"Don't get up every 10 minutes to satisfy your drug habit" is so specific I really really wanna be a fly in the wall for some of the sessions that led to this
Also DM: "You don't like my ruling, fight me." Players: "Okay." Plants Bowie knife in table and sets a handgun beside it. Also Players: "You never specified what kind of fight so pick one." DM: "You can leave if you don't like my ruling! REEEE!" Other Player: turns to DM. "It's actually my house so you can leave."
To be honest, if one of players were making fun of a guard's name and then 15 guards would appear out of nowhere and start making fun of our names, I'd love this moment
not to mention, with them all knowing the names, they must have all been hiding in random bushes and trees and houses to eavesdrop. that or the DM pulled their T - posing assets out of the ground
"Hey, Bob, this adventurer is called Deezy" *additional guards appear* "Deezy? Deez nuts! Carl! Come check out Deez... Deez Nuts" *more guards appear* 😂
You should make a followup on this, because it has come to light that the players were just bullying the DM to this breaking point. These rules exist because of abusive players who were proud to be abusive.
Yeah, just reading the title sent alarm bells off to me that these players were shitty players and the one who posted them on Reddit was butt hurt and wanted validation
Yes but then how would scummy D&D content creators farm outrage clicks if they actually approached this subject with nuance and didn't join in bullying this DM who didn't ask for or even really deserve it?
Yeah, I'm not sure how this list being a response to awful players is missed by so many people. I think some folks disingenuously act like they didn't pick up on it so they can make content out of it for their UA-cam channels.
Of note, the post was deleted for a reason - someone actually dug up the poster's comment history and he was literally *bragging* about making the DM's life hell. This list? Yeah, if you take it at face value, it makes the DM out to be a bad person. If you take it with that bit of context and ask yourself why the DM would have to specify a lot of them? That paints a *bad* picture of the entire table. This was a DM at the end of their rope. Given that little tidbit of "OP bragged about giving the DM a hard time", I also expect that some of these rules were added or had the wording changed by the player that posted them, in order to make the DM come off as worse than they were.
Wow! I knew the players were likely nightmares, but this is something else! I wish I had noted down that player's name so I can avoid ever having them in my games.
YIKES! Yeah, you kind of get the idea that the players weren't prizes themselves, even with no context, but that just throws things into perspective. This guy might not be a model DM or one you want to play with, but the one who originally posted them was definitely a That Guy.
Yeah, there's always a moment where even the best DM has something where he needs to put a foot down. I've had those moments a few times. Not this bad, but still it can be an issue.
I mean, I probably would've just stopped talking to this group instead of making these rules lol Edit: But also thanks for this information. I probably wouldn't have wanted to play with anyone that gets drunk/high during a more involved kind of game. It would be fine if you were playing CaH or pictionary, or another kind of party game.
"Oh, but don't you know!? I already took away all of your currency because rule 4! And you don't get an opinion about this because then I'll rage quit"
I would 100% do this. "Ok, well we dont know where to go, Im going to look for work and buy an inn. Guess you just signed up for Inn Simulator. Sucks to suck DM." This person 100 % sounds like a person that does not want to be a DM.
The reason the original post was removed from reddit and now only exists as screenshots is because when people started to ask OP questions, it quickly became clear that players are complete assholes and OP deleted it. So they all deserve each other.
Yeah, once I saw the “If you show up so drunk and high that you can’t play” portion a lot of the DMs rules make more sense. For any normal table these would be ridiculous.
Well in that case I'd say that DM dug his own grave trying to fix it by being a huge dick about it ^^ Go find some other players or something, stop wasting your time with a group of stoned and/or drunk lunatics expecting them to listen and adhere to a 44-point manifesto :P
@@Micras08 apparently the DM DID leave, and the players constantly were bugging him to come back, so he comes back with this manifesto. its like a "I don't want to fucking be here, you guys forced me here, so you either do what I say or I leave, and won't be coming back"
Ya it’s pretty clear that there must have been at least one event that sparked each of these rules. For instance, the “rolling correctly” thing probably had to do with people rolling onto the table and selectively choosing whether they had to reroll because it wasn’t in the tray, or just keep it, depending on if it was good. Similarly he probably had a problem where someone rolled 8d6, saw it was low, and then said they were doing a different spell when it was obvious they were doing fireball, and other times rolled 8d6 then declared they were doing fireball after they saw it was high.
So, after a bit of digging, I was able to find out a few things. TL;DR, everything here was absolutely the players fault because almost every bad player behavior listed here was intentional. This set of rules was a response from the DM to the players trying to get the DM back so they could bully him some more after their hiatus. When this post originally came out, a lot of people noticed that this sounded like a very angry, but very HURT DM. A few people were curious to see if there were any other stories like this from the OP. Turns out, OP had previously posted many times about gameplay behavior and the DM. However, it was the player bragging in other subreddits that they and their group had been bullying the DM intentionally for some time. Begging for or demanding more and more powerful magical items, smoking often, cheating, complaining, arguing, gaslighting, and the works. They continued to go out of their way to give the DM a bad time. This claim is also supported when you look at the number of rules that SPECIFICALLY mention Reddit. People started calling OP out on this, and that is why they not only deleted the post, but they deleted their account. Getting into speculation now. This looks like the DM took a hiatus/break with every intention of trying to just break up the party. However, the party was likely trying to get the DM back into playing with the group, hoping to be able to abuse them some more. So in response the DM decided he'd lay down a law for everything they'd done to wrong him as something of an ultimatum. "If we're going to be playing together, these are my terms. I'm tired of all of this. You will either fix your behavior, or I will stop playing with you and you will hate playing with me." A lot of people also mention the language and how aggressive this DM Seems to be given the profanity shown. I have a few theories on this. Firstly, is that given that this isn't the DM, but the OP who posted this, it's possible that they just punched up the language to be worse than it actually was. This is supported by the OPs previous language and posts on Reddit as well. Secondly, given some of the specific language used, we can assume that this group is either in the UK, or Austrailia. If they're in the UK, particularly on the northern side(Scotland and the like), they have quite liberal use of various swear words, so there might not even be the same amount of spite we here in Northern America might attribute to it. Often times, we in the US/Canadia make the bad assumption that UK = Polite and posh British. But don't forget, the UK includes Britain, Wales, N Ireland, and Scotland. Even further, if this was in Australia, then this would be a polite response to this group, given the lack of the use of the C Word. There's also a small chance he's military as well,(Former military myself,) and really, swear words just become interrogatives and common adjectives at that point, though prior service is much less likely. With that in mind, It's entirely possible then that this DM isn't actually as rude as we give him credit for. With all of this in mind, this was a DM that was tired of the bullshit, and likely wanted nothing to do with this group given their behavior. With everything here, the players were obviously the bad guys here, and OP at the very least knew it. It seems like the DM caught on as well and was basically saying: "Okay then. If you want me back to try and play your fuck-fuck games, I can play back." So OP Used that to try and get some extra Reddit Karma, but instead got some real and proper karma in return.
@@micahdye7215What I took from this comment was that this list wasn’t *actual* rules, just stuff that pissed the poor dude off about their players. I doubt they had any intention on going back, and was more “rationalizing” why they are absolutely not.
I was about to say any DM who feels this insecure probably either 1) can’t fight at all Or 2) the ONLY thing they have is strength and this is a threat that could get them Imprisoned
In regards to the 'aCt OuT yOuR cHaRiSmA cHeCkS', I find a good middle ground that still encourages roleplay is asking the player "How do you intimidate them?" Even if their answer is just "Idk, growl at him I guess" I say "Alright, roll intimidation" and boom, done. It's especially helpful for new players in my experience and avoids the whole 'acting' mentality. Edit: Why the hell does this have over 3000 likes?
@@danielcrafter9349 yeah seems like most people comenting are hearing like the first 2 rules and reacting off that rather than looking at all of the rules and extrapolating context. There is a little assumption work to be done certainly, but when you're hit with ' don't come to my table high' twice it kinda sets the tone. A lot of people ragging on the car ride home thing, it sounds like the person the dm gives a ride to complains at the dm every time something bad happens and then the dm has to endure it for however long the commute is and is very tired of it.
exactly, thats what i do. If you are intimidating, i ask how. or if your doing persuasion i ask how. I dont expect rp, i just need an explanation so i can explain what happens and then ill give bonuses and that type of thing if i think it makes sense like the other day someone tried to convince an enemy not to fight them. because they noticed it looked liek the enemy was in pain and they noticed they were being affected by the alterations caused by the person they were chasing. so they just told me that they say something along the lines of "we dont need to fight, they are harming you just as much as us" so i gave them advantage
As someone in the reddit comments put: "Around 3-4 is when it's time to leave cuz your DM's an asshole. 12-16 is when you realize they don't want to DM for your group anyways. Further down, you realize your group is full of shitty players anyways, and you'd better figure out if you're one of them before trying to find a new group."
Going through the full list of rules; it paints a picture of what this DM was putting up with. This is not some tyrannical DM inflicting this on a new batch of good players. This is an exhausted DM for a group of long term terrible players. He's hit his breaking point. No d&d is better than bad d&d, but when you're limited in your player pool sometimes it either rehabilitate bad players or don't get to play ever. From the post it's revealed the DM is from the northern suburbs of Melbourne, Victoria (Australia). We don't have a huge tabletop scene here (the FLGS scene is very sparse, and for some can be an hour drive just to get to a store that doesn't even offer in house tables to play at). Finding an in person group is rather difficult.
dude who made the post ended up deleting it when he realized that people were not on the players side after reading the whole thing. so i now cant find what the rest of the rules are
Yeah, I feel like XP3 kinda missed the stuff between the lines. From the original post, it was found that the OP had posted about how he enjoyed making his DM's life hell in game. So it's clear that the OP's DM made these rules for the specific players not for the specific party. I feel kinda bad that XP3 is just clowning some DM that everyone else realized got pushed to breaking by bad players.
@@investigativebatman I reiterate. No DMs start like that. Our imaginations run rampant considering what happened to convince them to craft this list of rules for them to DM again for that group.
@@brandonrathbone3690 No, there are DMs who start like this, I had one running a game for me, in fact. I mostly stayed out of morbid curiosity after it became obvious just what kind of game it was.
@@redviego6714 DM rules only mean something if the players care. If you have five players and the DM comes with these rules, the DM can find a new friend group.
I do always ask players to explain their approach when they make a charisma check, as with any other check. Ie “I appeal to his sense of fair play” is good, “I’m not so subtly attempting to bribe him” is good, “I persuade” is bad. That’s because I literally can’t resolve a check if I don’t know anything about their approach, since I need to set the DC and the stakes. But “acting out” the checks is completely optional. Requiring it adds nothing to the game.
I usually do something similar. Instead of setting the DC based on what they say, I let them roll and then ask them what they say. What they say doesn't actually matter, the roll has already decided the results, but I like to keep things light and this allows for some comedy.
I think this is a great way of doing it, and it allows you to also give bonuses if they're really appealing to the person with the check. Something like "I try to persuade them by promising riches far beyond anything they'd ever attain on their own" to a greedy NPC could give Advantage or a +5 or something, while "I try to persuade them by giving them a bouquet of flowers" to someone who's allergic to them could give Disadvantage or a -5 or whatever
My first DM had some things in common with this guy. Session zero he's very specific about the rules of what he allows for stat rolls. He made us go one at a time and watched saying "even if you roll all 1's you have to keep it". I rolled three near perfect stats and he tried to tell me to reroll because they were too good. Whole group agreed it was unfair to have to keep bad rolls, but can't keep good ones. He allows it. Session 1, level 1, we start off in a dungeon. Every monster targets my character, but we make it through the first room. Go to check loot. Rogue finds no traps with a 15 or so roll. I open a chest and a trap door opens and I drop 150ft. No save, and he says "you all don't have rope, can't be resurrected, you just have to roll a new character for next session" I didn't go back, and by the third session no one else did either.
I had a DM like that. It was my first time playing and we were going over characters. I had a pre-made character that I worked a lot on and was hoping to use. At the time the stats were a little intimidating so I used dnd beyond to do the rolls and math for me. I had kinda good stats (my lowest one was an 11 and my highest a 15). He didn't like that (or thought that I cheated) and made me re-roll in front of him. I ended up with even better stats. He was mad again. Then demanded that I change my og stats (at least my 11 to an 8 and another of my choice to a 10). I was already feeling like this was going to be a bad first experience to the game but I let him change the stats. Thankfully, it never went forward cause the DM got mad at another player, sent a big message telling us we were terrible and he deserved better and left.
I do kind of understand the whole thing about "NPCs will remember/ notice insults". It's annoying when a character tries to derail an important conversation, but what you have to do is make it so it only impacts that character. For example, I had some elves interrogating the party at the edge of the elves' territory, and this one player kept saying that he "wasn't with these guys" and joking about burning down the forest because he thought it's be funny to completely ruin what was honestly a pretty important conversation (he tried this with many other roleplay moments). So, the elves believed him on both accounts and tossed him in jail while they kept talking to the other characters. It took them less than a session to negotiate him out of the dungeon, and he stopped trying to do this sort of stuff, or at least decreased the frequency of it.
My son in a one-off session wanted to steal the armor of some guards and completely ignore the question at the beginning. He was thrown in jail and the other players who accepted the quest would only go if his character was released. Don't let players make dumb choices with no consequences lol
Since the video is incomplete and lacks the full picture, here's a quick rundown from all the comments I've read for others who're interested. The post was made by a PLAYER, not the DM himself. When people on Reddit dug into the players previous posts, he was found to be actively bragging about making the DM's life hell. It's possible that the player might have twisted the DM's rules to be even more unfair than they seemed. Building off of that, the DM had to deal with his players constantly being late / not showing up, metagaming and always expecting every session to be a huge scale dungeon / area, complaining about things being too easy and then complaining when things got too difficult, smoking weed or cigs or vaping 24/7, being drug or high all the time, ordering full on meals and making a mess during the sessions, and destroying the DM's personal belongings (accidentally or on purpose, unclear.) The DM decided to leave because he was tired of running for the group, and the group (presumably unable or unwilling to DM themselves) effectively harrassed the DM into coming back. In response, the DM made the "44 Rules of D&D" for his players, either in an attempt to bring some order to the group and actually have fun for once, or in an attempt to make all the players leave so he doesn't have to DM for them anymore. TL:DR: DM is not unhinged - his players are assholes and he made the rules in an attempt to make his players leave after they harrassed him to continue DMing when he left them the first time.
@@investigativebatman if what the players were doing is true, i'd like to meet someone who could put up with their bs without doing something like this
I get the feeling the players convinced the kobolds that dragons gain great power by bathing in lava, so they'll become closer to becoming dragons themselves if they do the same thing.
Once our party got kidnapped by kobolds so my Rogue ( who is basically a crazy person ) slipped out of his binds, casted sleep on the guards after they tried feeding us bugs ( which is a spell component for sleep ), skinned ones face off to wear as a mask to run around the dungeon acting like a tall Kobold so he could get the groups things and bring them back to them while they were all still in the prison cell, that way they wouldn't all get jumped while having no armor or weapons to defend themselves by like 15 armed and armored kobolds. And it worked because my charisma based skills were high enough to either out right fool them due to their low intelligence, or scare the shit out of them enough that they acted like they believed it to avoid being murdered horribly themselves. From that point on it became a gimmick for my character to collect at least one face of every race, didn't last long however as I started having to roll to avoid diseases which I took as my dm friend telling me to knock it off so I did. Goblins and kobolds make for fun player experiences more so than dragons or beholders in my opinion.
Isn’t this the one where Reddit called out OP’s group for being pricks and OP admitted the DM didn’t even want to run the game anymore but they bullied him into it?
I have a fun rule I like to play with, I call it the Avante-Garde Fail. Imagine you have a bard, immune to failing in every way, even a 2 will roll up to above a 15. He's trying to perform for an audience, and he rolls a 1. Instead of saying he chokes, instead of saying he somehow did something sleep easy to him and failed to keep tone, or whatever, I say something else. Ex: Your performance was advanced, complex, nuanced beyond degree. Your audience doesn't get it. The parts they understood they found insulting, they found the plight of the character in the performance unrelatable. The younger audience members where bored during the drama. You feel in your gut if you'd delivered this play in front of a court of nobles, it would have been an easy smash hit. But as it stands the audience can't stand it. Failing spectacularly doesn't always have to be a problem with just charisma either. You could have the Barbarian wreck and jam the mechanisms too a door because he literally ripped it apart. You could have a rogue OVERLEAP his intended destination. Or a ranger who failed a tracking check thinking of way too many creatures and beasts that these tracks could belong to and literally have the right answer be one of several possible animals it could be. I love this because it allows players to often fail with spectacle. It turns a nat-1 from a "Oh, I guess my Barbarian's suddenly too weak." to, "Oh my God, I can't believe we can't pass because I literally ripped off the counterweight."
That sounds like a good rule, and the base rules even mention how a nat 1 isn't your character suddenly becoming useless. It is the worst possible scenario. Like a maxed rogue could be lockpicking and fail, but maybe it wasn't entirely their fault. They could have gotten bumped into and the pins in the lock reset. Similarly, a nat 20 isn't an automatic success. It is the best possible scenario. Like you might not succeed in running up a sheet of smooth marble stone, but you land on your feet instead of your head.
I like this. I also like a failed rolled being "a success, but..." like the bard fails his performance check and kicks a metal helmet and breaks his toe but inadvertently gives one of the best performances ever seen. Works really great for checks I REALLY dont want my PCs to fail for narrative reasons.
That's a really fun idea! I always struggle in more serious campaigns where you can't hit the party with "And then suddenly a murder of crows bursts into the establishment to steal everyone's mugs, because the barkeep threw a rock at one of them the other day. The performance is unfortunatelly ruined."
"if I gave you a ride there, find your own way home" Make sure to carry a compass, fire starting stuff, 3 days rations, a knife, and a space blanket before you play DnD...consider a survival rifle or snare traps...no not for your character...I mean for you. Like your physical self.
In my head, the way this worked out was the players were constantly smoking and drinking, showed up like a half hour late with the excuses of "Oh, I don't know" or "I woke up late," constantly asked for redos whenever something went wrong ("I walk here" "You activate a pressure plate-" "Oh nooo, I actually step here."), basically demanded their skill checks without asking, and made rolls intentionally out of sight of the DM so they could lie about the roll and from the sound of it got caught a lot doing this. After what seems like many sessions of this, the DM got fed up and took an extended break from DMing this group, coming back with this list of intentionally terrible rules to call out players' annoying actions. See also: Players ignoring or forgetting plothooks for quests and deciding they'd rather free roam to the next city, then getting upset when the DM didn't prepare a massive globe trotting game, often deciding to just walk through multiple nights without consequences and complaining when the DM tries to impose them. It sounds like the hooks for these quests are there, and the players just decided to disregard them and do whatever they wanted, then complain they never get quests. Players entering dungeons or caves, completing them in a session or two, then getting upset they're not longer when that makes no functional sense. Players totally uninterested in RP at all, and the DM attempting to force some in. Both parties are partially in the wrong here, forcing RP isn't fun, but having players who only interact through the world by stabbing it isn't very fun either, especially if you put time and effort into NPCs are are excited to use them. This list makes a lot more sense when you consider most of the players were drunk and/or high for a lot of the games, and proceeded to leave the table to refill their drug dependency, probably often without asking, just getting up and leaving. It wouldn't surprise me if OP was either when posting this, as well. No, the DM does not want to manage these players, they seem terrible, and when OP realized they were the problem and got called out on all the social media, they deleted the post.
DUDE I SAW THESE JUST THE OTHER DAY HAHA What I love the most about the 44 rules is the fucking mood whiplash of seeing a rule that seems pretty reasonable and then getting hit with “call my shit unfair and you’re walking back home”
You know how sometimes you see those signs in public places that seem like completely insane rules like "No petting the carrots" but then you realize that the sign was put up because someone was definitely petting carrots? If I were to give the DM the highest benefit of the doubt, I would suspect that the players were using reddit meta builds, frequently asking for more loot and mega dungeons, never roleplayed, frequently skipped sessions without notice, would regularly get high mid-session, relied on the DM for transport, rolled their dice in secret, changed their mind after seeing rolls, frequently ridiculed NPCs, disregarded the direction the DM gave while complaining about missing it, and generally pushed the DM to the point of posting 44 ways he was getting out of running the game anymore.
I've DM'd for some pretty problematic groups, and while I think a lot of what this person is saying is definitely crazy, I can also see where some of these rules might be coming from. It's very easy to get frustrated when you've spent hours if not days working on a session and your players don't respect the fact you're there to have fun too. I think this person's main issue is not having enough self respect to just leave their (at best incompatible, at worst terribly toxic) group.
@@HD_HerpDerp from what ive read from other comments, the dm actually didnt want to dm for them, but they kept bugging him to dm, so he made those rules
That is actually the case. Remember, OP is a player who posted those rules, not the DM who made the rules. When people started to ask questions about the player, thsts when he deleted this post. And it turns out, the entirety group of players were all being shitty and bugging him to keep DMing after he tried to leave.
It's refreshing seeing someone play devil's advocate rather than immediately joining the mob. And I think you're right. This definitely didn't just come out of nowhere.
Yeah. Like, the DM is being a bit of an antagonistic jerk, but some of these rules are *so* specific I'm reasonably sure at least half his players are also nightmares, and the DM's just been pushed to his limits.
Rule 5: Sometimes I just tell my players "You roleplayed that so well between yall, fully in-character. This kobold pissed his pants 2 minutes ago. Put your dice away, you don't need to roll intimidation."
@@jackb.207 that's pretty much the thing about any lighter-rules/less-focus-on-combat/non-skill-based-parley/etc homebrew rulings. Many people, particularly dnd influencers, peddle them left and right without even once mentioning (perchance, having no understanding) that this is DM fiat and requires a huge amount of pre-established trust and mutual chemistry from the players, which many groups might not realize they didn't actually have before it leads to conflict at the table. This is what the ever so often said "Too many actual plays, not enought actual playing" alludes to. Say what you want about dnd, but its cumbersome and silly rules are there for a reason.
Believe me, that can work, but be careful, because it can also suck, especially for games where Faces are a distinct role. You either make it so players without charisma can make faces useless because they roleplayed well enough they do not have to roll. -or- You force players with low charisma to "roleplay their stats" forcing them to behave in a way that is not what they had in mind. For example: you want to be a mild-mannered person that makes good point, but in a very unimpressive way? You can't, because that might be considered likeable, and you have low charisma.
@@ereviscale3966 to be fair, there is some blame to lay onto 5e (well, 2e moreso, but 5e further continued the trend) itself. The existence of Persuasion/Deception/Intimidation and other decidedly non-combat (or even anti-combat) skills - particularly in the context that a player sometimes has to choose between a combat-useful proficiency and an anti-combat skill proficiency during character progression - _suggests_ these as equal alternatives to combat, or at least meaningfully supplementary to it, but the reality is that they amount to little else than a single die roll. That's where most of the frustrations with this side of gameplay originate for 5e DMs/players, probably.
I kind of get the no rolling before announcing stuff. You could theoretically roll, score really poorly, and go "Yeah darn I guess my cantrip missed. Fortunately I have my spell slot for next turn!"
Rule 2 just meant that players who want tougher fights should be prepared for characters to die in the fight. Have a backup sheet and be patient till your backup character can get introduced. I’m actually on board for that, don’t ask a dm for a deadly encounter and get upset because it’s a deadly encounter.
Oh.... honestly, I understood it as "bring another character and double up so your party can actually, possibly, handle a harder fight".... but, I could also see it as "have back ups and replacements ready and waiting".
@@VanNessy97 I remember a masks of Nyarlathotep campaign we started with 7 Spares per player and 3 of them actually ran out of spares and had to make new spares.
this might be the funniest comment from the reddit post "Man I bet OP didn't expect the response to this being "oh shit, what did yall do to this poor DM to make him break like this?"" and the post is now deleted
Ah yes, poor dm, instead of just leaving and telling them to fuck off when asked to come back, he did this, he’s just as bad as his players, they’re perfect for each other
@@OtisCluck except he did leave and they harrased him to join them again and this way his "impossible task" for them to comply with if he was to join them again. OP (is a player) and has actively bragged about harrassing and making the DM's life hell as well as breaking the DM's property on purpose.
god the "my character has 20 charisma, i do not" thing is so real 😭 i enjoy playing charisma-based classes and like writing characters with a lot of social skills but i'm so bad at coming up with things On The Spot like i don't understand being so strict about that as a table rule. either you're giving me 5 minutes to come up with a good line or you're letting me give you the general vibe of what i want to say for this check, some of us aren't incredible at improv, a little patience doesn't kill anybody :'))
Fair enough. That rule I'm almost certain was an overreaction from the DM to players just saying "I persuade the guard" then rolling for it. Personally, as a DM I find that almost impossible to role-playing from, as there's no direction. All you can really do is say "you pass and he lets you through, which is boring. Obviously, I don't ask people to RP the entire conversation if they don't want to, but a starting point like "I appeal to his good nature to let us in." at least gives me a starting point to RP off of.
@@Not_Here_To_Make_Friends Not even that, some people really DO just be like that...and that's fine. Some people have more interest in the mechanical side of the game than the roleplay side. I know, it's shocking that people like different things from the game than the 'norm'. Also if the player has a lot of social anxiety just letting them say "I persuade the X' and rolling for it can really help them as well until they're more comfortable in the groups social circle.
My rule is "what does that look like?" For persuasion, adds some comedy when theyve rolled a nat 1 for performance "what does that look like?" Because everyone knows what a nat 1 performance looks like and takes pressure off "do a good performance".
I’m a experienced player but new DM and all of the players in my campaign are completely new so I always try to get them to act things out but sometimes they just don’t have a good line so as the DM I will do the improv for them just so they can slowly but surely get acclimated to things. The bard in my group was not much of a talker at all at first and I was doing a lot of their persuasion lines and such but slowly they are starting to talk in character a lot more and be awkward and funny and it really helps to bring out their version of the character. It’s extremely fun to get everyone into their characters but it takes time and it’s definitely not always a 100% of the time brain mode is turned on thing. I’m pretty good with coming up with things off the cuff maybe because I grew up with rap and just writing a lot and free styling for fun with friends but not everyone is built like that and is able to come up with solid persuasion or deception or performance lines.
What if rule 45 was just like "Also let me know if you disagree with any of these rules and we can work together to change them to something you'll have fun with, after all D&D's about having a good time with some friends". You'd get mood whiplash so hard your head would fly off xD
I just started a campaign with three players: two rogues and a shadow sorceress. I had no plans prior to their decision to specifically run a stealth - heavy game, but as soon as they suggested it I realized it made way more sense for their patron to hire stealth operatives than a more balanced, traditional party. Never would have happened if they hadn't told them not to worry about party balance and to play whatever class they individually wanted. I've put a lot of brainpower into coming up with the world the characters are exploring, and I'm very grateful to have players who are interested in its history, geography, and characters. As a result, I do everything I can to maximize their fun and the drama of the story. We spent the entire first session shopping at and robbing "Hogarth's Heirlooms" and "The Hag Nose". And eventually, I'll give them the option to direct their own investigations. I have many roads which lead to Rome.
Imagining this dude just being like "You know what???? F this" and getting up and leaving all his shit at the table, driving home with no warning AND leaving his homie behind that he gave a ride to the session? That shit is so funny
It's funny until you live it, tbh. It's not fun, especially if it's every single time you anger them. Otherwise yeah it's pretty absurd and one can just laugh at how dramatic it is eventually.
@@luvhair255 This is why I will stick to being solo and independant if I get into DnD or other nerd gatherings; Always have the option of relying on someone as a Plan B, not a Plan A, you know?
I 100% did this once about ten years ago. Those players were fucking terrible. Their only solution was to try and murder things, and when they met something stronger than them I was a "bad dm." I got up and left. Didn't collect any of my shit.
My DM had an instant death trap that we were told about by two separate gods before we even entered the dungeon that held it. When we found it, it was obviously the thing we were told not to touch. Someone still touched it. That's a fair instakill trap.
"Yo, you're gonna find a sphere of annihilation. It looks like a black floating ball that's spinning stupid fast. It's called that because it annihilates people. Don't touch it unless you want to be annihilated." ... "You find a black floating ball. It is spinning stupid fast." "I touch it."
@@Poldovico Forgive me, but that makes me think of a Tabaxi that sees something and just cannot help himself. "I swipe at it." Ironically enough I used to roll WIS saves to see if my Tabaxi would engage in Cat Logic or not, never caused harm but it was amusing to go with it.
7:32 As a GM, it hurts to see people do this to their players. you bring up a fantastic point: You are often playing a character that isn't you, and it's not possible to be more charismatic than a high level bard. You are playing a hero who can do things you can't. If you want players to do things, reward them for doing it. Don't punish them for not meeting your expectations. There is already a system in place for this, and it's called inspiration! If a player comes up with a really good argument to persuade an NPC while in-character, give them inspiration! it's that easy folks.
I love the idea of rewarding for what you want rather than punishing for what you don't. That's also why I "grade on a curve" as it were. Some of my players are great at RP, others not so much. I have much lower expectations for the ones who struggle, and I reward them based on effort rather than skill. If someone who never RPs can stutter or stumble through an in-character dialogue, that deserves great celebration!
Quoth The Adventure Zone, "I have a skill on my sheet called History. Presumably this means I can roll History to see if my character knows something about the world that, I, the player, do not. If I can't use the History skill to answer a trivia question with the category of History, then why the fuck is it even on my sheet?"
Well, judging by the other rules and how much rage was in the DM, and especially those "No drunk and high" rules - his group was awful. I think acting out rule was about giving some idea of what they were doing, what they were trying to say when persuading, or intimidating, or insight checking. I bet his players were like: I persuade him, here's your roll. What do you mean how do I persuade him? I just do! No, I don't want to bribe him, I don't want to say something inspiring to him, I'm not begging or giving him reasons to believe me, I'm not doing anything to the guard, I just persuade him! What do you mean "how" I made a roll, take it!
Personally I think expecting mfs to act out their persuasion checks is unhinged, but I also find it really annoying when people just say "I roll to persuade him". Like, at least explain what your argument is, otherwise I have no idea what the DC for the persuasion roll should be. If you can't provide a rational reason why the npc has any reason to listen to you, I'm going to make the DC higher.
@OtisCluck In some circumstances, if somebody doesn't step up and DM, a game doesn't happen for anybody. Some people take it on just to make sure there's a game for everyone. That's how I started, and my campaign has been going on for nearly five years now. To be fair, I haven't minded DMing, although I didn't really want to do it at the start. Now with so long DMing, I am starting to get burnt out, and if nobody else offers to run anything I'm going to change system to mitigate the burnout, and anyone who wants to stick around and play a different system can.
they meltin magic items down to use the definitely not warpstone in them to make a massive laser. note: when i say not warpstone i mean certain magic items being infused with some warpstone like rock giving it magic
@@AdamJones-tu9lx Better than goblins, who will also melt your magic items down to bars, but only for their metal value. (Also the charcoal for their forge is made from stolen staffs and wands, or as they call them: walking sticks.)
these schematics.. a massive excavation laser to expand their burrows deeper perhaps. oh my god, do you see it, the ratbrains built it upside down, if they start this thing up the whole city above us evaporates.
@@MrGuana141 most of them are not good rules and he shouldn't play with that group, but i struggle to see why you'd read this and fantasize about being one of the players in that group, joining in with tormenting him
Yeah, this video hurt to listen to the longer it went on, but not because XP3 is a bad person, the situation simply flew over his head. It happens to all of us sometimes.
@@kurtisdeakinagreed. Even just the first few rules show this is a DM who wants to DM and everyone have a good time playing the game the DM has come up with. I suspect this DM has tried to make changes before, to encourage the players to…you know play the actual game, and they have been waved away by the players
Honestly more than half of them could be totally reasonable if everyone at the table wanted to play that way. But it's very, very clear from the tone that isn't the case.
Yeah like the group doesn't sound great either but just DO NOT play with them then, there's no need to try to make it work when it's obviously doomed. Although given how silly some of these rules are I doubt they'd be able to get a better group if they tried lol
to quote another comment: "The reason the original post was removed from reddit and now only exists as screenshots is because when people started to ask OP questions, it quickly became clear that players are complete assholes and OP deleted it." it's very clear the players were incredibly shitty so the GM quit running for them, they then harrassed him continuously to run a game for him so he came up with these rules basically so either they'd stop being assholes, or he wouldn't have to run.
It's pretty obvious if you take context into consideration that the DM isn't the only problem here. I'm really disappointed that everyone just jumped to OP's side on this, when he's clearly being dishonest and disingenuous about the whole thing. Think about it - what do we know about the players, just from context clues in the post? 1. They're consistently showing up super late to session, and then leaving constantly to smoke weed/cigarettes. 2. They're getting so drunk and high mid-session that the session has to end early. 3. They're ordering food - not snacks, but full MEALS - in the middle of the session and eating whenever they want to, getting food mess all over his stuff. 4. They're simultaneously complaining that the DM isn't giving them hard enough boss fights, and that the fights 'aren't fair' when things don't go their way at the same time?? 5. They're rolling dice before committing to actions, and rolling their dice OFF THE TABLE so no one can see the result and they can lie about it, something I haven't seen anyone do since my freshman year of high school. 6. They're whining that he doesn't do random encounters, the one thing any experienced DM will tell you is usually a terrible idea in the first place. 7. They're ignoring rule 0 and rules-lawyering the DM based on reddit posts. 8. They're actively using guidance and divination spells to meta-game. 9. They're actively talking trash about the DM behind his back to each-other, instead of bringing up issues to him directly. And that's all ignoring the context of the rules - these weren't what he was ALREADY doing, these are his demands if they want him to come back to DMing for them. Clearly he's fed up and doesn't want to continue because he has the players from hell, and I honestly can't blame him. I would never DM for a group like this, full-stop. No, punishing someone in-game for out-of-game behavior isn't a good idea, and a lot of these rules were written to be purposefully unreasonable from the get-go, so I can definitely see criticism there if he's actually serious about continuing the campaign. I highly doubt he is, though, from how angry his tone is throughout the entire post. This was a forever DM finally snapping after taking way too much abuse from disrespectful players, not a nightmare DM throwing a temper tantrum over his party not respecting his terrible rulings.
Thank you for being the only one I've seen recognize this. I honestly feel bad for the guy because he's so obviously dealing with terrible PCs. Obviously we can't vouch for his character, and the fact he got to the point of writing all this up says enough, but it's very possible he was trying to be a good DM and just got pushed over the edge by the wrong people. I sincerely hope that they all find another way to enjoy D&D (with other groups) and are able to get past the tragedy that was this campaign.
That's almost exactly what I was thinking. I'm imagining players wandering around, intimidating and making fun of everything, complaining about not knowing what's going on despite playing Pokemon go the entire time, if they showed up at all, and making his life hell. Finally quits, and the players come asking him to play again, so he makes absurd demands. Dude doesn't want to play with these people. Also, I follow most of these rules in all of my games without thinking about it. Be a conscientious player, let the DM be a DM, and pay attention to the plot covers most of these rules.
@@evil_planner Oh I totally agree. Obviously we can't know what the DM or the players are actually like, but clearly they don't belong in the same campaign with each other, that's for sure. I just hope if he's a good, passionate DM that he doesn't take this experience of getting treated this way and then publicly shamed on reddit and beyond as a sign that he should quit.
EXACTLY. The guy who made the post was brash in wording, sure. He's frustrated and wrote out his 44 rules in a most likely post-session anger. BUT, no one is asking (except you) why is he writing these rules? So many of them fall into the joke about warning signs that are "so specific there must be a story". You don't *specifically ban* ordering meals unless this is a repeat issue. The DM is angry his players disrespect him constantly. Many of these "rules" are basic common decency and having to write them out in a bullet list tells more about the players than the DM. You shouldnt have to make a rule to stop getting shit-faced in the middle of a game session.
Just like we do know the DM we also don't know the players and IMO of he had a problems with them he should've first off never posted it online and secondly stated that these rules were because of so. Otherwise I'mma see him as just a bitchy bad DM
Honestly, half of these rules could probably be replaced with one: If you aren't at the table AND paying attention, I will skip your turn and you won't get experience and loot. If you're late or don't show, we will go on without you. If the players actually want to play, they will get the message. If they don't, at least you'll be free to look for a new group or find something else to do, because they will probably not want to play at all.
Yeah, I feel like a lot of this DM's problem is that the players are not paying attention, and then whining when they aren't being handed treasure when they just happen to participate.
My party likes the 1 minute turn rule. My version is- declare your intention within 1 minute. You just need to tell us what you are doing by the end of that minute. It’s fine for us to read the spell and resolve the action after that minute. It is a combat game. You don’t get to pause time like Metroman and contemplate the origins of the universe or every conceivable way to win the fight during your turn. A round is 6 seconds in the game world so your character needs to think quickly, and in the midst of combat, it makes sense that not every decision will be perfect. Some of the most entertaining moments from my fave cave from players making snap decisions. Often really good, sometimes really bad. Always memorable.
Yeah, deciding in little time adds realism/ verisimilitude to the game, like the characters can make bad decisions in the heat of the battle, and its fun to deal with the consequences... Its too cold and perfect when the players have infinite time to think and decide his actions, considering every little detail. We dont use the 1 min rule, but if the player starts to drag, we call on him Beside that, every player has the others turns to think, so its not like 1 min, its everyone else's and all the enemies turns to think...
My elf bard got absolutely skewered because the barbarian decided to yeet his sword at a slime monster that my character (who was positioned between him and the slime) was currently kicking at the time. Which resulted in everyone at the table panicking, trying to figure out how to stop the bleeding as I was making death saving throws. Thankfully, the DM was being easy on us because we were all new to dnd, and I succeeded my saving throws. It definitely made our experience more interesting, and my bard used it as material whenever she wanted to tease the barbarian.
Another thing about what you're saying is: your party likes it. It doesn't seem to be a hard unbreakable rule and you seem to want to work together with your players. DnD is supposed to be fun and you do your best to keep it that way for everyone including yourself
Honestly, best way to run turn timer stuff is not that your turn gets skipped, but you character just runs at and attacks the closest guy as many times as he can then end turn and takes the dodge action if nothing is in range when the time is up instead of just skipping
I disagree about having a time limit being bad. I have some players who take wayyyy too long on their turns because they want to main character everything. I love that they enjoy my game and story so much that they feel like they can be this super bad a** character, but it's not being considerate to everyone else that's playing the game. We don't want to wait 6 minutes for you to decide whether you want to cast acid splash, flaming hands, or chromatic orb on a goblin, who is only there to make you feel bad a**, while you're in a dungeon puzzle about to fight a boss. I won't put super strict time limits on what my players can do in a round, but I do ask that they have their turn prepared before it gets to them. It is incredibly frustrating to watch you hog all of the playtime while everyone else gets bored, and we can't progress the story.
For clarification, if they're in a situation in which they need to think about what they're going to do, I absolutely let them. But other than that, I justify it because each round is 6 seconds in game. You're not on the pill from Limitless, you can't plan the entire bossfight out in less than 6 seconds. Especially not if you're a common peasant who can't even read. Play your character, not what a movie character is. React to a fight like they would.
Brings back memories of late game Civilization IV with friends. When everyone has a huge empire and massive amounts of units and everyone's turn can take upwards of 20 minutes because there is so much stuff to manage.
the rules were late to session so their hit points were halved. Thats why we have only 22 (or not, i could count them incorrect) rules, the exact half of the original ones.
I actually kind of agree with the rule about explaining what you're doing before you just roll dice. I ran a game when I was in college and had a player that would constantly just roll and give me a number. That's it, that's all he would do. In order to find out what he was doing, I would have to ask. Every. Single. Time. And it would always be something basic, like "I'm rolling to attack," or "oh, I'm casting this spell," something that would take maybe five seconds to explain. After a few sessions, he started sounding annoyed every time I asked. Eventually I pulled him aside after a session and said "Hey man, I need you to please start saying what you're doing before you just roll dice. I can't know what you're trying to do and whether or not you're successful unless you tell me." Those weren't the exact words I used, as this was a long time ago and I don't remember exactly what I said, but it was something along those lines. Just something quick, polite, and to the point. He then proceeds to blow up at me, yelling that that's not how he wants to play and it's my job as the DM to figure out what he's doing without "having to ask like a dmbss every single fking time". And yes, those were the words he used, that much I remember. After he got done, I was no longer in the mood to be polite and simply told him to either start announcing his actions or stop playing. He opted for the latter, and every session afterwards ran much more smoothly. Tldr: Don't just roll dice and expect the DM to know what you're trying to do, that's just annoying.
I've had a player who rolled and then announced what he was doing. Coincidentally, all of his good rolls were the "once per long rest" power attacks and whatever, whereas the bad rolls were basic attacks and whatever. Yeah we shut that shit down real quick.
you are right, later rules include not leaving the table every 5 minutes to smoke weed, not being blackout drunk, replacing his things when you break them, etc...
yup, people looked into the OPs comment history and found that they actively bragged about making their DM miserable, and that the DM took the hiatus specifically because they were sick of it, so the group outright harassed the DM into coming back, which is what lead to these rules being made. it seems fairly likely that these rules were intentionally meant to get the players to leave him alone. its also entirely possible that the OP is exagerating to some, potentially rather large, degree about how bad the rules actually were
The big context with many of these rules is they were written by a DM who's been putting up with the inverse for too long. This is a DM who's snapped after having a group of players with terrible habits and zero respect for the DMs efforts for a long time.
I don't know, man. I get the general sentiment, but with how the rules are written I'm just getting huge "everyone's an asshole" vibes. I struggle to believe this is purely a one-sided situation.
@@NeoZhinzo i dont think it is one-sided either, but regardless of that, speaking like an asshole is one of many common things people do when angry/at their limit, so i wouldn't use that as sole evidence
@@NeoZhinzo He's got 4 separate rules about people showing up late, not showing up at all, getting drunk/ high, and taking breaks "every 10 minutes" to smoke or w/e. I don't think it's purely , but it sounds a lot to me like these rules are the result of the DM possibly being new and having unrealistic expectations that their game will be like Critical Role or D20 wanting to play D&D, and and thee reality that not only do his friends not live up to that expectation but they aren't even taking the game seriously (to the point of not even bothering to show up on time/ at all, let alone sober) and in general disrespecting him.
@@shizucheesein the original post too, he also had rules about "not being on your ohone on [Instagram/snapchat]". It points more towards shitty players
I think the 2nd character sheet one was the result of players complaining about fights being too easy and then immediately complaining about them being too difficult when the DM increased the difficulty a small amount
Bro literally every dm tells you to have a second character sheet shit happens during play and characters will die 😂. I’m gunna be real this DM probably sucks ass though.
@@irontarkus190Yeah, even though some of the rules indicate the players were acting like goblins (the rules about cheating on spells/spell slots, missing sessions with no explanation and the DM’s stuff getting broken), this DM should not be running games because they clearly have zero communication or conflict resolution skills.
"...and there Is the real possibility that you might die, this Is a hard campaign" Players:"hell yeah! Let's go!" *PC actually dies* Player:"man, this game sucks, now I'm sad and I'll keep being sad the whole night" Player2:"yeah, this situation Is so hard, there Is a problem that I don't know how to handle and so I'll keep moaning about It and be pissed" This happens far too often, and the opposite too
"A small amount" he probably went the nuclear option and doubled or tripled the CR. Or did something scummy like putting the party up against a Rakshasa when they have no magic items or high enough level spells.
The little rat people is so funny, because i actually run a Nemesis that's a goblin with obscenely high stealth, but no dmg, which tries to steal from the party every once in a while. He's called Raglin, the Goblin and sells loot he steals to donate money and food to orphanages
That could even be an interesting plot point. The PCs notice that their stuff keeps disappearing. So they try to figure out what happened. And then they learn of the rat people. A decision needs to be made if it's worth taking their stuff back.
@@HappyBeezerStudios Yeah. It's not super often, and usually it's stuff they just took, not taking away items they've used for sessions. The resolution hasn't come yet, but I'm pretty sure at least the paladin is suspecting something, as he actually managed the DC and saw the Raglin, before they ran away. They also rebought their stolen goods from the guild, so they know someone is stealing and selling their goods.
“You can’t persuade someone out of trauma” Someone tell that to my GP who thought he could cure mine with the power of facts, logic, and condescending platitudes.
Its a GP mate, theyre basicaally licnese drug deaalers, hospital doctors use "they'd make a great GP" as a polite way to taake the pissout of a lesser Doctor. See a specialist, if you can get one ofc. Good luck.
@@genelearnsenglish4242 I assume General Practitioner or DM mispelled. It sounds like a very much GP thing to do. But, Grandparent is also i very likly cannidite
10:08 I literally write "emergency" characters where their location is "random street corner by the party" or "table next to them at the tavern" in case I accidentally make things unclear. They'll straight up be like "hey, my daughter went missing and was last seen at X location, can you help?" or something else blatantly obvious From there, it's 100% up to them if they want to pursue it or do something completely different lol
For every campaign, I always have at least one NPC specifically designed for the players to like, with an excuse for why they might be hanging around a lot; this gives me a lot of opportunities to get the players back on track when they're distracted or lost because they not only enjoy roleplaying with that NPC but they also actively want to help that character, so having that character somehow prompt them back into the plot usually works. In an upcoming Strixhaven campaign, for example, this NPC is a vampire Witherbloom student named Crux. They are so sad and pathetic that all the players have been captivated. One of them even wants her character to date them in the future. So I can rest assured that I can get my players to do almost anything if I find a way to leverage Crux's existence, like turning them into a bully magnet to encourage the players to fight other students
"And he is gonna move to hit you, he can just about get to you with all his movement" "Oh well I have spirit guardians up, so his movement is halfed as he enters it and I need a save for...21 damage, half on a save. I dont think he has the movement left to get to me, no?" "Oh well he saves so his movement is still the same" "But you still lose half just for entering it, the save is just damage" *DM walks off in a huf*
@@Deathnom Nope, can't do that, he has to take the save damage: "Rule 7: If you move to a square in combat there's no take backs." Man literally checkmated himself with his own rules, lol
Man a GM gets bullied, and one of the bullies drags it online. and then all the DnD influencers of course had to make a video profiting of it. Whelp. sometimes this hobby is fucking wild.
I'm guessing Rule #2- Someone must have said the fights weren't hard enough or they weren't feeling challenged, and the DM reacted by saying if you want harder fights, prepare to die and wait with a new character sheet and don't blame me- you asked for it! (Maybe)
There are a ton of these rules that honestly make sense with the context of shitty players but no one is reading between the lines and shitting in the DM. Don't get me wrong the DM is handling this horribly but these rules aren't happening on a vacuum.
@@charlesreid9337 see everyone just assumes malice on the DMs part giving him no benefit of the doubt. For a lot of DMs it's hard to give fights that are challenging but fair. And if you have players that are constantly commenting on your fights then it makes sense to be like "Fine but don't get mad if you die."
@@DivusMagus And if that rule was the only one like this, then that would be a valid interpretation. But when there are 43 other rules which include the assertion that there will be traps that just instantly kill you regardless, and you'll have your loot taken from you whenever the DM feels like it, and questioning or challenging the DM in any way will be met with getting cursed out, and/or the DM walking out; then this is no longer about needing a way to deal with shitty players. It's about making excuses to not be there. This is a DM literally making a list of reasons to get up and leave in the middle of a session.
@@phiefer3 I am not saying the DM is faultless, he is clearly immature and cant address problems properly but people are acting like this is coming out of thin air. The players are clearly causing a lot of issues too. The loot rule for instance he said "...how much you expect loot." You didn't add that part unless the players are constantly complaining about what they are getting loot wise. Players rolling before DM asks for it Players getting to from table in the middle of a session a lot. Showing up late a lot. All I am saying is a lot of these are somewhat understandable with context. The rules aren't good however but no one wants to even see it slightly from his perspective. This whole group sucks IMO.
"Hey, DM, could you maybe not give us so much exhaustion?" DM: * rolls inititive _in real life_ as a health bar appears over his head with his name under it like it's a boss battle *
Seriously annoying. I’ve been thinking about dipping on my game because my DM is VERY fond of punishment mechanics and making every fight a slog. If you don’t gain a level of exhaustion during a session, it’s because he’s busy constantly damaging you with environmental hazards you can’t avoid (like smoke)
This guy: "Guidance is banned!" Literally my group: "Hey, DM? Can Guidance be a reaction that we can use whenever someone makes a skill check? Otherwise it's a very short duration and I don't want to say a million times I'm casting Guidance for no reason." "Yeah, sure. I don't see why not." "Sweet."
Because you have actively assist somebody knowing they will do it in advance, that's why. It's a spell that can be stacked with lending assistance from another character.
@@asumax8 Except it really isn't that good since it only affects out of combat, and even then we have high DCs for this stuff. Even if we're using some strange thing like Insight to set the DC, passives exist for a reason.
@@hythunza1811 I agree that its not that great of one. Its good, not great. The annoying part is how people are constantly for EVERY little thing they or someone in the party does, they are like "I cast Guidance!" I mean for everything. Its like "Your characrer doesn't even know whats going on! So no you can't cast Guidance to help!" Lol Campaign 3 of CR shows a great example of how annoying casting Guidance can be. Matt even had to say something to them lol
@@asumax8 I personally just subtle nerf it by having NPCs call you out on it if you're using it during conversation or idle contests. You can use it on all the door picking, enemy spotting, and athletic rolls you like, but use it during arm wrestling contests, a card game, or while trying to persuade someone the DC will require more than just a +2 from guidance, and you'll auto-fail the arm wrestling due to cheating. Unless you're casting it on yourself in some circumstances, in which case it's considered natural.
Okay, so storytime! #10 reminded me of this time in our game, the DM pulled up some character art of a cool NPC he'd introduced. Now, I'm bad with names, and so to remember who someone is supposed to be I sometimes give them stupid nicknames. Usually, they just stay in my head, but sometimes my mouth moves faster than my brain can stop it. When I looked at this awesome image of this suave, handsome, silver-haired, dhampir elf guy wearing a fancy blue doublet, I immediately blurted out "Oh, Blue Dracula! Got it." Instead of chiding me, having my character be roasted randomly in vengeance, or leaving,...my DM sighed, rubbed his temples, and accepted that we would forever and always know this NPC as Blue Dracula and moved on. I suffered immense psychological trauma afterwards in game, but that was planned and part of the fun.
Yeah, I could imagine a timed fight being cool if its like a boss having some self destruc thing for the base, and they have like a set amount of turns to fucking run and figure out how to stop the boss from stopping you
Unless it's someone new at the game or someone playing a class they are unfamiliar with, timing turns is the way to go. Yeah, taking fifteen minutes to concoct a _master plan_ is fun... only for that guy while the rest of the party just idles away in boredom. I agree that a minute is too tight, in my current campaign is three minutes.
@@feckboygurry832That's completely different from timing individual turns, though. This DM seems okay with a thousand turns being taken as long as each one is 1 minute maximum. Having events that trigger after a set amount of turns, therefore giving the players a time-limit in-game is a reasonable thing to do.
Totally on board with 8. There are at least 4 reasons for this to be a universal truth. A player should first announce an action, and the GM should be the one requesting (or not) a roll.
real, but its also simple to have a bit of a talk abt cos yeah it can lead to some "the dm is an enemy"-type gameplay but imagine like, having ur chara killed or ur dm just WALKING OUT bc u got ahead of urself or ur new lmao
#6 is specifically about side quests, not a main quest. In my campaign I'm working on I have tons of side quests and it's up to the characters to follow it if they want, but for the main quest they will have their hands held when necessary. His "this isn't a video game" line is how in video games, when you finish a conversation with someone it will automatically log the quest, put a marker, etc. Even if you didn't pay any attention to the conversation lol
I get it, but it seems pretty clear that the players just want hack and slash dungeon crawl where they explore the map, kill monsters, and collect cool loot. It also seems like they want a pretty casual game while they hang out, eat, and drink/smoke. The DM wants to run a narrative focused, roleplay heavy campaign, but it just isn't what the players want or care about. It's like one person in a round of golf wanting to play strictly by the rules used on the PGA tour while everyone else is three beers in, barely want to keep score, and are more interesting in go to the club house after barely finishing the front 9.
Timed turns are also super okay, IF its something everyone has agreed to beforehand. I've played in multiple long campaigns that have had entire 8 hour+ sessions dedicated to a single combat. The absolute peak (or depth of despair) was a single round that took 6 hours. The madness of high level 3.5 dnd with homebrew on top.
XP is talking through the perspective of reasonable players and a randomly toxic DM. The thought experiment of “the DM made this a rule because some or all are doing the opposite to the point where they wanted to call it out” paints the picture of a frustrating session. That doesn’t mean all those rules are reasonable or good, but imagine a session where players are doing the opposite of 10 of those rules, that you most agree with, enough to where you needed to say something about it. Even players rolling dice in the floor or over the whole table and having to find them and gather them everytime, I would probably be like “hey can we just roll dice in the table infront of you, thank you”
i feel like 5 sessions of "guys can we PLEASE roll dice on the table infront of you with no shenanigans" will quickly lead you to make a rule of "if the dice leave the table, they are automatic worst outcomes"
Agreed. Like, this list is hella toxic and also don't threaten players to "actually fight" them, sure, but if you ask the guys not to show up stoned out of their mind and they repeatedly arrive 30+ minutes late in a hysterical gigglefit and then call your game stupid, I wouldn't blame you if you packed your stuff and went home.
Yep, this list of rules reads like trauma response to a table full of drunk A-holes that have harassed a DM to come back and continue to cop abuse. Or at least a troll post to illustrate a collection of worst case scenarios.
They could just say they dont want to DM. This list just makes me think they are a shitty person and i wouldn't want them as a player either. If i was a DM for a person with an attitude like this i would just kick them out of the game and i doubt anyone at the table would care.
As a forever DM, I can confirm that just saying "I don't want to DM anymore" is often met with guilt tripping and statements like "Well, I guess now WE can't play DnD anymore... you jerk! Thanks for NOTHING!" So yeah... maybe they were trying to make it as miserable as possible.
@@berserkasura8981they DID say they didn't want to DM. After they asked him to come back "after a long hiatus" this was his ultimatum. Basically he didn't want to DM, and wanted them to stop asking. Then the players decided to post this on reddit to publicly shame their former DM. Not cool, you guys!
My Drakewarden player has agreed that if a player dies, they control his Drake for the rest of the session. He’s a great player in a great party. Edit: Seeing everyone who agrees/is taking up the idea makes me very happy, thanks guys!
I never timed people's actual turns, however, I did have a bit of fun with timing at one point. The final boss of my campaign was an extremely powerful lich who in turn had a very short Rejuvenation window. Thus when my players killed him, I told them that we would be keeping initiative orders, and they'd need to figure out how to take down the wards and defenses around his phylactery in a certain amount of real world time, or he would revive again. When they asked questions I had to consider, or I wanted to give them some extra details on a specific thing they were attempting or an action they were considering, I would pause the timer so I personally wouldn't use any of the time I'd given to them, and give them a little room to breathe. When the timer ran out, they'd just figured out the puzzle that brought down the ward, so I told the party that they had until the end of the next "Round" to figure out how to break the Phylactery or he would come back. Luckily, due being level 20 as well as having obtained a special weapon that was empowered by vengeful souls from those the Lich had slain that could also bypass damage immunities against undead, they were able to destroy the phylactery and kill the Lich before he got to take another crack at them. I utilized this strategy specifically to create a feeling of stress and dread for them because it's exactly what their characters would be feeling, in trying to access the phylactery and destroy it before their foe could remanifest for Round 2. I wouldn't do that otherwise, because unnecessary stress isn't really the vibe at my table, but it was well worth using in this circumstance.
I personally sometimes time turns not as a "fuck you do your action already" but as a way to heighten tension. One time, my players were in this really high stakes chase scene and had to find a place to hide. They were taking so long that all the built-up tension just kinda fizzled out. When I turned on my phone and placed a one-minute timer in front of them, they all started panicking and decided on where their characters wanted to hide and rolled stealth. It was honestly pretty funny seeing their brains light up as they scrambled to not get caught. They didn't get caught at the end of the scene, so they felt pretty energized right after and the session ended up being a bit more dynamic. Now, whenever we have a high-tension situation and the players all get paralyzed, I just pull out ol' reliable timer and get the session rolling again.
But that's reasonable and from the sound of it you give them plenty of time before hand. (Correct me if I'm wrong please.) However making every action in combat timed, like this DM is doing, isn't good for anyone at the table. If a turn is taking way too long I probably would be like alright you're taking a while maybe we delay your turn for now or in an extreme case pull out a timer, but I wouldn't do it for every action in combat past that point. That said keeping tension is at the very least a good reason to do so.
I think that having timed turns is de facto bad is something I disagree with. If the very idea of timed turns causes a player to stress out to the point that everything is ruined for them than I question if they have the emotional maturity to even be playing the game in the first place. I honestly believe the part of being a good player is self imposing a time limit on yourself. The game may be make believe, but our ability to play it is still heavily constrained by reality.
I have to be honest, if my players are taking too long, I pull out a timer. There is no reason that you should be taking 5 plus minutes on a turn, to decide what you want to do. If you are rolling dice, or trying to figure out aoes thats fine, they just have to tell me what they are doing.
I was the one to suggest implementing timed turns to my dm a while ago, and she agreed along with the rest of the group , as a rp heavy party we all thought it was a smart idea to avoid any combat turning the game to a slog. When the next session rolled around the dm didn't even have to set a timer cause we were aware of the problem and making the collective effort to focus and streamline the game by ourselves, so it turns out ya just need to gently remind players to not stare at their character sheet in silence for 5 minutes and pay attention outside of their turn :)
I really think it's one of those things where it depends on if you're doing it to be vindictive to your friends, or if you're doing it to create tension because you believe that will create a better and more memorable experience. All "rules" can be broken for the sake of that last sentiment, to be fair, it just depends on how it's approached. If people understand the conditional circumstances. I actually think a large part of these rules is the way this guy presents them to his group. It feels like, really angry or checked out.
I was an hour late to one session - I try to sneak in through the back of a building to meet up with the rest of the party. SURPRISE! It’s the Thieve’s Guild. I get stabbed with four Sneak Attacks, barely survive, and play the rest of the session fading in and out of consciousness at 1HP.
Was this a "you should have checked/could have known to be more careful with context clues, and the DM hinted you were in trouble" sort of situation? There's a type of table where that could be funny, especially if it was your own fault you were late and you chat/socialise during games or have something else to do. But if it was just a vindictive way to punish you for being late to session then that's mean
@@danielcrafter9349 I mean it depends how much you like clusterf**ks in your game. I find the idea of my character sneaking into a tavern back room and accidentally wandering into a Thieves Guild meeting hilarious. What a story! I'm assuming that the characters weren't together in the last session and the decision to sneak in was from the player, not railroaded by the DM and the DM was open to the player doing other things without being ignored. If those things aren't true then the DM is on a power trip and you should probably call them on it. I give the DM points if they already prepped this room as the Thieves Guild or established it through play.
4:55 they probably mean that if you die in battle, your backup character can't just spontaneously show up in the middle of the battle; you'll have to wait for the next moment of downtime to introduce your new character.
I’ve been close to this mindset. If it isn’t made up, the DM is probably stuck with a handful of friends that aren’t good players but he desperately wants to have a group and feels like it’s them or nothing. The rules that I can imagine coming from a good place: 1. timed turns, it’s less about a hard time limit, more about players not bothering to learn basic rules or research their own character abilities between sessions. The solution depends on the player but it ain’t this. 2. Not showing up without reason - if you can imagine a disrespectful DM, you can imagine a disrespectful player. Biggest reason everyone I know who plays D&D but doesn’t get to play is flaky people. People they know personally say they’ll be there and then you get an excuse 5 minutes before session - if at all. Baffling, insane behavior imo, but some people be like that and it’s a pain when you can’t play without them. 3. Rolling before DM asks - it’s just rude. Especially when you do try to explain the dynamics of it and your players dgaf or are dismissive. 4. The whole “I’ll take my ball and go home” immature thing - like it or not if nobody else is willing to DM you do have this leverage in the relationship. It’s stupid to think it will play out in your favor, but it does discourage the rampant disrespect for the DM’s boundaries if you have immature friends that still want to play. There is obviously a healthier way to enforce boundaries and better friends to be had. Seriously, I think this guy just wants anyone else but him to DM - I doubt he’s had a chance to play or he’d get why players do half the stuff he hates and he’d have the opportunity to be as miserably passive aggressive as he clearly wants to be.
I agree with this. A lot of his rules seem to be trying to fix problems that are more common with people who are new to pen and paper games too, like the rule about needing to act out what you want your character to do. I run a high school tabletop club and am often one of the first DMs kids will have, so I see a lot of them try to navigate entire sessions without doing any RP at all. In pen and paper games the players need to RP, so requiring it for persuasion checks and the like isn't a big ask, you just can't give a penalty for the player making a poor argument. Nothing is more frustrating than coming up with several locations and NPCs introducing them to the players and then two sessions later needing to do it all again because the players decided, unprompted, to sail to the forbidden continent, only to immediately leave for some other, new place half the world away; except maybe having new players sit in silence in the first location you drop them in, not interacting with any NPCs in any meaningful ways and not acting on the opening premise of the session. So the rules about no traveling to other *continents* and no asking the DM about what to do make some sense, even if they're bad solutions to the problems they try to fix.
4. I get how the DM holds the leverage here and has the power to end the game, but it's not like he's saying "if the D&D isn't working out, we'll just call it and play some Smash or a board game or something" he's clearly taking it quite personally and acting out by storming out of there at the slightest provocation. I think you're generally right though, I've often been the DM by default just because most of my friends aren't able to put in that kind of preparation, but I did always wish they could put in more effort as players, like being attentive, knowing their abilities, and planning their turns in advance. I couldn't imagine speaking to my friends this way though. Not only would they not be coming back to D&D but I don't think we'd even be on speaking terms after this. Maybe they're only acquainted through the game? Maybe they just have a weird dynamic where it's cool to tell each other to F off and go cry about? Gotta wonder.
Actually this rule set was made after he had left the group, but they kept begging for him to come back. So rather than a plea of desperation, it’s more of a “Alright, if you want me back then follow these rules TO THE LETTER, or stop bothering me.”
Abut rule 8: I saw enough of sneaky prerollers in public groups to feel that. People who sit across from the dm, don't tell what they're planning and just rolling shit on other people's turns. First of all - since they roll before they tell they can just say that 2 was a cantrip and nat20 was a big spell. Second - dude, we're here to play together and I get angry both as a DM and as player when this happens because I can't muster any hype for good or bad rolls when person is just "my turn? oh, I hit this for this damage, move on". Feels like there's an empty space which somehow has a character.
You simply don't count them if that is the case. But i do like to roll out of turn for making decisions when i'm unsure. I remember my DM feeling uneasy constantly asking "what are you rolling for" just for me to clarify that i was using the dice to help me decide.
Maybe I'll sound like an elitist but problematic people just shouldn't play. The 1 difference would be if it was used for a group of people in a school class setting to develop such social skills, which they do have in Europe. Collective games are social contracts. It's not a competitive game. It's not 'let's focus on the murder hobo's ego day'. Gatekeep your games if possible.
@@rompevuevitos222 To clarify I don't have a problem with rolling in general - people can do what the want out of turn. it's when people roll, leave the die in a box and then on their turn point to it "I rolled this for my attacks and this for my damage"
as someone who has been a dm since i was 13, here are my rules as they have always stood: 1. please tell me what you’re rolling for 2. don’t hound me after session to get more info on an npc you thought was suspicious 3. let other players speak, wait your turn in combat unless you have an attack of opportunity 4. don’t kill other players??? 5. no seduction (we run our games in school at the dnd club) (getting down with a goblin is not appropriate in school and the teachers really don’t want to be telling you that)
@@pug8714 i’d allow it, but that has never come up in any of the campaigns i’ve run. because its in a club at school (i’ve managed to set up longer sessions outside school though), no one takes it very seriously and keeps on saying ‘can i kill them’ and i have to explain that half the quest line revolves around their character, so if they die, i have to write another campaign (at that point i had no pre written campaigns)
no one enjoys being a doormat for entitled narcissists, like this guy's players appear to be. They just shouldn't go as far as this guy did and become one of them.
@@bruuuuuuuuhhhhhonestly make that shit for everyone in the table free like all of the character sheet you got prepped for that table automatically just has abused on the background sheet
20:50 Warhammer 40K had a similar rule for dice needing to stay on the table to count. I kind of liked the flavor text in the rule book justifying it. "if you can't hit a table with your dice, what makes you think your characters can hit their targets with their weapons". Then realize the sheer chaos that is rolling for a shooty ork army, where you're easily dealing with 40-60 shots a turn.
The older editions of 40k had some hilariously fluffy fun rules. For example you could cram as many Orks into a Trukk as you could physically balance inside the Trukk flat bed...but if any fell out during movement they were considered dead. So you had Ork players with these elaborate pyramids of Orks.
Yeah. Go over all of them and you realize dude had to DM for a group that was busy chatting and doing drugs, then eating and wrecking his stuff, rather than playing the damn game.
I personally love when my dm is lucky and has “unfair” rolls, it forces us players to adapt and outsmart monsters in encounters, or solve problems without making rolls of our own. It’s pretty fun for both sides.
@@AlyssMa7rin The DM references a chat multiple times, meaning that he likely wrote all these rules in said chat, and the player just copy pasted them.
I've thought about timing turns before, but only as a special modifier for something like shutting off a bomb or a situation that is itself time-sensitive. I would of course apply it to the enemies' turns as well. As long as everyone agreed to it beforehand, or if we talked after and agreed not to do it again, then I think it would be a really cool factor in a battle.
I love the turn timer, because in combat nobody has time to think out their decisions. They have 6 seconds to make an action, and thats pretty much it. Unless someone is a 20 int wizard, they wouldnt really have the time to think of a super in depth battle plan, and would have to rely on adapting to the situation just as their characters would.
Use timers with players that just refuse to plan ahead. 1 minute time is HEAPS. You don't just get your 1 minute (which is already more than enough imo) you also get at least one more and a bit (another player plus dm) and realistically HEAPS more (since most groups are at least 3, if not 4 players). I don't want the fighter waiting 5 minutes to just walk (optionally) then hit.
I use timers mostly for bluff - I have a 5 minute sand clock, if someone does nothing on their turn for too long I'll pull it on the table, never had to think of a consequence for running it out. I occasionally do that with puzzles too - somehow having sand trickling down a sandclock gets people from overthinking to acting...
"I think this is a troll post" "these are children" Oh sweet innocence... I have seen actual adults, older than me (I'm in my mid 20's) have rules that were very similar or even worse, in terms of how restrictive, strict or even dictatorial they were (one gm even explicitly said their tables were dictatorships) and be as contradictory, or even batsh*t insane. All done with no humor or trolling whatsoever, fully genuinely and intentionally. They then of course failed to see the problems even after having a literal dozen people explaining to them exactly why and how it sucked, and left the servers (thankfully never had to talk to one irl) as offended majesties. And please take note that I did say adults, plural.
Later on in the original post, the DM references the players gossiping about an Australian high school. He is absolutely a teenager with no real life experience.
I happen to be a teenager, and even this seems extreme. Dealing damage to your character when the meta game is broken? That isn’t childlike, that’s just mean.
I share that sentiment. I've seen grown ass adults throw toddler style fits over this game because one player managed to get one over on the DM or a fellow player. Hell, had a whole campaign fall apart once because two players got into a fight over how their CHARACTERS where treating each other.
Everybody at the table thought this was fun but I thought it would fit here anyway, I once had a DM who made the first few sessions a story of us trying to invade the Mind Goblin fortress, and every time we said "mind goblin these nuts" he would make us take 1 psychic damage. Almost immediate tpk.
I gotta say, I have mad respect for the way you ended this video. Saying "I don't want to read the the rest of these, I'm not having fun anymore," is a sign that you value your own mental health above entertaining an audience, and in my mind, conveys that you are the type of DM who sets healthy boundaries both for your players and yourself.
@@OtisCluck Thing is, he made this list AFTER the players kept BEGGING him to come back. He said that if they wanted him to come back then they have to follow these rules. It was revealed that the player who posted the rules actually bragged about making the DM quit a while before this. These rules aren't for everyone, it's for this specific group who pissed him off and made him quit being a DM. If you actually read the rules without XP dramatizing them like Goblin did, you find yourself sympathising with the DM. There's a reason the post was taken down, and it's because the poster was the worst player a DM could have.
I interpretted rule 4 (I'm going to take your loot as regularly as you want it given out) not as "I'm going to give it and then steal it back" so much as "don't ask for loot. If you ask for loot, instead of giving you something new, I'm going to take away something you already had". Which is less silly, and more vindictive.
For me personally, the biggest actually helpful takeaway from this was your tale on the lawyering. "Rules-lawyer me (as the DM) but not other players." That's really fair. If I mess up that's a win for the players, but don't be a jerk to other people who are not as familiar with the game, sometimes I've let people get away with things because it's the first time they really started to get how many options are available and I just want to reward their creativity. I don't have a lot of DM experience so someone tell me of I'm totally wrong here but in the small games I've tried to run it seems like it's gone over well
Yeah but he decides what a good reason is, meaning if your dog gets hit by a car and he doesn't give a shit then it would count the same as if you just overslept
For roleplaying out persuasion checks: I provide two options. 1) Fully roleplay it out, where you can have your argument more tailor made exactly the way you want it, which could potentially lower the DC you need 2) Tell me the outcome your looking for the the general method you'll be using and make a roll
I like to roll the persuasion/deception before the acting. Then match what I think the rolled number should sound like. Makes persuading someone on a 4 *very amusing.*
@@FaeQueenCory Persuasion 4 is like "Your honor, i did not *steal* the sword oyt of this noble's house, i just borrowed it for unspecified period of time and i really was going to return it, i swear"
What I personally think is a really fair rule is to make it so that if you manage to actually roleplay well enough you can skip the dice roll, but if you "fail" you just get to roll like normal. That way it still encourages those fun moments but if someone doesnt want to participiate they wont get punished for it.
"My character has a 20 charisma and I don't" is the same way I feel about puzzles in games. My INT and WIS are nothing to sneeze at (my DEX is somewhat below an ochre jelly), but I don't want to sit there figuring out a puzzle because my INT 20 wizard should know it. So, unless you make the player of the Barbarian do pull ups each time they do a strength check....
A GM I play with sometimes (not D&D tho) says smth along the lines of: "The Player and the Character perceive things differently, either can be out of it for one reason or another, if the character can figure out something you can't, I will help and tell you." Tho I think the "Act out Persuasion/Intimidation" rule is correct when you use the most basic and good faith interpretation: The DM should at least know what you want to do, and some basics of how you want to do it. "I want to persuade" says very little of how the character is meant to react, "I want to intimidate" says a bit more, but still little. Describe something you want to appeal to while persuading (maybe the circumstances are so dire that they call for you and your enemy temporarily teaming-up), what particularly intimidating thing you want to do (do you want to just growl at someone, or maybe describe in detail how you will torture them?).
This guy isn’t fun enough to have a band of little rat thieves steal things, I imagine he’d just be like “the hand of god reaches down from the heavens and steals your magic item”.
if you actually read the post. youd know that he used to be a fun dm who let stuff slide and then he decided that this specific group didnt deserve that kind of leeway
I would just have my character not take any treasure. Just leave it in the dungeon. The more time the DM spent deciding on the treasure, trapping it and describing it, the better.
3 rules in and I'm already convinced this is a very patient DM who's group has done nothing but complain about his DM style for months and now he's finally had enough.
Yeah unfortunately because it was deleted and because Jacob only read partway through it it becomes increasingly clear via the comments from the OP in the thread that the players were all fucking goons where the DM had previously just left the group and they had constantly badgered him to come back and DM for them since none of them wanted to do it. These rules were his way of giving the group an 'impossible task' that meant even if he did DM for them (apparently they would not take no for an answer), he wouldn't be DMing for long.
I'm actually pissed jacob stopped midway and just sees the DM in bad faith. Loot goblin actually posted all 44 rules, and by the time you reached 30, it's downright horror story. The rule implied these players have in previous occasions: CHEAT (by casually 'forgetting' their spell slots), comparing the DM to critical role or internet DM, complaining everything including playlist, bringing actual meal on the table in the middle of session, BROKE the DM's DND gear AND NOT EVEN REPLACING THE ITEM.
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"Don't get up every 10 minutes to satisfy your drug habit" is so specific I really really wanna be a fly in the wall for some of the sessions that led to this
He's probably talking about smoking
Taking 10 seconds to vape out the window
Shit if this is their dm, I don't wonder why they constantly go out to smoke😂
Part of me is like “This DM sounds very unfun” but also it makes me wonder what kinds of sessions before led up to this.
Smoking or vaping. I have known a lot of people who are just sucking on that pipe constantly in some form or another.
“You have to act out your intimidation checks”
*waterboards the dm*
"It ain't waterboarding if'n ya use gasoline, yeeeeeehaw!"
Brings out the car battery
"Relax, DM. We're just going to act out the Intimidation check."
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@@WalterPowerbright 💀💀💀💀💀💀
Also DM: "You don't like my ruling, fight me."
Players: "Okay." Plants Bowie knife in table and sets a handgun beside it.
Also Players: "You never specified what kind of fight so pick one."
DM: "You can leave if you don't like my ruling! REEEE!"
Other Player: turns to DM. "It's actually my house so you can leave."
To be honest, if one of players were making fun of a guard's name and then 15 guards would appear out of nowhere and start making fun of our names, I'd love this moment
not to mention, with them all knowing the names, they must have all been hiding in random bushes and trees and houses to eavesdrop. that or the DM pulled their T - posing assets out of the ground
I mean yeah just don't do ut every time
I like my NPCs getting super hostile when disrespected. More fun to roleplay.
@@shhinysilver1720this is so funny 😭😭😭
"Hey, Bob, this adventurer is called Deezy"
*additional guards appear*
"Deezy? Deez nuts! Carl! Come check out Deez... Deez Nuts"
*more guards appear*
😂
You should make a followup on this, because it has come to light that the players were just bullying the DM to this breaking point. These rules exist because of abusive players who were proud to be abusive.
Thats the vibe I got immediately!
Yeah, just reading the title sent alarm bells off to me that these players were shitty players and the one who posted them on Reddit was butt hurt and wanted validation
Yes but then how would scummy D&D content creators farm outrage clicks if they actually approached this subject with nuance and didn't join in bullying this DM who didn't ask for or even really deserve it?
Yeah, I'm not sure how this list being a response to awful players is missed by so many people. I think some folks disingenuously act like they didn't pick up on it so they can make content out of it for their UA-cam channels.
The follow up would literally just be "Seems like everyone at the table is an asshole then and not just the DM"
Of note, the post was deleted for a reason - someone actually dug up the poster's comment history and he was literally *bragging* about making the DM's life hell.
This list? Yeah, if you take it at face value, it makes the DM out to be a bad person. If you take it with that bit of context and ask yourself why the DM would have to specify a lot of them? That paints a *bad* picture of the entire table. This was a DM at the end of their rope.
Given that little tidbit of "OP bragged about giving the DM a hard time", I also expect that some of these rules were added or had the wording changed by the player that posted them, in order to make the DM come off as worse than they were.
Wow! I knew the players were likely nightmares, but this is something else! I wish I had noted down that player's name so I can avoid ever having them in my games.
YIKES! Yeah, you kind of get the idea that the players weren't prizes themselves, even with no context, but that just throws things into perspective. This guy might not be a model DM or one you want to play with, but the one who originally posted them was definitely a That Guy.
Yeah, there's always a moment where even the best DM has something where he needs to put a foot down. I've had those moments a few times. Not this bad, but still it can be an issue.
Yeah, being inebriated and breaking the GM's stuff is the smoking gun.
I mean, I probably would've just stopped talking to this group instead of making these rules lol
Edit: But also thanks for this information. I probably wouldn't have wanted to play with anyone that gets drunk/high during a more involved kind of game. It would be fine if you were playing CaH or pictionary, or another kind of party game.
"Dm, where should we go?" "Sucks to suck" "Ok, guess i'm buying an inn and we're playing inn simulator for the next 3 sessions."
I would threaten the dm with cast guidance
Eh, DM will take away the inn within 30mins. Burns down over night or something.
"Oh, but don't you know!? I already took away all of your currency because rule 4! And you don't get an opinion about this because then I'll rage quit"
*Bandits pick up and steal the inn*
I would 100% do this. "Ok, well we dont know where to go, Im going to look for work and buy an inn. Guess you just signed up for Inn Simulator. Sucks to suck DM." This person 100 % sounds like a person that does not want to be a DM.
The reason the original post was removed from reddit and now only exists as screenshots is because when people started to ask OP questions, it quickly became clear that players are complete assholes and OP deleted it. So they all deserve each other.
Yeah, once I saw the “If you show up so drunk and high that you can’t play” portion a lot of the DMs rules make more sense. For any normal table these would be ridiculous.
Yeah, while the '44 rules' are a bit much, i cant imagine someone gets to that point without being pushed there
Well in that case I'd say that DM dug his own grave trying to fix it by being a huge dick about it ^^ Go find some other players or something, stop wasting your time with a group of stoned and/or drunk lunatics expecting them to listen and adhere to a 44-point manifesto :P
@@Micras08 apparently the DM DID leave, and the players constantly were bugging him to come back, so he comes back with this manifesto.
its like a "I don't want to fucking be here, you guys forced me here, so you either do what I say or I leave, and won't be coming back"
Ya it’s pretty clear that there must have been at least one event that sparked each of these rules. For instance, the “rolling correctly” thing probably had to do with people rolling onto the table and selectively choosing whether they had to reroll because it wasn’t in the tray, or just keep it, depending on if it was good. Similarly he probably had a problem where someone rolled 8d6, saw it was low, and then said they were doing a different spell when it was obvious they were doing fireball, and other times rolled 8d6 then declared they were doing fireball after they saw it was high.
So, after a bit of digging, I was able to find out a few things.
TL;DR, everything here was absolutely the players fault because almost every bad player behavior listed here was intentional. This set of rules was a response from the DM to the players trying to get the DM back so they could bully him some more after their hiatus.
When this post originally came out, a lot of people noticed that this sounded like a very angry, but very HURT DM. A few people were curious to see if there were any other stories like this from the OP.
Turns out, OP had previously posted many times about gameplay behavior and the DM. However, it was the player bragging in other subreddits that they and their group had been bullying the DM intentionally for some time. Begging for or demanding more and more powerful magical items, smoking often, cheating, complaining, arguing, gaslighting, and the works. They continued to go out of their way to give the DM a bad time. This claim is also supported when you look at the number of rules that SPECIFICALLY mention Reddit.
People started calling OP out on this, and that is why they not only deleted the post, but they deleted their account.
Getting into speculation now.
This looks like the DM took a hiatus/break with every intention of trying to just break up the party. However, the party was likely trying to get the DM back into playing with the group, hoping to be able to abuse them some more. So in response the DM decided he'd lay down a law for everything they'd done to wrong him as something of an ultimatum. "If we're going to be playing together, these are my terms. I'm tired of all of this. You will either fix your behavior, or I will stop playing with you and you will hate playing with me."
A lot of people also mention the language and how aggressive this DM Seems to be given the profanity shown. I have a few theories on this.
Firstly, is that given that this isn't the DM, but the OP who posted this, it's possible that they just punched up the language to be worse than it actually was. This is supported by the OPs previous language and posts on Reddit as well.
Secondly, given some of the specific language used, we can assume that this group is either in the UK, or Austrailia. If they're in the UK, particularly on the northern side(Scotland and the like), they have quite liberal use of various swear words, so there might not even be the same amount of spite we here in Northern America might attribute to it. Often times, we in the US/Canadia make the bad assumption that UK = Polite and posh British. But don't forget, the UK includes Britain, Wales, N Ireland, and Scotland.
Even further, if this was in Australia, then this would be a polite response to this group, given the lack of the use of the C Word. There's also a small chance he's military as well,(Former military myself,) and really, swear words just become interrogatives and common adjectives at that point, though prior service is much less likely. With that in mind, It's entirely possible then that this DM isn't actually as rude as we give him credit for.
With all of this in mind, this was a DM that was tired of the bullshit, and likely wanted nothing to do with this group given their behavior. With everything here, the players were obviously the bad guys here, and OP at the very least knew it. It seems like the DM caught on as well and was basically saying: "Okay then. If you want me back to try and play your fuck-fuck games, I can play back." So OP Used that to try and get some extra Reddit Karma, but instead got some real and proper karma in return.
I could understand all this. The only bit that confuses me if all this is true is just how inconsistent and contradictory some of the rules are
@@micahdye7215another person theorized that the OP / Player intentionally changed some rules to make the DM sound worse
@@micahdye7215What I took from this comment was that this list wasn’t *actual* rules, just stuff that pissed the poor dude off about their players. I doubt they had any intention on going back, and was more “rationalizing” why they are absolutely not.
Why is TLDR at the _start_ of the post? Everything after it is the stuff you're trying to explain? Sorry?
@@quuirrel19_-sz9pj that is how TLDR works ? Too Long Didn't Read : aka i want the short versions and if i want to i can read the long version
Rule 9: When the DM hits you with exhaustion and you respond by invoking your right to a duel
You get a level of exhaustion
YOU FOOL, I HAVE ENOUGH DIAMOND DUST TO NEVER SLEEP AGAIN *SNOOOORT*
I cast throw hands
Rules as written, rule 9 is actually an implicit consent by the DM to a surprise attack from the players at any time!
Bigby's Thrown Hands
I was about to say any DM who feels this insecure probably either
1) can’t fight at all
Or
2) the ONLY thing they have is strength and this is a threat that could get them
Imprisoned
In regards to the 'aCt OuT yOuR cHaRiSmA cHeCkS', I find a good middle ground that still encourages roleplay is asking the player "How do you intimidate them?" Even if their answer is just "Idk, growl at him I guess" I say "Alright, roll intimidation" and boom, done. It's especially helpful for new players in my experience and avoids the whole 'acting' mentality.
Edit: Why the hell does this have over 3000 likes?
I actually get the impression that's what the DM wants
Too many people aren't reading with charity and just see "act" and think it's a whole drama
@@danielcrafter9349 yeah seems like most people comenting are hearing like the first 2 rules and reacting off that rather than looking at all of the rules and extrapolating context. There is a little assumption work to be done certainly, but when you're hit with ' don't come to my table high' twice it kinda sets the tone. A lot of people ragging on the car ride home thing, it sounds like the person the dm gives a ride to complains at the dm every time something bad happens and then the dm has to endure it for however long the commute is and is very tired of it.
exactly, thats what i do. If you are intimidating, i ask how. or if your doing persuasion i ask how. I dont expect rp, i just need an explanation so i can explain what happens and then ill give bonuses and that type of thing if i think it makes sense
like the other day someone tried to convince an enemy not to fight them. because they noticed it looked liek the enemy was in pain and they noticed they were being affected by the alterations caused by the person they were chasing. so they just told me that they say something along the lines of "we dont need to fight, they are harming you just as much as us"
so i gave them advantage
You don't have to act you juat have to sau what you are doing..if you want to roll deception i have to know the lie that you are telling.
Same with persuasion - I just ask "what's your angle?"
As someone in the reddit comments put:
"Around 3-4 is when it's time to leave cuz your DM's an asshole.
12-16 is when you realize they don't want to DM for your group anyways.
Further down, you realize your group is full of shitty players anyways, and you'd better figure out if you're one of them before trying to find a new group."
nah. The millisecond the DM message begins with 'these are my non negotiable rules for me to come back' I'm out.
Yeah, it gives really weird vibes.
Sounds like a group of people without any social skills ran into each other and created this mess.
Going through the full list of rules; it paints a picture of what this DM was putting up with.
This is not some tyrannical DM inflicting this on a new batch of good players.
This is an exhausted DM for a group of long term terrible players.
He's hit his breaking point. No d&d is better than bad d&d, but when you're limited in your player pool sometimes it either rehabilitate bad players or don't get to play ever.
From the post it's revealed the DM is from the northern suburbs of Melbourne, Victoria (Australia).
We don't have a huge tabletop scene here (the FLGS scene is very sparse, and for some can be an hour drive just to get to a store that doesn't even offer in house tables to play at). Finding an in person group is rather difficult.
@@chrisblake4198 "Writting those rules was an amazing idea DM, you got the shitty player no one liked to leave and now we can finally have fun"
dude who made the post ended up deleting it when he realized that people were not on the players side after reading the whole thing. so i now cant find what the rest of the rules are
No DM Starts like this, I can only imagine what the players have been inflicting on this GM to turn him into this.
Yeah, I feel like XP3 kinda missed the stuff between the lines. From the original post, it was found that the OP had posted about how he enjoyed making his DM's life hell in game. So it's clear that the OP's DM made these rules for the specific players not for the specific party.
I feel kinda bad that XP3 is just clowning some DM that everyone else realized got pushed to breaking by bad players.
I don't know if you've played with a lot of people but some DMs absolutely start like this.
@@investigativebatman I reiterate. No DMs start like that. Our imaginations run rampant considering what happened to convince them to craft this list of rules for them to DM again for that group.
@@brandonrathbone3690 No, there are DMs who start like this, I had one running a game for me, in fact. I mostly stayed out of morbid curiosity after it became obvious just what kind of game it was.
@@redviego6714 DM rules only mean something if the players care. If you have five players and the DM comes with these rules, the DM can find a new friend group.
I do always ask players to explain their approach when they make a charisma check, as with any other check. Ie “I appeal to his sense of fair play” is good, “I’m not so subtly attempting to bribe him” is good, “I persuade” is bad. That’s because I literally can’t resolve a check if I don’t know anything about their approach, since I need to set the DC and the stakes.
But “acting out” the checks is completely optional. Requiring it adds nothing to the game.
I actually quite like this approach. Allows for creativity without feeling self conscious about lack of acting skills ❤
This.
I usually do something similar. Instead of setting the DC based on what they say, I let them roll and then ask them what they say. What they say doesn't actually matter, the roll has already decided the results, but I like to keep things light and this allows for some comedy.
I think this is a great way of doing it, and it allows you to also give bonuses if they're really appealing to the person with the check. Something like "I try to persuade them by promising riches far beyond anything they'd ever attain on their own" to a greedy NPC could give Advantage or a +5 or something, while "I try to persuade them by giving them a bouquet of flowers" to someone who's allergic to them could give Disadvantage or a -5 or whatever
Yeah I always say something like "What does (Character Name) Say/Do" Then they can chose whether to act it out or just tell me what they're going for
My first DM had some things in common with this guy. Session zero he's very specific about the rules of what he allows for stat rolls. He made us go one at a time and watched saying "even if you roll all 1's you have to keep it". I rolled three near perfect stats and he tried to tell me to reroll because they were too good. Whole group agreed it was unfair to have to keep bad rolls, but can't keep good ones. He allows it. Session 1, level 1, we start off in a dungeon. Every monster targets my character, but we make it through the first room. Go to check loot. Rogue finds no traps with a 15 or so roll. I open a chest and a trap door opens and I drop 150ft. No save, and he says "you all don't have rope, can't be resurrected, you just have to roll a new character for next session" I didn't go back, and by the third session no one else did either.
That's bullshit.
That doesn’t sound fun…
Bullshit
just got mad you were lucky
I had a DM like that. It was my first time playing and we were going over characters. I had a pre-made character that I worked a lot on and was hoping to use.
At the time the stats were a little intimidating so I used dnd beyond to do the rolls and math for me. I had kinda good stats (my lowest one was an 11 and my highest a 15). He didn't like that (or thought that I cheated) and made me re-roll in front of him. I ended up with even better stats. He was mad again. Then demanded that I change my og stats (at least my 11 to an 8 and another of my choice to a 10).
I was already feeling like this was going to be a bad first experience to the game but I let him change the stats. Thankfully, it never went forward cause the DM got mad at another player, sent a big message telling us we were terrible and he deserved better and left.
I do kind of understand the whole thing about "NPCs will remember/ notice insults". It's annoying when a character tries to derail an important conversation, but what you have to do is make it so it only impacts that character. For example, I had some elves interrogating the party at the edge of the elves' territory, and this one player kept saying that he "wasn't with these guys" and joking about burning down the forest because he thought it's be funny to completely ruin what was honestly a pretty important conversation (he tried this with many other roleplay moments). So, the elves believed him on both accounts and tossed him in jail while they kept talking to the other characters. It took them less than a session to negotiate him out of the dungeon, and he stopped trying to do this sort of stuff, or at least decreased the frequency of it.
"The elves belive you" is the best solution imo
Sounds like a good way to go about dealing with a player like that.
Interesting, do you find this to be a better approach than talking to the player directly about their behaviour? Or do you use both?
My son in a one-off session wanted to steal the armor of some guards and completely ignore the question at the beginning. He was thrown in jail and the other players who accepted the quest would only go if his character was released.
Don't let players make dumb choices with no consequences lol
Nah.
Since the video is incomplete and lacks the full picture, here's a quick rundown from all the comments I've read for others who're interested.
The post was made by a PLAYER, not the DM himself. When people on Reddit dug into the players previous posts, he was found to be actively bragging about making the DM's life hell. It's possible that the player might have twisted the DM's rules to be even more unfair than they seemed.
Building off of that, the DM had to deal with his players constantly being late / not showing up, metagaming and always expecting every session to be a huge scale dungeon / area, complaining about things being too easy and then complaining when things got too difficult, smoking weed or cigs or vaping 24/7, being drug or high all the time, ordering full on meals and making a mess during the sessions, and destroying the DM's personal belongings (accidentally or on purpose, unclear.)
The DM decided to leave because he was tired of running for the group, and the group (presumably unable or unwilling to DM themselves) effectively harrassed the DM into coming back. In response, the DM made the "44 Rules of D&D" for his players, either in an attempt to bring some order to the group and actually have fun for once, or in an attempt to make all the players leave so he doesn't have to DM for them anymore.
TL:DR: DM is not unhinged - his players are assholes and he made the rules in an attempt to make his players leave after they harrassed him to continue DMing when he left them the first time.
Dm is just as much of an asshole as the players for making the list instead of talking things out like an adult, or just telling them to pound sand
Thank you!
The rule about sneaking away to do drugs should have clued people in...
The DM is absolutely unhinged. I do no understand people saying that. You can be an asshole even if your behavior is in response to other assholes.
@@investigativebatman if what the players were doing is true, i'd like to meet someone who could put up with their bs without doing something like this
"Idk I think my character would say something inspiring to get these kobolds to jump in a volcano" There's a story behind that and I need to hear it
I had a party member who convinced our NPC companion to walk straight off a cliff once.
I get the feeling the players convinced the kobolds that dragons gain great power by bathing in lava, so they'll become closer to becoming dragons themselves if they do the same thing.
Once our party got kidnapped by kobolds so my Rogue ( who is basically a crazy person ) slipped out of his binds, casted sleep on the guards after they tried feeding us bugs ( which is a spell component for sleep ), skinned ones face off to wear as a mask to run around the dungeon acting like a tall Kobold so he could get the groups things and bring them back to them while they were all still in the prison cell, that way they wouldn't all get jumped while having no armor or weapons to defend themselves by like 15 armed and armored kobolds.
And it worked because my charisma based skills were high enough to either out right fool them due to their low intelligence, or scare the shit out of them enough that they acted like they believed it to avoid being murdered horribly themselves. From that point on it became a gimmick for my character to collect at least one face of every race, didn't last long however as I started having to roll to avoid diseases which I took as my dm friend telling me to knock it off so I did.
Goblins and kobolds make for fun player experiences more so than dragons or beholders in my opinion.
Ever seen Jobold versus the Volcano?
Isn’t this the one where Reddit called out OP’s group for being pricks and OP admitted the DM didn’t even want to run the game anymore but they bullied him into it?
I have a fun rule I like to play with, I call it the Avante-Garde Fail.
Imagine you have a bard, immune to failing in every way, even a 2 will roll up to above a 15. He's trying to perform for an audience, and he rolls a 1. Instead of saying he chokes, instead of saying he somehow did something sleep easy to him and failed to keep tone, or whatever, I say something else.
Ex: Your performance was advanced, complex, nuanced beyond degree. Your audience doesn't get it. The parts they understood they found insulting, they found the plight of the character in the performance unrelatable. The younger audience members where bored during the drama. You feel in your gut if you'd delivered this play in front of a court of nobles, it would have been an easy smash hit. But as it stands the audience can't stand it.
Failing spectacularly doesn't always have to be a problem with just charisma either. You could have the Barbarian wreck and jam the mechanisms too a door because he literally ripped it apart. You could have a rogue OVERLEAP his intended destination. Or a ranger who failed a tracking check thinking of way too many creatures and beasts that these tracks could belong to and literally have the right answer be one of several possible animals it could be.
I love this because it allows players to often fail with spectacle. It turns a nat-1 from a "Oh, I guess my Barbarian's suddenly too weak." to, "Oh my God, I can't believe we can't pass because I literally ripped off the counterweight."
that's a really good way to think about failure! i'll have to try that in my games
That sounds like a good rule, and the base rules even mention how a nat 1 isn't your character suddenly becoming useless. It is the worst possible scenario. Like a maxed rogue could be lockpicking and fail, but maybe it wasn't entirely their fault. They could have gotten bumped into and the pins in the lock reset. Similarly, a nat 20 isn't an automatic success. It is the best possible scenario. Like you might not succeed in running up a sheet of smooth marble stone, but you land on your feet instead of your head.
I like this. I also like a failed rolled being "a success, but..." like the bard fails his performance check and kicks a metal helmet and breaks his toe but inadvertently gives one of the best performances ever seen. Works really great for checks I REALLY dont want my PCs to fail for narrative reasons.
@@smittery unexpected Viggo Mortenson
That's a really fun idea! I always struggle in more serious campaigns where you can't hit the party with "And then suddenly a murder of crows bursts into the establishment to steal everyone's mugs, because the barkeep threw a rock at one of them the other day. The performance is unfortunatelly ruined."
"if I gave you a ride there, find your own way home" Make sure to carry a compass, fire starting stuff, 3 days rations, a knife, and a space blanket before you play DnD...consider a survival rifle or snare traps...no not for your character...I mean for you. Like your physical self.
You play dnd in the mountains or smth?
"Rule 4 means that compass is mine now, I hope you can read the stars"
Don't forget the 50 feet of hempen rope.
At least your character can make survival and nature checks now.
Don’t forget a 10ft pole
In my head, the way this worked out was the players were constantly smoking and drinking, showed up like a half hour late with the excuses of "Oh, I don't know" or "I woke up late," constantly asked for redos whenever something went wrong ("I walk here" "You activate a pressure plate-" "Oh nooo, I actually step here."), basically demanded their skill checks without asking, and made rolls intentionally out of sight of the DM so they could lie about the roll and from the sound of it got caught a lot doing this. After what seems like many sessions of this, the DM got fed up and took an extended break from DMing this group, coming back with this list of intentionally terrible rules to call out players' annoying actions.
See also:
Players ignoring or forgetting plothooks for quests and deciding they'd rather free roam to the next city, then getting upset when the DM didn't prepare a massive globe trotting game, often deciding to just walk through multiple nights without consequences and complaining when the DM tries to impose them. It sounds like the hooks for these quests are there, and the players just decided to disregard them and do whatever they wanted, then complain they never get quests.
Players entering dungeons or caves, completing them in a session or two, then getting upset they're not longer when that makes no functional sense.
Players totally uninterested in RP at all, and the DM attempting to force some in. Both parties are partially in the wrong here, forcing RP isn't fun, but having players who only interact through the world by stabbing it isn't very fun either, especially if you put time and effort into NPCs are are excited to use them.
This list makes a lot more sense when you consider most of the players were drunk and/or high for a lot of the games, and proceeded to leave the table to refill their drug dependency, probably often without asking, just getting up and leaving. It wouldn't surprise me if OP was either when posting this, as well. No, the DM does not want to manage these players, they seem terrible, and when OP realized they were the problem and got called out on all the social media, they deleted the post.
DUDE I SAW THESE JUST THE OTHER DAY HAHA
What I love the most about the 44 rules is the fucking mood whiplash of seeing a rule that seems pretty reasonable and then getting hit with “call my shit unfair and you’re walking back home”
I'd drive the DM somewhere, then call a rule unfair. Now I can drive home and leave him stranded.
@DanielLCarrier same
@DanielLCarrier “Thats it, I’m going home!”
“Have fun walking” **drives away**
What if he hosts one night? He just gets up all "I'm going home" and walks into the next room over?
@@stanleyjosten Probably tells everyone to get the fuck out of his house
You know how sometimes you see those signs in public places that seem like completely insane rules like "No petting the carrots" but then you realize that the sign was put up because someone was definitely petting carrots?
If I were to give the DM the highest benefit of the doubt, I would suspect that the players were using reddit meta builds, frequently asking for more loot and mega dungeons, never roleplayed, frequently skipped sessions without notice, would regularly get high mid-session, relied on the DM for transport, rolled their dice in secret, changed their mind after seeing rolls, frequently ridiculed NPCs, disregarded the direction the DM gave while complaining about missing it, and generally pushed the DM to the point of posting 44 ways he was getting out of running the game anymore.
I've DM'd for some pretty problematic groups, and while I think a lot of what this person is saying is definitely crazy, I can also see where some of these rules might be coming from. It's very easy to get frustrated when you've spent hours if not days working on a session and your players don't respect the fact you're there to have fun too. I think this person's main issue is not having enough self respect to just leave their (at best incompatible, at worst terribly toxic) group.
@@HD_HerpDerp from what ive read from other comments, the dm actually didnt want to dm for them, but they kept bugging him to dm, so he made those rules
That is actually the case. Remember, OP is a player who posted those rules, not the DM who made the rules. When people started to ask questions about the player, thsts when he deleted this post. And it turns out, the entirety group of players were all being shitty and bugging him to keep DMing after he tried to leave.
It's refreshing seeing someone play devil's advocate rather than immediately joining the mob. And I think you're right. This definitely didn't just come out of nowhere.
Yeah. Like, the DM is being a bit of an antagonistic jerk, but some of these rules are *so* specific I'm reasonably sure at least half his players are also nightmares, and the DM's just been pushed to his limits.
Rule 5: Sometimes I just tell my players "You roleplayed that so well between yall, fully in-character. This kobold pissed his pants 2 minutes ago. Put your dice away, you don't need to roll intimidation."
Roleplay advantages and disadvantages are cool. But only at very comfortable with role playing tables, otherwise it looks like DM play in favorites.
@@jackb.207 that's pretty much the thing about any lighter-rules/less-focus-on-combat/non-skill-based-parley/etc homebrew rulings. Many people, particularly dnd influencers, peddle them left and right without even once mentioning (perchance, having no understanding) that this is DM fiat and requires a huge amount of pre-established trust and mutual chemistry from the players, which many groups might not realize they didn't actually have before it leads to conflict at the table.
This is what the ever so often said "Too many actual plays, not enought actual playing" alludes to.
Say what you want about dnd, but its cumbersome and silly rules are there for a reason.
Believe me, that can work, but be careful, because it can also suck, especially for games where Faces are a distinct role.
You either make it so players without charisma can make faces useless because they roleplayed well enough they do not have to roll.
-or-
You force players with low charisma to "roleplay their stats" forcing them to behave in a way that is not what they had in mind. For example: you want to be a mild-mannered person that makes good point, but in a very unimpressive way? You can't, because that might be considered likeable, and you have low charisma.
@@Loromir17 at this point just play a game with rules for this. No point trying to shove 5e into every situation.
@@ereviscale3966 to be fair, there is some blame to lay onto 5e (well, 2e moreso, but 5e further continued the trend) itself. The existence of Persuasion/Deception/Intimidation and other decidedly non-combat (or even anti-combat) skills - particularly in the context that a player sometimes has to choose between a combat-useful proficiency and an anti-combat skill proficiency during character progression - _suggests_ these as equal alternatives to combat, or at least meaningfully supplementary to it, but the reality is that they amount to little else than a single die roll. That's where most of the frustrations with this side of gameplay originate for 5e DMs/players, probably.
I kind of get the no rolling before announcing stuff. You could theoretically roll, score really poorly, and go "Yeah darn I guess my cantrip missed. Fortunately I have my spell slot for next turn!"
Yeah, the rolling and then choosing your action based on the roll is a _really_ common way of cheating.
Rule 2 just meant that players who want tougher fights should be prepared for characters to die in the fight. Have a backup sheet and be patient till your backup character can get introduced.
I’m actually on board for that, don’t ask a dm for a deadly encounter and get upset because it’s a deadly encounter.
This... they probably had complaints that the fights were too easy. Then had fights when they got close to dying/died
Me generating 1d20 character sheets for my upcoming Curse of Strahd campaign: I have no idea what you're talking about.
Oh.... honestly, I understood it as "bring another character and double up so your party can actually, possibly, handle a harder fight".... but, I could also see it as "have back ups and replacements ready and waiting".
@@VanNessy97 I remember a masks of Nyarlathotep campaign we started with 7 Spares per player and 3 of them actually ran out of spares and had to make new spares.
There's a difference between a rollercoaster ride and a train crash. One very much seems like danger but isn't. The latter is.
this might be the funniest comment from the reddit post "Man I bet OP didn't expect the response to this being "oh shit, what did yall do to this poor DM to make him break like this?"" and the post is now deleted
Ah yes, poor dm, instead of just leaving and telling them to fuck off when asked to come back, he did this, he’s just as bad as his players, they’re perfect for each other
A lot of DMs actually ENJOY running the game, but like any relationship you do need to have boundaries.
@@OtisCluck except he did leave and they harrased him to join them again and this way his "impossible task" for them to comply with if he was to join them again. OP (is a player) and has actively bragged about harrassing and making the DM's life hell as well as breaking the DM's property on purpose.
@@OtisCluckthose rules ARE him leaving and telling them to fuck off
@@OtisCluckthis has the same vibe as saying that the victim and the harasser are equally to blame
god the "my character has 20 charisma, i do not" thing is so real 😭 i enjoy playing charisma-based classes and like writing characters with a lot of social skills but i'm so bad at coming up with things On The Spot like i don't understand being so strict about that as a table rule. either you're giving me 5 minutes to come up with a good line or you're letting me give you the general vibe of what i want to say for this check, some of us aren't incredible at improv, a little patience doesn't kill anybody :'))
Fair enough. That rule I'm almost certain was an overreaction from the DM to players just saying "I persuade the guard" then rolling for it.
Personally, as a DM I find that almost impossible to role-playing from, as there's no direction. All you can really do is say "you pass and he lets you through, which is boring.
Obviously, I don't ask people to RP the entire conversation if they don't want to, but a starting point like "I appeal to his good nature to let us in." at least gives me a starting point to RP off of.
You don't need a good line, you just need to do something higher effort than "I persuade the knight."
@@Not_Here_To_Make_Friends Not even that, some people really DO just be like that...and that's fine. Some people have more interest in the mechanical side of the game than the roleplay side. I know, it's shocking that people like different things from the game than the 'norm'. Also if the player has a lot of social anxiety just letting them say "I persuade the X' and rolling for it can really help them as well until they're more comfortable in the groups social circle.
My rule is "what does that look like?" For persuasion, adds some comedy when theyve rolled a nat 1 for performance "what does that look like?" Because everyone knows what a nat 1 performance looks like and takes pressure off "do a good performance".
I’m a experienced player but new DM and all of the players in my campaign are completely new so I always try to get them to act things out but sometimes they just don’t have a good line so as the DM I will do the improv for them just so they can slowly but surely get acclimated to things. The bard in my group was not much of a talker at all at first and I was doing a lot of their persuasion lines and such but slowly they are starting to talk in character a lot more and be awkward and funny and it really helps to bring out their version of the character. It’s extremely fun to get everyone into their characters but it takes time and it’s definitely not always a 100% of the time brain mode is turned on thing. I’m pretty good with coming up with things off the cuff maybe because I grew up with rap and just writing a lot and free styling for fun with friends but not everyone is built like that and is able to come up with solid persuasion or deception or performance lines.
I want to hug this DM. They were clearly hurt and these rules read like it.
What if rule 45 was just like "Also let me know if you disagree with any of these rules and we can work together to change them to something you'll have fun with, after all D&D's about having a good time with some friends".
You'd get mood whiplash so hard your head would fly off xD
i need to do this with my group now
@@xboxoneyes7734 this is a funny man
But if someone disagrees, as per rule 3, the DM must leave!!
this is the good ending
this is the good ending
Ngl the rat people looting their bags sounds like a fun little side quest where the players have to go chase down the rats for their stuff back.
i've done it, it was an entire quest inside a bag of holding
That's just Skaven in d&d
Bushy O'Bummer, the leprechaun tax-collector!
I had the same idea when I read that, funny enough. Sounds like a very fun little side quest.
i ws thinking the same thing actually
I just started a campaign with three players: two rogues and a shadow sorceress. I had no plans prior to their decision to specifically run a stealth - heavy game, but as soon as they suggested it I realized it made way more sense for their patron to hire stealth operatives than a more balanced, traditional party. Never would have happened if they hadn't told them not to worry about party balance and to play whatever class they individually wanted.
I've put a lot of brainpower into coming up with the world the characters are exploring, and I'm very grateful to have players who are interested in its history, geography, and characters. As a result, I do everything I can to maximize their fun and the drama of the story. We spent the entire first session shopping at and robbing "Hogarth's Heirlooms" and "The Hag Nose". And eventually, I'll give them the option to direct their own investigations. I have many roads which lead to Rome.
Idea for you. Have them commit a crime and then hire them to investigate their own crime.
Could be hilarious!
It’s very interesting seeing how different dnd UA-camrs have completely different takes on the same rules
Imagining this dude just being like "You know what???? F this" and getting up and leaving all his shit at the table, driving home with no warning AND leaving his homie behind that he gave a ride to the session? That shit is so funny
"Sorry I can't give you a ride back but the other player thought that was unfair so it's on them"
It's funny until you live it, tbh. It's not fun, especially if it's every single time you anger them. Otherwise yeah it's pretty absurd and one can just laugh at how dramatic it is eventually.
@@luvhair255 This is why I will stick to being solo and independant if I get into DnD or other nerd gatherings; Always have the option of relying on someone as a Plan B, not a Plan A, you know?
I 100% did this once about ten years ago. Those players were fucking terrible. Their only solution was to try and murder things, and when they met something stronger than them I was a "bad dm." I got up and left. Didn't collect any of my shit.
Irl Cartman. "Screw you guys i'm going home."
My DM had an instant death trap that we were told about by two separate gods before we even entered the dungeon that held it. When we found it, it was obviously the thing we were told not to touch. Someone still touched it. That's a fair instakill trap.
"Yo, you're gonna find a sphere of annihilation. It looks like a black floating ball that's spinning stupid fast. It's called that because it annihilates people. Don't touch it unless you want to be annihilated."
...
"You find a black floating ball. It is spinning stupid fast."
"I touch it."
@@Poldovico Yeah, I mean, the intent was that we couldn't let the evil book of dark knowledge fall into the wrong hands, but pretty much that.
@@2lazy4tag41 Was it the rogue? Did they go "Oh, I take a quick peak into the book of all evil"?
@@SiphonRayzar no, it was the paladin that used to be the warlock, I was the rogue.
@@Poldovico Forgive me, but that makes me think of a Tabaxi that sees something and just cannot help himself. "I swipe at it."
Ironically enough I used to roll WIS saves to see if my Tabaxi would engage in Cat Logic or not, never caused harm but it was amusing to go with it.
7:32 As a GM, it hurts to see people do this to their players. you bring up a fantastic point: You are often playing a character that isn't you, and it's not possible to be more charismatic than a high level bard. You are playing a hero who can do things you can't. If you want players to do things, reward them for doing it. Don't punish them for not meeting your expectations. There is already a system in place for this, and it's called inspiration! If a player comes up with a really good argument to persuade an NPC while in-character, give them inspiration! it's that easy folks.
I love the idea of rewarding for what you want rather than punishing for what you don't. That's also why I "grade on a curve" as it were. Some of my players are great at RP, others not so much. I have much lower expectations for the ones who struggle, and I reward them based on effort rather than skill. If someone who never RPs can stutter or stumble through an in-character dialogue, that deserves great celebration!
Quoth The Adventure Zone, "I have a skill on my sheet called History. Presumably this means I can roll History to see if my character knows something about the world that, I, the player, do not. If I can't use the History skill to answer a trivia question with the category of History, then why the fuck is it even on my sheet?"
Well, judging by the other rules and how much rage was in the DM, and especially those "No drunk and high" rules - his group was awful. I think acting out rule was about giving some idea of what they were doing, what they were trying to say when persuading, or intimidating, or insight checking. I bet his players were like: I persuade him, here's your roll. What do you mean how do I persuade him? I just do! No, I don't want to bribe him, I don't want to say something inspiring to him, I'm not begging or giving him reasons to believe me, I'm not doing anything to the guard, I just persuade him! What do you mean "how" I made a roll, take it!
Personally I think expecting mfs to act out their persuasion checks is unhinged, but I also find it really annoying when people just say "I roll to persuade him". Like, at least explain what your argument is, otherwise I have no idea what the DC for the persuasion roll should be. If you can't provide a rational reason why the npc has any reason to listen to you, I'm going to make the DC higher.
Every time you do a strength check I need you to go do a set of deadlifts. The weights will be set to match the DC
"Alright, you have to personally intimidate m-"
"Player pulls out a fucking gun."
After reading all the rules, this seems like a forever DM who didn't want to DM in the first place who just completely snapped.
I had one of those for a long time. Fortunately one of our other players stepped up and became an awesome DM before the snap inevitably occurred.
Then why did he even start playing in the first place?!
@OtisCluck In some circumstances, if somebody doesn't step up and DM, a game doesn't happen for anybody. Some people take it on just to make sure there's a game for everyone. That's how I started, and my campaign has been going on for nearly five years now.
To be fair, I haven't minded DMing, although I didn't really want to do it at the start. Now with so long DMing, I am starting to get burnt out, and if nobody else offers to run anything I'm going to change system to mitigate the burnout, and anyone who wants to stick around and play a different system can.
Funny idea, force the "wizard" to drink a shot of fireball to use fireball
Dungeons and Flagons?
Drunkards and flagons
Drunkards & Dodders
Drunkards & Dodders
The player takes a shot to use class or race abilities
*Cheesy Obligatory pop music*
Skaven trying to steal your player's loot while they're in a city actually sounds like a good hook for a silly rat man adventure
they meltin magic items down to use the definitely not warpstone in them to make a massive laser.
note: when i say not warpstone i mean certain magic items being infused with some warpstone like rock giving it magic
@@AdamJones-tu9lx Better than goblins, who will also melt your magic items down to bars, but only for their metal value. (Also the charcoal for their forge is made from stolen staffs and wands, or as they call them: walking sticks.)
HEAT but with Skaven
these schematics.. a massive excavation laser to expand their burrows deeper perhaps. oh my god, do you see it, the ratbrains built it upside down, if they start this thing up the whole city above us evaporates.
Or the start of a horror rat man adventure, diving deep into the themes of the rat men.
how can someone read this list and not only miss that this was a table of problem players, but go on to say they'd also like to bully the dm?
Because it's stupid to even Dm-ing is those rules are the solutions ?
@@MrGuana141 most of them are not good rules and he shouldn't play with that group, but i struggle to see why you'd read this and fantasize about being one of the players in that group, joining in with tormenting him
Yeah, this video hurt to listen to the longer it went on, but not because XP3 is a bad person, the situation simply flew over his head. It happens to all of us sometimes.
@@poycixyz4614 that's true, i don't think he's a bad person either. he usually makes good points
Problem players can definitely be chill people irl, but there's no way in hell this DM is a good person
The thing is, some of these rules are pretty reasonable, but the attitude of the guy makes it seem like he really does not want to be there
The guy sounds exhausted lol
People like you literally got called out on his commentary for the first rule.
How based.
@@kurtisdeakinagreed. Even just the first few rules show this is a DM who wants to DM and everyone have a good time playing the game the DM has come up with.
I suspect this DM has tried to make changes before, to encourage the players to…you know play the actual game, and they have been waved away by the players
Honestly more than half of them could be totally reasonable if everyone at the table wanted to play that way. But it's very, very clear from the tone that isn't the case.
Yeah like the group doesn't sound great either but just DO NOT play with them then, there's no need to try to make it work when it's obviously doomed. Although given how silly some of these rules are I doubt they'd be able to get a better group if they tried lol
This is the most toxic DM-to-player relationship ever. You can tell it’s the player’s fault too, and they just all need therapy or disband
Probably both.
@@Kresegoth Probably
Mmm. There are some pretty grap-ey DM’s out there.
to quote another comment:
"The reason the original post was removed from reddit and now only exists as screenshots is because when people started to ask OP questions, it quickly became clear that players are complete assholes and OP deleted it."
it's very clear the players were incredibly shitty so the GM quit running for them, they then harrassed him continuously to run a game for him so he came up with these rules basically so either they'd stop being assholes, or he wouldn't have to run.
The therapy is non-negotiable this isn’t an “or”
It's pretty obvious if you take context into consideration that the DM isn't the only problem here. I'm really disappointed that everyone just jumped to OP's side on this, when he's clearly being dishonest and disingenuous about the whole thing. Think about it - what do we know about the players, just from context clues in the post?
1. They're consistently showing up super late to session, and then leaving constantly to smoke weed/cigarettes.
2. They're getting so drunk and high mid-session that the session has to end early.
3. They're ordering food - not snacks, but full MEALS - in the middle of the session and eating whenever they want to, getting food mess all over his stuff.
4. They're simultaneously complaining that the DM isn't giving them hard enough boss fights, and that the fights 'aren't fair' when things don't go their way at the same time??
5. They're rolling dice before committing to actions, and rolling their dice OFF THE TABLE so no one can see the result and they can lie about it, something I haven't seen anyone do since my freshman year of high school.
6. They're whining that he doesn't do random encounters, the one thing any experienced DM will tell you is usually a terrible idea in the first place.
7. They're ignoring rule 0 and rules-lawyering the DM based on reddit posts.
8. They're actively using guidance and divination spells to meta-game.
9. They're actively talking trash about the DM behind his back to each-other, instead of bringing up issues to him directly.
And that's all ignoring the context of the rules - these weren't what he was ALREADY doing, these are his demands if they want him to come back to DMing for them. Clearly he's fed up and doesn't want to continue because he has the players from hell, and I honestly can't blame him. I would never DM for a group like this, full-stop.
No, punishing someone in-game for out-of-game behavior isn't a good idea, and a lot of these rules were written to be purposefully unreasonable from the get-go, so I can definitely see criticism there if he's actually serious about continuing the campaign. I highly doubt he is, though, from how angry his tone is throughout the entire post. This was a forever DM finally snapping after taking way too much abuse from disrespectful players, not a nightmare DM throwing a temper tantrum over his party not respecting his terrible rulings.
Thank you for being the only one I've seen recognize this. I honestly feel bad for the guy because he's so obviously dealing with terrible PCs. Obviously we can't vouch for his character, and the fact he got to the point of writing all this up says enough, but it's very possible he was trying to be a good DM and just got pushed over the edge by the wrong people. I sincerely hope that they all find another way to enjoy D&D (with other groups) and are able to get past the tragedy that was this campaign.
That's almost exactly what I was thinking. I'm imagining players wandering around, intimidating and making fun of everything, complaining about not knowing what's going on despite playing Pokemon go the entire time, if they showed up at all, and making his life hell. Finally quits, and the players come asking him to play again, so he makes absurd demands. Dude doesn't want to play with these people.
Also, I follow most of these rules in all of my games without thinking about it. Be a conscientious player, let the DM be a DM, and pay attention to the plot covers most of these rules.
@@evil_planner Oh I totally agree. Obviously we can't know what the DM or the players are actually like, but clearly they don't belong in the same campaign with each other, that's for sure.
I just hope if he's a good, passionate DM that he doesn't take this experience of getting treated this way and then publicly shamed on reddit and beyond as a sign that he should quit.
EXACTLY.
The guy who made the post was brash in wording, sure. He's frustrated and wrote out his 44 rules in a most likely post-session anger. BUT, no one is asking (except you) why is he writing these rules? So many of them fall into the joke about warning signs that are "so specific there must be a story". You don't *specifically ban* ordering meals unless this is a repeat issue.
The DM is angry his players disrespect him constantly. Many of these "rules" are basic common decency and having to write them out in a bullet list tells more about the players than the DM. You shouldnt have to make a rule to stop getting shit-faced in the middle of a game session.
Just like we do know the DM we also don't know the players and IMO of he had a problems with them he should've first off never posted it online and secondly stated that these rules were because of so. Otherwise I'mma see him as just a bitchy bad DM
"Act out your intimidation checks"
The one guy running the practically nonverbal barbarian: "COWABUNGA IT IS"
Jacob becoming an underwear model overnight was NOT what I was expecting from this channel, but I appreciate it nonetheless.
That's what I call multiclassing! XD
Mimic underwear.
REAL. lol
😂
Fatherhood changes people
Honestly, half of these rules could probably be replaced with one: If you aren't at the table AND paying attention, I will skip your turn and you won't get experience and loot. If you're late or don't show, we will go on without you.
If the players actually want to play, they will get the message. If they don't, at least you'll be free to look for a new group or find something else to do, because they will probably not want to play at all.
Yeah, I feel like a lot of this DM's problem is that the players are not paying attention, and then whining when they aren't being handed treasure when they just happen to participate.
My party likes the 1 minute turn rule. My version is- declare your intention within 1 minute. You just need to tell us what you are doing by the end of that minute. It’s fine for us to read the spell and resolve the action after that minute. It is a combat game. You don’t get to pause time like Metroman and contemplate the origins of the universe or every conceivable way to win the fight during your turn. A round is 6 seconds in the game world so your character needs to think quickly, and in the midst of combat, it makes sense that not every decision will be perfect. Some of the most entertaining moments from my fave cave from players making snap decisions. Often really good, sometimes really bad. Always memorable.
Yeah, deciding in little time adds realism/ verisimilitude to the game, like the characters can make bad decisions in the heat of the battle, and its fun to deal with the consequences...
Its too cold and perfect when the players have infinite time to think and decide his actions, considering every little detail.
We dont use the 1 min rule, but if the player starts to drag, we call on him
Beside that, every player has the others turns to think, so its not like 1 min, its everyone else's and all the enemies turns to think...
My elf bard got absolutely skewered because the barbarian decided to yeet his sword at a slime monster that my character (who was positioned between him and the slime) was currently kicking at the time. Which resulted in everyone at the table panicking, trying to figure out how to stop the bleeding as I was making death saving throws. Thankfully, the DM was being easy on us because we were all new to dnd, and I succeeded my saving throws.
It definitely made our experience more interesting, and my bard used it as material whenever she wanted to tease the barbarian.
@@EduHBa To be clear, I don't have a timer or anything- I just push people if the table is losing energy.
Another thing about what you're saying is: your party likes it. It doesn't seem to be a hard unbreakable rule and you seem to want to work together with your players. DnD is supposed to be fun and you do your best to keep it that way for everyone including yourself
Honestly, best way to run turn timer stuff is not that your turn gets skipped, but you character just runs at and attacks the closest guy as many times as he can then end turn and takes the dodge action if nothing is in range when the time is up instead of just skipping
I disagree about having a time limit being bad. I have some players who take wayyyy too long on their turns because they want to main character everything. I love that they enjoy my game and story so much that they feel like they can be this super bad a** character, but it's not being considerate to everyone else that's playing the game. We don't want to wait 6 minutes for you to decide whether you want to cast acid splash, flaming hands, or chromatic orb on a goblin, who is only there to make you feel bad a**, while you're in a dungeon puzzle about to fight a boss. I won't put super strict time limits on what my players can do in a round, but I do ask that they have their turn prepared before it gets to them. It is incredibly frustrating to watch you hog all of the playtime while everyone else gets bored, and we can't progress the story.
For clarification, if they're in a situation in which they need to think about what they're going to do, I absolutely let them. But other than that, I justify it because each round is 6 seconds in game. You're not on the pill from Limitless, you can't plan the entire bossfight out in less than 6 seconds. Especially not if you're a common peasant who can't even read. Play your character, not what a movie character is. React to a fight like they would.
Brings back memories of late game Civilization IV with friends. When everyone has a huge empire and massive amounts of units and everyone's turn can take upwards of 20 minutes because there is so much stuff to manage.
NOT READING ALL 44 RULES?!
*gets up and leaves*
AND GET YOUR OWN RIDE HOME!
the rules were late to session so their hit points were halved. Thats why we have only 22 (or not, i could count them incorrect) rules, the exact half of the original ones.
@@n0-nononame Who cares if they were 22 or not? We can't tell you you're wrong, otherwise you'll just leave.
post was deleted by the user that posted it so we can know what are the other rules...
players: WE PLAY ONLINE
@@stephenparkson3122 there are videos covering all of the rules like the one by DnD Doge
I actually kind of agree with the rule about explaining what you're doing before you just roll dice. I ran a game when I was in college and had a player that would constantly just roll and give me a number. That's it, that's all he would do. In order to find out what he was doing, I would have to ask. Every. Single. Time. And it would always be something basic, like "I'm rolling to attack," or "oh, I'm casting this spell," something that would take maybe five seconds to explain. After a few sessions, he started sounding annoyed every time I asked. Eventually I pulled him aside after a session and said "Hey man, I need you to please start saying what you're doing before you just roll dice. I can't know what you're trying to do and whether or not you're successful unless you tell me." Those weren't the exact words I used, as this was a long time ago and I don't remember exactly what I said, but it was something along those lines. Just something quick, polite, and to the point. He then proceeds to blow up at me, yelling that that's not how he wants to play and it's my job as the DM to figure out what he's doing without "having to ask like a dmbss every single fking time". And yes, those were the words he used, that much I remember. After he got done, I was no longer in the mood to be polite and simply told him to either start announcing his actions or stop playing. He opted for the latter, and every session afterwards ran much more smoothly.
Tldr: Don't just roll dice and expect the DM to know what you're trying to do, that's just annoying.
I don't get it why would he think you would just know what he's doing
@@1Peasant I have absolutely no idea.
@@crackergaming1252 You're trying to DM and you can't even read minds? I'm going home!
I've had a player who rolled and then announced what he was doing. Coincidentally, all of his good rolls were the "once per long rest" power attacks and whatever, whereas the bad rolls were basic attacks and whatever.
Yeah we shut that shit down real quick.
@@1Peasantmaybe he assumed the DM can read minds
really needed context on this video, this comes off like the players are the absolute worst. I would love to hear the dm talk about his reasoning
you are right, later rules include not leaving the table every 5 minutes to smoke weed, not being blackout drunk, replacing his things when you break them, etc...
yup, people looked into the OPs comment history and found that they actively bragged about making their DM miserable, and that the DM took the hiatus specifically because they were sick of it, so the group outright harassed the DM into coming back, which is what lead to these rules being made. it seems fairly likely that these rules were intentionally meant to get the players to leave him alone. its also entirely possible that the OP is exagerating to some, potentially rather large, degree about how bad the rules actually were
23:20 you are absolutely losing it, the voices won, the insanity went live. 😂😂😂
The big context with many of these rules is they were written by a DM who's been putting up with the inverse for too long.
This is a DM who's snapped after having a group of players with terrible habits and zero respect for the DMs efforts for a long time.
I don't know, man. I get the general sentiment, but with how the rules are written I'm just getting huge "everyone's an asshole" vibes. I struggle to believe this is purely a one-sided situation.
@@NeoZhinzo i dont think it is one-sided either, but regardless of that, speaking like an asshole is one of many common things people do when angry/at their limit, so i wouldn't use that as sole evidence
@@NeoZhinzo He's got 4 separate rules about people showing up late, not showing up at all, getting drunk/ high, and taking breaks "every 10 minutes" to smoke or w/e. I don't think it's purely , but it sounds a lot to me like these rules are the result of the DM possibly being new and having unrealistic expectations that their game will be like Critical Role or D20 wanting to play D&D, and and thee reality that not only do his friends not live up to that expectation but they aren't even taking the game seriously (to the point of not even bothering to show up on time/ at all, let alone sober) and in general disrespecting him.
@@shizucheesein the original post too, he also had rules about "not being on your ohone on [Instagram/snapchat]". It points more towards shitty players
@@shizucheese One of the rules actually has him saying shit like "This isn't Critical Role", and it's clearly in response to players pulling shit.
I think the 2nd character sheet one was the result of players complaining about fights being too easy and then immediately complaining about them being too difficult when the DM increased the difficulty a small amount
Bro literally every dm tells you to have a second character sheet shit happens during play and characters will die 😂. I’m gunna be real this DM probably sucks ass though.
@@irontarkus190Yeah, even though some of the rules indicate the players were acting like goblins (the rules about cheating on spells/spell slots, missing sessions with no explanation and the DM’s stuff getting broken), this DM should not be running games because they clearly have zero communication or conflict resolution skills.
"...and there Is the real possibility that you might die, this Is a hard campaign"
Players:"hell yeah! Let's go!"
*PC actually dies*
Player:"man, this game sucks, now I'm sad and I'll keep being sad the whole night"
Player2:"yeah, this situation Is so hard, there Is a problem that I don't know how to handle and so I'll keep moaning about It and be pissed"
This happens far too often, and the opposite too
@@irontarkus190in a campaign where revives are possible for about 1k gold worth of a diamond, second character sheets are pretty much moot.
"A small amount" he probably went the nuclear option and doubled or tripled the CR. Or did something scummy like putting the party up against a Rakshasa when they have no magic items or high enough level spells.
The little rat people is so funny, because i actually run a Nemesis that's a goblin with obscenely high stealth, but no dmg, which tries to steal from the party every once in a while. He's called Raglin, the Goblin and sells loot he steals to donate money and food to orphanages
That could even be an interesting plot point.
The PCs notice that their stuff keeps disappearing. So they try to figure out what happened. And then they learn of the rat people. A decision needs to be made if it's worth taking their stuff back.
@@HappyBeezerStudios Yeah. It's not super often, and usually it's stuff they just took, not taking away items they've used for sessions.
The resolution hasn't come yet, but I'm pretty sure at least the paladin is suspecting something, as he actually managed the DC and saw the Raglin, before they ran away.
They also rebought their stolen goods from the guild, so they know someone is stealing and selling their goods.
“You can’t persuade someone out of trauma”
Someone tell that to my GP who thought he could cure mine with the power of facts, logic, and condescending platitudes.
Its a GP mate, theyre basicaally licnese drug deaalers, hospital doctors use "they'd make a great GP" as a polite way to taake the pissout of a lesser Doctor. See a specialist, if you can get one ofc. Good luck.
Imagine if that's how it worked. Just the therapist sitting there rolling persuasion on you over and over until they got a 20 and you're cured.
@FieldMarshall3 I'm imagining a d20 in one of those Trouble board bubbles, and the GP pressing it as fast as they can
What's GP in this context? Grandparent? General practitioner?
@@genelearnsenglish4242 I assume General Practitioner or DM mispelled. It sounds like a very much GP thing to do. But, Grandparent is also i very likly cannidite
10:08 I literally write "emergency" characters where their location is "random street corner by the party" or "table next to them at the tavern" in case I accidentally make things unclear. They'll straight up be like "hey, my daughter went missing and was last seen at X location, can you help?" or something else blatantly obvious
From there, it's 100% up to them if they want to pursue it or do something completely different lol
For every campaign, I always have at least one NPC specifically designed for the players to like, with an excuse for why they might be hanging around a lot; this gives me a lot of opportunities to get the players back on track when they're distracted or lost because they not only enjoy roleplaying with that NPC but they also actively want to help that character, so having that character somehow prompt them back into the plot usually works.
In an upcoming Strixhaven campaign, for example, this NPC is a vampire Witherbloom student named Crux. They are so sad and pathetic that all the players have been captivated. One of them even wants her character to date them in the future. So I can rest assured that I can get my players to do almost anything if I find a way to leverage Crux's existence, like turning them into a bully magnet to encourage the players to fight other students
@@revui834 I love this idea! I have a new campaign starting in a couple week so I'm gonna come up with an NPC they'll love and see how it goes
"And he is gonna move to hit you, he can just about get to you with all his movement"
"Oh well I have spirit guardians up, so his movement is halfed as he enters it and I need a save for...21 damage, half on a save. I dont think he has the movement left to get to me, no?"
"Oh well he saves so his movement is still the same"
"But you still lose half just for entering it, the save is just damage"
*DM walks off in a huf*
The dm should just have their character stand outside of the range and start chucking daggers at a range.
@@Deathnom Nope, can't do that, he has to take the save damage: "Rule 7: If you move to a square in combat there's no take backs." Man literally checkmated himself with his own rules, lol
But he walks off in a huff at only half movement.
@@falsnamae3511nice
5e spellcasting needs serious help
Man a GM gets bullied, and one of the bullies drags it online. and then all the DnD influencers of course had to make a video profiting of it. Whelp. sometimes this hobby is fucking wild.
I'm guessing Rule #2- Someone must have said the fights weren't hard enough or they weren't feeling challenged, and the DM reacted by saying if you want harder fights, prepare to die and wait with a new character sheet and don't blame me- you asked for it! (Maybe)
There are a ton of these rules that honestly make sense with the context of shitty players but no one is reading between the lines and shitting in the DM.
Don't get me wrong the DM is handling this horribly but these rules aren't happening on a vacuum.
I think he was saying if you wanted harder fights he was going to kill your character to teach you a lesson
@@charlesreid9337 see everyone just assumes malice on the DMs part giving him no benefit of the doubt.
For a lot of DMs it's hard to give fights that are challenging but fair. And if you have players that are constantly commenting on your fights then it makes sense to be like "Fine but don't get mad if you die."
@@DivusMagus And if that rule was the only one like this, then that would be a valid interpretation. But when there are 43 other rules which include the assertion that there will be traps that just instantly kill you regardless, and you'll have your loot taken from you whenever the DM feels like it, and questioning or challenging the DM in any way will be met with getting cursed out, and/or the DM walking out; then this is no longer about needing a way to deal with shitty players. It's about making excuses to not be there.
This is a DM literally making a list of reasons to get up and leave in the middle of a session.
@@phiefer3 I am not saying the DM is faultless, he is clearly immature and cant address problems properly but people are acting like this is coming out of thin air.
The players are clearly causing a lot of issues too.
The loot rule for instance he said "...how much you expect loot." You didn't add that part unless the players are constantly complaining about what they are getting loot wise.
Players rolling before DM asks for it
Players getting to from table in the middle of a session a lot.
Showing up late a lot.
All I am saying is a lot of these are somewhat understandable with context. The rules aren't good however but no one wants to even see it slightly from his perspective. This whole group sucks IMO.
"Hey, DM, could you maybe not give us so much exhaustion?"
DM: * rolls inititive _in real life_ as a health bar appears over his head with his name under it like it's a boss battle *
Then you knock his health bar off. "Rule 6. Not a video game. "
Seriously annoying. I’ve been thinking about dipping on my game because my DM is VERY fond of punishment mechanics and making every fight a slog. If you don’t gain a level of exhaustion during a session, it’s because he’s busy constantly damaging you with environmental hazards you can’t avoid (like smoke)
Dark souls music only it's a sweaty neckbeard
@@vokkera6995 Exhaustion system is also just boring. Almost no table I have played has used it as it is written.
@@Syhyronica so Mohg?
This guy: "Guidance is banned!"
Literally my group: "Hey, DM? Can Guidance be a reaction that we can use whenever someone makes a skill check? Otherwise it's a very short duration and I don't want to say a million times I'm casting Guidance for no reason."
"Yeah, sure. I don't see why not."
"Sweet."
Because you have actively assist somebody knowing they will do it in advance, that's why.
It's a spell that can be stacked with lending assistance from another character.
I can see Guidance being banned because of how badly players can/will abuse it. Making it a reaction is definitely a good thing to do
@@asumax8 Except it really isn't that good since it only affects out of combat, and even then we have high DCs for this stuff. Even if we're using some strange thing like Insight to set the DC, passives exist for a reason.
@@hythunza1811 I agree that its not that great of one. Its good, not great. The annoying part is how people are constantly for EVERY little thing they or someone in the party does, they are like "I cast Guidance!" I mean for everything. Its like "Your characrer doesn't even know whats going on! So no you can't cast Guidance to help!" Lol
Campaign 3 of CR shows a great example of how annoying casting Guidance can be. Matt even had to say something to them lol
@@asumax8 I personally just subtle nerf it by having NPCs call you out on it if you're using it during conversation or idle contests. You can use it on all the door picking, enemy spotting, and athletic rolls you like, but use it during arm wrestling contests, a card game, or while trying to persuade someone the DC will require more than just a +2 from guidance, and you'll auto-fail the arm wrestling due to cheating. Unless you're casting it on yourself in some circumstances, in which case it's considered natural.
Okay, so storytime! #10 reminded me of this time in our game, the DM pulled up some character art of a cool NPC he'd introduced. Now, I'm bad with names, and so to remember who someone is supposed to be I sometimes give them stupid nicknames. Usually, they just stay in my head, but sometimes my mouth moves faster than my brain can stop it. When I looked at this awesome image of this suave, handsome, silver-haired, dhampir elf guy wearing a fancy blue doublet, I immediately blurted out "Oh, Blue Dracula! Got it." Instead of chiding me, having my character be roasted randomly in vengeance, or leaving,...my DM sighed, rubbed his temples, and accepted that we would forever and always know this NPC as Blue Dracula and moved on. I suffered immense psychological trauma afterwards in game, but that was planned and part of the fun.
Honestly - having timed turns for SOME very specific situations - can be fun. Like a gimmick for a fight - not while campaign.
I could totally imagine facing some speed focused opponent that does this
Yeah, I could imagine a timed fight being cool if its like a boss having some self destruc thing for the base, and they have like a set amount of turns to fucking run and figure out how to stop the boss from stopping you
fantasy hot potato
Unless it's someone new at the game or someone playing a class they are unfamiliar with, timing turns is the way to go. Yeah, taking fifteen minutes to concoct a _master plan_ is fun... only for that guy while the rest of the party just idles away in boredom. I agree that a minute is too tight, in my current campaign is three minutes.
@@feckboygurry832That's completely different from timing individual turns, though. This DM seems okay with a thousand turns being taken as long as each one is 1 minute maximum. Having events that trigger after a set amount of turns, therefore giving the players a time-limit in-game is a reasonable thing to do.
Totally on board with 8. There are at least 4 reasons for this to be a universal truth. A player should first announce an action, and the GM should be the one requesting (or not) a roll.
yeah i dont even play the game and its a completely understandable rule lolol
real, but its also simple to have a bit of a talk abt cos yeah it can lead to some "the dm is an enemy"-type gameplay but imagine like, having ur chara killed or ur dm just WALKING OUT bc u got ahead of urself or ur new lmao
#6 is specifically about side quests, not a main quest. In my campaign I'm working on I have tons of side quests and it's up to the characters to follow it if they want, but for the main quest they will have their hands held when necessary.
His "this isn't a video game" line is how in video games, when you finish a conversation with someone it will automatically log the quest, put a marker, etc. Even if you didn't pay any attention to the conversation lol
I get it, but it seems pretty clear that the players just want hack and slash dungeon crawl where they explore the map, kill monsters, and collect cool loot. It also seems like they want a pretty casual game while they hang out, eat, and drink/smoke. The DM wants to run a narrative focused, roleplay heavy campaign, but it just isn't what the players want or care about. It's like one person in a round of golf wanting to play strictly by the rules used on the PGA tour while everyone else is three beers in, barely want to keep score, and are more interesting in go to the club house after barely finishing the front 9.
Timed turns are also super okay, IF its something everyone has agreed to beforehand. I've played in multiple long campaigns that have had entire 8 hour+ sessions dedicated to a single combat. The absolute peak (or depth of despair) was a single round that took 6 hours. The madness of high level 3.5 dnd with homebrew on top.
XP is talking through the perspective of reasonable players and a randomly toxic DM.
The thought experiment of “the DM made this a rule because some or all are doing the opposite to the point where they wanted to call it out” paints the picture of a frustrating session.
That doesn’t mean all those rules are reasonable or good, but imagine a session where players are doing the opposite of 10 of those rules, that you most agree with, enough to where you needed to say something about it.
Even players rolling dice in the floor or over the whole table and having to find them and gather them everytime, I would probably be like “hey can we just roll dice in the table infront of you, thank you”
i feel like 5 sessions of "guys can we PLEASE roll dice on the table infront of you with no shenanigans" will quickly lead you to make a rule of "if the dice leave the table, they are automatic worst outcomes"
Agreed. Like, this list is hella toxic and also don't threaten players to "actually fight" them, sure, but if you ask the guys not to show up stoned out of their mind and they repeatedly arrive 30+ minutes late in a hysterical gigglefit and then call your game stupid, I wouldn't blame you if you packed your stuff and went home.
Yep, this list of rules reads like trauma response to a table full of drunk A-holes that have harassed a DM to come back and continue to cop abuse.
Or at least a troll post to illustrate a collection of worst case scenarios.
see i think the reason so many people are saying they are a bad DM is because they are looking at it from a perspective of never having DM'd before
this is actually 4d chess by a forever DM to force someone else to be the new DM
Disagreed, they just sound like a bad DM. If they don't want to DM, they can just say: "I don't want to DM."
Difficult to have someone be the DM for you, if people don't want to play with you
They could just say they dont want to DM. This list just makes me think they are a shitty person and i wouldn't want them as a player either. If i was a DM for a person with an attitude like this i would just kick them out of the game and i doubt anyone at the table would care.
As a forever DM, I can confirm that just saying "I don't want to DM anymore" is often met with guilt tripping and statements like "Well, I guess now WE can't play DnD anymore... you jerk! Thanks for NOTHING!" So yeah... maybe they were trying to make it as miserable as possible.
@@berserkasura8981they DID say they didn't want to DM. After they asked him to come back "after a long hiatus" this was his ultimatum. Basically he didn't want to DM, and wanted them to stop asking. Then the players decided to post this on reddit to publicly shame their former DM. Not cool, you guys!
My Drakewarden player has agreed that if a player dies, they control his Drake for the rest of the session. He’s a great player in a great party.
Edit: Seeing everyone who agrees/is taking up the idea makes me very happy, thanks guys!
Your Drakewarden player is a Chad
...A player dies? Not their character?????
(I'm joking and that's very cool to control a character after PC died actually)
last name Ever, first name Greatest.
@@adam17tt hey, if I die mid-dnd game and get magically transported into the body of a dragon in a fantasy world I'll TAKE IT, man
Very nice
I never timed people's actual turns, however, I did have a bit of fun with timing at one point. The final boss of my campaign was an extremely powerful lich who in turn had a very short Rejuvenation window. Thus when my players killed him, I told them that we would be keeping initiative orders, and they'd need to figure out how to take down the wards and defenses around his phylactery in a certain amount of real world time, or he would revive again.
When they asked questions I had to consider, or I wanted to give them some extra details on a specific thing they were attempting or an action they were considering, I would pause the timer so I personally wouldn't use any of the time I'd given to them, and give them a little room to breathe. When the timer ran out, they'd just figured out the puzzle that brought down the ward, so I told the party that they had until the end of the next "Round" to figure out how to break the Phylactery or he would come back.
Luckily, due being level 20 as well as having obtained a special weapon that was empowered by vengeful souls from those the Lich had slain that could also bypass damage immunities against undead, they were able to destroy the phylactery and kill the Lich before he got to take another crack at them.
I utilized this strategy specifically to create a feeling of stress and dread for them because it's exactly what their characters would be feeling, in trying to access the phylactery and destroy it before their foe could remanifest for Round 2. I wouldn't do that otherwise, because unnecessary stress isn't really the vibe at my table, but it was well worth using in this circumstance.
I personally sometimes time turns not as a "fuck you do your action already" but as a way to heighten tension. One time, my players were in this really high stakes chase scene and had to find a place to hide. They were taking so long that all the built-up tension just kinda fizzled out. When I turned on my phone and placed a one-minute timer in front of them, they all started panicking and decided on where their characters wanted to hide and rolled stealth. It was honestly pretty funny seeing their brains light up as they scrambled to not get caught. They didn't get caught at the end of the scene, so they felt pretty energized right after and the session ended up being a bit more dynamic. Now, whenever we have a high-tension situation and the players all get paralyzed, I just pull out ol' reliable timer and get the session rolling again.
But that's reasonable and from the sound of it you give them plenty of time before hand. (Correct me if I'm wrong please.) However making every action in combat timed, like this DM is doing, isn't good for anyone at the table. If a turn is taking way too long I probably would be like alright you're taking a while maybe we delay your turn for now or in an extreme case pull out a timer, but I wouldn't do it for every action in combat past that point. That said keeping tension is at the very least a good reason to do so.
I think that having timed turns is de facto bad is something I disagree with. If the very idea of timed turns causes a player to stress out to the point that everything is ruined for them than I question if they have the emotional maturity to even be playing the game in the first place. I honestly believe the part of being a good player is self imposing a time limit on yourself. The game may be make believe, but our ability to play it is still heavily constrained by reality.
I have to be honest, if my players are taking too long, I pull out a timer. There is no reason that you should be taking 5 plus minutes on a turn, to decide what you want to do. If you are rolling dice, or trying to figure out aoes thats fine, they just have to tell me what they are doing.
I was the one to suggest implementing timed turns to my dm a while ago, and she agreed along with the rest of the group , as a rp heavy party we all thought it was a smart idea to avoid any combat turning the game to a slog. When the next session rolled around the dm didn't even have to set a timer cause we were aware of the problem and making the collective effort to focus and streamline the game by ourselves, so it turns out ya just need to gently remind players to not stare at their character sheet in silence for 5 minutes and pay attention outside of their turn :)
I really think it's one of those things where it depends on if you're doing it to be vindictive to your friends, or if you're doing it to create tension because you believe that will create a better and more memorable experience.
All "rules" can be broken for the sake of that last sentiment, to be fair, it just depends on how it's approached. If people understand the conditional circumstances.
I actually think a large part of these rules is the way this guy presents them to his group. It feels like, really angry or checked out.
Use these rules in combination with 'Tomb of Horrors' and see if there's a real life murder in your group...
I was an hour late to one session - I try to sneak in through the back of a building to meet up with the rest of the party. SURPRISE! It’s the Thieve’s Guild. I get stabbed with four Sneak Attacks, barely survive, and play the rest of the session fading in and out of consciousness at 1HP.
That's pretty cool
@@apjapki- no, it isn't
Was this a "you should have checked/could have known to be more careful with context clues, and the DM hinted you were in trouble" sort of situation? There's a type of table where that could be funny, especially if it was your own fault you were late and you chat/socialise during games or have something else to do. But if it was just a vindictive way to punish you for being late to session then that's mean
@@danielcrafter9349 I mean it depends how much you like clusterf**ks in your game. I find the idea of my character sneaking into a tavern back room and accidentally wandering into a Thieves Guild meeting hilarious. What a story!
I'm assuming that the characters weren't together in the last session and the decision to sneak in was from the player, not railroaded by the DM and the DM was open to the player doing other things without being ignored. If those things aren't true then the DM is on a power trip and you should probably call them on it.
I give the DM points if they already prepped this room as the Thieves Guild or established it through play.
"THIS PERSON DOES NOT WANT TO DM, PLEASE FREE THEM" is literally all i got from these rules
4:55 they probably mean that if you die in battle, your backup character can't just spontaneously show up in the middle of the battle; you'll have to wait for the next moment of downtime to introduce your new character.
I’ve been close to this mindset. If it isn’t made up, the DM is probably stuck with a handful of friends that aren’t good players but he desperately wants to have a group and feels like it’s them or nothing.
The rules that I can imagine coming from a good place:
1. timed turns, it’s less about a hard time limit, more about players not bothering to learn basic rules or research their own character abilities between sessions. The solution depends on the player but it ain’t this.
2. Not showing up without reason - if you can imagine a disrespectful DM, you can imagine a disrespectful player. Biggest reason everyone I know who plays D&D but doesn’t get to play is flaky people. People they know personally say they’ll be there and then you get an excuse 5 minutes before session - if at all. Baffling, insane behavior imo, but some people be like that and it’s a pain when you can’t play without them.
3. Rolling before DM asks - it’s just rude. Especially when you do try to explain the dynamics of it and your players dgaf or are dismissive.
4. The whole “I’ll take my ball and go home” immature thing - like it or not if nobody else is willing to DM you do have this leverage in the relationship. It’s stupid to think it will play out in your favor, but it does discourage the rampant disrespect for the DM’s boundaries if you have immature friends that still want to play. There is obviously a healthier way to enforce boundaries and better friends to be had.
Seriously, I think this guy just wants anyone else but him to DM - I doubt he’s had a chance to play or he’d get why players do half the stuff he hates and he’d have the opportunity to be as miserably passive aggressive as he clearly wants to be.
I agree with this. A lot of his rules seem to be trying to fix problems that are more common with people who are new to pen and paper games too, like the rule about needing to act out what you want your character to do. I run a high school tabletop club and am often one of the first DMs kids will have, so I see a lot of them try to navigate entire sessions without doing any RP at all. In pen and paper games the players need to RP, so requiring it for persuasion checks and the like isn't a big ask, you just can't give a penalty for the player making a poor argument.
Nothing is more frustrating than coming up with several locations and NPCs introducing them to the players and then two sessions later needing to do it all again because the players decided, unprompted, to sail to the forbidden continent, only to immediately leave for some other, new place half the world away; except maybe having new players sit in silence in the first location you drop them in, not interacting with any NPCs in any meaningful ways and not acting on the opening premise of the session. So the rules about no traveling to other *continents* and no asking the DM about what to do make some sense, even if they're bad solutions to the problems they try to fix.
4. I get how the DM holds the leverage here and has the power to end the game, but it's not like he's saying "if the D&D isn't working out, we'll just call it and play some Smash or a board game or something" he's clearly taking it quite personally and acting out by storming out of there at the slightest provocation.
I think you're generally right though, I've often been the DM by default just because most of my friends aren't able to put in that kind of preparation, but I did always wish they could put in more effort as players, like being attentive, knowing their abilities, and planning their turns in advance. I couldn't imagine speaking to my friends this way though. Not only would they not be coming back to D&D but I don't think we'd even be on speaking terms after this. Maybe they're only acquainted through the game? Maybe they just have a weird dynamic where it's cool to tell each other to F off and go cry about? Gotta wonder.
Actually this rule set was made after he had left the group, but they kept begging for him to come back. So rather than a plea of desperation, it’s more of a “Alright, if you want me back then follow these rules TO THE LETTER, or stop bothering me.”
Abut rule 8: I saw enough of sneaky prerollers in public groups to feel that. People who sit across from the dm, don't tell what they're planning and just rolling shit on other people's turns.
First of all - since they roll before they tell they can just say that 2 was a cantrip and nat20 was a big spell.
Second - dude, we're here to play together and I get angry both as a DM and as player when this happens because I can't muster any hype for good or bad rolls when person is just "my turn? oh, I hit this for this damage, move on". Feels like there's an empty space which somehow has a character.
On the other hand that’s absolutely what this guy wants with the timed turn limit
You simply don't count them if that is the case.
But i do like to roll out of turn for making decisions when i'm unsure. I remember my DM feeling uneasy constantly asking "what are you rolling for" just for me to clarify that i was using the dice to help me decide.
Pre rolling just shouldn't be allowed, like seriously that just breaks the spirit and probably the written rules of DND
Maybe I'll sound like an elitist but problematic people just shouldn't play. The 1 difference would be if it was used for a group of people in a school class setting to develop such social skills, which they do have in Europe. Collective games are social contracts. It's not a competitive game. It's not 'let's focus on the murder hobo's ego day'. Gatekeep your games if possible.
@@rompevuevitos222 To clarify I don't have a problem with rolling in general - people can do what the want out of turn. it's when people roll, leave the die in a box and then on their turn point to it "I rolled this for my attacks and this for my damage"
as someone who has been a dm since i was 13, here are my rules as they have always stood:
1. please tell me what you’re rolling for
2. don’t hound me after session to get more info on an npc you thought was suspicious
3. let other players speak, wait your turn in combat unless you have an attack of opportunity
4. don’t kill other players???
5. no seduction (we run our games in school at the dnd club) (getting down with a goblin is not appropriate in school and the teachers really don’t want to be telling you that)
What if killing another player is crucial for the story...
@@pug8714 i’d allow it, but that has never come up in any of the campaigns i’ve run. because its in a club at school (i’ve managed to set up longer sessions outside school though), no one takes it very seriously and keeps on saying ‘can i kill them’ and i have to explain that half the quest line revolves around their character, so if they die, i have to write another campaign (at that point i had no pre written campaigns)
the only session where Aruaru's Destroy Universe is justified because the dm doesn't even enjoy dming anyway 💀
Every player under this DM should start with the Abused feat😏
no one enjoys being a doormat for entitled narcissists, like this guy's players appear to be. They just shouldn't go as far as this guy did and become one of them.
@@bruuuuuuuuhhhh uno reverse-card.
@@robinmohamedally7587found the DM who made the rules
@@bruuuuuuuuhhhhhonestly make that shit for everyone in the table free like all of the character sheet you got prepped for that table automatically just has abused on the background sheet
20:50 Warhammer 40K had a similar rule for dice needing to stay on the table to count. I kind of liked the flavor text in the rule book justifying it.
"if you can't hit a table with your dice, what makes you think your characters can hit their targets with their weapons".
Then realize the sheer chaos that is rolling for a shooty ork army, where you're easily dealing with 40-60 shots a turn.
Missing some shots because you can't fit all the dakka on the table at once is a very fitting thing to happen to an ork army.
The older editions of 40k had some hilariously fluffy fun rules. For example you could cram as many Orks into a Trukk as you could physically balance inside the Trukk flat bed...but if any fell out during movement they were considered dead. So you had Ork players with these elaborate pyramids of Orks.
@@luketfer I see many a fight being started because someone kicked a table and killed 6 orks.
@propyro85 ah it was only if they fell out whilst the Ork player was moving the trukk. If it was stationary you just put them back on the pile
You NEED to read all of them. You'll undertand the DM was hurt a lot. These are hilarious
Serves him right for being a DM.
@@RedSunUnderParadise Wat
@@RedSunUnderParadise That's... a take.
Yeah. Go over all of them and you realize dude had to DM for a group that was busy chatting and doing drugs, then eating and wrecking his stuff, rather than playing the damn game.
@@MurasakiTsukimaru Totally. You can read the lore between lines.
I personally love when my dm is lucky and has “unfair” rolls, it forces us players to adapt and outsmart monsters in encounters, or solve problems without making rolls of our own. It’s pretty fun for both sides.
There are so many ways some of these could be reworded to make it sound just a hundred times more reaosnable
Sounds like a player threw a temper tantrum about some rules, and got hyperbolic AF
@@AlyssMa7rinreally? It seems like the poster copy pasted this so I’d have thought the dm would have sent an email or something
The overall problem is that he clearly doesn't wanna DM for these people, but hes too much of a pussy to outright leave the table
@@AlyssMa7rin The DM references a chat multiple times, meaning that he likely wrote all these rules in said chat, and the player just copy pasted them.
Like if they stopped adding "fuck you suck it up" to the end of them, several of them would be fairly standard table etiquette.
I've thought about timing turns before, but only as a special modifier for something like shutting off a bomb or a situation that is itself time-sensitive. I would of course apply it to the enemies' turns as well. As long as everyone agreed to it beforehand, or if we talked after and agreed not to do it again, then I think it would be a really cool factor in a battle.
It actually is really fun if everyone agrees we've tried it before :D
Time it realistically to six seconds
I love the turn timer, because in combat nobody has time to think out their decisions. They have 6 seconds to make an action, and thats pretty much it. Unless someone is a 20 int wizard, they wouldnt really have the time to think of a super in depth battle plan, and would have to rely on adapting to the situation just as their characters would.
Use timers with players that just refuse to plan ahead. 1 minute time is HEAPS. You don't just get your 1 minute (which is already more than enough imo) you also get at least one more and a bit (another player plus dm) and realistically HEAPS more (since most groups are at least 3, if not 4 players).
I don't want the fighter waiting 5 minutes to just walk (optionally) then hit.
I use timers mostly for bluff - I have a 5 minute sand clock, if someone does nothing on their turn for too long I'll pull it on the table, never had to think of a consequence for running it out. I occasionally do that with puzzles too - somehow having sand trickling down a sandclock gets people from overthinking to acting...
"I think this is a troll post" "these are children"
Oh sweet innocence... I have seen actual adults, older than me (I'm in my mid 20's) have rules that were very similar or even worse, in terms of how restrictive, strict or even dictatorial they were (one gm even explicitly said their tables were dictatorships) and be as contradictory, or even batsh*t insane. All done with no humor or trolling whatsoever, fully genuinely and intentionally. They then of course failed to see the problems even after having a literal dozen people explaining to them exactly why and how it sucked, and left the servers (thankfully never had to talk to one irl) as offended majesties.
And please take note that I did say adults, plural.
Later on in the original post, the DM references the players gossiping about an Australian high school. He is absolutely a teenager with no real life experience.
I happen to be a teenager, and even this seems extreme. Dealing damage to your character when the meta game is broken? That isn’t childlike, that’s just mean.
Its reddit. Like half of them are mentally ill.
I share that sentiment. I've seen grown ass adults throw toddler style fits over this game because one player managed to get one over on the DM or a fellow player.
Hell, had a whole campaign fall apart once because two players got into a fight over how their CHARACTERS where treating each other.
Ohh yeah that's the issue... it is often adults
Everybody at the table thought this was fun but I thought it would fit here anyway, I once had a DM who made the first few sessions a story of us trying to invade the Mind Goblin fortress, and every time we said "mind goblin these nuts" he would make us take 1 psychic damage. Almost immediate tpk.
I gotta say, I have mad respect for the way you ended this video. Saying "I don't want to read the the rest of these, I'm not having fun anymore," is a sign that you value your own mental health above entertaining an audience, and in my mind, conveys that you are the type of DM who sets healthy boundaries both for your players and yourself.
If he bothered to read the rest, his opinion would change from "This is a shit DM" to "What the fuck did these Players do to this poor man!?"
@@starhammer5247both can be true tho, any dm that makes a list like this as a response to bad players is just as bad as said players
@@OtisCluck Thing is, he made this list AFTER the players kept BEGGING him to come back. He said that if they wanted him to come back then they have to follow these rules. It was revealed that the player who posted the rules actually bragged about making the DM quit a while before this. These rules aren't for everyone, it's for this specific group who pissed him off and made him quit being a DM. If you actually read the rules without XP dramatizing them like Goblin did, you find yourself sympathising with the DM. There's a reason the post was taken down, and it's because the poster was the worst player a DM could have.
18:00 I will occasionally have _a_ drink during game but getting drunk during the game just feels really disrespectful
Drunk dnd is fun but only if everyone is on board
I interpretted rule 4 (I'm going to take your loot as regularly as you want it given out) not as "I'm going to give it and then steal it back" so much as "don't ask for loot. If you ask for loot, instead of giving you something new, I'm going to take away something you already had". Which is less silly, and more vindictive.
yea it makes alot of sense, especially if literally every dungeon up to this point the players have been "unhappy" with the middling loot.
For me personally, the biggest actually helpful takeaway from this was your tale on the lawyering.
"Rules-lawyer me (as the DM) but not other players."
That's really fair. If I mess up that's a win for the players, but don't be a jerk to other people who are not as familiar with the game, sometimes I've let people get away with things because it's the first time they really started to get how many options are available and I just want to reward their creativity. I don't have a lot of DM experience so someone tell me of I'm totally wrong here but in the small games I've tried to run it seems like it's gone over well
some people would tell that DM to write a book, i'd argue that they've already written their manifesto
To be fair, he said “for no good reason” on the being late thing. Not just late in general
Yeah but he decides what a good reason is, meaning if your dog gets hit by a car and he doesn't give a shit then it would count the same as if you just overslept
@@youtopea yea, obviously
@@youtopea Based on some of the other rules though I would not be surprised if a reason he has received before was "I got too high and forgot."
@@youtopea That's obviously not what he meant
@@youtopea Based on the other rules, he has had some absolute dogshit players. The reason it was deleted was because people were turning on the OP.
For roleplaying out persuasion checks:
I provide two options.
1) Fully roleplay it out, where you can have your argument more tailor made exactly the way you want it, which could potentially lower the DC you need
2) Tell me the outcome your looking for the the general method you'll be using and make a roll
I like to roll the persuasion/deception before the acting.
Then match what I think the rolled number should sound like.
Makes persuading someone on a 4 *very amusing.*
@@FaeQueenCory
Persuasion 4 is like
"Your honor, i did not *steal* the sword oyt of this noble's house, i just borrowed it for unspecified period of time and i really was going to return it, i swear"
@@FaeQueenCoryI do this kind of thing with vicious mockery.
What I personally think is a really fair rule is to make it so that if you manage to actually roleplay well enough you can skip the dice roll, but if you "fail" you just get to roll like normal. That way it still encourages those fun moments but if someone doesnt want to participiate they wont get punished for it.
@@xah5560 Your honor, I did not murder this man. He just fell on my knife.
Our DM only ever asked us to make the persuasion “worded well”. Don’t just say “yo dork where’s my quest”
"My character has a 20 charisma and I don't" is the same way I feel about puzzles in games. My INT and WIS are nothing to sneeze at (my DEX is somewhat below an ochre jelly), but I don't want to sit there figuring out a puzzle because my INT 20 wizard should know it.
So, unless you make the player of the Barbarian do pull ups each time they do a strength check....
A GM I play with sometimes (not D&D tho) says smth along the lines of: "The Player and the Character perceive things differently, either can be out of it for one reason or another, if the character can figure out something you can't, I will help and tell you."
Tho I think the "Act out Persuasion/Intimidation" rule is correct when you use the most basic and good faith interpretation: The DM should at least know what you want to do, and some basics of how you want to do it. "I want to persuade" says very little of how the character is meant to react, "I want to intimidate" says a bit more, but still little. Describe something you want to appeal to while persuading (maybe the circumstances are so dire that they call for you and your enemy temporarily teaming-up), what particularly intimidating thing you want to do (do you want to just growl at someone, or maybe describe in detail how you will torture them?).
This guy isn’t fun enough to have a band of little rat thieves steal things, I imagine he’d just be like “the hand of god reaches down from the heavens and steals your magic item”.
With Spencer's Gygax comment I'm imagining taxes that the players have no reason to expect
He'd just say it breaks or runs out of magic or something equally stupid
if you actually read the post. youd know that he used to be a fun dm who let stuff slide
and then he decided that this specific group didnt deserve that kind of leeway
I would just have my character not take any treasure. Just leave it in the dungeon. The more time the DM spent deciding on the treasure, trapping it and describing it, the better.
@@thesatelliteslickers907 if he were a good DM he'd just leave
3 rules in and I'm already convinced this is a very patient DM who's group has done nothing but complain about his DM style for months and now he's finally had enough.
Yeah unfortunately because it was deleted and because Jacob only read partway through it it becomes increasingly clear via the comments from the OP in the thread that the players were all fucking goons where the DM had previously just left the group and they had constantly badgered him to come back and DM for them since none of them wanted to do it. These rules were his way of giving the group an 'impossible task' that meant even if he did DM for them (apparently they would not take no for an answer), he wouldn't be DMing for long.
I'm actually pissed jacob stopped midway and just sees the DM in bad faith.
Loot goblin actually posted all 44 rules, and by the time you reached 30, it's downright horror story. The rule implied these players have in previous occasions: CHEAT (by casually 'forgetting' their spell slots), comparing the DM to critical role or internet DM, complaining everything including playlist, bringing actual meal on the table in the middle of session, BROKE the DM's DND gear AND NOT EVEN REPLACING THE ITEM.
This isn't patience, it's hunger for power!
The DM could simply stop DMing for them
But instead demands to be treated higher than God.
@@Robin93k the DM did. these rules are made after the party begged the DM to return as a condition.
@@Robin93k tell me you are incapable of deep thought without telling me. All you see is what's on the surface.
Finding out the players were the problem is the best end to this story