D&D Players, What do DMs do that you hate?

What do DMs do that you hate?
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DND players, what was your funniest “nat 20” moment? (r/askreddit)
What stunt did your D&D players pull that completely derailed the campaign?
DND players, what was your funniest “rolled a 1” moment? (r/askreddit)
DnD players: What is the most creative character you've seen someone play as?
DND players, what was your funniest “nat 20” moment? Part 2 (r/askreddit)
What’s the DUMBEST thing a player rolled for and Succeeded?
D&D players, what was the NAT20 that made your DM facepalm?
What's the funniest thing PC's latched onto? #1 (r/dndstories)

[@facetankhank]

I am a DM and I came here to study

[@ZombieDireWolf]

you could also search tips for DMing there are a few good videos on YT about it.

[@dakotamcdonnell6680]

Same

[@facetankhank]

@@ZombieDireWolf Brother, I do hope you are trolling, as I am not serious.

[@gamerguy9961]

Same

[@robertheinrich2994]

dumb people don't learn from their mistakes intelligent people learn from their mistakes wise people learn from mistakes of others great, that you chose to be wise.

[@tennagon3822]

Telling the players what their characters are doing/thinking. The GM gets the innkeeper, the bandits, the wolves, the damsel, the shopkeep, the goblins, the king and all the king's horses and all the king's men. The players each get ONE character. Let them decide what their character is doing/thinking.

[@diegonunez3492]

From a dms perspective it really helps with RP

[@Choujeen]

What if they roll for sense motive?

[@tennagon3822]

@@diegonunez3492 by... doing both halves?

[@tennagon3822]

@@Choujeen sense motive is different from "you like/dislike this npc because you're supposed to."

[@karenmiles4431]

Telling players what their character is feeling, thinking, or doing should be limited to specific situations. For example; Passive Skills: "You get a sense of being watched". Phrases such as this are a clue that something is going on. It allows an opportunity to RP, utilizes skills that have been invested in, and can build suspense. Backstory: "You know this person is lying". Phrases such as this allows a DM to speak to a character's familiarity with an NPC, an institution, or even knowledge of some aspect of the world. Mechanics: "You feel the magic take hold of your body and render you frozen". Phrases such as this may be necessary to describe the effects of magic, poison, and conditions in order to establish certain mechanics. There are some situation in which a DM might have to speak to a character's specific thoughts, feeling, or actions. It should be done carefully, and with the ultimate goal of not stealing player agency.

[@dragonriderabens9761]

I disagree with the idea that nat 1s on skill checks result in the character losing all their skill Rather, shit happens that is completely outside their control and THAT is what is causing them to fail. The fighter with a +11 to athletics is trying to leap over a chasm? The rocks tumble beneath your feet right as you’re about to leap Thankfully, you quickly manage to catch yourself and pull yourself back up This gives both the nat 1 failure to show that it’s just bad luck while also giving that skill a chance to shine. As far as skill checks being required for plot progression, well, this has a rather simple solution No one passes? Person with the lowest roll fumbles somehow and gets the info you need out of that fumble. Task failed successfully! Everyone laughs and the plot progresses Making a critical fumble system is easy Making a critical fumble table that is fun and doesn’t impede the game while still feeling tangible is hard. But if you CAN do it…I fully believe you should give it a chance

[@ChuckUFarley90]

One campaign I was in, I played a Conjuration Wizard. The character was successful enough as an Adventurer to acquire 3 Rare (and rather pricey) Spell Tomes: An Atlas of Endless Horizons A Planecaller's Codex And a (+2) Arcane Grimoire Things weren't going that bad at first, until we went to a Desert region for a quest. At which point, we kept drawing the attention of huge Sandworms. Turns out, they're drawn to magic, specifically my Spell Tomes. What's worse, if these Sandworms swallow you, all your equipment had to made a saving throw or be destroyed by stomach acid. Including your magical gear. Armor & Weapons got a bonus to the save because they were naturally more durable, but other stuff (like MY SPELL TOMES) did not. I got lucky, and avoided getting swallowed. My Tomes were safe. The 6,000 Gold's worth of shiny jewelry on our Rogue, however, did not survive. I chalked it up to a unique feature of a unique monster, and moved on. Then we got to the hidden valley home of a Sphinx, and had to fight a horde of mummified undead. A mix of warriors & casters, not too unreasonable. . . . until one invisible bastard, a rogue-type undead, tried to backstab me. Then he used a Bonus Action to hit me with a magical spray of Acid . . . which forced a saving throw for each of my Tomes, which would destroy them on a failure. . . . um, what? I used inspiration to avoid losing my Tomes. Then I used my Conjuration Wizard features to teleport away from this bastard, because screw that nonsense. . . . THEN THE SOMBITCH TELEPORTED AFTER ME. THEN CAME THE ACID, ROLL SAVES FOR THE TOMES. I got VERY lucky, rolled no failures. I teleported again back to my comrades, who ambushed it when it teleported after me, stopping it before it could spray Acid again. The DM was quite proud of this creature, saying he created a "custom feat" to allow for the acid spray. I asked him to stop trying to destroy our Magic Items, but he flatly refused, saying "That happened ALL THE TIME in the older editions, you just learned to live with it." I should just get better. Fine. Whatever. I had a plan. After talking to the Sphinx, we went to some mountains bordering the Desert. We had to locate a hive of large Beetles, and procure a larva. Seemed simple enough. . . . until we saw the Beetles. Picture a Beetle the size of a Rhinoceros. Give it roughly 90 - 100 HP. Put it in a group of about 3 or 4 other Beetles. Now give it 100 feet of movement per round. Definitely strong, but we made plans and laid a trap. We tilted the field to our advantage as best as we could, even setting up a Tiny Hut as a safe refuge if it all went sideways . . . which, of course, it did. Turns out, these Beetles can teleport themselves and one friendly creature as a bonus action (we couldn't find a range on that) also they could do that every single damn round. Also, get this: THEY SPEW ACID AS A BREATH WEAPON, ROLL A SAVE FOR YOUR GEAR & MAGIC ITEMS. Oh, and DID I MENTION WE WERE ONLY LEVEL 6?!?! I had refused to put myself (remember, Wizard) or my Tomes in jeopardy again. So I was hiding in the Tiny Hut while using summoned creatures from Tasha's to run out of the Hut and fight for me. Let me tell you something: trying to fight as a Wizard & support your allies from inside a Tiny Hut you can't leave is NOT EASY OR FUN. But that was the ONLY way keep my VERY EXPENSIVE Magic Items from being destroyed. I brought this up to the DM, told him that I DON'T WANT to be the guy who cowers in a Tiny Hut when initiative is rolled. I hate doing that, it's not fun for me or fair to my Party, can you PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD STOP TRYING TO TAKE AWAY OR DESTROY OUR STUFF. He reiterated that older editions did this ALL THE TIME, that it would KEEP happening, and nothing I said or did was going to stop it. . . . and that's when I had enough.

[@Starfloofle]

*man.* what a bitch of a DM. Destroying the party's hard-earned loot, ESPECIALLY a wizard's, is a real dick move that should only *ever* be reserved for when it would be supremely narratively impactful. ESPECIALLY after the player comes up with clever ways to avoid it happening, EVEN MORE SO when the player tells you *to your face* "Stop doing that." If anything *I'd* give you a feature that gives you advantage on saves against acid damage after you saved so well against it LOL

[@Shadow-the-scribbler]

That's so stupid, if he didn't want you to have those items then why the fuck did he give them out in the first place???

[@calebdavidson3786]

If your DM wasn't after the stuff he gave you the entire time, that sounds like it would've been a great adventure.

[@DronePunkGAME]

And then you killed him for real

[@KalijahAnderson]

I had a DM try to do something similar. I was an enchanter in that game, so I enchanted some wax with acid resistance, and made all the skill checks needed to get the best outcome. The wax turned out to be acid proof and wasn't any more ignitable than leather. I infused all our acid vulnerable gear in the wax. The DM didn't see this coming until I started the skill checks. When he saw me get the best outcome, he was pissed that I crafted a way around his (twice every session) attempt to destroy our stuff. To his credit, he didn't alter anything in his game to get around the solution. He actually let the solution work. But every time we got to ignore his acid, we saw it east at him and his visible frustration was sweet to see. I swear the guy was a lawful evil DM. Do anything he can plan to make things hard. But won't change the rules of his game of the players get inventive.

[@DHTheAlaskan]

Bully players they dont want at the campaing but didn't have enough repsect to tell the player that they weren't welcome in the first place.

[@leonelegender]

Nice, I will do that myself

[@DHTheAlaskan]

@@leonelegender no, don't do that. That would make you an asshole.

[@ZombieDireWolf]

The first thing i learned before being a DM WAS never put significant or plot progressing info behind rolls [thanks to Robert Heartly] him and watching Viva's D&D show where the player Ben rolls very horribly quite often

[@lucifersatan8240]

I put significant info behind a difficult check because I hadn't planned for the check to exist. They where going to find out later but a player wanted to try to recognise someone and it was a historical figure so I had to let him but made the check difficult. He got a nat 20.

[@lucifersatan8240]

I also want to clarify, he almost prevented the inciting incident of the entire campaign by doing so. He almost sidestepped my campaign.

[@tylerian4648]

Another option is to have multiple routes to the plot info with the difficult checks acting more like shortcuts.

[@ZombieDireWolf]

@@tylerian4648 true

[@kylethomas9130]

10:36 - 13:09 Valuable tip. If it only makes sense for the party to achieve something with a single check, have all of them roll, then count either the highest or lowest roll as the mandatory success needed. Even if the highest roll is below average, you can flavor it in a way that makes sense for that character to overcome their shortcomings to achieve the goal. Conversely you may feel the lowest roll may be more authentic. Granting the character a kind of failing forward comedic moment. Both options I'd recommend allowing your players to rp the way their character accomplishes a brief description of the task, especially since a low roll success may come off as mean or rude if played off poorly.

[@leonelegender]

What a way to halt the game making everyone roll for every single thing

[@kylethomas9130]

@@leonelegender that would be stupid to roll for everything, why would you even suggest that?

[@ChuckUFarley90]

I had another DM more recently. His world had some fuckery going on with it. Tiamat, Goddess of all evil dragons, was in charge of the world. Anyone or anything involving Good-Aligned Deities or the Upper Planes was closed off and denied to us. Restrictions were put on character creation as a consequence. Enter my character. She's a Warlock, and her Patron isn't a Divine entity, so she should be mostly unaffected by all that nonsense. I give him the backstory. Nothing that would interfere with his world or interact with the Divine. "Can I make some tweaks?" he asks. "As long as her Patron remains honest to its promises, I'll be okay with that." He agrees that my Patron will remain honest with its promises. Then, in a later session, it came out that he changed out who my Patron was. "WHAT THE HELL? I DIDN'T SAY YOU COULD DO THAT!" "You said as long as your Patron remained honest, I could make changes." "YOU DIDN'T SAY YOU'D CHANGE MY PATRON COMPLETELY!" "You never asked." Then I left.

[@samzilla1281]

About the only one I can think of is a DM that wanted to use the 'gritty' alternate rules. Long rest was a week. Short rest was 24 hours. I hated it. I only played one session under that DM.

[@archmagemc3561]

That can work... if the DM doesn't rush the story and removes all points of rushing and timing from a module. But most DMs don't make those appropriate changes so yeah it sucks pretty hard.

[@algotkristoffersson15]

@@archmagemc3561if your gonna alter the story just make your own story instead of using a module. Also if you make time irrelevant to allow players to long rest after each fight. The longer rests homebrew rule becomes meaningless. The whole point of the rule is for players to NOT long rest after every fight.

[@leonelegender]

Sounds like you are a loser

[@sakairineko]

I absolutely despise gritty rules campaigns. I also left pretty much immediately.

[@TheKiddJ2Strong]

I have an online group i play with, and the thing that makes me so ANGRY is that he plays video games while he dm's with one of our players. We've had so many games derail because he will get to saying something only for them other player to say something about the game, and now, I and the other players have to wait SOOOOO long to play. I've talked to them about this in private, but the alway give me the same excuse "This is the only time we get to play together." Which is a lie. They both hang out every day and play the same game. It's gotten to the point that I and the rest of the party just left the game without warning. He sent out a group message saying, "Where is everybody? Game time." I had to then spend over 2 hours explaining to him they we wanted to play DnD and not just listen to you and the other player play video games. But the good news is that now im Dming the group, and we are just about to finish up a 3 year-long game!

[@TamTroll]

it's a very minor thing, still love my DM and players, but for me it's taking a serious / dramatic RP moment, and making it into something silly. My character was sad, she just realized she'd lost her home, the only thing she got back was a doll given to her from her mother (which she had to pay for to get back iirc), and everything else to her name fit in a single lockbox. In a moment of weakness, i had her take everything she considered "Hers", and bring it with her into her bed, taking a sad moment to say "Everything that is irrefutably mine... is in this bed." Real moment of reflection kind of thing, realizing that she has next to nothing that belongs to her anymore. "Shut up! We're trying to sleep!" says an NPC in response... Seriously man? I'm trying to be sad here, uncalled for.

[@legendnodensetsu8423]

On top of that, when players are being dicks for the lolz and the DM allows it. You have a prized possession, family heirloom, etc. and one player think it's funny to destroy or steal it? Okay the player finds it funny in the moment, but would their character actually do it? Please DMs, don't be scared to say no if "comedy" comes to the detriment of a player's fun. In this example, it's funny for one player for 5 minutes at most, but the really important item is lost forever to another player, and then you gotta deal with potential griefing.

[@isaacbatgamer9958]

​@@legendnodensetsu8423as someone who deribaletly has bern fighting with another pc (it all started when he threw a GRENADE at a crocodile near ALL OF US on LEVEL 1 and almoast killed my pet rat and my friend ( we were complete strangers to each other)) is it fair to say that in response to this happening a character who values his friends life more than a strangers life and is willing to kill potential threat Would in response point a gun at the person and say "dont do that ever again" or is that being unreasonable

[@jonathancarlson6127]

I don't mind being railroaded entirely, because there is a main plot to follow, but some sessions we were on the D&D equivalent of a haunted mansion ride. Lots of awesome stuff to see, nice environment, and we were just watching invulnerable NPCs do all the action before being swooped out to the next scene. Hate that. Just say you didn't prepare anything and we'll have a one-shot or someone will guest DM.

[@BarrakDraconis]

1. Fudging mechanics at the players' expense, to negate an "inconvenient" strategy. Party was fighting a mindless golem. I'm an artificer with a high AC that can impose disadvantage on a target's attacks. So I was tanking in melee. After two rounds, the golem moves around me and successfully grapples a squishier target, mysteriously ignoring the disadvantage it has. It was then impossible to break that grapple. Forced movement is supposed to break grapples. Any attempt to shove the golem caused it to bring its grappled target along. Any attempt to shove the grapple target suddenly required a strength-based check, including spell effects where that made no sense whatsoever. 2. Denying critical information that would be inconvenient to the narrative (or to torturing the players). This isn't just about the unfair split between "Your character wouldn't know that" and "I don't care if your character has an INT of 20, if you can't figure this out, neither can they", it's about negating all skills, spells, and other means of gaining information when the GM's puzzle is based on Moon Logic from a specific book series that nobody else has read. It's about rolling over 30 on an INT-based check for information, and being told only what everyone already knew. Thanks. Really glad I invested in the specific lore skill that should be helping here. 3. Critical fumble tables. I've already failed what I was rolling to do, what more do you want from me? Oh, for my armor to explode off my body into a jillion pieces, and for my weapon to fly off into another dimension, never to be seen again. Perfect. Whether it's kicking a player while they're down, or adding injury to injury, these are always crippling. And making the monsters roll on fumble tables too, doesn't balance them! Any increase in randomness is by definition weighted against the players, because while the monsters only have to worry about the single encounter they appear in, players have to survive EVERY encounter.

[@claude-alexandretrudeau1830]

"The only exception is in the middle of a long combat." No, that's the perfect way to introduce a new PC. How could you get a more badass introduction than in the middle of a fight?

[@Manicies]

As a DM, I gotta say...don't be afraid to compromise with your players, and have discussions with them. Nothing sucks more as a player than interpreting something differently to the DM, but the DM doesn't seem to care about how you understood it at all, and flatly says "you're wrong and I'm not going along with that", even if you banked a lot of your character/actions on that. In a session just yesterday, I had a player try to use Plant Growth indoors, not having realised that the spell specifies "all normal plants in the area become overgrown", rather than "it grows plants in the area". I let him know where that misunderstanding had come from, but since he'd clearly had a plan in mind, I told him that, because it wasn't his fault, I would let the spell work the way he'd intended this time, but now that it was clarified, he wouldn't be able to do that again. He later stated he REALLY appreciated that I worked with him to let his plan work rather than shutting him down completely, and he super understood why I said it wouldn't work that way again. He was really cool about it, and discussing and compromising to get him what he wanted rather than just hard shutting him down like "nope that's stupid" would've just made him upset and bitter, and it wouldn't have felt very good on my end either. We're both there to have fun - as a DM, make sure you remember that.

[@nathangerber1547]

I hate when the DM doesn't go to bed on time the night before and then he (me) is dying all session.

[@ryanfladung8490]

I’d say making your players abilities useless is my biggest pet peeve. So my former dm ran a pathfinder game where we were essentially exploring vaults and cracking them open to find old / awesome magical items. When this game was explained I was told cursed items would exist. I shot my dps in the foot and played an investigator whose archetype was an antiquerion. Essentially I could explore and search areas by taking 20 on a perception check in a minute. And I had resistances to curses / cursed items. In addition my spell list was all focused on finding hidden treasures and preventing traps. I was a highly dedicated rogue type. In the entire campaign up to level 13 all my class abilities never came up. It was so bad: I asked a wish granting genie to change my freaking class because I felt useless. In addition each vault would have a themed boss which was puzzle based. Some of these would be immune to magic entirely ( our whole party was casters) or the puzzle caused major issues with saves that our squishy bodies weren’t built for. I eventually swapped to enlightened scholar for my class.

[@randus7053]

Okay Fireball and Lightning bolt are really 4th level spells in 5e, which are available as 3rd level spells because of 2 reasons 1: Older Editions had the higher damage so tradition 2: These spells can hurt allies fairly easily.

[@kiarastardust]

I had a dm who would put fucking op DMPCs in the campaigns he did that was meant to humiliate the party. He was so fucking proud of them and would insert at least one into every campaign. He would get pissed when we managed to beat them. He once tried to kill off the whole party just to "Progress the story". In reality me and the rouge had kicked the crap out of his DMPC the previous session and he was pissed. It was a simple use of good teamwork with me basically deflecting all hits with a shield and the rouge using my shield as cover for sneak attack damage. We managed to escape his bullshit and he just canceled the campaign, We got fed up when he started openly bullying one of the other players at the table and a large group of us left and blocked him.

[@RadiantHealer]

One idea I’ve always liked that nobody seems to care for, is to roll a D20 upon targeting someone with a healing spell. On a Nat 20, either double the healing dice or treat the dice as their highest possible roll, and on a Nat 1 the spell fizzles out halfway and only heals the minimum possible amount.

[@Akira-ss6cm]

We had a dm in a Westmarch who played as Lolth who strung our Drow pc to her bidding, who was in truth an aranae. After months of planning with her partner, they decided the only way to unbind herself from Lolth was by reincarnating as a whole other race with the aid of a druid. We down her, go through the traumatic process of the wait, and rolled on the expanded updated reincarnation table. She rolled... A Drow. Barely a 1% chance of it happening. The players celebrated an almost Pinocchio like transformation, it was so poetic. Then our dm said 'Roll a d2. 1 for Lolth-sworn, 2 for other.' They rolled a 1. This was a text based session so true emotions were hidden, but everyone else I checked in the room was angered by this. Months of work and tense emotions that a dm decided to side step because he played baldur's gate 3 and thought it would be cool for your blood to decide who you are, not your actions. Random dm fiat ruining what was supposed to be a triumphant moment of freedom. To his credit, since it was a d20 after the d100 that determined the sub race of elf, her partner, a sorcerer, decided to try to use magical guidance to reroll the d20, and got wood elf instead. It's a compromise sure, but the damage had already been done. And none of us really saw that dm the same way again.

[@leonelegender]

Based dm. Evil races are evil

[@Derginator]

While shopping: “this blacksmith has weapons not armor” Oh cool now I’ll just sit her while the rest of the party haggle with this guy for an hour. Then we go to another blacksmith and everyone is like “we just went to one”

[@jimmusthegrimmace]

imposing penalties based on their interpretation of how an action goes. i had a DM tell me i failed a social combat because they changed the way i blew smoke away from my face and it made me look worse to the monster.

[@leonelegender]

Shouldn't be smoking to begin with

[@jimmusthegrimmace]

@@leonelegender it was a demon made of smoke. It was trying to intimidate me by filling the room with smoke. I wanted to just blow the smoke away from my face but the DM ruled it as if i were doing so out of panic instead of disrespecting it so i lost the encounter. Granted this was in new world of darkness so combats were a little different there hence why it may seem weird

[@viktorbazina]

​@leonelegender In game. Also it may have been required for the encounter. Also the monster/area may just be smoky.

[@azurewraith2585]

This might sound odd but one of my big gripes is false stakes. nothing kills my desire to play more than having every possible consequence of the party’s actions be solved for us.

[@lyntonfleming]

1. "Physics don't matter, we only use mechanics" When mechanics apparently say that jumping down from a ledge/tree is falling at a rate of 300 feet per round (205mph) which is over 50% the speed of terminal velocity... And you accelerate to that speed at the START of your jump action (so literally 0-205 MILES per hour in less than a second) And then damage is calculated as only 1d6 per 10 foot of falling, which caps at 20d6. So if you drop a giant block of iron from 500 feet, it'll do a max of 120 damage. And if YOU drop from 500 feet, a squishy human that goes splat on impact... You'll also do a max of 120 damage... 2. Stacking armour class. Chainmail shirt under plate mail? Nah, you only get the highest AC. Because if the plate is pierced, then the mail, padded leather, and whatever magical armour you enshroud yourself with after that are ALL inconsequential and may as well not exist at all. Likewise if you have a physical shield on your arm, a magical shield that you summon... Is useless. Despite it being another barrier to stop things hitting you. Absolutely ridiculous. 3. laughing at players when they say something inaccurate to YOUR specific world Lore. DnD is FULL of contradictions, errata and just straight up mistakes. It's a collection of literally hundreds, if not thousands of different books, spread out over multiple decades with god knows how many independent authors, not all of whom agree with each other. So if someone says "Oh yeah this is how this works." then instead of LAUGHING at them, just gently say "Ah, I don't run it that way. Here, it's this way." That's a MUCH nicer way to resolve those issues without trying to make the player look like an idiot in front of the entire party. 4. Kicking players for "bad internet" without so much as a word to them. Played a game recently, first session with a new group. No one mentioned ANY issues with my internet, but at the end of the game, they just kicked me, sent me a message saying "I have to let you go because your internet connection is horrible" then blocked me. Literally could have said anything during the game, and I'd have switched devices for a better connection. 5. Making an entire session to kill ONE player character instead of just talking about it like a mature adult. This is from the same game as above. I spent an entire 4 hours in ONE combat encounter with a character I'd literally JUST made. It was decent. I mean one of the players was a b3llend who decided to one-hit kill the monster that I summoned in the middle of the enemy horde to try and slow them down, so f!ck that guy up the arse sideways. That guy is ALSO the guy the DM was trying to kill. The mini-BBEG at the end of the encounter literally didn't take ANY damage at all. But i had Quintessence, which deals 1 point of damage every turn. Non-typed damage, too, so it literally cannot be avoided, even with Damage Resistance. So I poisoned him, then got ready to leave the area to go back to attacking from range. Then he explodes. I apparently get no reaction (despite having Anticipatory Strike, which lets me take an immediate action (e.g Psionic Teleport, Dimension Door, Planeshift, hell, even could have used Astral Caravan if I REALLY needed to) and instantly take over 100 damage. Which is more than 2x my HP. Oh. Okay. I think. I start trying to figure out ways I could survive, looking through everything... Nada. Party says "It's fine, we have ways to rev you" and then push my characters body into the hole and f!ck off leaving me dead. DM then cries for a full 10 minutes about "OMG HOW DID I NOT KILL YOU WITH THAT THIS WHOLE SESSION WAS JUST TO KILL YOU OMG!" to one player who was dropped to -7 before his Fast Healing kicked in. So yeah, F!CK that DM. If you EVER make an entire session on how to kill ONE player because you cannot figure out how to talk to them and say "Hey buddy. Maybe you wanna stop powergaming and let the others have some fun?" instead of just going "Okay, i'm going to get out all my epic level books and mix a load of prestige classes to make a monster that will eliminate you..." Not realising that he's just killing off the rest of the table EXCEPT that one guy. Also not realising he could literally have a God come down and say "F!ck you" and erase the character from the universe without all the collateral. 6. TALK TO YOUR PLAYERS Seriously. Just talk to them. That's all you need to do to NOT be a shitty DM. Talk. Listen. Understand. Work with them. Not against them. AND ONE MOAR TING! When a player is explaining a class to you, SHUT UP AND LET THEM EXPLAIN IT WITHOUT YELLING OVER THEM THAT ITS OVERPOWERED AND ANY LIMITATIONS ARE JUST "FEATURES". Like good god I can't beleive that has to be said, BUT Apparently, explaining "This character MAY be ABLE to learn 90% of the magic in the world... But that costs experience, which means I don't get access to the BEST spells if I want a wide verity of spells, which leaves me lagging behind the group in exchange for versatility.... However, I only get 5 different spells each day, even if I know 5000 of them. I have to pick CAREFULLY which ones I want to use. But no no no, the fact I'm locked into x number of unique powers per day is NOT a limitation of the class, but a FEATURE of the class. Just like how a Wizard having to prepare his spells every morning, in advance, is not a limitation, but a feature... Which LIMITS the effectiveness of the rather strong class.

[@postapocalypticnewsradio]

PANR has tuned in. That smug look on their face when I fall for their trap card.

[@GoblinGirlLindsey]

Me: *Is a forgotten realms lore master in a forgotten realms game* me: *Lays down some cool monster biology fact i learned from MrRhexx* DM: "YoUr ChArAcTeR wOuLdN't KnOw ThAt"

[@DHTheAlaskan]

Me: well my character made a living out of fighting monsters for well over 20 years. So yeah I'm pretty sure I know this stuff by heart. DM: *Slamming fist on table over and over while yelling*

[@thehellfirewolf13]

As a DM, i have to ask, was this statement in game or above game? Also, was this about a monster you were currently dealing with? If it was in game and relevant to what you were dealing with, yeah, that's metagaming and i'd have you roll some kind of knowledge check. Depending on your character, the DC would vary. If above game and say you're talking about a bullette while you're hunting a behir in game, yeah, no issue.

[@GoblinGirlLindsey]

​@@thehellfirewolf13 My current DM is accommodating to me. He only rarely reels my hyper activeness gently with "Would Zera know about the mind flayer space empire?" and let's it go if I have a good enough reason. He also let's me explain lore to the other players when they make good history and/or religion checks. I'm not the perfect fit for every DM, i know, but it doesn't exactly feel great to be shot down for being excited about the game and telling me what my character knows feels like micromanaging. I'm no authority on how games should be run I just know what makes me happy in one.

[@Gaiacrusher9fan2]

The part about putting plot progression behind a skill check reminds me of a story previously read on this channel. Those who have been here will probably remember "IT'S ON MY FUCKING MANTLE!"

[@humanoid-ur3gf]

In a DND game my character has a carriage that has been modified so that you can have 3/4 cover when in it (the cover could be broken if aimed at as it was wood)and has enough room for all the characters to sleep with 2 animals so that we can switch them out,So my dm added a magic train (powered by magic and not coal/steam) that moves faster than the carriage, but wouldn't say how fast it moves just that it's faster then the carriage(we were also given a map of the place with no scale even when I asked ,I think this is related to the other because I could figure out one if given the other). Also added a country randomly and says it wasn't and that we didn't ask when it was an NPC that had started talking about it (all NPCs we had talked to said town or city not country when referring to the place)

[@mcspooky8180]

i had a dm once who would never let us win fights. every fight was against a level 18 character who would just kick our asses then a "Beautiful and lovely" elf women wpuld come and save us, twll us we are weak and leave

[@SupersaiyanSlytherin]

Railroading or actively attempting to ‘defeat the party’ “The point of the game is not to ‘win’” applies to DMs too…

[@SharkPivo]

Spells should require a resource to be cast, but only one. Either a spell slot OR a material component. Ain't no way in hell im torturing players with "oh sowwy, you do have a spell slot but it seems your wizard dont have a glass of water to cast an icicle" or some bullshit like that. Like, do we want to stop the campaign to gather dirt and grass before EVERY combat encounter? No fuck that noise.

[@mini2239]

Most frustrating for me is a DM adding a major twist to a player's character arc without telling them about it. I get a DM might not want spoilers, but if it's going to send my character arc in a radically different direction, discuss it with me first. Don't dump a twist in my character's revenge fantasy by revealing their target was good all along without telling me first

[@randus7053]

Counterpoint the the DM should go the route of making the character claim they were good all along, then ask out of character if you the player want the character to actually be evil, thus allowing for options while respecting a player's wishes towards characters surrounding a backstory. But yes major twists without an 'out' should generally be frowned upon.

[@mini2239]

@@randus7053 that can work, but it can still leave me floundering when it comes to roleplay if I don’t know they’ll be out. It can put me on the back foot for roleplay, then again I'm relatively new to the game

[@leonelegender]

My biggest twist I do is that no character have any plan arc and the world will happen and respond you being there or not. You are not the mc

[@BlueTressym]

A lot of GMs vastly overrate the value of 'surprise' when it comes to things like that. Most of them mean well but misjudge it because they don't understand the player's intentions. Then you get the ones who only ever use family, friends etc. to screw over PCs. They're the creators of many an "I only make orphaned loners!" player.

[@thegreatandterrible4508]

This is a session 0 question for me. How much free reign do I have with your character's backstory. Luckily, most of my players trust me, and know I'm not going to fuck with anything fundamental to the concept they gave me.

[@stealth_meister4939]

I may not SAY it, but every time I see or hear someone say not to use fumbles, I think to myself “cope, seethe, and cry” I use them on my monsters too and it’s not like I use a table for it. Nat 1 on melee attack puts you off balance like you out too much force into the missed swing, giving the next attack against you advantage (this only applies to the first strike in a multi attack) Nat 1 ranged attack has the chance of hitting an ally if they’re within a reasonable margin of the attack’s path. Nat 1 on checks or saves are context dictated. Suck or take half from a spell? You take double. (None if you nat 20) Perception? You’re blind for a minute (this usually happens out of combat, so it’s easy to deal with unless an encounter happens right after) I do a lot of my own stuff that is just too much to text it all out, but I also reward nat 20s as stated with the spell save.

[@stoneharvey1017]

your table sounds like ass. First off, this completely fucks melee martials. Already a dangerous position to be in, made worse. Favors the projectile players who face no penalty at all if no ally is in reasonable shooting range. makes a failed skill check go from 'disappointing, feels bad' to 'feels really bad' without even the traditional upside of fumbles being funny. Makes the lucky feat even more broken and heavily rewards casters who dont need to roll 1d20s. Since they're already better than martials you're taking a problem with the game and making it worse. If you're going to be a fumble table advocate, at least try to make it sound like it isn't absolutely awful.

[@ArCSelkie37]

Only one I disagree with there is hitting an ally with ranged… depending on what is considered within a reasonable range. Like someone directly adjacent in combat could work. But it risks needless antagonism and blaming between players.

[@byronlee8745]

One of the things a couple of DMs did that I really hate was keeping only one Initiative throughout the entire game and never re-rolling initiative at the beginning of every battle. I do what I can to tolerate it. To me, having a random initiative in every battle is more fair to the players.

[@DJCherryTempo]

I may not play DnD, but from that first story, the Barbarian having to roll a 1d20 when they Rage and attacking anyone if they roll a 1 kinda makes sense to me.

[@stoneharvey1017]

it does, and if a barbarian was given a small buff, would be a fun rule to play with

[@bonedude756]

Recently I've stolen a rule from apocalypse world when it comes to DCs, and honestly it's great. I set higher DCs then one would normally. Not crazy, just a few points higher then what you'd expect. If the player rolls at least Half that DC, the roll becomes a Half success. Fail forward has always been a concept, but I feel like the partial success gets me thinking about the situation more, and it still allows for the risk of actual failure. Let's say a rogue rolls half success on lock picking. They get it open, but the lock makes a lot more noise then they were expecting, and it seems that it caught the attention of the guards. Another Example is that a Half Success on a charisma check might convince who they were trying to talk to, but make someone else suspicious of them. The player now has another decision to make, and it makes the story more interesting. I also feel like spitting up DCs like this makes for less "Save or die" moments.

[@StarKnight619]

As both a player and DM I feel these. that being said, my players hate me whenever we play because I dont use rolls for ability scores I use pre-created list or point-buy. Many of them DESPISE it because it makes them feel weak, when in reality they are the ones that make completely OP characters. An Example of this is when I started a Star Wars Saga Campaign and one player whined and cried until I gave in (yes my fault and I was stupid moving on) he was able to take down a AT-ST to almost half health, they have 120 HP with 10 Damage Reduction, .....with their fist and then had the balls to tell me that it wasnt OP. Recently I have a new group that has started a mostly themed Undead Campaign. There is a WIDE verity of race and class in this small 3 party strong group, so I took it upon myself to make a DMNPC (hold the torches and pitchforks please, let me finish), the character is all but attached to one of the players and is a pure Cleric, that ties to the player. She is the same level as the party and is basically the party's in-combat healer while the Alchemist is out of combat healer. As a player I hate when I'm gaslighted and then have to spend the next hour or session long argument on HOW I wasnt told or given the information I was asking about. An example of this is that I rolled a 30 on Gather Information with an added +5 because I wasnt trying to look suspicious and wanted to take my time, then another +5 bonus because the guild I worked for was a major player, so a 40. Even the GODS would tell you things with that, the DM basically told me I wasted the day and didnt find anything not a SINGLE clue. Town wasnt affected by magic or divine, hell it wasnt even effect by greed because the King cared for the people. We were hired BY THE KING to find a murderer and was given complete authority. It was so frustrating when the DM told us we didnt find anything and people still died. We left shortly after.

[@megaplays2748]

I actually do the whole "let players control NPCs" thing all the time. My first campaign had an NPC invited to join the party, and despite me not wanting to play as her in combat because I didn't want to have to control another character if I didn't want to, that character would have said yes. So I asked the player whose character is close to said NPC if he would control her in combat and he agreed. My second campaign had several NPCs permanently or temporarily ally with the party and I had the players control them as well, especially if their PCs weren't in that fight (for plot reasons, the party was split several times). That way, each player was still engaging in the session even if their character wasn't present.

[@QuixoteBadger]

OOOH... That dice rolling one really burned my beans. Cutting a rope? I would count that as a bonus action. Vaulting over a half-wall? Spend an extra 5ft of movement unless a relevant stat or proficiency is a +2 or higher. YOU SHOULD NEVER HAVE TO ROLL FOR THOSE THINGS! ESPECIALLY OUT OF COMBAT!

[@snowjohnson8095]

Something i hate is that when players speak over me they ignore me

[@LordBoZman]

Had a DM I like come to me like hey, I need to steal back this Very Rare Arcane Grimoire item you shouldn't have gotten so early. I said that's fine I'll accept that(I was level 5-6 with a +3 Arcane Grimoire cause we were sneaky and pitted two high level bad guys against one another and escaped afterwards so I was level 6 with a DC 18). But that fight right before it. He threw at us Helmeted Horrors, which have 3 spell immunities, two of the three were the examples, Fireball, Heat Metal, but replacing lightning bolt with Rim's Binding Ice. I was a bladesinging wizard who only just got 3rd level spells, and got Fireball, and one of my bread and butter spells was Rim's Binding Ice. So the majority of the session was me getting to feel useless and then got a lvl 20 Wizard's spellbook stolen back away from me. I didn't have time to copy really anything from it, we never were in any place where I could get the supplies, other than to copy 1 spell, Counterspell. That's it, that's all I could afford. Then after that I got 1200 gold worth of spell copying materials *after* I lost the book. Ughh

[@leonelegender]

Sadge

[@jettblade]

The obvious one where the DM tells you what your character is thinking or how they'd react to a given situation. Had this one game, not DnD, where elves and dwarves were extremely aggressive to each other to the point they will not work with each other and may attack each other on sight. We weren't told this when he talked about the world and it really screwed us because most of the party were elves and we were supposed to talk to a dwarf about a job. We nearly killed our would-be employer because our pacifist Cleric failed a self-control check. The character had the pacifist flaw meaning they literally couldn't start a fight except in this 'special' case. They also almost permanently losing her connection to her god because of that fight. The DM backed off of that after that player basically walked out. Another one that is a little bit minor is a DM that doesn't write any changes they rule on. Had too many times where they made a ruling way one week but the next it works a completely different way. Just be consistent with rulings and write things down.

[@legendnodensetsu8423]

Having a critical miss table. I get that it's supposed to be funny, I guess, but this creates an imbalance between martial classes and casters. One can lose their weapon, slash themselves or slash an ally, but the other isn't rolling for attack, they mostly impose a DC check to enemies.

[@strangebynature2798]

When a DM starts changing rules and adding custom content before actually understanding or playing under the rules as written.

[@LoveShaysloco]

The punishing for coming up with a good/smart way to do something. I was playing a dragon born and a problem my pc had was insted of lightning breath I could only do it threw my hands. I was given a 50 foot undamageable gold chain. Well I used it in combo with lightning hands so I could swing like a laso/whip while having it charged. So you got whip damage with electric damage. If we were only facing 1 person so first hit whip damage electric damage and entanglement. Entanglement and electric damage from then on out. Dm can't do that since can't combo moves despite I asked that situation and he said it was OK. Guess he didn't like that the person we were fighting was suppose to win but couldn't fight back since I just kept my electric hands kept dealing damage aslong as kept winning the movement roll me to keep him tangled and him loosing to untangle

[@leonelegender]

Sounds like you are a power gamer

[@lucifersatan8240]

In the first session of my campaign I had to do something that made me disgusted with myself. The major inciting incident of the campaign was going to be an ancient necromancer and a powerful abjurer fighting over a misunderstanding, resulting in the abjurers death. This was the only part of my entire story that HAD to play out a certain way, and a player figured out the identity of each, their motivations, and I had to send the killing death spell early and it was still ON THE SAME TURN that the player cleared up the misunderstanding. He was MOMENTS from avoiding the entire campaign and I really feel like I forced him down a path/negated the impact of his decision. He didn't even notice that but I feel kind of guilty.

[@leonelegender]

You truly are the worst human being in the world

[@rorybutler7961]

Don’t listen to the other commenter, you did nothing wrong. In an ideal world, players would have full agency, but most dm’s will only have the time and energy to come up with one plot. It wouldn’t have been satisfying for your players if you had to cancel the session and think up of a new story. You were perfectly right to bend the rules a little to give your players the best experience.

[@EyebrowsGaming]

Not a thing that Ive seen before or since, but one of my characters, a warlock, had a killswitch (for lack of a better word) tied into their backstory. It would only be activated by a Wish spell or otherwise powerful regenerative ability. After notifying my DM of it and insisting that it didn't NEED to be triggered, and served as a layer of depth to the character for the entertainment of the rest of the players, who seemed to really adore my character for his unique and quirky disposition. The DM triggered it immediately the following session, essentially forcing me to think on my feet and start roleplaying a new character in the moment. The rest of the party noticed the tension and rapid thinking I had to do to keep in character(s), and I got several DMs asking if I was okay and what had happened. I explained it was meant to be a big moment far in the future, and every one of them agreed with me that it felt very brushed over and flat. Most of them didn't even realise what had happened until after the session was over. I'm quite sure the DM didn't like me personally and did it to make my life difficult, as I had called him out for cheating in combat encounters in the past. I've reprised the character since, and other DMs have treated it with the respect and care I had hoped for. So not something I've experienced often, but one of my more unpleasant moments as a player, and an important lesson I learned on what NOT to do with your player's backstories.

[@criminalmatrix6]

Checks outside of combat really should only be used if there is a significant chance of failure or a condition for failure. If you need a check to continue a story, then there's always an option of failing forward. They lose the person they're chasing or they arrive at the scene too late, someone looted the treasure but the plot progresses either way with a positive or negative outcome.

[@xyzxyz4643]

Nat 1 on skill checks are absolutely valid. Hell you can be an acrobat and still trip, or maybe your hand does slip, maybe your detective gets distracted by something else and over looks something. Seriously we all fail menial stuff like drinking stuff without choking on it, or walking down the stairs. And so should characters?

[@MitchellTF]

See what happens to people who violate rules of society IRL...then do that, if you have trouble with "What to do with murderhobos". Legal Eagle has ideas.

[@Tomha]

One thing 2 of my previous DMs did is that they say/permit something, but then realize "Oh wait, this can backfire." So instead of just saying "Hey, on second thought, this might be a bad idea. I think we should undo this." they instead go out of their way to sandbag you so you can't do it anyway. The first example was a Necromancer build I was doing, the DM said "Knock yourself out." cause I told him how my guy was a "Quality over Quantity" type of necromancer and would only have 1-3 undead at a time. This was 3.5 mind you so it was plausible to have good undead henchmen. Well the DM saw my sheet and I think freaked when he saw how every undead I personally animate got +8 STR, +4 DEX, +5 HP per HD, 1d6 cold damager per nat attack, +4 Turn Resistance. I think the DM realized how disastrous that can be if I got my hand on monsters so he made sure we only ever fought humans, or the monster bodies would be so destroyed, that they were useless. Although he DID say I could mix and match bones for stronger undead, he also made sure the dead monsters had nothing salvageable. We did eventually kill a Giant and I thought "Oh awesome! Giant Skeleton pet! I could build a base in his ribcage!" but he was too durable for me to animate, for now. And everyone refused to help me drag his body around until I could. The Second was for 5e, the DM was doing his first campaign for the group and wanted everyone to start lvl 20. He had a rule for his Artificers "If you know what ingredients are needed, you can make it." and he really needed a healer, so I said I'd be willing to play an Alchemist and help keep the party alive. I wanted to experiment and make this class seem good. Since I was an Alchemist, I had a sensible idea: Explosives. The DM said you can build Nukes if you knew the ingredients. Well, I dunno that off the top of my head, but I knew how to make gunpowder. So I told me DM that before we start the campaign, I want to spend 100 Platinum of my guys 500 on crafting material for explosives. I needed fuses, plastic, sulfer, charcoal, saltpeter. As well as a plentiful supply of Acid, Alchemist Fire, Bags, glass vials, oil. "And hey, how would you rule the Glyph of Warding if I wanted to apply a Acid or Fire effect into bullets in a loaded revolver? Technically I'm casting the spell on the bullets inside a revolver, but the bullets aren't moving out of said revolver." He said no to the Glyph idea real quick, but as for everything else, he said no because we already left town...while I was making the character! So despite saying I can make stuff if I know how, he not only forced me to not do anything during Character Creation, and everywhere we went to conveniently had no supplies, I couldn't even restock my alchemy supplies at city capitals! Man, why do they have to get your hopes up to do something awesome?

[@nabra97]

I had a situation when the GM said "you already leaved the town" to as trying to ask the questgiver NPC for details on our mission. Apparently, we had to text him before the game, and we should have known that without him telling it to us ("you should have known that" to most random stuff - including rules of his homebrew system that aren't written anywhere - was the general topic of that game)

[@Tomha]

@@nabra97 Geez, that sucks. I honestly haven't had chance to DM often enough to have any real homebrew rules. The only one I really have is "We're having a Session Zero" and "If you wanna use 3rd party books, you gotta be willing to share them."

[@nabra97]

@@Tomha it wasn't even homebrewed rules, he made a system from scratch (that he explained as "just like FATE", but the only way it was similar to FATE was supposedly being narrative; I'm not actually sure it existed and he didn't make it up on the fly), and he said he would explain rules as we go, but then expected us to somehow know them

[@Menno_3]

Use a critical fail table. Or a 'naughty list' - made a bad joke during a rp moment and therefore my race was changed.

[@JerdMcLean]

If i decide i want to betray the party they wont allow me to literally drive a dagger into someone's back even though it would make it way more realistic and fun.

[@mithatbatur4645]

I hate my DM for this joke he did but its creative and had some funny moments and is still going on. Essentially before we were about to start our session I heard his friend in the background and I asked him to let his friend CO-DM with him because I wanted them to feel included. Turns out his friend is basically chaotic evil irl and he first warned me, but I insisted so he let his friend do something. I ended up witha curse where I take 1d6 damage anytime a creature touches me, which includes bugs and teammates. I almost died TWICE in one session and have been forced to use healing word or other ranged heals because I cant use things that include touch

[@mithatbatur4645]

THE ONLY WAY to remove this is either a 7th level remove curee OR find a gold slime and roll three 7s against it

[@leonelegender]

You got what you freaking deserved

[@darkjackl999]

14:20 basically happened to me My *FIRST* session joining an online west marches group, first and foremost the dm let his friend play a clearly imba ironman warlock homebrew which i didn't like because of the character restrictions for everyone else Said warlock cast scorching ray at one point and *1* roll was a 1, so dm decided all 3 were now going at me (the only new player btw) Suffice it to say i gave that group exactly 2 sessions, realized he was a bad gm n quit (there was also some 'office politics' level shit the head dm forced on every group to basically bully one particular guy that absolutely pissed me off) as well as several other minor things that just fully solidified my new stance of: no dnd > bad dnd Honestly in hindsight i wonder if he was trying to scare me off cause he was GIGA simping for the girl in the group

[@randus7053]

Ah, so this is why there is the optional rule of degrees of failure. Basically the premise for it is that given enough in game time the party will figure out the solution so the check determines how quickly the task is accomplished.

[@algotkristoffersson15]

Well that only makes sense for ones based on mental stats.

[@Keiji555]

The worst thing I hate about DMs, is when you go to ask to clarify if the DM sent 5 or 6 enemies, (I have short term memory issues) and the DM just decides to be a sadist, and jump up the numbers to that, when all I want was clarification. It took a while to get through to that DM, because I kept reminding him of my issues.

[@Quadraxis]

One of the gripes I had with an old DM was that he thought crits were too powerful, so he changed it to "threat of crit"; whenever you scored a natural 20, you rolled the attack again. Only if you beat the AC again did you get a crit. Of course, this was not the case for natural 1s nor if the monsters critted.

[@zambekiller]

Apparently I don't put enough combat into my campaigns when in reality I have told them many times to look at the bounty boards if they don't want to do random NPC fetch quests

[@waddleworth7360]

I had a dm that said," roll perception" "21" He actually mumbled "Uhhh yeah that doesn't matter you still fail" Why make me roll then

[@KnittingOnMyMind]

I've been both a player and a DM. Bottom line, if it doesn't sound fun to play for you, it won't be for your players. I run by a "don't be a dick" policy in my games.

[@oliverwilhelm6171]

Little late, but. When every NPC is rude for no gosh darn reason, even when the PC’s are the only ones willing and able to help fix the problems. Even after the problems are fixed, not a single word of gratitude. At this point, no, I don’t care if the dragon is burning down the combination orphanage/kitten adoption agency, if the NPC is treating the whole party like they’re idiots for asking questions like “what color is the dragon?” then the NPC can deal it themselves.

[@marshallrobinson1019]

As a DM, the first thing I do whenever a player fails a routine skill check is remind them (and the other players) the "Help" action exists. My current party has a barbarian with a musician origin feat (2 free rerolls after a long rest). If they can't meet the DC then they'll need to find another way to progress the story. Failure and consequences should always be an option. If they figure out an alternative solution, then they can have it.

[@tylerkister4628]

I use dmpcs keep them 2 lvls below the players typically ill allow the players to help pic class and subclass

[@pcalix17]

Time scaling. I suck at it to this day even after years of DMing. The only solutions I've come up with are either having the party separate close by so there aren't as many time scale issues or never splitting the party at all. The newest solution since I play DND online is to have a Discord RP area so, during downtime, each player can progress their own stories at their own pace.

[@trueblade39]

Act like they're above criticism. No matter what you do in life, good people take criticism and work with it. Any DM who can't take constructive criticism, especially when they feel like they can criticize other DMs for the way they run their games and then turn around and make the exact same mistakes, has no business running a game. Also, any DMs that allow their significant others into the game as PCs and/or let players contribute to running the game behind the scenes. I was unlucky enough to have a DM that was all three of these

[@leonelegender]

You have no business telling about business you duck

[@sleepinggiant4062]

Changing rules on the fly (nerfing characters, adding abilities to monsters). Favoritism. Saving the party deus ex machina because you can't design encounters.

[@manuhendriks4302]

4:25 I think DMPC's are okay to use. Especially for small groups (1-2 players). The NPC should be a supportive, weaker character then a PC, so the Players still feel like they are important (Tasha's Sidekicks are great for this.) You want your players to do the big damage numbers, have your NPC be "The mage that casts darkvision on the PC's halfling" or "The commoner that gave the rogue advantage because he caused a distraction" The DMPC is a supportive role, to help your players. It's not to show off your OP coffeelock build. 😊

[@XperimentorEES]

Mine to add is 'arbitrary time limits', especially when they're sprung out of nowhere. The party trying to escape a flooding labyrinth, sure nothing wrong with that as the dm tells them how much time they got left. But having the party miss a crucial plot point they weren't previously aware of is not sensible nor fun storytelling game design. If you want the plot on the clock, you should let the players know upfront and keep them informed frequently so they can gauge if they have time to sidetrack. Grand time scale tales can be a blast, but nobody likes being blindsided with deadlines.

[@Dan-fw2db]

A DM that doesn't allow you to simply say "I have no idea what to say or ask in this situation, I would like to roll to persuade/intimidate/deceit this NPC in order to get *desired result within the realm of possibility* and you tell me if I succeed or fail" because I love roleplaying and am not a big fan of rollplaying but I am not a master manipulator like my character is, and you know what the player with the Vargr Pirate in our group has literally never even held a gun but their character has a +6 to every shot so let me just do this"

[@the44head]

mfw you try to cast a reaction and they talk right through you 😭

[@xerneasgirlpkmn1433]

My DM added in too many DMPCs and characters from apparently another campaign into our originally small party of 3. The first one was meant to be added in as a guide but eventually it felt like it was getting main character treatment. The story started to revolve around him and his past. It didn’t help that we were using the Kids on Bikes system to find a way to combine Pokemon and Digimon so it was experimental and the rules were constantly changing. The only times I had true fun was during the two gym battles our group had and it was solo sessions so I wasn’t scared to speak up. I had scheduled a call for my dm about my grievances and I said I’d bring an emotional support human, one of my close friends who also is playing in the game, because I can get a nervous wreak and my DM didn’t like that I was going to bring someone into our conversation and brought one of the other players in to be on their side. I felt pressured because of that and I could get the wording right on what I wanted to say. I was told i’d get one more chance for the game because it felt like i was loosing interest since i’d be quiet but ofc i’d be quiet. You expect my character to be their normal self after having their fear come true in two separate fights practically one right after the other not being able to help their friends. After I listed my grievance of the too many DMPCs and NPCs turned PCs (all played either by the DM or our friend that they brought into the convo) and me being confused as to who was talking because they all sounded the same I was told that I was being kicked out of the campaign. We were just over 20 sessions in and I was attached to my character greatly. It really hurt to hear the DM say that because not only did I commission art for my character, I also commissioned art for our other friend’s character they were playing as and in the beginning of the campaign I was told to expand more upon my backstory and so I did adding as much as my dumb brain could think of with a sprinkle of irl personal trauma, because what else are you going to do, and I was so proud of what I had written for it. To see that in the end it was all for naught sucks but now I don’t feel stress on days we were meant to have the session

[@leonelegender]

You went too hard

[@brunosilva5652]

O don’t have much issue with anything narratively as I think all games have the proper player. As for mechanically I have 2 things, first is undermining a character’s ability, this ranges from never dealing a damage type a character resist to actually not giving them the situation to use their ability, punch the tanks, let the bard perform on the tavern, the players want to live a fantasy when they chose a feature. Problem 2 is tight to 1, homebrewing rules without letting the players know it. I had a game once that I built a crit fisher just to have the DM note that critical hits worked differently on they’re setting just after I hit my first crit

[@МаксимФалалеев-я3н]

The thing I hate about one DM in a local DnD club is the characters he makes for players. You can make your own character, but most players who come to the games are playing for the first time, so they use the characters the DM gives them. For example, a warlock without Eldritch Blast. Or a wizard with no damaging cantrips - just Light, Dancing Lights, and Minor Illusion - while most of the party had darkvision! I pointed that to him, and the last time I played, our warlock had EB, so that's progress. But then I looked at a barbarian's character sheet and that was awful: he had all stats at +1 or +2. Only 12 AC because he had just +1 in Dexterity and Constitution. And the worst part was that three of his stats were odd numbers, like 13 or 15. Having one odd-numbered stat can happen. Two odd stats make sense if you're in a campaign and plan to raise them at level 4. But three odd stats on a one-shot character is just wasting points that you could put into other stat to increase modifier

[@EyebrowsGaming]

I willingly play a Warlock and don't take Eldritch Blast to force myself to be more creative during fights, but I take your point if theyre premade characters. Eldritch Blast is an important tool in your average warlock's toolkit, and taking it away without giving the player a choice is a no-no for me

[@thomasblack33]

7:38 Depends on what you are going to do. And yes you can for example lift an object the wrong way and hurt your back (this happened to most of us before) its not about losing the strength in this case it is about failing the attempt

[@karenmiles4431]

I would clarify and say that skill checks should not reflect on the skill proficiency, but the environment and conditions that the character cannot control. You can have high athletics to scale a wall, but if that building has stone, brick, or wood a character might find themselves butt-flopping on a natural 1 when those elements fail. It can suck when a player puts in the effort to make a character worthy of being called a hero (or villain), only to have a DM counter that with failures at the core of that build.

[@alextrill1746]

For me its a minor thing, but the phrase "I guess there would be" in response to a player's question. Its one of the most immersion-ruining phrases. Yes, I _know_ you're making it up on the spot, but the art is in pretending it is a real scene you are describing, and you know exactly what's in there. When a DM says with confidence "Yes, there is", you feel like you're actually exploring an existent scene, not forcing DM to make it up as he goes.

[@archmagemc3561]

The best use of DMPCs is to make them the 'lore' characters if the players don't have any lore heavy PC. This avoids missing out on relevant information or any cool information you wanna give otu as a DM, and the players are OK with DMPCs like this since in 5e, int is a dump stat anyway outside of 2 very specific circumstances so if your party doesn't have a wizard or an artificer, they'll have a -1 on int checks anyway. Just use sidekick rules for a DM PC with a bit of additional stuff to make them durable, but not offensively strong and your fine.

[@alanaran1575]

The only thing my DM does that I don't like is pulling punches. I like having stakes, consequences for my actions. I'm not asking for a gritty meat grinder game but having the villain wizard stop attacking us and start casting fluff spells to stall because we're all having a string of bad luck in hitting him really sucks. It's not THAT bad cuz I enjoy hanging out and rolling dice but yeah.

[@josephradley3160]

OP DMPC. If the party is level 5 they shouldn't need a level 20 DMPC to get them through the village.

[@nathangerber1547]

I only use npcs when they make narrative sense. E.G. they are with a knight and some guards when they get hired by the knight to help him clear out the goblins. For other situations, I figured out that a cowardly npc is really good because he won't steal the limelight.

[@nathangerber1547]

Usually when I need to introduce a new PC, I have them be an additional adventurer that the npc hired to send with the party to do the quest he wanted done and come up with an excuse as to why they were hired later.

[@Phoenixoflife56]

3:04 thankfully my brother is isn’t this bad but he does have moments where he either forgets to mention key information or miscommunication ensues because he forgets to take into account his players actions or out of table shenanigans happen

[@Ducklesworth]

Im new to DMing and seeing the sad faces on players when i dont understand or get it just right hurt so bad

[@CarlosSpicyweiner-iv8mq]

bullcorn, the DM cant make class changes, thats not how anything works.

[@prestonjohnson1537]

Limiting of creativity of the players in character creation. Beyond that, everything listed here in the video.

[@Wtfzipcode]

hate the "dice rolling fetish" shit, too. trivial, pointless roles are a massive fucking drain. recently had to roll to hit a stationary box with a crossbow from like 10 feet away when there was literally no enemy npcs near. what the fuck would happen if i missed? just fucking shoot it again. how the fuck would an untrained person miss from that distance, let alone a trained person? what would happen if i get a 20, it opens and theres 50g inside? if i get a 1, does my crossbow break? what the fuck was the point of the fucking roll

[@Wtfzipcode]

i use fumbles and hope that dude keeps rolling nat 1s. should be discussed in session 0 though

[@SergioManuelFernándezLópez]

Fudge and cheat for the "player's good"

[@justinblachek6603]

Yeah I had a DM who wouldn't let me pick up a machete because it was dropped by an enemy and I'm not allowed to be a Pokemon trainer kind of weapon collector it was a single machete and I was going to use it for its intended purposes I had to convince the DM that I was just going to use to make a torch in order to even keep it the weapon wasn't even cursed it was a normal machete. Same DM also wouldn't let me solve a riddle because she knew that I was really good at riddles then yelled at me for not helping the others to solve the riddle and when I Solve the Riddle ignored me.

[@SageTigerStar]

My personal hatred is when DM's have that "DM vs Player" mentality. I understand it can be fun to test out what you can do with your players, but if it's not fun, then what are we doing at the table? (this can also be a problem reversed, Player Vs DM mentality, but that's not what the vid is about lol)

[@QuillStroke]

DM vs Player is so toxic, it can end up making a player feel singled out of it's aimed at one player.

[@SageTigerStar]

@@QuillStroke my last DM was so focused on both spoiling a player with all the gear and magic items he could ever want, but also wanted to see if he could "break" an Overpowered min-maxed character, and the rest of our party suffered for it. Everything the DM tossed at us was basically immune to anything the rest of the party could do, while the Rogue was the only one eating well with damage numbers and loot. Short of just causing a TPK, the DM was throwing everything he could think of at the Rogue but nothing was working, however, it did kill our Wizard, Paladin, and Cleric in the process. Pretty bad experience.

[@leonelegender]

​@@QuillStrokegood, let them feel the hate

[@leonelegender]

Dm is supposed to be indifferent. Monsters are fighting to kill

[@SageTigerStar]

@@leonelegender I think the word you're looking for is "Impartial". However, it's still a game. If the DM is going out of their way to throw things at the party that they know will kill them with little or no chance of the party winning the encounter, it's bad design.

[@robertsilvermyst7325]

Making something that is so complicated that you just mentally check out and lose interest.

[@leonelegender]

Skill issue

[@spongemanhere]

d100 rolls for what is essentially divine intervention when a fight is going poorly ive had it happen twice, and both times it left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth the more recent one less that the first one, since there was a bit of lore justification for what happened. both of them felt like attempts at fixing a hard fight, but there are far more invisible ways to do that.

[@fearglitchdragon7237]

Dm throwing overpowered enemies at us when we were only lvl 2 (he took over being dm of the group and I only got to lvl 6 via technicality of my barbarian's HP had gotten boosted to lvl 6 so I was just bumped up to lvl 6 and even then I still couldn't kill the shit he threw at us), nerfing our shit into the ground (me and another player who was a gang elf artificer, we had some stuff, I had hand eyes which I gained from a quest which I accidentally skipped to the end of which gave me true sight, a weapon that could change into other weapons, a flask of infinite alcohol that could heal me as well having drunken rage that I didn't need to roll to activate, and the other player had a magic hammer for forging shit, and over the course of the never ending campaign my hand eyes kept getting downgraded and how they function getting changed each time, the flask not being able to heal me anymore, couldn't do drunken rage on command anymore, other weapons of mine fucked with, and the other player's hammer never getting fleshed out), changing shit every session, making us practically blind (he had stuff added to surroundings that we should have seen but didn't due to not being there before and being retroactively retconned in then gaslighting us), he being a min maxer, withholding information and not telling us the most basic of stuff unless we specifically asked or rolled for it, as well as him getting mad at us for not knowing shit that he never told us that he claimed to have (literaly this happened like every other session when the retcon bullshittery started to get worst, like towards the point at which the campaign was almost abandoned he had a thing planned for the next session but when no one joined the call he decided to arbitrarily have it have been on a time limit thus skipping to a ruined future which fucking blindsided us since he NEVER FUCKING TOLD US THAT IT WAS ON A TIME LIMIT, LIKE IRL TIME LIMIT and when asked why he did this he kept say "What you talking about, I told you guys it was on a time limit." which he didn't and was obviously him being mad about no one wanting to do d&d that do so he chose to punish us)

[@derrickway8352]

I remember my first dm used to do the whole plot gated behind skill checks thing. It was aggravating. Especially so since he would always have one of his dmpc's point out the clue that was actually "obvious but you somehow missed it." He did do some cool stuff like let me double subclass my rogue but always made up for it by nerfing basic rogue class shit like my reliable talent arbitrarily not applying to certain skill checks or sneak attack not applying even though I had advantage on the attack because "he's currently focused on you"

[@derrickway8352]

I should clarify that when I say double subclass, he would let me choose at each subclass milestone if I wanted to take something from either thief or scout. I didn't get both just a choice of the two because of my backstory

[@leonelegender]

Roll better, Sherlock

[@thomasblack33]

adjusting combat difficulty mid combat. exception if the party is about to be TPKd and the DM has no backup plan. Sometimes the dice are in your favour and sometimes they are not. Yes i rolled 3 crits in a row next time i roll 3 crit fails in a row.

[@djmagichat1721]

I have a friend who made his own TTRPG system from scratch. It's a really cool system, which he improves mostly via player feedback. I just wish he'd stop treating the game like it's "supposed to be GM vs. player." Especially to the extent that he does. Openly trying to distract us from whatever our goal is at the time, the ways in which he tries to keep the monsters we fight the same strength relative to us (e.g., always 3 levels higher), and so much more...please don't do this.

[@Swaggyext]

When they hate a certain class or race, it makes me feel like I shouldn't play that class or race even though I really wanted to

[@leonelegender]

Good, you shouldn't

[@Swaggyext]

@@leonelegender Why?

[@hythunza1811]

TL;DW: Don't make sudden changes. Don't make pointless dice rolls about things that are mandatory to advance plot, or would disrupt RP(like cutting rope). Don't nerf/buff anything without thoroughly understanding the purpose behind it. Make sure you can give your players something to do, and account for the many outcomes that can come out of it. Don't skimp on combat unless it is obscenely obvious that the players will win. Be detailed with everything dangerous/is a potential hazard in making. And for the love of god, do not include characters that will outshine the party, unless it is extremely temporary. And maybe not include heavier crits of either kind. Crit fumbles are as debilitating as a crit success, so unless it is for a very specific tone, just don't do it.

[@leonelegender]

I'm not the players nannies, they can decide what they will do themselves

[@hythunza1811]

@@leonelegender It is directly in the rules for you to be the storyteller and referee. Don't make your players the narrators unless you want the game to die.

[@DarkRabbit-ck2ur]

This is probably just me, but I had a DM that loved to introduce new monsters into their game. It could be homebrewed or something he ripped from some 3rd party compendium. Whatever it was, they'd create a reason to drop this monstrosity into our adventure instead of writing an actual story for us to follow. Or work on the lore around their city or conjoined towns. Because there was some interesting bits and pieces in there that could have been explored. But we'd never had anytime for that. The monsters was priority.

[@leonelegender]

Are you playing dungeons and dragons or sissies and friendships?

[@DarkRabbit-ck2ur]

@@leonelegender I played Pathfinder 1e and 2e and walked out of it...okay. I'm saying if I wanted a cruncher game I'd play one. I didn't sign up for this shit. That's the problem.

[@ashalaev]

Nerfing classes or abilities or spells is something I would be very upset with and even consider leaving. As long as those things are RAW, leave them alone. If you think that someting is op, then balance the encounter or puzzle accordingly.

[@leonelegender]

This game is badly designed, it's dumb