Same here. then again i get up at 3 am every Friday morning to watch Critical role live rather than wait until the rebroadcast at around 7 am. FYI i live in the UK
Matt Mercer is the very picture of cool. I think he's a bit of an introvert...but he's got such a good on-camera presence that ppl don't even notice. His reactions are very cool and controlled, and when he doesn't need to react to anything he looks pensive and receptive. I don't know how he is able to accomplish this...but that's what makes him amazing.
This just made me want a campaign DMed by Travis Willingham with the players being Matt Mercer, Matt Colville, Satine, Liam and some other DM friends. Grog DMing the Masters. It could go so well. It could go so wrong. It could be both, but it would be awesome.
I’ll miss your take on this Satine. Matt talked from his own perspective. You used your own perspective and also brought in guests. It’s been informative and entertaining. I cannot speak for everyone, but I’ll miss your methods and take. Thank you for your time and efforts. Your show has made me a better DM... and I’ve been playing likely before you were born.
I want to thank all of you on this channel for your tips and insight. I'm watching this video literally 3 hours before my first session as a DM starts.
Dennis Sacca Good luck! Just remember to have fun and not take it too seriously :) Don't worry about making mistakes and if you do need to take a few mins to look something up, set the party up with something to think about. I feel a lot less pressured when I need to do that if they are chatting amongst themselves
A useful trick I've been doing for years to go along with that 'listen' advice is: At the end of every session I ask my players what their favorite part was. Over time you get to learn what kind of things each player really enjoys, and it's in a way that they don't just feel like they're being surveyed on 'how to improve your gaming experience', it's just sharing fun memories with each other after the game.
Some railroading thoughts for new GMs: 1) Like Matt said, don’t be afraid to railroad, but there is a “right” and “wrong” way to do it 2) Instead of thinking “railroad,” think “ runway; a long stretch of controlled road to give the party direction, then when the plane takes off, the sky is the limit 3) To prevent players from deviating too far, make sure your runway is compelling! Literally! The story should compel the players to take action! Why do they want to find the war machine maker and steal the plans for the rebellion? Why is this group of goblins invading the mines such an issue? Why should the players help the paladin order hunt down the necromancer king and his cult of druids? Help the players use their backstories to guide their motivations and reasoning to work together (hint: Xanathar’s Guide has some nice tricks to backstory planning) 4) Consequences: Ensure that there are consequences- both good AND bad for doing anything and everything! They decided to rush off to fight the bad guy rather than protect the mines whose minions he sent to attack? The good: they’ll take him by surprise and make the fight easier! The bad: the lack of reliable mithral from the mines has crippled the soldiers in the nearby city! And the hobgoblin empire is moving in to attack! They’ll be helpless and the economy of the region may collapse! There could be inflation of goods in nearby towns! Note that they could have saved the mines, but it would have made the big bad exponentially more difficult to fight, given his or her time to prepare. Every action should have both good and bad repercussions 5) Random encounters are your best friends! When planning the session, look to all the surrounding areas, what is there? Forests? Deserts? Ancient ruins? A battlefield littered with corpses? For each area, pull up Kobold Fightclub and select the terrain/ environment and set up random encounters for your players to take on! This does several things: - Kills time: if you weren’t fully prepared for the direction they were going, you can bide your time and plan while they fight or escape the collapsing tunnels, etc. Better yet, the session may be over once they are resting and licking their wounds, giving you time to plan the next session. - Injuries require healing, they may find the need to head back to the village they left, perhaps giving you the opportunity to “re-compel” your players on the tracks again... - props if you use the encounters to redirect them, or even help you to improv the area they went too! And adventure they weren’t even looking for! 6) Plan, just not too much: When planning, ask yourself, ‘how can my players mess up my plans?’ and create two or three backup plans. Wanted to use the big bad to intimidate them at the start of the session only to have them attack and put themselves or your big bad in danger? Plan to have a dead man’s switch! They attack and perhaps the whole building and all the civilians go down with it! Perhaps they’re holding the PC’s NPC ally or friends captive, and only they can reveal the location due to the magical fidelius charm (from HP)! Have some backups and redirection prompts that still feel organic 7) Factions. There is a really neat, but sort of cumbersome faction system in the tRPG “Stars without Numbers” repurposing their GM faction turn system allows you to have factions react to each other and world happenings as dictated by the players actions. They decided to abandon the clear prompt to head to the forest to stop the kidnapping group of dryads and went to the Holy City of Tredamos, led by the High Theocratic Leadership of the Divines instead? Perhaps, during your in-between faction turns, the city is undergoing a revolt! The two clerics and paladin belong to those holy orders! Will they be persecuted? Will they help? What will happen to the quest they are abandoning? Using these turns, you can create plot hooks to improv off of and creating compelling stories for players to follow 8) Modular material: Dungeon didn’t get used? Encounter was ignored? Repurpose it! That is the beauty of generic battlemaps, just have an encounter ready and if it isn’t used, no harm and no foul! Just shelve it and use it later! 9) Tech: make use of those online resources. I use OneNote for session planning and putting all sorts of useful rules player materials for quick access and easy reference. Roll20 has amazing tools to creating encounters on the fly. Kobold fight club is a great resource for quick encounter building. Hope this helps aspiring GMs out there!
Really good tips and hints - a few things I would like to add myself: 1) Backup NPCs. Yes, it is one of those very generic points but do not underestimate how quickly players can sometimes progress through your story-line. Prepare several backup NPCs. If you do not need them in a session? Re-purpose them. However if you do need them, you'll be thankful to have them in your arsenal as NPC generation takes a great toll on you, especially in games like Cyberpunk, which require you to generate the NPC stats yourself. 2) As mentioned before in other posts - do a session zero. Get to know your players, the way they act in character and also make sure to discuss with them where they want to go with their character. Self portray and third person perception can differ by an incredible amount. In addition to that - try to re-align your conceptions of the player characters with them once in a while. It helps you to understand them better and it might help them in integrating themselves into the story a lot better. 3) Solo sessions are your friend. I use them under several circumstances, here are a few examples: a) A player was gone for a while and re-joins the party and needs to be caught up b) A player has an individual part of story line that others in your campaign should not know about (for now) c) A player character has died and the player goes through character creation again up to a point where she / he rejoins the party. 4) Do not reward your party overly much (unless it serves the plot line). It is incredibly easy to accidentally throw in that little bit of extra for your players, but it stacks up. If you realize that one of the items was maybe a bit too overpowered, don't just simply take it away, use your story / the plot in order to remove it from the game. You do not even have to remove it permanently - have something stolen, lost during a raid, confiscated by the authorities, taken as a form of safety / insurance by a third party.... there are lot of options. Once you believe the players are in alignment with the power / potential of the item - have them go on a quest to retrieve it. Hope this little note helps :)
And here are my "railroading" tips: 1. Don't railroad the players, but do railroad the game world. The story and events in the world happen on schedule *unless* the players act to change it. 2. Less railroad, more train station. The players have more than one choice of "train" to ride, but once they are on it, they stay "on track" until finished with that quest or they "jump ship" (pardon the mixed metaphors) and get on a different track.
I was talking to a guy one time and he was telling me about the game he was DMing. He said it was COMPLETELY Sandbox.......... and his players hated it. Basically he created a world and said "So where do you want to go?". No hooks, no suggestions. You've got to at least have some hooks or options to suggest. Some rumors for them to hear, or some job offerings they can choose to accept. As Satine says know your world, so if they don't follow any of those........ I have a Complete world that I have created over many years. When I start my next campaign I will have 3 planned adventure options but enough known of the world that if they don't want to do any of those and go off in a different area, I know what's there and have many options or hooks for any area they go in.
@@Logan_Baron Sandboxing is way-overrated. It becomes an excuse for DMs to under-prepare and improv too much, and the quality is really low. As a player, I would rather play through a DM's pre-planned story and experience detailed places, NPCs, and items.
To the question about conflicting play styles or players not having the fun you were hoping for in your game: Something I do in my games is at the end of the wrap-up when people are putting away dice and books I ask my players to go around the table and share with the group what they liked and didn't like about the session if anything. Some times people don't speak up, but sometimes I've gotten a lot of great feedback. It has been helpful to see what the players have taken away from the session (in terms of what excited them) but also to see what frustrated them. The source of frustration could have been an encounter that didn't go well, a piece of dialogue that was janky or sometimes just a simple screw-up on my part but it has always been helpful and I'm happy that I've been able to provide a space where my players feel that they can contribute to the overall feel of the game.
I kept seeing commebts about the outro as I watched... Now that I have seen and heard it, thats what I want to use to go to sleep every night. Matts voice is just so soothing
For our table, we use Session Zero. Session zero happens before the first game is played. Also once gaming begins, any player at any time can request a session zero to reestablish boundaries, rules, and expectations. We sometimes will also have a new session zero after milestones (either concluding a story arc, or after the characters level to discuss new character options available after leveling). That way everyone understands how their character options work, including me, the GM.
UberDoogee Sure thing! All my players are new to D&D but one, so when new options comes up it gives us all a chance to discuss how those options work. I find it SUPER useful to keep my players engaged.
*Snatch* I'll take that idea for my own campaign, thanks. That's a great idea, giving the players agency to speak up if they're not happy. Some players need that.
Brave Heart Before actually starting the game, everyone meets up to talk about the game. DM usually describes the setting, players roll characters, ground rules and expectations are set. Might change from table to table, but generally it's a pre-campaign prep session.
I brag about this every chance I get, but I met Matt Mercer at the Irwindale renfaire. If you're reading this, Matt, you made my entire year and you made me a much better DM with everything you've done! We love you man
After seeing the Between the Sheets with Matt Mercer, his reaction to the "how'd you get so pretty" question is really put into context. Matt has some pretty severe body image issues, in case people don't know.
If i have one GM tip i'd like to share it is this. expect your players to do the unexpected, touch the statue that you hinted it would be a bad idea to touch. open the door that has a big sign saying keep out. or simply run like scared two year olds from a monster that you've lovingly custom made to get them to level 3 by the end of the session without sacrificing story.
First session I ran had the party go to a bar. (First time playing d&d for all) The plan was: they meet a rouge who joins them. Crazy old man tells them of a dragon's horde that lays empty, and is protected by a pretender king. They go to get the money. This is what happened. The monk sees a half-orc cheating a gnome out of his money. The monk ruins the game, orc tries the leave, in anger, monk does a flurry of blows, only hits once. The druid turns to a bear. The barbarian rages. The guards are getting ready to fight and I thought: "Oh god no... there is about to be a tpk in the first hour of this campaign." I ask my rouge what he wants to do. He talks to the orc, pays him off, where they are kicked out of the bar, instead of being cut down. On the way out kills the old man after they were given the quest. Our rouge and druid go to buy horses. I tell them that the stable boy (whos a grown man) can't speak well and seems mentally impaired. They preceded to rob the man and gallop away to the mountain. To this day they said that they were in the right and that their characters are good.
So glad you two have been able to touch so many people with not only your love of gaming but your encouragement to people as individuals. Having read Satine's story, I am so happy that she has found this place of light in her life after what she went through as a child.
I wish I could live long enough so that A Star Trek holodeck could be created, imagine if Mathew Mercer had one of those to play around in. The world, the story, the lore, the NPC's he would will into being for you to unfold would be awesome. Side note: please make a T2000 character class I have tried to make loads but their under Powered or too OP.
[TLDR] I have the most fun making it up as we go along. My group once walked into a town on winter solstice, a shadowy tentacle monster had moved into nearby caves and when a tendril found its way into the local well and my players were the only ones to see it drag someone down... they quickly decided it wasn't their problem and set the inn on fire because "The Innkeeper was a douche". The repercussions took a couple of hours to play out, first with guards, then the local militia- but the players all had fun and ended the game with a town still terrorized by a tentacle monster.
As much as that specific game sounds like the exact opposite of the type of group I like (I would have locked them all in prison for arson and told them to create new characters capable of existing as part of a civilization, but that's because I don't like running evil or chaotic-neutral games), it is still the best advice. Don't plan too much. Your players will absolutely not go where you want them to, so you will have to go where they want you to, and if you plan too specifically you're just wasting your time. Like they said, know your world. Then just see where they go in it, and be prepared to create encounters on the fly. It's also a great way of coming up with a "mystery" storyline (at least if your players like mysteries instead of chaotic-evil murder-hobo games). Just have something strange happen with one detail that seems out of place, that's all you have to come up with in advance. Then listen to all the crazy theories the players come up with trying to solve the mystery. Give them a direction to pursue based on one of their theories, then throw in a twist partway through based on one of their other theories, and wrap it up with whatever you can come up with (which doesn't have to be much). Eventually they "solve the mystery", and think you planned out this amazing twisting plotline with foreshadowing and stuff. XD
Just started my first foray into DnD a few months ago. Given my party's different schedules, we've so far had 3 sessions. Needing to brush up on my DnD, my GM and a few of the other players directed me to Geek and Sundry. Boy am I glad they did. I have sooooooo much content to explore. Fortunately, my semester is almost over. I just have my final exams left. :)
You are BOTH such admirable and talented people! I am in awe of your abilities as GM's and watching you in actions makes me want to do so much more for my games! Thank you for being such good role models! Cheers to you both!
17:34 Two things: 1. That must've been pre-written. 2. If not, and that was improvised then I'm officially taking up a religion that is based around Matt Mercer...
Watching Critical Role and his spur of the moment descriptions of battle effects I can totally believe that he is able to improvise something like that.
Glad to see Matt back and I will say that probably the best advice in this whole video is that players DM sometimes and DMs find a group where you can be a player. I DM for a group of five players all of which are are fellow DMs, and I play in two games.
I just discovered your channel today. It’s great, lots of amazing ideas and awesome presentation. I just came back to GMing after decades away from the hobbby, playing D&D with my kids and their friends, and it’s such an amazing experience. These type of videos help us a lot. As you mentioned, when we started playing we didn’t have internet and it really helps.
I've just started DM 3 games in so far and things are going great so far. I've been watching u guys for a while and I'm sure your the only reason I can talk about a field like I'm looking at a picture.
So i felt inspired after watching to leave my own tip. Ive been dealing with alot of first time players and the usual explanation of its improv meets collaborative story telling just isn't enough.. so ive started advising for them to think of their character as them this guy is you but he has been shaped by different life events that have taken him to this point theyve shaped his personallity and his morals you need to take all this in and embody it by asking yourself if i lived this way how would i act/react to the world around me. I think alot of rookie feel like they have to play so fresh new personality their first time playing and its both daunting and confusing. However when i started telling people to play themselves but try to excercise some empathy to put themselves into the role of their character i could see the light of clarity and understanding click on
I love that they remarked upon that point around 22 minutes. Recently, my group of 8 players have been making D&D a real ball ache to run. At first, I blamed myself so I kept trying new things... eventually I started to realize that 3 of the players wanted vastly different games than the other 5. One wanted heavy intrigue, another wanted a stealth subterfuge game, and another wanted a murder hobo diablo style game. The other 5, on the other hand, wanted either character driven or world driven storytelling. I broke up the group not cause I dislike those other 3 play styles or favor heavy RP/plot/character plot..more just 5 meshed more together than the 3. :\ Thankfully, even before session 1 it looks great. Everyone wrote fantastic backstories in only a few days, everyone is writing up bits of lore to add regarding their character, and everyone seems pretty hyped for the new setting (which I basically stole Gothic 3 but none of them have played it so it's surely perfectly fine. xD ) TL;DR - Point being to DMs: It can be super hard to tell what exactly is "the problem" with a game of D&D, but I think at the end of the day it's what Chris Perkins said. . "What makes a good DM is good players." I think what he meant by that, really, was that what makes D&D as a whole any good at all IS the players, not the DM.
Naming multiple RPGs right of the bat: I thumbed up right then. Thanks for acknowledging (although it certainly looks so sincere, honest, and natural for you to do so) that other RPGs besides D&D exist.
Mat said "toss them a tennis ball ... they toss it around and you would be surprised by what you get back!" I know this is not what he meant but the image I get is Matt looking down and saying " A football?!!!?" Also guess who throw the ball to him? LOL
This great stuff and Matt is such a great guy and really voice for gaming and D&D. Every time he is in interviews he's very insightful.I'll have to check out Sabine I havent seen anything from her.
The sheer and obvious love that you two both have for this game and the community always comes across so strongly. Thank you both so much for helping me and hundreds of others drag our friends through the nightmare scape of our imaginations. Also Satine 😍😍😍😍❤❤😍😍😍😍
This is still helping me so much to this day. I've been running this game since I started watching Critical Role during season 1 and I still find myself back here, getting inspired by something small as Satine saying, "know your world...". Such a simple thing to say but she got me because I'm running out of the Forgotten Realms and most often when I'm uncomfortable, it's because I don't feel that I know the Sword Coast well enough to wing it and do it justice. Did not mean to type this much x.x rant over. Love y'all 🖤
I love the dialogue, and I enjoy hearing from Matt, as always! Listening IS supremely important, but it is actually one of the most difficult challenges I face as a DM with A.D.D. I often hear what they say at the beginning but if they launch into this long description of what they are doing, my brain tends to switch gears to "response" mode instead of staying in "listen" mode. For me, it's a constant and conscious struggle.
I just started a pirates campaign with my friends at school as a Halfling monk (3ft.2). The rest of the group consists of a white Dragonborn fighter(7ft.3), a pink(red) Dragonborn ranger(7ft.), a gnome sorcerer(1ft.7), a Wood elf cleric(5ft.4), a half-elf Arcane trickster(5ft.3), a drow thief(5ft.), and a “Russian” dwarf barbarian(3ft.1).
About to start up dming after looong corona break - I came for advice - but your enthusiasm is really what helped me :-) just listening to you two talk about playing sort of replaces nervousness with excitement :-D
It's fun to watch this. That being said, after all the crappy sessions I've had as a DM, I'm not going to drive myself nuts by being a DM because I'm supposed to have fun too. Awesome stuff!
Voltroning!!!! This is such a great idea, among soooo many great ideas. You both are inspirations and I admire your styles and personal flair and flavor. Thank you so much for sharing ideas, tips and thoughts with all of us! And OMG what a beautiful end.....it gave me delicious goosebumps :)
Best advice right in the first few minutes. If your players trust you to be fair, if there's a rule you don't know or that's ambiguous, don't waffle or hesitate, just make a ruling with confidence and authority and your players will accept it (and believe you've memorized the DM's guide). And if you made a mistake (or your players did, like about exactly what one of their spells could do, or something), own it, don't retcon unless it's only been a minute or two, just accept that it was played wrong that time and you'll all remember the right way next time. There's nothing wrong with saying "I don't know the rules for that, so I'm just going to make a ruling for now, and we'll look it up later, just take that roll with advantage and if you hit I'll have him make a saving throw", but there's also nothing wrong with saying "Yeah, just take that roll with advantage, and if you hit I'll have him make a saving throw" as if you KNOW that actually is the rule. XD Also, not every DM ruling that violates the rules-as-written is a "mistake". If you find out later your ruling was not in keeping with the rules as written, decide which one you like better or makes more sense, and make that the house rule from then on. CONFIDENCE is key, even if you have to fake it, even if you're fudging everything. As long as you're fair and consistent, it's fine. Make a ruling with authority and the players will accept it. I don't remember exactly how he put it... but it was Jean-Luc Picard talking about being captain of a starship who gave me this DMing advice. XD
1:30 There's definitely only so much that a person has to offer. So true. I love watching Matt Mercer's games. He's masterful! But when watching other GMs/DMs, I realize how many other little elements they introduce into RPGs and that I should utilize them.
Hello @Matthew Mercer & @Satine Phoenix and thank you putting time and effort for all these greatly scripted and well paced videos. Taking advantage of the fact that you uploaded this video on my *31st birthday* I will dare to ask for a gift. **squints eyes** I wish, you will make a D&D 3.5e vs 5e pros and cons video and which version has better flexibility, overall. I have a bookcase full of 3.5 books and I have paused D&D over the last few years. A new group of players wants me to DM their way into the vast ocean of imagination and they're asking me if we can play 5e (they think "The latter, the better"). Farewell thee travellers and thank you for taking time to read aaaaaall this. May Corellon be always at your side.
Hearing your players is such important tip for multiple reasons. One way is that more than 75% of my improvising as GM is done by listening to the players. If you can get them somewhere, where they can talk over about your plot, or about something that is happening now, just listen to their ideas. For example, I ran something with my players and part of the plot was that one lord was serial killer. Then my players talked over this and one stated "What that Lord? He cant be serial killer, he was with us when last kill happend, remember?" and then i was ... well fucked up. But other player pressed with "Well ... are we sure he was with us? It could be ilusion as far as we know ... that would be really clever!" ... and there was me, DM, hastily writing "wizard, illusion spells", under my lord. Oh boy, my players were so happy when they discovered that he actually was wizard ... because they figured it out! It was so hard and they did it right? Little they know, that I just fucked up and use them to correct my story ... Listen to them, use their ideas, improvise base on those ideas :)
There's also the mass combat rules in the DMG, I forget exactly which page it is but it's in the variant rules section. If you have combats with a large number of combatants, you can determine how many of each type of combatant is needed to do an auto-hit. The player takes damage but it does eliminate the threat of crits from large groups (Really preserving that "Conservation of Ninjutsu" trope) So if the combatants need like... a 14-16 to hit the PC then it requires a certain number of combatants and you just calculate based on how many are attempting to attack that player.
For Initiative, I have all players roll and then I'll roll dice for half the number of enemies I have. If players roll higher than me, they move first as a team. The person who rolled highest goes first and then I cycle clockwise or counterclockwise depending on who get second place, moving towards them first. Then, I run an enemy turn. It helps me keep track of combat and turn order as a storyteller.
About the question of the playlist : If you do, as i, with very few notes while GMing, i Advise to put up a SMALL playlist during the prep time that will ahve all the musique you want or may use. No more than 10 entries. Maybe a second one for pure efect. That way, even if you are lost, you can catch what you need in only a glance and adapt. Something like 1 town ambiance, 1 travel musique, 3 or 4 battle music for intensity and/or Flavours/identity (Eg Demons and animals ahve not the same battle song), 1 Revelations ambiance (the big bad guys does his speches) 1 sad, melancolique or heavy ambiance, 1 tavern/joyful theme. During your prep you will knwo what they can encounter or not so prepare those short playlist in advance, you can expand them afterward when you get better at managing songs
Spend a quarter of your planning time on the story as you see it. Then take some time to look back over that story and say "but what if the players do x". Rinse repeat. You don't have to get all the possible points where the players could deviate and it's almost a guarantee that they will surprise you, but the more you plan for the unexpected the more prepared you will be. Eisenhower said plans are worthless, but planning is everything.
I had a group that had a favorite signature move, where they'd throw their dwarf like a baseball as an opener. Dwarf would run and jump, with a boosted assist from another fighter, then while in the air the druid's massive pet snake (w/ airwalk) would catch and sling the dwarf toward the enemies. The dwarf was a tank, and had a spiked tower shield he would have raised in front while he was flying, and it was always pretty cool. Looking back on it (it was my first time DMing) I should have given that move a downside, like potential or guaranteed recoil damage, to go with the upsides I gave it.
I tend to plan one or to plot one plotline, but knowing my players I also have several contingency plans ready to use. In general I do the outline,pass the ball then to the players and let them run with it.
![Critmas Unboxing 20161121 with Matthew Mercer & Marisha Ray [Spoilers E76]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/hC8ZtRi_xGo/mqdefault.jpg)
I'm a simple man. You put Mercer in a thumbnail, I press like.
Same here. then again i get up at 3 am every Friday morning to watch Critical role live rather than wait until the rebroadcast at around 7 am. FYI i live in the UK
Wait.....they stream thursday at 4 AM for me. SHIT! I NEED TO DO THAT TOO!
Preach
This guy gets it.
came for Matt. not a fan of Satine
Matt Mercer is the very picture of cool. I think he's a bit of an introvert...but he's got such a good on-camera presence that ppl don't even notice. His reactions are very cool and controlled, and when he doesn't need to react to anything he looks pensive and receptive. I don't know how he is able to accomplish this...but that's what makes him amazing.
yup im no psychologist but introvert with a high intelligence is what i see when i see his reactions
a graduate of the school of cool for sure
a good dm must talk without shame or fear or hesitance. pretend to be a vampire etc . chit chatting is easy when you can do that
As someone who is in many ways similar to Matt, I can see his discomfort and shyness here. He does cover it pretty well, though.
Now we need to get Satine, Matt Mercer and Matt Colville together for the same video.
ReierGotter Would watch for days... Which might be necessary given Colville's delightful verbosity.
krylo When he was on GM Tips they had to do two parts.
I’m not sure that video would ever end lmao
I'd pay to see that
They are a river to their people!
Bullshiting with confidence is my new life motto.
I remember using that phrase way back in college. Confident BS is a life skill. ;)
Starting a new job, this is my new motto
That's everyday at work
Bullshitting With Confidence might be Fake It Til You Make It's cousin.
This just made me want a campaign DMed by Travis Willingham with the players being Matt Mercer, Matt Colville, Satine, Liam and some other DM friends. Grog DMing the Masters.
It could go so well.
It could go so wrong.
It could be both, but it would be awesome.
grog or travis ?
Grog. Not Travis. Grog.
David Bliss Travis’ character is named grog in campaign 1
@Elan Emilio it would only work if they were into it
@@konradknox Given the named folks, I can't help but think they'd lean REALLY hard into it.
This series has been invaluable. Thank you both for the advice and lessons.
I must have missed something. Is this the last episode?
Simon Aytes it seems like it might be. But who can say for sure?
I hope not. This series is singlehandedly responsible for me being an OK GM.
so weird for matt to be a guest on DM Tips :p
Amer Turkistani or as a great Goliath barbarian would say, “GMmmm tips”?
The torch has been passed, but doing so has not left Matt in the shadows.
These two are among my favorite people on the Internet.
That DM out is literally a passing of the torch....so good!!
I’ll miss your take on this Satine.
Matt talked from his own perspective.
You used your own perspective and also brought in guests. It’s been informative and entertaining.
I cannot speak for everyone, but I’ll miss your methods and take. Thank you for your time and efforts.
Your show has made me a better DM... and I’ve been playing likely before you were born.
I want to thank all of you on this channel for your tips and insight. I'm watching this video literally 3 hours before my first session as a DM starts.
Dennis Sacca Good luck! Just remember to have fun and not take it too seriously :) Don't worry about making mistakes and if you do need to take a few mins to look something up, set the party up with something to think about. I feel a lot less pressured when I need to do that if they are chatting amongst themselves
A useful trick I've been doing for years to go along with that 'listen' advice is: At the end of every session I ask my players what their favorite part was. Over time you get to learn what kind of things each player really enjoys, and it's in a way that they don't just feel like they're being surveyed on 'how to improve your gaming experience', it's just sharing fun memories with each other after the game.
Some railroading thoughts for new GMs:
1) Like Matt said, don’t be afraid to railroad, but there is a “right” and “wrong” way to do it
2) Instead of thinking “railroad,” think “ runway; a long stretch of controlled road to give the party direction, then when the plane takes off, the sky is the limit
3) To prevent players from deviating too far, make sure your runway is compelling! Literally! The story should compel the players to take action! Why do they want to find the war machine maker and steal the plans for the rebellion? Why is this group of goblins invading the mines such an issue? Why should the players help the paladin order hunt down the necromancer king and his cult of druids? Help the players use their backstories to guide their motivations and reasoning to work together (hint: Xanathar’s Guide has some nice tricks to backstory planning)
4) Consequences: Ensure that there are consequences- both good AND bad for doing anything and everything! They decided to rush off to fight the bad guy rather than protect the mines whose minions he sent to attack? The good: they’ll take him by surprise and make the fight easier! The bad: the lack of reliable mithral from the mines has crippled the soldiers in the nearby city! And the hobgoblin empire is moving in to attack! They’ll be helpless and the economy of the region may collapse! There could be inflation of goods in nearby towns! Note that they could have saved the mines, but it would have made the big bad exponentially more difficult to fight, given his or her time to prepare. Every action should have both good and bad repercussions
5) Random encounters are your best friends! When planning the session, look to all the surrounding areas, what is there? Forests? Deserts? Ancient ruins? A battlefield littered with corpses? For each area, pull up Kobold Fightclub and select the terrain/ environment and set up random encounters for your players to take on! This does several things:
- Kills time: if you weren’t fully prepared for the direction they were going, you can bide your time and plan while they fight or escape the collapsing tunnels, etc. Better yet, the session may be over once they are resting and licking their wounds, giving you time to plan the next session.
- Injuries require healing, they may find the need to head back to the village they left, perhaps giving you the opportunity to “re-compel” your players on the tracks again...
- props if you use the encounters to redirect them, or even help you to improv the area they went too! And adventure they weren’t even looking for!
6) Plan, just not too much: When planning, ask yourself, ‘how can my players mess up my plans?’ and create two or three backup plans. Wanted to use the big bad to intimidate them at the start of the session only to have them attack and put themselves or your big bad in danger? Plan to have a dead man’s switch! They attack and perhaps the whole building and all the civilians go down with it! Perhaps they’re holding the PC’s NPC ally or friends captive, and only they can reveal the location due to the magical fidelius charm (from HP)! Have some backups and redirection prompts that still feel organic
7) Factions. There is a really neat, but sort of cumbersome faction system in the tRPG “Stars without Numbers” repurposing their GM faction turn system allows you to have factions react to each other and world happenings as dictated by the players actions. They decided to abandon the clear prompt to head to the forest to stop the kidnapping group of dryads and went to the Holy City of Tredamos, led by the High Theocratic Leadership of the Divines instead? Perhaps, during your in-between faction turns, the city is undergoing a revolt! The two clerics and paladin belong to those holy orders! Will they be persecuted? Will they help? What will happen to the quest they are abandoning? Using these turns, you can create plot hooks to improv off of and creating compelling stories for players to follow
8) Modular material: Dungeon didn’t get used? Encounter was ignored? Repurpose it! That is the beauty of generic battlemaps, just have an encounter ready and if it isn’t used, no harm and no foul! Just shelve it and use it later!
9) Tech: make use of those online resources. I use OneNote for session planning and putting all sorts of useful rules player materials for quick access and easy reference. Roll20 has amazing tools to creating encounters on the fly. Kobold fight club is a great resource for quick encounter building.
Hope this helps aspiring GMs out there!
Really good tips and hints - a few things I would like to add myself:
1) Backup NPCs. Yes, it is one of those very generic points but do not underestimate how quickly players can sometimes progress through your story-line. Prepare several backup NPCs. If you do not need them in a session? Re-purpose them. However if you do need them, you'll be thankful to have them in your arsenal as NPC generation takes a great toll on you, especially in games like Cyberpunk, which require you to generate the NPC stats yourself.
2) As mentioned before in other posts - do a session zero. Get to know your players, the way they act in character and also make sure to discuss with them where they want to go with their character. Self portray and third person perception can differ by an incredible amount. In addition to that - try to re-align your conceptions of the player characters with them once in a while. It helps you to understand them better and it might help them in integrating themselves into the story a lot better.
3) Solo sessions are your friend. I use them under several circumstances, here are a few examples:
a) A player was gone for a while and re-joins the party and needs to be caught up
b) A player has an individual part of story line that others in your campaign should not know about (for now)
c) A player character has died and the player goes through character creation again up to a point where she / he rejoins the party.
4) Do not reward your party overly much (unless it serves the plot line). It is incredibly easy to accidentally throw in that little bit of extra for your players, but it stacks up. If you realize that one of the items was maybe a bit too overpowered, don't just simply take it away, use your story / the plot in order to remove it from the game. You do not even have to remove it permanently - have something stolen, lost during a raid, confiscated by the authorities, taken as a form of safety / insurance by a third party.... there are lot of options. Once you believe the players are in alignment with the power / potential of the item - have them go on a quest to retrieve it.
Hope this little note helps :)
And here are my "railroading" tips:
1. Don't railroad the players, but do railroad the game world.
The story and events in the world happen on schedule *unless* the players act to change it.
2. Less railroad, more train station.
The players have more than one choice of "train" to ride, but once they are on it, they stay "on track" until finished with that quest or they "jump ship" (pardon the mixed metaphors) and get on a different track.
I was talking to a guy one time and he was telling me about the game he was DMing. He said it was COMPLETELY Sandbox.......... and his players hated it. Basically he created a world and said "So where do you want to go?". No hooks, no suggestions. You've got to at least have some hooks or options to suggest. Some rumors for them to hear, or some job offerings they can choose to accept. As Satine says know your world, so if they don't follow any of those........ I have a Complete world that I have created over many years. When I start my next campaign I will have 3 planned adventure options but enough known of the world that if they don't want to do any of those and go off in a different area, I know what's there and have many options or hooks for any area they go in.
@@Logan_Baron
Sandboxing is way-overrated. It becomes an excuse for DMs to under-prepare and improv too much, and the quality is really low.
As a player, I would rather play through a DM's pre-planned story and experience detailed places, NPCs, and items.
You! Are a great man/woman!
To the question about conflicting play styles or players not having the fun you were hoping for in your game: Something I do in my games is at the end of the wrap-up when people are putting away dice and books I ask my players to go around the table and share with the group what they liked and didn't like about the session if anything. Some times people don't speak up, but sometimes I've gotten a lot of great feedback. It has been helpful to see what the players have taken away from the session (in terms of what excited them) but also to see what frustrated them. The source of frustration could have been an encounter that didn't go well, a piece of dialogue that was janky or sometimes just a simple screw-up on my part but it has always been helpful and I'm happy that I've been able to provide a space where my players feel that they can contribute to the overall feel of the game.
I kept seeing commebts about the outro as I watched... Now that I have seen and heard it, thats what I want to use to go to sleep every night. Matts voice is just so soothing
Just when I think I'm improving as a new DM, I watch Matt improvise a suspenseful moment like it's nothing @ 17:35 ... Feelsnoobman
Such a good episode. Thanks for being awesome everyone!
For our table, we use Session Zero. Session zero happens before the first game is played. Also once gaming begins, any player at any time can request a session zero to reestablish boundaries, rules, and expectations. We sometimes will also have a new session zero after milestones (either concluding a story arc, or after the characters level to discuss new character options available after leveling). That way everyone understands how their character options work, including me, the GM.
A session zero in the middle of a campaign is something I've never thought of, but seeing it here, it sounds like a great idea! Thanks, friend!
UberDoogee Sure thing! All my players are new to D&D but one, so when new options comes up it gives us all a chance to discuss how those options work. I find it SUPER useful to keep my players engaged.
What is a session zero?
*Snatch* I'll take that idea for my own campaign, thanks. That's a great idea, giving the players agency to speak up if they're not happy. Some players need that.
Brave Heart Before actually starting the game, everyone meets up to talk about the game. DM usually describes the setting, players roll characters, ground rules and expectations are set. Might change from table to table, but generally it's a pre-campaign prep session.
I enjoyed Matt's gm tips very much. It was nice to see him visit the show again.
Great GM Tips Matt and Satine.
Nerdarchist Dave
Nerdarchy I'd love to see a game run by Nerdarchy with some of the GM's that have been on this show.
holy shit that would be awesome
I brag about this every chance I get, but I met Matt Mercer at the Irwindale renfaire. If you're reading this, Matt, you made my entire year and you made me a much better DM with everything you've done! We love you man
After seeing the Between the Sheets with Matt Mercer, his reaction to the "how'd you get so pretty" question is really put into context.
Matt has some pretty severe body image issues, in case people don't know.
That's kind of sad. He's a good looking man.
Yeah, I don't understand it either. I think he's a pretty good-looking guy (no homo).
I love this videos so much!!
This community is so amazing I love it so much
Matt and Satine are such an inspiration
I like how he put it. Yes gming is equivalent to giving a gift to your players. It is a present made with much effort and love.
If i have one GM tip i'd like to share it is this. expect your players to do the unexpected, touch the statue that you hinted it would be a bad idea to touch. open the door that has a big sign saying keep out. or simply run like scared two year olds from a monster that you've lovingly custom made to get them to level 3 by the end of the session without sacrificing story.
First session I ran had the party go to a bar. (First time playing d&d for all)
The plan was: they meet a rouge who joins them. Crazy old man tells them of a dragon's horde that lays empty, and is protected by a pretender king. They go to get the money.
This is what happened. The monk sees a half-orc cheating a gnome out of his money. The monk ruins the game, orc tries the leave, in anger, monk does a flurry of blows, only hits once. The druid turns to a bear. The barbarian rages. The guards are getting ready to fight and I thought: "Oh god no... there is about to be a tpk in the first hour of this campaign."
I ask my rouge what he wants to do. He talks to the orc, pays him off, where they are kicked out of the bar, instead of being cut down. On the way out kills the old man after they were given the quest.
Our rouge and druid go to buy horses. I tell them that the stable boy (whos a grown man) can't speak well and seems mentally impaired. They preceded to rob the man and gallop away to the mountain.
To this day they said that they were in the right and that their characters are good.
rogue*
So glad you two have been able to touch so many people with not only your love of gaming but your encouragement to people as individuals. Having read Satine's story, I am so happy that she has found this place of light in her life after what she went through as a child.
Both Satine and Matt make me not only want to be a better DM, but a better person. Love both your faces.
Great to watch. These two should do more of these together.
I came for the Matt. I stayed for the Satine!!! great great great episode
Plenty came for Satine back in the day
@@Jk-zv6tz can imagine lots of adolescent D&D fans still do :D
That last little scene Mercer played out... I got chills. If I can get to be half as good at gming as he is, oh man.
These videos always line up with the problems my group is having. It's insane!
You all are the greatest.
I wish I could live long enough so that A Star Trek holodeck could be created, imagine if Mathew Mercer had one of those to play around in.
The world, the story, the lore, the NPC's he would will into being for you to unfold would be awesome.
Side note: please make a T2000 character class I have tried to make loads but their under Powered or too OP.
Felix: "I designed Vic Fontaine."
Matt: "I created Victor the black powder merchant."
Felix: ".............touché!"
10:10 "Weird, unexpected..."
The sort of Freudian slips I make at the table all the time.
Glad to know I'm not the only one.
[TLDR] I have the most fun making it up as we go along.
My group once walked into a town on winter solstice, a shadowy tentacle monster had moved into nearby caves and when a tendril found its way into the local well and my players were the only ones to see it drag someone down... they quickly decided it wasn't their problem and set the inn on fire because "The Innkeeper was a douche". The repercussions took a couple of hours to play out, first with guards, then the local militia- but the players all had fun and ended the game with a town still terrorized by a tentacle monster.
Joshua Godwin That’s awesome!
As much as that specific game sounds like the exact opposite of the type of group I like (I would have locked them all in prison for arson and told them to create new characters capable of existing as part of a civilization, but that's because I don't like running evil or chaotic-neutral games), it is still the best advice. Don't plan too much. Your players will absolutely not go where you want them to, so you will have to go where they want you to, and if you plan too specifically you're just wasting your time.
Like they said, know your world. Then just see where they go in it, and be prepared to create encounters on the fly. It's also a great way of coming up with a "mystery" storyline (at least if your players like mysteries instead of chaotic-evil murder-hobo games). Just have something strange happen with one detail that seems out of place, that's all you have to come up with in advance. Then listen to all the crazy theories the players come up with trying to solve the mystery. Give them a direction to pursue based on one of their theories, then throw in a twist partway through based on one of their other theories, and wrap it up with whatever you can come up with (which doesn't have to be much). Eventually they "solve the mystery", and think you planned out this amazing twisting plotline with foreshadowing and stuff. XD
I love this material. Its really fine made nerd-artistic content for a huge community around the world. Long live tabletop rpg!
Can we talk about that outro though?!
YES! SO GOOD!
Mercer...his voice reverbs in my mind
I think Satine got some tingles.
Actually had a tear in my eye at the end.
Just started my first foray into DnD a few months ago. Given my party's different schedules, we've so far had 3 sessions. Needing to brush up on my DnD, my GM and a few of the other players directed me to Geek and Sundry. Boy am I glad they did. I have sooooooo much content to explore. Fortunately, my semester is almost over. I just have my final exams left. :)
You are BOTH such admirable and talented people! I am in awe of your abilities as GM's and watching you in actions makes me want to do so much more for my games! Thank you for being such good role models! Cheers to you both!
I wish I could like this five times. You two are so great!
wisemoon40 How did you do it 4 times?
17:34 Two things:
1. That must've been pre-written.
2. If not, and that was improvised then I'm officially taking up a religion that is based around Matt Mercer...
Watching Critical Role and his spur of the moment descriptions of battle effects I can totally believe that he is able to improvise something like that.
just checking in to see if you have uniforms for your religion yet?
D&d T-shirt with a soft vest over a pair of blue jeans for sure!!!!
Glad to see Matt back and I will say that probably the best advice in this whole video is that players DM sometimes and DMs find a group where you can be a player. I DM for a group of five players all of which are are fellow DMs, and I play in two games.
I just discovered your channel today. It’s great, lots of amazing ideas and awesome presentation. I just came back to GMing after decades away from the hobbby, playing D&D with my kids and their friends, and it’s such an amazing experience. These type of videos help us a lot. As you mentioned, when we started playing we didn’t have internet and it really helps.
I've just started DM 3 games in so far and things are going great so far. I've been watching u guys for a while and I'm sure your the only reason I can talk about a field like I'm looking at a picture.
So i felt inspired after watching to leave my own tip. Ive been dealing with alot of first time players and the usual explanation of its improv meets collaborative story telling just isn't enough.. so ive started advising for them to think of their character as them this guy is you but he has been shaped by different life events that have taken him to this point theyve shaped his personallity and his morals you need to take all this in and embody it by asking yourself if i lived this way how would i act/react to the world around me. I think alot of rookie feel like they have to play so fresh new personality their first time playing and its both daunting and confusing. However when i started telling people to play themselves but try to excercise some empathy to put themselves into the role of their character i could see the light of clarity and understanding click on
I could watch Matt and Satine all day. A longer video would definitely have been welcome.
I just found this and it is over! Need more GM tips... Satine and Matt please do more. Fledgling DM here looking for a grandmaster GM to learn from
I love that they remarked upon that point around 22 minutes. Recently, my group of 8 players have been making D&D a real ball ache to run. At first, I blamed myself so I kept trying new things... eventually I started to realize that 3 of the players wanted vastly different games than the other 5. One wanted heavy intrigue, another wanted a stealth subterfuge game, and another wanted a murder hobo diablo style game. The other 5, on the other hand, wanted either character driven or world driven storytelling. I broke up the group not cause I dislike those other 3 play styles or favor heavy RP/plot/character plot..more just 5 meshed more together than the 3. :\
Thankfully, even before session 1 it looks great. Everyone wrote fantastic backstories in only a few days, everyone is writing up bits of lore to add regarding their character, and everyone seems pretty hyped for the new setting (which I basically stole Gothic 3 but none of them have played it so it's surely perfectly fine. xD )
TL;DR - Point being to DMs: It can be super hard to tell what exactly is "the problem" with a game of D&D, but I think at the end of the day it's what Chris Perkins said. . "What makes a good DM is good players." I think what he meant by that, really, was that what makes D&D as a whole any good at all IS the players, not the DM.
It's like herding cats. Even three or four players is a bit much if nobody's on the same page.
You're a brave man. I don't run groups larger than six. Four is the sweet spot for me, but it doesn't happen too often. Sigh..... #dmproblems
Yay! Mercer is back and it's time to watch GM tips again!
Naming multiple RPGs right of the bat: I thumbed up right then.
Thanks for acknowledging (although it certainly looks so sincere, honest, and natural for you to do so) that other RPGs besides D&D exist.
Mat said "toss them a tennis ball ... they toss it around and you would be surprised by what you get back!" I know this is not what he meant but the image I get is Matt looking down and saying " A football?!!!?" Also guess who throw the ball to him? LOL
Tossed as a tennis ball and came back as a football? It was Sam. It was definitely Sam.
Travis, definitely Travis.
I am , hopefully, going to shut up now and let majority rule!
He just gets bombarded with everything from a football to a cricket ball and deadpans into the camera like he's on the Office.
This great stuff and Matt is such a great guy and really voice for gaming and D&D. Every time he is in interviews he's very insightful.I'll have to check out Sabine I havent seen anything from her.
The sheer and obvious love that you two both have for this game and the community always comes across so strongly.
Thank you both so much for helping me and hundreds of others drag our friends through the nightmare scape of our imaginations.
Also Satine 😍😍😍😍❤❤😍😍😍😍
I love when my players coordinate! It makes my day.
This is still helping me so much to this day. I've been running this game since I started watching Critical Role during season 1 and I still find myself back here, getting inspired by something small as Satine saying, "know your world...". Such a simple thing to say but she got me because I'm running out of the Forgotten Realms and most often when I'm uncomfortable, it's because I don't feel that I know the Sword Coast well enough to wing it and do it justice. Did not mean to type this much x.x rant over. Love y'all 🖤
Satine we are going to miss you dude.
Thanks for your perspective
I really liked having you Satine! Thanks for all the tips!
I love the dialogue, and I enjoy hearing from Matt, as always! Listening IS supremely important, but it is actually one of the most difficult challenges I face as a DM with A.D.D. I often hear what they say at the beginning but if they launch into this long description of what they are doing, my brain tends to switch gears to "response" mode instead of staying in "listen" mode. For me, it's a constant and conscious struggle.
Satine is superb and Mercer too
Thank you both very much
thank DM finish was incredible!!
I just started a pirates campaign with my friends at school as a Halfling monk (3ft.2). The rest of the group consists of a white Dragonborn fighter(7ft.3), a pink(red) Dragonborn ranger(7ft.), a gnome sorcerer(1ft.7), a Wood elf cleric(5ft.4), a half-elf Arcane trickster(5ft.3), a drow thief(5ft.), and a “Russian” dwarf barbarian(3ft.1).
Matt's scream at 0:56 is pretty much how I live my life in my head.
About to start up dming after looong corona break - I came for advice - but your enthusiasm is really what helped me :-) just listening to you two talk about playing sort of replaces nervousness with excitement :-D
It's fun to watch this. That being said, after all the crappy sessions I've had as a DM, I'm not going to drive myself nuts by being a DM because I'm supposed to have fun too. Awesome stuff!
Voltroning!!!! This is such a great idea, among soooo many great ideas. You both are inspirations and I admire your styles and personal flair and flavor. Thank you so much for sharing ideas, tips and thoughts with all of us! And OMG what a beautiful end.....it gave me delicious goosebumps :)
Best advice right in the first few minutes. If your players trust you to be fair, if there's a rule you don't know or that's ambiguous, don't waffle or hesitate, just make a ruling with confidence and authority and your players will accept it (and believe you've memorized the DM's guide). And if you made a mistake (or your players did, like about exactly what one of their spells could do, or something), own it, don't retcon unless it's only been a minute or two, just accept that it was played wrong that time and you'll all remember the right way next time. There's nothing wrong with saying "I don't know the rules for that, so I'm just going to make a ruling for now, and we'll look it up later, just take that roll with advantage and if you hit I'll have him make a saving throw", but there's also nothing wrong with saying "Yeah, just take that roll with advantage, and if you hit I'll have him make a saving throw" as if you KNOW that actually is the rule. XD
Also, not every DM ruling that violates the rules-as-written is a "mistake". If you find out later your ruling was not in keeping with the rules as written, decide which one you like better or makes more sense, and make that the house rule from then on.
CONFIDENCE is key, even if you have to fake it, even if you're fudging everything. As long as you're fair and consistent, it's fine. Make a ruling with authority and the players will accept it. I don't remember exactly how he put it... but it was Jean-Luc Picard talking about being captain of a starship who gave me this DMing advice. XD
Downloaded Syrinscape and I wish I had this years ago when I ran bi-weekly games. Amazing program. Thanks for letting me in on that.
Dat Matt Mercer session re-cap description. #DMDescriptionGoals
Definitely one of the better "DMing is out of here" narratives
1:30 There's definitely only so much that a person has to offer. So true. I love watching Matt Mercer's games. He's masterful! But when watching other GMs/DMs, I realize how many other little elements they introduce into RPGs and that I should utilize them.
ah god this is creative gold! Thank you for the introspective, educational content
Every player should DM... That means that Laura Bailey and Ashley Johnson still need to run a game. I want this to happen.
Well must be nice to have your wish fulfilled!
@@zedekiahcrockett4016 Well isn't this comment a blast from the past :). Indeed it has been, and Ashley's one-shot was fun.
that fucking awesome gm outro though, holy shit. it gave me goosbumps all over my body :o
Hello @Matthew Mercer & @Satine Phoenix and thank you putting time and effort for all these greatly scripted and well paced videos.
Taking advantage of the fact that you uploaded this video on my *31st birthday* I will dare to ask for a gift.
**squints eyes** I wish, you will make a D&D 3.5e vs 5e pros and cons video and which version has better flexibility, overall.
I have a bookcase full of 3.5 books and I have paused D&D over the last few years. A new group of players wants me to DM their way into the vast ocean of imagination and they're asking me if we can play 5e (they think "The latter, the better").
Farewell thee travellers and thank you for taking time to read aaaaaall this.
May Corellon be always at your side.
That outro though. That should be the intro in the GM manual. :)
Hearing your players is such important tip for multiple reasons. One way is that more than 75% of my improvising as GM is done by listening to the players. If you can get them somewhere, where they can talk over about your plot, or about something that is happening now, just listen to their ideas.
For example, I ran something with my players and part of the plot was that one lord was serial killer. Then my players talked over this and one stated "What that Lord? He cant be serial killer, he was with us when last kill happend, remember?" and then i was ... well fucked up. But other player pressed with "Well ... are we sure he was with us? It could be ilusion as far as we know ... that would be really clever!" ... and there was me, DM, hastily writing "wizard, illusion spells", under my lord.
Oh boy, my players were so happy when they discovered that he actually was wizard ... because they figured it out! It was so hard and they did it right?
Little they know, that I just fucked up and use them to correct my story ...
Listen to them, use their ideas, improvise base on those ideas :)
There's also the mass combat rules in the DMG, I forget exactly which page it is but it's in the variant rules section. If you have combats with a large number of combatants, you can determine how many of each type of combatant is needed to do an auto-hit. The player takes damage but it does eliminate the threat of crits from large groups (Really preserving that "Conservation of Ninjutsu" trope) So if the combatants need like... a 14-16 to hit the PC then it requires a certain number of combatants and you just calculate based on how many are attempting to attack that player.
Great series
Life Tips with Matt Mercer and Satine Phoenix? I'd so watch that.
Intresting hearing tips for GMs when I have only been a player.
sounds like its time to take up the mantle and run a game. :-D
When you've learned all you can learn, start teaching. That's where the true growth begins.
My immediate thought when they brought up Syrinscape was Satine's constant war against the birds! :D
For Initiative, I have all players roll and then I'll roll dice for half the number of enemies I have. If players roll higher than me, they move first as a team. The person who rolled highest goes first and then I cycle clockwise or counterclockwise depending on who get second place, moving towards them first. Then, I run an enemy turn. It helps me keep track of combat and turn order as a storyteller.
Tips for starting the first session in a campaign. What should the 1st session accomplish? How should I go about introducing/initiating those things?
Life Goal: Play in a game DMed by Mathew.
same
Ditto!
Ditto
About the question of the playlist :
If you do, as i, with very few notes while GMing, i Advise to put up a SMALL playlist during the prep time that will ahve all the musique you want or may use. No more than 10 entries. Maybe a second one for pure efect. That way, even if you are lost, you can catch what you need in only a glance and adapt.
Something like 1 town ambiance, 1 travel musique, 3 or 4 battle music for intensity and/or Flavours/identity (Eg Demons and animals ahve not the same battle song), 1 Revelations ambiance (the big bad guys does his speches) 1 sad, melancolique or heavy ambiance, 1 tavern/joyful theme.
During your prep you will knwo what they can encounter or not so prepare those short playlist in advance, you can expand them afterward when you get better at managing songs
Spend a quarter of your planning time on the story as you see it. Then take some time to look back over that story and say "but what if the players do x". Rinse repeat. You don't have to get all the possible points where the players could deviate and it's almost a guarantee that they will surprise you, but the more you plan for the unexpected the more prepared you will be. Eisenhower said plans are worthless, but planning is everything.
I like it when she shows me her tips.
In my opinion Matt was the better host/teacher of GM Tips
Is there a SUPER like button...get on that RUclips...
The magnitude of good looking people in this video cannot be measured.
I had a group that had a favorite signature move, where they'd throw their dwarf like a baseball as an opener. Dwarf would run and jump, with a boosted assist from another fighter, then while in the air the druid's massive pet snake (w/ airwalk) would catch and sling the dwarf toward the enemies. The dwarf was a tank, and had a spiked tower shield he would have raised in front while he was flying, and it was always pretty cool. Looking back on it (it was my first time DMing) I should have given that move a downside, like potential or guaranteed recoil damage, to go with the upsides I gave it.
I tend to plan one or to plot one plotline, but knowing my players I also have several contingency plans ready to use. In general I do the outline,pass the ball then to the players and let them run with it.
Matt Mercer seems like a really cool guy
Anyone else notice that at 10:12 Matt Mercer accidentally says "Unexpected Erections?"
so subliminal
"Mmmmmmm naughty naughty Matthew.....!"
_in Gilmore's voice_
Wow, I didn't even notice when watching, my brain just autocorrected it to directions I guess.
as 'long' as he shares it with her....
They are sitting rather close. like from what i can see they probably have knees touching. and she is rather good looking.
I love the chemistry between Mercer and Phoenix...
Also, it’s amazing how some of this advice also applies to parenting.
Listening, improvising, and working hard for people whose experience you're responsible for? I'd be more shocked if it didn't apply to parenting.
i just watch all the gm tips each time i start a new campaign no.1 best tips. ups my game like a hot air balloon
Awesome end to the series! I wonder if they are going to get someone new to do another season of GM Tips.
I've fallen in love with Satine.
Matt and Satine together...GREAT!