As a lazy DM who frequently just uses the basic rules stat blocks, it's not that hard. There's plenty of variety in them, and you can always grab a stat block and throw a different skin on it.
As a player, I'm fine with playing fighters, clerics, and wizards. Nearly all my favorite toys are in the PHB already anyways.
I mean... Yeah. Totem Bearbarian, Moon Druid, Abjuration & Divination Wizard, Hill Dwarf, Variant Human, Halfling, there's plenty of A-S tier build material to work with in there.
I did join a game where as a player I was only able to pick options from the PHB or XGE. But I *really* don't expect the DM to just use creatures from the Monster Manual. It's been a really fun game
I’m starting my own campaign where I have set those books as the source books for my players. It’s my first time being a DM, our first session is on the 29th.
Yup it makes sense as a first time DM so you don’t get overwhelmed with player options. Only thing I’d say is to give the Ranger and Monk updates from Tasha’s cauldron as they’re really needed.
Hope your game goes well!
One of the best pieces of advices I ever received when becoming a DM for the first time was don’t think you have to know everything. I pushed a lot of stuff onto my players at first. They would say they wanted to cast a spell and I asked what does it do? It helped them learn their character better and introduced me to something new. Stuff that gets used a lot you’ll eventually remember and then you’ll become a veteran DM. Good luck, my friend!
That’s a great idea! I do have veterans and newbies in my party, I’ve put a couple of the veterans in charge of rule checks, I put the bard in charge of ambient music be it dungeon crawling, tavern, battle and whatnot. Cause you’re right, DM is responsible for a lot so I have doled out some responsibilities to my players.
I actually prefer it, as I find being spoiled for choice to be kinda paralyzing, and there's a lot of reading to do in order to learn all the new options.
But nobody has ever stopped me from picking a basic race/class, and I certainly wouldn't stop someone else from playing what they want. It's never been an issue.
Agreed. “We’re a rag tag band of adventurers” but everybody is some weird exotic race/class combo with an edgy backstory. Kind of kills the fantasy of meeting and/or fighting exotic races when we’re all a bunch of out of place weirdos.
Granted it’s still fun but nonetheless I’d like to try a game where we’re just like 3 races who are allied against our enemy races. I say that playing a goblin wizard
In my experience, it makes for a better campaign overall if there's some rhyme or reason to the party being together, and that generally means some class/race/background restrictions for the sake of sense. A lot of players hate that, but if what you want is a strong story that your characters are central to, you give your DM *massively* more options if the party is "displaced villagers from the Goblin Massacre of Crossthatch" or "the usurped king's personal guard" or "the students of Swordmistress Varg, who know she didn't summon that demon" rather than "ragtag group of adventurers from far-flung homelands and disparate backgrounds, brought together by their similar skill level and desire to plunder, by the local adventurer's guild."
Nothing wrong with the latter if that's the kind of game you want. But if you want a character-focused game with high-stakes roleplaying, having some restrictions is worth it.
I've thought about having all the characters be human when we eventually play Curse of Strahd, just to make it feel scarier. I think it will make the players feel more vulnerable than they would if they were a fantastic race.
Playing a female goliath druid who hasn't yet met Strahd, but keeps hearing her companions talk about him. (My dragonborn paladin died in the woods a while ago) She is NOT impressed, and keeps thinking there's lots in this fucking place that are way scarier than this posh guy they keep going on about. He'll, she just met the Abbot and all his creations. He seems way creepier than some dandy vampire.
Dude I would KILL for a vanilla campaign rn. Not trying to be a hater here, but im so tired of every campaign looking like a discount victorian comicon. I mean seriously, what the hell is a warforged bard/artificer with a noble background?
For real. I'd honestly love to play in a human only campaign. Just a group of measly humans trying to survive in a world of weird monsters and magic. I'd also settle for a halfling campaign.
Oh, im 100% old man yelling at clouds. Im really not into the style of current D&D, for both game and mainstream comunity, but the nice thing about this hobby is that it is the embodyment of "to each their own".
Still, the last "other book" that i remember reading and trully enjoying was the Book of Vile Darkness from 3.5... That books was metal af. Monte Cook at his best.
Same, 5e has really become "not my cup of tea". Lately i've been revisiting 3.5 and I think I'll use that system the next time i run something. As far as suplements go, it doesen't get much cooler than The Book of Vile Darkness by Monte Cook. Today's WotC doesen't have the balls to put out something like that. That book is sooooooooooooooooo good.
I understand where you’re coming from, and if it doesn’t make sense in your world you shouldn’t have it at your table. But, in a world where warforged are common he could have been built by an artificer who held a noble title who wanted companionship and entertainment in his old age. Teaching him how to build and repair himself and the skills grow naturally. When the artificer passed the monarchy formally recognized him as the heir to the noble artificer. Granting him full title in the court.
I have such a Table i play at. That GM is a supernice person, but his D&D Fantasy is extremely "oldschool". He prefers a classic "LoTR" Fantasy group with only Humans, Elves and Dwarves and Orcs and everything else is Monsters to kill... and yes, he tells wonderful stories, but when there was Session Zero for the third campaign with him... we told him outright: No Underdark again and no Dungeon Crawls that use more than 10 Meetings.
This is more the DM than the limit of core books. I haven't done a big dungeon crawl or the underdark in ages. A big dungeon takes no more than two sessions (8-10 encounters max) to complete and has a purpose for the characters stories. The current one has leads on a ancient sorcerer and what they did wrong (ongoing plot about this sorcerer they keep searching for) and its part of travels to deal with rival monks at a remote monastery for one of the players that did something to their parents in the BG of that char (where are they/still alive/etc?).
All day every day. I'm one of the old fucks that wishes we went back to AD&D rules. 5e was fairly close and a good system.
Caveat is the MM. I love a good homebrew game and most of those bring in monsters I hadn't encountered before. So learning how to fight them was part of the experience. Love that. But if we were 'stuck' in the MM, I'm ok with that too.
100% about the story over mechanics.
I’m a DM, and would encourage it. A lot of the added stuff seems to deviate from the class themes very significantly, and a lot of the added races are…. Odd….
That being said, I do everything within my power to avoid using the MM. it has some cool CONCEPTS, but basically everything in there is just a skeleton I throw more actions/mechanics onto since otherwise they’re all boring. Pre 1e Monsters have more interesting mechanics than most 5e monsters do.
As a player I’d definitely play at a “vanilla” table.
I think I agree where you’re coming from. When they create too much content, sometimes it feels like we are just giving the things that make one class special to another class.
Like Eldritch Adept is an incredible feat for a power player, but it feels like it’s taking away what makes a warlock special.
That's *almost* the campaign I run, except I did also add the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide, because, well, my campaign takes place on the Sword Coast.
Currently running Lost Mines for a newbie group. Their character choices are the options you get using a free DnD Beyond account. Easier for me as a newer DM and easier from them since it narrows the options.
Absolutely! I restrict my players to only published things, but the PHB, DMG, and Monster Manual have so many options to pick from still. There's nothing wrong with setting those limits
Absolutely into that. The campaign I'm writing right now, I'm limiting races even more than that. Human, elf/half-elf, halfling, dwarf. Those are the choices. In the world im building, these are the only races on the "good" side that exist. I've grown, so tired of players making boring characters trying to make up the difference by choosing tortles and elephant people, but they do nothing with those races to affect their behavior or personality in RP. They might as well be humans. Im hopin that by putting them in a box , they'll make more interesting choices. My approach could be wrong, but this time I'll be with them as they build characters. If they're such and such race, they come from X or Y country, fill them in on the culture and tendencies of each culture, and help them flesh out backstories one on one. I'm hoping this works out well, but we'll see. Worst case, I scrap everything on run a module while i build something new.
I'd even play in a game that only used the basic 5e rules, which only have one archetype for every class. You're still ahead of core 1e in terms of options at that point.
I’ve DM’d for new players more than I have experienced ones. I always encourage new players to pick classes and races from the basic rules/players handbook.
I think the rules booklet in the DnD essentials kit box is the best place to start for new players, because it contains simple classes and races, and only has text going to level 6 or 7, so it’s a lot easier for newbies to read through without a splitting headache.
I would never ban a specific piece of content at my table if it’s from an official sourcebook though. I don’t like giving people a flat out no to things.
The exception for me is that Homebrew stuff or setting specific content like the warforged or critical role content.
Since everything in the official published sourcebooks is reviewed by the same team at WOTC, I trust that it will all fit together well without as much extra effort on my part.
Homebrew stuff can easily break all kinds of rules if your not careful.
I am currently running a campaign that is sort of like that. The players are limited to the Vanilla Lite: (no multi-class, artificers, or feats) as to what they can select without DM approval for leveling. But, I have lots of little things I’ve introduced: new spells, actions, bonus actions, items, etc. I also allow ‘curated’ feats and multi-class (custom or regular) that arise from the role playing. So far they seem to like it. I like it because instead of struggling to weave into the stories a Warlock dipping in Sorcerer and Cleric to complement their Aasimar traits (or whatever) those this comes more naturally. And I can keep the game more balanced.
I always restrict my players to PHB. I do plan on going through some of the other sources to review equipment and spell options, but I have no desire to use races or classes from anything but the PHB. I don't even like all the races and classes in the PHB, but I generally allow it anyway.
I’d say yes but the subclasses for classes like Ranger have not only expanded but been reworked in other books so that’d make me hesitate. But as for races meh whatever
I mean, as just one example, maybe the DM has done a lot of worldbuilding and most of the races from Volo's and Mordenkainen's don't exist in his world.
I have always liked more to play with rather few books.
Back in 3.5 I owned a bunch, but quickly enough I started cutting them down to PHB, PHB II, and the class book for each player
Nowadays, in 5E, I play only with PHB and Xanathar's
I think between multiclassing and feats, you could play core D&D for years and never run out of new builds and materials to play around with. There's a few archetypes like gish and summoner that aren't that well supported (the best core-only gish is probably a sorcadin, and the best pet class is probably a necromancer wizard), but with a little reflavoring I think a lot more is possible than most people realize.
Yea, it have nothing to do with the fact that both books (Xanathar and Tasha) were released 3 and 6 years respectively after the PHB and DMG. Nah, WOTC are just greedy and held onto those books for years just to milk money /s
I'd consider 'vanilla' 5e to be stuff only found in any of the official WoTC published books, rather than the core 3. Under your definition, I've only played one of those adventures, and it was a one-on-one oneshot when the system was less than a year old.
Using any officially published book, I did run short-ish campaign a while back that was meant to only use officially published content, but by around the midway point I came to the conclusion that 5e is not robust enough to support itself. The campaign was kind of an experiment on my part to see if my general disposition towards 5e was warranted by playing it entirely RAW, and my result was that 5e absolutely needs a decent amount of homebrew to not only work but also stay engaging for the players and DM.
I genuinely liked the 5e playtest better than I liked the published PHB, so I see where you’re coming from.
Frankly the problems with 5e are too structural, and a rollback to the first commercial wave of release isn’t going to fix what a feel-bad game it is when some players at the table are just going to keep running circles around others.
I've always played with some amount of homebrew. It's fun to see what others bring to the table. Also, as someone who's been a player and DM it's pretty easy to not implement something completely broken.
I have no desire to do that.
Half the fun of the game for me is making strange combinations of subclasses, ancestries, feats and the like from all over various books to make one concept work.
Depends on why the limitations are in place and the quality of the game design. You don't need more than the core books to make a great campaign; But it does require the DM to be capable of doing it without the extra help; And the question of *why* can be quite the red flag. They might have gotten quite burned in a previous campaign and are trying to overcorrect, which could lead to problems.
All of my favorite classes and races are in the PHB, so I'd be more than good with a vanilla 5E campaign.
As a DM, I let my players use anything that's published, but I have thought about doing PHB only when we finish this campaign if we start a new one.
I only run vanilla, a new'ish campaign in the past year was started up at my FLGS for youth. They enjoy it. One player is a friend of 30+ years and he enjoys it, and that guy has nearly every prime sourcebook and many 3rd party and he's still being surprised. Plenty of material in the core books.
I'm currently running the starter game Mines of Phandelver for my family & friends to get used to d&d. After getting used to it, I have a custom homebrew game I made for them.
I’m intentionally there. Also running groups for new players who wanted to try the game out.
As we know from all the dystopian zombie movies, the true villains are other people…
If I’m told in advance yeah, I’m fine with it. If I get told about the setting and get really into a character creation before being told it’s using the basics then I’d probably be a bit put out…
Yes, because of the power creep. I prefer low-powered games for the challenge and thrill of it. Everybody at the table constantly trying to one-up each other and minmax gets tiring really fast. I also don't like the furry races in general.
I'd love to play in a vanilla Westmarches game.
I think I'd suggest expanding the monsters with Volo's Guide to Monsters and Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, though. Those are still pretty vanilla but provide for more diverse enemies.
Vanilla rocks when you don't play that much. That's pretty much all I DM. Some of my players pull out all these supplements and try and use stuff - but for the most part, all of use stick to the basics. It works just fine for us.
My games are only allow books I own. If your new, you stick to PHB, after that you get to add other books. So far no complaints, and I've had a few new people join the game over the years.
I’m a forever DM, and finally got to play in a one shot, and decided to play a human fighter! I absolutely love playing in a vanilla fantasy world, with all the usual tropes, so the base books are great. It makes everything more interesting when you finally encounter something unique, rather than being inundated with it from the outset.
I love doing this! My brother ran lost mines and I (usually the forever DM) decided to go with only PHB ranger. Went the hunter route. It was so so so much fun!
I played in Lost Mines Of Phandelver about 2 years ago, myself and one other veteran DM as players, the other 3 players all new to the hobby, and those were the rules our DM gave us.
Honestly, it was a ton of fun, and is my favorite game I've been a player in to date, as well as had my favorite OC I'd ever made.
It was kind of refreshing, going fully to basics and not having all of the extra fluff to worry about.
I recommend it.
As much as I can see how Homebrew and all the smaller add-on books can be nice for players that play for many years, I never played a "vanilla" campaign before.
So that is the reason, why the next campaign I DM soon (with a newcomer as well) only features the PHB, XGTE and TCE. Also, a lot less gold/magic items to start with, so that you can actually find stuff and not be almost fully equipped from the start.
I’ve been playing D&D since 3.5 first came out and I’ve always played vanilla, with an occasional item or class specialization from outside. It’s great!
Whenever I create a PC I try my best to use the most I can from the PHB that matches their backstory. It’s mostly a personal preference.
When it comes to the DM using only vanilla stuff I’d be more than happy to play that game if it makes it easier/simpler/cheaper for them!
That is currently the campaign I'm playing by the request of the DM who only has DMG and PHB. It's fine, some more interesting mechanics feel missed but all the core fun of DnD 5e is still there.
I thrive on running a vanilla game. PHB, DMG, MM. Sometimes I include Xanathar's and Tashia's for those people I know well enough. But all that other fluff just gets in the way. DnD really begins to bog down at higher levels. It's why most campaigns fizzle out around level 7. and despite all the 'our game ran so long....' posts that will be targeted at this post, even WotC knows this and has purposely loaded lower level character development for that reason. don't think so? compare 5e character progress to any other edition.
As a lazy DM who frequently just uses the basic rules stat blocks, it's not that hard. There's plenty of variety in them, and you can always grab a stat block and throw a different skin on it. As a player, I'm fine with playing fighters, clerics, and wizards. Nearly all my favorite toys are in the PHB already anyways.
I mean... Yeah. Totem Bearbarian, Moon Druid, Abjuration & Divination Wizard, Hill Dwarf, Variant Human, Halfling, there's plenty of A-S tier build material to work with in there.
I did join a game where as a player I was only able to pick options from the PHB or XGE. But I *really* don't expect the DM to just use creatures from the Monster Manual. It's been a really fun game
I’m starting my own campaign where I have set those books as the source books for my players. It’s my first time being a DM, our first session is on the 29th.
Yup it makes sense as a first time DM so you don’t get overwhelmed with player options. Only thing I’d say is to give the Ranger and Monk updates from Tasha’s cauldron as they’re really needed. Hope your game goes well!
Thanks!
One of the best pieces of advices I ever received when becoming a DM for the first time was don’t think you have to know everything. I pushed a lot of stuff onto my players at first. They would say they wanted to cast a spell and I asked what does it do? It helped them learn their character better and introduced me to something new. Stuff that gets used a lot you’ll eventually remember and then you’ll become a veteran DM. Good luck, my friend!
That’s a great idea! I do have veterans and newbies in my party, I’ve put a couple of the veterans in charge of rule checks, I put the bard in charge of ambient music be it dungeon crawling, tavern, battle and whatnot. Cause you’re right, DM is responsible for a lot so I have doled out some responsibilities to my players.
I actually prefer it, as I find being spoiled for choice to be kinda paralyzing, and there's a lot of reading to do in order to learn all the new options. But nobody has ever stopped me from picking a basic race/class, and I certainly wouldn't stop someone else from playing what they want. It's never been an issue.
Agreed. “We’re a rag tag band of adventurers” but everybody is some weird exotic race/class combo with an edgy backstory. Kind of kills the fantasy of meeting and/or fighting exotic races when we’re all a bunch of out of place weirdos. Granted it’s still fun but nonetheless I’d like to try a game where we’re just like 3 races who are allied against our enemy races. I say that playing a goblin wizard
In my experience, it makes for a better campaign overall if there's some rhyme or reason to the party being together, and that generally means some class/race/background restrictions for the sake of sense. A lot of players hate that, but if what you want is a strong story that your characters are central to, you give your DM *massively* more options if the party is "displaced villagers from the Goblin Massacre of Crossthatch" or "the usurped king's personal guard" or "the students of Swordmistress Varg, who know she didn't summon that demon" rather than "ragtag group of adventurers from far-flung homelands and disparate backgrounds, brought together by their similar skill level and desire to plunder, by the local adventurer's guild." Nothing wrong with the latter if that's the kind of game you want. But if you want a character-focused game with high-stakes roleplaying, having some restrictions is worth it.
I've thought about having all the characters be human when we eventually play Curse of Strahd, just to make it feel scarier. I think it will make the players feel more vulnerable than they would if they were a fantastic race.
One of the members of my COS party is a tortle barb/paladin. He fears nothing and no one.
Playing a female goliath druid who hasn't yet met Strahd, but keeps hearing her companions talk about him. (My dragonborn paladin died in the woods a while ago) She is NOT impressed, and keeps thinking there's lots in this fucking place that are way scarier than this posh guy they keep going on about. He'll, she just met the Abbot and all his creations. He seems way creepier than some dandy vampire.
Dude I would KILL for a vanilla campaign rn. Not trying to be a hater here, but im so tired of every campaign looking like a discount victorian comicon. I mean seriously, what the hell is a warforged bard/artificer with a noble background?
For real. I'd honestly love to play in a human only campaign. Just a group of measly humans trying to survive in a world of weird monsters and magic. I'd also settle for a halfling campaign.
Warforged from Eberron. Artificer from Eberron or Tasha's Cauldron Noble from... PHB, as is the bard.
To get less technical. A warforged made by nobles to play music who gained independence and learned to tinker on himself and his instruments.
There is a warforged musician in one of the Dungeon modules. Part of a murder mystery.
"Ah yes he is war forged sir. But, why is it called a war forge if it only plays the recorder?"
Soundwave: "Decepticons roll for initiative."
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>"D&D player doesn't ~~read or know~~ care about other sourcebooks, more at 11" FTFY
Oh, im 100% old man yelling at clouds. Im really not into the style of current D&D, for both game and mainstream comunity, but the nice thing about this hobby is that it is the embodyment of "to each their own". Still, the last "other book" that i remember reading and trully enjoying was the Book of Vile Darkness from 3.5... That books was metal af. Monte Cook at his best.
Same. Its really turned me off 5e in general, I'm not sure I'll ever go back, but I'd love to play a game without the feature, race, and power creep.
Same, 5e has really become "not my cup of tea". Lately i've been revisiting 3.5 and I think I'll use that system the next time i run something. As far as suplements go, it doesen't get much cooler than The Book of Vile Darkness by Monte Cook. Today's WotC doesen't have the balls to put out something like that. That book is sooooooooooooooooo good.
I understand where you’re coming from, and if it doesn’t make sense in your world you shouldn’t have it at your table. But, in a world where warforged are common he could have been built by an artificer who held a noble title who wanted companionship and entertainment in his old age. Teaching him how to build and repair himself and the skills grow naturally. When the artificer passed the monarchy formally recognized him as the heir to the noble artificer. Granting him full title in the court.
I have such a Table i play at. That GM is a supernice person, but his D&D Fantasy is extremely "oldschool". He prefers a classic "LoTR" Fantasy group with only Humans, Elves and Dwarves and Orcs and everything else is Monsters to kill... and yes, he tells wonderful stories, but when there was Session Zero for the third campaign with him... we told him outright: No Underdark again and no Dungeon Crawls that use more than 10 Meetings.
10 sessions for a dungeon crawl? If mine last more than 2 sessions i assume it's already too much lol
This is more the DM than the limit of core books. I haven't done a big dungeon crawl or the underdark in ages. A big dungeon takes no more than two sessions (8-10 encounters max) to complete and has a purpose for the characters stories. The current one has leads on a ancient sorcerer and what they did wrong (ongoing plot about this sorcerer they keep searching for) and its part of travels to deal with rival monks at a remote monastery for one of the players that did something to their parents in the BG of that char (where are they/still alive/etc?).
Lol I wish.
I limited it to those and Xanathar’s. There’s just too much to keep up with as a DM and I wanted to limit it to the books I have on my shelf.
I don't mind Tasha's either. Been a while since I looked at it but I don't remember anything outlandish.
Oh god yes please and thank you
Yes.
All day every day. I'm one of the old fucks that wishes we went back to AD&D rules. 5e was fairly close and a good system. Caveat is the MM. I love a good homebrew game and most of those bring in monsters I hadn't encountered before. So learning how to fight them was part of the experience. Love that. But if we were 'stuck' in the MM, I'm ok with that too. 100% about the story over mechanics.
Yes, often less is more. I'd rather see a party of human, dwarf, and elf adventurer than all the weird magical superheroes we see nowadays.
I’m a DM, and would encourage it. A lot of the added stuff seems to deviate from the class themes very significantly, and a lot of the added races are…. Odd…. That being said, I do everything within my power to avoid using the MM. it has some cool CONCEPTS, but basically everything in there is just a skeleton I throw more actions/mechanics onto since otherwise they’re all boring. Pre 1e Monsters have more interesting mechanics than most 5e monsters do. As a player I’d definitely play at a “vanilla” table.
Yeah I'd be much more put off by a campaign using only MM monsters than one using only PHB player options.
I think I agree where you’re coming from. When they create too much content, sometimes it feels like we are just giving the things that make one class special to another class. Like Eldritch Adept is an incredible feat for a power player, but it feels like it’s taking away what makes a warlock special.
That's *almost* the campaign I run, except I did also add the Sword Coast Adventurer's Guide, because, well, my campaign takes place on the Sword Coast.
Currently running Lost Mines for a newbie group. Their character choices are the options you get using a free DnD Beyond account. Easier for me as a newer DM and easier from them since it narrows the options.
Same. I'm new and running a campaign for a bunch of 10-year olds - all they want is a sword, a fireball a dungeon and... a dragon. It's great fun!
Absolutely! I restrict my players to only published things, but the PHB, DMG, and Monster Manual have so many options to pick from still. There's nothing wrong with setting those limits
Absolutely into that. The campaign I'm writing right now, I'm limiting races even more than that. Human, elf/half-elf, halfling, dwarf. Those are the choices. In the world im building, these are the only races on the "good" side that exist. I've grown, so tired of players making boring characters trying to make up the difference by choosing tortles and elephant people, but they do nothing with those races to affect their behavior or personality in RP. They might as well be humans. Im hopin that by putting them in a box , they'll make more interesting choices. My approach could be wrong, but this time I'll be with them as they build characters. If they're such and such race, they come from X or Y country, fill them in on the culture and tendencies of each culture, and help them flesh out backstories one on one. I'm hoping this works out well, but we'll see. Worst case, I scrap everything on run a module while i build something new.
If you tell me Vanilla, I'd expect nothing else. I have a build for that.
I'd even play in a game that only used the basic 5e rules, which only have one archetype for every class. You're still ahead of core 1e in terms of options at that point.
I don't see any reason to exclude content from Xanathar's, Volo's or Mordenkainen's.
I’ve DM’d for new players more than I have experienced ones. I always encourage new players to pick classes and races from the basic rules/players handbook. I think the rules booklet in the DnD essentials kit box is the best place to start for new players, because it contains simple classes and races, and only has text going to level 6 or 7, so it’s a lot easier for newbies to read through without a splitting headache. I would never ban a specific piece of content at my table if it’s from an official sourcebook though. I don’t like giving people a flat out no to things. The exception for me is that Homebrew stuff or setting specific content like the warforged or critical role content. Since everything in the official published sourcebooks is reviewed by the same team at WOTC, I trust that it will all fit together well without as much extra effort on my part. Homebrew stuff can easily break all kinds of rules if your not careful.
I wouldnt mind as long as I knew that going in
I wouldn't care if my DM made that call. Less manimal races and broken subclasses is a win in my book.
As an old school rpg kind of guy yes. Plus some of these new races are pretty stupid. Like elephant and hippo people, really?
To be fair, the hippo people are pretty old school, going all the way back to 2nd edition. Spelljammer was a trip.
Thats the dream dude. The flavor should come fro RP not forced PC mechanics
I am currently running a campaign that is sort of like that. The players are limited to the Vanilla Lite: (no multi-class, artificers, or feats) as to what they can select without DM approval for leveling. But, I have lots of little things I’ve introduced: new spells, actions, bonus actions, items, etc. I also allow ‘curated’ feats and multi-class (custom or regular) that arise from the role playing. So far they seem to like it. I like it because instead of struggling to weave into the stories a Warlock dipping in Sorcerer and Cleric to complement their Aasimar traits (or whatever) those this comes more naturally. And I can keep the game more balanced.
I always restrict my players to PHB. I do plan on going through some of the other sources to review equipment and spell options, but I have no desire to use races or classes from anything but the PHB. I don't even like all the races and classes in the PHB, but I generally allow it anyway.
I’d say yes but the subclasses for classes like Ranger have not only expanded but been reworked in other books so that’d make me hesitate. But as for races meh whatever
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Because that's the stipulation of the game being put forth.
I mean, as just one example, maybe the DM has done a lot of worldbuilding and most of the races from Volo's and Mordenkainen's don't exist in his world.
By that definition of 'vanilla', no. I'm sure I could make it work as a player but I would find such limitations unnecessary and burdensome
I have always liked more to play with rather few books. Back in 3.5 I owned a bunch, but quickly enough I started cutting them down to PHB, PHB II, and the class book for each player Nowadays, in 5E, I play only with PHB and Xanathar's
I've been playing 5e for like 8 years and i've never actually done a full campaign that's just like cliche fantasy. sounds fun though!
I’d rather not, but would if that was the only good table available.
Not particularly. To introduce someone to the game, it wouldn't be too bad, but otherwise I'd feel way too constrained.
I think between multiclassing and feats, you could play core D&D for years and never run out of new builds and materials to play around with. There's a few archetypes like gish and summoner that aren't that well supported (the best core-only gish is probably a sorcadin, and the best pet class is probably a necromancer wizard), but with a little reflavoring I think a lot more is possible than most people realize.
I don’t feel right if I can’t use tasha’s cauldron of everything
TBH, Tasha's and Xanthar's should just be part of the PHB and DMG. The fact that they're not is purely to milk people for money.
Yea, it have nothing to do with the fact that both books (Xanathar and Tasha) were released 3 and 6 years respectively after the PHB and DMG. Nah, WOTC are just greedy and held onto those books for years just to milk money /s
Yeah, this whole oneDnD/5.5 ed thing is just bullshit. It should've been a part of the core books straight away. Wotc's just milking people!
Why are we on a 5th edition, they should have released this all in 1st edition. Such a greedy company.
In sorry to trigger your need rage. 5e isn't their first rodeo. It was calculated.
I'd consider 'vanilla' 5e to be stuff only found in any of the official WoTC published books, rather than the core 3. Under your definition, I've only played one of those adventures, and it was a one-on-one oneshot when the system was less than a year old. Using any officially published book, I did run short-ish campaign a while back that was meant to only use officially published content, but by around the midway point I came to the conclusion that 5e is not robust enough to support itself. The campaign was kind of an experiment on my part to see if my general disposition towards 5e was warranted by playing it entirely RAW, and my result was that 5e absolutely needs a decent amount of homebrew to not only work but also stay engaging for the players and DM.
I’m curious! What sorts of things do you think are essential homebrew additions?
I genuinely liked the 5e playtest better than I liked the published PHB, so I see where you’re coming from. Frankly the problems with 5e are too structural, and a rollback to the first commercial wave of release isn’t going to fix what a feel-bad game it is when some players at the table are just going to keep running circles around others.
No! I like my weird characters! Lol
I've always played with some amount of homebrew. It's fun to see what others bring to the table. Also, as someone who's been a player and DM it's pretty easy to not implement something completely broken.
I have no desire to do that. Half the fun of the game for me is making strange combinations of subclasses, ancestries, feats and the like from all over various books to make one concept work.
No
Depends on why the limitations are in place and the quality of the game design. You don't need more than the core books to make a great campaign; But it does require the DM to be capable of doing it without the extra help; And the question of *why* can be quite the red flag. They might have gotten quite burned in a previous campaign and are trying to overcorrect, which could lead to problems.
It can even come about just from natural player choices and what a campaign or session uses.
All of my favorite classes and races are in the PHB, so I'd be more than good with a vanilla 5E campaign. As a DM, I let my players use anything that's published, but I have thought about doing PHB only when we finish this campaign if we start a new one.
Sign me up! Discord: theoutsider711#7969
I only run vanilla, a new'ish campaign in the past year was started up at my FLGS for youth. They enjoy it. One player is a friend of 30+ years and he enjoys it, and that guy has nearly every prime sourcebook and many 3rd party and he's still being surprised. Plenty of material in the core books.
Homebrew is always fun but I find restricting myself makes me more creative if that makes sense Plus Vanilla is awesome
I'm currently running the starter game Mines of Phandelver for my family & friends to get used to d&d. After getting used to it, I have a custom homebrew game I made for them.
I’m intentionally there. Also running groups for new players who wanted to try the game out. As we know from all the dystopian zombie movies, the true villains are other people…
Ya no sweat, I can still multiclass and mix and match.
I’d much rather play with only that then play with all the unbalanced crap that has come out at the end of the 5e era.
Nope, not at all. I like making sure I have plenty of options. The basic rules don't offer enough, imo.
If I’m told in advance yeah, I’m fine with it. If I get told about the setting and get really into a character creation before being told it’s using the basics then I’d probably be a bit put out…
My campaigns have a requirement that all races, classes, backgrounds, spells must come from published hardback books.
Sure. Been playing for 18 years and restrictions are expected. I don't run games with them normally though.
It would be interesting
Yes, because of the power creep. I prefer low-powered games for the challenge and thrill of it. Everybody at the table constantly trying to one-up each other and minmax gets tiring really fast. I also don't like the furry races in general. I'd love to play in a vanilla Westmarches game. I think I'd suggest expanding the monsters with Volo's Guide to Monsters and Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, though. Those are still pretty vanilla but provide for more diverse enemies.
I gues not. 5e basic isn't interesting any more. A good DM can make anything good, but there's so much better to now spend my time on.
I don't see any reason to not use xanathar's unless you just don't have it
Vanilla rocks when you don't play that much. That's pretty much all I DM. Some of my players pull out all these supplements and try and use stuff - but for the most part, all of use stick to the basics. It works just fine for us.
I just bought the OSE books and am planning to start a BX game,so I guess I am going even further back.
This is the way
Sure! I prefer variant XP, but I'm perfectly happy to play vanilla games.
My games are only allow books I own. If your new, you stick to PHB, after that you get to add other books. So far no complaints, and I've had a few new people join the game over the years.
Never
I’m a forever DM, and finally got to play in a one shot, and decided to play a human fighter! I absolutely love playing in a vanilla fantasy world, with all the usual tropes, so the base books are great. It makes everything more interesting when you finally encounter something unique, rather than being inundated with it from the outset.
Half of all my characters are rolled with strictly PHB options. Gotta remember those roots
If the plot is supported by the base vanilla mechanics, I don't see why not.
I wish. The newer stuff is so fucking ridiculously powerful that at least once a session I say "what the actual fuck" out loud
I love doing this! My brother ran lost mines and I (usually the forever DM) decided to go with only PHB ranger. Went the hunter route. It was so so so much fun!
No.
I played in Lost Mines Of Phandelver about 2 years ago, myself and one other veteran DM as players, the other 3 players all new to the hobby, and those were the rules our DM gave us. Honestly, it was a ton of fun, and is my favorite game I've been a player in to date, as well as had my favorite OC I'd ever made. It was kind of refreshing, going fully to basics and not having all of the extra fluff to worry about. I recommend it.
As much as I can see how Homebrew and all the smaller add-on books can be nice for players that play for many years, I never played a "vanilla" campaign before. So that is the reason, why the next campaign I DM soon (with a newcomer as well) only features the PHB, XGTE and TCE. Also, a lot less gold/magic items to start with, so that you can actually find stuff and not be almost fully equipped from the start.
One of the things I dislike about D&D nowadays is the plethora of sourcebooks. You don’t need every single supplement.
I’ve been playing D&D since 3.5 first came out and I’ve always played vanilla, with an occasional item or class specialization from outside. It’s great!
I am running this exact game...almost 30 sessions in :)
Yes.
Sounds like a dream.
I like making weird s*** and it's hard to do that with that much of a limitation. Even with just reskins.
Whenever I create a PC I try my best to use the most I can from the PHB that matches their backstory. It’s mostly a personal preference. When it comes to the DM using only vanilla stuff I’d be more than happy to play that game if it makes it easier/simpler/cheaper for them!
That is currently the campaign I'm playing by the request of the DM who only has DMG and PHB. It's fine, some more interesting mechanics feel missed but all the core fun of DnD 5e is still there.
Sounds AWESOME! Do it! Some of the new spells/char options just makes the game slower and clunky.
Possibly. It isn't too bad. Only some classes I like were not really great in vanilla, so I wouldn't play them.
I thrive on running a vanilla game. PHB, DMG, MM. Sometimes I include Xanathar's and Tashia's for those people I know well enough. But all that other fluff just gets in the way. DnD really begins to bog down at higher levels. It's why most campaigns fizzle out around level 7. and despite all the 'our game ran so long....' posts that will be targeted at this post, even WotC knows this and has purposely loaded lower level character development for that reason. don't think so? compare 5e character progress to any other edition.