (Tome of Battle) to really shine...
Like that.

[AuraTwilight]

In general, the forum assumes first party only if it's not specified; not out of personal preferences or quality or anything so much as there's effectively infinite homebrew/third party material.

[Kantolin]

In general, the vibe seems to be the following. In most cases it's safest to just list books.

3.5
- All WoTC books are generally acceptable (Completes, PHB2, Races of, Tome of Magic/Battle, Draconomicon, etc)
- Some groups dislike Psionics or Tome of Battle, but if that's not stated it's usually assumed to be acceptable
- Online web enhancements and articles are also generally considered acceptable (With a provided link).
- Setting specific books /can/ be acceptable, just note that they're setting specific (Eberron, FR, Dragonlance)
- Dragon Magazine is unlikely to be acceptable but is often stated with a magazine reference.
- 3.0 books are unlikely to be acceptable, but are sometimes mentioned.
- Homebrew seems unlikely to be accepted, but a lot of homebrew gets positive accolades and can be encouraged.

Pathfinder
- All Paizo books generally seem acceptable
- Third party pathfinder books are unlikely to be accepted
- Dreamscarred Press is in the middle. A lot of games are 'First party Paizo or DSP', while some ban it for being third party.

Generally, I'd say suggest what you'd like, but if it's on the 'less likely' side then consider alternate options as well. So you might say 'An Aegis (http://www.d20pfsrd.com/psionics-unleashed/classes/aegis/)absolutely does exactly what you want, but a barbarian can sort of work'. Be sure to include references and/or links as appropriate for maximum help.

[eggynack]

If no book list is specified, then you should absolutely assume no 3rd party, just as a basic premise. If you really want to suggest that stuff, I'd advise suggesting it in the same manner you would homebrew. Beyond that, you should probably ask about book access, but if you'd rather skip that step, there are layers to how generally accepted books are. At the top is core, accepted in nearly all games, followed by material in the d20 SRD (http://www.d20srd.org/), because it's so accessible, then stuff on the level of the completes/MIC/SPC, because they're pretty common, then less common non-setting specific stuff, like dungeonscape, monster manuals past I, and magic of incarnum, then setting specific stuff, maybe weighted towards more common fare like eberron campaign setting over more obscure books, and finally dragon magazine, right between 1st and 3rd party.

There's some nuance beyond that, I think, like where web material fits into things, how you work in 3.0 stuff, and the fact that ToB is often unfairly maligned and thus banned more than it should be, but you can usually rule of thumb that stuff. Overall though, while weighting things a bit dependent on how common they are is reasonable, in the absence of information, it's usually fine to just assume that everything's on the table, especially if your answer's a fast one. Like, if someone asks how to get hands in a wild shape, then I won't hesitate to toss out obscure stuff like fangshields substitution levels and gloves of man, but if they ask what the best spells are at all levels, I'm not going into that without clear direction. It's really a question of how much time you're willing to waste listing useless stuff, rather than a question of how much you're inconveniencing the guy asking questions with useless answers.

[caimbuel]

Pretty much what I thought, I thank you for the feedback however. Got tired of pazio's forums getting uptight when the word "optimized" is mentioned. Also the psionic hate over there but that is another matter.