How permissive of a DM are you?

[SangoProduction]

I read a closed thread just recently. Can't go to bed. Despite literally getting like 2 hours sleep in the past 48.
Boiled down to: "Ask your GM to make a ruling."

Which had me thinking: "Eh. I might allow this. At least for a trial run."
I am generally an incredibly permissive DM. Even the junk that is a real, real stretch... so long as it's being used for a cool effect or story deal. I am less permissive when it comes to "This just gives me like +20 to all my stats. This rule here doesn't say I can't."

But obviously, most of the stuff that is a real stretch does come with... consequences. (Like my "chef" mage, whose spells are food... so he prepares the bad guy's breakfast... and the bad guy eats it. My GM was very much like "Ah. Well, this isn't going to be common, but I'll say he gave up his save for this. Next time, tell me it's magic food before you attempt that.") So, I do like to also preface it that the ruling may need to be taken back if it becomes an issue.

I know a lot of people are "If it's not by the books, it's not in my game."
So... out of sheer sleep-deprived curiosity, I come to you, the GITP community, asking this question.

[aglondier]

Fairly willing to accept anything that doesn't rediculously overbalance the party. If one character suddenly overwhelms the rest of the party, those players aren't going to be enjoying themselves. Something that enhances the game for everyone is a much better option.

That said, if what they want really doesn't fit with the setting established by the DM and play style of the group, then I'm going to need a really good justification and the character is probably going to suffer for it...I've lost players before because they couldn't or wouldn't play characters that fit into the group.

[NichG]

I'd say pretty permissive, but there's a sort of protocol to it I guess? Like, if someone wants to go a certain way I'll basically work with them to make that possible in almost any case, but if someone said 'I have this big chunk of external rules text I want to bring in as is', I'd insist on basically rewriting it for the campaign rather than just using it as is in most cases. But I'd be generally willing to actually do that versus just saying 'no'. Similarly, if someone wants to pull some infinite loop 'because the rules say I can', I won't allow that or it just won't work exactly like they expect. But if someone wants to go a certain direction and they were using that infinite loop because its the only way to hack together a way to get there in the system, I'd give them a way to pursue it without the loop. Sometimes there are also constraints I want the game to satisfy, and regardless of the rules source, if something would break those constraints I'll go OOC and explain the constraint to the players involved, change whatever rules need to be changed to preserve it, and offer rebuilds if necessary.

[lylsyly]

All 7 of us at our table are pretty permissive. Let's see;
All skills are class skills and each class gets +2 points
Always play Gestalt with all 1st party books available
Can Prc on boths sides of the build
LA+3 is free so use it up
starting array is 18, 18, 16, 16, 14, 14
Ability Score increaes ala VoP ​Which can so open doors aand are proficient with all simple weapons
PF Bard and Monk instead of 3.5 classes
PF Skill bundles and feat progression
Very easy on stupid alignment and race restrictions

yeah that'll do and that's only about half of it LOL

[Biggus]

so long as it's being used for a cool effect or story deal. I am less permissive when it comes to "This just gives me like +20 to all my stats. This rule here doesn't say I can't."

I am very much this...


I know a lot of people are "If it's not by the books, it's not in my game."


...and very much not this.

If I trust my players not to abuse it, I'll allow new feats, spells, classes, whatever. If something isn't adequately covered by the rules, I'm perfectly happy to use house rules, third party content etc. So in that way I'm very permissive.

On the other hand, if an ability makes someone game-breakingly powerful, I'm going to nerf it. Likewise, I don't like breaking the suspension of disbelief by allowing things which don't make any sense even in the context of a fantasy world, just because a strictly literal reading of the rules says you can. So in that way I'm not very permissive at all, at least by the standards of these boards (by the standards of DMs I've actually played with, I'm not very far from the average).

[Crake]

When it comes to character builds, I'm far more willing to sit down with the player and homebrew something that fits what they want to build as a character, rather than making players jump through hoops to try and shoehorn together a build to fit what they want.

When it comes to in game actions and choices and situations of "Can I do this?" I try to err on the side of fitting within the framework of the rules for a consistent world that the players can play in.

In both cases, I will tend to look at the player in quesiton and try to discern where there intent lies with making choices. If I feel like they're making choices from a roleplay and in character perspective, I will tend to be more lenient, but if I feel like they're metagaming or just pushing for raw character power, then I will probably be more strict. Obviously this approach relies on knowing your players fairly well, but that's why I've begun leaning toward more rules light systems like FATE as of late. Harder to munchkin the rules when there aren't as many.

[Buufreak]

All 7 of us at our table are pretty permissive. Let's see;
All skills are class skills and each class gets +2 points
Always play Gestalt with all 1st party books available
Can Prc on boths sides of the build
LA+3 is free so use it up
starting array is 18, 18, 16, 16, 14, 14
Ability Score increaes ala VoP ​Which can so open doors aand are proficient with all simple weapons
PF Bard and Monk instead of 3.5 classes
PF Skill bundles and feat progression
Very easy on stupid alignment and race restrictions

yeah that'll do and that's only about half of it LOL

None of this sounds like permissive. It all sounds like making powerful characters from level 1 all for the sake of "balance."

As to the question at hand, I don't think I've outright said no to much of anything other than someone trying to take the entire theoretical build and shoving it into their first level. Gotta play the game and earn that.

[Crake]

None of this sounds like permissive. It all sounds like making powerful characters from level 1 all for the sake of "balance."

Yeah, I'd be inclined to agree. Simply having a houserule baseline that's significantly above the standard bar doesn't really mean you're permissive.

[Quertus]

Eh, mu? Perhaps I should describe the *directions* in which I’m flexible, specific to 3e.

Want to follow the rules? Want to follow a different interpretation of the rules than what I read, but still makes sense for English? Want to use a different version of a named concept than someone else at the same table? That’s fine. You can use Reserves of Strength to bypass the cap by up to 3, or to completely bypass level caps, only when activated or always on, even if someone else at the table is using the same feat to different effect. What you *can’t* do is go outside the group’s balance range, regardless of what rules or interpretations you use. Balance to the table.

Want to create your own custom things - like spells or items - in accordance with the rules? Even if there aren’t rules for these particular things? That’s fine. We’ll figure out the rules for your Ever-warm Teapot. What you can’t do is go outside the group’s balance range. Balance to the table.

Want to create custom things - like some new races or classes - that there’s not really good rules for? Ok… maybe… but there’s been some problems with this, so at some of my tables, expect some of the other players to have pulled out magnifying glasses and clue-by-fours. Balance to the table - or else!

Want to run an existing character from another game? Sure, no problem… unless I happen to have put you in a special snowflake scenario where that doesn’t make sense.

Want to run a character (new or existing) from another system / another universe, like a Naruto Jedi? Sure, let’s see what we can do. (Curiously, this *hasn’t* been problematic, so no magnifying glasses or clue-by-fours from the other players yet).

Want to take an action not covered by the rules? Sure, no problem; however, don’t expect high default performance without clear “this is obviously a good idea” signaling from reality. If you want to use Craft: braids instead of Diplomacy? Well, if that’s something the target actually cares about, that might be valuable.

Want to “roll Diplomacy” at them? Um, no. That determines their attitude towards you, not replaces their brains with jello. Unless you’ve got friends irl who would do that (in which case, hook me up), don’t expect “but they’re friendly” to allow stupid stuff.

Want to introduce your cool new fumble rules? **** off. Same for wanting to play a Kender.

Want to splat dive, build a character that requires more books than you can carry? Want to play a Psion with Bo9S moves, or a character whose list of classes exceeds my short-term memory buffer? Sure, cool.

Want to keep the crunch, but take a chainsaw to the fluff? (What is that called? “Refluffing”?) Eh, maybe.

Want to slow the game down looking up your spells on your turn, asking questions that show you weren’t paying attention, or bog things down with non-Persisted, conditional “+X” buffs? Here’s the door.

Want to try to survive under me at 1st level, especially as a d4 HD class? Good luck. Want me to make everything “level appropriate”? Yeah, that’s unlikely. Want to bat above your level, and utterly own something without ever rolling the dice, and earn full XP? Sure thing - in fact, expect bonus XP for having a clever idea.

There’s other ways I’m flexible and inflexible, but that seems long enough already.


that's why I've begun leaning toward more rules light systems like FATE as of late. Harder to munchkin the rules when there aren't as many.

Is that the one where I wanted to topple some oil drums at an orc squad, and was asked why? Where’s my response was, I wanted the potential to: break up their squad (they lose the befits of their #formation tag); Damage the orcs; give the orcs the #coveredinoil tag; give the area the same tag; Create noise, giving the area the #witnesses tag; Create a #police clock; potentially alert the party (if nearby); leave evidence / clues / bread crumbs for the party; created a distraction to improve the odds that I lose the orcs; “Sense Motive” on which of these the orcs noticed / considered / cares about. You know, all the things that are *logical consequences* of that action. And I was told that the system doesn’t do logical consequences, just singular “X causes y” (il)logic, gated behind roles based on attributes corresponding to the desired attempt?

If so, I find “lighter” rules more constricting… and more likely for my thought process to be considered “munchkinry”.

[Crake]

Is that the one where I wanted to topple some oil drums at an orc squad, and was asked why? Where’s my response was, I wanted the potential to: break up their squad (they lose the befits of their #formation tag); Damage the orcs; give the orcs the #coveredinoil tag; give the area the same tag; Create noise, giving the area the #witnesses tag; Create a #police clock; potentially alert the party (if nearby); leave evidence / clues / bread crumbs for the party; created a distraction to improve the odds that I lose the orcs; “Sense Motive” on which of these the orcs noticed / considered / cares about. You know, all the things that are *logical consequences* of that action. And I was told that the system doesn’t do logical consequences, just singular “X causes y” (il)logic, gated behind roles based on attributes corresponding to the desired attempt?

If so, I find “lighter” rules more constricting… and more likely for my thought process to be considered “munchkinry”.

I mean, I don’t know if it was or not, but a bad DM can make any system bad. Sounds like the DM was either not very familiar with the rules, or wanted to be much more controlling.

Or, you know, you’re thinking of a different system.

The way it would have happened in FATE is that, instead of affecting all those different individuals, the SCENE itself would simply have gained the “spilled oildrums” aspect (thats what they refer to the “tags” as you put them), and perhaps some of the orcs would have received the “covered in oil” aspect depending probably on some opposed rolls and how successful you were, and that could be exploited by anyone in the scene in any way that they could find that makes sense.

[ahyangyi]

Ideally, the players could just come up with whatever they want to and I'd balance things while trying to keep their concept intact.

But, in reality, that's impossible, because I don't have that energy to read all those third party source books, nor do I study all the subtle interactions between them.

For example, I know the standard suggestion is "don't mix Path of War with Sphere of Might", but I don't really know the details. So, if someone comes up with a complex character that uses a Path of War class, the trades its weapon and armor proficiency away for some Sphere of Might content, then I would probably have to nope it because I really don't understand them well enough…

EDIT: by the way, considering that this is d20 subforum, not generic TRPG subforum, may I suggest that the discussion about FATE is slightly off-topic?

[icefractal]

Fairly permissive.
I like unusual interactions as a player, and so as a GM I make things more flexible in what can be combined with what. For example in PF, using part of one archetype and part of another, as long as you're not trading away a pure-negative. Not allowed RAW, but makes for more possibilities and often fits characters better. Same thing with combining things that would logically work together but don't technically combine - I'm not saying I'd say everything combines with everything blindly, but if it's mechanically not ridiculous then why not?

Also, this means 3PP is all on the table, including homebrew by the players (although few have done so) - some of it (SoP/SoM, PoW, Psionics, Akasha) is automatic, others is case-by-case, but really the source of something matters less than whether it's reasonable on its own merits.

The one thing I'm kinda strict on is that things need to usually work the same for PCs and NPCs. So something like infinite loops - no, because that would turn the world into a post-singularity situation that the rules can't handle. And "well just for me only, and I won't go infinite with it" just isn't legit, IMO. Same thing with lose-no-save tricks - would you as players be ok with a foe having this? If no, then don't bring it to the table. The foes are more often going to be the ones on the back foot (because IME, players like being Tucker's Kobolds significantly more than facing them), but that's not a categorical promise - NPCs do have the ability to be as smart as PCs and use any mechanics fully.

[pabelfly]

For world-building and character creation, I'd consider myself pretty permissive.

I'm about to start a new campaign. Before I did that, I had the players help me make a setting using the Microscope RPG system, which allowed the players to build the world they wanted to play in and let me know what races they wanted. This resulted in a homebrew "mixed race" template that lets a player combine two races together, a twenty-level progression for a Phoenix with choice of extra at-will spells, modified rules to make riding dragons easier, and a large monstrous centipede with added Half-Dragon template progression baked-on.

When running a game, I do my best to follow the internal rules and mechanics of DnD. Players are free to attempt to do cool things and innovate - I think that's a point in favour of tabletop gaming over a video game RPG - but there are rules to follow when attempting these things and there's no guarantee that it will succeed .

[Quertus]

EDIT: by the way, considering that this is d20 subforum, not generic TRPG subforum, may I suggest that the discussion about FATE is slightly off-topic?

That’s true, and you can suggest, but this is the Playground, where there’s no topic like off-topic. :smallbiggrin: Actually, it’s usually worse the other way around, where 3e intrudes on general roleplaying topics.

Still, this conversation ties into the primary topic in several ways. For example…


a bad DM

Yeah, in all my years of gaming, I’ve only had 1 GM I’d trust to simultaneously a) usually see and implement most of those logical consequences, making the world feel believable rather than simply a cardboard cutout for a game; b) roleplay the orcs as not necessarily seeing exactly the same thing as the GM; c) present the orcs’ responses and actions in such a way as to make adequately transparent their culture / thought process / motivations; d) ask for clarification if what they saw didn’t match up with what they perceived my (character’s) motivation/goal to be. In fact, I struggle to remember even a handful of GMs I’d trust with even a single one of those points.

Which, germane to the thread topic, is related to another way I’m flexible. Despite my intolerance of questions that indicate the player wasn’t paying attention, I’m quite happy to field questions for additional details, that show engagement. The sacred responsibility of the GM is to act as the interface between the world and the players, to act as the PCs’ eyes and ears. And if my description doesn’t contain the details that are important to you / your character? I’m more than happy to fix that without snide comments about wasting time with inattentive sloth.

[thatothersting]

Permissive. I have one strict, straightforward rule: if you can do it, so can I. Players set their own boundaries, essentially, which works out fine because they police themselves quite well (and I take care to remind them that if they do X there are infinity more X just waiting to happen) since nobody wants to be on the RECEIVING end of a Locate City nuke.

Unless they do, I suppose? Might be interesting to play out those consequences, and with an interested party that wants to engage with the idea I think it'd be great, blah blah blah, you get the idea. If they want it, why not go with it? What do I lose? I can now have a game of fantasy geopolitics, this is great!


About the only thing I don't roll with is tons of homebrew. I'll certainly look it over, but if it's 3rd party and the creators are utterly unknown to me I'm not very likely to accept it unless everyone involved is really down with the idea, at which point it's "Well, I mean, I guess? But if this makes everything lame then that's your own fault." In the end, feeling out the world and how it responds to player action is fun for me, and I influencing the world is fun for them.


Within play, rules will just be made up on the fly if they have to be, but so long as it's logically possible there's no reason someone should be restricted from X, it's simply a matter of X not yet being covered. Wanna knock your idiot friend out of the air mid-jump because he's going to mess up a carefully laid plan? How about... a reflex save against an arbitrary value, and messing it up too badly means you didn't twist your giant two-handed sword right and got him with the edge of it instead of the flat? Now this is a thing we can do again later, for better or for worse, though it's unlikely to ever come up again.


Nothing remarkable, I guess, but I'm certainly far more permissive than any of my players-turned-DMs have been, so I'm just gonna roll with that label...

[D+1]

I'm probably still not as permissive as I like to think I am, but definitely as restrictive as I am afraid I should be.

[Arcanist]

I'd like to believe I am a fairly lax DM as far as restrictions go. I've seen a lot of outright absurd and genuinely insane things on my time coming and going from this forum and I can fairly say I am rather amiable to a lot of the stupid stuff that gets posted here as long as it is delivered in a persuasive and interesting manner. My current game is DM'ing a bunch of Half-Dragon Nobles. I'll post my rules for generating characters and stuff as well as unwritten rules I am using for this game:


What is written:
- Starting at 6th level, meaning 6th level starting wealth and experience (you may reduce your experience total to the bare minimum to be ECL 5 for item creation or spellcasting)
- Stats are rolled using 5d6 dropping the lowest 2 numbers OR a 32 point buy (https://srd.dndtools.org/srd/tools/toolsPointbuyCalc.html); You may CHOOSE between these two arrays if you are so inclined.
- the Half-Dragon template has a LA of +0 for this campaign.
- Players without the Half-Dragon template gain action points (Eberron Campaign Setting) instead and may take an additional Flaw.
- You are allowed ONE Flaw UNLESS you do not take the Half-Dragon template, in which case you are allowed two flaws
- Racial prerequisites can be ignored at your convenience.
- Any WoTC published source
- Any Dragon Magazine source*
- Any Dungeon Magazine source*
- Leadership is not allowed.
- Item Familiar is not allowed.
- Bloodlines are not allowed.
- Psionic and Magic use full transparency. A Psion in an Anti-Magic Field cannot manifest anymore than a Wizard in a Null-Psionic Field can cast spells.

* If you use a Dragon Magazine or Dungeon Magazine source, please cite it when I inspect your sheet (a note anywhere will suffice).

What isn't written
-These rules are mutable. If you have a request or want something in particular, feel free to message me on the side. You might even get XP or something spiffy for it!


Entire Grey Elf Party, all of them are Half-Silver, Half-Red Dragons and the Psion is a Half-Crystal Dragon.

Wizard 5 / Paragnostic Apostle 1; Standard Uncanny Forethought affair.
Cloistered Cleric 1 / Singer of Concordance 5 (I allowed it); Most of their feats are centered around Archery.
Cloistered Cleric 1 / Archivist 5; They have no idea how to play a caster, nor how to pick spells so I am just generating Archivist staples as part of their loot.
Shaper 5 / Chronorebel 1 (They asked for Hyperconsciousness and I allowed it, or rather, I forgot to explicitly allow it and they asked for it.)


My reasoning for being so lax is that well? We've been playing this game for over 15 years at this point? I'd like to believe that we know each other enough to not be "That Guy" to one another, and what is more? I am the DM. I just have more than them. So as long as they don't play anything that warps the fabric of the game? Go nuts. This is one of the few games where I get to hit players with stuff like Melting Fury and Dying Curses from the Book of Vile Darkness and them NOT being totally helpless to fix anything about it. I gave them about 13 Elven Rangers (Rogue 1/Ranger 3) and they spent most of the first session getting blasted by Destructive Retribution augmented Corpse Manes as I forced them to fight down a narrow chokepoint. They currently have 9 Elven Rangers, most of them are at half HP and I'm really curious if they're going to ask to take an in-game rest to heal and restore spell slots which I'm perfectly fine with. Ambushing them in the middle of the night since the Wizard is very anal about casting Rope Trick (in that they don't want to have to cast Rope Trick) is kind of something I'm jazzed about.

[PoeticallyPsyco]

My typical on-the-spot ruling for something that makes sense is "Sure, I'll allow it this session, and then look up the actual rules and/or craft a house rule once we're done." Keeps things moving.

[Vaern]

In my experience, there is usually a direct proportional correlation between a DM's leniency with the rules and the quantity of snacks and/or drinks presented prior to the start of a given session.

[SangoProduction]

My typical on-the-spot ruling for something that makes sense is "Sure, I'll allow it this session, and then look up the actual rules and/or craft a house rule once we're done." Keeps things moving.

exact same

[martixy]

I'd like to think I'm fairly permissive.
(But then again this thread feels like 7 out of 10 drivers saying they're above average.)

I have a persistomancer that needs a separate spreadsheet for their buff routine in my current game.

Character building wise I'd rather work with players to make a character concept rather than force them to dig through splats.

It's hard to assess myself in-game, because it's all so subjective. Like if something doesn't quite seem right, I'll usually ask the player for an explanation, and if they give a reasonable one, it happens. But then "reasonable" is based on my subjective opinion, so...


My typical on-the-spot ruling for something that makes sense is "Sure, I'll allow it this session, and then look up the actual rules and/or craft a house rule once we're done." Keeps things moving.
This all sounds super reasonable, but the next level of that is "Probably won't even come up the next session, and 3 sessions down the line I'd have forgotten it again.", so I've always considered that approach as lying to yourself 80% of the time.

[ahyangyi]

I happen to be reading this Pathfinder Cleric optimization handbook (https://docs.google.com/document/d/15_OF0nNyOvMjjdcKkpWRHzWKHP4oZWPMcBWpKGT9e9s/edit#heading=h.s2pjrsjj29x4) for fun.

It mentions Stargazer, a Pulura-exclusive prestige class that gives lots of good star-themed powers. The author rates it 6/5 (which means the author thinks it is brokenly good and suggest DMs ban it), then also writes that DMs should not be restrictive and should just let non-Pulura-worshipping players use the prestige class. Then the author also lists one of the "good reasons" to grab Stargazer is that it grants the player the rare and powerful Stars domain. However, if the player character is a cleric of Pulura, then they should already have access to the Stars domain...

It occurs to me that the suggestions are contradictory to each other. So it provoked me to think about it, "what if my player asks about Stargazer?"

My answer is:

I would not allow a Lalaci worshiper to grab Stargazer. If they just liked the mechanics of Stargazer, I might allow a rainbow-themed Stargazer-style homebrew or third-party prestige class to be taken instead.
I would allow a Desna worshiper to grab Stargazer (because, Desna explicitly has Stars as her area of concern, she just doesn't grant the domain), but I probably won't allow people use it as a way to cheese the Stars Domain in. They get Fate domain instead.


I'm not sure if this answer would be considered as permissive or not, but I think I am in line with martixy's idea:


Character building wise I'd rather work with players to make a character concept rather than force them to dig through splats.


And I guess we could use a few more concrete examples like this one, so we can gauge our permissiveness. Better than "most drivers think they above average" :)

[Quertus]

I'd like to think I'm fairly permissive.
(But then again this thread feels like 7 out of 10 drivers saying they're above average.)


And I guess we could use a few more concrete examples like this one, so we can gauge our permissiveness. Better than "most drivers think they above average" :)

“Do you consider yourself a slaveholder? … Maybe we should look at how we define ‘slavery’ and ‘ownership’ until the average person is ‘sometimes’ a slaveholder” is not the right answer.

Yes, I agree that the question has problems, and, yes, I agree that more detailed explanations are the correct direction; however, I do not believe that the problem is related to an “average” permissiveness.

99% of GMs could be “permissive” to my definitions, and that would be fine. 99% of GMs could *consider* themselves “permissive”, and that would be… fine… I suppose? What’s interesting… will vary from person to person, but what *I* find interesting is in which dimensions GMs are how flexible, how self-aware they are, and what that results in them saying about themselves.

[ahyangyi]

but what *I* find interesting is in which dimensions GMs are how flexible, how self-aware they are, and what that results in them saying about themselves.

Well, that was my intention when I proposed to have a few more concrete examples. I have a vague feeling that "permissive" is a multi-dimensional thing.

Permissiveness can be about during character creation or during gameplay; and they can be about mechanics or about themes/feelings. Hence I see at least four dimensions of permissiveness.

[Rynjin]

I'm permissive in the sense that for the most part as long as it's written down SOMEWHERE, I'll probably allow it. 1st party, 3rd party, no problem. Want to make up a distinct houserule that we use a lot going forward? Sure, let's write it down.

I'm less permissive when it comes to making up stuff on the fly. I used to make more ad hoc rulings, but it just because hard to keep track of random **** I said people could do sometime in the past just as like a fun thing to happen once that I started doing it less.

I like consistency, and I feel like most players do to, and I know for sure my players do. As long as A=A everything is kosher.

[Telonius]

I'm pretty permissive, as long as something isn't being used to try to break or seriously unbalance the game. If somebody wants to have a thematically cool thing, I'm more likely to nerf it a bit if it's overpowered (or buff it, if it's underpowered) than say no to it.

[pabelfly]

Then the author also lists one of the "good reasons" to grab Stargazer is that it grants the player the rare and powerful Stars domain. However, if the player character is a cleric of Pulura, then they should already have access to the Stars domain.

Not sure about the other contradictions, but a cleric of Pulura could conceivably grab any two of its other domains (Air, Chaos, Good, Weather, Azata (Chaos), Azata (Good), Cloud, or Seasons), and then after entering Stargazer, gain the Stars domain for a wider selection of domain spells and gain Stars domain powers too.

[ahyangyi]

Not sure about the other contradictions, but a cleric of Pulura could conceivably grab any two of its other domains (Air, Chaos, Good, Weather, Azata (Chaos), Azata (Good), Cloud, or Seasons), and then after entering Stargazer, gain the Stars domain for a wider selection of domain spells and gain Stars domain powers too.

Most other options from Pulura are mediocre, according to the same guide: Air (2.5), Chaos (2), Good (3), Weather (1.5), Azata (3-3.5), Cloud (3), Seasons (1).

Meanwhile, an imaginary Desna follower, if following the same guide, would have already grabbed two from Travel (5), Fate (5) and Liberation (5), and now asks for Stars (5) because GM should be permissive.

I don't know what I want to say in this post actually, but I guess the above comparison could provide some context.

[Mordante]

All 7 of us at our table are pretty permissive. Let's see;
All skills are class skills and each class gets +2 points
Always play Gestalt with all 1st party books available
Can Prc on boths sides of the build
LA+3 is free so use it up
starting array is 18, 18, 16, 16, 14, 14
Ability Score increaes ala VoP ​Which can so open doors aand are proficient with all simple weapons
PF Bard and Monk instead of 3.5 classes
PF Skill bundles and feat progression
Very easy on stupid alignment and race restrictions

yeah that'll do and that's only about half of it LOL

What is the reasoning behind these house rules? Because when I'm honest I don't understand these at all?

[lylsyly]

None of this sounds like permissive. It all sounds like making powerful characters from level 1 all for the sake of "balance."


What is the reasoning behind these house rules? Because when I'm honest I don't understand these at all?

Your answer lies above.

[Buufreak]

Can you be more specific?

[lylsyly]

It's like yoiu said, designed to create powerful 3rd level (where we start characters because we always play with LA+3 for free and start with ECL 6 characters. Because their are 6 PCs we add one more to EL so the minimum Encounter Level is 7).

Myself and 2 others have been together since OD&D and the other 4 go back to BECMI and 2E AD&D. We play 4-6 sessions a week. I only posted a little more than 1/3 of our COMMON table rules. All 7 of us take turns DMing and we all also have our own quirks. For instance, I have 1 campaign world that I don't allow setting specific stuff and another that only has 1 PC Class. We were doing gestalt characters back in 2E.

I feel no need to discuss how and why we have modified our game because the rules are just a framework to start with.

To each Table/DM their own.

[ahyangyi]

To be honest, I don't think people are questioning your houserules. Houserule are always “to each their own”.

However, people (including me) don't quite understand: why do you describe these houserules as “permissive”?

The OP's example about +20 to all stats is, if a player asks the GM for things that essentially gives them bigger numbers, as a GM they'd say no. And that is an example of the upper bound of their permissiveness. But that's completely different from a houserule that just give all players +20 to their stats. Very different incentives for the players.

[Crake]

To be honest, I don't think people are questioning your houserules.

I mean, Mordante was quite literally questioning them.

[Mordante]

removed post

[Crake]

removed post

you can actually properly delete your post by checking the "Delete this post in the following manner:" checkbox and then clicking the delete message button on the edit post page.

[Asmotherion]

Hey fellow insomniac. 48 hours and counting here.

Well, I consider myself a VERY permissive DM, in the sence that, when someone asks me "can I do this" and there are no rules on how to do "x" I will improvise some rules for it, as long as it's reasonably possible.

[Crake]

Hey fellow insomniac. 48 hours and counting here.

Oh, im not an insomniac, I’m just an aussie

[Remuko]

We play 4-6 sessions a week.

ill let everyone else discuss the other stuff this is the part that blows MY mind. how do you find the time? I barely could find the time to play multiple sessions a week when me and my friends who played were still kids, as adults no one has any free time and most people i know barely find time to play once every week or every two weeks even!

[Quertus]

ill let everyone else discuss the other stuff this is the part that blows MY mind. how do you find the time? I barely could find the time to play multiple sessions a week when me and my friends who played were still kids, as adults no one has any free time and most people i know barely find time to play once every week or every two weeks even!

Yeah, my record was 6 sessions (with different groups) each week. I don’t remember how many months I lasted before I finally decided it was just too much, and cut back a bit.

[Quertus]

However, people (including me) don't quite understand: why do you describe these houserules as “permissive”?

Just had a thought: if players asked, “hey can we…” for each of those house rules, and the GM responded, “yes”, wouldn’t that make the GM “permissive”? :smallconfused:

[Crake]

Just had a thought: if players asked, “hey can we…” for each of those house rules, and the GM responded, “yes”, wouldn’t that make the GM “permissive”? :smallconfused:

I guess, thought it wasn't framed that way, so we don’t know if that was the case

[NerdHut]

I'll accept most things that 1) fit the setting relatively well, 2) aren't an intentional grab for too much power, and 3) aren't an obvious "No" based on my existing house rule sheet. Which means I'm probably about as permissive as the next DM, not standing out either direction.
A non-exhaustive list of examples below.

Some things I've allowed:
-Belt of Healing reflavored as a bedazzled Codpiece of Healing for our gaudy bard
-Replace a feat that hasn't been used in months, between level-ups, with the understanding that they'd have to commit to the switch and not immediately switch back
-Reflavor Anthropomorphic Black Bear as a miscast of a version of baleful polymorph. Later in the campaign the curse was lifted, but stats remained the same to avoid a total rebuild
-Let a feat (don't remember specifically which one) that normally applies to more common energy types to apply to force damage (This one turned out to be a minor mistake, but both the player and I were fairly new at the time, so we didn't realize how overpowered it was)
-A bunch of situations where a skill check subbed in one ability modifier for another, when it felt appropriate (Like INT to Gather Information when questing inside a giant Archive Library)
-When the situation (or bribery) has been favorable enough, I've pretended not to see a bad roll and asked players to roll again.
-Allowed an after-the-fact Aid Another when a check failed by 1, and it seemed reasonable that really someone would have been helping.

Some hypotheticals I would allow if they came up:
-Adaptation of Thayan Knight to fit my setting for a player that likes the concept
-Retroactively swap Ranger's Track bonus feat when taking a second class that gains Track
-Allow an underpowered ACF from an otherwise disallowed book to qualify for a super fun PrC
-New homebrew class that fits the power level of the group, subject to revision if something requires it
-Lawful barbarian, as long as there's a good story to back it up
-Dropping/adjusting RHD or LA on a poorly balanced race
-Swap in a new character if you're just really bored of your old one, or have a build that's hard to play before it becomes viable (as long as the end result still isn't overpowered relative to the rest of the party)
-Ranger has an animal from higher level options as a non-companion pet until the class ability catches up (harder to work with the animal, so partly self-balancing)
-You may absolutely attempt to convert the villagers to

I've also got some homebrew/house rules that are basically things I'd like as a player but would be hesitant to ask some DMs for.
-About to roll an even number of d6s, but you really like d12s? Go ahead and swap 'em at a 2:1 ratio. I like d12s too, and it's actually a drop in average damage.
-Tired of taking Power Attack for literally every martial build? Have it for free, as long as you've got 13 Strength.
-Creatures with both Darkvision and Light Sensitivity get a broadly-applicable option to reduce their darkvision and drop light sensitivity.
-Less restrictive on innappropriately sized weapons (upper and lower bounds are still a factor, but I don't like the -2 penalty)
-Pre-approved optional list of character races that I've already rebalanced

All that said, there are some things I don't want in my games:
-My campaigns have a set list of allowed sources (though off-list approvals, as previously mentioned may be allowed).
-Interactions between PCs must be consented to, so absolutely no stealing from other PCs unless the other player is cool with it.
-I don't care how high you rolled or what spells you have, you're not making love to the lady of the manor in front of the dinner guests.
-Just about anything that Crit Crab reads off of Reddit as a horror story is going to draw my ire.
-No elves [ok, you can play an elf,[I] I guess]

[lylsyly]

ill let everyone else discuss the other stuff this is the part that blows MY mind. how do you find the time? I barely could find the time to play multiple sessions a week when me and my friends who played were still kids, as adults no one has any free time and most people i know barely find time to play once every week or every two weeks even!

One of us is a widow with a 5 bedroom house and all the kids are grown and live all over the place. We all crash there on the weekends. Friday night session, 2 or 3 saturday sessions and one or 2 on sundays depending on how we feel (and how much NSFW adult activities are gpoing on).

[ahyangyi]

Just had a thought: if players asked, “hey can we…” for each of those house rules, and the GM responded, “yes”, wouldn’t that make the GM “permissive”? :smallconfused:

Touche.

Though I would assume that it also depends on the nature of the question.

"Can we play a game where every character is super powerful" isn't really different from "what about using the E6 rule for our next game?" or "can we start at epic levels?" I don't see it has anything to do with permissiveness, but just picking a ruleset, or setting an expectation about the nature of the campaign.

But if that-always-wizard-guy asks "can we buff incantatrix? that class gets a little dull." That starts sounding like testing the GM's permissiveness...

lylsyly's examples all sound more like the first kind to me though.

EDIT: or not.

I am also thinking about this game recruitment (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?653036-Boss-Encounter-Test-3-5-Level-20-Gestalt), where the premise is "I allow broken stuff, let's give them a test run". Is that an example of permissiveness? I see the GM is really giving permissive ruling over a few questions there. What's the line between "we are picking a particular set of house rule" and "we are playing the game but just really permissive?"

I'm confused as well

[Remuko]

One of us is a widow with a 5 bedroom house and all the kids are grown and live all over the place. We all crash there on the weekends. Friday night session, 2 or 3 saturday sessions and one or 2 on sundays depending on how we feel (and how much NSFW adult activities are gpoing on).

Oooooh. I see. Lucky! Tho if my group had a situation like that we'd probably have ended up with longer sessions on sat and sunday rather than multiple sessions in the same day. Thanks for the explainer though!

[Easy e]

I am so permissive, that I often outsource the "job" of DMing to the players themselves!

I tend to focus on saying, "Yes, and", "Yes, but", or "No, but" when I am DMing. To me, it is much more important to keep a game going than to get hung up on rules discussion. There is not much that kills a game faster than a simple, "No, you can not".

However, like many on the thread; if the player is angling for just a roll advantage I am more likely to take a "No, but" approach. However, if they can back up with a story/coolness element to why they should get the plus, then I am all ears.

Since I want to encourage players to take interesting and fun approaches to things I try not to penalize such thinking with bad Mods. If I consistently penalize them, they will default to an "I hit it with my stick!" mentality.

[icefractal]

One thing I forgot about earlier, which might actually be more relevant to "permissive" than the char-gen side - retraining. Personally, after trying different versions, and considering what I like as a player and what the alternatives are, my policy is this:

You can change as much as you want about your character between sessions, as long as it remains conceptually the same character and the differences aren't jarring. If they are, then you can change it as soon as an plausible opportunity can be inserted (nothing major, just something to explain the change).

I've played in plenty of games with limited retraining rules - you can only change X in Y time at Z cost, etc - or no ability to respec, and ... my conclusion is there's very little benefit and significant downside. There's maybe a strategic element of "more useful now vs later", but the majority of those aren't good balance-wise, and it's seldom that interesting a choice. And unless you prohibit retiring a character and bringing in a new one (which itself would be bad), then restrictive retraining is just encouraging people to change characters entirely - counterproductive if you want continuity.

"Boy am I happy that I'm stuck with this feat which doesn't match the party's play-style!" - said nobody ever.