things my players did that made me want to quit DMing, part 2

[@jameseiner]

Gotta say, the Master Oogway one seems painful... But a tortle wildshaping into a turtle is actually pretty funny...

[@christophercrafte]

I bet youd laugh at a tabaxi wild shaped into a cat too wouldnt you!! oh and I bet it would be super funny to see and owlin wild shape into an owl.

[@ZeroExperiment]

when he said “:) monky” i felt that deep down. human are monky…

[@k-aw-teksleepysageuni8181]

@@christophercrafte and I bet you're fun at parties.

[@writer5790]

​@@christophercrafte yeah... it's funny. Why do you have to be mad?

[@christophercrafte]

@@writer5790 who said I was mad? I also think it's funny.

[@Swan-may]

The player-spoiling-adventure middle bit was perfect, I felt my soul leave my body, it was the distilled essence of "I am going to ruin tonight for the DM and make the DM look like the bad guy for their trouble"

[@JarroHood]

Goddddd, I feel ya there. The longer it went on, the more I just went "noooooooo."

[@extrakrispy81]

Part of the reason I never run modules.

[@rodrigofernandezrivera1028]

Im actually here with the video paused becasue I had to take a break from that exact part

[@marvintodisco2970]

Yeah that one was probably the worst offense in there. I would have told the guy to leave my table within the first 3 minutes.

[@ZyroShadowPony]

Kinda the reason im afraid of playing modules with my groups. They have all played them and know whats up, and some are the type not to know when to shut up sadly

[@marcuselias4412]

Man, I wish my players put in half as much effort and enthusiasm as your nightmare clones do. A dreamless sleep is a worse curse.

[@BKScience812]

My players just cancel on me. Every. Single. Time. I can never play a session with everyone present.

[@emilysmith2965]

Well said!

[@AndrewTheUltraBoss99]

like, tons of rp going on, everyone is talking about stuff and you see that player in the webcam with his head down, just falling asleep, that when prompted really says:"I wouldn't care less for this stuff". which is fair since there may be plot hooks more interesting for everyone and it's hard to stay awake when it gets late, but it makes the dm feel bad

[@dominikwusa3570]

@@BKScience812 Who cares? Play with the ones that can play. Every session one or two cancel

[@lbm8972]

​@@BKScience812 when I ran my campaign the exact same thing happened. So I just adapted. Literally one of the best sessions I ever had was when only two of them showed up. It was super personal and we got to explore so much more because we didn't have to deal with too many people.

[@lucas_apenas]

Tbh, if my players thought about my world's lore and theorized as hard as in the last clip I'd cry out of joy

[@chaoticnote]

Yes. But if you're being completely honest and very clear that you are honest and they think otherwise, then it's a problem.

[@erinkarp]

same

[@thismemelord4048]

I’m running dragon heist and if my players were that in depth in the story it would be twice as long lol. Though it would be nice

[@sdgoliath7498]

Id kill to have my group that engrossed in my lore TwT

[@24601st]

players when you make intricate lore by yourself: 💤💤 players when the premade adventure has a clear objective: ‼️‼️

[@GumshoeClassic]

The last one reminds me of a specific Shadowrun campaign where our party was *absurdly* suspicious of our Mr Johnson, to the point where one player ultimately *convinced the others to fight Johnson and his bodyguards.* Needless to say we got absolutely canned and thrown into essentially a labor camp. Luckily it turned out that was planned by the DM, he'd been in league with that player to set up a prison break campaign.

[@voidwalker7774]

good lord, i miss Shadowrun.

[@AuntieHauntieGames]

​@@voidwalker7774 Jacob is definitely on the list of folk I'd like to run a game for and Shadowrun is definitely one of those games.

[@maxpowers9129]

I played shadow run and just couldn't get into it. It was so obvious that we were being set up that it made it difficult to roleplay someone stupid enough to go along with the plot. Maybe that was just that particular campaign, or I got a bad game master, but it was a horrible experience role-playing that I would fall for every trick thrown at me. I have heard other stories about how players killed characters by crashing planes into them and stuff that should have completely destroyed the bad guy's body, but the plot demanded the guy show up completely unharmed. It feels like a game where nothing the players does actually matters. In D&D it feels like the player's choices actually matter.

[@GumshoeClassic]

@@maxpowers9129 Uhhhhhhh.... story decisions and the weight of player choices don't really have anything to do with the games mechanics though. They're determined by how the module/campaign is written and played. I can't personally speak to the quality of Shadowruns modules as we always made our own scenarios and runs, but what you're describing sounds mostly like bad performance on the side of the GM to me.

[@90maducc]

I never played Shadowrun as a TTRPG, but as the game made by Harebrained Studios. But then again, I can't play a solo campaign, because that would be weird (I have no friends).

[@kenkubard]

Jacob: "We could go back and cast Speak w/ Dead on the gnome" Jacob: "He knows everything you already know" Jacob: "Yeah, but he could GNOME OAR"

[@stainlesssteelfox1]

That pun was physically painful. Though it should have been a gnome galley slave.

[@NearlyBatman]

*Takes 1 D12 Psychic Damage*

[@CrabOnABeach]

1d4 psychic damage and disadvantage on your next attack roll

[@CognetoBurrito]

That pun was utterly stupid and I love it.

[@TrippyTheShroom]

Having my players play incredibly goofy characters after explaining how I intend to run my grim dark, sword and sorcery style campaign... that one almost did me in

[@BKScience812]

I had a player who wanted to be difficult, so when he told me about his character, all he said was that he was a carrot farmer and he just wanted to go back to his farm. Fast forward to the first session, his character was polymorphed by the BBEG to a Harengon and he is obsessed with magic carrots. Doesn't matter that I intended this to be a serious campaign, I kinda had to allow some measure of random nonsense to make my players believe their choices matter, even if it was a hard pill to swallow

[@simplesushi9102]

i’ll do you one better. i was running strixhaven, you know, a school for magic, and not a single player created a character with spellcasting abilities

[@NYKevin100]

A certain amount of this is expectation setting... but a certain amount is "do your players even want to play the same game as you?" Because when the answer is no, there is no amount of expectation setting that will fix it. You can either meet them where they are, or (e.g.) go bowling instead of playing D&D.

[@TrippyTheShroom]

@@BKScience812 That is a pretty hilarious idea though. I've debated on doing something akin to that (changing characters fundamentally) but haven't convinced myself if the player(s) would be down for it.

[@TrippyTheShroom]

@@simplesushi9102 lol that is terrible, you may have me beat tbh.

[@blkhwk1321]

To be honest, my favorite part about DMing is watching their planing and plotting. I often find that they come up with a really great plan, and then the dice say if it works or not. They often pull one over on me and do some crazy stuff: like polymorphing the bbeg (level 10) into a raccoon and throwing them into a volcano. Which had the consequence of the bbeg opening a gate to the fire plane.

[@haku8135]

*Gives players a free skyship* "LET'S CRASH IT INTO A HOLE TO PISS OFF THE BAD GUYS!" *Matt Mercer screams internally*

[@Gwolf303]

That's literally the current plan of my BBEG (Open a portal to the fire plane after the adventure party clears out the lair of a red dragon) And one of my players is a druid who's whole theme is transformation. I may need to remove the lava or add a henchmen with counter spell.

[@eeefe972]

He's a druid can't use spells when in animal form

[@Gwolf303]

@@eeefe972 I never said they were the one transforming

[@zuzu6470]

Seeing players plan things out together also really shows their own character, I think it’s fun and a good form of bonding between players.

[@RedYDG]

"Ok DM so I'm going to be playing a totem barbarian multiclassed with druid. Race is a Bugbear." "Wait... No you don't. You are not-" "My totems are bear. And I wildshape mostly into bears. I'm--" "You are NOT playing a Bugbear bear barbarian bear!" I admit. It was a bit ursanine.

[@MegaChibirobo]

Boo.

[@doggolover9063]

Nice pun.

[@arat2376]

Needs more likes

[@NoriMori1992]

"ursanine" 😂

[@DMKarinZeeland]

My husband plays one for a year now in my campaign. It's a great character. I even bought him a great mini of a bear that wears a similar necklace as his bugbear.

[@chrishubbard64]

Worst part is tortle guy could have easily been another random being stuck in barovia. Surviving this long by disguising himself as various animals to avoid being overwhelmed. Unfortunately, he can tell the monsters of the area are starting to figure out what to look for so now he needs to attach himself to a group and hope to survive with strength in numbers. That might have made for an interesting character.

[@drewforchic9083]

I ran a Curse of Strahd speed run as a Halloween one shot. I specifically told my players, all of whom have a record for playing goofy characters, to prepare more serious characters to fit the tone. Instead, they brought: Toothless, an elderly hairless Tabaxi who was mostly deaf ("what was that, sonny?") Milton the centaur ("It's like Bilton, but with an M") Glassbot 3000, an autognome glassblower who's only equipment was bags of sand for glassblowing Bair, and Bugbear Beast Master, and his pet giant centipede Boog and an Aarakocra Warlock of the Deep, modeled after a cormorant bird (but was described as just being the Pokemon Cramorant) who obtained his warlock powers by "eating a cursed fish and now his tentacle attack comes out of his mouth" (every character this player has ever made is defined by some food related quirk where they eat things they're not supposed to and I hate it) Each of them independently assumed the others would bring a serious character and decided they would be the joke character of the group. Each one. They killed Strahd, but also TPK'd when the last of them died of lingering fire damage the next turn, so it was a tie.

[@matthewmcguigan4293]

This sounds like a fun group.

[@NoriMori1992]

I am laughing so hard at the name "Glassbot 3000" 😂

[@lunavixrn5651]

i love the "so it was a tie". Like an entire encounter of Barovian horror played by characters out of looneytunes and it just ends with, "yeah, it was a tie, everyone died."

[@noahtekulve2684]

This is why I really, really, really, encourage my players to NOT make any final decisions or write anything down about their character until we're all together for the first time (impossible).

[@Maliceinponderland]

You're lucky to have such creative friends. I'd rather have that than a bunch of edgelords or people deeply uninterested in their character (this is not a rant about my players, some of them are gimmicky but it love them for it and it leads to some great and unforeseen worldbuilding)

[@ShadyDoorags]

I used to be a player who would spend half a session planning but eventually that stopped. There was a game where my character was out of commission for a few sessions because of story reasons so the DM let me play as an NPC from my backstory, however, this new character wasn't big on talking so I rarely participated in the planning stages. It was at this point I realized how boring planning time can be for players who are more gameplay oriented. At the time, very few players in our group participated in planning if it took longer than 10 minutes, so I was basically listening to the same 2 people go on for hours about fine tuning a plan that, in hindsight, wasn't needed at all. After that, I started hating when too much time was spent on plans.

[@Berks11]

As a dm, my players constantly spend an exorbitant amount of time making plans and they NEVER WORK. They’re just not good at making plans; there’s always glaring issues that they’re completely missing. It’s times like that that I’m tempted to do the big no-no and insert my own character just to point out the things they’re overlooking.

[@Darthzilla99]

10 minutes planning is plenty imo.

[@woobackwednesday2299]

May I introduce you to our Lord and Savior Blades in the Dark?

[@vladgdc]

@@woobackwednesday2299 more like our Lord of Damning, am I right?... 😈

[@mrosskne]

woah dude playing the game is more fun than not playing the game? i never would have guessed

[@weareharbinger914]

To be fair, the Oogway thing is 100% the Dm's own fault for not looking at the character sheet.

[@doinyourmom7236]

I think it's mainly just spoofing on how players try to bring joke characters in. And when a group is closely knit friends, i find the DM mostly just leaves trust in the players to make decent characters without help, with the rare exception.

[@Hippiecult]

Sooooo…..there’s no Tortles in Barovia?

[@VisonsofFalseTruths]

⁠@@Hippiecult Ravenloft is an inter-dimensional hoarder that reaches into other settings’ pockets and steals their spare characters. That’s actually not even an exaggeration. The Demiplane of Dread is a pocket dimension that is coterminous with every other dimension all at once, and the Dark Powers that govern that realm reach into other realities and drag characters from them screaming into the fog-shrouded Domains of Dread. ANYTHING can be in Barovia, by the setting’s very premise. The only reason it’s not way wackier than it’s written is active and aggressive writer fiat to keep it gothic and grimdark. Some DMs think races like tortles and plasmids go against the intended feeling of the setting. They say you should bring characters that better fit into a campaign of gothic horror fantasy. I say what’s more Ravenloft than dragging a pure, kind-hearted, wacky being like that into a world that actually runs on high-octane nightmare fuel and playing some 30-odd sessions of break the cutie until the “joke character” gets shoved over the despair event horizon and suffers a permanent psychological blue screen of death? The prettiest stained glass windows are the most satisfying to throw a brick through. Ooooh, they’re a super strong paladin or barbarian or whatever? Kill their loved ones. Murder their family. Drown their pets. Hurt. Them. Etch it deep into the druid’s subconscious that this world, every natural and unnatural thing in it, hates them. This is a place of darkness; sunshine and happy thoughts come here against their will to be snuffed out. Oh but they’re a cleric so they can heal? Whatever god they prey to is out of reach, and whatever is allowing them to keep their powers is doing it so they’re a better toy; when they cast cure wounds it feels like cold grease slithering down their back, like maggots crawling inside their hand at the point of contact. They should KNOW these powers come from something evil, and attempting a communion or a divine intervention puts them in touch not with Sarenrae or Pelor or Bahamut or whatever, but with an evil, alien thing that looks at them with the most unwholesome hunger and says “I am your god now; your consent in the matter is irrelevant”.

[@Maliceinponderland]

@@Hippiecult he could just be an adventurer that somehow found his way there. Maybe his whole party got wiped out a couple years ago and he went into hiding to survive. You can work with some siliness as long as you get your stories straight

[@suzievandyk6593]

I've had players tell me who they are playing and then show up with like three different character sheets, none of which are the character we'd discussed, then decide which one they were playing on the spot so I kind of took it as that. He showed up with a different character than planned. A very very dumb one

[@thechangeling3851]

The broom of flying thing is why I remix almost any modules I run...while a lot of the story beats can be similar, some chars are the same...things can go quite a bit different especially in regards to items...

[@larkohiya]

Exactly! If you're playing a module 100% by the book and don't add anything else or deviate? Are you even playing dungeons& dragons? And how did you strong arm your players into only playing the content in the book ?

[@christophercrafte]

some times its a good idea to shift loot around. an extreme example but if you have a party of owlin a broom of flying would be kinda pointless, like the npc looks at a bunch of birds and says "ah I know what you all need. the ability to fly over great distances" now obviously you likely won't have a party of all birds but if a module's loot or rewards are meaningless to the party then NPCs probably shouldn't give it. no strength-based martials in the party? then a flame tongue great sword seems silly.

[@thechangeling3851]

@christopher crafte it's why If a item makes no sense for the party I often remix it with another or come up with something on the fly for fun. Frankly I like remixing modules quite a bit as well already though... Ex.decent into avernus in my setting is VERY mad max meets Great War vibes...with parties navigating incredibly hazardous "hell-fire wastes" that form no man's land between trenches and other fortifications constructed in the blood war by countless factions that had laid seige to hell in the past. Hell is basically in a ww1-2 era conflict where magi-tek meets arcane weaponry on both sides...some options are almost stupidly better...was it not for limited resources that even the largest war machine in the realms cannot keep up with.

[@HunterGargoyle]

My party are garanteed to derail any plan or module... so i just don't do them and basically only have a very loose list of events that could happen and what they will find/get/talk to. I encourage the murder-hoboing and depraved behavior because its more fun... i've never ran my group in a campain where they want to be good guys

[@thechangeling3851]

@Michael Poorman the trick I have done is use modules as a "blueprint" and then build off it and modify to a great extent. Ex. Curse of strhad rouge like (castle is almost completely randomly generated each time they enter castlevania style, they have a town on barovias edge that have to fortify and upgrade using recources they find castle delveing, as well as expeditions to numerous other locations not only in barovia but the demiplanes of dread), a tomb of annihilation game mixed with darksouls...the party able to die and comeback unlike others...but having major consequences in setting and on their chars...or honestly my favorite im running right now which is a massive expansion on decent into avernus...but putting the party right into the blood war, showing both sides as well as to why it's literally the most violent and destructive war in the lower planes...(think mad max meets the most intense parts of war the last 200 years...like imagine showing to a knight the horrors of trench warfare)

[@ionh7039]

Don’t axe all your problems, fireball them

[@allenwalker957]

Don't fireball all your problems, seduce them.

[@DiscardatRandom]

Divine smite them

[@Vassilinia]

I cast fireball ON MYSELF

[@JamesThatcher]

Can I get an Amen?

[@Hercules1-v9m]

@@Vassilinia The true power move.

[@ozpin8329]

Our CoS group has an artificer, a kenku, a kalashtar, and a changeling. To be fair, it didn't start as a CoS group - it was a homebrew campaign that the DM decided to change into CoS once we hit 5th level. Our characters were not built with that campaign in mind, and honestly? It's ended up being my favorite campaign because of that. None of us were prepared either with our characters or the way they were built to deal with Strahd, so it's really amped up the sense of tension and fear.

[@cattiston374]

Meanwhile our party consist of a Tiefling, Earth Genasi, Half Orc and yours truly, a Harengon lol.

[@tomasherrera9069]

ah so an Eberron party lmao

[@matthewmorley739]

is artificer a race now? lol

[@chazz30000]

I mean the set-up of Borrovia is such that you can justify literally any kind of race showing up.

[@sharmelfattakhov5041]

I believe one of the best decisition I made for CoS campain is that I didn't make a character specifically designed for some dark fantasy campain. I was the last to make it so when I saw our line-up of edgy and moody characters(though awesomely designed) who had seemingly came from Borovia itself my first thought was "I can do the same, but judging by experience we might not enjoy the heaviness of this dynamic" so I just made a character to lighten up the mood. It was a big lizardfolk druid who had tried to accustom herself to human culture and "make friends" due to personal reasons, but the only type of affection she could compare friendship to was protecting the tribe's children and she was projecting this onto other teammates. In other words, she had basically acted like party's overprotective mom and was the only party member who had always trusted others and was there for them. Not without Lizardfolk rational brutality and sometimes morally dumb decitions though. This Campain turned out to be great and so did this character.

[@Lightspectre1]

OMG I totally feel this. I wanna be like: "Guys, it's not complicated. Don't play joke characters, don't talk about other campaigns during this one, pay attention, and follow at least half of the freakin' adventure hooks. If you do that then the game is fun. If you faff about and zone out then it won't. It's almost like the amount of effort you put into the game directly corresponds to how much fun you have!"

[@Vassilinia]

What's not fun about joke characters?

[@Denetas]

Joke characters are fun imo but you do you

[@blackstone7732]

Absolutely true. Most, if not all, of my DMing problems were solved when I asked my players to start paying attention and investing themselves into the game. D&D is a cooperative game where we tell a story TOGETHER. It’s not supposed to be a chore for the DM, while the players are pampered recipients. Put the work in guys, it’s worth it.

[@hipopotamodata9932]

​@@blackstone7732 I do have a problem with that I m always invest in the game but my attention spam is really bad My friends in the table say I have ADHD

[@ENCHANTMEN_]

I like to make characters who are wacky or ridiculous, but only if they could actually exist in the setting and still allow for serious stuff to happen. Some of the best character arcs I've had have been on PCs I based off of shitposts

[@DramakilzU]

The “cuz this is a different campaign” line hit home for me. It’s so annoying when players make comparisons of how things went in other games that I’m like “I don’t care if you got +3 mithral armor at level 10 in another campaign, I think it’s too strong for you to have right now.”

[@haku8135]

"Hey DM, that Star Raiser thing is pretty cool, can we have a Vestige of Divergence too?" "THAT IS FROM ANOTHER UNIVERSE ENTIRELY!"

[@lucianoschroeder9777]

I spotted a copy of Curse of Strahd in one of my players' bags at a CoS session once. As soon as I got home that night i rewrote basically the entire story that they had not already played through. New NPCs, New monster stats, New magic items, etc.

[@JackAttack15]

They must've been happy with all of the twists lol

[@paulbreen5089]

That's genuinely awful. I don't know what I would do if someone from our group did that. The betrayal!

[@gaoth88]

I took over from a DM and run my own interpretation 9o CoS. Paladin 6th lvl: I cast daylight :D Me: strahd counterspells with lvl 8th spell slot :DDD Paladin: D: Other players who know powerplayers and dont like it: :DD

[@tybronx2446]

Idk why anyone would spoil a game by reading the campaign like that. Bro just read a book and let someone else play then

[@luminous3558]

@@gaoth88 Daylight's light isn't sunlight, its just the darkness counterpart.

[@Jacules]

I swear almost every campaign eventually develops to someone having an evidence board

[@hellterminator]

LOL, I use Obsidian for taking notes. Every campaign I'm in _starts_ with someone (me) having an evidence board.

[@KommandoCraftLP]

The Waterdeep part was EXACTLY what my party did last session. They got the map off the nimblewright, and instead of going where the X LITERALLY marks the spot, they decided to analyse the construct, speak with Nim about it, ask the Harpers AND the Watchful Order only to then find themselves confused on where to go next. Whole thing took over an hour.

[@CrowbornChaos]

Maps always lie. DnD 101.

[@Astar24653]

They didnt even insight check the map, psh

[@dannydumlet]

That last one reminded me of when I did a one shot and I described a slime trail leading to a basement at the scene of a monster attack and they did EVERYTHING but go down the stairs

[@RPanda3S]

Well, yeah, there's a monster down there! 💀

[@dannydumlet]

@@RPanda3S shit you right

[@insertname3977]

Been guilty of that before, but it comes from experience of "if I follow those tracks, I'm going to put myself into an ambush situation".

[@dannydumlet]

@@insertname3977 see none of them had that line of thinking. They just were not paying attention and when they asked me shit I turned into an old adventure game prompt where I kept mentioning the trail. They wanted to find it and just were confused for some reason

[@yarion4774]

​@@insertname3977 Sometimes you have to ask yourself "Am I here to make an optimal decision or play the game?". And sometimes playing the games means stepping in an obvious trap to see what happens.

[@nessa-parmentier]

The Master Oogway part is one of the reasons why I always advocate for players making their characters WITH their GM. That way you can tell them "no, this is a dark and serious campaign, and there are no tortles anywhere near the place, you'll need to make something else", as well as anticipate what they make and also know their abilities in advance

[@mrcritical6751]

Plus it helps the GM figure out how to fit the story around the characters more cause they know the backstory, personality and life of the characters before they begin

[@koboldengineering7687]

I always float the idea for my character by the DM first before fully committing and make sure that they fit within the setting the DM prepared

[@sorendaniels754]

I always incorporate character creation into my session zero and I require all players to be there. It's very fun cause it allows players to bounce ideas off of me and each other and I can help them fine-tune their backstory to fit the campaign

[@alchemicpunk1509]

Oh, Tortle is fine. They're just a kind of person as far as the world is concerned. The Oogway bit is what makes it unsuitable.

[@nessa-parmentier]

@@sorendaniels754 A GM of mine (who I know is really good when the game is actually running) has made a very bad session zero recently. He explained the basic rules of the game (not D&D and nobody was familiar with this particular one) and the general lore... and that's it. No indication on what the campaign's themes will be (and he clearly has something planned). Everyone created their characters and I was just sitting there with no idea what to do. I finally made a character sheet yesterday after like 2-3 weeks, but as someone who likes to tie my character into the campaign, I was just struggling. A session zero is always better than no session zero, but a bad session zero is not that great either.

[@J4D3R053]

6:12 i fucking wish my players thought like this, instead they're trusting literal actual Asmodeus at his word. No contract, nothing in writting, just "Oh yeah sure we'll betray and then help you overthrow the angels even though we haven't asked your motives"

[@Witchlexis]

I actually *HAD* the dude who played a Tortle in Strahd. Dude played a Circle of Spores Druid with this other class to try do nutso damage, all the while basically making his character a walking fart joke. Really killed the tension...

[@TimelordRick]

As someone who played a tortle cleric in a Strahd game, I can confirm it's always the right choice.

[@DullahanMigraines]

Tortles are just kind of based in general if you ask me

[@silasmccarron1936]

Mine was an immortal spores druid tortle who had been there since its inception needless to say i both stuck out like a sore thumb and yet fit perfectly.

[@paulbreen5089]

Tortle Monk is what I played, in the Curse of Strahd. He died half way through and I then played an artificer. I miss my tortle monk man

[@Rattman_4126]

@@paulbreen5089 which renaissance artist was he named after?

[@morrigankasa570]

Tortles are cool in many ways, BUT THE LIFESPAN IS TOO SHORT!!! Only times I'd possibly consider playing a Tortle is as a Druid or Undying Warlock or if it was homebrew adjusted to at least 200 years lifespan. Same for all other races that have less then 150 years potential lifespan.

[@ChargeQM]

'You cannot axe all your problems! Use your words!' 'Axe is a word, and I'M USING IT!'

[@jeanmaillard6001]

DUDE! you inspired your player so much that the last one got a detective board! that's amazing!

[@Neuroshimi]

yeah until you realise that every crafted world in books when author has lot of time has a lot of plotholes and you are just some human that develops this lore and story in your spare time, have of it during sessions on a fly. It has to have plotholes. A lot of them.

[@alphastring3619]

"You cannot Axe all of your problems, you need to use your words" oh really, well I have you know that Axe is *a word*

[@ozpin8329]

"I just want to *axe* him a question!"

[@FirstLast-wk3kc]

Or: We use a theatre of the mind, everything is a word!

[@cattiston374]

"Violence is not the answer, its a question, and the answer is YES"

[@KaliFortuna]

“I cast Power Word: AXE”

[@FirstLast-wk3kc]

@@KaliFortuna that's a cool one

[@MogoPrime]

I was trying to stare holes through the "flying broom guy." My god. Dear sweet jesus. Holy undead christ upon his flying pogo stick, do not DO THIS. AAAAAAAAAAAAAA- fantastic performances Jacob, I don't know how you act these out without cringing into a singularity. Bravo

[@christophermiller8589]

Yellow shirt Jacob is a player I just removed from my campaign. 😂 Thank you for this, it was extremely cathartic. The extreme paranoia and seeming refusal to do anything logical to “throw the DM off her trail” just made me want to strangle her from behind my screen.

[@akkmedia6578]

TBH the last one is pretty great RP from the players, I kinda love it when players get the ball rolling, sometimes I even steal their best ideas they talk about at the table because it's cooler than what I had planned, and additionally it's nice to know sometimes as a player that you "figued it out" without needing a roll, that can be super satisfying.

[@DarkSithBarbie]

We once had a new character introduce his pc by being a in a jail cell and telling my character to "Beat it. I don't need your help." And just being super rude. So... I left him there. And we continued playing the session until we "just so happened" to come across him again later where he was much nicer.

[@stormthrush37]

I mean it'd be hard for him to be mad, he told you to leave him alone and you left him alone.

[@dragongirl89115]

@@stormthrush37 Gotta be careful when making dark and moody characters, because the others might not have the patience for them, lol

[@RPanda3S]

I am so confused. Why is a *character* introducing their *NPC*? Wild.

[@CircumSamurai]

@@RPanda3S Probably means new player introducing their character, I think.

[@RPanda3S]

@@CircumSamurai thatsthejoke.gif

[@Hoovy00]

I'm going to be honest, I don't like restricting my players that much, but I was running CoS and had a tortle monk named Master Aaghwai, and that's just because I didn't want him to be master Oogway

[@ethanvelez2462]

What is it with CoS and tortle monks? I DM'd Strahd last year and one of my players was a Tortle monk named ravioli

[@raevir]

@@ethanvelez2462gaddamn, I would have named it Tortellini.

[@MythicMachina]

Personally, I think bootleg characters are way funnier, so i'd totally allow that

[@laughingpanda4395]

My guys overcomplicate EVERYTHING. They RP everything so well though that half the time they find a different way to succeed than what I had planned.

[@muatra3651]

"But he could know MORE" "Yup, okay, you guys question him and now you know exactly where the key is, but you have to solve a puzzle in order to retrieve it first."

[@evanbell]

4:50 was absolutely my group last night. I had spent literally 30 hours of prep work building out a major city, and they spent most of the night deciding whether or not to go to the city. They eventually did, but like… pain.

[@DHS222]

2:39 Man I was NOT READY for this man xD

[@peytonalexander5300]

Funny enough, I did in fact have a new player choose to play a tortle in my Curse of Strahd game! I sort of coached him through what the setting was like to make sure he was comfortable with that decision, but he was adamant about being a tortle. So we worked out a lore reason why he would have come to Barovia in the first place and he actually fit into the party rather well! Seeing as the adventurers from beyond the mist were looked at with distrustful scrutiny by default, the other, more traditional looking party members actually began to bond with him over how much they felt like outsiders in this place, and he gave them advice on how to deal with that feeling, and how to earn the trust of those who would judge you based on your appearance. He was a fighter who focused on shielding his allies rather than leaping into the fray, and I quite enjoyed his time with the group. Really wish that campaign hadn’t burned out, but that’s adult life for you.

[@shieldgenerator7]

6:56 you could feel the frustration in that last "WHAAA AAAA AAAAT"

[@David-qs7yv]

As a DM: "How can these idiots not know what is going on, I've given them dozens of clues, handouts, and descriptions!" Me as a player: "Durh, what is going on? Why are we here?"

[@Belphegorite]

I don't know what hurts more, my ribs from laughing at this or my soul from having DM'd it.

[@ThyTrueNightmare]

4:00 that player would be instant kicked and not welcome at my table

[@cfalkner1012]

Our CoS party has a tortle paladin named Oogway with 10 charisma. He got crushed in our last session by *redacted*.

[@chrisjacobs4716]

"A tortle? In Barovia?!" Yes, absolutely! It's canonically correct that the mists of Ravenloft (or perhaps the Demiplane of Dread, depending on the source you look at) can grab anyone from anywhere in the D&D universe and plop them smack into the middle of Barovia if they want to.

[@midnamidnightwhisper7529]

"You cannot axe all your problems, you need to use your words." Where axe fails, words (+hand movements +a tiny ball of bat guano and sulfur) will succeed.

[@polyhedron3386]

That last one I deeply love, amazing when players are that invested. Also when they all look like you.

[@jasonstrohl1675]

As amazing as Waterdeep: Dragonheist is, the player hook does seem a bit loose and it definitely makes keeping people on track difficult. I think everyone being dragon sick is how you get them to stay on task. Old Xoblob and a cabal of disembodied hands aren't orchestrating the Waterdavien French revolution! Thank you for this, Jacob. Thank you.

[@tinycrimester]

"you're out of spell slots? but we just rested!" "... i'm a warlock..." 😭

[@ninjajack6457]

I honestly had no idea everyone made Oogway with Tortle I instantly made an artificer

[@zoroearc2582]

Let me guess, Artillerist named Brasstoise

[@ninjajack6457]

@@zoroearc2582 no, his name is Gadget

[@authenticlimeflavor432]

“Most of your stats and bonuses come from your origin and backstory instead of your race” Sounds like they really found some sort of path

[@alphanoodle1877]

The overplanning, the unfitting characters, I feel all of this

[@newtpondskipper]

One of the reasons I always wanted Multiple Man's powers was so that I could play DnD anytime. Then I watch these are realize how hellish it could be.

[@Alkerae]

I relate so super hard to spending actual time out of my actual life to actually prepare to DM for a bunch of people who just kinda show up with incomplete character sheets and who need to spend the whole session resting and discussing and... honestly I kinda love it, we burn through content more slowly and I get to be there for the roleplay, but at the same time... like... the instant they aren't at the table, it's like our group doesn't even exist to them, they leave and don't think about me or my game again, at all, until our next session. ...except for the minmaxer, whom thought about their character, a lot, and nothing else, and is so attached to it that I'm actually too scared to let anything bad happen to it even though it's the clear and obvious target that would be targeted, because I promise they have not thought of how to respond to what I have planned, and no I'm not being clever, it's just, an attack, from an enemy. ...oh wait, I actually did quit DMing. :(

[@dlewdm]

“I spent all night on this. They haven’t even finished resting yet” 🤣 💀 The true pain of DMing is not when the players roll through every fight…it’s when they waste time overthinking lol

[@Phoenixx713]

my wild magic barb when she see's the possibility of a physical trap: GREATAXE our owlin warlock if something looks like a sparkly trap: OWLDRITCH BLAST

[@swordhunter12]

Im giving your comment a like, purely for the use of the words "Owldritch Blast"

[@SiberianOldPal]

I laughed so hard on "I am... Master Oogway"

[@trevorhannan5113]

It can get difficult when your party doesn't put the pieces together the way you intend. But it can be very fun to, within reason, yes-and their logic even if it goes way left of what you planned. That being said this video is a funny vent.

[@KappaKiller108]

I feel that. I just played a session last night where there was a basic word puzzle. I won't describe it in detail but basically, the solution was based on themed names that were in pairs. They got through literally 90% of the puzzle but we're hard-stuck on one word because my entire player group was interpreting the word "Tale" to mean "Tail". I wrote out all the words, to make it clear but it was like their brains stopped working. They were clearly reading the word, but somehow were still thinking "tail" in their minds. I watched them uncomfortably until they got so frustrated I gave them the answer.

[@headlesshunter8435]

The biggest thing for me was them tryna second guess me. "Why did you do that?" "I thought it was what you wanted me to do" Or "Why do that?" "I was trying to outthink you"

[@Zertryx]

We need a pention for Jacob to film an entire oneshot with all the other jacobs and release it as a mini series

[@limbothebiggay1709]

That puzzle the DM made that took 3 hours? Yeah, no, we're going to *PERSUADE* the door

[@squallshot]

Gave me a great idea for a dnd session, literally just get the players to play clue and see how long it takes them to figure it out. Could have a cheat sheet with what everyone knows by the cards they have drawn for them

[@xanderofnohr2422]

if your waterdeep dragon heist game doesn’t end up having a conspiracy board you’re playing it wrong lmao

[@rafaelmikoskirosa7510]

I once played a campaign wich one of the players was playing "Ugawey", a really peaceful tortle unable to harm any living being, but tanked absolutely everything during battles. It was nice.

[@katydidd6321]

Am currently running a multi-year Ravenloft campaign, and am now seriously considering attacking my players with turtles. They'll never see this coming...

[@chazz30000]

It would be the happiest day of my dm-ing carrier if a player made an honest to god red-string-conspiracy-board for one of my campaigns

[@SS-df5zo]

Even if you dont call your tortle oogway, you are legally obligated to make at least one oogway reference

[@ikidnapunicorns9033]

If my friend tried to advertise his kickstarter in our dnd session i would wanna quit dming too. So relatable

[@bartoszpytka3958]

Ahh, the first scene brings back many memories of my tortle warlock I have played in Curse of Strahd. He was great at charisma rolls and at all sorts of sabotage and spying thanks to his familliar imp. Great campaign, unfortunately it ended rather quickly after the vallaki arc. Still, many memorable moments happened, our druid solo'ing izek after trying to free the tiger from the wagon, stealing the said wagon, militia intervention at the wachterhaus, scaring a fisherman by imitating a kraken and more.

[@Tokumastu1]

For that last skit, I've been that player with the chart. When a mystery gets placed in front of me I go that crazy and the party usually follows.

[@MissyBonaBella]

Whenever my life feels like it's hard you put out a new video and it sends me down a path of watching all your content again and I laugh and feel a lot better. So to you and everyone who helps make this stuff thank you Jacob and Thank you everyone. It helps me keep going. Even if you think it's stupid it makes my life better. Please keep going, your amazing

[@Cadwallon85]

I played Strahd for the first time last year, with some regulars plus a new entrant to the group the DM introduced. Her character was an old tortle affectionately known as "Granny" and honestly she was my favourite character of the campaign. The sheer pathos involved in some of the more horrid things that happened psychologically to Granny throughout the campaign created some seriously emotionally fraught moments.

[@KingMadDog7]

“I took off work for this…” love to hear it, dnd time with friends ALWAYS wins over going to boring old work.

[@ChargeQM]

Not true. No game is better than bad game. Not saying that was a bad game, but... I've been in a truly awful group. Now it's been 10 years since i last got to play because there's no one else around me and I'm shit at making friends who wanna play online.

[@oz_jones]

@@ChargeQM there are subreddits for just that

[@jacawandersmok9043]

6:55 love it like tha t board and even same cards are empty ;]]

[@MythicMachina]

That one about overplanning gets me. Players often have a tendency to come up with plans for like 30 minutes, then decide that NONE of them are good enough and start on a plan F.

[@The_Kentuckian]

"You cannot ax all of your problems." was a great start to the ad & had me laughing.

[@lanabobana3311]

Not gonna lie though, as one of those players who usually ends up taking all the notes and theorizes a lot, it's actually a super fun bonding and roleplay moment when something goes over my head from overthinking and the quiet one of us turns out to have an epic idea/plan they just were too nervous or didn't think was good enough to mention. If anyone reading this happens to be one of those quiet types, please feel free to speak over the talkers like me! It's a party game, after all!

[@michaeldunkerton3805]

In the first one I was expecting the new player to constantly interrupt the GM description to ask banal questions about character creation because he was writing it up just then.

[@TooKorky]

Just came from a session where one of my players tried to calculate some place where he thinks/thought he had to go with pages filled with math because he thought the compass directions i gave him pointed to a place on the other side of the world. Our game is located on an island

[@Fisthammet]

Me and my DM have a running joke of bringing characters from Terry Pratchett's discworld to our games. It started during our last campaign when the DM introduced "foul ol' Ron" and "the guild of beggers" as our mad alchemists entourage, but in the end the alchemist got so hooked on his own product that these guys decided to go work for someone else; derailing the campaign by starting a drug empire in an already shady part of town, before fecking off on a terrible adventure by himself that further derailed the campaign and lost him his guild. It's this alchemist dudes signature move it seems. He basically became the hulk; got addicted to "anticipation herion," found a cursed crown that he refused to give up and proceeded to kill literally tens of thousands of people to get back.

[@spehizle]

Me the GM: "Okay, players. You were hired by a man claiming to be an exiled heir to a noble family. This dude wants you to break into his family's vault and steal their genealogical records, so he can restore his nobility and receive a personage in another country. But now that you've broken into this family estate, there are paintings everywhere of this family...yet not a single one has the "heir" that hired you. Like, not even edited out." Me the GM internally: Oh boy, this is the perfect hint that the players were hired under false pretenses and are being played. What will they do? The Players: "What? Oh, whatever. Yeah, let's kidnap a princess for no reason."

[@Shroom-Mage]

The Dragon Heist part was too accurate, right down to the sticky notes. My window had sticky notes on it for months.

[@Lordbuttermilk876]

Man, that broom of flying one hurt

[@HallowedKeeper_]

I agree

[@tuckerwilliams849]

The Master Oogway part hit too close to home. A players friend joined my Curse of Strahd campaign literally playing as Big Chungus

[@Dunybrook]

I wish I did anything as entertaining as this as a player. Mostly I suffer from having this irresistible compulsion to do the most boring thing ever only to realize latter on how I missed every adventure hook.

[@archersfriend5900]

Make a character with an adventurous and out going personality.

[@a_wild_Kirillian]

Yeah, your character should probably have some flaws that drive the action a lot. Make them want something that will bring some sort of trouble. And if you're not sure whenever to engage in them: roll your dice. Maybe even everytime you encounter a trigger. Basically, GURPS' disadvantages.

[@Belphegorite]

Hi half of my gaming group! Say hi to the other half that has the irresistible compulsion to do the most non-sensical stuff while also ignoring every single adventure hook for me!

[@doinyourmom7236]

@@archersfriend5900 Maybe they don't like to play characters like that. Lord knows i don't.

[@mrosskne]

If your character had goals you wouldn't have to rely on "hooks".

[@chrissugg968]

The last skit, if my players were having that conversation with no input from me I would be so, so, so happy and be taking notes from their suspicions.

[@TransGuyShane]

This had me laughing so hard lol I dmed for a party that took 9+ sessions to get out of a basement because they kept going back to rooms they already checked to check more 😑 the basement was their point of entry, didn't even make it to the 3 floor mansion upstairs 😑 😐

[@alyero6341]

And there wasnt an earthquake which started to collapse the basement starting from the back by session 5? I'm not for much railroading but admirable patience on the dms side lmao

[@TransGuyShane]

@@alyero6341 it was a two person group and ended up finding a way to make all my enemies into npcs lol we now have Brian the brain (in a jar) , Rusty (the not so Rusty anymore animated armour) and a construct made of multiple races called Paige Turner 😅 It was super fun and we haven't played in a while due to our health issues but next time it happens I will defo do something like that haha 😆 I was like a second time dm and I enjoy the exploring and the weird stuff that happens when I let them do it so I'm fine with it as long as they are lol. Brian now has a fun fedora and a bumbag on the jar and the construct has some none ragged clothing and they basically found everything ever in the basement lol so they are set for the rest when we eventually play again ♡ I got to use my pc Argh Stickyfeet a purple grung as an npc so that was also very fun ♡ *edit* oh they also have befriended 2 blink dogs , so the companion cat is delighted 😄 lol

[@limaTheNoob]

I mean, the DM has to be willing to let that happen. Otherwise it's just "yeah, you check the room again for 10 minutes, you find nothing new" and move on. If the DM asked for checks and whatnot every time they went back, the DM wanted to have that as session content

[@TransGuyShane]

@@limaTheNoob each time they rechecked a room it was for a reason, like they found a prisoner and took them to the storage room to see if their possessions were salvageable or they found the key to that door that was locked etc ♡ I had mapped everything out and knew what was going to be where and I knew who was playing so it wasn't like I didn't expect it. I mean I didn't expect 9 sessions lol I didn't expect them to find the bad guys exit tunnel and use it as their entry point but here we are lol The games were fun for everyone involved and that's what matters right ♡

[@leeryarch3523]

The Patrick Bateman moment at 3:08 is priceless. Excellent video.

[@miniwhiffy3465]

4:09 oh god

[@Yutah1981]

the 1st one - wait, the DM only NOW first hears what his player's character is? Well, he deserves it then.

[@pathalenvivaldi7811]

Oh I feel those last two, I feel those last two so much, and I kinda love when the last one in particular happens, as stupid as it sounds. It's heartening to see the group trying so hard... if in such a discouraging and despairing for me way. :D

That last part is actually dream came true for me.

[@torgranael]

I was legitimately concerned about the DM Jacob's safety when Ad-bard Jacob threw the axe. Not that the character might get hurt, that the other actor might get hurt. Your acting to too good.

[@stormthrush37]

"Use your words!" "Let me _axe_ you a question!"

[@Eisenwulf666]

This is literally every campaign i ever mastered, ever. It's uncanny. At one point in one campaign i started yelling at my players out of pure frustration:" Are you actually trolling me? Did you all had an aneurism i'm not aware of? What is wrong with you? It's not rocket science, it's not even a complicated plot. This is basically a puppet show without the puppets! You literally could not miss all the clues you were given, it's all been obvious from day 1.This is a published module, there are actual factual children who understood what was going on and finished it Why are we doing this then? I have better stuff to do, you should have too. " (i've had a bad week)

[@Belphegorite]

Had a moment like this with my players after an hour wasted checking the same door, table, and lack of windows for the 800th time. "There are no windows! None! Just a locked door, a table, and a desk you all refuse to investigate." Players (in unison): "Wait, there's a desk?" "Uh, did I not mention the desk? Shit... so there's also a desk in the corner..." So I'm the worst DM ever, but on the bright side my friends aren't so unforgivably stupid that I have to quit being friends with them.

[@Dreamer98-l9t]

Rude

[@Eisenwulf666]

@@Dreamer98-l9t i know, i apologised many times after that evening, but bloody hell, sometimes you just have to say it XD

[@luminous3558]

Its a player debuff, you just temporary become very paranoid and cautious to the point that your brain doesnt work anymore. Also a lot of stuff is a lot less obvious to someone who hasn't read the module due to how everyone envisions the events in their own mind with their own perspective. People just get odd ideas in their brain from having weird first impressions when they are presented with the scenario at hand.

[@WexMajor82]

And then there's me, happy that my players remembered that those fresh corpses they found in the tomb, was the precedent expedition. Well, one of them did, but it's enough!

[@doodlegarbage6769]

Now imagine this, but all of the players and the DM are like this.

[@timothywhitney6307]

I love this video! Please continue to make this series! As a forever DM I relate to so much of what you show us in these clips. Thank you for this humor!

[@lasonris8934]

3:26 I only did this once to describe how much better the current group was "It went differently for us last time but this is so much cooler!"

[@KareemFloat]

for the tortle incident.. "a ghost ship calmly approaches floating from and through the mist of barovia. as it nears, you can faintly see writing on the bow of the ship. -roll perception- upon squinting and focusing your eyes you can make out the writing, the ship is called HMS Beagle. as the ship approaches you can hear wails, screams, and cries for help from the ship. as it nears you can make out some of the cries for help as the passengers begging for food, a scrap, or just a whiff of food. tortle, -roll for stealth and perception-. as you try to hide the crew spots you and the ship speeds up and nears and that's where you notice it. hundreds of giant turtle and tortoise shells on the deck, lining the guard rails, on top the cannons, as helmets, shield and even as armor. the captain "Charloth Roberthar Darwineth" sends his crew of ghostly, starving, sailors to grab what they see before them, as it's just their luck as they just stumbled upon their most sought after and nearly extinct prize, the Gala'pagoth the Colossal Tortle."