Been DMing for 12 years and am starting a new campaign based very loosely within the setting of the Death Gate Cycle books. It is a world sundered by the gods, where the various races live on floating islands contained within a never ending maelstrom. The PHB is the main book for this campaign as far as building characters, although on a case by case basis I will consider things from other books. Please feel free to bring a character idea, and keep in mind that explaining what you plan to build openly will always be better than trying to sneak some broken build past the DM :P I like to keep a good balance of RP and Combat, but I try to let the players guide play as much as possible with their choices, so I find the group tends to find the balance that works for them. I reward creative thinking and team work, and I am not a DM who works against his players, but I do play my NPCs and monsters intelligently when applicable. I usually try to do a Game 0 with players, where we play a 1 hour 1-on-1 session to flush out the character slightly before the first session. Please DM me if you are interested, and we can chat from there.