What's wrong with starting off in a tavern?

What's wrong with starting off in a tavern?

Taverns are nice.

purely the cliche factor

and eveyone demanding "originality" with no appreciation for establishment of a scene

Taverns are fucking staples to the genre. Every adventure should include a tavern sequence. Back before the times of the internet people needed to collect information in taverns from the locals.

Making dumb shitposts as an excuse to post your shitty dA waifu isn't nice.

>purely the cliche factor
>Taverns are fucking staples to the genre.

Both of these. Taverns make sense as social gathering places, but because of that they're overused. It's a cliché because, like many clichés, it simply works. Some change is refreshing though, from time to time.

When starting an adventure you could come up with some convuluted narrative (like "you're all prisoners", but even that is being turned into a cliché by the Elder Scrolls games) that might turn out to be fun if everyone plays along, but when the DM starts out with "you all start in a tavern", everyone knows what's up.

Most DMs don't know how to make a tavern worth visiting.

Barkeep, order drinks, get rumor, go on quest. Do it enough times, and it just makes you want to skip all that and start off in the dungeon.

If you have started a new game so many times that it has become cliche, time to take a break or start looking into another hobby.

How do you make a tavern worth visiting then, other than that one tavernier/bar wench who knows you on a first name basis and remembers your favorite drinks and snacks?

I'm a bit of a culinary enthusiast, so I tend to be pretty detailed when it comes to food and drink in my settings, sometimes going as far as to give my regions regional cuisines based on IRL cuisines. I guess that's also why my settings always have a not!France

Trying to think of a tavern name, but all that comes to mind right now is The Subtle Dick Joke.

>It's a cliché because, like many clichés, it simply works.
Uh, I don't think you know what a cliché is.

>A cliché or cliche (/ˈkliːʃeJ/ or /klJˈʃeJ/) is an expression, idea, or element of an artistic work which has become overused to the point of losing its original meaning or effect, even to the point of being trite or irritating, especially when at some earlier time it was considered meaningful or novel.

>The [noun]
>The [adjective] [noun]
>The [noun] of [region]
>[Name]'s [type of establishment]

Examples
>The crown
>The bejeweled crown
>The crown of Cornwall
>Cornelia's cookery

I don't know. My DM never starts us in a tavern. I feel like I'm missing out.

Seven Secrets Tavern.

Players entertain themselves by slowly discovering its seven secrets.

1. The mounted minotaur head will animate and answer any question if you offer it a drink.
2. The cook in the back is actually a merman that sits in a barrel.
3. At 2AM, the ghost of a halfling appears and sits in the reserved seat at the bar, with seven secrets of his own.
4. The recipe for the roasted chicken doesn't include chicken.
5. The king visits once a month dressed as an old lady.
6. The minotaur head is actually just a cow head.
7. There is no seventh secret.

You are railroaded into paying for drinks.

>it's a small town and the only place renting rooms
>it's got a gambling room in the back, plus all the characters who'd go there
>it's the tavern-of-choice for certain someones
>no one has ever died while asleep in their room

Take your pick.
A tavern alone is of no note. A tavern is either a reflection of the society it exists in, or a rejection of that same society however. A flat town means a flat tavern. You see where this is going.

>muh originality

The Dispenser.
The Beer Belly.
The Ol' Watering Hole.
The Nirvana. Under the sign: You'll get so drunk, you'll stop caring about anything.
Fenris II. Under the sign: We make drunks like Fenris makes warriors:loud, proud and spoiling for a fight.
And that's off the top of my head.

>Making dumb shitposts as an excuse to post your shitty dA waifu isn't nice.
Are you new to the board? OP's been doing that for years.

wow dude, are you fucking new or something, huh? Did my post-ironic tone not tip you off or something?
Christ almighty, this board is a joke and you're not the only one responsible.

The Winking Cyclops is one of my favorites, but that really might be just a subtle dick joke.

>tfw the local tavern gets shutdown
>tfw you walk in one day
>tfw you didn't even notice it had been converted into a gay bar because the name didn't even need to be changed

goddamn don't start in a prison unless your party are intense murderhobos
>why is the moralfag in prison?
>if your strong enough to break out, how did you get arrested in the first place?
>you better not be relying on a GMPC to help them
>would the moralfag even want to break out if they have faith they'll be found innocent?

Your lack of imagination is astounding.

I desperately want an adorably sweet country girl Tiefling who was raised like any other child because the reputation just wasn't there.

>GMPC wizard's apprentice tells you how to escape the dungeon
>GMPC Emperor decides you're useful to his order to assassins and bodyguards
>GMPC Emperor needs to flee through an escape tunnel in your cell
>GMPC dragon disrupts the execution

Why is he elder scrolls Trebek

because if you watch the Oblivion documentary they made, he's basically an enthusiastic kid who wants to make great games full of features like bandit raids and cooking, but the company engineers won't let him because it's too much work.

>Children love playing with her cow tail
>She insists and everyone assumes she came from dad getting frisky with a Minotaur
>She actually likes it when you play with her horns.

I like how in defense of your imagination you take a pretty famous plot point from elder scrolls.
GG guy.

Make taverns great again.

>why is the moralfag in prison?

Corrupt police, mistaken identity, committed a crime under a wizard's mind control, protested an unjust law, saved an innocent from a witch-burning, got in a barfight for good reasons, framed by fairies... are you under the impression that good people never wind up in prison, in real life or in stories?

>if your strong enough to break out, how did you get arrested in the first place?

are you further under the impression that jailbreaks never occur, in reality or fiction?

>you better not be relying on a GMPC to help them

That's not necessary, but it's a perfectly fine way to start a campaign. Questgiver posts bail, asks them to do a quest in return.

>would the moralfag even want to break out if they have faith they'll be found innocent?

Do you also think innocent people always get out? Do you not know anything about jail, even about jail in stories?

Point me to another major work that will inspire the GM to start the game with a prison break.
Riddick, Andy Dufresne, and Manuel Garcia "Mannie" O'Kelly-Davis are not level one characters either.

If you're looking for a gross, run down dive-like tavern name, go with "The Grody Toadstool".

I think he just meant Lawful characters and not just MORALFAGS. A lawful good character would have to break their alignment to break out of jail, but only if they were put their lawfully according to the laws of his land or order
So yeah, there are plenty of ways out of jail.

The Shawshank redemption. Everybody in that film was technically level 0
Checkmate motherfucka

some of my best adventures have started outside the tavern at the bounty board. They always tend to start at a social gathering place and taverns are about the best ones for lower level play.

>who is Andy Dufresne

You're not as smart as you think you are.

I must not be because I can't find what point you are trying to make here.

That's the name of Tim Robbin's character in Shawshank.

>Your party starts in a Train
>Your party has no idea what a Train is
>All you know is that the room you are in, some kind of storage room, is vibrating

I know, but what point was he trying to make?

well, from , the major works listed are TES, Riddick, and a character from shawshank, and google tells me, a Heinlein novel.
The comeback, , names Shawshank, which had already been excluded.
It's akin to asking someone to name an excellent series of fantasy novels, exclusing Conan because it's obvious, and getting told Conan anyway.

The better question is: did the characters in Shawshank have levels?

>Not just asking for a pot of hot water and a cup like a proper fucking gentleman.

go back to /b/, user.
What's with all the newfags trying to shit on any and all threads that have a picture that involves a person?
Or armor?
Or anything, really?

I wasn't new back when Nazimod banned me for a whole year for arguing against his policies around '10-'11, and I sure as hell aren't new now, nor is this the first time or year I call this faggot out on his faggotry, or try to remind people not to feed his autistic ass of a troll. Now fuck off if that's all you've got to say.

If you were actually against the nazimod you wouldn't be trying to board police so fucking hard.

Taverns are nice.
I feel that food fight is pretty much how to use taverns ever since I learned some shadowrun. Regardless of setting. Or genre, really. Anybody can have a food fight unless you are some kind of... quasi-real non-entropic energy being.

You apparently don't know the meaning of board police, and apparently you haven't a fucking clue about what Nazimod actually did. The retarded OP is continuously shitting up the board with vague non-contributing topics that never lead to anything, for reasons that I'm either too untouched in the head to imagine, or simply because he wants to post his waifu from some shitty dA comic.

Your arguments are almost exactly the same as those who supported and demanded the nazimod.
Especially the parts about how you have some kind of righteous cause against some mysterious phantom shitposter.
What I'm confused about is how touched in the head you have to be to have the paranoid fantasy that everyone who posts an image with a person who is drawn in it and a legitimate discussion topic is the same person.

Sometines it's fun to talk about vague shit you will never Talk about again.

>daily threads with the same girl
>threads all have vague topics and OP doesn't contribute to the discussion
>different people each time
It's fairly obvious it's the same guy each time. And what legitimate discussion? About what? Who's saying it's wrong to start in taverns? Does OP give examples? Does he provide an argument? Is there at all a topic to discuss here? And for the record: Nazimod wasn't just some vague no fun allowed thing, he was a dude who didn't understand what creativity was or how it happened, and basically just cared about rules: board rules and rules discussion, and he baleeted tons of attempts at creativity or discussions that typically ended up doing or facilitating something creative. OP doesn't do any of that. OP's posted nothing at all save his waifu and a few words to make anons bump his waifu for awhile. These threads never lead to anything creative, never will, and have no value whatsoever.

And it's interesting to know why people feel the way they do about taverns.
is just being a board policing cunt at this point.

Nice bait, user.

I wish I had a fucking tavern.
Closest I have is overpriced bars.

Don't engage him. This guy is a weird troll, and it's best to just ignore people who seem crazy, because you'd be surprised how many genuinely crazy people there are.

Fair enough point.
He obviously has some kind of paranoid delusional shit going on.

On the tavern point, I think it's pretty cool that people are swinging around to non-ironic enjoyment of old cliches nowadays. I am so tired of people trying to make things they think are original instead of things they think are cool, which may or may not be original as a side effect.

>PCs meet at a glory hole

You figure it out.

There is nothing wrong with that. It is the best way for a party with new players is a simple way and provide a chance to learn about your players and teach them how you like to DM.

All the haters just hating for no real or good reason.

>more than one person at a glory hole
Are... Are the PCs cultists? Or illuminati?

I would argue that cycles of genuine behavior and post-genuine behavior are a good reason, but that is neither here nor there.

It's fucking summer

Have fun thinking you're doing something Veeky Forums-related or creative instead of just being too new or dumb to recognize the very simple pattern at play here. I'm sure it'll lead to a very productive discussion for you and the board both.

>Questgiver posts bail, asks them to do a quest in return.

This right here? This is a superb, albeit simple and slightly cliche, plot hook. It puts just about any kind of party together, gives them a reason to stick together, and makes that reason questionable enough to be a plot point later on. While the basic options are explicit and incredibly straightforward, you can do all kinds of things with this opener.

>moralfag in jail
He's in jail because he has been banned from JUSTICE because he was too loose a cannon.
Now he needs to break out, because doctor evilak is on the loose and only his loose justice cannon can stop him!

Okay, the real question here.
How does meeting in a bar actually help the group get together?
What is the joined experience that meshes them?

Bar fight.
Or the town gets attacked

OR a mysterious questgiver hires them. They only realize later they were all hired for the same job when they all show up at the same place.

What's wrong with a CG Drow Ranger who twin-wields and has a pet panther?

CG Drow Rangers who twin-wield and have a pet panther are nice.

Not much, really.
All the people pissed about drizzt are too busy having their legs cut off from diabetes and other unhealthy 30 year old problems to be in your game, so you're in the clear again.

Only one of those happens specifically in a bar and not elsewhere.
Which, I guess, is enough. Bar fights are strong.

Being broke and needing a drink and a job?

The idea of the Tavern opener, the conception of the cliche, is that they don't need to have anything else in common. Rough-and-tumble types frequent certain establishments, those of Greater Means discover which these are and visit said establishments looking for Alternative Methods of Problem Resolution when the normal avenues fail. Perhaps rumors circulate through the aformentioned watering holes and up-and-coming Kidney-Stabbers, Spine-Breakers and Washed-Out Apprentices comingle their independently inexperienced and weak resources.

Maybe my answer is obvious, but I suppose I feel your question is as well.

It's how the Irish have been making friends for a few centuries now.

Good god damn that's a long torso. And I'm pretty forgiving of Eschershit

given the width and breadth of freakish humanity I see at my job, not that outlandish.

I fucking met that blueberry girl from willy wonka, minus being blue. She smelled terrible and had varicose veins and required wheelchair assistance to get out of the airport.

An Execution is fine too

YOUR Execution

What does Escher have to do with wonky anatomy?

torso is about 3 heads tall, that's typical

That may seem obvious to you, but it seems out of place to me in many fantasy scenarios.

Though it works just fine if you are, say, a team of professional criminals/mercenaries and an employer trying to hire them.

Why does everything sound like shadowrun to me today?

Stolen.

Thank you for pointing those out, I glazed over them because of spoilers.
And because I was interested in people getting bailed out of jail by a mysterious questgiver.

I'd be totally okay with the art if the legs were longer. Picturing her standing up, with her proportions as they are, is unsettling.
>I fucking met that blueberry girl from willy wonka, minus being blue.
Was she still chewing it?
Typical for real life, but cartoon heads can go bigger. Again, if the legs were longer, a la Bayonetta, I wouldn't have batted an eye.
Eschergirls, a tumblr about wonky anatomy in cheesecake art. Should have been good for a laugh, but it's all about how progressive and forward thinking they are for rebuking nothing.

The Duke's Arms
The Stag and Oak
King Malcolm's
The Gypsy Cellar
Shingleroof House
Cranberry Hall
The Hole-in-the-Mug

I think your problem is that you are an ass man, and judge the proportions by leg/torso ratio, while he is a tit man, and judgest them by head/torso ration.

The 99 heavenly punishments

>laws of The land

This meme needs to end. A lawful good character doesn't need to follow laws that he views are unjust, nor does he need to abide by unjust application of just laws.

Well of course. What kind of man prefers fake asses?

fuck, I correctly deduced your preference based on that?
I might be a WIZARD

You all met in a tavern. Everyone roll please.

Ok everyone except pc4 is hungover you all realise that it is now daylight again, everyone except pcs2&5 has the sensation of movement and pc5 you think you might be naked and have something inserted in your rear.
Gentle men you are on a mission from the Emperor himself. Who wants to try opening their eyes? In might hurt given your hangovers.

not but he dose make a good point that even if its striped of all imagination then it can still work.

>the priest's tale in the Canterbury tails

it was original once

have a drink on me

I feel, now that internet exists, that everything is cliche and thus that must be discarded when considering the value of a thing.

>A lawful good character doesn't need to follow laws that he views are unjust

I wish it were that simple. Sometimes, you need to follow a law to set an example, to say that "If even I, the wisest among you, will follow the law even if it means my death, then who are you to think you are above the law and are to question it?"

ok so instead of arguing about nothing lets make a list of alternatives to taverns

well, then you value the law structure of the land enough to act according to it.
Sometimes, even the most lawful and good of people needs to say "yo fuck dis sheit", mount up, and go throwing molotovs at authority figures.
This usually involves REALLY shitty laws though.

bars

that wouldn't be LG that would be NG

brothels!

Pubs.

beer gardens

Taphouses

The Wench's Wayside