Things I May No Longer Do While Playing XII: A Thousand-Yard Stare is not Permission

[Reltzik]

* No longer allowed to create an open question of whether I get the party killed first or the party kills me first.
** "I'm just role-playing my low Int stat" isn't a good reason.
*** A low Wis stat wouldn't count, either.
**** Nor would a low Cha stat.
***** No longer allowed to dump all mental stats.
****** No, I'm not being told that I'm not allowed to dump all mental stats simultaneously. I'm being told that all mental stats are stats that I'm not allowed to dump.
******* Three wrongs do not make a right!
******** Yes, okay, technically the DM did say that ban wasn't about dumping all three simultaneously....
********* NO CREDITING THE DM FOR THAT ABOMINATION!

(Is it wrong that I see dumping a mental stat as less an exercise in min-maxing and more as a way of driving the rest of the table nutters?)

[dmteeter]

*13 year old overweight asthmatic kid who is obsessed with Japanese anime should not be the description of the main villain in my mutants and masterminds campaign.
* He should not call himself the Animaster
* Using his power to steal limited edition manga's and anime DVDs is a huge misuse of his power
* If at any point the party has to fight a summoned version of Itachi , All Might, Grimmjow, Luffy, Toguro, Meliodas,Or Saitama they will not be happy.
*all of the above is not considered a balanced encounter at any power level
* The party now has anime induced PTSD

[Anonymouswizard]

*13 year old overweight asthmatic kid who is obsessed with Japanese anime should not be the description of the main villain in my mutants and masterminds campaign.
* He should not call himself the Animaster

While I can't repeat the name I used, one of the villains of an Unknown Armies campaign I attempted to run gained magical power via being obsessed with Japanese media. The catch was that their powers weren't based on Japanese media, Japanese culture, or anything like that, but rather misconceptions about such things.

So in Unknown Armies melee weapons are statted by the questions of are they big, are they heavy, and are they sharp, with each giving a +3 to their damage. The group had agreed that katana, as well as by extention English Longswords/bastard swords didn't qualify for heavy and so only gave a +6 (normally they'd give the full +9, we didn't want that). This character had two katana-based spells, one of which made them +12 weapons (+3 big, +3 heavy, +3 sharp, +3 folded steel) and the other one allowed them to deflect bullets with, and only with, a katana. While there were some other things they could do those ended up being the only ones actually statted out. I believe there was some politeness-based stuff that nearly came up, but I've forgotten the rest.

The only reason the entire thing worked at all was that the group was entirely made up of anime fans, half of who had tried learning Japanese at one point, and so was more laughing at ourselves more than anything. Also the fact that one player was a Dipsomancer and another a Narco-Alchemist, so half the party was perpetually drunk or high anyway.

[Lord Raziere]

*I shall not curse all pedants to one day suffer pedantry over something they love in revenge for pedantry making me suffer.

*May not suggest that Dragon-Blooded are using their essence sub-optimally by emulating how the solars do it and that they could be better if they used more physical elemental bending stuff.

* I am not the queen of goats.

[danielxcutter]

*I shall not curse all pedants to one day suffer pedantry over something they love in revenge for pedantry making me suffer.

*May not suggest that Dragon-Blooded are using their essence sub-optimally by emulating how the solars do it and that they could be better if they used more physical elemental bending stuff.

* I am not the queen of goats.

You've goat to be kidding me!

[Telok]

* Discovering the depths of the depravity to which the players will sink is not the goal of the game.

** It would be nice if the players would question why and how the mind flayers are bankrolling them, their rather expensive starship, and a small army.

[danielxcutter]

* Discovering the depths of the depravity to which the players will sink is not the goal of the game.

** It would be nice if the players would question why and how the mind flayers are bankrolling them, their rather expensive starship, and a small army.

There was a Darklord from Ravenholm who had a similar backstory, I think. Well, specifically that he sold his people over to them or something.

[Lord Raziere]

* I am not to say that DnD is "Fantasy For Physicists"
** Exalted is not "Fantasy For Anthropologists"
*** Planescape is not "Fantasy For Philosophers"
**** Mage the Ascension is not "Fantasy For Subjectivists"
***** Mage the Awakening IS "Fantasy for Platonic Philosophers" though. No one denies that.
****** Dungeons the Dragoning is not "Fantasy for People who love memes"
******* Fate is not "Fantasy for Amateur Movie Makers"
******** Shadowrun is not "Fantasy For Accountants"
********* People who play things made by Jenna Moran are not Fair Folk in disguise.
********** Nor is Jenna Moran herself a Fae from Arcadia capable of weaving rpgs out of dreams and gossamer.

[Katrina]

* on the subject of parody villians, you should also not put that same otaku kid in a trenchcoat and fedora, give him the ability to form metal structures out of the nanites in his blood, and call him Ken Tenshi. ( a poor attempt at blade angel. )

* On a more serious note, i am apparently not supposed to use foreshadowing, subtle escalation and callouts in my storytelling.
* Villains must have obvious and clear motives and plans.
* The villain described as a borderline sociopath with mind control is no longer allowed to be subtle.
* The bully with the terrible backstory will apparently be maimed and left in the school pool if he keeps up his current ways...
* Even while the party wonders what they should do about said mind controller...
* Not like they've seen the bully demonstrate obvious cognitive disconnects like saying on week two he doesn't hit women, then doing so in week five...

* Especially not when there is a Psychic telepath in the party. (>.>)'

[Personification]

* After a month-long break, it is considered rude to point out the time that has passed.

[Lord Raziere]

* Not allowed to kill the captain of the guard for standing in the way of my OTP
** may no longer protest the marriage practices of the city I live in, no matter how unjust
*** may no longer burn an entire country to the ground because its filled with vampires and werewolves, no matter how sane the action is
**** my first action when I encounter a mushroom forest full of corpse zombies grow more mushrooms may not be to burn it down to keep it from spreading
***** when the authorities break the rules for me, I should be immediately suspicious and may not accept it as helpful.
****** may not point out that the romances all look awfully similar in how the play out.
******* may not point out the hypocrisy in one noble girl being able to escape her responsibilities while another is pushed into being bound by them
******** or one guy forcing marriage on the first girl being treated as a jerk while another forcing marriage on a second girl is treated as a decent guy
********* may not point out the last time a human cleric fell in love with an orc it was out of nowhere and made no sense

[Telok]

When I 3d print and paint custom minis I may no longer sneak in the fact that while the space pirate walrus is wearing force-field light armor, it is not wearing clothing.

Even if it does show of his gorgeous, blubbery, blue and red tiger striped physique.

Edit: Absolutelu no oosik allowed.

[Guizonde]

*not allowed to crush the hopes of the pc's before session one.
**during or after session one is fair game.

*if for some reason, a pc tames an animal or otherwise gets a pet, must not instinctively try to figure out how i can corrupt it so it eats both the pc and their enemies.

*"pookie" is not an appropriate name for a bobcat-sized rat.

[Rater202]

I need to make at least one PC whose gimmick isn't either being a hybrid of a bunch of things or becoming a hybrid of a bunch of things.

[HeraldOfExius]

* Even though we could find buyers for our regular houses that we just kept stabled for the past 7 levels, I am not able to spend a month of downtime using every spell slot I have to cast Mount in order to sell people large quantities of horses that will disappear in 18 hours.
** Even if I could do that, all potential buyers would recognize what was happening after the first day.
*** Casting Disguise Self to look like a new person each time I did this would not help at all.
**** Neither would stealing a couple of real horses each day and blaming the mass disappearances on thieves instead of magically conjured temporary horses.

[Wookieetank]

From an ongoing VtM game, where my character was a medic turned vampire:

*Having a vehicle kill count, while entertaining, does not count for much.
**Doublely so when they've all been by explosion
***Adding buildings to the list doesn't make it better.
****A whole city block is just overkill, even if it was by accident.
*****You do know vampires are supposed to be afraid of fire right?
******You know what? Fine, you're now deranged with a fire obsession.

[Lvl 2 Expert]

I need to make at least one PC whose gimmick isn't either being a hybrid of a bunch of things or becoming a hybrid of a bunch of things.

* Okay, okay, you can play a hybrid again. Stop with the pureblood forest gnome pride thing already.

[Tohron]

* okay, okay, you can play a hybrid again. Stop with the pureblood forest gnome pride thing already.

***************Gno gnomes!

[danielxcutter]

***************Gno gnomes!

...You know, if anything I'd imagine elves being banned for being insufferably smug, but I guess players always get even weirder than that.

[Lord Raziere]

...You know, if anything I'd imagine elves being banned for being insufferably smug, but I guess players always get even weirder than that.

* Not allowed to make an elf that isn't insufferably smug and is actually as free and happy as the PHB books claim them to be.
** nor can they be an elven waitress from a random inn who couldn't get a better job because of the stratified long-lived nature of elven society (do you REALIZE how hard it is to get a job in a society where everyone lives to 700?) but ran away and is now pretending to be an undercover elven princess to fool gullible humans
*** may not try to make fun of elf tropes.

[Telok]

* I may no longer inflict nightmare fuel on the DM and NPCs by having my character ask the NPCs out on a date.

** I may no longer use gecko foot implants and chamelion skin bioware for sexual innuendo.

*** I was never even allowed to as for a psychic damage roll despite other players holding their heads and moaning.

**** The space pirate walrus is no longer allowed to proposition the ancient evil hag coven. Even if it gets us the artifact without a fight.

[danielxcutter]

* I may no longer inflict nightmare fuel on the DM and NPCs by having my character ask the NPCs out on a date.

** I may no longer use gecko foot implants and chamelion skin bioware for sexual innuendo.

*** I was never even allowed to as for a psychic damage roll despite other players holding their heads and moaning.

**** The space pirate walrus is no longer allowed to proposition the ancient evil hag coven. Even if it gets us the artifact without a fight.

...Is this entirely hypothetical or are there settings that let that last one actually happen? Without homebrew.

[Anonymouswizard]

***************Gno gnomes!

* May gnot let jokes die, apparently.

[Kelb_Panthera]

...Is this entirely hypothetical or are there settings that let that last one actually happen? Without homebrew.

Sounds like spell-jammer. I know they have space pirates and hippo people. I'm not 100% sure about walrus folk but between the hippos, the giant hamsters, and a couple other ones I've heard, I wouldn't bat an eye.

[Telok]

Sounds like spell-jammer. I know they have space pirates and hippo people. I'm not 100% sure about walrus folk but between the hippos, the giant hamsters, and a couple other ones I've heard, I wouldn't bat an eye.

Nah, it's Pazio's Starfinder. Space fantasy with a little techno-babble thrown on top. The system is... acceptable. They "got the balance math right", meaning that your success rate at anything remains about the same at all levels, fights remain about the same at all levels, classes can't stray too far from their archtype without suffering total competence failure, etc., etc.

The system is balanced enough that all fun and entertainment comes from the players and DM being good enough to work outside it. Plus the plethora of weird races (nothing changes the way any rules work, e.g. stuff without legs can install cyber leg augments and get land speed boosts) tends, in my view, to lend itself to a sort of 'Star Wars cantina if it were run by Laurel and Hardy in a SNL skit' vibe.

[BisectedBrioche]

I may not joke about sneaking "Weapon Proficient (Snowballs)" onto my character's sheet because the DM joked about dragons being weak to snowballs while playing Spryo.

Spoiler: Twist

Show

Namely, because he allowed it on the basis my character has multiple siblings and lives in a snowy area.

[Personification]

I may not joke about sneaking "Weapon Proficient (Snowballs)" onto my character's sheet because the DM joked about dragons being weak to snowballs while playing Spryo.

Spoiler: Twist

Show

Namely, because he allowed it on the basis my character has multiple siblings and lives in a snowy area.

"See, your first mistake was getting into a fight with a halfling in the snow. We literally have bonuses for this!"

[Kelb_Panthera]

Nah, it's Pazio's Starfinder. Space fantasy with a little techno-babble thrown on top. The system is... acceptable. They "got the balance math right", meaning that your success rate at anything remains about the same at all levels, fights remain about the same at all levels, classes can't stray too far from their archtype without suffering total competence failure, etc., etc.

The system is balanced enough that all fun and entertainment comes from the players and DM being good enough to work outside it. Plus the plethora of weird races (nothing changes the way any rules work, e.g. stuff without legs can install cyber leg augments and get land speed boosts) tends, in my view, to lend itself to a sort of 'Star Wars cantina if it were run by Laurel and Hardy in a SNL skit' vibe.

So... spelljammer but worse then?

[danielxcutter]

So... spelljammer but worse then?

Hmm, does Spelljammer have any 3.5e updates, now that I think of it?

[Lord Torath]

Sounds like spell-jammer. I know they have space pirates and hippo people. I'm not 100% sure about walrus folk but between the hippos, the giant hamsters, and a couple other ones I've heard, I wouldn't bat an eye.

Walrus folk are called Thanoi and are from Dragonlance's Krynn's southern polar regions.

Hmm, does Spelljammer have any 3.5e updates, now that I think of it?

Not officially. Or possibly Kinda Sorta. Here's the 'official" Spelljammer Website: Beyond the Moons. Big Mac has a 3.5 Spelljammer conversion project over at The Piazza.

* I may not take advantage of the GM's unfamiliarity with Dark Sun and the Gold Piece/Ceramic Piece exchange rate to start with 40,000 cp worth of gems by using 400 of my 500 gp of starting funds to buy them on Athas instead of Sigil.
** I may not use said gems to start with receptacles that can hold 400 extra Psionic Strength Points at level 5.
*** I may not constantly make jokes about how Sigil rhymes with 'giggle'.
**** Where else would Giggles the Clown live?
*****May not compare the relative power of Giggles and the Lady of Pain.