D&D Players HATE These Things DMs Do

[@twistedpinttavern]

Sorry, I had to dip, so I just minor illusioned the character in there at the end, hence why the animations aren't so smooth... Totally no other reason...

[@ArshikaTowers]

I think the biggest pet peeve I have with DMS is when you give them a backstory, not even a complicated one; and they don't bother to read it the whole way through and just throw whatever they want into the game as you backstory. DM: "Well, you recognize this dragon. It is the dragon that killed your family." Me: "Umm, my parents are still alive." DM. "Nope, they died when you were six." Me: "The first sentence of my backstory is my parents are alive. My sister died when I was six, due to disease." DM: "Oh, ok. Then this is the dragon that killed your sister." Me: "..............................." ^^ Actual conversation at a table.

[@twistedpinttavern]

I made a mistake with one detail from a player's backstory and I felt so bad lol, we immediately retconned to fix it. I'd read his backstory, but mixed up which parent was the dead one, and even with it being super easy to retcon I still went and reread the backstory three more times to make sure I remembered everything else properly. I know some DMs don't care for the players' backstories, but at that point they're not even playing the character they wanted to, as motivations and history are important to rp!

[@kyleward3914]

DM: Your sister died of disease? The dragon's name is Disease.

[@ArshikaTowers]

@@kyleward3914 you know what, I would have accepted that. It would have been hilarious.

[@JuicyBlueWill]

Treating Nat 1s as a horrendous failure has been a consistent pet peeve of mine. If someone has a +8, a Nat 1 is still an okay attempt and shouldn't be treated lesser than someone who rolled a 6 with no bonus. Other side of the coin, if someone fails something with a 17 +6, someone else cannot succeed on a Nat 20 +1. Any acknowledgment of the number on the dice, outside of specific combat rules, is a violation of player sovereignty by ignoring the choices they made in character creation. I understand some people like to play with critical fumbles but they should never just be presumed. It's a controversial homebrew rule and should be discussed as such.

[@JuicyBlueWill]

Also for the bathroom break one, I've never been in a campaign with a bathroom break. I've never thought about it but there have only been 2 instances when someone has needed to go in our ~4 hour sessions and they did just get up and go then got a 5 second summary 2 minutes later.

[@twistedpinttavern]

I agree it should be discussed, since it's so controversial. I don't mind nat 1s being the worst outcome and nat 20s being the best outcome, but that's because I think it adds a sense of dynamic unpredictability to the world. A thief with a +18 to a lockpicking check wouldn't fail because of their skill, they might fail because their lockpicks broke, which can totally happen. A barbarian with a +10 athletics check doesn't fail to move a boulder because they're not strong enough, it's because the ground was wet and they couldn't get a good footing. But even with that mentality, it can be annoying when you build your character to be great at something and just frequently get told "no" by unlucky dice, so I totally understand both sides of it!

[@JuicyBlueWill]

I can definitely see the appeal of the rule in terms of adding excitement but I just feel like it's the opportunity to give way more extravagant descriptions of situations, like having the opportunity to get around a castle with guards at every corner to the point where the whole party needs to roll at least a 30 to even have a chance while also letting them breeze through any average DC 15 Stealth check with ease. To be fair, it's putting a lot of responsibility on the DM to think of the more difficult scenarios but it just makes for a more exciting story to actively play into the strengths of the players with more difficult situations in tandem with acknowledging how good they generally are with the skill. The characters are meant to be way more skilled than the average person. Accept near-impossible DCs. On the other hand, I can 100% see why it can be appealing to accept critical fumbles. It is much easier on the DM since they don't have to think of elaborate plans for there to be a chance of failure. It can definitely be fun to play into the risk of someone with a +11 in Stealth to roll a Nat 1 and trip over, smashing over a massive glass jar of bells, alerting everyone in a mile radius of the fall. One thing I'll never accept is Critical Fumbles in situations where Reliable Talent, or any similar class feature, would apply. I still think doing videos looking at either side of hot takes would make for a very interesting series.

[@EaterGreen]

Sometimes its just fun, last week my player was listening for movement behind a door, nat 1 perception. He got tinitus and then the ringing in his ears disappeared, everyone chuckled. No harm done. I also have a player who refuses to tell me if they got a nat 1 because they hate critical fails so much, even though I only use it for flavor.

[@TheMightyBattleSquid]

@Horrible room descriptions Literally what destroyed my first introduction to dnd. Was joining an existing campaign and a HELLHOUND was described as "you see a dog on the street." The two PCs fighting the hellhound was described as "you see these two fighting." So, since the dog got as much screentime as the people on the street and the DM refused to give me ANY info on the campaign I was walking into, I figured it was just filler and the PCs were doing PvP. Since the DM insisted I do something first (handwaving everyone else's turns to say my turn comes up again until I do something combat-wise) I ended up picking a side and attacking that player. It wasn't until after they asked "WHAT ARE YOU DOING!?" that they were finally interested in telling my confused self what the actual context was. We died a few turns later to the enemy reinforcements.

[@twistedpinttavern]

"You see a dog on the street" as a description for a hellhound is like "you see a large man" as a description for a fire giant lmao

[@stormkeeper1741]

While definitely a poor description, not everyone is good at on the fly in-depth descriptions. I know for a fact I'm not. If I don't have something prewritten my descriptions can be uinderwhelming lol. But my players and I have been together for years so they are used to it now.

[@JagmasterGeneral12374]

I co dmed s campaign and had a dmpc but he was a drunk fearless pirate who was a chronic liar. It was very quickly apperent to the party by thr end of session 1 that he should not be consulted with strategy or follow his lead. He sid have a really insane moment but it was all dice luck in a drunken stupper he roped into another ship light the arsenal room ablaze then ropped back to his ship. Nearly died in the process like three times but it was worth it to see the entire party laughing so hard we had to take a short break

[@Autumn-Muse]

8:05 I once made an error because I came back from the bathroom in time to see our rogue go unconscious, but I didn't realize that our cleric was too far away to get to him in time. Had to ask for a mulligan so that instead of letting rogue bleed out in front of me and casting a cantrip on a mook, I could try to stabilize rogue instead.

[@silkskywhite4603]

There is nothing I love more than a tale from the keep of the Twisted Pint. Another excellent read! Personal pet peeve of mine is a DM who treats knowledge like its some holy secret that we unwashed barbarian masses can't learn. I'm currently playing in a game where the DM is a fan of Critical Role, and uses the Mercerism "It's strange..." or "It's weird..." But instead of giving hints for us to actually draw on and ponder, he leaves it at, for example, "It's odd... This ruined town is infested with hydras but there's an abandoned subterranean sewer, but you, the Dwarf with a racial ability about masonry, can't find the secret door that's 3 feet in front of you to find out why. It's weird..." Personal opinion: if your players can't find anything, if knowledge is a tooth and nail affair every time a question is asked, knowledge becomes moot and you inspire murder hobos and a very bland set of characters.

[@twistedpinttavern]

Glad you enjoyed it! And yeah, you put it very well, if you don't let the players learn or figure anything out, all you do is inspire them to kill first and ask questions later lol

[@sleepinggiant4062]

1st story - It is completely the DM's call on when to ask for a skill roll. They can use your passive skill anytime they want or determine that it is impossible. That is how the game works and is not player agency. Doing it too frequently is bad form, and he is doing gotcha DMing. Tell your DM what you find fun. Telling a player how something makes your character feel is not telling them how they have to react, and this is perfectly fine. Don't tell the players how there character reacts, tell them what feelings come over them and let them say how they react. Things I hate that DMs do: Favoritism is my top one. Nerfing player abilities on the fly is a close second. Not knowing the rules, or spending too much time with their nose in the book. Not appropriately preparing combats - Saves the party deus ex machina when a combat is going bad, or combats are way too easy. "You see an ghoul" instead of giving a description. Retconning entire sessions. Using theater of the mind when combats are complex or important. Stop running a game when we reach mid level. Tests player skills instead of character skills.

[@leasemore6053]

Good choice at the end...

[@twistedpinttavern]

I'll take my payment in the form of permanent shadow blades, thank you

[@Soveit400]

Another Fantastic Video :D

[@twistedpinttavern]

Thank you!

[@BoredTAK5000]

I’ve got one. Killing important npcs off screen. At least give me something I can do about it.

[@twistedpinttavern]

Or even if they don't want you doing anything about it, at least let it happen on screen so you can still be a part of the story

[@BoredTAK5000]

@@twistedpinttavern even then that still kinda annoys me since you’ve kinda just robbed the party of a tension filled fight perhaps then followed up by some great rewards.

[@RaethFennec]

A big pet peeve of mine is the DM hiding combat rolls on VTTs and announcing the results. I have a DM who does this, and who acts very adversarial about trying to kill PCs. That's just how the table rolls, and I'm their newest member. I'm okay with it. And I trust the DM, too. They've demonstrated that they're almost never fudging, or if they are it is rarely. I think I've only caught them fudging once (I'm HIGHLY certain they did), and it wasn't really consequential. It built extra tension and there was almost no possible way we'd lose a player in the situation as the combat was nearly over. Even still, despite trusting them, and enjoying the tension that brought to the moment, and agreeing with the decision... I still can't help hating it! Aaaaagh, just roll in the open! We use a VTT where you can set the roll to even hide the modifier and only show the result of the roll, so it's not to hide information from the players. I know it hinders doing the math on probabilities (WHICH I DO ON THE FLY AND I KNOW SOME DMs HATE THAT TOO). The logic side of my brain says it's totally fine and it's a helpful tool for a skilled DM to craft memorable moments, and the dumb emotional side of my brain says it's awful and cheating and I want my moments to be genuine and now I forever have intrusive thoughts that my successes in-game are catered or that cool moment I had was given to me instead of lucky. lol

[@stormkeeper1741]

I know this won't help but instead of indulging the emotional side, just let it be. As a DM and player I've come to find that sometimes giving a player a moment to shine, even if the dice would dictate otherwise can make them feel good as well as lead to incredible story moments. Some of the most amazing moments have occurred because I let a roll that missed by one slide as I thought it would make for an epic moment and it almost always does. Also, I love the drama of unseen rolls. It's great not knowing what's happening until the DM announces it, but that could just be me. I never open roll, in person or on VTT, but again I love the drama of it all.

[@twistedpinttavern]

I think this comes from having a DM screen in person, which hides the rolls. It also does matter when certain spells like Shield are considered, which says you make the decision after knowing you're hit but before the total of the attack roll is stated. However, if a DM is being adversarial and using this to punish the players with false dice rolls, it's absolutely a problem.

[@EaterGreen]

Lol i always showed my dm combat rolls so everyone can see its fair but they actually told me they prefer not seeing the rolls so the combat doesn't just become 2 mins to generate a number game. Ask the table if all the players want to see the rolls and if its going to make the game more enjoyable for them the dm ~should~ allow it. Either way some VTT have fudgable rolls or macros built in. I know roll20 does.

[@RaethFennec]

I know! I get it. I'm a DM and a player. It makes perfect, logical sense. But it doesn't change the fact that there's always going to be some doubt in my mind about the legitimacy of the cool story of the time I locked down a boss and adds we clearly weren't meant to fight yet five rounds in a row with Command while the party beat them down. Because maybe, JUST MAYBE, the DM that normally is eager to kill off a PC if he gets a chance when they do something stupid, was using me as an excuse to salvage a situation that was otherwise a guaranteed TPK. lol If I can see the roll and the modifier, then I know what the odds were and I can relate that in real-world terms. I can do the math and say that my odds of keeping him down might have been some 0.4% or something. Without it, some element of it feels like "cool story bro glad your DM likes you." @@stormkeeper1741

[@tinycrimester]

My biggest DM pet peeve is when the DM rejects a flavor thing I want for my character because... idk, they're not feeling it. A DM recently pretty much told me to change my character's name 5 minutes before the start of the session because it was in Latin and everyone else's name was English or some fantasy keyboard smashing. ftr we weren't speaking English irl, and the game sure as hell wasn't set in England, so neither Latin nor English names make more sense than the other for the scenario. i also have a DM who won't let me summon giant owls with Conjure Animals because that's too wacky in a high magic setting, they have to be reflavored flocks of smaller birds. But he's not sticking his fingers into every single spell the bard and the wizard fart out. To be clear, how you approach this is everything, and banging a DM gavel is not it, because that says to me that there is no reason why it has to be this way, the DM is just a weird perfectionist a-hole.

[@twistedpinttavern]

Flavorful interpretations are usually harmless, and they just serve to improve someone's fun, so I don't know why so many people are against them! I get putting your foot down on some things if they're really important, but usually flavor is purely for fun!

[@EaterGreen]

i run several games for different groups and once someone got mad because I wouldn't let they turn hellish rebuke into radiant damage which is a huge upgrade because of resistances. It was such a huge disagreement that we parted ways, sometimes what players see as flavor is actually a power upgrade. If you increase the effective size of a summon that is an upgrade, but I'm not sure about that exact case. Not letting a player pick their name is a over reach, though, unless its a meme name in a serious campaign or a slur.

[@tinycrimester]

@@EaterGreen oh yeah no, i totally get that, but giant owls is one of the sample creatures in the official spell's text on wotc's site. this was just because the dm thought it was immersion breaking or something.

[@joshuawrigley5657]

I wonder who one of the people who said that they would guard the tavern? Watching the tavern from the rafters.

[@twistedpinttavern]

Thieves beware!

[@TheNoobRapter]

I know three 1. I have played with a GM that would allegedly give us the ability to save people or do diplomacy, only problem is he would be expecting the players to interrupt him mid sentence to do action (example, you see a bunch of cultists bringing some civilians to an alter to prepare to sacrifice them and they kill one of them and now all of the civilians are dead and the evil dark lord is awakened game over you all lost... why did you guy do nothing?) keep in mind the players are introverted people that try not to interrupt the GM. We have had some tpks because of this. 2. I call this reference mania, basically a GM would ether take/make legally different characters from movies, video games, and/or anime and have them appear in the game. Like I get it you like thou shows, but stop trying to use that to over shadow the party members. Bonus hate points if the GM uses that to try and make your characters "better" (we had a monk that was a capoeira fighter get railroaded into training with Goku to fight "correctly") 3. the meta freak= if you are playing a character that is not up to "meta" or is "wasting points" in skills/stats for role play purpose then you will have a target on your back and the GM will do everything to kill your character so you can make a character "correctly". Bonus hate points if the GM thinks martial characters are terrible.

[@twistedpinttavern]

"Reference mania" is a good way to put it, and it can absolutely be a nightmare to deal with

[@stormkeeper1741]

Martials are definitely lackluster but I would never tell players to choose casters or in any way make them feel they are inferior. The whole martials are weaker than casters boils down to spells. after 5th level casters start gaining the ability to reshape the battlefield and eventually the world on a whim. Teleport, conjure powerful thunderstorms, tsunamis, earthquakes, and firestorms. Or they can call forth minions from the deepest hells or highest heavens to fight for them in battle. Meanwhile martials are just swinging their weapons.

[@TheNoobRapter]

@@stormkeeper1741 the GM would still say you wasting points on something like teleport (it does not deal damage so you are wasting a turn in combat and a spell, unless you found the spell thru spell scroll, then it is a free spell in your spellbook). Also it is not just swinging weapons, if you are not using the type of weapon that can deal the most damage (like a rouge using a dagger and not a rapier) or you are thinking outside of the box (like using a bar of silver to beat a gargoyle to death) then you might as well pack your things and leave the game. Sorry just venting a bit from a recent game.

[@EaterGreen]

This was hard for me when i first started dming, I basically have to stop myself mid thought and check if players want to do anything. DM manual says describe, then let players respond. Best advice for a dm PERIOD.

[@theuncalledfor]

DM: "The pie blows up in your face, dealing 3 damage!" Player: "Does a 24 hit?" Or, at a higher level... Player: "Roll a CON save. I'm casting Finger of Death."

[@twistedpinttavern]

I thought you were asking the DM "does a 24 hit?" as if you were standing up to punch them IRL lol. I'd happily watch either route

[@RaethFennec]

DM: How did you get a 24? Player: It was my birthday last week. *BAM* @@twistedpinttavern

[@nabra97]

It isn't critical, but refusing to explain why he implement certain limitations, giving wage answers or just omitting the question. If it really matters, I will push him until he answers, but I feel bad about it, and in most cases I just give up. Also, it looks like he really doesn't like players coming up with some problems (problems, not solutions) he didn't intend to add, even in sandbox. There is also a problem with fights feeling poorly balanced that almost everyone have issues with, but to this one I have no solution, as they are balanced, it's really just about what it feels like.

[@twistedpinttavern]

Balancing encounters can be difficult at times, but if it's an every time thing, it might be a problem

[@nabra97]

@@twistedpinttavern The thing is that by math it works correctly. Like, we win most of the time, and we often can retreate. But it just *feels* unfair, and I can't even properly explain why. I would think that it's I'm being a problem, but other players have issues with it too.