Boy do I hear this one. I've played in several different groups, and I can tolerate a variety of play styles to a certain degree, but I have definitely encountered my limits in terms of play style and the types of players I vibe with in my own games. As you said, not every "problem" player would be a problem in every campaign...I had one of my own who would probably have been happier in a much more casual game than mine was. If everybody else is a role-player and they just want to murder hobo, they obviously aren't going to have fun, and they'll end up frustrating everyone else. Thankfully, we were able to part ways amicably, and they are having a great time in another group's game.
This was the biggest lesson I took from trying BIG LARPs and going back to tabletop. Having a large pool of rpg friends is great. Sorting them into playstyles really, really helps group game enjoyment.
To quote Our Flag Means Death, talk it through, as a crew! I've been lucky to have tried out a few groups, and therefore know what sort of game I prefer in the long run. I've had to talk to the dm, and go "it's not you, it's me" when I realised I was not enjoying the same things as the rest of the group but would happily join as a guest now and then.
I had an edgelord DM that wanted everything to be dark and creepy and destitute. And then he would get mad when none of us wanted to interact with the sadistic fantasy world he was creating. We didn't talk to anyone because they always ended up being deranged. We didn't buy anything because it was always cursed. We didn't even loot because when we'd loot we'd get nothing of interest to any of us. Like, he created a world that made us not want to play at all, and then get mad and try and force us to go to places and talk to people against our will. The players were all new and initially wanted to rp and have a chill time, but eventually it fell apart because we just couldn't match the DMs energy.
THIS VIDEO IS SO VALIDATING! I recently had to make the difficult choice to end my current campaign, split the group and continue with less players. Because this was a group of totally new players, we didn’t know our play styles but as the games went on, they started to show. Three of the seven players had to be removed from the party because their play styles did not mix well with my role play heavy immersive world with serious consequences. We weren’t having fun anymore and I knew it was because we weren’t looking for the same thing out of the game. This video summarized EXACTLY what I was thinking. Thank you for putting it so eloquently. Keep it up!
A hard truth to grasp sometimes, but very true. My own closest circle of friends ran some games that fell apart to scheduling issues, but, ultimately I think back on those sessions and wonder if the group was even on the same page in those games at all. maybe it's for the best that it never got ugly and our friendship continued intact
Great take, once again. I completely agree. I kind of wish there was a better way of communicating this when looking for groups. Like “I’m looking for RP heavy”. But the main problem is… everyone’s opinions vary. What’s heavy RP for one person is not the same heavy RP for another. For example, if you were to explain a tree to a group of people, each person would say “yes, that’s a tree alright” but be picturing a different genus of tree, but they all think they’re talking about the same tree. I’ve seen people (not maliciously) either lie or exaggerate their expectations, both DM and players, simply because they “want to make it work.” And I’ve also had DMs ghost me when I tried to be extra clear about what I was looking for and that I wanted the same clear and concise communication back, and they assumed I was not going to work out with the group. Like I was going to be a problem player simply because I advocated for myself to make sure there wouldn’t be any confusion.
One of the things I'd love to see you cover under this umbrella topic is running into this situation with a friend group. I'm DMing an ongoing campaign for my group of 5 friends, and it's become painfully obvious that one of them is only really interested in the combat side of things while the others are just happy to be playing. It's difficult for me to work on sessions for the group as a whole because not every sesh will have combat, and in those the player essentially checks out. Said player's place is also where we play so it makes it basically impossible to broach the subject.
Yeah, this. It took me a while as a DM to realize how to read potential players so that I can make sure everyone has a good time. And though it’s really hard telling some people no when I’m starting a campaign, I’m glad I invite players with cohesion who I think will get along now. It’s made things so much better and less stressful.
I've seen many advice videos, and I have to say your style is definitely some of the best imo. because you give concise advice, interesting examples and msot importantly don't come off as patronising. I really appreciate your videos friend.
I feel like this is a really good reminder. Even as a player. You have other players at the table who have different syles than you. I really enjoy roleplay and combat, but hate getting bogged down in puzzles and over investigation. Another player loves puzzles and picking through every detail. I've been trying to learn how to support their play and make it fun for them, even though its not what i like, because they do it for me with what i enjoy. Our dm balances well, so i think we're both at the right table, but its interesting to realize how much personal style affects things. You raise really good points.
My personal thought is that if you have new players it's hard to actually know what they want, of course combat is always awesome but sometimes you need to show the peek of role play before a person actually gets into it. Of course that's just for new players and I wanted to put that point out cause some beginners find role play hard to enter in, they just have to get that little improve training in from the game and I think it helps.
This is a great video. Don’t feel like it’s a negative or a downer to share this kind of topic. This is actually positive life advice. Not everyone fits in the same box and not everyone is looking for the same experience out of the same thing they do. It’s good to recognize that. Keep doing what you’re doing. I have found that I don’t always share your opinion on everything but I definitely love watching all your videos and can see that you are coming from a place of sincerity and acceptance and have a good heart. You’re doing a great job and I’m glad I found your channel
I'm so glad I found your channel a week ago. I'm planning to start as a DM because in my group we want to play DnD but I know that if I don't make the effort to make it, the won't do it and your videos help a lot. I love how much I can learn from your videos and especially how welcoming feels you are to everybody. I hope I can watch more of your videos and learn a lot more to try to be a better DM.
Excellent video. ❤ The group I play with now is what I've been calling the Fond. We've played with many many people over around 15 years, and we've kind of boiled down to the group we best play with that still live nearby (obviously, people come and go as their lives change). We have similar styles, and are all mostly introverted, so we don't interact with a lot of people we don't know. We have learned a lot through problems with previous groups. In a way, however toxic some of the situations were, I'm grateful to have learned the communication skills that those situations forced us to develop. In the game we are playing now, we had a problem player, and we learned two extremely important things: 1) If role play is your focus, be very very careful how much of yourself you put into your character. DnD can be therapeutic, it is not therapy. And 2) If role play becomes too intense, we need to be aware of our limits, and when we need to hit the pause button and make sure everyone is sure of where the character ends and the player begins. During one crazy and amazing episode of a mini campaign my little brother ran, my character (a barbarian named Ori) began a conversation with the captain of the ship they were on and said some stuff that was pretty unreasonable. I was a little caught up in the moment, but I never felt any anger personally (Ori sure as hell did lol) during the conversation. However, it turns out that my brother thought it was me that was saying this stuff (I'm not good at voices) and he timed us out to talk about what was happening. It boiled down to a misunderstanding where Ori said something unreasonable because things had gone sideways, and the captain had gotten defensive about it (rightfully so, I would say). We were able to joke about it later on, but because of the problems we've had in the past, he had the awareness to realize when he needed to take a step back and figure things out. We've had one other moment like that in our current game, where we had to take a step out to make sure that the issues we were having were in character and not with the players, and it makes me very proud of the group we have formed. I'm DMing an online group right now with four players who have never played a campaign before. I can see that there could be problems down the road based on some of the details of their play styles, but I have been very forward about how important communication is, and I think it is going very well. I love my boys. ❤
One thing that’s great about D&D, especially 5e, is how versatile the game is. I know a common refrain is to play other systems that fit specific genres, but I’ve not yet had trouble running a genre in D&D, usually with minimal finagling to the rules. And because of that versatility, while every DM develops a style, they don’t have to run the same style of game every time they do. Dimension 20 is a fantastic example. Fantasy High is a high school comedy with high fantasy elements blended in. That game is a lot goofier with its world building elements, ignoring any logic problems for the sake of the John Hughes vibes. Meanwhile, A Crown of Candy is a pretty brutal Game of Thrones style story by way of Candyland. Brennan banned resurrection magic for that game to give it a much darker and more dramatic tone where character death can really matter. Some campaigns can be dramatic, role play heavy epics and some can be It’s Always Sunny style shenanigans, and both can be fun as long as expectations are set in advance and everyone is on the same page. 🙂
Love your videos and your tone, Well Said! I am playing my first DnD campaign next week, and i Got talked into being the DM. Im franticly searching High and low for help, as im so nervous. Thats how i found your great Channel! High five from Denmark
One of the best things to develop in later editions is Session Zero. (For reference, I started playing in the 80s using ADnD.) S0 is so useful for getting expectations, group rules, and other various bits worked out.
From experience and watching a lot of similar video to this. Everything can be avoided by talking before a session zero and session zero’s are now mandatory for when I DM. I had a player once literally try to have the party killed by Duergar city guards. We told him three times to stand down. He said fine and then he never came back to play.
I'm so happy I stumbled across your channel! The level of empathy you speak with, and care you take with approaching your player situations is so genuine. I hope everyone has an opportunity to experience a game that is collaborative, and not metagamey. I'm really looking forward to more of your videos!
It's funny in my personal experience I just don't like playing the game but enjoy watching the story unfold or what tactics they use like a esport. Although I think this video is great advice for most people even if odd ones like me exist who prefer to be DnD adjacent or watchers.
This definitely rings true for me. With all the players I have had, only 2 were actual problems. I used to tell people that they can try my game and if they like it, great. If not, they can find a new one. Just like with videogames, there are different kinds of games that focus on different things and have different feels and focuses. If I am running a cyberpunk game and you want a fantasy game, not gonna be upset if you figure my game isn't for you because it truly isn't. The group I have now are people that love role-play and story even when it comes to combat. They won't necessarily do the optimal thing and just because we know things outside the game, we don't automatically think our character should know. We have played all sorts of games but our general styles are very similar so we mesh well. It also helps that 1 person is my cousin, the other is my friend of 10 years, and the other is my boyfriend. XD I am not saying this set up works for everyone. It helps because we are comfortable with each other and especially talking to each other.
I'm planning on running my first campaign this summer with a few of my friends. I've never DM-ed before, and I'm wondering exactly how to know when to stop describing the scene and when to let the players take action, while also taking the time to get into the important lore bits that will be important to the plot later. For example, early on I have a play that is based on the backstory of the BBEG, but I know the players' eyes will glaze over if I sit there and spend 20 minutes describing the story of the play to them. One of my players is one of the actors in the troupe, however, and she could also have a moment to shine within the scene potentially. I basically want to avoid the circus from CR's Campaign 2 start, where Matt sat there for half an hour describing circus acts that ultimately meant very little to the overall story of that episode.
While I think it’s a good instinct to want to avoid monologuing at the players for an extended time, especially your first time out, I’d also mention that Campaign 2 didn’t start with Matt describing the play for 20 minutes straight - it started with everyone meeting and role playing together for quite a while just vibing and getting to know these new characters. And by the time they started C2, Matt’s group had been playing together as a group for so long, I’m betting they were legitimately interested in his description of the circus, even if just for the world building and scene setting. Just like in this video, that was right for that table, but may not be right for another. (Also, there’s no telling how much of that stuff was meant to tie into later campaign stuff but didn’t because the players didn’t pick up those threads.) I started a campaign similarly to CR Campaign 2, but a bit more truncated. I spent a few minutes summarizing the show, but I tried to focus in on specifics of interest to the players that their characters would notice instead - actors arguing just off stage, key audience members doing things to act as red herrings, like glaring at the on stage performer, a particular costume or piece of jewelry that could be a clue later. As the DM, you control the camera, so you control where they focus their mind’s eye. You might look up a scene from Dimension 20s season “A Crown of Candy” to see how Brennan, the DM, handles describing a puppet show with relevant info to the campaign. That was a Game of Thrones style campaign set in Candyland, and There’s a scene midway through the campaign where the party encounters a puppet show about events they’d experienced earlier in. The group was able to learn how the rest of the world saw these grander political events and what that meant for them and their mission. There’s also nothing wrong with briefly summarizing the play’s overall story and then zeroing in on the particular scene in the play that your player acts in. It can be a great role play moment for them-especially if they’re accomplishing something else as well, such as having to make nice with an antagonistic rival in the same troupe that wants to upstage them. Or maybe they’re in a scene with a former romantic partner and it’s awkward because they haven’t talked since they broke up. It depends on where you want the scene to go from there. In fact, leading up to the show, each player or clusters of players could have a scene specific to them introducing them to the group-if you look up Fantasy High, that whole first season is on RUclips and Brennan starts with each character getting a brief scene to themselves that gets across their personality and starting goal. It introduces their character to everyone else, gives that player a moment to shine, introduces minor antagonists for each of them, and helps cement the tone of the setting. It’s a great campaign start. Good luck with your first campaign! As long as you keep the game focused on your players and tie things back to them so they can shine, you’ll all have a blast. 🙂
One approach to this - and I’m not sure this works for what you’re picturing, but it’s a possible solution - might be to say that the play is happening in the background while other things are going on. If you have another dialogue (or action) scene going on and you sometimes break in to explain what the actors are doing and how the audience is reacting, that might be a fun way to have your cake and eat it too. The three movie scenes I immediately thought of where the characters are at a play are: 1. Anakin and Palpatine in Revenge of the Sith. It’s not a perfect example because we get very few details of the “bubble ballet,” but every once in a while we get a glimpse of the action and we hear the audience applaud. 2. The Evil Meeting During the Opera in Quantum of Solace. While I can’t recommend people go watch this full movie (I kinda like it but it’s not, you know, great), one of the best scenes is when the bad guys all go to the opera to have a secret meeting and Bond spies on them. We get some shots of the opera in action, and it forms an interesting background for a more important scene. 3. The Opera Scene in Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation. In this example, there’s a full-on fight scene happening backstage. And while we as an audience don’t know everything that’s happening in the performance, we know the specific moment where an assassin will pull the trigger, so there’s a ticking clock. In this example, the players might know there’s a moment coming up where something significant will happen, and they have to prevent it without interrupting the play. Then, every scene you describe WILL have the players’ attention, because they’ll be on the lookout for a moment they know is coming. Ultimately I have no idea if these apply to the scenario you imagine, but I do believe that the best way to incorporate a play into your game is to make sure there’s something dramatic tied to the play, not just the drama on stage. For example, the play in Hamlet isn’t as important as the king’s reaction to seeing his crime recreated on stage - that’s a moment Hamlet knows is coming and he’s wondering what will happen when the play reaches that point, so we’re willing to put up with a bit more of that scene than we usually would because the tension isn’t coming from the play, but the characters watching it. Meanwhile, the tension around the play in Spider-Man 2 is whether Peter will make it to the show, and how Mary Jane will react. Like I said, this might not fit what you have in mind, but that’s my advice! As for your initial question, that is more about how much information to give to your players - I’ll do future videos about that, I’m sure, but for now I can point you to this Matt Colville video about the subject: ruclips.net/video/Xm4EvRUo4YQ/видео.html
Gosh I have had a few different problem players in the past, the worst was a player who would just tune in for combat or scenes with only his character in it and he would pull out his phone and wear ear buds while everyone else is role playing. It was just very infuriating
Wow that’s a new one! Every game is different and it depends on your table, but if someone put earbuds in during a game of D&D, I would tell him it could never happen again, and then if it did I would’ve instantly kicked him from the game. That is just so wildly unacceptable.
I've noticed that there are three types of players; Role Players, PvP-ers, and "Beer-and-Pretzel." Two of my biggest problems with groups has been either "More players is better!" where the group size just gets to the point that you're just waiting for something, anything, to happen, and of course, the infamous "We need to stream this!" I had to bow out of groups because of both issues, or you'd have people that are used to the World of Darkness system with a massive group that is highly encouraged for PvP, and you get people that are just complete asshats to everyone else just to start something "interesting."
Bit of advice for any DMs who want to reward/encourage rp and non-combat solutions to a possible combat scenario: give them the XP they'd have had from the fight. Or item rewards. My current players are much more rp focused. So I've tried to shift things up a bit and make sure they feel rewarded for finding a creative rp focused way around the challenges I put in front of them.
i’m about to have my first session of my first campaign as a dm, and i am quickly realizing there is a player who has been part of everything so far, but is not going to fit in at this table, in a way that will be detrimental to the experience of the rest of the group. i am hesitant to boot bc he is my friend and i don’t want to limit him bc i don’t want to hurt his experience… but i honestly do not know what to do.
Oof yeah this is really tough. I haven’t had exactly this position, but I would recommend you speak with him privately. Let him know what your expectations are, and that the rest of the cast is in sync with them (assuming they are). I might suggest you say something like, “I’d love to have you at the table, but I’m concerned you might not have fun with the other players. This is what they’re expecting and what I’m expecting - I’d love for you to come to the first session and see if this style suits you. If it doesn’t seem like the right fit, that’s totally fine, I won’t take any offense, and we can hopefully play together in another game at a different point, either with a different story or different players.” By doing so, you’re making sure they know what to expect, and giving them just as much control over whether they join the campaign. Nobody wants to be the odd man out at the table, so preparing him might either prime his expectations, or allow him to open his mind to a different style and see if he might enjoy it. Good luck!!
I hope to be able to, within some limits, be pretty adaptable to different styles. Particularly as a player. As a player I can enjoy playing in a lot of different styles of game. As a DM, I have a number of different strengths and weaknesses, but do my best to accommodate a variety of styles. I’m not great at heavy prep games or running games with a lot of heavy notes…
Had a game fall apart recently in part I think because of this. Our first game together, once we got the kinks worked out, went pretty well, in part because we were all still just feeling each other out and deciding how we wanted to play, so it was very casual with the only real focus being Finish The Quest. It all started falling apart when we started a new game with a different person DMing. Not only was he the newest player with no experience before the previous game which led to a lot of typical New DM problems, but as we've gone on in his and another game I think he's looking for a different experience from the rest of us. The rest of us, while still having silly fun times here and there because they just happen, were getting really into the deep roleplay and serious storytelling. And while he acted like that's what he wanted as well, he tended to interrupt serious moments with stoner humor, try to work as many references to whatever media he was into at the time into the game as possible, and was prone to making references in-character that would break immersion like calling my dhampir Hot Topic. I think he really just wanted to hang out and roll dice and laugh, while the rest of us wanted something more immersive. Finally had a guy drop out of the game cause he wasn't having fun anymore, and it just kind of fell apart after that. The hard part now is how to explain "We're fine still being your friends, but we don't really want to play with you anymore."
I'm happy just to be playing dnd. But I'd like to have a fight every other session. Every session works too. Even just a stubborn door or something to smash. 🔨
Honest advice? On RUclips? How dare you! In all honesty it's welcomed and should be heard by all DMs especially new ones. There is only so much you can do to create a fun game. You also need people who want to play that same game too.
A huge thing that happened to me is a personal life issue can break a group or specifically one of your players. It happened in my group, we rotated who was the GM and it was my one friend's turn and everything started out fine. We all made our characters which was working out, the cohesion of the characters was getting better, and then real-life issues happened to the GM at first we didn't know but we suddenly felt a dramatic shift in his game world and demeanor. He didn't want to roleplay anymore, and he began to be ever more annoyed with us when we were roleplaying. The culmination was he blew up one night, insulting myself and another player, things going south really fast with personal attacks and the like. The point here is he hid it from us, and this wasn't a fresh group we were regular friends who did other things together so we could have helped him or paused the game to help him with his real-life problems. Communication is a must or you'll never see the train coming.
I left my previous table of 3 years after all its single players paired off, leaving me as the only person with a non-playing significant other. Somehow my SO's non-participation steadily got me labeled the problem, mostly for the occasional comment that maybe we could go back to sessions without a preceding date night. And before anyone leaps to conclusions, this is a bunch of 39-42 year old professionals, not a bunch of kids. All good and reasonable people, no judgments. Things can just get weird for anyone, anytime, in unexpected ways. I still take umbrage at being considered the problem in the end over something I had no control over: their pairing off choices. I later heard the group imploded along with the pairings, I can't ever imagine why...
I left a game a few months ago because of this reason - I kept having friction with the DM, and while there were some confounding issues (no DM is perfect) the real problem is that he wasn't interested in running the kind of game I was interested in playing. I found him to be too inflexible, unwilling to stray from what was written in the module by even the smallest detail. But other players at the table didn't feel stifled by having to work around such a rigid structure. He was the kind of DM who had no qualms TPKing the party if they walked into the wrong room, and other players enjoyed that sense of survival being very up in the air, whereas I felt like it made PC death arbitrary and unsatisfying. Just different vibes, in the end, I think. His game had a players vs DM feel to it, and that's a lot more advarsarial than I want out of my DnD. I want us to be building a story together.
Roleplaying is like any other hobby or leisure activity, not everybody enjoys the same things, there are friends with whom I would go and watch a horror film and others with which I go and watch romcoms. Thus I don't think that anything new was said here, deep down we all know that already.
I actually do want to make a video about that, it’s just harder to find relevant stories because of how often style and skill are muddled when it comes to DMing - I wonder how many “bad DMs” would be better described as “problem DMs”...
@@SupergeekMike I meant it more of a joke. But a friend told me (sorry second hand information) his group disolved simply because the DM wasn't giving the player the freedom of doing what they wanted and the DM wanted the players to find either ones of his 2 or 3 solutions for the problems he was givin them.
If the 3 pillars of D&D are combat, social encounter and exploration. I really don't understand why experience players keep repeating that "I like to RP" or "I like combat" That doesn't say a shit! D&D is a Role Playing game, every thing you do on it is RP by the very definition of it. If you you like social encounter say that. Percival is probably one of the most RP intense characters out there and yes there's a lot of social encounter where he's the focal point a lot of his RP was happening while he was crafting his weapons. Resuming everything that's no combat to RP is dump. And excluding RP from it demineshes de game to simply rolling dice
Can't agree more. Of course you should always try to find solutions that keep people in the group and in the game first, but sometimes the table isn't a good fit. Ultimately everyone should be having fun and that deff includes the DM. That isn't a bad thing- recognizing it and realizing that you may not be the right placement means that person can go find a table that DOES suit them, whether that's a different table by the same DM or another table entirely. Or another game! DnD is great but there are hundreds of great TTRPGs out there and some suit folks more than others. One thing to watch out for is that if you are the player for whom the table never seems to work... it may be something you're doing without realizing. Once is unfortunate, twice is a coincidence, but thrice is a pattern and you should think about yourself as a player critically too. Are you expecting too much? Are you explaining your needs incorrectly? Are you honest with yourself? So many things could be the issue, you could be unlucky, or you could just be a unique player with unique needs.
Boy do I hear this one. I've played in several different groups, and I can tolerate a variety of play styles to a certain degree, but I have definitely encountered my limits in terms of play style and the types of players I vibe with in my own games. As you said, not every "problem" player would be a problem in every campaign...I had one of my own who would probably have been happier in a much more casual game than mine was. If everybody else is a role-player and they just want to murder hobo, they obviously aren't going to have fun, and they'll end up frustrating everyone else. Thankfully, we were able to part ways amicably, and they are having a great time in another group's game.
This was the biggest lesson I took from trying BIG LARPs and going back to tabletop. Having a large pool of rpg friends is great. Sorting them into playstyles really, really helps group game enjoyment.
To quote Our Flag Means Death, talk it through, as a crew! I've been lucky to have tried out a few groups, and therefore know what sort of game I prefer in the long run. I've had to talk to the dm, and go "it's not you, it's me" when I realised I was not enjoying the same things as the rest of the group but would happily join as a guest now and then.
I had an edgelord DM that wanted everything to be dark and creepy and destitute. And then he would get mad when none of us wanted to interact with the sadistic fantasy world he was creating. We didn't talk to anyone because they always ended up being deranged. We didn't buy anything because it was always cursed. We didn't even loot because when we'd loot we'd get nothing of interest to any of us. Like, he created a world that made us not want to play at all, and then get mad and try and force us to go to places and talk to people against our will. The players were all new and initially wanted to rp and have a chill time, but eventually it fell apart because we just couldn't match the DMs energy.
THIS VIDEO IS SO VALIDATING! I recently had to make the difficult choice to end my current campaign, split the group and continue with less players. Because this was a group of totally new players, we didn’t know our play styles but as the games went on, they started to show. Three of the seven players had to be removed from the party because their play styles did not mix well with my role play heavy immersive world with serious consequences. We weren’t having fun anymore and I knew it was because we weren’t looking for the same thing out of the game. This video summarized EXACTLY what I was thinking. Thank you for putting it so eloquently. Keep it up!
A hard truth to grasp sometimes, but very true. My own closest circle of friends ran some games that fell apart to scheduling issues, but, ultimately I think back on those sessions and wonder if the group was even on the same page in those games at all. maybe it's for the best that it never got ugly and our friendship continued intact
Great take, once again. I completely agree. I kind of wish there was a better way of communicating this when looking for groups. Like “I’m looking for RP heavy”. But the main problem is… everyone’s opinions vary. What’s heavy RP for one person is not the same heavy RP for another. For example, if you were to explain a tree to a group of people, each person would say “yes, that’s a tree alright” but be picturing a different genus of tree, but they all think they’re talking about the same tree.
I’ve seen people (not maliciously) either lie or exaggerate their expectations, both DM and players, simply because they “want to make it work.” And I’ve also had DMs ghost me when I tried to be extra clear about what I was looking for and that I wanted the same clear and concise communication back, and they assumed I was not going to work out with the group. Like I was going to be a problem player simply because I advocated for myself to make sure there wouldn’t be any confusion.
I was just thinking today about the different kinds of RP, it’ll probably be a while but I do want to tackle that as well :)
One of the things I'd love to see you cover under this umbrella topic is running into this situation with a friend group. I'm DMing an ongoing campaign for my group of 5 friends, and it's become painfully obvious that one of them is only really interested in the combat side of things while the others are just happy to be playing. It's difficult for me to work on sessions for the group as a whole because not every sesh will have combat, and in those the player essentially checks out. Said player's place is also where we play so it makes it basically impossible to broach the subject.
Yeah, this. It took me a while as a DM to realize how to read potential players so that I can make sure everyone has a good time. And though it’s really hard telling some people no when I’m starting a campaign, I’m glad I invite players with cohesion who I think will get along now. It’s made things so much better and less stressful.
I've seen many advice videos, and I have to say your style is definitely some of the best imo. because you give concise advice, interesting examples and msot importantly don't come off as patronising. I really appreciate your videos friend.
I feel like this is a really good reminder. Even as a player. You have other players at the table who have different syles than you. I really enjoy roleplay and combat, but hate getting bogged down in puzzles and over investigation. Another player loves puzzles and picking through every detail. I've been trying to learn how to support their play and make it fun for them, even though its not what i like, because they do it for me with what i enjoy. Our dm balances well, so i think we're both at the right table, but its interesting to realize how much personal style affects things. You raise really good points.
My personal thought is that if you have new players it's hard to actually know what they want, of course combat is always awesome but sometimes you need to show the peek of role play before a person actually gets into it. Of course that's just for new players and I wanted to put that point out cause some beginners find role play hard to enter in, they just have to get that little improve training in from the game and I think it helps.
This is a great video. Don’t feel like it’s a negative or a downer to share this kind of topic. This is actually positive life advice. Not everyone fits in the same box and not everyone is looking for the same experience out of the same thing they do. It’s good to recognize that. Keep doing what you’re doing. I have found that I don’t always share your opinion on everything but I definitely love watching all your videos and can see that you are coming from a place of sincerity and acceptance and have a good heart. You’re doing a great job and I’m glad I found your channel
Thank you!
How is your channel so new yet your content is so well polished?! So glad to have found you, looking forward to more content
Thank you so much!
I'm so glad I found your channel a week ago. I'm planning to start as a DM because in my group we want to play DnD but I know that if I don't make the effort to make it, the won't do it and your videos help a lot. I love how much I can learn from your videos and especially how welcoming feels you are to everybody. I hope I can watch more of your videos and learn a lot more to try to be a better DM.
Excellent video. ❤
The group I play with now is what I've been calling the Fond. We've played with many many people over around 15 years, and we've kind of boiled down to the group we best play with that still live nearby (obviously, people come and go as their lives change). We have similar styles, and are all mostly introverted, so we don't interact with a lot of people we don't know. We have learned a lot through problems with previous groups. In a way, however toxic some of the situations were, I'm grateful to have learned the communication skills that those situations forced us to develop.
In the game we are playing now, we had a problem player, and we learned two extremely important things:
1) If role play is your focus, be very very careful how much of yourself you put into your character. DnD can be therapeutic, it is not therapy.
And 2) If role play becomes too intense, we need to be aware of our limits, and when we need to hit the pause button and make sure everyone is sure of where the character ends and the player begins.
During one crazy and amazing episode of a mini campaign my little brother ran, my character (a barbarian named Ori) began a conversation with the captain of the ship they were on and said some stuff that was pretty unreasonable. I was a little caught up in the moment, but I never felt any anger personally (Ori sure as hell did lol) during the conversation. However, it turns out that my brother thought it was me that was saying this stuff (I'm not good at voices) and he timed us out to talk about what was happening. It boiled down to a misunderstanding where Ori said something unreasonable because things had gone sideways, and the captain had gotten defensive about it (rightfully so, I would say). We were able to joke about it later on, but because of the problems we've had in the past, he had the awareness to realize when he needed to take a step back and figure things out.
We've had one other moment like that in our current game, where we had to take a step out to make sure that the issues we were having were in character and not with the players, and it makes me very proud of the group we have formed.
I'm DMing an online group right now with four players who have never played a campaign before. I can see that there could be problems down the road based on some of the details of their play styles, but I have been very forward about how important communication is, and I think it is going very well. I love my boys. ❤
One thing that’s great about D&D, especially 5e, is how versatile the game is. I know a common refrain is to play other systems that fit specific genres, but I’ve not yet had trouble running a genre in D&D, usually with minimal finagling to the rules. And because of that versatility, while every DM develops a style, they don’t have to run the same style of game every time they do.
Dimension 20 is a fantastic example. Fantasy High is a high school comedy with high fantasy elements blended in. That game is a lot goofier with its world building elements, ignoring any logic problems for the sake of the John Hughes vibes.
Meanwhile, A Crown of Candy is a pretty brutal Game of Thrones style story by way of Candyland. Brennan banned resurrection magic for that game to give it a much darker and more dramatic tone where character death can really matter.
Some campaigns can be dramatic, role play heavy epics and some can be It’s Always Sunny style shenanigans, and both can be fun as long as expectations are set in advance and everyone is on the same page. 🙂
Love your videos and your tone, Well Said! I am playing my first DnD campaign next week, and i Got talked into being the DM. Im franticly searching High and low for help, as im so nervous. Thats how i found your great Channel!
High five from Denmark
One of the best things to develop in later editions is Session Zero. (For reference, I started playing in the 80s using ADnD.)
S0 is so useful for getting expectations, group rules, and other various bits worked out.
From experience and watching a lot of similar video to this. Everything can be avoided by talking before a session zero and session zero’s are now mandatory for when I DM. I had a player once literally try to have the party killed by Duergar city guards. We told him three times to stand down. He said fine and then he never came back to play.
I'm so happy I stumbled across your channel! The level of empathy you speak with, and care you take with approaching your player situations is so genuine. I hope everyone has an opportunity to experience a game that is collaborative, and not metagamey. I'm really looking forward to more of your videos!
Thank you so much!
Love the Dubli-Do thrown in at the end, it's a fun thing to say and should be the official name of it by now 🤣
It's funny in my personal experience I just don't like playing the game but enjoy watching the story unfold or what tactics they use like a esport. Although I think this video is great advice for most people even if odd ones like me exist who prefer to be DnD adjacent or watchers.
This definitely rings true for me. With all the players I have had, only 2 were actual problems. I used to tell people that they can try my game and if they like it, great. If not, they can find a new one. Just like with videogames, there are different kinds of games that focus on different things and have different feels and focuses. If I am running a cyberpunk game and you want a fantasy game, not gonna be upset if you figure my game isn't for you because it truly isn't. The group I have now are people that love role-play and story even when it comes to combat. They won't necessarily do the optimal thing and just because we know things outside the game, we don't automatically think our character should know. We have played all sorts of games but our general styles are very similar so we mesh well. It also helps that 1 person is my cousin, the other is my friend of 10 years, and the other is my boyfriend. XD I am not saying this set up works for everyone. It helps because we are comfortable with each other and especially talking to each other.
Finally someone said exactly what I was thinking and couldn't articulate properly!
I'm planning on running my first campaign this summer with a few of my friends. I've never DM-ed before, and I'm wondering exactly how to know when to stop describing the scene and when to let the players take action, while also taking the time to get into the important lore bits that will be important to the plot later.
For example, early on I have a play that is based on the backstory of the BBEG, but I know the players' eyes will glaze over if I sit there and spend 20 minutes describing the story of the play to them. One of my players is one of the actors in the troupe, however, and she could also have a moment to shine within the scene potentially.
I basically want to avoid the circus from CR's Campaign 2 start, where Matt sat there for half an hour describing circus acts that ultimately meant very little to the overall story of that episode.
While I think it’s a good instinct to want to avoid monologuing at the players for an extended time, especially your first time out, I’d also mention that Campaign 2 didn’t start with Matt describing the play for 20 minutes straight - it started with everyone meeting and role playing together for quite a while just vibing and getting to know these new characters. And by the time they started C2, Matt’s group had been playing together as a group for so long, I’m betting they were legitimately interested in his description of the circus, even if just for the world building and scene setting. Just like in this video, that was right for that table, but may not be right for another. (Also, there’s no telling how much of that stuff was meant to tie into later campaign stuff but didn’t because the players didn’t pick up those threads.)
I started a campaign similarly to CR Campaign 2, but a bit more truncated. I spent a few minutes summarizing the show, but I tried to focus in on specifics of interest to the players that their characters would notice instead - actors arguing just off stage, key audience members doing things to act as red herrings, like glaring at the on stage performer, a particular costume or piece of jewelry that could be a clue later. As the DM, you control the camera, so you control where they focus their mind’s eye.
You might look up a scene from Dimension 20s season “A Crown of Candy” to see how Brennan, the DM, handles describing a puppet show with relevant info to the campaign. That was a Game of Thrones style campaign set in Candyland, and There’s a scene midway through the campaign where the party encounters a puppet show about events they’d experienced earlier in. The group was able to learn how the rest of the world saw these grander political events and what that meant for them and their mission.
There’s also nothing wrong with briefly summarizing the play’s overall story and then zeroing in on the particular scene in the play that your player acts in. It can be a great role play moment for them-especially if they’re accomplishing something else as well, such as having to make nice with an antagonistic rival in the same troupe that wants to upstage them. Or maybe they’re in a scene with a former romantic partner and it’s awkward because they haven’t talked since they broke up. It depends on where you want the scene to go from there. In fact, leading up to the show, each player or clusters of players could have a scene specific to them introducing them to the group-if you look up Fantasy High, that whole first season is on RUclips and Brennan starts with each character getting a brief scene to themselves that gets across their personality and starting goal. It introduces their character to everyone else, gives that player a moment to shine, introduces minor antagonists for each of them, and helps cement the tone of the setting. It’s a great campaign start.
Good luck with your first campaign! As long as you keep the game focused on your players and tie things back to them so they can shine, you’ll all have a blast. 🙂
One approach to this - and I’m not sure this works for what you’re picturing, but it’s a possible solution - might be to say that the play is happening in the background while other things are going on. If you have another dialogue (or action) scene going on and you sometimes break in to explain what the actors are doing and how the audience is reacting, that might be a fun way to have your cake and eat it too.
The three movie scenes I immediately thought of where the characters are at a play are:
1. Anakin and Palpatine in Revenge of the Sith. It’s not a perfect example because we get very few details of the “bubble ballet,” but every once in a while we get a glimpse of the action and we hear the audience applaud.
2. The Evil Meeting During the Opera in Quantum of Solace. While I can’t recommend people go watch this full movie (I kinda like it but it’s not, you know, great), one of the best scenes is when the bad guys all go to the opera to have a secret meeting and Bond spies on them. We get some shots of the opera in action, and it forms an interesting background for a more important scene.
3. The Opera Scene in Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation. In this example, there’s a full-on fight scene happening backstage. And while we as an audience don’t know everything that’s happening in the performance, we know the specific moment where an assassin will pull the trigger, so there’s a ticking clock. In this example, the players might know there’s a moment coming up where something significant will happen, and they have to prevent it without interrupting the play. Then, every scene you describe WILL have the players’ attention, because they’ll be on the lookout for a moment they know is coming.
Ultimately I have no idea if these apply to the scenario you imagine, but I do believe that the best way to incorporate a play into your game is to make sure there’s something dramatic tied to the play, not just the drama on stage.
For example, the play in Hamlet isn’t as important as the king’s reaction to seeing his crime recreated on stage - that’s a moment Hamlet knows is coming and he’s wondering what will happen when the play reaches that point, so we’re willing to put up with a bit more of that scene than we usually would because the tension isn’t coming from the play, but the characters watching it.
Meanwhile, the tension around the play in Spider-Man 2 is whether Peter will make it to the show, and how Mary Jane will react.
Like I said, this might not fit what you have in mind, but that’s my advice!
As for your initial question, that is more about how much information to give to your players - I’ll do future videos about that, I’m sure, but for now I can point you to this Matt Colville video about the subject:
ruclips.net/video/Xm4EvRUo4YQ/видео.html
Gosh I have had a few different problem players in the past, the worst was a player who would just tune in for combat or scenes with only his character in it and he would pull out his phone and wear ear buds while everyone else is role playing. It was just very infuriating
Wow that’s a new one! Every game is different and it depends on your table, but if someone put earbuds in during a game of D&D, I would tell him it could never happen again, and then if it did I would’ve instantly kicked him from the game. That is just so wildly unacceptable.
I've noticed that there are three types of players; Role Players, PvP-ers, and "Beer-and-Pretzel." Two of my biggest problems with groups has been either "More players is better!" where the group size just gets to the point that you're just waiting for something, anything, to happen, and of course, the infamous "We need to stream this!" I had to bow out of groups because of both issues, or you'd have people that are used to the World of Darkness system with a massive group that is highly encouraged for PvP, and you get people that are just complete asshats to everyone else just to start something "interesting."
Bit of advice for any DMs who want to reward/encourage rp and non-combat solutions to a possible combat scenario: give them the XP they'd have had from the fight. Or item rewards. My current players are much more rp focused. So I've tried to shift things up a bit and make sure they feel rewarded for finding a creative rp focused way around the challenges I put in front of them.
i’m about to have my first session of my first campaign as a dm, and i am quickly realizing there is a player who has been part of everything so far, but is not going to fit in at this table, in a way that will be detrimental to the experience of the rest of the group. i am hesitant to boot bc he is my friend and i don’t want to limit him bc i don’t want to hurt his experience… but i honestly do not know what to do.
and this is post session zero! to which he didn’t show up.
Oof yeah this is really tough. I haven’t had exactly this position, but I would recommend you speak with him privately. Let him know what your expectations are, and that the rest of the cast is in sync with them (assuming they are). I might suggest you say something like, “I’d love to have you at the table, but I’m concerned you might not have fun with the other players. This is what they’re expecting and what I’m expecting - I’d love for you to come to the first session and see if this style suits you. If it doesn’t seem like the right fit, that’s totally fine, I won’t take any offense, and we can hopefully play together in another game at a different point, either with a different story or different players.”
By doing so, you’re making sure they know what to expect, and giving them just as much control over whether they join the campaign. Nobody wants to be the odd man out at the table, so preparing him might either prime his expectations, or allow him to open his mind to a different style and see if he might enjoy it.
Good luck!!
I'm an inexperienced dnd player. Would love to be in a game with you . You're very laid back and I love that 😌
Thank you!
I hope to be able to, within some limits, be pretty adaptable to different styles. Particularly as a player. As a player I can enjoy playing in a lot of different styles of game. As a DM, I have a number of different strengths and weaknesses, but do my best to accommodate a variety of styles. I’m not great at heavy prep games or running games with a lot of heavy notes…
Had a game fall apart recently in part I think because of this. Our first game together, once we got the kinks worked out, went pretty well, in part because we were all still just feeling each other out and deciding how we wanted to play, so it was very casual with the only real focus being Finish The Quest. It all started falling apart when we started a new game with a different person DMing. Not only was he the newest player with no experience before the previous game which led to a lot of typical New DM problems, but as we've gone on in his and another game I think he's looking for a different experience from the rest of us. The rest of us, while still having silly fun times here and there because they just happen, were getting really into the deep roleplay and serious storytelling. And while he acted like that's what he wanted as well, he tended to interrupt serious moments with stoner humor, try to work as many references to whatever media he was into at the time into the game as possible, and was prone to making references in-character that would break immersion like calling my dhampir Hot Topic. I think he really just wanted to hang out and roll dice and laugh, while the rest of us wanted something more immersive. Finally had a guy drop out of the game cause he wasn't having fun anymore, and it just kind of fell apart after that.
The hard part now is how to explain "We're fine still being your friends, but we don't really want to play with you anymore."
I'm happy just to be playing dnd. But I'd like to have a fight every other session. Every session works too. Even just a stubborn door or something to smash. 🔨
missed opportunity to title the video "D&D is for everyone everywhere, but not all at once"
Honest advice? On RUclips? How dare you!
In all honesty it's welcomed and should be heard by all DMs especially new ones. There is only so much you can do to create a fun game. You also need people who want to play that same game too.
A huge thing that happened to me is a personal life issue can break a group or specifically one of your players. It happened in my group, we rotated who was the GM and it was my one friend's turn and everything started out fine. We all made our characters which was working out, the cohesion of the characters was getting better, and then real-life issues happened to the GM at first we didn't know but we suddenly felt a dramatic shift in his game world and demeanor. He didn't want to roleplay anymore, and he began to be ever more annoyed with us when we were roleplaying. The culmination was he blew up one night, insulting myself and another player, things going south really fast with personal attacks and the like. The point here is he hid it from us, and this wasn't a fresh group we were regular friends who did other things together so we could have helped him or paused the game to help him with his real-life problems. Communication is a must or you'll never see the train coming.
I left my previous table of 3 years after all its single players paired off, leaving me as the only person with a non-playing significant other. Somehow my SO's non-participation steadily got me labeled the problem, mostly for the occasional comment that maybe we could go back to sessions without a preceding date night.
And before anyone leaps to conclusions, this is a bunch of 39-42 year old professionals, not a bunch of kids. All good and reasonable people, no judgments.
Things can just get weird for anyone, anytime, in unexpected ways. I still take umbrage at being considered the problem in the end over something I had no control over: their pairing off choices.
I later heard the group imploded along with the pairings, I can't ever imagine why...
I left a game a few months ago because of this reason - I kept having friction with the DM, and while there were some confounding issues (no DM is perfect) the real problem is that he wasn't interested in running the kind of game I was interested in playing. I found him to be too inflexible, unwilling to stray from what was written in the module by even the smallest detail. But other players at the table didn't feel stifled by having to work around such a rigid structure. He was the kind of DM who had no qualms TPKing the party if they walked into the wrong room, and other players enjoyed that sense of survival being very up in the air, whereas I felt like it made PC death arbitrary and unsatisfying. Just different vibes, in the end, I think. His game had a players vs DM feel to it, and that's a lot more advarsarial than I want out of my DnD. I want us to be building a story together.
Roleplaying is like any other hobby or leisure activity, not everybody enjoys the same things, there are friends with whom I would go and watch a horror film and others with which I go and watch romcoms. Thus I don't think that anything new was said here, deep down we all know that already.
D&D is for Anyone....not Everyone.
We keep hearing about a problem player, how about problem DM ? xD
I actually do want to make a video about that, it’s just harder to find relevant stories because of how often style and skill are muddled when it comes to DMing - I wonder how many “bad DMs” would be better described as “problem DMs”...
@@SupergeekMike I meant it more of a joke. But a friend told me (sorry second hand information) his group disolved simply because the DM wasn't giving the player the freedom of doing what they wanted and the DM wanted the players to find either ones of his 2 or 3 solutions for the problems he was givin them.
If the 3 pillars of D&D are combat, social encounter and exploration.
I really don't understand why experience players keep repeating that "I like to RP" or "I like combat"
That doesn't say a shit!
D&D is a Role Playing game, every thing you do on it is RP by the very definition of it.
If you you like social encounter say that.
Percival is probably one of the most RP intense characters out there and yes there's a lot of social encounter where he's the focal point a lot of his RP was happening while he was crafting his weapons.
Resuming everything that's no combat to RP is dump.
And excluding RP from it demineshes de game to simply rolling dice
Can't agree more. Of course you should always try to find solutions that keep people in the group and in the game first, but sometimes the table isn't a good fit. Ultimately everyone should be having fun and that deff includes the DM. That isn't a bad thing- recognizing it and realizing that you may not be the right placement means that person can go find a table that DOES suit them, whether that's a different table by the same DM or another table entirely. Or another game! DnD is great but there are hundreds of great TTRPGs out there and some suit folks more than others.
One thing to watch out for is that if you are the player for whom the table never seems to work... it may be something you're doing without realizing. Once is unfortunate, twice is a coincidence, but thrice is a pattern and you should think about yourself as a player critically too. Are you expecting too much? Are you explaining your needs incorrectly? Are you honest with yourself? So many things could be the issue, you could be unlucky, or you could just be a unique player with unique needs.