Useful video for new DMs
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#7
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silversea ONLINE (01/07/2016) [+] (4 replies)
As a new DM, this will really help me.
I've been running the game for a few months, two hours a session once a week. It's hell with our short sessions, but fun as hell because I've already tried my best to avoid these pitfalls.
In fact, for new DM's:
Don't be afraid to make **** up on the spot, but don't rely on it. As he said, get a framework, but for my game, the framework let me mold the encounters to my party's strengths and weaknesses right off the bat, to make them feel as if they were all useful and fun, even when the wizard set the place on fire and the barbarian killed 5 warriors singlehandedly, the Cleric and Rogue felt fine jumping in and assisting where they were needed, because the rogue had scouted ahead and the barbarian was hurt, requiring healing.
Use your creativity like the fighter with his sword: as an extension of yourself, and something you can attack with at your maximum potential always, while remaining limited to knowing what you can and cannot do.
stickied by peliaosfiendline
Click to show spoiler
I've been running the game for a few months, two hours a session once a week. It's hell with our short sessions, but fun as hell because I've already tried my best to avoid these pitfalls.
In fact, for new DM's:
Don't be afraid to make **** up on the spot, but don't rely on it. As he said, get a framework, but for my game, the framework let me mold the encounters to my party's strengths and weaknesses right off the bat, to make them feel as if they were all useful and fun, even when the wizard set the place on fire and the barbarian killed 5 warriors singlehandedly, the Cleric and Rogue felt fine jumping in and assisting where they were needed, because the rogue had scouted ahead and the barbarian was hurt, requiring healing.
Use your creativity like the fighter with his sword: as an extension of yourself, and something you can attack with at your maximum potential always, while remaining limited to knowing what you can and cannot do.
#19
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leonhardt (01/07/2016) [-] From that video's recommendations, I found this:
******* Vin Deisel playing DnD with Laura Bailey and one of the best DM's I've ever seen.
******* Vin Deisel playing DnD with Laura Bailey and one of the best DM's I've ever seen.
#21 to #19
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peliaosfiendline [OP](01/07/2016) [-] I thought about posting that to the channel, but decided not to. It's honestly something I wish there was a sequel to.
#59 to #19
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schneidend ONLINE (01/08/2016) [-] Mercer's ******* great. Travis Wellingham being hilarious, Laura Bailey being adorable, and Matt Mercer being one of the best DMs I've ever seen makes Critical Role a joy to watch. Vin Diesel certainly helps, but I feel like he must have been a bit rusty, you know? He's played a lot of D&D but seemed to be having some difficulty getting back into the swing of things.
#10
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narluga (01/07/2016) [-] I had a friend that made all of these mistakes, but the worst part was he was a player.
He created a backstory which is fair, but went more in depth with it than i did with the campaign (i was the DM) So when the other players decided to **** around and have fun, he got super butthurt and made the group stop playing. (there was only 4 of us total) He said he won't play any-more unless he's the DM. Naturally we all agreed cause we want to play, but everyone was still mad at him especially me b/c he made me pretty much throw away the campaign had had been working on since June) so we all agreed to pretty much **** with him and piss him off. We've only played once with him as DM, and so far he's already really mad. One of the players is a bear named Egg, and all he does is smack everyone, but my character b/c he sees me as worthy. In my campaign, the this person, lets call him asshat, was a playing as an a dick who felt entitled to everything, but wanted to do nothing. This pissed everyone off, he also was playing as calls/race that was broken as **** , he practically took no damage, and dealt a **** load. Then he complained that the encounters were 'too easy' when i was designing them for the rest of the party (which barely got out alive every time) So when he finally got knocked unconscious, the rest of the players took his cloths and tied him to a tree all night.This made Asshat really annoyed and once he was out, went home, and pretty much ended his character because he lost an family heir-loom, which was given back to him, but asshat didn't care. Then asshat said "this campaign is stupid, i'm not going to make a new character." The worst part is, they did 2 quests to progress the campaign, they ended up annoying the captain of the guards in one city and decided to flee the kingdom to be drug dealers in the kingdom to the south. So give me some more idea's on how to annoy the DM without breaking the rules. I'm a bard if that helps.
He created a backstory which is fair, but went more in depth with it than i did with the campaign (i was the DM) So when the other players decided to **** around and have fun, he got super butthurt and made the group stop playing. (there was only 4 of us total) He said he won't play any-more unless he's the DM. Naturally we all agreed cause we want to play, but everyone was still mad at him especially me b/c he made me pretty much throw away the campaign had had been working on since June) so we all agreed to pretty much **** with him and piss him off. We've only played once with him as DM, and so far he's already really mad. One of the players is a bear named Egg, and all he does is smack everyone, but my character b/c he sees me as worthy. In my campaign, the this person, lets call him asshat, was a playing as an a dick who felt entitled to everything, but wanted to do nothing. This pissed everyone off, he also was playing as calls/race that was broken as **** , he practically took no damage, and dealt a **** load. Then he complained that the encounters were 'too easy' when i was designing them for the rest of the party (which barely got out alive every time) So when he finally got knocked unconscious, the rest of the players took his cloths and tied him to a tree all night.This made Asshat really annoyed and once he was out, went home, and pretty much ended his character because he lost an family heir-loom, which was given back to him, but asshat didn't care. Then asshat said "this campaign is stupid, i'm not going to make a new character." The worst part is, they did 2 quests to progress the campaign, they ended up annoying the captain of the guards in one city and decided to flee the kingdom to be drug dealers in the kingdom to the south. So give me some more idea's on how to annoy the DM without breaking the rules. I'm a bard if that helps.
#53 to #10
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alexanderh (01/08/2016) [-]
Stop playing with him. Go back to playing your old campaign, but without him. You can play D&D with less than 4 players.
#63 to #62
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alexanderh (01/09/2016) [-]
Sure it is. I've played games before where it was me as a DM and just two players. It was fine.
#11 to #10
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peliaosfiendline [OP](01/07/2016) [-] use your bardic charisma and charm to lead peasant revolts.
Seriously, just every time you meet a peasant, or even a really low ranking soldier, start charismaing them up until they would gladly follow your party (note, this is important as it must be the party they're following and not just you, otherwise you'd need the Leadership feat to not be breaking the rules, and even that only covers so many npcs) into the darkest and most dangerous of dungeons. Maybe through a bit of magic into your words to make it happen.
Get them to start going to the tavern every night and wait for your signal (for convinience sake we'll say that it's the clasic vocal cord exercise backwards, so do ti la so fa me re do), which you will explain what it's for when it's given. Then unleash hell on whatever poor town/city/capital you're in when the unwashed, filth ridden peasants break out into all out war with the town's guardsmen/military.
Seriously, just every time you meet a peasant, or even a really low ranking soldier, start charismaing them up until they would gladly follow your party (note, this is important as it must be the party they're following and not just you, otherwise you'd need the Leadership feat to not be breaking the rules, and even that only covers so many npcs) into the darkest and most dangerous of dungeons. Maybe through a bit of magic into your words to make it happen.
Get them to start going to the tavern every night and wait for your signal (for convinience sake we'll say that it's the clasic vocal cord exercise backwards, so do ti la so fa me re do), which you will explain what it's for when it's given. Then unleash hell on whatever poor town/city/capital you're in when the unwashed, filth ridden peasants break out into all out war with the town's guardsmen/military.
#12 to #11
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peliaosfiendline [OP](01/07/2016) [-] *throw a bit of magic
it's late and I brain farted on the spelling.
it's late and I brain farted on the spelling.
#15
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coledunk (01/07/2016) [-] Seen a lot of good campaign ideas and settings die because the DM wanted to build the world completely before working on the story or letting the players start.
#23
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sqman (01/07/2016) [-] In my first game the DM got butthurt because our barbarian decided he would become the new pirate king instead of destroying the whole pirate fleet. Barbarian ripped the old king's head off and got natural 20 on intimidation roll, so there was no arguing, but DM wanted us to be big damn heroes and save people from both pirates and yuan-ti.
We were like " **** that, m8, we have an army now", so after waddling through a lot of salt, we made him let us lead our new armada to fight the dragon-emperor of yuan-ti.
Then we had to enter the pyramid where the dragon was ruling from. Here DM got mad, because we used gunpowder instead of solving his cringy riddles. He sad we didn't have enough powder, but we had like 20 pirate ships, half of which we've taken directly from a local pirate haven. He couldn't argue, just rage internally.
Then he tried to punish us by making the pyramid collapse on us (because explosions bad, riddles good), but we reminded him that he had told us that we couldn't blow up the whole thing.
During the last session he was just trying to eradicate our party. Apparently there was a self-destruct pressure plate in the main corridor of the dragon-emperor's palace. Everything exploded and everyone died. No saving throw.
At the end of the day we killed a dragon (and ourselves) with a thermonuclear landmine, and experienced an autistic display of asspain.
We agreed never to invite that guy again (friend's childhood friend, not a big loss).
We were like " **** that, m8, we have an army now", so after waddling through a lot of salt, we made him let us lead our new armada to fight the dragon-emperor of yuan-ti.
Then we had to enter the pyramid where the dragon was ruling from. Here DM got mad, because we used gunpowder instead of solving his cringy riddles. He sad we didn't have enough powder, but we had like 20 pirate ships, half of which we've taken directly from a local pirate haven. He couldn't argue, just rage internally.
Then he tried to punish us by making the pyramid collapse on us (because explosions bad, riddles good), but we reminded him that he had told us that we couldn't blow up the whole thing.
During the last session he was just trying to eradicate our party. Apparently there was a self-destruct pressure plate in the main corridor of the dragon-emperor's palace. Everything exploded and everyone died. No saving throw.
At the end of the day we killed a dragon (and ourselves) with a thermonuclear landmine, and experienced an autistic display of asspain.
We agreed never to invite that guy again (friend's childhood friend, not a big loss).
#58 to #23
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schneidend ONLINE (01/08/2016) [-] - Natural 20 isn't an automatic success on anything but attack rolls, and not always even then.
- The pirates outnumber the barbarian and his party several hundred to one, have more ships, and therefore have more cannons. He's looking at like a -10 or -20 to the check due to those factors.
- This is the lair of the dragon god-emperor. Any given section of wall is going to have some 500+ hit points for being hewn stone several feet thick because it's a ******* pyramid, and that's before the dragon god-emperor had centuries to place enchantments on the walls and **** .
- The ******* dragon is a dragon, and probably could have killed your whole stupid fleet by himself because cannons aren't designed to aim at straight up at a dragon that flies hundreds of feet in a single move action.
- Basically, it sounds like you and your friends are just cunts.
- The pirates outnumber the barbarian and his party several hundred to one, have more ships, and therefore have more cannons. He's looking at like a -10 or -20 to the check due to those factors.
- This is the lair of the dragon god-emperor. Any given section of wall is going to have some 500+ hit points for being hewn stone several feet thick because it's a ******* pyramid, and that's before the dragon god-emperor had centuries to place enchantments on the walls and **** .
- The ******* dragon is a dragon, and probably could have killed your whole stupid fleet by himself because cannons aren't designed to aim at straight up at a dragon that flies hundreds of feet in a single move action.
- Basically, it sounds like you and your friends are just cunts.
#44 to #23
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anon (01/07/2016) [-]
> childhood friend invites me to DM his session
> **** yeah this is gonna be so awesome
> spend days preparing, coming up with a cool campaign, riddles, a final boss
> they're gonna love this
> the day finally arrives
> get to friends house, walk into the living room
> it's a bunch of ******* Chads and drunk normies
> ************ .jpg
> "sup homie, you want a brewski?"
> politely decline and start to lay out my papers and books
> "haha look at this nerd, tryhard much?"
> whole group laughs
> laugh nervously with them
> finally get started half of them don't even know how to play, keep constantly chatting about sports and the new call of duty
> at some point, one of the chads decides it would be really funny to **** with the whole campaign
> "so you're saying, if I roll a 20, I can do whatever I want?"
> try to explain that's not exactly how it works but before I finish everyone starts rolling the d20 over and over again until someone gets a 20
> they all start whooping and chanting "TWEN-TY TWEN-TY TWEN-TY!!"
> basically the campaign got completely ****** and they ended up blowing themselves up with gun powder
> as I pack up my **** and leave, hear someone say "what a ****** loser..."
> wasn't invited back after that
> **** yeah this is gonna be so awesome
> spend days preparing, coming up with a cool campaign, riddles, a final boss
> they're gonna love this
> the day finally arrives
> get to friends house, walk into the living room
> it's a bunch of ******* Chads and drunk normies
> ************ .jpg
> "sup homie, you want a brewski?"
> politely decline and start to lay out my papers and books
> "haha look at this nerd, tryhard much?"
> whole group laughs
> laugh nervously with them
> finally get started half of them don't even know how to play, keep constantly chatting about sports and the new call of duty
> at some point, one of the chads decides it would be really funny to **** with the whole campaign
> "so you're saying, if I roll a 20, I can do whatever I want?"
> try to explain that's not exactly how it works but before I finish everyone starts rolling the d20 over and over again until someone gets a 20
> they all start whooping and chanting "TWEN-TY TWEN-TY TWEN-TY!!"
> basically the campaign got completely ****** and they ended up blowing themselves up with gun powder
> as I pack up my **** and leave, hear someone say "what a ****** loser..."
> wasn't invited back after that
#26 to #23
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flnonymousseven (01/07/2016) [-] I would never want to play with you or your friends.
there's thinking outside the box, and then there's intentionally ruining the whole campaign.
he probably worked really hard to make a fun adventure for you, but now he's gotta throw it all away and come up with a new one.
sometimes you just gotta go with the flow m8.
there's thinking outside the box, and then there's intentionally ruining the whole campaign.
he probably worked really hard to make a fun adventure for you, but now he's gotta throw it all away and come up with a new one.
sometimes you just gotta go with the flow m8.
#37 to #26
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JustintheWaysian ONLINE (01/07/2016) [-]
There's definitely a happy medium between "breaking the campaign" and "not immersing into the campaign".
My players fit into the latter category. They are experienced players, and we've all been friends with each other for several years. I feel like I have to hold their hands and railroad them through the campaign. I drop a lot of hints (maybe I'm not being clear or obvious enough for them) for different pathways that they can take into this sandbox campaign.
There is an overarching plot, but if they don't want to partake in it, then why should I force them? Nobody likes THAT DM that makes your player choices ultimately irrelevant. But at the same time, I present several choices to them and it's like they just wait for me to say "okay guys, let's go down this one path and let's see what happens!"
I guess it's personal taste from player to player. sqman's fellow players sound like "sandbox players" dealing with a "railroad DM", and I'm a "sandbox DM" dealing with "railroad players".
My players fit into the latter category. They are experienced players, and we've all been friends with each other for several years. I feel like I have to hold their hands and railroad them through the campaign. I drop a lot of hints (maybe I'm not being clear or obvious enough for them) for different pathways that they can take into this sandbox campaign.
There is an overarching plot, but if they don't want to partake in it, then why should I force them? Nobody likes THAT DM that makes your player choices ultimately irrelevant. But at the same time, I present several choices to them and it's like they just wait for me to say "okay guys, let's go down this one path and let's see what happens!"
I guess it's personal taste from player to player. sqman's fellow players sound like "sandbox players" dealing with a "railroad DM", and I'm a "sandbox DM" dealing with "railroad players".
#2 to #1
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peliaosfiendline [OP](01/07/2016) [-] wasn't expecting anyone to see this and comment that fast.
#3 to #2
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thereisaguy (01/07/2016) [-] Subbed to the channel and I've seen it before but lost the video. God damn could #1 be the biggest piece of advice I never had when I started.
#4 to #3
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peliaosfiendline [OP](01/07/2016) [-] agreed about number 1, both the over planning, and his little side thing about under planning
#5 to #4
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thereisaguy (01/07/2016) [-] Exactly, give the players guidance and enough to work with but not to be overbearing or make too much and stifle them since chances are they won't see or care about 90% of it.
#49
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dehnoobshow ONLINE (01/07/2016) [-] Last DnD post I replied on I mentioned my experience with dnd as a player
A tl;dr version of that is:
Worried about being over prepared or being under prepared. End up not getting any form of answer.
Game started late at night on a weekend during school year. ****** me up Monday.
Only good alignment character in a party of Chaotic Evil characters. Made me think for a long time every DnD player's favorite character is Chaotic Evil because edgy. Refuse to think that way due to large fan base, but still, I rarely hear of party deciding to be heroes. Always evil **** .
Literally worthless to party. New character in a party of multiple-games characters (Our bard had a +53 to charisma. I doubt that's natural.)
If you had a good first game experience. Then lucky you, you bastard.
A tl;dr version of that is:
Worried about being over prepared or being under prepared. End up not getting any form of answer.
Game started late at night on a weekend during school year. ****** me up Monday.
Only good alignment character in a party of Chaotic Evil characters. Made me think for a long time every DnD player's favorite character is Chaotic Evil because edgy. Refuse to think that way due to large fan base, but still, I rarely hear of party deciding to be heroes. Always evil **** .
Literally worthless to party. New character in a party of multiple-games characters (Our bard had a +53 to charisma. I doubt that's natural.)
If you had a good first game experience. Then lucky you, you bastard.
#51 to #49
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schneidend ONLINE (01/08/2016) [-] Bummer, dude. Just know, that good groups are out there. You just have to find them.
The easiest way is to CREATE that group. Get RL buds to play with you, and teach them the game as it's meant to be played, as a group narrative that is supposed to be fun for everybody involved.
The easiest way is to CREATE that group. Get RL buds to play with you, and teach them the game as it's meant to be played, as a group narrative that is supposed to be fun for everybody involved.
#56
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jonjohn (01/08/2016) [-] I could not attest to the accuracy of these points. Experienced dm speaking; The more Open world you can make your campaigns, the more you suit the players' needs. If they want more combat they will make it happen. Most of the best stories happen when I sit back and let them react to each other in a supposedly uneventful section of the story. Haven't been in more support of a video in a very VERY long time
#50
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schneidend ONLINE (01/08/2016) [-] Hell, this is a useful video for all DMs. Anybody who doesn't think they need to be reminded of these sorts of things is probably a That Guy DM.
I myself have been getting a little bogged down in the rules lately. Though, in the main instance that comes to mind, one of my players wanted a spell (Swipe, in Pathfinder) to work in a way that could be super broken in future sessions, so I had to get a little rulesy on him to shut that **** down. It's a tough job being the guy who is supposed to enable fun when one of your players is working real hard to be That Guy.
I myself have been getting a little bogged down in the rules lately. Though, in the main instance that comes to mind, one of my players wanted a spell (Swipe, in Pathfinder) to work in a way that could be super broken in future sessions, so I had to get a little rulesy on him to shut that **** down. It's a tough job being the guy who is supposed to enable fun when one of your players is working real hard to be That Guy.
#48
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lordsaucy (01/07/2016) [-] I once had to improvise an entire session because the party went chasing after a sword offhandedly I mentioned. It actually ended up being a really good session.
#47
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longlivedead (01/07/2016) [-] I feel like my first group fell for all of these problems except the second one. The main DM ripped off as much as he could, and while I understand taking inspiration or a simple outline from outside sources, he didn't add any originality to it, except maybe character names. All of the guest DMs had the same problem, except for one, but they grew out of completely ripping off other stories and went along with fusing old with new. I started out mostly ripping off other stories with a little of my own **** but I have since drifted away from high amounts of outside sourcing. I don't know why. It's just how I'm playing at the moment.
#45
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goingtopuke (01/07/2016) [-]
So me and a few others are trying to start a group and most of us has little to no experience playing D&D so what would you guys recommend to get started?
