Strangest bans

[Tanuki Tales]

What are the oddest things you've seen banned at a table you played at and/or the strangest rationale given for banning something from play?

[Xefas]

After creating a really infuriating NPC antagonist, both in that she was a genuine moral authority that often made the PCs feel bad for stuff they did, and that she was a bit condescending, and that, after the players changed sides for other plot reasons and came up against her in combat, she had a really frustrating fighting style based on doing very small amounts of damage while being very difficult to harm or hinder, it was voted that I am no longer allowed to use the noblewoman laugh (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7aq3W9Ctng0) at the table. Which is how she laughed, and how I would always announce her presence. As in, I would describe the scene and the situation, and the players would be like "Alright. Okay. What should we-" and then I'd start doing the laugh, and they'd all immediately begin groaning and cursing. Then I'd introduce her into the scene.

I put multi-sessions gulfs in between her appearances, so it always managed to catch them off guard. They were so happy when they finally killed her. And then she got the last laugh when they found out her motives were all entirely altruistic all along and they felt super horrible. And for the rest of the campaign NPCs would keep bringing her up, like "Man, that lady really was a saint, wasn't she? Before she went off and became a famous warrior, she once saved my dog from a house fire. I wonder what ever happened to her?" And they'd all just groan horribly OOC, and then the NPC would be like "I remember she had this really distinctive laugh. How'd it go again?" and they'd start yelling at me.

Anyway. Good times. Old group in an old city, haven't seen them in a long time. I hope our games together were as memorable to them as they were to me.

tldr; A style of laughter was banned at my table.

[hymer]

Norwegian PCs. It was a joke, though.

[RazorChain]

Kenders and Gungans

Oh wait....it isn't strange that they are banned

[Anonymouswizard]

Hmmm...not sure if I've ever had a particularly strange ban.

I have recently been banned from using my class features (including languages) because I don't know I have them. It's really my fault for taking two levels of Cleric when we're probably several countries away from the closest temple to Bahamut (I've managed to get the GM to agree to an Islamic flavour for his religion, although the dress codes are slightly different because Dragonborn).

I've been banned from minmaxing due to being the only player at the table who new the rules. Partially because the GM helped everyone make characters, but for my second one it turned out that I had read the rules more than he had and arrays were essentially abuse at his table.

Oh, one group I'm in got banned from trying to pimp another player's character. I honestly can't remember why it became a thing, but it started when she was interrogating a suspect (as our face) and he began flirting with her.

[RickAllison]

I am borrowing the system from the Things I am Not Allowed to Do thread. From our Star Wars game that I DMed:

*As a droid, may not steal the bodies of other droids to make myself better.
**I may not manufacture new bodies for myself.

I did this when I was a player before. Ended up with a vehicle-class mecha with so much armor that capital ships couldn't dent him. He ended up despising the Force because that was the one thing in the galaxy that seemed to still pose a threat to him. I learned for when I took up the chair...

*I may not create Grey Jedi
**The session may not be derailed because we aren't sure whether to spell grey with an "a" or an "e"

The lore on this is so prevalent that it seemed like a great idea at the time. Unfortunately, it was highly unbalanced...

*My PC may not be destined to oppose the party in such a way that they only keep him on because he is a PC. He will betray the party, but it won't be surprising.
**My PC can't be a vorarephile and a prostitute, then bring it up whenever possible
***My PC can't be insane and suffer a breakdown when confronted with the fact that he is supposed to endorse freedom, but considers droids as slaves and nothing more. Especially when another party member is a droid revolutionary.
****My PC can't try to push the party members back on the story's rails by blowing up their ship, especially before he has been introduced.
*****My PC can't make the droid into a bomb against his will
******My PC can't make a droid PC his slave, no matter what his slicing skills are
*******Fine, he can set up a programming block so the droid doesn't just shoot him in the face
********Nope, shooting my PC in the face is now allowed and encouraged.

One player. One player did all of this. Eventually, we taught him to be less disruptive, but it took a lot of coaching.

*Yes, the droid can be a revolutionary
**Yes, he can write his Droid Manifesto
***Yes, he can promote proletariat power
****We already get that he is Robo-Lenin.
*****Another player can be a droid follower
******He may act as the muscle of the two
*******No, he cannot murder robo-Lenin, usurp his position, and transform the revolution into a powerhouse where one is only considered worthy of being alive if one is useful to the party
********We are not creating Soviet Russia IN SPAAAAACE!

This happened. I may have encouraged it. It didn't help that the droids already had Star Destroyers.

*As DM, I may not split the party.
**Even if everyone agrees I am rather good at managing split parties
***Preying off the genre-savviness of the players and PCs to cause them to split themselves is not allowed either.

This rule happened after I lured away two PCs using a pretty lady, then filled their limo with sleeping gas (she was an Inquisitor). Meanwhile, two other PCs were trying to track them down using the ship, but really the traitor was going to steal their priceless artifact. He enlisted the help of a shadowy thug who one-punched the droid diplomat, he betrayed the traitor, everyone loses. Oh, and the last member of the party was drinking.

*May not play intelligent enemies who actually know tactics. The PCs will rush in headfirst and get themselves killed without trying to find alternate paths.

Swoop gang who took over a military compound and were terrorizing the population. Not only ran into fire from their turrets, but also split so they were fighting two different emplacements at the same time. Also, they already got the droid onto the premises where he was distributing pamphlets on how the droid revolution also would improve the lives of non-droid workers.

[TheYell]

Luchador mariachi cohorts.

Salaams.

Leroy Jenkins.

[mikeejimbo]

I'm no longer allowed to abuse the Alternate Forms rules in GURPS.

I'm no longer allowed to abuse the improving skills from default rules in GURPS.

[JellyPooga]

I'm no longer allowed to abuse the improving skills from default rules in GURPS.

Hey, that's just standard GURPS optimisation!

I've put a ban on Alternate Form as GM myself; that Advantage is all sorts of broken.

[Arbane]

Antimony, dolphins, and possibly neutrons. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?275152-What-am-I-supposed-to-do)

[ComaVision]

The strangest ban I've seen is no druids (in 3.5) because they are overpowered. That may not seem odd but the same DM also allowed Clerics to have spontaneous casting off their entire spell list.

[Honest Tiefling]

I've banned crowbars before. The moment certain players get those in their grubby little paws, they run off to the nearest building to dismantle it for gold regardless of habitation, law enforcement, common sense, or profit margins.

[Inevitability]

The strangest ban I've seen is no druids (in 3.5) because they are overpowered. That may not seem odd but the same DM also allowed Clerics to have spontaneous casting off their entire spell list.

Why is that overpowered? Clerics are only good at healing, you might as well throw them a bone.

They better get spontaneous casting of all domain lists, too, though. Why force the poor clerics to severely restrict themselves with their only class feature?

[mikeejimbo]

Hey, that's just standard GURPS optimisation!

I've put a ban on Alternate Form as GM myself; that Advantage is all sorts of broken.

Probably the best way to handle it is for the GM to design all the Alternate Forms and for the players to have to stick to those. Also set a minimum shift time, that is, you cannot take Reduced Time above a certain level.

[erikun]

My group was banned from purchasing Thermal Grenades in a Star Wars campaign after having a habit of tossing them at the vampire jedi (it was a strange campaign) and after completely destroying an enemy base by bringing in several crates of them and posing as a maintenance crew to set them all in the airducts.

[Jormengand]

You'd be surprised to see how many DMs will ban monk and/or truenamer on the basis that they're overpowered. Don't let them know about the Disciple of the Word optimisation thread, whatever you do.

[Anonymouswizard]

My group was banned from purchasing Thermal Grenades in a Star Wars campaign after having a habit of tossing them at the vampire jedi (it was a strange campaign) and after completely destroying an enemy base by bringing in several crates of them and posing as a maintenance crew to set them all in the airducts.

I've actually banned myself from both high power electronics and microelectronics, because once we get there I can basically out invent any GM. Heck, I'm bad enough with just standard ultra-tech (my first question is 'can I get an actual, speed of light, man portable solid state beam laser' and I generally end with sticking an AI in the spaceship to make it fly better. I tend to avoid forking AIs, just to save the GM major headaches). I've only met one GM who can out electronics me, and I just can't compete in any other areas of science.

I'm also trying to get FTL travel and teleportation banned, but I haven't managed to play in a game with them yet.

On an unrelated note, I'm trying to get my current GM to ban mercenaries as PCs, seeing as my character might end up leaving the party if more than about a month happens and my retainer hasn't been increased (...because there's people who will pay lots of money for a Dragonborn Fighter/Cleric, especially now I've hit 5th level).

EDIT: also, I'm not surprised that lots of people think monk and truenamer are overpowered. I've known people who consider them awesome class, and people who'll refuse to admit that the Fighter and Wizard aren't balanced (or that 5e prepared casters are just so much more versatile than Sorcerers, with the person 'proving' sorcerers were just as versatile using proficiencies they'd trained in in-game).

[JellyPooga]

You'd be surprised to see how many DMs will ban monk and/or truenamer on the basis that they're overpowered. Don't let them know about the Disciple of the Word optimisation thread, whatever you do.

I've banned Monks, Tome of Battle, all Spellcasters and more on the grounds of being settimg inappropriate, but nothing in 3.5 D&D was worth banning on the grounds of being overpowered. If a player brought something poweful to the table, that was them giving you, the GM, licence to bring the pain. 3.5 always had a bigger fish.

[Prefect Blart]

I was banned from ever making characters that are based on the GM when we were in college over 25 years ago, particularly when our wives are both playing and the GM's wife has never heard the college stories I am reenacting in game.

The one that put him over the edge was when I had the character drink too much and puke on his blind date's dress. The GM's wife couldnt figure out why the rest of us were laughing and the GM was fuming, and he finally blurted out " it didn't happen that way..."

[Calen]

I was banned from ever making characters that are based on the GM when we were in college over 25 years ago, particularly when our wives are both playing and the GM's wife has never heard the college stories I am reenacting in game.

The one that put him over the edge was when I had the character drink too much and puke on his blind date's dress. The GM's wife couldnt figure out why the rest of us were laughing and the GM was fuming, and he finally blurted out " it didn't happen that way..."

You made me spit ice cream on my desk. I demand you come clean it up. :tongue:

Not sure how common it is but my DM and me when I DM have banned resurrection type magic. I have also "banned" teleportation in that it is criminal magic so that players cant just avoid all the plot, at least not without some consequences.

[Anonymouswizard]

Oh, I completely forgot this one, one of my groups managed to get alcohol retconed. No, not drinking alcohol at the table, alcohol in any form suddenly stopped existing in the setting. Before the game began.

It all began with us essentially playing Scion with the Mutants and Masterminds system. We had a demigod of death (player picked Thanatos as their dad), a demigod of ice and death (yeah, I picked Hel as my divine parent), a trickster demigod (child of Loki, my character had an aunt), and a few others. Then one player picked a child of Dionysus, focused on wine, and asked if we could start in a brewery. This escalated into an argument (somehow), I think I at one point asked if I could have Expertise: Brewing, and suddenly alcohol no longer existed and we hadn't even made characters.

I still wish to play that character sometime. He was an intelligent guy with no combat skills but the ability to summon objects of ice from thin air (I believe up to 1000 cubic feet of ice) and a small squad of ghosts he could call up from the underworld (summon power). I had originally wanted to make him 400 years old, but this got cut down to in his 20s as the GM didn't want PCs with any experience.

[Jallorn]

Psions, not because the DM didn't know the subsystem, but because of a single power: Death Urge. We were staying at level one, Wizards were kosher (and I was tempted to run an SoD Wizard to show that Psions weren't any worse, but I didn't really want to b be a ****).

Same game, no Warlocks because they eventually get DR.

Ended up going Dragonfire Shaman, and despite everyone having fun with the story, the DM was unprepared for the breath weapon, and I think felt my character's desire to found a church to Bahamut in a setting where dragons were dead was derailing. He ended up resenting me but never said anything because he knew I wasn't trying to be a jerk. So his girlfriend (whose missing brother character arc did not seem to bother him despite being just as large a piece of her character) internalized his frustration and behaved like a brat towards me because she didn't appreciate that I wasnt being a jerk and no one had come to me like an adult and said, "This isn't working."

[Inevitability]

Same game, no Warlocks because they eventually get DR.

Were barbarians and favored souls banned too?

[Pex]

Magic items in 5E.

I don't care that PCs don't need as much or even specific items as they did in previous editions. I'll shout the greatness of that on the mountaintops with you if you'd like. That lack of need is not the same thing as no magic items at all, and I don't just mean consumables like the occasional potion. Magic weapons. Magic armor. Magic rings. Magic miscellaneous stuff. Magic wands. All of it. The game does not forbid them. The game does not fall apart when PCs have them, even those of the +1 variety though I'm perfectly fine with +0 and a cool effect. I don't care how dismissive you want to be with your accusation of "entitlement". Magic items are apart of the game, and PCs should have them and not their first one at some level above 10.

[Xefas]

Same game, no Warlocks because they eventually get DR.


I did briefly play in a game where Warlocks were banned. I was new to the group and, after asking if there were any houserules beforehand and being told there weren't any, drafted up a Warlock tinkerer-type character built to use Imbue Item to craft magic items for the party (two Fighters and a Ranger; I figured they could use some magic item help). After showing up, I was told that - whoops, Warlocks are banned, come back next session with something different.

The reason wasn't damage reduction, though. The reason I was given was "at-will spells are broken". What I found out a few sessions later was that the actual reason was that everyone in the group was incapable of reading spell descriptions properly and thought that Darkness made everyone inside the area completely invincible and immune to everything. (Not a hyperbole; that's exactly what they thought.) So having that one Least Invocation with at-will Darkness made the class broken.

Instead, I played an Artificer and just crafted 50-charge wands of everything I would've had as a Warlock, and more, as well as being better at the actual magic item tinkering that I wanted to do. And had better proficiencies and skills. And had the entire Infusion subsystem which is so much goddamn overkill for that class.

Wands actually kind of take forever to go empty.

Anyway, I was perfectly willing to play in a group where Warlocks were the height of overpowered, Monks skirted the line of being banned because all good saves, and Druids and Artificers were considered the bottom of the barrel. I was perfectly willing to sit in the back and buff and craft and play support. But the group eventually started complaining that I was dead weight on the party. They didn't really see the value of throwing down an Evard's Black Tentacles and a Glitterdust, crippling an entire encounter so that the fighters could mop up everyone without taking any damage. After handing out some command word items with 8th level spell effects on them, at level 13, because Artificers craft with a caster level of their class level +2 (because that's balanced), they just shook their heads and told me to come back next session with a proper fighter that could hold his weight on the front line and stop messing around with this 'sissy magic ****' or don't come back at all.

I was in two other groups at the time. It wasn't a hard choice. I wasn't a jerk about it or anything. I just politely declined and went on my way. It gave me some neat perspective, if nothing else.

[Anonymouswizard]

they just shook their heads and told me to come back next session with a proper fighter that could hold his weight on the front line and stop messing around with this 'sissy magic ****' or don't come back at all.

Yeah, I've met this sort of player. I've seen one refuse to play a non evocation wizard (while I was playing a dex-based front line fighter, and then later on a summon-focused Sorcerer, he complained about not being able to use cone spells on every enemy), and his standard character is the biggest bruiser he can (or occasionally a rogue who's abused the skill system so much he can't be seen).

At the exact same time they generally see my preferred plot-based games as completely stupid. I mean, it's not like anyone's enjoyed a game with about one combat every three sessions before. The annoying thing is that they tend to have the strangest non-bans ever when running a game. Combat focused game? They won't stop you from putting all your character points into science, charisma, investigation, and resources.

Oh, that's the strangest ban I've had. We were playing an All Flesh Must Be Eaten game, and I had made an investigative science character, with the plan to research the zombies. To that end I put four points in resources with the plan to cash in the money before the game started for various scientific tools and electrical apparatus. I was immediately banned from having starting equipment or spending money (the idea was that it was supposed to be a scavenging game, but the GM forgot that we knew his chosen setting well enough that if he didn't stop us we'd have turned one of the industrial estates into a fortress by the second session*). No refunds either, so I was left with useless money and a good number of skills I didn't have the equipment to use.

* Never run such a game in the players' home town.

[arclance]

Cannibalism is banned at my local game store.
One player kept getting into loooong arguments about the inherent Neutrality of cannibalism as a life choice (not a survival tactic) on the Good/Evil alignment axis until the Manager banned references to cannibalism from the store.
It caused in game problems as well but that was because he handled the in game ramifications of eating dead bodies in front of other Player Characters poorly.


My group was banned from purchasing Thermal Grenades in a Star Wars campaign after having a habit of tossing them at the vampire jedi (it was a strange campaign) and after completely destroying an enemy base by bringing in several crates of them and posing as a maintenance crew to set them all in the airducts.
Thermal Detonators were also banned in a FFG Star Wars (EotE) game I played in (they effectively no longer exist).
Every time the players or NPCs had a thermal detonator something wildly unexpected happened that usually vaporized (often literally) large parts of the GMs planed plot lines.
They were finally banned after a Wookie PC tied in a game of thermal detonator chicken.

[Requiem_Jeer]

Interesting. Personally, I draw the evil line vis a vis consumption of the flesh of sentient creatures at the point where you kill someone specifically to eat them, or just as an intensifier to an already evil killing. Even then, that operates under the assumption that you are something that can eat that flesh without undue stress on your digestive system (like, say, if you were a Half-dragon).

As for unusual bans, I've seen Monk banned for being overpowered, and more reasonably for the fluff not fitting. Anything else I've seen was more deliberate handicap kind of thing, like the no-full casters gestalt or the no-casting-at-all-period-not-even-SLAs one.

[RickAllison]

Accents were banned, and I am not allowed to play little girl PCs.

This was a preemptive ban after I traumatized the players when I was the villain in a game of Betrayal At House On Haunted Hill. After the repeated chiming of "Do you want to be my dolly?", they preemptively banned me from doing the same in RPGs...

[Belac93]

Accents were banned, and I am not allowed to play little girl PCs.

This was a preemptive ban after I traumatized the players when I was the villain in a game of Betrayal At House On Haunted Hill. After the repeated chiming of "Do you want to be my dolly?", they preemptively banned me from doing the same in RPGs...

I got banned from having any creepy children as NPCs.

[arclance]

Interesting. Personally, I draw the evil line vis a vis consumption of the flesh of sentient creatures at the point where you kill someone specifically to eat them, or just as an intensifier to an already evil killing. Even then, that operates under the assumption that you are something that can eat that flesh without undue stress on your digestive system (like, say, if you were a Half-dragon).
He once cracked a rib off of a random bad guy who fell off a roof after being hit by a Barbarian propelled javelin and started sucking the marrow out of it in the middle of the post combat looting.
He did not mention his characters cannibalism to the new player who joined the game which caused a in and out of character WTF moment which led to massive inter-party conflict.

[Jallorn]

Were barbarians and favored souls banned too?

I don't believe so. Certainly Barbarians weren't.

[Mr Booze]

2nd edition: My CG Halfling Thief couldn't use Backstab because that't considered evil (by the DM)

[Inevitability]

2nd edition: My CG Halfling Thief couldn't use Backstab because that't considered evil (by the DM)

How did he feel about the fighter chopping heads off or the wizard burning people alive? :smalltongue:

[mikeejimbo]

How did he feel about the fighter chopping heads off or the wizard burning people alive? :smalltongue:

It's fine as long as you do it from the front.

[Sith_Happens]

I once had a DM ban mithral grappling hooks because it was a Zelda-based campaign and he didn't want it to take away from the hookshot he was planning on giving us later. Which is a perfectly fine reason except for the part where Wind Waker had long since demonstrated that a grappling hook and a hookshot are not remotely the same thing no matter how far you can throw the grappling hook.

[Christopher K.]

I've been banned from using my "lucky" d20(even after thoroughly documenting that it tends to roll close to expected). Darn superstitious GM's

[ATHATH]

I did briefly play in a game where Warlocks were banned. I was new to the group and, after asking if there were any houserules beforehand and being told there weren't any, drafted up a Warlock tinkerer-type character built to use Imbue Item to craft magic items for the party (two Fighters and a Ranger; I figured they could use some magic item help). After showing up, I was told that - whoops, Warlocks are banned, come back next session with something different.

The reason wasn't damage reduction, though. The reason I was given was "at-will spells are broken". What I found out a few sessions later was that the actual reason was that everyone in the group was incapable of reading spell descriptions properly and thought that Darkness made everyone inside the area completely invincible and immune to everything. (Not a hyperbole; that's exactly what they thought.) So having that one Least Invocation with at-will Darkness made the class broken.

Instead, I played an Artificer and just crafted 50-charge wands of everything I would've had as a Warlock, and more, as well as being better at the actual magic item tinkering that I wanted to do. And had better proficiencies and skills. And had the entire Infusion subsystem which is so much goddamn overkill for that class.

Wands actually kind of take forever to go empty.

Anyway, I was perfectly willing to play in a group where Warlocks were the height of overpowered, Monks skirted the line of being banned because all good saves, and Druids and Artificers were considered the bottom of the barrel. I was perfectly willing to sit in the back and buff and craft and play support. But the group eventually started complaining that I was dead weight on the party. They didn't really see the value of throwing down an Evard's Black Tentacles and a Glitterdust, crippling an entire encounter so that the fighters could mop up everyone without taking any damage. After handing out some command word items with 8th level spell effects on them, at level 13, because Artificers craft with a caster level of their class level +2 (because that's balanced), they just shook their heads and told me to come back next session with a proper fighter that could hold his weight on the front line and stop messing around with this 'sissy magic ****' or don't come back at all.

I was in two other groups at the time. It wasn't a hard choice. I wasn't a jerk about it or anything. I just politely declined and went on my way. It gave me some neat perspective, if nothing else.
What I would have done in that situation:
1. During the next battle, record all of the things that your spells caused or prevented. Tally up the damage from the extra attacks that your Fighters received from Haste, the amount of damage that you prevented by Blinding enemies, the amount of extra damage that an enemy could have done if it had reached you earlier, the damage from the attacks that are hits because of your spells, etc.
2. If they still don't beat me, race them to the completion of an agreed-upon adventure module.
3. If they STILL don't believe me, stage a (non-lethal) fight: the rest of the party vs. the Artificer. Wipe the floor with them without even being touched.

You should check back in on this group soon; you could see if they've changed (significantly) from when you last interacted with them.

[Dr_Dinosaur]

Yeah, my usual group thought Warlocks and Factotums were the height of broken when I first started. Though to be fair to the poor DM of the game where it was "proven" I picked up the system a lot faster than the other newbies during character creation and made an Eldritch Theurge that was coincidentally able to avoid nearly all damage from the encounters in the module we were playing thanks to clever flight and item use. That was unfortunate and I offered to switch characters at least once before the game fell apart. But after that, they were convinced for years that Warlocks were untouchable gods with infinite, unblockable damage to throw around, until 5e came out and I showed them a side-by-side comparison on how improved it was over the 3.5 model. Factotums being able to "do anything" was a similar overreaction that they've since moved past to simple suspicion.

The silliest ban I've seen otherwise was the guy who banned all magic from his games except for monsters. Not just classes, but items too which went as well as you might expect in 3.5. The kicker was that monks and barbarian rage counted as magic because real people can't do those things (he says as the fighter swings a broadsword four times in six seconds).

[kingtiger13123]

Strangest ban I've experienced was probably a DM that said we could only have one halfling or gnome in the party, because little people were rare in this world, and a newcomer had already claimed halfling rogue, so I couldn't do gnome druid. After protests from me and another player who I was coordinating a combination with (he was my half-Orc barbarian adopted brother), we got him to change it, which was good, because newcomer only stayed one session before she found she didn't like D&D (partially due to the explosive slaughter of 186 kobolds that was spearheaded primarily by my gnome:smalltongue:) and before everyone else in the party hated her character, due to some annoying quirks.
It was only strange because the idea of "rare little people" hasn't showed up as a plot point yet (the campaign is still ongoing). Literally nobody has reacted to my gnome at all, and we've seen halflings doing the most mundane of things in the world, despite their supposed rarity.

[blackstarthegoa]

I'm banned from having an age.
It's a long story but my DM tried to spice up the game with out-of-game things, the thing that got me banned from age was darts. My group just finished a cave system clear-out quest and at the end of it we found a dart board with words no one could read. The DM took out a dart board for us to use, it had colored paper on it to help the DM pick things for us to get. The other players threw darts and got some awesome buffs (Bag of holding, one more feat, ect ect). I forgot my glasses and contacts that day so I couldn't see it. It was my turn and one of the other players said too me "Bet you 10 bucks you can't hit the white paper." The rest of the party got in on the bet so I did any thing a sane person would do: I took it. It was small, maybe 1/3 of an inch of white paper. I hit the middle of the white paper, the DM spit soda everywhere. Turns out the white paper said to take my age and add it to ability score points I could use how ever I wanted, everyone gathered around my paper to see my age. Now I got a feat that let me be as old as I wanted without taking de-buffs and not die. So I did the only thing that would be funny. I was 3,000,000 years old. My DM flipped as I kept this grin on my face. Now I'm not allowed to have age. But good news for the DM I didn't put it all into one stat (Only 2,000 into wisdom and 40 in intelligence). To be nice I traded all of the other points in for EXP for crafting and feats. But out all of this the best part was I got 50 bucks and two starbucks gift cards, so all ends well. :smallbiggrin:

[TheYell]

Shoulda said "Double or nothing?"

[elonin]

Fusion Grenades.

Group I was in was playing Space Master and we had to retreat from a planetary base via a space ship that we stole. Not having a good idea of what i had i decided to pull the pin and chuck it at the base when we were high up. Turned out the granade did enough damage to flatten the entire compound (which i recall as being huge). Was told we could no longer use any grenades that had a blast radius of further than our throwing range.

Also, not allowed to install cybernetic eye lazers purposely aimed back to the recipient.

[Anonymouswizard]

Fusion Grenades.

Group I was in was playing Space Master and we had to retreat from a planetary base via a space ship that we stole. Not having a good idea of what i had i decided to pull the pin and chuck it at the base when we were high up. Turned out the granade did enough damage to flatten the entire compound (which i recall as being huge). Was told we could no longer use any grenades that had a blast radius of further than our throwing range.

But how are you supposed to play Paranoia, where event he standard [this information is above your security clearance].


Also, not allowed to install cybernetic eye lazers purposely aimed back to the recipient.

Of course not, there's no such thing as a lazer :smallannoyed: Doing it with a laser would be more reasonable. Yes, this is a pet peeve of mine.

[hifidelity2]

I tend to ban or severely limit mind control spells (In GURPS) as they can be over powerful

[jindra34]

I tend to ban or severely limit mind control spells (In GURPS) as they can be over powerful

Eh... most of them are fairly reasonable. The GATE college gets a flat ban in my games because beyond the first 4 spells it just gives you to much control over space/time.

[Lacco]

Shadowrun: mind control (mood influence is ok) spells were banned by my players. I never used them, but then one of the players started to use them as universal tool - so I jumped in. Of course, they disliked it - who would? And we decided to ban them.

Any RPG: due to one of my players' strong necrophobia, "moving dead bodies" and "spirits of dead people" are universally banned. She doesn't mind "spirits" in Shadowrun, but I can't put in a single zombie in any game...

[RickAllison]

Shadowrun: mind control (mood influence is ok) spells were banned by my players. I never used them, but then one of the players started to use them as universal tool - so I jumped in. Of course, they disliked it - who would? And we decided to ban them.

Any RPG: due to one of my players' strong necrophobia, "moving dead bodies" and "spirits of dead people" are universally banned. She doesn't mind "spirits" in Shadowrun, but I can't put in a single zombie in any game...

But where is the fun in that? I still love my Halloween session for Star Wars. They walk onto a derelict Star Destroyer filled with dead bodies. When they return to the same room, one of the PCs notices that a body is missing...

[Sith_Happens]

But where is the fun in that? I still love my Halloween session for Star Wars. They walk onto a derelict Star Destroyer filled with dead bodies. When they return to the same room, one of the PCs notices that a body is missing...

I think the fun in it is not having to deal with a much bigger freakout then you're prepared for.

[arclance]

I think the fun in it is not having to deal with a much bigger freakout then you're prepared for.
I would agree about that most likely being the reason.
Some people have weird irrational phobias to a degree that any image or mention of it causes them to have a massive panic attack or freakout event than does not make sense rationally.
Spiders are a common one that people ask be removed from games so much that there are mods for video games (elder scrolls, etc) to replace spiders with other things.

I personally would not mind zombies/undead being removed from a game since they have been really over used lately in "popular" entertainment in ways I found dull which made them kind of boring to me.

[Lacco]

But where is the fun in that? I still love my Halloween session for Star Wars. They walk onto a derelict Star Destroyer filled with dead bodies. When they return to the same room, one of the PCs notices that a body is missing...

Welp, I can say that dungeon-delving (especially tomb-delving) is quite different without the undead...

...but it's workable.

And low-magic setting helps.


I think the fun in it is not having to deal with a much bigger freakout then you're prepared for.

Ooooh, yes.

That's exactly the correct type of fun :smallbiggrin:.

The fact that the player in this case is my significant other is another good reason... :smallbiggrin:


I personally would not mind zombies/undead being removed from a game since they have been really over used lately in "popular" entertainment in ways I found dull which made them kind of boring to me.

Yes, I had to get creative. She doesn't mind living shadows, animated items, eldritch horrors (if they are not put together from body parts) and has great imagination, so even a well-placed strange sounds and mist can have the same effect... :smallbiggrin:

[OldTrees1]

Welp, I can say that dungeon-delving (especially tomb-delving) is quite different without the undead...

...but it's workable.

And low-magic setting helps.

What solution(s) did you use? Constructs? More puzzle/traps? Grave robbers?

[The Fury]

Antimony, dolphins, and possibly neutrons. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?275152-What-am-I-supposed-to-do)

It's been a while but I seem to recall that Insane Troll Logic worked like actual logic too. Armed with this knowledge I'll bet there's even more stuff we could get banned!

[RickAllison]

Welp, I can say that dungeon-delving (especially tomb-delving) is quite different without the undead...

...but it's workable.

And low-magic setting helps.



Ooooh, yes.

That's exactly the correct type of fun :smallbiggrin:.

The fact that the player in this case is my significant other is another good reason... :smallbiggrin:



Yes, I had to get creative. She doesn't mind living shadows, animated items, eldritch horrors (if they are not put together from body parts) and has great imagination, so even a well-placed strange sounds and mist can have the same effect... :smallbiggrin:

I would definitely work around any phobias the players had, but it certainly limits things. I guess save your undead/spiders/etc. for days when the player is gone!

[Lacco]

What solution(s) did you use? Constructs? More puzzle/traps? Grave robbers?

Spiders, goblinoids, grave robbers, nothing with atmosphere, magically animated items, rats (lots of them), snakes, chokers, deformed humanoids, puzzles, unnaturally acting birds (just sitting and watching), lots of other strange flora/fauna, mystical & strange occurences (unnatural mist, smells, movement), eldritch horrors (she's fine with C'thulhu, nightmares, anything - except moving dead bodies and ghosts of dead people) and - dead bodies (unmoving).

Also, did lots of "Scooby-doo-ing" - the city vampire turned to be a pale man with allergies to sun, the mysterious robed persons that watched them from shadows were just assassins...


I would definitely work around any phobias the players had, but it certainly limits things. I guess save your undead/spiders/etc. for days when the player is gone!

Yessss! And then the undeads started to shamble out of their graves! :smallbiggrin:

On the other hand, it increased my ability to make a horror out of empty room with one rat... :smallbiggrin:

[MesiDoomstalker]

I had the following banned directly from me (and the DM's inability to cope with basic mechanics):

The Lightning Rush power in 4e
Power Points in 4e (now everything is an encounter Power)
Any Defender class
Any Controller class
Magic Missile in 4e
I was personally banned from playing any Leader class


She did not like me acting out of turn, so I couldn't use Lighting Rush (for those who don't know, I could smack opponents attacking my ally during their turn using the aforementioned power). She didn't like that I didn't have any encounter powers and that I was able to play most encounters sipping Power Points. First she changed it so they were a daily, not encounter, resource. Then she banned them altogether and made all my At-Will Psionic powers into Encounter powers (albeit with their added effects). Luckily, that game died before I had an option to change characters.

In another game (same group/DM) I played a Paladin. She didn't like that I could punish opponents for doing anything besides attacking me. When I explained that was the entire point of the Defender class category, I was not allowed to make a Defender. Since apparently, everyone's purpose is to dish out damage?

In yet another game (her games tend to die quickly and often) I played a Wizard. When I routinely used my powers for their intended purpose of restricting my opponent's actions and options or forcing movement upon them, I was not allowed to use any power of the sort. In a somewhat unrelated note, one of my At-Will's was forcibly retrained to Magic Missile. Since Magic Missile was LITERALLY the only spell that didn't do anything fun or interesting, I pimped out Magic Missile. Which got me banned, since being able to pop her horde of minions without attack rolls trivialized her encounter. Don't mention everyone else was popping 3-6 per turn with bigger AoE's while I was regulated to burning a Daily and all my actions popping 2 a round.

Finally, in the first game with this group/DM (I was working backwards) I played a Cleric because no one wanted to be a healbot Leader. I failed at being a healbot Leader from a combination of being new, getting terrible advice for 4e cleric's and the DM's inability to actually balance encounters. So I wasn't allowed to play the healbot Leader.

If anyone was counting, I wasn't allowed to play 3/4th of the classes in game. That left me with Strikers, if not for the fact everyone played a Striker (regardless of their actual class category). Needless to say, that group disintegrated under strain of general incompetence (and other issues) and the remnants congregated into two groups; those who knew what the heck they were doing and the incompetents.

[BootStrapTommy]

I've banned players from using fire, from making puns, and from making Monty Python/8-bit Theatre/Order of the Stick references. In each case, those bans quickly backfired.

Specific things to get banned include:
-tenser's floating disk
-alchemist fire
-bags of holding
-ring gates
-cannons
-daern's instant fortress
-warforged artificers
-explosive runes
-minionmancy
-economics textbooks
-mithral
-the color red

[ClintACK]

I've banned players from using fire, from making puns, and from making Monty Python/8-bit Theatre/Order of the Stick references. In each case, those bans quickly backfired.

Specific things to get banned include:
-tenser's floating disk
-alchemist fire
-bags of holding
-ring gates
-cannons
-daern's instant fortress
-warforged artificers
-explosive runes
-minionmancy
-economics textbooks
-mithral
-the color red

How did you get Tenser's Floating Disc banned?!?

[weckar]

At my table (Tri-Stat) I once banned gadgeteer. I don't quite remember why, but I don't think I ever overturned it...

[Inevitability]

I had the following banned directly from me (and the DM's inability to cope with basic mechanics):

The Lightning Rush power in 4e
Power Points in 4e (now everything is an encounter Power)
Any Defender class
Any Controller class
Magic Missile in 4e
I was personally banned from playing any Leader class


She did not like me acting out of turn, so I couldn't use Lighting Rush (for those who don't know, I could smack opponents attacking my ally during their turn using the aforementioned power). She didn't like that I didn't have any encounter powers and that I was able to play most encounters sipping Power Points. First she changed it so they were a daily, not encounter, resource. Then she banned them altogether and made all my At-Will Psionic powers into Encounter powers (albeit with their added effects). Luckily, that game died before I had an option to change characters.

In another game (same group/DM) I played a Paladin. She didn't like that I could punish opponents for doing anything besides attacking me. When I explained that was the entire point of the Defender class category, I was not allowed to make a Defender. Since apparently, everyone's purpose is to dish out damage?

In yet another game (her games tend to die quickly and often) I played a Wizard. When I routinely used my powers for their intended purpose of restricting my opponent's actions and options or forcing movement upon them, I was not allowed to use any power of the sort. In a somewhat unrelated note, one of my At-Will's was forcibly retrained to Magic Missile. Since Magic Missile was LITERALLY the only spell that didn't do anything fun or interesting, I pimped out Magic Missile. Which got me banned, since being able to pop her horde of minions without attack rolls trivialized her encounter. Don't mention everyone else was popping 3-6 per turn with bigger AoE's while I was regulated to burning a Daily and all my actions popping 2 a round.

Finally, in the first game with this group/DM (I was working backwards) I played a Cleric because no one wanted to be a healbot Leader. I failed at being a healbot Leader from a combination of being new, getting terrible advice for 4e cleric's and the DM's inability to actually balance encounters. So I wasn't allowed to play the healbot Leader.

If anyone was counting, I wasn't allowed to play 3/4th of the classes in game. That left me with Strikers, if not for the fact everyone played a Striker (regardless of their actual class category). Needless to say, that group disintegrated under strain of general incompetence (and other issues) and the remnants congregated into two groups; those who knew what the heck they were doing and the incompetents.

Banning Lightning Rush I can understand.

The others, though... I'm happy for you you no longer play with that DM.

[BootStrapTommy]

How did you get Tenser's Floating Disc banned?!?The same way I got alchemist fire banned.

[Sith_Happens]

The same way I got alchemist fire banned.

Lemme guess: by using them together.:smallbiggrin:

[Arbane]

I've banned players from using fire, from making puns, and from making Monty Python/8-bit Theatre/Order of the Stick references. In each case, those bans quickly backfired.

Specific things to get banned include:
-tenser's floating disk
-alchemist fire
-bags of holding
-ring gates
-cannons
-daern's instant fortress
-warforged artificers
-explosive runes
-minionmancy
-economics textbooks
-mithral
-the color red

Were you playing Paranoia for that one? If not, I wanna hear the story behind it.

[Belac93]

I recently got banned by one group from any sort of optimization

It was because I was told to "let myself loose" in terms of powergaming by the DM.

I ended up making a paladin/fighter/sorcerer nova build, and downing the final boss of a dungeon in 1 round, because he was low AC and I rolled pretty good (we were level 8, and I used twinned booming blade, smite, smite, action surge for another twinned booming blade, smite, smite, quickened booming blade, smite). We had been fighting weak enemies before, and I had conserved my spells for the final fight that I knew was coming.

And now I am banned from making powerful characters.

[Blue Duke]

I am apparently banned from playing characters in leadership positions.....any time I've played one whose tried to take charge and given logical suggestions i am either overruled by the rest of the party/the barbarian or we never play that game again. it isnt even asinine 'i'm in charge do what i say' leadership its 'maybe sneak down the hall way and listen at doors rather then....no...no Barbarian smash okay i guess we'll roll initiative then'

[kingtiger13123]

I am apparently banned from playing characters in leadership positions.....any time I've played one whose tried to take charge and given logical suggestions i am either overruled by the rest of the party/the barbarian or we never play that game again. it isnt even asinine 'i'm in charge do what i say' leadership its 'maybe sneak down the hall way and listen at doors rather then....no...no Barbarian smash okay i guess we'll roll initiative then'
The in-party leadership position is one we can never fill in our games. Usually it results from our one troll in the group messing something up or even worse, initiating the conversation with an NPC.
Last time a guy in our group tried to be in-party leader, he completely failed because
1) Two of our five player group was evil and another was CN, and each was so bogged down with their own esoteric evil plans that they paid no attention to the Lawful Good human fighter who was attempting to take charge
And
2) He randomly killed an NPC for an imagined slight, and derailed the entire campaign, in the first session.
Since then, we've kind of had an unspoken ban against trying this ever again. Though I'm interested in trying to clear this positions good name with my future Half-Drow Paladin.

[Telok]

The in-party leadership position is one we can never fill in our games. Usually it results from our one troll in the group messing something up or even worse, initiating the conversation with an NPC.
I feel your pain.

2) He randomly killed an NPC for an imagined slight, and derailed the entire campaign, in the first session.

Generally when ours does that sort of thing we help the local authorities kill/capture him and he gets to sit out the rest of the session making a new character. It took a couple of years but he learned. Then again our guy wasn't an intentional troll, just a sort of ADD for whom role playing games are table top versions of first person shooters.

On topic, many many years ago I was banned from playing Rogue Scientists in Rifts.

[BootStrapTommy]

Lemme guess: by using them together.:smallbiggrin:Of course. That's why they are next to each other on the list.

Needless to say, TFD can carry a lot of alchemist fires.

Certainly more than we had the dice to roll for...

[Friv]

I once banned the combat engine of a game we were running. Like, the whole thing. Just straight-up banned it.


If you guessed that the game system was Exalted 2e, you guessed right. But we didn't stop using the game system as a whole, no. That would have been a reasonable response. Instead, after literally nine years of increasing frustration, and at the tail end of a five-year gaming campaign, in the middle of a fight I just threw my arms up in the air and said, "Nope, we're not using the combat engine anymore. It's banned."

We ran all of our fights as skill challenges after that. It made things a lot more fun.

[kingtiger13123]

I feel your pain.


Generally when ours does that sort of thing we help the local authorities kill/capture him and he gets to sit out the rest of the session making a new character. It took a couple of years but he learned. Then again our guy wasn't an intentional troll, just a sort of ADD for whom role playing games are table top versions of first person shooters.

On topic, many many years ago I was banned from playing Rogue Scientists in Rifts.

The funny thing is, our resident troll and the guy that killed the NPC while trying to play leader were different people.
The guy who played leader was one we generally trusted not to make that sort of random, poorly-planned decision. At least the troll is consistent in playing flat, Chaotic Neutral characters with no motivation or backstory.
Another funny thing: the troll ended up being the one to kill our leader-turned-psycho, and everyone was cheering him on. I even leant him my D20 when his was unlucky, and he instantly rolled a 20 on it.

[blackstarthegoa]

I am now banned from the following:
-alchemist fire
- matches
- oil
- lightning
- all light sources that give off heat
- glasses
- glass bottles
- picking up the bard
- picking up the DM
- forests
- wood
- stone
- cloth
- charming the BBEG into letting me be second in command
- using this to kill the one party member that I don't like.
- Banned from charming the same gender as my character

The last one I didn't even do, it was the bard...

[mikeejimbo]

Oh right, another one. Encouraging NPCs to commit suicide. Not allowed to do that. Mind Controlling them into hurting their friends was OK though.

(Interestingly we were doing a parody of Captain Planet, and I was the one with the Heart Ring. I wanted to show why it was actually the most horrifying power in the wrong hands...)

[ComaVision]

I recently got banned by one group from any sort of optimization

Do you have to roll for all decision points on your character then? :smallwink:

[Belac93]

Do you have to roll for all decision points on your character then? :smallwink:

Not quite. I was allowed to choose my ability scores, class, and race, but I wasn't allowed to roll scores or play most spellcasters, and I couldn't multiclass, or take a specific list of feats.

Those limits are gone now, but I'm still not allowed to do any powergaming/loophole abuse (not that there is much in 5e).

[RickAllison]

Not allowed to try mind controlling the mentally-scarred DMPC to study the development of insanity !!FOR SCIENCE!!

Apparently turning a 12-year-old pyromaniac sorcerer insane is a bad idea...

[Âmesang]

Oh right, another one. Encouraging NPCs to commit suicide. Not allowed to do that. Mind Controlling them into hurting their friends was OK though.
I was once in the opposite situation; I was so happy to take control of a dread wraith via command undead (yay for Heighten Spell) since I could use it to (theoretically) soak up attacks and sense far off enemies…

…and all I kept hearing was, "so are you going to command it to commit suicide yet?" :smallconfused:

Oh, but they had no problems with the beastmaster having a small army of bears!

[RickAllison]

May not convince the legion of city guard-warlocks that the path to seeing their mysterious patron is by focusing all of their power together in one blast.

They all had Repelling Blast, which shoves the target creature 10' regardless of its size or shape. The idea would be to get them to stand in a sphere and simultaneously attack chipmunks or other animals in the center. The creature would be simultaneously pushed in every direction so the only direction to resolve is compression toward the center. And what happens if something is compressed to an infinitely dense form? Bad things, very bad things...

Despite the ban, the DM has yet to actually implement his guard plan :smallbiggrin:

[iceman10058]

I was banned from ever making a cleric again, after killing the entire party consisting of a human rogue, drow wizard, halfling barbarian, and a human monk, without "trying very hard" after they all turned against me.

[Inevitability]

I was banned from ever making a cleric again, after killing the entire party consisting of a human rogue, drow wizard, halfling barbarian, and a human monk, without "trying very hard" after they all turned against me.

Let me guess, 3.5?

[bulbaquil]

They all had Repelling Blast, which shoves the target creature 10' regardless of its size or shape. The idea would be to get them to stand in a sphere and simultaneously attack chipmunks or other animals in the center. The creature would be simultaneously pushed in every direction so the only direction to resolve is compression toward the center. And what happens if something is compressed to an infinitely dense form? Bad things, very bad things...

You... create a black hole with the mass of a chipmunk, which then proceeds to evaporate due to Hawking radiation in a tiny fraction of a nanosecond?

[RickAllison]

You... create a black hole with the mass of a chipmunk, which then proceeds to evaporate due to Hawking radiation in a tiny fraction of a nanosecond?

We aren't astrophysicists... But I am sure D&D has creatures that are big enough that we could create a stable black hole! It's a city guarded by a legion of crazy warlocks, I'm sure we can come up with some way to destroy the planet.

[Friv]

Alternately, you just declare "screw it, the repelling blasts all hit each other and repel the casters instead."

*EDIT* Actually, under a strict reading, Eldritch Blast doesn't do any extra damage if you shove the target into a wall or other solid object, so two shoves from two directions would just harmlessly cancel out.

[Rysto]

You... create a black hole with the mass of a chipmunk, which then proceeds to evaporate due to Hawking radiation in a tiny fraction of a nanosecond?

Won't you get nuclear fusion first? I wouldn't want to stand within a couple of hundred of feet of that.

[hifidelity2]

We aren't astrophysicists... But I am sure D&D has creatures that are big enough that we could create a stable black hole! It's a city guarded by a legion of crazy warlocks, I'm sure we can come up with some way to destroy the planet.

Easy

Sphere of force
Destroy air inside sphere
A Teleport at the bottom of sphere (inside it) that teleports anything to the top of the sphere (inside it)
Put a stone in the sphere

It will drop, be teleported to the top (and assuming it maintains momentum) drop again gaining speed at gravity (9.8m/s2)
leave for a bit
Stone hits close to speed of light
cancel sphere / teleport
Stone hits ground
BANG

[iceman10058]

Let me guess, 3.5?

Thus instance, but adnd wasnt better

[Arcacius]

I personally have banned players making characters that aren't either good or lawful after one too many times "just playing their alignment" has led to players killing each other of just taking off when another is in trouble.

[Inevitability]

I personally have banned players making characters that aren't either good or lawful after one too many times "just playing their alignment" has led to players killing each other of just taking off when another is in trouble.

Allow me to ask: why can't players make true neutral characters?

[Cazero]

Allow me to ask: why can't players make true neutral characters?
Well, duh. True Neutral characters are insane loonies who constantly switches sides to "preserve balance".

[Khedrac]

Allow me to ask: why can't players make true neutral characters?


Well, duh. True Neutral characters are insane loonies who constantly switches sides to "preserve balance".
It really doesn't help that WotC got their examples of True Neutral wrong. In the old DM test for the Living games one questions described a character who "might do this but might do that" - essentially they were chaotic sensible - and then the "correct" answer was 'True Neutral'.

The other problem is that people confuse "balance-centric" with "true neutral", presumably because Druids used to be all about balance and were required to be true neutral.

Someone fanatical about balance is (imo) more likely to be lawful neutral than true neutral (because they are predictable - they always go for balance). This not to say that they cannot be TN, but I personally think it unlikely.

What TN characters can be is disinterested in good and evil and law and chaos. Boccob is a good role-model for TN wizards - all he/they want is knowledge (and possibly power). They won't be cruel (evil) or particularly generous (good), they are probably fairly predictable (lawful) but not always as they decide what they need to know (chaotic). They don't try to follow the laws, but they don't try to break them either.
[Hmm, writing that I think I just invalidated my own argument for balance fanatics being lawful - oops.]

So yes, they can be all about balance, or they can simply be disinterested in morality and be focused on their own personal goal, be it knowledge or something else. (Note it can be power, but the maxim that 'all power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely' applies here so they may not remain TN if power focused.)
The problem with being "all about balance" is that this will usually bring them into conflict with the rest of the party at some point - there needs to be a degree of sense here, usually balance at the large scale not the small scale.

So - translating this into play. A TN character who regards the rest of the party as his or her friends and will face risk to help them works fine in the party.
However, a TN character who is not prepared to risk very much for the party may be useful to have around for some missions, but is likely to be kicked by the rest of the party as someone they cannot rely on.

If your players will not play the first (party helpful) form then banning TN characters does make sense, depending on the type of campaign.

[ExLibrisMortis]

I personally have banned players making characters that aren't either good or lawful after one too many times "just playing their alignment" has led to players killing each other of just taking off when another is in trouble.
That's heavy-handed (which can be necessary), but I wouldn't call it a strange ban, per sé. I totally get where you're coming from.

@Khedrac: Exactly as it applies to other alignments: the CE slaughterbarian is fine if they work with, for, and alongside the party, and horrible if they don't. TN specifically is in danger of inaction and lack of motivation, but the principle is the same.

[Pont]

I once got invited to a game (can't remember the system) where our native language (Danish) was banned. The GM wanted to play in English since the books were written in English...

Even though I speak English often, I just felt it was too weird and didn't accept the invitation.

[Inevitability]

I once got invited to a game (can't remember the system) where our native language (Danish) was banned. The GM wanted to play in English since the books were written in English...

Even though I speak English often, I just felt it was too weird and didn't accept the invitation.

If I tried to do that with my group, the game would just end up having one person who actually plays as usual, one player stitching something together that approaches logical language, one player sitting in silence and one player shouting "I attack!" "I attack!" over and over.

Now that I think about it, that's not that different from my usual group. :smalltongue:

[Cl0001]

My DM basically banned dumb and stubborn characters. This one guy in our group would always play a dwarf, like 3-4 campaigns on a row, and every character had an intelligence of 8 or lower and had some stupid habit. One would eat anything, and I mean anything. Another would try to break anything, including valuable artifacts, another was really lazy. And he would use his characters low int scores as excuses to do dumb stuff. So our dm would make items to kill off his characters by their flaw. Our dm also banned having a main class stat below 10. This was after we had a paladin had his stats going from greatest to least, St, Con, Int, Wis, Dex, Cha. Which led to him being the worst guy in the party

[Smorgonoffz]

In a brief campaign i ran i banned:

1) Evil characters( too much pvp, excuses of "i'm playing my aalignament" and screw over the party/ignoring party chars in danger)

2) Male players making female characters, every single player i know played only this 2 role with a female character: A) Lesbian ****
B) Straight ****

[Anonymouswizard]

2) Male players making female characters, every single player i know played only this 2 role with a female character: A) Lesbian ****
B) Straight ****

Not all of us. True, I still can't quite make it believable, but I've never played a female character as a ****. The only person I know who has is A) female and B) a feminist.

Now I know some men do have problems playing a non ****ly female character, but I want to point out that a few of us avoid it.

[Smorgonoffz]

Not all of us. True, I still can't quite make it believable, but I've never played a female character as a ****. The only person I know who has is A) female and B) a feminist.

Now I know some men do have problems playing a non ****ly female character, but I want to point out that a few of us avoid it. .

I fully agree tha not all male players do that, just the ones i met XD

[Arcacius]

Allow me to ask: why can't players make true neutral characters?

In a few cases I have seen players play true neutral to justify jumping all around the spectrum or characters that do nothing during the game because of neutrality.


Well, duh. True Neutral characters are insane loonies who constantly switches sides to "preserve balance".

They don't even understand that by acting at all they are undoing the innate balance of the system!


It really doesn't help that WotC got their examples of True Neutral wrong. In the old DM test for the Living games one questions described a character who "might do this but might do that" - essentially they were chaotic sensible - and then the "correct" answer was 'True Neutral'. *snip*

This might do this might do that mentality even if it spans both axi instead of just good and evil can have characters doing very clearly evil things and justifying it as somewhere in the middle.

Non evil character: how could you burn down that orphanage?!
TN character: there was a demon inside it.
Non evil character: but it was an orphanage!
TN character: well there won't be any more eaten orphans now will there?

And yes I have seen this happen.

Also if a person feels that true neutrality is sitting on average in the middle of the alignments a player can pick a race with a long life span and keep being evil "they were good" for the past 300 years of their life and now it's time to balance it out.

[Illven]

This might do this might do that mentality even if it spans both axi instead of just good and evil can have characters doing very clearly evil things and justifying it as somewhere in the middle.

Non evil character: how could you burn down that orphanage?!
TN character: there was a demon inside it.
Non evil character: but it was an orphanage!
TN character: well there won't be any more eaten orphans now will there?

And yes I have seen this happen.

Also if a person feels that true neutrality is sitting on average in the middle of the alignments a player can pick a race with a long life span and keep being evil "they were good" for the past 300 years of their life and now it's time to balance it out.

Now to play devil's advocate. (Probably appropriate I'm arguing for demon murdering) If the orphanage was evacuated and destroying the building, trapped or killed the demon, well the building can be rebuilt...

[ComaVision]

Now to play devil's advocate. (Probably appropriate I'm arguing for demon murdering) If the orphanage was evacuated and destroying the building, trapped or killed the demon, well the building can be rebuilt...

That'll show that demon for not having parents.

[bulbaquil]

In a few cases I have seen players play true neutral to justify jumping all around the spectrum or characters that do nothing during the game because of neutrality.

Why is this a bad thing?

[Belac93]

I just got banned from choosing my character class in D&D :smallbiggrin:

I have to give a list of 6 that I am fine with playing, and then the DM will choose one to let me be.

[MesiDoomstalker]

Why is this a bad thing?

The first is an inconsistent character that could help or hinder the party at seemingly arbitrary intervals. The second actively does nothing and might as well not play.

[Milo v3]

I ban alignment.

[Zaydos]

I got banned from running dragons once. It was after we had 3 guests for an already 8 person party and the dragon was only CR = party level +1 or 2 (the forest trolls brought up the EL to party level +4 or 5 but that should have been an easy encounter still).

Needless to say there was some heavy fudging done to prevent TPK (and the main tank died before reaching the dragon) and I was banned from running dragons... and have not actually run a dragon in a real campaign since before I got on this site. Weird.

I got banned from saying 'chitter chitter' or making a chittering sound. This can be blamed on slivers.

I had to ban a male player from playing female characters... almost had to ban a female player from playing male characters for what amounted to the same thing; their character didn't die and have to be replaced, though (with the other it was 'alright you can't make another female character everyone has complained to me').

I was not banned from having the rakshasa bbeg seduce PCs (they only managed it twice) but almost was.

[Inevitability]

I got banned from running dragons once. It was after we had 3 guests for an already 8 person party and the dragon was only CR = party level +1 or 2 (the forest trolls brought up the EL to party level +4 or 5 but that should have been an easy encounter still).

Needless to say there was some heavy fudging done to prevent TPK (and the main tank died before reaching the dragon) and I was banned from running dragons... and have not actually run a dragon in a real campaign since before I got on this site. Weird.

I got banned from saying 'chitter chitter' or making a chittering sound. This can be blamed on slivers.

I had to ban a male player from playing female characters... almost had to ban a female player from playing male characters for what amounted to the same thing; their character didn't die and have to be replaced, though (with the other it was 'alright you can't make another female character everyone has complained to me').

I was not banned from having the rakshasa bbeg seduce PCs (they only managed it twice) but almost was.

EL = Party level +4, assuming the 8 players are calculated in there, is, in fact, a difficult encounter. I've heard it described as a situation where the players have 50% chance of winning.

[Zaydos]

EL = Party level +4, assuming the 8 players are calculated in there, is, in fact, a difficult encounter. I've heard it described as a situation where the players have 50% chance of winning.

It was 11 PCs and an NPC. So theoretically "average" encounter should be EL = Party Level +3 (triple party size triple encounter strength), with EL +6 being 50% if they're tired, and EL +5 taking '50% resources' (equivalent to EL + 2) (EL +7 being 50% if they're fresh).

Real problem was that the party kept splitting between attacking the trolls (with fast healing) and the dragon, and the dragon was a gem dragon and I missed that they had updated its CR in 3.5 (which is why it was EL +4 or 5 instead of +3 or 4), but yes it should have still been a boss level encounter, not a total party kill. Mostly, though, it was just trying to run an 11 player session. (After that I banned guess players that would push us above 8 players, and once the group got smaller I banned myself from running games with more than 6 players ever again, but I don't think those count as strange really).

Which reminds me of how the 20 - 20 - hit = auto-kill got banned in all my games (it involves a wyrmling dragon, and the most nat 20s I saw in a battle under level 6). Let's just say that sans fudging it would have killed both PCs (one twice), and then it killed the dragon.

[illyahr]

Which reminds me of how the 20 - 20 - hit = auto-kill got banned in all my games (it involves a wyrmling dragon, and the most nat 20s I saw in a battle under level 6). Let's just say that sans fudging it would have killed both PCs (one twice), and then it killed the dragon.

This is exactly why celestial badgers are not a thing in my games anymore. TPKO, with the sorcerer summoning a celestial badger as his last move. A series of enraged chain-20's later, and the group wakes up to find their attackers torn to shreds and the badger returned to its home. :smallbiggrin:

[Zaydos]

I managed to almost get halflings, sorcerers, and familiars banned in a game where in the party wizard cast spells at-will from the entire 1st and 2nd level lists of the PHB (he didn't cast many and mostly just abused Tenser's Floating Disc*). The DM just 'lost' my character sheet because... um... I figured out how to get a message to the outside world from where he caved us in via a familiar.

So I made a fighter/barbarian that made the players try and get fighter banned. In their defense he was about as effective in combat as any 3 of the other PCs (there was the wizard who mostly used a bow, the paladin who acted as party fence, the rogue who played like a 2e thief, the monk who became a monk/sorcerer who became a monk/sorcerer/druid, and I forget what the other 2 or 3 chars were... this was when 3.5 had just come out). That and I punched the monk(/sorcerer) out while unarmed.

*Here defined as him and DM thought it could fly around willy nilly and didn't have to stay within 3 ft of the ground.

Actually come to think of it that was the DM that tried to ban me from figuring out my total on attack rolls (he kept changing NPC AC to keep them from dying).

[Vrock_Summoner]

That'll show that demon for not having parents.
As one of my players has said, word for word, during my current M&M campaign: "But if nobody's going to miss them, is it really murder?"

Edit: Oh, and as a matter of fact, I fully recognize that one of the strangest bans I've seen is one of my own. Namely, I banned ducklings from my Incarnum setting solely on the basis that Outsider Fey is a stupid fluff combination in my personal opinion.

[Milo v3]

Edit: Oh, and as a matter of fact, I fully recognize that one of the strangest bans I've seen is one of my own. Namely, I banned ducklings from my Incarnum setting solely on the basis that Outsider Fey is a stupid fluff combination in my personal opinion.
This was very odd to read until I remembered dusklings.

[HappyElf]

After a medieval fantasy adventure that was perhaps taken a little less seriously then intended, my DM declared that anyone whose response to entering a dungeon was "it's only a model" would be promptly force-fed their own character sheet.