🌟 FREE Checklist PDF available on Patreon! www.patreon.com/posts/39281630 ▶️ Tasha's Cauldron OFFICIAL Session 0 Guidelines! ruclips.net/video/l6ZV8bjTYZ8/видео.html
"Encourage players to privately share any topics they don't want to occur in the game." Very well said. Sensitive, without having to go through a checklist. Also, you get +100xp for Bardy McFly.
Yep, this checklist isn’t that kind of checklist. Both Bardy and I are grateful for the XP! Very cool to see you commenting on one of my videos! Thanks, professor!
@@BobWorldBuilderThis is so true I put this on to prepare for my session zero today and I'm in great mood now you've got some kind of magical aura my man.
I like to have a quick, non canon dungeon crawl ready at the end of session 0. That way, if we have time and everyone's ready to go, we can try out our characters and get a chance to get to know each playstyle.
I've just had a thought, You could Pseudo-cannon that crawl by having it be a weird shared dream that all the pc's had! Then they can act on that stuff in character (if you'd like) and gives a fun moment when they meet of "I think we've met" "Nah" "Can't remember where though" or something ^^
This is a great idea but in the "session 0" I just went to...that was almost all there was...some of us came with characters, some were new and needed help...I had a character half done, figured I would finish it there, but I spent the entire time helping a newbie make theirs and then the DM was like..."Everyone have a character? Okay let's do it" and went into the short dungeon. No talk about expectations, setting, plans, anything like that. It was fun but looking back I realize it was really a poor session 0.
I usually meet up with my friends (we are all newbies) for 7 hours. We play a bit of dnd, make a break where we cook some awesome food together, eat it and then keep playing. Makes those 7 hours go by like its nothing.
We used to use this rule for our games. However, a big flaw we found with it was it doesn't just affect the one PC who went down but the *whole* party since that PC will likely want to long rest immediately to clear the exhaustion. And because the other players are good sports, they'll say "yeah sure we should long rest" so the whole game has to stop just because one person went down. Another factor is that it inadvertently makes the game a lot easier because if the party keeps long resting as soon as someone drops to 0, then the party will be at full HP and resources a lot more. And lastly, I've tried to avoid those issues by putting the party in more situations where long resting wasn't always an option like with time-critical quests or environmental hazards. However, this just made the player resign and not want to try anything because they had the attitude "no point, I have disadvantage". But yeah, if it works for your table then ignore me lmao.
I do the same! Except mine is 2 Lv of exhaustion, so if you go down to 0 3 time you died. I also let my players know when they can long rest. Which is usually when they're in a safe environment, like a town.
Wait, people don't think about D and D all the time? Like when I'm driving around for work thinking about how I would DM a Beholder as a main Villain behind an epic adventure. Isn't that normal?
I think an important point you mentioned that isn't often considered is "you can have a session 0 at any point in your campaign". I hadn't ever really thought of that, and might try to schedule a half-session for a check in every few months
The first point about asking what players are interested in or want only works if they players actually know what they want. Consistently, I ask my players stuff like “hey, what’s something you want to see in this campaign? What’s something you’ve never faced/seen before and would like to see? How much role play vs how much strategy?” And consistently I get “I don’t know,” as a response. They keep coming back to play every week though, so I guess I’m doing something right, but getting feedback can be like pulling teeth sometimes
We have a house rule where each axis of alignment comes in "capital" and "lower-case" intensity. A capital letter alignment means your character values that alignment affiliation and actively pursues it. A lower-case alignment means the character is predisposed toward acts and behaviour consistent with that alignment, but does not consider that predisposition part of its identity. This effectively quadruples the granularity of an alignment description and helps explain how, say, cg, cG, Cg, and CG characters are all the "same alignment". While DMing, I also tend to house rule that players have two alignments--their "detectable" alignment, which is the one written on their sheet, and their "smitable" alignment, which is my assessment of what that character's alignment should read after taking into account all of the smitten character's actions. We like to call this smite evaluation an "hard alignment credit check".
@@ronanmcauley "Smitten" is the past-participle of "to smite". It's an irregular conjugation. The word you might have expected to see would be "smited", but "smited" is empirically non-standard. But it does also have the meaning you indicated.
@@ms.aelanwyr.ilaicos sorry I don't know what any of that means, could you explain it to me like I'm five please? I know smite also means "strike with a firm blow" but I still don't understand what you mean by "smitable alignment"
@@ronanmcauley If you are using a "smite evil" ability, the "smitable" alignments--the alignments that the smite will work on--are Lawful Evil, Neutral Evil, and Chaotic Evil (and, in my system, the lower-case permutations like Le, lE, le, Ne, etc.). The point of specifying between "smitable" and "detectable" is just to illustrate that smite evil might work on a creature that would not be detected by detect evil, and smite evil might not work on a creature that would be detected by detect evil.
One house rule I have heard/seen and really liked is the "Everyone gets one" rule...where, in the face of impending death, everyone gets the option to not die, and have something miraculous happen to save their character's life...divine intervention, a burst of heroism, something like that. Everyone gets one of those per campaign.
@@BobWorldBuilder I believe I slept through most of the day haha but my group are hardcore dnd players and they love to have the long sessions so I get used to it. I actually watched all your dragon of icespire peak and lost mines of phandelver for prep for the campaign, so thank you for all your hard work with those videos!
Yeah, in my first campaign, we played some early sessions that went most of the day, but if we start in the afternoon or evening, I'm pretty beat after ~4 hours if I'm DMing
@@BobWorldBuilder I do voices and acting during my sessions as a DM. Afterwards I feel spent. It's a lot to keep up with. I do 2 hour weekly sessions online (due to Covid) now and it's more manageable.
The "ice breaker" portion of a session zero is severely underrated. If the players aren't comfortable with each other as people, it'll most certainly crossover into the game. I also personally like my players to include what is there character's personal goal. It helps the DM build encounters specifically for that goal and helps the players get excited and invested in their other party members. Solid video!
the best way I've seen to handle a session that 1 player can't make is to run a simple oneshot with new characters (made by Dm) that delves into the backstory of that missing player. This makes the game world richer, lets players try a class they otherwise wouldn't choose and gives them some knowledge to be invested in the missing player (even to know more about things that player is trying to find in the campaign). Not my idea but it was done by our DM and I have done it since.
My dm has a lot of house rules and optional rules players can choose from. My favourite house rule is, when flanking with an ally you gain +2 to your attack roll instead of advantage. And his inspiration rules, you can have up to three inspirations at a time, the dm can grant you inspiration for doing something cool or your ally’s can give you their comradely giving you an inspiration. And finely, the number of magic items you can attune to equals your proficiency bonus.
we have a house rule i find very helpful: should you roll a nat 20 in initiative, you get advantage on your first attack and should you roll nat 1, you get disadvantage. We have found this rule working both for us and against us in many case but what do you guys think?
I like the nat 20 part. I don't like the idea of sitting through an entire round of combat only to have a bad turn when it finally gets round to me. It's particularly harsh on rogues, as you only get 1 attack and you can't sneak attack if you have disadvantage.
@@charleybrett1663 true, the rule can be pretty punishing to melee fighters and spellcasters with spells that requires spell attack rolls. However, this is only for the first round of combat. Now for the rogue, I would perhaps rule that should they be able to nullify the disadvantage, they would be able to roll their sneak attack should they be able to hit.
My group (playing Pathfinder 1e) have a house rule for a nat 20 and a nat 1 on initiatives. If you roll a nat 20, you get an extra standard action, a nat 1 you lose your move action.
Went from scared to stoked for my Session Zero tonight. What a kick-ass video. Your editing, your casual conversational style, the info itself, all phenomenal.
I got broken up with two days ago, and this video is the first time I've genuinely smiled since. Thanks for that, Bob. Your soothing voice settled my anger and distracted me enough to calm down
Because I run a very tactically complex game (often at a level my players find extremely challenging), I have Healing potions alway heal for max, but they still take an action to use. This gives my players assurance they well recover a good chunk of HP, but requires them to decide if it’s worth giving up their action for.
I have a list of feats that I call my Background Feats, and everyone gets to start with one. They're the mostly the racials and the non-combats... It's nice to see people think about taking Chef.
One thing I like to do is ask my players what is one cool thing you want to accomplish within the campaign. Maybe its slay a dragon, kill a king (or save a king), find a cool magic item, etc etc. I liked the video a lot Bob, I think I will use some of the things from the checklist the next time I start the campaign
Yeah, that definitely falls under the campaign framework section! I agree it’s important for characters to have personal goals as well as party goals. It creates interesting choices!
I like to ask this question in a more general way: "What would you be disappointed to not experience during the campaign? - any particular setting, theme, fantasy trope, type of character or item or spell?"
With a new group we usually do two presession. The first one determines rules, how to build characters etc, basically the mechanics parts of the game and also things like narrative tone, genre and setting, so that we have the most basic narative framework laid out. In the second presession everyone brings their character (or multiple to chose from) and we determine narrative things like if and how the characters know each other, what their relationships are like, why they decided to go on the same adventure or how they ended up at the same place, their goals, motivations etc. We also get to know each other's characters and determine how much the characters know about each other vs how much the players know about the characters. It might seem like overkill to have two pressessions, but with an entirely new group things like how to build a character might be points of discussion. We also sometimes play with an alternating DM system as we are usually short on people, who want to only DM and not play and that needs some serious planning ahead.
Though you say it may be overkill, I can totally see where you're going here. As Bob rightly pointed out, players need to know the world and campaign (or at least the beginnings) to really create their character (or at least flesh out a concept) Like where did your character grow up? How would they feel about the different factions and stuff like that. The space between the two presessions is the perfect time to actually sit down and create/finalise said character. Also a good time for the GM to make some final prep including any decisions the player mentioned like where they grew up or any background NPCs the GM can weave into the story.
I tried something very interesting with my last game. It was a new system my players weren't familiar with at all. So I created a whole tutorial game for our session 0. I started them as children in a village during a festival let them play games that taught them the checks, sent them on a short little quest and had them fight the elements and a few weak creatures. It turned into a way for them to see what kind of game was going to be played how they could interact with eachother and the world, it helped establish relationships with npcs and connected them to the world, while teaching them the game. They liked it so much that we are just continuing from there the wanted to play more as children and watch the world build their character. It might not work for everybody or every setting but it was definitely an easy way to pull them into the world.
House Rule: Max HP thru level 3. Adventuring is difficult enough without dying from a sneeze. Each class already has a different die and each character a different Con Modifier to allow for Raistlin and Caramon to exist but each will still be different.
@@santiagonutter8052 We finished after about 9 months, went really well overall! Had so many wild scenarios that we started keeping an “Out-of-Context Quotebook” that we all typed into (sessions were held online). Definitely a hoot to go back and read the quotes and remember what was happening.
We have a rule we like for critical hits. Instead of doubling the dice roll or rolling twice the dice, we roll normally and then add whatever a max damage roll would be.
We just auto max the damage and double all numbers. We enjoy both the protagonists and antagonists being able to land truly devastating blows more often than not since critting and rolling badly feels like trash sometimes.
Just had my first session zero last Saturday. Went well, though we some miscommunication over what "criminal strongholds" ment and two players created assassin charcters thinking there were cartels in my world, interesting idea, but as this is my first time DMing and I've only played 6 times before this, that felt a little more complicated than I'm ready for. Fortunately everyone else in my group are seasoned players, so after a little clarification and discussion We're all on the same page. Communication (actually getting the same idea in everyone's head) is important. Thank you for your tips.
Thank you so much for this video. I've been running a campaign for 2 years which was running stale and everyone decided to give it one more shot with a reset and a new session 0. Back when I started, I never played DnD before and now I have, but the problems of a newbie homebrew campaign showed and those video really helped me find out some pointers to get my campaign with my buddies back on track! Thank you again!
A house rule that my DM uses is what I like to call the "sportsmanship bonus". If you are being a good sport about the game, (i.e. fist bumps and high fives after battles, hyping eachother up, etc) than you get a little bit of xp. It's a fun little bonus that allows for quicker level ups. Which has been nice for us newer players who are excited to experience more about the game. It's basically just a faster way to get through the first few levels and unlock some abilities if you start at level 1.
I love that idea. A similar idea I heard recently is having the players all choose an MVP at the end of the session and that player gets some kind of bonus in the next one
My favorite house rule is starting everyone’s character at a “level 0” and naturally let the story and choices that the characters make determine their class. I believe this helps from a story aspect transition them from there background to there new life as a an adventurer.
This makes me remember of campaign where the characters we're designed by making a quiz of the players' personality. Like, if someone is very athletic, they get a lot of DEX, if they are religious, their class would probably be cleric, things like that. To this day, I want to try this someday.
Yeah I am a big fan of starting at level 0 because actually level 1 is insanely strong. I do however have them select classes already, the biggest issue with not doing that is it is hard to "stumble" into being a wizard. Should take at least a year of study to even be a 1st level wizard and that's being generous!
@@andrellnogueiraThat could be cool, but what about the players that DON'T want to play a character that is like them (aka, the majority of players -- especially any character after their 1st). You would have to do it another way.
Bardy has become a running gag on the channel, haha 😆 I always take an opportunity to plug him. And one day when I make some merch, that guy’s gonna be on a tshirt or something
This is very much me - I made 4 characters within a week from scratch just because one of my friends said he's gonna start a campaign... Even though the campaign doesn't start for weeks...
This is fantastic! Thank you so much for sharing this. I'm DMing for the first time, and this has made things so much easier to prep for my upcoming session! Fingers crossed!!
My favorite house rule was the ability to infuse an item with a single cast of a spell that could be released on command. (Or impact, if you asked nicely) The attempt would take the same number of days as the level of the spell, and had both a wis and int check of 10+the spell level, making cantrip earrings a half day project, but a thunderwave cherry bomb a time commitment project. Both checks had to pass for it to be a success, and if both failed, even if not critically, the item was destroyed. It was never clarified, but depending on the circumstances and the DM’s choice, the item was often destroyed by the sudden flow of magic for which it was not designed.
About to start a new homebrew campaign as a new dm. Session zero starts after my wife and I get back from vacation. It will be a cocktail night and after going over session 0 information we will be spending the rest of the time bonding while painting figures and drinking. 😂😁
I wrote up a google survey that listed out various themes and subjects and asked players to rate their comfort levels in engaging with these topics in the campaign. It included everything form common phobias to their “character horniness” level. It also had world themes they may not want to deal with like classism/bigotry/racism etc. It allows me to have essentially a cheat sheet for any triggers or just uncomfy situations so I can avoid them outright if need be.
One of my favorite house rules is Feats on ASI! Everytime a player takes an ASI, they take that AND a Feat of their choice; however, if the Feat would increase an Ability Score, such as Actor's +1 Charisma, you would ignore that particular feature of the Feat.
It should be possible to allow a player to take a +1 ASI together with any half-feat that gives a +1 stat increase with feat special ability. But your way allows people to add the ASI to any ability score (personal choice) instead of the one defined with the half-feat. It makes for faster and bigger increases in the PCs' powers and features.
@@theuncalledfor yeah, generally feats with that bonus aren't very good mechanically. That bonus is what makes them worth taking, some even suck with that bonus. I think I'd alter it slightly so that if you take a very powerful feat I'd lower your ASI to 1 instead of 2. Then it you pick a weaker fest you still get that little bump up.
A couple of house rules for me are: 1. When rolling HP for level up, roll with advantage, and reroll 1's 2. Healing potions heal max HP when used as an action, but can be used as a bonus action where you roll for the healing.
Ran my first Session Zero as a new DM yesterday and used your list as a guide, really helped stremaline the convo and help iron out some of the finer details. Really hipped to start playing officially in 3 weeks!
Thanks for the checklist bob! I'm about to DM a campaign after shaking off almost a decade of rust DMing, it's nice to have this checklist to use to help jump start the campaign so that I don't have to think of all this on my own. Made me even more excited for my campaign, knowing I'd have this to refer to
The 5e resources may not refer to the specific term “session 0”, but the Starter Set and core books DO offer plenty of ways to begin a game. A session 0 is all about how the party plans out their game ahead of time. Preferences dictate requirements.
At my session 0, I was running DOIP. So I just told them to make an adventuror, tell me their backstory, and decided to world build from there. Also I house ruled that I roll their death saves and don't tell them the results, and i told them that they can take a bonus action to use a potion or cast a low level healing spell.
This method is how my groups usually do it too. I mostly play with people I know well, and we've mostly been running modules, so it works! This list is meant to cover all the bases for new groups!
This is exactly how I ran DOIP, except the potion rule. This is the first time I am running Dnd and a lot of fun, learning and 2 players deaths and they are now ready to take on Cryovain.
okay... i am searching for dnd content 0/24 for about a week, but no one could even got my attention to watch their videos more than 2 minutes. than I found you.... The information you share is very useful and straightforward and... you have good vibes so I can finally watch a video from the beginning til the end. And I cant be thankful enough for that. (See, I even wrote a comment)
My favorite house rule for combat is on a Nat. 20 we do max damage plus the roll and modifier. (Makes them feel like a real success) But on a Nat. 1 we have critical failures (hurt a party member or yourself, loose or break your weapon etc.) Now all the bests stories from our group comes out of these rolls.
I’m having a lot of anxiety about running a game for people that aren’t just my friend group wanting to mess around for the first time and honestly your voice is so soothing and you made everything so easy to understand that it took a lot of it away!
Thanks, Bob! I just started a family game last year, having never played before. I’ve found your videos particularly helpful being succinct and entertaining, but conveying the needed information. Please keep up the great work!
Most people know my game style within the local community so I rarely have a session 0. There is no stealing from the group, magic items and money is divided fairly and equally. My 3.5 campaign was filled with house rules and was fortnightly ranging from minimally 8 hours up to 12 hours per session. I’ve recently finally succumbed to 5th and started running it for my wife and 13 year old son. I’ve been playing and DM’ing for over 36 years and I can hands down say this is the best experience I’ve had in the hobby. Phandalin is what brings joy to the campaign. All the villagers are now stat carded with tonnes of detail thrown in and my wife especially loves going about the village interacting with the npc’s making friends and new allies. I’ve made a point of not home brewing any of the rules, playing them as errata and I’ve combined both starter box sets into one large campaign which will lead into an adapted version of princes of the apocalypse, which will introduce their neighbours to the east. In the time of writing this the campaign has been going for 3 weeks and we’ve had 11 sessions totalling around 33 hours 🤣🤣🤣 they are mid way though 3rd level and are really starting to understand their characters (my wife is a devotion paladin of Helm, son is a champion fighter, and there are 3 npc’s in the party, they both insisted on npc’s to fill the group out and for me to have a voice in the group to lend advice etc as they are both new to the hobby. The first npc is a female life priestess of Sune and my wife’s best friend the next is a kind invoker wizard who actually hates hurting people and what his magic can do to them, and the last is a rough and tumble rogue (thief) who lived in the same orphanage as my sons fighter, in Waterdeep. I was hoping to drop an npc or two down the line but they have grown really attached to them. The main thing with doing it with the family is the ease of access to play (they prefer playing their characters to tv flicking) the fact that they have similar ethics to myself so try to do good in the world. I’ve made her cry so far (the ranch hand breaking down sobbing saying he’s a coward for leaving his friend to die at butterskull ranch) and I’ve brought a rage upon her when returning from the wyvern tor, old own well quests the redbrands had beaten their friend Gareale almost to death, leaving her in a coma (god help the redbrands in the next few sessions) my son is also emotionally invested loving the owner of the Stonehill Inn and his dog Rex, and the village in genaral. So it’s made it such a pleasure Gm’ing for them.
Just recently found your page as I get back into playing after 3-4 years again... Fast becoming one of my favorites! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!
I personally like the rule of at the end of each session, let the players determine which of them might get inspiration for the next session. Allows players some OOC urgency in the game, allows them to express when they think another player did something spectacular, and most importantly encourages them to pay attention to what other characters are doing.
genuinely as a new DND DM, having never even played before (i just happen to be the most grammar-fluent individual in my group and so decided to take on the challenge) and honestly im only 4 or 5 videos deep into your channel but i must say, i am very pleased with the easily digestible array of information you have shared. I too feel as thought the books are helpful in the moment, but often lack that one thing I need to know. I will surely be buying the The Return of the Lazy Dungeon Masters Guide- for starters- and having someone explain these DM topics makes me feel more prepared. Subscribed :)
Love the content and the energy, you deserve way more subscribers. Thanks for all the tips, thinking of running the dragon of icespire peak with friends and your videos are such a big help
The very first questions should be about the use of the rules. Will it be predominantly Rules as written, Rules as intended or the Rule of cool? Will optional rules (such as feats and multiclassing) be allowed? Campaign or series of adventures? What can be changed to suit the table and what is inflexible (i.e Bardy McFly)?
I appreciate your reference to Bardy haha, and yeah, I sorted the sections with the default being a group of people who haven’t played together. If you already know everyone, or you’ve played enough D&D to know general table expectations, jumping to house rules is probably fine
In all of the games I've played recently, session 0 was a series of 5 min conversations over the course of 3 to 4 weeks. But this is the advantage of being roommates with the other players.
My favorite House Rule is that a caster can cast a number of Levels of spells per round equal to their highest spell level. 1st level Cleric casts Healing Word, they can only do a Cantrip. But by 3rd level, they can follow that 1st level Healing Word with a 1st level Cure Wounds. And by 17th Level, the Sorcerer can follow up a 6th level Chain Lightening with a Quickened 3rd level Fireball.
I think you should make a video about the spellcasting of DnD if you havent already did that. You are a really interesting person, someone i could listen to for hours, i love your voice
When i was new to DND, my DM at the time would ask me what I knew and I as the player didn't know anything from the get go. So I'd be like "idk if I know this." So I'd ask for guidance. Especially since i dont have literally everything in DND memorized. When i asked what my character knew, he told me I was metagaming. Like he'd say because I didnt know something irl, my character couldnt possibly know it. It was so frustrating being new like that and my character being dumb as a box of rocks because of it.
Getting ready to run D&D for the first time in a year with a new group. (Was running Pathfinder 2E) Just found your channel. I like your take on the Session Zero. Great content ! Cheers 🍺
I really like a houserule we're using for our Tomb of annhilation. Getting Long rests in the wilderness is nigh impossible unless you find some sort of protective shelter. So a long rest out camping in the jungle just counts as a short rest. (makes even more sense since we take turns keeping watch). Makes the PC's resource management a lot more real.
Hey Bob! Just wanted to say I've been working on building my first homebrew 5e campaign with my frens and have been really loving your content! Your relaxed and frenly demeanor really does a lot to inspire confidence in me as a new DM (giving me a kind of "Okay, I can do this, this can be REALLY fun!" sentiment) while the content you present itself is informative and concise enough to "click" in my brain. Thank you so much for your videos! Really happy to subscribe and looking forward to subbing to your patreon next month (moving this month so I gotta put it off unfortunately)!
My favorite house rule: lvl 1 feat. It's due to backgrounds being really lackluster in my opinion and it gives a sense of multi level depth to the backstory of a character. "Yes im go' ol" McGee, I have the sailor background and swore revenge on thr Kraken, I am a palladin lvl 1. And I have the actor feat because I used to be in a theater group before going settling out to see" or something like that.
Just found your channel; 57yo that just got back into D&D - Used to play when it was in a blue box! Love your content, thanks for all the great videos! SUBBED!
I use Session 0 to explain odd house rules, rules that won't be used, expectations from everyone, welcoming newbies into the group, character creation, then a movie and food related to the subject matter. For instance, I got Heckna on order. When it comes in, Session 0 will probably be Killer Klowns from Outer Space along with popcorn, soda, and corn dogs. Really brings everyone together.
my favorite house rules that I'm gonna take from my dm and use in my own games are on crits. on a nat 20 attack you roll regular damage dice and add full damage, that way it feels more like a crit. on a nat 1 you roll it again and if you hit another player's ac you accidentally hit them (or if you're not near them you just drop/damage your weapon)
Had someone who was making their first character and I was throwing out ideas and we ended up going around for a little while. I stated I'd give them five minutes where I would not be able to listen or speak, and after that five minutes was up they had decided on something and are now playing it. Sometimes removing a chef from the kitchen is just as helpful as adding one.
Dude, awesome video! Really well put together. I've recently started up a tabletop RUclips channel as well, and you present a lot of awesome ideas here.
I have 4 big rules I put in as a super package. They each feed into each other. Players and Enemies are under all the same rules. Crits are crunchier, so instead of rolling an extra die, I just add the maximum value of that die to the roll. Also uses less dice. Potions restore a fixed amount of HP by type. The average of rolls rounded up. Falling to 0 health and going unconscious causes 1 point of exhaustion. Critical fails in combat have a 2d6 table (but I am likely going to change this to 2d4 after watching your vids). 678 have no effect. Lower than 6 causes defense drops and missteps. Greater than 8 causes weapon damage and fumbles. I like some of the suggestions here. Like the hidden death save rolls by the DM instead of player. Players might not like the loss of agency in rolling though.
The first casualty of war is the plan or the first casualty of the DM. We only play once a month and our campaign has been going for years we’ve even had to go online totally for awhile. With 11 players scheduling is tough
That’s why our group uses experience-based leveling (with xp for rp, not just combat), so people are incentivized to come, if they can’t make the exact time, then oh well.
My favorite house rule is: you can substitute levels of exhaustion for spare spell slots. No higher than your available spell levels, and only using spells you have.
As a house rule I've divided Dexterity into Dexterity and Agility. Dexterity covers things like picking pockets, performing surgery calligraphy, and so on. Agility is running over uneven ground, climbing, jumping over a chasm, etc.
Yeah I actually really like how they can be halfway between Combat (being a dice challenge) and roleplay (a freeform thing). I never even played 4e but have enjoyed a skill challenge my GM put in 5e.
I just discovered your channel! I am about to start a new original adventure, with a mix between new people and old friends this seems an awesome way to start. Thank you :)
House Rule : If you die ( Or Assumed Death) then death music plays and the dead player recieves 1 inspiration to give to another creature at anytime by "possession" or "Dying Will" or "Patron's Wrath" They can also choose to keep this point until they create a new character at the same level -1 as the character they died with when then the inspiration point vanishes.
Couple house rules I use: On level up, roll HP up to 3 times, no going back Standing from prone - takes 15’ of movement, regardless of your speed, provokes opportunity attacks OR uses all your movement, no opp attacks. I have had PCs start with a racial feat. On the fence about this one. I’ve been trying to come up with something to make it special when a monster is at 1 HP, because for some reason it seems to happen *a lot*
Our group typically has a playtest at Session 0. Though this more of the fact the current GM for the campaign prepare a character sheet a week prior. The playtest is there to see if the players are satisfied with their character and if there's gonna be any last minute changes they want for their character. We use to this probe for any problematic rulings nightmares we might encounter and how we're going to deal with those in future sessions, and test gimmicks/specific game mechanic that a character may rely on. The Session 0 can incorporated as a short introduction to the story and world, the playtest is more of way how the player characters perform under some short sampler event.
🌟 FREE Checklist PDF available on Patreon! www.patreon.com/posts/39281630
▶️ Tasha's Cauldron OFFICIAL Session 0 Guidelines! ruclips.net/video/l6ZV8bjTYZ8/видео.html
Ladies and Gents, he does it again!
Thanks Mate been a real help to me mates and I
Thanks for the checklist Bob, my new players and I really enjoyed it, and we came up with some really cool campaign ideas!
My personal fave house rule is that everyone gets inspiration on their birthday
I do it where if you bring snacks for the group then you get inspiration for that session (and only that session)
I give inspiration pretty readily, so for birthdays I give a free nat 20 to use on any d20 roll.
These are great ideas!
So wholesome! I love it!
"Encourage players to privately share any topics they don't want to occur in the game." Very well said. Sensitive, without having to go through a checklist. Also, you get +100xp for Bardy McFly.
Yep, this checklist isn’t that kind of checklist. Both Bardy and I are grateful for the XP! Very cool to see you commenting on one of my videos! Thanks, professor!
and do not forget to tell that the group
Sorry to tell you, but his house rule is that he only levels up when the dm tells him to 😂😉
I have just discovered your channel, and I've come to a conclusion.
You are the Bob Ross of D&D.
Thank you! I should wear that blue shirt more often 😆
@@BobWorldBuilderThis is so true I put this on to prepare for my session zero today and I'm in great mood now you've got some kind of magical aura my man.
I was thinking the same thing, i only recently found thr channel and i get serious bob ross vibes.
It's your world. If you want a happy little ogre in the tavern, give him a couple of friends too!
Oh, wait! No! Put the chair down! Aaahhh!!!
lmaoooo @@jimwalker1837
I like to have a quick, non canon dungeon crawl ready at the end of session 0. That way, if we have time and everyone's ready to go, we can try out our characters and get a chance to get to know each playstyle.
I like that!
I've just had a thought, You could Pseudo-cannon that crawl by having it be a weird shared dream that all the pc's had! Then they can act on that stuff in character (if you'd like) and gives a fun moment when they meet of "I think we've met" "Nah" "Can't remember where though" or something ^^
This is a great idea but in the "session 0" I just went to...that was almost all there was...some of us came with characters, some were new and needed help...I had a character half done, figured I would finish it there, but I spent the entire time helping a newbie make theirs and then the DM was like..."Everyone have a character? Okay let's do it" and went into the short dungeon. No talk about expectations, setting, plans, anything like that. It was fun but looking back I realize it was really a poor session 0.
I ran Strixhaven and did a dungeon crawl as part of a "orientation day" session.
I usually meet up with my friends (we are all newbies) for 7 hours. We play a bit of dnd, make a break where we cook some awesome food together, eat it and then keep playing. Makes those 7 hours go by like its nothing.
That's the way to do it, my friend!
That sounds so wonderful!
My fav house rule is: When a player gets healed back from unconsciousness, he gets a point of exhaustion
That's a good move! I've always found it weird how PCs go from being almost dead to totally back in the fight
That's a great one. Stealing.
Nice house rule!
We used to use this rule for our games. However, a big flaw we found with it was it doesn't just affect the one PC who went down but the *whole* party since that PC will likely want to long rest immediately to clear the exhaustion. And because the other players are good sports, they'll say "yeah sure we should long rest" so the whole game has to stop just because one person went down.
Another factor is that it inadvertently makes the game a lot easier because if the party keeps long resting as soon as someone drops to 0, then the party will be at full HP and resources a lot more.
And lastly, I've tried to avoid those issues by putting the party in more situations where long resting wasn't always an option like with time-critical quests or environmental hazards. However, this just made the player resign and not want to try anything because they had the attitude "no point, I have disadvantage".
But yeah, if it works for your table then ignore me lmao.
I do the same! Except mine is 2 Lv of exhaustion, so if you go down to 0 3 time you died.
I also let my players know when they can long rest. Which is usually when they're in a safe environment, like a town.
Wait, people don't think about D and D all the time? Like when I'm driving around for work thinking about how I would DM a Beholder as a main Villain behind an epic adventure. Isn't that normal?
It is to me! Haha 😆
I mean thinking about D&D all the time is a bit weird... When would I then think about the other systems I play?
i do if i don't have audio book and even that was dnd esk
wheel of time took me 9 months to finish
How would I build a Wight as a villain?
I think an important point you mentioned that isn't often considered is "you can have a session 0 at any point in your campaign". I hadn't ever really thought of that, and might try to schedule a half-session for a check in every few months
The first point about asking what players are interested in or want only works if they players actually know what they want. Consistently, I ask my players stuff like “hey, what’s something you want to see in this campaign? What’s something you’ve never faced/seen before and would like to see? How much role play vs how much strategy?” And consistently I get “I don’t know,” as a response.
They keep coming back to play every week though, so I guess I’m doing something right, but getting feedback can be like pulling teeth sometimes
Lord, tell me about it. In a way, the best thing for us to do is just do what WE, personally want and wait for them to complain…😈
We have a house rule where each axis of alignment comes in "capital" and "lower-case" intensity. A capital letter alignment means your character values that alignment affiliation and actively pursues it. A lower-case alignment means the character is predisposed toward acts and behaviour consistent with that alignment, but does not consider that predisposition part of its identity. This effectively quadruples the granularity of an alignment description and helps explain how, say, cg, cG, Cg, and CG characters are all the "same alignment".
While DMing, I also tend to house rule that players have two alignments--their "detectable" alignment, which is the one written on their sheet, and their "smitable" alignment, which is my assessment of what that character's alignment should read after taking into account all of the smitten character's actions. We like to call this smite evaluation an "hard alignment credit check".
What do you mean by smitable and smitten in this context? doesn't smitten mean you're in love with someone?
@@ronanmcauley "Smitten" is the past-participle of "to smite". It's an irregular conjugation. The word you might have expected to see would be "smited", but "smited" is empirically non-standard. But it does also have the meaning you indicated.
@@ms.aelanwyr.ilaicos sorry I don't know what any of that means, could you explain it to me like I'm five please? I know smite also means "strike with a firm blow" but I still don't understand what you mean by "smitable alignment"
@@ronanmcauley If you are using a "smite evil" ability, the "smitable" alignments--the alignments that the smite will work on--are Lawful Evil, Neutral Evil, and Chaotic Evil (and, in my system, the lower-case permutations like Le, lE, le, Ne, etc.).
The point of specifying between "smitable" and "detectable" is just to illustrate that smite evil might work on a creature that would not be detected by detect evil, and smite evil might not work on a creature that would be detected by detect evil.
@@ms.aelanwyr.ilaicos oh okay, I think I understand now, thanks. Is Smite Evil a 5e spell? I don't recognise it
One house rule I have heard/seen and really liked is the "Everyone gets one" rule...where, in the face of impending death, everyone gets the option to not die, and have something miraculous happen to save their character's life...divine intervention, a burst of heroism, something like that. Everyone gets one of those per campaign.
When you said 6 hour marathon, I felt disgusted at myself for allowing my players to goad me into a 14 hour one the other week 😂
That is truly an achievement, my friend. I hope you slept for the next 24 hours haha
@@BobWorldBuilder I believe I slept through most of the day haha but my group are hardcore dnd players and they love to have the long sessions so I get used to it.
I actually watched all your dragon of icespire peak and lost mines of phandelver for prep for the campaign, so thank you for all your hard work with those videos!
That's impressive. We try to meet twice a month and we do about 5 hours and that's pushing it. I'm DMing so I'm close to burnt out by the end of it.
Yeah, in my first campaign, we played some early sessions that went most of the day, but if we start in the afternoon or evening, I'm pretty beat after ~4 hours if I'm DMing
@@BobWorldBuilder I do voices and acting during my sessions as a DM. Afterwards I feel spent. It's a lot to keep up with. I do 2 hour weekly sessions online (due to Covid) now and it's more manageable.
The "ice breaker" portion of a session zero is severely underrated. If the players aren't comfortable with each other as people, it'll most certainly crossover into the game. I also personally like my players to include what is there character's personal goal. It helps the DM build encounters specifically for that goal and helps the players get excited and invested in their other party members.
Solid video!
Thank you, and you make an excellent point about character goals! That's something that hopefully comes up when the group is making characters
Personal goal should be shared only with the DM in secret. The characters can later share it in-game if they so choose.
I once solved this problem by having my players over for a pancake breakfast alongside the session zero.
And the playrts goal
the best way I've seen to handle a session that 1 player can't make is to run a simple oneshot with new characters (made by Dm) that delves into the backstory of that missing player. This makes the game world richer, lets players try a class they otherwise wouldn't choose and gives them some knowledge to be invested in the missing player (even to know more about things that player is trying to find in the campaign). Not my idea but it was done by our DM and I have done it since.
My dm has a lot of house rules and optional rules players can choose from.
My favourite house rule is, when flanking with an ally you gain +2 to your attack roll instead of advantage.
And his inspiration rules, you can have up to three inspirations at a time, the dm can grant you inspiration for doing something cool or your ally’s can give you their comradely giving you an inspiration.
And finely, the number of magic items you can attune to equals your proficiency bonus.
we have a house rule i find very helpful: should you roll a nat 20 in initiative, you get advantage on your first attack and should you roll nat 1, you get disadvantage. We have found this rule working both for us and against us in many case but what do you guys think?
I'm a fan!
I like the nat 20 part. I don't like the idea of sitting through an entire round of combat only to have a bad turn when it finally gets round to me. It's particularly harsh on rogues, as you only get 1 attack and you can't sneak attack if you have disadvantage.
@@charleybrett1663 true, the rule can be pretty punishing to melee fighters and spellcasters with spells that requires spell attack rolls. However, this is only for the first round of combat.
Now for the rogue, I would perhaps rule that should they be able to nullify the disadvantage, they would be able to roll their sneak attack should they be able to hit.
My group (playing Pathfinder 1e) have a house rule for a nat 20 and a nat 1 on initiatives. If you roll a nat 20, you get an extra standard action, a nat 1 you lose your move action.
I recently heard of another nat20/1 rule. 20=surprise round, 1=surprised
Went from scared to stoked for my Session Zero tonight.
What a kick-ass video. Your editing, your casual conversational style, the info itself, all phenomenal.
Woo! Thank you for the kind words. I hope it went well :D
I got broken up with two days ago, and this video is the first time I've genuinely smiled since. Thanks for that, Bob. Your soothing voice settled my anger and distracted me enough to calm down
Godspeed
How did things turn out 2 years later for you bud?
I just come across this comment and wanted to let you know I do hope it got better for you. Currently going through the same and Its hard
@@Erik-rr9xr it did get better, a lot better!
Because I run a very tactically complex game (often at a level my players find extremely challenging), I have Healing potions alway heal for max, but they still take an action to use. This gives my players assurance they well recover a good chunk of HP, but requires them to decide if it’s worth giving up their action for.
I have a list of feats that I call my Background Feats, and everyone gets to start with one. They're the mostly the racials and the non-combats... It's nice to see people think about taking Chef.
Share the list! Share the list! This sounds awesome!
Share the list!
I don't really know what this means but please share the list!
One thing I like to do is ask my players what is one cool thing you want to accomplish within the campaign. Maybe its slay a dragon, kill a king (or save a king), find a cool magic item, etc etc.
I liked the video a lot Bob, I think I will use some of the things from the checklist the next time I start the campaign
Yeah, that definitely falls under the campaign framework section! I agree it’s important for characters to have personal goals as well as party goals. It creates interesting choices!
In Warhammer Roleplay this stuff is mechanised - your players and party get Ambitions to get experience for
I like to ask this question in a more general way: "What would you be disappointed to not experience during the campaign? - any particular setting, theme, fantasy trope, type of character or item or spell?"
With a new group we usually do two presession. The first one determines rules, how to build characters etc, basically the mechanics parts of the game and also things like narrative tone, genre and setting, so that we have the most basic narative framework laid out.
In the second presession everyone brings their character (or multiple to chose from) and we determine narrative things like if and how the characters know each other, what their relationships are like, why they decided to go on the same adventure or how they ended up at the same place, their goals, motivations etc.
We also get to know each other's characters and determine how much the characters know about each other vs how much the players know about the characters.
It might seem like overkill to have two pressessions, but with an entirely new group things like how to build a character might be points of discussion. We also sometimes play with an alternating DM system as we are usually short on people, who want to only DM and not play and that needs some serious planning ahead.
Though you say it may be overkill, I can totally see where you're going here. As Bob rightly pointed out, players need to know the world and campaign (or at least the beginnings) to really create their character (or at least flesh out a concept) Like where did your character grow up? How would they feel about the different factions and stuff like that.
The space between the two presessions is the perfect time to actually sit down and create/finalise said character. Also a good time for the GM to make some final prep including any decisions the player mentioned like where they grew up or any background NPCs the GM can weave into the story.
A homebrew rule I use is "The Sentinel feat has a size limitation: if you can't grapple it, you can't drop it's speed to 0."
"oi giant! no moving - i gots a pointy stick!"
followed by:
STOMP - CRUNCH - SQUELCH and a very flat person with a pointy stick XD
Thank you for the video, but also HUGE thanks to everyone in the comments with their suggestions here. They're very useful.
I tried something very interesting with my last game. It was a new system my players weren't familiar with at all. So I created a whole tutorial game for our session 0. I started them as children in a village during a festival let them play games that taught them the checks, sent them on a short little quest and had them fight the elements and a few weak creatures. It turned into a way for them to see what kind of game was going to be played how they could interact with eachother and the world, it helped establish relationships with npcs and connected them to the world, while teaching them the game. They liked it so much that we are just continuing from there the wanted to play more as children and watch the world build their character. It might not work for everybody or every setting but it was definitely an easy way to pull them into the world.
That's actually a great idea - I might try that sometime.
House Rule: Max HP thru level 3. Adventuring is difficult enough without dying from a sneeze. Each class already has a different die and each character a different Con Modifier to allow for Raistlin and Caramon to exist but each will still be different.
Having a Session 0 in a couple hours! Thank you.
Have fun! Thank you for commenting :)
One year since this comment, how did it went??
@@santiagonutter8052 We finished after about 9 months, went really well overall! Had so many wild scenarios that we started keeping an “Out-of-Context Quotebook” that we all typed into (sessions were held online). Definitely a hoot to go back and read the quotes and remember what was happening.
We have a rule we like for critical hits. Instead of doubling the dice roll or rolling twice the dice, we roll normally and then add whatever a max damage roll would be.
I'll have to try that one! I've heard it from a few people now, so it must be a good alternative
We just auto max the damage and double all numbers. We enjoy both the protagonists and antagonists being able to land truly devastating blows more often than not since critting and rolling badly feels like trash sometimes.
We use this one too. It's super lame when you crit, then roll 1s for damage.
I may actually try this as well. We all hate seeing crits roll low!
my group does something similar, but it is just max damage. (1d8 is now 2d8, so 16 damage). might be OP but it's super exciting when it lands.
Just had my first session zero last Saturday. Went well, though we some miscommunication over what "criminal strongholds" ment and two players created assassin charcters thinking there were cartels in my world, interesting idea, but as this is my first time DMing and I've only played 6 times before this, that felt a little more complicated than I'm ready for. Fortunately everyone else in my group are seasoned players, so after a little clarification and discussion We're all on the same page. Communication (actually getting the same idea in everyone's head) is important. Thank you for your tips.
Thank you so much for this video. I've been running a campaign for 2 years which was running stale and everyone decided to give it one more shot with a reset and a new session 0. Back when I started, I never played DnD before and now I have, but the problems of a newbie homebrew campaign showed and those video really helped me find out some pointers to get my campaign with my buddies back on track! Thank you again!
A house rule that my DM uses is what I like to call the "sportsmanship bonus". If you are being a good sport about the game, (i.e. fist bumps and high fives after battles, hyping eachother up, etc) than you get a little bit of xp. It's a fun little bonus that allows for quicker level ups. Which has been nice for us newer players who are excited to experience more about the game.
It's basically just a faster way to get through the first few levels and unlock some abilities if you start at level 1.
I love that idea. A similar idea I heard recently is having the players all choose an MVP at the end of the session and that player gets some kind of bonus in the next one
My favorite house rule is starting everyone’s character at a “level 0” and naturally let the story and choices that the characters make determine their class. I believe this helps from a story aspect transition them from there background to there new life as a an adventurer.
This makes me remember of campaign where the characters we're designed by making a quiz of the players' personality.
Like, if someone is very athletic, they get a lot of DEX, if they are religious, their class would probably be cleric, things like that.
To this day, I want to try this someday.
really good idea!
Yeah I am a big fan of starting at level 0 because actually level 1 is insanely strong. I do however have them select classes already, the biggest issue with not doing that is it is hard to "stumble" into being a wizard. Should take at least a year of study to even be a 1st level wizard and that's being generous!
How does one start at level zero?
@@andrellnogueiraThat could be cool, but what about the players that DON'T want to play a character that is like them (aka, the majority of players -- especially any character after their 1st). You would have to do it another way.
Bob: "Bardy McFly"
Me: *spits drink everywhere*
Bardy has become a running gag on the channel, haha 😆 I always take an opportunity to plug him. And one day when I make some merch, that guy’s gonna be on a tshirt or something
Great ideas. Love the takeaway. Who doesn’t think about d&d everyday?!?!!?
Right?! I appreciate the solidarity :D
Everyone thinks about D&D · all day, everyday? ·.·
I think about DnD wayyyy to much.
This is very much me - I made 4 characters within a week from scratch just because one of my friends said he's gonna start a campaign... Even though the campaign doesn't start for weeks...
@@thesuitablecommand super guilty of this too
This is fantastic! Thank you so much for sharing this. I'm DMing for the first time, and this has made things so much easier to prep for my upcoming session! Fingers crossed!!
You're so welcome! Have fun!! :)
My favorite house rule was the ability to infuse an item with a single cast of a spell that could be released on command. (Or impact, if you asked nicely) The attempt would take the same number of days as the level of the spell, and had both a wis and int check of 10+the spell level, making cantrip earrings a half day project, but a thunderwave cherry bomb a time commitment project. Both checks had to pass for it to be a success, and if both failed, even if not critically, the item was destroyed. It was never clarified, but depending on the circumstances and the DM’s choice, the item was often destroyed by the sudden flow of magic for which it was not designed.
About to start a new homebrew campaign as a new dm. Session zero starts after my wife and I get back from vacation. It will be a cocktail night and after going over session 0 information we will be spending the rest of the time bonding while painting figures and drinking. 😂😁
I wrote up a google survey that listed out various themes and subjects and asked players to rate their comfort levels in engaging with these topics in the campaign. It included everything form common phobias to their “character horniness” level. It also had world themes they may not want to deal with like classism/bigotry/racism etc.
It allows me to have essentially a cheat sheet for any triggers or just uncomfy situations so I can avoid them outright if need be.
One of my favorite house rules is Feats on ASI! Everytime a player takes an ASI, they take that AND a Feat of their choice; however, if the Feat would increase an Ability Score, such as Actor's +1 Charisma, you would ignore that particular feature of the Feat.
That's a fun rule!
It should be possible to allow a player to take a +1 ASI together with any half-feat that gives a +1 stat increase with feat special ability. But your way allows people to add the ASI to any ability score (personal choice) instead of the one defined with the half-feat. It makes for faster and bigger increases in the PCs' powers and features.
That sounds awesome! I think I may add that
I'm not sure I like the rule about ignoring the Feat's built-in half-ASI. But in general I really like this rule.
@@theuncalledfor yeah, generally feats with that bonus aren't very good mechanically. That bonus is what makes them worth taking, some even suck with that bonus. I think I'd alter it slightly so that if you take a very powerful feat I'd lower your ASI to 1 instead of 2. Then it you pick a weaker fest you still get that little bump up.
A couple of house rules for me are:
1. When rolling HP for level up, roll with advantage, and reroll 1's
2. Healing potions heal max HP when used as an action, but can be used as a bonus action where you roll for the healing.
I liked the Lost Mines of Pandelver storyline,it had plenty of side quests for added fun.
Ran my first Session Zero as a new DM yesterday and used your list as a guide, really helped stremaline the convo and help iron out some of the finer details. Really hipped to start playing officially in 3 weeks!
Thanks for the checklist bob! I'm about to DM a campaign after shaking off almost a decade of rust DMing, it's nice to have this checklist to use to help jump start the campaign so that I don't have to think of all this on my own. Made me even more excited for my campaign, knowing I'd have this to refer to
Attunement slots = proficiency bonus instead of 3
That's a good one! I've thought about doing intelligence score, but this is a nice alternative for not-so-smart characters :P
Big same
@@BobWorldBuilder Have a minimum?
I swear this man is like the Mr Rogers of D&D, so soothing, so dedicated to help and teach. ♥
The 5e resources may not refer to the specific term “session 0”, but the Starter Set and core books DO offer plenty of ways to begin a game.
A session 0 is all about how the party plans out their game ahead of time. Preferences dictate requirements.
I like finding the map maker in the group and giving them the reins on that while I populate the journeys with encounters
At my session 0, I was running DOIP. So I just told them to make an adventuror, tell me their backstory, and decided to world build from there. Also I house ruled that I roll their death saves and don't tell them the results, and i told them that they can take a bonus action to use a potion or cast a low level healing spell.
This method is how my groups usually do it too. I mostly play with people I know well, and we've mostly been running modules, so it works! This list is meant to cover all the bases for new groups!
This is exactly how I ran DOIP, except the potion rule. This is the first time I am running Dnd and a lot of fun, learning and 2 players deaths and they are now ready to take on Cryovain.
okay... i am searching for dnd content 0/24 for about a week, but no one could even got my attention to watch their videos more than 2 minutes. than I found you.... The information you share is very useful and straightforward and... you have good vibes so I can finally watch a video from the beginning til the end. And I cant be thankful enough for that. (See, I even wrote a comment)
Just wanted to say that the editing of this video is really good.
Thank you very much!
Having my first ever session zero as DM tomorrow, this video helped me a lot with the prep! Thank you so much!!!
My favorite house rule for combat is on a Nat. 20 we do max damage plus the roll and modifier. (Makes them feel like a real success) But on a Nat. 1 we have critical failures (hurt a party member or yourself, loose or break your weapon etc.) Now all the bests stories from our group comes out of these rolls.
I’m having a lot of anxiety about running a game for people that aren’t just my friend group wanting to mess around for the first time and honestly your voice is so soothing and you made everything so easy to understand that it took a lot of it away!
Thanks, Bob! I just started a family game last year, having never played before. I’ve found your videos particularly helpful being succinct and entertaining, but conveying the needed information. Please keep up the great work!
Most people know my game style within the local community so I rarely have a session 0. There is no stealing from the group, magic items and money is divided fairly and equally. My 3.5 campaign was filled with house rules and was fortnightly ranging from minimally 8 hours up to 12 hours per session. I’ve recently finally succumbed to 5th and started running it for my wife and 13 year old son. I’ve been playing and DM’ing for over 36 years and I can hands down say this is the best experience I’ve had in the hobby. Phandalin is what brings joy to the campaign. All the villagers are now stat carded with tonnes of detail thrown in and my wife especially loves going about the village interacting with the npc’s making friends and new allies. I’ve made a point of not home brewing any of the rules, playing them as errata and I’ve combined both starter box sets into one large campaign which will lead into an adapted version of princes of the apocalypse, which will introduce their neighbours to the east. In the time of writing this the campaign has been going for 3 weeks and we’ve had 11 sessions totalling around 33 hours 🤣🤣🤣 they are mid way though 3rd level and are really starting to understand their characters (my wife is a devotion paladin of Helm, son is a champion fighter, and there are 3 npc’s in the party, they both insisted on npc’s to fill the group out and for me to have a voice in the group to lend advice etc as they are both new to the hobby. The first npc is a female life priestess of Sune and my wife’s best friend the next is a kind invoker wizard who actually hates hurting people and what his magic can do to them, and the last is a rough and tumble rogue (thief) who lived in the same orphanage as my sons fighter, in Waterdeep. I was hoping to drop an npc or two down the line but they have grown really attached to them. The main thing with doing it with the family is the ease of access to play (they prefer playing their characters to tv flicking) the fact that they have similar ethics to myself so try to do good in the world. I’ve made her cry so far (the ranch hand breaking down sobbing saying he’s a coward for leaving his friend to die at butterskull ranch) and I’ve brought a rage upon her when returning from the wyvern tor, old own well quests the redbrands had beaten their friend Gareale almost to death, leaving her in a coma (god help the redbrands in the next few sessions) my son is also emotionally invested loving the owner of the Stonehill Inn and his dog Rex, and the village in genaral. So it’s made it such a pleasure Gm’ing for them.
That sounds amazing. You’re lucky to have such a great family.
Just recently found your page as I get back into playing after 3-4 years again... Fast becoming one of my favorites! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!
Longtime player about to DM for first time this is super helpful thank you
I personally like the rule of at the end of each session, let the players determine which of them might get inspiration for the next session. Allows players some OOC urgency in the game, allows them to express when they think another player did something spectacular, and most importantly encourages them to pay attention to what other characters are doing.
I'm about to start a new campaign and I'm so excited! Thank you for all of this Bob!
Awesome! You’re welcome and I hope you have tons of fun!!
genuinely as a new DND DM, having never even played before (i just happen to be the most grammar-fluent individual in my group and so decided to take on the challenge) and honestly im only 4 or 5 videos deep into your channel but i must say, i am very pleased with the easily digestible array of information you have shared. I too feel as thought the books are helpful in the moment, but often lack that one thing I need to know. I will surely be buying the The Return of the Lazy Dungeon Masters Guide- for starters- and having someone explain these DM topics makes me feel more prepared. Subscribed :)
So please tell me how did that go?
Love the content and the energy, you deserve way more subscribers. Thanks for all the tips, thinking of running the dragon of icespire peak with friends and your videos are such a big help
Awesome, thank you! And you should totally do run DoIP! :)
The very first questions should be about the use of the rules.
Will it be predominantly Rules as written, Rules as intended or the Rule of cool? Will optional rules (such as feats and multiclassing) be allowed? Campaign or series of adventures? What can be changed to suit the table and what is inflexible (i.e Bardy McFly)?
I appreciate your reference to Bardy haha, and yeah, I sorted the sections with the default being a group of people who haven’t played together. If you already know everyone, or you’ve played enough D&D to know general table expectations, jumping to house rules is probably fine
Woah was just about to host a session 0 tomorrow and you uploaded this
Coincidence? Yes. But I'm super happy it worked out that way :D
@@BobWorldBuilder yeah
In all of the games I've played recently, session 0 was a series of 5 min conversations over the course of 3 to 4 weeks. But this is the advantage of being roommates with the other players.
My favorite House Rule is that a caster can cast a number of Levels of spells per round equal to their highest spell level.
1st level Cleric casts Healing Word, they can only do a Cantrip.
But by 3rd level, they can follow that 1st level Healing Word with a 1st level Cure Wounds.
And by 17th Level, the Sorcerer can follow up a 6th level Chain Lightening with a Quickened 3rd level Fireball.
That makes a lot of logical sense.
What is the house rule at that table to increase the power of martials in return?
@@Capa2. they can all do the -5 to hit, +10 damage from Great Weapon Master and Sharpshooter (but with any weapon type) without taking a Feat.
The tiny unicorn in your houseplant omg 😭 Thanks so much for this!! I'm starting my first campaign today, and I am so excited for it
I think you should make a video about the spellcasting of DnD if you havent already did that. You are a really interesting person, someone i could listen to for hours, i love your voice
The thing is this checklist is also amazing for other systems besides D&D
When i was new to DND, my DM at the time would ask me what I knew and I as the player didn't know anything from the get go. So I'd be like "idk if I know this." So I'd ask for guidance. Especially since i dont have literally everything in DND memorized. When i asked what my character knew, he told me I was metagaming. Like he'd say because I didnt know something irl, my character couldnt possibly know it. It was so frustrating being new like that and my character being dumb as a box of rocks because of it.
Getting ready to run D&D for the first time in a year with a new group. (Was running Pathfinder 2E)
Just found your channel. I like your take on the Session Zero.
Great content ! Cheers 🍺
Thanks! A lot of these things probably apply to Pathfinder too lol
great channel!
Thank you very much :)
Just found your channel looks great enjoying it I been playing D&D and dungeon mastering since 1978 I will be looking for more videos
I really like a houserule we're using for our Tomb of annhilation. Getting Long rests in the wilderness is nigh impossible unless you find some sort of protective shelter. So a long rest out camping in the jungle just counts as a short rest. (makes even more sense since we take turns keeping watch). Makes the PC's resource management a lot more real.
Hey Bob! Just wanted to say I've been working on building my first homebrew 5e campaign with my frens and have been really loving your content! Your relaxed and frenly demeanor really does a lot to inspire confidence in me as a new DM (giving me a kind of "Okay, I can do this, this can be REALLY fun!" sentiment) while the content you present itself is informative and concise enough to "click" in my brain. Thank you so much for your videos! Really happy to subscribe and looking forward to subbing to your patreon next month (moving this month so I gotta put it off unfortunately)!
My favorite house rule: lvl 1 feat. It's due to backgrounds being really lackluster in my opinion and it gives a sense of multi level depth to the backstory of a character. "Yes im go' ol" McGee, I have the sailor background and swore revenge on thr Kraken, I am a palladin lvl 1. And I have the actor feat because I used to be in a theater group before going settling out to see" or something like that.
Just found your channel; 57yo that just got back into D&D - Used to play when it was in a blue box! Love your content, thanks for all the great videos! SUBBED!
THANK YOU SO MUCH! This video helps me so much as a new DM trying to set up a campaign for the first time. Really appreciate it 👍
I use Session 0 to explain odd house rules, rules that won't be used, expectations from everyone, welcoming newbies into the group, character creation, then a movie and food related to the subject matter.
For instance, I got Heckna on order. When it comes in, Session 0 will probably be Killer Klowns from Outer Space along with popcorn, soda, and corn dogs. Really brings everyone together.
Dude, your videos are just so awesome. Clean, concise, and well put together. Thank you.
my favorite house rules that I'm gonna take from my dm and use in my own games are on crits. on a nat 20 attack you roll regular damage dice and add full damage, that way it feels more like a crit. on a nat 1 you roll it again and if you hit another player's ac you accidentally hit them (or if you're not near them you just drop/damage your weapon)
I went on a full ADHD Fueled panic 30' before session 0 of a new homebrew campaign and this video calmed me down a lot ahhahaha thanks :)
Had someone who was making their first character and I was throwing out ideas and we ended up going around for a little while. I stated I'd give them five minutes where I would not be able to listen or speak, and after that five minutes was up they had decided on something and are now playing it.
Sometimes removing a chef from the kitchen is just as helpful as adding one.
Dude, awesome video! Really well put together. I've recently started up a tabletop RUclips channel as well, and you present a lot of awesome ideas here.
Thank you! And good luck with your channel :)
I have 4 big rules I put in as a super package. They each feed into each other.
Players and Enemies are under all the same rules.
Crits are crunchier, so instead of rolling an extra die, I just add the maximum value of that die to the roll. Also uses less dice.
Potions restore a fixed amount of HP by type. The average of rolls rounded up.
Falling to 0 health and going unconscious causes 1 point of exhaustion.
Critical fails in combat have a 2d6 table (but I am likely going to change this to 2d4 after watching your vids). 678 have no effect. Lower than 6 causes defense drops and missteps. Greater than 8 causes weapon damage and fumbles.
I like some of the suggestions here. Like the hidden death save rolls by the DM instead of player. Players might not like the loss of agency in rolling though.
The first casualty of war is the plan or the first casualty of the DM.
We only play once a month and our campaign has been going for years we’ve even had to go online totally for awhile.
With 11 players scheduling is tough
ELEVEN? That's got to be a record! I DMed a one-shot for 10 once, but I can't imagine maintaining a campaign of that scale!
That’s why our group uses experience-based leveling (with xp for rp, not just combat), so people are incentivized to come, if they can’t make the exact time, then oh well.
My favorite house rule is: you can substitute levels of exhaustion for spare spell slots. No higher than your available spell levels, and only using spells you have.
As a house rule I've divided Dexterity into Dexterity and Agility. Dexterity covers things like picking pockets, performing surgery calligraphy, and so on. Agility is running over uneven ground, climbing, jumping over a chasm, etc.
Idk if it's homebrew technically, but my players love it when I implement D&D 4e's skill challenges.
Yeah I actually really like how they can be halfway between Combat (being a dice challenge) and roleplay (a freeform thing). I never even played 4e but have enjoyed a skill challenge my GM put in 5e.
Brilliant video. Thanks for this. Starting my campaign tomorrow.
Wonderful! You're going to have a great time! :D
Gonnah be using this method today...love your content Bob!!
Thank you very much! Hope it works well with your group :)
This is a really great video! Thank you very much, couldn't have came at a better time!
You’re welcome! And thank you for taking the time to comment :)
Glad my DM did a lot of this stuff already so I’m gonna carry it and definitely take all of these tips for next campaign great video!
I just discovered your channel! I am about to start a new original adventure, with a mix between new people and old friends this seems an awesome way to start. Thank you :)
oh my god you live with your dnd group? that sounds incredible
This is just what I needed!!!
Awesome! Happy to help :)
Brilliant, well done. Love the attitude you bring for new players.
House Rule : If you die ( Or Assumed Death) then death music plays and the dead player recieves 1 inspiration to give to another creature at anytime by "possession" or "Dying Will" or "Patron's Wrath" They can also choose to keep this point until they create a new character at the same level -1 as the character they died with when then the inspiration point vanishes.
Brutal Criticals is my favorite home rule. (Max damage on the extra dice rolled for criticals)
Couple house rules I use:
On level up, roll HP up to 3 times, no going back
Standing from prone - takes 15’ of movement, regardless of your speed, provokes opportunity attacks OR uses all your movement, no opp attacks.
I have had PCs start with a racial feat. On the fence about this one.
I’ve been trying to come up with something to make it special when a monster is at 1 HP, because for some reason it seems to happen *a lot*
Our group typically has a playtest at Session 0. Though this more of the fact the current GM for the campaign prepare a character sheet a week prior.
The playtest is there to see if the players are satisfied with their character and if there's gonna be any last minute changes they want for their character.
We use to this probe for any problematic rulings nightmares we might encounter and how we're going to deal with those in future sessions, and test gimmicks/specific game mechanic that a character may rely on.
The Session 0 can incorporated as a short introduction to the story and world, the playtest is more of way how the player characters perform under some short sampler event.