I made an interaction similar to this, but it’s a mundane book that only orcs can read, despite orcs being illiterate. The implication is that they aren’t actually incapable of reading contrary to what the lore (which is written by humans mind you) says. Their eyesight is just wildly different enough that literature is not 1:1 in the slightest. Nobody can read what orcs write nor can orcs read what anyone else writes. Also there’s a book that makes elves (and only elves) suffer a mental break due to the sheer overwhelming amount of information regarding their race specifically down to the comprising and gross violation.
Confession: I prefer it when the players break the story, it's so much more natural. Besides, reading a story to them would be a weird version of reading a bedtime story to adults.
I LOVE that my players try to find clever ways to break my game. I create obstacles and challenges, and although I don't always entirely allow their shenanigans, I LOVE that they find creative ways to outsmart my challenges, even when it's been completely game breaking and required me to rebalance entire aspects of my campaign. I love being able to just smile, look at them, and say, "give me a -blank- check" knowing full well I don't give a damn what they roll and I'm letting them have exactly what they were after. My reward? Their excitement, and me getting to play out their clever shenanigans.
Tough Question since I've only DMed once. I basically mashed together a campaign using some of my gamebooks (Specifically GRAILQUEST by J. H. Brennan) and BG3 Lore as inspiration. Since I play gamebooks more often than playing a DnD campaign (mostly because I don't know anyone who plays DnD and has the time for it.) I heavily relied on the gamebooks for references, not to say I didn't come up with my own ideas but that was mostly on the fly. (I did have my PC's run into the same character from GRAILQUEST multiple times to give then useless items that later turned out to be clever distractions or weapons [see Wind-up Mechanical Anteater]. If you know the Poetic Fiend, you know who I'm talking about!)
My players suspect but confirming here, I try to end every session on some sort of cliffhanger because it's like DM crack when they get a reveal or something happens and I go 'And that's where we will end it for the week' and they all groan or shout at me, it makes my DM heart happy I love the long term reveals, my lot recently found out a secret from the last campaign and it blew their minds a little 'it makes so much sense, why didnt we work it out? etc' when i refuse to confirm or deny something, half the time it's because I havnt decided yet or didnt know, it's not me being a mysterious DM hoarding my secrets
Confession... i dont take notes. i make it seem like i do, but i dont. i really should, ive forgotten half the shit ive given my players. i rely on them to manage their loot and inventory, and they are mostly good about it. but if no one else recorded it... its lost in the ether of my squirrel farm of a brain.
I am trying to lure the players into dire and sometimes lethal situations. But they always find a way out of it or a way to not die, sticking together(ish) and helping one another. It just compels me to try harder, in exchange for equal and fair rewards to the players.
My players think I do festivals and fairs for immersion and to explore the culture and character of a town or city. In reality it's cause I was unmotivated that week to prep, and forgot to call off the game at a reasonable time. So we are instead doing the equivalent of the substitute teacher putting a movie on for class.
Weird DM confession; I overhype my fights to make the players feel better lol. I generally don’t try to actually kill them simply because the easiest way to do that would be cheap tricks that aren’t fun for them. Fun for me though
I wrote a children's book that was a disguised hint for the party in what they were supposed to do to help out an ally (the book was written by her husband from the future; time distortions were a thing in this campaign), and when they read it as a group, multiple people genuinely cried because they thought it was so touching. They think I spent weeks putting it together. I wrote it in a single sitting in two hours at three in the morning. I barely proofread it.
I care more about narrative fairness than I do if my players were to die. So, if they were clearly out-classed and chose to fight-they'd die. In contrast, if they've prepared properly and everyone is ready to move forward, then I'd consider fudging rolls (but I haven't needed to do so).
I "procedurally create" most NPCs. Basically it's a memorized series of traits I mix and match for the random background NPCs as needed. If that particular one catches on I write them down and fill them out later
As a DM, since I expect to be surprised by my players, I simply focus my efforts on having a loose outline of the plot and giving the major npcs their own objectives they want to accomplish. Player's can't derail things too much if the NPCs themselves know what they want to do, and the players are made aware of the consequences.
the first one is so real, i actually love building random bits of a world, random scenarios that i find cool or fun, it's something that probably no one's gonna see but i love doing it for myself. Counts both as a DM and as a player, i also love building characters even if i know i'm never going to use them
Probably that I never actually keep track of bad guys hit points. I write down the damage done, but I don't track anything. I do this so that the combats fit the time that allotted for the game. I usually run games at the local game convention. So my games are almost completely on the fly. Which enables me to toss in things like Zombie My Little Ponies at the players.
My confession? I tend to find ideas from video games I previously played to create my games. Also, if something you do REALLY inspires me, I will most likely write it into my book series.
I spend way to much to time printing and painting miniatures for scenes and adventures they get so close to but always go off on a tangent quest line. While it bugs. It has created amazing plot lines and I dont really mind it since i gave them a whole world with its own lore
@@nullblasterthevoidmaker1750 it’s probably not complete to that degree. Sometimes despite having a very visual idea of it, not much of it gets written down, or the content isn’t self contained enough to stand solely on its own. It’s way more than the players ever need, yes, but not exactly up to par with published material.
I have a party member who keeps track of prices of items and such with his guide and I have no problem with that. But the look on his face and slow closing of the book was beautiful when an eccentric NPC offered to sell her used medical kit to him for twenty gold
My confession is that I tend to borrow from video games for my encounter designs. What I mean by this is that I like to homebrew encounters and monsters that have special gimmicks like a video games boss. Maybe they'll have a unique attack, a specific weakness, or just be an idea I ripped wholesale from Kingdom Hearts. I know there are some people who say that video games and D&D should NEVER mix, but the two have been cross pollinating for years by this point.
Confession.... im a newer DM running a Curse of Strahd campaign and have a few power gamers in my group. Knowing this before campaign start, i raised Strahds CR from an 18 normally to a CR30+. He is to help me keep those power players in check while the party as a whole formulates their next best course of action. As the party moves along, due to story reasons he will not be that strong when they fully fight him.
I wish I could DM for those girls, because they actually got invested im the world and their characters and just kept playing the game, but I'm a 40 year old man and they're teenagers. I don't feel comfortable doing that without parental supervision. Should have had kids of my own instead.
I have signatures I put into my dungeons, apparently some I did. I like to have occasional futuristic ruins run on crystallic fusion, and I have metroids (from the game with the same name) eat the corrosion on the crystals. They make great surprise enemies too. Also, apparently a friend noted that if I include an NPC that is basically described as “anime girl,” it is best not to mess with them. I didn’t even realize I was doing that one.
When I'm running a game, I have a world that is being simulated in my head. The players interact with that world as they do things. I increase the 'resolution' of the simulation for things that are closer to the players.
i keep my players on my toes by being extremely vague about their skill checks. even if they roll a nat 20 on perception, i say "there appears to be no hostile creatures nearby". i also have a tendency to randomly roll my d20 and make a noise like "hmmm" or "ooh" just to freak my players out.
Never being 100% affirmative about the results is 1. Key, and 2. Very fun. My players, bless their hearts, like to ask "is this person lying?" And when they roll well, I tell them "he believes what he's saying" which gives them incredible pause.
to be frank, ive been a rogue in real life too and am always checking and comparing the campaign presented with the dms notes and background material. i remember every single time a dm has single handedly "influenced" encounters or changed story developments. whenever that happens, ill eventually go haywire and start randomly breaking the plot for more variety and different outcomes.
I'm the same. I'm paying attention, and I want to believe in the world and the characters, so if the DM is going to take that away... I'll shake things up, too.
I am very much the overprepper like in the first story. I’ve built an entire planet with 7 continents and full maps. Three of the continents have been fully fleshed out with countries, capitals, demographics, sometimes histories and flags, ley lines, world wonders, and the like. I’ve been DMing for 3 years now. My players have only just started exploring the second country they’ve been in. At the end of the campaign, I tentatively plan on some mega upscale ritual taking effect that will literally tear the world apart so my players might choose to continue playing as demigods in a brand new world. I’m literally volunteering to throw away 90% of what I’ve worldbuilt just for fun out the window …. For fun.
My confession is, that I seriously think I'm not good enough and that my players deserve a better DM. I love my players and their characters to death, I love being a DM and writing an adventure for my players and myself. An hour doesn't pass, where I don't think about D&D. Me and my players are great friends and they never stop talking about the adventures, funny/cool/dramatic moments we've been through and that they actually stopped playing with other DMs, because "this campaign was just more fun". Yet, it doesn't help very much, knowing this. I always feel like I can and should do better, but I'm just not competent enough. Them leaving other groups in favour of this one brings with it the feeling of responsibility and also guilt, that I have ruined someone else's table. I never wanted them to leave other games in favour of ours. I just wanted to be a good DM and a good friend. But this is a clear sign, that I do more harm than good.
I added an assassin with mage slayer feat to a already tough fight because you're wizard was too powerful for me to comfortably encounter build for the rest of the party
My confession: I chafe when I'm a player in any TTRPG (which is why I DM many of the games I'm in), and I am dissapointed by (and perhaps hate) D&D and basically all other TTRPGs. I love creating lore, worldbuilding, interacting with players & NPCs, and seeing consequences unfold, but goddamnitall if I don't laser focus on every actual & arguable flaw in every single thing that I touch and hyperfocus on said flaws constantly. Even when I'm not making mention of such or making changes, the issues I perceive claw at my brain and drive me to constantly workshop my homebrew in a ceaseless need to try & make things better for everyone at the table - whether or not any agrees with my definition of "better".
I made too many plotlines and definitely had to drop them so I also gave up on planning and ever since then I fly by the seat of my pants. Instead of doing one really long overarching story in the Transformers TTRPG, I have them going through multiple shorter stories. The villain of the next one a character called Nova Prime. He's one of the primes who came before Optimus, he founded the original Cybertronian empire, and he disappeared after his conquests were over. The players are going to explore a place called the Underbase, which is where Nova kept his most powerful weapons and all of the treasures and information that his empire gathered as a fallback base in case he ever lost control of the empire. Only he ended up getting trapped in there, and when the players reached the bottom of the Underbase, they will have to do battle with him, and he is one of the most powerful Transformers that ever lived. Only the players have gotten really, really invested in Starscream, who was originally going to double cross the players and sell out Cybertron later on in in another chapter. But because I had too many plot lines and needed to cut some down, Starscream is actually going to be the villain of the Underbase chapter, sneakily following behind the party as they clear the place and then claiming the power source for himself. There was another chapter which would feature the character Liege Maximo, one of the 13 original Primes who is basically the Loki of Transformers. Only that's an arc that I don't feel like doing all that much anymore so that's also getting cut which is great because I since it's later on I haven't started building it up. I always like to set up plot threads that the party will eventually discover, Nova Prime being one of them, but I haven't figured out how to start doing that with Maximo so this will be an easy cut to make.
Most of these confessions are fine to me. Even low prep work, or even none, can be fine as long as you do things properly. Most of these confessions are this type of things, where it's not important as long as things work out. However, I do completely disagree with the "PCs have plot armor". I firmly believe that it takes away an important part of the game. It's not that I want DMs to be murder-hobo-y and try to TPK each session, I think they should (generally) try to avoid PC deaths. However, death is part of the game in DnD. There may be other TTRPGs where it isn't, but in DnD, with the focus being on combat, the chance to die should generally be a possibility. It doesn't matter if I did a stupid thing or a clever one that didn't work out, if the rolls say I fall, I should fall. Now, at that point is where DMs have many more ways to avoid PC death than some realise. When a player falls unconscious, the enemies should generally ignore it and go against the other heroes. Why bother hitting a downed enemy when there are still another five enemies killing your friends? If you want, intelligent enemies can see how valuable a hostage is, stabilize the downed player and use it to stop the fight, like "if you want your friend to live, you will surrender". Even before getting the player unconscious you can make the enemies try not to kill it for whatever reason, wasting a couple turns dealing zero damage trying to grapple and capture the PC. Heck, resurrection spells are a thing, even if the PC dies it's not the end if you allow them to use those. My point is that there are many ways to avoid PC death. You shouldn't need to give them plot armor. I feel like, in this case, "plot armor" is just there because the DM doesn't realise that there are many, many ways to tackle the problem while still keeping the chance of death. And I know that some people don't like it because they feel that this should be the PC's story, and if they die it doesn't make much sense... but I disagree. Just look at Tolkien's books. The typical example is Boromir, dying halfway through the story, and Gollum joining in later on, but look at the broader picture. Who started the story of the ring? Bilbo. He found it on The Hobbit, while traveling with a bunch of dwarves. But he's not there at the end of the story. Only Gandalf sees the whole story. None of the dwarves from The Hobbit take part in Lord of the Rings, while none of the heroes in Lord of the Rings come from The Hobbit. Even if none of the "original heroes" are at the end of the campaign, it just means they passed the mantle to these "new heroes".
A DM I played under led me astray with character creation and blamed me for making a unrealistic character. After I told them I made the character to how they said to make it then they threatened me with rape. I've learned to scrutinize every DM now and background check them before playing in their game.
My players are very undemanding...they really only care about combat and loot, so that's pretty much all I give them. But I sometimes feel guilty for not doing deeper, more ambitious campaigns.
Confession, i hate that 3 of my players activly refuse to engage in my game beyond the minimum ammount needed. Any time i write something i need answeres to there is about a 30% chance that any of them will respond. Its a real shame cause one of them is one of my best friends oog… and he has started to ignore mecthere aswell. I really dont know what ive done
I've read a lot more fables, folk tales, and fairy tales than fantasy, and my games reflect that. I enjoy fantasy, but rarely ones with bog standard fantasy worlds (unless they're like that for a good reason), so besides the characters and some plot ideas there's not much for me to draw from. I fudge a lot, but only during campaigns and find it quite freeing to run oneshots where the players might very well TPK without it ruining the story. Otherwise I try my best to keep the pcs alive - though only insofar it actually makes sense. Go fight a dragon at level one and you'll die (or you'll need to come up with a _very_ good plan). I prep a lot, but only at the beginning of a campaign and at certain points in the middle. For the rest of the time I coast on the ideas and tools I've prepared beforehand, with only minor additions I usually make up on the fly.
Maybe some of you can help me find what I'm looking for I don't remember how long ago the video was put out but it was a long the lines of dm what's one thing a player did without telling you and a guy is moving but for his last night at the table he showed hß group that him and his wife are pregnant and thats why is the game he wouldn't be around but in real life they had to move but the wife was actually pregnant, I want to show it to my wife and see if she'd be down for that
![Lil Uzi Vert - Chill Bae [Official Music Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/D7F42F_JM3U/mqdefault.jpg)
Confession...... that minotaur didn't attack you randomly, Alex. I needed you to be in the back to give other people a moment to shine.
Excellent!
I have made up titles of… explicit books so that when my party reads them an npc can catch them, look at them weird and leave them to their reading.
I made an interaction similar to this, but it’s a mundane book that only orcs can read, despite orcs being illiterate.
The implication is that they aren’t actually incapable of reading contrary to what the lore (which is written by humans mind you) says. Their eyesight is just wildly different enough that literature is not 1:1 in the slightest. Nobody can read what orcs write nor can orcs read what anyone else writes.
Also there’s a book that makes elves (and only elves) suffer a mental break due to the sheer overwhelming amount of information regarding their race specifically down to the comprising and gross violation.
Confession: I prefer it when the players break the story, it's so much more natural. Besides, reading a story to them would be a weird version of reading a bedtime story to adults.
The goblins did steal the treasure because reading my notes nearly gave me an aneurysm when I doublechecked what I said was in there.
That the crocodile god did target you and magically amputate your arm because you were a murderous hobo of epic proportions
If I am not as prepared as I want to be or if I'm feeling lazy, I just plan a large combat encounter that'll take up pretty much the whole session
Real
I LOVE that my players try to find clever ways to break my game. I create obstacles and challenges, and although I don't always entirely allow their shenanigans, I LOVE that they find creative ways to outsmart my challenges, even when it's been completely game breaking and required me to rebalance entire aspects of my campaign. I love being able to just smile, look at them, and say, "give me a -blank- check" knowing full well I don't give a damn what they roll and I'm letting them have exactly what they were after. My reward? Their excitement, and me getting to play out their clever shenanigans.
Tough Question since I've only DMed once. I basically mashed together a campaign using some of my gamebooks (Specifically GRAILQUEST by J. H. Brennan) and BG3 Lore as inspiration. Since I play gamebooks more often than playing a DnD campaign (mostly because I don't know anyone who plays DnD and has the time for it.) I heavily relied on the gamebooks for references, not to say I didn't come up with my own ideas but that was mostly on the fly. (I did have my PC's run into the same character from GRAILQUEST multiple times to give then useless items that later turned out to be clever distractions or weapons [see Wind-up Mechanical Anteater]. If you know the Poetic Fiend, you know who I'm talking about!)
Duuuuuum da dum dum!
@@badnewsBH I actually did that whenever they said the BBEG's name. Even when they said it by accident! It was fun!
My players suspect but confirming here, I try to end every session on some sort of cliffhanger because it's like DM crack when they get a reveal or something happens and I go 'And that's where we will end it for the week' and they all groan or shout at me, it makes my DM heart happy
I love the long term reveals, my lot recently found out a secret from the last campaign and it blew their minds a little 'it makes so much sense, why didnt we work it out? etc'
when i refuse to confirm or deny something, half the time it's because I havnt decided yet or didnt know, it's not me being a mysterious DM hoarding my secrets
Dude, one of my old groups had a DM that ended games on a cliffhanger constantly. It drove us crazy in the best way possible!
Confession... i dont take notes. i make it seem like i do, but i dont. i really should, ive forgotten half the shit ive given my players. i rely on them to manage their loot and inventory, and they are mostly good about it. but if no one else recorded it... its lost in the ether of my squirrel farm of a brain.
I am trying to lure the players into dire and sometimes lethal situations. But they always find a way out of it or a way to not die, sticking together(ish) and helping one another. It just compels me to try harder, in exchange for equal and fair rewards to the players.
My players think I do festivals and fairs for immersion and to explore the culture and character of a town or city. In reality it's cause I was unmotivated that week to prep, and forgot to call off the game at a reasonable time. So we are instead doing the equivalent of the substitute teacher putting a movie on for class.
Weird DM confession; I overhype my fights to make the players feel better lol. I generally don’t try to actually kill them simply because the easiest way to do that would be cheap tricks that aren’t fun for them.
Fun for me though
I've only experienced bad dnd up to now, I got fed up and will dm for my sister and her friends soon. Wish me luck.
that sucks, good luck finding or making a better game experience :)
Good luck.
I wrote a children's book that was a disguised hint for the party in what they were supposed to do to help out an ally (the book was written by her husband from the future; time distortions were a thing in this campaign), and when they read it as a group, multiple people genuinely cried because they thought it was so touching. They think I spent weeks putting it together.
I wrote it in a single sitting in two hours at three in the morning. I barely proofread it.
I care more about narrative fairness than I do if my players were to die. So, if they were clearly out-classed and chose to fight-they'd die. In contrast, if they've prepared properly and everyone is ready to move forward, then I'd consider fudging rolls (but I haven't needed to do so).
PANR has tuned in.
I'm fighting Apple!
I "procedurally create" most NPCs. Basically it's a memorized series of traits I mix and match for the random background NPCs as needed.
If that particular one catches on I write them down and fill them out later
As a DM, since I expect to be surprised by my players, I simply focus my efforts on having a loose outline of the plot and giving the major npcs their own objectives they want to accomplish. Player's can't derail things too much if the NPCs themselves know what they want to do, and the players are made aware of the consequences.
I love you, DMs.
the first one is so real, i actually love building random bits of a world, random scenarios that i find cool or fun, it's something that probably no one's gonna see but i love doing it for myself. Counts both as a DM and as a player, i also love building characters even if i know i'm never going to use them
Probably that I never actually keep track of bad guys hit points. I write down the damage done, but I don't track anything. I do this so that the combats fit the time that allotted for the game. I usually run games at the local game convention. So my games are almost completely on the fly. Which enables me to toss in things like Zombie My Little Ponies at the players.
My confession? I tend to find ideas from video games I previously played to create my games. Also, if something you do REALLY inspires me, I will most likely write it into my book series.
Great job as always, Brian!
I spend way to much to time printing and painting miniatures for scenes and adventures they get so close to but always go off on a tangent quest line. While it bugs. It has created amazing plot lines and I dont really mind it since i gave them a whole world with its own lore
Dude. If you've built up a world that much, publish the setting. Even if YOUR players never see all of it, other players will probably love it.
@@nullblasterthevoidmaker1750 it’s probably not complete to that degree. Sometimes despite having a very visual idea of it, not much of it gets written down, or the content isn’t self contained enough to stand solely on its own. It’s way more than the players ever need, yes, but not exactly up to par with published material.
Confession..... I'm gay
I have a party member who keeps track of prices of items and such with his guide and I have no problem with that. But the look on his face and slow closing of the book was beautiful when an eccentric NPC offered to sell her used medical kit to him for twenty gold
i feel that DM being his party biggest fan. that 100% what i think i be like if i tryed DMing
My confession is that I tend to borrow from video games for my encounter designs. What I mean by this is that I like to homebrew encounters and monsters that have special gimmicks like a video games boss. Maybe they'll have a unique attack, a specific weakness, or just be an idea I ripped wholesale from Kingdom Hearts.
I know there are some people who say that video games and D&D should NEVER mix, but the two have been cross pollinating for years by this point.
Confession.... im a newer DM running a Curse of Strahd campaign and have a few power gamers in my group. Knowing this before campaign start, i raised Strahds CR from an 18 normally to a CR30+. He is to help me keep those power players in check while the party as a whole formulates their next best course of action. As the party moves along, due to story reasons he will not be that strong when they fully fight him.
I wish I could DM for those girls, because they actually got invested im the world and their characters and just kept playing the game, but I'm a 40 year old man and they're teenagers.
I don't feel comfortable doing that without parental supervision.
Should have had kids of my own instead.
I have signatures I put into my dungeons, apparently some I did. I like to have occasional futuristic ruins run on crystallic fusion, and I have metroids (from the game with the same name) eat the corrosion on the crystals. They make great surprise enemies too.
Also, apparently a friend noted that if I include an NPC that is basically described as “anime girl,” it is best not to mess with them. I didn’t even realize I was doing that one.
Every campaign I run takes place in the same universe, just on alternate, sometimes criscrossing or overlapping timelines.
When I'm running a game, I have a world that is being simulated in my head. The players interact with that world as they do things. I increase the 'resolution' of the simulation for things that are closer to the players.
i keep my players on my toes by being extremely vague about their skill checks. even if they roll a nat 20 on perception, i say "there appears to be no hostile creatures nearby". i also have a tendency to randomly roll my d20 and make a noise like "hmmm" or "ooh" just to freak my players out.
Literally just DMing 101.
Never being 100% affirmative about the results is 1. Key, and 2. Very fun.
My players, bless their hearts, like to ask "is this person lying?" And when they roll well, I tell them "he believes what he's saying" which gives them incredible pause.
I practice NPC personalities when no one is looking. Practicing the acting for NPCs that may never be interacted with or just interacted with once.
to be frank, ive been a rogue in real life too and am always checking and comparing the campaign presented with the dms notes and background material. i remember every single time a dm has single handedly "influenced" encounters or changed story developments.
whenever that happens, ill eventually go haywire and start randomly breaking the plot for more variety and different outcomes.
I'm the same. I'm paying attention, and I want to believe in the world and the characters, so if the DM is going to take that away... I'll shake things up, too.
I am very much the overprepper like in the first story.
I’ve built an entire planet with 7 continents and full maps. Three of the continents have been fully fleshed out with countries, capitals, demographics, sometimes histories and flags, ley lines, world wonders, and the like.
I’ve been DMing for 3 years now. My players have only just started exploring the second country they’ve been in.
At the end of the campaign, I tentatively plan on some mega upscale ritual taking effect that will literally tear the world apart so my players might choose to continue playing as demigods in a brand new world. I’m literally volunteering to throw away 90% of what I’ve worldbuilt just for fun out the window …. For fun.
My confession is, that I seriously think I'm not good enough and that my players deserve a better DM.
I love my players and their characters to death, I love being a DM and writing an adventure for my players and myself. An hour doesn't pass, where I don't think about D&D.
Me and my players are great friends and they never stop talking about the adventures, funny/cool/dramatic moments we've been through and that they actually stopped playing with other DMs, because "this campaign was just more fun".
Yet, it doesn't help very much, knowing this. I always feel like I can and should do better, but I'm just not competent enough. Them leaving other groups in favour of this one brings with it the feeling of responsibility and also guilt, that I have ruined someone else's table.
I never wanted them to leave other games in favour of ours. I just wanted to be a good DM and a good friend. But this is a clear sign, that I do more harm than good.
Granted, I've only ever run one-shots... I've never written notes.
I added an assassin with mage slayer feat to a already tough fight because you're wizard was too powerful for me to comfortably encounter build for the rest of the party
My confession: I chafe when I'm a player in any TTRPG (which is why I DM many of the games I'm in), and I am dissapointed by (and perhaps hate) D&D and basically all other TTRPGs.
I love creating lore, worldbuilding, interacting with players & NPCs, and seeing consequences unfold, but goddamnitall if I don't laser focus on every actual & arguable flaw in every single thing that I touch and hyperfocus on said flaws constantly. Even when I'm not making mention of such or making changes, the issues I perceive claw at my brain and drive me to constantly workshop my homebrew in a ceaseless need to try & make things better for everyone at the table - whether or not any agrees with my definition of "better".
Every pc ever played by me or at my table exists on the same planet at the same time. Mwahahaha!
Not a DM but I've a weird confession
I love dnd, I absolutly HATE making characters though. I honestly don't know why
I made too many plotlines and definitely had to drop them so I also gave up on planning and ever since then I fly by the seat of my pants.
Instead of doing one really long overarching story in the Transformers TTRPG, I have them going through multiple shorter stories. The villain of the next one a character called Nova Prime. He's one of the primes who came before Optimus, he founded the original Cybertronian empire, and he disappeared after his conquests were over. The players are going to explore a place called the Underbase, which is where Nova kept his most powerful weapons and all of the treasures and information that his empire gathered as a fallback base in case he ever lost control of the empire. Only he ended up getting trapped in there, and when the players reached the bottom of the Underbase, they will have to do battle with him, and he is one of the most powerful Transformers that ever lived. Only the players have gotten really, really invested in Starscream, who was originally going to double cross the players and sell out Cybertron later on in in another chapter. But because I had too many plot lines and needed to cut some down, Starscream is actually going to be the villain of the Underbase chapter, sneakily following behind the party as they clear the place and then claiming the power source for himself.
There was another chapter which would feature the character Liege Maximo, one of the 13 original Primes who is basically the Loki of Transformers. Only that's an arc that I don't feel like doing all that much anymore so that's also getting cut which is great because I since it's later on I haven't started building it up. I always like to set up plot threads that the party will eventually discover, Nova Prime being one of them, but I haven't figured out how to start doing that with Maximo so this will be an easy cut to make.
Never been this early, I can finally die happy now
Most of these confessions are fine to me. Even low prep work, or even none, can be fine as long as you do things properly. Most of these confessions are this type of things, where it's not important as long as things work out.
However, I do completely disagree with the "PCs have plot armor". I firmly believe that it takes away an important part of the game. It's not that I want DMs to be murder-hobo-y and try to TPK each session, I think they should (generally) try to avoid PC deaths. However, death is part of the game in DnD. There may be other TTRPGs where it isn't, but in DnD, with the focus being on combat, the chance to die should generally be a possibility. It doesn't matter if I did a stupid thing or a clever one that didn't work out, if the rolls say I fall, I should fall.
Now, at that point is where DMs have many more ways to avoid PC death than some realise. When a player falls unconscious, the enemies should generally ignore it and go against the other heroes. Why bother hitting a downed enemy when there are still another five enemies killing your friends? If you want, intelligent enemies can see how valuable a hostage is, stabilize the downed player and use it to stop the fight, like "if you want your friend to live, you will surrender". Even before getting the player unconscious you can make the enemies try not to kill it for whatever reason, wasting a couple turns dealing zero damage trying to grapple and capture the PC. Heck, resurrection spells are a thing, even if the PC dies it's not the end if you allow them to use those.
My point is that there are many ways to avoid PC death. You shouldn't need to give them plot armor. I feel like, in this case, "plot armor" is just there because the DM doesn't realise that there are many, many ways to tackle the problem while still keeping the chance of death.
And I know that some people don't like it because they feel that this should be the PC's story, and if they die it doesn't make much sense... but I disagree. Just look at Tolkien's books. The typical example is Boromir, dying halfway through the story, and Gollum joining in later on, but look at the broader picture. Who started the story of the ring? Bilbo. He found it on The Hobbit, while traveling with a bunch of dwarves. But he's not there at the end of the story. Only Gandalf sees the whole story. None of the dwarves from The Hobbit take part in Lord of the Rings, while none of the heroes in Lord of the Rings come from The Hobbit.
Even if none of the "original heroes" are at the end of the campaign, it just means they passed the mantle to these "new heroes".
A DM I played under led me astray with character creation and blamed me for making a unrealistic character. After I told them I made the character to how they said to make it then they threatened me with rape. I've learned to scrutinize every DM now and background check them before playing in their game.
My players are very undemanding...they really only care about combat and loot, so that's pretty much all I give them. But I sometimes feel guilty for not doing deeper, more ambitious campaigns.
Confession. I had a couple in my party when I was DM'ing. Slept with her, he never knew.
Confession, i hate that 3 of my players activly refuse to engage in my game beyond the minimum ammount needed.
Any time i write something i need answeres to there is about a 30% chance that any of them will respond.
Its a real shame cause one of them is one of my best friends oog… and he has started to ignore mecthere aswell.
I really dont know what ive done
I've read a lot more fables, folk tales, and fairy tales than fantasy, and my games reflect that. I enjoy fantasy, but rarely ones with bog standard fantasy worlds (unless they're like that for a good reason), so besides the characters and some plot ideas there's not much for me to draw from.
I fudge a lot, but only during campaigns and find it quite freeing to run oneshots where the players might very well TPK without it ruining the story. Otherwise I try my best to keep the pcs alive - though only insofar it actually makes sense. Go fight a dragon at level one and you'll die (or you'll need to come up with a _very_ good plan).
I prep a lot, but only at the beginning of a campaign and at certain points in the middle. For the rest of the time I coast on the ideas and tools I've prepared beforehand, with only minor additions I usually make up on the fly.
I WANTED TO HEAR A SEX CHEATING CONFESSION!!!
Maybe some of you can help me find what I'm looking for I don't remember how long ago the video was put out but it was a long the lines of dm what's one thing a player did without telling you and a guy is moving but for his last night at the table he showed hß group that him and his wife are pregnant and thats why is the game he wouldn't be around but in real life they had to move but the wife was actually pregnant, I want to show it to my wife and see if she'd be down for that
Obligatory comment
I love using shit from the Rustage DnD's. Sue me.
Shoutout to all the DMs out there 🫡
~_~