These 20 Dungeon Master Mistakes Ruin D&D Games

Avoid these 20 DM mistakes that can ruin your D&D game. LAIRS & LEGENDS KICKSTARTER ▶▶ www.kickstarter.com/projects/...
Being a dungeon master in D&D isn't easy. A DM, novice or veteran, is likely to make mistakes; it's unavoidable. Some mistakes dungeon masters make are minor, and players barely notice; other mistakes are more grave; and then there are the dungeon master mistakes that can leach player fun in a heartbeat and destroy entire games. In this video, we discuss 20 dungeon master mistakes that leech fun, destroy comradery, and ruin D&D games.
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#dnd #dungeonsanddragons

[@dylank10101]

I have ONCE allowed a player to bribe me, he offered to grill steak for us all if I allowed him to switch his character next level up, who am I to say no to that offer? The steak was definitely worth it

[@memesterjohnson4096]

a worthy sacrifice

[@alexinfinite7142]

You did what you had to do

[@damiensteinrich9677]

Sacrifices must be made for the greater good. Like a dnd group with full tummies.

[@kalamity273]

I let my players bribe me all the time for tiny amounts of XP. They bring snacks, props, RP, and they get 25-50 XP bonuses. There are pros and cons and I try to acknowledge timid players to balance out the others.

[@piranhaplantX]

In all fairness, it sounds like he bribed the entire group equally. So I'd allow it.

[@zacchris532]

I had a DMPC that I shoe horned into a campaign I was running. He talked big and was full of himself (saying he was a dragon slayer), but seemed to hold his own in a fight. The players grew to rely on his knowledge and skills but not really like him. 1 session later he is bitten in half by a Dragon in a scripted event and my players shit their pants as intended.

[@wonkybiscuit2760]

Hilarious bait-and-switch

[@BenjaminMaller]

I like it... Especially Since some of my friends have told me that since my brain is so I'm a little cold that if I saw something weird I would try to figure it out approaching and I'll light it away at nighthere's a big dragon in the street there must be something robotic or a hologram I should go check it out so it's told me not talking about gaming would be the person who would end up approaching a real dragon and getting eaten as a warning everyone else said it wasn't an some kind of trick...lol

[@elizabethgemmell7635]

I have a DMPC I plan on using in my session tomorrow night whose entire purpose is to 1: act as a meat shield to let my players get a good look at a mini boss that they are NOT prepared for (they have already gone through 2 rough encounters since their last long rest, and kinda went nuclear on wave one of three... Oops) to decide if they want to stick around and fight it, or make an escape to fight another day; and 2: he carries a magic item needed to take said mini bosses most deadly ability off-line, and since I plan on giving them a more powerful item of a similar nature in a couple more sessions, a DMPC carrying it makes more sense than giving it to the party themselves.

[@doms.6701]

I once was playing and I said "I wanna climb over this 2ft wall" I was a 6'5" half orc barbarian. They had me roll an athletic check. A little ridiculous but ok. The issue came when the DM told the other players to roll to climb over, even though they never said they wanted to. Our DM was big on not allowing us to split. Which I get to an extent but we could not enter a room and have someone keep watch. We all had to enter the room. Just my small example of taking our agency

[@schwarzerritter5724]

My DM loved having us roll for everything too. Like we where fighting wererats and I had nothing that could hurt them. The wizard cast sleep on one of them. So I thought: We are in a warehouse, so if I lock this wererat in an empty crate, that would buy us some additional time in case it wakes up. "Roll Perception and Athletics." Everything was an ability check. The DM was much better at storytelling that reading the books.

[@jasonOfTheHills]

​@@schwarzerritter5724 I call for a lot of rolls that on face value most folks would think are unreasonable. But I am not doing it for a pass/fail type thing - I am doing it to get a spectrum idea. In your example, I would have asked for an investigation roll with whatever DC I was applying. If you barely beat the DC, I would say you find a box with a few rags in the bottom and a lid that was previously pried off. If you beat it by 5 or more, I would say you find a completely empty box, secure lid with some form of locking mechanism. If you barely failed, I would say you find a good box but it is full of crap, or the only empty boxes are on the other side of the room (basically, you are going to have to burn time/actions/etc. to get what you want). Failed it by more and maybe there isn't a lid for the box, or it is warped and there are gaps, etc. I feel that anyone who says "You are in a warehouse...you can't find a box because you rolled a 7..." is not doing this entirely right. But, yah - I ask for a lot of rolls to...I guess "variableize" things? OP - were you being chased, or otherwise did it "matter" if you climbed the wall or not? Then, I would have you roll. Doesn't matter how tall you are, how athletic, super-duper-cool you are, etc. - sh!t happens. Drives me nuts when people think that a character should automatically be able to do something because of stats or what not. On any given week of sports you can watch the elite of the elite make catastrophic mistakes, or the fates just decide to take a dump on them. Were you not being chased or did it not 'matter'? Yah, that's a waste of time roll.

[@doms.6701]

@@jasonOfTheHills so you have your players roll, not to see if they complete something, but to have them determine what you should have already placed there or thought up on the fly? That's like having them roll in an empty room and having their roll determine how big a pile of treasure is in the middle of this room. Seems to punish them in a way I didn't think was possible. Or like their roll decide if there are 2 enemies or 12 Really quick, what about having my other party members follow me and roll when they never said they were doing so? No, it was a wall and I was stepping over it, nothing else. The rooms were connected but divided by this short wall. And the DMs guide even mentions that some things are things that the average person can do, adventurers are well above average. You're right, you can see shit just happen but how often and how likely is it to happen? Having the DC be even 5 easily makes it a 5%+ chance of failing. Do you think of all the players on the field, and all the plays they run, there is a 5% chance on each play that someone will make a "catastrophic mistake". If it's a "catastrophic mistake" like you say, then it should be a nat 1. That's literally what the nat 1 is for. How short would that wall have to be for you to not have your players roll if they were chased? I mean, technically they could make a catastrophic mistake and trip over a twig or rock the size of a baseball. Where do you draw the line? It's like having my player roll to kill a sleeping enemy. Sure, stealth check but to have them roll to see if they hit and then roll for damage is ridiculous. Might as well play "do you complete the quest roll" and skip everything. My experiences of DMs having me roll for the dumbest things is why I'm now a DM. And there's lots of things I changed to make more sense. My games are DnD in name only really.

[@jasonOfTheHills]

@@doms.6701 To say I was taken aback by your reply is an understatement. It seems apparent to me that you are pretty passionate about this and I am not sure what I said that was so offensive but I apologize. I was simply trying to give some thoughts on the topic. Furthermore,. with the strawman, ad hoc, false equivalencies, etc, it is difficult to respond appropriately. I literally did not say nor take the positions you attribute to me. But I would like to make some clarifications if I could. I truly don't understand the characterization of "punish". In fact, I started doing this (range of outcome) many many years ago to combat being unfair. Maybe, personally, I think trying to round up kobolds in boxes is brilliant...but what do I know? I am just a dude who has never seen a kobold, let alone tried to wrangle one into a crate. Or on the other hand, maybe personally I believe the idea the player just threw out is flat-out bananas stupid. But again, what do I know? I ask the player to describe what they are attempting to do and then I have them roll what seems to be the most appropriate skill check. If they rock it, I tell them they succeed with some kind of bonus or flair. If they fail it, I tell them it will be a little trickier than they first thought it would be. How this equates to me shirking my duties to the game by not adequately planning or is equivalent to "roll to decide if there are 2 enemies..." I am just lost. But it definitely is not a punishment. In fact, the opposite - a player says they want to do something, they do it. We use the mechanics of the system at hand to determine what the outcome is. Regardless of my personal bias, ignorance or (yes, I admit it) occasional lack of planning to account for every possibility they could throw at me. "No, it was a wall and I was stepping over it, nothing else." Ok, then what is the issue? I completely agree with you. And I clearly stated that in my original comment - this is silly. If there is no 'point' then what is the point. I did not claim that there is a 5% chance of catastrophic mistake on every play run in a game. That is flat out misrepresentation. What I did say was - you seem to be taking the position that because the character is elite in some aspect, they are therefore immune from a chance of something going less-than-planned when they employ that characteristic. To go with the 5% point, I think that if you could find an athlete that only had a 5% failure rate, you would be a pretty luck person in deed. And these are tasks that they have drilled and practiced countless times. 30% is a phenomenal, near super human level of performance in certain disciplines. So, to clarify my position - yes, I think it is perfectly reasonable in a high stakes, high stress situation to ask a player to make a skill check against an attribute they have elite level status in. You fail it, "the BBEG screams out and you risk taking a look over you shoulder and trip over a little decorative bump in the fresco flooring. That's gonna cost you 2 movement unless someone can come up with some way to help"...you rock it, "You notice a small bump in the floor as you run over it and do a little shuck and jive move and the BBEG stubs his toe. He has DIS on his next round..." If this concept is so offensive to you that it has driven you to run your own games, then...honestly, that isn't a bad thing as more GMs in the world is probably a net gain. I am sure you will find players who enjoy your games as I have found plenty who do mine.

[@ice9ify]

Ha, I had players out of a roll happy dm, and they were shocked they could swim across a slow river without any check :).

[@Guy_W]

A campaign I was in did have a great unexpected PVP moment, but it was handled well. A new PC joined (player was already a friend), and there were some poor insights and misunderstandings right off the bat with another PC. They were about to fight and our DM stopped, asked how they both felt about PVP, reassured us that he wouldn't kill a PC in a PVP fight, then allowed it to continue. The two PCs sorted out their misunderstanding through beating the crud out of each other, and me and the other PCs let them sort it out in some great RP-fighting, then we stepped in when one fell and tended to both of them. It was a unique bonding experience between those two PCs that I felt was well handled.

[@TheLeebo1962]

i had an arena where players could settle differences (and make some gold from spectators betting).

[@BerzekGamer]

Yakuza 5e

[@nickwilliams8302]

"It doesn't _rule_ how I run my game, but it does _inform_ it." See, that's why I like you, Luke.

[@MrGBH]

I've only take player agency in very limited situations. A PC had been poisoned and had to be left behind whilst the others escaped. The villains captured him and used Ba Sing Se style brainwashing techniques on him. When he was rescued, the villain used a code-phrase to activate his brainwashing, and then I controlled the PC until it was fixed. I had subtly set up the brainwashing beforehand, the PC being left behind was a decision from the others, and I explained what was going to happen to the player privately before it happened. In other words, I put in a lot of effort to make sure that it was done in a way the players would appreciate, not just to advance a story.

[@sleepinggiant4062]

Player buy-in is important in these situations.

[@johnevans5782]

The one time I did something like this was in a campaign when a player was tricked by a Lamia and placed under a GEAS spell. The Player was under a Geas to spy on the party and to obey the Lamis'a commands to serve herwhile she kidnapped one of the characters. I discussed the situation privately with the player. Everything went well until the Kidnapping occurred. The Geased player was commanded to prevent the party from following the kidnappers. They fought and captured the Geased player. Then the players, who did not even attempt to try in game to figure out why the player was fighting them, got angry with me because I was forcing a player to do something in game and I would not even tell them what was going on. Without knowing what was affecting the PC they reasoned that if he was under the influence of a spell, then being knocked down to 0 HP and becoming unconscious should have ended the spell. When I said No... the rest of the players got really mad. The funny thing was that the player of the Geased PC was ok with it.

[@urdaanglospey6666]

@@johnevans5782 I don't know where that idea that 0HP knocks charms, etc. off of targets comes from. I run into it with more frequency than I would have imagined. Especially since I've never seen it so much as referenced ANYWHERE!

[@aaronhumphrey2009]

@@urdaanglospey6666 the mythical ' Death Cures All ' technique..used by Chaotic Stupid PCs from the Dawn of Time..

[@archersfriend5900]

I use bad guys to do this stuff all the time.

[@MrJjk1000]

Worst homebrew rule? The DM was new, very new so i have to forgive him for this, but if you hit an attack of opportunity the creatures movement is interrupeded and the creature could not move for the rest of the turn. This applied both for players and monsters. Basically everyone had the sentinel feat, always.

[@grosslittlegoblin1358]

Had a DM with same homebrew. But i was able to talk him down with an example. Like how stabbing a Dragon with a knife supposed to stop it on its route.

[@mastershadowthief]

You know, I was a new DM to 5e but had played prior editions of Dnd before switching to 5e. Due to the learning curve, when I didn’t know the 5e rule / mechanic for something (common with a heavy rule system), I’d make a judgment call on the fly based on how 2e Dnd was run (where I had more experience, could remember the ruling and be consistent, without having to reinvent the wheel every time), and one of the standard rules for 2e is equivalent to the “sentinel feat” in 5e. But, in 2e, you didn’t get a breakup of 3 choices: action / bonus action / movement. You just had 1, and you could be countered. (2e is a challenging version, especially with optional combat and tactics book). In 5e, the mechanics are just different. Basically, I didn’t know that they had changed things later when I tried to DM for 5e on the fly, and was just trying to keep the game going. It wasn’t until someone brought up that there was a feat to achieve that that I realized 5e is just different in that regard. And I didn’t want to somehow penalize players if they wanted to be special and have to take the feat. It’s usually better that the DM eventually learn the rules and have them basically memorized, my life was just too impacted by work / school / wife / and DM duties to memorize the game mechanics. I’m glad my players have more experience with 5e so we can just move on with our lives and game, and I don’t have to look in the book for rules on something I didn’t know existed! My players are chill about it, and help me run the game that way because they know I’m new and it’s a learning curve. Speculating and curious if the new DM has played any other versions of DnD, who knows?

[@nicholasstanley7933]

That used to be a thing in 3rd

[@pablohammerly448]

@MrBigJ: interrupted* (not "interrupeded") 🙄

[@BushBumperBaker]

Final Fantasy Tactics did that I think.

[@MasamiPhoenix]

So I once DMed for just two players, so I decided to give them a DMPC, but I decided to be clever about it. They were a warrior and a paldin, so.they could use either a cleric or a wizard. Since it was a relatively silly campaign, I gave them both. A guide who would flip between two personalities: a friendly but dimwitted wizard or a clever but surley cleric. Neither personality had a lot of agency, the wizard was just too airheaded to come up with any plans, and the cleric was too apathetic to take initiative. So the players were still forced to figure eveything oit themselves (I did occasionally use her to nudge them) More importantly though, she was a powerful tool and an obnoxious puzzle they had to figure out. The rules on what triggered her to switch personalities and power sets were very defined, but hidden from the players. They had to figure out what they were and then how to implement them when they needed her to shift. The end result was a fun puzzle that actually gave them more agency rather than taking it away.

[@Tengu125]

I like it

[@AnotherDuck]

DMPCs are fine for small groups. With one or two players, it works. More than that and it's questionable.

[@rascta]

@@AnotherDuck Old-school D&D had hirelings and henchmen as a core part of the game. I think that kind of got lost along the way, when it went from a game of adventurers that could eventually become heroes to more of a game of heroes that sometimes went on adventures. And I don't know if that is what ya'll are calling a DMPC, but it's valid if they're played right. Like, they're not the ones in the limelight, just the ones dealing with everything else, mostly.

[@v1de0gamr23]

Inventive 👍

[@waffleswafflson3076]

Im guilty on anti-favoritism. I had a player who lawyered for for advntage on almost every roll he made. Have to slap him down occasionally to make him stop

[@MonkeyJedi99]

That sounds more like a problem player issue than anti-favoritism.

[@Jermbot15]

@@MonkeyJedi99 Could be both, depends on how they mean "slap him down." If "slap him down" means making a ruling, having him complain about your ruling being 'personal' and then internalizing that to think that you've just slapped him down just by saying no, then that's completely 'problem player.' If "slap him down" means you tell him no, he whines, then 30 minutes later a passing wyvern poops on him from above, that's a problem player and anti-favoritism.

[@benjamindavis2475]

Your players shouldn't be arguing with you in game. If my players have an issue I tell them to just roll with it until the next bathroom break. It's not fair to the other players to have him waste the entire party's time

[@waffleswafflson3076]

@@Jermbot15 When I saw slap him down I mean give him warnings then have a squad of ethereal ghost monks walk out of the wall and beat him into 0 HP. He IS a problem player but its one of those situations where the positives he brings to the table outweighs the negatives he brings to the table.

[@Moj1989]

About the DMPC, I once had that happen entirely by accident for me. I was the DM, and I made a humble, bright-eyed NPC choirboy with a level in Cleric to act as someone to sweep the town chapel's floors while he studied his religion. For some plot-related reason or another, the head priest (who was actually the villain of the week posing as the priest via illusion magic) locked the main party in a crypt full of undead. Sadly, Douglas the choirboy was stuck down there with them - bad guy didn't want witnesses to his scheme after all. The main party wound up saving Douglas the Hostage via defending him against the zombie horde. When they escaped, Douglas stuck with them simply because he felt indebted to these kind strangers. When they confronted the villain a second time, Douglas, despite being level 1 while everyone else was 2, stuck around to help, even intercepting a melee attack against the group's caster by throwing himself in front of it, much to the players' surprise. He was due to die then, but the damage wasn't enough to kill him outright, and they spent one of the last few potions they had bringing Douglas back to his feet. He finished the fight alive, and helped save the town along with the heroes. At the end of the session, the players in their downtime made it clear that they were going to ask Douglas to join the main party... partially for healing reasons, as he was the only Cleric, and partially because they grew attached to this dumb but well-meaning choirboy. And so began the friendship between the players and Douglas Averness, Wielder of the Purifier Mace, Beacon of Greenside and Generally Nice Boy. Who just wanted to sweep the chapel floors.

[@alucardthespy5539]

10:08 My DM had a similar situation in which he introduced "The Tavern Brawl". During the Brawl everyone roles initiative as normal and, unless stated otherwise, hits with the intent to knock out, not kill. If you fall to 0hp, you are stable. It lead to fun moments where we got to let out our frustrations with the other characters, team up, and even fight to see who's plan we went with. I didn't win... but I gave it my all. In the first brawl my character (rogue) got knocked out by his aunt (barbarian) who got defeated by his adoptive daughter (rogue). Fun times. All this to say, I think it can be done well, but be clear with your players there is a line to not cross.

[@kodiakthebear4422]

Dear KZbin, Luke does not suck. The worst "homebrew" rule I had was when a DM ran a story with our characters from 5e in an Advanced D&D ruleset. Don't ask me how it works, because it didn't. What it amounted to is all of our characters losing class and race features and other things, like my cleric, having to assign one spell per spell slot (while only using 5e spells). I went down to 5 spell slots for some reason (level 11 cleric). It was miserable.

[@piketheknight2581]

Dear youtube, Luke does not suck In my case the worst homebrew were one time my dm decided that if a hit took half or more of your hp you would fall unconscious. We were a level one party. The tankiest playar had 12hp. If it continued that way you could guess what would happen

[@MonkeyJedi99]

@@piketheknight2581 Dear KZbin, Luke does not suck. In the worst homebrewing I played in, the DM was writing their own game system, and we were the unwitting alpha testers. Every other session would start with, "Here are the rule changes that effect your characters. And I changed YOUR class entirely." Which is how my illusionist became a dual wielding DPS character... - Edit: BACON!

[@Hepabytes]

@@piketheknight2581 pretty sure that one is in the DMG, but you get a save?

[@piketheknight2581]

@@Hepabytes when he implemented that he didnt allow saving throw (he allowed it later)

[@dragoknight589]

I doubt bacon could fix that.

[@Wordweaver166]

To number 7: "Winning" for the GM is telling the story from beginning to end (and the players will shape the ending, too - sometimes even writing a completely unexpected ending). If the GM "wins" through TPK before that, the story has not been told and not all the GM's prep work has actually paid off.

[@kishin901]

Another win condition I'd say is the players engaging and having fun.

[@davidmorgan6896]

What story? I have lots of situations. X wants to kill Y; the emergence of sorcery; the birth of a man-made god; the widow's quest for justice and revenge. Lots of conflicts at every level from the divine to the most mundane. Which of these, if any, get woven into the 'story' is largely down to the players.

[@josefwiggins]

I wanted to drop a HUGE thank you to Luke and this community. I binged this library of videos and read comments before building and running my very first game as a DM last weekend. I had almost crippling anxiety it would flop horribly. Instead, a planned 3 hour session turned into a 12 hour session. At the end, they all wanted to know when we play again. They did not follow the expected path, just like I was warned. They tried to do things I never considered, just like I was warned. They missed huge sections that I had spent hours preparing, just like I was warned. But they also noticed the subtle hooks I put in related to their backgrounds (we rolled their characters a week early so I could mix them into the setting) and they ate it up. And the setting preparation made it surprisingly easy to adapt when they went directions I hadn't planned out. It became obvious very early in the adventure I would not be coddling them. The first encounter, the sorcerer stepped on a stick, gave away his position, and almost died to a hail of goblin arrows. And that set a wonderful tone. When they leveled to 2 about 8 hours in, it felt like the party had really earned it. We had one scene where good RP by my players almost degenerated to PvP, but my players resolved it on their own before I had to flip to my notes on "How Luke stops PvP". And when they faced the BBEG, a hobgoblin Iron Shadow with a Goblin Boss flunky and 5 goblin grunts, the tension was real. Thankfully, they all survived, but they failed to capture the Iron Shadow, killing her instead. And the party knows that is a problem. Working on Adventure Setting 2 now. So thanks again to Luke and all that comment here. What could have been a horrible disaster, ended up being really fun.

[@theDMLair]

That's awesome. I'm so very happy to hear that we were all able to help you!!! That sounds like a resounding SUCCESSFUL first game session! Well done. :D

[@AnotherDuck]

GG. Hope it worked out for the past year.

[@mrosskne]

Don't forget to thank yourself too. You put in the work.

[@dabo77777]

Even as DM a 12 hour session would be sick, but we all had places to be the next day😢

[@CidGuerreiro1234]

I'd like to add another big one: thinking that something that is obvious to you as the DM is also obvious to the players. I don't even remember the context, but years ago I ran a game where there was a next step that seemed pretty obvious to me, yet the players simply couldn't figure out what to do next. I also remember unwittingly saying something that gave them an entirely false clue and led them into an even further direction from the expected path. I ended up slapping some supernatural intervention to help them as I was desperately trying to avoid showing up from behind the DM curtain and telling them they were going into the wrong direction. This is very similar to "removing player agency", when there is only one thing players can do that will push the story further, and anything else will lead to a dead end. You think it's obvious but it usually isn't. Our current DM has admitted to this mistake as well, thinking the next step to take was obvious, while from our POV there were a million story hooks that never led anywhere.

[@urdaanglospey6666]

I've run into this as well ;) Now, I don't try to solve the problems I throw at my players. Now, I evaluate their ideas for odds of working, choose a skill, and set a DC based on difficulty of the task. Impossible plan? Will they learn something from the failed attempt? Then, I'll have them try, roll and describe what happens. If it's impossible and they won't learn anything, I'll try to quickly explain why the plan won't work (preferably after a relevant [probably knowledge] check).

[@andrewtomlinson5237]

This is a common mistake in any sort of creative writing. And with the modern notion of a DM most definitely never, ever, being a "Story TELLER" but some sort of facilitator for the players, this gets horribly overlooked. As the writer you have all the information in your head, and so a straight line from A to B to C is automatic. The audience, readers, or players don't. No matter how much information you give them they will never have as much as you. So it is very important to give them enough information to make those connections. Good DMs are capable of doing this without giving them too much information and making it too easy, (at which point the accusations of "Railroading" and "Removing player agency" start being thrown about.) Being aware of THIS is one of the keys to running games that follow intelligent design and structure. If you only serve to chase the players' whims this is less likely to happen, but if you want to run something linear AND smart it's one of the most important elements of being a DM.

[@CidGuerreiro1234]

@@andrewtomlinson5237 Yup. I agree with everything you said. I've learned a lot since then. Today when I present a problem I always have at least one solution that should be within their capabilities, but it can never be the one and only solution. If their solution makes sense, it'll probably work, even if I have to quickly adapt the situation to give their solution a little push. That's not saying players should never fail, but succeeding will almost always be the most fun outcome for everyone (unless failure also pushes the events forward in a fun and unexpected way). The only thing that cannot happen is players losing interest and the drive to try new things because nothing they do ever works, or the DM having to solve things for them because he's narrated himself into a corner.

[@andrewtomlinson5237]

@@CidGuerreiro1234 Yeah. You can't be too precious about YOUR solution. No matter how clever it is... The players will often see a gap in your logic and solve your riddle in 10 seconds... Reward them. Don't curse them for being smarter than you. There are lots of lists and memes, from lofty experts about what constitutes a Good or Bad DM, (and according to most of them, I've been a terrible DM for over 40 years...) but the one thing that will really kill your game... and I'm talking about players never wanting you to DM for them again, is if the DM punishes good ideas. It's the behaviour that will cause a DM to lose players faster than pretty much anything else. I fudge like a... well... you know... and very few players' characters in my games die as a simple result of unfortunate dice rolls. They die when they do something dumb, or don't think through a situation, or just ignore the signs and evidence. Even poor resource management will see them die of thirst or starvation... but if they come up with something that SHOULD work, then I will always try and nudge things in their favour.

[@robbiejames1540]

Yeah, I remember this being an issue in the first game I played, where, although we all enjoyed the world and our characters, we ended up running into a "what do we do?" problem. I'm currently just starting my first game DMing, and the idea is that the players are searching the world for a powerful artefact. To avoid them not going to the right place to find information, my plan is pretty much to have many and multiple sources of information everywhere, so that no matter where they go, it's the "right" place, and they can progress through the plot. Does this seem a reasonable idea?

[@pika1222]

So, I’m currently in a campaign with a couple of friends, and since we were such a small group, our DM added in a DMPC, who was actually meant to be a story important character (we had all agreed to this decision). However, eventually our DM realized that playing as both a PC and a DM was extremely difficult, so they decided that Fenwyn, the Halfling Barbarian, would no longer be an important character. So, they had Fen disappear for a session, and then they got rid of him in the most cleverly cruel way possible. So during an adventure, our group was walking to a nearby town through the woods, after having to leave the previous town cause our Bard became a wanted criminal. On the way, we realized we were being stalked by someone, and eventually, they attacked. We THEN realized that it was Fenwyn, who heard that we were all criminals (cause we helped our Bard escape jail), and had come to kill us. We were eventually forced to kill our former friend, and let’s just say that my character is probably traumatized

[@beanburrito2871]

One of my dms had a homebrew rule where if you tried to heal someone with a spell and rolled minimum healing, they instead took damage. You want to cast cure wounds? Alright, roll for healing. You rolled a 1? The barbarian loses 4 hp. Made my cleric useless

[@darkmatter9643]

That’s a horrible rule, how did anyone think it was a good idea.

[@BroKenYaKnow]

Healing is already really bad in dnd, *why* would it ever need to be nerfed

[@Darien_England]

Played in a game where the dm randomly decides to cause characters to have "insanities." One insanity he tried to give me was hating javelins, something I loved using on my barbarian/fighter

[@wypmangames]

quote from the barbarian: i hate this javelin so much i throw it as far as i can *YEET* dm: roll? barbarian: nat20? dm: *rolls* by pure luck, your full speed javelin manages to hit the boss, right in the heart taking it down in a single shot... good job you can so badly use this insanity for the sake of roleplay to "outmeme" that dm

[@Pherim_]

Guess someone could not deal with a thing, and tried to get rid of it instead of try to be better or talk?

[@mrosskne]

but why?

[@DrexisEbon]

I can completely attest that a good "sandbox" requires WAAAAY more prep. I'm a worldbuilder type DM so I definitely prefer to run by the seat of my pants once the characters are in the world, but I built a world with tons of characters and places well in advance so now it's time for me to play around in that world some more, just as much as it is for my players.

[@jmmproductions6741]

I'm putting together a small sandbox rn for a custom world that will be used for a Campaign in a few months, and holy crap. So I'm doing a mix of modern fantasy (actually based on Type-Moon/Fate if anyone knows what that is), so the players will be left free to roam around in essentially a small rural town and the surrounding wilderness. After my previous experience running a couple campaigns, I've decided to prepare ALL the NPCs and ALL the maps ahead of time. This way when the players hop in, they can literally do what they want. Needless to say, fairly tiny sandbox, but the prep work I've put into this already is half the amount I've put into a linear campaign that's been running for 6 months now.

[@davidmorgan6896]

@@jmmproductions6741 I've noticed that some GMs treat writing campaign notes like writing content for publication. You don't need that. You could just have brief notes. Nobody else is going to read them. I like to find pictures that evoke a scene. I will think about NPC personalities, but won't work on stat-block and skill sets if I don't need them. If you are prepping a whole village, remember that most inhabitants are going to have similar life experiences and skill sets. Perhaps they are farm labourers or miners. Maybe they are housewives and beer wives. There may be one or two craftspeople, but in a small village, not many; there will be markets and faires and peddlers for buying goods. Most village houses will be the same. They will look the same and they will have similar contents, because people did not have access to wealth or such a vast array of material goods. My current WiP campaign spans two continents. I've prepped stuff that, depending on where the group chooses to start, the PCs will never see. But I only have two or three villages worked out for the civilized lands, because that's all I need. I can just use one of those if the PCs come a calling. On the map, I just mark the position and size of a village.

[@MeepChangeling]

It takes way less prep if you learn to code and then make some text generators that create content in your own words to your own needs. Why spend an hour making one NPC when you can spend 3 hours to make 94 million instantly thereafter?

[@davidmorgan6896]

@@MeepChangeling but then you don't know your characters. You might as well get them out of a Rogues Gallery book. You might have a description and some skills, but you won't have put yourself in their place and thought their thoughts. I did something similar for villages - randomly generating many aspects, but it didn't really help. It didn't tell me about the local politics or rivalries. Didn't generate stories.

[@davidmorgan6896]

@@jmmproductions6741 you don't necessarily need to fully create every character, just the ones that intersect with the story. There are many boats operating out of Seport. I could detail hundreds of crews and thousands of sailors, but I only need the one crew, the one the PCs hire. The rest are out of focus. Maybe have two, just in case.

[@hayleylingenfelter172]

I have seen PvP done well once. In the campaign I currently play in, we had a player who died to save the party, and his death was turned into an opportunity for him to take on the entire party, as he turned into an abomination. This was discussed ahead of time with the player by our DM, and was a really fun send-off.

[@jesusguadalupe8396]

Yeah I didn't really agree with him on that. On my first campaign my character and another character got into a bar fight. My character got humiliated but it was so funny and fun

[@teisonedwards7111]

To avoid the over powered magic items thing while still giving out sweet loot, is to give them weird consumables. Potions that can see through walls, or vampire candles that absorb light, or small smoke bomb marbles fired from a slingshot. Stuff that could be fun to find and use, but have an end in sight in case they're broken.

[@davidanddragons5339]

Prep is super important, I think there's certain things that don't really need to be prepped though such as dialogue. I've seen some DMS write scripts for the bbegs and read them at the table. It's much more helpful to figure out who the villain is, what they want, and how they're willing to get it, and maybe practice a special voice. Then you will be able to properly roleplay the npc and won't be caught off guard(probably, players do crazy things) and it will feel more natural

[@CaseyWilkesmusic]

I agree with you. As someone who makes dialogue part of their prep, I find having a few pre written quips or responses to questions that are likely to come up really helps keep scenes moving rather than have me stumble over my words or not convey the info I need to get across. Plus who doesn’t like hearing a great villain quip mid battle!! If it doesn’t get used, then jt get recycled.

[@davidanddragons5339]

@@CaseyWilkesmusic oh definitely, I like creating catchphrases and last words. Plus random things grunts can say because who doesn't like a funny sidekick

[@CaseyWilkesmusic]

@@davidanddragons5339 Halo infinite has the best lines for grunts!

[@willmena96]

I've been following this channel for a few years already and I'm sure I have avoided ruining my games thanks to Luke's advices. Most of what you say has happened in a lot of my games (as a player) and it always ended up poorly. I decided to follow your advice when I started DMing and I'm 100% sure my both groups are still alive because I didn't make those big mistakes. It takes a lot of work to keep the groups together yet it's so easy to ruin everything. Thanks Luke :D

[@IncrediPaulAZ]

I'm a new DM running a campaign for my nephew and a couple others, and I think the only 2 problems I've had so far is giving too much gold and not prepping enough. Glad I don't have some of those other problems, at least. Thanks for the breakdown!

[@danielfaubert1903]

I make sure whenever I hear of a homebrew rule I might like to use in my game that I explain to my players how it might work, and then poll them to see how they might feel about it. So far it's worked with great success.

[@bible.animations]

Thank you for getting straight into the video! I've been trying to stay away from your videos because of the long intros and sponsors, but your topics are really great, so I appreciate that you got straight into the action!

[@Zimzuni2980]

I hate the houserule that so many don't know is one in 5e: that a nat 20 on anything other than an attack is not auto-success. A DM once screwed me by making his barbarian auto-succeed on an opposed insight to my Rogue/Warlock's expert persuasion (i had rolled a 19 making my total 29)

[@bozieu]

You see, my players don't mind it because they know it's for both side. The barbarian was really happy to roll a Nat 20 when saving against a DC24 wisdom or become paralyzed for the whole fight. Don't you think it's good for the game to have a 5% chance to succeed something thought impossible? Also, I'm not saying all 20s should be auto successes, but I tend to not make my player roll if I know they have no chance of success, even with a natural 20. It's demorilizing to know you "wasted" a 20 on something that had no impact. If the roles were reversed and the ennemy had a +10 on a check and your only way to get out of that tight situation was a 20 and you rolled it! Wouldn't it be awesome?

[@Zimzuni2980]

@@bozieu yes. I agree with most of what u said. There are ways of bumping a skill check tho, guidance, bardic inspiration & other means which should be considered before we start bending the rules. If they NEED a nat 20 to meet a DC 20 then there should be consequences for rolling anything less. If ut is an important roll, u should slow down & maybe ask anyone who wasn't paying attention if they have anything to assist like a spell or bardic insp. I also like the idea of success at a cost if they roll high but are off by 1-2 pts. In my example, my roll was a 29 which is close to nearly impossible DC, & the DM should've seen how far apart his total check was from that & an NPC barbarian shouldn't have anywhere close to a +9 Insight modifier to break even, even with the nat 20. It should start with the question to the player, if u roll a nat 20 what is the highest DC u can achieve. If the skill check is still fairly too high don't even bother rolling, failure is certain if they want to do acrobatic maneuvers on a chunk of rock floating in the pool of acid-lava, or whatever.

[@taserrr]

I see nothing wrong with that. If he asked you to roll that means there's a chance for you to fail. perhaps the things you were persuading that barbarian for was not an easy thing to make him do. So obviously the barbarian would have a chance not to be convinced by your persuasion attempt. If this wasn't the case than I wouldn't have asked for a roll if I were that DM.

[@Dragowolf_Rising]

@@bozieu If it is supposed to be imposssible, no roll should even take place. Near impossible? Roll away! Nat 20s should not be the equivalent of divine intervention imo.

[@sherbert1321]

I enjoy the nat 20 rule, it is fun and feels great to get one

[@Deefry]

I was guilty of number 1 the other week - running Princes of the Apocalypse they were betrayed at the top of Feathergale Spire and I didn't want to get bogged down letting them try to fight off the Knights before they were thrown off the edge. They all enjoyed RPing with the Aarakocras that saved them by casting Feather Fall, though. I'm playing it much more fast and loose now they're level 4.

[@johnevans5782]

The occasional and extremely rare deus ex machina to move the story along can be OK. Like the Eagles in the Hobbit movie where the party was trapped in burning trees. Gandalf and the Eagles saved them. But if it had been a game, the players would have been frustrated by the 3rd time Gandalf had to save everyone.

[@urdaanglospey6666]

It's only a problem if it becomes a habit ;)

[@salimufari]

5:10 While I agree with this partly there are great times where a very strong agent NPC needs the party to finish the task. So while the party as a whole isn't as strong as said npc they are vital to the success of the overall mission. Plus it shows new players what they can aspire to with their own characters. I watched a streamed D&D game where a +/- level 10 paladin NPC had a phase shift when he got below 1/2 hp. While the party was all level 2. The enemy swarm tactics combined with a protect the MacGuffin forced a choice. Leave the badass NPC to his fate while protecting said MacGuffin or stand with him & fight it out to save the NPC yet risk failing the mission & a tpk. This really set the scene for the PCs to step up for success. When they witnessed the "empowered" npc at his strongest they were clearly stary eyed with the spectacle of it.

[@calcite_dragon]

as a dm that is just starting out, I found this very helpfull. Thank You!

[@NearlyH3adlessNick]

In the same boat here! This man is a God when it comes to reducing stress and prep time

[@elendiel]

3:20 - thank you for saying this!! Running a proper sandbox that has interesting moment and emotional impact takes FAR more prep than a linear adventure! I currently run a very long-term campaign (we're 56 sessions/2 years in), where parts are linear and parts are open world. Whenever I've been prepping the sandboxier parts, it took me way more time than prepping the linear ones!

[@davidmorgan6896]

You cannot just prep the 'sandboxier parts'. The whole world is a sandbox. The PCs may never go to the spice lands, but if they board a ship, and they are curious about the main cargo, I can tell them because I've mapped the trade routes and designed the main sea going vessels.

[@isaiahwelch8066]

#2 is the idea of, "I'd rather do one thing well, than 10 things piss-poor." Always good advice. And as for the "DM vs Player" mentality, I look at it like Matt Mercer: Set up your BBEG to have a shot to win -- but don't deny the PCs when they win, and deny the BBEG what they were working for. My go-to example is the end of the infamous "Cupcake Incident" with a certain blue Tiefling -- and, to quote Matt Mercer at the end of it, "It's one of the few times I've both been frustrated, and proud of, being outsmarted." As I watch C3, and go back and watch C1 and C2, I'm learning how Matt DMs, and what his style is. And all I can say is, DMs, take Matt's one way of DMing to heart, rolled up into one catchphrase: "You can certainly try." Because if it's reasonable, let the player have the win. If it's unreasonable, just assign a really high DC to the situation. But always facilitate what's both fun and cool. As for "Home-Brew Rule Nobody Liked," a long time ago, I was in a Star Wars Legacy game, based on D&D 3.5. The "Mary Sue" power gamer convinced the DM (in secret, as I'll shortly explain) to basically let him earn Force Points back on critical hits -- while also having both Improved Critical and Superior Critical. Needless to say, the rest of us were kind of struggling to keep Force Points at any kind of positive balance, but yet the Mary Sue always seemed to have at least 4 or 5 every time we turned around. He also rolled an unusually high amount of critical hits. I put two-and-two together, right before I was asked to leave the game and not return. Coincidence? I think not. As for too much wealth and too many magic items: Find a way to nerf them in-game. For example, don't be afraid of jacking up the costs of potions and components -- because the town the PCs are in? Only has 1 potion-maker and one merchant with magic items. And both NPCs are good at what they do, so they jack up the cost of potions by 10% or more, because they monopolize the trade. The other thing? Find a way to work in Anti-Magic! In CR C2, the BBEG had access to an Anti-Magic Cone -- much to the players' dismay. And it was a helluva fight, dealing with an enemy that could negate some or all of a PC's magic power, like Caleb or Cadeucus. There are ways to balance out PC magic items and wealth, you just have to be creative! In other words, my piece of advice is: 1) Expect the unexpected. 2) Try and predict what your players will do with the items you give them -- and don't be afraid of giving magic items flaws like being sentient or being cursed. A little chaos is never a bad thing with a group of PCs that think they are "golden gods," so to speak.

[@stephanshaw6201]

I gave my group a couple of strong homebrew items, tonight I cave the ranger a belt that as a reaction rebukes a melee attacker with piercing damage equal to their nat modifier & he can cast bramble shot & wall if thorns with it... one of the other players said "what if he's giving us all these magic items so he can just use stronger monsters against us?" & now I feel outed 😄

[@stirrcrazy2704]

Almost every campaign I’ve played in has involved some amount of PvP. None of us were experienced role players, and while my DMs have all been good, they weren’t the ones who planned the PvP. Our characters tend to get into fights over disagreements, and there’s an understanding that PCs shouldn’t fight to gain an advantage from another player (stealing a magic item or whatever) but rather to settle an in-character personal dispute. In my longest ever running campaign, my Ranger almost killed our party’s Barbarian for killing a civilian that he mistakenly believed to be involved in a conspiracy. Those two characters never got along, and they were both high strength and low charisma, so they often resolved their problems physically. The key thing is, we never were actually trying to kill each other out of character. The dynamic worked well because the party has a great deal of respect between players, we’ve almost killed each other many times, but we’ve never actually done it. While I absolutely agree that PvP is hard to get right, and encouraging it as a DM is usually a bad idea, that doesn’t mean you should write off the potential for RP that PvP provides. See how your party feels about it, and make sure it’s all in good fun. My biggest piece of advice is this: if you’re gonna choose to do PvP as a player, don’t roll initiative. You will most likely only be fighting one other player, and whoever gets attacked goes second in the turn order. Do your combat fast, and focus more on dialog than rolls. Use unarmed strikes, grapples, and shoves since you aren’t actually trying to kill anyone. And most importantly, FINISH YOUR FIGHT QUICKLY. The other players should be entertained by this, not mad about you taking too long. That barbarian and I could get 5 rounds done in 2 minutes by just narrating our actions and limiting ourselves to basic attacks and contests, all with time for banter with other party members trying to pull us apart. Fighting and RP aren’t separate, I’m not a great actor and neither are any of my friends, but by expanding the ways that our characters interact into fighting with each other, we make it easier to express how much our characters actually do care about the group.

[@heatherburke338]

Thanks again Luke for the vid! Haven't tried many homebrew rules but we will be trying soon in the campaign, The Curse of Stradh, your insanity system! Your vids are very helpful for the new starting DMs (myself included) on getting started and how to make the games enjoyable for both sides of the screen! Ps. KZbin, Luke doesn't suck.

[@theDMLair]

You are very welcome! And thank you, Heather!

[@leorblumenthal5239]

I once played in a Star Wars Saga Edition game where the GM wrote seven pages of house rules. Mind you this was weeks after he got the Core Rulebook, before we had even played the regular version of the rules. Some of the houserules were logical and might have made the campaign better, had it not been for the rest of the houserules.

[@RottenRogerDM]

I played once with a DM who had a SIX (6) inch binder of house rules. It was 1E and he was smarter than Gary. At the time you could only get a binder that thick from the Army Tech Manuals.

[@AkiraDraws124]

For my first time DMing, the party wanted a character to guide them during session. I made a Dm PC named Karlamora. She’s a Paladin in the started city. She’s a master in combat however she suffers from fainting spells. She is guilding the party, keeping track of the maps they were given by the Sovereign, and also giving information if a player asks. But because of the fainting spells and the rest of the party is of Fey Ancestry, Karlamora isn’t immune to magic sleep on top of her fainting spells.

[@pablohammerly448]

@ArtsyAria: starting* city (not "started city"); guiding* (not "guilding") 🙄

[@AkiraDraws124]

@@pablohammerly448 Lol sorry. Spelling isn’t my strongest suit 😆

[@Try_Hard_Dad]

The worst thing a DM can do is: Not be honest about the kind of game they intend to run. There IS a table for everyone- give your players the opportunity to see if they want to be at your's. BEFORE they are stressed and/or pissed off and ruin friendships.

[@michaelthomas1916]

Oh man, Burn Out is real. I finished running my first adventure as a DM this past fall after a year of play. I was stressed out by the end, and couldn't wait to wrap it up. Sadly, what I had prepared for a final session ending got pushed out another week because of players in a city. That stressed me out a lot by the end of the session, and I let it show a little. :-( I apologized after, and we wrapped up the next week well enough. I'm enjoying being a player for now but look forward to continuing my game's adventure as DM at some point.

[@connortonight]

in regards to issue #19 you can always do what gygax did: have a demon or another high-power enemy arrive and destroy your players' magic items. it's great motivation for having your players peruse a new villain

[@mrosskne]

pursue.

[@krinias1699]

Relatively new DM here. I generally agree with point 8, but would make an exception for certain characters, namely NPCs that are secretly villains. The BBEG of my campaign has met up with my party multiple times and has consistently fed them lies about the forgotten lore of the world, getting them to basically aid him in his mission to open the gates to a dimension where the Chromatic Dragons had been sealed away without them knowing, but could only do so because he has gotten their trust by saving them from an encounter that they would have had a very hard time winning. And because he is experienced enough and wields a greatsword gifted to him by Tiamat, well, he's bound to be stronger than most of them. I try to balance it out by having him play the diversion to more dangerous things while the party engages in encounters and he's going to leave them soon, but I feel like it is worth it for the plot twist (which is so far the only one they have not seen coming).

[@weebandgaminginc.7593]

I initially watched this for entertainment, but this really helped. My campaigns are extremely dull, and only involve quests where you carry something somewhere with the occasional encounters. Next time, I’ll definitely need to write out a little lore, instead of a spontaneous story.

[@golett0331]

I had a DM that let the players stack armour. I removed that rule as soon as I realised what I had done. Never dabble in homebrew without knowing the game first.

[@piranhaplantX]

Yeah, homebrew should be done sparingly, and the more of the game it affects. The more it should be tested in oneshots before dumping it into your main campaign.

[@ancientdarkmagic1409]

I recognized that back then I was a DM that was a Yes Man. That said yes to everything and that has let me to leave the problematic player in the table. Now I'm someone that is working on that.

[@smeefman6923]

man I learned a lot about DMing in this video that when all else fails use bacon

[@Spiceodog]

When it comes to really fucked up stuff like sexual abuse, it’s better to avoid gray spaces then trying to navigate them

[@brandonstone2754]

Suped up npc's can work under very specific conditions. Like where they're secretly a villain, using the players, and the players eventually get to kill the dude that was annoying them.

[@ddrew1973]

Sometimes you have to deny player agency. I ran a campaign once that was set in historical Scandinavia. I didn't allow a player to play a Japanese Ninja.

[@CidGuerreiro1234]

I don't think that counts as removing player agency, you're running a specific theme, everyone has to get on board for it to work.

[@sleepinggiant4062]

The player still had other choices, so that's not really taking away player agency. I'd call that a house rule.

[@buttmunchmcnugget328]

I agree with the previous comments. If you had allowed it just imagine the multitude of things they would want to do that so didnt fit the theme, it could have been a constant issue had you agreed.

[@al424242]

There's a limit to agency, you can't defy gravity or posses unknown knowledge. The Ninja is up there with okay, just how and why did this Ninja travel half the world. Avoiding peril, travelling far beyond the furthest reaches of their maps, to alien lands with alien language, you don't speak their language and you're 1000 miles from friends and allies.

[@pablohammerly448]

​@@al424242 Try several thousand miles -- IIRC, going across mainland USA is about 2500 miles, so Japan to Scandinavia is even further, maybe twice as far. 🙄

[@thickums5344]

If you're running a new homebrew rule just have a chat with your players prior to running it. Get their views and let them know that everything is subject to change. Never just randomly drop it on them when the situation comes up.

[@kevinbaker628]

The DM found a rule somewhere online, where all undead would ONLY attack holy characters and completely ignore all others (no matter what they did) then once the holy chracter was dead then only attack magic characters. At one point we were in a room with 5 ghouls (we were level 3) and my character being a paladin was the only character they would attack, even when was I was doing death saves, and I ended up dead for good. Same thing happened to the druid next. The DM had to spawn in a scrolls of revivify as the party was halved suddenly. They did the same thing in the next room and we had to have a talk.

[@immortalstar0138]

My dm made it a rule to add even more requirements for 9th level spells, which I argued “You can only cast them once, why make it harder if I have the spell slot?” So now when we reach said levels we have to waste more resources and time casting the spells.

[@thevandalizedvillager7334]

I just wanna say, for favoritism: My girlfriend is a player in a game I'm running, and the party she's in decided to go hunt a wild Allosaurus at level 2. She died in 1 hit, because she (a ranger) insisted on tanking for the party's warlock and monk... luckily the party pooled their money together and bought a healing potion before hunting, so the monk was able to revive her as she was making death saves. It's now been about half a year, and the campaign is going well, with no favoritism here. OH, and btw: Yes, they did kill the Allosaurus. :) EDIT: fixed a typo

[@danielcrafter9349]

How is that anything to do with favouritism?

[@thevandalizedvillager7334]

@@danielcrafter9349 It's a positive story with a happy ending, that shows fun can be had without favoritism. Just trying to spread positivity and share a fun story, that's all! :)

[@codyvandal2860]

@@danielcrafter9349 it's sort of implict I suppose that someone might show favoritism to their SO

[@jonathanschmitt5762]

4:55 That second part is really important. I always get annoyed when people say "DMPC bad" while my friend runs one so I actually have a party, and he's pretty good at running it. Edit: Allowing pvp is not an issue, not stopping it when players aren't having fun is.

[@whothefcares2687]

I deal with a DM who has an annoying habit of questioning everything I do while letting my other party members basically interpret how their class features and spells work any way they want to. Apparently now sneak attack is applied to spells, druids can wildshape into anything with a CR equal to their level, shield spells add 5 to a saving throw, hell shield spells can be used to increase another players saving throw... Mean while I have to stop and bust out the PHB/ cite sage advice rulings damn near every other turn. It's exhausting.

[@halodude7167]

I once had a dmpc, a little Kobold fighter who was just there to be a guide and a meatshield for the party, his purpose was to help them get from place to place on the little island they landed on, and to make sure they made it past lv.1 and got their fun builds going. They seemed to quite enjoy him, even hyped him up when he'd get in trouble, a favorite quote from one of my players was "Grundle's not stuck in there with you, you're stuck in there with Grundle." And he did his job very well, never stepped on toes in RP or combat, and eventually parted ways with the party, having a little more confidence to be a great little protector for his tribe.

[@Psymonkee]

Ooo worst homebrew rule I saw: Rogues only get to double the damage die of their weapon on a critical hit. Sneak attack dice stay standard. Funnily no one played rogue for that campaign.

[@KevinVideo]

That's honestly less of a homebrew, and more of a "we're going back to how it was in older editions." However, rogues had Extra Attack back then.

[@MonkeyJedi99]

Hmm... Now I need to re-read some rules. That 'homebrew' is how we've been playing it for over a year since we started 5E. If it is different, I need to share that with the DM and other players.

[@Psymonkee]

@@KevinVideo Huh. TIL! Only really played 5E and a tiny bit of PF1e. I'll see if I can find the game primer again and compare it to old rules!

[@Psymonkee]

@@KevinVideo Yep seems to be a 3.5 rule at least. Didn't see anything about Extra Attack though.

[@barinebold]

@@MonkeyJedi99 Yes. The rules as written are basically summarized as: if you roll dice on an attack that crits then you roll twice as many of them. Doesn't matter where the dice come from: sneak attack, smite, battle maneuvers, spell effects already on the target, spell effects on you, dice rolled based on a magical weapon's effect, etc. You do not double any flat bonuses like your str/dex bonus and any +1, +2, +3 weapons.

[@saibogu002love]

Getting Overwhelmed also in my experience has this weird side effect of being deflated to not see the players being as energic or deeply in the game as expected. Took me a while of self reflection to admit that because i decide to give it so much time and effort, i can't expect the same involvement from my players... Specially not without even telling them x) Also, Bacon is the DM best friend after their dice set !

[@darrenosborne8252]

I had a DM introduce wild/anti-magic area's that prevented magical items from working correctly. Made things interesting and I wasn't so quick to use my teleportation boots.

[@KujoJay]

12:50 I came up with a way to fix giving a player an overpowered weapon or item. I'll throw in an "overheard rumor" of a place that peaks the parties interest in the middle of a campaign and the hint that a "powerful relic" is required to enter, but after a bit i'll have an NPC point out that the over powered item i gave the character is actually that item they need to enter. So they have no choice but to give up the item like a magical key or sacrifice to go where they need to. But of course i throw a nice reward that offers a nice distraction from the fact that they had to give up the "+6 holy giant smiter" or whatever. Tends to work out pretty well. Hope i helped.

[@Justin-fk6br]

I can't even run 2 games, forget 10. I couldnt imagine the amount of work it would take to make them happen every week.

[@rowdyparks6770]

Number 1 homebrew rule I refuse to EVER use, fumble charts. Rolling a 1 shouldn't cause devastating consequences 😢

[@Gruoldfar]

Good advice for GM of levels clearly explained in examples.

[@geckotree7705]

You don't suck! You've helped me along my DM path

[@wypmangames]

hey luke, im looking to get into D&D but im not sure where to even get started, im asking some friends but im not really social (have social anxiety and also being introverted, also autistic which doesnt really help those points) and the lack of my social skills is a major problem for me trying to start and look for campaigns to join, do you have any advice for me on starting D&D and maybe some advice on social skills too?

[@thehunter907]

Well, I know I'm not Luke, but I have been in your spot before. My advice is to bring it up in a random conversation, when you're warmed up on talking to people and you're both comfortable. If they say no then you slowly change the subject to something else. However, if it seems just like they aren't showing too much interest, carry on. Keep trying until they either say "sure" or "nah it's not for me".

[@wypmangames]

@@thehunter907 thanks for the advice :) definitely will try it

[@grandmothergoose]

I used to DM for a group full of ASD and similar things teenagers. It started when one of them - one of my son's friends - saw my old AD&D 2nd Ed books on my bookshelf and asked if I could run a game. I agreed, expecting it to be maybe a one on one game seeing as my kids weren't the slightest bit interested. This young guy got excited and went and asked literally every friend he had and got his friends to ask their friends. Our session zero I expected 2 maybe 3 players at most, ended up with 13 of them, only one of which had ever played any kind of RPG! Most of them had never heard of the game until then. All it takes is - and I know it isn't easy to start with but once you've done it a few times it gets easier - when it's just you and and a person you know, and everything is chill and friendly between you, just politely and calmly but bluntly and straight up ask them (and really ask anyone that you know, even your neighbours, parents, aunts, uncles, grandparents even! You'll be surprised who will be interested) "I'm wanting to play a game of D&D, would you be interested in playing?" They may say yes, they may say no, they may ask for more information, you might even find out they're already playing in a campaign you didn't know about and they might invite you!. You'll never know if you don't ask. All you need to get started is a copy of and some understanding of the basic rules, a set of dice, an idea for a storyline, and one other person. Anything more than that is all bonus.

[@theDMLair]

Try joining our Discord. We have a looking for groups channel where you could find a group. Most people in our community are friendly and helpful.

[@wypmangames]

@@theDMLair im not social enough (introverted and anxiety) to join larger discord servers right now

[@dahelmang]

Ah yes, the DM's girlfriend. The easiest example for explaining what a Mary Sue is.

[@BeautyBeatdown]

New D&D player here. This video showed up on my home page. Thanks for the video!

[@djgreyjoy1495]

On the spot. Good choice of anti-patterns! 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

[@theDMLair]

𝗟𝗔𝗜𝗥𝗦 & 𝗟𝗘𝗚𝗘𝗡𝗗𝗦 𝗞𝗜𝗖𝗞𝗦𝗧𝗔𝗥𝗧𝗘𝗥 ▶▶ www.kickstarter.com/projects/thedmlair/lairs-and-legends?ref=59pir1 𝐁𝐞𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐚 𝐃𝐌 𝐋𝐚𝐢𝐫 𝐏𝐚𝐭𝐫𝐨𝐧 - Get Lair Magazine (5e adventures, VTT maps, puzzles, traps, new monsters, and more), play D&D with me, and other perks ▶▶ www.patreon.com/thedmlair

[@HWORD-xg6hi]

Definitely looking forward to these two products!

[@Justin-fk6br]

Character vs Character is fine, if there is ever the slightest hint that it's actually Player vs Player, it's absolutely not allowed.

[@MrJerks93]

That's a very slippery slope and can't be decided at the moment due to the chance that it escalates. Everyone in the game should consent to the PvP, even if it doesn't involve their player. It's nit just a matter of maturity but what people want to experience at the table.

[@grandmothergoose]

That makes sense seeing as Player vs Player combat, especially if one of them ends up killing another, is illegal in most places. I admit the part about PVP made me giggle. Character =/= Player.

[@leorellik]

I honestly wrote a module for my group. Overwhelming was an under statement. I made a city of 315k people. Drew out EVERYTHING. From housing, industrial district, farming. 48 different stores that have some being all day and some only open 12 hours. A Bizarre that rotates shops (merchants that are in town at the time) a 5 layer dungeon in town that’s always resets. A world of wonder outside the city. It’s basically a place that you can do lvl 1-4 in the city before you ever leave… so yea overwhelming but I got it all wrote and finalized in 2 weeks

[@pablohammerly448]

@leorellik: bazaar* (i.e. a place with multiple merchants; bizarre = weird) 🙄

[@Cursedpug89]

I had created a NPC named Competence she was a tiefling Cleric. She basically became my DmPC, Not because I wanted her too simply because my players wouldn't leave her alone. She was intended to help them escape a boat after being taken prisoner with no idea why but they got attached to her after her only moment of cool where she took out the guards that had spotted them so they could hide. After the they escaped the boat she told them it was time for them to go her separate ways. My players asked her where she was going and when they found out she was headed towards a temple to comune with her god they decided to tag along so they could hang out with Competence more. Any time I tried to do anything to get Competence to leave the group they made a reason why she could stay. They were so convinced she was gonna leave them it basically became a hostage situation where someone from the Party had to be with Competence at all times or else there was a chance they'd never see her again.

[@dickermannfilme_cora1717]

A homebrew rule that even outshines bacon? Let me tell you... "If a weaponattack misses the player must make a dexterety savingthrow against his own AC, and if not succeeded, hits himself."

[@xanabbott8753]

I disagree with #15. My way of handling problem players and "That's what my character would do!" players is actually to allow PVP when the characters would logically be pressed to that point. I have no problem with it as a DM, and I request it in-game as a player. I don't want my DM to tell the rogue he can't steal, but my Lawful Neutral Wizard is not going to be trifled with just because some spells have ingredients like a 50 gp diamond. I play nice and supportive until another player betrays me, then I handle that situation harshly. As a DM, I like to remind those players about how our barbarian sliced a cultist in two with one shot or how our fighter went 1v1 with a dragon and neither will appreciate their theft, and that they get to act like their characters would too.

[@DM_Kat]

Love your channel! I'll be coming to Lansing area in the near future & would love to visit some lfgs. Which ones do you suggest?

[@notrebelbuffoon522]

My very first campaign is a full homebrew world. And I made the map and the nations as well as the general story of the world (~7 months of work) before I just started the campaign. I still work on it as we go along. Specific history of nations I still write and unique other things that I create and I am on my second 1-20 campaign in this setting.. the motto I go with is to do as much work as is needed, not as much as could be needed.

[@razorboy251]

The worst homebrew rule I saw in a campaign that almost single-handedly ruined it (there were some issues but this was the biggest one) was getting a level of exhaustion every time a PC dropped to 0 HP. It severely penalized our melee characters (they were more likely to be brought down to 0 and were more affected by exhaustion), it slowed down the game considerably (because it forced us to long rest after each deadly combat - and this DM ran a LOT of deadly combats), and everyone hated it. Eventually we persuaded the DM to allow this exhaustion to go away on short rests, and then eventually dropped it from the game entirely.

[@sauce7670]

I think DMPC's are a slippery slope they can be used efficiently I think. I had a paladin in a game I was running who seeked out the party for aid. He wanted to investigate rumors of a ghost pirate ship but didnt have a boat of his own and the players did so he joined for the investigation. But I made sure to use him as little as possible, he never joined in to offer a plan unless the players asked him for his input, and during exploration of places of interest I always had him in the back ground, turning over rocks or poking at dead bodies while the players did the real work hed only ever chime in when asked to. I also made double sure that he never got any glory. I rolled a nat 20 on an attack roll against the boss for him and he actually did enough to finish it off but I ignored that and let the next player in the que kill it off. Everyone liked his excentric personality and appreciated his aid in healing during fights one of my players is currently attempting to think of a way to keep in contact with him once they make land fall again and he leaves. I think if they serve a small roll and dont take over the spot light DMPC's can work great as a story tool and now my party has made "a friend" and look forward to seeing him again

[@gicady]

10:09 I allowed PVP just when the barbarian and the paladin wanted to 1v1 each other while drunk on their ship. It was hella fun. No consequences, no dead characters. I actually advice other DMs to do this to finally release the stress of who is ”the strongest” while also NOT affecting the story. As long as its sportsmanlike, its fun and the players thanked me.

[@insertname3977]

There's actually been a fair amount of pvp in one of the games I'm in, that has lead to a few deaths. We're all enjoying it.

[@trooks40]

This video is all gold! You summed up in a few minutes what took me 20+ years to accumulate 🙄

[@theDMLair]

Thank you! But I cheated a bit and asked others for stuff to add to the list. 😁

[@Rubymagicalgirl88]

World building is fun, I started up with adapting a module I had already ran. Zi have also given out to many magic items in my Saltmarsh. I am working to bring it to a close so I can start fro scratch.

[@carrias1]

I’m running an open world sandbox - but with a session 0 where the players agreed that they hate it when people ignore the plot hook :p so I get to prepare as if it were a structured campaign, just one session/module ahead, letting the players choices really affect the world but with a game or so of lag. Works very well for me so far… collaboration and session 0 having makes So much of a difference

[@devoteeofmediocrity821]

I once had a DM who, whenever I had something he deemed too powerful, would just wait for my character to go asleep and say “a thief came in the middle of the night and stole X from you.” “Umm I was wearing that. How did he manage that without waking me up?” “He’s that good.”

[@FapperDan]

Fairly comprehensive list. Could also add on scheduling issues. Notably, when the DM cancels an entire group of five players because one person can’t make it. How about run a side quest? It’s incredibly easy to have the missing PC just sit out the session for any simple reason. Our group has done it dozens of times. This issue doesn’t happen in our group but I hear from a lot of people that ask to join our group that it happens to them often. It’s not fair at all to the rest of the party who may have gotten babysitters driven several miles, prepared & brought food, turned down other plans, etc. Don’t push the entire session off for one missing person just so they don’t miss anything.

[@surferdude4487]

Yes, I do prepare specific missions for my group to complete. However, I also create a more complete world so that they don't run into "Under Construction" signs if they do not choose the mission. So, if they go off in another direction, which they often do, I keep the chronology straight, so that the consequences of the mission they did not take will come up. It's as close to real-world as I can get and the players love it.

[@davidmorgan6896]

Yes, this. It seems the best approach to me. 'Missions' will only be introductory though. After that there are situations and, maybe, jobs. As you say, if the PCs don't get involved,that doesn't mean that the situations are held in stasis.

[@pedroarmstrong8625]

PvP if used correctly can be a lot of Fun, on some games that i have played we sometimes have pc fighting for trainings together in a majority of times we don't play the fights, but sometimes we do, just need everyone to be on the same page that's all for fun. We even use this as roleplay opportunity for some PCs create or strengthen their bonds.

[@piranhaplantX]

Like a lot of things, it comes down to the specific players. It's similar to ganes that are homebrewed to be grittier and more survival oriented. A lot of players may not like this. But some players will love it.

[@bahamutkaiser]

I had a player complain about player agency because I gave him a near death experience as part of his downtime activity to craft magic weapons. He just wanted to forage for spell components in a storm and wasn't happy that a lightning bolt struck him unconscious. He wanted Elemental Daggers, IDK where he expected to get magical components...

[@kjellgunnartrimbo-forthun6052]

One rule a dm tried to use was a weird initiative change. Basically it was split into two sections, fast and slow. If you chose fast, you would go first (before everyone who chose slow) and do your turn as normal. If you chose slow, you'd go after everyone, but you basically got two turns worth of actions each round. Almost every chose slow

[@Pherim_]

Someone has not heard of action economy

[@kjellgunnartrimbo-forthun6052]

@@Pherim_ Yeah, I believe his reasoning was so people who know what they want to do can go first or something?

[@Zantonny]

Currently running a sandbox game. My players have access to a whole city, and I have no idea where they are going next session. This means I have currently got about 20 locations planned prepped and ready to go. Every session it's like instead of planning for the straight line they are on, I am planning everything in a 20 mile radius of them. For anyone else doing something similar, a good tip I have found is to also a plan a "stalling session" for if they choose to do something you hadn't even remotely thought about. Basically, just have something ambiguous, that you can drop in anywhere, that is tempting enough that players will want to check it out. Then if they go for something you hadn't considered at all, that's when you spring that. This can also be done with an "event" such as a planned betrayal from an NPC, an earthquake that mixes up a lot of stuff, a vampire ambush, basically anything. But have something planned that can buy you an extra week to plan if you need it.

[@AbyssalDragon42]

Most extreme example of anti-favoritism I've ever seen was when a DM I know put an army of 20th level wizards against my first level vampire fighter I was using in their game. I never played with them DMing me again. That being said, somehow I managed to get my character to still survive long enough that by the time I left (after a couple minutes of the shards being there) they were still alive and unscathed, though also in extreme danger (as the situation implies).

[@maddogross900]

Great videos Luke, and a lot to learn from! Only my preference here but god man we get it on the bacon... I feel like its 2014 again

[@jasonwhitekettle]

Number 9 is a big one. In the campaign I am currently running, I am the Story Teller, and they are the Main Characters. What I try to do for my players is to prioritize their wants, needs and desires into the story arc as it progresses. To do this I try to get my players to put together fleshed out backstories that they share with me. I find aspects of each of their individual backgrounds and throw "character hooks" at them to see what they will do with them. I run a heavy RP game series with combat taking a background to PC/NPC interaction. Each player is given a multitude of opportunities to expand on their characters personalities and develop and grow. We do sessions once a week, and I spend a lot of hours between sessions to prepare material for my players because in my mind, it is all about their enjoyment. I have fun watching them squirm from the trials and tribulations I throw at them every session, and every time we close out for the day, I ask for input from each of them. Thus far, their comments have been very positive, expressing their enjoyment for the story I am trying to tell with them, and they have commented to me multiple times that their confusion at the end of each session is not only keeping them highly entertained, but they love that each question they have answered leaves them with five new questions, making their confusion grow every session. The thing is, I expressed my want to run this campaign several years ago when another person (now a player in my campaign) was running a campaign for the group. I told them the basics of what I had prepared, and asked them all what they wanted to see more of in my campaign. Everyone wanted a mystery/thriller type of campaign with more interpersonal interaction and a reduction in hack and slash. My advice to any burgeoning Game Master is to ask your players what they want, and work with their ideas and advice to formulate something that is enjoyable for everyone at the table.

[@andrewhaldenby4949]

Nearly committed #8 last adventure. Ty Luke!

[@kyleward3914]

With player agency, I will occasionally ask if we can switch to "narrative mode." This usually means we're in a combat that's basically decided (in the party's favor) but is still going to take awhile to resolve and that I just want to narrate it. It usually really means things are taking longer than I anticipated and I want to wrap up and go to bed.

[@davidmorgan6896]

Many years ago I was running Champions - a (the) supers game. A fight started, fights use lots of dice. My girlfriend went out. Two hours later, she came home. The same fight was still running. We had used about 30 seconds of game time. It was a slog.

[@LatulaArts]

On the pvp note, I've run pvp one shots (i.e. half the group is knights protecting a princess, half are assassins hired to kill her) and they can work but you really have to have a good group and know how to handle a group of the size needed for an interesting pvp session. It's easy to mess up a campaign like that, and I've had a mixed bag of experiences with them. Ranging from the assassins losing their cleric because his persuasion check to coerce his way into the castle was a 2 and, obviously, resulted in failure. So the player decided to pout outside the castle gate while his team tried to sneak in and got wrecked by the other team's paladin, to an amazing and interesting two session game that managed to have character development and really interesting tactical decisions despite being a one off game.

[@ether4211]

A genus trick our DM used to cure burnout was that they asked if anyone wanted to volunteer to run their own game to tie into the main plot so they could be a player. I'd been thinking of a one shot I wanted to try but didn't know how to ask to DM without offending them. Obviously I volunteered and I ran my first session on the DMs birthday, they had a awesome time and it lead to other players taking up the offer as well. Now I run a ongoing Ravenloft campaign when we don't have the numbers to do our main campaign or people are free for a extra session in the week :)

[@drongodyle3156]

For #19, I'd also add that you can always adjust things on the fly to keep players challenged if you accidentally gave them magic items that are too strong. In particular, making things harder in a way that makes the item still feel useful, by increasing the difficultly in ways that don't specifically target that one item. For example, increasing monsters AC/HP because you didn't realize a +3 longsword was a bit excessive to give to the party fighter. Now the monster is slightly harder to hit FOR EVERYONE, and so the fighter REALLY appreciates having that item, while other players who play more supportive roles, deal damage via saving throws, or have reliable sources of advantage, are slightly less effected. For example: Beef up the monsters health and damage, but add a

[@nagyzoli]

I almost always do PVP as a DM, but strictly arena setting. Pirate ship, crew is running a small "Fight Club" to reduce boredom on long journeys. Party reaches a drow camp and to proove worthy they must spill each others blood. I am basically running Spartacus in 5E. Etc

[@dangerdanjerz1479]

I've only knowingly (keyword knowingly) taken away player agency on 1 occasion, and it was with full player knowledge and buy-in. A homebrew campaign I'm running has all the players as classic golden age horror monsters (Wolfman, Mummy, Frankenstein Monster, etc.) And one of the characters is Dr. Jekyll. As one of his core character things he can take the Hyde Serum at any time for ridiculous stat boosts but has to roll each time he does something in order to maintain control of himself otherwise Hyde will do what HE wants to do instead, and I let the player have some sway over what that is (giving Hyde his own character sheet and priorities and flaws and encouraging the player to roleplay to their own detriment)

[@Zai-kyu]

The worst homebrew rule I have had to deal with was a "fumble" rule for spellcasters. Anytime a spellcaster used a spell attack (including cantrips) and rolled a natural 1, it caused a Wild Surge from the Wild Magic sorcerer table in the PHB. I remember specifically casting a cantrip, rolling a natural 1, and instantly summoned 8 Flumphs that poisoned half the party for 8 hours. I immediately became afraid to cast spells that required an attack roll in fear of nuking myself with a fireball if I rolled a natural 1 on a firebolt spell.

[@Rajoovi1]

The thing about what you said, being more prepared lets you run better games even if your players mess up the intended plot hooks, I've found is *absolutely* true. My favourite example is as follows: I was running a city based crime mystery campaign in which the players were recent conscripts into a spy network. They were supposed to investigate an unknown threat to the powers that be. I had prepared the city well in advance, with some specific facts about what each "ward" does, the type of buildings there, what is the average wealth of a commoner in that ward, what it contributes to town, local places if interest and factions, the works. It was a lot of work, prep way ahead of the actual playing of the game. It gave my players and me possibly one of the most memorable derailments of an entire plot hook. The region in question was called "The Harvest", and the reason it was called that was because this section of the city served as the main farming and food production hub for a lot of the city. It was next to the wall and had 3 gates that lead into the farmland in the surrounding countryside. The main populace was poor, being mainly commoners, peasants, farmhands and serfs. It was mostly made up of closely packed, wooden buildings with narrow, winding streets, but had a few large and wide main roads for grain and food delivery into the richer parts of town. These wide roads separated the ward into clusters of these packed together, wooden buildings. The game was run towards the end of summer, with a near Mediterranean, high heat. A lot of crop was harvested and being stored for use in autumn and winter. The PCs were here investigating one of the gangs making trouble, possible ties to the vague threat, and were sneaking around. I had a whole "streets" section prepared and a "compound" main warehouse as an in-city "dungeon" between narrow streets. Events transpired, and they got into combat with the gang inside a house. One of the party decides to smash an oil bottle he had on the floor and set it alight to block a doorway from reinforcements. Fire tends to set nearby, flammable non-magical things that aren't being worn on carried, on fire. It's also wooden buildings at the near peak of a dry summer. They are packed tight together. The fire would spread by 5ftin every direction it could at the top of the turn order as a new environmental hazard. The players could use an action to stamp out a 5 ft patch during their turn, or get water from the well, etc. However the other gang members had found their way around a different door, so the party were fighting off armed thugs in a burning building, trying to escape. The thugs eventually, too turned tail and ran off, once half of the house was covered in fire. The players made their way out, and decided to retreat, leaving the fire to rage. I then decided what would make sense to happen in this scenario, and basically said that as the party returns to their rented tavern, battered and bruised, they turn back to see thick, dark smoke rising into the sky, with a sinister orange glow from the horizon behind the nearby skyline. Seeing how this part of the city stores grain for later in the year, they likely lost a good chunk of it. You can expect food to become scarce this winter. Basically, I wiped that one "cluster" of wooden buildings separated by wide main roads that they were in from the map and claimed the fire consumed all of it, but couldn't spread across the wide roads before the civilian and city government could finally put it out overnight. I got really good feedback from that session, one player marvelling that their actions could have such a huge impact on the world, and they were super excited about playing the next game. I think before then he'd only played in modules people ran. I could never have done this if I didn't already prepare: what the ward is, who lives there, what are the buildings like, what do they contribute? I front load a lot of my prep for moments like this exactly.

[@davidmorgan6896]

I'm all for prep, but I'm also all for improv. You say you could not have run this session without prep, but why? You created all the details. You could have created them on the fly; quickly.

[@Rajoovi1]

@@davidmorgan6896 I could not have. I'm not good at coming up with intricate details about regions, their environments and politics, on the fly. My brain doesn't work that fast. I need to have that information pre-prepped and set in stone. If you can do that, thats great, it's a really good and useful skill to have, but I'm not blessed in that way. I need to do a good chunk of work ahead of time for any of this to be possible for me.