Millsy, if you do, let us know how it goes!

With D&D, I generally don’t limit things for players too much. Every now and then I may run something where I narrow the scope down to just certain races and classes. One particular instance was for the winter one-shot adventure that I ran for my group, where I specified that races, classes, etc. from only the first two core books could be used (PHP and DMG). What was supposed to have been a one-shot adventure ended up continuing for a few sessions, and it turned out to be a lot of fun. The characters the players developed were very colorful.

However, it is wise to limit some things if they turn out to be over-powered. I remember having one bad experience with a half-dragon character (whom I had mortally wounded ). And I’m currently dealing with a half-fiend Damage Monkey in my current Eberron Campaign. I think in my next long-term campaign I’ll put a limit on templates that can be used for characters, if not put a blanket ban on them.

However, it can be interesting to see what players can come up with when you allow all sources, as long as they’re still able to fit the theme of the adventure. In fact, I’m in the process right now of planning for a summer one-shot adventure where I’ve allowed all sources to be used. I’ve seen some interesting character builds so far, which includes a Ravid sorcerer.

So both extremes can turn out to be fun. It just comes down to what fits best for your campaign, and what you and your players are comfortable with.

But, sure limitation all the time. Sorry, you don’t get to play a Vulcan from the starship Enterprise in my D&D game.

It’s interesting to see that many of the “indie” games are very focused. In Dogs in the Vinyard, you get to play a Mormon “watchdog of the faith” and the GM tells you what town you will visit next.

Of course all of the exploding options did really start with AD&D 1e, or truthfully before that, when the Greyhawk supplement to the original D&D game was first published (and perhaps even before that people were writing up new classes and such – not to mention the original game does actually offer the possibility of playing monsters as PCs – though no guidelines for experience and character advancement are provided – on the flip side, AD&D quashed this as Gygax started to react to the proliferation of optional material for the game). And for a while Dragon tried to quash the alternate classes by labelling them “NPC” classes and not providing experience progressions for them, but other than for a several year period, the Dragon would not have been the same without new character options.

Frank

I still say you have to be careful with it though, just make sure it doesn’t limit the players fun.

In superheroes, I might say “No aliens.” For 7th Sea, “No sorcery” or “No Kreuzritter” is common. In a White Wolf game, I might declare certain tribes or traditions off-limits. For D&D, I (of course) outlaw evil and Chaotic Neutral alignments, and so on.

Setting some boundaries in no way limits the endless roleplaying possibilities, and it helps plan a game where everyone gets treated fairly and gets a chance to participate in the story.

During my initial experiences with GURPS, I think every character had Bloodlust, Lecherous, and Overconfident as disadvantages (you know, all the things our D&D characters had naturally ). We started banning things from the list that didn’t seem like disadvantages. I also tried a concept where no two characters could have the same disadvantage. Skill lists were also something that needed trimming.

Walt C

Fantasy adventure, and the stories we grew up with, are good versus evil, not evil versus good (sure there is a perspective to argue here but then we digress into topics of moral relativism).

This is not to say that PCs can be shady with a decidedly evil slant, but the character has to find an outward projection that keeps him/her as an otherwise functional member of society (“Serial Mom” comes to mind) if not odd, or ecentric, or creepy. Backgrounds are very helpful, but are not going to change my mind about orges, orcs, skaven, or dark elves.

Bottom line, I see it as a simple matter of what the greater campaign world is going to allow walking the streets: orges, orcs, and vile ratmen die by mob, sword, fire, or all three, with no trial.

It just makes sense to do so. You run a better campaign by saying “No Xs. It will ruin the game experience for this adventure.” If a player objects I talk it over with them and try to find a compromise, and if that doesn’t work then I suggest that they sit out for that game (only happened once).

Now if there is no reason for not allowing something then just allow it from the beginning. I do not like it when a GM says “No Xs because I don’t like them in my games.” and find that to be a true limitation of what the players have available to them.

And as you’d know it one player showed up and was miffed because he had already started statting out a half-orc ranger. He was a grump until I said I didn’t have anything against him playing a half-ogre ranger!

While it went against the philosophy of saying “yes” to player choice, I think the player was happier with option.

I also tried to push the idea of all players having at least one connection with another player but this didn’t work out as well as no one followed through.

At least each player gave me a couple of paragraphs worth of character background to use for plot hooks.

Personally, I try to get some common ground to my PCs beforehand, and try to do that without system reference. I’m not convinced that SRD-only is necessarily fit for purpose (spiked chain, anyone?), nor WotC-only (as mentioned previously, Warshapers). But I still agree with the concept… because I have never seen the “if you want to play a drow, you’d better give me a good character background…” ever lead to “okay, that’s not a good enough character background, you can’t play a drow.”

So, I guess, be upfront about it, rather than pansy about with “I’ll need a good background for that.” Genuine, game-nuisance powergamers will find that background.

I play Champions, which is, of course, something of a different animal than D&D. Due to the nature of the game, you will typically have a few general guidelines as things start–a point total, a campaign city, and general guidelines as far as level of lethality.

My face-to-face campaign started along these lines. The primary PCs started with 250 points, including disadvantages (this was during 4th edition–it would probably be 350 points now), and all were tied to San Angelo. I ended up with a mage, a firefighter-turned energy projector, and an armored guy. They crossed paths during the first adventure and eventually teamed up, and the campaign has lasted on and off for several years. The upsides include flexibility for the players and a wide variety of play options.

But other games have taught me the value of more specific guidelines and how they can add value. In one of my favorite face-to-face campaigns, all the PCs had to be beholden to PRIMUS (a U.S.-based SHIELD-like organization) in some way, and they ended up under orders as a sort of second-tier superhero team. The initial structure of the campaign was much more limited (they went where their boss told them to go), but the campaign relied much less on coincidence to bring the heroes together and gave them real room to grow (for example, when they began to suspect that their boss wasn’t such a good guy). I run a PBEM campaign where all the heroes work for Disney and have Disney-themed powers (not really tongue in cheek, just corporate heroes and spokespeople, like Doctor Tomorrow who has gadgets and equipment reminiscent of Tomorrowland). It wouldn’t appeal to everyone, but the strong theme and limitations on character backgrounds really helped boost the players’ creativity in some areas and have helped to make for some cool storylines.

Sometimes adding restrictions can really help to get the creative juices flowing.

To carry this back to D&D, I could see a campaign based around the concept “you are all members of the duke’s elite guard” or “you are all performers for a traveling carnival” or “you are all dwarven soldiers separated from your regiment by a purple worm attack” as being more interesting than “you are all adventurers who met in a tavern.”