Or option "Lets-all-get-on-a-boat-to-a-foreign-continent" Funny thing was, from that point on, that was my best campaign yet. I made up a few things and wrapped up the session, I came back with a full on plot, involving a murder mystery, spies, and all sorts of fun stuff. By the time the boat arrived at its destination, everyone had forgotten all about the story I first came up with, including me!
lol I had something like that once, though it didn't turn out so well. :P They fled the country after a massive invasion began, about an in game year later they came back shocked that everything was destroyed and Orcs ran things now. :P
One of my favorite moments where he was caught off guard was Scanlan's interaction with the Deurgar queen. "I'd promise you, but I don't make promises to dogs." It took him much longer than normal to respond to that.
Thoes are some really good moments. :P When you're like "How would this person respond to something like that.... what situation are they in.... do I make him roll an intimidation..... Okay, now it's time to just let words fly out of my mouth and hope it works..."
I made a joke skeleton encounter in the first dungeon my players explored. He plays a flute of charm skeleton. Instead of killing the skeleton and taking the flute to discover its power later on, the took the skeleton (who is always nonhostile and dancing) and shoved him into the bag of holding. They use him whenever a bar needs livening up or they're fighting hordes of undead. I believe they named him, although idk what name they gave him.
My players also have a skeleton. He's missing the bottom half of his body so one of the players carry him around. He's technically neutral, but he will bite your shoes if you stand too close. They named him McRibs, and the Nethermancer (Earthdawn) wants to give him legs.
While DMing, I once had the party run into an Ogre Blacksmith who turned out to be a human cursed into ogre form. Dude's name was Vance. Nice guy but kind of a recluse. He just wanted to be left alone with his son out in the woods, hiding from the rest of the world, waiting to get revenge on the bastard that cursed him. He passed the time smithing for the hell of it and by the time they met him, he had amassed a rather sizable armory that wasn't being put to any good use. The party later helped Vance stave off an attack by assassins sent by the guy who had cursed Vance in the first place. His cave/blacksmith dwelling became the party's go-to hang out spot and personal smithing source soon after. Fast forward a few plot threads later. The party came across a small village in a forest adjacent to the one Vance lived in. They were being attacked by a band of savage bugbears led by a murderous Sasquatch almost every night for the past month. I figured, "sheeeit, the party'll kill off the Squatch and the bugbears then be on their way right?" WRONG. Fuckers did not simply fight the monsters, they riled up the villagers and persuaded them to fight alongside the party to eventually take down Big Bad Squatch guy. (Specifically, party Monk punched his face off after party Dragonborn lit him on fire with breath weapon) I figured, "Alright, that was awesome and now it's over. They'll move on and get back to the main story hook." Once again, I was wrong.... The party got invested in the village and decided "hey, there could still be worse monsters out there in the woods. We won't always be here to protect them". So somehow (through a few unexpectedly good rolls) the party convinced a village of near-50 people to trudge through the forest with them as escorts and eventually made their way to Vance's place. (ALL THE WAY IN ANOTHER FUCKEN FOREST) They eventually convinced Vance to let the villagers stay at his crib and before ya knew it, a wholly new village formed around Vance's cave. Its citizens armed to the teeth with expertly crafted weaponry, and a big ass Ogre watching their backs, all the while the newfound sense of community and family helped Vance come to terms with his being a freakish but charming Ogre-man and become more open to the outside world. We now have a new hub town named after the Monk (Turtle Style Martial Arts) and Dragonborn who were key in taking down the Sasquatch and saving the villagers called Dragon-Turtle Village. And that is the story of how 2 completely unrelated sub-quests turned into something far greater than I ever could've imagined either of them could've been... creative bastards...
I had a "Steve" in one of my campaigns. I didn't have a name for an archmage so I went with the first thing that came to mind... Steve the Lich ended up being one of the major antagonists for the entire campaign, which was made even better by his love of humorous (but no less infuriating or dangerous) magical traps and bizarre dungeons.
Shootapickle Weird coincidence... I also had a lich named steve, except his quirk was he was kinda a "meh/layabout", and was OPAF. Ended with him being bribed with snacks...
Welcome to my world. I am good at world building, I can make an NPC on the fly with a decent backstory, with stats for fun (because I roll for stats for fun). Armor, weapons, buildings, magic, industry, all there. The names.... random name generators are my friend, because in stories I have written, the MAIN CHARACTER often doesn't have a name until I am most of the way through the story. By the way, I am workshopping an idea for character creation with the players that I call "deal with the devil". There are two versions of this, one is they roll one stat with a D20 but another stat is a straight 3 D6 roll instead of the normal 4 D6 - lowest one. That one can turn out bad (you can still roll a Nat 1 or Nat 2 and I will make them keep that shit) but the downside on the technical debuff to that is not bad. The other version is pure diabolical homebrew evil. The second version is roll a D30 for stat (yes, if they roll high I will honor it) but for another stat it is just 2 D6 (or, because I can be nice, 4 D4 so they don't get fully boned by two full low rolls, only if they roll super low on the D30). My personal personality is always jumping between chaotic and lawful, so having something that is lawful chaotic (chaos with rules to slightly reign it in) is always something I try to do. Also, it is always fun finding the gambler in the group.
I want there to be a city where every npc is named Steve. Not last name, all species and genders, everyone acts totally normal but all repond with Steve when asked for their name. It would probably get very confusing very quickly but I'm sure it would be hilarious as a dm (assuming you can keep a pokerface).
I had a player burn through a months worth of side quests and plot thanks to some lucky rolls and brute force tactics in a single session... I feel this episode... I feel it...
While DMing I once had my party take a mercenary hostage in the very first combat encounter they ever had. After releasing him they later found him again while ambushing the leader of the mercenary group. They left only him alive, taking him hostage again and dragging him along with them as their booby trap setter offer and the like. He'd try to escape, get caught, try to escape again. Many unlikely roles and 20 levels later, nondescript level 1 fighter became "Haus" ( short for hostage), the lawful good moral compass of the party that we used for people who wanted to drop in and try out D&D, who fullfilled his destiny by sacrificing himself to destroy the world-ending relic in the campaign climax. Have to say I didn't prepare for that one.
Lol I've seen this before and it's always amazing. :) I try to set up "reoccurring" NPC's and my players kill them.... Then they'll capture "Guy" and they'll have him stick around for months. :P
We did this once in our campaign, kept a simple enemy soldier as a hostage. He got hit so hard at one point that he had some permanent brain damage and we kept him around and took care of him because we felt bad for him. We left him alone for one day and he ended up becoming the host for a powerful demon that screwed our party over hard core once he was revealed.....we no longer take prisoners.
RPGs are like the jazz of storytelling- you prepare a crap-ton so you can fly by the seat of your pants and adeptly improvise! But don't worry, the longer and the more you do it, the better you get as a GM! -Ryan
To add to the metaphor, practicing patterns and shapes in jazz is like game prep. You will be surprised how much easier it is to adapt your prep if you have it in an adaptable format.
One of my best pieces of advice for GMs is to hold what I call a "Session 0" where you and your players get together and discuss the party's shared past. Are characters related? Childhood friends? Business partners? It gives players a genuine stake in everyone else's goals and actions as opposed to each being a story island unto themselves. Then take each player aside and let them come up with events or information that only they are privy too, this gives everyone at the table a level of social currency, information that only they can provide and can choose to withhold until they feel like the moment is the most dramatic.
I agree but I'd say don't do this with brand new players. I've tried on several occasions and without fail there never was a 1st session unless most people were experienced. I'm not sure, I think it's because new players (mostly) aren't sure what to expect and then get bored and the expectation becomes "Man all we did was discuss stuff for 4 hours we didn't do anything." and inevitably cancel (last min). So what I've started doing is the first session is just a quick one shot about 3 hours long so newbies can get into it and get excited killing shit. Then I host a session 1 1/2 which is to actually dig into the characters then they are super invested in making a grander story with deeper roots to grow bigger. (Wow sorry that was longer then I expected. :P ) Anyway, stay awesome and GM on! :)
Like Eric said, be careful with this around new players, even if you are GM for a FATE game and are trying to use the Phase Trio to flesh out the backstory. For new players, this will likely seem laborious and make them want to do something else/never play again. Many times, the best hook is just to jump right in and, depending on your group and how many are newcomers, maybe take the Ye Olde Random Tavern Meeting route. Of course, as with all things RPG, YMMV. :)
Indeed, One hook that I found was actually setting up a PvP/PvE combat encounter outside of the game itself as an introduction to the combat with premade barebone characters, maybe the PCs choose looks & weapons but nothing major. Most people seem to enjoy the combat, and even a non-RPer will love the chance to just describe how they brutally murdered X.
That's a good idea, note that it would probably be better for more roleplay heavy campaigns and players who would much rather play a character that kill things all know great advice
Hey so I have been hearing about your emporium of magical goods called Gilmore's Glorious Goods from a group of adventures. I can't quite remember what they were called Ver Mausoleum, Vid Materium, Vas Mechanicus, well it doesn't really matter. Let me ask you is your store really as glorious as they say or is it just a bunch of marketing.
pathora44 My friend, my dear, dear friend... If you don't find my goods to be glorious, I promise you I will walk right up to Throdak himself and offer to play the part of his tooth pick. My goods are, indeed, glorious.
Hey Geek & Sundry! Matt, thanks to you i've started my own campaign, but not with normal people, I'm a teacher in training and my campaign is with students at the school where I teach and THEY LOVE IT. I'm from Belgium so English is a third language here but it really works to get people talking, one of my pupils is already doing voices and it's only been two sessions! This is my science project for school and if it takes off I might start doing workshops for other teachers so they themselves can host their own campaign to improve our pupils' English. So yeah thanks to you and the Critical Role cast for inspiring me and making me fall in love with this game. Now I can make others do the same as well.
Yeah, and I'm glad he noted how important improve was before. I played D&D for a long time then stopped for about 3 years, during that time I took a 6 month improve group class, then started DMing again and I feel like my sessions are 1000x times better. It makes me less frustrated with players bringing odd things up or just going down a random path, it makes the NPC's feel more alive, and my players just love talking to some folks. I don't even use the "This NPC will know X Y Z about current situation." anymore when setting up.
Taking notes is incredibly important. In one of the games I am playing in, I am playing an investigator type. So his entire shtick is writing notes. Thing is I was the only one taking notes on what was going on during the story, so there were several times when the DM would ask me for my notes on the previous session. Mostly he would use this for names and sub-plots involving my character. However, there was a time the DM's computer went down and he could not get to his notes on what had just happened. Low and behold, my guy had all these notes on everything that had happened leading up to that moment (I think we were fighting some BBEG in a canyon at the time). On top of that, I had made several observations about the characters we had encountered along the way. Mostly just me stating what I thought there personality was like and how best to utilize them if the need were to ever arise. Thing is, the DM had not made any personal notes on how those characters might act or what they were like, so when I handed him my notes he got a lot of personal thoughts on what my character thought of the world. Suffice it to say, some of the characters started to act more in line to what my notes had said. Kind of an odd complement if I'm being honest.
As much as I love and appreciate the content of these "advanced" GM tips, I can honestly say I would just as happily watch Matt talk about pumpernickel bread or do a review on classical literature. Just about anything to be honest. Also, I think it would be AMAZ-BALLS to watch him interview his players about this stuff. Just my measly 2¢'s.
Adriaan Sluijs If I understand correctly TalksMachina is more of a fan show for Critical Role. Nothing against it at all, but it's also hosted by a "third party".
I will never forget my first DMing session: I had been preparing for this for little over one month, culminating in 5 different potential quest threads, a roughly mapped town and several important NPCs, all encounters and rewards considered and scaled. How did we spend the first 2 HOURS of the session? Trying to get a cupcake (and subsequently the recipe) Admittedly, it probably only took 2 hours because I decided to make it as hard as possible for my players after purposefully ignoring the obvious plot points I was dangling in front of them. It then lead to a new secret society, a personal quest for one of my players and probably one of my favourite NPCs to role play but still, that's what made it memorable.
The best tip I ever give a new GM is a simple four words; "I hate you guys". When someone decides to go too far off your carefully crafted plot threads just laugh, shake your head, smile and sigh "I hate you guys" in that endearing way that lets them know you've already added more guys to the next encounter. It sounds really stupid, but it gets a laugh, the table eases up for a minute and it gives you a few extra seconds to work out the ramifications of what the player's just said and how it all fits in, because the party WILL find an ironclad way to get the big bad to help them/decide to become gods/enact the plot of DOOM/invade the neighbouring country/enslave the kindly villagers/all of the above* and you'll need to work out how it affects the rest of the world. And seriously, take notes. *My last campaign ran every week for eight months. These examples are from one session. All of them.
Matt! Please please please please PLEASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSE! We NEED a behind-the-scenes series for Critical Role. What stories did you plan? What weird turns did the party take? What do your PCs do that you love and hate? What important characters did they kill off without a second thought? What improvised random character became a long-lasting favorite? These GM tips are great! But it would be AMAZING to hear the insider GM scoop behind this great game and series! Two specific questions I've long wanted an answer to: (1) did Clarota always exist in that cave waiting to help the party, or did you create him on the spot when the party wouldn't stop dicking around outside the encampment? (2) Did Clarota always intend to betray the party on his return home, or was his loyalty and friendship to the party brainwashed/assimilated away? A peek behind not just a generic GM screen but behind your Critcal Role GM screen would just be the greatest thing ever!
He answered the Clarota thing already. He was always there, even before the party came to the encampment, but they managed to find him way earlier than Matt had planned. As to his allegiance to the party, a peek into the nature of Illithids would inform you that they're manipulative by nature and look down upon every other race.
He's already answered both of these - 1) He was always there, but he was meant to be an encounter of sorts, not an ally. 2) yes, as soon as their usefulness ran out, Clarota intended to betray them. He's a mindflayer dude, they're his food
Dean Lewis There were some Q&As during the life of the show, be they at the end of the game, during Periscope sessions hosted by Matt or during conventions they participate. There's a channel called Critical Scope that has a collection of videos recorded by fans with most of those.
typos are great ways to come up with names! I misspelled Tornado once and ended up with a nifty character name. Another time i was RPing with a friend and mistyped and POOF! new character!
That look of "yeah... nope.... kill the npcs....uh huh, didn't see that coming" that's my party in a nutshell. I just write down names as it is now, my party are not friendly to others.
The good old tavern to start a quest. Oh you chose to start a fight with some random guys. Okay I'll just let you brawl for a bit and... you killed a guy... Okay no problem let me just... You want to leave and barricade the door? Okay you can do that. And now you chose to cover your tracks by setting the tavern on fire...
anytime I have a new player or new a group (and back in high school ONE player every time he started a new character!!) that wants to start a bar fight. my nephew tried this with his first character. I "Skyrim-ed" him. town guards, other patrons, everybody wanted a piece of him! he had it coming though. I specifically asked the group NOT to start any bar fights because it never amuses me as much as it does them! LOL
Bar fights are fun when NPCs do them because you can just summarize the aftermath. "You step into the tavern and see Bomm, the Goliath Storm Master, sitting atop a throne of bodies he has amassed in his bar fight while drinking fine wine from a tiny crystal stem. He sits his feet up on another small stack of unconscious bodies as he yawns and falls asleep after his hard fight." My players always get a kick out of that kind of NPC.
in one group i played it we kept note of each character's "kill count" and named character counted double so that quickly got out of hand with us in the middle of combat asking orcs what their name was and whenever an NPC introduced themselves have to resist the urge to just stab him in the face because it would look good on the kill count.
Speaking of collectors, we were tasked by one to acquire a set of items (Some gems, dragon parts, a dagger and most importantly - a feather. A standard feather, yes). Every time we got close to each item, a group of hooded men appeared and took it. After some investigation, we learnt that those people were trying to perform a ritual of summoning (DM never told us of what), so we went to their cave to take the components back. And then brought them to that elf-collector. Somehow it never raised any suspicion in us that he need the exact set of items required for that ritual. After receiving the reward, we decided to buy a castle just outside of a city(a suspiciously large sum, yes). As we were exploring it, DM describes a loud cracking sound coming from the outside, everything around us trembles, mirrors shatter... We run to the balcony. The sky is dark, blue lightnings crackle in the clouds. Where once stood a beautiful palace, we only saw a massive crater covered in smoke, it's charred peaces were floating in the air, seemingly unaffected by the force of gravity. When the party went there to learn what had happened, one of the few survivors described an elf in lavish clothes, walk into the throne room and stub himself with a dagger, covered in glowing runes. As the life left his body, the walls began to crumble. A few minutes later, the ground shook as the palace was consumed in an explosion of dark energy. That was the collector.
My party once nagged me to run a session when I wasn't prepared, and they were resting on the Rock of Braal in the 2E Spelljammer setting. During the resulting Macguffin hunt, there were several moments when the party were ahead of me in the plot by 10 minutes or more, and I still managed to improv my way to a satisfactory solution to the mystery. And I asked them afterwards, and they didn't realise :D
My favorite tip by far from this video is that very little time is wasted when you make extra preparations of stuff that won't get used in that particular story. You can always reuse them (with some alterations if necessary). Pretty obvious, but I hadn't thought of it, and it's actually a huge deal. Now I can prepare a shit ton without feeling stupid for wasting time :)
Matt always gives great tips. Idea: G&S should do a few Player Tips episodes and bring on some of the other cast. I have a feeling they would be well received.
Oh man you are so right! I can't count the times I've had to educate people on "player etiquette". Don't steal someone else's spotlight Don't hog the spotlight Don't shut down other players ideas Don't assume you know what the DM is trying to do Don't meta game Keep side talk to a minimum Don't look beyond the DM screen Trust your DM (And DM's trust your players) Even if it's "totally something my character would do." Remember that your friends are there trying to have fun too. If you're a merder hobo, make sure that's the kind of game everyone else wants to play. Stay in character Man... the list goes on... Suddenly flashback from my group in highschool are hitting me. :P
As much as I would love to watch that, the player's job requires much less skill, preparation, and know-how. Playing DnD is litterally just enjoying a game. DMing for DnD is actual work.
@@amandadube156 As a DM, it's nice when the players know what their characters abilities are and how they work, and roleplay a consistent personality and philosophy... unfortunately most of the Critical Role cast are NOT the ones to ask for advice about that (especially about knowing how their own abilities work, after YEARS of playing). XD
@@jessicalee333 I think using a reference manual once in a while is the reason there are reference manuals. Matt has to look things up too on occasion.
I actually laughed out-loud a couple times remembering exact times some of these things happened to me over the last 30 years and I cannot say how many time letting the paranoid ramblings of my players work out details for me that I wasn't prepared for has saved an awkward encounter. Bravo!
I threw my DM for a loop during the first session of our campaign by immediately splitting from the party, investigating a portion of the layout in the opposite direction from everyone else, and meeting an NPC we weren't supposed to encounter until much later in the campaign. It was my first experience with D&D, so I didn't know if I was being a bad player by going off book. But my DM loved the unexpected interactions, and he did an amazing job of adapting to my character's misadventures. So as a player, a flexible and creative DM is such a pleasure to work with, and those skills are so impressive and appreciated!
just got volunteered to be a gm for my first gm d&s game this video helped a lot by showing I'm mostly doing things right and a few helpful hints thanks so much
Note taking is indeed a must! I found out that making some sort of "session minutes" after the session is SOOOO good. I take notes while DMing, then use those notes in the end plus the just fresh memories to write down sort of a well organized diary with references to things like: where the party was, what info did they get, what did they do, who did they see and talked with, etc.
Also know your world. I've written up my own and are currently running a 90% improvised campaign with some friends and just knowing what is in the world and what is in most cities just makes it that much easier.
This is super helpful. My only problem is the note taking part. I always try, but I get distracted by actually taking the notes, and sometimes lose track of what my players are doing, even if I'm trying to scribble things down quickly and simply. Just something I still have to work on! Thanks for all the tips, Matt!
Are used to think you were just a UA-camr but recently found out that you were a voice actor in some of my favorite TV shows as a kid and now every time I watch your videos I feel like I'm meeting a celebrity
Tips: 1) Develop side plots for your characters 2) Develop extra NPCs for added depth 3) Keep cpmbat templates on stad by 4) Create unique traps and dangerous encounters 5) Generate fun items to reward your party 6) Create a complety immersive environment 7) Take notes
Thank you Mr. Mercer for putting together these videos. I want to start DMing myself and I've been intimidated by just what to do. So thank you for helping out us rookies find our footing.
Great tips! one of the things i like to do is if I want to give the players loot but don't actually have items. is get them a crafting material of a mysterious object that they have to have some one appraise or identify to know what it is. Then you can hold off on saying anything while the artificer "investigates it" and then between sessions, you can actually come up with what it does.
Literally my best adventure quest I did as a GM (or DM) was full of a bunch of improv that I came up with on the spot with little summaries of ideas I had before I started. I'm tell you guys once you find your own style as a GM things are going to be a lot more fun.
Matthew, you are my biggest inspiration for mastering, and I really love the way you use your voice acting abilitties to bring your character to life. Could you make a video on how to make different voices for our characters??
This is super deep and helpful info, but also overwhelming since I've not done anything beyond a practice session with my wife. Matthew Colliver's "Running the Game" seems better for beginners, whereas Matt Mercer's GM Tips seems like next level advice once you've got a couple of campaigns under your belt. Either way, I'm looking forward to that stage.
Appreciate all of these video tips for budding or even long-time GMs. Even the most literary of persons could use some kind of guide for holding a not-only enthralling but safely, organized D&D session! Thank you very much Matthew for the upload!
In one campaign I wrote, there was a captain of the local gaurd, who denied my characters entrance into his city as they were very secretive. So one of my characters, an elvish rouge who chose to play as chaotic neutral, convinced my entire party to just break in. Long story short, they failed on their first attempt at stealth and ended up brutally murdering the ENTIRE town militia, both civilian and soldier, and had an improvised boss fight with the leader who had denied them entry. The whole thing turned into a mess when they looted the town. Eventually they took over and decided to rule.
Mine is Corol. :P Though I've got a list of Silly names for when they seek someone with a specific occupation: Rhett Cross Clair Ick Hugs Freely Robin Banks Ian Cognito Dina Mite Daisy May'rollon Day'haton (elf) Poly Hedron Avery Longtime Flick Desnuts Jenny Talia Shay Ma'nam Un'stopa Paul Justin Thyme And of copurse... Master Ba'Tor
My favorite improvisation tactic is letting the players invent it. If it is outside the main plot (and frequently even inside it), players can create and destroy their stories. There are a few benefits on this: 1) Players will quickly red herring themselves as they extrapolate on their own ideas, which allows you to surprise them later on. Example: Players will likely guess names for a note or letter signed only with initials, which will allow you to introduce a character with that name to hurt them, help them, or cause chaos. 2) Players regularly come up with crazier stuff than the GM will ever think of. See also: Don't give the GM ideas to iterate on and bring back later 3) Players are more involved in a world they create. Reduces railroading if they have meaningful options in world creation.
I feel like #3 Is the main reason stories get derailed so much in games like DnD. Players want to feel like they had some sort of impact or influence over the story or world, so they will do things to NPCs that are often unexpected. A second reason would be that they simply get attached to random NPCs, or get interested in unrelated events or locations, then pursue those interests beyond what the DM planned for.
I’m seriously considering using this plan for when I panic: the cult of Steve. Steve is almost everywhere. He’s a chill guy, seekingly immortal. Likes bugs and basketball for some reason he keeps popping up and seems to be in on all the gossip the town has. Steve has a trustworthy face. You’re pretty sure Steve is a god of something, probably pot. It would explain alot
I've been told that I'm generally pretty good at improv, helpful since I generally only set out very basic guidelines for my campaigns and then make the rest up as I go, unless it's something really story important, even then I leave it open enough that there's room for change when necessary
My preferred way of taking notes is using a calendar. Pharmacies give them out for free here near the beginning of a new year, so I try to get a couple for use later on, and it lets me keep track of what happened in broad lines on which day of the year for my players. I asked them which day of the year they wanted to start their adventure, and have been keeping track of how long their travel and rests are day by day, writing the important events into the boxes. Good way of keeping track of things like teleportation circles which have to be cast for a year before becoming permanent; the calendar has the relevant date so I can write it down in the next calendar early and know when they get there. Of course, buying a large calendar with bigger squares would mean more room for notes, but I'm fairly good about remembering details. Most of the time. I did forget the name of a fairly important diplomat, once... but that wouldn't have been a problem if my players bothered to take any notes at all in the first place. Nothing! Not a single note out of them for months! At all! I watch Vox Machina sift through their papers and find the name of an NPC they met once three years ago, but my players can't be arsed to write down the name of an important foreign diplomat on a peace mission to the empire they live in!
Our DM went a step farther. He custom made a calendar for our world: 13 50-day months, and included the phases of 3 moons, solstices, and equinox. All in all I wouldn't recommend it, unless you're just the type of person who's excited by calendars. As you can imagine, it took a lot of extra work on his part, even with the fine resources for making fantasy calendars which are on line. It certainly adds a level of immersion to our game, but does it come up often? No, not at all. In fact I think he's the only one who really has a good grasp on the days of the week, the months, or anything else....
Also, a really helpful tip I've read somewhere: Don't be afraid to use stuff you've prepared for something else entirely. If you have a rough flowchart of rooms for some place, but the PCs go to someplace else, maybe you can reuse the original plan for that new location. With a few quick adjustments, the players will never notice. I had to literally do exactly that for the first game I've ever run. Similarly, if you had some creature statted out beforehand, you can basically reskin it, maybe slightly change its abilities and you're good.
Prepared chaos. *is* a really good description of DMing. I generally prepare in a modular fashion and just set up a basic scenario at the beginning of a session or game. Most of what I end up doing is improvisation and taking notes on it to maintain continuity. I write up regions/groups as sort of generic personalities, from which I deviate when making NPCs on the fly. (They, of course, go into the notes)
As someone who will be running a Vampire: Requiem game at some point in the next few months, I am so excited for these tips! Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge with us!
In addition to notes, I always found keeping a post-session journal to be very useful. It can be fun for the players too, when it dawns on them that something small from several sessions earlier has just come back to bite them on the bum.
If you mess up, you say something blatantly untrue, and it's from an unimportant character, have them say something like "So then, you've figured me out? WELL I'LL HAVE THE LAST LAUGH." Then 'As you watch, the farmer's face becomes hideously disfigured, and the illusion is broken, before you stands a man clad in dark robes, with a necromancer's sigil on the hood, his laughter is thunderous, nearly maddening as he raises his hands, and says "RISE MY FRIENDS, SHOW THESE DELIGHTFULLY FOOLISH ADVENTURES HOW WE TREAT THEIR MEDDLING KIND!", as his hands reach into the air at the apex of his motions, a dark light emanates from them.' Then have undead begin rising out of the ground, powerful undead, ones that that (for a presumably low level party) they know they're booking their asses out. Have them make an escape, fleeing the evil undead necromancer. After 24 hours, if they head back, the sky is no longer dark and gloomy, the farmer is tilling the fields as before, and no sign of the undead. Then have him repeat exactly what he said the last time. As long as they're not me, they won't stop to question the plot or your slip-up.
Thanks for these videos Matt. To learn from watching you is one thing, but these little tid bits behind the scenes are fantastic and so helpful. Thank you
I totally second, and third the tip on taking notes. Parties can come back to a random village sometimes months later expecting to speak to the same person about before about the thing.... yeah... been there.
I find it helpful to stop and really think bout the setting. If it's say, a small farming village, what are the crops, what else do people do there, when is church what are you wearing to the town dance and sociable? These answers make flying by the seat of my pants a lot easier.
We've done a few sessions now. I haven't been taking very good notes. My planning sesh last night was much more difficult than it needed to be. I'm gonna start taking notes.
Honestly, the biggest help I ever had in learning to improvise was in running a game called Beyond the Wall - a game designed to be played with literally no preparation.
thanks for the advice Matt, as always you have been a great teacher. I only started playing dnd 3 months ago and for my friends I imeadiatly became the DM. I have taken alot of my game running types after watching all 70 episodes of critical role. thanks for truly inspiring me to play!
For my first DM adventure, it was with all new players. So I wrote a king who was looking for a competent party of adventurers to go on an important quest. The king didn't want to hire just anyone, so he hosted a tournament. Player party vs several NPC parties. Parties were assembled at random, and what a coincidence, all the players are in one group together. (Hey, it beats "you all meet in a tavern...") The tournament ventured into a mock dungeon, pitted party against party, and solved puzzles and such. The winning party (the players of course) were then chosen by the king. Each tournament task was designed to be relatively safe, non-lethal, and to help new players understand what they can do in a tabletop game.
I have to say after watching all these tips and guides I feel more sure on taking on the GM role. That and my friends have been nagging me to do so. And after writing up 31 pages of a module I know they will do their best to break it...as soon as possible! Because it's what we do,. And thanks to taking all these tips and tucking them into my back pocket I am happy to tell them to bring it on! Now onward to my first attempt at GMing...wish me luck! And thanks for all the great content and information.
Taking notes is basic! Before I start: I'm a Spanish speaking person, so I apologize if my English is a little broken. I am currently home-brewing an Evil campaign. Making long story short, I'm using the "Magic the gathering" story and I added a few things here and there. One of the main things that I added into this roleplay is that most of the cool things can be bought only in a place called "The Planeswalker place" which is pretty much like a little dimension where only the Planeswalker's have access to but this place also has a chain of command and their own laws. At some point of the story, the party gets noticed by the counsel of the Planeswalker place and therefore, the party can't no longer go back there so they encountered themselves having issues to buy items, spells, armor, etc. So I had to come up with a way to make sure that they could keep buying stuff so I decided to develop some kind of "black market" and thanks to that they've met several different NPC's that could sell them useful stuff and they were okay with it. During the next few sessions, the party was wandering around an abandoned town and out of the blue I remembered a meme about Khajits from the Elder scrolls games in where the Khajit says something like "Khajit has wares, if you have coin" so just for the lolz when the party separated to cover more ground one of the players heard a voice saying "hey...come closer" while going up a ladder, when this player turned around the only thing she saw was an stray cat staring at her, when she kept climbing she heard "Hey...where are you going??" and then she turned around again and she saw the cat starting at her again, she smiled at me and she said "Are you serious?". The stray talking cat then said: "Hey, you are Sunshine right? (The character's name) Follow me!" and the character decided to follow the cat. After a few jumps here and there they managed to get to the roof of the building and then the cat jumped into an empty carton box and then started to take items out (Health potions, spells, etc) and then said "Khajit has wares...if you have coin". When they were done with the purchasing the cat placed all his items back and then jumped back into the box and when Sunshine checked the box, the box was empty, the cat and the wares were no longer there. She had this idea of taking the empty box with her and then it just hit me: Why not making a "Clan"? During the next few sessions, the "Khajits" became important, the party had a "portable" shop and everytime that they had to buy something, they just placed the box in the ground, knock a few times and a different cat would go out to sell them thing, ALWAYS using the slogan "Khajit has wares....if you have coin" whenever the cat would pop-out (The players even made me do the "thing" if for some reason I forgot to use the slogan when they wanted to buy something). The point is that the party loved these NPC's so much that they became obsessed with getting to know what was the lore behind them to the point that I had to come up with how these guys worked, create a lore, sub-types, etc. Pretty much, the "Khajits" are the the owners of the black market and the "Khajits" do not only dedicate themselves to sell, but there are mercenaries, assassins, artificers, anything that a Planeswalker might need but can't get since they are "banned" from the planeswalker place. At the beginning, all the "Khajits" were cats, but then the players made it to a point were they decided to ask why a "Khajit" had to necessarily be a cat, the salesman didn't knew the answer and they just dropped the question. Several sessions later when they tried to buy something, I surprised them when I started to describe a bear cub coming out of the box, they started to ask this NPC several questions about why he wasn't a cat and then the bear cub explained to them that the Khajit that they had previously asked about why they were only cats was a Khajit Manager covering for one of his guys that called in sick that day and this Khajit took those questions to the "King Khajit" and after debating for a few months they decided to start "recruiting" from different species and not limiting themselves to only get cats to do the job. That's when they noticed that the "Khajit" was not a race, but a profession. Several sessions later, the party received an invitation to become "Khajits" themselves, but their role would be not to sell, but to be mercenaries and get "coin" and items in exchange as long as the missions were completed. Having them accept joining the Khajits allowed me to extend the story quite a lot and also implement several ideas that I had but that I couldn't put into the game since the party was always doing different stuff at a different places, but now since the party receives requests here and there from the Khajits, now I can use these ideas without making it look that I am "railroading" them under the excuse that "The Khajits are requesting that the party takes care of X or Y thing". My point is that taking notes is essential because if I didn't I would had forgotten that first of all, they took the carton box and that they questioned one of the Khajits that later on facilitated a lot the story plot thanks to these little fellas.
I have never watched a single episode of anything this Mr Mercer has been in despite him being probably the most well known GM in the world. Yet, when I created my own roleplay system, and as an extension ran my very first campaign ever with it; I ended up using every strategy he just spoke of in this video (except the note-taking part because I have a pretty good memory, though I should do it more often). With my minimum experience from other campaigns as a player (which at this point had been two very short-lived experiences with 5E) I had realized three things, that I loved tabletop roleplaying games, I did not like how most campaigns were designed for them, and what kind of GM I did not want to be. I knew I wanted a far more open experience then most campaigns I had seen had allowed. I wanted to allow my players freedom of choice and direction in how they accomplished far off and grand goals. I wanted them to feel free to roleplay and develop their characters. After my first session I realized what I would need to allow all of that, I knew I would need to become good at improv. Thankfully, before I had started the campaign I had already fleshed out my world. Things like it's big actors/factions, what these factions would ask of the players and how these factions all entangled with each other. Along with this, I had written down basic info for around 100 different events that I could use at a moment's notice. along with NPC companions that could both help the party stay alive and act as plot devices when needed. Just as Mr Mercer has explained in this video, all of this prep was invaluable. This is not to say that this was all that was needed, being able to pull something out of your ass at a moment's notice and being able to have it seem like something you came up with a week ago is a skill all GM's should try to develop. All the prep work is useless if you can't find a way to tie it into the sometimes very particular moments your players find themselves in. Being able to combine the premises of pre-made events to fit the current narrative or to fill a hole in it, come up with further motivation/connections for factions and NPC's to explain missed details or plot holes you may have missed, along with being able to thoroughly describe a location you had never thought your players would run into within ten seconds of being asked about it are all things that help keep the narrative feeling more real and uncontrived. Just as Mercer explained, the prep work gives you a foundation to work off of. If you understand your world, it's characters and how they relate to each other, along with having basic plot points and character descriptions available to get your brain rolling, there will be little your characters can throw at you that you can not come up with a way to explain. I would also argue that consuming alot of media related to the genre of your campaign, viewing lots of different kinds geography, viewing lots of different architecture and studying basic sociology, economics, geopolitics, cosmology, history, and theology can help a lot with not only crafting your own world but making it easier to add to the world on the fly. The more you have in your brain, the more you can pull out of it.
In my first campaign we took the party to a city that we were only supposed to be there for 1 or 2 sessions just for intel but our DM rolled on a table of random npcs and we took the information given and started a rebellion. It turned into a 6 session part of the campaign that was AMAZING!!
I had an improved Steve in my campaign once, he was a caravan guard sent to pick up the PC's at one point. Steve ended up having information about them and it lead to a character getting a cursed cloak as punishment for stealing from the king. The one character's hatred eventually bled into everyone else, and after a little while everyone hated Steve for some unknown reason. Steve went from being a lowly guard for the king, to a sort of high guard, to being the puppet master behind the upcoming war because my PC's despised him so much that they would curse him at every set-back or blame him for any villainous enemies that showed up.
As a beginning DM'er, it really helped to stick to official stories and take inspiration as you go that you apply further. I own both the Starter and Essential kit so I had two campaigns to play and combine eventually.
Probably one of my favoriye moments as a DM was when my players walked into a room and found a Thayan Wizard alone, messing with the stuff in her bedroll. I expected the group to kill her. Our Berserker liked her, wrapped her up in the bedroll, then asked for her name. Thus was Lily the Invoker born, scroll maker extraordinaire, and helped in the war against Thay.
I like rewards you can give out of Xanathar's Guide. There some really good and powerful magic items, but most are comedic that make role-playing really interesting. Also all the simple things that people come up with on D&D Homebrew, Reddit, & Pinterest. Giving out these comedic items actually forces your group to find fun ways to use them!
It is a player's prerogative to never do what you intended. You plan out options A, B, and C and they choose option Triangle.
Or number banana.
Or option "Lets-all-get-on-a-boat-to-a-foreign-continent"
Funny thing was, from that point on, that was my best campaign yet. I made up a few things and wrapped up the session, I came back with a full on plot, involving a murder mystery, spies, and all sorts of fun stuff. By the time the boat arrived at its destination, everyone had forgotten all about the story I first came up with, including me!
lol I had something like that once, though it didn't turn out so well. :P They fled the country after a massive invasion began, about an in game year later they came back shocked that everything was destroyed and Orcs ran things now. :P
Jester Eric Ah, yes, the 'Lion King' approach. Only return once things have gone completely pear-shaped :-P
Every single time
it would be cool to have matt go back and do commentary on moments he was caught off guard and fill us in on what he was thinking at the moment.
One of my favorite moments where he was caught off guard was Scanlan's interaction with the Deurgar queen. "I'd promise you, but I don't make promises to dogs." It took him much longer than normal to respond to that.
Thoes are some really good moments. :P When you're like "How would this person respond to something like that.... what situation are they in.... do I make him roll an intimidation..... Okay, now it's time to just let words fly out of my mouth and hope it works..."
I’m pretty sure it would just be, “Crap. Crap crap crap, what? No don’t do... crap ummmmm winging it here we go.”
Oooh! I like that!!!
Definitely the Cupcake situation, I would say
What I wouldn’t give to play, even just once, with Matt. Not even because he’s a famous actor, but because he’s just a damn great DM.
DeathbyPixels I would refuse to do it unless he would narrate as mcree.
@@andrewpark78 why tho
I mean...there are plenty of *great* game masters out there. The trick is just to find them, my friend. :)
One of my life goals is to play a game of D&D with Matt Mercer. Either as fellow players, or with one of us DMing (I'd happily DM for Matt Mercer)
@@TheOnlyToblin or become one
The first casualty of the game session is the DMs plan.
shhh....
I made a joke skeleton encounter in the first dungeon my players explored. He plays a flute of charm skeleton. Instead of killing the skeleton and taking the flute to discover its power later on, the took the skeleton (who is always nonhostile and dancing) and shoved him into the bag of holding. They use him whenever a bar needs livening up or they're fighting hordes of undead. I believe they named him, although idk what name they gave him.
My players also have a skeleton. He's missing the bottom half of his body so one of the players carry him around. He's technically neutral, but he will bite your shoes if you stand too close.
They named him McRibs, and the Nethermancer (Earthdawn) wants to give him legs.
While DMing, I once had the party run into an Ogre Blacksmith who turned out to be a human cursed into ogre form. Dude's name was Vance. Nice guy but kind of a recluse. He just wanted to be left alone with his son out in the woods, hiding from the rest of the world, waiting to get revenge on the bastard that cursed him. He passed the time smithing for the hell of it and by the time they met him, he had amassed a rather sizable armory that wasn't being put to any good use. The party later helped Vance stave off an attack by assassins sent by the guy who had cursed Vance in the first place. His cave/blacksmith dwelling became the party's go-to hang out spot and personal smithing source soon after.
Fast forward a few plot threads later. The party came across a small village in a forest adjacent to the one Vance lived in. They were being attacked by a band of savage bugbears led by a murderous Sasquatch almost every night for the past month. I figured, "sheeeit, the party'll kill off the Squatch and the bugbears then be on their way right?" WRONG. Fuckers did not simply fight the monsters, they riled up the villagers and persuaded them to fight alongside the party to eventually take down Big Bad Squatch guy. (Specifically, party Monk punched his face off after party Dragonborn lit him on fire with breath weapon)
I figured, "Alright, that was awesome and now it's over. They'll move on and get back to the main story hook." Once again, I was wrong.... The party got invested in the village and decided "hey, there could still be worse monsters out there in the woods. We won't always be here to protect them". So somehow (through a few unexpectedly good rolls) the party convinced a village of near-50 people to trudge through the forest with them as escorts and eventually made their way to Vance's place. (ALL THE WAY IN ANOTHER FUCKEN FOREST)
They eventually convinced Vance to let the villagers stay at his crib and before ya knew it, a wholly new village formed around Vance's cave. Its citizens armed to the teeth with expertly crafted weaponry, and a big ass Ogre watching their backs, all the while the newfound sense of community and family helped Vance come to terms with his being a freakish but charming Ogre-man and become more open to the outside world.
We now have a new hub town named after the Monk (Turtle Style Martial Arts) and Dragonborn who were key in taking down the Sasquatch and saving the villagers called Dragon-Turtle Village.
And that is the story of how 2 completely unrelated sub-quests turned into something far greater than I ever could've imagined either of them could've been... creative bastards...
Razzrazz90 Damn, you're awesome for letting your players play that out, that's an amazing story.
Razzrazz90 I teared up a bit reading this. So beautiful!!
Good DM and good players. I like it.
im trying to raise a harpy and now my whole team is slowly becoming invested on what even the DM once called a lost cause.
This scares me as a new DM
I had a "Steve" in one of my campaigns. I didn't have a name for an archmage so I went with the first thing that came to mind... Steve the Lich ended up being one of the major antagonists for the entire campaign, which was made even better by his love of humorous (but no less infuriating or dangerous) magical traps and bizarre dungeons.
Shootapickle Weird coincidence... I also had a lich named steve, except his quirk was he was kinda a "meh/layabout", and was OPAF. Ended with him being bribed with snacks...
Never forget *Tim the Enchanter*
Welcome to my world. I am good at world building, I can make an NPC on the fly with a decent backstory, with stats for fun (because I roll for stats for fun). Armor, weapons, buildings, magic, industry, all there. The names.... random name generators are my friend, because in stories I have written, the MAIN CHARACTER often doesn't have a name until I am most of the way through the story. By the way, I am workshopping an idea for character creation with the players that I call "deal with the devil". There are two versions of this, one is they roll one stat with a D20 but another stat is a straight 3 D6 roll instead of the normal 4 D6 - lowest one. That one can turn out bad (you can still roll a Nat 1 or Nat 2 and I will make them keep that shit) but the downside on the technical debuff to that is not bad. The other version is pure diabolical homebrew evil. The second version is roll a D30 for stat (yes, if they roll high I will honor it) but for another stat it is just 2 D6 (or, because I can be nice, 4 D4 so they don't get fully boned by two full low rolls, only if they roll super low on the D30). My personal personality is always jumping between chaotic and lawful, so having something that is lawful chaotic (chaos with rules to slightly reign it in) is always something I try to do. Also, it is always fun finding the gambler in the group.
No campaign...No lich...or Archmage...but I am a Steve.
I want there to be a city where every npc is named Steve. Not last name, all species and genders, everyone acts totally normal but all repond with Steve when asked for their name.
It would probably get very confusing very quickly but I'm sure it would be hilarious as a dm (assuming you can keep a pokerface).
I had a player burn through a months worth of side quests and plot thanks to some lucky rolls and brute force tactics in a single session... I feel this episode... I feel it...
While DMing I once had my party take a mercenary hostage in the very first combat encounter they ever had. After releasing him they later found him again while ambushing the leader of the mercenary group. They left only him alive, taking him hostage again and dragging him along with them as their booby trap setter offer and the like. He'd try to escape, get caught, try to escape again. Many unlikely roles and 20 levels later, nondescript level 1 fighter became "Haus" ( short for hostage), the lawful good moral compass of the party that we used for people who wanted to drop in and try out D&D, who fullfilled his destiny by sacrificing himself to destroy the world-ending relic in the campaign climax.
Have to say I didn't prepare for that one.
Lol I've seen this before and it's always amazing. :) I try to set up "reoccurring" NPC's and my players kill them.... Then they'll capture "Guy" and they'll have him stick around for months. :P
Omg,actually "lol'ed at that one :D
We did this once in our campaign, kept a simple enemy soldier as a hostage. He got hit so hard at one point that he had some permanent brain damage and we kept him around and took care of him because we felt bad for him. We left him alone for one day and he ended up becoming the host for a powerful demon that screwed our party over hard core once he was revealed.....we no longer take prisoners.
If you want to keep an NPC alive, ALWAYS have an escape plan for the at the ready.
A smokebomb, a flashbang, anything.
Blue Radium i
I didn't notice last episode but the Unicorn goblet I sent him for Critmas is on the table. YAY!!!
RPGs are like the jazz of storytelling- you prepare a crap-ton so you can fly by the seat of your pants and adeptly improvise! But don't worry, the longer and the more you do it, the better you get as a GM! -Ryan
o7
Nerdarchy +
That's a really good comparison, son, and I'm really feelin' it right now. Cheers!
Nothing truer has ever been said
To add to the metaphor, practicing patterns and shapes in jazz is like game prep. You will be surprised how much easier it is to adapt your prep if you have it in an adaptable format.
One of my best pieces of advice for GMs is to hold what I call a "Session 0" where you and your players get together and discuss the party's shared past. Are characters related? Childhood friends? Business partners? It gives players a genuine stake in everyone else's goals and actions as opposed to each being a story island unto themselves. Then take each player aside and let them come up with events or information that only they are privy too, this gives everyone at the table a level of social currency, information that only they can provide and can choose to withhold until they feel like the moment is the most dramatic.
I agree but I'd say don't do this with brand new players. I've tried on several occasions and without fail there never was a 1st session unless most people were experienced.
I'm not sure, I think it's because new players (mostly) aren't sure what to expect and then get bored and the expectation becomes "Man all we did was discuss stuff for 4 hours we didn't do anything." and inevitably cancel (last min).
So what I've started doing is the first session is just a quick one shot about 3 hours long so newbies can get into it and get excited killing shit. Then I host a session 1 1/2 which is to actually dig into the characters then they are super invested in making a grander story with deeper roots to grow bigger.
(Wow sorry that was longer then I expected. :P ) Anyway, stay awesome and GM on! :)
Like Eric said, be careful with this around new players, even if you are GM for a FATE game and are trying to use the Phase Trio to flesh out the backstory. For new players, this will likely seem laborious and make them want to do something else/never play again. Many times, the best hook is just to jump right in and, depending on your group and how many are newcomers, maybe take the Ye Olde Random Tavern Meeting route. Of course, as with all things RPG, YMMV. :)
Indeed,
One hook that I found was actually setting up a PvP/PvE combat encounter outside of the game itself as an introduction to the combat with premade barebone characters, maybe the PCs choose looks & weapons but nothing major.
Most people seem to enjoy the combat, and even a non-RPer will love the chance to just describe how they brutally murdered X.
Gavriel01 I always offer my party a little extra stat boost or minor magical trinket the more they flesh out their character
That's a good idea, note that it would probably be better for more roleplay heavy campaigns and players who would much rather play a character that kill things all know great advice
I'd trust this one, his creations are glorious.
Surely not as glorious as your goods, though, right?
I feel, they may be on par.
Hey so I have been hearing about your emporium of magical goods called Gilmore's Glorious Goods from a group of adventures. I can't quite remember what they were called Ver Mausoleum, Vid Materium, Vas Mechanicus, well it doesn't really matter. Let me ask you is your store really as glorious as they say or is it just a bunch of marketing.
pathora44 My friend, my dear, dear friend... If you don't find my goods to be glorious, I promise you I will walk right up to Throdak himself and offer to play the part of his tooth pick. My goods are, indeed, glorious.
This is amazing
Kids in school
"Taking notes is a waste of time"
DMs
"I WENT THROUGH A FIVE SUBJECT NOTEBOOK IN TWO HOURS!"
Hey Geek & Sundry! Matt, thanks to you i've started my own campaign, but not with normal people, I'm a teacher in training and my campaign is with students at the school where I teach and THEY LOVE IT. I'm from Belgium so English is a third language here but it really works to get people talking, one of my pupils is already doing voices and it's only been two sessions!
This is my science project for school and if it takes off I might start doing workshops for other teachers so they themselves can host their own campaign to improve our pupils' English.
So yeah thanks to you and the Critical Role cast for inspiring me and making me fall in love with this game. Now I can make others do the same as well.
That is a fantastic idea. I wish my English lessons in school were by means of DnD.
Best of luck with that, and I sincerely hope it catches on.
Tweehoek I wish my teachers did this
Im doing this with my art classes for middleschoolers
I'd expect math would be the bigger subject.
The "painting the scene on improv" tip was THE MOST IMPORTANT
Yeah, and I'm glad he noted how important improve was before. I played D&D for a long time then stopped for about 3 years, during that time I took a 6 month improve group class, then started DMing again and I feel like my sessions are 1000x times better.
It makes me less frustrated with players bringing odd things up or just going down a random path, it makes the NPC's feel more alive, and my players just love talking to some folks. I don't even use the "This NPC will know X Y Z about current situation." anymore when setting up.
Don't you just hate autocorrect?
Hellz yeah, I Jackson Pollok that shiiit!!!
Taking notes is incredibly important. In one of the games I am playing in, I am playing an investigator type. So his entire shtick is writing notes. Thing is I was the only one taking notes on what was going on during the story, so there were several times when the DM would ask me for my notes on the previous session. Mostly he would use this for names and sub-plots involving my character. However, there was a time the DM's computer went down and he could not get to his notes on what had just happened. Low and behold, my guy had all these notes on everything that had happened leading up to that moment (I think we were fighting some BBEG in a canyon at the time). On top of that, I had made several observations about the characters we had encountered along the way. Mostly just me stating what I thought there personality was like and how best to utilize them if the need were to ever arise. Thing is, the DM had not made any personal notes on how those characters might act or what they were like, so when I handed him my notes he got a lot of personal thoughts on what my character thought of the world. Suffice it to say, some of the characters started to act more in line to what my notes had said.
Kind of an odd complement if I'm being honest.
As much as I love and appreciate the content of these "advanced" GM tips, I can honestly say I would just as happily watch Matt talk about pumpernickel bread or do a review on classical literature. Just about anything to be honest. Also, I think it would be AMAZ-BALLS to watch him interview his players about this stuff. Just my measly 2¢'s.
Pete Askme
Imagine him and the members of critical role, reading creepy pastas.
john cornwell That would make for an amazingly spooky Halloween Special!
Talksmachina?
Adriaan Sluijs If I understand correctly TalksMachina is more of a fan show for Critical Role. Nothing against it at all, but it's also hosted by a "third party".
Pete Askme you said you wanted intervieuws. and it is hosted by another person its still only g&s + vm
I will never forget my first DMing session: I had been preparing for this for little over one month, culminating in 5 different potential quest threads, a roughly mapped town and several important NPCs, all encounters and rewards considered and scaled. How did we spend the first 2 HOURS of the session?
Trying to get a cupcake (and subsequently the recipe)
Admittedly, it probably only took 2 hours because I decided to make it as hard as possible for my players after purposefully ignoring the obvious plot points I was dangling in front of them.
It then lead to a new secret society, a personal quest for one of my players and probably one of my favourite NPCs to role play but still, that's what made it memorable.
The best tip I ever give a new GM is a simple four words; "I hate you guys". When someone decides to go too far off your carefully crafted plot threads just laugh, shake your head, smile and sigh "I hate you guys" in that endearing way that lets them know you've already added more guys to the next encounter. It sounds really stupid, but it gets a laugh, the table eases up for a minute and it gives you a few extra seconds to work out the ramifications of what the player's just said and how it all fits in, because the party WILL find an ironclad way to get the big bad to help them/decide to become gods/enact the plot of DOOM/invade the neighbouring country/enslave the kindly villagers/all of the above* and you'll need to work out how it affects the rest of the world.
And seriously, take notes.
*My last campaign ran every week for eight months. These examples are from one session. All of them.
its been 5 years. Are you ok?
@@destroyerzy8678he dead bro
Matt! Please please please please PLEASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSE! We NEED a behind-the-scenes series for Critical Role. What stories did you plan? What weird turns did the party take? What do your PCs do that you love and hate? What important characters did they kill off without a second thought? What improvised random character became a long-lasting favorite? These GM tips are great! But it would be AMAZING to hear the insider GM scoop behind this great game and series!
Two specific questions I've long wanted an answer to: (1) did Clarota always exist in that cave waiting to help the party, or did you create him on the spot when the party wouldn't stop dicking around outside the encampment? (2) Did Clarota always intend to betray the party on his return home, or was his loyalty and friendship to the party brainwashed/assimilated away?
A peek behind not just a generic GM screen but behind your Critcal Role GM screen would just be the greatest thing ever!
He answered the Clarota thing already. He was always there, even before the party came to the encampment, but they managed to find him way earlier than Matt had planned.
As to his allegiance to the party, a peek into the nature of Illithids would inform you that they're manipulative by nature and look down upon every other race.
He's already answered both of these - 1) He was always there, but he was meant to be an encounter of sorts, not an ally. 2) yes, as soon as their usefulness ran out, Clarota intended to betray them. He's a mindflayer dude, they're his food
When did he answer these? Was there a behind the scenes or something I missed?
Dean Lewis There were some Q&As during the life of the show, be they at the end of the game, during Periscope sessions hosted by Matt or during conventions they participate. There's a channel called Critical Scope that has a collection of videos recorded by fans with most of those.
As a starter dungeons master its been really hard, but these videos are really helpful, so thank you Matt Mercer for doing this.
Thanks Matt!! I just turned DMing over to a friend of mine so I get some time as a PC. I definitely will show your tips to help him out too!
Keep a list of names at hand. Whenever you see something that makes you think "that's a nice fantasy name" add it to the list.
typos are great ways to come up with names! I misspelled Tornado once and ended up with a nifty character name. Another time i was RPing with a friend and mistyped and POOF! new character!
That look of "yeah... nope.... kill the npcs....uh huh, didn't see that coming" that's my party in a nutshell. I just write down names as it is now, my party are not friendly to others.
The good old tavern to start a quest.
Oh you chose to start a fight with some random guys. Okay I'll just let you brawl for a bit and... you killed a guy...
Okay no problem let me just... You want to leave and barricade the door? Okay you can do that.
And now you chose to cover your tracks by setting the tavern on fire...
Yeah..... This is exactly what led me to put guards around frequently. :P
anytime I have a new player or new a group (and back in high school ONE player every time he started a new character!!) that wants to start a bar fight. my nephew tried this with his first character. I "Skyrim-ed" him. town guards, other patrons, everybody wanted a piece of him! he had it coming though. I specifically asked the group NOT to start any bar fights because it never amuses me as much as it does them! LOL
Bar fights are fun when NPCs do them because you can just summarize the aftermath. "You step into the tavern and see Bomm, the Goliath Storm Master, sitting atop a throne of bodies he has amassed in his bar fight while drinking fine wine from a tiny crystal stem. He sits his feet up on another small stack of unconscious bodies as he yawns and falls asleep after his hard fight." My players always get a kick out of that kind of NPC.
in one group i played it we kept note of each character's "kill count" and named character counted double so that quickly got out of hand with us in the middle of combat asking orcs what their name was and whenever an NPC introduced themselves have to resist the urge to just stab him in the face because it would look good on the kill count.
Speaking of collectors,
we were tasked by one to acquire a set of items (Some gems, dragon parts, a dagger and most importantly - a feather. A standard feather, yes). Every time we got close to each item, a group of hooded men appeared and took it. After some investigation, we learnt that those people were trying to perform a ritual of summoning (DM never told us of what), so we went to their cave to take the components back. And then brought them to that elf-collector. Somehow it never raised any suspicion in us that he need the exact set of items required for that ritual.
After receiving the reward, we decided to buy a castle just outside of a city(a suspiciously large sum, yes). As we were exploring it, DM describes a loud cracking sound coming from the outside, everything around us trembles, mirrors shatter... We run to the balcony. The sky is dark, blue lightnings crackle in the clouds. Where once stood a beautiful palace, we only saw a massive crater covered in smoke, it's charred peaces were floating in the air, seemingly unaffected by the force of gravity. When the party went there to learn what had happened, one of the few survivors described an elf in lavish clothes, walk into the throne room and stub himself with a dagger, covered in glowing runes. As the life left his body, the walls began to crumble. A few minutes later, the ground shook as the palace was consumed in an explosion of dark energy. That was the collector.
My party once nagged me to run a session when I wasn't prepared, and they were resting on the Rock of Braal in the 2E Spelljammer setting.
During the resulting Macguffin hunt, there were several moments when the party were ahead of me in the plot by 10 minutes or more, and I still managed to improv my way to a satisfactory solution to the mystery. And I asked them afterwards, and they didn't realise :D
My favorite tip by far from this video is that very little time is wasted when you make extra preparations of stuff that won't get used in that particular story. You can always reuse them (with some alterations if necessary). Pretty obvious, but I hadn't thought of it, and it's actually a huge deal. Now I can prepare a shit ton without feeling stupid for wasting time :)
Matt always gives great tips.
Idea: G&S should do a few Player Tips episodes and bring on some of the other cast. I have a feeling they would be well received.
Oh man you are so right! I can't count the times I've had to educate people on "player etiquette".
Don't steal someone else's spotlight
Don't hog the spotlight
Don't shut down other players ideas
Don't assume you know what the DM is trying to do
Don't meta game
Keep side talk to a minimum
Don't look beyond the DM screen
Trust your DM (And DM's trust your players)
Even if it's "totally something my character would do." Remember that your friends are there trying to have fun too.
If you're a merder hobo, make sure that's the kind of game everyone else wants to play.
Stay in character
Man... the list goes on... Suddenly flashback from my group in highschool are hitting me. :P
7BitWorld developing characters, voice and personality (it would be besutiful)
As much as I would love to watch that, the player's job requires much less skill, preparation, and know-how. Playing DnD is litterally just enjoying a game. DMing for DnD is actual work.
@@amandadube156 As a DM, it's nice when the players know what their characters abilities are and how they work, and roleplay a consistent personality and philosophy... unfortunately most of the Critical Role cast are NOT the ones to ask for advice about that (especially about knowing how their own abilities work, after YEARS of playing). XD
@@jessicalee333 I think using a reference manual once in a while is the reason there are reference manuals. Matt has to look things up too on occasion.
I sent my party to take over a fort.
Needless to say they posed as chefs and poisoned ALL OF THEM. Great job guys.
I don't think that was needless to say
@@CarboKill ain't that part of the joke?
@@pasdezebra8684 Yes, and I'm playing off him. This is how comedy often works. Tsukkomi and boke.
I actually laughed out-loud a couple times remembering exact times some of these things happened to me over the last 30 years and I cannot say how many time letting the paranoid ramblings of my players work out details for me that I wasn't prepared for has saved an awkward encounter. Bravo!
I threw my DM for a loop during the first session of our campaign by immediately splitting from the party, investigating a portion of the layout in the opposite direction from everyone else, and meeting an NPC we weren't supposed to encounter until much later in the campaign. It was my first experience with D&D, so I didn't know if I was being a bad player by going off book. But my DM loved the unexpected interactions, and he did an amazing job of adapting to my character's misadventures. So as a player, a flexible and creative DM is such a pleasure to work with, and those skills are so impressive and appreciated!
just got volunteered to be a gm for my first gm d&s game
this video helped a lot by showing I'm mostly doing things right and a few helpful hints
thanks so much
Remember Improv classes!!! :D Good luck!
Note taking is indeed a must! I found out that making some sort of "session minutes" after the session is SOOOO good. I take notes while DMing, then use those notes in the end plus the just fresh memories to write down sort of a well organized diary with references to things like: where the party was, what info did they get, what did they do, who did they see and talked with, etc.
Also know your world. I've written up my own and are currently running a 90% improvised campaign with some friends and just knowing what is in the world and what is in most cities just makes it that much easier.
This is super helpful. My only problem is the note taking part. I always try, but I get distracted by actually taking the notes, and sometimes lose track of what my players are doing, even if I'm trying to scribble things down quickly and simply. Just something I still have to work on!
Thanks for all the tips, Matt!
Are used to think you were just a UA-camr but recently found out that you were a voice actor in some of my favorite TV shows as a kid and now every time I watch your videos I feel like I'm meeting a celebrity
Tips:
1) Develop side plots for your characters
2) Develop extra NPCs for added depth
3) Keep cpmbat templates on stad by
4) Create unique traps and dangerous encounters
5) Generate fun items to reward your party
6) Create a complety immersive environment
7) Take notes
Thank you Mr. Mercer for putting together these videos. I want to start DMing myself and I've been intimidated by just what to do. So thank you for helping out us rookies find our footing.
I want to thank matt because just the other day i did my first campaign as a GM and these videos were a big help
This series is seriously the best. I wanna run a game again now! See what you've wrought, Mercer!
Matt. I hope they have you a raise. Cuz I saw the trend on the vids for the GM advice.
I like the editing. Very fitting camera work. Kudos, whoever is in charge of that. :D
Man, Steve is a good guy, he always shows up when needed.
Great tips! one of the things i like to do is if I want to give the players loot but don't actually have items. is get them a crafting material of a mysterious object that they have to have some one appraise or identify to know what it is. Then you can hold off on saying anything while the artificer "investigates it" and then between sessions, you can actually come up with what it does.
If only he knew back then how awesome he would be now
Sometimes, when I'm feeling sad. I just go through each GM tips video and listen to you say, "hello" 20 times in different ways.
Literally my best adventure quest I did as a GM (or DM) was full of a bunch of improv that I came up with on the spot with little summaries of ideas I had before I started. I'm tell you guys once you find your own style as a GM things are going to be a lot more fun.
Matthew, you are my biggest inspiration for mastering, and I really love the way you use your voice acting abilitties to bring your character to life. Could you make a video on how to make different voices for our characters??
This is super deep and helpful info, but also overwhelming since I've not done anything beyond a practice session with my wife. Matthew Colliver's "Running the Game" seems better for beginners, whereas Matt Mercer's GM Tips seems like next level advice once you've got a couple of campaigns under your belt. Either way, I'm looking forward to that stage.
Appreciate all of these video tips for budding or even long-time GMs. Even the most literary of persons could use some kind of guide for holding a not-only enthralling but safely, organized D&D session! Thank you very much Matthew for the upload!
GM commentaries from past live campaigns that illustrate these DM tips would be awesome!
The life of a GM: 50% crafting amazing stories and lore, 50% pulling things out of your ass!
In one campaign I wrote, there was a captain of the local gaurd, who denied my characters entrance into his city as they were very secretive. So one of my characters, an elvish rouge who chose to play as chaotic neutral, convinced my entire party to just break in. Long story short, they failed on their first attempt at stealth and ended up brutally murdering the ENTIRE town militia, both civilian and soldier, and had an improvised boss fight with the leader who had denied them entry. The whole thing turned into a mess when they looted the town. Eventually they took over and decided to rule.
Full blown coup hobos
yeah... Steve is a pretty common name in my campaigns as well
Mine is Corol. :P
Though I've got a list of Silly names for when they seek someone with a specific occupation:
Rhett Cross
Clair Ick
Hugs Freely
Robin Banks
Ian Cognito
Dina Mite
Daisy May'rollon Day'haton (elf)
Poly Hedron
Avery Longtime
Flick Desnuts
Jenny Talia
Shay Ma'nam
Un'stopa Paul
Justin Thyme
And of copurse... Master Ba'Tor
Jester Eric LOL
Copied, Pasted and Saved
Glad I could be of service. ;)
So great! I'm totally using these names!
Take them, and do Pelor's work. ;)
The other players tend to get more of a giggle if you don't give away a part of the name too soon. :)
My favorite improvisation tactic is letting the players invent it. If it is outside the main plot (and frequently even inside it), players can create and destroy their stories. There are a few benefits on this:
1) Players will quickly red herring themselves as they extrapolate on their own ideas, which allows you to surprise them later on. Example: Players will likely guess names for a note or letter signed only with initials, which will allow you to introduce a character with that name to hurt them, help them, or cause chaos.
2) Players regularly come up with crazier stuff than the GM will ever think of. See also: Don't give the GM ideas to iterate on and bring back later
3) Players are more involved in a world they create. Reduces railroading if they have meaningful options in world creation.
plasticmanticor I love this idea. What does that actually look like, when and how do they contribute?
I feel like #3 Is the main reason stories get derailed so much in games like DnD. Players want to feel like they had some sort of impact or influence over the story or world, so they will do things to NPCs that are often unexpected.
A second reason would be that they simply get attached to random NPCs, or get interested in unrelated events or locations, then pursue those interests beyond what the DM planned for.
I’m seriously considering using this plan for when I panic: the cult of Steve.
Steve is almost everywhere. He’s a chill guy, seekingly immortal. Likes bugs and basketball for some reason he keeps popping up and seems to be in on all the gossip the town has. Steve has a trustworthy face. You’re pretty sure Steve is a god of something, probably pot. It would explain alot
I've been told that I'm generally pretty good at improv, helpful since I generally only set out very basic guidelines for my campaigns and then make the rest up as I go, unless it's something really story important, even then I leave it open enough that there's room for change when necessary
I don't usually make pre-written stories, because I find that improv is the *main* reason why my games are so lively and fun.
My preferred way of taking notes is using a calendar. Pharmacies give them out for free here near the beginning of a new year, so I try to get a couple for use later on, and it lets me keep track of what happened in broad lines on which day of the year for my players. I asked them which day of the year they wanted to start their adventure, and have been keeping track of how long their travel and rests are day by day, writing the important events into the boxes. Good way of keeping track of things like teleportation circles which have to be cast for a year before becoming permanent; the calendar has the relevant date so I can write it down in the next calendar early and know when they get there.
Of course, buying a large calendar with bigger squares would mean more room for notes, but I'm fairly good about remembering details. Most of the time. I did forget the name of a fairly important diplomat, once... but that wouldn't have been a problem if my players bothered to take any notes at all in the first place. Nothing! Not a single note out of them for months! At all! I watch Vox Machina sift through their papers and find the name of an NPC they met once three years ago, but my players can't be arsed to write down the name of an important foreign diplomat on a peace mission to the empire they live in!
Our DM went a step farther. He custom made a calendar for our world: 13 50-day months, and included the phases of 3 moons, solstices, and equinox.
All in all I wouldn't recommend it, unless you're just the type of person who's excited by calendars. As you can imagine, it took a lot of extra work on his part, even with the fine resources for making fantasy calendars which are on line. It certainly adds a level of immersion to our game, but does it come up often? No, not at all. In fact I think he's the only one who really has a good grasp on the days of the week, the months, or anything else....
Also, maybe just bring up note-taking with your players? It may not have ever occurred to them to take notes.
EdwardHowton This is really helpfulness! Thank you!
Your voice and mannerisms are incredible! love just hearing you explain these things!
Also, a really helpful tip I've read somewhere: Don't be afraid to use stuff you've prepared for something else entirely. If you have a rough flowchart of rooms for some place, but the PCs go to someplace else, maybe you can reuse the original plan for that new location. With a few quick adjustments, the players will never notice. I had to literally do exactly that for the first game I've ever run.
Similarly, if you had some creature statted out beforehand, you can basically reskin it, maybe slightly change its abilities and you're good.
This. This one episode has it all. Gorgeous.
A list of names is my best advice for improv, coming up with good names on the fly can be really hard.
Prepared chaos. *is* a really good description of DMing. I generally
prepare in a modular fashion and just set up a basic scenario at the
beginning of a session or game. Most of what I end up doing is
improvisation and taking notes on it to maintain continuity.
I write up regions/groups as sort of generic personalities, from which I deviate when making NPCs on the fly. (They, of course, go into the notes)
seriously, take notes. it's good advice and has saved my scaly hide a bunch of times
As someone who will be running a Vampire: Requiem game at some point in the next few months, I am so excited for these tips! Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge with us!
Matt's my hero. Wicked jealous of the voices. Super inspired by the work!
In addition to notes, I always found keeping a post-session journal to be very useful. It can be fun for the players too, when it dawns on them that something small from several sessions earlier has just come back to bite them on the bum.
Roll playing is so much fun if you and your friends can really get into it, it’s incredible
If you mess up, you say something blatantly untrue, and it's from an unimportant character, have them say something like "So then, you've figured me out? WELL I'LL HAVE THE LAST LAUGH." Then 'As you watch, the farmer's face becomes hideously disfigured, and the illusion is broken, before you stands a man clad in dark robes, with a necromancer's sigil on the hood, his laughter is thunderous, nearly maddening as he raises his hands, and says "RISE MY FRIENDS, SHOW THESE DELIGHTFULLY FOOLISH ADVENTURES HOW WE TREAT THEIR MEDDLING KIND!", as his hands reach into the air at the apex of his motions, a dark light emanates from them.' Then have undead begin rising out of the ground, powerful undead, ones that that (for a presumably low level party) they know they're booking their asses out. Have them make an escape, fleeing the evil undead necromancer.
After 24 hours, if they head back, the sky is no longer dark and gloomy, the farmer is tilling the fields as before, and no sign of the undead. Then have him repeat exactly what he said the last time.
As long as they're not me, they won't stop to question the plot or your slip-up.
Thanks for these videos Matt. To learn from watching you is one thing, but these little tid bits behind the scenes are fantastic and so helpful. Thank you
I totally second, and third the tip on taking notes. Parties can come back to a random village sometimes months later expecting to speak to the same person about before about the thing.... yeah... been there.
I find it helpful to stop and really think bout the setting. If it's say, a small farming village, what are the crops, what else do people do there, when is church what are you wearing to the town dance and sociable? These answers make flying by the seat of my pants a lot easier.
I am a keeper in call of Cthulhu and this series works for that game as well thanks
We've done a few sessions now. I haven't been taking very good notes. My planning sesh last night was much more difficult than it needed to be. I'm gonna start taking notes.
Really enjoying this series of vids, Matt, thanks!
thank you for the advice! this will definitely help me as I'm just now starting to GM!
Honestly, the biggest help I ever had in learning to improvise was in running a game called Beyond the Wall - a game designed to be played with literally no preparation.
thanks for the advice Matt, as always you have been a great teacher. I only started playing dnd 3 months ago and for my friends I imeadiatly became the DM. I have taken alot of my game running types after watching all 70 episodes of critical role. thanks for truly inspiring me to play!
The more I watch these GM Tips videos, the more I am convinced that Matt Mercer is every GM's spirit animal.
For my first DM adventure, it was with all new players. So I wrote a king who was looking for a competent party of adventurers to go on an important quest.
The king didn't want to hire just anyone, so he hosted a tournament. Player party vs several NPC parties. Parties were assembled at random, and what a coincidence, all the players are in one group together.
(Hey, it beats "you all meet in a tavern...")
The tournament ventured into a mock dungeon, pitted party against party, and solved puzzles and such.
The winning party (the players of course) were then chosen by the king. Each tournament task was designed to be relatively safe, non-lethal, and to help new players understand what they can do in a tabletop game.
I have to say after watching all these tips and guides I feel more sure on taking on the GM role. That and my friends have been nagging me to do so. And after writing up 31 pages of a module I know they will do their best to break it...as soon as possible! Because it's what we do,. And thanks to taking all these tips and tucking them into my back pocket I am happy to tell them to bring it on! Now onward to my first attempt at GMing...wish me luck! And thanks for all the great content and information.
Taking notes is basic!
Before I start: I'm a Spanish speaking person, so I apologize if my English is a little broken.
I am currently home-brewing an Evil campaign.
Making long story short, I'm using the "Magic the gathering" story and I added a few things here and there.
One of the main things that I added into this roleplay is that most of the cool things can be bought only in a place called "The Planeswalker place" which is pretty much like a little dimension where only the Planeswalker's have access to but this place also has a chain of command and their own laws. At some point of the story, the party gets noticed by the counsel of the Planeswalker place and therefore, the party can't no longer go back there so they encountered themselves having issues to buy items, spells, armor, etc.
So I had to come up with a way to make sure that they could keep buying stuff so I decided to develop some kind of "black market" and thanks to that they've met several different NPC's that could sell them useful stuff and they were okay with it.
During the next few sessions, the party was wandering around an abandoned town and out of the blue I remembered a meme about Khajits from the Elder scrolls games in where the Khajit says something like "Khajit has wares, if you have coin" so just for the lolz when the party separated to cover more ground one of the players heard a voice saying "hey...come closer" while going up a ladder, when this player turned around the only thing she saw was an stray cat staring at her, when she kept climbing she heard "Hey...where are you going??" and then she turned around again and she saw the cat starting at her again, she smiled at me and she said "Are you serious?".
The stray talking cat then said: "Hey, you are Sunshine right? (The character's name) Follow me!" and the character decided to follow the cat. After a few jumps here and there they managed to get to the roof of the building and then the cat jumped into an empty carton box and then started to take items out (Health potions, spells, etc) and then said "Khajit has wares...if you have coin".
When they were done with the purchasing the cat placed all his items back and then jumped back into the box and when Sunshine checked the box, the box was empty, the cat and the wares were no longer there. She had this idea of taking the empty box with her and then it just hit me: Why not making a "Clan"?
During the next few sessions, the "Khajits" became important, the party had a "portable" shop and everytime that they had to buy something, they just placed the box in the ground, knock a few times and a different cat would go out to sell them thing, ALWAYS using the slogan "Khajit has wares....if you have coin" whenever the cat would pop-out (The players even made me do the "thing" if for some reason I forgot to use the slogan when they wanted to buy something). The point is that the party loved these NPC's so much that they became obsessed with getting to know what was the lore behind them to the point that I had to come up with how these guys worked, create a lore, sub-types, etc.
Pretty much, the "Khajits" are the the owners of the black market and the "Khajits" do not only dedicate themselves to sell, but there are mercenaries, assassins, artificers, anything that a Planeswalker might need but can't get since they are "banned" from the planeswalker place.
At the beginning, all the "Khajits" were cats, but then the players made it to a point were they decided to ask why a "Khajit" had to necessarily be a cat, the salesman didn't knew the answer and they just dropped the question.
Several sessions later when they tried to buy something, I surprised them when I started to describe a bear cub coming out of the box, they started to ask this NPC several questions about why he wasn't a cat and then the bear cub explained to them that the Khajit that they had previously asked about why they were only cats was a Khajit Manager covering for one of his guys that called in sick that day and this Khajit took those questions to the "King Khajit" and after debating for a few months they decided to start "recruiting" from different species and not limiting themselves to only get cats to do the job. That's when they noticed that the "Khajit" was not a race, but a profession.
Several sessions later, the party received an invitation to become "Khajits" themselves, but their role would be not to sell, but to be mercenaries and get "coin" and items in exchange as long as the missions were completed. Having them accept joining the Khajits allowed me to extend the story quite a lot and also implement several ideas that I had but that I couldn't put into the game since the party was always doing different stuff at a different places, but now since the party receives requests here and there from the Khajits, now I can use these ideas without making it look that I am "railroading" them under the excuse that "The Khajits are requesting that the party takes care of X or Y thing".
My point is that taking notes is essential because if I didn't I would had forgotten that first of all, they took the carton box and that they questioned one of the Khajits that later on facilitated a lot the story plot thanks to these little fellas.
I have never watched a single episode of anything this Mr Mercer has been in despite him being probably the most well known GM in the world. Yet, when I created my own roleplay system, and as an extension ran my very first campaign ever with it; I ended up using every strategy he just spoke of in this video (except the note-taking part because I have a pretty good memory, though I should do it more often). With my minimum experience from other campaigns as a player (which at this point had been two very short-lived experiences with 5E) I had realized three things, that I loved tabletop roleplaying games, I did not like how most campaigns were designed for them, and what kind of GM I did not want to be. I knew I wanted a far more open experience then most campaigns I had seen had allowed. I wanted to allow my players freedom of choice and direction in how they accomplished far off and grand goals. I wanted them to feel free to roleplay and develop their characters. After my first session I realized what I would need to allow all of that, I knew I would need to become good at improv.
Thankfully, before I had started the campaign I had already fleshed out my world. Things like it's big actors/factions, what these factions would ask of the players and how these factions all entangled with each other. Along with this, I had written down basic info for around 100 different events that I could use at a moment's notice. along with NPC companions that could both help the party stay alive and act as plot devices when needed. Just as Mr Mercer has explained in this video, all of this prep was invaluable.
This is not to say that this was all that was needed, being able to pull something out of your ass at a moment's notice and being able to have it seem like something you came up with a week ago is a skill all GM's should try to develop. All the prep work is useless if you can't find a way to tie it into the sometimes very particular moments your players find themselves in. Being able to combine the premises of pre-made events to fit the current narrative or to fill a hole in it, come up with further motivation/connections for factions and NPC's to explain missed details or plot holes you may have missed, along with being able to thoroughly describe a location you had never thought your players would run into within ten seconds of being asked about it are all things that help keep the narrative feeling more real and uncontrived.
Just as Mercer explained, the prep work gives you a foundation to work off of. If you understand your world, it's characters and how they relate to each other, along with having basic plot points and character descriptions available to get your brain rolling, there will be little your characters can throw at you that you can not come up with a way to explain.
I would also argue that consuming alot of media related to the genre of your campaign, viewing lots of different kinds geography, viewing lots of different architecture and studying basic sociology, economics, geopolitics, cosmology, history, and theology can help a lot with not only crafting your own world but making it easier to add to the world on the fly. The more you have in your brain, the more you can pull out of it.
As always, thank you Matt Mercer! You are a massive inspiration to us all.
keep them coming Matt. pure gold
Thank you Matt Mercer for my life
Woo! My favourite series!
I took none of his advice in, I was too enraptured by how ridiculously charismatic and engaging this man is when he talks
Little do we know, the leather bands give him a +10 to charisma
In my first campaign we took the party to a city that we were only supposed to be there for 1 or 2 sessions just for intel but our DM rolled on a table of random npcs and we took the information given and started a rebellion. It turned into a 6 session part of the campaign that was AMAZING!!
Pee jole
I had an improved Steve in my campaign once, he was a caravan guard sent to pick up the PC's at one point. Steve ended up having information about them and it lead to a character getting a cursed cloak as punishment for stealing from the king. The one character's hatred eventually bled into everyone else, and after a little while everyone hated Steve for some unknown reason. Steve went from being a lowly guard for the king, to a sort of high guard, to being the puppet master behind the upcoming war because my PC's despised him so much that they would curse him at every set-back or blame him for any villainous enemies that showed up.
This stories is slowly becoming less about Matt's tips and more about the chronicle of wrongs his various players have done to him, and I love it.
As a beginning DM'er, it really helped to stick to official stories and take inspiration as you go that you apply further.
I own both the Starter and Essential kit so I had two campaigns to play and combine eventually.
after just recently diving head first into dnd, even more so, straight into being dm, I get where he is coming from with this.
Timeless archive of GM wisdom
Probably one of my favoriye moments as a DM was when my players walked into a room and found a Thayan Wizard alone, messing with the stuff in her bedroll. I expected the group to kill her. Our Berserker liked her, wrapped her up in the bedroll, then asked for her name. Thus was Lily the Invoker born, scroll maker extraordinaire, and helped in the war against Thay.
ah yes my favorite segment.. matthew mercer's gmmmmm tips
He is such a great GM and voice actor.
I like rewards you can give out of Xanathar's Guide. There some really good and powerful magic items, but most are comedic that make role-playing really interesting. Also all the simple things that people come up with on D&D Homebrew, Reddit, & Pinterest. Giving out these comedic items actually forces your group to find fun ways to use them!