Terrible DM Kills Player Turn 1 Of Combat, Player Kicks DM Out | Narrated D&D Story

[@PlehAP]

The DM smiled. He didn't want Divine Intervention to work. He wanted to hide behind RNGesus and pretend that's just how the dice rolled, as if Bahamut is some chaotic personification of wild magic rather than an intelligent dragon god diametrically opposed to the chromatic dragons

[@starbird3939]

Yeah. I dunno if he wanted the party to die, but he definitely didn’t want Divine Intervention to work-so he purposefully fucked with it.

[@liamdalemon1525]

I'm not familiar with D&D lore so... is Bahamut meant to be a complete moron?

[@admiralalex1000]

@@liamdalemon1525 Nope. He's the god/king of metallic dragons. Default good dragon god. Normally played as wise and Lawful but will destroy evil should it be needed. If Tiamat is in the story he won't be far behind to help the good guys.

[@admiralalex1000]

Tiamat being the evil queen/mother of the Chromatic dragons. Basically Metallic dragons are good. Chromatic are evil.

[@ZinTyPhoon]

@@liamdalemon1525 No. No he is not. In fact, he's the god of GOOD dragons, which are metallic, and would have a vested interest in helping one of his followers defeat an evil red dragon. What the DM did is basically say "Yeah, no, Bahamut doesn't actually care, so, like, go fuck yourself"

[@FreedomAndPeaceOnly]

_" RNG is more like a guideline instead of actual rules. "_ - Captain Hector Barbossa

[@enderfire3379]

i agree

[@sinamy]

What does "RNG" stand for?

[@enderfire3379]

@@sinamy random number change or something idk

[@Resavian]

@@sinamy random number generator. There is an old joke among gamers that you must never displease RNGesus or he will rain terrible loot and bad monster spawns upon you

[@guyfawkes8873]

Rng isn’t even that… as a DM, tables are more like options to pick from if you’re out of ideas, unless you have a specific reason for making it random, like wild magic. Personally I mostly use actual Randomness during prep, where I can consider the outcome and figure out how it would fit into the narrative. If you look at wotc adventures they do the same, providing suggestions for how to play all the random encounters in the book, at least in the newer ones.

[@confectortyrannis275]

2nd story is epic party fail. You stand up for your party members when bs like that goes down. You don't passively accept it. You flat out tell the wanna be DM this is not how it's done, and if you're just an RNG table instead of a DM then you're not necessary for the game. Anyone can read an RNG table. If you're gonna DM, be a godsdamned DM, not a chartboy who hides behind RNG for everything

[@KatriceMetaluna]

But the chart says...

[@MogofWar]

If I had been in OP's shoes and witnessed cleric be done that fucking dirty... I would've just jumped over the table and started wailing on DM. I'd end up in jail for at least a month over that.

[@GreaterGrievobeast55]

WHAT KIND OF FOOL THINK HE CAN ORDER THE HOST OF A HOUSE AROUND *WHEN YOU’VE JUST MET THEM??* Yirbel Lives! Oooh that game in the beginning does look intriguing! Whats a globerzoo?

[@mothdemon]

Glabrezu is a demon or devil (I can never keep them separate in my mind) with four arms: two large crab claws and two smaller humanoid arms.

[@GreaterGrievobeast55]

@@mothdemon oooh neat!

[@RustyhairedAlp9575]

@@mothdemon Demon

[@Zarkonem]

That second DM, wow, just wow. Way to take an epic and memorable moment, one that basically writes itself for you in how glorious and cool it would be, and just nonchalantly dropping it in the mud and walking away.If your going to roll for a spell like that, at least limit it to high level spells that can actually turn the tide of a battle.

[@Mgauge]

You have to be dedicated to not lifting a finger in storytelling to go that far. It’s like he was deliberately making an effort to avoid even accidentally making a coherent plot.

[@Avalikia]

I agree! I love using random tables myself, but I probably wouldn't randomize a divine intervention - that's too much fun to customize to the situation and an opportunity to show off the personality of the particular god and I love that stuff. But if I was feeling expecially non-creative and lazy I'd probably look up the top cleric spells and roll from those, AND reroll if I got a spell that didn't seem to apply well to the situation. That this DM was more lazy than that blows my mind.

[@kaycee1076]

It's after the final battle of Critical Role's campaign 2, Caleb's attempt with the transmuter stone failed, everyone is mourning, then Cadduceus implores the Wild Mother to "put it back", and it succeeds, the dice is rolled and it also succeeds. Matt sits down and after a second says... "Flowers grow around his body, and the wounds on the body are healed. The wild mother casts cure wounds for 18 points." _Hardly the same fucking moment, now is it?!_

[@lostbutfreesoul]

Do you now how many dice I have had to fudge behind the screen, just to get the players to think they are in one of those situations? As a Narrative Based storyteller... I dream of those moments writing themselves for me!

[@rayzerot]

The shitty part is that the ability called on a God and the God answered. There would be no RNG, the God would just do something sensible...

[@animeotaku307]

First DM: I’m God of this game. Host: Not in my home.

[@JeromeSkavenSlayer]

My roof, my rules.

[@Saiaix]

@@JeromeSkavenSlayer Precisely. I'll kill a player's character in his own house, but only for the same damn good reasons I would any other characters. And while I have only a few personal codified ethics, one of them is to never belittle someone under their own roof. I developed this when I once called out a DM I was angry with in college and asked him to step outside over a dispute, since it felt wrong to shout or swear at him under his own roof. He instantly thanked me and we made up, because of the respect I showed him while voicing my argument, which he also equated to "Right to Domain" in Vampire: the Masquerade. Basically, unless you do something grossly illegal or violent or wrong, I'll just get up and leave now. Never had to, but it's important to remember. Talking down to your host is inherently wrong.

[@leos.2322]

you missed the chance.....YOU HAVE NO POWER HERE

[@animeotaku307]

@@leos.2322 Crap, you’re right!

[@leos.2322]

@@animeotaku307 lol

[@Nazo-kage]

With the first story I think the most telling thing about the DM. Is that he told the player he just killed: “You’re dead so be quiet or leave.” I think that more than anything showed how big of an ass he was. (Never mind it was her house they were playing in) As for the second DM. His comment about how all these charts make DMing so easy, shows what a crap DM he is because he has absolutely no improvisation to him whatsoever that’s why divine intervention was such a flop. I mean the clerics deity is a dragon god and they’re fighting a dragon. The divine intervention could’ve done anything. He could’ve filled everybody’s spell slots back to full. Could’ve struck the dragon with a beam of light that for one hour transformed resistances into weaknesses. (imagine a red dragon that’s actually weak to fire.) It could’ve healed and revived the party. Heck since the guy loves charts so much, there’s the “damage severity by level chart” Have the hand of The clerics dragon God come down from the heavens and pimp slap the red dragon for 18D10 radiant damage. (The account said the cleric was level 13, and that’s the amount of damage under the ‘deadly’ category for that level.)

[@craigtucker1290]

I think most of your suggestions are a little over the top and beyond the ability since it states: The DM chooses the Nature of the intervention; the Effect of any Cleric spell or Cleric domain spell would be appropriate. However, I am sure that was a more appropriate choice than what was actually "chosen."

[@Nazo-kage]

@@craigtucker1290 while I admit that most of them were over the top, it mostly stems from the fact that the DM is the one that chooses the severity and what the deity does. Although I actually liked my last suggestion of using the damage severity by level chart.

[@craigtucker1290]

@@Nazo-kage The severity based on the guidelines provided. Otherwise, divine intervention is way too powerful. If there was a cleric spell or cleric domain spell that did radiant damage as an effect, than yes, it would be appropriate.

[@Nazo-kage]

@@craigtucker1290 well I also figured it would make sense to do that considering it was the first time the clerics call to their God was going to be answered so it kind of makes sense that it would be a big deal. I mean that makes sense especially when you consider the fact that what they got was practically the God equivalent of a fart, it would make sense if they decided to quit afterwards.

[@craigtucker1290]

@@Nazo-kage Except that the cleric had been trying multiple times before to no avail. Basically, the cleric was abusing the ability to begin with unsuitable request, which can affect the ability according to Sage Advice. Even so, when it is finally granted, it should fall within the provided parameters rather than just being a gimme on the DM's part. A gimme makes the story more about how the DM bailed out the party by allowing an ability to achieve something it normally couldn't do rather than the cleric legitimately using divine intervention. In other words, by having the DM go beyond the abilities guidelines, the DM is effectively cheating on the players behalf which is not what they are supposed to do. Being a good DM is being a fair arbiter of the rules, not bailing out the party when they face a TPK. What the DM did wrong in this story was randomize an ability that is not supposed to be randomized. The DM should have picked a useful and beneficial spell that would have helped, nothing more, nothing less. I am not sure I would quit so much as replace the DM with one that at least follows the rules everyone has agreed to. But I do understand the frustration as this is a common problem with DM fiat in that you as a player may be relying on a certain thing working as per the rules only to have the DM say "oh I don't do it that way." That was something I experienced back in the day way too often.

[@koanos2448]

First DM: There is no direction that made any level of sense. Second DM: Probably would have settled on Teleport then justify it as "I heard your call for help" meaning "Get us out of here!" Both DMs: Hiding behind rules isn't really a defense.

[@rayzerot]

They weren't even hiding behind the rules though. Both DMs were actively avoiding roleplaying. Those monsters wouldn't run through 3 armed fighters to get at one person who doesn't look like a threat (no spells had been cast yet). And a God answering their Cleric would respond to the request with something relevant, not pick a random spell to cast.

[@willparry530]

@@rayzerot indeed

[@CareerKnight]

@@rayzerot Even if the goblins knew she was a caster they're goblins, they're more likely to run away than suicidely charge through a meat grinder.

[@Awesome_Atlantean]

If that Cleric was in my group, and her deity answered her prayers in this scenario, I’d (as the DM) would at the VERY LEAST healed the entire party and given a resistance to whatever elemental type the dragon uses. I wouldn’t defeat the dragon for them, but give them the ability to fight on with renewed hope or something

[@Nyghtking]

At MINIMUM I think bless and guidance should have been cast on each party member as a permanent effect for the rest of the encounter, temporary HP added to each player, shield of faith on each player for the duration of the encounter, elemental resistance on each player for the duration of the encounter, and advantage on all saves and attacks for the players until the end of the encounter. Edit: added a little more of what I think should be the minimum.

[@SapphireDragon357]

ESPECIALLY calling on Bahamut against a red dragon... I don't think it'd be out of character to buff the party to the point of being unable to lose.

[@williamfalls]

The deity should have paused action/combat time and had a full on conversation with them. Like, ask her what they want. And then *maybe* roll to see whether the exact request is given or something of the God's choice... But overall should have at least provided some form of aid. That DM liked bs RNG charts too much to actually DM.

[@koanos2448]

Different than what I would choose. Probably would have settled for Teleport to get the party out of there.

[@bragnir]

@@koanos2448 In a normal, unwinnable fight, yeah... But this is a cleric of Bahamut, asking for help vs a freaking red dragon. By Bahamut's personality and dogma, he'd be likely to revive, heal and buff the entire party big time for this one fight.

[@michaelmorton5698]

What is it with DMs pitting relatively low level PCs against the equivalent of a Jem'Hadar strike team? And screwing the cleric out of her moment to save the party from a TPK is an absolute dick move.

[@WyntheRogue]

Player vs DM mentality most likely, when that's done it's more often than not a DM on some weird power trip or has a chip on their shoulder [sometimes both] D&D should have challenges yes but definitely not at the expense of their players fun in such a malicious manner that's just being a wang rod.

[@willparry530]

@@WyntheRogue indeed

[@singularity1130]

As a beginner DM I'd say it's an understatement to say I'm struggling to learn balance. Finding a thematic monster in the manual or close to our imagination for the stats, figuring out how CR applies to my party because it doesnt take into account my parties utility or experience and lastly supplying an encounter that satisfies everyone's needs without rng killing them. Im aware of and actively fudge rolls that drop anyone from half to 0 (3 hit minimum) but it leads to very few swarm fights and awkwardly paced single mob combat. I can see a dm without prep or will to fudge easily killing a party because fucking hell monsters are strong when played thematically.

[@Klomster88]

@@singularity1130 3 shot seems a bit excessive, but i can see the way you see monster balancing daunting, i'd struggle with DMing DnD as well since i don't usually play it. And CR is important in DnD. But take a step. Go to two-shot and try in another encounter to spice up the battle with a bunch of enemies, if you're scared they'll wipe the party, take some mobs you know are weak and have a cooler enemy be their boss. I guess i have a similar problem in my Godbound game, where the party basically only fight easy fights because i feel that's what logically would show up. The group should be able to easily handle hordes of werewolves, but i only put two mobs against them since the ruins they were exploring were abandoned, and that was after upping the numbers i felt was reasonable. So it will always be a balancing act, in the worst case you can always deus ex machina some saving graze. Party is going down? But not yet? Begin describing how the place rumbles every turn, then if the group is f-ed have a portion of the dungeon/place collapse and sweep them off. In my group, the characters usually have 1 saving graze, meaning if Rngeezus feels in a killy mood or the player accidentally make a stupid choice, the character survives. Basically 1 get out of "Rng lol" death. The character is always messed up tho, needing healing and/or emergency aid. One could even have them loose an arm or something. But we have very few deaths and PC downs. So i guess we could skip it, but it's nice to have.

[@singularity1130]

@@Klomster88 Thanks! I'll def bring it down to 2 shots and implement an RNGesus save system. I only ever used environmental factors in response to player actions or to set the mood but never thought to use mid encounter. Actually you made me imagine mult-stage boss fighting in a new light with this type of system! Thank you so much!

[@fmor2779]

1st DM: I don't know why the DM did that, but boy, if anyone did that to my friend I am not gonna say "Maybe we where to hard on the DM" No! I am going to open the door so he can get out, this DM disrespected my friend and ruined the night. I don't care why he did it, but I do know that targeting a PC for no apparent reason, not even a good one and then tell the player that she is not allowed to say anything because her PC died or to get out like he runs the place is the behavior of a jerk. Way too many things that makes me believe he had something against Host. What was this guy thinking? That he, the guest and newest person in the group was going to have more to say than one of the oldest members? The audacity. 2nd DM: I am going to bet that this DM was being lazy. Man, even if you don't know what to do a simple "...and your deity transports you and your party to safety..." would have been god enough. It's divine intervention...the fact that it doesn't happen often makes it special, and doing that it's lazy and awful.

[@OverlordMel]

That first DM was a jerk. If you have a problem with a player's character you talk to them about it, not deliberately try to kill them. And then he had the gall to tell her to leave? In her own house? Sheesh! The second DM clearly relied too heavily on random tables/random rolls. I only use tables when I'm trying to decide what could possibly happen when the party is traveling. And even then, I've spent some time tweaking the table to suit the environment, narrative and level of the players. There are a lot of options for DMs so it can feel overwhelming when you're trying to plan out a campaign and random tables can help you make decisions, or provide inspiration, on some things, but you shouldn't rely on them completely. If he had trouble deciding on which spell to use, he could have at least rolled on a higher level spell list. Or (and I've done this once or twice) rolled until he got a spell that at least made some sense.

[@Tinmann_77]

He did roll twice, so probably rolled until he got what he wanted.

[@shadenox8164]

@@Tinmann_77 I mean I suspect the first roll was spell level and then the second one was spell.

[@ZinTyPhoon]

Praying to your god and getting a spell that's absolutely useless for the situation you're in is the equivalent of the DM saying "Yeah, your god doesn't really give a shit. Guess you should've picked a different class."

[@seandavis1189]

2nd story reply: as someone who has been in a similar situation. i was the barbarian in this story and my turn came after something that should have happened, didnt. because dm didnt want it to, with no reason why. so my turn came and he asked what do i want to do and i said hold on, grabbed my phone and pulled out my stopwatch app and just let it run. after a minute went buy the dm asked "what are you doing?" i stated "im taking my turn. what does it look like?" he said "it looks like you dont want to do anything so its X's turn" i stated again " im taking my turn." he argued "your doing noting at all!!!" i finally relented and stated "well i figure i would waste your time with this nonsense since that what your doing to us." he got pissed and said "your turn is done X its your turn" X said "no its not!!! he hasnt finished his turn yet" dm again skipped another player saying "Y or Z do either of you want to do anything?" the dominos fell into place as they said "Y: you cant do that. just because your the dm doesnt mean you can skip peoples turns for no good reason. Z: yeah you can choose to not follow the rules when it comes to your world, but we can choose not to play your world." we stopped playing that game and weeks later dm appologized but we didnt let him dm just play.

[@whatsagoodusername823]

That second one isn't even that he's too into random charts, that was just him being lazy. I could see a DM using nothing but random charts, but then taking a moment to consider the current situation and re-rolling if what came up wasn't appropriate. He should have seen "Detect poison and disease", realized it wasn't helpful against a dragon that doesn't use poison or disease, and just re-rolled until something useful came up. He just didn't feel like thinking for 5 seconds to realize that a god wouldn't give something so useless when asked for help.

[@starbird3939]

I think the DM in story 1 just had a weird issue with host, probably cause she was a girl. But yeah, if he thought he could kick her out OF HER OWN HOUSE to take over? Now that is stupid.

[@gryphon5026]

I feel bad for that cleric if I were the DM I'd of been like "Bahamut hears your plea for help against the Mighty Red Dragon and out of the sky a blast of lightning hits the red dragon in between its wings dealing 50 damage and stunning it for 3 turns"

[@ultramegamighty]

I think he got it from somewhere else, but I had a DM that generally ran with a "rule of cool." If it was something generally amazing that bent or broke the rules, he might make you roll a rather high check for it, but if you succeed, you've got it. It might not be EXACTLY what you wanted to accomplish, or have the full desired effect, but you're already breaking the rules, so take the awesome while you can. A good example I can think of was during a boss battle that our party was slowly but DEFINITELY losing. The main baddie was a mindflayer floating above everyone flinging spells all over the place. Moslty out of forgetting that the spell doesn't work on mindflayers, and the rest out of desperation to survive the fight, my cleric cast hold person on him. I chose that spell out of all the other possible spells I could because at the moment, he was hovering over a lava flow, and I was gambling that he would fall. It took 3 different rolls to pull it off. First and foremost the saving throw, which the DM gave him a bonus to save against since it shouldn't affect him. He failed. The second was a normally unnecessary roll of my spell power against his. He failed again. Then a third and final check, which was his concentration to be able to remain airborne. He failed, and into the lava he went. It didn't kill him, but it kept him out of the fight for several rounds, immediately ended any concentration based spells he had on the party, and cut his hp roughly in half by the time he was out of the lava. I think the DM partially let the spell through because he could tell we were getting our asses thoroughly kicked, and that spell, even though it shouldn't have worked, was the only hail mary attempt that I had left.

[@kcollier2192]

Story 1- WTF? I get targeting the wizard as wizards are usually squishy, especially at low levels but this was character targeting pure and simple. What an a-hole... Story 2- I feel for Cleric- there's random tables and then there's just being lazy, and this DM was the latter.

[@emberfist8347]

Well I would probably go after the PC with healing magic.

[@willparry530]

@@emberfist8347 Which wasn't really the wizard, though--wizards don't have much in the way of healing spells.

[@VelaiciaCreator]

@@emberfist8347 It's meta-gaming.

[@emberfist8347]

@@VelaiciaCreator Not for the DM.

[@VelaiciaCreator]

@@emberfist8347 Actually, yes it is. If you break the logic of the characters just to achieve a goal then it's meta-gaming, idgaf if you're the DM or the fucking RPG developer.

[@defect213]

Wow. That first DM REALLY told the person who lived in that house to shut up or leave. I'm still reeling from just how socially inept that guy is

[@timtauber5557]

The second D.M. Should resign from ever being a D.M. Again! That was truly awful. The first D.M. Should have been lambasted verbally for quite a while, if he continued to not see the error of his ways, he deserves to be excommunicated with extreme prejudice. He should have been grilled on what his motives were.

[@The3ddfan]

So, he treated divine intervention like wild magic without the whimsy and treated the players in a purely adversarial manner. Sounds like a real nice guy.

[@SprayandPrayman22]

If, for some reason unknown to anyone, I ever became DM, I'd probably use RNG sheets like the DM in the second scenario, just as a crutch until I learn how to DM well. I would NOT, however, throw overleveled fights at them nor hit them with the cleric with that bullsh*t against the Red Dragon. In the spur of the moment during the Red Dragon fight, I'd probably make a choice about what she got for divine intervention. Heals, direct damage, buffs, etc. After the fact, I'd probably create relevant RNG sheets for each boss so that way the cleric could receive boons that actually help during the fights. DND is about getting together with your friends and having fun together, not trying to have fun at the expense of those you're playing with.

[@et3rnalabyss459]

honestly the best way to learn to DM is to run a module. helps out heaps by already having encounters and story but also makes you use improvisation when your party starts leaving the story

[@banaman7746]

honestly though, at level 13 party, fighting an adult red dragon isn't entirely out of the question, I saw a 9 person party at level 7 kill an adult black dragon with no one dieing (albeit with some VERY luck rolls... like cleric surviving with literally 1 hp left to heal entire group through life cleric goodness) so the level of encounter wasn't that huge of a thing... other then both party and DM obviously not having what an adult red dragon fight would look like (they obviously did not prepare for massive fire damage, and DM didn't use dragon's iconic and favorite weapon more then once) As for the main topic, RNG tables, while this is definitely a cautionary tale on overusing them, don't feel like they are a "crutch for new DM's" either... random tables can be an amazing tool for some quick, wacky encounters... but that's just it. a tool. the DM's problem is that he did make it a crutch, relying on it to do everything, even when it made no sense at all. RNG tables should be used to help enhance the game, not run the game. some examples of where it can really shine: party is going through an area and you want to make the trek more memorable by adding random encounters. party going into a shop and you pull up random items appropriate for their level. party goes to a bar and order a special drink that has a random effect. literally wild magic sorcerers. tl:dr: random tables are only bad when you use abuse them and don't use common sense for the results... and can be very useful in situations where it's already expected something is going to be random.

[@et3rnalabyss459]

@@banaman7746 i mean yeah a I was party of at level 11 and we took down an adult black dragon who had three different dragon breath attacks with only the giant npc dying at the start. and random tables are a great tool but main point was similar to yours. that it shouldn't be a crutch. however i was also giving advice to the original commenter which is if your nervous about first time DM'ing then a module or series of one shots is a great way to gain some confidence.

[@TheOneWhoReportsForDuty]

Devils Advocate: Now now, I’m sure there is a perfectly valid reason for the kill. Everyone: The reason is he’s an asshole.

[@willparry530]

yup :P

[@TheNewEvil1]

I mean he had a chance to advocate for himself, but decided to act like a dick and tell them to shut up in their own house when they asked why he did that.

[@fmor2779]

The reason was: 1. He made a killing way to specific, so it felted targeted. 2. Everyone agreed that it was to weird of a situation regarding the death of the wizard. 3. The DM's answer? You dead, no talk or get out. That is not a good enough answer. 4. The DM, a stranger, had the audacity to protest, even after finding out that very house he was in was the very player he disrespected. Case and point, it seemed targeted and disrespectful, don't know why, but if anyone did that to my friend I am not gonna say "Maybe we where to hard on the DM" No! I am going to open the door so he can get out, this DM ruined the night. I don't care why he did it, but a do I know that targeting a PC for no apparent reason, not even a good one and then tell the player to get out like he runs the place is the behavior of a jerk.

[@RaxusXeronos]

@@fmor2779 It WAS targeted. He had stated before that he didn't think her character fit with the rest of the group. So he killed them first turn.

[@Jawsomest]

Dm: Get out. Host: no u

[@cam4636]

When u think ur playing DnD then they hit u with an Uno reverse card

[@xRaalx]

Honestly if that cleric was putting that much of a show into each attempt, at some point for sticking to it and giving a good RP show, she gets to roll it with advantage. Fighting a dragon that god is opposed to? Maybe even a smudge roll if its close enough because it might draw the gods personal attention even without the clerics call. and you make that roll by more than half of what you needed? Player, you get to *choose* what spell from the ones i've picked to be useful in this fight, quietly, so that i can describe it in as much detail as i can to hopefully match how awesome of a player you've been. Because i guarantee you that players probably better than me at describing such things.

[@anionhero]

I will admit to being a DM who likes to use random charts perhaps a little too much, but I would have never did what that second DM did. When a player makes a roll like that, you have to give them something special for it! I mean, come on! That was a difficult roll to make!

[@dionisistheambivalent1553]

reminds me of my first and only dungeons and dragons experience. My school had an after hour rec room ment for teens to be apart of a community, the staff in charge of the place was really cool for the most part and started hosting dnd campaigns, I'll admit I was incredibly new to the whole thing and was under the assumption I could create any character I wanted, I was wrong and the dm didn't want to tell me. so instead of clarifying he decided to let me play my out of world character and killed me in my very first incounter. needless to say it left a very sour taste in my mouth, I was confused why he so clearly targeted me. now I somewhat understand, but I still taste the bitter experience and doubt I'll ever try again. there's nuance missing from this, but I don't really feel like going into further detail. just thought id share

[@nunya5230]

Don't let that ruin your experience

[@Sanodi21]

It was still a real shitty thing for the DM honestly. They should've spoken up and helped you with what you did wrong.

[@SapphireDragon357]

*a part. I don't always correct grammar, but so many people do this and "apart" literally means the complete opposite of what you're trying to say.

[@DrPluton]

I something (a race, class, etc.) doesn’t fit, it’s the DM’s job to tell you that instead of punishing you.

[@AuntLoopy123]

So, instead of being a mature person, using his words, and helping you and everyone else at the table have a better experience, he chose to drive the newbie out of the game, entirely, while terrorizing everyone else at the table, making them think, "What sort of monster is he? And what will he do to us?!" That's a GREAT way to build a community! Oh, yeah! /s

[@LocalMaple]

For the latter story, I as a player would have renounced my god and began a campaign against him. With the reasoning that my cleric had devoted her life to the deity; but when the moment was dire, and her god acknowledged her faith, she received effectively nothing in return. The god deemed the life of its subjects as insignificant, when even Eldritch horrors grant great powers to their weakest of followers. Such a deity did not deserve worship, and with that I vow to crusade against his churches, kill his bishops, and serve his opposite in the hope that that deity will care.

[@fourththex8818]

It would be a cool way to take the character but the DM would just ruin any sort of fun you would have.

[@alarkhar]

Him. Bahamut is a male.

[@LocalMaple]

@@alarkhar Thanks. I was trying to go neutral with a female cleric to make it generic to any character arc, but a male-female dichotomy makes it easier to read.

[@Klomster88]

That's cool, but i guess it wouldn't be worth it if EVERYTHING was a random table. I mean, that isn't much of a story. Sure one can have fun and make your own story. But the GM didn't seem very fun to play under to begin with. I mean, i would have chosen as the GM to either A) God rayed the party to full health and/or buffed them or hade a massive divine smite helping out in the fight or B) I would have made the executive choice in letting her god be a douché. But in this case, it was Bahamut and he usually isn't a douché. So A. Random tables are useful, but this GM lacked tact and sense of epic and i wouldn't want to play like that. And so didn't the players, seeing their reaction.

[@JohnDoe-fg4xe]

That was just bad, I feel really bad for that poor cleric. That DM sounds like the type that cant run anything that isn't a premade campaign.

[@kani75]

For the second GM I would say: "So, you have made yourself unnecessary with these random tables?"

[@willropa4226]

Any DM who asks the question out loud, "Is this the moment when I let my players do something incredibly badass?" would be cringing at the second story. My DM does say that and he would've possibly called down Bahamut himself if he were in that scenario.

[@majrbacon1293]

For the second dm props to him for not using the breath weapon after the first turn but wow that was dumb. That being said though id be totally down to do a oneshot where EVERYTHING is randomized. You wanna enter a tavern? Roll your dice and find out where you go there or are teleported straight to tiamat.

[@richardwarnercool1]

I hereby vote that in honour of poor Cleric, we each put forth a GOOD Divine Intervention to wash away the taste of... whatever that BS was. I'll start. You watch as the sky is split by a platinum line. Your ears ring as doors that have remained closed since time immemorial grind open and for the briefest of moments you look into a light, brighter and more perfectly beautiful that the sun and you close your eyes shut, before your sight is taken from you. But even still the light casts shadows before your eyelids and you see the shape of a great claw of immense size reach beyond the divine gate and rend down upon the Red Dragon that has harmed his Cleric and her compatriots so. And as the light fades and you open your eyes, you see before you the smashed and broken body of the Red Dragon, the single remaining yellow eye wide with fear and awe before the life dims from the creature. Around the body you see meter wide gashes in the earth that stretch far beyond the lengths of this one dragon. And as you look at the forms of your companions, no longer unconscious or exhausted but still pushed to their limits, you raise your eyes to the heavens to give thanks and you see platinum coloured Abora Borealis dancing along the clouds.

[@1Kapuchu100]

From the cleric's hands spills forth light; pure and brilliant, erasing all shadow around them. Several spears of light shoot out, striking each creature nearby, filling allies with warmth and power, and crippling enemies with weakness and fear. As the light fades, a faint shimmer remains around you, casting you in a gentle glow. Some of your wounds heal, some strength returns, and as you look up towards the dragon, you see it squint at the light, hissing and growling as the remaining light blinds it. And as you look closer, each of you, at different points on its body, see a platinum-mark on its body. You know instinctively to strike there, and victory will be that much closer. Effects: Everyone heals 20 HP Full Casters regain 10 levels worth of spell slots (Two 5th lvl spells, one 7th + one 3rd, etc) Half-Casters regain 5 levels worth of spell slots Dragon is blinded for 1d3 turns Dragon is Vulnerable to the next instance of damage by each character (1 pr character, first strike only). It's a... lot, kind of. Maybe *too* much, but I think it's a suitable amount. His domains are both Life and War, so they feel thematically appropriate.

[@richardwarnercool1]

@@1Kapuchu100 its Divine Intervention. If anything it should be the better version of the Wish spell because it specifically isn't taking the path of least resistance to reach the end point so it can't fall prey to jackass genie.

[@Monsterhunterbrony]

Let me try: You finish your prayers to the lord of platinum, at first, you feel nothing. All your senses suddenly extinguished. Suddenly your hearing, sense of touch, smell, sight, taste all awaken again, much stronger than before, from your back emerge 2 giant platinum wings which grants you a flight speed of 60. Your eyes glow with iridescent light as you ascent. Your allies, within a 20 foot radius feel invigorated as their senses awaken all the same. you and your companions' weapons all have the dragon slaying property. The red dragon, in awe in front of the miracle can't keep it's eyes on you as your radiance is too bright for it. All attacks aimed at you by this dragon are done with disadvantage. A roar splits the clouds above, a platinum wing briefly seen disappearing from the heavens, you hear a voice in your head. "Make me proud."

[@niikokun5326]

@@Monsterhunterbrony Here's my go of it: The clouds part as your prayers finish, and as the dragon's chest burns with terrible fire, ready to wash over and scorch away the remaining resistance to its tyrannical avarice and murderous pride, a wash of blinding, divine platinum light bathes the realm in the stifling weight of the progenitor, the God of Dragons. The red dragon's breath is stolen, a cooling rebuke of light stilling the flame in its belly, and the weight of the Platinum Dragon's chastisement beats it to the ground, too heavy a presence for the vile drake to fly under. The party's weapons glow with divine light, their strength resurges, and with the beast of greed grounded and muzzled, they charge into the fray, hope swelling in their hearts to seize the day before the blessing's zenith! For so-and-so rounds, the dragon's breath weapon cannot be used, its flying speed is reduced to 0, and it is rendered silent, unable to perform the vocal components of innate spells it might have. The party gains the effects of Divine Favor during this blessing, and are healed immediately as if affected by Mass Cure Wounds, while also restoring a spell slot for each level they possess, or all pact spell slots.

[@Greywander87]

You know what would have been both really cool and also quite fitting? Cleric turns into an adult gold dragon for 1 minute (or until they run out of HP, like the Polymorph spell) while retaining their cleric abilities. Once the transformation wears off, the cleric retains a half-dragon (gold) template permanently. Why gold? Well, for starters, they're also fire dragons, so you'd be immune to the red dragon's breath weapon. Gold is also generally considered the "highest" metallic dragon, except for the platinum dragon himself.

[@christhewritingjester3164]

For divine intervention, the player should make a request and the DM should rule what's possible towards that end. There's no way a deity is going to give some random useless effect in the middle of a heated battle, that's just insane.

[@adambooth7755]

That second DM, while not as bad as most horror DMs is one of the DMs I've heard about who cares the least. Most bad DMs who like, target a player or pride themselves on TPKs at least have some (twisted) emotional investment in the game. This DM was lazy to the point of boasting about how little work he did.

[@troodon1096]

Exactly; the problem wasn't just that he was lazy, it's that he was openly proud of being lazy.

[@TigerlilyWarrior]

That second story hurts. Who out there has been a part of a group, played for weeks or months, only to find out the hard way the DM or players don't give two shits about your character, class, or roleplaying? What a punch to the gut. I feel bad for the cleric. All that time, only to be let down by a lazy, selfish DM.

[@Sidequestkyle]

A divine intervention during a dragon fight and he has the gall to give a stupid 1st level spell to her? Like holy fuck that is dumb. It is very hard to get divine intervention to work and is the hail mary for mid level clerics and they had obviously been super excited for this pivotal moment in a fight. And what do they do? Give them something absolutely fucking useless and pointless. Like detect poison is hardly a spell I would ever take unless under very sus instances. Even an aura of life or something else without concentration needed would have been acceptable, not great but acceptable.

[@randallgpreston]

First GM definitely had something against the host, and kickinghim out was the right move. I'm surprised though that the cleric didn't try bringing the body to the temple. Make an offer to go into debt and doing tasks for the temple to pay off the resurrection. I feel bad for the cleric in the second story. What an epic moment to be ruined by the DM

[@utes5532]

That first DM does indeed sound like he disliked Host, or is just a DM vs PCs wargamer. In the case of the latter, it makes perfect sense for a group of goblins to kill the squishies as fast as possible purely from a strategic standpoint. But the problem is that you aren't really *supposed* to play creatures with meta knowledge like that. A group of very experienced combatants might go for a spellcaster after seeing them fling harmful spells at them, but a group of goblins completely throwing their self-preservation aside to rush through a group of armed people just to hack a comparably harmless PC to pieces? That's just nonsense.

[@witchybutterfly]

Yeah, first DM the warning sign was questioning the girl's character choice pre game. I'm glad she put him in his place and kicked his ass out. Firs t turn kills because of rng (enemy rolls a crit, etc) I get. This DM was just an asshole.

[@brandontucker6958]

I have a friend who's thinking of DMing but wan ts to get everything set up before we play. He's changed his mind now but his original idea of DMing (and keep in mind we were gonna make full characters, backstory and all) was that all of us, 5, at level one would fight trolls, one for each of us. I'm the DM for the main campaign and I threw an ogre encounter to them, they fought it and I mentioned to my friend "3 versus 1 with the other 2 players dealing with an orc was a challenge" . After that he said he would be a little while before he was ready to play.

[@AsboXFlemzo]

Alot of people think being dm is being the villan, its actually playing a active game engine role thats to keep the game flowing and fun.

[@waltercunningham1033]

A divine intervention moment like that is where you have a bolt of lightning strike the red dragon or have a silver dragon or something come swooping down out of the heavens or something. Some seriously cool and cinematic shit.

[@barriehannon6857]

i absolutely love the design of the cleric in the background of this vid

[@jonathanstern5537]

For the divine intervention here's what I would have done. I would have looked up what Bahamut would normally do in combat, then have that effect. In this case I did, and he would, if negotiations broke down, shoot an incredibly powerful cone of cold at the red dragon. I'd describe the air getting chilled and snow starting to fall. Then I'd tell the cleric to roll 13 D 8 (10th level cone of cold) and 1 D4. The dragon takes that amount of cold damage and is paralyzed for that number of rounds.

[@lukecrawford7051]

Personally, since she was a Life Domain and asked for a ‘boon’ specifically, I would’ve just had Bahamut use Mass Heal and divide the hit points evenly or just fully heal them based on HP. Y’know, spice it up as if Bahamut was showing the one who called on his aid what they could do, and how far his power could carry them. But he is a huge dragon, so just destroying the opponent would probably be what he’d do.

[@willparry530]

Sounds like the first party dodged a bullet, and I hope the cleric in the second party wasn't permanently discouraged from playing DnD ever again :(

[@chilly456]

"That's RNG for ya!" - words of a lazy DM

[@troodon1096]

If the DM is going to do nothing but roll on random tables, he can be replaced with a chart and dice and doesn't even need to be there.

[@HulkTheSurgeon]

As much as I think my DMing is a shit show, I can at least listen to stories like this and go "Well, at least I'm not those assholes." Lmao.

[@krinkrin5982]

I remember turn a turn 1 kill. I was GMing the Forge of Fury. The victim was a 3rd level rogue. Critted by an orc with a 2H axe, downed in one attack in the very first encounter of the game. We laughed and made a new character with the player, then continued.

[@nunya5230]

That sounds way better than what went on in this story

[@reloadpsi]

I've had a character die super early despite rolling the best stats at the table. The difference was he died trying to help the party escape an angry mob and botched an important athletics check, falling over and leaving him for dead. It was awesome. What that DM did though was disgusting.

[@DrPluton]

I had an ogre barbarian one-shot a fighter back in 3.5 on a crit. I felt bad, but the player shrugged it off.

[@river7874]

My first session with a group that ran a 3/3.5 homebrew, my Druid got turned into paste by a Troll(specifically the leader). The DM had forgotten that said Troll Leader had his feet entangled by rope from a few turns earlier. So he rolled to see if he would have failed, thus making my Druid no longer be paste on the wall, and he failed. We all had a great laugh about it, especially since my Druid earned the nickname "Pudding" by an NPC who had a crush on him. This was over a decade ago now, but I have so many fond memories of that campaign.

[@vulpes133]

I had a similar thing happen with my cleric. Level 1, had a negative con modifier so I only had 7hp, we go up against some bandits and there's one with a long bow. They went before me and got a critical hit, 14 damage, exactly enough to instantly kill me. Since it was the first encounter and I didn't even have a turn yet the DM allowed me to still make death saves instead of instant death, managed to get back up after that, but it was some bad luck with the dice there.

[@byronsmothers8064]

Talk about a white elephant's gift, hearing it compared to a cleric's wish ability, I'd have cast at 6th/7th lvl spell that has tangible benefit to the situation.

[@SilverFoxR]

I really hate the "they look like a wizard, so ignore everything else" mentality some DMs will do. I literally was in a party that had the same thing happen. Despite having a Barbarian and and imposing Fighter in the way, 4 orcs KOed our wizard with javelins, then ran past both beefy melee characters and, despite my character (a rogue) piling on top of the wizard to save her, they still were able to hit past me and kill her. I also had my Paladin killed in the first minute of a session by (again) orcs who beat me to death in my sleep despite having 2 other characters awake and ready to attack.

[@gilgameshdevourerofworldsg4101]

I had a dm who targeted my wizard sufficed to say when we reached the right levels me and the fighter started relying on each other. I took school of necromancy and the fighter took defender archetype so they could watch me when the dm tried to kill me. Every powerhouse the dm tried to use to get me I just waited for it to die then use it to wreck the weaker enemies.

[@goncalocarneiro3043]

Yeah, getting Detect Poison and Disease in that context is probably the equivalent of calling the help hotline and getting "Have you trie turning it off and back on?".

[@gaminreasons8941]

No. It's more like "Is you're refrigerator running?"

[@BlueTressym]

Nah, turning it off and back on actually has diagnostic use. What DM 2 did was just being an arse.

[@goncalocarneiro3043]

@@BlueTressym I guess you're right.

[@eddie9993]

The First DM reminds me of my current DM in one way. He did not want an illusionist in the party (as hinted in this video). Later he explained he had a bad experience trying to DM for one once in a different group as it really slowed down the game. The HUGE difference is the DM asked me not to make an illusionist UP FRONT. i was irked as that is what i wanted to play, but now i'm having fun as a sorcerer and the DM is not being annoyed by my character. good times

[@Lady0Chi]

I remember when I got divine intervention to work, against a lich no less with the Matron as my Goddess. My DM asked me what I prayed for and I call out give us aid so that we may smite one who has cursed your name so. He gave us to npcs to fight with us that were also followers of the Matron. They just teleported in after hearing the Matron call them to aid us. Never got it to work again, but that saved the party. The DM was happy for me and happy that he could play one of his PC as our aid.

[@deathmastersful]

I don’t mind random charts. They can be the coolest thing ever, but that might be good experience bias. An old friend who loves to do one shot DMs decided to do a full campaign and he had 3 random charts we could roll. One for in counters, one for nightmares for warlock/bbeg/mind flares basically if we fought something that had illusion powers or can communicate from long distances with enough power that chart was what it was used for, third was loot/weapon drops stuff a enemy would drop depending on the encounter (the enemy would be using this stuff so imagine a magic dagger held by a wild goblin). He also had a progress set up for it. D4 or d6 at the beginning and a d20 or d100 once we were at a much higher level or even fighting something crazy strong. So we could be fighting a lich while dungeon crawling at level 16 or something who had an over powered staff that would drop. It was cool

[@Diresilence]

Wish and Divine Intervention are up to the DM, however there's intent and wording involved in it. The few times i've seen Divine Intervention actually work, the DM just asked "Alright, so what are you acting big daddy god?", and go from there. This has ranged from a teleport spell, to giving the party full healed. I don't think Bahamut (as indifferent to the common man as he is), is going to answer the prayer, look down, see a red dragon, and go "Minimum effort that won't help at all, go!"

[@merendell]

Ok I'm sorry, if it was me and a player RPd like that and passed their roll the least that is going to happen is the mother of all flamestrikes landing on the foe. Seriously if they'd failed over and over but kept trying and then succeeded at a cinematic moment I'm going to give them their epic win. edit: Thinking on it some more here's how I'd have had it play out. Especially since her god was literally Bahamut. Your god hears your prayers, You are bathed in a column of red-gold light that coalesces into a brilliant orb that suddenly launches skyward from your outstretched hand. All of you, including the dragon stare as the orb disappears into the sky. After a few moments of nothing happening you hear a booming laugh from the dragon. "What were you aiming at foolish child?" it sneers at you. "Enough of this! Now die" As the dragon opens its mouth and you see fire build in the back of its throat a dark shadow falls across the battlefield. You look up to see a great winged shape blotting out the sky. This shape has a familiar red-gold orb in its mouth. You hear a great booming voice shake the earth. "SHE. IS. MINE!" OOC: "Cleric, do you want to say anything to the dragon?" Let her say whatever quip she wants before an avatar of her god nukes her foe from orbit. A great red-gold beam of energy strikes the red dragon from above blinding you all. A roar deafens you and a blazing heat assaults your skin. As you blink away the flash you see a dragon shaped cloud of ash blowing away on the wind away from a huge scorched patch of earth. You see no sign of the draconic avatar but you hear a voice echo in the distance. "YOUR ADVENTURES AMUSE ME LITTLE ONE. TRY NOT TO DIE TOO SOON." Its cinematic. It gives you that brief gut churning moment where it looks like it failed to raise tension before the literal wrath of the god you prayed to lands on your foe from a great hight. Instead of a disappointing nothingburger that left a player feeling dejected it would have probably been the high point of the campaign she'd never forget. Let her know after the session to not expect that level of intervention every time but a success in that type of situation, after that much devotion to the RP, had to be rewarded with an epic result. Yes its a bit of an OP result but DM's have alot of latitude to turn DI to an epic result when called for.

[@Rhian370]

Wow that would have been epic... That was truly cinematic!!!!

[@merendell]

@@Rhian370 like the players in the story thought, it was fate. She'd tried and failed the DI roll repeatedly for 3 levels but never gave up hope of it working. Implied was she was using it for smaller things, possibly frivolous things in the eyes of her god. Here when the chips are down, facing a boss monster and it actually triggers? Ya that should be an event to remember in a good way. Not your god droping a buy one get one coupon at the local ice cream shop in your lap and saying have fun while the dragon cooks your ass.

[@craigtucker1290]

The only problem with doing that is it turns that story from a player accomplishment that they can be proud of to a story that ends up being a gimme by the DM. One story is about the players, while what you are suggesting is about how the DM flexed their muscle to give the player a save.

[@Rhian370]

@@craigtucker1290 I dont see it that way. I see it as a player accomplishment.. She rped being devoted and when the chips were down her god rewarded her .. The DM did not give her a save, the DM rped her god rewarding her devotion. and if you see that as too much with the dragon being defeated you could tone it down to the god, healing the parties wounds and giving them their spells back.. to me, rolling an epic divine intervention in the middle of an epic battle should have an epic payoff.

[@craigtucker1290]

@@Rhian370 No, the only legitimate accomplishment the player made is making the divine intervention roll and if the DM rewarded her as suggested, that would make everything after the roll about how the DM put their finger on the scales on the players behalf. The thing is that those that know the rules would see such a story for what it really is, not something epic, but the very pedestrian DM breaking or bending the rules to give the players an undeserved win the players couldn't have achieve on their own. Or you could tone it down to how divine intervention is actually supposed to work with a spell that might turn the tide of battle, which will not only make the story legitimate, but keep the focus on what the players did rather than what the DM did. But if you enjoy games like that where the DM cheats on the players behalf, all the power to you. It is just these stories are *BS* player accomplishments that are really about what the DM did to give their players the win they weren't entitled to. That is the reality of such stories.

[@JohnW-yv6yp]

That's stupid, it's so hard to get Divine Intervention and he just shit on it. If I were going to randomly select a spell for Divine Intervention, I would say it needs to be 5th level spells or above.

[@troodon1096]

I wouldn't make it random unless the request wasn't specific, or unless the deity in question is known for randomness. You're asking your deity to intervene; unless a deity hates their subject they're not going to spite them by doing something useless for their situation.

[@FlyingDominion]

After the events of story two, I'd try to get the party to go for "random revenge." Step 1: List out every action, bonus action, and reaction your character can take (including do nothing) Step 2: Put those into tables. Step 3: Watch the DM wonder why nothing you're doing makes sense and respond with "It's what I rolled. That's RNG for you."

[@JD-mh8be]

4 minutes in and I hate this dm with a passion 😤

[@Zack0]

i feel heartbroken for that lovable cleric.

[@patrickedger2448]

We aren't given much info for story 1..but I kind of have a theory that DM might have either A: Had that oh so toxic opinion women should not play D&D or B: Attempted to flirt with host, and said attempt was rejected. Edit: For story 2, I honestly would have been moved by the cleric's RP (I'm a sucker for roleplay) and given the party fire resistance for the rest of the battle as a way of showing Bahamut giving the middle claw to the Red.

[@invictus_Vi]

My dm didn't ruin the game for me, but definitely threw logic out of the window, to make us happy. It was a blast. Basically, dm described a beautiful snowy mountaintop, approx. 3,000 ft or more, if I remember correctly? Player 1 to player 2: "Get on my shield, we're going sledding." *They proceed to glide down the mountainside gracefully* My 6 int barbarian; "oh yeah, we're doing this. " *grabs rogue bestie, and uses back as the sled, allowing rogue to "snowboard" using barbarian.* I used the stones endurance to prevent the massive initial damage, as well as rage, and got to be a living sled for my rogue to use, safely. All in all, rule of cool DEFINITELY applied, but amazing roleplay, and hilarious jokes came of it.

[@lukerausch9308]

Storytime!!! I was at Awesomecon for an Adventurer's League game after trying saki for the first time. Was allowed to make my own character, went for a human fighter with the lucky feat. Lord Lucius Cloudius Bigglesworth, the black sheep of the Lord's Alliance was born. I helped the party quite alot and fucked with the paid dm. Boss fight against a sorceress that we had tracked comes up. They have better initiative than my str fighter and magic missile me to 0hp. Party focuses on saving me rather than chasing the sorceress down but we still beat her plot. Win? I think? He lived to be an embarrassment to his family another day and tried to stop a ritual already in progress by killing the willing sacrifice. Was a tad too late as the imp was already summoned but was priceless to see the new dm's reaction.

[@alexinfinite7142]

That second DM is a special kind of horrible

[@Jebbtube]

No one should be targeted by the DM, and not everything in D&D needs to be random.

[@elmerthiendoesgames9061]

Imagine your house is on fire and the fire squad comes just to get your cat out of a one-meter tree and leave.

[@LegendStormcrow]

I'd have dropped a massive heal and a protection from elemental damage, or made her temporarily a level 20 Paladin or Cleric with full spell slots

[@Raptanax]

I am the random chart DM, though not that one, but if you want a story made with random numbers, you've got to put a LOT of effort into the system, and be very aware of narrative and story elements like tropes. Make it more like a choose your own adventure, where the random charts establish player choices, and the players then choose among them. Also, plan ahead and roll out the whole story from the beginning. My story charts always have at least six endings to choose from, and always a possibility of players going off the rails and doing their own thing. If you're going to be the RNG you need to make sure all the possibilities make sense, and lead to a good story.

[@BrianofKrypton]

That would have completely taken the wind out of my sales with that crappy of a Divine Intervention.

[@nickm9102]

Divine Intervention should NEVER be somthing bad. I ran a session for AL where a Cleric succeeded on a Divine Intervention and asked to banish the avatar of a god. So I treated it as a DC 26 Banish spell and still succeeded so instead of a full banishment I rolled a D10 and the Avatar was "forced to fight the Cleric's god on a different plane for a number of rounds equal to the d10 roll" it left him on the field but he could take no Actions, BA, reactions, or movement and he Auto failed Dex Saves during that time. I'll admit the player seemed a bit bummed it didn't work exactly like a banishment but he had all but the disappearance and would have gotten a warning when he would be free if the combat had lasted that long ( it was designed as a retreat in the module) the player asked if it had any chance of working when he did it and I explained how I treated it so 16-20 he succeeds and you get what happened anything else he is gone...I rolled a 16 so you get everything from a banishment except the physical removal and the full 10 round duration. (In this case 6 rounds)

[@AuntLoopy123]

Host is MY HERO!

[@ghostingz_6207]

Damn.. that second story just hurt.... I really hope she found a better DM to help her live out her awesome hero moments. I get rolling for stuff but seriously there are some times exactly like that where the player experience and the fun of the game etc come first and I don mind fudging a role...

[@matthewmckinnon7654]

What I got from both of these stories are DMs that really didn't want to put effort into their games beyond what they thought was necessary. The first one had a plan in mind and the wizard apparently didn't fit into it and he wanted her gone so he could probably railroad the party into the story he had in mind. No sense of improv at all or just didn't want a girl at the table or something. The same for the second. He didn't want to plan much of a story and didn't want to think and just rolled on tables. Apparently no hesitation over the Divine Intervention, a game-changer, and just rolled and picked whatever the dice told him to without a second thought. Way to ruin it for everyone.

[@BigSnail23]

Its like tying a string to the ball, tying the other end to the bat, underhand tossing the ball to you, and you use the bat as a hammer and slam your own foot with it. Thats how painful the fumble on that 2nd story was 🤦🏽‍♂️

[@serge263]

For the longest time I was certain that it was you that was also reading reddit stories on Slash Start as well. Well, hey, guess what? After listening to this story and comparing the sound of the voices....I can confirm 100%. Impressive that you can manage these two channels.

[@ViperPilotSleepy]

LOL at first DM, went straight for the only female player to kill her. Incel Army unite! I just started playing this year and I love our campaign, we work together well and laugh our asses off every session. Love having a DM who focuses on fun. Just made an unspecified deal with a fairy to enter the faye wilds so I can't wait to see how I shot myself in the foot with that lol.

[@bljy853]

I still can't believe some of the things terrible DMs do. I remember having a DM for 5e who, besides being generally sexist, homophobic, and creepy to our female characters and the one girl Player in the game, refused to give our characters advantage on anything. Our ranged Fighter who used a crossbow scaled a cliff to get the high ground against a bunch of Hobgoblins and this DM didn't want to give him advantage even though he straight up said the words: "Sure, being on the high ground is advantageous but it doesn't give you advantage." Then he'd turn around and give his monsters advantage on us for seemingly no reason. I have a bunch of stories about this guy being entertainingly infuriating, both as a DM and a player, despite only playing with him for a couple of months. The lack of awareness, or maybe willing ignorance, of people like him and these DMs never ceases to amaze me. At least in my case, my character got to kill his character at the end of it all. I just feel bad for the other players in the stories from the video.

[@SolstaceWinters]

If the party is facing a powerful chromatic Dragon, getting their teeth kicked in, and the party's Cleric of Bahamut calls in a favor, you can bet as a DM I'm going full FF14 and having him wipe the floor with it. He's the opposite of the Chromatic Dragons, standing against Tiamat! You'd think this would be exactly the kinda thing he'd show up for a bit of flashy shenanigans. Maybe he wouldn't kill it, maybe he'd just "summon" and do his Mega Flare and fly away, leaving it severely injured (more in line with the party's current HP) so the party can deliver the final blow. What a wasted opportunity. Tch.

[@kitkup8570]

If you want to use a random table atleast make a good table, don't just use any random junk and decide it's good, like for this the DM should of chose a spell from level 4-9 as that's her highest level spell slot to the max, if from there you want to random it it's atleast not a level 1 spell, Though honestly if you're that bad of a DM that you don't know how to do the rolepaly needed for Clerics you shouldn't let people play Clerics honestly, as you are required to play their god when they do such things, research what their god is like, what kind of spells they may want to cast to help in a situation like this, for example you could have them cast Mass Healing Word at 8th level so the whole party gets 5d4+20, as I would say a literal god can give it +20, also it makes it so even if the rolling results in just 5 in total you're still getting a decent amount of health, Though I may just be too nice of a person, either way I know I wouldn't give someone poison resistance when they're dealing with a fire dragon

[@gabrote42]

1:54 Vietnamese subtitles. Already on the wrong foot 4:30 Hoo boy. If this dude wasn't so unsubtle, we might have had 20 minutes of Killer GM. But he gave himself away 5:58 I like more random than most but if you want REALLY RANDOM experiences, play roguelikes. Much better. Especially NetHack or DFAM 9:04 Oh I know what's gonna happen. This guy must have either not liked putting effort on DM or really, *REALLY* loved Roguelikes

[@jediprotector216]

Just reading this story article makes me think of testing out an adventure for Pathfinder Society 2nd edition. The first time I clicked the roll button, the creature could have killed a character in one shot with a critical success. At least it was in testing mode.

[@stephenblevins3829]

As the words faded beyond the threshold of sound and the party's hope wavered, the cleric's faith remained true. Above, the threatening storm clouds parted and a single ray of light stabbed earthward, bathing Bahamut's chosen in a golden radiance. A loud, draconic roar broke the heavy silence and the red dragon, confident in its ensuing victory, quailed at the mighty sound. The platinum medallion around the cleric's neck began to glow, brighter and brighter, and with a silvery pulse, blinded the red dragon for a moment. When it's sight returned it was astonished to see it's adversaries who, only moments before teetered on the edge of defeat, restored to their full might. As the light dimmed, all knew that Bahamut, the Platinum Dragon, had blessed the cleric and her allies to defeat their chromatic foe. This is what I would have done. The party would have gotten the benefits of a full rest and all levels of exhaustion removed. That second DM was an abomination to all that is fun and good about RPGs.

[@damavlog1983]

My version of Devine intervention in a possable party wipe. I would describe the players sys begin to glue with radiant energy as the energy intensifies the flow becomes bright. Player loses control of all facaties, as she becomes a conduent for her God. As the light becomes ever brighter clarice begins to take a light form of her God with waves of energy her allies are bright back. And the dragon is hit with a Devine force droping its HP exreamly low. As the light raids cleric will be laying unconcious as she jest had all this godly power flowing through her. And the party has one more shot at taking the beast down. But will have to do so with out the cleric. If played right the party can win and everyone service. But cleric unable to do anything for some time DM descression. I like to DM giving a challange but not make it unbeatable. And that sounds like a good way for a devin intervention to work right at a point of a TPK you could even say cleric did not service the ordeal and stands at her Gods side as she sacrificed her mortal shell for the devin intervention to take place. What are all y'alls thoughts

[@Dewani90]

turning into a dragon god is hardly sporting, just kidding, that would have been epic, elder scrolls IV style

[@phylippezimmermannpaquin2062]

Think it's the first art from the new artist that I enjoyed

[@Thescott16]

"It makes being a DM so easy I never have to prepare anything!" That _red flag_ is big enough to make the CCP jealous...

[@nvfury13]

Second story: Ok, as a DM with a great love of letting the Dice Gods have input in the story with random rolls…that DM is a best described in a string of words I don’t want to use here for fear a profanity filter would block my comment. If you want to use random rolls there, you make a chart of *useful* effects and use that chart when rolling for that.

[@utes5532]

Oh God that second DM has me so pissed off. Divine Intervention actually working is rare, and as a DM I DREAM of a scenario like this. It's so fucking perfect. The party is desperate, the player has been super excited about the feature for a long time, and in their time of need they pull it off. It's the setup for a moment that the whole table will remember for years and years to come, if not for the rest of their lives. And this complete fuckwit just stomps and spits on it by invalidating the whole thing because he doesn't have a narrative bone in his fucking body GODDAMNIT

[@wapankiller1219]

This...this is outragess. This is unfair. How can you succeed a Divine Intervention and not gain the Rank of Glorious.

[@lostbutfreesoul]

Random Tables are easier?! In what world???!!! "Sure is easier, ensuring I have the sheets and models ready to go for every bloody option on this table!" "Know what would make my life better? Having to write three plotlines and rolling a dice to see which occurs!"

[@nunya5230]

I can tell the dm did it on purpose cause he didn't want that divine intervention to work

[@ashannahensley3288]

Holy fk! That second DM is just fuking terrible. Like seriously, "Gets a spell of higher level than the Cleric can cast for free. Is a legit minor miracle." >> "Okay! So ... she's level 10? Guess that means that I'll give them something that is utterly useless in this encounter and of a spell slot that's at the lowest possible level." If we were at that table, we'd have drop kicked him.

[@beason13]

I may not have yet to DM my first campaign (been lazy and a forever player). But while I plan to utilize random tables as needed to supplement, it's a grain of salt thing. If I had a cleric do that then any random rolls would be for inspiration ideas, and definitely for higher level and encounter appropriate spells.

[@joxyver]

If a DM ever does that to anyone in a table that uses divine intervention or wish and succeeds on having it used only to pull some RNG bullshit like that and say “sorry bro that’s luck for you” I will smack the DM with a fat hard cover Players handbook, and tell him “Oh sorry, guess you weren’t lucky enough to have that not happen”

[@davidspice3907]

On the first one the thing that made the dm super sus is continuing to attack the mage after they were downed. Like we all know to geek the mage and an argument could be made that goblins would know that as well. I could see going beyond downing the player as well if they were running a game that was meant to be hard. That all said it really shows that the dm had some sort of clear prejudice beyond the character class.

[@Nyghtking]

It sounded like they weren't the mage, the mage was behind them, so the goblins willingly let box themselves in so they could attack the person in the middle of the group.

[@davidspice3907]

@@Nyghtking that’s even worse.

[@Nyghtking]

@@davidspice3907 Yup, it makes no sense at all to do that, even if they were a cleric or something the goblins would want to split them up instead of just running into the middle of the group like that.

[@Tonz_of_Fun]

What the hell was that first GM thinking? Ten creatures should not act in the same turn like that. Separate them into groups of 2 or 3 so it saves on turn order and so that players can actually defend. Crunching some numbers for 3.5; this is counted as very difficult combat and made all the worse by singling out a player. Even in my first campaign ever I understood grouping enemies. Man, that's upsetting.

[@PulseTriangle]

Damn....that 2nd DM... I might have literally smacked them

[@valorensaxon6782]

Ever tried playing D&D with a law school student as DM? Tried it in college never again.

[@ambushbob5383]

Second DM I would not want to sit at his table.