🧙 The Secret Art of Game Mastery! Get decades of GM experience in one book! - www.kickstarter.com/projects/thedmlair/the-secret-art-of-game-mastery?ref=77qgbg 💖 Support us on Patreon and get Lair Magazine (5e and PF2 GM resources) and other rewards! www.patreon.com/thedmlair ~~more information on topics discussed in this video~~ The 3 Pillars of a Successful D&D Game ua-cam.com/video/dg_pIJoDXJE/v-deo.html The Ultimate Encounter Creation Guide ua-cam.com/video/bKqD2g7T7Nw/v-deo.html 9 Ways to Improve Treasure & Loot in Dungeons & Dragons ua-cam.com/video/cqWQ5nqLT2U/v-deo.html Thieves Abound PF2 Campaign ua-cam.com/play/PLo4-n9V0bKIUOBdgLo4CCa_At7-RG36uO.html How to Make Epic Boss Fights in D&D Part 1 ua-cam.com/video/uufG7zVE3nA/v-deo.html How to Make Epic Boss Fights in D&D Part 2 ua-cam.com/video/qoWr6PMPlhg/v-deo.html
1. 0:16 A compelling story 2. 4:15 A good plot hook 3. 6:08 An intriguing villain 4. 8:55 A subservient lieutenant 5. 10:53 A twist 6. 12:59 enemies that do more than just attack 7. 15:21 A piece of lore 8. 17:04 Balance among the three pillars 9. 20:57 Interesting encounters and combats 10. 22:06 Variety of encounter difficulty 11. 23:15 Escalation and rising action 12. 24:29 Climax and boss fight 13. 25:28 Resolution 14. 26:44 Rewards 15. 28:18 Stakes for the world 16. 29:46 Stakes for the characters
Oh ya. Forgot something. I never do a standard "random encounter" table. I use what I like to call "scouts". They are random in a sense, sure, but they are usually smallish groups that must be dealt with quickly, or they run and get friends. Great for tension. Sometimes it's not a small group of things. Instead it's just a big critter nosing around looking for dinner. It's best used during a normal encounter, and doesn't care which side it eats. Great for livening things up. Honorable mention: Rolling dice behind the screen for no reason, pretend to study them for a second, and say "hmm" quietly. Usually this leads to someone saying "Oh great". But nothing really happens.
I like to use the plot map method of making my adventures and campaigns, get all the players to give you a backstory, preferably open ended and a little vague, and then work out ways of linking the back stories together with each other but also with the overarching story, that way the characters have stakes in each other and the story
Monsters should use treasure items against the PCs whenever possible. Also, when the use of magic items is demonstrated by NPCs, it advances player knowledge about those items a bit, rather than leaving them as mysterious cyphers in need of identification. =^[.]^=
I love watching your video's while putting together/planning new adventures for my step-son. He's got really good "theater of the mind" but loves having physical maps and tokens he geeks out about. So while printing maps, cutting out paper tokens, enemy sheets and planning, just having it playing in the background, and listening, while doing the other work I constantly get new idea's. He loves using "home brew" characters. Making a back story of how a 5 Nights at Freddy's clone character meets my character "King Kick Ass" (Yes, I stole that from Robot Chicken), or my friends classic wizard can be hard sometimes. Listening to your "Old Chimera" character on our new campaign I've been planning. Trying to make a new beginning was confusing me until I heard that. Now I have my opening.. (Opening) In this world, an old dragon who's life force that is the source of the mage's power realizes his dragon, and his power, are at an end. The dragon only has one, at most two, hours of life left. The mage (who has been the protector of this world) will not be able to protect the people against this threat any longer, so he makes one last hail marry spell opening up a dimensional rift in time and space pulling said characters into his world. The characters, when warped in, will see a large dragon as it dies being comforted by the mage. The characters will see the dragon take it's last breath as it's life force disappears as it's body starts to turn to ash. The mage stumbles, dropping a piece of paper as the nose of the dragon he was holding crumbles in his hands. The Mage lifts his hands and see's it starting to turn to ash as well. He reaches out towards the adventures, his arm crumbling as it moves, the mage says (Clue #1), "I'm sorry for the sacrifice one of you must make." He helplessly gazes into their eyes as the blackness spreads to his face, before the blackness engulfs him, the mage's last words are a plea to save his world. Now, Only a black ashy figure stands where he once stood, his last words echo's through the chamber. Once the echoing stops, it collapses into a pile of dust leaving no trace he, or a dragon, ever existed. They will have to adventure to learn the land and try to figure out who the main villain is before it's too late and hopefully find a way back home. Only by adventuring and exploring will they find a way to make it back home. If they don't adventure and find it, none of them will make it back home, but, If they make it to the end, AND they found the way. They will possibly have to make a critical choice(s), 1 person may have to stay behind, be greedy and let the world die, attempt to save yourselves and this world, or leave the world to fate. As it takes one person outside the circle to cast the spell (the Mage, a 5th person, originally cast it) as the person casting the spell can not be inside the circle, as the final words spoken must be spoken after the dimensional rift has enclosed on the others. If the final words are not spoken at this time, the spell ends up sending those stuck inside into oblivion. (Clue #4)comes from the final boss as he dies. "Fools, ( he laughs as he coughs blood), With the Mage gone, only I could get you all home." The final clue (clue #5) will be hidden from them until just before they enter the area they will find the final riddle engraved on the door. "4 have entered, that took 5 to achieve, if only 4 you have, 1 will not leave." Why couldn't they just ask a towns person? Well, only a person of magical abilities, or one of those affected by the spell, may reverse it. Seeing as how the Mage died at the beginning, and if the group killed the boss, who was the only other enemy with magical abilities able to perform it and get them all home. (Clue #3) comes from interacting with the towns people at the beginning to learn that, in this world, only those effected by the magic, or one of magical abilities, may reverse the spells. This is a good backup clue if your adventurer's don't explore the starting area so you can give them a second chance to figure out how to get home, or if they find the paper the mage dropped, but not the book to put it together. They could possibly figure this out with the towns people's help. (Clue #2) comes IF your observant and search your starting area, as the paper the mage dropped was part of the spell you find to get you back home, I like this clue because it gives the adventurers two paths. If they are avid explorer's they could find the ripped paper dropped by the mage and by being observant, notice a spell book in the corner and put the two sections together in the book right away, giving them a heads up on the fate that awaits one of them and instant meaning to the mages words. By doing this, They have multiple paths. Either be greedy and convince the boss to cast the spell to send them home and he can take over this world. Beat the boss within an inch of his life, try to force him to cast the spell and hope he doesn't screw them over. This is where a saving throw by the DM could determine the fate of that world, as being greedy adventurer's could end with negative results against other people, Bad throw, he lives and takes over the world but your home, Good throw, he bleeds out and dies effectively saving this world and getting everyone home, or you may not want to leave the lives of millions to fate and just kill him, ultimately one of you being stuck in this world (which might not be a bad thing), getting your friends home, but saving millions. If you don't explore, hate exploring, or just kill everything you see, the fate of 1 is sealed unknowingly.
The surprise twist of this episode is that there really is 17 tips!! Ironically one of the number 3s should have been the twist, since the number was repeated twice. You know, since Luke apparently can’t count😂
Your channel has been very helpful to me, I am currently playing in a campaign my friend is DMing, but I am the go to DM for our group, so now I got more to plan our next adventure. Point is, so far I have just run official modules and longest campaign only went until lvl 8, so now I am planning a very ambituous campaign that I hope goes at least until lvl 10.
Three pillars to the game: Combat, Exploration, & Social Interaction. Personally, I think puzzles are also a pillar. I try to balance all four together.
@@MJ-jd7rs What I came to say. Puzzles have several issues imo. 1) Getting the right difficulty is really hard. Either they are obscenely easy (which breaks verisimilitude and doesnt provide a sense of accomplishment) or they are way too hard (which grinds the game to a halt). 2) puzzles are not really group activities, more often than not one player will take the lead on solving the puzzle and everyone else will sit around. 3) returning to verisimilitude, puzzles almost never make sense in the context of the world. If I have a vault I do not make the key something that any asshole with enough time and wits can figure out. I keep the key in a seperate place so that vault remains secure because I do not want anyone getting my stuff. Puzzles can make sense in the context of trials or rites of passage but if it is just a dungeon, you begin to wonder why the gold dragon locked its treasture behind a door that opens with the answer to a first grade riddle. This all being said, there are puzzles that can work and some tables may love them. But every GM should be aware of the obstacles that exist to making a good puzzle in a TTRPG.
It’s so hard to balance them but I implement all three to the extremes such as unique NPCs that might not or have big impacts in the world, also when I do combat I put in bad guys that have knowledge of there actions and my players might want to talk to them. And for exploration I use a variety of colorful description words and sometimes how the wold goes on outside of the players eyes that might just get seen with either passive or a straight perception check.
@@MJ-jd7rs Puzzles are not exploration. Exploring is exploration. Moving from one area to another and seeing more places. I get requests from some of my players to add more of them to the games I run, and I haven't received any complaints about them. I've only had someone skip one of my puzzles once, but there was a good reason for that. (I underestimated how stress-inducing that dungeon's gimmick would be for the party.) So I have not experienced having players that find puzzles tedious. Personally, I try to make puzzles that have actual physical components. Things the party can physically hold in their hands and move around... (Or if it's a digital game, I make the pieces of the puzzle into minis in Roll20 that the players can move around.) Occasionally a puzzle I come up with doesn't work well that way so I keep it to descriptions, but _most_ of them work like that. If your players are finding your puzzles tedious, maybe try making one that's more physical and see if they enjoy that more.
Great tips! I definitely shy away from exploration too much but I've been making an effort to include it more. I just get nervous when it's time to describe environments.
Easiest way to think about describing things is from the point of view of your senses. Sight, sound, touch possibly taste if your players lick things a lot. Don't be afraid of repeating words. You don't need to come up with new words for darkness or mist or the smell of flowers if you can't think of any.
If you do not want something specific, find a stock photo that is sort of what you were thinking and decide that this is now the view they see. And then describe the other senses. Visual information is easy to access, but not deep. It is immediate, and unless illusions, darkness or fog play a part, it is near infallible. Visual is the bare minimum. That alone is not good. Sounds can be cryptic. Sounds can get distorted. Sounds can come from far, muffled, with uncertainty of their exact place of origin. A scream right next to you in an eerily quiet, empty town sets the tone right away. A creaking noise in the night can send shivers down our spines, while seeing a creaking door will only make us put it on the backlog of things to fix in the house. Sounds are good. Smells are better. Smells linger, they stick. A tavern smelling of freshly baked bread will feel like home. A nobles mansion smelling like food gone bad will make your party be on edge. Why does it smell like something rotten? What could be the issue? (or on some parties cause them to outright murderhobo everyone on the mansion... know your players) To set a scene ask yourself, if you were standing there, what do you see, hear, and smell? Is there light and what is the source? Is it unusually cold or hot? (no need to describe if its normal room temperature) Humid or dry? (again no need to describe if its nothing of note) For important scenes i do this exercise during the preparation, but answering these questions with simple words will set most scenes.
You need to be minimalistic in describing, use senses better than visions in poetry, players forget what you say while describing in less than 5 seconds, add details only when necessary and when players ask for these. When you design a dungeon you follow a theme, or more, so you have lots of common elements in the rooms, you just present the differences, the furniture, the apparent role of the room in the dungeon, to paraphrase Simon Sinek, start with why.
I get what you mean by enemies just attacking. In one encounter I opened with a sneak attack of catapult and, well, separated a goblin overseer from his head. The ones he was overseeing didn't attack, they freaked out and fled. Had another where a shaman cast an eclipse to give his allies and advantage against us, so he became one of our primary targets, we managed to break his concentration and reverse things, giving THEM disadvantage, and ended up incinerating him as he tried to cast the spell again.
I think this is great advice! One thing I try to do, is think of at least three different ways for the players to solve a problem. They usually don't end up doing any of the three, but it is helpful to think of. It helps the GM react to different scenarios and prevents the GM expecting the players to come up with whatever answer popped into their heads. The players aren't psychic and aren't supposed to be.
+Ausferius, writes _"One thing I try to do, is think of at least three different ways for the players to solve a problem."_ I go one step further, I don't worry about how the players are going to solve the problem at all. I setup the scenario as the NPCs would set it up and then let the players approach it in whatever manner they want. Sometimes they find a "flaw" in my plans and overrun the baddies easily (and get to congratulate themselves for being "just that good"), other times they end up running into brisk walls over and over. _"They usually don't end up doing any of the three [...]"_ That's my point, why worry about it when they players probably aren't going to do it any of your ways anyway?
Forced evolution plothooks constantly popped up in the past for my older plots, villains wanting to forcibly enhance themselves, a monster type, etc. were constant as the vinaigrette drive but I wildly varied the methods or reasons they were doing it. The players usual got the classic start of getting good at beating natural threats and arena fights, then some externalised or foreign body stepped into the bigger picture gradually, messing with stuff until they got discovered and yeah it varied how involved the player characters were with that villain from there. One villain Mike is creator and enslaved their followers and made a war proclamation against the second home of the player, and the player used a battle of wits and patience, to which the player totally destroyed that villain. Then discovered a much deeper plot that never got expanded upon, as life went elsewhere.
If I'm not running a monster 100% as written, like if I added lair actions or special abilities or a magic item, I don't run it from the book. You can copy-paste it and put the magic item right in the stat block. Instead of "longsword" their action is now "flaming sword" and does an extra 2d6 fire damage, can't miss it. Never forget a magic item again!
This is where I differ as my two current campaigns have gone more classic and ditched the central BBEG. There's a world and each quest has an individual story but there is no epic, world-saving, beat-the-central big bad guy type of stuff.
@@theDMLair I think the best approach is the rouge's gallery approach multiple reacquiring colorful villains and wikid factions like a long running comic book series.
Using the age of the creatures or people in an encounter is a good idea, but the books only mention differences in the age of dragons. I had my party tracking what they thought was a small creature and did not figure out that it was a child of a larger species. Surprise!
I give my player's characters ties to the bbeg's lieutenants. It works. They have recently stated that will enjoy them getting to kick their asses. They are invested.
You are the best bro! Thanks for your videos. I'm restarting play D&D, and your tips are very useful! I'm brazilian and learning English too with you. LOL
DM: You can interact with the bad guys in all kinds of ways. You can talk to them, sleep with them, empathize with them, convince them... Players: I shoot him! And I cast a fireball! I swing my axe!
the first point is very easy to extrapolate into excellence if you put the work in. "the big bad is A, he is going to place b, so he can enact change C, by taking action D, for which he needs macguffin E, which they are retreiving by taking action F. and to set up his masterplan he needs to have things G, H, I and K happen before taking action D" thats the basics of making a baddies masterplan. but it doesnt just have to be the BBEG. i do this for each players background enemy as well, then for each faction that has real power in the setting, and use these other NPCs in the BBEG plan. either make the players enemies Leitenants for the BBEG, or have two factions goals clash and arrange for the players to be there. it makes everything effect every player and ties the whole thing into one story. even the side quests.
Much appreciating 2 things here: 1) Mention of Savage Worlds (such an excellent and simple to learn system!) 2) Emphasis away from combat (3 pillars). I have gone to an entirely 3 pillars xp system where my players choose their own values and short term goals matching those pillars that encourages their character's personality development, and drive not only story progression, but character progression, and inform my plot development of the campaign.
I think I had to discard most of the tips because a lot of them hinge on very D&D-style BBEG-behind-the-scenes adventures, whereas my group tends to prefer stories where the issues are systematic (oppressive laws, overly dogmatic religious control etc) where opponents are more nuanced and not necessarily combat-oriented. There's usually no overarching story, but there are factions with goals (and NPCs within those factions that agree or disagree with the goals) and those react to the players' actions. It's not clear-cut, there's no BBEG to kill, and killing might not even be the best course of action to take in some cases. There've even been times where they've had to choose between 2 bad choices based on which was less bad in the long term. All that seems to interest my group a lot more than the clearcut "there's a BBEG and we kill it and deal with the next one". Every time you mentioned something about "interesting villain" and the example given was a combat-based thing, I felt mildly disappointed.
One of the besf dnd fights we had was the most recent session. The players (who none have dark vision) were fighting a carriom crawler in a little flooded cave. Narrow, awkward and wet. The carriom crawler was attacking from the ceilimg and then they attacked it enough for him to fall. He hit the water and doused their torches. On top of that the paralysis was very threatening if they wemt under water especially because the others wouldn't know. Almost a tpk, only the fighter was alive without being paralyzed. The warlock was paralyzed having put the bug in a chokehold and basically used it as a tripod to not drown.
even when running a sandbox, I keep track of a background plot involving various factions and their pursuit of various goals. The plot might not be affected by the players much (depending on their choices), but the world changes around them regardless.
One thing great about pf2e you touched on (that I’d like to elaborate on!) is the “geriatric chimera”. Pf2e has a real rule for increasing and decreasing the difficulty of monsters with their weak/elite system, and it’s great fun! No more guessing about what will create a good challenge for your party. Creature too high level? Want some grunts for your boss fight? Weak monsters! Need an elite version of a mook to command the rest? Elite! I’m about to throw a gorgon at my level 4 pf2e party, and making it weak should do just enough to lower it to their current level and gear.
There is a trick I learned on how to remember that your NPC/villain has something special, a skill, a spell, an artefact etc. For whatever reasons and because of the system I mostly play stuff like magical items are often rare, except for the really weak ones. So it is quite natural to forget about such an item during the "stressful" combat... I have started to make simple pictures to represent such items. In the beginning, I drew them on the notes for the NPC which I use during the game, thus I am always reminded whenever I look at his stats, reduce the HP etc. Makes it harder to forget when you constantly see it. Later I used blank cards from Amazon or another store to draw the picture on one side and the stats on the other, then I fixed that card to the character notes and if the PCs loot said item, they have a card for it...
I am trying to make sure I sprinkle in optional rewards around for clever adventures. So add some non-critical loot or other rewards and make them non-central to the plot so the players are on their toes to try to go the extra mile. Contrary to what was said I find all or nothing play with lives on the line should be reserved for only the rarest of fights. When characters are dropping like flies and then of course being dragged back to town for resurrection (or later just brought back between fights) then death loses its meaning and just becomes a time out for that player. Time out is never fun! The game should always try to be fun for everyone. Instead tension is better built for most things with an array of stakes. Instead of 0 or 1 give the adventures a 0-10 range of success. Make the 10 really difficult but a 6 or 7 should be easy enough to obtain if they aren’t just being foolish. And constantly change the stakes, sometimes winning is defeating the foe, sometimes winning is just surviving or getting away with key loot or knowledge. Make sure the players understand what the win condition is though, so they set expectations appropriately.
The Attack, Attack, Attack thing is tricky because players with often use talk as a way to try to set themselves up for combat which is super metagame-y. 3 of my players are very experienced DM's. As a result many of my enemies are "homebrew" in that they don't exist in the monster manual, but will probably borrow stats from something that does. It makes finding tokens challenging, but it also means they now have to use checks to see what they might now about the creature rather than meta knowledge. I also often take spells and abilities and reskin them so they are statistically identical to a normal spell, but different. It is more work for me, but my players enjoy it. Items are also tough to homebrew. My favorite recent one is a huge shield that lowers movement by 5, but reduces ranged attack damage by 2 and also has a "shotgun" attached over the handle that can be tilted up and fired in a cone for damage similar to a dragonborn's breath weapon and requires a short rest to reload. My player loves the thing.
I am currently in a campaign where the DM is used to running one shots and it had a bit of rocky start with encounter difficulty as he was manually adjusting the encounters but didn't seem to have realized the difference in pacing in campaigns (ie, you are expected to have a long rest or equivalent between one shots).
As you guessed it is true that auto play is on But as long as you keep playing on my feed I refuse to tern it of You have saved me so many years of learning and so many hours of waisfull prep And I'm Shure you'll continue to save me many more
I usually find that the magic item i give bad guys is just worst then their normal abilities. (its hard to forgo 3 attacks for one item activation) and if players get item then its good again.
Depending on the system (ik pathfinder does this a lot), monsters sometimes have stronger abilities and attack modifiers than an equal-level PC would. Magic items, in this case, is not balanced against their power level. For weapons, this is simple to solve: you can just jack up their Attack mod higher. For the 3-action activation: if this is PF, im not sure if anyone, PC included, would really want a 3-action magic item if it's not extremely powerful?
Yelling at Luke again - So, another playing group had a TPK. I get it, a group can TPK because the players did something stupid. However, I'm noticing every campaign Luke runs a TPK happens. I'm not buying it anymore the players did something stupid, or at least all of them. A TPK can happen. It's sad when it does, but that's the game. However, when there are lot of TPKs something is wrong. I cannot give a definitive number of X PC deaths means the DM is a Killer DM i.e. unbalanced encounter design where X - 1 means everything is fine. However, TPKs are not normal, so to speak. I'm not saying they should never happen nor PC death should never happen, but when a TPK is happening every campaign yes, I will question encounter design. The common denominator here is the DM. No, I don't hate Luke. His DMing advice is well thought out, well presented, and helpful, but having so many TPKs something is in error. In my opinion of course.
Try to move your angle of view here. What chance should a party have to complete a session "winning" all the combats (not the single encounters)? A DM have to face this question. If the answer is 100% all the process of building characters and play the fights is empty, you always win, end of story. This get boring quite soon. So let's lower the chance of success to let's say 95%. This encourages the players to bring interesting builds, to pick good spells, to build characters that synergize ecc... and this brings fun to the table but... it's an average tpk every 20 sessions, raw math here. This means that probably if you run a long campaign you will "probably" have to face multiple TPK. One year of weekly sessions it's an average of 2 and half TPK even if you just give the players a little chance to fail (5%). So basically it's TPK or boredom tradeoff.
I've been playing D&D since 1989. The number of TPKs I've been in is 2, once in 2E and once in 3E, the latter because the DM did it on purpose to end the campaign. I called him out on it. The possibility of it happening is worth discussing, but I categorically reject it should be common or expected.
I unfortunately don't have a group to play with:( But I have created 6 different lvl 1 characters in case I found a group. Anyway, last year I looked at possibly being a GM for D&D at my local library. But no one signed up to play:( Anyhow, I created a "House Rule" that makes TPK and even Individual Player Character Deaths nearly impossible. But still some consequences can happen if the players mess up/have bad rolls of the dice. Basically an adapted version of videogame "Fable Series" results of falling in combat.
I started a game where death is possible, but not permanent death, unless it is party wipe. This is very intentional because the players are playing as themselves (isekai basically). If you die the players have to find a way to revive you. This is still discouraged for 2 reasons though 1. The players may get annoyed having to do extra work to revive you 2. You can still do things as a ghost, but are more limited so it wouldn't be as fun, so DON'T DIE.
I actually set up plot hooks in the lore itself.. I have a number of natural and supernatural conflicts that have taken place over the centuries in my setting,, as well as a global threat called the blight that affects the lands and minds of all people.. kinda cool to watch my players take the lore they"ve learned about over years of campaigns in my setting and create while new characters out if it..
Sometimes, a Murder Hobo one shot or campaign is a fun time and clears out the drama from the main campaign. So, it's OK to have a game session or two where all adversaries do is attack.
My last game i did a uh "state of the word" kinda thing and players took them as plot hooks When really only one was really a plot hook so now I have to go build an entire other country and create an adventure.
Could you give some advice, do a video on, finding a good gaming group? I was playing under a particular DM for the last 30 years. He recently passed away. I'm feeling rather lost.
So you are essentially saying that variety is the spice of life. What else has spice, CHILI! And where can you find a variety of chilies? A chili cook off! 1: (Interesting Story/Goal) Their goal is to taste them all, but also to see if they can handle how hot they get!. 2: (Motivation)Their motive is to win a bet that they are able to try them all without wimping out. 3: (Plot Hook) Where should you have them start? They need to get to a different Land, but don’t have enough money to get there. So they have to ask one of the characters super rich boss, Charles Van Scorchers, who wants to make a haunted house theme park. Good job Luke in your ability to count😆 3: (BBEG) The Big Bad is head of the city watch Sargent Wiggum’s, who makes the hottest of the hot chili. He makes it with the (not so) secret ingredient, The Merciless Peppers of Quetzalacatenango 🌶️ 4: (Lieutenant) But first they need see if they can handle last years winner in the spiciest category Sargent Wiggum’s son Ralfus. He named this Brew “It Tastes Like Burning” 5: (Twist) When they go to the booth of The Nettles of Flanders expecting a real challenge, they find out that the 5 alarm chili is really just a 2 alarm chili. 6: (More than Attacking) Every Chili doesn’t need to be spicy, it also should have some interesting tastes to it. “Is that cinnamon I detect?” 7: (Lore) Did you know that the super hot peppers that Sargent Wiggum uses are also called the Guatemalan Insanity Peppers that are picked by the inmates of an insane asylum?! 8: (3Pillars)You should have a balance between talking to the cooks, exploring the interesting tastes, and trying find ways to combat the spiciness of the different chili’s. 9: (Interesting Terrain) It would be boring if every Chili is just served from a crock pot. Sargent Wiggum has a cauldron to serve them with and a spoon with serrated edges. 10: (Variety challenges) Make sure you have a good variety of chilis. Some players like to eat different levels of spiciness. You should have mild, medium, spicy and super hot ones. 11: (Progression) You should have them progress from the mild to the super hot. They need to be able to try them all and should still be voting for favorites in each category. 12: (Boss Battle) The final tasting of Wiggum’s insanity hot chili should be very challenging and the players might need to be creative to win, like coating their tongues in wax. 13: (Resolution) After winning their bet they find out that their is a national chili tasting challenge that you can win some big prizes like a new 70” TV for their Dungeon. 14: (Reward) If they win their bet they get to go to the Land of Itchy and Scratchy. 15: (Consequence for the world) If they fail, they have to stay the night in a haunted house. When they do they will share that the house is actually a mimic and kill it. This saves the town from being destroyed by Van Scorchers to make a theme park. If they win and go to the land of Itchy and Scratch, they will potentially save a lot of lives from metal golems. 16: (Make it Personal) If they the fail they will also be laughing stalk of their town!
These are some great points but I would disagree that they have to be in every adventure. Definitely every campaign but but too many adventures aren't structured in such a way as to incorporate all those things. Overall it's definitely a good checklist to make sure that you're providing your players a fun exciting experience. I'm just coming back to Dungeons & Dragons after a more than 30 year hiatus so I've been listening to a lot of your videos and I really appreciate them.
My players were up against a vampire necromancer who is trying to use this amulet that will let him harness the power of all the hells and his lieutenant was a character from one of my player's backstories who had been turned into a vampire servant.
Regarding #6: I have groups that are going to thank you for the free round of combat they get against enemies who don't immediately grab their weapons and start fighting. I guess we can just give them that free round of combat every encounter...
honestly: enemies always fighting makes a certain amount of sense. if you're chillin' at your house and a group of heavily armed men kick down the door; fighting seems like the only real option. it's clear they're not here to talk; or play tidily winks. So yeah they're there to fight you; you have two options: fight or surrender. So if you want to give players the option to talk to monsters; put them in situation where the monsters are not being forced to fight the players... that doesn't mean combat can't break out mind you. Also make sure the monsters surrender when they're outnumbered or become aware that they're outclassed that prompts the players and gives them the chance to talk.
I'm currently making a campaign where it's open world and you can join pirates bandits colts bounty hunters and more and do whatever you want but eventually the rising war between the rebellion and tyranny group and another group takes over the story because it's going to keep going in the background whether they interact with it or not and eventually all the groups that they could have joined instead of the rebellion will eventually have to take a side of that war. Is there specific advice for choose your own adventure things that have an overarching evil that takes over.
Hi! I'm writing a campaign based on the Lord of the Rings 5e book, and I would like some advice on what to do for the Famous Weapons and Armour area of the story, I would like my Player-Heroes to discover it but I need like a dramatic accidental way they can discover it. Do you have any suggestions? I'm open to anything.😁 Great video by the way.😋
Okay good video - good explaining but my god my adhd did not let me stay focused for each explanation had to keep going back like huh I missed it again 😂
@theDMlair . Hey Luke! I know the Kickstarter is ended (congrats btw), but I'd really like to purchase the digital secrets bundle and the link to order goes to your website, but there's nothing available there. How can i get my hands on these pdfs?
In regards to #6, "enemies that do more than just attack" I have some questions that hopefully someone else can answer or at least relate to my experience. I learned to just have my enemies/BBEG just attack as soon as possible. Otherwise, they get pummeled after one action later in the initiative order. Each time I try to have them open with conversation, threats, negotiation, ect it doesn't work. I hype up an enemy over the course of sessions and finally when the opportunity to learn about them happens and I am having them explain things the players or give necessary information, the players always attack in the middle of conversation. So. Many. Damn. Times. I can't tell if they want to defeat the trope of the enemy having a monologue because they dislike it in media, if they want a tactical advantage, or they just want to skip to the action. It frustrates me because they HAVE negotiated, spoken to, and done other things. But when it's an enemy, it's always attack them in the middle of social interactions. I spend time analyzing and writing the rationale and motivations for my enemies. Rarely those things do actually become relevant but most of the time it turns into interrupting and spoiling the moment. I would like to have the grand epic moment sometimes as DM (largely playing a forever DM). Maybe my players find D&D most fun when it isn't fun for me. I can't force my players to care so I try to weave the narrative with a bit more tightness. I try to withhold JUST enough information or make things JUST weird enough but they don't seem to be that curious. How can I make this work better without me railroading them? Is there something that I'm missing? Am I reading into this too much? I appreciate anyone who can answer. Thank you.
@@theDMLair Love the Super Powers Compendium! Was able the to build the whole X-Men animated team for a "Necessary Evil" one-shot. worked very well and was lots of fun too!
I have an issue with one of my players is playing the equivilant of Hermione Granger in my campaign. His character (not the player) is ignoring plot hooks, so I have to rely on the other players to continue the story. One of his professors was murdered in my last session, which caused classes to be dismissed. His character's reaction is "oh well, that sucks...I'm wasting money in tuition to accept getting dragged out of class and having classes cancelled". I'm thinking about having a dragon destroy the college to encourage this character to explore the world.
I have been able to integrate high tension social interaction. The king of an entire nation wants to go on an "adventure" to find some important resources. Do you take him up on his request for help? How do you turn down royalty???
Newly arrived with a question… Where did the image of the twins come from? I recognized nearly all except that one. Recém chegado com uma pergunta… De onde veio a imagem dos gêmeos? Reconheci quase todos, menos aquele.
#3.5 Stop assuming an adventure requires a "villain" or "big bad". There are so many better ways to build an adventure around proactive rather than reactive PCs.
How do you balance using tactics and varied mobs and players skill in adapting to the situation. I do try and balance fights, taking into account players ability to adapt to new tactics and enjoyability. Although what usually happens is a fight where my players say I'm metagaming or just trying to kill the party. That's never my intention and I do understand I could just be the issue but looking for your advice here.
1) Tell your players "Word gets out. Do you think tales of your exploits don't travel the region? Do you think other bad guys don't hear about you?" 2) Simply tell your players YES, there is always some metagaming involved for the GM because it's MY JOB to create challenges for you. (Be thankful I take my role seriously and don't just toss together any old garbage.)
This is the most difficult challenge a DM faces, and it can change with the mood of your players. Sometimes the sorcerer is on top of their game and dishes out massive damage, other days they want to only use cantrips. My best advice is to ramp things up slowly and know your party's capabilities. Have a good mix of easy and hard fights. Also, have a talk with your players and build the trust up that you're intentions are to have fun by running a challenging game.
@@theDMLair so it should be more about setting expectations and being ok with someone being upset if things are not optimal for them. I'll keep trying to be fair and looking for advice from other dms. Although as long as a DM I strive to run the most entertaining and fair game I can I shouldn't worry?
You have to be aware of the pc's gear, abilities and spells in order to create interesting encounters, and consider the types of player at your table. It's good to give the pc's an easy win, but it's also good to throw something really quite challenging at them. I think it all boils down to managing expectations whilst entertaining the players (you are also a player, remember!).
Make your tactics regardless of the PC abilities and equipment. Smart monsters and NPCs will make smart decisions, they will attempt to identify dangers and look for opportunities. Monsters and creatures that operate on instinct will be very reactive and lurch about. This is what gaining experience as a DM is about. You're get there, just do what you need to to keep the story moving.
Vert good points. But GM's need to be careful when it comes to some of these points like the story, plot twist, and escalation. This is where Gam's go for out of conteol railroad. Everyone tries to become George RR Martin. Remember RPG is not a movie nor a novel. And the central theme revolves around the players. Not your NPC's.
"Why do you get to run this adventure?" "Because I'm the DM, that's why." "Why do you have so many books?" "Because I'm the DM, that's why." "How do you know what the gods are telling my player?" "Because I'm the DM, that's why." (And, yes, that has actually come up before. There was a player who tried to convince everyone that his god had given him a special quest and he was asking us, "How do I convince the DM that the gods have chosen my character to do this task and collect this item?" This wasn't a 1st level character, either.) "Why do I have to get you a slice of pizza?" "Because I'm the DM, that's why." 😁
Luke and others here, do you ever find that when you highlight alternative means of conflict resolution (stealth, talking, trickery, etc) to the players that they will then attempt to use the same strategy again and again and again ad naseum? For example, I find that once a party is able to negotiate successfully once they will do it everytime, and worse they will get upset when it doesnt work everytime. Moreover, I have struggled to find a way to get players to actually inquire and learn about the creatures they are trying to negotiate with. I do not think I have ever had a player ask an NPC what they want or what motivates them. So their negotiation attempts are almost always generic "help me and I will help you" or "oppose me and you will die". How have you communicated to players that alternative means of conflict resolution require just as much strategy and thought as combat, if not more strategy or thought than combat. And how have you handled players coming up with nonsense plans and then getting bent out of shape when NPCs dont act like Skyrim NPCs with all the situational awareness of a drowsy hamster.
my big bad guy is a ball of energy who turned himself into a mind flayer so he could feel and taste and touch and love, ultimately his wants turn him evil
Players also fall into the routine of "I attack". They should not make enemies a bag of HP. If you hate combat, you should not be playing D&D. Sounds like the balance needed to be in the werewolf fight. How did they TPK? All good adventures have good descriptions. Don't say "you see an orc".
My first TPK in my current campaign was also a werewolf. I designed the fight in mind that they would all be attacking it each turn. Instead, they decided to Scooby Doo it and split up which resulted in all of them getting picked off like a horror movie. It was hilarious for the whole group, but a shame that their fledgling characters died so soon.
@@halofornoobs93 - I like to warn my players in session 0 that splitting the party is a very bad idea, as the encounters are designed for the whole party to face together.
Anyone have any tips on widening my NPC creation range? Specifically women characters, it often feels outside of my expertise to create a well thought out and interesting female character. My players notice that whenever they meet a female NPC, it often just ends up pretty similar to everyone other girl they’ve met. I’ve been trying to create good ones but it just doesn’t seem to be clicking.
I have an NPC Female Character I created. She is a High Elf Woman who is essentially a Druid & Divination Wizard combined. She dresses in Faded Elegance with Hair Braided as a "crown" on her head. She is a traveling "Gypsy" who makes various Potions, Poisons, and Moonshine. She also can tell Fortunes (to an extent) by rolling "Bone Dice" and she seems 'Ageless'. She travels with a couple younger High Elves 1 is a Female Ranger and clearly looks like a Granddaughter of hers. The other is a young Male Bard who plays the Banjo and is the Husband of the Granddaughter. Basically combine aspects of the "Beverly Hillbillies" the old Woman being sort of based off "Grandma". As well as combining the Old Woman from the song "These Old Bones" by Dolly Parton.
Honestly, I just make male characters, sprinkle in a few feminine traits, and make them female. Outside of possible gender roles in your setting, there isn't a huge difference between the two. Don't overthink it.
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~~more information on topics discussed in this video~~
The 3 Pillars of a Successful D&D Game ua-cam.com/video/dg_pIJoDXJE/v-deo.html
The Ultimate Encounter Creation Guide ua-cam.com/video/bKqD2g7T7Nw/v-deo.html
9 Ways to Improve Treasure & Loot in Dungeons & Dragons ua-cam.com/video/cqWQ5nqLT2U/v-deo.html
Thieves Abound PF2 Campaign ua-cam.com/play/PLo4-n9V0bKIUOBdgLo4CCa_At7-RG36uO.html
How to Make Epic Boss Fights in D&D Part 1 ua-cam.com/video/uufG7zVE3nA/v-deo.html
How to Make Epic Boss Fights in D&D Part 2 ua-cam.com/video/qoWr6PMPlhg/v-deo.html
1. 0:16 A compelling story
2. 4:15 A good plot hook
3. 6:08 An intriguing villain
4. 8:55 A subservient lieutenant
5. 10:53 A twist
6. 12:59 enemies that do more than just attack
7. 15:21 A piece of lore
8. 17:04 Balance among the three pillars
9. 20:57 Interesting encounters and combats
10. 22:06 Variety of encounter difficulty
11. 23:15 Escalation and rising action
12. 24:29 Climax and boss fight
13. 25:28 Resolution
14. 26:44 Rewards
15. 28:18 Stakes for the world
16. 29:46 Stakes for the characters
Thank you!!
Thank u
Goat
You're the real MVP. I appreciate you saving me the time of this clickbait video. Literally nothing here that hasn't been said a million times.
thank you, so helpful.
Oh ya. Forgot something. I never do a standard "random encounter" table. I use what I like to call "scouts". They are random in a sense, sure, but they are usually smallish groups that must be dealt with quickly, or they run and get friends. Great for tension. Sometimes it's not a small group of things. Instead it's just a big critter nosing around looking for dinner. It's best used during a normal encounter, and doesn't care which side it eats. Great for livening things up. Honorable mention: Rolling dice behind the screen for no reason, pretend to study them for a second, and say "hmm" quietly. Usually this leads to someone saying "Oh great". But nothing really happens.
I try to do most of these.
I had a group in my 3.5 game convert a fire giant to their side and now he helps guard their stronghold.
Sweet! Great guard. :D
One of my past characters rescued a flesh golem. The retired character now runs a bar with a flesh golem in a purple pimp suit working as the bouncer.
I like to use the plot map method of making my adventures and campaigns, get all the players to give you a backstory, preferably open ended and a little vague, and then work out ways of linking the back stories together with each other but also with the overarching story, that way the characters have stakes in each other and the story
I tick off my players by having the monsters drink the potions of healing in the adventure. I still let them find the potions but it does throw them.
I am taking this idea. It will help speed up the party when they take too much time.
Lovely .. I see them finding the empty vials. 😂
same same
Monsters should use treasure items against the PCs whenever possible. Also, when the use of magic items is demonstrated by NPCs, it advances player knowledge about those items a bit, rather than leaving them as mysterious cyphers in need of identification. =^[.]^=
Let them find some empty bottles and some that haven't been used yet
I love watching your video's while putting together/planning new adventures for my step-son. He's got really good "theater of the mind" but loves having physical maps and tokens he geeks out about. So while printing maps, cutting out paper tokens, enemy sheets and planning, just having it playing in the background, and listening, while doing the other work I constantly get new idea's. He loves using "home brew" characters. Making a back story of how a 5 Nights at Freddy's clone character meets my character "King Kick Ass" (Yes, I stole that from Robot Chicken), or my friends classic wizard can be hard sometimes. Listening to your "Old Chimera" character on our new campaign I've been planning. Trying to make a new beginning was confusing me until I heard that. Now I have my opening.. (Opening) In this world, an old dragon who's life force that is the source of the mage's power realizes his dragon, and his power, are at an end. The dragon only has one, at most two, hours of life left. The mage (who has been the protector of this world) will not be able to protect the people against this threat any longer, so he makes one last hail marry spell opening up a dimensional rift in time and space pulling said characters into his world. The characters, when warped in, will see a large dragon as it dies being comforted by the mage. The characters will see the dragon take it's last breath as it's life force disappears as it's body starts to turn to ash. The mage stumbles, dropping a piece of paper as the nose of the dragon he was holding crumbles in his hands. The Mage lifts his hands and see's it starting to turn to ash as well. He reaches out towards the adventures, his arm crumbling as it moves, the mage says (Clue #1), "I'm sorry for the sacrifice one of you must make." He helplessly gazes into their eyes as the blackness spreads to his face, before the blackness engulfs him, the mage's last words are a plea to save his world. Now, Only a black ashy figure stands where he once stood, his last words echo's through the chamber. Once the echoing stops, it collapses into a pile of dust leaving no trace he, or a dragon, ever existed. They will have to adventure to learn the land and try to figure out who the main villain is before it's too late and hopefully find a way back home. Only by adventuring and exploring will they find a way to make it back home. If they don't adventure and find it, none of them will make it back home, but, If they make it to the end, AND they found the way. They will possibly have to make a critical choice(s), 1 person may have to stay behind, be greedy and let the world die, attempt to save yourselves and this world, or leave the world to fate. As it takes one person outside the circle to cast the spell (the Mage, a 5th person, originally cast it) as the person casting the spell can not be inside the circle, as the final words spoken must be spoken after the dimensional rift has enclosed on the others. If the final words are not spoken at this time, the spell ends up sending those stuck inside into oblivion. (Clue #4)comes from the final boss as he dies. "Fools, ( he laughs as he coughs blood), With the Mage gone, only I could get you all home." The final clue (clue #5) will be hidden from them until just before they enter the area they will find the final riddle engraved on the door. "4 have entered, that took 5 to achieve, if only 4 you have, 1 will not leave." Why couldn't they just ask a towns person? Well, only a person of magical abilities, or one of those affected by the spell, may reverse it. Seeing as how the Mage died at the beginning, and if the group killed the boss, who was the only other enemy with magical abilities able to perform it and get them all home. (Clue #3) comes from interacting with the towns people at the beginning to learn that, in this world, only those effected by the magic, or one of magical abilities, may reverse the spells. This is a good backup clue if your adventurer's don't explore the starting area so you can give them a second chance to figure out how to get home, or if they find the paper the mage dropped, but not the book to put it together. They could possibly figure this out with the towns people's help. (Clue #2) comes IF your observant and search your starting area, as the paper the mage dropped was part of the spell you find to get you back home, I like this clue because it gives the adventurers two paths. If they are avid explorer's they could find the ripped paper dropped by the mage and by being observant, notice a spell book in the corner and put the two sections together in the book right away, giving them a heads up on the fate that awaits one of them and instant meaning to the mages words. By doing this, They have multiple paths. Either be greedy and convince the boss to cast the spell to send them home and he can take over this world. Beat the boss within an inch of his life, try to force him to cast the spell and hope he doesn't screw them over. This is where a saving throw by the DM could determine the fate of that world, as being greedy adventurer's could end with negative results against other people, Bad throw, he lives and takes over the world but your home, Good throw, he bleeds out and dies effectively saving this world and getting everyone home, or you may not want to leave the lives of millions to fate and just kill him, ultimately one of you being stuck in this world (which might not be a bad thing), getting your friends home, but saving millions. If you don't explore, hate exploring, or just kill everything you see, the fate of 1 is sealed unknowingly.
The surprise twist of this episode is that there really is 17 tips!! Ironically one of the number 3s should have been the twist, since the number was repeated twice. You know, since Luke apparently can’t count😂
Your channel has been very helpful to me, I am currently playing in a campaign my friend is DMing, but I am the go to DM for our group, so now I got more to plan our next adventure.
Point is, so far I have just run official modules and longest campaign only went until lvl 8, so now I am planning a very ambituous campaign that I hope goes at least until lvl 10.
Three pillars to the game: Combat, Exploration, & Social Interaction.
Personally, I think puzzles are also a pillar. I try to balance all four together.
Puzzles are exploration. And they're often tedious AF. Although it depends on the players and their play style.
@@MJ-jd7rs What I came to say. Puzzles have several issues imo.
1) Getting the right difficulty is really hard. Either they are obscenely easy (which breaks verisimilitude and doesnt provide a sense of accomplishment) or they are way too hard (which grinds the game to a halt).
2) puzzles are not really group activities, more often than not one player will take the lead on solving the puzzle and everyone else will sit around.
3) returning to verisimilitude, puzzles almost never make sense in the context of the world. If I have a vault I do not make the key something that any asshole with enough time and wits can figure out. I keep the key in a seperate place so that vault remains secure because I do not want anyone getting my stuff. Puzzles can make sense in the context of trials or rites of passage but if it is just a dungeon, you begin to wonder why the gold dragon locked its treasture behind a door that opens with the answer to a first grade riddle.
This all being said, there are puzzles that can work and some tables may love them. But every GM should be aware of the obstacles that exist to making a good puzzle in a TTRPG.
It’s so hard to balance them but I implement all three to the extremes such as unique NPCs that might not or have big impacts in the world, also when I do combat I put in bad guys that have knowledge of there actions and my players might want to talk to them. And for exploration I use a variety of colorful description words and sometimes how the wold goes on outside of the players eyes that might just get seen with either passive or a straight perception check.
@@MJ-jd7rs Puzzles are not exploration. Exploring is exploration. Moving from one area to another and seeing more places.
I get requests from some of my players to add more of them to the games I run, and I haven't received any complaints about them. I've only had someone skip one of my puzzles once, but there was a good reason for that. (I underestimated how stress-inducing that dungeon's gimmick would be for the party.) So I have not experienced having players that find puzzles tedious.
Personally, I try to make puzzles that have actual physical components. Things the party can physically hold in their hands and move around... (Or if it's a digital game, I make the pieces of the puzzle into minis in Roll20 that the players can move around.) Occasionally a puzzle I come up with doesn't work well that way so I keep it to descriptions, but _most_ of them work like that. If your players are finding your puzzles tedious, maybe try making one that's more physical and see if they enjoy that more.
I see exploration as a pillar too
Great tips! I definitely shy away from exploration too much but I've been making an effort to include it more. I just get nervous when it's time to describe environments.
You could try writing something ahead of time, or just have a PHOTO that you find online that you can show players, even just on your phone.
Easiest way to think about describing things is from the point of view of your senses. Sight, sound, touch possibly taste if your players lick things a lot. Don't be afraid of repeating words. You don't need to come up with new words for darkness or mist or the smell of flowers if you can't think of any.
If you do not want something specific, find a stock photo that is sort of what you were thinking and decide that this is now the view they see. And then describe the other senses.
Visual information is easy to access, but not deep. It is immediate, and unless illusions, darkness or fog play a part, it is near infallible. Visual is the bare minimum. That alone is not good.
Sounds can be cryptic. Sounds can get distorted. Sounds can come from far, muffled, with uncertainty of their exact place of origin. A scream right next to you in an eerily quiet, empty town sets the tone right away. A creaking noise in the night can send shivers down our spines, while seeing a creaking door will only make us put it on the backlog of things to fix in the house. Sounds are good.
Smells are better. Smells linger, they stick. A tavern smelling of freshly baked bread will feel like home. A nobles mansion smelling like food gone bad will make your party be on edge. Why does it smell like something rotten? What could be the issue? (or on some parties cause them to outright murderhobo everyone on the mansion... know your players)
To set a scene ask yourself, if you were standing there, what do you see, hear, and smell? Is there light and what is the source? Is it unusually cold or hot? (no need to describe if its normal room temperature) Humid or dry? (again no need to describe if its nothing of note) For important scenes i do this exercise during the preparation, but answering these questions with simple words will set most scenes.
You need to be minimalistic in describing, use senses better than visions in poetry, players forget what you say while describing in less than 5 seconds, add details only when necessary and when players ask for these. When you design a dungeon you follow a theme, or more, so you have lots of common elements in the rooms, you just present the differences, the furniture, the apparent role of the room in the dungeon, to paraphrase Simon Sinek, start with why.
I get what you mean by enemies just attacking.
In one encounter I opened with a sneak attack of catapult and, well, separated a goblin overseer from his head. The ones he was overseeing didn't attack, they freaked out and fled.
Had another where a shaman cast an eclipse to give his allies and advantage against us, so he became one of our primary targets, we managed to break his concentration and reverse things, giving THEM disadvantage, and ended up incinerating him as he tried to cast the spell again.
I think this is great advice! One thing I try to do, is think of at least three different ways for the players to solve a problem. They usually don't end up doing any of the three, but it is helpful to think of. It helps the GM react to different scenarios and prevents the GM expecting the players to come up with whatever answer popped into their heads. The players aren't psychic and aren't supposed to be.
+Ausferius, writes _"One thing I try to do, is think of at least three different ways for the players to solve a problem."_
I go one step further, I don't worry about how the players are going to solve the problem at all. I setup the scenario as the NPCs would set it up and then let the players approach it in whatever manner they want. Sometimes they find a "flaw" in my plans and overrun the baddies easily (and get to congratulate themselves for being "just that good"), other times they end up running into brisk walls over and over.
_"They usually don't end up doing any of the three [...]"_
That's my point, why worry about it when they players probably aren't going to do it any of your ways anyway?
Forced evolution plothooks constantly popped up in the past for my older plots, villains wanting to forcibly enhance themselves, a monster type, etc. were constant as the vinaigrette drive but I wildly varied the methods or reasons they were doing it. The players usual got the classic start of getting good at beating natural threats and arena fights, then some externalised or foreign body stepped into the bigger picture gradually, messing with stuff until they got discovered and yeah it varied how involved the player characters were with that villain from there.
One villain Mike is creator and enslaved their followers and made a war proclamation against the second home of the player, and the player used a battle of wits and patience, to which the player totally destroyed that villain. Then discovered a much deeper plot that never got expanded upon, as life went elsewhere.
If I'm not running a monster 100% as written, like if I added lair actions or special abilities or a magic item, I don't run it from the book. You can copy-paste it and put the magic item right in the stat block. Instead of "longsword" their action is now "flaming sword" and does an extra 2d6 fire damage, can't miss it. Never forget a magic item again!
This is where I differ as my two current campaigns have gone more classic and ditched the central BBEG. There's a world and each quest has an individual story but there is no epic, world-saving, beat-the-central big bad guy type of stuff.
If you all enjoy that style of play, who's to say you're wrong? :D
@@theDMLair I think the best approach is the rouge's gallery approach multiple reacquiring colorful villains and wikid factions like a long running comic book series.
"Flying with a cane" made me laugh out loud for about a minute, thank you for the humor (and idea)!
Using the age of the creatures or people in an encounter is a good idea, but the books only mention differences in the age of dragons.
I had my party tracking what they thought was a small creature and did not figure out that it was a child of a larger species. Surprise!
A cane for fling is a kite...
Now I'm imagining a geriatric chimera leashed to a flying kite that it uses to help with short leaping flights.
I give my player's characters ties to the bbeg's lieutenants. It works. They have recently stated that will enjoy them getting to kick their asses. They are invested.
I’m DMing my first game this Saturday I’m at work watching your videos and I’m just so excited to go home take notes and prepare
How'd it go?
You are the best bro! Thanks for your videos. I'm restarting play D&D, and your tips are very useful! I'm brazilian and learning English too with you. LOL
DM: You can interact with the bad guys in all kinds of ways. You can talk to them, sleep with them, empathize with them, convince them...
Players: I shoot him! And I cast a fireball! I swing my axe!
the first point is very easy to extrapolate into excellence if you put the work in.
"the big bad is A, he is going to place b, so he can enact change C, by taking action D, for which he needs macguffin E, which they are retreiving by taking action F. and to set up his masterplan he needs to have things G, H, I and K happen before taking action D"
thats the basics of making a baddies masterplan. but it doesnt just have to be the BBEG. i do this for each players background enemy as well, then for each faction that has real power in the setting, and use these other NPCs in the BBEG plan. either make the players enemies Leitenants for the BBEG, or have two factions goals clash and arrange for the players to be there.
it makes everything effect every player and ties the whole thing into one story. even the side quests.
Much appreciating 2 things here:
1) Mention of Savage Worlds (such an excellent and simple to learn system!)
2) Emphasis away from combat (3 pillars). I have gone to an entirely 3 pillars xp system where my players choose their own values and short term goals matching those pillars that encourages their character's personality development, and drive not only story progression, but character progression, and inform my plot development of the campaign.
I think I had to discard most of the tips because a lot of them hinge on very D&D-style BBEG-behind-the-scenes adventures, whereas my group tends to prefer stories where the issues are systematic (oppressive laws, overly dogmatic religious control etc) where opponents are more nuanced and not necessarily combat-oriented. There's usually no overarching story, but there are factions with goals (and NPCs within those factions that agree or disagree with the goals) and those react to the players' actions. It's not clear-cut, there's no BBEG to kill, and killing might not even be the best course of action to take in some cases.
There've even been times where they've had to choose between 2 bad choices based on which was less bad in the long term. All that seems to interest my group a lot more than the clearcut "there's a BBEG and we kill it and deal with the next one". Every time you mentioned something about "interesting villain" and the example given was a combat-based thing, I felt mildly disappointed.
One of the besf dnd fights we had was the most recent session. The players (who none have dark vision) were fighting a carriom crawler in a little flooded cave. Narrow, awkward and wet. The carriom crawler was attacking from the ceilimg and then they attacked it enough for him to fall. He hit the water and doused their torches. On top of that the paralysis was very threatening if they wemt under water especially because the others wouldn't know. Almost a tpk, only the fighter was alive without being paralyzed. The warlock was paralyzed having put the bug in a chokehold and basically used it as a tripod to not drown.
Thanks! Maybe it's known for most of GM's, but nice to repeat it sometimes ♥️
This content is so useful! Thanks Luke, for enriching the lives (and untimely deaths) of my players.
I’m DEFINITELY INTERESTED in this kickstarter. Will there be an all .PDF version?
Me, running a sandbox:
step 1 👀
even when running a sandbox, I keep track of a background plot involving various factions and their pursuit of various goals. The plot might not be affected by the players much (depending on their choices), but the world changes around them regardless.
I’m glad you posted all the links. You mentioned quite a few.
One thing great about pf2e you touched on (that I’d like to elaborate on!) is the “geriatric chimera”. Pf2e has a real rule for increasing and decreasing the difficulty of monsters with their weak/elite system, and it’s great fun! No more guessing about what will create a good challenge for your party. Creature too high level? Want some grunts for your boss fight? Weak monsters! Need an elite version of a mook to command the rest? Elite! I’m about to throw a gorgon at my level 4 pf2e party, and making it weak should do just enough to lower it to their current level and gear.
There is a trick I learned on how to remember that your NPC/villain has something special, a skill, a spell, an artefact etc.
For whatever reasons and because of the system I mostly play stuff like magical items are often rare, except for the really weak ones.
So it is quite natural to forget about such an item during the "stressful" combat...
I have started to make simple pictures to represent such items.
In the beginning, I drew them on the notes for the NPC which I use during the game, thus I am always reminded whenever I look at his stats, reduce the HP etc. Makes it harder to forget when you constantly see it.
Later I used blank cards from Amazon or another store to draw the picture on one side and the stats on the other, then I fixed that card to the character notes and if the PCs loot said item, they have a card for it...
I am trying to make sure I sprinkle in optional rewards around for clever adventures. So add some non-critical loot or other rewards and make them non-central to the plot so the players are on their toes to try to go the extra mile. Contrary to what was said I find all or nothing play with lives on the line should be reserved for only the rarest of fights. When characters are dropping like flies and then of course being dragged back to town for resurrection (or later just brought back between fights) then death loses its meaning and just becomes a time out for that player. Time out is never fun! The game should always try to be fun for everyone. Instead tension is better built for most things with an array of stakes. Instead of 0 or 1 give the adventures a 0-10 range of success. Make the 10 really difficult but a 6 or 7 should be easy enough to obtain if they aren’t just being foolish. And constantly change the stakes, sometimes winning is defeating the foe, sometimes winning is just surviving or getting away with key loot or knowledge. Make sure the players understand what the win condition is though, so they set expectations appropriately.
Thank you for these videos! I start the pateron next month! Thank you thank you!
The Attack, Attack, Attack thing is tricky because players with often use talk as a way to try to set themselves up for combat which is super metagame-y.
3 of my players are very experienced DM's. As a result many of my enemies are "homebrew" in that they don't exist in the monster manual, but will probably borrow stats from something that does. It makes finding tokens challenging, but it also means they now have to use checks to see what they might now about the creature rather than meta knowledge. I also often take spells and abilities and reskin them so they are statistically identical to a normal spell, but different. It is more work for me, but my players enjoy it.
Items are also tough to homebrew. My favorite recent one is a huge shield that lowers movement by 5, but reduces ranged attack damage by 2 and also has a "shotgun" attached over the handle that can be tilted up and fired in a cone for damage similar to a dragonborn's breath weapon and requires a short rest to reload. My player loves the thing.
I am currently in a campaign where the DM is used to running one shots and it had a bit of rocky start with encounter difficulty as he was manually adjusting the encounters but didn't seem to have realized the difference in pacing in campaigns (ie, you are expected to have a long rest or equivalent between one shots).
In a major adventure it is important to use as much as the PCs background in the adventure as possible....
Combat is definitely my favorite piller of any TTPRPG. Well besides character creation.
As you guessed it is true that auto play is on
But as long as you keep playing on my feed I refuse to tern it of
You have saved me so many years of learning and so many hours of waisfull prep
And I'm Shure you'll continue to save me many more
I usually find that the magic item i give bad guys is just worst then their normal abilities. (its hard to forgo 3 attacks for one item activation) and if players get item then its good again.
Depending on the system (ik pathfinder does this a lot), monsters sometimes have stronger abilities and attack modifiers than an equal-level PC would. Magic items, in this case, is not balanced against their power level.
For weapons, this is simple to solve: you can just jack up their Attack mod higher. For the 3-action activation: if this is PF, im not sure if anyone, PC included, would really want a 3-action magic item if it's not extremely powerful?
Yelling at Luke again - So, another playing group had a TPK. I get it, a group can TPK because the players did something stupid. However, I'm noticing every campaign Luke runs a TPK happens. I'm not buying it anymore the players did something stupid, or at least all of them. A TPK can happen. It's sad when it does, but that's the game. However, when there are lot of TPKs something is wrong. I cannot give a definitive number of X PC deaths means the DM is a Killer DM i.e. unbalanced encounter design where X - 1 means everything is fine. However, TPKs are not normal, so to speak. I'm not saying they should never happen nor PC death should never happen, but when a TPK is happening every campaign yes, I will question encounter design. The common denominator here is the DM. No, I don't hate Luke. His DMing advice is well thought out, well presented, and helpful, but having so many TPKs something is in error. In my opinion of course.
Try to move your angle of view here. What chance should a party have to complete a session "winning" all the combats (not the single encounters)? A DM have to face this question. If the answer is 100% all the process of building characters and play the fights is empty, you always win, end of story. This get boring quite soon. So let's lower the chance of success to let's say 95%. This encourages the players to bring interesting builds, to pick good spells, to build characters that synergize ecc... and this brings fun to the table but... it's an average tpk every 20 sessions, raw math here. This means that probably if you run a long campaign you will "probably" have to face multiple TPK. One year of weekly sessions it's an average of 2 and half TPK even if you just give the players a little chance to fail (5%). So basically it's TPK or boredom tradeoff.
I've been playing D&D since 1989. The number of TPKs I've been in is 2, once in 2E and once in 3E, the latter because the DM did it on purpose to end the campaign. I called him out on it. The possibility of it happening is worth discussing, but I categorically reject it should be common or expected.
I unfortunately don't have a group to play with:(
But I have created 6 different lvl 1 characters in case I found a group.
Anyway, last year I looked at possibly being a GM for D&D at my local library. But no one signed up to play:(
Anyhow, I created a "House Rule" that makes TPK and even Individual Player Character Deaths nearly impossible. But still some consequences can happen if the players mess up/have bad rolls of the dice. Basically an adapted version of videogame "Fable Series" results of falling in combat.
"Flying with a cane."
It's a really long cane.
Scrambled eggs fried potatoes, seasoned small pork loin, bacon all over it. Maybe some ketchup
Hmm. I watched this video three times up until now. This is not a video. This is a master class… again 😇
I started a game where death is possible, but not permanent death, unless it is party wipe. This is very intentional because the players are playing as themselves (isekai basically). If you die the players have to find a way to revive you. This is still discouraged for 2 reasons though 1. The players may get annoyed having to do extra work to revive you 2. You can still do things as a ghost, but are more limited so it wouldn't be as fun, so DON'T DIE.
I actually set up plot hooks in the lore itself.. I have a number of natural and supernatural conflicts that have taken place over the centuries in my setting,, as well as a global threat called the blight that affects the lands and minds of all people.. kinda cool to watch my players take the lore they"ve learned about over years of campaigns in my setting and create while new characters out if it..
Sometimes, a Murder Hobo one shot or campaign is a fun time and clears out the drama from the main campaign. So, it's OK to have a game session or two where all adversaries do is attack.
My last game i did a uh "state of the word" kinda thing and players took them as plot hooks
When really only one was really a plot hook so now I have to go build an entire other country and create an adventure.
A list of the 15 things would have been nice.
Be the change you want to see in the world.
Done
Definitely agree with having plot hooks at end of an adventure for the next one. As soon as theres nothing on the horizon everything just looses focus
Could you give some advice, do a video on, finding a good gaming group?
I was playing under a particular DM for the last 30 years. He recently passed away. I'm feeling rather lost.
Go to a local game store and tell them you are looking for a game.
So you are essentially saying that variety is the spice of life.
What else has spice, CHILI! And where can you find a variety of chilies? A chili cook off!
1: (Interesting Story/Goal) Their goal is to taste them all, but also to see if they can handle how hot they get!.
2: (Motivation)Their motive is to win a bet that they are able to try them all without wimping out.
3: (Plot Hook) Where should you have them start? They need to get to a different Land, but don’t have enough money to get there. So they have to ask one of the characters super rich boss, Charles Van Scorchers, who wants to make a haunted house theme park.
Good job Luke in your ability to count😆
3: (BBEG) The Big Bad is head of the city watch Sargent Wiggum’s, who makes the hottest of the hot chili. He makes it with the (not so) secret ingredient, The Merciless Peppers of Quetzalacatenango 🌶️
4: (Lieutenant) But first they need see if they can handle last years winner in the spiciest category Sargent Wiggum’s son Ralfus. He named this Brew “It Tastes Like Burning”
5: (Twist) When they go to the booth of The Nettles of Flanders expecting a real challenge, they find out that the 5 alarm chili is really just a 2 alarm chili.
6: (More than Attacking) Every Chili doesn’t need to be spicy, it also should have some interesting tastes to it. “Is that cinnamon I detect?”
7: (Lore) Did you know that the super hot peppers that Sargent Wiggum uses are also called the Guatemalan Insanity Peppers that are picked by the inmates of an insane asylum?!
8: (3Pillars)You should have a balance between talking to the cooks, exploring the interesting tastes, and trying find ways to combat the spiciness of the different chili’s.
9: (Interesting Terrain) It would be boring if every Chili is just served from a crock pot. Sargent Wiggum has a cauldron to serve them with and a spoon with serrated edges.
10: (Variety challenges) Make sure you have a good variety of chilis. Some players like to eat different levels of spiciness. You should have mild, medium, spicy and super hot ones.
11: (Progression) You should have them progress from the mild to the super hot. They need to be able to try them all and should still be voting for favorites in each category.
12: (Boss Battle) The final tasting of Wiggum’s insanity hot chili should be very challenging and the players might need to be creative to win, like coating their tongues in wax.
13: (Resolution) After winning their bet they find out that their is a national chili tasting challenge that you can win some big prizes like a new 70” TV for their Dungeon.
14: (Reward) If they win their bet they get to go to the Land of Itchy and Scratchy.
15: (Consequence for the world) If they fail, they have to stay the night in a haunted house. When they do they will share that the house is actually a mimic and kill it. This saves the town from being destroyed by Van Scorchers to make a theme park. If they win and go to the land of Itchy and Scratch, they will potentially save a lot of lives from metal golems.
16: (Make it Personal) If they the fail they will also be laughing stalk of their town!
Amazing comment!!!!!!!!!
These are some great points but I would disagree that they have to be in every adventure. Definitely every campaign but but too many adventures aren't structured in such a way as to incorporate all those things. Overall it's definitely a good checklist to make sure that you're providing your players a fun exciting experience. I'm just coming back to Dungeons & Dragons after a more than 30 year hiatus so I've been listening to a lot of your videos and I really appreciate them.
My players were up against a vampire necromancer who is trying to use this amulet that will let him harness the power of all the hells and his lieutenant was a character from one of my player's backstories who had been turned into a vampire servant.
😬 "Put in some furniture..."
🤗 My very 1st thought was (classic) HERO QUEST, of course.
I still use Hero Quest furniture from when I was a kid in my games! :D
@@theDMLair Ah, a man of culture, you chose wisely, you earned yourself some extra bacon 😏
I actually found a second mostly complete original hero quest on eBay, just to round out my furniture and resupply my orc tribe!
@@theDMLairI use Hero Quest furniture as my furniture in my house!!!
Do you prepare notes or strategies for your combat encounters? That's where I write when or how the opponent will use the magic item so I don't forget
Regarding #6:
I have groups that are going to thank you for the free round of combat they get against enemies who don't immediately grab their weapons and start fighting. I guess we can just give them that free round of combat every encounter...
“Denoument”
The falling action, or the cigarette after …
Definitely gonna steal the priestess thing
honestly: enemies always fighting makes a certain amount of sense.
if you're chillin' at your house and a group of heavily armed men kick down the door; fighting seems like the only real option.
it's clear they're not here to talk; or play tidily winks. So yeah they're there to fight you; you have two options: fight or surrender.
So if you want to give players the option to talk to monsters; put them in situation where the monsters are not being forced to fight the players... that doesn't mean combat can't break out mind you. Also make sure the monsters surrender when they're outnumbered or become aware that they're outclassed that prompts the players and gives them the chance to talk.
I'm currently making a campaign where it's open world and you can join pirates bandits colts bounty hunters and more and do whatever you want but eventually the rising war between the rebellion and tyranny group and another group takes over the story because it's going to keep going in the background whether they interact with it or not and eventually all the groups that they could have joined instead of the rebellion will eventually have to take a side of that war. Is there specific advice for choose your own adventure things that have an overarching evil that takes over.
And yeah they can join the tyrannical group if they want but I'm going to make that harder on them
3:35 i'm sure Lord Paxton is behind all of this... oups sorry wrong campaign
Hi! I'm writing a campaign based on the Lord of the Rings 5e book, and I would like some advice on what to do for the Famous Weapons and Armour area of the story, I would like my Player-Heroes to discover it but I need like a dramatic accidental way they can discover it. Do you have any suggestions? I'm open to anything.😁 Great video by the way.😋
very useful content, Thank you!!
Okay good video - good explaining but my god my adhd did not let me stay focused for each explanation had to keep going back like huh I missed it again 😂
Great stuff thank you for what you do!!
Thanks for the gift
So I wonder if you could cover the topic of anticlimatic deathes? Thanks!
@theDMlair . Hey Luke! I know the Kickstarter is ended (congrats btw), but I'd really like to purchase the digital secrets bundle and the link to order goes to your website, but there's nothing available there. How can i get my hands on these pdfs?
Nice Luke! Thanks!
Glad you liked it!
In regards to #6, "enemies that do more than just attack" I have some questions that hopefully someone else can answer or at least relate to my experience.
I learned to just have my enemies/BBEG just attack as soon as possible. Otherwise, they get pummeled after one action later in the initiative order. Each time I try to have them open with conversation, threats, negotiation, ect it doesn't work. I hype up an enemy over the course of sessions and finally when the opportunity to learn about them happens and I am having them explain things the players or give necessary information, the players always attack in the middle of conversation. So. Many. Damn. Times.
I can't tell if they want to defeat the trope of the enemy having a monologue because they dislike it in media, if they want a tactical advantage, or they just want to skip to the action. It frustrates me because they HAVE negotiated, spoken to, and done other things. But when it's an enemy, it's always attack them in the middle of social interactions. I spend time analyzing and writing the rationale and motivations for my enemies. Rarely those things do actually become relevant but most of the time it turns into interrupting and spoiling the moment. I would like to have the grand epic moment sometimes as DM (largely playing a forever DM).
Maybe my players find D&D most fun when it isn't fun for me. I can't force my players to care so I try to weave the narrative with a bit more tightness. I try to withhold JUST enough information or make things JUST weird enough but they don't seem to be that curious.
How can I make this work better without me railroading them? Is there something that I'm missing? Am I reading into this too much?
I appreciate anyone who can answer. Thank you.
Have you asked your players out of game why they do that?
@@superhunksickle I have. One of them said that they enjoy the idea of interrupting and not allowing the BBEG to have their moment.
I'm a simple man! I see SavageWorlds, I hit the Like Button!
I played the super hero version of it for a one-shot. It was lots of fun!
@@theDMLair Love the Super Powers Compendium! Was able the to build the whole X-Men animated team for a "Necessary Evil" one-shot. worked very well and was lots of fun too!
A much better title for this video would be "Recipe for a railroad adventure". And it could use a good edit, too. About 2 minutes would suffice.
I have an issue with one of my players is playing the equivilant of Hermione Granger in my campaign. His character (not the player) is ignoring plot hooks, so I have to rely on the other players to continue the story. One of his professors was murdered in my last session, which caused classes to be dismissed. His character's reaction is "oh well, that sucks...I'm wasting money in tuition to accept getting dragged out of class and having classes cancelled". I'm thinking about having a dragon destroy the college to encourage this character to explore the world.
Damn, did anyone else feel for the geriatric chimera, or was it just me?
New to this stuff… what’s a TPK?
Total Party Kill
Hearing about the 3 pillars thing for some reason makes me want to make a character who is afraid of combat
I have a larp character who is reluctant about combat (not exactly afraid), and questions why to risk combat?
Does the Inventor work as Artificer well enough? I was struggling trying to do Eberron in Pathfinder
I have been able to integrate high tension social interaction. The king of an entire nation wants to go on an "adventure" to find some important resources. Do you take him up on his request for help? How do you turn down royalty???
Newly arrived with a question…
Where did the image of the twins come from? I recognized nearly all except that one.
Recém chegado com uma pergunta…
De onde veio a imagem dos gêmeos? Reconheci quase todos, menos aquele.
#3.5 Stop assuming an adventure requires a "villain" or "big bad". There are so many better ways to build an adventure around proactive rather than reactive PCs.
???
So you just want a campaign where the players go to fight monsters and there's just... none???
How do you balance using tactics and varied mobs and players skill in adapting to the situation. I do try and balance fights, taking into account players ability to adapt to new tactics and enjoyability. Although what usually happens is a fight where my players say I'm metagaming or just trying to kill the party. That's never my intention and I do understand I could just be the issue but looking for your advice here.
1) Tell your players "Word gets out. Do you think tales of your exploits don't travel the region? Do you think other bad guys don't hear about you?"
2) Simply tell your players YES, there is always some metagaming involved for the GM because it's MY JOB to create challenges for you. (Be thankful I take my role seriously and don't just toss together any old garbage.)
This is the most difficult challenge a DM faces, and it can change with the mood of your players. Sometimes the sorcerer is on top of their game and dishes out massive damage, other days they want to only use cantrips. My best advice is to ramp things up slowly and know your party's capabilities. Have a good mix of easy and hard fights.
Also, have a talk with your players and build the trust up that you're intentions are to have fun by running a challenging game.
@@theDMLair so it should be more about setting expectations and being ok with someone being upset if things are not optimal for them. I'll keep trying to be fair and looking for advice from other dms. Although as long as a DM I strive to run the most entertaining and fair game I can I shouldn't worry?
You have to be aware of the pc's gear, abilities and spells in order to create interesting encounters, and consider the types of player at your table. It's good to give the pc's an easy win, but it's also good to throw something really quite challenging at them. I think it all boils down to managing expectations whilst entertaining the players (you are also a player, remember!).
Make your tactics regardless of the PC abilities and equipment.
Smart monsters and NPCs will make smart decisions, they will attempt to identify dangers and look for opportunities.
Monsters and creatures that operate on instinct will be very reactive and lurch about.
This is what gaining experience as a DM is about. You're get there, just do what you need to to keep the story moving.
Vert good points. But GM's need to be careful when it comes to some of these points like the story, plot twist, and escalation.
This is where Gam's go for out of conteol railroad. Everyone tries to become George RR Martin. Remember RPG is not a movie nor a novel. And the central theme revolves around the players. Not your NPC's.
Great stuff friend 👏 👍
If your players want to use some diplomacy... maybe not kicking down the door would be a good start!
No good DM has ever had to say "because I'm the DM that why"
"Why do you get to run this adventure?"
"Because I'm the DM, that's why."
"Why do you have so many books?"
"Because I'm the DM, that's why."
"How do you know what the gods are telling my player?"
"Because I'm the DM, that's why."
(And, yes, that has actually come up before. There was a player who tried to convince everyone that his god had given him a special quest and he was asking us, "How do I convince the DM that the gods have chosen my character to do this task and collect this item?" This wasn't a 1st level character, either.)
"Why do I have to get you a slice of pizza?"
"Because I'm the DM, that's why." 😁
@@grondhero exactly
A futon is an encounter is good too...
gr8 video. cheers!
Luke and others here, do you ever find that when you highlight alternative means of conflict resolution (stealth, talking, trickery, etc) to the players that they will then attempt to use the same strategy again and again and again ad naseum? For example, I find that once a party is able to negotiate successfully once they will do it everytime, and worse they will get upset when it doesnt work everytime.
Moreover, I have struggled to find a way to get players to actually inquire and learn about the creatures they are trying to negotiate with. I do not think I have ever had a player ask an NPC what they want or what motivates them. So their negotiation attempts are almost always generic "help me and I will help you" or "oppose me and you will die".
How have you communicated to players that alternative means of conflict resolution require just as much strategy and thought as combat, if not more strategy or thought than combat. And how have you handled players coming up with nonsense plans and then getting bent out of shape when NPCs dont act like Skyrim NPCs with all the situational awareness of a drowsy hamster.
New players.
my big bad guy is a ball of energy who turned himself into a mind flayer so he could feel and taste and touch and love, ultimately his wants turn him evil
Players also fall into the routine of "I attack". They should not make enemies a bag of HP.
If you hate combat, you should not be playing D&D.
Sounds like the balance needed to be in the werewolf fight. How did they TPK?
All good adventures have good descriptions. Don't say "you see an orc".
My first TPK in my current campaign was also a werewolf. I designed the fight in mind that they would all be attacking it each turn. Instead, they decided to Scooby Doo it and split up which resulted in all of them getting picked off like a horror movie. It was hilarious for the whole group, but a shame that their fledgling characters died so soon.
@@halofornoobs93 - I like to warn my players in session 0 that splitting the party is a very bad idea, as the encounters are designed for the whole party to face together.
Anyone have any tips on widening my NPC creation range? Specifically women characters, it often feels outside of my expertise to create a well thought out and interesting female character. My players notice that whenever they meet a female NPC, it often just ends up pretty similar to everyone other girl they’ve met. I’ve been trying to create good ones but it just doesn’t seem to be clicking.
I have an NPC Female Character I created. She is a High Elf Woman who is essentially a Druid & Divination Wizard combined.
She dresses in Faded Elegance with Hair Braided as a "crown" on her head. She is a traveling "Gypsy" who makes various Potions, Poisons, and Moonshine. She also can tell Fortunes (to an extent) by rolling "Bone Dice" and she seems 'Ageless'. She travels with a couple younger High Elves 1 is a Female Ranger and clearly looks like a Granddaughter of hers. The other is a young Male Bard who plays the Banjo and is the Husband of the Granddaughter.
Basically combine aspects of the "Beverly Hillbillies" the old Woman being sort of based off "Grandma". As well as combining the Old Woman from the song "These Old Bones" by Dolly Parton.
Honestly, I just make male characters, sprinkle in a few feminine traits, and make them female. Outside of possible gender roles in your setting, there isn't a huge difference between the two. Don't overthink it.
Create a character. Make them female. It's really not difficult
Great tips…. But I forget the name of your pathfinder 2 campaign name lol
I like to put problems in my game. Npcs suffer, lack of supplies, that motivates Pcs to find out and then act. Insider antagonist divisions.
Falling action, or resolution is called denouement
“Denouement” my friend. 👍🏼
Number 1 should be snacks
A cane for flying is a kite
Good algo, pay the man
A subservient lieutenant you say? Ah yes, Rahadin