On the subject of Foundry: Not only is all the content stored offline after you've installed, but the installer itself contains the whole program (I've taken the liberty of turning on airplane mode while installing Foundry and it still worked.) This is also important to keep in mind if you want to avoid a centralized system, because sometimes those "installers" are basically just a little front end that goes and connects to a website to download the rest of the program. Which means if the website goes away, while you may be able to keep using an installed copy, you won't be able to reinstall on a new machine, for example. Foundry is NOT one of those. The installer package has it all, just hold on to that, and keep a backup copy of your license key in a text file somewhere. Maybe right beside the Foundry installer.
What about license verification? Something I've been wondering about but haven't tested, does it require Foundry servers to verify it's legitimate or is it internal verification in the software packet?
Speaking as a game industry vet, what likely happened is they asked the core engineers if they could split the items up by version, and while it's possible, it would take longer than they have time for pre-launch and they had other things they wanted to do. So likely this is just a reprioritization and something else like maps is gonna fall behind. Happens all the time. The issue here (as usual) is how PR seems to work as opposed to the magic side, they could just have the core team explaining the plan but instead it's some PR drone innocently typing up a message to the fan base not realizing how much gas they're about to pour on the fire. Just as an example, they could have avoided this by just saying the features would come in late, and then slow rolled them as needed to fit whatever else was in the schedule. But they just couldn't avoid pulling a "pappa wotc knows best".
I'm of the mind where two things are true: it's profitable/inexpenspive to not create the feature. But that's just from someone who has no idea what it takes to implement.
Yeah this kinda stinks of “Migrations are hard” and “the users can deal with by [insert boneheaded and stupid suggestion that’s mega cumbersome]”. Who knows though.
There are digital tools for Pathfinder 2e staffed by one person (Pathbuilder) and 8 part-timers (Archives of Nethys) that allow you to toggle between old and new content. Just saying that the responsibility falls on the leadership here.
@@TabletopTiger if management did decide it wasn't profitable/inexpensive, I'd tell them they just fell victim to the Cannibalism Fallacy. There's this idea that when you make a sequel to a game it's cheaper to stop supporting the old game and that will force the hardcore players to update to the new version. The reality is that the people who stick around and play "" are doing exactly what you wanted them to do in the first place... Have fun and be loyal to the overall brand. Cannibalism is the idea that if you split the player base into smaller groups then the overall brand is gonna suffer and that's rarely the case. They are still playing D&D and they are driving the overall ecosystem (social, purchasing, awareness). Too many brand managers see the old loyal group as a negative not realizing when they cut them off, they aren't necessarily going to upgrade to the new thing. There's too much competition now, they're just as likely to get burnt out, and decide to play the next elder scrolls game instead. It's MUCH easier to convince a player who is already into D&D that everyone is having fun with the new game when they actually hear supporting evidence from their friends ACTUALLY playing the game, vs trying to convince a totally unfamiliar person through advertising to pick up the new game. In conclusion, by undercutting support for the old game they are sending the message that they don't believe in the new system enough to let the old system stand side by side with it.
I have to say thanks you for recommending 'When we were Wizards'. It's a great podcast. I'm nearly finished listening to it for a second time. It's like listening to a slow motion train wreck where you already know the ending. Compelling listening.
I have no idea what WotC thinks anymore. This was such an obvious problem coming over the hill. Leave the old, make a mode toggle. Easier than this half change they tried forcing. It feels like the shot callers dont even know how humans act at this point.
This was a particularly great show! Lots of great advice and insights. I definitely suffer from getting lazy (no pun intended) with reviewing the characters as well. I like the idea of keeping dedicated character notes that I can quickly review and update.
Gosh. So, your tip about reviewing and planning with the characters in mind. Ironically, this is something that D&D beyond is EXCELLENT for. As the dm, I invite them to the campaign, which gives me access to all their character sheets. Because of that, I’m constantly able to see their languages, magic item inventory, skills, features, AC, damage potential, spell choices, etc. This has been a massive tool to encounter & treasure planning. Making sure a text comes up with that random language they have, or able to make that obscure tool proficiency matter. Having that deep access is amazing. I suppose you could get paper versions of their sheets to review, but through dnd beyond, they don’t know you’re looking and are surprised to see you fine tune to their characters. I don’t have to track or write down a thing. I never forget, because the burden to remember is never there. The full sheets are right there at all times. Last minute ideas are possible. That’s a big benefit to dnd beyond.
Mike, you'll like this. My friends and I have played a lot of other fantasy TTRPGs in the last 3 years, and this year we've spent our weekly sessions blending the games together into a game that is catered to us. We even designed our own character sheet and made our own core rule book with classes and everything. And now, each week, we play the best game made by us, for us, and love every minute of it. Just wanted to share =) Cheers mate!
Thanks for the timely reminder on focusing on the PC's. It's been a while since I've read through Return of the Lazy DM. Going through the lazy list is my main prep ritual, but I didn't realize I've been skimping on this step.
At 16:30, you dismiss as a "conspiracy theory" the argument that, "This was intended to force people into the new edition." Then at 20:00, you pretty much adopt that exact view of WotC's motives. A contradiction? Nope. On both counts, I 100% agree with you! Was this an explicit plan anyone in the company articulated? Doubtful. Does chasing growth-at-all-costs lead to a company culture that can't help but produce these outcomes? Absolutely! The organization is not financially incentivized to see these issues, so no one within the organization is rewarded for recognizing them before they become massive problems. Eventually, they'll get tired of capitulating to community outrage. Someone in leadership will force a change in the face of backlash. That's exactly what went down at Facebook, Netflix, Reddit, Unity, etc. This is how enshittification begins.
Buying physical books or PDFs is the way to go! I'm interested to see how long it takes for the community to ditch D&D Beyond. Building a character on paper is not that difficult.
I built my own Excel character sheet, so I didn't have to rely on D&D Beyond, at the time I started creating it, I was married & thought we didn't have the money for that, after the divorce, I found we had plenty of money for things that didn't involve me, so I could pay for it now, but I like my sheet & it means I learn the rules. (I knew that Jack of All Trades rounded down while Remarkable Athlete rounded up & that both applied to initiative because I actually read the books to build the sheet.)
The game Fellowship uses a strategy to allow exposure to the villain before the final confrontation. The villain has protections that prevent the characters from being to defeat them such as invulnerability, immunity to magic, teleportation, etc. The characters have to find macguffins to break those protections before they can finally confront and defeat the villain. Before that, the best they can do in a confrontation with the villain is to possibly thwart their current objective or even just survive and escape.
About tracking the characters, one system that really gives incenive to do it (and empower the players as well) is Fabula Ultima. The fact that the players are expect to contribute to the history is really refreshing.
The funny thing about the new exhaustion rules is that while they're indeed easier to remember, they're arguably even more punishing, which is the other thing people were unhappy about with the previous version. You get a negative modifier in combat (you know, the kind of situations that tend to get pcs killed?) right out the gate, that can be pretty rough. Still, the first level is the one case where, depending on the adventure, I can see the argument claiming it's less punishing now. But then, at level 2, you're at -4 across the board, which mathematically is mostly just as bad as disadvantage, but caps the highest possible result. So you're basically screwed in combat a level earlier than in 5e14. By level 3 you're at a global penalty of -6, which is worse than disadvantage even in the small target roll range where disadvantage has the strongest impact. The only thing that FEELS less punishing, is that disadvantage can feel quite bad when you get a good roll on your regular die and a bad roll on the extra one, it's a bit cruel because it rubs it in that you would normally have hit. I guess a negative modifier also doesn't prevent you from getting advantage, unlike in the previous system, but then again, it puts a hard cap on your highest total results, as I mentioned. Depending on the situation, either might be worse. I guess since the design trend has been to make it harder and harder for players to somehow avoid having advantage on a roll, a modifier penalty is the better fit. I can't help but feel like this is like those videogame balancing situations where people feel an rts unit is underpowered so the devs give it a more impressive sound effect and the community suddenly feels a lot better about it. It's also curious they chose to penalize only characters rolling for their attacks and left spellcasters mostly offensively unaffected, their spell DCs staying the same, unlike in the playtest version.
DMs: On a scale of "Hand their sheet back after creation and never look at it again" to "Tape them to your DM screen" How often do you look at your player's character sheets?
Basically never. I already have the rest of the game to run so I'm not going to bother with the one part that the players are supposed to take care of.
A way to incorporate the "review characters" step into OSR-style prep is to build your dungeon/session (without tailoring it to the characters) then review to see where they might shine. You can then lean on that aspect during play ("...and you saw these animal tracks in your background as a frontier ranger") and also remind players about their less often used features that can be brought to bear. If you ended up creating a super deadly dungeon the PCs will struggle with, then you can telegraph that early and give them a chance to prepare in town instead of discovering it 90 minutes into the session and having to break the flow to backtrack into town for specialized tools. I feel the keeps the "integrity" of the living world without potentially derailing your session.
Just to go along with the 1 hour D&D sessions. I try to do a short scene setting to let the players know what the mission is and start them at the encounter point. Then if they go through it quickly we can use the time to do the roleplaying and exploring.
The tips for reviewing the characters was really helpful! I run Shadowdark now and I've been falling entirely on that since the PCs might be different every session. I think this will really help! I also have a magic item grabber in my party, so I've been trying to mix up the items better - also he's gonna be real surprised when he puts on that magic armor tonight, it's super good 1/day, and a penalty the other 23 hours and 50 minutes. Maybe it will slow down the grabbiness at least a little.
So you totally got me off on a massive sidequest with those Gen Con TV episodes. I should probably come back and finish watching this... but wow! those are interesting!!!! Thanks Mike!
My favorite major villain introduction I've run was a wizard whose subordinates the party had already fought several times. He sent a small force to set up a mock assassination of the party and then teleported in already concentrating on "Invulnerability". They proceeded to try and kill him until they panicked and had to flee. He was doing a lot of damage
I have just switched my group over to pen and paper. We started using the shadowdark slot-based inventory system too, because tracking carry weight on paper is super annoying.
For 1 hour games. Mine are typically 1.5-2hour games. We talk for 10min to catch up but once we start everything is 100% in character, no talking to the GM (he doesn’t exist in the game world like in the cartoon😂) and no rules talk. Everything is role playing even combat. Instead of asking the GM“is the door locked?” We instead say “I walk to the door and turn the knob to determine if it’s locked” I know it doesn’t seem like a lot but in the 2nd version we’re in the game world. Everyone at the table is in the game world and everything flows faster because it’s in character. The way we used to do it it’s the player talking to the GM. So you’re switching in and out of the game world. Since we’ve been playing this way we get more done in 1.5-2 hours than we did in our 4 hours games. We just do all of your out of character talk and catching up before and after the game session. I also have 3 players with adhd (I’m one those 3) this keeps us all engaged and focus we used go on 15-20min talks not related to the game sometimes. Knowing it’s a shorter session and keeping in character for that time really keeps us all focus and engaged.
The thing that's upsetting to me abt the DND beyond changes is I feel like I, the DM, have to be the bad guy here to tell my players using that service in our current 5e game that they need to figure out a solution or use a different character sheet because this is a 5e game, not a 5.5e game
For short sessions, playing something like shadow dark over DND as less options and no bonus action, stuff like theatre of the mind faster, or not using grids.
I did the best answer I could think to this new change even if they reverted it. I bought a Pathfinder 2e GM manual. Next month will be the player handbook and next the bestiary.
Couldnt D&D Beyond just make a poll each certain time to get player feedback on idea and stuff? Like the 2014-2024 stuff could have been answered pretty fast and save so much time to everyone. I so wonder how they work internally ...
Initially I thought people were hating for the sake of hating, but when I read the changelog I was baffled. Being a dev, I couldn't understand what was so hard about it duplicating a database of spells and adding a "2014 Legacy" tag to it. I'm glad the outrage made them roll back so quickly, even if some of the yellers didn't even know what they were talking about. For the moment unfortunately I'm a bit dependent on DnD Beyond. I could run my mixed table without it but it would be a lot harder. Not worth it
@@SlyFlourish Thank! I’ve been walking round all week with a UA-cam video playing in my pocket…love your work and I’m really looking forward to your new book!
Whenever I hear something about dndbeyond, I think of d&d insider. That 4th edition character builder that went poof. To my knowledge there is no legal way to get it or even redownload it. What will happen when the inevitable 6e comes around? Or tech that dndbeyond is based on becomes extinct?
I actually find Foundry is a bit limited in its usefulness for escaping the walled garden, at least when it comes to 5e, because it relies heavily on D&D Beyond for character building - you also mention it's not as user-friendly. Particularly when running one-shots I find that not only is the character builder in Foundry hard for people to use but also it can be difficult and/or expensive to host a server (especially for multiple worlds) and players can't access their characters between sessions or keep them after one-shots if the server isn't up. It incentivizes people to use D&D Beyond and I've long wished they'd implement an offline character builder or even develop some kind of "Foundry Lite" that lets players see their characters between sessions. There are some mods that help, but another issue with Foundry is that every time they release an update, half the mods break. I've been considering other options lately, but it is in many other ways a great program and hard to beat.
I guess I'm in the minority here, but I actually don't use D&D Beyond for anything other than reading the books. Its phone layout is really nice and intuitive, making it easy to read while at work or on the bus or wherever. Plus, on the website side of things, you can save the art in the books onto your computer, which you can save onto a flash drive and put in a safety deposit box, and Wizards can never take those away - the art being one of the only things I like about WotC products.
What is wild is that this would've been a non-issue if Hasbro hadn't destroyed all the good faith we had in their management without the ogl fiasco. I honestly think that
I have been a strictly books and paper player and dm, but it would be cool to have an online platform that was open source (if there is one I am unaware), that you could customize and make your own
MapTool I think still exists and is open source. I haven't used it myself but when I was looking for an alternate to Roll20, folks recommended MapTool.
I love paper character sheets. And so do my players. However, in long campaigns (4 years for us with same characters) AND the shear character complexity at level 17, combined with options, numerous magic item implications, paper is tough. However, I will readily admit, we are a far minority in player groups with our level. In the event, we run a one shot and use lower level characters, my players enjoy, leaving the complexity behind and getting back to simpler representations of characters on paper. It is almost as if they need to rethink how tier 4 is represented on paper. Granted many would argue they need to rethink tier 4 altogether lol.
Return is a stand-alone book that you can benefit from on its own. There's a lot of overlap between the books so it's almost like a second edition of the original book.
John & Jane want homebrew magic, items, abilities, systems OK. John sends the next 4 hours trying to figure out how to implement home brew on App, but the math is all correct. Jane uses paper and is ready to play 30 seconds later, but the math is off for the next four hours. Personally, I'd prefer the paper, but it's a not a hill I've been willing to die on for my tables. I hope you have better luck with the quest for paper Mike.
I lost so much faith in Wizards that i no longer support them in any way. It’s a bitter sweet feeling. I have no desire to play the new game and have instead been pushed to try new and fun games. (Shadowdark, Cypher system, Shadow of the Weird Wizard, Vampire the masquerade, and most recently Marvel Multiverse.)
Happily playing Castles and Crusades while watching wotc 's D&D burn to the ground...MY FLGS owner tells me that no one is pre ordering new D&D...it makes me wonder what Hasborg is going to do with the IP after the impending abject failure.
D&D is a lifestyle brand and Hasbro makes money licensing the IP to companies like Lego, Converse, and Wizkids. Hasbro, a toy company, does not even manufacture their own D&D minis. DECCA does that via WizKids. I think the long term goal for Wizbro is to make a D&D version of MonopolyGO.
Of course they walked back the changes. They want to make money and they don’t like seeing people leave, but the problem is just like a bad ex-girlfriend eventually, you get tired of having to forgive someone who has to say sorry all the time and you look for someone who just treats you better in general. I printed out paper character sheets today. My current party is a group of people who learned online, but I think it is finally time for them to get some old-school education. I know in the end it will be more convenient and personal plus with this announcement, they even bought me a couple books😂, but the transition sure can be messy. If you’re reading this comment you can do it too! take charge of your own games. All we need is us, our players and each other
I'm stuck with virtual games for various reasons. Paper character sheets, unfortunately, are just not efficient enough for me and my players. : ( We just have to take the risks.
You can do virtual games without utilizing centralized platforms. Owlbear Rodeo is free, and a system agnostic VTT, though limited to sharing the maps and tokens. There are free fillable PDF versions of character sheets, and those are easily shared, by email or Discord. Discord is its own handy tool, to share files, images, and it has strong voice and video chat capabilities, plus the ability to share a screen with the players in the channel. All the players in your group need are the rules from the SRD. If you have the PHB and other core source books like XGtE and Tasha's, you could probably get away with doing a single page write up of a subclass they want to play, so they have it available. If you're playing a previous version of the game, Drive Thru RPG has a wide selection of the books that can be picked up in PDF or print format as well. And then there are less than legitimate means of acquiring older PDFs. The point is, you can still play online/virtually, with a little thought and a bit more work.
I use Excel or Google sheets for character sheets. Someone usually already made one, so I all need to do is search for it. I also can design the sheet however I want to. Bit of time commitment but free monetary wise For d&d I use Foundry nowadays. There are mods that let you import from dndbeyond
16:35 I think you massively underestimate the actively malicious motivations of billion+ dollar corporations Their capacity to implement those motivations without tripping over themselves and looking like they're incompetent fools, sure. But the motivations are absolutely there
People acting like Paper and Pens got trademarked by WotC and got pinkos ready to pink you up. 😂 Cant stop me from making my own path to treasure and enclaves.
Yeah, walking back a bad call was a good choice, but a BETTER choice would have been to read the room and make the charitable, pro-consumer move in the first place.
They don't think they are walking on eggshells anymore. And are they wrong? They're not going to get any major blowback from this. When I looked at the forums earlier today, I saw multiple threads THANKING them for the reversal.
Thank you, Mike for all you do. I appreciate you educating, helping, and entertaining GMs everywhere!
On the subject of Foundry: Not only is all the content stored offline after you've installed, but the installer itself contains the whole program (I've taken the liberty of turning on airplane mode while installing Foundry and it still worked.) This is also important to keep in mind if you want to avoid a centralized system, because sometimes those "installers" are basically just a little front end that goes and connects to a website to download the rest of the program. Which means if the website goes away, while you may be able to keep using an installed copy, you won't be able to reinstall on a new machine, for example. Foundry is NOT one of those. The installer package has it all, just hold on to that, and keep a backup copy of your license key in a text file somewhere. Maybe right beside the Foundry installer.
What about license verification? Something I've been wondering about but haven't tested, does it require Foundry servers to verify it's legitimate or is it internal verification in the software packet?
@@sylva_c137 That's a good point. I don't recall if I input the license before or after I reconnected the internet. I should check that.
Speaking as a game industry vet, what likely happened is they asked the core engineers if they could split the items up by version, and while it's possible, it would take longer than they have time for pre-launch and they had other things they wanted to do. So likely this is just a reprioritization and something else like maps is gonna fall behind. Happens all the time. The issue here (as usual) is how PR seems to work as opposed to the magic side, they could just have the core team explaining the plan but instead it's some PR drone innocently typing up a message to the fan base not realizing how much gas they're about to pour on the fire.
Just as an example, they could have avoided this by just saying the features would come in late, and then slow rolled them as needed to fit whatever else was in the schedule. But they just couldn't avoid pulling a "pappa wotc knows best".
I'm of the mind where two things are true: it's profitable/inexpenspive to not create the feature. But that's just from someone who has no idea what it takes to implement.
Yeah this kinda stinks of “Migrations are hard” and “the users can deal with by [insert boneheaded and stupid suggestion that’s mega cumbersome]”. Who knows though.
There are digital tools for Pathfinder 2e staffed by one person (Pathbuilder) and 8 part-timers (Archives of Nethys) that allow you to toggle between old and new content.
Just saying that the responsibility falls on the leadership here.
@@TabletopTiger if management did decide it wasn't profitable/inexpensive, I'd tell them they just fell victim to the Cannibalism Fallacy.
There's this idea that when you make a sequel to a game it's cheaper to stop supporting the old game and that will force the hardcore players to update to the new version. The reality is that the people who stick around and play "" are doing exactly what you wanted them to do in the first place... Have fun and be loyal to the overall brand.
Cannibalism is the idea that if you split the player base into smaller groups then the overall brand is gonna suffer and that's rarely the case. They are still playing D&D and they are driving the overall ecosystem (social, purchasing, awareness). Too many brand managers see the old loyal group as a negative not realizing when they cut them off, they aren't necessarily going to upgrade to the new thing. There's too much competition now, they're just as likely to get burnt out, and decide to play the next elder scrolls game instead.
It's MUCH easier to convince a player who is already into D&D that everyone is having fun with the new game when they actually hear supporting evidence from their friends ACTUALLY playing the game, vs trying to convince a totally unfamiliar person through advertising to pick up the new game.
In conclusion, by undercutting support for the old game they are sending the message that they don't believe in the new system enough to let the old system stand side by side with it.
@@jacoboblanco1555 right, that's very much a " we talked to the CTO about it and not the tech who actually works on it" problem
The Conan the Barbarian thumbnail had me DYING
I have to say thanks you for recommending 'When we were Wizards'. It's a great podcast. I'm nearly finished listening to it for a second time. It's like listening to a slow motion train wreck where you already know the ending. Compelling listening.
I have no idea what WotC thinks anymore.
This was such an obvious problem coming over the hill.
Leave the old, make a mode toggle. Easier than this half change they tried forcing.
It feels like the shot callers dont even know how humans act at this point.
This was a particularly great show! Lots of great advice and insights. I definitely suffer from getting lazy (no pun intended) with reviewing the characters as well. I like the idea of keeping dedicated character notes that I can quickly review and update.
I remember watching your DM kit video from 2013 when I first got into DND and role-playing games crazy I didn’t know that was you
Thank you for making your book available for free on your website, I'm glad there's such an option
It isn’t the whole book but the stuff we felt other producers could gain a lot of value from.
@@SlyFlourish though it's not the full book, the material presented is invaluable
You must learn its discipline. For no one - no one in this world can you trust. Not men, not women, not beasts. This you can trust.
Gosh. So, your tip about reviewing and planning with the characters in mind. Ironically, this is something that D&D beyond is EXCELLENT for. As the dm, I invite them to the campaign, which gives me access to all their character sheets. Because of that, I’m constantly able to see their languages, magic item inventory, skills, features, AC, damage potential, spell choices, etc. This has been a massive tool to encounter & treasure planning. Making sure a text comes up with that random language they have, or able to make that obscure tool proficiency matter. Having that deep access is amazing. I suppose you could get paper versions of their sheets to review, but through dnd beyond, they don’t know you’re looking and are surprised to see you fine tune to their characters. I don’t have to track or write down a thing. I never forget, because the burden to remember is never there. The full sheets are right there at all times. Last minute ideas are possible. That’s a big benefit to dnd beyond.
Mike, you'll like this. My friends and I have played a lot of other fantasy TTRPGs in the last 3 years, and this year we've spent our weekly sessions blending the games together into a game that is catered to us. We even designed our own character sheet and made our own core rule book with classes and everything. And now, each week, we play the best game made by us, for us, and love every minute of it. Just wanted to share =) Cheers mate!
Such a better and more useful comment than, "Just don't play WotC D&D and play (insert individual's favorite game) instead." Cheers, mate!
@@mattoliversd Hey thanks man. That’s exactly right. If you play D&D, but you wish it was different, then change it. Be proactive.
Thanks for the timely reminder on focusing on the PC's. It's been a while since I've read through Return of the Lazy DM. Going through the lazy list is my main prep ritual, but I didn't realize I've been skimping on this step.
*Just gonna play Shadowdark, ToV & other non WotC products like the Lazy DM*
1:01:20 There is a purple blob in your video.
Stating the purple blob using Forge of Foes ASAP
At 16:30, you dismiss as a "conspiracy theory" the argument that, "This was intended to force people into the new edition." Then at 20:00, you pretty much adopt that exact view of WotC's motives. A contradiction? Nope. On both counts, I 100% agree with you!
Was this an explicit plan anyone in the company articulated? Doubtful.
Does chasing growth-at-all-costs lead to a company culture that can't help but produce these outcomes? Absolutely!
The organization is not financially incentivized to see these issues, so no one within the organization is rewarded for recognizing them before they become massive problems. Eventually, they'll get tired of capitulating to community outrage. Someone in leadership will force a change in the face of backlash. That's exactly what went down at Facebook, Netflix, Reddit, Unity, etc. This is how enshittification begins.
Buying physical books or PDFs is the way to go! I'm interested to see how long it takes for the community to ditch D&D Beyond. Building a character on paper is not that difficult.
I built my own Excel character sheet, so I didn't have to rely on D&D Beyond, at the time I started creating it, I was married & thought we didn't have the money for that, after the divorce, I found we had plenty of money for things that didn't involve me, so I could pay for it now, but I like my sheet & it means I learn the rules. (I knew that Jack of All Trades rounded down while Remarkable Athlete rounded up & that both applied to initiative because I actually read the books to build the sheet.)
The game Fellowship uses a strategy to allow exposure to the villain before the final confrontation. The villain has protections that prevent the characters from being to defeat them such as invulnerability, immunity to magic, teleportation, etc. The characters have to find macguffins to break those protections before they can finally confront and defeat the villain. Before that, the best they can do in a confrontation with the villain is to possibly thwart their current objective or even just survive and escape.
I can't wait to get my City of Arches...
About tracking the characters, one system that really gives incenive to do it (and empower the players as well) is Fabula Ultima. The fact that the players are expect to contribute to the history is really refreshing.
Conan on the thumbnail? You know I'm clicking that.
The funny thing about the new exhaustion rules is that while they're indeed easier to remember, they're arguably even more punishing, which is the other thing people were unhappy about with the previous version.
You get a negative modifier in combat (you know, the kind of situations that tend to get pcs killed?) right out the gate, that can be pretty rough. Still, the first level is the one case where, depending on the adventure, I can see the argument claiming it's less punishing now.
But then, at level 2, you're at -4 across the board, which mathematically is mostly just as bad as disadvantage, but caps the highest possible result. So you're basically screwed in combat a level earlier than in 5e14.
By level 3 you're at a global penalty of -6, which is worse than disadvantage even in the small target roll range where disadvantage has the strongest impact.
The only thing that FEELS less punishing, is that disadvantage can feel quite bad when you get a good roll on your regular die and a bad roll on the extra one, it's a bit cruel because it rubs it in that you would normally have hit. I guess a negative modifier also doesn't prevent you from getting advantage, unlike in the previous system, but then again, it puts a hard cap on your highest total results, as I mentioned. Depending on the situation, either might be worse. I guess since the design trend has been to make it harder and harder for players to somehow avoid having advantage on a roll, a modifier penalty is the better fit.
I can't help but feel like this is like those videogame balancing situations where people feel an rts unit is underpowered so the devs give it a more impressive sound effect and the community suddenly feels a lot better about it.
It's also curious they chose to penalize only characters rolling for their attacks and left spellcasters mostly offensively unaffected, their spell DCs staying the same, unlike in the playtest version.
DMs: On a scale of "Hand their sheet back after creation and never look at it again" to "Tape them to your DM screen" How often do you look at your player's character sheets?
Almost never.
When they level up
Basically never. I already have the rest of the game to run so I'm not going to bother with the one part that the players are supposed to take care of.
30:18 I also needed this reminder. Thank you
A way to incorporate the "review characters" step into OSR-style prep is to build your dungeon/session (without tailoring it to the characters) then review to see where they might shine. You can then lean on that aspect during play ("...and you saw these animal tracks in your background as a frontier ranger") and also remind players about their less often used features that can be brought to bear.
If you ended up creating a super deadly dungeon the PCs will struggle with, then you can telegraph that early and give them a chance to prepare in town instead of discovering it 90 minutes into the session and having to break the flow to backtrack into town for specialized tools. I feel the keeps the "integrity" of the living world without potentially derailing your session.
Just to go along with the 1 hour D&D sessions. I try to do a short scene setting to let the players know what the mission is and start them at the encounter point. Then if they go through it quickly we can use the time to do the roleplaying and exploring.
Stuff like this is why I'm glad I'm a tactile, paper-pencil person. Also, congratulations on City of Arches! An incredible achievement.
The tips for reviewing the characters was really helpful! I run Shadowdark now and I've been falling entirely on that since the PCs might be different every session. I think this will really help! I also have a magic item grabber in my party, so I've been trying to mix up the items better - also he's gonna be real surprised when he puts on that magic armor tonight, it's super good 1/day, and a penalty the other 23 hours and 50 minutes. Maybe it will slow down the grabbiness at least a little.
So you totally got me off on a massive sidequest with those Gen Con TV episodes. I should probably come back and finish watching this... but wow! those are interesting!!!! Thanks Mike!
I'm waiting for when we've moved to 2024 and then "balance tweaks" occur even after being published as a dead tree.
In light of all the layoffs, vague rules and Sage Advice give Jeremy Crawford job security.
If you haven't abandoned WotC by now you should consider that this is the company on their best behavior.
My favorite major villain introduction I've run was a wizard whose subordinates the party had already fought several times. He sent a small force to set up a mock assassination of the party and then teleported in already concentrating on "Invulnerability". They proceeded to try and kill him until they panicked and had to flee. He was doing a lot of damage
It's been 11 years. Imagine the statblock on that Purple Blob. I shudder.
When we were wizards :(13.03.)DARTH VADRR theme.
DESKARI.
Hey Mike, where does the name "Sly Flourish" come from? Nice vid as always
It's the name of a power in 4th edition D&D. I believe it allowed you to make a weapon attack using Intelligence instead of Dexterity.
A 4e feature name
@@CJWproductions thanks!
@@minimoose7890 thank you!
I have just switched my group over to pen and paper. We started using the shadowdark slot-based inventory system too, because tracking carry weight on paper is super annoying.
I love DM/GM kit videos!
Conan reference reminds me that Modiphius lost the Conan RPG license and now the book and pdfs are gone from their store.
+1 for the meme.
For 1 hour games. Mine are typically 1.5-2hour games. We talk for 10min to catch up but once we start everything is 100% in character, no talking to the GM (he doesn’t exist in the game world like in the cartoon😂) and no rules talk. Everything is role playing even combat.
Instead of asking the GM“is the door locked?”
We instead say “I walk to the door and turn the knob to determine if it’s locked”
I know it doesn’t seem like a lot but in the 2nd version we’re in the game world. Everyone at the table is in the game world and everything flows faster because it’s in character. The way we used to do it it’s the player talking to the GM. So you’re switching in and out of the game world.
Since we’ve been playing this way we get more done in 1.5-2 hours than we did in our 4 hours games.
We just do all of your out of character talk and catching up before and after the game session. I also have 3 players with adhd (I’m one those 3) this keeps us all engaged and focus we used go on 15-20min talks not related to the game sometimes. Knowing it’s a shorter session and keeping in character for that time really keeps us all focus and engaged.
The thing that's upsetting to me abt the DND beyond changes is I feel like I, the DM, have to be the bad guy here to tell my players using that service in our current 5e game that they need to figure out a solution or use a different character sheet because this is a 5e game, not a 5.5e game
You did indeed tell us so!
For short sessions, playing something like shadow dark over DND as less options and no bonus action, stuff like theatre of the mind faster, or not using grids.
I did the best answer I could think to this new change even if they reverted it. I bought a Pathfinder 2e GM manual. Next month will be the player handbook and next the bestiary.
Frank Metzner is still alive and he posts on The Piazza regularly. Or at least he used to. I have been there in several years.
Couldnt D&D Beyond just make a poll each certain time to get player feedback on idea and stuff? Like the 2014-2024 stuff could have been answered pretty fast and save so much time to everyone.
I so wonder how they work internally ...
Initially I thought people were hating for the sake of hating, but when I read the changelog I was baffled. Being a dev, I couldn't understand what was so hard about it duplicating a database of spells and adding a "2014 Legacy" tag to it.
I'm glad the outrage made them roll back so quickly, even if some of the yellers didn't even know what they were talking about.
For the moment unfortunately I'm a bit dependent on DnD Beyond. I could run my mixed table without it but it would be a lot harder. Not worth it
Thanks
Does this talk show get uploaded as a podcast? If not please consider it!
It does!
@@SlyFlourish Thank! I’ve been walking round all week with a UA-cam video playing in my pocket…love your work and I’m really looking forward to your new book!
Lightning Rods, aka "Shoot your Monks". Love that tip.
Whenever I hear something about dndbeyond, I think of d&d insider. That 4th edition character builder that went poof. To my knowledge there is no legal way to get it or even redownload it.
What will happen when the inevitable 6e comes around? Or tech that dndbeyond is based on becomes extinct?
I actually find Foundry is a bit limited in its usefulness for escaping the walled garden, at least when it comes to 5e, because it relies heavily on D&D Beyond for character building - you also mention it's not as user-friendly. Particularly when running one-shots I find that not only is the character builder in Foundry hard for people to use but also it can be difficult and/or expensive to host a server (especially for multiple worlds) and players can't access their characters between sessions or keep them after one-shots if the server isn't up. It incentivizes people to use D&D Beyond and I've long wished they'd implement an offline character builder or even develop some kind of "Foundry Lite" that lets players see their characters between sessions. There are some mods that help, but another issue with Foundry is that every time they release an update, half the mods break. I've been considering other options lately, but it is in many other ways a great program and hard to beat.
I guess I'm in the minority here, but I actually don't use D&D Beyond for anything other than reading the books. Its phone layout is really nice and intuitive, making it easy to read while at work or on the bus or wherever. Plus, on the website side of things, you can save the art in the books onto your computer, which you can save onto a flash drive and put in a safety deposit box, and Wizards can never take those away - the art being one of the only things I like about WotC products.
What is wild is that this would've been a non-issue if Hasbro hadn't destroyed all the good faith we had in their management without the ogl fiasco. I honestly think that
Every misstep adds up for sure.
I have been a strictly books and paper player and dm, but it would be cool to have an online platform that was open source (if there is one I am unaware), that you could customize and make your own
MapTool I think still exists and is open source. I haven't used it myself but when I was looking for an alternate to Roll20, folks recommended MapTool.
I love paper character sheets. And so do my players. However, in long campaigns (4 years for us with same characters) AND the shear character complexity at level 17, combined with options, numerous magic item implications, paper is tough. However, I will readily admit, we are a far minority in player groups with our level. In the event, we run a one shot and use lower level characters, my players enjoy, leaving the complexity behind and getting back to simpler representations of characters on paper. It is almost as if they need to rethink how tier 4 is represented on paper. Granted many would argue they need to rethink tier 4 altogether lol.
15:00 "i dont care if its hard for wotc" , this guy needs to be president.
No sir.
@@SlyFlourish lol, ya I wouldn't want to either
$30 book? The PHB is $49.999
Is the Return of the Lazy Dungeonmaster an update to the original, or are both necessary to benefit from the full effect?
Return is a stand-alone book that you can benefit from on its own. There's a lot of overlap between the books so it's almost like a second edition of the original book.
Return is brilliant. I hadnt known i needed a template for prepping before getting Return of Lazy DM. Its great.
More of an update. You don't need both and if you're buying one, go for the newer book.
10:00 mark comment: Animal House, not Naked Gun but let’s not quibble. Hehe. Good stuff, Mike! 👍🏼
That line was delivered by a young Kevin Bacon no less!
ua-cam.com/video/aKnX5wci404/v-deo.html
They won- and so did we
Yeah, 3.0 and 3.5 were fare more complex than 5e.
John & Jane want homebrew magic, items, abilities, systems OK.
John sends the next 4 hours trying to figure out how to implement home brew on App, but the math is all correct.
Jane uses paper and is ready to play 30 seconds later, but the math is off for the next four hours.
Personally, I'd prefer the paper, but it's a not a hill I've been willing to die on for my tables. I hope you have better luck with the quest for paper Mike.
I lost so much faith in Wizards that i no longer support them in any way. It’s a bitter sweet feeling. I have no desire to play the new game and have instead been pushed to try new and fun games. (Shadowdark, Cypher system, Shadow of the Weird Wizard, Vampire the masquerade, and most recently Marvel Multiverse.)
Happily playing Castles and Crusades while watching wotc 's D&D burn to the ground...MY FLGS owner tells me that no one is pre ordering new D&D...it makes me wonder what Hasborg is going to do with the IP after the impending abject failure.
D&D is a lifestyle brand and Hasbro makes money licensing the IP to companies like Lego, Converse, and Wizkids.
Hasbro, a toy company, does not even manufacture their own D&D minis. DECCA does that via WizKids.
I think the long term goal for Wizbro is to make a D&D version of MonopolyGO.
Of course they walked back the changes. They want to make money and they don’t like seeing people leave, but the problem is just like a bad ex-girlfriend eventually, you get tired of having to forgive someone who has to say sorry all the time and you look for someone who just treats you better in general. I printed out paper character sheets today. My current party is a group of people who learned online, but I think it is finally time for them to get some old-school education. I know in the end it will be more convenient and personal plus with this announcement, they even bought me a couple books😂, but the transition sure can be messy. If you’re reading this comment you can do it too! take charge of your own games. All we need is us, our players and each other
By Crom!
Paper Character Sheets != Legally Bind
Adding ROMULUS.But it's a Long Trek there,(it's OPPOSITE)..'GO to
see the MOVIE.,you will then change your mind. Again.
..
I'm stuck with virtual games for various reasons. Paper character sheets, unfortunately, are just not efficient enough for me and my players. : (
We just have to take the risks.
You can do virtual games without utilizing centralized platforms. Owlbear Rodeo is free, and a system agnostic VTT, though limited to sharing the maps and tokens. There are free fillable PDF versions of character sheets, and those are easily shared, by email or Discord. Discord is its own handy tool, to share files, images, and it has strong voice and video chat capabilities, plus the ability to share a screen with the players in the channel. All the players in your group need are the rules from the SRD. If you have the PHB and other core source books like XGtE and Tasha's, you could probably get away with doing a single page write up of a subclass they want to play, so they have it available. If you're playing a previous version of the game, Drive Thru RPG has a wide selection of the books that can be picked up in PDF or print format as well. And then there are less than legitimate means of acquiring older PDFs.
The point is, you can still play online/virtually, with a little thought and a bit more work.
I use Excel or Google sheets for character sheets. Someone usually already made one, so I all need to do is search for it. I also can design the sheet however I want to. Bit of time commitment but free monetary wise
For d&d I use Foundry nowadays. There are mods that let you import from dndbeyond
16:35 I think you massively underestimate the actively malicious motivations of billion+ dollar corporations
Their capacity to implement those motivations without tripping over themselves and looking like they're incompetent fools, sure. But the motivations are absolutely there
People acting like Paper and Pens got trademarked by WotC and got pinkos ready to pink you up. 😂
Cant stop me from making my own path to treasure and enclaves.
you told them so lol, enshitified af
I just ordered SD, I’m never playing WOTC DnD again.
I’ve been playing since 3e came out. I’ve seriously had enough of the nonsense.
I bought the master tier only to let my players make characters easier. After the OGL I canceled my sub and have bought nothing from WotC....
Yo ho ho
Yeah, walking back a bad call was a good choice, but a BETTER choice would have been to read the room and make the charitable, pro-consumer move in the first place.
They don't think they are walking on eggshells anymore.
And are they wrong? They're not going to get any major blowback from this. When I looked at the forums earlier today, I saw multiple threads THANKING them for the reversal.
Just play CASTLES AND CRUSADES RPG. Dont give your hard earned money to wotc, they hate you😮
How is C&C different than D&D?
@@SeldonnHarithe overall flair of C&C has an old-school 2e feel and the mechanics/engine is different if not (subjectively) better than D&D 5e.
@SeldonnHari namely, it's not wotc produced.