_"DnD 5e is a complex game"_ I laugh in Shadowrun. Those are good advice, even outside of this game. Shadowrun, World of Darkness, Star Wars, Fragged Empires, Blades in the Dark, Heavy Gears... it ALL applies.
Kudos for the intro! Still, in a real group we should be ourselves AND have fun without toxic BS. Else, we can just run outside, trying to befriend repeat offender type criminals lurking in the neighborhood... 😉
@@priestesslucy Yes, the "/s" tag means that the preceding statement is meant to be taken sarcastically. Feel free to use it; it's quite widely known and generally saves a great deal of explanation.
My favorite players throughout the years all had one thing in common: They chatted me throughout the week about their character. There were much fewer surprises in-game that way, they showed that they were invested in the world and in the game, I was able to know their goals and likes/dislikes better so I could tailor the story and rewards to them, and overall it just made me want to work harder on the game and the world to make it fun for them. Players who only talked to me and the other PCs on the day of the game seemed less invested, and would sometimes be disappointed or apathetic with the way their character arc and rewards went.
Absolutely! Keeping the conversation going between sessions is great evidence of a player's investment, and it can be really helpful for the DM! Of course, not everyone will find time to join in that extra conversation, but it's great when they do :)
This is an extremely underused part of the game, tbh. With the days and days worth of travel montages that feature in most campaigns, you are really just making the character bonds feel realistic. _Of course_ the PCs are suddenly much closer, coordinated, and understanding of one another _after traveling together for a week._
Ok. But what to do when GM is not open at all to listen to players between sessions ? I hit a situation when GM says he wants to chat online but any time I start to communicate something he seems irritated, almost hostile? I thought he has some problem with me but in some time I learned that essencially nobody from player side is communicating in those chanels at all.... its dead town. I realy dont know what to think of it. Kinda mixed messages for me. Did you ever encounter it?
@@lamichka two steps. Bring this to the DM and try finding a solution, communicate. It doesn't work? Decide if that's a campaign worth your time, and comunicate that to DM and players. Ghosting is kinda rude.
Accepting failure is also a HUGE tip for GMs. When a planned session falls flat, don't hate yourself. Investigate sessions in the past that worked well, identify elements that made it succeed. Conversely, identify weak points in that "failed" session, so you never make the same mistake twice!
Yup, this is the best one. I had a chase scene in my last session that I felt was pretty weak. Lo and behold, there are RULES for that in the DMG, and they would've been way better than the lame thing I cooked up on the spot. Lesson learned!
My first session went horribly, imo. It was a tower defense homebrew and it started out fine but then came the combat and badly balanced waves and I could feel them fading 😭 it's taken a while to gather enough courage to DM again but I'm doing another one, a pre-made campaign, next week and hope it'll go better.
@@tybronx2446 How'd it go? In my experience, going premade as a starting DM is a good choice. You get a feel of balancing that way - which is more an art than a science. Later you can start tweaking things, or even overhaul elements wholesale if you think they'd work better with your game world. When I first started DMing 5th edition, I took a module from a whole different fantasy setting and retooled it for D&D.
@@Smilley85 You do get a better feel for balance, but not all adventures are balanced well either. I feel homebrewing my first campaign is a lot more freeing because anything and everything about the world is up to me to decide so I can just make up anything on the spot.
Collaborating with the DM on your character's background is severely underrated! Creating ties to the world makes for a much more fleshed out character AND world, and also creates the opportunity for plot hooks and role play moments. If you're new or just don't want to mess with the setting, just ask how to make your idea work with his world. Good luck finding a DM who won't want to talk your ear off about all the different facets of his setting and they'll probably get a ton of inspiration just from hearing your idea!
Yeah any homebrew DM will love you for it, and any DM running a module SHOULD love you for it because that's a big part of what makes playing out of books fun in my experience!
A caveat: if you work with a player extensively on their backstory, don’t then undermine it or contradict it, or take it in a direction you decide is right rather than the way the player wanted to play it. For example, if the character is deeply invested in family and blood obligations, think very carefully about your idea that the character will find out at some point that they were adopted so some villain could fulfill some contract clause or the like, and their cherished family relationships, which they were expecting to provide a specific kind of set of expectations and tensions, are not what they intended. This kind of thing has happened multiple times in games I’ve been in and it can really damage players’ trust. (It can also work if the player is interested and wants to go with it, but imposing that kind of thing on them is a problem.) (Also note that I’m not saying anything about adoption here. You could tell any number of awesome stories of whatever theme with a *willing* player.)
I take this one step further. I'm a very spontaneous, seat of the pants type GM (or at least I used to be. It's been a long time and I feel like my creativity is retired lol) and I would always collaborate with my players to create not only their characters but their entire homeland. The homelands of the party would be the cornerstone of the setting, with everything else evolving out from there.
THIS! I'm currently in a campaign and we're just 8 sessions in (It's going great). Initially, I didn't know almost anything about the world while creating my character, yet I talked with the dm and he confirmed that my backstory will work. I was starting to think that I shouldn't be rambling about my ideas as much, but gosh he had implemented my backstory into the world so well!! It feels so nice and validating that my character feels like he belongs to the environment. When some important plot points from my story were touched it had such an incredible impact on both me and the character! Glad that we could talk and figure out what would work and so on, cause now the experience is incredibly enhanced because of it.
My golden rule: It's the job of each person in a roleplaying group, including the DM, to make sure everyone is having as much fun as possible, including the DM. Also communication in an open and respectful way, at the right time, is the key to groups that go on for years and years.
I only played 4 sessions so far and the DM basically made us into the 4 four horseman of the apocalpsy. We ended up getting ambused by demons and now someone gave us four talking horses. We started to notice that weird stuff started to happen around us in town. I play a cleric and instead of healing people, the people I try to help get the plague. 😭 It was pretty exciting to figure it out. Now we have to "master" our powers so we can stop messing stuff up around us.
@@Revelwoodie Yeah, there was a fire in a temple and the priestesses asked me to help. Then I go back to help the next day (while our rogue is having an identity crisis) and BAM! everyone I healed has the plague. The priestesses: "Do you know what happened?" "No idea, but look I'm busy today, I really can't help." While inside I'm freaking out. I find our warlock who greets me with: "I was having lunch and the waiter dropped dead when I touched his hand." So we had an Oh Shit moment. Great way to find out that we're Death and Pestilence. Let's not even mention the barbarian who sent half of the town guards into a bloodrage. So he's War, yay? Wow, that was an info dump, sorry about that.
I ALWAYS makes sure to give my players an after-session feedback survey. The three questions I ask are: What they liked about the session, what they didn't like, and if they'd like to add anything else. It can be tricky getting your players to consistently do it so I decided completing a survey would give them a point of my homebrew inspiration they liked. It half remedied it, as I can still struggle to get responses. But if you're open to criticism and improving it's a super helpful tool.
@@BobWorldBuilder I agree! It makes things better for everyone, and makes players feel much better if things go wrong because they know there is a way to improve it.
I do the same, but with slightly more detail to the questions: 1. What did you like? Keep it as is? Or more of it? 2. What did you not like? Want less? Or none at all? 3. Anything you felt was missing that we should add? Or anything you would like to see eventually that would be disappointing to not experience?
As someone who's been DMing for more than 40 years, I endorse this list. 😆 For the rules one, I would say that just learning the rules for what their character can do would be enough to make me happy. I don't mind helping players out with reminders or quick explanations of rules for unusual situations or when they are trying out something new, but I expect players to understand how their own class abilities and spellls work so I don't have to stop the game to look them up.
If you're been DM'ing for 40 years... what exactly are you having to "look up" at this point? If you already know what classes/races your players are, you should have cheat sheets up (and literally at the ready) so that you don't have to "stop the game" to "look it up".
@@Dyanosis 5 editions, tons of classes, tons of subclasses, hundreds of spells, additional books (tosha, xanathar, UA etc). Hell, even knowing the PHB by heart can be hard.
@@andreimadalin6207 True but as your player prepare for the game, even more so for new players who are not familiar with the rule, why not take the extra step to print the few spell available to them or have sticky note or something to help regarding that. I usually try to prepare a bit more when playing with players that are less familiar with the rules and the setting. Knowing this is inevitably going to happen.
Fun fact about a fellow player at one of our games: Her dark elf rogue's character name is Bonk because when she came to the surface world she was taken in by a family of halflings and the youngest son couldn't pronounce her dark elf name so he called her Bonk instead. So she kept the name. :)
I thought I was immune to shitty player behavior since I had experience dming for a tough group but these vids make me realize that I’m just as bad at times and how to improve, as well as how to communicate problems with players without being a douche. Thanks for the advice!
That last tip is something I have experienced as DM and am slightly ashamed to say, only started recently implementing it as a player. And BOY, does it help make the game fun, grounded AND smooth. Just by the simple act of asking or engaging with other people's backstory instantly transforms a group from a couple of mercenaries individually working at the same goal by luck of the fates to an actual group with greater stakes when a PC dies than just for the player that controlled that PC. As a wild magic sorcerer with large aoe spells and spells like dimension door that can save friends from the stomachs of monsters, it became so much more impactful when using those spells around friends and spending two of my turns just to give an ally a slightly greater chance of surviving than if I didn't. The sheer tension when you are standing next to a low health ally while a wild magic burst happens is something I would have never been able to experience before just talking to those silly little sheets of paper we call a character sheet with a backstory.
I've played in games where the party is hiding their backstory and it sucks so much, there's nothing you can do because the characters don't trust each other
Another youtube page I follow, Dungeon Dudes, has a great character creation tool where every player character has to have some kind of relationship with at least one fellow PC and at least one possible NPC. Its a great tool for building a sense of belonging within the party and the campaign world.
My first character I ever played ended up not really having much of a personal goal of her own, so she just focused on supporting her friends. Which, incidentally, ended up with her the center of the group, and now there's an entire revenge arc involving her family and the BBEG that the DM brought to life, including her grandpa, who is played by another player who recently lost their PC. This, among other reasons, is why as a player, this is still my favorite campaign and character. Not because my PC is that great on her own (she has an incredibly (and purposefully) generic backstory and personality, in fact), but because of the connections she built with her group and all the shenanigans and RP that generated. Can definitely recommend.
Eliminating the gatekeeping on both sides. Being open to help from others, and helping others. Acknowledging egos and compromising can work wonders for building the community.
A Bard became one of my all time best characters (I’ve been doing this since the 70s) when he & I became the DM’s asset. This occurred because the DM had built his own world from the ground up and I, as a lore master, showed a lot of interest in the world allowing him to info dump often. I also became the party note taker as well as composing an in-character weekly recap of the game which always painted the other party members as heroes of ledgendary proportions which further ingratiated me to the DM as well as the party.
As I write this, my friend is making a campaign. He essentially uses me as a way to make sure plot points fit, help him refine details and the other players are getting my assistance with their character backstories, all because I kept asking how the writing was going. I'm his right-hand man. Not to mention the sessions are at my place and I work as an anonymous form of criticism. He calls me his secretary.
I never really comment on youtube videos but I just wanted to say thank you so much for your excellent subtitles on your videos. Makes it so much more enjoyable as someone who struggles with hearing.
7:40 my absolute favorite dnd moment was when my dwarf barbarian was walking into the woods accompanied by the city guard in search of some threat, and what would have been just a description of the forest we were walking through and a skip to the next combat was entirely changed when I interrupted the end of my dms fantastic description with one simple question: "are there monkeys?" And because he was awesome he said "yes. Absolutely." And dove right into the description of the monkeys I see and then my barbarian yelled so loud the monkeys fell out of the trees and he went over collected the dead monkeys (finishing one off) and walked back to my now in aw group of soldier acquaintances turned fearful helpers. It took all of five minutes and it added so much to my character, the flow of play and the overall humor of the game.
Fun Fact about one of my fellow PC’s: Their character told mine they were a noble, so I asked them what there titles were… Anyways my character now referees to them as ”Ressyn, the sweetest tongue, most beautiful voice, youngest son of the king Trogar.”
A youtube channel must always distinguish itself from others in order to stand out. Your recent focus on becoming a nexus of community information puts you in a unique position that is different from all the other dnd youtube channels. I'm happy to see you find a niche that supports the community and lets your channel grow. Well done.
As a player I managed to get a loop roaring with the DM which turbo-charged everything and brought huge amounts of detail and generated a phenomenal 25 year long campaign, much of which continued for me after the other players had dropped out years back. Cultivating a good working exchange with the DM and even feeding them creative data (videos, novels, graphics, scenarios) can make something really special happen. It's all about collaboration I think, despite me very much having to go it completely alone these days as a DM. 'Make your DM feel optimistic' is a good rule of thumb maybe. Bob World Builder, this video is really really good and I'd like to send the link to future players I get. Thought provoking and cool!
"Accept Failure." Oh boy, I finally have a story. So I was playing a paladin in an undead dungeon. There was a Specter floating just out of reach above some charging undead. Through both starting equipment and looting the dungeon, I actually had a longsword, a magic flame tongue short sword (which I was primarily using), and a longbow if needed. Our dragon monk frog lept into the air and pummeled the Specter, getting it super low. I wanted to kill it, but I didn't want to have to drop my short sword (which was ignited and my primary source of light in the dark dungeon) to draw my bow. So, thinking myself cleaver, I drew my longsword and threw it at the specter, an epic strike. I missed. After my hilarious failure, the specter retreated on its turn and I chased it, this time dropping my sword and drawing my bow, thinking the specter was hovering in the nearby light. As I was drawing my bow, the flame went out on my short sword. The torchlight, didn't extend far enough to cover the Specter (which was in the air), so it disappeared in total darkness. I had two shots, both with disadvantage. Knowing where it was moving to, I fired blind...and hit! Killed it with a blind shot as by sword flame was going out behind me! Managed to save an epic fail with a totally different epic success! Also, even knowing I killed it with that shot, my character didn't, so I had him fire his second shot into the wall before hearing the thud of the body hitting the ground (there were only a few undead left anyway. I did a lot of suboptimal things, but my DM was super cool with not punishing me for it and even helping out.
@@cole7274 I used to be a proofreader and a typesetter -- I'm sick and tired of seeing the English language being butchered by people who can't take the time to learn how to spell and/or the differences between words. My first language was Spanish that I learned from my immigrant parents. I made the effort to become an expert in English, my second language. If you don't like my attitude, you can kiss my posterior! 🤬
@@pablohammerly448 Oh I don't doubt you're an expert with language, you clearly know your stuff mate. It's pretty impressive to have that kind of language mastery, I'm struggling pretty hard in my own studies of Swedish (maybe not struggling per say, but it is a slow-going process). I'm certainly sorry to have caused offense, my goal was to point out some of the niceties of being nice. Your comment reads as if you're really angry about the whole ordeal, and I wouldn't want to cause that either. For you, as someone who's had to put an exhaustive amount of work to learn English, wouldn't you agree that you've had your fair share of mistakes while learning? Or that the annoyances of the internet, autocorrect and typing with keyboards sometimes leads to errors through no fault of your own? It seems that a comment with any error is a major annoyance to you, and I just can't help but wonder if being so heated about this all is healthy for your own sake or making you happy. What do you think? Maybe I'm missing the perspective of someone who knows more about other languages and sees a value to commenting that I don't.
@@cole7274 For example, how my phone likes completely changing words on me without me noticing. Another is trying to edit a comment and deleting a word and not noticing then you look very foolish. Anyways, my phone hates me.
Good tips I like players that take notes and know their character and abilities especially spells. Respect at the table is needed for sure. Roleplaying is always nice too.
The note on accepting failure is absolutely a great one and seems to get overlooked. Tbh the Nat 1s are usually more fun to remember than the Nat 20s and it's great when it happens. When my paladin has to make a Dex save, I don't get mad at the inevitable failure - I usually preface it with a "it was nice knowing y'all" and make the roll and I go with it. When I fail a persuasion check, I roleplay really bad strawman arguments or sometimes end up making points against myself. When I miss an attack, I describe how I put too much weight behind my halberd and missed wildly. Moments of failure can and are fun if you're a good sport about it, and it's a solid bonus when you engage in roleplay based on your bad rolls. As a player, it's fun to make this bit of narrative make sense - as the DM, it's great to see players engaged this way and nice to have a brief moment to breathe during an encounter as the player describes what happens
I think a lot of tips are things that go in one ear and out the other with d&d. All you have to do is care. Care about the game you’re playing. As much if not more than your DM. If you genuinely care about what’s going, care about having a good time with your friends and care about the story you’re telling then you’ll be a great player. Unenthusiasm is the death of creativity and creativity is the heart and soul of d&d. Engaging with the game, with plot hooks and wanting to arrive on time are all just offshoots of you actually wanting to play the game, and showing your DM this by being a cool person. Just care!
I'm a multi-time frustrated DM, and I love this list. I recommend it for everyone. Learning the rules is actually high on my list, and I pretty much always feel like we could've gotten more accomplished
with the last one though, I've noticed that a lot of players, and not just the old ones, don't really think out the motivations and backstories of their characters, but I find way the best way to do so is to work with the DM on your own so they can see how cool it will be. Last week, my DM did a whole section with my mom and we had a great interaction and afterward, one of the other players was like "I really need to flesh out my backstory" and he worked on it and this week the DM incorporated that into the session. Of course this also requires a DM that really puts the work in because I've had DMs where you might as well play a video game because the work I put into who my character was was completely irrelevant to the plot
The most important thing for me is: communication. In and outside of the game. Tell me what you want from the game. I cannot read minds. I want my players to come up with an amazing backstory and let me weave that into the plot, so that their characters are actually motivated to resolve that plot. (also to talk them out of playing a toxic character that sabotages the party before they even start)
My group is really good about this. Our DM is phenomenal, he finds ways to incorporate all of our backgrounds into the game. The party leadership changes all the time because the DM is great about incorporating our individual stories. We did throw a curve to our dm when, me as a neutral good who told the other party members to not attack each other, well we have an arcane rogue who has a cursed dagger, 2 other party members attacked this rogue to "prove a point" in the middle of combat...the DMs face went white, "WTF just happened"...long story short, alliances in the party changed, me and the rogue are now part of an orc clan...good thing as our defense of the 2 orcs was communicated among clans, it has helped...now no one in the party trusts each other...it is weird amd fun...we spy on each other all the time to get more backstop and motivation. DM handled that fiasco with grace amd dignity and worked the events that happened into the rest of the campaign...he is awesome
one of my players was a cleric and one day just out of nowhere could see where the campaign was going and said "it's in the prophecies, brother, we must do this" his prophecies are now an integral part of the game. "Yes, and" + collaborative world building are the best. Stuff that happens that I have no control over is what makes me the DM have fun, i don't know what to expect, and reacting to it is the challenge and skill and what makes us all leave the table with a smile.
Learned this week that the Aasimar Druid's family got murdered whilst protecting a Gate to the Feywild, the Tiefling Rogue got groomed as a child, the Leonin Bloodhunter might be royalty, and the Paladin Elf thinks that he was born from a tree...great tips, Bob!!!
What I want more than anything in my players is for them to be excited to forward their stories. I want them to engage with the players at the table, talk and plan things out with the group between sessions, and most importantly, *talk to me* about what they want to happen for the next session, or further down the road. If nothing else, that's what I think makes a player truly great.
I just shared this with a table-to-be: character creation happens next week. Thank you for this list. I think it will really help our players who have never done anything like this before.
Taking notes is INSANELY useful. We had a dedicated archivist / cartographer last game. I can't count the number of times he saved us from our ignorance. There's no way you'd remember what a particular NPC said 4 sessions ago without notes.
The most important thing for me is, show up on time, keep your phone in your pocket and try to organize when the next session takes place. Nothing shows more that you dont respect your dm then coming late, playing on your phone and never making suggestions when to play next time.
One of the things that I appreciate most from my group is feedback at the end of the session. Because they let me know what do they like and what they don't like and then I think about a way that I can maintain the campaign I want to run while also making sure they get to enjoy it. Because as a DM can easily fall into the trap of satisfying my players and forget about his own satisfaction.
A bonus advice concerning engaging: Don't just kill everything you believe to be a monster/bad guy/enemy sometimes the DM adds a story plot in these characters or they will turn them into one. try it, it is fun to "convert" a "Bad-Guy" to your side.
Sure, but only if it makes sense for the characters to do so, (and I am writing this as a forever Game Masters). I disagree that you should expect player to try to convert enemies into allies because you find it more interesting then killing them or you wrote possible side quest. What about creating character that are different shade of greys, or maybe introducing your NPCS in all shade of greys... introduce a NPC with a tragic backstory that humanize them with a setting that emphasize that the rogue in front of you isn't just a low life thief and a thug. He's the father of the 3 and the husband of a sick woman. He isn't a very good thief at that, a few local knew him growing up. Now he spend most of is time numbing the pain by drinking himself to black out. He can't go back to his life, there is too much heat on him, a bounty on his head means he will probably never see his family again. Of course you could argue that how are you going to have all that exposition to the players it seems force when the players are about to kill a random NPC that such information be given to them well, maybe some other random homeless see the group of adventurer who aren't making a decent job hiding their intention and truth be told , that drunk thief had it coming, but maybe the homeless feel bad for that drunk fool who felt asleep again in his alleyway...and decide to share a bit of local knowledge with the group of player. Maybe a town guard or some other NPC surprise the group by entering the alleyway and tells the party the information.
As someone who's spent more time DM'ing then playing, the PC interaction is probably the most satisfying thing to listen to. Makes me feel that I somehow wove the threads of fate to gather an odd party together and it makes sense for them to adventure together.
I had a “supporting the DM” moment once and it felt great. Basically in our world there’s only humans and a few monster races(But no tiefiling). My character, a Fiend Warlock, had as a role playing style turn more and more similar to a tiefiling when he uses a spell. My DM had the idea of making it the normal effects of making the pact when he saw it, not only that, eventually the tiefiling kind was born due to my character’s action. It was so awesome.
Hi Bob! I made a free version of your video in spanish, with a few things of my own opinion. Obviously i gave you credit and reccomended your great channel. Respects from Chile and let the dices keep rolling!!!
As a new player, I really apreciate this video. Just had my first session last week (yay!) and had a blast, think I did pretty good, and have been looking up how to make the game better. I love videos that teach players how to engage with the world and characters as a group, great work.
The rules one hits, I have had too many players say they are not really having fun. But have shown so little towards learning the rules, it makes me sad. Even basics like learning how the basic turn goes makes the game so much more for a player. It just makes being the GM so hard when you get to one players turn and you have to drop the game to explain how to make an attack a month into a campaign for the 5th time In a night. For exalted I give everyone a sheet that goes though the entire combat in a check list, and I make my players follow it every single time. It was a bit awquard at first. But I think my players have always done so much better despite it being so complex. I think D&D needs a good cheat sheet to give out players, I don’t really need most of the info given on DM screens, but would love a single sheet I could hand players. Just something like, taking your turn. Making an attack. Casting a spell. Simple, and covers some of the basics.
I know Anto of the Icarus Games channel on UA-cam is currently working on producing 5e cheat sheets for various classes and races. The kickstarter already funded so some digital versions may already be available. I just haven't kept up to date with it, but it sounds like exactly what you're looking for!
On another note "D4: DnD Deep dive" has a "DnD university" playlist where he goes over the basics of the game. He is super easy to listen to and explains things very well. He helped immensely when I first started playing. It is also good to as a refresher
Ohhh, cool. Anything to give players I think is great, some I do think just need a good one page of info so they don’t need to ask basics and can ask the more fun stuff !
Love this idea. Whether it's quick cheat cards in front of players, or on the face side of a GM screen, reminds me of quick guides I've designed at work for codes, reference etc
You might have found a solution by now, but I recommend checking out MPMB's PDF for character sheets. There's an optional last page that gives some great shorthand on what a player can do with their turn. It even explains some basics of casting spells, like cube, cone, etc. We started a group with all new players, and they found it really helpful.
I played several games as a PC before I became a DM and in all of those games I played, we didn't do travel time. If a place was three days away, we started walking and basically fast traveled. When I became a DM I decided that I didn't want travel to be painful, but there should at least be one night of camping if they're taking 3 days to travel somewhere. I came to this realization after watching Critical Role. So many of their interactions happened during watches, that it just made sense to me to add it to my game. Plus, without it, we'd might have miss the "killed my whole family" interaction which still makes me smile. Sitting around a campfire is something many of us know how to do instinctually, so sitting around a campfire in game isn't a stretch of the imagination. By setting up two shifts to watch camp, different PCs that may not speak often with one anther have a few minutes of conversation and interaction one on one, without interruption from the other players. It's been great.
I do this too. I skip travel time, and edit the travel distance so that locations are within a days travel unless I want something interesting to happen. I do this because I think random encounters that aren't driven by the story are kind of boring and a time sink.
@@jayspeidell I agree. I have a few random encounters planned, but they're more designed to be RP and world building, that just "7 bandits attaack. Roll initiative." However, I do think having an opportunity to find, set up, and guard the camp allow for interesting RP with characters that give them opportunities to build their backstory, use those skills that don't often get used (ranger's foraging skills) and just have a moment to talk.
All of this is great advice. Especially about characters matching the setting. I played in a Shadowfell game, playing a character I had made well before a campaign was even planned, who didn't fit at all. When he died, I made a Harengon monk who also didn't fit the setting. When I started wondering why I wasn't quite invested in the party's goals, I realized it was because, in a party of a half-orc oathbreaker, undead monstrosity, tormented wizard, and secretive warlock, a rabbit warrior didn't exactly make sense. So I rolled up a Shadar-Kai druid/cleric who was cursed with madness and now I fit in perfectly and everything flows much more naturally for us.
Great video! I subbed right after watching. These are habits that I always try to engage in when I am playing, but are great reminders for everyone. In one of my current campaigns we have a new player who is playing a rogue as her first experience with DND. She is doing very well for a newbie, but my wife and I (as more experienced players) have been doing our level best to support her as she learns the game. I am playing and artificer(1)/wizard(x) multiclass, my wife is playing a Life Cleric, and we have been prioritizing support spells during early level play in order to get us through the rocky learning curve. I picked up Guidance as one of my artificer cantrips and as soon as I got Find Familiar at Wizard 1, I started having him perch on our rogues shoulder whenever she is doing her solo rogue thing to give her unlimited extra D4's on her skill checks, assist her in her investigation and searches so she rolls at advantage as well, and occassionally remotely heal her as required; while my wife will routinely bless the entire party so we all get those D4's in combat as well and make sure that none of us go down for any reason. Our newbie rogue is going through dungeons feeling like a super star and is loving the experience every step of the way. Now, this may be more than is required or recommended, but by actively engaging with her, and showing how teamwork bolsters everyone, we have a made committed new player, and more importantly, a new friend in real life as well.
A big tip back to DM's. Facilitate player interaction! Give moments, story beats, breaks in the narrative where players can do things. Rushing from set-piece to set-piece, or even worse, hushing players RPing with each other so you can continue your story, is only giving yourself MORE work to do!
@@Dyanosis I mean, there's lots to specify, but in UA-cam comments brevity tends to be better than wordiness. No one wants to read my 3000 word dissertation on table etiquette and facilitating rp. One big paragraph is already a lot for most comments!
I think the most practical tip for players is to do the thing that they think is only for DMs: prepare for the session. Write down at least one thing you would like to ask or say to each of the other PCs. Consider relevant NPCs for this session, and think about how you might interact with them. Review your character sheet. Make alternate spell preparation "loadouts." Write out simple tactics. Make lists of short term goals for the party and your character. Call another player and talk about the game. Ask your DM for more info on an aspect of the world that interests you. If each player spends just a quarter of the time preparing that DMs typically do, a game would be improved DRAMATICALLY.
As a DM myself, i agree with this list pretty full hardily. Ive been dming for close to 20 years now and have structured several types of campaigns. I have personally landed on a specific style now however that players who know me seek me out to play. I still run my campaigns in a 3.5 setting because of its freedoms, and i have a very grim dark style of campaign that is always a homebrew setting. What im getting at is it takes a lot of time to create and maintain these settings and my campaigns are not hand holdy and easy. Thats what people seek me out for. With that being said, there is still a lot of effort that goes into crafting these settings and sometimes players dont see this. Making a challenging but not impossible campaign is difficult and i have so many notebooks full of settings that didnt take off. So my tip to players. Ask questions, explore possibilities, respect the entire party (dm included), and work together. I actually killed a quest giver today in my campaign because the party failed to stop it. It bummed them out a bit when they realized what happened, but they loved it because no one else they played with does that so openly. Now, they collected themselves, respected each other and myself, and are working on a solution to get out of the area together. Its fantastic! And they are (mostly) a pleasure to DM for. Everyone, including myself, has moments.
I LOVE this, Bob! Thank you! Sending this to my group. And you come across as SO empathetic that I'd let you raise my kid. But you wouldn't want to raise my kid because she's quite the minmaxer and way too jammy with rolling crits.
I find that in long campaigns with long hiatuses, backstory conversations between PC's are especially hamstrung by the player forgetting what they and their character know about the other PC's. For a campaign I'm in that had a year-long hiatus, I'm now going through my notes and trying to list all meta and in-game knowledge I have about each PC. I hope it enables deeper roleplay. I wish I did it sooner!
Maybe have an OOC update before the next game if there's a significant gap? It's a bit meta but the net effect of making those IC convos easier to have will be a positive one.
I love it when players get involved with the world-building, particularly when it comes to historical events and NPCs. If a player pops off some improvised story about some event that took place once upon a time, I take note of that and make it part of the world's history, though some of the actual details might be a little different than what the player had said, as things are often exaggerated or changed as stories are retold. Players sharing stories about various NPCs "back home" gives me material to work with and saves me a lot of trouble creating characters to populate that town that fit with the image the player has of it. If I had players that were really engaged, I would have them help build the world from the ground up by having them describe their characters' hometowns, some nearby settlements and points of interest, their culture, some interesting historical events that took place in the region, etc., then plop all of that into different areas on an otherwise blank world map and build around what the players had given me to start with. Add in whatever they improvise about their home regions during play and most of the heavy lifting is done for those regions by the time I actually need to do anything with them. First adventure takes place in a trade hub that is somewhat central to where all of the characters are coming from and the players are tasked with explaining what brought their characters to that location. My own worldbuilding can focus on the trade hub and surrounding region, expanding to other regions as the adventure moves to them. Early plot hooks move the adventures toward whichever player-made region is the most fleshed out, and we eventually make our way through each of the regions. From there, any future campaigns involving most of the same players can be set in that same world, which they are all intimately familiar with because they helped make it what it is.
LOL Funny story, I actually got kicked from a game for focusing on interacting with other PCs. I used my character to enable them to do really cool things, and it made them super uncomfortable. And no, it wasn't anything sexual. Stuff like helping the paladin establish a new temple, distract uptight soldiers by helping the bard set up entertainment, etc.
Really good as usual. One thing I would add, "perfect your craft" i.e. somethings are more basic others are more advanced. Make an effort to get better.
3:10 see, what's fun here is that in a current campaign im playing in, we realized my arcane trickster's spells weren't really within the list of spells they should be able to access (partiallty my fault for not reading the thing clearly, but also D&DBeyond just gave it full access to the entire wizard spell list) so between the last session and this one, i asked the DM to change the list for me because they're a lot better at forming spell-lists to fit a specific theme. i've read briefly through the spell-list i have now, and what we're thinking to do is decide to give a narative explination that ties into the themes of magic and the abyss that are already present in the campain. I asked the DM to throw something like mephits at us so that my character could go for "ol' reliable: chromatic orb," just for Color Spray to come out. the character is already getting paranoid about how much control he has in the setting, so realizing his spells are "acting up" is just gonna mess with him more. What's also great is that I get to "learn my abilities with the character" in a sense, because the character is gonna have to try out different spells to figure out how they work and how to apply them during some downtime stuff. it's great for RP
Finally, a video that satiates some final feeling in me with a final sense of finality. "Finally." - Ghost from StarCraft Brood War "I don't want to do this anymore. I'd rather play a war game. I have an army!" "Yeah, but do you have the economy to build an army?" "What is this a 4x?!" "Yes, and you have to conquer a civilization with your character before you can use it to build your army." *cartoonish cursing*
I'd say some tips on creating the character- 1. You are making this character as a part of a team. Make it not a pain. A loner character who is depressed or a confident and overly arrogant character might seem fun, but its only fun to you. I'd make a witcher who is actually soft on the inside and protects his friends (like in the tv show) or perhaps a bard that pretty quickly learns that he isn't that great or confident and reveals his shy side, then have him become a more friendly guy. 2. Going off of that, a character that has a planned transformation is a very good idea. As long as you bounce that idea off with the rest of the players and especially your dm, and that way make sure that the transformation you plan actually works, it helps make sure your character is never without purpose in a situation or specifically roleplaying session. 3. I wish to expand on something Bob said. Many people say "it's the dm's job to make sure I'm having fun in the world he creates" which is reasonable, a dm needs to see what the player wants to do and try and make situations where that is possible. But on the other hand, if a campaign is about intrigue and roleplay and stealthy missions, don't make a barbarian. Just don't. If a campaign is about mostly dungeon dwelling, your character isn't about protecting the forest. Try and make sure you also fit the dm's creation. If you don't like it, don't join in the first place.
An easy way to figure out how your character thinks is by taking a personality test online as my character. It really helps flesh out their personality
I am currently writing a game, and I am openly chatting with all my players about plot points, NPCs, Homebrew, Homebrew rules, and the setting. Your advice on getting the players involved is really helpful
My exposure to Fate and some of the other character-driven story-intense systems has led me to remember one of the keys to good improvisation, which is the use of "Yes and," and "Yes but" as responses to suggestions made by the players. After all, it is their game too and a good DM/GM is able/willing to work these ideas into the flow of the narrative rather than simply laying track.
Fun facts about the party: The monk tries to prove herself and loves to read/knowledge. The 1st Mage was undead related trauma and is looking for companionship and a true connection with people. The 2nd Mage is an ambassador from a different part of the world/continent and is particularly interested in jewels. The Ranger is an old Tabaxi making a living using his underworld connections. The Bard is a famous singer and has debts with some people in the underworld. The fighter is a monster hunter hardened by his past and possibly learning about teamwork. The Cleric (myself) lost someone dear in the past and is now trying to stop from loosing the new people close to him.
For me the biggest factor of becoming a better player was adopting a personal leather bound journal. My fiancé who's also a player, bought me a monogrammed journal JUST for my DnD character. So for the past five or so years my DM has granted my characters' a bonus to Charisma and Intelligence (not past 16). In-between scenes and pauses you'll ALWAYS see my scribbling down text like it's a Baldur's Gate quest log.
I'm old school 2nd Edition. I always tried to play like it was a living world. Most of my characters invested time and energy in the campaign as well as after the campaign. In some campaigns I played in, if I tried learning things about the other characters, they would think I was trying to either kill them or steal their treasure. See, I was the Thief in the group.
Sharing the spotlight is a big one for me. I've been at a table with players that HAD to be the center of attention. It sucks. I personally don't want the spotlight all that often, but I do want my character's heroic deeds acknowledged. I know my friends want theirs acknowledged. For example, I play at a table of mixed players. Half veterans, half noobs. When our only female player killed her first dragon we all high fived her and congratulated her. Her smile and excitement were palpable. Yes we all helped whittle the dragon's HP down, but she got the killing blow in, our DM described the dragon's death in detail, and we now call her character (quietly) "Dragon Killer". Seeing my friend's reaction to the event and the praise made my day. Two sessions later she returned it ten fold when I did something amazing and cool with my ranger (double crits on a baddie). The lesson here is that everyone wants to have fun at the table. By acknowledging the accomplishments of the others at the table they in turn will do the same for you. Even the spotlight hog will do it. May your roles/rolls be lucky my friends and have fun!
One of my players has giggle-fits that go be forever. They could be triggered by anything and I mean anything. One session he decided to walk into the front door of a stronghold that contained 15 goblins, 8 hobgoblins, a bugbear boss, a grick, and an owlbear. Everyone else wanted to sneak in, not knowing what’s to come, but he went right through the front door with his goblin sidekick. To my surprise, he did some great role play and I was going to reward him by making him the king over the goblins. He did great up to the point he got a giggle-fit and tried to grab a goblin to wipe his butt after taking a dump over a hole in the wall. He infuriated every goblin and they locked him and his sidekick in a dark room with a starving owlbear. He survived but just barely. I wish it was as easy as “be serious during serious moments and silly during silly moments “.
Be patient with this guy. My sisters and I get giggle fits… and based on what my dad did to us, I’m pretty dang sure it’s actually a trauma response, part of how we deal with awful fears now in adulthood.
On the subject of engaging with a scene, my friends and I awoke last session in a still and silent forest in animal forms and we spent a good quarter of the session digging, sniffing, climbing trees, and other investigations to compare this forest to the various forests we were already familiar with.
Some of the best moments we've had around the table have been when someone rolls a 1 and fails spectacularly at something they were trying to do. So, I'd not, not only accept failure, but embrace it and own it.
A friend was making his own ttrpg (still in the works) and we were play testing it for a few months. I would track what occurred each session by making memes. Just make some based on the situations we got into or how bad a characters luck was. Things like that. Made it easy to track and remember what happened because you see a image and text and think "oh yeah that boulder thing hit us all and the paladin couldn't get a hit to save his life".
We need more videos like this. I know only a few other creators that address players, while we have a ton of content for GMs. Guy from How to be a Great GM recently talked about the GM being just another player, focusing on relieving GMs from extra pressure and responsibility. If both GMs and other players think like that, I believe we can have better, more enjoyable games. I particularly liked when you said GMs could (should) share worldbuilding with other players whenever possible.
@@Tiyev lol. In my case I have to say I can't even refer my players to these videos. We are not native english speakers, I’m the only one that actually speaks english, but I can’t complain about them, we are all mostly inexperienced roleplayers, I try to apply my part of the deal as de GM and give them pointers when I feel they’ll accept them.
@@Tiyev Best of luck to you EDIT: on my game yesterday I was able to apply the “sharing the world building” suggestion, and it was great: my player asked me details about a certain tree they had come across, and I asked him back about it, so he came up with the details himself, and I have to say, he did it better than what I would have done
Worldbuilding with the DM is my favorite, as a DM myself. My favorite was when the party's paladin player made me a backstory that was a couple paragraphs long. So I incorporated it into the game. I knew he played skyrim, and no one else in the party ever did. So I ripped off a town from Skyrim so only he would already be familiar with the content when the party got to his character's city.
when I GM, I always tell my players that, if something you feel should be in the scene, but I haven't described it. It's probably there. I haven't had any bad GM experiences using this guideline yet. And I hope that it encourages my players to be engaged in the scene! And as a player, I always tentatively use this guideline by asking if there's something that would seem likely to be there, if it is. And I accept whatever answer they give me. :)
My favorite questions to ask my fellow PCs are “firsts” like when did you first know you could cast magic? When did you first pick up a sword? What was the first thing you stole? Lots of convos open up after that
Thank you for the tips! I'm nearly at the one year mark since I met my group and started playing. I really should talk to my dm more outside the game Plus the thanking thing. I do slip in comments about liking stuff from the game but I think I'll start thanking after every session It's one of those little things that make a big impact at the end of the day. Like a kiss at the end of a date. The best I've tried to help is learning obsidian and taking notes so I can casually mention some plot points and NPCs we've forgotten after a while.
This is amazing. Also, I have found that it goes so much better when my experienced players are kind and respectful to newer players. I think the goal is to get everybody playing, and that’s hard to do if we make any new player feel unwelcome. It’s a hard game with hundreds of rules, make it fun so the DM has more people ti explore their worlds.
Exactly. It is hard for new players for a bit, even if they are trying. To some people DnD is a TTRPG equivalent of slapping someone into a PC that's fully set up for a flight sim and yelling "FLY MOTHERFUCKER, FLY!!" when they don't even know what any of the controls do. Ya gotta help them out, without being condescending.
Also a good bit of advice I've seen about accepting failure is: if a failure in-game is genuinely making you frustrated or upset enough that it's making the game not fun, let the other players at the table know! A casual "hey guys, just letting you know I've missed all my attacks 5 turns in a row and it's making me feel frustrated and like I can't contribute anything to the game, could we take a break for a minute?" or "I'm feeling upset because my character is probably going to die right now and I'm really invested in this one and feel like I can't do anything to stop it. Is it okay to pause and talk about it for a bit?" Because while it's important to accept failure as part of the fun, it's equally important to recognise when it's actively hurting your fun and being honest about that. DnD is a game with a lot of risk and tense scenarios, but it's also a game where everyone wants to help each other have fun. Let your friends know when you're not having fun!
Just 1 thing. My group has 1 player who made this into my personal moto. 'Failure is fun' failing a check is fun. I repeat this a lot. This 1 character I had kept failing a con check as the cleric. He got dragged across a pirate ship for it. It was hilarious. My players have taken this on board and always laugh if in a duel and repeated failures. We laugh and make jokes about an off day. I love my players and I'm lucky to have them.
I'd like to see a sequel of this video, addressed to DMs, titled "What your PLAYERS want YOU to do!" Because not all DMs are good either, even when they mean well. ;)
I have to say SESSION 0! I cannot express how important sitting with your party to define the tone, kind of story characters etc... This way everyone gets what they want Otherwise, for example If a dm prepares a serious session but everyone is being goofy, probably the players will not have fun because this is not what they wanted, and the dm will be sad because he spent so much time and no one cares. The important thing is to all have fun :D
I love it. But one exception to keep your mouth closed when another player is talking. i had with another palyer an incharacter argument and we both incharacter yelled at each other and it ended in a fist fight between them. Also incharacter we made up for it. It was such an awesome RP moment and it was because with didnt shut up while the other was talking. I can't even remember why these both fought but it was hillarious for us players.
Thank you for saying that D&D 5E is not a simple game! It honestly might be the most complex TTRPG out of multiple dozens I have ever played, only rivaled by games inspired by D&D in the first place (though many games inspired by D&D are also way easier or flexible to engage and do amazing flashy things). This doesn't necessarily mean it is a lesser game, but it really needs to be stated clearly that on a rate of 1-10 for complexity for newcomers, D&D rests at around 8. Furthermore, accepting failure is also much more fun in other TTRPGs, since they are less focused on the tactics and more focused on the flash, theme, and narrative. Plus, there are little ways to compensate! Many PbtA games like Masks or Apocalypse World give XP whenever you fail a roll. Meanwhile, games like Kids on Bikes / Kids on Brooms give an Adversity Point when you fail, which kinda act like mini-inspiration.
Bob, thanks for being a good person. The fact that when talking about respecting other people your "everyone knows this" tone speaks volumes. Love the videos man!
Yes! Respect other players, especially new ones. We recently had a campaign fall flat because the DM insisted on including his veteran friend who was kinda dickish to the two new guys just trying to learn the game instead of being helpful and supportive. I and another player tried hinting to the DM that the vet player was kind of a problem, but the DM kept defending him. So all motivation to continue with the current group inevitably died out, and now I'm running my own campaign with the new guys because despite it all, they managed to see the appeal of D&D and wanted to keep playing.
In one of my husband's campaigns, my character was a PI in the capital city. So every time we interacted with a guardsmen I recognized, I got to name them.
I play a ranger a lot so I'll often get really far away and plink trash mobs to death before sneaking off to the goal while the rest of the group keeps the bigger baddies occupied. I go prone after taking a shot. Going prone means that enemies make ranged attacks against you with disadvantage. Since I don't plan on moving much until the trash mobs are dead, I don't really mind spending a little movement to get up or I could just combat crawl a short distance and roll stealth. If you are the sneaky kind of ranger, just crawl into the bushes or behind something and vanish. Stealthy/Stalker feats only makes you more ninja. 200+ IQ plan
I had my very first game of D&D this week and loved it. You've given me some great things to think about as I look forward to my next sessions. Cheers!
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Love your stuff. All good and practical.
_"DnD 5e is a complex game"_ I laugh in Shadowrun.
Those are good advice, even outside of this game. Shadowrun, World of Darkness, Star Wars, Fragged Empires, Blades in the Dark, Heavy Gears... it ALL applies.
Kudos for the intro! Still, in a real group we should be ourselves AND have fun without toxic BS. Else, we can just run outside, trying to befriend repeat offender type criminals lurking in the neighborhood... 😉
Murderhobos in the making, that is, what roleplayers have in common. Worldwide. 🤣
Finally, a player tips video that isn't condescending that most players will take the wrong way if sent by their DM! Thanks Bob :)
But how will my players know how contemptible I find them!?! /s
@@BoojumFed I suspect this is sarcasm, but I've _felt_ contempt (likely real, possibly misperceived) from a gm before and it's an awful feeling 😔
@@priestesslucy Yes, the "/s" tag means that the preceding statement is meant to be taken sarcastically.
Feel free to use it; it's quite widely known and generally saves a great deal of explanation.
@@BoojumFed Totally didn't recognize that was shorthand for /sarcasm lolol.
My b 😋
@@priestesslucy Not a prob. Have a good 'un!
My favorite players throughout the years all had one thing in common: They chatted me throughout the week about their character. There were much fewer surprises in-game that way, they showed that they were invested in the world and in the game, I was able to know their goals and likes/dislikes better so I could tailor the story and rewards to them, and overall it just made me want to work harder on the game and the world to make it fun for them.
Players who only talked to me and the other PCs on the day of the game seemed less invested, and would sometimes be disappointed or apathetic with the way their character arc and rewards went.
Absolutely! Keeping the conversation going between sessions is great evidence of a player's investment, and it can be really helpful for the DM! Of course, not everyone will find time to join in that extra conversation, but it's great when they do :)
This is an extremely underused part of the game, tbh. With the days and days worth of travel montages that feature in most campaigns, you are really just making the character bonds feel realistic. _Of course_ the PCs are suddenly much closer, coordinated, and understanding of one another _after traveling together for a week._
Ok. But what to do when GM is not open at all to listen to players between sessions ? I hit a situation when GM says he wants to chat online but any time I start to communicate something he seems irritated, almost hostile?
I thought he has some problem with me but in some time I learned that essencially nobody from player side is communicating in those chanels at all.... its dead town. I realy dont know what to think of it. Kinda mixed messages for me. Did you ever encounter it?
@@lamichka two steps. Bring this to the DM and try finding a solution, communicate.
It doesn't work? Decide if that's a campaign worth your time, and comunicate that to DM and players. Ghosting is kinda rude.
@@claire3614 thanks for the advice. :)
Accepting failure is also a HUGE tip for GMs. When a planned session falls flat, don't hate yourself. Investigate sessions in the past that worked well, identify elements that made it succeed. Conversely, identify weak points in that "failed" session, so you never make the same mistake twice!
Yup, this is the best one. I had a chase scene in my last session that I felt was pretty weak. Lo and behold, there are RULES for that in the DMG, and they would've been way better than the lame thing I cooked up on the spot. Lesson learned!
My first session went horribly, imo. It was a tower defense homebrew and it started out fine but then came the combat and badly balanced waves and I could feel them fading 😭 it's taken a while to gather enough courage to DM again but I'm doing another one, a pre-made campaign, next week and hope it'll go better.
@@tybronx2446 How'd it go? In my experience, going premade as a starting DM is a good choice. You get a feel of balancing that way - which is more an art than a science. Later you can start tweaking things, or even overhaul elements wholesale if you think they'd work better with your game world. When I first started DMing 5th edition, I took a module from a whole different fantasy setting and retooled it for D&D.
@@Smilley85 You do get a better feel for balance, but not all adventures are balanced well either. I feel homebrewing my first campaign is a lot more freeing because anything and everything about the world is up to me to decide so I can just make up anything on the spot.
Bingo! Actually working on DMing like any other craft can make it so much easier to improve!
Collaborating with the DM on your character's background is severely underrated! Creating ties to the world makes for a much more fleshed out character AND world, and also creates the opportunity for plot hooks and role play moments. If you're new or just don't want to mess with the setting, just ask how to make your idea work with his world. Good luck finding a DM who won't want to talk your ear off about all the different facets of his setting and they'll probably get a ton of inspiration just from hearing your idea!
Yeah any homebrew DM will love you for it, and any DM running a module SHOULD love you for it because that's a big part of what makes playing out of books fun in my experience!
I won’t play a character without a full backstory. It is essential to any character
A caveat: if you work with a player extensively on their backstory, don’t then undermine it or contradict it, or take it in a direction you decide is right rather than the way the player wanted to play it. For example, if the character is deeply invested in family and blood obligations, think very carefully about your idea that the character will find out at some point that they were adopted so some villain could fulfill some contract clause or the like, and their cherished family relationships, which they were expecting to provide a specific kind of set of expectations and tensions, are not what they intended. This kind of thing has happened multiple times in games I’ve been in and it can really damage players’ trust. (It can also work if the player is interested and wants to go with it, but imposing that kind of thing on them is a problem.)
(Also note that I’m not saying anything about adoption here. You could tell any number of awesome stories of whatever theme with a *willing* player.)
I take this one step further.
I'm a very spontaneous, seat of the pants type GM (or at least I used to be. It's been a long time and I feel like my creativity is retired lol) and I would always collaborate with my players to create not only their characters but their entire homeland.
The homelands of the party would be the cornerstone of the setting, with everything else evolving out from there.
THIS! I'm currently in a campaign and we're just 8 sessions in (It's going great). Initially, I didn't know almost anything about the world while creating my character, yet I talked with the dm and he confirmed that my backstory will work. I was starting to think that I shouldn't be rambling about my ideas as much, but gosh he had implemented my backstory into the world so well!! It feels so nice and validating that my character feels like he belongs to the environment. When some important plot points from my story were touched it had such an incredible impact on both me and the character! Glad that we could talk and figure out what would work and so on, cause now the experience is incredibly enhanced because of it.
My golden rule: It's the job of each person in a roleplaying group, including the DM, to make sure everyone is having as much fun as possible, including the DM. Also communication in an open and respectful way, at the right time, is the key to groups that go on for years and years.
Well if the DM has to have fun too, then the group is just screwed.
I only played 4 sessions so far and the DM basically made us into the 4 four horseman of the apocalpsy.
We ended up getting ambused by demons and now someone gave us four talking horses. We started to notice that weird stuff started to happen around us in town. I play a cleric and instead of healing people, the people I try to help get the plague. 😭 It was pretty exciting to figure it out. Now we have to "master" our powers so we can stop messing stuff up around us.
Wow! That sounds like a blast!
@@Revelwoodie Yeah, there was a fire in a temple and the priestesses asked me to help. Then I go back to help the next day (while our rogue is having an identity crisis) and BAM! everyone I healed has the plague.
The priestesses: "Do you know what happened?"
"No idea, but look I'm busy today, I really can't help." While inside I'm freaking out.
I find our warlock who greets me with: "I was having lunch and the waiter dropped dead when I touched his hand."
So we had an Oh Shit moment. Great way to find out that we're Death and Pestilence.
Let's not even mention the barbarian who sent half of the town guards into a bloodrage. So he's War, yay?
Wow, that was an info dump, sorry about that.
@@greenwren5072 WOOOOW, now I want to play a campaign with the settings🤣
@@ElifasTeQ It's pretty fun, but I really wish I could stop giving people the freakin plague every time. 😂
@@greenwren5072 😂
I ALWAYS makes sure to give my players an after-session feedback survey. The three questions I ask are: What they liked about the session, what they didn't like, and if they'd like to add anything else. It can be tricky getting your players to consistently do it so I decided completing a survey would give them a point of my homebrew inspiration they liked. It half remedied it, as I can still struggle to get responses. But if you're open to criticism and improving it's a super helpful tool.
Yeah any kind of debrief after a session is super helpful. Mixing the positive, negative, and other things left out is great!
@@BobWorldBuilder I agree! It makes things better for everyone, and makes players feel much better if things go wrong because they know there is a way to improve it.
Any room left in your group for another player?
I do the same, but with slightly more detail to the questions:
1. What did you like? Keep it as is? Or more of it?
2. What did you not like? Want less? Or none at all?
3. Anything you felt was missing that we should add? Or anything you would like to see eventually that would be disappointing to not experience?
My GM does something similar, but his questions are these:
Questions? Comments? Death threats? 😆
As someone who's been DMing for more than 40 years, I endorse this list. 😆
For the rules one, I would say that just learning the rules for what their character can do would be enough to make me happy. I don't mind helping players out with reminders or quick explanations of rules for unusual situations or when they are trying out something new, but I expect players to understand how their own class abilities and spellls work so I don't have to stop the game to look them up.
Wow, 40 years! Respect.
If you're been DM'ing for 40 years... what exactly are you having to "look up" at this point? If you already know what classes/races your players are, you should have cheat sheets up (and literally at the ready) so that you don't have to "stop the game" to "look it up".
@@Dyanosis 5 editions, tons of classes, tons of subclasses, hundreds of spells, additional books (tosha, xanathar, UA etc). Hell, even knowing the PHB by heart can be hard.
@@andreimadalin6207 True but as your player prepare for the game, even more so for new players who are not familiar with the rule, why not take the extra step to print the few spell available to them or have sticky note or something to help regarding that. I usually try to prepare a bit more when playing with players that are less familiar with the rules and the setting. Knowing this is inevitably going to happen.
13 minute video up for six minutes already has comments about the video. Hmmm... Bob must have said something early in video to engage the viewers.
I think some folks just love commenting immediately haha
some of us are 2x speed watching chads
@@bean9315 Or the chronically overworked
@@thenoble1 lol, when you dont have the free time to enjoy life, that makes you a beta
Do people still post "first" or am I just showing my age
Fun fact about a fellow player at one of our games: Her dark elf rogue's character name is Bonk because when she came to the surface world she was taken in by a family of halflings and the youngest son couldn't pronounce her dark elf name so he called her Bonk instead. So she kept the name. :)
This makes me so happy. ☺️
I thought I was immune to shitty player behavior since I had experience dming for a tough group but these vids make me realize that I’m just as bad at times and how to improve, as well as how to communicate problems with players without being a douche. Thanks for the advice!
That last tip is something I have experienced as DM and am slightly ashamed to say, only started recently implementing it as a player. And BOY, does it help make the game fun, grounded AND smooth. Just by the simple act of asking or engaging with other people's backstory instantly transforms a group from a couple of mercenaries individually working at the same goal by luck of the fates to an actual group with greater stakes when a PC dies than just for the player that controlled that PC.
As a wild magic sorcerer with large aoe spells and spells like dimension door that can save friends from the stomachs of monsters, it became so much more impactful when using those spells around friends and spending two of my turns just to give an ally a slightly greater chance of surviving than if I didn't. The sheer tension when you are standing next to a low health ally while a wild magic burst happens is something I would have never been able to experience before just talking to those silly little sheets of paper we call a character sheet with a backstory.
That's a great testimonial! lol, and so true, when I see these tips in practice, the game is so much more fun for everyone :)
I've played in games where the party is hiding their backstory and it sucks so much, there's nothing you can do because the characters don't trust each other
Another youtube page I follow, Dungeon Dudes, has a great character creation tool where every player character has to have some kind of relationship with at least one fellow PC and at least one possible NPC. Its a great tool for building a sense of belonging within the party and the campaign world.
My first character I ever played ended up not really having much of a personal goal of her own, so she just focused on supporting her friends. Which, incidentally, ended up with her the center of the group, and now there's an entire revenge arc involving her family and the BBEG that the DM brought to life, including her grandpa, who is played by another player who recently lost their PC. This, among other reasons, is why as a player, this is still my favorite campaign and character. Not because my PC is that great on her own (she has an incredibly (and purposefully) generic backstory and personality, in fact), but because of the connections she built with her group and all the shenanigans and RP that generated. Can definitely recommend.
Eliminating the gatekeeping on both sides. Being open to help from others, and helping others. Acknowledging egos and compromising can work wonders for building the community.
A Bard became one of my all time best characters (I’ve been doing this since the 70s) when he & I became the DM’s asset. This occurred because the DM had built his own world from the ground up and I, as a lore master, showed a lot of interest in the world allowing him to info dump often. I also became the party note taker as well as composing an in-character weekly recap of the game which always painted the other party members as heroes of ledgendary proportions which further ingratiated me to the DM as well as the party.
As I write this, my friend is making a campaign. He essentially uses me as a way to make sure plot points fit, help him refine details and the other players are getting my assistance with their character backstories, all because I kept asking how the writing was going. I'm his right-hand man. Not to mention the sessions are at my place and I work as an anonymous form of criticism. He calls me his secretary.
My all time greatest character was an AD&D Bard I started/played back in the 80s. I eventually gave him up to the DM to use in the world he built.
"Yes, and" is the mindset that has helped me be a better player so much
As a Pathfinder Main and Forever DM I love the little nod to "(Besides another more complicated RPG)" with the transparent popup.
I never really comment on youtube videos but I just wanted to say thank you so much for your excellent subtitles on your videos. Makes it so much more enjoyable as someone who struggles with hearing.
7:40 my absolute favorite dnd moment was when my dwarf barbarian was walking into the woods accompanied by the city guard in search of some threat, and what would have been just a description of the forest we were walking through and a skip to the next combat was entirely changed when I interrupted the end of my dms fantastic description with one simple question: "are there monkeys?" And because he was awesome he said "yes. Absolutely." And dove right into the description of the monkeys I see and then my barbarian yelled so loud the monkeys fell out of the trees and he went over collected the dead monkeys (finishing one off) and walked back to my now in aw group of soldier acquaintances turned fearful helpers. It took all of five minutes and it added so much to my character, the flow of play and the overall humor of the game.
Fun Fact about one of my fellow PC’s: Their character told mine they were a noble, so I asked them what there titles were…
Anyways my character now referees to them as ”Ressyn, the sweetest tongue, most beautiful voice, youngest son of the king Trogar.”
That's such a beautiful way to refer to someone :3
Their titles*
Refers* Referee is someone who oversees a game and is a general "judge" of a game. A DM could be seen as a referee at times.
A youtube channel must always distinguish itself from others in order to stand out. Your recent focus on becoming a nexus of community information puts you in a unique position that is different from all the other dnd youtube channels. I'm happy to see you find a niche that supports the community and lets your channel grow. Well done.
As a player I managed to get a loop roaring with the DM which turbo-charged everything and brought huge amounts of detail and generated a phenomenal 25 year long campaign, much of which continued for me after the other players had dropped out years back. Cultivating a good working exchange with the DM and even feeding them creative data (videos, novels, graphics, scenarios) can make something really special happen. It's all about collaboration I think, despite me very much having to go it completely alone these days as a DM. 'Make your DM feel optimistic' is a good rule of thumb maybe. Bob World Builder, this video is really really good and I'd like to send the link to future players I get. Thought provoking and cool!
"Accept Failure." Oh boy, I finally have a story.
So I was playing a paladin in an undead dungeon. There was a Specter floating just out of reach above some charging undead. Through both starting equipment and looting the dungeon, I actually had a longsword, a magic flame tongue short sword (which I was primarily using), and a longbow if needed. Our dragon monk frog lept into the air and pummeled the Specter, getting it super low. I wanted to kill it, but I didn't want to have to drop my short sword (which was ignited and my primary source of light in the dark dungeon) to draw my bow. So, thinking myself cleaver, I drew my longsword and threw it at the specter, an epic strike. I missed. After my hilarious failure, the specter retreated on its turn and I chased it, this time dropping my sword and drawing my bow, thinking the specter was hovering in the nearby light. As I was drawing my bow, the flame went out on my short sword. The torchlight, didn't extend far enough to cover the Specter (which was in the air), so it disappeared in total darkness. I had two shots, both with disadvantage. Knowing where it was moving to, I fired blind...and hit! Killed it with a blind shot as by sword flame was going out behind me! Managed to save an epic fail with a totally different epic success!
Also, even knowing I killed it with that shot, my character didn't, so I had him fire his second shot into the wall before hearing the thud of the body hitting the ground (there were only a few undead left anyway. I did a lot of suboptimal things, but my DM was super cool with not punishing me for it and even helping out.
@Kevin Meeker: clever* (cleaver = small ax like a butcher might use) 🙄
@@pablohammerly448 it's one thing to point out an error, it's another to do it with condescension
@@cole7274 I used to be a proofreader and a typesetter -- I'm sick and tired of seeing the English language being butchered by people who can't take the time to learn how to spell and/or the differences between words. My first language was Spanish that I learned from my immigrant parents. I made the effort to become an expert in English, my second language. If you don't like my attitude, you can kiss my posterior! 🤬
@@pablohammerly448 Oh I don't doubt you're an expert with language, you clearly know your stuff mate. It's pretty impressive to have that kind of language mastery, I'm struggling pretty hard in my own studies of Swedish (maybe not struggling per say, but it is a slow-going process). I'm certainly sorry to have caused offense, my goal was to point out some of the niceties of being nice. Your comment reads as if you're really angry about the whole ordeal, and I wouldn't want to cause that either. For you, as someone who's had to put an exhaustive amount of work to learn English, wouldn't you agree that you've had your fair share of mistakes while learning? Or that the annoyances of the internet, autocorrect and typing with keyboards sometimes leads to errors through no fault of your own? It seems that a comment with any error is a major annoyance to you, and I just can't help but wonder if being so heated about this all is healthy for your own sake or making you happy. What do you think? Maybe I'm missing the perspective of someone who knows more about other languages and sees a value to commenting that I don't.
@@cole7274 For example, how my phone likes completely changing words on me without me noticing. Another is trying to edit a comment and deleting a word and not noticing then you look very foolish. Anyways, my phone hates me.
Good tips
I like players that take notes and know their character and abilities especially spells.
Respect at the table is needed for sure. Roleplaying is always nice too.
Yeah many of these suggestions are basic things players should be doing, but things that can be practiced to make them great players!
The note on accepting failure is absolutely a great one and seems to get overlooked. Tbh the Nat 1s are usually more fun to remember than the Nat 20s and it's great when it happens. When my paladin has to make a Dex save, I don't get mad at the inevitable failure - I usually preface it with a "it was nice knowing y'all" and make the roll and I go with it. When I fail a persuasion check, I roleplay really bad strawman arguments or sometimes end up making points against myself. When I miss an attack, I describe how I put too much weight behind my halberd and missed wildly. Moments of failure can and are fun if you're a good sport about it, and it's a solid bonus when you engage in roleplay based on your bad rolls. As a player, it's fun to make this bit of narrative make sense - as the DM, it's great to see players engaged this way and nice to have a brief moment to breathe during an encounter as the player describes what happens
Every time Bob gets to the part where he says, "Because I'm Bob, and this..." I immediately feel at ease
Same. ☺️
I think a lot of tips are things that go in one ear and out the other with d&d.
All you have to do is care. Care about the game you’re playing. As much if not more than your DM. If you genuinely care about what’s going, care about having a good time with your friends and care about the story you’re telling then you’ll be a great player.
Unenthusiasm is the death of creativity and creativity is the heart and soul of d&d. Engaging with the game, with plot hooks and wanting to arrive on time are all just offshoots of you actually wanting to play the game, and showing your DM this by being a cool person.
Just care!
I'm a multi-time frustrated DM, and I love this list. I recommend it for everyone.
Learning the rules is actually high on my list, and I pretty much always feel like we could've gotten more accomplished
with the last one though, I've noticed that a lot of players, and not just the old ones, don't really think out the motivations and backstories of their characters, but I find way the best way to do so is to work with the DM on your own so they can see how cool it will be. Last week, my DM did a whole section with my mom and we had a great interaction and afterward, one of the other players was like "I really need to flesh out my backstory" and he worked on it and this week the DM incorporated that into the session. Of course this also requires a DM that really puts the work in because I've had DMs where you might as well play a video game because the work I put into who my character was was completely irrelevant to the plot
The most important thing for me is: communication. In and outside of the game. Tell me what you want from the game. I cannot read minds. I want my players to come up with an amazing backstory and let me weave that into the plot, so that their characters are actually motivated to resolve that plot. (also to talk them out of playing a toxic character that sabotages the party before they even start)
My group is really good about this. Our DM is phenomenal, he finds ways to incorporate all of our backgrounds into the game. The party leadership changes all the time because the DM is great about incorporating our individual stories. We did throw a curve to our dm when, me as a neutral good who told the other party members to not attack each other, well we have an arcane rogue who has a cursed dagger, 2 other party members attacked this rogue to "prove a point" in the middle of combat...the DMs face went white, "WTF just happened"...long story short, alliances in the party changed, me and the rogue are now part of an orc clan...good thing as our defense of the 2 orcs was communicated among clans, it has helped...now no one in the party trusts each other...it is weird amd fun...we spy on each other all the time to get more backstop and motivation. DM handled that fiasco with grace amd dignity and worked the events that happened into the rest of the campaign...he is awesome
one of my players was a cleric and one day just out of nowhere could see where the campaign was going and said "it's in the prophecies, brother, we must do this"
his prophecies are now an integral part of the game. "Yes, and" + collaborative world building are the best. Stuff that happens that I have no control over is what makes me the DM have fun, i don't know what to expect, and reacting to it is the challenge and skill and what makes us all leave the table with a smile.
Learned this week that the Aasimar Druid's family got murdered whilst protecting a Gate to the Feywild, the Tiefling Rogue got groomed as a child, the Leonin Bloodhunter might be royalty, and the Paladin Elf thinks that he was born from a tree...great tips, Bob!!!
I have been litteraly looking up on videos on youtube because I have my first DnD session this friday , and this really sums things up nicely.
Accept failure? I full on embrace that. Failing is where my favorite dnd moments come from
What I want more than anything in my players is for them to be excited to forward their stories. I want them to engage with the players at the table, talk and plan things out with the group between sessions, and most importantly, *talk to me* about what they want to happen for the next session, or further down the road. If nothing else, that's what I think makes a player truly great.
I just shared this with a table-to-be: character creation happens next week. Thank you for this list. I think it will really help our players who have never done anything like this before.
Taking notes is INSANELY useful. We had a dedicated archivist / cartographer last game. I can't count the number of times he saved us from our ignorance. There's no way you'd remember what a particular NPC said 4 sessions ago without notes.
Excellent tips all around... especially the one that's a reminder we have one mouth and two ears, so we should be listening twice as much as we talk.
Treat others the way you'd want to be treated. Makes total sense.
I'm pretty sure at least one mythological figure said this at some point...
🙌🏻🙌🏻☀️
The most important thing for me is, show up on time, keep your phone in your pocket and try to organize when the next session takes place.
Nothing shows more that you dont respect your dm then coming late, playing on your phone and never making suggestions when to play next time.
One of the things that I appreciate most from my group is feedback at the end of the session. Because they let me know what do they like and what they don't like and then I think about a way that I can maintain the campaign I want to run while also making sure they get to enjoy it. Because as a DM can easily fall into the trap of satisfying my players and forget about his own satisfaction.
A bonus advice concerning engaging: Don't just kill everything you believe to be a monster/bad guy/enemy sometimes the DM adds a story plot in these characters or they will turn them into one. try it, it is fun to "convert" a "Bad-Guy" to your side.
Sure, but only if it makes sense for the characters to do so, (and I am writing this as a forever Game Masters). I disagree that you should expect player to try to convert enemies into allies because you find it more interesting then killing them or you wrote possible side quest. What about creating character that are different shade of greys, or maybe introducing your NPCS in all shade of greys... introduce a NPC with a tragic backstory that humanize them with a setting that emphasize that the rogue in front of you isn't just a low life thief and a thug. He's the father of the 3 and the husband of a sick woman. He isn't a very good thief at that, a few local knew him growing up. Now he spend most of is time numbing the pain by drinking himself to black out. He can't go back to his life, there is too much heat on him, a bounty on his head means he will probably never see his family again.
Of course you could argue that how are you going to have all that exposition to the players it seems force when the players are about to kill a random NPC that such information be given to them well, maybe some other random homeless see the group of adventurer who aren't making a decent job hiding their intention and truth be told , that drunk thief had it coming, but maybe the homeless feel bad for that drunk fool who felt asleep again in his alleyway...and decide to share a bit of local knowledge with the group of player.
Maybe a town guard or some other NPC surprise the group by entering the alleyway and tells the party the information.
This is a great synthesis of the community post! As always, great insights delivered with soothing presence.
Thank you! Yeah it was really nice to be able to read all the comments and put this one together :)
As someone who's spent more time DM'ing then playing, the PC interaction is probably the most satisfying thing to listen to. Makes me feel that I somehow wove the threads of fate to gather an odd party together and it makes sense for them to adventure together.
I had a “supporting the DM” moment once and it felt great. Basically in our world there’s only humans and a few monster races(But no tiefiling). My character, a Fiend Warlock, had as a role playing style turn more and more similar to a tiefiling when he uses a spell. My DM had the idea of making it the normal effects of making the pact when he saw it, not only that, eventually the tiefiling kind was born due to my character’s action. It was so awesome.
All of these are phenomenal! ESPECIALLY Collaborative Worldbuilding!
Thanks, Baron! That's definitely my favorite!
Hi Bob! I made a free version of your video in spanish, with a few things of my own opinion. Obviously i gave you credit and reccomended your great channel. Respects from Chile and let the dices keep rolling!!!
As a new player, I really apreciate this video. Just had my first session last week (yay!) and had a blast, think I did pretty good, and have been looking up how to make the game better. I love videos that teach players how to engage with the world and characters as a group, great work.
The rules one hits, I have had too many players say they are not really having fun. But have shown so little towards learning the rules, it makes me sad.
Even basics like learning how the basic turn goes makes the game so much more for a player.
It just makes being the GM so hard when you get to one players turn and you have to drop the game to explain how to make an attack a month into a campaign for the 5th time In a night.
For exalted I give everyone a sheet that goes though the entire combat in a check list, and I make my players follow it every single time. It was a bit awquard at first. But I think my players have always done so much better despite it being so complex.
I think D&D needs a good cheat sheet to give out players, I don’t really need most of the info given on DM screens, but would love a single sheet I could hand players.
Just something like, taking your turn.
Making an attack.
Casting a spell.
Simple, and covers some of the basics.
I know Anto of the Icarus Games channel on UA-cam is currently working on producing 5e cheat sheets for various classes and races. The kickstarter already funded so some digital versions may already be available. I just haven't kept up to date with it, but it sounds like exactly what you're looking for!
On another note "D4: DnD Deep dive" has a "DnD university" playlist where he goes over the basics of the game. He is super easy to listen to and explains things very well. He helped immensely when I first started playing. It is also good to as a refresher
Ohhh, cool. Anything to give players I think is great, some I do think just need a good one page of info so they don’t need to ask basics and can ask the more fun stuff !
Love this idea. Whether it's quick cheat cards in front of players, or on the face side of a GM screen, reminds me of quick guides I've designed at work for codes, reference etc
You might have found a solution by now, but I recommend checking out MPMB's PDF for character sheets.
There's an optional last page that gives some great shorthand on what a player can do with their turn.
It even explains some basics of casting spells, like cube, cone, etc.
We started a group with all new players, and they found it really helpful.
I played several games as a PC before I became a DM and in all of those games I played, we didn't do travel time. If a place was three days away, we started walking and basically fast traveled. When I became a DM I decided that I didn't want travel to be painful, but there should at least be one night of camping if they're taking 3 days to travel somewhere. I came to this realization after watching Critical Role. So many of their interactions happened during watches, that it just made sense to me to add it to my game. Plus, without it, we'd might have miss the "killed my whole family" interaction which still makes me smile.
Sitting around a campfire is something many of us know how to do instinctually, so sitting around a campfire in game isn't a stretch of the imagination. By setting up two shifts to watch camp, different PCs that may not speak often with one anther have a few minutes of conversation and interaction one on one, without interruption from the other players. It's been great.
I do this too. I skip travel time, and edit the travel distance so that locations are within a days travel unless I want something interesting to happen.
I do this because I think random encounters that aren't driven by the story are kind of boring and a time sink.
@@jayspeidell I agree. I have a few random encounters planned, but they're more designed to be RP and world building, that just "7 bandits attaack. Roll initiative." However, I do think having an opportunity to find, set up, and guard the camp allow for interesting RP with characters that give them opportunities to build their backstory, use those skills that don't often get used (ranger's foraging skills) and just have a moment to talk.
All of this is great advice. Especially about characters matching the setting. I played in a Shadowfell game, playing a character I had made well before a campaign was even planned, who didn't fit at all. When he died, I made a Harengon monk who also didn't fit the setting. When I started wondering why I wasn't quite invested in the party's goals, I realized it was because, in a party of a half-orc oathbreaker, undead monstrosity, tormented wizard, and secretive warlock, a rabbit warrior didn't exactly make sense. So I rolled up a Shadar-Kai druid/cleric who was cursed with madness and now I fit in perfectly and everything flows much more naturally for us.
A rabbit warrior never really makes sense 😺
Great video! I subbed right after watching.
These are habits that I always try to engage in when I am playing, but are great reminders for everyone. In one of my current campaigns we have a new player who is playing a rogue as her first experience with DND. She is doing very well for a newbie, but my wife and I (as more experienced players) have been doing our level best to support her as she learns the game. I am playing and artificer(1)/wizard(x) multiclass, my wife is playing a Life Cleric, and we have been prioritizing support spells during early level play in order to get us through the rocky learning curve. I picked up Guidance as one of my artificer cantrips and as soon as I got Find Familiar at Wizard 1, I started having him perch on our rogues shoulder whenever she is doing her solo rogue thing to give her unlimited extra D4's on her skill checks, assist her in her investigation and searches so she rolls at advantage as well, and occassionally remotely heal her as required; while my wife will routinely bless the entire party so we all get those D4's in combat as well and make sure that none of us go down for any reason. Our newbie rogue is going through dungeons feeling like a super star and is loving the experience every step of the way. Now, this may be more than is required or recommended, but by actively engaging with her, and showing how teamwork bolsters everyone, we have a made committed new player, and more importantly, a new friend in real life as well.
That is SO AWESOME!
A big tip back to DM's. Facilitate player interaction! Give moments, story beats, breaks in the narrative where players can do things. Rushing from set-piece to set-piece, or even worse, hushing players RPing with each other so you can continue your story, is only giving yourself MORE work to do!
Your statement should also define that "RP'ing" doesn't mean "any form of table talk".
@@Dyanosis I mean, there's lots to specify, but in UA-cam comments brevity tends to be better than wordiness. No one wants to read my 3000 word dissertation on table etiquette and facilitating rp.
One big paragraph is already a lot for most comments!
I think the most practical tip for players is to do the thing that they think is only for DMs: prepare for the session. Write down at least one thing you would like to ask or say to each of the other PCs. Consider relevant NPCs for this session, and think about how you might interact with them. Review your character sheet. Make alternate spell preparation "loadouts." Write out simple tactics. Make lists of short term goals for the party and your character. Call another player and talk about the game. Ask your DM for more info on an aspect of the world that interests you. If each player spends just a quarter of the time preparing that DMs typically do, a game would be improved DRAMATICALLY.
As a DM myself, i agree with this list pretty full hardily. Ive been dming for close to 20 years now and have structured several types of campaigns. I have personally landed on a specific style now however that players who know me seek me out to play. I still run my campaigns in a 3.5 setting because of its freedoms, and i have a very grim dark style of campaign that is always a homebrew setting. What im getting at is it takes a lot of time to create and maintain these settings and my campaigns are not hand holdy and easy. Thats what people seek me out for. With that being said, there is still a lot of effort that goes into crafting these settings and sometimes players dont see this. Making a challenging but not impossible campaign is difficult and i have so many notebooks full of settings that didnt take off. So my tip to players. Ask questions, explore possibilities, respect the entire party (dm included), and work together. I actually killed a quest giver today in my campaign because the party failed to stop it. It bummed them out a bit when they realized what happened, but they loved it because no one else they played with does that so openly. Now, they collected themselves, respected each other and myself, and are working on a solution to get out of the area together. Its fantastic! And they are (mostly) a pleasure to DM for. Everyone, including myself, has moments.
I LOVE this, Bob! Thank you! Sending this to my group. And you come across as SO empathetic that I'd let you raise my kid. But you wouldn't want to raise my kid because she's quite the minmaxer and way too jammy with rolling crits.
I find that in long campaigns with long hiatuses, backstory conversations between PC's are especially hamstrung by the player forgetting what they and their character know about the other PC's. For a campaign I'm in that had a year-long hiatus, I'm now going through my notes and trying to list all meta and in-game knowledge I have about each PC. I hope it enables deeper roleplay. I wish I did it sooner!
Maybe have an OOC update before the next game if there's a significant gap? It's a bit meta but the net effect of making those IC convos easier to have will be a positive one.
I love it when players get involved with the world-building, particularly when it comes to historical events and NPCs. If a player pops off some improvised story about some event that took place once upon a time, I take note of that and make it part of the world's history, though some of the actual details might be a little different than what the player had said, as things are often exaggerated or changed as stories are retold.
Players sharing stories about various NPCs "back home" gives me material to work with and saves me a lot of trouble creating characters to populate that town that fit with the image the player has of it.
If I had players that were really engaged, I would have them help build the world from the ground up by having them describe their characters' hometowns, some nearby settlements and points of interest, their culture, some interesting historical events that took place in the region, etc., then plop all of that into different areas on an otherwise blank world map and build around what the players had given me to start with. Add in whatever they improvise about their home regions during play and most of the heavy lifting is done for those regions by the time I actually need to do anything with them. First adventure takes place in a trade hub that is somewhat central to where all of the characters are coming from and the players are tasked with explaining what brought their characters to that location. My own worldbuilding can focus on the trade hub and surrounding region, expanding to other regions as the adventure moves to them. Early plot hooks move the adventures toward whichever player-made region is the most fleshed out, and we eventually make our way through each of the regions. From there, any future campaigns involving most of the same players can be set in that same world, which they are all intimately familiar with because they helped make it what it is.
Thanks Bob, I think you bring up a lot of really good points, especially the last one. Thanks for sharing!
LOL Funny story, I actually got kicked from a game for focusing on interacting with other PCs. I used my character to enable them to do really cool things, and it made them super uncomfortable. And no, it wasn't anything sexual. Stuff like helping the paladin establish a new temple, distract uptight soldiers by helping the bard set up entertainment, etc.
Really good as usual. One thing I would add, "perfect your craft" i.e. somethings are more basic others are more advanced. Make an effort to get better.
Yeah totally! A lot of these tips are just fundamentals of the game, but honing these skills really makes a great player!
3:10 see, what's fun here is that in a current campaign im playing in, we realized my arcane trickster's spells weren't really within the list of spells they should be able to access (partiallty my fault for not reading the thing clearly, but also D&DBeyond just gave it full access to the entire wizard spell list)
so between the last session and this one, i asked the DM to change the list for me because they're a lot better at forming spell-lists to fit a specific theme. i've read briefly through the spell-list i have now, and what we're thinking to do is decide to give a narative explination that ties into the themes of magic and the abyss that are already present in the campain. I asked the DM to throw something like mephits at us so that my character could go for "ol' reliable: chromatic orb," just for Color Spray to come out. the character is already getting paranoid about how much control he has in the setting, so realizing his spells are "acting up" is just gonna mess with him more. What's also great is that I get to "learn my abilities with the character" in a sense, because the character is gonna have to try out different spells to figure out how they work and how to apply them during some downtime stuff. it's great for RP
Finally, a video that satiates some final feeling in me with a final sense of finality.
"Finally." - Ghost from StarCraft Brood War
"I don't want to do this anymore. I'd rather play a war game. I have an army!"
"Yeah, but do you have the economy to build an army?"
"What is this a 4x?!"
"Yes, and you have to conquer a civilization with your character before you can use it to build your army."
*cartoonish cursing*
I'd say some tips on creating the character-
1. You are making this character as a part of a team. Make it not a pain. A loner character who is depressed or a confident and overly arrogant character might seem fun, but its only fun to you. I'd make a witcher who is actually soft on the inside and protects his friends (like in the tv show) or perhaps a bard that pretty quickly learns that he isn't that great or confident and reveals his shy side, then have him become a more friendly guy.
2. Going off of that, a character that has a planned transformation is a very good idea. As long as you bounce that idea off with the rest of the players and especially your dm, and that way make sure that the transformation you plan actually works, it helps make sure your character is never without purpose in a situation or specifically roleplaying session.
3. I wish to expand on something Bob said. Many people say "it's the dm's job to make sure I'm having fun in the world he creates" which is reasonable, a dm needs to see what the player wants to do and try and make situations where that is possible. But on the other hand, if a campaign is about intrigue and roleplay and stealthy missions, don't make a barbarian. Just don't. If a campaign is about mostly dungeon dwelling, your character isn't about protecting the forest. Try and make sure you also fit the dm's creation. If you don't like it, don't join in the first place.
An easy way to figure out how your character thinks is by taking a personality test online as my character. It really helps flesh out their personality
I am currently writing a game, and I am openly chatting with all my players about plot points, NPCs, Homebrew, Homebrew rules, and the setting. Your advice on getting the players involved is really helpful
My exposure to Fate and some of the other character-driven story-intense systems has led me to remember one of the keys to good improvisation, which is the use of "Yes and," and "Yes but" as responses to suggestions made by the players. After all, it is their game too and a good DM/GM is able/willing to work these ideas into the flow of the narrative rather than simply laying track.
Fun facts about the party:
The monk tries to prove herself and loves to read/knowledge.
The 1st Mage was undead related trauma and is looking for companionship and a true connection with people.
The 2nd Mage is an ambassador from a different part of the world/continent and is particularly interested in jewels.
The Ranger is an old Tabaxi making a living using his underworld connections.
The Bard is a famous singer and has debts with some people in the underworld.
The fighter is a monster hunter hardened by his past and possibly learning about teamwork.
The Cleric (myself) lost someone dear in the past and is now trying to stop from loosing the new people close to him.
Omg #6 for sure, this is why I don't DM for randoms anymore. Too many times I've had people want to argue about a failed roll.
For me the biggest factor of becoming a better player was adopting a personal leather bound journal.
My fiancé who's also a player, bought me a monogrammed journal JUST for my DnD character. So for the past five or so years my DM has granted my characters' a bonus to Charisma and Intelligence (not past 16).
In-between scenes and pauses you'll ALWAYS see my scribbling down text like it's a Baldur's Gate quest log.
I'm old school 2nd Edition. I always tried to play like it was a living world. Most of my characters invested time and energy in the campaign as well as after the campaign.
In some campaigns I played in, if I tried learning things about the other characters, they would think I was trying to either kill them or steal their treasure.
See, I was the Thief in the group.
Sharing the spotlight is a big one for me. I've been at a table with players that HAD to be the center of attention. It sucks. I personally don't want the spotlight all that often, but I do want my character's heroic deeds acknowledged. I know my friends want theirs acknowledged. For example, I play at a table of mixed players. Half veterans, half noobs. When our only female player killed her first dragon we all high fived her and congratulated her. Her smile and excitement were palpable. Yes we all helped whittle the dragon's HP down, but she got the killing blow in, our DM described the dragon's death in detail, and we now call her character (quietly) "Dragon Killer". Seeing my friend's reaction to the event and the praise made my day. Two sessions later she returned it ten fold when I did something amazing and cool with my ranger (double crits on a baddie).
The lesson here is that everyone wants to have fun at the table. By acknowledging the accomplishments of the others at the table they in turn will do the same for you. Even the spotlight hog will do it.
May your roles/rolls be lucky my friends and have fun!
One of my players has giggle-fits that go be forever. They could be triggered by anything and I mean anything.
One session he decided to walk into the front door of a stronghold that contained 15 goblins, 8 hobgoblins, a bugbear boss, a grick, and an owlbear. Everyone else wanted to sneak in, not knowing what’s to come, but he went right through the front door with his goblin sidekick.
To my surprise, he did some great role play and I was going to reward him by making him the king over the goblins. He did great up to the point he got a giggle-fit and tried to grab a goblin to wipe his butt after taking a dump over a hole in the wall. He infuriated every goblin and they locked him and his sidekick in a dark room with a starving owlbear. He survived but just barely.
I wish it was as easy as “be serious during serious moments and silly during silly moments “.
Be patient with this guy. My sisters and I get giggle fits… and based on what my dad did to us, I’m pretty dang sure it’s actually a trauma response, part of how we deal with awful fears now in adulthood.
@@angelalewis3645 that’s fair. Never know what things a person has endured throughout their lives and how it might affect them.
On the subject of engaging with a scene, my friends and I awoke last session in a still and silent forest in animal forms and we spent a good quarter of the session digging, sniffing, climbing trees, and other investigations to compare this forest to the various forests we were already familiar with.
Some of the best moments we've had around the table have been when someone rolls a 1 and fails spectacularly at something they were trying to do. So, I'd not, not only accept failure, but embrace it and own it.
A friend was making his own ttrpg (still in the works) and we were play testing it for a few months.
I would track what occurred each session by making memes. Just make some based on the situations we got into or how bad a characters luck was. Things like that.
Made it easy to track and remember what happened because you see a image and text and think "oh yeah that boulder thing hit us all and the paladin couldn't get a hit to save his life".
We need more videos like this. I know only a few other creators that address players, while we have a ton of content for GMs. Guy from How to be a Great GM recently talked about the GM being just another player, focusing on relieving GMs from extra pressure and responsibility. If both GMs and other players think like that, I believe we can have better, more enjoyable games.
I particularly liked when you said GMs could (should) share worldbuilding with other players whenever possible.
Does anyone actually follow these advice videos, and can I join their group?
@@Tiyev lol. In my case I have to say I can't even refer my players to these videos. We are not native english speakers, I’m the only one that actually speaks english, but I can’t complain about them, we are all mostly inexperienced roleplayers, I try to apply my part of the deal as de GM and give them pointers when I feel they’ll accept them.
@@joaosevero9052 Aww.
Maybe someday, I'll find a new group. Maybe I just need to move to a more populated area.
@@Tiyev Best of luck to you
EDIT: on my game yesterday I was able to apply the “sharing the world building” suggestion, and it was great: my player asked me details about a certain tree they had come across, and I asked him back about it, so he came up with the details himself, and I have to say, he did it better than what I would have done
Worldbuilding with the DM is my favorite, as a DM myself. My favorite was when the party's paladin player made me a backstory that was a couple paragraphs long. So I incorporated it into the game. I knew he played skyrim, and no one else in the party ever did. So I ripped off a town from Skyrim so only he would already be familiar with the content when the party got to his character's city.
when I GM, I always tell my players that, if something you feel should be in the scene, but I haven't described it. It's probably there. I haven't had any bad GM experiences using this guideline yet. And I hope that it encourages my players to be engaged in the scene!
And as a player, I always tentatively use this guideline by asking if there's something that would seem likely to be there, if it is. And I accept whatever answer they give me. :)
My favorite questions to ask my fellow PCs are “firsts” like when did you first know you could cast magic? When did you first pick up a sword? What was the first thing you stole? Lots of convos open up after that
This is such a great idea! Thank you!
Thank you for the tips! I'm nearly at the one year mark since I met my group and started playing. I really should talk to my dm more outside the game
Plus the thanking thing. I do slip in comments about liking stuff from the game but I think I'll start thanking after every session
It's one of those little things that make a big impact at the end of the day. Like a kiss at the end of a date.
The best I've tried to help is learning obsidian and taking notes so I can casually mention some plot points and NPCs we've forgotten after a while.
This is amazing.
Also, I have found that it goes so much better when my experienced players are kind and respectful to newer players. I think the goal is to get everybody playing, and that’s hard to do if we make any new player feel unwelcome. It’s a hard game with hundreds of rules, make it fun so the DM has more people ti explore their worlds.
Exactly. It is hard for new players for a bit, even if they are trying. To some people DnD is a TTRPG equivalent of slapping someone into a PC that's fully set up for a flight sim and yelling "FLY MOTHERFUCKER, FLY!!" when they don't even know what any of the controls do. Ya gotta help them out, without being condescending.
Also a good bit of advice I've seen about accepting failure is: if a failure in-game is genuinely making you frustrated or upset enough that it's making the game not fun, let the other players at the table know! A casual "hey guys, just letting you know I've missed all my attacks 5 turns in a row and it's making me feel frustrated and like I can't contribute anything to the game, could we take a break for a minute?" or "I'm feeling upset because my character is probably going to die right now and I'm really invested in this one and feel like I can't do anything to stop it. Is it okay to pause and talk about it for a bit?"
Because while it's important to accept failure as part of the fun, it's equally important to recognise when it's actively hurting your fun and being honest about that. DnD is a game with a lot of risk and tense scenarios, but it's also a game where everyone wants to help each other have fun. Let your friends know when you're not having fun!
Good comment!
Just 1 thing. My group has 1 player who made this into my personal moto. 'Failure is fun' failing a check is fun. I repeat this a lot. This 1 character I had kept failing a con check as the cleric. He got dragged across a pirate ship for it. It was hilarious. My players have taken this on board and always laugh if in a duel and repeated failures. We laugh and make jokes about an off day. I love my players and I'm lucky to have them.
I'd like to see a sequel of this video, addressed to DMs, titled "What your PLAYERS want YOU to do!" Because not all DMs are good either, even when they mean well. ;)
THIS.
I have to say SESSION 0! I cannot express how important sitting with your party to define the tone, kind of story characters etc... This way everyone gets what they want
Otherwise, for example
If a dm prepares a serious session but everyone is being goofy, probably the players will not have fun because this is not what they wanted, and the dm will be sad because he spent so much time and no one cares.
The important thing is to all have fun :D
This is great! Very concise and a new take on the topic. Cheers Bob.
I love it. But one exception to keep your mouth closed when another player is talking. i had with another palyer an incharacter argument and we both incharacter yelled at each other and it ended in a fist fight between them. Also incharacter we made up for it. It was such an awesome RP moment and it was because with didnt shut up while the other was talking. I can't even remember why these both fought but it was hillarious for us players.
Yeah lol, I guess if it's part of the roleplay--and both players are 100% aware that it's only roleplay--then you're good :P
The best part about taking notes is recapping them just like Michael Pena in Ant-Man
Quality ADVICE ON LEVEL WITH COLVILLE AND MERCER. You have a new fan sir!
Our Dwarven paladin is terrified of moldy cheese. His home town was decimated by a food poisoning incident.
Thank you for saying that D&D 5E is not a simple game! It honestly might be the most complex TTRPG out of multiple dozens I have ever played, only rivaled by games inspired by D&D in the first place (though many games inspired by D&D are also way easier or flexible to engage and do amazing flashy things). This doesn't necessarily mean it is a lesser game, but it really needs to be stated clearly that on a rate of 1-10 for complexity for newcomers, D&D rests at around 8.
Furthermore, accepting failure is also much more fun in other TTRPGs, since they are less focused on the tactics and more focused on the flash, theme, and narrative. Plus, there are little ways to compensate! Many PbtA games like Masks or Apocalypse World give XP whenever you fail a roll. Meanwhile, games like Kids on Bikes / Kids on Brooms give an Adversity Point when you fail, which kinda act like mini-inspiration.
Bob, thanks for being a good person. The fact that when talking about respecting other people your "everyone knows this" tone speaks volumes. Love the videos man!
Yes! Respect other players, especially new ones. We recently had a campaign fall flat because the DM insisted on including his veteran friend who was kinda dickish to the two new guys just trying to learn the game instead of being helpful and supportive. I and another player tried hinting to the DM that the vet player was kind of a problem, but the DM kept defending him.
So all motivation to continue with the current group inevitably died out, and now I'm running my own campaign with the new guys because despite it all, they managed to see the appeal of D&D and wanted to keep playing.
Good job! Both bowing out and being a DM!
In one of my husband's campaigns, my character was a PI in the capital city. So every time we interacted with a guardsmen I recognized, I got to name them.
That’s rad.
I play a ranger a lot so I'll often get really far away and plink trash mobs to death before sneaking off to the goal while the rest of the group keeps the bigger baddies occupied. I go prone after taking a shot. Going prone means that enemies make ranged attacks against you with disadvantage. Since I don't plan on moving much until the trash mobs are dead, I don't really mind spending a little movement to get up or I could just combat crawl a short distance and roll stealth. If you are the sneaky kind of ranger, just crawl into the bushes or behind something and vanish. Stealthy/Stalker feats only makes you more ninja. 200+ IQ plan
I love it!
Saving this to my DND playlist coz sometimes we just gotta revert back to the basics.
I had my very first game of D&D this week and loved it. You've given me some great things to think about as I look forward to my next sessions. Cheers!
This video is great advice for both players and DM’s… after all, you can’t have players engaged in a world you haven’t put effort into making!